Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Tinnitus and inferior colliculus activity in chinchillas related to three distinct patterns of cochlear trauma

A longstanding hypothesis is that tinnitus, the perception of sound without an external acoustic source, is triggered by a distinctive pattern of cochlear hair cell (HC) damage and that this subsequently leads to altered neural activity in the central auditory pathway. This hypothesis was tested by assessing behavioral evidence of tinnitus and spontaneous neural activity in the inferior colliculus (IC) after unilateral cochlear trauma. Chinchillas were assigned to four cochlear treatment groups. Each treatment produced a distinctive pattern of HC damage, as follows: acoustic exposure (AEx): sparse low‐frequency inner hair cell (IHC) and outer hair cell (OHC) loss; round window cisplatin (CisEx): pronounced OHC loss mixed with some IHC loss; round window carboplatin (CarbEx): pronounced IHC loss without OHC loss; control: no loss. Compared with controls, all experimental groups displayed significant and similar psychophysical evidence of tinnitus with features resembling a 1‐kHz tone. Contralateral IC spontaneous activity was elevated in the AEx and CisEx groups, which showed increased spiking and increased cross‐fiber synchrony. A multidimensional analysis identified a subpopulation of neurons more prevalent in animals with tinnitus. These units were characterized by high bursting, low ISI variance, and within‐burst peak spiking of approximately 1,000/sec. It was concluded that cochlear trauma in general, rather than its specific features, leads to multiple changes in central activity that underpin tinnitus. Particularly affected was a subpopulation ensemble of IC neurons with the described unique triad of features. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
A Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer Survey of Late-Type Dwarf Stars

We describe the 910-1180 Å spectra of seven late-type dwarf stars obtained with the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) satellite. The stars include Altair (A7 IV), Procyon (F5 IV-V), α Cen A (G2 V), AB Dor (K1 V), α Cen B (K2 V), ϵ Eri (K2 V), and AU Mic (M0 V). We present line identifications, fluxes, Doppler shifts, and widths. Doppler shifts are measured with respect to heliocentric wavelength scales determined from interstellar absorption lines, and are compared with transition region line shifts seen in Hubble Space Telescope (HST) ultraviolet spectra. For the warmer stars the O VI lines extend the trend of increasing redshift with line formation temperature, but for the cooler stars the O VI line redshifts are essentially zero. The C III and O VI lines of most stars in the sample are best fit with two Gaussians, and we confirm the correlation of increasing importance of the broad component with increasing stellar activity. The nonthermal velocities of the narrow component are subsonic and exhibit a trend toward larger velocities with decreasing surface gravity, while the nonthermal velocities of the broad components show no obvious trend with stellar gravity. The C III and O VI lines of Altair show unique broad horned profiles. Two flares were observed on AU Mic. One shows increasing continuum flux to shorter wavelengths, which we interpret as free-free emission from hot plasma, and relatively narrow, redshifted C III and O VI emission. The other shows very broad line profiles.
Anterior disc protrusion as a cause for abdominal symptoms in childhood discitis. A case report.

STUDY DESIGN A case report on infectious spondylitis in a child who reported abdominal pain and whose magnetic resonance image revealed anterior herniation of disc space contents. OBJECTIVES To correlate the direction of disc protrusion in infectious spondylitis with clinical manifestations. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA Previous studies have correlated posterior protrusion of disc space contents in infectious spondylitis with a clinical presentation of back pain, paravertebral muscle spasm, hamstrings tightness, and radiculopathy. None has connected anterior herniation of disc phlegmon with abdominal pain. METHODS In addition to plain radiography and bone scintigraphy, magnetic resonance imaging was used to confirm the diagnosis of infectious spondylitis in a 6-year-old child with abdominal pain. Regular review for 1 year included repeat magnetic resonance imaging at 3 months. RESULTS Initial magnetic resonance imaging revealed characteristic changes associated with infectious spondylitis throughout the L5-S1 vertebra-disc-vertebra unit and anterior protrusion of the disc material and phlegmon. Magnetic resonance imaging at follow-up examination 3 months later demonstrated complete resolution of the disc herniation. CONCLUSION Future magnetic resonance imaging studies should correlate direction of disc herniation with age and symptomatology to validate or improve classifications of infectious spondylitis, which presently include only the last two parameters.
In vitro Degradation of Human Hair by some Keratinophilic Fungi

