Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Worsening Endothelial Function with Efavirenz Compared to Protease Inhibitors: A 12-Month Prospective Study

Objective Changes in endothelial function, measured as flow-mediated dilation (FMD) of the brachial artery, has not been systematically assessed beyond 6 months of initiation of antiretroviral therapy (ART) when drug-related effects might offset initial improvements with virologic control. Design We assessed 6 and 12 month changes in FMD [presented as median (quartile 1, quartile 3)] and circulating HIV and cardiovascular biomarkers in 23 subjects initiating ART. Results There were no significant changes in FMD at 6 or 12 months overall despite significant increases in CD4 cell count and HDL-C and reductions in HIV RNA level, MCP-1, IP-10, sVCAM-1, sTNFR2, and sCD14. However, there were significant differences (P = 0.04) in the changes in FMD between those receiving efavirenz [N = 12; −3.50% (−4.90%, 0.68%)] vs. protease inhibitors at 12 months [N = 11; 1.50% (−0.86%, 4.56%)]. The differences in changes in FMD between those receiving and not receiving emtricitabine/tenofovir/efavirenz were more pronounced and were significantly different at both 6 and 12 months (P<0.02 for both). Additional studies showed no significant differences in changes in 25-(OH)-vitamin D, PTH, FGF-23, of F2-isoprostane levels between efavirenz and PI use or between those receiving and not receiving emtricitabine/tenofovir/efavirenz. Conclusion Efavirenz use was associated with reduced FMD at 12 months compared to PI-based regimens while emtricitabine/tenofovir/efavirenz was associated with reduced FMD at both 6 and 12 months compared to those not receiving this combination. Long-term effects of antiretrovirals on endothelial function may play an important role in the risk of cardiovascular disease in HIV-infected patients.
Natural selection and neutral evolutionary processes contribute to genetic divergence in leaf traits across a precipitation gradient in the tropical oak Quercus oleoides

The impacts of drought are expanding worldwide as a consequence of climate change. However, there is still little knowledge of how species respond to long‐term selection in seasonally dry ecosystems. In this study, we used QST‐FST comparisons to investigate (i) the role of natural selection on population genetic differentiation for a set of functional traits related to drought resistance in the seasonally dry tropical oak Quercus oleoides and (ii) the influence of water availability at the site of population origin and in experimental treatments on patterns of trait divergence. We conducted a thorough phenotypic characterization of 1912 seedlings from ten populations growing in field and greenhouse common gardens under replicated watering treatments. We also genotyped 218 individuals from the same set of populations using eleven nuclear microsatellites. QST distributions for leaf lamina area, specific leaf area, leaf thickness and stomatal pore index were higher than FST distribution. Results were consistent across growth environments. Genetic differentiation among populations for these functional traits was associated with the index of moisture at the origin of the populations. Together, our results suggest that drought is an important selective agent for Q. oleoides and that differences in length and severity of the dry season have driven the evolution of genetic differences in functional traits.
What is the relationship between self-reported aberrant driving behaviors, mindfulness, and self-reported crashes and infringements?

ABSTRACT Objectives: This study investigated the relationship between self-reported aberrant driving behaviors, mindfulness, and self-reported crashes and infringements. Methods: Three hundred and eighteen participants (M = 46.0 years, SD = 13.7 years; female: 81.8%) completed an online survey that assessed aberrant driving behaviors, mindfulness (including regular mindfulness meditation [MM]), and self-reported crashes and infringements during the past 2 years. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to examine the relationship between self-reported aberrant driving behaviors and mindfulness simultaneously, as well as with participants' age and estimated kilometers driven over the past year. Results: The results of the SEM showed that mindfulness was negatively related to each self-reported aberrant driving behavior, with the strongest relationships being between mindfulness and driving-related lapses (−0.58) and errors (−0.46). Participants who practice MM had significantly fewer crashes in the past 2 years and reported significantly fewer driving-related violations and lapses compared to participants who did not practice MM (crashes: 9.3% vs. 18.8%, P < .05; violations: M = 6.66 [SD = 3.44] vs. M = 7.68 [SD = 4.53], P < .05; errors: M = 5.17 [SD = 3.44] vs. M = 6.19 [SD = 4.12], P < .05). Conclusions: More research is needed to understand whether MM results in more mindful and attentive drivers or whether individuals who practice MM may have other traits or behaviors that are linked to improved safety.
MultiBooked: A Corpus of Basque and Catalan Hotel Reviews Annotated for Aspect-level Sentiment Classification

