LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Wide Variations in Compliance with Tuberculosis Screening Guidelines and Tuberculosis Incidence between Antiretroviral Therapy Facilities — Côte d’Ivoire

BACKGROUND
In Côte d'Ivoire, tuberculosis (TB) is a common cause of death among HIV-infected antiretroviral therapy (ART) enrollees. Ivorian guidelines recommend screening for TB and initiation of TB treatment before ART initiation. Compliance with these guidelines can help reduce TB-related mortality during ART and possibly nosocomial TB transmission.


METHODS AND FINDINGS
In a retrospective cohort study among 3,682 randomly selected adults (≥15 years old) starting ART during 2004-2007 at 34 randomly selected facilities, documentation of TB screening completion, prevalence of active TB at ART initiation, and incidence of TB during ART were evaluated. At ART initiation, median age was 36 years, 67% were female, and median CD4 count was 135 cells/μL. Among all 3,682 enrollees, 73 (2%) were on TB treatment at the time of referral to the ART facility. Among the 3,609 not on TB treatment, 1,263 (36%) were documented to receive some TB screening before ART initiation; 21% were screened for cough, 21% for weight loss, 18% for fever, 18% for TB contacts, and 12% for night sweats. Among the 1,263 screened, 111 (11%) were diagnosed with TB and started TB treatment before ART. No associations between patient characteristics and probability of being screened were noted. However, documentation of TB screening completion before ART varied widely by ART facility from 0-100%. TB incidence during ART was 3.0 per 100 person-years but varied widely by ART facility from 0/100 person-year to 13.1/100 person-years.


CONCLUSIONS
Screening for TB before ART initiation was poorly documented. Facility-level variations in TB screening documentation suggest facility-level factors, such as investment in training programs, might determine documentation practices. Targeting under-performing ART facilities with improvement activities is needed. Variations among facilities in TB incidence warrant further research. These incidence variations could reflect differences between facilities in TB screening, diagnostic tests, documentation practices, or TB risk possibly related to infection control practices or local community TB incidence.
A few useful things to know about machine learning

Tapping into the "folk knowledge" needed to advance machine learning applications.
Application of Ridge Polynomial Neural Networks to Financial Time Series Prediction

This paper presents a novel application of ridge polynomial neural network to forecast the future trends of financial time series data. The prediction capability of ridge polynomial neural network was tested on four different data sets; the US/EU exchange rate, the UK/EU exchange rate, the JP/EU exchange rate, and the IBM common stock closing price. The performance of the network is benchmarked against the performance of multilayer perceptron, functional link neural network, and pi-sigma neural network. The predictions demonstrated that ridge polynomial neural network brings in more return in comparison to other models. It is observed that the network is able to find an appropriate input output mapping of various chaotic financial time series data with a good performance in learning speed and generalization capability.
Pharmacognostic studies of the seed of Syzygium cumini Linn.

Jamun is a very common, large evergreen beautiful tree of Indian subcontinent. The scientific name of Jamun is Eugenia jambolana Lam or Syzygium cumini Linn belongs to the family myrtaceae. The seed of Syzygium cumini is considered as an antidiabetic in folklore medicine. In present investigation, the detailed pharmacognostic study of Syzygium cumini leaf is carried out to lay down the standards which could be useful in future experimental studies. The study includes macroscopy, microscopy, preliminary phytochemical screening and physicochemical evaluation.
NCIC CTG IND.181: Phase I study of AT9283 given as a weekly 24 hour infusion in advanced malignancies

