Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Remediation in the Community College

Remediation is the most common approach to preparing students academically and socially during their early stages of college. However, despite its profound importance and its significant costs, there is very little rigorous research analyzing its effectiveness. The goal of this article is to provide a conceptual framework for the evaluation of remedial education programs. Based on previous literature, we review a list of ingredients for successful interventions, present a number of approaches to remediation that make use of these ingredients, discuss alternative research designs for systematic evaluations, and enumerate basic data requirements.
Transport of uridine and 3-deazauridine in cultured human lymphoblastoid cells.

The transport of uridine and 3-deazauridine was compared in two lines of cultured human lymphoblastoid cells that differ in their sensitivity to 3-deazauridine apparently because of reduced uridine-cytidine kinase activity in the resistant line. The kinetic parameters (+/- S.E.) of uridine transport were similar in the two cell lines: Km, 0.23 +/- 0.02 and 0.25 +/- 0.07 mM; and Vmax, 35 +/- 2 and 57 +/- 10 pmol/microliter of cell water per sec, respectively, for 6410/MP (parental) and 6410/MP/DU (resistant) cells. 3-Deazauridine, while transported with similar kinetic characteristics in both cell lines, was not as good a substrate for the nucleoside transporter as was uridine, and its transport was dependent on pH. Kinetic parameters, determined using calculated concentrations of the undissociated form of 3-deazauridine (pKa, 6.5), were: Km, 0.52 +/- 0.01 and 0.51 +/- 0.03 mM; and Vmax, 28 +/- 0.5 and 24 +/- 0.9 pmol/microliter of cell water per sec, respectively, for 6410/MP and 6410/MP/DU cells. At pH 8, a condition in which 97% of 3-deazauridine molecules are ionized, rates of transport were almost zero. It is concluded that the undissociated form of 3-deazauridine is the substrate for the nucleoside transporter.
Effects of Left Basal Ganglia Lesions on Language Production

Three patients with lesions mainly confined to the left basal ganglia were studied with a series of neuropsychological and neurolinguistic tests. Two patients were nonfluent, whereas one presented with fluent spontaneous speech. All of them produced agrammatic sentences and lexical and semantic mistakes. Perseverations and echolalias were two further characteristic disorders of their speech production. The linguistic symptoms observed in these three patients suggest that the left basal ganglia play an important role (a) in regulating arousal and speech initiation, (b) in monitoring the semantic and lexical aspects of language, and (c) in switching from one linguistic element to the following during language production.
Epicatechin Used in the Treatment of Intestinal Inflammatory Disease: An Analysis by Experimental Models

Background. This study was pathway of (−)-epicatechin (EC) in the prevention and treatment of intestine inflammation in acute and chronic rat models. Methods. Intestine inflammation was induced in rats using TNBS. The morphological, inflammatory, immunohistochemical, and immunoblotting characteristics of colon samples were examined. The effects of EC were evaluated in an acute model at doses of 5, 10, 25, and 50 mg/kg by gavage for 5 days. The chronic colitis model was induced 1st day, and treated for 21 days. For the colitis relapse model, the induction was repeated on 14th. Results. EC10 and EC50 effectively reduced the lesion size, as assessed macroscopically; and confirmed by microscopy for EC10. The glutathione levels were higher in EC10 group but decreased COX-2 expression and increased cell proliferation (PC) were observed, indicating an anti-inflammatory activity and a proliferation-stimulating effect. In the chronic colitis model, EC10 showed lower macroscopic and microscopic lesion scores and increase in glutathione levels. As in the acute model, a decrease in COX-2 expression and an increase in PC in EC10, the chronic model this increase maybe by the pathway EGF expression. Conclusion. These results confirm the activity of EC as an antioxidant that reduces of the lesion and that has the potential to stimulate tissue healing, indicating useful for preventing and treating intestine inflammation.
Landscape ‘stress’ and reorganization from χ‐maps: Insights from experimental drainage networks in oblique collision setting

