Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Usefulness of Preoperative Dual-Phase 99mTc MIBI-Scintigraphy and IO-PTH Assay in the Treatment of Secondary and Tertiary Hyperparathyroidism

Background:Persistent secondary or tertiary hyperparathyroidism (HPT) results from failure to remove enough hyperfunctioning parathyroid tissue. Ectopically situated parathyroid glands and supernumerary glands make failure more likely. Recurrent HPT after subtotal Ptx is usually due to regrowth of the remaining parathyroid tissue. Recurrence may also develop from a hyperplastic supernumerary gland or rarely from parathyromatosis. Recurrent HPT after total Ptx with autotransplantation is usually due to overgrowth of the autograft or for the previously mentioned reasons. Methods:Since 1995, 464 patients with SHPT or THPT were treated surgically; intraoperative parathormone (PTH) was measured in 277 patients. Sixty-eight patients also had a preoperative MIBI scan. We compared the preoperative MIBI scan results with intraoperative findings, parathyroid gland weight and histology. We questioned whether MIBI uptake corresponded to parathyroid gland size and weight. We also correlated the number of Ki67 nuclear positive cells with MIBI uptake. For SHPT in group I with 145 patients, neither intraoperative PTH (IO-PTH) assay nor MIBI scanning was done. In group II with 163 patients IO-PTH was used and in group III with 48 patients both IO-PTH and MIBI scanning was used. For THPT in group I with 42 patients, neither IO-PTH assay nor MIBI scanning was done. In group II with 46 patients IO-PTH was used and in group III with 20 patients both IO-PTH and MIBI scanning was used. Results:Parathyroid weight correlated directly with MIBI uptake. No correlation, however, occurred between MIBI uptake and parathyroid histology or between Ki67 staining and MIBI scanning. For SHPT in group I the persistence rate was 6.2% and recurrence rate 11%; in group II the persistence rate was 4.9% and recurrence rate 4.9%; in group III the persistence rate was 2%, and recurrence 4.2% (P < 0.05 between group I and III for persistence and recurrence). We obtained similar results in THPT, but recurrence was 0 in groups II and III, also when only 3 glands were removed, probably due to asymmetric hyperplasia commonly seen in this particular population (P < 0.05 regarding recurrence between group I and II–III, no difference between group II and III). Conclusion:In conclusion our findings support that the surgeon experience is a very important factor for good results in patients with SHPT and THPT. Preoperative MIBI scanning and IO-PTH are helpful but not essential except in reoperations.
Adaptive Modeling of Robotic Assembly Using Augmented Petri Nets

Robotic assembly process is modeled as a discrete event dynamic system using contact states of the workpieces and their transitions. The goal assembly state is obtained by changing the contact states. A primitive contact is defined as a relation between a vertex and an edge of two workpieces. An augmented Petri net is presented as a framework to model, plan, and control the assembly process. The augmented Petri-net assembly model is automatically built and modified on-line during the actual assembly to handle un-modeled and infeasible contact situations. Reachability graph of the assembly model is used to find sequence from the augmented Petri net model, by the weights of the arcs. The proposed method is evaluated by simulation with L-shaped peg-in-hole assembly.
Changes in cardiorespiratory fitness in 9-10 . 9 yr old children : SportsLinx 1998-2010 Running title : Changes in children ’ s fitness , 1998-2010

Purpose: 1. Assess changes in cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) from 1998-2010, controlling for decimal age and body mass index (BMI). 2. Repeat the analysis in cohorts from 20052010, controlling for maturation, deprivation and BMI. Methods: 27,942 (n = 14,247 boys) 9-10.9yr old participants from one UK city were included in this serial cross-sectional study from 1998-1999 to 2009-2010. A deprivation score (IMD) was assigned to each participant on the basis of home postcode. Stature, sitting stature and body mass were estimated. BMI and somatic maturity were calculated. Performance on the 20m multi-stage shuttle runs test (20mSRT) was used to estimate of CRF (total shuttles). One-way ANCOVAs were completed to assess temporal trends in CRF, separately by sex. Model one assessed changes from 1998-2010 and included decimal age and body mass index as covariates. Model two assessed changes from 2005-2010 and included maturity, IMD and
Characterization of variants of Bradyrhizobium elkanii and B. japonicum and symbiotic behaviour in soybeans

