Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
How Venture Capitalists can use their Network in order to reduce the Information Asymmetries between themselves and the Venture Management Team

The purpose of this study is to increase the understanding of how venture capitalists can use their network in order to reduce information asymmetries between themselves and the venture management team. A qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews, consisting of open questions, have been used to receive gradate information in order to reach our explorative purpose. Our theoretical framework consists of relevant studies made on the dynamics of networks and the problems that can arise in the complex relationship between a principal and an agent. We have been interviewing two venture capital firms and the representatives from two business angel networks. We also made an additional interview with an influential financial actor in order to try to verify our conclusions Our conclusions are that an extensive network can be used by venture capitalists in order to; verify ventures’ technologies, complement the competences in the venture management team, and arrange co-investments, resulting in reduced information asymmetries between themselves and the venture management team. By being structured the venture capitalist can develop an extensive network and thereby facilitate the implementation of these strategies.
Spontaneous abortion in the British semiconductor industry: An HSE investigation. Health and Safety Executive.

BACKGROUND The UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE) conducted a study to examine the risk of spontaneous abortion (SAB) in British female semiconductor industry workers, following reports from the USA which suggested an association between risk of SAB and work in fabrication rooms and/or exposure to ethylene glycol ethers. METHODS A nested case-control study based on 2,207 women who had worked at eight manufacturing sites during a 5-year retrospective time frame was established; 36 cases were matched with 80 controls. RESULTS The overall SAB rate in the industry was 10.0%. (65 SABs/651 pregnancies) The crude odds ratio (OR) for fabrication work was 0.65 (95% CI 0.30-1.40). This was essentially unchanged after adjustment for a range of potential confounding factors in the first 3 months of pregnancy and was reduced to 0.58 (95% CI 0.26-1.30) after adjustment for smoking in the previous 12 months. There were no statistically significantly elevated ORs for any work group or any specific chemical or physical exposure in the industry. CONCLUSIONS There is no evidence of an increased risk of SAB in the British semiconductor industry. Am. J. Ind. Med. 36:557-572, 1999. Published 1999 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
Pneumatic single flapper nozzle valve driven by piezoelectric tube

The article presents a construction, static testing and modelling of a single flapper nozzle pneumatic valve. Authors show testing of piezo tube PT230 which distinguishing feature is deflection in two directions. This testing is preliminary work in design of a novel electropneumatic valve. Studies have been performed on a special designed bench which consists of a pneumatic valve, which used piezo tube as a flapper. Data acquisition process and control were performed by dSPACE system. The preformed static pressure control tests, confirmed applicability of tube actuator in flapper nozzle type valves. Obtained results were compared with simulation model prepared in Matlab Simulink software. Streszczenie. Artykul zawiera opis konstrukcji, badania statyczne i modelowanie zaworu typu dysza przyslona. Autorzy zaprezentowali badania piezo rurki model PT230, ktorej cechą charakterystyczną jest mozliwośc odksztalcenia w dwoch kierunkach. Praca ta jest przygotowaniem do konstrukcji nowego zaworu elektropneumatycznego. Badania zostaly wykonane na specjalnie w tym celu wykonanym stanowisku zawierającym zawor, ktorym zastosowano piezo rurke jako przyslone. Procesy akwizycji danych oraz sterowania wykonane zostaly w systemie dSPACE. Przeprowadzone badania statyczne sterowania ciśnieniem wyjściowym, potwierdzają mozliwośc zastosowania piezo rurki w zaworach typu dysza przyslona. Zarejestrowane wyniki poddano porownaniu z modelem przygotowanym w oprogramowaniu Matlab Simulink. (Zawor pneumatyczny typu dysza przyslona z rurką piezoelektryczną jako elementem zadającym)
Administrative Work Consumes One-Sixth of U.S. Physicians' Working Hours and Lowers their Career Satisfaction

Doctors often complain about the burden of administrative work, but few studies have quantified how much time clinicians devote to administrative tasks. We quantified the time U.S. physicians spent on administrative tasks, and its relationship to their career satisfaction, based on a nationally representative survey of 4,720 U.S. physicians working 20 or more hours per week in direct patient care. The average doctor spent 8.7 hours per week (16.6% of working hours) on administration. Psychiatrists spent the highest proportion of their time on administration (20.3%), followed by internists (17.3%) and family/general practitioners (17.3%). Pediatricians spent the least amount of time, 6.7 hours per week or 14.1 percent of professional time. Doctors in large practices, those in practices owned by a hospital, and those with financial incentives to reduce services spent more time on administration. More extensive use of electronic medical records was associated with a greater administrative burden. Doctors spending more time on administration had lower career satisfaction, even after controlling for income and other factors. Current trends in U.S. health policy—a shift to employment in large practices, the implementation of electronic medical records, and the increasing prevalence of financial risk sharing—are likely to increase doctors' paperwork burdens and may decrease their career satisfaction.
Suppression of tumor metastasis by blockade of transforming growth factor beta signaling in bone marrow cells through a retroviral-mediated gene therapy in mice.

