Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Periodontal Infection and Cardiorespiratory Fitness in Younger Adults: Results from Continuous National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1999–2004

Objective Previous studies report associations between periodontal infection and cardiorespiratory fitness but no study has examined the association among younger adults. Our objective was to study the association between clinical measures of periodontal infection and cardiorespiratory fitness levels among a population-based sample of younger adults. Methods The Continuous National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1999–2004 enrolled 2,863 participants (46% women) who received a partial-mouth periodontal examination and completed a submaximal treadmill test for the assessment of estimated VO2 max(eVO2 max ). Participants were mean±SD age 33±9 years (range = 20–49 years), 30% Hispanic, 48% White, 19% Black, and 3% other. Mean eVO2 max (mL/kg/minute) as well as eVO2 max≤32 mL/kg/minute (20th percentile) were regressed across quartiles of mean probing depth and mean attachment loss in multivariable linear and logistic regression models. Results After multivariable adjustment, mean eVO2 max levels±SE across quartiles of attachment loss were 39.72±0.37, 39.64±0.34, 39.59±0.36, and 39.85±0.39 (P = 0.99). Mean eVO2 max±SE across quartiles of probing depth were 39.57±0.32, 39.78±0.38, 39.19±0.25, and 40.37±0.53 (P = 0.28). Similarly, multivariable adjusted mean eVO2 max values were similar between healthy participants vs. those with moderate/severe periodontitis: 39.70±0.21 vs. 39.70±0.90 (P = 1.00). The odds ratio (OR) for low eVO2 max comparing highest vs. lowest quartile of attachment loss = 0.89[95% CI 0.64–1.24]. The OR for comparing highest vs. lowest probing depth quartile = 0.77[95% CI 0.51–1.15]. Conclusion Clinical measures of periodontal infection were not related to cardiorespiratory fitness in a sample of generally healthy younger adults.
Image Enhancement for Reducing LCD Backlight Power Based on Human Visual Characteristics

One common way to reduce power consumption of display devices is to reduce the liquid crystal displays (LCD) backlight intensity since the main light source of LCD consumes 20~50% of the total system power. In this paper, we propose a novel method of reducing LCD backlight power which maximizes the power reduction ratio and minimizes the visual image quality degradation based on the human visual system (HVS). The proposed method uses histogram to minimize the number of clipped pixels and keep the perceptual quality and the characteristics of image. In contrast to previous approach, the proposed method uses no look-up table and preserves the hue values and the perceptual white brightness. Experimental results show that 41.35% of backlight power is reduced on average without severe perceptual distortion.
Perception of change communication factors between executive and non-executive in a restructuring exercise

The objective of this study is to differentiate between executives' and non-executives' change communication factors (consisted of receiving information, quality of information, involvement in decision making and leader's vision) in a selected organization for restructuring. Kurt Lewin's theory of effective communication was used. Data were gathered from 87 executives and 276 non-executives in a selected telecommunications company. A set of self-administered questionnaires was used to gather the data. T-test was used to differentiate the results from executives and non-executives on the change communication factors during the restructuring exercise. The study found that only one change factor, namely Receiving information' produced significant difference between the executives and non-executives through the study.
Decoding the fine-scale structure of a breast cancer genome and data

Access the most recent version at doi: 2006 16: 394-404; originally published online Feb 3, 2006; Genome Res. Collins A. Shagin, Irina A. Shagina, Joe W. Gray, Jan-Fang Cheng, Pieter J. de Jong, Pavel Pevzner and Colin John H. Brebner, Krystyna Bajsarowicz, Pamela L. Paris, Quanzhou Tao, David Kowbel, Anna Lapuk, Dmitri Stanislav Volik, Benjamin J. Raphael, Guiqing Huang, Michael R. Stratton, Graham Bignel, John Murnane, transcriptome Decoding the fine-scale structure of a breast cancer genome and
Engineering Competitions in the Middle School Classroom: Key Elements in Developing Effective Design Challenges

Engineering challenges that involve both the design and building of devices that satisfy constraints are increasingly employed in precollege science courses. We have experimented with exercises that are distinguished from those employed with elite students by reducing competition and increasing cooperation through the use of tests against nature, large dynamic ranges in performance, initial prototype designs, and alternative methods of recording and presenting results. We find that formulating easily understood goals helps engage students in fascinatingly creative processes that expose the need for a scientific methodology. Such challenges engage male and female students equally, helping to erase the gender disparity in familiarity with the technology and skills common to physical science.
Security in the Ajanta mobile agent system

