Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Recycle and reuse process of e-waste (printed circuit boards) in Brazil: a case study

This paper aims to describe all process involving recycling and reuse of Printed Circuit Board (PCB) in Brazil, as well as, check if exists a technology to this. This research was conducted by a case study in a manufacturer company of PCB with semi-structured interviews. The findings suggest that company needs to develop a reverse flow focusing on proper disposal of e-waste in the end of life. In Brazil, the recycling and reuse process of e-waste are decentralized, so, becomes complex to develop a network cooperation on its entirety, mainly the metal recovery process of e-waste which were made by foreign companies. Therefore, Brazil needs to invest in new technologies to recycle and reuse the national e-waste, and also facilitate and promote the solid waste management, allowing recovery of precious metals and reduce the waste disposal in the environment.
Clinical and Functional Anatomy of the Urethral Sphincter

Continence and micturition involve urethral closure. Especially, insufficient strength of the pelvic floor muscles including the urethral sphincter muscles causes urinary incontinence (UI). Thus, it is most important to understand the main mechanism causing UI and the relationship of UI with the urethral sphincter. Functionally and anatomically, the urethral sphincter is made up of the internal and the external sphincter. We highlight the basic and clinical anatomy of the internal and the external sphincter and their clinical meaning. Understanding these relationships may provide a novel view in identifying the main mechanism causing UI and surgical techniques for UI.
A Comparison of the Effects of Epidural Analgesia Versus Traditional Pain Management on Outcomes After Gastric Cancer Resection: A Population-Based Study

Background and Objectives Epidural analgesia may increase survival after cancer surgery by reducing recurrence. This population-based study compared survival and treated recurrence after gastric cancer resection between patients receiving epidurals and those who did not. Methods We used the linked federal Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program/Medicare database to identify patients aged 66 years or older with nonmetastatic gastric carcinoma diagnosed 1996 to 2005 who underwent resection. Exclusions included diagnosis at autopsy, no Medicare Part B, familial cancer syndrome, emergency surgery, and laparoscopic procedures. Epidurals were identified by Current Procedural Terminology codes. Treated recurrence was defined as chemotherapy greater than or equal to 16 months and/or radiation greater than or equal to 12 months after surgery. Recurrence was compared by conditional logistic regression. Survival was compared via marginal Cox proportional hazards regression model. Results We identified 2745 patients, 766 of whom had epidural codes. Patients receiving epidurals were more likely to have regional disease, be white, and live in areas with relatively high socioeconomic status. Overall treated recurrence was 25.6% (27.5% epidural and 24.9% nonepidural). In the adjusted logistic regression, there was no difference in recurrence (odds ratio, 1.40; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.96–2.05). Median survival did not differ: 28.1 months (95% CI, 24.8–32.3) in the epidural versus 27.4 months (95% CI, 24.8–30.0) in the nonepidural groups. The marginal Cox models showed no association between epidural use and mortality (adjusted hazard ratio, 0.93; 95% CI, 0.84–1.03). Conclusions There was no difference between groups regarding treated recurrence or survival. Whether this is true or simply a result of insufficient power is unclear. Prospective studies are needed to provide stronger evidence.
A Review of Real-Time Strategy Game AI

This literature review covers AI techniques used for real-time strategy video games, focusing specifically on StarCraft. It finds that the main areas of current academic research are in tactical and strategic decision-making, plan recognition, and learning, and it outlines the research contributions in each of these areas. The paper then contrasts the use of game AI in academia and industry, finding the academic research heavily focused on creating game-winning agents, while the indus- try aims to maximise player enjoyment. It finds the industry adoption of academic research is low because it is either in- applicable or too time-consuming and risky to implement in a new game, which highlights an area for potential investi- gation: bridging the gap between academia and industry. Fi- nally, the areas of spatial reasoning, multi-scale AI, and co- operation are found to require future work, and standardised evaluation methods are proposed to produce comparable re- sults between studies.
Decline in the Recovery from Synaptic Depression in Heavier Aplysia Results from Decreased Serotonin-Induced Novel PKC Activation

