Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modulation of Serotonin Transporter Function during Fetal Development Causes Dilated Heart Cardiomyopathy and Lifelong Behavioral Abnormalities

Background Women are at great risk for mood and anxiety disorders during their childbearing years and may become pregnant while taking antidepressant drugs. In the treatment of depression and anxiety disorders, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are the most frequently prescribed drugs, while it is largely unknown whether this medication affects the development of the central nervous system of the fetus. The possible effects are the product of placental transfer efficiency, time of administration and dose of the respective SSRI. Methodology/Principal Findings In order to attain this information we have setup a study in which these parameters were measured and the consequences in terms of physiology and behavior are mapped. The placental transfer of fluoxetine and fluvoxamine, two commonly used SSRIs, was similar between mouse and human, indicating that the fetal exposure of these SSRIs in mice is comparable with the human situation. Fluvoxamine displayed a relatively low placental transfer, while fluoxetine showed a relatively high placental transfer. Using clinical doses of fluoxetine the mortality of the offspring increased dramatically, whereas the mortality was unaffected after fluvoxamine exposure. The majority of the fluoxetine-exposed offspring died postnatally of severe heart failure caused by dilated cardiomyopathy. Molecular analysis of fluoxetine-exposed offspring showed long-term alterations in serotonin transporter levels in the raphe nucleus. Furthermore, prenatal fluoxetine exposure resulted in depressive- and anxiety-related behavior in adult mice. In contrast, fluvoxamine-exposed mice did not show alterations in behavior and serotonin transporter levels. Decreasing the dose of fluoxetine resulted in higher survival rates and less dramatic effects on the long-term behavior in the offspring. Conclusions These results indicate that prenatal fluoxetine exposure affects fetal development, resulting in cardiomyopathy and a higher vulnerability to affective disorders in a dose-dependent manner.
Corporate failure rates and the impact of the 1986 insolvency act: an econometric analysis

Reviews previous research on the links between business failures, macroeconomic conditions and insolvency law; and develops a mathematical, econometric model to investigate them further, using 1996‐1998 UK data. Presents and discusses the results, which suggest that the 1986 Insolvency Act did help to reduce the overall level of business failures and estimates that it saved 1100 companies from bankruptcy in the first three years after implementation. Finds that interest rates, price levels, levels of business formation, credit conditions and profit levels also affect business failure rates.
Multi-agent collaborative search: an agent-based memetic multi-objective optimization algorithm applied to space trajectory design

This article presents an algorithm for multi-objective optimization that blends together a number of heuristics. A population of agents combines heuristics that aim at exploring the search space both globally and in a neighbourhood of each agent. These heuristics are complemented with a combination of a local and global archive. The novel agent-based algorithm is tested at first on a set of standard problems and then on three specific problems in space trajectory design. Its performance is compared against a number of state-of-the-art multi-objective optimization algorithms that use the Pareto dominance as selection criterion: non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II), Pareto archived evolution strategy (PAES), multiple objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO), and multiple trajectory search (MTS). The results demonstrate that the agent-based search can identify parts of the Pareto set that the other algorithms were not able to capture. Furthermore, convergence is statistically better although the variance of the results is in some cases higher.
Rotation, entropy, and equilibrium states

For a dynamical system (X, T) and function f : X Rd we consider the corresponding generalised rotation set. This is the convex subset of Rd consisting of all integrals of f with respect to T-invariant probability measures. We study the entropy H(e) of rotation vectors e, and relate this to the directional entropy lHl(L) of Geller & Misiurewicz. For (X, T) a mixing subshift of finite type, and f of summable variation, we prove that if the rotation set is strictly convex then the functions -H and H are in fact one and the same. For those rotation sets which are not strictly convex we prove that 1H((e) and H(e) can differ only at non-exposed boundary points e.
Head Movements in Patients with Vestibular Lesion: A Novel Approach to Functional Assessment in Daily Life Setting

Objectives (1) To determine if head movements in patients with vestibular deficiency differ from those in normal subjects during daily life activities. (2) To assess if these differences can be correlated with patients’ perception of dizziness-induced handicap. Study Design Prospective matched-pairs study Setting Tertiary referral center Patients Thirty-one vestibular schwannoma patients with documented postoperative unilateral vestibular loss and their age-, gender-, and physical activity level–matched controls with symmetric vestibulo-ocular reflexes. Interventions Head movements during 10 tasks from daily life were recorded using body-worn movement sensors. Main Outcome Measures The time to complete the task, the average head velocity and acceleration during each task, and the number of head turns performed were compared between cases and controls. These measures were then correlated with the self-reported Dizziness Handicap Inventory (DHI) scores of the patients. Results Patients with a unilateral vestibular deficit took significantly longer to perform most daily life activities compared to controls. Their head movements, however, were not always slower. They adopted a different movement strategy, in certain instances less efficient and more disorganized. Dimensions of movement are not all affected equally after a unilateral vestibular loss with evidence of clear clustering of the differences within dimensions across tasks. There was no correlation between the DHI and patients’ performance in those tasks. Conclusion Vestibular loss, even when compensated, affects patients’ movements, which can be measured in an ambulatory setting of daily life activities. The differences in movements associated with vestibular loss do not correlate with the degree of self-reported handicap.
Composing Human and Machine Translation Services: Language Grid for Improving Localization Processes

