Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
(DP 2007-11) Justice and Cost of Doing Business: The Philippines

The effect of the performance of the judicial system has been thrown into the limelight as the business sector has in various surveys pointed to tits performance as being one of the main obstacles and disincentives to doing business in the Philippines. The channels through which the judicial decisions may affect business behavior are fairly straightforward and may be reduced to two; increased uncertainty and high costs. In order to quantify the perceived effect of the workings of the judiciary on the various economic decisions and on investment in general, a survey of 320 of the top 7000 corporations in the Philippines was conducted in 2001. Our findings show that governance problems are at least as important as economic or financial problems in doing business. Only weak market demand was cited as being more important than corruption, high crime levels, and lack of trust in government laws and policies as important obstacles to doing business. Of more direct relevance to the judiciary, difficulties in settling legal conflicts were the sixth most frequently cited factor affecting business, after high power costs but even more important than poor physical infrastructure and access to credit. Further, the current level of functioning of the legal system has an economic impact equivalent to foregoing at least 6-11 percent of total investment in the economy and foregoing at least one-fourth to one-half of a percentage point (0.25-0.46) of GDP growth annually, or an annual loss amounting to between P7 billion and P13 billion in 1999 alone. These are significant and recurring economic losses attributable to the nature and functioning of institutions and form a strong case for judicial reform.
Performance analyses and improvement of the IEEE 802.15.6 CSMA/CA using the low latency queuing

Recent advances in wireless communication and electronic manufacture have allowed the creation of a variety of bio-sensors to be used for Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs). These devices operate in close vicinity to, on or inside a human body. WBANs have gained much interest and became emerging technology in health monitoring due to its wide range of use in improving the human health. Many earlier wireless standards were used for the transport of medical data both to and from medical devices but these standards were not appropriate for wireless communication around the human body. The first international WBANs standard was established by the Task Group 6 and called IEEE 802.15. 6. The standard defines a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer that supports several Physical layers. To ensure a high quality of services (QoS), the standard defines many user priorities (UPs) for different types of data. This prioritization allows nodes with emergency packets to access the channel with high probability. Under saturation condition, the standard doesn't provide the manner in which the packets are queued and selected at MAC layer to be sent. In this paper, we study the performances of the IEEE 802.15. 6 CSMA/CA in monitoring of an individual cardiac patient while using many queues strategies. To meet the objectives of the standard, we propose an adapted Low Latency Queuing (LLQ) scheme in order to improve the QoS. Over Castalia simulator based on OMNeT++, a comparative performances analysis between queuing strategies over the IEEE 802.15. 6 standard has been conducted. Results of expanded simulations show that our queuing scheme performs the standard in terms of latency, energy consumption and packets delivery rate.
Cluster-based perimeter-coverage technique for heterogeneous wireless sensor networks

Sensor technologies have become vital today in gathering information about close by environments and its use in wireless sensor networks is getting widespread popular every day. Using heterogeneous nodes in a sensor network increases network reliability and lifetime. Our paper focuses on cluster head selection problem to improve full network coverage. Our proposed algorithm for cluster-based network organization is based on a perimeter-covered that support nodes deployed in densely populated network areas as better candidates for cluster head nodes. We provide performance metrics to analyze the performance of our approach and the simulation shows that the algorithm provides fairly accurate results.
Exhaustive graph cut-based vasculature reconstruction

We propose an exhaustive extension to graph cut-based coronary artery reconstruction from multiple views of a rotational angiography sequence. The reconstruction is formulated as an energy minimization problem that is solved using the a-expansion algorithm. We enforce reprojection-based data consistency and completeness conditions on the reconstructed centerline. The proposed strategy omits the need for selection and manual refinement of a reference view. A phantom study is used to assess the performance in 2D and 3D. The average reprojection error decreased from 1.32 ± 0.99mm to 0.54 ± 0.02 mm. Moreover, an increase in Dice score from 0.50 ± 0.04 mm to 0.59 ± 0.00 mm was observed, indicating superior volumetric reconstruction quality. The results suggest that the proposed extension removes the susceptibility to reference frame selection and manual interaction, while increasing reconstruction quality.
CONSORT revised--improving the reporting of randomized trials.

