Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Virulence of protein A-deficient and alpha-toxin-deficient mutants of Staphylococcus aureus isolated by allele replacement

The gene coding for protein A (spa) of Staphylococcus aureus 8325-4 has been inactivated by substituting part of the spa coding sequence for a DNA fragment specifying resistance to ethidium bromide. The in vitro-constructed spa::EtBrr substitution mutation was introduced into the S. aureus chromosome by recombinational allele replacement. Southern blot hybridization showed that the in vitro-constructed mutation was present in the chromosomal spa locus. We have previously reported the inactivation of the alpha-toxin gene (hly) by allele replacement with an in vitro-constructed hly::Emr (erythromycin resistance) mutation (M. O'Reilly, J.C.S. de Azavedo, S. Kennedy, and T.J. Foster, Microb. Pathogen. 1:125-138, 1986). A double Spa- Hly- mutant was constructed by transduction. The virulence of Spa- and Hly- mutants was tested by experimental infection of mice. When subcutaneous injections were given, Hly- mutants formed a flat, darkened lesion, whereas Hly+ strains caused a raised, cream lesion. Alpha-toxin was shown to be a major factor in forming subcutaneous lesions and in causing the death of mice injected intraperitoneally. Spa- mutants were slightly less virulent than their Spa+ counterparts, which suggests that protein A is also a virulence factor of S. aureus.
Calprotectin plasma level is elevated in preeclampsia

Background. Calprotectin is a protein found in myelomonocytic cells and plays a role in various physiological functions such as inflammatory processes and antiproliferation of cells, and in the neutrophil defense against bacterial infections. Preeclampsia is characterized by maternal endothelial dysfunction and by insufficient trophoblast invasion into the maternal endometrium (decidua). In addition, preeclampsia is associated with maternal leukocyte activation and we therefore wanted to investigate whether calprotectin levels in plasma from women with preeclampsia differed from the levels in normotensive pregnant and nonpregnant women.
A Relevance Score Estimation for Spoken Term Detection Based on RNN-Generated Pronunciation Embeddings

In this paper, we present a novel method for term score estimation. The method is primarily designed for scoring the out-of-vocabulary terms, however it could also estimate scores for in-vocabulary results. The term score is computed as a cosine distance of two pronunciation embeddings. The first one is generated from the grapheme representation of the searched term, while the second one is computed from the recognized phoneme confusion network. The embeddings are generated by specifically trained recurrent neural network built on the idea of Siamese neural networks. The RNN is trained from recognition results on wordand phone-level in an unsupervised fashion without need of any hand-labeled data. The method is evaluated on the MALACH data in two languages, English and Czech. The results are compared with two baseline methods for OOV term detection.
A Consideration of Literature on Trust and Distrust as They Relate to Auditor Professional Scepticism

type="main"> With a view to expanding the discussion on professional scepticism, and motivating a broader perspective in research undertaken with the aim of helping auditors meet ongoing demands for an elevated level of professional scepticism, we consider the literature on trust and distrust as it relates to auditor professional scepticism. We draw on literature from a range of disciplines, and highlight new opportunities and previously unidentified challenges in helping auditors exercise an elevated level of professional scepticism. We distinguish between trust and distrust and note that the issue of professional scepticism is likely to be as much about auditors being insufficiently distrusting as it is about auditors being overly trusting. A number of potentially fruitful means by which professional scepticism might be enhanced are highlighted but we also encourage caution in that lower levels of trust in management, and increased distrust in management, may have unintended negative consequences.
Le crédit d’impôt dédié au développement durable: une évaluation économétrique

