Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The full metallic double-pigtail ureteral stent: Review of the clinical outcome and current status

The full metallic double-J ureteral stent (MS) was introduced as a method for providing long-term drainage in malignant ureteral obstruction. Experimental evaluation of the MS revealed that its mechanical features allow efficient drainage in difficult cases, which could not be managed by the insertion of a standard polymeric double-J stent. Clinical experience with the MS showed controversial results. Careful patient selection results in efficient long-term management of malignant ureteral obstruction. The use of the MS should also be considered in selected benign cases. Major complications are uncommon and the minor complications should not hinder its use. Experience in pediatric patients is limited and warrants additional study. The cost-effectiveness of the MS seems to be appropriate for long-term treatment. Further investigation with comparative clinical trials would document the outcome more extensively and establish the indications as well as the selection criteria for the MS.
Fluctuations and stability of plasmas in the H-1NF heliac

The H-1NF heliac is a medium-sized heliac stellarator experiment with major radius R = 1 m, and average plasma minor radius a = 0.15–0.2 m. Its ‘flexible-heliac’ coil set permits precise variation in the value and shape of the rotational transform (ι) profile, with regions of both positive and negative shear. Operation at low fields ( B< 0. 2T ) with argon plasmas heated by helicon waves produces plasmas that have large ion Larmor radii (ρi/a ∼ 0.4) and show confinement transitions at low power like those in the edge of large devices, yielding fundamental measurements concerning electric fields and zonal flows. At a higher field (0.5 T), precise rotational transform scans with H–He plasmas heated by ICRF show resonant equilibrium and stability phenomena which depend on the value of the rotational transform at the radius of zero shear.
THE EFFECT OF RHEUMATOID FACTORS AND OF ANTIGLOBULINS ON IMMUNE HEMOLYSIS IN VIVO

Studies were undertaken in man and in the rat comparing the effects of rheumatoid factors and immune antiglobulins on red cells sensitized with incomplete antibodies. The interaction of immune antiglobulins with sensitized red cells produced (a) agglutination in vitro and (b) an accelerated sequestration of the sensitized cells in vivo. In contrast, rheumatoid macroglobulins, although capable of agglutinating Rh-sensitized red cells in vitro, did not modify their destruction in vivo. The failure of rheumatoid factors to function as antiglobulins in vivo appears to reflect their non-reactivity with sensitized cells in whole serum. It is suggested: (a) that the native (7S) gamma globulins of plasma competitively inhibit rheumatoid factors from reacting with fixed antibody in the blood stream; (b) that if these macroglobulins do indeed have pathogenetic activity, this may be limited to body fluids of low protein content.
The intention to give up smoking: disease versus social dimensions.

An expanded protection motivation model was used to investigate the intention to give up smoking. Because smoking has both physiological and social-psychological foundations, the model was expanded to include the social dimensions as well as the original disease dimensions as predictors of health behavior. The participants were 96 current smokers (35 male and 61 female) in Australia; 44 were young adults (age < 22 years), and 52 were adults (age > 34 years). Data were analyzed by multiple regression with hierarchical entry, first of disease dimensions, then of social dimensions. For both the young and the adult smokers, the disease dimensions contributed significantly to the results of the regression equations. Addition of the social dimensions yielded a significant F change only for young smokers and increased the amount of variance explained from 23% to 38%.
Inter- and Intra-Observer Concordance of Cyberpathology in Twenty-Five Cases

To study the feasibility of anatomical pathology consultation in cyberspace (cyberpathology) and to determine inter- and intra-observer concordance. Twenty-five consecutive cytology and histopathology cases are photographed using a digital camera placed against the eyepiece, and uploaded to an image-server in the Internet. Participants view the images, rate their confidence, and provide a diagnosis. They then view the original glass slides and provide a final diagnosis. The diagnoses are compared for inter- and intra-observer concordance. Participants are confident of their diagnoses based on viewing images on the Internet. The intra-observer concordance exceeds 95% individually, and 96% overall. Inter-observer concordance was 100% in a subset of cases. Cyberpathology as described is both available and affordable and is a valid alternative to slide-based anatomic pathology consultation.
Getting the Numbers Right: International Engineering Education in the United States, China, and India

This article challenges the commonly cited statistics for engineering graduates in the United States, China, and India. Our research shows that the gap between the number of engineers and related technology specialists produced in the United States versus those in India and China is smaller than previously reported, and the United States remains a leading source of high‐quality global engineering talent. Furthermore, engineering graduates in China and India face the prospect of substantial unemployment, despite high corporate demand for their services; this raises questions about the quality of recent graduates. The United States, however, also confronts problems in its continued ability to attract and retain top engineering talent from abroad because of visa uncertainties and growing economic opportunities in their countries of origin. We argue that the key issue in engineering education should be the quality of graduates, not just the quantity, since quality factors have the biggest impact on innovation and entrepreneurship.
A Qualitative Study of the Lived Experience of Single, Gay Adoptive Fathers

