Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Amazon vs. My Brother: How Users of Shared Smart Speakers Perceive and Cope with Privacy Risks

With the rapid adoption of smart speakers in people's homes, there is a corresponding increase in users' privacy and security concerns. In contrast to previous studies of users' concerns about smart speakers' divulging private information to their manufacturers, our study focused on investigating users' concerns with regard to housemates and external entities. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 26 participants living in 21 households. Our results suggest that users often have an inadequate understanding of what data their smart speakers makes available to all users and what is kept private. Although participants expressed different privacy concerns about their housemates and external entities, they adopted similar, yet suboptimal, risk management strategies. We provide recommendations for future speaker design to support more optimal coping with the perceived risks.
Influence of Both Magnetic Field and Temperature on Silicon Solar Cell Base Optimum Thickness Determination

The minority carrier’s recombination velocity at the junction and at the back surface is used for the modeling and determination of the optimum thickness of the base of a silicon solar cell in the static regime, under magnetic field and temperature influence. This study takes into account the Umklapp process and the Lorentz effect on the minority carriers photogenerated in the base.
GD COW: A PHENOMENON MUCH DIFFERENT AND DANGEROUS THAN THE GM COW

GD Cow or genetically damaged cow is the one which obviously has damaged DNA. It is entirely different from the GM or genetically modified cow which has a modified DNA. The term modification is a moderate one; often its use is on the positive side but damage is a very destructive term and unfortunately, most of the time it is used with a negative meaning. Here in present case we are debating the use of these terms with reference to the application of sexed semen technology on dairy animals, mainly cows and other related mammals and the outcome is very interesting. The semen sorting methodology certainly produces defects of genetic nature in sperms and this is the basis of present story. This defective sperm with damaged DNA certainly produces a defective zygote upon its fusion with the ovum. Henceforth with, this damage is carried forward very naturally via the route of the formation of a defective embryo, fetus or a neonate. This neonate as defective it is by birth will be more susceptible to the forces of lysis upon reaching youth and maturity and if survived will certainly produce future offsprings with defective DNA. The damage to the DNA in sperm is inevitable and unintentional as it is the inherent outcome of the process of sexed semen manufacture but ramifications as always upon intrusion with natural genetic balance of species, formed and maintained by Mother Nature are varied and not only unwelcome but ominous too.
Prospects of a Longer Life Span beyond the Beneficial Effects of a Healthy Lifestyle

Life span is limited by the effects of diseases and ageing. For the aim of a longer life span, it is indispensable that a rational analysis of the primary causes of these phenomena is not limited to the description of their physio-pathological mechanisms. If Dobzhansky’s statement that “nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution” is true, it appears logical to maintain that evolution theory must be the main tool for such analysis. From an evolutionary point of view, diseases are the predictable consequence of: 1) defects in the maintenance and transmission of genetic information; 2) alterations of the ecological niche to which the species is adapted (in particular, for our species, due to civilisation); 3) interactions with other species (bacteria, viruses, fungi, protozoa, parasitic worms, etc.); and 4) conditions for which the species is not adapted. Moreover, evolution theory allows the paradoxical prediction that, in particular ecological conditions, kin selection favours a progressive fitness decline, usually, in its more evident manifestations, referred to as ageing and that must not be classified as a disease. This decline is genetically determined and regulated and is obtained with a progressive limitation of cell turnover through a sophisticated modulation of the telomeretelomerase system. A lifestyle compatible with the ecological niche to which our species is adapted and good medical treatment permit the attainment of the highest life span defined by the genetic program of our species (within the limits of individual genetic peculiarities) but Giacinto Libertini 2 do not allow the overcoming of the maximal values of longevity defined by the same program. To increase these values, it is indispensable to modify the genetic planning of ageing, with a different modulation of the telomere-telomerase system. In principle, granted that this will be considered ethically acceptable, it is possible to propose a modification of that part of the genetic program that modulates ageing so that an unlimited survival is obtained, similar to the so-called “negligible senescence” observed for many animal and plant species. A possible schedule to achieve this aim and the effects on human civilisation are outlined.
Ablation/Maze Survey - 2008

Definition of Terms Overview of Procedures Evaluation of Background Data Initial Procedure – RF Ablation Procedure Outcome – RF Ablation Patient Outcome – RF Ablation Ablation for SVT Left Atrial Flutter Ablation Right Atrial Flutter Ablation Performance Rating – RF Ablation Summary – RF Ablation Procedures other than RF Ablation Cryoablation AV Node Ablation + Pacemaker Maze Procedure Mini-Maze Procedure Summary – Other Procedures
A hospital-based case-control study of urinary bladder cancer in relation to occupational exposure to acids in the Campania Region of Italy, 1988-1990

