Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A multiscale dynamic programming procedure for boundary detection in ultrasonic artery images

Ultrasonic measurements of human carotid and femoral artery walls are conventionally obtained by manually tracing interfaces between tissue layers. The drawbacks of this method are the interobserver variability and inefficiency. Here, the authors present a new automated method which reduces these problems. By applying a multiscale dynamic programming (DP) algorithm, approximate vessel wall positions are first estimated in a coarse-scale image, which then guide the detection of the boundaries in a fine-scale image. In both cases, DP is used for finding a global optimum for a cost function. The cost function is a weighted sum of terms, in fuzzy expression forms, representing image features and geometrical characteristics of the vessel interfaces. The weights are adjusted by a training procedure using human expert tracings. Operator interventions, if needed, also take effect under the framework of global optimality. This reduces the amount of human intervention and, hence, variability due to subjectiveness. By incorporating human knowledge and experience, the algorithm becomes more robust. A thorough evaluation of the method in the clinical environment shows that interobserver variability is evidently decreased and so is the overall analysis time. The authors conclude that the automated procedure can replace the manual procedure and leads to an improved performance.
Deferasirox-loaded polymeric micelles as nanoformulated iron chelating chemotherapy of prostate cancer

Nowadays, conventional chemotherapy is commonly used in many cancers and support for other cancer therapies to improve the success rate of treatment. However, the conventional chemotherapy has many severe side effects. Thus, polymers and nanotechnology are applied to develop drug delivery systems and to increase the properties of anti-cancer drug including reduction of side effect. Many reports show that the cancer cells express higher iron level therefore inhibiting iron metabolism in cancer cells is a novel strategy to treat cancer. Generally, iron chelator used to reduce iron overload in the thalassemia patients. In this experiment, iron chelator, deferasirox (Def) was used as anticancer drug that is trapped iron in cancer cells leading to antiproliferation of cancer cells. Deferasirox was loaded into PEG-b-PCL (MW of PEG = 5.0 kDa, MW of PCL = 5.0 kDa) polymeric micelles by the solvent evaporation method. The hydrodynamic diameter of Def-loaded micelles was measured. Released studies of Def were monitored in PBS pH 7.4. The drug loading content (DLC) and drug loading efficiency (EE) were determined. Def-loaded micelles was incubated with PC-3 cells for 72 h and viability of PC-3 was determined by MTT assay. The result shows that IC50 of free Def was 8.74 μM and IC50 of Def-loaded Micelles was 12.85 μM. This suggests that the Def and Def-loaded micelles were able to trap a free iron in cytoplasm and induce antiproliferation of PC-3 cells that is an alternative technique to kill cancer cells.
An investigation of ophthalmic function in winter seasonal affective disorder

To evaluate the possibility that abnormalities in visual functioning may be of importance in winter seasonal affective disorder (SAD), we compared various ophthalmological function tests by drawing subsets of a group of 61 patients and 61 normal controls. We measured dark adaptation with a Goldmann-Weekers dark adept meter in winter and summer. In winter we also measured intraocular pressure with an applanation tonometer while ‘off’ and “on” light therapy, pupillary size by measuring pupillaryphotos, color vision with a Nagelanomaloscope and the Farnsworth-Munsell 100 Hue test, and determined b-wave components of pattern electroretinograms and P100 components of pattern visual evoked potentials. We found no significant differences between patients and controls. These observations have direct implications upon different theories linking SAD to abnormal ophthalmic junction. This body of work provides little evidence to link SAD to an intrinsic ophthalmic defect in the electrophysiological and neurological pathways studied. Depression 1:29–37 (1993). Published 1993 by Wiley-Liss, inc.
Community Psychology, Political Efficacy, and Trust

Much attention has been paid to the effects of political efficacy and trust on political participation. Most studies tend to use efficacy or trust as an independent variable to explain political actions such as voting, campaign involvement, and the like. Despite their importance in explanations of political behavior, relatively little is known regarding mecha nisms through which social involvement may influence trust and efficacy. If efficacy and trust are of value, then it is important that we determine how their development can be fostered, and especially whether their development can be promoted through social interaction? such as a sense of community. Borrowing from the field of community psy chology, I employ the Sense of Community Index to provide a more nuanced measure of community based on individual perceptions of their community that previous studies were unable to capture. Analyzing original survey data, this paper examines to what extent, if any, a sense of community matters for trust and efficacy. The results demonstrate that social forces, such as community, exert positive and significant effects on internal and external efficacy and personal and political trust, independently of individual traits such as income, age, gender, and education.
Identifying and Challenging Social Work Students' Biases

