Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Clinical outcomes of acute stroke patients with atrial fibrillation

Evaluation of: Kazumi K, Yasuyuki I, Kensaku S, Takeshi I, Shinji Y, Junya A. IV-tPA therapy in acute stroke patients with atrial fibrillation. J. Neurol. Sci. 276(1–2), 6–8 (2009). Stroke is the leading cause of disability and the second most common cause of death worldwide. The care and treatment of stroke patients have evolved over the last two decades, with increasing use of thrombolysis (e.g., intravenous tissue plasminogen activator in acute stroke patients), which has improved survival and recovery following stroke. The article under evaluation offers a greater insight into the relationship of clinical outcome of stroke and atrial fibrillation after tissue plasminogen activator infusion.
Antibiotic Combination Therapy for Steroid Withdrawal in Steroid-Dependent Ulcerative Colitis

Background and Aim: Immunosuppressive drugs are recommended for use as replacements of steroid therapy in sustaining remission of steroid-dependent ulcerative colitis (UC). However, discontinuation of these therapeutic agents leads to a high relapse, and their long-term administration has not been proven safe. A newly introduced antibiotic combination therapy led to improvement and remission of active UC. The aim of this study is to examine whether this new therapy can replace immunosuppressive agents and allow discontinuation of steroids in steroid-dependent UC remission. Methods: 48 patients with steroid-dependent UC were recruited for a 2-week treatment with amoxicillin, tetracycline, and metronidazole (ATM). Examination of clinical symptoms, endoscopy, and histological evaluation were performed before and 6 and 12 months after treatment. Results: The proportion of patients who showed clinical improvement at 6 and 12 months after treatment was 54.2% (26/48) and 75.0% (36/48), respectively. The rate of clinical remission at 6 and 12 months was 31.3% (15/48) and 37.5% (18/48), respectively. Steroid withdrawal was attained in 64.6% (31/48) and 70.8% (34/48) of patients at 6 and 12 months, respectively. Endoscopic improvement was detected in 56.3% (27/48), and histological improvement was detected in 52.1% (25/48) at the final observation point for each patient. Conclusion: The triple antibiotic therapy resulted in improvement, remission, and steroid withdrawal in steroid-dependent UC patients.
Online video game addiction: identification of addicted adolescent gamers.

AIMS To provide empirical data-driven identification of a group of addicted online gamers. DESIGN Repeated cross-sectional survey study, comprising a longitudinal cohort, conducted in 2008 and 2009. SETTING Secondary schools in the Netherlands. PARTICIPANTS Two large samples of Dutch schoolchildren (aged 13-16 years). MEASUREMENTS Compulsive internet use scale, weekly hours of online gaming and psychosocial variables. FINDINGS This study confirms the existence of a small group of addicted online gamers (3%), representing about 1.5% of all children aged 13-16 years in the Netherlands. Although these gamers report addiction-like problems, relationships with decreased psychosocial health were less evident. CONCLUSIONS The identification of a small group of addicted online gamers supports efforts to develop and validate questionnaire scales aimed at measuring the phenomenon of online video game addiction. The findings contribute to the discussion on the inclusion of non-substance addictions in the proposed unified concept of 'Addiction and Related Disorders' for the DSM-V by providing indirect identification and validation of a group of suspected online video game addicts.
Extreme Correlation of International Equity Markets

Testing the hypothesis that international equity market correlation increases in volatile times is a difficult exercise and misleading results have often been reported in the past because of a spurious relationship between correlation and volatility. This paper focuses on extreme correlation, that is to say the correlation between returns in either the negative or positive tail of the multivariate distribution. Using "extreme value theory" to model the multivariate distribution tails, we derive the distribution of extreme correlation for a wide class of return distributions. Using monthly data on the five largest stock markets from 1958 to 1996, we reject the null hypothesis of multivariate normality for the negative tail, but not for the positive tail. We also find that correlation is not related to market volatility per se but to the market trend. Correlation increases in bear markets, but not in bull markets.
CLASSIFYING CHRONIC LOWER BACK PAIN GROUPS USING A TIME SERIES MODEL OF LIFTING

