Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Fatty acid metabolism in obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus

Disturbances in pathways of lipolysis and fatty acid handling are of importance in the aetiology of obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus. There is evidence that a lowered catecholamine-mediated lipolytic response may play a role in the development and maintenance of increased adipose tissue stores. Increased adipose tissue stores, a disturbed insulin-mediated regulation of lipolysis and subnormal skeletal muscle non-esterified fatty acid (NEFA) uptake under conditions of high lipolytic rate may increase circulating NEFA concentrations, which may promote insulin resistance and cardiovascular complications. In addition, a disturbance of NEFA uptake by adipose tissue postprandially is also a critical determinant of plasma NEFA concentration. Furthermore, evidence is increasing that insulin-resistant muscle is characterised by a lowered ability to oxidise fatty acids. A dysbalance between fatty acid uptake and fatty acid oxidation may in turn be a factor promoting accumulation of lipid intermediates and triacylglycerols within skeletal muscle, which is strongly associated with skeletal muscle insulin resistance. The present review describes the reported disturbances in pathways of lipolysis and skeletal muscle fatty acid handling, and discusses underlying mechanisms and metabolic consequences of these disturbances.
Between the Suit and the Selfie: Executives’ Lessons on the Social “Micro-Celebrity”

Personal branding is not the exclusive domain of megaphonewielding consumers like our fashion bloggers. Professionals of every shape and size deploy social media platforms to promote their brand image. What can the modern executive learn from this personal branding movement over the past fi ve years? Th e fact is that social branding has been creating grassroots “micro-celebrities” with increasing frequency. Take Bethany Mota, for example: A young girl with a well-targeted YouTube video blog turned her social media fame into a successful line of clothing for Aeropostale.
How Do Performance Targets Affect Future Performance by Students and Schools?

The paper examines whether meeting performance targets in tests at school has an effect on students' subsequent achievement in education and the take-up by schools of financial support from the government for students. We build a theoretical model to describe the channels through which students' belief of their ability, as proxied by previous performance in tests, affect their current effort in preparing for a test, and how previous performance affects the effort in teaching by a school. We find that an increase in the performance target in the first test has an ambiguous effect on the effort exerted for the second test. A higher performance target in the current test increases the effort of low-ability students and teaching effort for low ability students, while it has an ambiguous effect on high ability ones. Finally, an increase in government funding per student increases the effort by students.
Eciency and Liquidity in the Italian Index Option Market

Il lavoro si inserisce nel filone delle indagini sulla microstruttura dei mercati finanziari e propone, con specifico riferimento al mercato dei future e delle opzioni, una metodologia di verifica quantitativa delle relazioni funzionali fra liquidità del mercato ed efficienza dei prezzi. Sul piano metodologico, l’indagine sviluppa, preliminarmente, la costruzione di un modello che, muovendo dalla relazione di parità put-call di Black e Scholes, delinea un criterio di identificazione delle opportunità di arbitraggio fra i prezzi delle opzioni e quelli del corrispondente mercato future ed adduce alla definizione di un sintetico indicatore numerico delle violazioni dell’efficienza del pricing, riferito al mercato delle opzioni e calibrato sul mercato future e su quello del sottostante. L’indicatore che vene definito in un contesto metodologico (prezzi di mercato) indipendente dal modello di pricing eventualmente adottabile è del tutto oggettivo e di facile costruzione, sia per quanto attiene alla fase della sua quantificazione preliminare (nella quale esso viene definito senza tenere conto dei costi di transazione) sia per quanto attiene alla fase del suo adeguamento sulla base dei bid-ask. Dall’analisi congiunta delle dinamiche dell’indicatore di efficienza e di quelle di indicatori del grado di liquidità si traggono significativi riferimenti per la verifica della relazione oggetto di indagine. L’analisi teorica, basata sul predetto impianto, viene applicata ad un campione di dati riferiti al mercato italiano ed in particolare al mercato delle opzioni e dei future sull’indice S&P/MIB con il duplice scopo di testare, da un lato, l’efficienza del pricing dei suddetti mercati e, dall’altro, l’applicabilità sistematica del modello di indagine proposto. The paper investigates the pricing efficiency of the Italian option index markets in an ante-crisis period. Following the well-known model-free approach based on the putcall parity (PCP) of Black and Scholes, we develop a new cross-market methodology for the definition of the violations/inefficiency of the market (not only referable to the Italian market) using the future markets. This model allow us to cope several of the critical points rises by the literature about the implementation of the PCP to empirical dataset as the inclusion of the dividends and/or the choice of an adequate risk-free rate. These violations are also analyzed with respect to measures of liquidity as the number of contracts. This model is applied to a unique intraday dataset including options, futures and underlying values. The empirical results suggest a quite high level of pricing efficiency in the Italian Option market to be compared to a selected post-crisis period and a weak negative relation between inefficiency and liquidity. Preprint submitted to 2009 ADEIMF Conference Palermo June 2, 2009
Advertising Engagement: A Driver of Message Involvement on Message Effects