With the development of the Internet environments, more and more language services become accessible for common people. However, the gap between human translators and machine translators remains huge especially for the domain of localization processes that requires high translation quality. Although efforts of combining human and machine translators for supporting multilingual communication have been reported in previous research, how to apply such approaches for improving localization processes are rarely discussed. In this paper, we aim at improving localization processes by composing human and machine translation services based on the Language Grid, which is a language service platform that we have developed. Further, we conduct experiments to compare the translation quality and translation cost using several translation processes, including absolute machine translation processes, absolute human translation processes and translation processes by human and machine translation services. The experiment results show that composing monolingual roles and dictionary services improves the translation quality of machine translators, and that collaboration of human and machine translators is possible to reduce the cost comparing with the absolute bilingual human translation. We also discuss the generality of the experimental results and further challenging issues of the proposed localization processes.
Agency Costs, Net Worth, and the Credit Channel of Monetary Transmission

This paper presents a full model of the Credit Channel of the monetary transmission mechanism. In particular, the special role of the banking sector is derived endogenously and special attention is paid to the role of borrowers' net worth. A debt contracting problem with asymmetric information and heterogeneous borrowers is embedded in a stochastic dynamic general equilibrium model with money. In contrast to the traditional assumption, the paper assumes that agency costs arise in the production of aggregate output instead of in the investment sector. Numerical simulations of the model economy show two major points: First, the model with heterogeneous borrowers does not replicate as many stylized facts as the model without heterogeneous borrowers. Second, the model dampens the impulse response of output after a positive money supply shock, compared to the standard monetary business cycle model. Interestingly, the results of this paper differ considerably from the results o! f a related paper with agency costs arising in the production of the investment good.
Employment Growth and Real Estate Return: Are They Linked?

Executive Summary. Real estate returns and employment growth rates over the 1983-1997 period for forty-six major MSAs are used to examine the relationship between employment growth and real estate return. The results suggest: (1) Employment growth contributes to real estate return only in the short term. There is no relationship between expected return and employment growth over the long term (e.g., ten years). Employment growth, however, tends to reduce return beta and return volatility. (2) Employment beta and volatility are positively linked, respectively, to return beta and volatility. (3) Both employment beta and return beta are priced in the marketplace, that is, a larger beta is likely to be associated with a higher expected return. To investors, this study confirms the validity of employment analysis for investment decisionmaking because employment growth characteristics are related to return characteristics. Investors, however, are cautioned against aggressively pricing employment growth into the.
Twistor Theory of the Airy Equation

We demonstrate how the complex integral formula for the Airy functions arises from Penrose's twistor contour integral formula. We then use the Lax formulation of the isomonodromy problem with one irregular singularity of order four to show that the Airy equation arises from the anti-self-duality equations for conformal structures of neutral signa- ture invariant under the isometric action of the Bianchi II group. This conformal structure admits a null-Kahler metric in its conformal class which we construct explicitly.
A Multiple-Choice Task with Changes of Mind

The role of changes of mind and multiple choices has recently received increased attention in the study of perceptual decision-making. Previously, these extensions to standard two-alternative tasks have been studied separately. Here we explored how changes of mind depend on the number of choice-alternatives. To this end, we tested 14 human subjects on a 2- and 4-alternative direction-discrimination task. Changes of mind in the participants' movement trajectories could be observed for two and for four choice alternatives. With fewer alternatives, participants responded faster and more accurately. The frequency of changes of mind, however, did not significantly differ for the different numbers of choice alternatives. Nevertheless, mind-changing improved the participants' final performance, particularly for intermediate difficulty levels, in both experimental conditions. Moreover, the mean reaction times of individual participants were negatively correlated with their overall tendency to make changes of mind. We further reproduced these findings with a multi-alternative attractor model for decision-making, while a simple race model could not account for the experimental data. Our experiment, combined with the theoretical models allowed us to shed light on: (1) the differences in choice behavior between two and four alternatives, (2) the differences between the data of our human subjects and previous monkey data, (3) individual differences between participants, and (4) the inhibitory interaction between neural representations of choice alternatives.
The relationship between postnatal depression, sociodemographic factors, levels of partner support, and levels of physical activity

