Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Occupation, Growth, Skill Prices, and Wage Inequality

This paper studies the relationship between changes in occupational employment, occupational wages, and rising overall wage inequality. Using long-running administrative panel data with detailed occupation codes, we first document that in all occupations, entrants and leavers earn lower wages than stayers. This empirical fact suggests substantial skill selection effects that are negative for growing occupations and positive for shrinking ones. We develop and estimate a model for prices paid per unit of skill in occupations, which incorporates occupation-specific skill accumulation over the career and endogenous switching across many occupations. Our results shed light on two important puzzles in prior literature. First, consistent with leading explanations for occupational employment changes, price and employment growth are positively related. Strong counteracting skill changes along the lines of our new empirical fact explain why occupational wages are unrelated to employment growth. Second, skill prices establish a long-suspected quantitative connection between occupational changes and the surge in wage inequality.
Nonlinear response of nitric oxide fluxes to fertilizer inputs and the impacts of agricultural intensification on tropospheric ozone pollution in Kenya

Crop yields in sub‐Saharan Africa remain stagnant at 1 ton ha−1, and 260 million people lack access to adequate food resources. Order‐of‐magnitude increases in fertilizer use are seen as a critical step in attaining food security. This increase represents an unprecedented input of nitrogen (N) to African ecosystems and will likely be accompanied by increased soil emissions of nitric oxide (NO). NO is a precursor to tropospheric ozone, an air pollutant and greenhouse gas. Emissions of NO from soils occur primarily during denitrification and nitrification, and N input rates are a key determinant of emission rates. We established experimental maize plots in western Kenya to allow us to quantify the response function relating NO flux to N input rate during the main 2011 and 2012 growing seasons. NO emissions followed a sigmoid response to fertilizer inputs and have emission factors under 1% for the roughly two‐month measurement period in each year, although linear and step relationships could not be excluded in 2011. At fertilization rates above 100 kg N ha−1, NO emissions increased without a concomitant increase in yields. We used the geos‐chem chemical transport model to evaluate local impacts of increased NO emissions on tropospheric ozone concentrations. Mean 4‐hour afternoon tropospheric ozone concentrations in Western Kenya increased by up to roughly 2.63 ppbv under fertilization rates of 150 kg N ha−1 or higher. Using AOT40, a metric for assessing crop damage from ozone, we find that the increased ozone concentrations result in an increase in AOT40 exposure of approximately 110 ppbh for inputs of 150 kg N ha−1 during the March–April–May crop growing season, compared with unfertilized simulations, with negligible impacts on crop productivity. Our results suggest that it may be possible to manage Kenyan agricultural systems for high yields while avoiding substantial impacts on air quality.
Multivariate Marked Poisson Processes and Market Related Multidimensional Information Flows

The class of marked Poisson processes and its connection with subordinated Lévy processes allow us to propose a new interpretation of multidimensional information flows and their relation to market movements. The new approach provides a unified framework for multivariate asset return models in a Lévy economy. In fact, we are able to recover several processes commonly used to model asset returns as subcases. We consider a first application example using the normal inverse Gaussian specification.
Integration of Non‐Market and Market Activities in Cross‐Border Mergers and Acquisitions

Drawing on the resource dependence theory and the resource-based view, this paper investigates the interactions between market and nonmarket activities of firms in the context of the post-merger integration phase in cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As). Based on a cross-country survey of 111 M&A practitioners who were personally involved in cross-border M&As around the world, we test seven hypotheses on various market and nonmarket aspects of post-merger integration. We find a positive correlation between buffering strategies and adaptive capabilities in the nonmarket environment, and between bridging and adaptive capabilities in the market environment. However, we could not find any significant correlation between buffering and adaptive capabilities in the market environment, and bridging and adaptive capabilities in the nonmarket environment. We also find that adaptability in the nonmarket environment is positively correlated with adaptability in the market environment, and in turn adaptability in the market environment leads to positive organizational performance of a cross border M&A. These results provide further support for the value of the alignment between market and nonmarket activities and help to fill a gap in the literature on the market-nonmarket interactions in post-merger integration.
The Effects of Metacognition-Oriented Social Skills Training on Psychosocial Outcome in Schizophrenia-Spectrum Disorders: A Randomized Controlled Trial

