Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
School Leaders Sense-making and Use of Equity-related Data to Disrupt Patterns of Inequality

This qualitative phenomenological study explored how school leaders in seven urban high schools in California make sense of and use equity-related data to create more equitable educational opportunity for their students. Equity-related data here refers to school data (accountability data included) that demonstrate unequal access to educational opportunity and disparity of outcomes for subgroups of students. Data has been part of the U.S. educational system increasingly since 1965. The amount of data available has accelerated even more in the last decade in the wake of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. Much of that data has been collected and used by educators for a broader category of assessment and measurement of students and school performance. Recently, however, there is an increasing interest in and research about how school leaders can use data for equity purposes.Utilizing a qualitative phenomenological approach, this research examined how 19 school leaders, at seven urban high schools in the state of California, make sense of and use equity-related data to disrupt patterns of inequality. Through interviews, observation, shadowing, and collection of documents and paper artifacts, this studycollected data that demonstrate how these school leaders were making sense of data at their schools and using such to create more equitable opportunities for students. This study suggests that school leaders' interpretation and use of equity-related data could lead to the transformation and equalization of educational opportunities for all students. However, school leaders do not make sense of data in a void. They come to data with some set of mindscapes or ideological frame of reference that has been shaped by social background, beliefs, values, education, etc. It is important to understand the mindset with which school leaders come to data. This study then provides understanding and perspective that is too often missing in educational research about school leaders and data-driven decisions.
Bisphenol A Induces Hepatotoxicity through Oxidative Stress in Rat Model

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are cytotoxic agents that lead to significant oxidative damage. Bisphenol A (BPA) is a contaminant with increasing exposure to it and exerts both toxic and estrogenic effects on mammalian cells. Due to limited information concerning the effect of BPA on liver, this study investigates whether BPA causes hepatotoxicity by induction of oxidative stress in liver. Rats were divided into five groups: The first four groups, BPA (0.1, 1, 10, 50 mg/kg/day) were administrated orally to rats for four weeks. The fifth group was taken water with vehicle. The final body weights in the 0.1 mg group showed a significant decrease compared to control group. Significant decreased levels of reduced glutathione, superoxide dismutase, glutathione peroxidase, glutathione-S-transferase, glutathione reductase and catalase activity were found in the 50 mg BPA group compared to control groups. High dose of BPA (50 mg/kg) significantly increased the biochemical levels of ALT, ALP and total bilirubin. BPA effect on the activity of antioxidant genes was confirmed by real time PCR in which the expression levels of these genes in liver tissue were significantly decrease compared to control. Data from this study demonstrate that BPA generate ROS and reduce the antioxidant gene expression that causes hepatotoxicity.
Characterizing Videos and Users in YouTube: A Survey

Web 2.0 has reshaped the way people interact with Web sites. People are now able to view content created by other users as well as publish their own content on Web 2.0 sites, instead of downloading content created by a small number of publishing professionals. Understanding the characteristics of these sites has become a subject of immense interest to the Internet service providers, content makers and on-line advertisers. This understanding is also important for the sustainable development of the content distribution systems themselves. As an approach to comprehend the characteristics of media content delivery systems in Web 2.0, a significant amount of research has been done in investigating the characteristics of YouTube. In this paper, a survey of findings of the characteristics of YouTube and related sites is presented from both video and user perspectives along with some open research issues. This kind of study is instrumental to understand the usage of YouTube and other similar user generated content (UGC) sites.
Association between Serum Vitamin D Levels and Sleep Disturbance in Hemodialysis Patients

