Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Bilateral anterior cingulotomy for chronic noncancer pain.

OBJECTIVE: To document the value of bilateral anterior cingulotomy for patients with intractable chronic noncancer pain. METHODS: Twenty-three patients who underwent 28 cingulotomies between 1979 and 1996 for chronic refractory pain were sent questionnaires regarding their subjective response to the surgery and its impact on their pain. Questions dealt with pre- and postoperative pain, ability to resume work or usual activity, medications, family and social interactions, and overall benefit of cingulotomy. Results were compared with long-term (average, 8 yr) clinical follow-up. In 13 patients, pain was predominantly caused by lumbar adhesive arachnoiditis or "failed back. " The remainder had venous occlusive disease, ischemic bilateral leg pain, phantom leg pain, postoperative neck pain, or atypical facial pain. RESULTS: Eighteen patients returned questionnaires; two patients died of unrelated causes. Seventy-two percent of patients reported improvement in their pain, 55% were no longer taking narcotics, 67% noted improvement in their family life, and 72% noted improvement in their social interactions. Fifty-six percent of patients reported that the cingulotomy was beneficial, and 28% returned to their usual activities or work. Thirty-nine percent of patients developed transient or well-controlled seizures. Five patients required a second cingulotomy, and one patient did well despite developing brain abscesses. Patient assessments corresponded closely with clinical assessments. CONCLUSION: Bilateral anterior cingulotomy is safe for patients with refractory chronic pain. Seizures reported in this series were well controlled with medication. More than half of all respondents thought they had a positive outcome and that cingulotomy was beneficial to them. There were no deaths related to the procedure.
Low test application time resource binding for behavioral synthesis

Recent advances in process technology have led to a rapid increase in the density of integrated circuits (ICs). Increased density and the need to test for new types of defects in nanometer technologies have resulted in a tremendous increase in test application time (TAT). This article presents a test synthesis method to reduce test application time for testing the datapath of a design. The test application time is reduced by applying a test-time-aware resource sharing algorithm on a scheduled control data flow graph (CDFG) of a design.
A comparison of the emotional intelligence and thinking styles of students in different university study fields

An exploratory study was undertaken to investigate the relationship between emotional intelligence based on Mayer and Salovey’s (1990) trait model of emotional intelligence and cognitive thinking styles based on the theory of mental selfgovernment. Emphasis was placed on the influence of emotional intelligence and thinking styles on choice of study field. Participants were 309 students from a Gauteng university. Students registered with the humanities (n=99), management (n=41), sciences (n=131) and engineering (n=38) faculties were compared on the Schutte Self-Report Inventory for emotional intelligence (Schutte et al., 1998) and on the Thinking Styles Inventory (Sternberg & Wagner, 1992). A relationship was found between complex and creative thinking styles and high emotional intelligence. Results from the stepwise multiple regression analysis procedures indicated that the subscales of thinking styles could be significant predictors of emotional intelligence. Students from different faculties were found to have the same level of emotional intelligence and similar thinking styles.
A Game-Theoretic Approach to Energy-Efficient Modulation in CDMA Networks with Delay Constraints

A game-theoretic framework is used to study the effect of constellation size on the energy efficiency of wireless networks for M-QAM modulation. A non-cooperative game is proposed in which each user seeks to choose its transmit power (and possibly transmit symbol rate) as well as the constellation size in order to maximize its own utility while satisfying its delay quality-of-service (QoS) constraint. The utility function used here measures the number of reliable bits transmitted per joule of energy consumed, and is particularly suitable for energy-constrained networks. The best-response strategies and Nash equilibrium solution for the proposed game are derived. It is shown that in order to maximize its utility (in bits per joule), a user must choose the lowest constellation size that can accommodate the user's delay constraint. Using this framework, the tradeoffs among energy efficiency, delay, throughput and constellation size are also studied and quantified. The effect of trellis-coded modulation on energy efficiency is also discussed
On full text download and citation distributions in scientific‐scholarly journals

