Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Sex Difference in Lifestyle Factors Predictive of Diabetes in Mexican-Americans

OBJECTIVE Little is known about the role of lifestyle factors in non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) incidence among Mexican-Americans. Therefore, we examined whether baseline lifestyle factors predictive of 8-year NIDDM incidence differ in Mexican-American men and women. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS We studied 353 Mexican-American men and 491 Mexican-American women free of diabetes at baseline who participated in the San Antonio Heart Study follow-up. Lifestyle factors examined were body mass index (BMI), energy intake (total calories/kg), grams of alcohol consumed per week, efforts to control weight by dieting and exercise, leisure physical activity, sugar avoidance, saturated fat/cholesterol avoidance, and 24-h dietary recall assessment of total calories and percentage of calories from total carbohydrate, sucrose, and starch and from total, saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fat. Incidence of NIDDM was regressed on lifestyle factors separately for men and women using a backward elimination procedure. RESULTS Lifestyle factors significantly associated with NIDDM incidence differed for the two sexes. In men, leisure physical activity, was inversely associated and alcohol consumption, weight control by dieting, and BMI were positively associated with NIDDM. In women, BMI was positively associated with NIDDM and was the strongest lifestyle predictor. Sugar avoidance and leisure physical activity were also associated with increased NIDDM risk, while weight control by dieting was associated with decreased NIDDM risk. Saturated fat/cholesterol avoidance, grams of alcohol consumed per week, and energy intake were also negatively and indirectly associated with NIDDM in women by means of their direct effects on BMI. CONCLUSIONS It may be important to tailor interventions designed to prevent NIDDM in Mexican-Americans to address sex differences in lifestyle precursors of this disease.
BKK the EZ way. An International Production Economy with Recursive Preferences

We characterize an international production economy in which (1) agents have Epstein and Zin (1989) preferences, (2) international productivity frontiers are exposed to both short- and long-run shocks, and (3) consumption features a larger degree of home bias relative to investment. Under our recursive risk-sharing scheme, good long-run news for domestic productivity creates a net outflow of domestic investments. This response accounts for the Backus, Kehoe and Kydland (1994) anomaly concerning the lower degree of correlation of international consumption relative to output. We document that our model is strongly consistent with novel empirical evidence on both international quantities and prices.
On the Reliability of Surface Current Measurements by X-Band Marine Radar

Real-time quality-controlled surface current data derived from X-Band marine radar (MR) measurements were evaluated to estimate their operational reliability. The presented data were acquired by the standard commercial off-the-shelf MR-based sigma s6 WaMoS® II (WaMoS® II) deployed onboard the German Research vessel Polarstern. The measurement reliability is specified by an IQ value obtained by the WaMoS® II real-time quality control (rtQC). Data which pass the rtQC without objection are assumed to be reliable. For these data sets accuracy and correlation with corresponding vessel-mounted acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP) measurements are determined. To reduce potential misinterpretation due to short-term oceanic variability/turbulences, the evaluation of the WaMoS® II accuracy was carried out based on sliding means over 20 min of the reliable data only. The associated standard deviation σWaMoS = 0.02 m/s of the mean WaMoS® II measurements reflect a high precision of the measurement and the successful rtQC during different wave, current and weather conditions. The direct comparison of 7272 WaMoS® II/ADCP northward and eastward velocity data pairs yield a correlation of r ≥0.94, with bias∆ ≤0.06 m/s and σS=0.05 m/s. This confirms that the MR-based surface current measurements are accurate and reliable.
Electricity Price Modeling with Stochastic Time Change

In this paper, we develop a novel approach to electricity price modeling, based on the powerful technique of stochastic time change. This technique allows us to incorporate the characteristic features of electricity prices (such as seasonal volatility, time varying mean reversion and seasonally occurring price spikes) into the model in an elegant and economically justifiable way. The stochastic time change introduces stochastic as well as deterministic (e.g., seasonal) features in the price process' volatility and in the jump component.
Fluoride Intake of Japanese Infants from Infant Milk Formula