Variation in rhizobia strains isnt a desirable fact based mainly on the possibility of unexpected results on legume inoculation. In this work, we studied the variability on phenotypic characteristics and genetic stability of rhizobia strains recommended for soybean inoculation. Variants with stable colony morphology were obtained from Bradyrhizobium japonicum strain SEMIA 5080 and from B. elkanii SEMIA 5019. Variants from SEMIA 587 obtained by another author were also used. The variants differed on colony characteristics, nodulation capacity, nitrogen fixation efficiency and competitive ability for nodule formation in two soybean varieties (Jacui 7 and IAS 5). Symbiotic behavior varied according to plant variety. Only the variants 5019 G and 5019 P differed on the isoenzymatic profile. There were differences in antibiotic resistance between variants from two strains. Correlation between symbiotic characteristics and colony morphology or antibiotic resistance wasnt conclusive. The results indicate that the variability in rhizobia strains might be an important factor to be considered in strain selection and preservation of cultures for inoculant production.
Global Solution for the Optimal Feedback Control of the Underactuated Heisenberg System

We present a global solution for an optimal feedback controller of the underactuated Heisenberg system or nonholonomic integrator. Employing a recently developed technique based on generating functions appearing in the Hamilton-Jacobi theory, we circumvent a singularity caused by under actuation to develop a nonlinear optimal feedback control in an implicitly analytical form. The systematic procedure to deal with under actuation indicates that generating functions should be effective tools for solving general underactuated optimal control problems.
Adaptive H-Infinity Consensus Control of Multi-Agent Systems

Abstract Design methods of adaptive H ∞ consensus control of multi-agent systems composed of the first-order and the second-order regression models are presented in this paper. The proposed control schemes are derived as solutions of certain H ∞ control problems, where estimation errors of tuning parameters and imperfect knowledge of the leader are regarded as external disturbances to the processes. It is shown that the resulting control systems are robust to uncertain system parameters and that the desirable consensus tracking is achieved approximately via adaptation schemes and L 2 -gain design parameters.
MAILED DIETARY SURVEYS: RESPONSE RATES, ERROR RATES, AND THE EFFECT OF OMITTED FOOD ITEMS ON NUTRIENT VALUES

Mailed surveys may be a cost-effective way to collect dietary information in large populations. We sent a brief quantified food frequency survey to a random sample of 2,000 prepaid health plan members between the ages of 20 and 65 years for two consecutive years. Logistic regression was used to predict the probability of: (1) responding to the questionnaire, (2) completing all 60 items in the questionnaire correctly so that all information could be used (responding entirely correctly), and (3) completing all 60 items in the questionnaire incorrectly so that no information was usable (responding entirely incorrectly). In a follow-up survey of a subsample of respondents, Spearman correlation coefficients were used to compare nutrient intakes calculated from questionnaires that had omitted data with those from the same questionnaires after the missing information was completed by telephone interview. About 50% of all persons surveyed returned the questionnaire. Response rates were highest among persons who had taken a voluntary multiphasic health examination, among women, and among older persons. Only 22.9% of the respondents in year 1 and 27.7% of the respondents in year 2 responded entirely correctly; a small percentage of respondents (12.1%) omitted more than 10 food items. Responding entirely correctly was inversely related to age and related to race. Most correlations between nutrient intakes calculated from questionnaires with omitted data and those from the same questionnaire subsequently completed by telephone interview were > 0.90 and increased as the number of omitted items decreased. If a relatively low overall response rate is acceptable, food frequencies collected through the mail can be an effective way to gather dietary information.
Postpartum Depression in Women with the FMR1 Premutation.

