Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Avaliação de uma intervenção para redução de comportamentos antissociais e aumento da escolarização em adolescentes de uma instituição de acolhimento

Jovens sao encaminhados para instituicoes de acolhimento por maus-tratos e abandono familiar e apresentam um conjunto de comportamentos de risco, que variam de baixo rendimento escolar a deficits em comportamento moral e ate comportamentos antissociais de larga escala. As suas permanencias prolongadas em abrigos, sem intervencao especializada, agravam os comportamentos de risco determinantes da institucionalizacao. Esta pesquisa avaliou uma intervencao, com oito jovens acolhidos, com duracao de 10 meses, por meio de pre e pos-teste utilizando o TDE (Stein, 2011), o IEP (Gomide, 2006) e o YSR (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001). A intervencao compreendeu quatro atividades: programa de comportamento moral; reforco escolar; psicoterapia analitico-comportamental; e praticas educativas para cuidadores. Os resultados mostraram que houve diminuicao do deficit escolar em todos os participantes (Z= - 2,414; p = 0,016), melhoria na competencia total e reducao de comportamentos internalizadores, externalizadores, indicativos de TEPT, TOC, TC, entre outros, todos significativos em nivel de 0,05. Os cuidadores, que anteriormente a intervencao nao visitavam os adolescentes, passaram a faze-lo com regularidade. Os resultados apontaram para a eficacia da intervencao em produzir reducao de comportamentos antissociais e aumento da escolarizacao.
Longevity pathways and maintenance of the proteome: the role of autophagy and mitophagy during yeast ageing

Ageing is a complex and multi-factorial process that results in the progressive accumulation of molecular alterations that disrupt different cellular functions. The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is an important model organism that has significantly contributed to the identification of conserved molecular and cellular determinants of ageing. The nutrient-sensing pathways are well-recognized modulators of longevity from yeast to mammals, but their downstream effectors and outcomes on different features of ageing process are still poorly understood. A hypothesis that is attracting increased interest is that one of the major functions of these “longevity pathways” is to contribute to the maintenance of the proteome during ageing. In support of this hypothesis, evidence shows that TOR/Sch9 and Ras/PKA pathways are important regulators of autophagy that in turn are essential for healthy cellular ageing. It is also well known that mitochondria homeostasis and function regulate lifespan, but how mitochondrial dynamics, mitophagy and biogenesis are regulated during ageing remains to be elucidated. This review describes recent findings that shed light on how longevity pathways and metabolic status impact maintenance of the proteome in both yeast ageing paradigms. These findings demonstrate that yeast remain a powerful model system for elucidating these relationships and their influence on ageing regulation.
JUMP LANDING CHARACTERISTICS IN ELITE SOCCER PLAYERS WITH CEREBRAL PALSY

The aim of the present study was to analyse the parameters that characterize the vertical ground reaction force during the landing phase of a jump, and to determine the relationship among these parameters in elite soccer players with cerebral palsy (CP). Thirteen male members of the Spanish national soccer team for people with CP (mean age: 27.1 ± 4.7 years) volunteered for the study. Each participant performed three counter movement jumps. The characteristics of the first peak of the vertical ground reaction force during the landing phase of a jump, which corresponds to the forefoot contact with the ground, were similar to the results obtained in previous studies. However, a higher magnitude of rearfoot contact with the ground (F2) was observed in participants with CP than in participants without CP. Furthermore, a significant correlation between F2 magnitude and the elapsed time until its production (T2) was not observed (r = -0.474 for p = 0.102). This result implies that a landing technique based on a delay in the production of F2 might not be effective to reduce its magnitude, contrary to what has been observed in participants without CP. The absence of a significant correlation between these two parameters in the present study, and the high magnitude of F2, suggest that elite soccer players with CP should use footwear with proper cushioning characteristics.
The effect of high-level image structure in early human visual cortex

A commonly held view about neurons in early visual cortex is that they serve as localized filters. Here, however, we demonstrate that the responses of neurons in early visual cortex are sensitive to perceptual grouping based on global image structures. First we measured neural responses to an oriented Gabor (“target”) embedded in various orientation patterns using multiple methodologies— psychophysics, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and electroencephalography (EEG). Specifically, we varied whether a central target deviated from its context by changing distant orientations while leaving the immediately neighboring flankers unchanged. The results of psychophysical contrast adaptation and fMRI experiments show that a target that deviates from its context results in more neural activity compared to a target that is grouped into an alternating pattern. For example, the neural response to a vertically oriented target was greater when it deviated from the orientation of flankers (HHVHH) compared to when it was grouped into an alternating pattern (VHVHV). We then found that this pattern-sensitive response manifests in the earliest sensory component of the event-related potential to the target. In a forced-choice classification task of “noise” stimuli, perceptions are biased to “see” an orientation that deviates from its context. These results show that neurons in early visual cortex are sensitive to large-scale global patterns in images in a way that is more sophisticated than localized feature detection. Finally, we show using event-related potential (ERP) that the well-known orientation-specific surround suppression effect is dependent on the surface structure in the image, demonstrating an important role of high-level, global processes in determining when contextual effects occur in early visual cortex. Overall, our results demonstrate an important role of high-level, global processes in determining when contextual effects occur in early visual cortex. The effect of high-level image structure in early Human Visual Cortex
Getting the Most from a Variable Frequency Drive: The Optimal Way to Improve Lifetime and Reliability

