Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Examining Developmental Adversity and Connectedness in Child Welfare-Involved Children

Identifying optimal out-of-home placements for child welfare-involved youth is challenging. Examples of youth recovering within each “out-of-home” placement type (foster, relative, residential) are evident, as are examples of youth who are deteriorating. The heterogeneity in developmental history and current functioning of youth makes blanket policies regarding placement unwise. Examination of developmental heterogeneity and functioning of youth in the welfare system can provide insights about factors influencing outcomes, thereby informing practice, program and policy. We explore whether current relational health (connectedness) promotes positive outcomes for child welfare-involved youth while controlling for developmental risk (history of adverse, and lack of relationally positive, experiences). Clinicians at 19 organisations serving child welfare-involved youth used a neurodevelopmentally informed approach to intervention, the Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics (NMT), which includes metrics to assess the developmental timing of children's risk, “connectedness” and neurodevelopmental functioning (e.g., sleep, arousal, cortical control). Data-driven statistical techniques were used to produce stable, generalisable estimates. Risk during the perinatal (0–2 months) period significantly predicted children's functioning; current relational health predicted outcomes more strongly. Although early life developmental risk has a persistent effect on functioning, relationally supportive contexts may mitigate this risk. Improving relational contexts of child welfare-involved youth, regardless of placement type, is key.
The Persistence of Corruption and Slow Economic Growth

There is increasing recognition that corruption has substantial, adverse effects on economic growth. But if the costs of corruption are so high, why don't countries strive to improve their institutions and root out corruption? Why do many countries appear to be stuck in vicious circles of widespread corruption and low economic growth, often accompanied by ever-changing governments through revolutions and coups? A possible explanation is that when corruption is widespread, individuals do not have incentives to fight it even if everybody would be better off without it. Two models involving strategic complementarities and multiple equilibria attempt to illustrate this formally.
Deep Spatial Pyramid: The Devil is Once Again in the Details

In this paper we show that by carefully making good choices for various detailed but important factors in a visual recognition framework using deep learning features, one can achieve a simple, efficient, yet highly accurate image classification system. We first list 5 important factors, based on both existing researches and ideas proposed in this paper. These important detailed factors include: 1) ‘2 matrix normalization is more effective than unnormalized or‘2 vector normalization, 2) the proposed natural deep spatial pyramid is very effective, and 3) a very small K in Fisher Vectors surprisingly achieves higher accuracy than normally used large K values. Along with other choices (convolutional activations and multiple scales), the proposed DSP framework is not only intuitive and efficient, but also achieves excellent classification accuracy on many benchmark datasets. For example, DSP’s accuracy on SUN397 is 59.78%, significantly higher than previous state-of-the-art (53.86%).
Connecting management learning with change experiences: revisiting HR manager education

The effectiveness of traditional management education programmes, particularly those emanating from university business schools, has been questioned (e.g. Willmott, 1994: Clarke, 1999). Central to these critiques is the recognition that the pedagogic models underpinning much of contemporary management education are frequently incongruent with the needs of learning managers and the continuous change environment in which they operate. This paper describes the developmental outcomes of 45 HR managers undertaking a specifically designed management education programme premised on an adult learning model (Knowles, 1990) and set in the context of continuous organizational change (Weick and Quinn, 1999). The learning experienced fostered the development of meta-abilities (Pedler, 1994; Butcher, 1997), expanded perspective taking and the evolution of double-loop learning approaches to real life organizational change. Quantitative evidence of these meta-developments are presented and conclusions for management learning in rapid change environments are offered.
Monitoring Challenges and Approaches for P2P File-Sharing Systems

Since the release of Napster in 1999, P2P file-sharing has enjoyed a dramatic rise in popularity. A 2000 study by Plonka on the University of Wisconsin campus network found that file-sharing accounted for a comparable volume of traffic to HTTP, while a 2002 study by Saroiu et al. on the University of Washington campus network found that file-sharing accounted for more than treble the volume of Web traffic observed, thus affirming the significance of P2P in the context of Internet traffic. Empirical studies of P2P traffic are essential for supporting the design of next-generation P2P systems, informing the provisioning of network infrastructure and underpinning the policing of P2P systems. The latter is of particular significance as P2P file-sharing systems have been implicated in supporting criminal behaviour including copyright infringement and the distribution of illegal pornography
Identifying, Treating, and Reducing Risk for Offenders with Mental Illness

