Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Preference-based location sharing: are more privacy options really better?

We examine the effect of coarse-grained vs. fine-grained location sharing options on users' disclosure decisions when configuring a sharing profile in a location-sharing service. Our results from an online user experiment (N=291) indicate that users who would otherwise select one of the finer-grained options will employ a compensatory decision strategy when this option is removed. This means that they switch either in the direction of more privacy and less benefit, or less privacy and more benefit, depending on the subjective distance between the omitted option and the remaining options. This explanation of users' disclosure behavior is in line with fundamental decision theories, as well as the well-established notion of "privacy calculus". Two alternative hypotheses that we tested were not supported by our experimental data.
Clique is hard to approximate within n 1 − ǫ

We prove that, unless any problem in NP can be solved in proba-bilistic polynomial time, for any ǫ > 0, the size of the largest clique in a graph with n nodes is hard to approximate in polynomial time within a factor n 1−ǫ. This is done by constructing, for any δ > 0, a proba-bilistically checkable proof for N P which uses logarithmic randomness and δ amortized free bits.
The Human Fetus Preferentially Secretes Corticosterone, Rather than Cortisol, in Response to Intra-Partum Stressors

Context Fetal stress is relevant to newborn outcomes. Corticosterone is rarely quantified in human clinical endocrinology and is found at much lower concentrations than cortisol. However, fetal corticosterone is a candidate hormone as a fetal stress signal. Objective Test the hypothesis that preferential fetal corticosterone synthesis occurs in response to fetal intra-partum stress. Design Cross-sectional comparison of paired serum corticosteroid concentrations in umbilical artery and vein from 300 women providing consent at admission to a General Hospital Labor and Delivery unit. Pre-term and multiple births were excluded, leaving 265 healthy deliveries. Main Outcome Measures Corticosterone and cortisol concentrations determined by LC-MS/MS for umbilical cord venous (V) and arterial (A) samples and used to calculate fetal synthesis (A−V) and proportional fetal synthesis ([A−V]/V). Chart-derived criteria stratified samples by type of delivery, maternal regional analgesia, augmentation of contractions, and clinical rationale for emergent Caesarian delivery. Results Cortisol concentrations were higher than corticosterone concentrations; however, the fetus preferentially secretes corticosterone (148% vs 49% proportional increase for cortisol) and differentially secretes corticosterone as fetal stress increases. Fetal corticosterone synthesis is elevated after passage through the birth canal relative to Caesarian deliveries. For vaginal deliveries, augmentation of contractions does not affect corticosteroid concentrations whereas maternal regional analgesia decreases venous (maternal) concentrations and increases fetal synthesis. Fetal corticosterone synthesis is also elevated after C-section indicated by cephalopelvic disproportion after labor, whereas cortisol is not. Conclusions The full-term fetus preferentially secretes corticosterone in response to fetal stress during delivery. Fetal corticosterone could serve as a biomarker of fetal stress.
Is the Time Necessary to Obtain Preoperative Stabilization a Predictive Index of Outcome in Neonatal Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia?

Background. The study aims to verify if the time of preoperative stabilization (≤24 or >24 hours) could be predictive for the severity of clinical condition among patients affected by congenital diaphragmatic hernia. Methods. 55 of the 73 patients enrolled in the study achieved presurgical stabilization and underwent surgical correction. Respiratory and hemodynamic indexes, postnatal scores, the need for advanced respiratory support, the length of HFOV, tracheal intubation, PICU, and hospital stay were compared between patients reaching stabilization in ≤24 or >24 hours. Results. Both groups had a 100% survival rate. Neonates stabilized in ≤24 hours are more regular in the postoperative period and had an easier intensive care path; those taking >24 hours showed more complications and their care path was longer and more complex. Conclusions. The length of preoperative stabilization does not affect mortality, but is a valid parameter to identify difficulties in survivors' clinical pathway.
Pattern-Based Variant-Best-Neighbors Respiratory Motion Prediction Using Orthogonal Polynomials Approximation

