Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Measurement of open innovation through intellectual capital flows: framework and application

The paper suggests a methodology for measuring companies’ openness degree through accounting data and providing a relation between open innovation activities and intellectual capital components. Four openness dimensions are defined and a synthetic measure of openness is suggested. The model is applied to a sample of 126 world top R&D spending companies in the bio-pharmaceutical industry for the period 2008–2012. Results show a negative correlation of openness with firm age, dimension and efficiency and a positive correlation with R&D intensity, with biotech companies being more open than pharmaceutical ones. Further, the most relevant component of openness is represented by the revenues deriving from joint development projects, out-licensing and R&D outsourcing. The paper contributes to the existing research by suggesting inbound and outbound metrics for open innovation and by underlining the role of intellectual capital. The framework can be used for monitoring and benchmarking the openness degree of companies with competitors.
THE WELFARE STATE: A REGULATORY PERSPECTIVE

The role of regulation and the regulatory state in social policy, redistribution, and the reforms of the welfare state are increasingly important but often underestimated and misunderstood. These problems are evident in Majone’s highly influential work where the regulatory state and the ‘positive’ state stand as two alternative monomorphic forms of state. This article offers a polymorphic alternative where the regulatory state may come to the rescue of the welfare state, allowing independent extension, retrenchment, and stagnation of welfare via social regulation. The article extends a regulatory governance perspective into the core of the welfare state, clarifies the relations between fiscal and regulatory instruments, and demonstrates that the boundaries of the regulatory state are wider than are usually understood. It turns our understanding of the welfare state on its head, highlighting first the less visible regulatory layer, and then the more visible layer of fiscal transfers.
Expected Inflation and the Constant-Growth Valuation Model

In the presence of inflation, the standard Constant-Growth valuation model found throughout the finance literature is not valid in cases where a company either (1) makes no net new investments or (2) invests only in zero Net Present Value projects. If expected inflation is positive, the generally accepted and widely used expression for the value of the firm under either of these two conditions seriously understates the true value of the firm, even with modest levels of inflation. Copyright (c) 2008 Morgan Stanley.
Friend Recommendation System for Social Networks

The current social networking services suggests friends based on the respective individual’s network. This may not be the perfect way to recommend friends to respective user as friend suggestion should be more over focused on the real life friend selection style. In this paper, we present Friend Recommendation system for social networks, which recommends friends to users based on their life styles instead of social graphs. In Friend Recommendation system we discovers life styles of users from user-centric data, measures the similarity of life styles between users, and recommends friends to users if their life styles have high similarity. Inspired by text mining, we model a user’s daily life as life documents, from which his/her life styles are extracted by using the Collaborative Filtering with threshold algorithm. We further propose a similarity metric to measure the similarity of life styles between users, and calculate users’ impact in terms of life styles with a friend-matching graph. Upon receiving a request, Friend Recommendation system returns a list of people with highest recommendation scores to the query user. We have implemented Friend Recommendation system on the Android-based smart phones, and evaluated its performance on both small-scale experiments and large-scale simulations. The results show that the recommendations accurately reflect the preferences of users in choosing friends.
The Structure and Function of Francisella Lipopolysaccharide

Abstract: A key factor in the biology of Francisella spp. is lipopolysaccharide (LPS). Francisella LPS has many unique structural properties and poorly activates proinflammatory responses due to its lack of interaction with toll‐like receptor 4 (TLR4). The LPS of this organism can be modified by various carbohydrates including glucose, mannose and galactosamine, which affect various aspects of virulence. Spontaneously occurring colony variants of F. tularensis have altered LPS. This altered LPS may account for the novel phenotypes of these variants that include effects on susceptibility to killing by normal human serum, intracellular survival and animal virulence. Mutants devoid of O‐antigen (directed mutants in O‐antigen biosynthetic genes) show reduced intracellular survival and mouse virulence. Thus, this surface component is important in F. tularensis pathogenesis, and the inability of the LPS to alarm the immune system coupled with its frequent modification/alteration likely aid the success of this pathogen during human infection.
High bronchoalveolar levels of tumor necrosis factor and its inhibitors, interleukin-1, interferon, and elastase, in patients with adult respiratory distress syndrome after trauma, shock, or sepsis.

