Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
ETHICS AND METHODS FOR BIOLOGICAL RHYTHM RESEARCH ON ANIMALS AND HUMAN BEINGS

This article updates the ethical standards and methods for the conduct of high-quality animal and human biological rhythm research, which should be especially useful for new investigators of the rhythms of life. The editors of Chronobiology International adhere to and endorse the Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines of the Committee On Publication Ethics (COPE), which encourages communication of such updates at regular intervals in the journal. The journal accepts papers representing original work, no part of which was previously submitted for publication elsewhere, except as brief abstracts, as well as in-depth reviews. The majority of research papers published in Chronobiology International entails animal and human investigations. The editors and readers of the journal expect authors of submitted manuscripts to have made an important contribution to the research of biological rhythms and related phenomena using ethical methods/procedures and unbiased, accurate, and honest reporting of findings. Authors of scientific papers are required to declare all potential conflicts of interest. The journal and its editors endorse compliance of investigators to the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals of the Institute for Laboratory Animal Research of the National Research Council, relating to the conduct of ethical research on laboratory and other animals, and the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki of the World Medical Association, relating to the conduct of ethical research on human beings. The peer review of manuscripts by Chronobiology International thus includes judgment as to whether or not the protocols and methods conform to ethical standards. Authors are expected to show mastery of the basic methods and procedures of biological rhythm research and proper statistical assessment of data, including the appropriate application of time series data analyses, as briefly reviewed in this article. The journal editors strive to consistently achieve high standards for the research of original and review papers reported in Chronobiology International, and current examples of expectations are presented herein. (Author correspondence: prf@unife.it)
Prediction of Prolonged Postprocedural Hypotension after Carotid Artery Stenting

OBJECTIVE: Stent placement for the treatment of carotid artery stenosis may cause hemodynamic instability that induces ischemic complications for patients with bilateral carotid lesions. We carried out this study to define predictors of persistent hypotension after carotid stenting. METHODS: Thirty-three lesions in 31 consecutive patients (mean age, 69.2 ± 8.6 yr) who underwent stent deployment for carotid stenosis were studied. Fourteen lesions were treated with Easy Wall stents (Boston Scientific, Tokyo, Japan) and 19 lesions were treated with Smart stents (Johnson & Johnson, Warren, NJ). We reviewed preoperative angiograms and ultrasonograms of the carotid artery and analyzed the predictive factors of postprocedural prolonged hypotension (systolic blood pressure <90 mm Hg and periods >3 h). RESULTS: Postprocedural hypotension was observed in 14 lesions (42.4%), of which medical treatment was necessary in seven (21.2%). A distance between carotid bifurcation and maximum stenotic lesion (≤10 mm; P = 0.0028) and type of stenosis (eccentric; P = 0.0287) on angiogram and fibrous plaque morphological features (P = 0.0008) and calcifications at carotid bifurcation (P = 0.0004) on ultrasonograms were determined to be independent risk factors of postprocedural hypotension. We introduced a scoring system for predicting prolonged hypotension that included factors such as the distance from carotid bifurcation to maximum stenotic lesion (≤10 mm), type of stenosis (eccentric), plaque morphological features (echogenic), and calcification at carotid bifurcation. The score was determined by adding one point for each of these factors. Three points or more on this score strongly suggested a high risk of prolonged hypotension. CONCLUSION: Our scoring system, which includes angiographic and ultrasonographic findings, may be a good index for the prediction of prolonged hypotension after carotid stenting and may contribute to the reduction of periprocedural ischemic events.
Wages in the Czech Agricultural Sector: Comparison withIndustrial and Construction Sector

The present paper focuses on the development of wage distribution in the Czech Republic in the period shortly before, during and after the global economic crisis. Special attention is paid to wage development in the agricultural sector and its comparison with the industrial and construction sectors’ wage levels. The article deals with the development of statistical characteristics of the level, variability and concentration in the given period, mentioning the changes in these characteristics in the course of the economic recession. Since the relationship between the wage levels in the agricultural, industrial and construction sectors is monitored in other countries as well, the research topic can be analyzed within the whole European context, a comparison of the wage levels in the Czech Republic and other countries being drawn.
A Closed-Loop Map-Matching Approach for Ground Vehicle Navigation in GNSS-Denied Environments using Signals of Opportunity

