Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Role of Resource Profiles in Creating Competitive Heterogeneity Within Strategic Groups

This paper posits an integrated view of intra-industry competition, in which one can define the competitive strategy of any individual firm in terms of a combination of competitive positioning in the product/market space and profiles of key resources. We examine this by analyzing the patterns of firms’ commitments with respect to these two dimensions of competitive strategy, in the form of product/marketbased and resource-based configurations—i.e. strategic groups—within an industry. The two types of strategic groups are found to be nearly orthogonal, supporting our contention and suggesting that intraindustry competition can be depicted as an integration of these two key firm strategy decisions.
On the Language of Internet Memes

Internet Memes transverse and sometimes transcend cyberspace on the back of impossibly cute LOLcats speaking mangled English and the snarky remarks of Image Macro characters always on the lookout for someone to undermine. No longer the abstract notion of a cultural gene that Dawkins (2006) introduced in the late 1970s, memes have now become synonymous with a particular brand of vernacular language that internet users engage by posting, sharing and remixing digital content as they communicate jokes, emotions and opinions. For the purpose of this research the language of Internet Memes is understood as visual, succinct and capable of inviting active engagement by users who encounter digital content online that exhibits said characteristics. Internet Memes were explored through an Arts-Based Educational Research framework by first identifying the conventions that shape them and then interrogating these conventions during two distinct research phases. In the first phase the researcher, as a doctoral student in art and visual culture education, engaged class readings and assignments by generating digital content that not only responded to the academic topics at hand but did so through forms associated with Internet Memes like Image Macros and Animated GIFs. In the second phase the researcher became a meme literacy facilitator as learners in three different age-groups were led in the reading, writing and remixing of memes during a month-long summer art camp where they were also exposed to other art-making processes such as illustration, acting and sculpture. Each group of learners engaged age-appropriate meme types: 1) the youngest group, 6 and 7 year-olds, wrote Emoji Stories and Separated at Birth memes; 2) the middle group, 8-10 year-olds, worked with Image Macros and Perception memes, 3) while the oldest group, 11-13 year-olds, generated Image Macros and Animated GIFs. The digital content emerging from both research phases was collected as data and analyzed through a hybrid of Memetics, Actor-Network Theory, Object Oriented Ontology, Remix Theory and Glitch Studies as the researcher shifted shapes yet again and became a Research Jockey sampling freely from each field of study. A case is made for Internet Memes to be understood as an actor-network where meme collectives, individual cybernauts, software and source material are all actants interrelating and making each other enact collective agencies through shared authorships. Additionally specific educational contexts are identified where the language of Internet Memes can serve to incorporate technology, storytelling, visual thinking and remix practices into art and visual culture education. Finally, the document reporting on the research expands on the hermeneutics of Internet Memes and the phenomenological experiences they elicit that are otherwise absent from traditional scholarly prose. Chapter by chapter the dissertation was crafted as a journey from the academic to the whimsical, from the lecture hall to the image board (where Internet Memes were born), from the…
Cloning and expression of rhl AB operon under the control of tac promoter in E. coli

Today, efforts go towards the replacement of chemical surfactants by natural biological biosurfactants (biosurfactant), as these materials are not carcinogenic and highly compatibile with the environment. One of the main classes of biosurfactants is rhamnose containing glycolipid biosurfactant (rhamnolipids). This type of biosurfactants can be applied in many industries such as oil industry, pharmaceutical industry, food industry and esc. In the present study, with elimination of regulatory elements of monorhamnolipid operon, the suitable construct was made and transformed to E. coli BL12 and E. coli DH5α competent cells. Then the production of monorhamnolipid in recombinant E. coli BL12 harboring pET 12a vector and mono and di-rhamnolipid biosurfactant in recombinant E. coli DH5α harboring pTrc 99A evaluated by CTAB plate and thin layer chromatography (TLC). The relative production of mono and dirhamnolipid biosurfactant was determined by oil spreading method. Finally, the efficiency of the extracted biosurfactant was verified by E12 method in different salinity and pH conditions.
Long-Run Implications of the Covered Interest Rate Parity Condition: Evidence during the Recent Crisis and Non-Crisis Periods