This article evaluates the incentive impact of the 2006 increase from 25 % to 40 % in the tax credit on residential energy-efficiency improvement for homeowners who have lived for two years or less in a dwelling built before 1977. We estimate a triple-differences model combined with matching on exhaustive fiscal data. If the credit rate had stayed at 25 %, one in fifteen eligible households among households filing tax returns and living in buildings completed between 1969 and 1976 would not have used this tax credit in 2006; the proportion would have risen to one in eight in 2007 and 2008. Unless we assume substantial CO 2 emission reductions after energy conservation investments, our model shows that public spending per tonne of CO 2 not emitted would exceed ? 32, the social cost of carbon in France.
Peranan Teknologi dalam Konvergensi Pertumbuhan Ekonomi antar Daerah Pesisir di Kawasan Timur Indonesia

The economic growth of Indonesian eastern zone has lower than that of Indonesian western area relatively. Within pushing economic growth, poor region will faster than rich region, income disparity among region in Indonesian Eastern Region will converge. The phenomena also could be seen from comparing among coastal region in the area. The research was aimed to know of technological contribution in converging of economic growth among coastal region in Indonesian eastern area. Data were panel data from period 1975-2002 which were analyzed using Total Factor Productivity (TFP) catch-up model and Technological transferring model. The results show that within TFP model, the difference of technological level among coastal region in Indonesian Eastern Area brought of difference of catching TFP significantly. If the difference of technological level was gone, catching of TFP would show at the faster level and pushing converge at the income level among coastal region in Indonesian Eastern area. Within technological transferring model, most of the convergence come from technological transfer with the difference of technological level among coastal region are widest. If the difference was gone, the technological transfer would be faster and more pushing of income converging among coastal region in Indonesian eastern zone. Keywords: economic growth, eastern indonesia, coastal regions
A Dissipative Time Reversal Technique for Photoacoustic Tomography in a Cavity

We consider the inverse source problem arising in thermo- and photoacoustic tomography. It consists in reconstructing the initial pressure from the boundary measurements of the acoustic wave. Our goal is to extend versatile time reversal techniques to the case when the boundary of the domain is perfectly reflecting, effectively turning the domain into a reverberant cavity. Standard time reversal works only if the solution of the direct problem decays in time, which does not happen in the setup we consider. We thus propose a novel time reversal technique with a nonstandard boundary condition. The error induced by this time reversal technique satisfies the wave equation with a dissipative boundary condition and, therefore, decays in time. For larger measurement times, this method yields a close approximation; for smaller times, the first approximation can be iteratively refined, resulting in a convergent Neumann series for the approximation.
O ornitorrinco de chuteiras : determinantes econômicos da política de esporte e lazer do Governo Lula e suas implicações sociais

The focus of this study is the federal sport policy during Lula s government, and it aims to identify and discuss the economical, social and political determinants that outline and characterize Brazilian sport policy from 2003 to 2010. This is an exploratory social research in which the theoretical and methodological approach is anchored on historical materialism. The collection of data and the development of categorical and theoretical frameworks have been informed by methodological procedures/instruments associated with bibliographical and documental research, concentrating particularly in the following sources: (i) official government publications; (ii) systems for monitoring the budget and public expenditure at the federal level; (iii) reports from control bodies of the State; (iv) non-governmental organizations reports and technical notes; (v) econometric studies carried out by private foundations and international consultants. The discussions and arguments developed in the two first chapters prioritize a historical review of the consolidation of sport in Brazil, reinforcing the understanding of its social role as an intermediate necessity to the attainment of citizenship rights. At the same time, these chapters attempt to locate and lay emphasis on – from the period of the Estado Novo onwards – the interfaces between the evolution of the Brazilian capitalist system and its national sport system. The last two chapters concentrate on sport in the scope of Lula s Government and place emphasis on its interaction with the economic and social policies of that time. The analyses show that the sport policy’s priorities of the period between 2003-2010 were redirected because of the Pan American Games in 2007 and the III Sport National Conference in 2010. This redirection aimed to privilege the sport mega events (World Cup in 2014 and Olympic Games in 2016) to be organized in Brazil. The confirmation of the country as the host of these sports mega events is a consequence of a range of factors, among which a salient engagement and involvement on the part of the State. The sharp presence of the federal government in obtaining the right to host those events shows the bonds between the sport policies and the social and economic determinants of the neo-developmentalist model conceived by Lula s Administration, and it also emphasizes the State functions of accumulation and legitimacy highlighted by O Connor (1997). Key-words: Brazil, social policy, sport policy.
Intergenerational Transmission of Health at Birth from Mothers and Fathers

