Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Calcium Sensing Receptor Expression in Ovine Amniotic Fluid Mesenchymal Stem Cells and the Potential Role of R-568 during Osteogenic Differentiation

Amniotic fluid-derived stem (AFS) cells have been identified as a promising source for cell therapy applications in bone traumatic and degenerative damage. Calcium Sensing Receptor (CaSR), a G protein-coupled receptor able to bind calcium ions, plays a physiological role in regulating bone metabolism. It is expressed in different kinds of cells, as well as in some stem cells. The bone CaSR could potentially be targeted by allosteric modulators, in particular by agonists such as calcimimetic R-568, which may potentially be helpful for the treatment of bone disease. The aim of our study was first to investigate the presence of CaSR in ovine Amniotic Fluid Mesenchymal Stem Cells (oAFMSCs) and then the potential role of calcimimetics in in vitro osteogenesis. oAFMSCs were isolated, characterized and analyzed to examine the possible presence of CaSR by western blotting and flow cytometry analysis. Once we had demonstrated CaSR expression, we worked out that 1 µM R-568 was the optimal and effective concentration by cell viability test (MTT), cell number, Alkaline Phosphatase (ALP) and Alizarin Red S (ARS) assays. Interestingly, we observed that basal diffuse CaSR expression in oAFMSCs increased at the membrane when cells were treated with R-568 (1 µM), potentially resulting in activation of the receptor. This was associated with significantly increased cell mineralization (ALP and ARS staining) and augmented intracellular calcium and Inositol trisphosphate (IP3) levels, thus demonstrating a potential role for calcimimetics during osteogenic differentiation. Calhex-231, a CaSR allosteric inhibitor, totally reversed R-568 induced mineralization. Taken together, our results demonstrate for the first time that CaSR is expressed in oAFMSCs and that calcimimetic R-568, possibly through CaSR activation, can significantly improve the osteogenic process. Hence, our study may provide useful information on the mechanisms regulating osteogenesis in oAFMSCs, perhaps prompting the use of calcimimetics in bone regenerative medicine.
An L1-theory of existence and uniqueness of solutions of nonlinear elliptic equations

L’accès aux archives de la revue « Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, Classe di Scienze » (http://www.sns.it/it/edizioni/riviste/annaliscienze/) implique l’accord avec les conditions générales d’utilisation (http://www.numdam.org/legal.php). Toute utilisation commerciale ou impression systématique est constitutive d’une infraction pénale. Toute copie ou impression de ce fichier doit contenir la présente mention de copyright.
Use of Social Media Tool “Whatsapp” in Medical Education

We are living in an era of technology where smart phones and hence social media has entered into many aspects of our life. Many professions are using social media to improve communication between colleagues. Social media tools are gaining attention in medical education as well. Objective: To explore the potential of WhatsApp as an instructional strategy for 4 th Year MBBS students in Ophthalmology. Methods: We made two groups of students on WhatsApp one for males and one for females. Topic of lecture, relevant images of taught topic and MCQs and SEQs were shared in both groups and students were encouraged to ask questions if they had any. After ten lectures the students were asked to give their feedback on our activity of WhatsApp group on an anonymous questionnaire. Results: Two hundred and thirty four students, 145 (62.0%) female and 86 (36.8%) males students filled in the anonymous questionnaire. One hundred and eighty nine students (88.77%) were using social media to learn medicine while 45 students (19.23%) were not. Sixty seven students (29.39%) were using both WhatsApp and Facebook, 65 students (28.51%) were using Facebook, 57 students (25%) were using WhatsApp. Sixty percent of students were using social media once or more than twice a day. Eighty eight (63.8%) female students and 66 (77.7%) male students ranked this activity as high or above. To the open ended question we got appreciative comments and some suggestion. Conclusion: WhatsApp is an effective social media tool to motivate, augmentand perhaps improve the learning of undergraduates in addition to traditional teaching.
Narrative Experience of Violent Offending in Greece