Background: postnatal depression (PND) is defined as a psychological mood disorder that occurs in a mother within 6 weeks of her giving birth. It refers to an episode that causes mood disturbance and it could begin in, or extend into, the postpartum period. It is thought to have a high impact upon the mother's health as well as the family's functioning and the child's development. Socio-demographic, psych-social, and physical activity factors may all contribute to postpartum mood and ability to cope with responsibilities. The primary aim of this study was to determine which of these factors predicted PND in postpartum women. A secondary aim was to identify the socio-demographic and psycho-social predictors of physical activity in postpartum women. Methods: The study used a cross-sectional correlational design. A sample of 150 postpartum women was sent a package of six standardized questionnaires. Results: There was no association between physical activity and PND; however, older mothers, mothers of younger children, mothers who are less reluctant to ask for help, and mothers who are more satisfied with the help they get experience lower levels of PND. Mothers of older babies, mothers with more children, and less educated mothers are more likely to engage in caregiving activities, whereas mothers with fewer children and higher levels of partner support are more likely to engage in occupational activities. None of the socio-demographic factors or any of the parenting factors predicted levels of sporting activity.
Childhood familial and racial differences in physiologic and biochemical factors related to hypertension.

AR Hohn, DA Riopel, JE Keil, CB Loadholt, HS Margolius, PV Halushka, PJ Privitera, related to hypertension Childhood familial and racial differences in physiologic and biochemical factors ISSN: 1524-4563 Copyright © 1983 American Heart Association. All rights reserved. Print ISSN: 0194-911X. Online 72514 Hypertension is published by the American Heart Association. 7272 Greenville Avenue, Dallas, TX 1983, 5:56-70 Hypertension http://hyper.ahajournals. org/content/5/1/56.citation located on the World Wide Web at: The online version of this article, along with updated information and services, is
Lateral wedges alter mediolateral load distributions at the knee joint in obese individuals

Obesity is the primary risk factor for knee osteoarthritis (OA). Greater external knee adduction moments, surrogate measures for medial compartment loading, are present in Obese individuals and may predispose them to knee OA. Laterally wedged insoles decrease the magnitude of the external adduction moment in Obese individuals but it is unknown how they alter the center of pressure on the tibial plateau. A gait analysis was performed on 14 Obese (avg. 29.3 years; BMI range: 30.3–51.6 kg/m2) and 14 lean women (avg. 26.1 years; BMI range: 20.9–24.6 kg/m2) with and without a full‐length, wedged insole. Computed joint angles, joint moments, and knee extensor strength values were input into a musculoskeletal model to estimate center of pressure of the contact force on the tibial plateau. Statistical significance was assessed using a two‐way ANOVA to compare the main effects of group and insole condition (α = 0.05). The insole resulted in a significant (p < 0.01) lateral shift in the center of pressure location in both the Obese and Control groups (mean: 2.9 ± 0.7 and 1.5 ± 0.7 mm, respectively). The insole also significantly reduced the peak external knee adduction moment 1.88 ± 1.82 N m in the Control group (p < 0.01) and 3.62 ± 3.90 N m in the Obese group (p < 0.01). The results of this study indicate the effects of a prophylactic wedged insole for reducing the magnitude of the load on the knee's medial compartment in Obese women who are at risk for knee OA development. © 2012 Orthopaedic Research Society. Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Orthop Res 31: 665–671, 2013
7-monohydroxyethylrutoside protects against chronic doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity when administered only once per week.

Doxorubicin is a very effective antitumor agent, but its clinical use is limited by the occurrence of a cumulative dose-related cardiotoxicity, resulting in congestive heart failure. 7-Monohydroxyethylrutoside (monoHER), a flavonoid belonging to the semisynthetic hydroxyethylrutoside family, has been shown to protect against doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity when administered i.p. at a dose of 500 mg/kg five times/week in combination with a weekly i.v. dose of doxorubicin. Such a dosing schedule would be very inconvenient in clinical practice. We therefore investigated a dosing schedule of one administration of monoHER just before doxorubicin. The electrocardiogram was measured telemetrically in mice after the combined treatment of doxorubicin (4 mg/kg, i.v.) with one dose of monoHER (500 mg/kg, i.p., administered 1 h before doxorubicin) for 6 weeks. These data were compared with the five times/week schedule (500 mg/kg, i.p., administered 1 h before doxorubicin and every 24 h for 4 days). The increase of the ST interval was used as a measure for cardiotoxicity. It was shown that 500 mg/kg monoHER administered only 1 h before doxorubicin provided complete protection against the cardiotoxicity. This protection was present for at least 10 weeks after the last treatment. Because of the short half-life of monoHER, these results suggest that the presence of monoHER is only necessary during the highest plasma levels of doxorubicin.
Using the third state of matter: high harmonic generation from liquid targets

