Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Stability investigation of high aspect ratio n-type silicon field emitter arrays

Electron sources based on silicon field emitter arrays, produced in processes based on semiconductor technology, are good candidates for a miniaturized X-ray source. A key parameter for this application is the stability of the X-ray photon flux and, thus, the emission current. In the present work we have investigated the influence of the residual gas pressure and a resistor in series on the emission stability of a high aspect ratio n-type silicon emitter array with hybrid extraction electrode. An increase of current fluctuations was found for pressures above 10-6 mbar. High resistances in series to the emitter array alter the emission characteristics, but greatly suppress spikes in the emission current and improve its stability. This, however, strongly depends on the bias point. The field enhancement factor is not affected by the resistance. In a long term measurement the emission current was found to be constant after an initial phase of degradation.
Interferon-alpha does not improve outcome at one year in patients with diffuse cutaneous scleroderma: results of a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.

OBJECTIVE To determine whether interferon-alpha (IFNalpha) reduces the severity of skin involvement in early (<3 years) diffuse scleroderma. METHODS In a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind trial, 35 patients with early scleroderma received subcutaneous injections of either IFNalpha (13.5 x 10(6) units per week in divided doses) or indistinguishable placebo. Outcomes assessed were the modified Rodnan skin score, as determined by a single observer at baseline, 6 months, and 12 months, as well as data on renal, cardiac, and lung function. Pre- and posttreatment skin biopsy samples were analyzed and blood was obtained for assessment of procollagen peptide levels. RESULTS There were 11 withdrawals from the IFNalpha group and 3 from the placebo group due to either toxicity, lack of efficacy, or death. In the intent-to-treat analysis, there was a greater improvement in the skin score in the placebo group between 0 and 12 months (mean change IFNalpha -4.7 versus placebo -7.5; P = 0.36). There was also a greater deterioration in lung function in patients receiving active therapy, as assessed by either the forced vital capacity (mean change IFNalpha -8.2 versus placebo +1.3; P = 0.01) or the diffusing capacity for carbon monoxide (mean change IFNalpha -9.3 versus placebo +4.7; P = 0.002). Skin biopsy showed no significant decrease in collagen synthesis in the IFNalpha group, and no significant differences in the levels of procollagen peptides were seen between the 2 groups. CONCLUSION This study suggests that IFNalpha is of no value in the treatment of scleroderma, and that it may in fact be deleterious.
Awe Expands People’s Perception of Time, Alters Decision Making, and Enhances Well-Being

When do people feel as if they are rich in time? Not often, research and daily experience suggest. However, three experiments showed that participants who felt awe, relative to other emotions, felt they had more time available (Experiments 1 and 3) and were less impatient (Experiment 2). Participants who experienced awe also were more willing to volunteer their time to help other people (Experiment 2), more strongly preferred experiences over material products (Experiment 3), and experienced greater life satisfaction (Experiment 3). Mediation analyses revealed that these changes in decision making and well-being were due to awe’s ability to alter the subjective experience of time. Experiences of awe bring people into the present moment, and being in the present moment underlies awe’s capacity to adjust time perception, influence decisions, and make life feel more satisfying than it would otherwise.
Shock-capturing and front-tracking methods for granular avalanches

Shock formations are observed in granular avalanches when supercritical flow merges into a region of subcritical flow. In this paper we employ a shock-capturing numerical scheme for the one-dimensional Savage-Hutter theory of granular flow to describe this phenomenon. A Lagrangian moving mesh scheme applied to the nonconservative form of the equations reproduces smooth solutions of these free boundary problems very well, but fails when shocks are formed. A nonoscillatory central (NOC) difference scheme with TVD limiter or WENO cell reconstruction for the conservative equations is therefore introduced. For the avalanche free boundary problems it must be combined with a front-tracking method, developed here, to properly describe the margin evolution. It is found that this NOC scheme combined with the front-tracking module reproduces both the shock wave and the smooth solution accurately. A piecewise quadratic WENO reconstruction improves the smoothness of the solution near local extrema. The schemes are checked against exact solutions for (1) an upward moving shock wave, (2) the motion of a parabolic cap down an inclined plane, and (3) the motion of a parabolic cap down a curved slope ending in a flat run-out region, where a shock is formed as the avalanche comes to a halt.
Psychiatric Diagnoses of Abusive Mothers: A Preliminary Report

The Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-III-R diagnoses of 54 mothers who had maltreated their children were compared with those of 37 controls. The maltreatment group showed a significantly greater incidence of both current and past diagnoses. Maltreating mothers exhibited a significantly greater incidence of current mood disorder, alcohol abuse, and personality disorder than did controls. The results indicate that past abuse of cocaine, alcohol, other substances and past mood disorders were significantly more prevalent among the maltreatment sample than among controls. Mothers who had maltreated their children were significantly more likely to have histories of posttraumatic stress disorder than were controls.
Empirical assessment of an integrative service design framework

