Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
EXPLORING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CEO CHARACTERISTICS AND PERFORMANCE

This article examines the relationship between CEO characteristics and firm performance with a sample formed by the best performing CEOs in the world according to Harvard Business Review. The empirical analysis is based on descriptive statistics techniques and studies the universe of CEOs included in the 2016 ranking “The Best-Performing CEOs in the World” released by Harvard Business Review. Moreover, it addresses performance at various levels: financial performance, environmental, social and governance performance (ESG) and overall performance. The findings of the study show: 1) a strongly negative association between financial and ESG performance; 2) outsider CEOs outperform insider CEOs in overall performance; 3) CEOs with engineering degrees show significantly higher ESG performance; 4) CEOs with longer tenures in the firm present stronger financial performance though weaker ESG performance; and 5) the CEO’s country of origin emerges as an important driver to explain the different types of performance. Results in this field contradict the conventional wisdom of Anglo-Saxon CEOs as the best performers CEOs.
Efek Bawang Putih (Allium sativum Linn) Terhadap Penurunan Tekanan Darah

Latar belakang Hipertensi diketahui sebagai “silent killer”. Peningkatan tekanan darah merupakan faktor risiko utama untuk penyakit jantung koroner dan iskemik serta stroke hemoragik. Selain penyakit jantung koroner dan stroke, komplikasi peningkatan tekanan darah termasuk gagal jantung, penyakit pembuluh darah perifer, gangguan ginjal, perdarahan retina, dan gangguan penglihatan. Penyembuhan dengan herba merupakan salah satu alternatif untuk mengatasi hipertensi. Selain sebagai rempah dapur yang terkenal, kepopuleran bawang putih sebagai herba tidak diragukan lagi. Salah satu khasiat umbi bawang putih adalah untuk menurunkan tekanan darah. Tujuan Penelitian Ingin mengetahui apakah bawang putih menurunkan tekanan darah. Metode penelitian Penelitian ini menggunakan desain eksperimental kuasi dengan subjek penelitian sebanyak 30 orang. Data yang dinilai adalah tekanan darah sistolik dan diastolik. Hasil Hasil rerata tekanan darah sistolik sesudah mengkonsumsi bawang putih adalah sebesar 111,40 mmHg (SD = 8,139), lebih rendah daripada rerata sebelum mengkonsumsi bawang putih sebesar 121,53 mmHg (SD = 6,957) (p<0,01). Hasil rerata tekanan darah diastolik sesudah mengkonsumsi bawang putih adalah sebesar 74,00 mmHg (SD = 6,384), lebih rendah daripada rerata sebelum mengkonsumsi bawang putih sebesar 81,00 mmHg (SD = 6,057) (p<0,01). Simpulan Bawang putih menurunkan tekanan darah.
Improving clinical outcomes in rheumatoid arthritis : a patient centred approach

The existing medical model for managing rheumatoid arthritis (RA) focuses on minimising joint inflammation using suppressive treatments. However, patients have broader concerns spanning other symptoms like fatigue and pain and the way their health care is delivered. This thesis used qualitative and quantitative research methods to address three inter-related aspects of clinical care. Firstly, identifying critical challenges for providing patient-centred care. Secondly, defining outcomes important to patients like fatigue and pain and concomitant fibromyalgia. Finally, examining temporal changes in the RA management and evaluating aspects of clinical decision making. Firstly the thesis shows current care is not optimal. Key limitations include: being insufficiently patient-centred, failing to integrate management across the primary/secondary divide, over-emphasising drug treatment and overlooking "wholeperson" care. Secondly, care overlooks several crucially important areas to RA patients. Many patients had high levels of fatigue, associated with pain, disability and psychological factors. Their fatigue spanned several domains. Current fatigue questionnaires are heavily weighted towards psychological aspects, and a more balanced assessment is needed. Pain, a dominant RA symptom, is often not directly addressed. The research showed central sensitisation causes persistent pain in many RA patients; it may require different management approaches. The research also characterised patients with the fibromyalgic rheumatoid clinical phenotypes; their higher disease activity scores may not fully reflect disease activity. Despite changes in treatment over the years their disease activity scores have not improved significantly, unlike RA patients in general. Different treatment strategies are needed to improve their outcomes. Finally although patients with high disease activity usually have their treatment changed when reviewed in rheumatology clinics, patients with moderate disease activity often have insufficient treatment changes; patients' age has a significant influence on treatment decisions. Strategies are needed to better target moderate disease activity and overcome the limiting effect of age on treatment decisions.
Efek bawang putih (Allium sativum) dan cabe jawa (Piper retrofractum Vahl.) terhadap jumlah neutrofil pada tikus yang diberi suplemen kuning telur