Intrapulmonary activation of leukocytes and release of cellular mediators and enzymes are involved in the pathophysiology of the adult respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). To investigate a possible role of local cytokines, we measured bronchoalveolar fluid (BALF) and plasma levels of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha) and its soluble inhibitors (sTNF-RI + RII), interleukin-1 beta (IL-1 beta), interferon-alpha (IFN-alpha), and granulocyte elastase in 14 patients at risk for ARDS and in 35 patients developing ARDS after trauma, sepsis, or shock. During clinical development of severe ARDS, BALF cytokines increased markedly: TNF-alpha from 116 +/- 36 to 10,731 +/- 5,048 pg/ml (mean +/- SEM), p = 0.001; sTNF-RI + RII from 3.7 +/- 1.4 to 24.6 +/- 2.6 ng/ml, p less than 0.05; and IL-1 beta from 7,746 +/- 5,551 to 42,255 +/- 19,176 pg/ml, p = 0.01. Plasma cytokines were not increased in most patients, nor were they correlated with the development or severity of ARDS. BALF elastase was higher in patients developing ARDS than in those at risk but not going into pulmonary failure (0.97 +/- 0.26 versus 0.28 +/- 0.13 U/ml, p = 0.026), and the highest values were observed in the early stages of severe ARDS (1.85 +/- 0.39 U/ml). BALF elastase levels correlated with IFN-alpha (r = 0.72, p less than 0.001). In conclusion, local release of TNF-alpha and IL-1 beta, possibly by pulmonary macrophages or other cells, and/or accumulation in the lung is associated with the development of ARDS. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Appropriation And Appropriability In Open Source Software

Firms in open source software (OSS) are active in a field encompassing all the characteristics of a public good, given the non-excludability and non-rivalry nature of OSS. The fact that many important inputs to the innovative process are public should not be taken to mean that innovators are prevented from capturing private returns. The objective of this paper is to explore how firms appropriate returns from innovations that are created outside the boundaries of firms and in the public domain, using the case of OSS. To do so, the paper draws upon an explorative multiple case study of five small firms that attempt to appropriate returns from OSS, with rich empirical evidence from various data sources. The cases illustrate how firms try a variety of approaches to appropriate adequate returns, and suggest that selling services is the dominant trend. Firms also balance the relative inefficiency of traditional means of intellectual property rights such as patents by putting greater emphasis on first-mover advantages and creating network externalities.
Isolation and characterization of a class III homeodomain-leucine zipper-like gene from Gossypium barbadense

Class III homeodomain-leucine zipper (HD-Zip III) genes are important plant-specific transcription factors which have key roles in different stages of vascular and interfascicular fiber differentiation. A novel HD-Zip III gene, designated GbHB1, was isolated by suppression subtraction hybridization and RACE (rapid amplification of cDNA ends) from Gossypium barbadense (sea–island cotton). The GbHB1 cDNA has a total length of 3061 bp with an open reading frame of 2508 bp, encoding a predicated polypeptide of 836 amino acids with a molecular weight of 91.6 kDa and a calculated pI of 5.93. The putative polypeptide of GbHB1 is structurally characterized by a homeodomain positioned adjacent to a leucine zipper domain, which shares high identity with other reported HD-Zip III domains. DNA gel blotting analysis shows that GbHB1 is a low-copy gene. Organ expression pattern analysis reveals that GbHB1 expressed highly in ovule and stem, followed by in root, and low in leaf and cotyledon. The result suggests that GbHB1 may play a regulatory role in cotton interfascicular fiber development.
Neoliberalism, gender inequality and the Australian labour market

