Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Religion, Job Readiness, and Employment Outcomes: The Case of Latter-Day Saint Employment Resource Services

Despite increased attention to religious organizations as an ally in America's welfare-to-work revolution, faith- based employment assistance programs have garnered little attention from scholars. This study seeks to fill this gap by examining intake and follow-up survey data collected from clients of Employment Resource Centers sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS). The authors begin by examining the sociodemo- graphic composition and human capital of the clientele served by Employment Resource Centers. They then proceed to explore the economic outcomes associated with program participation. LDS job seekers differ from their national counterparts, with the former commanding significantly higher stocks of human capital. Still, net of controls for human capital and other characteristics, positive economic outcomes are observed for client participation in select Employment Resource Center programs. This study sheds new light on the prospects and challenges of faith-based efforts to assist unemployed and underemployed job seekers.
SWSpec: The Requirements Specification Language in Service Workflow Environments

Advanced technologies have changed the nature of business processes in the form of services. In coordinating services to achieve a particular objective, service workflow is used to control service composition, execution sequences as well as path selection. Since existing mechanisms are insufficient for addressing the diversity and dynamicity of the requirements in a large-scale distributed environment, developing formal requirements specification is necessary. In this paper, we propose a Service Workflow Specification language, called SWSpec, which allows arbitrary services in a workflow to formally and uniformly impose their requirements. As such, the solution will provide a formal way to regulate and control workflows as well as enrich the proliferation of service provisions and consumptions in opened environments.
All Aspirations are not Created Equal: The Differential Effects of Historical and Social Aspirations on Acquisition Behavior

Research on performance aspirations has tended to assume that historical and social aspirations work in parallel and influence strategic behavior in a similar manner. We posit that these two distinct modes of performance comparison in fact lead to dissimilar firm behavior. We also explore how variability in prior acquisition performance influences the relationship between aspiration levels and subsequent strategic behavior. We examine our questions in the context of mergers and acquisitions within the U.S. commercial banking industry from 1988 to 2005. Consistent with our opening prediction, we find that firms' acquisition behavior varies significantly depending on whether historical or social comparisons are used. We also find that high variability in the previous acquisition performance of a firm intensifies the relationship between acquisition performance relative to aspirations and the probability of the firm making acquisitions below historical and social aspirations, but attenuates the relationship above such aspirations
Sexual behavior of young people

516 young people of both sexes were asked to fill out questionnaires on their sexual behavior. 25% of the young people (15-17 years) have sexual intercourse prior to marriage. In about 50% of the cases the 1st sexual intercourse was not planned in advance. Only about 40-50% of the young people use contraceptives for their 1st sexual intercourse and out of those only 16% the pill. Young people wish to get their sex education 1st and foremost from their parents secondly from the physician. Only 10% want this information from a teacher. (Authors modified)
A direct imaging method using far-field data

We present a direct imaging algorithm for extended targets using far-field data generated by incident plane waves. The algorithm uses a factorization of the response matrix for far-field data that is derived from physical considerations and a resolution-analysis-based regularization. The algorithm is simple and efficient since no forward solver or iteration is needed. Efficiency and robustness of the algorithm with respect to measurement noise are demonstrated.
Does the Difficulty of an Interruption Affect our Ability to Resume?

Research has shown that different types of interruptions can affect their disruptiveness. However, it is unclear how different features of the interrupting task determine its disruptive effects. Specifically, some theories predict that the difficulty of an interruption does not contribute to the disruptive effects of that interruption alone. Disruptive effects can be mediated by the extent to which the interrupting task interferes with the ability to rehearse during the interruption. In this experiment participants performed a single primary task with three interruptions of different difficulty. We found that interruptions were more disruptive when the task minimized the participant's ability to rehearse (as measured by the number of mental operators required to perform the task) and not just when they were more difficult. These results suggest that the ability to rehearse during an interruption is critical in facilitating resumption of a primary task.
The relation of birth order and socioeconomic status to children's language experience and language development

ABSTRACT Variation in mothers' child-directed speech and in their children's rates of language development were examined as a function of child birth order and family socioeconomic status (SES). A total of 63 children between 18 and 29 months were recorded in dyadic interaction with their mothers on two separate occasions, 10 weeks apart. The children included first and later boms who came from high-SES and mid-SES backgrounds. Analyses of the children's speech at the second visit showed that the first-bom children were more advanced in lexical and grammatical development than the later-bom children, and that the later-bom children were more advanced in the development of conversational skill. High-SES children showed more advanced lexical development than mid-SES children. These differences are interpreted as the result of differences in language learning experience associated with birth order and SES, some of which were in evidence in the mothers' speech recorded at the first visit. With respect to theories of language acquisition, these findings suggest that language experience plays a nontrivial role in language development, and that the nature of that role is different for different components of language development. With respect to general developmental consequences of birth order and SES, the findings indicate that differences in early language experience may set the stage for later developmental differences, but that when long-term and pervasive differences are observed, as is the case for SES-related differences in achievement, it is likely that there are pervasive and continuing differences in experience.
Herbivore‐Mediated Ecological Costs of Reproduction Shape the Life History of an Iteroparous Plant

