Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Weaving the Threads of Life: The Khita Gyn-Eco-Logical Healing Cult among the Yaka

For the Yaka of Southwestem Zaire, infertility is a tear in the fabric of life, and the Khita fertility ritual is a trusted way of re-weaving the damaged strands. In "Weaving the Threads of Life", Rene Devisch offers an extended analysis of the Khita cult, which leads to an original account of the workings of ritual healing. Devisch analyzes the Yaka's understanding of existence as a fabric of firmly but delicately interwoven threads of nature, body and society. The fertility healing ritual calls forth forces, feelings and meanings that allow women to rejoin themselves to the complex pattern of social and cosmic life. These elaborate rites are not based on symbols or traditional beliefs; rather, Devisch shows, they themselves generate forces and meaning, creating and shaping the cosmic, physical, and social worlds of their participants. Devisch's praxiological approach is unique in using phenomenological insights into the intent and results of anthropological fieldwork.
Perspective: Uses and Misuses of Thresholds in Diagnostic Decision Making

The concept of thresholds plays a vital role in decisions involving the initiation, continuation, and completion of diagnostic testing. Much research has focused on the development of explicit thresholds, in the form of practice guidelines and decision analyses. However, these tools are used infrequently; most medical decisions are made at the bedside, using implicit thresholds. Study of these thresholds can lead to a deeper understanding of clinical decision making. The authors examine some factors constituting individual clinicians' implicit thresholds. They propose a model for static thresholds using the concept of situational gravity to explain why some thresholds are high, and some low. Next, they consider the hypothetical effects of incorrect placement of thresholds (miscalibration) and changes to thresholds during diagnosis (manipulation). They demonstrate these concepts using common clinical scenarios. Through analysis of miscalibration of thresholds, the authors demonstrate some common maladaptive clinical behaviors, which are nevertheless internally consistent. They then explain how manipulation of thresholds gives rise to common cognitive heuristics including premature closure and anchoring. They also discuss the case where no threshold has been exceeded despite exhaustive collection of data, which commonly leads to application of the availability or representativeness heuristics. Awareness of implicit thresholds allows for a more effective understanding of the processes of medical decision making and, possibly, to the avoidance of detrimental heuristics and their associated medical errors. Research toward accurately defining these thresholds for individual physicians and toward determining their dynamic properties during the diagnostic process may yield valuable insights.
La recuperación urbana y residencial del centro de Santiago: Nuevos habitantes, cambios socioespaciales significativos

palabras clave | Centros urbanos, movilidad, gentrificacion. abstract | Parallel to the process of suburban expansion in the Latin American cities and especially in Santiago of Chile a centrifugal residential and spatial movement is observed. This movement values the attributes of location of central spaces, thus raising the thesis of the return of the consolidated city. This movement begins in the nineties, when the municipality of Santiago carries out a Repopulation Plan that was oriented to the generation of a supply of new housing in of deteriorated zones and in consolidated and well connected districts. Works of road and urban improvement, the arrival of cultural and commercial supply and the arrival of new urban inhabitants --specifically young and adult professionals and technicians, who positioned and consolidated the downtown area as one of the more dynamic residential spaces—were added.
Metabolism and distribution of two highly potent and selective peptidomimetic inhibitors of matriptase

Matriptase is a serine protease expressed by several types of cancer cells and it participates in tumour growth and progression through the activation of hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) and urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA). The metabolism of two potent and selective peptidomimetic inhibitors of matriptase (CJ-1737 and CJ-672) was examined in vitro with enzyme preparations (9000g supernatants, microsomes, and plasma) from dog, pig, rat, and human. It was found that both compounds displayed interesting species-dependent differences. Though CJ-1737 was not metabolized by microsomes, by 9000g supernatants from all species, or by human or rat plasma, canine and porcine plasma enzymes rapidly hydrolysed this compound. In contrast, CJ-672 was metabolized exclusively by enzymes from human liver (microsomes and 9000g supernatants) via a two-step metabolic pathway. Additionally, the distribution of both compounds was investigated in mice. The highest amounts were measured in the kidney and liver, followed by the spleen, lung, and heart. In contrast to CJ-1737, high concentrations of CJ-672 were detected in the colon, indicating an additional biliary excretion. In summary, this work clarifies both the metabolism and distribution of two new matriptase inhibitors and demonstrates important metabolic differences between human enzymes and those from commonly used laboratory animals.
Pausing during interactions between deaf toddlers and their hearing mothers