Purpose AT9283 is a potent inhibitor of the mitotic regulators, Aurora-kinases A and B, and has shown anti-tumor activity in patients with solid and haematological malignancies. This phase I study assessed safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic properties of AT9283. Patients and methods Patients with advanced, incurable solid tumors or non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma received AT9283 as a continuous 24-hour infusion on days 1, 8 of a 21-day cycle. A 3 + 3 dose escalation design was used with a starting dose of 1.5 mg/m2/day. Pharmacokinetic samples were collected from all patients on cycle one, and pharmacodynamic samples were collected from 4 patients at the recommended phase II dose (RP2D). Results 35 patients were evaluable for toxicity and 32 were evaluable for response. AT9283 was well tolerated, with main toxicities being reversible dose-related fatigue, gastrointestinal disturbance, anemia, lymphocytopenia and neutropenia. The dose limiting toxicities were febrile neutropenia (two patients) and neutropenia with grade 3 infection (1 patient) at 47 mg/m2/day (established as the maximum tolerated dose). The RP2D was 40 mg/m2/day. Pharmacokinetic analyses showed AT9283 appeared to follow linear kinetics, with a mean elimination half-life of 8.2 h. Pharmacodynamic analyses showed no consistent or significant changes, but trends suggested evidence of AT9283 inhibition and anti-proliferative activity. One patient had partial response and four patients experienced RECIST stable disease (median 2.6 months). Conclusion In this study, AT9283 was well tolerated. The RP2D is 40 mg/m2/day on days 1, 8 of a 21-day cycle. Ongoing AT9283 trials will assess efficacy and safety in solid and haematological cancers.
Developing Web services using the Microsoft.Net platform: technical and business challenges

This paper discusses an ongoing research programme, which explores the development of the software-as-a-service business model by different service providers (xSPs). With the demise of the first phase of the ASP market, due to the failure of vendors to provide business value to potential and existing customers, Web services promise to resolve some of these problems by integrating software applications across heterogeneous technology platforms and business environments. Whether this will be achieved is the subject of continuing debate. This paper presents the preliminary findings from a study, which uses the Microsoft .NET technology platform to develop Web services. Two Web-enabled prototype databases are discussed. The paper concludes that Web services is still relatively new, but if key technical and business challenges are resolved, it may provide value for the customer where ASPs failed.
Bilberry ingestion improves disease activity in mild to moderate ulcerative colitis - an open pilot study.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS
A significant fraction of patients with ulcerative colitis (UC) is not sufficiently controlled with conventional therapy or suffers from therapy related side effects. Anthocyanins, highly abundant in bilberries (Vaccinium myrtillus), were shown to have antioxidative and anti-inflammatory effects. We aimed to explore the therapeutic potential of bilberries in active UC.


METHODS
In an open pilot trial with a total follow-up of 9 weeks the effect of a daily standardized anthocyanin-rich bilberry preparation was tested in 13 patients with mild to moderate UC. Clinical, biochemical, endoscopic and histologic parameters were assessed.


RESULTS
At the end of the 6 week treatment interval 63.4% of patients achieved remission, the primary endpoint, while 90.9% of patients showed a response. In all patients a decrease in total Mayo score was detected (mean: 6.5 and 3.6 at screening and week 7, respectively; p<0.001). Fecal calprotectin levels significantly decreased during the treatment phase (baseline: mean 778 μg/g, range 192-1790 μg/g; end of treatment: mean 305 μg/g, range <30-1586 μg/g; p=0.049), including 4 patients achieving undetectable levels at end of treatment. A decrease in endoscopic Mayo score and histologic Riley index confirmed the beneficial effect. However, an increase of calprotectin levels and disease activity was observed after cessation of bilberry intake. No serious adverse events were observed.


CONCLUSIONS
This is the first report on the promising therapeutic potential of a standardized anthocyanin-rich bilberry preparation in UC in humans. These results clearly indicate a therapeutic potential of bilberries in UC. Further studies on mechanisms and randomized clinical trials are warranted.
Investigating the predictive value of whole-brain structural MR scans in autism: A pattern classification approach

Autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) is accompanied by subtle and spatially distributed differences in brain anatomy that are difficult to detect using conventional mass-univariate methods (e.g., VBM). These require correction for multiple comparisons and hence need relatively large samples to attain sufficient statistical power. Reports of neuroanatomical differences from relatively small studies are thus highly variable. Also, VBM does not provide predictive value, limiting its diagnostic value. Here, we examined neuroanatomical networks implicated in ASD using a whole-brain classification approach employing a support vector machine (SVM) and investigated the predictive value of structural MRI scans in adults with ASD. Subsequently, results were compared between SVM and VBM. We included 44 male adults; 22 diagnosed with ASD using "gold-standard" research interviews and 22 healthy matched controls. SVM identified spatially distributed networks discriminating between ASD and controls. These included the limbic, frontal-striatal, fronto-temporal, fronto-parietal and cerebellar systems. SVM applied to gray matter scans correctly classified ASD individuals at a specificity of 86.0% and a sensitivity of 88.0%. Cases (68.0%) were correctly classified using white matter anatomy. The distance from the separating hyperplane (i.e., the test margin) was significantly related to current symptom severity. In contrast, VBM revealed few significant between-group differences at conventional levels of statistical stringency. We therefore suggest that SVM can detect subtle and spatially distributed differences in brain networks between adults with ASD and controls. Also, these differences provide significant predictive power for group membership, which is related to symptom severity.
An interaction between warfarin and cannabidiol, a case report

•An interaction between warfarin and cannabidiol is described•The mechanisms of cannabidiol and warfarin metabolism are reviewed•Mechanism of the interaction is proposed•INR should be monitored in patients when cannabinoids are introduced.
Rapid Generation of Realistic Mobility Models for VANET

One emerging, new type of ad-hoc network is the vehicular ad-hoc network (VANET), in which vehicles constitute the mobile nodes in the network. Due to the prohibitive cost of deploying and implementing such a system in real world, most research in VANET relies on simulations for evaluation. A key component for VANET simulations is a realistic vehicular mobility model that ensures conclusions drawn from simulation experiments will carry through to real deployments. In this work, we introduce a tool MOVE that allows users to rapidly generate realistic mobility models for VANET simulations. MOVE is built on top of an open source micro-traffic simulator SUMO. The output of MOVE is a realistic mobility model and can be immediately used by popular network simulators such as ns-2 and qualnet. We evaluate and compare ad-hoc routing performance for vehicular nodes using MOVE to that using the random waypoint model. We show that the simulation results obtained when nodes moving according to a realistic mobility model is significantly different from that of the commonly used random waypoint model.
Driving pressure and survival in the acute respiratory distress syndrome.

BACKGROUND
Mechanical-ventilation strategies that use lower end-inspiratory (plateau) airway pressures, lower tidal volumes (VT), and higher positive end-expiratory pressures (PEEPs) can improve survival in patients with the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), but the relative importance of each of these components is uncertain. Because respiratory-system compliance (CRS) is strongly related to the volume of aerated remaining functional lung during disease (termed functional lung size), we hypothesized that driving pressure (ΔP=VT/CRS), in which VT is intrinsically normalized to functional lung size (instead of predicted lung size in healthy persons), would be an index more strongly associated with survival than VT or PEEP in patients who are not actively breathing.


METHODS
Using a statistical tool known as multilevel mediation analysis to analyze individual data from 3562 patients with ARDS enrolled in nine previously reported randomized trials, we examined ΔP as an independent variable associated with survival. In the mediation analysis, we estimated the isolated effects of changes in ΔP resulting from randomized ventilator settings while minimizing confounding due to the baseline severity of lung disease.


RESULTS
Among ventilation variables, ΔP was most strongly associated with survival. A 1-SD increment in ΔP (approximately 7 cm of water) was associated with increased mortality (relative risk, 1.41; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.31 to 1.51; P<0.001), even in patients receiving "protective" plateau pressures and VT (relative risk, 1.36; 95% CI, 1.17 to 1.58; P<0.001). Individual changes in VT or PEEP after randomization were not independently associated with survival; they were associated only if they were among the changes that led to reductions in ΔP (mediation effects of ΔP, P=0.004 and P=0.001, respectively).


