Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
New developments in the study of optical parabolic pulses in normally dispersive fibers

We report two recent studies dealing with the evolution of parabolic pulses in normally dispersive fibres. On the one hand, the nonlinear reshaping from a Gaussian intensity profile towards the asymptotic parabolic shape is experimentally investigated in a Raman amplifier. On the other hand, the significant impact of the fourth order dispersion on a passive propagation is theoretically discussed: we numerically demonstrate flat-top, coherent supercontinuum generation in an all-normal dispersion-flattened photonic crystal fiber. This shape is associated to a strong reshaping of the temporal profile what becomes triangular.
A NEW ANALYSIS OF THE O vi EMITTING NEBULA AROUND KPD 0005+5106

We present observations of O vi λ1032 emission around the helium white dwarf KPD 0005+5106 obtained with the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer. Previously published data, reprocessed with an updated version of the calibration pipeline, are included along with new observations. The recent upward revision of the white dwarf's effective temperature to 200,000 K has motivated us to re-analyze all the data. We compare observations with photoionization models and find that the density of the O vi nebula is about 10 cm−3, and that the stellar flux must be attenuated by about 90% by the time it impinges on the inner face of the nebula. We infer that this attenuation is due to circumstellar material ejected by KPD 0005+5106 earlier in its evolution.
Differential effects of preschool quality on children’s emergent literacy skills in the final preschool year in Germany

Abstract The study investigates direct and indirect preschool quality effects on emergent literacy skills (children’s letter knowledge, oral skills, and interests and skills in print and communication) using quality indicators at process (ECERS-R, ECERS-E), structure (e.g. class size) and belief (e.g. support creativity) level. The study included a sample of 547 children from 97 preschools and implemented standardised tests and teacher-ratings in the final preschool year, as well as observations and questionnaires throughout the preschool period. Multiple regression models reveal that ECERS-R was significantly related to children’s teacher rated interest and skills in communication, and that ECERS-E predicted children’s tested letter knowledge. Group size predicted children’s interest and skills in print negatively, revealing lower scores in larger groups. With regard to beliefs, teachers’ creativity and social support beliefs were negatively related with children’s letter knowledge, whereas teachers’ knowledge- and cultural-tools-oriented beliefs were positively related with interest and skills in communication. These effects were partly mediated through ECERS-E. Although the study provides evidence for effects of preschool quality on the development of children’s emergent literacy skills and some evidence that effects of beliefs are partly mediated through process quality, effects are not consistent through the outcome variables and effect sizes are small.
New Data, New Doubts: A Comment on Burnside and Dollar&Apos;S "Aid, Policies, and Growth" (2000)

The Burnside and Dollar (2000, AER) finding that aid raises growth in a good policy environment has had an important influence on policy and academic debates. We conduct a data gathering exercise that updates their data from 1970 -93 to 1970 -97, as well as filling in missing data for the original period 1970 -93. We find that the Burnside and Dollar (2002, AER) finding is not robust to the use of this additional data.
C2C value co-creation through social interactions in tourism

Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. This paper examines the social practice of customer-to-customer value co-creation in tourism contexts by considering visitor–visitor interactions, their manifestations, influential factors, and types of resulting value using extended social situation analysis. On the basis of 76 qualitative in-depth interviews, results show that value co-creation is not necessarily dependent upon the underlying social interactions but predominantly influenced by personal factors and attitudes towards sociability. The stronger the focus on other social actors is and the longer and more personal the social interactions are, the more complex and multilayered is the co-created perceived value.
Receptive field formation by interacting excitatory and inhibitory synaptic plasticity

