Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Environmental Regulation and Financial Performance in China: An Integrated View of the Porter Hypothesis and Institutional Theory

The link between environmental regulations and financial performance has long been studied, but whether command and control environmental regulation or voluntary instruments induce better results is an unsettled question. By drawing on the Porter Hypothesis, this paper examines whether both approaches to environmental protection boost forms of environmental protection regulations that have positive impacts on financial performance. By integrating institutional theory, this study also examines whether ownership structures moderate the relationship between environmental regulation and financial performance. The results from data on 183 firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges confirmed that both command and control environmental regulation and voluntary instruments positively affect financial performance. This paper also found that ownership structure strengthens the relationship between command and control environmental regulation and financial performance. The findings enrich the Porter Hypothesis and contribute to environmental research by revealing that properly designed environmental regulations have positive impacts on financial performance. By drawing on institutional theory, this study further contributes to business and management studies by confirming that the specific moderator, China’s state-owned enterprises, is a crucial contributor in achieving robust financial results.
Identification and expression analysis of Tubulin gene family in upland cotton

Background Cotton fibers are single-celled extensions of the seed epidermis, a model tissue for studying cytoskeleton. Tubulin genes play a critical role in synthesizing the microtubules (MT) as a core element of the cytoskeleton. However, there is a lack of studies concerning the systematic characterization of the tubulin gene family in cotton. Therefore, the identification and portrayal of G. hirsutum tubulin genes can provide key targets for molecular manipulation in cotton breeding. Result In this study, we investigated all tubulin genes from different plant species and identified 98 tubulin genes in G. hirsutum . Phylogenetic analysis showed that tubulin family genes were classified into three subfamilies. The protein motifs and gene structure of α-, β- tubulin genes are more conserved compared with γ- tubulin genes. Most tubulin genes are located at the proximate ends of the chromosomes. Spatiotemporal expression pattern by transcriptome and qRT-PCR analysis revealed that 12 α- tubulin and 7 β- tubulin genes are specifically expressed during different fiber development stages. However, Gh.A03G027200 , Gh.D03G169300, and Gh.A11G258900 had differential expression patterns at distinct stages of fiber development in varieties J02508 and ZRI015. Conclusion In this study, the evolutionary analysis showed that the tubulin genes were divided into three clades. The genetic structures and molecular functions were highly conserved in different plants. Three candidate genes, Gh.A03G027200 , Gh.D03G169300, and Gh.A11G258900 may play a key role during fiber development complementing fiber length and strength.
xia2: an expert system for macromolecular crystallography data reduction

An expert system for macromolecular crystallography data reduction is presented, which builds on existing software to automate the complete data reduction process from images to merged structure factor amplitudes. This can automatically identify multi-wedge, multi-pass and multiwavelength data sets and includes explicit procedures to test for crystallographic special cases. With the push towards high-thoughput crystallography at synchrotron beamlines and automation of structure solution, the ability to reduce data with no user input fills an important gap in the pipeline.
Oligomerization and Adjuvant Activity of Peptides Derived from the VirB4-like ATPase of Clostridioides difficile

In a previous study, we demonstrated that the Clostridioides difficile VirB4-like ATPase forms oligomers in vitro. In the current investigation, to study the observed phenomenon in more detail, we prepared a library of VirB4-derived peptides (delVirB4s) fused to a carrier maltose-binding protein (MBP). Using gel chromatography and polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, we found a set of overlapping fragments that contribute most significantly to protein aggregation, which were represented as water-soluble oligomers with molecular masses ranging from ~300 kD to several megadaltons. Membrane filtration experiments, sucrose gradient ultracentrifugation, and dynamic light scattering measurements indicated the size of the soluble complex to be 15–100 nm. It was sufficiently stable to withstand treatment with 1 M urea; however, it dissociated in a 6 M urea solution. As shown by the changes in GFP fluorescence and the circular dichroism spectra, the attachment of the delVirB4 peptide significantly altered the structure of the partner MBP. The immunization of mice with the hybrid consisting of the selected VirB4-derived peptide and MBP, GST, or GFP resulted in increased production of specific antibodies compared to the peptide-free carrier proteins, suggesting significant adjuvant activity of the VirB4 fragment. This feature could be useful for the development of new vaccines, especially in the case of “weak” antigens that are unable to elicit a strong immune response by themselves.
Turing-Hopf bifurcation analysis in a diffusive Gierer-Meinhardt model

