Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Aspire

Abstract We gave US$1000 cash prizes to winners of a business plan competition in Africa. Participants were ranked by committees of established entrepreneurs. Each committee selected one winner among 12 candidates. Six months after the competition, we compare winners with the two runners-up in each committee: winners are about 33 percentage points more likely to be self-employed and, on average, have two more permanent employees than close runners-up. Our findings imply that access to start-up capital constitutes a sizeable barrier to entry into entrepreneurship.
The Fungibility of Health Aid Reconsidered

Abstract This article draws further attention to the importance of taking into account off-budget aid when estimating the degree of foreign aid fungibility. It does so by re-evaluating the results of a recent, influential paper which concluded that health aid is fully fungible in the long run. Allowing for the presence of off-budget aid indicates that the degree of fungibility of health aid is much more uncertain than at first blush appears. Under plausible assumptions about the role of off-budget aid, the conclusion of full fungibility is overturned and at most only a limited degree of fungibility is found.
Inoculating method for Alternaria alternata in seedling stage of tobacco.

Under greenhouse and potted condition,inoculating the strong pathogenic isolate GY-31 of Alternaria alternata on tobacco seedlings of the tested varieties,Hongda and K326 at 7-leaf stage was conducted by applying mycelium block inoculation,spore spraying inoculation,spore suspension tampon inoculation,spore hanging drop inoculation,mycelium hanging drop inoculation,respectively,to select and develop a suitable method for inoculation of the brown spot pathogen in seedling stage of tobacco.The results show that both spore suspension tampon method and mycelium block inoculation can cause brown spot on the two varieties of tobacco,suggesting that the two methods are suitable to the inoculation of A.alternata in seedling phase.However,spore spraying inoculation and spore hanging drop method had a low success rate,and mycelium hanging drop inoculation wilted the leaves of Hongda and didn't cause any lesion on K326,with a worse repeatability,suggesting that the these methods are not suitable to the inoculation of the pathogenic fungus.Further,the influence of conidial suspension concentration and moisture on the inoculation results of tobacco brown spot by spore suspension tampon method was investigated by two-factor randomized block design,and the results indicate that the incidence of diseased leaves caused by inoculation increased with the conidial suspension concentration.The incidence of diseased leaves was less than 35% when the conidial suspension concentration was below 104 CFU·mL-1,while the incidence of diseased leaves was between 70% and 92% when the conidial suspension concentration ranged from 105 to 107 CFU·mL-1.The results also suggest that moisturizing may improve the incidence of diseased leaves caused by inoculation.
Protective effect of CDDO-imidazolide against intestinal ischemia/reperfusion injury in mice

Intestinal ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) is life-threatening and challenging in clinical practice. CDDO-imidazolide (CDDO-Im) is therapeutic in alleviating I/R injury. Nevertheless, there is a lack of investigation on the effects of CDDO-Im on intestinal I/R. Mice were randomly divided into four groups: (a) the sham group, (b) the CDDO-Im group, (c) the I/R group, and (d) the I/R + CDDO-Im group. Intestinal I/R was performed by clamping arteria mesenteric anterior for 45 min, followed by 24 h reperfusion. In addition, Kaplan–Meier method and the log-rank test were used to compare the survival rates among groups by observing for 24 h. Intestinal I/R in model group demonstrated severe injury of the intestinal mucosa, lung, kidney, and liver. The intestinal mucosal damage and intestinal barrier dysfunction were obviously attenuated in CDDO-Im-treated group compared with the model group. Also, preconditioning with CDDO-Im reduced pulmonary, hepatic and renal damage, and decreased oxidative stress (malondialdehyde (MDA), superoxide dismutase (SOD), and NO) and pro-inflammatory responses (tumor necrosis factor (TNF-α), interleukin 1β (IL-1β), and interleukin 6 (IL-6)) following I/R injury. Furthermore, we also observed that these protective properties of CDDO-Im were accomplished by the activation of nuclear factor E2-related factor 2 (Nrf2) signaling pathway and upregulation of its downstream antioxidant genes, including heme oxygenase (HO-1), NQO-1, and glutamate–cysteine ligase regulatory subunit (GCLM). Our data suggest that CDDO-Im exerts a beneficial effect on intestinal I/R-associated mucosal barrier dysfunction and distant organ injuries.
Adjunctive use of Angio-Seal closure device following transcatheter aortic valve implantation via percutaneous transfemoral approach with incomplete hemostasis after modified Perclose ProGlide preclosure technique

