Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Suppression of plasma-activated factor VII levels by warfarin therapy.

To investigate the effect of warfarin treatment on the early phase of tissue factor-induced coagulation, we measured plasma-activated factor VII (factor VIIa) levels by a direct fluorogenic assay in 74 cardiovascular disease patients on long-term oral anticoagulation. We divided the patients into three groups based on the international normalized ratio (INR). In the patients with INR ranges of < 1.7 and 1.7 to 2.5, factor VIIa levels were 42% and 61% lower, respectively, than in age- and sex-matched controls. Factor VII coagulant activity (factor VIIc), factor VII antigen (factor VIIag), protein C, and factor X levels were also reduced to a similar extent in both groups. However, in patients with an INR > 2.5, the factor VIIa level was not decreased compared with that at an INR of 1.7 to 2.5, although the factor VIIc, factor VIIag, factor X, and protein C levels were all decreased further. Although the precise relation between the reduction of factor VIIa levels and the increase of INR requires appropriately designed long-term clinical trials, our data suggest that an INR range of 1.7 to 2.5 is sufficient for the suppression of factor VIIa. During the long-term follow-up of three patients with congenital antithrombin III or protein C deficiency, the factor VIIa level was more responsive to changes in the warfarin dose than the INR, and there were generally no corresponding changes of the thrombin-antithrombin III complex (TAT) level. However, one patient showed a transient marked increase of factor VIIa during the discontinuation of warfarin that was accompanied by an increase in TAT. Based on these findings, factor VIIa could be useful for monitoring both hypercoagulable and hypocoagulable states.
Methylation Matters in Child Development: Toward Developmental Behavioral Epigenetics

Child development might be conceptualized as experiences becoming sculpted in the organism's DNA through methylation, one of the major epigenetic mecha- nisms of change. This article introduces some of the basic biological mechanisms of methylation, discusses research on animal models, and highlights some of the most impres- sive methylation studies on human development. Although assessment of methylation levels still is under debate, saliva-derived methylation might tremendously enhance the opportunities for noninvasive epigenetic studies on child development. It seems worthwhile to add methyla- tion to the G · E equation to fully appreciate the effects of the environment on child and adult functioning. KEYWORDS—methylation; attachment; child development; parenting; trauma; nurture
Managing Country-of-Origin Choices: Competitive Advantages and Opportunities

This study investigates the effects of country-of-design/country-of-assembly combinations on consumers' evaluative beliefs about and attitudes toward buying automobiles. The effects are compared across groups of consumers differing with respect to levels of consumer ethnocentrism. Two design countries and two assembly countries (Japan or US) were considered, yielding four possible design-country/assembly-country combinations. The results suggest that manufacturing products in the country in which they are sold not only provides closer access to the market, but also allows multinational manufacturers to 'blur the boundaries' regarding a potentially sensitive country-of-origin issue among highly ethnocentric consumers. At the same time, they can leverage their country-brand images to appeal to those customers who recognize a particular country's ability to design high quality cars, regardless of their country of assembly.
Qualified audit opinions in Malta

Purpose – This paper has the objective of identifying the different types of qualifications in auditor's reports of companies in Malta, the extent of multiple and repeated qualifications in such reports and any significant relationships between such main types of qualifications and firm‐specific variables.Design/methodology/approach – The study in this small Mediterranean island is designed to investigate the auditor's reports of 419 companies in the period 1997/2000. This is also complemented by an analysis of 12 interviews held with audit partners in different practices.Findings – Results show that 19.9 per cent of sampled companies had a qualified auditor's report. The most common type of qualification was that of limitation‐on‐scope found in small companies and issued by non‐Big Four audit firms. Small companies were also prone to going concern qualifications in view of their more common net liability situations. Disagreement‐with‐management qualifications were found to be more likely in larger compan.
Potentiation of capsaicin receptor activity by metabotropic ATP receptors as a possible mechanism for ATP-evoked pain and hyperalgesia