The reaction-diffusion Gierer-Meinhardt system in one dimensional bounded domain is considered in the present paper. The Hopf bifurcation is investigated, which is found to be degenerate. With the aid of Maple, the normal form associated with the degenerate Hopf bifurcation is obtained to determinate the existence of Bautin bifurcation. We get the universal unfolding for the Bautin bifurcation so that we can identify the stability of periodic solutions. Then, the existence of the codimension-two Turing-Hopf bifurcation is further investigated. To research the spatiotemporal dynamics of the model near the Turing-Hopf bifurcation point, the method of the multiple time scale analysis is adopted to derive the amplitude equations. It is noted that the Gierer-Meinhardt model may show the spatial, temporal or the spatiotemporal patterns, such as the nonconstant steady state, spatially homogeneous periodic solutions and the spatially inhomogeneous periodic solutions. Finally, some numerical simulations are presented to demonstrate the applicability of the theoretical results.
MEASURED SOUND VELOCITIES OF H2O AND CH3OH

We present sound velocity results from impulsively stimulated light scattering (ISLS) experiments conducted in diamond anvil cells on pure supercritical fluids. We have made measurements on fluid H2O (water), and CH3OH (methanol). Sound speeds measured through ISLS have allowed us to refine existing potential models used in the exponential-6 (EXP-6) detonation product library [L, E. Fried and W. M. Howard, J. Chem. Phys., 109(17), 7338-7348 (1998). ]. The refined models allow us to more accurately assess the chemical composition at the Chapman-Jouget (C-J) state of common energetic materials. We predict that water is present in appreciable quantities at the C-J state of energetic materials HMX, RDX, and nitro methane.
MOONS, the next ESO VLT’s multi-object spectrograph: the field corrector and the rotating front end

MOONS will be the next Multi-Object Optical and Near-infrared Spectrograph for the Very Large Telescope, able to simultaneously observe 1000 targets, feeding a set of optical fibres which can be placed at user-specified locations on the Nasmyth focal plane using individual robotic positioners. The sub-fields thus selected are then driven by the fibres into two identical cryogenic spectrographs mounted on the Nasmyth platform of one of the ESO VLT 8 m telescopes. The instrument will provide both medium and high-resolution spectral coverage across the wavelength range of 0.65 μm to 1.8 μm. In this paper we will describe the two components that interface with the telescope: the MOONS Field Corrector (FC) and the Rotating Front End (RFE) Assemblies. The FC optics will correct the off-axis aberrations of the telescope, as well as determining the shape of the focal surface and the pupil location. The RFE assembly consists of a rotating part, which will be mounted on the VLT Nasmyth Rotator, and be connected to the two static Spectrographs via fibre assemblies, and all the sub-systems that give support to the fibre positioning, metrology and calibration units.
Design and Modeling of a Parent Big STAR Robot Platform That Carries a Child RSTAR

In this paper we present a wheeled robot platform for child-parent robot collaboration. The new robot, named Big STAR (BSTAR), is fitted with a tail that can act as a ramp to carry and deploy a child RSTAR that can crawl between small cracks and underneath obstacles. Both robots possess sprawling capabilities inspired from insects, enabling them to transform their external geometry and dynamics to overcome a variety of obstacles. The BSTAR can travel at speeds of up to 1.4 m/s, carry payloads of more than five kilograms and travel over rough terrains. The collaboration between the two robots substantially increases their navigability and their capability to overcome obstacles. It increases their working distance and scouting area since the larger robot can act as a charging point for the smaller one. We first describe the design of the newly developed parent BSTAR robot and provide a kinematic and dynamic analysis that determines the force requirements of the robots when collaborating, followed by an evaluation of their mechanical and electrical requirements. We show that under multiple challenging scenarios the robot pair can successfully overcome a variety of obstacles.
Development of EXo-Zodiacal Infrared Telescope (EXZIT) for observation of visible and near-infrared extragalactic background light

