Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Association between somatic RET mutations and clinical and genetic characteristics in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer

Rearranged during transfection (RET) is a targetable oncogene. RET fusions have been reported in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC). However, RET mutations in mCRC are less studied. Here, we aimed to characterize the clinical, pathological, and molecular landscape of RET‐mutated mCRC.
Percutaneous cholecystostomy: An update for the 2020s

Cholecystectomy is the standard treatment of acute cholecystitis. Surgery, however, poses significant risks for patients with advanced age and/or comorbid conditions. For such patients, percutaneous cholecystostomy (PC) is the only option. This interventional procedure does not have any absolute contraindications because of the life-threatening nature of the disease, in which other treatment options cannot be offered due to their risks. Nonetheless, these risk factors necessitate performing PC under urgent, rapid, and in many cases suboptimal conditions. In this article, PC was revisited in the light of our extensive experience in addition to the most current literature. Pre-procedural evaluation including the risk assessment and procedural steps was presented in detail. If conducted properly, PC provides significant clinical improvement in the short term and is life-saving, especially in the elderly and in patients with comorbid diseases or high surgical risk. It may also be the definitive treatment method for acute cholecystitis.
When do forecasts fail and when not? Contingencies affecting the accuracy of sales managers’ forecast regarding the future business situation

Abstract Improving business forecasts is a major goal of many companies because of its strong positive impact on future performance and potential competitive advantages. Even though sales managers have been called to serve as a profound base for business forecasts from a theoretical perspective, this premise has not been subject to empirical testing to date. Addressing this research void, the authors analyze under which conditions sales managers’ business forecasts are reliable and when not. The authors conducted a cross-industry field study including two measurement points with 180 high-ranking senior sales managers. Results show that managers’ forecast accuracy fundamentally depends on contextual moderators. Sales managers predict future business situations 2.5 times more accurate when they exhibit a long firm-specific experience and high confidence-levels in their own forecast. Furthermore, a comparably long sales cycle improves forecast accuracy. Conversely, sales managers may make considerable misjudgments if the before mentioned conditions are not met.
Knowledge and Attitude of Nurses towards Infection Control Practices during Hajj Season at Tertiary Care Hospital in City of Makkah

Infection prevention and control is required to prevent the transmission of communicable diseases in all health care settings. Every health care worker plays a vital part in helping to minimize the risk of health care-associated infections. Aim of the study: This study aimed to determine the level of knowledge, skills and attitude of nurses towards infection control practices during Hajj at Tertiary Care Hospital in Makkah. Research design: Quantitative descriptive cross-sectional correlational research design. Setting: The study was conducted at one of the tertiary care hospitals in Makkah. Sample: A convenient sample of (82) nurses assigned in different units. Tools of data collection: In the collection of data, validated self-made questionnaire was uploaded thru “Monkey Survey” and sent to the participants and data were analyzed using Kruder Richardson for the level of knowledge, and Cronbach alpha for the level of skills and attitude with its reliability testing. Result: The study revealed that nurses had a very good knowledge and having very positive attitude, which is a good indicator that infection control practices at tertiary care hospital in Makkah have been observed. Conclusion and Recommendations: Nurses are expected to actively participate in training or seminars related to infection control practices to acquire more knowledge, develop their skills and improve their attitude in handling with hospital wastes particularly sharps, and proper segregation of linen with commitment to follow the "5 Moments of Hand Hygiene" and appropriate use of PPE.
The Key Strategies to Implement Circular Economy in Building Projects—A Case Study of Taiwan

The building industry is blamed for consuming enormous natural resources and creating massive solid waste worldwide. In response to this, the concept of circular economy (CE) has gained much attention in the sector in recent years. Many pilot building projects that implemented CE concepts started to appear around the world, including Taiwan. However, compared with the pilot projects in the Netherlands, which are regarded as the pioneer ones by international society, many CE-related practices are not implemented in pilot cases in Taiwan. To assist future project stakeholders to recognize what the key CE-related practices are and how they could be implemented in their building projects in Taiwan, this study has conducted a series of case studies of Dutch and Taiwanese pilot projects and semi-structured interviews with key project stakeholders of Taiwanese pilot projects. Thirty key CE-related practices are identified via case studies, along with their related 5R principles (Rethink, Reduce, Reuse, Repair, Recycle) and project phases. Suggestion on CE-related practices, their 5R principles, project items, and phases to implement in building projects in Taiwan is also proposed while discussion on differences between two countries’ pilot projects is presented.
The Effects of Workplace Loneliness on Work Engagement and Organizational Commitment: Moderating Roles of Leader-Member Exchange and Coworker Exchange

