Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Heritability of plasma amyloid β in typical late‐onset Alzheimer’s disease pedigrees

Plasma amyloid β42 peptide (Aβ42) levels are significantly elevated in all genetic forms of early‐onset Alzheimer’s disease caused by familial Alzheimer’s disease mutations or Down’s syndrome. Moreover, recent studies have determined that both plasma Aβ42 and Aβ40 levels are significantly elevated in late‐onset Alzheimer’s disease (LOAD) patients, their cognitively normal first‐degree relatives, and members of typical LOAD families when compared to appropriate controls. To determine the magnitude of the genetic component affecting plasma Aβ levels, we estimated the heritability of plasma Aβ42 and Aβ40 in 15 extended, multigenerational LOAD pedigrees, using a variance components method. Heritability estimates as high as 73 and 54% were found for plasma Aβ42 and Aβ40 levels, respectively. Inclusion of the ApoE ϵ4 dosage as a covariate was not found to have a significant effect on the heritability of these traits. These results suggest that genetic determinants other than ApoE account for a very substantial percentage of the phenotypic variance in plasma Aβ levels. The high heritability and the significant elevation of these traits in LOAD pedigrees suggest that at least some of the genetic determinants of plasma Aβ levels may lead to elevated Aβ and LOAD in these families. Thus, we suggest that plasma Aβ levels are quantitative traits that may be excellent surrogate markers for use in linkage analysis to identify loci that are important in typical LOAD. Genet. Epidemiol. 21:19–30, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
The Relationship Between Body Iron Status, Iron Intake And Gestational Diabetes

AbstractBiological and epidemiological evidence have found that gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) may be correlated with body iron status and dietary iron intake. Therefore, we investigated the relationship between dietary iron intake and body iron status and GDM risk.We conducted a systematic search in Embase, PubMed, Web of Science, and Cochrane Library up to April 2015. Prospective cohort studies or case-control studies which appraised the relationship between body iron status, dietary iron intake, and GDM risk were included. Relative risks (RRs), standard mean difference (SMD), and 95% confidence intervals [CIs] were used to measure the pooled data.A total of 8 prospective cohort studies and 7 case-control studies were in accordance with inclusive criteria, and 14 studies were included in meta-analysis. The overall RR comparing the highest and lowest levels of serum ferritin was 3.22 (95% CI: 1.73–6.00) for prospective cohort studies. Serum ferritin of GDM group is markedly higher than that of control (0.88 ng/mL; 95% CI: 0.40–1.35 ng/mL) for case-control studies. The comparison between the highest and the lowest serum ferritin levels and dietary total iron levels revealed pooled RRs of 1.53 (95% CI: 1.17–2.00) and 1.01 (95% CI: 1.00–1.01) for prospective cohort studies, respectively. The combined SMD comparing serum transferrin levels of cases and controls was −0.02 &mgr;mol/L (95% CI: −0.22 to 0.19 &mgr;mol/L) for case-control studies.Increased higher ferritin levels were significantly correlated with higher risk of GDM, and higher heme iron levels may be correlated with higher risk of GDM; however, the present conclusion did not constitute definitive proof that dietary total iron or serum transferrin have relation to GDM.
Medical Management of Crohn’s Disease: Treatment Algorithms 2009

There has been a continual evolution of therapy for Crohn’s disease (CD) over the past decade since the introduction of biological therapies targeting tumor necrosis factor-α. Conventional agents continue to be safe and effective for patients with mild to moderately active CD and, in population series, less than half of the patients with CD require corticosteroid therapy. In contrast, patients presenting at young ages, those with extensive disease, deep ulcerations, transmural complications or extraintestinal complications that require corticosteroid therapy have a poor prognosis. Introduction of immunosuppressives late in the course or for patients with steroid-dependent or steroid-refractory disease have not changed the ‘natural history’ of CD or the need for eventual surgical resections. There is increasing evidence that early intervention with immunosuppressives or biologic agents at the same time as corticosteroids, or biologic agents targeting tumor necrosis factor or adhesion molecules, can have rapid and prolonged benefits, including steroid sparing, reductions in hospitalizations and, perhaps, reductions in the need for surgery. Treatment should be optimized according to the patient status and response with whichever level of therapy is introduced and maintained.
Actions of Mycobacterium sp. Strain AP1 on the Saturated- and Aromatic-Hydrocarbon Fractions of Fuel Oil in a Marine Medium

