Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Valuing empathy and emotional intelligence in health leadership: a study of empathy, leadership behaviour and outcome effectiveness

This article examines the relationship between health managers' self-assessed empathy, their leadership behaviours as rated by their staff, and staff's personal ratings on a range of work satisfaction and related outcome measures. Empathy was conceived of as four distinct but related individual dispositions, namely empathic concern (EC), perspective taking (PT), personal distress (PD) and empathic matching (EM). Results showed three empathy scales (EC, PT and EM) were, as postulated, positively related to transformational behaviour (inspiring followers to achieve more than expected). The same three measures, also as expected, showed no relationship to transactional behaviour (motivating followers to achieve expected results) and were negatively associated with laissez-faire leadership (an absence of leadership style). Relationships between empathy scales and outcome measures were selective and moderate in size. Strongest empathy association was evident between the PT scale and most outcome measures. Conversely, the extra effort outcome appeared most sensitive to the range of empathy scales. Where significant relationships did exist between empathy and outcome, leadership behaviour was in all cases a perfect mediator. Whilst not denying the smaller dispositional effects on leadership outcomes, leadership behaviour itself, rather than individual traits such as empathy, appear to be major influencing factors in leadership effectiveness.
AGE DIFFERENCES IN MEASURES OF FUNCTIONAL MOVEMENT AND PERFORMANCE IN HIGHLY YOUTH BASKETBALL PLAYERS.

Background There is a lack of information about the influence of age on functional movement tests (FMT) and performance tests as well as in their relationships in young basketball players. Purpose The purpose of the present study was to determine the variations in FMT and jump and/or sprint performance scores between age groups (U-14 vs. U-16) in Highly-trained young basketball players. The second purpose was to investigate the relationship between FMT for lower body and jump and/or sprint performance in highly-trained young (U-14 and U-16) male basketball players. Study Design Descriptive study. Methods Thirty elite young (U-14 to U-16) male basketball players performed several FMT (weight-bearing dorsiflexion test [WB-DF] and a modified Star Excursion Balance test [SEBT]) and performance including unilateral and bilateral countermovement jumps, unilateral horizontal jumping, linear sprinting and performance tests. Results All anthropometric and performance tests showed a statistically significant advantage (p<0.05) in the U-16 group, excluding the unilateral jump with left leg (p=0.127). Five out of the eight FMT performed showed a statistically significant advantage (p<0.05) in the U-16 group. The U-14 group did not differ statistically from the U-16 group in WB-DF with left leg and the SEBT anterior right leg and posteromedial left leg reaches. Effect size calculations did show small to moderate effects in favor of U-16. Only two significant correlations (p<0.05) between functional movement and performance measures were identified in the U-16 group for either limb (10-m sprint and SEBT-PLL, SEBT-CompositeL), while a total of 13 significant correlations (p<0.05) in the U-14 group were found. Conclusions The results of this study demonstrated differences in FMT and jump and/or sprint performance test between age groups (U-16 vs U-14). The findings of this study support the idea that the age of the player should be considered when interpreting FMT scores, which could have implications when implementing the FMT for injury risk prediction. Level of evidence 2b.
Design of an ultra-wideband reflectarray using transformation optics

Reflector antennas realized by reflectarrays have many attractive features that are unmatched by traditional reflectors. Low-profile planar reflectarrays can be made to have high gain and electronic beam steering. However, they tend to use elements operating near their resonant frequencies for achieving a large phase range, thus limiting their bandwidth significantly. Transformation optics (TO) offers a new way to design tunable reflecting devices while preserving many of the attractive features of a reflectarray antenna. The TO device accomplishes beam collimation by using a 2-D array of sub-wavelength dipoles, which is macroscopically seen as an effective medium, to incur different phase changes of the incident fields. The proposed reflector has a relative gain bandwidth of 150%.
Citizen Inquiry: Engaging Citizens in Online Communities of Scientific Inquiries

