Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Analysis of categorical moderators in mixed‐effects meta‐analysis: Consequences of using pooled versus separate estimates of the residual between‐studies variances

Subgroup analyses allow us to examine the influence of a categorical moderator on the effect size in meta-analysis. We conducted a simulation study using a dichotomous moderator, and compared the impact of pooled versus separate estimates of the residual between-studies variance on the statistical performance of the Q B(P) and Q B(S) tests for subgroup analyses assuming a mixed-effects model. Our results suggested that similar performance can be expected as long as there are at least 20 studies and these are approximately balanced across categories. Conversely, when subgroups were unbalanced, the practical consequences of having heterogeneous residual between-studies variances were more evident, with both tests leading to the wrong statistical conclusion more often than in the conditions with balanced subgroups. A pooled estimate should be preferred for most scenarios, unless the residual between-studies variances are clearly different and there are enough studies in each category to obtain precise separate estimates.
Reverse Engineering SPJ-Queries from Examples

This paper investigates the problem of reverse engineering, i.e., learning, select-project-join (SPJ) queries from a user-provided example set, containing positive and negative tuples. The goal is then to determine whether there exists a query returning all the positive tuples, but none of the negative tuples, and furthermore, to find such a query, if it exists. These are called the satisfiability and learning problems, respectively. The ability to solve these problems is an important step in simplifying the querying process for non-expert users. This paper thoroughly investigates the satisfiability and learning problems in a variety of settings. In particular, we consider several classes of queries, which allow different combinations of the operators select, project and join. In addition, we compare the complexity of satisfiability and learning, when the query is, or is not, of bounded size. We note that bounded-size queries are of particular interest, as they can be used to avoid over-fitting (i.e., tailoring a query precisely to only the seen examples). In order to fully understand the underlying factors which make satisfiability and learning (in)tractable, we consider different components of the problem, namely, the size of a query to be learned, the size of the schema and the number of examples. We study the complexity of our problems, when considering these as part of the input, as constants or as parameters (i.e., as in parameterized complexity analysis). Depending on the setting, the complexity of satisfiability and learning can vary significantly. Among other results, our analysis also provides new problems that are complete for W[3], for which few natural problems are known. Finally, by considering a variety of settings, we derive insight on how the different facets of our problem interplay with the size of the database, thereby providing the theoretical foundations necessary for a future implementation of query learning from examples.
Comparative Evaluation of Adolescents' Use of Public Libraries in the Nigerian States of Osun and Oyo

This study compares the utilization by adolescents age 12–17 of public libraries in Osun and Oyo States in Nigeria. The study utilized interviews and a checklist as data-gathering techniques. Some 414 volunteer adolescent users were selected, with males predominating. Of the respondents, 51.7 percent were in the libraries to read their own books. Of the respondents from Oyo State Public Library, 99 percent were aware of library Internet services compared to only 22 percent from Osun State. Users specified two major problems: no good display of library materials and lack of up-to-date materials on subjects in which students were interested. The authors suggest several policy changes to improve adolescent services in the two libraries.
Virion-associated Uracil DNA Glycosylase-2 and Apurinic/Apyrimidinic Endonuclease Are Involved in the Degradation of APOBEC3G-edited Nascent HIV-1 DNA*

Cellular cytidine deaminases APOBEC3 family is a group of potent inhibitors for many exogenous and endogenous retroviruses. It has been demonstrated that they induce G to A hypermutations in the nascent retroviral DNA, resulting from the cytosine (C) to uracil (U) conversions in minus-stranded viral DNA. In this report, we have demonstrated that the result of C to U conversion in minus-stranded DNA of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) could trigger a degradation of nascent viral DNA mediated by uracil DNA glycosylases-2 (UNG2) and apurinic/apyrimidinic endonuclease (APE). Since antiviral activity of APOBEC3G is partially affected by UNG2 inhibitor Ugi or UNG2-specific short-interfering RNA in virus-producing cells but not target cells, the virion-associated UNG2 most likely mediates this process. Interestingly, as APE-specific short-interfering RNA can also partially inhibit the anti-HIV-1 activity of APOBEC3G in virus-producing cells but not in target cells and APE molecules can be detected within HIV-1 virions, it seems that the required APE is also virion-associated. Furthermore, the in vitro cleavage experiment using uracil-containing single-stranded DNA as a template has demonstrated that the uracil-excising catalytic activity of virion-associated UNG2 can remove dU from the uracil-containing viral DNA and leave an abasic site, which could be further cleaved by virion-associated APE. Based upon our observations, we propose that the degradation of APOBEC3G-edited viral DNA mediated by virion-associated UNG2 and APE during or after reverse transcription could be partially responsible for the potent anti-HIV-1 effect by APOBEC3G in the absence of vif.
Climatically driven loss of calcium in steppe soil as a sink for atmospheric carbon

