Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cholesterol and the risk of renal dysfunction in apparently healthy men.

Despite extensive knowledge about abnormal lipid patterns in patients with end-stage renal disease, the association between cholesterol and the development of renal dysfunction is unclear. We evaluated this association in a prospective cohort study among 4,483 initially healthy men participating in the Physicians' Health Study who provided blood samples in 1982 and 1996. Main outcome measures were elevated creatinine, defined as >/= 1.5 mg/dl (133 micromol/L), and reduced estimated creatinine clearance, defined as </=55 ml/min. Cholesterol parameters included total cholesterol (<200, 200 to 239, and >/= 240 mg/dl), HDL (<40 or >/= 40 mg/dl), total non-HDL cholesterol, and the ratio of total cholesterol to HDL. We used logistic regression to calculate age- and multivariable adjusted odds ratios as a measure for the relative risk. After 14 yr, 134 men (3.0%) had elevated creatinine and 244 (5.4%) had reduced creatinine clearance. The multivariable relative risk for elevated creatinine was 1.77 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.10 to 2.86) for total cholesterol >/= 240 mg/dl, 2.16 (95% CI, 1.42 to 3.27) for HDL <40 mg/dl, 2.34 (95% CI, 1.34 to 4.07) for the highest quartile of total cholesterol/HDL ratio (>/= >6.8), and 2.16 (95% CI, 1.22 to 3.80) for the highest quartile of non-HDL cholesterol (>/= 196.1). Similar although smaller associations were observed between cholesterol parameters and reduced creatinine clearance. Elevated total cholesterol, high non-HDL cholesterol, a high ratio of total cholesterol/HDL, and low HDL in particular were significantly associated with an increased risk of developing renal dysfunction in men with an initial creatinine <1.5 mg/dl.
Wage Redistribution and the Long Run Phillips Curve

We derive a long-run Phillips curve that is negatively sloped at low inflation rates. Due to exogenous changes, unions want to redistribute wages across different members also in the long run. Wage stickiness, inflation targeting and union solidarity are central characteristics of our New Keynesian model. In the model, high enough inflation becomes the grease of the economy that allows wage redistribution across unions without causing unemployment to rise above NAIRU. We show that under nominal wage rigidity, long-run unemployment may rise drastically and at zero inflation, unemployment may be trapped at very high levels even if demands for wage redistribution tapers off. Under real wage rigidity, the economy may get trapped at high unemployment also at positive but low inflation rates irrespective of demand for wage redistribution has vanished or not. Thus, a period of wage redistribution may cause an economy of full real wage rigidity to get trapped at a high unemployment rate. A policy conclusion is that economies characterized by extensive wage rigidity should not target inflation at too low levels.
Redistributive Land Reform in Rwanda: The impact on Household Food Security

In 2007 the country of Rwanda started land reform in Eastern and Northern Provinces with the objective of providing access to land as a means of livelihood to the landless and reducing inequality in landholdings in those regions. Based on theory and empirics, this redistribution is expected to have a positive impact on its beneficiaries particularly on household welfare. To contribute on this important debate, this study investigates the impact of land redistribution on households’ food security. With data collected using household survey in July 2009 in Kayonza District, the study assessed the impact by using Dietary Diversity and Children’s Nutritional Status (Stunting, Underweight and Wasted) as proxies of Food Security. The results suggested that access to land has increased the number of people with adequate food quantity compared to the period before they received land. In addition, the results revealed the improvement in nutrition status of children as the impact of access to land; the number of children underweight decreased even if many of them are still stunted. This situation is not surprising, because within 18 months a child can improve in weight but not really in height. However, among the new landholders there were still a number of individuals whose food intake fell below their minimum dietary energy requirements. Hence, this study focuses on the complementary policies to make land redistribution an efficient tool for food security. Key words: Redistributive Land Reform, Household Food Security, Food Consumption Score, Dietary Diversity, Children’s Nutrition Status, Stunting, Underweight, Rwanda.
The stabilizing state: State capitalism as a response to financial globalization in one-party regimes

ABSTRACT One of the most important developments in the modern global economy is financial globalization. This has raised threats to the stability of political regimes in two ways: (1) by enhancing the possibility of a financial crisis that could cause political turmoil; and (2) by easing access to foreign sources of financing for opposition political groups. I argue that state capitalism – defined as state-owned publicly listed corporations – is greater among one-party regimes as a way to address these dual threats. One-party regimes have both the motivation and a greater institutional capacity for addressing these threats in comparison to other regimes. Tests are conducted on 607 firms in 1996 and 856 firms in 2008 across seven East Asian economies, and are supplemented with case studies of Malaysia and South Korea. The evidence suggests that financial globalization is contributing to the rise of the state as a counter reaction.
Real-Time Implementation of Fault-Tolerant Control Using Model Predictive Control