The capsaicin (vanilloid) receptor, VR1, is a sensory neuron-specific ion channel that serves as a polymodal detector of pain-producing chemical and physical stimuli. It has been proposed that ATP, released from different cell types, initiates the sensation of pain by acting predominantly on nociceptive ionotropic purinoceptors located on sensory nerve terminals. In this study, we examined the effects of extracellular ATP on VR1. In cells expressing VR1, ATP increased the currents evoked by capsaicin or protons through activation of metabotropic P2Y1 receptors in a protein kinase C-dependent pathway. The involvement of Gq/11-coupled metabotropic receptors in the potentiation of VR1 response was confirmed in cells expressing both VR1 and M1 muscarinic acetylcholine receptors. In the presence of ATP, the temperature threshold for VR1 activation was reduced from 42°C to 35°C, such that normally nonpainful thermal stimuli (i.e., normal body temperature) were capable of activating VR1. This represents a novel mechanism through which the large amounts of ATP released from damaged cells in response to tissue trauma might trigger the sensation of pain.
Demographic Transition and Youth Employment in Pakistan

There is convincing evidence that Pakistan has entered the demographic bonus phase; child dependency is declining and youth share in the total population is rising. This paper has examined youth employment in the context of demographic transition evidenced since the early 1990s. Changes in the level of educational attainment have also been analysed. The study has used the data from Pakistan Demographic Surveys and Labour Force Surveys carried out between 1990 and 2005. Findings of the study show that the benefits of demographic transition in terms of rising share of youth in the total population has partially been translated through development of their human capital and productive absorption in the local labour market. While the pace of human capital formation seems to be satisfactory in urban Pakistan, it is dismal in rural areas, particularly for females. High levels of both female inactivity across the education categories and unemployment for males as well as females urge a strong youth employment policy in Pakistan to reap the benefits of the ongoing demographic transition. Youth are a source of development, and a high priority may be placed on preparing them with the skills needed for their adjustment in the labour market.
COMPARISON OF THE ECONOMIC DISPATCH SOLUTIONS WITH AND WITHOUT TRANSMISSION LOSSES

The short-term optimization problem is how to schelude generation to minimize the total fuel cost or to maximize the total profit over a study period of typically a day, subject to a large number of constraints that must be satisfied. The most important constraint is that the total generation must equal the half-hourly forecast demands for electricity. There are two related short-term optimization problems, “unit commitment” and “economic dispatch”. This paper includes knowledge of economic dispatch and solution techniques with or without transmission losses. In the optimal economic dispatch solution, losses have very important roles. Choosing generator units is one of them. OZET Kýsa donem optimizasyon problemlerinde amac maliyeti minimum ve karý maksimum yapmaktýr. Bu gercekleotirilirken bircok olcut gozonunde bulundurulur. Ekonomik dispatch bu olcutlerden bir tanesidir. Bu calýþmada, ekonomik dispatch problemlerinin hatlardaki kayýplar olmaksýzýn ve kayýplar gozonunde bulundurulmuþ cozumu hakkýnda bilgi verilmiþtir.
Mood and UK equity pricing

We investigate the relationship between mood and UK equity pricing. Seven variables that are argued to proxy for mood are tested, including four weather variables (temperature, precipitation, wind speed and geomagnetic storms), and three biorhythm variables (Seasonal Affective Disorder, Daylight Savings Time Changes and lunar phases). Using GARCH specifications of the equity indices, and multiple constructs of each of the mood-proxy variables, we find evidence of a relationship between UK equity pricing and high temperatures and wind speed. However, the results are generally unfavourable towards a conclusion that investor mood influences aggregate UK equity pricing.
A New Look at the Acquisition of Relative Clauses

