Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Productivity Spillovers from Foreign Direct Investment: Indonesian Manufacturing Industry’s Experience 1975-2000

In recent decades, foreign direct investment (FDI) played an important role in achieving economic growth and development especially for developing countries. FDI bring capital and introduced new technology. Moreover, the new technology can also spill over to the local firms in the host country. For this reason, FDI often considered as the most significant channel for technology transfer. However, the empirical studies provide mixed evidence on the role of foreign investment in generating technology transfer to local firms. This paper attempts to provide some evidence to help reconcile the difference in empirical evidence by examining Indonesian manufacturing industries’ experienced from 1975-2000. This would provide an opportunity to examine the effect of host country economic development and policy environment to the technology spillovers process. In general, the result found positive and significant productivity spillovers in Indonesian manufacturing industry for the whole period. Interestingly, the estimation result for each economic episodes support the hypothesis on the effect of local firm absorptive capacity and host country economic policy. We found negative and significant spillovers during the pre-liberalization period (1975-1986) and found positive and significant spillovers in the post-liberalization period (1987-2000). This study also found that the spillovers effect is different between each 2-digit ISIC industry, proving that the sectoral characteristics do affect the local firm ability to learn and adopt new technology.
The Effects of Audit Risk and Information Importance on Auditor Memory During Working Paper Review

Auditors were required to review two working-paper areas (accounts) and, twenty-four hours later, recognize if information items had been present in the working papers and express how willing they would be to rely on their memory for each item (i.e., whether they would refer back to the working papers to verify the truth or falsity of each item). The results indicate that: (1) the accuracy of auditors' memories is positively related to the level of audit risk of the area and the degree of importance of an information item within the area; (2) the auditors' willingness to rely on memory is negatively related to the degree of information importance but not related to the audit risk of the area; and (3) the auditors' willingness to rely on memory is positively related to the accuracy of auditors' memories, and this positive relationship increases with the degree of information importance.
Resistive RAM Based on Hfox and its Temperature Instability Study

— High performance Resistive Random Access Memory (RRAM) based on HfO x has been prepared and its temperature instability has been investigated in this work. With increasing temperature, it is found that: leakage current at high resistance state increases, which can be explained by the higher density of traps inside dielectrics (related to trap-assistant tunneling), leading to a smaller On/Off ratio; set and reset voltages decrease, which may be attributed to the higher oxygen ion mobility, in addition to the reduced potential barrier to create / recover oxygen ions (or oxygen vacancies); temperature impact on the RRAM retention degradation is more serious than electrical bias.
Practical issues in microwave raster scanning

We discuss a number of practical issues in measurements with the recently proposed microwave raster scanning setup for near-field imaging of tissue. We consider the uncertainties in the measurements of phantoms emulating biological tissues. We discuss improvements in the design of sensors tailored for this application. We evaluate the performance of a tissue sensing sensor in terms of a parameter called coupling efficiency. We show that sensors with better coupling efficiency lead to significant improvement of the dynamic range of the imaging system. This is confirmed with an example of detecting a relatively small tumour simulant.
Clinical nurse specialists in palliative care. Part 3. Issues for the Macmillan Nurse role

The remit and boundaries of the Macmillan Nursing role in the UK have been called into question recently by a number of policy-driven changes. The rapid appointment of tumour site-specific nurses and the development of posts for palliative medicine, stemming originally from the Calman Hine recommendations for reorganizing cancer services, have created unparalleled challenges of adaptation to new working practices and procedures. The extent to which Macmillan Nurses are adapting to these new demands was addressed as part of a major evaluation study of UK Macmillan Nursing in 12 sites commissioned by the UK charity Macmillan Cancer Relief. This paper draws upon semi-structured interviews with Macmillan Nurses (n = 44) and their key colleagues (n = 47). We found that differences of expectation between Macmillan Nurses and their managers about the appropriate focus of their work lead to problems of role ambiguity and role conflict; that Macmillan Nurses lack resources with which to develop an educative and consultative role and yet substitute for inadequacies in skills and knowledge of other health care staff; and that problems are associated in co-working with newly appointed cancer site-specific nurses and palliative medicine colleagues. Macmillan Nursing has a crucial role to play in meeting the objectives in the NHS Cancer Plan. However, in order to ensure that their expertise is used efficiently and effectively, there is an urgent need to clarify the nature and scope of the Macmillan Nurse role, to attend to issues of team working and to improve the skills of nonspecialist staff in palliative care.
Pre-processed space-time trellis codes with one-bit feedback

