Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Factors influencing fluoride ingestion from dentifrice by children.

OBJECTIVE This study assessed the percentage of the amount of dentifrice loaded onto the toothbrush that is ingested by children, taking into account age, the amount of dentifrice used during toothbrushing, and the dentifrice flavor. METHODS The sample consisted of 155 children of both genders attending public kindergartens and schools in Bauru, Brazil, divided into 5 groups (n = 30-32) of children aged 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 years old. The dentifrices used were Sorriso™ (1219 ppm F, peppermint-flavored) and Tandy™ (959 ppm F, tutti-frutti-flavored). The assessment of fluoride intake from dentifrices was carried out six times for each child, using 0.3, 0.6, and 1.2 g of each dentifrice, following a random, crossover distribution. Brushing was performed by the children or their parents/caregivers according to the home habits and under the observation of the examiner. Fluoride present in the expectorant and on toothbrush was analyzed with an ion-specific electrode after HMDS-facilitated diffusion. Fluoride ingestion was indirectly derived. Results were analyzed by 3-way repeated-measures anova and Tukey's tests (P < 0.05) using the percent dentifrice ingested as response variable. RESULTS Age and percent dentifrice ingested for both dentifrices, and the three amounts used were inversely related (P < 0.0001). Percent dentifrice ingested was significantly higher after the use of Tandy™ under all conditions of the study when compared with Sorriso™ (P < 0.0001). Significant differences were observed when brushing with 0.3 g when compared with 1.2 g, for both dentifrices tested (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS The results indicate that all variables tested must be considered in preventive measures aiming to reduce the amount of fluoride ingested by young children.
Barriers and facilitators to antiretroviral therapy adherence among Peruvian adolescents living with HIV: A qualitative study

AIDS deaths among adolescents are increasing globally. This qualitative study investigated the barriers and facilitators to cART adherence among Peruvian adolescents living with HIV. Guided by a social ecological model, we analyzed transcripts from 24 psychosocial support groups for HIV-positive adolescents aged 13–17 years and 15 individual, in-depth interviews with cART providers and caregivers to identify the barriers and facilitators to cART adherence at the individual, family/caregiver and hospital levels. Most barriers and facilitators to cART adherence clustered at the individual and family/caregiver levels, centering on support provided to adolescents; history of declining health due to suboptimal cART adherence; side effects from antiretroviral drugs; and cART misinformation. Interventions to support adolescent HIV cART adherence should begin at the individual and family/caregiver levels and include an educational component. No adolescent living with HIV should die from AIDS in an era of accessible cART.
Sustained Load Strength and Short-Term Strain Behavior of High-Strength Concrete

A test program was carried out on 100-by-200 mm cylinders to study both the compressive strength under high sustained stresses and the short-term strain behavior of high-strength concrete. The sustained load specimens were subjected to sustained stresses for 3 months, if they did not fail sooner. The concretes had 56-day strengths of 65-120 MPa (9,425-17,400 psi). Sustained load stresses ranged from 70% to 95% of the short-term strength. The effects of strain gradient and silica fume were also studied. In addition, stress-strain curves, volumetric strains, and Poisson's ratio were measured in monotonic short-time tests. The ratio of the sustained load strength for specimens loaded for 90 days to the short-term strength of ultra-high-strength silica fume concrete was found to be 10-15% higher than that of normal-strength concrete, while the sustained load strength ratio for high-strength concrete was found to be similar to normal-strength concrete. The sustained load strength ratio for high-strength concrete under small eccentric loads was found to be approximately 5% higher than that under concentric loads. A correlation was found between the sustained load strength of high-strength concrete and the stress at which the short-time stress-strain curves deviate from a straight line. The volumetric strain, Poisson's ratio, and sustained load studies show that while the short-time stress-strain characteristics of high-strength concrete are similar to those of rock, its long-term behavior is similar to normal-strength concrete and is dominated with its composite nonhomogeneous structure, creep of the paste, and time-dependent deformation.
Bilingual Keyword Extraction and its Educational Application

