Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modification of nano alginate-chitosan matrix for oral delivery of insulin

The objective of this study is modification of nano chitosan blended alginate matrix (CBAM) by grafting with poly methacrylic acid (PMAA) to utilize for oral delivery of insulin. firstly, chitosan blended alginate matrix converted to nano by freeze drying method and then, free radical graft copolymerizations were carried out at 70 °C, bis-acrylamide as a cross-linking agent and persulfate as an initiator. The cross- linked three-dimensional polymers were characterized by scanning electron microscopy and FT-IR. In the matrices with increase in the content of chitosan had shown increased bioadhesivity. Equilibrium swelling studies were carried out in enzyme-free simulated gastric and intestinal fluids (SGF and SIF, respectively). Insulin was entrapped in these gels and the in vitro release profiles were established separately in both (SGF, pH 1) and (SIF, pH 7.4). Drug release studies showed that the increasing content of MAA in the copolymer enhances hydrolysis in SIF. In these cases, the biological activity of insulin was retained. These results were used to design and improve insulin release behavior from these carriers. (Nature and Science. 2009;7(8):1-7). (ISSN 1545-0740).
Computer Based Tools to Locate and Measure the Disease Infected Area of Rice Leaves

Computer based image processing system has been developed to automatically calculate the damaged area and also to identify the location of disease infected area of rice leaves. The developed image processing system separates the infected regions on leaf by pixel-wise processing. The color intensities associated with image pixels are used as inputs, which are taken by the software and produce the desired output. Experimental results show that the proposed system can produce accurate results in every case whereas conventional eye-estimation technique is not accurate. The amount of damaged area, as identified by proposed software system, can potentially be used in many decision making processes, like determination of the amount of pesticides need to be sprayed in a field. Moreover, an automated machine can be combined with this software to eliminate the requirement of human operators. Also this system may eliminate the requirement of costly Leaf Area Meter. DOI: http://dx.doi. org/10.3329/pa.v18i2. 18210 Progress. Agric. 18(2): 209 - 213, 2007
Audit quality, board gender and financial risk disclosure

This study compares three models: pooled OLS, fixed effect and panel EGLS random effects to examine the impact of corporate governance characteristics and IFRS7 financial instruments disclosure of 14 listed banks on the Nigerian Stock Exchange from 2008 to 2012. Empirical evidence suggests that chi-square and F-statistics in both pooled OLS and fixed effect models are significant thus, not suitable for appraising the model. When the Hausman test was applied to test for the effect, it is found that the null hypothesis of the correlated random effect has a significant probability value of 1.0000. This result supports the conclusion that IFRS7 disclosure is related to board committee, board accounting and board financial expertise and the type of gender in boards of the investigated banks in a random fashion. Based on this analysis, the random effect model which report significant values on three of the independent variables (BC, 0.0014 and BE, 0.0000) at 1% and (GEN, 0.0056) at 10% level of significance is the model of preference. The findings are germane to executive management, stakeholders and policy makers in banks of developing and emerging markets that have embraced IFRS7 for their financial instruments disclosure. It is recommended that existing regulations in Nigeria on mandatory disclosure should be strengthened to compel listed banks in Nigeria to have at least 15% of women on board because of their positive contribution to disclosure requirements. Keywords: Financial Risks, Audit quality, disclosure, board gender JEL Classification : G31
Lepidoptera from the Pantepui. Part VII. A distinctive Lamprospilusspecies from the Guiana Highlands (Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae: Theclinae)

Lamprospilus ayawi sp. nov. (Lycaenidae, Theclinae), whose male possesses distinctive transparent wing patches, is described from the Guiana Highlands of South America, on the basis of six males and five females from Venezuela (Auyán and Sororopán Tepuis) and one male from Guyana (Acarai Mts.). Resumen. Lamprospilus ayawi sp. nov. (Lycaenidae, Theclinae), cuyo macho presenta porciones transparentes distintivas en las alas, se describe de las Tierras Altas del Escudo Guayanés en Suramérica, sobre la base de seis machos y cinco hembras de Venezuela (Auyán y Sororopán Tepui) y de un macho de Guyana (Montes Acarai).
Social Media Burnout: Definition, Measurement Instrument, and Why We Care

