Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The effects of HRM practices on firm performance in Thailand's manufacturing industry

The purpose of this study is to determine the effects of human resource management (HRM) practices on firm performance in Thailand's manufacturing industrial Zone 2, a region that has seen an influx of foreign investment. A total of 23 theoretically-based hypotheses have been developed that point to possible positive and negative relationships between HRM practices, mediating variables, and firm performance. A total of 224 top managers, business leaders and line managers provided the input that was examined and then empirically tested using analysis of moment structures (AMOS) Path Analysis. The results show that HRM practices do strongly influence firm performance, a conclusion that is not only consistent with the results of previous research on the subject, but also indicative of methods that are of ever-increasing importance to long-term growth in organisations. This study has provided new insight into HRM practices and firm performance, getting to the heart of the role that mediating variables play in the network of relationships.
Donor lung assessment using selective pulmonary vein gases.

OBJECTIVES Standard donor lung assessment relies on imaging, challenge gases and subjective interpretation of bronchoscopic findings, palpation and visual assessment. Central gases may not accurately represent true quality of the lungs. We report our experience using selective pulmonary vein gases to corroborate the subjective judgement. METHODS Starting, January 2012, donor lungs have been assessed by intraoperative bronchoscopy, palpation and visual judgement of lung collapse upon temporary disconnection from ventilator, central gases from the aorta and selective pulmonary vein gases. Partial pressure of oxygen (pO2) <300 mmHg on FiO2 of 1.0 was considered low. The results of the chest X-ray and last pO2 in the intensive care unit were also collected. Post-transplant primary graft dysfunction and survival were monitored. RESULTS To date, 259 consecutive brain-dead donors have been assessed and 157 transplants performed. Last pO2 in the intensive care unit was poorly correlated with intraoperative central pO2 (Spearman's rank correlation rs = 0.29). Right inferior pulmonary vein pO2 was associated (Mann-Whitney, P < 0.001) with findings at bronchoscopy [clean: median pO2 443 mmHg (25th-75th percentile range 349-512) and purulent: 264 mmHg (178-408)]; palpation [good: 463 mmHg (401-517) and poor: 264 mmHg (158-434)] and visual assessment of lung collapse [good lung collapse: 429 mmHg (320-501) and poor lung collapse: 205 mmHg (118-348)]. Left inferior pulmonary pO2 was associated (P < 0.001) with findings at bronchoscopy [clean: 419 mmHg (371-504) and purulent: 254 mmHg (206-367)]; palpation [good: 444 mmHg (400-517) and poor 282 mmHg (211-419)] and visual assessment of lung collapse [good: 420 mmHg (349-496) and poor: 246 mmHg (129-330)]. At 72 h, pulmonary graft dysfunction 2 was in 21/157 (13%) and pulmonary graft dysfunction 3 in 17/157 (11%). Ninety-day and 1-year mortalities were 6/157 (4%) and 13/157 (8%), respectively. CONCLUSIONS Selective pulmonary vein gases provide corroborative objective support to the findings at bronchoscopy, palpation and visual assessment. Central gases do not always reflect true function of the lungs, having high false-positive rate towards the individual lower lobe gas exchange. Objective measures of donor lung function may optimize donor surgeon assessment, allowing for low pulmonary graft dysfunction rates and low 90-day and 1-year mortality.
Relationship between health-related quality of life domains and bone status in postmenopausal Japanese women

