Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Boycott or Buycott?: Internal Politics and Consumer Choices

Abstract Does politics affect economic relations? In particular, do political tensions significantly affect consumer choices? The main objective of the paper is to study the consequences of political conflicts between Spain and Catalonia (a region of Spain) and the subsequent boycott calls on sales of Catalan sparkling wine (cava) in the Spanish market. We use data from sales of sparkling wine in supermarkets and similar outlets. To determine with precision the boycott period we use data on the number of news on the issue that appeared in the main national Spanish daily newspapers. The results of our econometric analysis indicate that the boycott calls triggered different consumers’ reactions in different territories. While consumers in some Spanish regions followed them and reduced their purchases of Catalan cava, there was also an anti-boycott reaction of Catalan consumers which led them to increase their consumption of the product. As a consequence of this, the boycott calls had an insignificant impact at the Spanish aggregate level. These results can be rationalized by the predictions of theoretical models of boycotts that include both the free riding and animosity motives.
Circadian Clocks and Vascular Function

The circadian clock regulates many aspects of physiology, including cardiovascular function. Internal oscillators exist in endothelial, smooth muscle cells, and fibroblasts of the vasculature. Vascular tone and thrombus formation, 2 key elements of vascular function with regard to adverse cardiovascular events, exhibit diurnal rhythmicity. In this review, we describe changes in vascular function that result from genetic disruption of discrete elements of the circadian clock.
Combining Vector-Space and Word-Based Aspect Models for Passage Retrieval

This report summarizes the work done at Kyoto University and the University of Melbourne for the TREC 2006 Genomics Track. The single task for this year was to retrieve passages from a biomedical document collection. We devised a system made of two parts to deal with this problem. The first part was an existing IR system based on the vector-space model. The second part was a newly developed probabilistic word-based aspect model for identifying passages within relevant documents (or paragraphs).
Addressing [HEALTH TOPIC] among [POPULATION]: A fill-in-the-blank activity to promote understanding of formative health communication campaign decisions

Courses: Introduction to Communication Behavior, Health Communication, Public Communication Campaigns, Persuasion, Public Relations Objectives: Students gain practice determining various components of a health communication campaign (e.g. selecting appropriate target population(s), media channels), while noting the need for synergy across key strategic and creative decisions involved in formulating a mass-media campaign.
Algorithmic and combinatorial methods for enumerating the relators of a group presentation.

The main achievement of this thesis is an algorithm which given a finite group presentation and natural numbers n and k, computes all the relators of length and area up to n and k respectively. The complexity of this algorithm is better by a factor which is over-exponential than that of classical methods using van Kampen diagrams.
Analysis of Conductor-Backed Coplanar Waveguide using Integral Method

In this paper, an integral method for evaluating the propagation characteristics of conductor-backed coplanar wave guide structure is presented. In this method, the Helmholtez equation has been converted into integral equation using Green's second identity. The propagation constant is determined by using some basis functions. The obtained results are found to be very accurate when compared with experimental published data available in the literature. The effects of the ground metallizations on the propagation characteristics is analyzed in compared with the conventional coplanar waveguide structure
HTTP Mailbox - Asynchronous RESTful Communication

We describe HTTP Mailbox, a mechanism to enable RESTful HTTP communication in an asynchronous mode with a full range of HTTP methods otherwise unavailable to standard clients and servers. HTTP Mailbox allows for broadcast and multicast semantics via HTTP. We evaluate a reference implementation using ApacheBench (a server stress testing tool) demonstrating high throughput (on 1,000 concurrent requests) and a systemic error rate of 0.01%. Finally, we demonstrate our HTTP Mailbox implementation in a human assisted web preservation application called "Preserve Me".
Adaptive jointly parameter quantization method for sinusoidal audio coding

In this paper, we propose an adaptive jointly parameter quantization scheme for sinusoidal matching pursuit (MP) audio coding, where the sinusoidal parameters (amplitude, frequency, phase) are quantized jointly based on the real time statistical knowledge of parameters. The optimal quantizers which minimize the perceptual distortion under a given entropy constraint, are derived analytically by high-rate theory. In comparison tests, the significant improvements achieved with the proposed scheme are shown.
Expectations in culturally unfamiliar music: influences of proximal and distal cues and timbral characteristics