Latar belakang: Hiperlipidemia dapat menyebabkan penyakit kardiovaskular yang merupakan penyebab utama kematian. Bawang putih (Allium sativum) dan cabe jawa (Piper retrofractum Vahl.) memiliki khasiat antioksidan yang dapat menghambat terjadinya stress oksidatif pada endotel pembuluh darah dalam proses aterosklerosis, sehingga akan menurunkan profil neutrofil yang berperan sebagai makrofag lipid. Tujuan penelitian ini mengetahui pengaruh pemberian minyak atsiri bawang putih dan minyak atsiri dari cabe jawa per sonde lambung terhadap jumlah neutrofil pada tikus wistar yang hiperlipidemia. Metoda: Penelitian eksperimental Post Test Only Control Group Design. Sampel terdiri dari 25 tikus wistar 8 minggu dibagi dalam 5 kelompok yaitu 2 kelompok kontrol : kontrol negatif yang diberi pakan standar saja (K-), kontrol positif yang diberi diet kuning telur (K+), dan 3 kelompok perlakuan yang sebelumnya diberi diet kuning telur intermiten sebesar 1,5 gram selama 2 minggu yang kemudian kelompok pertama diberi minyak atsiri bawang putih sebesar 0,05 ml (P1), kelompok kedua diberi minyak atsiri cabe jawa sebesar 0,05 ml (P2), kelompok ketiga diberi minyak atsiri bawang putih 0,05 ml dan cabe jawa 0,05 (P3). Data diperoleh dari penghitungan jumlah neutrofil darah tepi di laboratorium. Data diuji dengan One Way Anova. Hasil: Jumlah neutrofil kelompok kontrol negative (28,0 ± 7,07); kontrol positif (28,8 ± 7,26); kelompok perlakuan P1 (47,8 ± 11,84); P2 (40,6 ± 16,59); P3 (35,9 ± 11,84). Uji one way anova antar kelompok tidak terdapat perbedaan bermakna (p=0,066, p>0,05) Kesimpulan: Kombinasi minyak atsiri bawang putih dan minyak atsiri cabe jawa dengan dosis 0,05 ml selama 3 minggu per sonde lambung tidak menurunkan jumlah neutrofil tikus wistar yang diinduksi dengan diet kuning telur
Long-term neuropsychologic outcome in children diagnosed with a low-grade astrocytoma

textabstractCentral nervous system (CNS) tumors in children have a relatively high frequency. They are the second most common form of cancer in childhood only exceeded by acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). However, prognosis is more severe and at present more children die because of CNS tumor than of ALL. The incidence of CNS tumors is estimated 3.5 per 100,000 in children below 15 years of age.1 Boys appear to be at greater risk than girls (1.1:1) and this ratio is even higher in primitive neuro-ectodermal tumor (PNET), plexus papilloma, and germinoma (2:1). 1 The most frequently occurring histological tumor type is astrocytoma (40-50%) followed by medulloblastoma (15-20%), ependymoma (8-13%), and craniopharyngiomas (7-10%) as shown in Table 1.2 Astrocytomas are classified according to increasing malignancy grade as pilocytic, fibrillary, anaplastic astrocytoma, and glioblastoma. The most common variant in children is the pilocytic astrocytoma.
The Effect of an Exercise and Diet Program on Fitness, Posture and Self Image in Women

