Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The acquisition of voicing contrasts in Spanish and English learning infants and children: a longitudinal study

ABSTRACT The production of voice-onset time (VOT) was studied in a group of Spanish- and English-learning subjects at 1 and 2 years of age. Voice-onset time of initial stop consonants from canonical utterances was measured oscillographically. At one year no significant difference in VOT production was found between Spanish and English learners at any place of articulation. Mean VOT values for infants fell in the short lag range. By two years, four of the seven children in the English group and four of the children in the Spanish group showed significant evidence of having acquired the VOT distinction in stop consonants appropriate for their native language.
The Role of Rhythmic Neural Synchronization in Rest and Task Conditions

Rhythmic neural synchronization is found throughout the brain during many different tasks and even at rest. Beyond their underlying mechanisms, the question of their role is still controversial. Modeling can bring insight on this difficult question. We review here our recent modeling results concerning this issue in different situations. During rest, we show how local rhythmic synchrony can induce a spatiotemporally organized spontaneous activity at the brain level. Then, we show how rhythmic synchrony decreases reaction time in attention and enhances the strength and speed of information transfer between different groups of neurons. Finally, we show that when rhythmic synchrony creates firing phases, the learning with spike timing-dependent plasticity of repeatedly presented input patterns is greatly enhanced.
What Millennials Want: How to Optimize Their Work

Abstract: It is known that it is quite difficult for companies to create a working environment that suits the characters of the Millennials, who are now undoubtedly make up the largest proportion of the workforce. This study aims to understand how job autonomy and boredom at work affect Millennials’ work engagement. Using non-probability sampling methods, 320 Millennial employees (19–37 years old) from various organizations (private and public organization) in Indonesia agreed to participate in this study. They filled in a questionnaire that measured the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9), Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ); and Workplace Boredom Scale. Data were analyzed using mediation analysis; and the results showed that boredom at work plays a significant role in mediating the relationship between job autonomy and employee engagement in Millennial employees. To conclude, job autonomy positively affects boredom levels of Millennial employees and low levels of boredom results in a higher employee engagement level.Abstrak: Dapat dipahami bahwa perusahaan kesulitan menciptakan lingkungan kerja yang sesuai bagi karyawan-karyawannya, khususnya karyawan Generasi Milenial yang merupakan pemain utama dalam dunia kerja. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah untuk melihat peran dari variabel-variabel yang diduga dapat mem­pengaruhi keterikatan kerja karyawan Generasi Milenial, yaitu kemandirian kerja dan kebosanan bekerja. Menggunakan metode non-probability sampling, 320 karyawan Generasi Milenial (19-37 tahun) dari berbagai organisasi di Indonesia (organisasi swasta dan negeri) bersedia berpartisipasi dalam penelitian ini. Mereka mengisi beberapa kuesioner, antara lain The Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9) Work Design Questionnaire dan Workplace Boredom Scale. Analisis data yang digunakan adalah analisis mediasi; dan hasilnya menunjukkan bahwa kebosanan bekerja berperan signifikan dalam memediasi hubungan kemandiran kerja dan keterikatan kerja pada karyawan Generasi Milenial. Dapat disimpulkan bahwa kemandirian kerja dapat mempengaruhi kebosanan Generasi Milenial dalam bekerja dan rendahnya tingkat kebosanan dalam bekerja tersebut dapat mempengaruhi keterikatan kerja yang dimiliki.
Neural Stem Cell Tropism to Glioma: Critical Role of Tumor Hypoxia

Hypoxia is a critical aspect of the microenvironment in glioma and generally signifies unfavorable clinical outcome. Effective targeting of hypoxic areas in gliomas remains a significant therapeutic challenge. New therapeutic platforms using neural stem cells (NSC) for tumor-targeted drug delivery show promise in treatment of cancers that are refractory to traditional therapies. However, the molecular mechanisms of NSC targeting to hypoxic tumor areas are not well understood. Therefore, we investigated the role of hypoxia in directed migration of NSCs to glioma and identified the specific signaling molecules involved. Our data showed that hypoxia caused increased migration of human HB1.F3 NSCs to U251 human glioma-conditioned medium in vitro. In HB1.F3 NSCs, hypoxia led to up-regulation of CXCR4, urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor (uPAR), vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2 (VEGFR2), and c-Met receptors. Function-inhibiting antibodies to these receptors inhibited the migration of HB1.F3 cells to glioma-conditioned medium. Small interfering RNA knockdown of hypoxia-inducible factor-1α in glioma cells blocked the hypoxia-induced migration of NSCs, which was due to decreased expression of stromal cell–derived factor-1 (SDF-1), uPA, and VEGF in glioma cells. Our in vivo data provided direct evidence that NSCs preferentially distributed to hypoxic areas inside intracranial glioma xenografts, as detected by pimonidazole hypoxia probe, as well as to the tumor edge, and that both areas displayed high SDF-1 expression. These observations indicate that hypoxia is a key factor in determining NSC tropism to glioma and that SDF-1/CXCR4, uPA/uPAR, VEGF/VEGFR2, and hepatocyte growth factor/c-Met signaling pathways mediate increased NSC-to-glioma tropism under hypoxia. These results have significant implications for development of stem cell–mediated tumor-selective gene therapies. (Mol Cancer Res 2008;6(12):1819–29)
Shaping Gene Expression in Activated and Resting Primary Macrophages by IL-101

