Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Investigating the motivations of parents choosing language immersion education for their child

Immersion programs have been identified as the vanguard of effective K-12 foreign language teaching. Through their early start and prolonged sequence of language learning, these programs allow students to develop intercultural sensitivity, high levels of functional language proficiency, and literacy in at least two languages. Despite immersion programs’ proven effectiveness and benefits they remain relatively unknown to the larger public. Yet the recent national momentum toward developing a languagecompetent society has brought with it an opportunity to both improve and learn from these programs. This qualitative study explored the motivations and decision-making processes of parents who chose to send their children to new German immersion schools. Parents are the subjects of this study because, as primary stakeholders in their children’s education, they have been recognized as a key feature in making school programs effective and successful. Particularly, attitudes and beliefs have been found to influence parents’ decisions to become involved in their child’s education. The instrument selected is comprised of semi-structured interview questions that were developed to examine how parents’ educational goals, language beliefs, program perceptions and expectations impact the educational decisions they make. A second aspect, this study investigated the kinds of roles parents had constructed for themselves by asking parents about their own school experience, and perceived roles and responsibilities in their children’s education. Using content analysis, this study examined sixteen parent interviews, reflective notes, and school observation write-ups. The study revealed that parents are of utmost importance to immersion programs. Participants are huge supporters of immersion education and very involved in their child’s school. They enrolled their children in these programs for reasons such as their family language background or a true passion for language learning. Parents appeared
Building a Large-Scale Knowledge Base for Machine Translation

Knowledge-based machine translation (KBMT) systems have achieved excellent results in constrained domains, but have not yet scaled up to newspaper text. The reason is that knowledge resources (lexicons, grammar rules, world models) must be painstakingly handcrafted from scratch. One of the hypotheses being tested in the PAN-GLOSS machine translation project is whether or not these resources can be semi-automatically acquired on a very large scale. This paper focuses on the construction of a large ontology (or knowledge base, or world model) for supporting KBMT. It contains representations for some 70,000 commonly encountered objects, processes, qualities, and relations. The ontology was constructed by merging various online dictionaries, semantic networks, and bilingual resources, through semi-automatic methods. Some of these methods (e.g., conceptual matching of semantic taxonomies) are broadly applicable to problems of importing/exporting knowledge from one KB to another. Other methods (e.g., bilingual matching) allow a knowledge engineer to build up an index to a KB in a second language, such as Spanish or Japanese.
The student experience of Foundation Degrees : a case study of a cohort in a Foundation Degree in Educational Administration

This thesis is the result of a qualitative case study of a group of ten part-time, mature, non-traditional learners enrolled on a Foundation Degree. The thesis identifies how students think, communicate with one another and manage the learning processes. It explores the attitudes of students who are a new type of cohort entering Higher Education. The thesis commences by identifying entry barriers to Higher Education and how these were overcome. Despite earlier failures, students retained a belief in their abilities, were motivated and maintained aspirations to achieve a Higher Education qualification. The research then identifies how this group of adult learners developed strategies to support them in their quest for continuing success and achievement, including developing supporting relationships with other students. Students were also very pragmatic in the way they handled the complexities of learning whilst at the same time coping with multiple roles. E-learning contributed to the learning experience and achievement and the research identifies new patterns and modes of learning for this group of students. Insights into human adaptation to a new learning environment are revealed and the research shows how students utilised technology in order to be successful in their learning. For example, students used discussion boards and email to continue social interaction, communication and relationships formed at day schools. Other issues that arose from the research are gender issues as well as student change. For example, students reported they felt they had gained confidence. This increased confidence manifested itself in the way they approached their academic work and approached their jobs. In addition, students also believed employers saw their value as enhanced. Students were goal driven yet highly interested in the process of learning, very much in line with mature female goals. This is a study, therefore, not only of a new type of degree but of new kinds of students following the huge expansion of entrants into Higher Education
Wilms' tumor: Prognostic factors for patients without metastases at diagnosis. Results of the national Wilms' tumor study

Multivariate statistical analyses are used to evaluate a wide range of factors in predicting relapse and survival for 429 children enrolled in the National Wilms' Tumor Study. Anaplastic or sarcomatous histology, specimen weight over 250 grams, positive regional lymph nodes, treatment with only a single drug and age over two years are the most important predictors of relapse. The first three factors also predict mortality. Laterality, capsular penetration, intrarenal vascular invasion, direct regional extension and operative spillage have lesser effects which do not contribute significantly to the multivariate prediction equations, while sex, race and the presence of a tumor thrombus in the renal vein have essentially no effect. Treatment with combination chemotherapy is confirmed to be efficacious regardless of what prognostic factors are operating. A statistical model allows prediction of relapse and death for each of 24 patient subgroups, with the estimates of percentage relapsed ranging from 3% to 100%.
Regional Pattern of Increased Water Diffusivity in Hippocampus and Corpus Callosum in Mild Cognitive Impairment

