Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Using Concept Maps to Engage Adult Learners in Critical Analysis

An understanding of learning theories can help adult educators become more effective practitioners and meet the needs of the learners they serve. Adult educators who understand how individuals learn can be better prepared to use effective strategies during the learning process. This article addresses the use of concept maps as a strategy to engage adult learners in critical analysis, a skill educators often aim to help learners strengthen. The discussion situates within four learning theories: cognitivist, constructivist, transformative, and social learning. Examples from different contexts using concept maps and connections between theories, learning process, locus of learning, teacher’s role, manifestation in adult education, and activities are presented. The article concludes with putting concept maps and critical analysis into practice in formal and nonformal settings.
Inter- and intra-individual variation in immediate free recall: An examination of serial position functions and recall initiation strategies

Serial position functions in immediate free recall have been historically noted for their bowed shape, where items presented at the beginning (primacy) and end (recency) of a list are better remembered than those presented in the middle. While extensive work has examined these effects, researchers typically ignore the systematic differences among individuals that likely contribute, but are lost when using an aggregate function. In the current study, inter- and intra-individual differences in serial position functions and differences in recall strategies were examined. Participants performed a free recall task on multiple lists. Three groups of participants were derived based on the relative profiles in their serial position functions. These groups differed in the extent that they output mainly primacy items, recency items, or both primacy and recency items. Performance on immediate free recall and on cognitive ability tasks was compared between these three groups. Systematic inter- and intra-individual variation in recall strategies led to differential profiles of performance in immediate free recall, which was also related to the additional cognitive ability measures. Performance on a task can be due to the utilisation of a variety of control processes that emphasise various components of that task over other components.
West Nile Virus and Non-West Nile Virus Mortality and Coinfection of American Crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) in California

SUMMARY American crows are acutely sensitive to West Nile virus (WNV) infection, and crow mortality has been used in WNV surveillance to monitor enzootic transmission. However, non-WNV sources of mortality could reduce the reliability of crow death as a surveillance tool. Here, using a combination of histopathologic, toxicologic, virologic, and molecular techniques we describe causes of mortality in 67 American crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) that were collected from a population in the Sacramento Valley of California in 2012 and 2013. Evidence of infectious disease was detected in 70% (47/67) of carcasses. The majority of deaths were linked to a suite of non-WNV viral, bacterial, and fungal infections (39%; 23/59 cases), WNV (36%; 24/67 cases), and an acute toxic event (25%; 15/59 cases). Coinfections were detected in 20% (12/59) of birds and frequently were associated with WNV and poxviral dermatitis. Inferences about WNV activity based on crow mortality should be supported by laboratory confirmation because crow mortality frequently can be caused by other infectious diseases or toxic events. RESUMEN Mortalidad por el virus del Nilo Occidental, mortalidad por otras causas y coinfecciones en cuervos americanos (Corvus brachyrhynchos) en California. Los cuervos americanos son muy sensibles a la infección del virus del Nilo Occidental (con las siglas en inglés WNV), y la mortalidad en los cuervos se ha utilizado en la vigilancia de esta enfermedad para estudiar su transmisión enzootica. Sin embargo, otras causas de mortalidad diferentes del virus del Nilo Occidental podrían reducir la confiabilidad de la mortalidad de cuervos como herramienta de vigilancia. En este caso, mediante el uso de una combinación de histopatología, toxicología, virología y técnicas moleculares, se describen las causas de mortalidad en 67 cuervos americanos (Corvus brachyrhynchos) que fueron recolectados de una población en el Valle de Sacramento en California entre los años 2012 y 2013. Se detectó evidencia de la enfermedad infecciosa en el 70% (47/67) de las aves. La mayoría de las muertes estaban vinculadas a una serie de infecciones virales diferentes del virus del Nilo Occidental, bacterianas y micóticas (39%; 23/59 casos), por el virus del Nilo Occidental (36%; 24/67 casos) y toxicidad aguda (25%; 15/59 casos). Se detectaron coinfecciones en el 20% (12/59) de las aves y con frecuencia se asociaron con el virus del Nilo Occidental y con dermatitis por poxvirus. Las inferencias acerca de la actividad del virus del Nilo con base en la mortalidad de los cuervos deben ser apoyados por la confirmación en el laboratorio porque la mortalidad en estas aves con frecuencia puede ser causada por otras enfermedades infecciosas o eventos tóxicos.
The changing landscape in drug resistant-tuberculosis: an analysis of recent advances

