Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
From Lexical Tone to Lexical Stress: A Cross-Language Mediation Model for Cantonese Children Learning English as a Second Language

This study investigated how Cantonese lexical tone sensitivity contributed to English lexical stress sensitivity among Cantonese children who learned English as a second language (ESL). Five-hundred-and-sixteen second-to-third grade Cantonese ESL children were tested on their Cantonese lexical tone sensitivity, English lexical stress sensitivity, general auditory sensitivity, and working memory. Structural equation modeling revealed that Cantonese lexical tone sensitivity contributed to English lexical stress sensitivity both directly, and indirectly through the mediation of general auditory sensitivity, in which the direct pathway had a larger relative contribution to English lexical stress sensitivity than the indirect pathway. These results suggest that the tone-stress association might be accounted for by joint phonological and acoustic processes that underlie lexical tone and lexical stress perception.
A Dynamic Level-k Model in Centipede Games

Backward induction is the most widely accepted principle for predicting behavior in dynamic games. In centipede game experiments, however, players frequently violate this principle. An alternative is a“dynamic level-k” model, where players choose a rule from a rule hierarchy. The rule hierarchy is iteratively defined such that the level-k rule is a best-response to the level-(k − 1) rule and the level-∞ rule corresponds to backward induction. Players choose rules based on their best guesses of others’ rules and use historical plays to improve their guesses. The model captures two systematic violations of backward induction in centipede games, limited induction and repetition unraveling. Since the dynamic level-k model always converges to backward induction over repetition, the former can be considered as a tracing procedure for the latter. We also investigate whether the same dynamic level-k model can be applied to explaining violations of backward induction in sequential bargaining games and show that the model has some promise in doing so.
Natural Language Generation through Character-based RNNs with Finite-state Prior Knowledge

Recently Wen et al. (2015) have proposed a Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) approach to the generation of utterances from dialog acts, and shown that although their model requires less effort to develop than a rule-based system, it is able to improve certain aspects of the utterances, in particular their naturalness. However their system employs generation at the word-level, which requires one to pre-process the data by substituting named entities with placeholders. This pre-processing prevents the model from handling some contextual effects and from managing multiple occurrences of the same attribute. Our approach uses a character-level model, which unlike the word-level model makes it possible to learn to “copy” information from the dialog act to the target without having to pre-process the input. In order to avoid generating non-words and inventing information not present in the input, we propose a method for incorporating prior knowledge into the RNN in the form of a weighted finite-state automaton over character sequences. Automatic and human evaluations show improved performance over baselines on several evaluation criteria.
Non-suicidal self-injury in a New Zealand student population: Demographic and self-harm characteristics

There is an established international literature on the prevalence of non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI). However, New Zealand information regarding prevalence, attitudes, motivation, co-morbidities, etc., is limited. In this study data were collected using an on-line survey from approximately 850 university students regarding self-injurious behaviour, risk and protective factors, mental health co-morbidity, help-seeking, and addiction. Our data revealed that 293 participants (38%) had engaged in NSSI on at least one occasion in their lifetime, elevated risk for females who were lesbian or bisexual, and different patterns of site and function of injury by gender. Given research suggesting that Māori (indigenous New Zealanders) are at elevated risk for suicide it was surprising that those identifying as Māori were at no greater risk of NSSI than those identifying as New Zealanders of European origin. Females were more likely to exhibit chronic self-injuring and more likely to engage in more ‘covert’ forms of self-injury that can be hidden or disguised (e.g., scratching and cutting on their wrists, arms or thighs) whereas males were more likely to engage in ‘overt’ forms of self-injury (e.g., banging or punching themselves or objects with their hands or head). Patterns of NSSI were similar to international comparisons, although prevalence was somewhat elevated. A number of factors differed by gender, including underlying reasons, forms, rates and increasing severity of self-injury, which add to the international literature.
Genome of Ca. Pandoraea novymonadis, an Endosymbiotic Bacterium of the Trypanosomatid Novymonas esmeraldas