This study aims to examine the effect of workplace loneliness on work engagement and organizational commitment and the moderating role of social relationships between an employee and his or her superior and coworkers in such mechanisms. Workplace loneliness decreased employees’ engagement with their jobs and, as such, decreased engagement had a positive relationship with organizational commitment. Also, the negative influence of workplace loneliness on work engagement was found to be moderated by coworker exchange, and employees’ maintenance of positive social exchange relationships with their coworkers was verified to be a major factor for relieving the negative influence of workplace loneliness.
Does information quality matter in corporate innovation? Evidence from the Korean market

ABSTRACT Using extensive manually collected data on granted patents, this study examines the effects of the degree of a firm’s information asymmetry on corporate innovation in the Korean market, which is characterized by weak transparency and active firm innovation. Based on four measures of information asymmetry, we find that the quality of information about a firm has a positive influence on its innovation activities. In addition, this influence is more evident in firms with poor corporate governance practices and in Chaebol-affiliated firms. Overall, this study offers insights on the importance of information quality for firms planning investments in innovation, which is a long-term and highly uncertain commitment. An important policy implication is that regulatory authorities should promote the timely and reliable disclosure of information on firms.
Understanding the decisional factors affecting consumers’ buying behaviour towards organic food products in Kerala

Rising concern for health and environmental issues associated with the rigorous use of chemical fertilizers has necessitated an alternate form of agriculture in Kerala, and that's how organic production came into existence. The organic agricultural production technique is considered to be quite conflicting with conventional production technique where the use of human-made fertilizers like pesticides, weedicides and insecticides are entirely banned. Organic products are perceived to be minimally processed to maintain the integrity of the food without artificial ingredients and preservatives. Therefore right from mid-eighties, consumers, particularly from the developed countries, started switching over towards organically produced food products as they more nutritious, healthy, and nature-friendly. Considering the organic market in Kerala, the state is still at its infant stage with a market share of less than 1%. Hence it is critical to investigate Kerala consumers low consumption level towards environmentally friendly products. The current research intents to explore the factors influencing Kerala consumers’ organic purchase behaviour based on data collected from 200 respondents (100 regular and 100 irregular organic users) using a structured questionnaire. Analysis techniques comprising of correlation and multiple linear regression has been applied for data evaluation. The research findings support the formulated hypothesis and aim at providing necessary guidelines for various stakeholders who are involved in the organic industry.
Blockchain-Enhanced Data Sharing With Traceable and Direct Revocation in IIoT

The industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) supports recent developments in data management and information services, as well as services for smart factories. Nowadays, many mature IIoT cloud platforms are available to serve smart factories. However, due to the semicredibility nature of the IIoT cloud platforms, how to achieve secure storage, access control, information update and deletion for smart factory data, as well as the tracking and revocation of malicious users has become an urgent problem. To solve these problems, in this article, a blockchain-enhanced security access control scheme that supports traceability and revocability has been proposed in IIoT for smart factories. The blockchain first performs unified identity authentication, and stores all public keys, user attribute sets, and revocation list. The system administrator then generates system parameters and issues private keys to users. The domain administrator is responsible for formulating domain security and privacy-protection policies, and performing encryption operations. If the attributes meet the access policies and the user's ID is not in the revocation list, they can obtain the intermediate decryption parameters from the edge/cloud servers. Malicious users can be tracked and revoked during all stages if needed, which ensures the system security under the Decisional Bilinear Diffie–Hellman (DBDH) assumption and can resist multiple attacks. The evaluation has shown that the size of the public/private keys is smaller compared to other schemes, and the overhead time is less for public key generation, data encryption, and data decryption stages.
Exploring the Relationship between Corporate Social Responsibility and Sales Growth of Small and Medium Enterprises: A Combined Case Study in the Light of a Literature Review

The purpose of this study is to analyze the influence of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) on a firms’ sales growth and to assess the mediating role of competitive advantage and the moderating role of the employee’s individual belief of social responsibility (SR) on the relationship between CSR and sales growth of small and medium enterprises. A survey of 107 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the consumption and manufacturing industry of a developing country was performed. Structural equation modeling based on AMOS path was employed to test the hypotheses linked to the relationship between CSR and sales growth of SMEs. Results indicate that the link between CSR and sales growth is mediated through competitive advantage and that the positive impact of CSR on sales growth is moderated by the employee’s individual belief of social responsibility.
On some beta ridge regression estimators: method, simulation and application

