Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Alzheimer's disease: β‐amyloid plaque formation in human brain

Although the precise cause of Alzheimer's disease is not known, the β‐amyloid peptide chains of 40–42 amino acids are suspected to contribute to the disease. The β‐amyloid precursor protein is found on many types of cell membranes, and the action of secretases (β and γ) on this precursor protein normally releases the β‐amyloids at a high rate into the plasma and the cerebrospinal fluid. However, the concentrations of the β‐amyloids in the plasma and the spinal fluid vary considerably between laboratories. The β‐amyloids adsorb in the nanomolar concentration range to receptors on neuronal and glial cells. The β‐amyloids are internalized, become folded in the β‐folded or β‐pleated shape, and then stack on each other to form long fibrils and aggregates known as plaques. The β‐amyloids likely act as monomers, dimers, or multimers on cell membranes to interfere with neurotransmission and memory before the plaques build up. Treatment strategies include inhibitors of β‐ and γ‐secretase, as well as drugs and physiological compounds to prevent aggregation of the amyloids. Several immune approaches and a cholesterol‐lowering strategy are also being tested to remove the β‐amyloids. Synapse, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Seasonal Hunger and Public Policies: Evidence from Northwest Bangladesh

Seasonal hunger induced by agricultural seasonality is often a characteristic feature of rural poverty. The evidence of seasonal distress in many agrarian societies can be found in the narratives of economic historians. With agricultural diversification made possible through technological breakthroughs in many parts of the developing world, the severity of seasonal stress and adversities has been reduced considerably, if not altogether eliminated. In certain agricultural settings, however, the seasonality of poverty and hunger, along with the associated seasonal shortfalls in income and consumption, is still a policy quagmire. The problem gets more complicated when agricultural seasonality is locked into a cycle of endemic poverty, seasonal hunger, and risk of further impoverishment. Poverty and seasonality may also reinforce each other through various other forces that create and sustain both. The thrust of policy needs to be to break this interlocking cycle of poverty and seasonality. The book has nine chapters. Chapter two looks at the key conceptual issues and presents a global perspective on the challenge of addressing seasonal hunger. Chapter three brings Bangladesh's reality to the fore regarding seasonal poverty and food insecurity and the vulnerability of the northwest region. Chapter four analyzes the vulnerability of households to seasonal hunger, their coping strategies, and the extent to which income seasonality affects seasonal poverty and food deprivation. Chapter five reports some findings for both the Rangpur region and the country as a whole regarding the effects of policies and programs on poverty and food deprivation. The findings reported in the next three chapters are mainly related to the Rangpur region only. Chapter six examines the issue of seasonal migration in the context of mitigating seasonal deprivation. In chapter seven, the impact of the social safety-net programs is tested, whereas the effectiveness of microfinance is assessed in chapter eight. The concluding chapter, chapter nine, looks at the policy implications while also pointing to some emerging challenges.
The European Internal Market Challenge and the Role of Microeconomic Analysis

This paper shows the role of the theories of imperfect competition and industrial organization for analyzing the channels through which the removal of the European Community's internal market barriers may result in economic gains, and for designing sensible accompanying policies. Some of the recent microeconomic research that provides a better framework for understanding the 1992 challenge than the one assumed in traditional trade theory are first presented. Then the main characteristics of corporate strategies in the internal European market are investigated. Finally two microeconomic policies intended to influence the allocative and the distributive effects of the integration process are discussed.
Effects of Marriage, Education and Occupation on the Female/Male Wage Gap in China

In the present study the way in which the gender wage gap in urban China differs according to marital status, education and occupation, is examined. Married Chinese women experience much larger absolute gender wage gaps than their unmarried counterparts. The proportion of the gender wage gap unexplained by differences in the levels of productive characteristics is also higher for married women than single women. Gender wage gaps are smaller for more educated women. These findings suggest that occupational segregation is not as important a factor as industrial segregation in accounting for the gender wage gap in China's urban labour markets.
Asynchronous protocols to meet real-time constraints: is it really sensible? How to proceed?