Individuals with serious and oft en disabling mental illnesses like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and major depression are grossly overrepresented in the criminal justice system. Compared to the general population, the lifetime prevalence rate of these serious mental illnesses in the correctional population is twice as high for both men and women Of off enders with serious mental illness, nearly 3 of 4 have a co-occurring substance abuse disorder (Abram and Teplin 1991 ; Abram, Teplin, and McClelland 2003). Th ese fi gures take on new meaning when considered in context. Currently, there are over 7.3 million people in the United States under cor-rectional supervision (Bureau of Justice Statistics 2009). Roughly 1 in 7 of these men (15 percent) and 1 in 4 of these women (31 percent) suff er from a major mental3 million people with serious mental illness in the United States are on probation and parole or incarcerated in jail or prison. Th at is, nearly 1 in 5 people (18 percent) involved in our correctional system suff er from a major mental illness.
Bringing Statistics Up to Speed with Data in Analysis of Lymphocyte Motility

Two-photon (2P) microscopy provides immunologists with 3D video of the movement of lymphocytes in vivo. Motility parameters extracted from these videos allow detailed analysis of lymphocyte motility in lymph nodes and peripheral tissues. However, standard parametric statistical analyses such as the Student’s t-test are often used incorrectly, and fail to take into account confounds introduced by the experimental methods, potentially leading to erroneous conclusions about T cell motility. Here, we compare the motility of WT T cell versus PKCθ-/-, CARMA1-/-, CCR7-/-, and PTX-treated T cells. We show that the fluorescent dyes used to label T cells have significant effects on T cell motility, and we demonstrate the use of factorial ANOVA as a statistical tool that can control for these effects. In addition, researchers often choose between the use of “cell-based” parameters by averaging multiple steps of a single cell over time (e.g. cell mean speed), or “step-based” parameters, in which all steps of a cell population (e.g. instantaneous speed) are grouped without regard for the cell track. Using mixed model ANOVA, we show that we can maintain cell-based analyses without losing the statistical power of step-based data. We find that as we use additional levels of statistical control, we can more accurately estimate the speed of T cells as they move in lymph nodes as well as measure the impact of individual signaling molecules on T cell motility. As there is increasing interest in using computational modeling to understand T cell behavior in in vivo, these quantitative measures not only give us a better determination of actual T cell movement, they may prove crucial for models to generate accurate predictions about T cell behavior.
The Side Effect of the Melastoma malabathricum L Ethanol Extract on the Gonad Maturation of Female Orange Mud Crab (Scylla olivacea)

The medicinal plants in aquaculture are currently being studied quite extensively by researchers. Medicinal plants can act as an inducer or aphrodisiac and an antifertility agent in gonad maturation. The aimed of the experiment was to known side effects of the herb M. malabathricum L. on maturation process in female mud crab (S. olivacea). This study used 40 crabs with an average weight of 200-250g. The experiment consists of two treatment groups. The controls group (A) that received 100 μl of aquadest and group treatment (B) received 100 μl of 2 mg/g of ethanol extract M. malabathricum L. were studied. For 5, 10, 15, and 20 days of experiment, crabs were anesthetized and sacrified. The ovary was collect for GSI and histology. The end of experiment days (20 day), the hemolymph was collect to used ELISA assay. The result showed, significant differences in treatment group and control groups (p<0.05) in terms the macroscopic morphology of ovary, the mean GSI and the diameter of oocytes. Histological showed the influence of extract M. malabathricum L. on inhibited the ovary development compared with the control groups. Based on this results, it is concluded that ethanol extract of M. malabathricum L. leaves at a dose of 2 mg/g act as an antifertility agent for ovary maturation of S. olivacea.
Critical Success Factors for Small and Medium Enterprises: Perceptions of Entrepreneurs in Urban Malaysia

This study aims to investigate the perceived success factors of operating small and medium enterprises amongst Malaysian entrepreneurs. The term “success” is defined with both traditional criteria such as profit and growth and also with intrinsic factors such as personal satisfaction and the sense of achievement. A total of one hundred and eight entrepreneurs from Klang Valley were surveyed. Data was collected using a questionnaire that was conducted through face to face approach. Eighteen Likert-style questions were used to determine the perceived success factors. Findings revealed that the perceived success factors across ethnic groups and gender were reputation of honesty, good customer service and hard work. In conclusion, the findings reported in this article indicated that several similarities are shared amongst entrepreneurs in terms of success factors perceptions despite differences across ethnic groups and gender.
Learning to learn and teach: Student seminar as a teaching-learning method in undergraduate medical physiology through students perspective

