Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Debt maturity structure, institutional ownership and accounting conservatism

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of debt maturity structure and types of institutional ownership on accounting conservatism by using different financial variables and proxies. Design/methodology/approach Employing panel data analysis in the R programming language, the authors test their hypotheses on a sample of 143 (858 firm-year observations) companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange during 2011–2016. Findings Using Basu (1997) and Beaver and Ryan (2000) models as proxies for accounting conservatism, the findings suggest a non-significant relationship between accounting conservatism and debt maturity structure. Contrary to the primary expectation, the results indicate that short-maturity debts are also non-significantly and negatively associated with accounting conservatism in financially distressed firms. Finally, using both conservatism measures, the authors document that there is no significant relationship between both active and passive institutional ownership and accounting conservatism as well as debt maturity structure. Originality/value The current study is the first study conducted in a developing country like Iran, and the outcomes of the study may be helpful to other developing nations.
AN EPIZOOTIC OF WATERFOWL ASSOCIATED WITH A RED TIDE EPISODE IN FLORIDA 1

During February and March, 1974, an epizootic involving lesser scaup (Aythya affinis) occurred in the Tampa Bay area on the west coast of Florida. Several thousand ducks are estimated to have died. Concurrent with this epizootic was a red tide caused by heavy blooms of the toxic dinoflagellate Gymnodinium breve which caused severe wide-spread fish kills. Clinical signs consistent with G. breve intoxication were evident in some of the lesser scaup. A controlled experimental feeding of G. breve toxic material to White Pekin ducklings produced illness and death with signs comparable to some of those seen in the scaup.
Intimin Gene (eae) Subtype-Based Real-Time PCR Strategy for Specific Detection of Shiga Toxin-Producing Escherichia coli Serotypes O157:H7, O26:H11, O103:H2, O111:H8, and O145:H28 in Cattle Feces

ABSTRACT Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) strains belonging to serotypes O157:H7, O26:H11, O103:H2, O111:H8, and O145:H28 are known to be associated with particular subtypes of the intimin gene (eae), namely, γ1, β1, ε, θ, and γ1, respectively. This study aimed at evaluating the usefulness of their detection for the specific detection of these five main pathogenic STEC serotypes in cattle feces. Using real-time PCR assays, 58.7% of 150 fecal samples were found positive for at least one of the four targeted eae subtypes. The simultaneous presence of stx, eae, and one of the five O group markers was found in 58.0% of the samples, and the five targeted stx plus eae plus O genetic combinations were detected 143 times. However, taking into consideration the association between eae subtypes and O group markers, the resulting stx plus eae subtype plus O combinations were detected only 46 times. The 46 isolation assays performed allowed recovery of 22 E. coli strains belonging to one of the five targeted STEC serogroups. In contrast, only 2 of 39 isolation assays performed on samples that were positive for stx, eae and an O group marker, but that were negative for the corresponding eae subtype, were successful. Characterization of the 24 E. coli isolates showed that 6 were STEC, including 1 O157:H7, 3 O26:H11, and 2 O145:H28. The remaining 18 strains corresponded to atypical enteropathogenic E. coli (aEPEC). Finally, the more discriminating eae subtype-based PCR strategy described here may be helpful for the specific screening of the five major STEC in cattle feces.
Site-Specific Integration in Mammalian Cells Mediated by a New Hybrid Baculovirus–Adeno-Associated Virus Vector

