Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A long-term demasculinization of X-linked intergenic noncoding RNAs in Drosophila melanogaster

Recent studies have revealed key roles of noncoding RNAs in sex-related pathways, but little is known about the evolutionary forces acting on these noncoding RNAs. Profiling the transcriptome of Drosophila melanogaster with whole-genome tiling arrays found that 15% of male-biased transcribed fragments are intergenic noncoding RNAs (incRNAs), suggesting a potentially important role for incRNAs in sex-related biological processes. Statistical analysis revealed a paucity of male-biased incRNAs and coding genes on the X chromosome, suggesting that similar evolutionary forces could be affecting the genomic organization of both coding and noncoding genes. Expression profiling across germline and somatic tissues further suggested that both male meiotic sex chromosome inactivation (MSCI) and sexual antagonism could contribute to the chromosomal distribution of male-biased incRNAs. Comparative sequence analysis showed that the evolutionary age of male-biased incRNAs is a significant predictor of their chromosomal locations. In addition to identifying abundant sex-biased incRNAs in the fly genome, our work unveils a global picture of the complex interplay between noncoding RNAs and sexual chromosome evolution.
Alpha‐wave frequency characteristics in health and insomnia during sleep

Appearances of alpha waves in the sleep electrencephalogram indicate physiological, brief states of awakening that lie in between wakefulness and sleep. These microstates may also cause the loss in sleep quality experienced by individuals suffering from insomnia. To distinguish such pathological awakenings from physiological ones, differences in alpha‐wave characteristics between transient awakening and wakefulness observed before the onset of sleep were studied. In polysomnographic datasets of sleep‐healthy participants (n = 18) and patients with insomnia (n = 10), alpha waves were extracted from the relaxed, wake state before sleep onset, wake after sleep‐onset periods and arousals of sleep. In these, alpha frequency and variability were determined as the median and standard deviation of inverse peak‐to‐peak intervals. Before sleep onset, patients with insomnia showed a decreased alpha variability compared with healthy participants (P < 0.05). After sleep onset, both groups showed patterns of decreased alpha frequency that was lower for wake after sleep‐onset periods of shorter duration. For patients with insomnia, alpha variability increased for short wake after sleep‐onset periods. Major differences between the two groups were encountered during arousal. In particular, the alpha frequency in patients with insomnia rebounded to wake levels, while the frequency in healthy participants remained at the reduced level of short wake after sleep‐onset periods. Reductions in alpha frequency during wake after sleep‐onset periods may be related to the microstate between sleep and wakefulness that was described for such brief awakenings. Reduced alpha variability before sleep may indicate a dysfunction of the alpha generation mechanism in insomnia. Alpha characteristics may also prove valuable in the study of other sleep and attention disorders.
The Link Between Small Business Governance and Performance: The Case of the Ghanaian SME Sector

ABSTRACT The present study set out to examine corporate governance practices of SMEs in Ghana and whether there is any linkage between these governance practices and financial performance. We employed two levels of interaction to achieve our objectives: The first is an interview for a general understanding of governance issues in the SME sector and the subsequent design of a questionnaire for an exploration of the linkages between governance issues and firm financial performance by employing a linear model. The study reveals that governance structures in SMEs are jointly influenced by credit providers and business ethical considerations. The regression results show that board size, size of audit committees, corporate ethics and the proportion of outsiders on the audit committees have negative impact on financial performance while independence of the board and the presence of audit committees enhance firms' financial performance. The findings have some policy implications in that it shows that exporting SMEs are relatively profitable. It is recommended that in an attempt to promote exports, the legal and regulatory environment should be conducive for these firms.
What your Facebook Profile Picture Reveals about your Personality

People spend considerable effort managing the impressions they give others. Social psychologists have shown that people manage these impressions differently depending upon their personality. Facebook and other social media provide a new forum for this fundamental process; hence, understanding people's behaviour on social media could provide interesting insights on their personality. In this paper we investigate automatic personality recognition from Facebook profile pictures. We analyze the effectiveness of four families of visual features and we discuss some human interpretable patterns that explain the personality traits of the individuals. For example, extroverts and agreeable individuals tend to have warm colored pictures and to exhibit many faces in their portraits, mirroring their inclination to socialize; while neurotic ones have a prevalence of pictures of indoor places. Then, we propose a classification approach to automatically recognize personality traits from these visual features. Finally, we compare the performance of our classification approach to the one obtained by human raters and we show that computer-based classifications are significantly more accurate than averaged human-based classifications for Extraversion and Neuroticism.
Does the threat of border apprehension deter undocumented U.S. immigration

