Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Long-term transmission rights in the Nordic electricity markets: An empirical appraisal of transmission risk management and hedging

Petr Spodniak Long-term transmission rights in the Nordic electricity markets: An empirical appraisal of transmission risk management and hedging Lappeenranta 2017 73 pages Acta Universitatis Lappeenrantaensis 734 Diss. Lappeenranta University of Technology ISBN 978-952-335-046-5, ISBN978-952-335-047-2 (PDF), ISSN-L 1456-4491, ISSN 1456-4491 The increasingly integrated European electricity markets enable participants to exploit market opportunities and participate in cross-border electricity trading. But, the network gets congested because of the scarce transmission capacity, so electricity prices vary greatly in time and across geographical areas. Market participants thus need an efficient hedging mechanism that limits their exposure to the locational price risks. The hedging solutions against the area price differences that originate from interconnector congestion are commonly called long-term transmission rights (LTRs). This work studies the economics of transmission network congestion in the Nordic electricity markets, including the associated risks and alternative LTR mechanisms and how to manage them. The Nordic electricity markets are selected as a case study for their unique market design and the current regulatory challenge they face with respect to efficiency limits identified in their transmission risk hedging contracts, called electricity area price differentials (EPADs). In addition to the policy and regulatory motivations, the current understanding of derivatives pricing for non-storable commodities, such as electricity, is limited. In particular, the interpretation of the systematic bias between futures prices and the expected delivery date spot prices, called risk premia, is still ambiguous in terms of economic theory. This study employs historical data (2001–2014) on electricity spot and futures markets and utilizes statistical and econometric methods to empirically assess the efficiency of the current Nordic transmission hedging mechanism and to evaluate LTR alternatives (FTR and EPAD Combo). Three main findings may be highlighted. First, despite the presence of systematic price differences between bidding zones and the reference system price, the real economic impacts of these differences are limited. Net-importing bidding zones are identified as the most vulnerable to systematic decoupling of prices. Second, despite the significant risk premia in EPAD contracts, the study finds that EPAD prices are unbiased predictors of the expected spot prices in the long run. Third, the study shows that financial transmission rights (FTRs) hedging effects can be replicated by combinations of EPAD contracts and that the TSOs theoretically auctioning FTR portfolios would need to newly address firmness risks, revenue adequacy, and counterparty risks.
Compensation, Incentives, and the Duality of Risk Aversion and Riskiness

The common folklore that giving options to agents will make them more willing to take risks is false. In fact, no incentive schedule will make all expected utility maximizers more or less risk averse. This paper finds simple, intuitive, necessary and sufficient conditions under which incentive schedules make agents more or less risk averse. The paper uses these to examine the incentive effects of some common structures such as puts and calls, and it briefly explores the duality between a fee schedule that makes an agent more or less risk averse, and gambles that increase or decrease risk. Copyright 2004 by The American Finance Association.
High Gain and High CMRR Two-Stage Folded Cascode OTA with Nested Miller Compensation

By using Gm-C compensation (GCC) technique, a two-stage recycling folded cascode (FC) operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) is designed. The proposed configuration consists of recycling structure, positive feedback and feed-forward compensation path. In comparison with the typical folded cascode CMOS Miller amplifier, this design has higher DC gain, unity-gain frequency (UGF), slew rate and common mode rejection ratio (CMRR). The presented OTA is simulated in 0.18-μm CMOS technology and the simulation results confirm the theoretical analyses. Finally, the proposed amplifier has a 111 dB open-loop DC gain, 20 MHz UGF and 145 dB CMRR @ 1.2 V supply voltage while the power consumption is 400 μW which makes it suitable for low-voltage applications.
Do Hospital-Acquired Condition Scores Correlate With Patients' Perspectives of Care?

Beginning in fiscal year 2015, the federal Hospital-Acquired Condition (HAC) Reduction Program requires the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to reduce payments by 1% for hospitals in the top quartile of risk-adjusted national HAC scores. The HAC penalty underscores the need for hospitals to become increasingly quality- and safety-focused, which could negatively affect their performance on patient satisfaction with care, another key performance metric tied to reimbursement. Using publicly available data through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Hospital Compare program, we assessed the correlation between preliminary HAC scores and patients' perspectives of care, as measured by the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey. Higher quality of care (lower HAC score) was modestly associated with a better patient experience (r = −0.090, P < .001). Additional research is needed to ensure that national policy efforts are not working at cross purposes and there need not be a trade-off between delivering high quality of care and patient satisfaction.
A single nucleotide polymorphism of CYP2b6 found in Japanese enhances catalytic activity by autoactivation.

