Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Testing Data-Driven Learning Algorithms for PoS Tagging of Icelandic

This paper gives the results of an experiment concerned with training three different taggers on tagged Icelandic text. The taggers fnTBL, TnT and MXPOST were trained on the corpus of the Icelandic Frequency Dictionary that contains over 500 thousand running words that have been tagged with morphological tags. The tagset contains over 600 tags. Different methods for tagger combination were also tested. The TnT tagger obtained best results for tagging or 90.36% accuracy. By applying different strategies for tagger combination a tagging accuracy of 93.65% was obtained.
Are you moved by your social network application?

This paper studies a Bluetooth-based mobile social network application deployed among a group of 28 participants collected during a computer communication conference. We compare the social graph containing friends, as defined by participants, to the contact graph, that is the temporal network created by opportunistic contacts as owners of devices move and come into communication range. Our contribution is twofold: first, we prove that most properties of nodes, links, and paths correlate among the social and contact graphs. Second, we describe how the structure of the social graph helps build forwarding paths in the contact graph, allowing two nodes to communicate over time using opportunistic contacts and intermediate nodes. Efficient paths can be built using only pairs of nodes that are socially close (i.e. connected through a few pairs of friends). Our results indicate that opportunistic forwarding complies with the requirement of social network application.
Alcohol and Self-Evaluation: Is a Social Cognition Approach Beneficial?

Based on psychosocial models, a view of alcohol use and addiction as resulting from a habitual maladaptive means of coping with stress has recently emerged. In this article, we present some critical experiments documenting the effects of alcohol on stress, self-awareness, and self-evaluation as exemplars of a social cognition approach to the study of alcohol and stress. We assert that a social cognition approach is a valuable theoretical framework and document the benefits for investigations of alcohol's impact on social, psychological, and health-related behaviors.
Sensing a live audience

Psychophysiological measurement has the potential to play an important role in audience research. Currently, such research is still in its infancy and it usually involves collecting data in the laboratory, where during each experimental session one individual watches a video recording of a performance. We extend the experimental paradigm by simultaneously measuring Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) of a group of participants during a live performance. GSR data were synchronized with video footage of performers and audience. In conjunction with questionnaire data, this enabled us to identify a strongly correlated main group of participants, describe the nature of their theatre experience and map out a minute-by-minute unfolding of the performance in terms of psycho-physiological engagement. The benefits of our approach are twofold. It provides a robust and accurate mechanism for assessing a performance. Moreover, our infrastructure can enable, in the future, real-time feedback from remote audiences for online performances.
The urotensin II receptor antagonist, urantide, protects against atherosclerosis in rats

The aim of this study was to explore the use of urantide as an antagonist of the urotensin II (UII) receptor, G protein-coupled receptor 14 (GPR14), to protect against atherosclerosis (AS) in rats. The AS rat model was induced by an intraperitoneal injection of vitamin D3 (VD3) into rats fed with a high-fat diet for four weeks. Urantide was then injected into the rats. Immunohistochemical staining, serum biochemical assay, reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and western blotting were used to investigate the expression of UII and its receptor GPR14 in the AS rat model. Four weeks after induction, pathological changes typical of AS were observed in the AS rat model. In the plaques of the aortic tunica intima and tunica media, expression of UII and GPR14 was observed. The protein and gene expression levels of UII and GPR14 in the model group were significantly increased compared with those in the normal group (P<0.01). Urantide ameliorated the pathological changes of AS in the rat model and reduced the gene and protein expression levels of UII and GPR14 (P<0.05 or P<0.01). UII is associated with AS and the UII receptor GPR14-specific antagonist, urantide, demonstrates the ability to protect against AS. Thus, this study provides new insight and experimental theories for the clinical application of urantide to treat AS.
Inflammatory bowel disease: Progress and current concepts of etiopathogenesis

