Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Think tank traditions : policy research and politics of ideas

1. Introduction Think tanks, policy advice and governance - Diane Stone Part I The international dimension 2. Institutes of International Affairs in foreign policy making, opinion mobilisation and unofficial diplomacy - Inderjeet Parmar 3. Think tanks beyond nation states - Diane Stone 4. European Union think tanks: Generating ideas, analysis and debate - Heidi Ullrich Part II European think tank traditions 5. Think tanks in Germany - Martin Thunert 6. Italy: Think tanks and the political system - Sonia Lucarelli and Claudio M. Radaelli 7. French think tanks in comparative perspective - Catherine Fieschi and John Gaffney 8. Think tanks, post communism and democracy in Russia, Central and Eastern Europe - Mark Sandle Part III. Think tanks in democratic development and economic transition 9. The Chinese tradition of policy research institutes - Ming Chen Shai with Diane Stone 10. Think tanks in Japan: A new alternative - Makiko Ueno 11. Think tanks and Malaysian development - Su Ming Khoo 12. Think tanks in developing countries: Lessons from Argentina - Miguel Braun, Antonio Cicioni and Nicholas J. Durote Part IV. The Anglo-American tradition 13. The business of ideas: A look at the think tank industry in the United States - Don Abelson 14. A 'hollowed out' tradition? British think tanks in the twenty-first century - Andrew Denham and Mark Garnett 15. Australian think tanks - Ian Marsh and Diane Stone 16. Three decades of Canadian think tanks: Evolving institutions, conditions and strategies - Evert A. Lundqvist Afterword Soft power, global agendas - William Wallace -- .
A Comparative Study of Conversion Aided Methods for WordNet Sentence Textual Similarity

In this paper, we present a comparison of three methods for taxonomic-based sentence semantic relatedness, aided with word parts of speech (PoS) conversion. We use WordNet ontology for determining word level semantic similarity while augmenting WordNet with two other lexicographical databases; namely Categorial Variation Database (CatVar) and Morphosemantic Database in assisting the word category conversion. Using a human annotated benchmark data set, all the three approaches achieved a high positive correlation reaching up to (r = 0.881647) with comparison to human ratings and two other baselines evaluated on the same benchmark data set.
Forms and Paradoxes of Principles Based Regulation

Principles-based regulation is high on the regulatory agenda in a number of regulatory domains, most particularly financial regulation. Its supporters argue that it provides a flexible regulatory regime which can facilitate innovation; its detractors argue that it is simply lax regulation. This article explores the political rhetoric surrounding principles-based regulation. It identifies four forms of principles-based regulation: formal, substantive, full and polycentric principles-based regulation. It also identifies and explores seven paradoxes which principles-based regulation may encounter in its various forms. These relate to interpretation, communication, compliance, enforcement, internal management, ethics, and above all trust. PBR, in its full form, can provide an effective, durable, resilient and goal based regulatory regime; but at the same time its paradoxical nature means that it is vulnerable in many respects. Unfortunately for the detractors of principles-based regulation, many of these paradoxes are not necessarily avoided by using detailed rules instead of principles. Rather their resolution lies in trust. Yet, it is argued, trust is the ultimate paradox. Principles-based regulation can help to create trust, but the core elements of that trust have to already exist if principles-based regulation is ever to operate effectively, if indeed at all.
Modelli di determinazione del tasso di cambio: un'analisi di cointegrazione

The aim of this paper is to examine the empirical relation between exchange rates and macroeconomic fundamentals for five major industrialised countries in the floating exchange rates period after 1973. Two theoretical models of exchange rate determination are considered - a monetary model in Frankel s real interest differential version (1979), and a synthesis of monetary and portfolio balance approaches proposed by Ashok Parikh (1992). The empirical analysis on these models has been run through the application of cointegration techniques, both in a univariate framework A la Engle and Granger and through the multivariate Johansen s procedure. After the cointegration analysis, the long run estimates have been put in a structural ECM in order to model simultaneously long and short run dynamics. The results for the monetary model in the long run are very interesting for France, Japan and Spain, while for Germany and UK the model cannot capture the actual pattern of the exchange rate; in the short run the difficulty in modelling exchange rate changes has been confirmed. The synthesis model between the two approaches estimated for Germany, Japan and UK appears to be completely unsatisfactory.
Formalizing Mobility in Service Oriented Computing

