Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A framework for improving the cost-effectiveness of DSM program evaluations

The prudence of utility demand-side management (DSM) investments hinges on their performance, yet evaluating performance is complicated because the energy saved by DSM programs can never be observed directly but only inferred. This study frames and begins to answer the following questions: (1) how well do current evaluation methods perform in improving confidence in the measurement of energy savings produced by DSM programs; (2) in view of this performance, how can limited evaluation resources be best allocated to maximize the value of the information they provide? The authors review three major classes of methods for estimating annual energy savings: tracking database (sometimes called engineering estimates), end-use metering, and billing analysis and examine them in light of the uncertainties in current estimates of DSM program measure lifetimes. The authors assess the accuracy and precision of each method and construct trade-off curves to examine the costs of increases in accuracy or precision. Several approaches for improving evaluations for the purpose of assessing program cost effectiveness are demonstrated. The methods can be easily generalized to other evaluation objectives, such as shared savings incentive payments.
The lattice‐based approaches for mining association rules: a review

The traditional methods for mining association rules (ARs) include two phrases: mining frequent itemsets (FIs)/frequent closed itemsets (FCIs)/frequent maximal itemsets (FMIs) and generating ARs from FIs/FCIs/FMIs. Lattice‐based approaches (LBAs) for mining ARs are new approaches including two phrases: frequent itemset lattice (FIL)/frequent closed itemset lattice (FCIL) building and generating ARs from the lattice. Total mining time of LBAs for mining ARs outperforms the traditional methods for mining ARs. Besides, the most important advantage of LBAs for mining ARs is that the algorithms only build the lattice once and mine ARs with many different confidences or many different minimum supports (the thresholds have to be greater than or equal to the threshold used to build lattices) without mining FIs/FCIs again. In this article, we describe a number of existing LBAs for mining ARs on static databases including lattice building and rule generation. In addition, in today's online system, the data often change in several operations such as insert, delete, and update. Hence, a number of LBAs for mining ARs on dynamic databases are mentioned. Finally, complexity analysis of the LBAs for mining ARs is also thoroughly discussed. WIREs Data Mining Knowl Discov 2016, 6:140–151. doi: 10.1002/widm.1181
Infection prevention and control

I prevention and control programs involve everyone; the patient, healthcare workers, and visitors. In order to maintain a health and safe environment, any effective strategy must understand that you are dealing with people with different languages, religions, nationalities and cultural attitudes. Therefore, preventionists should have an effective ability to communicate new skills, and to encourage and motivate people involved. Plus, an ability to address issues and flawed implementation habits that have formed historically within the organization. Based on my local experience in Taif, Saudi Arabia, organizations should believe strongly in their value systems and in their appropriate standards in the clinical environment. These rules should become not just guidelines but organizational law. Zero tolerance of healthcare associated infections can be achievable for MOH hospitals by following the SHEA/IDSA practice guidelines and setting them as applicable standards or laws. For example, we observed 60% reduction of central-line associated bloodstream infection and achieved to NHSN 50 percentile of catheter associated urinary tract infections in 2012. Also, there is increasing evidence, that international or national accreditation programs can play a vital role in healthcare service improvement. Infection control auditing compliance rate results in hospital standards on infection control have increased from 76% to 86% during 2017.
Damage costs of nitrogen fertilizer in Europe and their internalization