A classification procedure was developed that uses hidden Markov models (HMMs) to identify sub-groups within a chronic lower back pain (CLBP) patient population based on their time series of lifting patterns during a repetitive lifting task. Based on clinical observations of a repetitive lifting task, our approach assumed that the patient population was composed of two groups: one group that performed lifts more similar to controls than to other patients and another group that lifted differently from control subjects. Two HMMs were designed to describe the repetitive lifting data, one derived from the control subject data and one derived from the CLBP subject data. The HMMs were designed based on the results of a data reduction procedure that reduced and combined the multidimensional lifting parameters into discrete lifting patterns using factor analysis and cluster analysis. Simulation studies were performed to demonstrate that the HMMs could reliably identify subjects from one group that were intentionally mislabeled as the other group. When the HMMs were applied to clinical data, 35 of the 81 CLBP subjects were classified to the control HMM and 46 were classified to the CLBP HMM. For the control group, 46 of 53 control subjects were classified to the control HMM and only seven were classified to the CLBP HMM. The CLBP groups were found to use different lifting patterns during the task. The CLBP subjects that were classified to the CLBP HMM were found to use a lifting pattern that involves slow, controlled movements. Self-reported measures of the two groups of CLBP subjects were compared and self-reported pain intensity, pain severity and perceived self-efficacy found to be statistically different. The CLBP subjects that were classified to the CLBP HMM reported higher pain intensity and pain severity, and lower self-efficacy suggesting that the CLBP population is heterogeneous and that the HMM classification procedure can successfully identify two meaningfully different sub-groups of CLBP patients.
Long-Acting Ca2+ Blockers Prevent Myocardial Remodeling Induced by Chronic NO Inhibition in Rats

Abstract—Chronic inhibition of nitric oxide (NO) synthesis induces cardiac remodeling independent of systemic hemodynamic changes in rats. We examined whether long-acting dihydropyridine calcium channel blockers block myocardial remodeling and whether the activation of 70-kDa S6 kinase (p70S6K) and extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) are involved. Ten groups of Wistar-Kyoto rats underwent 8 weeks of drug treatment consisting of a combination of NO synthase inhibitor NG-nitro-l-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME), an inactive isomer (D-NAME), amlodipine (1 or 3 mg/kg per day), or benidipine (3 or 10 mg/kg per day). In other groups, L-NAME was also used in combination with a p70S6K inhibitor (rapamycin), a MEK inhibitor (PD98059), and hydralazine. Systolic blood pressure (SBP), heart rate, and left ventricular weight (LVW) were measured, together with histological examinations and kinase assay. L-NAME increased SBP and LVW (1048±22 versus 780±18 mg, P <0.01) compared with the control, showing a significant increase in cross-sectional area of cardiomyocytes after 8 weeks. Amlodipine, benidipine, or hydralazine equally attenuated the increase in SBP induced by L-NAME. However, both amlodipine and benidipine but not hydralazine attenuated the increase in LVW by L-NAME (789±27, 825±20 mg, P <0.01, and 1118±29 mg, NS, respectively), also confirmed by histological analysis. L-NAME caused a 2.2-fold/1.8-fold increase in p70S6K/ERK activity in myocardium compared with the control, both of which were attenuated by both amlodipine and benidipine but not hydralazine. Both rapamycin and PD98059 attenuated cardiac hypertrophy in this model. Thus, long-acting dihydropyridine calcium channel blockers inhibited cardiac hypertrophy induced by chronic inhibition of NO synthesis by inhibiting both p70S6K and ERK in vivo.
A Comprehensive Analysis of OpenMP Applications on Dual-Core Intel Xeon SMPs