While sentiment analysis has become an established field in the NLP community, research into languages other than English has been hindered by the lack of resources. Although much research in multi-lingual and cross-lingual sentiment analysis has focused on unsupervised or semi-supervised approaches, these still require a large number of resources and do not reach the performance of supervised approaches. With this in mind, we introduce two datasets for supervised aspect-level sentiment analysis in Basque and Catalan, both of which are under-resourced languages. We provide high-quality annotations and benchmarks with the hope that they will be useful to the growing community of researchers working on these languages.
Owner perceptions of their cat’s quality of life when treated with a modified University of Wisconsin–Madison protocol for lymphoma

Objectives The objectives of this study were to assess owner perceptions of their cat’s quality of life during treatment for lymphoma with a doxorubicin-containing multi-agent chemotherapy protocol, whether various health-related parameters correlated with quality of life scores, and to assess owner satisfaction with the protocol. Methods A postal questionnaire was sent to the owners of 33 treated cats. Owners retrospectively assessed their cat’s quality of life using a Likert scale (1–10) before lymphoma was diagnosed, at diagnosis and during chemotherapy. Owners assigned scores to various health-related parameters previously reported to affect quality of life at the three time points, and correlations with quality of life scores were sought. Owners were asked to rate the importance of these health-related parameters. Satisfaction with the protocol was investigated. Results Twenty questionnaires were completed (61% response rate). The median quality of life score before diagnosis (10, range 5–10) was higher than at diagnosis (3, range 1–9) (P <0.05). The median quality of life score during chemotherapy (7, range 3–9) was lower than before diagnosis (P <0.05) and higher than at diagnosis, but this was not statistically significant. Quality of life scores did not correlate with individual health-related parameter scores consistently; however, quality of life scores did correlate with appetite scores during chemotherapy. Appetite, vomiting and diarrhoea were parameters perceived as important in affecting quality of life. Most owners (75%) were happy they had treated their cat. Conclusions and relevance The quality of life scores observed were comparable to a previous study using cyclophosphamide, vincristine and prednisolone, employing the same scoring system. Although quality of life scores during chemotherapy were not significantly improved at diagnosis, owner satisfaction with the protocol was high. The factors perceived by owners to determine quality of life in their pets may be different to those previously conjectured, but appetite during chemotherapy remains important.
A General Framework for Relational

Reynolds’ original theory of relational parametricity intended to capture the idea that polymorphically typed System F programs preserve all relations between inputs. But as Reynolds himself later showed, his theory can only be formalized in a meta-theory with an impredicative universe, such as Martin-Löf Type Theory. A number of more abstract treatments of relational parametricity have since appeared; however, as we show, none of these truly generalize Reynolds’ original theory, in the sense of having it as a direct instance. Indeed, they all require certain strictness conditions that Reynolds’ theory does not satisfy. To correct this, we develop an abstract framework for relational parametricity that does deliver Reynolds’ theory as a direct instance in a natural way. This framework is parametric and uniform with respect to a choice of meta-theory, which allows us to obtain the well-known PER model of Longo and Moggi as a direct instance in a natural way as well. Moreover, we demonstrate on a concrete example that our notion of parametricity also encompasses proof-relevant parametric models, which does not seem to be the case for the well-known definitions. Our framework is thus both descriptive, in that it accounts for well-known models, and prescriptive, in that it identifies properties that good models of relational parametricity should satisfy. It is constructed using the new notion of a split λ2-fibration with isomorphisms, introduced in this paper, which relaxes certain strictness requirements on split λ2-fibrations. Our main theorem is a generalization of Seely’s classical construction of sound models for System F from split λ2-fibrations: we prove that the canonical model of System F induced by every split λ2-fibration with isomorphisms validates System F’s entire equational theory on the nose, independently of the parameterizing meta-theory.
EFFECT OF HIGH TEMPERATURE AND HIGH HUMIDITY TREATMENT ON BENDING PROPERTIES OF WOOD