The classic statistical method for modelling the rates and proportions is the beta regression model (BRM). The standard maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) is used to estimate the coefficients of the BRM. However, this MLE is very sensitive when the regressors are linearly correlated. Therefore, this study introduces a new beta ridge regression (BRR) estimator as a remedy to the problem of instability of the MLE. We study the mean squared error properties of the BRR estimator analytically and then based on the derived MSE, we suggest some new estimators of the shrinkage parameter. We also suggest a median squared error (SE) performance criterion, which can be used to achieve strong evidence in favour of the proposed method for the Monte Carlo simulation study. The performance of BRR and MLE is appraised through Monte Carlo simulation. Finally, an empirical application is used to show the advantages of the proposed estimator.
The diversification of the northern temperate woody flora – A case study of the Elm family (Ulmaceae) based on phylogenomic and paleobotanical evidence

Ulmaceae is a woody family widespread in northern temperate forests. Despite the ecological importance of this family, its phylogeny and biogeographic history are poorly understood. In this study, we reconstruct phylogenetic relationships within the family and infer spatio‐temporal diversification patterns based on chloroplast genome (complete cpDNA) and nuclear ribosomal DNA sequences (nrDNA). The seven Ulmaceae genera are resolved in two main clades (temperate vs. tropical) by both cpDNA and nrDNA sequences. The temperate clade includes four genera, Hemiptelea, Zelkova, Planera, and Ulmus. The relationships among Planera and other genera are controversial because of inconsistent topologies between plastid and nuclear data. The tropical clade includes three genera ((Ampelocera, Phyllostylon), Holoptelea). Molecular dating and diversification analyses show that Ulmaceae originated in the Early Cretaceous (ca. 110–125 Ma) with the main lineages establishing from the Late Cretaceous to the early Eocene. The diversification rate slowed during the middle to the late Paleogene (ca. 23–45 Ma), followed by a rapid diversification of the East Asian temperate group in the Neogene, congruent with a global cooling event. The ancestral state optimization analysis suggests an East Asian origin of the temperate Ulmaceae clade during the Paleocene, which is consistent with the fossil record. Both phylogenomic and fossil evidence support East Asia as a center of origin and diversification for the temperate woody lineages.
Why teach mathematics? – A study with preservice teachers on myths around the justification problem in mathematics education

In this article we report on a study focused on revealing and categorizing the arguments that preservice mathematics teachers put forward when they are asked about why mathematics is taught, which is a question closely related to the justification problem in mathematics education. Another focus of the study is the identification of myths within such arguments. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with 19 preservice mathematics teachers from Mexico. The results show that the arguments of the future teachers to justify the teaching of mathematics can be divided into three categories: (1) mathematics is related to the development of mental or thinking skills, (2) mathematics is useful for daily life, and (3) mathematics fosters positive attitudes and emotions. On the other hand, a presence of myths was identified in the arguments of the prospective teachers, namely: (1) the myth of reference, (2) the myth of participation, (3) the myth of importance, and (4) the myth of cognitive development. The report concludes by discussing the results and pointing out some future research routes.
Assessment of Factors Affecting the Amount of Food Waste in Households Run by Polish Women Aware of Well-Being

Food waste is a pressing problem in Western countries. Increased food waste production directly affects environmental changes and pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions and contamination with packaging. In Poland, 9.2 million tons of food is lost annually, 53% of which is produced by consumers. To minimize food waste by consumers, it is necessary to understand the factors affecting the behaviors associated with food wasting. This work is focused on investigating the causes and behaviors related to food wasting, and determining the kinds of food that are wasted in Polish households run by women that possess a high awareness of well-being. It was found that most of the respondents who took part in the survey admitted that their households did waste food. It was shown that there is a positive correlation between the number of people living in a household and the amount of food wasted. It was also confirmed that age has an impact on the amount of food discarded by Polish women, because respondents over 37 years of age wasted less food and more often declared a lack of wasting compared to others. In households, fresh food with short expiry dates, including vegetables, fruit, bread, and meat, was wasted the most. The most important factors directly influencing the amount of wasted food were: purchasing too much food, a lack of expiry-date control, a lack of planning of purchases and menus, and a lack of ideas for using food residues. The main element affecting waste is purchasing too much food, most often resulting from susceptibility to promotions, willingness to buy in stock, and a lack of prior planning. Understanding the mechanisms of waste allows households to take actions to effectively reduce it, and therefore ensure greater food security in the world.
A combined Globo H-OCT4-T7 immunotherapy restrains colorectal tumor growth

