Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Molecular Characterization of Infectious Bronchitis Virus Strains Isolated from the Enteric Contents of Brazilian Laying Hens and Broilers

Abstract Infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) is the causative agent of avian infectious bronchitis, which is characterized by respiratory, reproductive, and renal signs. However, the role of IBV as an enteric pathogen in still controversial. In Brazil, antigenic groups of IBV divergent from the Massachusetts serotype used for vaccination schedules in that country have already been demonstrated. The present study aimed to assess the different genotypes of IBV in Brazilian commercial poultry flocks by partial sequencing of the S1 amino-terminus coding region using enteric contents as samples and examine their relationship with the vaccine serotype currently in use. Samples of enteric contents were taken as pools of five birds from each of 18 poultry farms (17 broiler and one laying farm) from five Brazilian states between 2002 and 2006. Birds were presenting watery diarrhea and poor general condition but were without respiratory, renal, or reproductive signs. Conventional antibacterial and anticoccidial therapies were unsuccessful and, furthermore, all samples proved negative for rotavirus, reovirus, and astrovirus. Eleven IBV samples were isolated in embryonated eggs and resulted in S1 sequences. Phylogenetic analysis showed that these segregated into an exclusive cluster, close to serotype D274, but distant from Massachusetts. Mean amino acid identity amongst these Brazilian strains was 94.07%; amongst these and serotypes D274, 4/91, and Massachusetts, mean amino acid identity was 77.17%, 69.94%, and 68.93%, respectively. In conclusion, the presence of genotype variant strains of IBV in Brazilian poultry flocks has been demonstrated and might be the reason for the unsuccessful control of IBV in Brazil. Furthermore, these results also strengthen the implications of IBV in enteric diseases of poultry.
Shattering and reassembling hypersexual moments: Girls indulging in the pursuit of pleasure

A cultural lens, which is used to explore girlhood in the Southern African context, provides insight into traditional practices like virginity testing. The call for ‘retraditionalization’ of African youth, which is enacted through controlling and monitoring girls’ sexuality, is explored. Within this context, four teenage girls from schools in KwaZulu Natal, a province in South Africa, talk about how they understand their sexuality in ways that suggest that girls shatter and then reassemble the heterosexual terrain, through hypersexualized performativity, by ‘being girl’ in different ways. These teenage girls demonstrate hypervisibility and hypersexuality, and as they resist and subvert hetero-patriarchal cultural contexts, they go beyond projecting hyperfemininty and are largely driven by hedonistic behaviour. Through the use of innovative methodology, where girls are trained to serve as co-researchers to generate and analyse data, power is creatively deployed to enter the heterosexual matrix and find sites which reveal its pliable nature. Ways in which research participants actively resist or comply with heteronormative sexuality are analysed through the conceptual ideas of ‘moments of rupture’ and ‘sustained lines of flight’.
Hierarchical universal coding

In an earlier paper, we proved a strong version of the redundancy-capacity converse theorem of universal coding, stating that for "most" sources in a given class, the universal coding redundancy is essentially lower-bounded by the capacity of the channel induced by this class. Since this result holds for general classes of sources, it extends Rissanen's (1986) strong converse theorem for parametric families. While our earlier result has established strong optimality only for mixture codes weighted by the capacity-achieving prior, our first result herein extends this finding to a general prior. For some cases our technique also leads to a simplified proof of the above mentioned strong converse theorem. The major interest in this paper, however, is in extending the theory of universal coding to hierarchical structures of classes, where each class may have a different capacity. In this setting, one wishes to incur redundancy essentially as small as that corresponding to the active class, and not the union of classes. Our main result is that the redundancy of a code based on a two-stage mixture (first, within each class, and then over the classes), is no worse than that of any other code for "most" sources of "most" classes. If, in addition, the classes can be efficiently distinguished by a certain decision rule, then the best attainable redundancy is given explicitly by the capacity of the active class plus the normalized negative logarithm of the prior probability assigned to this class. These results suggest some interesting guidelines as for the choice of the prior. We also discuss some examples with a natural hierarchical partition into classes.
Vitamin D3 analogue inhibits keratinocyte growth factor signaling and induces apoptosis in human prostate cancer cells

Prostate cancer is a worldwide significant health care problem, due to its high incidence and mortality. In particular, androgen‐independent tumors have the worst prognosis, because they are refractory to almost all kinds of available therapy. Hence, there is the need of new treatment opportunities targeting androgen‐independent, growth factor‐mediated, tumor signaling. One of these new promising opportunities is vitamin D3 and its related analogues.
Religious Heterogamy and Marital Conflict

