Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Experimental Infection in Cats with a cagA+ Human Isolate of Helicobacter pylori

Helicobacter pylori has been cultured from the inflamed gastric mucosa of naturally and experimentally‐infected cats. The lesions in the H. pylori‐infected cat stomach mimic many of the features seen in human stomachs infected with H. pylori. This study sought to determine whether H. pylori‐negative, specific pathogen‐free cats with normal gastric mucosa were susceptible to colonization with a human cagA+ strain of H. pylori, and whether gastritis developed after infections.
Sacroiliac Joint Dysfunction: Evaluation and Management

Sacroiliac joint dysfunction is believed to be a significant source of low back and posterior pelvic pain. Methods:To assess the clinical presentation, diagnostic testing, and treatment options for sacroiliac joint dysfunction, a systematic literature review was performed using MEDLINE. Results:Presently, there are no widely accepted guidelines in the literature for the diagnosis and treatment of sacroiliac instability. Establishing management guidelines for this disorder has been complicated by the large spectrum of different etiologic factors, the variability of patient history and clinical symptoms, limited availability of objective testing, and incomplete understanding of the biomechanics of the sacroiliac joint. Conclusions:A reliable examination technique to identify the sacroiliac joint as a source of low back pain seems to be pain relief following a radiologically guided injection of a local anaesthetic into the sacroiliac joint. Most patients respond to non-operative treatment. Patients who do not respond to non-operative treatment should be considered for operative sacroiliac joint stabilization.
High–throughput automated platform for nuclear magnetic resonance–based structural proteomics

The development of new systems and strategies capable of synthesizing any desired soluble, labeled protein or protein fragment on a preparative scale is one of the most important tasks in biotechnology today. The Center for Eukaryotic Structural Genomics (WI, USA), in co-operation with Ehime University (Matsuyama, Japan) and CellFree Sciences Co., Ltd, has developed an automated platform for nuclear magnetic resonance-based structural proteomics that employs wheat germ extracts for cell-free production of labeled protein. The platform utilizes a single construct for all targets without any redesign of the DNA or RNA. Therefore, it offers advantages over commercial cell-free methods utilizing Escherichia coli extracts that require multiple constructs or redesign of the open reading frame. The protein production and labeling protocol is no more costly than E. coli cell-based approaches, is robust and scalable for high-throughput applications. This protocol has been used in the authors’ center to screen eukaryotic open reading frames from the Arabidopsis thaliana and human genomes and for the determination of nuclear magnetic resonance structures. With the recent addition of the GeneDecoder 1000™ (CellFree Sciences Co., Ltd) robotic system, the Center for Eukaryotic Structural Genomics is able to carry out as many as 384 small-scale (50 µl) screening reactions per week. Furthermore, the Protemist™ (CellFree Sciences Co., Ltd) robotic system enables the Center for Eukaryotic Structural Genomics to carry out 16 production-scale (4 ml) reactions per week. Utilization of this automated platform technology to screen targets for expression and solubility and to produce stable isotope-labeled samples for nuclear magnetic resonance structure determinations is discussed.
Forecasting oil price movements: Exploiting the information in the futures market

Relying on the cost of carry model, the long‐run relationship between spot and futures prices is investigated and the information implied in these cointegrating relationships is used to forecast out of sample oil spot and futures price movements. To forecast oil price movements, a vector error correction model (VECM) is employed, where the deviations from the long‐run relationships between spot and futures prices constitute the equilibrium error. To evaluate forecasting performance, the random walk model (RWM) is used as a benchmark. It was found that (a) in‐sample, the information in the futures market can explain a sizable portion of oil price movements; and (b) out‐of‐sample, the VECM outperforms the RWM in forecasting price movements of 1‐month futures contracts. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 28:34–56, 2008
Outlet Types and the Canadian Consumer Price Index

Recent phenomenal growth in popularity of large warehouse/discount stores has important implications for price measurement. Consumer substitution to such outlets could produce a bias in consumer price indexes (CPIs), which may be exacerbated by unrepresentative sampling and discount outlets" apparent slower rates of price increases. It is shown that in 1990-96 unit value indexes rose at a lower rate than the corresponding Canadian CPI subaggregate indexes for other household equipment, non-prescribed medicines, and audio equipment, and biases arising from unrepresentative sampling and differential rates of price increases across outlets have resulted in an additional overstatement for these subaggregates.
Tourism market segmentation in Iran

This study was a prototype segmentation of Iran's inbound tourism market with a concentration on culture. The focus of this paper was to introduce a step by step description of the methodology used to segment Iran's inbound tourism market. In the first phase, cluster analysis was employed to segment the entire market based on two dimensions of tourists' expenditure and cultural traits. In the second phase, the resulting clusters were divided into further subgroups using a common sense approach. Additional variables were utilised to profile the segments, and finally, the segmentation process was verified through outcome analysis. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Compositionality for perceptual classification

