Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Roles And Satisfaction During Internship Program In Estonian Universities

Abstract This study investigates an intern as someone who is a student in training, who may be paid, but in company is a temporary employee (Tovey, 2001); internship as a supplement or complement to academic instruction in environmental science. This article reviews roles during internship and satisfaction with the internship program from two perspectives: interns from five Estonian universities and site supervisors from various companies. The data from site supervisors and interns were collected through a web-based questionnaire. Surveys were carried out during 2012-2013. The sample consists of 418 interns and 194 institutions providing internship. The study gives and overview of the situation of the internship in Estonia. The data has been discussed in the context of the related literature.
Immunoglobulin domain crossover as a generic approach for the production of bispecific IgG antibodies

We describe a generic approach to assemble correctly two heavy and two light chains, derived from two existing antibodies, to form human bivalent bispecific IgG antibodies without use of artificial linkers. Based on the knobs-into-holes technology that enables heterodimerization of the heavy chains, correct association of the light chains and their cognate heavy chains is achieved by exchange of heavy-chain and light-chain domains within the antigen binding fragment (Fab) of one half of the bispecific antibody. This “crossover” retains the antigen-binding affinity but makes the two arms so different that light-chain mispairing can no longer occur. Applying the three possible “CrossMab” formats, we generated bispecific antibodies against angiopoietin-2 (Ang-2) and vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGF-A) and show that they can be produced by standard techniques, exhibit stabilities comparable to natural antibodies, and bind both targets simultaneously with unaltered affinity. Because of its superior side-product profile, the CrossMabCH1-CL was selected for in vivo profiling and showed potent antiangiogenic and antitumoral activity.
Alphaherpesvirus Subversion of Stress-Induced Translational Arrest

In this article, we provide an overview of translational arrest in eukaryotic cells in response to stress and the tactics used specifically by alphaherpesviruses to overcome translational arrest. One consequence of translational arrest is the formation of cytoplasmic compartments called stress granules (SGs). Many viruses target SGs for disruption and/or modification, including the alphaherpesvirus herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2). Recently, it was discovered that HSV-2 disrupts SG formation early after infection via virion host shutoff protein (vhs), an endoribonuclease that is packaged within the HSV-2 virion. We review this discovery and discuss the insights it has provided into SG biology as well as its potential significance in HSV-2 infection. A model for vhs-mediated disruption of SG formation is presented.
PIAS1 is a crucial factor for prostate cancer cell survival and a valid target in docetaxel resistant cells

Occurrence of an inherent or acquired resistance to the chemotherapeutic drug docetaxel is a major burden for patients suffering from different kinds of malignancies, including castration resistant prostate cancer (PCa). In the present study we address the question whether PIAS1 targeting can be used to establish a basis for improved PCa treatment. The expression status and functional relevance of PIAS1 was evaluated in primary tumors, in metastatic lesions, in tissue of patients after docetaxel chemotherapy, and in docetaxel resistant cells. Patient data were complemented by functional studies on PIAS1 knockdown in vitro as well as in chicken chorioallantoic membrane and mouse xenograft in vivo models. PIAS1 was found to be overexpressed in local and metastatic PCa and its expression was further elevated in tumors after docetaxel treatment as well as in docetaxel resistant cells. Furthermore, PIAS1 knockdown experiments revealed an increased expression of tumor suppressor p21 and declined expression of anti-apoptotic protein Mcl1, which caused diminished cell proliferation and tumor growth in vitro and in vivo. In summary, the presented data indicate that PIAS1 is crucial for parental and docetaxel resistant PCa cell survival and is therefore a promising new target for treatment of primary, metastatic, and chemotherapy resistant PCa.
Identification of Sepsis among Ward Patients.

