Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
New Insights into Unemployment Duration and Post Unemployment Earnings in Germany

Building on non-stationary search theory (Mortensen, 1977; Van den Berg, 1990), this article estimates the effects of UB on unemployment durations and future earnings using unique administrative data in Germany. We apply censored Box–Cox quantile regression. Our results imply that the length of entitlement shows only a weak effect on unemployment duration for entitlement lengths up to 12 months and no effect on post unemployment earnings. There are noticeable effects on exits from unemployment for entitlement lengths above 12 months. A high wage replacement rate for low-wage earners is associated with a longer duration of unemployment and higher post unemployment earnings.
Intubation learning curve: comparison between video and direct laryngoscopy by inexperienced students

Background: Direct laryngoscopy (DL) is considered the most common method of tracheal intubation. On the other hand, evidence shows the growing role of video laryngoscopy in danger airway administration. Objectives: Due to the importance of a proper training to accomplish an accurate and fast intubation by the student of anesthesia, this research was conducted to assess the effects of DL and video laryngoscopy (Glidescope VL) training on the success rate of tracheal intubation by low-skill students. Materials/Patients and styles: 50 undergraduate students of anesthesiology took part in this randomized control educational intervention. Having no considerable experience in intubation, they were selected and divided randomly into two equal groups (n = 25); video-laryngoscopy via GlideScope VL and direct laryngoscopy (DL) via a Macintosh blade were prepared by the same experienced anesthesiologist. All the participants practiced intubation six times on the same mannequin within a routine airway situation. The maximum acceptable time for each intubation was 3 minutes and three times of successful intubation was considered as an appropriate intubation skill. The required time for laryngoscopy and intubation at each stage, the grade of glottis view, the reasons for an unsuccessful intubation and the amount of successful intubations were recorded and compared between groups. Results: There was a clear variation between the 2 teams, in all the steps, based on the required time for laryngoscopy and intubation (p = 0.0001). Data analysis was performed by using repeated measures data which demonstrated that the necessary time for laryngoscopy and intubation during the study was clearly lower in the GlideScope VL team (p = .0001). In first five rounds of training, the glottis view in the DL group was significantly better than in the VL group (p < 0.05). Conclusion: Based on the result of today’ study, routine airway intubation by using GlideScope VL is significantly faster than direct laryngoscopy. It seems that further studies are needed to investigate the effect of the educational program on different laryngoscopy and intubation situations.
The relationship between gold price and exchange rate of Asean currencies (Ringgit Malaysia , Singapore Dollar, Thai Baht) against U.S. Dollar

The empirical study is to examine relationship between gold price and exchange rate of ASEAN currencies such as Malaysian Ringgit (MYR/USD), Singapore Dollar (SGD/USD), and Thai Baht (THB/USD) against U.S. dollar. After the end of the Bretton Woods System and Gold Standard, the floating exchange rate has been adopted by most of the countries. Many have argued that the adoption of the floating exchange rate has been a major cause for the instability of world gold price. Currently, the gold price is dominated in U.S. dollar in which the change in dollar will influence the gold price in other currencies. The Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) Unit Root Test, Johansen Cointegration Test, Granger Causality Test with Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) and Ordinary Least Square (OLS) Method are applied to examine the relationship between gold price and exchange rate of MYR/USD, SGD/USD and THB/USD on a monthly basis from January 1981 to December 2010. The result shows that long-term relationship exists between gold price and exchange rate of MYR/USD, SGD/USD and THB/USD. Nevertheless, there is no short-term relationship among them. Moreover, the result also indicates that gold price has positive relationship with MYR/USD but has inverse relationship with SGD/USD and THB/USD.
Image Generation and Editing with Variational Info Generative AdversarialNetworks

