Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Ubiquitous Aberrant RASSF 1 A Promoter Methylation in Childhood Neoplasia 1

Purpose and Experimental Design: The role of RASSF1A has been elucidated recently in regulating apoptosis and cell cycle progression by inhibiting cyclin D1 accumulation. Aberrant RASSF1A promoter methylation has been found frequently in multiple adult cancer types. Using methylation-specific PCR and reverse transcriptionPCR, we investigated epigenetic deregulation of RASSF1A in primary tumors, adjacent nontumor tissues, secondary metastases, peripheral blood cells, and plasma samples from children with 18 different cancer types, in association with their clinicopathologic features. Results: Regardless of the tumor size, ubiquitous RASSF1A promoter methylation was found in 67% (16 of 24) of pediatric tumors, including neuroblastoma, thyroid carcinoma, hepatocellular carcinoma, pancreatoblastoma, adrenocortical carcinoma, Wilms’ tumor, Burkitt’s lymphoma, and T-cell lymphoma. A majority (75%) of pediatric cancer patients with tumoral RASSF1A methylation was male. Methylated RASSF1A alleles were also detected in 4 of 13 adjacent nontumor tissues, suggesting that this epigenetic change is potentially an early and critical event in childhood neoplasia. RASSF1A promoter methylation found in 92% (11 of 12) of cell lines largely derived from pediatric cancer patients was significantly associated with transcriptional silencing/repression. After demethylation treatment with 5-aza-2 -deoxycytidine, transcriptional reactivation was shown in KELLY, RD, and Namalwa cell lines as analyzed by reverse transcription-PCR. For the first time, RASSF1A methylation was detected in 54% (7 of 13), 40% (4 of 10), and 9% (1 of 11) of buffy coat samples collected before, during, and after treatment, correspondingly, from pediatric patients with neuroblastoma, thyroid carcinoma, hepatocellular carcinoma, rhabdomyosarcoma, Burkitt’s lymphoma, T-cell lymphoma, or acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Concordantly, RASSF1A methylation was found during treatment in plasma of the same patients, suggesting cell death and good response to chemotherapy. Conclusions: RASSF1A methylation in tumor or buffy coat did not correlate strongly with age, tumor size, recurrence/metastasis, or overall survival in this cohort of pediatric cancer patients. Of importance, epigenetic inactivation of RASSF1A may potentially be crucial in pediatric tumor initiation.
Relationship of Pleural and Serum Cholesterol and Lipoprotein Levels in Exudative and Transudative Effusions

Background: This study aimed to assess whether total cholesterol (CHOL), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL), and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) are sensitive markers for discriminating between transudative and exudative pleural effusions (PE). Materials and Methods: In this study CHOL, LDL, HDL, TG, protein and LDH were analyzed in PE and serums of 119 patients with pleural effusion out of which 49 had transudative and 70 had exudative pleural effusion. Sensitivity, specificity, and area under the curve (AUC) of CHOL, LDL and HDL were measured by receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC). Results: Pleural fluid CHOL, LDL and HDL levels were significantly lower in the transudate group compared to the exudate (29.6 ±16.3 mg/dl versus 65.24 ± 25.9 mg/dl, p<0.001; 17 ±14.8 mg/dl versus 43.94 ± 21.6 mg/dl, p<0.001; and 9.2 ± 4.8 mg/dl versus14.9 ± 6.3 mg/dl, p<0.001, respectively). Sixty-seven percent of cases with pleural transudates were secondary to heart failure, while 41% and 39% of those with pleural exudates were of parapneumonic effusion and neoplastic origin, respectively. Pleural fluid CHOL, LDL and HDL levels were significantly higher in malignant pleural effusion (71.5±18.6, 48.1±17.4 and 16.1±6.6mg/dl, respectively), and in parapneumonic effusion (70.7±28.5, 49.4±22.4 and 14.7±6.4 mg/dl, respectively) than in heart failure (30.6±11.9, 17.5±10.4 and 9.6 ±5.4 mg/dl, respectively). The optimum cut-off value for pleural fluid CHOL level of ≥38 mg/dL had a sensitivity of 87% and 80% specificity, for LDL pleural fluid level a cut-off value of ≥ 22.5 mg/dl had a sensitivity of 87% and 78% specificity, and for HDL pleural fluid a cut-off value of ≥ 10.5 mg/dl had a sensitivity of 70% and 69% specificity. AUC values were 0.906, 0.883, and 0.783, for CHOL, LDL, and HDL of pleural fluid, respectively. Conclusion: We conclude that pleural fluid CHOL, LDL and HDL are significantly increased in exudative effusions compared to the transudative ones. Measurement of CHOL, LDL and HDL concentrations in pleural effusions is useful in distinguishing
Reconciling income mobility and welfare persistence