ABSTRACT Baculovirus can transiently transduce primary human and rat hepatocytes, as well as a subset of stable cell lines. To prolong transgene expression, we have developed new hybrid vectors which associate key elements from adeno-associated virus (AAV) with the elevated transducing capacity of baculovirus. The hybrid vectors contain a transgene cassette composed of the β-galactosidase (β-Gal) reporter gene and the hygromycin resistance (Hygr) gene flanked by the AAV inverted terminal repeats (ITRs), which are necessary for AAV replication and integration in the host genome. Constructs were derived both with and without the AAVrep gene under the p5 and p19 promoters cloned in different positions with respect to the baculovirus polyheidrin promoter. A high-titer preparation of baculovirus-AAV (Bac-AAV) chimeric virus containing the ITR–Hygr–β-Gal sequence was obtained with insect cells only when the rep gene was placed in an antisense orientation to the polyheidrin promoter. Infection of 293 cells with Bac-AAV virus expressing the rep gene results in a 10- to 50-fold increase in the number of Hygr stable cell clones. Additionally, rep expression determined the localization of the transgene cassette in the aavs1 site in approximately 41% of cases as detected by both Southern blotting and fluorescent in situ hybridization analysis. Moreover, site-specific integration of the ITR-flanked DNA was also detected by PCR amplification of the ITR-aavs1 junction in transduced human fibroblasts. These data indicate that Bac-AAV hybrid vectors can allow permanent, nontoxic gene delivery of DNA constructs for ex vivo treatment of primary human cells.
Comparative Analysis of MTJ/CMOS Hybrid Cells Based on TAS and In-Plane STT Magnetic Tunnel Junctions

In the last few years, spintronics has attracted the full attention of the scientific community for the synergy it provides to conventional complimentary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) devices (nonvolatility, infinite endurance, radiation immunity, increased density, and so on). Many hybrid (magnetic/CMOS) cells have been proposed which can store and process data in both electrical and magnetic ways. Such cells are mainly based on magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) and are suitable for use in magnetic random access memories (MRAMs) and reprogrammable computing (magnetic FPGAs, nonvolatile registers, processor cache memories, and so on). In this paper, we report the results of exhaustive energy-performance analysis of the set of hybrid cells recently published in the literature. We explore their limits in metrics of the required silicon area, robustness, read/write speed, and consumed energy. Two different mechanisms for writing non-volatile data stored in MTJs are applied to each hybrid cell: thermally assisted switching (TAS) and spin-transfer torque (STT). All the results were obtained through simulations in Cadence Spectre 7.2. For the CMOS part, we used 45 nm predictive transistor models whereas the MTJ part was simulated using the 120 nm × 120 nm TAS Spintec model and the 100 nm × 50 nm STT Spinlib model. The results presented here are a valuable resource for future designers of hybrid devices if they need to select an appropriate hybrid cell for a target application.
Collagen hydrolysate for the treatment of osteoarthritis and other joint disorders:a review of the literature

ABSTRACT Background: There is a need for an effective treatment for the millions of people in the United States with osteoarthritis (OA), a degenerative joint disease. The demand for treatments, both traditional and non-traditional, will continue to grow as the population ages. Scope: This article reviews the medical literature on the preclinical and clinical research on a unique compound, collagen hydrolysate. Articles were obtained through searches of the PubMed database (www.pubmed.gov) through May 2006 using several pairs of key words (collagen hydrolysate and osteoarthritis; collagen hydrolysate and cartilage; collagen hydrolysate and chondrocytes; collagen hydrolysate and clinical trial) without date limits. In addition, other sources of information, such as abstracts presented at scientific congresses and articles in the German medical literature not available on PubMed, were reviewed and included based on the authors’ judgment of their relevance to the topic of the review. Findings: According to published research, orally administered collagen hydrolysate has been shown to be absorbed intestinally and to accumulate in cartilage. Collagen hydrolysate ingestion stimulates a statistically significant increase in synthesis of extracellular matrix macromolecules by chondrocytes ( p < 0.05 compared with untreated controls). These findings suggest mechanisms that might help patients affected by joint disorders such as OA. Four open-label and three double-blind studies were identified and reviewed; although many of these studies did not provide key information – such as the statistical significance of the findings – they showed collagen hydrolysate to be safe and to provide improvement in some measures of pain and function in some men and women with OA or other arthritic conditions. Conclusion: A growing body of evidence provides a rationale for the use of collagen hydrolysate for patients with OA. It is hoped that ongoing and future research will clarify how collagen hydrolysate provides its clinical effects and determine which populations are most appropriate for treatment with this supplement.
Computer databases of medical school curricula