Introduction: Violent offenders are a divergent population of offenders. There are various types of violent offending, such as subcultural violent offenders who perceive a righteousness of violence when protecting and maintaining their reputation. There are considerably few studies that relate the causation of crime and violence with emotions and narrative roles. Furthermore, it is documented that narratives are associated with issues that are considered within the realms of personality. Thus, the purpose of this study is to investigate how violent offenders’ narratives, emotions, and their correlates with background and personality can shape their violent actions and to unfold violent offending patterns. Methodology: A total of 50 violent Greek offenders (41 males and 9 females), who were involved in hooligan/extreme political violent acts, with an age range of 18-63 participated in the study. These Greek participants had commit a wide variety of violent offences including robbery, gang fights and grievous bodily harm and were accused by the Greek court to be a part of a criminal organisation; of collective group violence. Participants who agreed to participate in this study were invited to fill a questionnaire that consisted of five sections (Description of Crime, Emotions Questionnaire, Narrative Roles Questionnaire, The Self-Report Offending Questionnaire and the HEXACO personality inventory). Results: Results revealed that emotions could be differentiated into four themes Elations, Calm, Distress and Depression in line with the circumplex structure of emotions postulated by Russell (1997) and narrative roles into Adventurer, Professional, Revenger and Victim. Furthermore, emotions themes and associated narrative roles themes were differentiated into four criminal narrative experience (CNE) themes namely Calm Professional, Elated Hero, Depressed Victim and Distressed Revenger. Interestingly, further analysis showed that Elated Hero was the most dominant theme for the violent offenders in the study contrasting previous findings (Ioannou, 2006). Significant associations between the CNE and background characteristics as well as personality traits were also demonstrated. Implications: The current study makes a significant contribution to knowledge supporting previous relevant studies. It was the first time that a theoretical framework of Criminal Narrative Experience was combined with personality and the first time that this was applied in a Greek population and exclusively with violent offenders that most had been involved in collective violence. The theoretical and practical implications are discussed as well as limitations and suggestions for future studies are described.
A Theoretical Framework for Formulating Non-Controversial Prices for Public Park and Recreation Services

Abstract A conceptual framework is offered which guides public park and recreation managers on how to minimize resistance to pricing decisions from affected users. The fulcrum of the framework is reference price, which is the benchmark criterion used to evaluate whether or not a new or revised price for a service is acceptable to users. The paper defines reference price and explains its theoretical genesis. The discussion demonstrates how residual knowledge, a community's prevailing concept of equity, and context, which are the three shapers of reference price, evolved from that genesis. Finally, the role of framing in influencing users' reactions to pricing decisions is explained.
Some Dynamical Features of a Bubble-Free Belousov-Zhabotinsky Reaction

An investigation on the influence of initial concentration of H2SO4 on the dynamics of a bubblefree Belousov-Zhabotinsky (BZ) reaction both in well-stirred and unstirred solutions is presented. This reaction has an advantage over the classical BZ reaction, as any disturbance of the system by CO2 bubbles is avoided. For [H2SO4] ≥ 250 mM, well-stirred solutions are self-oscillating between reduced and oxidized states. The oscillation period is found to decrease, while [H2SO4] is increased. For the unstirred case, propagating wave fronts (oxidized state) on a background (reduced state) occur in a thin layer of the solutions, when [H2SO4] ≥ 150 mM. The wave period and the wavelength decrease as [H2SO4] is increased. Differently, the wave velocity increases with [H2SO4]. At the same concentration of H2SO4, the wave period in the unstirred systems is always shorter than the oscillation period in the well-stirred solutions.
Pierre Bourdieu: theorizing the digital

ABSTRACT Pierre Bourdieu is known for his research in the areas of education and cultural stratification that led to a number of theoretical contributions informing the social sciences. Bourdieu’s interrelated concepts of field, capital, and habitus have become central in many approaches to inequality and stratification across the social sciences. In addition, we argue that Bourdieu’s ideas also feature in what is increasingly known as ‘digital sociology. ’ To underscore this claim, we explore the ways in which Bourdieu’s ideas continue to have a major impact on social science research both on and with digital and Internet-based technologies. To do so, we offer a review of both Bourdieusian theorizing of the digital vis-à-vis both research on the social impacts of digital communication technologies and the application of digital technologies to social science research methods. We contend that three interconnected features of Bourdieu’s sociology have allowed his approach to flourish in the digital age: (1) his theories’ inseparability from the practice of empirical research; (2) his ontological stance combining realism and social constructionism; and (3) his familiarity with concepts developed in other disciplines and participation in interdisciplinary collaborative projects. We not only reason that these three factors go some way in accounting for Bourdieu’s influence in many sociological subfields, but we also suggest that they have been especially successful in positioning Bourdieusian sociology to take advantage of opportunities associated with digital communication technologies.
Cognitive Processing of Verbal Quantifiers in the Context of Affirmative and Negative Sentences: a Croatian Study

Abstract Studies from English and German have found differences in the processing of affirmative and negative sentences. However, little attention has been given to quantifiers that form negations. A picture-sentence verification task was used to investigate the processing of different types of quantifiers in Croatian: universal quantifiers in affirmative sentences (e.g. all), non-universal quantifiers in compositional negations (e.g. not all), null quantifiers in negative concord (e.g. none) and relative disproportionate quantifiers in both affirmative and negative sentences (e.g. some). The results showed that non-universal and null quantifiers, as well as negations were processed significantly slower compared to affirmative sentences, which is in line with previous findings supporting the two-step model. The results also confirmed that more complex tasks require a longer reaction time. A significant difference in the processing of same-polarity sentences with first-order quantifiers was observed: sentences with null quantifiers were processed faster and more accurately than sentences with disproportional and non-universal quantifiers. A difference in reaction time was also found in affirmatives with different quantifiers: sentences with universal quantifiers were processed significantly faster and more accurately compared to sentences with relative disproportionate quantifiers. These findings indicate that the processing of quantifiers follows after the processing of affirmative information. In the context of the two-step model, the processing of quantifiers occurs in the second step, along with negations.
A Survey on the Automated Analyses of Feature Models