Sleep disturbance is a frequent and serious complication of hemodialysis (HD). Low serum vitamin D levels have been associated with sleep quality in non-HD subjects. Our aim was to examine the possible association between serum vitamin D levels and the presence of sleep disturbance in HD patients. We recruited 141 HD patients at the HD center of the First Affiliated Hospital of Jiaxing University during 2014–2015. Serum levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) were determined by the competitive protein-binding assay. Sleep quality was measured using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). Demographic, clinical and laboratory data were recorded. Meanwhile, 117 healthy control subjects were also recruited and underwent measurement of 25(OH)D. Eighty-eight patients (62.4%) had sleep disturbance (PSQI scores ≥ 5). Patients with sleep disturbance showed lower levels of 25(OH)D as compared to those without sleep disturbance (85.6 ± 37.4 vs. 39.1 ± 29.1 nmol/L, p < 0.001). In multivariate analyses, serum levels of 25(OH)D (≤48.0 nmol/L) were independently associated with sleep disturbance in HD patients (OR 9.897, 95% CI 3.356–29.187, p < 0.001) after adjustment for possible variables. Our study demonstrates that low serum levels of vitamin D are independently associated with sleep disturbance in HD patients, but the finding needs to be confirmed in future experimental and clinical studies.
Novel Preamble-Based Channel Estimation for OFDM/OQAM Systems

OFDM/OQAM has been considered as an attractive alternative to classic OFDM with cyclic prefix (CP) over doubly dispersive channels. By utilising well designed pulse shapes and removing CP, OFDM/OQAM has the advantage of reduced out-of-band energy and a theoretically higher spectral efficiency. However, channel estimation over doubly dispersive channels has been a big problem for OFDM/OQAM due to the nonorthogonality between the real and imaginary parts of its modulated signals. Therefore conventional channel estimation (CE) methods used for OFDM cannot be directly applied to OFDM/OQAM. Recently a preamble-based CE method - interference approximation method (IAM) - has been proposed to ease this task. By treating the intrinsic interference from neighbour symbols as known information, two heuristic preamble sequences have been constructed based on tentative observations, which turn out to be suboptimal. In this paper, we present a general theoretical framework for IAM preamble design and apply it to identify the optimal IAM preamble sequence which results in a higher gain. Numerical results have verified the effectiveness of the theoretical framework and a gain of 2.4 dB against CP-OFDM has been demonstrated with the new preamble in various doubly dispersive channels with a QPSK modulation.
Correlation analysis of VHL and Jade-1 gene expression in human renal cell carcinoma

Abstract Objective The aim of this study was to investigate the correlation of von Hippel-Lindau tumor suppressor (VHL) mRNA expression and jade family PHD finger 1 (Jade-1) gene expression in patients with renal cell carcinoma (RCC). Another aim of this study was to analyze the relationship of these two genes with clinicalpathological features of the RCC patients. Methods: A total of 75 RCC patients who received surgically therapy in our hospital were included. All patients had complete pathological data. The expression of VHL/Jade-1 was determined by real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Results: VHL and Jade-1 were both obviously downregulated in RCC tissues than that of the matched normal tissues, and both negatively correlated with tumor size as well as tumor grade. And we found a fine association of VHL gene expression with Jade-1. Conclusion: VHL/Jade-1 exhibited significantly decreased expression in RCC tissues and was closely related to the clinical prognosis of patients. The finding of VHL expression positively correlated with Jade-1 expression shed light and provided crucial evidence on the connection of VHL protein with Wnt/b-catenin pathway.
Learning Tonal Harmony from Bach Chorales

Tonal harmony analysis is an intriguing cognitive skill, combining general domain knowledge with contextual cues. In this work we cast it to a Supervised Sequential Learning problem (SSL), and introduce the system geraint, showing how such a problem can be solved via the HMPerceptron algorithm. We explain the main concepts used in music analysis, their use within an automatic environment, and provide their cognitive motivation, such that geraint is both effective on a computational viewpoint, and justifiable on musical and psychological accounts. geraint’s predictions are evaluated on a corpus of 4-parts harmonized chorals by J.S. Bach. We report on the experiment, and discuss our system’s results in comparison to literature.
Investigating the relation between place of articulation markedness and perceptual salience

