Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Interferon g Eliminates Responding CD 4 T Cells during Mycobacterial Infection by Inducing Apoptosis of Activated CD 4 T Cells

In Mycobacterium bovis Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG)-infected wild-type mice, there was a large expansion of an activated (CD44 hi ) splenic CD4 T cell population followed by a rapid contraction of this population to normal numbers. Contraction of the activated CD4 T cell population in wild-type mice was associated with increased apoptosis of activated CD4 T cells. In BCG-infected interferon (IFN)g knockout (KO) mice, the activated CD4 T cell population did not undergo apoptosis. These mice accumulated large numbers of CD4 1 CD44 hi T cells that were responsive to mycobacterial antigens. Addition of IFNg to cultured splenocytes from BCG-infected IFNg KO mice induced apoptosis of activated CD4 T cells. IFNg –mediated apoptosis was abolished by depleting adherent cells or Mac-1 1 spleen cells or by inhibiting nitric oxide synthase. Thus, IFNg is essential to a regulatory mechanism that eliminates activated CD4 T cells and maintains CD4 T cell homeostasis during an immune response.
A bidirectional multiple-input multiple-output modular multilevel DC-DC converter

This work introduces a new Multiple-Input Multiple-Output Modular Multilevel dc-dc Converter (MIMO-MMC). The proposed topology has a bidirectional structure and may be utilized in both low and high power applications ranging from approximately 100W to 10MW. The modular structure of the MIMO-MMC enables efficient component utilization through module voltage and current sharing capabilities. The topology can supply or extract regulated power from μ controllable voltage nodes without requiring source or load multiplexing, resulting in minimized filtering requirements. The MIMO-MMC's structure is described, and the steady state operation of the converter is theoretically analyzed. Based on the derived dynamic model of the converter, an effective control algorithm is proposed. The steady-state operation and dynamic response of the converter is investigated through both simulation and experiment.
Internal market orientation:construct, measurement and consequences

This thesis contributes to the paucity of marketing research into the area of internal marketing. Drawing from knowledge developed in a diverse range of marketing and management literatures, the domaill of internal marketing is clarified Gild a new concept, internal market orientation is developed. A new instrument, measuring the internal market orientation, is developed and subjected to standard scale development procedures. Six dimensions of the construct are confirmed; collegial interaction, group interaction, jorlllal interaction, external envirollment, wage flexibility and job flexibility. A sample of 766 UK retail store managers are surveyed to identify levels of internal market orientation and external market orientation in large UK multi-product, multi-site retailers and the structural relationships between internal market orientation, extemal market orientation alld company performance are examined. The external market orientation construct is applied to the local retail market and established measurement instruments adapted to this pwpose. Three measures of performance are employed ill this study. The structural relationships between the six dimensions of internal market orientation and the three dimensions of external market orientation are examined employing structural equations methodology, using LISREL 8.3. alld the impact of internal market orientation Oil external market orientation and company performance is measured. The study finds no direct link between internal market orientation and financial performance but does identify the moderated role of internal market orientation on financial performance. Significant relationships between three of the six dimensions of internal market orientation and the three dimensions of external market orientation are identified and the impact of internal market orientation on the retention of employees and their behaviour is also identified. The research findings contribute to marketing theory by providing empirical evidence to support the long held assumption that internal marketing has an impact on marketing success and offers an explanation of the mechanism by which this influence operates. For marketing practitioners, the research findings offer additional information on which services marketing strategies may be formulated.
Down‐regulation of SKP2 induces apoptosis in lung‐cancer cells

S‐Phase kinase associated protein 2 (SKP2), an F‐box protein constituting the substrate‐recognition subunit of the SCFSKP2 ubiquitin ligase complex, targets cell‐cycle regulators, such as the cyclin‐de‐pendent kinase inhibitor p27KIP1, for ubiquitin‐mediated degradation. Our earlier studies indicated frequent amplification and over‐expression of the SKP2 gene in primary small‐cell lung cancers (SCLCs) and cell lines derived from this type of tumor, and showed that down‐regulation of SKP2 expression by means of an antisense oligonucleotide inhibited the growth of SCLC cells in culture (Yokoi et al. Am J Pathol, 161, 207‐216, 2002). The anti‐sense effect was confirmed in two cell lines of non‐small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) that also exhibited over‐expression of the gene. In the work reported here, we examined the mechanism(s) responsible for antisense‐mediated growth inhibition of SCLC‐ and NSCLC‐derived cultures. SKP2‐antisense treatment not only suppressed DNA synthesis, as determined by [3H]thymidine incorporation, but also induced spontaneous apoptosis characterized by an increase in the sub‐G1 population, fragmentation of nuclei, and activation of caspase‐3. Our results suggest that since down‐regulation of SKP2 appears to induce apoptosis in lung‐cancer cells directly, targeting this molecule could represent a promising new therapeutic approach for this type of cancer, and possibly other tumors that over‐express SKP2. (Cancer Sci 2003; 94: 344–349)
Globalisation and National Incentives for Protecting Environmental Goods: Types of Goods, Trade Effects, and International Collective Action Problems