This study reconsiders the acquisition of relative clauses based on data from two sentencerepetition tasks. Usingmaterials modeled on the relative constructions of spontaneous child speech, we asked four-year-old English- and German-speaking children to repeat six different types of relative clauses. Although English and German relative clauses are structurally very different, the results were similar across studies: intransitive subject relatives caused fewer errors than transitive subject relatives and direct object relatives, which in turncaused fewer errors thanin direct object relatives and oblique relatives; finally, genitive relatives caused by far the most problems. Challenging previous analyses in which the acquisition of relative clauses has been explained by the varying distance between filler and gap, we propose a multifactorial analysis in which the acquisitionprocess is determined primarily by the similarity betweenthe various types of relative clauses and their relationship to simple sentences.
Cost estimation of software development: improving the COCOMO model using a genetic algorithm approach

The use of computers and Information Technology (IT) solutions is a vital necessity for enterprises, which requires continuously increasing investments in hardware and software applications. Prior to any software development project estimation of cost has to be carried out. Because of the complex nature of software applications, it is often difficult to predict the cost of software development accurately. Recently, various methods have been proposed by researchers to predict the effort of software projects and estimate the cost accordingly. In this study, first a discussion on the major available models for software cost estimation along with their strengths and weaknesses is presented. Next, using Genetic Algorithms (GAs), three new models are introduced in order to estimate the cost of software development projects. The performances of these three models are tested using real data. The results show that the proposed models are able to provide better estimates in comparison to previously discussed models.
Social Capital and Local Government Capacity

Local authorities vary considerably in their capacity for governance. The dimensions of this capacity can only be developed by drawing on local stocks of social capital. The seminal theories of social capital tend to conceive it as a community resource that is built up through a long tradition of civic engagement. We take issue with the laissez-faire implications of these theories, highlighting ways in which local governments can positively contribute to social capital formation by opening their ‘political opportunity structure’ and engaging voluntary organisations and community groups in trust-based partnership arrangements.
Using Road Pricing Revenue: Economic Efficiency and Equity Considerations:

Issues of economic efficiency, equity, external costs, and political feasibility as they can help determine the distribution of road pricing revenue are examined. Economic efficiency requires only that revenue be used to benefit society and that it not be refunded to users in proportion to how much they have paid. Efficiency does not require that revenue be dedicated to transportation programs. Horizontal equity implies that revenues should be returned to vehicle users as a class but only after external costs are compensated. Because most estimates of motor vehicle external costs are larger than the expected revenue of road-pricing proposals, the horizontal equity justification for returning revenues to drivers is reduced or eliminated. Vertical equity requires that revenues benefit low-income drivers as a class at least as much as the costs they bear and that disadvantaged residents (including nondrivers) benefit overall. Current conventional thinking is that revenues must be dedicated to transportation improvements to be politically feasible, but some analyses indicate that alternative distributions that include broad tax reductions or financial rebates benefit the largest number of citizens and therefore may be more politically popular.
Discovering the Unexpected with the Utilization of NGS in Diagnostics of Non-syndromic Hearing Loss Disorders: The Family Case of ILDR1-Dependent Hearing Loss Disorder

Sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) is a heterogeneous family of hearing disabilities with congenital (including genetic) as well as acquired etiology. Congenital SNHL of genetic etiology is further sub-divided into autosomal dominant, autosomal recessive and X-linked SNHL. More than 60 genes are involved in the etiology of autosomal recessive non-syndromic hearing loss (ARNSHL) commonly manifesting as heterogeneous pre-lingual profound to severe non-progressive clinical phenotype. ILDR1-dependent ARNSHL (DFNB42, OMIM: # 609646) is a very rare sub-type of hearing disability, with unknown prevalence, caused by function-damaging genetic variants in ILDR1 gene reported in families of Middle-Eastern origin. ILDR1 (Immunoglobulin-Like Domain-containing Receptor 1) is involved in the development of semicircular canal, tricellular tight junction and auditory hair cells. An apparently non-consanguineous family of European ancestry with two affected siblings with profound progressive hearing loss characterized in their infancy and successfully treated with cochlear implants (CI) is presented. Genetic analysis of common ARNSHL genetic causes in the population of origin was negative, thus the next-generation sequencing (NGS) and family segregation analysis to identify underlying causative genetic variant was performed. Unexpectedly and atypical for the population of origin a homozygous non-sense variant ILDR1 c.942C > A (p.Cys314Ter) inherited from both heterozygous parents was identified in both patients. Contrary to the commonly reported phenotype, indices of a progressive hearing loss and potential compensatory mechanism of vestibular function were revealed with the analysis of clinical data. The utilization of NGS was demonstrated as an invaluable tool for the detection of atypical rare variants in diagnostics of unidentified hearing loss disorders.
Five‐year lung cancer survival