ABSTRACT The pyrene-degrading Mycobacterium sp. strain AP1 grew in nutrient-supplemented artificial seawater with a heavy fuel oil as the sole carbon source, causing the complete removal of all linear (C12 to C40) and branched alkanes from the aliphatic fraction, as well as an extensive degradation of the three- and four-ring polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) phenanthrene (95%), anthracene (80%), fluoranthene (80%), pyrene (75%), and benzo(a)anthracene (30%). Alkylated PAHs, which are more abundant in crude oils than the nonsubstituted compounds, were selectively attacked at extents that varied from more than 90% for dimethylnaphthalenes, methylphenanthrenes, methylfluorenes, and methyldibenzothiophenes to about 30% for monomethylated fluoranthenes/pyrenes and trimethylated phenanthrenes and dibenzothiophenes. Identification of key metabolites indicated the utilization of phenanthrene, pyrene, and fluoranthene by known assimilatory metabolic routes, while other components were cooxidized. Detection of mono- and dimethylated phthalic acids demonstrated ring cleavage and further oxidation of alkyl PAHs. The extensive degradation of the alkanes, the two-, three-, and four-ring PAHs, and their 1-, 2-, and 3-methyl derivatives from a complex mixture of hydrocarbons by Mycobacterium sp. strain AP1 illustrates the great substrate versatility of alkane- and PAH-degrading mycobacteria.
Development of effective marketing strategies for a housing equipment company based on analysis of sales data and sales personnel

A housing equipment company under consideration has a variety of products such as sash windows, bath modules, toilets, and bathroom sinks. The company also provides construction and maintenance services through a network of partner building companies. It typically takes a few months to establish an order since the initial contact to a client and another few months before the construction for the order actually takes place. Because of this, the company often suffers from losing orders. One client may buy only one product or a combination of products at a time. Since sales channels for different products are not necessarily the same, multiple sales persons from different sales offices may approach the same client without realizing it. In order to eliminate such unnecessary complications, it is important to develop effective marketing strategies for coordinating sales personnel better. The purpose of this paper is to achieve this goal by analyzing sales data and sales personnel. More specifically, by identifying the characteristics of profitable clients and those of clients who are likely to cancel orders, we provide a basis to establish recommendation rules concerning how combinations of products might be sold to one client and how sales personnel should be assigned to that client. Keywords—Marketing Strategy, Statistical Analysis, Sales Data, Combination of Products, Characteristics of Clients
What's in a Name? The Valuation Effect of Directors' Sharing of Surnames

Abstract Using surname sharing as a novel measure of social ties, we examine the effect of directors’ surname sharing on firm value. We find that boards with greater surname homogeneity are associated with lower firm value. This finding is not driven by familial ties. The negative effect of surname sharing on firm value is more pronounced when directors share rare surnames and when firms operate in regions with stronger clan systems, but is attenuated by stronger corporate governance mechanisms. The market reacts positively to plausibly exogenous director resignations that reduce director surname sharing, and negatively to board appointments that increase director surname sharing. Director surname sharing lowers firm value by reducing director dissension, granting excess executive compensation, and increasing related-party transactions. Overall, our results suggest that directors’ surname sharing, an easy-to-trace but previously neglected social tie, can have significant economic consequences.
Forecasting Corporate Business Failure with an Innovative Model: An Application on UK Construction Companies