We use a unique data set of linked birth records from Florida to analyze the intergenerational transmission of health at birth by parental gender. We show that both paternal and maternal birth weights significantly predict the child’s birth weight even after accounting for all genetic and environmental factors that are common and time-invariant within a family. Our estimates reveal that a one standard deviation increase in mother’s birth weight (535 grams) translates into a 0.13-0.23 standard deviations increase in child’s birth weight (70-123 grams), accounting or not for maternal grandmother fixed effects. On the father’s side, we find that a one standard deviation increase in father’s birth weight (563 grams) translates into a 0.10-0.14 standard deviations increase in child’s birth weight (51-73 grams), accounting or not for maternal grandmother fixed effects. The significant role of both maternal and paternal health at birth in explaining offspring health at birth is confirmed when using alternative metrics: intrauterine growth restriction, being small for gestational age, or being too heavy (i.e., macrosomic).
Effects of post-deposition anneal on the electrical properties of Si3N4 gate dielectric

The effects of postdeposition anneal of chemical vapor deposited silicon nitride are studied. The Si/sub 3/N/sub 4/ films were in situ annealed in either H/sub 2/(2%)/O/sub 2/ at 950/spl deg/C or N/sub 2/O at 950/spl deg/C in a rapid thermal oxidation system. It is found that an interfacial oxide was grown at the Si/sub 3/N/sub 4//Si interface by both postdeposition anneal conditions. This was confirmed by thickness measurement and X-ray photoelectronic spectroscopy (XPS) analysis. The devices with H/sub 2/(2%)/O/sub 2/ anneal exhibit a lower gate leakage current and improved reliability compared to that of N/sub 2/O anneal. This improvement is attributed to a greater efficiency of generating atomic oxygen in the presence of a small amount of hydrogen, leading to the elimination of structural defects in the as-deposited Si/sub 3/N/sub 4/ film by the atomic oxygen. Good drivability is also demonstrated on a 0.12 /spl mu/m n-MOSFET device.
Cuspal Flexure and Extent of Cure of a Bulk-fill Flowable Base Composite.

OBJECTIVES To investigate a bulk-fill flowable base composite (Surefil SDR Flow) in terms of cuspal flexure and cure when used in incremental or bulk techniques. METHODS Mesio-occluso-distal cavities (4 mm deep, 4 mm wide) were prepared in 24 extracted molars. The slot-shaped cavities were etched, bonded, and restored in 1) two 2-mm increments Esthet-X HD (control), 2) two 2-mm increments Surefil SDR Flow, or 3) 4-mm bulk Surefil SDR Flow (N=8). The teeth were digitized after preparation (baseline) and restoration and were precisely aligned to calculate cuspal flexure. Restored teeth were placed in fuchsin dye for 16 hours to determine occlusal bond integrity from dye penetration. Extent of cure was assessed by hardness at 0.5-mm increments through the restoration depth. Results were analyzed with analysis of variance and Student-Newman-Keuls post hoc tests (α=0.05). RESULTS Surefil SDR Flow, either incrementally or bulk filled, demonstrated significantly less cuspal flexure than Esthet-X HD. Dye penetration was less than 3% of cavity wall height and was not statistically different among groups. The hardness of Surefil SDR Flow did not change throughout the depth for both incrementally and bulk filled restorations; the hardness of Esthet-X HD was statistically significantly lower at the bottom of each increment than at the top. CONCLUSIONS Filling in bulk or increments made no significant difference in marginal bond quality or cuspal flexure for the bulk-fill composite. However, the bulk-fill composite caused less cuspal flexure than the incrementally placed conventional composite. The bulk-fill composite cured all the way through (4 mm), whereas the conventional composite had lower cure at the bottom of each increment.
The Quality of Institutions and Quality of Development

