Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Inhibition of tyrosine kinase receptor type B synthesis blocks axogenic effect of estradiol on rat hypothalamic neurones in vitro

17‐β‐estradiol (E2) increases axonal growth and tyrosine kinase receptor (Trk)B levels of male‐derived hypothalamic neurones in vitro. To investigate whether the axogenic response depends on the upregulation of TrkB, we analysed neuritic growth and neuronal polarization in cultures treated with an antisense oligonucleotide against TrkB mRNA. In cultures without E2, treatment with 7.5 or 10 µm antisense reduced TrkB levels and the percentage of neurones showing an identifiable axon; the number and length of minor processes were increased. In cultures treated with 5 µm antisense, morphometric parameters were normal although total TrkB levels were reduced. The same dose prevented the E2‐dependent increase of TrkB levels and suppressed the axogenic effect of E2. These results indicate that TrkB is necessary for normal neuronal growth and maturation and further suggest that an increase in TrkB is necessary for E2 to exert its axogenic effect in male‐derived neurones.
Sustainability, longevity and transgenerational value in family firms. The case of Amarelli

Purpose of the paper : In family business research, sustainability has never received as much attention as large corporations despite the relevance of their global economic impact. Thus, the paper’s aim is to investigate this issue by taking two key structures into consideration: longevity and trans-generational value. Methodology : Drawing on systems theory, we developed an exploratory conceptual framework (Trans-generational Sustainability Model - TSM) for family firms. We argue that the three pillars for the creation of trans-generational value, representing a long-standing value for family businesses, are growth, family success and local embeddedness quality. An exploratory case study on a long-lived Italian family firm (Amarelli) belonging to the Henokiens association, has been conducted to investigate some of the hypotheses that have been developed in relation to this preliminary model. Findings : In the case of Amarelli sustainability seems to be the result of the combination of a unique strategic orientation and distinctive competences. The presence of family members in management positions is a major concern for the “enlarged” family and high quality of local embeddedness which are likely to support the creation of trans-generational value. Practical implications : The balance between the three components of family firms’ sustainability may provide directions for entrepreneurs in their family firms management, particularly during the succession phase or other disruptive changes involving their businesses. Originality of paper : This article provides a review of significant trends in the strategic management approach by studying family firms’ sustainability. Its original contribution is twofold: firstly by its accumulating evidence that the creation of “enlarged” trans-generational value may determine family businesses’ longevity and sustainability, and secondly, system theory seems as the leading theoretical perspective.
Fabric classification using new mapping of local binary pattern

This research proposes a new mapping technique of Local Binary Patterns (LBPs) for texture classification. Mapping is an approach for producing a vector of features from the features that are extracted. This mapping method is based on extending nonuniform patterns for better classification of defects in patterned fabrics. By extending nonuniform patterns, a new mapping technique is suggested that extracts more discriminative features from textures. This new mapping can be used for various types of LBP and is tested for CLBP operator to show the improvement on the accuracy of the classification. The developed mapping technique is rotation invariant and has all the positive points of previous approaches. The proposed approach can code nonuniform patterns into more than one feature for producing distinctive features and better classification rate. Implementation of the proposed mapping on our patterned dataset shows that proposed method can improve the classification accuracy. Besides, the suggested approach improves the classification rate for all types of LBPs, particularly those with large neighborhoods.
China-Africa Trade and Investment Relations: Whither South-South Cooperation?

This paper aims to examine the dynamics that lie behind Sino-Africa relations through trade and investment channels and provides a comprehensive understanding on the determinants and interactions of these two modalities of cooperation in the Sino-African case. The paper further identifies if the same patterns prevail in China’s relationships with her other Southern counterparts by analyzing the interactions between China with Latin America and the Middle East. The results consistently suggest that market potentials and similar distribution of FDI stocks not only matter for Sino-Africa trade ties but also in trade cooperation between China and the other southern regions. However, strategic interaction between exports and FDI do not drive China’s strategic move into Africa and the other Southern regions. China’s trading and investment roles in Africa are therefore a reflection of South-South economic order that responds to the market. In short, Africa does not present a unique case in China’s South-South strategy.
Rickettsial Infection in Animals, Humans and Ticks in Paulicéia, Brazil