A statistical analysis of full text downloads of articles in Elsevier's ScienceDirect covering all disciplines reveals large differences in download frequencies, their skewness, and their correlation with Scopus‐based citation counts, between disciplines, journals, and document types. Download counts tend to be 2 orders of magnitude higher and less skewedly distributed than citations. A mathematical model based on the sum of two exponentials does not adequately capture monthly download counts. The degree of correlation at the article level within a journal is similar to that at the journal level in the discipline covered by that journal, suggesting that the differences between journals are, to a large extent, discipline specific. Despite the fact that in all studied journals download and citation counts per article positively correlate, little overlap may exist between the set of articles appearing in the top of the citation distribution and that with the most frequently downloaded ones. Usage and citation leaks, bulk downloading, differences between reader and author populations in a subject field, the type of document or its content, differences in obsolescence patterns between downloads and citations, and different functions of reading and citing in the research process all provide possible explanations of differences between download and citation distributions.
Nisin-Producing Lactococcus lactis Strains Isolated from Human Milk

ABSTRACT Characterization by partial 16S rRNA gene sequencing, ribotyping, and green fluorescent protein-based nisin bioassay revealed that 6 of 20 human milk samples contained nisin-producing Lactococcus lactis bacteria. This suggests that the history of humans consuming nisin is older than the tradition of consuming fermented milk products.
Properties of the Bacillus subtilis spore coat

About 70% of the protein in isolated Bacillus subtilis spore coats was solubilized by treatment with a combination of reducing and denaturing agents at alkaline pH. The residue, consisting primarily of protein, was insoluble in a variety of reagents. The soluble proteins were resolved into at least seven bands by sodium dodecyl sulfate gel electrophoresis. About one-half of the total was four proteins of 8,000 to 12,000 daltons. These were relatively tyrosine rich, and one was a glycoprotein. There was also a cluster of proteins of about 40,000 daltons and two or three in the 20,000- to 25,000-dalton range. The insoluble fraction had an amino acid composition and N-terminal pattern of amino acids very similar to those of the soluble coat proteins. A major difference was the presence of considerable dityrosine in performic acid-oxidized preparations of insoluble coats. Coat antigen including a 60,000-dalton protein not present in extracts of mature spores was detected in extracts of sporulating cells by immunoprecipitation. This large antigen turned over in a pulse-chase experiment. Antibodies to either the array of 8,000- to 12,000-dalton coat polypeptides or to the larger coat proteins reacted with this 60,000-dalton species, suggesting a common precursor for many of the mature coat polypeptides. Spore coats seem to be assembled by processing of proteins and by secondary modifications including perhaps dityrosine formation for cross-linking.
Consistent group and coset reductions of the bosonic string

Dimensional reductions of pure Einstein gravity on cosets other than tori are inconsistent. The inclusion of specific additional scalar and p-form matter can change the situation. For example, a D-dimensional Einstein–Maxwell-dilaton system, with a specific dilaton coupling, is known to admit a consistent reduction on S2 = SU(2)/U(1), of a sort first envisaged by Pauli. We provide a new understanding, by showing how an S3 = SU(2) group-manifold reduction of (D + 1)-dimensional Einstein gravity, of a type first indicated by DeWitt, can be broken into two steps; a Kaluza-type reduction on U(1) followed by a Pauli-type coset reduction on S2. More generally, we show that any D-dimensional theory that itself arises as a Kaluza U(1) reduction from (D + 1) dimensions admits a consistent Pauli reduction on any coset of the form G/U(1). Extensions to the case G/H are given. Pauli coset reductions of the bosonic string on G = (G × G)/G are believed to be consistent, and a consistency proof exists for S3 = SO(4)/SO(3). We examine these reductions, and arguments for consistency, in detail. The structures of the theories obtained instead by DeWitt-type group-manifold reductions of the bosonic string are also studied, allowing us to make contact with previous such work in which only singlet scalars are retained. Consistent truncations with two singlet scalars are possible. Intriguingly, despite the fact that these are not supersymmetric models, if the group manifold has dimension 3 or 25, they admit a superpotential formulation, and hence first-order equations yielding domain-wall solutions.
The global footprint of persistent extra‐tropical drought in the instrumental era