This study aimed to measure the fluoride (F) content of all infant milk formulas (IMF) available for purchase in Japan and estimate the F exposure of infants whose primary source of nutrition is IMF when reconstituted with different F concentrations of water. Twenty-two commercially available IMFs were purchased from 6 manufacturers in Japan. These IMFs included 21 milk-based products and 1 soy-based product. Each IMF was reconstituted using distilled water and 0.13 µg F/ml fluoridated water according to the manufacturers’ instructions. The F concentrations in each sample were measured using the hexamethyldisiloxane diffusion technique and an F ion-selective electrode. The mean F concentration of all products was 0.41 (range 0.15–1.24) µg/g. There were no statistically significant differences among mean F concentrations of newborn milks, follow-on milks and other milks or among manufacturers. The mean F concentration of all products, when reconstituted with distilled water and 0.13 µg F/ml water, was 0.09 and 0.18 µg/ml, respectively. The mean F intake from IMF ranged from 0.039 to 0.134 mg/day with distilled water and from 0.078 to 0.258 mg/day with 0.13 µg/ml fluoridated water, respectively. These results suggested that F intake of infants from IMFs depended on the F concentration of added water, and therefore the risk of dental fluorosis for most Japanese infants would be small since most Japanese municipal water supplies are low in F. However, there was a possibility to exceed the tolerable upper intake level, even under the limit of the law, especially for infants within the first 5 months of life.
Global Bad and Good Uncertainties and Their Impact on Macro Aggregates and Stock Returns

This paper estimates global bad and good uncertainties from monthly data on industrial production from a large set of countries. Bad and good uncertainties have opposite effects on macro aggregates and stock returns. An increase in bad uncertainty adversely impacts both, while an increase in good uncertainty has positive effects. This holds for many considered countries. Furthermore, global uncertainties help to explain stock returns in the cross-section. The pricing performance of the global CAPM and two-factor model of Fama and French (1998) always improve if the pricing factors are scaled with global uncertainties. Bad uncertainty is important in conomic distress times. In contrast, good uncertainty helps to explain returns in calm times. Overall, the results highlight the opposite effect of bad and good uncertainty and show that both are key drivers of real economies and financial markets.
Differential effects of ponesimod, a selective S1P1 receptor modulator, on blood-circulating human T cell subpopulations

Abstract Ponesimod, a novel selective sphingosine-1-phosphate 1 receptor modulator in the development for the treatment of autoimmune diseases, dose-dependently reduced lymphocyte counts in peripheral blood of healthy subjects. It rapidly and transiently reduced the number of circulating T and B cells, but not natural killer cells. T lymphocyte subsets exhibited differential sensitivities with a maximum decrease from baseline ranging from 67% to 89% following high doses. Naïve T cells were more sensitive than memory T cells. CD4+ T cells were more sensitive than CD8+ T cells or CD4+CD25+ T regulatory cells. The differential effects on specialized T cell subsets may contribute to the immunomodulatory activity of ponesimod. The therapeutic potential of ponesimod has been recently shown in phase II studies of chronic plaque psoriasis and relapsing–remitting multiple sclerosis. Our data suggest that lymphocyte sequestration underlies the therapeutic potential of ponesimod in multiple autoimmune and chronic inflammatory diseases.
Dhat Syndrome

Dhat syndrome is a culture-bound sex neurosis of the Indian subcontinent. Fifty-two patients with a presenting complaint of passage of ‘Dhat’ in urine were studied. Diagnosis of neurotic depression, anxiety neurosis, hypochondriacal neurosis, and psychogenic impotence were made in 21, 19, 3, and 1 cases respectively. Seven patients received the diagnosis of pure Dhat syndrome, and one of gonorrhoea.
Chinese Preschool Children’s Socioemotional Development: The Effects of Maternal and Paternal Psychological Control

The present study examined the relative prediction and joint effects of maternal and paternal psychological control on children’s socioemotional development. A total of 325 preschool children between the ages of 34 and 57 months (M = 4 years 2 months) and their parents participated in the study. Fathers and mothers, respectively, reported their levels of psychological control and mothers evaluated the socioemotional development of children using two indicators (i.e., behavioral problems and prosocial behaviors). The results indicated that the relative predictive effects of maternal and paternal psychological control on children’s socioemotional development differed. Specifically, maternal psychological control was a significant predictor of children’s behavioral problems and prosocial behaviors, whereas the levels of paternal psychological control were unrelated to children’s socioemotional development. With regard to the combined effects of maternal and paternal psychological control, the results of ANOVAs and simple slope analysis both indicated that children would be at risk of behavioral problems as long as they had one highly psychologically controlling parent. High levels of paternal psychological control were associated with increased behavioral problems of children only when maternal psychological control was low. However, the association between maternal psychological control and children’s behavioral behaviors was significant, despite paternal psychological control.
Day of the Week Effect and Market Efficiency in the Italian Stock Market: An Empirical Analysis

This paper examines the presence of the day-of-the-week effect in the Italian stock market index (MIB) sub-sectoral returns. The study, by using GARCH-M (1,1) models, did not find evidence of the day-of-the-week effect in mean equations, while some evidence was present in variance equations. The study also investigates the validity of random walk hypothesis for all the MIB sub-sectoral returns. The results indicate that almost all sub-sectoral returns did not follow a random walk process as required by market efficiency hypothesis.
Technical Efficiency-Food Security Nexus in Kaduna State, Nigeria: A Case Study of Poultry Egg Farmers