Objective: To assess the relationship between health-related quality of life domains and bone status, including bone metabolism, in postmenopausal Japanese community women. Design: The study subjects were 88 women who were participants in a screening program for osteoporosis in 2003 without a history of mental disorders, metabolic disorders, smoking, bone fractures, and/or estrogen treatment. The participation rate was 75.9%. The age range was 50 to 68 years (mean, 57), and body mass index (BMI) ranged from 15.7 to 36.6 (mean, 22.4). Health-related quality of life domains were evaluated using the Medical Outcomes Study Short-Form 36 Health Survey, and bone mineral content was measured by quantitative ultrasound of the calcaneus. Serum total osteocalcin and serum N-telopeptide were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Multiple linear regression models were used to study the association of age, BMI, and eight health-related quality of life domains as independent variables in age-corrected bone status and markers of bone turnover as dependent ones. Results: The participants' calcaneal Z scores by quantitative ultrasound ranged from −2.14 to 2.71. The mean Z score was −0.17 (−0.27,−0.07). Multiple regression analysis revealed that BMI (P < 0.05), physical function (P < 0.01), and role-emotional (role limitations caused by emotional problems) (P < 0.01) were factors in increasing bone mineral content. Also, a positive relationship was found between vitality (P < 0.01), social function (P < 0.05), and total osteocalcin. Conclusions: Although causality is not clear, in addition to low BMI, role limitations due to poor emotional status and low physical function are related to low bone mineral content in postmenopausal Japanese community women. These results imply that when we are concerned about osteoporosis in postmenopausal women, we should pay attention not only to their physical function but also to their psychological state.
Differential effect of CD 69 targeting on bystander and antigen-specific T cell proliferation

In spite of an initially proposed role as a costimulatory molecule for CD69, in vivo studies showed it as a regulator of immune responses and lymphocyte egress. We found constitutive CD69 expression by T cell subsets and pDC. We examined a possible effect of CD69 on T cell proliferation using transfer models and in vitro assays. In mice locally expressing or receiving antigen, anti-CD692.2 treatment did not affect the proliferation of antigen-specific transgenic T cells in ADLN, although we observed the presence of proliferated T cells in non-ADLN and spleen. This was not affected by FTY720 treatment and thus, not contributed by increased egress of proliferated lymphocytes from ADLN. In the absence of antigen, anti-CD69 2.2 treatment induced bystander proliferation of transferred memory phenotype T cells. This proliferation was mediated by IL-2, as it was inhibited by anti-IL-2 or anti-CD25 antibodies in vitro and by anti-CD25 antibodies in vivo. It was also dependent on CD69 expression by donor T cells and recipient cells. CD69 targeting on T cells enhanced IL2-mediated proliferation and CD25 expression. However, it did not lead to increased early IL-2 production by T cells. No T cell subset was found to be specifically required in the recipient. Instead, CD69 targeting on pDC induced their expression of IL-2 and CD25, and pDC depletion showed that this subset was involved in the proliferation induction. These results indicate that CD69 targeting induces bystander T cell proliferation through pDC IL-2 production and T cell sensitization to IL-2 without affecting antigen-driven T cell proliferation. J. Leukoc. Biol. 92: 145–158; 2012.
Sequence of Degeneration of Corti's Organ and its First-Order Neurons

In our temporal bone material, sensory and neural degeneration do not occur independently. Usually there is a good correlation between the extent and severity of hair cell loss and the nerve degeneration in the osseous spiral lamina. Sensorineural degeneration in ototoxicity and after sound exposure is mostly sensory in nature in the initial phase of the process. Presence of supporting elements effectively delays secondary nerve degeneration. Degeneration of Corti's organ can often be complete, but the corresponding nerve degeneration is usually only severe to subtotal, never complete. Sensorineural degeneration which is predominantly neural (without parallel hair cell loss) is rare and occurred in less than 5% of our material. Severe subtotal nerve degeneration with hair cells still remaining was found only in one single temporal bone. Furthermore, Spoendlin's experiments in the cat suggest that in man also a portion of the first-order cochlear neuron could have an unusual degeneration behavior and may not degenerate in the case of compression or transection. The fact that sensory and neural degeneration rarely occur in reasonably “pure” forms may explain why it is often difficult to distinguish between them by means of audiological tests alone.
A neutralizing anti‐fibroblast growth factor (FGF) 8 monoclonal antibody shows anti‐tumor activity against FGF8b‐expressing LNCaP xenografts in androgen‐dependent and ‐independent conditions

Fibroblast growth factor 8‐isoform b (FGF8b) has been detected in human clinical sex‐organ related cancers including hormone‐refractory prostate cancer. There are, however, few relevant experimental models. A murine monoclonal anti‐FGF8 antibody, KM1334, has been shown to neutralize FGF8b and inhibit the growth of androgen‐dependent mouse mammary SC‐3 cells in vitro and in vivo. In the present study, we evaluated the anti‐tumor activity of KM1334 against androgen‐dependent and ‐independent progression of FGF8b‐expressing human prostate cancer xenografts.
What can we learn about fertilization from cystic fibrosis?