We introduce a method that extracts keywords in a language with the help of the other. The method involves estimating preferences for topical keywords and fusing language-specific word statistics. At run-time, we transform parallel articles into word graphs, build crosslingual edges for word statistics integration, and exploit PageRank with word keyness information for keyword extraction. We apply our method to keyword analysis and language learning. Evaluation shows that keyword extraction benefits from cross-language information and language learners benefit from our keywords in reading comprehension test.
Effects of Antibiotics on Quorum Sensing in Pseudomonas aeruginosa

ABSTRACT During infection, Pseudomonas aeruginosa employs bacterial communication (quorum sensing [QS]) to coordinate the expression of tissue-damaging factors. QS-controlled gene expression plays a pivotal role in the virulence of P. aeruginosa, and QS-deficient mutants cause less severe infections in animal infection models. Treatment of cystic fibrosis (CF) patients chronically infected with P. aeruginosa with the macrolide antibiotic azithromycin (AZM) has been demonstrated to improve the clinical outcome. Several studies indicate that AZM may accomplish its beneficial action in CF patients by impeding QS, thereby reducing the pathogenicity of P. aeruginosa. This led us to investigate whether QS inhibition is a common feature of antibiotics. We present the results of a screening of 12 antibiotics for their QS-inhibitory activities using a previously described QS inhibitor selector 1 strain. Three of the antibiotics tested, AZM, ceftazidime (CFT), and ciprofloxacin (CPR), were very active in the assay and were further examined for their effects on QS-regulated virulence factor production in P. aeruginosa. The effects of the three antibiotics administered at subinhibitory concentrations were investigated by use of DNA microarrays. Consistent results from the virulence factor assays, reverse transcription-PCR, and the DNA microarrays support the finding that AZM, CFT, and CPR decrease the expression of a range of QS-regulated virulence factors. The data suggest that the underlying mechanism may be mediated by changes in membrane permeability, thereby influencing the flux of N-3-oxo-dodecanoyl-l-homoserine lactone.
Identification of Dynamic Mass Spring Parameters for Deformable Body Simulation

Mass spring systems (MSS) are frequently used to simulate deformable objects because of their conceptual simplicity and computational speed. Unfortunately, the model parameters (spring coefficients, masses) are not related to material constitutive laws in an obvious way. In our earlier work we proposed a method, which can be used to relate the parameters of the MSS to constitutive models, often used in continuum mechanics. In this report we have used this strategy to develop new formulae for the dynamic MSS parameters, i.e. the masses and the damping coefficients. This is the first report which identifies the damper coefficients analytically. In this work we restrict our attention to triangular meshes. Experimental evidence is given in support of our results.
Epicardial Phenol Interrupts Refractory Period Responses to Sympathetic but Not Vagal Stimulation in Canine Left Ventricular Epicardium and Endocardium

We studied the effects of regional epicardial application of phenol on autonomic neural control of electrophysiological characteristics of the anterior left ventricle. In eight open-chest dogs, we applied a thin line of 88± phenol on the perimeter encircling a multipolar electrode and measured the effective refractory period (ERP) and recorded electrograms in phenol-encircled and untreated areas. Before phenol was applied, sympathetic nerve stimulation shortened ERP in all areas: percent change (Δ) ⩾ 12. Phenol application to an area with a radius of 1-2 cm prevented ERP shortening in encircled epicardium during sympathetic stimulation, ±Δ = 0.9 ± 0.8 (SEM), and attenuated ERP shortening in underlying endocardium, ±Δ = 2.5 ± 1.6, compared to ERP shortening in untreated areas, ±Δ = 10 ± 1. A subsequent phenol application to an area with a radius of 2-3 cm prevented ERP shortening during sympathetic stimulation in both encircled epicardium and underlying endocardium. Phenol did not alter electrograms, activation times, or ERP shortening produced by norepinephrine infusion; these data suggest that electrophysiological characteristics of ventricular muscle encircled by phenol were unchanged apart from effects of withdrawal of sympathetic neural influence. To support these functional data, norepinephrine content measured in phenol-treated epicardium and endocardium of three dogs was 7 and 21±, respectively, of the norepinephrine content of untreated areas. In eight additional dogs, vagus nerve stimulation during norepinephrine infusion prolonged ERP by 3-5 msec both before and after phenol encircling an area with a radius of 2-3 cm. In these dogs, phenol did prevent ERP shortening during sympathetic nerve stimulation. We conclude that epicardial phenol interrupts sympathetic neural influences to both epicardial and endocardial sites without impairing responses either to intravenous norepinephrine or to vagus nerve stimulation. Circ Res 47: 33-40, 1980
Autogenous Immunity to Endogenous RNA Tumor Virus: Differential Reactivities of Immunoglobulins M and G to Virus Envelope Antigens

