Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Reproductive and competitive radial basis function networks adaptable to dynamical environments

The radial basis function network is a suitable neural network for the function approximation problem and for pattern recognition. The radial basis function network has the ability to perform local learning at each neuron, making it superior to multilayer neural networks. But the number of neurons required in order for the radial basis function network to approximate an unknown nonlinear function is not clear in advance, a fact that leads to delay and overfitting of learning. We initially proposed a competitive radial basis function network to solve these problems. The proposed competitive radial basis function network can learn effectively by means of a synapse plasticity equation that takes account of competition among the synapse weights. The competitive radial basis function network has the ability to remove redundant radial basis functions, but it cannot add necessary radial basis functions. In this paper we therefore propose an effective method for the addition of necessary neurons based on an investigation of the synapse plasticity equation. In this method, the newly added radial basis function takes over some properties of the radial basis functions that have been acquired when the learning converges. We then propose a reproductive and competitive radial basis function network, which is a neural network combining this method and the competitive radial basis function network. Simulations show that the reproductive and competitive radial basis function network can decrease the sum of the squared errors effectively in application to the function approximation problem. Our model proves able to learn faster than the usual radial basis function network. © 2000 Scripta Technica, Syst Comp Jpn, 31(13): 6575, 2000
Education for All: The Future of Education and Training for 14-19 Year-Olds

1. Introduction: Why a Review? 2. Aims and Values 3. Context 4. Measuring System Performance 5. Learning 6. Teaching 7. Curriculum Framework for the 21st Century 8. From Qualification Reform to a Framework for Learning 9. Employers and the Labour Market 10. Progression to Higher Education 11. Insitutional Arrangements and the Wider Governance Landscape 12. Policy and Policy Making in 14-19 Education and Training 13. Conclusions and Recommendations
Information technology and sustained competitive advantage: a resource-based analysis

The concept of IT as a powerful competitive weapon has been strongly emphasized in the literature, yet the sustainability of the competitive advantage provided by IT applications is not well-explained. This work discusses the resource-based theory as a means of analyzing sustainability and develops a model founded on this resource-based view of the firm. This model is then applied to four attributes of IT -- capital requirements, proprietary technology, technical IT skills, and managerial IT skills -- which might be sources of sustained competitive advantage. From this resource-based analysis, we conclude that managerial IT skills is the only one of these attributes that can provide sustainability.
Damage of the outer membrane of enteric gram-negative bacteria by lactoferrin and transferrin

Many studies have shown that lactoferrin and transferrin have antimicrobial activity against gram-negative bacteria, but a mechanism of action has not been defined. We hypothesized that the iron-binding proteins could affect the gram-negative outer membrane in a manner similar to that of the chelator EDTA. The ability of lactoferrin and transferrin to release radiolabeled lipopolysaccharide (LPS) from a UDP-galactose epimerase-deficient Escherichia coli mutant and from wild-type Salmonella typhimurium strains was tested. Initial studies in barbital-acetate buffer showed that EDTA and lactoferrin cause significant release of LPS from all three strains. Further studies found that LPS release was blocked by iron saturation of lactoferrin, occurred between pH 6 and 7.5, was comparable for bacterial concentrations from 10(4) to 10(7) CFU/ml, and increased with increasing lactoferrin concentrations. Studies using Hanks balanced salt solution lacking calcium and magnesium showed that transferrin also could cause LPS release. Additionally, both lactoferrin and transferrin increased the antibacterial effect of a subinhibitory concentration of rifampin, a drug excluded by the bacterial outer membrane. This work demonstrates that these iron-binding proteins damage the gram-negative outer membrane and alter bacterial outer membrane permeability.
Training and development in the UK context: an emerging polarisation?

This paper aims to highlight the main debates in the field of skill development in a UK context. We begin with an examination of the economic and labour market conditions and their potential implications for skill development. The supply of training and development is examined through a critique of policy developments in both initial and continuing education and training. Original survey data are used in combination with national statistical sources and other survey findings to present a picture of human resource development activity within organisations. In conclusion the paper considers the implications of national policy and economic and labour market conditions for the state, employers and the individual.
Negotiated Municipal Bond Underwritings: Implications for Efficiency: A Note

Recent empirical research has demonstrated that increased bidder competition lowers borrowing costs for issuers of municipal bonds [4, 5, 7, 12, 13, 14]. Consequently, the accepted position of many economists is that new issues should be offered by competitive bid. However, this conclusion is unwarranted in the case of lower-quality bonds receiving only one or two bids. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the economic consequences of municipalities selling bonds by negotiation. More specifically, it investigates the hypothesis that in instances when issuers face relatively high demand uncertainty for their new bonds, it is potentially more efficient to sell bonds by negotiation than by competitive bidding. It is shown that, for lower rated bonds having only one or two bids, cost savings are possible by using negotiation.
Effect of LED curing on microleakage and microhardness of Class V resin-based composite restorations.