Over the past 25 years neoliberal philosophies have increasingly informed labour market policies in Australia that have led to increasing levels of wage decentralization. The most recent industrial relations changes aim to decentralize wage setting significantly further than has previously been the case. We argue that this is problematic for gender equity as wage decentralization will entrench rather than challenge the undervaluation of feminized work. In this article we provide an overview of key neoliberal industrial relations policy changes pertinent to gender equity and examine the current state of gender equity in the labour market. Results show that women's labour force participation has steadily increased over time but that a number of negative trends exclude women with substantial caring responsibilities from pursuing a career track. The implications of increasing levels of wage deregulation are that gender wage inequality and the potential for discrimination will grow.
Bioactive molecules and antioxidant activity in durum wheat grains and related millstream fractions

Abstract The present study was performed to evaluate the distribution of phytochemicals in wheat grains and millstreams and the contribution of these compounds to the antioxidant activity. Bioactive molecules, although related to genotype, were highly affected by the milling procedure applied. Carotenoids were unevenly distributed in the kernel and lutein resulted to be the main carotenoid in all samples considered. The WSB method was confirmed to be a useful tool to detect yellow color intensity of semolina but it was not suitable to get information on the true content of carotenoids of the sample. Water-methanol soluble components showed antioxidant activity which decreased from the outer to the inner parts of the kernel. Chloroform-methanol soluble compounds showed generally negligible or negative antioxidant activity due to the inadequate amount of antioxidants unable to counteract oxidative processes already in progress.
Taurine potentiates presynaptic NMDA receptors in hippocampal Schaffer collateral axons

We have previously shown that activation of presynaptic N‐methyl‐d‐aspartate (NMDA) receptors (NMDAR) enhances the amplitude of the presynaptic fibre volley (FV) evoked in Schaffer collateral axons of rat hippocampal slices, by a mechanism independent of extracellular Ca2+. Here we compared the pharmacological characteristics of presynaptic NMDARs affecting axon excitability (activated by 10–300 µm NMDA for 10 min), with those mediating field excitatory postsynaptic potentials (NMDA‐fEPSP). We found that NMDA‐induced potentiation was completely inhibited by NVP‐AAM077, an antagonist of NR2A‐containing NMDAR, but not by ifenprodil, an NR2B‐selective antagonist. The inhibitor of the glycine‐binding site in NMDARs, 7‐clorokynurenic acid (7‐CK), was more potent against NMDA‐fEPSP (IC50 = 6.3 ± 1.3 µm) than against the NMDA‐induced FV potentiation (IC50 = 26.5 ± 1.3 µm). Moreover, both post‐ and presynaptic NMDAR‐mediated phenomena were enhanced by glycine and d‐serine, but taurine, an endogenous analogue of glycine, only enhanced the latter (EC50 = 19 µm). Taurine was able to block the inhibitory effect of low doses of 7‐CK on NMDA‐induced FV potentiation, while glycine and d‐serine only reduced the effects of higher concentrations of this drug. Surprisingly, the enhancing effect of taurine on NMDA‐induced FV potentiation was blocked when it was co‐applied with glycine. Furthermore, the glutamate released synaptically with a train of stimuli also increased FV amplitude by a mechanism dependent on NMDARs; this was potentiated by taurine but not by co‐application of taurine and glycine. These results reveal that presynaptic NMDARs have unique properties that mediate the facilitation of axon excitability.
Clinical diagnosis of bilateral vestibular loss: three simple bedside tests

Bilateral vestibular loss (BVL) may present with or without vertigo and hearing loss. Amongst the causes of BVL are vestibulotoxic antibiotics, autoimmune ear diseases, Menière’s disease and meningitis. Clinical diagnosis of BVL is based on the result of three simple bedside tests: a positive head impulse test, reduced dynamic visual acuity and a positive Romberg test on foam rubber. With these signs, diagnosis of severe BVL is usually straightforward to establish.
MYC Protein Inhibits Transcription of the MicroRNA Cluster MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d via Noncanonical E-box*