CONCLUSIONS
We found that ΔP was the ventilation variable that best stratified risk. Decreases in ΔP owing to changes in ventilator settings were strongly associated with increased survival. (Funded by Fundação de Amparo e Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo and others.).
Preparation of carbon nanotubes with iron nanowires inside using a simple microwave-based method

Abstract
The importance of synthesizing carbon nanotubes with iron nanowires inside (Fe-MWNTs) via microwave radiation lies in the fact that it allows to improve aspects such as selective and uniform heating of the sample, reduction of the time of synthesis, avoiding complex experimental procedures and lowering the cost of production. In this paper we synthesize and characterize carbon nanotubes with iron nanowires inside using a mixture of graphite and iron acetate powders as starting materials and a 900 W domestic microwave oven used as power source. A mixture of the starting materials inside a vacuum sealed quartz ampoule was subjected to radiation for 7 min. As a result straight Fe nanowires are obtained with lengths between 5 and 15 microns, and a wide variety of partially Fe filled nanotubes with diameters in the 30–80 nm range. Samples were characterized with scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy and Raman spectroscopy.
Real time object detection and tracking using the Kalman Filter embedded in single board in a robot

This paper presents an algorithm implemented in real time in a laboratory robot, designed to trace and detect the color of an object in an indoor environment using the Kalman filter. The image capture is done by a kinect camera installed in the robot. The algorithm is programmed into a single board computer, BeagleBone Black that uses the ROS — OpenCV system in image processing.
Mortality, mauling, and maiming by vicious dogs.

OBJECTIVE
Maiming and death due to dog bites are uncommon but preventable tragedies. We postulated that patients admitted to a level I trauma center with dog bites would have severe injuries and that the gravest injuries would be those caused by pit bulls.


DESIGN
We reviewed the medical records of patients admitted to our level I trauma center with dog bites during a 15-year period. We determined the demographic characteristics of the patients, their outcomes, and the breed and characteristics of the dogs that caused the injuries.


RESULTS
Our Trauma and Emergency Surgery Services treated 228 patients with dog bite injuries; for 82 of those patients, the breed of dog involved was recorded (29 were injured by pit bulls). Compared with attacks by other breeds of dogs, attacks by pit bulls were associated with a higher median Injury Severity Scale score (4 vs. 1; P = 0.002), a higher risk of an admission Glasgow Coma Scale score of 8 or lower (17.2% vs. 0%; P = 0.006), higher median hospital charges ($10,500 vs. $7200; P = 0.003), and a higher risk of death (10.3% vs. 0%; P = 0.041).


CONCLUSIONS
Attacks by pit bulls are associated with higher morbidity rates, higher hospital charges, and a higher risk of death than are attacks by other breeds of dogs. Strict regulation of pit bulls may substantially reduce the US mortality rates related to dog bites.
Unsupervised Learning of Disentangled and Interpretable Representations from Sequential Data

IProposed a factorized hierarchical variational autoencoder (FHVAE) model, which learns to encode sequence-level attributes (e.g. speaker) and segment-level attributes (e.g. phoneme) into different sets of latent variables. IShowed the capability of voice conversion and denoising without parallel data. IApplied learned representations to speaker verification and domain invariant speech recognition tasks, which outperform i-vectors and reduce word error rate by 35%.
Author ' s personal copy The role of RFID in agriculture : Applications , limitations and challenges

The recent advances in RFID offer vast opportunities for research, development and innovation in agriculture. The aim of this paper is to give readers a comprehensive view of current applications and new possibilities, but also explain the limitations and challenges of this technology. RFID has been used for years in animal identification and tracking, being a common practice in many farms. Also it has been used in the food chain for traceability control. The implementation of sensors in tags, make possible to monitor the cold chain of perishable food products and the development of new applications in fields like environmental monitoring, irrigation, specialty crops and farm machinery. However, it is not all advantages. There are also challenges and limitations that should be faced in the next years. The operation in harsh environments, with dirt, extreme temperatures; the huge volume of data that are difficult to manage; the need of longer reading ranges, due to the reduction of signal strength due to propagation in crop canopy; the behavior of the different frequencies, understanding what is the right one for each application; the diversity of the standards and the level of granularity are some of them. 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Multiscale Forecasting Method using ARMAX Models