Over the past few years, none of the numerous conditions that are grouped under the broad designation of ‘chronic inflammatory or autoimmune disorders’ has undergone as much scientific and clinical progress as the two main forms of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC). Progress has occurred in all major areas relevant to IBD pathogenesis, which include the external environment, genetics, microbial factors, and the immune system. This review presents an update on the specific major advances that have occurred in each of these four areas, briefly discusses the therapeutic implications of the observed progress, and points out the additional work that needs to be accomplished in the next few years to reach a full understanding of IBD etiopathogenesis.
Serum Lipids and Lipoproteins in Chinese Men and Women

Background— Because of rapid change in lifestyle risk factors, cardiovascular disease has become the leading cause of death in China. We sought to estimate the national levels of serum lipids and lipoproteins among the Chinese adult population. Methods and Results— We conducted a cross-sectional study in a nationally representative sample of 46 239 adults aged ≥20 years. Fasting serum total, high-density lipoprotein, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides were measured by standard methods. The age-standardized estimates of total, high-density lipoprotein, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides were 4.72 (95% confidence interval, 4.70–4.73), 1.30 (1.29–1.30), 2.68 (2.67–2.70), and 1.57 (1.55–1.58) mmol/L, respectively, in the Chinese adult population. In addition, 22.5% (21.8–23.3%) or 220.4 million (212.1–228.8) Chinese adults had borderline high total cholesterol (5.18–6.21 mmol/L), and 9.0% (8.5–9.5%) or 88.1 million (83.4–92.8) had high total cholesterol (≥6.22 mmol/L). The population estimates for borderline high (3.37–4.13 mmol/L), high (4.14–4.91 mmol/L), and very high (≥4.92 mmol/L) low-density lipoprotein cholesterol were 13.9% (13.3–14.5%) or 133.5 million (127.0–140.1), 3.5% (3.3–3.8%) or 33.8 million (31.2–36.5), and 3.0% (2.8–3.3%) or 29.0 million (26.3–31.8) persons, respectively. In addition, 22.3% (21.6–23.1%) or 214.9 million (207.0–222.8) persons had low high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (<1.04 mmol/L). The awareness, treatment, and control of borderline high or high total cholesterol were 11.0%, 5.1%, and 2.8%, respectively, in the Chinese adult population. Conclusions— Serum total and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels were high and increasing in the Chinese population. Without effective intervention, atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases may soar in the near future in China.
Survivin is Highly Expressed and Promotes Cell Survival in Malignant Peritoneal Mesothelioma

Background: The biology of malignant peritoneal mesothelioma (MPM) is largely unknown. In the present study, we assessed the expression of survivin and other members of the inhibitors of apoptosis proteins (IAP) family (IAP-1, IAP-2 and X-IAP) in a series of 32 MPM surgical specimens and investigated the effects of survivin knockdown in an established MPM cell line. Methods: Expression of different IAPs was measured by immunohistochemistry. MPM cells were transfected with a small-interfering RNA (siRNA) targeting survivin mRNA and analyzed for survivin expression, growth rate, and ability to undergo spontaneous and drug (cisplatin, doxorubicin)-induced apoptosis. Results: Survivin expression was observed in 29 (91%) surgical MPM specimens, whereas the positivity rate for the other IAPs ranged from 69% to 100%. Transfection of MPM cells with the survivin siRNA induced a marked inhibition of survivin protein expression, a time-dependent decline in cell growth and an enhanced rate of spontaneous and drug-induced apoptosis, with a concomitant increase in the catalytic activity of caspase-9. Conclusion: Our results show for the first time that survivin, as well as other IAPs, is largely expressed in clinical MPMs and suggest that strategies aimed at down-regulating survivin may provide a novel approach for the treatment of the malignancy.
Evaluation of surgical conditions during laparoscopic surgery in patients with moderate vs deep neuromuscular block.

