Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
New Wideband Miniature Branchline Coupler on IPD Technology for Beamforming Applications

In this paper, we present a new wideband miniature branchline coupler as a key circuit to be integrated in 60-GHz packaged beamforming networks for phased-array antennas. First, the integrated passive device (IPD) technology from STMicroelectronics is investigated in the mm-wave range through the simulation, fabrication, and measurements of a microstrip line and a simple hybrid coupler. Then, a novel coupler topology with emphasis on miniaturization and broadband operation is theorized. Analytical equations are derived and a 60-GHz coupler is optimized on IPD technology. Measurement results are discussed and compared with state-of-the art publications. The whole 57-66-GHz bandwidth is efficiently covered with the three following performance: -10-dB impedance matching, ±1-dB amplitude imbalance, and ±5° phase imbalance. As an application example, the novel coupler is integrated into a 4 × 4 Butler matrix suitable for an array-antenna demonstrating stateof-the art performance in terms of insertion loss and phase error. The measurement of different samples shows low variation of the IPD process because of very good reproducibility making it a suitable candidate for circuits operating in the 60-GHz band.
Gene therapy for immunodeficiency due to adenosine deaminase deficiency.

BACKGROUND We investigated the long-term outcome of gene therapy for severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) due to the lack of adenosine deaminase (ADA), a fatal disorder of purine metabolism and immunodeficiency. METHODS We infused autologous CD34+ bone marrow cells transduced with a retroviral vector containing the ADA gene into 10 children with SCID due to ADA deficiency who lacked an HLA-identical sibling donor, after nonmyeloablative conditioning with busulfan. Enzyme-replacement therapy was not given after infusion of the cells. RESULTS All patients are alive after a median follow-up of 4.0 years (range, 1.8 to 8.0). Transduced hematopoietic stem cells have stably engrafted and differentiated into myeloid cells containing ADA (mean range at 1 year in bone marrow lineages, 3.5 to 8.9%) and lymphoid cells (mean range in peripheral blood, 52.4 to 88.0%). Eight patients do not require enzyme-replacement therapy, their blood cells continue to express ADA, and they have no signs of defective detoxification of purine metabolites. Nine patients had immune reconstitution with increases in T-cell counts (median count at 3 years, 1.07x10(9) per liter) and normalization of T-cell function. In the five patients in whom intravenous immune globulin replacement was discontinued, antigen-specific antibody responses were elicited after exposure to vaccines or viral antigens. Effective protection against infections and improvement in physical development made a normal lifestyle possible. Serious adverse events included prolonged neutropenia (in two patients), hypertension (in one), central-venous-catheter-related infections (in two), Epstein-Barr virus reactivation (in one), and autoimmune hepatitis (in one). CONCLUSIONS Gene therapy, combined with reduced-intensity conditioning, is a safe and effective treatment for SCID in patients with ADA deficiency. (ClinicalTrials.gov numbers, NCT00598481 and NCT00599781.)
Ecosystem consequences of diversity depend on food chain length in estuarine vegetation

Biodiversity and food chain length each can strongly influence ecosystem functioning, yet their interactions rarely have been tested. We manipulated grazer diversity in seagrass mesocosms with and without a generalist predator and monitored community development. Changing food chain length altered biodiversity effects: higher grazer diversity enhanced secondary production, epiphyte grazing, and seagrass biomass only with predators present. Conversely, changing diversity altered top-down control: predator impacts on grazer and seagrass biomass were weaker in mixed-grazer assemblages. These interactions resulted in part from among-species trade-offs between predation resistance and competitive ability. Despite weak impact on grazer abundance at high diversity, predators nevertheless enhanced algal biomass through a behaviourally mediated trophic cascade. Moreover, predators influenced every measured variable except total plant biomass, suggesting that the latter is an insensitive metric of ecosystem functioning. Thus, biodiversity and trophic structure interactively influence ecosystem functioning, and neither factor’s impact is predictable in isolation.
Study on conduction current characteristics of corona-resistant polyimide film before and after thermal aging

