Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Total and individual PBC-40 scores are reliable for the assessment of health-related quality of life in Greek patients with primary biliary cholangitis

Abstract Background Primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) has been long associated with impairment of various aspects of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) with substantial differences among populations. This study evaluated for the first-time the HRQoL in Greek PBC patients in conjunction with clinical and laboratory parameters of patients. Methods We analyzed prospectively collected data regarding the HRQoL by using the PBC-40 and SF-36 questionnaires in 374 Greek PBC patients and 131 age- and sex-matched non-PBC controls. Results The PBC-40 questionnaire is a reliable tool for HRQoL assessment in Greek PBC patients (Cronbach's α > 0.7 for all domains). Implementation of PBC-40 and SF-36 demonstrated significant impairment of HRQoL in Greek PBC patients compared to controls (P < 0.001 for all comparisons). Emotional dysfunction, social impairment, and fatigue (100%, 80.5% and 78%, respectively) were amongst those with the highest, while cognitive dysfunction (32%) with the least impact on quality of life. Fatigue was associated with female sex (P = 0.02), longer disease duration (P = 0.01), presence of cirrhosis (P = 0.02) and positivity for PBC-specific ANA (P < 0.05), while social dysfunction with increased age (P < 0.001), longer disease duration (P < 0.001) and presence of cirrhosis (P = 0.004). Living in urban areas was linked to impaired social function (P = 0.04), cognition (P = 0.02), fatigue (P = 0.04) and increased total PBC-40 score (P = 0.01). Conclusions Implementation of PBC-40 and SF-36 revealed impaired HRQoL in Greek PBC patients with fatigue, social and emotional dysfunction exerting the highest impact. However, total, and individual PBC-40 scores were lower than that reported in studies from Northern/Central Europe and Canada. Deranged HRQoL was associated with severity of liver disease and presence of PBC-specific ANA.
Blood eosinophils in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: A potential biomarker

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a common, preventable and treatable disease that is characterized by persistent respiratory symptoms and airflow limitation. [1] The underlying cellular and molecular mechanisms of COPD are still insufficiently understood. The variable clinical characteristics and differences in response to therapy suggest that COPD may have different phenotypes. The identification of phenotypes based on biomarkers could help clinicians to establish individual treatment programs for patients with COPD.
Jet injection potentiates naked mRNA SARS-CoV-2 vaccine in mice and non-human primates by adding physical stress to the skin

Naked mRNA-based vaccines may reduce the reactogenicity associated with delivery carriers, but their effectiveness has been suboptimal against infectious diseases. Herein, we aimed to enhance their efficacy by using a pyro-drive liquid jet injector that precisely controls pressure to widely disperse mRNA solution in the skin. The jet injection boosted naked mRNA delivery efficiency in the mouse skin. Mechanistic analyses indicate that dendritic cells, upon uptake of antigen mRNA in the skin, migrate to the draining lymph nodes for antigen presentation. Additionally, the jet injector activated innate immune responses in the skin, presumably by inducing physical stress, thus serving as a physical adjuvant. From a safety perspective, our approach, utilizing naked mRNA, restricted mRNA distribution solely to the injection site, preventing systemic pro-inflammatory reactions following vaccination. Ultimately, the jet injection of naked mRNA encoding SARS-CoV-2 spike protein elicited robust humoral and cellular immunity, providing protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection in mice. Furthermore, our approach induced plasma activity of neutralizing SARS-CoV-2 in non-human primates, comparable to that observed in mice, with no detectable systemic reactogenicity.
Including organism and environmental heterogeneity in kinematic continuum models of collective behaviour with applications to locust foraging and group structure

