Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Why Sunk Costs Matter for Bargaining Outcomes: An Evolutionary Approach

Abstract Two bargaining parties play the Nash Demand Game to share a pie whose size is determined by one party's investment decision. Various investment levels are subgame-perfect. Adding the investment decision to Young's evolutionary bargaining model yields the following long-run outcome: efficient investment prevails and the investor's share of the pie approximates die maximum of (i) the smallest share that induces efficient investment, even if the investor expects to appropriate the available pie from every inefficient investment, and (ii) half of the pie. The result favors forward induction to subgame consistency and equity theory to hold-ups. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C78, L14.
Efficacy of acupuncture for degenerative lumbar spinal stenosis: protocol for a randomised sham acupuncture-controlled trial

Introduction Degenerative lumbar spinal stenosis (DLSS) is a major public health problem and the primary reason why older adults seek lumbar spine surgery. Acupuncture may be effective for DLSS, but the evidence supporting this possibility is still limited. Methods and analysis A total of 80 participants with DLSS will be randomly allocated to either an acupuncture group or a sham acupuncture (SA) group at a ratio of 1:1. 24 treatments will be provided over 8 weeks. The primary outcome is the score change of the Modified Roland-Morris Disability Questionnaire (RMDQ) responses from baseline to week 8. The secondary outcomes include the assessment of lower back pain and leg pain using the Numeric Rating Scale (NRS), the change in the number of steps per month, and the assessment of the specific quality of life using the Swiss Spinal Stenosis Questionnaire (SSSQ). We will follow-up with the participants until week 32. All of the participants who received allocation will be included in the statistical analysis. Ethics/dissemination This protocol has been approved by the Research Ethical Committee of Guang'anmen Hospital (Permission number: 2015EC114) and Fengtai Hospital of Integrated Traditional and Western Medicine (Permission number: 16KE0409). The full data set will be made available when this trial is completed and published. Applications for the release of data should be made to ZL (principal investigator). Trial registration number NCT02644746.
Iterated Tabu Search for the Unconstrained Binary Quadratic Optimization Problem

Given a set of objects with profits (any, even negative, numbers) assigned not only to separate objects but also to pairs of them, the unconstrained binary quadratic optimization problem consists in finding a subset of objects for which the overall profit is maximized. In this paper, an iterated tabu search algorithm for solving this problem is proposed. Computational results for problem instances of size up to 7000 variables (objects) are reported and comparisons with other up-to-date heuristic methods are provided.
Prevalence of Congenital Coronary Artery Anomalies and Variants in 2697 Consecutive Patients Using 64-Detector Row Coronary CTAngiography

Background Coronary artery anomalies are not common, but could be very serious. Objectives This study determines the frequency of coronary anomalies and normal variants by multi-detector-row computed tomography (MDCT). Patients and Methods The results of cardiac MDCT study in 2697 consecutive patients were analyzed retrospectively. Acquisition was performed by a 64-detector row CT machine. Imaging results were assessed by experienced radiologists. Results Myocardial bridging was by far the most frequent coronary variant (n = 576, 21.3%). Eighty-three subjects (3.1%) showed other coronary anomalies and variants. Anomalies of origination and course of the left main coronary artery (LMCA) were detected in 1.09% of the subjects. The frequency of these anomalies in the right coronary artery (RCA), left circumflex artery (LCx), left anterior descending artery (LAD), posterior descending artery (PDA) and obtuse marginal (OM) artery were 1.24%, 0.33%, 0.1%, 0.07% and 0.03%, respectively. The single coronary pattern was seen in 0.18% and coronary fistulas in 0.07%. Conclusion Based on the fact that coronary CT-angiography using MDCT can display different coronary anomalies, this study shows similar results to other reports on the subject. Future advances in the performance of CT machines will further improve the quality of CT-based cardiac imaging.
Antigen-Specific FoxP 3-Transduced T-Cells Can Control Established Type 1 Diabetes