Sepsis is a systemic response to infection, which may progress to severe sepsis and septic shock (1). It is a global health problem that carries a huge economic burden (2, 3). The last decade has seen a significant drive to improve outcomes for patients with sepsis, with substantial effort focused on intensive care unit (ICU) and emergency department (ED) patients in particular. Recent data have indicated that ward patients who develop sepsis have worse outcomes than ICU or ED patients (4, 5), which has led to efforts to improve sepsis recognition in the ward environment to enable prompt intervention.
Are the Basel II requirements justified in the presence of structural breaks?

The Basel Accord and the Swedish regulatory authority Finansinspektionen stipulate that banks and securities firms are obliged to estimate their Internal Risk Management Models (IRMMs) based on a minimum time series estimation period length of 1 year back in time. In this article, the Minimum Capital Risk Requirements (MCRRs) are estimated using moving windows of Swedish long and short OMX index futures positions that are bootstrapped (in blocks) by the use of Value-at-Risk Exponential Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity (VaR-(E)GARCH) models. In order to detect and adjust for structural changes in the variance, a so-called Iterative Cumulative Sums of Squares (ICSS) algorithm is applied. By the use of the earlier-mentioned approach, it is concluded that out-of-sample risk predictions are more accurate when using estimation periods shorter than 1 year, probably since relevant information are outdated fairly quickly on the markets. Therefore, the Basel Committee can discard the 1-year requirement without increased risk of financial instability.
Infection with Brugia microfilariae induces apoptosis of CD4+ T lymphocytes: a mechanism of immune unresponsiveness in filariasis

In humans infected with lymphatic filariasis, microfilaraemia [the presence of microfilariae (Mf) in the blood] is generally associated with both poor antigen (Ag)‐specific proliferative responses and with protection from severe disease. Clonal deletion has been suggested as one possible mechanism by which parasite‐reactive lymphocytes, that may be capable of mediating resistance and / or immunopathology, are silenced in asymptomatic carriers. In this study we demonstrate that splenic lymphocytes from mice infected with microfilariae of Brugia pahangi display an Ag‐specific proliferative defect. However, these cells were not completely unresponsive since they produced high levels of Ag‐specific IFN‐γ. Using TdT‐mediated dUTP‐biotin nick end labeling for flow cytometry, CD4+ lymphocytes from Mf‐infected mice cultured with Ag showed high levels of apoptosis when compared to those from L3‐infected mice which proliferated well in response to Ag. Treatment of Ag‐stimulated cultures with aminoguanidine (AMG), an inhibitor of inducible nitric oxide synthase, rescued the CD4+ T cells from apoptosis and reversed the proliferative defect. Furthermore, carboxyfluorescein diacetate succinimidyl ester labeling allowed the visualization of dividing CD4+ T cells in cultures from Mf‐infected animals only in the presence of AMG. We hypothesize that CD4+ T cells indirectly trigger their own apoptosis by secreting significant quantities of IFN‐γ resulting in the induction of high levels of nitric oxide, and the subsquent elimination of effector T cells. Our findings are the first direct evidence that infection with Brugia Mf can selectively induce lymphocyte apoptosis, a phenomenon that could contribute to the proliferative defect and parasite persistence associated with the microfilaraemic state in the infected human.
An adaptive reconfigurable Radix-2n FFT/IFFT architecture

The suitability of the Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) from arbitrary viewpoints is an important requirement for different tasks which covers various area of engineering including signal processing, image processing, quantum computing, digital communication system, biomedical sector and so on. For the execution of DFT, several computation schedule based on different structural patterns have been proposed and among these the widely used practical design is Radix-2n N points Fast Fourier Transform (FFT/IFFT) which has the order of complexity of some crucial tasks is N-log2N, where N and n are the FFT points and stages respectively. The problems of Radix-2nN points FFT/IFFT is that they are architectural based, non-reconfigurable and the input-output data are generally not in sequence. In this paper, we proposed two algorithmic schematic structures to compute the DFT & IDFT which are adaptive, reconfigurable and compatible to any 2n point FFT/IFFT where the input-output data are in sequences. The proposed architecture uses an adaptive feedback single butterfly stage that will reduce the hardware cost. This architecture is implemented on MATLAB and the computation time for different N points FFT/IFFT are investigated.
Options Reporting and the Political Costs of CEO Pay

