Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Study of the Effect of HAART on Lipid Profile in HIV Positive Patients

DOI: 10.21276/sjams.2018. 6.3. 88 Abstract: Human immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infection is pandemic worldwide). Patients with HIV infection were reported to have hypocholesterolemia with or without hypertriglyceridemia however the mechanism of decrease in cholesterol levels is not known. Infections can increase serum triglycerides levels by decreasing clearance of circulating lipoprotein levels as process seems to inhibit the lipoprotein lipase activity or stimulating hepatic lipid synthesis through increase in either hepatic fatty acid synthesis or esterification of fatty acids derived from lipolysis. Keeping in view of the various biochemical abnormalities associated with lipid metabolism, our research was inclined to assess the lipid profile in HIV positive cases, with an attempt to further elucidate more features of HIV disease which erupts as acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) linking any possible involvement of lipid profile in disease progression of AIDS. A hospital based descriptive cross-sectional study. Conducted at ART centre, Department of Medicine, Hamidia Hospital, Gandhi Medical College, and Bhopal. Study participants were between age group 20 to 50 years those who newly diagnosed cases of HIV/AIDS in whom decision about ART was yet to be taken and patients on HAART whose initial lipid profile is available in records. Patients participating in study were thoroughly examined with standard clinical methods and assigned WHO clinical staging and subjected to various laboratory investigations. Mean age being (±SEM) 34.85±2.46 years. Highest number of the patients was of stage III disease with number of 102(51%). Out of all 200 patients 51 registered patients were HAART naïve and never started ART during study. Patients on HAART shows statistically significant (p<0.05) for Total Cholesterol (TC) which increased upto 242.6 ± 1.42 (Mean±SEM) from its baseline value of 240.3 ± 1.09. Serum Triglyserides also shown significant (p<0.05) rise from 137.5 ± 2.22 to 140.7 ± 2.88 (Mean±SEM). In lipid profile parameters all parameters raised from HAART to patients on HAART group but significant increase was seen for TC in HAART naïve group(p<0.05), for TC, S.TG (p<0.05) in Regimen I treated patients, same for the Regimen II treated patients, TC (p<0.005), S.TG (p<0.0001), HDLC (p<0.05) in Regimen II treated Patients and for TC, S.TG, HDLc, LDL and VLDL (p<0.005, p<0.005, p<0.05, p<0.005, p<0.05,) in Regiment III treated patients.
Love Styles in the Context of Life History Theory

The evolutionary function of love is to create a strong bond between the partners with reproduction in view. In order to achieve this goal, humans use various sexual/reproductive strategies, which have evolved due to specific reproductive benefits. The use of particular strategies depends on many factors but one of the most important is early childhood experiences, on which life history theory (LHT) focuses. John Lee (1973) identified 6 basic love styles: eros, ludus, storge, pragma, agape, and mania. Our goal was to check whether love styles may be treated as sexual/reproductive strategies in the context of LHT – slow or fast strategy. In our study (N = 177) we found that people who prefer the slow reproductive strategy are inclined to show passionate, pragmatic and friendly love, and those who prefer the fast strategy, treated love as a game. A low level of environmental stress in childhood results in preferring eros, storge and agape love styles, belonging to the slow strategy, and a high one results in preferring ludus, which belongs to the fast strategy. People representing eros, storge or pragma styles have restricted sociosexual orientation so they prefer long-term relationships, whereas those with the ludus style are people with unrestricted orientation, preferring short-term relationships. Besides, storge, agape and pragma seem to determine preferring qualities connected with parental effort in one’s partner, mania – with mating effort, and eros – with both kinds of effort. No correlation was found between the love style and the number of children.
Customer Experience Monitoring: A Study of Zambian Banks