A pilot study of the effects of metacognition-oriented social skills training (MOSST) on social functioning in patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSDs) reported promising results. The main purpose of the current trial was to compare the effectiveness and potential benefits of MOSST vs conventional social skills training (SST). Single-blind randomized controlled trial with 2 groups of patients aged 18-65 with SSDs on partial hospitalization. Participants were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive 16 group sessions with MOSST or conventional SST, both in addition to standard care, over 4 months, with a 6-month follow-up. Psychosocial functioning, metacognition, and symptom outcomes were measured by blind assessors. Statistical analyses used mixed models to estimate treatment effects in each postrandomization time point. Thirty-six patients were randomly assigned to the MOSST group and 33 patients to the conventional SST group. Between-group differences were significant in favor of MOSST on Social and Occupational Functioning Assessment Scale (SOFAS) and Personal and Social Performance Scale (PSP) total scores at post-treatment and follow-up. Concerning PSP subscales, there were significant between-group differences in favor of MOSST at follow-up on socially useful activities, personal and social relationships, and disturbing and aggressive behaviors. Metacognition only improved following MOSST group. For people with SDDs, MOSST appears to have short- and long-term beneficial effects on social functioning and symptoms. Further studies are required to replicate the current results in other samples.
E-commerce success factors: exploratory and empirical research on the Chinese publishing industry

This research studies the electronic commerce (EC) success factors of Chinese enterprises, and builds the assessment indicator system of EC success. Although there are already a large amount of similar researches in this field, the existing studies still have limitations. On the basis of literature review, as well as two rounds of survey to specialists, we propose 15 assessment indicators of EC success, and 33 impact factors affecting the EC success. The hypothesis is proposed that leadership, strategy, management, organization, technology, customers and supplier factors would affect EC success. Focusing on the Chinese publishing industry, we conduct the empirical study to verify this hypothesis. 305 questionnaires are sent out to the book publishing companies that have already implemented EC; 93 questionnaires are sent back. After regression and factor analysis, this research finds out several key factors and critical sub-factors affecting EC success
A Solution Processed ZnO Thin Film

The effect of Zinc-Oxide (ZnO) thin film annealed in different ambiences is presented. To achieve low cost and environmentally friendly process, ZnO aqueous solution is synthesized by dissolving zinc acetate dihydrate in deionized water directly. Zinc oxide aqueous solution of high solubility and stability is presented. High quality and dense Zinc oxide thin film is formed by spin coating. Annealing temperatures are in the range of 300 °C~500 °C, and annealing ambiences of both air and N2 are discussed.
Children's psychological distress during pediatric HSCT: Parent and child perspectives

Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) can be challenging to pediatric recipients and their families. Little is known about the recipients' psychological status as they initiate treatment and in the year afterwards. The purpose of this study is to describe the psychological status of 107 pediatric HSCT recipients from their parents' perspective, and to compare reports from parents and children in a subset of 55 children. We hypothesized that there would be discrepancies between parent and child report of child distress.
Face detection using one-class-based support vectors

Almost all the proposed approaches regard face detection as a typical two-class pattern classification task, i.e., face pattern vs. non-face pattern, and learn face detector from face samples and non-face samples. In practice, face pattern model can be established easily, while it is hard to gain a perfect non-face pattern model, for any pattern beyond face pattern (cat, plane, flower etc.) should belong to non-face pattern. In this paper, we propose a novel face detection approach based on one-class SVM (OCSVM), in which face detection is just considered to be a one-class pattern problem. Support vectors are used to model face pattern, and non-face patches in given images are rejected based on this model. In order to further improve performance, course-to-fine strategy is used in both the training and detection procedure. Extensive experiments show that the proposed method has an encouraging performance.
Prevalence of Teachers' Professional Malpractices in Tanzanian Public Secondary Schools: What Ought to Be Done?.

This study explored stakeholders’ views on preventive measures towards increasing teachers’ malpractices in schools in Tanzania. Specifically, the study sought to identify prevalent forms of teachers' malpractices; explore factors for their occurrence; and explore views on how to forestall the problem. It draws on qualitative and quantitative data generated from 75 respondents including the Teachers’ Service Department (TSD) officers, education officers, school inspectors, teachers, and students. The data were generated from questionnaires, interviews, Focused Group Discussion, documentary search and non-participant observation. Data analysis involved both qualitative and quantitative approaches. While Qualitative data were subjected to thematic analysis, Quantitative data were converted into frequencies and percentages and then presented in tabular forms. The findings unveiled that absenteeism, abusive and violent behaviours, sexual abuse to mention a few were prevalent forms of teachers’ malpractices in schools. Their occurrence were attributed to teachers’ low salaries and remunerations, poor living and working conditions, influence of science and technology, lack of professional knowledge and poor management as well as infrequent visits and inspections of schools. In order to remedy the problem respondents proposed that teachers’ needs and plights to be addressed timely, funds allocated to the TSD should be raised and involvement of stakeholders in all decision making related to the teaching profession. It was also suggested for the TSD to be empowered to oversee teachers’ discipline both in public and private owned schools. In the light of the findings, the study concludes that teachers’ malpractice is still a problem of great concern in rural and urban schools in Tanzania. Therefore, rigorous collaborative effort by the government and the wider community is needed in order to promote desirable professional behaviour in schools.
Gamma-radiation-induced growth arrest and apoptosis in p53-null lymphoma cells is accompanied by modest transcriptional changes in many genes.

