Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
FACTORS AFFECTING ENTREPRENEURIAL ATTITUDES OF AMERICAN AND CHINESE BUSINESS STUDENTS

Identifying factors which influence the development of future entrepreneurial orientation is important to the customization of entrepreneurship education and initiatives. This study identified differences between the U.S. and China by surveying business students in the U.S. (N = 211) and China (N = 227) using the Entrepreneurial Attitudes Orientation survey. Results indicated that overall, U.S students had significantly higher entrepreneurial attitude scores than Chinese students. Both U.S. and China scores were significantly related to exposure to entrepreneurship and several demographic characteristics. In addition, Chinese scores were higher for Chinese students who had taken at least one business or entrepreneurial course. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Research into the entrepreneurial attitudes of U.S. and Chinese students can have important implications for the customization of entrepreneurship education and initiatives. This study identified differences between the U.S. and China in terms of demographic characteristics and business education and entrepreneurship exposure factors which could influence the development of entrepreneurial attitudes in business students. Undergraduate and graduate business students from a university in the mid-Atlantic U.S. (N = 211) and a mid-sized university in China (N = 227) completed the 75-question Robinson and Hunt (1991) Entrepreneurial Attitudes Orientation scale which is based on four attitudinal constructs: (1) achieving attitude, (2) business self-esteem, (3) personal control, and (4) innovative attitude. Results indicated that U.S students had significantly higher attitudinal scores than Chinese students. For both the U.S. and China, scores were significantly higher for students in graduate business programs than for the undergraduate business students. Chinese attitudinal scores were also significantly higher for Chinese students who had taken at least one business or entrepreneurial course. In addition, exposure to entrepreneurship, such as working in a small business or having close friends or relatives who owned a small business, also increased American and Chinese scores. Attitudinal scores for both countries were also significantly related to various demographic characteristics. Chinese scores were higher for students who were
Analysis of Joint Source Channel LDPC Coding for Correlated Sources Transmission over Noisy Channels

: In this paper, a Joint Source Channel coding scheme based on LDPC codes is investigated. We consider two concatenated LDPC codes, one allows to compress a correlated source and the second to protect it against channel degradations. The original information can be reconstructed at the receiver by a joint decoder, where the source decoder and the channel decoder run in parallel by transferring extrinsic information. We investigate the performance of the JSC LDPC code in terms of Bit-Error Rate (BER) in the case of transmission over an Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) channel, and for different source and channel rate parameters. We emphasize how JSC LDPC presents a performance tradeoff depending on the channel state and on the source correlation. We show that, the JSC LDPC is an efficient solution for a relatively low Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) channel, especially with highly correlated sources. Finally, a source-channel rate optimization has to be applied to guarantee the best JSC LDPC system performance for a given channel.
A Three-Dimensional Scale of Intangibility

As new information technologies are being developed, so have new generations of information products. Because these new products appear highly intangible, this renews the debate about intangibility as defined in the marketing literature, which has traditionally considered it as a unidimensional or two-dimensional construct and has associated it almost exclusively with services. The objective of this study is to show that intangibility is a three-dimensional construct. A survey was conducted, and structural equation modeling analyses were used to test the proposed scale. Results showed that intangibility is indeed composed of three dimensions: mental intangibility, physical intangibility, and generality. The scale was then applied to some goods and services, and it was found that some goods appear to be less tangible than many services. These results suggest the need for some changes in how service marketing research is carried out and how managers deal with the “intangibility” of their services.
Using a Technology Acceptance Model to Investigate Academic Acceptance of the Internet

Information Technology has long been a well-known research area, but this changed considerably when the Internet became prominent just over a decade ago. Many researchers have studied and proposed theories and models of Technology Acceptance in order to predict and explain user behaviour with technology to account for rapid change in both technologies themselves and their environments. Each theory or model has been proposed with different sets of determinants and moderators. More importantly, most of the research has been conducted in the U.S. Therefore, it is questioned whether the technology acceptance models and theories that have been developed, modified, and extended in the U.S. can be used in other regions such as South East Asia and more specifically in Thailand. It is questioned whether there might be other determinants and moderators that also play important roles in this specific environment. This research study has seven objectives, of which five have already been achieved. From the findings, despite the fact that academics hardly used the Internet (used a few times a month) for teaching in class and providing a personal Web-Base for facilitating teaching, they intended to use it more (a few times a week) in the future. On the contrary, at the time of the survey, they used the Internet rather often (five to six times a week) for enhancing teaching knowledge, searching information for their research, personal tasks, enhancing personal knowledge, and using email for personal contact. Significantly, no matter how often they currently used the Internet, they all intended to use the Internet more often in all type of tasks in the future. With respect to motivation to make full use of the Internet in their work, they not only ‘quite agree’ that if good facilities were available to support usage (e.g. good computer hardware and software, good communication network etc.) this would motivate them, but they also thought that their strong intentions for providing student contacts, the university’ policy to be Research Oriented and become an e-University in the future, also play an important role in motivating them to make full use of the Internet in their work. On the contrary, the availability of technicians and Internet training motivated them less. They also thought that using the Internet helped improve their professional practice (such as teaching in class, preparing teaching materials, research, and administrative tasks), and helped improve personal developments (such as improving their academic and personal knowledge) and helped improve their
Analysis of Contingency Tables with Sparse Values