During the last several thousand years the semi‐arid, cold climate of the Russian steppe formed highly fertile soils rich in organic carbon and calcium (classified as Chernozems in the Russian system). Analysis of archived soil samples collected in Kemannaya Steppe Preserve in 1920, 1947, 1970, and fresh samples collected in 1998 indicated that the native steppe Chernozems, however, lost 17–28 kg m−2 of calcium in the form of carbonates in 1970–1998. Here we demonstrate that the loss of calcium was caused by fundamental shift in the steppe hydrologic balance. Previously unleached soils where precipitation was less than potential evapotranspiration are now being leached due to increased precipitation and, possibly, due to decreased actual evapotranspiration. Because this region receives low levels of acidic deposition, the dissolution of carbonates involves the consumption of atmospheric CO2. Our estimates indicate that this climatically driven terrestrial sink of atmospheric CO2 is ∼2.1–7.4 g C m−2 a−1. In addition to the net sink of atmospheric carbon, leaching of pedogenic carbonates significantly amplified seasonal amplitude of CO2 exchange between atmosphere and steppe soil.
The Relationship between Personality Traits with Life Satisfaction

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between personality traits with life satisfaction among employed women in higher education centers of Rasht. This study was performed on 206 employed women in higher education centers of Rasht selected by classified random sampling they answered the NEO questionnaire (Costa & McCrae, 1992) and the Satisfaction With Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985). Extraversion, conscientious and openness had a significant negative correlation with life satisfaction, and agreement has significant positive correlation with life satisfaction. The results of stepwise regression showed that personality traits can explain 19 percent of the variance in life satisfaction, interaction of income and education has not significant effect on the life satisfaction. The results of one way ANOVA indicated that there isn’t significant difference between employed women life satisfaction and personality trait in diversity higher education centers. Life satisfaction is influenced by interaction of different factors that one of these factors is personality traits.
Impact of Antimicrobial Usage on Antimicrobial Resistance in Commensal Escherichia coli Strains Colonizing Broiler Chickens

ABSTRACT Escherichia coli strains isolated from commercial broilers and an experimental flock of chickens were screened to determine phenotypic expression of antimicrobial resistance and carriage of drug resistance determinants. The goal of this study was to investigate the influence of oxytetracycline, sarafloxacin, and enrofloxacin administration on the distribution of resistance determinants and strain types among intestinal commensal E. coli strains isolated from broiler chickens. We detected a high prevalence of resistance to drugs such as tetracycline (36 to 97%), sulfonamides (50 to 100%), and streptomycin (53 to 100%) in E. coli isolates from treated and untreated flocks. These isolates also had a high prevalence of class 1 integron carriage, and most of them possessed the streptomycin resistance cassette, aadA1. In order to investigate the contribution of E. coli strain distribution to the prevalence of antimicrobial resistance and the resistance determinants, isolates from each flock were DNA fingerprinted by enterobacterial repetitive intergenic consensus sequence (ERIC) PCR. Although very diverse E. coli strain types were detected, four ERIC strain types were present on all of the commercial broiler farms, and two of the strains were also found in the experimental flocks. Each E. coli strain consisted of both susceptible and antimicrobial agent-resistant isolates. In some instances, isolates of the same E. coli strain expressed the same drug resistance patterns although they harbored different tet determinants or streptomycin resistance genes. Therefore, drug resistance patterns could not be explained solely by strain prevalence, indicating that mobile elements contributed significantly to the prevalence of resistance.
Microbial contamination and preservative capacity of some brands of cosmetic creams

