Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Loan Officers’ Gender and Microfinance Repayment Rates

Abstract This study examines the impact of loan officer characteristics on repayment rates of microfinance borrowers in Mexico applying multilevel analyses, with special attention to the impact of the gender of the loan officer on default rates. The results strongly suggest that loan officers play a crucial role in improving repayment rates in microfinance and that male loan officers are better able to induce borrowers to repay than female loan officers. This may be because men exert authority over women and face fewer problems working late, travelling through unsafe places, and combining a position as counsellor with enforcing repayment.
The model of remote video surveillance in hierarchical autonomous e-testing WbeTS system for knowledge testing

The web-based system for online knowledge testing (WbeTS) is a hierarchical and modular autonomous system for remote knowledge assessment whose autonomy is based on remote video surveillance as one of the testing validation mechanisms. The main problem facing the system is the physical implementation of the video surveillance unit for remote monitoring of a student, as well as development of a decision making mechanism based on such monitoring. The monitoring would need to take place in conditions of widely available broadband Internet access and the use of a webcam. A possible solution is a model of the remote control described in this paper, which could solve this problem and make the system more reliable. The model is based on built-in elements and algorithms for visual recognition and motion tracking of the student, sound tracking, user (teacher) interface for assessing the validity of testing and of the system's kernel responsible for assessing the validity of the tests and reporting. The model is envisaged to be implemented accordingly to the wishes and needs of users, and can be integrated as a part of an integral e-learning environment. Although the model described is in principle technologically feasible, its practical realization requires professional refinement and experimental validation. Only by in-depth testing and experiences gained from the actual application of the system will be possible to identify all deficiencies and requirements that currently cannot be predicted.
Echinomycin in Recurrent and Metastatic Endometrial Carcinoma: A Phase II Trial of the Gynecologic Oncology Group

Twenty-one evaluable patients with recurrent or metastatic endometrial carcinoma were treated with 1,500 μg/m2 of echinomycin every 3 weeks. All patients had received prior chemotherapy. There was one complete response (5%), 95% confidence interval for response is 0.9–22.7%. The major toxicity was nausea and vomiting which was moderate to severe in 42% of patients. Myelosuppression was minimal. Echinomycin, in this dose and schedule, displays minimal activity in patients with advanced endometrial carcinoma who have had prior chemotherapy.
Assessment of bacterial load in broiler chicken meat from the retail meat shops in Chitwan, Nepal

INTRODUCTION: Keeping quality of meat and meat related food hazard relates to microbes present in the meat during processing or storage. The poultry slaughtered and dressed under Chitwan conditions carrying high initial contamination would be present in meat as inherent contamination in the finished products. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This cross-sectional study included 26 fresh broiler meat samples from registered retail shops. The samples were subjected to bacteriological analysis such as total viable count (TVC), total enterobacteriaceae count (TEC), total coliform count (TCC) and total staphylococcal count (TSC). Also, the samples were analyzed for the detection of Salmonella spp. and identified by different biochemical tests. RESULTS: The mean counts in log 10 ±SE colony forming units per gram (cfu/g) for Bharatpur, Ratnanagar and Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science (IAAS) vicinity were obtained as 11.1±0.3, 11.5±0.3 and 12.2±0.5 TVC; 8.5±0.2, 9.2±0.3 and 10.2±0.4 TEC; 6.5±0.3, 7.6±0.3 and 8.4±0.5 TCC; 6.5±0.2, 6.8±0.3 and 7.7±0.4 TSC respectively. No samples were found to be within the permissible limits given by different agencies. Prevalence of Salmonella spp. in retail broiler meat in Chitwan was found 46.2%. CONCLUSION: The retail broiler meat samples from the locations contain high count of bacteria suggesting deplorable state of hygienic and sanitary practices. The presence of Salmonella and Staphyloccus aureus organisms over the permissible limits are of special concern because these account for potential food borne intoxication. So, the need for microbial assessment of fresh meats can be emphasized.
Academic Science as a System of Markets

