Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
First In-Mouse Development and Application of a Surgically Relevant Xenograft Model of Ovarian Carcinoma

Purpose Preclinical models of epithelial ovarian cancer have not been exploited to evaluate the clinical standard combination therapy of surgical debulking with follow-up chemotherapy. As surgery is critical to patient survival, here we establish a combined surgical/chemotherapy xenograft model of epithelial ovarian cancer and demonstrate its translational relevance. Experimental Design SKOV-3luc+ ovary cancer cells were injected topically into the ovaries of immunodeficient mice. Disease development and effect of clinical standard treatment including hysterectomy, bilateral salpingoophorectomy and removal of metastasis with follow up chemotherapy (carboplatin 12 mg/kg + paclitaxel 15 mg/kg) was evaluated by clinical parameters. Tumor burden was quantified by bioluminescence imaging (BLI). Results The xenograft ovarian tumors developed were poorly differentiated and multicystic and the disease disseminated into the peritoneal cavity. When compared to the controls with a mean survival time of 4.9 weeks, mice treated with surgery and chemotherapy, surgery or chemotherapy demonstrated significantly improved mean survival of 16.1 weeks (p = 0.0008), 12.7 weeks (p = 0.0008), or 10.4 weeks (p = 0.008), respectively. Conclusion Combined surgical intervention and adjuvant chemotherapy was demonstrated for the first time in an orthotopic xenograft model of ovarian cancer. Similar to observation in human studies the combined approach resulted in the longest medial survival time, advocating application of this strategy in future preclinical therapeutic development for this disease.
Suicidal Ideation and Associated Factors Among School-Going Adolescents in Harare, Zimbabwe

This study determined the prevalence and associated factors of suicidal ideation among school-going adolescents in Harare, Zimbabwe. Data on 1970 respondents were obtained from a cross sectional study of the Global School-based health survey. Respondents were selected using a two-stage probability sampling technique. The prevalence of suicidal ideation was 21.6%. Males were less likely to have suicidal ideation than females (OR=0.70; 95% CI 0.54,0.91). Worrying (OR=1.81; 95% CI 1.29,2.56), feeling of loneliness (OR=2.04; 95% CI 1.43,2.90), cigarette smoking (OR=1.87; 95% CI 1.11, 3.16), and drinking alcohol (OR=1.74; 95% CI 1.17, 2.60) were associated with suicidal ideation. Public health programs designed to control cigarette smoking and alcohol use may also impact positively on suicidal ideation.
A thrombin generation assay may reduce the need for compression ultrasonography for the exclusion of deep venous thrombosis in the elderly

Abstract Introduction. The exclusion of deep venous thrombosis (DVT) by pre-test probability (PTP) and D-dimer in the elderly is safe, but has a low specificity. There is increasing interest in the diagnostic role of thrombin generation in patients with thrombosis. We evaluated the value of thrombin generation in the exclusion of DVT, especially in elderly patients. Material and methods. All thrombin generation parameters of the Endogenous Thrombin Potential assay were tested retrospectively in a cohort of 443 patients suspected for DVT. The performance of the assay was calculated as AUC of the ROC curve and association with DVT as odds ratio (OR). The lag time value was combined with results of PTP and Innovance D-dimer assay. Results. All thrombin generation parameters had a low AUC. In the 4th age quartile, the corrected OR of lag time increased to 16 and the AUC of lag time for the combination PTP < 2 and D-dimers ≥ 500 μg/L was 0.96 with a cut-off value of 23.0 sec. The exclusion of DVT in patients ≥ 75 years (n = 30), based on this combination and lag time values ≤ 23.0 sec had a NPV of 100% and a specificity of 96.0% in this subgroup of patients and decreased the number needed to test from 10 to 1.1. Conclusion. Thrombin generation parameters alone are inappropriate for the exclusion of DVT. However, in the elderly, the current algorithm of exclusion of DVT may improve markedly by the addition of the lag time results of the ETP.
An enhanced ABS/OLA sinusoidal model for waveform synthesis in TTS