Managers' systematic influence on accounting policy is well documented in the earnings management literature. Recent studies in the “management of information” line of research suggest that such influence is exhibited in financial reporting more generally, including supplemental disclosures in proxy statements. Using 1996 compensation data, I extend recent research on how firms report the value of options paid to their CEOs. I conduct several tests of the argument that potential political costs of unexplained compensation explain cross-sectional variation in how aggressively firms report option awards. Even after incorporating several variables not considered previously, I find strong support for the assertion that firms whose CEOs receive unexplained pay relative to performance tend to report lower grant date values for their CEOs' option awards. The evidence also suggests that the tendency to report lower grant date values is stronger for firms under more scrutiny from institutional owners. Contrary to previous research, I find that unexplained pay also increases the likelihood that the firm will choose grant date reporting methods (over the allowable alternative) in their proxy disclosures. I interpret the overall results as consistent with the argument that political costs related to compensation influence options reporting. The findings have implications for accounting standard-setters and for researchers who rely on estimates of option values reported in proxy statements.
The PFA-100® detects sub-optimal antiplatelet responses in patients on aspirin

Although it is suspected that some patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS) could have a sub-optimal response to aspirin (SASAR), currently a fixed dose of ASA is long-term used in all individuals. This study was designed to determine SASAR and whether a SASAR is a predictor for recurrence of ischemic events in patients on low-dose ASA with a previous ACS. One hundred patients taking ASA 100 mg/day were assessed at 1 and 6 months after a first ACS. SASAR was initially defined as a failure of the ASA treatment to significantly prolong the closure time in the Platelet Function Analyzer (PFA-100®). SASAR in these samples was reconfirmed by conventional aggregometry. TXB2 levels were determined in plasma. At one month 49 patients showed SASAR in the PFA-100®; only 25 of them showed SASAR by conventional aggregometry. At six months, 39 of 81 patients showed SASAR by PFA-100®, but conventional aggregometry detected SASAR in only 12 of the 39 patients. TXB2 levels were significantly higher in patients with SASAR. Five patients with SASAR, by both tests, died during follow-up (p=0.013). The PFA-100® detected a high rate of SASAR in patients with ACS. This instrument could be used to screen for suboptimal response to the antiplatelet action of ASA. Whether persistence of SASAR could relate to a higher risk of recurrence and how adjusting the dose of ASA could reduce the rate of SASAR are issues that deserve further investigations.
Just Culture: Balancing Safety and Accountability

Prologue Preface Why bother with a just culture? Between culpable and blameless The importance, risk and protection of reporting The importance, risk and protection of disclosure Are all mistakes equal? Hindsight and determining culpability 'You have nothing to fear if you've done nothing wrong' Without prosecutors there would be no crime Are judicial proceedings bad for safety? Stakeholders in the legal pursuit of justice 3 questions for a just culture Not individuals or systems, but individuals in systems A staggered approach to building your just culture Epilogue Index.
Dynamics of Islamic Financing in Malaysia: Causality and Innovation Accounting

The article evaluates dynamic interactions between Islamic financing and macroeconomic and financial variables for Malaysia using the Toda-Yamamoto (1995) causality test and innovation accounting approach. The results suggest strong causal influences of interest rate on Islamic financing but insignificant causal relations from real stock prices or real production to Islamic financing. Thus, while the results suggest that Islamic financing in Malaysia is resilient to boom/bust cycles of the stock market or fluctuations in real activity, Islamic banks under a dual-banking environment are not spared from fluctuations in interest rate or monetary conditions of the country.
Price Convexity and Skewness

This paper develops a model in which investors who are prohibited from short selling agree to disagree on the precision of a publicly observed signal. The model implies that the equilibrium price is a convex function of the public signal. The model predicts that (1) the stock price reacts more to good news than to bad news; (2) the skewness of stock returns is positively correlated with contemporaneous returns, but negatively correlated with lagged returns; (3) short sale constraints increase rather than decrease skewness; and (4) disagreement about information precision increases skewness. Empirical tests conducted find supportive evidence for all these predictions.
Purification and characterization of the tween-hydrolyzing esterase of Mycobacterium smegmatis

