Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Anterior-Only Stabilization of Three-Column Thoracolumbar Injuries

Objective: The optimal treatment of “unstable” thoracolumbar injuries remains controversial. Studies have shown the advantages of direct anterior decompression of thoracolumbar injuries along with supplemental posterior instrumentation as a combined or staged procedure. Others have also shown success in decompression as a single-stage anterior procedure, largely limited to two-column (anterior and middle) injuries. A retrospective review of all available clinical and radiographic data was used to classify unstable three-column thoracolumbar fractures according to the Association for the Study of Internal Fixation (AO) classification system. This was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of stand-alone anterior decompression and reconstruction of unstable three-column thoracolumbar injuries, utilizing current-generation anterior spinal instrumentation. Methods: Between 1992 and 1998, 40 patients underwent anterior decompression and two-segment anteriorly instrumented reconstruction for three-column thoracolumbar fractures. Retrospective review of all available clinical and radiographic data was used to classify these unstable injuries according to the AO classification system, evaluating for neurologic changes, spinal canal compromise, preoperative and postoperative segmental angulation, and arthrodesis rate. Results: According to the AO classification system, there were 24 (60%) type B1.2, 10 (25%) type B2.3, 5 (12.5%) type C1.3, and 1 (2.5%) type C2.1 three-column injuries. Preoperative canal compromise averaged 68.5% and vertebral height loss averaged 44.5%. There were no cases of neurologic deterioration, and 30 (91%) patients with incomplete neurologic deficits improved by at least one modified Frankel grade. Mean preoperative segmental kyphosis of 22.7° was improved to an early mean of 7.4° (P < 0.0001). At latest follow-up, angulation had increased by an average 2.1° but maintained significant improvement from preoperative measurements (P < 0.0001). There was one early construct failure due to technical error. Thirty-seven of the remaining patients (95%) went on to apparently stable arthrodesis. Conclusions: Current types of anterior spinal instrumentation and reconstruction techniques can allow some types of unstable three-column thoracolumbar injuries to be treated in an anterior stand-alone fashion. This allows direct anterior decompression of neural elements, improvement in segmental angulation, and acceptable rates of arthrodesis without the need for supplemental posterior instrumentation.
Teachers’ reasons for using self-assessment: a survey self-report of Spanish teachers

The study aimed to explore teachers’ beliefs about student self-assessment (SSA) and the reasons for their use of it in their classrooms. A representative sample of 944 Spanish teachers (38.8% primary school sector, 54.0% secondary school sector and 7.2% university or adult education sector) were surveyed about SSA. Data were analysed using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling to determine statistically and theoretically significant predictors of teachers’ self-reported use of SSA. Results showed that 90% of the teachers indicated having used SSA in their courses and 90% reported having positive experiences. A well-fitting structural model found five statistically significant predictors for the use of SSA: (1) positive experience with self-assessment, (2) belief in student participation in assessment, (3) willingness to include self-assessment as percentage of final grade, (4) self-assessment advantages and (5) having attended assessment courses. Statistically significant mean score differences for these factors were found according to level of employment and level of educational qualifications. In conclusion, teachers’ values, attitudes and prior experiences with this type of assessment contributed a significant proportion of self-reported SSA usage.
Social linking and physical proximity in a mobile location-based service

In this paper we collected and examined the indoor location traces of users of an indoor location-based social network service called Find & Connect deployed at an academic conference, to explore the relation between users' physical proximity and the connecting properties of their social links. We define a parameter called encounter to represent the physical proximity between users, and also select two kinds of social links that exist in the online social graph formed during the conference, i.e., friendship and sharing common friends. Using these parameters, we present a correlation study of encounter duration, frequency and distribution with the formation and strength of the social links. Results show that, on average, an increasing encounter duration between users leads to a high possibility of the establishments of social links, while afterwards this increment of encounter duration slows down after establishments of social links. We also find users that are highly sociable (with regards to the number of friends and common friends) indicate a higher proximity interaction with their friends, and similarity of a pair of users suggests more and longer encounters between them. This means, for two kinds of social links we select, there is a strong relation between social linking and physical proximity.
ADCP's Gravity waves data processing with wavelet Matched Phase Method

This work uses data from Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP), which form a spatial arrangement (array) of 12 sensors placed near the sea surface, to determine the directional wave spectrum by a new schema for data processing, named Matched Phase Method - MPM, that also utilizes the wavelet Data Analysis with Adaptive Technique (DAAT). The method is inverse and determines the direction of the ocean wave field, in frequency bands, based on the match between the phase observed in the cross-spectrum of different combinations of sensors of the ADCP and the theoretical phase response of each pair of sensors subjected to gravity waves of unit amplitude from different directions (transfer function). The method provides the spreading function directly, without using fitting models. The wavelet approach grants high temporal resolution for selected frequency bins representative of the ocean wave field. The MPM results were consistently robust, showing stability between results from subsequent independent records.
© 2012 Landes Bioscience. Do not distribute. Tissue, cell type and stage-specific ectopic gene expression and RNAi induction in the Drosophila testis