A QUALITATIVE STUDY OF THE LIVED EXPERIENCE OF SINGLE, GAY ADOPTIVE FATHERS A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University By John D. Matthews, Ph.D. Virginia Commonwealth University, 2004 Major Director: Elizabeth P. Cramer, Ph.D. This qualitative study expands the existing literature on fatherhood, single parents, and gay and lesbian adoption to include the unique experiences of single, gay men who became adoptive parents after “coming out,” or establishing a gay identity. To illustrate these unique and common experiences, individual ethnographic interviews were conducted with 16 fathers residing throughout the United States, as well as internationally. Specifically, this study explored the participants’ experiences through their reflections of the adoption process, and through their experiences after the family was established. The participants had experiences to those found in previous studies on gay and lesbian adoption and gay fathers, as well as possessed unique strengths, including tenacity and resiliency. Of particular importance are the strategies that each participant
The Simple Micro-Economics of Public-Private Partnerships

We build on the existing literature in public-private partnerships (PPP) to analyze the main incentive issues in PPPs and the shape of optimal contracts in those contexts. We present a basic model of procurement in a multitask environment in which a risk-averse firm chooses noncontractible efforts in cost reduction and quality improvement. We first consider the effect on incentives and risk transfer of bundling building and management stages into a single contract, allowing for different assumptions on feasible contracts and information available to the government. Then we extend the model in novel directions. We study the relationship between the operator and its financiers and the impact of private finance. We discuss the trade-off between incentive and flexibility in PPP agreements and the dynamics of PPPs, including cost overruns. We also consider how institutions, and specifically the risk of regulatory opportunism, affect contract design and incentives. The conclusion summarizes policy implications on the desirability of PPPs.
A Novel Estimator for the Rate of Information Transfer by Continuous Signals

The information transfer rate provides an objective and rigorous way to quantify how much information is being transmitted through a communications channel whose input and output consist of time-varying signals. However, current estimators of information content in continuous signals are typically based on assumptions about the system's linearity and signal statistics, or they require prohibitive amounts of data. Here we present a novel information rate estimator without these limitations that is also optimized for computational efficiency. We validate the method with a simulated Gaussian information channel and demonstrate its performance with two example applications. Information transfer between the input and output signals of a nonlinear system is analyzed using a sensory receptor neuron as the model system. Then, a climate data set is analyzed to demonstrate that the method can be applied to a system based on two outputs generated by interrelated random processes. These analyses also demonstrate that the new method offers consistent performance in situations where classical methods fail. In addition to these examples, the method is applicable to a wide range of continuous time series commonly observed in the natural sciences, economics and engineering.
Hidden Markov model for parameter estimation of a random walk in a Markov environment

We focus on the parametric estimation of the distribution of a Markov environment from the observation of a single trajectory of a one-dimensional nearest-neighbor path evolving in this random environment. In the ballistic case, as the length of the path increases, we prove consistency, asymptotic normality and efficiency of the maximum likelihood estimator. Our contribution is two-fold: we cast the problem into the one of parameter estimation in a hidden Markov model (HMM) and establish that the bivariate Markov chain underlying this HMM is positive Harris recurrent. We provide different examples of setups in which our results apply, in particular that of DNA unzipping model, and we give a simple synthetic experiment to illustrate those results.
Correlation of Serum Alp Activity with the Healing Process of Femoral Fractures in Rats Used Cissus Quadrangularis Extract as Therapy

The purpose of this study was to find out corellate value of serum ALP activity with the process of fracture healing in rat with therapy Cissus quadrangularis extract. This study used 18 male white rats (Rattus Norwegicus) age of 12 weeks. After 1 week of adaptation, all rats were treated femoral dexter osteotomy under aseptic conditions. Then, reposition of femoral dexter fractures with intramedullary pin fixation. The rats model were evenly randomly divided into three groups at 2nd weeks after surgery: group I treated with normal diet, group II with normal diet + CaCo3 supplement 150 mg/day, group III with normal diet + Cissus qudrangularis extract 500 mg / day per oral. Furthermore, the treatment was carried out for 4 weeks. At the end of the experiment (6th weeks after surgery), the blood samples were taken directly from canthus orbitalis dexter for alkaline phosphatase analysis. The data were analyzed by One Way Anova using SPSS for Windows program. The results indicated that ALP activity was significantly decreased ( p < 0,05). The more complete the fracture healing process, ALP activity the closer to normal value. The conclusion is the serum total ALP actvity have a positive correlation with the process of fracture healing and could be used to determine the progress of fracture healing of the surgically treated fractures.
Performance of modified asymmetric LTE Turbo codes with reliability-based hybrid ARQ