ABSTRACT Social media users have shown several burnout symptoms lately. In this research, we study the social media burnout issue from three perspectives, including a user’s ambivalence, emotional exhaustion, and depersonalization. Building on the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), we designed a new scale to measure a user’s social media burnout. Using social media continuance as an example, we investigated the effects of social media burnout on a user’s post-adoption intention. We find that ambivalence, emotional exhaustion, and depersonalization can all significantly negatively influence a user’s social media continuance.
From Exhaustive Vacation Queues to Preemptive Priority Queues with General Interarrival Times

Abstract We consider the discrete-time G/GI/1 queueing system with multiple exhaustive vacations. By a transform approach, we obtain an expression for the probability generating function of the waiting time of customers in such a system. We then show that the results can be used to assess the performance of G/GI/1 queueing systems with server breakdowns as well as that of the low-priority queue of a preemptive MX+G/GI/1 priority queueing system. By calculating service completion times of low-priority customers, various preemptive breakdown/priority disciplines can be studied, including preemptive resume and preemptive repeat, as well as their combinations. We illustrate our approach with some numerical examples.
Identification of essential and virulence genes in Mycoplasma pneumoniae

The bacterial group of Firmicutes includes many pathogenic bacteria, as Mycoplasma pneumoniae. The Gram-positive, but cel wall-less bacterium is characterized by a minimal genome with only 694 genes. Elucidating the function of all genes encoded in M. pneumoniae would allow the understanding of a cell in its entire complexity. Unfortunately, these bacteria grow very slowly and are hard to manipulate genetically. Only a few techniques and tools are available for the manipulation of M. pneumoniae. In this work, we extended the toolbox for M. pneumoniae with the first self-replicating plasmid pGP2756. It enabled for the first-time plasmid-based protein overexpression, expression of fusion proteins and complementation assays in Mycoplasma, to analyze unknown virulence factors contributing to mycoplasmal pathogenicity. Even if Mycoplasmas contain only down to 482 genes, one-third thereof is of unknown function and has no homology to any available nucleotide sequence so far. For instance, they lack common detoxification enzymes, such as catalase or superoxide dismutase, but many Mycoplasmas use hydrogen peroxide as a virulence factor. Accordingly, we investigated how they can tolerate high peroxide concentrations. Recently, peroxiredoxins were identified in the genomes of Mycoplasmas, which act as antioxidant enzymes. We identified and characterized two similar genes mpn625 and mpn668 to have specific detoxification activities for hydrogen peroxide and organic peroxide, respectively. Analyzing their specific regulation in M. pneumoniae, which has in general only a few transcription factors, revealed that the trigger enzyme GlpQ and the protein kinase C are involved in peroxide stress response. Strikingly, GlpQ and the protein kinase C have a strong influence on each other’s expression. In addition, we identified, mpn329 encoding a zinc responsive regulator (Zur) rather a ferrous iron regulator (Fur), which could alter gene expression in response to the intracellular ion homeostasis and peroxide concentration. For effective pathogenicity, M. pneumoniae needs to escape the host immune system using immunoglobulin binding proteins. In this work, the novel immunoglobulin binding protein of M. pneumoniae IbpM was identified. Our experiments show that IbpM is a multi-binding protein with high affinity for human immunoglobulins, plasminogen and fibronectin. IbpM represents a new surface protein of M. pneumoniae likely responsible for the efficient immune evasion properties of this bacterium often leading to chronic infections. Pathogenicity was shown to be strongly connected to c-di-AMP metabolism in many Firmicutes. Our results show that this essential messenger is present even in the near-minimal bacterium M. pneumoniae, controlling potassium homeostasis by binding to the potassium uptake protein KtrC and might contribute to mycoplasmal pathogenicity. With this work we have shown that even if M. pneumoniae contains only 694 genes, there is more controlled gene expression, second messenger-regulated protein functions and undiscovered virulence mechanisms as ever thought of.
PROCESS OF MAKING CARBOXYLATED DEXTRAN FIED OF INVENTION

