Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Utah State University From the SelectedWorks of James Long 1997 Coarse woody debris as a function of age , stand structure , and disturbance in boreal Newfoundland

We examined the structural attributes of coarse woody debris (CWD) in balsam fir and mixed balsam fir-black spruce forests in western and central Newfoundland. The purpose of the study was to document CWD abundance and structure within various stages of stand development, and to generate simple models to predict CWD availability as habitat for forest wildlife. Our objectives were threefold: (1) determine the temporal patterns of CWD following clear-cut disturbance, and compare these second-growth stands to old sites (.80 yr) of natural origin; (2) relate the temporal patterns of CWD to stand development; and (3) demonstrate how factors such as site conditions and disturbance may influence these temporal patterns. Our chronosequence included 19 second-growth stands with a mean tree age ranging from 33 to 80 yr, and 7 old-growth stands ranging from 87 to 110 yr. The volume of coarse woody debris (CWD), here defined as downed wood, was relatively low to intermediate early in the chronosequence (e.g., 32.3 m3/ha in a 36-yr-old stand), lowest in a 58-yr-old stand (15.2 m3/ha), and highest in an 80-yr-old stand (78.1 m3/ha). Results indicated that CWD volume followed the general ‘‘U-shaped’’ temporal trend observed in other forest systems. The presence of CWD early in the sequence was strongly influenced by residual hardwoods (i.e., birch) left by the original logging operation. The highest observed volume of CWD corresponded with stand senescence and appeared to be maintained within oldgrowth stands. Snag (standing dead wood) density was low within the youngest stands (,200 snags/ha), and peaked within mature second growth. Defoliation disturbance increased both the volume and the structural diversity of CWD within silviculturally mature second-growth stands. Results from our study indicate that CWD in stands . 50–60 yr of age is not residual but generated primarily from regenerating tree structure. Factors affecting the rate of stem growth, e.g., site quality and initial stocking levels, should influence the accumulation and overall abundance of CWD within later stages of forest development. We therefore applied yield-density relationships as a method of examining stand-level dynamics of CWD.
HOST WITH EVALUATION AND RISK RATING IN THE EMERGEN CY : CHARACTERIZATION OF ATTENDANCES

Study aimed to characterize the attendances at the Emergency Room of Pelotas-Rio Grande do Sul, according to the protocol host with evaluation and risk classification, which makes use of colors to identify the severity of the case and the order of visits. This is a study with quantitative approach, cross-sectional and descriptive. There were evaluated 5,629 medical records and their classification protocols. There were predominant attendances to young adults (36 to 65 years old) of both sexes, and the majority (84.4%) residents of the municipality itself. The period of greatest demand for attendance was between 10 and 15 o’clock. Regarding the classification by colors, 1% of consultations received red (emergency), 15% yellow (urgent), 40% green (needs attention, but without risk of life), 5% blue (mild cases) and 39% the attendances were not classified according to risk. Adjustments to the data that comprised the protocol may be needed to accommodate recurring demands of service and maximize the use of it to direct the flow of care.
Municipal Awareness as an Integral Part for Enhancing Citizen Satisfaction of Malaysian Municipal Councils, Batu Pahat

This research study critically analysed the existing literature on municipal awareness relevancy of municipal councils’ service delivery for the purpose of enhancing citizen satisfaction. The purpose of the study is the investigation of citizen satisfaction level of municipal services through the use of municipal awareness. The Material and methods were carried out using secondary data and were meticulously and critically analysed to come up with reliable results. The study shows the relevance of the public awareness, citizen satisfaction and municipal council performance in Malaysia. It is evidence in the research that citizen consent is important before municipal services should be provided in the local community. The research study highlighted many discrepancies in many kinds of literature related to the existing research study, evidence-based analysis were carried out to buttress importance and significance of the related study to the research work. The literature was reviewed to ascertain the current happening in the area of municipal council service delivery. The study shows that many municipal councils in Malaysia provide adequate and satisfactory services to their citizens’. The results of the study also revealed that municipal awareness plays an important role on citizen satisfactions of municipal service delivery. It is also evident that adequate provision of services has direct bearing with municipal councils. The study concludes that municipal service delivery can be enhanced through citizen awareness campaign, to sensitise the local community on various aspects of service delivery including maintenance of the facilities provided. The study also concludes that local Authorities lack of awareness section affects their performance in service delivery process. The study recommends that municipal councils need to consults the citizen for their needs and wants; awareness campaign needs to be regularly carried out to maintain cordial relationship between local Authorities and their citizen; it is also recommended that municipal services should be delivered the needed services by the local inhabitants’ after duly consultation.
Foreign aid and growth

