Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The California Critical Thinking Skills Test--College Level. Technical Report #1. Experimental Validation and Content Validity.

Four experiments were conducted to determine if the California Critical Thinking Skills Test--College Level (CCTST) measured the growth in critical thinking (CT) skills achieved by college students completing approved CT courses. The experiments, conducted at California State University (Fullerton) involved 1,169 college students in 5 courses with 20 instructors. The theoretical construct for the CCTST is the consensus conceptualization of CT reached by a panel of 46 experts participating in a Delphi research project of the American Philosophical Association during 1987-89. Experiment 1, comparing pretest and posttest scores of students enrolled in CT courses, demonstrated significant growth in CT scores. As a control, the second experiment related CCTST scores of two independent groups enrolled in introduction to psychology courses. The null hypothesis was retained. In the third experiment, using paired pretest/posttest scores, the CCTST measured the growth in CT skills assumed to have occurred as a rcsult of one semester of approved CT inst:uction. The fourth experiment retained the null hypothesis for the control group using paired pretest/posttest scores. Data are summarized in one table. (SLD) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ********** A U.11 DEPARTIMIT OF IDUCATION Office at Educehonel Research and Improurment EOUCATIONAI. RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ENG) OP4Ms dczument has been ruroduCed u recanted from the person or Ofgenttahon Onfanating et 0 Minor Changes have been made to uproot furoduchon welsh Pants of mew or °prune stated in this document do not necessanho reProsant &hold (NM median or POIICY -PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY PE 15, A. Folo,v6.TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)" The California Critical Thinking Skills Test -College Level
Real-time target and pose recognition for 3-D graphical overlay

Applications involving human-computer interaction are becoming increasingly popular and necessary as the power of computers is integrated into almost every corner of business and entertainment. One problem with the current interfaces, however, is that the user is forced to manually input information about their current task, or glance away from what they are doing to read a screen. One solution to this problem of efficiency is to allow the computer to automatically sense the environment around the user, and display data in the user's field of view when appropriate. With comptuer graphics drawn over the user's field of view, the appearance of certain objects in the scene can be modified, or augmented, to either point out critical regions, or provide on-line information about an object whenever the object is encountered. Two solutions to this problem are proposed: one requires each special object to be marked with special color "tags", while the other tries to detect the presence of the object directly with no artificial additions to the appearance of the object. In both systems, the 3D pose of the object is tracked from frame to frame so that the overlay will appear to be solidly attached to the real object. The overlayed graphics eliminate the distraction of consulting a separate screen, and provide the information exactly when it is most useful, thus creating an efficient and seamless interface. Thesis Supervisor: Alex P. Pentland Title: Toshiba Professor of Media Arts and Sciences
Metabolic analyses elucidate non-trivial gene targets for amplifying dihydroartemisinic acid production in yeast

Synthetic biology enables metabolic engineering of industrial microbes to synthesize value-added molecules. In this, a major challenge is the efficient redirection of carbon to the desired metabolic pathways. Pinpointing strategies toward this goal requires an in-depth investigation of the metabolic landscape of the organism, particularly primary metabolism, to identify precursor and cofactor availability for the target compound. The potent antimalarial therapeutic artemisinin and its precursors are promising candidate molecules for production in microbial hosts. Recent advances have demonstrated the production of artemisinin precursors in engineered yeast strains as an alternative to extraction from plants. We report the application of in silico and in vivo metabolic pathway analyses to identify metabolic engineering targets to improve the yield of the direct artemisinin precursor dihydroartemisinic acid (DHA) in yeast. First, in silico extreme pathway (ExPa) analysis identified NADPH-malic enzyme and the oxidative pentose phosphate pathway (PPP) as mechanisms to meet NADPH demand for DHA synthesis. Next, we compared key DHA-synthesizing ExPas to the metabolic flux distributions obtained from in vivo 13C metabolic flux analysis of a DHA-synthesizing strain. This comparison revealed that knocking out ethanol synthesis and overexpressing glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase in the oxidative PPP (gene YNL241C) or the NADPH-malic enzyme ME2 (YKL029C) are vital steps toward overproducing DHA. Finally, we employed in silico flux balance analysis and minimization of metabolic adjustment on a yeast genome-scale model to identify gene knockouts for improving DHA yields. The best strategy involved knockout of an oxaloacetate transporter (YKL120W) and an aspartate aminotransferase (YKL106W), and was predicted to improve DHA yields by 70-fold. Collectively, our work elucidates multiple non-trivial metabolic engineering strategies for improving DHA yield in yeast.
In Vitro Culture and Characterization of Equine Peripheral Blood Mesenchymal Stromal Cells Running Title: Equine Peripheral Blood Msc Characterization