In this paper, we provide evidence that reconciles the co-existence of high income mobility among people on low income and patterns of high persistence on income support among people whose income from government payments is low – both phenomena have been founded in different Australian studies. We find that these phenomena are evident in data from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey, but that they reflect the experiences of different groups of individuals. These groups of individuals are around the same size. While there is considerable mobility in income from the lowest two deciles of household equivalised income, this mobility is greater for those not reliant on welfare for the majority of their income than for those who are. The non-welfare reliant individuals appear to have substantially different characteristics compared with those in the (more disadvantaged) welfare reliant group, being much younger, less likely to suffer from a long-term health condition, more likely to be full-time students and less likely to have been divorced than the welfare reliant group.
Spatial Dependence of Income Inequality among Trading Partners

Questions surrounding income inequality have received great attention in the recent economic literature. Traditionally the literature does not attempt to investigate how income inequality in a country could be affected by the income inequality of countries economically related to it. Using Trade Spatial Lags, this paper shows that a country’s income inequality is affected by the inequality of its top trading partners. This investigation shows a strong positive relationship of the Gini coefficient among major trading partners. To conduct the study, we use panel data for a sample of 180 countries from 1960 to 2008.
MODIFIED DYNAMIC NETWORK SELECTION ALGORITHM FOR HETEROGENEOUS OVERLAID NETWORKS

To meet wide expectation and growing demand of mobile users, operators have started to deploy different overlapping radio access network technologies. In heterogonous overlaid networks, network selection decision is delegated to mobile users to avoid processing and signaling overhead. In user centric network selection, users select the network selfishly to maximize their utility and cause undesirable network states. Selecting optimal network to meet user experience with enhancement in network performance under dynamically varying network environment is a real challenge. The existing online dynamic network selection algorithm (DNSA) selects network only by considering change in user demand type to meet user experience. Network assisted selection is another existing algorithm which selects network based on dynamic change in network state and improves network performance. In this paper modified dynamic network selection algorithm (m-DNSA) is proposed which learns network state using Boltzmann-Gibb’s reinforcement algorithm, dynamic change in user demand type using Markov Decision Process and selects optimal network. The m-DNSA also considers cost of handover between different networks for selecting network. Hence, it jointly improves performance of network and user experience. The proposed algorithm is investigated in UMTS-WiMAX-WLAN overlaid networks with different type of services and various economical categories of users. Simulation results show that the proposed m-DNSA improves QoS of the users and also increases throughputs of individual network compared with existing DNSA.
Efficiency of Finnish general upper secondary schools: an application of stochastic frontier analysis with panel data

Different stochastic frontier models for panel data are used to estimate education production functions and the efficiency of Finnish general upper secondary schools. Grades in the matriculation examination are used as an output and explained with the comprehensive school grade point average, parental socio-economic background, school resources, the length of studies and the decentralization of test-taking. Heterogeneity across schools is allowed for by estimating true random effect (TRE), random parameter (RP) and true fixed effect (TFE) models. The results show that inefficiency and rankings of schools based on their inefficiency scores vary considerably depending on the type of stochastic frontier model applied. The lowest estimates for inefficiency are obtained with TRE, RP and TFE models, which separate time-constant random or fixed effects from inefficiency. The length of studies and the decentralization of test-taking negatively affect student achievement.
Corporate Governance and Private Placement Issuance In Australia

In this study, we examine the effectiveness of corporate governance in mitigating dilution in the economic and voting interests of existing nonparticipating (retail) shareholders in private placements. Based on a sample of 2420 private placements in Australia from 2001 to 2012, we find support for this proposition through the influence of corporate governance on pricing negotiation and firms’ choice of issuing method in private placements. Specifically, firms with better corporate governance offer private placements with a smaller discount, and are more likely to include a share purchase plan, which protects nonparticipating shareholders from ownership dilution in the placement.
The contextualization of human resource and quality management: a sensemaking perspective on everybody's involvement

The principal idea of this paper is that human resource management (HRM) and quality management (QM) ideas require contextualization when used to change organizations. Here, contextualization stands for the process that leads to a shared meaning, i.e. the majority of the co-workers in an organization understand and define a concept or change in terms that are shared and accepted. In the present paper, we study a strategic change project, based on HRM and QM ideas, conducted at the County Council of Värmland (CCV), the public healthcare authority in the County of Värmland in Sweden, where the focus was on everybody's involvement. Our interpretation of the project shows that a shared meaning of the concept of everybody's involvement was not reached in this particular case, i.e. contextualization did not occur. One important result of the study is that contextualization is a prerequisite for realizing HRM and QM thoughts. The paper also stresses how important it is that general and ‘non-contextualized’ HRM and QM ideas are adapted to local practices when used to direct organizational change.
Fiscal Expansions and Fiscal Adjustments in OECD Countries