The major North American droughts as per instrumental records are shown to be part of a larger, global pattern of low‐frequency drought variability. Drought in western North America during the 1850s–1860s, 1870s, 1890s, 1930s and 1950s, is shown to coincide with the occurrence of prolonged dry spells in parts of Europe, southern South America and western Australia. Tropical land regions are mostly wet during these periods, with the exception of central east Africa, southern India and Sri Lanka, which are dry. The recent 1998–2003 period of drought in western North America reveals a similar global hydroclimatic ‘footprint’ with the exception of a wet southern South America and continued dry conditions in the Sahel. Common to each of the six droughts is the persistence of anomalously cool east central tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures (SSTs). For the 1998–2003 case, the warming of SSTs everywhere outside of the east central tropical Pacific may be influencing precipitation and masking the influence of persistent precipitation anomalies driven from the tropical Pacific alone. In general, examination of these major historical extra‐tropical droughts reveals a hemispherically and, in the extra‐tropics, a zonally symmetric pattern consistent with forcing from the Tropics.
Determination of Urinary Biomarkers for Assessment of Short-Term Human Exposure to Aflatoxins in São Paulo, Brazil

In the present study, a longitudinal assessment was carried out to evaluate the short-term human exposure to aflatoxins in Pirassununga region, São Paulo, Brazil, by determination of urinary aflatoxins by a liquid chromatography coupled to mass sprectrometry (UPLC-MS/MS) method. Sixteen volunteers with ages ranging from 14 to 55 years old were instructed to collect the early morning first urine four times every three months, from June 2011 to March 2012, totaling 64 samples. Aflatoxin M1 (AFM1) was found in 39 samples (61%) at levels ranging from 0.19 to 12.7 pg·mg−1 creatinine (mean: 1.2 ± 2.0 pg·mg−1 creatinine). Residues of aflatoxins B1, B2, G1, G2 and aflatoxicol were not identified in any urine sample. No significant difference was found among the AFM1 mean levels in urine samples collected in the four sampling periods. The levels of AFM1 found in urine samples indicate a low short-term exposure of the population studied to aflatoxins through the diet, although further investigations are needed to assess other long-term biomarkers of exposure to AFB1.
ULTRACAM photometry of the eclipsing cataclysmic variables XZ Eri and DV UMa

We present high-speed, three-colour photometry of the faint eclipsing cataclysmic variables XZ Eri and DV UMa. We determine the system parameters through two techniques: first, timings of the eclipse contact phases of the white dwarf and bright-spot using the derivative of the light curve; and secondly, a parametrized model of the eclipse fitted to the observed light curve by X 2 minimization. For both objects, we prefer the latter method, as it is less affected by photon noise and rapid flickering. For XZ Eri we obtain a mass ratio q = 0.1098 ± 0.0017 and an orbital inclination i = 80. °16 ± 0. °09. For DV UMa we derive figures of q = 0.1506 ± 0.0009 and i = 84. °24 ± 0°07. The secondary star in XZ Eri has a very low mass M r /M ○. = 0.0842 ± 0.0024, placing it close to the upper limit on the mass of a brown dwarf.
EVALUATION OF PERIPAPILLARY INTRACHOROIDAL CAVITATION WITH SWEPT SOURCE AND ENHANCED DEPTH IMAGING OPTICAL COHERENCE TOMOGRAPHY

