Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Distribution of Networks Generating and Coordinating Locomotor Activity in the Neonatal Rat Spinal Cord In Vitro: A Lesion Study

The isolated spinal cord of the newborn rat contains networks that are able to create a patterned motor output resembling normal locomotor movements. In this study, we sought to localize the regions of primary importance for rhythm and pattern generation using specific mechanical lesions. We used ventral root recordings to monitor neuronal activity and tested the ability of various isolated parts of the caudal thoracic-lumbar cord to generate rhythmic bursting in a combination of 5-HT and NMDA. In addition, pathways mediating left/right and rostrocaudal burst alternation were localized. We found that the isolated ventral third of the spinal cord can generate normally coordinated rhythmic activity, whereas lateral fragments resulting from sagittal sections showed little or no rhythmogenic capability compared with intact control preparations. The ability to generate fast and regular rhythmic activity decreased in the caudal direction, but the rhythm-generating network was found to be distributed over the entire lumbar region and to extend into the caudal thoracic region. The pathways mediating left/right alternation exist primarily in the ventral commissure. As with the rhythmogenic ability, these pathways were distributed along the lumbar enlargement. Both lateral and ventral funiculi were sufficient to coordinate activity in the rostral and caudal regions. We conclude that the networks organizing locomotor-related activity in the spinal cord of the newborn rat are distributed.
Dynamic generation of event trees for risk modelling of terrorist attacks

Probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) is a method used to identify and evaluate the risk of terrorist attacks in complex technological security systems in order to improve their safety and performance. PRA requires determining the probabilities and consequences of a number of potential scenarios. In this paper, a dynamic generation of event tree to model different hypothetical attack scenarios is proposed. An innovative approach is described to limit the size of this tree, which employs specific truncation rules for retaining only those scenarios with risk estimates above a certain threshold. The proposed method which takes into account the consequences and the probabilities of attack scenarios allows low probability high risk attack to be considered.
Role of RanBP9 on amyloidogenic processing of APP and synaptic protein levels in the mouse brain

We previously reported that RanBP9 binds low‐density lipoprotein receptor‐related protein (LRP), amyloid precursor protein (APP), and BACE1 and robustly increased Aβ generation in a variety of cell lines and primary neuronal cultures. To confirm the physiological/ pathological significance of this phenotype in vivo, we successfully generated transgenic mice overexpressing RanBP9 as well as RanBP9‐null mice. Here we show that RanBP9 overexpression resulted in > 2‐fold increase in Aβ40 levels as early as 4 mo of age. A sustained increase in Aβ40 levels was seen at 12 mo of age in both CHAPS‐soluble and formic acid (FA)‐soluble brain fractions. In addition, Aβ42 levels were also significantly increased in FA‐soluble fractions at 12 mo of age. More important, increased Aβ levels were translated to increased deposition of amyloid plaques. In addition, RanBP9 overexpression significantly decreased the levels of synaptophysin and PSD‐95 proteins. Conversely, RanBP9‐null mice showed increased levels of synaptophysin, PSD‐95, and drebrin A protein levels. Given that loss of synapses is the best pathological correlate of cognitive deficits in Alzheimer's disease (AD), increased Aβ levels by RanBP9 observed in the present study provides compelling evidence that RanBP9 may indeed play a key role in the etiology of AD. If so, RanBP9 provides a great opportunity to develop novel therapy for AD. —Lakshmana, M. K. , Hayes, C. D. , Bennett, S. P., Bianchi, E. , Reddy, K. M. , Koo, E. H. , Kang, D. E. Role of RanBP9 on amyloidogenic processing of APP and synaptic protein levels in the mouse brain. FASEB J. 26, 2072‐2083 (2012). www.fasebj. org
HIV care and the incidence of acute renal failure.