Background: The three microRNAs from miRNA cluster MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d are often down-regulated in human cancers. Results: We functionally characterized the promoter and investigated the transcriptional regulation of MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d. Conclusion: MYC oncoprotein could inhibit the transcription of MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d via binding to a noncanonical E-box. Significance: Understanding how MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d is regulated could shed light on identifying new molecular targets and designing novel treatment for cancers. The human microRNA cluster MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d, with three members let-7a-1, let-7f-1, and let-7d, is an important cluster of the let-7 family. These microRNAs play critical roles in regulating development and carcinogenesis. Therefore, precise control of MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d level is critical for cellular functions. In this study, we first showed that the expression of these three members was significantly reduced in human hepatocellular carcinoma HepG2 cells as compared with the immortalized human liver L02 cells. We demonstrated that the MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d cluster was encoded by a single polycistronic transcript driven by a 10-kb upstream promoter, with two MYC-binding sites. Importantly, MYC inhibited MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d promoter activity via binding to the noncanonical E-box 3 downstream of the transcription start sites, whereas it enhanced promoter activity by binding to the canonical E-box 2 upstream of the transcription start sites. We found that although the binding affinity of MYC to E-box 2 was stronger than E-box 3, the binding quantum of MYC to E-box 3 was significantly higher in cancerous HepG2 cells as compared with the noncancerous L02 cells. In addition, forced expression of let-7 could reverse the MYC-mediated cell proliferation. These findings suggested that in L02 cells with a low level of MYC, MYC binds mainly to E-box 2 to enhance MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d expression. However, in HepG2 cells with an elevated MYC, the extra MYC could bind to E-box 3 to suppress the transcription of MC-let-7a-1∼let-7d and thus enable HepG2 cells to maintain a high level of MYC and a low level of let-7 microRNAs simultaneously.
SVM multi-classifier and Web document classification

This paper deals with support vector machine for multi-classification problem and its application to Web page document classification. Several multi-classifier of SVM are mentioned, their construction and computing complexity are compared and analyzed. For special application problems, most of multi-classifier of SVM are limited on the number of class. Web page document classification is a classical multi-classification problem; also the number of samples and the scale of dimension are so large that many classifiers are inefficient, such as multi-layer neural networks, RBF neural networks, k-neighbor, etc. SVM is the first choice for Web page document classification because of its advantage on non-effective of feature dimension scale. This paper focuses on direct design of multi-classifier of SVM and its application to Web page classification. The experiment results illustrate the efficiency of this kind of classifier.
Relative Price Determination in the Medium Run: The Influence of Wages, Productivity, and International Prices

This work explores three critical assumptions of the Balassa–Samuelson productivity differential model for the short and medium run: wage equalization, competitive labor markets, and purchasing power parity. The data reveal violations in these assumptions for France, Germany, Japan, the U.K., and the U.S. Significant wage and unit labor cost differentials exist across industries, and traded and nontraded sectors and these differentials do not diminish over time. The findings are consistent with the presence of industry and/or sectoral-specific human capital.
Induction of antigen‐specific human CD4+ T cell anergy by peripheral blood DC2 precursors

Dendritic cells (DC) are antigen (Ag)‐presenting cells that are essential for initiation of T cell‐dependent immunity, and distinct DC subsets are known to direct different classes of immune responses. DC2 precursors (pDC2) or plasmacytoid DC were recently identified as a Th2‐skewing and IFN‐α‐producing human DC subset. Here, we demonstrate that pDC2 enriched from human peripheral blood have a capacity to induce an anergic state in human Ag‐specific CD4+ T cell lines. Tetanus toxoid‐specific T cell lines incubated with tetanus toxoid‐pulsed autologous pDC2 failed to proliferate in secondary cultures with optimal Ag stimulation. T cell anergy induction required TCR engagement with Ag/MHC complex presented on pDC2. T cells rendered anergic lost IL‐2 production but produced IFN‐γ and IL‐10 upon stimulation. The pDC2‐induced unresponsiveness was completely or partially reversible when a high concentration of exogenous IL‐2 was added in the secondary cultures. Autoreactive CD4+ T cell clones specific for topoisomerase I derived from a patient with scleroderma were also rendered anergic after co‐culture with topoisomerase I‐pulsed autologous pDC2,resulting in failure to proliferate or provide help to B cells. These results suggest that pDC2 are involved in maintenance of peripheral T cell tolerance and have potential for use in the suppression of pathogenic T cell responses in autoimmune diseases and organ transplantation.
The Impact of Representative Bureaucracies: Educational Systems and Public Policies

