Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Role of Environmental Knowledge and Attitude : Predictors for Ecological Behavior Across Cultures ? An Analysis of Argentinean and German Students 1

This study examined the relationships between a general measure of environmental attitude (NEP), general environmental knowledge (GEK), and general ecological behavior (GEB) in two university student samples, one from Argentina (NArg= 85, Mage= 24.1, 59 % female) and one from Germany (NGer= 98, Mage= 22.5, 51 % female). Whereas Argentinean and German students did not differ in ecological worldview, Germans displayed more environmental knowledge (d= 1.40) and reported more ecological behavior (d= .87). Two separately conducted hierarchical regression analyses for each sample revealed that after controlling for age and gender, ecological worldview explained about the same amount of variance in both countries (5 % in Germany vs. 6 % in Argentina). Environmental knowledge on the other hand explained an additional 24 % of variance in ecological behavior in the German sample only and accounted for no additional variance in the argentine sample. These differences are discussed in terms of situational restrictions that are thought to be stronger in Argentina and thus suppress the influence of enSonja Geiger
Analysis of fl oristic composition and structure as an aid to monitoring protected areas of dense rain forest in southeastern Brazil

To study forest composition and structure, as well as to facilitate management plans and monitoring programs, we conducted a phytosociological survey in the PE Caverna do Diabo State Park and the Quilombos do Médio Ribeira Environmentally Protected Area, both located within the state of São Paulo, Brazil. We analyzed 20 plots of 400 m2 each, including only individuals with a circumference at breast height ≥ 15 cm. We employed cluster analysis and ordination (principal component analysis and correspondence analysis), including species data and abiotic data. We evaluated 1051 individuals, belonging to 155 species in 48 families. Of those 155, 18 were threatened species, 33 were endemic species, and 92 (59.4%) were secondary species. Th e overall Shannon index was 4.524, one of the highest recorded for a dense rainforest in southeastern Brazil. We found that our sample plots fell into three blocks. Th e fi rst was forest in which there had been human disturbance, showing low species richness, minimal density, and a small relative quantity of biomass. Th e second was undisturbed mature forest, showing a comparatively larger quantity of biomass. Th e third was mature forest in which there had been natural intermediate disturbance (dead trees), showing higher species richness and greater density. We identifi ed various groups of species that could be used in monitoring these distinct forest conditions.
Milestones in research on the pathophysiology of Parkinson's disease

Progress in our understanding of the mechanisms underlying the cardinal motor abnormalities of Parkinson's disease (PD), in particular akinesia and bradykinesia and their treatment, has been remarkable. Notable accomplishments include insights into the functional organization of the basal ganglia and their place in the motor system as components of a family of parallel cortico‐subcortical circuits that subserve motor and nonmotor functions and the development of models of the intrinsic organization of the basal ganglia, including delineation of the so‐called direct, indirect, and hyperdirect pathways. Studies in primate models of PD have provided insight into the alterations of neuronal activity that are responsible for the motor features of PD, revealing both altered tonic levels of discharge and significant disturbances of the patterns of discharge throughout the motor circuitry and have led to the formulation of circuit models of PD, providing testable hypotheses for research and stimulating the development of new therapies. Most importantly, the discovery that lesions of the subthalamic nucleus, a key node of the indirect pathway, abolish the cardinal features of PD contributed to the renaissance in the use of surgical approaches to treating patients with PD, including ablation and deep brain stimulation. © 2011 Movement Disorder Society
Individual visuospatial factors and familiar environment knowledge : A structural equation modeling analysis

