Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A new instrument to measure gaseous nitrous acid (HONO) in the atmosphere.

A new in situ instrument (LOPAP: long path absorption photometer) to measure gaseous nitrous acid (HONO) using wet chemical sampling and photometric detection has been developed. This instrument is aimed to overcome the known problems with current HONO measurement techniques and was designed to be a cheap, sensitive, compact, and continuouslyworking HONO monitorfor ambient air measurements in the troposphere or for measurements of higher concentrations e.g. in smog chambers, in exhaust gases, and in indoor environments. Laboratory investigations were carried outto characterize the instrument components with respect to collection efficiency, optimum dye formation, optimum detection, and interfering species. Detection limits ranging from approximately 3 to 50 pptV have been obtained with response times from 4 to 1.5 min, respectively, using different instrument parameters. The accuracy of the measurements is in the range between +/-(10-15)%. The validation of the instrument was performed in the laboratory for HONO concentrations of 3 and 30 ppbV using ion chromatography and with a DOAS (differential optical absorption spectrometer) instrument in a large outdoor smog chamber in the range from 0.1 to 20 ppbV. The deviations were well within the errors of the measurements; however, when comparing the data with the DOAS instrument systematically higher values were found with the LOPAP instrument.
ALIFE 14 : Proceedings of the Fourteenth International Conference on the Synthesis and Simulation of Living Systems

We studied the roles of morphogenetic principles— heterogeneity of components, dynamic differentiation/redifferentiation of components, and local information sharing among components—in the self-organization of morphogenetic collective systems. By incrementally introducing these principles to collectives, we defined four distinct classes of morphogenetic collective systems. Monte Carlo simulations were conducted using an extended version of the Swarm Chemistry model that was equipped with dynamic differentiation/re-differentiation and local information sharing capabilities. Self-organization of swarms was characterized by several kinetic and topological measurements, the latter of which were facilitated by a newly developed network-based method. Results of simulations revealed that, while heterogeneity of components had a strong impact on the structure and behavior of the swarms, dynamic differentiation/re-differentiation of components and local information sharing helped the swarms maintain spatially adjacent, coherent organization.
The use of control groups in impact assessments for microfinance

Contents: Foreword 1. Why use control groups in impact assessments of microfinance projects? 2. Biases of the control-group method and how to avoid them 2.1 Sample selection bias 2.2 Misspecification of underlying causal relationships 2.3 Motivational problems 3. Conclusions and recommendations General recommendations Recommendations for evaluators and donors Recommendations for programme managers Bibliography.
Quasi-Double-Blind Screening of Semiochemicals for Reducing Navel Orangeworm Oviposition on Almonds

A three-step, quasi-double-bind approach was used as a proof-of-concept study to screen twenty compounds for their ability to reduce oviposition of gravid female navel orangeworm(NOW), Ameylois transitella (Lepidoptera: Pyralidae). First, the panel of compounds, whose identity was unknown to the experimenters, was tested by electroantennogram (EAG) using antennae of two-day old gravid females as the sensing element. Of the twenty compounds tested three showed significant EAG responses. These three EAG-active compounds and a negative control were then analyzed for their ability to reduce oviposition via small-cage, two-choice laboratory assays. Two of the three compounds significantly reduced oviposition under laboratory conditions. Lastly, these two compounds were deployed in a field setting in an organic almond orchard in Arbuckle, CA using black egg traps to monitor NOW oviposition. One of these two compounds significantly reduced oviposition on black egg traps under these field conditions. Compound 9 (later identified as isophorone) showed a significant reduction in oviposition in field assays and thus has a potential as a tool to control the navel orangeworm as a pest of almonds.
Conversion to tacrolimus for the treatment of cyclosporine-associated nephrotoxicity in heart transplant recipients.