BACKGROUND The routine use of neuromuscular blocking agents reduces the occurrence of unacceptable surgical conditions. In some surgeries, such as retroperitoneal laparoscopies, deep neuromuscular block (NMB) may further improve surgical conditions compared with moderate NMB. In this study, the effect of deep NMB on surgical conditions was assessed. METHODS Twenty-four patients undergoing elective laparoscopic surgery for prostatectomy or nephrectomy were randomized to receive moderate NMB (train-of-four 1-2) using the combination of atracurium/mivacurium, or deep NMB (post-tetanic count 1-2) using high-dose rocuronium. After surgery, NMB was antagonized with neostigmine (moderate NMB), or sugammadex (deep NMB). During all surgeries, one surgeon scored the quality of surgical conditions using a five-point surgical rating scale (SRS) ranging from 1 (extremely poor conditions) to 5 (optimal conditions). Video images were obtained and 12 anaesthetists rated a random selection of images. RESULTS Mean (standard deviation) SRS was 4.0 (0.4) during moderate and 4.7 (0.4) during deep NMB (P<0.001). Moderate block resulted in 18% of scores at the low end of the scale (Scores 1-3); deep block resulted in 99% of scores at the high end of the scale (Scores 4 and 5). Cardiorespiratory conditions were similar during and after surgery in both groups. Between anaesthetists and surgeon, there was poor agreement between scores of individual images (average κ statistic 0.05). CONCLUSIONS Application of the five-point SRS showed that deep NMB results in an improved quality of surgical conditions compared with moderate block in retroperitoneal laparoscopies, without compromise to the patients' peri- and postoperative cardiorespiratory conditions. Trial registration The study was registered at clinicaltrials.gov under number NCT01361149.
Revisiting Lexical Inferencing Strategies in L2 Reading: A Comparison of Successful and Less Successful EFL Inferencers.

There are many questions about how EFL learners infer word meanings from context and what distinguishes successful from less successful inferencers. This study explored the lexical inferencing strategies used by EFL learners and the characteristics which distinguish successful from less successful inferencers. To this end, 15 EFL students in an intact class were selected. The participants were supposed to think aloud while they were reading the passages and trying to infer the meanings of unknown words. Two passages were given to them and 20 words were highlighted as the target words. Afterwards, the number of used strategies and percentage of the participants’ correct inferencing were identified. Then, the participants were divided into two groups of successful and less successful inferencers. Mann-Whitney U tests were conducted to examine the two groups in terms of the strategies used by the participants. The results revealed no significant differences between the successful and less successful inferencers in terms of the number of strategies. However, they differed concerning the quality of each strategy type (i.e., the way they made use of lexical inferencing strategies). The results can be of significance for teachers and learners of English to consider the quality of inferential strategies more than the quantity.
Large anti-HER2/neu liposomes for potential targeted intraperitoneal therapy of micrometastatic cancer

Effective targeting and killing of intraperitoneally disseminated micrometastases remains a challenge. Objective/Methods: In this work, we evaluated the potential of antibody-labeled PEGylated large liposomes as vehicles for direct intraperitoneal (i.p.) drug delivery with the aim to enhance the tumor-to-normal organ ratio and to improve the bioexposure of cancer cells to the delivered therapeutics while shifting the toxicities toward the spleen. These targeted liposomes are designed to combine: (1) specific targeting to and internalization by cancer cells mediated by liposome-conjugated tumor-specific antibodies, (2) slow clearance from the peritoneal cavity, and (3) shift of normal organ toxicities from the liver to the spleen due to their relatively large size. Results: Conjugation of anti-HER2/neu antibodies to the surface of large (approximately 600 nm in diameter) PEGylated liposomes results in fast, specific binding of targeted liposomes to cancer cells in vitro, followed by considerable cellular internalization. In vivo, after i.p. administration, these liposomes exhibit fast, specific binding to i.p. cancerous tumors. Large liposomes are slowly cleared from the peritoneal cavity, and they exhibit increased uptake by the spleen relative to the liver, while targeted large liposomes demonstrate specific tumor uptake at early times. Although tissue and tumor uptake are greater for cationic liposomes, the tumor-to-liver and spleen-to-liver ratios are similar for both membrane compositions, suggesting a primary role for the liposome’s size, compared to the liposome’s surface charge. Conclusions: The findings of this study suggest that large targeted liposomes administered i.p. could be a potent drug-delivery strategy for locoregional therapy of i.p. micrometastatic tumors.
Mechanical and Biological Interactions of Implants with the Brain and Their Impact on Implant Design

