Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Corporate governance disclosure practices by Swaziland public enterprises

This paper presented an account of corporate governance disclosure practices by public enterprises in Swaziland. The study was an attempt to compare the findings to the corporate governance disclosure requirements constructed by the United Nations. Findings revealed that the idea of corporate governance disclosure in general is a relatively new requirement for Swaziland business organizations and, at present, Swaziland does not have a specific framework for corporate governance which can be applicable to all business entities. The study also showed that the most important area regarding corporate governance disclosure was the financial transparency disclosure issues while the least important related to auditing disclosure issues. The study encouraged Swaziland government and companies to focus on improving the governance disclosure levels and develop a common corporate governance framework which will be applicable to all entities in order to enhance good corporate governance practices in the country. But such framework must take the socio-cultural and institutional conditions in Swaziland into account rather than transplanting corporate governance framework from different setting. Key words: Corporate governance, corporate governance disclosure practice, public enterprise.
Molecular Identification and Diversity of Helopeltis antonii and Helopeltis theivora (Hemiptera: Miridae) in India

ABSTRACT The genus Helopeltis (Hemiptera: Miridae) includes some of the major pests of cashew (Anacardium occidentale L. [Anacardiaceae]). Helopeltis species severely damage tender shoots, inflorescences, immature cashew nuts and associated cashew apples (pseudocarps). In India cashew crop losses of more than 40% caused by Helopeltis species are often reported. One of the major limitations in meeting this problem has been the lack of taxonomic knowledge of the Helopeltis species complex, its distribution, host range, and the associated parasitoid complex. The two major pests of cashew, Helopeltis antonii and Helopeltis theivora closely resemble each other. Morphological identification of these species can be facilitated by the use of DNA barcoding of the mitochondrial cytochrome C oxidase subunit 1 (COX-1) and the development of species-specific molecular markers; and we accomplished both of these objectives in this study. These molecular markers also enable non-specialists to identify the above mentioned species in their various life stages, i.e., egg, nymph and adult. The molecular identification of H. antonii and H. theivora has been corroborated with morphological identification. We examined genetic differences in COX-1 sequences among 12 populations of H. antonii collected from different geographic locations in India for the first time. The phylogenetic analysis did not show any geographic or host-associated genetic differences in H. antonii, which were collected on different host plants. The present investigation resulted in the development of molecular technology to achieve quick, accurate and timely identification of H. antonii and H. theivora, a critical factor in understanding the epidemiology of the crop losses in cashew, resistance management and also in quarantine.
The growth performance and prospects in the Euro area: a balance-of-payments approach

This paper aims to apply the balance of payments constrained-growth model to explain Euro area growth performance in the last forty years and to discuss likely prospects for the future. After a formal reconsideration of the long-run and short-run arguments supporting the validity of the Post-Keynesian approach to economic growth, a simplified and an extended version of the basic model are outlined. The application of these models to the Euro area experience shows that Thirlwall’s Law performs quite well in explaining growth in all decades under consideration. The fundamental reasons behind the recent unsatisfactory EMU growth experience, therefore, appear to be a decreasing export dynamics and a rising dependence on imports. Given current trends, the prospects for the future appear to be gloomy, unless structural reforms of the productive system are promoted in order to improve overall EMU competitiveness.
STUDY OF THE dp-ELASTIC SCATTERING AT THE ENERGY OF 2 GeV

The results of the measurements of the dp-elastic scattering cross section at the energy of 2 GeV at the Internal Target Station of the JINR Nuclotron are reported. The data were obtained for the angular range of 70−107◦ in the c.m.s. by using CH2 and C targets. The results are compared with the existing data and with the theoretical calculations based on the relativistic multiple scattering theory.
Student Final Year Project Declaration

Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is a popular transmission technique for high data rate applications. It uses orthogonal subcarriers to transmit data with long symbol duration and thus reduce the effect of inter-symbol-interference due to the multipath channel. However, the successful data detection at the receiver relies on locating the FFT window correctly at the received data sequence ----the so-called symbol synchronization. In this project, various symbol synchronization techniques are investigated and compared. These include S&C’s method, Minn’s first method, Minn’s second method and Park’s method. The performance under an Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN), frequency offset, phase offset and multipath channels are investigated. Simulation results and theoretical analysis show that (a) Park’s method has the best performance under AWGN channel; (b) all of them are not sensitive to frequency offset and phase offset; (c) they all suffer from the degradation due to multipath channel. In this project, a new symbol synchronization algorithm is proposed. The proposed method uses the combination of Park’s method with multiplying the sum of a window on Park’s timing metric. The computation complexity is comparable to Park’s method. Simulation results show that it has lower estimation mean and variance compared with the above four methods under some multipath channels.
Annonaceae substitution rates - a codon model perspective

The Annonaceae includes cultivated species of economic interest and represents an important source of information for better understanding the evolution of tropical rainforests. In phylogenetic analyses of DNA sequence data that are used to address evolutionary questions, it is imperative to use appropriate statistical models. Annonaceae are cases in point: Two sister clades, the subfamilies Annonoideae and Malmeoideae, contain the majority of Annonaceae species diversity. The Annonoideae generally show a greater degree of sequence divergence compared to the Malmeoideae, resulting in stark differences in branch lengths in phylogenetic trees. Uncertainty in how to interpret and analyse these differences has led to inconsistent results when estimating the ages of clades in Annonaceae using molecular dating techniques. We ask whether these differences may be attributed to inappropriate modelling assumptions in the phylogenetic analyses. Specifically, we test for (clade-specific) differences in rates of non-synonymous and synonymous substitutions. A high ratio of nonsynonymous to synonymous substitutions may lead to similarity of DNA sequences due to convergence instead of common ancestry, and as a result confound phylogenetic analyses. We use a dataset of three chloroplast genes (rbcL, matK, ndhF) for 129 species representative of the family. We find that differences in branch lengths between major clades are not attributable to different rates of non-synonymous and synonymous substitutions. The differences in evolutionary rate between the major clades of Annonaceae pose a challenge for current molecular dating techniques that should be seen as a warning for the interpretation of such results in other organisms.
New frontiers: a view to the future

This final paper first summarises some of the major themes that previous authors have mentioned. The first theme is their endeavour to understand human beings in their ecological context. The second is that they also adhere to a (health) systems approach. The third theme refers to the proposed valuable research developments. This paper then elaborates on three ideas that deserve attention as potential ‘new frontiers’. The first is Network Mental Health, referring to the clinical staging model that may solve a range of problems: a new generation of epidemiological research that accommodates cultural expressions of distress, mitigates response bias, prevents outliers in prevalence rates, increases the cross cultural validity of psycho pathological constructs, opens venues to develop transdiagnostic treatments by non specialists, and that may help to bury the perennial universalism versus relativism debate.1 The second idea is referred to as Community Intervention Capital. Arguing that we need interventions, beneath the primary care level within communities, as the foundations of our public mental health care system and as the crucial source of universal prevention. In low and middle income countries, this involves a wide range of community resources including: healers, teachers, community leaders, extended families and organised religion. Additionally, concerted action of all players could achieve a great deal. The third idea is called Mental Health Mathematics. Mental health professionals are ill equipped for sophisticated mathematical modelling. We need a new generation of research to study causal pathways, robustness and redundancy of interventions in order to improve equity, access to care, life course research, complex health systems and/or stigma related to mental health.
Efficient SMT Encodings for the Petrobras Domain