The study explores whether U.S. Border Patrol enforcement actively discourages undocumented migration at its source. Two models are compared. One includes such familiar determinants of undocumented migration as relative economic conditions between the United States and Mexico the size of the Mexican young-adult population and implementation of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act. An alternative model relates the magnitude of undocumented migration to lagged monthly values of estimated apprehension probabilities on the assumption that migrants form expectations about the apprehension risks they will face on the basis of experiences of other recent undocumented migrants. The study shows not only that both models have some explanatory power but also that the influence of perceived risks of apprehension all but disappears when both sets of predictor variables are combined into a single model. (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA) (EXCERPT)
Degradation of High-Brightness Green LEDs Submitted to Reverse Electrical Stress

This letter describes an extensive analysis of the reverse-bias degradation of green light-emitting diodes. The analysis consists in a wide set of stress tests carried out under different negative-bias levels. The results presented in this letter indicate the following: 1) Leakage current is strongly correlated to the presence of reverse-bias luminescence; 2) reverse current flows through preferential leakage paths and is due to a soft-breakdown mechanism that is possibly correlated to the presence of structural defects; 3) reverse-bias stress can induce an increase in the leakage current, with a corresponding decrease in the breakdown voltage of the samples; and 4) the degradation rate has a linear dependence on the (reverse) stress-current level, suggesting that degradation is induced by hot carriers. On the basis of the evidence collected in this letter, degradation can be ascribed to the generation/propagation of point defects due to the injection of highly accelerated carriers.
The Analysis of Structural Characteristic of Knowledge Work and its Effect on Productivity

Based on the analysis of knowledge work’s structural characteristics, a relationship model between the knowledge work productivity and the corresponding procedure & standard was established. From the empirical research, this paper pointed that, the process of structuring for knowledge work does not necessarily lead to optimal productivity. The productivity shows a downward trend after the first rise with the structuring of knowledge work. At the same time, for the knowledge work positions with specific knowledge content, their productivity curve showed the first increase after lowering trend with the constant improvement of standardization; The higher the knowledge content of the positions have, the lower degree of standardization of its optimal productivity. This paper analyses the optimal productivity for the corresponding procedure and standard, as well as the innovational behavior potentially exists in the knowledge work with non-procedure and non-standard characteristic. This study puts forward a new perspective of scientific management and people-oriented management for the enterprise as well as provides a new theoretical perspective for the knowledge work productivity study.
Quality of Life for Individuals with Traumatic Brain Injury: Comparison with Others Living in the Community

Objectives:To provide a conceptual overview of approaches to quality of life (QOL) measurement and an extensive review of research relating to QOL after TBI; to document subjective QOL of individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI); to explore how subjective QOL differs for people with TBI in comparison to individuals with no disability (ND) and those with spinal cord injury (SCI); and to document the perceptions of unmet important needs and the relationship between such perceptions and subjective QOL Design:Interview-based data focusing on current perceptions of QOL and unmet important needs, obtained from individuals with TBI, SCI, or ND. Covariancc and partial regression analyses were used to explore group differences and to document relationships between variables Setting: Individuals drawn from diverse communities across New York State. Participants:TBI group: 430 individuals who identified themselves as having TBI; SCI group: 101 individuals with spinal cord injury; ND group: 187 people who identified themselves as having no disability. Participants were recruited through recruitment ads in general circulation newspapers and newsletters and through contacting a wide variety of community agencies Main Outcome Measures:Two summary QOL indicators: a Global QOL Measure based on two items tapping the individual's emotion-based view of QOL, and a summary score adapted from Flanagan's Scale of Needs, reflecting the individual's perceptions of total unmet important needs Results:Both summary QOL indicators were correlated with demographic characteristics. Unmet important needs were stronger in the TBI group than in the SCI and ND groups. Most areas of unmet important need were moderately correlated with the summary QOL indicators. Analyses of covariancc showed that severity of injury was a more powerful modulator of post-TBI QOL judgments than the mere fact of TBI. I:or example, those with the most severe injury (ie, loss of consciousness [LOC]<1 month) rated their QOL similar to that in the ND group, whereas individuals who had experienced only a brief LOC (>20 minutes) viewed their QOL as significantly lower than that in the ND and SCI groups and lower than other TBI severity subgroups Conclusions:This exploration of subjective QOL strengthens the argument that after TBI, the insider's reaction to injury varies greatly within the population. Thus, severity of injury strongly affects perceptions of QOL. The use of a multimethod approach for exploring the reactions and perceptions of QOL has proven useful in this study
Inclusion or Insurance? National Insurance and the Future of the Contributory Principle

