Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Augmented immunogenicity of tumor cell membranes produced by surface budding viruses: Parameters of optimal immunization

Membranes prepared from tumor cells infected with surface budding viruses are much more immunogenic than membranes from uninfected tumor cells. Factors affecting immunization with membranes from virusinfected tumor cells were studied. Preparations made with influenza virus were clearly superior to those prepared with vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV). Membranes infected with VSV were maximally immunogenic at a dose equivalent to a 10% cell pack whereas influenza‐virus‐infected membranes were immunogenic at 1/100th of this dose. Subcutaneous inoculation was better than other routes of administration. Maximum protection against challenge with viable tumor cells was afforded by two inoculations of VSV‐infected membranes spaced 3 days apart or a single inoculation with influenza‐virus‐infected membranes. Administration of membranes in complete Freund's adjuvant either had no effect or induced a slight degree of tumor enhancement. Immunization with influenza‐virus‐infected membranes significantly reduced tumor size and incidence even at a challenge dose of tumor cells which was 50 times the LD100.
Optimal margin level in futures markets: Extreme price movements

Along with price limits and capital requirements, the margin mechanism ensures the integrity of futures markets. Margin committees and brokers in futures markets face a trade‐off when setting the margin level. A high level protects brokers against insolvent customers and thus reinforces market integrity, but it also increases the cost supported by investors and in the end makes the market less attractive. This article develops a new method for setting the margin level in futures markets. It is based on “extreme value theory,” which gives interesting results on the distribution of extreme values of a random process. This extreme value distribution is used to compute the margin level for a given probability value of margin violation desired by margin committees or brokers. Extreme movements are central to the margin‐setting problem, because only a large price variation may cause brokers to incur losses. An empirical study using prices of silver futures contracts traded on COMEX is also presented. The comparison of the extreme value method with a method based on normality shows that using normality leads to dramatic underestimates of the margin level. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 19: 127–152, 1999
Effect of antihypertensive medication adherence among employees with hypertension.

OBJECTIVES To determine if antihypertensive medication adherence is associated with decreased medical and drug costs, medical service utilization, and work absence days. STUDY DESIGN Retrospective database study using medical, pharmacy, sick leave, short-term and long-term disability, and workers' compensation claims data from multiple large US employers from 2001 to 2008. METHODS We used medical and pharmacy claims to identify employees with hypertension. The index date was the date of the first hypertension-related pharmacy claim. Eligible employees had health plan enrollment 6 months before the index date and at least 12 months after the index date. Employees younger than 45 years were excluded from the study. Regression models estimated the effect of the proportion of days covered (PDC) by hypertension medication on outcomes after the index date, including health benefit costs, medical service utilization, and work absence days, as well as some clinical outcomes calculated separately for high-prior-cost and low-prior-cost employees. High-prior-cost employees were those who accounted for the top 60.0% of total medical costs during the 6 months before the index date. The regression models controlled for demographics, job-related variables, and comorbidities. RESULTS Among low-prior-cost employees, high PDC was associated with increased medical and drug costs and work absence days. Among high-prior-cost employees, high PDC was associated with decreased medical and drug costs, fewer work absence days and inpatient hospital days, and increased hypertension-specific medical costs. CONCLUSION Antihypertensive medication adherence was associated with improvement in some short-term utilization measures among high-prior-cost employees, but significant short-term improvement was not seen among low-prior-cost employees.
A single alternative formula for Department of Health and Social Security S-curves

The formula most commonly used in the United Kingdom for prediction of cash flows during construction of a building is that published by the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS). The one empirical formula for the S-curve requires a series of parameters to be used for different contract costs. From a reliability theory approach, an alternative mathematical form, which includes the Weibull function, has been proposed as the basis for the S-curves. This paper demonstrates that not only can the Weibull function be used as an excellent altnerative to the DHSS formula but also that the Weibull function overcomes some of the limitations of the original formula. Relationships between the Weibull parameter values for each of the fits to the set of DHSS curves are derived empirically so that one single formula with a total of seven parameters replaces the DHSS formula and its associated tables for different project costs.
Impact of the time interval between MDCT imaging and surgery on the accuracy of identifying metastatic disease in patients with pancreatic cancer.