Abstract This paper estimates the environmental impacts and damage costs (‘external costs’) of synthetic nitrogen fertilizer and discusses options for reducing these impacts, including their consequences for farmers and for producers of fertilizer. The damage costs of the fertilizer life cycle that could be estimated are large, about 0.3 €/kgN (compared to the current market price of about 0.5 €/kgN); much of that is due to global warming by N2O and CO2 emissions during fertilizer production and N2O emissions from fertilized fields. Policy options for internalizing these costs are discussed, and the consequences of reduced fertilizer input on crop yield are explored. If the damage costs were internalized by a pollution tax or tradable permits that are auctioned by the government, the economic consequences would be heavy, with a large revenue loss for farmers. However, if it is internalized by tradable permits that are given out free, the revenue loss for farmers is small. The loss for fertilizer producers increases linearly with the amount of external cost that is internalized, by contrast to the loss for farmers which increases quadratically but is very small for a damage cost of 0.3 €/kgN. Expressed as a change in the fertilizer-dependent part of the farmers' revenue (crop yield × crop price – fertilizer used× fertilizer price), the decrease is less than 0.5% for most crops; the losses are larger only for crops with low €/ha revenue. Averaged over wheat, barley, potatoes, sugar beet and rapeseed, the loss to farmers is about 0.1% in the UK and 0.4% in Sweden. The revenue loss for fertilizer producers is larger, about 8% in the UK and 14% in Sweden.
Protecting Early Innovators: Should Second-Generation Products Be Patentable?

Incentives to develop basic technologies are greater if the patentholder profits from applications or other second-generation products. Assuming that such products infringe the basic patent and that there is not much delay between the innovations, I argue that (i) patents on second-generation products are not necessary to encourage their development and (ii) the patentholder of the basic technology collects a larger share of the profit if applications or other second generation products are not patentable.
Spontaneous catalytic generation of nitric oxide from S-nitrosothiols at the surface of polymer films doped with lipophilic copperII complex.

A new approach for preparing potentially more blood-compatible nitric oxide (NO)-generating polymeric materials is described. The method involves creating polymeric films that have catalytic sites within (lipophilic copper(II) complex) that are capable of converting endogenous S-nitrosothiols present in blood (S-nitrosoglutathione (GSNO), S-nitrosocysteine (CysNO), etc.) to NO. The catalytic NO generation reaction involves the initial reduction of Cu(II) to Cu(I) within the complex by appropriate reducing agents (e.g., thiolates or ascorbate), followed by the reduction of S-nitrosothiols to NO by the Cu(I) complex at the polymer/solution interface. The NO fluxes observed when PVC or polyurethane films containing the copper(II) complex are placed in solutions containing physiological levels of nitrosothiols (muM levels) reach ca. 8 x 10-10 mol cm-2 min-1, greater than that produced by normal endothelial cells that line all healthy blood vessels. It is thus anticipated that this spontaneous catalytic generation of NO from endogenous nitrosothiols will render such polymeric materials more thromboresistant when in contact with blood in vivo.
Cooperative Binding of the Cytoplasm to Vacuole Targeting Pathway Proteins, Cvt13 and Cvt20, to Phosphatidylinositol 3-Phosphate at the Pre-autophagosomal Structure Is Required for Selective Autophagy*

Autophagy is a catabolic membrane-trafficking mechanism involved in cell maintenance and development. Most components of autophagy also function in the cytoplasm to vacuole targeting (Cvt) pathway, a constitutive biosynthetic pathway required for the transport of aminopeptidase I (Ape1). The protein components of autophagy and the Cvt pathway include a putative complex composed of Apg1 kinase and several interacting proteins that are specific for either the Cvt pathway or autophagy. A second required complex includes a phosphatidylinositol (PtdIns) 3-kinase and associated proteins that are involved in its activation and localization. The majority of proteins required for the Cvt and autophagy pathways localize to a perivacuolar pre-autophagosomal structure. We show that the Cvt13 and Cvt20 proteins are required for transport of precursor Ape1 through the Cvt pathway. Both proteins contain phox homology domains that bind PtdIns(3)P and are necessary for membrane localization to the pre-autophagosomal structure. Functional phox homology domains are required for Cvt pathway function. Cvt13 and Cvt20 interact with each other and with an autophagy-specific protein, Apg17, that interacts with Apg1 kinase. These results provide the first functional connection between the Apg1 and PtdIns 3-kinase complexes. The data suggest a role for PtdIns(3)P in the Cvt pathway and demonstrate that this lipid is required at the pre-autophagosomal structure.
Twenty years of jumps in commodity markets