In order to investigate the effect of thermal aging on the conduction current characteristics of polyimide film, two types of corona-resistant polyimide films (represented by A and B) were thermal aged at 250 °C from 0 h to 40 h. The polarization currents and the depolarization currents of all films were measured, and the corresponding electric degradation threshold under which the current changed from ohm region to space charge limited current (SCLC) region were also calculated. The results showed that the electric degradation threshold of unaged A and unaged B were 46 kV/mm and 45 kV/mm, respectively. As the thermal aging time increased, the electric degradation threshold of A became larger, whereas that of B showed no remarkable change. Two-order exponential fitting was used to analyze the depolarization process. It is inferred that after the thermal aging, there are more traps in A. And B shows a better thermal-resistant performance than A.
Investigation of sequential experimental approaches in logistic regression modeling

Binary responses are routinely observed in practice whether it is medicine, geology, defense or day to day life situations. Logistic regression methods can be used to capture the binary responses. Modeling becomes critical when there is sensitivity analysis involved, and the selection of the settings of variables depends on sequential design methodology. A total number of experimental runs is also an important factor since cost is directly related to it. In this research different experimental approaches for logistic regression modeling are investigated to improve the estimation of median quantile, to reduce the number of experimental runs as well as to improve overall modeling quality. We present the Break Separation Method which guarantees an overlap in the data such that the Maximum Likelihood Estimation may be used to estimate the model parameters. We also investigate and discuss the augmentation after the BSM.
Unpacking ICT : understanding the implications of ICT availability and adoption on firm performance

Since Bresnahan & Trajitenberg’s original 1995 article on ‘General Purpose Technology (GPT): Engines of Growth’, the concept of GPT has slowly but steadily influenced the literature on business ICT (information and communication technology) adoption. Considering business ICT within the framework of GPT allows us to focus on the externalities of ICT. In the literature, these externality benefits of business ICT have rarely been examined. Given this context, the article provides a survey of recently published empirical studies (from 2004 to 2013) using the original definition of GPT by Bresnahan & Trajenberg. Using the science citation index and citations derived from Google Scholar, we found 1090 articles citing the original paper of Bresnahan & Trajtenberg and taking ICT as a GPT; from these articles just 57 studies provided empirical estimation of the productivity impact of ICT. Our survey suggests that if GPT refers to the whole range of ICT, this might generate misleading results. In general, our review of papers indicates a shift in the discussion on GPT focusing on business ICT. The literature also demonstrates that ‐ with the availability of better data ‐ a better distinction between infrastructure technologies and different kinds of applications should be developed. While infrastructure technologies are uniformly adopted among small and large enterprises, the adoption of applications is a more complex phenomenon. In particular, the adoption of business ICT within small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) has rarely been examined.
Generation and diagnostic application of monoclonal antibodies against Seneca Valley virus

Seneca Valley virus (SVV), a member of the Picornaviridae family, was implicated in a suspicious vesicular disease discovered in pigs from Canada in 2007. Because any outbreak of vesicular disease in pigs is assumed to be foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) until confirmed otherwise, a test for diagnosing the presence of SVV would be a very useful tool. To develop the diagnostic tests for SVV infection, 5 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) were produced from mice immunized with binary ethylenimine (BEI)-inactivated SVV. Using a dot blot assay, the reactivity of the mAbs was confirmed to be specific for SVV, not reacting with any of the other vesicular disease viruses tested. The mAbs demonstrated reactivity with SVV antigen in infected cells by an immunohistochemistry assay. An SVV-specific competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (cELISA) was developed using BEI-inactivated SVV antigen and a mAb for serodiagnosis. The cELISA results were compared to the indirect isotype (immunoglobulin [Ig]M and IgG) ELISA and the virus neutralization test. All SVV experimentally inoculated pigs exhibited a positive SVV-specific antibody response at 6 days postinoculation, and the sera remained positive until the end of the experiment on day 57 (>40% inhibition) using the cELISA. The cELISA reflected the profile of the indirect ELISA for both IgM and IgG. This panel of SVV-specific mAbs is valuable for the identification of SVV antigen and the serological detection of SVV-specific antibodies.
INTROGRESSION OF FECUNDITY GENE ( FecB ) IN NON-PROLIFIC SHEEP BREEDS : A BOON FOR FARMERS