Japanese cedar ( Cryptomeria Japonica D. Don) 110 110 1000-mm green boxed-heart timbers were dried under high temperature (110-140C) and high humidity (0.01-0.24 MPa gauge pressure) conditions until the weight remained unchanged. Then strength properties were examined. Wood became brittle because of the high temperature and high humidity treatment. We hypothesize that the wood was seriously damaged by hydrolysis because of the long treatment time used in this study and that the large cross-sectional area and high set gauge pressure lengthened the time of water loss from the wood. We considered viscosity and plasticity, rather than elasticity, to be the main factors that contributed to the decrease of work for rupture.
Feasibility of systematic handgrip strength testing in digestive cancer patients treated with chemotherapy: The FIGHTDIGO study

Handgrip strength (HGS) is a widely studied noninvasive test. Weak strength (dynapenia) seems to be associated with high morbidity and mortality in different populations, notably oncology populations. Despite this, HGS testing is not used in daily practice in oncology. The study was aimed at evaluating the feasibility and acceptability of HGS testing in patients with digestive cancer treated with ambulatory chemotherapy.
Black Women’s Recommendations for Developing Effective Type 2 Diabetes Programming

The purpose of this study was to learn from 29 Black women how to develop effective Type 2 diabetes programming. Three focus groups were held in Des Moines, Iowa, during fall 2012. Results highlighted themes related to diabetes knowledge, diabetes management and prevention, physical activity, diet, and diabetes management programming. Opinions were shared as to whether family members should be included in programs for supporting those diagnosed with diabetes. These results provided guidance and ideas to scholars and health care professionals aiming to improve effectiveness of diabetes programs for Black women and families.
Non-invasive imaging through opaque scattering layers

Non-invasive optical imaging techniques, such as optical coherence tomography, are essential diagnostic tools in many disciplines, from the life sciences to nanotechnology. However, present methods are not able to image through opaque layers that scatter all the incident light. Even a very thin layer of a scattering material can appear opaque and hide any objects behind it. Although great progress has been made recently with methods such as ghost imaging and wavefront shaping, present procedures are still invasive because they require either a detector or a nonlinear material to be placed behind the scattering layer. Here we report an optical method that allows non-invasive imaging of a fluorescent object that is completely hidden behind an opaque scattering layer. We illuminate the object with laser light that has passed through the scattering layer. We scan the angle of incidence of the laser beam and detect the total fluorescence of the object from the front. From the detected signal, we obtain the image of the hidden object using an iterative algorithm. As a proof of concept, we retrieve a detailed image of a fluorescent object, comparable in size (50 micrometres) to a typical human cell, hidden 6 millimetres behind an opaque optical diffuser, and an image of a complex biological sample enclosed between two opaque screens. This approach to non-invasive imaging through strongly scattering media can be generalized to other contrast mechanisms and geometries.
How effective and fair is user fee removal? Evidence from Zambia using a pooled synthetic control

Abstract Despite its high political interest, the impact of removing user charges for health care in low‐income settings remains a debatable issue. We try to clear up this contentious issue by estimating the short‐term effects of a policy change that occurred in 2006 in Zambia, when 54 of 72 districts removed fees. We use a pooled synthetic control method in order to estimate the causal impact of the policy on health care use, the provider chosen, and out‐of‐pocket medical expenses. We find no evidence that user fee removal increased health care utilisation, even among the poorest group. However, we find that the policy is likely to have led to a substitution away from the private sector for those using care and that it virtually eliminated medical expenditures, thereby providing financial protection to service users. We estimate that the policy was equivalent to a transfer of US$3.2 per health visit for the 50% richest but of only US$1.1 for the 50% poorest.
Texture and Geometry Scattering Representation-Based Facial Expression Recognition in 2D+3D Videos