The fast growing level of competitiveness and fundamental amendments in the world of business especially in the banking sector nowadays are pushing firms and for that matter banks to implement a customer-based strategy, which proves the importance of customer experience monitoring constructs such as customer experience and satisfaction, quality of service, and customer loyalty in explaining a bankâ€™s performance. Consequently, this study seeks to develop and empirically test customer experience monitory and evaluation and also to study the influences of service quality, customer satisfaction, and customer loyalty in the Zambian banking industry. A survey was conducted with banking customers on many validated questions, based on which we got 107 valid responses. The data was processed to produce the valuable results and Quantitative Data Analysis (QDA), via simple regression analysis and ANOVA. The findings and analysis of data shows that quality of service provided and customer satisfaction are important when monitoring the experience of customers based on the effects of quality of service and customer loyalty and there returns thereafter. Based on the data analyzed, the study concluded that customer experience has positive impact on customer loyalty and banks must ensure that their customer walk out with good experience by monitoring this periodically to adapt or adjust to current trends. The study also observed a significant relationship between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. The theoretical and managerial implications of the study confirmed the theoretical framework. Consequently, the following recommendations were contrived: staffs of financial institutions should create a friendly environment with their customers. The Bankâ€™s environment should be conducive, attractive, decent and enabling enough to psychologically assure their customer of the best of service. Also, there should be a routine high quality of service delivered to customers and their views sorted routinely. This may help boost and also add to the value of experience of customers, thus their total satisfaction on the Bankâ€™s service.
C Communication

In humans, communication is one of those terms that everyone knows but may be a little more difficult for some of us to define. In animal communication, biologists have been arguing over the definition for decades (see Table 1 for some, but by no means exhaustive list, of animal communication definitions). There are three things that most biologists agree upon: (1) there has to be a sender and a receiver, (2) there has to be a signal, and (3) this signal has been shaped by natural selection for the purpose of communication (this last piece becomes important when we start to define cues versus signals below). Where biologists disagree is the relationship between sender and receiver and what is being transmitted in the signal. The relationship between sender and receiver becomes important when we think about fitness and how natural selection acts on individuals. Dawkins and Krebs (1978) proposed that communication involves a sender manipulating the receiver but failed to take into account that the receiver is also under natural selection and is not a by-stander in the communication relationship. Later, they (Krebs and Dawkins 1984) clarified that, in general, a sender is manipulating the receiver and the receiver is trying to mind-read the sender. Viewed this way, both sender and receiver are under natural selection and both are essentially trying to trick the other into doing something that benefits them. This adaptationist definition was stated best by Maynard Smith and Harper (2003, p. 3) where they defined communication as: “a sender producing a signal, which alters the behavior of other organisms, which evolved because of that effect, and which is effective because the receiver’s response has also evolved. ” This takes the sender and receiver into account, clearly defines a signal, and allows for natural selection to act on the sender and receiver. The next thing most biologists disagree on is what, if anything, is being transferred between sender and receiver in a signal.
Paper Series EDP-0724 Weighted smooth transition regressions

A new procedure is developed for modelling and testing nonlinearity of a smooth transition form, allowing the possibility that the transition variable is a weighted function of lagged observations. This is achieved through use of a beta function and requires specification of only the maximum permissable lag. Nonlinearity testing uses a search over the beta function parameters, with inference explicitly reconising these are unidentified under the null hypothesis. A wild boostrap procedure is recommended to allow for heteroscedasticity of unknown form, with a Monte Carlo study showing this to perform well even for a homoscedastic DGP. Estimation issues are also discussed. An application to the yield curve as a predictor of quarterly UK growth illustrates the usefulness of the procedure for modelling data of mixed frequencies. Corresponding author Ralf Becker Economics, School of Social Sciences University of Manchester Manchester M13 9PL, UK email ralf.becker@manchester.ac. uk Ph +44 (0)161 275 4807.
Physical and Mechanical Properties of Particleboard Made from Palm Tree Prunings