Open-loop (no feedback) pre-processing methods for improving the error-rate performance of space-time trellis codes in additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) and Ricean channels which nearly preserve the performance in Rayleigh channels are proposed. The rotation based pre-processing preserves the Rayleigh channel performance, whereas there is a small degradation in performance in the power division based pre-processing. This degradation depends on the trellis complexity, and is more pronounced for the lower state trellis codes. In this letter, we propose a one-bit feedback method, that improves the performance of the power division method in Rayleigh channels. Simulation results for a 2/spl times/1 system show that this improvement is significant for the higher state trellis codes. The one-bit feedback is used to determine which of the two channels has a higher gain, and the higher power is assigned to the corresponding transmitter.
A Novel Interaction between Kinesin and p120 Modulates p120 Localization and Function*

p120-catenin exists in a membrane-associated cadherin-bound pool, a cytosolic pool that affects Rho GTPases, and a nuclear pool that is thought to associate with the methylation-relevant transcriptional repressor Kaiso. We show here that cytoplasmic p120 can also associate both directly and indirectly with the microtubule network, and that p120 traffics along microtubules toward their plus ends. The direct binding required most of the armadillo repeats and was mutually exclusive for interaction with E-cadherin. Perturbing the p120-microtubule interaction with nocodazole or taxol markedly affected both the tubulin interaction and the balance between cytoplasmic and nuclear p120. The indirect binding occurred via a novel interaction between a segment of the p120 N-terminal domain and conventional kinesin heavy chains. Selective uncoupling of the p120-kinesin interaction by overexpression of the respective p120 and kinesin-binding fragments promoted nuclear p120 accumulation. In addition, expression of full-length kinesin reduced the nuclear accumulation of p120 and blocked the branching phenotype associated with p120 overexpression. Taken together, the data suggest that kinesin affects both the targeting and activity of p120 at several cellular locations.
Intermedin Ameliorates Atherosclerosis by Increasing Cholesterol Efflux Through the cAMP-PKA Pathway in Macrophage RAW264.7 Cell Line

Background The aim of this study was to explore the role of intermedin and its mechanism in cholesterol efflux of macrophage THP-1 and RAW264.7 cell lines in atherosclerosis (AS). Material/Methods ApoE−/− mice were fed with a high-fat diet, and the concentrations of total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) were measured. The lipidoses of the aortic sinus were analyzed by hematoxylin and eosin staining, and the cAMP level was detected by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). The expressions of ATP-binding cassette transporter (ABCA1) were tested by real-time PCR and Western blot analysis. Results IMD decreased serum TC and LDL-C, and increased serum HDL-C level in apoE−/− mice and attenuated AS plaque areas. In vitro, IMD increased intracellular cAMP concentration in a dose-dependent manner in THP-1 and RAW264.7 cell lines, which enhanced the expression of ABCA1 and increased cholesterol efflux rate. However, this effect was inhibited by PKAI in the RAW 264.7 cell line but not in the THP-1 cell line. Conclusions IMD can ameliorate the development of AS in ApoE−/− mice and regulate cholesterol balance in the RAW264.7 cell line through the cAMP-PKA pathway.
Housing Wealth in Retirement Strategies: Towards Understanding and New Hypotheses

