Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Essays on social learning, cooperation, asset markets and human capital

• This work is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights, which are retained by the thesis author, unless otherwise stated. • A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge. • This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the author. • The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the author. • When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given. 2014 ii To my family, It would have been impossible without you.
Using Random Parameters to Account for Heterogeneous Preferences in Contingent Valuation of Public Open Space

To test for preference heterogeneity in dichotomous choice contingent valuation responses, a random parameter logit (RPL) specification is used in this analysis. The RPL model confirms heterogeneity in respondents' preferences for protection of public open space, as reflected in statistically significant standard deviations of the normally distributed random parameters. Results show that while the majority of respondents indicate a positive willingness to pay (WTP), a minority of those surveyed report a negative WTP. Some of this variation in tastes remains even after individual characteristics and attitudinal variables are included in the model.
Climate Policy And Petroleum Depletion

This paper extends the Nordhaus DICE model to include the demands for coal, oil, and natural gas. These demands depend on own price, prices of substitute fuels, per capita income, and population. An augmented Hotelling model captures the effect of depleting oil resources. A methodological advantage of including price, income, and population sensitive energy demand functions is that it allows substitution possibilities in the 'production' of emissions. Furthermore, it allows the analysis of energy tax regimes in an environment of growing world population and income, non-decreasing energy and carbon intensity, and declining petroleum availability.
Distributed Incremental Quantization and Estimation for Wireless Sensor Networks

This paper proposes a distributed incremental quantization and estimation scheme by which each sensor can make a maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) of the unknown parameter based on its local observations and the quantized messages transmitted by the previous sensor. We derive the upper bound of the estimation mean squared error (MSE) of the proposed scheme, and propose the bit allocation algorithms, which minimize the total required bandwidth while ensuring a given MSE performance. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme requires much less bandwidth, but achieves around 40% MSE reduction compared with the distributed adaptive quantization and estimation scheme.
Fetal alcohol spectrum disorder: Canadian guidelines for diagnosis

THE DIAGNOSIS OF FETAL ALCOHOL SPECTRUM DISORDER (FASD) is complex and guidelines are warranted. A subcommittee of the Public Health Agency of Canada's National Advisory Committee on Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder reviewed, analysed and integrated current approaches to diagnosis to reach agreement on a standard in Canada. The purpose of this paper is to review and clarify the use of current diagnostic systems and make recommendations on their application for diagnosis of FASD-related disabilities in people of all ages. The guidelines are based on widespread consultation of expert practitioners and partners in the field. The guidelines have been organized into 7 categories: screening and referral; the physical examination and differential diagnosis; the neurobehavioural assessment; and treatment and follow-up; maternal alcohol history in pregnancy; diagnostic criteria for fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS), partial FAS and alcohol-related neurodevelopmental disorder; and harmonization of Institute of Medicine and 4-Digit Diagnostic Code approaches. The diagnosis requires a comprehensive history and physical and neurobehavioural assessments; a multidisciplinary approach is necessary. These are the first Canadian guidelines for the diagnosis of FAS and its related disabilities, developed by broad-based consultation among experts in diagnosis.
Community-Based Innovation Contests: Where Competition Meets Cooperation

While the principle of competition has long been found to be conducive to innovation, community-based innovation contests additionally offer the possibilities of interaction and cooperation among participants. This duality makes innovation contests an interesting field for both academia and practice. However, a surge in practical implementations stands in contrast to a still restricted body of academic knowledge in the field. To close this gap, drawing on a boundary spanning perspective, we examine if and how cooperation in the competitive setting of innovation contests leads to innovativeness. Cooperative orientation of contest participants is explored within a community-based innovation contest run in 2009 at one of the largest universities in Germany. We analyse a complete set of data collected during the contest, data from a follow-up survey among individual participants (n = 943), as well as video and audio footage from four focus groups. Findings suggest that a very high as well as a very low degree of cooperative orientation result in a high degree of innovativeness, while a medium degree of cooperative orientation results in a low degree of innovativeness. Additionally, this research extends the concept of boundary spanning by identifying two subtypes: proactive and reactive boundary spanning.
Analysis of iodinated contrast delivered during thermal ablation: is material trapped in the ablation zone?