We compare three approaches to compositional semantics for words that are modeled (in part) using perceptual classiﬁers: ”meanings as sets”, ”meanings as transparent functions”, and ”mean-ings as opaque functions”. The approaches are evaluated according to whether they fulﬁll a set of desiderata, including dealing with non-intersective compositionality, working with state of the art classiﬁers, and accounting for learning of perceptual meanings. We ﬁnd that none of the current approaches fulﬁll all our desiderata.
A basis for cones

Why do the human cones have the spectral sensitivities they do? We hypothesize that they may have evolved to their present form because their sensitivities are optimal in terms of their ability to recover the spectrum of incident light. As evidence in favor of this hypothesis, we compare the accuracy with which the incoming spectrum can be approximated by a three-dimensional linear model based on the cone responses and compare this to the optimal approximations defined by models based on principal components analysis, independent component analysis, non-negative matrix factorization and non-negative independent component analysis. We introduce a new method of reconstructing spectra from the cone responses and show that the cones are almost as good as these optimal methods in estimating the spectrum.
Editorial: Social Enterprise – At the Forefront of Rethinking Business?

The most recent edition of the Harvard Business Review (January–February, 2011) has a new ‘Big Idea’ – creating ‘shared value’ (Porter and Kramer 2011). In an entire edition dedicated to the challenging task of ‘fixing capitalism’, this is, perhaps, the central contribution. Inherent in this radical view of the new frontier of firm behaviour is a recognition that the opportunities and challenges for business going forward are increasingly determined by the sort of factors that were once consigned to a subsidiary position in strategic planning as contextual or risk factors lying behind more critical issues of competitive market analysis. These factors were typically framed as macro-level trends and issues summarized by the acronym PESTLE (or Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal, and Environmental). Many of the interfaces between business and its social and environmental contexts were dismissed from economic modelling – and, therefore, much business planning – as representing ‘externalities’ that lay beyond the proper boundaries of the firm and its core activities, despite lip service being paid from time to time to the notion of a ‘triple bottom line’ (Elkington 2001). The argument for a ‘shared value’ strategy put forward by Porter and Kramer acknowledges, at least in part, that what were formerly externalities are increasingly ‘internalities’ that effect business performance as a product of regulatory or cultural shifts in their core markets. Furthermore, the authors craft a new set of market opportunities – particularly in terms of re-imagined value and supply chains – that offer pro-active market opportunities as much as defensive strategies to protect the bottom line. The discernable shift is towards re-embedding corporate activity in a deeper social and environmental context as competitive strategy. To some extent these ideas build upon other recent business practice that has explored the boundaries of the firm, for example: the (often untested) logics of Bottom of the Pyramid market opportunities (Prahalad 2004); recent innovations in foreign direct investment in Africa; and the drive towards ‘Impact’ Investing as a new asset class (Freireich and Fulton 2009). Journal of Social Entrepreneurship Vol. 2, No. 1, 1–5, March 2011
The quality movement: Where are you going?

The aim of this article is to reflect on the evolution of total quality management (TQM) as the most widespread quality management approach during the last 25 years. However, during the first 10 years of the new millennium, the term TQM seems to have lost its attractiveness in Western parts of the world and instead new terms such as Business Excellence, Organisational Excellence, Six Sigma, and Lean seem to have overtaken the position even though the contents of these new terms can be understood within the framework of TQM. Through a literature survey the author reflects on the current status of the quality movement. Furthermore, the role of Japan is analysed under the term of ‘Japanese morphogenesis’ with an attached meaning of learning, renewing and improving ability. When the Japanese morphogenesis has been identified, the identified pattern is adopted as a framework for identifying and analysing the Western morphogenesis. By searching the underlying cognitive structures, and with an application of the identified morphogenesis in the history of quality management, it is possible to understand how Japan achieved the position of a world leader in quality, and also to understand ‘the lost decades’ from the beginning of the 1990s until today when the interest for TQM diminished. As a continuation of the previous research [Dahlgaard-Park, S.M. (1999). The evolution patterns of quality management, Total Quality Management, 10(4 and 5), 465–472; Dahlgaard-Park, S.M. , Bergman, B. , & Hellgren, B. (2001). TQM – managerial fad or a case of social becoming? In J. Löwstedt & B. Hellgren (Eds.), Management in the thoughtful enterprise. Oslo: Fagbook for laget], this article has included a discussion on the recent Toyota crisis with the massive withdrawals in 2010 used as an example of what happens when companies change their strategies from a ‘customer first strategy’ to a ‘quantity first strategy’. This article, together with the selected articles in this special issue, addresses several critical issues and suggestions on possible solutions on how companies can escape stagnation and recover from the crisis. The driving forces and learning patterns identified may inspire many organisations and countries, which are struggling in learning, adopting, and implementing TQM principles, tools, and methods.
Foreign interest rate disturbance, financial flows, and physical capital accumulation in a small open economy