A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) resulting in a substitution from Gln to His was found in exon 4 of the CYP2B6 gene in Japanese. The frequency of the variant allele was found to be 19.9%. The mutant- and the wild-type enzymes were expressed in Escherichia coli, and the effects of the single amino acid substitution on the catalytic activity were examined by investigating the kinetic profiles of 7-ethoxycoumarin O-deethylase activity. The wild-type enzyme showed typical Michaelis-Menten kinetics, while the mutant-type enzyme represented the sigmoidal kinetics with a higher V(max) value compared to that of the wild-type enzyme. Eadie-Hofstee plots further revealed an existence of allosteric effects for the reaction catalyzed by the variant. This is the first evidence demonstrating that only one amino acid substitution, Gln172His, caused by natural SNP enhances the catalytic activity of CYP by obtaining the character of homotropic cooperativity.
Isolated hepatic cholinergic denervation impairs glucose and glycogen metabolism.

BACKGROUND Hepatic innervation plays an essential role in insulin extraction and glucose production, but the specific role of hepatic cholinergic innervation remains unclear. We sought to establish a model of isolated hepatic cholinergic denervation (IHCD), and to assess whether glycogen storage or the control of net hepatic glucose production (HGP) was altered by IHCD. MATERIALS AND METHODS Sprague-Dawley rats underwent either hepatic vagotomy or sham operation. Liver tissue was stained for vesicular acetylcholine transporter (VAChT) and (nonspecific neural) protein gene product 9. 5 (PGP) for verification of IHCD. Liver glycogen content was quantified in fed and fasted IHCD or sham-operated animals. HGP was determined after single-pass isolated liver perfusion, during which a 30-min 12 ng/ml glucagon infusion was begun after equilibration, and after 10 min, a 200 microU/ml insulin infusion was added. RESULTS Uniform staining of PGP and absence of VAChT staining in hepatic vagotomized rats demonstrated the validity of our model. Glycogen content of sham-operated livers (n = 8) increased from 6.0 +/- 1.7 in the fasting state to 10.6 +/- 1.8 mg/g liver, after feeding (P < 0.05). IHCD livers (n = 8) showed no comparable increase (3.5 +/- 0.6 to 4.0 +/- 0.7 mg/g liver). Perfusion with glucagon alone resulted in less HGP in IHCD livers (n = 12) compared with sham-operated livers (n = 10) (integrated HGP 3.3 +/- 0.3 mg/g liver min(-1) vs 5.1 +/- 0.5 mg/g liver min(-1), P < 0.05). Insulin infusion revealed impaired responsiveness to insulin after IHCD; the ratio of HGP in the final 10 min of perfusion (glucagon and insulin) to HGP in the initial 10 min (glucagon alone) was 90.3 +/- 2.4% for IHCD livers versus 68.1 +/- 4.4% for sham-operated controls, respectively (P = 0.0002). CONCLUSIONS Our study shows that IHCD results in significant impairment in liver glycogen storage and impaired hepatic sensitivity to glucagon and, possibly, to insulin. We conclude that hepatic cholinergic integrity is essential to normal hepatic glucose metabolism.
Aspergillosis in a cancer hospital

D THE LAST 12 YEARS 30 PATIENTS AT Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases and the James Ewing Hospital, New York, N.Y. , have had Aspergillus infections. This fungus disease was a contributing factor in the cause of death in at least 11 patients (37%). There were 2 basic patterns of infection: (1) localized to a single organ; (2) multiple organ involvement. A review of aspergillosis in a cancer hospital is pertinent since there is now a more general awareness of this type of complication in such patients. ' > However, aspergillosis is not
The Vertebrate mesolimbic reward system and social behavior network: A comparative synthesis

All animals evaluate the salience of external stimuli and integrate them with internal physiological information into adaptive behavior. Natural and sexual selection impinge on these processes, yet our understanding of behavioral decision‐making mechanisms and their evolution is still very limited. Insights from mammals indicate that two neural circuits are of crucial importance in this context: the social behavior network and the mesolimbic reward system. Here we review evidence from neurochemical, tract‐tracing, developmental, and functional lesion/stimulation studies that delineates homology relationships for most of the nodes of these two circuits across the five major vertebrate lineages: mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and teleost fish. We provide for the first time a comprehensive comparative analysis of the two neural circuits and conclude that they were already present in early vertebrates. We also propose that these circuits form a larger social decision‐making (SDM) network that regulates adaptive behavior. Our synthesis thus provides an important foundation for understanding the evolution of the neural mechanisms underlying reward processing and behavioral regulation. J. Comp. Neurol. 519:3599–3639, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Maternal smoking during pregnancy and false positive maternal serum alpha‐fetoprotein (MSAFP) screening for open neural tube defects

Alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) testing has been employed since the 1970s to screen pregnant women for the presence of open neural tube defects in the fetus (Brock et al., 1974). Along with fetal neural tube defects, several other conditions are known to affect the maternal serum alpha-fetoprotein (MSAFP) value including multiple gestation, maternal race, bleeding during pregnancy, and the presence of other fetal anomalies such as gastroschisis and omphalocele. At least 11% of pregnant women in the United States smoke during their pregnancy (Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 2004); actual rates are likely even higher than this due to maternal under-reporting of smoking during pregnancy (England et al., 2007). Our objective was to determine whether maternal smoking during pregnancy is associated with increased falsepositive rates for MSAFP screening [i.e. MSAFP values greater than or equal to 2.0 or 2.5 multiples of the median (MoM)].
ECG Signal Denoising with Savitzky-Golay Filter and Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT)

— Electrocardiogram (ECG) demonstrates the electrical activity of heart muscles over a period of time. The ECG is one of the extensively used physiological parameters for examination and diagnosis of cardiac diseases. The non-stationary ECG signal often gets contaminated with different noises. Hence, it is required to denoise the signal to provide accurate information to physicians. In this paper, Savitzky-Golay filter and Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) are being used to denoise ECG signal and a comparison is provided between two methods. The filter and DWT are applied on MIT-BIH arrhythmia database to check the robustness of proposed methods. Two parameters, signal to noise ratio (SNR) and mean squared error (MSE) are used for performance comparison.
Altered methionine metabolism and global DNA methylation in liver cancer: Relationship with genomic instability and prognosis

Mounting evidence underlines the role of genomic hypomethylation in the generation of genomic instability (GI) and tumorigenesis, but whether DNA hypomethylation is required for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) development and progression remains unclear. We investigated the correlation between GI and DNA methylation, and influence of methionine metabolism deregulation on these parameters and hepatocarcinogenesis in c‐Myc and c‐Myc/Tgf‐α transgenic mice and human HCCs. S‐adenosyl‐L‐methionine/S‐adenosylhomocysteine ratio and liver‐specific methionine adenosyltransferase (MatI/III) progressively decreased in dysplastic and neoplastic liver lesions developed in c‐Myc transgenic mice and in human HCC with better (HCCB) and poorer (HCCP) prognosis (based on patient's survival length). Deregulation of these parameters resulted in a rise of global DNA hypomethylation both in c‐Myc and human liver lesions, positively correlated with GI levels in mice and humans, and inversely correlated with the length of survival of HCC patients. No changes in MATI/III and DNA methylation occurred in c‐Myc/Tgf‐α lesions and in a small human HCC subgroup with intermediate prognosis, where a proliferative activity similar to that of c‐Myc HCC and HCCB was associated with low apoptosis. Upregulation of genes involved in polyamine synthesis, methionine salvage and downregulation of polyamine negative regulator OAZ1, was highest in c‐Myc/Tgf‐α HCCs and HCCP. Our results indicate that alterations in the activity of MAT/I/III, and extent of DNA hypomethylation and GI are prognostic markers for human HCC. However, a small human HCC subgroup, as c‐Myc/Tgf‐α tumors, may develop in the absence of alterations in DNA methylation. © 2007 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Assessment Essentials Planning Implementing And Improving Assessment In Higher Education

Thank you very much for downloading assessment essentials planning implementing and improving assessment in higher education. As you may know, people have search hundreds times for their chosen books like this assessment essentials planning implementing and improving assessment in higher education, but end up in infectious downloads. Rather than reading a good book with a cup of tea in the afternoon, instead they juggled with some harmful bugs inside their desktop computer.
Climacteric, male and female.

In women the climacteric at one time referred to seven year cycles throughout life, puberal climacteric, menopausal climacteric, and at the age of 63 the grand climacteric. Nowadays when we mention the climacteric we mean the period of a woman's life in which the function of child bearing ceases; the menopause, which is an incident in this change, is the result of hormonal readjustments and genital atrophy which result. The whole process is normal and physiological and is not a disease. In general the menopause is considered a mark of the climacteric, although climacteric symptoms frequently precede the cessation of menstruation by months and sometimes by years, and although it is rare, typical symptoms may make their appearance as late as ten years after the menstrual flow disappears. Rarely the climacteric occurs before the age of 20, and it may occur before the menarche, as in a case which I recently reported in which typical hormonal changes, headaches and hot flashes were present at the age of 16 years, before the menses appeared. On the other hand menstrual periocfs occasionally remain regular until the age of 65. The average age for cessation of menstrual periods is 47 years, and race or the age of onset of menstruation have not been shown to have a distinct bearing on the time of the menopause.
IC spot-defect and fault semantics-a unified framework

A theoretical framework to model spot defects with their related faults in any IC technology is presented. The defect models are unintended geometrical variations introduced in the shape of the patterns of the IC. The transcendence of a defect is determined by the impact that it has at several levels of abstractions. This impact is called a fault. The framework is a mathematical construction which encompasses a hierarchical fault modeling that avoids irrelevant information at every level of abstraction. The framework includes consistency requirements on fault modeling which can be used to analyze the origins and reasons of malfunctions in production chips. <<ETX>>
Modulation of rat behaviour by using a rat-like robot