When using a three-phase variable frequency drive (VFD) powered from a single-phase ac source, the drive's output power has to be limited to prevent higher component stresses in it and in the input power system. To address this issue, many VFD manufacturers derate the drive. Typically, based on the dc-bus-voltage ripple, the output frequency of the drive is limited so that the capacitors are not overstressed. This method does not take into account the stresses in other VFD components, especially the input diodes and terminal blocks. In this article, a new method of protecting the drive using the motor q-axis current is proposed. The motor q-axis current has information that is relevant to the stresses in various parts of the VFD, including the input diodes, input terminal block, and the dc bus capacitors. The output power can be limited by reducing the output frequency based on the average and ripple amplitude of the q-axis current instead of the dc-bus-voltage ripple. The traditional dc-bus-voltage-ripple-based fold-back method is experimentally compared with the proposed method using a VFD fed from a single-phase ac source to prove the concept.
Declines of the California red-legged frog: climate

The federally threatened California red-legged frog (Rana aurora draytonii) has disappeared from much of its range for unknown reasons. We mapped 237 historic locations for the species and determined their current population status. Using a geographic information system (GIS), we determined latitude, elevation, and land use attributes for all sites and analyzed the spatial pattern of declines. We then compared the observed patterns of decline to those predicted by the climate change, UV-B radiation, pesticides, and habitat alteration hypotheses for amphibian decline. Declines were not consistent with the climate change hypothesis but showed a strong positive association with elevation, percentage upwind agricultural land use, and local urbanization. These results apply to patterns of decline across the entire range of R. a. draytonii in California, as well as within geographic subregions. The elevational gradient in declines is consistent with the UV-B hypothesis, although the UV-B hypothesis also predicts a north-to-south gradient in declines, which we did not observe. The association of declines with the amount of upwind agricultural land use strongly suggests that wind-borne agrochemicals may be an important factor in declines. This association was most pronounced within the Central Valley-Sierra region, where other studies have documented both transport and deposition of pesticides to the Sierra Nevada and the presence of pesticide residues in the bodies of congeneric (Rana muscosa) and more distantly related (Hyla regilla) frog species.
Prevention of Bleomycin-Induced Pulmonary Fibrosis by a Novel Antifibrotic Peptide with Relaxin-Like Activity

Pulmonary fibrosis is a progressive and lethal lung disease characterized by accumulation of extracellular matrix and loss of pulmonary function. No cure exists for this pathologic condition, and current treatments often fail to slow its progression or relieve its symptoms. Relaxin was previously shown to induce a matrix-degrading phenotype in human lung fibroblasts in vitro and to inhibit pulmonary fibrosis in vivo. A novel peptide that targets the relaxin RXFP1/LGR7 receptor was recently identified using our computational platform designed to predict novel G protein-coupled receptor peptide agonists. In this study, we examined the antifibrotic properties of this novel peptide, designated CGEN25009, in human cell-based assays and in a murine model of bleomycin-induced pulmonary fibrosis. Similar to relaxin, CGEN25009 was found to have an inhibitory effect on transforming growth factor-β1-induced collagen deposition in human dermal fibroblasts and to enhance MMP-2 expression. The peptide's biological activity was also similar to relaxin in generating cellular stimulation of cAMP, cGMP, and NO in the THP-1 human cell line. In vivo, 2-week administration of CGEN25009 in a preventive or therapeutic mode (i.e., concurrently with or 7 days after bleomycin treatment, respectively) caused a significant reduction in lung inflammation and injury and ameliorated adverse airway remodeling and peribronchial fibrosis. The results of this study indicate that CGEN25009 displays antifibrotic and anti-inflammatory properties and may offer a new therapeutic option for the treatment of pulmonary fibrosis.
Time Series Analysis of Cholera in Matlab, Bangladesh, during 1988-2001

