Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Monetary Value of Winter Sport Services in the European Alps

Considering the increasing stress of competition in winter sports, e.g., caused by the increasing popularity of sun holidays in the winter season or recently developed new ski areas, cable-car companies have to optimize their price-performance ratio with a modified marketing management approach. For most decisions regarding the marketing mix (e.g. the price calculation of new supply attributes), the knowledge about the monetary value of the different single attributes a consumer receives when purchasing a ski-lift ticket is indispensable. Since economics in general has a certain value for practical decision-taking in leisure management we follow other authors and transfer the economic concept of ‘hedonic prices’ to the field of empirical leisure research to derive the monetary value of some core service attributes in winter sports. The study is based on data of n=260 ski areas in five countries of the European Alps (Austria, France, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland). While the developed hedonic price models show rather high-variance explanatory power, most of the estimated attribute prices differ significantly between the countries studied. Possible implications for the price and product policies of cable-car companies are presented and discussed.
Strategies to Promote Data Use for Instructional Improvement: Actions, Outcomes, and Lessons fromThree Urban Districts

The current high‐stakes accountability environment has created strong incentives for educators to systematically collect and use data to inform instructional decisions. This article examines the strategies employed by three urban school districts to promote data use for instructional improvement and their effect on administrator, principal, and teacher practice. Several factors are found to affect data use, including accessibility and timeliness of data, perceptions of data validity, training, and support for teachers with regard to data analysis and interpretation, and the alignment of data strategies with other instructional initiatives.
Delay and Its Effect on The Delivery of Construction Projects In Ghana

It is common knowledge that our construction industry in this country has been bedeviled with a lot of delayed and uncompleted projects. Delays can be minimized when the factors causing them are identified. The objective of this study was therefore to identify the various delay factors that affect the delivery of construction projects, the effects of delays on the delivery of construction projects, and assess and identify the most critical delay factors that affect construction project delivery in Ghana. During the review a total of fifty-seven factors were identified and categorized into eight groups that contributed to the causes of delays. Six effects of these delays on construction projects and thirty five methods of minimizing construction delays were identified. Questionnaires were distributed to targeted respondents mainly contractors belonging to Association of Building and Civil Engineering Contractors, as well as Consultants who were on good standing with the Department of Feeder Roads. Results from the research indicated that the top three out of the ten most critical factors that cause delays in the delivery of construction projects were; Shortage of construction materials, poor site management practices and poor supervision. In order to minimize the effects of delays, it was recommended that contractors' managerial skills and technical knowledge be improved through frequently organized seminars, workshop and training programs which would help update their knowledge on project management techniques and processes.
Biocompatible polymeric coatings do not inherently reduce the cytotoxicity of iron oxide nanoparticles

Nanotechnology in biomedical research is an emerging and promising tool for different purposes, like high-resolution medical imaging, diagnostics, and targeted drug delivery. Although some experimental efforts focused on determination of the cytotoxicity of nanoparticles (NPs) are present, there are many controversial results. In this study, chitosan (CS)- and poly(acrylic acid) (PAA)-coated iron oxide nanoparticles (IONPs) were used to investigate the possible cytotoxicity of coated IONPs on model mammalian cell line SaOs-2 by evaluating cellular viability and membrane integrity. Increasing concentrations of IONPs increased the cytotoxic effect on SaOs-2 cells with both CS- and PAA-coated IONPs. Cell viability on day 3 was as low as 40% and 48% at 1000 ? M concentration for PAAand CS-coated IONPs, respectively, in 1% FBS-supplemented media. Cytotoxicity determined by the released lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) was as high as 163% with 1000 ? M concentration of CS-IONPs, while there was no significant change in LDH release with PAAcoated IONPs at any concentration. This study reveals that IONPs coated with a biocompatible polymer, which are usually assumed to be nontoxic, show cytotoxicity with increasing concentration and incubation time. The cytotoxicity of nanoparticles intended for biomedical purposes must be evaluated using more than one approach.
Modeling for Deformable Body and Motion Analysis: A Review

