Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Measuring Consequentialism : Trolley Cases and Sample Bias

We use data from a recent survey on communication norms among scientists to argue that standard Trolley and Sophie’s Choice scenarios induce subjects to drop from studies, generating loss of data and sample bias. We explain why these effects make instruments based on such scenarios unreliable measures of the general deontic versus consequentialist commitments of study subjects. I. Moral Epistemology and Empirical Data. Since the seminal work by Harman (1999) and Greene et al. (2001), empirical data has been of increasing importance in moral philosophy, and several important studies surveying the range and variation of moral intuitions have been done (Nichols, 2004; Nichols and Mallon, 2006; Hauser et al., 2007). Largely, however, the import of this work has been critical rather than positive. To the extent that the moral intuitions of professional philosophers are not widely shared outside the confines of academic philosophy, the method employed by most of ethics, reflective equilibrium, is suspect, providing at best a check on consistency. Unless the intuitions of professional ethicists can be grounded as especially truth conducive, arguments for moral claims which rely on such intuitions are bad. But for all that this lesson is salutary, it does little to further the aim of moral theory: if the search for reflective equilibria, grounded in the considered moral judgments of ethicists, is bad method, what methods might be better, and to what theoretical ends might they be reliably deployed?
Complementary Roles for Scavenger Receptor A and CD36 of Human Monocyte–derived Macrophages in Adhesion to Surfaces Coated with Oxidized Low-Density Lipoproteins and in Secretion of H2O2

Oxidized low-density lipoprotein (oxLDL) is considered one of the principal effectors of atherogenesis. To explore mechanisms by which oxLDL affects human mononuclear phagocytes, we incubated these cells in medium containing oxLDL, acetylated LDL (acLDL), or native LDL, or on surfaces coated with these native and modified lipoproteins. The presence of soluble oxLDL, acLDL, or native LDL in the medium did not stimulate H2O2 secretion by macrophages. In contrast, macrophages adherent to surfaces coated with oxLDL secreted three- to fourfold more H2O2 than macrophages adherent to surfaces coated with acLDL or native LDL. Freshly isolated blood monocytes secreted little H2O2 regardless of the substrate on which they were plated. H2O2 secretion was maximal in cells maintained for 4–6 d in culture before plating on oxLDL-coated surfaces. Fucoidan, a known ligand of class A macrophage scavenger receptors (MSR-A), significantly reduced macrophage adhesion to surfaces coated with oxLDL or acLDL. Monoclonal antibody SMO, which blocks oxLDL binding to CD36, did not inhibit adhesion of macrophages to oxLDL-coated surfaces but markedly reduced H2O2 secretion by these cells. These studies show that MSR-A is primarily responsible for adhesion of macrophages to oxLDL-coated surfaces, that CD36 signals H2O2 secretion by macrophages adherent to these surfaces, and that substrate-bound, but not soluble, oxLDL stimulates H2O2 secretion by macrophages.
Multicenter impact analysis of a model for predicting recurrent early-onset preeclampsia: A before–after study

ABSTRACT Objective: This study aims to determine the impact of using a prediction model for recurrent preeclampsia to customize antenatal care in subsequent pregnancies. Methods: We compared care consumption, pregnancy outcomes, and self-reported health state of two risk-based subgroups, and compared these to a reference group receiving standard care. Results: We included a total of 311 women from 12 hospitals. Compared to standard care, recurrence-risk guided care did not lead to different outcomes or self-perceived health. Conclusion: Our study exemplifies that recurrence-risk-based stratification of antenatal care in former preeclampsia patients is feasible; it does not lead to worse pregnancy outcomes.
The Role of Race and Economic Characteristics in the Presentation and Survival of Patients With Surgically Resected Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer

Background Little is understood regarding the inter-relation between economic, marital, and racial/ethnic differences in presentation and survival of surgically resected lung cancer patients. Our investigation will assess these differences in addition to known therapeutic, patient, and histopathologic factors. Methods A retrospective review of the Surveillance Epidemiology and End Reporting database was conducted through the years 2007–2012. The population was split into nine different ethnic groups. Population differences were assessed via chi-square testing. Multivariable analysis (MVA) were used to detect overall survival (OS) differences in the total surgical population (TS, N = 35,689) in an ear (T1–T2 < 4 cm N0) surgical population [early-stage resectable (ESR), N = 17,931]. Lung cancer-specific survival (LCSS) was assessed in the ESR. Results In the TS population, as compared to Whites, Blacks, and Hispanics presented with younger age, more adenocarcinomas, lower rates of marriage, lower rates of insurance, less stage I tumors, and had less nodes examined, but their type of surgical procedures and OS/LCSS were the same. MVA demonstrated that lower OS and LCSS were associated with males, single/divorced/widowed partnership, lower income (TS only), and Medicaid insurance. MVA also found that Blacks and Hispanics had a similar OS/LCSS to Whites and that all ethnic groups were associated with a similar or better outcomes. The 90-day mortality and positive nodes were correlated with not having insurance and not being married, but they were not associated with ethnicity. Conclusion In TS and ESR groups, OS was not different in the two largest ethnic groups (Black and Hispanic) as compared to Whites, but was related to single/widowed/divorced status, Medicaid insurance, and income (TS group only). Nodal positivity was associated with patients who did not have a married partner or insurance suggesting that these factors may impact disease biology. Economic and psychosocial variables may play a role in survival of ear lung cancer in addition to standard histopathologic and treatment variables.
The Quality vs. Time Trade-off for Approximate Image Descriptor Search