This paper investigates the use of asynchronous protocols to design and build middleware whose aim is to provide run-time support for soft real-time applications. A simple and general framework is described. This framework allows to take into account timeliness constraints of upper layer applications, while using an asynchronous protocol at the underlying level. When a timeliness constraint is about to be violated, the application layer is informed and can take appropriate measures. The deadline period can then be extended if the constraint is soft enough; in the other case, a default value can be used as a result. This framework can be seen as a bridge from asynchronous systems to synchronous ones. The proposed approach is illustrated with the consensus problem. This approach is investigated in the ARGO system we are implementing. The target applications of the ARGO middleware are telecommunication applications.
Evaluation of reperfusion strategy for the globally ischaemic rat heart. Recovery of function and energy metabolism.

OBJECTIVE The sequelae of myocardial ischaemia can in principle be alleviated by repeated reperfusion, but the accumulation of adenosine monophosphate (AMP) and the loss of interstitial adenosine may lead to adenylate depletion. Repeated oxidative stress could predispose the heart to reperfusion injury. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of intermittent reperfusion on myocardial energetics and postischaemic function. METHODS Isolated retrogradely perfused rat hearts were subjected to 20 min ischaemia, this being continuous in group I while the hearts in group II were reperfused for three 2 min periods at 5 min intervals. Function and energy metabolism were evaluated during the postischaemic reperfusion. RESULTS Considerable efflux of adenosine compounds was seen during the final reperfusion, this being greater in group I than in group II, at 6.6(SEM 0.9) v 2.0(0.4) mumol.g-1 dry weight (p < 0.01). Tissue AMP, inorganic phosphate, and adenosine catabolites were higher in group I than in II after the ischaemic insult (p < 0.02), and ATP was higher in group II at the end of the final reperfusion (p < 0.05). All the hearts recovered; however, in group I the rate-pressure product was lower than in group II. CONCLUSIONS Repetitive reperfusion, although short in duration, is beneficial in ischaemia in terms of lower adenylate loss and better postischaemic recovery. This should be taken into consideration when designing clinical reperfusion interventions.
EVIDÊNCIAS TEÓRICAS PARA COMPREENSÃO DA INOVAÇÃO ABERTA (OPEN INNOVATION) NAS ORGANIZAÇÕES

Este estudo teorico tem como objetivo compreender como a estrategia de inovacao aberta pode ser usada para acelerar e aprimorar o processo de inovacao nas empresas. O presente trabalho pretende, ainda, aprofundar o conhecimento e oferecer uma visao analitica sobre o tema. Enquanto tradicionalmente, muitas empresas, isoladamente, lutam para produzir a inovacao exigida pelos mercados, o modelo de inovacao aberta mostra-se como uma alternativa para complementar os esforcos inovadores das empresas. A partir de uma analise da literatura existente sobre inovacao aberta, foi possivel compreender o processo de criacao de inovacoes nas empresas ao abrir-se para o ambiente externo, atraves do compartilhamento de ideias, conhecimentos, experiencia e oportunidades. O modelo de inovacao discutido permite que pequenas e grandes empresas possam melhorar sua competitividade, ao envolver-se nesse atual tipo de inovacao.
Farm-Level Fertilizer Demand for Mexican Wheat Varieties in the Indian Punjab

A restricted profit function is used to estimate jointly the profit and factor demand functions from farm-level, cross-sectional data for Mexican wheat varieties in the Indian Punjab. The main focus is analysis of fertilizer demand. The results indicate that output price is a more powerful policy instrument than fertilizer price to influence fertilizer use, output supply, and returns to fixed farm resources, that producers attain allocative efficiency, that education of the farm people contributes significantly to agricultural production, and that profit function is a suitable concept for empirical analysis and interpretation.
Fabrication and evaluation of SiC inverter using SiC-MOSFET

This paper deals with device characteristics of SiC-MOSFET (600 V, 10 A) and efficiency characteristics of SiC inverter when the motor is driven as compared respectively with Si-MOSFET and Si inverter. As a result, it was found that on-resistance of SiC-MOSFET is smaller than that of Si-MOSFET, and switching loss of SiC-MOSEFET is approximately 1/3 compared with Si-MOSFET. It was also found that the SiC inverter is operated at high efficiency about 7.3% than the Si inverter at the switching frequency of 100 kHz.
Compensating Wage Differentials and the Endogeneity of Job Riskiness

