Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Vascular Remodeling and Angiogenesis in Ectopic Ovarian Transplants: A Crucial Role of Pericytes and Vascular Smooth Muscle Cells in Maintenance of Ovarian Grafts1

Abstract Cancer patients, treated by either chemo- or radiotherapy, frequently suffer from ovarian failure and infertility. One of the new emerging techniques to preserve reproductive potential of such patients is cryopreservation of ovarian fragments prior to treatment and their retransplantation after healing. A major obstacle in survival of the ovarian implants is vascular failure, which leads to tissue necrosis. In order to investigate the role of angiogenesis in implant preservation, we used a xenograft model in which rat ovaries were transplanted into immunodeficient mice. Graft reception and maintenance were monitored by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and histology. Two transplantation sites were explored, i.e., subcutaneous and intramuscular. Comparison between these two transplantation sites revealed the importance of vascular smooth muscle cells and pericytes in sustaining vascular and tissue integrity. Histological examination of the grafts, at different time points and sizes, revealed that loss of perivascular cells preceded damage to endothelial cells and was closely correlated with loss of follicular and oocyte integrity. Intramuscular implantation provided better maintenance of implant perivascular cells relative to subcutaneous implantation. Accordingly, follicular integrity was superior in the intramuscular implants and the number of damaged follicles was significantly lower compared with the subcutaneous transplantation site. These results suggest that improving ovarian implant maintenance should be directed toward preservation of perivascular support.
State–Society Relationships, Social Trust and the Development of Labour Market Policies in Italy and Sweden

The first decade of the twenty-first century may be remembered for the rebirth of consensus on labour market policy. After three decades of bitter political and ideological controversy between a neo-liberal and a traditional social democratic approach, a new model, often labelled flexicurity, has emerged. This model is promoted by numerous political organisations since it promises to put an end to the old trade-off between equality and efficiency. Several countries are embracing the flexicurity model as a blueprint for labour market reform, but others, mostly belonging to the ‘Mediterranean Rim’, are clearly lagging behind. Why is it so difficult for these countries to implement the flexicurity model? This paper argues that the application of a flexicurity strategy in these countries is complicated by the lack of social trust between social partners and the state as well as political economy traditions that highlight the role of labour market regulation as a source of social protection.
A touchstone of dissent: Euroscepticism in contemporary Western European party systems

With the recent acceleration of the integration process of the European Union there has been a rise in political parties expressing either scepticism or outright criticism of the nature of the integration process. Using a four-fold differentiation between single issue, protest, established parties and factions within parties, the first part of the article presents an overview of Euroscepticism within EU member states and Norway. This reveals the diversity of sources of Euroscepticism both in ideology and in the types of parties that are Eurosceptical but with a preponderance of protest parties taking Eurosceptical positions. The second part of the article is an attempt to map Euroscepticism in West European party systems through a consideration of ideology and party position in the party system. The conclusions are that Euroscepticism is mainly limited to parties on the periphery of their party system and is often there used as an issue that differentiates those parties from the more established parties which are only likely to express Euroscepticism through factions. Party based Euroscepticism is therefore both largely dependent on domestic contextual factors and a useful issue to map emergent domestic political constellations.
Effect of cytochalasin D on Toxoplasma gondii cell entry

Cytochalasin D did not prevent attachment but did prevent entry of Toxoplasma gondii into peritoneal macrophages and bladder tumor 4934 cells. Inhibition of entry of T. gondii into peritoneal macrophages by cytochalasin D was dose related and comparable to inhibition of phagocytosis. Prevention of entry of T. gondii into bladder tumor 4934 cells by cytochalasin D followed a dose response identical to that observed with peritoneal macrophages. After removal of the medium containing cytochalasin D, its effect was completely reversible, and the kinetics of the loss of inhibition followed a similar time course for both phagocytic and "nonphagocytic" cell types. The studies support the concept that the host cells actively participate in the process by which T. gondii gains entry into cells.
The Financial Crisis of 2008 - 2009 and the Arab States Economies

This paper will examine the impact of the global financial crisis on the Arab counties during the period(2008-2009). The paper has shown that increasing inter-connected world economic and financial matters meansmore effects on countries with high exposure to the rest of the world.The study finds that the various economies of the Arab countries were impacted by the crisis. The impacts variedbetween the Arab countries according to the nature of their economies and the degree of openness and theassociation with the global economy. Some governments in the region have moved to reassure depositors that theirmoney is safe in addition to the overall economic reforms carried out. The study classified Arab countries intothree groups depending on their economies structure.The effects of the crisis spread to the Arab economies through several local and external factors. The paper foundout that the direct impact of the crisis was less dramatic in the financial sectors of some Arab countries due to thelow level of interlink ages with the international system. One important lesson from the crisis is to preventfinancial contagion from crippling their domestic banking and non-banking financial sectors in addition to theneeded work to restore macroeconomic stability and sustainable growth and to work together to face the currentand future economic and financial crisis.
Preparing for European Diplomacy?