Background. The lifetime risk for urinary bladder cancer in the United States ranges from 0.5%-3%, depending on gender and ethnic group, with Caucasian males having the highest rate. Occupational exposures account for one-quarter of this risk in Caucasian males, and chemicals are central to creating this workplace hazard. Past research indicates that the aryl amines, benzidine, 2-naphthalene, and aniline dyes, are the main chemicals associated with bladder carcinogenesis. Aim. Because long-term, high-level occupational exposure to strong-inorganicacid mists containing sulphuric acid is an established carcinogen, the relationship between occupational acid exposure and bladder cancer was tested as part of an extensive occupational cancer case-control study of 513 male hospitalized patients in the Campania Region of Italy. Patients and methods. The full dataset included exposure information on up to 20 major groups of occupational chemicals with the target cancers of lung (n = 111), laryngeal (n = 35), naso/nasal/pharyngeal (n = 22), oral cavity (n = 23) and bladder (n = 75). For this study, cases (n = 75) were defined as people with bladder cancer, while controls (n = 270) were other unmatched patients with oral cavity cancers (but none of the other three target cancers) or patients with any other reason for hospitalization. Unconditional logistic regression was used to fit the acid-bladder cancer model controlling the effects of tobacco and age. Other confounders, such as alcohol and coffee consumption (the only dietary variable in our dataset) are discussed and considered, but neither was significant. Results. The results demonstrate an adjusted statistically significant association between occupational acid exposure and bladder cancer (OR = 4.09; p = 0.028). Discussion. The implications of this new finding in humans are discussed, both in the context of existing evidence, and in light of the 1992-IARC designation based on research to that time demonstrating the role of acid mixtures in the causation of upper respiratory tract cancers. Conclusion. Further research is warranted to replicate this finding.
Situational Judgment Tests: An Overview of Development Practices and Psychometric Characteristics

Situational judgment tests (SJTs) are popular assessment methods often used for personnel selection and promotion. SJTs present problem scenarios to examinees, who then evaluate each response option for addressing the issue described in the scenario. As guidance for practitioners and researchers alike, this paper provides experience- and evidence-based best practices for developing SJTs: writing scenarios and response options, creating response instructions, and selecting a response format. This review describes scoring options, including key stretching and within-person standardization. The authors also describe research on psychometric issues that affect SJTs, including reliability, validity, group differences, presentation modes, faking, and coaching.
Competitive Strategy Orientation and Innovative Success: Mediating Market Orientation a Study of Small-Medium Enterprises

In this paper, we investigate the mediating effects of market orientation in the competitive strategy orientation product innovative success relationship. Quantitative approach was employed in the investigation. Instruments used to collect data was self-administered questionnaires. Finally, a series of hypotheses are posited to explore the relationships of the variables and to test the effects of mediator. A field survey administered to 425 workers of small to medium enterprise in the manufacturing and services sector were used to gather the data. Out of the 425 surveys sent, hypotheses were empirically tested using structural equation modelling software’s AMOS to analysis regression and confirmatory factors of variables on a data set of
Improving performance and outcome (mortality) after implementation of a change-bundle approach for management of septic patients

Objective: Despite the existence of evidence-based guidelines for the management of patients with severe sepsis and septic shock, there is much variation among individual treatments. Methods: A before-after study with prospective data collection was performed at the emergency department and intensive care unit of a 485-bed, private, tertiary, general hospital. A total of 160 patients were enrolled (94 in a “pre-protocol phase” and 66 in a “post-protocol phase”). A resuscitation bundle for the first six hours and a management bundle for 24 hours were used. Additional quality indicators were also proposed and evaluated. The outcomes analyzed included hospital mortality, hospital and intensive care unit length of stay, compliance with bundles and performance related to quality indicators. results: From the “pre-protocol” to “post-protocol” phase, the diagnosis moved from the intensive care unit (52.0 to 18.2%) to the emergency department (26.6 to 40.9%) and to the wards (17.0 to 36.4%). Number of blood cultures prior to antibiotics, administration of activated drotrecogin alfa, use of corticosteroids and compliance with six-hour and 24-hour sepsis bundles were significantly higher after protocol implementation. Patients in the “post-protocol” group had a statistically lower risk of in-hospital mortality (56.4 versus 36.4%, p = 0.01). The greatest decrease in mortality rate occurred among the most critically ill patients (67.7 to 40.7%, p = 0.004). conclusions: Adopting an institutional protocol focused on behavioral changes and using quality improvement tools led to reduced hospital mortality and generated changes in healthcare team practice. This result adds to the growing evidence that optimized process-of-care by implementing managed protocols for sepsis patients can reduce mortality. Therefore, similar strategies should be routinely employed.
Climate Regulatory Risks and Corporate Bonds

