Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Psychological stress assessment of patients suffering from prostate cancer

Abstract Objective. The aim of this study was to assess the psychological distress of men with prostate cancer (PC) throughout the whole process from initial diagnosis to therapy and to evaluate patients' tolerance regarding treatment delay. Material and methods. This prospective study, performed between July 2007 and March 2010, evaluated the psychological distress of 28 men who underwent prostate biopsy (PB), who were confronted with a cancer diagnosis and were about to undergo radical prostatectomy (RP). Three evaluation points were defined: E1, immediately before PB; E2, after definitive diagnosis and when RP was scheduled; and E3, on the day of admission for RP. Results. Emotional distress was highest before PB, declining significantly until RP (p = 0.02). Symptoms of depression and anxiety were low at all evaluation points, with anxiety rising significantly after cancer diagnosis (p = 0.008). Concerns about postoperative erectile dysfunction and incontinence were registered at all evaluation points. Concerns about the effect on their partnership due to PC were low. The patient's tolerable waiting time for RP differed significantly from daily practice. Conclusions. Anxiety and depression as well as concerns about a negative effect on their partnership were shown to play a minor role in patients during the interval between PB and RP, while distress and concerns about erectile dysfunction and urinary incontinence were more prevalent. Support from the patient's medical and social environment and a sound partnership may have a protective effect on emotional status. Waiting time for surgery exceeded the patients' tolerated time-frames and may further contribute to the psychological distress of PC.
Churg–Strauss syndrome

Purpose of reviewChurg–Strauss syndrome is a small-vessel necrotizing vasculitis typically characterized by asthma, lung infiltrates, extravascular necrotizing granulomas and hypereosinophilia. The most recent clinical studies on its pathogenesis and therapeutic management are reviewed here. Recent findingsFrench and Italian clinical studies found that the clinical characteristics of patients with Churg–Strauss syndrome differed according to their antineutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibody status: cardiomyopathy predominated in antineutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibody-negative patients while necrotizing glomerulonephritis was more often observed in antineutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibody-positive patients. These histologically documented findings suggest the existence of different Churg–Strauss syndrome subtypes, characterized by the predominance of distinct pathogenetic mechanisms. To date, following the therapeutic recommendations for Churg–Strauss syndrome (i.e. corticosteroids and, when required, immunosuppressants), patient outcomes are good, with 5-year survival exceeding 90%, but often with the need to continue low-dose corticosteroids to control residual asthma. SummaryThe precise pathogenetic mechanisms of Churg–Strauss syndrome are only partly elucidated. Recent results suggest that antineutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibodies are probably more involved in the vasculitic manifestations of Churg–Strauss syndrome (e.g. glomerulonephritis) whereas eosinophil tissue infiltration and associated cytotoxicity would be responsible for cardiomyopathy. If confirmed, these results could support individual therapeutic stratification according to the clinical pattern. Furthermore, some patients may benefit from new biologic therapies under development, for example antiinterleukin-5 or antiimmunoglobulin E monoclonal antibodies.
Pretarget radiotherapy with an anti-CD25 antibody-streptavidin fusion protein was effective in therapy of leukemia/lymphoma xenografts

Although radioimmunotherapy with radiolabeled intact monoclonal antibodies has demonstrated efficacy in the treatment of lymphoma, it provides low tumor-to-normal-tissue radionuclide target ratios and unwanted prolonged radiation exposure to the bone marrow. To overcome these obstacles, the administration of the radionuclide was separated from that of the antibody by using an anti-IL-2 receptor α antibody single chain Fv-streptavidin fusion protein, followed by radiolabeled biotin to treat lymphoma or leukemia xenografted mice. This Pretarget approach provided extremely rapid and effective tumor targeting, permitting the use of short-lived α-emitting radionuclides. With the β-emitter 90Y, all of the 10 lymphoma-xenografted mice were cured. With the α-emitter 213Bi, significant efficacy was obtained in treating leukemic mice, and, furthermore, when combined with immunotherapy, 7 of 10 leukemic mice were cured. Thus, Pretarget radioimmunotherapy is very promising and could represent the next generation in the treatment of lymphoma and leukemia.
Archives des publications du CNRC

