Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Late life depression and dementia: a mental health literacy survey of Australian general practitioners

ABSTRACT Background: Whilst previous surveys of mental health literacy of general practitioners (GPs) have shown high rates of recognition of common mental disorders, few studies have been carried out into GPs' understanding of presentations in late life. This study aims to determine GPs' recognition of mental disorders in older people, their intentions regarding investigation, specialist referral and treatment, and their beliefs about prognosis. Methods: Australian GPs who attended an educational seminar were administered questions based on clinical vignettes describing older people with depression, dementia and coronary heart disease. Results: There was a high rate of recognition of all disorders amongst the 436 respondents. GPs demonstrated a high level of consistency about screening questionnaires, investigations and specialist referral in the dementia vignette. In contrast, less than half of GPs endorsed using a screening questionnaire or neuroimaging, and considered referral to a variety of medical specialties in the depression vignette. For both the depression and dementia vignettes, self-help treatments like walking, dietary advice or alcohol reduction were endorsed more frequently than an antidepressant or cholinesterase inhibitor respectively. Dementia tended to be viewed as having a poor prognosis, and late-life depression a moderate prognosis. Conclusions: Actual or intended rates of diagnostic recognition, specialist referral and benzodiazepine prescription found in this study may not translate into clinical practice for a number of reasons. Non-specific treatments without a clear evidence base were considered as often as those with a stronger evidence base. There is a need to improve the knowledge of GPs with regard to screening and investigating late life depression and managing dementia.
Observations of the Interaction and Transport of Fine Mode Aerosols With Cloud and/or Fog in Northeast Asia From Aerosol Robotic Network and Satellite Remote Sensing

Analysis of Sun photometer measured and satellite retrieved aerosol optical depth (AOD) data has shown that major aerosol pollution events with very high fine mode AOD (>1.0 in midvisible) in the China/Korea/Japan region are often observed to be associated with significant cloud cover. This makes remote sensing of these events difficult even for high temporal resolution Sun photometer measurements. Possible physical mechanisms for these events that have high AOD include a combination of aerosol humidification, cloud processing, and meteorological covariation with atmospheric stability and convergence. The new development of Aerosol Robotic Network Version 3 Level 2 AOD with improved cloud screening algorithms now allow for unprecedented ability to monitor these extreme fine mode pollution events. Further, the spectral deconvolution algorithm (SDA) applied to Level 1 data (L1; no cloud screening) provides an even more comprehensive assessment of fine mode AOD than L2 in current and previous data versions. Studying the 2012 winter‐summer period, comparisons of Aerosol Robotic Network L1 SDA daily average fine mode AOD data showed that Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer satellite remote sensing of AOD often did not retrieve and/or identify some of the highest fine mode AOD events in this region. Also, compared to models that include data assimilation of satellite retrieved AOD, the L1 SDA fine mode AOD was significantly higher in magnitude, particularly for the highest AOD events that were often associated with significant cloudiness.
Born with an Ear for Dialects? Structural Plasticity in the Expert Phonetician Brain

Are experts born with particular predispositions, or are they made through experience? We examined brain structure in expert phoneticians, individuals who are highly trained to analyze and transcribe speech. We found a positive correlation between the size of left pars opercularis and years of phonetic transcription training experience, illustrating how learning may affect brain structure. Phoneticians were also more likely to have multiple or split left transverse gyri in the auditory cortex than nonexpert controls, and the amount of phonetic transcription training did not predict auditory cortex morphology. The transverse gyri are thought to be established in utero; our results thus suggest that this gross morphological difference may have existed before the onset of phonetic training, and that its presence confers an advantage of sufficient magnitude to affect career choices. These results suggest complementary influences of domain-specific predispositions and experience-dependent brain malleability, influences that likely interact in determining not only how experience shapes the human brain but also why some individuals become engaged by certain fields of expertise.
Habitat suitability and demography, a time‐dependent relationship

Abstract The habitat suitability index, which reflects spatial variability in species occurrence probability, has been shown to exhibit various contrasting relationships with local demographic performances (survival, productivity) in several species. One proposed explanation for these discrepancies is that the link between the habitat suitability index and demography is influenced by density‐dependent, temporally variable processes. Based on the survival rates of more than 3,000 nests monitored over 12 years in the North African Houbara Bustard, we investigated whether the habitat suitability index computed over the species breeding range is related to nest survival throughout the breeding season, accounting for variation in meteorological conditions. We found that the relationship between the habitat suitability index and nest survival progressively changes along the breeding season and that this intra‐annual variation is consistent between years. Our results support the hypothesis that variation in space use occurs intra‐annually and that biotic interactions throughout the breeding season strongly influence the habitat suitability index–demography relationship.
Simulation as a tool for improving acquisition of neonatal resuscitation skills for obstetric residents