Background: Corpus callosum atrophy possibly indicates neuronal degeneration in association cortex in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Water diffusivity allows detecting physiological changes that probably occur earlier than structural shrinkage in cerebral regions during the development of AD. Objective: To simultaneously investigate the focal volumetric and early structural changes with apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) of corpus callosum in mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and to explore the regional pattern of ADC increase in hippocampus and corpus callosum. Methods: Thirteen subjects with MCI and 13 healthy age-matched control subjects were studied. With three-dimensional volumetric spoiled gradient recalled echo MRI images, we measured the volume of hippocampus and corpus callosum. Using MRI-guided diffusion-weighted imaging analysis, we calculated ADCs from hippocampus and corpus callosum. Within the receiver-operation curve (ROC) statistical framework, areas under ROC curves from hippocampal and callosal ADCs were compared in differentiating between MCI and controls. Results: After normalization to intracranial volume, hippocampal, not callosal, volume was significantly reduced in MCI. ADC values were increased in hippocampus and corpus callosum in MCI. The extent of ADC increase was similar between hippocampus and corpus callosum. Conclusion: Alterations in water diffusivity may precede corpus callosum atrophy during the development of MCI. Diffusion changes might occur simultaneously in allocortex and neocortex in MCI.
Evaluation of three commercial enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays and two latex agglutination assays for diagnosis of primary Epstein-Barr virus infection

Three commercially available enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISAs) from Gull, Biotest, and Behring (Enzygnost) and two latex agglutination tests for heterophile antibodies (Monolatex [Biotest] and Mono-Lex [Trinity Laboratories]) were evaluated for the diagnosis of primary Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection and EBV seropositivity. Two hundred fourteen consecutive samples from 197 patients with symptoms of primary EBV infection were analyzed by the five assays at a clinical microbiology laboratory. The samples were also analyzed independently by immunofluorescence methods at a reference laboratory. According to the reference methods, 37 patients (40 serum samples) had primary EBV infections, 120 patients (127 serum samples) had had past EBV infections, 33 patients (36 serum samples) were seronegative, and 7 patients (11 serum samples) exhibited atypical reactions. The respective sensitivities and specificities for the diagnosis of primary EBV infection were 95 and 100% for the Gull assays, 100 and 94% for the Biotest assays, and 100 and 89%, for the Enzygnost assays. The Monolatex and Mono-Lex methods showed similar sensitivities and specificities (78 to 85% and 100 to 99%, respectively) for the diagnosis of primary EBV infection. This study demonstrates the usefulness of commercially available assays for the rapid diagnosis of primary EBV infection, but also the importance of large-scale testing of routine samples before choosing an assay.
Assessing the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard of 2016: Can Americans Access Electronic Disclosure Information?

The debate as to whether to require mandatory labeling of genetically modified organism (GMO) foods was partially settled on 29 July 2016, when President Obama signed the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard into public law. In contrast to precipitating legislation passed by the State of Vermont that required disclosure of GMO ingredients on food shelves or food packages, the superseding National Standard allows firms to disclose bioengineered ingredients to consumers via symbols, electronic or digital links, or phone numbers, and further requires a study assessing the ability of consumers to access disclosure information by these means. This communication analyzes survey responses from 525 adults to investigate whether U.S. consumers are able to obtain information as per the disclosure methods allowed in the Federal legislation. The survey probes deeper to investigate consumer perceptions of genetically modified organisms and whether consumers would use the tools available to access disclosure about bioengineered ingredients. Findings from the survey show that 93.8% of respondents have the ability to access information via the disclosure methods permitted. Those in the lowest income group, and from the oldest age group are least likely to have such access. This provides the United State Department of Agriculture with information relevant to how they can implement the law and highlights particular demographic segments that may require additional attention to ensure the disclosed information is universally accessible.
Image, language, brain : papers from the First Mind Articulation Project Symposium

Recent attempts to unify linguistic theory and brain science have grown out of recognition that a proper understanding of language in the brain must reflect the steady advances in linguistic theory of the last forty years. The first Mind Articulation Project Symposium addressed two main questions: How can the understanding of language from linguistic research be transformed through the study of the biological basis of language? And how can our understanding of the brain be transformed through this same research? The best model so far of such mutual constraint is research on vision. Indeed, the two long-term goals of the Project are to make linguistics and brain science mutually constraining in the way that has been attempted in the study of the visual system and to formulate a cognitive theory that more strongly constrains visual neuroscience. The papers in this volume discuss the current status of the cognitive/neuroscience synthesis in research on vision, whether and how linguistics and neuroscience can be integrated, and how integrative brain mechanisms can be studied through the use of noninvasive brain-imaging techniques. Contributors: Noam Chomsky, Ann Christophe, Robert Desimone, Richard Frackowiak, Angela Friederici, Edward Gibson, Peter Indefrey, Masao Ito, Willem Levelt, Alec Marantz, Jacques Mehler, Yasushi Miyashita, David Poeppel, Franck Ramus, John Reynolds, Kensuke Sekihara, Hiroshi Shibasaki.
Opioid peptides and alpha-melanocyte-stimulating hormone in genetically obese (ob/ob) mice during development.

