Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Low 24-hour adiponectin and high nocturnal leptin concentrations in a case-control study of community-dwelling premenopausal women with major depressive disorder: the Premenopausal, Osteopenia/Osteoporosis, Women, Alendronate, Depression (POWER) study.

OBJECTIVE Major depressive disorder (MDD) is associated with immune system dysfunction and disruption of multiple circadian systems. Adiponectin is an adipocytokine with anti-inflammatory and antiatherogenic effects. Circulating concentrations are inversely related to adiposity and risks of metabolic syndrome and diabetes mellitus. Our goals were (1) to establish whether premenopausal women with MDD exhibit decreased plasma adiponectin concentrations and/or disruption of circadian adiponectin rhythmicity; (2) to assess whether there is a relationship between adiponectin and MDD; and (3) to explore the temporal relationships among adiponectin, leptin, corticotropin, and cortisol secretion. METHOD We conducted a case-control study of community-dwelling premenopausal women with DSM-IV MDD (n = 23) and age- and body mass index (BMI)-matched control subjects (n = 23). Main outcome measures were circulating concentrations of adiponectin, leptin, corticotropin, and cortisol measured hourly for 24 hours. Subjects were recruited from July 1, 2001, to February 28, 2003. RESULTS Women with MDD had approximately 30% lower mean 24-hour concentration of adiponectin than did control subjects. Adiponectin concentration was inversely related to depression severity and total duration of disease, suggesting a causal link. In contrast, mean nocturnal leptin concentration was higher in the MDD versus control groups. Mean leptin concentration was inversely related to cortisol and adiponectin concentrations, both in subjects with depression and in control subjects. In cross-correlation analyses, the relationship between corticotropin and cortisol concentrations was stronger in women with MDD than in control subjects, a finding consistent with hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activation in MDD. CONCLUSIONS In premenopausal women with MDD, reduced daily adiponectin production may increase the risk of diabetes mellitus, and elevated leptin may contribute to osteoporosis.
The Influence of Forgiveness on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Questioning Individuals’ Shame and Self‐Esteem

This survey research examined relationships among self-esteem, shame proneness, and forgiveness of self, situations, and others in a sample of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (LGBTQ) individuals (N= 657). Findings indicate that LGBTQ self-esteem was largely predicted by higher self-forgiveness and lower shame proneness. Forgiveness of self, others, and situations each partially mediated the relationship between shame proneness and self-esteem. Implications for counseling include the importance of forgiveness as a psychological mechanism to reduce LGBTQ shame and enhance self-esteem.
Mortgages and monetary policy

How is monetary policy transmitted through its impact on mortgage borrowings? How does this transmission mechanism depend on whether mortgages are fixed or floating rate? To address these questions, we add a model of financial institutions’ behaviour to a dynamic general equilibrium model in which some households face credit constraints. We use this model to analyse the real effects of inflationary shocks, and derive implications for monetary policy. We question the conventional wisdom that inflationary shocks necessarily benefit debtors and provide a rationale for interest rate smoothing on the part of central banks.
Choosing a career in science: The Nigerian student perception

The selection of subjects is a vital incident in the life of the senior secondary school child hence the need for proper guidance and encouragement to boost their interest and perception of science subjects. In this research a total of 180 senior secondary III students (91 boys and 89 girls) were carefully selected from four secondary schools in Delta State Nigeria, for the study. One research question and 4 hypotheses guided the study. The instrument used is the Subject Choice and Perception Questionnaire (SCAPQ). It was discovered that 40.6% of the students studying sciences as a result of personal interest had better perception of sciences than the 32.7%, 20.6% and 6.1%, influenced to study science by parental, teacher and gender factors respectively. Also, there was no significant difference between perception of boys and girls about science subjects. Conclusion and recommendations were made based on the results.
Self-Esteem and Method Effects Associated With Negatively Worded Items: Investigating Factorial Invariance by Sex