Abstract Fault-tolerant control using model predictive control with online accommodation to recover from faults is investigated. A framework for this purpose is presented and problems that one encounters by changing the control law online like error-free tracking, feasibility and computational effort are addressed. In a real-time implementation, the model predictive controller is tested under actuator faults like saturation, freezing and total loss as well as under a structural fault.
Subject extraction method of urban complaint data

By analyzing a large number of complaints information, we put forward a method based on rules to extract subject words of urban complaint data. We first segment the title of complaint data using stop words and extract candidate subject words, and then filter them using position features, overlapping word features and dependency features to get subject words. The experimental results show that the method proposed is effective to extract subject words of urban complaint data.
Remnants of ancient genetic diversity preserved within captive groups of scimitar‐horned oryx (Oryx dammah)

Scimitar‐horned oryx, now considered extinct in the wild, persists in large numbers in captivity. In this first molecular genetic study on this species, we explore the patterns of genetic diversity across European, North American, and a few other captive groups using microsatellite markers and mitochondrial control region sequencing. Strong population structure was not evident from microsatellite data but we discovered deep divergence within the mitochondrial DNA haplotypes from a network analysis where three disconnected networks were obtained, with estimated divergence times of c. 2.1–2.7 million years. Mismatch distribution analyses suggest population expansions c. 1.2 and 0.5 million years ago. We discuss our findings in the context of historical climatic changes in North Africa and use information obtained on current patterns of genetic diversity within captive groups to make recommendations for future captive management and reintroduction strategies.
Quay crane scheduling with time windows, one-way and spatial constraints

In this paper, we address the quay crane scheduling problem in maritime container terminals, with some new features on the machine environment. We consider rail-mounted cranes and we assume that they are not allowed to span all over the vessel and that they can work only in predefined time windows. We furthermore take into account one-way constraints on the crane movements. We present a mixed integer mathematical model and a heuristic algorithm to get feasible solutions to the problem. Finally, we report on some computational experience.
Thyroid disease and mental disorders: cause and effect or only comorbidity?

Purpose of review To discuss the effects of thyroid dysfunction and thyroid autoimmunity on mental symptoms and disorders in patients with thyroid disease with reference to recent epidemiological, clinical, and genetic findings. Recent findings During brain development, iodine deficiency, maternal thyroid dysfunction, and neonatal thyroid malformations together with genetic factors contribute to neurological deficit. Most adults with thyroid dysfunction will develop mental symptoms. In hyperthyroidism, adrenergic hyperactivity is a major cause of psychiatric symptoms, and beta-adrenergic antagonists are effective treatment. Most patients with severe hypothyroidism will also demonstrate mental symptoms; however, causality is not so evident as in hyperthyroidism. Polymorphism in deiodinase genes and in transporter genes appears to make an important contribution to the presentation of mental symptoms as well as to the outcome of treatment of hypothyroidism. A thyroid autoimmunity process may by itself contribute to mental symptoms in vulnerable patients. Data from epidemiological studies provide conflicting evidence as to associations between thyroid disorders and mental symptoms. Summary In the adult brain, compared with the developing brain, brain–thyroid relationships are less apparent but still important. Adrenergic hyperactivity is a major cause of psychiatric symptoms in hyperthyroidism. Genetic factors contribute to the development and treatment outcome of mental disorder in hypothyroidism.
Role of the Cytosolic Heat Shock Protein 70 Ssa5 in the Ciliate Protozoan Tetrahymena thermophila

Heat shock protein 70 (Hsp70) is a member of a family of conserved chaperone proteins whose function is well investigated in many model organisms. Here we focus on an Hsp70 called Ssa5 in the ciliate protozoan Tetrahymena thermophila, and reveal that its translation is heat inducible as for general Hsps. Moreover, the protein is abundantly expressed in the cytoplasm during sexual reproduction (conjugation) as well as in response to heat‐stress. Knocking out of SSA5 (ΔSSA5) does not affect the survival of the cell under heat‐stress, likely due to other Hsp70 paralogs compensating for the defect. During conjugation, ΔSSA5 leads to a fertilization defect in which the two pronuclei are in close proximity but never fuse. The unfertilized pronuclei differentiate, resulting in a heterokaryon with developed haploid germline and somatic nuclei. In addition, degeneration of the parental somatic nucleus is not affected. These results suggest a specific involvement of Ssa5 in pronuclear fusion and fertilization.
The value of stability ratings to the Canadian income trust market