Intra-procedural contrast-enhanced CT (CECT) has been proposed to evaluate treatment efficacy of thermal ablation. We hypothesized that contrast material delivered concurrently with thermal ablation may become trapped in the ablation zone, and set out to determine whether such an effect would impact ablation visualization. CECT images were acquired during microwave ablation in normal porcine liver with: (A) normal blood perfusion and no iodinated contrast, (B) normal perfusion and iodinated contrast infusion or (C) no blood perfusion and residual iodinated contrast. Changes in CT attenuation were analyzed from before, during and after ablation to evaluate whether contrast was trapped inside of the ablation zone. Visualization was compared between groups using post-ablation contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR). Attenuation gradients were calculated at the ablation boundary and background to quantitate ablation conspicuity. In Group A, attenuation decreased during ablation due to thermal expansion of tissue water and water vaporization. The ablation zone was difficult to visualize (CNR = 1.57 ± 0.73, boundary gradient = 0.7 ± 0.4 HU mm−1), leading to ablation diameter underestimation compared to gross pathology. Group B ablations saw attenuation increase, suggesting that iodine was trapped inside the ablation zone. However, because the normally perfused liver increased even more, Group B ablations were more visible than Group A (CNR = 2.04 ± 0.84, boundary gradient = 6.3 ± 1.1 HU mm−1) and allowed accurate estimation of the ablation zone dimensions compared to gross pathology. Substantial water vaporization led to substantial attenuation changes in Group C, though the ablation zone boundary was not highly visible (boundary gradient = 3.9 ± 1.1 HU mm−1). Our results demonstrate that despite iodinated contrast being trapped in the ablation zone, ablation visibility was highest when contrast is delivered intra-procedurally. Therefore, CECT may be feasible for real-time thermal ablation monitoring.
Analysis and Research on Combinatorial Attack of Android Platform Applications

In recent years, scholars at home and abroad have carried out in-depth research and analysis on the combination attacks among Android platforms, but there are some deficiencies in the research results. Since inter application combination attacks involve multiple applications, joint triggering malicious behavior is more subtle than conventional malicious attacks, and a single application detection scheme is no longer applicable. Based on this, this paper presents the analysis scheme of combination attacks among applications based on analysis of privacy leak. Firstly this paper analyze risky components exist in mobile terminal applications and extract the related applications, then construct privacy leak route of related applications, to analyze composite attack applications. The results of experiment show that this scheme can validly analysis composite attack applications among mobile terminal.
Inhibition of the c-Jun N-Terminal Kinase-Mediated Mitochondrial Cell Death Pathway Restores Auditory Function in Sound-Exposed Animals

We tested and characterized the therapeutic value of round window membrane-delivered (RWM) d-JNKI-1 peptide (Bonny et al., 2001) against sound trauma-induced hearing loss. Morphological characteristics of sound-damaged hair cell nuclei labeled by Hoechst staining show that apoptosis is the predominant mode of cell death after sound trauma. Analysis of the events occurring after sound trauma demonstrates that c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK)/stress-activated protein kinase activates a mitochondrial cell death pathway (i.e., activation of Bax, release of cytochrome c, activation of procaspases, and cleavage of fodrin). Fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC)-conjugated d-JNKI-1 peptide applied onto an intact cochlear RWM diffuses through this membrane and penetrates cochlear tissues with the exception of the stria vascularis. A time sequence of fluorescence measurements demonstrates that FITC-labeled d-JNKI-1 remains in cochlear tissues for as long as 3 weeks. In addition to blocking JNK-mediated activation of a mitochondrial cell death pathway, RWM-delivered d-JNKI-1 prevents hair cell death and development of a permanent shift in hearing threshold that is caused by sound trauma in a dose-dependent manner (EC50 = 2.05 μM). The therapeutic window for protection of the cochlea from sound trauma with RWM delivery of d-JNKI-1 extended out to 12 h after sound exposure. These results show that the mitogen-activated protein kinase/JNK signaling pathway plays a crucial role in sound trauma-initiated hair cell death. Blocking this signaling pathway with RWM delivery of d-JNKI-1 may have significant therapeutic value as a therapeutic intervention to protect the human cochlea from the effects of sound trauma.
A flexible and reconfigurable 5G networking architecture based on context and content information

The need for massive content delivery is a consolidated trend in mobile communications, and will even increase for next years. Moreover, while 4G maturity and evolution is driven by video contents, next generation (5G) networks will be dominated by heterogeneous data and additional massive diffusion of Internet of Things (IoT). The current network architecture is not sufficient to cope with such traffic, which is heterogeneous in terms of latency and QoS requirements, and variable in space and time. This paper proposes architectural advances to endow the network with the necessary flexibility helping to adapt to these varying traffic needs by providing content and communication services where and when actually needed. Our functional hardware/software (HW/SW) architecture aims at influencing future system standardization and leverage the benefits of some key 5G networking enablers described in the paper. Preliminary results demonstrate the potential of these key technologies to support the evolution toward content-centric and context-aware 5G systems.
Increasing activity and thermal resistance of Bacillus gibsonii alkaline protease (BgAP) by directed evolution