Purpose: Cosmetic and topical products need not be sterile but may contain low levels of microbial load during use. This study was conducted to determine and compare the level and type of microbial contaminants in commercial cosmetic products sold in the market and a laboratory prepared aqueous cream and their preservative capacities while in use. Methods: Ten brands of commercially available cosmetic creams and lotions were randomly purchased from the open markets in Benin City. Aqueous Cream was also prepared. Their bacterial and fungal loads as well as types were evaluated. Preservative capacity was evaluated by challenging the creams and lotions with washed and characterized isolates of Staph. aureus and viable counting was performed by the surface viable method. The prepared aqueous cream was similarly challenged with the test organism. Results: All the products were contaminated to varying degrees. Staphylococci and other gram-positive cocci were the most preponderant; gram-negative isolates were hardly found. Fungal contaminants consisted largely of Asp. fumigatus, Penicillium and Microsporium species. Challenge test (re-infection) with Staph. aureus revealed the commercial products as having low capacity for suppressing bacterial proliferation such as may be encountered during in ‐ use contamination. Conclusion: Commercial cosmetic creams and lotions evaluated did not generally meet the standards for microbial limits as specified in official monographs. Such products can adversely affect health status of consumers as well as the stability profiles of the products.
Selected Topics : Prehospital Care PREHOSPITAL TRAUMA ANALGESIA

R w Abstract—This review aims to describe and evaluate urrent practices and controversies surrounding provision f pain relief in the prehospital setting. The review addresses nalgesia indications and contraindications, frequency with hich analgesics are used, and factors associated with imroved prehospital analgesia care in Emergency Medical Serices systems with both physician and non-physician staffing. s part of its evaluation of the state of the art in prehospital harmacologic treatment of pain, the review will summarize vailable evidence relevant to the major drugs. Although some ituations have been insufficiently studied to allow for definiive data-driven analgesia recommendations, the review will, here possible, include evidence-based recommendations conerning prehospital pain medication. © 2008 Elsevier Inc.
Determination of ciprofloxacin in ocular aqueous humor by high performance liquid chromatography: Comparison of topical and oral administration

Purpose: Fluoroquinolones are widely used antibiotics for prophylaxis of intra and postoperative infections in individuals undergoing cataract surgery. This study was designed to assess the penetration of ciprofloxacin into the ocular aqueous humor (topical only versus topical and oral administration). Methods: Studied population (n=47) consisted of two groups: group one (n=26) and group two (n=21). Group one received eye drop (one drop every six hours for three days before surgery and on the day of surgery topical medication was administered every 30 minutes with the last drop instillation maximum 4 hours before start of surgery). Group two received a combination of ciprofloxacin comprising of eye drop therapy as describe above plus oral dose (500 mg/twice a day starting three days before operation). Samples of aqueous humor were taken at the start of surgery. Ciprofloxcacin concentration was determined by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with fluorescence detector. Results: Aqueous humor concentrations of ciprofloxacin in the patients who received combinations of eye drops and oral administration doses (mean 0.95 µg/ml) were significantly higher than patients receiving only eye drops (mean 0.23 µg/ml, P<0.001). Conclusion: The results for first group were below the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values of Staphylococcus epidermidis, S. aureus, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeroginosa, Escherichia coli and Haemophilus influenzae. These results for the second group were over the MIC values of S. epidermidis, S. aureus, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Escherichia coli and below the MIC values of Pseudomonas aeroginosa and Haemophilus influenzae. These results demonstrate that topical ciprofloxacin can penetrate into the aqueous humor but it alone dose not seems to be prophylactically effective against most of the ocular pathogens. In most cases, combining the oral therapy with topical therapy increases the aqueous humor drug level and also is effective significantly against most of the ocular pathogens. This proposal is applicable for drug monitoring in patients undergoing prophylactic antibiotic therapy prior to surgery.
Approaches for Neural-Network Language Model Adaptation Conference

