Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Letter to U.S. FDA Commissioner

An important new long-term animal feeding study, published in Environmental Health Perspectives, from the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Center at the European Ramazzini Foundation of Oncology and Environmental Sciences in Italy, raises anew serious questions about the safety of the artificial sweetener aspartame.1 Dose-dependent increases in total malignant tumors, lymphomas/leukemias, and mammary carcinomas were observed in male and/ or female rats. At the higher dosage level, the increases were statistically significant for lymphomas/ leukemias in both male and female rats, mammary carcinomas in females, and tumor-bearing males. Nonsignifican t increases were observed at the higher dosage for total tumors in males and females and for mammary carcinomas in males and at the lower dosage for total tumors in females, lymphomas/leukemias in males and females, and mammary carcinomas in females. Those non-significant increases would tend to elevate the dose-response trend. The new study follows up on a study from the same laboratory, but is more sensitive because the rats were exposed to aspartame in utero; in the earlier study the rats were not fed aspartame un til they were 8 weeks old. In the new study, groups of animals were exposed from the 12th day in utero to aspartame at levels of 0, 20, or 100 mg/kg bw/day (mg/kg) administered to the pregnant dams and, after weaning, to the animals through their feed. The previous study used those and several additional dosages (4; 500; 2,500; 5,000 mg/kg). 2 That study found statistically significant increased incidences of leukemias/lymphomas in both male and female rats, malignant schwannomas of peripheral nerves in males, and transitional-cell carcinomas of the renal pelvis and ureter and their precursors (dysplasias) in females. Additionally, a few uncommonly occurring brain tumors occurred only in aspartametreated animals. The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) reviewed the study and concluded for various reasons that aspartame was not demonstrated to be carcinogenic.3 While EFSA's rationale may be debated, it must be reconsidered due to the results of the new study. To put the doses used in the study in context, consider that the acceptable daily intake of aspartame in the United States is 50 mg/kg. The 20 mg/kg dose is equivalent to a 50pound child's drinking about 2/2 cans of soda per day and a 150pound adult's drinking about 7/2 cans of soda per day (assuming 175 mg per 12-ounce serving of beverage). 4 The higher dose is equivalent to about 12/2 and 37/2 cans of soda per day. * The lower dose is something that about 5% of American teenagers actually consume.5 Obviously, few people drink the larger amounts of aspartame-sweetened soda, but one must presume that lower levels of consumption would lead to increased, but proportionately lower, cancer risks. Of course, increasing exposure to aspartame is
The Nuclear δB Isoform of Ca2+/Calmodulin-dependent Protein Kinase II Regulates Atrial Natriuretic Factor Gene Expression in Ventricular Myocytes*

Cultured neonatal ventricular myocytes display features of myocardial hypertrophy including increased cell size, myofilament organization, and reexpression of the embryonic gene for atrial natriuretic factor (ANF). KN-93, an inhibitor of multifunctional Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase (CaM kinase II), blocked the induction of these responses by the α1-adrenergic receptor agonist phenylephrine, whereas its inactive analog KN-92 did not. To directly determine whether CaM kinase II could regulate ANF gene expression, we transiently expressed each of three isoforms of CaM kinase II (α, δB, and δC) along with an ANF promoter/luciferase reporter gene. The δB isoform markedly increased luciferase gene expression, whereas comparable levels of the δC and α isoforms were ineffective. Expression of δB-CaM kinase II also potentiated phenylephrine-mediated ANF gene expression, and this effect was blocked by KN-93 but not by KN-92. The ability of δB-CaM kinase II to transactivate a truncated ANF promoter, containing a serum response element (SRE) required for phenylephrine-inducible gene expression, was lost when this SRE was mutated. The δB isoform of CaM kinase II has been shown to exhibit nuclear localization. Coexpression of the non-nuclear δC or α isoforms, which can form multimers with the δB isoform, prevented the nuclear localization of δB-CaM kinase II and also blocked its effects on ANF reporter gene and protein expression. In addition, a chimeric α-CaM kinase II which contains the nuclear localization signal of the δB isoform was able to induce ANF reporter gene expression, albeit to a lesser extent than δB-CaM kinase II. These data are the first to assign a function to the δB isoform of CaM kinase II and to link its nuclear localization to subsequent activation of cardiac gene expression.
Aspect-oriented middleware framework for resolving service discovery issues in Internet of Things

Internet of Things IoT is a model of future internet and pervasive computing which have its own challenges derived from the internet in terms of scalability, undefined topology and so on. The proposed work aims to resolve the challenges posed by IoT in service discovery functionality. Considering the pervasive and context dependent nature of IoT the planned work bases its development strategy using an aspect oriented software development methodology. The novelty lies in achieving high degree configuration and customisability by selecting subset of middleware functionality depending on the need. The performance is compared with MUSIC pervasive computing middleware and Android built-in configuration. The result reveals 6.5% decrease on average boot up and reconfiguration time for smart phones and 11.6% percentage decrease in Android tablets. In the context of boot up and reconfiguration time the middleware brings out 5% decrease for smart phones and 3% for Android tablets when compared with MUSIC middleware. The middleware shows 6.3% and 4% reduction in execution time of applications on smart phones and tablets when assessed with MUSIC middleware.
Is there Long-Run Equilibrium in the House Prices of Australian Capital Cities?