All students have individual biases that can affect their judgment and ability to utilize professional values when interacting with marginalized groups in social work practice. While traditional cultural diversity courses often address racial/ethnic or sexual minorities, many students are biased against other groups that may not be included in social work curricula designed to address prejudice. This manuscript describes a four-step teaching method designed to provide students individualized assistance with self-identifying and challenging prejudicial beliefs and value systems. Steps include consciousness raising and identification of the targeted group, education, exposure, and self-reflection.
Magnetic field microscopy of rock samples using a giant magnetoresistance–based scanning magnetometer

We have developed a new scanning magnetic microscope to image with micrometric resolution magnetic fields originating from room temperature polished samples. This microscope is based on a giant magnetoresistance (GMR) sensor working at room temperature. These magnetic sensors are sensitive to the in‐plane components of the magnetic field. The size of the sensing element is 9 μm × 36 μm. The noise of the GMR sensor is dominated by a low‐frequency 1/f noise. The field equivalent noise of the sensors is 10 nT at 1Hz and decreases to 0.3 nT above 1 kHz for a 1 mA sensing current. The spatial resolution of the system is ∼20 μm, and its peak‐to‐peak noise during operation is ∼250 nT. Its high spatial resolution and a minimum sensor‐to‐sample distance of 30 μm compensate for its rather moderate field sensitivity. This room temperature small‐sized and rugged magnetic microscope appears as a powerful instrument for small‐scale rock magnetic investigations.
Mutual benefit partnership: A curricular design for authenticity

The concept of authenticity is an under-theorized design principle at the centre of debates about the relationship of school activities to professional practices. We explore one approach to articulating the concept of authenticity through the design of a novel curricular structure, which we call 'mutual benefit partnership', developed in collaboration with a telecommunications company and four middle schools. The partnership created products of value to the corporate partner as well as to the teachers and students. But attempts to provide significant benefits to all parties of the partnership brought out conflicts in cultural values between school and corporate communities, resulting in both learning opportunities and risks to participants. Mutual benefit from students' work resulted more from ancillary (or secondary) products of their work than from primary products, suggesting the need to design curricular structures to achieve joint focus of school and corporate participants on the primary products of student work.
Advances in Linking Wintering Migrant Birds to Their Breeding-Ground Origins Using Combined Analyses of Genetic and Stable Isotope Markers

An enduring problem in avian ecology and conservation is linking breeding and wintering grounds of migratory species. As migratory species and populations vary in the degree to which individuals from distinct breeding locales mix on stop-over sites and wintering grounds, establishing migratory connectivity informs our understanding of population demography and species management. We present a new Bayesian approach for inferring breeding grounds of wintering birds of unknown origins in North America. We incorporate prior information from analysis of genetic markers into geographic origin assignment based upon stable-hydrogen isotope analysis of feathers (δ2Hf), using the Loggerhead Shrike (Lanius ludovicianus). Likely geographic origins derived from analyses of DNA microsatellites were used as priors for Bayesian analyses in which birds were assigned to a breeding-ground origin using their δ2Hf values. As with most applications of Bayesian methods, our approach greatly improved the results (i.e. decreased the size of the potential area of origin). Area of origin decreased by 3 to 5-fold on average, but ranged up to a 10-fold improvement. We recommend this approach in future studies of migratory connectivity and suggest that our methodology could be applied more broadly to the study of dispersal, sources of productivity of migratory populations, and a range of evolutionary phenomena.
Analyzing Song Structure with Spectral Clustering

Many approaches to analyzing the structure of a musical recording involve detecting sequential patterns within a selfsimilarity matrix derived from time-series features. Such patterns ideally capture repeated sequences, which then form the building blocks of large-scale structure. In this work, techniques from spectral graph theory are applied to analyze repeated patterns in musical recordings. The proposed method produces a low-dimensional encoding of repetition structure, and exposes the hierarchical relationships among structural components at differing levels of granularity. Finally, we demonstrate how to apply the proposed method to the task of music segmentation.
Improved short‐term survival for advanced ovarian, tubal, and peritoneal cancer patients operated at teaching hospitals

The aim of this study was to study the impact of hospital level and surgical skill on short-term survival of advanced ovarian, tubal, and peritoneal cancer patients in a prospective population-based study. All 198 women with a diagnosis of advanced epithelial invasive ovarian, tubal, and peritoneal cancer in Norway who underwent surgery during 2002 were included in this study. The data were derived from notifications to the Norwegian Cancer Registry and from medical, surgical, and histopathologic records. The hospitals were grouped into teaching and nonteaching hospitals (NTH), and the operating physicians were classified according to specialty (specialist gynecologist, gynecologist, and surgeon). The follow-up period was from 455 to 820 days. The short-term survival at 450 days was 79% for women operated at teaching hospitals (TH) and 62% at NTH (P= 0.02). After simultaneous adjustment for seven prognostic factors and residual disease, the risk of death within 600 days at NTH was unchanged compared to TH, hazard ratio 1.83. The women operated on by specialist compared to general gynecologists had a 20% increased short-term survival (P < 0.0001). TH and specialist gynecologists achieved better short-term survival of patients operated for advanced ovarian, tubal, and peritoneal cancer. Centralization and specialization of ovarian cancer surgery might improve the outcome for this patient group.
PREDICTING (UNDER)ACHIEVEMENT OF GIFTED CHILDREN