Facial Expression Recognition (FER) is one of the most important topics in the domain of computer vision and pattern recognition, and it has attracted increasing attention for its scientific challenges and application potentials. In this article, we propose a novel and effective approach to FER using multi-model two-dimensional (2D) and 3D videos, which encodes both static and dynamic clues by scattering convolution network. First, a shape-based detection method is introduced to locate the start and the end of an expression in videos; segment its onset, apex, and offset states; and sample the important frames for emotion analysis. Second, the frames in Apex of 2D videos are represented by scattering, conveying static texture details. Those of 3D videos are processed in a similar way, but to highlight static shape details, several geometric maps in terms of multiple order differential quantities, i.e., Normal Maps and Shape Index Maps, are generated as the input of scattering, instead of original smooth facial surfaces. Third, the average of neighboring samples centred at each key texture frame or shape map in Onset is computed, and the scattering features extracted from all the average samples of 2D and 3D videos are then concatenated to capture dynamic texture and shape cues, respectively. Finally, Multiple Kernel Learning is adopted to combine the features in the 2D and 3D modalities and compute similarities to predict the expression label. Thanks to the scattering descriptor, the proposed approach not only encodes distinct local texture and shape variations of different expressions as by several milestone operators, such as SIFT, HOG, and so on, but also captures subtle information hidden in high frequencies in both channels, which is quite crucial to better distinguish expressions that are easily confused. The validation is conducted on the BU-4DFE and BP-4D databa ses, and the accuracies reached are very competitive, indicating its competency for this issue.
A Long Shadow

I never knew my grandfather, the father of my mother. But he was a WWI veteran. Originally a baker by trade in Beechworth (Victoria), by the First World War he was a horse whisperer in the Tumut region of NSW. At the age of 50 in 1915, he went to war with his horse Conquerer, with the 2nd Remount Unit. Disciplines Arts and Humanities | Law Publication Details Cahill, R. (2014). A long shadow. Labour History Melbourne, (11 November), 1-3. This journal article is available at Research Online: http://ro.uow. edu.au/lhapapers/1748
Node Priority Strategy for Energy Efficient Data Collection Scheme in Wireless Body Area Networks

With the enhancement of human health perception and development of nanotechnologies, Wireless body area networks (WBANs) are captivating growing interest because of their suitability for wide range of applications. However, such a resource-constrained network makes energy efficient and lifetime become a challenging barrier in deploying these networks for most applications. This paper proposed an energy efficient data collection scheme based on a hierarchical nano-router and nano-node architecture to reduce energy consumption and prolong lifetime of WBANs. Moreover, Node Priority (NP) strategy is applyed to select target node finishing data collection process. Furthermore, a Local Node Respond (LND) mechanism to control sleep/active state of nano-nodes are used. Finally, we conduct extensive simulations for both the proposed data collection scheme and the benchmark greedy scheme to illustrate the energy efficiency of our scheme as well as to discuss the impacts of network parameters on network energy saving performance.
Autologous transplantation of cytokine-induced killer cells as an adjuvant therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma in Asia: an update meta-analysis and systematic review