Many heart transplant recipients experience nephrotoxicity caused by cyclosporine. Tacrolimus has been associated with similar efficacy and safety in heart transplant recipients compared with cyclosporine. It is unknown whether there is any benefit to switching calcineurin inhibition from cyclosporine to tacrolimus in heart transplant recipients with presumed cyclosporine nephrotoxicity. We report five such cases in which this approach was used successfully. In these cases, the heart transplant recipients had bland urine sediments, low urinary sodium concentrations, adequate cardiovascular and systemic hemodynamics, and cyclosporine levels within or below the therapeutic range as defined by heart transplant criteria. The mechanism of renal failure in these patients was believed to be consistent with renal hypoperfusion secondary to cyclosporine-induced renal vasoconstriction. Conversion to tacrolimus resulted in a prompt and significant improvement in serum creatinine concentrations in these patients (P = 0.002). This report shows that conversion to tacrolimus may represent a useful therapeutic strategy to reduce cyclosporine-associated renal failure in recipients of orthotopic heart transplants.
Oral health in children and adolescents with different socio-cultural and socio-economic backgrounds

Abstract Objectives. To describe the occurrence and severity of dental caries in children and adolescents and to relate these findings to the subject's socio-cultural and socio-economic backgrounds. Material and methods. A cross-sectional study in 12 706 children aged 5, 7, 12 and 15 years was conducted in 2006. Data on children's caries experience were collected from public oral health registers and pooled with socio-cultural and socio-economic data obtained from official statistics. The study population represented 76% of all registered inhabitants. Results. Among 5- and 7-year-old children with non-Danish mothers, the mean caries experience was three to four times higher than among children of Danish mothers, and a doubled rate was seen among the adolescents (p < 0.001). Significant differences in caries experience were found in various ethnic minorities. Multiple regression analysis showed that the level of caries was highest among children in families where mothers were not Danish, with low income, where mothers’ educational levels were low, and in with a high number of children (p < 0.001). Conclusions. Although almost all children and adolescents attend the prevention-oriented, free public dental service, a social gradient still exists for dental health. In addition, in all age groups, major inequalities in dental health were found when families with Danish and non-Danish backgrounds were compared. The findings indicate a need for social action by policymakers. Furthermore, a change in the oral health preventive strategy is proposed to meet the needs of children in risk of caries, and appropriate oral health-promotion programmes should be organized in collaboration with leaders from different ethnic minorities.
Evaluation of hand functions in women with polycystic ovary syndrome

Objectives. Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is characterized by hyperandrogenemia and androgen levels are associated with muscle size and strength; thus we aimed to investigate the hand functions of women with PCOS. Methods. Thirty-seven patients with PCOS and 35 age-matched healthy women were included in the study as PCOS and control groups. Age, body mass index, dominant hand, physical activity level, lean/fat mass ratio, percentage of body fat, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) score and Duruoz Hand Index (DHI) score were recorded. Hand grip and pinch strengths were tested in the dominant hand using a hand dynamometer and a pinch meter, respectively. Manuel dexterity was tested by the grooved pegboard test. Serum concentrations of total testosterone, estradiol, dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate, follicle-stimulating hormone, luteinizing hormone, thyroid-stimulating hormone and progesterone were measured. Results. Patients with PCOS had high total testosterone levels (p < 0.001). There were no differences between groups in all of the hand strengths or dexterity. No correlations between hand parameters and hormones were found. DHI and BDI scores were high in the PCOS group (p = 0.002 and 0.039, respectively). There was a correlation between DHI and BDI scores. Depressive patients had higher BMI (p = 0.021) and body fat percentage (p = 0.05) than non-depressive patients in the PCOS group. Conclusion. Hand strength and dexterity did not change in patients with PCOS. Depression risk increased especially in the patients with high BMI and affected hand functional status in PCOS.
Multiple Resource Theory I

Comprehending television is a complex process. Multiple resource theory proposes that the necessary resources are limited. Limitations, however, depend on four separate factors. First, resources are used by three different tasks—attention, meaning-level processing, and memory. Demands arise from individual tasks and combinations. The consequences of reaching limitations are different for each task. Second, television's auditory and visual modalities use different symbol systems. Audio information might be more difficult to process and requires more resources. Third, television stimuli might contain the meaningful information in either the auditory or visual modality. Meaningful information might require more processing and resources and should result in resource shifts. Fourth, television programs use varying levels of redundancy. Whereas processing two modalities generally requires additional resources, actual demands depend on the level and nature of the redundancy. As a result of these four factors, resource limitations can inhibit one process, modality, or attribute. Systematic study of these outcomes is necessary.
The effect of a fibrin glue on the integration of Bio-Oss with bone tissue. A experimental study in labrador dogs.