In mobile communication systems such as LTE, Hybrid-ARQ (HARQ) schemes based on Turbo codes have proved to be very effective in ensuring reliable transmission. However, several modified HARQ and Turbo decoding strategies have been recently developed to further improve performance. This paper proposes an enhanced coding scheme for LTE which couples a modified Turbo coding strategy with Reliability Based Hybrid ARQ (RB-HARQ). The modified LTE Turbo codes employs an asymmetric encoder and uses a different channel reliability estimate during iterative decoding along with the estimated noise variance. Moreover, an adaptive extrinsic scaling factor is incorporated in the decoder to enhance its performance and provide a stopping criterion. Simulation results show that the proposed modified asymmetric LTE Turbo codes provides an average gain of 1 dB in Eb/N0 over a conventional LTE Turbo code with RB-HARQ and also improves the throughput.
A fundamental scalability criterion for data aggregation in VANETs

The distribution of dynamic information from many sources to many destinations is a key challenge for VANET applications such as cooperative traffic information management or decentralized parking guidance systems. In order for these systems to remain scalable it has been proposed to aggregate the information within the network as it travels from the sources to the destinations. However, so far it has remained unclear by what amount the aggregation scheme needs to reduce the original data in order to be considered scalable. In this paper we prove formally that any suitable aggregation scheme must reduce the bandwidth at which information about an area at distance d is provided to the cars asymptotically faster than 1/d2. Furthermore, we constructively show that this bound is tight: for any arbitrary ε>0, there exists a scalable aggregation scheme that reduces information asymptotically like 1/d(2+ε).
Capparis spinosa L. aqueous extract evokes antidiabetic effect in streptozotocin-induced diabetic mice

Objective: As the aqueous extract of Capparis spinosa (CS) possess antidiabetic effect, he present study aims to reveal the possible mechanism of action of CS in diabetic mice. Materials and Methods: Both single and repeated oral administrations of aqueous extract of CS were performed in multi-low dose streptozotocin-induced (MLDS) diabetic mice. Euglycemic hyperinsulinemic clamp was used in association with the endogenous glucose production (perfusion rate of 3-3H glucose) to evaluate the effect of CS aqueous extract on insulin sensitivity. Results: Our study showed that aqueous extract of CS possess a potent hypoglycaemic activity in MLDS diabetic mice. Furthermore, the analysis perfusion of 3-3H glucose demonstrated the parallel decrease of basal endogenous glucose production (EGP) with the hypoglycaemic activity. EGP was lower in CS-Treated group when compared to the control group (p<0.001). The euglycemic hyperinsulinemic clamp technique demonstrated that CS treatment improves insulin sensitivity in peripheral tissues. Conclusion: We conclude that the antihyperglycemic effet CS is probably due to the inhibition of basal endogenous glucose production and the improvement of insulin sensitivity in MLDS diabetic mice.
Predictable 802.11 packet delivery from wireless channel measurements

RSSI is known to be a fickle indicator of whether a wireless link will work, for many reasons. This greatly complicates operation because it requires testing and adaptation to find the best rate, transmit power or other parameter that is tuned to boost performance. We show that, for the first time, wireless packet delivery can be accurately predicted for commodity 802.11 NICs from only the channel measurements that they provide. Our model uses 802.11n Channel State Information measurements as input to an OFDM receiver model we develop by using the concept of effective SNR. It is simple, easy to deploy, broadly useful, and accurate. It makes packet delivery predictions for 802.11a/g SISO rates and 802.11n MIMO rates, plus choices of transmit power and antennas. We report testbed experiments that show narrow transition regions (<2 dB for most links) similar to the near-ideal case of narrowband, frequency-flat channels. Unlike RSSI, this lets us predict the highest rate that will work for a link, trim transmit power, and more. We use trace-driven simulation to show that our rate prediction is as good as the best rate adaptation algorithms for 802.11a/g, even over dynamic channels, and extends this good performance to 802.11n.
Preliminary Characterization of the Transcriptional Response of the Porcine Intestinal Cell Line IPEC-J2 to Enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli, Escherichia coli, and E. coli Lipopolysaccharide