Abstract This study investigated the prosodic feature of ‘pausing’ during interactions between profoundly deaf toddlers and their hearing mothers. The participants in the study were 12 mother–toddler dyads comprising six normally hearing toddlers and their hearing mothers and six profoundly deaf toddlers and their hearing mothers. Child participants were matched by language stage based on Brown's stages of morphological development and were aged between 25 and 45 months. Child participants were observed interacting with their mothers during videotaped free play sessions. Language samples containing up to a maximum of 100 child utterances from each dyad were transcribed, coded and analysed. The association between the prosodic feature of pausing (using measured time intervals) and the hearing status of the dyads was investigated. Results indicated that significant differences existed between dyads having hearing toddlers and dyads having deaf toddlers with regard to the length of pause between reciprocal utterances. The findings also suggested that there was a significant relationship between the language stage of the toddler and the dyad's use of pause length. Some variations in this general finding were noted. The implications of this study in terms of educational strategies for parents, teachers and speech pathologists are discussed.
Environmental peace education in foreign language learners’ English grammar lessons

English language teachers create contexts to teach grammar so that meaningful learning occurs. In this study, English grammar is contextualized through environmental peace education activities to raise students’ awareness of global issues. Two sources provided data to evaluate the success of this instructional process. Fourth‐year pre‐service English language teachers (n = 50) learned about relevant classroom activities and evaluated their applicability in foreign language classrooms. Secondly, tenth‐grade students (n = 46) completed these activities with pre‐service teachers and then evaluated the overall learning process. The students were enrolled in the English language course offered in the second year of their four‐year secondary school education. Pre‐service ELT (English language teaching) teachers’ evaluations were collected through 15 Likert‐type questions. Tenth‐grade students answered four structured, but open‐ended questions. The quantitative data were analyzed using SPSS 13.5, and the qualitative data were studied through multiple readings of the data. The findings from this study indicate that learning English grammar in relation to environmental peace education is an effective strategy that can be used in foreign language teaching.
Seropositivity of cytomegalovirus in patients with recurrent pregnancy loss

Background: Some evidence has shown a relationship between human cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection and pregnancy loss. However, whether recurrent or latent CMV infection or altered immune response to CMV is related to recurrent pregnancy loss (RPL) is unclear. We evaluated CMV infection and avidity of antibodies to CMV in women with RPL. Materials and Methods: This case-control study was conducted on 43 women with RPL referred to a clinical immunology out-patient clinic in Isfahan (Iran), and 43 age-matched multiparous women without history of abortion as control subjects. Patients and controls were evaluated for anti-CMV IgG and IgM antibodies and IgG avidity index (AI) using the enzyme linked immunosorbent assay method. Student's t-test and Chi-square test were used to analyze the data. Results: One case (2.3%) of positive anti-CMV IgM was detected in each group. Anti-CMV IgG positivity was more frequent in patients than in controls (90.6% vs. 69.8%, P = 0.014), but there was no difference between the two groups in anti-CMV IgG AI (79.4 ± 11.4 vs. 80.1 ± 10.2, P = 0.781). IgG titer was significantly higher in seropositive cases with RPL than seropositive controls (5.18 ± 1.99 vs. 2.00 ± 0.81, P < 0.001). Conclusion: We found that previous exposure to CMV was significantly higher in patients with RPL than the control group. However, no association was found between IgG AI and RPL. Further investigations are needed to find whether latent CMV infection starts an indirect process of autoimmune etiology in RPL or women with RPL have recurrent or reactivation of CMV infection.
Anomalies in the Influenza Virus Genome Database: New Biology or Laboratory Errors?

