Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Review of Patient Safety in Time‐Varying Gradient Fields

In magnetic resonance, time‐varying gradient magnetic fields (dB/dt) may stimulate nerves or muscles by inducing electric fields in patients. Models predicted mean peripheral nerve and cardiac stimulation thresholds. For gradient ramp durations of less than a few milliseconds, mean peripheral nerve stimulation is a safe indicator of high dB/dt. At sufficient amplitudes, peripheral nerve stimulation is perceptible (ie, tingling or tapping sensations). Magnetic fields from simultaneous gradient axes combine almost as a vector sum to produce stimulation. Patients may become uncomfortable at amplitudes 50%–100% above perception thresholds. In dogs, respiratory stimulation has been induced at about 300% of mean peripheral nerve thresholds. Cardiac stimulation has been induced in dogs by small gradient coils at thresholds near Reilly's predictions. Cardiac stimulation required nearly 80 times the energy needed to produce nerve stimulation in dogs. Nerve and cardiac stimulation thresholds for dogs were unaffected by 1.5‐T magnetic fields. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2000;12:20–29. © 2000 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
The Pseudomonas aeruginosa PhoP-PhoQ Two-Component Regulatory System Is Induced upon Interaction with Epithelial Cells and Controls Cytotoxicity and Inflammation

ABSTRACT The adaptation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa to its environment, including the host, is tightly controlled by its network of regulatory systems. The two-component regulatory system PhoPQ has been shown to play a role in the virulence and polymyxin resistance of P. aeruginosa as well as several other Gram-negative species. Dysregulation of this system has been demonstrated in clinical isolates, yet how it affects virulence of P. aeruginosa is unknown. To investigate this, an assay was used whereby bacteria were cocultured with human bronchial epithelial cells. The interaction of wild-type (WT) bacteria that had adhered to epithelial cells led to a large upregulation of the expression of the oprH-phoP-phoQ operon and its target, the arn lipopolysaccharide (LPS) modification operon, in a PhoQ-dependent manner, compared to cells in the supernatant that had failed to adhere. Relative to the wild type, a phoQ mutant cocultured on epithelial cells produced less secreted protease and lipase and, like the phoQ mutant, piv, lipH, and lasB mutants demonstrated reduced cytotoxicity toward epithelial cells. Mutation in phoQ also resulted in alterations to lipid A and to increased inflammatory LPS. These data indicate that mutation of phoQ results in a phenotype that is similar to the less virulent but more inflammatory phenotype of clinical strains isolated from chronic-stage cystic fibrosis lung infections.
The Demise of Radical Political Economics? An Essay on the Evolution of a Theory of Capitalist Production

The paper traces the historical development of American radical economics. The focus is on the work of Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis. The central aim is to examine the implications of their recent move towards neoclassical economics for the study of capitalist production in particular, and the future of American radical economics more generally. By embracing neoclassical concepts and methodology, radical economists have denied themselves the opportunity to elucidate both the bases of capitalist class conflict, and the nature of more complex social interactions at the point of production. American radical economics once provided a powerful critique of capitalism and its system of production, but it now struggles to provide more than a policy prescription for reduced levels of opportunism among individual workers. American radical economics cannot remain a distinctive voice in economics while it retains such close associations with neoclassicism. Copyright 2000 by Oxford University Press.
Testing the Conventional Wisdom Regarding Volunteer Programs: A Longitudinal Analysis of the Service Corps of Retired Executives and the U.S. Small Business Administration

Conventional wisdom holds that volunteer programs save money and raise the level of services provided by an organization but threaten paid positions. This study tests these assumptions qualitatively and quantitatively based on the experience of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) and its volunteer program, the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE). The authors examined the SBA’s history with SCORE using interviews, records, and reports and then applied interrupted time-series statistical analysis to 42 years of budget, employment, and output data. The authors found evidence that SBA services increased with SCORE but found no support for stereotypes of adversarial relationships between volunteers and paid staff, volunteer replacement of paid personnel, or cutbacks in agency budget to compensate for the addition of an unpaid workforce. This study has broad implications for both public agencies and nonprofit organizations, sounding a cautionary note that conventional assumptions regarding the impact of volunteers on budget and paid staff may need to be reevaluated.
The Performance Impact of Strategic Corporate Real Estate in Franchise Organizations