This paper analyzes the stationarity of forward premiums in foreign exchange markets. Considering a wide range of countries and contract periods and taking into account cross-sectional correlations and heterogeneities in nonstationary environments, we con�rmed mixed evidence of stationary forward premiums. Further analysis suggests that the nonstationary element has been attributable to regime shifts which are closely associated with the effects of the Lehman Shock and changing monetary policies. These effects can be captured by interest rates, leaving the covered interest parity condition as a valid economic concept at least in the long-run.
Transceiver Architectures in Multiuser MIMO Environments with Different Power Allocations

In this paper we present efficient MIMO transceiver architectures evaluated in a multiuser environment. In this context we consider traditional MIMO transmit structures and also hybrid ones proposed in (6) capable of achieve diversity and multiplexing gains. Our results shown that in a multiuser environment the MIMO transmit structures of the desired user has a crucial impact in the performance due the diversity orders of the multiple layers in the MIMO structure.
INCREASE OF MOBILITY OF IONS IN LI-ION BATTERIES BY ULTRATHIN PHONON COATINGS OF ELECTRODES

This paper presents the results of research of behavior of phonon subsystem in ultrathin coatings that are applied on electrodes in Li-ion batteries and that increase the efficiency of ion transport. Using the method of Green functions it was demonstrated that in ultrathin films, increased mechanical oscillating of crystalline lattice and forming of standing waves occur, while, thermal capacitiveness and conduction of the overall coating decreases. With their increased oscillating, phonons release the ions captured on and within electrodes, and thus influence an increase in efficiency of ion conductivity.
Dependability and responsibility: the Ladbroke Grove rail inquiry

Constructing and maintaining safe and dependable systems in complex inter-organisational settings such as the UK rail network is a wicked problem that demands significant organisational effort. When disasters like the Ladbroke Grove Rail Crash occur the subsequent scrutiny of organisational operations undertaken in the Inquiry into the tragedy offers us an opportunity to understand these operations that we might not usually have. This paper takes the materials of the Inquiry as a means for examining the manner in which the social and technical systems implicated in the disaster were organisationally configured and managed. As such this article can be considered as a condensed report on the Inquiry which focuses on explicating the organisational context of disaster from a holistic systems perspective. The courtroom reconstruction of the prior organisational circumstances, by the parties to the proceedings, provides a display of some of the working relations that embody the dependability practices across parts of the organisations. This provides a view of the way organisations, in an on-going manner, work on dependability, in-and-through existing organisational structures and practices. In this case we can see that problems regarding the signal implicated in the tragedy were organisationally recognised and subsequent ameliorative actions were being undertaken, except, with the benefit of hindsight, they were not taken quickly enough or were not the ‘right’ actions. The lesson learned is that dependable design always needs to have a strong focus on the inter-operation of organisational units, social as well as technical, as misalignments in schedules, practices, procedures and standards between organisational groupings can be as threatening to a system as technical incompatibilities. Finally, we consider how notions of responsibility may be pertinent to thinking about dependability given the preceding analysis.
Designing Project-based Adaptive Educational Systems

In this paper we investigate the design of adaptive educational systems based on constructivist theories. Particularly we propose a design approach which combines the project-based and case-based learning theories. Based on this approach, learners are provided with a set of learning goals and a project to complete, and the system proposes them a learning cycle to follow as well as individualised content and resources in the form of realistic cases, in order to deal with the project and accomplish the goal they selected. The web-based adaptive educational system ProSys developed based on the above approach is also described.
Active Semisupervised Clustering Algorithm with Label Propagation for Imbalanced and Multidensity Datasets