Listeners' musical perception is influenced by cues that can be stored in short-term memory (e.g., within the same musical piece) or long-term memory (e.g., based on one's own musical culture). The present study tested how these cues (referred to as, respectively, proximal and distal cues) influence the perception of music from an unfamiliar culture. Western listeners who were naïve to Gamelan music judged completeness and coherence for newly constructed melodies in the Balinese gamelan tradition. In these melodies, we manipulated the final tone with three possibilities: the original gong tone, an in-scale tone replacement or an out-of-scale tone replacement. We also manipulated the musical timbre employed in Gamelan pieces. We hypothesized that novice listeners are sensitive to out-of-scale changes, but not in-scale changes, and that this might be influenced by the more unfamiliar timbre created by Gamelan “sister” instruments whose harmonics beat with the harmonics of the other instrument, creating a timbrally “shimmering” sound. The results showed: (1) out-of-scale endings were judged less complete than original gong and in-scale endings; (2) for melodies played with “sister” instruments, in-scale endings were judged as less complete than original endings. Furthermore, melodies using the original scale tones were judged more coherent than melodies containing few or multiple tone replacements; melodies played on single instruments were judged more coherent than the same melodies played on sister instruments. Additionally, there is some indication of within-session statistical learning, with expectations for the initially-novel materials developing during the course of the experiment. The data suggest the influence of both distal cues (e.g., previously unfamiliar timbres) and proximal cues (within the same sequence and over the experimental session) on the perception of melodies from other cultural systems based on unfamiliar tunings and scale systems.
Threshold Corrections to the MSSM Finite-Temperature Higgs Potential

In the minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM) the one-loop finite-temperature corrections from the squark-Higgs bosons sector are calculated, the effective two-Higgs-doublet potential is reconstructed and possibilities of the electroweak phase transition in full MSSM ( , , , , , , ) parameter space are studied. At large values of and of around 1 TeV, favored indirectly by LEP2 and Teva-tron data, the threshold finite-temperature corrections from triangle and box diagrams with intermediate third generation squarks are very substantial. Four types of bifurcation sets are defined for the two-Higgs-doublet potential. High sensitivity of the low-temperature evolution to the effective two-doublet and the MSSM squark sector parameters is observed, but rather extensive regions of the full MSSM parameter space allow the first-order electroweak phase transition respecting the phenomenological constraints at zero temperature. As a rule, these regions of the MSSM parameter space are in line with the case of a light stop quark.
Cooperative Hunting by Multiple Mobile Robots Based on Local Interaction

The problem of multi-robot coordination and cooperation has drawn great interest in recent years [1]. Generally speaking, for a given task, utilizing more than one robot may enhance the quality of the solution. Furthermore, many inherently distributed tasks must require a distributed solution. However, if the robots are not properly organized, the interference among them will block the task. Many challenging issues should be considered carefully. In this paper, we conduct our research in the context of multi-robot hunting. The hunting task concerning mobile robots and its target to be hunted is a particular challenge due to the nature of unknown and irregular motion of the target. In order to coordinate the motion of multiple mobile robots to capture or enclose a target, a novel feedback-control law [2], linear autonomous system [3] and Multiple Objective Behavior Coordination [4] have been used. Other related works including pursuit game [5][7], whose environments are usually modeled in grid. In this chapter, we choose non-grid environments where each robot with a limited visual field moves in any collision-free direction. This chapter considers a typical hunting task where multiple mobile robots (pursuers) cooperatively hunt an invader with certain intelligence in unknown environments. After the invader is found, its position information is broadcasted. If each robot knows where other robots are, it may take action from the group’s perspective. However, this will generate a communication burden that is too heavy to be practical. An approach where no positions of the robots are exchanged must be pursued. With less information, what action should the individual robot take? In this paper, an approach called Cooperative Local Interaction (CLI) is proposed to achieve cooperative hunting. This chapter is organized as follows. Section 2 describes CLI approach where the hunting task is divided into four states and the detailed design in each state is given. In section III, the motion strategies for the invader are designed. Simulations are conducted in section IV and section V concludes the chapter.
Urban road extraction based on hough transform and region growing

In the paper, we present an approach of road extraction in urban area by combining the Hough transform and region growing. In this case, we use Digital Surface Mode (DSM) data, which is based on the elevation of land surface, building, and so on to overcome the disadvantage of aerial photo image. The main problem in extracting the road in urban area from an aerial photo is the shadow cast by the buildings. The shadow will lead to an inappropriate road segment. Another benefit of using the DSM data in urban area is the significant different of the elevation between the road and the building elevation. A simple thresholding of this data could extract some of the road. To improve the result, we use Hough transform to detect and recognize the road as a line and use this information to make a better threshold. Furthermore, we use the seeding region growing method to expand the road network. The seeds for region growing are obtained from the perimeter of the threshold segmentation resulted by hough lines. Finally, the post processing is required to remove a false road by employing the morphology image operator. The experiment result shows that the proposed method improves the quality result with a very good performance.
Optimization Methods and Algorithms for Solving Of Hydro- Thermal Scheduling Problems.