21 The use of mesenchymal stromal cells (MSC) for the treatment of orthopedic injuries in 22 horses has been described in several studies. In contrast to human MSC, no official guidelines 23 have been proposed to classify a particular cell as an equine MSC. For peripheral blood (PB)-24 derived MSC in specific, only a limited characterization has been reported to date. In the 25 present study, we have increased the currently available data on PB-derived MSC. To this 26 end, MSC were isolated from equine PB samples and colony forming unit (CFU) assays as 27 well as population doubling time (PDT) calculations from P 0 to P 10 were performed. Hereby, 28 two types of colonies, fingerprinted and dispersed, could be observed based on macroscopic 29 as well as microscopic features. Moreover, after an initial lag phase as indicated by a negative 30 PDT at P 0 to P 1 , the MSC divided rapidly as shown by a positive PDT at all further passages.
Bilingualism delays age at onset of dementia, independent of education and immigration status

Objectives: The purpose of the study was to determine the association between bilingualism and age at onset of dementia and its subtypes, taking into account potential confounding factors. Methods: Case records of 648 patients with dementia (391 of them bilingual) diagnosed in a specialist clinic were reviewed. The age at onset of first symptoms was compared between monolingual and bilingual groups. The influence of number of languages spoken, education, occupation, and other potentially interacting variables was examined. Results: Overall, bilingual patients developed dementia 4.5 years later than the monolingual ones. A significant difference in age at onset was found across Alzheimer disease dementia as well as frontotemporal dementia and vascular dementia, and was also observed in illiterate patients. There was no additional benefit to speaking more than 2 languages. The bilingual effect on age at dementia onset was shown independently of other potential confounding factors such as education, sex, occupation, and urban vs rural dwelling of subjects. Conclusions: This is the largest study so far documenting a delayed onset of dementia in bilingual patients and the first one to show it separately in different dementia subtypes. It is the first study reporting a bilingual advantage in those who are illiterate, suggesting that education is not a sufficient explanation for the observed difference. The findings are interpreted in the context of the bilingual advantages in attention and executive functions.
Mutation screening and genotype phenotype correlation of α-crystallin, γ-crystallin and GJA8 gene in congenital cataract

Purpose To screen α-crystallin (CRYAB), γ-crystallin (CRYGC and CRYGD), and Connexin 50 (Cx-50 or GJA8) genes in congenital cataract patients and controls. Methods Thirty clinically diagnosed congenital cataract cases below 3 years of age from northern India, presenting at Dr. R. P. Centre for Ophthalmic Sciences (AIIMS, New Delhi, India) were enrolled in this study. Genomic DNA was extracted from peripheral blood, all coding and exon/intron regions were amplified using PCR and direct sequencing was performed to detect any nucleotide variation. ProtScale and Discovery Studio programs were used for insilico and structural analysis of non-synonymous mutations. Results DNA sequencing analysis of CRYAB, CRYGC, CRYGD, and GJA8 showed a total of six variations of which two were novel (CRYGC:p.R48H and GJA8:p.L281C) and four have been previously reported (CRYAB: rs11603779T>G, GJA8: p.L268L, CRYGD: p.R95R, and c.T564C). Both the novel changes, in CRYGC and GJA8 were found in 16.6% of the patients. Previously reported nucleotide alterations (CRYGD:p.R95R and c.T564C) were found in 90% of the patients. Insilico and structural analysis data suggested that two novel non-synonymous mutations altered the stability and solvent accessibility of γC-crystallin and Cx-50 proteins which may lead to lens opacification. Conclusions We observed two novel nonsynonymous variations and four reported variations in CRYAB, CRYGC, CRYGD, and GJA8. The p.R48H variation in γC-crystallin may disrupt the normal structure of lens and can cause cataract. Cx50 is responsible for joining the lens cells into a functional syncytium and a mutation (p.L281C) in GJA8 may lead to lens opacification resulting in cataract formation. This study further expands the mutation spectrum of congenital cataract and help understanding how mutant proteins lead to opacification of lens.
Text message communication in primary care research: a randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND Text message communication is increasingly used in clinical practice but rarely in research. Particularly in young people, this method of participation in primary care research appears both feasible and acceptable. However, previous experience shows that text messaging for research may lead to lower response rates. Aim. To test the hypothesis that text message communication in primary care research does not lead to lower response rates compared to a paper-based method. METHODS This randomized controlled trial took place in 26 randomly selected practices in Victoria, Australia. Consecutive patients aged 16-24 years attending general practice appointments were recruited as part of a larger study on patients' perspectives. Patients owning a mobile phone were randomized to receive a question about satisfaction with the consultation either by text message or on a card completed before leaving the practice. Logistic regression was used to estimate the effect on the response rate of using text message rather than the card method, adjusting for clustering within practices and for differences in baseline characteristics among participants. RESULTS In total, 402 of 409 eligible young people agreed to participate and were randomized to either receive a text message (n = 193) or a card enquiry (n = 209). The response rate was 80.2% [95% confidence interval (CI): 73.3-87.1%] with text message and 85.6% (95% CI: 79.6-91.7%) with the card. The adjusted odds of responding (odds ratio: 0.62; 95% CI: 0.30-1.27) were not significantly lower in the group using text messaging compared to the group using the card response method. CONCLUSION These findings offer new perspectives for use of text message communication to gather information from patients in primary care research.
Finance, Growth, and Inequality: Channels and Outcomes