This paper surveys the modeling methods for deformable human body and motion analysis in the recent 30 years. First, elementary knowledge of human expression and modeling is introduced. Then, typical human modeling technologies, including 2D model, 3D surface model, and geometry-based, physics-based, and anatomy-based approaches, and model-based motion analysis are summarized. Characteristics of these technologies are analyzed. The technology accumulation in the field is outlined for an overview.
China’s Joining the WTO: Opportunities for the Australian Agribusiness Sector

China first applied to join the GATT (now the WTO) in July 1986. After almost 15 years of negotiations, China may soon get accepted to the WTO. China’s joining the WTO will undoubtedly bring opportunities and challenges to the agribusiness sector of both China and overseas countries. To a large extent, opportunities for China’s agribusiness sector are likely to be challenges for the agribusiness sector of foreign countries; and for the same reason, challenges for China are likely to be opportunities for overseas countries. In this paper, after highlighting China’s "long journey" to the WTO, we examine the likely opportunities and challenges facing the agribusiness sectors of China and overseas countries, with particular reference to Australia. We will also attempt to identify possible areas of cooperation between China and Australia’s agribusiness sectors.
Private Equity and Buyouts: A Study of Value Creation in Portfolio Companies

Buyouts became a hot topic in the financial academia after billions of euros have been invested by the private equity industry over the past decade. Are these deals economically desirable? Acknowledging the need to adjust operating returns by the new risk profile of target firms after the buyout (i.e. the new cost of capital), this study provides new empirical evidence on whether and how buyouts create value in portfolio companies. Using a sample of 159 pan-European deals, we found no evidence of higher value creation in buyouts after adjusting for industry effects. Furthermore, we applied a multivariate analysis to study the determinants of value creation and found that, apart from sales growth and the outsourcing of intermediate goods and services, the majority of theoretical drivers have weak explanatory power or actually fail to explain the behaviour of risk adjust returns. Overall, our findings support the theory that private equity investments introduce an entrepreneurial and growth mid-set, reflected in higher pace of growth and capex levels, while value may be created by reducing labour intensity through higher outsourcing. In the end, our results highlighted the need for further investigation of the value creation process in the more recent waves of deals. Key-words: Buyouts, Private Equity, Value Creation, Operating Performance JEL-Codes: G24, G32, G34
Heating effects of the matrix of experimentally shocked Murchison CM chondrite: Comparison with micrometeorites

Abstract— Micrometeorites have been significantly altered or melted by heating, which has been mainly ascribed to aerodynamic drag during atmospheric entry. However, if a major fraction of micrometeorites are produced by impacts on porous asteroids, they may have experienced shock heating before contact with the Earth's atmosphere (Tomeoka et al. 2003). A transmission electron microscope (TEM) study of the matrix of Murchison CM chondrite experimentally shocked at pressures of 10–49 GPa shows that its mineralogy and texture change dramatically, mainly due to shock heating, with the progressive shock pressures. Tochilinite is completely decomposed to an amorphous material at 10 GPa. Fe‐Mg serpentine is partially decomposed and decreases in amount with increasing pressure from 10 to 30 GPa and is completely decomposed at 36 GPa. At 49 GPa, the matrix is extensively melted and consists mostly of aggregates of equigranular grains of Fe‐rich olivine and less abundant low‐Ca pyroxene embedded in Si‐rich glass. The mineralogy and texture of the shocked samples are similar to those of some types of micrometeorites. In particular, the samples shocked at 10 and 21 GPa are similar to the phyllosilicate (serpentine)‐rich micrometeorites, and the sample shocked at 49 GPa is similar to the olivine‐rich micrometeorites. The shock heating effects also resemble the effects of pulse‐heating experiments on the CI and CM chondrite matrices that were conducted to simulate atmospheric entry heating. We suggest that micrometeorites derived from porous asteroids are likely to go through both shock and atmospheric‐entry heating processes.
High Dimensional Model Representation With Principal Component Analysis