Background High recurrence rate after curative treatment is the major problem for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Cytokine-induced killer cells (CIKs) therapy was extensively studied among HCC patients. However, the value of CIKs therapy was controversial. A meta-analysis was performed to investigate the efficacy of adjuvant CIKs after invasive treatments among HCC patients. Methods We searched online for literatures studying sequential CIKs therapy for HCC patients. Recurrence-free survival (RFS), progress-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were set as the main endpoints. Both overall and subgroup analysis were accomplished. Results A total of 12 clinical trials with 1,387 patients were included. The pooled analysis showed a significant improvement of RFS, PFS and OS in CIK group (HR 0.56, 95% CI 0.47-0.67, p<0.00001 for RFS; HR 0.53, 95% CI 0.40-0.69, p<0.00001 for PFS; HR 0.59, 95% CI 0.46-0.77, p<0.0001 for OS). The proportion of CD4+ T cells increased significantly, while CD8+ T cells decreased significantly after CIKs therapy (WMD 4.07, 95% CI 2.58-5.56, p<0.00001; WMD -2.84, 95% CI -4.67 to -1.01, p=0.002, respectively). No significant differences of adverse events between CIK and non-CIK group existed. Conclusions Conventionally invasive therapies combined with CIKs therapy could improve the prognosis of HCC patients, especially for RFS and PFS, with mild side effects. Optimizing patient selection shall be the direction in future studies.
EFFECTS OF MANURE STORAGE TIME AND FILLING SCHEME ON ODOR AND HEADSPACE ANALYSIS USING SIMULATED MANURE STORAGE PITS

Swine manure was stored in 2-L simulated manure storage vessels for up to 91 d. Manure was added to the vessels using one of two filling schemes. Vessels were filled either completely on d 0 (single fill; SF) or received a 1/10th-volume addition each week (200 ml) for 10 wk (weekly fill; WF). Weekly, headspace gases were collected for analysis by an electronic nose and gas chromatography. Once weekly, headspace gases were adsorbed to cotton swatches for odor evaluation by human panelists. Vessel contents were collected when vessels were terminated (between 56 and 91 d) and were analyzed for composition. Findings indicate that filling mode and length of manure storage influenced manure components. Solids content was greater in WF vessels. While total nitrogen did not change with storage time, NH4-N increased with time, likely due to conversion of organic nitrogen to inorganic nitrogen. Headspace gas content was influenced by both storage time and filling scheme, although not all analytes were affected similarly. Length of storage time affected odor score. A prediction equation developed from headspace analytes reflected odor scores moderately (R2 = 0.18). as did an equation based on the chemical composition of the manure following storage (R2 = 0.20). Correlation of the electronic nose response to odor score was similar (r = 0.20). However, a prediction equation developed from headspace gas constituents predicted electronic nose response well (R2 = 0.76). Results suggest that manure management practices may be modified to address odor potential. Instrumental methods continue to require further development before they become practical tools for odor assessment.
Hypotension Risk Based on Vasoactive Agent Discontinuation Order in Patients in the Recovery Phase of Septic Shock

Patients with septic shock often require vasoactive agents for hemodynamic support; however, the optimal approach to discontinuing these agents once patients reach the recovery phase is currently unknown. The objective of this evaluation was to compare the incidence of hypotension within 24 hours based on the discontinuation order of norepinephrine (NE) and vasopressin (AVP) in patients in the recovery phase of septic shock.
The mediating role of cognitive flexibility on the relationship between cross-race interactions and psychological well-being

OF DISSERTATION THE MEDIATING ROLE OF COGNITIVE FLEXIBILITY ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CROSS-RACE INTERACTIONS AND PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL-BEING Counseling psychologists are tasked with understanding optimal psychological and cognitive functioning. Recent theoretical predictions (Crisp & Turner, 2011) and growing evidence suggest that cross-race interactions are important ways individuals might improve their cognitive and psychosocial functioning. However, the theoretical predictions from Crisp and Turner have not yet been tested in one model. Further, much of the empirical support for the theoretical predictions has been from studies using 1) undergraduate samples and 2) weak theory-measurement fit. The present study used an online, community survey (N = 270) to test Crisp and Turner’s (2011) predictions that cognitive flexibility would mediate the relationship between cross-race interactions and psychological well-being in both a White sample (N = 198) and a sample of Color (N = 70). Results supported the hypothesized mediational model, indicating that more frequent cross-race interactions were associated with greater psychological well-being, through greater cognitive flexibility. The findings are discussed in the context of Crisp and Turner’s model (2011). Implications for sociological, educational, and psychological professionals are also discussed. Recommendations for future studies include experimental, longitudinal, and intervention studies with strong theory-measurement fit.