In this article, we provide statistical evidence around jumps affecting commodity returns. Using nearly 20 years of daily data, we use Laurent, Lecourt, and Palm's (2011) methodology to jump extraction, and discuss various aspects of the estimated jump activity. On average across various commodity markets, we find a high number of days for which returns exhibit the presence of jumps, consistently with the intuition that commodities are affected by large price fluctuations. We emphasize that the post-jump average return depends on the commodity sector considered (e.g. agriculture, energy, or metals). We also show evidence of a jump-to-volatility channel for commodities (similar to the effect usually found for equities). Finally, we diagnose around 40 dates during which commodity indices, stocks, bonds and currencies `co-jump’, revealing a tail dependence between standard and alternative assets.
Social, environmental and sustainability reporting and organisational value creation?

Purpose - The objective of this essay is to examine the extent to which social, environmental and sustainability accounting and reporting (SEA) can or should contribute to shareholder value and, correspondingly, to consider the challenge that SEA can offer to the conventional views of “value” that underpin traditional financial accounting. The essay is then used as a vehicle to introduce some relatively new data about sustainable development that has implications for our consideration of “value”. Design/methodology/approach - Although drawing from a wide range of secondary contextual data, the paper is primarily argumentative and seeks to challenge a number of implicit assumptions within both conventional and more “critical” accounting. Findings - Substantive social and environmental reporting and, especially, high quality reporting on (un)sustainability will demonstrate that modern international financial capitalism and the principle organs which support it are essentially designed to maximise environmental destruction and the erosion of any realistic notion of social justice. This paper seeks to demonstrate this contention and the powerful and fundamental implications that this has for conventional financial reporting and for the superficial and cosmetic adjustments to that reporting through “new models of organisational reporting”. Research limitations/implications - The paper questions whether any research which is not either cognisant of or directed towards sustainability and/or sustainable development makes any real sense in the context of current data about the planet. More especially, the paper asks whether any notion of “value” employed in the accounting (and wider) literature can be anything other than self-delusional and empty if it ignores a crucial wider context. Originality/value - Apart from taking debates about “value” and, especially “shareholder value” into another dimension, the paper is one of the first (at least in accounting as far as I am aware) to formally introduce and confront data about planetary sustainability.
Assessing cost-effectiveness in healthcare: history of the $50,000 per QALY threshold

Cost–effectiveness analyses, particularly in the USA, commonly use a figure of $50,000 per life-year or quality-adjusted life-year gained as a threshold for assessing the cost-effectiveness of an intervention. The history of this practice is ill defined, although it has been linked to the end-stage renal disease kidney dialysis cost-effectiveness literature from the 1980s. The use of $50,000 as a benchmark for assessing the cost-effectiveness of an intervention first emerged in 1992 and became widely used after 1996. The appeal of the $50,000 figure appears to lie in the convenience of a round number rather than in the value of renal dialysis. Rather than arbitrary thresholds, estimates of willingness to pay and the opportunity cost of healthcare resources are needed.
Change in serum prostate-specific antigen as a marker of response to cytotoxic therapy for hormone-refractory prostate cancer.

PURPOSE Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) has been used as a marker of advanced prostate cancer but remains controversial. To evaluate PSA as a predictor of survival, we analyzed data from sequential phase II trials of estramustine and etoposide. METHODS A landmark analysis that used data from 62 men with PSA levels at baseline and 8 weeks was conducted. The best PSA measure (of six evaluated) was incorporated into a multiple regression model with performance status (PS); relative change in PSA level; and pretreatment PSA, alkaline phosphatase, and hemoglobin values. RESULTS A decrease in PSA of 50% or greater at 8 weeks was associated with a significantly increased survival (P=.0005, two-sided log-rank test). Median survival from the landmark was 91 weeks in patients with a 50% or greater decrease at 8 weeks versus 38 weeks in those without this decrease. Modeling showed that PS, pretreatment hemoglobin level, and relative change in PSA level were significant prognostic factors, with a significant interaction between PS and pretreatment hemoglobin level. In the final model, a relative change in PSA level at 8 weeks of less than 50% had an adjusted relative risk of 2.20 (95% confidence interval, 1.21 to 4.00). A decrease in PSA level of 50% or greater at any time during therapy was associated with a response in measurable disease (P=.0369, two-sided Fisher's exact test). CONCLUSION The PSA value after 8 weeks of this cytotoxic regimen does predict survival. A decrease in PSA level is associated with both survival and response in soft tissue lesions and should be incorporated into the response criteria and reporting of trials of cytotoxic agents in prostate cancer.
Traffic Restraint as a Transport Planning Policy 3: The Effects on Different Users