What is the current role of housing wealth in household retirement strategies across the European Union member states? And could this role be extended? This question is often raised by researchers and policymakers, since governments search for ways to cut pensions expenditure in response to ageing populations and the global financial crisis. Housing wealth could potentially be part of a solution as the retired are often rich in terms of housing wealth. The existing theory shows that owner-occupation can be regarded as a form of pension: once the mortgage has been repaid, housing expenses are substantially lower and also housing wealth can be cashed in either by selling or using equity release schemes. However, converting housing assets into cash appears a much less common strategy than expected. This thesis contributes to the existing knowledge by relating household strategies to broader national contexts. The countries included in the study are Belgium, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Portugal, Slovenia, Sweden and United Kingdom, while the Netherlands is the subject of particular attention. The study suggests that owner-occupation will become more relevant in the near future when pension systems become less generous. At the same time it shows that owner-occupation is not the clear-cut solution that governments might have hoped for. Generally, European households appear averse against cashing in housing wealth: they distrust complex financial products and their providers. Moreover, in some countries it would seriously undermine family solidarity; and households who are most likely to need extra pension income are least likely to be owner-occupiers. Additionally, an ageing society has a negative effect on the affordability of a pension system, yet at the same time it has an impact on housing markets. Shrinking populations typically coincide with decreasing house prices and hence reduce the options of cashing in housing wealth.
Histone H1 and the origin of protamines

We present evidence that chordate protamines have evolved from histone H1. During the final stages of spermatogenesis, the compaction of DNA in many organisms is accomplished by the replacement of histones with a class of arginine-rich proteins called protamines. In other organisms, however, condensation of sperm DNA can occur with comparable efficiency in the presence of somatic-type histones or, alternatively, an intermediate class of proteins called protamine-like proteins. The idea that the highly specialized sperm chromosomal proteins (protamines) and somatic chromosomal proteins (histones) could be related dates back almost to the discovery of these proteins. Although this notion has frequently been revisited since that time, there has been a complete lack of supporting experimental evidence. Here we show that the emergence of protamines in chordates occurred very quickly, as a result of the conversion of a lysine-rich histone H1 to an arginine-rich protamine. We have characterized the sperm nuclear basic proteins of the tunicate Styela montereyensis, which we show consists of both a protamine and a sperm-specific histone H1 with a protamine tail. Comparison of the genes encoding these proteins to that of a sister protochordate, Ciona intestinalis, has indicated this rapid and dramatic change is most likely the result of frameshift mutations in the tail of the sperm-specific histone H1. By establishing an evolutionary link between the chromatin-condensing histone H1s of somatic tissues and the chromatin-condensing proteins of the sperm, these results provide unequivocal support to the notion that vertebrate protamines evolved from histones.
Alcohol and the disruption of cognitive processes.

Memory processes of alcoholic and matched nonalcoholic volunteers were studied under sober, and two alcohol conditions. Alcohol administration significantly impaired registration, recall, and organization in both groups. These processes were differentially susceptible to alcohol's acute effects. There were no significant differences between groups in the amount of information registered or recalled. However, alcoholics displayed significantly poorer organization under sober and intoxicated conditions, suggesting chronic impairment of abstracting ability due to alcohol.
Clinical outcomes of staged bilateral carotid endarterectomy for bilateral carotid artery stenosis

Purpose This retrospective cohort study aimed to determine the clinical outcomes of staged bilateral carotid endarterectomy (CEA) for bilateral internal carotid artery (ICA) stenosis performed with a short interval between the primary and secondary CEA procedures. Methods In our institution, 574 consecutive patients underwent CEA between September 2007 and August 2014. Bilateral significant ICA stenosis was identified in 43 patients (7.5%) who underwent staged bilateral CEA within 30 days or less. Patients with unilateral CEA and staged bilateral CEA were compared in terms of CEA outcomes. The primary endpoint was the composite of any stroke, myocardial infarction, or death during the periprocedural period or ipsilateral stroke within 3 years after the CEA. Results Staged bilateral CEA was not associated with ipsilateral stroke (P = 0.178) during postoperative follow-up. The two groups did not differ in terms of estimated 3-year primary endpoint rates (2.8% vs. 4.7%, P = 0.456) or ipsilateral stroke-free (P = 0.225), any stroke-free (P = 0.326), or overall (P = 0.739) survival rates. Conclusion Patients with bilateral significant ICA stenosis can undergo staged bilateral CEA within 30 days or less with outcomes that compare favorably with those of patients undergoing unilateral CEA.
Screening Women With Polycystic Ovary Syndrome for Metabolic Syndrome