Those with greater earnings capacity are likely to choose safer jobs, assuming safety is a normal good. Those who e xperience greater returns to job may choose riskier jobs. This paper estimates wage premia for risk of fatality and injury, allowing unobs ervables to affect earnings capacity and the returns to risk. As the endogeneity of job risk causes bias in OLS estimation, the model is e stimated with simultaneous equations and modified selection bias tech niques. The results indicate that unobserved heterogeneity in the ret urns to risk is important and that OLS underestimates the wage premia for fatality and injury risk. Copyright 1988 by MIT Press.
A Compact and Low-Profile Loop Antenna With Six Resonant Modes for LTE Smartphone

In this paper, a novel six-mode loop antenna covering 660-1100, 1710-3020, 3370-3900, and 5150-5850 MHz has been proposed for the application of long-term evolution (LTE) including the coming LTE in unlicensed spectrum and LTE-Licensed Assisted Access. Loop antennas offer better user experience than conventional planar inverted-F antennas (PIFAs), inverted-F antennas (IFAs), and monopole antennas because of their unique balanced modes (1λ, 2λ, .). However, the bandwidth of loop antennas is usually narrower than that of PIFA/IFA and monopole antennas due to these balanced modes. To overcome this problem, a novel monopole/dipole parasitic element, which operates at an unbalanced monopole-like 0. 25λ mode and a balanced dipole-like 0. 5λ mode, is first proposed for loop antennas to cover more frequency bands. Benefiting from the balanced mode, the proposed parasitic element is promising to provide better user experience than conventional parasitic elements. To the best of the authors' knowledge, the balanced mode for a parasitic element is reported for the first time. The proposed antenna is able to provide excellent user experience while solving the problem of limited bandwidth in loop antennas. To validate the concept, one prototype antenna with a size of 75 × 10 × 5 mm3 is designed, fabricated, and measured. Both simulations and experimental results are presented and discussed. Good performance is achieved.
The Changing Role of Tourism in China's Economy

This article seeks to examine the features of China's tourism development after its rapid economic progress over the past few decades. Three main features were discovered. First, as China's economy continues to grow, the insignificant share of tourism in the economy indicates that tourism is not a growth engine. Second, instead of stimulating economic growth, tourism has been employed to accommodate China's economic needs at different stages of development. Third, the development of tourism actually reflects the rapid urbanization in China. The key cities in China, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Macao, are the main drivers of China's overall tourism development.
Topical Diltiazem Cream Versus Botulinum Toxin A for the Treatment of Chronic Anal Fissure: A Double-Blind Randomized Clinical Trial

Objective:A double-blind randomized clinical trial to compare topical diltiazem with botulinum toxin A (BTA) in the treatment of chronic anal fissure. Background:Chronic anal fissures remain a challenging condition. Topical diltiazem and BTA are promising agents in the treatment of anal fissure. As to date diltiazem and BTA were never compared in a solid randomized trial, which is the purpose of this study. Methods:One hundred thirty-four patients were randomized to receive either diltiazem cream and placebo injection or BTA injection and placebo cream. The primary end point was fissure healing after 3 months. Results:After 3 months healing of the fissure was noted in 32 of 74 (43%) patients in the diltiazem group and 26 of 60 (43%) patients in the BTA group. Reduction >50% in mean pain score was noted in 58 of 74 (78%) patients in the diltiazem group and 49 of 60 (82%) patients in the BTA group. Perianal itching was the only side effect reported and was noted in 15% of patients in the diltiazem group, and this difference was statistically significant (P = 0.012). Conclusions:BTA yields higher healing rates in the short term, though after 3 months diltiazem and BTA resulted in equal healing rates. Also no significant difference in pain reduction was observed for both treatments. This study shows no significant advantage of one treatment compared to the other. This randomized clinical trial is registered by the Dutch Trial Register as NTR1012.
Hybrid professionalism and beyond: (New) Forms of public professionalism in changing organizational and societal contexts

