Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Increasing social mobility: an effective policy to reduce health inequalities

Summary. Data from the Office for National Statistics Longitudinal Study are used to investigate the effect of mobility between occupationally defined social classes between 1991 and 2001 on health inequality in men and women. Logistic regression models related movement into more or less advantaged employment conditions to limiting long‐term illness in 2001, controlling for social class in 1991 and 2001. When class in 1991 was controlled (‘class of origin’) those who moved into more advantaged social classes were least likely and those moving into less advantaged classes most likely to report a limiting illness. However, when social class in 2001 (‘class of destination’) was controlled, those moving from less to more advantaged positions were most likely to report limiting illness. The same patterns were seen in women. This means that social mobility did not increase the extent of health inequality over the time period that was observed, but rather served to constrain or dilute it. The results are interpreted in terms of an accumulation model of health inequality, and the policy implications are discussed.
Human Capital Development, Poverty and Income Inequality in Nigeria (1985-2020)

Test and Error Correction Model were the tools that were used to estimate the relationship between the variables. Data is from the World Bank Development Indicators (WDI) online database, 2021, Official Gazettes of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Federal Ministry of Education and Macrotrend, 2021. Empirical results showed that the ratio of human capital to government spending was positive at 5 per cent in the short term, in line with a previous expectation. The long-term relationship between human capital development, poverty and income inequality in Nigeria has been negative. The ECM has a weak rate of adjustment of 1.2 per cent and a 1 per cent significance of this imbalance is corrected annually. Therefore, among other things, it was recommended that the federal government should increase budget allocations for the education and health sectors, and improves living standards through empowerment and the acquisition of self-employment skills.
Poorer Survival in Patients with Cecum Cancer Compared with Sigmoid Colon Cancer

Background and Objectives: An increasing number of studies have shown the influence of primary tumor location of colon cancer on prognosis, but the prognostic difference between colon cancers at different locations remains controversial. After comparing the prognostic differences between left-sided and right-sided colon cancer, the study subdivided left-sided and right-sided colon cancer into three parts, respectively, and explored which parts had the most significant prognostic differences, with the aim to further analyze the prognostic significance of primary locations of colon cancer. Materials and Methods: Clinicopathological data of patients with colon cancer who underwent radical surgery from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program database were analyzed. The data was divided into two groups (2004–2009 and 2010–2015) based on time intervals. Two tumor locations with the most significant survival difference were explored by using Cox regression analyses. The prognostic difference of the two locations was further verified in survival analyses after propensity score matching. Results: Patients with right-sided colon cancer had worse cancer-specific and overall survival compared to left-sided colon cancer. Survival difference between cecum cancer and sigmoid colon cancer was found to be the most significant among six tumor locations in both 2004–2009 and 2010–2015 time periods. After propensity score matching, multivariate analyses showed that cecum cancer was an independent unfavorable factor for cancer specific survival (HR [95% CI]: 1.11 [1.04–1.17], p = 0.001 for 2004–2009; HR [95% CI]: 1.23 [1.13–1.33], p < 0.001 for 2010–2015) and overall survival (HR [95% CI]: 1.09 [1.04–1.14], p < 0.001 for 2004–2009; HR [95% CI]: 1.09 [1.04–1.14], p < 0.001 for 2010–2015) compared to sigmoid colon cancer. Conclusions: The study indicates the prognosis of cecum cancer is worse than that of sigmoid colon. The current dichotomy model (right-sided vs. left-sided colon) may be inappropriate for the study of colon cancer.
Over 30% efficient InGaP/GaAs tandem solar cells

