Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Hormone therapy and risk of venous thromboembolism among postmenopausal women in Taiwan - a 10-year nationwide population-based study.

BACKGROUND The incidence of venous thromboembolism (VTE) in Asians is lower than in Caucasians, but the risk of VTE associated with hormone therapy (HT) in Taiwanese postmenopausal women has not been determined. METHODS AND RESULTS From Taiwan's National Health Insurance Research Database, we established matched cohorts (HT users and nonusers) of postmenopausal women aged ≥50 years between 1 January 1998 and 31 December 2008. We calculated the 2-year incidence of VTE in HT users and nonusers. HT users and nonusers were matched 1:1 based on propensity-score matching. Cox regression hazard model was used to identify risk factors of VTE. We initially identified 499,594 HT users and 424,963 nonusers. There were higher percentages of cancer and cardiovascular events among the HT nonusers. After matching, the VTE incidence was 4.4 vs. 2.6 per 10,000 patient-years (adjusted hazard ratio 1.796, 95% confidence interval 1.272-2.537) in HT users and nonusers, respectively. The Cox regression hazard model showed that HT use, older age, malignancy, heart failure, and recent major surgery were independent risk factors for VTE. CONCLUSIONS Although the incidence of VTE was very low among this cohort of Taiwanese postmenopausal women, oral HT was still associated with an increased risk of VTE. Therefore, physicians should be aware of other potential VTE risk factors when prescribing oral HT to postmenopausal women.
Satisfaction (sexual, life, relationship, and mental health) is associated directly with penile-vaginal intercourse, but inversely with other sexual behavior frequencies.

INTRODUCTION Some sex therapists and educators assume that many sexual behaviors provide comparable sexual satisfaction. Evidence is required to determine whether sexual behaviors differ in their associations with both sexual satisfaction and satisfaction with other aspects of life. AIMS To test the hypothesis that satisfaction with sex life, life in general, sexual partnership, and mental health correlates directly with frequency of penile-vaginal intercourse (PVI) and inversely with frequency of both masturbation and partnered sexual activity excluding PVI (noncoital sex). METHODS A representative sample of 2,810 Swedes reported frequency of PVI, noncoital sex, and masturbation during the past 30 days, and degree of satisfaction with their sex life, life in general, partnership, and mental health. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Multivariate analyses (for the sexes separately and combined) considering the different satisfaction parameters as dependent variables, and the different types of sexual activities (and age) as putative predictors. RESULTS For both sexes, multivariate analyses revealed that PVI frequency was directly associated with all satisfaction measures (part correlation = 0.50 with sexual satisfaction), masturbation frequency was independently inversely associated with almost all satisfaction measures, and noncoital sex frequencies independently inversely associated with some satisfaction measures (and uncorrelated with the rest). Age did not confound the results. CONCLUSIONS The results are consistent with evidence that specifically PVI frequency, rather than other sexual activities, is associated with sexual satisfaction, health, and well-being. Inverse associations between satisfaction and masturbation are not due simply to insufficient PVI.
Software Sectoral Systems of Innovation in Asia. Empirical Analysis of Industry-Academia Relations

The article compares sectoral systems of innovation (SSI) related to software in the selected Asian countries: China, India, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, focusing on industry-academia relations. It attempts to answer a question about the relevance of scientific research in each of the countries for local software companies, using tech mining research method. The analysis focuses on relevant scientific output of individual countries: publications from Compendex database in a 5-years time frame (2000-2004). The paper characterizes the involvement of private sector in scientific research, identifying the leading regional science-based software firms as well as key foreign vendors, conducting software research in Asia. It subsequently analyzes the balance between basic and applied research by clustering applied research topics and verifying contributions to dominant software domains. Finally, it measures the responsiveness of researchers to emerging technologies. The analysis helps identify potential inefficiencies and strategic threats in the software sectors of the concerned countries
Changing Patterns of International Investment:Implications for Urban Development in Ireland