The autogenous humoral immune response of mice to their endogenous leukemia virus has been examined in terms of the reactivities of individual classes of antibody present in normal B6C3F1 serum. Whole serum and the immunoglobulin (Ig) M and IgG fractions of serum from animals of different age groups were compared by radioimmune precipitation assays and viral infectivity neutralization assays. Both IgM and IgG fractions were able to precipitate virus, although not as effectively as whole serum. Virus-specific antibody levels, as well as total antibody concentrations in whole serum, appeared to increase with age. Sodium dodecyl sulfate gel electrophoresis analysis was performed with immune precipitates obtained when whole serum or 19 or 7S fractions from animals of different age groups were reacted with disrupted virus. The 19S antibody fraction reacted with three antigenic determinants on the viral envelope. These antigens have apparent molecular weights of 17,000, 43,000, and 68,000. The last two appear to be glycoproteins and may correspond to the M2 and M1 antigens. In contrast, the 7S component reacted only with the 17,000-molecular-weight protein. Neutralization assays against BALB:virus-2, a xenotropic endogenous mouse type C virus, revealed that 19S and whole serum but not the 7S fraction possessed neutralizing activity. These findings indicate that there are differential reactivities of IgM and IgG antibodies in normal serum of B6C3F1 mice, with respect to both recognition of viral envelope antigens and neutralization of endogenous MuLV. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that the autogenous humoral immune response is a systemic host function that may be important in the regulation of endogenous type C virus expression in vivo.
Misuse of Statistical Methods in 10 Leading Chinese Medical Journals in 1998 and 2008

Statistical methods are vital to biomedical research. Our aim was to find out whether progress has been made in the last decade in the use of statistical methods in Chinese medical research. We reviewed 10 leading Chinese medical journals published in 1998 and in 2008. Regarding statistical methods, using a multiple t-test for multiple group comparison was the most common error in the t-test in both years, which significantly decreased in 2008. In contingency tables, no significant level adjustment for multiple comparison significantly decreased in 2008. In ANOVA, over a quarter of articles misused the method of multiple pair-wise comparison in both years, and no significant difference was seen between the two years. In the rank transformation nonparametric test, the error of using multiple pair-wise comparison for multiple group comparison became less common. Many mistakes were found in the randomised controlled trial (56.3% in 1998; 67.9% in 2008), non- randomised clinical trial (57.3%; 58.6%), basic science study (72.9%; 65.5%), case study or case series study (48.4%; 47.2%), and cross-sectional study (57.1%; 44.2%). Progress has been made in the use of statistical methods in Chinese medical journals, but much is yet to be done.
Evaluation of a role-based approach for customizing a complex development environment

Coarse-grained approaches to customization allow the user to enable or disable groups of features at once, rather than individual features. While this may reduce the complexity of customization and encourage more users to customize, the research challenges of designing such approaches have not been fully explored. To address this limitation, we conducted an interview study with 14 professional software developers who use an integrated development environment that provides a role-based, coarse-grained approach to customization. We identify challenges of designing coarse-grained customization models, including issues of functionality partitioning, presentation, and individual differences. These findings highlight potentially critical design choices, and provide direction for future work.
Performance analysis of an AoA estimator in the presence of more mutual coupling parameters

