Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Circuit design, transistor sizing and wire layout of FPGA interconnect

This paper examines the electrical design of FPGA interconnect circuitry. We explore the circuit design of pass transistor and tri-state buffer routing switches, determine which transistor sizing, metal width and metal spacing are best for FPGA interconnect, and show that FPGA interconnect should be electrically heterogeneous-some (/spl sim/20%) of the routing tracks should be designed for maximum speed while the remainder should be more area-efficient.
The role of laser interstitial thermal therapy in enhancing progression-free survival of difficult-to-access high-grade gliomas: a multicenter study

Surgical extent‐of‐resection has been shown to have an impact on high‐grade glioma (HGG) outcomes; however, complete resection is rarely achievable in difficult‐to‐access (DTA) tumors. Controlled thermal damage to the tumor may have the same impact in DTA‐HGGs. We report our multicenter results of laser interstitial thermal therapy (LITT) in DTA‐HGGs. We retrospectively reviewed 34 consecutive DTA‐HGG patients (24 glioblastoma, 10 anaplastic) who underwent LITT at Cleveland Clinic, Washington University, and Wake Forest University (May 2011–December 2012) using the NeuroBlate® System. The extent of thermal damage was determined using thermal damage threshold (TDT) lines: yellow TDT line (43°C for 2 min) and blue TDT line (43°C for 10 min). Volumetric analysis was performed to determine the extent‐of‐coverage of tumor volume by TDT lines. Patient outcomes were evaluated statistically. LITT was delivered as upfront in 19 and delivered as salvage in 16 cases. After 7.2 months of follow‐up, 71% of cases demonstrated progression and 34% died. The median overall survival (OS) for the cohort was not reached; however, the 1‐year estimate of OS was 68 ± 9%. Median progression‐free survival (PFS) was 5.1 months. Thirteen cases who met the following two criteria—(1) <0.05 cm3 tumor volume not covered by the yellow TDT line and (2) <1.5 cm3 additional tumor volume not covered by the blue TDT line—had better PFS than the other 21 cases (9.7 vs. 4.6 months; P = 0.02). LITT can be used effectively for treatment of DTA‐HGGs. More complete coverage of tumor by TDT lines improves PFS which can be translated as the extent of resection concept for surgery.
Learning of basic concepts in informatics using collaborative hypertext: an experiment and its preliminary results based on SOLO taxonomy

Hypertext appears to be a powerful cognitive tool supporting knowledge construction. A study was conducted to determine whether or not collaborative hypertext affects learning outcomes in the learning of basic concepts in informatics. We organized two courses about the basics in informatics using collaborative hypertext (experimental groups). Simultaneously, we ran two courses without collaborative hypertext (control groups). We analyzed learning and we present our preliminary results utilizing a SOLO taxonomy based measure. The study found that the use of collaborative hypertext does not improve cognitive learning outcomes in our context. This reflects the need for traditional uncomputerized learning methods at the start of learning informatics or the need to concentrate on improving the truthfulness of a collaborative hypertext based learning environment. However, some students can derive benefit from collaborative hypertext under all circumstances and the next question will be how to find these students.
A Theoretical and Empirical Review of Dialectical Behavior Therapy Within Forensic Psychiatric and Correctional Settings Worldwide

ABSTRACT Cognitive-behavioral programs which are structured, skills-based, and risk-focused have been found to reduce recidivism rates by up to 55%. Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) exemplifies all of these components, and has been rapidly adapted and implemented in correctional and forensic psychiatric facilities worldwide to reduce recidivism. Regrettably, the widespread implementation of adapted DBT has outpaced the research on its effectiveness for this purpose. Thus, it is currently unclear whether these programs are meeting the rehabilitation needs of these systems. In the following article, a qualitative systematic literature review of all DBT programs within forensic psychiatric and correctional populations using the PRISMA statement guidelines is presented, along with a detailed exploration of how these programs align with best practices in offender rehabilitation, and whether they are effective in reducing recidivism risk. Results offer very preliminary evidence that DBT has the potential to reduce recidivism risk in criminal justice systems if applied within a Risk-Need-Responsivity framework.
Influences of Media Exposure on Chinese University Students’ Attitudes and Perceptions of Intimate Partner Violence

ABSTRACT Research on media influence on attitudes and perceptions regarding intimate partner violence (IPV), a prominent predictor of IPV, is limited. Using a convenience sample of 2057 Chinese undergraduate students, this survey explored influences of media exposure on attitudes and perceptions of IPV the first time in literature. Significant differences (p < .05) of perceptions of IPV were found between respondents who reported developing cognitions of IPV from books, magazines, or newspapers and those who didn’t, with the former having better perceptions than the latter. Positive associations were also found between print-based media access and perceptions and negative attitudes concerning IPV.
Diagnostic performance of bone metabolic indexes for the detection of stroke