We address the problem of learning classiﬁers when observations have multiple views, some of which may not be observed for all examples. We assume the existence of view generating functions which may complete the missing views in an approximate way. This situation corresponds for example to learning text classiﬁers from multilingual collections where documents are not available in all languages. In that case, Machine Translation (MT) systems may be used to translate each document in the missing languages. We derive a generalization error bound for classiﬁers learned on examples with multiple artiﬁcially created views. Our result uncovers a trade-off between the size of the training set, the number of views, and the quality of the view generating functions. As a consequence, we identify situations where it is more interesting to use multiple views for learning instead of classical single view learning. An extension of this framework is a natural way to leverage unlabeled multi-view data in semi-supervised learning. Experimental results on a subset of the Reuters RCV1/RCV2 collections support our ﬁndings by showing that additional views obtained from MT may signiﬁcantly improve the classiﬁcation performance in the cases identiﬁed by our trade-off.
Trends in Primary Health Care-sensitive Conditions in Brazil: The Role of the Family Health Program (Project ICSAP-Brazil)

BackgroundThis study describes trends in hospital admission rates for primary healthcare-sensitive conditions (PHCSC) in Brazil. ObjectivesTo evaluate the impact of increased primary healthcare availability through the implementation of the Family Health Program (FHP) on PHCSC admissions rates at the national, regional, and state-levels between 1999 and 2007. Research DesignAn ecologic panel data study was used and a fixed effects multivariate negative binomial model was used to estimate the association of PHCSC admission rate and FHP controlling for other relevant covariates. ResultsIt was shown that, at the national level, PHCSC hospital admissions declined by 24%—over 2.5 times more rapidly than the decline in hospitalizations for all other (non-PHCSC) conditions. Greater reductions in the PHCSC admission rates when compared with the non-PHCSC admission rates were also observed when the data were divided by regions and states. Regression models showed that at the state level the greater the FHP coverage, the less was the PHCSC hospital admissions even when controlling for confounding variables. ConclusionsThe results of this study have important implications for the healthcare model in countries that base their national health systems on primary healthcare. This is the first study to evaluate the association between FHP coverage and PHCSC admissions rates in all the Brazilian states over a long and relevant period for the consolidation of FHP in the country.
Perceptually guided inexact DSP design for power, area efficient hearing aid

Inexact design has been recognized as very viable approach to achieve significant gains in the energy, area and speed efficiencies of digital circuits. By deliberately trading error in return for such these gains, inexact circuits and architectures have been shown to be especially useful in contexts where our senses such as sight and hearing, can compensate for the loss in accuracy. It is therefore important to understand, characterize the manner in which our sensorial systems interact and compensate for the loss in accuracy. Further use this knowledge to optimize and guide the manner in which inexactness is introduced. For the first time, we achieve both of these goals in this paper in the context of human audition-specifically, using the architecture of a hearing-aid and the DSP primitive of an FIR filter as our candidate. Our algorithms for designing an inexact hearing-aid thus use intelligibility as the metric. The resulting inexact FIR filter in the hearing aid is 1.5X or 1.8X more efficient in terms of power-area product while producing 5% or 10% less intelligible speech respectively when compared with the corresponding exact version.1
One-Volt Oxide Thin-Film Transistors on Paper Substrates Gated by $\hbox{SiO}_{2}$-Based Solid Electrolyte With Controllable Operation Modes

Microporous SiO2 can provide large electric-double-layer (EDL) capacitance and negligible leakage current, owing to lack of electron carrier and limited mobility of mobile ions. The impedance spectroscopy (ionic-conductivity-frequency and capacitance-voltage characteristics) and Fourier-transformed infrared spectroscopy of microporous SiO2 are characterized, which demonstrated that such dielectric is actually a solid-electrolyte dielectric. InGaZnO4 thin-film transistors (TFTs) on paper substrates gated by microporous-SiO2 solid electrolyte are fabricated at room temperature. The large EDL-specific capacitance (1.36 μF/ cm2) results in the paper TFTs operate at a battery-drivable low voltage of 1.0 V. Both depletion-mode (Vth = -0.45 V) and enhancement-mode (Vth = 0.25 V) operations are realized by rationally controlling the oxygen concentration in argon ambient during InGaZnO4 channel deposition. Electrical characteristics with an equivalent field-effect mobility of ~ 21 cm2/V·s, a current on/off ratio of greater than 105, and a subthreshold swing of ~ 80 mV/dec are demonstrated at low frequencies, which are promising for portable paper electronics.
Prevalence of Psychiatric Morbidity Among Undergraduate Students of a Dental College in West Bengal.

