Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Advantage of Pedicle Screw Fixation Directed Into the Apex of the Sacral Promontory Over Bicortical Fixation: A Biomechanical Analysis

Study Design. A biomechanical study of human cadaveric sacra using insertional torque and bone mineral density was conducted to determine the optimal sagittal trajectory of S1 pedicle screws. Objective. To measure the maximal insertional torque of sacral promontory versus bicortical pedicle screw fixation. Summary of Background Data. Fixation of instrumentation to the sacrum is commonly accomplished using S1 pedicle screws, with previous studies reporting biomechanical advantages of bicortical over unicortical S1 screws. The biomechanical effect of bicortical screws (paralleling the endplate) versus screws directed into the apex of the sacral promontory is unknown. Methods. For this study, 10 fresh frozen cadaver sacra were harvested and evaluated with dual-energy radiograph absorptiometry to assess bone mineral density. Matched 7.5-mm monoaxial stainless steel pedicle screws then were randomly assigned by side (left versus right) and placed bicortically or into the apex of the sacral promontory under direct visualization. Maximum insertional torque was recorded for each screw revolution with a digital torque wrench (TQJE1500, Snap-On Tools, Kenosha, WI). Results. Maximum bicortical S1 screw insertional torque averaged 5.22 ± 0.83 inch-pounds, as compared with the maximum sacral promontory S1 screw insertional torque of 10.34 ± 1.94 inch-pounds. This resulted in a 99% increase in maximum insertional torque (P = 0.005) using the “tricortical” technique, with the screw directed into the sacral promontory. Mean bone mineral density was 940 ± 0.25 mg/cm2 (range, 507–1428 mg/cm2). The bone mineral density correlated with maximal insertional torque for the sacral promontory technique (r = 0.806;P = 0.005), but not for the bicortical technique (r = 0.48;P = 0.16). Conclusions. The screws directed into the apex of the sacral promontory of the S1 pedicle resulted in an average 99% increase in peak insertional torque (P = 0.005), as compared with bicortical S1 pedicle screw fixation. Tricortical pedicle screw fixation correlates directly with bone mineral density.
Benefits—Satisfaction—Loyalty Linkages in Retail Loyalty Card Program Model: Exploring the Roles of Program Trust and Program Commitment

Investigations to determine whether benefits that members derived from a loyalty program could influence their satisfaction, trust, commitment, loyalty with the program, and ultimately store loyalty are critical to elucidating the roles and significance of constructs and advancing management practice. With this in mind, our research aims to assess the effects of the loyalty program’s benefits offered by one of the leading superstore in Malaysia on its members’ loyalty towards the store.
Effect of Calcium Lactate, Sodium Diacetate and Sodium Chloride Mixture on the Microbiological, Chemical and Sensory Properties of Chicken Nuggets Stored in Refrigeration and under Modified Atmospheres

2 Abstract: This study was conducted to assess the effects of 0.5% Preservative Mixture (PM) containing calcium lactate (40%), sodium diacetate (40%) and sodium chloride (20%) on the microbiological, chemical and sensory quality of chicken meat nuggets stored at 4±2 C and under Modified Atmosphere Packaging o (MAP). There were two experimental groups of samples, namely control and PM-treated. The results showed that the PM-treated nugget samples had significantly (P<0.05) lower total bacterial count (TAB), coliform, Peroxide Value (PV) and Free Fatty Acids (FFA). At the same time, PM-treated nugget samples markedly higher scores for sensory evaluation such as appearance, texture, taste, odour and totally.
Analyzing the impact of using pthreads versus OpenMP under fault injection in ARM Cortex-A9 dual-core