In engineering design, spending excessive amount of time on physical experiments or expensive simulations makes the design costly and lengthy. This issue exacerbates when the design problem has a large number of inputs, or of high dimension. High dimensional model representation (HDMR) is one powerful method in approximating high dimensional, expensive, black-box (HEB) problems. One existing HDMR implementation, random sampling HDMR (RS-HDMR), can build an HDMR model from random sample points with a linear combination of basis functions. The most critical issue in RS-HDMR is that calculating the coefficients for the basis functions includes integrals that are approximated by Monte Carlo summations, which are error prone with limited samples and especially with nonuniform sampling. In this paper, a new approach based on principal component analysis (PCA), called PCA-HDMR, is proposed for finding the coefficients that provide the best linear combination of the bases with minimum error and without using any integral. Several benchmark problems of different dimensionalities and one engineering problem are modeled using the method and the results are compared with RS-HDMR results. In all problems with both uniform and nonuniform sampling, PCA-HDMR built more accurate models than RS-HDMR for a given set of sample points. [DOI: 10.1115/1.4025491]
Ricardian Equivalence Hypothesis and Budgetary Deficits: The Case of Pakistan 1972-2008

During the last few decades, the Ricardian equivalence hypothesis (REH) has been an important theme of economic research both theoretical and applied. However, to test the validity and consistency of REH, there is very limited work has been done in the developing countries. Since the REH requires a number of assumptions that might not appear to be satisfied in developing countries, it seems that the REH should not hold. In this study an attempt has been made to empirically test the validity of Ricardian equivalence hypothesis for Pakistan using annual time series data for the period 1972 to 2008. The use of cointegration analysis invalidate the RE hypothesis in Pakistan. So Pakistan is a non Ricardian economy facing budget and current account deficits.
Fabrication process and 110 GHz measurement result of MS-to-CPW RF-via transition for RF-MEMS devices packaging applications

This paper presents the fabrication process of RF-via (0-level) and flip-chip bump (1-level) transitions for applications of packaging MS (microstrip) RF-MEMS devices. The interconnect structure with MS-to-CPW transition between GaAs MEMS substrate and Al2O3 motherboard was in-house fabricated. A novel fabrication process for RF-MEMS packaging is in detail. After fabrication, the samples were measured up to 110 GHz using on-wafer probing measurement. From the measured results, the insertion loss of entire interconnect structure is better than -2 dB up to 100 GHz, documenting the feasibility for millimeter-wave RFMEMS devices packaging applications.
Fast Pyrolysis of Sunflower Oil in the Presence of Microporous and Mesoporous Materials for Production of Bio-Oil

The present work describes the study of micro (H-ZSM-5) and mesoporous (AL-MCM-41) structures, aiming at their application in the production of renewable fuels through the thermos-catalytic pyrolysis process both were synthesized hydrothermally and characterized by X-ray diffraction, thermal analysis, infrared spectroscopy, nitrogen adsorption, and surface acidity. The catalytic effect of the materials mentioned, as well as their mechanical mixtures in the proportions of H-ZSM-5 (75% wt) and AL-MCM-41 (25% wt); H-ZSM-5 (50% wt) and AL-MCM-41 (50% wt); H-ZSM-5 (25% wt) and AL-MCM-41 (75% wt) were used in the thermal and thermo-catalytic pyrolysis of sunflower oil. The products obtained in the presence of H-ZSM-5 (25% wt) and AL-MCM-41(75% wt) showed selectivity for the conversion of hydrocarbons between C11 and C16, which is near that of the petroleum-derived kerosene and diesel (>C16). On the other hand, the H-ZSM-5 (75% wt) and AL-MCM-41 (25% wt) material, in which the majoritarian catalyst is the microporous, with active sites and a higher surface acidity, indicates selectivity for light hydrocarbons (C5-C10), in the range of gasoline obtained by the conversion of mineral oil. The presence of catalysts (AL-MCM-41and H-ZSM-5) favors the deoxygenation of the pyrolysis products of sunflower oil by decarbonylation reaction.
High Technology Exports, Gross Capital Formation and Economic Growth in Uganda: A Vector Auto Regressive Approach

