Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Sustainable Export Marketing Strategy Fit and Performance

Despite the growing global importance of sustainability issues, scant research has examined marketing strategy sustainability issues in international settings. Although significant prior work has examined drivers and performance consequences of adaptation/standardization of marketing strategies in international markets, researchers have yet to apply this avenue of inquiry to sustainable marketing strategies. Building on contingency theory and the concept of strategic fit, the authors develop a model of drivers of sustainable export marketing strategy adaptation and explore the circumstances under which such a strategy affects export performance. Using a sample of U.K. exporters, they find that various macro- and microenvironmental factors are responsible for sustainable export marketing strategy adaptation, which shapes the nature of sustainable export marketing strategy fit and its export venture performance outcomes. The results indicate that sustainable export marketing strategy adaptation is the outcome of the differences between home and export markets in terms of economic and technological conditions, competitive intensity, customer characteristics, and stakeholder pressures. Moreover, the performance relevance of sustainable export marketing strategy adaptation requires adequate fit with these macro- and microenvironmental factors.
Dual hesitant fuzzy aggregation operators in multiple attribute decision making

In this paper, we investigate the multiple attribute decision making MADM problem based on the aggregation operators with dual hesitant fuzzy information. Then, motivated by the ideal of arithmetic and geometric operation, we have developed some aggregation operators for aggregating dual hesitant fuzzy information: dual hesitant fuzzy weighted average DHFWA operator, dual hesitant fuzzy weighted geometric DHFWG operator, dual hesitant fuzzy ordered weighted average DHFOWA operator, dual hesitant fuzzy ordered weighted geometric DHFOWG operator, dual hesitant fuzzy hybrid average DHFHA operator and dual hesitant fuzzy hybrid geometric DHFHG operator. The prominent characteristic of these proposed operators are studied. Then, we have utilized these operators to develop some approaches to solve the dual hesitant fuzzy multiple attribute decision making problems. Finally, a practical example for potential evaluation of emerging technology commercialization with dual hesitant fuzzy information is given to verify the developed approach and to demonstrate its practicality and effectiveness.
Design of Low Phase-Noise Oscillator Based on a Hairpin-Shaped Resonator Using Composite Right/Left-Handed Transmission Line

In this letter, a low phase-noise microwave oscillator based on a hairpin-shaped resonator (HSR) using a composite right/left-handed transmission line (CRLH TL) is proposed. The proposed HSR consists of the conventional transmission line (CTL) and the CRLH TL. In order to obtain the high- Q factor, an electric field is concentrated on the CRLH TL, and then the CRLH TL provides a low loss due to a slow wave effect. The proposed HSR has a very compact size of 0.105 λg ×0.19 λg. An oscillator based on the HSR was designed, fabricated and measured. At the oscillation frequency of 4.95 GHz, the measured phase noise is -120.5 dBc/Hz at 100 kHz offset with 4.93 dBm output power.
Correlation of serum leptin levels with anthropometric and metabolic parameters and biochemical liver function in Chinese patients with chronic hepatitis C virus infection.

AIM To determine serum leptin levels and investigate their correlations with anthropometric and metabolic parameters and biochemical liver function in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and their potential clinical implications. METHODS Forty-two chronic HCV-infected patients without anti-viral treatment were enrolled in this study, 30 patients had chronic hepatitis C, 10 had cirrhosis, and 2 had hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Thirty age- and sex-matched healthy individuals served as controls. Serum leptin levels were determined by ELISA. The biochemical liver function and serum lipids were determined at the same time. The height and body weight of patients and controls were measured, and body mass index (BMI) and body fat were calculated simultaneously. The correlations of serum leptin levels with anthropometric and metabolic parameters and biochemical liver function were assessed statistically. RESULTS The mean of serum leptin levels in patients with chronic hepatitis C, HCV-associated cirrhosis, HCV-associated HCC and control groups was (6.13+/-3.94), (5.25+/-4.21), (4.17+/-0.28), and (3.59+/-3.44) ng/mL, respectively. The serum leptin level in patients with chronic hepatitis C was significantly higher than that in controls. The serum leptin levels between cirrhotic patients and controls and between male and female cirrhotic patients had no significant difference. Serum leptin levels were positively-correlated with body fat, BMI, and apolipoprotein B (Apo B) in patients with chronic HCV infection. The serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels were closely-correlated with BMI in patients with chronic hepatitis C. CONCLUSION HCV infection interferes with fat and lipid metabolism in patients with chronic HCV infection and leptin may play a role in hepatosteatosis.
A tuned cuckoo search algorithm for optimal coordination of Directional Overcurrent Relays