ABSTRACT Engagement plays a contingent role in the effectiveness of advertising processing that corresponds to the message effects created during the process. Such message effects are advertising recall, message involvement, message believability, attitude toward the message (AM), and attitude toward the advertisement (AAD). This study's objective is to examine whether higher engagement initiated by contextual relevance increases advertising recall, message involvement, message believability, AM, and AAD. The results have revealed that higher engagement increases advertising recall, message involvement, message believability, AM, and AAD. Moreover, message involvement mediates the engagement effect on message believability, whereas AM mediates message believability on AAD. Implications based on the findings demonstrate the importance of engagement as a driver of message involvement and a metric for advertising effectiveness.
Pose estimation for multi-camera systems

We build a multi-camera platform and present a relevant approach for pose estimation of the multi-camera system with known internal camera parameters. The proposed approach is able to solve the pose estimation, for a three-camera system that main camera has overlapping views with the left camera and the right camera respectively. By taking advantage of the optical flow method and the key frame policy to track the feature points, using Kalman filter (KF) to manage 3D points and adopting bundle adjustment (BA) to optimize the pose of the main camera, the experiment shows that the pose estimation results of the multi-camera system have good robustness.
Competitive intelligence in practice: empirical evidence from the UK retail banking sector

This paper presents the findings of an empirical study of the major UK retail banks, the purpose of which was to investigate, not only how they operate their competitive intelligence gathering activities, but the degree to which they "buy-in" to the information sharing attitude. The findings were applied to a best practice model which provides a clear picture of the current status of CI in these establishments and the attitudes of senior managers toward such activity. Recommendations are made on the improvements which would be required for the sector to be considered effective and efficient operators of CI practice.
Using the Framework of Distributed Cognition in the Evaluation of a Collaborative Tool

This paper reports on the preliminary findings of an on-going research on the usability of an interactive tabletop, DiamondTouch in a computer-supported collaborative design environment. It summarizes the analysis of the collaborative design activities around the table. Modelled after a household coffee table, DiamondTouch provides users with an informal environment where users can sit on comfortable chairs while interacting with the table concurrently. The framework of distributed cognition was used as an analytic tool which demonstrated how the communicative events around the tabletop were used to bring the design representations into coordination with one another and how information processing activity was performed. Researcher examined the relationship between actors, artifacts, and the settings in which interactions occur. Within a single conceptual framework, the representations flowing through functional systems as objects of analysis could be identified and allowed researcher to reason about design artifacts and cognitive artifacts. These helped in identifying characteristics which could enhance the usability of DiamondTouch, and potential weaknesses of the tabletop.
The Slovak Spas in the Light of the Health Care System

Abstract Demographic trends in population ageing have put increasing pressure on health care costs. These include spa care expenses. Thus, the aim of this article is to analyse the importance of public health insurance in the utilisation of spa accommodation capacities, the health insurers' spa care expenses, and the trends in the number of self-payers. Besides, it analyses spa care by treatment specialisation and the number of foreign visitors to Slovak spas. The health insurers' limited spa care expenses place greater emphasis on the creation by spas of wellness products and on the building up of relationships through destination management organisations that enable the integration of resources for marketing activities.
Electronic procurement and manufacturing strategic objectives

There is increasing recognition in recent years that the procurement function has much strategic relevance with the competitiveness of manufacturing firms. On the other hand, the advent of the internet has greatly affected the way organisations procure goods and services. Much discussion has been presented in the literature on how the application of the internet could result in costs as well as time savings. However, given the strategic importance of the procurement function, the objectives of any initiatives should not be assessed in terms of costs and time savings only, as strategic competitiveness of manufacturing companies are also determined by other aspects, including quality, flexibility, and innovation. This paper is an attempt to offer a more holistic conceptual view on how e-procurement contributes to various aspects of procurement management in manufacturing companies and how their competitive objectives are affected. The paper also outlines opportunities for future research in the relevant field.
Retrieval of Cloud Microphysical Properties from MODIS and AIRS

