Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Super-Proximity and Spatial Development

Our world is getting smaller all the time. Connectivity and accessibility in space have improved to an unprecedented degree compared to past centuries, thanks to the enhanced design and effective implementation of transport infrastructure networks and increasingly also as a result of advance cyber infrastructure networks. Our connected and accessible world has indeed become «a small world». Technological innovation has become a buzzword in the past decades. The design, implementation and adoption of digital technology, in particular, have prompted entirely new forms of spatial interaction and communication, with a significant and unprecedented impact on transport, trade, tourism, migration, and social contact networks. In today’s increasingly innovation-driven society, almost every activity, action, task, communication, interaction, movement and decision is supported by new technological artifacts and inventions. This paper introduces the notion of «super-proximity» to highlight the force field of physical and virtual infrastructures at various geographical scale and time levels, and to sketch the spatial-economic implications of this universal megatrend towards zero distance-frictions. The paper will be concluded with some prospective observations on the future spatial implications of the e-society and their analysis.
CafeSat: a modern SAT solver for Scala

We present CafeSat, a SAT solver written in the Scala programming language. CafeSat is a modern solver based on DPLL and featuring many state-of-the-art techniques and heuristics. It uses two-watched literals for Boolean constraint propagation, conflict-driven learning along with clause deletion, a restarting strategy, and the VSIDS heuristics for choosing the branching literal. CafeSat is both sound and complete. In order to achieve reasonable performance, low level and hand-tuned data structures are extensively used. We report experiments that show that significant speedup can be obtained from translating a high level algorithm written in a relatively idiomatic Scala style to a more C-like programming style. These experiments also illustrate the importance of modern techniques used by SAT solver. Finally, we evaluate CafeSat against the reference SAT solver on the JVM: Sat4j.
Association between genes, stressful childhood events and processing bias in depression vulnerable individuals

The brain‐derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and catechol‐O‐methyltransferase (COMT) genes are relevant candidates for depression. Variation in these genes is associated with stress sensitivity and depressotypic cognitive biases. The interaction between genes and stressful events is considered as an important mechanism in the development of depression. This study examined the effects of the BDNF and COMT genes on biased processing and the interaction with childhood stress in vulnerable individuals. A total of 198 remitted depressed individuals performed an n‐back task with emotional facial stimuli (happy and sad). Childhood events were measured with a questionnaire. Genotype by childhood events interactions were analyzed for happy and sad expressions for BDNF (Val66Met; rs6265) and COMT (Val158Met; rs4680), individually and combined. BDNF and COMT both interacted significantly (P = 0.006 and P = 0.014, respectively) with childhood trauma on reaction time for happy faces. For both genes, Met‐carriers with childhood trauma showed less positive bias for happy faces than those without childhood trauma. Val‐carriers did not show a differential bias. Individuals with childhood trauma and 3 or 4 risk alleles (BDNF and COMT combined) showed less positive bias than those without childhood trauma (P = 0.011). The BDNF × COMT × childhood trauma interaction yielded a P = 0.055, but had limited power. A potential weakness is the measurement method of the childhood events, as negative bias might have affected participants' recall. Our findings endorse the association of BDNF and COMT with stress and depression and provide a possible intermediate, i.e. biased processing of positive information. Tailoring treatment to specific risk profiles based on genetic susceptibility and childhood stress could be promising.
Integrating The Arts Across The Elementary School Curriculum

Thank you for reading integrating the arts across the elementary school curriculum. Maybe you have knowledge that, people have search hundreds times for their chosen readings like this integrating the arts across the elementary school curriculum, but end up in infectious downloads. Rather than reading a good book with a cup of tea in the afternoon, instead they juggled with some infectious bugs inside their desktop computer.
Impact of Anemia and Transfusion on Readmission and Length of Stay After Spinal Surgery: A Single-center Study of 1187 Operations