BACKGROUND Polymerisation shrinkage is a critical limitation of dental composites and may contribute to microleakage, postoperative pain, tooth fracture, and secondary caries. It has been shown that curing methods play a significant role in polymerisation shrinkage of light-cured dental resins. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of a LED curing light on microleakage as well as microhardness of a dental composite. METHOD For the microleakage test 32 Class V cavities were prepared in human premolars, conditioned with 35% phosphoric acid and treated with the bonding agent Prime & Bond NT. They were then incrementally filled with the composite Esthet-X and randomly divided into two groups of 16 each. The first group was cured by means of a Spectrum 800 set at 500 mW/cm2 for 40 seconds and the second group with the GC E-Light in standard mode. The specimens were thermo-cycled in a 0.5% basic fuchsin solution, sectioned and evaluated for dye penetration. For the microhardness test two groups of 6 specimens each were exposed using either the LED- or the Halogen curing unit. Vickers microhardness tests were performed immediately after curing as well as 24 hours later, on the top, and at the bottom surface. RESULTS At the dentine/cementum interface, significantly less microleakage (p=0.004) was found when the restorations were cured with the LED-unit. At the enamel interface no significant difference (p=0.340) in microleakage was found between curing methods. Immediately after exposure significantly harder surfaces were found at the top (p<0.001) as well as at the bottom (p<0.001), using the halogen unit (p<0.05). CONCLUSION Although a reduction in microleakage could be demonstrated exposing the composite restoration to an LED LCU, an effective microhardness ratio was not achieved.
The Intangible Assets Monitor

A “Swedish Community of Practice” emerged during the mid 1980s in Sweden. The “community” today follows two tracks; one is Human Resource Costing & Accounting (HRCA) and the other is a nonfinancial measurement system for intangible assets based on a theory originally brought forward by a work group consisting of members from several Swedish knowledge companies, the so called “Konrad Group. ” This article describes the development of the latter track. Inspired by McLuhan, it is suggested that individuals in organizations create external and internal structures to express themselves. Indicators can be created that monitor External Structure (Customers and Suppliers), Internal Structure (Organization) and People's Competence. The indicators can be incorporated into a management information system. Indicators that monitor renewal, efficiency and stability are preferred. A matrix framework, called “The Intangible Assets Monitor,” is suggested for presenting the indicators. A number of generic indicators are defined under each heading and suggestions for interpretation and examples of how Swedish companies use the indictors are cited.
An Atlas of the Ethiopian Rural Economy: expanding the range of available information for development planning

This article describes a recently released Atlas of the Ethiopian Rural Economy that synthesizes spatial information on agriculture and other aspects of the rural environment in Ethiopia from a number of secondary sources. A primary goal of the project was to increase the relevance and accessibility of this information for policy-makers and development program planners through its compilation and harmonization within a cartographic format. Understanding the many dimensions of a nation's rural economy is critical to policy-makers and program planners as they develop strategies to transform the rural economy in order to sustainably reduce rural poverty and accelerate broad economic growth. In many countries, there is a wealth of valuable and spatially explicit information that could enlarge and deepen such an understanding. However, this is often difficult to use because it is fragmented, found in many different formats, presented at different levels of aggregation, and held by agencies with different access policies and procedures. Several aspects of a statistical atlas of this nature recommend it as a model for initiating transformations in poor-access and fragmented information environments that characterize many developing countries. This article describes these characteristics, as well as the challenges that face those implementing such projects, and seeks to relate information projects of this nature to the broader importance of information access for guiding rural development policy and strategy formulation.
A fast genetic method for inducting linguistically understandable fuzzy models

Fuzzy rule bases can be regarded as mixtures of experts, and boosting techniques can be applied to learn them from data. In particular, provided that adequate reasoning methods are used, fuzzy models are extended additive models, thus backfitting can be applied to them. We propose to use an implementation of backfitting that uses a genetic algorithm for fitting submodels to residuals and we also show that it is both more accurate and faster than other fuzzy rule learning methods.
Tumor Microenvironment in Gene Signatures: Critical Biology or Confounding Noise?