Booroola Merino (BM) ewes have a high ovulation rate and litter size which was due to the effects of FecB gene. FecB was due to a mutation (BMPR-1B) on chromosome 6. The mutation has been found in native sheep breeds in India and it is likely that FecB in the Australian BM was derived from importations of Garole sheep from India in 1792 and 1793. The introgression of this FecB mutation form highly prolific breeds like Garole and Kendrapada to the nonprolific but higher body weighted sheep breeds can enhance the productivity to the sheep industry and thus the socioeconomic condition of the farmers. The introgression of FecB mutation into a nonprolific breed through forced PCR-RFLP followed by backcrossing technique can be established after six generation and a nonprolific sheep breed can be converted into a prolific breed. The introgression of FecB mutation into higher body weighted sheep could be a boon for the farmers involved in sheep rearing.
The Effect of Industry Restructuring on Peer Firms

We study the bond price reaction of a merged firms peers, in order to better understand how the market responds to a restructuring. We argue that a merger announcement may signal the possibility of a merger wave to the industry, and in doing so, increase the conditional probability that peer firms might themselves be acquired in the future. However, while peer firm equity holders expect a direct benefit from a potential acquisition—in the form of a price premium—peer firm bond holders can only expect an indirect benefit—in the form of a risk reduction. Consistent with these hypotheses, we show that price reactions are stronger for firms that have a higher unconditional probability of being acquired ex-ante. In addition, we document that, cross-sectionally, the abnormal returns we observe from peer bondholders are concentrated among firms that have the highest expected risk reduction benefit from a potential acquisition. In order to distinguish a potential reduction in risk as the explicit return driver, we show that abnormal bond returns within firm (between different bond issues) are also concentrated among issues that have the highest expected risk reduction benefit.
A belief‐desire‐intention agent architecture for partner selection in peer‐to‐peer live video streaming applications

In peer‐to‐peer (P2P) video streaming systems, one of the most challenging parts is to schedule video data dissemination, that is, each peer should carefully select the partner(s) it receives video from and the partner(s) it sends data to. We believe that an agent‐based partner selection approach may improve the quality of streaming by taking both autonomy and dynamic plan selection into account in a goal‐oriented manner. In this study, a Belief‐Desire‐Intention agent architecture for partner selection in P2P video streaming systems is introduced. The major concern of our study is to exhibit how to select the best partner during video streaming session whilst maximizing the quality of video and minimizing delay and hop count. The effects and comparative results of executing proposed agent behaviours are evaluated in the study. The proposed autonomous agent‐based approach also provides an infrastructure in which the best plan for the achievement of optimum streaming goal can be dynamically determined and executed at runtime. Experimental results of the implementation have revealed to us that both of the partner selection methods (with or without agents) manage to increase the video quality. However, the agent‐based approach performs better in terms of received bitrate, delay and hop count during streaming.
Multiboundary wormholes and holographic entanglement

