LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Evaluating the effectiveness of personal resilience and enrichment programme (PREP) for HIV prevention among female sex workers: a randomised controlled trial

BACKGROUND
Female sex workers (FSWs) are often considered as the vector, if not reservoir, of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. Building upon the existing evidence on the role of psychological health in sexual health, the aim of this protocol is to describe a trial investigating the effectiveness of the Personal Resilience and Enrichment Programme (PREP), a resilience-promoting intervention that targets at psychological well-being i.e. self-esteem, self-efficacy and coping, to facilitate adaptation and ultimately safe sexual practices among FSWs, which could be an innovative strategy in controlling the spread of these infections.


METHODS
A total of 132 FSWs will be recruited and randomly assigned to either the intervention or usual care (control) groups in a multi-centred randomised controlled trial. Based on the resilience framework, this intervention is comprised of six weekly sessions focused on the awareness, expression and management of emotions, identifying roles and personal strengths, and effective problem-solving skills. Complex intervention assessment on both intervention process and effectiveness will be adopted when the primary outcome reduction of sexual risk behaviour and other psychological outcomes include their perceived stress, self-esteem, self-efficacy, coping overall resilience, and psychological distress will be measured at baseline, post-treatment and 3-month post-intervention and differences assessed by ANOVA. The relationship of resilience factors, psychological health and HIV preventive behaviours will be evaluated using structural equation modelling.


DISCUSSION
It is anticipated that this study will increase our understanding of the relationships between individual resilience attributes, positive adaptation, psychological health and sexual health practices. If successful, this programme will provide an innovative direction for HIV prevention by applying the personal resilience factors to promote both psychological well-being and safe sex for this high risk population.


TRIAL REGISTRATION
ChiCTR-PRC-13003091.
Real Analysis for Complex Systems

Formal verification techniques are used routinely in finite-state digital circuits. Theorem proving is also used successfully for infinite-state discrete systems. But many safety-critical computers are actually embedded in physical systems. Hybrid systems [1] model complex physical systems as dynamical systems with interacting discrete transitions and continuous evolutions along differential equations. They arise frequently in many application domains, including aviation, automotive, railway, and robotics. There is a well-understood theory for proving programs. But what about complex physical systems? How can we prove that a hybrid system works as expected, e.g., an aircraft does not crash into another one? This talk illustrates the complexities and pitfalls of hybrid systems verification. It describes a theoretical and practical foundation for deductive verification of hybrid systems called differential dynamic logic (dL). The proof calculus for this logic is interesting from a theoretical perspective, because it is a complete axiomatization of hybrid systems relative to differential equations. The approach is of considerable practical interest too. Its implementation in the theorem prover KeYmaera [7] has been used successfully to verify collision avoidance properties in the European Train Control System [8] and air traffic control systems [6]. The number of dimensions and nonlinearities in they hybrid dynamics of these systems is surprisingly tricky such that they are still out of scope for other verification tools. This talk is based on recent work [2, 3, 4]. More comprehensive details can be found in a corresponding book [5].
Enterprise Resource Planning: A Trio of Resources

Enterprise Resource Planning: A Trio of Resources Cindy P. Stevens a a Currently an assistant professor at Wentworth Institute of Technology, Boston, Massachusetts, for the Management of Technology (BMT) program. She holds an M.A. in Technical and Professional Communication from East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina, and a Ph.D. in Technology Management specializing in Digital Communications from Indiana State University. She can be reached at stevensc@wit.edu. Published online: 21 Dec 2006.
A Machine Learning Approach to Musical Style Recognition

Much of the work on perception and understanding of music by computers has focused on low-level perceptual features such as pitch and tempo. Our work demonstrates that machine learning can be used to build e ective style classi ers for interactive performance systems. We also present an analysis explaining why these techniques work so well when hand-coded approaches have consistently failed. We also describe a reliable real-time performance style classi er.
Predicting Markov-Switching Vector Autoregressive Processes

Abstract While there has been a great deal of interest in the modelling of non-linearities and regime shifts in economic time series, there is no clear consensus regarding the forecasting abilities of these models. In this paper we develop a general approach to predict multiple time series subject to Markovian shifts in the regime. The feasibility of the proposed forecasting techniques in empirical research is demonstrated and their forecast accuracy is evaluated.
Optimatch: Applying Constraint Programming to Workforce Management of Highly-skilled Employees