This paper assesses how financial development impacts income inequality using a data set which covers over 150 countries and goes back to before 1960. Using System Generalized Method of Moments (GMM), we find that financial development leads to a reduction in income inequality which is economically significant. A one standard deviation increase in the private credit to GDP for the median country-year observation would reduce the gini co-efficient by 10.0% (from 41.05 to 36.93). We also find that broadening access to financial services (increasing the geographic/demographic penetration of bank branches) may work faster in reducing income inequality than merely deepening the availability of credit. In addition, identifying the specific channels through which financial development impacts inequality via growth is important both for research and policy prescriptions. The existing literature on the subject has not yet attempted this important task in a cross-country setting. In the present study we consider two possible channels: (1) educational attainment, in particular the level of tertiary education; and (2) the labor channel, where we look at the relative wage difference between skilled and unskilled workers. While financial development is weakly associated with a rise in the level of tertiary education, we find that its relationship with the second channel is much stronger. Higher financial development is associated with a tightening of the wage gap between the skilled and the unskilled. Both channels are associated with inequality in an economically meaningful way.
Active Constraint Selection For Semi-Supervised Clustering

Due to strong demand for the ability to enforce top-down structure on clustering results, semi-supervised clustering methods using pairwise constraints as side information have received increasing attention in recent years. However, most current methods are passive in the sense that the side information is provided beforehand and selected randomly. This may lead to the use of constraints that are redundant, unnecessary, or even harmful to the clustering results. To overcome this, we present an active clustering framework which selects pairwise constraints online as clustering proceeds, and propose an online constraint selection method that actively selects pairwise constraints by identifying uncertain nodes in the data. We also propose two novel methods for computing node uncertainty: one global and parametric and the other one local and nonparametric. We evaluate our active constraint selection method with two different semisupervised clustering algorithms on UCI, digits, gene and image datasets, and achieve results superior to current state of the art active techniques.
Automated extraction and visualization of learning concept dependencies using Q-matrices and exam results

Information systems of educational organizations often represent a potential well of useful information which can be discovered and interpreted by using specific methods. Exam results in particular are commonly used as a single-use measure of individual knowledge states, after which they are archived and subsequently never used again. Our approach suggests using past exam results as a rich data source for extracting knowledge about learning concepts, especially regarding their mutual relationships. To achieve this goal, we adopt our method for interactive visualization of patterns in transactional data and apply it to knowledge state matrices generated from real-life exam results and Q-matrices constructed by domain experts, providing the end user with rich, easily interpretable and visually engaging dendrogram structures.
Reconstruction Using Structured Light

Extracting range data through active optical triangulation requires robust stripe edge detection w. r. t. the emitted pattern. On the other hand, due to ambiguous subpattern in the projection caused by the limitations of the windowed uniqueness property, corresponding a pattern consisting of multiple stripes, in attempts to reduce the number of input images, often leads to mislabeling. Moreover, high frequency shape and shading variations in the scanned object introduce significant noise in the resulting range map. We propose several extensions and an implementation of a subpixel-accurate shape acquisition system using color structured light. Assuming that stripes have a certain width, our edge detection criterion is achieved by restricting the number of consecutive edge pixels and exploiting the positive metric for multi-spectral edge detection. We fix the multi-pass dynamic programmed labeling by considering a background plane behind the object and masking it during the triangulation. The subpixel accuracy from one single input image can be obtained by approximating the gradient of the square local contrast with a piecewise linear curve. Finally, we present a noise reduction technique on the range map through meshing followed by a parametrized face orientation culling. Experimental results have demonstrated major improvements in terms of robustness against acquisition noise, shading variations and complex shapes in the multi-pass dynamic programming approach originally proposed by Zhang et al. [ZCS02].
Edinburgh Research Explorer Autobiographical thinking interferes with episodic memory consolidation