Collective behaviour occurs at all levels of the natural world, from cells joining together to form complex structures, to locusts interacting to form large and destructive plagues. These complex behaviours arise from simple individual and environmental interactions, and thus lend themselves well to mathematical modelling. One simplifying assumption, that of relative homogeneity of organisms, is often applied to keep the mathematics tractable. However, heterogeneity arising due to the internal state of individuals has an impact on these interactions and thus plays a role in group structure and dynamics. In this paper, we introduce a continuum model that accounts for this heterogeneity in the form of a state space that models an organisms internal state and converts this to movement characteristics. Using a variety analytic techniques, we investigate the effect of internal state on aggregation density and aggregation formation behaviour, finding that density and formation is most affected by the ratio of attractive to dispersive interactions. We then apply the model to a concrete example of locust foraging to investigate the effect of food, hunger, and gregarisation on locust group formation and structure. Through numerical simulations we find that the most gregarious and satiated locusts tend to be located towards the centre of locust groups. Conversely, hunger drives locusts towards the edges of the group. Finally, we find that locust group dispersal may be driven in part by hunger. Author Summary Collective behaviour occurs at all levels of the natural world, from cells joining together to form complex structures, to locusts interacting to form large and destructive plagues. We can modelling these complex behaviours using mathematical models however we often need to rely on simplifying assumptions to keep the mathematics easy enough to analyse. One simplifying assumption that is often employed is assuming that all the modelled organisms are the same (or in one of only a few possible states). However, this is often not the case in nature where the differences between individuals arising due to internal characteristics, such as hunger or age, often affects their behaviour and thus can change group dynamics. In this paper we introduce a mathematical model that is able to capture these differences and apply the newly developed model to locust foraging. We find that hunger tends to drive individuals to the edges of aggregations as well as lowers the maximum possible density. These two results combine to give a possible mechanism for the dispersal of locust groups.
Visual looming is a primitive for human emotion

Looming objects afford threat of collision across the animal kingdom. Defensive responses to looming and neural computations for looming detection are strikingly conserved across species. In mammals, information about rapidly approaching threats is conveyed from the retina to the midbrain superior colliculus, where variables that indicate the position and velocity of approach are computed to enable defensive behavior. Although neuroscientific theories posit that midbrain representations contribute to emotion through connectivity with distributed brain systems, it remains unknown whether a computational system for looming detection can predict both defensive behavior and phenomenal experience in humans. Here, we show that a shallow convolutional neural network based on the Drosophila visual system predicts defensive blinking to looming objects in infants and superior colliculus responses to optical expansion in adults. Further, the responses of the convolutional network to a broad array of naturalistic video clips predict self-reported emotion largely on the basis of subjective arousal. Our findings illustrate how motor and experiential components of human emotion relate to species-general systems for survival in unpredictable environments.
Simulation des grandes echelles de l'ecoulement instationnaire turbulent dans une tuyere 3d transsonique

Cette these porte sur la simulation numerique d'un ecoulement interne compressible, ins- tationnaire et turbulent a l'aide de la Simulation des Grandes Echelles (SGE). Dans cette approche, les grandes echelles energetiques et instationnaires de l'ecoulement sont calcu- lees, tandis que les petites echelles sont modelisees. L'objectif de ce travail, realise en collaboration avec le Consortium Industrie-Recherche dans les Turbomachines (CIRT) et le LEMFI, est d'analyser les potentialites de la SGE pour le calcul d'ecoulements confines en geometrie 3D en vue d'applications aux turboma- chines. Le cas d'etude retenu pour la validation de la methodologie est l'ecoulement dans une tuyere 3D transsonique pour lequel il existe de nombreux resultats statistiques (LEMFI) et experimentaux (ONERA). La tuyere est caracterisee par une bosse en fleche sur la paroi basse generatrice d'effets 3D. L'ecoulement, sans rotation, presente cependant les phenomenes physiques complexes d'interaction onde de choc/couche limite et de large de- collement, comme ceux rencontres au sein des turbomachines. La SGE est obtenue a partir d'un modele de sous maille d'echelles mixtes developpe au LIMSI-CNRS. La discretisa- tion temporelle des equations est realisee par un schema de Runge-Kutta explicite d'ordre deux. Les flux Euler sont discretises par un schema TVD d'Harten-Yee d'ordre deux tandis que les flux visqueux le sont par un schema centre. La SGE a permis d'obtenir des informations instationnaires sur l'ecoulement, et de mettre en evidence la formation et le lâcher de tourbillons dans la tuyere. La solution insta- tionnaire est differente de la solution stationnaire RANS obtenue avec une modelisation statistique classique et montre l'oscillation du choc et la destabilisation du decollement au cours du temps. Les resultats de la SGE obtenus sur le nombre de Mach isentropique, les profils de la vitesse moyenne et les tensions de Reynolds sont discutes et compares aux resultats experimentaux (ONERA) et statistiques, obtenus avec le modele de Launder- Shima (LEMFI). Le bilan de l'energie cinetique turbulente (k) est analyse et compare a celui donne par la modelisation statistique, dans le decollement. Les resultats de la SGE montrent des differences notables avec les resultats statistiques dans le c÷ur de la tuyere : les termes de fluctuations de pression importants mesures dans le choc sont pris en compte par la SGE.
SIAN OURNAL OF HEMISTRY