The precise coordination of Directional Overcurrent Relays (DOCRs) is required to identify fault timely, effectively and isolate them from the network to avoid possible outages in a power system. The DOCRs coordination is an optimization problem including highly nonlinear constraints. In this paper, Cuckoo Search Algorithm (CSA) is implemented to solve coordination problem of DOCRs on two different case studies. The parameters of CSA are effectively tuned to obtain global best solution for the DOCRs coordination problem. The obtained results using the proposed method are compared with Genetic Algorithm (GA) and hybrid GA-Nonlinear programming (GA-NLP) methods. The result shows that the effective modification of CSA parameters can obtain feasible and superior solution for this complex problem.
Influenza B/Victoria Antigen Induces Strong Recall of B/Yamagata But Lower B/Victoria Response in Children Primed With Two Doses of B/Yamagata

Objectives: Trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine (TIV) contains 1 of 2 influenza B/lineages (B/Yamagata or B/Victoria) annually. We assessed prime-boost responses in young children following a change in the B/lineage included in TIV. Methods: Participants were primed during a clinical trial as infants or toddlers with two 0.25 or two 0.5 mL doses of 2008–2009 TIV containing B/Florida/4/06(Yamagata) antigen. In subsequent years, sequential subsets received annual age-appropriate doses of 2009–2010 and 2010–2011 TIV containing the changed influenza B/lineage antigen (B/Brisbane/60/08(Victoria)). Serologic response was assessed pre- and postimmunization by hemagglutination inhibition (HI; with/without ether treatment of influenza B antigen) and microneutralization. The primary immunogenicity outcome was the seroprotection rate (SPR) measured by HI without ether treatment (SPR:HI titers ≥40). Results: Fifty-six children were included in 2009–2010 and 36 in 2010–2011 analyses. Before the 2009–2010 TIV dose, antibody to all 2008–2009 TIV components had fallen to low levels: SPR <10% for B/Florida/4/06(Yamagata) and B/Brisbane/60/08(Victoria) antigens. A single 2009–2010 TIV dose boosted antibody to the shared 2008–2009/2009–2010 influenza A antigens and to the priming 2008–2009 B/Florida/4/06(Yamagata) antigen with SPRs >85%. In contrast, antibody to the B/Brisbane/60/08(Victoria) antigen included in the 2009–2010 TIV remained low: SPR <25%. Antibody to the B/Brisbane/60/08(Victoria) antigen was not improved from a further dose in the 2010–2011 TIV: SPR 31% versus SPR 69% to B/Yamagata. A similar pattern of B/Yamagata dominance was observed when HI testing was conducted with antigen prepared by ether treatment. Conclusions: Repeated annual TIV doses containing B/Victoria-lineage antigen strongly recalled antibodies to the B/Yamagata antigen of first exposure, but elicited lower B/Victoria responses.
Ontology-based semantic web services clustering

Web service discovery is an important operation in Web service architecture, this paper aims to cluster the Web services before Web service discovery based on OWL-S language. In this paper, Web service ontology is defined. We use Web service function and progress to calculate similarity. Petri net is used to describe Web service process. The Web service similarity is based on an accurate concept semantic similarity of the domain ontology. A domain ontology hierarchy is defined to describe the concept semantic information. The concept semantic similarity is discussed from several aspects, such as the path between two concepts, the path weight, the density of concepts, and the antisense relationship. Finally, we use the Web service similarity to cluster services, and prove the similarity efficiency.
A new online learning algorithm with application to image segmentation