This study analysed the technical efficiency of poultry egg production for sustainable food security in the study area using primary data. The data were analysed using stochastic frontier, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) food security measurement, and correlation analysis to determine the relationship between technical efficiency and food security. The result of the study revealed that the poultry egg farmers had a very low technical efficiency of 23%, which implies that the poultry egg farmers have a chance of improving their technical efficiency by 77% using their available resource efficiently. The result also revealed that few of the households (10%) were food secure while most of them (90%) were food insecure at different levels of food insecurity. The result of the study further indicated a direct relationship between technical efficiency and food security at 1% level of probability, implying that as average productivity increases, food security increases. The policy implication is that food security among the poultry egg farmers is linked with improving their farm efficiency. If food security is to be ensured among the poultry egg farmers, their farming activities must be efficient. The study recommended that the poor food security status of the poultry egg farmers be improved by addressing their low level of technical efficiency through ensuring the efficient utilization of their available resources. This calls for emphasis on extension activities to focus on training poultry egg farmers on improved production management practices. Author’s Note This study was borne out of the need to address the issue of food security among poultry egg farmers in the study area in a bid to ensure sustainable development. However, the pertinent question of interest which formed the basis for this study was whether the efficiency of production of the farmers has a significant link with their food security and what policy implication can be drawn from the outcome of such a link.
Fine pose estimation of known objects in cluttered scene images

Understanding the precise 3D structure of an environment is one of the fundamental goals of computer vision and is challenging due to a variety of factors such as appearance variation, illumination, pose, noise, occlusion and scene clutter. A generic solution to the problem is ill-posed due to the loss of depth information during imaging. In this paper, we consider a specific but common situation, where the scene contains known objects. Given 3D models of a set of known objects and a cluttered scene image, we try to detect these objects in the image, and align 3D models to their images to find their exact pose. We develop an approach that poses this as a 3D-to-2D alignment problem. We also deal with pose estimation of 3D articulated objects in images. We evaluate our proposed method on BigBird dataset and our own tabletop dataset, and present experimental comparisons with state-of-the-art methods.
Business Software as a Facilitator for Business Process Excellence: Experiences from Case Studies

Software vendors claim in their marketing brochures that business processes and interoperability can be optimised through the use of business software. Business literature emphasizes the various benefits companies can gain from the targeted use of IT systems. Academic literature has, however, paid scant attention to the relationship between business process excellence and the use of ERP systems. Interoperability and business process excellence resulting from it are in the foreground of the following analysis of fourteen business software projects, examined within the eXperience framework in 2006. Hardly surprising was the insight that, in all the selected companies, central performance processes were identified as 'Excellence Processes'. Interoperability was, in this context, often crucial to the company's success. In some companies hybrid solutions were implemented, in which the relationship between human being and machine was optimized and a one-hundred-percent technology support was not necessarily pursued as an ideal.
Disruptive Approaches for Subtitling in Immersive Environments

The Immersive Accessibility Project (ImAc) explores how accessibility services can be integrated with 360o video as well as new methods for enabling universal access to immersive content. ImAc is focused on inclusivity and addresses the needs of all users, including those with sensory or learning disabilities, of all ages and considers language and user preferences. The project focuses on moving away from the constraints of existing technologies and explores new methods for creating a personal experience for each consumer. It is not good enough to simply retrofit subtitles into immersive content: this paper attempts to disrupt the industry with new and often controversial methods. This paper provides an overview of the ImAc project and proposes guiding methods for subtitling in immersive environments. We discuss the current state-of-the-art for subtitling in immersive environments and the rendering of subtitles in the user interface within the ImAc project. We then discuss new experimental rendering modes that have been implemented including a responsive subtitle approach, which dynamically re-blocks subtitles to fit the available space and explore alternative rendering techniques where the subtitles are attached to the scene.
Occupational Outcome in Adult ADHD: Impact of Symptom Profile, Comorbid Psychiatric Problems, and Treatment

Objective: To determine the effects of symptom profile, comorbid psychiatric problems, and treatment on occupational outcome in adult ADHD patients. Method: Adult ADHD patients (N = 414) responded to questionnaires rating past and present symptoms of ADHD, comorbid conditions, treatment history, and work status. Results: Of the patients, 24% reported being in work, compared to 79% in a population-based control group (N = 359). Combined subtype of ADHD, substance abuse, and a reported history of depression or anxiety were correlated with being out of work. Current and past medical treatment of ADHD was correlated with being in work. Logistic regression analyses showed that stimulant therapy during childhood was the strongest predictor for being in work as adults (odds ratio = 3.2, p = .014). Conclusion: Early recognition and treatment of ADHD is a strong predictor of being in work as an adult, independently of comorbidity, substance abuse, and current treatment. (J. of Att. Dis. 2009; 13(2) 175-187)
Leukotriene C4 and histamine in early allergic reaction in the nose