Objective: Women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) are at an increased risk for insulin resistance and hyperlipidemia. Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of risk factors that confers an increased risk for cardiovascular disease. The objectives of this study were to compare the prevalence of metabolic syndrome in women with PCOS and controls and to identify the role of androgens or insulin resistance in the development of metabolic syndrome. Methods: Women with PCOS (n = 129) and women with regular menses and no hirsutism seen for an annual examination (n = 177) were studied. Results: The age-adjusted prevalence of metabolic syndrome was higher in women with PCOS (47.3%, 95% confidence interval 35.3–56.9%) compared with controls (4.3%, 95% confidence interval 1.9–7.6%, P < .001). Compared by age group, the risk of metabolic syndrome in women with PCOS was higher for all groups (P < .001). There were no significant differences in serum androgen levels between women with PCOS with or without metabolic syndrome. In contrast, all markers of insulin resistance were abnormal in women with PCOS with metabolic syndrome compared with those without metabolic syndrome (P < .001). We found serum triglyceride/high density lipoprotein cholesterol (TG/HDL-C) ratio correlated with insulin resistance in this population (P < .001). Serum TG/HDL-C > 3.2 has a high sensitivity and specificity for the detection of metabolic syndrome in women with PCOS. Conclusion: Women with PCOS have a 11-fold increase in the prevalence of metabolic syndrome compared with age-matched controls. The risk of metabolic syndrome is high even at a young age, highlighting the importance of early and regular screening. The TG/HDL-C ratio may serve as a screening tool and needs to be prospectively validated in this group. Level of Evidence: II-2
Millimeter wave orthogonally polarized substrate integrated waveguide slot antenna arrays

Substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) antenna array design with orthogonal polarizations with respect to the array axis is proposed. The antenna structure consists of three layers containing a feeding network, cavities and dielectric cover. The proposed design can achieve any desired polarization and it can be used to design two dimensional arrays. Two 10 element arrays are fabricated with polarization parallel and orthogonal to the array axis. These arrays provide 1GHz impedance bandwidth in automotive radar frequency range (76-81GHz). The designed beamwidth is 9° in the plane parallel to the array axis and 120° in the perpendicular plane. Approximately 20dB cross polarization rejection is measured in the desired field of view. The matched measured and simulated results show the validity of the proposed design.
A change in the relationship between tropical central Pacific SST variability and the extratropical atmosphere around 1990

A newly released reanalysis dataset covering the period 1979–2009 is analyzed to show that the sea surface temperature (SST) variability in the tropical central Pacific is more closely related to the SST variability in the tropical eastern Pacific before 1990 but more closely related to sea level pressure (SLP) variations associated with the North Pacific Oscillation (NPO) after 1990. Only during the period after 1990 can the NPO excite large SST variability in the tropical central Pacific. Related to this change, El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) SST anomalies tend to spread from the eastern to central tropical Pacific before 1990 in a pattern resembling that associated with the Eastern Pacific (EP) type of ENSO, but are more closely connected to SST variability in the subtropical north Pacific after 1990 with a pattern resembling that of the Central Pacific (CP) type of ENSO. This study concludes that the increased influence of the NPO on the tropical Pacific is a likely reason for the increasing occurrence of the CP type of ENSO since 1990. An analysis of the mean atmospheric circulation during these two periods suggests that the increased NPO influence is associated with a strengthening Hadley circulation after 1990.
Role of nerve growth factor in the expression of trkA mRNA in cultured embryonic rat basal forebrain cholinergic neurons

