Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Vegetation and climate changes in northwestern Russia during the Lateglacial and Holocene inferred from the Lake Ladoga pollen record

The new pollen record from the upper 12.75 m of a sediment core obtained in Lake Ladoga documents regional vegetation and climate changes in northwestern Russia over the last 13.9 cal. ka. The Lateglacial chronostratigraphy is based on varve chronology, while the Holocene stratigraphy is based on AMS 14C and OSL dates, supported by comparison with regional pollen records. During the Lateglacial (c. 13.9–11.2 cal. ka BP), the Lake Ladoga region experienced several climatic fluctuations as reflected in vegetation changes. Shrub and grass communities dominated between c. 13.9 and 13.2 cal. ka BP. The increase in Picea pollen at c. 13.2 cal. ka BP probably reflects the appearance of spruce in the southern Ladoga region at the beginning of the Allerød interstadial. After c. 12.6 cal. ka BP, the Younger Dryas cooling caused a significant decrease in spruce and increase in Artemisia with other herbs, indicative of tundra‐ and steppe‐like vegetation. A sharp transition from tundra‐steppe habitats to sparse birch forests characterizes the onset of Holocene warming c. 11.2 cal. ka BP. Pine forests dominated in the region from c. 9.0 to 8.1 cal. ka BP. The most favourable climatic conditions for deciduous broad‐leaved taxa existed between c. 8.1 and 5.5 cal. ka BP. Alder experiences an abrupt increase in the local vegetation c. 7.8 cal. ka BP. The decrease in tree pollen taxa (especially Picea) and the increase in herbs (mainly Poaceae) probably reflect human activity during the last 2.2 cal. ka. Pine forests have dominated the region since that time. Secale and other Cerealia pollen as well as ruderal herbs are permanently recorded since c. 0.8 cal. ka BP.
Symbiodinium biogeography tracks environmental patterns rather than host genetics in a key Caribbean reef-builder, Orbicella annularis

The physiological performance of a reef-building coral is a combined outcome of both the coral host and its algal endosymbionts, Symbiodinium. While Orbicella annularis—a dominant reef-building coral in the Wider Caribbean—is known to be a flexible host in terms of the diversity of Symbiodinium types it can associate with, it is uncertain how this diversity varies across the Caribbean, and whether spatial variability in the symbiont community is related to either O. annularis genotype or environment. Here, we target the Symbiodinium-ITS2 gene to characterize and map dominant Symbiodinium hosted by O. annularis at an unprecedented spatial scale. We reveal northwest–southeast partitioning across the Caribbean, both in terms of the dominant symbiont taxa hosted and in assemblage diversity. Multivariate regression analyses incorporating a suite of environmental and genetic factors reveal that observed spatial patterns are predominantly explained by chronic thermal stress (summer temperatures) and are unrelated to host genotype. Furthermore, we were able to associate the presence of specific Symbiodinium types with local environmental drivers (for example, Symbiodinium C7 with areas experiencing cooler summers, B1j with nutrient loading and B17 with turbidity), associations that have not previously been described.
3D interactive tractography-informed resting-state fMRI connectivity

In the past decade, the fusion between diffusion magnetic resonance imaging (dMRI) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has opened the way for exploring structure-function relationships in vivo. As it stands, the common approach usually consists of analysing fMRI and dMRI datasets separately or using one to inform the other, such as using fMRI activation sites to reconstruct dMRI streamlines that interconnect them. Moreover, given the large inter-individual variability of the healthy human brain, it is possible that valuable information is lost when a fixed set of dMRI/fMRI analysis parameters such as threshold values are assumed constant across subjects. By allowing one to modify such parameters while viewing the results in real-time, one can begin to fully explore the sensitivity of structure-function relations and how they differ across brain areas and individuals. This is especially important when interpreting how structure-function relationships are altered in patients with neurological disorders, such as the presence of a tumor. In this study, we present and validate a novel approach to achieve this: First, we present an interactive method to generate and visualize tractography-driven resting-state functional connectivity, which reduces the bias introduced by seed size, shape and position. Next, we demonstrate that structural and functional reconstruction parameters explain a significant portion of intra- and inter-subject variability. Finally, we demonstrate how our proposed approach can be used in a neurosurgical planning context. We believe this approach will promote the exploration of structure-function relationships in a subject-specific aspect and will open new opportunities for connectomics.
Different excitation and reception distributions with a single‐loop transmit‐receive surface coil near a head‐sized spherical phantom at 300 MHz

