Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Total a-Tocopherol Intakes Are Associated with Serum a-Tocopherol Concentrations in African

African Americans in the southern United States have a high prevalence of chronic disease. Tocopherol intake and status have been associated with protection against several chronic diseases. Our objectives were, therefore, to examine the association between tocopherol intakes as measured by 2 regional FFQ and their corresponding concentrations in serum and to report on dietary sources of tocopherols in 404 men and women participating in the cross-sectional Diet and Physical Activity Sub-Study of the Jackson Heart Study. A large proportion (49% of men and 66% of women) reported dietary supplement use. Only 5.8% of men and 4.5% of women met the estimated average requirement (EAR) for vitamin E from foods alone, whereas 44.2% men and 49.2% women met it from foods and supplements. Total (diet 1 supplement) intake of a-tocopherol was associated with its corresponding measure in serum. Vitamin E supplement use, sex, serum cholesterol, education, and BMI, but not g-tocopherol intakes, were associated with serum g-tocopherol. For d-tocopherol, associated variables included sex and serum cholesterol. The top food sources of a- and g-tocopherol were snack chips and the top food source of d-tocopherol was margarine. Despite prevalent vitamin E supplement use, more than one-half of this population did not meet the EAR for a-tocopherol intake and very few met it from food alone. Supplement use was associated with higher a- but lower g-tocopherol concentration in serum. The possible health implications of this difference in relative tocopherol subtypes require further study. J. Nutr. 137: 2297–2303, 2007.
Microsite and grazing intensity drive infiltration in a semiarid woodland

Human activities such as vegetation removal and overgrazing that result in changes in land cover have substantial impacts on ecosystem processes, including the infiltration of water. Different land cover types (microsites) vary in their capacity to conduct water, but the extent to which infiltration is affected by different herbivores or microsites is largely unknown. We examined the effects of grazing and microsite on infiltration in two extensive woodland communities in semiarid eastern Australia that vary in current condition. Poor condition sites had lower steady‐state infiltration under ponding than either average or good condition sites, and this effect was consistent across the two communities. Ponded infiltration and sorptivity beneath grasses, shrubs or trees were about twice that on bare soil, and this corresponded to greater indices of macroporosity. Structural equation modelling showed that shrubs, trees, and grasses had strong positive effects on sorptivity and steady‐state infiltration under ponding, whereas grazing had generally negative effects. The suppressive effects of grazing on soil hydrological processes were mainly due to cattle grazing. The positive effects of grasses, shrubs, and trees on hydrology were twice as strong as the negative effects of grazing. Our results also suggest that prolonged overgrazing that leads to reductions in grass cover is likely to have a synergistic reduction in hydrological function in these woodlands by reducing the cover of highly conductive patches and by reducing the extent of macropores.
Flow Manifold for Automated On-Line Dilution of Standards for Flame Atomic Absorption Spectrometry and Its Use in a Null Measurement Method

A flow manifold that automatically dilutes solutions presented to a flame atomic absorption spectrometer while maintaining a constant flow to the nebuliser is described. The manifold is based on a fixed-speed pump, together with a computer-controlled stream switching valve and pump. The computer is also used for data acquisition and handling. In addition to the production of solutions for a conventional calibration procedure, the system is also used for a novel calibration procedure whereby the stock standard solution is automatically diluted by a known factor until its absorbance matches that of the sample. This null measurement method avoids the need to fit a curve to a set of calibration points. The performance of both methods compares favourably with the conventional procedure with errors ranging from 0.0 to 4% and no significant bias at the 99% confidence level. Problems with pulsations in the flow caused by peristaltic pump rollers were encountered with the consequent difficulties of accurate flow-rate measurement. Attempts to improve the speed of the method by the use of flow injection introduction were not successful owing to these pulsations in the flow.
Monetary Policy Across Space and Time