CD4 CD25 T-cells can be used to interfere with spontaneous autoimmune diseases such as type 1 diabetes. However, their low frequency and often unknown specificity represent major obstacles to their therapeutic use. Here we have explored the fact that ectopic expression of the transcription factor Foxp3 can confer a suppressor phenotype to naı̈ve CD4 T-cells. We found that retroviral transduction of polyclonal CD4 T-cells with FoxP3 was not effective in interfering with established type 1 diabetes. Thus, more subtle and more organ-specific regulation might be required to prevent type 1 diabetes, as well as to avoid systemic immunosuppression. However, a single injection of 10 FoxP3transduced T-cells with specificity for islet antigen stabilized and reversed disease in mice with recentonset diabetes. By comparing FoxP3-transduced T-cells with various antigen specificities, it became clear that the in vivo effect correlated with specific homing to and activation in pancreatic lymph nodes and not with in vitro suppressor activity or cytokine production. Our results complement recent results on in vitro–amplified antigen-specific T-cells in ameliorating type 1 diabetes and suggest that FoxP3 transduction of expanded Tcells might achieve the same goal. Diabetes 54:306–310, 2005
Modularity of music: evidence from a case of pure amusia

A case of pure amusia in a 20 year old left handed non-professional musician is reported. The patient showed an impairment of music abilities in the presence of normal processing of speech and environmental sounds. Furthermore, whereas recognition and production of melodic sequences were grossly disturbed, both the recognition and production of rhythm patterns were preserved. This selective breakdown pattern was produced by a focal lesion in the left superior temporal gyrus. This case thus suggests that not only linguistic and musical skills, but also melodic and rhythmic processing are independent of each other. This functional dissociation in the musical domain supports the hypothesis that music components have a modular organisation. Furthermore, there is the suggestion that amusia may be produced by a lesion located strictly in one hemisphere and that the superior temporal gyrus plays a crucial part in melodic processing.
A Study on the Relationship between College students’ Critical Thinking Skills and Dispositions and the Generalizability by students characteristics

Purpose: This study was to analyze the relationships of critical thinking skills and disposition to think critically of college students. In addition, this study tried to determine whether there are differences depending on the students characteristics. Method: The sample was 231 students from A universities who were participated in both diagnoses. To solve the research problems, this study employed confirmatory factor analysis and multiple group analysis. Results: The result did not show statistically significant relationship between critical thinking skills and disposition of college students. Additionally, these relationships can be generalized by students characteristics. However, relationships of some of the sub constructs in 4 grade were statistically significant. Conclusion: The relationship of the sub constructs by critical thinking skills and disposition may result in the adjustment effects of the school year. Therefore, school year should be considered when developing a program that can be promoted both the critical thinking skills and disposition of college students.
Work-Efficient Parallel Skyline Computation for the GPU

The skyline operator returns records in a dataset that provide optimal trade-offs of multiple dimensions. State-of-the-art skyline computation involves complex tree traversals, data-ordering, and conditional branching to minimize the number of point-to-point comparisons. Meanwhile, GPGPU computing offers the potential for parallelizing skyline computation across thousands of cores. However, attempts to port skyline algorithms to the GPU have prioritized throughput and failed to outperform sequential algorithms. In this paper, we introduce a new skyline algorithm, designed for the GPU, that uses a global, static partitioning scheme. With the partitioning, we can permit controlled branching to exploit transitive relationships and avoid most point-to-point comparisons. The result is a non-traditional GPU algorithm, SkyAlign, that prioritizes work-efficiency and respectable throughput, rather than maximal throughput, to achieve orders of magnitude faster performance.
Miners' Wages in Post-War Britain: An Application of a Model of Trade Union Behavior

The paper studies the determination of wages in the British coal industry. A utility-maximising model of a trade union is used to represent the behaviour of the National Union of Mineworkers. A non- linear structural model is derived and is estimated by Full Information Maximum Likelihood. The results are quite encouraging: there is support for a neo-classical demand curve for miners' labour, and a significant estimate of workers' relative risk aversion.
Recombinant human erythropoietin therapy is very effective after an autologous peripheral blood stem cell transplant when started soon after engraftment.