It is instructive to think of UK academic science as in interlocking system of ‘markets’, where ‘vendors’ offer ‘commodities’ to ‘customers’ in return for ‘currencies’. In the institutional market, higher education institutions compete commercially as research contractors. Money is also the effective currency in the markets in projects, academic jobs and intellectual property rights. But these are linked with the metaphorical reputational and research claims markets where academics compete fiercely for intangible ‘recognition’. Some typical market imperfections, such as research customer monopsony, arbitrary variations of project pricing, inadequate information on quality, and rigidities of staffing, could be reduced by systematic reform. But some current structural problems are deep-seated. For example, damaging conflict between institutional and individual interests is being generated by the introduction of commercial ‘market forces’ into the traditional academic marketplace, where competition was always by quality, not by price, and where individuals could enter and leave at minimal personal cost.
Evaluation of a nematode (Capillaria hepatica Bancroft, 1893) as a control agent for populations of house mice (Mus musculus domesticus Schwartz and Schwartz, 1943).

Sudden, large-scale infestations of house mice (Mus musculus domesticus) occur irregularly in the cereal-growing regions of Australia, resulting in substantial economic losses. Mathematical modelling has been used to evaluate the use of the liver nematode Capillaria hepatica as a potential agent for the biological control of mouse populations. The models suggest that C. hepatica is unlikely to be successful as a single-release control agent: instead, the parasite would need to be released when it becomes apparent that an outbreak is likely. Stage-structured models, including time delays and seasonal mouse demographic parameters, suggest that the parasite may be successful as a control agent, provided it can be introduced into the mouse population at least one year before an outbreak occurs. The optimum time for introduction is in summer or autumn. Some generalisations of this work are discussed. A parasite which affects fecundity alone is unlikely to be a good control agent, because it will destabilize the host population. Macroparasites may be unable to spread sufficiently rapidly to control sudden rises in vertebrate populations.
A comparative study of performance for Electric Vehicles for wheel traction configurations

The Electric Vehicles (EVs) use electric traction motors and energy sources such as chemical batteries, fuel cells, ultra-capacitors, flywheels. The EVs have many advantages of absence of emission, high efficiency, independence from oil and quiet operation. In this work ADVISOR simulator is used to measure the fuel economy, performance and emissions of vehicles with the cases of alternative technologies. Battery is a critical component central to the success of electric vehicles. So IBM batteries called lithium-air battery which is much more interesting because of its theoretical energy density around 1.000 times higher than that of Lithium ion batteries, which places it almost on a par with gasoline is considered. Simulation is carried out with three types of powertrain: front wheel drive, rear wheel drive and four wheel drive. Calculus was used for the standard table of the efficiency of the electric vehicle ADVISOR.
Titration of the BOLD effect: Separation and quantitation of blood volume and oxygenation changes in the human cerebral cortex during neuronal activation and ferumoxide infusion

Most functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) techniques are sensitive to susceptibility variations and rely on the change in blood oxygenation level in response to neuronal activation (BOLD). The BOLD effect is accompanied by a change in cerebral blood flow (rCBF) and cerebral blood volume (rCBV). Intravascular contrast agents, such as magnetite nanoparticles, can be used to measure changes in rCBV. A new measuring protocol has been developed that enables the separate quantification of changes in blood volume and oxygenation levels. A combination of alternating acoustic stimulation blocks and infusion of a superparamagnetic contrast agent offers the possibility to disentangle the competing influences of oxygenation and blood volume changes. Serial blood sampling during infusion was used to assess the actual contrast agent concentration during infusion in order to calculate absolute blood volume changes during neuronal resting and activation states. Magn Reson Med 42:829–836, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Travel expenditure patterns of elderly households in the US.

