Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Optimal injection volume of epinephrine for endoscopic treatment of peptic ulcer bleeding.

AIM To define the optimal injection volume of epinephrine with high efficacy for hemostasis and low complication rate in patients with actively bleeding ulcers. METHODS This prospective, randomized, comparative trial was conducted in a medical center. A total of 228 patients with actively bleeding ulcers (spurting or oozing) were randomly assigned to three groups with 20, 30 and 40 mL endoscopic injections of an 1:10000 solution of epinephrine. The hemostatic effects and clinical outcomes were compared between the three groups. RESULTS There were no significant differences in all background variables between the three groups. Initial hemostasis was achieved in 97.4%, 98.7% and 100% of patients respectively in the 20, 30 and 40 mL epinephrine groups. There were no significant differences in the rate of initial hemostasis between the three groups. The rate of peptic ulcer perforation was significantly higher in the 40 mL epinephrine group than in the 20 and 30 mL epinephrine groups (P < 0.05). The rate of recurrent bleeding was significantly higher in the 20 mL epinephrine group (20.3%) than in the 30 (5.3%) and 40 mL (2.8%) epinephrine groups (P < 0.01). There were no significant differences in the rates of surgical intervention, the amount of transfusion requirements, the days of hospitalization, the deaths from bleeding and 30 d mortality between the three groups. The number of patients who developed epigastric pain due to endoscopic injection, was significantly higher in the 40 mL epinephrine group (51/76) than in the 20 (2/76) and 30 mL (5/76) epinephrine groups (P < 0.001). Significant elevation of systolic blood pressure after endoscopic injection was observed in the 40 mL epinephrine group (P < 0.01). Significant decreasing and normalization of pulse rates after endoscopic injections were observed in the 20 mL and 30 mL epinephrine groups (P < 0.01). CONCLUSION Injection of 30 mL diluted epinephrine (1:10000) can effectively prevent recurrent bleeding with a low rate of complications. The optimal injection volume of epinephrine for endoscopic treatment of an actively bleeding ulcer (spurting or oozing) is 30 mL.
PCR-based identification of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus strains and their antibiotic resistance profiles.

OBJECTIVE To evaluated the PCR for mecA gene compared with the conventional oxacillin disk diffusion method for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) identification. METHODS A total of 292 S. aureus strains were isolated from various clinical specimens obtained from hospitalized patients. Susceptibility test to several antimicrobial agents was performed by disk diffusion agar according to Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute guidelines. The PCR amplification of the mecA gene was carried out in all the clinical isolates. RESULTS Among antibiotics used in our study, penicillin showed the least anti-staphylococcal activity and vancomycin was the most effective. The rate of methicillin-resistant S. aureus prevalence determined by oxacillin disk diffusion method was 47.6%; whereas, 45.1% of S. aureus isolates were mecA- positive in the PCR assay. CONCLUSIONS This study is suggestive that the PCR for detection of mecA gene is a fast, accurate and valuable diagnostic tool, particularly in hospitals in areas where methicillin-resistant S. aureus is endemic.
Effects of coaches' timeouts on basketball teams' offensive and defensive performances according to momentary differences in score and game period

Abstract The aim of the present study was to assess the effects of game timeouts on basketball teams' offensive and defensive performances according to momentary differences in score and game period. The sample consisted of 144 timeouts registered during 18 basketball games randomly selected from the 2007 European Basketball Championship (Spain). For each timeout, five ball possessions were registered before (n=493) and after the timeout (n=475). The offensive and defensive efficiencies were registered across the first 35 min and last 5 min of games. A k-means cluster analysis classified the timeouts according to momentary score status as follows: losing (−10 to −3 points), balanced (−2 to 3 points), and winning (4 to 10 points). Repeated-measures analysis of variance identified statistically significant main effects between pre and post timeout offensive and defensive values. Chi-square analysis of game period identified a higher percentage of timeouts called during the last 5 min of a game compared with the first 35 min (64.9±9.1% vs. 35.1±10.3%; χ2=5.4, P<0.05). Results showed higher post timeout offensive and defensive performances. No other effect or interaction was found for defensive performances. Offensive performances were better in the last 5 min of games, with the least differences when in balanced situations and greater differences when in winning situations. Results also showed one interaction between timeouts and momentary differences in score, with increased values when in losing and balanced situations but decreased values when in winning situations. Overall, the results suggest that coaches should examine offensive and defensive performances according to game period and differences in score when considering whether to call a timeout.
The chiral ring of AdS3/CFT2 and the attractor mechanism

