Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Incorporating primary eye care into primary health care: Piloting a perceived visual disability questionnaire based model in rural southern India – An observational study

Purpose: Over 20% of the world's visually impaired and blind populations live in India. Integration of primary eye care (PEC) into existing primary health care by trained personnel could address access-related barriers. We piloted an unreported, modified WHO disability questionnaire-based model for community health workers (CHWs) to screen and refer persons with perceived visual impairment instead of the traditional visual acuity model. The objective of the study was (1) to determine the prevalence of perceived visual impairment, rate of follow-up postreferral, distribution of ocular morbidity, visual impairment, and proportion of appropriate referrals and (2) to compare results of this intervention with those of existing services. Methods: CHWs were trained in administering a questionnaire for identification and referral of persons with perceived visual impairment in 7 rural villages and 22 tribal hamlets from the institutional database. In this cross-sectional study, patients screened and referred to PEC services from September 2014 to March 2015 underwent comprehensive ocular examination by an optometrist and ophthalmologist. Data collected from their records were analyzed retrospectively. Results: Of 18,534 individuals screened, 3082 (16.64%, 95% confidence interval: 16.06–17.14) complained of perceived visual impairment and were referred; 463 (15%) of these followed up for examination. Correct referrals were noted in 452 (97.6%) cases. Cataract (52.3%) and refractive error (15.8%) were the most common morbidities. There was a 39.6% increase in uptake of eye care services from baseline. Conclusion: The questionnaire-based screening tool administered by CHWs can lead to appropriate identification and referral of persons with ocular morbidity impacting uptake of eye care services.
Non-invasive right ventricular load adaptability indices in patients with scleroderma-associated pulmonary arterial hypertension

Scleroderma-associated pulmonary arterial hypertension (SSc-PAH) is associated with worse outcome than idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (IPAH), potentially due to worse right ventricular adaptation to load as suggested by pressure–volume loop analysis. The value of non-invasive load-adaptability metrics has not been fully explored in SSc-PAH. This study sought to assess whether patients with incident SSc-PAH have worse echocardiographic load-adaptability metrics than patients with IPAH. Twenty-two patients with incident SSc-PAH were matched 1:1 with IPAH based on pulmonary vascular resistance. Echocardiographic load-adaptability indices were divided into: surrogates of ventriculo-arterial coupling (e.g. right ventricular area change/end-systolic area), indices reflecting the proportionality of load adaptation (e.g. tricuspid regurgitation velocity-time integral normalized for average right ventricular radius), and simple ratios (e.g. tricuspid annular plane systolic excursion/right ventricular systolic pressure). The prognostic value of these indices for clinical worsening (i.e. death, transplant, or hospitalization for heart failure) at one year was explored. The two groups were comprised of patients of similar age, with similar cardiac index, pulmonary resistance, capacitance and NT-proBNP levels (p > 0.10). There was no difference in baseline right ventricular dimension, function or load-adaptability indices. At one year, eight (36.4%) SSc-PAH patients had experienced clinical worsening (eight hospitalizations and two deaths) versus one hospitalization in the IPAH group. Load adaptation at one year in survivors was not worse in SSc-PAH (p > 0.33). Patients with IPAH responded better to therapy than SSc-PAH in terms of reduction of right ventricular areas at one year (p < 0.05). Right ventricular load-adaptability echocardiographic indices do not appear to capture the increased risk of negative outcomes at one year associated with SSc-PAH.
Carbon stocks, sequestration, and emissions of wetlands in south eastern Australia