Compared to littermate controls (C57BL/6J ob/? ), body weights of genetically obese (ob/ob) mice are significantly higher at 1-6 months of age; the greatest percentage weight gain of the ob/ob group occurs during the first 3 months of life. Levels of pituitary immunoreactive beta-endorphin and immunoreactive alpha-melanocyte-stimulating hormone are also significantly elevated in ob/ob animals compared to controls. However, these pharmacological differences only emerge at 4-6 months of age--3 months after the appearance of obesity. High levels of immunoreactive endorphin in the pituitary are, therefore, more likely to be a consequence than a cause of obesity. Furthermore, numerous other neurologic abnormalities, which may or may not play a role in the obesity syndrome, are evident in ob/ob mice. Compared to controls, ob/ob total brain, hypothalamus, and pituitary weights are 11%, 16%, and 23% less, respectively. Levels of immunoreactive Leu5-enkephalin in pars nervous are also 200% higher in ob/ob mice; this increase is apparent at 1-6 months of age and is highly correlated with changes in body weight.
Effect of Recent Historical Events on Migration and Isonymic Stratification among the Rama Amerindians from Nicaragua

ABSTRACT The Rama Amerindians from southern Nicaragua are one of few indigenous populations inhabiting the east coast and lowlands of southern Central America. Early-eighteenth-century ethnohistorical accounts depicted the Rama as a mobile hunter-gatherer and horticulturalist group dispersed in household units along southern Nicaraguan rivers. However, during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Rama settlement patterns changed to aggregated communities because of increased competition for local resources resulting from nonindigenous immigration. The objective of this study was to discern the degree of relatedness between and within subdivisions of seven of these communities based on patterns of surname variation and genealogical data. We applied surname analyses (n = 592) to evaluate inter-and intrapopulation variation, consanguinity and substructure estimates, and isolation by distance and used a genealogically based marital migration matrix obtained during fieldwork in 2007 and 2009 to better understand internal migration. Our evaluation indicates a pattern of geographic distribution linking kinships in major subpopulations to nearby family-based villages. Mantel tests provide a correlation (r = 0.4;p < 0.05) between distance matrices derived from surname and geography among Rama communities. Genealogical analysis reveals a pattern of kin networks within both peripheral and central populations, consistent with previous genetic investigations, where the Amerindian mitochondrial DNA haplogroup B2 is commonly found among peripheral communities and A2 is frequent in central subpopulations. Marital migration and genealogies provide additional information regarding the influx of non-Ramas to communities near populated villages. These results indicate that the disruption of the Rama's traditional way of life has had significant consequences on their population structure consistent with population fissions and aggregations since the eighteenth century.
The Years of High Econometrics: A Short History of the Generation that Reinvented Economics

Introduction Part 1: Foundation 1. 'Not Afraid of the Impossible': Ragnar Frisch, 1895-1973 2. The Emergence of Social Physics: The Econometric People are Assembled 3. The Years of High Theory Part 2: Construction 4. What Counts is What Can be Counted 5. Particles or Humans: Paradoxes of Mechanics Part 3: Debates 6. Challenging Keynes: The Econometric Movement Builds its Trenches 7. Intriguing Pendula: Delights and Dangers of Econometric Conversation 8. Quod Errat Demonstrandum: The Concept of Probability Puzzling the Econometricians Part 4: Theory and Practice at the Edge 9. Chaos or Randomness 10. Is Capitalism Doomed? : A Nobel Discussion 11. Prometheus Tired of War 12. Conclusion: A Brave New World
Bifurcations in iterative decoding and root locus plots

A class of error correction codes called dasialow-density parity-check (LDPC)dasia codes have been the subject of a great deal of recent study in the coding community as a result of their ability to approach Shannondasias fundamental capacity limit. Crucial to the performance of these codes is the use of an dasiaiterativedasia decoder. These iterative decoders are effectively high-dimensional, nonlinear dynamical systems and, consequently, control-theoretic tools are useful in analysing such decoders. The authors describe LDPC codes and the decoding algorithm and make a connection between the fixed points of the decoding algorithm and the well-known root locus plot. Through two examples of LDPC codes, the authors show that the root locus plot visually captures the bifurcation behaviour of iterative decoding that occurs at the signal-to-noise ratio predicted by Shannondasias noisy channel coding theorem.
Conversion of Phosphodiesterase-5 (PDE5) Catalytic Site to Higher Affinity by PDE5 Inhibitors