Extragalactic background light (EBL) consists of entire radiation emitted throughout the cosmic history and is one crucial observable quantity to study astrophysics in the early universe, such as first stellar objects or primordial black holes. In the visible and near-infrared, zodiacal light (ZL), sunlight scattered by interplanetary dust, is the brightest foreground for observer in the near-earth orbit and its uncertainty limits accuracy of the EBL measurement. To overcome this problem, observations from heliocentric distance beyond 5 au, where the ZL is negligible, is promising. To achieve the EBL observation in deep space, we have been developing EXo- Zodiacal Infrared Telescope (EXZIT) onboard a solar sail spacecraft to Jovian Trojans planned in Japan around 2030. According to our mission study, a three-mirror reflective telescope optics design with a 90mm × 50mm effective aperture and 16 deg × 8 deg field of view (FoV) followed by a focal plane array HAWAII-2RG with a linear variable filter makes available to detect the EBL at high significance in 0.4–1.6 μm with specific wavelength resolution of ∼ 20 . In the present study, we develop test optics to demonstrate optical performance in room temperature for the future observation. By adopting only mirrors of aspherical surface, we design the optics whose aberration is minimized to show point spread function (PSF) of approximately 3 pix × 3 pix on the focal plane. The mirrors are fabricated by machining aluminum alloy A6061 with a honeycomb processing on the back surface to reduce the mirror mass. After integrating and aligning the mirrors with support jigs, we measure the PSF on the focal plane by a visible camera by inserting collimated beam of different angle of incidence, covering the whole FoV. We evaluate the PSF size by analyzing encircled energy in comparison with that expected from the ray-trace simulation of the optics. Throughout the FoV of the optics, the measured PSF size is comparable to the simulation. The present study demonstrates the precision machining of the aspherical mirrors and the optical performance of the designed optics. As a next step, we plan to develop thermal structure of EXZIT to demonstrate the optical performance in low temperature.
Association between Drinking Habits and Oral Symptoms: A Cross-Sectional Study Based on Japanese National Statistical Data

Aim The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between drinking habits and subjective symptoms of the oral cavity based on Japanese national statistical data. Methods The subjects were 8,698 respondents of the Japan National Livelihood Survey 2013, in their 30s to 60s. The association between drinking habits and each survey item was investigated by contingency table analysis and binary logistic regression analysis. Results The proportion of people with drinking habits was 55.3% among men and 20.3% among women, and the proportion of men with drinking habits above the age of 40 years was high. Contingency table analysis indicated an association between drinking habits and the following items in men: subjective symptoms (p < 0.01), chewing difficulty (p < 0.05), subjective impression of health (p < 0.01), smoking habit (p < 0.01), and income level (p < 0.01). Analysis indicated an association between drinking habits and hospital visits (p < 0.01) and smoking habits (p < 0.01) in women. When comparing the response rates of symptoms and presence of disease stratified according to drinking habits, inflammatory and sensory system symptoms were common in those who had drinking habits, as were diabetes and gout. Binomial logistic regression analysis with drinking habit as the objective variable indicated statistically significant odds ratios for smoking habit (2.13; 95% CI: 1.65–2.75), difficulty in chewing (1.63; 95% CI: 1.01–2.62), and working hours (1.50; 95% CI: 1.10–2.04). This study identified a correlation between drinking habits and masticatory disorders, suggesting that the effects of drinking as a risk factor for dental diseases should be examined in greater detail in the future.
SMConf: One-Size-Fit-Bunch, Automated Memory Capacity Configuration for In-memory Data Analytic Platform