Study Design: Retrospective cohort study. Objective: To determine whether receipt of blood transfusion and preoperative anemia are associated with increased rates of 30-day all-cause readmission, and secondarily with a prolonged hospital stay after spinal surgery. Summary of Background Data: Increased focus on health care quality has led to efforts to determine postsurgical readmission rates and predictors of length of postoperative hospital stay. Although there are still no defined outcome measures specific to spinal surgery to which providers are held accountable, efforts to identify appropriate measures and to determine modifiable risk factors to optimize quality are ongoing. Methods: Records from 1187 consecutive spinal surgeries at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in 2010 were retrospectively reviewed and data were collected that described the patient, surgical procedure, hospital course, complications, and readmissions. Presence or absence of transfusion during the surgery and associated hospital course was treated as a binary variable. Multivariate negative binomial regression and logistic regression were used to model length of stay and readmission, respectively. Results: Nearly one fifth (17.8%) of surgeries received transfusions, and the overall readmission rate was 6.1%. After controlling for potential confounders, we found that the presence of a transfusion was associated with a 60% longer hospital stay [adjusted incidence rate ratio=1.60 (1.34–1.91), P<0.001], but was not significantly associated with an increased rate of readmission [adjusted odds ratio=0.81 (0.39–1.70), P=0.582]. Any degree of preoperative anemia was associated with increased length of stay, but only severe anemia was associated with an increased rate of readmission. Conclusions: Both receipt of blood transfusion and any degree of preoperative anemia were associated with increased length of hospital stay after controlling for other variables. Severe anemia, but not receipt of blood transfusion, was associated with increased rate of readmission. Our findings may help define actions to reduce length of stay and decrease rates of readmission.
Price Impact Correlation Between Buy-/Sell-Pressure in the Stock Market and Subsequent Price Changes

In this thesis, the correlation between aggregated buy-/sell-pressure and price change is analyzed, something often referred to as price impact. The purpose is not only to ﬁnd a model that can explain how prices change given a certain traded volume, but also to see how much of the variance in price changes results from the actual buy- or sell-pressure. Analysis is conducted on monthly trading data from stocks comprising OMXS30 in 2016. An odd and increasing function of net bought relative to average daily turnover is suggested as an appropriate way to model price impact. In line with previous research thefunction is alsoconcave in order size. An exponentially decaying part dependent on previous trades is then added to the model in order to keep price changes uncorrelated. Further it is analyzed how the dependency on average daily turnover aﬀects price impact, and how the rise of smaller market places might change the sensitivity to price impact at larger ones. Ultimately, it is concluded that the hypothesis stating that a fragmented market increases sensitivity to price impact cannot be rejected. (Less)
DtpB (YhiP) and DtpA (TppB, YdgR) are prototypical proton‐dependent peptide transporters of Escherichia coli

The genome of Escherichia coli contains four genes assigned to the peptide transporter (PTR) family. Of these, only tppB (ydgR) has been characterized, and named tripeptide permease, whereas protein functions encoded by the yhiP, ybgH and yjdL genes have remained unknown. Here we describe the overexpression of yhiP as a His‐tagged fusion protein in E. coli and show saturable transport of glycyl‐sarcosine (Gly‐Sar) with an apparent affinity constant of 6.5 mm. Overexpression of the gene also increased the susceptibility of cells to the toxic dipeptide alafosfalin. Transport was strongly decreased in the presence of a protonophore but unaffected by sodium depletion, suggesting H+‐dependence. This was confirmed by purification of YhiP and TppB by nickel affinity chromatography and reconstitution into liposomes. Both transporters showed Gly‐Sar influx in the presence of an artificial proton gradient and generated transport currents on a chip‐based sensor. Competition experiments established that YhiP transported dipeptides and tripeptides. Western blot analysis revealed an apparent mass of YhiP of 40 kDa. Taken together, these findings show that yhiP encodes a protein that mediates proton‐dependent electrogenic transport of dipeptides and tripeptides with similarities to mammalian PEPT1. On the basis of our results, we propose to rename YhiP as DtpB (dipeptide and tripeptide permease B), by analogy with the nomenclature in other bacteria. We also propose to rename TppB as DtpA, to better describe its function as the first protein of the PTR family characterized in E. coli.
Classifying Two-Class Chinese Texts in Two Steps

Text categorization (TC) is a task of assigning one or multiple predefined category labels to natural language texts. To deal with this sophisticated task, a variety of statistical classification methods and machine learning techniques have been exploited intensively (Sebastiani, 2002), including the Naive Bayesian (NB) classifier (Lewis, 1998), the Vector Space Model (VSM)-based classifier (Salton, 1989), the example-based classifier (Mitchell, 1996), and the Support Vector Machine (Yang & Liu, 1999). Text filtering is a basic type of text categorization (two-class TC). There are many real-life applications (Fan, 2004), a typical one of which is the ill information filtering, such as erotic information and garbage information filtering on the web, in e-mails and in short messages of mobile phones. It is obvious that this sort of information should be carefully controlled. On the other hand, the filtering performance using the existing methodologies is still not satisfactory in general. The reason lies in that there exist a number of documents with high degree of ambiguity, from the TC point of view, in a document collection, that is, there is a fuzzy area across the border of two classes (for the sake of expression, we call the class consisting of the ill information-related texts, or, the negative samples, the category of TARGET, and, the class consisting of the ill information-not-related texts, or, the positive samples, the category of Non-TARGET). Some documents in one category may have great similarities with some other documents in the other category, for example, a lot of words concerning love story and sex are likely appear in both negative samples and positive samples if the filtering target is erotic information. BACKGROUND
PHYSIOLOGICAL STRESS AND COLOR POLYMORPHISM IN THE INTERTIDAL SNAIL NUCELLA LAPILLUS