The Union TB-HIV Department, Barcelona, Spain; The Union TB-HIV Department, Gran Canarias, Spain; Hospital General de Gran Canaria, Dr. Negrin – Pneumology, Las Palmas de Gran Canarias, Spain; The Union – Training Department, New York, NY, USA; Infectious diseases department, Tropical Medicine Unit, PROCIS (International Health Program of the Catalan Health Institute), Vall d’Hebron University Hospital, Universistat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
Considerations on the Use of Patient-Reported Outcomes in Comparative Effectiveness Research

Comparative effectiveness research (CER) involves studies that generate evidence through an evaluation of the spectrum of health care interventions and services that reflect patient choices for a given clinical situation, with the intent of improving patient and physician decision-making. In this paradigm, CER can be defined as a rigorous evaluation of the impact of different options that are available for treating a given medical condition for a particular set of patients.1 Such studies may compare similar treatments, such as competing drugs, or they may analyze very different approaches, like surgery and drug therapy.1 To date, the areas of emphasis in CER have primarily been on clinical endpoints, with extensive work in mixed and indirect treatment comparisons,2-3 use of Bayesian approaches,4 simulated treatment comparisons,5 realworld data use,6-8 and therapeutic index determination.9 Despite the potential role of patient-reported outcomes (PRO) data in CER, a central role for PRO data has not yet been fully established in CER because of the challenges associated with the collection and interpretation of such data within and across studies. A PRO is any report on the status of a patient’s health condition that comes directly from the patient.10 PRO is an umbrella term that includes a whole host of subjective outcomes, such as pain, fatigue, depression, aspects of well-being (e.g., physical, functional, psychological), treatment satisfaction, health-related quality of life, and physical symptoms, such as nausea and vomiting.11 In the traditional clinical research domain, there have been great advances with regard to the recognition of the role of PROs,12 as evidenced also by the recent publications of guidance documents by regulatory agencies.13-14 In different parts of the world, agencies or government bodies like the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Healthcare (IQWiG) in Germany, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC) in Australia, the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) in the United Kingdom, and the Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH) in Canada have long histories of using PROs. While there are ongoing initiatives aimed at selecting preferred PRO instruments that would support validity and comparability of PRO measures and results, the use of PROs for CER is less defined than it is for regulatory approval. In this paper we discuss the role of PROs in CER, review the challenges associated with the inclusion of PROs in CER initiatives, provide a framework for their effective utilization, and propose several areas for future research.
The IEEE 802.15.4g standard for smart metering utility networks

Smart utility network (SUN) communications are an essential part of the smart grid. Major vendors realized the importance of universal standards and participated in the IEEE802.15. 4g standardization effort. Due to the fact that many vendors already have proprietary solutions deployed in the field, the standardization effort was a challenge, but after three years of hard work, the IEEE802.15. 4g standard published on April 28th, 2012. The publication of this standard is a first step towards establishing common and consistent communication specifications for utilities deploying smart grid technologies. This paper summaries the technical essence of the standard and how it can be used in smart utility networks.
Knowledge-Based CRM : A Map

Let’s define Customer Relationship Management as the set of tools, processes and technologies that help a business to attract, retain and develop high-value customers. That definition could be unpacked substantially, but it will serve our purpose in expressing the two key concepts of high value customers (as opposed to low value customers) and a customer lifecycle from entry into relationship, and departure.
Aridity weakens population-level effects of multiple species interactions on Hibiscus meyeri