It has long been observed that segments having different places of articulation tend to exhibit different phonological behaviour (Paradis & Prunet 1991, Rice 1996, among others). These differences are manifested most clearly in place assimilation processes, where less marked segments often assume the place of articulation of the following more marked segments. For example, in Korean, coronals in consonant clusters assimilate to following dorsals and labials (1a); labials assimilate to following dorsals, but not to coronals (1b), and dorsals assimilate neither to labials nor to coronals (1c).
The effect of stimuli that isolate S-cones on early saccades and the gap effect

Disappearance of the fixation spot before the appearance of a peripheral target typically reduces average saccadic reaction times (the gap effect) and may also produce a separate population of early or express saccades. The superior colliculus (SC) is generally believed to be critically involved in generating both effects. As the direct sensory input to the SC does not encode colour information, to determine whether this input was critical in generating the gap effect or express saccades we used coloured targets which this pathway cannot distinguish. Our observers still made early saccades to colour-defined targets, but these were anticipations in response to the offset of the non-coloured fixation target. We also show that a gap effect still occurs when either the fixation target or the peripheral target is colour defined, suggesting that direct sensory input to the SC is not required and that information about the location of colour-defined targets is abstracted prior to processing within the SC.
The Indian superstition scale: creating a measure to assess Indian superstitions

ABSTRACT Despite humans’ capacity for rational thought, they are not immune to superstitions. Superstitions are strongly tied to cultural practices, especially in India. Although 17% of the world’s population resides in India, Indian culture is understudied, and there have not been sufficient attempts to understand Indian superstitions in a scientific manner from a psychometric standpoint. By creating a proper superstition measurement for the Indian population, we can better understand how Indians think and behave. The goal of the present research is to create a superstition measure specific to Indian culture. The results reveal 18 items reflecting Indian superstitions that can be generalised across contemporary India.
The opposition effect in Saturn rings seen by Cassini/ISS: 1. Morphology of phase curves

The Cassini cameras have captured the opposition effect in Saturn rings with a high radial resolution at phase angles down to 0.01o in the entire main ring system. We derive phase functions from 0.01 to 25 degrees of phase angle in the Wide-Angle Camera clear filters with a central wavelength of 0.611microns and phase functions from 0.001 to 25 degrees of phase angle in the Narrow-Angle and Wide-Angle Cameras color filters (from the blue 0.451 microns to the near infrared 0.752 microns). We characterize the morphology of the phase functions of different features in the main rings. We find that the shape of the phase function is accurately represented by a logarithmic model (Bobrov 1970, in Surfaces and Interiors of Planets and Satellites, Academic, edited by A. Dollfus). For practical purposes, we also parametrize the phase curves by a simple linear-by-part model (Lumme and Irvine 1976, Astronomical Journal, 81, p865), which provides three morphological parameters : the amplitude and the Half-Width at Half-Maximum (HWHM) of the surge, and the slope S of the linear-part of the phase function at larger phase angles. Our analysis demonstrates that all of these parameters show trends with the optical depth of the rings. These trends imply that the optical depth is a key-element determining the physical properties which act on the opposition effect. Wavelength variations of the morphological parameters of the surge show important trends with the optical depth in the green filter (0.568 microns), which implies that grain size effects are maximum in this wavelength.
Salinity Decreases Nitrite Reductase Gene Diversity in Denitrifying Bacteria of Wastewater Treatment Systems

ABSTRACT Investigation of the diversity of nirK and nirS in denitrifying bacteria revealed that salinity decreased the diversity in a nitrate-containing saline wastewater treatment system. The predominant nirS clone was related to nirS derived from marine bacteria, and the predominant nirK clone was related to nirK of the genus Alcaligenes.
The Proteome and Lipidome of Thermococcus kodakarensis across the Stationary Phase