This paper presents an analysis of the occurrence of software errors at parallel applications using POSIX Threads (Pthreads) versus their OpenMP counterparts and sequential versions. All cases were tested at the ARM Cortex-A9 dual-core processor that is embedded in many commercial SoC available in the market. The OVP simulator platform is used to instantiate the processor model and a fault injection platform injects faults in the system during simulation. We analyze the effect of bit-flips in the registers in both ARM cores during the execution of sequential and parallel versions of the same applications. We then use the fault injection results to analyze the error rate and their causes. Results show that different parallelization algorithms can have different error rates, and that there is a tendency on parallel applications to have more silent data corruption errors than their sequential counterparts when exposed to faults. The results also show a general tendency for Pthreads applications to be more susceptible to silent data corruption errors than their OpenMP counterparts.
11. Social inequalities in oral health – towards targeted health policy interventions

▸ Oral diseases belong to the most common chronic diseases worldwide and there are substantial oral health inequalities both within and between countries ▸ Tooth status is a relevant marker of health and a useful measure to detect pathways between socioeconomic status, health, and general well-being, particularly in older adulthood ▸ The number of natural teeth exhibits strong pro-rich inequalities with respect to income and deprivation ▸ Inequalities in oral health appear partially attributable to dental non-attendance due to treatment costs – more so in some countries, less so in others. No clear geographical pattern or clustering according to welfare state regime could be detected
The different faces of social capital in NSW Australia

Social capital is emerging as a crucial concept in the understanding of healthy groups and communities. It is therefore important to understand better the conditions in which social capital flourishes. As one approach to this task, this chapter explores some differences in the patterns of social capital to be found in different kinds of groups and communities in NSW Australia. Does social capital flourish best in isolated and rural communities? Can a community that shows intolerance of outsiders also be said to have high levels of social capital? Are there different dimensions to social capital that are equally important? These and other questions can only be answered by carefully measuring some of the differences in patterns of social capital across different communities.
Assessing the health of older adults with intellectual disabilities

Older adults with intellectual disability are at increased risk of a wide range of health problems. Hitherto, methods to assess these problems have been healthcare-professional-led and largely based on traditional medical models. Following a literature review and focus group work we produced a user-led health assessment that was feasible and acceptable. The assessment was administered to 57 adults with a wide range of intellectual disability aged 40 years and over, living in the community. The assessment took a median of 21 minutes to administer and covered user-led themes of participation/ability, nutrition and hygiene/self-care. A principal component representing a user-led general health measure correlated positively with the number of health problems (ρ = 0.54, p < 0.001) and the number of drugs (ρ = 0.55, p < 0.001). Further studies using such user-led assessments are needed to assess whether they can have a wider application.
The global potential for Agave as a biofuel feedstock

Large areas of the tropics and subtropics are too arid or degraded to support food crops, but Agave species may be suitable for biofuel production in these regions. We review the potential of Agave species as biofuel feedstocks in the context of ecophysiology, agronomy, and land availability for this genus globally. Reported dry biomass yields of Agave spp. , when annualized, range from <1 to 34 Mg ha−1 yr−1 without irrigation, depending on species and location. Some of the most productive species have not yet been evaluated at a commercial scale. Approximately 0.6 Mha of land previously used to grow Agave for coarse fibers have fallen out of production, largely as a result of competition with synthetic fibers. Theoretically, this crop area alone could provide 6.1 billion L of ethanol if Agave were re‐established as a bioenergy feedstock without causing indirect land use change. Almost one‐fifth of the global land surface is semiarid, suggesting there may be large opportunities for expansion of Agave crops for feedstock, but more field trials are needed to determine tolerance boundaries for different Agave species.
Effect of videotape for home instruction on the quality of life of tracheostomy patients: a randomized clinical trial