A two-terminal monolithic InGaP/GaAs tandem solar cell with a new efficiency record of 30.28% is realized with a practical large area of 4 cm2 under one-sun air-mass 1.5 global illumination. We report improvements of the tandem cell performance by introducing a double-hetero (hereafter DH) structure InGaP tunnel junction, in which the InGaP layers are surrounded by high band gap AlInP barriers. The DH structure by AlInP barriers increase the peak current of InGaP tunnel junction. The AlInP barrier directly below the InGaP top cell, which takes the part of a back surface field (hereafter BSF) layer, is found to be considerably effective in reflecting minority carriers in the top cell. The AlInP BSF layer does not only form a high potential barrier but also prevents the diffusion of zinc from a high doped tunnel junction toward the top cell during epitaxial growth. Furthermore, an InGaP tunnel junction reduces the absorption loss, which exists in a GaAs tunnel junction, and increases the photogenerated curr.
Global existence and asymptotic behavior of small solutions for semilinear dissipative wave equations

We study the global existence and asymptotic behavior of solutions to the Cauchy problem for the semilinear dissipative wave equations: $\square u + \partial_t u = |u|^{\alpha+1}$, $u|_{t=0}=\varepsilon u_0 \in H^1 \cap L^1$, $\partial_t u |_{t=0} = \varepsilon u_1 \in L^2 \cap L^1$ with a small parameter $\varepsilon>0$. When $N\le 3$ and $2/N<\alpha \le 2/[N-2]^+$, we show the global solvability and derive the sharp rates of the solutions.
Lymphocyte-to-Monocyte Ratio Is Independently Associated with Progressive Infarction in Patients with Acute Ischemic Stroke

Methods From April 2017 to December 2020, we retrospectively recruited 477 patients with acute ischemic stroke (within 48 hours after onset). Progressive infarction was defined as an increase of ≥1 point in motor power or ≥2 points on the total National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) within 7 days after admission and extension of the original infarction were further confirmed by diffusion-weighted imaging. Demographic characteristics, clinical information, and neuroimaging characteristics were evaluated after admission. All blood draws and initial imaging were completed within 24 hours of admission. Results PI occurred in 147 (30.8%) patients. Univariate analysis comparing the two groups revealed that hypertension, initial NIHSS score, discharge NIHSS score, modified Rankin scale score at 90 days, monocyte level, creatinine level, fasting glucose level, LMR, monocyte-to-high-density lipoprotein ratio (MHR), and lesion location were significantly different (P < 0.05). Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the odds ratio of PI increased as the quartile of LMR increased, with the lowest quartile as the reference value. Subgroup analyses showed that a high LMR was an independent predictor of PI only in large artery atherosclerosis (LAA) patients. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was drawn to estimate the predictive value of LMR for PI. For all cases, the area under the curve was 0.583 (95% CI 0.526-0.641), and the best predictive cutoff value was 3.506, with a sensitivity of 53.1% and a specificity of 63.9%. In patients with LAA, the area under the curve was 0.585 (95% CI 0.505-0.665), and the best predictive cutoff value was 3.944, with a sensitivity of 48.7% and a specificity of 72.8%. Conclusions LMR was an independent predictor for progressive infarction in patients with acute ischemic stroke, especially in LAA cerebral infarction patients.
Building a case for trust: reputation, institutional regulation and social ties in online drug markets

ABSTRACT In illicit online markets, actors are pseudonymous, legal institutions are absent, and predation is ripe. The literature proposes that problems of trust are solved by reputation systems, social ties, and administrative governance, but these are often measured independently or in single platforms. This study takes an eclectic approach, conceiving of trust as an estimate informed by any available evidence. Using transaction size as a proxy for trust I estimate the association between competing sources of trust – mediation, reputation, authentication, and social ties – and transaction value using multilevel regression. Using data from two online drug markets, I find mixed evidence that reputation and authentication are associated with transaction value, whereas results are consistent for social ties. Furthermore, transactions outside the scope of administrative mediation are generally larger. These findings have implications for future research and suggest increased attention should be given to the role of mediation practices and social ties.
ON THE CORRELATION STRUCTURE FOR THE GENERALIZED AUTOREGRESSIVE CONDITIONAL HETEROSKEDASTIC PROCESS

The correlation structure for the squares from the generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedastic (GARCH) process is presented. It is shown that the behaviour of the correlations for the squares mimics the usual correlations of an appropriately defined ARMA process, although the admissible regions for the correlations are somewhat more restrictive. Simulation experiments are used to study the applicability of the theoretical results for order identification and diagnostic checking. Finally, an empirical example is given for the IBM stock market price series from Box and Jenkins (1976).
Isavuconazole Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics in Children