BACKGROUND Psychiatric disorders in women with the FMR1 premutation are common and include attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety, depression, and eating disorders. This pilot study explored the risk factors for postpartum depression (PPD) in women with the premutation. METHODS We conducted a chart review of 50 women premutation carriers with major depressive disorder who had children. Of these, 7 women had a history of major depressive episodes in the postpartum period. The PPD and non-PPD groups were characterized descriptively based on women's age at the time of the psychiatric evaluation, race, ethnicity, education level, IQ, CGG repeat size, comorbid psychiatric conditions, parity, and number of children with fragile X syndrome (FXS). Exact logistic regression was used to analyze the relationship between the number of children with FXS and the risk of PPD. RESULTS The PPD and non-PPD groups were similar on all variables examined, with the exception of the number of affected children. Each of the 7 women with PPD had at least one child with FXS, whereas a third of the women without PPD had no affected children. For each additional affected child, the risk of PPD increased by 158% (exact odds ratio 2.58, 95% CI 0.99-7.59). Further studies are needed to replicate these findings and to better characterize PPD in female premutation carriers.
Population Genetics and Phylogenetics of the Endangered American Burying Beetle, Nicrophorus americanus (Coleoptera: Silphidae)

Abstract The burying beetle Nicrophorus americanus Olivier is an endangered species known to occur in disjunct populations in 6 states. Parsimony and maximum likelihood analysis of the nuclear ribosomal DNA first internal transcribed spacer (ITS1) sequences from 10 Nicrophorinae species revealed N. americanus to form a distinct clade with N. orbicollis Say. Genetic variation within and among 5 N. americanus populations, collected from South Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Rhode Island, was studied. Ribosomal DNA ITS1 sequences from 14 beetles revealed 48 polymorphic and 20 informative nucleotide sites. N. americanus genetic divergence was between 0.16 and 4.76%. We found little evidence that these 5 populations have maintained unique genetic variation. No nucleotide sites were found that were diagnostic for any of the 5 populations examined, indicating that these populations may not be necessarily treated as separate, independent objects of conservation. However, further genetic investigation is warranted before translocations are attempted among the remaining populations of the American burying beetle.
A review of pregnancy outcomes after exposure to orally inhaled or intranasal budesonide

ABSTRACT Background: Inadequately controlled rhinitis is associated with worsening asthma, one of the most common potentially serious causes of pregnancy complications. Recent evidence-based guidelines now stress the importance of inhaled corticosteroids as first-line therapy in controlling asthma during pregnancy, with preference given to budesonide. Both inhaled and intranasal budesonide formulations are rated Pregnancy Category B; all other inhaled and intranasal corticosteroids are rated Pregnancy Category C. Objective: To review data from clinical and epidemiological studies investigating the effects of orally inhaled or intranasal budesonide on pregnancy outcomes. Methods: Clinical and epidemiological studies on the effects of maternal exposure to orally inhaled or intranasal budesonide were identified through searches of the literature indexed on Medline or the Developmental and Reproductive Toxicology (DART) database through January 2005. The search terms used were: ‘budesonide’ and ‘pregnancy’; ‘pregnancy complications’; ‘teratogens’; ‘fetus’; ‘embryo’; or ‘toxicology’. The search was limited to English-language articles and those evaluating humans. Pertinent abstracts were identified from recent US asthma and allergy meetings. Results: A total of five articles and three abstracts meeting the search criteria were identified. Retrospective epidemiological studies and a randomized, placebo-controlled, multicenter trial found no clinically or statistically significant effects on fetal outcomes among more than 6600 infants whose mothers were exposed to orally inhaled budesonide during pregnancy. Women who reported use of orally inhaled budesonide either during early pregnancy only or throughout pregnancy gave birth to infants of normal gestational age, birth weight, and length, with no increased rate of stillbirths, multiple births, or congenital malformations. In a retrospective case-control analysis, no association was found between inhaled budesonide or intranasal budesonide and the overall rate of infant cardiovascular defects. However, a marginally increased risk of less severe cardiovascular defects (odds ratio = 1.58, 95% confidence interval 1.02 to 2.46) was observed with intranasal budesonide in one analysis, possibly the result of a random association due to multiple testing or an unidentified confounder. Conclusion: Maternal exposure to orally inhaled budesonide during pregnancy is not associated with an increased risk of congenital malformations or other adverse fetal outcomes in studies of more than 6600 infants. Data on pregnancy outcomes after maternal exposure to intranasal budesonide are limited, but the totality of evidence, including pharmacological studies showing a much lower systemic exposure after intranasal administration, indicates its safety profile is at least comparable with that of orally inhaled budesonide.
An extended DMP framework for robot learning and improving variable stiffness manipulation