Several recent studies have suggested that maps of flow length normalized for drainage area called chi (χ) could reveal landscapes in a transient state, which are prone to reorganizations of basin geometry, flow line topology and water divide locations. However, the potentially long timescales associated with the evolution of basin geometry make the capability of χ to predict such reorganization challenging to test in natural settings. Here, we investigate the evolution of experimental drainage networks developed on a wedge coupled to a piedmont and growing in oblique convergence. We use this experimental setting to investigate the relationships between χ maps, the imposed tectonic deformation and the drainage network evolution. As deposition can occur within channels or in the piedmont, our experimental streams deviate from purely bedrock channels for which the χ metric has been initially developed. Yet we show that the large‐scale χ pattern of the experimental drainage network is consistent with the imposed deformation field, as ∼2/3 of the observed χ gradients across water divide are oriented in the expected direction with respect to the imposed deformation. This suggests that χ maps can be used to infer the horizontal component of regional deformation in large‐scale natural mountainous fluvial landscapes. In addition, we observe that when a divide affected by a χ gradient migrates, the orientation of the gradient correctly anticipates the sense of landscape reorganization for ∼2/3 of these divides. © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Detecting the overlapping and hierarchical community structure in complex networks

Many networks in nature, society and technology are characterized by a mesoscopic level of organization, with groups of nodes forming tightly connected units, called communities or modules, that are only weakly linked to each other. Uncovering this community structure is one of the most important problems in the field of complex networks. Networks often show a hierarchical organization, with communities embedded within other communities; moreover, nodes can be shared between different communities. Here, we present the first algorithm that finds both overlapping communities and the hierarchical structure. The method is based on the local optimization of a fitness function. Community structure is revealed by peaks in the fitness histogram. The resolution can be tuned by a parameter enabling different hierarchical levels of organization to be investigated. Tests on real and artificial networks give excellent results.
Acceptance, adherence and dropout rates of individuals with COPD approached in telehealth interventions: a protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis

Introduction Telehealth interventions have the potential of improving exacerbation and health outcomes for individuals with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), by delivering care in between clinical visits. However, the precise impact on avoiding exacerbation and reducing the incidence of hospital readmissions remains inconclusive. This lack of knowledge on the effectiveness of telehealth for COPD care might be due to non-adherence or partial adherence to intervention programmes and/or the withdrawal of participants over the course of previous studies. Objectives To conduct a systematic review of trials of telehealth interventions (including randomised control trials (RCT), crossover and pre-post studies) to: (1) estimate the acceptance, adherence and dropout rates; (2) identify the reasons for dropout from telehealth interventions among individuals with COPD; (3) evaluate the impact of trial-related, sociodemographic and intervention-related factors on the acceptance, adherence and dropout rates and (4) estimate the extent to which the acceptance, adherence and dropout rates impact outcomes in comparison with usual monitoring. Methods and analysis A systematic literature review of four databases from earliest records to November 2018 will be carried out using CINAHL, Medline (Ovid), Cochrane Library and Embase. Randomised and non-randomised control studies will be included, in addition to crossover and pre-studies post-studies comparing telehealth with standard monitoring among individuals with COPD only. Two independent reviewers will screen all relevant abstracts and full-text studies to determine eligibility, assess the risk of bias and extract the data using structured forms. If the included studies are sufficiently homogenous in terms of interventions, populations and objectives, a meta-analysis will be performed. Ethics and dissemination Ethical considerations are not required for this research. Trial registration number CRD42017078541.
A reassessment of the Brassington Formation (Miocene) of Derbyshire, UK and a review of related hypogene karst suffosion processes

The Brassington Formation of the Pennines is the most extensive onshore Miocene succession in the UK. It is preserved as outliers in Lower Carboniferous Limestone. During the Cenozoic, central England underwent uplift, with erosion of post-Mississippian strata from the Pennine axis in the Peak District. The Brassington Formation is hence significant in reconstructing Cenozoic geological history. It is non-marine, derived from Triassic sandstone and of Mid–Late Miocene age. The c. 60 outliers occur in three clusters over c. 220 km2. They are remnants of a sedimentary prism at least 75 m thick and with a volume of c. 10 km3. Suffosion of bedrock, conditioned by aggressive precursor fluids of hypogenic origin, was the major control on subsidence. The calculated volume of the fills in the Bees Nest and Green Clay outliers is 3.7–5.0 × 106 m3. Referenced to a sub-Miocene surface at c. 450 m OD in pre-subsidence times, the original volume of this subsidence complex was c. 21.8 × 106 m3 and the aggregated volume of the Late Neogene White Peak palaeokarst was at least 0.66 km3. Subsidence was concomitant with Pliocene uplift of the Pennine Axis, suggesting suffosion accommodation of 3 × 106 m3 per km2 or 244 m3 per annum.
Meteorological inventory of rain-on-snow events and detection assessment in the Canadian arctic archipelago using passive microwave radiometry