Motion-adaptive radiotherapy techniques are promising to deliver truly ablative radiation doses to tumors with minimal normal tissue exposure by accounting for real-time tumor movement. However, a major challenge of successful applications of these techniques is the real-time prediction of breathing-induced tumor motion to accommodate system delivery latencies. Predicting respiratory motion in real-time is challenging. The current respiratory motion prediction approaches are still not satisfactory in terms of accuracy and interpretability due to the complexity of breathing patterns and the high inter-individual variability across patients. In this paper, we propose a novel respiratory motion prediction framework which integrates four key components: a personalized monitoring window generator, an orthogonal polynomial approximation-based pattern library builder, a variant best neighbor pattern searcher, and a statistical prediction decision maker. The four functional components work together into a real-time prediction system and is capable of performing personalized tumor position prediction during radiotherapy. Based on a study of respiratory motion of 27 patients with lung cancer, the proposed prediction approach generated consistently better prediction performances than the current respiratory motion prediction approaches, particularly for long prediction horizons.
Surgical treatment of chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension.

BACKGROUND There are only limited treatment options for patients with chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension in Canada. OBJECTIVE To conduct a case-series study to assess the effectiveness of surgical endarterectomy of the pulmonary artery. DESIGN AND SETTING Twenty-one patients with chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension were admitted for surgery between July 1995 and October 1999. Clinical, laboratory and radiological data were collected for all patients who then underwent pulmonary thromboendarterectomy. MAIN RESULTS Thirteen men and eight women between 22 and 71 years of age underwent surgery. The main presenting complaint was dyspnea on exertion. Pulmonary vascular resistance ranged from 382 to 1694 dynes s cm-5 with a mean of 765+/-372 dynes s cm-5 (normal is less than 180 dynes s cm-5) with a mean cardiac index of 2.2+/-0.9 L/min/m2. Two patients had concomitant tricuspid valve replacement and one patient had coronary bypass grafting. In three cases, the surgery involved a repeat sternotomy. After surgery, there was a significant drop in the pulmonary vascular resistance (208+/-92 dynes s cm-5, P<0.05) and a concomitant rise in the cardiac index to a mean of 3.1+/-0.6 L/min/m2 (P<0.05). There was one death in a patient who also had severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Of the remaining patients, all but two showed significant clinical improvement. Spiral computed tomography postsurgery demonstrated improvement in pulmonary perfusion with either complete clearing or significant improvement in the mosaic perfusion pattern. Right ventricular function and pressure on echocardiogram improved in all but two patients. CONCLUSIONS Pulmonary thromboendarterectomy provides effective treatment for chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension.
Cord blood vitamin D status is associated with cord blood insulin and c-peptide in two cohorts of mother-newborn pairs.

CONTEXT Vitamin D may be important for prenatal programming of insulin and glucose regulation, but maternal vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy is common. OBJECTIVE We examined associations of early vitamin D status with markers of fetal insulin secretion (cord blood insulin and c-peptide). We hypothesized that maternal 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) during pregnancy and cord blood 25(OH)D would both be positively associated with cord blood insulin and c-peptide. METHODS We studied mother-newborn pairs from two cohorts: Project Viva (862 pairs included) and Genetics of Glucose Regulation in Gestation and Growth (Gen3G, 660 pairs included). We analyzed associations of the cord blood hormones with maternal 25(OH)D using generalized additive models with nonlinear spline terms and with cord blood 25(OH)D using multivariable linear regression models. RESULTS 25(OH)D levels were <75 nmol/L in over 70% of mothers and 85% of newborns. Maternal and cord blood 25(OH)D levels were correlated: r=0.58 in Project Viva and 0.37 in Gen3G. Maternal 25(OH)D had an inverted U-shaped relationship with cord blood insulin and c-peptide in both cohorts. Cord blood 25(OH)D had a linear relationship with the cord blood hormones. In fully adjusted models, each 10-nmol/L increase in cord blood 25(OH)D was associated with higher cord blood insulin and c-peptide concentrations: 3.7% (95% CI: (0.09, 7.5) and 3.2% (95% CI: 0.8, 5.6), respectively in Project Viva; 2.2% (95% CI: -0.1, 4.6) and 3.6% (95% CI: 1.0, 6.3), respectively in Gen3G. CONCLUSIONS Vitamin D may play a role in regulating fetal insulin secretion, potentially impacting glucose regulation and growth.
Disease manifestations and X inactivation in heterozygous females with Fabry disease