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a method which enables a robot to learn both motion skills and stiffness profiles from humans through kinesthetic human-robot cooperation. Design Methodology Approach Admittance control is applied to allow robot-compliant behaviors when following the reference trajectories. By extending the dynamical movement primitives (DMP) model, a new concept of DMP and stiffness primitives is introduced to encode a kinesthetic demonstration as a combination of trajectories and stiffness profiles, which are subsequently transferred to the robot. Electromyographic signals are extracted from a human’s upper limbs to obtain target stiffness profiles. By monitoring vibrations of the end-effector velocities, a stability observer is developed. The virtual damping coefficient of admittance controller is adjusted accordingly to eliminate the vibrations. Findings The performance of the proposed methods is evaluated experimentally. The result shows that the robot can perform tasks in a variable stiffness mode as like the human dose in the teaching phase. Originality Value DMP has been widely used as a teaching by demonstration method to represent movements of humans and robots. The proposed method extends the DMP framework to allow a robot to learn not only motion skills but also stiffness profiles. Additionally, the authors proposed a stability observer to eliminate vibrations when the robot is disturbed by environment.
A comparison of the implementation means for development of modelling tool

While Model-Driven Software Development (MDSD) is a popular trend in the software development area, it still lacks the support of the appropriate tools in many cases. This can be explained by the fact, that many proposed methods are purely theoretical and cannot be simply introduced in industry. In order to make these methods practically usable, it would be necessary to support those with the appropriate CASE tools, which in turn requires the necessity to implement such tools. Since the MDSD support tool has well-known components, its implementation shouldn't be a problem using suitable solutions for each of these components. In this paper authors study the frameworks implemented in Java programming language that can be used for the model editor development.
Hypoglycemia-Associated Electroencephalogram and Electrocardiogram Changes Appear Simultaneously

Background: Tight glycemic control in type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) may be accomplished only if severe hypoglycemia can be prevented. Biosensor alarms based on the body's reactions to hypoglycemia have been suggested. In the present study, we analyzed three lead electrocardiogram (ECG) and single-channel electroencephalogram (EEG) in T1DM patients during hypoglycemia. Materials and Methods: Electrocardiogram and EEG recordings during insulin-induced hypoglycemia in nine patients were used to assess the presence of ECG changes by heart rate, and estimates of QT interval (QTc) and time from top of T wave to end of T wave corrected for heartbeat interval and EEG changes by extraction of the power of the signal in the delta, theta, and alpha bands. These six features were assessed continuously to determine the time between changes and severe hypoglycemia. Results: QT interval changes and EEG theta power changes were detected in six and eight out of nine subjects, respectively. Rate of false positive calculations was one out of nine subjects for QTc and none for EEG theta power. Detection time medians (i.e., time from significant changes to termination of experiments) was 13 and 8 min for the EEG theta power and QTc feature, respectively, with no significant difference (p = .25). Conclusions: Severe hypoglycemia is preceded by changes in both ECG and EEG features in most cases. Electroencephalogram theta power may be superior with respect to timing, sensitivity, and specificity of severe hypoglycemia detection. A multiparameter algorithm that combines data from different biosensors might be considered.
Generating snippets for undirected information search

In this paper a system is described to generate snippets for undirected information search. The system is divided in three components: extracting snippets, ranking snippets and avoiding redundancy. To determine the best methods for these components, different experiments have been carried out using datasets from the Cross Language Evaluation Forum. Unfortunately evaluation turned out to be impossible due to a wrong evaluation method and dataset of WebCLEF 2007. This paper shows the problems of the evaluation used in WebCLEF 2007 and discusses possible solutions.
Divergence, hybridization, and recombination in the mitochondrial genome of the human pathogenic yeast Cryptococcus gattii