We have sequenced, annotated, and analyzed the genome of Ca. Pandoraea novymonadis, a recently described bacterial endosymbiont of the trypanosomatid Novymonas esmeraldas. When compared with genomes of its free-living relatives, it has all the hallmarks of the endosymbionts’ genomes, such as significantly reduced size, extensive gene loss, low GC content, numerous gene rearrangements, and low codon usage bias. In addition, Ca. P. novymonadis lacks mobile elements, has a strikingly low number of pseudogenes, and almost all genes are single copied. This suggests that it already passed the intensive period of host adaptation, which still can be observed in the genome of Polynucleobacter necessarius, a certainly recent endosymbiont. Phylogenetically, Ca. P. novymonadis is more related to P. necessarius, an intracytoplasmic bacterium of free-living ciliates, than to Ca. Kinetoplastibacterium spp. , the only other known endosymbionts of trypanosomatid flagellates. As judged by the extent of the overall genome reduction and the loss of particular metabolic abilities correlating with the increasing dependence of the symbiont on its host, Ca. P. novymonadis occupies an intermediate position P. necessarius and Ca. Kinetoplastibacterium spp. We conclude that the relationships between Ca. P. novymonadis and N. esmeraldas are well-established, although not as fine-tuned as in the case of Strigomonadinae and their endosymbionts.
Acquisition of adjectival inflections (secondary paradigms in child Russian)

L'A. examine les premiers stades d'acquisition de la flexion adjectivale par un enfant russe. Il se concentre plus particulierement sur les adjectifs attributs qui, en general, se developpent plus tardivement que les noms, et souligne l'influence mutuelle entre la flexion nominale et la flexion adjectivale, specialement quand l'imitation des terminaisons se manifeste dans le meme syntagme nominal
Common Carp: Cyprinus carpio

Description The bluegill is a small freshwater fish. It ranges in size from 6 to 12 inches and they typically weigh less than one pound. Blue gill vary in color. They can be dark green, olive-green, olive brown or bluish black on the top of its body. The belly can be yellowish-green or silver. Normally, there are 5 to 7 dark vertical bars extending down on each side. The lower parts of the blue gill’s cheek and gill cover are bluish.
Discrete-time synchronization on the N-torus

In this paper, we study the behavior of a discrete-time network of N agents, each evolving on the circle. The global convergence analysis on the N -torus is a distinctive feature of the present work with respect to previous synchronization results that have focused on convergence in the Euclidean space (R) . We address the question from a control perspective, but make several connections with existing models, including the Hopfield network, the Vicsek model and the (continuous-time) Kuramoto model. We propose two different distributed algorithms. The first one achieves convergence to equilibria in shape space that are the local extrema of a potential UL built on the graph Laplacian associated to a fixed, undirected interconnection topology; it can be implemented with sensor-based interaction only, since each agent just relies on the relative position of its neighbors. The second one achieves synchronization under varying and/or directed communication topology using local estimates of a consensus variable that are communicated between interacting agents. Both algorithms are based on the notion of centroid and can be interpreted as descent algorithms. The proposed approach can be extended to other embedded compact manifolds. Keywords— Coordinated control, Synchronization
Nrf2 Negatively Regulates Melanogenesis by Modulating PI3K/Akt Signaling

Nrf2 plays a role in protection of cells against oxidative stress and xenobiotic damage by regulating cytoprotective genes. In this study, we investigated the effect of Nrf2 on melanogenesis in normal human melanocytes (NHMCs). When NHMCs were transduced with a recombinant adenovirus expressing Nrf2, melanin synthesis was significantly decreased. Consistent with this result, overexpression of Nrf2 decreased the expression of tyrosinase and tyrosinase-related protein 1. The inhibitory effect of Nrf2 was reversed by overexpression of Keap1, an intracellular regulator of Nrf2. Interestingly, Nrf2 overexpression resulted in marked activation of PI3K/Akt signaling. Conversely, inhibition of PI3K activity by treatment with wortmannin reversed the depigmentary effects of Nrf2. Taken together, these results strongly suggest that Nrf2 negatively regulates melanogenesis by modulating the PI3K/Akt signaling pathway.
A STUDY ON NONSYMMETRIC MATRIX-VALUED FUNCTIONS