In order to explore the long-run equilibrium in the house prices of different cities, studies on house price convergence have been conducted by a number of researchers. However, the majority of previous studies have neglected the effects of spatial heterogeneity and autocorrelation on house prices. This research improves on the investigation of house price convergence by developing a spatio-temporal autoregressive model based on a framework of panel regression methods. Both spatial heterogeneity and autocorrelation of house prices in different cities are taken into account. Geographical distance and the scale of development of the urban housing market are used to construct temporal varying spatial measurements. The spatio-temporal model is then applied to investigate the long-run equilibrium in the house prices of Australian capital cities. The results confirm that house prices in Sydney approach a steady state in the long run, whereas house prices in Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne and Perth are able to do with lower confidence. However, little evidence supports the existence of long-run equilibrium in the house prices of Adelaide, Darwin and Hobart.
Housing Bubbles and the Consumer Price Index: A Proposal for a Better Inflation Indicator

The Bank of Canada needs a better inflation indicator that is more sensitive to swings in house prices than the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The author points out that the CPI has not usefully reflected the rapid run-up in housing prices in recent years. He proposes a new official inflation indicator for monetary policy purposes that would better reflect the prices of houses sold in the market. The use of assumed prices for dwellings rather than actual prices for houses and the inclusion of a mortgage interest component make the CPI less sensitive than otherwise to housing price changes. The main concern is that the CPI's insensitivity to housing could potentially cause the central bank - reassured by its imperfect indicator that inflation is under control - to keep rates too low for too long.
Understanding the Risk-Return Relation: The Aggregate Wealth Proxy Actually Matters

ABSTRACT The ICAPM implies that the market’s conditional expected return is proportional to its conditional variance and that the reward-to-risk ratio equals the representative investor’s coefficient of relative risk aversion. Prior studies examine this relation using the stock market to proxy for aggregate wealth and find mixed results. We show, however, that stock-based tests suffer from low power and lead to biased estimates of the risk-return tradeoff when stocks are an imperfect market proxy. Tests designed to mitigate this bias by incorporating a more comprehensive measure of aggregate wealth produce large, positive estimates of the risk-aversion coefficient around seven to nine. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.
P2Y12 Receptor Modulates Sepsis-Induced Inflammation

Objective—Platelets modulate hemostasis and immune responses via interactions with immune cells through secretion of immunemodulators and cell–cell interactions. The P2Y12 receptor mediates ADP-induced aggregation and secretion in platelets. Approach and Results—Using a mouse model of intra-abdominal sepsis and acute lung injury, we investigated the role of the P2Y12 receptor in neutrophil migration and lung inflammation in P2Y12 null mice and in mice pretreated with the P2Y12 antagonist clopidogrel. Our data show a decrease in circulating white blood cells and a decrease in platelet activation and platelet–leukocyte interactions in treated mice compared with untreated mice. Additionally, lung injury and platelet sequestration were diminished in clopidogrel-treated mice compared with their untreated septic littermates. Similar results were observed in P2Y12 null mice: platelet activation and platelet–leukocyte aggregates were decreased in septic P2Y12 null mice compared with wild-type mice. P2Y12 null mice were refractory to lung injury compared with wild-type mice. Finally, to evaluate P2Y12-independent effects of clopidogrel, we pretreated P2Y12 null mice. Interestingly, the number of circulating neutrophils was reduced in treated septic P2Y12 null mice, suggesting neutrophils as a target for clopidogrel pleiotropic effects. No difference was observed in P2Y1 null mice during sepsis, indicating that the P2Y12 receptor is responsible for the effects. Conclusions—P2Y12 null mice are refractory to sepsis-induced lung injury, suggesting a key role for activated platelets and the P2Y12 receptor during sepsis.
Investigating Commonalities and Changes in Labor and Financial Relations in East Asia

This paper contributes to the discussion on East Asian capitalism as a distinct and path dependent economic model. Taking the discussion on the “varieties of capitalism” (VoC) as a departure point, we distinguish East Asian capitalism from Anglo-American liberal market economies and European coordinated market economies. We show that the core East Asian capitalist countries Japan, Korea and China follow a coordinated approach in business-finance relations, while business-labor affairs remain largely uncoordinated. These findings identify some limitations of the classic VoC approach, which is based on the dichotomy of the liberal and the 493
Projective Clustering Using Neural Networks with Adaptive Delay and Signal Transmission Loss