Damage to DNA produces cell cycle arrest, apoptosis, or both. The response in cells with p53 tumor suppressor function involves transcriptional changes, but whether that holds for cells lacking active p53, as in most tumors, is not known. Better characterization of the DNA damage response in tumors lacking p53 function is relevant to cytotoxic therapy. We have explored whether gamma-irradiated p53-null mouse T lymphoma cells undergo marked changes in transcription. Their arrest in G2/M prior to apoptosis required transcription. Transcripts whose abundance altered on irradiation were sought by subtractive hybridization, and 1010 candidate clones from two oppositely enriched cDNA populations were sequenced. Hybridization revealed small (<3-fold) increases or decreases in the transcripts of more than 15 genes, including some implicated in cell cycle control (e.g., BTG, Bap1) or apoptosis (e.g., STAT1, calpain), but no marked changes like those associated with other forms of T-cell death. Moreover, the expression of some critical apoptosis regulators, such as Bcl-2 family members, did not change. Hence, the G2/M arrest and apoptosis in the irradiated p53-null lymphoma appears to involve modest expression changes for many genes, but post-transcriptional alterations may be more critical.
Brown adipose tissue in the new‐born calf (Bos taurus).

1. Electron microscopic examinations revealed that most of the adipose tissue of new‐born calves had the cellular morphology of brown adipose tissue; only subcutaneous tissue had the cellular morphology of white adipose tissue. 2. The cellular morphology of the brown adipose tissue changed progressively to that of white adipose tissue as the age of the calves increased. 3. Infusion of noradrenaline (I.V.) at rates of 1 and 5 mug/kg.min into new‐born calves exposed to a thermoneutral environment increased metabolic rate two‐ to threefold, and also increased rectal temperature and respiration rate. The responses declined as age of calf increased. 4. Approximately 2% of the body weight of new‐born calves appears to be brown adipose tissue.
A Study on Socio-Economic Impact of Sabarmati Riverfront on Life of Displaced Communities

: Development-Induced displacement have become a common phenomenon in developing countries where in order to facilitate any infrastructure project, Dam project or any Transportation project, there is a huge displacement that takes place. With the people who struggles through such displacements suffers a wrath of disturbance that can be seen on the social fabric of their society and economic status of their families. Sabarmati Riverfront had accounted a displacement of 11000 such families from the year 2006 to 2010. The displaced families were relocated to 6 different BSUP sites out of which Vatwa accounted to largest number of relocation. With the R&R policy that talked about a healthy compensation to these urban poor, they suffered from a socio-economic crisis. Formations of places like Hindustan and Pakistan were also observed in places like Vatwa to places where the majority of people living were Hindus and Muslims. A Municipal politics was also observed during such displacements who insensitively forced involuntary resettlements. It becomes very important for us to understand the socio-economic impact of Sabarmati Riverfront on the life of such displaced communities. We did a Socio-Economic survey where we also observed the behavioural changes that came into people when they talked about displacements, government, AMC and people they are surrounded with. We also did interviews with different experts from the field of urban planning, journalism, and legal institutions to get a different view of people regarding such displacements. After doing our survey and interviews, the team across some very astounding findings which is mentioned in our research.
Prognostic nomograms to predict oncological outcome of thyroid cancers.

CONTEXT Thyroid cancers represent a conglomerate of diverse histological types with equally variable prognosis. There is no reliable prognostic model to predict the risks of relapse and death for different types of thyroid cancers. OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to build prognostic nomograms to predict individualized risks of relapse and death of thyroid cancer within 10 years of diagnosis based on patients' prognostic factors. DESIGN Competing risk subhazard models were used to develop prognostic nomograms based on the information on individual patients in a population-based thyroid cancer cohort followed up for a median period of 126 months. Analyses were conducted using R version 2.13. 2. The R packages cmprsk10, Design, and QHScrnomo were used for modeling, developing, and validating the nomograms for prediction of patients' individualized risks of relapse and death of thyroid cancer. SETTING This study was performed at CancerCare Manitoba, the sole comprehensive cancer center for a population of 1.2 million. PATIENTS Participants were a population-based cohort of 2306 consecutive thyroid cancers observed in 2296 patients in the province of Manitoba, Canada, during 1970 to 2010. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Outcomes were discrimination (concordance index) and calibration curves of nomograms. RESULTS Our cohort of 570 men and 1726 women included 2155 (93.4%) differentiated thyroid cancers. On multivariable analysis, patient's age, sex, tumor histology, T, N, and M stages, and clinically or radiologically detectable posttreatment gross residual disease were independent determinants of risk of relapse and/or death. The individualized 10-year risks of relapse and death of thyroid cancer in the nomogram were predicted by the total of the weighted scores of these determinants. The concordance indices for prediction of thyroid cancer-related deaths and relapses were 0.92 and 0.76, respectively. The calibration curves were very close to the diagonals. CONCLUSIONS We have successfully developed prognostic nomograms for thyroid cancer with excellent discrimination (concordance indices) and calibration.
South African Learners' Conceptual Understanding about Image Formation by Lenses.