This article tries to explain national incentives for protecting environmental goods either autonomously or collectively; it explores how globalisation has affected those incentives; and it suggests how national environmental policy might respond so as to ensure its effectiveness. The central argument is that national incentives for environmental protection may to a considerable extent be explained by a combination of the type of environmental good to be protected (in terms of public goods theory) and the effects of environmental protection measures on international competitiveness. Arrangements for protecting environmental goods can be ranked according to their centripetal effects on non-participating countries. Centripetal effects are strongest in the case of club goods (1), followed by private goods (2), public goods (3), and common pool resources (4). The centripetal effects resulting from the type of environmental good can be further reinforced by competitive advantages resulting from environmental protection measures; they can be weakened by competitive disadvantages; or they can remain unchanged due to competitive neutrality. The combination of four types of environmental goods and three types of competitive effects (positive, negative, neutral) results in twelve possible cases, with differing national incentives for autonomous and collective environmental protection. Given specific assumptions, these twelve cases can be ranked with regard to the severity of collective action problems they involve. The article includes a short empirical illustration for each case. It also analyses how globalisation (in the form of increasing trade) and some of its driving forces (in the form of free trade agreements) influence national incentives and legal possibilities for environmental protection. This article concludes with a brief discussion of four options for (re-)expanding the action space for national environmental policies under the condition of economic globalisation.
Credit Rationing Under Asymmetric Information and the Fund of Guarantees for Agriculture and Forestry

There exist many different programs for government support of agricultural credit around the world. Many of these programs are specified for special purposes such as the support of environmentally friendly farming, or for the support of young farmers. But a great proportion of the government money for the support of agricultural credit goes to general programs aimed just at financing agricultural activities. In a majority of these general purpose programs of government support for agricultural and small business credit in the U.S.A. and Western European countries, there is the condition that these programs are intended for borrowers who do not qualify for ordinary commercial loans. In some of these programs the applicant for the subsidized loan has to show that his loan application was rejected by a commercial bank. The government support for agriculture is in this way strictly targeted toward the most disadvantaged farmers. The Czech programs administered by the Fund of Guarantees for Agriculture and Forestry (Fund of Guarantees) are in sharp contrast with this approach of targeting credit support. Of course, there exist a number of conditions to determine the eligibility of a farmer for support by the Fund of Guarantees. Primarily, in order to be considered for support, the agricultural enterprise has to have settled all the restitution and transformation liabilities, and there are further conditions elaborated in the program guidelines "Pokyny pro poskytovani garance a dotace prostrednictvim," PGRLF (1994). However, there is no special emphasis on targeting the support towards a special group of farmers, who are rejected by commercial banks. The aim of this paper is to provide the possible theoretical rationale and justification of such a nondiscriminating policy and of the credit guarantee approach to government support of agricultural credit markets.
STRAINS OF Staphylococcus aureus AND PATHOLOGY ASSOCIATED WITH NATURAL CHRONIC AND EXPERIMENTAL ACUTE SUPPURATIVE MASTITIS

Staphylococcal mastitis is one of the main causes of culling of adult rabbit does from commercial rabbitries. The aims of this work were: 1) to provide a detailed description of the spectrum of gross and microscopic lesions observed in chronic natural cases of staphylococcal mastitis in adult does, 2) to determine whether there is a correlation between the different Staphylococcus aureus genotypes and the pathology observed and 3) to study the host immune response after an experimental infection with this bacterium. The results showed that the different lesions observed were independent of the bacterial genotype. A broad spectrum of different pathological stages could be established based on the histomorphological characteristics and the cellular composition of the lesions. There were two major types of pathologies, one focused on the mammary gland structures (with variations which could suggest possible stages of infection) and one focused on periglandular tissue. Mammary glands were histologically grouped into four different types: abscesses (66.3%), suppurative mastitis (lobular pattern) (7.9%), cellulitis (19.6%) and mixed (6.2%). In the experimental infection, the important role of the individual immune response was considered after observing that animals inoculated with the same bacterial strain showed histological lesions of different level of severity.
Return on investment in the public sector