A closed-loop map-matching framework for ground vehicle navigation using ambient signals of opportunity (SOPs) is developed. The proposed framework aims to enable navigation in global navigation satellite system (GNSS)–denied environments. The proposed navigation framework employs a particle filter that estimates the ground vehicle’s state by fusing pseudoranges drawn from ambient SOP transmitters with road data stored in commercial maps. The problem considered assumes the ground vehicle to have a priori knowledge about its initial states as well as the position of SOPs. The proposed closed-loop approach estimates the vehicle’s states for subsequent time as it navigates without GNSS signals. In this approach, a particle filter is employed to continuously estimate the vehicle’s position and velocity along with the clock error states of the vehicle-mounted receiver and SOP transmitters. Simulation and experimental results with cellular long-term evolution (LTE) SOPs are presented, evaluating the efficacy and accuracy of the proposed framework in different driving environments. The experimental results demonstrate a position root-mean squared error (RMSE) of 2.4 m over a 1.44 km trajectory in an urban environment with 4 LTE SOPs and a position RMSE of 3.9 m over a 1.5 km trajectory in a suburban environment with 2 LTE SOPs. Moreover, it is demonstrated that incorporating the proposed map-matching algorithm reduced the position RMSE by 55% and 58%, respectively, from the RMSE obtained by an SOPonly navigation solution.
New Axes of Political Cleavages in Poland After 2005

The aim of the study is to analyse new axes of cleavages which came into existence in Poland after 2005. The analysis is presented in the context of generally accepted notions and concepts of political cleavages. The methods used for the analysis are: comparative method and historical method. Findings of the research are presented in the following way. First, the author determines that cleavages in Poland only partially correspond to classical cleavages, then identifies and analyses new stimulators of political cleavages in Poland, which appeared after 2005. A significant role in the consolidation of cleavages played political parties, which instead of translating the existing social conflicts to the level of authority, became the creators of cleavages.KEYWORDS: socio-political cleavage, political parties, transition in Poland.
Do Asthma Medication Beliefs Mediate the Relationship Between Minority Status and Adherence to Therapy?

Minority status has been associated with lower asthma medication adherence. We evaluated whether medication beliefs mediated this association. 86 adults with asthma on inhaled corticosteroid therapy completed surveys regarding selected beliefs about asthma medications. Medication adherence for 1 month was electronically measured. Mean daily adherence was lower in minority patients than in Caucasians (p <. 001). Multiple negative asthma medication beliefs were associated with lower adherence (p′s <. 05). Minorities had increased adjusted odds of having a high negative medication beliefs score. Finally, a bootstrapped estimate demonstrated a mediating effect by negative asthma beliefs on the minority status-adherence association (−.073 [95% CI: −.16, −.01]).
Education systems and foreign direct investment: does external efficiency matter?

ABSTRACT This paper examines the effect of the efficiency of the education system on Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). First, it applies a frontier-based measure as a proxy of the ability of countries to optimally convert the average years of schooling into income for individuals. Second, it shows the relationship between the external efficiency of the education system and FDI inflows. The results show that the efficiency level varies across regions and countries and appears to be driven by higher education and secondary vocational education. Similarly to other studies in the literature, there is no significant relationship between the average years of schooling and FDI inflows. However, the external efficiency of the education system is important for FDI inflows. Improving the external efficiency of the education system can play a role in attracting FDI especially in non-resource rich countries, non-landlocked countries and countries in the low and medium human development groups.
The Influence of the Family in the Development of Talent in Sport

The purpose of the present study was to describe patterns in the dynamics of families of talented athletes throughout their development in sport. Four families, including three families of elite rowers and one family of an elite tennis player were examined. The framework provided by Ericsson, Krampe, and Tesch-Romer (1993) to explain expert performance served as the theoretical basis for the study. Ericsson et al. suggested that the acquisition of expert performance involves operating within three types of constraints: motivational, effort, and resource. In-depth interviews were conducted with each athlete, parent, and sibling to explore how they have dealt with these three constraints. A total of 15 individual interviews were conducted. Results permitted the identification of three phases of participation from early childhood to late adolescence: the sampling years, the specializing years, and the investment years. The dynamics of the family in each of these phases of development is discussed.
Cost effective emulation of geostationary satellite channels by means of software-defined radio

This contribution is about the use of software-defined radio (SDR) for channel emulation. Based on NI USRP devices and the LabVIEW programming environment, we devised an affordable RF channel emulator for geostationary satellite transmission. It is able to process 2 × 1.6 MBaud in realtime while adding thermal noise, phase noise and propagation delay according to the system which is modelled. This extensible tool is valuable for supporting teaching activities and it also serves as a convenient test bench when devising new protocols and services that are meant to run over satellite links.
Tweet Sentiments and Stock Market: New Evidence from China