Abstract Objective: Our goal was to compare the confidence, knowledge, and performance of obstetric residents taught initial neonatal resuscitation steps in a simulation-based versus lecture-based format. Methods: Our study was a prospective randomized controlled trial of 33 obstetric residents. Baseline confidence, knowledge, and clinical skills assessments were performed. Subjects were randomized to traditional lecture (n = 14) or simulation-based (n = 19) neonatal resuscitation curriculum with a focus on initial steps. Follow-up assessments were performed at 3 and 6 months. Total confidence, knowledge, and clinical performance scores and change from baseline in these scores were calculated and compared between groups. Results: Both the lecture-based and simulated-based groups demonstrated significant improvement in confidence, knowledge, and performance over time. However, compared with the lecture group, the magnitude of the mean change from baseline in performance scores was significantly greater in the simulation group at 3 months (2.9 versus 10.1; p < 0.001), but not at 6 months (7.0 versus 9.3; p = 0.11). Conclusions: Our study demonstrates the superiority of simulation in teaching obstetric residents initial neonatal resuscitation steps compared with a traditional lecture format. Skills are retained for upwards of 3–6 months. Refresher instruction by 6 months post-instruction may be beneficial.
Clinical comparison of pulse and chirp excitation

Coded excitation (CE) using frequency modulated signals (chirps) combined with modified matched filtering has earlier been presented showing promising results in simulations and in-vitro. In this study an experimental ultrasound system is evaluated in a clinical setting, where image sequences are assessed by skilled medical doctors. The effect on penetration depth and image quality were measured. A modified clinical scanner with a 4 MHz single element mechanical transducer, and external transmitter and receiver boards (RASMUS system) were used. The system allowed rapid toggling between chirp and short pulse excitation to simultaneously produce identical image sequences using both techniques. Nine healthy male volunteers were scanned in abdominal locations. All sequences were evaluated by 3 skilled medical doctors, blinded to each other and to the technique used. They assessed the depth (1) in which image quality decreased and (2) in which the image would be insufficient for clinical diagnosis. Furthermore they compared image quality in matching pairs of conventional and CE images. The average increase in penetration depth were almost 2 cm. Side-by-side comparison showed that coded image quality was consistently rated better; significant (p/spl les/0.05) when images were cropped at minimum the depth for good image quality and highly significant (p<0.001) when cropped at maximum depth sufficient for clinical diagnosis. We conclude that coded excitation with linear FM chirps improves penetration and image quality significantly in a clinical setting.
Blockchains and Bitcoin: Regulatory Responses to Cryptocurrencies

This paper examines Bitcoin from a legal and regulatory perspective, answering several important questions. We begin by explaining what Bitcoin is, and why it matters. We describe problems with Bitcoin as a method of implementing a cryptocurrency. This introduction to cryptocurrencies allows us eventually to ask the inevitable question: is it legal? What are the regulatory responses to the currency? Can it be regulated? We make clear why virtual currencies are of interest, how self-regulation has failed, and what useful lessons can be learned. Finally, we produce useful and semi-permanent findings into the usefulness of virtual currencies in general, blockchains as a means of mining currency, and the profundity of Bitcoin as compared with the development of block chain technologies. We conclude that though Bitcoin may be the equivalent of Second Life a decade later, so blockchains may be the equivalent of Web 2.0 social networks, a truly transformative social technology.
Line-based Multi-Label Energy Optimization for fisheye image rectification and calibration

Fisheye image rectification and estimation of intrinsic parameters for real scenes have been addressed in the literature by using line information on the distorted images. In this paper, we propose an easily implemented fisheye image rectification algorithm with line constrains in the undistorted perspective image plane. A novel Multi-Label Energy Optimization (MLEO) method is adopted to merge short circular arcs sharing the same or the approximately same circular parameters and select long circular arcs for camera rectification. Further we propose an efficient method to estimate intrinsic parameters of the fisheye camera by automatically selecting three properly arranged long circular arcs from previously obtained circular arcs in the calibration procedure. Experimental results on a number of real images and simulated data show that the proposed method can achieve good results and outperforms the existing approaches and the commercial software in most cases.
Development of an Allele-Specific PCR Assay for Simultaneous Sero-Typing of Avian Pathogenic Escherichia coli Predominant O1, O2, O18 and O78 Strains