The Drosophila testis has numerous advantages for the study of basic cellular processes, as production of sperm requires a highly orchestrated and complex combination of morphological changes and developmentally regulated transitions. Experimental genetics using Drosophila melanogaster has advanced dramatically with the advent of systems for ectopic expression of genetic elements in specific cells. However the genetic tools used in Drosophila research have rarely been generated with the testes in mind, and the utility of relatively few systems has been documented for this tissue. Here I will summarize ectopic expression systems that are known to work for the testis, and provide advice for selection of the most appropriate expression system in specific experimental situations.
Chitosan Enhances the In Vitro Surface Activity of Dilute Lung Surfactant Preparations and Resists Albumin-Induced Inactivation

Chitosan is a natural, cationic polysaccharide derived from fully or partially deacetylated chitin. Chitosan is capable of inducing large phospholipid aggregates, closely resembling the function of nonionic polymers tested previously as additives to therapeutic lung surfactants. The effects of chitosan on improving the surface activity of a dilute lung surfactant preparation, bovine lipid extract surfactant (BLES), and on resisting albumin-induced inactivation were studied using a constrained sessile drop (CSD) method. Also studied in parallel were the effects of polyethylene glycol (PEG, 10 kD) and hyaluronan (HA, 1240 kD). Both adsorption and dynamic cycling studies showed that chitosan is able to significantly enhance the surface activity of 0.5 mg/mL BLES and to resist albumin-induced inactivation at an extremely low concentration of 0.05 mg/mL, 1000 times smaller than the usual concentration of PEG and 20 times smaller than HA. Optical microscopy found that chitosan induced large surfactant aggregates even in the presence of albumin. Cytotoxicity tests confirmed that chitosan has no deleterious effect on the viability of lung epithelial cells. The experimental results suggest that chitosan may be a more effective polymeric additive to lung surfactant than the other polymers tested so far.
Unexpected genetic differentiation between recently recolonized populations of a long-lived and highly vagile marine mammal

Many species have been heavily exploited by man leading to local extirpations, yet few studies have attempted to unravel subsequent recolonization histories. This has led to a significant gap in our knowledge of the long-term effects of exploitation on the amount and structure of contemporary genetic variation, with important implications for conservation. The Antarctic fur seal provides an interesting case in point, having been virtually exterminated in the nineteenth century but subsequently staged a dramatic recovery to recolonize much of its original range. Consequently, we evaluated the hypothesis that South Georgia (SG), where a few million seals currently breed, was the main source of immigrants to other locations including Livingston Island (LI), by genotyping 366 individuals from these two populations at 17 microsatellite loci and sequencing a 263 bp fragment of the mitochondrial hypervariable region 1. Contrary to expectations, we found highly significant genetic differences at both types of marker, with 51% of LI individuals carrying haplotypes that were not observed in 246 animals from SG. Moreover, the youngest of three sequentially founded colonies at LI showed greater similarity to SG at mitochondrial DNA than microsatellites, implying temporal and sex-specific variation in recolonization. Our findings emphasize the importance of relict populations and provide insights into the mechanisms by which severely depleted populations can recover while maintaining surprisingly high levels of genetic diversity.
Incidence and Outcome of Tube Thoracostomy Positioning in Trauma Patients

Abstract Objectives. To evaluate the frequency of use, placement site, success and misplacement rates, and need for intervention for tube thoracostomies (TTs), and the complications with endotracheal intubation associated with TT in the prehospital setting. Methods. We performed a five-year, retrospective study using the records of 1,065 patients who were admitted to the trauma emergency room at a university hospital and who had received chest radiographs or computed tomography (CT) scans within 30 minutes after admission. Results. Seven percent of all patients received a TT (5% unilateral, 2% bilateral). Ninety-seven percent of all patients with a TT were endotracheally intubated. The success rate for correctly placed chest tubes was 78%. Twenty-two percent of the chest tubes were misplaced (i.e., too far in the chest, twisted, or bent); half of those had to be corrected, with one needing to be replaced. There were no statistical differences in the frequency of Monaldi or Bülau positions, or the frequency of left or right chest TT. In addition, the two positions did not differ in misplacement rates or the need for intervention. Helicopter emergency medical services physicians used the Monaldi position significantly more frequently than the Bülau position. In-hospital physicians performing interhospital transfer used the Bülau position significantly more frequently, whereas ground emergency medical physicians had a more balanced relationship between the two positions. Tube thoracostomy had no influence on endotracheal tube misplacement rates, and vice versa. Conclusion. Tube thoracostomy positioning mostly depends on the discretion of the physician on scene. The Monaldi and Bülau positions do not differ in misplacement or complication rates.
Pattern Popularity in 132-Avoiding Permutations