The Canadian income trust market has witnessed phenomenal growth over the past few years. Limited institutional investment and analyst coverage in these securities creates an asset class with little monitoring or unbiased evaluation. Stability ratings, therefore, become crucial in providing information to investors about the quality of trusts. We find that ratings in the oil and gas and utility sectors provide a credible signal of quality. However, in the business trust sector, with the greatest diversity of underlying operating companies and need for evaluation, stability ratings are not as useful in providing a separating equilibrium between the rated and unrated trusts. We also find that market participants’ reactions to new information releases in this sector tend to be greater for unrated trusts.
Significance of Proto-Oncogene Bcl-XS/L Expression in Wilms Tumor

The rate of apoptosis varies in malignant tumors, and it can be involved in diminishing tumor size. Different protein-regulators of apoptosis, such as Bcl-2, BclX, and Bax have an influence on the rate of apoptosis in various tumors. In human renal diseases, such as the experimental model of acute renal failure, and many tumors, including Wilms' tumor, the expression of antiapoptotic members of Bcl-2 family is increased, while the expression of proapoptotic members is low. Aim: The aim of our study was to investigate Bcl-XS/L protein expression in Wilms' tumor, to compare it with the expression in normal renal tissue, as well as to see if there is a correlation between Bcl-XS/L expression in Wilms' tumor with tumor stage, histological type, prognostic group, or response to preoperative chemotherapy. Materials and Methods: Twenty-eight cases of Wilms' tumor (two cases with metastasis) and two samples of normal kidney tissue were studied using streptavidin-biotin-complex technique. Bcl-XS/L expression levels were semiquantitatively scored. Results: The expression of Bcl-XS/L was observed in the majority of cases (60.7%), more often in the blastemal than in the epithelial component of Wilms' tumor: 60.7% and 28.6%, respectively (p = 0.02). There was a statistically significant inverse relationship between Bcl-XS/L expression and tumor stage (p = 0.015). Bcl-XS/L was found less frequently in high-risk tumors then in tumors with good prognosis (p = 0.02). Treated Wilms' tumors showed Bcl-XS/L expression more often than nontreated tumors, but the relationship was not statistically significant (p = 0.08). Expression of Bcl-XS/L was detected in various histological types of Wilms' tumor, but there was no statistically significant association (p = 0.82) except in cases with diffuse anaplasia (p = 0.012), which were always negative. No Bcl-XS/L immunostaining was observed in two cases of metastasis or in one case of bilateral Wilms' tumor. Conclusion: Our results suggest that the expression of Bcl-XS/L protein is associated with prognostic group, tumor stage, and presence of anaplasia.
Human factors and behavioral science: Performance in locating terminals on a high-density connector

In two experiments thirty participants located terminals on variations of a new main distributing frame connector. Abutting individual connectors in mirror image led to a higher termination density. Location times and errors were evaluated using deadline procedures. Experiment 1 results showed a high incidence of parallax, counting, and left-right reversal errors. Design modifications aimed at reducing these errors led to improved performance in Experiment 2. Parallax, counting errors, and location times were significantly reduced. The continued occurrence of left-right reversal errors is discussed.
Orchestrating BigData Analysis Workflows

Data analytics has become not only an essential part of day-to-day decision making, but also reinforces long-term strategic decisions. Whether it is real-time fraud detection, resource management, tracking and prevention of disease outbreak, natural disaster management or intelligent traffic management, the extraction and exploitation of insightful information from unparalleled quantities of data (BigData) is now a fundamental part of all decision making processes. Success in making smart decisions by analyzing BigData is possible due to the availability of improved analytical capabilities, increased access to different data sources, and cheaper and improved computing power in the form of cloud computing. However, BigData analysis is far more complicated than the perception created by the recent publicity. For example, one of the myths is that BigData analysis is driven purely by the innovation of new data mining and machine learning algorithms. While innovation of new data mining and machine learning algorithms is critical, this is only one aspect of producing BigData analysis solutions. Just like many other software solutions, BigData analysis solutions are not monolithic pieces of software that are developed specifically for every application. Instead, they often combine and reuse existing trusted software components that perform necessary data analysis steps. Furthermore, in order to deal with the large variety, volume and velocity of BigData, they need to take advantage of the elasticity of cloud and edge datacenter computation and storage resources as needed to meet the requirements of their owners.
Assessment of asthma control and its impact on optimal treatment strategy