The defensive withdrawal reflexes of Aplysia are important behaviors for protecting the animal from predation. Habituation and dishabituation allow for experience-dependent tuning of these reflexes and the mechanisms underlying these forms of behavioral plasticity involve changes in transmitter release from the sensory to motor neuron synapses through homosynaptic depression and the serotonin-mediated recovery from depression, respectively. Interestingly, dishabituation is reduced in older animals with no corresponding change in habituation. Here we show that the cultured sensory neurons of heavier animals (greater than 120g) that form synaptic connections with motor neurons have both reduced recovery from depression and reduced novel PKC Apl II activation with 5HT. The decrease in the recovery from depression correlated better with the size of the animal than the age of the animal. Much of this change in PKC activation and synaptic facilitation following depression can be rescued by direct activation of PKC Apl II with phorbol dibutyrate, suggesting a change in the signal transduction pathway upstream of PKC Apl II activation in the sensory neurons of larger animals.
Most “babies” are “little” and most “problems” are “huge”: Compositional Entailment in Adjective-Nouns

We examine adjective-noun (AN) composition in the task of recognizing textual entailment (RTE). We analyze behavior of ANs in large corpora and show that, despite conventional wisdom, adjectives do not always restrict the denotation of the nouns they modify. We use natural logic to characterize the variety of entailment relations that can result from AN composition. Predicting these relations depends on context and on common-sense knowledge, making AN composition especially challenging for current RTE systems. We demonstrate the inability of current state-of-the-art systems to handle AN composition in a simpliﬁed RTE task which involves the insertion of only a single word.
Nursing privilege: A concept analysis

Abstract Aim The study aimed to provide a comprehensive concept analysis of nursing privileges by elucidating its meaning and implications within the healthcare context. Design A concept analysis paper. Methods A comprehensive literature review was conducted from nursing and healthcare databases, professional nursing organizations, and regulatory bodies. Documents reviewed include research studies, policy documents and professional guidelines. The study employed Walker and Avant's eight‐step method of concept analysis. This involved identifying the uses of the concept, its underlying attributes and referents, and constructing model, borderline, related and contrary cases. The antecedents, consequences and empirical referents of nursing privileges were also determined. Results The analysis uncovered vital attributes defining nursing privileges, encompassing professional authority, autonomy, access to resources, information, influence, decision‐making power, respect and recognition. Additionally, antecedents and consequences of nursing privilege were identified, spanning development and resource access, as well as professional satisfaction and enhanced patient care. Patient or Public Contribution No patient or public contribution.
Cytologic subtyping of lung adenocarcinoma by using the proposed International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer/American Thoracic Society/European Respiratory Society (IASLC/ATS/ERS) adenocarcinoma classification

The significance of histologic subtyping of surgically resected lung adenocarcinoma (ADC) was recently proposed by the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer/American Thoracic Society/European Respiratory Society (IASLC/ATS/ERS) classification. Approximately 70% of lung cancer patients present with advanced disease, and small biopsies or cytology specimens are frequently the only available diagnostic material. It is uncertain whether proposed morphologic subtyping of ADC can be applied to small specimens. The objective of this study was to assess the applicability of morphologic subtyping of ADC on cytologic specimens.
Emergence of Filamentary Structure in Cosmological Gravitational Clustering

The morphological nature of structures that form under gravitational instability has been of central interest to cosmology for over two decades. A remarkable feature of large-scale structures in the universe is that they occupy a relatively small fraction of the volume and yet show coherence on scales comparable to the survey size. With the aid of a useful synthesis of percolation analysis and shape statistics we explore the evolution of morphology of isolated density clumps in real space, and that of the cluster distribution as a whole, in scale-invariant cosmological models of gravitational instability. Our results, based on an exhaustive statistical analysis, indicate that at finite density thresholds one-dimensional filaments are more abundant than two-dimensional sheets (pancakes) at most epochs and for all spectra, although the first singularities could be pancake-like. Both filamentarity and pancakeness of structures grow with time (in scale-free models this is equivalent to an increase in resolution), leading to the development of a long coherence length scale in simulations.
Boosting Automatic Commit Classification Into Maintenance Activities By Utilizing Source Code Changes