2009 Acknowledgements I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Professor Sun Defeng for all of his guidance, encouragement and support. He taught me how to do research and did it with great care and patience. his patient guidance and great help. I would also like to acknowledge National University of Singapore for providing me the financial support and the pleasant environment for my study. Last but not least, I am also grateful to many friends at National University of Singapore for their help and support.
Multidimensional approximate agreement in Byzantine asynchronous systems

The problem of ε-approximate agreement in Byzantine asynchronous systems is well-understood when all values lie on the real line. In this paper, we generalize the problem to consider values that lie in Rm, for m ≥ 1, and present an optimal protocol in regard to fault tolerance. Our scenario is the following. Processes start with values in Rm, for m ≥ 1, and communicate via message-passing. The system is asynchronous: there is no upper bound on processes' relative speeds or on message delay. Some faulty processes can display arbitrarily malicious (i.e. Byzantine) behavior. Non-faulty processes must decide on values that are: (1) in Rm; (2) within distance ε of each other; and (3) in the convex hull of the non-faulty processes' inputs. We give an algorithm with a matching lower bound on fault tolerance: we require n > t(m+2), where n is the number of processes, t is the number of Byzantine processes, and input and output values reside in Rm. Non-faulty processes send O(n2 d log(m/ε max{δ(d): 1 ≤ d ≤ m})) messages in total, where δ(d) is the range of non-faulty inputs projected at coordinate d. The Byzantine processes do not affect the algorithm's running time.
Writing groups for doctoral education and beyond : innovations in practice and theory

Chapter 1 Introduction: Writing groups for doctoral and scholarly writing by Claire Aitchison (University of Western Sydney) and Cally Guerin (University of Adelaide) Chapter 2 Writing together, for many reasons by Anthony Pare (McGill University, Canada) Chapter 3 Pick-n-Mix: A Typology of Writers' by Groups by Sarah Haas (University of Ghent, Belgium) Chapter 4 Doctoral students create new spaces to write by Rowena Murray (University of Strathclyde, Scotland) Chapter 5 Scaffolding the thesis writing process: An ongoing writing group for international research students by Linda Li (University of Canberra, Australia) Chapter 6 The writing group as gift by Cally Guerin (University of Adelaide, Australia) Chapter 7 'If they're not laughing, watch out! ': Emotion and risk in postgraduate writers' circles by Lucia Thesen (University of Cape Town, South Africa) Chapter 8 Learning from multiple voices: Intertextuality, feedback and authority in doctoral writing groups by Claire Aitchison (University of Western Sydney, Australia) Chapter 9 The transparent transaction: Writing groups in the development of academic writers and writing mentors by Michelle Maher (University of South Carolina, USA) Chapter 10 A weekly dose of applause! Connectedness and playfulness in the Thesis Marathon by Judith Wolfsberger (The writers' studio, Austria) Chapter 11 Circles of trust: The generous embrace of academic writing retreats by Barbara Grant and Sally Knowles (Auckland University, New Zealand Edith Cowan University, Australia) Chapter 12 Listening to doctoral students talk about research writing and groups: Implications for doctoral programs by Doreen Starke-Meyerring (McGill University, Canada) Chapter 13 An intimate circle: Reflections on writing as women in higher education by Agnes Bosanquet, Jayde Cahir, Elaine Huber, Christa Jacenyik-Trawoger and Margot McNeill (Macquarie University, Australia) Chapter 14 Shut up and write! Facilitating informal learning in doctoral education (with 'no critiquing, exercises, lectures, ego, competition or feeling guilty') by Inger Mewburn, Lindy Osborne, Glenda Caldwell and Tseen Khoo (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology Queensland University of Technology Queensland University of Technology Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia)
Spectrophotometric Determination of Uric Acid in Urine Based-Enzymatic Method Uricase with 4-Aminodiphenylamine Diazonium Sulfate (Variamine Blue RT Salt)