20. Cooper HA, Exner DV, Domanski MJ. Light-to-moderate alcohol consumption and prognosis in patients with left ventricular systolic dysfunction. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2000;35:1753-1759. 21. Rimm E, Klatsky AL, Grobbee D, Stampfer MJ. Review of moderate alcohol consumption and reduced risk of coronary heart disease. BMJ. 1996;312:731-736. 22. Longnecker MP. Alcoholic beverage consumption in relation to risk of breast cancer: meta-analysis and review. Cancer Causes Control. 1994;5:73-82. 23. Friedman GD, Klatsky AL. Is alcohol good for your health? [editorial]. N Engl J Med. 1993;329:1882-1883. 24. Pearson TA, Terry P. What to advise patients about drinking alcohol. JAMA. 1994;272:957-958.
Protein Kinase C Epsilon Is a Key Regulator of Mitochondrial Redox Homeostasis in Acute Myeloid Leukemia

Purpose: The intracellular redox environment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) cells is often highly oxidized compared to healthy hematopoietic progenitors and this is purported to contribute to disease pathogenesis. However, the redox regulators that allow AML cell survival in this oxidized environment remain largely unknown. Experimental Design: Utilizing several chemical and genetically-encoded redox sensing probes across multiple human and mouse models of AML, we evaluated the role of the serine/threonine kinase PKC-epsilon (PKCϵ) in intracellular redox biology, cell survival and disease progression. Results: We show that RNA interference-mediated inhibition of PKCϵ significantly reduces patient-derived AML cell survival as well as disease onset in a genetically engineered mouse model (GEMM) of AML driven by MLL-AF9. We also show that PKCϵ inhibition induces multiple reactive oxygen species (ROS) and that neutralization of mitochondrial ROS with chemical antioxidants or co-expression of the mitochondrial ROS-buffering enzymes SOD2 and CAT, mitigates the anti-leukemia effects of PKCϵ inhibition. Moreover, direct inhibition of SOD2 increases mitochondrial ROS and significantly impedes AML progression in vivo. Furthermore, we report that PKCϵ over-expression protects AML cells from otherwise-lethal doses of mitochondrial ROS-inducing agents. Proteomic analysis reveals that PKCϵ may control mitochondrial ROS by controlling the expression of regulatory proteins of redox homeostasis, electron transport chain flux, as well as outer mitochondrial membrane potential and transport. Conclusions: This study uncovers a previously unrecognized role for PKCϵ in supporting AML cell survival and disease progression by regulating mitochondrial ROS biology and positions mitochondrial redox regulators as potential therapeutic targets in AML. Clin Cancer Res; 24(3); 608–18. ©2017 AACR.
Efficient Computation of Maximum Loading Point by Load Flow Method With Optimal Multiplier

This letter introduces a new method for obtaining the maximum loading point (MLP) of electric power systems based on the load flow method with optimal multiplier in rectangular coordinates. The proposed method starts from an infeasible point beyond power system maximum loadability and approaches the MLP iteratively. Tests on several IEEE test systems and a real system show its effectiveness.
Redesigning The Work Of Human Services

Introduction Definitions and Historical Overview Children and Families as Common Pool Resources: A Metaphor for Understanding Family Policies Strategic Planning in Human Services: Promoting Competition and Local Responsibility for Problem-Solving Public-Private Partnerships in Human Services: Negotiating the Trade-off between Flexibility and Accountability Linking Tasks and Technologies in Designing Community Social Services Streamlining Social Services Budgeting, Managing, and Monitoring for Results in the Interorganizational Environment: An Impossible Dream or Public Sector Revolution in the Making? Community Asset Mapping: Place-Based Stories and Grass-Roots Development Next Steps in the Redesign of Human Services References Index
The effect of the MRI radiofrequency field on medical leads embedded beneath skin tissue