Palm trees are very fast-growing species. Their management produces annually a large amount of biomass that traditionally has been either disposed of at dumping sites or has been burnt onsite. This paper presents an experimental study to obtain particleboard using this biomass in a low energy process (short pressing time and low pressing temperature), using particles of different sizes from the rachis (midrib) of the three palm species most representative of urban gardening in Spain: canary palm (Phoenix canariensis hort. ex Chabaud), date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) and washingtonia palm (Washingtonia robusta H. Wendl). Their physical and mechanical properties were tested, and the feasibility of their use as a construction material was evaluated. The results showed that the manufactured particleboard had similar performance to conventional wood particleboard and good thermal insulation properties. Boards made with the canary species showed better mechanical performance. The properties of the particleboard depended on the particle size and species. The use of the pruning waste of palm trees to produce durable materials such as particleboard could be beneficial to the environment since it is a method of carbon fixation, helping to decrease atmospheric pollution and reducing the amount of waste that ends in dumping sites.
The Influence of Trauma, Locus of Control, And Health-Related Quality Of Life on a Child’s Self-Worth

Previous literature has shown that childhood trauma and adverse experiences are related to a wide range of negative outcomes that can span into adulthood (e.g., low selfworth, poor physical health, and increased likelihood of co-morbid psychological symptoms). However, a gap remains in the existing literature regarding early interventions that may target complicated outcomes (i.e., self-esteem and self-worth) while the survivor is still in childhood. This paper attempts to elucidate the impact that traumatic childhood experiences may have on self-worth, and the importance of implementing targeted intervention before the child reaches adulthood. Therefore, an extensive review was first conducted to gain further insight in regards to how specific variables, namely locus of control and health-related quality of life, may predict childhood development of self-worth. The present study then explored the influence of each factor on a child and adolescent community sample that experienced various types of trauma 61 children and adolescents who were survivors of varying types of trauma were recruited from a local mental health clinic (M=11.89; SD=2.49; 31 males, 30 INFLUENCE ON A CHILD’S SELF WORTH viii females). Measures pertaining to locus of control, health-related quality of life, and selfworth were administered at their therapeutic baseline by a randomly assigned therapist. A measure of resiliency was also administered as a secondary exploratory analysis. Results highlighted pediatric quality of life and trauma type as meaningful predictors of selfworth outcomes. Additionally, resiliency as a construct with a significant correlational relationship with self-worth. All findings were interpreted for purposes of intervention, and treatment proposals were delineated.
Quality of Services in Cataract Control Programme in Wardha District

Cataract is a major cause of blindness and severe visual impairment in India. For controlling cataract blindness and effective implementation of program there is need of data on to see the effectiveness of the surgical procedures adopted and the cause for failure of improvement in vision after surgery. Hence in this study coverage of cataract surgery and the outcome of surgery were studied in Wardha district. Out of 5263 persons screened, 648 persons had been operated for cataract in one or both eyes (379 in one eye and 269 in both eyes) were included in the study. And other 456 persons having presenting visual acuity less than 6/60 in either eye with no history of ocular surgery were also included. Total 1104 persons were taken for detailed ocular examination, history and interview. In this study it was found that the cataract surgical coverage was 59% for persons. Quality of life scores in all fields of activities were significantly better in persons who had been operated for cataract in both eyes as compared to persons suffering from bilateral cataract blindness (p<0.0001). Visual function scores of persons who had been operated for cataract in both eyes were significantly better as compared to persons suffering from bilateral cataract blindness.
Development of Appetizer from Box Myrtle (Myrica nagi) and its Quality Evaluation during Storage

Box myrtle (Myrica nagi), a wild fruit is a rich source of antioxidants like phenols and anthocyanins, and has commercial importance because of higher sugar content. Investigations were conducted to develop a commercial appetizer (spiced squash) and evaluate its quality during storage. Different combinations of juice and sugar syrup were tried to standardize a proper combination for appetizer. The appetizer prepared by the optimize recipe was packed in glass and PET bottles and stored for six months under ambient and refrigerated temperature conditions. Appetizer could be safely stored for a period of six months under both the ambient and refrigerated conditions without much change in various quality characteristics. However, the changes in the quality characteristics of the appetizer were slower in refrigerated storage conditions as compared to ambient conditions. Both the packaging materials viz., PET and glass bottles were found suitable, with comparatively lesser changes occurring in glass bottle under refrigerated conditions than others.
Opportunities and challenges of implementing Pharmacogenomics in cancer drug development