Bacillus gibsonii Alkaline Protease (BgAP) is a recently reported subtilisin protease exhibiting activity and stability properties suitable for applications in laundry and dish washing detergents. However, BgAP suffers from a significant decrease of activity at low temperatures. In order to increase BgAP activity at 15°C, a directed evolution campaign based on the SeSaM random mutagenesis method was performed. An optimized microtiter plate expression system in B. subtilis was established and classical proteolytic detection methods were adapted for high throughput screening. In parallel, the libraries were screened for increased residual proteolytic activity after incubation at 58°C. Three iterative rounds of directed BgAP evolution yielded a set of BgAP variants with increased specific activity (Kcat) at 15°C and increased thermal resistance. Recombination of both sets of amino acid substitutions resulted finally in variant MF1 with a 1.5‐fold increased specific activity (15°C) and over 100 times prolonged half‐life at 60°C (224 min compared to 2 min of the WT BgAP). None of the introduced amino acid substitutions were close to the active site of BgAP. Activity‐altering amino acid substitutions were from non‐charged to non‐charged or from sterically demanding to less demanding. Thermal stability improvements were achieved by substitutions to negatively charged amino acids in loop areas of the BgAP surface which probably fostered ionic and hydrogen bonds interactions. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2013; 110: 711–720. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Predicting financial crisis happening by using data envelopment technique (a comparative study using Springate, Altman, Ohleson, Zimmesky, Shirata) in Tehran Stock Exchange

Abstract. Regarding the effects of financial vulnerability of companies for different beneficiary groups, the presentation of financial vulnerability prediction patterns has always been one of the most attractive issues in financial researches. In current prediction patterns mainly financial ratios are utilized as prediction variables. In this research the efficiency of firms has been calculated by using data envelopment analysis technique. To do so, first we designed a pattern by using this variable and to investigate the results better we tried to consider model posed by Springate, Altman, Ohleson, Zimmesky, and Shirata. Then models mentioned were ranked according to their efficiency and the results were compared with the primary ones. Thus, 21 hypotheses were devised. The statistical population for this research entailed all companies enlisted in Tehran Stock Exchange. Our statistical sample included 52 financially vulnerable companies and 52 safe ones during the time period between 2005 and 2011 and in order to categorize them into two groups we used article 141 of business rule. Results showed that the designed pattern was based on efficiency mark of financial crisis prediction capability in companies enlisted in Stock Exchange up to two years before it happens. Also results approved the improvement of prediction of vulnerable companies be applying efficiency mark to models but this improvement was not very considerable.
Molecular phylogeny and forms of photosynthesis in tribe Salsoleae (Chenopodiaceae)

Abstract While many C4 lineages have Kranz anatomy around individual veins, Salsoleae have evolved the Salsoloid Kranz anatomy where a continuous dual layer of chlorenchyma cells encloses the vascular and water‐storage tissue. With the aim of elucidating the evolution of C4 photosynthesis in Salsoleae, a broadly sampled molecular phylogeny and anatomical survey was conducted, together with biochemical, microscopic, and physiological analyses of selected photosynthetic types. From analyses of photosynthetic phenotypes, a model for evolution of this form of C4 was compared with models for evolution of Kranz anatomy around individual veins. A functionally C3 proto‐Kranz phenotype (Proto‐Kranz Sympegmoid) and intermediates with a photorespiratory pump (Kranz‐like Sympegmoid and Kranz‐like Salsoloid types) are considered crucial transitional steps towards C4 development. The molecular phylogeny provides evidence for C3 being the ancestral photosynthetic pathway but there is no phylogenetic evidence for the ancestry of C3‐C4 intermediacy with respect to C4 in Salsoleae. Traits considered advantageous in arid conditions, such as annual life form, central sclerenchyma in leaves, and reduction of surface area, evolved repeatedly in Salsoleae. The recurrent evolution of a green stem cortex taking over photosynthesis in C4 clades of Salsoleae concurrent with leaf reduction was probably favoured by the higher productivity of the C4 cycle.
Secular rise in economically valuable personality traits