Neural prostheses have already a long history and yet the cochlear implant remains the only success story about a longterm sensory function restoration. On the other hand, neural implants for deep brain stimulation are gaining acceptance for variety of disorders including Parkinsons disease and obsessive-compulsive disorder. It is anticipated that the progress in the field has been hampered by a combination of technological and biological factors, such as the limited understanding of the longterm behavior of implants, unreliability of devices, biocompatibility of the implants among others. While the field's understanding of the cell biology of interactions at the biotic-abiotic interface has improved, relatively little attention has been paid on the mechanical factors (stress, strain), and hence on the geometry that can modulate it. This focused review summarizes the recent progress in the understanding of the mechanisms of mechanical interaction between the implants and the brain. The review gives an overview of the factors by which the implants interact acutely and chronically with the tissue: blood-brain barrier (BBB) breach, vascular damage, micromotions, diffusion etc. We propose some design constraints to be considered in future studies. Aspects of the chronic cell-implant interaction will be discussed in view of the chronic local inflammation and the ways of modulating it.
The Metallicity of the Redshift 4.16 Quasar BR 2248–1242

We estimate the metallicity in the broad emission line region of the redshift z = 4.16 quasar BR 2248-1242 by comparing line ratios involving nitrogen to theoretical predictions. BR 2248-1242 has unusually narrow emission lines with large equivalent widths, thus providing a rare opportunity to measure several line-ratio abundance diagnostics. The combined diagnostics indicate a metallicity of ~2 times solar. This result suggests that an episode of vigorous star formation occurred near BR 2248-1242 prior to the observed z = 4.16 epoch. The time available for this enrichment episode is only ~1.5 Gyr at z = 4.16 (for H0= 65 km s-1 Mpc-1, Ωm = 0.3, and ΩΛ ≲ 1). This evidence for high metallicities and rapid star formation is consistent with the expected early-epoch evolution of dense galactic nuclei.
Cooperative strategies and capacity theorems for relay networks

Coding strategies that exploit node cooperation are developed for relay networks. Two basic schemes are studied: the relays decode-and-forward the source message to the destination, or they compress-and-forward their channel outputs to the destination. The decode-and-forward scheme is a variant of multihopping, but in addition to having the relays successively decode the message, the transmitters cooperate and each receiver uses several or all of its past channel output blocks to decode. For the compress-and-forward scheme, the relays take advantage of the statistical dependence between their channel outputs and the destination's channel output. The strategies are applied to wireless channels, and it is shown that decode-and-forward achieves the ergodic capacity with phase fading if phase information is available only locally, and if the relays are near the source node. The ergodic capacity coincides with the rate of a distributed antenna array with full cooperation even though the transmitting antennas are not colocated. The capacity results generalize broadly, including to multiantenna transmission with Rayleigh fading, single-bounce fading, certain quasi-static fading problems, cases where partial channel knowledge is available at the transmitters, and cases where local user cooperation is permitted. The results further extend to multisource and multidestination networks such as multiaccess and broadcast relay channels.
Diabetic Retinopathy in Patients with Diabetic Nephropathy: Development and Progression