Studies of representative bureaucracies are staples of public administration research; however, because of a variety of methodological problems, too few have been able to address the basic "so what? " question. Do bureaucracies with different levels of representativeness produce different policy outputs and have different policy impacts? Our research addresses these inquiries using data from the 67 public school districts in Florida. The analysis shows that when we focus on (a) bureaucrats who exercise discretion, (b) a demographic factor with a lasting impact-race, and (c) policy measures that are clearly salient to the chosen demographic factor, we can detect the relationships between bureaucratic representation and public policy outputs and outcomes. We particularly highlight the representativeness of "street-level" bureaucrats (in this case, teachers). Thus, the issue of representation in public bureaucracies possesses more than just symbolic importance.
The effects of continuous hot weather training on risk of exertional heat illness.

PURPOSE To determine whether cumulative daily average wet-bulb globe temperature (WBGT) index, over one or two preceding days, is a better measure for predicting cases of exertional heat illness (EHI) than current daily average WBGT, which is the standard heat index used by the Marine Corps; and to identify the most accurate index of heat stress to prevent and predict future cases of EHI. METHODS A case-crossover study was conducted in male and female Marine Corps recruits in basic training at Marine Corps Recruit Depot, Parris Island, SC. Weather measurements were obtained for 2069 cases of EHI during 1979-1997 and for randomly selected control periods before and after each EHI episode. RESULTS The risk of EHI increased with WBGT (OR = 1.11 degrees F(-1); 95% CI, 1.10-1.13). EHI risk was associated not only with the WBGT at the time of the event (OR = 1.10 degrees F(-1); 95% CI, 1.08-1.11) but with the previous day's average WBGT as well (OR = 1.03 degrees F(-1); 95% CI, 1.02-1.05). Alternative combinations of WBGT components were identified that better predicted EHI risk. CONCLUSION Our results provide evidence for a cumulative effect of previous day's heat exposure on EHI risk in these Marine Corps recruits. A simple index for use in predicting EHI risk is proposed that includes the dry-bulb temperature and the relative humidity.
Proximal junctional kyphosis in adult spinal deformity with long spinal fusion from T9/T10 to the ilium.

BACKGROUND Proximal junctional kyphosis (PJK) is a common complication after corrective long spinal fusion for adult spinal deformity. Although some reports evaluated PJK after corrective long spinal fusion, there is no report about analysis of PJK cases in the same fusion area. The purpose of this study to investigated the incidence of and risk factors for PJK in adults undergoing long spinal fusion from the distal thoracic vertebrae (T9/T10) to the ilium. METHODS We enrolled 56 adult patients (>40 years of age) who underwent posterior corrective surgery with same fusion area from T9 or T10 to the ilium for spinal deformity. Pre- and postoperative radiographic measurements included the sagittal vertical axis (SVA), lumbar lordosis (LL), thoracic kyphosis (TK), pelvic tilt (PT), and pelvic incidence minus LL (PI-LL). The Oswestry disability index (ODI) was used to evaluate patient outcomes preoperatively and one year after surgery. We analyzed the incidence for PJK and compared PJK and non-PJK cases. RESULTS PJK at the final follow-up occurred in 19 of 56 (33.9%) patients. The mean age and ODI were not significantly different between the PJK and non-PJK groups. Both two groups had good spinopelvic sagittal alignment after surgery in terms of SVA and PI-LL. Only three cases required revision surgery for symptomatic PJK. Three cases had history of rheumatoid arthritis and/or total hip arthroplasty surgery. CONCLUSIONS The incidence of PJK was 33.9%, and ODI was not significantly different between the PJK and non-PJK groups. Symptomatic PJK was only three cases and all of them had lower extremity joint disorders. We should pay attention also lower extremity joint to prevent symptomatic PJK at the lower thoracic level.