Transforming growth factor B (TGF-beta) is a potent immunosuppressive cytokine that is frequently associated with mechanisms of tumor escape from immunosurveillance. We report that transplantation of murine bone marrow (BM) expressing a dominant-negative TGF-beta type II receptor (TbetaRIIDN) leads to the generation of mature leukocytes capable of a potent antitumor response in vivo. Hematopoietic precursors in murine BM from donor mice were rendered insensitive to TGF-beta via retroviral expression of the TbetaRIIDN construct and were transplanted in C57BL/6 mice before tumor challenge. After i.v. administration of 5 x 10(5) B16-F10 murine melanoma cells into TbetaRIIDN-BM transplanted recipients, survival of challenged mice at 45 days was 70% (7 of 10) versus 0% (0 of 10) for vector-control treated mice, and surviving TbetaRIIDN-BM mice showed a virtual absence of metastatic lesions in the lung. We also investigated the utility of the TGF-beta-targeted approach in a mouse metastatic model of prostate cancer, TRAMP-C2. Treatment of male C57BL/6 mice with TbetaRIIDN-BM resulted in the survival of 80% (4 of 5) of recipients versus 0% (0 of 5) in green fluorescent protein-BM recipients or wild-type controls. Cytolytic T-cell assays indicate that a specific T-cell response against B16-F10 cells was generated in the TbetaRIIDN-BM-treated mice, suggesting that a gene therapy approach to inducing TGF-beta insensitivity in transplanted BM cells may be a potent anticancer therapy.
The four articles consider drug therapy , parenteral nutrition , the use of automation to prepare artificial feeds , and the role of the pharmacist in neonatal and paediatric intensive care

S afe and effective drug treatment for children requires an understanding of the wide variability and constant changes in pharmacokinetic handling and pharmacodynamic response to drugs that occur during the time from birth to adulthood. An awareness of, and empathy with, the problems and challenges of drug administration throughout childhood is essential if the pharmacist is to be competent and confident in becoming part of the multidisciplinary team caring for paediatric patients and their families. Children are not just “small adults”, particularly when drug handling is considered; children are not “just children” either. Patients range from premature babies, born as early as 24 weeks gestation, to 18-yearold adolescents. They suffer from cardiac, respiratory, renal, and other system diseases, in the same way as adults. The “specialist” paediatric pharmacist usually also has to be a “generalist”. Recently, there has been international agreement on age groups to be used when considering medicines for children (see Panel 1, p50). These age groups are aimed at the pharmaceutical industry to help rationalise the licensing of medicines for children. They will avoid product licences having recommendations based on age bands, which have sometimes appeared to be arbitrarily chosen rather than being based on relevant physiological and pharmacokinetic principles. ALTERED PHARMACOKINETICS
A 10.8-GHz CMOS Low-Noise Amplifier Using Parallel-Resonant Inductor

A noise-reduction design method using parallel-resonant technique is demonstrated to improve the noise performance of a 10-GHz CMOS cascode low-noise amplifier, which is designed and implemented in a standard mixed-signal/RF bulk 0.18-mum CMOS technology. Measurements show a power gain of 10 dB with noise figure of 2.5 dB at 10.8 GHz, which is believed to be the lowest NF among the LNAs using bulk 0.18 mum CMOS at this frequency.
Crystallographic Identification of a Noncompetitive Inhibitor Binding Site on the Hepatitis C Virus NS5B RNA Polymerase Enzyme

ABSTRACT The virus-encoded nonstructural protein 5B (NS5B) of hepatitis C virus (HCV) is an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase and is absolutely required for replication of the virus. NS5B exhibits significant differences from cellular polymerases and therefore has become an attractive target for anti-HCV therapy. Using a high-throughput screen, we discovered a novel NS5B inhibitor that binds to the enzyme noncompetitively with respect to nucleotide substrates. Here we report the crystal structure of NS5B complexed with this small molecule inhibitor. Unexpectedly, the inhibitor is bound within a narrow cleft on the protein's surface in the “thumb” domain, about 30 Å from the enzyme's catalytic center. The interaction between this inhibitor and NS5B occurs without dramatic changes to the structure of the protein, and sequence analysis suggests that the binding site is conserved across known HCV genotypes. Possible mechanisms of inhibition include perturbation of protein dynamics, interference with RNA binding, and disruption of enzyme oligomerization.
Effectiveness of Influenza Vaccine When Given During an Outbreak of Influenza A/H3N2 in a Nursing Home