Article history: Received 15 December 2016 Received in revised form 9 March 2017 Accepted 10 March 2017 Available online xxxx Individual differences in visuo-spatial factors play an important part in environment learning when it comes to mentally representing environments, but little is known about how visuo-spatial factors (in terms of abilities and self-assessments) are related to an individual's representations of familiar environments. A group of 273 female undergraduates familiar with a university campus completed object-based visuo-spatial tasks (i.e., mental rotation and visuo-spatial working memory [VSWM] tasks), and questionnaires on their self-assessed wayfinding inclinations (i.e., sense of direction, visuo-spatial preferences, pleasure in exploring environments), and their spatial anxiety. Their spatial orientation performance was assessed with landmark locating and pointing tasks. The results of structural equation modeling showed that object-based visuo-spatial abilities and self-assessedwayfinding inclinationswere relatedwith spatial orientation performance. In particular, itwas postulated that object-based visuo-spatial abilities (where rotation had an indirect effect through VSWM) and selfassessed wayfinding inclinations support spatial orientation performance. Spatial anxiety was only related to self-assessed wayfinding inclinations. Overall, these results show that a set of different individual visuo-spatial factors have a role in the representation of a familiar environment. © 2017 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
High-Frequency Doubler Operation of GaAs Field-Effect Transistors

A comprehensive study of single-gate GaAs FET frequency doublers is presented. Speciaf emphasis is placed on exploring frighfrequency limitations, while yielding explanations for previously observed lower frequency phenomena as well. Extensive Iarge-signaf simntations demonstrate the underlying relationships between circutt performance characteristics and principaf design parameter% Verifying experiments include a straight frequency doubler and a self-oscillating doubler, both with output signal frequencies in Ku-band. The self-oscillating doubler appears especially attractive, yielding an overafl de-to-RF efficiency of 10 percent. The type of transistor employed in the numerical and experimental examples possesses a gate length of 0.5 pm and a gate width of 250 pm. Manuscript received September 29, 1982; revised January 27, 1983. The author is with the Navrd Research Laboratory, Washington, DC 20375.
Uptake of Water via Branches Helps Timberline Conifers Refill Embolized Xylem in Late Winter1[C][W][OPEN]

Timberline conifers, which exhibit potentially lethal winter embolism, refill stem xylem with water taken up via branches and water transport to isolated, embolized conduits by active, cellular processes. Xylem embolism is a limiting factor for woody species worldwide. Conifers at the alpine timberline are exposed to drought and freeze-thaw stress during winter, which induce potentially lethal embolism. Previous studies indicated that timberline trees survive by xylem refilling. In this study on Picea abies, refilling was monitored during winter and spring seasons and analyzed in the laboratory and in situ experiments, based on hydraulic, anatomical, and histochemical methods. Refilling started in late winter, when the soil was frozen and soil water not available for the trees. Xylem embolism caused up to 86.2% ± 3.1% loss of conductivity and was correlated with the ratio of closed pits. Refilling of xylem as well as recovery in shoot conductance started in February and corresponded with starch accumulation in secondary phloem and in the mesophyll of needles, where we also observed increasing aquaporin densities in the phloem and endodermis. This indicates that active, cellular processes play a role for refilling even under winter conditions. As demonstrated by our experiments, water for refilling was thereby taken up via the branches, likely by foliar water uptake. Our results suggest that refilling is based on water shifts to embolized tracheids via intact xylem, phloem, and parenchyma, whereby aquaporins reduce resistances along the symplastic pathway and aspirated pits facilitate isolation of refilling tracheids. Refilling must be taken into account as a key process in plant hydraulics and in estimating future effects of climate change on forests and alpine tree ecosystems.
Preeclampsia, a pregnancy-specific disease, is associated with fetal monocyte activation.

The maternal syndrome of preeclampsia is an exclusively pregnancy-related illness involving multiple organs and severe forms may be complicated by HELLP (hemolysis, elevated liver enzymes, low platelets) syndrome. Recently, it has been proposed that both normal pregnancy and preeclampsia are associated with a systemic activation of the nonspecific maternal immune system and that, in particular, monocytes have a central role in the adjustment of maternal immune functions in pregnancy. Here we have investigated the role of the fetal nonadaptive immune system in normal term delivery, uncontrollable preterm labor, and preeclampsia. We demonstrate that spontaneous delivery at term as well as preterm occurrence of preeclampsia or HELLP syndrome are accompanied by an increased intracellular production of IL-6 in fetal monocytes, indicating strong activation of this cell type. In contrast, we show that elective cesarean delivery at term in the absence of labor or preterm delivery due to uncontrollable labor are not accompanied by an increased production of IL-6 in these cells. These results suggest that increased IL-6 synthesis in fetal monocytes may be a process occurring in association with normal spontaneous term delivery and that this process obviously occurs in early pregnancy in case of preeclampsia. Therefore, we propose that the activation of fetal monocytes as effectors of the innate immunity may be involved in mechanisms inducing spontaneous term delivery and that the occurrence of preeclampsia may be based on dysfunctions of probably both the maternal and the fetal innate immune system.
Reports of ‘growth’ in survivors of non‐small cell lung cancer and healthy controls: what is the value‐added by the cancer experience?