Models used to simulate traffic flow and travel demand normally represent traveller behaviour by a single, averaged, group responding to cost, time, and distance changes. For systematic traffic-management measures, such as those of traffic restraint, it is desirable to examine shifts of benefits and costs between different groups of travellers. This requires equilibrium models of two or more types of traveller, each of which responds differently to charges or to travel-time changes. An appropriate technique has been developed to deal with this question, and results are presented in terms of two situations where benefit and cost transfers could arise: The effect of private parking places, and the differential impacts of road pricing.
Assessing Fiscal Sustainability in the G-7 Countries

Rising longevity, falling fertility rates, and the retirement of the baby boom generation will substantially raise age-related government spending in most advanced and many emerging market countries. This paper assesses the evolution of fiscal sustainability for each of the G-7 countries using two standard primary gap indicators. the estimated fiscal adjustment required to ensure long-run fiscal sustainability is substantial for all G-7 countries. in particular, ensuring fiscal sustainability would require an average improvement in the primary balance of about 4 percentage points of GDP. While the overall adjustment required to achieve long-run fiscal sustainability in G-7 countries is large, there are significant growth benefits to putting public finances on a sustainable footing in the near term versus delayed adjustment.
¿Es estable la relación entre tipo de cambio y posiciones netas de los especuladores en monedas de economías desarrolladas? Evidencia del Chicago Mercantile Exchange

Este trabajo analiza si la relacion entre los cambios en las posiciones netas de los especuladores de monedas de cinco economias desarrolladas en el Chicago Mercantile Exchange y los cambios porcentuales semanales en los tipos de cambio con respecto al dolar estadounidense de dichas monedas es estable en el tiempo, o bien depende, en alguna medida, del tamano del mercado para los contratos de futuros de dichas monedas. Los resultados sugieren que no puede rechazarse la hipotesis de que el crecimiento del mercado incide sobre la sensibilidad del tipo de cambio ante una variacion en las posiciones netas de los especuladores.
Sex of Applicant and the Availability of Business “Start-Up” Finance

While women are undoubtedly disadvantaged in the process of preparing for a career in business ownership, there is a lack of experimental evidence to verify the belief that loan managers discriminate against women at the point of loan application. This study, therefore, investigates the extent to which concerns that women in business face discrimination from trading banks when seeking to raise start-up capital are valid. Scenarios of an application for loan finance to purchase a commercial enterprise were mailed to loan officers of major trading bank branches. The scenarios were identical in all respects, except that half included a photograph of a male applicant and the remainder a photograph of a female. Loan officers were asked whether or not they would approve loan finance for the proposed business, and to indicate factors that contributed to their decision. Significant differences in loan officer response to female and male applicants were observed. This supported the widely held perception that women face discrimination in seeking start-up capital.
Chk1 phosphorylation during mitosis: A new role for a master regulator

The human DNA damage responses are modulated by both nonessential and essential pathways. The extensively studied ATM kinase and p53 are examples of the former. While loss-of-function mutations in genes that encode ATM and p53 cause marked predispositions to cancer, the loss of these proteins does not appear to impact basic cell growth and proliferation. In contrast, the checkpoint kinase Chk1 and its upstream activator ATR are essential.1-4 What do these proteins do in undamaged cells?
Mean Reversion-Effekte auf dem deutschen Aktienmarkt : Statistische Analysen der Entwicklung des DAX-KGV