In recent years, content-based image retrieval has become more and more important in many application areas. Similarity retrieval is inherently a very demanding process, in particular when performing exact searches. Therefore, there is an increasing interest in performing approximate searches, where result quality guarantees are traded for reduced query execution time. The goal of approximate retrieval systems should be to obtain the best possible result quality in the minimum amount of time. As a result, typical indexing strategies divide the data set into many data chunks. Minimizing the search time suggests to generate uniformly sized chunks to best overlap I/O costs with CPU costs. Maximizing quality, on the other hand, suggests to strongly limit the intra-chunk dissimilarity of data. The paper addresses the question to what extent guaranteeing the query processing time, using uniform chunk sizes, compromises the quality of the results, and vice versa. Using a large collection of 5 million 24-dimensions local descriptors computed over more than 50 thousand real life images, we show that minimizing the query processing time may in fact lead to better quality of the intermediate results.
Chemoattractant‐ and Mitogen‐Induced Generation of Reactive Oxygen Species in Human Lymphocytes: The Role of Calcium

This study examined the role of calcium in the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in human lymphocytes activated by the chemoattractant formyl‐Met‐Leu‐Phe (fMLP) and the T‐cell mitogen phytohaemagglutinin (PHA). The concentrations of cytosolic calcium ([Ca2+]i) and ROS were monitored simultaneously with a fluorescence spectrophotometer after the cells had been incubated in fura‐2 (calcium‐sensitive dye) and 2′,7′‐dichlorofluorescein diacetate (DCF‐DA, ROS‐sensitive dye). The lymphocytes were stimulated with fMLP (200 nmol l−1) or PHA (10 μmol l−1) in the absence and presence of extracellular calcium. A dose‐response test was also conducted for extracellular calcium. fMLP and PHA significantly increased both [Ca2+]i (P < 0.001) and ROS concentrations (P < 0.001) above the control levels in the presence of extracellular calcium. However, such increases were abolished in the absence of extracellular calcium, suggesting total dependence of the responses to both fMLP and PHA on transplasma‐membrane calcium influx. There were also graded increases in ROS with increasing concentrations of extracellular calcium. The results show that transplasma‐membrane calcium influx is essential for fMLP‐ and PHA‐induced generation of reactive oxygen species in human lymphocytes.
How Cancer Survivors Provide Support on Cancer-Related Internet Mailing Lists

Background Internet mailing lists are an important and increasingly common way for cancer survivors to find information and support. Most studies of these mailing lists have investigated lists dedicated to one type of cancer, most often breast cancer. Little is known about whether the lessons learned from experiences with breast cancer lists apply to other cancers. Objectives The aim of the study was to compare the structural characteristics of 10 Internet cancer-related mailing lists and identify the processes by which cancer survivors provide support. Methods We studied a systematic 9% sample of email messages sent over five months to 10 cancer mailing lists hosted by the Association of Cancer Online Resources (ACOR). Content analyses were used to compare the structural characteristics of the lists, including participation rates and members’ identities as survivors or caregivers. We used thematic analyses to examine the types of support that list members provided through their message texts. Results Content analyses showed that characteristics of list members and subscriber participation rates varied across the lists. Thematic analyses revealed very little “off topic” discussion. Feedback from listowners indicated that they actively modeled appropriate communication on their lists and worked to keep discussions civil and focused. In all lists, members offered support much more frequently than they requested it; survivors were somewhat more likely than caregivers to offer rather than to ask for support. The most common topics in survivors’ messages were about treatment information and how to communicate with health care providers. Although expressions of emotional support were less common than informational support, they appeared in all lists. Many messages that contained narratives of illness or treatment did not specifically ask for help but provided emotional support by reassuring listmates that they were not alone in their struggles with cancer. Survivors’ explicit expressions of emotional support tended to be messages that encouraged active coping. Such messages also provided senders with opportunities to assume personally empowering “helper” roles that supported self-esteem. Conclusions Many cancer survivors use the Internet to seek informational and emotional support. Across 10 lists for different cancers, informational support was the main communication style. Our finding of an emphasis on informational support is in contrast to most prior literature, which has focused on emotional support. We found the most common expressions of support were offers of technical information and explicit advice about how to communicate with health care providers. Topics and proportions of informational and emotional support differed across the lists. Our previous surveys of ACOR subscribers showed that they join the lists primarily to seek information; this qualitative study shows that they can and do find what they seek. They also find opportunities to play rewarding roles as support givers.
T1‐weighted–SPACE dark blood whole body magnetic resonance angiography (DB‐WBMRA): Initial experience