Abstract : In an environment of scarce resources and rising federal deficits the people not only expect, but demand greater accountability for the spending of public funds. This demand has created a trend in the public sector, not only in the United States, but worldwide as well, towards the importation of private sector business practices to improve accountability-oriented analysis. One example is increased emphasis on return on investment (ROI) analysis in public sector organizations. Development and application of ROI analysis is challenging in the public sector since most government organizations do not generate profit necessary for calculation of ROI in the manner in which it is done in the private sector. This thesis develops the methodology necessary for use of ROI analysis in the public sector. ROI methodology is applied for test evaluation with the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR) in San Diego. The test demonstrates that ROI can be applied successfully to assess the relative efficiency of value-added work and to improve the process of choosing between investment alternatives. Properly designed ROI analysis reveals how and for what goods and services money is spent and provides a means for comparing the value derived from investment and work performed.
Evolutionary channel state information feedback control for interference alignment

Interference alignment (IA) has been well recognized as a promising technique to obtain a large multiplexing gain in multiple input multiple output (MIMO) interference channels. However, most of the existing IA schemes require global channel state information (CSI) at the transmitter to design precoding vectors, which causes a large amount of feedback bits. To reduce the feedback overhead, in this paper, we model the evolution and dynamic behavior of the CSI feedback rate control problem using the evolutionary game theory over orthogonal feedback channels with a total bandwidth constraint. The game utility is defined as the performance gain by CSI feedback minus the price as a linear function of the CSI feedback rate, subject to an overall bandwidth constraint. Then, an algorithm for the implementation of the evolution process is also presented. The proposed game-theoretic framework for modeling the interactions among the feedback of multiple users can be used to efficiently control the CSI feedback amount while achieving fairness among all the mobile receivers.
Effects of alpha lipoic acid on motor function and antioxidant enzyme activity of nerve tissue after sciatic nerve crush injury in rats.

AIM Background: Alpha lipoic acid (ALA) that is a strong antioxidant drug is tried for both protection and treatment of various diseases of central and peripheral nervous systems. MATERIAL AND METHODS Material and Methods: Protective effects of ALA on crush type peripheral nerve injury were evaluated. 28 Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into four groups: In Group 1, sciatic nerve was only explored. Sciatic nerve crush injury was performed after serum physiologic injection intraperitoneally in Group 2, and after ALA injection in Groups 3 and 4. In all subjects, Sciatic Functional Index (SFI) was calculated. All subjects were sacrificed 1 hour after injury in first three groups, and 48 hours after in Group 4. Nerve samples were taken. Superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione peroxidase activities were measured in nerve tissue. RESULTS Results: Administration of ALA before injury provided significantly better SFI values and higher levels of antioxidant enzymes than control group. These effects were significantly prominent 48 hours after injury. CONCLUSION Conclusion: ALA that was given before crush type peripheral nerve injury provided to decrease damage of the nerve. Specific mechanisms of this effect must be clarified and must be shown that it is whether effective when it is given after injury or not.
Fault Detection, Diagnostics, and Prognostics: Software Agent Solutions

Fault diagnosis and prognosis are important tools for the reliability, availability, and survivability of navy all-electric ships (AES). Extending the fault detection and diagnosis into predictive maintenance increases the value of this technology. The traditional diagnosis can be viewed as a single diagnostic agent having a model of the component or the whole system to be diagnosed. This becomes inadequate when the components or system become large, complex, and even distributed as on navy electric ships. For such systems, the software multiagents may offer a solution. A key benefit of software agents is their ability to automatically perform complex tasks in place of human operators. After briefly reviewing traditional fault diagnosis and software agent technologies, this paper discusses how these technologies can be used to support the drastic manning reduction requirements for future navy ships. Examples are given on the existing naval applications and research on detection, diagnostic, and prognostic software agents. Current work on a multiagent system for shipboard power systems is presented as an example of system-level application.
Gene Array Studies in Renal Neoplasia

Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is comprised of several distinct histologic subtypes many of which have characteristic cytogenetic abnormalities. The molecular pathogenesis of some of these neoplasms is beginning to be elucidated. Yet renal cell carcinoma is often discovered at an advanced clinical stage and effective pharmacologic therapies for this disease remain to be discovered. For these reasons, renal cell carcinoma is ideally suited to the genome scale investigation made possible by DNA microarrays. A number of DNA array studies of renal cell carcinoma have been published. Renal cell carcinomas have also been studied by array based comparative genomic hybridization. The purpose of this review will be to summarize these studies, to compare the results of the different studies, and to suggest future areas of investigation with a particular emphasis on clinically relevant advances.
Characterization of a Multicopper Oxidase Gene from Staphylococcus aureus

ABSTRACT A multicopper oxidase gene from Staphylococcus aureus was cloned and overexpressed. Purified recombinant multicopper oxidase oxidized the substrate 3,3′-dimethoxybenzidine in the presence of copper. Disruption of mco showed copper sensitivity and H2O2 resistance, suggesting roles for mco in copper homeostasis and oxidative stress response. Northern blot analysis showed copper-induced mco transcription.
Measurement method of zooming by a cameraman

We are developing an intelligent robot camera that is capable of automatically shooting images like those taken by broadcasting cameramen. In order to elucidate the zooming techniques of broadcasting cameramen, we developed the new measurement tool of zooming works which is able to be attached to or detached from broadcasting cameras easily. Then we measured the zooming works of broadcasting cameramen in shooting the images of still subject with this tool, and analyzed them. We confirmed that it is possible to reproduce faithfully the subtle zooming techniques of broadcasting cameramen. It was also established that when a cameraman shoots the same scene repeatedly in an improvised manner, the velocity of the operation rod follows almost the same velocity curve each time. This has led us to believe that the cameramen conduct zooming on the basis of a method acquired through individual experience. The frequency components of the operation rod's subtle velocity changes are from 5 to 10 Hz and the frequency levels of less than 5 Hz are especially large. The peak of variation of the subject's size is observed at the timing of 0.53 to 0.66 (the second half) during zoom-in operation and at the timing of 0.38 to 0.47 (the first half) during zoom-out operation, with both measured in terms of normalized zooming time.
The Influence of Strategic Leadership on Employee Performance in the Hotel Industry

-----This research is about the influence of strategic leadership on employee performance in the hotel industry. The hotel industry is a service industry hence dependent on human labour for its growth and ultimate survival. Employees are crucial in determining whether a customer will leave happy and willing to come back or not because people don't leave organizations but they leave management and leadership. The objectives of the study were to find out what kind of communication is applied in classified hotels. to examine the effects of implementation of strategic goals on employee performance and explore the relationship between strategic leadership and employee performance. The researcher used descriptive research design where qualitative data was collected. Descriptive approach helps to depict. describe, find patterns or simply try to understand occurrence of behaviour or phenomenon which is the essence of this study. Data was collected using closed ended and open ended questionnaires and ana lysed using inferential statistics where statistical findings from a sample were general ised to pertain to the entire population. The population was 2713 which resulted in a sample of 268. using simple random sampling. Out of this number 249 responded making a response rate of 93%. This enabled generalisation about the population and the key findings were that 44.55% of employees cited money as the main reason they reported to work. Majority of the organisations had some form of appraisal which mainly included promotions and financial gains but as discussed in chapter five there are various ways of appraisals like critical incident method, weighted checklist method, performance ranking among others that managers and leaders need to understand and utilise to improve performance. Some managers sti II felt lost and bored at work, making it even harder for them to motivate others in quest to improving organisational performance. Managers as strategic leaders have a role to motivate employees so that they can also feel responsible for organisational goal achievement and ultimate success. They have been tasked to look at the past. present and seek a better performance by working with people, not for the people and the organisation. It is clear from the findings that there is a communication breakdown between senior managers and subordinates. The recommendations are for organisations to train their leaders in employee motivation and performance analysis techniques. There is need to look into what demotivated employees cost an organisation's resources.
Optimal management of plug-in electric vehicles in smart distribution systems

This paper investigates optimal operation management of plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) in distribution systems. In this regard, the high penetration of electric vehicles (EVs) especially in the form of PEVs is another source of energy that can help the grid if optimally managed. In order to make the existence of PEVs to a suitable opportunity for the grid, vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology is employed to change the PEVs from moving loads into moving sources. We also suggest a novel smart strategy to first manage the operation of PV and PEVs for providing the operator targets and second model the uncertainties generated by both PV and PEV in the system. The proposed method uses particle swarm optimization algorithm (PSO) along with the point estimate method (PEM) to deal with these issues. The 69-bus IEEE test system is employed as the case study to examine the high performance and ability of the proposed algorithm.