Hybrid chip multithreaded SMPs present new challenges as well as new opportunities to maximize performance. Our intention is to discover the optimal operating configuration of such systems for scientific applications and to identify the shared resources that might become a bottleneck to performance under the different hardware configurations. This knowledge will be useful to the research community in developing software techniques to improve the performance of shared memory programs on modern multi-core multiprocessors. In this paper, we study a two-way dual-core Hyper-Threaded (HT) Intel Xeon SMP server under single program and multi-program multithreaded workloads using the NAS OpenMP benchmark suite. Our performance results indicate that in the single-program case, the CMP-based SMP and CMT-based SMP configurations have the highest average speedup across all of the applications. The most efficient architecture is a single HT-enabled dual-core processor that is almost comparable to the performance of a 2-way dual-core HT-disabled system.
The Social Processes of Organizational Sensemaking.

A longitudinal study of the social processes of organizational sensemaking suggests that they unfold in four distinct forms: guided, fragmented, restricted, and minimal. These forms result from the degree to which leaders and stakeholders engage in “sensegiving”—attempts to influence others' understandings of an issue. Each of the four forms of organizational sensemaking is associated with a distinct set of process characteristics that capture the dominant pattern of interaction. They also each result in particular outcomes, specifically, the nature of the accounts and actions generated.
Heterogeneous basis of the type VIB form of Ehlers–Danlos syndrome (EDS VIB) that is unrelated to decreased collagen lysyl hydroxylation

Skin fibroblasts from the majority of patients with the clinical diagnosis of Ehlers–Danlos syndrome type VI (EDS VI; kyphoscoliosis type), have significantly decreased lysyl hydroxylase (LH) activity due to mutations in the LH1 gene (classified as EDS VIA: OMIM no. 225400). A rare condition exists in which patients are clinically similar but have normal levels of LH activity (designated EDS VIB: OMIM no. 229200). To define the biochemical defect, we have examined cultured fibroblasts from four EDS VIB patients for changes in the levels of the mRNAs for LH1, LH2, and LH3, collagen cross‐linking patterns, and the extent of lysine hydroxylation of type I collagen α chains. Although normal levels of LH1 mRNA were observed in all four patients, in two patients the levels of LH2 mRNA were decreased by >50%, and a similar decrease was observed in LH3 mRNA in the other two patients. A distinct pattern of collagen cross‐links, indicative of decreased lysyl hydroxylation, could be identified in EDS VIA patients, but there was no clear correlation between collagen cross‐link pattern and changes in the individual LH mRNAs in EDS VIB patients. Linkage to tenascin‐X was excluded in these patients. This study suggests that the basis for this form of EDS VI is genetically heterogeneous, and that alternative pathways in addition to lysine hydroxylation of collagen may be affected. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
A Multicenter Evaluation of How Many Infants With Permanent Hearing Loss Pass a Two-Stage Otoacoustic Emissions/Automated Auditory Brainstem Response Newborn Hearing Screening Protocol

Objective. Ninety percent of all newborns in the United States are now screened for hearing loss before they leave the hospital. Many hospitals use a 2-stage protocol for newborn hearing screening in which all infants are screened first with otoacoustic emissions (OAE). No additional testing is done with infants who pass the OAE, but infants who fail the OAE next are screened with automated auditory brainstem response (A-ABR). Infants who fail the A-ABR screening are referred for diagnostic testing to determine whether they have permanent hearing loss (PHL). Those who pass the A-ABR are considered at low risk for hearing loss and are not tested further. The objective of this multicenter study was to determine whether a substantial number of infants who fail the initial OAE and pass the A-ABR have PHL at ∼9 months of age. Methods. Seven birthing centers with successful newborn hearing screening programs using a 2-stage OAE/A-ABR screening protocol participated. During the study period, 86634 infants were screened for hearing loss at these sites. Of those infants who failed the OAE but passed the A-ABR in at least 1 ear, 1524 were enrolled in the study. Data about prenatal, neonatal, and socioeconomic factors, plus hearing loss risk indicators, were collected for all enrolled infants. When the infants were an average of 9.7 months of age, diagnostic audiologic evaluations were done for 64% of the enrolled infants (1432 ears from 973 infants). Results. Twenty-one infants (30 ears) who had failed the OAE but passed the A-ABR during the newborn hearing screening were identified with permanent bilateral or unilateral hearing loss. Twenty-three (77%) of the ears had mild hearing loss (average of 1 kHz, 2 kHz, and 4 kHz ≤40-decibel hearing level). Nine (43%) infants had bilateral as opposed to unilateral loss, and 18 (86%) infants had sensorineural as opposed to permanent conductive hearing loss. Conclusions. If all infants were screened for hearing loss using the 2-stage OAE/A-ABR newborn hearing screening protocol currently used in many hospitals, then ∼23% of those with PHL at ∼9 months of age would have passed the A-ABR. This happens in part because much of the A-ABR screening equipment in current use was designed to identify infants with moderate or greater hearing loss. Thus, program administrators should be certain that the screening program, equipment, and protocols are designed to identify the type of hearing loss targeted by their program. The results also show the need for continued surveillance of hearing status during childhood.
Genetic Diversity of Avian Infectious Bronchitis Coronavirus in Recent Years in China

