Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
MatchBox: combined meta-model matching for semi-automatic mapping generation

Data integration is a well-known challenge offering a common view on heterogeneous data, e. g. to ensure consistency or tool interoperability. To implement this integration MDE proposes to apply model transformations. A model transformation requires meta-model matching, i. e. the task of discovering semantic correspondences between elements. Recently, semi-automatic matching has been proposed to support transformation development by mapping generation. However, current meta-model matching approaches concentrate on a fixed non-configurable set of matching algorithms and often miss a thorough evaluation, thus no estimate concerning their quality can be made. We tackle these issues by proposing MatchBox, an approach using a configurable combination of matchers in a common framework. Thereby, we adapt and extend established schema matching techniques for the purpose of meta-model matching. Additionally, we present a benchmark for meta-model matching consisting of 23 real-world model transformations and mappings. This benchmark is used to comprehensively evaluate MatchBox. The results obtained lead to conclusions regarding our approach and the effectiveness of meta-model matching.
Evaluating a Targeted Social Program When Placement is Decentralized

It has been shown that the social security system and other sorts of government transfers have helped poor elderly people, such as widows, to live alone in the U.S. This paper investigates whether government financial support contributed to the increase in the probability of the vulnerable elderly living alone in Latin American countries as well. Specifically, the countries that in the 1980s experienced government reforms favorable to the vulnerable elderly, Mexico and Uruguay, are examined. It is concluded that the improvement of educational attainment was mainly responsible for helping the elderly poor to live alone in rural areas in Mexico, and not the government system. On the other hand, in Uruguay, for unmarried elderly females, the increase in social security income explains most of the increase in the probability of living alone.
Analysis of Environmental Efficiency Variation

In this article, we develop and implement a methodology for analyzing the sources of variation in environmental efficiency across producers. We formulate a two-stage model. In the first stage, we use stochastic frontier analysis to estimate both technical and environmental efficiency. In the second stage, we again use stochastic frontier analysis to regress estimated environmental efficiency scores against a variety of technology, physical environment, and management variables. In this stage we estimate the impact of each explanatory variable on environmental efficiency, and we derive conditional estimates of environmental efficiency from the one-sided error component. We illustrate our methodology with an empirical application to a panel of Dutch dairy farms. We find evidence of relatively low levels of environmental efficiency, and we find that environmental efficiency can be improved through a number of policy options, including the provision of farmers with more insight into the nutrient balance of their farms.
Business Elites, Political Connections, and Economic Entrenchment: Evidence from Belgium 1858-1909

Pre-World War I Belgium was characterized by a strong concentration of power in the hands of a small elite with ties to business, banks, and politics. We find that political and upper class connections were widespread amongst listed firms, especially connections with the ruling political party. Connected firms had higher growth levels and a higher probability of survival. A shift in political power in 1870 significantly affected the value of connected firms. By 1905, it was bank-affiliated firms active in traditional industries, developed prior to 1870, that had more connections and accrued the largest benefits, which suggest economic entrenchment.
An examination of microfinance self-help groups and the poorest of the poor women in Tamil Nadu, India

This study examined the formation and operation of women's microfinance self-help groups in southern India and investigated whether or not the poorest of the poor women were accepted as members of those groups. The study found that caste was used as a selection criterion. Many eligible women excluded themselves from joining the self-help group due to their own lack of education, age, poor health, poverty and lack of trust in the system. The research revealed that self-help groups enhanced women's income and education, improved village infrastructure, and reduced household conflict. Factors that might prevent inclusion of the poorest of the poor in future microfinance programs were identified.
Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience Who Are Those " Risk-taking Adolescents " ? Individual Differences in Developmental Neuroimaging Research

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has illuminated the development of human brain function. Some of this work in typically-developing youth has ostensibly captured neural underpinnings of adolescent behavior which is characterized by risk-seeking propensity, according to psychometric questionnaires and a wealth of anecdote. Notably, cross-sectional comparisons have revealed age-dependent differences between adolescents and other age groups in regional brain responsiveness to prospective or experienced rewards (usually greater in adolescents) or penalties (usually diminished in adolescents). These differences have been interpreted as reflecting an imbalance between motivational drive and behavioral control mechanisms, especially in mid-adolescence, thus promoting greater risk-taking. While intriguing, we caution here that researchers should be more circumspect in attributing clinically significant adolescent risky behavior to age-group differences in task-elicited fMRI responses from neurotypical subjects. This is because actual mortality and morbidity from behavioral causes (e.g. substance abuse, violence) by mid-adolescence is heavily concentrated in individuals who are not neurotypical, who rather have shown a lifelong history of behavioral disinhibition that frequently meets criteria for a disruptive behavior disorder, such as conduct disorder, oppositional-defiant disorder, or attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. These young people are at extreme risk of poor psychosocial outcomes, and should be a focus of future neurodevelopmental research.
NanoCheckpoints: A Task-Based Asynchronous Dataflow Framework for Efficient and Scalable Checkpoint/Restart

