Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prevalence of Occult Hepatitis B Virus in Plasma and Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cell Compartments of Patients With Chronic Hepatitis C Infection in Tehran-Iran

Background Occult hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection (OBI) is frequently reported in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. An association between OBI and more liver damage, cirrhosis, hepatocellular carcinoma, and reduced response to interferon therapy in patients with HCV infection is suggested. Objectives The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of occult HBV, and evaluate its clinical influence on patients with chronic HCV. Patients and Methods A cohort study including50 patients with positive results for HCV, and negative results for HBsAg tests was performed. The patients were divided into two groups: one group had positive results for both HCV and occult HBV tests (n = 18), and the other had positive results for HCV, but negative findings for occult HBV (n = 32). All were treated with PEG-IFN alpha-2a and Ribavirin. Presence of HCV RNA was followed in these patients. Results HBV-DNA was detected using nested-PCR in 20% of plasma and 32.6% of peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) compartments. No significant differences were observed between patients with and without occult HBV for sex, age, duration of HCV infection, histological markers, presence of anti-HBc, HCV viral load, and HCV genotype. The response rate was significantly higher in patients with positive results for HBV-DNA test compared to those with negative findings (100% vs. 71.9 %, P < 0.05). Conclusions In conclusion, occult HBV was found in 36% of patients with negative results for HBsAg, but positive results for HCV. Detection of HBV-DNA in both PBMCs and plasma together in comparison with plasma alone provided more true identification of OBI.The SVR rate was significantly higher in coinfected patients than mono-infected ones.
Three-Dimensional Path Planning for Uninhabited Combat Aerial Vehicle Based on Predator-Prey Pigeon-Inspired Optimization in Dynamic Environment

Three-dimension path planning of uninhabited combat aerial vehicle (UCAV) is a complicated optimal problem, which mainly focused on optimizing the flight route considering the different types of constrains under complex combating environment. A novel predator-prey pigeon-inspired optimization (PPPIO) is proposed to solve the UCAV three-dimension path planning problem in dynamic environment. Pigeon-inspired optimization (PIO) is a new bio-inspired optimization algorithm. In this algorithm, map and compass operator model and landmark operator model are used to search the best result of a function. The prey-predator concept is adopted to improve global best properties and enhance the convergence speed. The characteristics of the optimal path are presented in the form of a cost function. The comparative simulation results show that our proposed PPPIO algorithm is more efficient than the basic PIO, particle swarm optimization (PSO), and different evolution (DE) in solving UCAV three-dimensional path planning problems.
Prospect or promise Internationalisation in Australia

We assert a tension between "internationalisation" as an evolving construct and its enactment in the higher education marketplace in relation to short-term, TESOL teacher education programs conducted in Australia. We argue that this tension is evident in instances of dissonance between how internationalisation has been portrayed in academic literature and federal policy and how it is perceived at the higher education coalface. In making this claim, we recognise that the instantiation of internationalisation-in-practice that we draw upon as a data source is only one of many practical manifestations of the paradigm. Indeed, data from our case study of a TESOL program in teacher education support many of the defining characteristics of internationalisation. However, they indicate also a growing tension between discursive trends, policy rhetoric and enactment. We assert that the resolution of this tension is central to avoiding conflict surrounding ambiguous signals of purpose from the federal government and the higher education sector. While many see such short-term programs as mutually beneficial for providers who gain financially and for teachers who gain in value-added ways from refining their craft in an immersion context for English usage, we warn that Australian goals for internationalisation in Education need to be more honest in reflecting the pecuniary interest of the sector. We believe they can do this without impunity by being sensitive and responsive to what participating international students want from the preparation.
Association of Parity With Carotid Diameter and Distensibility: Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis

Pregnancy and childbirth are associated with hemodynamic changes and vascular remodeling. It is not known whether parity is associated with later adverse vascular properties such as larger arterial diameter, wall thickness, and lower distensibility. We used baseline data from 3283 women free of cardiovascular disease aged 45 to 84 years enrolled in the population-based Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis. Participants self-reported parity status. Ultrasound-derived carotid artery lumen diameters and brachial artery blood pressures were measured at peak-systole and end-diastole. Common carotid intima-media thickness was also measured. Regression models to determine the association of carotid distensibility coefficient, lumen diameter, and carotid intima-media thickness with parity were adjusted for age, race, height, weight, diabetes mellitus, current smoking, blood pressure medication use, and total and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels. The prevalence of nulliparity was 18%. In adjusted models, carotid distensibility coefficient was 0.09×10−5 Pa−1 lower (P=0.009) in parous versus nulliparous women. Among parous women, there was a nonlinear association with the greatest carotid distensibility coefficient seen in women with 2 live births and significantly lower distensibility seen in primiparas (P=0.04) or with higher parity >2 (P=0.005). No such pattern of association with parity was found for lumen diameter or carotid intima-media thickness. Parity is associated with lower carotid artery distensibility, suggesting arterial remodeling that lasts beyond childbirth. These long-term effects on the vasculature may explain the association of parity with cardiovascular events later in life.
The Psychology of prejudice

Contents: Preface. R.C. Gardner, Stereotypes as Consensual Beliefs. M. Snyder, P. Miene, On the Functions of Stereotypes and Prejudice. M.R. Banaji, A.G. Greenwald, Implicit Stereotyping and Prejudice. V.M. Esses, G. Haddock, M.P. Zanna, The Role of Mood in the Expression of Intergroup Stereotypes. S.L. Neuberg, Expectancy-Confirmation Processes in Stereotype-Tinged Social Encounters: The Moderating Role of Social Goals. B. Altemeyer, Reducing Prejudice in Right-Wing Authoritarians. C.D. Batson, C.T. Burris, Personal Religion: Depressant or Stimulant of Prejudice and Discrimination? R.Y. Bourhis, Power, Gender, and Intergroup Discrimination: Some Minimal Group Experiments. R.Y. Bourhis, I. Sachdev, A. Gagnon, Intergroup Research with the Tajfel Matrices: Methodological Notes. D.M. Taylor, S.C. Wright, L.E. Porter, Dimensions of Perceived Discrimination: The Personal/Group Discrimination Discrepancy. R.N. Lalonde, J.E. Cameron, Behavioral Responses to Discrimination: A Focus on Action. J. Crocker, B. Major, Reactions to Stigma: The Moderating Role of Justifications. M.B. Brewer, The Social Psychology of Prejudice: Getting it All Together.
Functional Heterogeneity in Neighboring Neurons of Cat Primary Visual Cortex in Response to Both Artificial and Natural Stimuli

Neurons in primary visual cortex of many mammals are clustered according to their preference to stimulus parameters such as orientation and spatial frequency. Nevertheless, responses to complex visual stimuli are highly heterogeneous between adjacent neurons. To investigate the relation between these observations, we recorded from pairs of neighboring neurons in area 17 of anesthetized cats in response to stimuli of differing complexity: sinusoidal drifting gratings, binary dense noise, and natural movies. Comparisons of the tuning curves revealed similar orientation and direction preferences for neighboring neurons, but large differences in preferred phase, direction selectivity, and tuning width of spatial frequency. No pair was similar across all tuning properties. The neurons' firing rates averaged across multiple stimulus repetitions (the “signal”) were also compared. Binned between 10 and 200 ms, the correlation between these signals was close to zero in the median across all pairs for all stimulus classes. Signal correlations agreed poorly with differences in tuning properties, except for receptive field offset and relative modulation (i.e., the strength of phase modulation). Nonetheless, signal correlations for different stimulus classes were well correlated with each other, even for gratings and movies. Conversely, trial-to-trial fluctuations (termed “noise”) were poorly correlated between neighboring neurons, suggesting low degrees of common input. In response to gratings and visual noise, signal and noise correlations were well correlated with each other, but less so for responses to movies. These findings have relevance for our understanding of the processing of natural stimuli in a functionally heterogeneous cortical network.
Chronic Postconcussion Symptoms and Functional Outcomes in OEF/OIF Veterans with Self-Report of Blast Exposure