Background: Understanding maintenance activities performed in a source code repository could help practitioners reduce uncertainty and improve cost-effectiveness by planning ahead and pre-allocating resources towards source code maintenance. The research community uses 3 main classification categories for maintenance activities: Corrective: fault fixing; Perfective: system improvements; Adaptive: new feature introduction. Previous work in this area has mostly concentrated on evaluating commit classification (into maintenance activities) models in the scope of a single software project. Aims: In this work we seek to design a commit classification model capable of providing high accuracy and Kappa across different projects. In addition, we wish to compare the accuracy and kappa characteristics of classification models that utilize word frequency analysis, source code changes, and combination thereof. Method: We suggest a novel method for automatically classifying commits into maintenance activities by utilizing source code changes (e.g, statement added, method removed, etc.). The results we report are based on studying 11 popular open source projects from various professional domains from which we had manually classified 1151 commits, over 100 from each of the studied projects. Our models were trained using 85% of the dataset, while the remaining 15% were used as a test set. Results: Our method shows a promising accuracy of 76% and Cohen's kappa of 63% (considered "Good" in this context) for the test dataset, an improvement of over 20 percentage points, and a relative boost of ~40% in the context of cross-project classification. Conclusions: We show that by using source code changes in combination with commit message word frequency analysis we are able to considerably boost classification quality in a project agnostic manner.
Minimum cost routing and wavelength allocation using a genetic-algorithm/heuristic hybrid approach

This paper describes early results in minimum cost routing and wavelength allocation of multi-wavelength all-optical transport networks using a genetic-algorithm (GA)/heuristic hybrid approach. The results were obtained using a tool for optical network optimisation, modelling and design (NOMaD) developed by the author. NOMaD is used as part of the author's research into the application of GA/heuristic hybrid optimisation techniques to network design, as well as in several research projects at Essex, including two under the European Commission funded research programme in Advanced Communications Technologies and Services (ACTS): WOTAN (Wavelength-agile Optical Transport and Access Network) and OPEN (Optical Pan-European Network); and the Fujitsu Telecommunications Europe Ltd. “Future Broadband Networks” project.
Supergravity and Fermions

We study the fermionic extension of the E10/K(E10) coset model and its relation to eleven-dimensional supergravity. Finite-dimensional spinor representations of the compact subgroup K(E10) of E10(R) are studied and the supergravity equations are rewritten using the resulting algebraic variables. The canonical bosonic and fermionic constraints are also analysed in this way, and the compatibility of supersymmetry with local K(E10) is investigated. We find that all structures involving A9 levels l = 0, 1 and 2 nicely agree with expectations, and provide many non-trivial consistency checks of the existence of a supersymmetric extension of the E10/K(E10) coset model, as well as a new derivation of the ‘bosonic dictionary’ between supergravity and coset variables. However, there are also definite discrepancies in some terms involving level l = 3, which suggest the need for an extension of the model to infinite-dimensional faithful representations of the fermionic degrees of freedom.
Is There a Common Linkage Among Reading Comprehension, Visual Attention, and Magnocellular Processing?