This paper considers budget expansions and adjustments in OECD countries in the last three decades. Our main results are: i) on average fiscal expansions are the results of increases in expenditures, particularly of transfer programs, while contractions are typically due to tax increases; ii) however successful (i.e. long lasting), a minority of the total rely primarily on reduction of government wages and employment and cuts in transfer programs; iii) even major successful fiscal adjustments do not seem to have recessionary consequences, on average; iv) different types of governments show different degrees of success at implementing successful fiscal adjustment, with coalition governments showing the worst performance.
Prediction of psychosis using neural oscillations and machine learning in neuroleptic-naïve at-risk patients

Abstract Objectives: This study investigates whether abnormal neural oscillations, which have been shown to precede the onset of frank psychosis, could be used towards the individualised prediction of psychosis in clinical high-risk patients. Methods: We assessed the individualised prediction of psychosis by detecting specific patterns of beta and gamma oscillations using machine-learning algorithms. Prediction models were trained and tested on 53 neuroleptic-naïve patients with a clinical high-risk for psychosis. Of these, 18 later transitioned to psychosis. All patients were followed up for at least 3 years. For an honest estimation of the generalisation capacity, the predictive performance of the models was assessed in unseen test cases using repeated nested cross-validation. Results: Transition to psychosis could be predicted from current-source density (CSD; area under the curve [AUC] = 0.77), but not from lagged phase synchronicity data (LPS; AUC = 0.56). Combining both modalities did not improve the predictive accuracy (AUC = 0.78). The left superior temporal gyrus, the left inferior parietal lobule and the precuneus most strongly contributed to the prediction of psychosis. Conclusions: Our results suggest that CSD measurements extracted from clinical resting state EEG can help to improve the prediction of psychosis on a single-subject level.
Do Capital Flows Improve Macroeconomic Performance in Emerging Markets? : The Turkish Experience

This study examines the effects of capital inflows on the macroeconomic performance in an emerging, small open economy--Turkey. Using monthly data from 1992:01 to 2001:06 and a recursive vector autoregression model, we find that positive innovations in capital inflows appreciate the domestic currency, and increase output and money supply, but decrease interest rates and prices in the short run. We also find that the exchange rate regime does not influence the effects of capital flows on macroeconomic performance. Implications of the findings for policymakers are analyzed.
The Inverse Newsvendor Problem: Choosing an Optimal Demand Portfolio for Capacitated Resources

The classical newsvendor problem is one of optimally choosing a level of capacity to respond to a known demand distribution. The inverse newsvendor problem is one of optimally choosing a demand distribution with fixed capacity. The applications of the inverse problem include industrial settings where demand management is relatively less costly than capacity adjustments. Demand distributions are chosen from an opportunity set, which reflects the set of market opportunities for the firm. We analyze the firm's profit as a function of these demand alternatives, provide solution methods and insights, and identify inefficient and dominated distributions. We provide results when the opportunity set is known or only partially known. We extend the results to cases in which there are multiple prioritized customer classes that share the firm's productive capacity. This paper was motivated by an industrial application in a firm selling a semicommodity product into three prioritized industrial sectors. We review the application of our methods to this setting.
Roles of Systemic Intermediaries in Transition Processes

We note the emergence of a new type of intermediary organization, which functions at system or network level, in contrast to traditional intermediary organizations that operate mainly bilaterally. These "systemic intermediaries" are important in long-term and complex changes, such as "transitions" to sustainable development, which require the coordinated effort of industry, policy makers, research institutes and others. We use the Systems of Innovation approach to characterize the roles of traditional and systemic intermediary organizations. A review of recent changes in innovation systems points to the need of more systemic efforts, such as the articulation of needs and options, the alignment of relevant actors and the support of learning processes. In a phase model of transitions additional roles of systemic intermediaries are identified. A case study of the Californian Fuel Cell Partnership shows how the efforts of systemic intermediaries in encompassing systemic innovations are useful and necessary, but not sufficient.
Gene Set Analysis of Survival Following Ovarian Cancer Implicates Macrolide Binding and Intracellular Signaling Genes

Background: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) for epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC), the most lethal gynecologic malignancy, have identified novel susceptibility loci. GWAS for survival after EOC have had more limited success. The association of each single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) individually may not be well suited to detect small effects of multiple SNPs, such as those operating within the same biologic pathway. Gene set analysis (GSA) overcomes this limitation by assessing overall evidence for association of a phenotype with all measured variation in a set of genes. Methods: To determine gene sets associated with EOC overall survival, we conducted GSA using data from two large GWAS (N cases = 2,813, N deaths = 1,116), with a novel Principal Component-Gamma GSA method. Analysis was completed for all cases and then separately for high-grade serous histologic subtype. Results: Analysis of the high-grade serous subjects resulted in 43 gene sets with P < 0.005 (1.7%); of these, 21 gene sets had P < 0.10 in both GWAS, including intracellular signaling pathway (P = 7.3 × 10−5) and macrolide binding (P = 6.2 × 10−4) gene sets. The top gene sets in analysis of all cases were meiotic mismatch repair (P = 6.3 × 10−4) and macrolide binding (P = 1.0 × 10−3). Of 18 gene sets with P < 0.005 (0.7%), eight had P < 0.10 in both GWAS. Conclusion: This research detected novel gene sets associated with EOC survival. Impact: Novel gene sets associated with EOC survival might lead to new insights and avenues for development of novel therapies for EOC and pharmacogenomic studies. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev; 21(3); 529–36. ©2012 AACR.
Political competition and contestability: a study of the barriers to entry in 21 democracies