Cancer drug development is a time and resources consuming process. Around 90% of drugs entering clinical trials fail due to lack of efficacy and/or safety issues, more often after conspicuous research and economic efforts. Part of the discarded drugs might be beneficial only in a subgroup of the study patients, and some adverse events might be prevented by identifying those patients more vulnerable to toxicities. The implementation of pharmacogenomic biomarkers allows the categorization of patients, to predict efficacy and toxicity and to optimize the drug development process. Around seventy FDA approved drugs currently present one or more genetic biomarker to keep in consideration, and with the progress of Precision Medicine tailoring therapies on individuals’ genomic landscape promises to become a new standard of cancer care. In the current article we review the role of pharmacogenomics in cancer drug development, underlying the advantages and challenges of their implementation.
A Win-Win Outcome between Corporate Environmental Performance and Corporate Value: From the Perspective of Stakeholders

This paper combines determinants of corporate environment performance (CEP) and the effect of CEP on corporate value together, namely how to motivate firms to conduct environmental protection from the perspective of enhancing firm value. Using a sample of 204 observations of listed corporations in Chinese pollution-intensive industries over the period of 2013–2014, we observed that: (1) compared to investment in a single stakeholder, combinations of multidimensional stakeholders are more likely to affect CEP, and the path is not unique; (2) employees have a positive role, but investors, the community, suppliers, and customers have negative roles; (3) among three patterns for high CEP, both high investment in employees and low investment in the community, suppliers and customers will not detract from firm value, i.e., a win-win outcome; (4) among three patterns for low CEP, one will enhance firm value; and (5) the investor should be seen as an important breakthrough in corporate environmental protection. Such conclusions have stronger promotional value for other emerging countries where corporate social and environmental responsibility is still in the initial stage and the traditional corporate government mode still has a leading position.
An Approach for Image Dis-occlusion and Depth Map Completion using Computational Cameras

Low-cost computational cameras have enabled the use of depth channel information along with color images, and the same will be possible with next-generation smartphones. However, occlusions in the scene pose challenges for the amateur photographer. This paper addresses the problem of automatic removal of fences/occlusions from an image using the video of a static/dynamic scene. We also perform depth completion by fusing data from multiple recorded depth maps affected by occlusions or holes. Interestingly, in this work we harness depth cue for fence segmentation. However, accurate estimation of the relative shifts between captured color frames and depth maps of the RGBD video data is necessary. To handle this challenging task, we propose a robust algorithm to estimate optical flow under known fences/occlusions. In order to preserve discontinuities in the defenced image/inpainted depth map, we formulate an optimization framework using the total variation of the unoccluded image and the completed depth map as regularization constraints. To preserve discontinuities along the boundaries of depth layers, we also integrate a non-local regularization term along with the local total variation prior on the depth map. The ill-posed inverse problem of simultaneous estimation of the de-fenced image and the inpainted depth map is solved using the split Bregman iterative algorithm. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach, we have conducted several experiments on real-world videos containing both static and dynamic scene elements captured using Kinect, Lytro and smartphone cameras.
EFFECTS OF LONG-TERM CONSERVATION TILLAGE ON SOIL NITROGEN CONTENT AND ORGANIC NITROGEN COMPONENTS IN A CHINESE MOLLISOL