The usual scenario of service oriented systems is characterized by several services offering the same functionalities, by new services that are continuosly deployed and by other ones that are removed. In this context it can be useful to dynamically discover and compose services at runtime. Orchestration languages provide a mean to deal with service composition, while the problem of fulfilling at runtime the information about the involved services is usually referred to as open-endedness. When designing service-based applications both composition and open endedness play a central role. Such issues are strongly related to mobility mechanisms which make it possible to design applications that acquire, during the execution, the information which are necessary to invoke services. In this paper we discuss the forms of mobility for the service oriented computing paradigm. To this end we model a service by means of the notions of interface, location, internal process and internal state, then we formalize a calculus supporting the mobility of each element listed above. We conclude by tracing a comparison between the proposed calculus and the mobility mechanisms supported by the Web Services technology.
The Upward Pricing Pressure Test and the Sensitivity of the Diversion Ratio

The diversion ratio is a key ingredient to the calculation of the Upward Pricing Pressure (UPP) test, which is a new shortcut for screening mergers. It measures the degree of substitutability between the merging goods, which affects the potential for price increase post-merger. There is currently little existing research on how the diversion ratio is to be estimated (unlike its cousin, the cross-price elasticity). This paper explores one of the methods to estimate diversion ratios, which is through the estimation of a demand system. Specifically, this paper shows that the estimated value of the diversion ratio is, in fact, little affected by one of the most contentious decisions in merger analysis: the definition of the market boundary.
Removing tetrahedra from a manifold mesh

One of the most important task in surgical simulation is the ability to cut volumetric organs. Several algorithms have already been described but none of them can actually maintain a specific and important topological property of the mesh called manifoldness. In this article we define the notion of manifoldness and we explain why it is important to preserve it. We propose a new algorithm that maintains manifoldness and that implements a very simple cut strategy: the removing of soft tissue material, which is an efficient way to simulate the action of an ultrasound cautery. Finally, we present experimental results which show the efficiency of this algorithm in a surgery simulation system.
On embedding trees into uniformly convex Banach spaces

In thin film optical systems including thin film optical waveguides, of such materials as Nb2O5, it is desirable to fabricate thin film lenses. One of the types of lenses which can be made is the step-in-thickness type. This type of thin-film lens can be fabricated by plasma etching through a photoresist mask in such materials as Nb2O5 and Ta2O5. Plasma etching yields an etch wall with smooth steep sides which is important for good quality thin-film lenses; however, the etch rate is too variable for reproducible etch depth based upon etch time, and the bottom of the etch is very rough, causing excessive scattering loss. It has been found that a sandwich-like structure of Nb2O5, TiO2 and Nb2O5 provides an improved arrangement in that a good control of the etch depth and a smooth flat bottom in the etch areas have been achieved by introducing the layer of TiO2 as an etch stop.
Useless Hearing in Male Emblemasoma auditrix (Diptera, Sarcophagidae) – A Case of Intralocus Sexual Conflict during Evolution of a Complex Sense Organ?

Sensory modalities typically are important for both sexes, although sex-specific functional adaptations may occur frequently. This is true for hearing as well. Consequently, distinct behavioural functions were identified for the different insect hearing systems. Here we describe a first case, where a trait of an evolutionary novelty and a highly specialized hearing organ is adaptive in only one sex. The main function of hearing of the parasitoid fly Emblemasoma auditrix is to locate the host, males of the cicada species Okanagana rimosa, by their calling song. This task is performed by female flies, which deposit larvae into the host. We show that male E. auditrix possess a hearing sense as well. The morphology of the tympanal organ of male E. auditrix is rather similar to the female ear, which is 8% broader than the male ear. In both sexes the physiological hearing threshold is tuned to 5 kHz. Behavioural tests show that males are able to orient towards the host calling song, although phonotaxis often is incomplete. However, despite extensive observations in the field and substantial knowledge of the biology of E. auditrix, no potentially adaptive function of the male auditory sense has been identified. This unique hearing system might represent an intralocus sexual conflict, as the complex sense organ and the behavioural relevant neuronal network is adaptive for only one sex. The correlated evolution of the sense organ in both sexes might impose substantial constraints on the sensory properties of the ear. Similar constraints, although hidden, might also apply to other sensory systems in which behavioural functions differ between sexes.
Large Commercial Farmers and Land Reform in Africa: The Case of Zimbabwe

Part 1 Introduction: large farms and large farmers worldwide large farms as object of redistributive land reforms. Part 2 Agrarian structure and the position of large farms in Zimbabwe: historic development present political and economic status of the large commercial farmers land policy since independence. Part 3 Outline of the large commercial farmers study: objectives of the research the implementation research areas and characteristics of the sample farms. Part 4 Characteristics of the surveyed farmers: personal and family data historic background of the farmers' families. Part 5 Crop and animal production: crop production use of irrigation animal husbandry wildlife. Part 6 Impact of the drought of 1991 and 1992: extent and effects on production and farm economy countermeasures and lessons for the future. Part 7 Investment and finance: investment behaviour finance facilities. Part 8 Farm labour and social issues: structure and quantitative development of farm labour labour management wages and living conditions nutrition and health situation in the workers' families the farmers' social consciousness, responsibilities and loyalties. Part 9 Professional environment and outlook to the future: the professional and political support system commitment to farming plans for the future farmers' assessment of the new land redistribution programme reactions to land reform. Part 10 The large commercial farmers in the Zimbabwean society: position in the society assistance to other agricultural groups. Part 11 Final assessment of the large farmers' contributions and liabilities. Part 12 Concluding remarks: speculations on the future of the large farmers' community lessons from the Zimbabwean land reform.
An approach from Thomas S . Schelling