The authors examined the relationships between reading comprehension, visual attention, and magnocellular processing in 42 Grade 7 students. The goal was to quantify the sensitivity of visual attention and magnocellular visual processing as concomitants of poor reading comprehension in the absence of either vision therapy or cognitive intervention. Nineteen good readers (M = grade equivalent of 11.2) and 23 poor readers (M = grade equivalent of 3.5) were identified. Participants were tested for visual attention skills (Cognitive Assessment System: CAS) and magnocellular integrity (Coherent Motion Threshold: CM). Individual and combined correlations of dependent variables with reading were significant at the 0.01 level. When combined, the two tests (CAS + CM) accounted for 61% of the variance in reading comprehension. Logistic regression analysis measured sensitivity of the two diagnostic tests. Attention tests correctly classified 95.7% of poor readers, and coherent motion correctly classified 78.3% of poor readers. When the data were combined, 91.3% of poor readers were correctly classified. The research reinforces the notion that a common linkage exists between reading comprehension, visual attention, and magnocellular processing. Diagnostic test batteries for students who have been identified as reading disabled should include magnocellular and visual attention tests. Procedures to diagnose and ameliorate these disabilities are discussed.
The effects of perinatal tebuconazole exposure on adult neurological, immunological, and reproductive function in rats.

Studies are under way to address concerns of potential persistent immunotoxic, reproductive, and neurotoxic effects of perinatal exposure to several pesticides. Tebuconazole, a triazole fungicide, was evaluated as part of this project. Sprague-Dawley dams were administered tebuconazole (0, 6, 20, or 60 mg/kg) by oral gavage daily from gestational day 14 to postnatal day (PND)7; the pups were then dosed daily at the same levels from PND7-42. Separate groups of rats were used for testing of immunological parameters, neurobehavioral testing using a screening battery of functional tests, and cognitive evaluations. Other groups of rats were evaluated for reproductive development and function, while yet others were sacrificed at the end of the dosing period for histological analyses of major organs systems, including neuropathological assessments. Pup viability and body weight were decreased in the highest dose group. There were no differences in the fertility indices in the exposed rats mated as adults. In the sheep RBC-immunized high-dose rats, spleen weights and cellularity were increased, and the ratio of cell types was altered compared to controls. There were, however, no biologically significant changes in the immune function of these rats. At necropsy on PND46 or 152, kidney, liver, and spleen weights were altered by tebuconazole treatment, but a dose-response relationship was not clear for most organs; only decreased kidney and increased liver weights were consistent in both sexes. Histological analyses were generally unremarkable outside of the brain. One month after the end of dosing, acquisition of learning the platform location in a water tank (i.e., Morris water maze) was impaired in the high-dose group; there were no differences in neuromuscular ability, motor activity, or swim speed to account for this finding. Furthermore, there was no effect on recall of the position during a free-swim trial. Neuropathological evaluations revealed pyknotic cells across hippocampal cell fields in animals of all tebuconazole treatment groups, with the highest incidence in the 20 and 60 mg/kg/day dose groups, coincident with cell loss within pyramidal cell layer of CA3-4 cell fields of the hippocampus and layer V of the neocortex. Thus, perinatal exposure to tebuconazole produced neurobehavioral deficits and neuropathology in rats, but did not alter immunological or reproductive function.
BeamSwitch: System solution for energy-efficient directional communication on mobile devices

Directional communication has the potential to improve the energy efficiency of wireless communication without sacrificing its quality. We present a system solution, BeamSwitch, for directional communication on mobile devices. BeamSwitch employs a special multi-antenna system that consists of multiple identical directional antennas, or beams, a single regular omni-directional antenna, and a single RF chain. It uses one of the directional beams for transmitting data frames and receiving their acknowledgements and the regular antenna for all other transceiving. BeamSwitch tracks the signal strength of incoming frames and selects the right beam for data transmission. We report an extensive evaluation of BeamSwitch including both measurements with a prototype with three beams and Qualnet-based simulation. Our evaluation shows that BeamSwitch with three 6 dBi directional antennas can improve the energy efficiency of a commercial 802.11 network interface card (NIC) by up to 20% and simultaneously provide better or close communication quality. BeamSwitch achieves this under diverse radio propagation environments and extreme mobility (up to 360° per second direction change).
Dipterinyl Calcium Pentahydrate Inhibits Intracellular Mycobacterial Growth in Human Monocytes via the C-C Chemokine MIP-1β and Nitric Oxide

