Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Does the Use of a Decision Aid Improve Decision Making in Prosthetic Heart Valve Selection?: A Multicenter Randomized Trial

Background— A Dutch online patient decision aid to support prosthetic heart valve selection was recently developed. A multicenter randomized controlled trial was conducted to assess whether use of the patient decision aid results in optimization of shared decision making in prosthetic heart valve selection. Methods and Results— In a 5-center randomized controlled trial, patients were allocated to receive either standard preoperative care (control group) or additional access to the patient decision aid (intervention group). Legally capable adult patients accepted for elective isolated or combined aortic and mitral valve replacement were included. Primary outcome was preoperative decisional conflict (Decisional Conflict Scale); secondary outcomes included patient knowledge, involvement in valve selection, anxiety and depression, (valve-specific) quality of life, and regret. Out of 306 eligible patients, 155 were randomized (78 control and 77 intervention). Preoperative decisional conflict did not differ between the groups (34% versus 33%; P=0.834). Intervention patients felt better informed (median Decisional Conflict Scale informed subscore: 8 versus 17; P=0.046) and had a better knowledge of prosthetic valves (85% versus 68%; P=0.004). Intervention patients experienced less anxiety and depression (median Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale score: 6 versus 9; P=0.015) and better mental well-being (mean Short Form Health Survey score: 54 versus 50; P=0.032). Three months postoperatively, valve-specific quality of life and regret did not differ between the groups. Conclusions— A patient decision aid to support shared decision making in prosthetic heart valve selection does not lower decisional conflict. It does result in more knowledgeable, better informed, and less anxious and depressed patients, with a better mental well-being. Clinical Trial Registration— http://www.trialregister. nl. Unique identifier: NTR4350.
Probabilistic estimation of earthquake growth to a catastrophic one

We propose a method to estimate the probability of earthquake growth to a catastrophic one immediately after observing its initiation, for practical usage in an earthquake early warning system. This method is essentially an application of the conditional probability theory, where the magnitude‐frequency relation plays a crucial role. We apply it to the Nankai trough region, Japan, where a catastrophic earthquake is expected in the near future. Based on the historical catalogue, we estimate the probability density of magnitude using a Bayesian approach. We then estimate the probability of earthquake growth to a catastrophic one. If the observed earthquake magnitude reaches 6.5, the estimated probability that the final magnitude exceeds 7.5 is 25–41%. According to previous studies, the time taken for the magnitude to increase from 6.5 to 7.5 is approximately 10–15 seconds. Our method is highly beneficial in that it enables an earlier alarm to be issued.
Is tau a preload-independent measure of isovolumetric relaxation?

Several studies have been performed in patients with a variety of myocardial diseases that have identified a prolongation of tau. However, it is not clear whether prolongation of tau represents abnormal myocardial physiology or the effect of excessive load associated with a particular disease process. Accordingly, we evaluate the effect on tau of an isolated decrease in preload induced by inferior vena cava occlusion before the appearance of reflex changes in six patients designated as normal by catheterization criteria. A computer-based digitization routine identified cardiac contractions in all patients early after inferior vena cava occlusion where left ventricular end-diastolic pressure decreased (18.3 +/- 6.3 to 9.3 +/- 5.8, p less than 0.05) while left ventricular systolic pressure (113.3 +/- 13.8 to 111.8 +/- 14.0, p = NS) and heart rate (66.0 +/- 10.0 to 65.9 +/- 10.3, p = NS) did not change. After this alteration in preload, no change in tau from baseline, as calculated by the logarithmic (TL), derivative (TD), or method of Mirsky (T1/2), was noted: TL, 47.4 +/- 6.5 to 44.6 +/- 7.6; TD, 39.3 +/- 8.1 to 39.8 +/- 8.4; T1/2, 33.0 +/- 4.0 to 31.8 +/- 4.6; all p = NS. The baseline pressure extrapolated from isovolumetric relaxation did not change in these preload beats compared with baseline (+4.26 +/- 6.20 to -0.80 +/- 4.87, p = NS). Subsequent beats were identified where left ventricular systolic pressure showed a numeric decrease compared with baseline (113.3 +/- 13.8 to 100.8 +/- 14.3, p = NS) despite no change in heart rate (66.0 +/- 10.0 to 66.8 +/- 10.5, p = NS). (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Testing the island effect in adaptive radiation: rates and patterns of morphological diversification in Caribbean and mainland Anolis lizards

