Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Role of Alveolar Macrophages in Initiation and Regulation of Inflammation in Pseudomonas aeruginosaPneumonia

ABSTRACT To evaluate the role of alveolar macrophages (AMs) in acutePseudomonas aeruginosa pneumonia in mice, AMs were depleted by aerosol inhalation of liposomes containing clodronate disodium. AM-depleted mice were then intratracheally infected with 5 × 105 CFU of P. aeruginosa. In addition to monitoring neutrophil recruitment and chemokine releases, lung injury was evaluated soon after infection (8 h) and at a later time (48 h). At 8 h, depletion of AMs reduced neutrophil recruitment, chemokine release, and lung injury. At 48 h, however, depletion of AMs decreased bacterial clearance and resulted in delayed movement of neutrophils from the site of inflammation with aggravated lung injury. With instillation of 5 × 107 CFU of bacteria, AM-depleted mice showed low mortality within 24 h of infection but high mortality at a later time, in contrast to non-AM-depleted mice. These results demonstrate that depletion of AMs has beneficial early effects but deleterious late effects on lung injury and survival in cases of P. aeruginosa pneumonia.
Costimulation provided by DNA immunization enhances antitumor immunity.

The interaction of the TCR with MHC class I-bound Ag is insufficient for the priming of CTL unless secondary costimulatory signals are provided. To ascertain the minimum elements required to activate an Ag-specific CTL response in vivo, we injected mice intradermally or i.m. with plasmid DNA encoding a MHC class I-restricted peptide Ag (minigene) and different membrane-bound costimulatory ligands. The minigene-encoded epitope only primed a specific CTL response if injected in the vicinity of an ectopically expressed costimulatory ligand. Vector encoding B7-1 was repeatedly more potent at stimulating a cytolytic response than vector encoding B7-2. In contrast the B7-2-encoding plasmid preferentially enhanced Ag-specific Ab responses when injected with either protein or a cDNA expression vector. Gene vaccination with plasmids encoding OVA and B7-1, but not B7-2, prolonged survival in mice challenged with an OVA-transfected tumor. These results show that functional B7-1 transfection can be achieved in vivo and induces the selective induction of CTL. The data suggest that B7-1 plasmids should be coadministered with naked DNA vaccines that aim to induce tumor-specific cellular immunity.
CD90(+) Mesothelial-Like Cells in Peritoneal Fluid Promote Peritoneal Metastasis by Forming a Tumor Permissive Microenvironment

The peritoneal cavity is a common target of metastatic gastrointestinal and ovarian cancer cells, but the mechanisms leading to peritoneal metastasis have not been fully elucidated. In this study, we examined the roles of cells in peritoneal fluids on the development of peritoneal metastasis. We found that a minor subset of human intraperitoneal cells with CD90(+)/CD45(−) phenotype vigorously grew in culture with mesothelial-like appearance. The mesothelial-like cells (MLC) displayed the characteristics of mesenchymal stem cell, such as differentiating into adipocytes, osteocytes, and chondrocytes, and suppressing T cell proliferation. These cells highly expressed type I collagen, vimentin, α-smooth muscle actin and fibroblast activated protein-α by the stimulation with TGF-β, which is characteristic of activated myofibroblasts. Intraperitoneal co-injection of MLCs with the human gastric cancer cell line, MKN45, significantly enhanced the rate of metastatic formation in the peritoneum of nude mice. Histological examination revealed that many MLCs were engrafted in metastatic nodules and were mainly located at the fibrous area. Dasatinib, a potent tyrosine kinase inhibitor, strongly inhibited the proliferation of MLCs but not MKN45 in vitro. Nevertheless, oral administration of Dasatinib significantly inhibited the development of peritoneal metastasis of MKN45, and resulted in reduced fibrillar formation of metastatic nodules. These results suggest floating MLCs in the peritoneal fluids support the development of peritoneal metastasis possibly through the production of the permissive microenvironment, and thus the functional blockade of MLCs is a reasonable strategy to treat recurrent abdominal malignancies.
Mentoring in Intercollegiate Athletic Administration

Associate/Assistant athletic administrators from Division I (139 males, 123 females) and Division III (130 males, 123 females) universities of the NCAA responded to a questionnaire consisting of (a) items eliciting background information, (b) perceived and preferred mentoring functions measured by the Mentor Role Instrument (Ragins & McFarlin, 1990), (c) perceived barriers to mentoring measured by Perceived Barriers Scale (Ragins & Cotton, 1991), and a scale of satisfaction developed for the study. Factor analysis yielded three facets of satisfaction: Work Group, Extrinsic Rewards, and Intrinsic Rewards. The results of MANOVA showed that an equal proportion of males and females had experienced mentoring relationships, and mentored individuals were more satisfied with work than their non-mentored counterparts. Respondents from Division I received significantly higher salaries, and they were more satisfied with their extrinsic rewards than the respondents from Division III. Finally, correlational analyses s.
Expressed Emotion Trait or State?