One hundred seventeen female research subjects were involved in a single blinded randomized control study to assess the benefits of an exercise and diet program in restoring posture and balance and fitness in women who have given birth to 1or more children in the last 18 years. The program lasted for 2 months. There were 3 groups of subjects, an exercise group (E), a control group (C), and a pre pregnancy group (P). E, followed a diet involving exchanges for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The exercise involved a 10 minute abdominal exercise
Liquidity and The Profitability of Manufacturing Firms in Nigeria

This study examined the relationship between liquidity and profitability of manufacturing firms in Nigeria. The study specifically analyzed the effect of cash ratio, current ratio and quick ratio on profit after tax of the manufacturing firms in Nigeria. Secondary data were collected from annual reports of sampled firms over a period of ten years (2007-2016) and were analyzed using panel data estimators such as pooled OLS estimator, fixed effect estimator, random effect estimator, Hausman test, panel co-integration and pooled granger causality tests. The findings revealed that financial liquidity proxy in terms of quick ratio (QR) had a negative and insignificant impact on profit after tax with coefficient estimate of -0.094121 (p=0.2247 > 0.05). Financial liquidity measured in terms of Cash ratio (CR) exert positive and significant impact on profit after tax with coefficient estimate of 0.379774 (p=0.0121< 0.05). Result also showed that financial liquidity measured in terms of Current ratio (CNR) exert insignificant negative impact on profit after tax with coefficient estimate of -0.024989 (p=0.1163 > 0.05). Meanwhile the study revealed that quick ratio (QR), cash ratio (CR) and current ratio (CNR) has 0.581533 (58.1%) variation in profit after tax (PAT). Result further revealed that that there is no long-run relationship between liquidity and profitability of manufacturing firms in Nigeria. The study concluded that financial liquidity has helped to improve financial performance selected manufacturing firms in Nigeria. Also, that cash ratio has positive and significant effect on the profitability of manufacturing Firms in Nigeria. Thus, firms in the manufacturing industry should objectively try to reduce their bill receivable, so as to guide against waiting longer to collect from customers, for the purpose of increasing their profitability.
Three Essays on Credit Unions

This dissertation is comprised of three essays on issues related to the financial reporting practices of credit unions in the United States. The first essay relies on an agency theory perspective to examine the extent of earnings management in U.S. credit unions through loan loss provisions (LLP). The context of member-owned credit unions provides a different set of financial reporting incentives than the one typically found in shareholder-owned banks, thus providing an opportunity to extend earnings management research. The sample comprises U.S. credit unions above $50 million in total assets, between 2003 and 2016. Results show that credit union managers engage in income smoothing through the discretionary use of LLP to avoid earnings declines. Results also show that larger and better-capitalized credit unions engage in more earnings management, as do credit unions with a federal charter. Moreover, credit unions are driven by the incentive of merging to engage in earnings management. The findings are economically significant, and thus, relevant to policymakers contemplating new regulations since these managerial activities may place the cooperative principle at risk. The second essay examines how competition affects risk-taking of a matched sample (by size and county) of banks and credit unions, and whether it affects differently credit unions and banks. Several measures of risk-taking are used in the study. The period of the study is from 2010 till 2017. First, univariate analyses are conducted to compare the risk-taking of the two types of institutions. We find that the means of the risk-taking measures do not differ significantly between banks and credit unions. Second, examining the difference in the risk-taking of credit unions and banks in a multivariate analysis, we find that banks’ managers engage in riskier activities. Third, we examine the effect of competition on the risk-taking. We find that increased competition induces managers of credit unions and banks to take more risk; this finding supports the competition-fragility hypothesis. We also find that credit unions’ managers take more risk than banks’ managers in the presence of competition. Finally, by including the quadratic term of competition, we find that there is a non-linear relationship between competition and risk-taking. This study has public policy implications: the American Banking Association argues that public policy toward credit unions and banks should be similar due to their similarities; whereas, credit unions express their difference to protect their privilege of tax exemption. The third essay attempts to identify certain traits of the target credit unions in comparison to acquiring and non-merging credit unions. The analysis is performed both qualitatively and quantitatively. First, the paper presents a clinical analysis of three cases of mergers of credit unions. Each case is analyzed from the perspective of agency theory to determine the reason for merger. The three cases illustrate how the executives and directors are seeking…
Effect of Islamic social reporting: A comparative study between Indonesia and Malaysia