The popularity of a pattern p is the total number of copies of p within all permutations of a set. We address popularity in the set of 132-avoidng permutations. B ona showed that in this set, all other non-monotone length-3 patterns are equipopular, and proved equipopularity relations between some length-k patterns of a specic form. We prove equipopularity relations between general length-k patterns, based on the structure of their corresponding binary plane trees. Our result explains all equipopularity relations for patterns of length up to 7, and we conjecture that it provides a complete classication of equipopularity in 132-avoiding permutations.
Qualitative and quantitative pharmacophore-similarity assessment of anthranilamide-based factor Xa inhibitors: applications on similar molecules with identical biological endpoints

Abstract It is a conventional practice to exclude molecules with identical biological endpoints to avoid bias in the resulting hypothesis model. Despite the diverse chemical functionalities, the receptor interactions of such molecules are often unexplored. The present study motivates the selection of these molecules diversified by single atom or functional group compared to internal molecules as external set and helps in the understanding of corresponding effects toward receptor interactions and biological endpoints. Applied on anthranilamide-series of factor Xa analogs, the inhibitory activities were correlated (r2 = 0.99) and validated (q2 = 0.68) with distance-based pharmacophore descriptors using support vector machine. The selected external set molecules exhibited better prediction accuracy by securing activities less than one residual threshold. The effect on inhibitory activity was assessed by the examination of pharmacophore-similarity and its interactions with key residues of Human factor Xa enzyme using molecular docking approach. Furthermore, qualitative pharmacophore models were developed on the subset of molecular dataset divided as most actives, moderately actives and least actives, to recognize crucial activity governing pharmacophore features. The outcome of this study will bring new insights about the requirements of pharmacophore features and prioritizes its selection in the design and optimization of potent Xa inhibitors.
Jacopo da Firenze's Tractatus Algorismi and Early Italian Abbacus Culture

how a general history can be truly general with silences or quietudes on this scale. This feature is heightened by the final chapter of the second volume, a prediction of future progress in mathematics written by Eberhard Zeidler, where applications are very prominent. A notable feature of these handsomely produced books is the illustrations: 740 in all, with 430 in colour. Quite a few of them are portraits or illustrations made up as postage stamps, of which the author has a remarkable collection. Both books are enriched by substantial bibliographies of primary and especially historical literature. The latter category includes many items written in German, a very rich source that is unknown to most Anglo-Saxon historians. Should an English edition of these books be prepared, these bibliographies would be among the many benefits provided to English-speaking readers.
Motor and Sighting Dominance in Schizophrenia and Affective Disorder

Summary Unusually frequent sinistral motor and sighting dominance have sometimes been reported in schizophrenics, although the majority of patients are still dextral. In this study, assessment of lateral dominance also included a measure of grip strength—a potentially more sensitive index of dominance or lateralised impairment; schizophrenics, non-schizophrenic patients (affective disorder), and normal controls were studied. There were no differences in handedness or sighting dominance. Affective patients, particularly bipolar psychotics, had greater right-handed grip superiority than normals or non-paranoid schizophrenics. Paranoid schizophrenics were similar, being significantly greater in right-sided dominance than non-paranoids, who tended toward a smaller value than normals. Hand grip asymmetry was highly correlated with handedness in normals, but not in patients. The possibility is discussed that these results may reflect asymmetrical patterns of cerebral impairment or attentional bias.
Teaching as a Two-Way Street: Discontinuities among Metaphors, Images, and Classroom Realities

What went well in the lesson? I don't think much of it did. I wasn't happy with my lesson. I couldn't get the right questions. My questions were good and I got them thinking. They came up with lots of great ideas and they're thinking about the dialect and how people speak and why that's important. I don't think they ever got to what I really wanted, that it aids in the reading and makes it more interesting. And that's what I wanted, just to give myself one question in my notes to say, that's the one, that's the one that will get them to find the answer.
Expanding post‐primary education in Malawi: are private schools the answer?

