Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Et Tú Brutè?

Intensive interviews were conducted with 31 streetwalking prostitutes to examine their interpersonal support systems. Interviews focused on their relationships with parents or parental figures, partners, and children. Data were analyzed using phenomenological descriptive analysis. Results reveal the potentially dark side of human relationships and the destructive, lingering effects of such on individual development. Familial environments were characterized by parental alcoholism and drug abuse, domestic violence, parental absence and abandonment, and multiple forms of childhood abuse. Relationships between the women and their male partners were largely devoid of emotional content but rather based on sex and drugs. Few of the women retained custody of their children, although many were hopeful that they would be reunited with them in the future.
Role of Mouse Hepatitis Virus (MHV) Receptor Murine CEACAM1 in the Resistance of Mice to MHV Infection: Studies of Mice with Chimeric mCEACAM1a and mCEACAM1b

ABSTRACT Although most inbred mouse strains are highly susceptible to mouse hepatitis virus (MHV) infection, the inbred SJL line of mice is highly resistant to its infection. The principal receptor for MHV is murine CEACAM1 (mCEACAM1). Susceptible strains of mice are homozygous for the 1a allele of mCeacam1, while SJL mice are homozygous for the 1b allele. mCEACAM1a (1a) has a 10- to 100-fold-higher receptor activity than does mCEACAM1b (1b). To explore the hypothesis that MHV susceptibility is due to the different MHV receptor activities of 1a and 1b, we established a chimeric C57BL/6 mouse (cB61ba) in which a part of the N-terminal immunoglobulin (Ig)-like domain of the mCeacam1a (1a) gene, which is responsible for MHV receptor function, is replaced by the corresponding region of mCeacam1b (1b). We compared the MHV susceptibility of these chimeric mice to that of SJL and B6 mice. B6 mice that are homozygous for 1a are highly susceptible to MHV-A59 infection, with a 50% lethal dose (LD50) of 102.5 PFU, while chimeric cB61ba mice and SJL mice homozygous for 1ba and 1b, respectively, survived following inoculation with 105 PFU. Unexpectedly, cB61ba mice were more resistant to MHV-A59 infection than SJL mice as measured by virus replication in target organs, including liver and brain. No infectious virus or viral RNA was detected in the organs of cB61ba mice, while viral RNA and infectious virus were detected in target organs of SJL mice. Furthermore, SJL mice produced antiviral antibodies after MHV-A59 inoculation with 105 PFU, but cB61ba mice did not. Thus, cB61ba mice are apparently completely resistant to MHV-A59 infection, while SJL mice permit low levels of MHV-A59 virus replication during self-limited, asymptomatic infection. When expressed on cultured BHK cells, the mCEACAM1b and mCEACAM1ba proteins had similar levels of MHV-A59 receptor activity. These results strongly support the hypothesis that although alleles of mCEACAM1 are the principal determinants of mouse susceptibility to MHV-A59, other as-yet-unidentified murine genes may also play a role in susceptibility to MHV.
Embedded Online Optimization for Model Predictive Control at Megahertz Rates

Faster, cheaper, and more power efficient optimization solvers than those currently possible using general-purpose techniques are required for extending the use of model predictive control (MPC) to resource-constrained embedded platforms. We propose several custom computational architectures for different first-order optimization methods that can handle linear-quadratic MPC problems with input, input-rate, and soft state constraints. We provide analysis ensuring the reliable operation of the resulting controller under reduced precision fixed-point arithmetic. Implementation of the proposed architectures in FPGAs shows that satisfactory control performance at a sample rate beyond 1 MHz is achievable even on low-end devices, opening up new possibilities for the application of MPC on embedded systems.
Microstructural white matter alterations in patients with drug induced parkinsonism

Drug‐induced parkinsonism (DIP) is the second most common etiology of parkinsonism. And yet, there is little information on structural imaging in DIP to elucidate the accurate underlying pathomechanisms. To investigate microstructural white matter (WM) in patients with DIP using diffusion tensor image and to determine its relationship to severity of parkinsonian motor symptoms and cognitive function. A total of 42 patients with DIP, 65 with Parkinson's disease, and 33 control subjects were recruited from a movement disorders outpatient clinic. We performed comparative analysis of fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD) values among groups using tract‐based spatial statistics. Correlation analysis between WM integrity and parkinsonian motor symptoms and cognitive performance was also performed in DIP patients using voxel‐wise statistical analysis. DIP patients had significantly lower FA and higher MD values over widespread WM areas than control subjects. The patients with DIP had poor cognitive performance relative to control subjects, which correlated well with WM properties. Additionally, the parkinsonian motor symptoms were negatively correlated with FA values. In contrast, exposure time to the offending drugs prior to the development of parkinsonism or duration of parkinsonism showed no significant association with FA or MD values. The present study demonstrates that disruption of the WM microstructure is extensive in patients with DIP, and it is correlated with clinical parameters of parkinsonism and cognitive performance. This suggests that DIP may be reflective of underlying abnormality of microstructural WM. Hum Brain Mapp 38:6043–6052, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Robust Rate Adaptation and Proportional Fair Scheduling With Imperfect CSI

