Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Unresolved Questions Concerning Mammalian Sperm Acrosomal Exocytosis1

ABSTRACT In recent years, the study of mammalian acrosomal exocytosis has produced some major advances that challenge the long-held, general paradigms in the field. Principally, the idea that sperm must be acrosome-intact to bind to the zona pellucida of unfertilized eggs, based largely on in vitro fertilization studies of mouse oocytes denuded of the cumulus oophorus, has been overturned by experiments using state-of-the-art imaging of cumulus-intact oocytes and fertilization experiments where eggs were reinseminated by acrosome-reacted sperm recovered from the perivitelline space of zygotes. In light of these results, this minireview highlights a number of unresolved questions and emphasizes the fact that there is still much work to be done in this exciting field. Future experiments using recently advanced technologies should lead to a more complete and accurate understanding of the molecular mechanisms governing the fertilization process in mammals.
Anthropology in and of the Archives: Possible Futures and Contingent Pasts. Archives as Anthropological Surrogates*

Derrida and Foucault provide key starting points to understanding archives. They see archives as hegemonic, characterizing ways of thought, modes of colonization, and the control of citizens. However, they also make clear that archives can be read subversively. With patience, counter-readings allow the excavation of the voices (sometimes names) of subaltern and otherwise suppressed others from the archive. By reading along and across the archival grain, researchers can follow the development of ideas and processes across historical periods. Archives can be seen as orphanages, containing surrogates of performances. Archives (paper and digital) also provide access to the results of anthropological research in ways mandated by ethics codes, but these are subject to controversy. What sorts of consent and what sorts of anonymization should be provided? Archives run by the groups traditionally studied by anthropologists provide models of radical archives that are very different from those conceived of by tradit.
Publication Bias: A Computer-Assisted Demonstration of excluding Nonsignificant Results from Research Interpretation

This article describes a computer-assisted classroom demonstration illustrating the consequences of excluding nonsignificant findings from interpreting published literature. This demonstration, based on tenets of the Central Limit Theorem, simulates research interpretation when the full range of results are available compared with the subsample of significant results only. Results demonstrated that (a) exclusion of nonsignificant findings positively biases research interpretation and (b) smaller sample sizes are prone to greater bias when nonsignificant results are excluded from research interpretation.
Retribution, deterrence and reform: the dilemmas of plagiarism management in universities

Universities face constant scrutiny about their plagiarism management strategies, policies and procedures. A resounding theme, usually media inspired, is that plagiarism is rife, unstoppable and university processes are ineffectual in its wake. This has been referred to as a ‘moral panic’ approach (Carroll & Sutherland-Smith, forthcoming; Clegg, 2007) and suggests plagiarism will thwart all efforts to reclaim academic integrity in higher education. However, revisiting the origins of plagiarism and exploring its legal evolution reveals that legal discourse is the foundation for many plagiarism management policies and processes around the world. Interestingly, criminal justice aims are also reflected in university plagiarism management strategies. Although universities strive for deterrence of plagiarism in a variety of ways, the media most often calls for retribution through increasingly tougher penalties. However, a primary aim of the justice system, sustainable reform, is not often reported in the media or visible in university policies or processes. Using critical discourse analysis, this paper examines the disjunction between media calls for increased retribution in the wake of moral panic and institutional responses to plagiarism. I argue that many universities have not yet moved to sustainable reform in plagiarism management.
Lessons of Disaster: Policy Change after Catastrophic Events

Lessons of Disaster: Policy Change after Catastrophic Events. By Thomas A. Birkland. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2006. 240p. $44.95 cloth, $26.95 paper. Lessons of Disaster is a natural follow-up to the author's previous book, After Disaster (1997), which examined the extent to which disasters and accidents influence policy agendas within relevant domains. Lessons of Disaster is built on this previous work but focuses specifically on whether or not disasters, as focusing events, induce policy learning. The author differentiates between simple policy change and actual policy learning by defining learning as a process by which policy actors incorporate new information and insights revealed by a disaster and purposefully apply it to the design of more appropriate or effective policies.
The growth and the stagnation of work stress

Stress at work is a frequent subject of scientific research. In most of this, the unit of analysis has been the employee and his or her work stress. Historical, cultural and macro-contextual approaches have rarely been included in the analytical framework. In this study, we examined secular trends in scientific publications on work stress, and analysed how, over a period of 50 years, a new discursive, institutional, intellectual and subjective space has developed, in which questions related to workers’ diminished mental energy became the centre of attention. Our interpretation links the occupational health debate to the broader historical and cultural processes that took place in western countries and work organizations in the period 1960–2011. Our quantitative analysis shows how the number of work stress publications rose steeply until the early 2000s and how the growth evened out and even started to decline in some data sources in the early 2010s. It would seem that work stress research is reaching its peak and that other conceptualizations in the domain of occupational health (e.g. resource-based views) are becoming more important. This historical study provides new insights regarding the nature of work stress and its links with societal changes for all those interested in the changing nature of health at work.
Self-Efficacy, Decision-Making, and Stages of Change: An Integrative Model of Physical Exercise1