Background: The efficacy of traditional lectures has been debated. Still a predominant form of educational technique, lectures have failed to transfer concepts as effectively as active learning approaches. Innovative teaching-learning methods such as students seminars that can hold the attention span of the students for a longer time need to be explored. Aims and Objectives: The aim and objective of this study were to evaluate the efficacy of student seminar as a teaching-learning method in undergraduate physiology through students perception. Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional questionnaire-based study conducted in a private medical college of Pune, across 3 years involving 596 1st-year MBBS students of three academic year batches. The selected topic was divided into five subtopics to be presented in 1012 min. Five volunteers from students presented a subtopic under a teachers guidance, while the non-presenting students read the topic too before attending the students seminar. A questionnaire containing 13 questions of both open-ended and close-ended types was designed to extract feedback from the students. The data were analyzed in Microsoft Excel. Results: Majority of the students gave a positive feedback to various aspects of the seminar. Negative response was given to only two items in the questionnaire. Conclusion: Students seminar is a potentially important resource of teaching-learning method yet to be fully tapped and hence needs to be incorporated on a regular basis in the medical curriculum.
Neuromagnetic Responses to Frequency-Tagged Sounds: A New Method to Follow Inputs from Each Ear to the Human Auditory Cortex during Binaural Hearing

Binaural cortical responses are mixtures of inputs from both ears. We introduce here a novel method that allows, for the first time, to selectively follow these inputs in humans up to the cortex during binaural hearing. We recorded neuromagnetic cortical responses to amplitude-modulated continuous tones, with different modulation frequencies at each ear. During binaural hearing, the left- and right-ear inputs competed strongly in both auditory cortices: the right-hemisphere responses were symmetrically suppressed, compared with monaural stimulation, for sounds of both ears, whereas the left-hemisphere responses were suppressed significantly more for ipsilateral than contralateral sounds, thereby intensifying the right-ear dominance of the left auditory cortex. This type of hemisphere- and ear-selective information on cortical binaural interaction could have important applications in human auditory neuroscience.
Bounded solutions to backward SDE's with jumps for utility optimization and indifference hedging

We prove results on bounded solutions to backward stochastic equations driven by random measures. Those bounded BSDE solutions are then applied to solve different stochastic optimization problems with exponential utility in models where the underlying filtration is noncontinuous. This includes results on portfolio optimization under an additional liability and on dynamic utility indifference valuation and partial hedging in incomplete financial markets which are exposed to risk from unpredictable events. In particular, we characterize the limiting behavior of the utility indifference hedging strategy and of the indifference value process for vanishing risk aversion.
Photocatalytic Activity of TiO2 on Activated Carbon Under Visible Light in the Photodegradation of Phenol

The photodegradation of phenol under visible light by using TiO2 and activated carbon prepared by physical activation was performed. Activated carbon was prepared from Tabebuia Pentaphyla wood by physical activation under CO2 flow at 800oC. UV-Vis lamp with a high proportion of visible light was used. Kinetic results of phenol photodegradation indicated a beneficial effect between TiO2 and AC. An increase of apparent first-order rate constant (kapp) by a factor of 1.74 in presence of TiO2-AC was obtained in comparison than TiO2 alone. This cooperative effect between both solids was ascribed to the high surface area and basic surface pH of this type of AC.
Immunoassays developed for pregnancy-associated plasma protein-A (PAPP-A) in pregnancy may not recognize PAPP-A in acute coronary syndromes.

BACKGROUND Pregnancy-associated plasma protein-A (PAPP-A) concentrations are increased in the circulation of patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS) and are associated with future adverse cardiac events. PAPP-A in ACS differs from PAPP-A in pregnancy in that PAPP-A in ACS is not complexed with the proform of eosinophil major basic protein (proMBP). We investigated the effect of antibody selection on the utility of PAPP-A assays for measurement of PAPP-A in pregnancy and/or ACS, and whether immunoassays for PAPP-A in pregnancy are suitable for PAPP-A in ACS. METHODS We constructed 2-site sandwich time-resolved immunofluorometric assays using 22 monoclonal antibodies raised against pregnancy serum PAPP-A. All antibodies were studied in pairs, with each antibody used as either capture or tracer. We compared the reactivity of each antibody combination with PAPP-A/proMBP complex derived from pregnancy sera or with uncomplexed PAPP-A extracted from atherosclerotic plaques. Recombinant human PAPP-A and proMBP were also used to determine the specificity of the antibodies. We confirmed all major findings with serum samples collected from patients with myocardial infarction. RESULTS Six monoclonal antibodies reacted with the proMBP subunit of the PAPP-A/proMBP complex. Epitopes of 3 proMBP-reactive antibodies largely overlapped, but were well separated from those of another group of 3 proMBP-reactive antibodies. Assays using any of the 6 proMBP-reactive antibodies failed to detect PAPP-A in ACS. In addition, some 2-site assays capable of detecting PAPP-A in pregnancy were almost incapable of detecting PAPP-A in ACS, although the individual epitopes remained detectable in PAPP-A in ACS. CONCLUSIONS Immunoassays developed for PAPP-A in pregnancy may not be suitable for PAPP-A in ACS. Assays for PAPP-A in ACS should be based on careful antibody selection and subjected to extensive testing with clinical ACS samples.
The Effects of Prosthetic Tactile Feedback on Persons Who Stutter