This study addresses two questions: Do religiously dissimilar couples argue more often than other couples? Are religious differences among partners associated with arguments concerning particular issues? We investigate these issues using data on 2,945 co-residing, first-time married couples from Wave 1 of the National Survey of Families and Households. Denominational homo/heterogamy, measured in several different ways, has little bearing on the frequency or types of marital disagreements. Men's religious attendance is inversely related to the overall frequency of disputes and to disagreements over housework, money, how time is spent, and sex, whereas women's attendance is not. Attendance (dis)similarities among partners are positively associated with the overall frequency of conflicts. Theological disparities between partners are linked with more frequent conflicts overall and also with disagreements over household labor and finances. Several implications and promising directions for future research are discussed.
“A place between places”: Language and identities in a border town

This article investigates variation in the use of glottalling and glottalization of the voiceless stops (p t k) in an urban variety of British English. Middlesbrough, the locality in question, lies on a regional border in the North of England and has been subject to repeated redrawing of local administrative boundaries and shifting orientations in terms of popular culture. Linguistic trends that converge with North Eastern varieties and diverge from those associated with Yorkshire are correlated with attitudinal information and informants' shifting sense of the identity of the area. Findings reveal socially conditioned variation in perceptions of language and community identity that have clear connections with both the changing sociogeographic status of the urban center and with the linguistic trends uncovered. Results emerging from the attitudinal data offer insight into both the indexical function of the linguistic forms of interest and the motivation for the change in progress in the voiceless stops.
Personal factors influencing informal reasoning of economic issues and the effect of specific instructions

Personal factors influencing argument of federal budget-deficit solutions were investigated. Sixty-one adult participants were prompted for alternative points of view and reasons to support their solutions. Issue involvement and local knowledge were significantly related to one or more quality of argument measures. Specific and neutral prompts had similar effects on argument quality criteria, with the exception of counterargument. Guided direction favorably influenced the production of counterargument, but this effect was not maintained when prompts were withheld. Small-group exercises in issue argumentation may initiate desirable patterns of thinking; however, periodic prompts or challenges may be necessary to nurture sustained multilogical reasoning
Professional Development of In‐service Primary Teachers in Environmental Education: an action research approach

summary This paper deals with an attempt to organize a university research‐based course the aim of which is to promote in‐service primary teachers’ professional development in environmental education. The decision to engage them in participatory action research was made after a careful investigation of the factors that seem to discourage them from becoming involved in environmental education. From the results that have come out of the evaluation, the process that was followed appears to be a promising way for empowering teachers to overcome existing obstacles, so as to promote environmental education. The various problems that crop up in the running of such a course are identified and some suggestions for their resolution are offered.
Talking to learn: why biology students should be talking in classrooms and how to make it happen.

Student Talk is key to student learning. In addition, the teaching strategies needed to promote student talk are highly accessible to all biology instructors and are applicable to classroom settings of any size. Whether your teaching philosophy is more aligned with a traditional lecture approach or a more active-learning approach, Student Talk is easily integrated into the classroom in as little as 5 min. Together, these ideas suggest that with relatively minimal effort, instructors can promote Student Talk as a regular and expected part of undergraduate biology learning and have a significant impact on student learning.
Polymorphisms in the ERCC5 Gene and Risk of Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma (ESCC) in Eastern Chinese Populations

Background Excision repair cross complementing group 5 (ERCC5 or XPG) plays an important role in regulating DNA excision repair; its functional single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) may alter DNA repair capacity and thus contribute to cancer risk. Methodology/Principal Findings In a hospital-based case-control study of 1115 esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) cases and 1117 cancer-free controls, we genotyped three potentially functional SNPs of ERCC5 (SNPs, rs2296147T>C, rs2094258C>T and rs873601G>A) and estimated crude and adjusted odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for their associations with risk of ESCC using unconditional logistic regression models. We also calculated false-positive report probabilities (FPRPs) for significant findings. We found that compared with the TT genotype, ERCC5 rs2296147 C variant genotypes were associated with a significantly lower ESCC risk (CT: adjusted OR = 0.76, 95% CI = 0.63–0.93, CT/CC: adjusted OR = 0.80, 95% CI = 0.67–0.96); however, this risk was not observed for the other two SNPs (rs2094258C>T and rs873601 G>A), nor in further stratification and haplotype analysis. Conclusions/Significances These findings suggested that ERCC5 polymorphisms may contribute to risk of ESCC in Eastern Chinese populations, but the effect was weak and needs further validation by larger population-based case-control studies.
Surprise as Shortcut for Anticipation: Clustering Mental States in Reasoning