Background: Nowadays, some of the patients, such as the patients with tracheostomy are taken care of at home. The quality of life of these cases may decrease due to the appearance of changes, limitations caused by tracheostomy and improper care. Objectives: This research was performed in order to discover the effect of videotape for home instruction on the quality of life of tracheostomy cases. Patients and Procedure: A quasi-empirical research was carried out on 80 cases by a tracheotomy in Amir Elm Hospital and the Imam Khomeini Medical Center in Tehran. Patients were randomized into two teams of invasion and check through the randomized block design method. At the time of discharge and after a routine training from the clinical staff, the two groups completed a questionnaire regarding the demographic information and the sf-36 quality of life. Then, the intervention team was given a CD containing the routine training for patient care to watch at home. After two months, the participants completed the sf-36 questionnaires again, and the data were entered into SPSS version 20. The information was investigated by using the statistical tests. Findings: The statistical investigation demonstrated that the comparison between the two groups after the intervention in the overall quality of life (p = 0.003) and all the concepts included: the physical role (p = 0.02), the mental role (p = 0.01), energy and fatigue (p = 0.03), motion health (p = 0.005), social functioning (p = 0.06), disorder (p = 0. 001), common health percentage (p = 0.002) and physical functioning (p = 0.001) in the arbitration team, being higher than in the check one. Conclusion: Using the videotape education additionally to routine care has a significant effect on the improvement of the quality of life in these patients. Therefore, the use of this method is recommended as a complementary program for tracheostomy patients.
A Novel Wideband Differentially-Fed Higher-Order Mode Millimeter-Wave Patch Antenna

This paper presents a novel differentially-fed wideband patch antenna working at millimeter-wave band. The antenna is fabricated using conventional low-cost printed-circuit-board and plated-through-hole technologies and the patch size of the element has been enlarged by exploiting higher-order mode operation for good fabrication tolerance. The antenna element is a 0.86 guided wavelength ( λg at 60 GHz) long patch shorted at one end. A slot of 0.09 λg in width is introduced on the shorted patch and the distance between the slot center to the other end of the patch is 0.5 λg. The shorted patch resonates at TM30 mode and the 0.46 λg patch, created by presence of the slot, operates at TM10 mode. The combination of these two modes broadens the impedance bandwidth of the element to 18%. Asymmetric radiation patterns in the E-plane and large cross-polarization levels in the H-plane generated by a single patch are eradicated by feeding two mirrored elements differentially. The designed differentially-fed prototype has more than 18% measured impedance bandwidth, stable gain at 9-10 dBi and symmetric and stable radiation patterns across the operating band from 56 to 67 GHz.
Religiosity Aspect in Consumer Behaviour: Determinants of Halal Meat Consumption

Previous studies indicate that religion may influence consumer attitude and behavior in general, especially in food purchasing decisions and eating habits. There are limited studies that examined the role of religiosity in consumer behaviour; especially in relations to halal meat consumption. Due to gaps found in the literature, this study investigates the determinants of intention to eat halal meat. It also examines the levels of determinants of halal meat consumption between Indonesian Muslim living in Jakarta and Melbourne. Respondents were personally and electronically contacted. In total, 160 questionnaires were completed for this initial study. The results indicate that behavioural control and availability of halal meat have significant impact on intention to eat halal meat. The results further suggest that in general there are no significant differences in the levels of determinants of halal meat consumption between Indonesian Muslim living in Jakarta compared to those of in Melbourne, except for availability of halal meat. This study contributes to the marketing literature focuses on the impacts of religion on consumer behaviour which is still under researched. Keywords: Religiosity, Consumer Behavior, Attitutude
A Study of Brand Image, Perceived Service Quality, Patient Satisfaction and Behavioral Intention Among the Medical Tourists

Objective – This paper aims to examine the importance of brand image, and its impact on hospital service quality as perceived by the medical tourists. Moreover, this paper also evaluates the interrelationships among perceived service quality, patient satisfaction, and behavioural intention. Methodology/Technique – Based on quota sampling method, a questionnaire survey was used to collect data from 400 medical tourists to test the hypothesized relationships in this study. Findings – The findings from this study indicate that brand image has a significant positive influence on perceived service quality; and brand image is significantly and positively related to medical tourists’ behavioural intention (i.e., their revisit intention). The findings also show that level of satisfaction partially mediates the relationship between service quality and behavioural intention among medical tourists. Novelty – This study is one of the very few empirical studies that examine the importance of brand image in the context of medical tourism. Moreover, this study is also one of the few studies that addressed patient satisfaction as a mediator in the healthcare context.
DoS Detection Method based on Artificial Neural Networks