An esterase hydrolyzing Tween 80 (polyoxyethylene sorbitan monooleate) was purified from sonicated cell lysates of Mycobacterium smegmatis ATCC 14468 by DEAE-cellulose, Sephadex G-150, phenyl Sepharose, and diethyl-(2-hydroxypropyl) aminoethyl column chromatography and by subsequent preparative polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The molecular weight was estimated to be 36,000 by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and 41,000 by gel filtration on a Sephadex G-150 column. The esterase contained a single polypeptide. The esterase was stable to heat treatment at 100 degrees C and to a wide range of pH. The temperature and pH optima for the hydrolysis of Tween 80 were 50 degrees C and 8.3, respectively. The esterase had a narrow substrate specificity; it exhibited a high activity only on compounds having both polyoxyethylene and fatty acyl moieties, such as Tweens. Monoacylglyceride was hydrolyzed more slowly by this esterase and this enzyme exhibited a nonspecific esterase activity on p-nitrophenyl acyl esters, especially those having short chain acyl moieties. The Km and Vmax were 19.2 mM and 1,670 mumol/min per mg of protein for Tween 20, 6.6 mM and 278 mumol/min per mg of protein for Tween 80, and 0.25 mM and 196 mumol/min per mg of protein for p-nitrophenyl acetate, respectively. Observations of the effects of various chemical modifications on the activity of the esterase indicated that tyrosine, histidine, arginine, and methionine (with tryptophan) residues may be active amino acids which play important roles in the expression of Tween 80-hydrolyzing activity of the enzyme.
Antibiotics as intermicrobial signaling agents instead of weapons

It has been widely assumed that the ecological function of antibiotics in nature is fighting against competitors. This made them a good example of the Darwinian struggle-for-life in the microbial world. Based on this idea, it also has been believed that antibiotics, even at subinhibitory concentrations, reduce virulence of bacterial pathogens. Herein, using a combination of genomic and functional assays, we demonstrate that specific antibiotics (namely tobramycin, tetracycline, and norfloxacin) at subinhibitory concentrations trigger expression of determinants influencing the virulence of the major opportunistic bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa. All three antibiotics induce biofilm formation; tobramycin increases bacterial motility, and tetracycline triggers expression of P. aeruginosa type III secretion system and consequently bacterial cytotoxicity. Besides their relevance in the infection process, those determinants are relevant for the ecological behavior of this bacterial species in natural, nonclinical environments, either by favoring colonization of surfaces (biofilm, motility) or for fighting against eukaryotic predators (cytotoxicity). Our results support the notion that antibiotics are not only bacterial weapons for fighting competitors but also signaling molecules that may regulate the homeostasis of microbial communities. At low concentrations, they can even be beneficial for the behavior of susceptible bacteria in natural environments. This is a complete change on our vision on the ecological function of antibiotics with clear implications both for the treatment of infectious diseases and for the understanding of the microbial relationships in the biosphere.
Clinical relevance of viral dynamics and genotypes in hepatitis B virus

Abstract Advances in molecular diagnostic technology make it possible to accurately measure viral loads and this has allowed the detailed study of viral dynamics of HIV, hepatitis C virus (HCV) and hepatitis B virus (HBV). Following antiviral therapy, there are at least two phases of viral load decay: one corresponding to clearance of free virions and a second, slower phase corresponding to eradication of infected cells. Application of mathematical models allows for the assessment of antiviral efficacy and improved design of therapeutic regimens. The clinical application of these tools should help optimize patient outcome. Another advantage of molecular diagnostics is characterization of the heterogeneity of viruses in particular patient populations under selective pressure situations. The HBV can be classified into seven major genotypes (A–G) that have mainly a geographic distribution. Recent genotypic studies have revealed the clinical and therapeutic relevance of viral genotyping in HBV infections.
Seroprevalence of cytomegalovirus infection in France in 2010