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) measurements from the NASA Earth Observing System Aqua satellite enable global monitoring of the distribution of clouds during day and night. The MODIS is able to provide a high-spatial-resolution (1–5 km) cloud mask, cloud classification mask, cloud-phase mask, cloud-top pressure (CTP), and effective cloud amount during both the daytime and the nighttime, as well as cloud particle size (CPS) and cloud optical thickness (COT) at 0.55 m during the daytime. The AIRS high-spectral-resolution measurements reveal cloud properties with coarser spatial resolution (13.5 km at nadir). Combined, MODIS and AIRS provide cloud microphysical properties during both the daytime and nighttime. A fast cloudy radiative transfer model for AIRS that accounts for cloud scattering and absorption is described in this paper. Onedimensional variational (1DVAR) and minimum-residual (MR) methods are used to retrieve the CPS and COT from AIRS longwave window region (790–970 cm 1 or 10.31–12.66 m, and 1050–1130 cm 1 or 8.85–9.52 m) cloudy radiance measurements. In both 1DVAR and MR procedures, the CTP is derived from the AIRS radiances of carbon dioxide channels while the cloud-phase information is derived from the collocated MODIS 1-km phase mask for AIRS CPS and COT retrievals. In addition, the collocated 1-km MODIS cloud mask refines the AIRS cloud detection in both 1DVAR and MR procedures. The atmospheric temperature profile, moisture profile, and surface skin temperature used in the AIRS cloud retrieval processing are from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts forecast analysis. The results from 1DVAR are compared with the operational MODIS products and MR cloud microphysical property retrieval. A Hurricane Isabel case study shows that 1DVAR retrievals have a high correlation with either the operational MODIS cloud products or MR cloud property retrievals. 1DVAR provides an efficient way for cloud microphysical property retrieval during the daytime, and MR provides the cloud microphysical property retrievals during both the daytime and nighttime.
A New Fast Facial Recognition Algorithm Applicable to Large Databases

In this contribution, a transform domain two-dimensional principal component analysis algorithm employing vector quantization (TD2DPCA/VQ) is presented for facial recognition, particularly for large databases. The algorithm has attractive properties with respect to storage requirements in the training mode and the computational complexity in the testing mode. The experimental results obtained by applying the new algorithm to the ORL database confirmed the significant reduction in the storage and computational requirements while improving the excellent recognition accuracy of the spatial 2DPCA method
Frame Switch Splicing and Regulated Intramembrane Proteolysis: Key Words to Understand the Unfolded Protein Response

Proteins must be correctly folded and assembled to fulfill their functions as assigned by genetic code. All living cells have developed systems to counteract protein unfolding or misfolding. A typical example of such a homeostatic response is triggered when unfolded proteins are accumulated in the endoplasmic reticulum. Eukaryotic cells cope with endoplasmic reticulum stress by attenuating translation, generally to decrease the burden on the folding machinery, as well as by inducing transcription of endoplasmic reticulum‐localized molecular chaperones and folding enzymes to augment folding capacity. These translational and transcriptional controls are collectively termed the unfolded protein response. The unfolded protein response is unique in that the molecular mechanisms it uses to transmit signals from the endoplasmic reticulum lumen to the nucleus are completely different from those used for signaling from the plasma membrane. Frame switch splicing (a term newly proposed here) and regulated intramembrane proteolysis (proposed by Brown et al., Cell 2000; 100: 391–398) employed by the unfolded protein response represent novel ways to activate a signaling molecule post‐transcriptionally and post‐translationally, respectively. They are critically involved in various cellular regulation pathways ranging from bacterial extracytoplasmic stress response to differentiation of mature B cells into antibody‐secreting plasma cells. Further, mammalian cells take advantage of differential properties between the two mechanisms to determine the fate of proteins unfolded or misfolded in the endoplasmic reticulum. This review focuses on the transcriptional control that occurs during the unfolded protein response in various species.
Succession rates and patterns twelve years after land use abandonment in the estuary of the river aliakmon, n. greece

Abstract Vegetation succession is a key element for research studying biodiversity losses, effects of climatic change on ecosystems, invasive species and restoration of ecosystems in which human activities have shifted their natural or semi-natural vegetation. Surrogate variables like Pignatti's bioindicator values or dissimilarity indices can provide further insights regarding succession trajectories aggregating the combined effects of changes in the cover/abundance of taxa. The land-use abandonment in an area in the estuary of the River Aliakmon, N. Greece, provides an opportunity to study medium-term rates and patterns during the first twelve years of vegetation succession. Cluster and time-series analyses of turnover rates, Sørensen's dissimilarity index and Pignatti's bioindicator values revealed clear differences in succession patterns and rates among permanent plots. Succession rates and patterns in the study area were found to be dominated by two ecological factors. On the one hand, availability of fresh water, assumed by the proximity to the river, allows the fast growing Populus alba to develop a forest canopy that radically alters the shading environment which, in its turn, controls succession trajectories. Increased soil salinity on the other hand, allows salt-tolerant taxa to be quickly established, and defines the species inventory on these sites as early as the first years of succession.
Acute Neuronal Apoptosis in a Rat Model of Multiple Sclerosis