The tumor microenvironment contributes important information in gene expression signatures but may be susceptible to sampling variance. Mesenchymal signatures in particular may be influenced by sampling of nonrepresentative regions with high stromal content. Appropriate pathology quality control is required to ensure reproducibility of gene expression signatures. Clin Cancer Res; 22(16); 3989–91. ©2016 AACR. See related article by Dunne et al., p. 4095
Output-Error Identification of Large Scale 1D-Spatially Varying Interconnected Systems

In this paper, a new identification method for large heterogeneous spatially interconnected systems is presented. A string of different systems in state-space representation is considered. The proposed algorithm optimizes the Output-Error of the global system by using the Steepest-Descent and the Gauss-Newton methods. The main contribution of this work is that both the Jacobian and the Hessian matrix can be entirely captured by using Sequentially Semi-Separable (SSS) matrices. Therefore, all the computations in the optimization routine can be performed with complexity that is linear in the number of subsystems. This fact permits to obtain models for large interconnected systems at low computational cost. Finally, a numerical example is presented in order to show the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.
Prediction models for estimation of survival rate and relapse for breast cancer patients

In this paper, we described the practical application of data mining methods for estimation of survival rate and disease relapse for breast cancer patients. A comparative study of prominent machine learning models was carried out and according to the achieved results we concluded that the classifiers obviously learn some of the concepts of breast cancer survivability and recurrence. These algorithms were successfully applied to a novel breast cancer data set of the Clinical Center of Kragujevac. The Naive Bayes classifier is selected as a model for prognosis of cancer survivability on the basis of the 5 years survival rate, while the Artificial Neural Network has achieved the best performance in prognosis of cancer recurrence. Selection of twenty attributes that are the most related to success of prognosis on survivability can give new insights into the set of prognostic factors which need to be observed by medical experts.
Earnings Functions, Specific Human Capital, and Job Matching: Tenure Bias Is Negative

This article investigates the hypothesis that when measures of specific human capital (such as job tenure) are included in earnings functions, there may be a sample selection bias because of job‐matching effects—because workers with high unobserved match quality receive and accept high wage offers. We develop a model for wage offers in a labor market characterized by both specific human capital and job matching. The model provides a theoretical basis for empirical earnings functions containing specific capital, and it demonstrates that sample selection bias reduces the estimated return to specific human capital and tenure.
Electromagnetic Design of a Novel Linear Maglev Transportation Platform With Finite-Element Analysis

In this paper, a novel maglev transportation platform is developed for ultra-precision linear motion with large travel range, and an optimized decoupled electromagnet spatial distribution of this platform is designed with finite-element analysis. The platform consists of a levitation subsystem and a propulsion subsystem. The levitation subsystem uses six pairs of electromagnets to steadily suspend the moving platform over the guideway, and then the propulsion subsystem drives the moving platform run along the guideway. To minimize the magnetic coupling among electromagnets, the magnetic field analysis of electromagnets is executed with the finite-element method. Through the analysis, an optimized spatial distribution and type of electromagnets are found. Finally, the maglev transportation platform is manufactured, assembled, and mechanically adjusted.
Productivity, Machinery and Skills: Clothing Manufacture in Britain and Germany

This study compares samples of matched plants in Britain and Germany engaged in the manufacture of women's outerwear; it follows earlier matched plant studies, also published in the National Institute Economic Review, which examined matched plants in metalworking and furniture manufacture in these two countries. German clothing manufacturers specialise in high-fashion items produced in great variety of which a high proportion is exported at high unit prices; the typical British manufacturer concentrates on more standardised items produced in long runs and is consequently more vulnerable to competition from lower-cost producers in developing countries. The study examines the contribution of machinery, new technology and skills to differ ences in clothing productivity in the two countries. A final section discusses future trends in the industry in the light of the 1992 proposals for a Single European Market.
'Th'Ancient Distaff' and 'Whirling Spindle': Measuring the Contribution of Spinning to Household Earnings and the National Economy in England, 1550–1770

The purpose of this article is to estimate the workforce involved in spinning from the late sixteenth century until the eve of mechanization. In addition, the potential contribution to family earnings from spinning will be examined. Just about all of the millions of yards of woollen yarn that went into making English cloth had to be spun by women and children, but this activity has not been investigated to the extent that it deserves. Spinning was a skilled occupation where there was a great demand for the best quality product. Sources exist which make it possible to make general estimates of the amount of spinning needed in the economy, and its cost. This evidence shows that employment in spinning increased dramatically from the late seventeenth century, and continued to increase until there were probably over one million women and children employed in spinning by the mid‐eighteenth century. In addition earnings increased to the extent whereby earnings from spinning could contribute over 30 per cent of household income for poorer families. This has implications for looking at trends in real wages over time, as well as for the concept of the industrious revolution.
Microsatellite analysis of serum DNA in patients with head and neck cancer