A previous study in Paulicéia Municipality, south‐eastern Brazil, reported 9.7% of the Amblyomma triste ticks to be infected by Rickettsia parkeri, a bacterial pathogen that causes spotted fever in humans. These A. triste ticks were shown to be associated with marsh areas, where the marsh deer Blastocerus dichotomus is a primary host for this tick species. During 2008–2009, blood serum samples were collected from 140 horses, 41 dogs, 5 opossums (Didelphis albiventris) and 26 humans in farms from Pauliceia Municipality. Ticks were collected from these animals, from vegetation and from additional wildlife in these farms. Overall, 25% (35/140) of the horses, 7.3% (3/41) of the dogs, 3.8% (1/26) of the humans and 100% (5/5) of the opossums were seroreactive (titre ≥64) to spotted fever group (SFG) Rickettsia spp. Multivariate statistical analysis indicated that horses that were allowed to forage in the marsh were 4.8 times more likely to be seroreactive to spotted fever group (SFG) Rickettsia spp than horses that did not forage in the marsh. In addition, horses that had been living in the farm for more than 8.5 years were 2.8 times more likely to be seroreactive to SFG Rickettsia spp than horses that were living for ≤8.5 years. Ticks collected from domestic animals or from vegetation included Amblyomma cajennense, Amblyomma coelebs, Amblyomma dubitatum, Dermacentor nitens and Rhipicephalus microplus. By PCR analyses, only one pool of A. coelebs ticks from the vegetation was shown to be infected by rickettsiae, for which DNA sequencing revealed to be Rickettsia amblyommii. Ticks (not tested by PCR) collected from wildlife encompassed A. cajennense and Amblyomma rotundatum on lizards (Tupinambis sp), and A. cajennense and A. triste on the bird Laterallus viridis. Our results indicate that the marsh area of Paulicéia offers risks of infection by SFG rickettsiae.
Basic Body Awareness Therapy in patients suffering from fibromyalgia: A randomized clinical trial

ABSTRACT Introduction: The aim of this study is to assess whether Basic Body Awareness Therapy (BBAT) improves musculoskeletal pain, movement quality, psychological function, and quality of life. Methods: The effects of BBAT in addition to treatment as usual (TAU) were studied in a randomized controlled trial. Forty-one patients were randomly assigned to a control group (n = 21) and an intervention group (n = 20). Both groups received TAU including pharmacological therapy. The intervention group took part in 10 BBAT sessions. Outcome variables were measured regarding pain, movement quality, psychological function, and quality of life. Outcome measures were assessed before intervention, in posttest, and in follow-ups at 12 and 24 weeks. Results: The BBAT group showed significant improvement in ‘pain’ at posttest (p = 0.037) and in ‘movement quality’ from baseline to 24 weeks (p = 0.000). Intragroup analysis showed significant improvements in the SF-36 body pain subscale at 12 and 24 weeks (p = 0.001, p = 0.014), Hospital Anxiety Depression scale in anxiety subscale at 12 weeks (p = 0.019), State-Trait Anxiety Inventory anxiety questionnaire at 12 and 24 weeks (p = 0.012, p = 0.002), and STAI state at 12 and 24 weeks (p = 0.042, p = 0.004). Conclusion: This study showed that BBAT might be an effective intervention in patients suffering from fibromyalgia in relation to pain, movement quality, and anxiety.
Interest Arbitration as Alternative Dispute Resolution: The History from 1919 to 2011

This paper comes from a February 2012 Symposium, "The Role of ADR Mechanisms in Public Sector Labor Disputes: What Is at Stake, Where We Can Improve & How We Can Learn from the Private Sector. " It discusses the history of an important form of alternative dispute resolution: the use of what is called “interest arbitration” to resolve bargaining impasses in public-sector labor relations. This process is used in many states as an alternative to strikes. While interest arbitration has been a crucial part of public-sector labor law and labor relations for decades, it has come under increased scrutiny recently. Indeed, in the wave of laws passed in 2011 restricting the rights of public-sector unions to bargain collectively, interest arbitration was repeatedly attacked, and in several states it was eliminated or restricted.This paper gives a historical overview of the development of interest arbitration, discussing how and why it developed as it did. This development was neither inevitable nor “natural” in that many other western democracies generally allow public workers to strike. But only a few states in the U.S. allows any public workers to strike. Thus, the question is: why did U.S. law and policy develop the way it did? This paper traces the relevant history from 1919 through to the new, restrictive laws of 2011. It starts with the Boston Police strike of 1919 — a seminal event in the history of public-sector labor law, that had a profound and lasting impact on how U.S. policymakers felt about dispute resolution in public sector labor law. It then turns to the first public-sector labor law permitting collective bargaining — passed, ironically in view of recent events, in Wisconsin in 1959 — and describes how concerns about dispute resolution were central to debates over that law. The paper continues by explaining how interest arbitration in public-sector labor relations has evolved and how it has worked from the 1960s into the 21st century. Finally, the paper explores the very recent developments in this area in the laws of 2011.
Order and disorder in conversation: Encounters with dementia of the Alzheimer's type

After a brief introduction to Dementia of the Alzheimer's Type (DAT), its behavioral diagnostic symptom complex and a summary of communicative implications, we present data from two conversations involving participants with and without DAT. We discuss the concept of “order” in conversation, and the central importance of interactional monitoring. Conversational success and problems in interactions with persons with DAT are seen as emergent from situationally embedded conversations in the presence of cognitive and linguistic impairments on the part of the person with DAT, and of contextually situated communicative impairment resulting therefrom.
Purification and partial characterization of the major outer membrane protein of Chlamydia trachomatis