Ireland is a country which has become extraordinarily dependent on inward investment as the main driver of its economy over the last 50 years. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) "transnationality index" (a composite index based on a number of indicators of the relative intensity of inward investment), Ireland has the second highest level of penetration by foreign direct investment (FDI) in the world (after Hong Kong): its index of 63.2 compares with a weighted average of just over ten for all developed countries (UNCTAD, 2006). This reflects the fact that, unlike countries such as South Korea and Taiwan, which made judicious and selective use of FDI as an aid in the promotion of their indigenous industrial capacity, in Ireland, since the introduction of the inward investment promotion policy in the l~te 1950s, the attraction of inward investment per se has been the main plank of industrial and economic policy.
Prophylaxis of cytomegalovirus infection with ganciclovir in allogeneic marrow transplantation

Abstract: Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is one of the most common causes of morbidity and mortality after allogeneic marrow transplantation. We studied 14 consecutive CMV‐seropositive patients adding ganciclovir (2.5 mg/kg i.v. every 8 hours for 7 days prior to transplant and 6 mg/kg three times a week after neutrophils became > 0.5 times 109/1 and the patients were platelet transfusion‐independent until d 70) to our previous prophylaxis regimen which consisted of intravenous immunoglobulin and acyclovir. The result was compared with 30 consecutive patients whom we studied with our previous regimen. The addition of ganciclovir did not cause any extra toxicities. The incidence of interstitial pneumonitis and cumulative probability of CMV excretion in the first 100 d post‐transplantation was significantly reduced (p = 0.038 and p = 0.035 respectively). The result shows that addition of ganciclovir significantly decreased the incidence of CMV infection in the early post‐transplantation period.
Evaluating Operational and Risk-management Efficiency of Commercial Banks in Vietnam and Taiwan

The commercial bank has formed, existed and developed for many years ago and it has gone with the development of commodity economy. It is also considered as the circulatory system of the capital of national and global economy. Because of its important role towards the economy, especially for market economy, commercial bank becomes more essential with every passing day. In general, commercial bank both holds the balance trade and decides the success or failure of an economy. Vietnam is a developing country and expected to have strong growth potential in the future. Besides, Vietnam has an important geographical location and as a link between Southeast and Northeast Asia. Taiwan is known as the country with a developed economy and has close corporation with Vietnam in recent years. They both are influenced by the impact of global economic crisis and overcome its consequence such as bad debt increasing, falling in investment, etc. For that reason, the purpose of this study is to propose some suggestions to improve performance of commercial banking system in Vietnam and Taiwan by evaluating operational and risk-management efficiency of 44 commercial banks in Vietnam and Taiwan by using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). Applying a two-stage DEA model, this study can assess the whole of banks efficiency. Based on the results of technical efficiency (TE), pure technical efficiency (PTE), scale efficiency (SE), the performance of the banks can be evaluated. Besides, this study also uses the slack analysis is to provide suggestions to improve banks efficiency and sensitivity analysis is to define the elements affect banks operation. Finally, the performance of banking system in Vietnam and Taiwan would be compared.
Corporate corruption and governance--from the perspective of China

Corruption is a difficult problem that troubles developing and developed countries. With economic development and globalization, the number and extent of corporate corruption have increased to gain advantages over competitors in commercial transactions. This article introduces the definition, and causes of corruption in China. Supported with Carroll’s corporate social responsibility pyramid model and Freeman’s stakeholder theory, it explains the difficulties made by corruption in fulfilling corporate social responsibility and the necessity of anti-corruption. Finally, it puts forward some feasible ways to control corporate corruption through analysis of the GlaxoSmithKline bribery case.
The 8th International Conference in Evolutionary Linguistics: August 8-10, 2016, Bloomington, Indiana (USA)