Nontidal wetlands are estimated to contribute significantly to the soil carbon pool across the globe. However, our understanding of the occurrence and variability of carbon storage between wetland types and across regions represents a major impediment to the ability of nations to include wetlands in greenhouse gas inventories and carbon offset initiatives. We performed a large‐scale survey of nontidal wetland soil carbon stocks and accretion rates from the state of Victoria in south‐eastern Australia—a region spanning 237,000 km2 and containing >35,000 temperate, alpine, and semi‐arid wetlands. From an analysis of >1,600 samples across 103 wetlands, we found that alpine wetlands had the highest carbon stocks (290 ± 180 Mg Corg ha−1), while permanent open freshwater wetlands and saline wetlands had the lowest carbon stocks (110 ± 120 and 60 ± 50 Mg Corg ha−1, respectively). Permanent open freshwater sites sequestered on average three times more carbon per year over the last century than shallow freshwater marshes (2.50 ± 0.44 and 0.79 ± 0.45 Mg Corg ha−1 year−1, respectively). Using this data, we estimate that wetlands in Victoria have a soil carbon stock in the upper 1 m of 68 million tons of Corg, with an annual soil carbon sequestration rate of 3 million tons of CO2 eq. year−1—equivalent to the annual emissions of about 3% of the state's population. Since European settlement (~1834), drainage and loss of 260,530 ha of wetlands may have released between 20 and 75 million tons CO2 equivalents (based on 27%–90% of soil carbon converted to CO2). Overall, we show that despite substantial spatial variability within wetland types, some wetland types differ in their carbon stocks and sequestration rates. The duration of water inundation, plant community composition, and allochthonous carbon inputs likely play an important role in influencing variation in carbon storage.
Analyzing mixing systems using a new generation of Bayesian tracer mixing models

The ongoing evolution of tracer mixing models has resulted in a confusing array of software tools that differ in terms of data inputs, model assumptions, and associated analytic products. Here we introduce MixSIAR, an inclusive, rich, and flexible Bayesian tracer (e.g., stable isotope) mixing model framework implemented as an open-source R package. Using MixSIAR as a foundation, we provide guidance for the implementation of mixing model analyses. We begin by outlining the practical differences between mixture data error structure formulations and relate these error structures to common mixing model study designs in ecology. Because Bayesian mixing models afford the option to specify informative priors on source proportion contributions, we outline methods for establishing prior distributions and discuss the influence of prior specification on model outputs. We also discuss the options available for source data inputs (raw data versus summary statistics) and provide guidance for combining sources. We then describe a key advantage of MixSIAR over previous mixing model software—the ability to include fixed and random effects as covariates explaining variability in mixture proportions and calculate relative support for multiple models via information criteria. We present a case study of Alligator mississippiensis diet partitioning to demonstrate the power of this approach. Finally, we conclude with a discussion of limitations to mixing model applications. Through MixSIAR, we have consolidated the disparate array of mixing model tools into a single platform, diversified the set of available parameterizations, and provided developers a platform upon which to continue improving mixing model analyses in the future.
Ergenlik Dönemi Öğrencilerinin Okuma Alışkanlıkları

Bu calisma ergenlik donemi icerisinde bulunan 8, 9, 10, 11 ve 12. sinif ogrencilerinin bos zamanlarinda Arastirmanin bulgulari 2009-2010 egitim- ogretim yilinin birinci doneminde Kirsehir il merkezindeki farkli sosyo-ekonomik duzeyden ilkogretim ve ortaogretim ogrencilerine anket uygulanarak elde edilmistir. Anket calismasi 627 ogrenciye uygulanmistir. Bulgular kismi ogrencilerin ankete verdikleri cevaplarin frekans (f), yuzde (%), aritmetik ortalama (X) ve standart sapma (ss) degerleri kullanilarak olusturulmustur. Bulgularin bir kismi su sekilde ozetlenebilir: Orneklemdeki ogrencilerin 239’u kiz, 388’i erkek ogrencilerden olusmaktadir. Elde edilen verilere gore kiz ogrencilerin okuma sikliklarinin erkek ogrencilere gore daha fazla oldugu; anne-baba egitim duzeyinin okuma sikligini artirdigi, 8. sinif ogrencilerinin 11 ve 12. sinif ogrencilerine gore daha fazla okudugu tespit edilmistir
Identification of fake reviews using semantic and behavioral features

