Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Upregulated Hexokinase Activity in Isolated Islets from Diabetic 90% Pancreatectomized Rats

Glucokinase is the β-cell glucose sensor, i.e., the site in glucose metabolism that determines the glucose set-point (sensitivity) for insulin secretion. Hexokinase is also present, but it normally contributes little to glucose metabolism because of end-product inhibition by glucose 6-phosphate. There is a lowered glucose set-point for insulin secretion in 90% pancreatectomized (Px) diabetic rats. We investigated the mechanism by measuring hexokinase and glucokinase activity in islet extracts. Glucokinase activity was minimally raised in Px islets (Vmax 125% of sham-operated control rats). In contrast, hexokinase Vmax was 250% of the control value, suggesting that the increased hexokinase activity caused the β-cell glucose hypersensitivity. Additional evidence was obtained with a 40-h fast that was performed because of a previous observation that the inhibitory effect of fasting on insulin secretion was impaired in Px rats. Glucokinase activity fell normally in the Px rats (32 ± 4% reduction in sham vs. 37 ± 4% in Px rats) as opposed to hexokinase activity, which was unaffected in either group. In summary, a feature of hyperglycemia is upregulated islet hexokinase activity. The result is that hexokinase assumes partial control over the glucose set-point for insulin secretion. As such, regulatory effects on insulin secretion, such as fasting, that are mediated through glucokinase activity may be altered.
Fringe benefits and loyalty on the Chinese labour market – a trend towards higher individual‐ and performance‐orientation

Purpose – The labour turnover rate is in general 10 per cent in China. Although this rate is especially high for blue collar workers, fluctuation among qualified employees and managers is high as well. As a result, the economic development has led to high competition on the Chinese market. Moreover, companies also have to deal with lack of employees – especially highly qualified ones. The purpose of this paper is to figure out the impact of fringe benefits on the labour turnover rate of Chinese professionals.Design/methodology/approach – The study subjects were 14 managers working for private companies in the Shanghai region. The authors conducted semi‐structured interviews as the primary data collection procedure to investigate reasons, opinions, and views about fringe benefits and employees' loyalty to their organisations.Findings – The paper outlines highly diverse perspectives about fringe benefits. Furthermore, the authors show a series of reasons for labour turnover and motivators of Chinese profess.
A Novel Ultra-Wideband Bandpass Filter Based on Multiple-Mode Resonators with Defected Ground Structure

In this paper, a novel ultra-wideband (UWB) bandpass filter (BPF) with excellent passband performance and skirt selectivity is designed and fabricated. The proposed UWB filter consists of dual symmetric multiple-mode resonators (MMRs) and four defected ground structures. Six modes, including three odd modes and three even modes, could be designed within UWB band, and two transmission zeros are at the lower and upper cutoff frequencies. The paper shows that even modes can be controlled flexibly, while the odd modes remain the same. The design of the proposed filter is confirmed by simulation with a fullwave electromagnetic simulator and the experiment. The passband of the implemented filter covers the range of 3.1-10.6GHz. A good agreement between the simulated and measured results is obtained.
Design 'the Pori hidden beauties geocaching series': computer-supported collaborative web-based learning and sharing experiences

This article presents the creation of social game, result of collaborative learning and sharing experience supported by computer. 'The Pori hidden beauties geocaching series' was built on face to face classroom sessions and by the Facebook social network. Geocaching is a global treasure hunt game that uses GPS technology to find geocaches all over the world. The study findings show how socio-contextual enhancement can increase performance through computer-supported collaborative learning on Facebook and task-driven geocaching games, while also suggesting that it can increase student activity and engagement when provided in a specific context like this study in Pori National City Park for non-task-driven game environments. The result has present increasing availability of geocaching game is changing the way people interact with the web, and bring us a large amount of GPS trajectories representing user's location histories and stories.
Discriminating Factors of First-time and Repeat Visitors to Wine Festivals

While many events individually claim varied successes, it is worth acknowledging the growing competition between events and festivals in attracting and retaining repeat visitors. In particular, it is of interest to investigate festivals which have established a 'following' of visitors, and to establish what could sustain their attendees' interest for staging of future festivals. Event managers should be aware of the festival attributes that differentiate between two distinct visitor groups – the first-time visitor group versus the repeat visitors attending an annual festival on a regular basis. This paper investigates the attributes associated with the successful staging of a wine festival staged over a five-weekend period during the autumn of 2002 to determine which of the attributes significantly discriminate between first-time and repeat visitor groups. Results identified two attributes and four visitor characteristics that showed discriminating ability. The two festival attributes with discriminating abilities between the first-time visitors and repeat visitors were parking and services, while the four visitor characteristics that showed discriminating effects were age, place of residence, group composition, and information sources utilised. Results are discussed and implications for the festival organisers are proposed.
Alsin/Rac1 signaling controls survival and growth of spinal motoneurons