BACKGROUND Bio-Oss is a deproteinized bovine mineral used in bone augmentation procedures. The particles are often mixed with a protein product (Tisseel) to form a mouldable graft material. AIM The aim of the present experiment was to study the healing of self-contained bone defects after the placement of Bio-Oss particles alone or mixed with Tisseel in cylindrical defects in the edentulous mandibular ridge of dogs. MATERIAL AND METHODS In 4 labrador dogs, the 2nd, 3rd and 4th mandibular premolars were extracted bilaterally. 3 months later, 3 cylindrical bone defects, 4 mm in diameter and 8 mm in depth, were produced in the right side of the mandible. Following a crestal incision, full thickness flaps were raised and the bone defects were prepared with a trephine drill. The defects were filled with Bio-Oss (Geistlich Biomaterials, Wolhuser, Switzerland) particles alone or mixed with Tisseel (Immuno AG, Vienna, Austria), or left "untreated". A collagen membrane (Bio-Gide, Geistlich Biomaterials, Wolhuser, Switzerland) was placed to cover all defects and the flaps were sutured. 2 months later, the defect preparation and grafting procedures were repeated in the left side of the mandible. After another month, the animals were sacrificed and biopsies obtained from the defect sites. RESULTS Bio-Oss-treated defects revealed a higher percentage of contact between graft particles and bone tissue than defects treated with Bio-Oss+ Tisseel (15% and 30% at 1 and 3 months versus 0.4% and 8%, respectively). Further, the volume of connective tissue in the Bio-Oss treated defects decreased from the 1 to the 3 month interval (from 44% to 30%). This soft tissue was replaced with newly formed bone. In the Bio-Oss+ Tisseel treated defects, however, the proportion of connective tissue remained unchanged between 1 and 3 months. CONCLUSION The adjunct of Tisseel may jeopardize the integration of Bio-Oss particles with bone tissue.
Scheduling algorithms for optical packet fabrics

Utilizing optical technologies to build packet fabrics for high-capacity switches and routers has several advantages in terms of scalability, power consumption, and cost. However, several technology related problems have to be overcome to be able to use such an approach. The reconfiguration times of optical crossbars are longer than those of electronic fabrics and end-to-end clock recovery in such systems add to the reconfiguration overheads. Both these problems can limit the efficiency of optical packet fabrics. In addition, existing work on input-buffered switches mostly assumes fixed size packets (referred as envelopes in this paper). When fixed size switching is used for Internet protocol networks where packets are of variable size, the incoming packets need to be fragmented to fit the fixed size envelopes. This fragmentation can lead to, possibly large loss of bandwidth and even instability. This paper addresses all of the above issues by presenting packetization and scheduling techniques that allow optical packet fabrics to be used within switches and routers. The proposed scheme aggregates multiple packets in a single envelope and when used in combination with proper scheduling algorithms, it can provide system stability as well as bandwidth and delay guarantees. As a result of the aggregation method, the reconfiguration frequency required from the optics is reduced, facilitating the use of optical technologies in implementing packet switch fabrics.
Clathrin-coated vesicles in nervous tissue are involved primarily in synaptic vesicle recycling