The study examined the impact of in-situ climatic and marine environmental variability on cholera incidence in an endemic area of Bangladesh and developed a forecasting model for understanding the magnitude of incidence. Diarrhoea surveillance data collected between 1988 and 2001were obtained from a field research site in Matlab, Bangladesh. Cholera cases were defined as Vibrio cholerae O1 isolated from faecal specimens of patients who sought care at treatment centres serving the Matlab population. Cholera incidence for 168 months was correlated with remotely-sensed sea-surface temperature (SST) and in-situ environmental data, including rainfall and ambient temperature. A seasonal autoregressive integrated moving average (SARIMA) model was used for determining the impact of climatic and environmental variability on cholera incidence and evaluating the ability of the model to forecast the magnitude of cholera. There were 4,157 cholera cases during the study period, with an average of 1.4 cases per 1,000 people. Since monthly cholera cases varied significantly by month, it was necessary to stabilize the variance of cholera incidence by computing the natural logarithm to conduct the analysis. The SARIMA model shows temporal clustering of cholera at one- and 12-month lags. There was a 6% increase in cholera incidence with a minimum temperature increase of one degree celsius in the current month. For increase of SST by one degree celsius, there was a 25% increase in the cholera incidence at currrent month and 18% increase in the cholera incidence at two months. Rainfall did not influenc to cause variation in cholera incidence during the study period. The model forecast the fluctuation of cholera incidence in Matlab reasonably well (Root mean square error, RMSE: 0.108). Thus, the ambient and sea-surface temperature-based model could be used in forecasting cholera outbreaks in Matlab.
Short-Term Memory for Serial Order: The Start-End Model

Three solutions to the problem of serial order can be identified: chaining, ordinal and positional theories. Error patterns in serial recall from short-term memory fail to support chaining theories, yet provide unequivocal evidence for positional theories. In a new model of short-term memory, the Start-End Model (SEM), the positions of items in a sequence are coded relative to the start and end of that sequence. Simulations confirm SEM's ability to capture the main phenomena in serial recall, such as the effects of primacy, recency, list length, grouping, modality, redundant suffices, proactive interference, retention interval, and phonological similarity. Moreover, SEM is the first model to capture the complete pattern of errors, including transpositions, repetitions, omissions, intrusions, confusions, and, in particular, positional errors between groups and between trials. Unlike other positional models however, SEM predicts that positional errors will maintain relative rather than absolute position, in agreement with recent experiments (Henson, 1977).
Using fixed point theorems to model the binding in protein-protein interactions

The binding in protein-protein interactions exhibits a kind of biochemical stability in cells. The mathematical notion of fixed points also describes stability. A point is a fixed point if it remains unchanged after a transformation by a function. Many points may not be a fixed point, but they may approach a stable status after multiple steps of transformation. In this paper, we define a point as a protein motif pair consisting of two traditional protein motifs. We propose a function and propose a method to discover stable motif pairs of this function from a large protein interaction, sequence data set. There are many interesting properties for this function (for example, the convergence). Some of them are useful for gaining much efficiency in the discovery of those stable motif pairs; some are useful for explaining why our proposed fixed point theorems are a good way to model the binding of protein interactions. Our results are also compared to biological results to elaborate the effectiveness, of our method.
Distinct roles of left inferior frontal regions that explain individual differences in second language acquisition

Second language (L2) acquisition is more susceptible to environmental and idiosyncratic factors than first language acquisition. Here, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging for L2 learners of different ages of first exposure (mean: 12.6 and 5.6 years) in a formal school environment, and compared the cortical activations involved in processing English sentences containing either syntactic or spelling errors, where the testing ages and task performances of both groups were matched. We found novel activation patterns in two regions of the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) that correlated differentially with the performances of the late and early learners. Specifically, activations of the dorsal and ventral triangular part (F3t) of the left IFG correlated positively with the accuracy of the syntactic task for the late learners, whereas activations of the left ventral F3t correlated negatively with the accuracy for the early learners. In contrast, other cortical regions exhibited differential correlation patterns with the reaction times (RTs) of the syntactic task. Namely, activations of the orbital part (F3O) of the left IFG, as well as those of the left angular gyrus, correlated positively with the RTs for the late learners, whereas those activations correlated negatively with the RTs for the early learners. Moreover, the task‐selective activation of the left F3O was maintained for both the late and early learners. These results explain individual differences in L2 acquisition, such that the acquisition of linguistic knowledge in L2 is subserved by at least two distinct inferior frontal regions of the left F3t and F3O. Hum Brain Mapp, 2009. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Authoritative school climate and suspension rates in middle schools: Implications for reducing the racial disparity in school discipline

