Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Who, Why and How of Spinoffs

Studies have consistently found that entrepreneurs who enter industries in which they have prior experience as employees perform better. We nevertheless know little about what accounts for this effect. The presumed explanation has been that experienced entrepreneurs benefit from knowledge acquired in their former jobs. But they might also differ from entrepreneurs without industry experience on a variety of other dimensions: preferential access to resources or differing motivations, for example, may account for their decisions to enter known industries instead of new ones. Combining novel data from a representative survey of entrepreneurs with the matched employer–employee database of all residents in Denmark, we examined how entrepreneurs with prior industry experience differed from those without it, and the extent to which those differences could account for the performance premium associated with prior industry experience. We found that entrepreneurs with industry experience came from younger, smaller, and more profitable parent firms, and that they recruited more experienced employees, worked harder, and placed less value on having flexible hours. The recruitment of more experienced employees and the greater effort exerted appeared to account for at least some of the performance advantage associated with prior industry experience.
Curriculum Development for Transfer Learning in Dynamic Multiagent Settings

Abstract : Transfer learning in reinforcement learning has been an active area of research over the past decade. In transfer learning, training on a source task is leveraged to speed up or otherwise improve learning on a target task. This project addressed the ambitious problem of curriculum learning in reinforcement learning, in which the goal is to design a sequence of source tasks for an agent to train on, such that final performance or learning speed is improved. We take the position that each stage of such a curriculum should be tailored to the ability of the agent in order to promote learning new behaviors. To tackle the problem of curriculum learning, we addressed three key sub-problems: 1) Learning Transferability, and 2) Automatic Source Task Creation, 3) Curriculum Construction through Crowd Sourcing. This technical report documents the methods, experiments, and results of the proposed frameworks for curriculum construction for reinforcement learning agents.
Adapting Sources of Middle School Mathematics Self-Efficacy Scale to Turkish Culture

The purpose of this study was to adapt the Sources of Middle School Mathematics Self-Efficacy Scale developed by Usher and Pajares to Turkish culture. This scale assesses Bandura’s theorized sources of self-efficacy among mathematics students in middle school. After the Turkish version of the scale was formed, it was applied 6th, 7th and 8th grades 282 middle school students (157 girls and 125 boys). Results of Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) showed good fit indeces; χ2/sd= 2.25, RMSEA= . 06, CFI= . 98, NNFI= . 97 and SRMR= . 05. These values indicated that the proposed four factor model was acceptable for this Turkish sampling. The reliability coefficient estimated by Cronbach alpha was found; mastery experience α= . 86, vicarious experience α= . 75, social persuasions α= . 94, physiological state α= . 91. Also the reliability coefficient estimated by split-half was found; mastery experience α= . 81, vicarious experience α= . 73, social persuasions α= . 92, physiological state α= . 89. Deciding on stability of the scale test-retest applied to 36 studens for 16 days interval. Results showed that mastery experience r= . 67, vicarious experience r= . 48, social persuasions r= . 63, physiological state r= . 41. These values indicated that this scale is a reliable instrument for Turkish sampling. In conlusion, Sources of Mathematics Self-Efficacy Scale is a valid and reliable instrument to meeasure sources of mathematics self-efficacy for middle school students in Turkish culture.
Preliminary Assessment of Variable Speed Power Turbine Technology on Civil Tiltrotor Size and Performance

A Large Civil Tiltrotor (LCTR) conceptual design was developed as part of the NASA Heavy Lift Rotorcraft Systems Investigation in order to establish a consistent basis for evaluating the benefits of advanced technology for large tiltrotors. The concept has since evolved into the second-generation LCTR2, designed to carry 90 passengers for 1,000 nm at 300 knots, with vertical takeoff and landing capability. This paper performs a preliminary assessment of variable-speed power turbine technology on LCTR2 sizing, while maintaining the same, advanced technology engine core. Six concepts were studied; an advanced, single-speed engine with a conventional power turbine layout (Advanced Conventional Engine, or ACE) using a multi-speed (shifting) gearbox. There were five variable-speed power turbine (VSPT) engine concepts, comprising a matrix of either three or four turbine stages, and fixed or variable guide vanes; plus a minimum weight, twostage, fixed-geometry VSPT. The ACE is the lightest engine, but requires a multi-speed (shifting) gearbox to maximize its fuel efficiency, whereas the VSPT concepts use a lighter, fixed-ratio gearbox. The NASA Design and Analysis of Rotorcraft (NDARC) design code was used to study the trades between rotor and engine efficiency and weight. Rotor performance was determined by Comprehensive Analytical Model of Rotorcraft Aerodynamics and Dynamics (CAMRAD II), and engine performance was estimated with the Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS). Design trades for the ACE vs. VSPT are presented in terms of vehicle gross and empty weight, propulsion system weight and mission fuel burn for the civil mission. Because of its strong effect on gearbox weight and on both rotor and engine efficiency, rotor speed was chosen as the reference design variable for comparing design trades. Major study assumptions are presented and discussed. Impressive engine power-to-weight and fuel efficiency reduced vehicle sensitivity to propulsion system choice. The 10% weight penalty for multi-speed gearbox was more significant than most engine technology weight penalties to the vehicle design because drive system weight is more than two times engine weight. Based on study assumptions, fixed-geometry VSPT concept options performed better than their variable-geometry counterparts. Optimum design gross weights varied 1% or less and empty weights less than 2% among the concepts studied, while optimum fuel burns varied up to 5%. The outcome for some optimum configurations was so unexpected as to recommend a deeper look at the underlying technology assumptions.
Innovative firms and the urban/rural divide: the case of agro‐food system