Different optimization methods have been applied to solve hydrothermal scheduling problems. This study reviews some of the common optimization methods and algorithms their strengths and weaknesses. The study found out that with time, old methods are improved upon and novel methods are developed to provide for more efficiency, faster convergence, robustness, and adaptability.
Cerebral Emboli and Ischemic Brain Injury

Objective: The aims of this study were firstly to determine prevalence, frequency, and clinical significance of cerebral microemboli in an unselected acute ischemic stroke population and secondly to examine how this information may improve ischemic stroke subtype classification. Methods: We intended to perform transcranial Doppler (TCD) microembolus monitorings of the middle cerebral artery (MCA) in the symptomatic hemisphere for 45 min in 120 consecutive patients with internal carotid artery territory ischemia. The first examination was performed within 72 h from start of symptoms and the second 5 B 1 days later. Platelet and coagulation system activation were measured following TCD monitoring in 38 patients. The strokes were subtyped using the TOAST classification criteria, and the patients’ clinical status was assessed at discharge using the Scandinavian Stroke Scale and the Barthel Index. Results: Microembolus monitoring was technically possible in 83 (69.2%) of the 120 patients. Thirty-two (26.6%) patients had an inadequate temporal bone acoustic window or were too restless to allow long-time monitoring. In 5 (4.2%) patients the relevant MCA was occluded. Twenty-two (26.5%) of the 83 patients had microemboli despite the fact that over 90% were receiving an antiplatelet or an anticoagulant treatment. The mean frequency of microemboli was 6.7 B 13.6 per 45 min. Microemboli were more prevalent in assumed cardioembolic stroke than in other subtypes of ischemic stroke (p = 0.047). We found no association between the presence of cerebral microemboli and the clinical outcome or the parameters for platelet or coagulation system activation. The presence of microemboli was not associated with in-hospital deaths (p = 0.17), whereas MCA occlusion was (p = 0.01). Conclusions: Cerebral microemboli are frequent in unselected acute ischemic stroke patients despite antiplatelet or anticoagulant treatment. TCD detection of microemboli provides valuable pathophysiological information and may, therefore, improve current ischemic stroke subtype classification. Copyright © 2000 S. Karger AG, Basel
Erim Report Series Research in Management Agent Based Computational Model of Trust Bibliographic Data and Classifications Agent Based Computational Model of Trust

This paper employs the methodology of Agent-Based Computational Economics (ACE) to investigate under what conditions trust can be viable in markets. The emergence and breakdown of trust is modeled in a context of multiple buyers and suppliers. Agents adapt their trust in a partner, the weight they attach to trust relative to profitability, and their own trustworthiness, modeled as a threshold of defection. Adaptation occurs on the basis of realized profit. Trust turns out to be viable under fairly general conditions. This paper employs the methodology of Agent-Based Computational Economics (ACE) to investigate under what conditions trust can be viable in markets. The emergence and breakdown of trust is modeled in a context of multiple buyers and suppliers. Agents adapt their trust in a partner, the weight they attach to trust relative to profitability, and their own trustworthiness, modeled as a threshold of defection. Adaptation occurs on the basis of realized profit. Trust turns out to be viable under fairly general conditions.
Effective HIV prevention: the indispensable role of social science

This paper examines the ways in which HIV prevention is understood including “biomedical”, “behavioural”, “structural”, and “combination” prevention. In it I argue that effective prevention entails developing community capacity and requires that public health addresses people not only as individuals but also as connected members of groups, networks and collectives who interact (talk, negotiate, have sex, use drugs, etc.) together. I also examine the evaluation of prevention programmes or interventions and argue that the distinction between efficacy and effectiveness is often glossed and that, while efficacy can be evaluated by randomized controlled trials, the evaluation of effectiveness requires long‐term descriptive strategies and/or modelling. Using examples from a number of countries, including a detailed account of the Australian HIV prevention response, effectiveness is shown to be dependent not only on the efficacy of the prevention technology or tool but also on the responses of people – individuals, communities and governments – to those technologies. Whether a particular HIV prevention technology is adopted and its use sustained depends on a range of social, cultural and political factors. The paper concludes by calling on biomedical and social scientists to work together and describes a “social public health”.
Recovered memories: Unearthing the past in court

In the past seven years, hundreds of lawsuits based upon repressed memories have forced courts to deal with a new set of issues, including the reliability of such memories, what kind of expert testimony would help judges and juries evaluate the memories, and whether professionals who help retrieve repressed memories should be held liable when therapy goes awry. Research has demonstrated the fallibility of human memory. Experts can help illuminate the controversy over memory in general and repressed memory in particular, as well as the external factors that may distort resurfaced memories.
Interactive simulation of fire in virtual building environments

