Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Max van der Stoel: A life in the service of mankind

In the steady flow of sorrowful responses to the news of the death of Max van der Stoel earlier this year, four words regularly occupied an important position: idealism, dedication, integrity and modesty. These same words describe precisely my personal experience and observations of Max during his full life in Dutch politics, as a diplomat, in senior international positions and as a Minister of State. As a result of our highly divergent careers and probably also due to our considerable age difference, in our day-to-day life, our paths crossed considerably less often than would perhaps be expected. On those occasions when it did happen, however, we generally required few words to confirm the high degree of consensus and like-mindedness between us. In the early nineteen sixties — a period when Max was already a member of the Dutch Upper Chamber and for some time had been associated with the research institute for the Dutch Labour Party (the Wiardi Beckman Stichting) based in Amsterdam’s Tesselschadestraat — I occasionally saw him walking down the road, sometimes together with Joop den Uyl, eating his lunchtime sandwich or an apple, from a plastic sandwich bag. I had recently started work nearby in the Vondelstraat, as a young policy worker of the construction union of the Dutch Trade Union Congress (NVV), and would often spend my lunchtime in the same way. In other words, as young men, we were both employed with a branch of what at the time was still known as ‘the Red Family’; the branches in question, however, were separated by a considerable gulf. Furthermore, Max was already clearly in the process of establishing a position for himself; I, on the other hand, was fresh to the job. It would be more than ten more years before my career elevated me to chairmanship of the NVV, later the FNV, and as a natural extension thereof, also of the European trade union movement. During that same period, Max occupied a number of important Cabinet positions — twice Minister and once Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs — and, as a member of the Dutch Lower and Upper Chamber established a wealth of parliamentary experience. When I first entered the Dutch Lower Chamber as an elected people’s representative, in 1986, Max had moved away from The Hague several years previously, to take up the position of Dutch ambassador to the United Nations. It was however specifically in his capacity as UN ambassador that I came to know Max more intimately. As chairman of the FNV, I was invited to join an international commission whose role was to issue proposals for the drawing up of a code of conduct for multinational companies. My work took me to New York
Effects of Antibiotics on Epithelial Ion Transport in the Rabbit Distal Colon In‐vitro

One side‐effect of the therapeutic use of antimicrobial agents is respiratory paralysis as a result of inhibition of skeletal neuromuscular transmission; cholinergic neuro‐effector motor transmission in the gastrointestinal tract is inhibited by the same classes of antimicrobial agent. Study of the effects of several classes of antibiotic compound on intestinal motility has suggested that antibiotic‐induced alterations of intestinal motility may be related to the onset of diarrhoea or the development of antibiotic‐associated colitis. These compounds may, however, also initiate or exacerbate diarrhoea by altering control of epithelial function, a possibility that has not previously been rigorously investigated. This series of experiments investigated the effect of six antibiotics on rabbit distal colonic epithelial ion transport.
Automatic QRS onset and offset detection for body surface QRS integral mapping of ventricular tachycardia

A QRS onset and offset detection algorithm has been developed for use in body surface QRS integral mapping of ventricular tachycardia. To determine QRS intervals, the algorithm uses two computed signals: the sum of the absolute values of the first derivatives of all leads and the sum of the absolute values of all leads. The second order derivative of the latter parameter is used to detect the time instants of QRS onset and offset. Using the algorithm, QRS integral maps are subsequently computed, which are correlated with a database of QRS integral maps in order to localize the site of origin of ventricular tachycardia. Comparison of the performance of the algorithm with visual evaluation by a human expert in this procedure revealed, in 95% of the cases, an identical or adjacent localization of the site of origin. <<ETX>>
Managing a Bank's Currency Inventory Under New Federal Reserve Guidelines

New currency recirculation guidelines implemented by the Federal Reserve System (Fed) of the United States are intended to reduce the overuse of its currency processing services by depository institutions (banks). These changes are expected to have a significant impact on operating policies at those depository institutions that handle large volumes of currency. We describe two business models that capture the flow of currency between a bank and the Fed; the first model captures the current operations of most banks, while the second is expected to be adapted by many banks in response to the new guidelines. Motivated by our work with Brink's, Inc., to assess the economic impact that banks will sustain from these guidelines, we present a detailed analysis that provides managers of banks with optimal strategies to manage the flow of currency to and from the Fed for a variety of cost structures and demand patterns. Given this insight into a bank's optimal behavior, the Fed can also use our analysis to fine tune its guidelines to achieve the desired goals.
Social Networks and Women Micro-Enterprise Performance: A Conceptual Framework