Objectives: To explore the diagnostic performance of 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D), parathyroid hormone (PTH), bone alkaline phosphatase (BALP), and osteocalcin (OC) in predicting stroke. Methods: This retrospective survey was conducted in The Second Affiliated Hospital to Nanchang University, Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, China. involved 121 cerebral infarction patients and 103 cerebral hemorrhage patients as the experimental groups, 100 volunteers as the healthy control group and 80 brain trauma patients as the disease control group. The 25(OH)D, PTH, BALP, and OC levels of all participants were measured by electrochemiluminescence immunoassay. Results: The serum concentration of 25(OH)D in stroke patients was appreciably lower than that of the control groups (p<0.05), and subsequently, the deficiency level of 25(OH)D in the stroke population was considerably higher than that of the control groups (p<0.05). The serum concentrations of PTH and OC in stroke patients exceeded those found in the control groups (p<0.05), and the abnormal level in the stroke patients was also higher than that of the control. Compared with the control group, BALP concentrations in cerebral infarction patients were increased significantly. Additionally, abnormal levels of BALP in stroke patients were found to be higher than those in the control groups. However, concentrations and abnormal levels of BALP in cerebral hemorrhage patients were not found to be significantly different than those found in cerebral infarction and the control groups, There were no substantial differences between the 2 control groups. Conclusion: Lack of 25(OH)D and excessive PTH, BALP, and OC could indicate a high risk of stroke.
Acceptance and commitment therapy for depression and anxiety : an interpretative phenomenological analysis of clients’ experiences in a group context

Rationale: There is accumulating evidence supporting the effectiveness of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) in a group context for individuals with depression and/or anxiety. However, there is limited qualitative research in this area. Aim: This thesis aimed to address this gap by exploring individuals’ experiences of an ACT group for depression and/or anxiety. This may provide an insight into how individuals understand ACT processes and the mechanisms for therapeutic change within ACT. Method: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six participants. Transcripts were analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Findings: Three master superordinate themes emerged; Group Dynamics; The Journey of Therapy; Usefulness of Therapy. A description of these superordinate themes and the seven related subordinate themes are discussed. The findings highlighted the benefits and challenges of ACT tools and concepts as well as the group context. Recommendations for clinical practice and future research are outlined.
Sharing LRU Cache Resources among Content Providers: A Utility-Based Approach

In this paper, we consider the problem of allocating cache resources among multiple content providers. The cache can be partitioned into slices and each partition can be dedicated to a particular content provider, or shared among a number of them. It is assumed that each partition employs the LRU policy for managing content. We propose utility-driven partitioning, where we associate with each content provider a utility that is a function of the hit rate observed by the content provider. We consider two scenarios: i)~content providers serve disjoint sets of files, ii)~there is some overlap in the content served by multiple content providers. In the first case, we prove that cache partitioning outperforms cache sharing as cache size and numbers of contents served by providers go to infinity. In the second case, It can be beneficial to have separate partitions for overlapped content. In the case of two providers, it is usually always beneficial to allocate a cache partition to serve all overlapped content and separate partitions to serve the non-overlapped contents of both providers. We establish conditions when this is true asymptotically but also present an example where it is not true asymptotically. We develop online algorithms that dynamically adjust partition sizes in order to maximize the overall utility and prove that they converge to optimal solutions, and through numerical evaluations, we show they are effective.
Utility of Repeated Praziquantel Dosing in the Treatment of Schistosomiasis in High-Risk Communities in Africa: A Systematic Review

Background Controversy persists about the optimal approach to drug-based control of schistosomiasis in high-risk communities. In a systematic review of published studies, we examined evidence for incremental benefits from repeated praziquantel dosing, given 2 to 8 weeks after an initial dose, in Schistosoma-endemic areas of Africa. Methodology/Principal Findings We performed systematic searches of electronic databases PubMed and EMBASE for relevant data using search terms ‘schistosomiasis’, ‘dosing’ and ‘praziquantel’ and hand searches of personal collections and bibliographies of recovered articles. In 10 reports meeting study criteria, improvements in parasitological treatment outcomes after two doses of praziquantel were greater for S. mansoni infection than for S. haematobium infection. Observed cure rates (positive to negative conversion in egg detection assays) were, for S. mansoni, 69–91% cure after two doses vs. 42–79% after one dose and, for S. haematobium, 46–99% cure after two doses vs. 37–93% after a single dose. Treatment benefits in terms of reduction in intensity (mean egg count) were also different for the two species—for S. mansoni, the 2-dose regimen yielded an weighted average 89% reduction in standardized egg counts compared to a 83% reduction after one dose; for S. haematobium, two doses gave a 93% reduction compared to a 94% reduction with a single dose. Cost-effectiveness analysis was performed based on Markov life path modeling. Conclusions/Significance Although schedules for repeated treatment with praziquantel require greater inputs in terms of direct costs and community participation, there are incremental benefits to this approach at an estimated cost of $153 (S. mansoni)–$211 (S. haematobium) per additional lifetime QALY gained by double treatment in school-based programs. More rapid reduction of infection-related disease may improve program adherence, and if, as an externality of the program, transmission can be reduced through more effective coverage, significant additional benefits are expected to accrue in the targeted communities.
FocVel1 influences asexual production, filamentous growth, biofilm formation, and virulence in Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. cucumerinum