Summary: The ability of five keratinophilic fungi, i. e. , Auxarthron conjugatum, Chrysosporium indicum, C. pannicola, Keratinomyces ajelloi and Microsporum gypseum, to digest human hair in shake cultures has been studied. The degradation of human hair was studied by analysis of protein, soluble sulphydryl groups in the culture fluid and by microscopic examination. M. gypseum showed maximum degradation while A. conjugatum was found with minimum activity out of the present test fungi. All test fungi were able to utilize human hair as sole carbon and nitrogen sources in vitro.
Effects of magnesium-aluminum hydroxide and calcium carbonate antacids on bioavailability of ofloxacin

The effects of 15- and 5-ml doses of magnesium-aluminum hydroxide (MAH) and calcium carbonate (CC) antacids, respectively, on the bioavailability of ofloxacin after single oral 400-mg doses of ofloxacin were investigated in a 32-subject, randomized, crossover, open-label study. On four separate occasions, subjects received ofloxacin alone or antacid 24 h before, 2 h before, or 2 h after ofloxacin administration (n = 16 for each antacid). CC administration had no significant effect on the rate and extent of ofloxacin absorption regardless of the timing of antacid administration. A small but significant negative effect of MAH administration 2 h before ofloxacin administration was noted as evidenced by area under the curve and peak concentration in plasma data. Simultaneous administration of ofloxacin with either antacid was not investigated in this study. It appears that MAH and CC antacids in the doses used in this study generally do not interfere in a clinically significant manner with the bioavailability of ofloxacin, provided that an interval of at least 2 h separates the administration of these products.
Preformed Silos versus Traditional Abdominal Wall Closure in Gastroschisis: 163 Infants at a Single Institution

Abstract Introduction The surgical management of gastroschisis (GS) is controversial. The most commonly used strategy for abdominal wall closure is surgery on day 1 of life with the aim of primary closure (PC) or construction of a surgical silo (SS) and secondary closure thereafter. The other widely used technique is application of a preformed silo (PFS) and reduction of contents over a few days before final closure. There is still a paucity of comparative outcome data. Methods A retrospective case note review of all infants initially treated at a single institution between October 1993 and October 2012. PFS was adopted as the technique of choice in April 2005. Infants with closed or closing GS were excluded. Data are presented as median (range). p < 0.05 were significant. Results There were 163 infants (156 complete data sets). PFSs were applied in 67 infants and PC/SS were applied in 89 infants of whom 19 infants required a SS. There was no statistical difference between gestational age (p = 0.8), birth weight (p = 0.7), time to first (p = 0.07) and full enteral feeding (p = 0.08), length of hospital stay (p = 0.17), or necrotizing enterocolitis (p = 0.4) and mortality (p = 0.4). Infants treated with PC + SS were closed on day 0 (range, 0–11 days) versus day 6 (range, 2–22 days) of life (p < 0.001). PC + SS were ventilated for day 5 (range, 1–22 days) versus day 3.5 (range, 0–20 days) days (p = 0.01). Conclusion Infants treated with PFS required less ventilation than those treated by PC + SS. There was no difference in time to full feeds, length of hospital stay mortality or morbidity.
2 Testing Partition Problems with One-Sided Error

Property-testers are fast randomized algorithms for distinguishing between graphs (and other combinatorial structures) satisfying a certain property, from those that are far from satisfying it. In many cases one can design property-testers whose running time is in fact independent of the size of the input. In this paper we survey some recent results on testing graph properties. A common thread in all the results surveyed is that they rely heavily on the simple yet useful notion of graph homomorphism. We mainly focus on the combinatorial aspects of property-testing.
From Innovation to Exporting or Vice Versa?