IPEC-J2, a promising in vitro model system, is not well characterized especially on the transcriptional level, in contrast to human counterparts. The aim of this study was to characterize the gene expression in IPEC-J2 cells when coincubated with enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC), nonpathogenic E. coli, and E. coli endotoxin. Apical infection of polarized IPEC-J2 monolayers caused a time-dependent decrease in transepithelial electrical resistance (TEER). Microarray analysis showed up-regulation of interleukins when IPEC-J2 were cocultured with E. coli strains this has so far never been measured in this cell line. Highest IL8 expression was found with the ETEC strain possessing the F4 fimbrium, suggesting IPEC-J2 cells to be F4 receptor positive, confirmed in a brush border membrane adhesion assay. It is concluded that the innate immune responses to pathogens and LPS makes the IPEC-J2 cell line a suitable model for research on intestinal host pathogen interaction.
The Parent-Child Relationship when Parents’Contact with their Children is Supervised

This study focuses on the personal experiences and perceptions of non-custodial parents’ relationship with their children where the only contact is supervised. It explores the subjective experience, meanings and processes that non-custodial parents construct when faced with these circumstances. The data was collected through semi-structured interviews with nine supervised non-custodial parents in Malta. Using a methodological approach based on constructivist grounded theory, four main categories have emerged from these parents’ discourse which capture how and where perceptions of the non-custodial parent have changed. These relate to external influences, on being a parent, the parent and child relationship and concerns about future relating. The key issues that emerge show that supervised parents are very sensitive to external influences around them. These are often embodied in the presence of the supervisor who thus becomes part of a triadic relationship, with trust being a key determinant of how this relationship develops. Indirectly, supervised parents provide a profound definition of what being a parent is all about for them by also describing those factors which they consider important for a relationship with their child to develop. From this explorative study, a number of potential areas for related research emerge. Finally, and at a practical level, the study also serves to highlight those areas where improvement in supervision services is recommended for a better relationship between the parent and the child to be fostered.
Early Blindness Results in Developmental Plasticity for Auditory Motion Processing within Auditory and Occipital Cortex

Early blind subjects exhibit superior abilities for processing auditory motion, which are accompanied by enhanced BOLD responses to auditory motion within hMT+ and reduced responses within right planum temporale (rPT). Here, by comparing BOLD responses to auditory motion in hMT+ and rPT within sighted controls, early blind, late blind, and sight-recovery individuals, we were able to separately examine the effects of developmental and adult visual deprivation on cortical plasticity within these two areas. We find that both the enhanced auditory motion responses in hMT+ and the reduced functionality in rPT are driven by the absence of visual experience early in life; neither loss nor recovery of vision later in life had a discernable influence on plasticity within these areas. Cortical plasticity as a result of blindness has generally be presumed to be mediated by competition across modalities within a given cortical region. The reduced functionality within rPT as a result of early visual loss implicates an additional mechanism for cross modal plasticity as a result of early blindness—competition across different cortical areas for functional role.
Individual reactions to stress predict performance during a critical aviation incident

Background: Understanding the influence of stress on human performance is of theoretical and practical importance. An individual's reaction to stress predicts their subsequent performance; with a “challenge” response to stress leading to better performance than a “threat” response. However, this contention has not been tested in truly stressful environments with highly skilled individuals. Furthermore, the effect of challenge and threat responses on attentional control during visuomotor tasks is poorly understood. Design: Thus, this study aimed to examine individual reactions to stress and their influence on attentional control, among a cohort of commercial pilots performing a stressful flight assessment. Methods: Sixteen pilots performed an “engine failure on take-off” scenario, in a high-fidelity flight simulator. Reactions to stress were indexed via self-report; performance was assessed subjectively (flight instructor assessment) and objectively (simulator metrics); gaze behavior data were captured using a mobile eye tracker, and measures of attentional control were subsequently calculated (search rate, stimulus driven attention, and entropy). Results: Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that a threat response was associated with poorer performance and disrupted attentional control. Conclusion: The findings add to previous research showing that individual reactions to stress influence performance and shed light on the processes through which stress influences performance.
Exploiting uncertainty in regression forests for accurate camera relocalization

Recent advances in camera relocalization use predictions from a regression forest to guide the camera pose optimization procedure. In these methods, each tree associates one pixel with a point in the scene's 3D world coordinate frame. In previous work, these predictions were point estimates and the subsequent camera pose optimization implicitly assumed an isotropic distribution of these estimates. In this paper, we train a regression forest to predict mixtures of anisotropic 3D Gaussians and show how the predicted uncertainties can be taken into account for continuous pose optimization. Experiments show that our proposed method is able to relocalize up to 40% more frames than the state of the art.