Citizen Inquiry has been proposed as an informal science learning approach to enable widespread involvement in science and empower citizens with reasoning and problem-solving skills used by scientists. It combines aspects from citizen science and inquiry-based learning, producing science learning experiences within distributed communities of interest. A central challenge for Citizen Inquiry is to involve citizens in planning and implementing their own investigations, supported and guided by online systems and tools within an inquiry environment, while collaborating with science experts and non-experts. This thesis explores how to create an active and sustainable online community for citizens to engage in scientific investigations. To this end, it investigates the design of online communities, recruitment and retaining of members, factors that engage or disengage members from the community, and whether and how members learn throughout their participation. The intervention comprises two iterations of Citizen Inquiry communities: ‘Inquiring Rock Hunters’ and ‘Weather-it’. The communities were accommodated by the nQuire platform and the nQuire-it toolkit, respectively, software designed and structured to support collaborative personally-meaningful inquiry learning. The findings of this research are explained through an analysis that compared the two design studies with previous research on citizen participation projects and online communities. Results highlight the importance of frequent project communication, multiple ways of participation, software usability, and interaction and collaboration between the members, while indicating disengagement factors such as lack of time, interest and confidence. Different categories of learning are identified (activity, on-topic and community), emphasizing the understanding of inquiry activities as part of a complete scientific process and the balance between fun and learning. The thesis concludes with design considerations for the creation of future Citizen Inquiry and other citizen participation communities.
Effects of time of suckling during the solar day on duration of the postpartum anovulatory interval in Brahman x Hereford (F1) cows.

Previously published reports have indicated that postpartum anovulatory intervals can be markedly reduced and rebreeding performance enhanced in Bos taurus cows by eliminating nighttime suckling. We sought to confirm this hypothesis by examining the effects of day, nighttime, and ad libitum suckling on suckling behavior of calves, duration of the postpartum anovulatory interval, and pregnancy rates in 45 fall-calving Brahman x Hereford (F1) cows. Beginning on d 9 to 12 postpartum, calves were removed from lactating cows from 0700 to 1900 (Night-Suckled, n = 15) or from 1900 to 0700 (Day-Suckled, n = 15), or remained with their dams continuously (Ad Libitum-Suckled, n = 15). Cows in each group were maintained with fertile Angus bulls from d 10 postpartum until the first normal luteal phase or 100 d postpartum, whichever occurred first. Cows were observed for estrous behavior twice daily, and jugular blood samples were collected twice weekly for the determination of serum progesterone concentration. Mean number of suckling episodes per 24 h was greater (P < .0001) for the Ad Libitum-Suckled group than either Night- or Day-Suckled groups (5.9+/-.42 vs 3.8+/-.14, and 3.9+/-.32, respectively). Hourly analysis of suckling episodes in the Ad Libitum group indicated that they were not skewed toward a particular period, with suckling occurring at a periodicity of 4 to 6 h. Intervals to the first rise in progesterone > or = 1 ng/mL (32+/-2.5, 32+/-4.5, and 31+/-1.7 d, respectively), first normal luteal phase (38+/-3.1, 38+/-3.8, and 37+/-2.5 d, respectively), and first estrus (43+/-3.5, 40+/-3.9, and 36+/-1.1 d, respectively) did not differ (P > .05) among the three groups. Similarly, cumulative pregnancy rates within 100 d after calving did not differ (P > .05). These results in Bos indicus x Bos taurus (F1) cattle do not support the previous conclusions in Bos taurus that eliminating nighttime suckling reduces the postpartum anovulatory interval.
A Revised Approach to CIR Short-Term Interest Rates Model

It is well known that the Cox-Ingersoll-Ross (CIR) stochastic model to study the term structure of interest rates, as introduced in 1985, is inadequate for modelling the current market environment with negative short interest rates. Moreover, the diffusion term in the rate dynamics goes to zero when short rates are small; both volatility and long-run mean do not change with time; they do not fit with the skewed (fat tails) distribution of the interest rates, etc. The aim of the present work is to suggest a new framework, which we call the CIR # model, that fits well the term structure of short interest rates such that the market volatility structure is preserved as well as the analytical tractability of the original CIR model.
Pork Barrel Politics