ABSTRACT A search of the influenza virus genome database reveals anomalies associated with a nonnegligible number of submitted sequences. There are many pairs of viral segments that are very close to each other in nucleotide sequence but relatively far apart in reported time of isolation, resulting in an abnormally low evolutionary rate. Also, some sequences show clear evidence of apparent homologous recombination, a process normally assumed to be extremely rare or nonexistent in this virus. These findings may point to surprising new biology but are perhaps more readily explained by stock contamination or other errors in the sequencing laboratories.
Stereotypical and counterstereotypical defendants: who is he and what was the case against her?

Three studies investigated the effects of stereotype congruence on juror decision making by focusing on how defendant gender affects the way in which jurors attend to aspects of the case. Due to the female defendant's incongruence with offender stereotypes, mock jurors may direct greater attention to encoding features of the defendant at the expense of carefully considering the evidence. Study 1 (N = 101) found that mock jurors took into account the strength of the evidence against male (stereotypical), but not female (counterstereotypical) defendants. Consistent with this, Study 2 (N = 144) demonstrated that mock jurors were less able to recall facts of the case, but better able to recall details of the defendant, when the defendant was female rather than male. The third and final study (N = 113) found that participants spent longer looking at a female defendant than they did looking at a male defendant in a video simulation of a mock trial. Results are discussed in light of the encoding-flexibility explanation of the influence of stereotypes.
Melatonin Pharmacological Blood Levels Increase Total Antioxidant Capacity in Critically Ill Patients

In this study, the aim was to test the biochemical effects of melatonin supplementation in Intensive Care Unit (ICU) patients, since their blood levels are decreased. Sixty-four patients were enrolled in the study. From the evening of the 3rd ICU day, patients were randomized to receive oral melatonin (3 mg, group M) or placebo (group P) twice daily, at 20:00 and 24:00, until discharged. Blood was taken (at 00:00 and 14:00), on the 3rd ICU day to assess basal nocturnal melatonin values, and then during the treatment period on the 4th and 8th ICU days. Melatonin, total antioxidant capacity, and oxidative stress were evaluated in serum. Melatonin circadian rhythm before treatment was similar in the two groups, with a partial preservation of the cycle. Four hours from the 1st administration (4th ICU day, 00:00), melatonin levels increased to 2514 (982.3; 7148) pg·mL−1 in group M vs. 20.3 (14.7; 62.3) pg·mL−1 in group P (p < 0.001). After five treatment days (8th ICU day), melatonin absorption showed a repetitive trend in group M, while in group P nocturnal secretion (00:00) was impaired: 20 (11.5; 34.5) pg·mL−1 vs. 33.8 (25.0; 62.2) on the 3rd day (p = 0.029). Immediately from the beginning of treatment, the total antioxidant capacity was significantly higher in melatonin treated subjects at 00:00; a significant correlation was found between total antioxidant capacity and blood melatonin values (ρ = 0.328; p < 0.001). The proposed enteral administration protocol was adequate, even in the early phase, to enhance melatonin blood levels and to protect the patients from oxidative stress. The antioxidant effect of melatonin could play a meaningful role in the care and well-being of these patients.
Pre-Twentieth-Century Sikh Sacred Music: The Mughals, Courtly Patronage and Canonisation

AbstractThis article discusses the canonisation and institutionalisation of Sikh sacred music (kirtan) at the courts of the ten Sikh gurus and the later Sikh maharajas in Lahore and Patiala. At the same time, it emphasises possible parallels with what happened musically at the Mughal court. Essentially, the article argues that pre-twentieth-century Sikh sacred music was Hindustani (classical) music because of its performance practice, instruments used, music theory and the interactions between Sikh court musicians and those of the Mughal and other North Indian courts, as well as of different Hindustani music lineages (gharanas). Ultimately, it underlines the importance of contextual history, for example in terms of Mughal culture, the imperial encounter and globalisation, in forming a firm understanding of continuity and change over five centuries of kirtan performance practice.
Greater China, the challenges of global production networks and the dynamics of transformation