OBJECTIVE Pancreatic adenocarcinoma is a rapidly progressive malignancy characterized by its tendency for early metastatic spread. MDCT is the primary diagnostic modality for the preoperative staging of patients with pancreatic cancer, with an accuracy established in multiple studies. However, for a variety of reasons, there is often a prolonged interval between staging MDCT and the surgical intervention. This study examines the relationship between the interval between imaging and surgery and the accuracy of MDCT in determining the presence or absence of metastatic disease at surgery in patients with pancreatic cancer. MATERIALS AND METHODS Patients were identified who had undergone surgery for pancreatic cancer at our institution with a dedicated preoperative pancreas-protocol MDCT performed in our department. Findings from the preoperative MDCT report were correlated with the operative findings, as well as the time between imaging and surgery. RESULTS Two hundred ninety-two MDCT scans were performed on 256 patients who underwent exploration for pancreatic adenocarcinoma. The patients had a median age of 67 years (range, 30-95 years), and 51.6% (132/256) were male. The median time between MDCT and surgical exploration was 15.5 days (range, 1-198 days). MDCT correctly predicted the absence of metastatic disease at surgery in 233 of 274 (85.0%) studies. MDCT was more accurate in predicting the absence of metastatic disease if the study was performed within 25 days of surgery than it was if the study was performed within more than 25 days of surgery (89.3% vs 77.0%; p = 0.0097). Furthermore, regression models showed that the negative predictive value of a given MDCT significantly decreased after approximately 4 weeks. CONCLUSION MDCT is an accurate method to stage patients with pancreatic cancer, but its accuracy in excluding distant metastatic disease depreciates over time. Patients should undergo a repeat MDCT within 25 days of any planned definitive operative intervention for pancreatic cancer to avoid unexpectedly finding metastatic disease at surgery.
Stochastic MPC With Learning for Driver-Predictive Vehicle Control and its Application to HEV Energy Management

This paper develops an approach for driver-aware vehicle control based on stochastic model predictive control with learning (SMPCL). The framework combines the on-board learning of a Markov chain that represents the driver behavior, a scenario-based approach for stochastic optimization, and quadratic programming. By using quadratic programming, SMPCL can handle, in general, larger state dimension models than stochastic dynamic programming, and can reconfigure in real-time for accommodating changes in driver behavior. The SMPCL approach is demonstrated in the energy management of a series hybrid electrical vehicle, aimed at improving fuel efficiency while enforcing constraints on battery state of charge and power. The SMPCL controller allocates the power from the battery and the engine to meet the driver power request. A Markov chain that models the power request dynamics is learned in real-time to improve the prediction capabilities of model predictive control (MPC). Because of exploiting the learned pattern of the driver behavior, the proposed approach outperforms conventional model predictive control and shows performance close to MPC with full knowledge of future driver power request in standard and real-world driving cycles.
Paramyxovirus RNA Synthesis and the Requirement for Hexamer Genome Length: the Rule of Six Revisited

The template for paramyxovirus RNA synthesis is not naked RNA but the helical nucleocapsid core of the virus, in which each nucleocapsid protein (N protein) is predicted to be associated with precisely 6 nucleotides (nt) (11). Presumably as a consequence of this association, paramyxovirus genomes are replicated efficiently only when they are a multiple of 6 nt in length, and this has been dubbed the “rule of six” (4). The structure of paramyxovirus nucleocapsids is thus central to understanding how this rule might operate.
A Simple Computational Cell: Coupling Boolean Gene and Protein Networks

This article presents an abstract, tunable model containing two of the principal information-processing features of cells and explores its use with simulated evolution. The random Boolean model of genetic regulatory networks is extended to include a protein interaction network. The underlying behavior of the resulting two coupled dynamical networks is investigated before their evolvability is explored using a version of the NK model of fitness landscapes.
The Transaction Cost Economics Theory of the Family Firm: Family–Based Human Asset Specificity and the Bifurcation Bias

We develop a transaction cost economics theory of the family firm, building upon the concepts of family–based asset specificity, bounded rationality, and bounded reliability. We argue that the prosperity and survival of family firms depend on the absence of a dysfunctional bifurcation bias. The bifurcation bias is an expression of bounded reliability, reflected in the de facto asymmetric treatment of family vs. nonfamily assets (especially human assets). We propose that absence of bifurcation bias is critical to fostering reliability in family business functioning. Our study ends the unproductive divide between the agency and stewardship perspectives of the family firm, which offer conflicting accounts of this firm type's functioning. We show that the predictions of the agency and stewardship perspectives can be usefully reconciled when focusing on how family firms address the bifurcation bias or fail to do so.
Cultural Aspects of Business‐to‐Consumer (B2C) E‐commerce: Acomparative Analysis of Pakistan and Australia

