Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Predicting Inflation and Output in Pakistan: The Role of Yield Spread

This paper presents the empirical evidences on the predictability of yield spread, particularly with respect to inflation and output growth in Pakistan. To our knowledge, this study is the first of its kind in case of Pakistan. We also test the role of foreign interest rates such as of the US in influencing the domestic interest rates in Pakistan and their contribution towards predicting inflation and output growth as well. Our results indicate that the yield spread in Pakistan do contain information about future changes in output growth but not for inflation. Both in-sample and out-of-sample forecasts for output growth show that the predictive content span from 6 to 24 months in future across the yield spreads. Use of the US yield spread further increases the predictability of domestic yield spread for output growth. In case of inflation, the results are found to be insignificant across different horizons and measures of yield spreads.
Sustained Activation of p38 Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase and c-Jun N-Terminal Kinase Pathways by Hepatitis B Virus X Protein Mediates Apoptosis via Induction of Fas/FasL and Tumor Necrosis Factor (TNF) Receptor 1/TNF-α Expression

ABSTRACT Activation of the cellular stress pathways (c-Jun N-terminal kinase [JNK] and p38 mitogen-activated protein [MAP] kinase) is linked to apoptosis. However, whether both pathways are required for apoptosis remains unresolved. Hepatitis B virus X protein (pX) activates p38 MAP kinase and JNK pathways and, in response to weak apoptotic signals, sensitizes hepatocytes to apoptosis. Employing hepatocyte cell lines expressing pX, which was regulated by tetracycline, we investigated the mechanism of apoptosis by p38 MAP kinase and JNK pathway activation. Inhibition of the p38 MAP kinase pathway rescues by 80% the initiation of pX-mediated apoptosis, whereas subsequent apoptotic events involve both pathways. pX-mediated activation of p38 MAP kinase and JNK pathways is sustained, inducing the transcription of the death receptor family genes encoding Fas/FasL and tumor necrosis factor receptor 1 (TNFR1)/TNF-α and the p53-regulated Bax and Noxa genes. The pX-dependent expression of Fas/FasL and TNFR1/TNF-α mediates caspase 8 activation, resulting in Bid cleavage. In turn, activated Bid, acting with pX-induced Bax and Noxa, mediates the mitochondrial release of cytochrome c, resulting in the activation of caspase 9 and apoptosis. Combined antibody neutralization of FasL and TNF-α reduces by 70% the initiation of pX-mediated apoptosis. These results support the importance of the pX-dependent activation of both the p38 MAP kinase and JNK pathways in pX-mediated apoptosis and suggest that this mechanism of apoptosis occurs in vivo in response to weak apoptotic signals.
High-Throughput, High-Sensitivity Analysis of Gene Expression in Arabidopsis1[W][OA]

High-throughput gene expression analysis of genes expressed during salt stress was performed using a novel multiplexed quantitative nuclease protection assay that involves customized DNA microarrays printed within the individual wells of 96-well plates. The levels of expression of the transcripts from 16 different genes were quantified within crude homogenates prepared from Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) plants also grown in a 96-well plate format. Examples are provided of the high degree of reproducibility of quantitative dose-response data and of the sensitivity of detection of changes in gene expression within limiting amounts of tissue. The lack of requirement for RNA purification renders the assay particularly suited for high-throughput gene expression analysis and for the discovery of novel chemical compounds that specifically modulate the expression of endogenous target genes.
The effects of low-volume resistance training with and without advanced techniques in trained subjects.