Many major macroeconomic events have occurred across multiple countries. This Economic Brief looks at similarities and differences among the euro area, the United Kingdom, and the United States and finds that macroeconomic variables tend to become more interconnected during periods of financial distress. Movements in monetary policy are highly correlated across all three regions. In addition, inflation and unemployment become less responsive to monetary policy shocks over time.
Mapping Political Communities: A Statistical Analysis of Lobbying Networks in Legislative Politics

Abstract We propose a new methodology for inferring political actors’ latent memberships in communities of collective activity that drive their observable interactions. Unlike existing methods, the proposed Bipartite Link Community Model (biLCM) (1) applies to two groups of actors, (2) takes into account that actors may be members of more than one community, and (3) allows a pair of actors to interact in more than one way. We apply this method to characterize legislative communities of special interest groups and politicians in the 113th U.S. Congress. Previous empirical studies of interest group politics have been limited by the difficulty of observing the ties between interest groups and politicians directly. We therefore first construct an original dataset that connects the politicians who sponsor congressional bills with the interest groups that lobby on those bills based on more than two million textual descriptions of lobbying activities. We then use the biLCM to make quantitative measurements of actors’ community memberships ranging from narrow targeted interactions according to industry interests and jurisdictional committee membership to broad multifaceted connections across multiple policy domains.
Governance Based on Partnership with NGOs: Implications for Development and Empowerment in Rural Bangladesh

In line with the current global trend of streamlining the role of the state, the governments in most countries have transferred some of their economic activities and basic services to non-governmental organizations (NGOs), which are now considered partners in governance. In the developing world, some of the largest and most well-known NGOs are in Bangladesh where the government has formed partnership with these NGOs in various sectors with a view to enhance human development and social empowerment in rural areas. But in reality, such partnership has been quite ineffective (and even unfavorable) to achieve this goal. This article briefly introduces the current debate on governance based on partnership between the state and NGOs; explains the forms and dimensions of such partnership in the case of Bangladesh; and evaluates this partnership experience in terms of whether it has achieved the stipulated objectives of development and empowerment. It also explores major factors and interests (internal and external) behind this partnership and offers some suggestions to rethink partnership and overcome its drawbacks in Bangladesh.
Synthesizing Texture on Image using Texture Synthesis

Image Enhancement is found to be a very effective technique useful in today's digital image processing applications. Generating novel photo-realistic imagery from smaller examples has been widely recognized as significant in computer graphics. Many natural and man-made surface patterns are created by interactions between texture elements and surface geometry. We believe that the best way to create such patterns is to synthesize a texture directly on the surface of the model. Given a texture sample in the form of an image, we create a similar texture over an irregular mesh hierarchy that has been placed on a given surface. Our method draws upon texture synthesis methods that use image pyramids, and we use a mesh hierarchy to serve in place of such pyramids. First, we create a hierarchy of points from low to high density over a given surface, and we connect these points to form a hierarchy of meshes. Next, the user specifies a vector field over the surface that indicates the orientation of the texture. The mesh vertices on the surface are then sorted in such a way that visiting the points in order will follow the vector field and will sweep across the surface from one end to the other. Each point is then visited in turn to determine its color. The color of a particular point is found by examining the color of neighboring points and finding the best match to a similar pixel neighborhood in the given texture sample. The color assignment is done in a coarse-to-fine manner using the mesh hierarchy. A texture created this way fits the surface naturally and seamlessly.
Sharing the load: Mobile robotic networks in dynamic environments

shown the equilibrium status of the median locations in the context of an appropriate game. Another interesting field of study in the context of spatial tessellations is the emergent group behavior, i.e., territorial versus gregarious behavior arising out of foraging and hunting strategies of animals. The utility function approach again is a promising tool, since it provides a natural framework to study the behavior of animals as selfish agents. This line of research would be in stark contrast to the discipline of biorobotics, where instead of taking inspiration from nature, we would try to identify possible motives explaining the observed behavior of animal populations.
Interference of nutrients with fungicide activity against Septoria nodorum on wheat leaves