The International Conference in Evolutionary Linguistics held its 8 annual meeting (CIEL8) at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, August 8-10, 2016. 1 It was the first meeting in this series to be held outside of China. The conference was sponsored by many units on campus, including the Office of the Vice President for International Affairs, The College of Arts and Sciences, the Indiana University Ostrom Workshop, the Cognitive Science Program, the Departments of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Linguistics, and Anthropology, the Center for the Integrative Study of Animal Behavior, the East Asian Studies Center, the Australian National University-Indiana University Pan Asia Institute, and the Chinese Flagship Program. In addition, the Stone Age Institute (http://www.stoneageinstitute.org) hosted a beautiful dinner/reception, as well as the closing banquet on the last night. The organizing committee chair was Prof. Thomas Schoenemann, Department of Anthropology at Indiana. A total of 92 papers were submitted from researchers all over the world, including Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Iran, Turkey, Ethiopia, Austria, France, the United Kingdom,
Elections, Checks and Balances, and Government Expenditures: Empirical Evidence for Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan

implicitly assume the executive has full discretion power over fiscal policy, neglecting the role of checks and balances of the legislature. This paper goes beyond traditional PBCs models and sheds light on the case study of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan over the 1988-2007 periods. Based on the results, we find no evidence of electoral impacts on the public expenditures in South Korean and Taiwan's congressional elections. We also noted that PBCs are found on Taiwan’s government expenditures during our sample periods. Furthermore, the results also show that Japan’s legislature has a significant checks and balances on government’s expenditures. However, empirical results show that the legislature veto player in Taiwan neither has effect on the reduction of public expenditures, nor has the moderating effectover Taiwan’s political budget cycles, albeit that they are statistically insignificant. We suggest that the existence of PBCs in Taiwan is due to a weaker system of checks and balances. Our conjecture is that Taiwan either has no legislative veto player or has observed low compliance to the law during the time period examined in our study.
JATE 2.0: Java Automatic Term Extraction with Apache Solr

Automatic Term Extraction (ATE) or Recognition (ATR) is a fundamental processing step preceding many complex knowledge engineering tasks. However, few methods have been implemented as public tools and in particular, available as open-source freeware. Further, little effort is made to develop an adaptable and scalable framework that enables customization, development, and comparison of algorithms under a uniform environment. This paper introduces JATE 2.0, a complete remake of the free Java Automatic Term Extraction Toolkit (Zhang et al., 2008) delivering new features including: (1) highly modular, adaptable and scalable ATE thanks to integration with Apache Solr, the open source free-text indexing and search platform; (2) an extended collection of state-of-the-art algorithms. We carry out experiments on two well-known benchmarking datasets and compare the algorithms along the dimensions of effectiveness (precision) and efficiency (speed and memory consumption). To the best of our knowledge, this is by far the only free ATE library offering a flexible architecture and the most comprehensive collection of algorithms.
(C3) The Oral Epithelial Cell and First Encounters with HIV-1

The oral epithelium is the site of first exposure of HIV-1 to host tissues during oral sex with an infected partner or through breast-feeding by an infected mother. Although the oral epithelium is distinguishable by its apparent resistance, the mucosal surfaces represent a primary target of HIV-1. After oral exposure and swallowing, infection is detected prominently in the gastrointestinal tract, which becomes depleted of CD4+ T-cells. The oral cavity and palatine tonsils appear to resist infection and transfer to susceptible lymphoid cells in the lamina propria by local anti-HIV-1 mechanisms. In some cases, expression of these antiviral mechanisms increases after exposure to HIV-1. During primary exposure and before seroconversion, based on limited in vitro and primate data, a window of opportunity for capture of HIV-1 by the oral epithelium may exist. After seroconversion, the risk of infectious HIV-1 appearing in saliva is negligible. This report considers evidence that oral epithelium has the potential both to enable and to resist infection by HIV-1.
LuxR- and LuxI-Type Quorum-Sensing Circuits Are Prevalent in Members of the Populus deltoides Microbiome