Plant reproduction yields immediate fitness benefits but can be costly in terms of survival, growth, and future fecundity. Life‐history theory posits that reproductive strategies are shaped by trade‐offs between current and future fitness that result from these direct costs of reproduction. Plant reproduction may also incur indirect ecological costs if it increases susceptibility to herbivores. Yet ecological costs of reproduction have received little empirical attention and remain poorly integrated into life‐history theory. Here, we provide evidence for herbivore‐mediated ecological costs of reproduction, and we develop theory to examine how these costs influence plant life‐history strategies. Field experiments with an iteroparous cactus (Opuntia imbricata) indicated that greater reproductive effort (proportion of meristems allocated to reproduction) led to greater attack by a cactus‐feeding insect (Narnia pallidicornis) and that damage by this herbivore reduced reproductive success. A dynamic programming model predicted strongly divergent optimal reproductive strategies when ecological costs were included, compared with when these costs were ignored. Meristem allocation by cacti in the field matched the optimal strategy expected under ecological costs of reproduction. The results indicate that plant reproductive allocation can strongly influence the intensity of interactions with herbivores and that associated ecological costs can play an important selective role in the evolution of plant life histories.
Multi-Dimensional Trust: how beginning principals build trust with their staff during leader succession

As part of principal succession, new school leaders must take action to solidify their position as the school’s legitimate lead authority while at the same time, develop and utilize interactive mechanisms designed to nurture staff relations and engender teacher support and confidence in their leadership. For beginning principals, this process highlights the critical importance of understanding the influences and expectations of the leadership context and the need for building and maintaining trust. This paper explores how beginning principals attend to multidimensional criteria when building trust with their staff as part of early-phase school leadership during principal succession. New principals identified using actionable principles and behaviours related to knowledge/skills, interaction, and communication as a means to engender trust with their colleagues. Findings were combined with concepts associated with educational trust in extant research to create the conceptualization of Three-Dimensional Trust. The multidimensional trust model includes three different dimensions of criteria for each of two areas of ability—task ability and interpersonal ability.
A Phase I Study with Neratinib (HKI-272), an Irreversible Pan ErbB Receptor Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitor, in Patients with Solid Tumors

Purpose: The dose-limiting toxicities, maximum tolerated dose, pharmacokinetic profile, and preliminary antitumor activity of neratinib (HKI-272), an irreversible pan ErbB inhibitor, were determined in patients with advanced solid tumors. Experimental Design: Neratinib was administered orally as a single dose, followed by a 1-week observation period, and then once daily continuously. Planned dose escalation was 40, 80, 120, 180, 240, 320, 400, and 500 mg. For pharmacokinetic analysis, timed blood samples were collected after administration of the single dose and after the first 14 days of continuous daily administration. Results: Dose-limiting toxicity was grade 3 diarrhea, which occurred in one patient treated with 180 mg and in four patients treated with 400 mg neratinib; hence, the maximum tolerated dose was determined to be 320 mg. Other common neratinib-related toxicities included nausea, vomiting, fatigue, and anorexia. Exposure to neratinib was dose dependent, and the pharmacokinetic profile of neratinib supports a once-a-day dosing regimen. Partial response was observed for 8 (32%) of the 25 evaluable patients with breast cancer. Stable disease ≥24 weeks was observed in one evaluable breast cancer patient and 6 (43%) of the 14 evaluable non–small cell lung cancer patients. Conclusion: The maximum tolerated dose of once-daily oral neratinib is 320 mg. The most common neratinib-related toxicity was diarrhea. Antitumor activity was observed in patients with breast cancer who had previous treatment with trastuzumab, anthracyclines, and taxanes, and tumors with a baseline ErbB-2 immunohistochemical staining intensity of 2+ or 3+. The antitumor activity, tolerable toxicity profile, and pharmacokinetic properties of neratinib warrant its further evaluation.
Sorting, Supporting, Connecting, and Transforming: Intervention Strategies for Students at Risk