BACKGROUND This study examined low-volume resistance training (RT) in trained participants with and without advanced training methods. METHODS Trained participants (RT experience 4±3 years) were randomised to groups performing single-set RT: ssRM (N.=21) performing repetitions to self-determined repetition maximum (RM), ssMMF (N.=30) performing repetitions to momentary muscular failure (MMF), and ssRP (N.=28) performing repetitions to self-determined RM using a rest pause (RP) method. Each performed supervised RT twice/week for 10 weeks. Outcomes included maximal isometric strength and body composition using bioelectrical impedance analysis. RESULTS The ssRM group did not significantly improve in any outcome. The ssMMF and ssRP groups both significantly improved strength (p < 0.05). Magnitude of changes using effect size (ES) was examined between groups. Strength ES's were considered large for ssMMF (0.91 to 1.57) and ranging small to large for ssRP (0.42 to 1.06). Body composition data revealed significant improvements (P<0.05) in muscle and fat mass and percentages for whole body, upper limbs and trunk for ssMMF, but only upper limbs for ssRP. Body composition ES's ranged moderate to large for ssMMF (0.56 to 1.27) and ranged small to moderate for ssRP (0.28 to 0.52). ssMMF also significantly improved (P<0.05) total abdominal fat and increased intracellular water with moderate ES's (-0.62 and 0.56, respectively). CONCLUSIONS Training to self-determined RM is not efficacious for trained participants. Training to MMF produces greatest improvements in strength and body composition, however, RP style training does offer some benefit.
Portable wide-band channel sounder based software defined radio for studying the radio propagation in an outdoor environment

Recently, applying the multimedia wireless sensor networks and computer vision techniques in the outdoor agriculture field can be observed. Since the performance of such techniques is limited by the low data rate of the wireless sensor network, the transmission using the wider bandwidth is one of the possible solutions. This paper proposes the technique to develop the wide-band channel sounder for investigating the wideband propagation characteristic in such outdoor environment by utilizing only the low cost and simple narrow-band software defined radio system. It can be realized by synchronizing the timing between the transmitter and the receiver over the air using the power detection approach as well as implementing the multitone-overlapping frequency stepping technique for the wideband coverage. The validation test in the laboratory was performed to verify the proposed channel sounder.
Spectral-Cepstral Estimation of Dysphonia Severity: External Validation

Objectives: The current study applied an acoustic algorithm incorporating measures from cepstral and spectral analyses, the Cepstral Spectral Index of Dysphonia (CSID), in an attempt to externally validate the CSID as an acoustic estimate of dysphonia severity. Methods: Correlation (Pearson's r) between the CSID and trained listener-perceived severities as rated on the Consensus Auditory-Perceptual Evaluation of Voice (CAPE-V) was calculated from sentence and sustained vowel samples from 56 patients before or after they underwent thyroid surgery. Results: A strong correlation was identified between the mean CSID values calculated across CAPE-V sentences and vowels and the median rating of perceived overall severity (r = 0.82; p < 0.001). The CSID values did not differ significantly from their corresponding auditory-perceptual ratings of dysphonia severity for these samples (CSID: Mean, 15.54, SD, 16.63; CAPE-V Severity: Mean, 17.33, SD, 13.61; p = 0.16). Conclusions: Independent testing of an acoustic algorithm incorporating measures from cepstral and spectral analyses (the CSID) confirmed a strong correlation of the CSID to perceptual ratings of overall voice quality. This study provides external validation of the CSID as a robust correlate of dysphonia severity as rated by trained listeners.
An Effective Way to Improve YouTube-8M Classification Accuracy in Google Cloud Platform

Large-scale datasets have played a significant role in progress of neural network and deep learning areas. YouTube-8M is such a benchmark dataset for general multi-label video classification. It was created from over 7 million YouTube videos (450,000 hours of video) and includes video labels from a vocabulary of 4716 classes (3.4 labels/video on average). It also comes with pre-extracted audio & visual features from every second of video (3.2 billion feature vectors in total). Google cloud recently released the datasets and organized 'Google Cloud & YouTube-8M Video Understanding Challenge' on Kaggle. Competitors are challenged to develop classification algorithms that assign video-level labels using the new and improved Youtube-8M V2 dataset. Inspired by the competition, we started exploration of audio understanding and classification using deep learning algorithms and ensemble methods. We built several baseline predictions according to the benchmark paper and public github tensorflow code. Furthermore, we improved global prediction accuracy (GAP) from base level 77% to 80.7% through approaches of ensemble.
Assessing Workplace Emotional Intelligence: Development and Validation of an Ability-based Measure