This paper focuses on the interaction of financial capital movements and accumulation of physical capital in a small, open economy faced with a foreign interest disturbance. It is shown that endogenizing physical capital has important implications for the exchange rate dynamics not captured by models that assume a fixed capital stock. An increase in the foreign interest rate leads to decumulation of physical capital, reduces the full employment level of output, increases foreign debt, and depreciates the currency. Appropriate monetary and fiscal policies could counteract the effects on domestic wealth and the reduction in the stock of capital. Copyright 1991 by The editors of the Scandinavian Journal of Economics.
An Examination of the Operating Efficiency of Three Financial Intermediaries

This paper examines the operating efficiency of three types of financial intermediaries in the United States: (1) credit unions, (2) savings and loan associations, and (3) mutual savings banks during the past three decades. In particular, it examines by how much, if any, the operating efficiency of these intermediaries has been enhanced.
Sustainability Practices of SMEs: the Case of NZ

While individually small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) may have small social, environmental and financial impacts, cumulatively their impact is significant. One of the fundamental questions is how a single economic entity, especially a small-scale enterprise, can be engaged in the uptake of sustainability practices. This question is particularly pertinent to New Zealand, where 98% of enterprises are SMEs. In this paper questions are raised about the conventional models of ‘business ethics’ and accountability and their relevance to SMEs. The paper reports on actual practices and discusses the possibility of small enterprises having accountability for their social and environmental impacts. Ways of linking individual firm activities to sustainability, such as a communitarian model of accountability, are discussed and illustrated. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.
Patch-based fire detection with online outlier learning

Fire detection is one of the most interesting issues for surveillance. The existing approaches for the fire detection suffer from a high false positive ratio. To solve the problems, we present a patch-based fire detection algorithm with online outlier learning. In the proposed algorithm, the candidates of fire are obtained in the form of patch, while the classical candidates have been based on pixels or blobs. Because the patches of fire have more distinctive shape than the entire fire, the shape classifier can recognize the candidates correctly from fire-like outliers. In addition, we propose an online outlier learning scheme which handles the irregularity of fire based on the repeatability of shape in time. The proposed algorithm is experimented with new challenging dataset, consisting of 50 positive videos with fire and 44 negative ones with fire-like outliers. By evaluating on the dataset, we validate the performance of our algorithm qualitatively and quantitatively.
The Limited Reach of Russia's Party System: Underinstitutionalization in Dual Transitions

While Russian political parties appear to be institutionalizing to some degree at the national level, they are surprisingly absent at the regional level. This is a result of the dynamics of Russia's dual economic and political transition. Regional elites prefer a “partial reform equilibrium” in political institutional development so that they can avoid widening the sphere of accountability for their decisions in order to protect the gains they have made in the early stage of the economic transition. Strong political institutions—like competitive political parties that penetrate the periphery—would render transitional winners more broadly accountable to wider societal interests as well as to national political actors. The argument suggests that the territorial penetration and further institutionalization of Russia's party system are not necessarily inevitable. Under the conditions of dual, simultaneous economic and political transitions, elites may prefer an equilibrium of political underinstitutionalization to preserve their early winnings from the economic transition.
Working the Crowd: Employment and Labor Law in the Crowdsourcing Industry

This Article confronts the thorny questions that arise in attempting to apply traditional employment and labor law to “crowdsourcing,” an emerging online labor model unlike any that has existed to this point. Crowdsourcing refers to the process of taking tasks that would normally be delegated to an employee and distributing them to a large pool of online workers, the “crowd,” in the form of an open call. The Article describes how crowdsourcing works, its advantages and risks, and why workers in particular subsections of the paid crowdsourcing industry may be denied the protection of employment laws without much recourse to vindicate their rights. Taking Amazon’s Mechanical Turk platform as a case study, the Article explores the nature of this employment relationship in order to determine the legal status of the “crowd. ” The Article also details the complications that might arise in applying existing work laws to crowd labor. Finally, the Article presents a series of brief recommendations. It encourages legislatures to clarify and expand legal protections for crowdsourced employees, and suggests ways for courts and administrative agencies to pursue the same objective within our existing legal framework. It also offers voluntary “best practices” for firms and venues involved in crowdsourcing, along with examples of how crowd workers might begin to effectively organize and advocate on their own behalf.
An Econometric Analysis of Yield Variability in Paddy Production