Firm productivity and export decisions are closely related to innovation activity. Innovation may play a more important role in the decision to start exporting, and successful exporting may drive process innovation. This suggests that the causality between innovation and exporting may run in both directions. Using detailed microdata from innovation surveys, industrial production surveys, and trade information for Slovenian firms in 1996–2002, we investigate the bidirectional causal relationship between firm innovation and export activity. We find no evidence for the hypothesis that either product or process innovations increase the probability of becoming a first-time exporter, but we do find evidence in both the innovation survey and the industrial production survey that exporting leads to productivity improvements. These, however, are likely to be related to process rather than product innovations, and are observed only in a sample of medium and large first-time exporters. This finding makes a case in favour of the learning-by-exporting hypothesis by demonstrating that these learning effects from exporting occur through the mechanism of process innovation enhancing firm technical efficiency.
Performance of Adults With and Without Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) on Measures of Response Inhibition and Frontal Lobe Functioning

In this study 2 groups of adults, those with and without ADHD, were studied in terms of cognitive functioning and symptoms of ADHD, depression, anxiety, and substance abuse. Due to the difficulties in diagnosing ADHD in this population three methods of diagnosis were used and the resulting findings presented. The groups did not differ in measures of depression, anxiety, substance abuse or age. Those adults who met criteria for ADHD showed worse performance on a measure of response inhibition compared to those without ADHD. The patterns of correlations among the cognitive measures differed between the two groups. The conclusions from the findings are discussed in relation to Barkley's (1997) self-regulation model of ADHD.
Combining quadratic classifier and pair discriminators by pairwise coupling for handwritten Chinese character recognition

The accuracy of handwritten Chinese character recognition can be improved by pair discrimination of similar characters. In this paper, we propose a new method for combining the baseline classifier with incomplete pair discriminators to better exploit their complementariness. The outputs of the baseline classifier and pair discriminators are transformed to two-class probabilities, which are then fused by pairwise coupling (PWC) for final decision. In our experiments using the modified quadratic discriminant function (MQDF) as baseline classifier and LDA-based pair discriminators, the PWC method outperforms the filter method. At best, the error rate of MQDF was reduced by factors over 28%.
Risk Factors and Risk Scoring Tool for Infection during Tissue Expansion in Tissue Expander and Implant Breast Reconstruction

Tissue expander and implant (TE/I) breast reconstruction has been increasing recently. In TE/I breast reconstruction, infection leads to reconstruction failure and is the most serious complication. The infection rate was reported to be higher during the tissue expander period than the implant period. However, few studies have investigated the risk factors for infection during tissue expansion following TE/I breast reconstruction. The goal of this study was to identify risk factors for infection during tissue expansion in TE/I breast reconstruction and to develop a simple risk scoring tool for infection that can be used for clinical application. In this retrospective cohort study, 981 patients who received TE/I breast reconstruction were surveyed and analyzed at one of the main clinics performing TE/I breast reconstruction in Japan. Numerous potential risk factors were collected from the clinical charts. Multiple logistic regression analyses were used to identify risk factors for infection. To develop a risk scoring tool, we converted the coefficients of the identified predictors estimated in the multiple logistic regression analyses into simplified risk scores. We assessed the tool discrimination by drawing a receiver operating characteristic curve and calculating the area under the curve. Infection was noted in 47 patients (4.79%) during tissue expansion. In multiple logistic regression analyses, diabetes, repeated expander insertions, larger expander size (≥400 cc), postoperative hormone therapy before silicone implant surgery, preoperative chemotherapy, and nipple‐sparing mastectomy were identified as risk factors for infection during expansion. The area under the curve of the risk scoring tool for infection was 0.734 (95% CI: 0.662–0.807). We have revealed risk factors and proposed a risk scoring tool for infection during tissue expansion in TE/I breast reconstruction. This study may contribute to the prevention and prediction of infection.
Assessment of Exercise Capacity and Oxygen Consumption Using a 6 min Stepper Test in Older Adults