A growth in senior travellers' market has caused an increasing interest of marketers in this segment, promising new pastures. This paper delves into this group to explore variables that affect the choices that these people make. Using the 1995 Consumer Expenditure Survey, this study (a) examines the travel-related expenditure patterns of U.S. households headed by those 55 years old and older; and (b) uses a double-hurdle model to identify factors that influence the decision to travel and the level of travel expenditure among this elderly segment. In order to reflect the heterogeneity among the elderly, the total sample (n=1,588) is divided into three groups: young-old (aged 55 to 64), old (aged 65 to 74) and very old (aged 75 and above). Elderly households spend the most on transportation, followed by food, lodging, sightseeing and entertainment, and other travel expenses. Probit results show that elderly who are Whites, those who have high school or college education, those who are married, and those who.
Institutional paradigm and the management of transitions: A sub-Sahara African perspective

One of the overarching goals of many African countries since the past two decades has been the rapid move towards integration with the global economy. This is evident through far‐reaching macroeconomic and political reforms now taking place in these countries. However, despite the aggressive lurch towards market‐driven transformations, results on the ground have been less than satisfactory – arising largely from a myriad of implementation failures. It appears that while much emphasis is put on the potency of a free market‐driven transition, there is little understanding of how particular institutional arrangements shape and determine the success (or failure) of market/economic reforms. This paper adopts an institutional approach to analyse the transition challenges facing Africa. It concludes that countries in Africa are facing tumultuous problems in achieving sustainable growth, largely because the market‐driven transition programmes are rooted in economic orthodoxy that is anti‐institutional and, therefore, ill‐equipped to deliver desired results. Paradoxically, this appears to be the case with the UN Millennium Development Goals. Improved results in achieving the goals and, indeed, the broader market reform efforts are possible if planners and policy makers are able to root their planning processes within the contextually embedded institutional environment.
International Negotiations and Domestic Politics: The Case of IMF Labor Market Conditionality

Abstract What is the role of international organizations (IOs) in the formulation of domestic policy, and how much influence do citizens have in countries' negotiations with IOs? We examine these questions through a study of labor-related conditionality in International Monetary Fund (IMF) loans. Using new data from IMF loan documents for programs from 1980 to 2000, we test to see if citizens' economic interests influence IMF conditionality. We examine the substance of loan conditions and identify those that require liberalization in the country's domestic labor market or that have direct effects on employment, wages, and social benefits. We find evidence that democratic countries with stronger domestic labor receive less intrusive labor-related conditions in their IMF loan programs. We argue that governments concerned about workers' opposition to labor-related loan conditions negotiate with the IMF to minimize labor conditionality. We find that the IMF is responsive to domestic politics and citizens' interests.
Modelling Exchange-Traded Barrier Options Traded in the Australian Options Market

Barrier options traded in the Australian market vary considerably in terms of the extent to which the barrier is monitored and in terms of the location of the barrier level relative to the exercise price. This paper examines the impact of these differences on prices and also on deltas and gammas. We find that it is not possible to generalize results concerning hedge parameter values to all barrier options. We find that options examined by Easton "et al". (2004) do not display discontinuity of deltas at the barrier levels and that their apparent overpricing cannot be attributed to hedging difficulties. Copyright (c) The Authors Journal compilation (c) 2006 AFAANZ.
Money and Productive Efficiency: Evidence from a High-Inflation Country

This paper examines how money balances held by manufacturing firms affect their efficiency in generating sales revenue in a high-inflation economy. The analysis employs data from Turkish firms to estimate a stochastic frontier model, finding a strong positive association between the firms' money holdings and their efficiency. However, the role of money balances seems to diminish as firms hold higher raw material inventories.
Longevity of outstanding sporting achievers: Mind versus muscle