Calculations and experiments were used to examine the B1 field behavior and signal intensity distribution in a 16‐cm diameter spherical phantom excited by a 10‐cm diameter surface coil at 300 MHz. In this simple system at this high frequency very complex RF field behavior exists, resulting in different excitation and reception distributions. Included in this work is a straightforward demonstration that coil receptivity is proportional to the magnitude of the circularly polarized component of the B1 field that rotates in the direction opposite to that of nuclear precession. It is clearly apparent that even in very simple systems in head‐sized samples at this frequency it is important to consider the separate excitation and reception distributions in order to understand the signal intensity distribution. Magn Reson Med 47:1026–1028, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Adapt to more wildfire in western North American forests as climate changes

Wildfires across western North America have increased in number and size over the past three decades, and this trend will continue in response to further warming. As a consequence, the wildland–urban interface is projected to experience substantially higher risk of climate-driven fires in the coming decades. Although many plants, animals, and ecosystem services benefit from fire, it is unknown how ecosystems will respond to increased burning and warming. Policy and management have focused primarily on specified resilience approaches aimed at resistance to wildfire and restoration of areas burned by wildfire through fire suppression and fuels management. These strategies are inadequate to address a new era of western wildfires. In contrast, policies that promote adaptive resilience to wildfire, by which people and ecosystems adjust and reorganize in response to changing fire regimes to reduce future vulnerability, are needed. Key aspects of an adaptive resilience approach are (i) recognizing that fuels reduction cannot alter regional wildfire trends; (ii) targeting fuels reduction to increase adaptation by some ecosystems and residential communities to more frequent fire; (iii) actively managing more wild and prescribed fires with a range of severities; and (iv) incentivizing and planning residential development to withstand inevitable wildfire. These strategies represent a shift in policy and management from restoring ecosystems based on historical baselines to adapting to changing fire regimes and from unsustainable defense of the wildland–urban interface to developing fire-adapted communities. We propose an approach that accepts wildfire as an inevitable catalyst of change and that promotes adaptive responses by ecosystems and residential communities to more warming and wildfire.
Investigating the early-life determinants of illness in Africa: the Drakenstein Child Health Study

Respiratory disease is the predominant cause of illness in children globally. We describe a unique multidisciplinary South African birth cohort, the Drakenstein Child Health Study (DCHS), to investigate the incidence, risk factors, aetiology and long-term impact of early lower respiratory tract infection (LRTI) on child health. Pregnant women from a poor, peri-urban community with high exposure to infectious diseases and environmental risk factors are enrolled with 1000 mother–child pairs followed for at least 5 years. Biomedical, environmental, psychosocial and demographic risk factors are longitudinally measured. Environmental exposures are measured using monitors placed at home visits. Lung function is measured in children at 6 weeks, annually and during LRTI episodes. Microbiological investigations including microbiome and multiplex PCR measures are done longitudinally and at LRTI episodes. The DCHS is a unique African birth cohort study that uses sophisticated measures to comprehensively investigate the early-life determinants of child health in an impoverished area of the world.
TESTING FOR UNEQUAL AMOUNTS OF EVOLUTION IN A CONTINUOUS CHARACTER ON DIFFERENT BRANCHES OF A PHYLOGENETIC TREE USING LINEAR AND SQUARED‐CHANGE PARSIMONY: AN EXAMPLE USING LESSER ANTILLEAN ANOLIS LIZARDS

Although a large body of work investigating tests of correlated evolution of two continuous characters exists, hypotheses such as character displacement are really tests of whether substantial evolutionary change has occurred on a particular branch or branches of the phylogenetic tree. In this study, we present a methodology for testing such a hypothesis using ancestral character state reconstruction and simulation. Furthermore, we suggest how to investigate the robustness of the hypothesis test by varying the reconstruction methods or simulation parameters. As a case study, we tested a hypothesis of character displacement in body size of Caribbean Anolis lizards. We compared squared‐change, weighted squared‐change, and linear parsimony reconstruction methods, gradual Brownian motion and speciational models of evolution, and several resolution methods for linear parsimony. We used ancestor reconstruction methods to infer the amount of body size evolution, and tested whether evolutionary change in body size was greater on branches of the phylogenetic tree in which a transition from occupying a single‐species island to a two‐species island occurred. Simulations were used to generate null distributions of reconstructed body size change. The hypothesis of character displacement was tested using Wilcoxon Rank‐Sums. When tested against simulated null distributions, all of the reconstruction methods resulted in more significant P‐values than when standard statistical tables were used. These results confirm that P‐values for tests using ancestor reconstruction methods should be assessed via simulation rather than from standard statistical tables. Linear parsimony can produce an infinite number of most parsimonious reconstructions in continuous characters. We present an example of assessing the robustness of our statistical test by exploring the sample space of possible resolutions. We compare ACCTRAN and DELTRAN resolutions of ambiguous character reconstructions in linear parsimony to the most and least conservative resolutions for our particular hypothesis.
Delayed Argatroban Treatment Reduces Edema in a Rat Model of Intracerebral Hemorrhage