IL-10 regulates inflammation by reducing cytokine and chemokine production from activated macrophages. We performed microarray experiments to identify possible effector molecules of IL-10 and to investigate the global effect of IL-10 on the transcriptional response induced in LPS-activated macrophages. To exclude background effects of endogenous IL-10, macrophages from IL-10-deficient mice were used. IL-10 up-regulated expression of a small number of genes (26 and 37 after 45 min and 3 h, respectively), including newly identified and previously documented targets such as suppressor of cytokine signaling-3 and IL-1 receptor antagonist. However, the activation program triggered by LPS was profoundly affected by IL-10. IL-10 repressed 62 and further increased 15 of 259 LPS-induced genes. For all genes examined, the effects of IL-10 were determined to be STAT3-dependent. These results suggest that IL-10 regulates STAT3-dependent pathways that selectively target a broad component of LPS-induced genes at the mRNA level.
D-terms on the resolved conifold

We derive a novel deformation of the warped resolved conifold background with supersymmetry breaking ISD (1,2) fluxes by adding D7-branes to this type IIB theory. We find spontaneous supersymmetry breaking without generating a bulk cosmological constant. In the compactified form, our background will no longer be a Calabi-Yau manifold as it allows a non-vanishing first Chern class. In the presence of D7-branes the (1,2) fluxes can give rise to non-trivial D-terms. We study the Ouyang embedding of D7-branes in detail and find that in this case the D-terms are indeed non-zero. In the limit when we approach the singular conifold, the D-terms vanish for Ouyang's embedding, although supersymmetry appears to be broken. We also construct the F-theory lift of our background and demonstrate how these IIB (1,2) fluxes lift to non-primitive (2,2) flux on the fourfold. The seven branes correspond to normalisable harmonic forms. We briefly sketch a possible way to attain an inflaton potential in this background once extra D3-branes are introduced and point out some possibilities of restoring supersymmetry in our background that could in principle be used as the end point of the inflationary set-up. In a companion paper we will analyse in details the inflationary dynamics in this background.
Increased fractional anisotropy in white matter of the right frontal region in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a diffusion tensor imaging study.

UNLABELLED Abnormalities of frontal white matter (WM) have been found in some children with ADHD. The purpose of this study was to explore the changes in WM in child patients with ADHD by DTI, which detects changes in WM microstructure based on properties of diffusion. We also expect to investigate the relationship between the changes in WM and executive function in child patients with ADHD. DTI was performed on 24 patients with ADHD and 20 healthy controls. A series of neuropsychological tests and a structural interview were conducted to assess the cognitive functions and clinical data of the ADHD patients and controls. Firstly, child patients with ADHD have higher fractional anisotropy (FA) values in WM in the right frontal region. Secondly, FA in right frontal WM is positively correlated with scores in the Stroop test. CONCLUSIONS Increased FA of right frontal WM implies a higher degree of myelination and lower degree of neural branching in WM, contributing to the neurological deficits of ADHD.
A quantitative study on execution time variability in computing experiments

Several modeling, simulation and experimental research works in computer science and engineering depend on correctly measuring the execution time of computer programs. It is observed that not everyone takes into account that repeated executions of the program with the same input can result in execution times statistically significant different. The lack of rigor in the analysis of execution times of computer programs has been investigated in several studies in the literature. In this work, we first reproduce experiments from the literature in order to analyze the statistical properties of their results in terms of execution times, as well as to assess the effects of different variability sources in influencing the execution times. Particularly, we consider variability sources related to the operating system. We also propose a protocol to systematize the comparison of programs' execution times in order to identify the significant differences in samples obtained from experiments with multiple treatments.
VAMPIR: Visualization and Analysis of MPI Resources

Performance analysis most often is based on the detailed knowledge of program behavior. One option to get this information is tracing. Based on the research tool PARvis, the visualization environment VAMPIR was developed at KFA which now supports the new message passing standardMPI.VAMPIR translates a given trace file into a variety of graphical views, e.g., state diagrams, activity charts, time-line displays, and statistics. Moreover, it supports an animation mode that can help to locate performance bottlenecks, and it provides flexible filter operations to reduce the amount of information displayed. The most interesting part of VAMPIR is the powerful zooming feature that allows to identify problems at any level of detail.
Cruise Control for Pedestrians: Controlling Walking Direction using Electrical Muscle Stimulation