Purpose: To investigate the anatomic characteristics of peripapillary intrachoroidal cavitation using optical coherence tomography methodologies that are capable of deeper tissue penetration and consider pathophysiologic mechanisms of disease on the basis of the derived imaging information. Methods: Consecutive eyes with peripapillary intrachoroidal cavitation were imaged with swept source optical coherence tomography with a 1-mm light source and in one eye with enhanced depth imaging spectral domain optical coherence tomography and 3-dimensional rendering. The anatomic layers were identified, and the induced abnormalities were evaluated. Results: There were 16 eyes of 13 patients who had a mean age of 50.3 years and a mean spherical refraction of −12.5 diopters in the affected eyes. The lesion appeared as a yellowish-orange lobular region, usually inferior to the optic nerve, which was invariably tilted. The sclera was bowed posteriorly under the region of the intrachoroidal cavitation, while the overlying retina–retinal pigment epithelium–Bruch membrane complex showed little, if any deformation. Full-thickness defects in the retina at the inferior border of the conus were seen in four eyes and were associated with prominent cavitation within the choroid with marked posterior bowing of the sclera, but negligible deformation of the overlying retina inferior to the nerve. Conclusion: Newer imaging modalities provided information about deeper structures in the eye not available in older studies that were performed with time-domain optical coherence tomography. This study demonstrated posterior deformation of the sclera in regions previously thinned by the ocular expansion that occurs in high myopia and imaged the resultant effects on the involved choroid.
Ventral occipito-temporal cortex function and anatomical connectivity in reading

Previous functional neuroimaging studies of reading in skilled readers, acquired dyslexia and developmental dyslexia have all shown that the left ventral occipito-temporal cortex (vOT) is involved in visual word recognition. Specifically, a region in the left posterior occipito-temporal sulcus lateral to fusiform gyrus and medial to inferior temporal gyrus has been reported to play an important role. However, the precise functional contribution of this area in reading is yet to be fully explored. In this thesis, I empirically evaluated a claim that vOT responds not only to bottom-up processing demands of the visual stimuli but is also influenced by automatic, top-down non-visual processing demands, as proposed by the Interactive Account of vOT functioning. The first part of this thesis investigated the functional properties of vOT during reading, using functional magnetic resonance imaging. In the first project, the top-down influences on vOT were investigated, teasing apart visual and non-visual properties of written stimuli. In the second project, using the Japanese orthography I disentangled a word’s lexical frequency from the frequency of its visual form – an important distinction for understanding the neural information processing in regions engaged by reading and further explored the interactive nature of the vOT responses. The second part then investigated the anatomical basis of these functional interactions between vOT and other cortical regions. I used diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging and tractography, the only method currently available to identify and measure white matter fibre pathways non-invasively and in vivo. My research has demonstrated that vOT integrates bottom-up visual information and top-down predictions from regions encoding non-visual attributes of the stimulus in an interactive fashion. It also illustrated the putative anatomical basis for functional connectivity during reading, which is consistent with the parallel cortical visual pathways seen in other primates. Altogether, the results provide strong support for the Interactive Account.
Three-Dimensional Analytical Calculation of Permanent Magnet Interactions by “Magnetic Node” Representation

The interaction force and torque between two parallelepiped magnets can be analytically calculated by “magnetic nodes. ” The obtained expressions only depend on the corner positions. It leads F. Bancel to propose the notion of magnetic nodes situated at the corner positions. The force and torque components can be directly calculated with the magnetic nodes representation. The only hypothesis is that the magnets are supposed to be perfect (polarizations J and J' constant, rigid and uniform). The analytical calculation is made by replacing polarizations by distributions of magnetic charges on the poles. The torque is calculated for rotational movement of the second magnet around its center. The three components of the force and the torque can be written with functions based on logarithm and arc-tangent. The representation by magnetic nodes is correct from a mathematical point of view. But attention must be paid to the fact that the magnetic nodes cannot be isolated from the others. The whole force is correct even when the value on the magnetic nodes is not. Meanwhile, the magnetic node representation is very suitable for global interaction understanding and for force and torque calculation.
Leptin/LepRb in the Ventral Tegmental Area Mediates Anxiety-Related Behaviors

