Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Breast-feeding and hospitalization for asthma in early childhood: a nationwide longitudinal survey in Japan

Abstract Objective Whether or not breast-feeding is protective against asthma among children is still controversial. Therefore, we examined the effects of breast-feeding on hospitalization for asthma in early childhood. Design Secondary data analyses of a nationwide longitudinal survey of children in Japan ongoing since 2001, with results collected from 2001 to 2004. We used logistic regression models to evaluate the associations of breast-feeding with hospitalization for asthma in children between the ages of 6 and 42 months, adjusting for children’s factors (sex, day-care attendance and presence of older siblings) and maternal factors (educational attainment and smoking habit). Setting All over Japan. Subjects Term singleton children with information on feeding practices during infancy (n 43367). Results After adjusting for maternal factors and children’s factors, exclusive breast-feeding at 6–7 months of age was associated with decreased risk of hospitalization for asthma in children. The adjusted odds ratio was 0·77 (95 % CI 0·56, 1·06). One-month longer duration of breast-feeding was associated with a 4 % decreased risk of hospitalization for asthma (OR=0·96; 95 % CI 0·92, 0·99). Conclusions The protective effects of breast-feeding on hospitalization for asthma were observed in children between the ages of 6 and 42 months.
First assessment at home of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients by a nutrition network in the French region of Limousin

Malnutrition is associated with poor survival among patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). This study aimed to evaluate nutritional assessment by a network during first consultations in patients’ homes. Patients identified by the regional ALS centre gave their informed consent. Assessment included functional, nutritional issues, evaluation of the need for help, whether personal or the use of aids, and noted any dietary supplementation and modification of the texture of food. Forty patients were seen a mean of 7.4 months after diagnosis; 52.5% had bulbar disease, 7.5% were malnourished; 29.4 ± 10.1 kcal/kg/day were consumed and protein intake was 1.3 ± 0.5 g/kg/day. Thirty-five percent of patients were anorexic, 43.8% reported taste disorders, and 70% had dysphagia, significantly associated with salivary stasis. Only 30% of dysphagic patients ate texture-modified food, and 90% of patients with problems drinking liquids did not use a thickener. In conclusion, assessment at home by a nutritional network can be conducted promptly. Malnutrition is rare in early disease, despite the fact that patients’ diets are often low in energy and dysphagia is common. Unexpected taste disorders are detected. Dysphagia is very common but inadequately addressed. Consequently, home assessment by the network led several beneficial interventions.
Counseling Immigrant Parents about Food and Feeding Practices: Public Health Nurses' Experiences.

OBJECTIVES To describe the experiences of public health nurses (PHNs) in counseling immigrant parents on food and feeding practices at child health centers (CHCs). DESIGN AND SAMPLE In this study employing a qualitative description (QD) approach, the participants (n = 26) were PHNs from five CHCs in the greater Oslo region of Norway. MEASURES Data were collected through five focus group interviews and examined using qualitative content analysis. RESULTS Counseling on food and feeding practices was an important topic in most consultations with immigrant parents. The PHNs were concerned that the child should eat ordinary, healthy food regularly. Immigrant families were often experienced as a "generic group" and the PHNs disclosed that they rarely adjusted their counseling strategy based on enquiries about families' food culture or parents' level of education or knowledge. Time constraints and language and cultural barriers were common challenges. The PHNs suggested that culturally adapted information materials and visual aids from health authorities could improve communication. CONCLUSIONS Counseling immigrant parents on food and feeding at CHCs is often challenging for PHNs. The study findings could be used in the development of guidelines to assist PHNs in delivering culturally competent counseling about food and feeding practices.
Detection of merkel cell polyomavirus in oral samples of renal transplant recipients without Merkel cell carcinoma

Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is a rare but aggressive neuroendocrine cancer, with approximately 80% of cases associated with Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCPyV). The lack of information concerning its occurrence in non‐MCC immunosuppressed populations led to the investigation of MCPyV DNA in saliva and oral biopsies from 60 kidney allograft recipients and 75 non‐transplanted individuals (control group). In contrast to herpesviruses, which was also investigated (CMV, HHV‐6A, and B, HHV‐7) MCPyV was detected predominantly in patients with oral lesions (gingivitis and/or periodontitis) of both transplanted and non‐transplanted groups (P = 0.016) and in the saliva of the transplanted group (P = 0.009). MCPyV co‐detection with CMV (P = 0.048), and HHV‐6 (P = 0.020) in the saliva of transplanted patients requires further investigation on a possible role of co‐infection. J Med. Virol. 85:2016–2019, 2013. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Stability of a dc Distribution System for Power System Integration of Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicles

This paper proposes a method for enhancing the stability of a dc distribution system that integrates plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) with an ac power grid. The dc distribution system is interfaced with the host ac grid via a voltage-sourced converter and can also embed photovoltaic (PV) modules. Thus, bidirectional dc-dc electronic power converters act as battery chargers and interface the PHEVs with the dc distribution system, while PV modules are interfaced with the dc distribution system via unidirectional dc-dc converters. The dc distribution system is expected to be more efficient and economical than a system of ac-dc battery chargers directly interfaced with an ac grid, but it is prone to instabilities due to the constant-power property of the dc-dc converters. Using a nonlinear control strategy, the proposed stability enhancement method mitigates the issue of instability by altering the power setpoints of the battery chargers, bidirectional dc-dc converters, without a need for changing system parameters or hardware. The paper presents mathematical models for the original and modified systems and demonstrates that the proposed technique expands the stable operating region of the dc distribution system. Simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method for a study system in the PSCAD/EMTDC software environment.
Projective Nonnegative Matrix Factorization : Sparseness , Orthogonality , and Clustering

Abstract In image compression and feature extraction, linear expansions are standardly used. It was pointed out by Lee and Seung that the positivity or non-negativity of a linear expansion is a very powerful constraint, that seems to lead to sparse representations for the images. Their technique, called Non-negative Matrix Factorization (NMF), was shown to be useful in approximating high dimensional data where the data are comprised of non-negative components. We have earlier proposed a new variant of the NMF method, called Projective Nonnegative Matrix Factorization, for learning spatially localized, sparse, part-based subspace representations of visual patterns. The algorithm is based on positively constrained projections and is related both to NMF and to the conventional SVD or PCA decomposition. In this paper we show that PNMF is intimately related to ”soft” k-means clustering and is able to outperform NMF in document classification tasks. The reason is that PNMF derives bases which are somewhat better for a localized representation than NMF, more orthogonal, and produce considerably more sparse representations.
Brain volume in pediatric patients with sickle cell disease: evidence of volumetric growth delay?

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Despite the large body of data available about somatic growth delay in patients with sickle cell disease (SCD), virtually nothing is known about the effect of the disease on volumetric growth of the brain. This study was designed to test a hypothesis that children with SCD have a disease-related delay in brain volumetric growth compared with healthy children. METHODS A cross-sectional study design was used to evaluate 83 children with SCD and 43 age-similar healthy children, including 27 patient siblings. Brain volume was measured by segmenting and classifying MR imaging data, by using at least three separate image sets (T1-, T2-, and proton density-weighted MR images). A linear model was used to compare the various brain volumes with the covariates of group (patient versus control) and age, with age treated as a continuous variable. RESULTS With age controlled for, no significant difference was noted in total brain volume between patients and control subjects at age 9.5 years. However, patients showed a deficit specifically in gray matter volume (P=.005), without significant differences in white matter or ventricular volume. The deficit in patient gray matter was greater in central gray matter (P <.005) than in cortical gray matter (P <.02). In healthy control subjects, gray matter volume decreased significantly with age (P <.005), probably due to myelination of white matter tracts. In patients with SCD, gray matter volume did not change with age. CONCLUSION Volumetric growth of brain gray matter may be delayed in children with SCD, suggesting that there may be neurodevelopmental consequences of this disease.
Service-user involvement in forensic mental health care research: Areas to consider when developing a collaborative study

Background: Although service-users are increasingly involved in the conduct of research in mental health settings, involvement in forensic mental health settings is limited. Aims: This paper looks at the factors perceived by professionals and service-users as important for developing collaborative research in forensic mental health settings. Method: Following a collaborative research project undertaken in three forensic mental health units, the researchers involved in the project (professionals and service-users) reviewed factors perceived as important for developing service-user research in secure settings. Results: Three broad themes were identified. The main issues considered within these themes were detailed. Conclusions: Service-users in forensic mental health settings are able to have full involvement in research.
Functional co‐expression of two insect nicotinic receptor subunits (Nlα3 and Nlα8) reveals the effects of a resistance‐associated mutation (Nlα3Y151S) on neonicotinoid insecticides