It is generally believed that Business to‐Consumer (B2C) e‐commerce will help firms to improve productivity to the global market both in developing and developed countries. This study examines the extent of B2C websites communication differentiation on cultural ground. Through a content analysis, Hofstede's and Hall's cultural factors were examined in 64 B2C e‐commerce websites of Pakistan and Australia. To test for the difference an independent samples t‐test was conducted. The results show that B2C websites somehow reflects the cultural environment that surrounds the online buyers. It appears that to influence online buyers to purchase, firms need to develop culturally adapted websites. This study provides some indications that the cultural trend in B2C websites is providing opportunities to business firms to make changes to their market strategies to better trigger their online sale by targeting two different cultures.
Poor People's Knowledge: Promoting Intellectual Property in Developing Countries

This book aims to expand the international discourse by: Calling attention to a broader range of knowledge that has commercial potential in developing countries. Bringing an economic dimension into the discussion of traditional knowledge, where legal analysis has thus far been at the forefront. Bringing out the incentives for and concerns of poor people-which may be different from those of corporate research, Northern nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), or already successful entertainment stars. Demonstrating that the best answer is sometimes a commercial one, for example, providing musicians basic training in small business management or reform of regulations that burden small businesses, rather than obtaining formal patent or copyright protection. Calling attention to the many income-earning (rather than the income-using) dimensions of culture-to dispel the notion that culture and commerce are necessarily in opposition. Bringing out instances in which more or less standard legal approaches have been effective as an antidote to the general sense of conflict between traditional knowledge and normal legal conceptions so as to identify the problems in which legal innovation-beyond diligent application-is really needed. Imbuing into the discourse a sense of the legal and commercial tasks needed to solve a developmental problem-away from "knowledge" as an isolated legal issue.
Dark matter with ultra compact mini halos

The isocurvature mode of dark matter is not damped away during kinetic decoupling from the thermal plasma. For weakly interaction massive particle as dark matter, the large density perturbation can generate the small scale ultra compact mini halos and the annihilation of dark matter inside them can give accessible signatures in the indirect detection of dark matter. The early matter domination epoch is one way to produce the isocurvature perturbation of weakly interacting massive dark matter at small scales from the initial adiabatic perturbation form single inflation model.
The Behavior of Prices and Inflation: An Empirical Analysis of Disaggregat Price Data

This paper analyzes the effects of inflation on the dispersion of prices, as well as other aspects of price behavior, using disaggregated data on prices of foodstuffs in Israel during 1978-84. We find that the effect of expected inflation on intramarket price variability is stronger than the effect of unexpected inflation. We show that even in times of high inflation, price quotations are not trivially short and price changes are not synchronized across firms. These facts, taken together, confirm that there is some staggering in the setting of prices. We find that the distribution of real prices is far from being uniform, as many menu cost-based models assume or conclude. In fact, as inflation increases to very high levels, this distribution is not even symmetric. When the annual inflation rate reaches 130 percent, there are equal chances of finding real prices above or below the market average, but upward deviations in the real price are further away from zero than downward ones. Furthermore, as the annual rate of inflation more than doubles from 60 to 130 percent, real prices are pushed toward both tails of the distribution.
Expression and clinical significance of TAp73alpha, p53, PCNA and apoptosis in hepatocellular carcinoma.

AIM To study the prognostic role of TAp73alpha, p53, proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) and apoptosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) after surgical tumor ablation. METHODS Forty-seven human resected HCC tissues and 42 adjacent non-cancerous tissues were studied with 10 normal liver tissues as control group. TAp73alpha, p53, and PCNA were detected with Elivision immunohistochemistry. Terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT)-mediated d-UTP-biotin nick-end labeling (TUNEL) method was used to detect the apoptosis cells. All clinical and pathological materials were analyzed by SPSS10.0 statistical package. RESULTS TAp73alpha overexpressed in HCC tissues (36.2%) when compared with adjacent non-cancerous tissues (2.38%, P<0.005) and normal liver tissues (0, P<0.01). Mutant type p53 (mt-p53) overexpressed in HCC tissues (38.3%) when contracted with adjacent non-cancerous tissues (16.7%, P<0.05) and normal liver tissues (0, P<0.01). Proliferation index (PI) level in HCC tissues was significantly higher than that in adjacent non-cancerous tissues (30.34%+/-4.46% vs 27.88%+/-5.89%, t, P = 0.028). Apoptosis index (AI) level in HCC tissues was higher than that in adjacent non-cancerous tissues (8.62%+/-2.28% vs 7.38%+/-2.61%, t, P = 0.019). Expression of TAp73alpha was associated with lymph node metastasis and mt-p53, with r = 0.407 and 0.265, respectively. Expression of mt-p53 was associated with Edmondson's stage and AFP, with r = 0.295 and -0.357, respectively. In Kaplan-Meier univariant analysis, TAp73alpha, AFP, TNM stage, portal vein invasion, liver membrane invasion and HBsAg correlated with prognosis (log rank, P = 0.039, 0.012, 0.002, 0.000, 0.014, 0.007, respectively). Multivariant Cox regression analysis showed that TAp73alpha, AFP, TNM stage, portal vein invasion, liver membrane invasion and age were independent factors of prognosis. CONCLUSION These results suggest that TAp73alpha can be used as a prognostic indicator of patients with HCC undergoing surgical tumor ablation. AFP, TNM, portal vein invasion, liver membrane invasion and age also have a potency of predicting the prognosis of HCC.
Distributed Consensus on Set-valued Information