Exercise has important health benefits but a large proportion of the population is physically inactive. We examined the stages of readiness to exercise and their relationship to self-efficacy, the costs and benefits of exercising, and self-report of physical activity in a sample of Rhode Island worksites. Using a three-step model-building approach, exploratory principal components analyses were followed by an examination of the stages of change model with confirmatory structural equation modeling procedures. The model was then examined with longitudinal data. Confirmatory and longitudinal analyses showed an excellent tit between the model and the data. Results indicated that the costs and benefits of exercise and self-efficacy for exercise were related to physical activity only indirectly, through the mediation of stage of readiness to exercise. Structural modeling fit indices revealed that much of the variation and covariation in physical activity was explained by the model. There is the potential to enhance the impact of exercise interventions, by targeting them so as to address factors related to these different stages of readiness.
Cross-National Comparison of Religious Conviction and the Meaning of Work

This article examines religious conviction in relation to the meaning of work through representative samples of the labor forces in Ger many, Israel, and the Netherlands. Among workers with strong religious convictions in Germany and the Netherlands, the meaning of work was positively related to the variables of work centrality, obligation norms, and intrinsic orientation. However, the same workers negatively related the meaning of work to economic orien tation and entitlement norms. The picture in Israel was the opposite. Nonreligious Israelis, Germans, and Dutch people with strong religious convictions seemed to adhere to the Judeo-Protestant work ethic.
AdaNet: Adaptive Structural Learning of Artificial Neural Networks

We present new algorithms for adaptively learning artificial neural networks. Our algorithms (AdaNet) adaptively learn both the structure of the network and its weights. They are based on a solid theoretical analysis, including data-dependent generalization guarantees that we prove and discuss in detail. We report the results of large-scale experiments with one of our algorithms on several binary classification tasks extracted from the CIFAR-10 dataset. The results demonstrate that our algorithm can automatically learn network structures with very competitive performance accuracies when compared with those achieved for neural networks found by standard approaches.
Power and Personality Perception in Real–Life Hierarchical Relationships

The present study examined how Big Five personality ratings of the same target individuals differ as a function of the power relation between the target and the judge. Our targets were 37 employees with leadership duties from two large organizations. The targets‘ subordinates (N = 352), peers (N = 186), and superiors (N = 62) constituted our groups of judges. The targets and judges also provided self–reports of personality. Subordinate judges showed higher consensus but not higher self–other agreement than peer or superior judges. Furthermore, the targets were judged as more extraverted, more emotionally stable, less agreeable, and less open to experience by their subordinates than by their superiors. The results suggest that (i) observer consensus, but not self–other agreement or assumed similarity varies as a function of real–life power; (ii) the effects of power on mean trait scores are mostly congruent with the previously observed effects of power on behaviour and on stereotypes. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Assessment of Renal Function in Patients with Unilateral Ureteral Obstruction Using Whole-Organ Perfusion Imaging with 320-Detector Row Computed Tomography

Background Obstructed nephropathy is a common complication of several disease processes. Accurate evaluation of the functional status of the obstructed kidney is important to achieve a good outcome. The purpose of this study was to investigate renal cortical and medullary perfusion changes associated with unilateral ureteral obstruction (UUO) using whole-organ perfusion imaging with 320-detector row computed tomography (CT). Methodology/Principle Findings Sixty-four patients with UUO underwent whole-organ CT perfusion imaging. Patients were divided into 3 groups, mild, moderate, and severe, based on hydronephrosis severity. Twenty sex- and age-matched patients without renal disease, who referred to abdominal CT, were chosen as control subjects. Mean cortical and medullary perfusion parameters of obstructed and contralateral kidneys were compared, and mean perfusion ratios between obstructed and contralateral kidneys were calculated and compared. Mean cortical or medullary blood flow (BF) and blood volume (BV) of the obstructed kidneys in the moderate UUO and BF, BV, and clearance (CL) in the severe UUO were significantly lower than those of the contralateral kidneys (p < 0.05). The mean cortical or medullary BF of the obstructed kidney in the moderate UUO, and BF, BV, and CL in the severe UUO were significantly lower than those of the kidneys in control subjects (p < 0.05). Mean cortical or medullary BF of the non-obstructed kidneys in the severe UUO were statistically greater than that of normal kidneys in control subjects (p < 0.05). An inverse correlation was observed between cortical and medullary perfusion ratios and grades of hydronephosis (p < 0.01). Conclusions/Significance Perfusion measurements of the whole kidney can be obtained with 320-detector row CT, and estimated perfusion ratios have potential for quantitatively evaluating UUO renal injury grades.
Interleukin 6: a possible marker of disease activity in adult onset Still's disease.