In this paper we present a new online learning and classification algorithm and suggest its use for image segmentation. Our online learning algorithm follows a variation of Bayesian estimation procedure, which combines prior knowledge with knowledge learned from data. Our classification algorithm strictly follows a statistical classification procedure. The new online learning algorithm is simple to implement, robust to initial parameters and has a linear complexity. The experimental results using computer-generated data show that the proposed online learning algorithm can quickly learn the underlying structure from data. The proposed online learning algorithm is used to develop a novel image segmentation procedure. This image segmentation procedure is based on the region growing and merging approach. First, region growing is carried out using the online learning algorithm. Then, a merging operation is performed to merge the small regions. Two merging methods are proposed. The first method is based on statistical similarity and merges the statistically similar and spatially adjacent regions. The second method uses an information-based approach merging small regions into their neighbouring larger regions. Experiments with several images clearly show the efficacy of the proposed image segmentation method.
Effectiveness of Self-Generated Cues in Younger and Older Adults: The Role of Retention Interval

Younger and older participants generated one or three properties to a set of forty nouns. Immediately after, one week after, or three weeks after this generation phase, the participants received an incidental recall test, in which they were cued with their self-generated properties, and requested to recall the nouns. Although the younger adults recalled more nouns than the older participants in all conditions, both age groups exhibited an extremely high level of immediate recall. In addition, younger and older adults did not differ with respect to the forgetting rate, and both age groups recalled more nouns when three, as compared to one, properties were provided as cues. It is suggested that cue effectiveness is optimized both for younger and older adults when the cues describing the information encoded are compatible and distinctive. Finally, it is emphasized that the individual's idiosyncratic knowledge may serve an important function in attempts at optimizing memory performance of elderly people.
Experimental studies in a new automatic speaker verification system using telephone speech

New techniques for automatic speaker verification are described which are based on cepstral analysis of fixed sentence-long utterances. Utterances are represented by time functions of cepstral coefficients expanded by an orthogonal polynomial. Sample utterance representations are compared with similarly constituted reference patterns to decide whether to accept or reject an identity claim. A dynamic programming technique is used to bring sample utterance representations into time registration with reference patterns. A local distance measurement is summed along the optimal path associated with the time registration to provide an overall distance which is compared with a threshold to effect the decision. Results of an evaluation using prerecorded utterance sets including telephone speech are presented. Verification error rates less 1% are obtained.
Assessment of central pulmonary arteries in patients with obstructive lesions of the right ventricle: comparison of MR imaging and cineangiography.

OBJECTIVE MR imaging and cineangiography were compared in the evaluation of central pulmonary arteries in patients with obstructive lesions of the right ventricular outflow tract. SUBJECTS AND METHODS Prospectively, we obtained multiplanar spin-echo cardiac-gated MR images and cineangiograms in 29 patients who had obstructive lesions of the right ventricular outflow tract (31 examinations). Blinded first observers evaluated the presence, size, confluence, and stenoses of the pulmonary artery and the presence of aortopulmonic collaterals. Blinded second observers evaluated the presence and size of the pulmonary artery. RESULTS Each imaging technique revealed pulmonary arteries that were not shown by the other technique. We measured pulmonary arteries as being smaller on MR images; however, we found good correlation between the two techniques (r value for right pulmonary arteries = .82, r value for left pulmonary arteries = .88). MR imaging revealed five of six stenoses in the left pulmonary artery, but our observers falsely identified five right pulmonary arteries as stenotic from MR images. Interobserver variability and intraobserver variability in estimating size of the pulmonary artery on MR images and cineangiograms were similar and were less than variability when paired estimations in the same patient with both imaging techniques were compared. CONCLUSIONS MR imaging and cineangiography should be viewed as complementary techniques.
Magnetic Properties and Columnar Structure for CoPt Alloy Granular Media With Grain Boundary Oxides of Various Melting Points