Aim: Fabry disease is an X‐linked lysosomal storage disorder characterized by an accumulation of neutral glycosphingolipids in multiple organ systems caused by α‐galactosidase A deficiency due to mutations in the GLA gene. The majority of heterozygous females show the characteristic signs and symptoms of the disease, and some of them are severely affected. The current hypothesis for the occurrence of disease manifestations in females is skewed X inactivation favouring the mutant GLA allele.
Author ' s personal copy A computational damage mechanics model for thermomigration

Miniaturization of electronics to nanoscale leads to significantly higher current density levels and larger thermal gradients in electronics packaging. Laboratory test data show that thermomigration plays a significant role in high current density induced failure in solder joints and interconnects. In this paper, a computational damage mechanics model for thermomigration process is proposed and implemented in finite element method. This model is based on thermodynamics and formulated by continuum mechanics equations, mass transport principals and heat transfer equations. A damage evolution model using entropy production rate as a metric is utilized to evaluate the degradation in solder joints subjected to high temperature gradients. 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Self-organizing broker topologies for publish/subscribe systems

Distributed publish/subscribe systems are usually deployed on top of an overlay network that enables complex routing strategies implemented in the application layer. Up to now, only little effort has been spent on the design of the broker overlay network assuming that it is either static or manually administered. As publish/subscribe systems are increasingly targeted at dynamic environments where client behavior and network characteristics vary over time, static overlay networks lead to suboptimal performance. In this paper, we present a self-organizing broker overlay infrastructure that adapts dynamically to achieve a better efficiency on both, the application and the network layer. This is obtained by taking network metrics as well as notification traffic into account.
Integration of nondegradable polystyrene and degradable gelatin in a core–sheath nanofibrous patch for pelvic reconstruction

Pelvic organ prolapse (POP) is a serious health issue affecting many adult women. Complications of POP include pelvic pressure, pelvic pain, and problems in emptying their bowels or bladder. Sometimes, POP may even cause urinary outflow obstruction and lead to bladder or kidney infections. Currently, synthetic and naturally derived materials have been chosen for treatment of POP to reduce the high recurrence rates after surgical interventions. However, existing materials for POP treatment cannot meet the clinical requirements in terms of biocompatibility, mechanics, and minimal risk of rejection. Especially, erosion in synthetic polymers and rapid degradation in natural polymers limit their further applications in clinics. To address these concerns, we report a novel POP replacement using core–sheath polystyrene/gelatin electrospun nanofiber mesh. The outside gelatin sheath provides a hydrophilic surface and implantable integrity between host and guest, while the inner PS core offers the necessary mechanical support. The composite mesh shows graft accommodation in pelvic submucosa after implantation in vivo, as shown in hematoxylin–eosin staining and T helper cell phenotype and macrophage phenotype stainings. Qualitative analysis of inducible nitric oxide synthase, arginase, interferon-γ, and interleukin-10 gene expressions also indicates that the implanted composite mesh switches to accommodation mode 2 weeks postimplantation. Thus, these novel core–sheath polystyrene/gelatin nanofibrous membranes are promising in pelvic reconstruction.
Isolation and Identification of Concanavalin A Binding Glycoproteins from Human Seminal Plasma: A Step Towards Identification of Male Infertility Marker Proteins