BACKGROUND The clinical epidemiology of acute renal failure (ARF) in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected patients remains poorly defined. METHODS We conducted a retrospective analysis of patients who developed ARF while attending King's College Hospital (London, United Kingdom) during January 1998-December 2005. Serum creatinine level and estimated glomerular filtration rate were used to identify ARF. ARF episodes were classified as early onset if they occurred <3 months after initiation of HIV care and as late onset if they occurred > or =3 months after initiation of HIV care. RESULTS During the study period, 130 (5.7%) of 2274 patients developed 144 episodes of ARF. The incidences of early-onset and late-onset ARF were 19.3 episodes per 100 person-years (95% confidence interval [CI], 15.4-24.1 episodes per 100 person-years) and 1.1 episodes per 100 person-years (95% CI, 0.83-1.49 episodes per 100 person-years), respectively (rate ratio, 17.4; P<0.001). In multivariate analysis, nadir CD4 T cell count <100 x 10(9) cells/L (odds ratio [OR], 6.7; 95% CI, 2.5-18.3) and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (OR, 6.7; 95% CI, 3.4-13.3) were associated with early-onset ARF, whereas injection drug use (OR, 4.8; 95% CI, 1.3-17.7), hepatitis C virus coinfection (OR, 3.4; 95% CI, 1.3-8.6), and nadir CD4 T cell count <100 x 10(9) cells/L (OR, 5.8; 95% CI, 2.5-13.4) were associated with late-onset ARF. CONCLUSIONS ARF was common and was associated with advanced immunodeficiency. The incidence of ARF decreased >10-fold in patients who had received HIV care for > or =3 months.
Evaluation of guide wire cannulation in reduced risk of post - ERCP pancreatitis and facilitated bile duct cannulation

Background: Pancreatitis is most common complication of post-ERCP and needs to admission at least for one day. The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of guide wire for better common bile duct (CBD) cannulation for reducing post-ERCP pancreatitis. Methods: From April 2010 through March 2011, the patients who needed ERCP and referred to Shahid Beheshti and Rouhani Teaching Hospital were entered into the study. Guide wire cannulation (65 subjects) as case group and 78 cases with standard cannulation as control group were performed on them randomly. Data from these cases were collected and analyzed. Results: One hundred eighteen (82.5%) patients were females and 28 (17.5%) were males. The mean age of these patients was 56.5±16.8 years. Post- ERCP pancreatitis rate in guide wire group was 6 (9.2%) and in the standard group was 12 (15.4%) (p=0.269). Successful cannulation in these two groups was 67.7% and 67.9%, respectively (p=0.974). Conclusion: The results show that post- ERCP pancreatitis rate in both groups are similar. Other studies with large number of cases are required to confirm our results.
Characterizing the Musical Phenotype in Individuals With Williams Syndrome

Williams Syndrome (WS), a neurodevelopmental genetic disorder, is characterized by peaks and valleys in mental function: substantial impairments in cognitive domains such as reasoning, arithmetic ability, and spatial cognition, alongside relatively preserved skills in social domains, face processing, language, and music. We report the results of a comprehensive survey on musical behaviors and background administered to the largest sample of individuals with WS to date (n = 118, mean age = 20.4), and compare the results to those obtained from a control group of typically developing normal individuals (n = 118, mean age = 20.9) and two groups of individuals with other neurodevelopmental genetic disorders, Autism (n = 30, mean age = 18.2) and Down Syndrome (n = 40, mean age = 17.2). Individuals with WS were found to be rated higher in musical accomplishment, engagement, and interest than either of the comparison groups, and equivalent on most measures to the control group. Compared to all other groups including the controls, the WS individuals displayed greater emotional responses to music, manifested interest in music at an earlier age, and spent more hours per week listening to music. In addition, the effects of music listening (whether positive or negative) tended to last longer in the WS group. A factor analysis extracted seven principal components that characterize the musical phenotype in our sample, and discriminant function analysis of those factors was able to successfully predict group membership for the majority of cases. We discuss the neurobiological implications of these findings.
Link layer behavior of body area networks at 2.4 GHz