Reformulation into SAT is one of the main approaches to deterministic planning. The main idea is to successively check the satisfiability of each of the propositional formulas in a sequence φ0, φ1, φ2, . where φi encodes the feasibility of a plan of length i. For real-life applications, resources such as time, distances, or money must often be considered. Therefore, in the context of plannning with resources, a natural choice is to consider satisfiability modulo theories (SMT) instead of plain SAT. In this paper we consider the application of off-the-shelf SMT solvers to the Petrobras domain, an abstraction of a real-life problem of resource-efficient transportation of goods from ports to petroleum platforms. We consider different encodings into SMT and compare with state of the art alternative approaches.
The Self Group Distinction Scale: A new approach to measure individualism and collectivism in adolescents

Individualism/Collectivism (I/C) was defined as a group orientation characterized by the degree of the convergence of an individual’s opinion with an anchor group opinion. The Self Group Distinction (SGD) Scale as a new measurement using difference scores was developed. In sum, 532 Japanese adolescents with a mean age of 12.3 years (SD = 1.78 years) and 277 Austrian with a mean age of 11.96 years (SD = 1.81 years) were asked to indicate their own and the perceived class opinion with respect to seven items covering different aspects of I/C. Confirmatory factor analyses of difference scores demonstrated scalar measurement invariance between cultural groups. Validity was demonstrated by a smaller self-group distinction in Japanese compared with Austrian adolescents.
Internal Migration in the Context of Trade Liberalisation in Vietnam

This study aims to examine the determinants of internal migration in the context of trade liberalisation in Vietnam. The methods of instrumental variables (IV) and two stage least squares (2SLS) estimations were employed on panel data on gross province-toprovince migration flows from 2002-2005 to solve the problem of endogeneity of explanatory variables. The empirical analyses showed that although overall internal migration was medium in Vietnam in this period, it did depend on distance, density of population, income (GDP per capita), employment (working time rate), quality of labour (rate of unskilled workers), living conditions (hospital beds per capita) and degree of openness.
The acquisition of differential object marking in 2L1 Romanian

This paper charts the acquisition route of differential object marking (DOM) in Romanian by Hungarian-Romanian simultaneous bilinguals (2L1). The main finding is that these 2L1 children acquire the properties of the DOM system similarly to monolinguals. The only difference targets descriptive DPs, with which marking is constrained by discourse-pragmatics. During the early stages, the 2L1 children undermark these DPs in comparison with age-matched monolinguals. Data from ‘frog story’ narratives of 4-year-old bilinguals reveal an increase in DOM use with these DPs. The results show that the vulnerability is selective and that it is overcome early. We tentatively account for our findings in terms of the syntax of DOM in Romanian and of positive cross-linguistic interference effects from Hungarian.
Oncotarget paper published

Hypoxic cancer cells exhibit resistance to many therapies. This study compared the therapeutic effect of targeting the pH regulatory proteins (CAIX, NHE1 and V-ATPase) that permit cancer cells to adapt to hypoxic conditions, using both 2D and 3D culture models. Drugs targeting CAIX, NHE1 and V-ATPase exhibited antiproliferative effects in MCF-7, MDA-MB-231 and HBL-100 breast cancer cell lines in 2D. Protein and gene expression analysis in 2D showed that CAIX was the most hypoxiainducible protein of the 3 targets. However, the expression of CAIX differed between the 3 cell lines. This difference in CAIX expression in hypoxia was consistent with a varying activity of FIH-1 between the cell lines. 3D expression analysis demonstrated that both CAIX and NHE1 were up-regulated in the hypoxic areas of multicellular tumor spheroids. However, the induction of CAIX expression in hypoxia was again cell line dependent. 3D invasion assays conducted with spheroids showed that CAIX inhibition significantly reduced the invasion of cells. Finally, the capability of both NHE1 and CAIX inhibitors to combine effectively with irradiation was exhibited in clonogenic assays. Proteomic-mass-spectrometric analysis indicated that CAIX inhibition might be combining with irradiation through stimulating apoptotic cell death. Of the three proteins, CAIX represents the target with the most promise for the treatment of breast cancer.
Morality, Maximization, and Economic Behavior