Human seminal plasma contains a large array of proteins of clinical importance which are essentially needed to maintain the reproductive physiology of spermatozoa and for successful fertilization. Thus, isolation and identification of seminal plasma proteins is of paramount significance for their biophysical characterization and functional analysis in reproductive physiological processes. In this study, we have isolated Concanavalin-A binding glycoproteins from human seminal plasma and subsequently identified them by MALDI-TOF/MS analysis. The major proteins, as identified in this study, are Aminopeptidase N, lactoferrin, prostatic acid phosphatase, zinc-alpha-2-glycoprotein, prostate specific antigen, progestagen-associated endometrial protein, Izumo sperm-egg fusion protein and prolactin inducible protein. This paper also reports preliminary studies to identify altered expression of these proteins in oligospermia and azoospermia in comparison to normospermia. In oligospermia, five proteins were found to be downregulated while in azoospermia, four proteins were downregulated and two proteins were upregulated. Thus, this study is of immense biomedical interest towards identification of potential male infertility marker proteins in seminal plasma.
Evaluation of Service Reliability Impacts of Traffic Signal Priority Strategies for Bus Transit

Recent progress in technology has facilitated the design, testing, and deployment of traffic signal priority strategies for transit buses. However, a clear consensus has not emerged about the evaluation of these strategies. Each agency implementing these strategies can have differing goals, and there are often conflicting issues, needs, and concerns among the various stakeholders. To assist in the evaluation of such strategies an evaluation framework and plan was developed that provides a systematic method to assess potential impacts. The use of this framework and plan is illustrated on the Columbia Pike corridor in Arlington, Virginia, with the use of the INTEGRATION simulation package. In building on previous efforts on this corridor, the work presents a method of simulating conditional priority to late buses to investigate the impacts of priority on service reliability. By using the measures developed in this research, a conditional priority strategy designed to increase bus service reliability without resulting in severe traffic-related impacts was tested. Simulation results indicated statistically significant improvements of 3.2% in bus service reliability and 0.9% for bus efficiency, whereas negative traffic-related impacts were found in the form of increased overall delay to the corridor of 1.0% on a vehicle basis or 0.6% on a person basis. These results are also comparable and consistent with the results of other research.
Non-replication of an association between the Odd-skipped related 1 c.654G>A (rs12329305) polymorphism and kidney volume in newborns

Abstract Introduction: Odd-skipped related 1 (Osr1) protein is a marker of intermediate mesoderm from which all definitive kidney progenitor cells develop. The loss-of-function OSR1 c.654G>A (rs12329305) polymorphism has been associated with a reduced kidney volume at birth and congenital renal anomalies. The aim of this study was to re-investigate whether the OSR1 c.654A allele is associated with a smaller kidney volume (a surrogate of the congenital nephron number) in newborns, either alone or in combination with RET c.1296G>A(RET x OSR1 interaction). Materials and methods: A total of 178 healthy, full-term Polish newborns were included in this study. Kidney size was measured by ultrasound on the third day of life and normalised for body surface area (TKV/BSA). The OSR1 polymorphism was identified by mini-sequencing. The reduced model without interaction and the full model including interaction terms were compared using the F test. Results: TKV/BSA did not differ across the genotype groups, t(176) = −0.45, p = 0.653 (106 ±24 and 108 ±25 mL/m2 for GG and GA, respectively). Similarly, there was no effect of the c.654G>A geno-type on TKV/BSA after controlling for the effect of covariates, F(1,175) = 0.28, p = 0.598. There was no association of the RET x OSR1 interaction on the TKV/BSA. Conclusion: We did not find an association between the OSR1 c.1296G> A polymorphism, alone and in combination with RET c.645G> A and kidney size in a group of healthy full-term newborns.
Epigenetic reprogramming and re-differentiation of a Ewing sarcoma cell line