Elementary bodies (EB) of Chlamydia trachomatis serotypes C, E, and L2 were extrinsically radioiodinated, and whole-cell lysates of these serotypes were compared by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE). Autoradiography of the polypeptide profiles identified a major surface protein with an apparent subunit molecular weight of 39,500 that was common to each C. trachomatis serotype. The abilities of nonionic (Triton X-100), dipolar ionic (Zwittergent TM-314), mild (sodium deoxycholate and sodium N-lauroyl sarcosine), and strongly anionic (SDS) detergents to extract this protein from intact EB of the L2 serotype were investigated by SDS-PAGE analysis of the soluble and insoluble fractions obtained after each detergent treatment. Only SDS readily extracted this protein from intact EB. Sarkosyl treatment selectively solubilized the majority of other EB proteins, leaving the 39,500-dalton protein associated with the Sarkosyl-insoluble fraction. Ultrastructural studies of the Sarkosyl-insoluble EB pellet showed it to consist of empty EB particles possessing an apparently intact outer membrane. No structural evidence for a peptidoglycan-like cell wall was found. Morphologically these chlamydial outer membrane complexes (COMC) resembled intact chlamydial EB outer membranes. The 39,500-dalton outer membrane protein was quantitatively extracted from COMC by treating them with 2% SDS at 60 degrees C. This protein accounted for 61% of the total COMC-associated protein, and its extraction resulted in a concomitant loss of the COMC membrane structure and morphology. The soluble extract obtained from SDS-treated COMC was adsorbed to a hydroxylapatite column and eluted with a linear sodium phosphate gradient. The 39,500-dalton protein was eluted from the column as a single peak at a phosphate concentration of approximately 0.3 M. The eluted protein was nearly homogeneous by SDS-PAGE and appeared free of contaminating carbohydrate, glycolipid, and nucleic acid. Hyperimmune mouse antiserum prepared against the 39,500-dalton protein from serotype L2 reacted with C. trachomatis serotypes Ba, E, D, K, L1, L2, and L3 by indirect immunofluorescence with EB but failed to react with serotypes A, B, C, F, G, H, I, and J, with the C. trachomatis mouse pneumonitis strain, or with the C. psittaci feline pneumonitis, guinea pig inclusion conjunctivitis, or 6BC strains. Thus, the 39,500-dalton major outer membrane protein is a serogroup antigen of C. trachomatis organisms.
Increased prescription rate of antibiotics prior to non-typhoid Salmonella infections: A one-year nested case-control study

We conducted a nested case-control study of antibiotic consumption 1 y prior to a non-typhoid Salmonella (NTS) infection. We included all 1882 NTS patients diagnosed in 1994–2003 in North Jutland County, Denmark, and for each case we retrieved 10 controls among all residents in the county, matched for the specimen date, gender, and age. Antibiotic redemptions were retrieved from a countywide prescription database. Being a marker of the infection, redemptions within 1 week before NTS infection were excluded. The subject's last antibiotic redemption, if any, was the binary outcome in a conditional logistic regression model, and we adjusted for comorbidity based on previous hospital discharge diagnoses. In the y up to the NTS episode, 42.0% of cases and 28.5% of controls redeemed antibiotics (adjusted odds ratio (OR) 1.59, 95% confidence intervals 1.43–1.77). The OR was constant up to 20 weeks before the NTS episode and increased continuously thereafter. The higher antibiotic consumption during the entire y may imply that NTS patients are frailer than the general population. The increased OR in the weeks close to the NTS infection are consistent with alterations in the intestinal microflora being involved in acquiring an NTS infection.
A view on EGFR-targeted therapies from the oncogene-addiction perspective

Tumor cell growth and survival can often be impaired by inactivating a single oncogen– a phenomenon that has been called as “oncogene addiction. ” It is in such scenarios that molecular targeted therapies may succeed. among known oncogenes, the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) has become the target of different cancer therapies. So far, however, the clinical benefit from EGFR-targeted therapies has been rather limited. a critical review of the large amount of clinical data obtained with anti-EGFR agents, carried out from the perspective of the oncogene addiction concept, may help to understand the causes of the unsatisfactory results. In this article we intend to do such an exercise taking as basis for the analysis a few case studies of anti-EGFR agents that are currently in the clinic. There, the “EGFR addiction” phenomenon becomes apparent in high-responder patients. We further discuss how the concept of oncogene addiction needs to be interpreted on the light of emerging experimental evidences and ideas; in particular, that EGFR addiction may reflect the interconnection of several cellular pathways. In this regard we set forth several hypotheses; namely, that requirement of higher glucose uptake by hypoxic tumor cells may reinforce EGFR addiction; and that chronic use of EGFR-targeted antibodies in EGFR-addicted tumors would induce stable disease by reversing the malignant phenotype of cancer stem cells and also by sustaining an anti-tumor T cell response. Finally, we discuss possible reasons for the failure of certain combinatorial therapies involving anti-EGFR agents, arguing that some of these agents might produce either a negative or a positive trans-modulation effect on other oncogenes. It becomes evident that we need operational definitions of EGFR addiction in order to determine which patient populations may benefit from treatment with anti-EGFR drugs, and to improve the design of these therapies.
Evaluation of User Interface in Drive Focus® Application