A simple spectrophotometric method based-uricase enzyme for the detection of uric acid in normal urine and gout patient’s urine samples has been developed based on the reaction of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) with yellow color of 4-Aminodiphenylamine Diazonium Sulfate (variamine blue RT salt) to yield a pale yellow-green coloured solution. The absorbance of products as the output of enzymatic reaction and variamine blue RT salt were detected using uv-visible spectrophotometer with maximum absorbance at 269 nm. The response time of this proposed method was 20 minutes. The optimum pH activity on enzymatic and variamine blue RT salt reactions was foud to be pH 9. The relative standard deviation (RSD) of the reproducibility of this method was very good at 0.7%. The calibration plot of different concentrations of uric acid was found to be between 0.5-13 mM with a detection limit of 0.58 mM. The kinetic parameters the Michaelis-Menten constant (KM) and the maximum abosrbance (Absmax) in the presence of different concentrations of uric acid were evaluated using the Linewaver-Burk and Hofstee plots respectively. The enzymatic-spectrophotometric method was compared with established clinicalmethod and satisfactory agreement was achieved.
Factors of s-commerce influencing trust and purchase intention

This paper aims to study factors influencing trust and purchase intention on the Internet, develop model of trust and purchase intention by empirical data, and analyze path of antecedents influencing purchase intention. This study identifies the factors proposed in the existing social commerce constructs: recommendation and referrals, rating and reviews, forums and communities, together with three additional important factors in online environments to get comprehensive results comprising security concerns, communication, and word of mouth. It has been found that the four investigated factors: recommendation and referrals, rating and reviews, communication, and WOM, have positive effects on both trust and purchase intention. The rest of the investigated factors: forums and communities, and security concerns have positive effects specific to trust. The results also indicate that the more consumers trust an s-commerce, the more likely they are to exhibit purchase intention.
Immunotherapy for hepatocellular carcinoma: the force awakens in HCC?

Systemic therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been disappointing. The only drug approved by Food and Drug Administration recently has been sorafenib. Sorafenib has modest benefits with a low response rate and an improvement in time to progression of only 2-3 months. Multiple randomized trials, which compare the new agent to sorafenib as either first line or second line therapy, have been negative, showing no improved clinical benefit. Recently, in a large phase III randomized trial, regorafenib has shown superiority to placebo as a second line treatment for HCC. However, this drug has multiple side effects and is not well tolerated by many patients. The clinical benefit is also modest. Clearly, new approaches to treat advanced HCC are still needed. There is data showing that HCC is immunogenic and the immune system can be stimulated to attack these cancer cells. This article will briefly review immunotherapy as a promising treatment for HCC.
Sequential Broadening of CTL Responses in Early HIV-1 Infection Is Associated with Viral Escape

Background Antigen-specific CTL responses are thought to play a central role in containment of HIV-1 infection, but no consistent correlation has been found between the magnitude and/or breadth of response and viral load changes during disease progression. Methods and Findings We undertook a detailed investigation of longitudinal CTL responses and HIV-1 evolution beginning with primary infection in 11 untreated HLA-A2 positive individuals. A subset of patients developed broad responses, which selected for consensus B epitope variants in Gag, Pol, and Nef, suggesting CTL-induced adaptation of HIV-1 at the population level. The patients who developed viral escape mutations and broad autologous CTL responses over time had a significantly higher increase in viral load during the first year of infection compared to those who did not develop viral escape mutations. Conclusions A continuous dynamic development of CTL responses was associated with viral escape from temporarily effective immune responses. Our results suggest that broad CTL responses often represent footprints left by viral CTL escape rather than effective immune control, and help explain earlier findings that fail to show an association between breadth of CTL responses and viral load. Our results also demonstrate that CTL pressures help to maintain certain elements of consensus viral sequence, which likely represent viral escape from common HLA-restricted CTL responses. The ability of HIV to evolve to escape CTL responses restricted by a common HLA type highlights the challenges posed to development of an effective CTL-based vaccine.
Robust Policy Counterfactuals with an Application to Fiscal Unions