Phosphodiesterase-5 (PDE5) specifically hydrolyzes cGMP, thereby contributing to modulation of intracellular levels of this nucleotide. In the present study, preincubation with cGMP increased PDE5 catalytic activity for cGMP degradation, and it converted the PDE5 catalytic site to a form that was more potently inhibited by each of the three PDE5 catalytic site-specific inhibitors: sildenafil, vardenafil, and tadalafil. These results implied that elevated cGMP initiates a physiological negative feedback on the cGMP pathway by increasing the affinity of the PDE5 catalytic site for cGMP. This increase in catalytic site activity or affinity for inhibitors could be caused by binding of cGMP to either the PDE5 allosteric sites, catalytic site, or both. Whether occupation of the catalytic site alone could mediate the effect was examined using radiolabeled PDE5 inhibitors in the absence of cGMP. Exchange-dissociation of [3H]sildenafil (Viagra), [3H]vardenafil (Levitra), or [3H]tadalafil (Cialis) from full-length PDE5 or isolated catalytic domain revealed two kinetic components (slow and fast). Extended preincubation of full-length PDE5, but not isolated catalytic domain, with 3H inhibitors converted the biphasic pattern to a single slow (high-affinity) component. Studies of amino-terminally truncated PDE5 established that full-length mammalian GAF-B (cGMP-binding phosphodiesterase, Anabaena adenylyl cyclases, Escherichia coli FhlA) subdomain conjoined with the catalytic domain was sufficient for this conversion. In conclusion, binding of substrate or substrate analogs such as PDE5 inhibitors to the catalytic site converts a fast (low-affinity) inhibitor dissociation component of the PDE5 catalytic site to a slow (high-affinity) inhibitor dissociation component. This effect is predicted to improve the substrate affinity or inhibitory potencies of these compounds in intact cells.
Rigidity and mental health: challenging the view that rigid thinking leads to poor mental health

A substantial amount of research has suggested that cognitive rigidity is associated with poor mental health (e.g., Dieserud, Roysamb, Ekeberg, & Kraft, 2001; Dugas, Gagnon, Ladouceur, & Freeston, 1998; Haaga, Fine, Terrill, Stewart, & Beck, 1995; Nezu, Nezu, & Perri, 1989). We hypothesized that some types of rigidity may not be associated with poor mental health. The Personal Need for Structure scale (PNS; Thompson, Naccarato & Parker, 1989) was used to assess two types of rigidity, namely, the Desire for Structure (DS) and Response to Lack of Structure (RLS). We hypothesized that RLS but not DS would be related to poor mental health outcomes. Studies 1 (n = 302) and 2 (n = 351) revealed that those with a personal tendency to express negative reactions when confronted with a lack of structure were consistently shown to experience poor mental health. These outcomes included greater depression (assessed in studies 1 & 2), hopelessness (assessed in studies 1 & 2), suicide ideation (assessed in studies 1 & 2), anxiety (only assessed in study 2) and stress (only assessed in study 2). In contrast to these findings, those who had a tendency to desire structure were consistently shown not to experience poor mental health. The second study extended the first study by expanding the range of mental health variables assessed to include measures of anxiety, stress and life satisfaction. Also tested in both studies was the possible interaction between stressful life events and RLS and DS. Support was found for an interaction between stressful life events and RLS across both studies. These findings indicated that those who were highly rigid tended to experience greater increases in poor mental health in response to stressful life events. Some support was found for the expectation that DS would not interact with stressful life events. However, since this finding was not replicated across both studies, it was treated with caution. The results of the present research not only replicate but extend previous research by demonstrating that there are
Modeling behavior dynamics using computational psychometrics within virtual worlds

In case of fire in a building, how will people behave in the crowd? The behavior of each individual affects the behavior of others and, conversely, each one behaves considering the crowd as a whole and the individual others. In this article, I propose a three-step method to explore a brand new way to study behavior dynamics. The first step relies on the creation of specific situations with standard techniques (such as mental imagery, text, video, and audio) and an advanced technique [Virtual Reality (VR)] to manipulate experimental settings. The second step concerns the measurement of behavior in one, two, or many individuals focusing on parameters extractions to provide information about the behavior dynamics. Finally, the third step, which uses the parameters collected and measured in the previous two steps in order to simulate possible scenarios to forecast through computational models, understand, and explain behavior dynamics at the social level. An experimental study was also included to demonstrate the three-step method and a possible scenario.