As the pace of curriculum reform in medical education has accelerated during the past decade, so too have demands on curriculum managers to supply increasingly detailed information about the curriculum. In response, a number of schools have joined together to begin work on designs for computer databases of the curriculum. The authors describe three of the most mature curriculum database prototypes, developed by groups at the medical schools of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC), The University of Maryland, and the University of Miami. All three groups have employed relational database management systems to organize information about each “instructional unit” in the preclinical curriculum, including a set of defining the major concepts presented. The are indexed to a controlled vocabulary, either the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) or a MeSH derivative. The UNC database also employs a textfile management system to provide users with an overview of the entire curriculum. Future work will focus on identifying a suitable controlled vocabulary; capturing content in greater contextual detail; incorporating alternative learning formats, such as problem-based learning; creating links between content items and examination questions; and capturing information generated by student-patient interactions in clinical settings. As a result of recent collaboration with the Association of American Medical Colleges, work to define a prototype national database has begun and a consortium of interested schools is addressing further development activities.
Association of tissue-specific differentially methylated regions (TDMs) with differential gene expression.

Early studies proposed that DNA methylation could have a role in regulating gene expression during development [Riggs, A.D. (1975) Cytogenet. Cell Genet. 14, 9-25]. However, some studies of DNA methylation in known tissue-specific genes during development do not support a major role for DNA methylation. In the results presented here, tissue-specific differentially methylated regions (TDMs) were first identified, and then expression of genes associated with these regions correlated with methylation status. Restriction landmark genomic scanning (RLGS) was used in conjunction with virtual RLGS to identify 150 TDMs [Matsuyama, T. , Kimura, M.T. , Koike, K. , Abe, T. , Nakao, T. , Asami, T. , Ebisuzaki, T. , Held, W.A. , Yoshida, S. & Nagase, H. (2003) Nucleic Acids Res. 31, 4490-4496]. Analysis of 14 TDMs by methylation-specific PCR and by bisulfite genomic sequencing confirms that the regions identified by RLGS are differentially methylated in a tissue-specific manner. The results indicate that 5% or more of the CpG islands are TDMs, disputing the general notion that all CpG islands are unmethylated. Some of the TDMs are within 5' promoter CpG islands of genes, which exhibit a tissue-specific expression pattern that is consistent with methylation status and a role in tissue differentiation.
Contribution of VCAF‐positive cells to neovascularization and calcification in atherosclerotic plaque development

Calcification of the vessel wall is a regulated process with many similarities to osteogenesis. Progenitor cells may play a role in this process. Previously, we identified a novel gene, Vascular Calcification Associated Factor (VCAF), which was shown to be important in pericyte osteogenic differentiation. The aim of this study was to determine the localization and expression pattern of VCAF in human cells and tissues. Immunohistochemical analysis of seven atherosclerotic arteries confirmed VCAF protein expression within calcified lesions. In addition, individual VCAF‐positive cells were detected within the intima and adventitia in areas where sporadic 3G5‐positive pericytes were localized. Furthermore, VCAF‐positive cells were identified in newly formed microvessels in association with CD34‐positive/CD146‐positive/c‐kit‐positive cells as well as in intact CD31‐positive endothelium in internal mammary arteries. Western blot analysis confirmed the presence of VCAF (18 kD) in protein lysates extracted from human smooth muscle cells, endothelial cells, macrophages, and osteoblasts. In fracture callus samples from three patients, VCAF was detected in osteoblasts and microvessels. This study demonstrates the presence of VCAF in neovessels and raises the possibility that VCAF could be a new marker for vascular progenitor cells involved in a number of differentiation pathways. These data may have implications for the prevention or treatment of vascular disease. Copyright © 2006 Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Fast and Accurate Face Recognition with Image Sets