In recent years, online reviews have been playing an important role in making purchase decisions. This is because, these reviews can provide customers with large amounts of useful information about the goods or service. However, to promote factitiously or lower the quality of the products or services, spammers may forge and produce fake reviews. Due to such behavior of the spammers, customers would be misleaded and make wrong decisions. Thus detecting fake (spam) reviews is a significant problem. In this paper, we propose two types of features and apply supervised machine learning algorithms for performing classification on Yelp's real-life data. In terms of features used, there are two new semantic feature sets: readability features and topic features. Our results show that our proposed new features are more effective than n-gram features in detecting spam reviews. To improve classification on the real Yelp review data, we use a set of behavioral features about reviewers and their reviews for learning, which dramatically improves the classification result on real-life opinion spam data. For further improvement, we also ensure the number of reviewers instead of reviews is balanced.
Addendum to “Relationships between Authentic Leadership, Moral Courage, and Ethical and Pro-Social Behaviors”

ABSTRACT: The authors provide this addendum to the following article to provide corrections to the results reported and further explanation of the structural equation modeling techniques utilized: Sean T. Hannah, Bruce J. Avolio, and Fred O. Walumbwa, “The Relationships between Authentic Leadership, Moral Courage, and Ethical and Pro-Social Behaviors,” Business Ethics Quarterly 21:4 (October 2011): 555–78.
Optimization of E. coli Inactivation by Benzalkonium Chloride Reveals the Importance of Quantifying the Inoculum Effect on Chemical Disinfection

Optimal disinfection protocols are fundamental to minimize bacterial resistance to the compound applied, or cross-resistance to other antimicrobials such as antibiotics. The objective is twofold: guarantee safe levels of pathogens and minimize the excess of disinfectant after a treatment. In this work, the disinfectant dose is optimized based on a mathematical model. The model explains and predicts the interplay between disinfectant and pathogen at different initial microbial densities (inocula) and dose concentrations. The study focuses on the disinfection of Escherichia coli with benzalkonium chloride, the most common quaternary ammonium compound. Interestingly, the specific benzalkonium chloride uptake (mean uptake per cell) decreases exponentially when the inoculum concentration increases. As a consequence, the optimal disinfectant dose increases exponentially with the initial bacterial concentration.
Oxidative stress regulates autophagy in cultured muscle cells of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

The proteolytic autophagy pathway is enhanced in the lower limb muscles of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Reactive oxygen species (ROS) have been shown to regulate autophagy in the skeletal muscles, but the role of oxidative stress in the muscle autophagy of patients with COPD is unknown. We used cultured myoblasts and myotubes from the quadriceps of eight healthy subjects and twelve patients with COPD (FEV1% predicted: 102.0% and 32.0%, respectively; p < 0.0001). We compared the autophagosome formation, the expression of autophagy markers, and the autophagic flux in healthy subjects and the patients with COPD, and we evaluated the effects of the 3‐methyladenine (3‐MA) autophagy inhibitor on the atrophy of COPD myotubes. Autophagy was also assessed in COPD myotubes treated with an antioxidant molecule, ascorbic acid. Autophagosome formation was increased in COPD myoblasts and myotubes (p = 0.011; p < 0.001), and the LC3 2/LC3 1 ratio (p = 0.002), SQSTM1 mRNA and protein expression (p = 0.023; p = 0.007), BNIP3 expression (p = 0.031), and autophagic flux (p = 0.002) were higher in COPD myoblasts. Inhibition of autophagy with 3‐MA increased the COPD myotube diameter (p < 0.001) to a level similar to the diameter of healthy subject myotubes. Treatment of COPD myotubes with ascorbic acid decreased ROS concentration (p < 0.001), ROS‐induced protein carbonylation (p = 0.019), the LC3 2/LC3 1 ratio (p = 0.037), the expression of SQSTM1 (p < 0.001) and BNIP3 (p < 0.001), and increased the COPD myotube diameter (p < 0.001). Thus, autophagy signaling is enhanced in cultured COPD muscle cells. Furthermore, the oxidative stress level contributes to the regulation of autophagy, which is involved in the atrophy of COPD myotubes in vitro.
Morphological assessment of the mandibular canal trajectory in edentate subjects.