PURPOSE Previous trials of recombinant human erythropoietin (rHuEpo) therapy after autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation have administered very high doses of i.v. rHuEpo starting on day 1 and continuing for 1-2 months until erythroid engraftment and have shown no benefit of rHuEpo therapy. We sought to establish a more effective use of rHuEpo in this setting. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN In this report, we show in a first cohort of 45 lymphoma or myeloma patients undergoing peripheral blood stem cell transplant (control group) that endogenous erythropoietin levels are high for the degree of anemia during the first 3 weeks after transplant but become adequate or slightly decreased thereafter. We thus enrolled 41 consecutive similar patients in a trial of rHuEpo therapy at a dose of 500 units/kg/week started on day 30 after the transplant. RESULTS The 12-week probability of achieving hemoglobin (Hb) levels of 13 g/dl was 87% in rHuEpo-treated patients versus 14% in controls (P = 0.0001). Mean Hb levels were significantly higher in the rHuEpo group than in the control group from day 42 through day 150 after transplant (Ps of <0.05 to <0.001). Two of 41 patients in the rHuEpo group versus 12 of 45 patients in the control group had Hb levels of <9 g/dl between day 42 and day 100 after the transplant (P = 0.0078). CONCLUSIONS Anemia after autologous peripheral blood stem cell transplant is exquisitely sensitive to rHuEpo when therapy is started soon after engraftment. This is the first convincing report showing that rHuEpo is effective in this setting. Our data set the stage for a more rational use of rHuEpo after autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation and should renew interest in erythropoietin therapy in this setting. Prospective, randomized trials should investigate the impact of rHuEpo therapy on transfusion requirements and quality of life.
Preferred Spatial Frequencies for Human Face Processing Are Associated with Optimal Class Discrimination in the Machine

Psychophysical studies suggest that humans preferentially use a narrow band of low spatial frequencies for face recognition. Here we asked whether artificial face recognition systems have an improved recognition performance at the same spatial frequencies as humans. To this end, we estimated recognition performance over a large database of face images by computing three discriminability measures: Fisher Linear Discriminant Analysis, Non-Parametric Discriminant Analysis, and Mutual Information. In order to address frequency dependence, discriminabilities were measured as a function of (filtered) image size. All three measures revealed a maximum at the same image sizes, where the spatial frequency content corresponds to the psychophysical found frequencies. Our results therefore support the notion that the critical band of spatial frequencies for face recognition in humans and machines follows from inherent properties of face images, and that the use of these frequencies is associated with optimal face recognition performance.
Atherosclerotic plaque at the carotid bifurcation: CT angiographic appearance with histopathologic correlation.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE The likelihood that carotid plaque will give rise to cerebral ischemia probably relates to the degree of arterial stenosis and to plaque morphology. The aim of this study was to assess whether features seen at CT angiography might be used to predict carotid plaque stability by comparing CT angiograms with histopathologic examinations of the carotid artery bifurcation. METHODS Nine patients with symptomatic severe carotid stenosis at intraarterial angiography had CT angiography of the carotid bifurcation before carotid endarterectomy. After endarterectomy, multiple sections of the specimens through the carotid bifurcation were examined histologically. Plaque characteristics recorded included the proportion of necrotic/lipid core, presence of hemorrhage, extent of fibrosis, ulceration, calcification, inflammatory cell infiltrate, and fibrous cap thickness. Corresponding CT angiograms were assessed for plaque size, distribution, and radiodensity as well as presence of calcific density and ulceration. Histologic findings and CT angiograms were compared. RESULTS Plaque with a large necrotic/lipid core, which was often hemorrhagic, was found in 16 of 23 sections, and in 15 of these this histologic appearance corresponded with patchy or homogeneous low density on CT angiograms. Six of seven predominantly fibrous plaques were of soft-tissue density on CT angiograms. High density consistent with calcification was seen more frequently on CT angiograms than it was detected histologically, but CT angiography depicted plaque ulceration poorly (four ulcers at histology; two false-positive and two false-negative findings at CT angiography). CONCLUSION CT angiography is a promising method for assessing the lumen and wall of the carotid artery. The apparent correlation between histologic appearance and plaque density on CT angiograms has important implications for the prediction of plaque stability, even though ulceration is shown inconsistently.
Phospholipid Alterations in Canine Ischemic Myocardium: Temporal and Topographical Correlations with Tc‐99m‐PPi Accumulation and an in Vitro Sarcolemmal Ca2+ Permeability Defect