Many of the classic examples of adaptive radiation, including Caribbean Anolis lizards, are found on islands. However, Anolis also exhibits substantial species richness and ecomorphological disparity on mainland Central and South America. We compared patterns and rates of morphological evolution to investigate whether, in fact, island Anolis are exceptionally diverse relative to their mainland counterparts. Quite the contrary, we found that rates and extent of diversification were comparable—Anolis adaptive radiation is not an island phenomenon. However, mainland and Caribbean anoles occupy different parts of morphological space; in independent colonizations of both island and mainland habitats, island anoles have evolved shorter limbs and better-developed toe pads. These patterns suggest that the two areas are on different evolutionary trajectories. The ecological causes of these differences are unknown, but may relate to differences in predation or competition among mainland and island communities.
Injury of the Ascending Reticular Activating System in Patients With Fatigue and Hypersomnia Following Mild Traumatic Brain Injury

AbstractWe report on patients with post-traumatic fatigue and hypersomnia who showed injury of the lower portion of the ascending reticular activating system (ARAS) between the pontine reticular formation (RF) and the intralaminar thalamic nucleus (ILN) following mild traumatic brain injury (TBI), using diffusion tensor tractography (DTT). Two patients with mild TBI resulting from a car accident were enrolled in this study. Patient 1 was a 51-year-old woman showed abnormalities as 6.9 (cut off: 3.7 points) and 18 (cut off: 10) on the Fatigue Severity Scale and the Epworth Sleepiness Scale at 11 months after onset. Patient 2 was a 64-year-old woman who revealed abnormalities on the Fatigue Severity Scale and the Epworth Sleepiness Scale with 6.8 and 19 at 3 months after onset.In both patients, the upper ARAS in which the neural connectivity of the ILN to the cerebral cortex did not show significant abnormalities. However, we observed the narrowing of the left dorsal lower ARAS between the pontine RF and the ILN in both patients and the tearing (patient 1) and narrowing (patient 2) of the left ventral lower ARAS between the pontine RF and the hypothalamus.Injuries of the dorsal and ventral lower ARAS were demonstrated in patients with fatigue and hypersomnia following mild TBI. We believe that these injuries of the ARAS might be a pathogenetic mechanism of fatigue and hypersomnia in patients with TBI.
Neuronal Migration: An Overview of Modes, Molecular Mechanisms and Model Systems

A century ago, Santiago Ramon y Cajal had already postulated that neurons born in specific proliferative zones have to migrate to ensure correct neocortical layering. Today we know that neuronal migration is a common phenomenon in many brain regions and that neurons are often born micrometres to centimetres away from the place they fulfil their function. Mutations that lead to defects in neuronal migration can have devastating consequences like lissencephaly, autism and schizophrenia in humans. With these conditions in mind, neuronal migration has been an area of intense research for more than 50 years. Additionally, neuronal migration phenomena are outstanding models to understand basic themes in cell biology. The rodent neocortex has been a very popular system to study different modes of neuronal migration. More recently, additional model tissues and organisms have been examined, which help to further expand our knowledge. The authors provide an overview on different migratory modes and then focus on the cell biology that enables migration in different contexts. They further discuss some experimental challenges that need to be overcome in order to understand neuronal migration in even more depth. Key Concepts: Actomyosin and microtubules play active roles in neuronal migration. Their exact roles depend on cellular context. Endo- and exocytosis of adhesion molecules are crucial for cell–cell and cell–substrate adhesion during migration. Extracellular matrix proteins are important guidance cues for neuronal migration. Neuronal migration is a widespread phenomenon in the central nervous system. The advancement of modern light microscopy should be embraced to observe neuronal migration modes in intact developing organism. Two basic modes of migration exist: radial and tangential migration. Keywords: neuronal migration; tangential migration; radial glial-guided migration; cerebral cortex; cerebellar granule neurons; actomyosin; microtubule cage; cell adhesion deadhesion; vertebrate model systems; time-lapse imaging
Health and Quality of Life Outcomes