The recycling of synaptic vesicles in nerve terminals is thought to involve clathrin-coated vesicles. However, the properties of nerve terminal coated vesicles have not been characterized. Starting from a preparation of purified nerve terminals obtained from rat brain, we isolated clathrin-coated vesicles by a series of differential and density gradient centrifugation steps. The enrichment of coated vesicles during fractionation was monitored by EM. The final fraction consisted of greater than 90% of coated vesicles, with only negligible contamination by synaptic vesicles. Control experiments revealed that the contribution by coated vesicles derived from the axo-dendritic region or from nonneuronal cells is minimal. The membrane composition of nerve terminal-derived coated vesicles was very similar to that of synaptic vesicles, containing the membrane proteins synaptophysin, synaptotagmin, p29, synaptobrevin and the 116-kD subunit of the vacuolar proton pump, in similar stoichiometric ratios. The small GTP- binding protein rab3A was absent, probably reflecting its dissociation from synaptic vesicles during endocytosis. Immunogold EM revealed that virtually all coated vesicles carried synaptic vesicle proteins, demonstrating that the contribution by coated vesicles derived from other membrane traffic pathways is negligible. Coated vesicles isolated from the whole brain exhibited a similar composition, most of them carrying synaptic vesicle proteins. This indicates that in nervous tissue, coated vesicles function predominantly in the synaptic vesicle pathway. Nerve terminal-derived coated vesicles contained AP-2 adaptor complexes, which is in agreement with their plasmalemmal origin. Furthermore, the neuron-specific coat proteins AP 180 and auxilin, as well as the alpha a1 and alpha c1-adaptins, were enriched in this fraction, suggesting a function for these coat proteins in synaptic vesicle recycling.
Family Income and Home Environment on Children’s Chemistry Achievement

Aims of this study is to profile students’ achievement based on their socioeconomic status and home environment. This study is a survey study that involved 317 students who took Form Four Chemistry subject at schools. Chemistry test also includes the students’ socioeconomic status questions and the presence of learning materials at home. The reliability of the Chemistry Test instrument was measured by using Kuder-Richardson (KR-20) for dichotomous data and the result showed value of . 50. The study revealed that students from high sosioeconomic status scored higher as compared to students from low socioeconomic status. Present study also found that learning materials at home has no impact on students’ academic achievement. This paper concludes with some practical suggestions of how to improve students’ chemistry achievement.
Intensification of Pacific storm track linked to Asian pollution

Indirect radiative forcing of atmospheric aerosols by modification of cloud processes poses the largest uncertainty in climate prediction. We show here a trend of increasing deep convective clouds over the Pacific Ocean in winter from long-term satellite cloud measurements (1984–2005). Simulations with a cloud-resolving weather research and forecast model reveal that the increased deep convective clouds are reproduced when accounting for the aerosol effect from the Asian pollution outflow, which leads to large-scale enhanced convection and precipitation and hence an intensifed storm track over the Pacific. We suggest that the wintertime Pacific is highly vulnerable to the aerosol–cloud interaction because of favorable cloud dynamical and microphysical conditions from the coupling between the Pacific storm track and Asian pollution outflow. The intensified Pacific storm track is climatically significant and represents possibly the first detected climate signal of the aerosol–cloud interaction associated with anthropogenic pollution. In addition to radiative forcing on climate, intensification of the Pacific storm track likely impacts the global general circulation due to its fundamental role in meridional heat transport and forcing of stationary waves.
Should Hypersexual Disorder be Classified as an Addiction?

Hypersexual behavior has been documented within clinical and research settings over the past decade. Despite recent research on hypersexuality and its associated features, many questions remain around how best to define and classify hypersexual behavior. Diagnostic criteria for Hypersexual Disorder (HD) have been proposed for the DSM-5 and a preliminary field trial has lent some support to the reliability and validity of the HD diagnosis. However, debate exists with respect to the extent to which the disorder might be categorized as a non-substance or behavioral addiction. In this article, we will discuss this debate in the context of data citing similarities and differences among hypersexual disorder, drug addictions, and pathological gambling. The authors of this article conclude that despite many similarities between the features of hypersexual behavior and substance-related disorders, the research on HD at this time is in its infancy and much remains to be learned before definitively characterizing HD as an addiction.
Disentangling the College Wage Premium: Estimating a Model with Endogenous Education Choices