This paper describes a method for text-to-speech waveform synthesis based on the Analysis-by-Synthe-sis/Overlap-Add (ABS/OLA) sinusoidal model. This model has been shown in previous work to be a use-ful framework for pitch and time-scale modi(cid:12)cation of both speech and music signals. This paper ex-plores some extensions of the original ABS/OLA for-mulation that attempt to overcome speci(cid:12)c artifacts, including a phase dithering approach for unvoiced speech synthesis and an improved pitch modi(cid:12)ca-tion method that compensates for undesirable energy modulation e(cid:11)ects. The implementation of the model within a text-to-speech synthesis (TTS) system is described, and the results of a listener evaluation of the method are discussed.
Memory and performance issues in parallel multifrontal factorizations and triangular solutions with sparse right-hand sides. (Problèmes de mémoire et de performance de la factorisation multifrontale parallèle et de la résolution triangulaire à seconds membres creux)

We consider the solution of very large sparse systems of linear equations on parallel architectures. In this context, memory is often a bottleneck that prevents or limits the use of direct solvers, especially those based on the multifrontal method. This work focuses on memory and performance issues of the two memory and computationally intensive phases of direct methods, namely, the numerical factorization and the solution phase. In the first part we consider the solution phase with sparse right-hand sides, and in the second part we consider the memory scalability of the multifrontal factorization. In the first part, we focus on the triangular solution phase with multiple sparse right-hand sides, that appear in numerous applications. We especially emphasize the computation of entries of the inverse, where both the right-hand sides and the solution are sparse. We first present several storage schemes that enable a significant compression of the solution space, both in a sequential and a parallel context. We then show that the way the right-hand sides are partitioned into blocks strongly influences the performance and we consider two different settings: the out-of-core case, where the aim is to reduce the number of accesses to the factors, that are stored on disk, and the in-core case, where the aim is to reduce the computational cost. Finally, we show how to enhance the parallel efficiency. In the second part, we consider the parallel multifrontal factorization. We show that controlling the active memory specific to the multifrontal method is critical, and that commonly used mapping techniques usually fail to do so: they cannot achieve a high memory scalability, i.e., they dramatically increase the amount of memory needed by the factorization when the number of processors increases. We propose a class of "memory-aware" mapping and scheduling algorithms that aim at maximizing performance while enforcing a user-given memory constraint and provide robust memory estimates before the factorization. These techniques have raised performance issues in the parallel dense kernels used at each step of the factorization, and we have proposed some algorithmic improvements. The ideas presented throughout this study have been implemented within the MUMPS (MUltifrontal Massively Parallel Solver) solver and experimented on large matrices (up to a few tens of millions unknowns) and massively parallel architectures (up to a few thousand cores). They have demonstrated to improve the performance and the robustness of the code, and will be available in a future release. Some of the ideas presented in the first part have also been implemented within the PDSLin (Parallel Domain decomposition Schur complement based Linear solver) package.
DOES NATIONAL RISK MANAGEMENT SIGNAL VIRTUE-BASED LEADERSHIP ?

Using exploratory factor analysis of a unique dataset of global executives, we find their perceptions of their national government’s risk management effectiveness are largely driven by two latent factors: leadership virtue and governance. We show that the leadership virtue signal is potentially a stronger signal (3.19 times more correlated with risk management perceptions than the governance indicator). We hypothesize that this may be because making decisions and taking actions to manage risk is a continuous process requiring inter alia foresight and moral discipline in looking to the interests of others and acting in service to those interests above self-interest. To our knowledge this is the first paper to make this connection empirically between national risk management and leadership. This suggests at least two propositions for further testing.
Listening to the community: social media monitoring tasks for improving government services