Experimental myocardial ischemia produced in dogs by proximal left anterior descending coronary artery (LAD) ligation results in a small but measurable decrease in total phospholipid content in the subendocardium of the ischemic region. After 3 hours of fixed occlusion, there is a 10% decrease in total phospholipid content. Silica gel chromatography reveals this decrease to be reflected predominantly by decreases in phosphatidyl choline (PC) and phosphatidyl ethanolamine (PE). If technetium 99m stannous pyrophosphate (Tc-99m-PPi) is injected intravenously after various intervals of LAD occlusion and 10 minutes prior to Vh hours of reflow, there is a close temporal and topographical correlation between the extent of PE depletion and Tc-99m-PPi uptake. To measure the effects of phospholipid degradation on cardiac sarcolemmal membranes, an enriched sarcolemmal preparation was treated with an exogenous phospholipase (0.01 mg/ml). Phospholipid degradation, even without depleting total phospholipid content, resulted in more than a 50% increase in net Ca2+ efflux from vesicles preloaded by Na+:Ca2+ exchange. In addition, sarcolemmal vesicles isolated from ischemic myocardium after 3 hours of LAD occlusion have an increased Ca2+ permeability and phosphatidyl choline depletion compared to vesicles obtained from the corresponding nonischemic myocardium. These studies suggest that an alteration in phospholipid metabolism is related closely to the development of irreversible damage in ischemic canine myocardium. The biochemical mechanism responsible for this relationship may be the degradation of sarcolemmal membrane phospholipids and the associated increase in sarcolemmal Ca2+ permeability.
Study of cardiovascular disease biomarkers among tobacco consumers, part 2: biomarkers of biological effect

Abstract An age-stratified, cross-sectional study was conducted in the US among healthy adult male cigarette smokers, moist snuff consumers, and non-tobacco consumers to evaluate cardiovascular biomarkers of biological effect (BoBE). Physiological assessments included flow-mediated dilation, ankle-brachial index, carotid intima-media thickness and expired carbon monoxide. Approximately one-half of the measured serum BoBE showed statistically significant differences; IL-12(p70), sICAM-1 and IL-8 were the BoBE that best differentiated among the three groups. A significant difference in ABI was observed between the cigarette smokers and non-tobacco consumer groups. Significant group and age effect differences in select biomarkers were identified.
Articulatory Perspectives on Errors

In speech error research discrepant results have been obtained depending on the research tool employed. While traditionally errors have been identified perceptually, acoustic and articulatory measurements have come to different conclusions about the characteristics of errors. This has led to renewed concerns about perceptual biases in transcription records on the one hand and the comparability of laboratory elicited and naturally occurring errors on the other hand. The present paper presents an overview of the results of articulatory error studies and discusses their relation to transcription based error work. We also discuss briefly how future research avenues may further our understanding of errors.
Efficient Content Replacement in Wireless Content Delivery Network with Cooperative Caching