Burnside and Dollar (2000) (BD) ignite a policy debate by claiming that foreign aid works only in good policy environments. This result, however, has been criticized by a number of studies on numerous statistical grounds concluding that the BD result is too fragile. I revisit the aid-growth relationship using Bayesian Model Averaging techniques to account for uncertainty issues regarding model specification. I find that the data evidence does not support the claim that aid works only in good policy environments. My analysis also suggests that aid flows are not very effective in boosting growth regardless of the quality of the policy environment.
Lack of association between the HLA-Cw 6 surrogate SNP rs 4406273 and psoriasis

Objective. Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin disease associated with increased cardiovascular morbidity. Although the exact pathogenesis of psoriasis is still not clear, inflammation, vasodilatation, acanthosis and parakeratosis are known to be the major events involved in the pathogenesis. Several studies have demonstrated that HLACw6 allele at PSORS1 confers susceptibility to early-onset psoriasis. The purpose of the present study was to measure cardio metabolic variables and HLA-Cw6 allele (rs4406273) frequencies and their association in psoriasis cases and controls originating from Chhattisgarh region of India. Methods. 34 psoriatic and 30 non-psoriatic subjects were subjected to detailed clinical evaluation followed by biochemical investigations such as fasting blood glucose, lipid profile, hsCRP and lipoprotein(a). The rs4406273 single nucleotide polymorphism was genotyped in 22 psoriasis and 21 controls using PCR and sequencing protocol. Results. Systolic blood pressure, FBS, serum cholesterol, serum triglyceride, serum VLDL, lipoprotein(a), levels were significantly higher in psoriasis patients compared to control group. No association between HLA-Cw6 positive allele and psoriasis was noticed. Conclusions. In conclusion, the HLA-Cw6 allele does not have a key role in conferring the risk in psoriasis patients from central India. As the study population is too small to draw any conclusion, a parallel investigation with larger samples is needed to further clarify the role of the HLA-Cw6 allele in causing psoriasis.
Liquidity Changes Following Stock Splits

THERE HAS BEEN CONSIDERABLE empirical research on the return behavior of common stocks in calendar intervals surrounding stock splits. A partial list includes work by Barker [2]; Johnson [25]; Hausman, West and Largay [21]; Fama, Fisher, Jensen, and Roll [16]; and Bar-Yosef and Brown [1]. However, little or no evidence has been collected about stockholder trading behavior in split-up securities. This is surprising because it is often alleged that stocks split because they provide "better" markets for trading. This study presents evidence about the liquidity effects of stock splits. There are numerous rationales for stock splits, and many are related to the liquidity of trading. For example, one often hears on Wall Street that there is an "optimal" price range for securities. Stocks which trade in this range are presumed to have lower brokerage fees as a percent of value traded and therefore appear to be more liquid. This "optimal" range is considered to be a compromise between the desires of wealthy investors and institutions who will minimize brokerage costs if securities are high-priced, and the desires of small investors who will minimize odd-lot brokerage costs if securities are low-priced. Implicitly, there is a trade-off between diversification benefits and the lower transactions costs of round-lot trading. ' One difficulty with the argument is that small investors can economize on odd-lots by forming investment clubs or by buying no-load mutual funds. A second difficulty is that odd-lot trades are simply not a significant fraction of trading activity. Finally, if the price of a security becomes "too high," the market obliges by making ten shares a round lot. Another explanation for splits, also heard on Wall Street, is that they create "wider" markets. Following a split, the number of shareholders may increase simply because an individual, who holds one round lot and who is likely to sell it to one buyer before a two-for-one split, may sell two round lots to two people after the split.2 If the number of shareholders increases after the split, then trading volume increases. Demsetz [11] shows that higher volume results in lower
Food Security and Fossil Energy Dependence: An International Comparison of the Use of Fossil Energy in Agriculture (1991-2003)