The spatial and temporal distribution of ROS across the Canadian Arctic Archipelago (CAA) remains poorly understood owing to their sporadic nature in time and space. In this study, we highlight the distribution and evolution of ROS occurrences inventoried since 1984 at 14 Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) weather stations in the CAA. We introduce an adaptation of the detection algorithm proposed by Dolant et al., (2016), to investigate spatio-temporal patterns in occurrence. Across the 14 weather stations, more than 600 ROS events were identified since 1984, 80% of which occurred during the Spring season.
Distinct triphone acoustic modeling using deep neural networks

To strike a balance between robust parameter estimation and detailed modeling, most automatic speech recognition systems are built using tied-state continuous density hidden Markov models (CDHMM). Consequently, states that are tied together in a tied-state are not distinguishable, introducing quantization errors inevitably. It has been shown that it is possible to model (almost) all distinct triphones effectively by using a basis approach; previously two methods were proposed: eigentriphone modeling and reference model weighting (RMW) in CDHMM using Gaussian-mixture states. In this paper, we investigate distinct triphone modeling under the state-of-the-art deep neural network (DNN) framework. Due to the large number of DNN model parameters, regularization is necessary. Multi-task learning (MTL) is first used to train distinct triphone states together with carefully chosen related tasks which serve as a regularizer. The RMW approach is then applied to linearly combine the neural network weight vectors of member triphones of each tied-state before the output softmax activation for each distinct triphone state. The method successfully improves phoneme recognition in TIMIT and word recognition in the Wall Street Journal task.
Recent Acceleration of a Rock Glacier Complex, Ádjet, Norway, Documented by 62 Years of Remote Sensing Observations

Recent acceleration of rock glaciers is well recognized in the European Alps, but similar behavior is hardly documented elsewhere. Also, the controlling factors are not fully understood. Here we provide evidence for acceleration of a rock glacier complex in northern Norway, from 62 years of remote sensing data. Average annual horizontal velocity measured by aerial feature tracking increased from ~0.5 myr−1 (1954–1977) to ~3.6 myr−1 (2006–2014). Measured by satellite synthetic aperture radar offset‐tracking, averages increased from ~4.9 to ~9.8 myr−1 (2009–2016) and maximum velocities from ~12 to ~69 myr−1. Kinematic analysis reveals different spatial‐temporal trends in the upper and the lower parts of the rock glacier complex, suggesting progressive detachment of the faster front. We suggest that permafrost warming, topographic controls, and increased water access to deeper permafrost layers and internal shear zones can explain the kinematic behavior.
Infinite Order Domination in Graphs

The previously studied notions of smart and foolproof finite order domination of a simple graph G = (V, E) are generalised in the sense that safe configurations in G are not merely sought after k ≥ 1 moves, but in the limiting cases where k → ∞. Some general properties of these generalised domination parameters are established, after which the parameter values are found for certain simple graph structures (such as paths, cycles, multipartite graphs and products of complete graphs, cycles and paths).
Does parental body mass index status modify the associations among birth weight, early growth and childhood adiposity?

