Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Innovation incentives or performance measures for improved innovation practices ? The case of scale-intensive service firms

Purpose: Innovation practices that are client-centric or open paradoxically require simultaneously increased individual autonomy as well as increased managerial control to guarantee alignment between on-going activities and organizational goals. Innovation management theory emphasizes management control and explicit innovation strategies as prerequisites for innovation performance, while theory on service innovation emphasizes individual autonomy and incentives to foster open innovations. In this paper we explore this tension by addressing the research question: How are innovation practices incentivized and controlled to ensure sustained innovation performance?
The dependence of amino acid pair correlations on structural environment

A statistical analysis was performed to determine to what extent an amino acid determines the identity of its neighbors and to what extent this is determined by the structural environment. Log‐linear analysis was used to discriminate chance occurrence from statistically meaningful correlations. The classification of structures was arbitrary, but was also tested for significance. A list of statistically significant interaction types was selected and then ranked according to apparent importance for applications such as protein design. This showed that, in general, nonlocal, through‐space interactions were more important than those between residues near in the protein sequence. The highest ranked nonlocal interactions involved residues in β‐sheet structures. Of the local interactions, those between residues i and i + 2 were the most important in both α‐helices and β‐strands. Some surprisingly strong correlations were discovered within β‐sheets between residues and sites sequentially near to their bridging partners. The results have a clear bearing on protein engineering studies, but also have implications for the construction of knowledge‐based force fields. Proteins 32:175–189, 1998. © 1998 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
The reliability of portable fixed dynamometry during hip and knee strength assessments.

CONTEXT Insufficient lower extremity strength may be a risk factor for lower extremity injuries such as noncontact anterior cruciate ligament tears. Therefore, clinicians need reliable instruments to assess strength deficiencies. OBJECTIVE To assess the intrarater, interrater, intrasession, and intersession reliability of a portable fixed dynamometer in measuring the strength of the hip and knee musculature. DESIGN Crossover study. SETTING Sports medicine research laboratory. PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS Three raters (A, B, C) participated in this 2-phase study. Raters A and B tested 11 healthy college graduate students (2 men, 9 women) in phase 1. Raters A and C tested 26 healthy college undergraduate students (7 men, 19 women) in phase 2. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S) The dependent variables for the study were hip adductor, hip abductor, hip flexor, hip extensor, hip internal rotator, hip external rotator, knee flexor, and knee extensor peak force. RESULTS The phase 1 intrasession intraclass correlation coefficients for sessions 1, 2, and 3 ranged from 0.88 to 0.99 (SEM = 0.08-3.02 N), 0.85 to 0.99 (SEM = 0.26-3.88 N), and 0.92 to 0.96 (SEM = 0.52-2.76 N), respectively. Intraclass correlation coefficients ranged from 0.57 to 0.95 (SEM = 1.72-13.15 N) for phase 1 intersession values, 0.70 to 0.94 (SEM = 1.42-9.20 N) for phase 2 intrarater reliability values, and 0.69 to 0.88 (SEM = 1.20-8.50 N) for phase 2 interrater values. CONCLUSIONS The portable fixed dynamometer showed good to high intrasession and intersession reliability values for hip and knee strength. Intrarater and interrater reliability were fair to high, except for hip internal rotation, which showed poor reliability.
EXPERTISE OF ACTORS: THREE VIEWPOINTS IN ACTING

Anecdotal evidence indicates that highly experienced good actors assume the viewpoint of the character, the actor, and the audience at the same time while acting. This study demonstrated this empirically and compared experienced actors with novice and intermediate actors. Twelve junior expert actors watched and evaluated 6 actors’ performances (2 novice, 2 intermediate, and 2 junior expert actors). Results suggested that novice actors could not assume, intermediate actors inadequately assumed and junior expert actors adequately assumed the three viewpoints while acting. The evidence also suggested that viewpoint of the audience was the most difficult to acquire. The process of gaining expertise and educational implications are discussed.
Laparoscopic partial nephrectomy: the University of Saskatchewan (Regina division) experience.