In this paper, we present NanoCheckpoints which is a lightweight software-based checkpoint/restart scheme for task-parallel HPC applications. We leverage OmpSs, a task-based OpenMP derivative programming model (PM) and its Nanos asynchronous dataflow runtime. NanoCheckpoints achieves minimal overheads by check pointing only tasks' inputs which are available for free in the OmpSs PM. We evaluate NanoCheckpoints by both pure task-parallel shared memory benchmarks (up to 16 cores) and hybrid OmpSs+MPI applications (up to 1024 cores). The results indicate that NanoCheckpoints has on average overhead 3% for shared memory benchmarks. The dataflow semantics of Nanos, where both check pointing and error recovery are asynchronous, allows NanoCheckpoints to scale at large core counts even when high error rates are present. For hybrid OmpSs+MPI benchmarks, NanoCheckpoints has very low overhead, on average 2%, and high scalability.
Cadmium and Its Neurotoxic Effects

Cadmium (Cd) is a heavy metal that has received considerable concern environmentally and occupationally. Cd has a long biological half-life mainly due to its low rate of excretion from the body. Thus, prolonged exposure to Cd will cause toxic effect due to its accumulation over time in a variety of tissues, including kidneys, liver, central nervous system (CNS), and peripheral neuronal systems. Cd can be uptaken from the nasal mucosa or olfactory pathways into the peripheral and central neurons; for the latter, Cd can increase the blood brain barrier (BBB) permeability. However, mechanisms underlying Cd neurotoxicity remain not completely understood. Effect of Cd neurotransmitter, oxidative damage, interaction with other metals such as cobalt and zinc, estrogen-like, effect and epigenetic modification may all be the underlying mechanisms. Here, we review the in vitro and in vivo evidence of neurotoxic effects of Cd. The available finding indicates the neurotoxic effects of Cd that was associated with both biochemical changes of the cell and functional changes of central nervous system, suggesting that neurotoxic effects may play a role in the systemic toxic effects of the exposure to Cd, particularly the long-term exposure.
The Correction of Eye Blink Artefacts in the EEG: A Comparison of Two Prominent Methods

Background The study investigated the residual impact of eyeblinks on the electroencephalogram (EEG) after application of different correction procedures, namely a regression method (eye movement correction procedure, EMCP) and a component based method (Independent Component Analysis, ICA). Methodology/Principle Findings Real and simulated data were investigated with respect to blink-related potentials and the residual mutual information of uncorrected vertical electrooculogram (EOG) and corrected EEG, which is a measure of residual EOG contribution to the EEG. The results reveal an occipital positivity that peaks at about 250ms after the maximum blink excursion following application of either correction procedure. This positivity was not observable in the simulated data. Mutual information of vertical EOG and EEG depended on the applied regression procedure. In addition, different correction results were obtained for real and simulated data. ICA yielded almost perfect correction in all conditions. However, under certain conditions EMCP yielded comparable results to the ICA approach. Conclusion In conclusion, for EMCP the quality of correction depended on the EMCP variant used and the structure of the data, whereas ICA always yielded almost perfect correction. However, its disadvantage is the much more complex data processing, and that it requires a suitable amount of data.
Supporting parents in the use of the early start Denver model as an intervention program for their young children with autism spectrum disorder

Abstract: Parents are the logical intervention agents for young children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The early start Denver model (ESDM) is a promising early intervention approach for children with ASD that can be implemented by parents. This study evaluated the effects of training parents in the use of the ESDM. We used a non-concurrent multiple probe across participants design to evaluate the effects of providing five mothers of young children with ASD with one hour per week of training for 12 weeks. Outcome measures included mothers use of the ESDM techniques and measures of the children’s levels of engagement and imitation, and expressive language skills. Maintenance of outcomes after one month was also assessed. Results showed four of the five mothers increased the percentage of ESDM techniques that they were using usually or consistently. Four of the five children showed some improvement on at least one of the child outcome measures. This suggests mixed results for supporting parents in the use of the ESDM. Implications and future research directions are discussed.
Induces Tumor and Endothelial Cell Apoptosis Inhibits the Growth of Colon Cancer Liver Metastasis and Receptor for Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Receptor Antiangiogenic Therapy Targeting the Tyrosine Kinase Updated