The purpose of this research was to explore South African Grade 11 learners’ conceptual understanding of ‘image formation by lenses’. The participants for this study were 70 Grade 11 learners from a selected senior secondary school in Mthatha, Eastern Cape Province, South Africa. The qualitative approach employed in the study made use of a two-tier open-ended questionnaire as the data collection instrument. The study explored several alternative conceptions the learners had held in terms of the roles that the lens and the screen play in the image formation and the characteristics of the image formed when a lens with a larger diameter is used and when a portion of the lens is covered. Most of the participants could not respond correctly in the situations presented in the questionnaire. However, almost all of them were found to have adequate conceptual understanding about the role of a lens in the image formation.
An Econometric Study of Lead-Lag Relationship between Futures and Spot Markets in India

The temporal relation between stock index and index futures has been an area of interest to academicians, regulators, and practitioners alike as it gives an idea about the efficiency of the market, its volatility, and arbitrage opportunities, if any. The issue of price discovery on futures and spot markets and the lead-lag relationship are topics of interest to traders, financial economists, and analysts. Although futures and spot markets react to the same information, the major question is which market reacts first. This paper examines the lead-log relationship between futures and spot markets in India. For both available stock index futures contracts, i.e., NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex of National Stock Exchange (NSE) and Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) respectively, we employ a Bivariate GARCH model to explain price discovery of futures market over the period from July 2000 to March 2007. Empirical results confirm that futures market plays a price discovery role, implying that futures prices contain useful information about spot prices (in line with similar findings in the literature). We evidence a bidirectional lead-lag relationship between spot and futures prices in both the stock indices and this is relatively stronger in NSE Nifty than in BSE Sensex. Futures markets are more informationally efficient than underlying stock markets in India during the period 2001-7. These findings are helpful to financial managers and traders dealing with Indian stock index futures.
Improved long period fibre gratings sensing devices coated with thin films

Long period fibre gratings (LPFG) have found an increasing interest due to the easy fabrication in any kind of fibre through the induced electric arc technique with low cost and flexibility. They have been used in applications such as gain-flattening and band-rejection, and for sensing strain, temperature and chemical and biological parameters. The sensitivity of LPFG increases when the fibre is coated with certain thin films. In this short review it is presented the recent developments and applications of these kind of sensors.
Correlation between Ferumoxytol Uptake in Tumor Lesions by MRI and Response to Nanoliposomal Irinotecan in Patients with Advanced Solid Tumors: A Pilot Study

Purpose: To determine whether deposition characteristics of ferumoxytol (FMX) iron nanoparticles in tumors, identified by quantitative MRI, may predict tumor lesion response to nanoliposomal irinotecan (nal-IRI). Experimental Design: Eligible patients with previously treated solid tumors had FMX-MRI scans before and following (1, 24, and 72 hours) FMX injection. After MRI acquisition, R2* signal was used to calculate FMX levels in plasma, reference tissue, and tumor lesions by comparison with a phantom-based standard curve. Patients then received nal-IRI (70 mg/m2 free base strength) biweekly until progression. Two percutaneous core biopsies were collected from selected tumor lesions 72 hours after FMX or nal-IRI. Results: Iron particle levels were quantified by FMX-MRI in plasma, reference tissues, and tumor lesions in 13 of 15 eligible patients. On the basis of a mechanistic pharmacokinetic model, tissue permeability to FMX correlated with early FMX-MRI signals at 1 and 24 hours, while FMX tissue binding contributed at 72 hours. Higher FMX levels (ranked relative to median value of multiple evaluable lesions from 9 patients) were significantly associated with reduction in lesion size by RECIST v1.1 at early time points (P < 0.001 at 1 hour and P < 0.003 at 24 hours FMX-MRI, one-way ANOVA). No association was observed with post-FMX levels at 72 hours. Irinotecan drug levels in lesions correlated with patient's time on treatment (Spearman ρ = 0.7824; P = 0.0016). Conclusions: Correlation between FMX levels in tumor lesions and nal-IRI activity suggests that lesion permeability to FMX and subsequent tumor uptake may be a useful noninvasive and predictive biomarker for nal-IRI response in patients with solid tumors. Clin Cancer Res; 23(14); 3638–48. ©2017 AACR.