Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
DETERMINANTS OF COMPUTER ASSISTED AUDIT TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES (CAATs) ADOPTION

Determinants of the adoption of CAATs in the Internal Audit Departments are examined in this study by employing the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT). The attributes that were taken from the UTAUT theoretical model are performance expectancy, organisation readiness, effort expectancy and social influence. Apart from UTAUT’s attributes, this study has taken individual factors to be examined together with the model. They are also considered an external factor that was established through the Theory of Acceptance Model (TAM) in previous literature. Using a quantitative approach, questionnaires were administered to internal auditors, followed by IT auditors and others such as Compliance officers and Quality auditors who use CAATs in their routine tasks; they work in multinational companies, government link companies and government agencies. The companies were chosen because they have in-house Internal Audit Departments. The results show that performance expectancy and individual factors are the most supported attributes that influence the adoption of CAATs. This study offers insights into the effect of individual factors on CAATs adoption. This paper expands the existing literature on factors that influence CAATs adoption among internal auditors.
The Effect of Female Personnel on the Voluntary Disclosure of Carbon Emissions Information

This paper examines the effect of female personnel (female executives and female employees) on corporate voluntary disclosure policy on carbon emission information. The study is motivated from the recent fact that the laws and systems related to female workers are rapidly changing as the social and economic status of women in South Korea has recently improved. In a sample of 9406 firm-year observations over the period from 2014 to 2020, the higher the proportion of female executives, the higher the frequency of voluntary disclosure on carbon emission information. These results are the same even when the female workforce was measured as the proportion of general female employees. Therefore, it can be said that the existence of female personnel at the management and practice level plays a significant role in improving voluntary disclosure quality. By considering the impact of gender manpower composition on enhancing corporate transparency, it provides evidence that market participants can have a positive view on the quality of information environment provided by companies with a high proportion of female personnel.
A Honey Badger Optimization for Minimizing the Pollutant Environmental Emissions-Based Economic Dispatch Model Integrating Combined Heat and Power Units

Traditionally, the Economic Dispatch Model (EDM) integrating Combined Heat and Power (CHP) units aims to reduce fuel costs by managing power-only, CHP, and heat-only units. Today, reducing pollutant emissions to the environment is of paramount concern. This research presents a novel honey badger optimization algorithm (HBOA) for EDM-integrated CHP units. HBOA is a novel meta-heuristic search strategy inspired by the honey badger’s sophisticated hunting behavior. In HBOA, the dynamic searching activity of the honey badger, which includes digging and honing, is separated into exploration and exploitation phases. In addition, several modern meta-heuristic optimization algorithms are employed, which are the African Vultures Algorithm (AVO), Dwarf Mongoose Optimization Algorithm (DMOA), Coot Optimization Algorithm (COA), and Beluga Whale Optimization Algorithm (BWOA). These algorithms are applied in a comparative manner considering the seven-unit test system. Various loading levels are considered with different power and heat loading. Four cases are investigated for each loading level, which differ based on the objective task and the consideration of power losses. Moreover, considering the pollutant emissions minimization objective, the proposed HBOA achieves reductions, without loss considerations, of 75.32%, 26.053%, and 87.233% for the three loading levels, respectively, compared to the initial case. Moreover, considering minimizing pollutant emissions, the suggested HBOA achieves decreases of 75.32%, 26.053%, and 87.233%, relative to the baseline scenario, for the three loading levels, respectively. Similarly, it performs reductions of 73.841%, 26.155%, and 92.595%, respectively, for the three loading levels compared to the baseline situation when power losses are considered. Consequently, the recommended HBOA surpasses the AVO, DMOA, COA, and BWOA when the purpose is to minimize fuel expenditures. In addition, the proposed HBOA significantly reduces pollutant emissions compared to the baseline scenario.
Metabolomic Signatures of Autism Spectrum Disorder