BACKGROUND Stresses of medical course affects the academic performance as well as physical and psychological health of the students negatively. In the present day scenario every one of us has vulnerability to have psychiatric morbidity. Like other young adults, undergraduate dental students are similarly vulnerable to turmoil due to academic and social stresses, which often hamper the educational achievement. Early detection and treatment of psychological morbidities shorten the suffering leading to less social impairment in long term. AIM The aim of this study was to assess the psychiatric morbidity of dental students and the factors affecting their mental health. SETTINGS AND DESIGN This cross sectional, descriptive and correlation study was conducted in North Bengal Dental College, a rural dental college of West Bengal, India. MATERIALS AND METHODS The study sample consisted of a total of 89 dental students. The student enrollment was done by "simple random sampling method". The semi-structured proforma and the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ)-28 were used to collect data and to assess the psychiatric morbidity. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS Pearson's correlation followed by multivariate linear regression analysis was done to assess the effect of academic achievement, positive and negative event on the GHQ total score. RESULTS The overall mean GHQ total score in the study population was 5.33, with a SD of 4.85 which was above the cutoff (>4) score. Karl Pearson correlation co-efficient r-values for GHQ total score with 'academic achievement' and 'negative events' score were 0.718 and 0.628 respectively and p-values were 0.001 and 0.001. CONCLUSION The poor academic performance and negative events had strong impact on psychological morbidity of dental students. The findings of our study can't be generalized for all undergraduate dental student due to small sample size and non inclusion of many other variables.
Charge transport properties of water dispersible multiwall carbon nanotube-polyaniline composites

The transmission electron microscopy images of in situ prepared multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) and polyaniline (PANI) composites show that nanotubes are well dispersed in aqueous medium, and the nanofibers of PANI facilitate intertube transport. Although low temperature transport indicates variable range hopping (VRH) mechanism, the dc and ac conductivity become temperature independent as the MWNT content increases. The onset frequency for the increase in conductivity is observed to be strongly dependent on the MWNT weight percent, and the ac conductivity can be scaled onto a master curve. The negative magnetoresistance is attributed to the forward interference scattering mechanism in VRH transport.
Wind Tactor: An Airflow-based Wearable Tactile Display

Traditional wearable tactile displays transfer information through a firm contact between the tactile stimulator (tactor) and the skin. The firm contact, however, might limit the location of wearable tactile displays and might be the source of discomfort when the skin is being exposed to prolonged contact. This motivated us to find a non-contact wearable tactile display, which is able to transfer information without a contact. Based on the literature review, we concluded that we should focus on airflow-based tactile displays among various non-contact stimulation methods. In my previous work, I proposed the concept of a non-contact wearable tactile display using airflows and explored its feasibility. Focusing on an airflow-based wearable tactile display, I am investigating the expressivity and the feasibility of wearable airflow displays in real-world environments. I expect my dissertation will provide empirical grounds and guidelines for the design of an airflow-based wearable tactile display.
Experience in flipping the classes in engineering study

The paper discusses experience gained in flipping classes of Automatic Control Systems carried out in the 2nd and 3rd years of Bachelor study and in a leveling course to Master study of Automotive Mechatronics at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology of the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava. It points out similarities and differences appearing when comparing our experience with equivalent courses and activities reported abroad. These are mostly caused by the significantly different higher education framework in Slovakia. The importance of simulations and real time experiments, as well as student's motivation are accented and the corresponding technical arrangements are briefly described. At the end, the new approach evaluation by the students is briefly mentioned.
Acute effects of whole‐body vibration on peak isometric torque, muscle twitch torque and voluntary muscle activation of the knee extensors

The purpose of this investigation was to compare the acute effects of whole‐body vibration (WBV) with a static squat on resting muscle twitch torque, peak isometric torque and voluntary muscle activation of the knee extensors during an isometric maximal voluntary contraction (MVC). Twenty‐four healthy, strength‐trained males were recruited for this randomized, cross‐over design investigation. The WBV treatment consisted of three sets of 60 s of vibration (30 Hz, ±4 mm) while standing in a semi‐squat position. Voluntary muscle activation, peak isometric torque during MVC and resting muscle twitch torque (RTT) through percutaneous femoral nerve stimulation were obtained before and following the treatment. Change in peak isometric torque, voluntary muscle activation and the RTT were calculated as the difference between pre‐ and post‐treamtent values. There was no observable post‐activation potentiation of muscle twitch torque or enhancement in voluntary muscle activation or peak isometric torque. However, decreases in the peak isometric torque (P=0.0094) and voluntary muscle activation (P=0.0252) were significantly smaller post WBV interventions compared with the control treatment. Based on the current data, it is unclear whether or not this was attributable to the effects of WBV but further research into this possibility is warranted.
A Study on an Effective Feature Selection Method Using Hog-Family Feature for Human Detection

