Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Theory of ICT User Types: Exploring Domestication and Meaning of ICTS through Comparative Case Studies

The population in the United States is aging, with a predicted 147% increase in the number of older adults (those over age 65) from 20002050 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2008). At the same time, Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are increasingly being used in work, leisure, and government. Despite these two trends towards an aging population and greater ICT use, very little is known about if and how older adults are using ICTs in their everyday lives (Birkland & Kaarst-Brown, 2011). Despite many calls for researchers to take a wider perspective (Bouwhuis, 2006; van Bronswijk, et al., 2009), most studies have concentrated on assistive devices or examining the care of older adults with health issues. In order to understand how older adults were using ICTs in their daily lives this study used a comparative case methodology of 17 cases, with each case consisting of an older adult and several members of their social network. Using domestication theory (Silverstone, 1994) and an interpretive interactionism approach (Denzin, 2001), this series of comparative case studies discovered five distinct domestication patterns. These domestication patterns, or user types, differ in how these users were introduced to, use, display, and the meaning they attribute to ICTs in their everyday lives. A THEORY OF ICT USER TYPES: EXPLORING DOMESTICATION AND MEANING OF ICTS THROUGH COMPARATIVE CASE STUDIES by Johanna L.H. Birkland B.S Cornell University, 2003 M.S. Ithaca College, 2005 M.S. Syracuse University, 2006
Lack of genetic linkage evidence for a trans-acting factor having a large effect on plasma lipoprotein[a] levels in African Americans Published, JLR Papers in Press, May 1, 2003. DOI 10.1194/jlr.M300163-JLR200

The distribution of plasma lipoprotein[a] (Lp[a]) concentrations, a risk factor for cardiovascular disease, varies greatly among racial groups, with African Americans having values that are shifted toward higher levels than those of whites. The underlying cause of this heterogeneity is unknown, but a role for “trans-acting” factors has been hypothesized. This study used genetic linkage analysis to localize genetic factors influencing Lp[a] levels in African Americans that were absent in other populations; linkage results were analyzed separately in non-Hispanic whites, Hispanic whites, and African Americans. As expected, all three samples showed highly significant linkage at the approximate location of the lysophosphatidic acid locus. The white populations also independently had regions of significant linkage on chromosome 19 (LOD 3.80) and suggestive linkage on chromosomes 12 (LOD 1.60), 14 (LOD 2.56), and 19 (LOD 2.52). No linkage evidence was found to support the hypothesis of another single gene with large effects specifically segregating in African Americans that may account for their elevated Lp[a] levels.
Children's engagements with violence : a study in a South African school

This thesis is an account of a qualitative study which set out to explore the meanings for children of living with violence. Using a social constructionist epistemology, I examine how, through social relationships, children (co-)construct beliefs, values and practices in relation to violence, and consider the implications for violence prevention. Set in the changing context of post-apartheid South Africa, the study was located in a primary school in a township of Cape Town, where gangsterism, criminal and domestic violence were rife. With 36 children (aged 8, 10 and 13 years), I carried out a series of semi-structured interviews and group sessions, using participatory data-gathering techniques to explore themes of relationships, conflict and violence. Further ethnographic data was gathered through playground observation, working as a classroom assistant, and parent and teacher interviews. Forms of discourse analysis, blending frameworks from developmental psychology, social psychology and sociology, were used to analyse children's talk, thus creating a fine-grained analysis which is sensitive to children's creative engagement with multi-layered social relations. This emphasis on children's active construction of meaning differs from much of the social science literature, which assumes a uni-directional relationship and casts children as passive victims, sometimes caught up in a 'cycle' of violence. The study reveals some of the complex, contradictory and shifting ways in which children engaged with violence in the social fields of the neighbourhood, peer relations and in adult-child relations. Three psycho-social processes were central to these engagements: control (agency), connection (inclusion) and coherence (sense making). But striving for control, connection and coherence generated tensions and conflicts. In managing these tensions, children sometimes colluded with and perpetuated forms of violence, but they also found ways to contest violent social relations. I construct a framework to illustrate these relationships, and consider how interventions, using this framework, can work with children to reduce the possibility of violence.
Hierarchical SLAM: real-time accurate mapping of large environments