The accuracy of most of the existing semisupervised clustering algorithms based on small size of labeled dataset is low when dealing with multidensity and imbalanced datasets, and labeling data is quite expensive and time consuming in many real-world applications. This paper focuses on active data selection and semisupervised clustering algorithm in multidensity and imbalanced datasets and proposes an active semisupervised clustering algorithm. The proposed algorithm uses an active mechanism for data selection to minimize the amount of labeled data, and it utilizes multithreshold to expand labeled datasets on multidensity and imbalanced datasets. Three standard datasets and one synthetic dataset are used to demonstrate the proposed algorithm, and the experimental results show that the proposed semisupervised clustering algorithm has a higher accuracy and a more stable performance in comparison to other clustering and semisupervised clustering algorithms, especially when the datasets are multidensity and imbalanced.
Electrooxidation of Formic Acid and Formaldehyde on the Fe3O4@Pt Core-Shell Nanoparticles/Carbon-Ceramic Electrode

In the present work, the electrooxidation of formic acid and formaldehyde; potentially important fuels for future fuel cells, was investigated on the Fe3O4@Pt core-shell nanoparticles/carbon-ceramic electrode (Fe3O4@Pt/CCE). The Fe3O4@Pt nanoparticles were prepared via a simple and fast chemical method and their surface morphology, nanostructure properties, chemical composition, crystal phase, and electrochemical behavior were investigated by scanning electron microscope, transmission electron microscope, X-ray diffraction, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and electrochemical methods, respectively. Then the electrocatalytic activity of the Fe3O4@Pt/CCE toward the oxidation of formic acid and formaldehyde was studied in details. The primary electrochemical analysis shows that the Fe3O4@Pt/CCE has superior catalytic activity and stability for formic acid and formaldehyde oxidation compared to Pt-alone nanoparticles on the carbon-ceramic electrode (Pt/CCE). The present investigation demonstrates that the Fe3O4@Pt/CCE electrocatalyst may play a significant role in future fuel cell applications.
Impacts of Vessel Capacity Reduction Programmes on Efficiency in Fisheries: the Case of Australia’s Multispecies Northern Prawn Fishery

Capacity reduction programmes, in the form of buybacks or decommissioning, have had relatively widespread application in fisheries in the US, Europe and Australia. A common criticism of such programmes is that they remove the least efficient vessels first, resulting in an increase in average efficiency of the remaining fleet, which tends to increase the effective fishing power of the remaining fleet. In this paper, the effects of a buyback programme on average technical efficiency in Australia’s Northern Prawn Fishery are examined using a multi-output production function approach with an explicit inefficiency model. As expected, the results indicate that average efficiency of the remaining vessels was generally greater than that of the removed vessels. Further, there was some evidence of an increase in average scale efficiency in the fleet as the remaining vessels were closer, on average, to the optimal scale. Key factors affecting technical efficiency included company structure and the number of vessels fishing. In regard to fleet size, our model suggests positive externalities associated with more boats fishing at any point in time (due to information sharing and reduced search costs), but also negative externalities due to crowding, with the latter effect dominating the former. Hence, the buyback resulted in a net increase in the individual efficiency of the remaining vessels due to reduced crowding, as well as raising average efficiency through removal of less efficient vessels.
Cognitive Constraints on Valuing Annuities

We show that people have difficulty valuing annuities, and this, instead of a preference for lumpsums, helps explain observed low annuity demand. Although the median price at which people are willing to sell an annuity stream is close to the actuarial value, many responses diverge greatly from optimizing behavior. Moreover, people will pay substantially less to buy than to sell annuities. We conclude that boundedly rational consumers adopt "buy low, sell high" heuristics when confronting a complex trade-off. This suggests that many consumers do not make optimizing decisions, underscoring the difficulty of explaining cross-sectional annuity valuation differences using standard models.
Invasion by the leguminous tree Acacia dealbata (Mimosaceae) reduces the native understorey plant species in different communities