We present a preliminary analysis of the tasks and information needs of users performing social media monitoring to improve government services. In general, our aim is to explore how text analysis tools can support a social media monitoring task in the government context. We find that, in this context, social media monitoring is a complex activity. Social media monitors not only perform traditional media monitoring tasks, but they also take specific actions to provide an improved service, predominantly by checking and vetting information contributed by the wider online community. In our analysis, we found a number of specific information-based actions performed in order to determine how one should respond to a particular social media post.
Avoiding Pitfalls With Implementation of Randomized Controlled Multicenter Trials: Strategies to Achieve Milestones

You breathe a huge sigh of relief because you just received the official notice of award that your grant was funded by the American Heart Association (AHA), the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), or the Patient‐Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI). Your award will fund a
Practical Operationalizations of Risk Factors for Fracture in Older Women: Results From Two Longitudinal Studies

Several guidelines on osteoporosis have proposed algorithms to identify persons at high risk of fractures. Although these algorithms include well‐known risk factors, it is not clear how they can best be operationalized for use in general practice. The aim of this study was to compare the predictive performance of different operationalizations of four categories of risk factors for fractures that can be used in general practice. This study included 4157 women of ≥60 yr of age (mean ± SD: 74.1 ± 9.1 yr) with a median follow‐up of 8.9 yr of the Rotterdam Study and 762 women of ≥65 yr of age (mean ± SD: 76.0 ± 6.7.yr) with a median follow‐up of 6.0 yr of the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA). At baseline, information on four categories of risk factors was obtained, including (1) family history of hip fractures, (2) type of prior fractures, (3) low body weight/body mass index (BMI), and (4) mobility impairment. The occurrence of fragility fractures, including hip, pelvic, humerus, and wrist fractures, was used as outcome measure. We quantified the predictive performance of each risk factor by a χ2 statistic, calculated as the difference in –2 Log likelihood attributable to the risk factor, with adjustment for age and other risk factors. In the Rotterdam Study, 399 fragility fractures occurred during 31,472 person‐years (PY) of follow‐up. In this study, any prior fracture in the past 5 yr (χ2 = 6; p = 0.02), body weight < 64 kg (versus ≥64 kg; χ2 = 6.7; p = 0.01), BMI < 22 kg/m2 (versus ≥22 kg/m2; χ2 = 8.7; p = 0.003), and use of a walking aid (χ2 = 7.5; p = 0.004) were the most practical operationalizations of the risk factor categories, after adjustment for age and other risk factors. In LASA, 52 fragility fractures occurred during 3935 PY of follow‐up. Associations were similar as in the Rotterdam Study, except that low body weight and BMI were not associated with fragility fracture. None of the usual operationalizations of family history of hip fractures was independently associated with fragility fracture in either study. Prior osteoporotic fracture, body weight <64 kg, a BMI <22 kg/m2, and the use of a walking aid are practical operationalizations of risk factors for fragility fractures. On the basis of the results of this study, a simple, practical algorithm can be developed for use in general practice.
Multi-template approach to artificial locomotion control

In this paper a new approach, the so called Multi-Template Approach (MTA), to implement the Central Pattern Generator (CPG) for locomotion control in Cellular Neural Networks (CNNs) is presented. From a biological point of view an approximated chemical synapse is realized and implemented in a CNN structure. This allows one to extend the results previously obtained with a Reaction-Diffusion (RD) CNN for locomotion control in an insect-like prototype robot to a more general class of artificial CPGs in which the desired locomotion pattern and the switching among patterns is realized by means of a spatiotemporal algorithm implemented in the same CNN structure.
TrustZone Technology Support in Zynq-7000 All Programmable SoCs

www.xilinx. com 1 © Copyright 2014 Xilinx, Inc. Xilinx, the Xilinx logo, Artix, ISE, Kintex, Spartan, Virtex, Vivado, Zynq, and other designated brands included herein are trademarks of Xilinx in the United States and other countries. AMBA, AMBA Designer, ARM, ARM1176JZ-S, CoreSight, Cortex, and PrimeCell are trademarks of ARM in the EU and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Embedded systems are becoming more and more vulnerable to unauthorized penetration, in many cases due to preventable weaknesses within the system kernel itself — often a simple lack of appropriate security features and protections that could have been designed in to safeguard the integrity of important data and processes. This dangerous situation is compounded by the fact that each device becomes potentially connectable to other devices outside its intended functional space, making use either of open Internet connectivity or other contrived digital transport strategies.
Emission of electron Bernstein waves in plasmas