OBJECTIVE Adult onset Still's disease (AOSD) is an inflammatory disorder with elevated serum acute phase proteins. Interleukin-6 is a major contributor to the acute phase response. We therefore examined the serum levels of CRP, SAA and interleukin-6 in active and inactive AOSD. RESULTS Active patients had significantly elevated CRP, SAA, and interleukin-6 values. After steroid treatment a marked reduction was observed in all three parameters. There was a close kinetics on the fluctuations of CRP and SAA, but not on IL-6. CONCLUSION Acute phase proteins and IL-6 are useful markers of disease activity in AOSD.
Hey Brother, How's Your Health?

Men, especially African American men, have poorer health than women. To identify concerns and experiences that may contribute to this disparity, participatory action research methods were used to conduct six focus groups with fifty-nine participants in a North Carolina city. Aspects of male gender socialization were identified as major barriers to health. This socialization influences many behaviors in which men engage, such as unhealthy diet, limited exercise, unsafe sex, and substance abuse. Focus group participants with fewer educational and financial resources discussed drug-infested communities, economic barriers, crime, lack of affordable health insurance, and perceived discrimination in health care encounters. Participants with more formal education and more financial resources expressed concerns about managed care and chronic diseases. These results demonstrate the importance of male gender socialization in the health of African American men. In addition, economic class must be taken into account when addressing the health of African American men.
An Individual Differences Measure of Attributions That Affect Achievement Behavior

Attributing a negative achievement outcome (e.g., failing a test) to causes that are personally uncontrollable and stable elicits a low expectancy of future success, feelings of hopelessness in that domain, and reduced behavioral efforts to succeed. Thus, a tendency to make such attributions (i.e., dysfunctional academic attributional style) is an individual differences variable that puts people at risk. Two studies examine the factor structure and predictive validity of the Academic Attributional Style Questionnaire (AASQ). Study 1 (using two independent samples) found that the AASQ is a factorially valid measure of functional and dysfunctional attributional styles. In Study 2, during repeated failure in an academic task, the success expectancies, hopefulness, and behavioral persistence of students with a dysfunctional attributional style were lower than those of students with a functional attributional style. These findings modify the attributional theory of achievement motivation (Weiner, 1985) by positing an individual differences moderator variable (i.e., attributional style) and extend attributional research on at-risk students.
Effect of the Urbanization of Wetlands on Microclimate: A Case Study of Xixi Wetland, Hangzhou, China

Urbanization affects the microclimate and forms a unique urban climate environment. To deepen the understanding on the microclimate regulation function of an urban wetland, this study analyzed the influence of a suburb wetland’s urbanization process on the local climate through contrast observations of the protected wetland area and the former wetland area in Xixi wetland. Results show that the urbanization of suburb wetlands has an impact on the local microclimate and decreases human comfort, and that wetlands can effectively regulate the microclimate. The fragmentation of urban wetlands caused by urban sprawl decreases their microclimate regulation function, a decrease that is particularly evident in summer. Additionally, wetlands stabilize the microclimate in all seasons. For every land cover type in wetlands, vegetation has a better stabilizing effect on temperature, whereas a water body has a better stabilizing effect on wind speed and humidity. Meteorological conditions also affect the microclimate regulation function of wetlands. Temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, and wind speed influence the cooling function of urban wetlands, while solar radiation modifies the humidifying function of urban wetlands.
Heterogeneous Topographic and Cellular Distribution of Huntingtin Expression in the Normal Human Neostriatum