BACKGROUND The mandibular canal and its content represent the vital structure, which can complicate dentoalveolar surgical procedures in the posterior region of the mandible. The purpose of the present study was to determine the path the mandibular canal takes in relation to the horizontal and the vertical anatomical reference planes in edentate subjects, in order to minimize the risk of affecting its neurovascular content during various oral surgery procedures. MATERIALS AND METHODS Morphometric evaluations were performed on 12 dried fully edentulous human mandibles and on cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) cross-sectional images of the mandible, from 20 patients with either partial or complete edentulism. Both methods were utilized, in three target areas (corresponding to the second premolar, to the first molar and to the second molar regions), in order to measure the distance between the mandibular canal and the following reference points: (i) the lateral (buccal) surface of the mandible (MC-BS distance); (ii) the medial (lingual) surface of the mandible (MC-LS distance); (iii) the alveolar surface of the mandible (MC-AS distance). The results were statistically processed in Stata MP/13 software package using analysis of variance (ANOVA) test. RESULTS The mandibular canal crossed the trabecular bone from the posterior towards the anterior, and from the lingual towards the buccal, reaching the premolar region, distal to the mental foramen, where it was located in the centre of the trabecular bone, main topographic pattern encountered in 27 (84.37%) of the cases. In five (15.63%) of the cases, in the premolar region, the mandibular canal was located near the buccal cortical plate. The mandibular canal descended from the second molar region towards the premolar region, main topographic pattern found in 28 (87.5%) of the cases. In four (12.5%) cases, the mandibular canal had a descending trajectory in the molar regions and it took a slightly ascending course in the premolar region. CONCLUSIONS According to the results, the second molar region represents the highest risk area in the accidental injury to the content of the mandibular canal, during various oral surgery procedures.
A Framework for Clustered and Skewed Sparse Signal Recovery

A novel framework, clustered-skew normal mixture-belief propagation, is developed to solve the reconstruction of undersampled clustered signals, where the magnitudes of signal coefficients in each cluster are distributed asymmetrically w.r. t the cluster mean. To address the skewness feature, a finite skew-normal density mixture is utilized to model the prior distribution, where the marginal posterior of the signal is inferred by an efficient approximate message-passing-based algorithm. An expectation-maximization-based algorithm is developed to estimate the mixture density. The clustered property is then modeled by the Potts model, and a loopy belief propagation algorithm is designed to promote the spatial feature. Experimental results show that our technique is highly effective and efficient in exploiting both the clustered feature and asymmetrical feature of the signals and outperforms many sophisticated techniques.
NK cells inhibit Plasmodium falciparum growth in red blood cells via antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity

Antibodies acquired naturally through repeated exposure to Plasmodium falciparum are essential in the control of blood-stage malaria. Antibody-dependent functions may include neutralization of parasite–host interactions, complement activation, and activation of Fc receptor functions. A role of antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity (ADCC) by natural killer (NK) cells in protection from malaria has not been established. Here we show that IgG isolated from adults living in a malaria-endemic region activated ADCC by primary human NK cells, which lysed infected red blood cells (RBCs) and inhibited parasite growth in an in vitro assay for ADCC-dependent growth inhibition. RBC lysis by NK cells was highly selective for infected RBCs in a mixed culture with uninfected RBCs. Human antibodies to P. falciparum antigens PfEMP1 and RIFIN were sufficient to promote NK-dependent growth inhibition. As these results implicate acquired immunity through NK-mediated ADCC, antibody-based vaccines that target bloodstream parasites should consider this new mechanism of action.
Mutational and transcriptional landscape of spontaneous gene duplications and deletions in Caenorhabditis elegans