Morality influences economic behavior. It has been invoked to explain worker solidarity, statesmanship, voting patterns, cooperative behavior, bargaining outcomes, the production of public goods and externalities, worker performance, and the degree of competition in labor markets [1; 10; 14; 19; 21; 26]. So economists ought to consider the economic consequences of prevailing moral norms. In some areas such considerations will be distinctly secondary (e.g., the study of arbitrage pricing relationships). But in many areas that economists traditionally consider to be in their purview-including the study of labor markets, organizational design, income distribution, long run growth, and the provision of public goods-economic models can be improved by the accommodation of moral behavior.1
In vitro biochemical evaluation of methanol extract of Moringa oleifera pods on rat liver mitochondrial membrane permeability transition pore and lipid peroxidation

Background: Moringa oleifera is a well-known world herbal plant for its amazing medicinal and nutritional properties. The effect of methanol extract of M. oleifera can be useful in managing diseases associated with mitochondrial membrane permeability transition pore and lipid peroxidation. Methods: Evaluation was done at varying concentrations of the methanol pods extract on mitochondrial membrane permeability transition pore opening (swelling) and Fe 2+ - H 2 O 2 -EDTA (Fenton reaction)-induced lipid peroxidation in vitro . Five male albino rats (weighed 120-250 g) were anaesthetized and sacrificed; the liver was excised and homogenized to obtain mitochondria pellets. This study analyzed the effect of varying concentrations of methanol pods extract of M. oleifera at 50, 150, and, 300 µg/ml respectively. The effects of M. oleifera varying concentration in vitro was determined using malondialdehyde reaction quantified at 532 nm in a UV- spectrophotometer as index for lipid peroxidation and spectrophotometric absorptions at 520 nm was observed as an index of mitochondrial membrane permeability pore respectively. Results: Varying concentrations of methanol pods extract of M. oleifera at 50, 150, and 300 µg/ml in the presence and absence of triggering agent (Ca 2+ ) inhibited opening of mitochondria membrane permeability transition pore while 0.25, 0.50 and 1.00 mg/ml inhibited lipid peroxidation induced mitochondria of the rat liver respectively in a concentration dependent mode. Conclusion: The results suggest that methanol extract of M. oleifera pods at high concentrations (such as 300 µg/ml and 1.00 mg/ml respectively) may inhibit mitochondrial membrane permeability transition pore opening and lipid peroxidation. Keywords: Moringa oleifera, mitochondria membrane permeability transition pore, lipid peroxidation
Phylogeography of the ground squirrel subgenus Xerospermophilus and assembly of the Mojave Desert biota

Aim The Mohave ground squirrel (Xerospermophilus mohavensis) is one of a few endemic species of the Mojave Desert of south‐western North America. We describe phylogeographic patterns within this species and its sister taxon (Xerospermophilus tereticaudus) and test hypotheses concerning their biogeographical history using genetic signatures of stable versus expanding populations. We compare these patterns with those of other Mojave species to evaluate the role of vicariance in producing phylogeographic structure during the assembly of the Mojave Desert biota.
Firm Growth in Conflict Countries: Some Evidence from South Asia

This paper provides robust evidence on feedback effects of violent conflicts on firm growth. It uses South Asian firm level data that contain rare employment information on countries that experience severe conflicts. We show that firm growth exists in conflict areas. Yet, there are fewer expanding firms. They tend to grow slower than firms in other countries in the region, and firms that shed staff decline faster. Particularly firms in urban conflict areas were performing less dynamically. The results point at severe investment climate issues in conflict countries, which imply a lower degree of industrial and productivity dynamics in afflicted regions.
Red blood cell segmentation and classification method using MATLAB