In the chi square analysis of cross-tabulated variables, the problem of low cell counts is usually solved by combining categories, at the cost of a loss of information, or by using larger samples, at added financial cost. Use of a chi square statistic based on an extension of the Fisher Exact Test can provide a third, less costly, alternative.
A novel germline mutation (c.A527G) in STK11 gene causes Peutz–Jeghers syndrome in a Chinese girl

Rationale: Peutz–Jeghers syndrome (PJS) is a Mendelian autosomal dominant disease caused by mutations in the tumor suppressor gene, serine/threonine kinase 11 (STK11). The features of this syndrome include gastrointestinal (GI) hamartomas, melanin spots on the lips and the extremities, and an increased risk of developing cancer. Early onset of disease is often characterized by mucocutaneous pigmentation and intussusception due to GI polyps in childhood. Patient concerns: A girl with a positive family history grew oral pigmentation at 1 and got intussusception by small bowel hamartomas at 5. Diagnoses: She was diagnosed with PJS based on oral pigmentation and a positive family history of PJS. Interventions: Enteroscopy was employed to treat the GI polyps. Sanger sequencing was used to investigate STK11 mutation in this family. Outcomes: A large jejunal polyp together with other smaller ones was resected, and the girl recovered uneventfully. We discovered a heterozygous substitution in STK11, c.A527G in exon 4, in the girl and her father who was also a PJS patient, and the amine acid change was an aspartic acid-glycine substitution in codon 176. This mutation was not found in other healthy family members and 50 unrelated non-PJS controls, and it is not recorded in databases, which prove it a novel mutation. Evolutionary conservation analysis of amino acid residues showed this aspartic acid is a conserved one between species, and protein structure prediction by SWISS-MODEL indicated an obvious change in local structure. In addition, PolyPhen-2 score for this mutation is 1, which indicates it probably damaging. Lessons: PJS can cause severe complication like intussusception in young children, and early screening for small bowel may be beneficial for these patients. The mutation of STK11 found in this girl is a novel one, which enlarges the spectrum of STK11. Our analysis supported it a causative one in PJS.
The significance of working capital management and its components on SMEs performance - Evidence from India

Purpose-The main aim of present study is to empirically examine the importance of working capital management and its components on the profitability of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in India.Design/methodology/approach - We employ panel data regression method on a sample of 433 Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) from India for the period spanning from 2007 to 2012. Following Deloof (2003); Garcia-Teruel and Martinez-Solano (2007) and Tauringana & Afrifa (2013), we use Cash Conversion Cycle (CCC) as measure of working capital management and its components (inventory, accounts receivable and accounts payable) and Return on Assets (ROA) as the proxy for SMEs profitability.Findings -Using panel data analysis, we find that the number of days of inventory (DI), number of days of accounts receivables (DAR), the number of days of accounts payables (DAP) and cash conversion cycle (CCC) are negatively correlated with profitability of SMEs in India. Results further show that the management of inventory (DI) and accounts receivables (AR) are important for SMEs profitability in India, albiet the latter is relatively less important than inventory management. Overall, our findings are consistent with the earlier work on SMEs by Garcia-Teruel and Martinez-Solano (2007) and Tauringana & Afrifa (2013). Research limitations/implications - Our sample is limited to 433 SMEs, and therefore the findings cannot be generalized to all the SMEs in India.Practical implications -Results of the present study imply that the SMEs in India need to focus their resources on managing inventory and accounts receivables in order to be more profitable.Originality/value-To best of author? s knowledge, the present study is the first to examine the relationship between WCM and its components to SMEs portability in India. The main contribution of this paper is the finding of relative importance of components of working capital management and their differential influence on profitability of SMEs in the Indian context.
The Effect of Country of Origin on Purchase Intention: The Role of Product Knowledge

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of country-of-origin (COO) cues on purchase intention by considering the role of product knowledge. On the basis of the results of the present study, marketers are able to do a more effective job in formulating the contents of their messages in marketing communications. A total of 380 questionnaires were distributed to university students. Country-of-origin, the independent variable, was measured using Maheswaran (1994) scale; purchase intention, the dependent variable; and product knowledge was the moderator variable. Structural equation modeling was used for data analysis and to test the hypotheses. The results show that the effect of production origin country on willingness to purchase in individuals with low product knowledge is greater than in those with high product knowledge; also the effect of production origin country on willingness to purchase in individuals whit low objective knowledge is greater than that in those with high objective knowledge. In final, Structural equation modeling shows that the effect of production origin country on willingness to purchase in individuals with low and high subjective knowledge of product is rejected because of quantity of T-value which are 1.4 and 1.9 respectively.
Molecular quantification of Saccharomyces cerevisiae α-pheromone secretion.

Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast cells court each other by producing an attractive sex pheromone specific to their mating type. Cells detect the sex pheromone from potential mates using a well-defined intracellular signalling cascade that has become a model for studying signal transduction. In contrast, the factors contributing to the production of pheromone itself are poorly characterized, despite the widespread use of the S. cerevisiae α-pheromone secretion pathway in industrial fungal protein expression systems. Progress in understanding pheromone secretion has been hindered by a lack of a precise and quantitative pheromone production assay. Here, we present an ELISA-based method for the quantification of α-pheromone secretion. In the absence of pheromone from the opposite mating type, we found that each cell secretes over 550 mature α-pheromone peptides per second; 90% of this total was produced from MF α1. The addition of a-pheromone more than doubled total α-pheromone secretion. This technique offers several improvements on current methods for measuring α-pheromone production and will allow detailed investigation of the factors regulating pheromone production in yeast.
A citizen-centric framework for government e-services uptake

Online services or e- and m-services have gradually replaced traditional over-the-counter services in government offices. Some countries like Singapore with 1900 or Estonia with 550 e- and m-services respectively, have been very successful, while others like Mauritius have lagged behind with only 66 e-services, most of which are underutilised. A coherent and comprehensive citizen-centric framework for e-services is therefore necessary in order to guide the development and deployment of government e-services for citizens. This paper presents an e-services framework based on 136 factors influencing e-services uptake, categorised into 21 components that have been grouped into 3 core concepts and 2 main thrusts of the government e-services ecosystem. It is accompanied by 21 sets of actions for its implementation. The framework has been validated through a survey of citizens of Mauritius to confirm the hypothesis that adoption of the measures proposed in the framework will positively influence the behavioural intention of citizens to adopt government e-services.
Association between Ambient Air Pollution and Hospital Emergency Admissions for Respiratory and Cardiovascular Diseases in Beijing: a Time Series Study.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the association between ambient air pollution and hospital emergency admissions in Beijing. METHODS In this study, a semi-parametric generalized additive model (GAM) was used to evaluate the specific influences of air pollutants (PM10, SO2, and NO2) on hospital emergency admissions with different lag structures from 2009 to 2011, the sex and age specific influences of air pollution and the modifying effect of seasons on air pollution to analyze the possible interaction. RESULTS It was found that a 10 μg/m3 increase in concentration of PM10 at lag 03 day, SO2 and NO2 at lag 0 day were associated with an increase of 0.88%, 0.76%, and 1.82% respectively in overall emergency admissions. A 10 μg/m3 increase in concentration of PM10, SO2 and NO2 at lag 5 day were associated with an increase of 1.39%, 1.56%, and 1.18% respectively in cardiovascular disease emergency admissions. For lag 02, a 10 μg/m3 increase in concentration of PM10, SO2 and NO2 were associated with 1.72%, 1.34%, and 2.57% increases respectively in respiratory disease emergency admissions. CONCLUSION This study further confirmed that short-term exposure to ambient air pollution was associated with increased risk of hospital emergency admissions in Beijing.
Financial Risk Management: Applications in Market, Credit, Asset and Liability Management and Firmwide Risk

Financial Risk Management presents an in-depth look at banking risk on a global scale, including comprehensive examination of the U.S. Comprehensive Capital Analysis and Review, and the European Banking Authority stress tests. Written by the leaders of global banking risk products and management at SAS, this book provides the most up-to-date information and expert insight into real risk management. The discussion begins with an overview of methods for computing and managing a variety of risk, then moves into a review of the economic foundation of modern risk management and the growing importance of model risk management. Market risk, portfolio credit risk, counterparty credit risk, liquidity risk, profitability analysis, stress testing, and others are dissected and examined, arming you with the strategies you need to construct a robust risk management system. The book takes readers through a journey from basic market risk analysis to major recent advances in all financial risk disciplines seen in the banking industry. The quantitative methodologies are developed with ample business case discussions and examples illustrating how they are used in practice. Chapters devoted to firmwide risk and stress testing cross reference the different methodologies developed for the specific risk areas and explain how they work together at firmwide level. Since risk regulations have driven a lot of the recent practices, the book also relates to the current global regulations in the financial risk areas.
Differentiated induction of cytochrome P450b/e and P450p mRNAs by dose of phenobarbital in primary cultures of adult rat hepatocytes.