PURPOSE Open partial nephrectomy (OPN) is now the preferred treatment for most T1a and selected T1b tumours. Laparoscopic partial nephrectomy (LPN), created to reduce the morbidity associated with OPN, is now a viable option when performed by experienced laparoscopic surgeons. We retrospectively review our LPN experience and propose a new parameter, the LPN utilization rate (LPN-UR), defined as the probability of any referred patient with a T1 tumour undergoing LPN before the surgeon's knowledge of its imaging characteristics, to define the role of LPN at our institution. METHODS Between March 2003 and August 2008, 47 consecutive patients underwent LPN for T1 tumours. All patients underwent transient en bloc vascular occlusion of the renal hilum for cold-scissor tumour excisions. Preoperative, intraoperative, postoperative and pathological data were collected. The LPN-URs for 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 were calculated. RESULTS There were 31 nonhilar tumours and 16 hilar tumours. All procedures were completed laparoscopically. Mean tumour size was 3.8 (range 1.5-7.2) cm. Mean operating time was 2.8 (range 1.2-4.5) hours. Mean hospital stay was 5.2 (range 2.0-15.0) days. Mean warm ischemic time (WIT) was 32.7 (range 14.2-50.4) minutes. Six patients (12.8%) received blood transfusions and 1 patient required an emergency nephrectomy for bleeding. One patient developed urinary leakage. One patient developed a late calyceal stricture. Mean postoperative differential renal function was 35%:50%. Median follow-up was 18 months. Pathological examination of all tumours revealed 38/47 (80.9%) malignant tumours with 2 positive surgical margins (4.3%). The LPN-URs for 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 were 50%, 54%, 63% and 93%, respectively, for all T1 tumours. CONCLUSION Laparoscopic partial nephrectomy can be safely performed and used for treatment of most T1 tumours referred to our institution. Long-term follow-up will be required to determine the oncological efficacy of LPN. Every effort should be made to further reduce the WIT. The LPN-UR is a useful parameter for consulting referring physicians and patients.
Evaluating Monitoring Strategies to Detect Precipitation-Induced Microbial Contamination Events in Karstic Springs Used for Drinking Water

Monitoring of microbial drinking water quality is a key component for ensuring safety and understanding risk, but conventional monitoring strategies are typically based on low sampling frequencies (e.g., quarterly or monthly). This is of concern because many drinking water sources, such as karstic springs are often subject to changes in bacterial concentrations on much shorter time scales (e.g., hours to days), for example after precipitation events. Microbial contamination events are crucial from a risk assessment perspective and should therefore be targeted by monitoring strategies to establish both the frequency of their occurrence and the magnitude of bacterial peak concentrations. In this study we used monitoring data from two specific karstic springs. We assessed the performance of conventional monitoring based on historical records and tested a number of alternative strategies based on a high-resolution data set of bacterial concentrations in spring water collected with online flow cytometry (FCM). We quantified the effect of increasing sampling frequency and found that for the specific case studied, at least bi-weekly sampling would be needed to detect precipitation events with a probability of >90%. We then proposed an optimized monitoring strategy with three targeted samples per event, triggered by precipitation measurements. This approach is more effective and efficient than simply increasing overall sampling frequency. It would enable the water utility to (1) analyze any relevant event and (2) limit median underestimation of peak concentrations to approximately 10%. We conclude with a generalized perspective on sampling optimization and argue that the assessment of short-term dynamics causing microbial peak loads initially requires increased sampling/analysis efforts, but can be optimized subsequently to account for limited resources. This offers water utilities and public health authorities systematic ways to evaluate and optimize their current monitoring strategies.
Examination of Type 2 Diabetes Loci Implicates CDKAL1 as a Birth Weight Gene