Background This exploratory study addresses the question of whether expressed emotion (EE) is a response characteristic of the parent (trait) or a parental response to specific circumstances or persons (state). Method Seventeen parents participated in two audiotaped interviews, using modified versions of the Camberwell Family Interview. One interview concerned the child with chronic schizophrenia and the other a well sibling. Subsequent ratings of the EE variables of critical comments (CC), emotional overinvolvement (EOI) and warmth were completed and compared. Results E response patterns directed towards patients, as compared with towards siblings, were significantly different on two measures: EOI (P=0.01) and warmth (P=0.02). The parents showed significantly more emotional overinvolvement with the child with schizophrenia and significantly more warmth towards the well child. Conclusions These data suggest that the EE variables of EOI and warmth are related to the state of child, and the lack of a significant difference in CC suggests that this is a parental trait.
Using Managerial Attributes to Identify Market Feedback Effects: The Case of Mutual Fund Fire Sales

We develop a model of feedback and learning in the aftermath of a “fire sale,” and test its implications. Mutual funds gather information about a firm’s potential investment opportunities. This information finds its way into stock prices and helps firms to decide on new investments. The incentive to produce information comes from two sources of profits: “trading” profits and capital gains on prior “holdings. ” We show that fire sales can disrupt the incentive to produce information by reducing capital gains. Further, we show that managers, who rely to a greater extent on market-feedback, are more likely to cutback on future investments and suffer a drop in firm value relative to overconfident (OC) managers, who are inherently less dependent on market information and consequently, less affected by a fire sale. Our empirical findings strongly support these testable implications. We find a monotonic relationship between level of CEO overconfidence and investment-Q sensitivity. A striking finding is that firms headed by OC CEOs suffer little drop in firm value following a fire sale vis-á-vis firms headed by non-OC CEOs. JEL Classification Code: G23, G32, G34 Keyword: Fire sale, Market feedback, Mutual funds, CEO overconfidence, Quality of Investment We acknowledge the thoughtful comments of Mark Humphery-Jenner. We thank the seminar participants at University of New South Wales, Stevens Institute of Technology, University of Texas at Dallas and University of Wyoming. Suman Banerjee gratefully acknowledges SER Research Grant from the University of Wyoming. School of Business, Stevens Institute of Technology. Tel: 307-761-3315. Email: sbanerj2@stevens.edu Naveen Jindal School of Management, University of Texas at Dallas; Tel: 404-769-4368. E-mail: vikram.nanda@utdallas.edu Naveen Jindal School of Management, University of Texas at Dallas; Tel: 972-883-5056. E-mail: steven.xiao@utdallas.edu
The Roots of Prison Violence: A Test of the Deprivation, Management, and “Not-So-Total” Institution Models

Studies of prison violence typically focus either on individual-level aggression or large-scale collective acts. Most past work consists of case studies, limiting the generalizations from the results. The present study used data from 371 state prisons and measures of both individual and collective violence and attempted to identify the structural, managerial, and environmental determinants of prison disorder. Findings suggest that poor prison management is a predictor of rates of assault toward inmates and staff. However, the likelihood of prison riots is largely independent of structural, managerial, and environmental factors. The article also discusses the implications for public policy.
Effects of Applying Different Time Limits to a Proposed GRE Writing Test

In order to determine the role of time limits on both test performance and test validity, we asked approximately 300 volunteers–prospective graduate students–to each write two essays–one in a 40-minute time period and the other in 60 minutes. Analyses revealed that, on average, test performance was significantly better when examinees were given 60 minutes instead of 40. However, there was no interaction between test-taking style (fast vs. slow) and time limits. ‘That is’, examinees who described themselves as slow writers/test takers did not benefit any more (or any less) from generous time limits than did their quicker counterparts. In addition, there was no detectable effect of different time limits on the meaning of essay scores, as suggested by their relationship to several nontest indicators of writing ability.
Evaluating Test-Driven Development in an Industry-Sponsored Capstone Project

Test-Driven Development (TDD) is an agile development process wherein automated tests are created before production code is designed or constructed in short, rapid iterations. This paper discusses an experiment conducted with undergraduate students in a year-long software engineering capstone course. In this course the students designed, implemented, deployed, and maintained a software system to meet the requirements of an industry sponsor who served as the customer. The course followed an incremental process in which features were added incrementally under the direction of the industry sponsor and the professor. The fourteen students observed in the study were divided into three teams. Among the three teams were two experimental groups. One group consisted of two teams that applied a Test-First (TDD) methodology, while a control group applied a traditional Test-Last methodology. Unlike Test-First, the tests in Test-Last are written after the design and construction of the production code being tested. Results from this experiment differ from many previous studies. In particular, the Test-Last team was actually more productive and wrote more tests than their Test-First counterparts. Anecdotal evidence suggests that factors other than development approach such as individual ambition and team motivation may have more affect than the development approach applied. Although more students indicated a preference for the Test-First approach, concerns regarding learning and applying TDD with unfamiliar technologies are noted.
Saliency estimation using a non-parametric low-level vision model