Counterfactuals in fully specified structural models are the leading paradigm for analyzing systematic policy changes because they are immune to Lucas Critique. However, such counterfactuals are less credible whenever they lack robustness to variations in primitives across models that are observationally equivalent and reasonable a-priori. In this paper, I propose a methodology to construct policy counterfactuals in a set of linear models of dynamic stochastic economies that are both observationally equivalent under the benchmark policy and have identical counterfactual equilibrium under the alternative policy. These counterfactuals are immune to Lucas critique and robust to variations in primitives across models within the set. Then, I apply the methodology to quantify how fiscal unions contribute to regional stabilization. I focus on models where the federal government redistributes resources via a transfer policy rule in order to smooth local shocks. This rule is a function of local variables. Using US state-level data, I construct a counterfactual US economy without the rule in place. This counterfactual is identical in many fiscal union models with rich features, such as nominal rigidities and asset market incompleteness. I find that, during the Great Recession, fiscal integration significantly reduced cross-state employment differences by redistributing resources from well to poorly performing states. Finally, I discuss how the methodology can further be used to falsify a set of models, provided data before and after a policy change is available. ∗I am indebted to my advisors Fernando Alvarez, Erik Hurst, and Veronica Guerrieri, for their encouragement, support, and guidance during my stay in Chicago, for our many insightful conversations, and for their patience and skill in distilling the important points from my presentations. I thank Harald Uhlig for useful comments and deep generosity of time. I thank all participants of the Capital Theory Working Group, especially Nancy Stokey and Andy Atkeson, as well as those at the Minneapolis Fed Junior Scholar Conference, Chicago Fed Lunch Seminar, and the Review of Economic Studies Tour. I owe my classmates Jonathan Adams, Philip Barret, and Chanont Banternghansa for their valuable suggestions. Finally, I thank Juliette Caminade for her support and comments on preliminary versions of this paper. †MIT and Princeton University. Email: maberaja@uchicago.edu. Web: home.uchicago.edu/∼maberaja
A pr 1 99 2 Multi-Grid Monte Carlo III . Two-Dimensional O ( 4 )-Symmetric Nonlinear σ-Model

We study the dynamic critical behavior of the multi-grid Monte Carlo (MGMC) algorithm with piecewise-constant interpolation applied to the two-dimensional O(4)symmetric nonlinear σ-model [= SU(2) principal chiral model], on lattices up to 256 × 256. We find a dynamic critical exponent zint,M2 = 0.60 ± 0.07 for the Wcycle and zint,M2 = 1.13 ± 0.11 for the V-cycle, compared to zint,M2 = 2.0 ± 0.15 for the single-site heat-bath algorithm (subjective 68% confidence intervals). Thus, for this asymptotically free model, critical slowing-down is greatly reduced compared to local algorithms, but not completely eliminated. For a 256× 256 lattice, W-cycle MGMC is about 35 times as efficient as a single-site heat-bath algorithm.
Neuroanatomical voxel-based profile of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder

Although schizophrenia (SCZ) and bipolar disorder (BD) share elements of pathology (Ellison-Wright and Bullmore, 2009), the neural mechanisms underlying these disorders are still under investigation. Up until now, many neuroimaging studies investigated the brain structural differences of SCZ and BD compared with healthy controls (HC), trying to identify the possible neuroanatomical markers for the two disorders. However, just a few studies focused on the brain structural changes between the two diagnoses. The present review summarises the findings of the voxel-based grey matter (GM) comparisons between SCZ and BD, with the objective to highlight the possible consistent anatomical differences between the two disorders. While the comparisons between patients and HC highlighted overlapping areas of GM reduction in insula and anterior cingulate cortex, the SCZ–BD comparisons suggest the presence of more generalised GM deficits in SCZ compared with BD. Indeed, in a number of studies, SCZ patients showed lower GM volumes than BD patients in fronto-temporal cortex, thalamus, hippocampus and amygdala. Conversely, only a couple of studies reported GM deficits in BD compared with SCZ, both at the level of cerebellum. In summary, the two disorders exhibit both common and specific neuroanatomical characteristics, whose knowledge is mandatory to develop innovative diagnostic and treatment strategies.