The effect of skin tissue on the scattering of the MRI RF field by deep brain stimulation (DBS) leads is analyzed. RF induced heating occurs in the tissue surrounding the electrodes at the end of such a medical lead. The electric field and the induced temperature rise are found by solving the wave and heat equations. Spatial plots of the solutions are obtained. The presence of skin tissue also affects the transmission line behavior of the lead, and the resonant length; these effects are discussed.
Everyday Online Sharing

People make a range of everyday decisions about how and whether to share content with different people, across different platforms and services. These sharing decisions can encompass complex preferences and a variety of access-control dimensions. I plan to explore how varied conceptions of privacy, as well as the sharing “ecosystem” created by the platforms and services with which, and people with whom, one shares can shape these sharing decisions. I also plan to look at how the affordances that shape these decisions can fall short, resulting in regret or self-censorship. Drawing on prior and proposed work, I plan to propose and examine improved modalities for sharing on SNSs.
A Proposed Visualization for Vulnerability Scan Data

System administrators make security decisions based on data provided by a variety of tools. Yet too often these tools do not structure the presentation of that data to support the communication and decision making needs of a variety of stakeholders within an organization. For example, consider the task of ﬁxing system vulnerabilities based on network scans. Network vulnerability tools produce an overwhelming amount of raw data that is diﬃcult to prioritize. The most critical vulnerabilities in the most sensitive systems must be addressed quickly, before attackers discover and exploit them. Additionally, non-security domain experts are often called upon to perform remediation and/or to make critical security decisions. As such, it is imperative that the security state of the network be communicated in such a way as to support these eﬀorts. Unfortunately, current security tools that provide visualizations are complex and fail to provide actionable data. In this paper, we propose a new way to visualize vulnerability scan data by network zone using free and open-source tools to demonstrate how visualizations can be created to support decision making.
Predator exposure alters brain serotonin metabolism in bicolour damselfish

THE effect of predator exposure on brain serotonin utilization was studied in bicolour damselfish (Pomacentrus partitus). Predator exposure (lasting 2 h), which took place in an aquarium where a transparent wall separated the damselfish from the predator (a graysby, Epinephelus cruentatus), resulted in increased concentrations of 5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid (5-HIAA, the main serotonin metabolite) and 1.6–1.8 fold elevations of 5-HIA A/serotonin ratios (an index of serotonergic activity) in telencephalon, hypothalamus and brain stem. The results show that predator exposure, like intraspecific social stress, induces increased brain serotonergic activity in fish. Different types of stress also elevate brain serotonergic activity in mammals, indicating that this is a phylogenetically very old stress response, possibly helping the animal's coping response.
Detecting Tropical Forests' Responses to Global Climatic and Atmospheric Change: Current Challenges and a Way Forward

Because of tropical forests' disproportionate importance for world biodiversity and for the global carbon cycle, we urgently need to understand any effects on these ecosystems from the ongoing changes in climate and atmosphere. This review, intended to complement existing data reviews on this topic, focuses on three major classes of challenges that we currently face when trying to detect and interpret directional changes in tropical forests. One is the very limited existing information on the historical context of study sites. Lasting effects from past climate, natural disturbances, and/or human activities could be significantly affecting current‐day processes in tropical forests and need to be investigated for all active field sites. Second, while progress has been made in recent years on standardizing and refining research approaches, a number of methods‐ and data‐limitations continue to affect efforts both to detect within‐forest changes and to relate them to ongoing environmental change. Important outstanding needs are improved sampling designs, longer time‐series of observations, filling key data gaps, and data access. Finally, forest responses to ongoing environmental change are complex. The effects of many simultaneously changing environmental factors are integrated by the plants, and their responses can involve significant lags, carryovers, and non‐linearities. Specifying effects of individual environmental changes, however, is required for accurate ecosystem‐process models and thus for projecting future impacts on these forests. After discussing these several types of challenges and ways to address them, I conclude with a priority agenda for this critical area of research.
A MPPT control method for stand-alone photovoltaic system in consideration of partial shadow