An explosive outbreak of influenza A/H3N2 began in a nursing home in the Denver area early in November, 1987. Residents had not been vaccinated at that time. Vaccine was administered on November 11th. Two weeks after the vaccine was given, the attack rate differed between the vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals. There were 40 cases of influenza among the 98 elderly residents, 12 cases of pneumonia, and seven deaths. Vaccine efficacy two weeks after it was given was estimated to be 65.4% in preventing clinical illness. There were no cases of pneumonia and no deaths among people who were vaccinated more than two weeks before. The virus was identified as influenza A by complement fixation tests with convalescent sera from 16 individuals who had been ill. Many also had hemagglutination inhibition titers for A/Colorado/1/87, which were as high as titers for A/Leningrad/87. A/Colorado/1/87 closely resembled A/Sichuan/87.
A Novel Clustering Algorithm Based on Hierarchical and K-means Clustering

Although the priority and randomicity to initiate clustering centers of K-means have been solved by traditional hierarchical k-means clustering algorithm, the algorithm is difficult to be applied widespread popularly owing to its high computational complexity. So a novel clustering algorithm based on hierarchical and K-means clustering, which has good computational complexity, is proposed in this paper. Firstly, the concept of silhouette coefficient is introduced and the optimal clustering number Kopt included in data set of unknown class information is decided. Then the distribution of data set is gotten through hierarchical clustering and clustering center is decided. Finally, the clustering is completed through K-means clustering. The efficiencies of the algorithm is validated through the test of IRIS testing data set.
Introduction and spread of thermophilic campylobacters in broiler flocks

Campylobacteriosis is the most commonly reported infectious cause of human gastroenteritis in developed countries and broiler chickens are considered to be the major food-borne source of the infection. The control of the infection in man depends upon its control in broiler flocks but the epidemiology in poultry is poorly understood. Up to 50 per cent of broiler flocks may be infected and most of the birds in an infected flock carry the organisms until slaughter. Vertical transmission through the egg appears unlikely but there are many other potential sources of the infection for the chicks; direct contact with infected animals or birds has been proposed and there is also evidence for indirect transmission through drinking water or insect vectors. It is suggested that the cross-sectional studies discussed in this review should be followed by well designed case-control studies to test the aetiological hypotheses put forward.
The future of supply management

Subtitle: Part 1 of this series on the Future of Supply Management highlighted the importance of category and supplier management strategies. In Part 2, the authors described a world of customer-driven supply chain complexity that will require new technology combined with relationship-based management. This final installment focuses on the future organizational structure for supply management and the related talent considerations. To read all of the articles in the series -- a joint project of CAPS Research, A.T. Kearney, and the Institute for Supply Management -- visit www.scmr. com.
Canada 2030: An Agenda for Sustainable Development

As the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) reach their end date in 2015, negotiations are ramping up at the United Nations for the establishment of a new set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs, to be announced in September this year, will replace the MDGs and serve as a universal framework for achieving sustainable development outcomes in all countries by 2030, including Canada. This report takes an in-depth look at what the SDGs could mean for Canada, providing a concise overview of the report in the eight areas it covers: poverty, education, employment and inequality, energy, the environment, infrastructure, governance and international cooperation in Canada. Key themes discussed include global and national sustainable development priorities, challenges and opportunities for implementation of the SDGs, and data availability for measuring progress.
The relationship between chief executive officer (CEO) remuneration and financial performance of an organisation

Orientation: In theory, effective remuneration contracts will link executive remuneration with organisation financial performance and provide strong incentives for executives to operate organisations and behave in ways that will be in the shareholders’ best interests. Many proclaim that this is not happening as CEOs continue to be rewarded even when their respective organisations are performing poorly. Research purpose: The purpose of this research study was to take advantage of the available information on executive remuneration data and establish the best link (correlation) between executive remuneration and organisation financial performance between 2008 and 2012. Motivation for the study: The motivation for the research study was due to the acknowledged challenge encountered by organisations in finding a balance between executive remuneration that will be enticing enough to keep executives in the employ of the organisation and not overpaying them, especially when organisation’s performance is not favourable. Research design approach and method: The research was a quantitative, archival study, conducted over a seven year time period. The primary statistical techniques used in the study included: multiple correlation analysis, bivariate regression analysis, multiple regression analysis and stepwise regression analysis. Main findings/results: The primary finding was that the relationship between executive remuneration and organisation financial performance has been experiencing a decline since the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. The decline has predominantly been due to a move by executives away from performance related elements of the remuneration contracts, creating disconnect between what executives are being paid and the performance of the organisation. The findings point out to the fact that, to a large extent, remuneration contracts for executives are predominantly no longer shaped by what would be optimal for an organisation and its shareholders, but are also influenced by the natural propensity of executives to influence their own remuneration contracts.
Comparison Study of Uptake of Colorectal Cancer Testing between Ethnic Minorities and the General Population in Hong Kong.