In wireless fading channels, multi-user scheduling has the potential to boost the spectral efficiency by exploiting diversity gains. In this regard, proportional fair (PF) scheduling provides a solution for increasing the users' quality of experience by finding a balance between system throughput maximization and user fairness. For this purpose, precise instantaneous channel state information (CSI) needs to be available at the transmitter side to perform rate adaptation and scheduling. However, in practical setups, CSI is impaired by, e.g., channel estimation errors, quantization and feedback delays. Especially in centralized cloud based communication systems, where main parts of the lower layer processing is shifted to a central entity, high backhaul latency can cause substantial CSI imperfections, resulting in significant performance degradations. In this work, robust rate adaptation as well as robust PF scheduling are presented, which account for CSI impairments. The proposed rate adaptation solution guarantees a fixed target outage probability, which is of interest for delay critical and data intensive applications, such as, video conference systems. In addition to CSI imperfections, the proposed scheduler is able to account for delayed decoding acknowledgements from the receiver.
Errors, Conflicts, and the Brain

In the summer of 2003 the Second Conference on Performance Monitoring took place in Dortmund, Germany. The conference was focused on electrophysiological and fMRI correlates of response monitoring. The present report aims at giving a short review of the oral reports and the posters. While the invited talks were published in the proceedings book (Ullsperger & Falkenstein, 2004), the poster contributions have not yet been mentioned or reviewed, and some of the book chapters substantially deviate from the oral contributions. Further, I want to provide a short overview of the contributions and the conclusions they allow, thus providing in a nutshell the 2003 state of research on the cognitive neuroscience of performance monitoring and error/conflict processing for readers not specialized in this field. Conclusions from the data are generally formulated by the authors themselves, though occasionally I have tried to comment on the results or to link them to other contributions. These comments are marked by the statement “In my view . ” The talks are presented in the order they were held: The talks on Thursday, July 3 (Falkenstein to van Boxtel) were devoted to the electrophysiology and neuroimaging of performance monitoring; the talks on Friday, July 4 (Holroyd to Brunia) were on feedback, reinforcement learning, and control, and the talks on Saturday, July 5 (Praamstra to Mathalon) were devoted to consequences of errors, personality and developmental factors, and the pathology of performance monitoring. The posters were presented in alphabetical order by name of the first authors. A final reason for the present review is to explicitly mention and thank my co-workers at IfADo, namely, Ludger Blanke, Matthias Bonacker, Peter Dillmann, Ute Lobisch, Christiane Westedt, and Dagmar Winter, for their most helpful cooperation before and during the conference. Without these people the conference could not have taken place. Talks
Ethnic Minorities' Ratings of Ethnically Similar and European American Counselors: A Meta-Analysis.

A meta-analysis of studies that assessed ethnic minorities' perceptions of and preferences for ethnically similar counselors and European American counselors showed that ethnic minorities tended to prefer ethnically similar counselors over European American counselors. However, the perceptions of and preferences for counselors were influenced by the cultural affiliation of the participants and the research methods used. More precise methods for determining the degree to which ethnic minorities' preferences for ethnically similar counselors is a function of inferences concerning attitudes, values, and skill needs to be developed
What’s wrong with this picture? an experiment in quantifying accuracy in 2D portrait drawing

Traditional portraiture aims to produce a life-like representation of an individual’s unique facial features, but there are a number of perceptual factors that may affect how an artist sees and depicts a sitter’s facial shapes. The anatomical accuracy of a portrait is predominantly ascertained subjectively, and not through quantitative methods. To see if it was possible to apply the methods of analysis more typically used to study variation in biological forms, the authors produced 30 portrait drawings based on 30 pose photographs, and analysed how the portrait drawings differed from the photographs using three different measures: visual assessment, anthropometric measures, and geometric morphometric analysis. Of the three methods, geometric morphometric analysis was found to be the far better technique to account for patterns of depiction common to one artist, and our study indicates this method may have broad research applicability to the face as it is variously represented across a range of visual media.
Crime, Teenage Abortion, and Unwantedness

This article disaggregates Donohue and Levitt’s (DL’s) national panel-data models to the state level and shows that high concentrations of teenage abortions in a handful of states drive all of DL’s results in their 2001, 2004, and 2008 articles on crime and abortion. These findings agree with previous research showing teenage motherhood is a major maternal crime factor, whereas unwanted pregnancy is an insignificant factor. Teenage abortions accounted for more than 30% of U.S. abortions in the 1970s, but only 16% to 18% since 2001, which suggests DL’s panel-data models of crime/arrests and abortion were outdated when published. The results point to a broad range of future research involving teenage behavior. A specific means is proposed to reconcile DL with previous articles finding no relationship between crime and abortion.
Building Oral Reading Fluency With Peer Coaching