We develop a new neural network architecture for projective clustering of data sets that incorporates adaptive transmission delays and signal transmission information loss. The resultant selective output signaling mechanism does not require the addition of multiple hidden layers but instead is based on the assumption that the signal transmission velocity between input processing neurons and clustering neurons is proportional to the similarity between the input pattern and the feature vector (the top-down weights) of the clustering neuron. The mathematical model governing the evolution of the signal transmission delay, the short-term memory traces, and the long-term memory traces represents a new class of large-scale delay differential equations where the evolution of the delay is described by a nonlinear differential equation involving the similarity measure already noted. We give a complete description of the computational performance of the network for a wide range of parameter values.
When Knowing Leads to NOT Doing: Reasoning as evidence of TPCK

Teachers need to know how to use new technologies in ways that support powerful learning experiences for students. This knowledge, known as Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPCK), is challenging to measure. This paper explores the use of scenarios to illuminate the ways in which teachers reason about technology use. This example suggests that scenario-based measures hold promise for uncovering teachers’ application of professional judgment to questions of classroom technology use, even in situations with low technology access. The results illuminate the importance of considering whether high TPCK may in some cases result in a decision not to use technology with students.
Policy properties and political influence in post-delegation: the case of EU agencies

The literature on EU agencies has examined the issue of political control and independence in EU agency design and in post-delegation. However, studies measuring and providing accounts for the political influence that the Commission, the member states and the European Parliament exert in decision-making across a wide sample of EU agencies are missing in the specialized literature. This article addresses this topic and poses the following questions: How influential is each of the main parent institutional actors on agency boards' decision-making? Do agency powers and policy properties affect political influence? Based on an online survey, documentary analysis and semi-structured interviews, this article combines a quantitative and a qualitative study identifying differentiated patterns of political influence by supranational and intergovernmental actors. Regulatory functions and saliency decrease the leverage of the Commission and the European Parliament, whereas complexity decreases the influence of the member states. Moreover, highly centralized and far-reaching regulatory activity affects institutional balances in post-delegation. Points for practitioners The article is of interest to practitioners concerned with the issue of political control and the independence of EU specialized agencies. The article identifies certain conditions under which political influence by the main parent institutional actors on the boards of EU agencies is diminished. More specifically, the Commission and the European Parliament are less influential on the boards of salient and regulatory agencies, whereas the member states have reduced leverage on the boards of agencies undertaking highly complex activities. Agency policy properties affect the political influence of institutional actors unevenly depending on whether it is exercised by supranational or intergovernmental actors.
Inhibition of Babesia divergens in cattle by oxytetracycline

The effects of continuous oxytetracycline administration on the development of parasitaemia of Babesia divergens during both natural and artificial infections were studied. During natural exposure on grazing heavily infested with Ixodes ricinus, seven out of 42 cattle with no previous exposure to tick-borne diseases were injected every four days with a long acting preparation of oxytetracycline at a dose rate of 20 mg/kg. During the six week grazing period 21 untreated cattle developed a patent parasitaemia of B divergens and all became seropositive by the fluorescent antibody test. In contrast, no parasites were observed in treated cattle and antibody titres remained low. Artificial infections were studied with different dose levels of oxytetracycline and their effects on antibody stimulation noted. First, four groups of cows were infected with 10(8) erythrocytes infected with B divergens, three groups being injected every four days with the long acting oxytetracycline formulation at dose levels of 20, 10 and 5 mg/kg, respectively. The highest level completely inhibited parasite replication and antibody formation; the same was observed in one animal dosed at 10 mg/kg but the remainder, plus those treated at 5 mg/kg, developed both low parasitaemia and high antibody titres. The untreated cows developed severe babesiosis. A further untreated control group was added and three weeks after cessation of oxytetracycline treatment all were infected with 10(9) erythrocytes infected with a homologous isolate of B divergens. The controls, plus those in which the previous infection had been completely inhibited, developed severe clinical babesiosis but the remainder were refractory to parasite development.
Growth Kinetics of Thiobacillus thiooxidans on the Surface of Elemental Sulfur