ABSTRACT Tuberculosis remains one of the top three leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide, complicated by the emergence of drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis strains and high rates of HIV coinfection. It is important to develop new antimycobacterial drugs and immunomodulatory therapeutics and compounds that enhance antituberculous immunity. Dipterinyl calcium pentahydrate (DCP), a calcium-complexed pterin compound, has previously been shown to inhibit human breast cancer cells and hepatitis B virus (HBV). DCP inhibitory effects were attributed to induction of apoptosis and/or increased production of interleukin 12 (IL-12) and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF). In this study, we tested the ability of DCP to mediate inhibition of intracellular mycobacteria within human monocytes. DCP treatment of infected monocytes resulted in a significant reduction in viability of intracellular but not extracellular Mycobacterium bovis BCG. The antimicrobial activity of DCP was comparable to that of pyrazinamide (PZA), one of the first-line antituberculosis drugs currently used. DCP potentiated monocyte antimycobacterial activity by induction of the cysteine-cysteine (C-C) chemokine macrophage inflammatory protein 1β (MIP-1β) and inducible nitric oxide synthase 2. Addition of human anti-MIP-1β neutralizing antibody or a specific inhibitor of the l-arginase-nitric oxide pathway (N G-monomethyl l-arginine [l-NMMA] monoacetate) reversed the inhibitory effects of DCP on intracellular mycobacterial growth. These findings indicate that DCP induced mycobacterial killing via MIP-1β- and nitric oxide-dependent effects. Hence, DCP acts as an immunoregulatory compound enhancing the antimycobacterial activity of human monocytes.
Nodal/activin signaling promotes male germ cell fate and suppresses female programming in somatic cells

Testicular development in the mouse is triggered in somatic cells by the function of Sry followed by the activation of fibroblast growth factor 9 (FGF9), which regulates testicular differentiation in both somatic and germ cells. However, the mechanism is unknown. We show here that the nodal/activin signaling pathway is activated in both male germ cells and somatic cells. Disruption of nodal/activin signaling drives male germ cells into meiosis and causes ectopic initiation of female-specific genes in somatic cells. Furthermore, we prove that nodal/activin-A works directly on male germ cells to induce the male-specific gene Nanos2 independently of FGF9. We conclude that nodal/activin signaling is required for testicular development and propose a model in which nodal/activin-A acts downstream of fibroblast growth factor signaling to promote male germ cell fate and protect somatic cells from initiating female differentiation.
Genetic diversity of ST5 Staphylococcus aureus isolated from swine veterinarians in the USA

The term livestock associated methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (LA-MRSA) has been synonymous with sequence type ST398 since the identification of this lineage of MRSA in Holland. Subsequent research indicates broader genetic diversity of MRSA strains in swine, with MRSA variants belonging to MLST sequence type ST9, and ST5 also being reported in studies of swine in various countries. Unlike ST398, considered a novel sequence type, the ST5 lineage has long been associated with human MRSA infections, and particularly the USA100 group (defined by sma1 PFGE). We investigated the prevalence of S. aureus, and associated health events, in swine veterinarians in US and evaluate the genetic diversity of isolates using spa typing, MLST and PFGE. The ST398 and ST5 were the most prevalent spa types and 60 (18%) of 325 MSSA isolates and 6 (19%) of 32 MRSA isolates detected were spa type t002 (ST5). Sma1 PFGE analysis of 23 isolates indicated that t002 isolates from the swine veterinarians were not clonal. Given previous reports of t002-ST5 MRSA in North American pigs, our findings of diverse ST5 spa types as well as genetic diversity within spa type t002, suggest that S. aureus variants of the ST5 lineage may be livestock associated. These organisms need to be more broadly characterized to understand their potential implications for human health.