Background While there is strong evidence showing the survival advantage of elite athletes, much less is known about those engaged in mind sports such as chess. This study aimed to examine the overall as well as regional survival of International Chess Grandmasters (GMs) with a reference to the general population, and compare relative survival (RS) of GMs with that of Olympic medallists (OMs). Methods Information on 1,208 GMs and 15,157 OMs, respectively, from 28 countries were extracted from the publicly available data sources. The Kaplan-Meier method was used to estimate the survival rates of the GMs. A Cox proportional hazards model was used to adjust the survival for region, year at risk, age at risk and sex, and to estimate the life expectancy of the GMs. The RS rate was computed by matching each GM or OM by year at risk, age at risk and sex to the life table of the country the individual represented. Results The survival rates of GMs at 30 and 60 years since GM title achievement were 87% and 15%, respectively. The life expectancy of GMs at the age of 30 years (which is near the average age when they attained a GM title) was 53.6 ([95% CI]: 47.7–58.5) years, which is significantly greater than the overall weighted mean life expectancy of 45.9 years for the general population. Compared to Eastern Europe, GMs in North America (HR [95% CI]: 0.51 [0.29–0.88]) and Western Europe (HR [95% CI]: 0.53 [0.34–0.83]) had a longer lifespan. The RS analysis showed that both GMs and OMs had a significant survival advantage over the general population, and there was no statistically significant difference in the RS of GMs (RS [95% CI]: 1.14 [1.08–1.20]) compared to OMs: (RS [95% CI]: 1.09 [1.07–1.11]) at 30 years. Conclusion Elite chess players live longer than the general population and have a similar survival advantage to elite competitors in physical sports.
An Optimality-theoretic Analysis of the Tone-melody mapping in Cantonese Popular Songs

This paper provides a preliminary analysis of some mapping phenomena at the tone-melody interface in Cantonese popular songs. Pitch is one of the common acoustic properties shared by language and music. In tone languages in particular, pitch variations are contrastive and therefore play an important role in differentiating word meanings. The question that arises is whether the lexical tones correspond to the melody of a song written in these languages, and if so, to what extent and how tone and tune match. This study investigates a sample of popular songs written in Cantonese, a language with a relatively complex tonal inventory. In all the Cantonese songs collected and analyzed, it is observed that tone and tune correlate closely, and the patterns of correlation are found to be quite systematic. It is suggested that these regular mapping characteristics can be accounted for by constraint interaction from the optimality-theoretic perspective. Optimality Theory, being one of the current central linguistic theories in the areas of phonology and syntax, is adopted as the theoretical framework in this study, and is extended to address tonal issues at the interface of language and music.
Improved retargeting algorithm based on optimized scale-and-stretch

Effective resizing of images should not only use geometric constraints, but consider the image content as well. According to the fact that it is not necessary that the image content in the middle is more important than on the border, the image resizing technology in view of content is becoming new hotspot in image retargeting domain. At first, this technology treat the area that attract the eyes as important region, but the area that not attract the people as unimportant district, then to the greatest extent maintain the important area but changing unimportant area in order to fit target image size. This technology is known as content-aware image resizing. Among all the algorithms relating to content-aware image retargeting, the status of SNS method is beyond all doubt, its inauguration and innovation is better than other methods. This text analyses the classical SNS algorithm and presents a improved algorithm basing on scale-and-stretch, in our experiment it is easy to see that our new method enhances the performance and makes better effect.
A 12‐bit 10‐MS/s SAR ADC with a binary‐window DAC switching scheme in 180‐nm CMOS

This paper presents an energy‐efficient 12‐bit successive approximation‐register A/D converter (ADC). The D/A converter (DAC) plays a crucial role in ADC linearity, which can be enhanced by using larger capacitor arrays. The binary‐window DAC switching scheme proposed in this paper effectively reduces DAC nonlinearity and switching errors to improve both the spurious‐free dynamic range and signal‐to‐noise‐and‐distortion ratio. The ADC prototype occupies an active area of 0.12 mm2 in the 0.18‐μm CMOS process and consumes a total power of 0.6 mW from a 1.5‐V supply. The measured peak differential nonlinearity and integral nonlinearity are 0.57 and 0.73 least significant bit, respectively. The ADC achieves a 64.7‐dB signal‐to‐noise‐and‐distortion ratio and 83‐dB spurious‐free dynamic range at a sampling rate of 10 MS/s, corresponding to a peak figure‐of‐merit of 43 fJ/conversion‐step.
Clean Surplus Accounting Models and Market-based Accounting Research: A Review