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is associated with many variations in metabolism, but the ex-act correlates of these metabolic disturbances with behavior and development and their links to other core metabolic disruptions are understudied. In this study, large-scale targeted LC-MS/MS metabolomic analysis was conducted on fasting morning plasma samples from 57 children with ASD (29 with neurodevelopmental regression, NDR) and 37 healthy controls of similar age and gender. Linear model determined the metabolic signatures of ASD with and without NDR, measures of behavior and neurodevelopment, as well as markers of oxidative stress, inflammation, redox, methylation, and mitochondrial metabolism. MetaboAnalyst ver 5.0 (the Wishart Research Group at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada) identified the pathways associated with altered metabolic signatures. Differences in histidine and glutathione metabolism as well as aromatic amino acid (AAA) biosynthesis differentiated ASD from controls. NDR was associated with disruption in nicotinamide and energy metabolism. Sleep and neurodevelopment were associated with energy metabolism while neurodevelopment was also associated with purine metabolism and aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis. While behavior was as-sociated with some of the same pathways as neurodevelopment, it was also associated with alternations in neurotransmitter metabolism. Alterations in methylation was associated with aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis and branched chain amino acid (BCAA) and nicotinamide metabolism. Alterations in glutathione metabolism was associated with changes in glycine, serine and threonine, BCAA and AAA metabolism. Markers of oxidative stress and inflammation were as-sociated with energy metabolism and aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis. Alterations in mitochondrial metabolism was associated with alterations in energy metabolism and L-glutamine. Using behavioral and biochemical markers, this study finds convergent disturbances in specific metabolic pathways with ASD, particularly changes in energy, nicotinamide, neurotransmitters, and BCAA, as well as aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis.
Sida cordata assisted bio-inspired silver nanoparticles and its antimicrobial, free-radical scavenging, tyrosinase inhibition, and photocatalytic activity (4 in 1 system)

Abstract This study presents the successful application of Sida cordata (SC) extract in the renewable bio-inspired green synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs). The aqueous-alcoholic extract of S. cordata (aerial part) was effectively used for the silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) green synthesis. Physiochemical techniques, such as UV-Vis, FT-IR, XRD, FE-SEM, and HR-TEM analyses were applied to characterize the green synthesized AgNPs. UV-vis spectra showed characteristic plasmon resonance spectra with the maximum at 447 nm; the crystalline nature of SC-AgNPs was confirmed by XRD. Shape, size, and morphology were examined by FE-SEM and HR-TEM and the results confirmed the spherical shape of particles with an average diameter of about 48 nm. The presence of alcohols or phenols, carboxylic acids, ketones, amine functional groups were revealed by FTIR. In vitro biological activity studies portrayed that the synthesized SC-AgNPs have potential antimicrobial activity against Gram(−)ve and Gram(+)ve bacteria in a dose-dependent manner, dose-dependent antioxidant activity against DPPH (75.47 ± 2.5%) and a dose-dependent inhibition of tyrosinase (98.25 ± 1.25% at a dose of 110 µg/ml), moreover, the nanoparticles show excellent photocatalytic activity for methylene blue dye degradation. The AgNPs synthesized here were considered a 4 in-1 system.
Bayesian multivariate predictions

This work offers two strategies to raise the prediction accuracy of Vector Autoregressive (VAR) Models. The first strategy is to improve the Minnesota prior, which is frequently used for Bayesian VAR models. The improvement is achieved in two ways. First, the variance-covariance matrix of regression disturbances is treated as unknown and random to incorporate parameter uncertainty. Second, the prior variance-covariance matrix of regression coefficients is constructed as a function of the variance-covariance matrix of disturbances, in order to account for dependencies between different equations. Since different prior specifications unavoidably lead to different models, and forecasting capability of any such model is often limited, the second strategy is to build an optimal prediction pool of models by using the conventional log predictive score function. The effectiveness of the proposed strategies is examined for one-step-ahead, multi-4-step-ahead, and single-4-step-ahead predictions through two exercises. One exercise is predicting national output, inflation, and interest rate in the United States, and the other is predicting state tax revenue and personal income in Iowa. The empirical results indicate that a properly selected prior can improve the prediction performance of a BVAR model, and that a real-time optimal prediction pool can outperform a single best constituent model alone.
Laser Treatment Increases the Antimicrobial Efficacy of Cyanobacterial Extracts against Staphylococcus aureus (SA) and Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)

Staphylococcus aureus (SA) and Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) are multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens. A novel approach needs to be followed to combat these pathogens in an ecofriendly manner. Cyanobacterial extracts were previously proven to be affective as antimicrobial agents. To capitalize on this, laser treatments were used to increase their antimicrobial efficacy. Two cyanobacterial strains isolated from Al-Ahsa were identified using molecular methods. Their aqueous extracts were used in the antimicrobial bioassay for these two bacterial pathogens. The first group of aqueous extracts were exposed directly to laser treatment and used in antibacterial bioassay. In parallel, the cyanobacterial biomass of the two isolates was exposed to the laser, then aqueous extracts were prepared. The third group of extracts were not exposed to the laser and were used as a control. Time and distance were the factors tested as they affected the dose of the laser, both individually and in combination. In addition, accessory pigment estimation in extracts before and after laser exposure of extracts was also determined. The two cyanobacterial strains were identified as Thermoleptolyngbya sp. and Leptolyngbya sp. and the molecular analysis also confirmed the identity of pathogenic bacteria. The untreated cyanobacterial aqueous extracts had little effect against the two bacterial strains. In contrast, the extract directly exposed to the laser was significantly more effective, with an inhibition zone of 22.0 mm in the case of a time of 32 min and distance of 10 cm against S. aureus. Accessory pigment composition increased in extracts directly exposed to the laser. This is the first case report on the effect of lasers on enhancing the antimicrobial profile of cyanobacterial extracts against SA and MRSA bacterial pathogens, as well as enhancing accessory pigment content. The laser dose that was most effective was that of 32 min time and 10 cm distance of Thermoleptolyngbya sp. extract directly exposed to the laser, which highlights the importance of time for increasing the laser dose and consequently increasing its antimicrobial impact.
Discriminating between impact or nonimpact origin of small meteorite crater candidates: No evidence for an impact origin for the Tor crater, Sweden