Examining how climate and other environmental regulatory risks affect bond risk and pricing, we find that bond credit ratings and yield spreads appear to be influenced by a firm's environmental performance along with its regulatory conditions. Firms with poor environmental profiles tend to have lower credit ratings and higher yield spreads, particularly when the firm is located in a state with more stringent environmental regulations. Using the Paris Agreement as a shock to expected climate regulation, we provide evidence of a causal relation between climate regulatory risks and the credit ratings and yield spreads of bonds with problematic environmental profiles.
Clinical profile, treatment, and outcomes of patients with mantle cell lymphoma treated in a tertiary care center in South India

Introduction: Mantle cell lymphoma has an aggressive course, with unfavorable outcomes. Subjects and Methods: A retrospective analysis was undertaken and 77 cases were identified between 2009 and 2014. Results: Median age was 55 years with a male to female ratio of 6:1. Patients with pure nodal disease at presentation were fewer than with extranodal disease (53.2%). Most common extranodal site was bone marrow. A number of patients with low-, low-intermediate, high-intermediate, and high-risk International Prognostic Index (IPI) scores were 6, 24, 22, and 25. Treatment consisted of cyclophosphamide,hydroxydaunorubicin, oncovin, prednisolone (CHOP) or R-CHOP regimens. Median survival was 21 months. Median overall survival with early and advanced disease was 31 and 18 months (P = 0.02). Patients who received R-CHOP survived better than those given CHOP, 30 and 16 months (P = 0.0002). There was no difference in survival with respect to age, gender, extranodal, or bone marrow involvement. Conclusions: Most patients presented with extranodal disease, advanced stage, and high IPI. Although rituximab has improved survival, intensive chemotherapy would be required to improve survival.
Edinburgh Research Explorer Differentially Private Range Counting in Planar Graphs for Spatial Sensing

—This paper considers the problem of privately reporting counts of events recorded by devices in different regions of the plane. Unlike previous range query methods, our approach is not limited to rectangular ranges. We devise novel hierarchical data structures to answer queries over arbitrary planar graphs. This construction relies on balanced planar separators to represent shortest paths using O (log n ) number of canonical paths, where n is the number of nodes in the graph. Pre-computed sums along these canonical paths allow efﬁcient computations of 1 D counting range queries along any shortest path. We make use of differential forms together with the 1 D mechanism to answer 2 D queries in which a range is a union of faces in the planar graph. The methods are designed such that the range queries could be answered with differential privacy guarantee on any single event, with only a poly-logarithmic error. They also allow private range queries to be performed in a distributed setup. Theoretical and experimental results conﬁrm that the methods are efﬁcient and accurate on real data and incur less error than competing existing methods.
High Thermoelectric Performance of Cu-Doped PbSe-PbS System Enabled by High-Throughput Experimental Screening

Recent advances in high-throughput (HTP) computational power and machine learning have led to great achievements in exploration of new thermoelectric materials. However, experimental discovery and optimization of thermoelectric materials have long relied on the traditional Edisonian trial and error approach. Herein, we demonstrate that ultrahigh thermoelectric performance in a Cu-doped PbSe-PbS system can be realized by HTP experimental screening and precise property modulation. Combining the HTP experimental technique with transport model analysis, an optimal Se/S ratio showing high thermoelectric performance has been efficiently screened out. Subsequently, based on the screened Se/S ratio, the doping content of Cu has been subtly adjusted to reach the optimum carrier concentration. As a result, an outstanding peak zT~1.6 is achieved at 873 K for a 1.8 at% Cu-doped PbSe0.6S0. 4 sample, which is the superior value among the n-type Te-free lead chalcogenides. We anticipate that current work will stimulate large-scale unitization of the HTP experimental technique in the thermoelectric field, which can greatly accelerate the research and development of new high-performance thermoelectric materials.
Die funktionelle Nah-Infrarot-Spektroskopie (fNIRS) und das visuell-räumliche Arbeitsgedächtnis: Experimentelle Befunde zur Sensitivität und Spezifität der Methode und zu intelligenzbedingten, interindividuellen

Functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) is increasingly used for investigating cognitive processes. To provide converging evidence for the validity of fNIRS recordings in cognitive neuroscience, we investigated functional activation in the frontal cortex in 43 participants during the processing of a visuospatial working memory (WM) task and a sensory duration discrimination (DD) task functionally unrelated to WM. To distinguish WM-related processes from a general effect of increased task demand, we applied an adaptive approach, which ensured that subjective task demand was virtually identical for all individuals and across both tasks. Our specified region of interest covered Brodmann Area 8 of the left hemisphere, known for its important role in the execution of WM processes. Functional activation, as indicated by an increase of oxygenated and a decrease of deoxygenated hemoglobin, was shown for the WM task, but not in the DD task. The overall pattern of results indicated that hemodynamic responses recorded by fNIRS are sensitive to specific visuospatial WM capacity-related processes and do not reflect a general effect of increased task demand. In addition, the finding that no such functional activation could be shown for participants with far above-average mental ability suggested different cognitive processes adopted by this latter group.
Corticosteroid Prescribing in New Zealand Palliative Care Settings

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Compensatory driving behaviour of older drivers with Parkinson’s disease. Is it sufficient to counterbalance their driving difficulties?