The Rosenberg Self-Esteem scale (RSE) has been widely used in examinations of sex differences in global self-esteem. However, previous examinations of sex differences have not accounted for method effects associated with item wording, which have consistently been reported by researchers using the RSE. Accordingly, this study examined the multigroup invariance of global self-esteem and method effects associated with negatively worded items on the RSE between males and females. A correlated traits, correlated methods framework for modeling method effects was combined with a standard multigroup invariance routine using covariance structure analysis. Overall, there were few differences between males and females in terms of the measurement of self-esteem and method effects associated with negatively worded items on the RSE. Our findings suggest that, whereas method effects exist on the RSE scale for both males and females, the method effects associated with negatively worded items do not influence the measurement invariance and mean differences in global self-esteem scores between the sexes.
SPATIAL SUMMATION OF INHIBITORY INFLUENCES IN THE EYE OF LIMULUS, AND THE MUTUAL INTERACTION OF RECEPTOR UNITS

The inhibitory influences exerted mutually among the receptor units (ommatidia) of the lateral eye of Limulus are additive. If two groups of receptors are illuminated together the total inhibition they exert on a "test receptor" near them (decrease in the frequency of its nerve impulse discharge in response to light) depends on the combined inhibitory influences exerted by the two groups. If the two groups are widely separated in the eye, their total inhibitory effect on the test receptor equals the sum of the inhibitory effects they each produce separately. If they are close enough together to interact, their effect when acting together is usually less than the sum of their separate effects, since each group inhibits the activity of the other and hence reduces its inhibitory influence. However, the test receptor, or a small group illuminated with it, may interact with the two groups and affect the net inhibitory action. A variety of quantitative effects have been observed for different configurations of three such groups of receptors. The activity of a population of n interacting elements is described by a set of n simultaneous equations, linear in the frequencies of the receptor elements involved. Applied to three interacting receptors or receptor groups equations are derived that account quantitatively for the variety of effects observed in the various experimental configurations of retinal illumination used.
The Attachment Motivational System as a Guide to an Effective Therapeutic Process

In this article, we have drawn upon the attachment motivational system (Bowlby, 1988; Lichtenberg, 1989; Shane, Shane, and Gales, 1997) as a guide to providing “positive new experience” as the cornerstone of therapeutic progress. We see positive new experience as paramount, over and above insight and/or interpretation because insight and interpretation are so varied among different theories. The common denominator that is effective in therapy, then, must be something beyond insight and interpretation. We call that therapeutic factor the positive new experience and will draw from attachment theory to understand its components. In addition, using the attachment motivation system and trauma research, we elaborate on why certain types of negative experiences in psychotherapy and psychoanalysis should be avoided. We address, in particular, harmful repetitions of traumatic relational patterns or traumatic events in the transference, overemphasis on “the empathic stance,” and the search for motivation in patients' behaviors where such a search may be based on the false assumption that all behavior is motivated. This latter category addresses aspects of behaving that may not be motivated; that is, they just “are,” and as such, the search for and attribution of meaning in such instances may lead to failed understanding and insight and to faulty correctives. We have illustrated with clinical examples both positive new experience and three types of negative experiences to be avoided in treatment.
Identity Politics

a cane, would be arrested after showing proof of residence. But the attention generated by identity politics often focuses on sensationalized details at the expense of understanding systemic dimensions of social problems. The media’s coverage of this shocking, frightening, and embarrassing public incident often focused on Professor Gates’s professional achievements while alluding to, but never fully addressing, the structural dimension of police officers’ abuse of authority, especially when racial minorities are involved. Public conversation centered on whether Professor Gates’s achievements should have exempted him from the indignities of “being black”—a view rebutted by the answer to the question, “What do you call a black man with a Ph.D.? ” Consequently, the systemic suffering of poor and minority communities, IdentIty PolItIcs Part of a Reinvigorated Class Politics
Modeling the Relationship between Growth in Rapid Naming Speed and Growth in Decoding Skill in First-Grade Children.