Achieving and maintaining optimal asthma control is a major asthma management goal advocated by the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA). Recent evidence suggests that while asthma control is clearly achievable in most asthmatics, not all asthmatics attain optimal asthma control. The difficulty is compounded further because patients, physicians and regulatory bodies have different perceptions of what is meant by asthma control. The challenge therefore remains as to how best to assess asthma control and define management strategies to ensure that this control is achieved and maintained. Despite the availability of several patient‐based tools for assessing asthma control, these are mostly employed in a research setting or in selected specialist clinics. A symptom‐based treatment approach also may have its limitations because patients can be poor judges of disease symptoms and severity and under‐estimation may lead to inadequate treatment of airway inflammation and airway hyperresponsiveness (AHR) when treatment is administered as on‐demand reliever therapy, since the effect of treatment on these underlying features occurs over a longer time course. The clinical benefits of sustained maintenance treatment for at least 3 months has been documented in recent studies of salmeterol/fluticasone propionate combination, which have demonstrated correlations between reduction in airway inflammation/AHR and reduction in exacerbation rates.
The contribution of manufacturing strategy involvement and alignment to world-class manufacturing performance

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to explore links between the process of strategy formulation and subsequent performance in operations within firms. Design/methodology/approach - An in-depth literature review on resource-based and operations strategy naturally led to three hypotheses. These are then tested using evidence from field-based case studies of manufacturing/assembly plants in the computer industry. Findings - The research suggests that world-class plants incorporate both strategic operations content and strategic operations processes, whilst low-performing plants do not. Practical implications - It is argued that involving manufacturing/operations managers in the strategic planning process helps align manufacturing and business strategy, and this alignment is associated with higher manufacturing performance. This should be of interest to operations managers and strategists within firms. Originality/value - By linking strategic alignment and the manufacturing strategy process to world-class manufacturing practices and performance, this research adds a new dimension to the study of world-class manufacturing and more generally to the best practices and practice-performance debates.
Adaptive image pre-processing for quality control in production lines

Flexible and self-adaptive behaviours in automated quality control systems are features that may significantly enhance the robustness, efficiency and flexibility of the industrial production processes. However, most current approaches on automated quality control are based on rigid inspection methods and are not capable of accommodating to disturbances affecting the image acquisition quality, fact that hast direct consequences on the system's reliability and performance. In an effort to address the problem, this paper presents the development of a self-adaptive software system designed for the pre-processing (quality enhancement) of digital images captured in industrial production lines. The approach introduces the use of scene recognition as a key-feature to allow the execution of customized image pre-processing strategies, increase the system's flexibility and enable self-adapting conducts. Real images captured in a washing machines production line are presented to test and validate the system performance. Experimental results demonstrate significant image quality enhancements and a valuable reliability improvement of the automated quality control procedures.
Interactive Views to Improve the Comprehension of UML Models - An Experimental Validation

Software development is becoming more and more model-centric. As a result models are used for a large variety of purposes, such as quality analysis, understanding, and maintenance. We argue that the UML and related existing tooling does not offer sufficient support to the developer to understand the models and evaluate their quality. We have proposed and implemented a collection of views to increase model understanding: MetaView, ContextView, MetricView, and UML-City-View. The purpose of this experiment is to validate whether there is a difference between the proposed views and the existing views with respect to comprehension correctness and comprehension effort. The comprehension task performed by the subjects was to answer a questionnaire about a model. 100 MSc students with relevant background knowledge have participated in the experiment. The results are statistically significant and show that the correctness is improved by 4.5% and that the time needed is reduced by 20%.
Enabling Inertial Response of Variable-Speed Wind Turbines: A Survey and New Perspectives

Abstract: With the rapid development of wind power generations, the inertial response of wind turbines (WTs) are widely concerned recently, which is important for grid frequency dynamic and stability. This paper recognizes and understands the inertial response of type-3 and type-4 WTs from the view of equivalent internal voltage, in analogy with typical synchronous generators (SGs). Due to the dynamic of the equivalent inertial voltage different from SGs, the electromechanical inertia of WTs is completely hidden. The rapid power control loop and synchronization control loop is the main reasons that the WT's inertial response is disenabled. On the basis of the equivalent internal voltage's dynamic, the existing inertia control method for WTs are reviewed and summarized as three approaches from the view of WT's control, i.e. optimizing the power control or synchronization control or both. At last, the main challenges and issues of these inertia controls are attempted to explain and address.
The producers' stake in the bioeconomy: a survey of Oklahoma producers' knowledge and willingness to grow dedicated biofuel crops.

The study reported here found that producers were familiar with the biofuel industry through mass media channels and were willing to convert cropland to energy crops. Producers were motivated by patriotic reasons, but overall profitability was the greater motive for converting cropland to dedicated biofuel crops such as switchgrass. Barriers to energy crop production were a lack of markets (biorefineries) and information about biofuel crop production. It is recommended that an educational campaign regarding biofuel crop production best practices, especially cellulosic crops (switchgrass) and marketing, be implemented. A statewide leadership campaign to attract biorefineries to the state is also recommended.