To evaluate the feasibility of the dark blood fast spin echo (FSE) T1‐weighted–Sampling Perfection with Application of optimized Contrasts using different flip angle Evolution (T1w‐SPACE) sequence in assessing whole body arterial wall information from the extracranial carotids to the popliteal artery.
Occupational Prestige in Australia: A New Scale

The Australian Bureau of Statistics recently released a new occupational classification, the Australian Standard Classifi cation of Occupations. Unlike its predecessor, the new classifi cation is skill-based. In this research note, I use a public use sample from the 1986 Census, the ASCO/CCLO link file, and other census data, to explore the structural basis of the two main Australian prestige scales. I also present a new socio- economic status scale, the ANU3 scale, for use with the Aus tralian occupational classification.
Echoes of Veblen's theory of business enterprise in the later development of macroeconomics: Fisher's debt-deflation theory of great depressions and the financial instability theories of minsky and tobin

Irving Fisher's debt-deflation theory of great depressions, first published in 1932 and 1933, was invoked by Hyman Minsky and James Tobin as a crucial precursor of their theories of macroeconomic financial instability. This paper argues that Wesley Mitchell was right to perceive a close intellectual affinity between Fisher's debt-deflation theory and Thorstein Veblen's Theory of Business Enterprise (1904), and that this affinity also exists between Veblen (1904) and the analyses of Minsky and Tobin.
The inequitable influence that varying accountability contexts in the United States have on teacher professional development

Teachers today operate in highly politicized accountability environments where quick results, typically measured by K–12 test scores, are demanded. Although focusing on student learning outcomes is critical, equally essential is assuring that teacher learning opportunities which can strengthen instruction are available to teachers. A decade ago, Boardman and Woodruff found that teaching in a ‘high-stakes’ environment led to more assessments, scripted curriculum decisions and a shift in professional development that emphasized preparation for and enhancing results on tests. This exploratory, descriptive case study sought to understand how teachers described professional development a decade later. We used purposeful sampling and qualitative methodology to better understand educator perceptions of professional learning within two different accountability environments in the United States. Using the insights of educators working in these environments, the research explored ‘How do teachers describe the influence of accountability on their professional learning? ’ We achieved this by asking teachers directly about their professional learning opportunities. This article points to the potential inequitable influence various sanctions have on teacher professional learning. Findings illustrate that although job-embedded professional development opportunities existed in both contexts, the nature, quality and outcomes of the professional learning differed.
FDTD Modeling of Double Negative Metamaterials Characterized by High-Order Frequency-Dispersive Constitutive Parameters

This paper presents an extension of this formulation that makes the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method suitable for the modeling of high-order dispersive double negative (DNG) media. The main advantage of the new technique is that it is able to directly model arbitrary high-order dispersive DNG media with minimum storage requirements. To illustrate the validity of the proposed formulation the propagation through a DNG slab has been simulated. The reflection coefficient computed shows good agreement with the exact solution
Genome-wide approaches for identification of nuclear receptor target genes

Large-scale genomics analyses have grown by leaps and bounds with the rapid advances in high throughput DNA sequencing and synthesis techniques. Nuclear receptor signaling is ideally suited to genomics studies because receptors function as ligand-regulated gene switches. This review will survey the strengths and limitations of three major classes of high throughput techniques widely used in the nuclear receptor field to characterize ligand-dependent gene regulation: expression profiling studies (microarrays, SAGE and related techniques), chromatin immunoprecipitation followed by microarray (ChIP-on-chip), and genome-wide in silico hormone response element screens. We will discuss each technique, and how each has contributed to our understanding of nuclear receptor signaling.
Android Malware Detection using Markov Chain Model of Application Behaviors in Requesting System Services