Vibrotactile speech feedback has been documented to enhance fluency in adults who stutter. Based on these data, researchers at the University of Mississippi have developed a prosthetic device that captures the speech signal of the speaker, converts this signal into tactile stimulation, and administers vibratory speech feedback to the speaker through a handheld stimulator. This patented device, as tested with a handheld tactile stimulator, has been documented as producing significant fluency enhancement comparable to that of other auditory speech feedback prosthetic devices. The purpose of this present study is to collect data measuring the effects of tactile speech feedback on overt stuttering frequency as a function of different bodily locations as a means to increase its wearability and improve user experience during activities of daily living. Twelve adults who stutter (AWS) ranging from 18 to 43 years of age were prompted to read various ~300 syllable passages under four different conditions: a no stimulation control speaking condition and experimental speaking conditions that tactilely stimulated the hand, dominant wrist, and dominant foot. Results suggest a significant main effect of tactile speech feedback on fluency enhancement, with Bonferroni post-hoc comparisons revealing that the foot condition provided significantly better fluency enhancement than other speaking conditions. Prosthetic implementation and future applications of the device are discussed.
Multi-class blue noise sampling

Sampling is a core process for a variety of graphics applications. Among existing sampling methods, blue noise sampling remains popular thanks to its spatial uniformity and absence of aliasing artifacts. However, research so far has been mainly focused on blue noise sampling with a single class of samples. This could be insufficient for common natural as well as man-made phenomena requiring multiple classes of samples, such as object placement, imaging sensors, and stippling patterns. We extend blue noise sampling to multiple classes where each individual class as well as their unions exhibit blue noise characteristics. We propose two flavors of algorithms to generate such multi-class blue noise samples, one extended from traditional Poisson hard disk sampling for explicit control of sample spacing, and another based on our soft disk sampling for explicit control of sample count. Our algorithms support uniform and adaptive sampling, and are applicable to both discrete and continuous sample space in arbitrary dimensions. We study characteristics of samples generated by our methods, and demonstrate applications in object placement, sensor layout, and color stippling.
Predictive Models for the Breeder Genetic Algorithm I. Continuous Parameter Optimization

In this paper a new genetic algorithm called the Breeder Genetic Algorithm (BGA) is introduced. The BGA is based on artificial selection similar to that used by human breeders. A predictive model for the BGA is presented that is derived from quantitative genetics. The model is used to predict the behavior of the BGA for simple test functions. Different mutation schemes are compared by computing the expected progress to the solution. The numerical performance of the BGA is demonstrated on a test suite of multimodal functions. The number of function evaluations needed to locate the optimum scales only as n ln(n) where n is the number of parameters. Results up to n = 1000 are reported.
When the Death Penalty Goes Public: Referendum, Initiative, and the Fate of Capital Punishment

This article considers what happens when the death penalty is put on the ballot. It reviews the history of referenda/initiatives concerning capital punishment from the start of the twentieth century to the present. That history reveals the role that referenda/ initiatives have played in struggles against and within governmental institutions. In addition, we find that abolitionists seldom prevail in those electoral contests. We consider the implications of these findings for the prospects that the death penalty could be ended democratically.
Age-Related Changes in the Prevalence of Osteoporosis according to Gender and Skeletal Site: The Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2008-2010

Background The incidence of osteoporosis and its related fractures are expected to increase significantly in the rapidly aging Korean population. Reliable data on the prevalence of this disease is essential for treatment planning. However, sparse data on Korean patients is available. Methods We analyzed data from the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES) 2008 to 2010. Bone mineral density (BMD) was measured at the femoral neck and lumbar spine using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry. Osteopenia and osteoporosis were diagnosed according to the World Health Organization T-score criteria. We analyzed the BMD data of 17,208 people (men, 7,837; women, 9,368). Results The adjusted prevalence of osteoporosis was 7.8% in men versus 37.0% in women. No significant difference was observed in the prevalence of osteopenia between genders (men, 47.0%; women, 48.7%). The prevalence of osteoporosis in men in their 50s was 4.0%, in their 60s was 7.2%, in their 70s was 15.1%, and in their 80s was 26.7%. The figures in women were 15.2%, 36.5%, 62.7%, and 85.8%, respectively. The age group with the maximal BMD differed between genders. In the men, 20s had the highest value in all the skeletal sites. However, in the women, the maximal BMD in the femoral neck, lumbar spine, and the total hip was observed in their 20s, 30s, and 40s, respectively. The onset age of osteoporosis differed between genders. Osteoporosis in the femoral neck began at 55 years in the women and at 60 years in the men. Conclusion The prevalence of osteoporosis in Korea was significantly high. In addition, the age-related changes in the prevalence of osteoporosis differed according to gender and skeletal site.