The stimulus selectivity of synaptic currents in cortical neurons often shows a co-tuning of excitation and inhibition, but the mechanisms that underlie the emergence and plasticity of this co-tuning are not fully understood. Using a computational model, we show that an interaction of excitatory and inhibitory synaptic plasticity reproduces both the developmental and – when combined with a disinhibitory gate – the adult plasticity of excitatory and inhibitory receptive fields in auditory cortex. The co-tuning arises from inhibitory plasticity that balances excitation and inhibition, while excitatory stimulus selectivity can result from two different mechanisms. Inhibitory inputs with a broad stimulus tuning introduce a sliding threshold as in Bienenstock-Cooper-Munro rules, introducing an excitatory stimulus selectivity at the cost of a broader inhibitory receptive field. Alternatively, input asymmetries can be amplified by synaptic competition. The latter leaves any receptive field plasticity transient, a prediction we verify in recordings in auditory cortex.
Effects of Enactment in Episodic Memory: A Pilot Virtual Reality Study with Young and Elderly Adults

None of the previous studies on aging have tested the influence of action with respect to the degree of interaction with the environment (active or passive navigation) and the source of itinerary choice (self or externally imposed), on episodic memory (EM) encoding. The aim of this pilot study was to explore the influence of these factors on feature binding (the association between what, where, and when) in EM and on the subjective sense of remembering. Navigation in a virtual city was performed by 64 young and 64 older adults in one of four modes of exploration: (1) passive condition where participants were immersed as passengers of a virtual car [no interaction, no itinerary control (IC)], (2) IC (the subject chose the itinerary, but did not drive the car), (3) low, or (4) high navigation control (the subject just moved the car on rails or drove the car with a steering-wheel and a gas pedal on a fixed itinerary, respectively). The task was to memorize as many events encountered in the virtual environment as possible along with their factual (what), spatial (where), and temporal (when) details, and then to perform immediate and delayed memory tests. An age-related decline was evidenced for immediate and delayed feature binding. Compared to passive and high navigation conditions, and regardless of age-groups, feature binding was enhanced by low navigation and IC conditions. The subjective sense of remembering was boosted by the IC in older adults. Memory performance following high navigation was specifically linked to variability in executive functions. The present findings suggest that the decision of the itinerary is beneficial to boost EM in aging, although it does not eliminate age-related deficits. Active navigation can also enhance EM when it is not too demanding for subjects’ cognitive resources.
Psychological well-being of young people engaged in a group- based weight management programme

Obesity in youth is associated with many psychological adversities yet psychological well-being is infrequently monitored as a primary outcome in weight management programmes. Such programmes have been specifically criticised for increasing the risk of eating disorders (ED) in adolescents who are overweight and have obesity. Therefore this study aimed to look at psychological well-being in a sample of adolescents from the community using a group-based weight management programme. Eighty-two young people aged 13-17 participated in an online survey assessing depressive symptoms, body dissatisfaction, self-esteem, quality of life and eating disorder psychopathology. A cross sectional and longitudinal design was utilised to assess psychological well-being change over the monitoring period of 3 months and relate to weight change. Psychological impairment was evident within the sample: 36% showed depressive symptoms, 68% poor quality of life (QoL) and 28 % had disordered eating psychopathology. High ED risk was associated with depressive symptoms, body dissatisfaction and a poorer QoL in comparison to those at low risk of ED. No significant changes were noted across weight status and well-being between phase 1 and phase 2 of the study and change in well-being was not associated with a change in weight. Psychological-wellbeing is impaired in some adolescents using these programmes therefore it is recommended that the impact of psychopathology is considered more thoroughly by monitoring psychological well-being regularly during young peoples’ engagement in these. This will aid evaluative practices and will increase our understanding in this area.
Incorporating Trustiness and Collective Synonym/Contrastive Evidence into Taxonomy Construction

Taxonomy plays an important role in many applications by organizing domain knowledge into a hierarchy of is-a relations between terms. Previous works on the taxonomic relation identification from text corpora lack in two aspects: 1) They do not consider the trustiness of individual source texts, which is important to filter out incorrect relations from unreliable sources. 2) They also do not consider collective evidence from synonyms and contrastive terms, where synonyms may provide additional supports to taxonomic relations, while contrastive terms may contradict them. In this paper, we present a method of taxonomic relation identification that incorporates the trustiness of source texts measured with such techniques as PageRank and knowledge-based trust, and the collective evidence of synonyms and contrastive terms identified by linguistic pattern matching and machine learning. The experimental results show that the proposed features can consistently improve performance up to 4%-10% of F-measure.
Pengembangan Modul Berbasis Discovery Learning Untuk Meningkatkan Pemahaman Konsep