Fingerprints in forensic science generally are used to identify suspects, victims and people who touch a surface at the crime scene. The science of fingerprint identification is more desirable in forensic chemistry based on the fact that fingerprints are unique, individual prints remain unchanged, and no two individuals have exactly the same pattern. The impression of the fingerprint comes from the friction ridge, which is the arch, loop and whorls, which cover the surface of the finger and sweat [1]. Several studies of visible and latent fingerprints have been carried out. Deoxyribose nucleic acid (DNA) extracts from adhesive tapes for fingerprint development [2]. In addition, latent fingerprints were found in short random repeats (STR) [3]. Similarly, for DNA collection from relatively hairless areas of the body using Scotch tape ®3M No. 5414. DNA was then recovered using 3M "Scotch" No. 5414 to collect cells from clothing [4,5]. Fingerprinting is a valuable type of physical evidence in identification. In general, three fingerprint traces can be found in a crime scene are visible (or printed patterns), impressions (or plastic prints) and latent prints. Latent print outs are not visible to the ordinary eye and therefore require some development tools or enhancements for their visualization. Development of Eco-Friendly Fingerprint Visualization using Herb
Weight Science: Evaluating the Evidence for a Paradigm Shift

n ot on ly in ef fe ct iv e at pr od u ci n g th in n er , h ea lt h ie r bo di es ,b ut al so da m ag in g, co nt ri bu ti ng to fo od an d bo dy pr eo cc up at io n, re pe at ed cy cl es of w ei gh t lo ss an d re ga in , di st ra ct io n fr om ot he r pe rs on al he al th go al s an d w id er he al th de te rm in an ts ,r ed uc ed se lf -e st ee m ,e at in g di so rde rs ,o th er he al th de cr em en t, an d w ei gh t st ig m at iz at io n an d di sc ri m in at io n [6 -8 ]. A s ev id en ce -b as ed co m pe te nci es ar e m or e fi rm ly em be dd ed in he al th pr ac ti ti on er st an da rd s, at te nt io n ha s be en gi ve n to th e et hi ca li m pl ic ati on s of re co m m en di ng tr ea tm en t th at m ay be in ef fe ct iv e or da m ag in g [5 ,9 ]. A gr ow in g tr an sdi sc ip lin ar y m ov em en t ca lle d H ea lt h at E ve ry Si ze S M (H A E S) 2 sh if ts th e fo cu s fr om w ei gh t
The Significance of Urban Trees and Forests: Toward a Deeper Understanding of Values

Many city dwellers hold very strong personal ties to urban trees and forests, with some attachments approaching a spiritual involvement. Ties between people and trees are associated with traditions, symbolism, and the need to "get involved" at the local level to sustain or enhance the environment for present and future generations. Urban forestry programs that aim to improve quality of life in urban areas will be most effective if urbanites learn about the basic biological needs of trees. At the same time managers and planners must learn about the many psychological, social, and cultural needs that trees and forests fulfill for urbanites.
Example-based elastic materials