Background: Malignant tumors express multiple common markers that might constitute targets for tumor immunotherapy. Methods: Here we performed antigen epitope screening and molecular docking to design a new combination vaccine based on covalently linking Globo H and Oct 4 with a TLR7 agonist. We mainly use flow cytometry to analyze the changes in lymphocyte differentiation after the vaccine is applied. Use Elisa technology to detect the antibodies produced by the vaccine and the changes in lymphokines. In order to supplement the immunological data, RNA sequencing was performed on untreated and vaccine-treated tumors to define the interference of the vaccine on the genome-wide gene expression profile.Results: Our results demonstrated that the Globo H-OCT4-T7 conjugate vaccine effectively induced cellular uptake, maturation and antigen presentation of BMDCs. The combination vaccine enhanced cytokine production, CTLs activity elicited high levels of IgG. Importantly, the tumor immune microenvironment was significantly improved in tumor-bearing mice treated by Globo H-OCT4-T7 conjugate vaccine, demonstrated by increased the ratio of M1 to M2 TAMs, reduced number of Tregs in PBMCs and promoted the infiltration of tumor-specific IFN γ-producing CD8+ T cells. Prophylactic vaccination of Globo H-OCT4-T7 significantly reduced tumor growth by >80 % in both CT26 transplanted mice and in a human PDX mouse model when exposing mice to the combined vaccine compared to control. Our novel, combination vaccine is safe and effective at preventing tumor growth in mice. Conclusions: This combination vaccine is more effective than the single vaccine, and thus has the potential to prevent OCT4 and Globo H from expressing cancer.
Mapping the material distribution of a complex structure in an electron beam

The simulation and analysis of High Energy Physics experiments require a realistic simulation of the detector material and its distribution. The challenge is to describe all active and passive parts of large scale detectors like ATLAS in terms of their size, position and material composition. The common method for estimating the radiation length by weighing individual components, adding up their contributions and averaging the resulting material distribution over extended structures provides a good general estimate, but can deviate significantly from the material actually present. A method has been developed to assess its material distribution with high spatial resolution using the reconstructed scattering angles and hit positions of high energy electron tracks traversing an object under investigation. The study presented here shows measurements for an extended structure with a highly inhomogeneous material distribution. The structure under investigation is an End-of-Substructure-card prototype designed for the ATLAS Inner Tracker strip tracker—a PCB populated with components of a large range of material budgets and sizes. The measurements presented here summarise requirements for data samples and reconstructed electron tracks for reliable image reconstruction of large scale, inhomogeneous samples, choices of pixel sizes compared to the size of features under investigation as well as a bremsstrahlung correction for high material densities and thicknesses.
Prey ecology of the burrowing owl Athene cunicularia cunicularia (Molina, 1782) on the northern coast of Santa Catarina, Brazil

ABSTRACT We analyzed the diet of Athene cunicularia cunicularia in order to identify and compare prey items in dune populations in Santa Catarina, Brazil: Interpraias (INT), Praia Brava (BRA), Praia Central (NAV) and Peninsula (BVE). Due to the characteristics of urbanization in these regions, we hypothesized that there would be greater abundance and consumption of urban insect pests in the areas of BRA, NAV, and INT than in BVE. We collect owl pellets monthly in 2017. The non-parametric analysis ANOVA was applied to identify differences in pellet weights and niche amplitude between populations and seasons and PERMANOVA was applied to identify differences between prey items. Were collected 1064 pellets containing 20 prey items, including: invertebrates (Arachnida, Insecta and Crustacea Malacostraca – 83%), vertebrates (Osteichthyes, amphibians, Reptilia, birds and Mammalia – 8.6%), seeds (6.38%) and miscellaneous materials of anthropic origin (0.19%). There was no difference in the pellet weights, but the diets observed in INT and BRA were significantly different, a result that may be a reflection of the microenvironments in which the burrowing owl lives. This shows that, in addition to a generalist diet, this species has the capacity to adapt to urban changes.
Synthesis, applications and Structure-Activity Relationship (SAR) of cinnamic acid derivatives: a review

The article aims to analyze the progress of the evolution of cinnamic acid derivatives through a bibliographic review, describing the main synthetic routes in obtaining this class, as well as remarkable biological applications and application of the structure-activity relationship (SAR) as a strategy for design pharmacologically active molecules. The methodology used consists of reading and analyzing articles, whose approach is descriptive, with data being collected regarding the therapeutic potential of derivatives of cinnamic acid and its relationship with structural scaffolding, as well as the most widely used synthetic approaches. As a result, it was observed that cinnamic acid and its derivatives from natural sources can be synthesized in appreciable quantities with varied synthetic routes, as well as being candidates for therapeutic agents, since they have several therapeutic applications against diabetes, infectious and degenerative diseases, among others, in addition to presenting activity such as pest control, which has attracted the attention of academic and industrial researchers. These compounds are highly versatile since their activity is intrinsically associated with the mode of interaction between the structure and its molecular target. However, in nature they are obtained in small quantities, therefore, the development of new approaches of synthetic methodologies to obtain such compounds in substantial quantities and linked to medicinal chemistry can contribute to the development of very effective bioactive molecules in comparison with their precursors.