Palabras clave: Software Product Lines, Domain Engineering, Feature ModelsResumen. Feature models are one of the most important assets in software productline engineering when capturing variability. Although the analyses of feature models wasstated as challenging problem since they were ﬁst proposed, it has not been fully achievedyet. In this paper we survey the state of the art on the automated analyses of featuremodels outlining the main advances made until now. We conclude that our proposal basedon constraint programming is one of the most promising ones since it supports all theoperations identiﬁed in this paper over feature models.1 IntroductionThe industrialization of the software engineering discipline is not achieved yet. We un-derstand the industrialization of software as the capability of producing software systemsthat fulﬁll budget and quality in a prescribed way. In other industries this is achieved byproducing product lines. Indeed, Boing, Dell or even Mc Donalds builds product lines ofaircraft, computers or hamburgers. Why not Software Product Lines (SPLs)? A key technical question that confronts software engineers is how to specify a particularproduct in an SPL. One of the possible solutions is to do it in terms of features, where afeature is an increment in product functionality. Designing a family of software systemsin terms of features is more natural than doing it in terms of objects or classes becausethey are understood by all stakeholders [19]. While single software systems are speciﬁedin terms of features, software product lines are speciﬁed using feature models.Feature models are recognized in the literature to be one of the most important contri-butions to SPL engineering [3]. A key task is to capture commonalities and variabilitiesamong products and feature models are used to this end.Although there has been advances in SPL engineering regarding feature models, a keytechnical aspect remains open: their automated analyses. In this paper we survey thestate of the art on the automated analyses of feature models. First, we review the diﬀerent1
Swimming Exercise Prevents Fibrogenesis in Chronic Kidney Disease by Inhibiting the Myofibroblast Transdifferentiation

Background The renal function of chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients may be improved by a number of rehabilitative mechanisms. Swimming exercise training was supposed to be beneficial to its recovery. Methodology/Principal Findings Doxorubicin-induced CKD (DRCKD) rat model was performed. Swimming training was programmed three days per week, 30 or 60 min per day for a total period of 11 weeks. Serum biochemical and pathological parameters were examined. In DRCKD, hyperlipidemia was observed. Active mesangial cell activation was evidenced by overexpression of PDGFR, P-PDGFR, MMP-2, MMP-9, α-SMA, and CD34 with a huge amount collagen deposition. Apparent myofibroblast transdifferentiation implicating fibrogenesis in the glomerular mesangium, glomerulonephritis and glomeruloscelorosis was observed with highly elevated proteinuria and urinary BUN excretion. The 60-min swimming exercise but not the 30 min equivalent rescued most of the symptoms. To quantify the effectiveness of exercise training, a physical parameter, i.e. “the strenuosity coefficient” or “the myokine releasing coefficient”, was estimated to be 7.154×10−3 pg/mL-J. Conclusions The 60-min swimming exercise may ameliorate DRCKD by inhibiting the transdifferentiation of myofibroblasts in the glomerular mesangium. Moreover, rehabilitative exercise training to rescue CKD is a personalized remedy. Benefits depend on the duration and strength of exercise, and more importantly, on the individual physiological condition.
Monitoring the Change in Resonance Frequency of a Dental Implant in Hardening Dental Plaster Using Microcontroller

A low cost instrumentation system was proposed in this paper to determine the stability of dental implants using Resonance Frequency Analysis (RFA) technique. In the present work, an improved system has been described which provides a microcontroller based tracking of the change in resonance frequency (RF) when the dental implant is dipped in a hardening dental plaster mixture. In order to do so, the acquisition of the sensor output using the microcontroller as well as its corresponding display on the LCD has been calibrated and characterized. Thereafter, the performance of the system in tracking the change in RF in in-vitro experiments has been validated.
Multi-phase socially-aware routing in distributed mobile social networks