In this paper, we study the response of a rat to a rat-like robot capable of generating different types of behaviour (stressful, friendly, neutral). Experiments are conducted in an open-field where a rat-like robot called WR-4 is put together with live rats. The activity level of each rat subject is evaluated by scoring its locomotor activity and frequencies of performing rearing (rising up on its hind limbs) and body grooming (body cuddling and head curling) actions, whereas the degree of preference of that is indicated by the robot–rat distance and the frequency of contacting WR-4. The moving speed and behaviour of WR-4 are controlled in real-time based on the feedback from rat motion. The activity level and degree of preference of rats for each experimental condition are analysed and compared to understand the influence of robot behaviour. The results of this study show that the activity level and degree of preference of the rat decrease when exposed to a stressful robot, and increase when the robot exhibit friendly behaviour, suggesting that a rat-like robot can modulate rat behaviour in a controllable, predictable way.
[Beta-myosin heavy-chain gene mutations in patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy].

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES To determine the frequency of mutations in the beta-myosin heavy-chain gene (MYH7) in a cohort of patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) and their families, and to investigate correlations between genotype and phenotype. METHODS Single-strand conformation polymorphism analysis and sequencing of fragments with abnormal MYH7 gene mobility were carried out in 128 consecutive index patients with HCM. The phenotypes of patients with and without mutations were compared and the phenotypes of identified families were recorded. RESULTS A total of 11 mutations were found in 13 families (10%); 7/11 had been previously described. The I736T mutation was found in three families and the A797T in two. One patient had two mutations (i.e., I736T and R787H). Mutations were more frequent in patients with a family history of sudden death (31%) and in those with severe hypertrophy (39% had a thickness > or = 30 mm). Mutations were found in 29 of 42 members of the 13 families, including six family members (20%) who were healthy carriers and aged < or = 36 years. Sudden death had occurred in eight members of four families: four in two families with the I736T mutation, one in a family with A797T, one in a family with R870H, and two in a family with A901P. CONCLUSIONS MYH7 mutations were present in 10% of our families. Mutations were more frequent in patients with a family history of sudden death and in those with severe hypertrophy. Most mutations had been described previously. Some appeared in several families. For some mutations, the correlation between genotype and phenotype was stable, while for others, there were marked differences between the phenotypes of the index patients and their relatives, suggesting the presence of additional genetic factors that have yet to be identified.
The DNA binding domain of the initiator protein DnaA.

The 94 C‐terminal amino acids of the initiator protein DnaA of Escherichia coli are required and sufficient for specific binding to the cognate DNA binding site. The binding domain contains two potential amphipathic alpha‐helices and a third alpha‐helix. It represents a new DNA binding motif so far not found in other DNA binding proteins. Temperature‐sensitive mutations in the binding motif, dnaA204, dnaA205 and dnaA211, abolish DNA binding. In the solid‐phase DNA binding assay, applicable to other DNA binding proteins, fusions of domains of DnaA protein to beta‐galactosidase are reacted with biotinylated anti‐beta‐galactosidase antibody. These are coupled to streptavidin‐coated magnetic beads. The DNA binding domain is able to selectively remove the DNA target (oriC) from the liquid phase. Alternatively, the DNA binding domain is fused to a peptide containing a target sequence which is naturally biotinylated in vivo in E.coli. This fusion protein can be coupled directly to streptavidin‐coated magnetic beads. Homologies between DnaA protein and transcription factors of the NtrC family are discussed.
Q-factor control in asymmetry single circular split ring resonator via positon of gap

In this paper we introduce a resonator using asymmetric single circular split ring resonator. The impact of the degree of asymmetric on the frequency response and its quality factor within the microwave frequency regime has been studied. The results have been shown that the resonance frequency and quality factor of asymmetric single circular split ring resonator are strongly depended on the relations between the gap orientation and the electric field direction. More asymmetric structure will generate high Q-factor.
Corporate Social Responsibility in Enhancing Disaster Education

Today, university educators are confronting unparalleled challenges regarding declining state education budgets. Meanwhile, an ethos of corporate social responsibility has taken hold in some sectors, where companies define themselves as members and participants in a community, able to offer something besides financial transactions. Engagement and support of educational programs and institutions is an example of one such kind of involvement. This chapter details such collaborations between Grainger corporation, NC4, ESi Acquisition Inc. and the University of North Texas’s Emergency Administration and Planning program. The generosity of these private companies helped the program open an Emergency Operations Center training lab on campus to facilitate hands-on decision support systems training, and enhance creativity and problem solving skills in a simulated environment for emergency management students. Such public-private partnerships and outreach efforts to enhance disaster management training and educational experiences of students have the potential to make a real and lasting difference to all players involved.