This paper investigates mean reversion effects in the German stock market. Recent studies have shown that stock prices tend to follow random walks over short horizons while there is empirical evidence for a mean-reverting behavior over long horizons. Considering fundamental values, we examine mean reversion in the price/earnings ratio of the German blue-chip index DAX for different time horizons to be able to compare the relative strength of the corresponding mean reversion effects.
Frame-Based Sparse Analysis and Synthesis Signal Representations and Parseval K-SVD

Frames are the foundation of the linear operators used in the decomposition and reconstruction of signals, such as the discrete Fourier transform, Gabor, wavelets, and curvelet transforms. The emergence of sparse representation models has shifted the emphasis in frame theory toward sparse-norm minimization problems. In this paper, we apply frame theory to the sparse representation of signals, wherein a frame is used for synthesis dictionary and a dual frame is used for analysis dictionary. Our objective was to formulate a novel dual-frame design in which the sparse vector obtained through the decomposition of any signal is also the sparse solution representing signals based on a reconstruction frame. Our findings demonstrate that this type of dual frame cannot be constructed for overcomplete frames, thereby precluding the use of any linear analysis operator to derive the sparse synthesis coefficient for signal representation. We also developed a novel dictionary learning algorithm (called Parseval K-SVD) to learn a tight-frame dictionary with normalized atoms. We then dealt with the problem of signal representation using frames from the analysis and synthesis perspective to derive optimization formulations for problems pertaining to image recovery. Our preliminary results demonstrate that the images recovered using this approach are correlated with the frame bounds of dictionaries, thereby demonstrating the importance of using different dictionaries for different applications.
Improvement of in vitro mitogen proliferative responses in non‐Hodgkin's lymphoma patients exposed to fractionated total body irradiation

Patients with non‐Hodgkin's lymphomas who failed to respond to chemotherapy were treated with low dose fractionated total body irradiation (TBI). Prior to, during and after scheduled therapy, their clinical status was evaluated and peripheral blood studies were performed to enumerate EAC and E rosetting cells and to measure proliferative responses to mitogens. Peripheral blood abnormalities were present prior to TBI using these in vitro assays. Patients who obtained clinical remissions following therapy had restoration of mitogen proliferative responses, whereas patients who showed no response or progressive disease had no change in their ability to proliferate in response to mitogens. Normalization of EAC and E rosetting profiles often occurred regardless of clinical response. These data indicate that low dose fractionated TBI produces clinical and in nitro detectable immunological changes. Furthermore, they show that improvement in mitogen responsiveness correlates best with good clinical responses.
Veterinary Rehabilitation Science-A Review

Accepted: 27/03/2016 Abstract Aim of physical rehabilitation is to maximize recov ery from disease processes and surgical procedures while improving f unction and overall well-being of the patient. Rehabilitation therapies are classified into manual therapy, physical therapy and therapy with emerging modalities. The manual therapy is further classified into Massage, Joint mobilization exercises and Acupuncture. The physical therapies i nclude thermal agents, prosthetics, orthotics, aquatic therapy, electrical stimulation and therapeutic exercises. Thermal therapy is further divided into hot and cold therapies. Therapeutic exercise includes various type physical exercises. Orthotics are applied externally to rehabilitate patients and inc lude various splints and slings, whereas, prosthetics are artificial replace ments (e.g., artificial limb). Emerging modalities in rehabilitation includes lase r therapy, pulsed magnetic field therapy and extracorporeal shock wav e therapy. Outcome assessment of rehabilitation therapy is done by ass essing pain, vital signs, body condition and composition, range of motion, mu scle strength and gait of the patient. Rehabilitation is a very broad fiel d including physiotherapy using manual and physical therapy. It is very old s cience used regularly in human medicine but is under-utilized in veterinary sciences especially in India. If used in conjunction with standard medicin al and surgical treatment, rehabilitation can be very useful, as th ey increase the rate of recovery.