This study provides new insights on the nexus between Tweet sentiments and stock price in China. Based on machine learning, we classify the Tweets from Weibo, a Twitter’s variant in China into five sentiments of anger, disgust, joyful, sadness, and fear. Using wavelet analysis, we find close positive linkages between sentiments of Tweets and stock price, which have both frequency and time-varying features. Anger, disgust, joyful, sadness, and fear sentiments are positively related to stock price at certain periods, especially during September to December of 2014. Less evidence of significant correlations between five sentiments and stock price are provided during June to July. Similarly, bullishness of Tweets exerts a positive effect on the stock market. However, agreement of Tweets has a less significant effect. The relationships are stronger at the long-term horizon for more than five trading days rather than in the short-term. Furthermore, only synchronous co-movements are found, showing little evidence supporting the causation between Tweet sentiments and stock price.
Association of Anxiety and ODD/CD in Children With and Without ADHD

The goal of this study is to examine levels of oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) and conduct disorder (CD) in four groups of children: attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) only, anxiety only, ADHD and anxiety, and controls (i.e., non-ADHD youth). Although children with ADHD exhibit more ODD and CD than non-ADHD youth, it is unknown if anxiety is associated with increased or decreased ODD and CD in children with ADHD. We examined parent and teacher ratings of ODD and CD from the Disruptive Behavior Disorder Rating Scale in 203 school age children (ages 6–9); 70% were male, and 47% were Caucasian. Children were divided into four diagnostic groups based on ADHD and anxiety status from the Diagnostic Interview Scale for Children. According to parents, children with ADHD and anxiety had the highest levels of ODD/CD, followed by children with ADHD only (i.e., without anxiety). Children with anxiety only and controls had lowest ODD and CD scores, and these groups did not differ from each other. The same patterns were found according to teacher report, except that the anxiety only group had significantly lower levels of ODD than non-ADHD controls. Further, combined type ADHD youth with anxiety exhibited the highest levels of ODD and CD compared to all other groups. Comorbid anxiety may strengthen the association of ADHD and ODD/CD, particularly in the combined subtype. We discuss the importance of comorbid anxiety to the development of externalizing problems as well as potential explanatory factors underlying elevated ODD and CD among children with ADHD and anxiety.
An exploration of the experience of pain among culturally diverse migrant communities

Abstract Objective. To explore the ethnocultural influences on the chronic pain experience in three culturally and linguistically diverse communities in Australia. Methods. Six focus groups were conducted with 34 women and 7 men (ages 36–74 years) who self-identified as Mandaean, Assyrian or Vietnamese. A purposive sample of community-dwelling adults living with chronic pain (daily pain >3 months) was recruited from community organizations. Participants were asked broadly about the meanings of chronic pain, acceptance, ethnocultural community expectations and approaches to pain management. A standardized interview collected sociodemographic and symptom data for descriptive purposes. Results. Inductive thematic analysis yielded a multidimensional web of themes interrelated with the pain experience. Themes of ethnocultural identity and migrant status were intertwined in the unique explanatory model of pain communicated for each community. The explanatory model for conceptualizing pain, namely biopsychosocial, biomedical or a traditional Eastern model, framed participants’ approaches to health seeking and pain management. Conclusions. Chronic pain is theoretically conceptualized and experienced in diverse ways by migrant communities. Knowledge of cultural beliefs and values, alongside migration circumstances, may help providers deliver health care that is culturally responsive and thereby improve outcomes for migrant communities with chronic pain.
Cranial anomaly of homozygous rSey rat is associated with a defect in the migration pathway of midbrain crest cells

Craniofacial development of vertebrates depends largely on neural crest contribution and each subdomain of the crest‐derived ectomesenchyme follows its specific genetic control. The rat small eye (rSey) involves a mutation in the Pax‐6 gene and the external feature of rSey homozygous embryos exhibits craniofacial defects in ocular and frontonasal regions. In order to identify the mechanism of craniofacial development, we examined the cranial morphology and migration of cephalic crest cells in rSey embryos. The chondrocranial defects of homozygous rSey embryos primarily consisted of spheno‐orbital and ethmoidal anomalies. The former defects appeared to be brought about by the lack of the eye. In the ethmoid region, the nasal septum and the derivative of the medial nasal prominence were present, while the rest of the nasal capsule, as well as the nasal and lachrymal bones, were totally absent except for a pair of cartilaginous rods in place of the nasal capsule. This suggests that the primary cranial defect is restricted to the lateral nasal prominence derivatives. Dil labeling revealed the abnormal migration of crest cells specifically from the anterior midbrain to the lateral nasal prominence in homozygous rSey embryos. Pax‐6 was not expressed in the crest cells but was strongly expressed in the frontonasal ectoderm. To determine whether or not this migratory defect actually resides in environmental cues, normal midbrain crest cells from wild‐type embryos were labeled with Dil and were orthotopically injected into host rSey embryos. Migration of the donor crest cells into the lateral nasal prominence was abnormal in homozygous host embryos, while they migrated normally in wild‐type or heterozygous embryos. Therefore, the cranial defects in rSey homozygous embryos are due to inappropriate substrate for crest cell migration towards the lateral nasal prominence, which consistently explains the cranial morphology of homozygous rSey embryos.
Health diagnostics of water-cooled power generator stator windings using a Directional Mahalanobis Distance (DMD)