The rise of ? greater? China (which includes mainland China, the ? specialadministrative regions? of Hong Kong and Macao and ? particularly for ourpurposes ? Taiwan), marks a transformative process in terms of the global politicaleconomy. China is now the world? s second biggest economy, and continues to post double-digit growth despite the global downturn. More significant than the numeric size of China? s economy per se, is the extraordinary scale at which it is combining labour with capital to transform raw materials into commodities and, as part of that process, embedding the potential for innovation within China? s political economy and society. In the introductory article to this special issue, we highlight the implications arising from the dynamism of Greater China for the evolving structures of global production networks (GPNs). The GPN framework provides a powerful analytical tool with which to map the shifting nature of corporate power and capital in the global economy and their consequences for local producers and regions. The externalization of the Chinese political economy and, with it, the emergence of Chinese lead firms, suggests that Western-centric views on GPNs are likely to be challenged. We outline the ways in which the contributions to this special issue throw light on this, and the implications that arise for analysis of GPNs within China as well as for other developing countries. We conclude by considering the consequences this transformative process has for the developmental project and how it might be theorized.
A Pharmacodynamic Study of Rapamycin in Men with Intermediate- to High-Risk Localized Prostate Cancer

Purpose: Given discrepancies between preclinical and clinical observations of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) inhibition in prostate cancer, we sought to determine the pharmacodynamic effects of the mTOR/TORC1 inhibitor rapamycin in men with intermediate- to high-risk prostate cancer undergoing radical prostatectomy. Experimental Design: Rapamycin was given at 3 or 6 mg orally for 14 days before radical prostatectomy in men with multifocal Gleason sum ≥7 prostate cancer; 10 untreated control subjects were included. The primary outcome was inhibition of phosphorylation of ribosomal S6 in posttreatment radical prostatectomy versus pretreatment biopsy tumor tissue, evaluated using a Simon two-stage design for pharmacodynamic efficacy. Results: Thirty-two subjects were accrued: 20 at 3 mg, 2 at 6 mg, and 10 controls. No dose-limiting toxicities were observed at 3 mg; however, two of two men enrolled at 6 mg experienced dose-limiting toxicities including thrombocytopenia and fever with grade 3 stomatitis. Adverse events observed at 3 mg included stomatitis, rash, ileus, and neutropenia. Pharmacodynamic studies showed tumor S6 phosphorylation inhibition in 50% of 10 evaluable rapamycin-treated men with sufficient paired tissue [median 58% inhibition (P = 0.049) versus 2% inhibition in controls (P = 0.75)] with no significant effect on AKT activity. We observed no change in Ki-67 or caspase-3 cleavage but noted a reduction in cytoplasmic p27 staining with increased nuclear localization with rapamycin treatment. Prostate tissue rapamycin concentrations were 3- to 4-fold higher than blood. Conclusions: At 3 mg daily, rapamycin successfully and safely inhibited prostate cancer S6 phosphorylation and achieved relatively high prostate tissue concentrations. No effect on AKT phosphorylation, tumor proliferation, or apoptosis was observed. Clin Cancer Res; 16(11); 3057–66. ©2010 AACR.
Cross‐cultural equity sensitivity: a test of differences between the United States and Japan

Purpose – This study aims to examine the cross‐cultural differences in equity sensitivity between the USA and Japan.Design/methodology/approach – A sample of 390 Americans and 202 Japanese were surveyed to determine their equity sensitivities and how each group would likely respond to under‐payment scenarios.Findings – The findings support the notion that the Japanese are in fact more entitled in their equity orientation than Americans. Furthermore, the Japanese were also significantly more likely to respond with overt actions to reduce their feelings of inequity.Research limitations/implications – Foremost among these limitations is the fact that the situation presented to the subjects was hypothetical rather than real. Since it would be considered unethical to manipulate subjects in real work settings a first person scenario approach was utilized consistent with other equity theory literature. While the scenario was easily identifiable by the student subjects, it is unknown if the findings from this res.
Distance between Home and Work: A Multilevel Analysis of Individual Workers, Neighbourhoods, and Employment Sites in Northern Ireland