The core strategy of American College of Chest Physicians lung cancer guidelines is identification of the earliest symptoms of lung cancer and the immediate initiation of diagnosis and treatment. In the absence of screening, most symptomatic lung cancer is discovered at advanced stages, with the goal of long‐term survival entirely dependent on effective treatment of stage III and IV lung cancer.
Design of e-learning courseware for hearing impaired (HI) students

Nowadays, e-learning courseware could be used as an alternative to simplify the process of teaching and could create an effective learning process for the disable students. The problem is how far the helpfulness of the current education multimedia application could be used to suit and to attract student disabilities in learning. This research focuses on design a new interface courseware based on user requirements on disabilities students mainly for students who have hearing problem. The research was conducted using qualitative methods whereby observation and interview approaches were used to collect data from teachers and the hearing impaired students in Sekolah Pendidikan Khas Selangor (SPKS) on what would better approach to help them in learning. Significance of this application is to increase the attention and intention level for the HI students in their learning process. Thus, the results of this research would contribute the significant impact in terms of how the improvements in the design interface from the courseware influence the learning performance of HI students.
Multiple-steady-state growth models explaining twin-peak empirics?

The explanation of twin peak empirics through multiple-steady-state growth models has one serious implication: Whenever a model generates twin peaks in GDP per capita it also generates twin peaks in other variables. We check for some multiple steadystate models whether or not they have twin peaks in the other variables besides GDP per capita. It turns out that the required twin peaks do not exist for the textbook version of the population trap model but a modified version cannot be dismissed. Stiglitz’ (1987) endogenous growth model requires twin peaks in savings per capita, which are not found in the data. Models of human capital accumulation and endogenous population growth are closer to the idea of twin peaks because twin peaks in population growth rates do exist, but human capital accumulation is not exactly distributed in a way twin peaks would require but that distribution rather follows a structure of one peak with one or two stairs depending on the human capital variable.
Economic Rights and Regional Integration: Considering the EU and ASEAN Charters within the Perspective of Global Regional Integration

The paper is confined to addressing the question of whether a relationship exists between ‘economic rights’ and ‘regional integration’; confined because the title has several manifestations and interpretations. I categorically assert that there is not: regional integration is governed by WTO’s Article XXIV, which is utterly silent on ‘economic rights’, or for that matter ‘human rights’; human rights being the basic rights to which all humans are entitled, often held to include the right to life and liberty, freedom of thought and expression, and equality before the law. I find that the EU is the only regional integration scheme that has been endeavouring to give economic rights a legally-binding basis, but this will not happen fully even when the Lisbon Treaty has been ratified, due to the enactment not being embracive since Poland and the UK have opt-out protocols; thus rendering the term regional integration somewhat meaningless within this context. This, however should not distract from the fact that the EU has been able to make progress with and achieve the promotion of human rights in areas where single member state efforts have been to no avail; feats that would otherwise not have been possible without the creation of a single European state. The implications of this for the yet-to-be-ratified ASEAN Charter are briefly tackled where they are pertinent within the EU context.
A role for histone deacetylase HDAC1 in modulating the transcriptional activity of MyoD: inhibition of the myogenic program