Opportunistic networking is perhaps the only available option for the deployment of distributed mobile social networks, in which no form of infrastructure is present. There have been numerous approaches attempting to devise new socially-aware metrics, in order to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the opportunistic routing algorithms. However, the routing procedure itself is usually not considered. This paper proposes a novel routing method which takes into account the phases of the opportunistic routing procedure. These are detected by checking the availability of information concerning the whereabouts of the destination. Thus, by identifying in which phase a message is in, the algorithm is able to choose the appropriate metric that should be utilized. Using similar metrics as existing routing schemes, this routing protocol is able to provide much higher delivery rates, minimizing the delay. The protocol has been implemented using a base system combining ad-hoc and opportunistic functionality, deployed in the OMNET++ simulation environment. The results presented, clearly demonstrate the benefits of using multi-phase opportunistic routing, when the mobility of the underlying network is driven by social relationships.
Prometheus: scalable and accurate emulation of task-based applications on many-core systems

Modeling the performance of non-deterministic parallel applications on future many-core systems requires the development of novel simulation and emulation techniques and tools. We present "Prometheus", a fast, accurate and modular emulation framework for task-based applications. By raising the level of abstraction and focusing on runtime synchronization, Prometheus can accurately predict applications' performance on very large many-core systems. We validate our emulation framework against two real platforms (AMD Interlagos and Intel MIC) and report error rates generally below 4%. We, then, evaluate Prometheus' performance and scalability: our results show that Prometheus can emulate a task-based application on a system with 512K cores in 11.5 hours. We present two test cases that show how Prometheus can be used to study the performance and behavior of systems that present some of the characteristics expected from exascale supercomputer nodes, such as active power management and processors with a high number of cores but reduced cache per core.
Understanding User Acceptance of Micro-Blog Services in China Using the Extended Motivational Model

The growing popularity of micro-blogs has drawn an increasing amount of attention from users keen to expand friendship, facilitate information sharing and information seeking. Given the extensive use of micro-blog services, there is a pressing need to understand users’ behavioral intentions in microblog services. Although there are some studies exploring the factors explaining micro-blog users’ acceptance, none of research has been reported from both of the technological characteristics and network effects of micro-blog services. This study extended motivational model with socio-technical approach as a theoretical framework to examine the roles of technological factors and network effect factors in determining micro-blog users’ behavioral intentions. This study suggests that interactivity, convenience, accessibility, network size, existing social contacts, performance expectancy, sense of belonging and hedonic expectancy together provide a strong explanation for micro-blog use intention. The results of this study provide directions for system administrators and service providers to achieve higher levels of micro-blog usage by developing multi-faceted strategies.
The relationships among sensorimotor components, fine motor skill, and functional performance in preschool children.

OBJECTIVES This correlational study investigated the relationships among sensorimotor components, standardized measures of fine motor skill, and functional performance in self-care, mobility, and social interaction. It also examined which sensorimotor components and fine motor skills were predictors of functional performance. METHOD Thirty preschool children with motor delays were evaluated with tests of in-hand manipulation, tactile defensiveness, stereognosis, grasping strength, and fine motor skill. Parents of the subjects were interviewed with the Pediatric Evaluation of Disabilities Inventory. Correlational and regression analyses were computed. RESULTS Significant correlations were found among sensorimotor components and discrete fine motor skills as measured on standardized observational tests. Few correlations emerged between foundational components of fine motor skill and functional performance in self-care, mobility, and social function. CONCLUSION Lack of significant relationships among the variables, all of which were aspects of functional performance might be due to the difference between judgment-based and observational evaluation, the influence of the environmental context on the child's performance, and the influence of cultural values on the opportunities afforded to the child.
Impacts of Alternative Emissions Allowance Allocation Methods Under a Federal Cap-and-Trade Program

This paper examines the implications of alternative allowance allocation designs for industry profits and GDP under a federal cap-and-trade program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We employ a general equilibrium model of the U.S. economy with a unique treatment of capital dynamics that permits close attention to profit impacts. Effects on profits depend critically on the relative reliance on auctioning or free allocation of allowances. Freely allocating fewer than 15% of the emissions allowances generally suffices to prevent profit losses in the most vulnerable U.S. industries. Freely allocating all of the allowances substantially overcompensates these industries. When emissions allowances are auctioned and the proceeds employed to finance cuts in income tax rates, GDP costs are about 33% lower than when all allowances are freely allocated. Our results are robust to policies differing in stringency, the availability of offsets, and the opportunities for intertermporal trading of allowances.
Machine Learning Approach to Identifying the Dataset Threshold for the Performance Estimators in

Currently for small-scale machine learning projects, there is no limit which has been set by its researchers to categorise datasets for inexperienced users such as students while assessing and comparing performance of machine learning algorithms. Based on the lack of such a threshold, this paper presents a step by step guide for identifying the dataset threshold for the performance estimators in supervised machine learning experiments. The identification of the dataset threshold involves performing experiments using four different datasets having different sample sizes from the University of California Irvine (UCI) machine learning repository. The sample sizes are categorised in relation to the number of attributes and number of instances available in the dataset. The identified dataset threshold will help unfamiliar machine learning experimenters to categorise datasets correctly and hence selecting the appropriate performance estimation method.