It is often necessary to assess physical function in older adults to monitor disease progression, rehabilitation or decline in function with age. However, increasing frailty and poor balance that accompany aging are common barriers to exercise testing protocols. We investigated whether a 6-min stepper test (6MST) was acceptable to older adults and provided a measure of exercise capacity and a predicted value for peak aerobic capacity (VO2max). 635 older adults from a tri-ethnic UK population-based cohort were screened to undertake a self-paced 6MST. Expired gas analysis, heart rate and blood pressure monitoring were carried out. A sub-set of 20 participants performed a second 6MST for assessment of reproducibility and a further sub-set of 10 performed the 6-min walk test as verification against a well-recognized and accepted self-paced exercise test. 518 (82%) participants met inclusion criteria and undertook the 6MST (299 men, mean age 71.2 ± 6.4). Step rate showed a strong positive correlation with measured VO2 (r = 0.75, p < 0.001) and VO2 was lower in women (male-female difference in VO2 = 2.61 (95% confidence interval −3.6, −1.7) ml/min/kg; p < 0.001). 20 participants repeated a 6MST, step rate was higher in the second test but the predicted VO2max showed good agreement (mean difference = 0.1 [3.72, 3.95] ml/min/kg). In 10 participants who completed a 6MST and a 6-min walk test there was a strong positive correlation between walking rate and step rate (r = 0.77; p < 0.009) and weaker positive correlations between the tests for measured VO2 and peak heart rate. In conclusion, the 6MST is a convenient, acceptable method of assessing exercise capacity in older adults that allows VO2max to be predicted reproducibly. The test shows good correlation between performance and measured physiological markers of performance and can detect the expected gender differences in measured VO2. Furthermore, the 6MST results correlate with a previously verified and established self-paced exercise test.
Economical and biological efficiencies of beef cattle differing in level of milk production.

Economical and biological efficiencies of beef production to weaning and to slaughter were estimated in three groups, different in milk available (low, medium, and high) to the calves but with the same potential for growth. Data from different breed groups of cows (low [L] = Hereford x Angus, medium [M] = Red Poll x Angus, and high [H] = Milking Shorthorn x Angus) were used. Economical efficiency was the ratio of income to expenses and biological efficiency was the ratio of calf weight to total feed energy required. Income was derived from cull cows and calves at weaning or carcasses of calves fed to slaughter. Feed and non-feed expenses for the cowherd and for calves to weaning or to slaughter were included in economical efficiency. Efficiencies were estimated assuming observed reproductive rates and energy requirements for maintenance, as well as for equal reproductive rates and equal energy requirements for maintenance in the M and H groups. With the observed reproductive rates and maintenance requirements, biological efficiencies to weaning and to slaughter were 28.1, 27.2, and 27.5 g of weaning weight and 22.0, 20.4, and 20.3 g of carcass weight per megacalorie of ME for L, M, and H, respectively; the corresponding values using equal reproduction and equal maintenance in M and H were 28.3, 27.2, and 27.4 g of weaning weight and 22.1, 20.5, and 20.5 g of carcass weight per megacalorie of ME. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Role of efflux pumps in the antibiotic resistance of bacteria embedded in a biofilm

Biofilms are complex microbial associations anchored to abiotic or biotic surfaces, embedded in extracellular matrix produced by the biofilms themselves where they interact with each other and the environment. One of the main properties of biofilms is their capacity to be more resistant to antimicrobial agents than planktonic cells. Efflux pumps have been reported as one of the mechanisms responsible for the antimicrobial resistance in biofilm structures. Evidence of the role of efflux pump in biofilm resistance has been found in several microorganisms such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli and Candida albicans. However, in spite of the studies on the importance of efflux pumps in biofilm growth and about their relevance in antimicrobial resistance forming biofilm, the exact role of these efflux systems has not been determined as yet.
PENERAPAN ASESMEN PORTOFOLIO UNTUK MENINGKATKAN HABITS OF MIND DAN PENGUASAAN KONSEP SISWA SMA KELAS XI