The inheritance of mitochondrial genes and genomes are uniparental in most sexual eukaryotes. This pattern of inheritance makes mitochondrial genomes in natural populations effectively clonal. Here, we examined the mitochondrial population genetics of the emerging human pathogenic fungus Cryptococcus gattii. The DNA sequences for five mitochondrial DNA fragments were obtained from each of 50 isolates belonging to two evolutionary divergent lineages, VGI and VGII. Our analyses revealed a greater sequence diversity within VGI than that within VGII, consistent with observations of the nuclear genes. The combined analyses of all five gene fragments indicated significant divergence between VGI and VGII. However, the five individual genealogies showed different relationships among the isolates, consistent with recent hybridization and mitochondrial gene transfer between the two lineages. Population genetic analyses of the multilocus data identified evidence for predominantly clonal mitochondrial population structures within both lineages. Interestingly, there were clear signatures of recombination among mitochondrial genes within the VGII lineage. Our analyses suggest historical mitochondrial genome divergence within C. gattii, but there is evidence for recent hybridization and recombination in the mitochondrial genome of this important human yeast pathogen.
An Ontological Model of an Information System

An ontological model of an information system that provides precise definitions of fundamental concepts like system, subsystem, and coupling is proposed. This model is used to analyze some static and dynamic properties of an information system and to examine the question of what constitutes a good decomposition of an information system. Some of the major types of information system formalisms that bear on the authors' goals and their respective strengths and weaknesses relative to the model are briefly reviewed. Also articulated are some of the fundamental notions that underlie the model. Those basic notions are then used to examine the nature and some dynamics of system decomposition. The model's predictive power is discussed. >
Diseño de un algoritmo de seguimiento del instrumental quirúrgico mediante un dispositivo Leap Motion y su validación en un simulador físico

La Cirugia de Minima Invasion (CMI) ha crecido de manera espectacular en los ultimos anos y se ha introducido y consolidado en las principales especialidades quirurgicas de la practica clinica, gracias a las multiples ventajas que ofrece al paciente, entre las que destacan menor trauma tisular, menor morbilidad, menor estancia hospitalaria y recuperacion mas rapida, que repercuten de forma directa en la seguridad del paciente. La incorporacion de estas tecnicas quirurgicas ha supuesto un cambio de paradigma y requerido la formacion de nuevos cirujanos, quienes han tenido que adaptarse al nuevo entorno quirurgico. El desarrollo de sistemas de seguimiento, junto con los avances en tecnologia computacional, ha permitido refinar los metodos de entrenamiento y evaluacion empleados. En este contexto se situa el presente Trabajo Fin de Grado, cuyo objetivo principal es disenar y desarrollar un algoritmo de seguimiento de dos instrumentales quirurgicos mediante el controlador Leap Motion en un simulador fisico. Dicho controlador se presenta como un dispositivo de bajo coste, objetivo y que no interfiere con el movimiento de los instrumentales, ya que no es necesario situarlo sobre ellos. Para la validacion del algoritmo dentro del simulador se han realizado cuatro experimentos. En ellos se estudia la precision y la fiabilidad del sistema de seguimiento propuesto, comprobando las distintas posiciones captadas por el controlador de los instrumentales, tanto en situaciones estaticas como dinamicas. Para llevar a cabo dichos experimentos ha sido necesario contar con distintos materiales como trocares, disectores y una tarea de entrenamiento real utilizada durante las primeras fases de entrenamiento de CMI. A traves de los resultados obtenidos se puede considerar que el controlador Leap Motion es una buena opcion para medir las habilidades de los cirujanos durante el entrenamiento de CMI, aunque sigue siendo necesario incidir mas en este estudio comparando los resultados de las trayectorias obtenidas con otros sistemas de seguimiento ya implementados presentados en el estado del arte de este Trabajo Fin de Grado.