Pedestrian navigation systems require users to perceive, interpret, and react to navigation information. This can tax cognition as navigation information competes with information from the real world. We propose actuated navigation, a new kind of pedestrian navigation in which the user does not need to attend to the navigation task at all. An actuation signal is directly sent to the human motor system to influence walking direction. To achieve this goal we stimulate the sartorius muscle using electrical muscle stimulation. The rotation occurs during the swing phase of the leg and can easily be counteracted. The user therefore stays in control. We discuss the properties of actuated navigation and present a lab study on identifying basic parameters of the technique as well as an outdoor study in a park. The results show that our approach changes a user's walking direction by about 16°/m on average and that the system can successfully steer users in a park with crowded areas, distractions, obstacles, and uneven ground.
Small-scale enterprises and the informal sector in Kenya

The next issue of the African Newsletter will come out at the end of December 2012. The theme of the issue 3/2012 is Nanotechnology. The responsibility for opinions expressed in signed articles, studies and other contributions rests solely with their authors, and publication does not constitute an endorsement by the International Labour Office , World Health Organization or the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health of the opinions expressed in it. T he majority of the world's workers are economically active in small-scale enterprises, a large proportion of which operates in the informal economy. In some jurisdictions, undertakings falling into this group are known as micro and small-scale enterprises (MSEs). The size of the sector is estimated in some parts of Africa to constitute 17–27% of the workforce while it is over 90% in others. The sector is heterogeneous in nature, comprising small businesses using relatively modern equipment and employing up to about 50 workers ; microbusinesses employing up to around five persons, some of whom may be family members; and micro-enterprises run by individual self-employed persons and tending to use relatively old-fashioned or traditional equipment and/or production methods. Whereas businesses in the first category tend to be registered, most of those in the latter two categories are in the unregulated informal economy. The occupational groups operating in this sector are as varied as the wide range of industries contained in it. They include persons involved in seemingly benign jobs such as catering and cleaning, market trading and street hawking as well as those in jobs generally regarded as hazardous by occupational safety and health (OSH) practitioners. The latter include waste-picking, agriculture and mining , to mention a few. Increasingly, the distinction between the work and the non-work environment in some small-scale informal operations is becoming increasingly blurred. This has been attributed among others to massive expansion of the informal economy, outsourcing of production to home-based work and the direct proximity of homes to the place of work. Another observation is the fact that toxic substances are being used in home-based production processes. The hazardous exposures these substances pose in the domestic setting are less likely to be adequately identified or controlled, and may result in human health risks that are not found in typical workplace settings. This also implies that the workplace has categories of vulnerable persons in domestic exposure settings who are not normally present in a workplace, such …
Conditional Moment Models under Weak Identification

We consider models defined by a set of conditional moment restrictions where weak identification may arise. Weak identification is directly defined through the conditional moments that are allowed to flatten as the sample size increases. We propose a minimum distance estimator of the structural parameters that is robust to potential weak identification and that uses neither instrumental variables nor smoothing. Hence, its properties only depend upon identification weakness, and not on the interplay between some tuning parameter, as the growth rate of the number of instruments, and the unknown degree of weakness. Our estimator is consistent and asymptotically normal, and its rate of convergence is the same as competing estimators based on many weak instruments. Heteroskedasticity-robust inference is possible through Wald testing without prior knowledge of the identification pattern. In simulations, we find that our estimator is competitive with estimators based on many instruments.
Cytogenetic Characteristics of New Monosomic Stocks of Cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.)

The use of aneuploid lines significantly increases the effectiveness of molecular-genetic analysis and the development of superior quality breeding lines via substitutions by alien chromosomes. To date, however, a complete set of aneuploid series for each cotton chromosome is not available. Here, we present the development of a monosomic stock collection of cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) from Uzbekistan, including the origin of 92 primary monosomics, meiotic metaphase-I analysis, study of tetrads of microspores, pollen fertility, and monosomic transmission rates for some monosomic lines. We report desynaptic effects of some monosomes detected both in parental and daughter monosomics, a positive role of interchanges in translocation heterozygous monosomics due to selective advantages of gametes with deficiency and a simultaneous interchange, pollen fertility variation, and strong differences in transmission rates. This monosomic cotton collection, developed using single genome background, will be useful for future breeding, genetic, cytogenetic, and molecular-genetic investigations of the cotton genome.
The Effects of Anti-Dementia and Nootropic Treatments on the Mortality of Patients with Dementia: A Population-Based Cohort Study in Taiwan