The growth kinetics of Thiobacillus thiooxidans on elemental sulfur in batch cultures at 30(deg)C and pH 1.5 was studied by measuring the time courses of the concentration of adsorbed cells on sulfur, the concentration of free cells suspended in liquid medium, and the amount of sulfur oxidized. As the elemental sulfur was oxidized to sulfate ions, the surface concentration of adsorbed cells per unit mass of sulfur approached a maximum value (maximum adsorption capacity of sulfur particles) whereas the concentration of free cells continued to increase with time. There was a close relationship between the concentrations of free and adsorbed cells during the microbial sulfur oxidation, and the two cell concentrations were well correlated by the Langmuir isotherm with adsorption equilibrium constant K(infA) and maximum adsorption capacity X(infAm) of 2.10 x 10(sup-9) ml per cell and 4.57 x 10(sup10) cells per g, respectively. The total concentration of free and adsorbed cells increased in parallel with the amount of sulfate formed. The total growth on elemental sulfur gave a characteristic growth curve in which a linear-growth phase followed the period of an initial exponential phase. The batch rate data collected under a wide variety of inoculum levels (about 10(sup5) to 10(sup8) cells per ml) were consistent with a kinetic model assuming that the growth rate of adsorbed bacteria is proportional to the product of the concentration, X(infA), of adsorbed cells and the fraction, (theta)(infV), of adsorption sites unoccupied by cells. The kinetic and stoichiometric parameters appearing in the model were estimated from the experimental data, and the specific growth rate, (mu)(infA), and growth yield, Y(infA), were 2.58 day(sup-1) and 2.05 x 10(sup11) cells per g, respectively. The proposed model and the parameter values allowed us to predict quantitatively the surface attachment of T. thiooxidans cells on elemental sulfur and the bacterial growth in both initial exponential and subsequent linear phases. The transition from exponential to linear growth was a result of two competing factors: an increase in the adsorbed-cell concentration, X(infA), permitted a decrease in the unoccupied-site fraction, (theta)(infV).
Potentiation of ATP calcium responses by A2B receptor stimulation and other signals coupled to Gs proteins in type‐1 cerebellar astrocytes

We have studied the interaction between P1 and P2 purinoceptors in purified type‐1 astrocyte cultures from postnatal days 7–8 rat cerebella using single cell microfluorimetry with fura‐2. The stimulation of astrocytes with ATP elicits rapid [Ca2+]i transients showing an EC50 value of 7.9 ± 0.3 μM. Costimulation of type‐1 astrocytes with adenosine and ineffective ATP concentrations (0.1 or 1 μM) evoked [Ca2+]i transients that correspond to 60% of the maximal ATP response. NECA (5′‐N‐ethylcarboxamidoadenosine) was the only agonist that mimicked the adenosine effect and showed an EC50 value of 0.17 ± 0.01 μM. This value was identical to that obtained for the cAMP production stimulation, indicating that A2B receptors coupled to adenylate cyclase activation were involved. The presence of A2B adenosine receptors was also confirmed by immocytochemistry experiments. When astrocytes were costimulated with isoproterenol and ineffective ATP concentrations similar [Ca2+]i transients were observed. The treatment of astrocytes with cholera toxin potentiated ATP calcium signals, lowering the EC50 value for ATP to 1.5 ± 0.2 μM. However, the pretreatment of cells with forskolin or a permeable cAMP analogue had no effect on ATP calcium responses. These results indicated that the potentiation mechanism was elicited before the adenylate cyclase activation. We could conclude that in type‐1 astrocytes, the activation of A2B adenosine receptors or other signals positively coupled to adenylate cyclase stimulation strongly potentiate metabotropic calcium responses to ATP. The potentiation was parallel but independent on cAMP accumulation suggesting the involvement of βγ subunits released after Gs stimulation. GLIA26:119–128, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Mandatory Requirements, Voluntary Rules and 'Please Explain': A Corporate Governance Quagmire

This article characterises Australia's corporate governance regime as a hybrid blend of mandatory requirements, voluntary rules and a regime whereby if guidelines are not followed then an explanation is expected to be given. Mandatory rules may offer stronger protections to investors, but they are inherently inflexible and not appropriate for all companies. Voluntary rules, on the other hand, raise questions of compliance. This article analyses the present regime and the widening role of 'black letter' law after recent corporate collapses.
Business Intelligence Maturity Models: An Overview

In order to identify and explore the strengths and weaknesses of business intelligence (BI) initiatives, managers need to assess the maturity of their BI efforts. For this, a wide range of maturity models has been developed. In this paper, we present an overview of BI maturity models and elaborate their methodical and conceptual characteristics. This overview helps to understand the topic of BI maturity and can be used to guide the selection of an appropriate BI maturity model.
Domestic and Political Lives of Classic Maya Elites: The Excavation of Rapidly Abandoned Structures at Aguateca, Guatemala

The Aguateca Archaeological Project conducted extensive excavations of elite residences at the Maya center of Aguateca, which was attacked by enemies and abandoned rapidly at the end of the Classic period. Burned buildings contained rich floor assemblages, providing extraordinary information on the domestic and political lives of Classic Maya elites. Each elite residence served for a wide range of domestic work, including the storage, preparation, and consumption of food, with a relatively clear division of male and female spaces. These patterns suggest that each of the excavated elite residences was occupied by a relatively small group, which constituted an important economic and social unit. In addition, elite residences were arenas where crucial processes of the operation of the polity and court unfolded through political gatherings, artistic production, and displays of power.