The serious food crisis in 2007 has reinstated the issue of food security. In particular, it evokes an old set of questions associated with the sustainability of an adequate food supply: are we facing a systemic shortage of arable land for food production? How serious is the oil dependence of food security in relation to peak oil (the point in time when the maximum rate of global oil extraction is reached)? To answer these questions one has to study the role of technical inputs in agricultural production, especially those inputs generated from fossil energy (how much fossil energy is used? for which inputs? in relation to which tasks? ). This paper provides a synchronic comparison—e.g., comparing the use of technical inputs in 21 countries belonging to different typologies, at a given point in time—and a diachronic comparison, e.g., comparing the use of technical inputs in the same sample of 21 countries, over a time window of 12 years (1991–2003). The results confirm the conclusions of previous studies and include the following: (i) current pattern of inputs use reflects the existence of different typologies of constraints in different typologies of countries. Wealthier countries must have a very high productivity of labor, whereas poor and crowded countries must have a very high productivity of land. Different technical inputs are used for different purposes: irrigation and fertilizers are used to boost yield per hectare; machinery and infrastructures to boost the productivity of labor; and (ii) when looking at the changes over the period of 12 years we see a constant and worrisome trend. The pattern of energy use in agriculture associated with the paradigm of industrial agriculture (High External Input Agriculture) has been simply amplified, by doing more of the same, with only minor adjustments in special countries. For those looking for a major transition toward a different pattern of production more focused on rural development, ecological compatibility and quality food, this is a reason for concern.
Comparing small mammal faunas based on barn owl ( Tyto alba ) pellets collected in two different lowland landscapes

The composition of small mammal assemblages was analysed in two lowland landscapes (Drava floodplain, Győr basin) and was evaluated on three different spatial scales (meso-, microregions and local scale), based on barn owl pellets collected between 2006 and 2009. Altogether 273 pellet samples were collected from 41 settlements of the two regions during the four years of monitoring. The analysed 6978 pellets contained 17214 small mammal individuals. The distribution of the relative abundance of small mammal taxa was evaluated as well as the correlation of frequency order on a mesoand microregional scale in the comparison of the two lowland areas. The food niche parameters of barn owl were calculated on a local scale, regarding the breeding pairs. We investigated three null hypotheses: the distribution of species frequency values is homogeneous between two landscape areas (H01); there are no significant differences in the rank of frequencies (H02) in mesoand microregional scale; and niche parameters of the barn owl do not show difference between two landscapes (H03). The first null hypothesis had to be rejected in several cases of small mammal taxa. The rank correlation of species frequency and the homogeneity test of total species pool of two investigated landscapes showed that the composition of small mammal fauna of the compared landscapes is basically the same, but the distribution of abundance was different between landscapes on both mesoand microregional scales. The statistical analysis of the niche parameters showed that the barn owl’s niche breadth did not differ between the Drava floodplain and the Győr basin. However, the niche overlap within each of the two mesoregions was higher than between them, and thus we rejected the third null hypothesis. This provides a further evidence that besides the species-specific hunting strategy, the regional differences of the quantitative relations of small mammals is also reflected in the dietary composition of the barn owl.
CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AND BANK PERFORMANCE IN TRANSITION COUNTRIES