Reports of ‘growth’ following cancer diagnosis and treatment are common and are considered evidence for the transformative potential of the cancer experience. However, reports of growth are also common in the general population. This study sought to identify the unique, ‘value‐added’ with regard to the nature and magnitude of growth represented by the cancer experience.
Applied to the Coupling of a Continuum ( Elmer v 8 . 3 ) and a Discrete Element ( HiDEM v 1 . 0 ) Ice Dynamic Model

Scientific computing applications involving complex simulations and data-intensive processing are often composed of multiple tasks forming a workflow of computing jobs. Scientific communities running such applications on distributed and heterogeneous computing resources find it cumbersome to manage and monitor the execution of these tasks. Scientific workflow management systems (WMS) can be used to automate and simplify complex task structures by providing tooling for the composition and execution of workflows across distributed and heterogeneous computing environments. As a case study, we 5 apply the UNICORE workflow management system to a formerly hard-coded coupling of a glacier sliding and calving simulation that contains many tasks and dependencies, ranging from pre-processing and data management to repetitive executions in heterogeneous high-performance computing (HPC) resource environments. Using the UNICORE workflow management system, the composition, management, and execution of the glacier modelling workflow becomes easier with respect to usage, monitoring, maintenance, re-usability, portability, and reproducibility in different environments and by different user groups. 10
Evidence for regional differences of semen quality among fertile French men Fédération Française des CECOS

sperm concentration of Finnish men may be higher (140 3 1CECOS (Centres d’ Etude et de Conservation des Oeufs et du 106/ml) than elsewhere in Europe (Vierula et al., 1996). Sperme humains), 2CECOS Paris-Cochin, Service d’ Histologie et Furthermore, mean sperm concentrations of men from four Biologie de la Reproduction, Ho ˆpital Cochin, Universite ́ Paris V, Paris, France different regions of the USA were found to vary significantly
Long-term Effectiveness of Intensive Therapy in Chronic Stroke

Background. While recent clinical trials involving robot-assisted therapy have failed to show clinically significant improvement versus conventional therapy, it is possible that a broader strategy of intensive therapy—to include robot-assisted rehabilitation—may yield clinically meaningful outcomes. Objective. To test the immediate and sustained effects of intensive therapy (robot-assisted therapy plus intensive conventional therapy) on outcomes in a chronic stroke population. Methods. A multivariate mixed-effects model adjusted for important covariates was established to measure the effect of intensive therapy versus usual care. A total of 127 chronic stroke patients from 4 Veterans Affairs medical centers were randomized to either robot-assisted therapy (n = 49), intensive comparison therapy (n = 50), or usual care (n = 28), in the VA-ROBOTICS randomized clinical trial. Patients were at least 6 months poststroke, of moderate-to-severe upper limb impairment. The primary outcome measure was the Fugl-Meyer Assessment at 12 and 36 weeks. Results. There was significant benefit of intensive therapy over usual care on the Fugl-Meyer Assessment at 12 weeks with a mean difference of 4.0 points (95% CI = 1.3-6.7); P = . 005; however, by 36 weeks, the benefit was attenuated (mean difference 3.4; 95% CI = −0.02 to 6.9; P = .05). Subgroup analyses showed significant interactions between treatment and age, treatment and time since stroke. Conclusions. Motor benefits from intensive therapy compared with usual care were observed at 12 and 36 weeks posttherapy; however, this difference was attenuated at 36 weeks. Subgroups analysis showed that younger age, and a shorter time since stroke were associated with greater immediate and long-term improvement of motor function.
Analysis of Gene Induction and Arrest Site Transcription in Yeast with Mutations in the Transcription Elongation Machinery*