Background and Purpose— Studies indicate that thrombin plays an important role in intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH)–induced edema formation. Although thrombin is produced as the blood clots, it may be bound to fibrin and only gradually released from the clot. The time window for administration of a thrombin inhibitor to reduce ICH-induced edema is unknown. Whether this time window extends beyond the period when a thrombin inhibitor might exacerbate rebleeding is also unknown. Methods— This study examines (1) whether argatroban, an inhibitor of both free and fibrin-bound thrombin, can reduce edema formation after intracerebral infusion of 100 &mgr;L of blood in the rat; (2) the therapeutic time window for argatroban; and (3) whether argatroban promotes rebleeding in a model in which ICH was induced by intracerebral injection of collagenase. Results— Intracerebral infusion of blood caused a marked increase in perihematomal water content. Intracerebral injection of argatroban 3 hours after ICH caused a significant reduction in edema measured at 48 hours (80.9±1.0% versus 82.6±0.8%;P <0.01). The systemic administration of high-dose argatroban (0.9 mg/h) starting 6 hours after ICH also significantly reduced edema (80.3±1.1% versus 82.0±1.3% in vehicle controls;P <0.05). There was no protection when the onset of argatroban administration was delayed to 24 hours after ICH or if a lower dose of argatroban (0.3 mg/h) was used. Argatroban did not increase collagenase-induced hematoma volume when given into the clot after 3 hours or given systemically at 6 hours. Conclusions— Our data suggest that argatroban may be an effective therapy for ICH-induced edema.
Extending the Scope of Representation Theory: A Review and Proposed Research Model

This paper reflects on a popular and influential theory unique to Information Systems (IS), namely representation theory, which is widespread in research on conceptual modelling. We review scholarly work in this domain and discuss why and how studies using representation theory need to transcend their focus of research and link their findings to further consequential variables of interest. We propose an innovative research design that builds upon, and converges, Representation Theory and the established Technology Acceptance Model as an example for an extended study. We conclude by discussing how the example of this research study may inspire IS researchers to overcome traditional theory boundaries and converge rather than diverge existing approaches to IS research in related domains.
Cellular Hyperplasia and Hypertrophy in Cardiomegalies Induced by Anemia in Young and Adult Rats

In our previous studies a twofold cardiomegaly associated with a proportional increase in cardiac DNA was found in rats subjected to a low-iron diet after weaning. To localize the newly synthesized DNA, control and anemic rats 24−34 days of age were given three intraperitoneal injections of 3H-thymidine (1 μc/g body weight; 22c/mM) at 2-hour intervals. The radioautographs were prepared from sections of the left ventricle stained with PAS-hematoxylin. Between 26 and 34 days of age, significantly larger numbers of labeled nuclei were found in both muscle (31−160/1000) and nonmuscle cells, (29−139/1000) in the hearts of anemic rats as compared to controls (11−49/1000 and 6−35/1000, respectively). When 80-day-old rats were given a low-iron diet, a cardiomegaly of approximately 50% developed. A nonsignificant increase in total cardiac DNA and a small significant increase in labeled cardiac nonmuscle nuclei (16−35/1000) was observed in the anemic groups. We conclude that hyperplasia of cardiac muscle and nonmuscle cells is responsible for the increased cardiac mass if cardiomegaly is induced during early postweaning life, while cardiomegaly induced in adult life gives rise to hypertrophy of cardiac muscle cells and hyperplasia of cardiac nonmuscle cells.
The glucocerobrosidase E326K variant predisposes to Parkinson's disease, but does not cause Gaucher's disease

Heterozygous loss‐of‐function mutations in the acid beta‐glucocerebrosidase (GBA1) gene, responsible for the recessive lysosomal storage disorder, Gaucher's disease (GD), are the strongest known risk factor for Parkinson's disease (PD). Our aim was to assess the contribution of GBA1 mutations in a series of early‐onset PD.
Model‐based constraints on the lunar exosphere derived from ARTEMIS pickup ion observations in the terrestrial magnetotail

We use Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence and Electrodynamics of the Moon's Interaction with the Sun (ARTEMIS) measurements of lunar exospheric pickup ions in the terrestrial magnetotail lobes combined with a particle‐tracing model to constrain the source species and distributions of the lunar neutral exosphere. These pickup ions, generated by photoionization of neutral species while the Moon is in the magnetotail lobes, undergo acceleration from both the magnetotail convection electric field and the lunar surface photoelectric field, giving rise to distinct pickup ion flux, pitch angle, and energy distributions. By simulating the behavior of lunar pickup ions in the magnetotail lobes and the response of the twin ARTEMIS probes under various ambient conditions, we can constrain several physical quantities associated with these observations, including the source ion production rate and the magnetotail convection velocity (and hence, electric field). Using the model‐derived source ion production rate and established photoionization rates, we present upper limits on the density of several species potentially in the lunar exosphere. In certain cases, these limits are lower than those previously reported. We also present evidence that the lunar exosphere is displaced toward the lunar dawnside while in the terrestrial magnetotail based on fits to the observed pickup ion distributions.
Ertapenem for the treatment of urinary tract infections caused by extended-spectrum β-lactamase-producing bacteria in children