Abstract Adequate and reliable hemostasis following transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) is crucial. Closure devices have improved the amount of time required to achieve hemostasis following these procedures. We retrospectively looked at TAVI procedures that achieved adequate hemostasis after use of the Angio-Seal as an adjunctive measure following use of the Perclose ProGlide system. Sixteen cases (age range, 56–91 years) were identified between January 2016 and February 2018. Half had undergone transfemoral diagnostic angiography in the same vessel used for the TAVI delivery system within the prior 1 to 63 days. Five were receiving oral anticoagulants; six, aspirin; and two, dual-antiplatelet therapy. All had undergone computed tomography angiography for sizing of iliofemoral arteries, aorta, and the aortic valve prior to TAVI. No patient experienced any significant access site-related complications or ischemic leg symptoms, and there were no reports of late vascular or access site complications. Our case series suggests that adjunctive Angio-Seal systems may be a reliable alternative for incomplete hemostasis following Perclose ProGlide systems and can serve as a “bailout” procedure for incomplete postprocedural hemostasis.
The Nationalization of Special Elections for the U.S. House of Representatives

Abstract Scholars and political commentators have argued that special elections to the U.S. House of Representatives are national contests, serving as a referendum on the president's party and a predictor of future election outcomes (Sigelman 1981; Smith and Burnnell 2010). But the empirical record is mixed, with one leading study demonstrating that candidate and district characteristics alone explain special election outcomes (Gaddie, Bullock, and Buchanan 1999). We investigate this disagreement by comparing special election and open-seat results using new data for the period 1995–2014. We find that while candidate characteristics affect special election outcomes, presidential approval is predictive of special election outcomes as well. Furthermore, we find that the effect of presidential approval on special election outcomes has increased in magnitude from 1995 to 2014, with the 2002 midterm representing an important juncture in the nationalization of special elections. We conclude that special elections have developed into national contests since the 1970s and situate this development within broader electoral trends.
Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein Filaments Can Tolerate the Incorporation of Assembly-compromised GFAP- , but with Consequences for Filament Organization and B-Crystallin Association

The glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) gene is alternatively spliced to give GFAP, the most abundant isoform, and seven other differentially expressed transcripts including GFAP. GFAPhas an altered C-terminal domain that renders it incapable of self-assembly in vitro. When titrated with GFAP, assembly was restored providing GFAPlevels were kept low ( 10%). In a range of immortalized and transformed astrocyte derived cell lines and human spinal cord, we show that GFAPis naturally part of the endogenous intermediate filaments, although levels were low ( 10%). This suggests that GFAP filaments can naturally accommodate a small proportion of assembly-compromised partners. Indeed, two other assembly-compromised GFAP constructs, namely enhanced green fluorescent protein (eGFP)-tagged GFAP and the Alexander disease–causing GFAP mutant, R416W GFAP both showed similar in vitro assembly characteristics to GFAPand could also be incorporated into endogenous filament networks in transfected cells, providing expression levels were kept low. Another common feature was the increased association of B-crystallin with the intermediate filament fraction of transfected cells. These studies suggest that the major physiological role of the assembly-compromised GFAPsplice variant is as a modulator of the GFAP filament surface, effecting changes in both protein– and filament–filament associations as well as Jnk phosphorylation.
Comparative Study of Factors-Motives in Beginning Practicing Judo and Karate

The present study was undertaken due to the scarcity of research in Greece concerning t he situation on martial arts. In times that sport gains an important place in our society, the inve stigation of the factors that lead people to become engaged in less popular activities like Judo and Karate gathe rs a special interest. For the completion of this purpose a questionnaire of 28 items (typical – relat ed sons) was translated into Greek to be implemented. The query was administered to 56 Judo and 47 Karate individuals of both sexes, with variant experience in these arts. Data analysis revea led no difference between the two sports and sexes as regards to the main motives encountered for enteri ng the sports. The latter serve as interesting for participants as well as a means of physi cal and personal cultivation. Differences were detected upon second rate reasons. Basically in Karate (p<.001), but also in all sample (p<.05) males are influenced more by demonstration means. The same applies for recrea tion being the reason (p<.01). Family urge was found higher among females (p<.05) in general, owing main ly to Karate subjects. Finally, the prevailing motivation underlining Judo / Karate involvement is of a rather internal source.
Aitchison, L. (2019). Tensor Monte Carlo: particle methods for the GPU era. Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems , 32 .