The thesis o¤ers a theoretical clari cation of the concept of political competition and an empirical study of one of its de ning dimensions, namely contestability. In the rst part, the relevant literature is subjected to a critical review with an eye to arriving at a model of competition suited to an empirical study of its e¤ects. The model proposed focusses attention on the incentives political actors aspiring to positions of power have to win votes. Two dimensions are singled out as crucial for such incentives. The rst is the degree of contestability. That is, how open the political arena is to the entry of new competitors. The second dimension, vulnerability, addresses how closely incumbent governments are faced with the threat of losing o¢ ce. The second, and main part of the thesis, is devoted to the empirical study of contestability by examining the barriers to entry for new parties in 21 democracies. Four barriers are identi ed and measured in turn. The rst two determine access to competition for votes. The Registration barrier captures the costs of participation,
Substrate and temperature influence on the trap density distribution in high-k III-V MOSFETs

In this work we apply a new spectroscopic technique based on the simulation of capacitance and conductance measurements to investigate the defect density in high-κ/III-V MOSFETs. This technique exploits the simulation of C-V and G-V curves measured over a wide frequency range to extract the defect density map in the energy-position domain. The technique was used to investigate the role of the substrate material and the temperature on the interfacial and bulk defect distributions in the gate stack in InGaAs MOS capacitors grown on both InP and Si substrate. It was found that the substrate material does not affect the defect density in the gate dielectric stack. Applying the technique to C-V and G-V curves measured at different temperatures allows extracting the relaxation energy of defects, an important parameter connected to their atomic nature.
Regulation of the Vasopressin V 2 Receptor by Vasopressin in Polarized Renal Collecting Duct Cells

Binding of arginine-vasopressin (AVP) to its V2 receptor (V2R) in the basolateral membrane of principal cells induces Aquaporin-2–mediated water reabsorption in the kidney. To study the regulation of the V2R by dDAVP in a proper model, a polarized renal cell line stably-expressing V2R-GFP was generated. Labeled AVP-binding studies revealed an equal basolateral vs. apical membrane distribution for V2R-GFP and endogenous V2R. In these cells, GFP-V2R was expressed in its mature form and localized for 75% in the basolateral membrane and for 25% to late endosomes/lysosomes. dDAVP caused a doseand time-dependent internalization of V2R-GFP, which was completed within 1 h with 100 nM dDAVP, was prevented by coincubation with a V2R antagonist, and which reduced its half-life from 11.5 to 2.8 h. Semiquantification of the V2R-GFP colocalization with E-cadherin (basolateral membrane), early endosomal antigen-1 (EEA-1) and lysosome-associated membrane protein-2 (LAMP-2) in time revealed that most dDAVP-bound V2R was internalized via early endosomes to late endosomes/lysosomes, where it was degraded. The dDAVP-internalized V2R did not recycle to the basolateral membrane. In conclusion, we established the itinerary of the V2R in a polarized cell model that likely resembles the in vivo V2R localization and regulation by AVP to a great extent.
Analysis of the upper airway by the acoustic reflection method in children with mucopolysaccharidosis

Upper airway obstruction is common in children with mucopolysaccharidosis. The acoustic reflection method is a noninvasive technique that can analyze the caliber of the upper airways. The aim of the study was to evaluate the feasibility of the acoustic reflection method in children with mucopolysaccharidosis, and to compare the characteristics of the upper airways evaluated by the acoustic reflection method in patients with mucopolysaccharidosis to matched healthy counterparts.
The Behavior of Asian and Latin American Closed-End Country Funds and Investment Trusts Premiums Following the Asian Financial Crisis

This paper examines the behavior of Asian and Latin American closed-end country funds and investment trusts premiums following the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98. We document and analyze the puzzling large premiums developed by country funds dedicated to emerging markets after the crisis erupted. We also determine that none of the existing hypothesis that attempt to explain the closed-end fund discount puzzle can account for the emergence and time-series behavior of such large premiums, and propose a new explanation which assumes that money and capital markets are partially segmented. We perform a number of time series techniques such as cointegration tests and error correction models and find support for our hypothesis.