This study examines the relationship between high technology exports, gross capital formation and economic growth in Uganda with the ultimate aim of establishing whether exportation of high-tech goods and gross capital formation have a significant effect on economic growth. Motivated by the continued policy shift in Sub-Saharan Africa and generally in the developing world, towards outward looking strategies, this study seeks to provide a validation test to this trend from a small open developing country perspective. The study utilizes data from the World Bank Development Indicators. This study estimates a basic Vector Autoregressive model to establish the likely effects of high-tech exports and gross capital formation on growth. The authors later provide in-depth analysis of our results using impulse response functions (IRF). Our Vector Auto Regression (VAR) results indicate that in the short run, high-tech exports do not have a significant effect on economic growth in Uganda and gross capital formation has a negative and significant effect. However, IRF reveals gross capital formation having a positive and significant effect on growth and the effect of high-tech exports improving significantly over a long horizon. Our findings do not contradict previous studies but support the belief that once economic fundamentals are put in place, high-tech exportation can spur growth more than mere export volumes.
The Association between Earnings Persistence and Internal Control Quality: Evidence from China

﻿We investigated the association between internal control quality (ICQ) and earnings persistence (EP) in the Chinese capital market. Specifically, we examined how ICQ exerts an influence on EP, using data from listed A-share corporations in the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, from 2008 to 2011. We assumed that a more favorable internal control environment could prevent managers and employees from exploiting company resources or embezzling company property, preventing managers from using opportunistic earnings management (accrual-based or real earnings management) and motivating them to strive for the corporation. The company would thus be more likely to operate efficiently and effectively, resulting in higher EP. Consistent with this assumption, our findings suggest that firms with better ICQ have less real activities manipulation, and that a lesser extent of real earnings management results in higher EP.
The heliospheric modulation of cosmic ray boron and carbon

Abstract. The observed boron to carbon ratio (B/C) at Earth provides a good measure of the overall secondary to primary ratio of galactic cosmic rays. This makes B/C an important constraint and test for the validity and general applicability of theoretical and numerical models of galactic propagation and heliospheric modulation. For this purpose, the modulation of boron and carbon in the heliosphere must be understood in greater detail. The latest approach to heliospheric modulation, using a numerical model containing a termination shock, a heliosheath and particle drifts, is used to the study the modulation of the two species. This model also includes a more comprehensive set of diffusion coefficients. From this and previous work follows that the model is compatible with a variety of observations, for seven species, i.e. protons, anti-protons, electrons, positrons, helium, boron, and carbon, with the same set of parameters for both solar magnetic polarity cycles. Despite the rather flat interstellar spectrum for carbon below 100MeV/nuc, the modulated spectra at 1AU look very similar for boron and carbon, caused by adiabatic energy losses, implying that the carbon modulation should have a much larger radial gradient in the outer heliosphere below ~200-500MeV/nuc than boron. Significant modulation can be caused by the heliosheath but it is strongly dependent on energy and on the field polarity, with almost no effect at high energies to the largest effect at low energies. The solar wind termination shock has an important effect on the B to C ratio in the heliosphere, although small at Earth, during the A 0 cycle and with increasing tilt angles. Drift models produce different spectra for consecutive solar minimum conditions which may account for the modulation level differences between observations around 100MeV/nuc compared to around 500MeV/nuc. All factors taken into account, heliospheric modeling indicates that the interstellar spectra for B and C need further refinement around 1GeV/nuc, in order to fit observations over a wide energy range at Earth and that this refinement probably has to take into account the proposed contribution of a local interstellar carbon component. These results confirm that this numerical model with a TS can reasonably reproduce the B and C modulation between the outer boundary and Earth, making it a reasonable approximation for both polarity cycles from solar minimum to moderate solar activity.
Abundance , diversity , and seasonal dynamics of hard ticks infesting cattle in Isfahan Province , Iran