Recessive mutations in alsin, a guanine‐nucleotide exchange factor for the GTPases Rab5 and Rac1, cause juvenile amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS2) and related motoneuron disorders. Alsin function in motoneurons remained unclear because alsin knock‐out mice do not develop overt signs of motoneuron degeneration.
Decision trees with AND, OR queries

We investigate decision trees in which one is allowed to query threshold functions of subsets of variables. We are mainly interested in the case where only queries of AND and OR are allowed. This model is a generalization of the classical decision tree model. Its complexity (depth) is related to the parallel time that is required to compute Boolean functions in certain CRCW PRAM machines with only one cell of constant size. It is also related to the computation using the Ethernet channel. We prove a tight lower bound of /spl theta/(k log(n/k)) for the required depth of a decision tree for the threshold-k function. As a corollary of the method we also prove a tight lower bound for the "direct sum" problem of computing simultaneously k copies of threshold-2 in this model. Next, the size complexity is considered. A relation to depth-three circuits is established and a lower bound is proven. Finally the relation between randomization, nondeterminism and determinism is also investigated, we show separation results between these models.
Spectrophotometric determination of rosuvastatin in pharmaceutical formulations using quinalizarin

This work presents the development of a methodology based on the formation of a charge transfer complex between quinalizarin and rosuvastatin, allowing for the spectrophotometric determination of rosuvastatin at 579 nm. The factors involved in the sensitivity of the technique were studied (nature and proportion of the solvent, reaction time, pH of aqueous phase and quinalizarin concentration). The proposed spectrophotometric procedures were validated with respect to linearity, ranges, precision, accuracy, detection and quantification limits. Calibration curves of the formed color products showed good linear relationships over the concentration range of 6-15 mg L-1. The proposed method has been successfully applied, which can be confirmed by interference test (comparison between the standard curves and addition of analyte), method precision (RSD 2.3% to 6 mg L-1), and by accuracy (statistically equivalent results between the proposed method and a chromatographic method of reference).
The Management and Implementation of Human Rights Education in the Primary Schools of Lesotho

Lesotho, being a signatory to international treaties, has a mandate to ensure that the contents of these treaties are up-held by its citizens. This necessitates the formulation of local laws in line with the international conventions. Education is very important in this case to ensure that citizens understand and abide by these laws. The purpose of this study was to find out if primary school teachers were conversant with international and local laws that protect children and how this knowledge (or lack of) impacts their practice in human rights education. To achieve this, 88 teachers responded to a questionnaire consisting of both closed and open ended items. The results of this study revealed that though teachers could not name international and local instruments that address children rights, they are aware of some rights such as right to education and right to be protected from abuse. Teachers do not only use this knowledge to advocate for children’s protection but they also appropriately seek help when children’s rights that they are aware of are violated. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014. v5n11p131
Aproximación a una taxonomía de modelos de gestión del conocimiento

In the last years the meaningful increment and application of knowledge management (KM) in diverse economic, social, cultural, organizational, technological and scientific areas, has given place to the generation of an important amount of models for the application and understanding of the knowledge on the part of individuals and groups within public and private organizations, the academy, the government, among others. Such models pretend to explain the function and operation of knowledge management from diverse points of view, both theoretical and empirical in the different specific contexts where these are applied. Trying to generate a theoretical approximation towards a taxonomy of models of KM, this work tries to offer some general criteria that would help the gathering and classification of these models for their better study and understanding; as well as a compilation and amplification of the revision of the literature on this study area.
The rise of endogeneity in multilevel models: A theoretical assessment of the role of stratification

This paper studies the role of stratification in the rise of endogeneity bias in multilevel models. The theory is illustrated using educational stratification and its implications on the estimation of multilevel education production functions. Educational stratification results from the functioning of the education market; it transforms a continuum of student characteristics into a continuum of tuition fees. These fees enter students' utility functions and determine the school they attend and its quality. In other words, student characteristics are the major determinants of school quality and the two are correlated. In this paper, I analyze how these correlations arise and what their implications are for multilevel estimation of education production functions. The major problem posed by such correlations is cross-level endogeneity bias. The theory developed in this paper can be extended to any economic phenomenon that exhibits stratification or nesting of smaller units within larger units (employees within firms, residents within neighborhoods, etc.).
Sharing Space: Urban Design and Social Mixing in Mixed Income New Communities