Abstract Background: Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are a problem frequently encountered by paediatric healthcare providers. Recent data suggest that extended-spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL)-producing bacteria are an emerging cause of UTIs in non-hospitalized patients. We report our experience of ertapenem use in 50 patients with complicated UTIs, mainly pyelonephritis, caused by ESBL-producing organisms. Methods: Fifty patients aged <16 y who had a complicated UTI caused by ESBL-producing organisms and who were treated with ertapenem at our hospital from 1 January 2009 to 31 December 2009, were included in the study. Results: There were 20 (40%) males and 30 (60%) females with a mean ± standard deviation age of 38.6 ± 36.9 months (range 6–156 months). Twenty-eight patients had no urological abnormality. In 40 patients ertapenem was initiated after results of microbiological cultures became available. Ertapenem was initiated empirically for 10 patients known to be colonized with ESBL-producing bacteria. Urine cultures were negative at 3.3 ± 0.7 days (range 2–5 days) after starting ertapenem treatment. The mean duration of ertapenem treatment was 7.8 ± 1.2 days (range 7–14 days). No laboratory or clinical side effects were observed. Conclusions: Ertapenem is promising for the culture-guided treatment of ESBL-producing Gram-negative complicated UTIs. Well-designed prospective studies are needed to define the role of ertapenem in treating complicated paediatric UTIs, especially upper UTIs.
Remote dynamic proxies for wave-based peer-to-peer haptic interaction

This paper introduces a distributed haptic control architecture that can render direct interaction between users in addition to cooperative manipulation of virtual objects. The proposed architecture integrates remote dynamic proxies and peer-to-peer wave-based communications. Remote dynamic proxies are avatars of users at peer sites with motion governed by second order dynamics laws. They render physically-based motion of the distant users in the presence of update discontinuities caused by packet transmission limitations. They also enable users to touch their far away peers directly. The remote dynamic proxies are integrated with peer-to-peer wave-based communications by using wave variable controllers to connect the distributed copies of the shared virtual object, and to connect the users to their remote dynamic proxies. The proposed distributed control architecture is compared via experiments to peer-to-peer haptic cooperation with wave variable time delay compensation. The results illustrate that remote dynamic proxies with wave-based communications: (1) improve position coherency between the distributed copies of the shared virtual object; (2) render mass more faithfully in the presence of network delay; and (3) permit users to interact with each other directly in addition to enabling them to cooperatively manipulate the shared virtual object.
Adding Gradient Noise Improves Learning for Very Deep Networks

Deep feedforward and recurrent networks have achieved impressive results in many perception and language processing applications. Recently, more complex architectures such as Neural Turing Machines and Memory Networks have been proposed for tasks including question answering and general computation, creating a new set of optimization challenges. In this paper, we explore the low-overhead and easy-to-implement optimization technique of adding annealed Gaussian noise to the gradient, which we find surprisingly effective when training these very deep architectures. Unlike classical weight noise, gradient noise injection is complementary to advanced stochastic optimization algorithms such as Adam and AdaGrad. The technique not only helps to avoid overfitting, but also can result in lower training loss. We see consistent improvements in performance across an array of complex models, including state-of-the-art deep networks for question answering and algorithm learning. We observe that this optimization strategy allows a fully-connected 20-layer deep network to escape a bad initialization with standard stochastic gradient descent. We encourage further application of this technique to additional modern neural architectures.
Associated Factors and Cost of Inappropriate Hospital Admissions and Stays in a Second-Level Hospital

The objective of this study was to analyze the variables related to inappropriate admissions and hospital stays and their financial repercussions. This was a descriptive retrospective study in which the Appropriateness Evaluation Protocol (AEP) was applied to a representative sample of 725 hospital admissions and 1350 hospital stays. The cost of inappropriate stays was calculated by cost accounting. The study found that 7.4% of admissions and 24.6% of stays were inappropriate. Inappropriate admissions were significantly related to medical specialties and younger patient age. Inappropriate stays were related to these factors, plus patients being outside their corresponding areas, nonurgent admissions, and low occupancy rate. The cost of the inappropriate admissions and stays was 147 044 euros. Extrapolated to the hospital as a whole this would represent 2125638 euros per year. Steps must be taken to reduce inappropriate admissions and stays to lower health care costs and to reserve hospital resources for patients who genuinely need them. (Am J Med Qual 2009;24:321-332)