Gifted children may perform worse or achieve much less than expected: how can this happen and how can such underachievement be prevented? To answer this question it is theorized that personal variables (e.g. identity, cognitive and motivational factors) and environmental variables (e.g. home and school) influence or interact with each other. The environmental variables may occur at different levels, e.g., the individual level or the group level Mutual influences or interactions between variables at different levels can be integrated within an interactional multilevel theory. A first example of such a theory is constructed with the aid of four consecutive developmental models. With a child's increasing age the number of variables in a model increases because of the child's growth in cognitive complexity and the accumulating differentiation in meaningful environmental levels and situations. With these models it is possible to explain a gifted child's underachievement in certain situations and its simultaneo.
Tetrahydrobiopterin Is Present in High Quantity in Human Milk and Has a Vasorelaxing Effect on Newborn Rat Mesenteric Arteries

Breast milk reduces the incidence of necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC). BH4 is a cofactor for endothelial NOS (eNOS). Reduced BH4 levels, or its oxidation to dihydrobiopterin (BH2), uncouple eNOS resulting in formation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) that have been implicated in the pathogenesis of NEC. We evaluated colostrum and mature breast milk, as well as infant formula, BH4 and BH2 content. In addition, we tested the BH4 effect on the newborn rat mesenteric arterial vascular tone. BH4 and BH2 content increased 3-fold in mature breast milk, when compared with colostrum (p < 0.01), without a change in their ratio. Infant formula had a negligible BH4 content and lower biopterins ratio, when compared with breast milk. eNOS is the predominant synthase isoform in newborn rat mesenteric arteries. In the presence of BH4, mesenteric arteries contracted less to thromboxane A2 analog U46619 (p < 0.01) and this effect was abolished following eNOS inhibition. BH4 (10−6 M) vasorelaxed the newborn rat mesenteric arteries. We conclude that when compared with infant formula, breast milk has a high BH4 content that increases as breastfeeding continues. Given its mesenteric arterial vasorelaxing effect, BH4 may play an important role in the reduced NEC incidence among breast-fed infants.
New Venture Growth: A Review and Extension

New venture growth differs from that of established firms and is an important topic for scholarly inquiry. Current literature on new venture growth has focused primarily on why new ventures grow to the exclusion of how and where that growth is occurring. This article reviews the literature on new venture growth and addresses key limitations within this stream of research. It unites the literature on why new ventures grow with that of how (through internal or external means) and where (in domestic or international markets) new ventures grow to advance an important research agenda for future new venture growth studies.
Delivery of exogenous antigen into the major histocompatibility complex class I and class II pathways by electroporation

Exogenous, nonreplicating protein antigens (Ags) are usually taken up by antigen‐presenting cells (APCs) via endocytosis or pinocytosis and enter the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class II processing and presentation pathway. Although exogenous Ags are not processed and presented in the class I pathway by most cells, soluble proteins can enter the class I processing and presentation pathway if they are introduced directly into the cytoplasm of APCs. The purpose of these studies was to determine whether exogenous proteins could be processed and presented to T cells if they were delivered into cells by electroporation. The conditions for electroporation were optimized so that the viability of the electroporated cells was high, and the majority of electroporated cells had protein incorporated. Electroporated B cells not only presented exogenous ovalbumin to CD8+, class I MHC–restricted T cells but also stimulated CD4+, class II MHC–restricted T cells. Electroporated cells also primed Ag‐specific cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) in vivo, stimulated CTL precursors in vitro, and served as target cells for lysis by Ag‐specific CTLs, indistinguishable from transfected cells. Thus, electropermeabilized cells were structurally intact, and the introduced exogenous protein was processed and presented in association with both class I and class II MHC molecules. This approach is as efficient and reproducible as other techniques of delivering exogenous proteins into the intracellular processing pathways. These studies suggest that electroporation could be employed for the study of cell‐mediated immunity to various exogenous proteins. J. Leukoc. Biol. 56: 616–624; 1994.
Morphogenetic and proliferative changes in the regenerating lung of the rat