This study aims at examining the impact of social networks on women micro-enterprise’s performance in Malaysia. This is to compare the situation in Malaysia with other countries, as to whether scarcity of studies exist in this area, and whether similar results obtained globally could be established in Malaysia, given her multi-racial and ethnic diversity. The result of this study will help women entrepreneurs increase their business performance, enable the government assess the effectiveness of her micro-enterprise assistance programs and develop strategies to enhance the ability of women entrepreneurs to benefit from their social networks in order to improve their business performance; in line with global practice. The study uses a cross-sectional survey design, with stratified random sampling, to collect data from women entrepreneurs in Malaysia Peninsula. The study also uses t-test to determine whether the success or failure of women micro-enterprises was due to availability or lack of social networks. Therefore, it samples two groups made up of well-established women clients and nascent women clients of a microfinance bank. Descriptive statistics and hierarchical regression are data analyses methods. The study concludes that women entrepreneurs do not only need loans and skill acquisition training but also social networks to provide access to information and other resources such as professional advice and avenue for customers. It is recommended that the government should create awareness among the women about the existence and benefits of women associations and groups, especially in local areas since most of such associations are located in urban cities. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015. v6n4s3p360
Creativity in the Age of Emerging Technology: Some Issues and Perspectives in 2010

Five years ago, most research in computer science seemed to concentrate on specifying the ways a computer could support creativity in various areas of human activities such as brainstorming, creative problem solving (CPS), arts and design, to name just a few. Two contrasted approaches (generic vs. specific) were clearly represented in the literature. Some work considered technology at a rather global and generic level, attempting to propose and to establish general relationships between computer technology and how it could/should support creativity (see Shneiderman et al., 2006). These papers were usually very enthusiastic, providing a list of potential values and positive effects of information technology on developing creativity in organizations (Dewett, 2003). Alternatively, a second approach has been to advance from empirical evidence and theories related to a specific targeted activity to derive fine-grained requirements for skill-based tools (e.g., Burleson, 2005; Yamamoto & Nakakoji, 2005) and, in some work, to extract design principles to apply for designing tools that aim to foster creativity (e.g., Hewett, 2005). In this introductory, we examine the two featured papers in this issue which illustrate three evolutions of research in the field of computer support for creativity. First, collecting empirical evidence is needed to embrace different aspects of creativity with multiple methods that bridge the disciplines of computer science, human–computer interaction (HCI), ergonomics and psychology. Second, evaluation approaches are conceptualizing computers as tools and/or computers as (digital) spaces. Third, collaborative and social aspects should be also considered when studying creativity in order to get a more ecological picture of variables that practically affect creative processes as well as creative outcomes.
Impact of Industry Structure and Product Characteristics on the Structure of B2B Vertical Hubs

Business-to-business (B2B) vertical hubs are expected to play an important role in the digital economy and add value by reducing inefficiencies in industrial procurement and enabling efficient interfirm interactions and collaborations. The last few years have witnessed both a proliferation of business models underlying these hubs and the failure of many of these hubs. This study identifies key structural dimensions of vertical hubs and develops a conceptual framework to characterize vertical hubs. We draw from the industrial organization theory and the marketing literature to examine the relationship between the characteristics of the vertical hubs, those of the industries they serve, and the products transacted through the hubs. Based on data collected from 63 B2B vertical hubs, we test our hypotheses relating industry and product characteristics to the structure of vertical hubs. The results provide modest support to our theoretical proposition that the characteristics of vertical hubs are likely to be shaped by the industry and product characteristics. We interpret the results and discuss the implications of the study for research and practice.
Stability of infinite-horizon optimal control with discounted cost

We investigate the stability of general nonlinear discrete-time systems controlled by an optimal sequence of inputs that minimizes an infinite-horizon discounted cost. We first provide conditions under which a global asymptotic stability property is ensured for the corresponding undiscounted problem. We then show that this property is semiglobally and practically preserved in the discounted case, where the adjustable parameter is the discount factor. We then focus on a scenario where the stage cost is bounded and we explain how our framework applies to guarantee stability in this case. Finally, we provide sufficient conditions, including boundedness of the stage cost, under which the value function, which serves as a Lyapunov function for the analysis, is continuous. As already shown in the literature, the continuity of the Lyapunov function is crucial to ensure some nominal robustness for the closed-loop system.
Tolerance induction in memory CD4 T cells requires two rounds of antigen-specific activation