In this paper, we present a hierarchical mapping method that allows us to obtain accurate metric maps of large environments in real time. The lower (or local) map level is composed of a set of local maps that are guaranteed to be statistically independent. The upper (or global) level is an adjacency graph whose arcs are labeled with the relative location between local maps. An estimation of these relative locations is maintained at this level in a relative stochastic map. We propose a close to optimal loop closing method that, while maintaining independence at the local level, imposes consistency at the global level at a computational cost that is linear with the size of the loop. Experimental results demonstrate the efficiency and precision of the proposed method by mapping the Ada Byron building at our campus. We also analyze, using simulations, the precision and convergence of our method for larger loops.
An Algorithm for Timely Transmission of Solicitation Messages in RPL for Energy-Efficient Node Mobility

The IPv6 Routing Protocol for Low Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) was proposed for various applications of IPv6 low power wireless networks. While RPL supports various routing metrics and is designed to be suitable for wireless sensor network environments, it does not consider the mobility of nodes. Therefore, there is a need for a method that is energy efficient and that provides stable and reliable data transmission by considering the mobility of nodes in RPL networks. This paper proposes an algorithm to support node mobility in RPL in an energy-efficient manner and describes its operating principle based on different scenarios. The proposed algorithm supports the mobility of nodes by dynamically adjusting the transmission interval of the messages that request the route based on the speed and direction of the motion of mobile nodes, as well as the costs between neighboring nodes. The performance of the proposed algorithm and previous algorithms for supporting node mobility were examined experimentally. From the experiment, it was observed that the proposed algorithm requires fewer messages per unit time for selecting a new parent node following the movement of a mobile node. Since fewer messages are used to select a parent node, the energy consumption is also less than that of previous algorithms.
Spontaneously immortalized adult mouse Schwann cells secrete autocrine and paracrine growth‐promoting activities

We established spontaneously immortalized Schwann cell lines from long‐term cultures of adult mouse dorsal root ganglia and peripheral nerves. One of the cell lines, designated IMS32, responded to mitogenic stimuli by platelet‐derived growth factor (PDGF)‐BB, acidic and basic fibroblast growth factors (aFGF, bFGF), and transforming growth factors (TGF)‐b̃1 and ‐b̃2, as determined by bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) incorporation and double immunofluorescence for S100 and BrdU. Furthermore, conditioned media (CM) obtained from IMS32 cells showed mitogenic activity for both IMS32 cells and long‐term cultured Schwann cells. Western blot analysis revealed TGF‐b̃‐like molecule in the CM, and the activity was absorbed with anti‐TGF‐b̃ neutralizing antibody. Reverse transcription followed by polymerase chain reaction (RT‐PCR) of IMS32 RNA revealed that these cells expressed TGF‐b̃1, b̃2, and ‐b̃3 transcripts. When rat pheochromocytoma PC 12 cells were incubated with the CM, they developed neurite growth. Coculture of PC12 and IMS32 cells also showed neurite growth of PC12 cells. RNA transcripts of nerve growth factor (NGF), brain‐derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), neurotrophin‐3 (NT3), ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF), and glial cell line‐derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF) were detected from IMS32 cells by RT‐PCR. In these, we sequenced the mouse GDNF cDNA coding region and observed 97% and 90% homologies to corresponding rat and human cDNA sequences, respectively. These results indicate that the immortalized Schwann cell line mitotically responds to various growth factors and secretes autocrine and paracrine growth‐promoting activities in vitro. © 1995 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Novel Strategies in the Treatment of Multiple Myeloma: From Proteasome Inhibitors to Immunotherapy