This study used an extant longitudinal correlational data set (D. L. Compton, 2000) to model the relationship between growth in decoding skill and growth in rapid automatized naming (RAN) in 1st-grade children. During an academic year, 75 1st-grade children were assessed 7 times (once per month) in word reading, nonword reading, RAN numbers, and RAN colors. Results indicated a unique relationship between RAN numbers and early decoding skill. A bidirectional relationship between decoding skill and RAN numbers was supported, with RAN performance prior to the acquisition of decoding skill predictive of future decoding skill and with increased growth in RAN facilitated by the acquisition of decoding skill. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)
Incentive-Compatible Forecasting Competitions

We initiate the study of incentive-compatible forecasting competitions in which multiple forecasters make predictions about one or more events and compete for a single prize. We have two objectives: (1) to incentivize forecasters to report truthfully and (2) to award the prize to the most accurate forecaster. Proper scoring rules incentivize truthful reporting if all forecasters are paid according to their scores. However, incentives become distorted if only the best-scoring forecaster wins a prize, since forecasters can often increase their probability of having the highest score by reporting more extreme beliefs. In this paper, we introduce two novel forecasting competition mechanisms. Our first mechanism is incentive compatible and guaranteed to select the most accurate forecaster with probability higher than any other forecaster. Moreover, we show that in the standard single-event, two-forecaster setting and under mild technical conditions, no other incentive-compatible mechanism selects the most accurate forecaster with higher probability. Our second mechanism is incentive compatible when forecasters’ beliefs are such that information about one event does not lead to belief updates on other events, and it selects the best forecaster with probability approaching one as the number of events grows. Our notion of incentive compatibility is more general than previous definitions of dominant strategy incentive compatibility in that it allows for reports to be correlated with the event outcomes. Moreover, our mechanisms are easy to implement and can be generalized to the related problems of outputting a ranking over forecasters and hiring a forecaster with high accuracy on future events. This paper was accepted by Yan Chen, behavioral economics and decision analysis.
Genetic Diversity of Grasspea and Its Relative Species Revealed by SSR Markers

The study of genetic diversity between Lathyrus sativus L. and its relative species may yield fundamental insights into evolutionary history and provide options to meet the challenge of climate changes. 30 SSR loci were employed to assess the genetic diversity and population structure of 283 individuals from wild and domesticated populations from Africa, Europe, Asia and ICARDA. The allele number per loci ranged from 3 to 14. The average gene diversity index and average polymorphism information content (PIC) was 0.5340 and 0.4817, respectively. A model based population structure analysis divided the germplasm resources into three subgroups: the relative species, the grasspea from Asia, and the grasspea from Europe and Africa. The UPGMA dendrogram and PCA cluster also demonstrated that Asian group was convincingly separated from the other group. The AMOVA result showed that the cultivated species was quite distinct from its relative species, however a low level of differentiation was revealed among their geographic origins. In all, these results provided a molecular basis for understanding genetic diversity of L. sativus and its relatives.
Quantification and toxicity of group A streptococcal pyrogenic exotoxins in an animal model of toxic shock syndrome-like illness

Toxic shock-like syndrome isolates of group A streptococci were evaluated for production of pyrogenic exotoxins (also called SPEs, scarlet fever toxins, and erythrogenic toxins). The isolates were consecutively obtained during 1987 and 1988. Of these isolates, 23 of 26 made SPE type A, 10 of 26 made SPE B, and 8 of 26 made SPE C. SPE A was produced in significantly greater amounts than SPEs B and C (3.2 micrograms/ml of culture fluid compared with 0.7 and 0.6 microgram/ml, respectively). SPE A, administered in miniosmotic pumps implanted subcutaneously in rabbits, was significantly more toxic than SPE C; seven of eight rabbits succumbed after challenge with 150 or 300 micrograms of SPE A, compared with one of six after challenge with SPE C.
Quality in Early Childhood Education and Care: A cultural context

