Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Clinical Profile and Prognostic Factors Influencing Mortality in Patients With Acute Encephalitis Syndrome

Introduction Acute encephalitis syndrome (AES) is a significant global public health concern. AES is a disorder characterized by fever and altered mental status, and it is associated with considerable morbidity and mortality. There is a limited amount of existing literature on the clinical profile and prognostic markers that influence mortality in these patients. Our study seeks to comprehend the etiology, clinical characteristics, complications, and prognostic markers that impact mortality among patients with AES. Methods The study was a prospective observational study conducted over 18 months, involving a sample size of 105 patients. Patients aged 12 years and older, who met the WHO case definition of Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (AES), were consecutively recruited for this study. The patients' details were recorded, including their medical history and physical and clinical examination findings upon admission. The extent of cognitive impairment was evaluated using the Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS). Additionally, the patient's presenting symptoms, any complications experienced during their hospital stay, and the mortality rate were documented. The etiology, MRI results of the brain, laboratory parameters, and the need for assisted ventilation were also recorded. In-hospital characteristics were analyzed using the t-test for continuous variables and the chi-square test for binary variables. The log-rank test was employed to identify the predictors with the most significant independent influence on prognosis. All participants were selected only after obtaining their written informed consent. Results Most of the patients were in the age group of 21-30. 60% of the patients were male. Advanced age at presentation was associated with an increased risk of mortality (p-value=0.018). All patients presented to the hospital with symptoms of fever and altered sensorium. The most common agent isolated as the etiologic cause was HSV-1, found in 31.4% of the patients. 28.6% of the patients succumbed to death. The leading cause of death was raised intracranial pressure leading to hemorrhage in the brain. There was no significant correlation between the duration of symptoms and the primary outcome of death (p-value=0.498). The requirement for assisted ventilation was shown to increase the risk of death (p-value=0.001). A low GCS score at presentation was associated with a higher mortality rate (p-value=0.048). Conclusions The factors that predict mortality in AES involve a complex interplay of patient demographics, viral etiology, clinical severity, neuroimaging findings, and the need for assisted ventilation. Integrating these factors into clinical practice would enable healthcare providers to make informed decisions regarding patient management and interventions. As our comprehension of AES continues to develop, forthcoming advancements in diagnostics and therapeutics could refine prognostic assessments further. These developments could open new avenues for enhancing outcomes and diminishing mortality rates in this complex neurological disorder.
Dread and unknown characteristics of particulate matter pollution: cognitive and affective routes to air pollution prevention

Abstract This study investigates the effect of dread and unknown risks on individuals’ cognitive and affective responses and decision-making related to particulate matter (PM) air pollution. In particular, we investigate how dread and unknown risks play different roles in forming the cognitive and affective routes that affect the South Korean public’s intentions to reduce PM air pollution by adopting risk mitigation behaviors. One thousand South Korean adults participated in the study via a professional research company in 2022. Statistical analysis was performed using PROCESS Marco. Indirect effects and their significance were estimated using bias-corrected bootstrap (n = 5,000 resampling) confidence intervals (CIs). According to the results, perceived dread of PM air pollution had significant and positive associations with perceived health risks and negative emotion, and perceived risks had a significant and positive association with negative emotion. Moreover, the perceived unknown-ness of PM air pollution had a significant and positive association with perceived uncertainty, which had a significant and negative association with negative emotion. Our mediation models demonstrate that the cognitive and affective routes associated with the two risk dimensions had different effects on behavioral intentions to reduce PM air pollution. These distinct cognitive and affective routes have significant theoretical implications for the effective application of the psychometric paradigm in addressing various risk-related issues. The findings also imply that an appropriate level of negative emotion is crucial to motivate the public’s engagement in risk-reduction behaviors. While employing campaign messages that integrate perceived risk and negative emotional appeals derived from dread can be effective, caution should be taken not to diminish the public’s negative emotions when addressing the risk-related uncertainty in campaigns or interventions. Overall, our findings not only have several practical implications for environmental communication strategies but also make important theoretical contributions to the literature on risk perceptions and the psychometric paradigm.
The Nexus between Residential Density, Travel Behavior and Traffic Congestion in Developing Metropolitans: A Case Study of Harare, Zimbabwe

There is a noticeable dearth of empirical studies on the mediating role of travel behaviour on the influence of residential density on traffic congestion in developing countries, particularly in Zimbabwe. To address this gap, this study examined the effect of residential density on traffic congestion and delved into the potential mediating role of travel behaviour in this relationship. This study used data from a sample of 384 households in the Harare metropolitan province of Zimbabwe. Structural equation modelling was used to test the research hypotheses. The findings indicate that residential density and travel behaviour have a positive effect on traffic congestion. The results also established that travel behaviour partially mediates the relationship between residential density and traffic congestion. This study adds to the existing body of knowledge by providing an array of indicators that can inform policymakers in transportation and urban planning to alleviate traffic congestion.
Longitudinal changes in attention bias to infant crying in primiparous mothers