A power generator, one of the most critical components in power plant, could experience unexpected series system failures, resulting in substantial maintenance and societal cost. This paper proposes a new health diagnostics method for water-cooled power generator windings against moisture absorption. The main idea of the proposed diagnostics method is a Directional Mahalanobis Distance (DMD) based on the correlation matrix of health data. In this study capacitance data measured from a winding insulator is referred to as health data. It is an indirect measure of moisture absorption in power generator windings by water leakage. Data from ten generators, of which each has 42 windings, are used for demonstration of the proposed health diagnostics method for power generator windings.
Effect of TALEN-mediated IL-6 knockout on cell proliferation, apoptosis, invasion and anti-cancer therapy in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC-LM3) cells

Purpose To determine the exact effect of Interleukin-6 (IL-6) on tumor cell proliferation, apoptosis, invasion, and anti-cancer therapy in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Experimental Design IL-6 was disrupted by transcription activator-like effector nucleases (TALEN) in HCCLM3 cells, and was used to evaluate the role of IL-6 on tumor cell proliferation, apoptosis, invasion and key signaling pathways involved in sorafenib and/or IFNα therapy. Results IL-6 has no direct effect on cell proliferation and invasion but promotes cell apoptosis and up-regulate IL-33 and VEGF-A expression. IL-6 could attenuate the anti-proliferation effect by sorafenib and combination therapy but facilitate the pro-apoptosis of the combination therapy and augment the pro-invasive effect induced by single treatment. IL-6 could down-regulate p-STAT3, however up-regulate the p-MEK/p-ERK and NF-kB/iNOS expression, and it also facilitated the promotion on p-JAK2 and p-MEK/p-ERK by either sorafenib or IFN-α. in vivo study, IL-6 significantly promotes tumor growth. The combination treatment showed the highest inhibition on tumor growth which is derived from HCCLM3-IL6(-) cells. Conclusions IL-6 has no direct effect on cell proliferation and invasion but promotes tumor cell apoptosis in vitro study. Sorafenib and combination therapies are suitable for HCC cells with low or no IL-6 expression confirmed in vivo study.
Strangers in the Academy: Retention of Latino Non-Traditional Students and College Culture

This work is a study of how Latino non-traditional students interpret and give meaning to their withdrawal experiences from a higher education institution. To examine this phenomenon, I used a qualitative method, which included a focus on a unique institution with a mission to serve Latino non-traditional students, a student satisfaction survey, and interviews with 31 former students. These were divided into 21 non-graduates and 10 graduates. The analysis used a Cultural Studies approach with additional theoretical grounding from Gramsci and Bourdieu. The study finds that Latino non-traditional students interpret their experiences as working in culturally contested spaces. Students give meaning to these experiences in complex and fluid ways, which in many cases, lead to decisions to withdraw. This reinforces and reproduces social systems that limit access to higher education to non-traditional populations.
Minimization of annotation work: diagnosis of mammographic masses via active learning

The prerequisite for establishing an effective prediction system for mammographic diagnosis is the annotation of each mammographic image. The manual annotation work is time-consuming and laborious, which becomes a great hindrance for researchers. In this article, we propose a novel active learning algorithm that can adequately address this problem, leading to the minimization of the labeling costs on the premise of guaranteed performance. Our proposed method is different from the existing active learning methods designed for the general problem as it is specifically designed for mammographic images. Through its modified discriminant functions and improved sample query criteria, the proposed method can fully utilize the pairing of mammographic images and select the most valuable images from both the mediolateral and craniocaudal views. Moreover, in order to extend active learning to the ordinal regression problem, which has no precedent in existing studies, but is essential for mammographic diagnosis (mammographic diagnosis is not only a classification task, but also an ordinal regression task for predicting an ordinal variable, viz. the malignancy risk of lesions), multiple sample query criteria need to be taken into consideration simultaneously. We formulate it as a criteria integration problem and further present an algorithm based on self-adaptive weighted rank aggregation to achieve a good solution. The efficacy of the proposed method was demonstrated on thousands of mammographic images from the digital database for screening mammography. The labeling costs of obtaining optimal performance in the classification and ordinal regression task respectively fell to 33.8 and 19.8 percent of their original costs. The proposed method also generated 1228 wins, 369 ties and 47 losses for the classification task, and 1933 wins, 258 ties and 185 losses for the ordinal regression task compared to the other state-of-the-art active learning algorithms. By taking the particularities of mammographic images, the proposed AL method can indeed reduce the manual annotation work to a great extent without sacrificing the performance of the prediction system for mammographic diagnosis.