For large-scale face recognition applications using image sets, the images of the query set typically lie in compact regions surrounded by a diffuse sea of images of the gallery set. In this study, we propose a fast and accurate method to approximate the distances from gallery images to the region spanned by the query set for large-scale applications. To this end, we propose a new polyhedral conic classifier that will enable us to compute those distances efficiently by using simple dot products. We also introduce one-class formulation of the proposed classifier that can use query set examples only. This makes the method ideal for real-time applications since testing time approximately becomes the independent of the size of the gallery set. One-class formulation is very important for large-scale face recognition problems in the sense that it can be used in a cascade system with more complex and time-consuming methods to return the most promising candidate gallery sets in the first stage of the cascade so that more complex methods can be run on those a few candidate sets. As a result, we strongly believe that the proposed method will impact future methods and it will enable to introduce face recognition methods working in real-time even for large-scale set based recognition problems. Experimental results on both small and moderate sized face recognition datasets support these claims and demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed method. More precisely, the proposed methods achieve the best accuracies on all tested datasets and we obtained improvements around 18% compared to the best performing rival methods on larger datasets.
On the residual of large-scale Lyapunov equations for Krylov-based approximate solutions

In this paper a new formulation of the residual of large-scale Lyapunov equations is presented, which results from the approximate solution using projections byKrylov subspaces. The formulation is based on low-rank factors, which allows an efficient numerical treatment of the residual even for large-scale Lyapunov equations. It is shown, how the matrix 2-norm can be computed with low numerical effort. The results are presented for the most general case, which means that generalized Lyapunov equations are considered and that oblique projections are utilized for approximately solving the Lyapunov equation. With this regard, this paper also presents generalizations to Krylov-based methods that are available in the literature. Furthermore, based on the new results, the suitability of the residual as a stopping criterion in iterative methods is discussed and an upper bound on the approximation is reviewed. Numerical examples illustrate the contributions.
Firm Size and Age mediating the Firm Survival-Hedging Effect: Hayes’ 3-Way Parallel Approach

A James Gaskin Excel Macro Analysis is performed to determine the reliability of our scales, and a 3-way parallel mediation using the Andrew Hayes’ PROCESS model is applied to test the formulated hypotheses. Results show that hedging has a direct effect on firms’ survival; firms’ size and age individually do not strongly influence these effects, but a combination of the two does. We, therefore, concluded that while the hedging-survival effect exists on all forms of hedging, the practice of hedging is consequential for firms on the premise of their ages and numbers of employees.
Target groups for the prevention of late-life anxiety.

BACKGROUND Anxiety disorders in older people are highly prevalent, yet there is little evidence to guide targeted prevention strategies. AIMS To identify subgroups at increased risk of developing anxiety in later life. METHOD Anxiety was measured with the Hospital Anxiety and Depression anxiety sub-scale in 1931 people aged 55-85 years followed over 3 years. Risk factors were identified that had a high combined attributable fraction, indicative of substantial health gains when the adverse effect of the risk factors can be contained. RESULTS Factors significantly associated with increased risk of developing anxiety included sub-threshold anxiety, depression, two or more chronic illnesses, poor sense of mastery, poor self-rated health and low educational level. CONCLUSIONS The identified risk groups are small, thus providing prevention with a narrow focus, and health gains are likely to be more substantial than in groups not exposed to these risk factors. Nevertheless, more research is needed to produce evidence on target groups where prevention has optimal impacts.
Sequential transformation of 4-androstenedione into dihydrotestosterone in prostate carcinoma (DU-145) cells indicates that 4-androstenedione and not testosterone is the substrate of 5α-reductase