Significance Predicting the impacts of global change on biodiversity requires understanding the factors that regulate population growth and set species’ range boundaries. Darwin proposed that abiotic factors limit population growth in stressful areas, whereas species interactions dominate in less stressful environments because of an increased density and diversity of enemies (consumers, parasites, pathogens). We present experimental support for this hypothesized shift in the strength of species interactions with climate, but we also show that this pattern does not arise from Darwin’s proposed mechanism. Our work implies that effects of species interactions on population growth rate decrease with stress, with implications for how different range boundaries are likely to respond to climatic change. Predicting how species’ abundances and ranges will shift in response to climate change requires a mechanistic understanding of how multiple factors interact to limit population growth. Both abiotic stress and species interactions can limit populations and potentially set range boundaries, but we have a poor understanding of when and where each is most critical. A commonly cited hypothesis, first proposed by Darwin, posits that abiotic factors (e.g., temperature, precipitation) are stronger determinants of range boundaries in apparently abiotically stressful areas (“stress” indicates abiotic factors that reduce population growth), including desert, polar, or high-elevation environments, whereas species interactions (e.g., herbivory, competition) play a stronger role in apparently less stressful environments. We tested a core tenet of this hypothesis—that population growth rate is more strongly affected by species interactions in less stressful areas—using experimental manipulations of species interactions affecting a common herbaceous plant, Hibiscus meyeri (Malvaceae), across an aridity gradient in a semiarid African savanna. Population growth was more strongly affected by four distinct species interactions (competition with herbaceous and shrubby neighbors, herbivory, and pollination) in less stressful mesic areas than in more stressful arid sites. However, contrary to common assumptions, this effect did not arise because of greater density or diversity of interacting species in less stressful areas, but rather because aridity reduced sensitivity of population growth to these interactions. Our work supports classic predictions about the relative strength of factors regulating population growth across stress gradients, but suggests that this pattern results from a previously unappreciated mechanism that may apply to many species worldwide.
Changing Times Together? A Time‐Diary Analysis of Family Time in the Digital Age in the United Kingdom

Abstract Objective: This study examines the impact of digital mobile devices on different aspects of family time in the United Kingdom. Background: Recent years have witnessed increasing concerns surrounding the consequences of the widespread diffusion of Internet‐enabled mobile devices such as smartphones for family well‐being. However, research examining the extent to which mobile devices have influenced family time remains limited. Method: Using nationally representative time‐diary data spanning a period of unprecedented technological change (U.K. 2000 and 2015 Time Use Surveys), the authors construct a set of novel family time measures that capture varying degrees of family togetherness and examine changes in these measures over time. Novel diary data are also analyzed to explore the occurrence of mobile device use during different aspects of family time in 2015. Results: Children and parents spent more time at the same location in 2015, and there was no change in the time they spent doing activities together. However, there was a marked increase of alone‐together time, when children were at the same location as their parents, but did not report that they were copresent with them. The results show that children and parents used mobile devices during all aspects of family time in 2015, but device use was notably concentrated during alone‐together time. Conclusion: This study provides an empirical basis for documenting the impact of mobile device use on family time.
Adaptive radar pulses clustering based on density cluster window

As radar signal environments become denser and more complex, the capability of high-speed and accurate signal analysis is required for an ES(Electronic warfare Support) system to identify individual radar signals in realtime. This paper presents the adaptive clustering algorithm of radar pulses to alleviate the load of signal analysis process and support reliable analysis. The proposed clustering algorithm determines the size of cluster window based on the type of frequency modulation of received radar signals. Simulation results show the superior performance of the proposed algorithm over conventional sequential histogram and scan model.
Neural Network Approach for Modelling Hysteretic Magnetic Materials Under Distorted Excitations