Phenobarbital induces cytochromes P450 (P450s) of not only the class IIB gene subfamily (i.e., P450b and P450e) but also the class IIIA gene subfamily (P450p and P450pcn2). To determine whether coinduction of these structurally dissimilar gene products involves the same mechanism, we examined the dose dependency of phenobarbital induction of the mRNAs for these four P450s in a new responsive system for primary monolayer cultures of adult rat hepatocytes on Matrigel, a reconstituted basement membrane. Two-day treatments of the cultures with phenobarbital produced marked dose-dependent increases in the levels of P450b, P450e, and P450p mRNAs, which reached maximal inductions ranging from 11- to greater than 193-fold. Although the dose-response relationships for the inductions of P450b and P450e mRNAs by phenobarbital were similar (ED50 = 1.5 x 10(-5) and 5.7 x 10(-6) M, respectively), the dose-response curve for the induction of P450p mRNA was positioned distinctly to the right (ED50 = 3.0 x 10(-4) M). This difference reflects a potency ratio of 20-fold for P450p/P450b mRNA induction. Phenobarbital also produced a weak dose-dependent induction of P450pcn2 mRNA, with a potency (ED50 = 3.4 x 10(-5) M) intermediate between those for P450b/e and P450p. In a similar experiment using two phenobarbital-like inducers, (trans)nonachlor and clotrimazole, the relative inductions of P450b, P450e, P450p, and P450pcn2 mRNAs proved to be similar to those produced by phenobarbital (P450p/P450b potency ratios = 14- and 16-fold, respectively). These findings provide strong further evidence in support of the newly emerging concept that "phenobarbital" induction of the responsive class IIB and class IIIA P450 isozymes likely reflects multiple mechanisms.
Primary and secondary store‐loyal customer perceptions of grocery retailers

Gaining competitive advantage in retailing requires knowledge of the attributes consumers use to evaluate stores and an understanding of why these attributes are important. Although a number of store‐image studies have identified store attributes, evidence suggests that these attributes vary by store type and over time, but no work has considered the most crucial aspects to retailers, namely store loyalty. As no study has examined the links between store attributes and store loyalty, our knowledge remains largely speculative. This article explores this link using Kelly′s repertory grid methodology to assess the store images of three UK grocery retailers. Important differences were seen between primary store‐loyal customers’ perception of their store and secondary store‐loyal customers’ perception of that store. For example, primary‐loyal Tesco customers perceived quality, convenience and value factors in that order of importance, whilst primary‐loyal Kwik‐Save customers perceived quality, value and convenience factors when considering Tesco. Implications for retail positioning strategies and the development of store loyalty are discussed.
THE BIOMECHANICS BODY OF KNOWLEDGE

INTRODUCTION Thank you for your presence at this conference and at this presentation. I will infer from your attendance that you care about the learning and teaching of biomechanics. In that regard, I will take you as kindred spirits. Moreover, I am fairly certain that you are geniuses – more about that later. Given that I view you as kindred spirits and geniuses, I would like to have you as allies. So, please remember, whenever I say something that conflicts with your cherished beliefs, the word is allies – not enemies. Today I would like for us to consider the biomechanics body of knowledge. By biomechanics I will be referring primarily to human movement biomechanics as it might be practiced in departments of physical education or kinesiology. I will be using the term body in both literal and figurative ways. As for knowledge, we will examine several perspectives. In particular, those perspectives can be framed with the following questions: How is our body of knowledge conceived? What aspects of our body are prominent when viewed by ourselves, our students, our colleagues, and our constituents? How is our body of knowledge communicated to and consumed by our students? How is our body of knowledge critiqued; what does it look like when the procedures of critical theory are applied? And finally, how is our body of knowledge constructed?
Threonyl-transfer ribonucleic acid synthetase and the regulation of the threonine operon in Escherichia coli

Two threonine-requiring mutants with derepressed expression of the threonine operon were isolated from an Escherichia coli K-12 strain containing two copies of the thr operon. One of them carries a leaky mutation in ilvA (the structural gene for threonine deaminase), which creates an isoleucine limitation and therefore derepression of the thr operon. In the second mutant, the enzymes of the thr operon were not repressed by threonine plus isoleucine; the threonyl-transfer ribonucleic acid(tRNA) synthetase from this mutant shows an apparent Km for threonine 200-fold higher than that of the parental strain. The gene, called thrS, coding for threonyl-tRNA synthetase was located around 30 min on the E. coli map. The regulatory properties of this mutant imply the involvement of charged threonyl-tRNA or threonyl-tRNA synthetase in the regulation of the thr operon.