Today many companies face the challenge of matching highly-skilled professionals to high-end positions in large organizations and human deployment agencies. Unlike traditional Workforce Management problems such as shift scheduling, highly-skilled employees are professionally distinguishable from each other and hence non-interchangeable. Our work specifically focuses on the services industry, where much of the revenue comes from the assignment of highly professional workers. Here, non-accurate matches may result in significant monetary losses and other negative effects. We deal with very large pools of both positions and employees, where optimal decisions should be made rapidly in a dynamic environment. Since traditional Operations Research (OR) methods fail to answer this problem, we employ Constraint Programming (CP), a subfield of Artificial Intelligence with strong algorithmic foundations. Our CP model builds on new constraint propagators designed for this problem (but applicable elsewhere), as well as on information retrieval methods used for analyzing the complex text describing high-end professionals and positions. Optimatch, which is based on this technology and is being used by IBM services organizations, provides strong experimental results.
MRI in the diagnosis of Mayer-Rokitansky-Kuster-Hauser syndrome.

PURPOSE
The aim of this study was to establish the role of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in patients with Mayer-Rokitansky-Kuster-Hauser syndrome (MRKHS).


MATERIALS AND METHODS
Sixteen female MRKHS patients (mean age, 19.4 years; range, 11-39 years) were studied using MRI. Two experienced radiologists evaluated all the images in consensus to assess the presence or absence of the ovaries, uterus, and vagina. Additional urogenital or vertebral pathologies were also noted.


RESULTS
Of the 16 patients, complete aplasia of uterus was seen in five patients (31.3%). Uterine hypoplasia or remnant uterus was detected in 11 patients (68.8%). Ovaries were clearly seen in 10 patients (62.5%), and in two of the 10 patients, no descent of ovaries was detected. In five patients, ovaries could not be detected on MRI. In one patient, agenesis of right ovary was seen, and the left ovary was in normal shape. Of the 16 cases, 11 (68.8%) had no other extragenital abnormalities. Additional abnormalities were detected in six patients (37.5%). Two of the six had renal agenesis, and one patient had horseshoe kidney; renal ectopy was detected in two patients, and one patient had urachal remnant. Vertebral abnormalities were detected in two patients; one had L5 posterior fusion defect, bilateral hemisacralization, and rotoscoliosis, and the other had coccygeal vertebral fusion.


CONCLUSION
MRI is a useful and noninvasive imaging method in the diagnosis and evaluation of patients with MRKHS.
PPARγ Pro12Ala interacts with fat intake for obesity and weight loss in a behavioural treatment based on the Mediterranean diet.

SCOPE
The goal of this study was to examine whether the Pro12Ala polymorphism of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ) is associated with insulin resistance, obesity and weight loss and to analyze potential interactions between fat intake and PPARγ polymorphism in a Spanish overweight/obese population.


MATERIALS AND METHODS
We recruited 1465 subjects enrolled in a behavioural treatment program for obesity based on a Mediterranean diet, which included the following: dietary treatment, physical activity, nutritional education and behavioral techniques. A significant association was found between PPARγ2 Pro12Ala genotype and plasma insulin concentration and homeostasis model assessment insulin resistance. Subjects with the Ala12 genotype had lower insulin levels than those with the Pro12Pro genotype. We detected a gene-diet interaction between the PPARγ Pro12Ala polymorphism and MUFA for BMI and body fat. Furthermore, we detected an interaction between the PPARγ Pro12Ala polymorphism and fat intake for total weight loss (p<0.001). When total fat intake was high, Ala12-carriers exhibited a significantly lower percentage of total weight loss than major-allele-carriers (p=0.037).


CONCLUSION
Data are consistent with previous results showing a protective role for the Ala12 allele against insulin resistance, and replicate an earlier study that detected an interaction between dietary MUFA and PPARγ2 for BMI. Our detection of a gene-diet interaction between PPARγ Pro12Ala and fat intake for weight loss may explain previous discrepancies among different studies.
Modeling the influence of APOC3, APOE, and TNF polymorphisms on the risk of antiretroviral therapy-associated lipid disorders.

BACKGROUND
Single-nucleotide polymorphisms in genes involved in lipoprotein and adipocyte metabolism may explain why dyslipidemia and lipoatrophy occur in some but not all antiretroviral therapy (ART)-treated individuals.


METHODS
We evaluated the contribution of APOC3 -482C-->T, -455T-->C, and 3238C-->G; epsilon 2 and epsilon 4 alleles of APOE; and TNF -238G-->A to dyslipidemia and lipoatrophy by longitudinally modeling >2600 lipid determinations and 2328 lipoatrophy assessments in 329 ART-treated patients during a median follow-up period of 3.4 years.