Wireless content delivery networks (WCDNs) have received attention as a promising solution to reduce the network congestion caused by rapidly growing demands for mobile content. The amount of reduced congestion is intuitively proportional to the hit ratio in a WCDN. Cooperation among cache servers is strongly required to maximize the hit ratio in a WCDN where each cache server is equipped with a small-size cache storage space. In this paper, we address a content replacement problem that deals with how to manage contents in a limited cache storage space in a reactive manner to cope with a dynamic content demand over time. As a new challenge, we apply reinforcement learning, which is Q-learning, to the content replacement problem in a WCDN with coooperative caching. We model the content replacement problem as a Markov Decision Process (MDP) and finally propose an efficient content replacement strategy to maximize the hit ratio based on a multi-agent Q-learning scheme. Simulation results exhibit that the proposed strategy contributes to achieving better content delivery performance in delay due to a higher hit ratio, compared to typical existing schemes of least recently used (LRU) and least frequently used (LFU).
Alkaline Mineral Supplementation Decreases Pain in Rheumatoid Arthritis Patients: A Pilot Study

The aim of this pilot study was to investigate the efficacy of an alkaline mineral supplement as a means of sup- pressing disease activity in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients, and to check whether any change occurs in the circulating beta-endorphin concentration. Thirty-seven patients with moderately active RA of at least two years duration, who were receiving stable pharmacological treatment, participated in a 12-week study. All patients were randomly allocated to a supplemented group (30g of an alkaline mineral supplement daily) or to an unsupplemented group. Their usual diet and medication was maintained. Disease activity, pain, and health-associated status were recorded (DAS 28 - Disease Activity Score 28, VAS - visual analogue scale for pain, HAQ - Health Assessment Questionnaire). Plasma immunoreactive en- dorphin (ir-EP) was measured in the study groups and also in healthy subjects. DAS 28 and VAS decreased in the sup- plemented group, whereas there was no change in these parameters during the trial in the control group. The functions (HAQ) of the supplemented patients improved. The ir-EP levels increased in both groups but to a higher degree in the supplemented group. During the trial, medication (NSAIDs and steroids) could be reduced in the supplemented group only. Conclusion: This study suggests that an alkaline supplement may improve function and pain in rheumatoid arthritis and may represent an easy and safe addition to the usual treatment of RA patients.
Social Work 1-26-2010 Predictors of Depressive Symptomatology in Family Caregivers of Women With Substance Use Disorders or Co-Occurring Substance Use and Mental Disorders

This study utilized a stress-process model to examine the impact of having a female family member with substance use or co-occurring substance use and mental disorders on family caregivers' depressive symptomatology. Participants were 82 women receiving substance abuse treatment and the family member providing the most social support for each woman. Greater caregiver depressive symptomatology was predicted by greater care recipient emotional problems, less care recipient social support, and poor caregiver health. Implications of findings for treatment and future research are discussed.
An Anthelmintic Drug, Pyrvinium Pamoate, Thwarts Fibrosis and Ameliorates Myocardial Contractile Dysfunction in a Mouse Model of Myocardial Infarction

Metabolic adaptation to limited supplies of oxygen and nutrients plays a pivotal role in health and disease. Heart attack results from insufficient delivery of oxygen and nutrients to the heart, where cardiomyocytes die and cardiac fibroblasts proliferate – the latter causing scar formation, which impedes regeneration and impairs contractility of the heart. We postulated that cardiac fibroblasts survive metabolic stress by adapting their intracellular metabolism to low oxygen and nutrients, and impeding this metabolic adaptation would thwart their survival and facilitate the repair of scarred heart. Herein, we show that an anthelmintic drug, Pyrvinium pamoate, which has been previously shown to compromise cancer cell survival under glucose starvation condition, also disables cardiac fibroblast survival specifically under glucose deficient condition. Furthermore, Pyrvinium pamoate reduces scar formation and improves cardiac contractility in a mouse model of myocardial infarction. As Pyrvinium pamoate is an FDA-approved drug, our results suggest a therapeutic use of this or other related drugs to repair scarred heart and possibly other organs.