BACKGROUND Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most common cancers. This study aimed to compare the uptake of CRC testing in the general public and in ethnic minorities in Hong Kong. MATERIALS AND METHODS This cross-sectional survey covered 2,327 South Asian and Chinese adults aged over 50, recruited from two separate studies. A structured questionnaires were administered by research staff over the telephone or in face- to-face interviews. RESULTS The uptake rate of CRC testing among South Asians was significantly lower than that of the general population in Hong Kong. Factors associated with the uptake rate were health professional's recommendation, perception of regular visits to doctor, use of complementary therapy, ethnicity, perceived susceptibility to cancer, presence of chronic illness, and education level. In addition, a significant interaction (p<0.05) between ethnicity and health professionals' recommendations was found, after adjustment for the main independent factors identified. CONCLUSIONS Older people with lower educational attainment, without chronic illness and those have lower perceived susceptibility to cancer may be targeted for CRC testing promotion in the society. In addition, health professionals can play a highly influential role in promoting such testing, particularly among ethnic minorities.
Clinical and research challenges of intermediate care.

Health care systems of today did not evolve to provide optimum care to an ageing population. The philosophies that shaped the United Kingdom's (UK's) response to disease drew on the perceived health care needs in the 19th and early 20th century, and were crystalised into the formation of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in the mid-20th century. In those days, life was reletavely brutish and often quite short, illness was acute, severe and potentially life threatening.
Informing Science Special Issue on Information Science Research

The papers in this Special Issue of Informing Science highlight research areas in the interdisciplinary field of Information Science. Key research problems for Information Science include: (1) how to model and effectively support human information behaviors, including information seeking and use behaviors, and interaction with information retrieval (IR) technologies, (2) how information should be organized intellectually in IR technologies for more effective human information retrieval, and (3) the organizational, social and policy implications for the information society of human information behaviors. Information Scientists are concerned with how people's information problems can be resolved. In this way, information science is an important part of the "informing sciences". Information Science has largely borrowed theories and approaches from other disciplines but is now attracting attention from other disciplines as a generator of theory and models that delineate key areas of human information-related endeavors. As humans struggle to seek and use information within the plethora of information sources increasingly available via the Web, Information Science research is taking center stage. Each paper in this special issue is written by an expert in their area of Information Science research.
Multiuser receiver scheme for full‐rate space–time coded CDMA system with imperfect estimation

By introducing a full‐rate space–time coding (STC) scheme, a synchronous CDMA (code division multiple access) system with full‐rate STC is given, and the corresponding uplink performance is investigated in Rayleigh fading channel with imperfect estimation. Considering that existing STC‐CDMA system has high decoding complexity, low‐complexity multiuser receiver schemes are developed for perfect and imperfect estimations, respectively. The schemes can make full use of the complex orthogonality of STC to reduce the high decoding complexity of the existing scheme, and have linear decoding complexity compared with the existing scheme with exponential decoding complexity. Moreover, the proposed schemes can achieve almost the same performance as the existing scheme. Compared with full‐diversity STC‐CDMA, the given full‐rate STC‐CDMA can achieve full data rate, low complexity, and partial diversity, and form efficient spatial interleaving. Thus, the concatenation of channel coding can effectively compensate for the performance loss due to partial diversity. Simulation results show that the full‐rate STC‐CDMA has lower bit error rate (BER) than full‐diversity STC‐CDMA systems under the same system throughput and concatenation of channel code. Moreover, the system BER with imperfect estimation are worse than that with perfect estimation due to the estimation error, which implies that the developed multiuser receiver schemes are valid and reasonable. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Psychospołeczne warunki pracy konsultantów w biurze obsługi klienta - na podstawie badań niemieckich

This article discusses job characteristics of call center employees. It also presents the results of Zapf et al.’s 2003 study, in which different aspects of a call center job were compared with a non-call centre job (in the services sector). The results indicated that a call center job involved a lower level of task complexity, a lower level of task control and a higher level of emotional dissonance in comparison to non-call center jobs. This articles also presents good practices for call center employees.