Developmental reprogramming techniques have been used to generate induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells from both normal and malignant cells. The derivation of iPS cells from cancer has the potential to provide a unique scientific tool to overcome challenges associated with the establishment of cell lines from primary patient samples and a readily expandable source of cells that may be used to model the initial disease. In the current study we developmentally reprogrammed a metastatic Ewing sarcoma (EWS) cell line to a meta-stable embryonic stem (ES)-like state sharing molecular and phenotypic features with previously established ES and iPS cell lines. EWS-iPS cells exhibited a pronounced drug resistant phenotype despite persistent expression of the oncogenic EWS-FLI1 fusion transcript. This included resistance to compounds that specifically target downstream effector pathways of EWS-FLI1, such as MAPK/ERK and PI3K/AKT, which play an important role in EWS pathogenesis. EWS-iPS cells displayed tumor initiation abilities in vivo and formed tumors exhibiting characteristic Ewing histopathology. In parallel, EWS-iPS cells re-differentiated in vitro recovered sensitivity to molecularly targeted chemotherapeutic agents, which reiterated pathophysiological features of the cells from which they were derived. These data suggest that EWS-iPS cells may provide an expandable disease model that could be used to investigate processes modulating oncogenesis, metastasis, and chemotherapeutic resistance in EWS.
Theory and Practice of Temporal Scalability

This paper evaluates two temporally scalable video coding techniques, temporal subband coding (TSB) and predictive coding, both theoretically and in practice to provide comparisons of compression and visual quality at differing frame rates. An emphasis is placed on evaluating only the visual effects caused by the temporal coding technique rather than those introduced by any spatial coding. Results demonstrate that TSB coding has a higher coding gain at full frame rate than predictive coding if both algorithms use either no motion compensation (MC) or MC that can be modeled as an invertible pre-distortion of the video sequence. However, MC techniques often exploit local motion of many different regions in a scene, and therefore must contend with covered and uncovered regions. Often in TSB schemes using regional MC (e.g. block-based MC), these covered or uncovered regions are coded with “open-loop” prediction, instead of subband coding, to maintain the ability to fully reconstruct coded video. Since quantization errors are propagated in open-loop prediction, this is less efficient than “closed-loop” prediction used in motion compensated prediction (MCP) coding. Thus, MCP coding outperforms TSB coding at full frame rate with block-based MC for sequences containing regions being covered and uncovered, even if there are only a small number of these regions. In addition, visual results for lower-frame-rate video using TSB coding are unacceptable due to significant distortions from temporal filtering. These results are demonstrated through both mathematical evaluation of rate-distortion based coding gains and simulated coding of real video sequences.
The Pleasures of Success: Game-Related Efficacy Experiences as a Mediator Between Player Performance and Game Enjoyment

In the present study, the interplay of player performance, game-related self-efficacy experiences, and the resulting effects on game enjoyment are investigated. We hypothesized that a player's performance stimulates enjoyment via its potential to stimulate game-related self-efficacy experiences. In a laboratory setting, participants (N = 213) played a jump 'n' run game. Their performance during game play was recorded by log-file software, and efficacy and enjoyment were assessed with questionnaires. As predicted, both player performance and game-related self-efficacy experience were significant predictors of enjoyment. Furthermore, the results demonstrate that game-related self-efficacy experience significantly mediates the relationship between player performance and game enjoyment.
Second-Best Fairness Under Limited Information: The Trade-Off between False Positives and False Negatives

In many important economic settings, limited information makes it impossible for decision makers to ensure that each individual gets what he or she deserves. Decision makers are then faced with the trade-off between giving some individuals more than they deserve, false positives, and giving some individuals less than they deserve, false negatives. We present the results from a large-scale experimental study of how people trade off these two mistakes in distributive choices. We find that a majority are more concerned with avoiding false negatives than With avoiding false positives, but we also document heterogeneity with respect to how people make this trade-off. The findings shed important light on people’s attitudes to a wide range of policies by providing novel evidence on an important dimension of people’s social preference.