Purpose: To analyze the effect of corporate real estate asset ownership on the performances of franchise organizations. Design/methodology/approach: Using data on all available US public franchise companies, we measure the effect of corporate real estate ownership on the risk and return characteristics of franchise firms. Findings: Unlike previous findings that show negative performance effects of corporate real estate ownership in general, our study shows positive effects for franchise organizations. Research limitations/implications: Although we include all available public franchises in our sample, the sample size is still limited. Practical implications: Our results show how corporate real estate ownership can impact the long term performances of franchise organizations. Originality/value: While most of the corporate real estate literature focuses on theory, we offer positive empirical evidence of the importance of corporate real estate ownership.
Heritability of gonad size varies across season in a wild songbird

Many organisms advance their seasonal reproduction in response to global warming. In birds, which regress their gonads to a nonfunctional state each winter, these shifts are ultimately constrained by the time required for gonadal development in spring. Gonadal development is photoperiodically controlled and shows limited phenotypic plasticity in relation to environmental factors, such as temperature. Heritable variation in the time required for full gonadal maturation to be completed, based on both onset and speed of development and resulting in seasonally different gonad sizes among individuals, is thus a crucial prerequisite for an adaptive advancement of seasonal reproduction in response to changing temperatures. We measured seasonal gonadal development in climate‐controlled aviaries for 144 great tit (Parus major) pairs, which consisted of siblings obtained as whole broods from the wild. We show that the extent of ovarian follicle development (follicle size) in early spring is highly heritable (h2 = 0.73) in females, but found no heritability of the extent of testis development in males. However, heritability in females decreased as spring advanced, caused by an increase in environmental variance and a decrease in additive genetic variation. This low heritability of the variation in a physiological mechanism underlying reproductive timing at the time of selection may hamper genetic adaptation to climate change, a key insight as this great tit population is currently under directional selection for advanced egg‐laying.
Listening to Those We Serve: Assessing the Research Needs of University Faculty

This study presents findings from a university-wide faculty survey on research resources at a top-tier research institution in the United States (U.S.). The researchers (faculty leaders) designed the original instrument, submitted it for critique and validation to a faculty senate’s research body, and solicited participation from all colleges. The principal investigators sought to identify impediments to research and scholarship, as perceived by faculty. The questions posed were: What specific types of resources do faculty members deem important to facilitate their research activities? Are financial and non-financial resources deemed equally important? Do junior and senior faculty members differ in their views on the importance of various resources as valued resources? Are there differences across academic units in the degree to which particular resources are valued? The survey also elicited faculty perceptions of the level of research support actually received and demographic information about the faculty respondents, their recent research and scholarship activities, and their attitudes towards various types of incentives for research. The survey was distributed
A Text Matching Method to Facilitate the Validation of Frequent Order Sets Obtained Through Data Mining

In order to compare order sets discovered using a data mining algorithm with existing order sets, we developed an order matching tool based on Oracle Text. The tool includes both automated searching and manual review processes. The comparison between the automated process and the manual review process indicates that the sensitivity of the automated matching is 81% and the specificity is 84%.
Integrating Sustainability Into The Business Curriculum Through E-Learning

This article presents a set of online activities, using free Internet resources, aimed at increasing students’ understanding of sustainability in business. Incorporating sustainability education into business curricula can shape organizational work climates by influencing various microeconomic objectives such as (1) sustainability certification of products, operations, and supply chains; (2) zero-waste; (3) eco-efficiency; (4) work-place well- being; (5) and community vitality. Currently, European and North American business schools mostly focus sustainability education efforts at the graduate level. Due to this gap, the authors designed the activities described in this paper for implementation at the undergraduate level. The outcomes reveal that students who participate in these activities more successfully identify the relevance of sustainability, and corporate social responsibility in the work place and in their personal lives. In contrast, students who did not participate in these activities exhibited a vague understanding of these concepts, and were less adept at both identifying and describing socially responsible practices. In addition, students not exposed to the activities were less apt to engage in sustainability practices in their personal lives. The results indicate that educators can increase students’ knowledge of sustainability, business ethics, and social responsibility by integrating the suggested activities into their curricula.
The Impact of Human Rights Organizations on Naming and Shaming Campaigns

Given the myriad of human rights abuses that occur globally and daily, why are some nations on the receiving end of a substantial amount of international opprobrium, while others receive far less attention and condemnation? The authors contend that the increasing presence of human rights organizations in such states is the critical link between the local and the international. Increases in the number of such groups contributes significantly to the generation of Amnesty International urgent actions, one of the most-often-utilized tools in naming and shaming campaigns against human rights abusing regimes. The authors find strong support for nearly all their hypotheses.
Towards a Comprehensive Understanding of Lead Userness: The Search for Individual Creativity