The purpose of current study aims to investigate the development and progression of diabetic retinopathy (DR) in patients with diabetic nephropathy (DN) in a nationwide population-based cohort in Taiwan. Newly diagnosed DN patients and age- and sex-matched controls were identified from the Taiwanese Longitudinal Health Insurance Database from 2000 to 2010. We studied the effects of age, sex, hypertension, dyslipidemia, diabetic polyneuropathy (DPN), and medications on the development of nonproliferative DR (NPDR), proliferative DR (PDR), and diabetic macular edema (DME) in patients with DN. Cox proportional hazard regression analyses were used to estimate the adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) of the development of DR. Our results show that the adjusted HRs of NPDR and PDR were 5.01 (95% confidence interval (CI) = 4.68–5.37) and 9.7 (95% CI = 8.15–11.5), respectively, in patients with DN as compared with patients in the non-DN cohort. At 5-year follow-up, patients with DN showed an increased HR of NPDR progression to PDR (HR = 2.26, 95% CI = 1.68–3.03), and the major comorbidities were hypertension (HR = 1.23, 95% CI = 1.10–1.38 with NPDR; HR = 1.33, 95% CI = 1.02–1.72 with PDR) and DPN (HR = 2.03, 95% CI = 1.72–2.41 in NPDR; HR = 2.95, 95% CI = 2.16–4.03 in PDR). Dyslipidemia increased the HR of developing NPDR but not PDR or DME. Moreover, DN did not significantly affect DME development (HR = 1.47, 95% CI = 0.87–2.48) or progression (HR = 0.37, 95% CI = 0.11–1.20). We concluded that DN was an independent risk factor for DR development and progression; however, DN did not markedly affect DME development in this study, and the potential association between these disorders requires further investigation.
A new methodology for constraint-driven layout design of analog circuits

Layout design of analog integrated circuits suffers from a lack of automation due to the multitude of complex design constraints. Most of them are specified and considered manually by expert designers (expert knowledge). We present a new methodology that enables the automatic inclusion of expert knowledge in the form of layout constraints. The resulting comprehensive constraint-driven design approach allows defining and verifying the analog layout constraints by transforming them between the different design domains. In order to verify our methodology, we present a new constraint-driven placement optimization engine. It includes a deterministic decision maker. The decision maker is used to solve effectively the hard instances of the optimization problem that are resulting from complex correlations between the constraints. We have verified our methodology successfully by applying it to the placement of analog circuits in an industrial design environment.
Dark Plasmonic Breathing Modes in Silver Nanodisks

We map the complete plasmonic spectrum of silver nanodisks by electron energy loss spectroscopy and show that the mode which couples strongest to the electron beam has radial symmetry with no net dipole moment. Therefore, this mode does not couple to light and has escaped from observation in optical experiments. This radial breathing mode has the character of an extended two-dimensional surface plasmon with a wavenumber determined by the circular disk confinement. Its strong near fields can impact the hybridization in coupled plasmonic nanoparticles as well as couplings with nearby quantum emitters.
Lack of Superiority for Soluble ST2 over High Sensitive C-Reactive Protein in Predicting High Risk Coronary Artery Calcium Score in a Community Cohort

Purpose Soluble ST2 (sST2) is an emerging prognostic biomarker in patients with cardiovascular disease (CVD). A recent study showed that sST2 predicted incident hypertension. High sensitive C-reactive protein (hsCRP) has been a widely-used biomarker for risk-stratifying in CVD. We compared the abilities of sST2 and hsCRP to predict high risk coronary artery calcium score (CACS). Materials and Methods The CACS was assessed by cardiac computed tomography, and sST2 was measured in 456 subjects enrolled in the Mapo-gu community cohort. In accordance with the 2013 ACC/AHA guidelines, we defined the high risk CACS group as individuals with a CACS ≥300 Agatston units (AU). Results There were 99 (21.7%) subjects with a CACS ≥300 AU. There was a strong correlation between log sST2 and log hsCRP (r=0.128, p=0.006), and both log sST2 and log hsCRP showed significant associations with CACS (r=0.101, p=0.031 for sST2, r=0.101, p=0.032 for hsCRP). In net reclassification improvement (NRI) analysis, the NRI for hsCRP over sST2 was significant [continuous NRI 0.238, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.001–0.474, integrated discrimination index (IDI) 0.022, p=0.035], while the NRI for sST2 over hsCRP was not significant (continuous NRI 0.212, 95% CI -0.255–0.453, IDI 0.002, p=0.269). Conclusion sST2 does not improve net reclassification for predicting a high risk CACS. Using hsCRP provides superior discrimination and risk reclassification for coronary atherosclerosis, compared with sST2.