In vitro, transcript elongation by RNA polymerase II is impeded by DNA sequences, DNA-bound proteins, and small ligands. Transcription elongation factor SII (TFIIS) assists RNA polymerase II to transcribe through these obstacles. There is however, little direct evidence that SII-responsive arrest sites function in living cells nor that SII facilitates readthrough in vivo. Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains lacking elongation factor SII and/or containing a point mutation in the second largest subunit of RNA polymerase II, which slows the enzyme's RNA elongation rate, grow slowly and have defects in mRNA metabolism, particularly in the presence of nucleotide-depleting drugs. Here we have examined transcriptional induction in strains lacking SII or containing the slow polymerase mutation. Both mutants and a combined double mutant were defective in induction of GAL1 and ENA1. This was not due to an increase in mRNA degradation and was independent of any drug treatment, although treatment with the nucleotide-depleting drug 6-azauracil exacerbated the effect preferentially in the mutants. These data are consistent with mutants in the Elongator complex, which show slow inductive responses. When a potent in vitroarrest site was transcribed in these strains, there was no perceptible effect upon mRNA accumulation. These data suggest that an alternative elongation surveillance mechanism exists in vivo to overcome arrest.
HIV Case Management Support Service Is Associated with Improved CD4 Counts of Patients Receiving Care at the Antiretroviral Clinic of Pantang Hospital, Ghana

Background Factors associated with individual patient-level management of HIV have received minimal attention in sub-Saharan Africa. This study determined the association between support services and cluster of differentiation 4 (CD4) counts among HIV patients attending ART clinic in Ghana. Methodology This was a cross-sectional study involving adults with HIV recruited between 1 August 2014 and 31 January 2015. Data on support services were obtained through a closed-ended personal interview while the CD4 counts data were collected from their medical records. Data were entered into EpiData and analyzed using Stata software. Results Of the 201 patients who participated in the study, 67% (129/191) received case management support service. Counseling about how to prevent the spread of HIV (crude odds ratio (cOR) (95% confidence interval (CI)) (2.79 (1.17–6.68)), mental health services (0.2 (0.04–1.00)), and case management support service (2.80 (1.34–5.82))) was associated with improved CD4 counts of 350 cells/mm3 or more. After adjusting for counseling about how to prevent the spread of HIV and mental health services, case management support service was significantly associated with CD4 counts of 350 cells/mm3 or more (aOR = 2.36 (CI = 1.01–5.49)). Conclusion Case management support service for HIV patients receiving ART improves their CD4 counts above 350 cells/mm3. Incorporating HIV case management services in ART regimen should be a priority in sub-Saharan Africa.
Hypermethylated DNA, a circulating biomarker for colorectal cancer detection

Background Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most common cancers in the western world. Screening is an efficient method of reducing cancer-related mortality. Molecular biomarkers for cancer in general and CRC in particular have been proposed, and hypermethylated DNA from stool or blood samples are already implemented as biomarkers for CRC screening. We aimed to evaluate the performance of proven hypermethylated DNA promoter regions as plasma based biomarkers for CRC detection. Methods We conducted a cross-sectional case-control study of 193 CRC patients and 102 colonoscopy-verified healthy controls. Using methylation specific polymerase chain reaction, we evaluated 30 DNA promoter regions previously found to be CRC specific. We used multivariable logistic regression with stepwise backwards selection, and subsequent leave-pair-out cross validation, to calculate the optimism corrected area under the receiver operating characteristics curve (AUC) for all stage as well as early stage CRC. Results None of the individual DNA promoter regions provided an overall sensitivity above 30% at a reasonable specificity. However, seven hypermethylated promoter regions (ALX4, BMP3, NPTX2, RARB, SDC2, SEPT9, and VIM) along with the covariates sex and age yielded an optimism corrected AUC of 0.86 for all stage CRC and 0.85 for early stage CRC. Overall sensitivity for CRC detection was 90.7% at 72.5% specificity using a cut point value of 0.5. Conclusions Individual hypermethylated DNA promoter regions have limited value as CRC screening markers. However, a panel of seven hypermethylated promoter regions show great promise as a model for CRC detection.
Analysis of regulatory elements of E‐cadherin with reporter gene constructs in transgenic mouse embryos