ABSTRACT Existing measures of Emotional Intelligence (EI), defined as the ability to perceive, understand, and manage emotions for productive purposes, have displayed limitations in predicting workplace outcomes, likely in part because they do not target this context. Such considerations led to the development of an ability EI measure with work-related scenarios in which respondents infer the likely emotions (perception) and combinations of emotion (understanding) that would occur to protagonists while rating the effectiveness of ways of responding (management). Study 1 (n = 290 undergraduates) used item-total correlations to select scenarios from a larger pool and Study 2 (n = 578) reduced the measure—termed the NEAT—to 30 scenarios on the basis of structural equation modeling. Study 3 (n = 96) then showed that the NEAT had expected correlations with personality and cognitive ability and Study 4 (n = 85) demonstrated convergent validity with other ability EI measures. Last, study 5 (n = 91) established that the NEAT had predictive validity with respect to job satisfaction, job stress, and job performance. The findings affirm the importance of EI in the workplace in the context of a valid new instrument for assessing relevant skills.
Leukemia Proto-Oncoprotein MLL Forms a SET1-Like Histone Methyltransferase Complex with Menin To Regulate Hox Gene Expression

ABSTRACT MLL (for mixed-lineage leukemia) is a proto-oncogene that is mutated in a variety of human leukemias. Its product, a homolog of Drosophila melanogaster trithorax, displays intrinsic histone methyltransferase activity and functions genetically to maintain embryonic Hox gene expression. Here we report the biochemical purification of MLL and demonstrate that it associates with a cohort of proteins shared with the yeast and human SET1 histone methyltransferase complexes, including a homolog of Ash2, another Trx-G group protein. Two other members of the novel MLL complex identified here are host cell factor 1 (HCF-1), a transcriptional coregulator, and the related HCF-2, both of which specifically interact with a conserved binding motif in the MLLN (p300) subunit of MLL and provide a potential mechanism for regulating its antagonistic transcriptional properties. Menin, a product of the MEN1 tumor suppressor gene, is also a component of the 1-MDa MLL complex. Abrogation of menin expression phenocopies loss of MLL and reveals a critical role for menin in the maintenance of Hox gene expression. Oncogenic mutant forms of MLL retain an ability to interact with menin but not other identified complex components. These studies link the menin tumor suppressor protein with the MLL histone methyltransferase machinery, with implications for Hox gene expression in development and leukemia pathogenesis.
Metal tolerance and antibiotic resistance patterns of a bacterial population isolated from sea water

The total aerobic heterotrophic and metal‐resistant bacterial communities were studied in marine water. The resistance patterns, expressed as MICs, for 81 bacterial isolates to eight heavy metals were surveyed by using the agar dilution method. A great proportion of the isolates were sensitive to cadmium (99%), mercury (91%), zinc (84%) and cobalt (83%). On the other hand, 94%, 40%, 35% and 22% were resistant to lead, nickel, arsenate and copper, respectively. The majority of the tested strains (95.06%) were multiple metal‐resistant, with pentametal resistance as the major pattern (25.9%). The response of the isolates to 11 tested antibiotics was tested and ranged from complete resistance to total sensitivity and multiple antibiotic resistance was exhibited by 70.38% of the total isolated population. The highest incidence of metal‐antibiotic double resistance existed between lead and all antibiotics (100%), copper and penicillin (95%) and nickel and ampicillin (83.3%).
Optimal scheduling of electric vehicle battery swap station based on time-of-use pricing

