Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Adolescent fear of crime: Testing Ferraro’s risk interpretation model

The aim of this study is to broaden the scope of knowledge on fear of crime by examining if Ferraro’s risk interpretation model of fear of crime also holds true for the adolescent population. Using data on approximately 1500 Czech students in middle and grammar school, we test three different models. First, the classic model of fear of crime, applied originally to adults, is estimated. Second, the role of perceived school disorganization is examined, taking into account that adolescents spend a substantial part of the day at school. Finally, we propose an extension of Ferraro’s model by considering parental supervision as a factor influencing adolescent fear of crime through risk perception and avoidance behaviour. The results indicate that Ferraro’s original model of fear of crime can be appropriately applied to both adults and adolescents. Nevertheless, adolescent risk perception, which remains the most influential determinant of individual fear, seems to be influenced by stimuli stemming from the school rather than the neighbourhood environment. Furthermore, the relationship between parental supervision and fear of crime is mediated by avoidance behaviour, while no direct effect of parental supervision on risk perception and fear of crime was found in the data.
Impact of Ambient Humidity on Child Health: A Systematic Review

Background and Objectives Changes in relative humidity, along with other meteorological factors, accompany ongoing climate change and play a significant role in weather-related health outcomes, particularly among children. The purpose of this review is to improve our understanding of the relationship between ambient humidity and child health, and to propose directions for future research. Methods A comprehensive search of electronic databases (PubMed, Medline, Web of Science, ScienceDirect, OvidSP and EBSCO host) and review of reference lists, to supplement relevant studies, were conducted in March 2013. All identified records were selected based on explicit inclusion criteria. We extracted data from the included studies using a pre-designed data extraction form, and then performed a quality assessment. Various heterogeneities precluded a formal quantitative meta-analysis, therefore, evidence was compiled using descriptive summaries. Results Out of a total of 3797 identified records, 37 papers were selected for inclusion in this review. Among the 37 studies, 35% were focused on allergic diseases and 32% on respiratory system diseases. Quality assessment revealed 78% of the studies had reporting quality scores above 70%, and all findings demonstrated that ambient humidity generally plays an important role in the incidence and prevalence of climate-sensitive diseases among children. Conclusions With climate change, there is a significant impact of ambient humidity on child health, especially for climate-sensitive infectious diseases, diarrhoeal diseases, respiratory system diseases, and pediatric allergic diseases. However, some inconsistencies in the direction and magnitude of the effects are observed.
Analysis of Timing Jitter for Ultrashort Soliton Communication Systems Using Perturbation Methods

Abstract We analyse timing jitter of ultrashort soliton systems taking into account the major higher order effects, namely, intrapulse Raman scattering and third order dispersion and using adiabatic perturbation theory. We obtain an expression for the soliton arrival time variance that depends on the quintic power of propagation distance. This timing jitter could be partly overcome by use of bandwidth-limited amplification as it happens in systems using longer solitons. In this case the quintic dependence with distance is reduced to a linear one.
Mapping of three carbohydrate attachment sites in embryonic and adult forms of the neural cell adhesion molecule

The sialic-rich carbohydrate moiety of the neural cell adhesion molecule (N-CAM) undergoes major structural changes during development and plays a significant role in altering the homophilic binding of the molecule. In order to understand the mechanism of these changes, a cyanogen bromide (CNBr) fragment that contained 90% of the sialic acid of N-CAM was isolated and characterized according to the number of carbohydrate attachment sites and reactivity with specific monoclonal antibodies. The CNBr sialopeptide migrated on SDS PAGE as a broad zone of Mr 42,000-60,000. Upon treatment with neuraminidase, it was converted to a single component of Mr 42,000, and subsequent, limited treatment with endoglycosidase F gave four evenly spaced components of Mr 35,000-42,000, suggesting that it contained three attachment sites for N-linked oligosaccharides. The fragment reacted with monoclonal antibody 15G8, which detects the sialic acid in embryonic N-CAM, and with a monoclonal antibody, anti-(N-CAM) No. 2. Treatment with neuraminidase or with endoglycosidase F destroyed reactivity with 15G8 but not with anti-(N-CAM) No. 2. A similar CNBr sialopeptide was obtained from adult N-CAM; it contained sialic acid, had three N-linked oligosaccharides and reacted with anti-(N-CAM) No. 2 but not with 15G8 monoclonal antibodies. A peptide fragment, Fr2, comprising the NH2 terminal and middle regions of the molecule yielded a CNBr fragment closely similar to the fragment obtained from the whole molecule. The CNBr fragment from Fr2 reacted with monoclonal antibody anti-(N-CAM) No. 2. Fr1, comprising the NH2 terminal region alone, failed to react. These data confirm that the majority of the sialic acid is localized in the middle region of the N-CAM molecule and support the hypothesis that embryonic to adult conversion of N-CAM is the result of differences in sialidase or sialytransferase activity.
Adaptable Mechanisms That Regulate the Contrast Response of Neurons in the Primate Lateral Geniculate Nucleus