Investigation of the effect of the melting point (<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$T_{m})$ </tex-math></inline-formula> of various single oxides on the columnar growth and generation of the nucleation site for CoPt granular media deposited at room temperature were conducted. When oxide with <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$T_{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> from 1857 °C to 2410 °C is added to the granular media, thickness of the heteroepitaxial growth of the magnetic grains on the Ru underlayer (columnar structure) decreases from 13 to 5.5 nm. The employment of oxide with <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$T_{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> of the range from 450 °C to 2410 °C to the granular media will lead to the reduction of grain size from 5.6 to 3.0 nm, due to the suppression of the lateral grain growth by the high <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$T_{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> oxide.
Ozone Exposure Initiates a Sequential Signaling Cascade in Airways Involving Interleukin-1Beta Release, Nerve Growth Factor Secretion, and Substance P Upregulation

Previous studies demonstrated that interleukin-1β (IL-1β) and nerve growth factor (NGF) increase synthesis of substance P (SP) in airway neurons both after ozone (O3) exposure and by direct application. It was postulated that NGF mediates O3-induced IL-1β effects on SP. The current study specifically focused on the influence of O3 on IL-1β, NGF, and SP levels in mice bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and whether these mediators may be linked in an inflammatory-neuronal cascade in vivo. The findings showed that in vivo O3 exposure induced an increase of all three proteins in mouse BALF and that O3-induced elevations in both NGF and SP are mediated by the inflammatory cytokine IL-1β. Further, inhibition of NGF reduced O3 induced increases of SP in both the lung BALF and lung tissue, demonstrating NGF serves as a mediator of IL-1β effects on SP. These data indicate that IL-1β is an early mediator of O3-induced rise in NGF and subsequent SP release in mice in vivo.
Coping with the 10th anniversary of 9/11: Muslim Americans' sadness, fear, and anger

The events of 9/11 marked an increase in prejudice, discrimination, and other forms of unfair treatment toward Muslim Americans. We present a study that examined the emotions of Muslim Americans in the days preceding the ten-year 9/11 anniversary. We measured the antecedents (concerns) and consequences (coping) of sadness, fear, and anger. The 9/11 anniversary precipitated intense concerns with loss and discrimination, and intense feelings of sadness, fear, and anger. We measured three coping responses: rumination, avoidance of public places, and religious coping. Participants engaged in all three coping responses, with seeking solace in one's religion being the most frequent response. Moreover, emotions mediated the relationship between concerns and coping responses. Sadness accounted for the association between concern with loss and rumination. Fear explained the association between concern with discrimination and avoidance. Anger accounted for the association between concern with discrimination and religious coping.
Adult Onset Systemic Carnitine Deficiency: Favorable Response to L-Carnitine Supplementation

Abstract: We report the case of a patient who at age 39 first developed an episode of muscle weakness and transient ketoacidosis with biopsy proven fatty infiltration of the liver. Over the next several years, myopathy ensued; biopsy revealed extensive deposition of lipid globules in type 1 muscle fibres. Further investigations established the diagnosis of systemic carnitine deficiency (SCD) with skeletal muscle, hepatic, and cardiac involvement. The patient has benefited from L-carnitine supplementation. Our case represents an unusually late onset of SCD and highlights the necessity, when appropriate, of a high index of suspicion of this rare but treatable disorder.
Human Papillomavirus Type 16 E6* Induces Oxidative Stress and DNA Damage