A Neural Network (NN) approach for modelling dynamic hysteresis is presented. The modelling of the dynamic behavior of hysteretic materials and devices must take into account magnetodynamic effects. In the present paper these tasks are simultaneously modelled by means of an ad-hoc Neural System (NS) based on an array of 3-input 1-output Feed Forward NNs. Each NN is dedicated to a particular typology of the excitation field (prediction of flux density from a known waveform of the magnetic field strength or vice-versa) and it manages just a fixed portion of the dynamic hysteresis loop. The whole hysteretic path is reconstructed by the union of the evaluations made by different NNs of the NS. The NS is able to perform the simulation of any kind of dynamic loop (saturated and non-saturated, symmetric or asymmetric) generated by any assigned arbitrarily distorted excitations into a fixed range of frequencies. Numerical validations are presented.
Selection of Suitable Reference Genes for Analysis of Salivary Transcriptome in Non-Syndromic Autistic Male Children

Childhood autism is a severe form of complex genetically heterogeneous and behaviorally defined set of neurodevelopmental diseases, collectively termed as autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Reverse transcriptase quantitative real-time PCR (RT-qPCR) is a highly sensitive technique for transcriptome analysis, and it has been frequently used in ASD gene expression studies. However, normalization to stably expressed reference gene(s) is necessary to validate any alteration reported at the mRNA level for target genes. The main goal of the present study was to find the most stable reference genes in the salivary transcriptome for RT-qPCR analysis in non-syndromic male childhood autism. Saliva samples were obtained from nine drug naïve non-syndromic male children with autism and also sex-, age-, and location-matched healthy controls using the RNA-stabilizer kit from DNA Genotek. A systematic two-phased measurement of whole saliva mRNA levels for eight common housekeeping genes (HKGs) was carried out by RT-qPCR, and the stability of expression for each candidate gene was analyzed using two specialized algorithms, geNorm and NormFinder, in parallel. Our analysis shows that while the frequently used HKG ACTB is not a suitable reference gene, the combination of GAPDH and YWHAZ could be recommended for normalization of RT-qPCR analysis of salivary transcriptome in non-syndromic autistic male children.
Trending pool: Visual analytics for trending event compositions for time-series categorical log data

Although many visualization tools provide us plenty of ways to view the data, users can not easily find the trending events and their explanation from the data. In this work, we address the issue by leveraging the real music streaming log data as an example to better understand a million-scale dataset. Trending event explanation turns out to be challenging when it comes to categorical log data. Therefore, we propose to use a learning-based method with an interface design to uncover the trending event compositions for time-series categorical log data, which can be extend to other datasets, e.g., the hashtags in social media. First, we perform “trending pool” operation to save the memory and time cost. Second, we apply sparse coding to learn important trending candidate combination sets instead of traditional brute-force way or manual investigation for generating combinations. Besides the contributions above, we also observe some interesting user behaviors by exploring detected trending candidate combinations visually through our interface.
Changes in thylakoid membrane thickness associated with the reorganization of photosystem II light harvesting complexes during photoprotective energy dissipation

Using freeze-fracture electron microscopy we have recently shown that non-photochemical quenching (NPQ), a mechanism of photoprotective energy dissipation in higher plant chloroplasts, involves a reorganization of the pigment-protein complexes within the stacked grana thylakoids1. Photosystem II light harvesting complexes (LHCII) are reorganized in response to the amplitude of the light driven transmembrane proton gradient (ΔpH) leading to their dissociation from photosystem II reaction centers and their aggregation within the membrane1. This reorganization of the PSII-LHCII macrostructure was found to be enhanced by the formation of zeaxanthin and was associated with changes in the mobility of the pigment-protein complexes therein1. We suspected that the structural changes we observed were linked to the ΔpH-induced changes in thylakoid membrane thickness that were first observed by Murikami and Packer2,3. Here using thin-section electron microscopy we show that the changes in thylakoid membrane thickness do not correlate with ΔpH per se but rather the amplitude of NPQ and is thus affected by the de-epoxidation of the LHCII bound xanthophyll violaxanthin to zeaxanthin. We thus suggest that the change in thylakoid membrane thickness occurring during NPQ reflects the conformational change within LHCII proteins brought about by their protonation and aggregation within the membrane
Maternal SNPs in the p53 Pathway: Risk Factors for Trisomy 21?