In previous publications [A. K. Ram and S. D. Schultz, Phys. Plasmas 7, 4084 (2000); A. Bers, A. K. Ram, and S. D. Schultz, in Proceedings of the Second Europhysics Topical Conference on RF Heating and Current Drive of Fusion Devices, edited by J. Jacquinot, G. Van Oost, and R. R. Weynants (European Physical Society, Petit-Lancy, 1998), Vol. 22A, pp. 237–240] it has been shown that, in overdense plasmas of the type encountered in spherical tori, electron Bernstein waves can be excited in a plasma by mode conversion of either an externally launched X mode or an O mode. The electron Bernstein waves are strongly absorbed by electrons in the region where the wave frequency matches the Doppler broadened electron cyclotron resonance frequency or its harmonics. The strong absorption also implies that electron Bernstein waves are emitted by a thermal plasma. These waves can then mode convert to the X mode and to the O mode and be observed external to the plasma. In this paper an approximate kinetic model describing the coupling between the X mode, the O mode, and the electron Bernstein waves is derived. This model is used to study the mode conversion properties of electron Bernstein wave emission from the plasma interior. It is shown, analytically and numerically, that the energy flow conversion efficiencies of the electron Bernstein wave to the X mode and to the O mode are the same as the energy flow conversion efficiency of the X mode to electron Bernstein waves and of the O mode to the electron Bernstein waves, respectively. This has important experimental consequences when designing experiments to heat overdense plasmas by electron Bernstein waves.
Revealing Pairwise Coupling in Linear-Nonlinear Networks

Through an asymptotic analysis of a simple network, we derive an estimate of the coupling between a pair of units when all other units are unobservable. The analysis is based on a model where the response of each unit is a linear-nonlinear function of a white noise stimulus. The results accurately determine the coupling when all unmeasured units respond to the stimulus differently than the measured pair. To account for the possibility of unmeasured units similar to the measured pair, we cast our results in the framework of "subpopulations," which are defined as a group of units who respond to the stimulus similarly. We demonstrate that we can determine when correlations between two units are caused by a connection between their subpopulations, although the precise identity of the units involved in the connection may remain ambiguous. The result is rigorously valid only when the coupling is sufficiently weak to justify a second-order approximation in the coupling strength. We demonstrate through simulations that the results are still valid even with stronger coupling and in the presence of some deviations from the linear-nonlinear model. The analysis is presented in terms of neuronal networks, although the general framework is more widely applicable.
ENGINEERING STUDENTS' WRITING SKILLS

This paper considers the problems with engineering students' writing skills and their possible causes. It discusses the types of communication skills (including writing) needed by engineers, and how they have been successfully included in some engineering courses - perhaps with more success in the area of spoken skills than in writing. Studies of student writing in other subject areas are referred to, and these confirm the importance of context - of not scrutinising writing in isolation. Engineering students' perceptions to writing are explored using the results of a focus group study at Coventry University, and the paper ends with general conclusions about the development of students' writing skills in engineering courses. It is suggested that the keys to developing engineering students' writing skills are context and confidence. Context is created by embedding writing skills development throughout engineering courses and by showing students the relevance of developing these skills. Confidence is encouraged by creating opportunities for significant experiences that lead to its growth.
Anti-islanding protection relay for medium voltage feeder with distributed generator