Spark is the most popular in-memory processing framework for big data analytics. Memory is the crucial resource for workloads to achieve performance acceleration on Spark. The extant memory capacity configuration approach in Spark is to statically configure the memory capacity for workloads based on user’s specifications. However, without the deep knowledge of the workload’s system-level characteristics, users in practice often conservatively overestimate the memory utilizations of their workloads and require resource manager to grant more memory share than that they actually need, which leads to the severe waste of memory resources. To address the above issue, SMConf, an automated memory capacity configuration solution for in-memory computing workloads in Spark is proposed. SMConf is designed based on the observation that, though there is not one-size-fit-all proper configuration, the one-size-fit-bunch configuration can be found for in-memory computing workloads. SMConf classifies typical Spark workloads into categories based on metrics across layers of Spark system stack. For each workload category, an individual memory requirement model is learned from the workload’s input data size and the strong-correlated configuration parameters. For an ad-hoc workload, SMConf matches its memory requirement signature to one of the workload categories with small-sized input data and determines its proper memory capacity configuration with the corresponding memory requirement model. Experimental results demonstrate that, compared to the conservative default configuration, SMConf can reduce the memory resource provision to Spark workloads by up to 69% with the slight performance degradation, and reduce the average turnaround time of Spark workloads by up to 55% in the multi-tenant environments.
Mortality and glycemic control among patients with diabetes mellitus and uterine or ovarian cancer

Aim: To evaluate associations between survival and glycemic control in age-matched patients with endometrial or ovarian cancer, with/without diabetes mellitus (DM). Patients & methods: Patients with newly diagnosed ovarian or endometrial cancer with and without DM were compared. Results: The study included 84 patients with ovarian cancer (28, DM); 96 with endometrial cancer (48 with, 48 without DM). DM patients did not have worse overall or progression-free survival than non-DM patients. Glycemic control was not associated with either cancer. Conclusion: There was no association between DM and survival for patients with uterine or ovarian cancer. In addition, there was no association between uterine and ovarian cancer and glycemic control. Additional studies to confirm these observations in larger populations are required.
Comparative study between ovarian response prediction index versus anti-Müllerian hormone, antral follicular count as predictors of ovarian response in women undergoing IVF/ICSI cycles

Aim to compare individual predictors as AMH, AFC versus the ovarian response prediction index in determining the ovarian response to controlled ovarian stimulation Methods A prospective cohort study conducted on 84 infertile couples candidate for Intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) for the first time using either long agonist or antagonist protocol according to clinical evaluation. Participants were classified according to the number of MII oocytes into poor response with 3 or less oocytes and normal responders with 4 or more oocytesResults Women with poor response were statistically older than those with normal ovarian response (33.1±5.9 vs. 29.8±5.4 respectively). The number of cumulus (12.1±5.2 vs. 2.5±1.5) , MII oocytes (7.8±3.6 vs. 2±0.8), grade A embryos (3±0.8 vs. 1.4±0.9) and total number of embryos (3.8±2.2 vs. 1.7±0.7) were significantly higher in normal responders . ORPI has the highest accuracy n predicting ovarian response (88%) when compared to AMH (83%)and AFC (86%) . Conclusion AMH, AFC and ORPI are good predictive of the ovarian response and help in choosing the protocol and gonadotropin dose of induction and prediction of OHSS.
Efficient Routing Protection Algorithm in Large-scale Networks