The p53 family and its regulatory pathway play an important role as regulators of developmental processes, limiting the propagation of aneuploid cells. Its dysfunction or imbalance can lead to pathological abnormalities in humans. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of maternal polymorphisms TP53 c.215G>C (P72R), TP73 4 c. -30G>A and 14 c. -20C>T, MDM2 c.14+309T>G (SNP309), MDM4 c.753+572C>T and USP7 c.2719-234G>A as risk factors for Down Syndrome (DS) birth. A case-control study was conducted with 263 mothers of DS children and 196 control mothers. The distribution of these genotypic variants was similar between case and control mothers. However, the combined alleles TP53 C and MDM2 G, and TP53 C and USP7 A increased the risk of having offspring with DS (OR = 1.84 and 1.77; 95% CI; P < 0.007 and 0.018, respectively). These results suggest that, although the individual polymorphisms were not associated with DS birth, the effect of the combined genotypes among TP53, MDM2 and USP7 genes indicates a possible role of TP53 and its regulatory pathway as a risk factor for aneuploidy.
Pelagic bacterial heterotrophy and biomass

Bactenal actlvltles and abundance were rneasured seasonally in the wata column of merom~c t~c Big Soda Lake wh~ch IS dl\ ~ d e d Into three cheni~cally d~stinct Lones aerob~c m ~ x o l ~ m n ~ o n , anaerob~c m~xol~mnlon, and anaerob~c rnon~rnol~mn~on Bactenal abundance ranged between 5 and 52 x loh cells ml , w ~ t h h~ghest b~omass at the mterfaces between these zones. 2-4 mg C hiel ' In the photosynthet~c bacter~al ayel (oxqcllne) and 0 8-2 0 mg C h e r ' In the chemochne. Bactenal cell sue and niorphologq also ~ a r l e d w ~ t h depth. small coccold cells were doni~nant In the aerob~c m ~ x o l m n ~ o n whereas the rnonimohmn~on had a more d ~ v e ~ s e populat~on that mcluded COCCI, rods, and large filaments Heterotroph~c actlvltq was measured by [methyl-'H]thymid~ne mcorpordtlon and ['4C]glutamate uptake H~ghest uptake rates were at or just below the photosynthetic bacterial layer and were attrlbutahlc to small ( q 1 pm) heterotrophs rather than the lagei photosynthet~c bactena These h ~ g h rates 01 heterotroph~c uptake were agpa~ently hnked with fermentatlon. rdtes of o t h e ~ n i~ne ra l i~a t~on processey (e.g sulfate rcduct~on, methanogenes~s, den~tnficanon) In the anoxlc m~vol imn~on wele ~ns~gn~ficant Hetrrot~opii~c a tlvlty In the hlghlq reduced mon~mol~mnion mas generally much lower than elsewhere In the water columrl Therefore, although the m o n ~ m o l ~ m n ~ o n c ntamed most of thc bactt-11a1 abundance and biomass (-60°/o), most of the cells there were inactive. Big Soda Lake, Nevada, is a meroniictic lake which represents environmental extremes of pH, salinity, and sulfide concentration. It has sharp and predictable vertical gradients in temperature, oxygen, and water density that make it ideal for the study of pelagic microbial processes. In this series of papers we report our seasonal studies ofbacter ial processes within the chemically stratified water column of this lake. These studBound reprints of this four-paper series can be obtained from R. S. Oremland. ies included measures of bacterial abundance and heterotrophic activity, sulfate reduction, methanogenesis, methane oxidation, and sinking losses of seston from the mixolimnion. Bacterial activity in aquatic environments has bcen measured by several methods. The assimilation, respiration, and turnover of radioactive organic substrates (usually amino acids and sugars) have often been used as indices of bacterial heterotrophy. However, these methods measure only a fraction of total bacterial production