Using a quantitative reverse transcription‐polymerase chain reaction (RT‐PCR), we studied the regulation of trkA mRNA expression in serum‐free, cultured basal forebrain neurons from 17‐day fetal rats. Besides increasing choline acetyltransferase (ChAT) activities, nerve growth factor (NGF) strikingly induced trkA gene expression in a time‐ and NGF concentrationdependent manner. Therefore, NGF might play a critical role in trkA gene expression during the development of basal forebrain cholinergic neurons. Furthermore, to investigate whether this up‐regulation is connected with the trophic effects on basal forebrain cholinergic neurons, we examined the effects of some other neurotrophic agents (BDNF, NT‐3, bFGF, CNTF, and 40 mM KCl) upon ChAT activity and trkA gene expression. Some neurotrophic factors increased ChAT activities to the same degree as NGF, whereas they did not stimulate trkA mRNA expression so potently. NT‐3 plus K252b promotes the tyrosine phosphorylation of TrkA in PC12 cells and increases ChAT activity in cultured basal forebrain cholinergic neurons like NGF (Knusel et al., J Neurochem 59: 715–722, 1992). W e found that NT‐3 plus K252b upregulated the level of trkA mRNA. These results suggested that the expression of trkA mRNA is regulated directly by its specific ligand NGF, rather than neurotrophic effects upon basal forebrain cholinergic neurons and that the up‐regulation is connected to a molecular event initiated by the binding of NGF to the TrkA receptor. ©1995 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Swedish teenager perceptions of teenage pregnancy, abortion, sexual behavior, and contraceptive habits – a focus group study among 17‐year‐old female high‐school students

Background. Sweden has the highest abortion numbers among the Nordic countries. Since 1995, the abortion rate among teenagers has increased by nearly 50%. We therefore undertook a study where the overall aim was to gain a deeper understanding on which factors female teenagers believe may explain the increasing numbers of teenage abortions. Teenagers' perceptions of teenage pregnancy, abortion, sexual behavior, and contraceptive habits were investigated.
External Venturing and Discontinuous Strategic Renewal: An Options Perspective

This study examines the relationship between a firm’s venturing activities and its undertaking of strategic renewal. The study was motivated by some important gaps in the corporate entrepreneurship literature on venturing and renewal. The extant literature has not focused on the different types and dimensions of firms’ renewal activities. In particular, discontinuous renewal involving shifts in firms’ core businesses is not well understood. Moreover, the conditions that drive firms to undertake strategic renewal have not been examined. For example, it is not known how venturing increases or reduces the benefits of undertaking renewal. This study focuses on a discontinuous form of renewal involving major changes in firms’ core businesses, and examines firms’ external venturing activities which complement their internal development. We examine corporate venture capital (CVC) investments, which are direct minority equity investments made by established companies in privately held ventures. Discontinuous renewal is conceptualized as resulting from a set of related, and often sequential, managerial decisions. The first managerial decision is to initiate growth in a business that is relatively newer or smaller for the organization. The second decision is to move away, or even withdraw completely, from the current core business which enabled prior growth and prosperity for the firm and served as its primary revenue earner. Employing a real options perspective, we argue that CVC investments create growth options in new and existing businesses, but do not result in firms’ withdrawal from existing businesses. Therefore, we expect CVC activity to be negatively associated with the likelihood of a firm undertaking discontinuous renewal. We also propose that the benefits of withdrawing from existing businesses are even lower, and the costs even higher, for firms in dynamic industries and for firms that possess strong internal capabilities. The predictions of the study are tested using longitudinal data on 477 firms from the 1990 Fortune 500 list for the period 1990-2000. We find support for all our predicted hypotheses. These results help address important limitations in the corporate entrepreneurship literature. The study also contributes to the real options and organizational capabilities literatures.