Velvet genes play critical roles in the regulation of diverse cellular processes. In current study, we identified the gene FocVel1, a homolog of Fusarium graminearum VelA, in the plant pathogenic fungus F. oxysporum f. sp. cucumerinum. This pathogen causes the destructive disease called cucumber Fusarium wilt (CFW), which severely affects the production and marketing of this vegetable worldwide. Transcript analyses revealed high expression of FocVel1 during conidiophore development. Disruption of the FocVel1 gene led to several phenotypic defects, including reduction in aerial hyphal formation and conidial production. The deletion mutant ΔFocVel1 showed increased resistance to both osmotic stress and cell wall-damaging agents, but increased sensitivity to iprodione and prochloraz fungicides, which may be related to changes in cell wall components. In the process of biofilm formation in vitro, the mutant strain ΔFocVel1 displayed not only a reduction in spore aggregation but also a delay in conidial germination on the polystyrene surface, which may result in defects in biofilm formation. Moreover, pathogenicity assays showed that the mutant ΔFocVel1 exhibited impaired virulence in cucumber seedlings. And the genetic complementation of the mutant with the wild-type FocVel1 gene restored all the defects of the ΔFocVel1. Taken together, the results of this study indicated that FocVel1 played a critical role in the regulation of various cellular processes and pathogenicity in F. oxysporum f. sp. cucumerinum.
My worst faults and misdeeds: Self-criticism and self-enhancement can co-exist*

Abstract Three studies explored whether self-enhancement is precluded when people recognize or even exaggerate their worst faults and behaviors. Even when acknowledging their faults, participants minimized the extent to which their bad characteristics reflected what kind of people they were, predicted that they would improve more in the future than would others with the same faults, claimed that others have done worse things to them than they have to others, and indicated that others are more likely to repeat the same bad behaviors in the future than themselves. Observers who read actors’ descriptions of their own misdeeds and those of others also saw the things that were done to actors as worse than the things actors had done.
Gender Differences in Caregiving at End of Life: Implications for Hospice Teams.

BACKGROUND Researchers have identified important gender differences in the experience of caring for a family member or friend living with advanced disease; however, trends suggest that these differences may be diminishing over time in response to changing gender roles. In addition, while many studies have found caregiving experiences and outcomes to be poorer among female caregivers, noteworthy exceptions exist. OBJECTIVE The primary aim of this exploratory study was to determine how, if at all, current day caregiving at end of life varies by gender. METHODS We conducted a secondary analysis of data from a multisite randomized controlled trial of a family caregiving intervention performed between 2010 and 2014. We compared female and male hospice family caregivers on baseline variables using χ(2) tests for association of categorical variables and t-tests for continuous variables. Our sample included 289 family caregivers of individuals receiving services from one of two hospice agencies located in the northwestern United States. Demographic data and other categorical variables of interest were provided via caregiver self-report using an instrument created specifically for this study. Reaction to caregiving and caregiving burden were measured using the Caregiver Reaction Assessment (CRA). RESULTS As it related to caregiving, females had significantly lower self-esteem and more negative impact on their schedule, health, and family support than males. No gender differences were detected with regard to the impact of caregiving on individuals' finances. CONCLUSIONS Despite changing social expectations, pronounced gender differences persist in caregiving at the end of life.
Are FLOSS developers committing to CVS / SVN as much as they are talking in mailing lists ? Challenges for Integrating d ata from Multiple Repositories

This paper puts forward a framework for investigating Free and Open Source Software (F/OSS) developers activities in both source code and mailing lists repositories. We used data dumps of fourteen projects from the FLOSSMetrics (FM) retrieval system. Our intentions are (i) to present a possible methodology, its advantages and disadvantages which can benefit future researchers using some aspects of the FM retrieval system’s data dumps, and (ii) discuss our initial research results on the contributions developers make to both coding and lists activities.
Comparison of cardiac and pulmonary-specific quality-of-life measures in pulmonary arterial hypertension