High harmonic generation on solid and gaseous targets has been proven to be a powerful platform for the generation of attosecond pulses. Here we demonstrate a novel technique for the XUV generation on a smooth liquid surface target in vacuum, which circumvents the problem of low repetition rate and limited shot numbers associated with solid targets, while it maintains some of its merits. We employed atomically smooth, continuous liquid jets of water, aqueous salt solutions and ethanol that allow uninterrupted high harmonic generation due to the coherent wake emission mechanism for over 8 h. It has been found that the mechanism of plasma generation is very similar to that for smooth solid target surfaces. The vapor pressure around the liquid target in our setup has been found to be very low such that the presence of the gas phase around the liquid jet could be neglected.
Optimal Particle Filters for Tracking a Time-Varying Harmonic or Chirp Signal

We consider the problem of tracking the time-varying (TV) parameters of a harmonic or chirp signal using particle filtering (PF) tools. Similar to previous PF approaches to TV spectral analysis, we assume that the model parameters (complex amplitude, frequency, and frequency rate in the chirp case) evolve according to a Gaussian AR(1) model; but we concentrate on the important special case of a single TV harmonic or chirp. We show that the optimal importance function that minimizes the variance of the particle weights can be computed in closed form, and develop procedures to draw samples from it. We further employ Rao-Blackwellization to come up with reduced-complexity versions of the optimal filters. The end result is custom PF solutions that are considerably more efficient than generic ones, and can be used in a broad range of important applications that involve a single TV harmonic or chirp signal, e.g., TV Doppler estimation in communications, and radar.
An empirical estimation of total factor productivity growth for Australia from 1960 to 2010

Australia's economy has shown resilience and flexibility to deal with challenges over the past century. Krugman (1997) has claimed that the long run growth of a country is almost entirely dependent on productivity. The subject of this thesis is total factor productivity (TFP), which is based on the neoclassical growth model pioneered by Solow (1956). This thesis has two objectives. The first is to review the literature on the Solow growth model. The second is to empirically estimate TFP growth in Australia from 1960 to 2010 and in doing so, attempt to update the literature. The results suggest Australia experienced a decline in productivity growth during the latter half of the 2000s, however, policy makers recognise the challenges facing the economy.
Neural network forecast of daily pollution concentration using optimal meteorological data at synoptic and local scales

We present a simple neural network and data pre–selection framework, discriminating the most essential input data for accurately forecasting the concentrations of PM10, based on observations for the years between 2002 and 2006 in the metropolitan region of Lisbon, Portugal. Starting from a broad panoply of different data sets collected at several air quality and meteorological stations, a forward stepwise regression procedure is applied enabling to automatically identify the most important variables for predicting the pollutant and also to rank them in order of importance. The importance of this variable ranking is discussed, showing that it is very sensitive to the urban location where measurements are obtained. Additionally, the importance of Circulation Weather Types is highlighted, characterizing synoptic scale circulation patterns and the concentration of pollutants. We then quantify the performance of linear and non–linear neural network models when applied to PM10 concentrations. In the light of contradictory results of previous studies, our results show no clear superiority for the case studied of non–linear models over linear models. While all models show similar predictive performances, we find important differences in false alarm rates and demonstrate the importance of removing weekly cycles from input variables.
CT scan of body packers: findings and costs.

OBJECTIVE To determine the CT features of intra abdominal illicit drug packs used for trafficking, by using scout CT scan image and describe its cost re-imbursement METHODS An observational study was conducted from January to December 2005, at the CT scan department, Civil Hospital, Karachi. The study subjects included alleged drug traffickers smuggling by body packing, intercepted at Karachi International Airport and referred for CT scan of abdomen by the Anti Narcotic department. Those with suspected body pack rupture were excluded. Scout CT image of the abdomen was taken. Scans were read on console as well as hard copy for the presence of radio opaque foreign bodies in the gut. The number, size in cm, density in H.U. , and the site of foreign body in positive scans were noted. The cost of each scan in terms of technical expenditure and official reimbursement was also determined. RESULTS There were 11 alleged traffickers with 9 being males. Positive scans were obtained in 7 of whom 06 were males. All visualized foreign bodies were seen as high density objects (89-340 HU) compared to the surrounding tissues. The size ranged from 1.5-4 cms. All were multiple in number and variable in shape which was oval to elongated in 4 cases. The site was distal ileum in 1, ascending colon in 2 and transverse colon in 4 cases. The technical cost of each procedure was Pak Rs. 300-600 per case for which a reimbursement of Rs. 200-250 was received. CONCLUSION Scout CT scan is good at picking ingested drug packs in the gut lumen. However the test should be conducted in liaison with the reporting radiologist with regard to the possible time of ingestion and rectal passage of foreign bodies. The cost is also under paid at public institutes.