We study the moduli dependence of the chiral ring in N = (4, 4) superconformal field theories, with special emphasis on those CFT's that are dual to type IIB string theory on AdS(3) x S-3 x X-4. The chiral primary operators are sections of vector bundles, whose connection describes the operator mixing under motion on the moduli space. This connection can be exactly computed using the constraints from N = (4, 4) supersymmetry. Its curvature can be determined using the tt* equations, for which we give a derivation in the physical theory which does not rely on the topological twisting. We show that for N = (4, 4) theories the chiral ring is covariantly constant over the moduli space, a fact which can be seen as a non-renormalization theorem for the three-point functions of chiral primaries in AdS(3)/CFT2. From the spacetime point of view our analysis has the following applications. First, in the case of a D1/D5 black string, we can see the matching of the attractor flow in supergravity to RG-flow in the boundary field theory perturbed by irrelevant operators, to first order away from the fixed point. Second, under spectral flow the chiral primaries become the Ramond ground states of the CFT. These ground states represent the microstates of a small black hole in five dimensions consisting of a D1/D5 bound state. The connection that we compute can be considered as an example of Berry's phase for the internal microstates of a supersymmetric black hole.
Fracking Deep Convolutional Image Descriptors

In this paper we propose a novel framework for learning local image descriptors in a discriminative manner. For this purpose we explore a siamese architecture of Deep Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN), with a Hinge embedding loss on the L2 distance between descriptors. Since a siamese architecture uses pairs rather than single image patches to train, there exist a large number of positive samples and an exponential number of negative samples. We propose to explore this space with a stochastic sampling of the training set, in combination with an aggressive mining strategy over both the positive and negative samples which we denote as "fracking". We perform a thorough evaluation of the architecture hyper-parameters, and demonstrate large performance gains compared to both standard CNN learning strategies, hand-crafted image descriptors like SIFT, and the state-of-the-art on learned descriptors: up to 2.5x vs SIFT and 1.5x vs the state-of-the-art in terms of the area under the curve (AUC) of the Precision-Recall curve.
Collaborative Learning in a Software Bug-Tracking Scenario

Bug-tracking in software engineering is a distributed work process that involves collaborative learning. We seek tounderstand this process better through theories which view learning as a situated activity [Suchman 87, Lave 88]. Laveand Wenger argue that learning is a function of the activity, context, and culture in which it occurs (i.e. is situated)[Lave, Wenger 91]. A critical ingredient of situated learning is social interaction [Nardi 93]. People become involved ina community of practice which embodies certain roles of individuals and norms of behaviors. Within this community,learning occurs incidentally to a task. Thus, we examine the bug-tracking scenario with respect to the knowledge thatindividuals must acquire, and the collaborations necessary to acquire and apply this knowledge. Our long-term goal isto develop this analysis sufﬁciently to guide the adaptation of software engineering tools (e.g., see [Taylor et al. 96]) tosupport learning in the collaborative context of bug-tracking and software maintenance.
Running head : LINGUISTIC MARKERS IN EMOTIONAL ELABORATION 1 Linguistic Markers of Emotional Elaboration in the Past and the Present in Online

Online blog data provide numerous benefits over clinical and laboratory studies, including increased sample size and more genuine responses. By investigating the number of feeling words that a blogger uses in a blog sentence, we can characterize the degree to which individuals elaborate on their emotional experiences. In this study, data were obtained from the website, wefeelfine.org, which collects sentences from English language blogs containing the phrases, “I feel”, “I felt”, and other tenses of the verb “feel”. The number of emotion words in each sentence was counted and used as a metric of emotional elaboration. The results show that sentences containing the phrase “felt” included a significantly smaller proportion of emotion adjectives than those sentences that use the words “feel,” “feeling,” or “feels,” but a significantly larger raw number of emotion adjectives than those sentences. This suggests that people write more words generally in the past tense, but the proportion of emotional words is higher in the present.
Operand size reconfiguration for big data processing in memory

Nowadays, applications that predominantly perform lookups over large databases are becoming more popular with column-stores as the database system architecture of choice. For these applications, Hybrid Memory Cubes (HMCs) can provide bandwidth of up to 320 GB/s and represents the best choice to keep the throughput for these ever increasing databases. However, even with the high available memory bandwidth and processing power, in order to achieve the peak performance, data movements through the memory hierarchy consumes an unnecessary amount of time and energy. In order to accelerate database operations, and reduce the energy consumption of the system, this paper presents the Reconfigurable Vector Unit (RVU) that enables massive and adaptive in-memory processing, extending the native HMC instructions and also increasing its effectiveness. RVU enables the programmer to reconfigure it to perform as a large vector unit or multiple small vectors units to better adjust for the application needs during different computation phases. Due to its adaptability, RVU is capable of achieving performance increase of 27 χ on average and reduce the DRAM energy consumption in 29% when compared to an x86 processor with 16 cores. Compared with the state-of-the-art mechanism capable of performing large vector operations with fixed size, inside the HMC, RVU performed up to 12% better in terms of performance and improve in 53% the energy consumption.
Spatial Aggregation in Gravity Models: 3. Two-Dimensional Trip Distribution and Location Models