Abstract. In this paper we propose a new forecasting methodology that comprises simultaneous level-wise modeling in the wavelet domain. The WAW methodology (short for wavelet-armax-winters) uses three modeling startegies: ARMAX models capable of incorporating external inputs and model feedbacks, trigonometric regressions sensitive to seasonality effects and Holt-Winters models describing trends. The comprehensive empirical analysis of WAW models is provided, as well as the illustration on the real life problem in forecasting the natural gas price, electricity price, and customer demand for electric business.
A nondegenerate penalized likelihood estimator for variance parameters in multilevel models.

Group-level variance estimates of zero often arise when fitting multilevel or hierarchical linear models, especially when the number of groups is small. For situations where zero variances are implausible a priori, we propose a maximum penalized likelihood approach to avoid such boundary estimates. This approach is equivalent to estimating variance parameters by their posterior mode, given a weakly informative prior distribution. By choosing the penalty from the log-gamma family with shape parameter greater than 1, we ensure that the estimated variance will be positive. We suggest a default log-gamma(2,λ) penalty with λ → 0, which ensures that the maximum penalized likelihood estimate is approximately one standard error from zero when the maximum likelihood estimate is zero, thus remaining consistent with the data while being nondegenerate. We also show that the maximum penalized likelihood estimator with this default penalty is a good approximation to the posterior median obtained under a noninformative prior.Our default method provides better estimates of model parameters and standard errors than the maximum likelihood or the restricted maximum likelihood estimators. The log-gamma family can also be used to convey substantive prior information. In either case-pure penalization or prior information-our recommended procedure gives nondegenerate estimates and in the limit coincides with maximum likelihood as the number of groups increases.
Electromyographic analysis of the rotator cuff and deltoid musculature during common shoulder external rotation exercises.

STUDY DESIGN
Prospective single-group repeated-measures design.


OBJECTIVES
To quantify electromyographic (EMG) muscle activity of the infraspinatus, teres minor, supraspinatus, posterior deltoid, and middle deltoid during exercises commonly used to strengthen the shoulder external rotators.


BACKGROUND
Exercises to strengthen the external rotators are commonly prescribed in rehabilitation, but the amount of EMG activity of the infraspinatus, teres minor, supraspinatus, and deltoid during these exercises has not been thoroughly studied to determine which exercises would be most effective to achieve strength gains.


METHODS AND MEASURES
EMG measured using intramuscular electrodes were analyzed in 10 healthy subjects during 7 shoulder exercises: prone horizontal abduction at 100 degrees of abduction and full external rotation (ER), prone ER at 90 degrees of abduction, standing ER at 90 degrees of abduction, standing ER in the scapular plane (45 degrees abduction, 30 degrees horizontal adduction), standing ER at 0 degrees of abduction, standing ER at 0 degrees of abduction with a towel roll, and sidelying ER at 0 degrees of abduction. The peak percentage of maximal voluntary isometric contraction (MVIC) for each muscle was compared among exercises using a 1-way repeated-measures analysis of variance (P<.05).


RESULTS
EMG activity varied significantly among the 7 exercises. Sidelying ER produced the greatest amount of EMG activity for the infraspinatus (62% MVIC) and teres minor (67% MVIC). The greatest amount of activity of the supraspinatus (82% MVIC), middle deltoid (87% MVIC), and posterior deltoid (88% MVIC) was observed during prone horizontal abduction at 100 degrees with full ER.


CONCLUSIONS
Results from this study provide initial information to develop rehabilitation programs. It also provides information helpful for the design and conduct of future studies.
Enhanced RFID Security Method with Ownership Transfer

The popularity of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) has raised the interest towards its security. Threat concerns towards individuals privacy slows down the adoption of the technology in the new innovative application areas. In this paper we will describe simple and efficient security method for lightweight RFID tags with support for ownership transfer. It based on solution described by Osaka et al, which had some security flaws. Our solution fixes the security flaws while maintaining the simplicity and efficiency of the original method.