The proteasome serves as the catalytic core of the Ubiquitin (Ub) protein degradation pathway and has become an intriguing target in drug development and cancer therapy. Successful pharmacologic inhibition of the proteasome with the small molecule bortezomib led to US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory approval for the treatment of mantle cell lymphoma and multiple myeloma (MM) and has been extended to a steadily increasing number of clinical trials to assess effi cacy and safety in other hematologic malignances and solid tumors. Proteasome inhibition results in the accumulation of multi-ubiquitinated proteins, which are normally degraded through the tightly regulated Ub pathway. The Ub-Proteasome pathway is responsible for the selective degradation of many proteins that regulate the cell cycle and growth. Inhibition of the proteasome generates the accumulation of multi-ubiquitinated proteins that eventually leads to apoptosis although the exact mechanism of cell death is not completely understood. A specialized form of the proteasome, known to as the immunoproteasome, processes intracellular and viral proteins to generate peptides that are then presented at the cell surface bound as antigens (Ags) bound to the Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) class I molecule receptor. Importantly, inhibitors of the immunoproteasome decrease the processing and generation of MHC class I Ags and alter tumor cell recognition by the principal cellular effectors of the immune system. Hence, proteasome inhibitors may be employed as therapeutics to regulate the production of tumor specifi c Ags and for the selective removal of tumor cells through recognition by cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs), natural killer (NK) cells and dendritic cells (DC). Proteasome inhibitors have been validated as effective cytotoxic agents and may have further potential as novel immunotherapeutic strategies.
Cricket: A Mapped, Persistent Object Store

This paper describes Cricket, a new database storage system that is intended to be used as a platform for design environments and persistent programming languages. Cricket uses the memory management primitives of the Mach operating system to provide the abstraction of a shared, transactional single-level store that can be directly accessed by user applications. In this paper, we present the design and motivation for Cricket. We also present some initial performance results which show that, for its intended applications, Cricket can provide better performance than a general-purpose database storage system.
Characterization of a Fucose-Binding Protein from Bull Sperm and Seminal Plasma That May Be Responsible for Formation of the Oviductal Sperm Reservoir1

Abstract Oviductal sperm reservoirs have been found in cattle, mice, hamsters, pigs, and horses. In cattle (Bos taurus), the reservoir is evidently formed when sperm bind to fucosylated ligands resembling Lea trisaccharide on the surface of oviductal epithelium. The aim of this study was to characterize the fucose-binding protein on bull sperm. Fresh ejaculated sperm were extracted with 0.5 M KCl in Hepes-balanced salts. Extracts were subjected to affinity chromatography using immobilized Lea trisaccharide (α-l-Fuc[1,4]-β-d-Gal[1,3]-d-GlcNAc). Two-dimensional PAGE of the affinity chromatography eluates revealed a prominent protein of approximately 16.5 kDa and a pI of 5.8. This protein inhibited binding of sperm to oviductal explants. A similar analysis of proteins extracted from capacitated sperm (which do not bind to oviductal epithelium) showed a reduction in the amount of the 16.5-kDa protein. When examined by epifluorescence microscopy, live uncapacitated sperm labeled over the acrosome with a fucose-BSA-fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) conjugate, while capacitated sperm did not. When capacitated sperm were treated with 16.5-kDa protein, labeling with fucose-BSA-FITC was partially restored. The comparative ease with which the protein was removed from sperm and its apparent reassociation with sperm suggested that it could be a peripheral protein derived from epididymal or accessory gland fluids. Blots of SDS-PAGE gels of seminal plasma proteins revealed the presence of a Lea-binding protein with an apparent mass of 16.5 kDa. Amino acid sequencing of two tryptic fragments of the protein purified from sperm extracts identified it as PDC-109 (BSP-A1/A2), a product of the seminal vesicles.
The Effects of Customer Loyalty on Repurchase Intention in B2C E-commerce- A Customer Loyalty Perspective

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of online relationship quality on customer loyalty and then the effect of customer loyalty on online repurchase intention. This research is descriptive of survey type. The population under study was constituted of Allameh Tabataba’i University in Tehran. The stratified sampling method was used and 201 questionnaires were completed. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was used. The structural method indicated a good fit to the data. Using structural equation modeling (SEM),we observed that customer loyalty is significantly related to online repurchase intention and also online relationship quality is significantly related to online repurchase intention. The proposed model explain 86% of the variance of the online repurchase intention construct. We found that perceived vendor reputation is the strongest antecedent of online relationship quality.
Phase IB Randomized, Double-Blinded, Placebo-Controlled, Dose Escalation Study of Polyphenon E in Women with Hormone Receptor–Negative Breast Cancer