The effect of nutrients on reduction of the germination and mycelial growth of Septoria nodorum by the fungicides propiconazole, fenpropimorph and prochloraz, and on the reduction of S.nodorum infection by prochloraz, was tested on wheat plants in a controlled environment. The nutrients tested were aphid honeydew, sucrose, a mixture of amino acids and combinations of sucrose with yeast extract and amino acids, all in different concentrations. All nutrients could stimulate S. nodorum infection in combination with the tested prochloraz concentrations (4.5–45 mg a.i./1), but amino acids did not significantly stimulate infection in the fungicide-free treatments. The stimulating effect of the nutrients was generally stronger with higher nutrient/fungicide ratios. Aphid honeydew had more effect than its main components sucrose and amino acids separately. Antagonism between nutrients and prochloraz was determined with the Colby method and from dose-response curves by comparing ED50 S and drawing antagonism isoboles. Aphid honeydew, sucrose and amino acids caused an up to 10-fold increase of the ED50 and can be considered antagonistic to prochloraz
INTIMATE RELATIONSHIPS IN UNIVERSITY STUDENTS: A PSYCHOMETRIC APPROACH

The current research explored the expression of intimate relationship in university students in Pakistani cultural context. In the first phase of the study, 20 university students were interviewed individually to generate the item pool. It resulted in the generation of 71 items on intimate relationship as experienced and expressed by university students. After excluding the repetition and redundant items 35 finalized items were piloted on 30 university students as a self-report measure of 4 point rating scale (Intimate Relationship Scale). Finally a stratified sample of 223 university students (45.9% men and 54.1% women) was given the final list of 35 items scale and a demographic form. Principal component factor analysis revealed two factor solution namely intimacy in relationship and conflict in relationship. The Intimate Relationship Scale found to have acceptable psychometric properties. The results of the research are discussed in the light of cultural context and its implication for the university students.
Downward Compatible Revision of Dialogue Annotation

This paper discusses some aspects of revising the ISO standard for dialogue act annotation (ISO 24617-2). The revision is aimed at making annotations using the ISO scheme more accurate and at providing more powerful tools for building natural language based dialogue systems, without invalidating the annotated resources that have been built, with the current version of the standard. In support of the revision of the standard, an analysis is provided of the downward compatibility of a revised annotation scheme with the original scheme at the levels of abstract syntax, concrete syntax, and semantics of annotations.
From apathy to ambivalence: How is persuasion knowledge reflected in consumers' comments about in-game advertising?

In today's fragmented media environment, advertising in videogames (i.e. in-game advertising) is an increasingly appealing marketing communication tool to reach a targeted and captive audience, especially the elusive and hard-to-reach 18–34-year-old demographic. This article develops a conceptual framework that adapts the persuasion knowledge model to consumers' views of in-game advertising. The propositions are tested in a content analysis of consumer comments about brands in videogames collected on 21 online forums. The results show that the interplay between knowledge types is reflected in gamers' comments about in-game advertising. The absence of persuasion knowledge is reflected in more positive comments about the practice, but consumers who express both topic and agent knowledge also express more positive views of it. A key finding is that, when all three knowledge types are activated, consumers express ambivalent thoughts about the practice, and ambivalence is actually more common than univalent or apathetic views. The findings collectively suggest a nuanced approach to the relationship between persuasion knowledge and consumers' opinions of new advertising formats.
Geophysical and Geochemical Models of Mantle Convection: Successes and Future Challenges

Although more and more robust evidence of whole mantle convection comes from seismic tomography and geoid modeling, the rare gases and other isotopic or trace element signatures of ridge and hotspot basalts indicate the presence of various isolated geochemic al reservoirs in the mantle. We discuss this discrepancy between the fluid dynamic views of mantle convection and the chemical observations. We compare the standard model of geodynamicists where the mantle behaves as a fluid mostly heated from within with the findings of seismic tomography. We suggest that a significant part of the subducted oceanic crust transformed into dense eclogitic assemblages, partially segregates to form a D'' layer growing with time. We show how a two component marble cake mantle filling the whole mantle except D'' can account for the variability of OIBs and MORBs in rare gases. We then present the state of the art in thermochemical convection of the mantle and emphasize the numerical and conceptual progress that must be made to quantitatively test the geochemical hypothesis.
How to Build a Quality of Community Health Center Financial Statement ?