This paper studies the relationship between corporate social responsibility and bank performance for 16 transition countries of the former Soviet Union and Central and Eastern Europe. The aim is to investigate (1) the nature of the link between corporate social responsibility and bank performance and the motive of banks to engage in corporate social responsibility (2) whether this is different during stable (2002-2005) and turbulent (2008-2012) periods. The results of the structural equation model using the data for 254 banks show that corporate social responsibility positively impacts on bank performance in both periods and implies that the strategic choice is the main motive of the banks to engage in corporate social responsibility for the countries investigated in the paper.
Second Time Lucky? Withdrawn Ipos that Return to the Market

We investigate issuers withdrawing an IPO (after security regulation filings) that return later for a successful offering. Venture capital backing and reputation of the lead underwriter are key factors in predicting successful return. The possibility of returning has a significant impact on the decision to withdraw and the pricing of offerings that succeed. Our sample of returning IPOs also provides a unique setting to investigate underwriter switching after a withdrawal but before a successful IPO. We find that switching occurs in response to poor bank performance and when switching firms "graduate" to banks that have high industry market shares.
Antibacterial Activity of Verbascum antinori

Amac: Bu calismada, Verbascum antinori Boiss. et Heldr. (Scrophulariaceae) bitkisinden elde edilen metanol ekstraktinin antibakteriyal aktivitesi arastirilmistir. Gerec ve Yontem: Ekstraktin antibakteriyal aktivitesi, Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 6538P, Proteus vulgaris ATCC 8427, Klebsiella pneumoniae UC57, Micrococcus luteus CCM 169, Escherichia coli ATCC 11230, Listeria monocytogenes ATCC 15313, Bacillus cereus ATCC 7064 ve Pseudomonas aeruginosa ATCC 27853 bakterilerine karsi disk difuzyon metodu kullanilarak belirlenmistir. Bulgular: Elde edilen ekstraktin, calismada kullanilan Gram-pozitif bakterilere karsi oldukca etkin oldugu, ancak Gram-negatif bakterilere karsi ise etkisiz oldugu saptanmistir. Sonuc: V. antinori bitkisinden elde edilen ekstraktin antibakteriyal ajan olarak kullanilabilirligi saptanmis ve ilerki calismalarda bu bitkinin antibakteriyal bilesiklerinin belirlenmesine yonelik calismalarin gerekliligi ongorulmustur.
Last Ice Age Millennial Scale Climate Changes Recorded in Huon Peninsula Corals

Uranium series and radiocarbon ages were measured in corals from the uplifted coral terraces of Huon Peninsula (HP), Papua New Guinea, to provide a calibration for the 14C time scale beyond 30 ka (kilo annum). Improved analytical procedures, and quantitative criteria for sample selection, helped discriminate diagenetically altered samples. The base-line of the calibration curve follows the trend of increasing divergence from calendar ages, as established by previous studies. Superimposed on this trend, four well-defined peaks of excess atmospheric radiocarbon were found ranging in magnitude from 100% to 700%, relative to current levels. They are related to episodes of sea-level rise and reef growth at HP. These peaks appear to be synchronous with Heinrich Events and concentrations of ice-rafted debris found in North Atlantic deep-sea cores. Relative timing of sea-level rise and atmospheric 14C excess imply the following sequence of events: An initial sea-level high is followed by a large increase in atmospheric 14C as the sea-level subsides. Over about 1800 years, the atmospheric radiocarbon drops to below present ambient levels. This cycle bears a close resemblance to ice-calving episodes of Dansgaard-Oeschger and Bond cycles and the slow-down or complete interruption of the North Atlantic thermohaline circulation. The increases in the atmospheric 14C levels are attributed to the cessation of the North Atlantic circulation.
Performance of Groundnut as Influenced by Organic and Inorganic Sources of Nutrients and their Method of Application