The molecular mechanism(s) that are responsible for suppressing MyoD's transcriptional activities in undifferentiated skeletal muscle cells have not yet been determined. We now show that MyoD associates with a histone deacetylase‐1 (HDAC1) in these cells and that this interaction is responsible for silencing MyoD‐dependent transcription of endogenous p21 as well as muscle‐specific genes. Specifically, we present evidence that HDAC1 can bind directly to MyoD and use an acetylated MyoD as a substrate in vitro, whereas a mutant version of HDAC1 (H141A) can not. Further more, this mutant also fails to repress MyoD‐mediated transcription in vivo, and unlike wild‐type HDAC1 it can not inhibit myogenic conversion, as judged by confocal microscopy. Finally, we show that an endogenous MyoD can be acetylated upon its conversion to a hypophosphorylated state and only when the cells have been induced to differentiate. These results provide for a model which postulates that MyoD may be co‐dependent on HDAC1 and P/CAF for temporally controlling its transcriptional activity before and after the differentiation of muscle cells.
Request Strategies: Cross-Sectional Study of Iranian EFL Learners and Australian Native Speakers.

This study was a cross-sectional investigation into the request strategies used by Iranian learners of English as a Foreign Language and Australian native speakers of English. The sample involved 96 BA and MA Persian students and 10 native speakers of English. A Discourse Completion Test (DCT) was used to generate data related to the request strategies used by each group. Selection of request situations in DCT was based on two social factors of relative power and social distance. Although results revealed pragmatic development, particularly in the movement from direct to conventionally indirect strategies on the part of EFL learners, learners with higher proficiency displayed overuse of indirect type of requesting; whereas the native group was characterized by the more balanced use of this strategy. The lower proficiency learners, on the other hand, overused the most direct strategy type. In terms of the influence of the social variables, the findings of this research revealed that as far as social power is concerned EFL learners display closer performance to native speakers. But considering social distance, it seems that Iranian EFL learners have not acquired sufficient sociopragmatic knowledge to display proper social behavior.
Pharmacokinetics of Cefepime in Patients with Thermal Burn Injury

ABSTRACT The pharmacokinetics of cefepime following administration of a single 2-g dose were evaluated for 12 adult patients with thermal burn injury and suspected or documented infection. Serial blood and urine samples for cefepime concentration determination were obtained for 24 h following drug administration. Serum and urine cefepime concentrations were determined by high-performance liquid chromatography and serum concentrations were fit to a two-compartment pharmacokinetic model. Mean (standard deviation [SD]) age, actual body weight (ABW), percent total body surface area burned, and days postburn at the time of study were 41 (13) years, 84 (22) kg, 36 (17)%, and 9 (3) days, respectively. Mean (SD) measured creatinine clearance (CLCR), total clearance (CLT), renal clearance (CLR), alpha phase half-life, beta phase half-life, and volume of distribution at steady state (VSS) were 135 (31) ml/min, 8.8 (2.4) liters/h, 8.1 (2.0) liters/h, 0.33 (0.14) h, 2.8 (0.6) h, and 0.43 (0.10) liters/kg ABW, respectively. Cefepime CLT and CLR in burn patients were similar to previously reported values for healthy volunteers when normalized by CLCR. Stepwise multiple regression was used to associate CLT with CLCR and days postburn (r2 = 0.861), CLRwith CLCR and days postburn (r2 = 0.773), nonrenal clearance with percent third-degree (% 3°) burn and albumin concentration (r2 = 0.550), andVSS only with % 3° burn (r2 = 0.624). Simulated steady-state serum concentrations obtained by using the patients’ pharmacokinetic parameters exceeded the susceptibility interpretive standard (breakpoint) of cefepime for at least 60% of the dosing interval with dosing regimens of 1 g every 8 h (q8h), 2 g q8h, and 2 g q12h. Despite differences in pharmacokinetic parameters between our patients and healthy volunteers, it appears that these dosing regimens may be adequate in similar burn patients.