This is the third of four papers and in it the methodology for analysing spatial aggregation in gravity models outlined in the first paper is further elaborated. In the second paper, the methodology was applied to one-dimensional spatial interaction models of the population density type, with some success; and here it is proposed to apply the methodology to two-dimensional spatial interaction models using the same data base, the Reading (UK) region. Accordingly, the methodology is first stated for linking information in data measured by spatial entropy to the parameters of models generated from spatial entropy. The family of four spatial interaction models due to Cordey-Hayes and Wilson is then derived, the canonical forms of their associated spatial entropy functions presented, and the analytic properties of such models explored. These four models are then fitted to spatial aggregations of the Reading region, and various empirical relationships between their entropies and parameters described. The results are not as regular as those of the models in the second paper because of more variable model performance, but nevertheless a means of approximating scale parameters from data based on the work of Kirby is outlined. This enables estimates of the dispersion parameters to be made through the canonical forms. Although the results are poor because of model performance, the methodology outlined here serves as a basis for the more fully fledged application to be discussed in the final paper.
Mirror Visual Feedback-Induced Performance Improvement and the Influence of Hand Dominance

Mirror visual feedback (MVF) is a promising technique in clinical settings that can be used to augment performance of an untrained limb. Several studies with healthy volunteers and patients using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) or functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) indicate that functional alterations within primary motor cortex (M1) might be one candidate mechanism that could explain MVF-induced changes in behavior. Until now, most studies have used MVF to improve performance of the non-dominant hand (NDH). The question remains if the behavioral effect of MVF differs according to hand dominance. Here, we conducted a study with two groups of young, healthy right-handed volunteers who performed a complex ball-rotation task while receiving MVF of the dominant (n = 16, group 1, MVFDH) or NDH (n = 16, group 2, MVFNDH). We found no significant differences in baseline performance of the untrained hand between groups before MVF was applied. Furthermore, there was no significant difference in the amount of performance improvement between MVFDH and MVFNDH indicating that the outcome of MVF seems not to be influenced by hand dominance. Thus our findings might have important implications in neurorehabilitation suggesting that patients suffering from unilateral motor impairments might benefit from MVF regardless of the dominance of the affected limb.
The Relationship Between Islamic Work Ethics and Organizational Commitment

This study investigates the relationship between Islamic work ethics and organizational commitment. In this study, Islamic work ethics was treated as independent variables. organizational commitment as a dependent variable. A questionnaire survey of 63 employees working in Jawwal Telecommunication Company in Palestine. The reliability analysis show that the Cronbach's Alpha value for all the variables under study were satisfactorily acceptable except for normative commitment (.542). Due to a very low reliability for normative commitment, the item was removed from the study and was not considered for futher analysis. The descriptive analysis of the variables especially the mean value for Islamic Work Ethics, affective commitment and continuance commitment (where the responses were tapped on the 5 point likert scale) were all above moderate and towards agreement. However, the results from correlation analysis show no significant relations between Islamic Work Ethics and Organizational Commitment.
Low-Intensity Ultrasound-Induced Anti-inflammatory Effects Are Mediated by Several New Mechanisms Including Gene Induction, Immunosuppressor Cell Promotion, and Enhancement of Exosome Biogenesis and Docking

Background: Low-intensity ultrasound (LIUS) was shown to be beneficial in mitigating inflammation and facilitating tissue repair in various pathologies. Determination of the molecular mechanisms underlying the anti-inflammatory effects of LIUS allows to optimize this technique as a therapy for the treatment of malignancies and aseptic inflammatory disorders. Methods: We conducted cutting-edge database mining approaches to determine the anti-inflammatory mechanisms exerted by LIUS. Results: Our data revealed following interesting findings: (1) LIUS anti-inflammatory effects are mediated by upregulating anti-inflammatory gene expression; (2) LIUS induces the upregulation of the markers and master regulators of immunosuppressor cells including MDSCs (myeloid-derived suppressor cells), MSCs (mesenchymal stem cells), B1-B cells and Treg (regulatory T cells); (3) LIUS not only can be used as a therapeutic approach to deliver drugs packed in various structures such as nanobeads, nanospheres, polymer microspheres, and lipidosomes, but also can make use of natural membrane vesicles as small as exosomes derived from immunosuppressor cells as a novel mechanism to fulfill its anti-inflammatory effects; (4) LIUS upregulates the expression of extracellular vesicle/exosome biogenesis mediators and docking mediators; (5) Exosome-carried anti-inflammatory cytokines and anti-inflammatory microRNAs inhibit inflammation of target cells via multiple shared and specific pathways, suggesting exosome-mediated anti-inflammatory effect of LIUS feasible; and (6) LIUS-mediated physical effects on tissues may activate specific cellular sensors that activate downstream transcription factors and signaling pathways. Conclusions: Our results have provided novel insights into the mechanisms underlying anti-inflammatory effects of LIUS, and have provided guidance for the development of future novel therapeutic LIUS for cancers, inflammatory disorders, tissue regeneration and tissue repair.
Review of the Literature for Cross-Training and Job Redesign for Respiratory Care Personnel in Florida Acute Care Hospitals