The intertidal snail Nucella lapillus exhibits considerable variation in shell color both within and between populations differentially exposed to wave action. Populations from high‐wave‐energy shores tended to be highly polymorphic and were dominated by pigmented morphs (especially brown), while those at more sheltered locations exhibited less polymorphism and were predominantly white. Field and laboratory experiments were conducted to determine the role of physiological stress and selective predation in maintaining the observed distribution of color morphs.
U.S. Senators on Twitter: Asymmetric Party Rhetoric in 140 Characters

The U.S. Senate is a party-polarized institution where divisive political rhetoric stems from the partisan divide. Senators regularly chastise political opponents, but not all senators are equally critical. Research finds that elite party polarization is asymmetrical with greater divergence by Republicans, so I expect Republican senators to mimic that trend with higher levels of partisan rhetoric. To assess the variance in partisan rhetoric, I catalogue senators’ Twitter activity during the first 6 months of the 113th and 114th Congresses, and find that Republicans are more likely to name-call their Democratic opponents and to make expressions of intraparty loyalty, particularly when they are the minority party.
Development and validation of the Attitudes Towards Smoking Scale (ATS-18).

AIM To develop and test the validity of a scale measuring attitudes towards smoking in current and former cigarette smokers. DESIGN AND PARTICIPANTS In a first mail survey, we collected qualitative data from 616 smokers. In a second mail survey, we collected quantitative data from 529 smokers and ex-smokers. We conducted a 16-month follow-up survey among 93 participants in the second survey. SETTING Geneva, Switzerland, 1995-98. FINDINGS The study resulted in a three-dimensional, 18-item scale: the "Attitudes Towards Smoking Scale" (ATS-18). The scale was validated with reference to criteria of content-, construct- and predictive validity. The three subscales measure perceptions of adverse effects of smoking (10 items), psychoactive benefits (four items) and pleasure of smoking (four items). Internal consistency coefficients (0.85, 0.88 and 0.81) and test-retest correlations were high (0.90, 0.75, 0.89, respectively). Differences in attitude scores between smokers in the pre-contemplation and preparation stages of change were -0.83, 0.71 and 1.23 standard deviation units, respectively. A differential score (advantages minus disadvantages of smoking) predicted smoking cessation in baseline smokers and relapse in baseline ex-smokers. CONCLUSION ATS-18 is a valid and reliable instrument which can be used in both research and clinical settings.
Evolution of the Major Pilus Gene Cluster ofHaemophilus influenzae

ABSTRACT Haemophilus influenzae is a ubiquitous colonizer of the human respiratory tract and causes diseases ranging from otitis media to meningitis. Many H. influenzae isolates express pili (fimbriae), which mediate adherence to epithelial cells and facilitate colonization. The pilus gene (hif) cluster of H. influenzae type b maps between purE andpepN and resembles a pathogenicity island: it is present in invasive strains, absent from the nonpathogenic Rd strain, and flanked by direct repeats of sequence at the insertion site. To investigate the evolution and role in pathogenesis of the hif cluster, we compared the purE-pepN regions of various H. influenzae laboratory strains and clinical isolates. Unlike Rd, most strains had an insert at this site, which usually was the only chromosomal locus of hif DNA. The inserts are diverse in length and organization: among 20 strains, nine different arrangements were found. Several nontypeable isolates lack hif genes but have two conserved open reading frames (hicA andhicB) upstream of purE; their inferred products are small proteins with no data bank homologs. Other isolates havehif genes but lack hic DNA or have combinations of hif and hic genes. By comparing these arrangements, we have reconstructed a hypothetical ancestral genotype, the extended hif cluster. The hif region of INT1, an invasive nontypeable isolate, resembles the hypothetical ancestor. We propose that a progenitor strain acquired the extended cluster by horizontal transfer and that other variants arose as deletions. The structure of the hif cluster may correlate with colonization site or pathogenicity.
Self-Trained Stacking Model for Semi-Supervised Learning

The most important characteristic of semi-supervised learning methods is the combination of available unlabeled data along with an enough smaller set of labeled examples, so as to increase the learning accuracy compared with the default procedure of supervised methods, which on the other hand use only the labeled data during the training phase. In this work, we have implemented a hybrid Self-trained system that combines a Support Vector Machine, a Decision Tree, a Lazy Learner and a Bayesian algorithm using a Stacking variant methodology. We performed an in depth comparison with other well-known Semi-Supervised classification methods on standard benchmark datasets and we finally reached to the point that the presented technique had better accuracy in most cases.
Comparison of the configuration of the human anterior chamber angle, as determined by the Spaeth gonioscopic grading system and ultrasound biomicroscopy.