DoS attack tools have become increasingly sophisticated challenging the existing detection systems to continually improve their performances. In this paper we present a victimend DoS detection method based on Artificial Neural Networks (ANN). In the proposed method a Feed-forward Neural Network (FNN) is optimized to accurately detect DoS attack with minimum resources usage. The proposed method consists of the following three major steps: (1) Collection of the incoming network traffic, (2) selection of relevant features for DoS detection using an unsupervised Correlation-based Feature Selection (CFS) method, (3) classification of the incoming network traffic into DoS traffic or normal traffic. Various experiments were conducted to evaluate the performance of the proposed method using two public datasets namely UNSW-NB15 and NSL-KDD. The obtained results are satisfactory when compared to the state-of-the-art DoS detection methods. Keywords—DoS detection; Artificial Neural Networks; Feedforward Neural Networks; Network traffic classification; Feature selection
The influence of cigarette and qalyan (hookah) smoking on serum nitric oxide metabolite concentration

Abstract Objective: To assess the effect of exposure to cigarette and qalyan (hookah) smoking on serum nitric oxide (NO) metabolites (NOx) concentration. Material and methods: Fasting serum NOx was measured by the Griess method in 333 men free of diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease selected from participants of the Tehran Lipid and Glucose Study. Subjects were classified into active and passive cigarette smokers and they were age-matched with the non-smoker groups (n = 93/group). Twenty-seven qalyan smokers were also included in the study with their age-matched controls. Results: Multivariable-adjustment serum NOx values were compared between groups by analysis of covariance. Serum NOx was significantly higher (p < 0.05) in the active smokers [28.9 μmol/L (95% CI 26.2–32.0)] compared to nonsmokers [24.1 μmol/L (95% CI 21.8–26.7)]. A positive correlation was found between serum NOx and the number of cigarettes smoked per day (r = 0.222, p < 0.05). Qalyan smokers had higher serum NOx levels compared to the non-smoker controls [34.3 μmol/L (95% CI 27.8–42.3) vs. 22.5 μmol/L (95% CI 18.4–27.6), p < 0.01]. Conclusion: Active cigarette and qalyan smoking are associated with high serum NOx levels.
An evaluation of stakeholder management approach for improving energy efficiency outcomes in housing

Context - Energy efficient housing is influenced by a number of attributes that describe the key players involved in its production. Stakeholders’ levels of interest, motivation, awareness and power to impose their decision can have an impact on housing energy performance. Understand-ing these stakeholder attributes can help resolve barriers to energy efficiency performance. Approach - This paper examines a number of stakeholder management approaches, compares their classification and prioritisation approaches and analyses each approach’s suitability to be adopted for managing energy efficiency stakeholders. Results - Energy efficiency stakeholders can be classified as internal and external, with the attrib-utes of power, interest, proximity and knowledge. The most suitable stakeholder management approach enables these attributes to be quantified, and with the addition of a time management, could enable a better understanding and management of energy efficiency stakeholders Implications - This approach may enable a correlation between stakeholder management strate-gies and the energy performance of housing, and manage the relationships between stakeholders in a way that ensures the achievement of both their individual interests and sustainability goals. Originality - This paper explores the possibility of applying stakeholders’ theories that are com-monly used for managing organisations to one aspect of the housing industry (energy efficiency).
Response to alcohol in daughters of alcoholics: a pilot study and a comparison with sons of alcoholics.