Building on previous service design theories, the authors propose an integrative framework for service design. Through an extensive literature review and qualitative fieldwork in eight Asian service organizations, the authors specify nine constructs with 62 measurement items. These are validated and refined using data from 28 survey respondents. The authors further explore the relationship among the constructs and discuss the theoretical and managerial implications.
Exploring communication and mobility behavior of 3G network users and its temporal consistency

Over the past decade, telecommunication network operators have more and more realized the added value of data analytics for their network deployment efficiency. Early studies targeted the global network perspective by localizing peak loads, both in terms of area and time period. Due to their higher granularity and information richness, current telecommunication datasets allow increasingly deeper insights into the network activities of the users. Existing network traffic classification studies tend to divide users into groups without considering the transitions between different groups caused by individual behavioral traits, which we expect to show observable regularities. Our approach defines a profiling model that characterizes the user behavior as well as its temporal dynamics from two perspectives: w.r. t. (i) the network load the users generate, and (ii) their mobility patterns. The model is evaluated with two unsupervised clustering algorithms of different complexity (namely, XMeans and EM) by means of a 3G trace dataset from a European operator.
Privacy-Preserving Outsourcing of Data Mining

Data mining is gaining momentum in society due to the ever increasing availability of large amounts of data, easily gathered by a variety of collection technologies and stored via computer systems. Due to the limited computational resources of data owners and the developments in cloud computing, there has been considerable recent interest in the paradigm of data mining-as-a-service (DMaaS). In this paradigm, a company (data owner) lacking in expertise or computational resources outsources its mining needs to a third party service provider (server). Given the fact that the server may not be fully trusted, one of the main concerns of the DMaaS paradigm is the protection of data privacy. In this paper, we provide an overview of a variety of techniques and approaches that address the privacy issues of the DMaaS paradigm.
Prepregnancy SHBG Concentrations and Risk for Subsequently Developing Gestational Diabetes Mellitus

OBJECTIVE Lower levels of sex hormone–binding globulin (SHBG) have been associated with increased risk of diabetes among postmenopausal women; however, it is unclear whether they are associated with glucose intolerance in younger women. We examined whether SHBG concentrations, measured before pregnancy, are associated with risk of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS This was a nested case-control study among women who participated in the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Multiphasic Health Check-up examination (1984–1996) and had a subsequent pregnancy (1984–2009). Eligible women were free of recognized diabetes. Case patients were 256 women in whom GDM developed. Two control subjects were selected for each case patient and were matched for year of blood draw, age at examination, age at pregnancy, and number of intervening pregnancies. RESULTS Compared with the highest quartile of SHBG concentrations, the odds of GDM increased with decreasing quartile (odds ratio 1.06 [95% CI 0.44–2.52]; 2.33 [1.07–5.09]; 4.06 [1.90–8.65]; P for trend < 0.001), after adjusting for family history of diabetes, prepregnancy BMI, race/ethnicity, alcohol use, prepregnancy weight changes, and homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance. Having SHBG levels below the median (<64.5 nmol/L) and a BMI ≥25.0 kg/m2 was associated with fivefold increased odds of GDM compared with normal-weight women with SHBG levels at or above the median (5.34 [3.00–9.49]). CONCLUSIONS Low prepregnancy SHBG concentrations were associated with increased risk of GDM and might be useful in identifying women at risk for GDM for early prevention strategies.
A PRAGMATIC ANALYSIS OF POLITENESS STRATEGIES REFLECTED IN NANNY MCPHEE MOVIE

This research is a pragmatic study on politeness strategies employed by the main characters in Nanny McPhee movie in the context of family discourse. The objectives of this research are (1) to identify the types of politeness strategies employed by the main characters in Nanny McPhee movie and (2) to describe the way politeness strategies are realized in the utterances employed by the main characters in Nanny McPhee movie. This research used descriptive qualitative approach. The key instrument of the research was the researcher herself. The data were in the form of utterances which contain politeness strategies. The data source was Nanny McPhee movie script. The data were collected by note-taking technique then they were classified and analyzed. The trustworthiness was attained by using credibility through two kinds of triangulation: by observers and theories. The results of the research show two important points. First, there are four types of politeness strategies employed by the main characters in Nanny McPhee movie when having conversation with the children: Bald-on record strategy (31 out of 104), Positive politeness strategy (46), Negative politeness strategy (15), and Off record strategy (12). Positive politeness strategy has the highest frequency among other strategies since the dialogues are among family members who have a close relationship and know each other very well. Second, in realizing those politeness strategies, the main characters utilize their own sub-strategies: Bald-on record is realized by showing disagreement (5 out of 104), giving suggestion/advice (4), requesting (4), warning/threatening (11), and using imperative form (7); Positive politeness by claiming common ground (25), conveying that S and H are cooperators (17), and fulfilling H’s wants for some X (4); Negative politeness by being indirect (2), not presuming/assuming (3), not coercing H (4), communicating S’s want to not impinge on H (4), and redressing other wants of H’s (2); and Off-record by inviting conversational implicature (8) and being vague or ambiguous (4). Among all substrategies, claiming common ground is the most frequent strategy as the main characters need to share common ground with the children.
Research priorities for the development and implementation of serological tools for malaria surveillance