The AdS/CFT correspondence relates quantum entanglement between boundary conformal field theories and geometric connections in the dual asymptotically anti-de Sitter spacetime. We consider entangled states in the n ? > -fold tensor product of a 1 + 1 dimensional CFT Hilbert space defined by the Euclidean path integral over a Riemann surface with n holes. In one region of moduli space, the dual bulk state is a black hole with n asymptotically AdS3 regions connected by a common wormhole, while in other regions the bulk fragments into disconnected components. We study the entanglement structure and compute the wave function explicitly in the puncture limit of the Riemann surface in terms of CFT n-point functions. We also use AdS minimal surfaces to measure entanglement more generally. In some regions of the moduli space the entanglement is entirely multipartite, though not of the GHZ type. However, even when the bulk is completely connected, there are regions of the moduli space in which the entanglement is instead almost entirely bipartite: significant entanglement occurs only between pairs of CFTs. We develop new tools to analyze intrinsically n-partite entanglement, and use these to show that for some wormholes with n similar sized horizons there is intrinsic entanglement between all n parties, and that the distillable entanglement between the asymptotic regions is at least ( n + 1 ) / 2 ? > partite.
Benefits of CT urography in patients presenting to the emergency department with suspected ureteric colic

Background: Ureteric colic is a common presentation in the emergency department and accounts for approximately 1% of all hospital admissions. Diagnosis depends on a typical history, clinical examination and the presence of haematuria. Intravenous urography has traditionally been used as the means of investigation, but over recent years this has been superseded by CT urography. This latter investigation gives potentially more information and may detect alternative or additional pathology which would otherwise be missed on intravenous urography. Methods: 100 consecutive patients attending the emergency department with a provisional diagnosis of ureteric colic undergoing CT urography were studied to detect the incidence of alternative or incidental pathology. Results: Stone disease was found in 58% of patients, with obstruction present in 43%. The most common site of obstruction was the vesicoureteric junction. Significant incidental or alternative pathology was found in 16% of patients. It was estimated that, in 12%, these findings would not have been detected by intravenous urography. Conclusion: The use of non-contrast CT urography is recommended in the initial investigation of patients with ureteric colic.
Interaction between reinforcement and inhibitory control in ADHD : A review and research guidelines Ili

The majority of studies which have aimed to identify cognitive and motivational factors at play in ADHD have investigated cognitive-control processes and reinforcement effects in isolation. Notably, in recent years, the interaction between these two processes has been increasingly examined. Here, we aimed to provide a comprehensive and critical review of the behavioural and functional neuroimaging studies that have investigated reinforcement effects on inhibitory control in ADHD. The findings of our meta-analyses show that reinforcement can normalize inhibitory control in children and adolescents with ADHD to the baseline level of controls. Furthermore, the data suggests that inhibitory control may improve to a larger extent in youth with ADHD compared with controls, as a function of reinforcement. Based on (1) this review and meta-analyses, (2) functional neuroimaging studies in healthy populations, and (3) existing ADHD and neurobiological models of dual processes, we propose specific guidelines for future research, which are anticipated to further elucidate processes underlying impulsive behaviour associated with ADHD.
EQUILIBRIUM IN A CAPITAL ASSET MARKET

This paper investigates the properties of a market for risky assets on the basis of a simple model of general equilibrium of exchange, where individual investors seek to maximize preference functions over expected yield and variance of yield on their port- folios. A theory of market risk premiums is outlined, and it is shown that general equilibrium implies the existence of a so-called "market line," relating per dollar expected yield and standard deviation of yield. The concept of price of risk is discussed in terms of the slope of this line.
Mobility management challenges in 3GPP heterogeneous networks

In this article we provide a comprehensive review of the handover process in heterogeneous networks (HetNets), and identify technical challenges in mobility management. In this line, we evaluate the mobility performance of HetNets with the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Release-10 range expansion and enhanced inter-cell interference coordination (eICIC) features such as almost blank subframes (ABSFs). Simulation assumptions and parameters of a related study item in 3GPP are used to investigate the impact of various handover parameters on mobility performance. In addition, we propose a mobility-based inter-cell interference coordination (MB-ICIC) scheme, in which picocells configure coordinated resources so that macrocells can schedule their high-mobility UEs in these resources without co-channel interference from picocells. MB-ICIC also benefits low-mobility UEs, since handover parameters can now be more flexibly optimized. Simulations using the 3GPP simulation assumptions are performed to evaluate the performance of MB-ICIC under several scenarios.
Sensitivity to an Illusion of Sound Location in Human Auditory Cortex