Studies systematically comparing the performance of health-related quality-of-life (HRQoL) instruments in pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) are lacking. We sought to address this by comparing cardiac and respiratory-specific measures of HRQoL in PAH. We prospectively assessed HRQoL in 128 patients with catheterisation-confirmed PAH at baseline and at 6, 12 and post-24 month follow-up visits. Cardiac-specific HRQoL was assessed using the Minnesota Living with Heart Failure Questionnaire (LHFQ); respiratory-specific HRQoL was assessed using the Airways Questionnaire 20 (AQ20); and general health status was assessed using the 36-item Short Form physical component summary (SF-36 PCS). The LHFQ and AQ20 were highly intercorrelated. Both demonstrated strong internal consistency and converged with the SF-36 PCS. Both discriminated patients based on World Health Organization (WHO) functional class, 6-min walking distance (6MWD) and Borg dyspnoea index (BDI), with the exception of a potential floor effect associated with low 6MWD. The LHFQ was more responsive than the AQ20 to changes over time in WHO functional class, 6MWD and BDI. In multivariate analyses, the LHFQ and AQ20 were each longitudinal predictors of general health status, independent of functional class, 6MWD and BDI. In conclusion, both cardiac-specific and respiratory-specific measures appropriately assess HRQoL in most patients with PAH. Overall, the LHFQ demonstrates stronger performance characteristics than the AQ20.
Binocular Stereopsis and Lane Marker Flow for Vehicle Navigation: Lateral and Longitudinal Control

We propose a new approach for vision based longitudinal and lateral vehicle control which makes extensive use of binocular stereopsis. Longitudinal control | i.e. maintaining a safe, constant distance from the vehicle in front | is supported by detecting and measuring the distances to leading vehicles using binocular stereo. A known camera geometry with respect to the locally planar road is used to map the images of the road plane in the two camera views into alignment. Any signi cant residual image disparity then indicates an object not lying in the road plane and hence a potential obstacle. This approach allows us to separate image features into those lying in the road plane, e.g. lane markers, and those due to other objects. The features which lie on the road are stationary in the scene and appear to move only because of the egomotion of the vehicle. Measurements on these features are used for dynamic update of (a) the camera parameters in the presence of camera vibration and changes in road slope (b) the lateral position of the vehicle with respect to the lane markers. In the absence of this separation, image features due to vehicles which happen to lie in the search zone for lane markers would corrupt the estimation of the road boundary contours. This problem has not yet been addressed by any lane marker based vehicle guidance approach, but has to be taken very seriously, since usually one has to cope with crowded trafc scenes where lane markers are often obstructed by vehicles. Lane markers are detected and used for lateral control, i.e. following the road while maintaining a constant lateral distance to the road boundary. For that purpose we model the road and hence the shape of the lane markers as clothoidal curves, the curvatures of which we estimate recursively along the image sequence. These curvature estimates also provides desirable look-ahead information for a smooth ride in the car. Research funded by PATH grant no. MOU 94
Development of an environment for building ontologies which is based on a fundamental consideration of “relationship” and “role”

A methodology of ontology design and a computer system supporting ontology design are needed. Our research goals include a methodology for ontology design and developing an environment for building and using ontologies. Although several systems for building ontologies have been implemented, they do not consider enough ontological theory. We discuss how to apply the “role-concept” and “relationship” in our environment, named Hozo, for creating and using ontologies. We present the architecture, functionalities of its modules, its interface and the different possibilities for the design and use of ontologies.
Beyond composite scores and Cronbach's alpha: advancing methodological rigor in recreation research.

Critically examining common statistical approaches and their strengths and weaknesses is an important step in advancing recreation and leisure sciences. To continue this critical examination and to inform methodological decision making, this study compared three approaches to determine how alternative approaches may result in contradictory conclusions in the interpretation of the psychometric properties of a scale and in response to a given research question. To this end, this study explored what factors best predicted parental endorsement of competition climbing in a sample of 184 parents of youth competition climbers. The study findings suggest that the three distinct approaches provided meaningfully different conclusions regarding the adapted psychometric properties of the questionnaire, but offered no meaningful differences in the primary finding of the study: Parent–coach relationship quality is the best predictor of parental endorsement of competition climbing. The results suggest that deeper examination of self-report questionnaire data may advance our understanding of complex recreation and leisure constructs beyond what can be understood with less advanced analytic techniques. Subscribe to JOREL
Experiments in learning prototypical situations for variants of the pursuit game

We present an approach to learning cooperative b.ehavior of agents. Our approach is based on classi~’ing situations with the help of tile nearest-neighbor rule. In this context, learning amounts to evolving a set. of good prototypic’dd situations. With each prototypical situation an action is ,associated that should be executed in that situation. A set of prototypicaa situation/action pairs together with the nearest-neighbor rule represent the behavior of an agent. We demonstrate the utility of our approazh in the light of variants of the well-known pursuit game. To this end, we present a classification of variants of the pursuit game, and wc report on the results of our approach obtained for variants regarding several aspects of the classification. A first implementation of our approach that utilizes a genetic algorithm to conduct the search for a set. of suitable prototypical situation/a~tion pairs was able to handle many different variants.