Language Models (LMs) for Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) are typically trained on large text corpora from news articles, books and web documents. These types of corpora, however, are unlikely to match the test distribution of ASR systems, which expect spoken utterances. Therefore, the LM is typically adapted to a smaller held-out in-domain dataset that is drawn from the test distribution. We propose three LM adaptation approaches for Deep NN and Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM): (1) Adapting the softmax layer in the Neural Network (NN); (2) Adding a non-linear adaptation layer before the softmax layer that is trained only in the adaptation phase; (3) Training the extra non-linear adaptation layer in pre-training and adaptation phases. Aiming to improve upon a hierarchical Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) second-pass LM baseline, which factors the model into word-cluster and word models, we build an NN LM that predicts only word clusters. Adapting the LSTM LM by training the adaptation layer in both training and adaptation phases (Approach 3), we reduce the cluster perplexity by 30% on a held-out dataset compared to an unadapted LSTM LM. Initial experiments using a state-of-the-art ASR system show a 2.3% relative reduction in WER on top of an adapted MaxEnt LM.
Serum lipid concentrations correlate with the progression of chronic renal failure.

OBJECTIVE To explore the distribution pattern for serum lipid concentrations among patients with different degrees of chronic renal failure; to study the characteristics of abnormal lipid metabolism for chronic renal failure patients when the disease progress further. SETTING No. 255 Hospital of PLA, Tangshan, Hebei, China; No. 281 Hospital of PLA, Beidanhe, Hebei, China; and the General Hospital of Beijing Military Region, Beijing, China. PRACTICE DESCRIPTION A total of 240 serum/urine samples from 50 healthy volunteers and from 190 patients with different degrees of chronic renal failure, which fall into four groups according to their glomerular filtration rates, were measured for serum levels of triglyceride, lipoprotein(a), lipoprotein(a) cholesterol, total cholesterol, apolipoprotein A1, apolipoprotein B100, low density lipoprotein cholesterol, high density lipoprotein cholesterol, and for urine albumin concentrations; the levels of these criteria were compared between the control group and diseased groups; the mean concentrations of different lipid variables were paired and subjected to linear regression analysis. MAIN OUTCOME MEASUREMENTS Glomerular filtration rates were estimated by the iohexol clearance method, in which plasma content of iohexol was measured with high performance liquid chromatography; concentrations of triglyceride, lipoprotein(a), lipoprotein(a) cholesterol, total cholesterol, apolipoprotein A1, apolipoprotein B100, low density lipoprotein cholesterol, high density lipoprotein cholesterol, and albumin were assayed according to standard protocols. RESULTS Serum levels of triglyceride, lipoprotein(a), lipoprotein(a) cholesterol, total cholesterol, apolipoprotein A1, apolipoprotein B100, low density lipoprotein cholesterol, and urine albumin contents were significantly higher, whereas those of high density lipoprotein cholesterol were lower, in diseased groups than that of the control (p < 0.05, p < 0.01). When the disease progressed, concentrations of these criteria increased or decreased further (p < 0.01, p < 0.05). Significant correlations were found between a few lipid criteria for their mean concentrations in diseased groups. CONCLUSION The study demonstrates a correlation between abnormalities of lipid metabolism and the degrees of kidney insufficiency, and a correlation within certain kinds of lipid criteria in patients with different degrees of renal damage. The results suggest the existence of multi-correlations in vivo in catabolism and metabolism of lipid, lipoprotein, apolipoprotein, and protein in the patients. The exact mechanism responsible for the association and correlation remains to be clarified.
Elevated levels of the second messenger c‐di‐GMP contribute to antimicrobial resistance of Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Biofilms are highly structured, surface‐associated communities. A hallmark of biofilms is their extraordinary resistance to antimicrobial agents that is activated during early biofilm development of Pseudomonas aeruginosa and requires the regulatory hybrid SagS and BrlR, a member of the MerR family of multidrug efflux pump activators. However, little is known about the mechanism by which SagS contributes to BrlR activation or drug resistance. Here, we demonstrate that ΔsagS biofilm cells harbour the secondary messenger c‐di‐GMP at reduced levels similar to those observed in wild‐type cells grown planktonically rather than as biofilms. Restoring c‐di‐GMP levels to wild‐type biofilm‐like levels restored brlR expression, DNA binding by BrlR, and recalcitrance to killing by antimicrobial agents of ΔsagS biofilm cells. We likewise found that increasing c‐di‐GMP levels present in planktonic cells to biofilm‐like levels (≥ 55 pmol mg−1) resulted in planktonic cells being significantly more resistant to antimicrobial agents, with increased resistance correlating with increased brlR, mexA, and mexE expression and BrlR production. In contrast, reducing cellular c‐di‐GMP levels of biofilm cells to ≤ 40 pmol mg−1 correlated with increased susceptibility and reduced brlR expression. Our findings suggest that a signalling pathway involving a specific c‐di‐GMP pool regulated by SagS contributes to the resistance of P. aeruginosa biofilms.
Psychometric Properties of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA): An Analysis Using the Rasch Model