Demyelination caused by inflammation of the CNS has been considered to be a major hallmark of multiple sclerosis (MS). Using experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis, a model of MS, we demonstrate that an immune-mediated attack of the optic nerve is accompanied by an early degeneration of retinal ganglion cells (RGCs). The decrease of neuronal cell density was correlated with functional disabilities as assessed by visual evoked cortical potentials and electroretinogram. Visual acuity was significantly reduced. DNA degradation and activation of caspase-3 in RGCs indicate that cell death of RGCs is apoptotic. These findings show for the first time that an inflammatory attack against myelin components can lead to acute neuronal cell loss by apoptosis.
Characteristics of Successful Family Businesses

In response to the statistics showing high mortality among family businesses, this study looks at a group of Spanish family businesses (FBs) that have demonstrated an ability to grow and innovate. Typically, these FBs have gained prestige in the Spanish economy not only because they have reached the top 1000, but also because they have stayed there for over 30 years. We collected data from interviews with the managers of 21 of the 64 companies that fulfilled both these conditions. Our aim was to learn from these successful business leaders what, in their personal opinion, had been the driving force behind their firms' success. The factors they mentioned included a set of values that successful business families have made a way of life. They are what we have called the "ELISA" values. These values are the bedrock of these firms' culture, inspiring top performance, reducing the cost of capital, and resolving other related issues that are made easy to deal with by adherence to these values.
Hyperspectral Image Classification With Canonical Correlation Forests

Multiple classifier systems or ensemble learning is an effective tool for providing accurate classification results of hyperspectral remote sensing images. Two well-known ensemble learning classifiers for hyperspectral data are random forest (RF) and rotation forest (RoF). In this paper, we proposed to use a novel decision tree (DT) ensemble method, namely, canonical correlation forest (CCF). More specifically, several individual canonical correlation trees (CCTs) that are binary DTs, which use canonical correlation components for the hyperplane splitting, are used to construct the CCF. Additionally, we adopt the projection bootstrap technique in CCF, in which the full spectral bands are retained for split selection in the projected space. The techniques aforementioned allow the CCF to improve the accuracy of member classifiers and diversity within the ensemble. Furthermore, the CCF is extended to the spectral-spatial frameworks that incorporate Markov random fields, extended multiattribute profiles (EMAPs), and the ensemble of independent component analysis and rolling guidance filter (E-ICA-RGF). Experimental results on six hyperspectral data sets are used to indicate the comparative effectiveness of the proposed method, in terms of accuracy and computational complexity, compared with RF and RoF, and it turns out that CCF is a promising approach for hyperspectral image classification not only with spectral information but also in the spectral-spatial frameworks.
Charge movement in skeletal muscle fibers paralyzed by the calcium-entry blocker D600.

We report measurements of nonlinear charge movement in frog skeletal muscle fibers paralyzed by the calcium-entry blocker [Schwartz, A. & Taira, N. , eds. (1983) Circ. Res. 52, Part II, Number 2, 1-181. ] D600 (methoxyverapamil, recently renamed gallopamil). Nonlinear charge movement was not seen in such fibers, suggesting that the drug severs the link between membrane depolarization and the main components of charge movement. This is the only pharmacological agent that blocks the main components of charge movement.
A Model-Based Shot Boundary Detection Technique Using Frame Transition Parameters

We have presented a unified model for detecting different types of video shot transitions. Based on the proposed model, we formulate frame estimation scheme using the previous and the next frames. Unlike other shot boundary detection algorithms, instead of properties of frames, frame transition parameters and frame estimation errors based on global and local features are used for boundary detection and classification. Local features include scatter matrix of edge strength and motion matrix. Finally, the frames are classified as no change (within shot frame), abrupt change, or gradual change frames using a multilayer perceptron network. The proposed method is relatively less dependent on user defined thresholds and is free from sliding window size as widely used by various schemes found in the literature. Moreover, handling both abrupt and gradual transitions along with non-transition frames under a single framework using model guided visual feature is another unique aspect of the work.
Trust in a Principled Filesystem

Users typically have little reason to trust that systems will protect user data against unauthorized access. A prototype filesystem stack was implemented with a structure designed to provide such assurance by preventing filesystem administrators and most filesystem code from violating user data security goals. The design instantiates a number of well-known security principles that have been proposed for the design of trustworthy systems. Benchmark results indicate the associated performance