Penelitian ini bertujuan: (1) menghasilkan media pembelajaran fisika berupa Modul Berbasis Discovery Learning Untuk Meningkatkan Pemahaman Konsep Pada Siswa SMP/MTS Kelas VIII Semester Genap (2) Mengetahui kualitas Modul Berbasis Discovery Learning Untuk Meningkatkan Pemahaman Konsep Pada Siswa SMP/MTS Kelas VIII Semester Genap melalui penilaian validator dan respon siswa; (3) Mengetahui persentase peningkatan pemahaman konsep siswa setelah menggunakan media pengembangan Modul Berbasis Discovery Learning Untuk Meningkatkan Pemahaman Konsep. Model pengembangan yang digunakan untuk mengembangkan media pembelajaran fisika berbasis Discovery Learning adalah adaptasi model pengembangan prosedural menurut Sugiyono dan model pengembangan 4-D oleh S. Tiagarajan Dorothy S. Semmel dan Melvyn L. Semmel. Desain uji coba produk pengembangan dalam penelitian ini yaitu validasi ahli, uji kelas kecil, dan uji coba terbatas. Subjek uji coba adalah 6 siswa untuk uji kelas kecil dari kelas VIII B SMPN 2 Geger dan uji coba terbatas yaitu 20 siswaVIII A SMPN 2 Geger. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa: 1) Langkah-langkah pembuatan Modul Berbasis Discovery Learning dalam penelitian ini yaitu analisis ujung depan, analisis siswa, analisis materi, membuat instrumen, menentukan format, perancangan, validasi ahli, uji kelas kecil dan uji coba kelas terbatas; 2) Kualitas Modul Berbasis Discovery Learning ini memperoleh kategori baik dimana yang telah dinilai oleh ahli materi memperoleh presentase sebesar 91,56% (sangat layak) dan ahli media memperoleh presentase sebesar 88,88% (sangat layak) sedangkan pada uji kelas kecil memperoleh presentase sebesar 87,33% (sangat baik) dan uji coba terbatas memperoleh presentase sebesar 85,53% (sangat baik); 3) Hasil pemahaman konsep siswa dilakukan pada uji kelas kecil memperlihatkan peningkatan sedang dengan rata-rata N-Gain dan pada uji coba terbatas memperlihatkan peningkatan sedang dengan rata-rata N-Gain.
Odor Identification Test in Idiopathic REM-Behavior Disorder and Parkinson's Disease in China

Background Olfactory dysfunction is common in Parkinson's disease (PD) and idiopathic rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder (iRBD), which is a risk factor in the development of PD. However, a few studies have conflicting results when comparing dysosmia in the patients with iRBD and PD. There is no study investigating the olfactory function in Chinese patients with iRBD. Additionally, the Sniffin’ Sticks screening 12 test (SS-12) contains several odors that are not familiar to people in different cultures. Methods Odor identification was evaluated in iRBD patients (n = 54), PD patients (n = 54) and healthy controls (n = 54). With the identification data, a brief odor identification test was established and then validated in other subjects. Results Odor identification scores in iRBD patients were significantly higher than those in PD patients (P<0.001) but lower than those in controls (P<0.001). At the cut-off value of 7.5, the Sniffin’ Sticks clearly differentiated iRBD and PD patients from the controls, and the brief test could increase the specificity in diagnosing PD. Neither the Sniffin’ Sticks nor the brief test could clearly differentiate PD and iRBD patients from each other. Conclusions Olfaction is more impaired in PD patients than in iRBD patients, possibly due to the heterogeneity of iRBD patients. The Sniffin’ Sticks could be a useful tool for differentiating iRBD patients from the healthy population, and it could be useful for screening people at high-risk of PD in China, especially when combined with polysomnography. To reduce the expense and time required for the Sniffin’ Sticks test, this study shows that a brief test is feasible.
Spontaneous NA+ transients in individual mitochondria of intact astrocytes