Large distributed generators such as solar farms and wind farms are usually connected to medium voltage feeders. The anti-islanding protection for medium-voltage (typically up to 50 kV) DG relies on the transfer trip from transformer station. This paper presents a local anti-islanding protection relay as a backup for transfer trip in case of failures. The anti-islanding detection scheme is to short the phase or line voltage at the point of common coupling when voltage crossing zero, and then detects the current in thyristor to determine the operating mode of the DG units. This proposed scheme has been evaluated using analytical, simulation and experimental test. The results show that the proposed scheme features high performance, low cost and high neutrality. It has the ability to protect against islands operation of DG units.
Miniaturization of microstrip fractal H-Shape patch antenna using stack configuration for wireless applications

A novel technique for miniaturization of microstrip patch antenna is proposed for Portable and multifunctional Communication systems. Our proposed design consists of fractal patch, H-Shape slot on fractal patch with first iteration and combination of L-Shape and U-Shape slots on the Ground plane. In this way we get smaller size antenna which is smaller than the conventional antenna. The most interesting feature of our proposed design is that we are getting multiband response in the frequency range of 1-8GHZ having Directivity in the range of 4.37dBi-5.31dBi, Gain in the range of 2.12dB-3.87dB and good impedance bandwidth for desired bands. As we have used the fractal patch with substrate in which substrate is FR4. Co-axial cable is used as a feeding method. We also employed shorting pin between fractal patch and ground plane. By the combination of all these proposed technique size of antenna is reduced 66.50% and it produces multiband response while the impedance bandwidth and gain are satisfactory for each band. We can adjust different bands by changing position of shorting pin. This type of smaller size antenna has applications in mobile phone for Wi-Fi, WALAN, Wi-Max, Bluetooth, C-band, S-band, ZigBee and also for other wireless applications.
An authoethnography: Understanding my mathematical learning process to improve my future educator skills

AN AUTOETHNOGRAPHY: UNDERSTANDING MY OWN MATHEMATICAL LEARNING PROCESS TO IMPROVE MY FUTURE EDUCATOR SKILLS by Jeanneth Cristina Paredes There are different challenges in a math classroom. Understanding some of the challenges that obstruct students’ learning could help teachers modify their teaching style to promote more effective learning in the classroom. The ability of teachers to reflect on their own learning process provides insight as to how to encourage their students and help them succeed. The purpose of this thesis is to provide a detailed account of one student’s journey in her process to learn, highlighting key moments in her academic life that have molded her into the prospective educator she is today. This study has relevance because the self-examination done by the researcher illuminates her to be aware of different possibilities for her future when she becomes a teacher. This study is important because it shows the process of how a student of education wants to be well-prepared before entering a classroom and becoming a math teacher. The methodology used in this qualitative research study is autoethnographical. An autoethnography is research where the researcher plays a double role as the researcher and as the participant, which makes him/her being involved with the text on a higher level (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000). Interviews, memories and artifacts are supporting data sources to render narratives detailing the findings. The research question guiding this research study are: Who was Jeanneth Paredes as a mathematical learner? , and Who was Jeanneth Paredes as a student in a math classroom? The following sub-questions will also be examined: How does language UNDERSTANDING MY OWN MATH LEARNING PROCESS 4 influence the quality and understanding of her learning? , What motivated Jeanneth Paredes to engage in mathematical activity and learning? , and In what ways did these change with age? The findings show that a student’s mathematical learning can be affected due to several factors including teaching style, language, age and experience. The findings also indicate that a student’s learning style can be modified because of different life experiences.
Landmark lecture in nursing: a life-cycle perspective on CHD: What happens beyond your clinic?*

Abstract Over the past decades, survival of patients with CHD improved significantly, making it a life-cycle disease. Hence, there is a need for a workforce that can take up the care for afflicted individuals in the different phases of the life spectrum. Each life phase is associated with specific challenges. Topics that should receive more attention in clinical care or in CHD research are parenting styles of parents of children, transfer and transition of adolescents, cumulative burden of injury in the brain in adults, and geriatric care for older persons with CHD. Nurses, along with other healthcare professionals, will play a pivotal role in building up expertise in these areas and taking up these challenges.