This paper presents a modified maximum power point tracking (MPPT) method for photovoltaic (PV). In this method, both the open-circuit voltage and short-circuit current of PV are instantaneously measured to distinguish between irradiance change and the occurrence of partial shadow when the output power of PV changes. The method can successfully operate even though a partial shadow arises. The rapid and accurate operation of the proposed MPPT method is confirmed by simulation results.
Non‐linear summation of end‐plate potentials in the frog and mouse.

1. End‐plate potentials (e.p.p.s) and end‐plate currents (e.p.c.s) were recorded intracellularly from muscle fibres of frog and mouse at various levels of curarization to determine the relation between the potential change and the underlying synaptic conductance change over a wide range of e.p.p. amplitudes. 2. In frog muscle fibres the e.p.p.‐e.p.c. relation was linear for e.p.p. amplitudes up to about 10 mV, beyond which the rate of increase of e.p.p. amplitude became progressively smaller as the e.p.c. amplitude increased. The equation proposed by Martin (1955) to correct for this non‐linearity consistently over‐corrected the e.p.p. amplitudes. 3. When synaptic potentials and currents of long duration were produced by ionophoresis of ACh onto the end‐plate, the voltage‐current relation showed greater non‐linearity than with nerve‐evoked responses, and correction of the synaptic potential amplitudes resulted in a linear relation. 4. The relation between e.p.p. and e.p.c. amplitudes in mouse muscle showed a greater non‐linearity than in frog muscle and over‐correction by the equation was correspondingly smaller. Theoretical voltage‐current relations were calculated for various membrane models and compared with the relations observed experimentally. The results from mouse muscle agreed with those expected for a point synaptic contact on an infinite cable; those from from muscle were consistent with simple resistive‐capacitative model with no cable extending from the synaptic region. 6. The applicability to the experimental results of several correction factors for non‐linear summation is discussed.
The Conflict between Agency Theory and Corporate Control on Managerial Ownership: The Evidence from Taiwan IPO Performance

When a private-held firm goes public through an IPO (initial public offering) process, the managerial ownership of the IPO firm declines due to external equity financing. The effects of dilution of ownership structure on firm performance are different with respect to the agency theory and corporate control theory. For Taiwan IPOs, we argue that the level of managerial ownership of IPO firms at issuance is basically high enough to control the firm. We show that the increase of managerial ownership of IPO firms in the early aftermarket would be hazardous to firm performance. That is, the corporate control benefit dominates the agency costs of IPO firm from the point of view of managerial ownership.
Stability theorems and hyperbolicity in dynamical systems

We present an approach to proving structural stability and semi-stability theorems for diffeomorphisms and flows using the idea of shadowing an e-chain. We treat the cases when the whole manifold is hyperbolic and when the chain recurrent set is hyperbolic and the strong transversality condition is satisfied. The last two sections discuss the progress made on the converse to the structural stability theorem and a criterion for hyperbolicity. 0. Introduction. The first section presents the shadowing and stability results for a diffeomorphism near a single hyperbolic set. This section is very much in the spirit of C. Conley, [4] and [5]. The second section shows how these results can be carried over to several hyperbolic sets when the strong transversality condition is satisfied. The semi-stability theorem for diffeomorphisms is discussed in some detail in § 2. With this new proof the result carries over to flows as mentioned in § 3. The fourth section reviews the results of R. Mane and V. Pliss on the converse to the structural stability theorem. Finally, the last section discusses a criterion for hyperbolicity; namely, a linear bundle isomorphism is hyperbolic if the map on the base space is chain-recurrent and the zero section is an isolated invariant set. The results of § 1 through § 3 assume the sets are compact. We really only need uniform hyperbolicity and uniformly continuous derivatives. J. Hale has been asking how much of this theory carries over to functional differential equations and flows on infinite dimensions, [12]. In this context, see the papers of W. Oliva [24], D. Henry [ 13], and J. Montgomery [ 19]. An invariant set A C M is called hyperbolic for f: M-* M if there exist a continuous invariant splitting TM | A = E © E and constants O 0 a n d 0 < X < l such that \\Tf | Ex \\ < C\ and \\Tf~ \ Ex \\ < Ck for x G A and n ^ 0. By averaging the metric, we can take C = 1. This is called an adapted metric. See [22]. We use adapted metrics in this paper. If U is a small neighborhood of A, then the splitting extends to U, TM \ U = E © E. If x, f(x) G U, Txf can be written as •Partially supported by the National Science Foundation Grant No. MPS74-06731 A01. AMS subject classification: 58F10. Copyright © 1977 Rocky Mountain Mathematics Consortium
Performance evaluation of unscented Kalman Filter using multi-core processors environment

The Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF) is widely used to solve nonlinear systems, like submarine tracking, aircraft surveillance, autonomous robotics and mobile systems. One of the typical problems solved using UKF is Bearing-Only Target Motion Analysis (BOTMA) for manoeuvring and non manoeuvring targets. This paper proposes a methodology for parallel execution of UKF with an aim to enhance its performance in terms of computational throughput. Parallel algorithm and its execution of UKF for BOTMA will use multi-core processor environment. The study concentrate on identifying the phases of UKF enabled BOTMA that can be parallelized to execute on the hardware underneath to enhance the response time. The performance is observed and results are verified.
Angling tourism and landowner based management of Atlantic salmon stocks in the Trondheim fjord region of Norway

The objective of this paper was to analyze how different property and landowner characteristics and other factors affect landowners’ profit efficiency from salmon angling tourism. A stochastic profit frontier function with an inefficiency module was estimated based on questionnaire survey responses from 203 landowners along four rivers of Mid-Norway. Profit efficiency decreased as the revenues from off-property and onproperty activities increased relative to angling tourism. Factors increasing efficiency were long term rent of fishing instead of permit sale or selling fishing packages with additional services, and common property ownership instead of simple fee ownership. Cooperation, through merging several fishing rights into one unit instead offering fishing on a single property basis, decreased efficiency. This study did not distinguish between different forms of cooperation, and both mandatory cooperation in the form of common property and voluntary cooperation between private properties are issues for further research. As long as economic efficiency is a public goal, the implication for policy is to promote long-term renting, and to ensure a predictable economic environment for landowners specializing in salmon angling tourism. There is thus a need to extend rent periods beyond the current maximum of 10 years.
A Label-Free Optical Biosensor Built on a Low-Cost Polymer Platform

Planar integrated optical biosensors are becoming more and more important as they facilitate label-free and real-time monitoring with high sensitivity. In this paper, the systematic work on the development of this kind of optical biosensor built on a novel polymer platform named PSQ-Ls will be presented. The material itself is of very low cost, and the optical devices with high performances are fabricated through a simple UV-based soft imprint lithography technique. Especially for ring resonator, Q value as high as 5 × 104 and 2.7 × 104 are achieved in air and water condition. These optical chips are functionalized efficiently with protein A molecules through physical immobilization, after careful investigation of the physicochemical and chemical properties of their surface. Both bulk sensing and surface sensing are performed. The proposed optical biosensor exhibits good response not only to its surrounding environment's change but also to the small amount of targeted molecules appearing in the buffered solution, which is human-IgG in our study.
Implied Volatility: Market Models

We survey the different approaches to modeling option prices, which take the implied volatility as the modeling variable. These approaches all face the difficult task of handling and understanding the important relations among implied volatilities and between the implied and the spot volatilities. Keywords: drift restriction; spot volatility specification; static arbitrage constraints