This paper reviews recent attempts to provide a rigorous theoretical basis for market-based accounting research based on the pioneering ideas of Ohlson. We argue that the Ohlson development can best be understood as an attempt to restate economic theories of income measurement in the light of advances in the economics of asset pricing under uncertainty. We contrast the Ohlson approach with other economic theories of financial reporting, and conclude that, while the Ohlson approach has made a significant contribution to understanding the theoretical basis of market-based accounting research, it remains to be seen whether the method can be extended beyond the simple linear models that have so far been developed.
Estimation of motion blur parameters using cepstrum analysis

In this paper, we propose a novel estimation method of the parameters of motion blur, which is caused by the camera or object motion during the image and video capture. In the proposed method, the motion blur is characterized by the blur orientation and length in cepstrum domain. To a better estimation of orientation and length of the motion blur in the cepstrum domain, we use the difference of Gaussian as the input of the cepstrum transform, without additional transform such as Hough or Radon transform. We propose a simple and effective method, which separates blur components from image components. Simulations with various sets of simulated and real motion blurred images show the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm in terms of the quality. The proposed algorithm is computationally efficient and easy to use.
Safe Use of Hazardous Chemicals

This unit provides protocols for some commonly used disposal and decontamination procedures along with analytical techniques that are used to verify that reagents have been decontaminated. Some of the specific reagents covered are diaminobenzidine, ethidium bromide, cyanogen bromide, and chloromethylsilane. With modification, these assays may also be used to determine the concentration of a particular chemical. Curr. Protoc. Microbiol. 23:1A.3. 1‐1A.3. 36. © 2011 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Efficient Analytical Evaluation of Complex Dispersion Relations of a Multiple-Row Periodic Array of Magnetodielectric Circular Cylinders

An analytical mode-matching method based on the common area concept and mixed coordinate formulations is proposed for a multiple-row periodic array of magnetodielectric circular cylinders (PAMCs). Complex dispersion relations for single- and double-row PAMCs are computed with Davidenko’s method and tested using commercial electromagnetic (EM) analysis packages, thus verifying that our solutions are very accurate and numerically efficient. The EM bandgap formations of a single-row PAMC are presented with respect to different cylinder spacing. We also observe that a resonance gap, which results in a sharp band-stop phenomenon, can appear in a double-row PAMC with high-permittivity cylinders.
Hepatocyte growth factor modified human umbilical cord mesenchymal stem cells accelerate the recovery of mouse hepatic injury

Aim: MSC-based therapies have been accepted as a promising approach for treating liver injury. Here we aimed to investigate the effect of hepatocyte growth factor（HGF） modified human umbilical cord MSCs (HGF-hucMSCs) on mouse hepatic injury. Methods: HGF transduction to hucMSCs by using adenovirus-HGF was prepared. HGF-hucMSCs were transplanted into carbon tetrachloride (CCl4)-injured mice. Reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction for the human 17a gene and fluorescence examination of green fluorescent protein positive cell were used to locate exogenous hUCMSCs in mouse livers. For evaluating the recovery of injured liver tissues, the pathological state of the hepatocytes was assessed, and survival rate of the mice was measured. Results: When transplanted into liver injured mouse, hucMSCs could located in the area of liver injury. Pathological examination revealed that the mice in HGF-hucMSCs group showed less inflammation and denaturation than those in GFP-hucMSCs group. Kaplan-Meier survival curves showed that the survival rate in HGF-hucMSCs group was higher than which in GFP-hucMSCs and PBS group. Moreover, the least hepatocyte apoptosis were found in HGF-hucMSCs group. Conclusions: Our results suggest that transplantation of HGF-hucMSCs can accelerate the recovery of mice hepatic injury.