New episodic memories are retained better if learning is followed by a few minutes of wakeful rest than by the encoding of novel external information. Novel encoding is said to interfere with the consolidation of recently acquired episodic memories. Here we report four experiments in which we examined whether autobiographical thinking, i.e. an ‘internal’ memory activity, also interferes with episodic memory consolidation. Participants were presented with three wordlists consisting of common nouns; one list was followed by wakeful rest, one by novel picture encoding and one by autobiographical retrieval/future imagination, cued by concrete sounds. Both novel encoding and autobiographical retrieval/future imagination lowered wordlist retention significantly. Follow-up experiments demonstrated that the interference by our cued autobiographical retrieval/future imagination delay condition could not be accounted for by the sound cues alone or by executive retrieval processes. Moreover, our results demonstrated evidence of a temporal gradient of interference across experiments. Thus, we propose that rich autobiographical retrieval/future imagination hampers the consolidation of recently acquired episodic memories and that such interference is particularly likely in the presence of external concrete cues.
"Free riding" as a Consequence of an Agent's Adjustments to the Publicly Observed Social Involvement in the Creation of the Public Good : the Results of Experimental Research

The paper describes the results of the experiments concerning sequential choices of economic agents, contributing to the creation of the public good. As based on the collected data, a model which explains the agents’ decisions as a function of publicly revealed average social contribution was constructed. Previous experiments and practice have shown that the average contribution of agents falls in the subsequent periods, which is typically explained as a consequence of rising agents’ frustration, resulting from the observation of the non-cooperative behaviour of other community members. The results described in this paper demonstrate that this is only partially true, as the increasing individual willingness to a free-ride is also observed in the situation when participants are misinformed about the growing level of the average social contribution. The paper concludes that an increasing tendency to free-ride is motivated by adjustments to average social contribution, as well as by the individual urge to maximize the short-term payoff.
Inductive Reasoning and Bounded Rationality

The type of rationality we assume in economics--perfect, logical, deductive rationality--is extremely useful in generating solutions to theoretical problems. But it demands much of human behavior--much more in fact than it can usually deliver. If we were to imagine the vast collection of decision problems economic agents might conceivably deal with as a sea or an ocean, with the easier problems on top and more complicated ones at increasing depth, then deductive rationality would describe human behavior accurately only within a few feet of the surface. For example, the game Tic-Tac-Toe is simple, and we can readily find a perfectly rational, minimax solution to it. But we do not find rational "solutions" at the depth of Checkers; and certainly not at the still modest depths of Chess and Go.
p27 cytoplasmic localization is regulated by phosphorylation on Ser10 and is not a prerequisite for its proteolysis

The activity of the cyclin‐dependent kinase inhibitor p27 is controlled by its concentration and subcellular localization. However, the mechanisms that regulate its intracellular transport are poorly understood. Here we show that p27 is phosphorylated on Ser10 in vivo and that mutation of Ser10 to Ala inhibits p27 cytoplasmic relocalization in response to mitogenic stimulation. In contrast, a fraction of wild‐type p27 and a p27(S10D)‐phospho‐mimetic mutant translocates to the cytoplasm in the presence of mitogens. G1 nuclear export of p27 and its Ser10 phosphorylation precede cyclin‐dependent kinase 2 (Cdk2) activation and degradation of the bulk of p27. Interestingly, leptomycin B‐mediated nuclear accumulation accelerates the turnover of endogenous p27; the p27(S10A) mutant, which is trapped in the nucleus, has a shorter half‐life than wild‐type p27 and the p27(S10D) mutant. In summary, p27 is efficiently degraded in the nucleus and phosphorylation of Ser10 is necessary for the nuclear to cytoplasmic redistribution of a fraction of p27 in response to mitogenic stimulation. This cytoplasmic localization may serve to decrease the abundance of p27 in the nucleus below a certain threshold required for activation of cyclin–Cdk2 complexes.
Information visualization of Twitter data for co-organizing conferences

The aim of this research is to explore what kinds of insights information visualization of social media data can provide for co-organizing conferences. Our paper focuses on Twitter in 'during-conference' use. We present a case study based on CMAD2013 conference and on the tweet traffic during the conference day. We applied the process of data-driven visual network analysis for providing insights on Twitter use during CMAD2013 conference day. By analyzing the network of conference participants and the conference's discussion topics, we were able to identify e.g. influential conference delegates, most interesting presentations and discussions, similarities between interests of the conference participants, and several development and information needs of conference co-organization derived from the information visualizations, which have implications for the planning and co-organizing of conferences, as well as for Twitter use in communicating during conferences.
Research and Implementation on Routing Scheme Based on Interest Mining in Unstructured P2P Systems

In the environment of unstructured peer-to-peer (P2P), routing scheme is one of the key factors affecting information searches. A routing scheme based on interest indexical table is proposed in this paper. Moreover, on the basis of it, we implement a P2P full text information retrieval prototype system, Isearch. Firstly, we represent local file content of a peer with vector space model. After that, space vector is clustered to obtain interest class of this peer. And then, interest similar degree is computed among peers to build interest indexical table locally. When search occurs, query requests are forwarded to the peers with similar interest directly according to the interest indexical table. Experimental results show that Isearch doesn't have much influence on retrieval results, but also can reduce the number of query peers so that make routing more efficient.