This paper examines the decline of National Insurance in Britain, as witnessed by its declining share of all social security spending and the steady dilution of the ? contributory principle? on which it was originally based. It argues that this decline is not an accident: under governments of the Left, arguments in favour of inclusion have been predominant, non-contributory benefits expanded and contribution conditions softened; under those of the Right, the emphasis has been on focussing limited resources on the poorest through means-testing. Given where we are now, the strong arguments in principle for social insurance look much weaker. However, there are also reasons why the system has not been swept away, notably the way in which the bulk of the system is concerned with state pension rights which have already accrued. The paper explores current plans for the future development of state pensions, arguing that their combined effect is to restore something like a flat rate state pension, but with significant complexity. This could be developed into a more transparent system guaranteeing a total state pension at a fixed percentage of average earnings for those meeting a participation test, rather than being based on contribution records. This leaves a choice for the remaining sixth of National Insurance benefits: to separate out state pensions and absorb the other insurance benefits within the rest of working age social security, or to maintain the scope of National Insurance, but also based on participation, not past contributions.
Iranian Journal of Basic Medical Sciences, 2015 at a glance

The Iranian Journal of Basic Medical Sciences (IJBMS) is a peer-reviewed, monthly publication by Mashhad University of Medical Sciences (Mashhad, Iran). It is currently indexed in major national and international scientific databases such as Science Citation Index (ISI), PubMed Central, Scopus, EMBASE, BIOSIS Previews (Biological Abstracts), and Chemical Abstracts (CA). An analysis of manuscripts submitted to the journal during 2013–2015 is presented in Figure 1. Examination of this figure shows an increase of 45% in submitted articles during 2015 compared to 2014. In 2015, around 30% of the published articles were from 14 countries including China, Turkey, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Portugal, Thailand, Tunisia, Jordan, Taiwan, Colombia, Iraq, and Egypt. Figure 1 Analysis of manuscripts submitted to Iranian Journal of Basic Medical Sciences in the last three years The main challenge of the journal in 2015 was manuscript withdrawal by the authors. In some cases, this happened even after the final acceptance of the articles. During the online submission of the articles, we require the authors to declare that they have not submitted their articles simultaneously to other journals. But, occasionally, the authors submit their articles to different journals at the same time without informing the editorial office. This has raised a big ethical issue for the editors of IJBMS. Another ethical issue is duplicate publication of articles. In some cases, the submitted articles have been published elsewhere prior to submission to IJBMS. Fortunately, most of these duplications are recognized during the initial check by the editorial office or during the review process. As mentioned, compliance with publication ethics by the authors remains a major issue that needs to be resolved either by training of the researchers or even by establishing a blacklist of the offending authors. We published between 13 and 16 papers in each issue (an average of 15) in 2015. Table 1 shows the article types published by IJBMS since 2011. IJBMS plans to publish at least one review article per issue in 2016. In 2015, there was an improvement in journal’s impact factor from 0.604 to 1.228. A brief comparison of the recent impact factors and international share of articles is presented in Table 2. Table 1 Types of articles published by Iranian Journal of Basic Medical Sciences 2011 Table 2 Impact factor, rejection rate and international share of the Iranian Journal of Basic Medical Sciences’ articles in three years IJBMS is committed to publication of high-quality research articles from the researchers of different fields including anatomical sciences, biochemistry, genetics, immunology, microbiology, pathology, pharmacology, pharmaceutical sciences, and physiology. We also encourage researchers to submit review articles with reference to their own publications. These manuscripts will also have to be peer reviewed before publication.
DEVELOPMENTAL BASIS OF TOOTHLESSNESS IN TURTLES: INSIGHT INTO CONVERGENT EVOLUTION OF VERTEBRATE MORPHOLOGY

The tooth is a major component of the vertebrate feeding apparatus and plays a crucial role in species survival, thus subjecting tooth developmental programs to strong selective constraints. However, irrespective of their functional importance, teeth have been lost in multiple lineages of tetrapod vertebrates independently. To understand both the generality and the diversity of developmental mechanisms that cause tooth agenesis in tetrapods, we investigated expression patterns of a series of tooth developmental genes in the lower jaw of toothless turtles and compared them to that of toothed crocodiles and the chicken as a representative of toothless modern birds. In turtle embryos, we found impairment of Shh signaling in the oral epithelium and early‐stage arrest of odontoblast development caused by termination of Msx2 expression in the dental mesenchyme. Our data indicate that such changes underlie tooth agenesis in turtles and suggest that the mechanism that leads to early‐stage odontogenic arrest differs between birds and turtles. Our results demonstrate that the cellular and molecular mechanisms that regulate early‐stage arrest of tooth development are diverse in tetrapod lineages, and odontogenic developmental programs may respond to changes in upstream molecules similarly thereby evolving convergently with feeding morphology.
Environment development linkages: modelling a wetland system for ecological and economic value