Technology is used in healthcare settings to aid clinicians in accessing client information, researching data, and enhancing communication with the client and other healthcare team members. In order for an app to best support client engagement, the app needs to have a welldeveloped user interface design There are four main aspects of user interface design, context, fidelity, accessibility, and consistency. The Drive Focus® application (app) is designed to identify how an individual recognizes, prioritizes, and reacts to information during real-world driving simulations. The Drive Focus® app has efficacy and feasibility, however, the user interface design has never been assessed. Therefore, our research question is: Do clinicians find the Drive Focus® app to have a strong user interface design when using it for rehabilitation purposes? Through the use of a descriptive study, the student researchers investigated the user interface design of the Drive Focus® app using two different data collection methods; an anonymous survey and an hour-long focus group discussion. The source of the participant population was from Dr. Miriam Monahan, OTD, OTR/L, the developer of the Drive Focus® app who provided a list of clinicians using the app. The study determined there are three of the four components of user interface design. The app has fidelity, accessibility, and consistency, but lacks context.
Mothers’ complex talk when sharing books with their toddlers: Book genre matters

This study investigated the influence of book genre (narrative or didactic) on mothers’ language use during a book sharing interaction with their 18- to 25-month-olds. Mother–child dyads were videotaped sharing both a narrative and a didactic book, adapted from two commercially available books, and matched in terms of length, quantity of text, and target content. A greater proportion of mothers’ talk was complex (i.e., predictions, text-to-life comparisons) during narrative book sharing than during didactic book sharing. Mothers also used a greater variety of verb tenses and referenced more mental states during narrative book sharing. These results differ from findings from previous studies with older children where it has been concluded that didactic books offer greater opportunities for complex talk than narrative books. The results also highlight the importance of taking situational factors into account when investigating parent–child communicative interactions.
Structured matrices for predictive control of large and multi-dimensional systems

The extremely large telescopes that should see first light in coming years demand so-called adaptive optics systems to overcome the devastating effect of the atmospheric turbulence on the image quality. A sensor measures the incoming distortion of the light and is used for reshaping the latter using a deformable mirror. Processing the large number of sensor channels to operate the actuators at kilohertz frequencies is challenging on the computational point of view. The correction applied by the mirror and based on the sensor measurements should indeed not be already outdated because the turbulence has evolved during the computation time. In order to reduce the memory storage and the computational requirements, prior knowledge on the system is commonly translated into assumptions on the system matrices. When the sensors are regularly spread on a two-dimensional grid as is the case in adaptive optics, and the underlying function that describes the spatial dynamics is separable in its horizontal and vertical coordinates, a particular matrix representation is studied. This parametrization allows to write the matrices with a linear number of parameters (instead of quadratic without) and especially to derive more efficient algorithms for identifying from data the spatio-temporal dynamics of the turbulent atmosphere. This PhD thesis draws pros and cons of such a parametrization of large matrices for Linear Time Invariant systems, especially from an identification perspective. Besides, its close connection with tensors raises new fundamental questions in the analysis of such systems.
Individuals matter : three essays on French politicians

The aim of this thesis is to explicitly introduce the decision-maker into the empirical analysis of different political processes in the French context. Three cases are successively analyzed,each raising a specific problematic. The first chapter focuses on French municipalities. A new original dataset, covering mayors of municipalities of more than 10,000 inhabitants over the period 2000-2012, underpins the study. The objective is to investigate to what extentthe mayor’s personal influence on the investment policy affects his/her reelection probability. Results show that this information plays a significant role only in small municipalities. Chapter twostudies the French legislative production, exploiting another original dataset. A dual cycle of the production of laws emerges, connected to both the presidential and the legislative elections. A link between government members’ personal characteristics and legislative output is established. Finally, chapter three investigates the relationship between electoral competition and political selection. A third important dataset providing data about the individual parliamentary work of the deputies over the period 1958-2012 allows such an analysis. Resultsindicate that deputies elected in contested districts have a higher overall productivity. The intensity of the relationship reached its peak in the 1980’s, but is continuously decreasing since then.