What is it? The term "pork barrel" originated from the era of slavery before the US civil war, when "when slave owners occasionally would present a barrel of salt pork as a gift to their slaves" (Drudge, 2008). Since then, it has been used often to describe US politics when congressmen set asde funds for their own district to garner votes. In a wider sense, pork barrel politics refer to governmental spending on policies that are popular with and benefit a certain group of people, which then helps to win favour (in the form of votes) from the affected group(s) of people. Within Japan, the deeply rooted iron triangle system supports the formation of pork barrel politics. This triangle refers to politicians, bureaucrats, and interest groups (like businesses) which work closely together for mutual interests through a “back-scratching alliance” and the practice of amakudari (Sugimoto, 2010). Pempel (2010) argues that pork barrel politics have led to huge regions of LDP agricultural blocs, comprising farmers from rural areas who vote in return for the protection of domestic agriculture. Another form of pork barrel politics that he identifies are large public spending on construction projects like highways and bridges. He thus argues that this has led to an underlying tension between “pork and productivity”, deeming pork barrel policies to be largely inefficient and a wastage of resources. Additionally, Japanese politicians’ heavy reliance on pork barrel politics have led to a problem of dependence. They face difficulty when trying to change policies because pushing for competitive neoliberal market reforms often go against the ideals of these sheltered groups like the farmers who wield much political power.
Dialogue with computers: dialogue games in action

With the advent of digital personal assistants for mobile devices, systems that are marketed as engaging in (spoken) dialogue have reached a wider public than ever before. For a student of dialogue, this raises the question to what extent such systems are genuine dialogue partners. In order to address this question, this study proposes to use the concept of a dialogue game as an analytical tool. Thus, we reframe the question as asking for the dialogue games that such systems play. Our analysis, as applied to a number of landmark systems and illustrated with dialogue extracts, leads to a fine-grained classification of such systems. Drawing on this analysis, we propose that the uptake of future generations of more powerful dialogue systems will depend on whether they are self-validating. A self-validating dialogue system can not only talk and do things, but also discuss the why of what it says and does, and learn from such discussions.
High-efficiency three-phase inverter with SiC MOSFET power modules for motor-drive applications

This paper presents the design process of a 312 kVA three-phase silicon carbide inverter using ten parallel-connected metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect-transistor power modules in each phase-leg. The design processes of the gate-drive circuits with short-circuit protection and the power circuit layout are also presented. Electrical measurements in order to evaluate the performance of the gate-drive circuits have been performed using a double-pulse setup. Experimental results showing the electrical performance during steady-state operation of the power converter are also shown. Taking into account measured data, an efficiency of approximately 99.3% at the rated power has been estimated for the inverter.
Can we identify patients at risk of life‐threatening allergic reactions to food?

Anaphylaxis has been defined as a ‘severe, life‐threatening generalized or systemic hypersensitivity reaction’. However, data indicate that the vast majority of food‐triggered anaphylactic reactions are not life‐threatening. Nonetheless, severe life‐threatening reactions do occur and are unpredictable. We discuss the concepts surrounding perceptions of severe, life‐threatening allergic reactions to food by different stakeholders, with particular reference to the inclusion of clinical severity as a factor in allergy and allergen risk management. We review the evidence regarding factors that might be used to identify those at most risk of severe allergic reactions to food, and the consequences of misinformation in this regard. For example, a significant proportion of food‐allergic children also have asthma, yet almost none will experience a fatal food‐allergic reaction; asthma is not, in itself, a strong predictor for fatal anaphylaxis. The relationship between dose of allergen exposure and symptom severity is unclear. While dose appears to be a risk factor in at least a subgroup of patients, studies report that individuals with prior anaphylaxis do not have a lower eliciting dose than those reporting previous mild reactions. It is therefore important to consider severity and sensitivity as separate factors, as a highly sensitive individual will not necessarily experience severe symptoms during an allergic reaction. We identify the knowledge gaps that need to be addressed to improve our ability to better identify those most at risk of severe food‐induced allergic reactions.
The Longitudinal Effect of a Single Peritonitis Episode on Peritoneal Membrane Transport in CAPD Patients