The author reviews the literature on strategies for serving students considered to be at risk because they need assistance to succeed academically and socially at the college level. After reviewing the changing demographic and functional definitions of students at risk and providing an overview of why such students need special services from colleges, the author uses Beatty-Guenter's (1994) typology to provide a research and practice framework for current intervention strategies. Sorting strategies attempt to divide the student body into meaningful subsets for intervention. Supporting strategies strive to ease students' everyday problems with academic life. Connecting strategies promote bonding between the student and others at the college to motivate continued enrollment. Transforming strategies seek to overcome barriers that might prevent students from achieving their potential. A summary of characteristics that distinguish successful intervention programs and strategies concludes this review.
Understanding persistence in adult learning

The paper summarizes recent data on the retention and non‐completion patterns of adult students, especially those over the age of 25 who have had a gap since completing full‐time education. While data on further and higher education suggest that older learners are less likely than younger ones to complete longer, qualification‐bearing programmes, central statistics do not distinguish between students in their early‐to‐mid 20s, many of whom still have much in common with those in their late teens, and those in their 30s, 40s and 50s whose lifestyles, learning goals and aspirations are often qualitatively different. The section on retention data is followed by a summary of the reasons for not completing courses commonly cited by adults learning in conventional education settings, and reflection on whether these are significantly different from those cited by younger students and students in open or distance learning programmes. The paper ends with a summary of the kind of factors that might increase adult retention rates in both kinds of learning programme. For the purposes of this paper, ‘adults’ are defined as those over the age of 25 who have had a gap since completing full‐time education.
The Effects of Parental Mental Illness upon Children: A Descriptive Study of the Views of Parents and Children

The association between parental mental illness and child disturbance has been documented although the experience of children coping with such illness has received comparatively little attention. This article details the impact of parental mental illness on children of patients attending a community mental health team. Information was obtained from 24 adults and 26 dependent children. Children were concerned about their parents, had little understanding of their parent’s illness and most wanted more information. Parents were aware of the negative impact of the illness upon their children, particularly disruption to everyday life and concerns about significant behaviour problems. Despite the negative impact of the illness, parents perceived their relationship with their children positively. In undertaking this research a number of potential barriers to identifying the needs of these children were identified which are reported. The study highlights the need for more collaborative and integrated child and adult mental health services and the development of a more family-centred focus.
Cilostazol Suppresses Aβ-induced Neurotoxicity in SH-SY5Y Cells through Inhibition of Oxidative Stress and MAPK Signaling Pathway

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a slowly progressive form of dementia, characterized by memory impairment and cognitive dysfunction. AD is mainly characterized by the deposition of amyloid β (Aβ) plaques and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles in the brain, along with neuronal degeneration and high levels of oxidative stress. Cilostazol (CSZ) was recently found to suppress the progression of cognitive decline in patients with stable AD receiving acetylcholinesterase inhibitors. This present study aimed to clarify the mechanism by which CSZ protects neurons from degeneration associated with Aβ(1–42). We used Aβ(1–42) to induce neurotoxicity in human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cells. Cells were pretreated with CSZ before co-treatment with Aβ. To evaluate the effect of CSZ on oxidative stress, we examined levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS), nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate oxidase (Nox) activity, mRNA expression of NOX4, and Cu/Zn-Superoxide Dismutase (SOD), as well as apoptosis biomarkers [MTT, (3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide), caspase-3 and -9 activities and staining of annexin V]. We also assayed the activity of mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPK): p38 MAPK and extracellular signal-regulated kinase1/2 (ERK1/2), and biomarkers of mitochondrial function (Bcl-2 and Bax), and cyclic adenosine monophosphate response element-binding protein (CREB). Aβ-induced oxidative stress (ROS, NOX4 activity, and expression of NOX mRNA), caspase activation (caspase-3 and -9), and p38 MAPK phosphorylation were suppressed by co-treatment with CSZ, but not by ERK1/2 activation. In addition, pretreatment with CSZ suppressed Aβ-induced apoptosis and increased cell viability via suppression of Bax (a proapoptotic protein), upregulation of Bcl-2 (an antiapoptotic protein) and Cu/Zn-SOD (a superoxide scavenging enzyme), and phosphorylation of CREB. These findings suggested that CSZ could counteract neurotoxicity through multiple mechanisms, one mechanism involving the attenuation of oxidative stress by suppressing NOX activity and Nox mRNA expression in Aβ-induced neurotoxicity and another involving the anti-neurotoxic effect via the ERK1/2/phosphorylated CREB pathway.
An Interactive Diagnosis and Repair of OWL Ontology