Proper regulation of E‐cadherin–mediated cell adhesion is important during early embryonic development and in organogenesis. In mice, E‐cadherin is expressed from the fertilized egg onward and becomes down‐regulated during gastrulation in mesoderm and its derivatives, but its expression is maintained in all epithelia. E‐cadherin promoter analyses led to the identification of binding sites for two transcriptional repressors, Snail and SIP1, which are able to mediate down‐regulation in vitro, but little is known about the regulatory elements that govern E‐cadherin transcriptional activity in vivo. Here, we compared the developmentally regulated expression of a series of lacZ‐reporter transgenes fused to different sequences of the murine E‐cadherin gene between −6 kb, including the promoter, and +16 kb, covering one third of intron 2. Four different segments with distinct regulatory properties were identified. The promoter fragment from +0.1 to −1.5 kb remains inactive in most cases but occasionally induces ectopic expression in mesodermal tissues, although it contains binding sites for the repressors Snail and SIP1. This promoter fragment also lacks positive elements needed for the activation of transcription in ectoderm and endoderm. Sequences from −1.5 to −6 kb harbor regulatory elements for brain‐specific expression and, in addition, insulator or silencer elements, because they are consistently inactive in the mesoderm. Only if sequences from +0.1 to +11 kb are combined with the promoter fragments is E‐cadherin–specific transgene expression observed in endoderm and certain epithelia. Sequences between +11 and +16 kb contain cis‐active elements that generally enhance transcription. Our analyses show that E‐cadherin expression is governed by a complex interplay of multiple regulatory regions dispersed throughout large parts of the locus. Developmental Dynamics 227:238–245, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Re-evaluating the Roles of Proposed Modulators of Mammalian Target of Rapamycin Complex 1 (mTORC1) Signaling*

Signaling through mammalian target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) is stimulated by amino acids and insulin. Insulin inactivates TSC1/2, the GTPase-activator complex for Rheb, and Rheb·GTP activates mTORC1. It is not clear how amino acids regulate mTORC1. FKBP38 (immunophilin FK506-binding protein, 38 kDa), was recently reported to exert a negative effect on mTORC1 function that is relieved by its binding to Rheb·GTP. We confirm that Rheb binds wild type FKBP38, but inactive Rheb mutants showed contrasting abilities to bind FKBP38. We were unable to observe any regulation of FKBP38/mTOR binding by amino acids or insulin. Furthermore, FKBP38 did not inhibit mTORC1 signaling. The translationally controlled tumor protein (TCTP) in Drosophila was recently reported to act as the guanine nucleotide-exchange factor for Rheb. We have studied the role of TCTP in mammalian TORC1 signaling and its control by amino acids. Reducing TCTP levels did not reproducibly affect mTORC1 signaling in amino acid-replete/insulin-stimulated cells. Moreover, overexpressing TCTP did not rescue mTORC1 signaling in amino acid-starved cells. In addition, we were unable to see any stable interaction between TCTP and Rheb or mTORC1. Accumulation of uncharged tRNA has been previously proposed to be involved in the inhibition of mTORC1 signaling during amino acid starvation. To test this hypothesis, we used a Chinese hamster ovary cell line containing a temperature-sensitive mutation in leucyl-tRNA synthetase. Leucine deprivation markedly inhibited mTORC1 signaling in these cells, but shifting the cells to the nonpermissive temperature for the synthetase did not. These data indicate that uncharged tRNALeu does not switch off mTORC1 signaling and suggest that mTORC1 is controlled by a distinct pathway that senses the availability of amino acids. Our data also indicate that, in the mammalian cell lines tested here, neither TCTP nor FKBP38 regulates mTORC1 signaling.