This research aims to find out: (1) The Effect of Islamic social reporting on financial performance, (2) The Effect of Islamic social reporting on the company value, and (3) Differences in disclosure of Islamic Social Reporting in Indonesia and Malaysia. The population in this research are companies listed in Indonesia Sharia Stock Index (ISSI) and Islamic stocks in Malaysia, Suruhanja Sekuriti, during the period 2014-2017. The samples of companies were determined using purposive sampling technique. The research samples in Indonesia were 50 companies with 400 observations. While in Malaysia the research samples were 50 companies with 700 observations. Data analysis used robust regression analysis. The research results indicate that (1) There are differences in the disclosure of Islamic Social Reporting between Indonesia and Malaysia. (2) Islamic social reporting has a significant positive effect on financial performance. (3) Islamic social reporting has a significant effect on company value.
Effect of Accruals Earnings Management on Share Price of Quoted Nigerian Firms

Earnings management occurs during which financial reports are prepared using judgment in order to mislead the stakeholders about the underlying economic performance of the company, or to influence contractual outcomes that are based on the reported earnings. This indicates that managements have incentives to manipulate the earnings in the purpose of maximizing the wealth of the company and/or the manager. This study employed the panel least squares while assuming fixed effects to test the effect of accrual-based earnings management on share prices of ten (10) sectors purposively sampled for twelve (12) years (2006 – 2017) and resulting in one hundred and fifteen (115) observations. The findings of DAA (Discretionary Adjustment Accrual) been positive and significant conforms with prior studies that distinguishes earnings management based on discretionary accruals. This suggests that discretionary accruals adjustment provides managers in Nigerian quoted firms the opportunities to manipulate earnings and hence share prices.
Investment in Human Capital and Economic Growth in Jammu and Kashmir: Using a Granger Causality Approach

The study is an empirical investigation of the long-run relationships and the causal links between human capital investment and economic growth in Jammu and Kashmir using the granger causality test on the annual data for the time period 1975-76 to 2011-12. Government expenditure both on education and health are included as proxy variables for human capital investment and state per-capita domestic product as proxy variable for economic growth. The study highlights that in case of expenditure on health and per-capita domestic product their exists bivariate causality while in case of expenditure on education causality runs from expenditure on education to per-capita state domestic product. The findings revealed that increasing expenditures on health and education will improve the state domestic product figures in the long run. The analysis suggested when income of population increases then there would be a definite desire to educate the children. The study recommends that substantial amount of government budgetary allocation should be directed towards the educational and health sector. It is better to provide the citizen with substantial amount of education with good health which in turn will improve their ca[ability to command more goods and services. The study has limitation of including the limited variables in the model and applying the limited methodology.
The efficacy of a ‘novel mobilisation technique’ on thoracic, lumbar, hip and knee range of motion