Abstract Postconcussion symptoms (PCS) and functional outcomes were evaluated in 91 OEF/OIF outpatient veterans with reported histories of blast-exposure, with the goal of evaluating (1) the association between these outcomes and a clinical diagnosis of mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) with or without loss of consciousness (LOC); and (2) the influence of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression on PCS reporting and perceived functional limitations. Individuals who reported mTBI with LOC had greater PCS complaints than individuals who reported mTBI without LOC or individuals without mTBI. However, after adjusting for severity of PTSD and depression symptoms, this group difference disappeared. Functional limitations were particularly prominent in the psychosocial domain. Again, PTSD was significantly associated with functional outcomes, but the mTBI with LOC group had greater psychosocial limitations than the other two groups, even when PTSD and depression symptoms were taken into account. These findings highlight the role of mental health in both outcomes, but additionally point to the impact of mTBI with LOC on long-term psychosocial adjustment. (JINS, 2013, 19, 1–10)
Polysomnography performed in the unattended home versus the attended laboratory setting--Sleep Heart Health Study methodology.

STUDY OBJECTIVE To compare polysomnographic recordings obtained in the home and laboratory setting. DESIGN AND SETTING Multicenter study comparing unsupervised polysomnography performed in the participant's home with polysomnography supervised at an academic sleep disorders center, using a randomized sequence of study setting. Sleep Heart Health Study (SHHS) standardized polysomnographic recording and scoring techniques were used for both settings. PARTICIPANTS 64 of 76 non-SHHS participants recruited from 7 SHHS field sites who had both a laboratory and home polysomnogram meeting acceptable quality criteria. MEASUREMENTS AND RESULTS Median sleep duration was greater in the home than in the laboratory (375 vs 318 minutes, respectively, P < .0001) as was sleep efficiency (86% vs 82%, respectively, P < .0024). Very small, but significant increases in percentage of rapid eye movement sleep and decreases in stage 1 sleep were noted in the laboratory. Employing multiple definitions of respiratory disturbance index (RDI), median RDI was similar in both settings (for example, RDI with 3% desaturation: home 12.4, range 0.6-67; laboratory 9.5, range 0.1-93.4, P = .41). Quartile analysis of laboratory RDI showed moderate agreement with home RDI measurements. Based on the mean of laboratory and home RDI and using a cutpoint of 20, there was a biphasic distribution, with the RDI 3% above 20 being more common in the recordings performed in the laboratory than in the home and below 20 being more common in the recordings performed in the home than in the laboratory. These differences could not be attributed to quality of recording, age, sex, or body mass index. CONCLUSIONS Using SHHS methodology, median RDI was similar in the unattended home and attended laboratory setting with differences of small magnitude in some sleep parameters. Differences in RDI between settings resulted in a rate of disease misclassification that is similar to repeated studies in the same setting.
The Role of Religion and Spirituality in Working with Children and Adolescents

Abstract This national study examined social workers' attitudes and behaviors about religion and spirituality in practice with children and adolescents. The majority of respondents regarded religion and spirituality as relevant to this population and used a wide variety of spiritually-based interventions. Respondents also reported a somewhat frequent identification of spiritual and religious abuse and neglect of youth. However, the vast majority reported that religious or spiritual issues were rarely, if ever, addressed in their social work education. Findings reveal the need to develop specific curricular content about the religious and spiritual lives of youth, including ethical guidelines for spiritually sensitive practice with this population. doi:10.1300/J377v26n03_01
Effects of voice-adaptation and social dialogue on perceptions of a robotic learning companion