Significance Autoimmune diseases are driven by immune cells that recognize self-tissues. A major goal for treatment strategies for autoimmune diseases is to turn off or tolerize self-reactive immune cells such as CD4 T cells that coordinate tissue damage in many autoimmune diseases. Autoimmune diseases are often diagnosed many years following their onset. The self-reactive CD4 T cells that must be tolerized, therefore, are previously activated or memory CD4 T cells. Little is known about whether tolerance can be induced in memory CD4 T cells. This paper demonstrates that memory CD4 T cells survive initial exposure to tolerance-inducing signals but that a second activation signal leads to cell death. This study has important implications for immunotherapeutic strategies for autoimmune diseases. A major goal for immunotherapy is to tolerize the immune cells that coordinate tissue damage in autoimmune and alloantigen responses. CD4 T cells play a central role in many of these conditions and improved antigen-specific regulation or removal of these cells could revolutionize current treatments. A confounding factor is that little is known about whether and how tolerance is induced in memory CD4 T cells. We used MHC class II tetramers to track and analyze a population of endogenous antigen-specific memory CD4 T cells exposed to soluble peptide in the absence of adjuvant. We found that such memory T cells proliferated and reentered the memory pool apparently unperturbed by the incomplete activation signals provided by the peptide. Upon further restimulation in vivo, CD4 memory T cells that had been previously exposed to peptide proliferated, provided help to primary responding B cells, and migrated to inflamed sites. However, these reactivated memory cells failed to survive. The reduction in T-cell number was marked by low expression of the antiapoptotic molecule B cell lymphoma 2 (Bcl2) and increased expression of activated caspase molecules. Consequently, these cells failed to sustain a delayed-type hypersensitivity response. Moreover, following two separate exposures to soluble antigen, no T-cell recall response and no helper activity for B cells could be detected. These results suggest that the induction of tolerance in memory CD4 T cells is possible but that deletion and permanent removal of the antigen-specific T cells requires reactivation following exposure to the tolerogenic antigen.
Strange Talk: The Politics of Dialect Literature in Gilded Age America

Late-nineteenth-century America was crazy about dialect: vernacular varieties of American English entertained mass audiences in "local color" stories, in realist novels, and in poems and plays. But dialect was also at the heart of anxious debates about the moral degeneration of urban life, the ethnic impact of foreign immigration, the black presence in white society, and the female influence on masculine authority. Celebrations of the rustic raciness in American vernacular were undercut by fears that dialect was a force of cultural dissolution with the power to contaminate the dominant language. In this volume, Gavin Jones explores the aesthetic politics of this neglected "cult of the vernacular" in little-known regionalists such as George Washington Cable, in the canonical work of Mark Twain, Henry James, Herman Melville, and Stephen Crane, and in the ethnic writing of Abraham Cahan and Paul Laurence Dunbar. He reveals the origins of a trend that deepened in subsequent literature: the use of minority dialect to formulate a political response to racial oppression, and to enrich diverse depictions of a multicultural nation.
Benchmarking Transport Policy in an Aging Society in Ontario, Canada

In recent years, there has been a greater recognition of the transportation implications of an aging society in impacting health, quality of life and the environment so much so that policy movements for its greater recognition in government policies has been substantial in Europe and North America. This paper surveys five interrelated policy areas that directly and indirectly affect elderly mobility: travel mode preference, infrastructure stock and investments, land-use-transportation linkage, research and technology and management reform. The geographic focus of the study is Ontario, the most populous province and considered the engine of economic growth of Canada. Analysis showed that demographic aging concerns are not articulated directly in Ontario? s transport policies, although these are being indirectly addressed. Moreover, while there has been a return of provincial funding support for municipal public transit after almost a decade long subsidy cut, a great deal of catching up is needed to renew, expand and make more accessible the existing transit systems as well as increase support to specialized transport services to respond to a growing and aging population.
'Political Conditionality' and Democratisation

The use of aid to impose political conditions on recipient countries, to further democratic and government reforms or to punish non‐compliance with earlier demands, is a relatively new feature of the international aid regime. This article evaluates the proliferating donor and academic literature emerging on the subject. At the heart of discussion of democracy/ governance policies are debates about transformation of the state, its relationship to economic development and the decreasing extent to which considerations of sovereignty limit donor interventions. The author argues that, while political conditionalities may assist the development of democratic movements in Africa, there is an irony in that structural adjustment risks undermining the state reforms seen to be essential to them while, equally, democratisation may challenge the processes of economic restructuring being imposed.
Criteria for screening new products in the electronic component distribution industry

Screening new industrial product ideas at the early stages of a new product development (NPD) process is a critical activity. Although making a good new product choice is vital, managers have not applied systematic screening models because these models have not been customized to reflect the particular character of their company and industry. A customized systematic procedure is proposed to manage the task of selecting potential new products for an electronic component distributor at the early stages of a NPD process. Screening criteria have been reviewed and optimized by project leaders and managers closest to the new product selection decision. The screening model has been used in a company to predict the success or failure of projects, and these predictions have been compared to the actual results from real projects. Thus, the study provides insights into the capability of the screening model and suggests further improvements to the screening process.
Comment: Tankers’ modification economics: Is there an arbitrage?