Acacia dealbata Link (Mimosaceae) is a woody leguminous tree introduced to Europe from Australia that has become a serious environmental problem in north-western Spain, where it forms dense monospecific patches threatening native-plantbiodiversity.WedescribetheeffectsofinvasionbyA. dealbataonunderstoreyplantcompositioninshrubland, oak- and pine-forest communities in north-western Spain. Plant species richness and composition, plant density and total plantcoverweremeasuredandcomparedamongpatcheswithdifferentinvasionstatus(invaded,transitionandnon-invaded patches) in each studied community. A clear effect of the community type and invasion on the understorey vegetation was observed.Ingeneral,compositionofshrublandwasdifferentfromthatofoakandpineforests.Wefoundsignificanteffectsof invasion status on species richness, plant density and total plant cover; values were significantly lower in invaded than non- invaded patches. Invasion by A. dealbata also was associated with changes in species composition. In total, eight native species, including the endemic Daboecia cantabrica (thuds) K. Koch, were confined to non-invaded patches and were replacedbyothernativesininvadedandtransitionpatches.OurresultssuggestthatalthoughA. dealbatarepresentedaserious threat to all of the study communities, the severity of the impact depended on the community type.
Content-based image retrieval of digitized histopathology via boosted spectral embedding (BoSE)

OF THE THESIS Content-Based Image Retrieval of Digitized Histopathology via Boosted Spectral Embedding (BoSE) by Akshay Sridhar Thesis Director: Dr. Anant Madabhushi Content-based image retrieval (CBIR) systems allow for retrieval of images from a database that are similar in visual content to a query image. This is particularly useful in scenarios such as digital pathology, where text-based descriptors alone might be inadequate to accurately describe image content. By representing images via a set of quantitative image descriptors, the similarity between a query image with respect to archived, annotated images in a database can be computed and the most similar images retrieved. Recently, non-linear dimensionality reduction (NLDR) methods have become popular for embedding high dimensional data into a reduced dimensional space while preserving local object adjacencies, thereby allowing for object similarity to be determined more accurately in the reduced dimensional space. However, most dimensionality reduction (DR) methods implicitly assume, in computing the reduced dimensional representation, that all features are equally important. Erroneous or noisy features could potentially result in dissimilar images being mapped close to each other in the reduced embedding space. In this work we present Boosted Spectral Embedding (BoSE), a variant of the traditional Spectral Embedding (SE) NLDR method, which unlike SE utilizes a boosted distance metric (BDM) to selectively weight individual features to subsequently map the data into a reduced dimensional space. In this work BoSE is evaluated against SE (which employs equal feature weighting) in the
CONSUMER DEMAND FOR ZERO CARBON HOMES WITHIN THE UK

Household emissions currently account for some 25% of the overall CO2 emissions within the UK, whose government has a clearly defined series of directives, strategies and targets aimed at achieving widespread zero carbon (Zc) housing by 2016. Lack of consumer demand is a potential hindrance to the drive for Zc homes and therefore it becomes vital that the delivery of such homes align with the attitudes and values of potential home buyers. This extends to consumer buying decisions as a result of differing levels of concern and motivation surrounding carbon emissions, with some home buyers engaging in more pro-environmental behaviour than others due to varying levels of awareness of the benefits to be gained from Zc homes. To date, there is little evidence within the existing literature to either confirm or refute the presence of a buoyant market demand for Zc homes. Consequently, this research focuses on buyer decisions related to Zc, private, housing. The findings from the analysis of a number of questionnaire responses provides views and opinions of potential home buyers when asked to consider the drivers of their choice of new home and views on Zc homes. The findings suggest that consumers currently have a moderate to strong Zc awareness and are able to determine potential benefits of the concept. However, such awareness does not necessarily result in increased pro-environmental behaviour, which is often dependant on a much wider range of contributing factors.
Estimating the adverse selection and fixed costs of trading in markets with multiple informed traders