Objective To evaluate the longitudinal effect of a single peritonitis episode on peritoneal membrane transport. Design A prospective longitudinal study. Setting Department of nephrology in a university hospital. Patients Eighteen continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis patients with peritonitis. Methods Peritoneal transport for low, middle, and high molecular weight (MW) solutes was evaluated by peritoneal equilibration test (PET). The first PET was performed on the day following the diagnosis of peritonitis. The test was repeated at weeks 1, 2, 4, 12, and 24 and the results were compared to baseline PET data obtained before peritonitis. In addition, dialysate CA125 concentration and leukocyte count were measured. Results During peritonitis there were significant increases in dialysate-to-plasma (D/P) ratios for all low, middle, and high MW solutes except potassium, and decreases in D4/D0 glucose ratio and ultrafiltration (UF) volume. Over the subsequent 2 weeks, solute transport gradually decreased to the baseline values then remained unchanged during follow-up. Although net UF volume demonstrated a similar course during the study, it did not completely return to the baseline value. No decrease in D/P sodium ratio was found at 60 minutes during the PET performed 24 weeks after peritonitis. The percent change in solute transport during peritonitis compared to baseline value was significantly correlated with a solute's MW (r = 0.776, p = 0.014). The slope of the regression line for D/P ratios versus MW, in double logarithmic scale, before peritonitis (-0.73 ± 0.09) was steeper than the slope during peritonitis (-0.59 ± 0.08). Conclusions These findings indicate that a single peritonitis episode does not permanently affect peritoneal solute transport. However, the loss of net UF that accompanies peritonitis is not completely recovered, probably due to impairment of transcellular water transport. The transport changes associated with peritonitis may be due to the combined effect of increased effective peritoneal surface area and intrinsic permeability. Our findings suggest that the latter mechanism seems to be more important.
Intraoperative renal regional oxygen desaturation can be a predictor for acute kidney injury after cardiac surgery.

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the usefulness of renal regional oxygen saturation (renal rSO2) in predicting the risk of acute kidney injury (AKI) after cardiac surgery. DESIGN A prospective observational study. SETTING Tertiary care university hospital. PARTICIPANTS One hundred patients undergoing cardiac surgery. INTERVENTIONS Renal rSO2 was monitored continuously by near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) throughout the anesthetic period. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS Postoperative AKI was defined using the Risk, Injury, Failure, Loss, and End-stage (RIFLE) criteria. Of 95 patients who were included in the final analysis, 34 patients developed AKI after surgery. Recorded renal rSO2 data were used to calculate the total duration of the time when renal rSO2 was below the threshold values of 70%, 65%, 60%, 55%, and 50%. The total periods when the renal rSO2 level was below each of the threshold values were significantly longer in patients with AKI than in those without AKI (p = 0.001 or p<0.001). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was used to evaluate the predictive power of renal rSO2 for AKI. The ROC curve analysis showed that renal rSO2 could predict the risk of AKI with statistical significance and that a renal rSO2<55% had the best performance (area under the curve-ROC, 0.777; 95% CI, 0.669-0.885; p<0.001). Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that AKI significantly correlated with the duration of renal rSO2<55% (p = 0.002) and logistic EuroSCORE (p = 0.007). CONCLUSIONS Intraoperative renal regional oxygen desaturation can be a good predictor of AKI in adult patients undergoing cardiac surgery.
Animal plasma membrane energization by proton‐motive V‐ATPases