To enhance effectiveness in real world applications, autonomous agents have to develop cognitive competencies and anticipatory capabilities. Here we point out their strong liaison with the functional roles of affective mental states as those of humanlike metaphor: not only the root elements for both surprise and anticipation are expectations, but also part of the effects of the former elicit efforts on the latter. By analyzing different kinds of expectations, we provide a general architecture enhancing practical reasoning with mental states, describing and empirically evaluating how mental and behavioral attitudes, emerging from mental states, can be applied for augmenting agent reactivity, opportunism and efficacy in terms of anticipation.
Age and depression in patients with metastatic cancer: the protective effects of attachment security and spiritual wellbeing

ABSTRACT Psychological distress in cancer patients is inversely related to age, although the reasons are unclear. The adult development literature suggests that ageing may be associated with the development of adaptive capacities, specifically greater attachment security (the sense that others will be available and supportive when needed) and spirituality (the capacity to view one's life as having meaning, purpose and value), that enable older people to cope better with disease. We examined whether age-related patterns in attachment security and spiritual wellbeing account for the protective effect of age against distress. Measures of depression, attachment security, spiritual wellbeing and disease burden were collected from 342 patients aged from 21 to 88 years with advanced, metastatic cancer. Attachment security and spiritual wellbeing were tested as mediators of the effect of age on depression, controlling for disease burden. It was found that age was associated inversely with depression and positively with spiritual wellbeing and attachment security. Depression was inversely related to attachment security and spiritual wellbeing, and the effect of age on depression was fully mediated by attachment security and spiritual wellbeing. The relative protection from psychological distress among older cancer patients may be the result of age-related developmental accomplishments and/or differences in the response to adverse life-events.
A Measure of Social of Globalization: Factor Analytic and Substantial Validity Assessment Using a Sample of Young Adult Kuwaitis

A sample of 146 undergraduate university students in Kuwait were used to establish the factor structure and substantive validity of a 21-item questionnaire of social globalization based on the conceptualized dimensions of personal contact, cultural proximity, and information flows. Results of the factor analysis suggested a five-factor structure that was labeled: information flows-internet; information flows-print; information flows-TV; personal contact; and cultural proximity. Furthermore, results of the substantive validity analysis suggested that although the items may be indicative of the constructs under investigation, respondents did not correlate them with their intended constructs with a higher degree of concordance. Implications for further research are discussed.
COAGULASE‐NEGATIVE STAPHYLOCOCCUS *

Although coagulase-negative staphylococci have long been regarded as nonpathogenic commensal organisms residing on skin and mucous membranes, their occasional association with serious infections has been observed in the past.ls Nevertheless, the problem of the pathogenicity of coagulase-negative staphylococci has not been well defined, and recovery of these organisms from lesions with external drainage may have little clinical significance. Recently, however, the role of coagulase-negative staphylococci as the causative agent in specific infections has assumed increasing clinical importance. "16 These organisms are well-known causes of bacterial endocarditis410 and have been responsible for from 10 to 13% of cases in recent ~er ies . ~J Of more importance, however, coagulase-negative staphylococci are frequently responsible for postcardiotomy endocarditis and were recently described as the causative agent in 11 of 14 patients who developed bacterial endocarditis after open-heart surgery? These otganisms have also produced central nervous system infections and bacteremia by colonization of ventriculovenous cerebrospinal fluid shunts inserted for control of h y d r o ~ e p h a l u s . ~ ~ ~ ~ Unfortunately, antibiotic treatment of coagulase-negative staphylococcal endocarditis, ventriculitis, and septicemia has not been highly successful. In addition to these more serious infections, coagulase-negative staphylococci have also been implicated as the causative organism in patients with urinary tract infections.15J6 This cumulative evidence that coagulase-negative staphylococci are a cause of serious infection that may not respond to antibiotic treatment, combined with the frequent clinical enigma of determining the importance of this organism when it is recovered from cultures of clinical material, led to the following prospective study. In this study we attempted to determine 1 ) the frequency with which coagulase-negative staphylococci were recovered from routine blood cultures, 2) the frequency with which coagulase-negative staphylococci were associated with infection when these organisms were isolated from routine blood cultures, and 3) the antibiotic sensitivity of a number of these organisms that had been recovered from a variety of clinical specimens.
Narcissism or Openness?: College Students’ Use of Facebook and Twitter