The objectives of this study were to determine the diversity, seasonal dynamics, and abundance of ticks infesting cattle in Isfahan, Iran. The study was conducted in three traditional cattle farms. No acaricides were applied to the cattle at the selected farms. Adult ticks were collected twice a month from different parts of the cattle's body. Environmental data, including relative humidity, temperature, and rainfall, were recorded in each sampling. A total of 1206 ticks (56% males and 44% females) were collected in the selected farms. Hyalomma anatolicum anatolicum was the most abundant species (85.5%), followed by Hyalomma marginatum marginatum (8.7%) and Rhipicephalus sanguinus (6.5%), respectively. Ixodid tick abundance showed a dramatic increase, leading to remarkable abundance peaks during spring (April, May, and June) mainly due to the H. anatolicum anatolicum activity. The highest number of H. marginatum marginatum was found in the end of spring and early summer. R. sanguinus was only collected in March (end of winter) and June (end of spring). Maximum density of the collected hard ticks was in spring (68.4%). Approximately 27.1%, 3.5%, and 1% of the whole tick samples were collected in summer, fall, and winter, respectively. Out of the total samples collected from different parts of the animals’ body, the maximum number of ticks were collected from udders (63.2%) followed by 36.1% from under the tail and 0.7% between the legs, while no ticks were found on the other parts of the animals’ body. A significant correlation was detected between tick abundance and mean temperature (P<0.05). Since tick distribution is used for estimation of the distribution of tick-transmitted pathogens and climate as well as the intensity of livestock are changing in different regions of Iran, further studies regarding the tick ecology and the relationship between ticks and environmental variables are helpful in predicting the probability of new tick species presence and prediction of the risk of tick-borne pathogen transmission in ecological zones of Iran.
Cannabis as a Possible Treatment for Spasticity in Multiple Sclerosis / Kanabis Kao Moguci Tretman U Lecenju Spasticnosti Kod Multiple Skleroze

Abstract The therapeutic potential of cannabis has been known for centuries. Cannabinoids express their effects through two types of receptors, cannabinoid receptor 1 (CB1) and cannabinoid receptor 2 (CB2). Present studies indicate that cannabis-based drugs can make a positive impact in the treatment of different diseases. For many years, multiple sclerosis patients have self-medicated with illegal street cannabis to alleviate spasticity, a common and debilitating symptom that impairs quality of life. Nabiximols is the cannabis-based medicine approved in many countries as an add-on therapy for symptom improvement in patients with spasticity who have not responded adequately to other medications. Adverse events such as dizziness, diarrhoea, fatigue, nausea, headache and somnolence occur quite frequently with nabiximols, but they are generally of mild-to-moderate intensity and their incidence can be markedly reduced by gradual uptitration. The prerequisite for the therapeutic use of cannabis in Serbia arerequires legal clarification for the use of the drug in a clinical environment
The Impact of Renewable Energies and Electric Market Liberalization on Electrical Prices in the European Union . An Econometric Panel Data Model .

A controversial debate has arisen about the effects on household electricity prices of electricity generation from Renewable Energy Sources and regulatory reforms in the European Union Electricity Market. In this paper we propose to use panel data models with the aim of explaining the household electricity prices as a function of several economic variables related to renewable energy sources and electricity market regulation. More specifically we use a panel data set provided by Eurostat and covering 27 European Union countries during the period 1998–2009. Our results suggest that electricity prices increase with the deployment of Electricity from Renewable Energy Sources. Keywords-renewable energy, electricity market, panel data model.