Increased vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) expression is associated with colon cancer metastases. We hypothesized that inhibition of VEGF receptor activity could inhibit colon cancer liver metastases. BALB/c mice underwent splenic injection with CT-26 colon cancer cells to generate metastases. Mice received daily i.p. injections of vehicle, tyrosine kinase inhibitor for Flk-1/KDR (SU5416) or tyrosine kinase inhibitor for VEGF, basic fibroblast growth factor, and platelet-derived growth factor receptors (SU6668). SU5416 and SU6668 respectively inhibited metastases (48.1% and 55.3%), microvessel formation (42.0% and 36.2%), and cell proliferation (24.4% and 27.3%) and increased tumor cell (by 2.6and 4.3-fold) and endothelial cell (by 18.6and 81.4-fold) apoptosis (P < 0.001). VEGF receptor inhibitors increased endothelial cell apoptosis, suggesting that VEGF may serve as an endothelial survival factor.
Child sleep in Japan perspective: based on the experience during these 10 years

Although sleep is known to be the primary activity of the brain especially during early stage of life, the condition of child sleep has been unfavourable in Japan. In 2000, nearly half of young children in Japan were reported to go to sleep at 10 pm or later. In 2002, we designed a web site for promoting an early bedtime and wake-up time, and for providing sufficient sleep duration for children in Japan. We also have been asked to join the nationwide campaign to have an early bedtime and wake-up time, and to have breakfast, organized by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. In addition, we have worked together with many local governments throughout Japan including Tokyo metropolitan to support this campaign. In 2010, the rate of young children in Japan who went to sleep at 10 pm or later was found to have decreased by 30%. We report here on our activity to promote better sleeping habits and discuss the perspective of child sleep in Japan.
Measuring the credibility of Arabic text content in Twitter

Recent research in measuring web content credibility automatically for text and multimedia have addressed many languages. Unfortunately, there is no research for credibility measurements of Arabic web content. Thus, this paper proposes a solution to automatically measure the credibility of Arabic web content. The automatic tool we present in this paper measures Arabic content credibility published in Twitter (a micro blogging service) targeting the news domain. Our tool is based on two approaches. The first approach uses the similarity between Twitter posts and authentic news sources, while the second approach is based on a set of proposed features, among them is the similarity with verified content. Preliminary evaluations of our tool have shown that the first approach for rating tweets credibility has higher precision and recall compared with the second approach.
Drugs, Wavefronts, and the Cardiac Vulnerable Period

The heart can be considered as a 3D mass of nonlinear excitable medium. With simple models of an excitable cell, one can probe arrhythmogenic processes with numerical experiments and possibly identify new therapeutic strategies. An important target for such experiments is the reduction in the incidence of sudden cardiac death in patients with cardiac disease. Potentially fatal cardiac rhythm disturbances are often initiated by extra endogenous heart beats. It was thought that drugs that reduced the frequency of extra heart contractions in individual cells would reduce the incidence of sudden cardiac death in patients. Two large clinical trials of drugs that exhibited significant antiarrhythmic properties in single cells were found to increase the rate of sudden cardiac death in patients by 2-3 fold over untreated patients even though the treated patients experienced an 80% reduction in extra heart beats. Presented here is a model of drug interactions with a cardiac cell that, when coupled with a nonlinear model of cardiac excitability, yields new insights into the proarrhythmic effects of supposedly antiarrhythmic drugs. With this model, a single unifying principle arises: that drug alteration of the dynamics of cardiac excitability displays both antiarrhythmic and proarrhythmic effects. In single cells, blockade of the Na channel (the action of antiarrhythmic drugs) reduces excitability and increases the interval of time that a cell remains inexcitable following a normal stimulation. When cells are coupled in 1, 2 and 3 D arrays, spatial gradients of excitability follow the activation wavefront. Reducing excitability and slowing the recovery dynamics of excitability in a multicellular medium extend the spatial gradient of the excitability recovery process. Consequently the vulnerable period, the interval of time during which an unsuppressed extra heart beat can initiate a fatal arrhythmia, is prolonged. Thus, reduced excitability, the drug property that contributes to the cellular " antiarrhythmic " response to extra stimulation is the same property that contributes to the multicellular " proarrhythmic " response (a prolonged vulnerable period and increased likelihood of initiating a fatal arrhythmia). Understanding the dynamics of drug binding to ion channels and wave formation in a nonlinear excitable medium is a major challenge and new insights will likely improve the development of suitable arrhythmia control strategies
CKIε/δ-dependent phosphorylation is a temperature-insensitive, period-determining process in the mammalian circadian clock

A striking feature of the circadian clock is its flexible yet robust response to various environmental conditions. To analyze the biochemical processes underlying this flexible-yet-robust characteristic, we examined the effects of 1,260 pharmacologically active compounds in mouse and human clock cell lines. Compounds that markedly (>10 s.d.) lengthened the period in both cell lines, also lengthened it in central clock tissues and peripheral clock cells. Most compounds inhibited casein kinase Iε (CKIε) or CKIδ phosphorylation of the PER2 protein. Manipulation of CKIε/δ-dependent phosphorylation by these compounds lengthened the period of the mammalian clock from circadian (24 h) to circabidian (48 h), revealing its high sensitivity to chemical perturbation. The degradation rate of PER2, which is regulated by CKIε/δ-dependent phosphorylation, was temperature-insensitive in living clock cells, yet sensitive to chemical perturbations. This temperature-insensitivity was preserved in the CKIε/δ-dependent phosphorylation of a synthetic peptide in vitro. Thus, CKIε/δ-dependent phosphorylation is likely a temperature-insensitive period-determining process in the mammalian circadian clock.
Life‐history trade‐offs during the seed‐to‐seedling transition in a subtropical wet forest community