Neonicotinoid insecticides, such as imidacloprid, are selective agonists of insect nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) and are used extensively to control a variety of insect pest species. Previously, we have identified a nAChR point mutation (Y151S) associated with insecticide resistance in the brown planthopper Nilaparvata lugens. Although this mutation has been identified in two different N. lugens nAChR subunits (Nlα1 and Nlα3) because of difficulties in heterologous expression of Nlα3; its influence on agonist potency has been examined only in Nlα1‐containing nAChRs. Here we describe the cloning of a novel nAChR subunit from N. lugens (Nlα8), together with evidence for its co‐assembly with Nlα3 in native and recombinant nAChRs. This has, for the first time, enabled the functional effects of the Nlα3Y151S mutation to be examined. The Nlα3Y151S mutation has little effect on agonist potency of acetylcholine but has a dramatic effect on neonicotinoid insecticides (reducing Imax values and increasing EC50 values). The apparent affinity of neonicotinoids was higher and the effect of the Y151S mutation on neonicotinoid agonist potency was more profound in Nlα3‐containing, rather than Nlα1‐containing nAChR. We conclude that Nlα3‐ and Nlα1‐containing nAChRs may be representative of two distinct insect nAChR populations.
Effects of Resonance in Quasi-periodic Oscillators of Neutron Star Binaries

Using a large quantity of Rossi X-Ray Timing Explorer data presented in the literature, I offer a detailed investigation into the accuracy of the quasi-periodic oscillation (QPO) frequency determination. The QPO phenomenon seen in X-ray binaries is possibly a result of the resonance of the intrinsic (eigen) oscillations and harmonic driving forces of the system. I show that the resonances, in the presence of the damping of oscillations, occur at frequencies that are systematically and randomly shifted with respect to the eigenfrequencies of the system. The shift value strongly depends on the damping rate that is measured by the half-width of the QPO feature. Taking into account this effect, I analyze the QPO data for four Z sources, Scorpius X-1, GX 340+0, GX 5-1, and GX 17+2, and two atoll sources, 4U 1728-34 and 4U 0614+09. The transition-layer model (TLM) predicts the existence of the invariant quantity δ, an inclination angle of the magnetospheric axis with respect to the normal to the disk. I calculate δ and the error bars of δ using the resonance shift, and I find that the inferred δ-values are consistent with constants for these four Z sources, in which horizontal-branch oscillation and kilohertz frequencies have been detected and correctly identified. It is shown that the inferred δ are in the range between 5. °5 and 6. °5. I conclude that the TLM seems to be compatible with the data.
A study of knowledge, attitudes and practices (KAP) of a rural community on malaria and the mosquito vector.

A study of malaria on the Kano Plain, Kisumu District, Western Kenya, was carried out between April and August, 1985. The study included a knowledge, attitudes and practices (K.A.P.) survey on malaria illness and the mosquito vector. Overall knowledge about malaria illness was found to be good. However, treatment and prevention practices of malaria were found to be poor. Knowledge of the mosquito and its relationship to malaria was found to be high. Knowledge of methods of prevention of mosquito bites was also found to be high but actual use of the methods was low. Knowledge of traditional methods of prevention of mosquito bites was also found to be high. Actual use was again found to be low.
A new technique to compute polygonal schema for 2-manifolds with application to null-homotopy detection

We provide a new technique for deriving optimal-sized polygonal schema for triangulated compact 2-manifolds without boundary inO(n) time, wheren is the size of the given triangulationT. We first derive a polygonal schemaP embedded inT using Seifert-Van Kampen's theorem. A reduced polygonal schemaQ of optimal size is computed fromP, where a surjective map from the vertices ofP is retained to the vertices ofQ. This helps detecting null-homotopic (contractible to a point) cycles. Given a cycle of lengthk, we determine if it is null-homotopic inO(n+k logg) time and in θ(n+k) space, whereg is the genus of the given 2-manifold. The actual contraction for a null-homotopic cycle can be computed in θ(nk) time and space. This is a considerable improvement over the previous best-known algorithm for this problem.
Charles A. Dice Center for Research in Financial Economics Globalization, Governance, and the Returns to Cross-Border Acquisitions

Using a sample of control cross-border acquisitions from 61 countries from 1990 to 2007, we find that acquirers from countries with better governance gain more from such acquisitions and their gains are higher when targets are from countries with worse governance. Other acquirer country characteristics are not consistently related to acquisition gains. For instance, the anti-self-dealing index of the acquirer has opposite associations with acquirer returns depending on whether the acquisition of a public firm is paid for with cash or equity. Strikingly, global effects in acquisition returns are at least as important as acquirer country effects. First, the acquirer’s industry and the year of the acquisition explain more of the stockprice reaction than the country of the acquirer. Second, for acquisitions of private firms or subsidiaries, acquirers gain more when acquisition returns are high for acquirers from other countries. We find strong evidence that better alignment of interests between insiders and minority shareholders is associated with greater acquirer returns and weaker evidence that this effect mitigates the adverse impact of poor country governance. JEL Classification: G31; G32; G34
Giant Lyα Nebulae Associated with High-Redshift Radio Galaxies