In innovation research the identification of lead users has attracted considerable research effort. While lead user research has made important advances, there is still a significant lack in terms of understanding antecedents to lead userness. Therefore the aim of this paper is to offer a framework which is rooted in creativity psychology in order to provide a more comprehensive understanding of who leading‐edge users are. It will allow for a systematic investigation and detection of innovative users. We conducted an empirical study in the field of small kitchen appliances in co‐operation with Philips Consumer Lifestyle, a field which lacks some of the typical characteristics that have been emphasized in markets traditionally studied in lead user research. With our research we show that (1) lead userness is fundamentally linked to individual creativity; (2) particularly creativity‐ and domain‐relevant skills (cognitive style, product knowledge and use experience) are related to lead userness; (3) creativity‐relevant skills can be explained by personal characteristics, such as education, gender and openness to experience.
177Lu labelled polyaminophosphonates as potential agents for bone pain palliation

Polyphosphonate ligands labelled with radioisotopes decaying by moderate energy beta emission have shown utility as palliative agents for painful bone metastasis. 177Lu (T½ = 6.71 d, Eβmax = 497 keV) has radionuclidic properties suitable for use in palliative therapy of bone metastasis. 177Lu was produced at a high specific activity and excellent radionuclidic purity by thermal neutron bombardment of a target prepared from natural Lu. Three polyaminomethylene phosphonate ligands, abbreviated as EDTMP, DTPMP and TTHMP, were synthesized and radiolabelled with 177Lu. Complexation parameters were optimized to achieve maximum yields (97-99.5%). All the complexes were found to retain their stability at room temperature even 14 days after preparation. Biodistribution studies of the complexes were carried out in Wistar rats. All the complexes showed significant bone uptake (6-6.5%/g in tibia at 3 h post-injection (p.i.)) with rapid clearance from blood and minimum uptake in soft tissues. These studies reveal that 177Lu complexes with the synthesized ligands have a potential use in palliative treatment of painful bone metastasis.
Microenvironmental characteristics and physiology of biofilms in chronic infections of CF patients are strongly affected by the host immune response

In vitro studies of Pseudomonas aeruginosa and other pathogenic bacteria in biofilm aggregates have yielded detailed insight into their potential growth modes and metabolic flexibility under exposure to gradients of substrate and electron acceptor. However, the growth pattern of P. aeruginosa in chronic lung infections of cystic fibrosis (CF) patients is very different from what is observed in vitro, for example, in biofilms grown in flow chambers. Dense in vitro biofilms of P. aeruginosa exhibit rapid O2 depletion within <50–100 μm due to their own aerobic metabolism. In contrast, in vivo investigations show that P. aeruginosa persists in the chronically infected CF lung as relatively small cell aggregates that are surrounded by numerous PMNs, where the activity of PMNs is the major cause of O2 depletion rendering the P. aeruginosa aggregates anoxic. High levels of nitrate and nitrite enable P. aeruginosa to persist fueled by denitrification in the PMN‐surrounded biofilm aggregates. This configuration creates a potentially long‐term stable ecological niche for P. aeruginosa in the CF lung, which is largely governed by slow growth and anaerobic metabolism and enables persistence and resilience of this pathogen even under the recurring aggressive antimicrobial treatments of CF patients. As similar slow growth of other CF pathogens has recently been observed in endobronchial secretions, there is now a clear need for better in vitro models that simulate such in vivo growth patterns and anoxic microenvironments in order to help unravel the efficiency of existing or new antimicrobials targeting anaerobic metabolism in P. aeruginosa and other CF pathogens. We also advocate that host immune responses such as PMN‐driven O2 depletion play a central role in the formation of anoxic microniches governing bacterial persistence in other chronic infections such as chronic wounds.
Edwards Revisited: Technical Control and Call Centres

Call centres represent a new strategy by capital to reduce unit labour costs. While this strategy has been applied to many different types of work, it is particularly successful in cutting costs in routine interactive service encounters. Telebank, the case study research site, is one of four integrated call centres throughout the UK. Data collection includes taped semi-structured interviews with customer service representatives and managers as well as non-participant observation of recruitment, training and the labour process. This article argues that management has developed a new form of structural control. Theoretically this draws heavily on Edwards's concept of technical control, but not only is this shown to be extended and modified, it is also combined with bureaucratic control, which influences the social structure of the workplace. Contrary to Edwards such systems are not distinct; rather they are blended together in the process of institutionalizing control. Part of the rationale for this is to camouflage control, to contain conflict by making control a product of the system rather than involving direct confrontation between management and workers. Despite such attempts the struggle for transforming labour power into profitable labour remains, and the article ends by exploring confrontation between workers and managers and worker agency more generally.
Does Information Technology Cause Skill-Biased Technical Change?