We propose an example-based approach for simulating complex elastic material behavior. Supplied with a few poses that characterize a given object, our system starts by constructing a space of prefered deformations by means of interpolation. During simulation, this example manifold then acts as an additional elastic attractor that guides the object towards its space of prefered shapes. Added on top of existing solid simulation codes, this example potential effectively allows us to implement inhomogeneous and anisotropic materials in a direct and intuitive way. Due to its example-based interface, our method promotes an art-directed approach to solid simulation, which we exemplify on a set of practical examples.
Influences on the decision to study veterinary medicine: variation with sex and background

A questionnaire was developed to look at attitudes to veterinary medicine as a career choice among students at different stages of the veterinary course at the Royal Veterinary College. Traditional-entry first-year and final-year students, as well as entry-level ‘Gateway’ (widening participation) students, were invited to participate. Wanting to work with animals and exposure to a veterinary role model through taking a sick animal to visit a veterinary surgeon appeared to be major factors in choosing a veterinary career for all undergraduates, regardless of their socioeconomic background. Overall, women were more strongly influenced by owning animals (P=0.014), and men were more positively influenced by the challenging reputation of the course (P=0.028). When the students were asked to indicate their top three reasons for wanting to become a vet, men were 9.5 times as likely as women to select ‘Want to train as a scientist’, 5.3 times as likely to select ‘Join a profession’ and 13.2 times as likely to select ‘Hardest course to get in to’; the top choice for both sexes was ‘Want to work with animals’. Thirty-one per cent of the students felt their careers adviser had been a negative influence on their decision to become a vet.
GTWS-MLrec: global terrestrial water storage reconstruction by machine learning from 1940 to present

Abstract. Terrestrial water storage (TWS) includes all forms of water stored on and below the land surface, and is a key determinant of global water and energy budgets. However, TWS data from measurements by the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite mission are only available from 2002, limiting global and regional understanding of the long-term trends and variabilities in the terrestrial water cycle under climate change. This study presents long-term (i.e., 1940–2022) and relatively high-resolution (i.e., 0.25∘) monthly time series of TWS anomalies over the global land surface. The reconstruction is achieved by using a set of machine learning models with a large number of predictors, including climatic and hydrological variables, land use/land cover data, and vegetation indicators (e.g., leaf area index). The outcome, machine-learning-reconstructed TWS estimates (i.e., GTWS-MLrec), fits well with the GRACE/GRACE-FO measurements, showing high correlation coefficients and low biases in the GRACE era. We also evaluate GTWS-MLrec with other independent products such as the land–ocean mass budget, atmospheric and terrestrial water budget in 341 large river basins, and streamflow measurements at 10 168 gauges. The results show that our proposed GTWS-MLrec performs overall as well as, or is more reliable than, previous TWS datasets. Moreover, our reconstructions successfully reproduce the consequences of climate variability such as strong El Niño events. The GTWS-MLrec dataset consists of three reconstructions based on (a) mascons of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of the California Institute of Technology, the Center for Space Research at the University of Texas at Austin, and the Goddard Space Flight Center of NASA; (b) three detrended and de-seasonalized reconstructions; and (c) six global average TWS series over land areas, both with and without Greenland and Antarctica. Along with its extensive attributes, GTWS_MLrec can support a wide range of geoscience applications such as better understanding the global water budget, constraining and evaluating hydrological models, climate-carbon coupling, and water resources management. GTWS-MLrec is available on Zenodo through https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10040927 (Yin, 2023).
East India Companies and Long-Term Economic Change in India