Introduction Infant stimuli attract caregiver attention and motivate parenting behavior. Studies have confirmed the existence of attentional bias toward infant face stimuli; however, relatively little is known about whether attentional bias exists for infant cry stimuli, which are as important as faces in child-rearing situations. Furthermore, scarce longitudinal evidence exists on how attentional bias toward infant crying changes through the postpartum period. Methods In the present study, we conducted an experiment to assess bias toward infant crying at two postpartum time points: at Time 1 (Mean = 75.24 days), 45 first-time mothers participated and at Time 2 (Mean = 274.33 days), 30 mothers participated. At both time points, the mothers participated in a Stroop task with infant crying and white noise as the stimuli. They were instructed to answer the color out loud as quickly and accurately as possible, while ignoring the sound. Four types of audio stimuli were used in this task (the cry of the mother’s own infant, the cry of an unfamiliar infant, white noise matched to the cry of the mother’s own infant, and white noise matched to the cry of an unfamiliar infant), one of which was presented randomly before each trial. Response time and the correct response rate for each condition were the dependent variables. Results For response time, the main effect of familiarity was significant, with longer response times when the participant’s infant’s cry was presented. In addition, response times were lower at Time 2 than at Time 1 in some conditions in which crying was presented. Discussion The results suggest that mothers may be less disturbed by infant crying as they gain more experience. Elucidating the characteristics of postpartum mothers’ changes in cognitive performance related to infants’ cries would be useful in fundamental and applied research to understand the process of parents’ adaptation to parenting.
Surfing and Social Theory: Experience, Embodiment and Narrative of the Dream Glide

CONTENTS Illustrations Preface 1 INTRODUCTION 2 THE ENCHANTED SEA: THE EVOLVING PERCEPTIONS OF THE SEA, COASTSCAPE AND BEACH 3 THE NARRATIVE HISTORY AND GLOBALIZATION OF SURFING 4 SURFING AS SUBCULTURE AND LIFESTYLE 5 GENDERING THE WAVES: SURFING IN THE GENDER ORDER AND THE GENDER ORDER ON SURFING 6 SURFING AND SURFED BODIES: THE EMBODIMENT OF SURFING 7 THE EXPERIENCE OF SURFING 8 CONCLUSION AND RESEARCH DIRECTIONS Notes Bibliography Index
Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era

List of Figures and Tables vii Acknowledgments ix Chapter 1 Introduction 1 Chapter 2 The Sources of Regional Power Nuclear Postures: Posture Optimization Theory 13 Chapter 3 Pakistan 55 Chapter 4 India 94 Chapter 5 China 121 Chapter 6 France 153 Chapter 7 Israel 179 Chapter 8 South Africa 207 Chapter 9 Deterring Unequally I: A Large-n Analysis 222 Chapter 10 Deterring Unequally II: Regional Power Nuclear Postures and Crisis Behavior 253 Chapter 11 Conclusion 299 Bibliography 313 Index 333
Lifestyle factors, serum parameters, metabolic comorbidities, and the risk of kidney stones: a Mendelian randomization study

Background and objective The early identification of modifiable risk factors is important for preventing kidney stones but determining causal associations can be difficult with epidemiological data. We aimed to genetically assess the causality between modifiable factors (lifestyle factors, serum parameters, and metabolic comorbidities) and the risk of kidney stones. Additionally, we aimed to explore the causal impact of education on kidney stones and its potential mediating pathways. Methods We conducted a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) study to explore the causal association between 44 modifiable risk factors and kidney stones. The FinnGen dataset initially explored the causal relationship of risk factors with kidney stones and the UK Biobank dataset was used as the validation set. Then, a meta-analysis was conducted by combining discovery and validation datasets. We used two-step MR to assess potential mediators and their mediation proportions between education and kidney stones. Results The combined results indicated that previous exposures may increase the risk of kidney stones, including sedentary behavior, urinary sodium, the urinary sodium/potassium ratio, the urinary sodium/creatinine ratio, serum calcium, 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25OHD), the estimated creatinine-based glomerular filtration rate (eGFRcrea), GFR estimated by serum cystatin C (eGFRcys), body mass index (BMI), waist circumference, type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), fasting insulin, glycated hemoglobin, and hypertension. Coffee intake, plasma caffeine levels, educational attainment, and the urinary potassium/creatinine ratio may decrease the risk of kidney stones. Ranked by mediation proportion, the effect of education on the risk of kidney stones was mediated by five modifiable risk factors, including sedentary behavior (mediation proportion, 25.7%), smoking initiation (10.2%), BMI (8.2%), T2DM (5.8%), and waist circumference (3.2%). Conclusion This study provides MR evidence supporting causal associations of many modifiable risk factors with kidney stones. Sedentary lifestyles, obesity, smoking, and T2DM are mediating factors in the causal relationship between educational attainment and kidney stones. Our results suggest more attention should be paid to these modifiable factors to prevent kidney stones.
Explaining students’ attitudes towards a sustainable future: Evidence from SEA-PLM 2019 data