The problem of Angle-of-Arrival estimation of multiple sources in the presence of mutual coupling is addressed. In this paper, we derive a Mean-Squared-Error (MSE) expression of a recently proposed algorithm that could estimate the Angles-of-Arrival of multiple sources in the presence of more mutual coupling parameters, compared to traditional methods. The MSE expression is compared with the MSE of MUSIC with known mutual coupling parameters and to the Cramer-Rao bound (CRB) of any unbiased estimator that estimates the Angles-of-Arrival in the presence of mutual coupling. It is shown that the proposed method is asymptotically unbiased. In addition, it is also shown that the method attains CRB for large number of antennas with fixed coupling parameters and uncorrelated sources. For high SNR, the CRB is not necessarily attained, however, we study the gap between the derived MSE and the CRB.
Non-Bayesian Updating: a Theoretical Framework

This paper models an agent in a multi-period setting who does not update according to Bayes. Rule, and who is self-aware and anticipates her updating behavior when formulating plans. Choice-theoretic axiomatic foundations are provided. Then the model is specialized axiomatically to capture updating biases that re.ect excessive weight given to (i) prior be- liefs, or alternatively, (ii) the realized sample. Finally, the paper describes a counterpart of the exchangeable Bayesian model, where the agent tries to learn about parameters, and some answers are provided to the question, "what does a non-Bayesian updater learn? "
Detection of morphological and functional progression in initial glaucoma

Background To observe the prospective follow-up results of functional and morphological data in patients with early, moderate and suspected glaucoma. Methods Eyes (n=156; average mean defect (MD)=2.2 dB) were examined every 3 months for an average of 3.6 years. Progression was estimated using regression analysis of the indices rim area and Glaucoma Probability Score of the Heidelberg retinal tomograph, mean thickness of the fibre layer using laser polarimetry with corneal compensation, MDs of standard, Pulsar and frequency doubling technology perimetries, and the threshold noiseless trend (TNT) program for the standard and Pulsar perimetries. Results TNT showed more than twice the diagnostic capacity of other methods. The maximum diagnostic sensitivity was obtained with TNT Pulsar. This procedure indicated progression in 40% of cases after seven examinations, and presented the lowest number of cases of progression not confirmed in two consecutive examinations. Most of the progressions of initial glaucoma were diffuse, without changes in the lens or loss of visual acuity. Heidelberg retinal tomograph and laser polarimetry made few diagnoses of progression. The diagnostic agreement between different methods was low, but higher between functional than morphological procedures. Conclusion Functional indices, especially Pulsar, showed better detection of progression than morphological indices.
Previous prenatal loss as a predictor of perinatal depression and anxiety

Background Prenatal loss, the death of a fetus/child through miscarriage or stillbirth, is associated with significant depression and anxiety, particularly in a subsequent pregnancy. Aims This study examined the degree to which symptoms of depression and anxiety associated with a previous loss persisted following a subsequent successful pregnancy. Method Data were derived from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children cohort, a longitudinal cohort study in the west of England that has followed mothers from pregnancy into the postnatal period. A total of 13 133 mothers reported on the number and conditions of previous perinatal losses and provided self-report measures of depression and anxiety at 18 and 32 weeks' gestation and at 8 weeks and 8, 21 and 33 months postnatally. Controls for pregnancy outcome and obstetric and psychosocial factors were included. Results Generalised estimating equations indicated that the number of previous miscarriages/stillbirths significantly predicted symptoms of depression (β = 0.18, s.e. = 0.07, P<0.01) and anxiety (β = 0.14, s.e. = 0.05, P<0.01) in a subsequent pregnancy, independent of key psychosocial and obstetric factors. This association remained constant across the pre- and postnatal period, indicating that the impact of a previous prenatal loss did not diminish significantly following the birth of a healthy child. Conclusions Depression and anxiety associated with a previous prenatal loss shows a persisting pattern that continues after the birth of a subsequent (healthy) child. Interventions targeting women with previous prenatal loss may improve the health outcomes of women and their children.
Gravity in the Weightless Economy