Ontology diagnosis is an important phase in the process of knowledge base development and management. In the various applications of semantic computing, ontology is not static, but keeps changing over time due to changes in the local environments. A change is typically effected by adding new axioms or modifying parts of existing axioms in the ontology. Such arbitrary changes might result in conflicts in the knowledge base and how to diagnose and repair the conflict in the knowledge base is an interesting but hard problem. In this paper, we propose an interactive strategy for maintaining knowledge base consistency by identifying the unsatisfiable concepts in the knowledge base, and eliminating them using suggestions obtained from the knowledge engineer (user).
Improving Recommendation Diversity

Recommender systems offer users a more intelligent and personalised mechanism to seek out new information. Content-based recommender systems generally prefer to retrieve a set of items maximally similar to a users’ query and/or profile. We argue that as new types of recommendation domains and tasks emerge, this blind faith in the similarity assumption begins to seem flawed. We show that very often recommendation diversity is important and that traditional recommendation systems are marred by poor diversity characteristics. We evaluate a new class of diversity-preserving algorithm capable of addressing this without compromising similarity or
Transcriptional regulation of the interleukin-6 gene in mesangial cells.

Cytokine secretion by mesangial cells (MC) plays a major role in the pathogenesis of glomerulonephritis. To define signaling events that occur during the activation of MC, the cell-specific transcriptional regulation of the interleukin-6 (IL-6) gene was studied. Stimulation with lipopolysaccharide and IL-1beta resulted in the full induction of IL-6 expression only if the cells were coincubated with cAMP agonists; this effect was attenuated by protein kinase A inhibitors. In reporter gene experiments, the IL-6 promoter showed a stimulation pattern comparable to that of the endogenous gene. Elimination of individual transcription factor binding sites provided evidence for functional roles for four cis-acting elements, i.e., activator protein-1, cAMP response element-binding protein (CREB), nuclear factor for IL-6 expression (NF-IL6), and nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-kappaB). Electrophoretic mobility shift assays using nuclear extracts from MC revealed that the DNA-binding activities of activator protein-1 and NF-KB were inducible, whereas no change could be observed for CREB and NF-IL6. The presence of several transcription factor proteins, including JunB, JunD, c-Fos, Fra-1, CREB-1, activating transcription factor-2, NF-KB p50, p52, and p65, and CAAT/enhancer-binding protein-delta, was demonstrated by supershift analysis. Of particular interest was the novel finding of the participation of NF-kappaB p65 in the NF-IL6 complex. In summary, a signal transduction pathway in MC that requires protein kinase A activation in addition to a second signal provided by lipopolysaccharide or IL-1beta was identified.
QOS Differentiation of Various Cloud Computing Load Balancing Techniques

With an increase in the demands the Cloud computing has become one of the ongoing scalable approach to fulfill the cloud based neccesties. The biggest advantage of the cloud computing is the ability to overcome the infrastructural challenges those are earlier faced by other technologies. Since the technology is new, therefore the development of the whole structure is not so efficient. It does have a lot of issues on which various scientists and others are working on. Scheduling, load balancing, fault tolerance, etc. are various challenges faced by cloud computing. For this purpose various techniques and algorithms have been proposed. In this paper discussion will be done on the issue of load balancing in cloud computing and different types of load balancing techniques have been reviewed and a comparative analysis have been made among all the existing techniques. General Terms Cloud computing,Load balancing,Algorithms.
An urbach study of the degree of structural disorder in cdte nanocrystals in glass matrix

CdTe nanocrystals embedded in matrixes such as, glass, plastic and, aqueous solution have been investigated extensively due to their potential applications in nonlinear optical devices, biotechnology and medicine. When the size of bulk semiconductor is reduced to nanometer scales, the crystal gains new optical and electronic properties. Energy levels are quantized as in atoms and the energy difference between levels widens with the inverse of the size squared. CdTe nanocrystals were grown in glass by solid-state phase precipitation at the above glass transition temperature. A size dependent blue shift in the asymptotic absorption edge was observed in optical absorption spectra. The crystalline composition was studied by Resonant Raman spectroscopy. The width of the optical absorption tail at long wavelengths depends on the spread of electron energy levels within the structure, called the Urbach energy, which was calculated depending on size. We observe that the Urbach tail narrows as the surface to volume ratio of the nanocrystals decreases.
An evaluation of the use of peer assessment in higher education: a case study in the School of Music, Kingston University

Abstract The following paper outlines and evaluates the implementation of the use of peer assessment in higher education (HE), using the BA in music course at Kingston University as a case study. The rationale of the peer assessment systems introduced into two curriculum areas is examined, and the operation of the scheme is evaluated, by the use of lecturer interviews, attitudinal questionnaires completed by the participating students, and the assessments and feedback produced. Conclusions drawn are that the introduction of peer assessment seems to improve students’ critical faculties and gives them a greater ownership of the whole assessment process.