: With an increasing urgent demand for fast recovery routing mechanisms in large-scale networks, minimizing network disruption caused by network failure has become critical. However, a large number of relevant studies have shown that network failures occur on the Internet inevitably and frequently. The current routing protocols deployed on the Internet adopt the reconvergence mechanism to cope with network failures. During the reconvergence process, the packets may be lost because of inconsistent routing information, which reduces the network ’ s availability greatly and affects the Internet service provider ’ s (ISP ’ s) service quality and reputation seriously. Therefore, improving network availability has become an urgent problem. As such, the Internet Engineering Task Force suggests the use of downstream path criterion (DC) to address all single-link failure scenarios. However, existing methods for implementing DC schemes are time consuming, require a large amount of router CPU resources, and may deteriorate router capability. Thus, the computation overhead introduced by existing DC schemes is signi ﬁ cant, especially in large-scale networks. Therefore, this study proposes an ef ﬁ cient intra-domain routing protection algorithm (ERPA) in large-scale networks. Theoretical analysis indicates that the time complexity of ERPA is less than that of constructing a shortest path tree. Experimental results show that ERPA can reduce the computation overhead signi ﬁ cantly compared with the existing algorithms while offering the same network availability as DC.
Enabling counsellors: the social construction of disability among Maltese counsellors

ABSTRACT Counselling is generally recognised by persons with disability as a valuable service. However, persons with disability tend to be a particular client group which is often avoided by counsellors. In this study I investigated the social construction of disability among six Maltese counsellors. Data were collected using semi-structured interviews and analysed thematically. Findings showed that the social construction of disability among Maltese counsellors is influenced by three main forces, namely by the international and national politics of disability, by the Maltese social and cultural context, and by the counsellors’ professional training and cultures of practice. Findings of this research indicate the need for further training among Maltese counsellors about persons with disability and disability issues.
First Look at a Geomagnetic Storm With Santa Maria Digisonde Data: F Region Responses and Comparisons Over the American Sector

Santa Maria Digisonde data are used for the first time to investigate the F region behavior during a geomagnetic storm. The August 25, 2018 storm is considered complex due to the incidence of two Interplanetary Coronal Mass Ejections and a High‐Speed Solar Wind Stream (HSS). The F 2 layer critical frequency (f o F 2) and its peak height (h m F 2) collected over Santa Maria, near the center of the South American Magnetic Anomaly (SAMA), are compared with data collected from Digisondes installed in the Northern (NH) and Southern (SH) Hemispheres in the American sector. The deviation of f o F 2 (Df o F 2) and h m F 2 (Dh m F 2) are used to quantify the ionospheric storm effects. Different F region responses were observed during the main phase (August 25–26), which is attributed to the traveling ionospheric disturbances and disturbed eastward electric field during nighttime. The F region responses became highly asymmetric between the NH and SH at the early recovery phase (RP, August 26) due to a combination of physical mechanisms. The observed asymmetries are interpreted as caused by modifications in the thermospheric composition and a rapid electrodynamic mechanism. The persistent enhanced thermospheric [O]/[N2] ratio observed from August 27 to 29 combined with the increased solar wind speed induced by the HSS and IMF B z fluctuations seem to be effective in causing the positive ionospheric storm effects and the shift of the Equatorial Ionization Anomaly crest to higher than typical latitudes. Consequently, the most dramatic positive ionospheric storm during the RP occurred over Santa Maria (∼120%).
Discourses in accounts of rape by sex offenders in Limpopo province, South Africa

South Africa is known for having the highest number of sexual violence cases in the world. In response to these reports, the government has declared rape as a priority crime, and various measures have been put in place to address this scourge. Despite these measures, rape statistics have continued to escalate. It is against this background that this study sought to explore accounts of sexual offences, particularly reports of rape, from a sample of sex offenders. Data were drawn from five Correctional Centres in the Limpopo province. Nineteen sex offenders were selected through a purposive sampling approach and interviewed face-to-face. Discourse analysis was used to identify and analyse the patterns of talk that sex offenders drew upon to account for their sex offences. Findings revealed that ‘blame’ was the most dominant discourse cited. The ‘rhetoric of blame’ revolved around uncontained sexual desires, sexual entitlement, absent mothers, provocative dress code by women, and unfair laws that discriminated men when they asserted their sexual power in relationships with women. Multi-sectoral intervention strategies are recommended for deconstructing blame discourses that perpetuate rape offences in South Africa.