Modeling the factors determining ecological and economic value gives rise to conceptual and methodological problems. Economic valuation typically focuses on use value in the short run, whether within or outside the market. Ecologists, however, are more concerned with ecological values, which provide an underlying long-run notion of value interpreted in a more general sense. This paper investigates the nature of the link between these two aspects of value in the context of a wetland in Northern India, which is also designated as a Ramsar site and a national park. A dynamic simulation model in a ‘STELLA’ environment is set up to understand the linkages between underlying ecological relationships and economic value emerging from them. The simulations point towards a critical dependence of economic value (direct and indirect income derived from the park) on ecological health indices. A non-linearity is to be seen in the impact of an increase in ecological health indices on tourist traffic. This responsive or elasticity with respect to ecological health is more at higher values of the indices, indicating thereby that once efforts at conservation increase the attractiveness of the park above a certain level, the impact may be cumulative and returns in terms of income may rise more than proportionately.
Early-Phase Alcoholic Liver Disease: An Update on Animal Models, Pathology, and Pathogenesis

Alcoholic liver disease (ALD) remains to be one of the most common etiology of liver disease and is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. The pathologic stages of ALD comprises of steatosis, steatohepatitis, and fibrosis/cirrhosis. Steatosis and steatohepatitis represents the early phase of ALD and are precursor stages for fibrosis/cirrhosis. Numerous research efforts have been directed at recognizing cofactors interacting with alcohol in the pathogenesis of steatosis and steatohepatitis. This review will elucidate the constellation of complex pathogenesis, available animal models, and microscopic pathologic findings mostly in the early-phase of ALD. The role of endotoxin, reactive oxygen species, alcohol metabolism, and cytokines are discussed. Understanding the mechanisms of early-phase ALD should provide insight into the development of therapeutic strategies and thereby decrease the morbidity and mortality associated with ALD.
Structural and thermodynamic characterization of the interaction of the SH3 domain from Fyn with the proline-rich binding site on the p85 subunit of PI3-kinase.

The interaction of the Fyn SH3 domain with the p85 subunit of PI3-kinase is investigated using structural detail and thermodynamic data. The solution structure complex of the SH3 domain with a proline-rich peptide mimic of the binding site on the p85 subunit is described. This indicates that the peptide binds as a poly(L-proline) type II helix. Circular dichroism spectroscopic studies reveal that in the unbound state the peptide exhibits no structure. Thermodynamic data for the binding of this peptide to the SH3 domain suggest that the weak binding (approximately 31 microM) of this interaction is, in part, due to the entropically unfavorable effect of helix formation (delta S0 = -78 J.mol-1.K-1). Binding of the SH3 domain to the intact p85 subunit (minus its own SH3 domain) is tighter, and the entropic and enthalpic contributions are very different from those given by the peptide interaction (delta S0 = +252 J.mol-1.K-1; delta H0 = +44 kJ.mol-1). From these dramatically different thermodynamic measurements we are able to conclude that the interaction of the proline-rich peptide does not effectively mimic the interaction of the intact p85 subunit with the SH3 domain and suggest that other interactions could be important.
"Institutions", What Is In a Word? A Critique of the New Institutional Economics

This thesis is a critique of the New Institutional Economics (NIE) in economic history. The focus is on explanations to the origin and development of capitalist institutions within NIE. After a methodological discussion in chapter 1 the author investigates into how well NIE succeeds in explaining capitalist institutions. In chapters 2 and 3, a conceptual critique of the theoretical bases of evolution and competition, behavioural assumptions, property rights, and transaction costs in NIE is conducted. In chapters 4 and 5, some of the most influential theories of the firm within NIE are accounted for, analysed and criticised. In chapters 6 and 7, an account and criticism of the institutional economic history of Douglass North, the main example of economic history from the NIE perspective, is conducted. In the concluding chapter 8, the author points out what necessitates the institution concept in NIE, thereby finding a key to how one could avoid some of the problems associated with it. In the appendix the contribution of Karl Polanyi is analysed. The main results of the analysis are: (i) In the conceptualisation of the market, the logic of the economic system and the development of individuals, history does not matter to the validity of the model in NIE. NIE transfers the capitalist economic logic into every possible economic system. The economy remains an ahistorical, non-realist, purely theoretical construct. Hence, conceptually the capitalist economy cannot be given a history. (ii) In the explanations to economic development in NIE, production, markets, prices, etc. increasingly lose their explanatory power. Rather than seeing economic development as a causal factor to societal evolution, economic development becomes a consequence of non-economic institutions. To analytically achieve economic evolution and development in such a model it is necessary to first separate an institutional sphere from the economy, and then reunite it with the economic sphere again, thereby allowing for a historical development to the economy. Were the economy defined in a social manner – as a set of social relations and structures – at the outset, such a course would not be necessary. This suggests that the particular venture of NIE of introducing institutions to the model is a sign of the theoretical inadequacy and asocial, ahistorical conceptualisation of the economic theory at the outset, rather than anything else. (Less)