Surveillance is a key component of control and elimination programs. Malaria surveillance has been typically reliant on case reporting by health services, entomological estimates and parasitemia (Plasmodium species) point prevalence. However, these techniques become less sensitive and relatively costly as transmission declines. There is great potential for the development and application of serological biomarkers of malaria exposure as sero-surveillance tools to strengthen malaria control and elimination. Antibodies to malaria antigens are sensitive biomarkers of population-level malaria exposure and can be used to identify hotspots of malaria transmission, estimate transmission levels, monitor changes over time or the impact of interventions on transmission, confirm malaria elimination, and monitor re-emergence of malaria. Sero-surveillance tools could be used in reference laboratories or developed as simple point-of-care tests for community-based surveillance, and different applications and target populations dictate the technical performance required from assays that are determined by properties of antigens and antibody responses. To advance the development of sero-surveillance tools for malaria elimination, major gaps in our knowledge need to be addressed through further research. These include greater knowledge of potential antigens, the sensitivity and specificity of antibody responses, and the longevity of these responses and defining antigens and antibodies that differentiate between exposure to Plasmodium falciparum and P. vivax. Additionally, a better understanding of the influence of host factors, such as age, genetics, and comorbidities on antibody responses in different populations is needed.
How Could Hospitalisations at the End of Life Have Been Avoided? A Qualitative Retrospective Study of the Perspectives of General Practitioners, Nurses and Family Carers

Background Although many patients prefer to stay and die at home at the end of life, many are hospitalised. Little is known about how to avoid hospitalisations for patients living at home. Aim To describe how hospitalisation at the end of life can be avoided, from the perspective of the GPs, nurses and family carers. Method A qualitative design with face-to-face interviews was used. Taking 30 cases of patients who died non-suddenly, 26 GPs, 15 nurses and 18 family carers were interviewed in depth. Of the 30 patients, 20 were hospitalised and 10 were not hospitalised in the last three months of life. Results Five key themes that could help avoid hospitalisation at the end of life emerged from the interviews. The key themes were: 1) marking the approach of death, and shifting the mindset; 2) being able to provide acute treatment and care at home; 3) anticipatory discussions and interventions to deal with expected severe problems; 4) guiding and monitoring the patient and family in a holistic way through the illness trajectory; 5) continuity of treatment and care at home. If these five key themes are adopted in an interrelated way, this could help avoid hospitalisations, according to GPs, nurses and family carers. Conclusions The five key themes described in this study can be seen as strategies that could help in avoiding hospitalisation at the end of life. It is recommended that for all patients residing at home, GPs and community nurses work together as a team from the moment that it is marked that death is approaching up to the end of life.
High Performance Web of Things Architecture for the Smart Grid Domain

The increasing complexity in the management of Smart Grids is an essential factor in the creation of new technological infrastructures capable of managing the different devices involved in the network. This network has been converted into an example of the Internet of Things. In this regard, the Web of Things enables an improvement in the processing of these data. Besides, the large amount of data in the Smart Grid domain means that a high performance architectural design is able to manage concurrently the entire information processing ability. This paper presents an initial approach for a new architecture and the first results after the system implementation.
Structural Knowledge Discovery in Chemical and Spatio-Temporal Databases

Most current knowledge discovery systems use only attribute-value information. But relational information between objects is also important to the knowledge hidden in today’s databases. Two such domains are chemical structures and domains where objects are related in space and time. Inductive Logic Programming (ILP) discovery systems handle relational data, but require data to be expressed as a subset of first-order logic. We are investigating the application of the graph-based relational discovery system SUBDUE (Cook, Holder, Djoko 1996) in structural domains. Input to SUBDUE is a graph with labeled vertices and directed or undirected labeled edges. SUBDUE performs a beam search of the space of all possible subgraphs of the input graph. The search is guided by the minimum description length (MDL) principle, looking for subgraphs (substructures) with many instances that can be used to compress the original data and represent structural knowledge. We applied SUBDUE to the task of identifying structural patterns that distinguish carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic chemical compounds available from the National Toxicology Program (ntpserver.niehs.nih.gov). Each atom in a compound is represented as a vertex with directed edges to other vertices, where the edge labels specify whether the vertex is the atom name, type or partial charge. Bonds between atoms are represented as undirected edges between the vertices. We divided the data into a training set (268 compounds) and a testing set (30 compounds). SUBDUE found a substructure containing a bromine atom that occurred in 134 of the 143 carcinogenic training compounds and in only 24 of the 125 noncarcinogenic training compounds. This same substructure was found in 15 of the 19 carcinogenic testing compounds and in only 4 of the 11 noncarcinogenic testing compounds. The results are similar to those of ILP systems like PROGOL (Srinivasan ct aL 1997). We are experimenting with a new concept-learning version of SUBDUE that finds substructures compressing the positive data without compressing the negative data. Preliminary results show that the new version is competitive with the predominantly concept-learning ILP systems.
Fluorescence In Vivo Hybridization (FIVH) for Detection of Helicobacter pylori Infection in a C57BL/6 Mouse Model