SUMMARY This paper suggests that different cultural communities may hold different definitions of “quality” in Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) conforming with their respective, culturally valued educational goals and culturally based beliefs regarding practices that facilitate their attainment. Despite the negative implication of stereotyping socio-cultural communities as “individualist” or “collectivist” (Triandis, 1995), the conceptualisation of cultural variations in educational goals and practices along a continuum between these dichotomous extremes, has a heuristic value in clarifying our thinking about “quality” in ECEC in different cultural contexts. The paper examines valued educational goals (self-identity and motivation, social and emotional behavior and cognitive processes) and valued educational practices (children's learning environments, learning activities and educator-child interaction) in the context of “individualist” and “collectivist” cultural scripts. In conclusion the implications of this analysis for variations in the understanding of “quality” of ECEC in multi-cultural and rapidly changing societies are discussed.
Innate resistance of chickens to Trichinella spiralis at the muscular phase of the parasite.

Experimental infection of Trichinella spiralis in 1-day-old chickens showed that most worms were rapidly expelled from the intestine but those that remained developed to maturity and produced newborn larvae. These newborn larvae were found in the chicken muscles between days 9-21 postinfection (PI) but they showed little or no development. No larvae were detected in the muscles at day 25 PI and thereafter. Although the newborn larvae were able to penetrate the chicken muscle fibers, they were unable to grow normally, which resulted in their death and degeneration. The fact that the newborn larvae, which were shed in vitro by female worms retrieved from the chicken intestine, were able to develop into mature larvae when injected intravenously into mice indicated that the death of the newborn larvae in the chicken muscles was not due to any inherent defect of the larvae.
fastcluster: Fast Hierarchical, Agglomerative Clustering Routines for R and Python

The fastcluster package is a C++ library for hierarchical, agglomerative clustering. It provides a fast implementation of the most efficient, current algorithms when the input is a dissimilarity index. Moreover, it features memory-saving routines for hierarchical clustering of vector data. It improves both asymptotic time complexity (in most cases) and practical performance (in all cases) compared to the existing implementations in standard software: several R packages, MATLAB, Mathematica, Python with SciPy.
Electrical Machines Laminations Magnetic Properties: A Virtual Instrument Laboratory

Undergraduate courses in electrical machines often include an introduction to their magnetic circuits and to the various magnetic materials used in their construction and their properties. The students must learn to be able to recognize and compare the permeability, saturation, and losses of these magnetic materials, relate each material to its specific properties, and understand the impact of these properties on the major performance metrics of electrical machines. This paper describes a new test equipment setup and lab guide that helps students achieve these learning goals. The test equipment consists of two transformers of grain-oriented and non-grain-oriented electrical steel, transducers, a data acquisition (DAQ) board and a PC-based virtual instrument. The virtual instrument shows voltage, current, and core flux time waveforms, the rms voltage versus current curves and, most importantly, the lamination material magnetic cycle. Students' laboratory work was organized into a series of experiments that guide their achievement of these magnetic materials-related abilities. Pre- and post-lab exams assessed student learning, which was shown to have increased significantly. Students' opinions of the relevance, usefulness, and motivational effect of the laboratory were also positive.
Contribution of Sialic Acid-Binding Adhesin to Pathogenesis of Experimental Endocarditis Caused by Streptococcus gordonii DL1

ABSTRACT An insertional mutation in hsa, the gene encoding the sialic acid-binding adhesin of Streptococcus gordonii DL1, resulted in a significant reduction of the infection rate of the organism and an inflammatory reaction in the rat aortic valve with experimental endocarditis, suggesting that the adhesin contributes to the infectivity of the organism for heart valves.
The Micropolitics of Effective School-Based Leadership: Teachers' Perspectives