OBJECTIVES To examine the associations among birth weight, infant growth and childhood adiposity, and to test whether parental weight status modifies these associations. METHODS The sample was comprised of 423 participants born at term who were an appropriate size for their gestational age from the Quebec Adipose and Lifestyle Investigation in Youth (QUALITY) study, a cohort of 630 children with a parental history of obesity. Infant growth velocity from zero to two years of age was estimated using slopes from simple linear regression for weight and body mass index (BMI) Z-scores. Child anthropometrics and body composition, and parental BMI were measured from eight to 10 years of age. Associations were modelled using multiple linear regressions. RESULTS Increased birth weight and growth velocity independently predicted increased childhood adiposity. Effects of infant growth velocity on later adiposity were stronger with higher maternal BMI but not with higher paternal BMI. Similar interactions with birth weight were not found. CONCLUSIONS Early childhood measures of growth and the mother's BMI score should be included in investigations on obesity risk.
Metabolic syndrome increases endogenous carbon monoxide production to promote hypertension and endothelial dysfunction in obese Zucker rats.

Vascular heme oxygenase (HO) metabolizes heme to form carbon monoxide (CO). Increased heme-derived CO inhibits nitric oxide synthase and can contribute to hypertension via endothelial dysfunction in Dahl salt-sensitive rats. Obese Zucker rats (ZR) are models of metabolic syndrome. This study tests the hypothesis that endogenous CO formation is increased and contributes to hypertension and endothelial dysfunction in obese ZR. Awake obese ZR showed increased respiratory CO excretion, which was lowered by HO inhibitor administration [zinc deuteroporphyrin 2,4-bis glycol (ZnDPBG) 25 micromol.kg(-1). 24 h(-1) ip]. In awake obese ZR, chronically instrumented with femoral arterial catheters, blood pressure was elevated but was decreased by the HO inhibitor ZnDPBG. Body weight, blood glucose, glycated hemoglobin, plasma insulin, total and LDL cholesterol, oxidized LDL, and triglyceride levels were elevated in obese ZR, and, except for LDL cholesterol, were unchanged by HO inhibition. Total HO-1 protein levels were not different between lean and obese ZR aortas. In vitro experiments used isolated skeletal muscle arterioles with constant pressure and no flow, or constant midpoint, but altered endpoint pressures to establish graded levels of luminal flow. In obese ZR arterioles, responses to ACh and flow were attenuated. Acute in vitro pretreatment with an HO inhibitor, chromium mesoporphyrin, enhanced ACh and flow-induced dilation and abolished the differences between groups. Furthermore, exogenous CO prevented the restoration of flow-induced dilation by the HO inhibitor in obese ZR arterioles. These results suggest that HO-derived CO production is increased and promotes hypertension and arteriolar endothelial dysfunction in obese ZR with metabolic syndrome independent of affecting metabolic parameters.
Plasma cortisol and prognosis of patients with acute myocardial infarction

Aims Cortisol is associated with increased cardiovascular morbidity and mortality in patients with chronic heart failure and in the general population. The negative predictive effect of cortisol on survival in non-diabetic patients who have suffered an acute myocardial infarction (AMI) has been shown. We aimed to determine the prognostic significance of cortisol in a general group of AMI patients, as this is not well known. Methods Plasma cortisol levels were measured in 955 consecutive patients admitted with AMI. We prospectively evaluated the relationship between cortisol and major adverse cardiovascular event (MACE), which was a composite of all-cause mortality, and combination all-cause mortality and re-hospitalization for heart failure, in post-AMI patients. Results During the 2-year follow-up, MACE occurred in 261 patients (27.3%). Patients with MACE had significantly higher median levels of cortisol than those without (609.4 versus 549.4 pmol/ml, P = 0.0073). Log cortisol was independently predictive of MACE after adjusting for covariates with hazard ratio (95% confidence interval) of 1.55 (1.05–2.27), P = 0.027. Patients in the highest quartile of cortisol had significantly more risk of MACE compared with those in the lowest quartile, with an adjusted hazard ratio (95% confidence interval) of 1.91(1.16–3.15), P = 0.0120. Kaplan–Meier survival estimates for MACE were lower in patients with plasma cortisol levels in the highest quartile compared with those in the first three quartiles (Log rank test &khgr;2 for survival = 10.41, P = 0.0013). Conclusion This study has shown the prognostic significance of cortisol in 955 post-AMI patients from a single centre.
Differences in Presentation, Treatment Initiation, and Response Among Children Infected With Human Immunodeficiency Virus in Urban and Rural Zambia