The literature on European foreign policy has paid scant attention to one critical aspect - European diplomacy. This article considers the nature of European diplomacy, the ways in which it manifests itself and, most importantly, the preparation of EU officials as well as national diplomats for European diplomacy. It is argued that more attention needs to be paid to training so that they may engage more effectively in European diplomacy. In order to facilitate this, support is lent to the idea of establishing a College of European Diplomacy. Effective European foreign policy needs a professional supporting diplomatic service.
Competence development in start-ups and SMEs: what is the role of higher education institutions as cooperation partners?

Competence development is a key competitive factor for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In the last few years, cooperation schemes between SMEs and higher education institutions (HEIs) have increased in quantity and intensity. The online survey among 4,050 Austrian companies examines the role of HEIs as cooperation partners in corporate competence development for SMEs and shows that cooperation with HEIs depends on the firm size. SMEs see the target group for HEIs mainly on management level, young executives, and specialists. Companies cooperate with HEIs mainly to keep specialist knowledge updated, to improve their access to students as potential future staff members and to increase their reputation. The initiative for cooperation projects is taken by company staff rather than by HEIs. SMEs’ main selection criteria are a high degree of practical experience and didactic qualifications of the staff as well as a flexible programme provision.
The Regressive Recovery: Distribution, Inequality and State Power in Britain's Post-Crisis Political Economy

This article interrogates the underlying mechanisms at the heart of Britain's post-crisis political economy. We argue that the contemporary economic recovery has been characterised by a dynamic of ‘regressive redistribution’: a socially regressive dynamic of state-led economic restructuring that has worked through two axes at the centre of the recovery. The first axis, a monetary policy framework centred upon Quantitative Easing, has driven asset-price inflation to the benefit of the wealthiest asset holders. The second axis centres upon the politics of regressive labour market restructuring which has provoked widespread wage deflation. In combination, these two axes have been central to defining the contours of the Britain's post-crisis political economy paradigm: characterised by rising asset wealth for the few, and falling living standards alongside increasing economic insecurity for wage earners. The opportunity to change path from the trends of deepening inequality that defined the pre-crisis era has not been taken. Instead, the prevailing policy paradigm of the post-crisis period – discursively unified and sustained by David Cameron's government – has intensified the regressively redistributive dynamics at the core of the neo-liberal project. Ultimately, this is likely to further entrench structural weaknesses in Britain's economy in the years ahead.
Establishment of embryonic neuroepithelial cell lines exhibiting an epiplastic expression pattern of region specific markers

Neuroepithelial b2T cells were derived from the hindbrain and the spinal cord of mouse transgenic embryos, which expressed SV40 T antigen under the control of a Hoxb2 enhancer. Strikingly, b2T cell lines of either origin exhibit a very similar gene expression pattern, including markers of the hindbrain and the spinal cord, such as Hox genes, but not of more anterior cephalic regions. In addition, the broad expression pattern of b2T cells, probably linked to culture conditions, appeared to be appropriately modulated when the cells were reimplanted at different longitudinal levels into chick host embryos, suggesting that these cells are responsive to exogenous signalling mechanisms. Further support for these allegations was obtained by culturing b2T cells in defined medium and by assessing the expression of Krox20, an odd‐numbered rhombomere marker, which appeared to be modulated by a complex interplay between FGF, retinoic acid (RA), and noggin. With respect to these as yet unique properties, b2T cells constitute an original alternative tool to in vivo models for the analysis of molecular pathways involved in the patterning of the neural tube. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Marketing Margins and Agricultural Technology in Mozambique

Improvements in agricultural productivity and reductions in marketing costs in Mozambique are analysed using a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model. The model incorporates detailed marketing margins and separates household demand for marketed and home-produced goods. Individual simulations of improved agricultural technology and lower marketing margins yield welfare gains across the economy. In addition, a combined scenario reveals significant synergy effects, as gains exceed the sum of gains from the individual scenarios. Relative welfare improvements are higher for poor rural households, while factor returns increase in roughly equal proportions, an attractive feature when assessing the political feasibility of policy initiatives.
Open economy and processor oligopoly power effects of beef advertising in Canada