ABSTRACT We are interested in the root microbiome of the fast-growing Eastern cottonwood tree, Populus deltoides. There is a large bank of bacterial isolates from P. deltoides, and there are 44 draft genomes of bacterial endophyte and rhizosphere isolates. As a first step in efforts to understand the roles of bacterial communication and plant-bacterial signaling in P. deltoides, we focused on the prevalence of acyl-homoserine lactone (AHL) quorum-sensing-signal production and reception in members of the P. deltoides microbiome. We screened 129 bacterial isolates for AHL production using a broad-spectrum bioassay that responds to many but not all AHLs, and we queried the available genome sequences of microbiome isolates for homologs of AHL synthase and receptor genes. AHL signal production was detected in 40% of 129 strains tested. Positive isolates included members of the Alpha-, Beta-, and Gammaproteobacteria. Members of the luxI family of AHL synthases were identified in 18 of 39 proteobacterial genomes, including genomes of some isolates that tested negative in the bioassay. Members of the luxR family of transcription factors, which includes AHL-responsive factors, were more abundant than luxI homologs. There were 72 in the 39 proteobacterial genomes. Some of the luxR homologs appear to be members of a subfamily of LuxRs that respond to as-yet-unknown plant signals rather than bacterial AHLs. Apparently, there is a substantial capacity for AHL cell-to-cell communication in proteobacteria of the P. deltoides microbiota, and there are also Proteobacteria with LuxR homologs of the type hypothesized to respond to plant signals or cues.
The European Union’s transformation after Russia’s attack on Ukraine

ABSTRACT Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022 shattered any remaining illusions that closer economic integration with Europe would lead Russia, over time, towards democracy at home and peaceful coexistence with its neighbors abroad. It reinvigorated the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and jolted the European Union (EU) into cutting off trade and energy ties with Russia, while welcoming a massive flow of refugees from war-torn Ukraine. It empowered Central and East European states in the EU, reignited enlargement debates, and shifted NATO and Europe’s borders to the north and east. Introducing a special issue, this article argues that the EU’s peace through integration strategy has always existed side by side with NATO’s peace through strength approach, in a broader European project with blurred boundaries. This war may force the EU to solidify its borders between an internal zone of integration and an external zone of strength projection and geopolitics.
Forecasting Gasoline Price with Time Series Models

This research forecasts the gasoline price in U.S. and analyzes its managerial implications by means of both univariate and multivariate time series forecasting models. Gasoline price forecast is among the most difficulty time series variables during its importance to the economy and extremely volatile nature. The average regular gasoline price in U.S. reached $5.06 per gallon in the month of June 2022, as opposed to $3.41 at the beginning of 2022, a 48% increase. While gasoline prices had been rising over the first half of 2022 due to supply chain disruptions as a result of global Covid 19 lockdowns and the Russia invasion of Ukraine since February 24, 2022, they then surprisingly came down in the second half of 2022 to $3.85 in November 2022, which has caught many consumers and business organizations off-guard. Both univariate time series forecasting models, such as exponential smoothing and autoregressive integrated moving average, and multivariate time series forecasting models, such as time series regression models, are used in this research with the data for the period January 2002 through November 2022. We find that the time series regression model with trend, season, GDP, CPI, and crude oil price turns out the be the best forecasting model both on the training data and the testing data, even with the testing data containing significant turning points. Managerial implications and future research directions are also discussed.
Assessing Censorship on Microblogs in China: Discriminatory