Multi-sample, importance-weighted variational autoencoders (IWAE) give tighter bounds and more accurate uncertainty estimates than variational autoencoders (VAEs) trained with a standard single-sample objective. However, IWAEs scale poorly: as the latent dimensionality grows, they require exponentially many samples to retain the beneﬁts of importance weighting. While sequential Monte-Carlo (SMC) can address this problem, it is prohibitively slow because the resampling step imposes sequential structure which cannot be parallelised, and moreover, resampling is non-differentiable which is problematic when learning approximate posteriors. To address these issues, we developed tensor Monte-Carlo (TMC) which gives exponentially many importance samples by separately drawing K samples for each of the n latent variables, then averaging over all K n possible combinations. While the sum over exponentially many terms might seem to be intractable, in many cases it can be computed efﬁciently as a series of tensor inner-products. We show that TMC is superior to IWAE on a generative model with multiple stochastic layers trained on the MNIST handwritten digit database, and we show that TMC can be combined with standard variance reduction techniques.
Land Grabbing and Ethnic Conflict

We study the effect of large-scale land acquisitions on the risk of ethnic tensions for a sample of 133 countries for the 2000-2012 period. Running a series of fractional response models, we find that more land grabbing activity is associated with a higher risk of ethnic tensions, indicating that the negative effects of land deals outweigh their potential benefits. In addition to that, we also show that democratic institutions may moderate the relationship between land deals and ethnic tensions. That is, non-democratic countries face a substantially higher risk of ethnic tensions as the level of large-scale land acquisitions increases; by contrast, strongly democratic countries tend to see lower ethnic tension risk. JEL Classifications: F21, F63, O13, O43, Q15
Risk reference charts for speeding based on telematics information

Reference charts are widely used as a graphical tool for assessing and monitoring children’s growth given gender and age. Here, we propose a similar approach to the assessment of driving risk. Based on telematics data, and using quantile regression models, our methodology estimates the percentiles of the distance driven at speeds above the legal limit depending on drivers’ characteristics and the journeys made. We refer to the resulting graphs as risk reference charts for speeding and illustrate their use for a sample of drivers with Pay-How-You-Drive insurance policies. We find that percentiles of distance driven at excessive speeds depend mainly on total distance driven, the percentage of driving in urban areas and the driver’s gender. However, the impact on the estimated percentile for these covariates is not constant. We conclude that the heterogeneity in the risk of driving long distances above the speed limit can be easily represented using reference charts and that, conversely, individual drivers can be scored by calculating an estimated percentile for their specific case. The dynamics of this risk score can be assessed by recording drivers as they accumulate driving experience and cover more kilometres. Our methodology should be useful for accident prevention and, in the context of Manage-How-You-Drive insurance, reference charts can provide real-time alerts and enhance recommendations for ensuring safety.
Sea-Effect Snowfall Case in the Baltic Sea Region Analysed by Reanalysis, Remote Sensing Data and Convection-Permitting Mesoscale Modelling

A sea-effect snowfall accumulated a national record-breaking snowdrift of 73 cm in Merikarvia, on the west coast of Finland, in less than one day on 8 January 2016. A good understanding of such heavy sea-effect snowfalls in the present climate is essential if we want to assess the probability of their occurrence and intensity in the future. Since very few in situ observations were made of the Merikarvia snowfall event in the sea area where the convection cells developed, we investigated the case with an ERA5 reanalysis, the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), and the numerical weather prediction model HARMONIE, using weather radar information as a reference. We aimed to study the feasibility of the reanalysis and GNSS methods for investigating the basic characteristics of the snowband. In addition, we examined whether the assimilation of observed radar reflectivities could improve the HARMONIE simulations. In addition to snowfall patterns, the vertical structure of the atmosphere during the sea-effect snowfall case was analysed. HARMONIE was able to simulate the intensity of the sea-effect snowfall situation well, but the spatial spread of the snowfall remained too narrow, and the snowband was located slightly too far north compared to the radar observations. Assimilation of radar reflectivities increased the simulated moisture content in the vertical direction and spread the precipitation area horizontally, especially in the north-south direction, but shifted the most intense precipitation even more to the north. The location of the snowfall area was captured by ERA5, but the intensity was estimated to be considerably weaker, and the site of the most intense snowfall was more offshore compared to the radar observations and HARMONIE simulations. The vertical structure of specific humidity was similar and of the same order of magnitude in HARMONIE and ERA5. The GNSS, ERA5 and HARMONIE showed reasonably good agreement on the precipitable water content. The case study demonstrated that the three methods, and combinations of them, can be useful in order to obtain the best possible view of local severe weather events as possible.
Saltwater Transport under the Influence of Sea-Level Rise in Coastal Multilayered Aquifers