A North American beef industry model incorporating a hypothesized relationship between beef advertising and processor oligopoly power was estimated and used to evaluate various advertising options faced by Canadian cattle producers. Generic and branded advertising significantly increased Canadian and U.S. beef demand. As well, historic generic beef advertising expenditure in Canada returned a net profit to Canadian producers. However, additional Canadian producer investment in generic beef advertising in Canada lowered producer profits, while investment in Canadian or U.S. brand advertis- ing or U.S. generic advertising generated positive net returns. Nous avons construit un modele mathematique pour le secteur nord-americain de la viande de boeuf, incorporant un rapport hypothetique entre la publicite du produit et le pouvoir oligopolistique au niveau du secteur de la preparation-transformation. Nous avons utilise le modele pour evaluer diverses options de publicite auxquelles font face les producteurs de bavins canadiens. La publicite generique et la publicite de marque ont procure un accroissement de la demande de viande bovine tant au Canada qu'aux Etats-Unis. De plus, les depenses engagees au cours des annees au chapitre de la publicite generique de la viande bovine au Canada ont valu aux producteurs canadiens un benefice net. En revanche tout accroissement des investissements consacres a la publicite generique par ces producteurs s‘est solde par une baisse des profits a la production, alors qu‘aux Etats-Unis il se revelait en general rentable. Par aileurs, l'intensification de la publicite de marque s'est montree rentable dans les deux pays.
Investors' Perceptions of Audit Quality: Effects of Regulatory Change

SUMMARY: In an experiment using M.B.A. students as proxies for individual investors, I examine the effects of two important regulatory changes on investors' perceptions of audit quality. The first change examined is from a bottom-up coverage-based approach for auditing internal controls to a more top-down risk-based approach. The second change is litigation reform further limiting auditor liability exposure following an alleged audit failure. I find that investors perceive a reduction in audit quality following each of the two regulatory changes. These observed effects are mediated by a perceived focus on efficiency for the new auditing standard and by a perceived change in the auditor's economic incentives following the proposed litigation reform. I also find that investors believe the perceived reduction in audit quality will lead management to invest fewer resources in internal controls. Data Availability: Contact the author.
Micro Evidence on the Adjustment of Sticky-Price Goods: It's How Often, Not How Much

We use a unique panel data set to analyse price setting in restaurants in Switzerland 1977-93, for items known to have sticky prices. The macroeconomic environment during this time period allows us to examine how firms adjust prices at low (0%) and fairly high (7%) inflation. Our results indicate that firms strongly react to inflation in the timing of their price adjustment: hazard of price changes is increasing with time and becomes steeper at higher inflation rates. However, we find little evidence that the amount by which they change the price responds to the inflation rate.
High-resolution full-color LCD driven by OTFTs using novel passivation film

A full-color twisted-nematic type liquid crystal display (TN-LCD) of 1.4-in diagonal size driven by organic thin-film transistors (TFTs) has been fabricated. This TN-LCD has 80/spl times/80/spl times/3 (RGB) pixel arrays addressed by pentacene TFTs with a channel width of 50 /spl mu/m. The contact resistance between the pentacene film and the source/drain electrodes has been reduced by selecting the exposure condition of the photoresist in patterning the electrodes. In addition, a solution-processed passivation film with a novel structure, consisting of photosensitive polyvinylalcohol and organosiloxane glass resin, has been developed to protect the TFTs against degradation induced by integration with TN-LCD devices. Consequently, it has been confirmed that the organic-TFT-driven TN-LCD fabricated in this paper is capable of displaying full-color moving images at a resolution of 80 pixels per inch.
Between the traditional and the contemporary: careers of women managers from a developing Middle Eastern country perspective

Informed by Institutional Theory, this study adopts an exploratory, qualitative, in-depth interviews-based approach as it explores the self-reported career paths of 32 women managers in Lebanon. The results indicate that in contrast with the majority of Western-based literature, the traditional-organizational career path in comparison to contemporary career patterns is still relevant, and continues to exist for Lebanese women managers as they progress in their managerial careers. At the same time, the findings suggest that women selectively adopt some aspects of contemporary, flexible careers to navigate their career paths amidst the macro-national economic and sociocultural factors and institutional challenges. The overall results and the implications for various stakeholders are further discussed in light of the related literature. This study suggests that scholars interested in women's careers in under-researched developing nations need to further integrate the agentic process – and the role played by women's individual agency in constructing their careers as they respond to institutional mandates – into their career models in more details. Similarly, multinational companies currently operating or interested in expanding their operations to the developing Arab Middle East region should incorporate these factors into their management and human resource practices.
The Adoption of Reduced Tillage: The Role of Human Capital and Other Variables