It is tempting to stick to traditional, ‘pure’ images of professionalism—as the protected treatment of complex cases—and to resist ‘alien’ intrusions, especially managerial ‘encroachments’. However, it has become rather normal to link professionalism to well-managed organizational surroundings and to focus on emerging hybrid professional practices in which professional work is (re)organized in one way or the other. Contradictory professional and managerial principles such as autonomy and control, or quality and efficiency, are combined in order to establish contemporary professional actions. This article analyses the hybridization of professional work in public domains, in order to accomplish three things. First, we show what hybridization is about and which types of hybridization are identified. Second, we show the importance of hybridization, against the background of (changing) organizational and societal contexts. Third, we move beyond hybridization and discuss ‘organizing professionalism’ as a new model of professionalism. Organizing becomes a normal part of professional work—instead of an hybrid, ‘uneasy’ combination of professional and managerial principles.
DIAGNOSES IN DISCHARGE COMMUNICATIONS: HOW FAR ARE THEY RELIABLE?

To discover whether general practitioners are correctly notified of a patient's final diagnosis following hospital discharge, an observational study was undertaken in a district general hospital. The final diagnosis was compared with the diagnosis documented in the discharge summary and the take‐home prescription. Two hundred discharges were studied. Only 163 (81%) discharge summaries and 138 (69%) take‐home prescriptions had the correct diagnosis; 24 (12%) take‐home prescriptions did not have any diagnosis at all. In some cases the diagnosis differed between the discharge summaries and the take‐home prescriptions. Only in 122 (61%) cases was the final diagnosis correctly documented in both instances. Communication regarding diagnosis in discharge letters is less than adequate. Every effort should be made to improve this.
Vaginal Agglutination: Chronic Graft-Versus-Host Disease Mimics Lichen Planus

Background. Graft-versus-host (GVH) disease is a common problem in transplant patients, whereas vulvovaginal gingival syndrome is an uncommon and severe variant of lichen planus characterized by erosions of characteristic mucosal surfaces, with frequent vaginal involvement, resulting in scarring or stricture formation. Both conditions have the potential to present with similar clinical pictures. Case. We report the history, evaluation, and treatment of a woman who had recently undergone stem cell transplant for acute lymphoblastic leukemia who presented with vaginal agglutination. A clinical diagnosis of erosive lichen planus versus chronic GVH disease was considered. Conclusions. Lichen planus and GVH disease are both inflammatory processes, which can present with a range of clinical conditions. Each may result in the development of irritative symptoms and erosive lesions on mucosal surfaces. Although lichen planus is a well-defined dermatosis, GVH disease is an iatrogenic process. We report the case history of a patient with erosive vulvovaginal lesions with scarring, likely caused by GVH disease, which mimicked erosive vulvovaginal lichen planus. Although the clinical presentation and treatment of these 2 entities are similar, this case demonstrates the subtle diagnostic difference between the 2 diseases.
Detecting flooding attack while accommodating burst traffic in delay tolerant networks

Delay Tolerant Network (DTN) is developed to cope with intermittent connectivity and long delay in wireless networks. Due to limited connectivity, DTN is vulnerable to flooding attack in which malicious nodes flood the network with superfluous data to deplete the network resources. Existing works mitigate internal flooding attacks by rate-limit to constrain the number of messages that nodes can generate per time slot. However, rate-limit cannot flexibly accommodate burst traffic in which nodes may have sending demand higher than the rate-limit for a short period. In this paper, we propose FDER to detect flooding attack and yet allow legitimate burst traffic simultaneously. Nodes exchange their histories of encounter records (ER) which record the sent messages during their previous encounters. The ER history is used to infer a node's new message transmission rate over time and the number of forwarded replicas per message. Nodes which send too many messages or replicas can thus be detected. Since ER serves as a useful tool for monitoring nodes' sending behavior over a long time period, FDER could detect the burst traffic violation efficiently. Simulation results show that FDER can detect flooding attack at higher accuracy and lower delay compared to state-of-the-art scheme.
Ubc9 Interacts with the Androgen Receptor and Activates Receptor-dependent Transcription*