OBJECTIVE A number of studies have found that reduced birth weight is associated with type 2 diabetes later in life; however, the underlying mechanism for this correlation remains unresolved. Recently, association has been demonstrated between low birth weight and single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) at the CDKAL1 and HHEX-IDE loci, regions that were previously implicated in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes. In order to investigate whether type 2 diabetes risk–conferring alleles associate with low birth weight in our Caucasian childhood cohort, we examined the effects of 20 such loci on this trait. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Using data from an ongoing genome-wide association study in our cohort of 5,465 Caucasian children with recorded birth weights, we investigated the association of the previously reported type 2 diabetes–associated variation at 20 loci including TCF7L2, HHEX-IDE, PPARG, KCNJ11, SLC30A8, IGF2BP2, CDKAL1, CDKN2A/2B, and JAZF1 with birth weight. RESULTS Our data show that the minor allele of rs7756992 (P = 8 × 10−5) at the CDKAL1 locus is strongly associated with lower birth weight, whereas a perfect surrogate for variation previously implicated for the trait at the same locus only yielded nominally significant association (P = 0.01; r2 rs7756992 = 0.677). However, association was not detected with any of the other type 2 diabetes loci studied. CONCLUSIONS We observe association between lower birth weight and type 2 diabetes risk–conferring alleles at the CDKAL1 locus. Our data show that the same genetic locus that has been identified as a marker for type 2 diabetes in previous studies also influences birth weight.
From Neurons to Circuits: Linear Estimation of Local Field Potentials

Extracellular physiological recordings are typically separated into two frequency bands: local field potentials (LFPs) (a circuit property) and spiking multiunit activity (MUA). Recently, there has been increased interest in LFPs because of their correlation with functional magnetic resonance imaging blood oxygenation level-dependent measurements and the possibility of studying local processing and neuronal synchrony. To further understand the biophysical origin of LFPs, we asked whether it is possible to estimate their time course based on the spiking activity from the same electrode or nearby electrodes. We used “signal estimation theory” to show that a linear filter operation on the activity of one or a few neurons can explain a significant fraction of the LFP time course in the macaque monkey primary visual cortex. The linear filter used to estimate the LFPs had a stereotypical shape characterized by a sharp downstroke at negative time lags and a slower positive upstroke for positive time lags. The filter was similar across different neocortical regions and behavioral conditions, including spontaneous activity and visual stimulation. The estimations had a spatial resolution of ∼1 mm and a temporal resolution of ∼200 ms. By considering a causal filter, we observed a temporal asymmetry such that the positive time lags in the filter contributed more to the LFP estimation than the negative time lags. Additionally, we showed that spikes occurring within ∼10 ms of spikes from nearby neurons yielded better estimation accuracies than nonsynchronous spikes. In summary, our results suggest that at least some circuit-level local properties of the field potentials can be predicted from the activity of one or a few neurons.
Achievement, Gender and the Single-Sex/Coed Debate

This paper explores the gender differences in achievements at a variety of levels in secondary schools in New Zealand. Gender differences are shown in relation to English, mathematics and science, but the pattern is not consistent across year levels in the senior school. The relative achievements of girls in single-sex and coeducational schools are explored in detail, with careful controls for the student population differences at the two types of school. When such controls are exercised, the apparent differences between the two types of school reduce to non-significance. Data from a longitudinal study of 37 schools and from the Ministry of Education national database are used.
Agent communication in ubiquitous computing: the Ubismart approach

A vehicle tire has a radial carcass and a reinforced crown and the tire beads each comprise at least one beadwire surmounted by a filler strip whose cross-section is broadly tapered towards the side-wall and which is made of a rubbery mixture reinforced with short fibres. According to the invention, the fibres reinforcing the filler strip are, at least in part, orientated in the radial direction of the tire so that the mixture used for the strip has a ratio of anisotropy at least equal to 2:1. The filler strip may rise up the side wall to a height of between 0.2 and 0.5 times the cross-sectional height of the tire.
Measurement of midregional proadrenomedullin in plasma with an immunoluminometric assay.