Body Area Networks (BANs) can perform the task of continuous, remote monitoring of a patient's physiological signals in diverse environments. Apart from providing healthcare professionals with extensive logs of a patient's physiological history, BANs can be used to identify and react to emergency situations. We identify three important factors that afflict wireless communication in BANs: impermeability of the human body to radio waves at frequencies commonly used in BANs, efficient operation in mobile and time-varying environments, and mission-critical requirements for quick response to emergencies. An understanding of the link layer behavior of wireless sensor nodes placed on the body is crucial to address these and other challenges such as reducing energy consumption and increasing network lifetime. In this paper, we investigate link layer behavior by placing nodes on the body and directly measuring metrics of interest to engineers such as packet delivery ratio (PDR) and RSSI. Emulating a possible real-life BAN operating at the 2.4 GHz band with 12 sensor nodes, we collect over 80 hours of data from 14 volunteers in $3$ different environments that BANs are expected to operate in. We analyze the data to reveal several link layer characteristics to provide insight and guidelines for the designing of BANs. We also evaluate the performance of common routing metrics on our data. Our analysis helps us make the following conclusions. Link PDR is highly affected by the environment and not significantly by the volunteer for the experiment. Routing between nodes on the same side of the body is preferred to routing between nodes on the opposite sides. For links with the same source, failure of packet transmission to a certain node, in some cases, implies the increased probability of reception for other nodes. Most errors occur in bursts of length 1, but a small fraction occur in longer periods ($40$ packets or more).
An Accurate Genomic Island Prediction Method for Sequenced Bacterialand Archaeal Genomes

A genomic island (GI) is a genomic segment in a host genome, and it was transferred from donor genomes. Since genomic islands (GIs) usually contain important genes such as pathogenicity genes, the detection of GIs becomes extremely critical to medical research and industrial applications. Previous computational GI detection tools used one or a few GI-associate features, and thus they suffered the problem of low prediction accuracy. A systematic approach that uses multiple sources to improve GI prediction accuracy, therefore, is in great demand. In this paper, we report the development of Genomic Island Hunter (GIHunter), an accurate software tool for GI detection. GIHunter is a decision tree based bagging model that uses eight GI-associated features such as sequence composition, mobile gene information, and integrase. The performance metric comparison between our approach and other current existing GI prediction methods has shown that our approach is more accurate than other approaches. We have used GIHunter to predict GIs in more than 2000 prokaryotic genomes. We have also visualized our predicted GIs so that our predicted results become useful and meaningful for biomedical studies. Our GI program GIHunter can be obtained at: http://www.esu. edu/cpsc/che_lab/software/GIHunter. Our GI prediction results are available on our genomic islands database, which is: http://www5.esu. edu/cpsc/bioinfo/dgi.
An investigation of human responses to climatic fluctuations at Allen’s Cave, South Australia, from ca 40,000 to 5,000 BP, by a technological analysis of stone artefacts

Abstract Following its initial occupation ca 40,000 years ago, Aboriginal people using Allen’s Cave in South Australia’s arid zone experienced two major climatic changes. From the onset of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) at ca 30,000 cal. BP, until its peak at ca 22,000–18,000 cal. BP, aridity in Australia reached its most intense phase during the human occupation of the site. Conversely, conditions around the Allen’s Cave region during the early Holocene, 11,000–8,000 cal. BP, were the most favourable for human occupation. In this paper, we present the results of a technological and statistical re-analysis of previously excavated Allen’s Cave stone artefact assemblages, focusing on the period ca 40,000–5,000 cal. BP, to examine whether people made adjustments to stone tool manufacture in response to these climatic fluctuations. Our results and interpretations are consistent with some of the conclusions of previous scholars, primarily that the site was used for infrequent visitation rather than long-term occupation, and that little change occurred in the production of stone artefacts (despite changing environmental conditions). We also concur that lithic evidence exists for trade/exchange and/or a change in foraging range or stone curation practices at the start of the early Holocene. However, we do not support all prior claims for significant cultural and demographic changes at this time and we argue that Allen’s Cave was probably abandoned from ca 30,000 to 26,000 cal. BP. The ca 4,000 year hiatus, combined with probable increased visitation after the LGM, suggests that whilst stone tool technology remained largely consistent during the period of focus, Aboriginal people did alter their occupation patterns in response to environmental changes. On the basis of these new interpretations about the site’s occupation history, we provide updated observations in order to contribute to desert occupation modelling.
Analisis Pengaruh Self-efficacy, Kapabilitas, dan Perilaku Kerja Inovatif terhadap Kinerja