This study examined the work values, abilities, and reading levels of respiratory therapy students in six states, using the Career Decision-Making System Revised (CDM-R) and the Ability Explorer (AE) instruments. Data were analyzed for variables of gender, grade, and type of institution and for correlation between CDM-R and AE. The top four work values for all students were work with people, good salary, job security, and high achievement. The top four work abilities on the CDM-R were social, scientific, teaching, and manual. The results indicated that abilities and values related to leadership, prestige, and independence emerge as students progress through the 4-year curriculum; attrition in programs may be, in part, related to lack of confidence in ability to learn science; and attention to teaching strategies, learning styles, and building self-confidence may help students be more successful in programs.
Attenuation Correction Synthesis for Hybrid PET-MR Scanners: Application to Brain Studies

Attenuation correction is an essential requirement for quantification of positron emission tomography (PET) data. In PET/CT acquisition systems, attenuation maps are derived from computed tomography (CT) images. However, in hybrid PET/MR scanners, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) images do not directly provide a patient-specific attenuation map. The aim of the proposed work is to improve attenuation correction for PET/MR scanners by generating synthetic CTs and attenuation maps. The synthetic images are generated through a multi-atlas information propagation scheme, locally matching the MRI-derived patient's morphology to a database of MRI/CT pairs, using a local image similarity measure. Results show significant improvements in CT synthesis and PET reconstruction accuracy when compared to a segmentation method using an ultrashort-echo-time MRI sequence and to a simplified atlas-based method.
Temperature and concentration distribution within the Genius dialysate container.

BACKGROUND The Genius single-pass batch system, using a closed dialysate container, is increasingly applied for dialysis treatment. Although fluid separation between fresh and spent dialysate is maintained in the container during standard dialysis, dialysate mixing may occur under certain clinical conditions. An in vitro study showed that differences in dialysate temperature and solute content between fresh and spent dialysate determine the occurrence and moment of dialysate mixing. METHODS To better understand the maintenance of separation of fresh and spent dialysate in the prevention of mixing, a mathematical model of the 75 l Genius container was developed and the general fluid, mass and heat transfer equations were solved, simulating a dialysis session of 300 min with 1 g/l urea as starting 'blood' urea concentration and 36.2 degrees C starting dialysate temperature. Boundary and initial conditions were chosen according to two different strategies applied in previous in vitro tests, with spontaneous cooling of the reservoir on the one hand and heating of the spent dialysate to maintain an equal temperature as the fresh dialysate on the other. RESULTS Our simulation data show that dialysate inside the container is cooling down near the container wall in both scenarios and near the central glass tube in the setup with spontaneous cooling. In the setup with heating of spent dialysate, the upper layers are heated near the central tube. Since density stratification is maintained at each time point, solutes will rise towards warmer zones. This is halfway between the container axis and wall for spontaneous cooling and, even to a larger extent, near the central tube for simulations with heated spent dialysate. Hence, the contaminated volume in the case of heating is much larger than theoretically supposed. CONCLUSIONS These computer simulations unravel temperature and concentration distribution inside the container, offering insight into the complicated mixing phenomenon and indicate that temperature is a major impacting factor.
An evidence-based review of natalizumab therapy in the management of Crohn’s disease

Treatment options for Crohn’s disease have evolved beyond the early goals of induction and remission and are now more focused on preventing complications by altering the natural history of the disease. The advent of biologic therapies has revolutionized the management of Crohn’s disease. Specifically, antibodies to tumor necrosis factor alpha induce rapid mucosal healing. This translates into improved patient outcomes. However, many patients will fail these and other therapies. Natalizumab is a new biologic agent that has been approved for the treatment of moderately to severely active Crohn’s disease in patients who have failed or are intolerant to immunosuppressants and/or tumor necrosis factor inhibitors. It is a selective adhesion molecule inhibitor to alpha-4 integrin resulting in inhibition of the migration of inflammatory cells across the endothelium. This unique mechanism of action has been shown to be effective in the treatment of Crohn’s disease, making it an important option for otherwise refractory patients. Its use has been limited to these refractory patients because of concerns about the development of complications, especially progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy. In this review, evidence-based data on the indications, efficacy and safety of natalizumab will be presented and its role in the management of patients with Crohn’s disease will be defined.