Proton‐translocating, vacuolar‐type ATPases, well known energizers of eukaryotic, vacuolar membranes, now emerge as energizers of many plasma membranes. Just as Na+ gradients, imposed by Na+/K+ ATPases, energize basolateral plasma membranes of epithelia, so voltage gradients, imposed by H+ V‐ATPases, energize apical plasma membranes. The energized membranes acidify or alkalinize compartments, absorb or secrete ions and fluids, and underwrite cellular homeostasis. V‐ATPases acidify extracellular spaces of single cells such as phagocytes and osteoclasts and of polarized epithelia, such as vertebrate kidney and epididymis. They alkalinize extracellular spaces of lepidopteran midgut. V‐ATPases energize fluid secretion by insect Malpighian tubules and fluid absorption by insect oocytes. They hyperpolarize external plasma membranes for Na+ uptake by amphibian skin and fish gills. Indeed, it is likely that ion uptake by osmotically active membranes of all fresh water organisms is energized by V‐ATPases. Awareness of plasma membrane energization by V‐ATPases provides new perspectives for basic science and presents new opportunities for medicine and agriculture. BioEssays 21:637–648, 1999. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Discretionary accounting choices: the case of IAS 19 pension accounting

Based on a sample of 3207 firm-year observations for the years 2005–2013, we investigate how stock-listed companies in France, Germany and the UK use two discretionary choices in their accounting for defined benefit pension plans under International Accounting Standard (IAS) 19 Employee Benefits. We first analyse companies’ decision whether to voluntarily early adopt the equity method of accounting for actuarial gains and losses. Second, we analyse companies’ choice to present pension interest cost and expected return on plan assets, or, in 2013, net pension interest cost, in operating or financial income. Our findings provide evidence that companies’ decisions to early adopt the equity method in 2005, the first year this accounting choice was available, were motivated by short-term effects on equity. Our analyses also indicate that the choice regarding where to present interest cost and expected return on plan assets in the income statement is associated with the resulting effect on Earnings before Interest and Tax. Finally, we document country-specific differences in the use of the discretion provided under IAS 19, suggesting that discretionary pension accounting choices may impede comparability.
Phenolic Compounds Hybrid Detectors

Phenolic compounds are among the major classes of pollutants produced by industrial and agricultural activities. The amperometric biosensors have been mainly applied to the determination of phenolic compounds because of the advantages such as good selectivity, low cost, and easy automation. Amperometry is a method to measure the electric current that flows as a result of reactions generated at the electrode. Amperometric phenol biosensors are most often based on tyrosinase, laccase or horseradish peroxidase immobilized on the electrode surface. The immobilization of enzymes into ordered thin materials has attracted considerable attention over the past few years. The present researches have demonstrated that biomolecules immobilized in different matrixes retain their functional characteristics to a large extent. These new materials are of great interest for applications as biosensors and biocatalysts. Lately, also conducting polymers have attracted much interest in the development of biological sensors. The electrically conducting polymers are known as possessing many interesting features, which allow them to act as excellent materials for immobilization of biomolecules.
Accelerometric assessment of different dimensions of natural walking during the first year after stroke: Recovery of amount, distribution, quality and speed of walking.

OBJECTIVES To describe the course of walking behaviour over a period of 1 year after stroke, using accelerometry, and to compare 1-year data with those from a healthy group. DESIGN One-year follow-up cohort study. SUBJECTS Twenty-three stroke patients and 20 age-matched healthy subjects. METHODS Accelerometer assessments were made in the participants' daily environment for 8 h/day during the 1st (T1), 12th (T2) and 48th (T3) weeks after stroke, and at one time-point in healthy subjects. Primary outcomes were: percentage of time walking and upright (amount); mean duration and number of walking periods (distribution); step regularity and gait symmetry (quality); and walking speed. RESULTS Time walking, time upright, and number of walking bouts increased during T1 and T2 (p < 0.01) and then levelled off (p > 0.30). Mean duration of walking periods showed no significant improvements (p > 0.30) during all phases. Step regularity, gait symmetry and gait speed showed a tendency to increase consistently from T1 to T3. At T3, amount and distribution variables reached the level of the healthy group, but significant differences remained (p < 0.02) in step regularity and gait speed. CONCLUSION In this cohort, different outcomes of walking behaviour showed different patterns and levels of recovery, which supports the multi-dimensional character of gait.