Planning and housing policies in the UK have recently adopted the principle of developing mixed schemes, whereby a mixing of tenures stands in for a mixing of income groups. A series of recent research studies has informed the future production of mixed income new communities. This article draws on these wider studies to consider the issue of social mixing and design within developments in detail. In particular the concept of “tenure blind” development is critically investigated with regard to three mature case studies, combining design analysis with social research. Conclusions are drawn about the dangers of over-specific prescriptions towards design and the continuing relevance of urban design theory.
Why some nascent entrepreneurs do not seek professional assistance

As the high share of failed new businesses shows, the marked success of new firms is still rather low. Hence, enhancing the quality of new firms is an important goal of entrepreneurship support policies. Schemes that give professional assistance to individuals who want to start up a business are a key feature of most developed countries' policies towards improving the performance of new firms. In our sample, only approximately half of nascent entrepreneurs seek professional assistance. Given that assistance is highly subsidized and available to everyone interested in starting up a firm, we ask why certain nascent entrepreneurs do not seek assistance. By using survey data consisting of an initial screening interview and a follow-up interview after 1 year, we are able to show that men and well-educated founders tend to refrain from professional assistance. Notably, those without any experience in the industry of the planned business are more apt not to seek assistance. This finding suggests that cognitive biases such as overconfidence might play a role in explaining the assistance-avoiding behaviour. Policy measures aiming at improving the knowledge of potential entrepreneurs are therefore well advised to target well-educated males in particular.
Robust real time motion compensation for intraoperative video processing during neurosurgery

A motion compensation method dedicated to intraoperative RGB video imaging in neurosurgery is presented in this work. The dedicated motion model proposed is based on subspace learning of the patient brain motion. The resolution method uses keypoints for a sparse, fast and robust estimation of the brain motion. Our results, obtained from in vivo data, show that our method is as accurate as standard motion estimation method while being much faster. It is also very robust to un-predicted events that can happen in the operative room and opens the way to intraoperative real time hemodynamics map during neurosurgery on human subjects.
Pharmacist-acquired medication histories in a university hospital emergency department.

PURPOSE A study was conducted to identify discrepancies between medication histories taken by emergency department (ED) providers (physicians, nurses, and medical students) and medication histories taken by clinical pharmacists. METHODS During a three-month period, a clinical pharmacist was assigned to the ED in a 475-bed, tertiary care teaching facility that serves as a level I trauma center. On the arrival of a patient, ED providers completed a standard assessment that included the patient's medication history. Patients to be admitted through the ED were interviewed by the clinical pharmacist. In addition to a medication history, the pharmacist collected the patient's height, weight, immunization history, and allergy information. The medication history obtained by the ED provider was compared with the history obtained by the clinical pharmacist, and discrepancies were documented. RESULTS The clinical pharmacists in the ED performed 286 medication histories; 34 were excluded. The remaining 252 histories taken were used in the study. The pharmacists identified 1096 home medications versus 817 home medications documented by ED providers. Of the 817 home medications documented by the ED, the regimens of 637 (78%) were incomplete and were supplemented with dosing information by the pharmacists. Pharmacists reported 375 medication allergies versus 350 reported by ED providers. Immunization histories were obtained in 252 of the 252 (100%) pharmacist-acquired medication histories versus 45 of the 252 (18%) acquired by ED personnel. CONCLUSION Pharmacist-acquired medication histories in the ED were more complete than those acquired by other health professionals.
Aging is associated with changes in allopregnanolone concentrations in brain, endocrine glands and serum in male rats.

OBJECTIVE Allopregnanolone is a potent neuroactive steroid hormone produced in the brain and in peripheral endocrine glands. The present study investigated possible age-related variations in allopregnanolone content in brain areas, endocrine glands and serum of male rats. DESIGN Wistar male rats were categorized into 5 groups (6 rats in each) according to age: 6, 12, 16, 18 and 20 months respectively. METHODS Allopregnanolone content in acidic homogenates of brain cortex, hypothalamus, pituitary, adrenals and gonads was measured by a specific radioimmunoassay. Serum allopregnanolone, corticosterone and testosterone were also assayed by radioimmunoassay. RESULTS Brain cortex allopregnanolone content decreased significantly with age, while hypothalamic allopregnanolone content remained constant until 18 months and increased significantly at 20 months. Pituitary content showed a significant age-related reduction. Adrenal allopregnanolone content remained constant until 18 months, and was significantly higher at 20 months. Testis and serum allopregnanolone contents showed significant age-related increases. Serum testosterone levels showed an age-related decrease, while no age-related variation in serum corticosterone was found. CONCLUSIONS The present study showed a significant impact of aging on allopregnanolone contents in brain, endocrine glands and serum, showing an age-related decrease in brain cortex and pituitary, and an age-related increase in testes, adrenals and serum.
Bmp7 mediates early signaling events during induction of chick epidermal organs