We investigate, both theoretically and empirically, the relation between the adverse selection and fixed costs of trading and the number of informed traders in a financial asset. As a proxy for informed traders, we use dual traders -- i.e., futures floor traders who execute trades both for their own and customers' accounts on the same day. Our theoretical model shows that dual traders optimally mimic the size and direction of their informed customers' trades. Further, the adverse selection (fixed) costs of trading: (1) decrease (increase) with the number of dual traders m, if dual traders are risk neutral; and (2) are a single-peaked (U-shaped) function of m, if dual traders are risk averse. Using data from four selected futures contracts, we find that the number of dual traders are a significant determinant of both the adverse selection and fixed costs of trading, after controlling for the effects of other determinants of market liquidity. In addition, for three of the four contracts, the estimated (fixed) costs of trading are a single-peaked (U-shaped) function of m. The implication from our theory is that the dual traders in these contracts exhibit risk averse behavior.
Lumacaftor/Ivacaftor (LI) for Treatment of Cystic Fibrosis: A ContemporaryApproach

Citation: Maira Nusrat. , et al. “Lumacaftor/Ivacaftor (LI) for Treatment of Cystic Fibrosis: A Contemporary Approach”. EC Pharmacology and Toxicology 6.8 (2018): 689-694. Abstract Cystic fibrosis has been treated by many conventional regimens including Antibiotics, mucolytics etc. Lumacaftor/Ivacaftor (LI) is a new drug for treating Cystic fibrosis. Our study is based on a detailed analysis and review of the trials using Lumacaftor/Ivacaftor as the treatment drug for Cystic Fibrosis. The study trials with these drugs showed an improvement in the lung functions of the patients treated with this drug with no considerable improvement in pancreatic function. Some side effects such as chest tightness, dyspnea also appeared but the benefits of the drug outweighed the risks. LI being a new drug is very costly compared to other treatment options for Cystic Fibrosis. With more extensive trials and research, LI can be a potential alternate for other regimens in treating Cystic fibrosis.
ow many dimensions of biodiversity do we need ? lga

Biodiversity is a measure of the total difference within a biological system. It is understood to arise at genetic, species and multiple levels of community organisation, hence is multidimensional in nature. Biodiversity indices have proliferated in attempts to capture this complexity but may now have confounded it. Here we attempt a reduction to the minimal set of metrics needed to describe biodiversity (often by default taken to be species richness). 1000 model communities with realistic taxonomic composition were synthesised using databases of marine benthic species. A battery of 19 biodiversity indices were calculated for every community and analysed by PCA to show inter-dependence and sensitivity to variation in taxonomic (a surrogate for genetic), functional (based on ecological roles) and structural (based on species abundance) diversity. We found the three major axes of biodiversity were (a) structural
PERANCANGAN AUGMENTED REALITY MEDIA MARKERLES POINT OF INTEREST ( POI )

Universitas Kristen Satya Wacana (UKSW) merupakan sebuah intuisi pendidikan swasta yang terletak di Salatiga. Setiap intuisi pendidikan tinggi memiliki fasilitas penunjang berupa gedung tempat mahasiswa berkuliah. Melihat permasalahan umum kesalahan gedung perkuliahan yang sering terjadi bagi mahasiswa baru terlebih di UKSW, maka dibangun sebuah aplikasi pencarian lokasi gedung yang dirancang dengan mengacu pada tata letak gedung yang diperoleh melalui google map.Penelitian ini menggunakan teknologi Augmented Reality sebagai media informasi yang digunakan sebagai point of interest dan penanda gedung yang dapat dijalankan pada smarthphone Android.Objek penelitian ini adalah gedunggedung perkuliahan yang ada di UKSW. Hasilnya adalah aplikasi Find Buildings dapat memberikan informasi mengenai gedung yang dituju secara cepat dan dapat diintegrasikan dengan media promosi konvensional lainnya. Kata Kunci: Universitas, Android, Augmented Reality, Pengenalan Gedung