Mitochondria in intact cells maintain low Na+ levels despite the large electrochemical gradient favoring cation influx into the matrix. In addition, they display individual spontaneous transient depolarizations. The authors report here that individual mitochondria in living astrocytes exhibit spontaneous increases in their Na+ concentration (Na mit+ spiking), as measured using the mitochondrial probe CoroNa Red. In a field of view with ∼30 astrocytes, up to 1,400 transients per minute were typically detected under resting conditions. Na mit+ spiking was also observed in neurons, but was scarce in two nonneural cell types tested. Astrocytic Na mit+ spikes averaged 12.2 ± 0.8 s in duration and 35.5 ± 3.2 mM in amplitude and coincided with brief mitochondrial depolarizations; they were impaired by mitochondrial depolarization and ruthenium red pointing to the involvement of a cation uniporter. Na mit+ spiking activity was significantly inhibited by mitochondrial Na+/H+ exchanger inhibition and sensitive to cellular pH and Na+ concentration. Ca2+ played a permissive role on Na mit+ spiking activity. Finally, the authors present evidence suggesting that Na mit+ spiking frequency was correlated with cellular ATP levels. This study shows that, under physiological conditions, individual mitochondria in living astrocytes exhibit fast Na+ exchange across their inner membrane, which reveals a new form of highly dynamic and localized functional regulation. © 2007 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
How Does Fiction Reading Influence Empathy? An Experimental Investigation on the Role of Emotional Transportation

The current study investigated whether fiction experiences change empathy of the reader. Based on transportation theory, it was predicted that when people read fiction, and they are emotionally transported into the story, they become more empathic. Two experiments showed that empathy was influenced over a period of one week for people who read a fictional story, but only when they were emotionally transported into the story. No transportation led to lower empathy in both studies, while study 1 showed that high transportation led to higher empathy among fiction readers. These effects were not found for people in the control condition where people read non-fiction. The study showed that fiction influences empathy of the reader, but only under the condition of low or high emotional transportation into the story.
Cav3.2 T-Type Ca2+ Channel-Dependent Activation of ERK in Paraventricular Thalamus Modulates Acid-Induced Chronic Muscle Pain

Treatments for chronic musculoskeletal pain, such as lower back pain, fibromyalgia, and myofascial pain syndrome, remain inadequate because of our poor understanding of the mechanisms that underlie these conditions. Although T-type Ca2+ channels (T-channels) have been implicated in peripheral and central pain sensory pathways, their role in chronic musculoskeletal pain is still unclear. Here, we show that acid-induced chronic mechanical hyperalgesia develops in Cav3.1-deficient and wild-type but not in Cav3.2-deficient male and female mice. We also show that T-channels are required for the initiation, but not maintenance, of acid-induced chronic muscle pain. Blocking T-channels using ethosuximide prevented chronic mechanical hyperalgesia in wild-type mice when administered intraperitoneally or intracerebroventricularly, but not intramuscularly or intrathecally. Furthermore, we found an acid-induced, Cav3.2 T-channel-dependent activation of ERK (extracellular signal-regulated kinase) in the anterior nucleus of paraventricular thalamus (PVA), and prevention of the ERK activation abolished the chronic mechanical hyperalgesia. Our findings suggest that Cav3.2 T-channel-dependent activation of ERK in PVA is required for the development of acid-induced chronic mechanical hyperalgesia.
Openness, growth and development: trade and investment issues for developing economies