The effect of different long-term (2001-2016) tillage practices on soil nitrogen forms in different soil layers were studied to provide a scientific basis for evaluating soil fertility and establishing rational fertilization measures. Soil contents of total nitrogen (TN), particulate organic nitrogen (PON), microbial biomass nitrogen (MBN), water soluble organic nitrogen (WSON), NO3-N content, NH4-N content ammonium nitrogen and organic acid nitrogen component contents were measured under notillage (NT) and mould plow (MP) treatments based on a long-term (16 year) conservation tillage experiment in Northeast China. The results showed that no-tillage increased soil total nitrogen, active nitrogen, inorganic nitrogen and organic nitrogen content, which varied with soil depth. Compared with MP, NT significantly (p < 0.05) increased total nitrogen and active nitrogen content in the surface soil (030 cm); TN, PON, MBN and WSON increased significantly (p < 0.05) by 28.32%, 23.07%, 15.13% and 25.21% in 0-5 cm and by 10.17%, 19.4%, 15.97%, and 31.33% in 5-10 cm, respectively. For soil inorganic nitrogen, the content of ammonium nitrate at 0-5 cm and at 5-10 cm under NT was significantly (p < 0.05) higher than that of MP by 28.1% and 32.13%, respectively, and the content of ammonium nitrogen in soil at 0-5 cm was significantly (p < 0.05) higher, by 12.86%, than that of MP. No-tillage significantly increased the content of total hydrolysable nitrogen, hydrolysable ammonia nitrogen, hydrolysable amino acid nitrogen and hydrolysable unidentified nitrogen in the 0-10 cm soil layer, but no significant effect was found on the content of hydrolysable amino sugar nitrogen. Soil nitrogen content was closely related to tillage practices. These results suggest that no-tillage was beneficial in augmenting soil nitrogen supply capacity by increasing soil total nitrogen, active nitrogen, inorganic nitrogen and organic nitrogen content.
Análisis espacio-temporal del SARS-coV-2 en Cali, Colombia

Objetivo Describir la distribución espacio-temporal del COVID-19 en la ciudad de Cali durante el primer mes de epidemia. Métodos Se realizó un análisis exploratorio de datos espaciales, compuesto por un análisis de densidad de Kernel y se verificó la presencia de patrones espaciales por medio de la función K de Ripley.Resultados La distribución espacial de los casos tiende a concentrarse inicialmente en el norte y sur de la ciudad, con una dinámica cambiante hacia el oriente y occidente.Conclusiones El patrón espacial identificado puede estar influenciado por las medidas de aislamiento tomadas a nivel local y nivel nacional, además no se puede descartar el efecto del poco acceso que tiene la población general a las pruebas diagnósticas,los retrasos y represamientos para conocer los resultados de las mismas y aun los posibles sesgos por dificultades en la técnica de toma de la muestra o su conservación.
Prospects for Imaging Terrestrial Water Storage in South America Using Daily GPS Observations

Few studies have used crustal displacements sensed by the Global Positioning System (GPS) to assess the terrestrial water storage (TWS), which causes loadings. Furthermore, no study has investigated the feasibility of using GPS to image TWS over South America (SA), which contains the world’s driest (Atacama Desert) and wettest (Amazon Basin) regions. This work presents a resolution analysis of an inversion of GPS data over SA. Firstly, synthetic experiments were used to verify the spatial resolutions of GPS-imaged TWS and examine the resolving accuracies of the inversion based on checkerboard tests and closed-loop simulations using “TWS” from the Noah-driven Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS-Noah). Secondly, observed radial displacements were used to image daily TWS. The inverted results of TWS at a resolution of 300 km present negligible errors, as shown by synthetic experiments involving 397 GPS stations across SA. However, as a result of missing daily observations, the actual daily number of available stations varied from 60–353, and only 6% of the daily GPS-imaged TWS agree with GLDAS-Noah TWS, which indicates a root-mean-squared error (RMSE) of less than 100 kg/m 2 . Nevertheless, the inversion shows agreement that is better than 0.50 and 61.58 kg/m 2 in terms of the correlation coefficient (Pearson) and RMSE, respectively, albeit at each GPS site.