Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cause’s Attributes Influencing Consumer’s Purchasing Intention: Empirical Evidence from Pakistan

Purpose – One purpose of this paper is to examine several factors that potentially influence a consumer’s purchasing decision to participate in cause-related marketing (CRM) program in the Pakistani context. The other is to empirically test the hypothesized relationship between cause’s attributes and purchase intention in such environment.Design/Methodology/Approach – This paper develops a measure for exploring the cause’s attributes influencing consumer’s purchasing intention. One group of valid sample with 150 respondents is collected through questionnaire survey.Findings – The results show that the degree of cause’s participation for consumer, fit between the brand and the cause, cause importance, congruence between the firm’s product and the cause, cause proximity play an important role in consumers’ attitudes toward the product and firm and their intentions to purchase the advertised product and participate in the CRM campaign.Research limitations/Implications – The sample is random but a convenience sample in terms of geographic area that is the main limitation of this research. There was a lack of experimental control for the questionnaire investigation, so the quality of questionnaire cannot be ensured.Practical Implications – This research should help firms determine the best partners for strategic social alliances, and provide an advice on how to make them maximum participation, also should help current and potential consumers ascribe personality traits to nonprofit organizations and differentiate between nonprofits on the basis of the cause’s attributes. At the same time, this paper provides several interesting areas for future research that will further aid marketing managers to develop a more effective CRM campaign to fit with goals of corporate, which adds some valuable insights or new ideas to develop essential theory.Originality/Value – This paper offers interesting insight into the development of CRM campaigns, and explores the five variables: the degree of cause’s participation for consumer; fit between the brand and the cause; cause importance; congruence between the firm’s product and the cause; cause proximity also should influence consumer’s purchasing attitude, intention and decision behavior in the Pakistani context.
The Incentive of Cournot Duopolists to Reveal Cost Information After Costs are Realized

This is a study of the incentive of firms to disclose private information about their costs to competitors (when firms compete by setting quantitites). This paper expands on previous contributions by analyzing a model in which firms decide whether to disclose their cost information to their rivals after they observe their own costs. I calculate the levels of profit to the firm, the benefit to the consumers, and welfare to society when competitors do not disclose such information, when a firm unilaterally discloses provate cost information to its competitor and when firms exchange such information. The results show that risk-neutral Cournot competitors have an incentive to disclose firm-specific cost information ex post if their costs are below the expected mean cost. Disclosure reduces consumer surplus when the disclosing firm's costs are below the expected mean cost. The effect of disclosure on social welfare depends on the parameters of the problem. Finally, I analyze the incentive of firms to agree to exchange information when disclosure exposes a firm to the risk of antitrust liability.
Maximising occupier value from business improvement districts

This paper is a review of Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) from the perspective of property occupiers. The issues that property occupiers should consider when analysing the potential benefits that a BID could deliver are identified and reasoned. The differing approaches to BIDs in the UK and North America are contrasted, and occupiers are alerted to the need to think differently in these locations — especially in respect of ‘voting power’. The ‘property cost paradox’ is also explored. This leads on to the relative merits of involving property owners — in addition to occupiers — in the strategy and funding of a BID in the UK.
A Conceptual Model of Residents’ Support for Tourism Development in Developing Countries

ABSTRACT This conceptual study proposes a comprehensive tourism development support model for developing countries. It focuses on residents’ perceptions of imperialism as a new contribution to the tourism literature, as well as their trust and identity; and how these constructs can influence their perceptions of tourism and subsequently their support for its development. The residents’ perceptions of tourism development are examined with respect to the perceived positive and negative impacts. The residents’ support for tourism is assessed by their attitudes toward its development. The model also proposes the relationship among imperialism, trust and identity. Respectively, the institutional, social exchange and identity theories are used to provide theoretical support for the nine research propositions. The model provides the foundation for future empirical analysis of the constructs to ascertain meaningful results for governments and tourism planners. This will enable better policies and decisions regarding the residents and tourism development in developing countries.
Automated Inventory Control and Management for Auto Spare Parts in Developing Nations