ABSTRACT The overuse of school suspensions has been linked to a host of negative outcomes, including racial disparities in discipline. School climate initiatives have shown promise in reducing these disparities. The present study used the Authoritative School Climate Survey—which measures disciplinary structure and student support as key measures of school climate—to investigate an association between teacher and student perceptions of school climate and suspension rates in a statewide sample of middle schools. Regression analyses controlling for school-level poverty and school size found that elements of authoritative climate, particularly structure, distinguish high- and low-suspending schools. Schools with high levels of student- and teacher-reported structure had lower overall suspension rates and a lower gap between Black and White suspension rates. These findings can be used to guide school climate initiatives to reduce racial disparities in school discipline.
Stratosphere‐troposphere coupling and annular mode variability in chemistry‐climate models

The internal variability and coupling between the stratosphere and troposphere in CCMValA¢Â�Â�2 chemistryA¢Â�Â�climate models are evaluated through analysis of the annular mode patterns of variability. Computation of the annular modes in long data sets with secular trends requires refinement of the standard definition of the annular mode, and a more robust procedure that allows for slowly varying trends is established and verified. The spatial and temporal structure of the modelsA¢Â�Â� annular modes is then compared with that of reanalyses. As a whole, the models capture the key features of observed intraseasonal variability, including the sharp vertical gradients in structure between stratosphere and troposphere, the asymmetries in the seasonal cycle between the Northern and Southern hemispheres, and the coupling between the polar stratospheric vortices and tropospheric midlatitude jets. It is also found that the annular mode variability changes little in time throughout simulations of the 21st century. There are, however, both common biases and significant differences in performance in the models. In the troposphere, the annular mode in models is generally too persistent, particularly in the Southern Hemisphere summer, a bias similar to that found in CMIP3 coupled climate models. In the stratosphere, the periods of peak variance and coupling with the troposphere are delayed by about a month in both hemispheres. The relationship between increased variability of the stratosphere and increased persistence in the troposphere suggests that some tropospheric biases may be related to stratospheric biases and that a wellA¢Â�Â�simulated stratosphere can improve simulation of tropospheric intraseasonal variability.
Physiological Profiles of International- and Collegiate-Level Japanese Male Freestyle Wrestlers in the Lightweight Classes

Abstract The purpose of this study was to clarify the physiological abilities of international-level male wrestlers compared with those of collegiate-level wrestlers. Twenty Japanese male freestyle wrestlers in the lightweight classes were categorized into two groups. The first group comprised 11 international-level wrestlers. The second group comprised 9 collegiate-level wrestlers. Body composition was assessed by a multifrequency bioimpedance-analysis device. Isokinetic concentric knee and hip extension and flexion torque were measured using an isokinetic dynamometer at 180 and 60 deg/sec. Anthropometric data were obtained through three-dimensional scanning. Eleven circumferences (neck, both upper arms, both forearms, both thighs, both lower legs, chest, and hip) and four lengths (both arms and both legs) were computed. Simple reaction time was evaluated using an electronic device. Between-group comparisons of these variables were performed with unpaired t tests or Welch’s tests. There were no differences in body composition, circumferences, and limb length between groups, other than chest circumference (p < .05). There were no differences in hip and knee strength and simple reaction time between groups. These results suggest that chest circumference is important for becoming an international-level wrestler. Additionally, other aspects, such as multijoint motor and technical skills, may be important for international-level wrestlers.
Processing Deficits of Motion of Contrast-Modulated Gratings in Anisometropic Amblyopia

Several studies have indicated substantial processing deficits for static second-order stimuli in amblyopia. However, less is known about the perception of second-order moving gratings. To investigate this issue, we measured the contrast sensitivity for second-order (contrast-modulated) moving gratings in seven anisometropic amblyopes and ten normal controls. The measurements were performed with non-equated carriers and a series of equated carriers. For comparison, the sensitivity for first-order motion and static second-order stimuli was also measured. Most of the amblyopic eyes (AEs) showed reduced sensitivity for second-order moving gratings relative to their non-amblyopic eyes (NAEs) and the dominant eyes (CEs) of normal control subjects, even when the detectability of the noise carriers was carefully controlled, suggesting substantial processing deficits of motion of contrast-modulated gratings in anisometropic amblyopia. In contrast, the non-amblyopic eyes of the anisometropic amblyopes were relatively spared. As a group, NAEs showed statistically comparable performance to CEs. We also found that contrast sensitivity for static second-order stimuli was strongly impaired in AEs and part of the NAEs of anisometropic amblyopes, consistent with previous studies. In addition, some amblyopes showed impaired performance in perception of static second-order stimuli but not in that of second-order moving gratings. These results may suggest a dissociation between the processing of static and moving second-order gratings in anisometropic amblyopia.