In evaluating the impact of colonialism on long-term political economy outcomes, scholars have focused on political institutions developed during colonial rule. I argue, in contrast, that the beginnings of long-term economic transformation pre-dated the colonial era, and were not driven by formal institutional changes. Centuries prior to the period of military annexation, European trading companies drew local economies into networks of long-distance maritime trade, transforming geographical and social patterns of economic organization. I use original archival data to study the impact of trading hubs built in India by the various European East India Companies before colonization. My analysis reveals a systematic and robust relationship between pre-colonial commercial developments and modern indicators of economic transformation, even after addressing a plethora of selection concerns. Overall, my evidence indicates that the precolonial commercial era was more significant than the colonial era in redirecting India’s long-term development trajectories. Words: 13,827
La participación política orientada al sistema representativo: dimensiones y factores explicativos

espanolAl margen de los distintos repertorios de participacion politica en diferentes contextos sociales, han predominado las modalidades mas cercanas al sistema representativo, mas cuando estas han demostrado ser heterogeneas. En esta linea, en el presente trabajo identificamos mediante analisis multivariados (analisis del camino y regresion lineal multiple por pasos) los predictores de tres modalidades participativas orientadas hacia el sistema representativo: la eleccion de representantes (voto obligatorio), la participacion partidaria de campana y las acciones orientadas a influir decisiones del Poder Legislativo. EnglishBeyond of political participation repertoires in different social contexts, the emphasis on the study of the modes closest to the representative system has been maintained. More so when these modalities have proven to be heterogeneous. In this paper -by multivariate analysis (path analysis and stepwise multiple linear regression)- identify the predictors of three forms of participation oriented to the representative system: election of representative authorities (compulsory voting), participation in parties and campaigns, and actions that try to influence the decisions of the legislature.
ACR – NASCI – SPR PRACTICE PARAMETER FOR THE PERFORMANCE OF QUANTIFICATION OF CARDIOVASCULAR COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY ( CT ) AND MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING ( MRI )

This document is an educational tool designed to assist practitioners in providing appropriate radiologic care for patients. Practice Parameters and Technical Standards are not inflexible rules or requirements of practice and are not intended, nor should they be used, to establish a legal standard of care1. For these reasons and those set forth below, the American College of Radiology and our collaborating medical specialty societies caution against the use of these documents in litigation in which the clinical decisions of a practitioner are called into question. The ultimate judgment regarding the propriety of any specific procedure or course of action must be made by the practitioner in light of all the circumstances presented. Thus, an approach that differs from the guidance in this document, standing alone, does not necessarily imply that the approach was below the standard of care. To the contrary, a conscientious practitioner may responsibly adopt a course of action different from that set forth in this document when, in the reasonable judgment of the practitioner, such course of action is indicated by the condition of the patient, limitations of available resources, or advances in knowledge or technology subsequent to publication of this document. However, a practitioner who employs an approach substantially different from the guidance in this document is advised to document in the patient record information sufficient to explain the approach taken. The practice of medicine involves not only the science, but also the art of dealing with the prevention, diagnosis, alleviation, and treatment of disease. The variety and complexity of human conditions make it impossible to always reach the most appropriate diagnosis or to predict with certainty a particular response to treatment. Therefore, it should be recognized that adherence to the guidance in this document will not assure an accurate diagnosis or a successful outcome. All that should be expected is that the practitioner will follow a reasonable course of action based on current knowledge, available resources, and the needs of the patient to deliver effective and safe medical care. The sole purpose of this document is to assist practitioners in achieving this objective.
Durability and Availability of Erasure-Coded Systems with Concurrent Maintenance

This document is written to establish some of the fundamentals of reliability theory as well as to identify the theoretical machineries for the prediction of durability/availability of the erasure-coded storage systems. Most of the contents of this document are dedicated to a review of fundamentals as well as major improved stochastic models. Yet, it also has many contributions. One of the contributions of this document is the introduction of one of the most general form of Markov models for the estimation of mean time to failure numbers. Very good approximations for the closed form solutions for this general model are investigated. Various storage conﬁgurations under different policies are compared using such advanced models. Topics that include simulation modelings for more accurate estimations are included towards the end of the document by noting the deﬁciencies of the simpliﬁed canonical Markov models. Throughout the document, we shall focus on concurrently maintained systems although the discussions will only slightly change for the systems repaired one device at a time. Some background on probability and coding theory is expected.