Inventory and its control is an aspect that has received considerable attention in contemporary times. This is attributed to the fact that salvaging the challenges posed by inventory drawbacks lies at the heart of management considerations and decisions in companies. For clarity,‟ Inventory Control focuses on acquiring, storing and managing the inventory in such a manner that it is available as and when due so as to cater for contingencies, maximize profit and to minimize wastage, losses or disservice to the customers. It is worthy of note that lost sales due to disservice are enormous. As it regards Spare/Service Parts which are interchangeable part kept in the inventory for the repair and replacement of failed parts. Spare parts industries and vehicle manufacturing companies strive to achieve the aim of inventory control which is to secure the best balance between “too much and too little. ” They must provide supply (sales), repair and maintenance services to their customers who would never desire downtime for their equipments because downtime is lost production capacity. Irrespective of the fact that spare part demands are stochastic (unpredictable) and provision of after-sales service compulsory, companies that can predict approximate optimal values for inventory decision making only topple their contemporaries in terms of sales and efficient service delivery. This research has designed and developed a model that performs a discrete event simulation of stochastic demands for spare parts inventory control.
Application of Segmentation Techniques on Atherosclerosis Images

This paper presents application of segmentation techniques on atherosclerosis images using various segmentation methods like Otsu thresholding, fuzzy C means, clustering algorithm and marker controlled watershed segmentation algorithm. Atherosclerosis is one of the causes of coronary heart disease (CHD). The proposed marker controlled watershed algorithm for medical image segmentation and analysis is very important because of its advantages, such as always being able to construct an entire division of the color image and prevent over segmentation as compared to conventional watershed algorithm. Paper finds Region of Interest (ROI) values of segmented image with proposed technique for coronary atherosclerosis. Keywords - Coronary heart disease (CHD), Clustering Image Segmentation Technique, Medical Image Segmentation, Fuzzy C means algorithm, Marker based Watershed Image Segmentation Technique.
Prevalence of andRacialDisparities in Risk Factor Control in Older Adults With Diabetes : The Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study

We conducted a cross-sectional study of 5,018 participants aged 67–90 years (1,574 with and 3,444 without diagnosed diabetes) who attended visit 5 of the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) Study (2011–2013). Risk factor targets were defined using both stringent (and less stringent) goals: hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) <7%, or <53 mmol/mol (<8%, <64 mmol/mol); LDL cholesterol (LDL-c) <100 mg/dL (<130 mg/dL); and blood pressure (BP) <140/90 mmHg (<150/90 mmHg). We used Poisson regression to obtain prevalence ratios (PRs).
Stem cell‐based composite tissue constructs for regenerative medicine

A major task of contemporary medicine and dentistry is restoration of human tissues and organs lost to diseases and trauma. A decade‐long intense effort in tissue engineering has provided the proof of concept for cell‐based replacement of a number of individual tissues such as the skin, cartilage, and bone. Recent work in stem cell‐based in vivo restoration of multiple tissue phenotypes by composite tissue constructs such as osteochondral and fibro‐osseous grafts has demonstrated probable clues for bioengineered replacement of complex anatomical structures consisting of multiple cell lineages such as the synovial joint condyle, tendon‐bone complex, bone‐ligament junction, and the periodontium. Of greater significance is a tangible contribution by current attempts to restore the structure and function of multitissue structures using cell‐based composite tissue constructs to the understanding of ultimate biological restoration of complex organs such as the kidney or liver. The present review focuses on recent advances in stem cell‐based composite tissue constructs and attempts to outline challenges for the manipulation of stem cells in tailored biomaterials in alignment with approaches potentially utilizable in regenerative medicine of human tissues and organs. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Comeback Victory