This paper presents a model of adoption behavior and explains differences econometrically in farmers' decisions to adopt reduced-tillage practices and in the efficiency of farmers' adoption decisions. The empirical results, obtained from microdata, show that the probability of adopting reduced tillage in corn enterprises differs widely across farms and depends on soil characteristics, cropping systems, and size of farming operation. The results also show that farmers' schooling enhances the efficiency of the adoption decision.
Reordering by Parsing

We present a new discriminative reordering model for statistical machine translation. The model employs a standard data-driven dependency parser to predict reorderings based on syntactic information. This is made possible through the introduction of a reordering structure, which is a word alignment structure where the target word order is transposed onto the source sentence as a path. The approach is integrated in a phrase-based system. Experiments show a large increase in long distance reorderings. Both automatic and human evaluations show substantial increases in translation quality on an English to German task.
Imagining the Future: Perspectives Among Youth and Caregivers in the Trans Youth Family Study

Future perspectives of transgender youth and their caregivers may be shaped by knowledge of discrimination and adverse mental health among transgender adults. Qualitative data from the Trans Youth Family Study were analyzed to examine how transgender and gender nonconforming (TGN) youth and their caregivers imagine the youth’s future. A community-based sample of 16 families (16 TGN youth, ages 7–18 years, and 29 caregivers) was recruited from 2 regions in the United States. Participants completed in-person qualitative interviews and surveys. Interview transcripts were analyzed using grounded theory methodology for coding procedures. Analyses yielded 104 higher order themes across 45 interviews, with 8 prominent themes: comparing experiences with others, gender affirming hormones, gender affirming surgery, gender norms, questioning whether the youth is really transgender, expectations for romantic relationships, uncertainty about the future, and worries about physical and emotional safety. A conceptual model of future perspectives in TGN youth and caregivers is presented and clinical implications are discussed.
Civic Engagement, Ethnic Heterogeneity, and Social Capital in Urban Areas

Scholars and policy makers argue that civic engagement is intrinsically linked to social capital. In particular, they assume that political participation and associational activity can minimize negative externalities for social capital associated with ethnic heterogeneity, such as mistrust and lack of respect. This research note tests this assumption by analyzing the relationship between civic engagement, ethnic heterogeneity, and perceptions of mutual respect and social cohesion among citizens in urban local government areas across England. The statistical results suggest that associational life is positively associated with social capital and that political participation enhances perceptions of mutual respect in ethnically diverse areas. The evidence provides support for arguments that civic engagement can moderate negative externalities for social capital associated with ethnic heterogeneity.
A Review of the Stern Review

The Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change was published on 30 October 2006. In this article Richard Tol and Gary Yohe, while agreeing with some of the Reviewâ€™s conclusions, disagree with some other points raised in the Review and they address six issues in particular: First, the Stern Review does not present new estimates of either the impacts of climate change or the costs of greenhouse gas emission reduction. Rather, the Stern Review reviews existing material. It is therefore surprising that the Stern Review produced numbers that are so far outside the range of the previous published literature. Second, the high valuation of climate change impacts reported in the Review can be explained by a very low discount rate, risk that is double-counted, and vulnerability that is assumed to be constant over very long periods of time (two or more centuries). The latter two sources of exaggeration are products of substandard analysis. The use of a very low discount rate is debatable. Third, the low estimates for the cost of climate change policy can be explained by the Reviewâ€™s truncating time horizon over which they are calculated, omitting the economic repercussions of dearer energy, and ignoring the capital invested in the energy sector. The first assumption is simply wrong, especially since the very low discount rates puts enormous weight on the other side of the calculus on impacts that might be felt after the year 2050. The latter two are misleading. Fourth, the cost and benefit estimates reported in the Stern Review do not match its policy conclusions. If the impacts of climate change are as dramatic as the Stern Review suggests, and if the costs of emission reduction are as small as reported, then a concentration target that is far more stringent than the one recommended in the Review should have been proposed. The Review, in fact, does not conduct a proper optimization exercise. Fifth, a strong case for emission reduction even in the near term can nonetheless be made without relying on suspect valuations and inappropriate summing across the multiple sources of climate risk. A corollary of this observation is that doing nothing in the short term is not advisable even on economic grounds. Sixth, alarmism supported by dubious economics born of the Stern Review may further polarize the climate policy debate. It will certainly allow opponents of near-term climate policy to focus the worldâ€™s attention on the estimation errors and away from its more important messages: that climate risks are approaching more quickly than previously anticipated, that some sort of policy response will be required to diminish the likelihoods of the most serious of those risks, and that beginning now can be justified by economic arguments anchored on more reliable analysis. These six points are discussed in separate sections before the authors reach their conclusion.