<span class="fontstyle0">The relative power of personal factors such as self-efficacy, capability, and innovative work behaviour in predicting performance was tested with 40 teachers through a survey. The variables’ measurements are adapted from </span><span class="fontstyle0">Avallone et al., (2007), Menon and Kohli (1999), Jong and Hartog (2008), and Campbell (1990). Path analysis </span><span class="fontstyle0">were used to test the hypotheses. Our findings showed that all of hypotheses were accepted. The hypotheses stated that innovative work behaviour as a mediator variable were accepted in this study. </span> <br /><br />
Pronunciation models in regional environments: a comparison and assessment of RP and SSE

For many years, the native speaker of English has been exclusively seen as the ‘standard’ or preferred pronunciation model of choice for L2 users of English, and the accent known as Standard British English, also called Received Pronunciation (RP), was seen as the normative. However, in environments where the aforementioned model has ‘a negligible number of speakers’ (Brown, 1991) and could even be described as ‘phantom’ (Daniels, 1995), the question of whether RP supports student perception and production better than a local standard model is particularly relevant. Scotland, with its range of academic institutions and growing number of international students could be considered such an environment. In order to establish the most appropriate model for L2 students studying in Scotland, a 5-week explicit pronunciation study was conducted, with international students being exposed to 10 hours of pre-recorded pronunciation instruction with either an RP or a Scottish Standard English (SSE) model. Prior to beginning, and upon culmination of the course, students undertook diagnostic and summative testing in which perception and production of a range of pre-selected segmental and suprasegmental features was assessed. A control group was also assessed in order to establish whether any improvements in scores that occurred were due to the explicit pronunciation tuition, or were simply instances of implicit learning which developed upon exposure to the 21 hours of weekly English tuition all participants were receiving on their pre-sessional course. Having been quantitatively analysed, test results show that after 5 weeks all groups, including the controls, made significant increases in their perception of Nuclear stress. There were also surprising significant increases in the perception of the tested, but not taught, segmental ɔ/O in the SSE and control group suggesting the occurrence of implicit learning. However, in terms of production, while results hint at a positive trend among SSE students, the RP group made the most significant increase in score after 5 weeks. This contrasts with the Control group’s results which decreased over the same time period.
Role of Morphological Structure, Doping, and Coating of Different Materials in the Sensing Characteristics of Humidity Sensors

The humidity sensing characteristics of different sensing materials are important properties in order to monitor different products or events in a wide range of industrial sectors, research and development laboratories as well as daily life. The primary aim of this study is to compare the sensing characteristics, including impedance or resistance, capacitance, hysteresis, recovery and response times, and stability with respect to relative humidity, frequency, and temperature, of different materials. Various materials, including ceramics, semiconductors, and polymers, used for sensing relative humidity have been reviewed. Correlations of the different electrical characteristics of different doped sensor materials as the most unique feature of a material have been noted. The electrical properties of different sensor materials are found to change significantly with the morphological changes, doping concentration of different materials and film thickness of the substrate. Various applications and scopes are pointed out in the review article. We extensively reviewed almost all main kinds of relative humidity sensors and how their electrical characteristics vary with different doping concentrations, film thickness and basic sensing materials. Based on statistical tests, the zinc oxide-based sensing material is best for humidity sensor design since it shows extremely low hysteresis loss, minimum response and recovery times and excellent stability.
Expanding “ Choice ” in School Choice Atila Abdulkadiro ğ