With a growing number of applications involving social human-robot interactions, there is an increasingly important role for socially responsive speech interfaces that can effectively engage the user. For example, learning companions provide both task-related feedback and motivational support for students with the goal of improving learning. As a learning companion's ability to be socially responsive increases, so do learning outcomes. This paper presents a socially responsive speech interface for an embodied, robotic learning companion. We explore two methods of social responsiveness. The first method introduces social responses into the dialogue, while the second method augments these responses with voice-adaptation based on acoustic-prosodic entrainment. We evaluate the effect of a social, voice-adaptive robotic learning companion on social variables such as social presence and rapport, and we compare this to a companion with only social dialogue and one with neither social dialogue nor voice-adaptions. We contrast the effects against those of individual factors, such as gender. We find (1) that social presence is significantly higher with a social voice-adaptive speech interface than with purely social dialogue, and (2) that females feel significantly more rapport and are significantly more persistent in interactions with a robotic learning companion than males.
Guidelines for International Breast Health and Cancer Control – Implementation Supplement to Cancer Guideline Implementation for Breast Healthcare in Low-Income and Middle-Income Countries Overview of the Breast Health Global Initiative Global Summit 2007

The Breast Health Global Initiative (BHGI) gratefully acknowledges grants and conference support from the following organizations and agencies: Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center; Susan G. Komen For The Cure; American Society of Clinical Oncology; US National Cancer Institute, Office of International Affairs; American Cancer Society; Lance Armstrong Foundation; US Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (*Grant 1 R13 HS017218-01); US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Division of Cancer Prevention and Control, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion; American Society of Breast Disease; Oncology Nursing Society; US National Cancer Institute, Office of Women’s Health; US National Institutes of Health, Office of Research on Women’s Health. In addition, the BHGI received unrestricted educational grants from AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Ethicon Endo-Surgery, F. Hoffmann-La Roche, GE Healthcare, Novartis Oncology, and Pfizer Oncology. Complete financial disclosures are presented at the end of this article.
How Secure is TextSecure?

Instant Messaging has gained popularity by users for both private and business communication as low-cost short message replacement on mobile devices. However, before releases about mass surveillance performed by intelligence services such as NSA and GCHQ and Facebook's acquisition of WhatsApp, most mobile messaging apps did not protect confidentiality or integrity of the messages. A messaging app that claims to provide secure instant messaging and has attracted a lot of attention is TextSecure. Besides numerous direct installations, its protocol is part of Android's most popular aftermarket firmware Cyanogen-Mod. TextSecure's successor Signal continues to use the underlying protocol for text messaging. In this paper, we present the first complete description of TextSecure's complex cryptographic protocol, provide a security analysis of its three main components (key exchange, key derivation and authenticated encryption), and discuss the main security claims of TextSecure. Furthermore, we formally prove that - if key registration is assumed to be secure - TextSecure's push messaging can indeed achieve most of the claimed security goals.
Comparison of Bacterial Community Structures in the Rhizoplane of Tomato Plants Grown in Soils Suppressive and Conducive towards Bacterial Wilt

ABSTRACT It has been reported that the growth of Ralstonia solanacearum is suppressed at the rhizoplane of tomato plants and that tomato bacterial wilt is suppressed in plants grown in a soil (Mutsumi) in Japan. To evaluate the biological factors contributing to the suppressiveness of the soil in three treated Mutsumi soils (chloroform fumigated soil; autoclaved soil mixed with intact Mutsumi soil; and autoclaved soil mixed with intact, wilt-conducive Yamadai soil) infested with R. solanacearum, we bioassayed soil samples for tomato bacterial wilt. Chloroform fumigation increased the extent of wilt disease. More of the tomato plant samples wilted when mixed with Yamadai soil than when mixed with Mutsumi soil. Consequently, the results indicate that the naturally existing population of microorganisms in Mutsumi soil was significantly able to reduce the severity of bacterial wilt of tomato plants. To characterize the types of bacteria present at the rhizoplane, we isolated rhizoplane bacteria and classified them into 22 groups by comparing their 16S restriction fragment length polymorphism patterns. In Yamadai soil a single group of bacteria was extremely predominant (73.1%), whereas in Mutsumi soil the distribution of the bacterial groups was much more even. The 16S rDNA sequence analysis of strains of dominant groups suggested that gram-negative bacteria close to the β-proteobacteria were most common at the rhizoplane of the tomato plants. During in vitro assays, rhizoplane bacteria in Mutsumi soil grew more vigorously on pectin, one of the main root exudates of tomato, compared with those in Yamadai soil. Our results imply that it is difficult for the pathogen to dominate in a diversified rhizobacterial community that thrives on pectin.
Physician Adherence to Blood Pressure Guidelines and Its Effect on Seniors