BACKGROUND Adrenomedullin (ADM) is a potent vasodilatory peptide, and circulating concentrations have been described for several disease states, including dysfunction of the cardiovascular system and sepsis. Reliable quantification has been hampered by the short half-life, the existence of a binding protein, and physical properties. Here we report the technical evaluation of an assay for midregional pro-ADM (MR-proADM) that does not have these problems. METHODS MR-proADM was measured in a sandwich immunoluminometric assay using 2 polyclonal antibodies to amino acids 45-92 of proADM. The reference interval was defined in EDTA plasma of 264 healthy individuals (117 male, 147 female), and increased MR-proADM concentrations were found in 95 patients with sepsis and 54 patients with cardiovascular disease. RESULTS The assay has an analytical detection limit of 0.08 nmol/L, and the interassay CV was <20% for values >0.12 nmol/L. The assay was linear on dilution with undisturbed recovery of the analyte. EDTA-, heparin-, and citrate-plasma samples were stable (<20% loss of analyte) for at least 3 days at room temperature, 14 days at 4 degrees C, and 1 year at -20 degrees C. MR-proADM values followed a gaussian distribution in healthy individuals with a mean (SD) of 0.33 (0.07) nmol/L (range, 0.10-0.64 nmol/L), without significant difference between males or females. The correlation coefficient for MR-proADM vs age was 0.50 (P < 0.001). MR-proADM was significantly (P < 0.001) increased in patients with cardiovascular disease [median (range), 0.56 (0.08-3.9) nmol/L] and patients with sepsis [3.7 (0.72-25.4) nmol/L]. CONCLUSIONS MR-proADM is stable in plasma of healthy individuals and patients. MR-proADM measurements may be useful for evaluating patients with sepsis, systemic inflammation, or heart failure.
The Mass-Count Distinction: Acquisition and Disambiguation

At least in the realm of fast parsing, the masscount distinction has led the life of a wallflower. We argue in this paper that this should not be so. In particular, we argue, both theoretical linguistics and computational linguistics can gain by a corpus-based investigation of this distinction: Computational linguists get more accurate parses; the knowledge extracted from these parses becomes more reliable; theoretical linguists are presented with new data in a field that has been intensely discussed and yet remains in a state that is not satisfactory from a practical point of view.
Visualizing Host-Nation Sentiment at the Tactical Edge

Abstract : Measures of sentiment can help refine a Warfighter's knowledge and understanding of an unfamiliar operational environment, for example, the sentiment of civilians and insurgents to the Army, its operations, or its adversaries. In addition, observing changes in expressed sentiment about topics over time may provide baselines from which to detect if and when important shifts in attitude occur triggering further investigation. The paper discusses new visualization techniques for displaying sentiment offered by social media analysis platforms currently under development by the Army. The sentiment analysis capabilities of these platforms were tested within the realistic military conditions of the C4ISR OTM field exercise using an operational scenario composed of diversified data sources including social media content. A human subjects experiment is planned for more fine-grained testing to better understand the advantages offered by different visualization approaches to sentiment analysis. shift is under way in recent military operations from standard, kinetic warfare to stability, security, transition and reconstruction (SSTR) operations. There is growing recognition that new information sources and text processing techniques are needed by the intelligence community to understand the socio-cultural landscape of an area of operations. To meet this emerging need, OSD and ARL are making significant investments in purposefully funding and managing the development of SM analysis platforms with sentiment analysis and topic trending capabilities. Two SM analysis platforms currently under development, MiNPAC and MIST, extract and visually present social sentiment themes from large datasets. MiNPAC provides measures of author based sentiment how positive/negative are their communications to the public; while MIST provides community measures of sentiment how community members feel about their leaders in reference to topics of concern
Memory of dental experiences as related to naturally occurring changes in state anxiety