A mobile agent is an object which can autonomously migrate in a distributed system to perform tasks on behalf of its creator. Security issues in regard to the protection of host resources, as well as the agent themselves, raise significant obstacles in practical applications of the agent paradigm. This article describes the security architecture of Ajanta, a Java‐based system for mobile agent programming. This architecture provides mechanisms to protect server resources from malicious agents, agent data from tampering by malicious servers and communication channels during its travel, and protection of name service data and the global namespace. We present here a proxy based mechanism for secure access to server resources by agents. Using Java's class loader model and thread group mechanism, isolated execution domains are created for agents at a server. An agent can contain three kinds of protected objects: read‐only objects whose tampering can be detected, encrypted objects for specific servers, and a secure append‐only log of objects. A generic authentication protocol is used for all client–server interactions when protection is required. Using this mechanism, the security model of Ajanta enforces protection of namespaces, and secure execution of control primitives such as agent recall or abort. Ajanta also supports communication between agents using RMI, which can be controlled if required by the servers' security policies. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Co-Development of Academic Interest and Effortful Engagement and Its Role for Educational Attainment in a Tracked School System

Internal dynamics of school engagement and their impact on educational attainment have been studied scarcely. Understanding these processes is crucial, particularly in view of declining school engagement across adolescent years. This study examines dynamic interrelations of motivational and behavioral engagement components across mid-childhood and mid-adolescence. We analyze how levels and changes of academic interest and effortful engagement interact and scrutinize their co-development for its impact on educational attainment in a tracked school system. Structural equation models based on ten-year six-wave Swiss longitudinal data show that academic interest triggers a feedback loop with effortful engagement gradually leading towards differential educational attainment.
Dose-Dependent Inverted U-Shaped Effect of Dopamine (D2-Like) Receptor Activation on Focal and Nonfocal Plasticity in Humans

The neuromodulator dopamine (DA) has multiple modes of action on neuroplasticity induction and modulation, depending on subreceptor specificity, concentration level, and the kind of stimulation-induced plasticity. To determine the dosage-dependent effects of D2-like receptor activation on nonfocal and focal neuroplasticity in the human motor cortex, different doses of ropinirole (0.125, 0.25, 0.5, and 1.0 mg), a D2/D3 dopamine agonist, or placebo medication were combined with anodal and cathodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) protocols, which induce nonfocal plasticity, or paired associative stimulation (PAS, ISI of 10 or 25 ms), which generates focal plasticity, in healthy volunteers. D2-like receptor activation produced an inverted “U”-shaped dose–response curve on plasticity for facilitatory tDCS and PAS and for inhibitory tDCS. Here, high or low dosages of ropinirole impaired plasticity. However, no dose-dependent response effect of D2-like receptor activation was evident for focal inhibitory plasticity. In general, our study supports the assumption that modulation of D2-like receptor activity exerts dose-dependent inhibitory or facilitatory effects on neuroplasticity in the human motor cortex depending on the topographic specificity of plasticity.
Histone modifications and chromatin dynamics: a focus on filamentous fungi

The readout of the genetic information of eukaryotic organisms is significantly regulated by modifications of DNA and chromatin proteins. Chromatin alterations induce genome-wide and local changes in gene expression and affect a variety of processes in response to internal and external signals during growth, differentiation, development, in metabolic processes, diseases, and abiotic and biotic stresses. This review aims at summarizing the roles of histone H1 and the acetylation and methylation of histones in filamentous fungi and links this knowledge to the huge body of data from other systems. Filamentous fungi show a wide range of morphologies and have developed a complex network of genes that enables them to use a great variety of substrates. This fact, together with the possibility of simple and quick genetic manipulation, highlights these organisms as model systems for the investigation of gene regulation. However, little is still known about regulation at the chromatin level in filamentous fungi. Understanding the role of chromatin in transcriptional regulation would be of utmost importance with respect to the impact of filamentous fungi in human diseases and agriculture. The synthesis of compounds (antibiotics, immunosuppressants, toxins, and compounds with adverse effects) is also likely to be regulated at the chromatin level.
Enabling Reputation and Trust in Privacy-Preserving Mobile Sensing

Mobile sensing is becoming a popular paradigm to collect information from and outsource tasks to mobile users. These applications deal with lot of personal information, e.g., identity and location. Therefore, we need to pay a deeper attention to privacy and anonymity. However, the knowledge of the data source is desired to evaluate the trustworthiness of the sensing data. Anonymity and trust become two conflicting objectives in mobile sensing. In this paper, we propose ARTSense, a framework to solve the problem of “trust without identity” in mobile sensing. Our solution consists of a privacy-preserving provenance model, a data trust assessment scheme and an anonymous reputation management protocol. In contrast to other recent solutions, our scheme does not require a trusted third party and both positive and negative reputation updates can be enforced. In the trust assessment, we consider contextual factors that dynamically affects the trustworthiness of the sensing data as well as the mutual support and conflict among data from difference sources. Security analysis shows that ARTSense achieves our desired anonymity and security goals. Our prototype implementation on Android demonstrates that ARTSense incurs minimal computation overhead on mobile devices, and simulation results justify that ARTSense captures the trust of information and reputation of participants accurately.
Unsupervised Induction of a Syntax-Semantics Lexicon Using Iterative Refinement