Background: Currently, there is a lot of interest in the flexible framework offered by item banks for measuring patient relevant outcomes. However, there are few item banks, which have been developed to quantify functional status, as expressed by the ability to perform activities of daily life. This paper examines the measurement properties of the Academic Medical Center linear disability score item bank in a mixed population. Methods: This paper uses item response theory to analyse data on 115 of 170 items from a total of 1002 respondents. These were: 551 (55%) residents of supported housing, residential care or nursing homes; 235 (23%) patients with chronic pain; 127 (13%) inpatients on a neurology ward following a stroke; and 89 (9%) patients suffering from Parkinson's disease. Results: Of the 170 items, 115 were judged to be clinically relevant. Of these 115 items, 77 were retained in the item bank following the item response theory analysis. Of the 38 items that were excluded from the item bank, 24 had either been presented to fewer than 200 respondents or had fewer than 10% or more than 90% of responses in the category 'can carry out'. A further 11 items had different measurement properties for younger and older or for male and female respondents. Finally, 3 items were excluded because the item response theory model did not fit the data. Conclusion: The Academic Medical Center linear disability score item bank has promising measurement characteristics for the mixed patient population described in this paper. Further studies will be needed to examine the measurement properties of the item bank in other populations. Background Functional status is now seen as an important determinant of patients' quality of life and a wide variety of instruments have been developed [1]. Instruments for quantifying functional status tend to have a fixed length and administer all items to the whole group of patients Published: 29 December 2005 Health and Quality of Life Outcomes 2005, 3:83 doi:10.1186/1477-7525-3-83 Received: 20 October 2005 Accepted: 29 December 2005 This article is available from: http://www.hqlo. com/content/3/1/83 © 2005 Holman et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
BASIL: Automated IO Load Balancing Across Storage Devices

Live migration of virtual hard disks between storage arrays has long been possible. However, there is a dearth of online tools to perform automated virtual disk placement and IO load balancing across multiple storage arrays. This problem is quite challenging because the performance of IO workloads depends heavily on their own characteristics and that of the underlying storage device. Moreover, many device-specific details are hidden behind the interface exposed by storage arrays. In this paper, we introduce BASIL, a novel software system that automatically manages virtual disk placement and performs load balancing across devices without assuming any support from the storage arrays. BASIL uses IO latency as a primary metric for modeling. Our technique involves separate online modeling of workloads and storage devices. BASIL uses these models to recommend migrations between devices to balance load and improve overall performance. We present the design and implementation of BASIL in the context of VMware ESX, a hypervisor-based virtualization system, and demonstrate that the modeling works well for a wide range of workloads and devices. We evaluate the placements recommended by BASIL, and show that they lead to improvements of at least 25% in both latency and throughput for 80 percent of the hundreds of microbenchmark configurations we ran. When tested with enterprise applications, BASIL performed favorably versus human experts, improving latency by 18-27%.
Predicting motivational regulations in physical education: the interplay between dispositional goal orientations, motivational climate and perceived competence

In this study, we examined the main and interactive effects of students' goal orientations, perceived competence and perceptions of the motivational climate on the motivational styles advanced by self-determination theory. The participants were 328 British secondary school students aged 13.6±0.6 years (mean±s). Moderated hierarchical regression analyses revealed task orientation, perceived competence and perceptions of a mastery climate to be positive predictors of self-determined styles of motivation. Perceived competence in physical education was negatively associated with amotivation. Significant interaction effects for mastery climate×task orientation and for ego orientation×perceived competence emerged. The results indicate that: (1) for students endorsing a high task orientation, the perception that the class climate was high in mastery cues was associated with increased intrinsic motivation; and (2) for students high in ego orientation, the belief that one was competent increased, while perceptions of incompetence attenuated intrinsic motivation. Additionally, a three-way interaction between ego orientation, performance climate and perceived competence emerged. In light of achievement goal and self-determination frameworks, we propose that studying the potential interplay between both individual and situational goal perspectives and the moderating effect of perceived competence may further enhance our understanding of motivation in physical education.
Differentiation of autoimmune thrombocytopenia from thrombocytopenia associated with immune complex disease: systemic lupus erythematosus, hepatitis‐cirrhosis, and HIV‐1 infection by platelet and serum immunological measurements