We have examined the measurements of LTC4 and histamine in nasal lavage fluids and blown secretions as a possible model of the early mediator events during nasal allergy. A nasal challenge with grass pollen extract was undertaken on two separate occasions in 20 patients with a history of seasonal rhinitis and a positive immediate skin test to grass pollen. A 2 ml nasal lavage was performed before allergen challenge, and blown secretion collected separately 15 min after the provocation, followed by a final 2 ml nasal lavage. The dilution of nasal secretion by the lavage fluid was determined using 99mTc‐labelled albumin as an exogenous marker added to the fluid. The amounts of admixture in the nasal lavages did not correlate to the concentrations of LTC4 and histamine, indicating that the variable amounts of nasal secretion in nasal lavage do not constitute a confounding variable for measurements of LTC4 and histamine. In the pre‐challenge lavages, the median concentrations, of LTC4 and histamine were 1.7 and 52 nmol/1 respectively. Following allergen challenge neither LTC4 nor histamine measured in nasal lavage showed any significant change from pre‐challenge baseline values. However, measurements of both mediators in the blown secretion showed a significantly higher concentration than in the pre‐ or post‐challenge lavage samples, compatible with transitory release during the acute allergic reaction. However, it seems doubtful whether measurements of LTC4 or histamine can be compared between blown secretion and nasal lavage fluid, even if the dilution factor is disregarded. While allergen provocation of the nasal mucosa releases inflammatory mediators locally, uncontrolled variables confound their measurement in the nasal lavage fluids to an extent which limits the application of this model to study details of mediator release during nasal allergy.
Evaluation of Healthy Choices: A commercial weight loss programme commissioned by the NHS

Aim: The aim of this study is to identify factors that influence successful weight loss in an NHS-funded commercial weight loss programme. Methods: Baseline height, weight, body mass index (BMI), age, gender, address, date of referral, referrer and 12-week attendance and weight were measured. Participants were classified as having achieved successful weight loss if they had > 5% weight loss and ‘completers’ if they had attended at least 10 of the 12 free sessions. Logistic regression analysis was used to estimate predictors of successful weight loss. Predictors tested in regression analyses were initial weight, number of meetings attended, deprivation, age and gender. Results: In total, 2,456 (87%) of referred participants were given vouchers to attend a commercial weight loss programme for 12 weeks. The majority of the participants were female and the mean age group was 45–54 years. Almost half (44%) of all patients referred had > 5% weight loss at 12 weeks. A statistically significant difference was found in the mean weight loss between completers (6.1 kg, SD 3.7) and drop outs (2.2 kg, SD 2.5). Participants who had successful weight loss were significantly more likely to be older, male and in obese class I. They were also significantly more likely to have attended more meetings. Conclusions: Commercial weight loss programmes produce successful weight loss in the short term. There was no difference in successful weight loss between providers and deprivation quintiles. Age, gender, initial BMI and number of meetings attended are all predictors of successful weight loss.
Attending Physician Remote Access of the Electronic Health Record and Implications for Resident Supervision: A Mixed Methods Study.

Background Advances in information technology have increased remote access to the electronic health record (EHR). Concurrently, standards defining appropriate resident supervision have evolved. How often and under what circumstances inpatient attending physicians remotely access the EHR for resident supervision is unknown. Objective We described a model of attending remote EHR use for resident supervision, and quantified the frequency and magnitude of use. Methods Using a mixed methods approach, general medicine inpatient attendings were surveyed and interviewed about their remote EHR use. Frequency of use and supervisory actions were quantitatively examined via survey. Transcripts from semistructured interviews were analyzed using grounded theory to identify codes and themes. Results A total of 83% (59 of 71) of attendings participated. Fifty-seven (97%) reported using the EHR remotely, with 54 (92%) reporting they discovered new clinical information not relayed by residents via remote EHR use. A majority (93%, 55 of 59) reported that this resulted in management changes, and 54% (32 of 59) reported making immediate changes by contacting cross-covering teams. Six major factors around remote EHR use emerged: resident, clinical, educational, personal, technical, and administrative. Attendings described resident and clinical factors as facilitating "backstage" supervision via remote EHR use. Conclusions In our study to assess attending remote EHR use for resident supervision, attendings reported frequent remote use with resulting supervisory actions, describing a previously uncharacterized form of "backstage" oversight supervision. Future work should explore best practices in remote EHR use to provide effective supervision and ultimately improve patient safety.