Ubc9, a homologue of the class E2 ubiquitin-conjugating enzymes, has recently been shown to catalyze conjugation of a small ubiquitin-like molecule-1 (SUMO-1) to a variety of target proteins. SUMO-1 modifications have been implicated in the targeting of proteins to the nuclear envelope and certain intranuclear structures and in converting proteins resistant to ubiquitin-mediated degradation. In the present work, we find that Ubc9 interacts with the androgen receptor (AR), a member of the steroid receptor family of ligand-activated transcription factors. In transiently transfected COS-1 cells, AR-dependent but not basal transcription is enhanced by the coexpression of Ubc9. The N-terminal half of the AR hinge region containing the C-terminal part of the bipartite nuclear localization signal is essential for the interaction with Ubc9. Deletion of this part of the nuclear localization signal, which does not completely prevent the transfer of AR to the nucleus, abolishes the AR-Ubc9 interaction and attenuates the transcriptional response to cotransfected Ubc9. The C93S substitution of Ubc9, which prevents SUMO-1 conjugation by abrogating the formation of a thiolester bond between SUMO-1 and Ubc9, does not influence the capability of Ubc9 to stimulate AR-dependent transactivation, implying that Ubc9 is able to act as an AR coregulator in a fashion independent of its ability to catalyze SUMO-1 conjugation.
Can the EMS Be Exported? Lessons from Ten Years of Monetary Policy Coordination in Europe

This paper addresses the question of whether the European Monetary System can be copied outside Europe. Our answer is negative. The presence of the EC and the dependence of EC institutions on exchange rate stability lend credibility to EMS exchange rate targets in a way that would not be present, say, among the United States, Europe and Japan. The EMS has also reproduced previous experiences of fixed exchange rates by not imposing the exchange rate constraint symmetrically on all member countries: the System has de facto worked as a Deutschmark zone, confirming that the institution of fixed rates per se cannot induce international monetary cooperati.
77-fs pulse generation from a stretched-pulse mode-locked all-fiber ring laser.

By incorporating a section of large positive-dispersion fiber in an all-fiber erbium ring laser, we obtain high-energy pulses with spectral widths of 56 nm. The chirp on these pulses is highly linear and can be compensated for with dispersion in the output coupling fiber lead. The result is a fully self-starting source of 77-fs pulse with 90 pJ of energy and greater than 1 kW of peak power at a 45-MHz repetition rate.
Local anaesthetic blockade of neuronal nicotinic ACh receptor‐channels in rat parasympathetic ganglion cells

1 The effects of the local anaesthetics QX‐222 and procaine on nicotinic acetylcholine (ACh)‐evoked currents in cultured parasympathetic cardiac neurones of the rat were investigated by use of the whole‐cell, perforated‐patch, and outside‐out recording configurations of the patch clamp method. 2 QX‐222 and procaine, applied to the extracellular surface, reversibly inhibited the peak amplitude of the whole‐cell nicotinic ACh‐evoked current in a concentration‐dependent manner, with half‐maximal inhibitory concentrations (IC50) of 28 μm and 2.8 μm, respectively, at − 80 mV. In these neurones, the sustained inward current mediated by M1 muscarinic receptor activation was unaltered by QX‐222, and neither local anaesthetic affected the adenosine 5′‐triphosphate (ATP)‐evoked current. 3 QX‐222 and procaine block of nicotinic ACh‐evoked inward current was voltage‐dependent and enhanced by hyperpolarization. An e‐fold change in their dissociation equilibrium constants (Kd) resulted from a 62 mV and a 122 mV change in membrane potential, respectively. 4 Both local anaesthetics produce a concentration‐dependent increase in the half‐time of decay of the nicotinic ACh‐evoked inward current. 5 Measurements of unitary currents in outside‐out patches showed that QX‐222 reversibly increased the mean burst duration and closed time and reduced the mean channel open time and open‐state probability of the nicotinic ACh receptor‐channel (AChR) in a concentration‐dependent manner. 6 The Kd and voltage sensitivity of local anaesthetic block of the nicotinic AChR in rat intracardiac neurones suggests that the pore‐forming region of this channel differs from that of the AChR in frog and rat skeletal muscle and from the neuronal α4β2 ACh receptor‐channel.