It is a curious and intriguing situation that mammalian sperm are introduced into the female reproductive tract in an infertile state and must be educated there before they are able to fertilize oocytes. The recognition that mammalian sperm must first be switched into a competent state, or capacitated, was exploited in the development of in vitro fertilization methods and has proved essential for the dependent technologies of clinical assisted reproduction and infertility treatments. Yet many aspects of the mechanisms of capacitation remain unclear (for recent reviews, see refs. 1 and 2). In a recent issue of PNAS, Xu et al. (3) advanced our understanding of capacitation by showing that CFTR, the cystic fibrosis transmembrane regulator, plays an essential role in some aspects of this process.
Towards a science of human stories: using sentiment analysis and emotional arcs to understand the building blocks of complex social systems

Given the growing assortment of sentiment measuring instruments, it is imperative to understand which aspects of sentiment dictionaries contribute to both their classification accuracy and their ability to provide richer understanding of texts. Here, we perform detailed, quantitative tests and qualitative assessments of 6 dictionary-based methods applied, and briefly examine a further 20 methods. We show that while inappropriate for sentences, dictionary-based methods are generally robust in their classification accuracy for longer texts. Stories often following distinct emotional trajectories, forming patterns that are meaningful to us. By classifying the emotional arcs for a filtered subset of 4,803 stories from Project Gutenberg's fiction collection, we find a set of six core trajectories which form the building blocks of complex narratives. Of profound scientific interest will be the degree to which we can eventually understand the full landscape of human stories, and data driven approaches will play a crucial role. Finally, we utilize web-scale data from Twitter to study the limits of what social data can tell us about public health, mental illness, discourse around the protest movement of #BlackLivesMatter, discourse around climate change, and hidden networks. We conclude with a review of published works in complex systems that separately analyze charitable donations, the happiness of words in 10 languages, 100 years of daily temperature data across the United States, and Australian Rules Football games.
A multi-sensor, cable-driven parallel manipulator based lower limb rehabilitation device : design and analysis. (Analyse et conception d'un système de rééducation de membres inférieurs reposant sur un robot parallèle à câbles)

Gait analysis and human joint motion measurement has been studied extensively in the recent past. In order to address the effects of soft tissue artifacts (STA), a common source of error in most type of measurements, the standard procedure in gait analysis has been to use a combination of measurement methods for efficient estimation of joint angles and the body segment poses. This work proposes a gait analysis system based on a multi-sensor cable-driven parallel manipulator, focusing specifically on tracking the human knee. Our system assumes a human joint to be a general 6 DOF joint between 2 body segments. In order to measure pose of these body segments, up to 14 wires are attached to these human body segments and this permits the system to treat each of these body segments as the end-effector of a parallel mechanism. The pose of the body segments can thus be determined by measuring the wire lengths and solving the forward kinematics of this parallel architecture. The system is also equipped to use additional sensors including inertial sensors (accelerometers and gyroscopes), a 12 camera optical tracking system, in-shoe pressure sensors, variable length resistive wires, IR distance sensors, force sensors to measure muscle contraction. A number of choices are available in the approach for analyzing the knee during gait activity and the design of the setup depends on these choices. This work discuses the options available and details how they have impacted the choices we make in developing the experimental setup. We discuss the hardware developed and used, and specifically discuss the flexible collar used to attach wires to the patient body and to hold the additional sensors. We treat the collar as a serial kinematic chain and propose a calibration method for it that, unlike commonly used calibration techniques, avoids using joint angle measurements. We then outline the experiment and the methods used to synchronize and fuse the data from all sensors to obtain a pose estimate for the collar and thus, the body segments. Finally, this work helps identify steps necessary to improve the current setup and lays the groundwork for a complete rehabilitation system.
Performance Analysis of Message Dissemination in ICMN Under the Last-Create–First-Relay Scheme