We present a method for learning syntax-semantics mappings for verbs from unannotated corpora. We learn linkings, i. e. , mappings from the syntactic arguments and adjuncts of a verb to its semantic roles. By learning such linkings, we do not need to model individual semantic roles independently of one another, and we can exploit the relation between different mappings for the same verb, or between mappings for different verbs. We present an evaluation on a standard test set for semantic role labeling.
Music, emotion and auditory processing : towards new models of musical expression and cognition.

This study represents an interdisciplinary investigation of music cognition from both theoretical and empirical perspectives drawing principally from research in neuropsychology, and philosophy. The main aim of the thesis is to produce a coherent model of music cognition, reconciling empirical findings, current accounts of musical expression, and broader cognitive models. With this aim the investigation divides into two parts: first, examining musical expression of emotion, and second, exploring music cognition as a whole and its place within global models of cognition. A particular focus is the subdivision and independence of music subsystems, notably the separation of music and language and to what extent these are functionally, and neuro-anatomically separate cognitive systems.
Sex-differences and stress : Effects on regional high and low affinity [ 3 H ] GABA binding

Sex-differences are observed in the GABAergic neurotransmitter system both at rest and following acute stress, yet the brain regions and functional implications of these differences are unknown. We examined sex-differences in the number of lowand high-affinity [H]GABA binding sites in various brain regions of male and female mice and the effect of stress on such sex-differences. Male (n = 6) and female (n = 6) QS mice were exposed to a brief swim stress (3 min at 32 1 8C) either individually or with cage-mates whilst control males (n = 6) and females (n = 6) remained undisturbed in the home cage. Using quantitative receptor autoradiography, sections of mouse brain were labelled with either 30 or 1000 nM [H]GABA to label high or low affinity binding sites, respectively. Results indicated that males had more low affinity [H]GABA binding sites in various forebrain cortical regions but less high affinity binding sites in many of these regions compared with females. Forced swim stressinduced rapid changes in forebrain GABA binding sites in females and group stressed males, suggesting a mechanism for rapid GABAergic adaptations. However the number of functional binding sites for GABA in certain forebrain regions was altered by stress in opposite directions in males and females, such that baseline sex-differences were removed following stress. These results exemplify sex-differences in brain chemical function and stress responses, and are of potential importance for understanding sex-differences in response to GABAergic compounds and disorders with sex and stress as predisposing factors. # 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Does patient experience of multimorbidity predict self-management and health outcomes in a prospective study in primary care?

Background. There is a need to better understand the mechanisms which lead to poor outcomes in patients with multimorbidity, especially those factors that might be amenable to intervention. Objective. This research aims to explore what factors predict self-management behaviour and health outcomes in patients with multimorbidity in primary care in the UK. Methods. A prospective study design was used. Questionnaires were mailed out to 1460 patients with multimorbidity. Patients were asked to complete a range of self-report measures including measures of multimorbidity, measures of their experience of multimorbidity and service delivery and outcomes (three measures of self-management: behaviours, Self-monitoring and Insight and medication adherence; and a measure of self-reported health). Results. In total, 36% (n = 499) of patients responded to the baseline survey and 80% of those respondents completed follow-up. Self-management behaviour at 4 months was predicted by illness perceptions around the consequences of individual conditions. Self-monitoring and Insight at 4 months was predicted by patient experience of ‘Hassles’ in health services. Self-reported medication adherence at 4 months was predicted by health status, Self-monitoring and Insight and ‘Hassles’ in health services. Perceived health status at 4 months was predicted by age and patient experience of multimorbidity. Conclusions. This research shows that different factors, particularly around patients’ experiences of health care and control over their treatment, impact on various types of self-management. Patient experience of multimorbidity was not a critical predictor of self-management but did predict health status in the short term. The findings can help to develop and target interventions that might improve outcomes in patients with multimorbidity.
The X-ray properties of the dwarf Magellanic-type galaxy NGC 55