In this paper we examine whether IT causes the relative demand for skilled workers to rise and substitutes for low-skill human work. A system of factor demand derived from a general cost function is estimated, along with some price generation processes in oredr to allow e¢ ciency gains in production to arise when new inputs generate an improvement i
Topography of ganglion cells in human retina

We quantified the spatial distribution of presumed ganglion cells and displaced amacrine cells in unstained whole mounts of six young normal human retinas whose photoreceptor distributions had previously been characterized. Cells with large somata compared to their nuclei were considered ganglion cells; cells with small somata relative to their nuclei were considered displaced amacrine cells. Within the central area, ganglion cell densities reach 32,000‐‐38,000 cells/mm2 in a horizontally oriented elliptical ring 0.4‐‐2.0 mm from the foveal center. In peripheral retina, densities in nasal retina exceed those at corresponding eccentricities in temporal retina by more than 300%; superior exceeds inferior by 60%. Displaced amacrine cells represented 3% of the total cells in central retina and nearly 80% in the far periphery. A twofold range in the total number of ganglion cells (0.7 to 1.5 million) was largely explained by a similar range in ganglion cell density in different eyes. Cone and ganglion cell number were not correlated, and the overall cone: ganglion cell ratio ranged from 2.9 to 7.5 in different eyes. Peripheral cones and ganglion cells have different topographies, thus suggesting meridianal differences in convergence onto individual ganglion cells.
Geoengineering as an optimization problem

There is increasing evidence that Earth’s climate is currently warming, primarily due to emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities, and Earth has been projected to continue warming throughout this century. Scientists have begun to investigate the potential for geoengineering options for reducing surface temperatures and whether such options could possibly contribute to environmental risk reduction. One proposed method involves deliberately increasing aerosol loading in the stratosphere to scatter additional sunlight to space. Previous modeling studies have attempted to predict the climate consequences of hypothetical aerosol additions to the stratosphere. These studies have shown that this method could potentially reduce surface temperatures, but could not recreate a low-CO2 climate in a high-CO2 world. In this study, we attempt to determine the latitudinal distribution of stratospheric aerosols that would most closely achieve a low-CO2 climate despite high CO2 levels. Using the NCAR CAM3.1 general circulation model, we find that having a stratospheric aerosol loading in polar regions higher than that in tropical regions leads to a temperature distribution that is more similar to the low-CO2 climate than that yielded by a globally uniform loading. However, such polar weighting of stratospheric sulfate tends to degrade the degree to which the hydrological cycle is restored, and thus does not markedly contribute to improved recovery of a low-CO2 climate. In the model, the optimal latitudinally varying aerosol distributions diminished the rms zonal mean land temperature change from a doubling of CO2 by 94% and the rms zonal mean land precipitation minus evaporation change by 74%. It is important to note that this idealized study represents a first attempt at optimizing the engineering of climate using a general circulation model; uncertainties are high and not all processes that are important in reality are modeled.
Visualising and mapping stakeholder influence

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to offer insights into a tool that one of the authors has developed to help map, and thus visualise, stakeholder power and influence within the performing organisation.Design/methodology/approach – The concept described in this paper has been tested at several large international gatherings to well over 200 active professional project managers. The feedback to date has been very positive. This positive feedback led to testing of these ideas through research being conducted during 2004/2005 by one of the authors who is a candidate for the doctor of project management (DPM) at RMIT.Findings – The research is centred around this tool, the stakeholder circle, as a means to provide a useful and effective way to visualise stakeholder power and influence that may have pivotal impact on a project's success or failure. The stakeholder‐circle tool is developed for each project through a methodology that identifies and prioritises key project stakeholders and then develops an e.
The Perils of Pensions: Does Pension Accounting Lead Investors and Analysts Astray?

This paper explores the ability of investors and analysts to fully process available pension information when establishing prices and making earnings forecasts. I find that neither prices nor forecasts fully reflect the quantifiable future earnings effects of changes in pension information at the time it becomes publicly available in the firm's 10‐K. Instead, the evidence suggests that investors and analysts only gradually incorporate this information into prices and forecasts as they observe the effects of the pension plan changes on subsequent quarterly earnings. The persistent tardiness of analysts to incorporate this relevant and economically significant information about earnings is surprising given that they are provided with pension information on a repeated and timely basis. Additionally, I find that the off‐balance‐sheet portion of the pension plan's funded status and the PBO are predictive of future returns while the on‐balance‐sheet portion of the funded status is not. This implies that investo.