The response of the classical receptive field of visual neurons can be suppressed by stimuli that, when presented alone, cause no change in the discharge rate. This suppression reveals the presence of an extraclassical receptive field (ECRF). In recordings from the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) of a New World primate, the marmoset, we characterize the mechanisms that contribute to the ECRF by measuring their spatiotemporal tuning during prolonged exposure to a high-contrast grating (contrast adaptation). The ECRF was strongest in magnocellular cells, where contrast adaptation reduced suppression from the ECRF: adaptation of the ECRF transferred across spatial frequency, temporal frequency, and orientation, but not across space. This implies that the ECRF of LGN cells comprises multiple adaptable mechanisms, each broadly tuned but spatially localized, and consistent with a retinal origin. Signals from the ECRF saturated at high contrasts, and so adaptation of one part of the ECRF brought into its operating range signals from other parts of the visual field. Although the ECRF is adaptable, its major impact during contrast adaptation to a spatially extended pattern was to reduce visual response and hence reduce a neuron's susceptibility to contrast adaptation; in normal viewing, a major role of the ECRF might be to protect visual sensitivity in scenes dominated by high contrast.
An Empirical Evaluation of OS Support for Real-time CORBA Object Request Brokers

There is increasing demand to extend Object Request Broker (ORB) middleware to support distributed applications with stringent real-time requirements. However, lack of proper OS support can yield substantial inefficiency and unpredictability for ORB middleware. This paper provides two contributions to the study of OS support for real-time ORBs. First, we empirically compare and evaluate the suitability of real-time operating systems, VxWorks and LynxOS, and general-purpose operating systems with real-time extensions, Windows NT, Solaris, and Linux, for real-time ORB middleware. While holding the hardware and ORB constant, we vary the operating system and measure platform-specific variations, such as latency, jitter, operation throughput, and CPU processing overhead. Second, we describe key areas where these operating systems must improve to support predictable, efficient, and scalable ORBs. Our findings illustrate that general-purpose operating systems like Windows NT and Solaris are not yet suited to meet the demands of applications with stringent QoS requirements. However, LynxOS does enable predictable and efficient ORB performance, thereby making it a compelling OS platform for real-time CORBA applications. Linux provides good raw performance, though it is not a real-time operating system. Surprisingly, VxWorks does not scale robustly. In general, our results underscore the need for a measure-driven methodology to pinpoint sources of priority inversion and non-determinism in real-time ORB endsystems.
Linkage and Association Mapping of Arabidopsis thaliana Flowering Time in Nature

Flowering time is a key life-history trait in the plant life cycle. Most studies to unravel the genetics of flowering time in Arabidopsis thaliana have been performed under greenhouse conditions. Here, we describe a study about the genetics of flowering time that differs from previous studies in two important ways: first, we measure flowering time in a more complex and ecologically realistic environment; and, second, we combine the advantages of genome-wide association (GWA) and traditional linkage (QTL) mapping. Our experiments involved phenotyping nearly 20,000 plants over 2 winters under field conditions, including 184 worldwide natural accessions genotyped for 216,509 SNPs and 4,366 RILs derived from 13 independent crosses chosen to maximize genetic and phenotypic diversity. Based on a photothermal time model, the flowering time variation scored in our field experiment was poorly correlated with the flowering time variation previously obtained under greenhouse conditions, reinforcing previous demonstrations of the importance of genotype by environment interactions in A. thaliana and the need to study adaptive variation under natural conditions. The use of 4,366 RILs provides great power for dissecting the genetic architecture of flowering time in A. thaliana under our specific field conditions. We describe more than 60 additive QTLs, all with relatively small to medium effects and organized in 5 major clusters. We show that QTL mapping increases our power to distinguish true from false associations in GWA mapping. QTL mapping also permits the identification of false negatives, that is, causative SNPs that are lost when applying GWA methods that control for population structure. Major genes underpinning flowering time in the greenhouse were not associated with flowering time in this study. Instead, we found a prevalence of genes involved in the regulation of the plant circadian clock. Furthermore, we identified new genomic regions lacking obvious candidate genes.
The Dynamic Impact of Ict Spillovers on Companies' Productivity Performance

Using company account data for the US and four European countries this paper analyses the impact of ICT spillovers on companies’ performance. We use different definitions of spillovers to account for inter and intra-industry spillover effects, as well as assessing the presence of spillovers from the US to Europe. We also look at the possibility that spillovers might take some time to materialise, by comparing their short and long run impact. Our results show that ICT spillovers affect productivity differently in the US and in Europe in the short run but in the long run such differences are less profound. JEL classification: C23, D24, D62
Driving HIV-1 into a Vulnerable Corner by Taking Advantage of Viral Adaptation and Evolution