The objective of this paper is to extend the specification of conventional production functions to a stochastic production frontier in order to explain productivity differences among firms. This involves explicitly incorporating the random variability, which is beyond the farm operator's control, and the true farmer specific variability, which is under his control, into the model. Assuming a Cobb-Douglas production relationship, the model was estimated by the maximum likelihood method. Using the estimated results, the causes for the farmer specific variability were identified. Farmers' understanding of the technology and access to extension advice were the most important factors influencing yield variability. L'objectifde cette communication est d'etendre la specification desfonctions deproduction convenlionelle a la limite dune production stochaslique dans le but d'expliguer les differences de productivite entre firmes. Ceci implique l'incorporation au modele d'une part de la variabilite due au hasard el hors du controle de l'agriculteur, d'autre part de la variability specifique a I'agriculteur qu'il peut controler. Supposant un rapport de production Cobb-Douglas. le modele a ete eslime par la methode de probabilite maximum. Utilisant les resultals estimes. les motifs de la variabilite specifique de I'agriculteur om ete identifies. La comprehension par l'agriculteur de la technologie el l'acces au conseil d'extension ont ete les plus importants facteurs affectanl la variabilite des rendemenls.
RECONSTRUCTING THE SPREAD OF DIROFILARIA IMMITIS IN CALIFORNIA COYOTES

Dirofilaria immitis is a filarial nematode parasite that is currently widely enzootic in dog and coyote (Canis latrans) populations of California. Weak historical evidence suggests that the initial focus of D. immitis in California occurred 3 decades ago in the Sierra Nevada foothills (SNF) and spread to other parts of California thereafter. However, this hypothesis is difficult to evaluate because of the lack of epidemiological studies on heartworm in California before 1970. We investigated this hypothesis by comparing D. immitis prevalence in coyotes between initial (1975–1985) and current (2000–2002) surveys in the SNF and 2 coastal regions. In the SNF, prevalence of heartworm was not significantly different between initial (35%, n = 169) and current (42%, n = 60) surveys (P = 0.17), suggesting the existence of a stable enzootic focus in the initial survey period. In contrast, current prevalence was 4 times higher than initial prevalence in the northern Coast Range foothills (44 vs. 10%; n = 119, 107; P < 0.001) and in the south San Francisco Bay foothills (32 vs. 8%; n = 31, 59; P = 0.005), suggesting that initial surveys were made during the early stages of colonization. Dirofilaria immitis prevalence, intensity, and abundance was similar in a coastal location in Mendocino County between 1994–1996 and 1999–2002, suggesting some degree of stability in this enzootic focus. Collectively, these findings support the hypothesis that D. immitis established itself initially in California coyotes living in the SNF and subsequently expanded its range of enzootic foci in central California.
Glossokinetic Potentials for a Tongue-Machine Interface: How Can We Trace Tongue Movements with Electrodes?

Glossokinetic potentials (GKPs) refer to electrical responses involving tongue movements that are measured at electrodes placed on the scalp when the tip of the tongue touches tissue inside the mouth. GKP has been considered an electroencephalography (EEG) artifact that is removed to minimize the interference with signals from a cerebral region for successful EEG analysis. In this article, we emphasize a different side of GKP where we analyze its spatial patterns to trace tongue movements developing tongue-machine interfaces. We begin with a brief overview of GKP and its spatial patterns and then describe its potential applications to man-machine interfaces. First, we describe the spatial pattern of GKP for horizontal tongue movements and explain how it can be utilized to identify the position of the tongue. We also introduce a tongue-rudder system where this technique enables smooth control of an electric wheelchair. Then we describe GKP patterns for vertical and frontal tongue movements that are closely related to speech production. Based on this pattern, we discuss its application to silent speech recognition, which allows speech communication without using a sound.
Passive targeting of paramagnetic lipid-based contrast agents to acute mouse cardiac ischemia / reperfusion injury

Introduction: Paramagnetic MRI contrast agents of low molecular weight (MW) are widely used to determine myocardial infarct size on delayed enhancement scans and to measure myocardial perfusion from the first passage of the contrast agent. High MW MRI contrast agents, or so-called blood pool contrast agents, also have been used for visualization of perfusion defects. In addition, high MW liposomes, which have been studied for targeted drug delivery, have been shown to accumulate in the infarcted myocardium due to the enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect. The aim of this study was to assess the circulation and extravasation kinetics of paramagnetic micelles and liposomes with MRI and evaluate their ability to report on infarct status in a mouse model of acute myocardial ischemia/reperfusion injury.