The majority of cells in nature probably exist in a stationary-phase-like state, due to nutrient limitation in most environments. Studies on bacteria and yeast reveal morphological and physiological changes throughout the stationary phase, which lead to an increased ability to survive prolonged nutrient limitation. However, there is little information on archaeal stationary phase responses. We investigated protein- and lipid-level changes in Thermococcus kodakarensis with extended time in the stationary phase. Adaptations to time in stationary phase included increased proportion of membrane lipids with a tetraether backbone, synthesis of proteins that ensure translational fidelity, specific regulation of ABC transporters (upregulation of some, downregulation of others), and upregulation of proteins involved in coenzyme production. Given that the biological mechanism of tetraether synthesis is unknown, we also considered whether any of the protein-level changes in T. kodakarensis might shed light on the production of tetraether lipids across the same period. A putative carbon-nitrogen hydrolase, a TldE (a protease in Escherichia coli) homologue, and a membrane bound hydrogenase complex subunit were candidates for possible involvement in tetraether-related reactions, while upregulation of adenosylcobalamin synthesis proteins might lend support to a possible radical mechanism as a trigger for tetraether synthesis.
The Impact of Longevity Risk on the Term Structure of the Risk-Return Tradeoff

The increase in worldwide life expectancy finds a major drawback in the higher-than-expected liabilities that annuity providers will face in the next few years by paying more retirees for a longer period of time. Longevity-Linked Securities have recently been subject to great interest from academics and practitioners as capable of hedging longevity risk through financial markets. Objective of this paper is the analysis of the long-term risk-return tradeoff and its term structure when an ideal longevity-linked security is added to stocks, bonds and T-Bills investment opportunities and the effect of Longevity Risk on the optimal asset allocation in efficient portfolios.
Toward an Impairment Metric for Stereoscopic Video: A Full-Reference Video Quality Metric to Assess Compressed Stereoscopic Video

The quality assessment of impaired stereoscopic video is a key element in designing and deploying advanced immersive media distribution platforms. A widely accepted quality metric to measure impairments of stereoscopic video is, however, still to be developed. As a step toward finding a solution to this problem, this paper proposes a full reference stereoscopic video quality metric to measure the perceptual quality of compressed stereoscopic video. A comprehensive set of subjective experiments is performed with 14 different stereoscopic video sequences, which are encoded using both the H.264 and high efficiency video coding compliant video codecs, to develop a subjective test results database of 116 test stimuli. The subjective results are analyzed using statistical techniques to uncover different patterns of subjective scoring for symmetrically and asymmetrically encoded stereoscopic video. The subjective result database is subsequently used for training and validating a simple but effective stereoscopic video quality metric considering heuristics of binocular vision. The proposed metric performs significantly better than state-of-the-art stereoscopic image and video quality metrics in predicting the subjective scores. The proposed metric and the subjective result database will be made publicly available, and it is expected that the proposed metric and the subjective assessments will have important uses in advanced 3D media delivery systems.
Unique Equilibrium in a Model of Self-Fulfilling Currency Attacks" American Economic Review

Even though self-fulfilling currency attacks lead to multiple equilibria when fundamentals are common knowledge, we demonstrate the uniqueness of equilibrium when speculators face a small amount of noise in their signals about the fundamentals. This unique equilibrium depends not only on the money in criculation and the costs of speculative trading. In contrast to multiple equilibrium models, our model allows analysis of policy proposals directed at curtailing currency attacks.
The EU within the G8: A Case of Ambiguous and Contested Actorness. College of Europe EU Diplomacy Paper 05/2009, August 2009