Purpose – This paper aims to analyse the capacity of rural and urban spaces to promote innovation in the agro‐food firms. The purpose is to determine if the rural/urban division affects the innovative behaviour of agriculture, food processing and food distribution firms.Design/methodology/approach – Business data have been obtained for over 2,000 firms based in the Valencia region, Spain. Out of them, over 200 declared to have taken part in R&D&i activities, mainly in partnership with public support institutions. The database supplies data of micro and small enterprises, which have been typically underestimated in the Spanish Survey on Technological Innovation in Enterprises. The database also makes it possible to identify the main location of agro‐food business, and the territory is divided in Local Labour Systems (LLS). LLS were in turn classified as rural or urban according to alternative criteria (OECD, national legislation). A logit model has been used in the analyses.Findings – The location of enter.
A Corpus Management System for Historical Semantics

This paper presents a corpus management System for historical semantics. Its background is a notion of semantics which relies on corpus analyses of diachronic corpora. These corpora are analyzed to explore semantic change as an access point to the understand-ing of social change. The system to be presented supports this kind of corpus-based historical semantics.
PROBING SECRETORY VESICLES AND LIPOSOME MODEL SYSTEMS USING NANOSCALE ELECTROCHEMISTRY AND MASS SPECTROMETRY

Cellular communication is based on the process of exocytosis, regulated release of chemical messengers into the extracellular space. These messengers, neurotransmitters, are packed into vesicles that during exocytosis fuse with the plasma membrane and release their content. Much work has been done to understand the mechanism of exocytosis, whether it is full or transitory transmitter release or a combination of these modes of exocytosis. However, its full comprehension is still under debate. One of the important pieces of the exocytosis puzzle and relevant evidence for the fractional exocytosis, is probing the entire neurotransmitter content of secretory vesicles. Despite the challenge to achieve this, owing to small vesicle size and often less than an attomole of detectable material, advances in bioanalytical techniques have allowed measurements at higher spatial resolution and with decreasing amounts of analytes. In this thesis, I have employed electrochemical techniques and imaging mass spectrometry as analytical tools to study the content of large dense core vesicles of neuroendocrine cells and liposome systems as secretory vesicle models. In the first part of the thesis work, Papers I and II, I applied a new amperometric technique called vesicle electrochemical cytometry to measure the catecholamine content in native vesicles and liposomes. In Paper I, this technique was employed to quantify the content of catecholamines present in single mammalian vesicles isolated from cells of the bovine adrenal gland. Paper II represents the continuation of work done in Paper I, where the same experimental setup was employed with focus on investigation of the mechanism of vesicle rupture onto the electrode by applying a bottom up approach and probing the transmitter loaded liposomes. The second part of this thesis, Papers III, IV and V, describe the application of imaging mass spectrometry to reveal the chemical composition of vesicles and liposomes. In Paper III, time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) was employed to study the chemistry of micrometer size liposome models containing histamine and liposomes containing an aqueous two-phase system, both to mimic secretory vesicles. Paper IV demonstrates the potential of ToF-SIMS to evaluate the preservation capabilities of chemical fixation, a common approach for sample preparation in subcellular imaging as well as a screening tool for optimization of high-resolution NanoSIMS imaging. In Paper V, NanoSIMS, and electrochemical techniques were used in combination, to study the neurochemistry of large dense core vesicles from PC12 cells. The major goals were to investigate the impact of pharmaceuticals like L-3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine and reserpine on metabolic pathways of neurotransmitter dopamine and to quantify dopamine content in PC12 vesicles, one vesicle at a time and in subvesicular regions.
PATIENTS RECEIVING MECHANICAL VENTILATION