A method and approach are described to differentiate classic autoimmune thrombocytopenia (ATP) from immune complex‐associated thrombocytopenia in systemic lupus (SLE), hepatitis/chronic liver disease (LIV‐ITP) and HIV‐1 related thrombocytopenia (HIV‐1‐ITP). The platelet immunologic profile of IgG, C3C4 and IgM was measured with a solid‐phase ELISA, employing 125I‐staphylococcal protein A to detect indicator antibody binding. Polyethylene glycol was employed to precipitate immune complexes (PEG‐IC). Platelet‐associated IgG (PAIgG) was 2.8‐, 5.6‐ and 5.8‐fold higher in SLE, LIV‐ITP and HIV‐1‐ITP patients respectively compared to ATP patients; platelet C3C4 was 3.2‐, 4.8‐ and 4.5‐fold higher respectively; platelet IgM was 2.2‐, 3.7‐ and 3.8‐fold higher respectively; serum PEG‐IC levels were 4.2‐, 4.8‐ and 2.1‐fold higher respectively. With all parameters measured, there was no overlap between the 75th percentile for ATP patients and the 25th percentile for all three cohorts. The likelihood of having a platelet C3C4 level higher than the highest ATP level was 69% for SLE, 90% for LIV‐ITP and 94% for HIV‐1‐ITP respectively; with PEG‐IC measurements the likelihood was 83%, 100% and 100% respectively. Serum IgG, C3, C4, IgM and PEG‐IC were examined for a possible relationship with platelet measurements. Except for a positive correlation between serum and platelet IgM in ATP, r = 0.5, P < 0.04, there was no positive correlation with any of the parameters measured. An inverse correlation was noted between PEG‐IC level and platelet C3C4 in SLE, r = 0.7, P < 0.04. Thus platelet immunologic profile and serum PEG‐IC level measurements differentiated classic ATP from immune complex‐associated thrombocytopenias (SLE, LIV‐ITP, HIV‐1‐ITP). Except for IgM measurements in ATP, platelet measurements could not be attributed to their respective serum concentration.
Identifying multiple deep aquifers in the Bengal Basin: Implications for resource management

In the Bengal Basin of Bangladesh and West Bengal (India), where arsenic (As) and salinity adversely affect groundwater in shallow aquifers (<150 m deep), consumers increasingly turn to “the deep aquifer” as a source of low‐As and low‐salinity water. We show that “the deep aquifer,” which has traditionally been regarded as a single entity, can be divided into at least eight deep aquifer units each with distinctive chemical, isotopic, hydraulic, and piezometric characteristics. Except in the rapidly subsiding Sylhet Basin, the deep aquifers are largely As‐safe (<50 μg/L and mostly <10 μg/L) but differ in terms of iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), salinity, stable isotopic composition, groundwater age, and in their piezometric response to pumping. We use isotopic data to identify recharge from five periods, of which two are quantitatively dominant: (a) from the Last Glacial Maximum, isotopically heavy water (δ18O >−3.5‰) with low As, Cl, and Fe concentrations occupies hydraulically trapped positions in the South‐Central, Southeast, Southwest, and Madhupur aquifer units and (b) terminal Pleistocene to Early Holocene recharge of isotopically lighter water (δ18O <−3.5‰) that has high Fe and slightly elevated Cl concentrations and was recharged along palaeochannels that facilitated deep circulation up to the mid‐Holocene. Piezometric responses to development change in style towards the coast. In the north, water levels at all depths tend to be coincident and transition through a seasonally divergent pattern to become parallel in the south with a near constant downward gradient. The delineation of the deep aquifer units provides a practical framework for the assessment and management of groundwater resources for water supply.
Implicit and Explicit Prejudice Toward Overweight and Average-Weight Men and Women: Testing Their Correspondence and Relation to Behavioral Intentions