This report discusses how students’ attitudes towards global issues are now crucial more than ever to build a sustainable world for future generations. The first section describes why students’ attitudes towards school and learning are important and how they are linked to the Educational Prosperity Framework (Willms & Tramonte, 2015). The second section highlights the literature about the key factors which can influence students’ attitudes towards school and learning and how they are related to students’ attitudes towards sustainable development. The third section discusses the methods used for analysing the relationships between these different factors and outcomes, using data from the Southeast Asia Primary Learning Metrics (SEA-PLM) program in 2019. It also explains the rationale for the selection of the key variables. The fourth section presents the main results. The fifth section concludes with some key observations that support the goal of raising the awareness of future generations of their ecological footprints and to strive for a sustainable world.
Spoken Sibe: Morphology of the Inflected Parts of Speech

At present, the Sibe language is the only still-active oral variety of Manchu, the language of the indigenous tribe of Manchuria. With some 20,000 to 30,000 speakers it is also the most widely spoken of the Tungusic languages, which are found in both Manchuria and eastern Siberia. In the 1990s, when the oral varieties of Manchu either became extinct or were on the verge of extinction, Sibe survived as a language spoken by all generations of Sibe people in the Chapchal Sibe autonomous county, and by the middle and older generations in virtually all other Sibe settlements of Xinjiang. "Spoken Sibe" is a carefully researched study of this historically and linguistically important language.
The Role of Uric Acid in Human Health: Insights from the Uricase Gene

Uric acid is the final product of purine metabolism and is converted to allantoin in most mammals via the uricase enzyme. The accumulation of loss of function mutations in the uricase gene rendered hominoids (apes and humans) to have higher urate concentrations compared to other mammals. The loss of human uricase activity may have allowed humans to survive environmental stressors, evolution bottlenecks, and life-threatening pathogens. While high urate levels may contribute to developing gout and cardiometabolic disorders such as hypertension and insulin resistance, low urate levels may increase the risk for neurodegenerative diseases. The double-edged sword effect of uric acid has resurrected a growing interest in urate’s antioxidant role and the uricase enzyme’s role in modulating the risk of obesity. Characterizing both the effect of uric acid levels and the uricase enzyme in different animal models may provide new insights into the potential therapeutic benefits of uric acid and novel uricase-based therapy.
Spatial Distribution of Thermal Properties on Debris-Covered Glaciers in the Himalayas Derived From ASTER Data

The present study investigates thermal resistances on debris-covered glaciers around Mt. Everest and in the Lunana region of Bhutan, using satellite images taken by ASTER and NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data. The thermal resistance is defined as the thickness divided by the thermal conductivity of a debris layer, and is an important index to the evolution of glacial lakes through the melting process. This index is obtained from surface temperature and heat balance on the debris layers. Since the net radiation is a dominant energy source on the Himalayan glaciers, thermal resistances are calculated by neglecting turbulent heat flux in heat balance. We evaluate errors of thermal resistances using field meteorological data and multitemporal ASTER data. The result shows that above errors are unlikely to a#ect the spatial pattern of thermal resistances. About half of ,/ target glaciers without moraine-dammed lakes have larger thermal resistances than 1 glaciers with the lakes. Spatial distribution of thermal resistances shows the large increases toward glacier termini on the glaciers without lakes, whereas relatively small and uniform values on those with lakes. These results imply that the di#erence in magnitudes and distribution of thermal resistances on debriscovered glaciers are related to di#erent evolutionary stages of the glacial lakes in the Himalayas. The present study demonstrates the possibility that ASTER data provide thermal resistance distribution over many glaciers for glacial lake studies without simultaneous field observations.
Predictive Sliding-Mode Control for Networked High-Order Fully Actuated Multiagents Under Random Deception Attacks

This article investigates the coordinated control of networked high-order fully actuated multiagents (NHOFAMAs) under random deception attacks in the feedback and forward channels, where a Bernoulli process is used to denote the launching success rate of random deception attacks. When launching the attacks successfully, the output and control signals are tampered via the injection of false data. A predictive sliding-mode control method is proposed to achieve the security coordination. In this method, a sliding variable for the improvement of the robustness of closed-loop systems is introduced to defend random deception attacks. Then, a Diophantine equation is applied to develop a prediction model in an incremental high-order fully actuated (IHOFA) form. Based on this model, multistep ahead predictions of sliding variables are established to realize the optimization of coordinated control performance and the defense of random deception attacks. By utilizing the Lyapunov function and linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) approach, a necessary and sufficient condition is given to maintain the stability and consensus of closed-loop NHOFAMAs. The feasibility and practicability of the proposed method can be illustrated via simulated and experimental results of formation control for air-bearing spacecraft (ABS) simulators.
Clinical Potential of Cellular Material Sources in the Generation of iPSC-Based Products for the Regeneration of Articular Cartilage