Drivers with Parkinson’s disease (PD) may have difficulties in their driving competence and these deficits may lead to reduced driver performance and increased accident probability. The objective of the present paper is the analysis of traffic and safety behaviour of drivers with PD and the identification of possible compensatory strategies that these drivers follow, by applying a large driving simulator experiment. A thorough neurological and neuropsychological assessment was carried out and then a driving simulator experiment was applied. 54 elderly drivers of similar demographics went through the whole experimental procedure: 34 healthy controls and 20 PD patients. The following driving performance measures were examined: mean speed, time headway, lateral position, steering angle variability, reaction time, and accident probability, by Generalized Linear Models. Summarizing patients with PD are aware of their driving difficulties and they try to develop not in a successful way a compensatory driving behaviour and follow a more conservative driving pattern.
An Investigation into the Relationship among Iranian EFL Learner’s Emotional Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence, Strategy Use and Second Language Achievement

The current study investigated the relationship among emotional intelligence, cultural intelligence, language learning strategy use, and second language achievement of Iranian EFL learners. One hundred and fifty intermediate and upper-intermediate level Iranian EFL learners, studying at private language institutes in Kerman, were selected as the participants of the study. The participants completed three questionnaires: The Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (Bar-On, 1997), The Cultural Intelligence Questionnaire (Ang & Van Dyne, 2008), the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) (Oxford, 1990). All the three instruments adopted had already been validated extensively in various EFL/ESL contexts including Iran. Also, the participants’ GPAs were collected and regarded as the measure of their second language achievement. The results of Pearson Product Moment correlation analyses revealed that second language achievement was significantly positively correlated with both emotional intelligence and cultural intelligence as well as language learning strategy use of Iranian EFL learners. Moreover, the results of multiple regression analysis showed that, among the predictor variables of the study, strategy use was a significantly stronger predictor of second language achievement of Iranian EFL learners. Furthermore, the findings of multiple regression analysis indicated that among the components of strategy use, metacognitive strategy use was a stronger predictor of second language achievement. The findings of the content analysis of the interviews, conducted with 50 participants selected randomly from among the participants of the study, also confirmed the quantitative findings pinpointing the fact that strategy use was of prime importance in foreign/second language learning. The results are discussed in more detail in the paper.
495-504 Ruang-areerate T.pmd

Leishmaniasis, a vector-borne disease caused by Leishmania, is the second leading mortality after malaria. Continuously increasing cases of cutaneous and visceral leishmaniasis (CL/VL) have been documented in Thailand. Recently, loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) based on malachite green (MG) colorimetric assay that detects Leishmania DNA was developed to facilitate epidemiological studies of leishmaniasis in affected areas. However, ambiguous reading interpretation sometimes occurred using the MG-LAMP assay. In this study, the efficiency and effectiveness of the SYBRTM Safe fluorescent assay for LAMP detection of Leishmania siamensis (MON-324) and Leishmania martiniquensis (MON-229) were compared under two different light sources, i.e., blue light and ultraviolet light transilluminators. Regarding the SYBRTM-LAMP assay, the detection limit of DNA of both L. siamensis and L. martiniquensis was 103 parasites/mL. The assay exhibited consistency and reproducibility without requiring any post-reaction preparations. The dye is generally available, affordable and safe while reliable interpretation can be easily visualized under both blue light and ultraviolet light transilluminators. Using buffy coat of VL patients, the SYBRTM-LAMP offers an alternative method for screening samples with high sensitivity and specificity. This cost effective SYBRTM Safe fluorescent assay is simple to use without ambiguous evaluation which could provide another suitable choice of a standard LAMP assay in molecular laboratories as well as further development in field studies.
Pharmaceutical Probability of Success

Critical strategic decisions are made based on valuation models of pharmaceutical assets. Of the many assumptions that underpin a valuation model, probability of success is a key input, but one that often receives little thought or consideration. Several publications have analyzed historic probability of success in the pharmaceutical industry. Each study uses different datasets or different methodologies, often leading to a significant difference in conclusions. We examine the literature, provide a summary of the different datasets and urge model developers to think carefully about which assumptions to use. Depending on the profile of the drug, there can be as much as a 280% difference for the final valuation. Failing to account for the characteristics of the molecule, which we believe is best done with a thorough review of the data by seasoned drug developers, can result in a significantly skewed picture of valuation and misguided investment decisions.