Truthful revelation of preferences has emerged as a desideratum in the design of school choice programs. Gale-Shapley’s deferred acceptance mechanism is strategy-proof for students but limits their ability to communicate their preference intensities. This results in ex-ante inefficiency when ties at school preferences are broken randomly. We propose a variant of deferred acceptance mechanism which allows students to influence how they are treated in ties. It maintains truthful revelation of ordinal preferences and supports a greater scope of efficiency.
Implications of elemental abundances in dwarf spheroidal galaxies

Unusual elemental abundance patterns observed for stars belonging to nearby dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxies are discussed. Analysis of the [ α /H] vs. [Fe/H] diagrams where α represents Mg or an average of α -elements reveals that Fe from type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) does not contribute to the stellar abundances in the dSph galaxies where the member stars exhibit low α /Fe ratios except for the most massive dSph galaxy, Sagitarrius. The more massive dwarf (irregular) galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud, also has an SNe Ia signature in the stellar abundances. These findings suggest that whether SNe Ia contribute to chemical evolution in dwarf galaxies is likely to depend on the mass scale of galaxies. Unusual Mg abundances in some dSph stars are also found to be the origin of the large scatter in the [Mg/Fe] ratios and are responsible for a seemingly decreasing [Mg/Fe] feature with increasing [Fe/H]. In addition, the lack of massive stars in the dSph galaxies does not satisfactorily account for the low- α signature. Considering the assembly of deficient elements (O, Mg, Si, Ca, Ti and Zn), all of which are synthesized in pre-SN massive stars and in SN explosions, the low- α signature appears to reflect the heavy-element yields of massive stars with less rotation compared to solar neighborhood stars.
Types of leisure, leisure motivation, and well-being in university students

ABSTRACT This research aimed at investigating types of leisure motivation, leisure satisfaction, leisure patterns, health status, demographic backgrounds, and the relationship between these and current leisure. A cross-sectional study by recruiting 199 university students showed that intrinsic leisure motivation is the single greatest predictor for leisure satisfaction, even after controlling for elementary and high school leisure, extrinsic leisure motivation, and perceived stress. Social support moderated the impact of high Body Mass Index (BMI) on active leisure, indicating that university students with high BMI did not tend to engage in active leisure in the presence of high perceived social support. Also, they were more likely to engage in passive leisure in the presence of low-stress levels. This research provides a new insight into leisure patterns depending on health status with an emphasis on BMI interacting with stress and social support.
The Importance of Auditory Discrimination in the Acquisition of Mental Lexicon and Reading Automation in Arabic-Speaking Students in Kenitra (Morocco)

Auditory discrimination is the ability to discriminate between words and sounds. Auditory discrimination can affect reading, spelling and writing. Several studies examined the correlation between auditory discrimination and reading performance. The aim of this study is to demonstrate the importance of auditory discrimination in the acquisition of mental lexicon and consequently the automation of reading in a sample of 101 students in their fourth year of primary education coming from four different schools in Kenitra (Morocco). The results analysis shows that reading scores correlated significantly with the auditory discrimination scores (r = 0.30, p < 0.01). This proves that the inability to discriminate words causes a disability to store them in the mental lexicon, which makes it difficult to identify these words at a later encounter. This conclusion is supported by the significant correlation between reading and auditory and visual lexical decision tasks. In this study we were able to emphasize the importance of having good acoustic discrimination capacities for language development. Students who were successful at the auditory discrimination task are more successful at reading. A remediation program based on improving auditory discrimination capacities using the language assessment battery LABBEL could see reading performance improvement in these students.