Drinking, but not alcohol-dependent, 18-29-year-old daughters of alcoholics (n = 38) from the Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism were compared to 75 family-history-positive (FHP) men from the same families, and 68 family-history-negative (FHN) male controls. Subjects received 0.75 ml/kg of ethanol (for women), 0.9 ml/kg of ethanol (for men), and placebo, each of which was consumed over 8 min on different occasions. The breath-alcohol concentrations (BrAC) and reactions to alcohol [using the Subjective High Assessment Scale (SHAS) and body sway measures] were evaluated over 210 min. The results indicate that, despite slightly higher BrAC values for the FHP men, on the SHAS the FHP women and the FHP men demonstrated significantly lower scores than the FHN male controls, although the values for FHP men and women did not differ. On body sway, the FHP men showed evidence of less alcohol-related increases than FHN men, and there was a trend in the same direction for FHP women, but only early in the session (e.g. at 60 min). Pilot data for 11 FHN women revealed higher scores for both SHAS and body sway at 60 min, compared to FHP women, but, perhaps reflecting the small number of subjects, the family history differences were not significant. Overall, the results in FHP women resemble those for FHP men, and suggest that a low level of response to alcohol might also be a characteristic of daughters of alcoholics.
Medical Provider Agency and Pharmaceutical Demand with Universal Coverage: Evidence from Taiwan

Medical providers’ profit considerations might take priority over their patients’ needs in Taiwan because they are allowed to both dispense and prescribe medications. I examine this problem in the demand of the anti-diabetic drugs market using information from millions of claims. Empirical results show that owners of medical institutions are more likely to prescribe generic drugs and expensive drugs. These drugs, however, are less likely to be prescribed by the medical providers owned by government. Medical providers are less price-sensitive to generic drugs than the brand-name drugs. The demand of clinics are more price-elastic than that of the hospitals.
Identification of the hand-arm system mechanical impedance by simultaneous measurement of grip, transmitted force and acceleration with an adaptable instrumented handle

Abstract In this paper the results of static and dynamic tests carried out with an instrumented handle are presented and discussed. The instrumented handle was designed and constructed to be directly mounted on the handlebar of a two-wheeled vehicle and it can measure simultaneously grip, force transmitted by the handlebar to the hand and acceleration at the handle interface. The results of repeatability tests on the hand-arm weight and grip static measurement without and with real-time measure feedback show the importance of the use of an instrumented handle to ensure repeatability and also to estimate the influence of such parameters on the dynamic response. On the basis of preliminary dynamic tests conducted with the handle mounted on a shaker, the hand-arm system was characterized on two subjects, through a spectrum of its mechanical impedance as function of the excitation frequency, for different postures and grip levels. The results were compared to literature ideal impedance curves with acceptable agreement. The effect of grip showed to increase impedance in some specific frequency ranges.
WAKAF TUNAI UNTUK PEMBERDAYAAN USAHA KECIL

Cash Waqf is a new thing in raising public funds. Endowments cash can be used as a means for empowering small businesses, by way of lending and small business financing, venture capital and business development. In practice, needed assistance in terms of managerial and marketing to maintain product quality and marketing of small businesses.
Daily rhythms in activity and mRNA abundance of enzymes involved in glucose and lipid metabolism in liver of rainbow trout, Oncorhynchus mykiss. Influence of light and food availability

The present research aimed to investigate in a model of teleost fish (rainbow trout) the existence of daily changes in activity and mRNA abundance of several proteins involved in major pathways of carbohydrate and lipid metabolism in liver, and to test whether or not both the light–dark cycle and food availability might influence such rhythms. For this purpose, four cohorts of animals previously adapted to normal housing conditions (12L:12D; Lights on at ZT0; feeding time at ZT2) were subjected to: normal conditions (LD); 48-h constant darkness (DD); 96-h food deprivation (LD + Fasting); or constant darkness and food deprivation (DD + Fasting) respectively. After such time periods, fish were sacrificed and sampled every 4-h on the following 24-h period (ZT/CT0, 4, 8, 12, 16, 20 and 0′). Our results reveal that cortisol and all the analysed genes (gk, pepck, g6pase, pk, glut2, hoad and fas) exhibited well defined daily rhythms, which persisted even in the absence of light and/or food indicating the endogenous nature of such rhythms. Even when the variations of enzyme activities were not significant, their rhythms mostly paralleled those of the respective gene expression. The rhythms of mRNA abundance were apparently dependent on the presence of food, but the light/dark cycle also influenced such rhythms. Since cortisol does not appear to be mainly involved in generating such daily rhythms in liver, alternative mechanisms might be involved, such as a direct interaction between metabolism and the circadian system.