SUMMARY Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection remains the leading cause of congenital virus infection in developed countries. Measuring the national prevalence of this infection, especially among women of childbearing age, is of great value to estimate the risk of congenital CMV infection, as well as to identify risk groups that should be targeted for behavioural interventions and/or vaccination once a CMV vaccine finally becomes available. In order to fulfil these objectives, a seroprevalence survey was conducted in 2010, using a nationally representative, population-based sample of 2536 people aged between 15 and 49 years, living in metropolitan France and attending private microbiological laboratories for blood testing. All blood samples were analysed in the same laboratory and screened for CMV-specific IgG using an enzyme-linked immunoassay technique (Elisa PKS Medac Enzyme immunoassay). The overall point estimate of CMV infection seroprevalence for individuals aged 15–49 years was 41.9%. The estimates were higher in women than in men (respectively 45.6% and 39.3%), and people born in a non-Western country were more likely to be CMV seropositive than those born in France or in another Western country (93.7% vs. 37.7%). Our results showed that a substantial percentage of women of childbearing age in France are CMV seronegative and therefore at risk of primary CMV infection during pregnancy. Educational measures and future vaccine are key issues to prevent infection in pregnant women and congenital CMV disease.
Capacity Analysis of Asynchronous Optical CDMA Systems Utilizing Wrapped OPPM: Multiple Access Interference Limited Case

In this paper the capacity of asynchronous incoherent optical CDMA (OCDMA) systems employing wrapped overlapping pulse position modulation (WOPPM) for two types of receiver structures is analyzed. The analysis is performed in the presence of multiple access interference as the main limiting factor. Throughput analysis for uncoded systems utilizing WOPPM is conducted and a lower bound on the capacity for two types of correlator based receiver structures is derived. Furthermore, for a fixed code and a fixed maximum number of symbols, a numerical solution for maximizing the capacity is presented. Moreover, to minimize the probability of error when the throughput and the number of users are fixed, a numerical solution is introduced. Finally, for two common design problems, algorithms are proposed for achieving the system parameters well close to the optimal settings. The results of our different analyses for uncoded systems using WOPPM have been compared with unwrapped OPPM. Our results have also been compared with on-off keying (OOK) and pulse position modulation (PPM). The results of this work show that, for a fixed throughput, the performance of WOPPM is significantly superior to OOK and PPM.
Ageing: alternative futures and policy choices

Ageing is a fundamental issue for the future of the planet. An ageing society challenges basic assumptions of modern culture and political economy. This paper explores alternative futures of ageing in Queensland, understanding that certain assumptions about Queensland’s future are given. It is also focused on probable futures, and not on every possible future. Based on this map of the future‐developed through causal layered analysis and scenario planning – policy recommendations are developed for the Queensland Government.
Performance Optimization of Java Virtual Machine on Dual-Core Technology for Web Services - A Study

How well the Web applications handle the workload is a key factor in determining the performance of the Web service. Due to its support for multithreading at language level, Java is becoming a popular language for Web application. The performance of Java application is greatly dependent on Java virtual machine (JVM). Performance of multithreaded Java application can be enhanced by fully utilizing the computing resources of dual-core processor. This paper targets in optimizing the JVM to take advantage on dual-core processor. With the optimization, the Web service is expected to have a marked performance gain.
University Technology Transfer and Manufacturing Innovation: The Case of Italy

This article analyzes the influence of universities on Italian firms' probability to innovate. Using firm-level data, we focus on institutionalized technology transfer (TT) activities in universities, namely spin-offs, patents, and research contracts. Results show that TT activities play a significant role in the probability to innovate by Italian manufacturing firms located in the same province as the university. Nevertheless, the effect is not uniform: the contribution of university TT activities to the probability of firms' innovating is concentrated in certain territorial areas (North-East and Center) and sectors (science based and scale intensive) and among firms that are large.