Background: Access to pediatric antiretroviral therapy (ART) in rural areas remains limited due to the unique challenges faced by providers and patients. Few rural ART programs have been evaluated to determine whether these challenges affect care and treatment response. Methods: Routinely collected data from 3 pediatric ART programs in rural and urban Zambia were obtained from medical records. Participants included human immunodeficiency virus-infected children <15 years of age presenting for care between August 2004 and July 2008. Characteristics at presentation, time to ART initiation, and treatment response were compared between urban and rural children. Results: A total of 863 children were enrolled (562 urban and 301 rural). At presentation, children in rural clinics were significantly younger (3.4 vs. 6.5 years), had higher CD4+ T-cell percentages (18.0% vs. 12.8%), less advanced disease (47.5% vs. 62.3% in World Health Organization stage 3/4), lower weight-for-age Z-scores (−2.8 vs. −2.3), and traveled greater distances (29 vs. 2 km). Rural children eligible for ART at presentation took longer to initiate treatment (3.6 vs. 0.9 months); no differences were found in time to ART initiation among children ineligible at presentation (15.4 vs. 12.1 months). For the 607 children initiating ART, clinical and immunologic status improved in both urban and rural clinics. Mortality was highest in the first 90 days of treatment and was higher at all times in rural clinics. Conclusions: The findings support expansion of ART programs into rural areas to increase access to treatment services and reduce inequities.
Diminished Ca2+ and Ba2+ currents in myocytes surviving in the epicardial border zone of the 5-day infarcted canine heart.

Ventricular arrhythmias frequently occur in patients suffering from ischemic heart disease. In a canine model developed to understand the pathoelectrophysiological mechanisms of the ischemia-related arrhythmias, electrical stimulation can initiate and terminate reentrant ventricular tachyarrhythmias, which arise in surviving subepicardial muscle fibers (epicardial border zone [EBZ] fibers) of the left ventricle 5 days after coronary artery occlusion. Both the structural and electrical changes occurring in the EBZ provide the important substrate for generation of reentrant ventricular tachyarrhythmias. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that abnormalities exist in the electrophysiological properties of macroscopic Ca2+ currents in myocytes isolated from the EBZ of the 5-day infarcted canine heart (IZs). We recorded the T-type (ICa,T) and L-type (ICa,L) Ca2+ currents by using the whole-cell voltage-clamp technique with either Ca2+ or Ba2+ (5 mmol/L) as the charge carrier and under experimental conditions (Na(+)- and K(+)-free solutions, 10 mmol/L intracellular EGTA) that eliminated contamination by other currents. When Ca2+ served as the charge carrier, the density of peak ICa,T in IZs (0.89 +/- 0.5 pA/pF, n = 28) was similar to that in myocytes from normal noninfarcted hearts (NZs) (1.1 +/- 0.5 pA/pF, n = 32). Although no changes existed in the properties of ICa,T, dramatic changes occurred in the density and function of ICa.L in IZs compared with NZs. Density of peak ICa,L at a holding potential of -40 mV (8-second clamp-step interval) was significantly reduced in IZs (4.6 +/- 1.5 pA/pF, n = 40) compared with NZs (7.2 +/- 1.6 pA/pF, n = 53). The reduction in peak ICa,L density was not attributable to altered steady state inactivation relations or a delay in recovery of ICa,L from inactivation. The time course of decay of peak ICa,: was described by a biexponential function in both cell types, with the fast and slow time constants (tau 1 and tau 2, respectively) of decay being significantly faster in IZs (tau 1 12.3 +/- 3.6 ms; tau 2, 55.1 +/- 31.1 ms) than in NZs (tau 1, 16.1 +/- 4.1 ms; tau 2, 85.2 +/- 51.7 ms). In addition, rapid clamp stimulation (at 1-s intervals) of cells produced a larger frequency-dependent decrease of peak ICa,L density in IZs than NZs, suggesting that at more physiologically relevant rates, little ICA.L may be activated. Finally, a significant reduction and acceleration of decay of the ICa,L persisted even when Ca2+ was substituted by equimolar Ba2+ as the charge carrier. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)