Many developing economies have become increasingly disenchanted with the operations of the World Trade Organisation and the global trading system in general, reflecting a perception that their interests and concerns have been neglected. Inevitably this has reduced the enthusiasm of many governments for participating in further rounds of multilateral trade and investment talks. Yet international trade and investment liberalisation are far from complete, suggesting that it may still be worthwhile to pursue reforms to the rules governing the multilateral trading system. This paper assesses the evidence for the proposition that the interests of developing countries will be enhanced through greater international openness and draws out some of the implications for the issues confronting them in any future round of negotiations. The evidence suggests that greater international openness can help to raise per capita incomes, but the gains from greater openness are by no means automatic. Openness is part of a development strategy, not a substitute for one, and needs to be complemented by a sound institutional and legal framework, along with timely and predictable enforcement of the rules embodied in that framework. Developing economies have much to gain from further multilateral liberalisation of trade policies, but are unlikely to achieve those gains without assistance to help develop their existing institutional and social capabilities.
Songs as a Medium for Embedded Reproductive Messages

Research shows that sensational news stories as well as popular romance novels often feature themes related to important topics in evolutionary psychology. In the first of four studies described in this paper we examined the song lyrics from three Billboard charts: Country, Pop, and R&B. A content analysis of the lyrics revealed 18 reproductive themes that read like an outline for a course in evolutionary psychology. Approximately 92% of the 174 songs that made it into the Top Ten in 2009 contained one or more reproductive messages, with an average of 10.49 reproductive phrases per song. Although differences in the frequency of different themes between charts were found, further analyses showed that the most popular/bestselling songs contained significantly more reproductive messages. An analysis of the lyrics of opera arias and art songs also revealed evidence for many of the same embedded reproductive messages extending back more than 400 years.
Sparse equalization in high data rate WCDMA systems

Low computational complexity is among the most important criteria for receiver design in mobile communication systems such as WCDMA. Low complexity receivers are desirable especially in the downlink. In this paper we address the problem of complexity reduction of MMSE equalization. It is well known that for good performance the length of an equalizer should be at least twice the channel length. However, employing such a long filter is computationally very demanding. A novel method for selecting the filter coefficients for WCDMA receiver is proposed. This receiver is called sparse equalizer. It is shown via simulations to outperform both conventional RAKE and generalized RAKE (CRAKE) using the same filter length. Simulations are carried out in high speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) systems in ITU vehicular A and pedestrian A channels with multiple receive antennas.
Asymptotic Statistics of Nodal Domains of Quantum Chaotic Billiards in the Semiclassical Limit

Quantum chaos concerns eigenfunctions of the Laplace operator in a domain where a billiard ball would bounce chaotically. Such chaotic eigenfunctions have been conjectured to share statistical properties of their nodal domains with a simple percolation model, from which many interesting quantities can be computed analytically. We numerically test conjectures on the number and size of nodal domains of quantum chaotic eigenfunctions at very high energies, approaching the semiclassical limit. We use a highly efficient scaling method to quickly compute eigenfunctions at low resolution and interpolate to higher resolution. We computed 10 eigenfunctions and counted 10 nodal domains. Our results agree with the conjectured size nodal domains but disagree with the conjectured mean and variance of the number of nodal domains. Chapter
Understanding the relationship between language proficiency, language impairment and rehabilitation: Evidence from a case study

The goal of this study was to address the relationship between language proficiency, language impairment and rehabilitation in bilingual Russian–English individuals with aphasia. As a first step, we examined two Russian–English patients' pre-stroke language proficiency using a detailed and comprehensive language use and history questionnaire and evaluated their impairment using the Bilingual Aphasia Test. We then attempted to replicate and extend Kiran and Roberts' study in 2010, examining results of a primarily semantic treatment for anomia in one Russian–English bilingual patient. The patient's ability to name the trained and untrained items in both the trained (English) and untrained (Russian) languages significantly improved by achieving 100% accuracy. Finally, we examined whether improvements observed in treatment were captured by a broader language test such as the Bilingual Aphasia Test. Results are discussed with respect to factors contributing to the successful treatment and the implications of rehabilitation on assessment of language skills as a function of treatment.