Human listeners place greater weight on the beginning of a sound compared to the middle or end when determining sound location, creating an auditory illusion known as the Franssen effect. Here, we exploited that effect to test whether human auditory cortex (AC) represents the physical vs. perceived spatial features of a sound. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure AC responses to sounds that varied in perceived location due to interaural level differences (ILD) applied to sound onsets or to the full sound duration. Analysis of hemodynamic responses in AC revealed sensitivity to ILD in both full-cue (veridical) and onset-only (illusory) lateralized stimuli. Classification analysis revealed regional differences in the sensitivity to onset-only ILDs, where better classification was observed in posterior compared to primary AC. That is, restricting the ILD to sound onset—which alters the physical but not the perceptual nature of the spatial cue—did not eliminate cortical sensitivity to that cue. These results suggest that perceptual representations of auditory space emerge or are refined in higher-order AC regions, supporting the stable perception of auditory space in noisy or reverberant environments and forming the basis of illusions such as the Franssen effect.
Using Hyperlink Texts to Improve Quality of Identifying Document Topics Based on Wikipedia

This paper presents a method to identify the topics of documents based on Wikipedia category network. It is to improve the method previously proposed by Schonhofen by taking into account the weights of words in hyperlink texts in Wikipedia articles. The experiments on Computing and Team Sport domains have been carried out and showed that our proposed method outperforms the Schonhofen’s one.
CRF1 Receptor‐Dependent Increases in Irritability‐Like Behavior During Abstinence from Chronic Intermittent Ethanol Vapor Exposure

BACKGROUND In humans, emotional and physical signs of withdrawal from ethanol are commonly seen. Many of these symptoms, including anxiety-like and depression-like behavior, have been characterized in animal models of ethanol dependence. One issue with several current behavioral tests that measure withdrawal in animal models is that they are often not repeatable within subjects over time. Additionally, irritability, one of the most common symptoms of ethanol withdrawal in humans, has not been well characterized in animal models. The corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF)-CRF1 receptor system has been suggested to be critical for the emergence of anxiety-like behavior in ethanol dependence, but the role of this system in irritability-like behavior has not been characterized. METHODS The present study compared the effects of chronic intermittent ethanol (CIE) vapor exposure-induced ethanol dependence on irritability-like behavior in rats using the bottle-brush test during acute withdrawal and protracted abstinence. Rats were trained to self-administer ethanol in operant chambers and then either left in a nondependent state or made dependent via CIE. Naïve, nondependent, and dependent rats were tested for irritability-like behavior in the bottle-brush test 8 hours and 2 weeks into abstinence from ethanol. Separate cohorts of dependent and nondependent rats were used to examine the effect of the specific CRF1 receptor antagonist R121919 on irritability-like behavior. RESULTS Dependent rats exhibited escalated ethanol intake compared with their own pre-CIE baseline and nondependent rats. At both time points of abstinence, ethanol-dependent rats exhibited increased aggressive-like responses compared with naïve and nondependent rats. R121919 reduced irritability-like behavior in both dependent and nondependent rats, but dependent rats were more sensitive to R121919. CONCLUSIONS Irritability-like behavior is a clinically relevant and reliable measure of negative emotional states that is partially mediated by activation of the CRF-CRF1 system and remains elevated during protracted abstinence in ethanol-dependent rats.
FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT: DIAGNOSIS AND PROPOSALS FOR A BRAZILIAN PUBLIC POLICY

______________________________________________________________________________ CAMPANARIO, M. A. ; SILVA, M. M. ; JUNIOR, M. F. C. ; PESSOA, L.C. Foreign Direct Investment: Diagnosis And Proposals For A Brazilian Public Policy Internext – Revista Eletrônica de Negócios Internacionais da ESPM, São Paulo, v.6, n.1, p. 125-158, jan./jun. 2011 FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT: DIAGNOSIS AND PROPOSALS FOR A BRAZILIAN PUBLIC POLICY