Many successful models for predicting attention in a scene involve three main steps: convolution with a set of filters, a center-surround mechanism and spatial pooling to construct a saliency map. However, integrating spatial information and justifying the choice of various parameter values remain open problems. In this paper we show that an efficient model of color appearance in human vision, which contains a principled selection of parameters as well as an innate spatial pooling mechanism, can be generalized to obtain a saliency model that outperforms state-of-the-art models. Scale integration is achieved by an inverse wavelet transform over the set of scale-weighted center-surround responses. The scale-weighting function (termed ECSF) has been optimized to better replicate psychophysical data on color appearance, and the appropriate sizes of the center-surround inhibition windows have been determined by training a Gaussian Mixture Model on eye-fixation data, thus avoiding ad-hoc parameter selection. Additionally, we conclude that the extension of a color appearance model to saliency estimation adds to the evidence for a common low-level visual front-end for different visual tasks.
Beyond Stereotypes: Violence and the Porousness of Ethnic Boundaries in the Republic of Macedonia

In this article, the author explores the social construction of local classifications and their work in the Republic of Macedonia. Macedonians and Albanians construe classifications of their social world that are modeled on ethnicity, but at the same time readily violate them. By deploying the classificatory principles kultura and besa (widely glossed as “culture” and “trustworthiness”, respectively), local actors can render ethnic boundaries porous and incorporate selected individuals of different ethnic origin within their ethnic communities. The different degrees of social inclusion within the Macedonian and Albanian ethnic communities are examined and it is argued that the porousness of ethnic boundaries can be indicative of the ways in which actors experience the social world and their position in it. The processes that are described in this article shed light on how so-called “inter-ethnic tensions” can be negotiated in daily life and how local society, at first sight fraught with negative ethnic stereotypes, can prove resilient towards ethnic violence.
THE IMPACT OF WORKING WITH HIV AIDS ON HEALTH-CARE PROFESSIONALS - DEVELOPMENT OF THE AIDS IMPACT SCALE

Abstract The 24 item AIDS Impact Scale was designed to measure dimensions relevant to the work of staff in HIV/AIDS units. Both positive and negative aspects of this work are measured. Five factors were isolated and corresponded to different dimensions of AIDS impact. These were gay affiliation. stigma/ discrimination, identification/responsibility, grief/powerlessness and recognition/reward. All scales had acceptable reliability (α = .72–.89). The gay affiliation factor was negatively related to homophobia, lack of personal accomplishment (burnout sub-scale) and depersonalisation (burnout sub-scale). The stigma/discrimination factor was negatively related to scores on social withdrawal and internal coping. The identification with and responsibility for people living with AIDS factor was positively related to scores on external coping and negatively related to social withdrawal and choice of work area. Grief and powerlessness was positively associated with social withdrawal and external coping strategies .
Counseling Psychology Model Training Values Statement Addressing Diversity

This article provides a brief overview of this Major Contribution. In addition to previewing the articles contained in this Major Contribution, two principles guiding the use of the Counseling Psychology Model Training Values Statement Addressing Diversity (henceforth referred to as the “Values Statement”) are discussed. In addition, the authors present a concise summary of the development of the Values Statement, including a description of how feedback received influenced the final product. The authors conclude by articulating their hope that this Major Contribution will move the field forward in terms of more directly discussing, and perhaps even resolving, the long-standing dilemma of resolving value clashes.
INTRODUCTION: Advancing Our Understanding of Religious Dynamics in the Family and Parent—Child Relationship

This special issue contains four original empirical articles that address links between religion and family functioning. The articles are marked by many desired attributes: a rich combination of novel variables and constructs, a sampling of a diverse set of religious groups, and multiple measures of religiosity. The data analyses here not only examine between— group effects and direct links between religiosity and parenting or child outcome but also offer a more complex and interesting set of findings. Specifically, the authors have found provocative interaction or mediation effects between different religiosity measures in relation to parenting behaviors or child outcomes. Collectively, the four articles illuminate how the various dimensions of religiosity can play a powerful role in the family.
Isolating stereotypical gender in a grammatical gender language: Evidence from eye movements