Recently there has been an enormous interest in generative models for images in deep learning. In pursuit of this, Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) and Variational Auto-Encoder (VAE) have surfaced as two most prominent and popular models. While VAEs tend to produce excellent reconstructions but blurry samples, GANs generate sharp but slightly distorted images. In this paper we propose a new model called Variational InfoGAN (ViGAN). Our aim is two fold: (i) To generated new images conditioned on visual descriptions, and (ii) modify the image, by fixing the latent representation of image and varying the visual description. We evaluate our model on Labeled Faces in the Wild (LFW), celebA and a modified version of MNIST datasets and demonstrate the ability of our model to generate new images as well as to modify a given image by changing attributes.
Analysis of intracorporeal knotting with invaginating suture versus endoloops in appendiceal stump closure

Introduction Laparoscopic appendectomy is a well-described surgical technique and has gained wide clinical acceptance. Laparoscopic appendectomy offers fewer wound infections, faster recovery and an earlier return to work in comparison to open surgery. However, concerns still exist regarding the appendiceal stump closure. Aim The aim of this study was to compare the overall incidence and specific intraoperative and postoperative complications after application of intracorporeal knotting with invaginating suture versus endoloops for stump closure in laparoscopic appendectomy. Material and methods One hundred fifty two consecutive patients according to the following inclusion criteria were included in the study: 1. Laparoscopic appendectomy was performed during the study period; 2. Acute phlegmonous or gangrenous appendicitis without perforation was diagnosed during operation. Exclusion criteria - patients with acute perforated appendicitis and local or diffuse peritonitis. Data was grouped according to the appendiceal stump closure technique, with either endoloops – 112 patients (73.7 percent) or intracorporeal knotting with invaginating suture – 40 patients (26.3 per cent). The primary outcome measure was the rate of intraabdominal surgical-site infection, defined as post-operative intra-abdominal abscess. Secondary outcome variables were intraoperative and postoperative complications, duration of operation, hospital stay. Results There were no significant differences between the two groups in overall intraoperative and postoperative complications rate and in hospital stay. The median duration of operation was significantly shorter when the endoloop was used. The use of intracorporeal knotting with invaginating suture instead of endoloop to close the appendiceal stump decreased the total cost of laparoscopic appendectomy. Conclusions According our study results, intracorporeal knotting with invaginating suture appendiceal stump closure technique is acceptable laparoscopic procedure, which intraoperative and postoperative results do not differ from endoloops technique. The total cost of this procedure is 80 € cheaper then endoloops technique.
A Set of Principles for Conducting Critical Research in Information Systems

While criteria or principles for conducting positivist and interpretive research have been widely discussed in the IS research literature, criteria or principles for critical research are lacking. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to propose a set of principles for the conduct of critical research in information systems. We examine the nature of the critical research perspective, clarify its significance, and review its major discourses, recognizing that its mission and methods cannot be captured by a fixed set of criteria once and for all, particularly as multiple approaches are still in the process of defining their identity. However, we suggest it is possible to formulate a set of principles capturing some of the commonalities of those approaches that have so far become most visible in the IS research literature. The usefulness of the principles is illustrated by analyzing three critical field studies in information systems. We hope that this paper will further reflection and debate on the important subject of grounding critical research methodology.
Risk Factors and Characterization of Plasmodium Vivax-Associated Admissions to Pediatric Intensive Care Units in the Brazilian Amazon