This paper analyses the degree of European Union (EU) actorness within the Group of Eight (G8). Drawing on the work of Jupille and Caporaso, actorness is probed along the criteria of ‘recognition’, ‘authority’, ‘autonomy’ and ‘cohesion’. We argue that the vague and informal nature of the G8 is conducive to EU participation in the summit. The system of EU representation within the G8 can be seen as a case of constructed ambiguity because the ambiguity that is inherent in the EU’s participation has been institutionalized within the G8. When assessing the above criteria, actorness of the EU as a whole remains questionable. However, recognition, authority, autonomy and most of all cohesion differ considerably per context. We suggest that the ‘independence’ aspect of ‘autonomy’ constitutes a weakness in the conceptuali-sation of actorness and may better be replaced by ‘proactivity’. Finally, on the basis of our findings it can be tentatively hypothesised that a number of factors condition EU actorness in the G8, including the degree of integration at EU level, the degree of politicisation and whether or not an EU member state is acting as G8 host.
Calcium-independent contraction in lysed cell models of teleost retinal cones: activation by unregulated myosin light chain kinase or high magnesium and loss of cAMP inhibition

The retinal cones of teleost fish contract at dawn and elongate at dusk. We have previously reported that we can selectively induce detergent-lysed models of cones to undergo either reactivated contraction or reactivated elongation, with rates and morphology comparable to those observed in vivo. Reactivated contraction is ATP dependent, activated by Ca2+, and inhibited by cAMP. In addition, reactivated cone contraction exhibits several properties that suggest that myosin phosphorylation plays a role in mediating Ca2+-activation (Porrello, K., and B. Burnside, 1984, J. Cell Biol., 98:2230-2238). We report here that lysed cone models can be induced to contract in the absence of Ca2+ by incubation with trypsin-digested, unregulated myosin light chain kinase (MLCK) obtained from smooth muscle. This observation provides further evidence that MLCK plays a role in regulating cone contraction. We also report here that lysed cone models can be induced to contract in the absence of Ca2+ by incubation with high concentrations of MgCl2 (10-20 mM). Mg2+-induced reactivated contraction is supported by inosine triphosphate (ITP) just as well as by ATP. Because ITP will not serve as a substrate for MLCK, this finding suggests that Mg2+-activation of contraction does not require myosin phosphorylation. Although Ca2+-induced contraction is completely blocked by cAMP at concentrations less than 10 microM, cAMP has no effect on cone contraction activated by unregulated MLCK or by high Mg2+ in the absence of Ca2+. Because trypsin digestion of MLCK cleaves off not only the Ca2+/calmodulin-binding site but also the site phosphorylated by cAMP-dependent protein kinase, and because Mg2+ activation of cone contraction circumvents MLCK action altogether, both these observations would be expected if cAMP inhibits reactivated cone contraction by catalyzing the phosphorylation of MLCK and thus reducing its affinity for Ca2+, as has been described for smooth muscle. Together our results suggest that in lysed cone models, myosin phosphorylation is sufficient for activating cone contraction, even in the absence of other Ca2+-mediated events, that cAMP inhibition of contraction is mediated by cAMP-dependent phosphorylation of MLCK, and that 10-20 mM Mg2+ can activate actin-myosin interaction to produce contraction in the absence of myosin phosphorylation.
Working Paper / Document de travail 2009-11 Information Flows and Aggregate Persistence

Bank of Canada working papers are theoretical or empirical works-in-progress on subjects in economics and finance. The views expressed in this paper are those of the author. No responsibility for them should be attributed to the Bank of Canada. ii Acknowledgements This paper is a heavily revised Chapter 3 of my Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Minnesota.
Anomalous X-ray line ratios in the cTTS TW Hydrae

The cTTS TW Hya has been observed with high-resolution X-ray spectrometers. Previously found high densities inferred from He-like $f/i$ triplets strongly suggested the detected X-ray emission to be dominated by an accretion shock. Because of their radiation field dependence He-like $f/i$ ratios do not provide unambiguous density diagnostics. Here we present additional evidence for high densities from ratios of Fe xvii lines. Key Fe xvii line ratios in TW Hya deviate from theoretical expectations at low densities as well as from the same measurements in a large sample of stellar coronae. However, a quantitative assessment of densities is difficult because of atomic physics uncertainties. In addition, estimates of low optical depth in line ratios sensitive to resonance scattering effects also support a high-density emission scenario in the X-ray emitting regions of cTTS.