Isavuconazole is a broad-spectrum azole anti-fungal not yet approved in children. We conducted a retrospective, single-center review of isavuconazole use and routine therapeutic drug monitoring in pediatric patients, extracting demographic, dosing, concentration, mortality and hepatoxicity data. We constructed a nonparametric population model using Pmetrics. Of 26 patients, 19 (73%) were male. The mean (SD) age and weight were 12.7 (5.5) years and 50.9 (26.8) kg. Eighty percent received between 9.7 and 10.6 mg/kg per dose. Ten (38%) subjects had proven fungal disease and eight (31%) had probable disease, mostly with Candida and Aspergillus spp. The predicted steady-state isavuconazole concentrations in our patients were similar to previous reports in children and adults, and simulations with the proposed dosing of 10 mg/kg/dose every 8 h for 2 days followed by once daily maintenance matched effective adult exposures. Attributable mortality (5 of 11 deaths) was associated with steady-state daily AUC < 60 mg∗h/L and higher AST/ALT with trough concentrations > 5 mg/L. Neither dose nor trough alone correlated well with AUC, but AUC can be estimated with one sample 10 h after the first maintenance dose or a trough concentration, if combined with a Bayesian approach or a peak and trough without a Bayesian approach.
ART‐P‐MAP Neural Networks Modeling of Land‐Use Change: Accounting for Spatial Heterogeneity and Uncertainty

Spatial land-use models over large geographic areas and at fine spatial resolutions face the challenges of spatial heterogeneity, model predictability, data quality, and of the ensuing uncertainty. We propose an improved neural network model, ART-Probability-Map (ART-P-MAP), tailored to address these issues in the context of spatial modeling of land-use change. First, it adaptively forms its own network structure to account for spatial heterogeneity. Second, it explicitly infers posterior probabilities of land conversion that facilitates the quantification of prediction uncertainty. Extensive calibration under various test settings is conducted on the proposed model to optimize its utility in seeking useful information within a spatially heterogeneous environment. The calibration strategy involves building a bagging ensemble for training and stratified sampling with varying category proportions for experimentation. Through a temporal validation approach, we examine models’ performance within a systematic assessment framework consisting of global metrics and cell-level uncertainty measurement. Compared with two baselines, ART-P-MAP achieves consistently good and stable performance across experiments and exhibits superior capability to handle the spatial heterogeneity and uncertainty involved in the land-use change problem. Finally, we conclude that, as a general probabilistic regression model, ART-P-MAP is applicable to a broad range of land-use change modeling approaches, which deserves future research.
Room-Temperature Response Performance of Coupled Doped-Well Quantum Cascade Detectors with Array Structure

Energy level interaction and electron concentration are crucial aspects that affect the response performance of quantum cascade detectors (QCDs). In this work, two different-structured array QCDs are prepared, and the detectivity reaches 109 cm·Hz1/2/W at room temperature. The overlap integral (OI) and oscillator strength (OS) between different energy levels under a series of applied biases are fitted and reveal the influence of energy level interaction on the response performance. The redistribution of electrons in the cascade structure at room temperatures is established. The coupled doped-well structure shows a higher electron concentration at room temperature, which represents a high absorption efficiency in the active region. Even better responsivity and detectivity are exhibited in the coupled doped-well QCD. These results offer a novel strategy to understand the mechanisms that affect response performance and expand the application range of QCDs for long-wave infrared (LWIR) detection.
Magellanic Cloud WC/WO Wolf–Rayet stars – II. Colliding winds in binaries