SUMMARY. Fifty-six isolates of avian infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) were obtained from different field outbreaks in China in 2010, and they were genotyped by comparison with 19 reference strains in the present study. The results showed that LX4-type isolates are still the predominant IBVs circulating in chicken flocks in China, and these isolates could be grouped further into two clusters. Viruses in each cluster had favored amino acid residues at different positions in the S1 subunit of the spike protein. In addition, a recombination event was observed to have occurred between LX4- and tl/CH/LDT3/03I-type strains, which contributed to the emergence of a new strain. The most important finding of the study is the isolation and identification of Taiwan II–type (TW II–type) strains of IBV in mainland China in recent years. The genome of TW II–type IBV strains isolated in mainland China has experienced mutations and deletions, as demonstrated by comparison of the entire genome sequence with those of IBV strains isolated in Taiwan. Pathogenicity testing and sequence analysis of the 3′ terminal untranslated region revealed that TW II–type IBV strains isolated in mainland China have a close relationship with the embryo-passaged, attenuated TW2296/95.
Horizontal cells of the mouse retina contain glutamic acid decarboxylase-like immunoreactivity during early developmental stages

We have used an antiserum to L-glutamic acid decarboxylase ((GAD), a synthesizing enzyme for gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA)) to localize putative GABAergic neurons in the developing C57BL/6J mouse retina. At early developmental stages (embryonic day 17 to postnatal day 3), strong GAD-like immunoreactivity is detectable in cell bodies located within the neuroblastic layer. These cells have relatively large cell bodies and extend several sturdy processes which are oriented radially at these early stages. We have identified these cells as horizontal cells. In addition, cell bodies adjacent to the inner plexiform layer and both diffuse and punctate structures within the inner plexiform layer proper have weak GAD-like immunoreactivity at this time. By postnatal day 6, GAD-positive horizontal cell processes begin to form a horizontal network in the newly formed outer plexiform layer. Immunolabeling of amacrine cell bodies and of punctate structures in the inner plexiform layer becomes much stronger at this time, reaching a maximum staining intensity during the second postnatal week. After postnatal day 12, GAD-like immunoreactivity of the horizontal cells begins to decline; in 4-week-old mice the horizontal cells are no longer detectably labeled by this GAD antiserum. At the same time, the GAD-like-immunoreactive material in the inner plexiform layer becomes stratified, forming distinct layers. Amacrine cells and the inner plexiform layer remain GAD positive into adulthood.
The Effects of Perceived Parental Expectations on Chinese Children's Mathematics Performance

The influence of perceived parental expectations on children's school perfor mance was examined. Sixty-four Chinese children from two elementary schools in Hong Kong participated. Subjects completed a questionnaire on their parents' expectations of their school performance. They later took an arithmetic test un der the condition of anticipating either parental evaluation or peer evaluation of their test scores. When children anticipated that their parents would evaluate their performance, performance was better for those who perceived their par ents as having higher expectations of them, and worse for those with lower per ceived parental expectations. In contrast, performance in the peer evaluation condition was unrelated to perceived parental expectations.
Contracts with Framing