The positive influences of institutions to economic growth, commonly measured by GDP per capita, have been intensively tested by many empirical studies. However, as the challenges of pollution, corruption, and inequality raise up, the quality of economic development and how to achieve the good quality development have become an unavoidable issues. This paper attempts to establish a comprehensive performance measurement for economic development and explores the connections between the quality of institutions and the quality of economic development. The good quality economic development is defined as an innovation oriented environmental friendly economic growth with a fair income distribution, and is quantified by six sub-indices. The Quality Development Index (QDI) is formed by using the econometrics methodologies of mean value treatment and Principle Component Analysis (PCA). The World Governance Indicators (Kaufmann, Kraay, and Mastruzzi 2013) is adopted as the indicators of the institutions quality. The Fixed Effected Regression model is employed and the regressions results are tested by GLS and GMM methodologies. The results demonstrate that the quality of institutions have the significant positive impacts to the quality of economic development. This study also approves that the social, politic and economic institutions are interconnected, and the better quality of social and political institutions, such as more equal political and economic rights, better quality of public services and judiciary system, are significantly contribute to the higher performance of innovation, environment protection, and fair income distribution.
Extraction, Purification and Characterization of Protease from Aspergillus Niger Isolated from Yam Peels

Protease was obtained from Aspergillus niger isolated from yam peels; a food waste, purified and characterized. Purification was achieved using ion exchange DEAE column and gel filtration (Sephadex G-200) chromatography. Effects of temperature; pH and production time on protease production were investigated. Also, physicochemical characteristics of the purified enzyme were investigated. The optimum production of protease was at temperature, pH and time of 37oC, 7.0 and 42 hrs respectively. The results showed that purified protease had more specific enzymatic activity than crude samples from Aspergillus Niger. whereas the specific activity of crude enzyme was 0.51 (U/mg), while the purified enzyme had an improved specific activity of 8.51 (U/mg). Optimum temperature and pH values of the purified protease were found to be 50°C and 10.0, respectively. pH stability of the enzyme ranged from 3.0- 12.0. At 3.0 and 10.0 it retained 70% and 60% of its activity after 5 hrs of incubation. Temperature stability ranged between 30oC and 90oC but most stable at 50oC retaining 94% of its activity after 1 h of incubation. The enzyme exhibited maximum activity on casein, among other protein substrates. EDTA, Cu2+, Fe2+, Mg 2+, and Ca2+ inhibited its activity while Na+ enhanced it. The enzyme was purified 16.60-fold, had a yield of 10.96 and the apparent molecular weight was 46.90 kDa. The study revealed that protease from A. niger can be exploited for protein conversion biotechnologies.
Diagnostic accuracy of benign eyelid skin lesions in the minor operation theatre

PURPOSE To determine the accuracy of the clinical diagnosis of benign eyelid skin lesions in a minor operation theatre (MOT) setting. METHODS This study was carried out prospectively over a 6-month period. Subjects attending the minor operation theatre set-up with eyelid skin lesions were assessed and lesions were labelled as benign, pre-malignant or malignant. All patients underwent excision biopsy of the lesion. Histopathologic diagnosis was obtained for each lesion, which was then matched with the respective clinical diagnosis. The Diagnostic Accuracy (DA) was calculated for benign lesions using the formula proposed by Lightstone et al. RESULTS Two hundred eyelid skin lesions from 183 consecutive patients were included in the study. Clinically, 187 lesions were labelled as benign, 12 as malignant and 1 as pre-malignant. The histopathologic report matched with the clinical diagnosis in 192 cases (96%). However, incorrect diagnoses included 3 malignant and 3 premalignant lesions that were labelled as benign clinically. The DA for benign lesion was 95.7%. CONCLUSION Histopathologic confirmation may be necessary for most cases in the MOT.
BraceAssertion: Runtime Verification of Cyber-Physical Systems

Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) have gained wide popularity, however, developing and debugging CPS remain significant challenges. Many bugs are detectable only at runtime under deployment conditions that may be unpredictable or at least unexpected at development time. The current state of the practice of debugging CPS is generally ad hoc, involving trial and error in a real deployment. For increased rigor, it is appealing to bring formal methods to CPS verification. However developers often eschew formal approaches due to complexity and lack of efficiency. This paper presents Brace Assertion, a specification framework based on natural language queries that are automatically converted to a determinitic class of timed automata used for runtime monitoring. To reduce runtime overhead and support properties that reference predicate logic, we use a second monitor automaton to create filtered traces on which to run the analysis using the specification monitor. We evaluate the Brace Assertion framework using a real CPS case study and show that the framework is able to minimize runtime overhead with an increasing number of monitors.
The Value of Imaging in Standing Position in Preoperative Breast Lymphoscintigraphy

Purpose: Breast lymphoscintigraphy is an accurate technique, but in a minority of cases the sentinel node (SN) visualization cannot be achieved or can be very difficult. We evaluated the potential clinical advantages and limitations of performing imaging in the standing position. The aim was to establish if this examination modality is quicker and helpful in the presence of “hidden” SN, checking also for any influence of SN skin landmarking in the upright position on the correct intraoperative SN identification. The overall objective was to verify if the standing position can be routinely used in breast lymphoscintigraphy. Methods: A total of 144 patients underwent lymphoscintigraphy in both standing and supine positions. In both modalities, a skin landmark was set coincident with the SN orthogonal projections. The acquisition times of 2 groups (each consisting of 45 patients) examined with the standing or supine acquisition modality, were compared. Results: In 6 cases with hidden SN and in 34 cases with difficult or partial visualization in one of the supine views, the standing protocol was effective and led to better and quicker visualization of lymph nodes (median examination time: 25.5 minutes standing, 35.5 minutes supine). Significant differences in skin landmark position between the 2 modalities were present only in overweight patients and in large breasts. This, however, did not have a negative impact on successful intraoperative localization of SN with the gamma probe. Conclusions: Standing acquisition resulted to be a faster, easier, and more accurate examination protocol and can be used as the routine method for SN detection in breast lymphoscintigraphy.
Irradiated and Activated Autologous PBMCs Induce Expansion of Highly Cytotoxic Human NK Cells In Vitro

Adoptive cell transfer of ex vivo-activated natural killer (NK) cells is a promising therapy for cancer treatment. Because of inhibitory signaling through killer immunoglobulin-like receptor (KIR)-KIR ligands, KIR-mismatched allogeneic NK cell transfer is considered to be a more effective strategy than is autologous transfer. However, purified NK cells do not expand well enough in vitro with good manufacturing practice-compliant components for clinical use. Some investigators have developed selective expansion of NK cells from peripheral blood mononuclear cells, but these cells have the risk of graft-versus-host disease in allogeneic settings because of T cells contamination. In this study, we developed a novel method for NK cell activation and expansion. Using only good manufacturing practice-compliant components and autologous feeder cells, once purified NK cells were effectively expanded (2500-fold at day 17). The expanded cells were highly purified NK cells, and the use of these cells is suitable for allogeneic transfer without the risk of graft-versus-host disease induction. Importantly, the expanded NK cells also showed enhanced cytotoxicity compared with NK cells conventionally expanded by recombinant human interleukin 2. Finally, induction of NKG2D ligand expression on feeder cells implies that the NKG2D-NKG2DL interaction may play a role in NK cell expansion. In conclusion, this method can be used to obtain NK cells for more successful allogeneic NK cell adoptive transfer for use in antitumor immune therapy.