A search for evidence of colliding winds is undertaken among the four certain Magellanic Cloud WC/WO spectroscopic binaries found in the companion Paper I, as well as among two Galactic WC/WO binaries of very similar subtype. Two methods of analysis, which allow the determination of orbital inclination and parameters relating to the shock cone from spectroscopic studies of colliding winds, are attempted. In the first method, Luhrs’ spectroscopic model is fitted to the moderately strong C iii 5696-A excess line emission arising in the shock cone for the stars Br22 and WR 9. The four other systems show only very weak C iii 5696-A emission. Luhrs’ model follows well the mean displacement of the line in velocity space, but is unable to reproduce details in the line profile and fails to give a reliable estimate of the orbital inclination. In the second method, an alternative attempt is also made to fit the variation of more global quantities, full width at half-maximum and radial velocity of the excess emission, with phase. This method also gives satisfactory results in a qualitative way, but shows numerical degeneracy with orbital inclination. Colliding wind effects on the very strong C iv 5808-A Wolf–Rayet emission line, present in all six binaries, are also found to behave qualitatively as expected. After allowing for line enhancement in colliding wind binaries, it now appears that all Magellanic Cloud WC/WO stars occupy a very narrow range in spectral subclass: WC4/WO3.
Activin B and Activin C Have Opposing Effects on Prostate Cancer Progression and Cell Growth

Simple Summary Prostate cancer is one of the leading causes of death in men. Current methods for grading and determining treatment options are not as accurate as they need to be with some men either undergoing unnecessary, life-changing treatment or not being treated and developing late-stage disease. We assessed the effect of proteins called activins on the growth of prostate cell lines and examined their expression in prostate cancer biopsy samples from patients with different grades of tumor. Activin B and activin C were shown to have increased and decreased expression, respectively, in higher grade prostate cancer and to have opposing effects on prostate cell growth and migration. Therefore, these proteins are potential markers for distinguishing aggressive from indolent prostate cancer and may also provide novel targets for prostate cancer treatment. Abstract Current prognostic and diagnostic tests for prostate cancer are not able to accurately distinguish between aggressive and latent cancer. Members of the transforming growth factor-β (TGFB) family are known to be important in regulating prostate cell growth and some have been shown to be dysregulated in prostate cancer. Therefore, the aims of this study were to examine expression of TGFB family members in primary prostate tumour tissue and the phenotypic effect of activins on prostate cell growth. Tissue cores of prostate adenocarcinoma and normal prostate were immuno-stained and protein expression was compared between samples with different Gleason grades. The effect of exogenous treatment with, or overexpression of, activins on prostate cell line growth and migration was examined. Activin B expression was increased in cores containing higher Gleason patterns and overexpression of activin B inhibited growth of PNT1A cells but increased growth and migration of the metastatic PC3 cells compared to empty vector controls. In contrast, activin C expression decreased in higher Gleason grades and overexpression increased growth of PNT1A cells and decreased growth of PC3 cells. In conclusion, increased activin B and decreased activin C expression is associated with increasing prostate tumor grade and therefore have potential as prognostic markers of aggressive prostate cancer.
Efficacy of Bromhexine versus Standard of Care in Reducing Viral Load in Patients with Mild-to-Moderate COVID-19 Disease Attended in Primary Care: A Randomized Open-Label Trial

A 28-day randomized open-label multicenter study was conducted to assess the efficacy of bromhexine plus standard of care (SOC) (n = 98) vs. SOC alone (n = 93) in 191 outpatients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 in the primary health care setting. Bromhexine three daily doses of 10 mL (48 mg/day) were administered for seven days. The primary efficacy endpoint was the reduction of viral load estimated as the cycle thresholds (Ct) to detect ORF1ab, N Protein, and S Protein genes by RT-qPCR in saliva samples on day 4 as compared with baseline. Ct values of the three genes increased from baseline throughout days 4 to 14 (p < 0.001) but significant differences between the study groups were not found. Differences in the percentages of patients with low, medium, and high viral loads at 4, 7, and 14 days were not found either. In summary, treatment with bromhexine plus SCO was associated with a viral load reduction of ORF1ab, N Protein, and S Protein genes at day 4, which was not significantly different than similar viral load reductions observed with SOC alone. The present findings do not seem to favor the use of bromhexine as an antiviral in patients with COVID-19.
Investigating the strategic interaction between QMS, organisational agility and innovative performance