Background Plasmodium vivax is responsible for a significant proportion of malaria cases worldwide and is increasingly reported as a cause of severe disease. The objective of this study was to characterize severe vivax disease among children hospitalized in intensive care units (ICUs) in the Western Brazilian Amazon, and to identify risk factors associated with disease severity. Methods and Findings In this retrospective study, clinical records of 34 children, 0–14 years of age hospitalized in the 11 public pediatric and neonatal ICUs of the Manaus area, were reviewed. P. falciparum monoinfection or P. falciparum/P. vivax mixed infection was diagnosed by microscopy in 10 cases, while P. vivax monoinfection was confirmed in the remaining 24 cases. Two of the 24 patients with P. vivax monoinfection died. Respiratory distress, shock and severe anemia were the most frequent complications associated with P. vivax infection. Ninety-one children hospitalized with P. vivax monoinfections but not requiring ICU were consecutively recruited in a tertiary care hospital for infectious diseases to serve as a reference population (comparators). Male sex (p = 0.039), age less than five years (p = 0.028), parasitemia greater than 500/mm3 (p = 0.018), and the presence of any acute (p = 0.023) or chronic (p = 0.017) co-morbidity were independently associated with ICU admission. At least one of the WHO severity criteria for malaria (formerly validated for P. falciparum) was present in 23/24 (95.8%) of the patients admitted to the ICU and in 17/91 (18.7%) of controls, making these criteria a good predictor of ICU admission (p = 0.001). The only investigated criterion not associated with ICU admission was hyperbilirubinemia (p = 0.513)]. Conclusions Our study points to the importance of P. vivax-associated severe disease in children, causing 72.5% of the malaria admissions to pediatric ICUs. WHO severity criteria demonstrated good sensitivity in predicting severe P. vivax infection in this small case series.
How to textually describe images in medical academic publications

Figures in medicine publications are an essential source of information, but people with visual impairments cannot access them. The publishing workflow adopted by biomedical publishers does not include acceptable accessibility recommendations. A main solution to image accessibility is the inclusion of an alternative text. The article presents a proposal of supporting authors in the creation of appropriate textual alternatives by means of a decision tree, which would guide authors through the process of selecting where and how to include a text alternative, and a checklist of items for a comprehensive description of the figure content in the caption.
Radio, optical and infrared observations of CLASS B0128+437

We present new observations of the gravitational lens system CLASS B0128+437 made in the optical, infrared and radio regimes. Hubble Space Telescope observations detect only a very faint, extended object in the I band with no obvious emission from the lensed images visible; no detection at all is made in the V band. The lens system is detected with a much higher signal-to-noise ratio with the United Kingdom Infrared Telescope in the K band and, although resolved, the resolution is not sufficient to allow the lensed images and the lens galaxy to be separated. A careful astrometric calibration, however, suggests that the peak of the infrared emission corresponds to the two merging images A and B and therefore that the lensed images dominate at infrared wavelengths. The new radio data consist of high-resolution very long baseline interferometry radio images at three frequencies, 2.3, 5 and 8.4 GHz, made with the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) and the 100-m Effelsberg telescope. These reveal that the lensed source consists of three well-defined subcomponents that are embedded in a more extended jet. Due to the fact that the subcomponents have different spectral indices, it is possible to determine, unambiguously, which part of each image corresponds to the same source subcomponent. Our main finding is that one of the images, B, looks very different to the others, there being no obvious division into separate subcomponents and the image being apparently both broader and smoother. This is a consequence, we believe, of scatter-broadening in the interstellar medium of the lensing galaxy. The large number of multiply imaged source subcomponents also provides an abundance of modelling constraints and we have attempted to fit a singular isothermal ellipsoid + external shear model to the data, as well as utilizing the novel method of Evans and Witt. It proves difficult in both cases, however, to obtain a satisfactory fit, which strongly suggests the presence of substructure in the mass distribution of the lensing galaxy, perhaps of the kind that is predicted by cold dark matter theories of structure formation.
Using web interaction to monitor parkinson's disease progression through behavioural inferences on the web

Traditional Parkinson's Disease (PD) assessment techniques are inaccurate, sporadic and subjective. Although recent works have used wearable devices to try to overcome these issues, most interfere with people's routines, are uncomfortable to use and unsuitable for long-term assessments. In contrast, my approach aims to monitor PD in a longitudinal, naturalistic, non-disruptive and non-intrusive way. It uses smartphones to log social, environmental and web interaction data about people and their surroundings. This data is complemented with other web data sources and then processed to infer a set of metrics (a latent behavioural variable or LBV) of people's activities and habits. Then, LBVs' trends are quantified and mapped to the progression of the disease. During a first pilot study, I collected a dataset with ≈290 million records that has 34.5x more rows and scanned 4x more data sources than state-of-the-art sets. I used this data to identify six possible PD-related LBVs. This project aims to get a more accurate disease picture and to reduce the physical and psychological burden of traditional and other technology-based assessment methods. Ultimately, the work has the potential to save people's time and improve the efficiency and effectiveness of health services.
CD133+ neural stem cells in the ependyma of mammalian postnatal forebrain