This article proposes and empirically implements a structural model of education choices and wage determination to quantitatively evaluate the contributions of productivity enhancement and ability signaling in the college wage premium. The model is estimated under various distributional parameterizations using 1990 U.S. Census 5% Public Use Micro Sample. Under these parameterizations, I find that college education enhances attendees' productivity by about 40%, and productivity enhancement accounts for close to two-thirds of the college wage premium.
Modelling for vehicle to vehicle applications

Rapid growth of personal communications has led to the development of many wireless systems, competing for radio bandwidth. In the vehicular environment, there is recognition of the importance of communications, and therefore the ability to model these channels is important. This paper addresses this issue through the exploration of both vehicle to roadside (VTR) and vehicle to vehicle (VTV) communications. The paper presents a design methodology for achieving the maximum capacity under the above mentioned propagation conditions as well as reference and stochastic simulation models for vehicular environments.
Object Discrimination Based on Depth-from-Occlusion

We present a model of how objects can be visually discriminated based on the extraction of depth-from-occlusion. Object discrimination requires consideration of both the binding problem and the problem of segmentation. We propose that the visual system binds contours and surfaces by identifying proto-objectscompact regions bounded by contours. Proto-objects can then be linked into larger structures. The model is simulated by a system of interconnected neural networks. The networks have biologically motivated architectures and utilize a distributed representation of depth. We present simulations that demonstrate three robust psychophysical properties of the system. The networks are able to stratify multiple occluding objects in a complex scene into separate depth planes. They bind the contours and surfaces of occluded objects (for example, if a tree branch partially occludes the moon, the two "half-moons" are bound into a single object). Finally, the model accounts for human perceptions of illusory contour stimuli.
PIDEMIOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF VIRAL DIARRHEA AMONG CHILDREN IN U ZBEKISTAN

With the purpose of an estimation of the contribution of virus agents in the etiological structure of acute intestinal infections in children during the rise of prevalence of acute intestinal infections from 2009 to 2011 there were studied 1050 children admitted to the hospital with diarrheal diseases. It is established, that acute intestinal infections have a viral nature in 56.67% of cases. Thus the leading role belongs to rotaviruses and adenoviruses. Infectious agents of diarrheal diseases are rotaviruses in 28.1 % of cases, adenoviruses in 17.05 %, and astroviruses in 11.43 %. The viral monoinfections occur more often, than mixed-infections. The rise of sporadic diseases of viral diarrhea was characterized by seasonal prevalence. For intestinal infections of viral etiology the seasonal rise in a cold season with peak of the rate of diseases of rotavirus infection in April, adenoviral infection in November, and astrovirus infection in December is characteristic. R. LATIPOV, M. ASILOVA, F. NAZAROVA
Some Factors Involved in Alcohol Consumption of First-Year Undergraduates

Three studies were conducted with samples of first-year undergraduates in order to assess relationships among college drinking, adjustment, recent life-changing events, interpersonal factors, self-control, and perceived risk. Significant correlations were found between alcohol use and life-change, but not between alcohol use and college adjustment. In addition, several significant findings linked alcohol use to social factors. Responses to open-ended interview questions suggest that self-control and risk may play a role in students' decisions regarding consumption, after initial experience with alcohol use. Non-social factors, namely stressful events, appear to play a role in consumption behavior; however, students more frequently report on social factors as motivating their decisions regarding alcohol intake.
S‐phase fraction determined on fine needle aspirates is an independent prognostic factor in breast cancer – a multivariate study of 770 patients

Background: The prognostic significance of DNA ploidy and the S‐phase fraction (SPF) have been extensively studied in breast cancer, but their clinical utility remains controversial. The type of tumour material can substantially influence flow cytometric DNA measurements. Material obtained by fine needle aspiration (FNA) biopsy is very suitable for flow cytometric DNA analysis because it contains a low proportion of non‐tumour cells and less debris than tissue samples.