Study Objective. To compare physician adherence to guidelines from the Seventh Report of the Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Pressure for patients younger than 65 years of age with those aged 65 years and older, and to analyze whether factor groupings (subsets of criteria used to determine adherence) were predictive of blood pressure control.
Retromer Regulates Postendocytic Sorting of β‐Secretase in Polarized Madin–Darby Canine Kidney Cells

β‐Amyloid (Aβ) peptides are generated from the successive proteolytic processing of the amyloid precursor protein (APP) by the β‐APP cleaving enzyme (BACE or β‐secretase) and the γ‐secretase complex. Initial cleavage of APP by BACE leads into the amyloidogenic pathway, causing or exacerbating Alzheimer's disease. Therefore, their intracellular traffic can determine how easily and frequently BACE has access to and cleaves APP. Here, we have used polarized Madin–Darby canine kidney (MDCK) cells stably expressing APP and BACE to examine the regulation of their polarized trafficking by retromer, a protein complex previously implicated in their endosome‐to‐Golgi transport. Our data show that retromer interacts with BACE and regulates its postendocytic sorting in polarized MDCK cells. Depleting retromer, inhibiting retromer function, or preventing BACE interaction with retromer, alters trafficking of BACE, which thereby increases its localization in the early endocytic compartment. As a result, this slows endocytosis of apically localized BACE, promoting its recycling and apical‐to‐basolateral transcytosis, which increases APP/BACE interaction and subsequent cleavage of APP toward generation and secretion of Aβ peptides.
PCA Ketamine and Morphine after Abdominal Hysterectomy

Following a standardized general anaesthetic for total abdominal hysterectomy, patients received either patient controlled analgesia (PCA) with morphine 1 mg/ml (group M, n=33) or morphine 1 mg/ml plus ketamine 2 mg/ml (group K, n=37) for 48 hours in a randomized, double-blind fashion. In 43 women the area of allodynia around the scar was mapped as a measure of the degree of central sensitization. A significant reduction in the area of allodynia was found in those receiving ketamine with morphine (42 cm 2 [interquartile range (IQR) 57] compared with 57 cm 2 [IQR 82] z=–2.0, P=0.04) in those receiving morphine alone. There were no significant differences between the two groups with respect to age, or weight, or between the subgroups within which the area of allodynia was measured with respect to length of incision. No significant differences were found between the groups with respect to pain scores, total or hourly drug consumption, patient satisfaction, nausea scores or antiemetic use. Patients in group K were more likely to require PCA for a shorter period than those in group M (median 40 hours, IQR 26 versus 48 hours IQR 7). Ten patients in group K were withdrawn because of side-effects (dysphoria n=4, nausea n=2, pruritus n=4) compared with one in group M (nausea n=1)(P=0.006). The potential usefulness of ketamine after hysterectomy was offset by a high incidence of adverse effects and a lack of opioid-sparing effects, such that combined intravenous ketamine and morphine PCA as used in this study cannot be recommended for routine care.
Pseudo-Relevance Feedback and Title Re-Ranking for Chinese Information Retrieval

In our formal runs, we have experimented with the retrieval based on character-based indexing and hybrid term indexing because these are more distinct types of indexing for better pooling. We confirmed that character-based indexing did not produce relatively good retrieval effectiveness. We have also experimented with three new pseudo-relevance feedback (PRF) methods. These new methods were able to achieve slightly better performance compared with our original PRF method for short queries at the same time using only 60 expanded terms instead of 140 expanded terms, thereby reducing the retrieval time by abo ut 30 percentage points. We have experimented with a novel reranking strategy, called title re-ranking. This strategy rewards documents which title terms match with the terms in the title query. Title re-ranking is able to improve the performance but it h urts the performance of long queries when PRF is used with it. For title queries, our best MAP achieved was 24.9% using both title re-ranking and PRF based on rigid relevance judgment. For long queries using our original PRF, our best MAP was 26.0%.