This research focuses on developing a bankruptcy prediction model in the UK construction industry. It fills the gap of previous researches which did not focus on the construction industry and in the UK. The aim of this research is to establish accurate model which successfully classify firms into their respective financial status of failed and non-failed. This research analyses financial variable extracted from FAME database by Bureau Van Dijk for the development of bankruptcy prediction model. Ranging from SIC trade codes of 41100 (Development of building projects), 41 (Construction of buildings), 42(Civil Engineering), 43 (Specialised construction activities), 68 (Real estate activities), and 71(Architectural and engineering activities and related technical consultancy). Then the model is tested against the collected sample and compared with two other Z-score model. These models have an average accuracy of 80%. The model with the strongest predictive power (SIC 42) correctly predicts 93.2% (non-bankrupt) and 90.9% (bankrupt) while the weakest model (SIC 68) classify 51.2% (non-bankrupt) and 70% (bankrupt) correctly into their respective group. The developed model is far superior in classifying firms into their financial status when compared to the other two prediction models. Furthermore, the established model is robust enough that it has an average classification accuracy over the years of 70%. A practical case study is conducted utilising the developed Z-score model and ratio analysis. Macroeconomic variable is then analysed where long term interest rate, inflation, 3 months’ treasury bills has a negative impact on the firms Z-score. However, construction output and gilt repo interest rate has a positive relationship to the Z-score of companies. The estimate of covariance is also seen to build up from the year 2006 which acts as a warning sign that a financial crisis is emerging. This result point towards the fact that both macroeconomics and microeconomics contributes significantly to business failure. The developed bankruptcy prediction model serves as a warning sign for management to pay attention to. As firms enter the “grey zone”, management should act to save firms from defaulting. Ultimately, this model is applicable widely for other industry of world economies.
On the assimilation of Ku-band scatterometer winds for weather analysis and forecasting

Following the successful assimilation of European remote sensing satellite (ERS) scatterometer winds for weather analysis and forecasting, the authors further develop this methodology for the assimilation of the NASA scatterometer (NSCAT) and QuikSCAT Ku-band scatterometer data. Besides retrieval problems in cases of a confused sea state, the quality control (QC) developed identifies cases with rain on a wind vector cell (WVC) by WVC basis. The elimination of such geophysical conditions is a prerequisite to arrive at a successful assimilation of Ku-band scatterometer data. Moreover, the authors propose to assimilate ambiguous winds rather than radar backscatter measurements, as is being done at most meteorological centers assimilating ERS scatterometer data. After their quality assessment, NSCAT winds still have more difficult ambiguity removal properties than ERS winds. A further testing of the data assimilation method proposed is being carried out at the European Center for Medium-range Weather Forecasts in NSCAT impact experiments. A normalized wind inversion residual is used for QC. In order to determine a threshold for the rejection of poor quality wind solutions, the inversion residual and the wind vector departure from the ECMWF model are correlated. They end up rejecting around 7.4% of wind vector solutions and 4.2% of the NSCAT WVCs. In order to perform a qualitative assessment of this rejection, comparisons to collocated SSM/I rain and ECMWF winds are used. Confused sea state and presence of rain seem to be the most likely causes for the rejection of WVCs.
High- ${Q}$  Inductors Utilizing Thick Metals and Dense-Tapered Spirals

Ultra-thick metals are known to be counter productive for quality factor (Q) improvement at high frequencies in multiturn inductors. From the experimental results, assisted by electromagnetic simulations, it is first shown that Q improvement with ultra-thick metals can be pushed to higher frequencies using variable width and spaced (tapered) spirals. Furthermore, it is also shown that the extent of tapering is proportional to the metal thickness for the highest performance. Second, dense-tapered layouts are shown to be good candidates for higher Q rather than hollow ones for a given inductance density.
Contribution of gut bacteria to the metabolism of the spleen tyrosine kinase (Syk) inhibitor R406 in cynomolgus monkey