Will MR CLEAN Results Affect the Management of Patients with Ischemic Stroke? A single trial with a positive outcome is certainly not sufficient to claim that EVT is now the first-line treatment for ischemic stroke. Positive data from 3 additional trials (ESCAPE, EXTEND-IA, and SWIFT PRIME) are now available. On the basis of this evidence, it is likely that EVT will rapidly become the first-line treatment in patients with ischemic stroke with LVO. This will tremendously impact the health care system, because it will be necessary to offer this demanding treatment by well-trained interventional neuroradiologists to all patients without delay. This means early identification of patients with ischemic stroke who will benefit from EVT, the establishment of stroke centers offering this service 24 hours/7 days, and enabling training in the EVT of cerebral arteries. MR CLEAN has shown the value of EVT initiated within 6 hours of ischemic stroke onset caused by LVO of the anterior circulation. According to the clinical severity of ischemic stroke of the posterior circulation and recent data from a registry showing high recanalization rates in patients with basilar artery occlusion, continued evaluation in this group of patients seems important. Indeed further trials will be necessary to precisely define the arterial occlusion type, brain pathology, and finally the time window in which EVT is indicated for patients with anterior or posterior circulation stroke and the management of patients with wake-up stroke.
Consumption as Voting: A Path to Sustainability

This paper examines ‘consumption as voting’ with the aim of critiquing it as a practice and evaluating whether if promoted, it could help satisfy the objectives of not for profit organisations engaged in the development and management of sustainability. The review shows that it can motivate market place change and send messages regarding broad sustainability issues including consumers desire to see action upon them. It is limited however, in its ability to directly affect social change and lead development of a sustainable economy. Overall, it is a useful practice to promote, capable of advancing not for profit organisational objectives.
A moving sound source tracking based on two successive algorithms

In this paper, we proposed a novel method for single moving sound source tracking based on two successive algorithms. Although the MUSIC(MUltiple SIgnal Classification) method is well-known as one of the best high resolution methods for the unmoving source, two serious difficulties occur regarding as computational costs to solve the problem when the MUSIC method is applied in such a situation. The first occurs at the signal subspace tracking, which requires the eigen-decomposition and thus needs the enormous computations. The second occurs at a peak search of the MUSIC spectrum function, which involve many complex multiplying operations. In the proposed method, the PAST algorithm is applied to track sequentially the signal subspace without the eigen-decomposition, and the IPLS algorithm is applied to search successively the peak of MUSIC spectrum. Several experimental results in actual room environments are shown to present that more accurate results equivalent to the MUSIC method can be obtained by the proposed method less computational costs than the MUSIC method.
Applications of Data Fusion in Monitoring Inaccessible Ocean Machinery

Machine condition monitoring (MCM) enables real time health assessment, prognostics, and advisory generation by interpreting data from sensors installed on the machine being monitored. To effectively utilize measurements for determining the health of individual components, macro-components and the overall system, these measurements must somehow be combined or integrated to form a holistic picture. The process used to perform this combination is called sensor data fusion. While research on data fusion techniques spans across many domains, not much work has been done in data fusion for MCM in unmanned systems. This paper addresses this need by providing the intuition behind a mathematical model and process for data fusion in ocean machinery.
The Room Effect: Metric Spatial Knowledge of Local and Separated Regions

Navigating through real or virtual worlds requires a workable knowledge of the spatial layout. According to the landmark-route-survey model, metric spatial knowledge (survey knowledge) is acquired only following the acquisition of landmark and route knowledge. A dual mode model was proposed that assumes that survey knowledge may be quickly acquired for local regions. Research was conducted to understand how people rapidly acquire survey knowledge. Participants in three experiments briefly navigated on one floor of a virtual building, moving down hallways and performing tasks by using objects in rooms. Participants were later asked to answer from memory about the direction of objects by using pointing and map-drawing measures. A room effect was found for both measures; the angular positions of two objects in the same room were more accurately reported than those in different rooms. Accurate metric spatial information was available for objects in the same room, supporting an early acquisition assumption.
A Fitts' Law Evaluation of Video Game Controllers: Thumbstick, Touchpad and Gyrosensor