Significance Copy-number variants are ubiquitous in nature, yet their immediate functional consequences are obscure. We conducted a spontaneous mutation accumulation experiment at varying sizes in Caenorhabditis elegans, thereby enabling the simultaneous investigation of the mutational input and strength of selection on the evolution of copy-number changes. Whole-genome sequencing reveals the highest genome-wide rate of gene duplication for any species thus far. Our transcriptome analysis further demonstrates that gene duplication frequently results in a greater than two-fold change in transcription. Despite the adaptive role of duplication as the primary source of novel genes, we find duplications and deletions of highly transcribed genes to be more detrimental to fitness and evidence for selection against increase in transcript abundance. Gene duplication and deletion are pivotal processes shaping the structural and functional repertoire of genomes, with implications for disease, adaptation, and evolution. We employed a mutation accumulation (MA) framework partnered with high-throughput genomics to assess the molecular and transcriptional characteristics of newly arisen gene copy-number variants (CNVs) in Caenorhabditis elegans populations subjected to varying intensity of selection. Here, we report a direct spontaneous genome-wide rate of gene duplication of 2.9 × 10−5/gene per generation in C. elegans, the highest for any species to date. The rate of gene deletion is sixfold lower (5 × 10−6/gene per generation). Deletions of highly expressed genes are particularly deleterious, given their paucity in even the N = 1 lines with minimal efficacy of selection. The increase in average transcript abundance of new duplicates arising under minimal selection is significantly greater than twofold compared with single copies of the same gene, suggesting that genes in segmental duplications are frequently overactive at inception. The average increase in transcriptional activity of gene duplicates is greater in the N = 1 MA lines than in MA lines with larger population bottlenecks. There is an inverse relationship between the ancestral transcription levels of new gene duplicates and population size, with duplicate copies of highly expressed genes less likely to accumulate in larger populations. Our results demonstrate a fitness cost of increased transcription following duplication, which results in purifying selection against new gene duplicates. However, on average, duplications also provide a significant increase in gene expression that can facilitate adaptation to novel environmental challenges.
The generalization performance of kernelized elastic net regularization based on exponentially strongly mixing observations

The study of kernelized elastic net regularization (KENReg) is a promising topic in machine learning community. Different from the elastic net regularizer in Zou and Hastie [1] which focuses on selecting group and correlated features, KENReg aims at obtaining a sparse and stable approximation to the regression function. In terms of generalization, sparseness and stability, KENReg performs better than kernelized Lasso, we are concerned about the generalization performance of KENReg in this paper. For the purpose of this paper is to study the generalization ability of KENReg for the dependent samples, and the dependent samples we choose are exponentially strongly mixing sequence. So as to study the generalization ability of KENReg for exponentially strongly mixing samples, we first use the stepping-stone technique proposed in Wu and Zhou [2], then we shown the generalization bounds of KENReg based on exponentially strongly mixing samples, and finally we make the results more accurate with uniformly ergodic Markov chains (u.e.M.c.) samples.
Spatial Distribution, Adsorption/Release Characteristics, and Environment Influence of Phosphorus on Sediment in Reservoir

Sediment gradually accumulates at the bottom of reservoirs after decades of running. To explore the influences of sediments on the water quality of reservoirs, the spatial distribution, adsorption/release characteristics, and environment influence of sediment pollutants should be analyzed. In this paper, the spatial distributions of phosphorus (P) and P fractions in the Biliuhe reservoir (river valley reservoirs) sediments were investigated. The adsorption and release characteristics of sediments P were studied in the experiment, while its environmental influence was analyzed too. The results indicate that the concentration of P in sediments was higher at the dam and the Zhongling site, while lower at other entrances of the reservoir and the smallest in the water-level fluctuating zone. Total Phosphorus (TP) varied from 355.46 to 764.57 mg/kg. Inorganic Phosphorus (IP) was the main form of TP in sediments, making up a proportion of 56–75%, while the correlation coefficient of P bound to Al, Fe, and Mn oxides was 0.922. Hydroxide (Fe/Al-P) was the main form of IP, which accounted for 46–83% with a correlation coefficient of 0.888. The maximum adsorption capacity calculated by Langmuir model was between 714.29 and 3333.33 mg/kg. The adsorption efficiency obtained by the Freundlich model was within the range of 0.40–1.42, which indicated that P adsorption was more difficult in the water-level fluctuating zone. The critical adsorption and release concentration range was 0.1–0.2 mg/L for the majority of the sampling points. The amount of P released in 24 h (the initial concentration of TP in the overlying water was 0 mg/L) accounted for 1.15–4.16% of TP in sediments, which was higher than the average concentration in the reservoir. It is concluded that the sediment is the potential pollution source. The relationship between the change of environmental factors and the release of sediment contaminants should be considered in the future.