Compared to intensive research on km‐sized meteorite impact craters, fewer studies focus on smaller craters. The small craters are often hard or impossible to recognize using “classical” criteria like the presence of shatter cones, shocked quartz, and geochemical indicators. Therefore, a long list of candidate structures awaiting approval/disapproval of their origin has been formed over the last decades. One of them is the Tor structure in central Sweden. To test a hypothesis of an impact origin of this structure, we have performed topographical analysis, geophysical studies, 10Be exposure dating of boulders, and 14C dating of Tor‐associated charcoal. None of the methods gave us a reason to claim the Tor structure is of impact origin. Thus, we support a recently suggested idea of Tor being formed by a grounded iceberg within a glacial lake.
Effect of Radium-223 on the Gut Microbiota of Prostate Cancer Patients: A Pilot Case Series Study

Radium-223 (Ra-223) is a targeted nuclear medicine therapy for castration-resistant prostate cancer with bone metastases. Its major route of elimination is the intestine. There is overwhelming evidence that the gut microbiota is altered by ionizing radiation (IR) from radiotherapy treatments. Nevertheless, it is known that extrapolation of outcomes from radiotherapy to nuclear medicine is not straightforward. The purpose of this study was to prospectively determine the effect of Ra-223 on selected important bacteria from the gut microbiota. Stool samples from three prostate cancer patients and two healthy individuals were obtained, processed, and analysed. We specifically measured the relative change of the abundance of important bacteria, determined by the 2−ΔΔC method. We found that Ra-223 influenced the gut microbiota composition. The most relevant changes were increases of Proteobacteria and Atopobacter; and decreases of Bacteroidetes, Prevotella, Lactobacillus, Bifidobacterium, Clostridium coccoides, and Bacteroides fragilis. Additionally, our experiment confirms that the composition of gut microbiota from prostate cancer patients is altered. No significant correlation was found between each subject’s gut microbiome profile and their clinical indices. Despite its limited sample, the results of this pilot study suggest that ionizing radiation from Ra-223 alters the gut microbiota composition and that the gut microbiota of prostate cancer patients has an increase of the bacteria with known prejudicial effects and a decrease of the ones with favorable effects.
Analyses of circRNA Expression throughout the Light-Dark Cycle Reveal a Strong Regulation of Cdr1as, Associated with Light Entrainment in the SCN

Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a large class of relatively stable RNA molecules that are highly expressed in animal brains. Many circRNAs have been associated with CNS disorders accompanied by an aberrant wake-sleep cycle. However, the regulation of circRNAs in brain homeostasis over daily light-dark (LD) cycles has not been characterized. Here, we aim to quantify the daily expression changes of circRNAs in physiological conditions in healthy adult animals. Using newly generated and public RNA-Seq data, we monitored circRNA expression throughout the 12:12 h LD cycle in various mouse brain regions. We identified that Cdr1as, a conserved circRNA that regulates synaptic transmission, is highly expressed in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), the master circadian pacemaker. Despite its high stability, Cdr1as has a very dynamic expression in the SCN throughout the LD cycle, as well as a significant regulation in the hippocampus following the entry into the dark phase. Computational integration of different public datasets predicted that Cdr1as is important for regulating light entrainment in the SCN. We hypothesize that the expression changes of Cdr1as in the SCN, particularly during the dark phase, are associated with light-induced phase shifts. Importantly, our work revises the current beliefs about natural circRNA stability and suggests that the time component must be considered when studying circRNA regulation.
Urinary Citrate Is Associated with Kidney Outcomes in Early Polycystic Kidney Disease

Key Points Low urinary citrate and crystal deposition accelerated cystogenesis in an experimental model of polycystic kidney disease (PKD). Hypocitraturia, frequently observed in patients with autosomal dominant PKD (ADPKD) could contribute to disease progression. Present findings suggest lower urinary citrate in early PKD was associated with faster eGFR decline and worse kidney survival.
Unravelling the Portuguese Coastal and Transitional Waters’ Microbial Resistome as a Biomarker of Differential Anthropogenic Impact