Abstract In a study designed to explore the relevance of anxious mood on recall, patients about to see their dentist were asked to complete questionnaires measuring their anxiety before and after the appointment. The patients were also asked to describe a previous visit, but half were given this task before the appointment—when their state anxiety was high—and half afterwards—when their state anxiety had declined. Female patients rated the recalled experience as being significantly more unpleasant before the appointment than afterwards, a result not shown by the males. A judge's ratings of the descriptions indicated similar effects for vividness, but not for procedures, sensations or dentist's behaviour. The results support the notion that anxious mood can affect the description of previous experiences.
Proteomic insights into the maturation and capacitation of mammalian spermatozoa

Spermatozoa represent the epitome of terminally differentiated, highly specialized cells. They are transcriptionally and translationally silent and yet manage to undergo a complete functional transformation after they leave the testes, entirely fuelled by post-translational modifications occurring during epididymal maturation and capacitation. The latter have been recognized as biological processes for more than half a century. However, the biochemical mechanisms that drive these events have remained elusive, as have the pathological mechanisms that lead to defective sperm function and infertility. In the past decade the combined power of advanced proteomics, biochemistry, and functional genomics has permitted an unprecedented improvement in our understanding of sperm cell biology. We can also predict that a systems-biology approach, in concert with the new tools provided by the ‘omics’ revolution, will lead to dramatic gains in our understanding in the near future. As a result of such advances, insights will be generated that should ultimately lead to significant improvements in our capacity to diagnose and treat the infertile male.
Consumer credit, debt poverty and counselling: the Australian experience

petition to be declared legally bankrupt in the city of Melbourne, Australia. It also briefly outlines, in the context of the results of this study, a course on financial problems developed for social work students, designed to (1) acquaint them with the realities of financial problems for their clients, and (2) provide them with the skills and knowledge to assist their indebted clients. Such a course could readily be adapted for use in other countries.
Spinal and cutaneous schwannomatosis is a variant form of type 2 neurofibromatosis: a clinical and molecular study.

OBJECTIVE: To delineate the clinical phenotype, molecular basis, and implications for screening in patients and families with multiple schwannomas not generally involving the cranium. METHODS: As part of a United Kingdom clinical and genetic study of type 2 neurofibromatosis (NF2) patients and families with multiple schwannomas who do not fulfil diagnostic criteria for NF2 have been identified. The clinical phenotype was studied in the extended families and molecular analysis was carried out at the NF2 gene locus on chromosome 22. RESULTS: Patterns of inheritance in five families with schwannomatosis are consistent with inheritance of an autosomal dominant gene. The consistency of phenotype, with relative sparing of the cranium, is constant in these families. However, families which initially seem to be indicative of schwannomatosis may develop into classic NF2 as shown by a sixth family. Many of the tumours found in these families were referred to as "neurofibroma" when they were clearly schwannomas. This difference in classification has major implications for the relative risk of each particular type of neurofibromatosis and neuropathological review may be important in some cases. Genetic linkage analysis in the two largest families is entirely consistent with primary involvement of the NF2 gene. CONCLUSIONS: Variant forms of neurofibromatosis have presented a dilemma in classification and determination of recurrence risks in families. Previous reports have suggested that schwannomatosis is a sporadic non-hereditary condition. Patients with multiple schwannomas are likely to have a variant form of NF2 and up to a 50% risk of passing on a gene predisposing to multiple schwannoma.
Novel non-isolated DC-DC converter using high frequency transformer

This paper presents design and analysis of a non-isolated, high voltage gain dc-dc converter, This converter is compared with two such topologies namely coupled inductor-switched capacitor boost converter and coupled inductor boost converter The proposed converter is designed using a high frequency transformer which combine both electrical and magnetic coupling, hence the converter is said to be non-isolated. The transformer provides hybrid switching technique which combines both conventional linear PWM and traditional resonant conversion. The transformer transfers the inductive and capacitive energy simultaneously to increase the voltage gain of the converter and decreases the size of the magnetic component. Switching losses of the proposed converter is reduced by incorporating the resonant mode, thereby increasing the efficiency. The voltage stress of all the devices are also reduced.