In the present study we analyzed the psychometric characteristics of the MoCA (Portuguese version) using the Rasch model for dichotomous items. The total sample comprised of 897 participants distributed between two main subgroups: (I) healthy group that was comprised of 650 cognitively healthy community dwellers and (II) clinical group that was comprised of 90 patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment, 90 patients with Alzheimer’s disease, 33 patients with frontotemporal dementia, and 34 patients with vascular dementia recruited at a reference dementia clinic. All patients were investigated through a comprehensive neuropsychological assessment, laboratory tests essential to exclude a reversible form of dementia, imaging studies (CT or MRI and SPECT or FDG-PET), Apolipoprotein E allele genotyping and CSF biomarker (Aβ42,Tau, and P-tau) analyses. The clinical diagnosis was established through the consensus of a multidisciplinary team, based on international criteria. The results demonstrated an overall good fit of both items and the person’s values, a high variability on cognitive performance level, and a good quality of the measurements. The MoCA scores also demonstrated adequate discriminant validity, with high diagnostic value. DIF analyses indicated the generalized validity of the MoCA scores. In conclusion, the results of this study show the overall psychometric adequacy of the MoCA and verify the discriminant and generalized validity of the obtained results.
Mechanism of coronavirus transcription: duration of primary transcription initiation activity and effects of subgenomic RNA transcription on RNA replication

Previously, we established a system whereby an intergenic region from mouse hepatitis virus (MHV) inserted into an MHV defective interfering (DI) RNA led to transcription of a subgenomic DI RNA in helper virus-infected cells. By using this system, the duration of a primary transcription initiation activity which transcribes subgenomic-size RNAs from the genomic-size RNA template in MHV-infected cells was examined. Efficient DI genomic and subgenomic RNA synthesis was observed when the DI RNA was transfected at 1, 3, 3.5, 5, and 6 h postinfection, indicating that all activities which are necessary for MHV RNA synthesis are present continuously during the first 6 h of infection. The effect of subgenomic DI RNA synthesis on DI genomic RNA replication was then examined. Replication efficiency of the DI genomic RNA which synthesized the subgenomic RNA was approximately 70% lower than that of DI genomic RNA which did not synthesize the subgenomic DI RNA in MHV-infected cells. Cotransfection of two different-size DI RNAs demonstrated that replication of the larger DI RNA was strongly inhibited by replication of the smaller genomic DI RNA. Cotransfection of two DI RNA species of the same length into MHV-infected cells demonstrated that reduced replication of the genomic DI RNA which synthesizes the subgenomic RNA did not affect the replication of cotransfected DI RNA, demonstrating that the reduction in DI genomic RNA replication works only in cis, not in trans. Therefore, the previously proposed hypothesis that coronavirus, subgenomic RNA synthesis may inhibit the replication of genomic RNA by competing for a limited amount of virus-derived factors seems unlikely. Possible mechanisms of coronavirus transcription are discussed.