With encounter-based communication introduced in intermittently connected mobile networks (ICMNs), the message dissemination in mobile Internet subscriber/publisher services can be augmented through near-distance communication of mobile nodes. Specifically, mobile nodes with Internet connectivity can help those without to obtain messages once stored and currently carried by the former. We model such a system, particularly considering the time-critical property of messages, the limited communication bandwidth, and the existence of multiple sources. Based on the model, we propose analytical methods for obtaining the performance of message delivery ratio and average delay under the 1-hop or the 2-hop relaying mode specified in this paper, respectively. Through extensive simulations, we validate the proposed methods and discuss system performance under different parameter settings and relaying schemes.
Specificity of the Cyclic Adenosine 3′,5′-Monophosphate Signal in Granulosa Cell Function

Abstract Cyclic AMP signaling is involved in most aspects of differentiation and maturation of the granulosa cells in the ovarian follicle. As the genetic programs activated at different stages of follicle growth maturation are being elucidated, it is becoming increasingly difficult to reconcile the simplicity of the cAMP cascade with the complexity and the divergent patterns of gene expression activated in these cells. To account for these divergent outcomes of the cAMP signal, three aspects of this signaling cascade in granulosa cells will be reviewed. We will discuss the evidence for gonadotropin receptors coupling to different G proteins and effectors. Next, we will explore the possibility that the temporal and spatial dimensions of the cAMP signal itself may contribute to the diverse outcomes. Finally, we will summarize available data showing that the cAMP signal is distributed through several cascades of kinase activation. It is hoped this compendium will provide a framework with which to understand how the initial signals activated by gonadotropins control the complex patterns of gene expression that are required for follicle maturation and ovulation.
A Fast Volume Conductor Segmentation and Modeling Pipeline for NICE

In this paper an approach for extracting patient individual volume conductor models (VCM) using volume data acquired from Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) for computational biology of electrical excitation in the patient's individual heart is introduced. The VCM consists of the compartments chest, lung, atrial and ventricular myocardium and the blood masses. For each compartment a segmentation approach with no or little user interaction was developed and integrated into the VCM modeling pipeline to enable the inverse problem of electrocardiography to become clinical applicable.
Accuracy of alternative approaches to capture-recapture estimates of disease frequency: internal validity analysis of data from five sources.

The authors used "internal validity analysis" to evaluate the performance of various capture-recapture methods. Data from studies with five overlapping, incomplete lists generated subgroups whose known sizes were compared with estimates derived from various four-source capture-recapture analyses. In 15 data sets unanalyzed previously (five subgroups of each of three new studies), the authors observed a trend toward mean underestimation of the known population size by 16-25%. (Coverage of the 90% confidence intervals associated with the method found to be optimal was acceptable (13/15), despite the downward bias. ) The authors conjectured that (with the obvious exception of geographically disparate lists) most data sets used by epidemiologists tend to have a net positive dependence; that is, cases captured by one source are more likely to be captured by some other available source than are cases selected randomly from the population, and this trend results in a bias toward underestimation. Attempts to ensure that the underlying assumptions of the methods are met, such as minimizing (or adjusting adequately) for the possibility of loss due to death or migration, as was undertaken in one exceptional study, appear likely to improve the behavior of these methods.
Successful renal transplantation in a patient with a Wiskott–Aldrich syndrome protein (WASP) gene mutation