Battery swap station (BSS) is an important energy supply place for electric vehicles (EVs), where discharged batteries could be replaced with fully charged ones. Therefore, an optimal scheduling model of the BSS under time-of-use (TOU) electricity price is proposed in this paper, which takes the particular constrains relating the BSS into account. Meanwhile, a statistic model of daily battery swapping demand based on historical data is developed to generate a scenario set of EVs' energy need, which can be reduced based on the Kantorovich distance(KD) to obtain a typical scenario set while still being close to the original set. The reasonability and validity of the proposed model is proved by a case study. The results show that the controlled domestic charging can smooth the charging curve as well as decrease the charging cost relative to the uncontrolled domestic charging. Moreover, the optimization results are sensitive to the charging level and the number of batteries in the BSS.
Brain atrophy rates in Parkinson's disease with and without dementia using serial magnetic resonance imaging

Increased rates of brain atrophy are seen in Alzheimer's disease, but whether rates are similarly increased in other dementias such as Parkinson's disease dementia (PDD) has not been well examined. We determined the rates of brain atrophy using serial magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in PDD and compared this finding to rates seen in cognitively intact Parkinson's disease (PD) patients and age‐matched control subjects. Thirty‐one patients (PD = 18, PDD = 13) and 24 age‐matched controls underwent serial volumetric 1.5 T MRI scans, approximately 1 year apart. Baseline and repeat scans were registered and quantification of the brain boundary shift integral was used to determine whole‐brain atrophy rates. Rates of brain atrophy were significantly increased in PDD (1.12 ± 0.98%/year) compared to PD (0.31 ± 0.69%/year; P = 0.018) and control subjects (0.34 ± 0.76%/year; P = 0.015). There were no differences in atrophy rates between controls and PD (P = 0.79). No correlations between increased atrophy rates and age or dementia severity (Mini‐Mental State Examination score) were observed. Serial MRI may be a useful tool for monitoring disease progression in PDD and further studies should investigate its utility for early diagnosis. © 2005 Movement Disorder Society
Cross-country differences in innovative entrepreneurial activity

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to clarify the relationship between entrepreneurial cognition and innovative entrepreneurial activity (IEA) across countries using an institutional perspective. Design/methodology/approach The paper tests theoretical model using data collected by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, the Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness study and the Index of Economic Freedom (IEF). A multi-level analysis is performed based on set of 1,004,620 observations from 49 countries spanning 13 years (2001–2013). Findings The results suggest that in terms of formal regulations; the relationship between entrepreneurial cognitions and IEA becomes stronger when there is an increase in intellectual property right and business freedom regulations in a country. On the other hand, in terms of informal institutions the relationship between entrepreneurial cognitions and IEA becomes stronger when the level of institutional collectivism and uncertainty decreases and performance orientation increases. Originality/value The study indicates that entrepreneurship by innovation increases when the individuals possess high level of entrepreneurial cognition under suitable institutional conditions (e.g. intellectual property right, business freedom, institutional collectivism, uncertainty avoidance and performance orientation).
Corporate social responsibility in Economia Aziendale scholars’ theories

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide an analytical overview of the academic output of eminent Italian scholars in the period from the end of the Second World War to the 1970s on the subject of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Design/methodology/approach Through the use of content analysis, possible logical and conceptual similarities between the theories of the scholars and present-day definition of CSR have been identified. Findings Concepts as ethical values and stakeholders included in definition of CSR come from the thinking of the Italian Economia Aziendale scholars, so that it is possible to get pioneering aspects in the light of the international debate on CSR today. Originality/value The originality of this paper derives from the fact that the theme of CSR has rarely been examined from a historical point of view and that the development of the theme in Italy has rarely been examined through analysis of the ideas of the leading Italian Economia Aziendale Scholars.
cDNA microarray gene expression profiling of hydroxyurea, paclitaxel, and p‐anisidine, genotoxic compounds with differing tumorigenicity results