Abstract Background: Although it is well recognized that 5α-reductases possess higher affinity for 4-androstenedione than testosterone, and the affinity of 4-androstenedione is higher for 5α-reductases than 17β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenases, it is generally believed that dihydrotestosterone is necessarily produced by the transformation of testosterone into dihydrotestosterone, suggesting that the step catalyzed by 17β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase precedes the step catalyzed by 5α-reductase. This interpretation is in contradiction with the enzymatic kinetic law that suggests that the 5α-reduction step that catalyzes the transformation of 4-dione into 5α-androstane-3,17-dione precedes the 17keto-reduction step. Materials and methods: To verify which of these two pathways is operative, we quantified mRNA expression levels of steroidogenic enzymes in prostate carcinoma DU-145 cells by real-time PCR and determined the metabolites produced after incubation with [14C]4-dione in the presence and absence of a 5α-reductase inhibitor and analyzed the metabolites produced by thin layer chromatography and HPLC. Results: Real-time PCR analysis strongly suggests that the new type 3 5α-reductase is responsible for 5α-reductase activity in DU-145 cells. Steroid profile analysis shows that in the absence of inhibitor 5α-androstanedione is first produced, followed by the production of androsterone and dihydrotestosterone. The concentration of testosterone was not detectable. In the presence of Finasteride, an inhibitor of 5α-reductase, there was no transformation of 4-androstenedione and also there was no production of testosterone. The present data clearly indicate that the biosynthesis of dihydrotestosterone in DU-145 cells does not require testosterone as intermediate, and the step catalyzed by 5α-reductase precedes the step catalyzed by 17β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase.
Actomyosin purse strings: Renewable resources that make morphogenesis robust and resilient

Dorsal closure in Drosophila is a model system for cell sheet morphogenesis and wound healing. During closure two sheets of lateral epidermis move dorsally to close over the amnioserosa and form a continuous epidermis. Forces from the amnioserosa and actomyosin‐rich, supracellular purse strings at the leading edges of these lateral epidermal sheets drive closure. Purse strings generate the largest force for closure and occur during development and wound healing throughout phylogeny. We use laser microsurgery to remove some or all of the purse strings from developing embryos. Free edges produced by surgery undergo characteristic responses as follows. Intact cells in the free edges, which previously had no purse string, recoil away from the incision and rapidly assemble new, secondary purse strings. Next, recoil slows, then pauses at a turning point. Following a brief delay, closure resumes and is powered to completion by the secondary purse strings. We confirm that the assembly of the secondary purse strings requires RhoA. We show that α‐actinin alternates with nonmuscle myosin II along purse strings and requires nonmuscle myosin II for its localization. Together our data demonstrate that purse strings are renewable resources that contribute to the robust and resilient nature of closure.
Molecular Analysis of Three Aeromonas hydrophila AH-3 (Serotype O34) Lipopolysaccharide Core Biosynthesis Gene Clusters

ABSTRACT By the isolation of three different Aeromonas hydrophila strain AH-3 (serotype O34) mutants with an altered lipopolysaccharide (LPS) migration in gels, three genomic regions encompassing LPS core biosynthesis genes were identified and characterized. When possible, mutants were constructed using each gene from the three regions, containing seven, four, and two genes (regions 1 to 3, respectively). The mutant LPS core structures were elucidated by using mass spectrometry, methylation analysis, and comparison with the full core structure of an O-antigen-lacking AH-3 mutant previously established by us. Combining the gene sequence and complementation test data with the structural data and phenotypic characterization of the mutant LPSs enabled a presumptive assignment of all LPS core biosynthesis gene functions in A. hydrophila AH-3. The three regions and the genes contained are in complete agreement with the recently sequenced genome of A. hydrophila ATCC 7966. The functions of the A. hydrophila genes waaC in region 3 and waaF in region 2 were completely established, allowing the genome annotations of the two heptosyl transferase products not previously assigned. Having the functions of all genes involved with the LPS core biosynthesis and most corresponding single-gene mutants now allows experimental work on the role of the LPS core in the virulence of A. hydrophila.