The spleen tyrosine kinase (Syk) inhibitor R406 is orally administered as the prodrug R788. Following administration of R788 (12.5 mg kg−1, 20 µCi kg−1 14C-R788) to intact and bile duct-cannulated cynomolgus monkeys, drug-related radioactivity was rapidly observed in plasma. No R788 was observed in plasma, while R406 was the major radioactive peak observed at all time points. Only low levels of metabolites were observed in plasma. The half-life for plasma radioactivity was 2.0–2.8 h. The majority (68.9%) of drug-related radioactivity was eliminated into bile. No intact R406 was observed in excreta. Biliary and urinary metabolites consisted of glucuronide and sulfate conjugates of the para-O-demethylated metabolite of R406 (R529), and a direct N-glucuronide of R406. The major metabolite in faeces from intact and bile duct-cannulated monkeys was a unique 3,5-benzene diol metabolite of R406. This metabolite was formed following the sequential O-demethylation and para-dehydroxylation of R529 by anaerobic gut bacteria.
Neonatal neutropenia due to maternal isoimmunization.

A family is reported with multiple cases of neonatal neutropenia. The first child died of severe infection, the second was asymptomatic, the third and the fourth children had a benign course of agranulocytosis which lasted about 10 weeks and was followed by spontaneous recovery. A potent leukoagglutinin was found in the maternal serum which agglutinated leukocytes obtained from the father and all three available children but failed to agglutinate the mother’s own cells. Identical leukoagglutinin was found in the last baby’s serum; it disappeared after the baby recovered. The disorder is tentatively named "isoimmune neonatal neutropenia" and is considered to represent a condition analogous to erythroblastosis fetalis.
Phonon softening in Ni-Mn-Ga alloys

The TA2 phonon dispersion curves of Ni-Mn-Ga alloys with different compositions which transform to different martensitic structures have been measured over a broad temperature range covering both paramagnetic and ferromagnetic phases. The branches show an anomaly ~dip! at a wave number that depends on the particular martensitic structure, and there is softening of these anomalous phonons with decreasing temperature. This softening is enhanced below the Curie point, as a consequence of spin-phonon coupling. This effect is stronger for systems with higher electronic concentration.
Nonoptimal Edges for the Symmetric Traveling Salesman Problem

For the symmetric traveling salesman problem, we identify a set of undirected edges that can be eliminated while still retaining at least one optimal solution of the problem. The simple identification rules are based on the fact that a solution can be optimal only if it is 2-optimal. The rules are less stringent than those formulated for nonoptimal arcs directed, applied to the symmetric case. So, in general, they identify more nonoptimal edges. Application of the theory in a 1-tree based traveling salesman algorithm roughly halves the average computation time for Euclidean problems. We indicate to what extent the theorems presented here can be adapted for variants of the traveling salesman problem.
Non-optimality of constant radii in high dimensional continuum percolation

Consider a Boolean model $\Sigma$ in $\R^d$. The centers are given by a homogeneous Poisson point process with intensity $\lambda$ and the radii of distinct balls are i.i. d. \ with common distribution $\nu$. The critical covered volume is the proportion of space covered by $\Sigma$ when the intensity $\lambda$ is critical for percolation. Previous numerical simulations and heuristic arguments suggest that the critical covered volume may be minimal when $\nu$ is a Dirac measure. In this paper, we prove that it is not the case in sufficiently high dimension.
Public–private partnerships and beyond: Potential for innovation and sustainable development

In recent years, public–private partnerships (PPPs) have become widespread for the creation of public–private investments in various sectors, ranging from construction to transport infrastructure and culture (Grimsey and Lewis, 2007; Hodge et al., 2010; Kort et al., 2016; Reeves, 2013; Regan et al., 2011; Roberts and Siemiatycki, 2015; Siemiatycki, 2015). In many countries, their use has been encouraged in order to facilitate the growth of innovation and development processes in times of crisis and public budget constraints (Roumboutsos and Saussier, 2014). In Europe, for example, a recent EU directive concludes a path of reform started in the first half of the 2000s, which had simplified the regulatory framework imposed upon the procurement of public works (Directive 2014/24/ EU). In addition, with the Smart Specialization strategies, the European Union encourages member states to use the old procurement tools in a new sense (smart procurement), emphasizing the role that public demand can play in supporting the development of sustainable innovations (Edler and Georghiou, 2007; Edquist and Zabala-Iturriagagoitia, 2012; Edquist et al., 2015; Foray et al., 2012). The new measures fit within a broader collaborative framework and/or network-based approach to public policies (Klijn and Koppenjan, 2000, 2016). A particular feature of the policies that are developed within the collaborative framework is that the role of the policymaker – both at national and at regional level – is not simply to provide funds, issue call for tenders and select the best projects. Policy-makers are required to exercise a strategic action
PCA IP-core for gas applications on the heterogenous zynq platform