Anti-retroviral therapy (ART) is crucial for controlling human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1) infection. Recently, progress in identifying and characterizing highly potent broadly neutralizing antibodies has provided valuable templates for HIV-1 therapy and vaccine design. Nevertheless, HIV-1, like many RNA viruses, exhibits genetically diverse populations known as quasispecies. Evolution of quasispecies can occur rapidly in response to selective pressures, such as that exerted by ART and the immune system. Hence, rapid viral evolution leading to drug resistance and/or immune evasion is a significant barrier to the development of effective HIV-1 treatments and vaccines. Here, we describe our recent investigations into evolutionary pressure exerted by anti-retroviral drugs and monoclonal neutralizing antibodies (NAbs) on HIV-1 envelope sequences. We also discuss sensitivities of HIV-1 escape mutants to maraviroc, a CCR5 inhibitor, and HIV-1 sensitized to NAbs by small-molecule CD4-mimetic compounds. These studies help to develop an understanding of viral evolution and escape from both anti-retroviral drugs and the immune system, and also provide fundamental insights into the combined use of NAbs and entry inhibitors. These findings of the adaptation and evolution of HIV in response to drug and immune pressure will inform the development of more effective antiviral therapeutic strategies.
Impaired LDL Receptor-Related Protein 1 Translocation Correlates with Improved Dyslipidemia and Atherosclerosis in apoE-Deficient Mice

Objective Determination of the in vivo significance of LDL receptor-related protein 1 (LRP1) dysfunction on lipid metabolism and atherosclerosis development in absence of its main ligand apoE. Methods and Results LRP1 knock-in mice carrying an inactivating mutation in the NPxYxxL motif were crossed with apoE-deficient mice. In the absence of apoE, relative to LRP1 wild-type animals, LRP1 mutated mice showed an increased clearance of postprandial lipids despite a compromised LRP1 endocytosis rate and inefficient insulin-mediated translocation of the receptor to the plasma membrane, likely due to inefficient slow recycling of the mutated receptor. Postprandial lipoprotein improvement was explained by increased hepatic clearance of triglyceride-rich remnant lipoproteins and accompanied by a compensatory 1.6-fold upregulation of LDLR expression in hepatocytes. One year-old apoE-deficient mice having the dysfunctional LRP1 revealed a 3-fold decrease in spontaneous atherosclerosis development and a 2-fold reduction in LDL-cholesterol levels. Conclusion These findings demonstrate that the NPxYxxL motif in LRP1 is important for insulin-mediated translocation and slow perinuclear endosomal recycling. These LRP1 impairments correlated with reduced atherogenesis and cholesterol levels in apoE-deficient mice, likely via compensatory LDLR upregulation.
Risk minimization by median-of-means tournaments

We consider the classical statistical learning/regression problem, when the value of a real random variable Y is to be predicted based on the observation of another random variable X. Given a class of functions F and a sample of independent copies of (X, Y ), one needs to choose a function f from F such that f(X) approximates Y as well as possible, in the mean-squared sense. We introduce a new procedure, the so-called median-of-means tournament, that achieves the optimal tradeoff between accuracy and confidence under minimal assumptions, and in particular outperforms classical methods based on empirical risk minimization.
Digital Democracy: Reimagining Pathways to Political Participation

Recently, research revolving around blogs has flourished. Usually, academics illustrate what blogs are, motivations to blog, and, only to some extent, their role in politics. Along these lines, we examine the impact of digital politics by looking specifically at blog readers. Although blog readers might be considered at the forefront of a new technological revolution, and people have speculated about their participatory habits both online and off, little research has specifically looked at this growing proportion of the population. This article models factors that predict traditional and online forms of participation, presenting a portrait of a new type of political advocate.
Intelligence Is What the Intelligence Test Measures. Seriously

The mutualism model, an alternative for the g-factor model of intelligence, implies a formative measurement model in which "g" is an index variable without a causal role. If this model is accurate, the search for a genetic of brain instantiation of "g" is deemed useless. This also implies that the (weighted) sum score of items of an intelligence test is just what it is: a weighted sum score. Preference for one index above the other is a pragmatic issue that rests mainly on predictive value.
Transitioning Racial/Ethnic Minorities With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities: Influence of Socioeconomic Status on Related Services

Related services were examined for 1,400 racial/ethnic transitioning minorities enrolled in the National Longitudinal Transition Study–2 database after adjusting for demographic and socioeconomic variables. Propensity methods balanced minorities (32%) and nonminorities (68%) on demographic and socioeconomic factors. Logistic regressions determined predictors of each outcome while incorporating propensity scores and survey weights. Education and income influenced more service receipt; whereas, percentage of persons with free or reduced lunch and minorities in high school had lower service receipt. After incorporating propensity scores, differences between minorities and nonminorities attenuated for occupational therapy and career counseling and increased for assistive technology with no services reaching significance after adjustment. Complex analyses incorporating socioeconomic factors best determine differences between racial/ethnic transitioning minorities with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Planning for water sensitive communities: The need for a bottom up systems approach