The potential application of toxicogenomics to predictive toxicology has been discussed widely, but the utility of the approach remains largely unproven. Using cDNA microarrays, we compared the gene expression profiles produced in mouse lymphoma cells by three genotoxic compounds, hydroxyurea (a carcinogen), p‐anisidine (a noncarcinogen), and paclitaxel (carcinogenicity unknown). To minimize the effect of biological variability and technological limitations, quadruplicate observations were made for each compound and a subset of genes yielding reproducible induction/repression was selected for comparison. A method was applied to attach normalized expression data to genes with a low false‐discovery rate (<0.1) to yield more confidence regarding differential expression. This analysis identified genotoxicity‐specific gene expression. Seven genes were consistently upregulated and 12 downregulated more than 2‐fold by the three genotoxic compounds. Using additional genes, the expression pattern induced by the genotoxic noncarcinogen, p‐anisidine, was readily distinguished from that associated with the genotoxic carcinogen, hydroxyurea. Comparison of paclitaxel‐induced expression data to data for p‐anisidine and hydroxyurea suggested that paclitaxel's profile is more similar to the genotoxic noncarcinogen. With further supporting evidence it may be possible to perform large‐scale monitoring of gene expression during drug and chemical development that can provide an early warning of potential toxicological responses. Environ. Mol. Mutagen. 42:91–97, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Improving Fidelity of Translation of the Stepping On Falls Prevention Program through Root Cause Analysis

Background Fidelity monitoring is essential with implementation of complex health interventions, but there is little description of how to use results of fidelity monitoring to improve the draft program package prior to widespread dissemination. Root cause analysis (RCA) provides a systematic approach to identifying underlying causes and devising solutions to prevent errors in complex processes. Its use has not been described in implementation science. Methods Stepping On (SO) is a small group, community-based intervention that has been shown to reduce falls by 31%. To prepare SO for widespread U.S. dissemination, we conducted a pilot of the draft program package, monitoring the seven SO sessions for fidelity of program delivery and assessing participant receipt and enactment through participant interviews after the workshop. Lapses to fidelity in program delivery, receipt, and enactment were identified. We performed a RCA to identify underlying causes of, and solutions to, such lapses, with the goal of preventing fidelity lapses with widespread dissemination. Results Lapses to fidelity in program delivery were in the domains of group leader’s role, use of adult learning principles, and introducing and upgrading the exercises. Lapses in fidelity of participant receipt and enactment included lack of knowledge about balance exercises and reduced adherence to frequency of exercise practice and advancement of exercise. Root causes related to leader training and background, site characteristics and capacity, and participant frailty and expectations prior to starting the program. The RCA resulted in changes to the program manual, the training program, and training manual for new leaders, and to the methods for and criteria for participant and leader recruitment. A Site Implementation Guide was created to provide information to sites interested in the program. Conclusion Disseminating complex interventions can be done more smoothly by first using a systematic quality improvement technique, such as the RCA, to identify how lapses in fidelity occur during the earliest stages of implementation. This technique can also help bring about solutions to these lapses of fidelity prior to widespread dissemination across multiple domain lapses.
A parallelized network traffic classification framework based on selective ensemble and diversity measures

Network Traffic Classification (NTC) is an important technology for network management, traffic control, security detection and so on. With the development of the high-speed, large-scale complex networks, NTC appears some challenges in area of data storage and processing for massive network traffic. Although there are a few NTC based on cloud computing, its parallel computing model has not received enough attention. In this paper, based on the Selective Ensemble and Diversity Measures, we propose a novel Parallelized Network Traffic Classification framework (PNTC-SE-DM), which is used to parallel process the large-scale network traffic data by MapReduce architecture. In particular, in PNTC-SE-DM, we present a new method to select the classifiers for ensemble classification, which is closely related to both the prediction accuracy of the single classifier and the diversity among the multi-classifiers. The experimental results demonstrate that the new approach has the advantage of tackling large-scale network traffic data, and is favorable in terms of the evaluation metrics of speedup, sizeup and accuracy.