Although the micropolitics of educational settings has received significant attention in recent years, few empirical studies of this important phenomenon have been published. The data discussed in this article were drawn from a larger qualitative study that examined the perspectives of 1,200 teachers on the everyday strategies school principals use to influence them. This article focuses on the responses of the 836 teachers who specifically reported strategies used by principals whom they described as open and effective. The goals and impacts of strategies employed by open and effective principals are only briefly discussed. The data strongly suggest that open and effective principals rely primarily on normative strategies and pursue normative goals. The concept of normative-instrumental leadership, derived from the data, delineates open and effective principals' everyday political orientation vis-à-vis teachers. This concept is examined in the context of compliance theory and the notion of transformational leadership.
PREDICTIVE FACTORS OF THYROID CARCINOMA IN NON-TOXIC MULTINODULAR GOITRE

Abstract The management of nontoxic multinodular goitre (NMNG) remains controversial. The challenge for the clinician is to identify the small proportion of NMNG patients with associated thyroid carcinoma who would thus benefi t from surgery. We studied retrospectively the medical records of 80 patients with NMNG and coexisting thyroid carcinoma who underwent total thyroidectomy. Eighty total thyroidectomy patients with NMNG whose histology was benign were then randomnly chosen as controls. In univariate analysis, the following parameters were signifi cantly more frequent in the carcinoma group: rapid growth of the goitre (p=0.002), presence of microcalcifi cations (p=0.01), hypoechogenicity (p=0.02), firm consistency of a nodule (p=0.03), and presence of a dominant cold nodule on scintigraphy (p=0.03). In the multiple regression analysis, the variables signifi cantly associated with carcinoma were rapid growth (Odds ratio (OR) = 4.13, 95% confi dence interval(CI):1.72-9.89), hypo-echogenicity (OR = 3.11, 95% CI : 1.13-8.51) and the presence of a dominant nodule (OR = 2.26, 95% CI :1.06-4.79)). In the cancer group, tumour size was positively correlated with compression signs (p=0.01), age (p=0.02), the presence of a dominant nodule on scintigraphy (p=0.02), and with rapid growth (p=0.04). Concerning nodule size estimated on US (ultrasound), the majority (65%) of patients without carcinoma had nodules < 3 cm, whereas 73% of patients with clinical thyroid carcinoma (≥ 1cm on histology) had nodules with a diameter of ≥ 3 cm on US (p=0.02). In conclusion, our study suggests that surgical treatment of NMNG should be proposed in the presence of rapid nodular growth, compression signs, dominant nodule on scintigraphy, nodule size ≥ 3 cm and hypo-echogenicity.
The teaching efficacy beliefs of pre‐service teachers in the USA and Turkey

The purpose of this study was to compare pre‐service elementary teachers' sense of mathematics teaching efficacy beliefs in a Turkish university and in a major American university located in the Midwest. The data for this study were collected by means of the Mathematics Teaching Efficacy Beliefs Instrument. In the Turkish sample there were 141 pre‐service elementary teachers, and in the American sample there were 104 pre‐service elementary teachers. Results from the study indicate that pre‐service teachers in Turkey tend to have a stronger belief that teaching can influence student learning when compared with pre‐service teachers in the United States. However, a similar difference was not observed for personal mathematics teaching efficacy.
Joint source-channel coding via statistical mechanics: Thermal equilibrium between the source and the channel

We examine the classical joint source-channel coding problem from the viewpoint of statistical physics and demonstrate that in the random coding regime, the posterior probability distribution of the source given the channel output is dominated by source sequences, which exhibit a behavior that is highly parallel to that of thermal equilibrium between two systems of particles that exchange energy, where one system corresponds to the source and the other corresponds to the channel. The thermodynamical entropies of the dual physical problem are analogous to conditional and unconditional Shannon entropies of the source, and so, their balance in thermal equilibrium yields a simple formula for the mutual information between the source and the channel output, that is induced by the typical code in an ensemble of joint source-channel codes under certain conditions. In the full version of this paper [8], we also demonstrate how our results can be used in applications, like the wiretap channel, and how can it be extended to multiuser scenarios, like that of the multiple access channel.