We present a pilot study evaluating three different game input methods offered by the Steam Controller: a thumb-based touchpad, thumbstick, and gyrosensor. In a Fitts' law pointing experiment, we compared these three input methods to the mouse, a commonly used baseline condition. The mouse had the best throughput at 4.73 bps, followed by the touchpad at 2.98 bps, then the gyrosensor at 2.85 bps, and finally the thumbstick at 2.39 bps. This indicates that the touchpad and gyrosensor are good alternatives to the traditional thumbstick, despite prevalence of the thumbstick on modern game controllers.
Adipose tissue‐derived mesenchymal stem cells as a source of human hepatocytes

Recent observations indicate that several stem cells can differentiate into hepatocytes; thus, cell‐based therapy is a potential alternative to liver transplantation. The goal of the present study was to examine the in vitro hepatic differentiation potential of adipose tissue‐derived mesenchymal stem cells (AT‐MSCs). We used AT‐MSCs from different age patients and found that, after incubation with specific growth factors (hepatocyte growth factor [HGF], fibroblast growth factor [FGF1], FGF4) the CD105+ fraction of AT‐MSCs exhibited high hepatic differentiation ability in an adherent monoculture condition. CD105+ AT‐MSC‐derived hepatocyte‐like cells revealed several liver‐specific markers and functions, such as albumin production, low‐density lipoprotein uptake, and ammonia detoxification. More importantly, CD105+ AT‐MSC‐derived hepatocyte‐like cells, after transplantation into mice incorporated into the parenchyma of the liver. Conclusion: Adipose tissue is a source of multipotent stem cells that can be easily isolated, selected, and induced into mature, transplantable hepatocytes. The fact that they are easy to procure ex vivo in large numbers makes them an attractive tool for clinical studies in the context of establishing an alternative therapy for liver dysfunction. (HEPATOLOGY 2007;46:219–228.)
Intermittent claudication due to ischaemia of the lumbosacral plexus

The distinct clinical syndrome of exercise induced ischaemia of the lumbosacral plexus is not a widely known cause for intermittent claudication. Eight patients with the mentioned syndrome were investigated clinically, neurophysiologically, and with imaging techniques. The clinical examination showed a typical exercise induced sequence of symptoms: pain, paraesthesia, and sensory and motor deficits. The underlying vascular conditions were high grade stenoses or occlusions of the arteries supplying the lumbosacral plexus. Spinal stenosis could be excluded in all cases. Five patients received successful interventional radiological therapy. The syndrome can be diagnosed clinically and successful therapy is possible by interventional radiology.
A preliminary study on the correlation of frequency components between finger PPG and radial arterial BP waveforms

Objective: Blood pressure (BP) waveform has important meaning in the study of circulatory diseases, but its noninvasive assessment is not sufficiently user-friendly for practical applications. In the present study, we try to build up a user-friendly PPG measurement system, and study the correlation between radial BP and finger photoplethysmography (PPG) waveforms Methods: User-friendliness of a self-made PPG measurement system was improved by applying an appropriate contacting pressure on the measured finger and adapting a hand-shape mold for the finger to put on. Finger PPG and radial-artery BP signals were then measured simultaneously and noninvasively on healthy volunteers (n=? ). In frequency-domain analysis performed on each 1-minute recorded data sequence, the linear regression was applied to the calculated amplitude ratios between BP and PPG waveforms. Results: After a series of testing, the PPG measurement system was found to be user-friendly and has a good reproducibility in the frequency components within the measured PPG waveform. The BP-PPG regression of amplitude ratios were all significant (R2 values all ≫0.72) for the first three harmonics. Conclusion: In the present study we built up a user-friendly PPG measurement system, and developed a frequency-domain analysis method to study the correlation between BP and PPG waveforms. We hope that the noninvasive PPG measurement system and the frequency-domain waveform analysis can provide an alternative and a more user-friendly method to reconstruct the radial BP waveform, and hence broaden the application of BP waveform analysis, which may bring deeper understanding for important circulatory diseases.
Slow Epidemic of Lymphogranuloma Venereum L2b Strain