Epidemiologic data support an inverse association between green tea intake and breast cancer risk, and numerous experimental studies have shown the antitumor effects of its main component, epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG). We conducted a phase IB dose escalation trial in women with a history of stage I to III hormone receptor–negative breast cancer of an oral green tea extract, polyphenon E (Poly E) 400, 600, 800 twice daily or matching placebo for 6 months. The primary endpoint was to determine the maximum tolerated dose (MTD), defined as the dose that causes 25% dose-limiting toxicity (DLT, grade ≥II). Assignment to dose level was based upon an adaptive design, the continual reassessment method. A mammogram and random core biopsy of the contralateral breast were obtained at baseline and 6 months and serial blood/urine collections every 2 months for biomarker analyses. Forty women were randomized: 10 to placebo, 30 to Poly E (16 at 400 mg, 11 at 600 mg, 3 at 800 mg). There was one DLT at 400 mg (grade III rectal bleeding), three DLTs at 600 mg (grade II weight gain, grade III indigestion and insomnia), and one DLT at 800 mg (grade III liver function abnormality). The DLT rate at 600 mg was 27% (3 of 11). Pharmacologic levels of total urinary tea polyphenols were achieved with all three dose levels of Poly E. Using a novel phase I trial design, we determined the MTD for Poly E to be 600 mg twice daily. This study highlights the importance of assessing toxicity for any chemopreventive agent being developed for chronic use in healthy individuals. Cancer Prev Res; 5(9); 1144–54. ©2012 AACR.
Glycophorin as a Receptor for Escherichia coliα-Hemolysin in Erythrocytes*

Escherichia coli α-hemolysin (HlyA) can lyse both red blood cells (RBC) and liposomes. However, the cells are lysed at HlyA concentrations 1–2 orders of magnitude lower than liposomes (large unilamellar vesicles). Treatment of RBC with trypsin, but not with chymotrypsin, reduces the sensitivity of RBC toward HlyA to the level of the liposomes. Since glycophorin, one of the main proteins in the RBC surface, can be hydrolyzed by trypsin much more readily than by chymotrypsin, the possibility was tested of a specific binding of HlyA to glycophorin. With this purpose, a number of experiments were performed. (a) HlyA was preincubated with purified glycophorin, after which it was found to be inactive against both RBC and liposomes. (b) Treatment of RBC with an anti-glycophorin antibody protected the cells against HlyA lysis. (c) Immobilized HlyA was able to bind glycophorin present in a detergent lysate of RBC ghosts. (d) Incorporation of glycophorin into pure phosphatidylcholine liposomes increased notoriously the sensitivity of the vesicles toward HlyA. (e) Treatment of the glycophorin-containing liposomes with trypsin reverted the vesicles to their original low sensitivity. The above results are interpreted in terms of glycophorin acting as a receptor for HlyA in RBC. The binding constant of HlyA for glycophorin was estimated, in RBC at sublytic HlyA concentrations, to be 1.5 × 10− 9 m.
AUC-maximized Deep Convolutional Neural Fields for Sequence Labeling

Deep Convolutional Neural Networks (DCNN) has shown excellent performance in a variety of machine learning tasks. This manuscript presents Deep Convolutional Neural Fields (DeepCNF), a combination of DCNN with Conditional Random Field (CRF), for sequence labeling with highly imbalanced label distribution. The widely-used training methods, such as maximum-likelihood and maximum labelwise accuracy, do not work well on highly imbalanced data. To handle this, we present a new training algorithm called maximum-AUC for DeepCNF. That is, we train DeepCNF by directly maximizing the empirical Area Under the ROC Curve (AUC), which is an unbiased measurement for imbalanced data. To fulfill this, we formulate AUC in a pairwise ranking framework, approximate it by a polynomial function and then apply a gradient-based procedure to optimize it. We then test our AUC-maximized DeepCNF on three very different protein sequence labeling tasks: solvent accessibility prediction, 8-state secondary structure prediction, and disorder prediction. Our experimental results confirm that maximum-AUC greatly outperforms the other two training methods on 8-state secondary structure prediction and disorder prediction since their label distributions are highly imbalanced and also have similar performance as the other two training methods on the solvent accessibility prediction problem which has three equally-distributed labels. Furthermore, our experimental results also show that our AUC-trained DeepCNF models greatly outperform existing popular predictors of these three tasks.
Relational Database: A Practical Foundation