The authors examined prejudice toward overweight men and women. Participants (N = 76) indicated their perceptions, attitudes, behavioral intentions, and implicit associations toward an average-weight or overweight man or woman. Results indicated the presence of explicit and implicit antifat prejudice, with male participants showing greater negativity toward overweight targets. Analyses of covariance indicated that overweight targets received greater derogation than did their average-weight counterparts, regardless, for the most part, of the target's gender. With one exception, no significant relations emerged between explicit and implicit measures of weight bias. The authors discuss limitations of the study and implications for future research.
Experimental Investigation and Assessment of Internal Stability of Granular Filters under One-Dimensional Static and Cyclic Loading

Internal instability occurs when the finer fraction of a filter escapes with the infiltrates, causing permanent changes to its particle size distribution and rendering it ineffective. Thus far, numerous criteria based on particle and constriction size distributions have been proposed to assess the potential of internal instability. This paper reports the results of pressure gradient controlled hydraulic tests performed on granular soils including silt-sand-gravel, sand, and sand-gravel mixtures with their uniformity coefficients ranging from 1 to 304 and compacted at varying relative densities between 0 and 100 %. Select dense samples were then subjected to a series of hydraulic tests under static loading up to 100 kPa and cyclic loading up to 30 Hz, simulating subballast filtration under heavy-haul freight trains with speeds as high as 210 km/h. The analysis revealed that the agitation and pore pressure development under cyclic loading promotes premature suffusion, thereby making it the worst case of filtration. An objective evaluation of some of the existing criteria led to a more realistic interpretation of experimental results based on a modified technique that accurately assessed the internal stability of soils under cyclic loading. Results of internal stability assessments from existing geometrical criteria were then compared with those from the proposed technique, which showed enhanced success, thereby contributing to increased confidence in the practical design of granular filters under cyclic conditions.
Numerical Experiments with Iteration and Aggregation for Markov Chains

This paper describes an iterative aggregation/disaggregation method for computing the stationary probability vector of a nearly completely decomposable Markov chain. The emphasis is on the implementation of the algorithm and on the results that are obtained when it is applied to three modeling examples that have been used in the analysis of computer/communication systems. Where applicable, a comparison with standard iterative and direct methods for solving the same problems, is made. INFORMS Journal on Computing, ISSN 1091-9856, was published as ORSA Journal on Computing from 1989 to 1995 under ISSN 0899-1499.
Clustering of neuronal potassium channels is independent of their interaction with PSD-95

Voltage-dependent potassium channels regulate membrane excitability and cell–cell communication in the mammalian nervous system, and are found highly localized at distinct neuronal subcellular sites. Kv1 (mammalian Shaker family) potassium channels and the neurexin Caspr2, both of which contain COOH-terminal PDZ domain binding peptide motifs, are found colocalized at high density at juxtaparanodes flanking nodes of Ranvier of myelinated axons. The PDZ domain–containing protein PSD-95, which clusters Kv1 potassium channels in heterologous cells, has been proposed to play a major role in potassium channel clustering in mammalian neurons. Here, we show that PSD-95 colocalizes precisely with Kv1 potassium channels and Caspr2 at juxtaparanodes, and that a macromolecular complex of Kv1 channels and PSD-95 can be immunopurified from mammalian brain and spinal cord. Surprisingly, we find that the high density clustering of Kv1 channels and Caspr2 at juxtaparanodes is normal in a mutant mouse lacking juxtaparanodal PSD-95, and that the indirect interaction between Kv1 channels and Caspr2 is maintained in these mutant mice. These data suggest that the primary function of PSD-95 at juxtaparanodes lies outside of its accepted role in mediating the high density clustering of Kv1 potassium channels at these sites.