Unilateral extirpation of the lung in rats is followed by increased mitotic activity in alveolar cells of the contralateral lung, reaching a maximum six to seven days after operation. The response is delayed if the cavity created by the operation is packed with plastic sponge. Unilateral collapse of the lung without removal of tissue also leads to a contralateral mitotic response. Changes in the rate of cell proliferation evidently are not directly dependent on changes in tissue mass and it is suggested that compensatory growth in the lung may be controlled by chemical factors whose local concentration depends on variations in the rate of blood flow.
The Impact of Faculty and Staff on High-Risk College Student Persistence

The purpose of this study was to identify the attitudes and behaviors of faculty and staff that impact the success and persistence of highrisk students. Using an exploratory qualitative approach, 62 successful high-risk students from nine different colleges and universities were interviewed and asked to identify and describe someone on campus who had been most influential in their ability to persist. The 54 campus personnel who were identified by these students were interviewed twice to learn what they do to help students succeed and persist. Seven themes on how college personnel positively influence high-risk student success and persistence were identified.
EL IMPACTO DE LA INMIGRACIÓN EN LA SOCIEDAD RECEPTORA

El articulo presenta un modelo para analizar el impacto de la inmigracion teniendo en cuenta los condicionantes materiales y los factores institucionales que inciden, mediatizados por los medios de comunicacion de masas, en tres dimensiones: la seguridad ciudadana, la identidad cultural y la competencia por los recursos, de la sociedad receptora. Si bien este modelo se diseno para llevar a cabo el analisis comparativo del impacto de la inmigracion en cuatro paises del sur de Europa (Espana, Grecia, Italia, Portugal), el presente articulo recoge los resultados obtenidos para el caso espanol.
Researching collaborative processes in domestic violence perpetrator programs: Benchmarking for situation improvement

Summary This article reports on research undertaken in Victoria, Australia with workers from men’s behavior change programs (perpetrator programs) to explore the extent of the collaborative processes established with police, child protection, and other human service organizations. It poses the question: how do regional collaborative arrangements and the pathways to referral reflect the responsiveness of men’s behavior change programs to domestic violence service integration? It builds on a strand of research highlighting the significance of the wider domestic violence intervention system in holding men who use violence accountable. Findings A research tool was designed around a Practice Matrix to outline different dimensions against which expectations of collaboration could be benchmarked in men’s behavior change programs. It was found that at this early stage within the domestic violence reform process in Victoria that the integration of programs within the wider domestic violence sector was relatively undeveloped. The feedback loops between agencies, which enable reporting on attendance, breaches of intervention orders, changes to the risk assessment, and progress at formal review points were relatively undeveloped. However, the formal engagement within domestic violence regional committees and with police was more developed. Application Social workers, particularly in the vulnerable children’s area provide referrals to men’s behavior change programs. Active involvement in feedback, risk assessment review, monitoring for change support the accountability and collaborative effort required to strengthen the effectiveness of men’s behavior change and enhance the safety of women and their children.
Associational links with home among zimbabweans in the UK: reflections on long-distance nationalisms

In this article, I provide an overview of the character of associations formed in Britain by Zimbabweans in the context of the mass exodus that gathered pace from the late 1990s. I discuss the politicization of the Zimbabwe diaspora, which infuses many aspects of associational life beyond specifically political organizations, and also emphasize the importance of Zimbabwean church fellowships. I offer an historical explanation for the strength of nationalism expressed in the diaspora and the absence of 'translocal' associations characteristic of other African diaspora groups, such as hometown associations, and explore reasons why burial societies, which have been centrally important for Zimbabwean migrants in other periods and contexts, are less prevalent in Britain. I build my argument on an historical discussion of continuities and changes in the associational forms characteristic of labour migrancy and urbanization within the southern African region. I emphasize the legacies of a strong segregationist settler state, the mobilizations and international solidarities of the protracted struggle for independence, the Christianization of elite African culture in Zimbabwe's cities, and the international politics of the recent multifaceted crisis. My discussion of the associational expression of 'long distance nationalisms' is based on interviews conducted in 2004-5, participation in diaspora meetings and events, and reading of diaspora media and websites. In the article I aim to highlight the specific social histories of association and the political context of diaspora formation, which are essential for understanding the nature of institutions connecting with home, and ideas about home itself.
'Pains of imprisonment': Narratives of the women partners and children of the incarcerated

This paper focuses on an important line of inquiry in contemporary criminal justice social work research: the collateral consequences of incarceration in the Chinese context. It gives an insight into the impact of incarceration on families from an insider's perspective. An analysis of interviews with 10 partners and 10 children yielded three major themes concerning the impact of imprisonment: the problems associated with the imprisonment of a family member, the coping strategies used and views on the importance of maintaining family ties. It is hoped that this study will give practical guidance regarding what should be done, and how, to reduce the negative consequences brought about by the absence (temporary or permanent) of the imprisoned on their families, including both their partners and vulnerable children.