The induction and specification of a large number of vertebrate organs require reciprocal signaling between an epithelium and subjacent mesenchyme. In the formation of integumentary organs, the initial inductive signaling events leading to the formation of the organ primordia stem from the mesenchyme. However, the epithelium must have the capacity to respond to these signals. We demonstrate that bone morphogenetic protein 7 (Bmp7) is an early molecular marker for epidermal organ development during development of feathers and scales of the chick. Bmp7 is expressed broadly in the preplacode epidermis and subsequently becomes localized to the forming placodes of feathers and scales. An examination of Bmp7 expression in the scaleless mutant chicken integument indicates that Bmp7 expression in the epidermis is associated with the ability to form epidermal organs. We show that BMP7 function is necessary for the formation of epidermal placodes in both feather and scale forming epidermis. In addition, precocious expression of Bmp7 in the metatarsal epidermis of the Silkie mutant or treatment of the metatarsus with ectopic BMP7 protein results in feather development from scale forming integument. From these data, we propose that Bmp7 is necessary and sufficient, in a developmental context, to mediate the competence of an epithelium to respond to inductive signals from the underlying mesenchyme to form epidermal organs in the chick. We propose that regulation of Bmp7 in localized areas of the embryonic epidermis facilitates the development of regional formation of integumentary organs. Developmental Dynamics 231:22–32, 2004. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Relationships between the integration of audits and management systems

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyze the application and the level of integration of internal and external audits in organizations that are registered to multiple management system standards.Design/methodology/approach – Using descriptive analyses, this work examines the manner in which organizations, categorized in a previous study with respect to the degree of integration of their standardized management systems (MSs), apply and integrate the related MS audits. The sample included 435 Spanish organizations registered to ISO 9001: 2000 and ISO 14001: 2004 at the minimum.Findings – It was found that organizations that exhibited a higher level of integration of their standardized MSs also demonstrated more highly‐integrated audits. In addition, the level of integration was generally higher for internal compared with the external audits.Research limitations/implications – The main limitation was related to the survey responses, because they were asked and obtained from the organizations' manage.
Rotated k-means hashing for image retrieval problems

Hamming embedding is shown to be efficient for solving large scale image retrieval problems. The k-means hashing is applied to find compact binary codes for hashing. On the other hand, the iterative quantization hashing has been proposed to find better hash codes by minimizing the quantization error between binary hash code and hash function output values of images. The k-means hashing distorts the hypercube of binary codes to minimize quantization error while the iterative quantization hashing rotates the feature vector of images to minimize the quantization error. The proposed rotated k-means hashing combines the distortion of hypercube with the rotation of feature vector of images for further minimization of quantization error. Experimental results show the RKMH preserves good similarities among images.
Effects of Dynavision Training as a Preparatory Intervention Status Postcerebrovascular Accident: A Case Report

ABSTRACT Objective. This is a case study of a 67-year-old woman, status post right hemispheric ischemic lesion cerebrovascular accident (CVA), and her use of Dynavision training as a preparatory intervention to determine its influence on her performance skills and perceived occupational performance. Method. The participant engaged in 6 weeks of Dynavision intervention, 3 days per week. The participant was evaluated using a broad battery of assessments at pretest and posttest. Outcome measures included the Action Research Arm Test (ARAT), Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM), and goniometric active range of motion (AROM) measurements for the upper extremity. Standing activity tolerance during engagement in occupations also was assessed. A qualitative interview was employed to ascertain the participant's perceptions of how Dynavision training influenced her performance in activities of daily living (ADL) and instrumental activities of daily living (IADL). Results. Improvements in performance skills, perceived occupational performance, and perceived satisfaction with engagement in occupation were noted. The participant demonstrated improved AROM, functional activity tolerance, and greater awareness of the neglected side. Qualitative interviews revealed that the participant's satisfaction and confidence with ADL and IADL tasks improved at the time of posttest. Conclusion. Data suggest positive effects of Dynavision intervention when used with an individual status post-CVA.