C hina is known as a society in which the government strictly regulates news media and often censors public infor mation. International bodies routinely rank the country's citizens as having the least freedom of speech and freedom of the press. However, on Internet platforms, such as online forums and blogs, the Chinese people seem to have more autonomy to speak on public affairs and can occasionally set a social agenda that successf ully draws media and public attention. 1 Examples include the " My father is Li Gang " or " Guo Mei-mei " incidents that were widely covered in the Western media. These cases support a notion that the Internet in China has played an overarching role in constructing China's public sphere, empowering civil discourse, and helping build the public agenda. 2,3 Recently, China's Twitter equivalent microblog-ging service, weibo, has been enthusiastically depicted by Western media as a new " free speech platform. " 4 This optimistic view is, however, challenged by the Chinese authorities' ubiquitous mechanisms for controlling the public information flow, including the sophisticated filtering system known as the Great Firewall 5 and a new requirement that microbloggers must register with their real identities. 6 The authors investigated the use of microblogs – or weibos – and related censorship practices using 111 million microblogs collected between 1 January and 30 June 2012. Using a matched case-control study design helped researchers determine a list of Chinese terms that discriminate censored and uncensored posts written by the same microbloggers. This list includes homophones and puns created by Chinese microbloggers to circumvent the censors successfully. The study's design also allowed for evaluating the new real-name registration system's impact on microbloggers' posting activities. Findings suggest that this policy might have stopped some microbloggers from writing about social and political subjects. 7 the total number of Chinese microbloggers reached 274 million by mid-2012, comprising 51 percent of the total Internet population. Currently, the two leading Chinese microblog platforms are Sina Weibo and Tencent Weibo, each of which claims more than 300 million registered accounts. To comply with the government's content regulations, all Chinese weibo service providers must establish an internal censorship department to filter sensitive posts. Although a few scholars have examined censorship practices in Chinese blogs 8,9 and micro-blogs, 10 their studies suffer from limitations. Here, we present a new approach to understanding the censorship characteristics of Chinese microblogs and evaluate …
Rightful resistance revisited

James Scott (1985) placed ‘everyday forms of resistance’ between quiescence and rebellion. Others have noted that defiance in unpromising circumstances need not be quiet, disguised and anonymous if the aggrieved use the language of power to mitigate the risks of confrontation. How does ‘rightful resistance’ (O'Brien and Li 2006) relate to Scott's everyday resistance and other types of protest in contemporary China? Are rightful resisters sincere or strategic? Is their contention reactive or proactive? Does rightful resistance suggest growing rights consciousness or only a familiar rules consciousness? Rightful resistance in rural China has been criticized for (1) lacking ‘peasantness’, (2) shortchanging history and culture, (3) focusing on elite allies and one pattern of protest and (4) being overly rationalist, state-centric and caught in ‘developmental thinking’. How do I respond?
Tomography and Location Problems in China Using Regional Travel-Time Data

Abstract : Phase data from the Annual Bulletin of Chinese Earthquakes (ABCE) are being collected and used for tomographic inversion and event location problems within China. So far, we have seven years of data in computer form and six more in catalog form. Current efforts focus on regional tomography of China, comparing locations between the ABCE and other earthquake catalogs, and developing station corrections for International Monitoring System (IMS) stations in and around China. We used the Pn phase data from the ABCE catalog to image the uppermost mantle velocity and anisotropy structure beneath China. Raypaths cover most of central and eastern China; coverage in western China and Tibet is poor. The data quality is exceptional, with Pn phases routinely identified and picked for distances from 1.5 to 9 degrees. Over 25,000 arrivals have been used in the Pn tomography algorithm. The average uppermost mantle velocity beneath China is 8.0 km/s. The Tarim, Junggar, Tsidam, and Sichaun basins have the highest Pn velocities (over 8.2 km/s). These places are cratonic terrains that were accreted to southern Asia before the Indian-Asian collision. The high velocities imply higher density mantle that may have aided in the development of these basins. The eastern Tien Shan has normal Pn velocities of 8.0 to 8.1 km/s. Pn velocity beneath Tibet decreases from south to north as previous studies have also found. Late station delays in and around Tibet attest to its 70-km thick crust. Along the southeastern Tibet margin, low Pn velocities are found, suggesting that high temperatures and possible partial melt exist in the uppermost mantle there. A region of high anisotropy surrounds Tibet. Eastern China has lower Pn velocities and thinner crust as a result of Cenozoic extension of eastern China. A very low Pn velocity (<7.7 km/s) is found north of Hainan Island. This feature may be related to the opening of the South China Sea. We made regional travel-time plots for the ten CDSN stations in