This paper focuses on the convergence of infor- mation in distributed systems of agents communicating over a network. The information on which the convergence is sought is not represented by real numbers, rather by sets of real numbers, whose possible dynamics are given by the class of so-called Boolean maps, involving only unions, intersections, and complements of sets. Based on a notion of contractivity, a necessary and sufficient condition ensuring the global and local convergence toward an equilibrium point is presented. In particular the analysis of global convergence recovers results already obtained by the authors, but the more general approach used in this paper allows analogue results to be found to characterize the local convergence.
Insider Holding Requirements, Stock Options, and Stock Appreciation Rights

This study examines how a Securities and Exchange Commission rule change affected the design of executive compensation contracts. It shows that a change in insider holding requirements for employee stock options led to a widespread decrease in the use of stock appreciation rights. Further, we find firms that decrease their use of stock appreciation rights compensate employees by increasing their use of employee stock options. The Securities and Exchange Commission rule change provides a unique opportunity to examine the use of compensation methods as it caused firms to examine their policies and make an active decision to modify their practices. Cross-sectionally, we find the likelihood a firm decreases its use of stock appreciation rights positively associated with the magnitude of expense associated with stock appreciation rights, the firm's use of income-increasing accounting methods, leverage, and the ratio of market to book value of assets. We also find a significant interaction effect for the magnitude of expense when interacted with profitability.
Marriage, Motherhood, and Wages

We explore several problems in drawing causal inferences from cross-sectional relationships between marriage, motherhood, and wages. We find that heterogeneity leads to biased estimates of the "direct" effects of marriage and motherhood on wages (i.e., effects net of experience and tenure); first-difference estimates reveal no direct effect of marriage or motherhood on women's wages. We also find statistical evidence that experience and tenure may be endogenous variables in wage equations; instrumental variables estimates suggest that both ordinary least squares cross-sectional and first-difference estimates understate the direct (negative) effect of children on wages.
Reinitiation after Translation of Two Upstream Open Reading Frames (ORF) Governs Expression of the ORF35-37 Kaposi's Sarcoma-Associated Herpesvirus Polycistronic mRNA

ABSTRACT The Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) ORF36 protein kinase is translated as a downstream gene from the ORF35-37 polycistronic mRNA via a unique mechanism involving short upstream open reading frames (uORFs) located in the 5′ untranslated region. Here, we confirm that ORF35-37 is functionally dicistronic during infection and demonstrate that mutation of the dominant uORF restricts KSHV replication. Leaky scanning past the uORFs facilitates ORF35 expression, while a reinitiation mechanism after translation of the uORFs enables ORF36 expression.
Teenage Unemployment: Permanent Scars or Temporary Blemishes?

This paper examines the persistence and long-term impacts of early labor force experiences. The paper reports a rise in employment rates for a cohort of young men as they age, but points out that those persons with poor employment records early have comparatively poor records later. In order to asses the extent to which differences in later employment and wages are causally related to these earlier employment experiences, the methodologies of Heckman, Chamberlain, and others are extended to account for Markov type persistence and a straight forward estimation technique results. In addition, a Sims type causality test is used to measure the true impact of work experience on wages. The paper concludes that the effects of a period without work do not end with that spell. A teenager who spends time out of work in one year will probably spend less time working in the next than he would have had he worked the entire year. Furthermore, the lost work experience will be reflected in considerably lower wages. At the same time, the data provide no evidence that early unemployment sets off a vicious cycle of recurrent unemployment. The reduced employment effects die off very quickly. What appears to persist are effects of lost work experience on wages.
Decreasing of Oil Extraction: Consumption behavior along transition paths

A normative analysis of the problem of optimal extraction of a non-renewable resource is considered. The economy depends on the essential non-renewable resource and the rate of the resource extraction increases over time. At some instant the government gradually switches to a sustainable (in sense of non-decreasing consumption over time) pattern of the resource extraction. Different approaches are offered for the construction some curves of switching to decreasing paths of the resource depletion. Consumption paths have diverse behavior patterns along these curves, including a path of unlimited growth. A new approach to the Rawlsian maximin criterion which allows for growth of consumption is offered.