(51) Int. Cl. C08B 37/02 (57) ABSTRACT (52) U.S. Cl. 536/113; 536/112 (58) Field of Search . 536/113, 112. The present invention provides a process of preparing a 424/18O novel carboxylic acid derivative of dextran. In particular, in the present invention, carboxylated dextran containing at (56) References Cited least one carboxylic acid is reduced to remove all or Sub Stantially all reducing groups. U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS
UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository) Understanding the effects of personalization as a privacy calculus: Analyzing self-disclosure across health, news, and commerce contexts

revealing that it was stable across contexts. Personalization decreased trust slightly and bene ﬁ ts marginally. Interestingly, these e ﬀ ects were context-dependent: While personalization a ﬀ ected outcomes in news and commerce contexts, no e ﬀ ects emerged in the health context.
Recommendation Algorithm Focused on Individual Viewpoints Noriyuki Yamamoto

In recommender systems, it is essential to improve the adaptability not for some typical user models but for each individual. In this paper, we propose several personalization methods for content recommendation focused on individual differences in intention to select contents and in desire to acquire information. We provide multiple content-based algorithms for TV program recommendation having respectively different purposes. We then present results of a field user test for five weeks demonstrating our new method can enhance the adaptability for each individual, especially the method of personalizing the contribution of each attributes by extracting differences between user preference and common preference. Finally, we discuss about the necessity of dynamic algorithm adaptation depending on characteristics of users. KeywordsPersonalization; TV program Recommendation; Individual Viewpoints; Content-based; Vector Space Model
Impact of Rebates and Refunds on Charitable Giving: Evidence from a Field Experiment *

This paper investigates the impact of rebates and refunds on contributions to threshold public goods using evidence from a field experiment conducted in conjunction with an Australian charity, Life Goes On. Rebates and refunds are, respectively, commitments to return excess and insufficient funds. We find that both rebates and refunds have a significant impact on average donations. The impact tends to be stronger in the absence of seed money rather than in the presence of seed money. We conjecture that this may be due to the signaling role played by such commitments in the absence of seed money.
Implicit perceptual memory can increase or decrease with ageing

A decline in declarative or explicit memory has been extensively characterized in cognitive ageing and is a hallmark of cognitive impairments. However, whether and how implicit perceptual memory varies with ageing or cognitive impairment is unclear. Here, we compared implicit perceptual memory and explicit memory measures in three groups of subjects: (1) 59 healthy young volunteers (20-30 years); (2) 238 healthy old volunteers (50-90 years) and (3) 21 patients with mild cognitive impairment MCI (50-90 years). To measure explicit memory, subjects were tested on standard recognition and recall tasks. To measure implicit perceptual memory, we used a classic perceptual priming paradigm. Subjects had to report the shape of a visual search pop-out target. Implicit priming was measured as the speedup in response time for targets with the same vs different color/position on consecutive trials. Our main findings are as follows: (1) Explicit memory was weaker in old compared to young subjects, and in MCI compared to age-matched controls; (2) Surprisingly, implicit perceptual memory did not always decline with age: color priming was smaller in older subjects but position priming was larger; (3) Position priming was less frequent in the MCI group compared to age-matched controls; (4) Implicit and explicit memory measures were uncorrelated in all three groups. Thus, implicit memory can increase or decrease with age or cognitive impairment, but this decline does not covary with explicit memory. We propose that incorporating explicit and implicit measures can yield a richer characterization of memory.
Efficient BI-RME Method Implementation For The Full-Wave Analysis Of Passive Devices Based On Circular Waveguides With Arbitrary Perturbations