A striking heterogeneous distribution of topographic and cellular huntingtin immunoreactivity was observed within the human neostriatum using three distinct huntingtin antibodies. Patchy areas of low huntingtin immunoreactivity were present in both the caudate nucleus and putamen, surrounded by an intervening area of greater immunoreactivity. Comparison of huntingtin immunoreactivity with contiguous serial sections stained for enkephalin and calbindin D28k immunoreactivities showed that the topographic heterogeneity of huntingtin immunostaining corresponded to the patch (striosome) and matrix compartments within the striatum. Huntingtin immunoreactivity was confined primarily to neurons and neuropil within the matrix compartment, whereas little or no neuronal or neuropil huntingtin immunostaining was observed within the patch compartment. There was marked variability in the intensity of huntingtin immunolabel among medium-sized striatal neurons, whereas a majority of large striatal neurons were only faintly positive or without any immunoreactivity. Combined techniques for NADPH-diaphorase enzyme histochemistry and huntingtin immunocytochemistry, as well as double immunofluorescence for either nitric oxide synthase or calbindin D28k in comparison with huntingtin expression, revealed a striking correspondence between calbindin D28k and huntingtin immunoreactivities, with little or no colocalization between NADPH-diaphorase or nitric oxide synthase neurons and huntingtin expression. These observations suggest that the selective vulnerability of spiny striatal neurons and the matrix compartment observed in Huntington’s disease is associated with higher levels of huntingtin expression, whereas the relative resistance of large and medium-sized aspiny neurons and the patch compartments to degeneration is associated with low levels of huntingtin expression.
Arts-based Teaching: A Pedagogy of Imagination and a Conduit to a Socially Just Education

â€œWhen all is said and done,â€ contends Hammond (1997), â€œwhat matters most for studentsâ€™ learning are the commitments and capacities of their teachers. â€ This paper examines how 53 teachers gained, through arts-based professional development implementations, an understanding of the power of the arts and developed deeper perceptions about student voice and higher-order thinking to provide all children the possibility of success in learning. The writings of the participants were examined using document analysis to determine how the teachers developed an understanding of a pedagogy of social justice, and how the use of arts-based approaches contributed to this perspective.
Superintendent Vulnerability and Mobility

Since the turn of the century, public school superintendents have often exhibited less of their superintendent-scholar persona as they administer ever-increasing expenditures in educational programs. As a survival tactic, the more pragmatic approach of top school chief executive officers (CEOs) has been to utilize business management practices that are thought to increase the length of their tenure as leaders of their districts. The benefit of borrowing strategies from the business world evolved as superintendents fought for recognition as good managers who are regarded as valuable by most school board members, businessmen in the community, and taxpayers in general. That way, it was reasoned, success in at least one arena was guaranteed, even if the schools under their leadership were not deemed academically successful.
A Novel Approach of Area-Efficient FIR Filter Design Using Distributed Arithmetic with Decomposed LUT

Abstract: In this paper, a highly area-efficient multiplier-less FIR filter is presented. Distributed Arithmetic (DA) has been used to implement a bit-serial scheme of a general asymmetric version of an FIR filter, taking optimal advantage of the 3-input LUT-based structure of FPGAs. The implementation of FIR filters on FPGA based on traditional arithmetic method costs considerable hardware resources, which goes against the decrease of circuit scale and the increase of system speed. This paper presents the realization of area efficient architectures using Distributed Arithmetic (DA) for implementation of Finite Impulse Response (FIR) filter. The performance of the bit-serial and bit parallel DA along with pipelining architecture with different quantized versions are analyzed for FIR filter Design. Distributed Arithmetic structure is used to increase the resource usage while pipeline structure is also used to increase the system speed. In addition, the divided LUT method is also used to decrease the required memory units. However, according to Distributed Arithmetic, we can make a Look-Up-Table (LUT) to conserve the MAC values and callout the values according to the input data if necessary. Therefore, LUT can be created to take the place of MAC units so as to save the hardware resources. The simulation results indicate that FIR filters using Distributed Arithmetic can work stable with high speed and can save almost 50 percent hardware resources to decrease the circuit scale, and can be applied to a variety of areas for its great flexibility and high reliability. This method not only reduces the LUT size, but also modifies the structure of the filter to achieve high speed performance.
Making the hidden curriculum visible: sustainability literacy in higher education

Despite strong political support for the development of sustainability literacy amongst the UK graduates, embedding sustainability in the higher education curriculum has met with widespread indifference, and in some cases, active resistance. However, opportunities exist beyond the formal curriculum for engaging students in learning about sustainability. Previous research has highlighted the potential of the university campus for experiential, place-based learning about and for sustainability. This has been conceptualised as the ‘informal’ curriculum, consisting of extra-curricular activities and student projects linking estates and operations to formal study. However, the impact of the so-called ‘hidden curriculum’ (the implicit messages a university sends about sustainability through the institutional environment and values) has been overlooked as a potential influence on student learning and behaviour. This article reports on a small-scale research project which utilised a phenomenographic approach to explore students’ perceptions of the ‘hidden sustainability curriculum’ at a leading sustainability university. The findings suggest that helping students deconstruct the hidden campus curriculum may enhance aspects of sustainability literacy; developing students’ understanding about sustainability and creating solutions to sustainability issues, enabling evaluative dialogue around campus sustainability and also self-reflection, which could be transformative and translate into pro-environmental behaviour change. This research is transferable to other contexts.