Red blood cells (RBCs) are the most important kind of blood cell. Its diagnosis is very important process for early detection of related disease such as malaria and anemia before suitable follow up treatment can be proceed. Some of the human disease can be showed by counting the number of red blood cells. Red blood cell count gives the vital information that help diagnosis many of the patient’s sickness. Conventional method under blood smears RBC diagnosis is applying light microscope conducted by pathologist. This method is time-consuming and laborious. In this project an automated RBC counting is proposed to speed up the time consumption and to reduce the potential of the wrongly identified RBC. Initially the RBC goes for image pre-processing which involved global thresholding. Then it continues with RBCs counting by using two different algorithms which are the watershed segmentation based on distance transform, and the second one is the artificial neural network (ANN) classification with fitting application depend on regression method. Before applying ANN classification there are step needed to get feature extraction data that are the data extraction using moment invariant. There are still weaknesses and constraints due to the image itself such as color similarity, weak edge boundary, overlapping condition, and image quality. Thus, more study must be done to handle those matters to produce strong analysis approach for medical diagnosis purpose. This project build a better solution and help to improve the current methods so that it can be more capable, robust, and effective whenever any sample of blood cell is analyzed. At the end of this project it conducted comparison between 20 images of blood samples taken from the medical electronic laboratory in Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM). The proposed method has been tested on blood cell images and the effectiveness and reliability of each of the counting method has been demonstrated.
Testing of insect microsporidians (Microspora: Nosematidae) in nontarget aquatic species.

This paper reports results of tests with the mosquito microsporidian Nosema algerae and the orthopteran microsporidian N. locustae on nontarget aquatic organisms. Organisms tested were the freshwater grass shrimp Palaemonetes kadiakensis, the estuarine grass shrimp P. pugio, the marine rotifer Brachionusplicatilis, and the inland silverside Menldia beryllina. These organisms were exposed by intrahemocoelic injection, gavage, or ingestion. Infections d ~ d not develop in either the freshwater grass shrimp or the estuarine grass shrimp that were gavaged with N. algerae spores. However, infections did develop in both species of grass shrimp after intrahemocoelic injections with N. algerae spores. Infected tissues included the gills, antenna1 gland, eyes, skeletal muscle, heart, and gonads. Proof of infection was demonstrated ultrastructurally by the presence of mature spores and developmental stages in infected tissues. Infections did not develop in P. pugio following intrahemocoelic injections of N. locustae spores. N. algerae infections did not develop in the marine rotifer after ingestion of spores or in inland silversides fed marine rotifers containing ingested spores.
EQUIPARTITION GAMMA-RAY BLAZARS AND THE LOCATION OF THE GAMMA-RAY EMISSION SITE IN 3C 279

Blazar spectral models generally have numerous unconstrained parameters, leading to ambiguous values for physical properties like Doppler factor δD or fluid magnetic field B′. To help remedy this problem, a few modifications of the standard leptonic blazar jet scenario are considered. First, a log-parabola function for the electron distribution is used. Second, analytic expressions relating energy loss and kinematics to blazar luminosity and variability, written in terms of equipartition parameters, imply δD, B′, and the peak electron Lorentz factor . The external radiation field in a blazar is approximated by Lyα radiation from the broad-line region (BLR) and ≈0.1 eV infrared radiation from a dusty torus. When used to model 3C 279 spectral energy distributions from 2008 and 2009 reported by Hayashida et al., we derive δD ∼ 20–30, B′ ∼ few G, and total (IR + BLR) external radiation field energy densities u ∼ 10−2–10−3 erg cm−3, implying an origin of the γ-ray emission site in 3C 279 at the outer edges of the BLR. This is consistent with the γ-ray emission site being located at a distance R ≲ Γ2ctvar ∼ 0.1(Γ/30)2(tvar/104 s) pc from the black hole powering 3C 279's jets, where tvar is the variability timescale of the radiation in the source frame, and at farther distances for narrow-jet and magnetic-reconnection models. Excess ≳ 5 GeV γ-ray emission observed with Fermi LAT from 3C 279 challenges the model, opening the possibility of a second leptonic component or a hadronic origin of the emission. For low hadronic content, absolute jet powers of ≈10% of the Eddington luminosity are calculated.