ABSTRACT High-risk types of human papillomavirus (HPV) are the causative agents of virtually all cases of cervical cancer and a significant proportion of other anogenital cancers, as well as both oral and pharyngeal cancers. The high-risk types encode two viral oncogenes, E6 and E7, which work together to initiate cell transformation. Multiple steps involving the activities and interactions of both viral and cellular proteins are involved in the progression from HPV infection to cell transformation to cancer. The E6 oncoprotein is expressed as several isoforms: a full-length variant referred to as E6 and a few shorter isoforms collectively referred to as E6*. In this study, we found that expression of E6* increased the level of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in both HPV-positive and HPV-negative cells. This increased oxidative stress led to higher levels of DNA damage, as assessed by the comet assay, quantification of 8-oxoguanine, and poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase 1. The observed increase in ROS may be due to a decrease in cellular antioxidant activity, as we found that E6* expression also led to decreased expression of superoxide dismutase isoform 2 and glutathione peroxidase. These studies indicate that E6* may play an important role in virus-induced mutagenesis by increasing oxidative stress and DNA damage. IMPORTANCE Our findings demonstrate for the first time that an HPV gene product, E6*, can increase ROS levels in host cells. This ability may play a significant role both in the viral life cycle and in cancer development, because an increase in oxidative DNA damage may both facilitate HPV genome amplification and increase the probability of HPV16 DNA integration. Integration, in turn, is thought to be an important step in HPV-mediated carcinogenesis.
Audition assessment using the NIH Toolbox

The NIH Toolbox project has assembled measurement tools to assess a wide range of human perception and ability across the lifespan. As part of this initiative, a small but comprehensive battery of auditory tests has been assembled. The main tool of this battery, pure-tone thresholds, measures the ability of people to hear at specific frequencies. Pure-tone thresholds have long been considered the “gold standard” of auditory testing, and are normally obtained in a clinical setting by highly trained audiologists. For the purposes of the Toolbox project, an automated procedure (NIH Toolbox Threshold Hearing Test) was developed that allows nonspecialists to administer the test reliably. Three supplemental auditory tests are also included in the Toolbox auditory test battery: assessment of middle-ear function (tympanometry), speech perception in noise (the NIH Toolbox Words-in-Noise Test), and self-assessment of hearing impairment (the NIH Toolbox Hearing Handicap Inventory Ages 18–64 and the NIH Toolbox Hearing Handicap Inventory Ages 64+). Tympanometry can help differentiate conductive from sensorineural pathology. The NIH Toolbox Words-in-Noise Test measures a listener's ability to perceive words in noisy situations. This ability is not necessarily predicted by a person's pure-tone thresholds; some people with normal hearing have difficulty extracting meaning from speech sounds heard in a noisy context. The NIH Toolbox Hearing Handicap Inventory focuses on how a person's perceived hearing status affects daily life. The test was constructed to include emotional and social/situational subscales, with specific questions about how hearing impairment may affect one's emotional state or limit participation in specific activities. The 4 auditory tests included in the Toolbox auditory test battery cover a range of auditory abilities and provide a snapshot of a participant's auditory capacity.
Effects of gamma-rays on the populations of the steady-state ecological microcosm.

PURPOSE To investigate the dose-response of an aquatic microcosm exposed to gamma-rays and to test the suitability of microcosms for elucidation of the mechanisms that account for such ecological effects. MATERIALS AND METHODS The microcosm used in this study consisted of algae Euglena gracilis Z as a producer, protozoa Tetrahymena thermophila B as a consumer and bacteria Escherichia coli DH5alpha as a decomposer. After the steady-state microcosm was irradiated with 60Co gamma-rays at various dose levels, the population densities of each species were measured. RESULTS Irradiation at up to 100 Gy did not affect the population of the microcosm except for a temporary decrease of E. coli just after irradiation. At 500 or 1000Gy, E. coli died out just after irradiation. Only Eu. gracilis and T. thermophila could survive. Their populations, however, decreased compared with that of each control, except for a temporary increase of T. thermophila after 1000 Gy irradiation. These population changes were attributable to the extinction of E. coli in addition to the direct effects of radiation. Irradiation at 5000 Gy extinguished all species in the microcosm. CONCLUSIONS The response of the microcosm to radiation was dose-dependent over a range of high doses. The microcosm was also shown to be suitable for examining not only direct effects but also secondary effects.