RESULTS
In human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected individuals, the effects of variant alleles of APOE on plasma cholesterol and triglyceride levels and of APOC3 on plasma triglyceride levels were comparable to those reported in the general population. However, when treated with ritonavir, individuals with unfavorable genotypes of APOC3 and [corrected] APOE were at risk of extreme hypertriglyceridemia. They had median plasma triglyceride levels of 7.33 mmol/L, compared with 3.08 mmol/L in the absence of ART. The net effect of the APOE*APOC3*ritonavir interaction was an increase in plasma triglyceride levels of 2.23 mmol/L. No association between TNF -238G-->A and lipoatrophy was observed.


CONCLUSIONS
Variant alleles of APOE and APOC3 contribute to an unfavorable lipid profile in patients with HIV. Interactions between genotypes and ART can lead to severe hyperlipidemia. Genetic analysis may identify patients at high risk for severe ritonavir-associated hypertriglyceridemia.
Fatigue Life Prediction and Analysis of Wafer Level Packages with SnAgCu Solder Balls

Currently, various mainly tin-based lead free solders are in use or under evaluation. Many solder fatigue models have been developed to predict the fatigue life of solder joints under low-cycle fatigue conditions, however, because of the diversity of solders, more work is needed in this respect. The theoretical fatigue life prediction of solder joints, based upon non-linear finite element (FE-) calculation results, requires both a solder constitutive model and a Coffin-Manson type failure criterion, if an engineering type of evaluation is chosen. The material investigated was near-eutectic SnAgCu solder with lower silver content, i.e Sn98.5Ag1Cu0.5, which is one choice currently discussed. Properties like the lower creep resistance but a better brittle failure performance combined with lower cost can make the SnAg1Cu0. 5 solder a candidate material for a broader application. The study deals with the low-cycle fatigue performance of this material. A special wafer level test package (WLP) was used for the evaluation. The derived fatigue model is based on experimentally observed low-cycle fatigue data compared to FE results. In FEA effects of input quantities scatter, of different element types and mesh densities, and different analysis codes are studied and a general averaging strategy, to be used in Coffin-Manson type failure criterions for ball interconnects, is proposed
CrossFlow: cross-organizational workflow management in dynamic virtual enterprises *

In this report, we present the approach to cross-organizational workflow management of the CrossFlow project. CrossFlow is a European research project aiming at the support of cross-organizational workflows in dynamic virtual enterprises. The cooperation in these virtual enterprises is based on dynamic service outsourcing specified in electronic contracts. Service enactment is performed by dynamically linking the workflow management infrastructures of the involved organizations. Extended service enactment support is provided in the form of cross-organizational transaction management and process control, advanced quality of service monitoring, and support for high-level flexibility in service enactment. CrossFlow technology is realized on top of a commercial workflow management platform and applied in two real-world scenarios in the contexts of a logistics and an insurance company. ♣ The work presented in this paper is supported by the European Commission as ESPRIT project No. 28635.
Oil prices, exchange rates and asset prices

This paper takes a financial market perspective in examining the relationship between oil prices, the US dollar and asset prices, and it exploits the heteroskedasticity for the identification of causality in a multifactor model. It finds a bidirectional causality between the US dollar and oil prices since the early 2000s. Moreover, both oil prices and the US dollar are significantly affected by changes in equity market returns and risk. By contrast, oil prices did not react to changes in these financial assets before 2001. The paper provides evidence that this may be explained by the increased use of oil as a financial asset over the past decade, which intensified the link between oil and other assets. The model can account well for the strong and rising negative correlation between oil prices and the US dollar since the early 2000s, with risk shocks and the financialisation process of oil prices explaining most of the strengthening of this correlation.
Comparison of the clinical characteristics and outcomes of Klebsiella pneumoniae and Streptococcus pneumoniae meningitis.

This multicenter, retrospective cohort study compared the clinical characteristics and outcomes of community-acquired Klebsiella pneumoniae meningitis (CA-KPM) with those of community-acquired Streptococcus pneumoniae meningitis (CA-SPM). Eighty-three adult patients, 27 with CA-KPM and 56 with CA-SPM, were included. Diabetes mellitus (48.1% versus 21.4%; P=0.01) and liver cirrhosis (22.2% versus 5.4%; P=0.05) were more commonly associated with CA-KPM. Comatose mental status (40.7% versus 12.5%; P=0.01), septic shock (44.4% versus 8.9%; P<0.001), and concomitant extrameningeal infections (40.7% versus 7.1%; P=0.001) were also more common in the CA-KPM group. The 28-day mortality (44.4% versus 10.7%; P<0.001) and inhospital mortality (51.9% versus 14.3%; P<0.001) were higher in the CA-KPM group. In conclusion, diabetes mellitus and liver cirrhosis are more common in the CA-KPM patients who were also more likely to present with severe manifestations and poor outcomes.
LIE EXPERTS ' BELIEFS ABOUT NONVERBAL INDICATORS OF DECEPTION