In their recent work Thomas S. Schelling (2007, 2010), reiterating original arguments about game theory and its applications to social sciences. In particular, game theory helps to explore situations in which agents make decisions interdependent (strategic communication). Schelling's originality is to extend economic theory to social sciences. When a player can anticipate the options and influence the decisions of others. The strategy, indirect communication plays a crucial role. To illustrate, we investigate how to perform the payoff matrix in cases of bribery and threat
Singularities of eddy current problems

We consider the time-harmonic eddy current problem in its electric formulation where the conductor is a polyhedral domain. By proving the convergence in energy, we justify in what sense this problem is the limit of a family of Maxwell transmission problems: Rather than a low frequency limit, this limit has to be understood in the sense of Bossavit [11]. We describe the singularities of the solutions. They are related to edge and corner singularities of certain problems for the scalar Laplace operator, namely the interior Neumann problem, the exterior Dirichlet problem, and possibly, an interface problem. These singularities are the limit of the singularities of the related family of Maxwell problems.
Diffusion normalized least mean squares over wireless sensor networks

Recently, distributed adaptive algorithms have been proposed to solve the problem of estimation over distributed networks. In a diffusion protocol, each node in the network function as an individual adaptive filter whose aim is to estimate the parameter of interest through local observations. All the estimates obtained from the nodes are then locally fused with their neighboring estimates in the network. The aim of this work is to improve the signal processing capability of the distributed network in a novel way by applying the diffusion normalized least mean squares (ε-NLMS) algorithm. The simulation results will show that the diffusion ε-NLMS algorithm outperforms its counterpart the diffusion least mean squares (LMS) algorithm for slowly changing environment, where data are expected to show high correlation.
Ordinal utility of moments: foundations and financial behavior

En After Tobin (1958), a considerable effort has been devoted to connecting the expected utility approach to a utility function directly expressed in terms of moments. We follow the alternative route of providing, for the first time, the theoretical, autonomous foundation of an ordinal utility function of moments, representing rational choices under uncertainty, free of any ‘independence axiom’ and compatible with all the behavioral “paradoxes” documented in the economic literature.
The Brain's Cutting-Room Floor: Segmentation of Narrative Cinema

Observers segment ongoing activity into meaningful events. Segmentation is a core component of perception that helps determine memory and guide planning. The current study tested the hypotheses that event segmentation is an automatic component of the perception of extended naturalistic activity, and that the identification of event boundaries in such activities results in part from processing changes in the perceived situation. Observers may identify boundaries between events as a result of processing changes in the observed situation. To test this hypothesis and study this potential mechanism, we measured brain activity while participants viewed an extended narrative film. Large transient responses were observed when the activity was segmented, and these responses were mediated by changes in the observed activity, including characters and their interactions, interactions with objects, spatial location, goals, and causes. These results support accounts that propose event segmentation is automatic and depends on processing meaningful changes in the perceived situation; they are the first to show such effects for extended naturalistic human activity.
Biovolume spectrum theories applied: spatial patterns of trophic levels within a mesozooplankton community at the polar front

Three-dimensional data on the mesoscale distribution of hydrography and mesozooplankton were collected at the Polar Front, northwestern Barents Sea, in spring 2008 (29 April–15 May) using a combination of multinet and towed instrument platform equipped with Laser Optical Plankton Counter, fluorometer and CTD. Trophic levels (TLs) within the zooplankton community (whole community and size-separated) were analysed for three consecutive periods using biovolume spectrum theory, which proved to be a powerful tool in the physically and biologically variable frontal system. Trophic structure was highly variable in time and across the Polar Front, but was mostly related to the phytoplankton bloom (as determined by fluorescence). High TLs of 5.5 within the zooplankton community were observed outside bloom situations (mostly in Atlantic Water) and were likely due to increased omnivory of Calanus spp. , which dominated the large zooplankton size group that had a lower TL (2.2) during the bloom than outside blooms (max. TL 5.6). A strong input of herbivorous barnacle nauplii (Cirripedia) into the upper layer (35 000 ind. m−3 in net samples) substantially decreased mean TL in the marginal ice zone. Differences in TL estimates based on biovolume spectrum theory and other methods (stable isotopes, lipid markers, dietary analyses) are discussed.
Exploring the Potential of Mentoring Programs for Public Sector Management