ABSTRACT The present study investigates the effects of stereotypical gender during anaphor resolution in German. The study aims at isolating the effects of gender-stereotypical cues from the effects of grammatical gender. Experiment 1 employs descriptions of typically male, female, and neutral occupations that contain no grammatical cue to the referent gender, followed by a masculine or feminine role noun, in a reaction time priming paradigm. Experiment 2 uses eye-tracking methodology to examine how the gender typicality of these descriptions affects the resolution of a matching or mismatching anaphoric pronoun. Results show a mismatch effect manifest at very early stages of processing. Both experiments also reveal asymmetries in the processing of the two genders suggesting that the representation of female rather than male referents is more flexible in counterstereotypical contexts. No systematic relation is found between eye movements and individual gender attitude measures, whereas a reliable correlation is found with gender typicality ratings.
StencilMaps and EphemeralMaps: spatially stable interfaces that highlight command subsets

Identifying a target command can be difficult and time-consuming when the user is unfamiliar with a software system. One technique for assisting command identification is to provide a subset interface that contains only a limited set of the system's capabilities. We examine the design of subset interfaces, showing that subsets can be presented separately to the full user interface (UI) (e.g. in a palette) or in place, with in-place methods using either static or dynamic methods to identify the subset. We introduce the StencilMap and EphemeralMap as in-place subset UIs that, respectively, use static and dynamic highlighting. Both StencilMaps and EphemeralMaps make all of an application's commands concurrently available for selection within a grid. To highlight subset items StencilMaps use a static dark semi-transparent ‘stencil’ overlay to de-emphasise all but the subset items; EphemeralMaps, in contrast, use a short delay, with subset items shown immediately, and other items gradually faded in. A first experiment compares user performance with the in-place presentation of StencilMaps against that of the separate presentation of a subset palette. Results confirm the predicted spatial memory benefits for StencilMaps. A second experiment analyses the performance impact of three approaches to highlighting: none, static highlighting in StencilMaps, and dynamic highlighting in EphemeralMaps. Results show an interesting trade-off – while highlighting can offer benefits in assisting rapid target identification (particularly when the user is unfamiliar with the interface layout), there can also be longer-term performance benefits when highlighting is absent because the increased difficulty of visual search promotes the use and formation of spatial memory.
Accuracy of sagittal abdominal diameter as predictor of abdominal fat among Brazilian adults: a comparation with waist circumference.

AIM We aim was to compare the sagittal abdominal diameter (SAD) with waist circumference (WC) as a predictor of central obesity among adults and to identify the sensitivity and specificity of the best cut-off point for SAD. METHODS A cross-sectional study of 266 Brazilians adults (euthrophic and overweight), aged 31-84 years old, of which 89 men and 177 women, was carried out. Anthropometric measurements such as SAD, weight, height, waist and hip circumferences, waist and hip ratio, body mass index, body fat percentage were performed. Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) curve was used to identify the sensitivity and specificity of the best cut off point for SAD as a predictor of central obesity. Statistical analysis were considered significant with a value of p < 0.05. RESULTS The SAD measurement was positively correlated with WC for both genders, although stronger among overweight and obesity women (r = 0.71; p < 0.001 and r = 0.79; p < 0.001, respectively) than men. ROC curves identified the best cut-off points for SAD of 23.1 cm and 20.1 cm for men and women (96% and 85% sensitivity, 86% and 84% specificity, respectively). CONCLUSION SAD measurement may be used as an anthropometric tool to identify central obesity among women for presenting adequate sensitivity and specificity.
Degree based seed optimization to maximize information dissemination in social networks

We study the problem of optimal seed selection to maximize the fraction of individuals which has received a message in a social network. We have used the Susceptible-Infected (SI) process to model information epidemics. We formulate an optimization problem under a fixed budget constraint on the resource available to recruit individuals in the network to act as seeds, to achieve the above objective. The seeds are decided based on node degrees. This approach will work even when the exact adjacency matrix of the network is unknown and only degrees of the individuals in the network have been estimated. We study effect of the degree distribution of the network on the optimal seed selection strategy and present results for synthetic scale free and Erdös-Rényi networks, and a real scientific collaboration social network. The optimal strategy is compared with two heuristic strategies that (i) selects seeds uniformly among all degrees and (ii) selects highest degree nodes as seeds. Our results show that for a wide range of model parameters, targeting only the highest degree nodes is not optimal for various networks. This work may be of interest to advertisers and campaigners who are interested in spreading a message in a population connected via social networks.
In Vivo and In Vitro Studies of Antibiotic Release from and Bacterial Growth Inhibition by Antibiotic-Impregnated Polymethylmethacrylate Hip Spacers

ABSTRACT The antimicrobial properties and the elution characteristics of gentamicin-vancomycin-loaded hip spacers were studied in vivo and in vitro. Vancomycin elution was greater than gentamicin elution. The antibiotic concentrations in vivo were less than those in vitro. Not dependent on implantation duration, growth inhibition by spacers in vitro was observed for 2 weeks. The reason for protracted wound healing cannot be insufficient antibiotic release.