. Beliefs about behavioral clues to deception were investigated in 212 people, consisting of prisoners, police detectives, patrol police officers, prison guards, customs officers, and college students. Previous studies, mainly conducted with college students as subjects, showed that people have some incorrect beliefs about behavioral clues to deception. It was hypothesized that prisoners would have the best notion about clues of deception, due to the fact that they receive the most adequate feedback about successful deception strategies. The results supported this hypothesis. In deception research a distinction is usually made between actual and perceived indicators of deception (DePaulo, Stone, & Lassiter, 1985, Zuckerman, DePaulo, & Rosenthai, 1981). Actual indicators of deception consist of nonverbal behaviors which have been found to be associated with deception. Perceived indicators of deception are nonverbal behaviors that observers associate with deception, regardless of whether such behavior is a manifestation of actual deception. Meta:analyses of actual indicators of deception (DePaulo, 1992; DePaulo et al., 1985; Ekman, 1989; Vrij, 1991; Zuckerman & Driver, 1985; Zuckerman et al., 1981) provide empirical evidence that deceiving others is correlated with several nonverbal behaviors, such as an increase in speech disturbances (both more ahs and non-ahs), a higher-pitched voice, a slower speech rate, a longer latency period, and a decrease in leg/foot movements and hand/arm movements. The emotional, cognitive, and control approaches have been offered to explain these findings. In the emotional approach (Knapp, Hart, & Dennis, 1974; KOhnken, 1989; Riggio & Friedman, 1983) it is emphasized that deceiving causes physiological reactions, such as high blood pressure, increased heart rate, and increased respiration rate. The physiological reaction is the conseAddress correspondence to Aldert Vrij, University of Portsmouth, Department of Psychology, King Charles Street, Portsmouth PO1 2ER, United Kingdom. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior 20(I), Spring 1996 @ 1996 Human 5cier~c~ Pres~,/nc. 65
After the Gold Rush: Establishing a True Profession of Software Engineering

Award-winning author Steve McConnell offers candid reflections upon the state of software development today and a critical look at the work needed to turn software engineering into a true profession. This talk highlights key trends and calls for a more rigorous and standards-based profession. The ideas presented in this talk will help software developers step back from the day-to-day rush of their work and think about where their careers and the industry are heading. Bio Steve McConnel1 is Chief Software Engineer at Construx Software. In 1998, readers of Software Development named Steve one of the three most influential people in the software industry, along with Bill Gates and Linus Torvalds. His first two books (Code Complete and Rapid Development) won Software Development magazine's Jolt Excellence award for outstanding software development books of their respective years. McConnel1 has also written numerous technical articles and volunteers as Editor in Chief of IEEE Software magazine. His most recent book is After the Gold Rush: Creating a True Profession of Software Engineering. He can be reached at stevemcc@construx.com. Proceedings of the 14th Conference on Software Engineering Education and Training (CSEET01) 1093-0175 $10.00 © 2001 IEEE
Influence of BMI, Age and duration of diabetes mellitus on glycaemic control with twice-daily injections of biphasic insulin aspart 30 versus multiple daily injections of insulin aspart (JDDM 18): retrospective reanalysis of a 6-month, randomized, open-label, multicentre trial in Japan.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE
Good glycaemic control in patients with diabetes mellitus often requires insulin supplementation therapy. Recent developments of analogue insulin and premixed formulations have increased the therapeutic options for patients who need such therapy. This study aimed to retrospectively clarify appropriate treatment regimens according to age, body mass index (BMI) and duration of diabetes in Japanese patients with type 2 diabetes previously entered in an open-label, randomized trial that compared convenience-oriented biphasic insulin aspart 30 versus multiple injections of insulin aspart with or without NPH insulin.


METHODS
Japanese insulin-naïve patients were randomized to receive either biphasic insulin aspart 30 twice daily or insulin aspart three times daily with or without multiple injections of NPH insulin for a treatment period lasting 6 months.


RESULTS
Reduction of glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA(1c)) at the end of 6 months was not different in the two treatment groups irrespective of BMI, age and duration of diabetes. However, the achievement rate of HbA(1c) <7.0% was significantly higher in patients with a BMI <25 kg/m2 in the multiple-injection group and tended to be higher in patients with a diabetes duration <10 years in the twice-daily injection group.


CONCLUSION
Twice-daily injections of biphasic insulin aspart 30 may be more suitable for obese patients whereas multiple injections of insulin aspart with or without NPH insulin may be preferable for those with a longer duration of diabetes.