The transition from seed to established seedling (STS) represents a major bottleneck in plant demography with implications for community dynamics and the maintenance of species diversity. The relative strength of seed limitation versus seedling establishment limitation can reveal life‐history trade‐offs that contribute to the maintenance of community diversity. If seed limitation dominates, chance arrival to open sites may play a key role in maintaining diversity. If seedling establishment limitation dominates, however, species relative abundances may depend more on tolerance to environmental and biotic conditions during seedling establishment (i.e. species‐specific regeneration niche). We used three years of seed rain and seedling recruitment data for 19 species of tropical woody plants collected in the Luquillo Forest Dynamics Plot in Puerto Rico to (i) examine a trade‐off between seed and seedling establishment limitation and (ii) quantify the biotic and abiotic factors that mediate the STS transition. We did not find evidence of a life‐history trade‐off in the form of a negative correlation between seed and seedling establishment limitation. However, species varied considerably in the relative levels of seed and seedling establishment limitation they displayed. Seed mass correlated negatively with seedling establishment limitation but not with seed limitation. We found striking differences in STS transition between life‐forms categorized as trees (including two palms) and lianas; lianas exhibited significantly higher STS transition rates than trees. The biotic and abiotic variables most strongly associated with successful STS transition differed between life‐forms. For trees, conspecific seed density and temporal fruiting concentration had negative effects on seedling establishment, while seed mass had a positive effect. A significant interaction between leaf litter input at a plot and seed size suggested that large‐seeded species had higher STS transition probability in plots with more leaf litter biomass. This effect was reversed for small‐seeded species. For lianas, leaf litter had a negative effect on STS transition and temporal fruiting concentration had a positive effect. Synthesis. Our analyses demonstrate the multidimensional axes of regeneration niches and how they can be related to seed size. Long‐term data sets are critical for understanding these relationships because the relevant factors vary along large spatial and temporal scales.
Mechanisms of sustained ventricular tachycardia in myotonic dystrophy: implications for catheter ablation.

BACKGROUND Ventricular arrhythmias have been documented and linked to the high incidence of sudden death seen in patients with myotonic dystrophy. However, their precise mechanism is unknown, and their definitive therapy remains to be established. METHODS AND RESULTS We studied 6 consecutive patients with myotonic dystrophy and sustained ventricular tachycardia by means of cardiac electrophysiological testing. Particular attention was paid to establish whether bundle-branch reentry was the tachycardia mechanism, and when such was the case, radiofrequency catheter ablation of either the right or left bundle branch was performed. Clinical tachycardia was inducible in all patients and had a bundle-branch reentrant mechanism. In 1 patient, 2 other morphologies of sustained tachycardia were also inducible, neither of which had ever been clinically documented, and both had a bundle-branch reentrant mechanism. Ventricular tachycardia was no longer inducible after bundle-branch ablation, except for a nonclinically documented and nonsustained ventricular tachycardia in the only patient who had apparent structural heart disease. CONCLUSIONS A high clinical suspicion of bundle-branch reentrant tachycardia is justified in patients with myotonic dystrophy who exhibit wide QRS complex tachycardia or tachycardia-related symptoms. Because catheter ablation will easily and effectively abolish bundle-branch reentrant tachycardia, myotonic dystrophy should always be considered in patients with sustained ventricular tachycardia. This is especially true if no apparent heart disease is found.
Analyzing Patients' Values by Applying Cluster Analysis and LRFM Model in a Pediatric Dental Clinic in Taiwan

This study combines cluster analysis and LRFM (length, recency, frequency, and monetary) model in a pediatric dental clinic in Taiwan to analyze patients' values. A two-stage approach by self-organizing maps and K-means method is applied to segment 1,462 patients into twelve clusters. The average values of L, R, and F excluding monetary covered by national health insurance program are computed for each cluster. In addition, customer value matrix is used to analyze customer values of twelve clusters in terms of frequency and monetary. Customer relationship matrix considering length and recency is also applied to classify different types of customers from these twelve clusters. The results show that three clusters can be classified into loyal patients with L, R, and F values greater than the respective average L, R, and F values, while three clusters can be viewed as lost patients without any variable above the average values of L, R, and F. When different types of patients are identified, marketing strategies can be designed to meet different patients' needs.