We report deep, Keck narrowband Lyα images of the luminous z > 3 radio galaxies 4C 41.17, 4C 60.07, and B2 0902+34. The images show giant, 100-200 kpc scale, emission-line nebulae, centered on these galaxies, that exhibit a wealth of morphological structure, including extended low surface brightness emission in the outer regions, radially directed filaments, cone-shaped structures and (indirect) evidence for extended Lyα absorption. We discuss these features within a general scenario in which the nebular gas cools gravitationally in large cold dark matter halos, forming stars and multiple stellar systems. Merging of these "building blocks" triggers large-scale starbursts, forming the stellar bulges of massive radio galaxy hosts, and feeds supermassive black holes, which produce the powerful radio jets and lobes. The radio sources, starburst superwinds, and radiation pressure from active galactic nucleus then disrupt the accretion process, limiting galaxy and black hole growth, and imprint the observed filamentary and cone-shaped structures of the Lyα nebulae.
On reputation and the interaction of …rm and individual reputations

I brie‡y review alternative modelling approaches to understanding reputation and show how these can be used and have been applied to consider reputations of individuals working in a …rm. The focus is on models in which the …rm reputation is informative about the type of an individual belonging to the …rm. The selection of papers discussed is no doubt idiosyncratic and incomplete.
X-ray motion analysis of the vertebral column during the startle response in striped bass, Morone saxatilis

SUMMARY Whole-body stiffness has a substantial impact on propulsive wave speed during axial undulatory locomotion in fishes. The connective tissues of the vertebral column may contribute to body stiffness, but without mechanical and kinematic analysis it is unclear whether the in vivo range of motion of intervertebral joints (IVJs) is great enough to stress IVJ tissues, thus generating stiffness. The present study used 2D videoradiography and 3D X-ray reconstruction of moving morphology (XROMM) to quantify vertebral kinematics during the startle response in striped bass (Morone saxatilis). X-ray video revealed two distinct patterns of bending: pattern I begins in the abdominal region and then proceeds to maximum IVJ angles in the caudal region, whereas pattern II begins in the cervical region and proceeds to maximum IVJ angles in the abdominal and then the caudal joints. In pattern II bends, the cervical joints exhibit a greater in vivo range of motion than previously reported in other species. XROMM analysis of caudal IVJs suggests primarily lateral bending: mean axial and dorsoventral rotations were less than 2 deg and inconsistent across 51 sequences analyzed from five individuals, whereas mean maximum lateral bending angles were 10.4±3.57 deg. These angles, combined with previous investigations of mechanical properties, reveal that the maximum angles all occur within the neutral zone of bending, indicating that little stress is experienced about the joint. This suggests that the IVJs of striped bass are quite compliant and likely do not contribute significantly to whole-body stiffness or elastic recoil during swimming in vivo.
First steps toward underactuated human-inspired bipedal robotic walking

This paper presents the first steps toward going from human data to formal controller design to experimental realization in the context of underactuated bipedal robots. Specifically, by studying experimental human walking data, we find that specific outputs of the human, i.e., functions of the kinematics, appear to be canonical to walking and are all characterized by a single function of time, termed a human walking function. Using the human outputs and walking function, we design a human-inspired controller that drives the output of the robot to the output of the human as represented by the walking function. The main result of the paper is an optimization problem that determines the parameters of this controller so as to guarantee stable underactuated walking that is as “close” as possible to human walking. This result is demonstrated through the simulation of a physical underactuated 2D bipedal robot, AMBER. Experimentally implementing this control on AMBER through “feed-forward” control, i.e., trajectory tracking, repeatedly results in 5-10 steps.
Pregabalin in the discontinuation of long‐term benzodiazepines' use

Tolerance, dependence, and adverse effects on cognitive functions are well‐known consequences of long‐term use of benzodiazepines (BDZ), especially at high doses, raising thorny therapeutic problems in their discontinuation. One promising pharmacological agent in BDZ discontinuation might be the newer anti‐epileptic pregabalin, already successfully tested in the treatment of anxiety disorders.
Improved Accuracy of PSO and DE using Normalization: an Application to Stock Price Prediction

Data Mining is being actively applied to stock market since 1980s. It has been used to predict stock prices, stock indexes, for portfolio management, trend detection and for developing recommender systems. The various algorithms which have been used for the same include ANN, SVM, ARIMA, GARCH etc. Different hybrid models have been developed by combining these algorithms with other algorithms like roughest, fuzzy logic, GA, PSO, DE, ACO etc. to improve the efficiency. This paper proposes DE-SVM model (Differential EvolutionSupport vector Machine) for stock price prediction. DE has been used to select best free parameters combination for SVM to improve results. The paper also compares the results of prediction with the outputs of SVM alone and PSO-SVM model (Particle Swarm Optimization). The effect of normalization of data on the accuracy of prediction has also been studied.