Systemic infections by avian pathogenic Escherichia coli (APEC) are economically devastating to poultry industries worldwide. E. coli strains belonging to serotypes O1, O2, O18 and O78 are preferentially associated with avian colibacillosis. The rfb gene cluster controlling O antigen synthesis is usually various among different E. coli serotypes. In present study, the rfb gene clusters of E. coli serotypes O1, O2, O18 and O78 were characterized and compared. Based on the serotype-specific genes in rfb gene cluster, an allele-specific polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay was developed. This PCR assay was highly specific and reliable for sero-typing of APEC O1, O2, O18 and O78 strains. The sensitivity of the assay was determined as 10 pg DNA or 10 colony forming units (CFUs) bacteria for serotypes O2 and O18 strains, and 500 pg DNA or 1,000 CFUs bacteria for serotypes O1 and O78 strains. Using this PCR system, APEC isolates and the infected tissue samples were categorized successfully. Furthermore, it was able to differentiate the serotypes for the samples with multi-agglutination in the traditional serum agglutination assay. Therefore, the allele-specific PCR is more simple, rapid and accurate assay for APEC diagnosis, epidemiologic study and vaccine development.
Bassoon, a Novel Zinc-finger CAG/Glutamine-repeat Protein Selectively Localized at the Active Zone of Presynaptic Nerve Terminals

The molecular architecture of the cytomatrix of presynaptic nerve terminals is poorly understood. Here we show that Bassoon, a novel protein of >400,000 M r, is a new component of the presynaptic cytoskeleton. The murine bassoon gene maps to chromosome 9F. A comparison with the corresponding rat cDNA identified 10 exons within its protein-coding region. The Bassoon protein is predicted to contain two double-zinc fingers, several coiled-coil domains, and a stretch of polyglutamines (24 and 11 residues in rat and mouse, respectively). In some human proteins, e.g., Huntingtin, abnormal amplification of such poly-glutamine regions causes late-onset neurodegeneration. Bassoon is highly enriched in synaptic protein preparations. In cultured hippocampal neurons, Bassoon colocalizes with the synaptic vesicle protein synaptophysin and Piccolo, a presynaptic cytomatrix component. At the ultrastructural level, Bassoon is detected in axon terminals of hippocampal neurons where it is highly concentrated in the vicinity of the active zone. Immunogold labeling of synaptosomes revealed that Bassoon is associated with material interspersed between clear synaptic vesicles, and biochemical studies suggest a tight association with cytoskeletal structures. These data indicate that Bassoon is a strong candidate to be involved in cytomatrix organization at the site of neurotransmitter release.
The ultra-wide bandwidth indoor channel: from statistical model to simulations

We establish a statistical model for the ultra-wide bandwidth (UWB) indoor channel based on an extensive measurement campaign in a typical modern office building with 2-ns delay resolution. The approach is based on the investigation of the statistical properties of the multipath profiles measured in different rooms over a finely spaced measurement grid. The analysis leads to the formulation of a stochastic tapped-delay-line (STDL) model of the UWB indoor channel. The averaged power delay profile can be well-modeled by a single exponential decay with a statistically distributed decay constant. The small-scale statistics of path energy gains follow Gamma distributions whose parameters m are truncated Gaussian variables with mean values and standard deviations decreasing with delay. The total received energy experiences a lognormal shadowing around the mean energy given by the path-loss power law. We also find that the correlation between multipath components is negligible. Finally, we propose an implementation of the STDL model and give a comparison between the experimental data and the simulation results.
Surgical punctal occlusion: a prospective study

Aims: To assess the outcome of a surgical punctal occlusion technique. Method: Prospectively, 11 consecutive patients (26 puncta) with severe dry eyes recalcitrant to maximal medical therapy underwent permanent punctal occlusion at a tertiary eye care centre between January 1999 and December 2000. The epithelium of the punctum and the vertical portion of the canaliculus was removed with a corneal rust ring burr. The bared punctum-canaliculus complex was closed with a 6-0 chromic suture. Success was measured by the complete functional occlusion of the punctum, tear function tests, and patients’ response. Result: Five males and nine females, aged 26–77 enrolled in the study with three patients later excluded. As of November 2001, the remaining 11 patients had follow up ranging from 14 to 34 months (mean 24 months; median 24 months). 24 puncta (or 92%) remained occluded, including four puncta which showed anatomical reopening. Seven out of 11 patients (63.6%) stated they had symptomatic improvement regardless of their objective findings. Conclusion: This technique resulted in a 92% permanent occlusion of the puncta and compared favourably with other reported techniques. Punctal occlusion does not appear to correlate well with Schirmer tests, the frequency of lubrication, and/or subjective feelings in these patients.
Cross-Reactive Immune Responses as Primary Drivers of Malaria Chronicity