The study was concerned with the range of public and private provision of secondary education and how it is configured in terms of key dimensions of participation, staffing, curriculum, management and costs. It sought to explore how private schools have been developing to meet rapidly growing demand for secondary education of different types in Malawi, and to develop policy‐relevant insights based on evidence using illustrative case studies. The evidence showed that private schools are playing a pivotal role in supplementing government efforts in secondary school provisioning. However, lack of control and regulatory mechanisms has meant that the quality of the education offered in both Community Day Secondary Schools (CDSSs) and private schools is very low. The development of secondary schooling policy in Malawi revolves around the striking of proper balances in the quality of education provided by CDSSs and the lower‐end private schools. The tug of war in the contribution towards increased secondary school access seems to be between the CDSSs and the private schools and the extent of contribution by the private sector will be determined by what policies are put in place by the government to improve the CDSSs. There is need to establish some regulatory mechanisms so that access to private school is within the limits of parental affordability, otherwise private schools may not be the answer to problems of secondary education in poor Malawi.
Diffusion tensor imaging of left ventricular remodeling in response to myocardial infarction in the mouse

The cardiac muscle architecture lies at the basis of the mechanical and electrical properties of the heart, and dynamic alterations in fiber structure are known to be of prime importance in healing and remodeling after myocardial infarction. In this study, left ventricular remodeling was characterized using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) in a mouse model of myocardial infarction. Myocardial infarction was induced in mice by permanent ligation of the left anterior descending coronary artery. Serial ex vivo DTI measurements were performed 7, 14, 28, and 60 days after ligation. Apparent diffusion coefficient, fractional anisotropy, the three eigenvalues of the diffusion tensor, and the myofiber disarray served as readout parameters. After myocardial infarction, the mouse hearts displayed extreme wall thinning in the infarcted area, which covered large parts of the apex and extended into the free wall up to the equator. Average heart mass increased by 70% 7–60 days after infarction. Histological analysis showed that the infarct at 7 days consisted of unstructured tissue with residual necrosis and infiltration of macrophages and myofibroblasts. At 14 days after infarction, the necrotic tissue had disappeared and collagen fibers were starting to appear. From 28 to 60 days, the infarct had fully developed into a mature scar. DTI parameters showed dynamic changes as a function of time after infarction. The apparent diffusion coefficient in the infarcted region was lower than in remote regions and increased as a function of time after infarction. The fractional anisotropy was higher in the infarcted region and was maximum at 28 days, which was attributed to the development of structured collagen fibers. Myofiber disarray, which was analyzed by considering the alignment of fibers in neighboring voxels, was significantly higher in infarcted regions. DTI provides a valuable non‐destructive tool for characterizing structural remodeling in diseased myocardium. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
A Principal Component Analysis of 39 Scientific Impact Measures

Background The impact of scientific publications has traditionally been expressed in terms of citation counts. However, scientific activity has moved online over the past decade. To better capture scientific impact in the digital era, a variety of new impact measures has been proposed on the basis of social network analysis and usage log data. Here we investigate how these new measures relate to each other, and how accurately and completely they express scientific impact. Methodology We performed a principal component analysis of the rankings produced by 39 existing and proposed measures of scholarly impact that were calculated on the basis of both citation and usage log data. Conclusions Our results indicate that the notion of scientific impact is a multi-dimensional construct that can not be adequately measured by any single indicator, although some measures are more suitable than others. The commonly used citation Impact Factor is not positioned at the core of this construct, but at its periphery, and should thus be used with caution.
Cucurbitacin E Has Neuroprotective Properties and Autophagic Modulating Activities on Dopaminergic Neurons

Natural molecules are under intensive study for their potential as preventive and/or adjuvant therapies for neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's disease (PD). We evaluated the neuroprotective potential of cucurbitacin E (CuE), a tetracyclic triterpenoid phytosterol extracted from the Ecballium elaterium (Cucurbitaceae), using a known cellular model of PD, NGF-differentiated PC12. In our postmitotic experimental paradigm, neuronal cells were treated with the parkinsonian toxin 1-methyl-4-phenylpyridinium (MPP+) to provoke significant cellular damage and apoptosis or with the potent N,N-diethyldithiocarbamate (DDC) to induce superoxide (O2 •−) production, and CuE was administered prior to and during the neurotoxic treatment. We measured cellular death and reactive oxygen species to evaluate the antioxidant and antiapoptotic properties of CuE. In addition, we analyzed cellular macroautophagy, a bulk degradation process involving the lysosomal pathway. CuE showed neuroprotective effects on MPP+-induced cell death. However, CuE failed to rescue neuronal cells from oxidative stress induced by MPP+ or DDC. Microscopy and western blot data show an intriguing involvement of CuE in maintaining lysosomal distribution and decreasing autophagy flux. Altogether, these data indicate that CuE decreases neuronal death and autophagic flux in a postmitotic cellular model of PD.