The postnatal forebrain subventricular zone (SVZ) harbors stem cells that give rise to olfactory bulb interneurons throughout life. The identity of stem cells in the adult SVZ has been extensively debated. Although, ependymal cells were once suggested to have stem cell characteristics, subsequent studies have challenged the initial report and postulated that subependymal GFAP+ cells were the stem cells. Here, we report that, in the adult mouse forebrain, immunoreactivity for a neural stem cell marker, prominin-1/CD133, is exclusively localized to the ependyma, although not all ependymal cells are CD133+. Using transplantation and genetic lineage tracing approaches, we demonstrate that CD133+ ependymal cells continuously produce new neurons destined to olfactory bulb. Collectively, our data indicate that, compared with GFAP expressing adult neural stem cells, CD133+ ependymal cells represent an additional—perhaps more quiescent—stem cell population in the mammalian forebrain.
Mathematical Modeling and Optimization Methods for De Novo Protein Design

A major challenge in computational peptide and protein design is the systematic generation of novel peptides and proteins which are either compatible with existing target template structures or with arbitrarily postulated new three dimensional structural folds. This chapter presents an account of the recent advances in mathematical modeling and optimization methods for de novo protein design. It will be followed by a novel integrated framework based on global optimization and mixed-integer optimization for the computational design of peptides and proteins. Compstatin, a 13-residue cyclic peptide that binds to complement component C3 and inhibits complement activation, will be employed as the peptide target for testing the novel de novo protein design framework. Experimental functional analysis provides validation to the in silico predicted novel peptide sequences (e.g. Ac − I [CV Y QDWGAHRC]T − NH2) which are shown to exhibit 16-fold improved activity over the synthetic therapeutic peptide Compstatin. Further validation of the in silico sequence prediction framework is obtained by considering tryptophan in position 4 of Compstatin. It is shown that the mutation of valine to tryptophan is preferred (e.g. Ac − I [CV WQDWGAHRC]T − NH2) compared to the mutation from valine to tyrosine, in agreement with recent experimental results (Mallik et al., 2005) which demonstrated 45-fold higher inhibitory activity.
Dual Inhibition of Interleukin-23 and Interleukin-17 Offers Superior Efficacy in Mouse Models of Autoimmunity

Therapies targeting either interleukin (IL)-23 or IL-17 have shown promise in treating T helper 17 (Th17)–driven autoimmune diseases. Although IL-23 is a critical driver of IL-17, recognition of nonredundant and independent functions of IL-23 and IL-17 has prompted the notion that dual inhibition of both IL-23 and IL-17 could offer even greater efficacy for treating autoimmune diseases relative to targeting either cytokine alone. To test this hypothesis, we generated selective inhibitors of IL-23 and IL-17 and tested the effect of either treatment alone compared with their combination in vitro and in vivo. In vitro, using a novel culture system of murine Th17 cells and NIH/3T3 fibroblasts, we showed that inhibition of both IL-23 and IL-17 completely suppressed IL-23–dependent IL-22 production from Th17 cells and cooperatively blocked IL-17–dependent IL-6 secretion from the NIH/3T3 cells to levels below either inhibitor alone. In vivo, in the imiquimod induced skin inflammation model, and in the myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein peptide–induced experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis model, we demonstrated that dual inhibition of IL-17 and IL-23 was more efficacious in reducing disease than targeting either cytokine alone. Together, these data support the hypothesis that neutralization of both IL-23 and IL-17 may provide enhanced benefit against Th17 mediated autoimmunity and provide a basis for a therapeutic strategy aimed at dual targeting IL-23 and IL-17.
Assessment of Bacillus pumilus Isolated from Fresh Water Milieu for Bioflocculant Production