PURPOSE The primary purpose of this investigation was to validate anatomically, if possible, the Spaeth gonioscopic grading system. METHODS The gonioscopic appearance of the anterior chamber angle of 22 patients was described, using a Zeiss 4-mirror gonioscopic lens; the angle was graded according to the Spaeth gonioscopic grading system (SGGS) previously described elsewhere. This system provides a more comprehensive characterization of the angle than other methods, including the site of iris insertion, the angular approach to the recess and the curvature of the peripheral iris. The same patients were then evaluated with biomicroscopic ultrasound examination of the anterior segment; the nature of the anterior chamber angle was described independently by two observers. The two methods of characterizing the anterior chamber angle were then compared. RESULTS There was a high correlation between the two different methods of characterizing the anterior chamber angle. Ultrasound biomicroscopy had limitations relating to inability to distinguish between iris-cornea apposition and iris-cornea adhesion, and to exact location of the posterior trabecular meshwork. The angularity of the approach to the anterior chamber angle using the SGGS tended to be underestimated by about 5 degrees. Other aspects showed high correlation. CONCLUSION The SGGS appears to be an accurate method of characterizing the anatomic appearance of the anterior chamber angle in patients. It also provides a more comprehensive description of the angle that other grading systems.
Advances in real-time rendering

Real-time rendering is a quickly developing field in computer graphics. Recent advances in graphics hardware make it possible to tackle completely new challenges, and to rethink old ones. While previously, the main focus of real-time rendering lay on classical problems like visibility and level-of-detail rendering, nowadays we see new challenges in the form of interactive procedural content generation, handling of massive amounts of data, and interactive simulation of extremely complex objects like trees. In this talk, I will try to broaden the definition of realtime rendering and give some insights how to address new research challenges. Starting with a few classical problems like rendering accurate shadows, achieving smooth transitions between different levels of detail, and global visibility computations, I will then show a few examples of recent advances in real-time rendering. One challenge is the ever-increasing size of models due to automatic acquisition methods like range scanners. In a new system we have developed, we are able to visualize and interact with datasets of over 1 Billion raw points. Another source of large models is procedural modeling, and we have developed a method to aid designers in creating these models interactively. Finally, vegetation plays an important role in interactive scenes. I will show a system to simulate both illumination and animation in such complex vegetation very realistically.
Neuropsychological Impairment in Female Patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: A Preliminary Study

This study examines neuropsychological impairments associated with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and explores their association with related clinical factors. Sixty-eight women with CFS were assessed with a neuropsychological battery. Raw scores were adjusted for age and gender and were converted to T scores according to normative data extracted from a local sample of 250 healthy subjects. Neuropsychological dysfunction was calculated using summary impairment indexes (proportion of test scores outside normal limits—T score <40—for each cognitive domain). Finally, a linear regression was calculated to identify predictors of cognitive deficit, including intrinsic factors of the disease (level of fatigue and length of illness) and extrinsic factors (emotional factors, age, and education). Approximately 50% of scores showed impairment in attention and motor functioning, and nearly 40% showed impairment in speed information processing and executive functioning. Fatigue predicted attention and executive functioning impairment, and emotional factors predicted verbal memory dysfunction. According to our findings, cognitive dysfunction in CFS could be explained by pathophysiological processes of the disease. One implication of this would be the need to identify homogeneous subgroups of patients with CFS by taking into account common factors, which, in turn, would help to identify more specific cognitive profiles, which could then serve to implement appropriate therapeutic measures accordingly.
Evaluation of performance and opportunities for improvements in automotive power electronics systems

Thermal management strategies for automotive power electronic systems have evolved over time to reduce system cost and to improve reliability and thermal performance. In this study, we characterized the power electronic thermal management systems of two electric-drive vehicles-the 2012 Nissan LEAF and 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid. Tests were conducted to measure the insulated-gate bipolar transistor-to-coolant thermal resistances for both steady-state and transient conditions at various coolant flow rates. Water-ethylene glycol at a temperature of 65°C was used as the coolant for these experiments. Computational fluid dynamics and finite element analysis models of the vehicle's power electronics thermal management system were then created and validated using experimentally obtained results. Results indicate that the Accord module provides lower steady-state thermal resistance as compared with the LEAF module. However, the LEAF design may provide improved performance in transient conditions and may have cost benefits.