ABSTRACT The within-host dynamics of an infection with the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum are the result of a complex interplay between the host immune system and parasite. Continual variation of the P. falciparum erythrocyte membrane protein (PfEMP1) antigens displayed on the surface of infected red blood cells enables the parasite to evade the immune system and prolong infection. Despite the importance of antigenic variation in generating the dynamics of infection, our understanding of the mechanisms by which antigenic variation generates long-term chronic infections is still limited. We developed a model to examine the role of cross-reactivity in generating infection dynamics that are comparable to those of experimental infections. The hybrid computational model we developed is attuned to the biology of malaria by mixing discrete replication events, which mimics the synchrony of parasite replication and invasion, with continuous interaction with the immune system. Using simulations, we evaluated the dynamics of a single malaria infection over time. We then examined three major mechanisms by which the dynamics of a malaria infection can be structured: cross-reactivity of the immune response to PfEMP1, differences in parasite clearance rates, and heterogeneity in the rate at which antigens switch. The results of our simulations demonstrate that cross-reactive immune responses play a primary role in generating the dynamics observed in experimentally untreated infections and in lengthening the period of infection. Importantly, we also find that it is the primary response to the initially expressed PfEMP1, or small subset thereof, that structures the cascading cross-immune dynamics and allows for elongation of the infection.
Scalable Levy Process Priors for Spectral Kernel Learning

Gaussian processes are rich distributions over functions, with generalization properties determined by a kernel function. When used for long-range extrapolation, predictions are particularly sensitive to the choice of kernel parameters. It is therefore critical to account for kernel uncertainty in our predictive distributions. We propose a distribution over kernels formed by modelling a spectral mixture density with a L\'evy process. The resulting distribution has support for all stationary covariances--including the popular RBF, periodic, and Mat\'ern kernels--combined with inductive biases which enable automatic and data efficient learning, long-range extrapolation, and state of the art predictive performance. The proposed model also presents an approach to spectral regularization, as the L\'evy process introduces a sparsity-inducing prior over mixture components, allowing automatic selection over model order and pruning of extraneous components. We exploit the algebraic structure of the proposed process for $\mathcal{O}(n)$ training and $\mathcal{O}(1)$ predictions. We perform extrapolations having reasonable uncertainty estimates on several benchmarks, show that the proposed model can recover flexible ground truth covariances and that it is robust to errors in initialization.
Crystal structure of ammonia monohydrate phase II.

We have determined the crystal structure of ammonia monohydrate phase II (AMH II) employing a combination of ab initio computational structure prediction and structure solution from neutron powder diffraction data using direct space methods. Neutron powder diffraction data were collected from perdeuterated AMH II using the D2B high-resolution diffractometer at the Institut Laue-Langevin. AMH II crystallizes in space-group Pbca with 16 formula units in a unit-cell of dimensions a = 18.8285(4) A, b = 6.9415(2) A, c = 6.8449(2) A, and V = 894.61(3) A3 [rho(calc)(deuterated) = 1187.56(4) kg m(-3)] at 502 MPa, 180 K. The structure is characterized by sheets of tessellated pentagons formed by orientationally ordered O-D.O, O-D.N, and N-D.O hydrogen-bonds; these sheets are stacked along the a-axis and connected by N-D.O hydrogen bonds alone. With the exception of the simple body-centered-cubic high-pressure phases of ammonia monohydrate and ammonia dihydrate, this is the first complex molecular structure of any of the high-pressure stoichiometric ammonia hydrates to be determined. The powder structure solution is complemented by an ab initio structure prediction using density functional theory which gives an almost identical hydrogen bonding network.
Two-way coupling of fluids to rigid and deformable solids and shells

We propose a novel solid/fluid coupling method that treats the coupled system in a fully implicit manner making it stable for arbitrary time steps, large density ratios, etc. In contrast to previous work in computer graphics, we derive our method using a simple back-of-the-envelope approach which lumps the solid and fluid momenta together, and which we show exactly conserves the momentum of the coupled system. Notably, our method uses the standard Cartesian fluid discretization and does not require (moving) conforming tetrahedral meshes or ALE frameworks. Furthermore, we use a standard Lagrangian framework for the solid, thus supporting arbitrary solid constitutive models, both implicit and explicit time integration, etc. The method is quite general, working for smoke, water, and multiphase fluids as well as both rigid and deformable solids, and both volumes and thin shells. Rigid shells and cloth are handled automatically without special treatment, and we support fully one-sided discretizations without leaking. Our equations are fully symmetric, allowing for the use of fast solvers, which is a natural result of properly conserving momentum. Finally, for simple explicit time integration of rigid bodies, we show that our equations reduce to form similar to previous work via a single block Gaussian elimination operation, but that this approach scales poorly, i.e. as though four spatial dimensions rather than three.