LIMITING BIRTHRATE DECLINE : AN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF RECENT PRO-NATALIST MEASURES

Bachelor'sBACHELOR OF SOCIAL SCIENCES (HONOURS

The competitive advantage of nations : the case of Guangxi, assessing Porter's framework for national advantage.

86 p.The focus of our research is on Guangxi's competitive position as a region. Our initial plan was to first understand the critical success factors of CAEXPO in attracting participation from the ASEAN countries and secondly, its impact on the economic development of Guangxi. Through CAEXPO, we were able to understand what it takes for Guangxi to become a competitive region in China.Master of Business Administratio

A Circulating miRNA Signature for Stratification of Breast Lesions among Women with Abnormal Screening Mammograms

Although mammography is the gold standard for breast cancer screening, the high rates of false-positive mammograms remain a concern. Thus, there is an unmet clinical need for a non-invasive and reliable test to differentiate between malignant and benign breast lesions in order to avoid subjecting patients with abnormal mammograms to unnecessary follow-up diagnostic procedures. Serum samples from 116 malignant breast lesions and 64 benign breast lesions were comprehensively profiled for 2,083 microRNAs (miRNAs) using next-generation sequencing. Of the 180 samples profiled, three outliers were removed based on the principal component analysis (PCA), and the remaining samples were divided into training (n = 125) and test (n = 52) sets at a 70:30 ratio for further analysis. In the training set, significantly differentially expressed miRNAs (adjusted p < 0.01) were identified after correcting for multiple testing using a false discovery rate. Subsequently, a predictive classification model using an eight-miRNA signature and a Bayesian logistic regression algorithm was developed. Based on the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis in the test set, the model could achieve an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.9542. Together, this study demonstrates the potential use of circulating miRNAs as an adjunct test to stratify breast lesions in patients with abnormal screening mammograms