We explore the distances between home and work for employees at twenty-eight different employment sites across Northern Ireland. Substantively, this is important for better understanding the geography of labour catchments. Methodologically, with data on the distances between place of residence (566 wards) and place of work for some 15 000 workers, and the use of multilevel modelling (MLM), the analysis adds to the evidence derived from other census-based and survey-based studies. Descriptive analysis is supplemented with MLM that simultaneously explores individual, neighbourhood, and site variations in travel-to-work patterns using hierarchical and cross-classified model specifications, including individual and ecological predictor variables (and their cross-level interactions). In doing so we apportion variability to different levels and spatial contexts, and also outline the factors that shape spatial mobility. We find, as expected, that factors such as gender and occupation influence the distance between home and work, and also confirm the importance of neighbourhood characteristics (such as population density observed in ecological analyses at ward level) in shaping individual outcomes, with major differences found between urban and rural locations. Beyond this, the analysis of variability also points to the relative significance of residential location, with less individual variability in travel-to-work distance between workers within wards than within employment sites. We conclude by suggesting that, whilst some general ‘rules’ about the factors that shape labour catchments are possible (eg workers in rural areas and in higher occupations travel further than others), the complex variability between places highlighted by the MLM analysis illustrates the salience of place-specific uniqueness.
Interferon as a treatment for uveitis associated with multiple sclerosis

Aim: In addition to optic neuritis (ON), multiple sclerosis (MS) may also involve the eye with a typically bilateral intermediate uveitis. The aim of this pilot study was to evaluate the efficacy of type I interferons (IFN) for the treatment of MS associated uveitis. Methods: In this non-randomised, retrospective observational case series 13 patients (eight female, five male) with proved MS and associated uveitis from five uveitis centres who were treated with interferon β1a were included. Visual acuity (VA), cell count in the aqueous humour and vitreous, as well as the presence of cystoid macula oedema (CMO) were observed. Results: All except one patient had a bilateral form of intermediate uveitis (total of 24 eyes). Seven patients had documented CMO before IFN treatment (n = 13 eyes). Median duration of treatment was 24.6 months (range 7.9–78.7). VA improved in 17 eyes (comparing VA before therapy and at last follow up); while 10 eyes (36%) improved ⩾3 Snellen lines. Aqueous cell count improved by 1.2 (SD 1.1) grades in all eyes. Vitreous cell count improved by 1.7 (1.4) in all eyes. Only two patients still had minimal CMO on last follow up angiographically. CMO resolved after or during IFN treatment in nine eyes. Conclusions: IFN has been shown to have beneficial effects in patients with MS and/or ON. As shown in the models of experimental allergic encephalomyelitis (EAE) and uveitis, the neurological and ophthalmological manifestations seem to share similar pathogenic mechanisms. Treatment of MS associated uveitis with IFN appears to have beneficial effects on VA, intraocular inflammation activity, and the presence of CMO.
Psychological antecedents of career women's fashion clothing conformity

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between independent and interdependent self‐construal and attention to social comparison information (ATSCI) on professional career women's fashion clothing conformity.Design/methodology/approach – A sample of 207 professional career women aged 21‐50 living in London and New York were interviewed using a structured questionnaire via the internet.Findings – A partial least square analysis found that interdependent self‐construal has strong and positive relationships with ATSCI, and that this construct, in‐turn, has a strong and positive relationship with motivation to conform. Independent self‐construal has a significant, but unhypothesized, relationship with ATSCI. However, independent self‐construal is significantly negatively related to conformity motivation.Research limitations/implications – A limitation of the study includes the reliance on internet self‐administered data collection method.Practical implications – The integrations of .