This paper describes the integration of the Berkeley Architectural Walkthrough Program with the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s CFAST fire simulator. The integrated system creates a simulation based design environment for building fire safety systems; it also allows fire safety engineers to evaluate the performance of building designs, and helps make performance-based fire codes possible. We demonstrate that the visibility preprocessing and spatial decomposition used in the Walkthru also allow optimization of the data transfer between the simulator and visualizer. This optimization improves the ability to use available communication bandwidth to get needed simulation data to the Walkthru in the best order to visualize results in real time; an appropriate communication model and data structures are presented. General issues arising in the integration of environmental simulations and virtual worlds are discussed, as well as the specifics of the Walkthru-CFAST system, including relevant aspects of the user interface and of the visualization and simulation programming interfaces. A recommendation is made to structure future simulators in such a way that they can selectively direct their computational efforts toward specified spacetime regions of interest and thereby support real-time, interactive virtual environment visualization more effectively. CR Categories: I.3. 2 [Computer Graphics]: Graphics Systems— Distributed/Network Graphics; I.3. 6 [Computer Graphics]: Methodology and Techniques—Graphics Data Structures and Data Types; I.3. 6 [Computer Graphics]: Methodology and Techniques—Interaction Techniques; I.3. 7 [Computer Graphics]: Three-Dimensional Graphics and Realism—Virtual Reality; I.6. 7 [Simulation and Modeling]: Simulation Support Systems—Environments; J.6 [Computer-Aided Engineering]: Computer-Aided Design.
Expert consensus on facilitating the coming-out process in sexual minority clients: A Delphi study

Abstract This article presents the results of a Delphi study conducted to generate expert consensus about the best techniques for working with clients in the coming-out process. The initial expert interview phase (N = 19) generated a list of suggestions, including two therapist prerequisites, 11 suggestions for creating a welcoming environment, 15 areas of assessment, seven areas of psychoeducation, and 46 other specific techniques. During a second phase, the perceived helpfulness of these suggestions was rated by experts. The most highly rated techniques generally focused on guiding clients towards making their own coming-out decisions (e.g., “Allow the client to make his or her own decisions about how out to be, and to whom”), expressing a gay-positive attitude (e.g., “Discuss sexual minority identity as normal”), and helping clients prepare for coming-out disclosures (“Help the client to create a safety plan to address the possible negative outcomes of disclosure”).
UvA-DARE ( Digital Academic Repository ) Radio and optical follow-up observations and improved interplanetary network position of GRB 970111

We report on Westerbork 840 MHz and 1.4 and 5 GHz radio observations of the improved Interplanetary Network Wide Field Camera (IPN WFC) error box of the g-ray burst GRB 970111, between 26.4 hr and 120 days after the event onset. In the 113 arcmin area defined by the IPN (BATSE and Ulysses) annulus and the published refined BeppoSAX WFC error box, we detected no steady sources brighter than 0.56 mJy (4 s) and no varying radio emission, down to 1.0 mJy (4 s). We also report on B-, V-, R-, and I-band observations of the error box with the 4.2 m William Herschel Telescope at La Palma. Subject headings: gamma rays: bursts — radio continuum: general
Malaria Infection Increases Attractiveness of Humans to Mosquitoes

Do malaria parasites enhance the attractiveness of humans to the parasite's vector? As such manipulation would have important implications for the epidemiology of the disease, the question has been debated for many years. To investigate the issue in a semi-natural situation, we assayed the attractiveness of 12 groups of three western Kenyan children to the main African malaria vector, the mosquito Anopheles gambiae. In each group, one child was uninfected, one was naturally infected with the asexual (non-infective) stage of Plasmodium falciparum, and one harboured the parasite's gametocytes (the stage transmissible to mosquitoes). The children harbouring gametocytes attracted about twice as many mosquitoes as the two other classes of children. In a second assay of the same children, when the parasites had been cleared with anti-malarial treatment, the attractiveness was similar between the three classes of children. In particular, the children who had previously harboured gametocytes, but had now cleared the parasite, were not more attractive than other children. This ruled out the possibility of a bias due to differential intrinsic attractiveness of the children to mosquitoes and strongly suggests that gametocytes increase the attractiveness of the children.
Warning signals are seductive: Relative contributions of color and pattern to predator avoidance and mate attraction in Heliconius butterflies

Visual signaling in animals can serve many uses, including predator deterrence and mate attraction. In many cases, signals used to advertise unprofitability to predators are also used for intraspecific communication. Although aposematism and mate choice are significant forces driving the evolution of many animal phenotypes, the interplay between relevant visual signals remains little explored. Here, we address this question in the aposematic passion‐vine butterfly Heliconius erato by using color‐ and pattern‐manipulated models to test the contributions of different visual features to both mate choice and warning coloration. We found that the relative effectiveness of a model at escaping predation was correlated with its effectiveness at inducing mating behavior, and in both cases wing color was more predictive of presumptive fitness benefits than wing pattern. Overall, however, a combination of the natural (local) color and pattern was most successful for both predator deterrence and mate attraction. By exploring the relative contributions of color versus pattern composition in predation and mate preference studies, we have shown how both natural and sexual selection may work in parallel to drive the evolution of specific animal color patterns.