ABSTRACT Guo, Q. ; Zhang, Y. ; Zhou, Z. , and Zhao, Y. , 2020. Saltwater transport under the influence of sea-level rise in coastal multilayered aquifers. Journal of Coastal Research, 36(5), 1040–1049. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. The dynamic behavior of groundwater flow and salt transport in coastal multilayered aquifers is affected by sea-level rise (SLR). Two sets of laboratory experiments were completed that took into account SLR (seawater rising from 85 to 105 cm for scenario 1 and inland head decreasing from 100 to 80 cm for scenario 2). Groundwater flow and salt transport in the multilayered aquifers were observed during the experiment. SEAWAT software was used to validate the processes of seawater transport in the coastal multilayered aquifer under the influence of SLR. The hydrogeological parameters were identified by fitting the observed values of groundwater level and salinity in the model. The influences of aquifer heterogeneity, SLR, and boundary condition on solute mixing of saltwater and freshwater were described. Results showed that the transient toe penetration xtoe and area of the seawater wedge increased initially and then tended to stabilize as the seawater level increased in each stage of both scenarios. The spreading rate of the seawater wedge during the process of releasing water in scenario 2 was faster than that of storing water in scenario 1, although the difference between sea level and inland boundary head was the same in the two scenarios. Sensitivity analysis indicated that the estimated parameters were reasonable. Moreover, the variation of the seawater wedge could not be reproduced well when the hydraulic conductivities and saltwater density of the upper and lower layers were increased or decreased. The analysis provided insights into how SLR and inland water head influence seawater intrusion rate and area.
What Did I Do Wrong in My MOBA Game? Mining Patterns Discriminating Deviant Behaviours

The success of electronic sports (eSports), where professional gamers participate in competitive leagues and tournaments, brings new challenges for the video game industry. Other than fun, games must be difficult and challenging for eSports professionals but still easy and enjoyable for amateurs. In this article, we consider Multi-player Online Battle Arena games (MOBA) and particularly, "Defense of the Ancients 2", commonly known simply as DOTA2. In this context, a challenge is to propose data analysis methods and metrics that help players to improve their skills. We design a data mining-based method that discovers strategic patterns from historical behavioral traces: Given a model encoding an expected way of playing (the norm), we are interested in patterns deviating from the norm that may explain a game outcome from which player can learn more efficient ways of playing. The method is formally introduced and shown to be adaptable to different scenarios. Finally, we provide an experimental evaluation over a dataset of 10 000 behavioral game traces.
Helicobacter pylori Pathogenicity-Associated cagA and vacA Genotypes Among Nigerian Dyspeptic Patients

Objective: Although Helicobacter pylori infection is endemic in Nigeria, the specific genotypes that influence treatment responses are scarcely known. We aimed to determine the specific genotypes of H. pylori virulence genes, vacA and cagA in dyspeptic patients. Subjects and methods: Gastric biopsy samples were obtained from 80 dyspeptic patients referred for endoscopy. Genomic DNA was extracted from biopsies using the ReliaPrep DNA kit. H. pylori DNA was detected by a singleplex PCR based on the genus specific 16s rRNA gene. The vacA subtypes for the s1 and s2 regions and the m1 and m2 alleles were detected by allele specific multiplex PCR. The cagA gene was amplified by a singleplex PCR. Results: Of the 80 samples, 30 (37.5%) had abnormal mucosa which were chronic gastritis. The rest (62.5%) had normal mucosa lining. Of the 30 chronic gastritis cases, 22 (73%) had H. pylori infection as detected by 16s rRNA PCR. Only 2 (4%) of the normal mucosa cases had H. pylori infection. For the vacA genotypes, 79% of the H. pylori infections were s1c/m2 genotype, followed by 8% s1b/m2 genotype. Three different genotypes: s1c/m1/m2, s1c/s2/m2 and s1c/m1 occurred at 4% each. The most virulent vacA genotype, s1/m1 was only 8% while the least virulent vacA genotype s2/m2 was 4%. The moderate virulent vacA genotype, s1/m2 was the most prevalent (83%) in the Nigerian patients. The most prevalent subtype was the s1c/m2. Only 7 cases (29%) were cagA positive. Conclusion: The pathogenicity-associated virulence genes present in Nigerian dyspeptic patients were moderate types. The endemicity of the disease may not necessarily lead to high rate of fatal outcomes or treatment failures as reported in other parts of the world.
An Approach for Automatic Formalization of Business Rules

This paper presents an approach that aims to suggest to Construction experts a formal representation of given requirements. When available as formal expressions, requirements are suitable for automatic compliance checking. The goal of conformity checking is to answer the question " which components of a building project are non-compliant to a set of construction rules? ". When we consider both the size and the complexity of corpora of construction requirements, a computer-aided compliance checking process would be beneficial for experts. Such checking process requires a formal representation of building projects and construction rules. Nowadays, there are various tools for the formal designing of building products obeying to the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) standard (e.g. Revit Building of Autodesk, ArchiCAD by Graphisoft, and ACTIVe3d by ARCHIMEN GROUP). On the other hand, to the best of our knowledge, there isn't any tool which allows business experts to convert automatically and in a formal language, construction rules written in natural language. We propose an approach which intends to convert automatically natural language requirements into formal expressions. This approach relies on the IfcOWL ontology and represents formal rules as SPARQL queries using the RAINS language as an interim result. RAINS is a controlled natural language (CNL), whose sentences can be transformed automatically into SPARQL queries, and as a CNL it hides the complexity of formal languages.