Fluent oral reading is an essential literacy skill, and data suggest that it is a consistent and persistent problem for many elementary school children. Peer-mediated instruction in which students work together to support each other is an evidence-based practice for improving performance in a variety of academic areas. In this study, we investigated the effectiveness of a peer-mediated fluency-building intervention for struggling readers in second grade. The intervention was provided to small groups of students referred to as difficult-to-remediate, treatment resisters, nonresponders, or lower responders in similar research. Oral reading fluency performance for students who received supplemental intervention (n = 17) was statistically significantly better than that for their peers who received only typical classroom instruction (n = 17). The effects of enhanced fluency instruction were evident across multiple benchmarks, and significant relationships were evident between oral reading fluency and comprehension. The authors discuss the findings in the context of similar peer-mediated interventions and the emerging development of targeted interventions to support response-to-intervention practices.
Thermal Stability of PECVD SiN/sub x/ Films

This study investigates the effect of oxidation on the structural integrity of PECVD SiNx thin films at elevated temperatures in dry air, by means of scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and nanoindentation measurement. It is found the heating to elevated temperatures results in the replacement of the nitrogen content in the films by oxygen, implying an oxidation process. SEM examination revealed that the surface of the films is severely damaged, mostly in the form of circular in-plane cracks, as a result of the oxidation heating. This in turn leads to high scattering of the nanoindentation measurement of mechanical properties
Spitzer Number Counts of Active Galactic Nuclei in the GOODS Fields

We present mid-infrared observations of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) in the GOODS fields, performed with the Spitzer Space Telescope. These are the deepest infrared and X-ray fields to date and cover a total area of ~0.1 deg2. AGNs are selected on the basis of their hard (2-8 keV) X-ray emission. The median AGN infrared luminosity is at least 10 times larger than the median for normal galaxies with the same redshift distribution, suggesting that the infrared emission is dominated by the central nucleus. The X-ray-to-infrared luminosity ratios of GOODS AGNs, most of which are at 0.5 ≲ z ≲ 1.5, are similar to the values obtained for AGNs in the local universe. The observed infrared flux distribution has an integral slope of ~1.5, and there are 1000 sources per square degree brighter than ~50 μJy at ~3-6 μm. The counts approximately match the predictions of models based on AGN unification, in which the majority of AGNs are obscured. This agreement confirms that the faintest X-ray sources, which are dominated by the host galaxy light in the optical, are obscured AGNs. Using these Spitzer data, the AGN contribution to the extragalactic infrared background light is calculated by correlating the X-ray and infrared catalogs. This is likely to be a lower limit given that the most obscured AGNs are missed in X-rays. We estimate the contribution of AGNs missed in X-rays, using a population synthesis model, to be ~45% of the observed AGN contribution, making the AGN contribution to the infrared background at most ~2%-10% in the 3-24 μm range, depending on wavelength, lower than most previous estimates. The AGN contribution to the infrared background remains roughly constant with source flux in the IRAC bands but decreases with decreasing flux in the MIPS 24 μm band, where the galaxy population becomes more important.
Automatic Food Categorization from Large Unlabeled Corpora and Its Impact on Relation Extraction

We present a weakly-supervised induction method to assign semantic information to food items. We consider two tasks of categorizations being food-type classification and the distinction of whether a food item is composite or not. The categorizations are induced by a graph-based algorithm applied on a large unlabeled domain-specific corpus. We show that the usage of a domain-specific corpus is vital. We do not only outperform a manually designed open-domain ontology but also prove the usefulness of these categorizations in relation extraction, outperforming state-of-the-art features that include syntactic information and Brown clustering.
Seroprevalence of antibodies to toxoplasmosis, brucellosis and chlamydiosis in abortive sheep in Nineveh governorate, Iraq.

Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was used to identify the antibodies of toxoplasmosis, brucellosis and chlamydiosis in Nineveh governorate-north of Iraq. Sera from 100 sample of sheep aborted from any reason were randomly collected. The results showed that 32.8%, 56% and 11.2% were positive for toxoplasmosis, brucellosis and chlamydiosis respectively. Percentage of identified and unidentified agents causing abortion were 63% and 37% respectively. First of occurrence of abortion was the most common in the unidentified pathogen (27 cases), however, the repeated occurrence of abortion was almost caused by toxoplasmosis which was 19 cases. Stillbirth was found to be the commonest in brucella infection as compared with other months of abortion or other pathogens causing abortion. Chlamydiosis were the first record in this region. The findings of the current work indicated that toxoplasmosis and brucellosis was widely prevailing and may be the cause of sheep abortion in northern Iraq.
Project Success

Project Success is a comprehensive, middle schoolprogramfor the early intervention of alcohol and otherdrug (ATOD) use by high-risk youth to reduce riskfactors and increase resiliency across environmental domains. Referred youth had high levels of ATOD use and risk, lowerself-esteem, more absences, and lower grades than normative peers. For 6 to 12 months, each cohort of students participated in a variety of individual and group interventions (e.g., counseling, tutoring, and community service). Interventions with parents (e.g., periodic contact, counseling, and parent education) also were conducted. Environmental interventions (e.g., training school staff in risk and resiliency strategies, development of an intervention team to access school resources, and the linkages with the community to offer positive alternatives) also were included. These environmental interventions demonstrated positive effects on participating students by maintaining lower than expected ATOD use levels, with reductions in risk levels andfailing grades.
Double‐ vs. single‐injection infraclavicular plexus block in the emergency setting: higher success rate with lower volume of local anaesthetic

Background and objectives: Infraclavicular plexus block has many advantages of particular interest in the emergency setting. However, the number of nerve stimulations needed to optimize the technique remains unclear. We evaluated both the local anaesthetic requirement and the success rate of Sim's derived infraclavicular plexus block performed with a nerve stimulator when either one or two responses were sought. Methods: In this prospective study, 50 patients who presented for distal upper limb surgery were randomized into two groups: in Group 1, ropivacaine 0.75% 40 mL was injected when nerve stimulation elicited a distal motor response (median, ulnar or radial). In Group 2, only 30 mL of the same local anaesthetic was injected, 7 mL to the musculocutaneous nerve and 23 mL to the median, ulnar or radial nerves. Sensory and motor blocks were tested at 5‐min intervals over 30 min. Results: The time to perform the block was similar in both groups. The success rate of the block increased from 80% in the single‐stimulation group to 92% in the double‐stimulation group (not significant). The onset time of sensory and motor block was shorter and block extension was greater in ulnar, antebrachial cutaneous and brachial cutaneous nerve distributions in the multistimulation group (P < 0.05). Conclusions: We conclude that only 30 mL of local anaesthetic seems to be sufficient to ensure a high level of success when performing an infraclavicular block with stimulation of both the musculocutaneous nerve and median, ulnar or radial nerve.
Prenatal factors, childhood growth trajectories and age at menarche.

BACKGROUND In recent studies a larger birth size has been shown to delay the timing of menarche. The mechanisms underlying this association are not clear, however, as birthweight is a predictor of body size in childhood, and a large body size is known to be associated with an early onset of menarche. METHODS Data from a representative British cohort of 2547 girls born in 1946 who were followed prospectively throughout childhood were used. Information was available on prenatal characteristics, birthweight, height, weight and social circumstances during childhood, and on age at menarche. Random coefficients models were used to estimate the individual trajectories in height and body mass index (BMI) up to age 7 years. The parameters identified by these models were then included in Weibull survival models for the timing of menarche together with birthweight. RESULTS Birthweight was found to positively influence height and BMI values at age 2 years, but not to affect their rates of change from age 2 to 7 years. Initial analyses showed low birthweight to be associated with an early onset of menarche, but after controlling for growth in infancy this effect was reversed, with girls who were heavy at birth reaching menarche earlier than others with similar infant growth. Rapid growth in infancy was also related to early pubertal maturation. The effects of birthweight and infant growth disappeared, however, when further controlled for growth from age 2 to 7 years. CONCLUSIONS The effects of birthweight and growth in infancy on the timing of menarche seem to be mediated through growth in early childhood. These findings are consistent with the possibility that timing of menarche may be set in utero or early in life, although it may be modified by changes in body size and composition in childhood.
Somebody’s Gotta Fight for Them

This year-long ethnographic study explores one alternative school’s journey of creating a positive and collaborative learning community while negotiating through the disadvantages and marginalization within a school district and society at large. This study examined various aspects of school culture, including learning processes, discourses, relationships, and challenges the students and teachers face in schools. Participants discussed the importance of a flexible learning environment, strong relationships between students and teachers, while displaying a strong resistance toward authority. How schools must change to meet all students’ needs still remains a vital question.
Personality Correlates of the Report of Mystical Experience

The search for stable personality correlates of mystical experience has been hampered by the use of pathologically oriented personality inventories or those confounded by heavy loadings on mystical experiences. The present research with college students (n = 118) utilizing the Jackson Personality Inventory, a normatively oriented, psychometrically sound inventory, indicated stable personality correlates for scores on Hood's Mysticism Scale. These were conceptually consistent with previous research on mysticism.