A bioflocculant produced by a Bacillus species was assessed with regards to its physiochemical properties and flocculating efficiency. Identification of the bacteria through 16S rDNA sequencing revealed it to have 99% similarity to Bacillus pumilus strain ZAP 028. The optimum culture conditions for bioflocculant production by the bacterial strain were inoculum size of 4% (v/v), maltose as a sole carbon source, multiple nitrogen source (yeast extract, urea and ammonium sulfate) and medium initial pH 7. The bioflocculant was thermostable with high flocculating rate for kaolin suspension at low dosage 0.1 mg/mL over a wide pH range (3–11). Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy analysis result of the purified bioflocculant showed that hydroxyl, amino and carboxyl groups were the main functional moieties in its molecular structure. The bioflocculant was composed of sugar (75.4%), protein (5.3%) and uronic acid (15.4%). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) showed a dendritic bioflocculant structure and the energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) analysis revealed that the purified bioflocculant had weight fractions of elements as follows: 22.71% of C, 11.56% of N, 41.60% of O, 0.51% of S and 7.98% of P. The bioflocculant produced had strong flocculating activity and high thermal stability, which affords its utilization in industrial processes.
Automating Software Traceability in Very Small Companies: A Case Study and Lessons Learne

There is a wide consensus on the benefits of software traceability. However, traceability techniques are still not commonly used in industry $typically only in larger companies and if mandated by standards such as the CMMI or ISO 15504. Success stories in small companies are quite rare. However, small companies represent a significant share of the IT industry and a better understanding of their needs is essential for the research community. This paper presents APIS, a traceability environment we developed and introduced in a very small software company. We discuss the traceability approach and report on key lessons learned. We have found in the project that comparably simple automation techniques are surprisingly effective. We believe that the lessons learned in this project are relevant for researchers and practitioners facing similar challenges
Estimating Desirable Cattle Traits Using Latent Class and Mixed Logit Models: A Choice Modeling Application to the U.S. Grass-Fed Beef Industry

This study examines preferences for cattle traits using mixed logit and latent class models. Choice experiment data from a 2013 mail survey of 1,052 U.S. grass-fed beef producers were used. Preliminary results indicate that producers prefer lower-priced, heavy, black, and easy-to-handle feeders backgrounded from their own cows.
Automatic Gain Control for ADC-Limited Communication

As the date rates and bandwidths of communication systems scale up, the cost and power consumption of high-precision (e.g., 8-12 bits) analog-to- digital converters (ADCs) become prohibitive. One possible approach to relieve this bottleneck is to redesign communication systems with the starting assumption that the receiver employs ADCs with drastically reduced precision (e.g., 1-4 bits). Encouraging results from information- theoretic analysis in idealized settings prompt a detailed investigation of receiver signal processing algorithms when ADC precision is reduced. In this paper, we investigate the problem of automatic gain control (AGC) for pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) signaling over the AWGN channel, with the goal being to align the ADC thresholds with the maximum likelihood (ML) decision regions. The approach is to apply a variable gain to the ADC input, ﬁxing the ADC thresholds, with the gain being determined by estimating the signal amplitude from the quantized ADC output. We consider a blind approach in which the ML estimate for the signal amplitude is obtained based on the quantized samples corresponding to an unknown symbol sequence. We obtain good performance, in terms of both channel capacity and uncoded bit error rate, at low to moderate SNR, but the performance can actually degrade as SNR increases due to the increased sensitivity of the ML estimator in this regime. However, we demonstrate that the addition of a random Gaussian dither, with power optimized to minimize the normalized mean squared error of the ML estimate, yields performance close to that of ideal AGC over the entire range of SNR of interest.