Widespread growth in Android malwares stimulates security researchers to propose different methods for analyzing and detecting malicious behaviors in applications. Nevertheless, current solutions are ill-suited to extract the fine-grained behavior of Android applications accurately and efficiently. In this paper, we propose ServiceMonitor, a lightweight host-based detection system that dynamically detects malicious applications directly on mobile devices. ServiceMonitor reconstructs the fine-grained behavior of applications based on a novel systematic system service use analysis technique. Using proposed system service use perspective enables us to build a statistical Markov chain model to represent what and how system services are used to access system resources. Afterwards, we consider built Markov chain in the form of a feature vector and use it to classify the application behavior into either malicious or benign using Random Forests classification algorithm. ServiceMonitor outperforms current host-based solutions with evaluating it against 4034 malwares and 10024 benign applications and obtaining 96\% of accuracy rate and negligible overhead and performance penalty.
State constraints and list decoding for the AVC

List decoding for arbitrarily varying channels (AVCs) under state constraints is investigated. It is shown that rates within $\epsilon$ of the randomized coding capacity of AVCs with input-dependent state can be achieved under maximal error with list decoding using lists of size $O(1/\epsilon)$. Under average error an achievable rate region and converse bound are given for lists of size $L$. These bounds are based on two different notions of symmetrizability and do not coincide in general. An example is given that shows that for list size $L$ the capacity may be positive but strictly smaller than the randomized coding capacity. This behavior is different than the situation without state constraints.
Zero clock skew synchronization with rotary clocking technology

Rotary clocking is a resonant clocking technology that provides a low-power, low-jitter clock signal with controllable skew. Due to the ¿rotary¿ traveling of the clock signal on the ring interconnect, each location on the rotary ring network leads to a different clock phase. Consequently, one of the features of the rotary clocking technology is the inherent non-zero clock skew operation. In this paper, it is shown that zero clock skew circuits can also be efficiently implemented with rotary clock synchronization. Design automation experiments are performed to demonstrate that the zero clock skew operation can be achieved with minimal change in the performance of rotary clock operation. In particular, a marginal ±1.5% change in the tapping wirelength is reported in experiments on R1¿R5 benchmark circuits.
Pickup and Delivery Traveling Salesman Problem with Traffic Conditions

This paper deals with the pickup and delivery traveling salesman problem with traffic conditions (PDTSPTC), an extension of the pickup and delivery traveling salesman problem (PDTSP) where each customer to be served is associated with two quantities of product to be collected and delivered. Almost PDTSP problems uses distance between each point of customers as Euclidean Distance and are not concerned with other parameters to find minimal cost. The PDTSPTC concerns more parameters, such as street network and vehicle speed, which results it closer to the real world condition. The paper also proposes the new developed genetic algorithm called “Hybrid Encoding Genetic Algorithm (HEGA)”. The concept is to combine binary encoding and integer encoding together, causing the incomplexity of the algorithm structure and the ease of implementation. The main advantage of this new algorithm is the improvement of overall system efficiency.
BD-CATS: big data clustering at trillion particle scale

Modern cosmology and plasma physics codes are now capable of simulating trillions of particles on petascale systems. Each timestep output from such simulations is on the order of 10s of TBs. Summarizing and analyzing raw particle data is challenging, and scientists often focus on density structures, whether in the real 3D space, or a high-dimensional phase space. In this work, we develop a highly scalable version of the clustering algorithm Dbscan, and apply it to the largest datasets produced by state-of-the-art codes. Our system, called Bd-Cats, is the first one capable of performing end-to-end analysis at trillion particle scale (including: loading the data, geometric partitioning, computing kd-trees, performing clustering analysis, and storing the results). We show analysis of 1.4 trillion particles from a plasma physics simulation, and a 10,2403 particle cosmological simulation, utilizing ~100,000 cores in 30 minutes. Bd-Cats is helping infer mechanisms behind particle acceleration in plasma physics and holds promise for qualitatively superior clustering in cosmology. Both of these results were previously intractable at the trillion particle scale.
Estimation of arterial baroreflex sensitivity in relation to carotid artery stiffness

Arterial baroreflex has a significant role in regulating blood pressure. It is known that increased stiffness of the carotid sinus affects mecanotransduction of baroreceptors and therefore limits baroreceptors capability to detect changes in blood pressure. By using high resolution ultrasound video signal and continuous measurement of electrocardiogram (ECG) and blood pressure, it is possible to define elastic properties of artery simultaneously with baroreflex sensitivity parameters. In this paper dataset which consist 38 subjects, 11 diabetics and 27 healthy controls was analyzed. Use of diabetic and healthy test subjects gives wide scale of arteries with different elasticity properties, which provide opportunity to validate baroreflex and artery stiffness estimation methods.