Inflammatory joint diseases, among which osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis are the most common, are characterized by progressive degeneration of the cartilage tissue, resulting in the threat of limited or lost joint functionality in the absence of treatment. Currently, treating these diseases is difficult, and a number of existing treatment and prevention measures are not entirely effective and are complicated by the patients’ conditions, the multifactorial nature of the pathology, and an incomplete understanding of the etiology. Cellular technologies based on induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) can provide a vast cellular resource for the production of artificial cartilage tissue for replacement therapy and allow the possibility of a personalized approach. However, the question remains whether a number of etiological abnormalities associated with joint disease are transmitted from the source cell to iPSCs and their chondrocyte derivatives. Some data state that there is no difference between the iPSCs and their derivatives from healthy and sick donors; however, there are other data indicating a dissimilarity. Therefore, this topic requires a thorough study of the differentiation potential of iPSCs and the factors influencing it, the risk factors associated with joint diseases, and a comparative analysis of the characteristics of cells obtained from patients. Together with cultivation optimization methods, these measures can increase the efficiency of obtaining cell technology products and make their wide practical application possible.
After the Disaster Guidebook: Designing a Post-Disaster Communication Intervention for Rural Landowners

Extension is well-positioned to facilitate communication strategies that foster community resilience and disaster recovery, particularly for rural residents. This paper proposes a new approach to post-disaster communication that strengthens rural community capacities in locally and culturally relevant ways. The findings revealed specific post-disaster information needs, preferences for local resources, and communication that encourages resilience through a document analysis and interviews with informants recovering from the 2020 Colorado wildfires. The practical recommendations discussed serve as a starting point for Extension professionals in other areas to consider ways to engage with their communities before, during, and after a disaster.
Functional Meta-Analysis of the Proteomic Responses of Arabidopsis Seedlings to the Spaceflight Environment Reveals Multi-Dimensional Sources of Variability across Spaceflight Experiments

The human quest for sustainable habitation of extraterrestrial environments necessitates a robust understanding of life’s adaptability to the unique conditions of spaceflight. This study provides a comprehensive proteomic dissection of the Arabidopsis plant’s responses to the spaceflight environment through a meta-analysis of proteomics data from four separate spaceflight experiments conducted on the International Space Station (ISS) in different hardware configurations. Raw proteomics LC/MS spectra were analyzed for differential expression in MaxQuant and Perseus software. The analysis of dissimilarities among the datasets reveals the multidimensional nature of plant proteomic responses to spaceflight, impacted by variables such as spaceflight hardware, seedling age, lighting conditions, and proteomic quantification techniques. By contrasting datasets that varied in light exposure, we elucidated proteins involved in photomorphogenesis and skotomorphogenesis in plant spaceflight responses. Additionally, with data from an onboard 1 g control experiment, we isolated proteins that specifically respond to the microgravity environment and those that respond to other spaceflight conditions. This study identified proteins and associated metabolic pathways that are consistently impacted across the datasets. Notably, these shared proteins were associated with critical metabolic functions, including carbon metabolism, glycolysis, gluconeogenesis, and amino acid biosynthesis, underscoring their potential significance in Arabidopsis’ spaceflight adaptation mechanisms and informing strategies for successful space farming.
Ground penetrating radar in temperate ice: englacial water inclusions as limiting factor for data interpretation

Ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been extensively used in glaciology to infer glacier's ice thickness, liquid water content, water drainage pathways, and other properties. The interpretation of such GPR data is not always straightforward and for temperate glaciers, the signal is often affected by strong scattering and attenuation. It has often been suggested that such effects originate from englacial water inclusions, since water and ice have a large contrast in their di-electric permittivity. To investigate such effects quantitatively, we perform an extensive numerical modeling study of GPR signals. By exploring how different liquid water contents (LWC) and water-inclusions size affect the GPR signal, we show that their effects are much larger than the potential presence of a wet snowpack or a heterogeneous distribution of ice permittivity. In particularly, we show that the presence of such water inclusions is a necessary and sufficient condition for reproducing the typical characteristics of GPR data acquired in the field. Further, we find that for 25 MHz GPR antennas, a bulk LWC $\gtrsim$ 0.2%, associated with decimeters-scale water inclusions already limits bedrock detectability for ice thicknesses $\gtrsim 100$ m. Since these values are typical for Alpine glaciers, they clarify why the quality of GPR data is often poor in such environments.