In this paper, the efficient full-wave analysis of passive devices composed of circular and arbitrarily-shaped waveguides is considered. For this purpose, the wellknown Boundary Integral Resonant Mode Expansion (BI-RME) method has been properly extended. Circular waveguides are used for the resonant mode expansion, whereas the arbitrary contour is defined by any combination of straight, circular and elliptical segments, thus allowing the exact representation of the most widely used geometries. The proposed algorithm extends previous implementations of the BI-RME method based on circular waveguides by considering circular and elliptical arcs for defining arbitrary geometries. Likewise, it allows the efficient analysis of passive devices based on circular waveguides with arbitrary perturbations, thus providing more accurate results with less computational efforts than a rectangular waveguide based BI-RME approach. The extended method has been successfully tested with several practical application examples, having compared its performance with the BI-RME method based on rectangular waveguides.
Investor's Cognitive Bias and Stock Misvaluation

This article seeks to measure stock misvaluation following (Rhodes-Kropf, et al., 2005) and examine its relation to stock return. This model presents a new measure to investigate investors' over- and under-reaction for individual stocks and industries. The results show that there are both overreaction and under-reaction in Tehran stock Exchange. Based on the misvaluation factor, portfolios are formed and the properties of stocks with different degrees of misvaluation are investigated. The evidence is consistent with the argument that stock misvaluation is caused by Investor's Overconfidence, Representativeness Bias and Anchoring. It is also found out that there is relationship between misvaluation factor measure and factors like past stock return, price, firm size, B/M and stock liquidity degree.
Characteristics of the Stress Reduction and Output Voltage of ST(Switched Trans) Quasi Z-Source Inverter

This paper proposes a ST(Switched Trans) quasi Z-source inverter using a Switched Trans Cell combing the characteristics of a Switched Inductor Cell and Trans. A DC link inductor of the conventional quasi Z-source inverter is alternated with Switched Trans Cell of the proposed ST quasi Z-source inverter. Trans Cell of the proposed method consists of one Trans and two diodes, and the proposed method has higher and more various boost function than the conventional quasi Z-source inverter by simply changing the turns ratio of primary and secondary of the Trans. The validity of the proposed ST Z-source inverter was confirmed by PSIM simulation and a DSP based experiment under the input voltage 48V and output phase voltage 30V. As a result, when compared with the traditional quasi Z-source inverter, the proposed method has the advantage of the low voltage stress under the same output voltage condition of the voltage.
Assessment of the ability of sludge to degrade PCP under anaerobic conditions

Abstract - The capacity of sludge from different sources to degrade pentachlorophenol (PCP) was evaluated. Three 2.5 liter reactors (R 1 , R 2 , and R 3 ) were inoculated with different anaerobic sludges, semi continuously fed and maintained in orbital motion at 30±1°C. R 1 was inoculated with aerobic sludge and river sediment collected downstream from a pulp and paper plant. 2 received sludge from an anaerobic reactor treatingR effluents from a paper recycling plant and R 3 received anaerobic sludge from a biodigestor treating industrial and domestic effluents. The sludges were first acclimatized to a culture medium generally recommended for organochloride anaerobic degradation studies. The reactors were then subjected to increasing concentrations of PCP from 0.05 to 10.0 mg.l -1 . PCP degradation and metabolite formation were monitored using gas chromatography, and the effects of PCP on the anaerobic process were verified by monitoring pH, volatile fatty acids, alkalinity, total suspended solids, and chemical oxygen demand. It was found that PCP did not affect reactor performance. All the sludges displayed the best PCP degradation capacity at a concentration of 0.2 mg.l
Short-term effects of GPS collars on the activity, behavior, and adrenal response of scimitar-horned oryx (Oryx dammah)