Speculation that social networking sites (SNSs) breed narcissism has produced research with mixed results (e.g., Bergman, Fearrington, Davenport, & Bergman, 2011; Buffardi & Campbell, 2008). This study viewed SNSs as tools for communication and maintaining relationships, examining whether providing information about oneself reflects a positive attitude about sharing such information with one's social network, rather than reflecting narcissism. A questionnaire was completed by 233 undergraduate students. Results indicated that attitude toward being open about sharing information about oneself was significantly related to frequency of using Facebook® and Twitter to provide self-focused updates. Higher levels of narcissism were associated with a larger number of Facebook friends and with the number of self-focused “tweets” an individual sends.
Associations between neck musculoskeletal complaints and work related factors among public service computer workers in Kaunas

ObjectivesInformation technologies have been developing very rapidly, also in the case of occupational activities. Epidemiological studies have shown that employees, who work with computers, are more likely to complain of musculoskeletal disorders (MSD). The aim of this study was to evaluate associations between neck MSD and individual and work related factors.Materials and MethodsThe investigation which consisted of two parts — a questionnaire study (using Nordic Musculoskeletal questionnaire and Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire) and a direct observation (to evaluate ergonomic work environment using RULA method) was carried out in three randomly selected public sector companies of Kaunas. The study population consisted of 513 public service office workers.ResultsThe survey showed that neck MSDs were very common in the investigated population. The prevalence rate amounted to 65.7%. According to our survey neck MSDs were significantly associated with older age, bigger work experience, high quantitative and cognitive job demands, working for longer than 2 h without taking a break as well as with higher ergonomic risk score. The fully adjusted model working for longer than 2 h without taking a break had the strongest associations with neck complaints.ConclusionIt was confirmed, that neck MSDs were significantly associated with individual factors as well as conditions of work, therefore, preventive actions against neck complaints should be oriented at psychosocial and ergonomic work environment as well as at individual factors.
Qualitative Regulation of B Cell Antigen Receptor Signaling by CD19: Selective Requirement for PI3-Kinase Activation, Inositol-1,4,5-Trisphosphate Production and Ca2+ Mobilization

Genetic ablation of the B cell surface glycoprotein CD19 severely impairs the humoral immune response. This requirement is thought to reflect a critical role of CD19 in signal transduction that occurs upon antigen C3dg coligation of antigen receptors with CD19 containing type 2 complement receptors (CR2). Here we show that CD19 plays a key accessory role in B cell antigen receptor signaling independent of CR2 coligation and define molecular circuitry by which this function is mediated. While CD19 is not required for antigen-mediated activation of receptor proximal tyrosines kinases, it is critical for activation of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3-kinase). PI3-Kinase activation is dependent on phosphorylation of CD19 Y484 and Y515. Antigen-induced CD19-dependent PI3-kinase activation is required for normal phosphoinositide hydrolysis and Ca2+ mobilization responses. Thus, CD19 functions as a B cell antigen receptor accessory molecule that modifies antigen receptor signaling in a qualitative manner.
Effect of Harvest Success on Hunter Attitudes Toward White-Tailed Deer Management in Pennsylvania

This study examined effects of harvest and subjective evaluations of the state's deer herd on hunter satisfaction with white-tailed deer ( Odocoileus virginianus ) management in Pennsylvania. Hunters were classified as rifle, archery, or muzzleloader through a probability model based on prior experience. Backward hierarchical log-linear analysis was used to model satisfaction with deer management for the three groups. Successfully harvesting deer was significant in predicting satisfaction with deer management among the three hunting groups. Different models explained satisfaction for each type of deer hunter. Harvest was a main effect for archery and a partial-order effect for rifle and muzzleloader deer hunters. Harvest success was directly related to satisfaction with management for archery deer hunters. In the rifle deer-hunter model, harvest success was associated with perception of balanced harvest, which was related to satisfaction with deer management. Harvest success was associated with perceptions of herd size and seeing deer in the muzzleloader model, and seeing deer directly related to satisfaction with deer management. Differing relationships between harvest success and satisfaction with management for different types of hunters may offer understanding into hunter opposition to management programs.
Flexible Grouping and Student Learning in a High-Needs School

The study focused on the impact of flexible grouping on student learning during a period of time in a high-needs school. The study tracked nontransient, below-goal elementary students on multiple literacy assessments during a 5-year flexible grouping implementation. Results showed that the percentage of students attaining mastery increased in 16 of 19 over-time comparisons. Increases in the percentage of students At Mastery ranged from 10% to 57%. The percentage of teachers using flexible grouping on a weekly basis increased from 25% to 95% during the same 5-year period. Teachers attributed the impact of flexible grouping to (a) focused instruction related to particular learning needs, (b) the ability to keep student attention focused on the instructional task, and (c) increased student confidence. The results support the use of flexible grouping to improve student learning for below-goal students without the potentially negative effects of ability grouping.