The purpose of this study is to discuss and analysis factors thatinfluencethequality of the financial statementof Community Health Center.This research use mixmethod.It was carried out in two stages.The first stage is quantitative method.it was used multiple regression to analyze the hypothesis.In second stage is qualitative method which the data collection using focus group discussion.The findings of the study showed that professionalisme and role ofinspectoratefunction wereinfluent positively on the quality of financialstatements.The culture and information technology were not influence to quality of financial statements. This is caused by implementation of software and regulation are not not optimal.
The Use of the EmotionalStroop Test to Establish the Onset and Efficacy of Antipsychotic Activity

Twenty‐eight subjects who met criteria for delusional disorder, of whom 16 were on neuroleptic treatment and 12 were not, were tested using an Emotional Stroop Test to measure aspects of their deployment of attentional resources in response to emotionally valent material. Interference indices were calculated to assess their level of accommodation to depressive, anxiety‐related and threat‐related words. Those who were on neuroleptics demonstrated significantly less interference from anxiety and threat‐related words, raising the possibility that this test might provide a sensitive measure of the onset and efficacy of antipsychotic activity. The differential effects on anxiety and threat‐related words also suggest that the antipsychotic activity of current neuroleptics is non‐specifically tranquillizing rather than specifically psychotolytic in nature.
ARCH-COMP22 Category Report: Continuous and Hybrid Systems with Nonlinear Dynamics

We present the results of a friendly competition for formal verification of continuous and hybrid systems with nonlinear continuous dynamics. The friendly competition took place as part of the workshop Applied Verification for Continuous and Hybrid Systems (ARCH) in 2022. This year, 6 tools Ariadne, CORA, DynIbex, JuliaReach, Kaa and KeYmaera X (in alphabetic order) participated. These tools are applied to solve reachability analysis problems on six benchmark problems, two of them featuring hybrid dynamics. We do not rank the tools based on the results, but show the current status and discover the potential advantages of different tools.
INFLUENCE OF SAND MOLDING PROCESS PARAMETERS ON PRODUCT QUALITY OF AL-SI ALLOY CASTING - AN ANOVA APPROACH

Sand mold casting is an age old metal casting process. Even today, though there are many advanced techniques present to produce metal castings, sand molding remains one of the most widely used casting process because of its ability to produce low cost and wide variety of castings. Sand casting process involves many parameters which affect the quality of the produced castings. In this study, an attempt has been made to optimize the sand molding parameters, and to study the influence of these parameters on quality of Al-Si alloy castings. Taguchi’s experimental design approach is adopted to achieve optimum level of parameters, and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) technique is used to identify the significant factors and their percentage contribution for improved mechanical properties. Experimental results show that amount of clay and amount of moisture are the parameters making significant influence on mechanical properties of these castings. Based on optimum level of parameters, verification test is performed and the results are found to be in confidence level. Experimental results confirmed the validity of selected approach in enhancing and optimizing the sand mold casting process for aluminium alloys.
Evaluating the impact of oyster (Crassostrea virginica) gardening on sediment nitrogen cycling in a subtropical estuary