The impacts of making average demand assumptions on water security predictions and distribution patterns is investigated using calibrated bottom up multi-scale numerical models of the Greater Melbourne and Sydney water networks. The calibrated models, which are highly spatially and temporally resolved, are progressively modified by removing their temporal and spatial granularity and replacing demands with various average assumptions. It is shown that average assumptions lead to material differences in model predictive behaviour, and that the directions of these differences are unpredictable and sometimes lead to counterintuitive outcomes. It is concluded that the application of average demand assumptions of any kind is difficult to support and that doing so has the potential to influence heavily infrastructure investment and, more broadly, policy direction.
A Functional Grammar

Functional Grammar describes grammar in functional terms in which a language is interpreted as a system of meanings. The language system consists of three macro-functions known as meta-functional components: the interpersonal function, the ideational function, and the textual function, all of which make a contribution to the structure of a text. The concepts discussed in Functional Grammar aims at giving contribution to the understanding of a text and evaluation of a text, which can be applied for text analysis. Using the concepts in Functional Grammar, English teachers may help the students learn how various grammatical features and grammatical systems are used in written texts so that they can read and write better.
STRATEGI REGULASI EMOSI PADA KORBAN PERSELINGKUHAN

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui gambaran strategi regulasi emosi dewasa madya yang menjadi korban perselingkuhan. Penelitian ini berfokus kepada bagaimana korban perselingkuhan memunculkan emosi, kapan, dan bagaimana individu mengekspresikan emosi tersebut. Penelitian ini juga berfokus kepada faktor eksternal yang dapat mempengaruhi strategi regulasi emosi korban perselingkuhan. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode penelitian kualitatif dengan pendekatan studi kasus intrinsik. Data yang diperolah dianalisis dengan membuat tema sehingga dapat mendeskripsikan strategi regulasi emosi korban. Penelitian ini melibatkan 3 subjek penelitian dewasa madya yang menjadi korban perselingkuhan. Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa strategi regulasi emosi yang digunakan oleh ketiga subyek cenderung sama namun dengan cara yang berbeda. Penelitian ini juga menunjukkan bahwa terjadi dinamika pada perubahan kognitif dan seleksi situasi yang dialami oleh subyek 1 dan subyek 2. Dukungan dari lingkungan sosial juga mempengaruhi strategi regulasi emosi pada ketiga subyek. Penelitian ini juga menunjukkan bahwa penggunaan strategi regulasi emosi antara pria dan wanita memiliki perbedaan.
The Case for Multiple Views

We argue that viewing a program as a linear sequence of symbols on paper or on a display is outmoded and unnecessarily restrictive. Instead, programs should be regarded as complex multi-dimensional artifacts on which linear text provides but one possible view. Freeing ourselves from these restrictions is very difficult: it requires not only a modest amount of new technology, but also a qualitative change in the way that programmers think. However, the potential benefits are enormous. Multiple views make it easier to understand complex programs, and provide a unifying framework for many common program transformations. In addition, Multiple views provide a solution for language designers trying to choose between competing alternatives: provide the advantages of both, but in different views.
Genome-Wide Analysis of Gene and Protein Expression of Dysplastic Naevus Cells

Cutaneous melanoma, a type of skin tumor originating from melanocytes, often develops from premalignant naevoid lesions via a gradual transformation process driven by an accumulation of (epi)genetic lesions. These dysplastic naevi display altered morphology and often proliferation of melanocytes. Additionally, melanocytes in dysplastic naevi show structural mitochondrial and melanosomal alterations and have elevated reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels. For this study we performed genome-wide expression and proteomic analysis of melanocytes from dysplastic naevus (DNMC) and adjacent normal skin (MC) from 18 patients. Whole genome expression profiles of the DNMC and MC of each individual patient subjected to GO-based comparative statistical analysis yielded significantly differentially expressed GO classes including “organellar ribosome,” “mitochondrial ribosome,” “hydrogen ion transporter activity,” and “prefoldin complex. ” Validation of 5 genes from these top GO classes revealed a heterogeneous differential expression pattern. Proteomic analysis demonstrated differentially expressed proteins in DNMC that are involved in cellular metabolism, detoxification, and cytoskeletal organization processes, such as GTP-binding Rho-like protein CDC42, glutathione-S-transferase omega-1 and prolyl 4-hydroxylase. Collectively these results point to deregulation of cellular processes, such as metabolism and protein synthesis, consistent with the observed elevated oxidative stress levels in DNMC potentially resulting in oxidative DNA damage in these cells.