Penelitian ini berjudul “Penerapan Asesmen Portofolio untuk Meningkatkan Habits of Mind dan Penguasaan Konsep Siswa SMA Kelas XI”. Penelitian yang dilakukan di kelas IX IPA IV SMAN X Bandung tahun ajaran 2012/2013 dengan jumlah sampel sebanyak 48 orang. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui seberapa besar peningkatan habits of mind dan penguasaan konsep melalui penerapan asesmen portofolio, serta tanggapan siswa setelah mengikuti pembelajaran dengan menggunakan asesmen portofolio tersebut. Pengambilan data dilakukan sebanyak 7 kali pertemuan pada dua materi yaitu sistem ekskresi dan sistem saraf. Instrumen yang digunakan pada penelitian ini adalah angket habits of mind, soal penguasaan konsep sistem ekskresi dan sistem saraf serta angket siswa tentang penerapan asesmen portofolio. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa kategori habits of mind yang meningkat dalam kategori sedang adalah critical thinking dan self regulation sedangkan kategori creative thinking meningkat dalam kategori rendah. Terjadi peningkatan penguasaan konsep siswa tentang sistem ekskresi dan saraf setelah penerapan asesmen protofolio dimana peningkatan tersebut secara rata-rata berada di atas standar yang telah ditetapkan yakni 0.31 dengan rata-rata peningkatan sebesar 0.51. Peningkatan habits of mind sebesar 31% memiliki korelasi yang signifikan dengan asesmen portofolio dengan kontribusi sebesar 13.7% sedangkan peningkatan penguasaan konsep sebesar 55.45% tetapi memiliki korelasi yang tidak signifikan dengan asesmen portofolio dengan kontribusi hanya 3.8%. Secara keseluruhan siswa menanggapi positif penerapan asesmen portofolio pada materi sistem ekskresi dan sistem saraf. Kata Kunci: Habits of mind, penguasaan konsep, asesmen portofolio
Image restoration using a stochastic variant of the alternating direction method of multipliers

We propose an efficient image restoration framework based on stochastic optimization. Image restoration usually requires some iterative methods for solving optimization problems that characterize restored images, where the multiplication of the observation matrix Φ ϵ Rm × n and variables has to be computed at each iteration. If an efficient implementation of the multiplication (e.g., using FFT) is unavailable, its computational cost becomes O(MN), which is quite expensive since both N and M are usually large in image restoration. Our method needs to load and apply only a part of the observation matrix of size M/b × N (b: the number of parts), so that the computational cost is only O(MN/b). Moreover, the proposed method accepts various nonsmooth objectives effective for image restoration. Experiments on compressed sensing reconstruction and non-uniform deblurring show the advantage of the proposed method over state-of-the-art proximal optimization methods.
Energy-Aware Adaptive Attitude Estimation Under External Acceleration for Pedestrian Navigation

In this paper, we consider the problem of a rigid body attitude estimation under external acceleration using a small inertial/magnetic sensors module containing a triad of gyroscope, accelerometer, and magnetometer. This paper is focused on two main challenges. The first one concerns the attitude estimation during dynamic cases, in which external acceleration occurs. In order to compensate for such external acceleration, we design a quaternion-based adaptive Kalman filter q-AKF. Precisely, a smart detector is designed to decide whether the body is in static or dynamic case. Then, the covariance matrix of the external acceleration is estimated to tune the filter gain. The second challenge is related to the energy consumption issue of gyroscope. In order to ensure a longer battery life for the inertial measurement units, we study the way to reduce the gyro measurements acquisition by switching on/off the sensor while maintaining an acceptable attitude estimation. The switching policy is based on the designed detector. The efficiency of the proposed scheme is evaluated by means of numerical simulations and experimental tests.
Analysis of forward error correction methods for nanoscale networks-on-chip

The amount of errors in future nanoscale technologies is expected to increase dramatically when compared to technologies that have line width larger than 90 nm. In nanoscale CMOS circuits fault tolerance is one of the most important design constraints to sustain system reliability at an acceptable level. We analyze different error correcting coding methods for on-chip communication networks of future nanoscale multiprocessor systems. The implemented communication circuits are compared in terms of error correction capability, circuit area and power consumption. In addition, performance of implemented systems is evaluated under different error scenarios by taking into account variable number of single bit errors, burst errors, and their combinations.