Wiskott–Aldrich syndrome (WAS) is a rare primary immunodeficiency disorder caused by mutations in the WAS protein (WASP) gene. Renal disease progressing to renal failure is a well‐recognized complication in patients with WAS. Only a few case reports of renal transplantation have been reported to date. Here, we present a patient with a WASP mutation who suffered from severe atopic eczema, mild thrombocytopenia and only a slightly increased frequency of infections, who then developed IgA nephropathy and consequently underwent renal transplantation, which was successful. This study demonstrates that renal transplantation is possible in patients with WAS, regardless of conceivable complications.
Prospects for and Barriers to Local Government Joint Ventures

This study examines the formation of local government joint ventures for economic development. The results of a survey of local government officials in 12 metropolitan areas are used to compare cities that do and do not have a joint venture agreement and identify prospects for interjurisdictional cooperation. Transaction cost theory is applied as an analytical framework to explain the barriers to collective action. The results suggest there are differences in the motivations for cooperation and significant variation among cities in the extent to which officials perceive coordination, division, and defection problems as obstacles to forming a joint venture. Local governments oftentimes establish interlocal agreements to deliver services and manage problems that cross jurisdictional borders. Voluntary agreements between cities can be flexible and informal in nature and are intended to address multiple local and regional issues, with costs and responsibilities shared among a small number of participants. From this perspective, horizontal cooperation is a mechanism by which local governments can complement existing governing arrangements and enable government units to address pressing urban problems while maintaining control over local land-use and development decisions (Steinacker, forthcoming). Furthermore, bilateral agreements between communities may be more acceptable politically than other forms of cooperation that reduce the latitude of a government unit to change policy directions and partners (Feiock and Scholz, forthcoming). Cooperation even extends into policy areas such as economic development in which the political economy strongly mediates policy choices and competition exists (Feiock and Kim 2001; Hawkins, forthcoming). There are numerous benefits to cooperation. Access to resources that are only available through cooperative actions, particularly when there are constraints on revenue-raising abilities, suggests that forming an agreement is one mechanism by which a city can achieve its goals. Joint venture agreements, for instance, are critically important to supporting local growth and future economic development (Feiock, Steinacker, and Park 2009). Rather than being potentially ad hoc or strictly related to the transfer of funds, as some interlocal service agreements are, a joint venture may be more legally binding and considerably costly depending on the policy focus and investment decisions made by the participating communities (Zeemering 2008). The literature notes a variety of benefits that may accrue from cooperation and identiProspects for and Barriers to Local Government Joint Ventures
Noninvasive evaluation of Helicobacter pylori therapy: role of fasting or postprandial gastrin, Pepsinogen I, Pepsinogen II, or serum IgG antibodies

OBJECTIVE:We evaluated the potential value of a change in serum IgG antibodies, fasting or meal-stimulated gastrin levels, and pepsinogen I (PGI) or pepsinogen II (PGII) levels for identifying Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) status after antibiotic therapy.METHODS:A total of 32 men and one woman with peptic ulcer disease and documented H. pylori infection were enrolled. Fasting and 30-min postprandial blood samples were obtained at 0, 2, 7, 11, 17, 23, 27, and 39 wk of the study and were analyzed for the factors evaluated.RESULTS:Treatment was successful in 25 patients and failed in seven. Serum IgG antibodies, meal-stimulated gastrin, and both fasting and meal-stimulated pepsinogen I and II levels fell throughout the study, and pepsinogen I:II ratios increased in those whose infection was cured. The mean levels at wk 0 versus wk 7 were: fasting gastrin (fmol/ml) 12.4 and 11, meal-stimulated gastrin 26.5 and 15.4, PGI (ng/ml) 83.7 and 59, PGII (ng/ml) 24.5 and 13.6, PGI/PGII 3.5 and 4.7, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay value 4.8 and 4.55. The sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values for the data analyzed using different percent changes (e.g., 80%, 50%, and 20%) were calculated. The specificity and sensitivity remained < 80% at all time points.CONCLUSIONS:Despite a significant fall in serum markers of H. pylori infection in groups of individuals, no marker tested could be used to reliably determine posttherapy H. pylori status for individual patients.