The 1981 ACM Turing Award was presented to Edgar E Codd, an IBM Fellow of the San Jose Research Laboratory, by President Peter Denning on November 9, 1981, at the ACM Annual Conference in Los Angeles, California. It is the Association's foremost award for technical contributions to the computing community. Codd was selected by the ACM General Technical Achievement Award Committee for his "~undamental and continuing contributions to the theory and practice of database management systems. " The originator of the relational model for databases, Codd has made further important contributions in the development of relational algebra, relational calculus, and normalization of relations. Edgar E Coddjoined IBM in 1949 to prepare programs for the Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator. Since then, his work in computing has encompassed logical design of computers [IBM 701 and Stretch], managing a computer center in Canada, heading the development of one of the first operating systems with a general multiprogramming capability, con-
Practical, Real-time Centralized Control for CDN-based Live Video Delivery

Live video delivery is expected to reach a peak of 50 Tbps this year. This surging popularity is fundamentally changing the Internet video delivery landscape. CDNs must meet users' demands for fast join times, high bitrates, and low buffering ratios, while minimizing their own cost of delivery and responding to issues in real-time. Wide-area latency, loss, and failures, as well as varied workloads ("mega-events" to long-tail), make meeting these demands challenging. An analysis of video sessions concluded that a centralized controller could improve user experience, but CDN systems have shied away from such designs due to the difficulty of quickly handling failures, a requirement of both operators and users. We introduce VDN, a practical approach to a video delivery network that uses a centralized algorithm for live video optimization. VDN provides CDN operators with real-time, fine-grained control. It does this in spite of challenges resulting from the wide-area (e.g., state inconsistency, partitions, failures) by using a hybrid centralized+distributed control plane, increasing average bitrate by 1.7x and decreasing cost by 2x in different scenarios.
Visualization of SHP-1-target interaction

Signaling of receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs) is regulated by protein-tyrosine phosphatases (PTPs). We previously discovered the efficient downregulation of Ros RTK signaling by the SH2 domain PTP SHP-1, which involves a direct interaction of both molecules. Here, we studied the mechanism of this interaction in detail. Phosphopeptides representing the SHP-1 candidate binding sites in the Ros cytoplasmic domain, pY2267 and pY2327, display high affinity binding to the SHP-1 N-terminal SH2 domain (Kd=217 nM and 171 nM, respectively). Y2327 is, however, a poor substrate of Ros kinase and, therefore, contributes little to SHP-1 binding in vitro. To explore the mechanism of association in intact cells, functional fluorescent fusion proteins of Ros and SHP-1 were generated. Complexes of both molecules could be detected by Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) in intact HEK293 and COS7 cells. As expected, the association required the functional SHP-1 N-terminal SH2 domain. Unexpectedly, pY2267 and pY2327 both contributed to the association. Mutation of Y2327 reduced constitutive association in COS7 cells. Ligand-dependent association was abrogated upon mutation of Y2267 but remained intact when Y2327 was mutated. A phosphopeptide representing the binding site pY2267 was a poor substrate for SHP-1, whereas Ros activation loop phosphotyrosines were effectively dephosphorylated. We propose a model for SHP-1-Ros interaction in which ligand-stimulated phosphorylation of Ros Y2267 by Ros, phosphorylation of Y2327 by a heterologous kinase, and inactivation of Ros by SHP-1-mediated dephosphorylation play a role in the regulation of complex stability.