As organisations find themselves in continuously more competitive and volatile markets, it is imperative that organisational leaders understand the impacts of their management systems and work to optimise their customer-satisfying deliverables. This exploratory literature review explores three strategic elements of organisational performance, with an intention of identifying if factors linking between the performance elements exist. Specifically, this research investigates the strategic expressions of Quality Management Systems, Organisational Agility and Innovative Performance. The structure of this paper first looks at how the Quality Management System interacts with an organisation’s performance objective. This is followed by a review literature pertaining to innovative performance as well as the consequences and attributes of organisational agility. Finally, a concluding analysis outlines potential areas of correlation between the organisational performance factors and avenues for continued research. This study contributes directly to organisational performance literature as well as practical implementations by providing a context for how the three strategic performance elements may interact.
Electrical properties of a highly oriented, textured thin film of the ionic conductor Gd:CeO2−δ on (001) MgO

Highly oriented ionic conductor gadolinium-doped CeO2−δ (Ce0.8Gd0.2O2−δ) thin films have been grown on single-crystal (001) MgO substrates by pulsed-laser ablation. The films are highly c-axis oriented with cube-on-cube epitaxy, as shown by x-ray diffraction and electron microscopy. The interface relationship is, surprisingly, found to be (001)film//(001)sub and [100]film//[100]sub with an extremely large lattice misfit of more than 28%. Ac impedance measurements in the temperature range of 500 to 800 °C reveal that electrical conductivity is predominantly ionic over a very broad oxygen partial pressure range from pO2 from 1×10−19 atm to 1 atm. The activation energy Ea for ionic conductivity measured on unannealed films is 0.86 eV, but after heat treatment, Ea decreases to 0.74 eV.
A review of autoimmunity and immune profiles in patients with primary ovarian insufficiency

Primary ovarian insufficiency (POI) is a complicated clinical syndrome characterized by progressive deterioration of ovarian function. Autoimmunity is one of the main pathogenic factors affecting approximately 10% to 55% of POI cases. This review mainly focuses on the role of autoimmunity in the pathophysiology of POI and the potential therapies for autoimmunity-related POI. This review concluded that various markers of ovarian reserve, principally anti-Müllerian hormone, could be negatively affected by autoimmune diseases. The presence of lymphocytic oophoritis, anti-ovarian autoantibodies, and concurrent autoimmune diseases, are the main characteristics of autoimmune POI. T lymphocytes play the most important role in the immune pathogenesis of POI, followed by disorders of other immune cells and the imbalance between pro-inflammatory and anti-inflammatory cytokines. A comprehensive understanding of immune characteristics of patients with autoimmune POI and the underlying mechanisms is essential for novel approaches of treatment and intervention for autoimmune POI.
Fossil history of bark-beetles (Coleoptera: Scolytidae) with descriptions of two new species

ABSTRACT The presence of fossil bark beetles from the early Cretaceous to the Miocene is discussed. Changes in the diversity of this group over time are presented. Assumptions about trophic relationships are given. Two new species, Hylastes perkovskyi n. sp. from the tribe Hylastini and Chramesus boninoi n. sp. from the tribe Hylesinini, are described, respectively, from Eocene Rovno and Miocene Dominica amber. These are the first records of the genera Hylastes in Rovno amber and Chramesus in Dominican amber.
Leukocyte DNA methylation in Alzheimer´s disease associated genes: replication of findings from neuronal cells

ABSTRACT Differences in gene-wide DNA methylation of the Alzheimer’s disease (AD)-associated genes BIN1, HLA-DRB5, SORL1, SLC24A4, and ABCA7 are reported to be associated with AD in post-mortem brain samples. We investigated whether the same associations could be found in leukocytes collected pre-mortem. Using cohort data of 544 Swedish twins (204 dementia diagnoses), we replicated the findings in HLA-DRB5 and SLC24A4 at P < 0.05. However, co-twin control analyses indicated that the associations were partly explained by familial confounding. Thus, DNA methylation differences in HLA-DRB5 and SLC24A4 are present in both neuronal cells and leukocytes, and not fully explained familial factors.