We traced the Chlamydia trachomatis L2b variant in Amsterdam and San Francisco. All recent lymphogranuloma venereum cases in Amsterdam were caused by the L2b variant. This variant was also present in the 1980s in San Francisco. Thus, the current "outbreak" is most likely a slowly evolving epidemic.
Usefulness of multislice computed tomography to assess patency of coronary artery stents versus conventional coronary angiography

Background The aim of the present study was to assess the in-stent restenosis and occlusion of coronary artery stents by multislice computed tomography (MSCT) compared with conventional coronary angiography in patients with atypical chest pain and not practicable/non-conclusive stress test. Methods Between December 2004 and March 2006, 81 patients were scheduled and of these 72 (65 men, mean age 61 years) with 90 stents underwent MSCT angiography using a 16-slice scanner, Toshiba Aquilion 16, 8–12 months after stent placement. Results Of the 90 stents, 71 (79%) could be assessed and 19 (21%) were excluded because the image quality at the stent level was incompatible with diagnostic assessment. This results in sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values for all assessable stents in the identification of occlusion and/or in-stent restenosis of 82, 96, 87, and 94%, respectively. When the 19 uninterpretable stents were included in the analysis, the diagnostic accuracy of MSCT in detecting in-stent restenosis and occlusion resulted in a sensitivity of 82%, specificity of 71%, positive predictive value of 40%, and negative predictive value of 94%. Conclusion The results of the study suggest that MSCT angiography is a useful method for evaluating patency/occlusion of large (≥3 mm) coronary stents in symptomatic patients with atypical chest pain and concomitant not practicable/non-conclusive exercise or stress imaging test.
Revealing Smooth Structure of Visual Data by Permutation on Manifolds

In this paper, we address the issue of visual data organization by recovering an intrinsic order from an unorganized dataset. The proposed method exploits the inherent nature of manifold. This new perspective, posing no hypothesis on local topology of observed data, is simply built on the smoothness prior of manifold geometry. Under the observation that strong relation exists among visual content, we assume a visual dataset lies on a manifold and thus changes smoothly from point to point. By exploiting the linearity within nearby data points, our goal becomes to visit all of the data points along a manifold-guided order and to characterize the specific manifold’s shape.
Analysis of an UHF-RFID system in a metallic closed vehicle

A ray-tracing technique to predict the propagation channel parameters in indoor scenarios is presented. An analysis of the physical radio channel propagation inside a van full of buckets is presented. The propagation model is a deterministic technique, based on 3D ray launching. The results show the dependence of the scenario in the performance of the system, revealing that the consideration of the topology of the wireless system prior to deployment leads to an optimal final configuration.
Functionality and perceived atypicality of expressive prosody in children with autism spectrum disorders

People with autism are perceived to have ‘odd’ prosody, but is it malfunctioning? A new prosody test assesses the functionality of prosody in four aspects of speech (phrasing, affect, turn-end and focus) by tasks that elicit utterances in which prosody alone conveys the meaning. The test was used with 100 typically-developing children (TD), 39 with Asperger's syndrome (AspS) and 31 with high-functioning autism (HFA). In results, HFA<TD on all six tasks, HFA<AspS on four, and AspS<TD on one. In perception experiments, judges rated the atypicality of the prosody in samples of conversation from participants in each of the three groups. Correlation between the judges’ ratings was high, and ANOVAs showed differences between groups similar to those found in the test results. The ratings correlated significantly (mainly at the 0.01 level) with the test’s output scores. The findings support the ecological validity of the test for use as a clinical assessment tool.