We have shown previously that microsatellite alterations in serum DNA was predictive of distant metastasis in a study with 21 primary head and neck squamous cell carcinoma patients. To further investigate serum microsatellite alterations as a prognostic tool, we carried out microsatellite analysis of serum DNA with 10 markers on 152 patients with head and neck cancer. Forty‐five percent (68/152) of patients had microsatellite alterations of serum DNA identical to corresponding tumor DNA. In 16 patients that had distant metastasis, 11 patients had a positive serum test (microsatellite alterations detectable in their serum DNA with one or more markers). The difference in distant metastasis rates between the negative and positive serum tests (6.0% [5/84] vs. 16.2% [11/68], RR = 2.7) was clinically significant and almost reached statistical significance (p = 0.06). When the analysis was restricted to patients with recurrent disease, a positive serum test correlated with those who developed distant metastasis (p = 0.04). Other parameters, such as development of recurrence, stage of the cancer, disease‐free survival and overall survival, were not associated with a positive serum test. Detecting tumor DNA in serum by microsatellite analysis may help identify patients at risk for distant metastasis. Therefore, circulating tumor cells may contribute to the presence of tumor DNA in the serum. In the future if a serum test is positive, therapeutic approaches may by intensified, such as platinum‐based chemoradiation, to reduce distant failures. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
The Optimal Tariff Structure in Higher Dimensions

This paper generalizes to higher dimensions the two good result that the optimal trade policy for a large country is an import tariff. A weak form of the optimal tariff, requiring that an import (export) good be most (least) protected holds under gross substitutability. Sufficient conditions are obtained for a strong form of the optimal tariff (which requires that all imports be more protected than any export) and also for the trade tax revenue to be nonnegative in the optimal policy. Copyright 1990 by Economics Department of the University of Pennsylvania and the Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association.
The New Institutional Economics: Its Start, its Meaning, its Prospects

This article first describes the history of the use of the term ‘new institutional economics’ (NIE) since its introduction by Oliver Williamson. It shows how the term has evolved from a generic term to a standard term on the basis of NIE conference publications and collective volumes that appeared between 1984 and 1997. In 1997, the International Society for New Institutional Economics was founded. Ronald Coase, Douglass North and Oliver Williamson were the driving force behind this development. In the second part of this article, the meaning of the NIE is outlined according to the basic concepts of Williamson and North. The ideas of these two protagonists are compared with each other and their better-known criticisms are described and assessed. The final part of the article deals with possibilities for broadening and deepening the objectives and analytical style of the NIE. It concludes with the observation that the potentialities of the NIE are far from being exhausted.
Behavioral Economics and the Analysis of Consumption and Choice

Behavioral economics (BE) in psychology focuses on the application of traditional microeconomics concepts to the study of behavior, particularly the cross‐species analysis of consumption broadly defined and choice. Here, we review key concepts such as demand, substitution, and complementarity within a behavioral psychology framework, novel behavioral economics analysis techniques for quantifying demand elasticity and patterns of choice behaviors, and broader implications for organizational decision‐making and empirical public policy. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Metrological inspection of multi-material drilled holes using X-ray Computed Tomography and image processing

This paper demonstrates a novel method that combines X-ray Computed Tomography (CT) and image processing for the investigation of bonded materials with significantly different densities. CT is increasingly used in aerospace applications for the inspection of materials and identification of defects. The limitations of the scanning process and data reconstruction methods are continuously being researched so as to improve the quality of the final results. One of the common issues experienced in the scanning of multi-material samples using CT is beam hardening. The materials examined to demonstrate the method developed are Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymers (CFRP) and titanium alloy Ti6Al4V. These materials are often combined together to optimise the strength to weight ratio and joined together with fixings and rivets which require holes to be drilled through the two materials together. The machining of these materials is difficult due to their higher specific properties and as a result tool wear can become an issue. CFRPs properties depend on the nature, orientation and bond of the fibres and as a result drilling also affects service life. The results of the method ensure the quality of the drilled holes by quantifying variation in the process by measuring maximum diameter and radius of the hole and examining the entrance delamination and exit burrs though image processing. These results can then be compared to the tolerances defined within the design specification to help certify product acceptance.