Background Few studies have examined the contribution of treatment on the mortality of dementia based on a population-based study. Objective To investigate the effects of anti-dementia and nootropic treatments on the mortality of dementia using a population-based cohort study. Methods 12,193 incident dementia patients were found from 2000 to 2010. Their data were compared with 12,193 age- and sex-matched non-dementia controls that were randomly selected from the same database. Dementia was classified into vascular (VaD) and degenerative dementia. Mortality incidence and hazard ratios (HRs) were calculated. Results The median survival time was 3.39 years (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.88–3.79) for VaD without medication, 6.62 years (95% CI: 6.24–7.21) for VaD with nootropics, 3.01 years (95% CI: 2.85–3.21) for degenerative dementia without medication, 8.11 years (95% CI: 6.30–8.55) for degenerative dementia with anti-dementia medication, 6.00 years (95% CI: 5.73–6.17) for degenerative dementia with nootropics, and 9.03 years (95% CI: 8.02–9.87) for degenerative dementia with both anti-dementia and nootropic medications. Compared to the non-dementia group, the HRs among individuals with degenerative dementia were 2.69 (95% CI: 2.55–2.83) without medication, 1.46 (95% CI: 1.39–1.54) with nootropics, 1.05 (95% CI: 0.82–1.34) with anti-dementia medication, and 0.92 (95% CI: 0.80–1.05) with both nootropic and anti-dementia medications. VaD with nootropics had a lower mortality (HR: 1.25, 95% CI: 1.15–1.37) than VaD without medication (HR: 2.46, 95% CI: 2.22–2.72). Conclusion Pharmacological treatments have beneficial effects for patients with dementia in prolonging their survival.
Relative Density Estimation with Censored Data

Well-described tools for comparing two populations via their cumulative distribution functions are the socalled relative distribution R(t) = F{FFo' (t)} and the corresponding relative density (or grade density) r(t). The authors propose a kernel-type estimator for the relative density r(t) in the situation where independent samples of right-censored observations are available from the two populations. It is shown that the estimator admits an asymptotic representation from which its limit distribution can be obtained. The results generalize those of Cwik & Mielniczuk (1993) in the complete sample case. RESUME La fonction de repartition relative R(t) = F{Fo-'(t)} et sa d6riv6e r(t) sont deux outils bien connus de comparaison de populations de lois F et Fo. Les auteurs montrent comment estimer r par la m6thode du noyau & partir d'6chantillons ind6pendants mais 6ventuellement censures a droite des deux populations. Une representation asymptotique de cet estimateur permet d'en d6duire la loi limite. Ces r6sultats 6tendent ceux d6ja obtenus par Cwik & Mielniczuk (1993) dans le cas non censur6.
Reliability of video motion-analysis systems to measure amplitude and velocity of shoulder elevation.

CONTEXT Dynamic shoulder motion can be captured using video capture systems, but reliability has not yet been established. OBJECTIVE To compare the reliability of 2 systems in measuring dynamic shoulder kinematics during forward-elevation movements and to determine differences in these kinematics between healthy and injured subjects. DESIGN Reliability and cohort. SETTING Research laboratory. PARTICIPANTS 11 healthy subjects and 10 post-superior labrum anteroposterior lesion patients (SLAP). INTERVENTION Contrasting markers were placed at the hip, elbow, and shoulder to represent shoulder elevation and were videotaped in 2 dimensions. Subjects performed 6 repetitions of active elevation (AE) and active assisted elevation of the shoulder, and 3 trials were analyzed using Datapac (comprehensive system) and Dartfish (basic system). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Amplitudes and velocities of the shoulder angle were calculated. Intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC), standard error of measurement (SEM), and levels of agreement (LOA) were used to determine intersystem and intertrial reliability. RESULTS For AE, the amplitude maximum (ICC = .98-.99, SEM = 2-3°, LOA = -9° to 5°) and average velocity (ICC = .94-.97, SEM = 1°/s, LOA = -4° to 1°/s) indicated excellent intersystem reliability between systems. Intratrial reliability for minimum velocity was moderate for Datapac (ICC = .64, SEM = 4°/s, LOA = 7°/s) and poor for Dartfish (ICC = .52, SEM = 20°/s, LOA = 37°/s). Cohort results demonstrated for AE a greater amplitude for healthy v SLAP (139° ± 11° v 113° ± 13°; P = .001) and interaction for an average velocity increase of 2°/s in healthy and decrease of 2°/s in SLAP patients over the 3 trials (P = .02). CONCLUSIONS Reliability ranges provide the means to assess the clinical meaningfulness of results. The cohort differences are supported when the values exceed the ranges of the SEM; hence the amplitude results are meaningful. For dynamic shoulder elevation measured using video, the assessment of velocity was found to produce moderate to good reliability. The results suggest that with these measures subtle changes in both measures may be possible with further investigations.