GPS collars have revolutionized the field of animal ecology, providing detailed information on animal movement and the habitats necessary for species survival. GPS collars also have the potential to cause adverse effects ranging from mild irritation to severe tissue damage, reduced fitness, and death. The impact of GPS collars on the behavior, stress, or activity, however, have rarely been tested on study species prior to release. The objective of our study was to provide a comprehensive assessment of the short-term effects of GPS collars fitted on scimitar-horned oryx (Oryx dammah), an extinct-in-the-wild antelope once widely distributed across Sahelian grasslands in North Africa. We conducted behavioral observations, assessed fecal glucocorticoid metabolites (FGM), and evaluated high-resolution data from tri-axial accelerometers. Using a series of non-standard regression models, we illustrate clear but short-term effects to animals fitted with GPS collars. Behavioral observations highlighted a significant increase in the amount of headshaking from pre-treatment levels, returning below baseline levels during the post-treatment period (>3 days post-collaring). Similarly, FGM concentrations (i.e., stress hormones) increased after GPS collars were fitted on animals but returned to pre-collaring levels within 5 days of collaring. Lastly, tri-axial accelerometers, collecting data at eight positions per second, indicated a > 480 percent increase in the amount of hourly headshaking immediately after collaring. This post-collaring increase in headshaking was estimated to decline in magnitude within 4 hours after GPS collar fitting. These effects constitute a handling and/or habituation response (model dependent), with animals showing short-term responses in activity, behavior, and stress that dissipated within several hours to several days of being fitted with GPS collars. Importantly, none of our analyses indicated any long-term effects that would have more pressing animal welfare concerns.
The Effectiveness of Objective 1 Structural Funds in the EU 15: New Empirical Evidence from NUTS 3 Regions

Based on a sample of 1,084 European regions (EU 15) over the period of 1995–2004, we estimate the determinants of regional growth of GDP per capita, allowing for both spatial lag and spatial error dependence. We find that robust LM tests cannot reject the null hypothesis of no spatial dependence when country dummy variables are included in the growth equation. OLS and robust regression methods show that population density and industry share are significantly and positively related to economic growth. Regions that received EU structural funds have a significantly higher growth of GDP per capita, but the effect is only marginally significant. Blinder-Oaxaca decompositions reveal that the growth differential between Objective 1 regions and the remaining regions is solely due to the difference in the characteristics and not to differences in the coefficients. Finally, we find that the added value gained in Objective 1 regions is much lower than the resources that have been allocated to them.
Author ' s personal copy Ensemble based sensing anomaly detection in wireless sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks are often used to monitor and measure physical characteristics from remote and sometimes hostile environments. In these circumstances the sensing data accuracy is a crucial attribute for the way these applications complete their objectives, requiring efficient solutions to discover sensor anomalies. Such solutions are hard to be found mainly because the intricate defining of the correct sensor behavior in a complex and dynamic environment. This paper tackles the sensing anomaly detection from a new perspective by modeling the correct operation of sensors not by one, but by five different dynamical models, acting synergically to provide a reliable solution. Our methodology relies on an ensemble based system composed of a set of diverse binary classifiers, adequately selected, to implement a complex decisional system on network base station. Moreover, every time a sensing anomaly is discovered, our ensemble offers a reliable estimation to replace the erroneous measurement provided by
Cold hardiness of Phauda flammans (Lepidoptera: Zygaenidae) larvae

This study aimed to determine the cold hardiness of Phauda flammans (Lepidoptera: Zygaenidae) larvae. Supercooling points of the 1st–6th instar larvae of P. flammans ranged from –7.7 to –13.0 °C. The lethal temperatures were –8 °C for 1st, –5 °C for 2nd, and –7 °C for 3rd–6th instars. Lethal times at the instar-specific lethal temperatures were 12 h for 1st, 14 h for 2nd, 15 h for 3rd, 17 h for 4th, and 18 h for 5th–6th instars. The times required for all larvae to die in an incubator at 5 °C were 30 d for 1st, 3rd, 4th, and 5th instars, and 25 d for 2nd and 6th instars. The findings suggest that P. flammans is a chill-intolerant species, and larvae will die if the air temperature decreases to –5 to –8 °C for 12–18 h or to 5 °C for 25–30 d. Such conditions are, however, unlikely to occur in southern China.