This paper studies the international mobility of technology through the lens of multinational firms. We show that gravity applies to the activity of multinational firms, and the strength of gravity is greatest in technologically-complex, research and development intensive industries. To explain gravity in the weightless economy, we develop a model in which a multinational's production can be fragmented into intermediates that vary in the codifiability of their technology. Poorly codified technology requires face-to-face communication to transfer accurately, leading to production inefficiencies that can be avoided if an affiliate instead imports intermediates embodying this technology from its parent firm. Because intermediate input trade incurs shipping costs, affiliates' sales are subject to the force of gravity, and this force is strongest in technologically complex industries. An additional implication of this mechanism is that affiliates are more constrained in their ability to substitute local production for intermediate imports in technologically complex industries. We confirm these predictions and show that trade costs increase the average technological complexity of intra-firm trade. Our analysis offers a new perspective on the mobility of technology, which is a topic crucial to a wide range of fields in economics.
Expression and regulation of two RFamide peptide genes in the rat

6 List of original publications 7 List of abbreviations 8 1. Review of the literature 9 1.1 General aspects of neuropeptides 9 1.2 The RFamide family of neuropeptides 11 1.3 Biosynthesis and secretion of neuropeptides 13 1.4 Neuropeptide receptors 15 1.5 Functional properties of neuropeptides 17 1.5. 1 Energy and fluid homeostasis 17 1.5. 2 Neuropeptides and prolactin secretion 19 1.5. 3 Cardiovascular control 19 1.5. 4 Neuropeptides, adrenal hormones and the immune system 21 1.5. 5 Neuropeptides and ingestion 22 1.6 Role of neuropeptides in the development 23 1.7 Mechanisms of pain and involvement of neuropeptides 24 1.7. 1 Pain circuits 25 1.7. 2 Pain modulatory pathways 26 1.7. 3 Pain and RFamides 27 2. Aims of the study 29 3. Materials and methods 30 3.1 Ethics 30 3.2 Animals 30 3.3 Experimental models 30 3.3.1 Hyperosmolar stimulus 30 3.3.2 Methods for assessing pain 31 3.3.3 Injections 31 3.4 Cloning 31 3.5 Immunohistochemistry 32 3.6 In situ hybridisation 32 3.7 Measurements and statistics 33 3.7. 1 Measurements 33 3.7. 2 Quantification of gene expression 33
3D Numerical Simulation of Friction Stir Welding of Lap Joints Using an Arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian Formulation

The numerical simulation of Friction Stir Welding (FSW) is carried out using an Arbitrary Lagrangian or Eulerian (ALE) formulation. Its computational cost is reduced by appealing to the parallel version recently developed within the Forge software. The accuracy of the numerical model is increased by enhancing the state variables remapping algorithm and by introducing a better suited time integration scheme based on the cylindrical coordinates. The pin and shoulder threads are modelled in order to account for this crucial phenomenon on material heating. The developed model provides quite satisfactory temperature fields for the FSW of a butt joint of 6061 aluminium, as compared to experimental results. It allows simulating welding defects such as tunnels holes or flashes. The study then focuses on numerical simulations and experimental measurements of a lap joint of a 7175 aluminium sheet on a 2024 aluminium sheet for an aeronautical application.
Need fulfillment and stay–leave behavior

Need fulfillment has been found to be associated with numerous positive relationship outcomes, but its impact on stay–leave behavior is less clear. In the current study, we considered whether the fulfillment of different needs might differentially affect stay–leave behavior. We distinguished between needs that are personal in nature and those that are relational in nature. Central to our theoretical analysis is the interdependence-based contention that the fulfillment of different kinds of needs provides diagnostic information regarding a partner’s motives and intentions regarding a relationship. Using two-wave longitudinal data obtained from romantically involved participants, we tested the relative fit of two alternative models that specified the associations between the fulfillment of different kinds of needs, commitment, and stay–leave behavior. Consistent with an interdependence approach, we found that the influence of the fulfillment of personal needs on stay–leave behavior was mediated by commitment, whereas the fulfillment of relational needs directly influenced stay–leave behavior. Implications for relationship functioning are considered.