Principal component analysis (PCA) is a commonly used technique for data reduction in general as well as for dimensionality reduction in gas identification systems when a sensor array is being used. This paper presents the design and implementation of a complete PCA IP core for gas application on the Zynq programmable system on chip (SoC). All steps of PCA starting from the mean computation to the projection of data onto the new space, passing by the normalization process, covariance matrix and the eigenvectors computation are developed in C and synthesized using the new Xilinx VIVADO high level synthesis (HLS). The Jacobi method is used to find the eigenvectors and different approaches for the implementation of the PCA core on the heterogeneous Zynq platform are proposed. The hardware implementation of the presented PCA algorithm for a 16 × 30 matrix is faster than the software one with a speed up of 1.41 times when executed on a desktop running a 64-bit Intel i7-3770 processor at 3.40GHz. It was achieved using an average of 23% of all resources.
A comparison of lumped-based tunable matching networks for dynamically-load-modulated power amplifiers

The power-added-efficiency of power amplifiers deteriorates rapidly as the input power drops. The efficiency at power back-off can be improved by modulating the load dynamically with a tunable matching network. In this work, a novel design method is presented in which the dynamic range of the tunable matching network is plotted on top of the required dynamic load. A comparison between conventional topologies has been performed, and the optimal network is chosen based on its dynamic range and the tunability of its capacitors. As proof of concept, an amplifier has been fabricated and tested achieving a maximum efficiency of 60% and an improvement of 9% with 6 dB of power back-off. The proposed method is useful in designing and optimizing tunable matching networks.
Comparing sentiment expression in movie reviews from four online genres

Purpose – This paper aims to investigate the characteristics and differences in sentiment expression in movie review documents from four online opinion genres – blog postings, discussion board threads, user reviews, and critic reviews.Design/methodology/approach – A collection of movie review documents was harvested from the four types of web sources, and a sample of 520 movie reviews were analysed to compare the content and textual characteristics across the four genres. The analysis focused on document and sentence length, part‐of‐speech distribution, vocabulary, aspects of movies discussed, star ratings used and multimedia content in the reviews. The study also identified frequently occurring positive and negative terms in the different genres, as well as the pattern of responses in discussion threads.Findings – Critic reviews and blog postings are longer than user reviews and discussion threads, and contain longer sentences. Critic reviews and blogs contain more nouns and prepositions, whereas discuss.
A high performance data-path to accelerate DSP kernels

In this paper, a high-performance data-path for accelerating DSP kernels is proposed. The data-path is based on a flexible, universal, and regular component that allows one to optimally exploiting both inter- and intra-component chaining of operations. The component is implemented as a combinational circuit and the steering logic existing inside the component allows one to easily realizing any desirable complex hardware unit - called a template - so that the data-path's performance benefits from the chaining of operations. Due to the universal structure of the component, the synthesis of an application is accomplished by unsophisticated, yet efficient, algorithms. An average reduction of 20% in latency is achieved when a comparison with a template-based data-path is performed.
Semi-blind source separation for convolutive mixtures based on frequency invariant transformation

A novel method for separation of a class of convolutive mixtures is proposed, in which the received sensor signals are first transformed into instantaneous mixtures and then standard blind source separation (BSS) algorithms for instantaneous mixtures are applied. Since partial information about the mixing mechanism is required in the design of the transformation, the proposed method is strictly speaking semi-blind. From the beamforming viewpoint, the proposed approach represents a blind broadband beamforming method. As the separation is performed in fullband and only one separation is needed, the permutation problem associated with the frequency-domain BSS is avoided and the separation can be easily implemented online. Simulation results verify the usefulness of the proposed method.