Introduction In this study, we applied fluorescence in vivo hybridization (FIVH) using locked nucleic acid (LNA) probes targeting the bacterial rRNA gene for in vivo detection of H. pylori infecting the C57BL/6 mouse model. A previously designed Cy3_HP_LNA/2OMe_PS probe, complementary to a sequence of the H. pylori 16S rRNA gene, was used. First, the potential cytotoxicity and genotoxicity of the probe was assessed by commercial assays. Further, the performance of the probe for detecting H. pylori at different pH conditions was tested in vitro, using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH). Finally, the efficiency of FIVH to detect H. pylori SS1 strain in C57BL/6 infected mice was evaluated ex vivo in mucus samples, in cryosections and paraffin-embedded sections by epifluorescence and confocal microscopy. Results H. pylori SS1 strain infecting C57BL/6 mice was successfully detected by the Cy3_HP_LNA/2OMe_PS probe in the mucus, attached to gastric epithelial cells and colonizing the gastric pits. The specificity of the probe for H. pylori was confirmed by microscopy. Conclusions In the future this methodology can be used in combination with a confocal laser endomicroscope for in vivo diagnosis of H. pylori infection using fluorescent LNA probes, which would be helpful to obtain an immediate diagnosis. Our results proved for the first time that FIVH method is applicable inside the body of a higher-order animal.
Analysis of Topology Aggregation techniques for QoS routing

We study and compare topology aggregation techniques used in QoS routing. Topology Aggregation (TA) is defined as a set of techniques that abstract or summarize the state information about the network topology to be exchanged, processed, and maintained by network nodes for routing purposes. Due to scalability, aggregation techniques have been an integral part of some routing protocols. However, TA has not been studied extensively except in a rather limited context. With the continuing growth of the Internet, scalability issues of QoS routing have been gaining importance. Therefore, we survey the current TA techniques, provide methodology to classify, evaluate, and compare their complexities and efficiencies.
Evidence for genes on chromosome 2 contributing to alcohol dependence with conduct disorder and suicide attempts

Twin studies provide strong evidence that there is a shared genetic liability that predisposes to a number of different psychiatric outcomes related to behavioral disinhibition. Further, alcohol dependence comorbid with other disinhibitory disorders is particularly heritable. Chromosome 2p14‐2q14.3 has been linked to multiple psychiatric conditions related to behavioral undercontrol. In the Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism (COGA), we previously reported linkage to this region with alcohol dependence (AD), suicide attempts (SUI), and conduct disorder (CD). In this study, we follow‐up on these previous reports of linkage by combining the phenotypes in analyses that jointly consider the presence of multiple conditions. Linkage analyses of the combined phenotype of AD with CD or SUI results in a maximum LOD score of 5.4 in this region. In addition to this primary linkage peak, independent samples have reported linkage to other alcohol‐related phenotypes across chromosome 2. Accordingly, we followed‐up these linkage signals by testing for association with SNPs across chromosome 2 in a case–control sample, in which a subset of the cases consisted of alcohol‐dependent probands from the linkage sample. We find evidence of association with the combined AD with CD or SUI phenotype, with 23 genes surviving permutation testing. The number of associated genes across the chromosome may explain the persistent linkage findings reported on chromosome 2 across a number of independent studies of alcohol and disinhibitory phenotypes. Further, none of the genes were located directly under the primary COGA linkage peak, which has implications for association tests following‐up linkage peaks. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Application of Kohonen Self-Organizing Maps (SOM) Based Clustering for the Assessment of Religious Motivation

We investigated possible application of the Kohonen self-organizing maps (SOM) to the social sciences data clustering, and compare the results of the procedure to the principal components analysis (PCA) and hierarchical clustering methods. Real dataset consisting of the responses of 473 individuals to the questions of the Hoge Intrinsic Religious Motivation Scale was used. It is concluded that combined approach to the exploratory data analysis by means of SOM, PCA and hierarchical clustering gives a more clear picture of variable interrelations and grouping. Consequently it may be of help for the exploratory data analyses in social (and natural) sciences.