A major challenge facing Romania, as a new member of the European Union (EU), is the implementation of Public Administration Reform. Among the significant supporting initiatives it can mention the project Young Professionals Scheme launched in 2003 that includes mentoring as a basic component of training Romanian public managers under this scheme. On the other hand, an extended documentary research on recent international approaches of mentoring in public sector allowed us to note a considerable gap relative to other sectors and relative to the situation of implementing government mentoring programs in EU countries and in other countries such as USA, Canada, or Australia. Against this background our paper attempts to point out why and how mentoring programs could and should be used not only as a component of initial training of public managers, but also as a current managerial practice for ensuring continuity and sustainability of the reform in Romania.
Prolonged Response of Meningeal Carcinomatosis from Non-small Cell Lung Cancer to Salvage Intrathecal Etoposide Subsequent to Failure of First-Line Methotrexate: A Case Report and Literature Review

Patient: Male, 58 Final Diagnosis: Non-small cell lung cancer with meningeal carcinomatosis Symptoms: Headache Medication: Etoposide Clinical Procedure: Intraventricular chemotherapy Specialty: Oncology Objective: Unusual setting of medical care Background: As the incidence of meningeal carcinomatosis (MC) in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients has been increasing, MC has recently become an important clinical problem in the management of NSCLC. However, development of new treatments is lacking and a standard treatment guideline is not yet available. Research on salvage intrathecal chemotherapy after failure of first-line treatment for NSCLC patients with MC has rarely been reported in the literature. Here, we report the case of an NSCLC patient with MC who showed durable response to salvage intrathecal etoposide subsequent to failure of first-line methotrexate. Case Report: A 58-year-old Asian man with lung adenocarcinoma with bone metastasis presented gait disturbance, diplopia, and progressively increasing headache. The diagnosis of MC was made by brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) cytology. After MC progression was suspected during the first-line treatment of intrathecal MTx, intrathecal etoposide was used as a salvage treatment. Brain MRI performed after 2 months of the treatment demonstrated disappearance of enhancing lesions along the ependymal lining of the lateral ventricles. His clinical status markedly improved from Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 4 to 2. Stable neurologic status was maintained and CSF cytology remained negative while weekly injection of etoposide was continued for 19 weeks. However, hepatic metastatic lesions persistently progressed despite systemic palliative chemotherapy and the patient died of the disease. Conclusions: To our knowledge, this is the first case report in which intrathecal etoposide was successfully used to treat MC from NSCLC after failure of MTx. This case report might provide preliminary evidence of the feasibility of intrathecal etoposide as salvage intrathecal chemotherapy (ITC). Further clinical trials including larger numbers of patients are necessary to evaluate the role of this ITC regimen for NSCLC patients with MC.
Modelling magnetically deformed neutron stars

Rotating deformed neutron stars are important potential sources for ground-based gravitational wave interferometers such as LIGO, GEO600 and VIRGO. One mechanism that may lead to significant non-asymmetries is the internal magnetic field. It is well known that a magnetic star will not be spherical and, if the magnetic axis is not aligned with the spin axis, the deformation will lead to the emission of gravitational waves. The aim of this paper is to develop a formalism that would allow us to model magnetically deformed stars, using both realistic equations of state and field configurations. As a first step, we consider a set of simplified model problems. Focusing on dipolar fields, we determine the internal magnetic field which is consistent with a given neutron star model and calculate the associated deformation. We discuss the relevance of our results for current gravitational wave detectors and future prospects.
GAUR: a method to detect Sybil groups in peer-to-peer overlays

Sybil attack is an important problem as the peer-to-peer networks grow in size and become prominent means for distributing multimedia. In order to validate the feasibility of using psychometric tests as an approach to detect Sybils in their entirety as Sybil groups, an experiment is conducted by taking the tests on a population of considerable size. Selected people were given multiple questionnaires corresponding to multiple identities in the network. The survey data is analysed using DBSCAN clustering algorithm using several metrics. The results show that 75% of the Sybil groups were detected with 67% completeness.
Punctuation Prediction using Linear Chain Conditional Random Fields

We investigate the task of punctuation prediction in English sentences without prosodic information. In our approach, stochastic gradient ascent (SGA) is used to maximize log conditional likelihood when learning the parameters of linear-chain conditional random fields. For SGA, two different approximation techniques, namely Collins perceptron and contrastive divergence, are used to estimate the update step size. We construct 672 feature functions for our punctuation prediction model on a dataset with 70, 115 training examples and 28, 027 test examples. Experimental results show that SGA with Collins perceptron and SGA with contrastive divergence yield 7.11% and 13.89% word level error rate, respectively.