In this paper we address the following question: how much is a ship-owner willing to pay in order to convert his single-hull vessel to a double-hull vessel? Our research is motivated by a recent article in Tradewinds, according to which owners have become reluctant in scrapping their vessels by turning them into double hull from single hull. We apply a structural no-arbitrage condition for deriving and estimating ‘good-deal’ bounds.
A New Fast Method for Obtaining Flux-Linkage Characteristics of SRM

This paper proposes a new fast method to determine the entire flux-linkage characteristics of a switched reluctance machine (SRM), which are critical for performance estimation and advanced control of the machine. The proposed method mainly consists of two steps, namely, measuring and calculating. In the measuring step, the flux-linkage characteristics of the SRM are measured at four specific rotor positions by a new indirect method without rotor clamping devices and position sensors. The magnetic coupling among phases is considered to improve the accuracy of measurement. In the calculating step, based on the measured results, the analytical expression of the flux-linkage characteristics is proposed, which only needs a few coefficients. With the expression, the flux-linkage characteristics at any rotor position can be calculated. The entire flux-linkage characteristics of a 1-kW three-phase 12/8-pole SRM obtained by the proposed method and traditional rotor clamping method are compared, and a good agreement can be found, which verifies the feasibility and accuracy of the proposed method. Furthermore, with the entire flux-linkage characteristics calculated by the proposed analytical method, the dynamic performances of the SRM prototype under both motoring and generating modes are simulated and compared with those from other methods and experiments, which further verify the accuracy of the proposed method.
The wave expansion approach to broadcasting in multihop radio networks

An algorithm for efficient communication between neighbours in multihop radio networks is proposed. The algorithm guarantees a bound on the transmission efficiency in a radio channel for arbitrary topology. The algorithm can be embedded in protocols for solving basic network problems such as broadcast, multicast, leader election, or finding shortest paths. The problem of bounded-time broadcasting utilizing the proposed algorithm is addressed. A polynomial solution in which the process of spreading information over the network is viewed as the expansion of a wave caused by a point of disturbance is presented. The broadcast originates at a source node and is accomplished in repeated transmission periods, emulating a wave progressing away from the source. The algorithm is used to select a subset of potential transmitters in each period, so that a tightly bound proportion of potential receivers receive the transmission without collisions, guaranteeing a high level of spatial reuse in the broadcast process. >
Global effects of the small RNA biogenesis machinery on the Arabidopsis thaliana transcriptome

In Arabidopsis thaliana, four different dicer-like (DCL) proteins have distinct but partially overlapping functions in the biogenesis of microRNAs (miRNAs) and siRNAs from longer, noncoding precursor RNAs. To analyze the impact of different components of the small RNA biogenesis machinery on the transcriptome, we subjected dcl and other mutants impaired in small RNA biogenesis to whole-genome tiling array analysis. We compared both protein-coding genes and noncoding transcripts, including most pri-miRNAs, in two tissues and several stress conditions. Our analysis revealed a surprising number of common targets in dcl1 and dcl2 dcl3 dcl4 triple mutants. Furthermore, our results suggest that the DCL1 is not only involved in miRNA action but also contributes to silencing of a subset of transposons, apparently through an effect on DNA methylation.
Active learning method for external Q computation

The external quality factor (Qext) of a resonator which represents the strength of the electromagnetic coupling between the resonant mode and the transmission mode of the feed line is an important parameter for designing microwave filters. Analytical computation of Qext needs exact determination of the field distribution around the coupling port. But the complexities of input/output ports in microwave/millimeter wave filters make this procedure completely complicated. In the case of some special resonators such as microstrip open loop resonators, lack of analytical solution for field distribution increases this complexity and results in time consuming full wave simulations. This paper proposes the use of active learning method (ALM) with ink drop spread (IDS) engine in computation of external quality factor of microstrip triangular open loop resonators (TOLR) in a vanishingly short time while keeping the accuracy. Using ALM based extracted Qext in the case of TOLR, a four pole chebychev bandpass filter was designed and fabricated. Very good agreement between the desired characteristics of the filter and the fabricated response shows the accuracy of the proposed approach.