We present an analysis of the X-ray properties of the Magellanic-type galaxy NGC 55 based on two contiguous XMM‐Newton observations. We detect a total of 137 X-ray sources in the field of view, down to a flux of ∼5 × 10 −15 erg cm −2 s −1 (0.3‐6 keV), 42 of which are located within the optical confines of the galaxy. On the basis of X-ray colour classification and after correcting for background objects, we conclude that our source sample includes ∼20 X-ray binaries (XRBs), five supernova remnants and seven very soft sources (including two good candidate supersoft sources) associated with NGC 55. We also detect an X-ray source coincident with a previously identified globular cluster in NGC 55. Detailed spectral and timing analysis was carried out on four of the brightest X-ray sources (excluding the brightest source, which was the subject of a previous paper). One of these objects is identified with a Galactic foreground star and is a possible new RS CVn system. The other three are persistent X-ray sources with X-ray spectra well described by either a single absorbed power law (� ∼ 2) or a multicolour disc blackbody (kT in ∼ 1 keV) model. While the observed luminosities of these sources (L X ∼ 1‐2 × 10 38 erg s −1 ) and their X-ray spectra are consistent with accreting XRBs, further evidence of short-term variability is required to confirm this. Although the observed X-ray emission from NGC 55 is dominated by point sources, we do find evidence of an underlying component, which is concentrated on the bar region but has an extent of at least 6 arcmin (3 kpc) in the plane of the galaxy and ±1 arcmin (±500 pc) perpendicular to it. This emission is best fitted by a thermal plasma (MEKAL )( kT ∼ 0.2 keV) plus power-law (� ∼ 2) model but with high intrinsic absorption consistent with its location in the central disc of the galaxy. We interpret the soft component as diffuse thermal emission linked to regions of current star formation, whilst the hard power-law component may originate in unresolved X-ray binary sources. The intrinsic luminosity of this residual disc emission may exceed L X ∼ 6 × 10 38 erg s −1 (0.3‐6 keV). A comparison with other Magellanic systems confirms that, in terms of both its discrete X-ray source population and its extended emission, NGC 55 has X-ray properties which are typical of its class.
Impact of a rape revictimization risk reduction program on women's drinking behavior

DRINKING BEHAVIOR by JENNA L. MCCAULEY (Under the Direction of Karen S. Calhoun) ABSTRACT The current study examined the longitudinal impact of sexual revictimization risk reduction intervention on women’s binge drinking behavior and prospectively examined mechanistic relationships between drinking behavior and alcohol-related rape experiences among a multi-site sample of college women (N=491). Hierarchical linear modeling results indicate that group participants did not significantly differ from controls on number of reported binge episodes across follow-ups, nor did they differ on their trajectory of change in frequency of binge drinking across time. Prospective analyses indicated that binge drinking increased risk for subsequent rape. Among weekly binge drinkers, this risk was specific to alcohol-involved rape. Only prior binge drinking, and not type of rape experience, predicted subsequent binge drinking. Findings have direct implications for targeted programming addressing combined risks for binge drinking and rape among college women.
Differential Evolution and swarm intelligence techniques for analog circuit synthesis

This paper presents an application of different variants of Differential Evolution (DE) and swarm intelligence techniques for analog circuit synthesis. A CMOS Miller Operational Trans-conductance Amplifier (OTA) that satisfies certain design specifications is designed as a case study. Two important swarm intelligence techniques namely Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) and Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) are used for this problem. The optimization of CMOS parameters are carried out using evolutionary algorithms in MATLAB interfaced with WINSPICE circuit simulator. Chaotic DE algorithms are used for performance comparison along with ABC and PSO. The results show that all three evolutionary techniques are capable of designing the Miller OTA satisfying most of the design specifications. However Chaotic DE algorithm performs better in terms of quality of solution, robustness and computational time as compared to standard DE, PSO and ABC algorithms.
A dynamic clustering-based approach for anomaly detection in AODV-based MANETs

Mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) are multi-hop wireless networks of autonomous mobile nodes without any fixed infrastructure. In MANETs, it is difficult to detect malicious nodes because the network topology constantly changes due to node mobility. A malicious node can easily inject false routes into the network. A traditional method to detect such malicious nodes is to establish a base profile of normal network behavior and then identify a node's behavior to be anomalous if it deviates from the established profile. As the topology of a MANET constantly changes over time, the simple use of a static base profile is not efficient. In this paper, we propose a clustering-based anomaly detection approach, called DCAD, which allows the profile to be dynamically updated. In the approach, we use the weighted fixed width clustering (WFWC) algorithm in order to establish a normal profile and to detect anomalies. We also use weighted coefficients and a forgetting equation to periodically update the normal profile. We conduct MANET simulations using the NS2 simulator and consider scenarios for detecting several types of routing attacks on AODV protocol. The simulation results show that DCAD can be successfully used for detecting anomalies caused by malicious nodes in AODV-based MANETs.