Significance The secular rise in intelligence across birth cohorts is one of the most widely documented facts in psychology. This finding is important because intelligence is a key predictor of many outcomes such as education, occupation, and income. Although noncognitive skills may be equally important, there is little evidence on the long-term trends in noncognitive skills due to lack of data on consistently measured noncognitive skills of representative populations of successive cohorts. Using test score data based on an unchanged test taken by the population of Finnish military conscripts, we find steady positive trends in personality traits that are associated with high income. These trends are similar in magnitude and economic importance to the simultaneous rise in intelligence. Although trends in many physical characteristics and cognitive capabilities of modern humans are well-documented, less is known about how personality traits have evolved over time. We analyze data from a standardized personality test administered to 79% of Finnish men born between 1962 and 1976 (n = 419,523) and find steady increases in personality traits that predict higher income in later life. The magnitudes of these trends are similar to the simultaneous increase in cognitive abilities, at 0.2–0.6 SD during the 15-y window. When anchored to earnings, the change in personality traits amounts to a 12% increase. Both personality and cognitive ability have consistent associations with family background, but the trends are similar across groups defined by parental income, parental education, number of siblings, and rural/urban status. Nevertheless, much of the trends in test scores can be attributed to changes in the family background composition, namely 33% for personality and 64% for cognitive ability. These composition effects are mostly due to improvements in parents’ education. We conclude that there is a “Flynn effect” for personality that mirrors the original Flynn effect for cognitive ability in magnitude and practical significance but is less driven by compositional changes in family background.
Inter-Organizational Collaboration as a Source of Innovation in Public Management

Innovations in public management tend to be defined as creative ideas put into practice; of management seeking to resolving persistent problems faced while pursuing the public interest. Interorganizational collaboration fuelling the effective accomplishment of ventures launched within organizations is regarded as one of the methods for creating and implementing innovations. Therefore, the overarching objective of this paper is to investigate the correlations between interorganizational collaboration and creation of organizational innovations. The paper was drawn from literature studies and empirical research. It gives an insight into requirements for inter-organizational collaboration in public management with an emphasis on creating innovations. Furthermore, the innovative process in public management was illustrated as well as innovative inter-organizational collaboration was defined as creating cutting-edge ideas, concepts and methods for untangling specific problems underlying management by numerous organizations through their engagement in common enterprises and consolidation of resources, knowledge and ingenuity. Overall, this collaboration takes into account organizational and legal requirements and relies on previous positive relationships and capabilities enjoyed by individual organizations to build and advance rapports with other organizations. Literature studies were partly illustrated with empirical findings from research conducted in 2010 in commune offices located in the south of Poland (in the Malopolskie province). Surveys carried out led to affirming that though the needs and benefits in terms of creation of innovations as part of inter-organizational collaboration in public management attained visibility and recognition, though common practice within local government units fails to reaffirm this. Different replies to the implementation gaps of inter-organizational collaboration have been rendered, but there was no conclusive answer about how to achieve implementation.
Aboriginal Disadvantage in Major Cities of New South Wales: Evidence for Holistic Policy Approaches

type="main" xml:lang="en"> Aboriginal Australians experience disadvantage relative to other Australians across multiple socioeconomic indicators. Whilst Aboriginal disadvantage occurs across the nation, its characteristics may differ between locations. This article presents the first econometric analysis of Aboriginal disadvantage in major cities of New South Wales. The analysis is based on a multiple indicator framework devised by the Productivity Commission, populated with data from the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Survey of 2002. The results demonstrate the key drivers and interdependence of various indicators of Aboriginal disadvantage. This supports holistic approaches to improving Aboriginal welfare, rather than focusing on individual policy areas in isolation.
Efficiency map prediction of flux switching machine

The foremost requirement of todays electric vehicle is comfort and power. The challenge that todays electric motor designer face is to have a large traction torque at low speed and wide constant power speed range. Flux switching machine has magnets parallel to stator winding that avoids the risk of demagnetisation because of better thermal cooling. Efficiency map of such machines can be determined efficiently from the response surface method using control algorithm, optimisation and finite element analysis.
The influence of linguistic and cognitive factors on the time course of verb-based implicit causality

In three eye-tracking experiments the influence of the Dutch causal connective “want” (because) and the working memory capacity of readers on the usage of verb-based implicit causality was examined. Experiments 1 and 2 showed that although a causal connective is not required to activate implicit causality information during reading, effects of implicit causality surfaced more rapidly and were more pronounced when a connective was present in the discourse than when it was absent. In addition, Experiment 3 revealed that—in contrast to previous claims—the activation of implicit causality is not a resource-consuming mental operation. Moreover, readers with higher and lower working memory capacities behaved differently in a dual-task situation. Higher span readers were more likely to use implicit causality when they had all their working memory resources at their disposal. Lower span readers showed the opposite pattern as they were more likely to use the implicit causality cue in the case of an additional working memory load. The results emphasize that both linguistic and cognitive factors mediate the impact of implicit causality on text comprehension. The implications of these results are discussed in terms of the ongoing controversies in the literature—that is, the focusing-integration debate and the debates on the source of implicit causality.