• BACKGROUND Use of protocols to reduce weaning time for patients receiving mechanical ventilation helps reduce cost and length of stay. However, implementation of this type of protocol is not easy and requires a consistent collaborative effort. • OBJECTIVE To provide a systematic approach to the weaning process by developing, implementing, and evaluating a protocol for weaning patients from mechanical ventilation in a medical respiratory intensive care unit. • METHODS The weaning protocol used was a modification of a protocol developed by Ely et al. Modifications included a more aggressive approach in proceeding to the spontaneous breathing trial, inclusion of the Richmond Agitation-Sedation Scale, and documentation of the production of secretions. • RESULTS Implementation of the protocol significantly reduced the duration of mechanical ventilation as measured by 8-hour shifts and ventilator days. Although length of stay in the intensive care unit was not significantly reduced (P = .29), a continuing downward trend occurred, from a mean of 8.6 days before the protocol was implemented to 7.9 days during the last 6 months of data collection (P=.07). • CONCLUSIONS The need to provide efficient care requires the collaboration of all disciplines involved in providing patients’ care. The weaning protocol introduced in this study demonstrates the benefits of using a collaborative team to identify best practices and implement them in a practice setting. (American Journal of Critical Care. 2003;12:454-460). COLLABORATIVE PRACTICE: DEVELOPMENT, IMPLEMENTATION, AND EVALUATION OF A WEANING PROTOCOL FOR PATIENTS RECEIVING MECHANICAL VENTILATION
A Survey on Sensor Cloud : Architecture and Applications

Cloud Computing is a part of computer science and it enables providing Internet services to external customers via very scalable computing capacities. It is abstracted, high-scalable and controlled computer infrastructure which hosts applications for end-users. Data and services are located in shared, dynamic and scalable set of resources based on technologies of virtualization and scalable application environments. Wireless Sensor Networks can be used for collecting these data because they present distributed systems which consists of different sensor nodes. Sensors are spatially distributed and they are used for measuring different values, such as temperature, humidity, sound levels, pressure, environment variables etc.Many researchers have cited different types of technology in this context. But the application scenario are of important consideration while designing a specific protocol for Sensor network with reference to Cloud Computing. In this paper, we surveyed some typical applications of Sensor Network using Cloud computing as backbone. Since Cloud computing provides plenty of application, platforms and infrastructure over the Internet; it may combined with Sensor network in the application areas such as environmental monitoring, weather forecasting, transportation business, healthcare, military application etc. Bringing various WSNs deployed for different applications under one roof and looking it as a single virtual WSN entity through cloud computing infrastructure is novel.
Patent Litigation in China: Protecting Rights or the Local Economy?

Though it lacked a patent system until 1985, China is now the world leader in patent filings and litigation. Despite the meteoric rise of the Chinese patent system, many in the West believe that it acts primarily to facilitate local protectionism rather than innovation. Recent high-profile patent suits filed by relatively unknown Chinese firms against high-profile foreign tech companies, like Apple, Samsung, and Dell, have only added fuel to the fire. Surprisingly, given how commonplace assertions of Chinese protectionism are, little empirical evidence exists to support them. This Article contributes to the literature on this topic by analyzing five years' of data (2006-11) on patent suits litigated in courts with the fifty most active intellectual property (IP) dockets in China. Among other things, we find that Chinese patent suits are highly concentrated in a handful of major urban jurisdictions — not in smaller inland cities where protectionism is most often alleged to take place — and also have rates of success and appeal very similar to those of US patent suits. We also observe that foreign companies appear in Chinese patent suits most often as patent enforcers, not as accused infringers, and win their cases roughly as often as Chinese patentees. Finally, we find that patents litigated in China are generally more than five years old at the time of assertion and frequently have family members issued by foreign patent offices. Together, these findings contradict conventional wisdom that China’s patent system has been structured to benefit domestic industry at the expense of foreign firms.
Bank-Firm Relation Changes and Earnings Quality - An Analysis on Italian Small-Medium Sized Companies

In the last years banks and firms relationship in Italy has experienced deep changes due to a new revised national and international regulation and to an increasing globalization of economic environment. These evolutions imply a new bank-firm relationship with a deeper disclosure, in a perspective of partnership between them. In this scenario, Basel 1 and 2 accords have been contributing to revise bank-firm relationship, moreover in the specific perspective of small-medium sized firms. In Italy, the evolution of bank-firm relation has been also influenced by an intensive banking system restructuring process, characterized by big mergers and small local banks aggregations. This paper focuses on bank-firm relation impact on small-medium sized firms financial reporting quality. The analysis empirically examines some proxies for earnings quality for a sample of Italian small-medium sized firms over 10 years period. Earnings quality metrics are based on the relation between working capital accruals and cash flows, following Dechow and Dichev (2002) approach. Across these metrics we will perform a cross-sectional analysis on the relation between earnings quality and some variables regarding banks and firms governance, controlling for regulation changes and other variables such as size, sector etc.
ENERGY EFFICIENT DATA COLLECTION SCHEME USING RENDEZVOUS POINTS AND MOBILE ACTOR IN WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS

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IMPORTANCE OF LIPID NANOPARTICLES IN THE TREATMENT OF EPILEPSY: A FOCUS ON NASAL DELIVERY

Nasal delivery of lipid Nanoparticles directly into brain may become an attractive treatment option for epilepsy treatment. H igh concentration of drug reaches to brain by using lipid Nanoparticles. Nasal delivery bypasses the blood brain barrier and also avoids systemic side effects. This review sets out to discuss brief description about epilepsy, mechanism of epilepsy, drug used in epilepsy and nasal delivery by using lipid nanopariculate car rier for the treatment of epilepsy.
CO2 As An Alternative Refrigerant For Applications Below -50°C

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a well-known and established refrigerant with many advantageous properties and therefore used in many applications. However, the lowest achievable temperature is usually limited by the triple conditions at approximately 217 K and a corresponding pressure of 5.2 bar. Below these triple conditions CO2 only exists is gaseous and solid state. Commonly, the occurrence of solid particles in vapour compression cycles is carefully avoided and hence CO2 in solid state no option at all. With respect to increasing legal restrictions and upcoming bans for fluorinated refrigerants CO2 might be also a reasonable alternative in low temperature refrigeration – despite the obstacles with the solid phase. In this paper we give an overview on previous research activities with CO2 sublimation cooling in literature. Further, the theoretical efficiency of a CO2 cycle with a sublimation temperature of 198 K is compared to a conventional R404A/R23 cascade. It can be shown that a CO2 sublimation cycle can exceed the cycle efficiency of conventional systems. Finally, a closer look to the heat transfer of solid-gaseous flow in the sublimation heat exchanger is given and challenges are discussed.
User-Level Race and Ethnicity Predictors from Twitter Text

User demographic inference from social media text has the potential to improve a range of downstream applications, including real-time passive polling or quantifying demographic bias. This study focuses on developing models for user-level race and ethnicity prediction. We introduce a data set of users who self-report their race/ethnicity through a survey, in contrast to previous approaches that use distantly supervised data or perceived labels. We develop predictive models from text which accurately predict the membership of a user to the four largest racial and ethnic groups with up to . 884 AUC and make these available to the research community.
Promoting Resilience in ESRD : Evaluation of a Group Cognitive-Behavioral Intervention for Patients on Hemodialysis

Dialysis significantly changes the lives it saves while creating unique challenges for patients with End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). Symptom management, limitations on lifestyle, ongoing uncertainty of life on dialysis, and increased dependence are prominent life-altering features in the lives of dialysis patients (Polaschek, 2003), potentially positioning them for depression. The occurrence of clinical depression, as defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV-TR) of the American Psychiatric Association (2000), is common among patients on dialysis (Illic, Djordjevic, & Stefanovic, 1996; Kimmel, 2002; Kimmel, Peterson, Weihs, Simmens, et al., 1998; Mazzella, 2004). This study and others demonstrate the prevalence of depression and anxiety in dialysis patients (Beder, Mason, Johnstone, Callahan, & LeSage, 2003; Dobrof, Dolinko, Lichtiger, Uribarri, & Epstein, 2001; Estrada & Hunt, 1998; Lopes, Bragg, Young, Goodkin, Mapes, et al. 2002; Soykan, Arapaslan, & Kumbasar, 2003). Because the effects of depression influence patient motivation for dialysis treatment and adherence to renal regimes, nephrology social workers may need to intervene at different points along the dialysis continuum of care. When treated, depression has been shown to be a modifiable risk factor for cardiovascular disease in ESRD patients (Beder et al., 2003); left untreated, suicide ideation and lethal plan may result (Soykan et al., 2003). Accordingly, social workers are choosing interventions for depression to improve survival in ESRD because they recognize the traumatic life changes imposed on patients with chronic kidney disease. Nephrology social workers in dialysis centers are particularly vigilant for the symptoms of depression in this population.
Geographically weighted regression - Modelling spatial non-stationarity

In regression models where the cases are geographical locations, sometimes regression coefficients do not remain fixed over space. A technique for exploring this phenomenon, geographically weighted regression is introduced. A related Monte Carlo significance test for spatial non-stationarity is also considered. Finally, an example of the method is given, using limiting long-term illness data from the 1991 UK census.
Magi: A System Software Model for Intelligent Devices

Architectural advances have pushed general-purpose processors into devices. These \intelligent" devices provide great opportunity for mitigating the I/O bottleneck. This paper presents principles that an intelligent device programming model should adhere to in order to achieve the full potential of these emerging devices. It also presents a prototype implementation of an intelligent device programming model.