A field experiment to study the effect of sources of nutrients viz. organic and inorganic and their method of application on groundnut was carried out at Allahabad. Application of 13t FYM/ha recorded significantly higher yield of groundnut as compared to control, while the application of 75% recommended dose of Fertilizer (RDF) recorded significantly higher nut yield over 25 and 50% RDF but it was at par with 100% RDF. Root zone application of nutrients recorded significantly higher nut yield as compared to broadcasting. Among the interaction effects combination of 13t FYM + 75% RDF, 13t FYM + root zone application and 100% RDF + root zone application recorded the highest nut yield of groundnut as compared to other combinations. The growth and yield attributes also showed similar trends.
ADULT PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT IN LATVIAN FOLK HIGH SCHOOLS: AN OBSERVATIONAL ANALYSIS

Folk high school movement has been known in Latvia since 1917, when the first Folk high school was established in Valmiera. These institutions have never been real boarding schools; they provided lectures for any kind of interest to listeners mainly from rural areas approximately once a week. In this article, attention is drawn to an understanding of the study process that facilitates personal development of adult learners at the folk high school. A participant observation was carried out at one of the biggest folk high schools in Latvia in October 2011 and March-April 2012. The study took 9 days, 2-3 hours were spent in direct observation of various lessons (Latvian and English languages and floristic) each day. A conclusion drawn from the results of the study is that in situations where personal development takes place the study process is characterized by three main aspects: human as a value, human values, and higher human values at the centre of the study.
Spatial variability of the direct radiative forcing of biomass burning aerosols and the effects of land use change in Amazonia

Abstract. This paper addresses the Amazonian shortwave radiative budget over cloud-free conditions after considering three aspects of deforestation: (i) the emission of aerosols from biomass burning due to forest fires; (ii) changes in surface albedo after deforestation; and (iii) modifications in the column water vapour amount over deforested areas. Simultaneous Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) shortwave fluxes and aerosol optical depth (AOD) retrievals from the Moderate Resolution Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MODIS) were analysed during the peak of the biomass burning seasons (August and September) from 2000 to 2009. A discrete-ordinate radiative transfer (DISORT) code was used to extend instantaneous remote sensing radiative forcing assessments into 24-h averages. The mean direct radiative forcing of aerosols at the top of the atmosphere (TOA) during the biomass burning season for the 10-yr studied period was −5.6 ± 1.7 W m −2 . Furthermore, the spatial distribution of the direct radiative forcing of aerosols over Amazonia was obtained for the biomass burning season of each year. It was observed that for high AOD (larger than 1 at 550 nm) the maximum daily direct aerosol radiative forcing at the TOA may be as high as −20 W m −2 locally. The surface reflectance plays a major role in the aerosol direct radiative effect. The study of the effects of biomass burning aerosols over different surface types shows that the direct radiative forcing is systematically more negative over forest than over savannah-like covered areas. Values of −15.7 ± 2.4 W m −2 τ 550 nm and −9.3 ± 1.7 W m −2 τ 550 nm were calculated for the mean daily aerosol forcing efficiencies over forest and savannah-like vegetation respectively. The overall mean annual land use change radiative forcing due to deforestation over the state of Rondonia, Brazil, was determined as −7.3 ± 0.9 W m −2 . Biomass burning aerosols impact the radiative budget for approximately two months per year, whereas the surface albedo impact is observed throughout the year. Because of this difference, the estimated impact in the Amazonian annual radiative budget due to surface albedo-change is approximately 6 times higher than the impact due to aerosol emissions. The influence of atmospheric water vapour content in the radiative budget was also studied using AERONET column water vapour. It was observed that column water vapour is on average smaller by about 0.35 cm (around 10% of the total column water vapour) over deforested areas compared to forested areas. Our results indicate that this drying contributes to an increase in the shortwave radiative forcing, which varies from 0.4 W m −2 to 1.2 W m −2 depending on the column water vapour content before deforestation. The large radiative forcing values presented in this study point out that deforestation could have strong implications in convection, cloud development and the ratio of direct to diffuse radiation, which impacts carbon uptake by the forest.