We study a model of contracts in which a profit-maximizing seller uses framing to influence buyers’ purchasing behavior. Framing temporarily affects how buyers evaluate different products, and buyers can renege on their purchases after the framing effect wears off. We characterize the optimal contracts with framing and their welfare properties in several settings. Framing that is not too strong reduces total welfare in regulated markets with homogenous buyers, but increases total welfare in markets with heterogenous buyers when the proportion of buyers with low willingness to pay is small. (JEL D11, D82, D86)
Autonomous driving: A comparison of machine learning techniques by means of the prediction of lane change behavior

In the presented work we compare machine learning techniques in the context of lane change behavior performed by humans in a semi-naturalistic simulated environment. We evaluate different learning approaches using differing feature combinations in order to identify appropriate feature, best feature combination, and the most appropriate machine learning technique for the described task. Based on the data acquired from human drivers in the traffic simulator NISYS TRS1, we trained a recurrent neural network, a feed forward neural network and a set of support vector machines. In the followed test drives the system was able to predict lane changes up to 1.5 sec in beforehand.
Learning Musical Structure Directly from Sequences of Music

This paper addresses the challenge of learning global musical structure from databases of music sequences. We introduce a music-specific sequence learner that combines an LSTM recurrent neural network with an autocorrelationbased predictor of metrical structure. The model is able to learn arbitrary long-timescale correlations in music but is biased towards finding correlations that are aligned with the meter of the piece. This biasing allows the model to work with low learning capacity and thus to avoid overfitting. In a set of simulations we show that the model can learn the global temporal structure of a musical style by simply trying to predict the next note in a set of pieces selected from that style. To test whether global structure has in fact been been learned, we use the model to generate new pieces of music in that style. In a discussion of the model we highlight its sensitivity to three distinct levels of temporal order in music corresponding to local structure, long-timescale metrical structure and long-timescale non-metrical structure.
Are Locking Screws Advantageous with Plate Fixation of Humeral Shaft Fractures? A Biomechanical Analysis of Synthetic and Cadaveric Bone

Objectives: To investigate whether locking screws offer any advantage over nonlocking screws for plate fixation of humeral shaft fractures for weight-bearing applications. Design: Mechanical evaluation of stiffness in torsion, bending, and axial loading and failure in axial loading in synthetic and cadaveric bone. Setting: Biomechanical laboratory in an academic medical center. Methods: We modeled a comminuted midshaft humeral fracture in both synthetic and cadaveric bone. Humeri were plated posteriorly. Two study groups each used identical 10-hole, 3.5-mm locking compression plates that can accept either locking or nonlocking screws. The first group used only nonlocking screws and the second only locking screws. Stiffness testing and failure testing were performed for both the synthetic bones (n = 6) and the cadaveric matched pairs (n = 12). Fatigue testing was set at 90,000 cycles of 440 N of axial loading. Main Outcome Measures: Torsion, bending, and axial stiffness and axial failure force after cyclic loading. Results: With synthetic bones, no significant difference was observed in any of the 4 tested stiffness modes between the plates with locking screws and those with nonlocking screws (anteroposterior, P = 0.51; mediolateral, P = 0.50; axial, P = 0.15; torsional, P = 0.08). With initial failure testing of the constructs in axial loading, both plates failed above anticipated physiologic loads of 440 N (mean failure load for both constructs >4200 N), but no advantage to locking screws was shown. The cadaveric portion of the study also showed no biomechanical advantage of locking screws over nonlocking screws for stiffness of the construct in the 4 tested modes (P > 0.40). Fatigue and failure testing showed that both constructs were able to withstand strenuous fatigue and to fail above anticipated loads (mean failure >3400 N). No difference in failure force was shown between the 2 groups (P = 0.67). Conclusions: Synthetic and cadaveric bone testing showed that locking screws offer no obvious biomechanical benefit in this application.