The efficacy of a ‘novel mobilisation technique’ on thoracic, lumbar, hip and knee range of motion Background Low back pain is a common problem affecting most people at some stage in their lives. Manual therapy is commonly used as a form of treatment in the presence of lower back pain. Aim The aim of the study was to investigate the concepts of regional interdependence with Mulligan’s mobilisation with movement and the effect of a novel mobilisation technique (Mulligan’s traction SLR combined with a post-isometric relaxation). Study Design The present study was a controlled pre-post experimental research design. Method Twelve, healthy and physically active male participants (mean age 28.1 ± 3.5 years), with perceived ‘tight hamstrings’ were recruited for the study. Participants were randomised to receive the novel mobilisation technique to the left (n=6) or right (n=6) leg, using the contralateral limb as the control. Outcome measures included; SLR, KE, modified Schober’s (Tsp, Lsp) and sit and reach tests, which were taken before, immediately and 1hour post intervention. Results The main statistically significant and clinically meaningful result included immediate changes in the modified Schober’s Tsp (mean difference = -0.40 ± SD 0.48, 95% CI -0.70 to -0.10, t = -2.9, p = 0.014, d = 0.435) and changes in the sit and reach test immediately post (mean difference = -2.20cm ± 1.56, 95% CI -3.30 to -1.20cm, t = -4.869, p difference = -2.62 ± 2.89, 95% CI -4.5 to -0.78cm, t = -3.1, p = 0.009, d = 0.39 “small”) . There were no significant changes in the SLR, KE active or passive and modified Schober’s Lsp tests, immediately or 1-hour post intervention. Conclusion The novel mobilisation technique applied to the hip demonstrated statistically significant changes in the modified Schober’s Tsp and sit and reach tests. The main limitations to the present study included a potential ‘ceiling’ effect with the baseline SLR values, short technique duration (‘time under tension’) and no warm up.
An efficient method for stable transfection of mouse myogenic C2C12 cell line using a nonviral transfection approach

Aim: To describe in detail the use of the T-RExTM System (a tetracycline-regulated mammalian expression system; Invitrogen) for rapid, easy, and eff ective generation of stable C2C12 cell clones. Tetracycline-inducible stable cell lines are useful tools to study the function of various genes in diff erent types of mammalian cells. However, the generation of stable cell lines is a time-consuming, technically diffi cult, and expensive process.
Spatially Inhomogeneous Search Strategies

The efficiency of intracellular reactions which are driven by motorassisted transport strongly depends on the spatial organization of the cytoskeleton. The cytoskeleton is a highly complex filament network which is generally neither homogeneous nor isotropic. In cells with a centrosome, microtubules emanate radially from the center, whereas actin filaments populate the cortex underneath the plasma membrane in a random manner. While intermittent search strategies with stochastic transitions between a slow reactive phase and a fast non-reactive phase have been shown to be advantageous in homogeneous, isotropic environments, the effect of a realistic global cytoskeleton topology has only very recently gained scientific interest. In this chapter we review the progress in analyzing the efficiency of spatially inhomogeneous search strategies.
Studies of adipose tissue in humans with special reference to innervation by the sympathetic nervous system

This thesis reports the effects in vivo of the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) in human subcutaneous abdominal white adipose tissue (WAT) and other tissues involved in energy storage and utilisation. Cannulation of superficial veins draining skin, abdominal subcutaneous WAT and deep forearm muscle combined with isotope turnover methodology and tissue blood flow estimation was used to investigate the behaviour of these tissues under varying experimental conditions. Glucose infusion study: This examined differential substrate uptake and utilisation in the three tissues. WAT was responsible for only a small amount of glucose disposal and deep forearm muscle took up but did not release NEFA. Skin was a net exporter of lactate. Results confirm the relative purity of the venous effluent from these tissues. Sympathetic Nervous System study: This examined whole body, WAT and forearm muscle SNS activity in lean and obese individuals under fasting and postprandial conditions. Whereas whole body SNS activity was increased in the obese, regional heterogeneity of SNS activity was evidenced by reduced SNS activity in WAT. Adipose tissue blood flow was significantly reduced in the obese. This may underlie abnormal lipolysis and/or blood flow regulation in obesity.