Portugal mainland and Atlantic archipelagos (Madeira and Azores) provide a wide array of coastal ecosystems with varying typology and degrees of human pressure, which shape the microbial communities thriving in these habitats, leading to the development of microbial resistance traits. The samples collected on the Portuguese northeast Atlantic coast waters show an unequivocal prevalence of Bacteria over Archaea with a high prevalence of Proteobacteria, Cyanobacteria, Bacteroidetes and Actinobacteria. Several taxa, such as the Vibrio genus, showed significant correlations with anthropogenic pollution. These anthropogenic pressures, along with the differences in species diversity among the surveyed sites, lead to observed differences in the presence and resistance-related sequences’ abundance (set of all metal and antibiotic resistant genes and their precursors in pathogenic and non-pathogenic bacteria). Gene ontology terms such as antibiotic resistance, redox regulation and oxidative stress response were prevalent. A higher number of significant correlations were found between the abundance of resistance-related sequences and pollution, inorganic pressures and density of nearby population centres when compared to the number of significant correlations between taxa abundance at different phylogenetic levels and the same environmental traits. This points towards predominance of the environmental conditions over the sequence abundance rather than the taxa abundance. Our data suggest that the whole resistome profile can provide more relevant or integrative answers in terms of anthropogenic disturbance of the environment, either as a whole or grouped in gene ontology groups, appearing as a promising tool for impact assessment studies which, due to the ubiquity of the sequences across microbes, can be surveyed independently of the taxa present in the samples.
Dynamics, Deployment and Retrieval Strategy for Satellite-Sail Transverse Formation with Model Inaccuracy

One of the important applications of the space tethered system is formation flying. To satisfy the requirement for interferometry of ground targets by remote-sensing satellites, a new type of tethered solar sail spacecraft has been proposed in recent research. The replacement of subsatellites of conventional tethered satellite systems with solar sail spacecraft allows for a special formation configuration in which the main satellite is in sun-synchronous orbit and the subsolar sail is in displaced orbit. If the solar sail is at the appropriate attitude, the main satellite and the solar sail spacecraft connected by metal tethers could move side by side, hence this formation system is called transverse formation. The relative baseline of this transverse formation system is perpendicular to the ground trajectory of the satellite, effectively solving the problem that the relative baseline of conventional orbital formations varies in a trigonometric cycle. Researchers on the past ignored the mass and elasticity of the tether, and considered the tether just a constraint in the model system. Since the solar sail is generally quite light compared to the other components of the system, the model inaccuracy caused by ignoring the mass of the tether on the dynamic model and control is extremely obvious. This paper investigates the relative dynamics and control of a proposed system during the deployment process with the mass of the tether. Two precise models of satellite-sail systems are established. One is based on the dumbbell model with the mass tether for the tethered satellite system, and the other is on the basis of the beads model of a tethered satellite system. The rigid one is for control design and the flexible one is for dynamic simulation. It is concluded that the length of the tether and attitude angle of the transverse formation configuration can be decoupled and controlled separately. On the basis of the models, a length rate and LQR control law is developed and the control of the deployment and retrieval process of the tethered solar sail system is investigated. Numerical simulations are performed to verify the accuracy of the conclusions.
Staphylococcus aureus Biofilm Inhibiting Activity of Advanced Glycation Endproduct Crosslink Breaking and Glycation Inhibiting Compounds

Staphylococcus aureus is a Gram-positive bacterium that plays a role in the pathogenesis of skin lesions in diabetes mellitus, atopic dermatitis, and psoriasis, all of which are associated with elevated non-enzymatic glycation biomarkers. The production of biofilm protects resident bacteria from host immune defenses and antibiotic interventions, prolonging pathogen survival, and risking recurrence after treatment. Glycated proteins formed from keratin and glucose induce biofilm formation in S. aureus, promoting dysbiosis and increasing pathogenicity. In this study, several glycation-inhibiting and advanced glycation endproduct (AGE) crosslink-breaking compounds were assayed for their ability to inhibit glycated keratin-induced biofilm formation as preliminary screening for clinical testing candidates. Ascorbic acid, astaxanthin, clove extract, n-phenacylthiazolium bromide, and rosemary extract were examined in an in vitro static biofilm model with S. aureus strain ATCC 12600. Near complete biofilm inhibition was achieved with astaxanthin (ED50 = 0.060 mg/mL), clove extract (ED50 = 0.0087 mg/mL), n-phenacylthiazolium bromide (ED50 = 5.3 mg/mL), and rosemary extract (ED50 = 1.5 mg/mL). The dosage necessary for biofilm inhibition was not significantly correlated with growth inhibition (R2 = 0.055. p = 0.49). Anti-glycation and AGE breaking compounds with biofilm inhibitory activity are ideal candidates for treatment of S. aureus dysbiosis and skin infection that is associated with elevated skin glycation.