Background: Leptin, an adipose-derived hormone, has been implicated in emotional regulation. We have previously shown that systemic administration of leptin produces anxiolytic-like effects and deletion of the leptin receptor, LepRb, in midbrain dopamine neurons leads to an anxiogenic phenotype. This study investigated whether activation or deletion of LepRb in the ventral tegmental area of adult mice is capable of inducing anxiolytic and anxiogenic effects, respectively. Methods: Mice were cannulated in the ventral tegmental area and received bilateral intra-ventral tegmental area infusions of leptin or the JAK2/STAT3 inhibitor AG490. Anxiety-like behaviors were assessed using the elevated plus-maze, light-dark box, and novelty suppressed feeding tests. Deletion of LepRb in the ventral tegmental area was achieved by bilateral injection of AAV-Cre into the ventral tegmental area of adult Leprflox/flox mice. Anxiety-related behaviors were evaluated 3 weeks after viral injection. Results: Intra-ventral tegmental area infusions of leptin reduced anxiety-like behaviors, as indicated by increased percent open-arm time and open-arm entries in the elevated plus-maze test, increased time spent in the light side and decreased latency to enter the light side of the light-dark box, and decreased latency to feed in the novelty suppressed feeding test. Blockade of JAK2/STAT3 signaling in the ventral tegmental area by AG490 attenuated the anxiolytic effect produced by systemic administration of leptin. Leprflox/flox mice injected with AAV-Cre into the ventral tegmental area showed decreased leptin-induced STAT3 phosphorylation and enhanced anxiety-like behaviors in the elevated plus-maze test and the novelty suppressed feeding test. Conclusions: These findings suggest that leptin-LepRb signaling in the ventral tegmental area plays an important role in the regulation of anxiety-related behaviors.
L'efficacité territoriale et l'évaluation. Penser le déploiement spatial du politique grâce au programme européen LEADER.

Cette these interroge un couple quasi fondateur de la territorialisation de l'action publique : la relation « territoire » - « efficacite ». La notion de territoire repose sur l'idee qu'il existe des systemes politiques situes. L'efficacite renvoie a la recherche d'une meilleure rationalisation de l'action politique visant a sa legitimation dans l'espace public. Ce couple fonctionne sur un postulat historique, en France au moins, que la territorialisation accroit l'efficacite. Or, la plupart des analyses montrent que sa verification n'est pas evidente. Nous avons cherche a comprendre les raisons de ce decalage entre le postulat et les faits en explorant de maniere approfondie les territoires de projet LEADER (programme europeen de developpement territorial) des Monts du Lyonnais et du Massif de Chambaran (Rhone-Alpes, France). Ce travail a permis de degager deux enseignements fondamentaux sur le deploiement spatial du politique. D'abord, la spatialite politique, c'est-a-dire ce que les acteurs politiques font avec l'espace, est soumise a deux logiques contradictoires : l'efficacite des politiques (l'adequation probleme / solution) et l'efficacite politique (la construction de la possibilite d'agir). Dans cette perspective, la construction des espaces politiques est a envisager comme une articulation de ces deux dimensions de l'action politique. Ensuite, cette articulation est territorialement differenciee, ce qui exclut de la definir a priori. Elle repond a la necessite pour les acteurs politiques de gerer la complexification de l'action publique territoriale a l'origine de deux types d'incertitude : l'incertitude verticale (relations entre niveaux territoriaux) et l'incertitude horizontale (processus de differenciation territoriale). Ainsi, l'etude des territoires de projet met a jour une nouvelle espece de territoire politique, l'espace-tampon, qui rend possible et ordonne la co-existence de ces differentes dimensions de l'action publique territoriale. En ce sens, l'efficacite territoriale doit etre pensee comme une capacite des systemes politiques a articuler des logiques contradictoires. Au final, ces apports academiques nourrissent la reflexion sur l'evaluation des politiques territoriales et permettent de dessiner les pistes pour une amelioration de son utilite. D'une part, ils invitent a depasser l'approche evaluative classique fondee sur l'integration politique de l'espace. D'autre part, ils permettent de poser les bases d'une grammaire de la spatialite politique, qui reste a elaborer, dont l'evaluation pourrait se saisir afin d'informer plus en profondeur la territorialisation de l'action publique.