To quantify the effect of oysters on sediment N cycling, oyster-free cages and cages with adult or juvenile oysters [Crassostrea virginica (Gmelin, 1791)] were suspended above the sediments at two sites in Mobile Bay, Alabama, located in the northern Gulf of Mexico. While hydrogen sulfide (HS–) was below detection limits at Site 2, HS– exceeded 500 μM prior to the deployment at Site 1 and remained detectable in sediments in the oyster treatments. Oyster mediated N inputs were estimated at 11.4 (SE 0.4) g N m–2 and 3.2 (SE 0.2) g N m–2 in the juvenile and adult treatments, respectively. The abundances of genes associated with denitrifiers (nirK), sulfate reducers (dsrB), and bacterial and archaeal nitrifiers (bac_amoA, arc_amoA, respectively) varied over the course of the study, but were not affected by the treatments. Similarly, potential denitrification rates measured during the study were similar in all treatments. Net N2 fluxes, determined from N2:Ar ratios using a membrane inlet mass spectrometer were similar among treatments, despite significantly higher sediment chlorophyll-a content in the juvenile treatment. We conclude that the commonly assumed enhanced rates of N2 loss from sediments in response to deployment of oysters is not guaranteed and may depend on site-specific biogeochemistry.
AN INVESTIGATION OF THE EFFECT OF MOBILE NUMBER PORTABILITY ON MARKET COMPETITION by Yuriy Podvysotskiy

AN INVESTIGATION OF THE EFFECT OF MOBILE NUMBER PORTABILITY ON MARKET COMPETITION by Yuriy Podvysotskiy Chairperson of the Supervisory Committee: Professor Roy Gardner Department of Science This thesis examines possible affects of implementation of technology known as mobile number portability (MNP) on market competition. Previously it was strongly believed that MNP leads to improvement of market competition, but recently several papers argued that. This work developed theoretical model aplicable for investigation of the effect of MNP under different market parameters such as growth rate and interconnection costs. Arellano-Bond GMM model was used to estimate empirically the effects described in theoreical literature on switching costs and also the ways that MNP changes these effects. Original cross-country firm-level panel data was used for the estimation. Empirical results provide theoretical evidence, besides, estimated model is transformed into a rule that could be applied for testing possible effect of MNP on market competition.
A ug 2 01 0 Gauge-Invariant Quantum Gravity Corrections to Gauge Couplings via Vilkovisky-DeWitt Method and Gravity Assisted Gauge Unification

Gravity is the weakest force in nature, and the gravitational interactions with all standard model (SM) particles can be well described by perturbative expansions of the Einstein-Hilbert action as an effective theory, all the way up to energies below the fundamental Planck scale. We use VilkoviskyDeWitt method to derive the first gauge-invariant nonzero gravitational power-law corrections to the running of gauge couplings, which make both Abel and non-Abel gauge interactions asymptotically free. We further demonstrate that the graviton-induced universal power-law runnings always assist the three SM gauge forces to reach unification around the Planck scale, irrespective of the detail of logarithmic corrections. We also compute the power-law corrections to the SM Higgs sector and derive modified triviality bound on the Higgs boson mass.
Cryo-EM : an Emergent Structural Biology Technique for the Visualization of Macromolecular Complexity

Eva Nogales, UC Berkeley & Berkeley Lab, (USA) tructural visualization is invaluable for a mechanistic understanding of macromolecular function. X-ray crystallography is a very effective method to produce atomic models of proteins and nucleic acids, but suffers from the requirement of large amounts of sample and the bottleneck of crystallization. On the other hand, NMR needs also large sample amounts and requires isotopic enrichment. Such constrains have imposed limitations in the application of X-ray crystallography and NMR to large macromolecular complexes, integral membrane proteins, polymers or macromolecular samples with coexistence of multiple conformational or compositional states. Single particle cryo-electron microscopy – cryo-EM is a structural biology technique applicable to the study of challenging biological systems, for which crystallization is not required and only small amounts of sample are needed. Furthermore, via computational classification this technique has the potential to deal with compositional and conformational mixtures. Single particle cryo-EM has just taken a quantum leap in applicability and achievable resolution, gaining worldwide attention (see Nogales and Scheres 2015 for a recent review).