It is the important that Support Vector Machine (SVM) is the powerful learning machines and has been applied to varying task with generally acceptable performance. The SVM success for classification tasks in one domain is affected by features that it represents the instance of specific class. The representative and discriminative features that they are given, SVM learning is going to provide better generalization and consequently that we are able to obtain good classifier. In this paper, we define the problem of feature choices for tasks of human detections and measure the performance of each feature. And also we consider HOGfamily feature to study an effective feature selection method. Finally we proposed the multiscale HOG as a NEW family member in this feature group. In addition we also combine SVM with Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to reduce dimension of features and enhance the evaluation speed while retaining most of discriminative feature vectors.
Performance analysis of isolated three-level half-bridge bidirectional DC/DC converter

A novel topology of isolated three-level half-bridge bidirectional DC/DC converter is proposed. the proposed novel isolated bidirectional DC/DC converter has not only the advantages, such as enabling bidirectional power flow, ease of realizing soft-switching control, galvanic isolation, high reliability and having complete symmetry of configuration and so on, but also can be used in high voltage application and apparently decreased the stress of the switches. In this paper, working principle of the Proposed DC/DC converter is discussed in detail. Equivalent circuit analysis is also used to obtain the criterion of soft switching conduction. In the end, simulation is done to certify to feasibility of the proposed DC/DC converter and accuracy of the criterion. Simulation results go hand in hand with our conclusion which indicates the correctness of our analysis.
3D-printed frequency selective surfaces for microwave absorbers

A flat periodic FSS (frequency selective surface) is presented, which is fully fabricated by a 3D-printer and commercial 3D printing filaments which normally are used for printing metal like structures. The FSS absorber structure was developed and optimized for 10 GHz, fabricated with the 3D printer, measured afterwards and compared with the simulations. Further simulations were made with the new materials at higher frequencies and the results confirm that 3D printing technology works well and could be used to the best advantage for absorbers and other applications in the frequency range below 100 GHz.
New Prenylated ortho‐Dihydroxycoumarins from the Fruits of Ficus nipponica

Two new prenylated ortho‐dihydroxycoumarins, designated fipsomin (1) and fipsotwin (2), were isolated from the fruits of Ficus nipponica together with a known prenylated coumarin, apigravin (3). Their structures were established by spectroscopic data and X‐ray crystallographic analysis. Compound 1 exhibited antibacterial activity against Bacillus subtilis with an MIC value of 61 μm, while 2 and 3 showed very weak activity.
A Comparison of Color Metrics

Color differences are almost always described by DE in Lab color space. This space, defined by the 1976 CIE report, is calculated using the Tristimulus values X, Y, Z, defined in the CIE 1931 report. Further, a complex image is often evaluated by averaging the individual ∆ Es to calculate a Color Metric for the color difference between two images. The experiments in this paper generate triplets of images: one is defined as “Original” the other two as “Repro-ductions. ” Each area in the “Reproduction” differs from the “Original” by a constant ∆ E. The goal of the experiments is to see if some choices of colors make better repro-ductions than others. The results show that color metrics comparing color differences across edges within the same image predict better reproductions than color metrics comparing absolute Lab values of corresponding areas in different images.
A 260mV L-shaped 7T SRAM with bit-line (BL) Swing expansion schemes based on boosted BL, asymmetric-VTH read-port, and offset cell VDD biasing techniques

This work proposes bit-line (BL) swing expansion schemes (BL-EXPD), which minimize the product (A*VDDmin) of SRAM cell area (A) and the minimum operation voltage (VDDmin) to the best of our knowledge. The key-enablers to minimize A*VDDmin are: L-shaped 7T cell (L7T) and BL-EXPD. The L7T features: (1) an area efficient cell layout, (2) a read-disturb free decoupled 1T read port (RP), and (3) a half-select disturb free write back scheme[1]. The BL-EXPD enables a 9× larger read-BL (RBL) swing at the 6σ point than that in our previously proposed Z8T[2] and allows single BL sensing to reduce cell area. A fabricated 65nm 256-row BL 32Kb L7T SRAM achieved a 260mV VDDmin. As a result, its A*VDDmin is ~50% lower than for Z8T and conventional 8T SRAM cells [3,4].
Isolation of H3N2 Swine Influenza Virus in South Korea

Swine influenza is a significant respiratory disease causing occasional reproductive problems in nïve swine herds. Although different subtypes of swine influenza virus (SIV) have been implicated in clinical outbreaks of swine influenza in Asian countries, no virus isolation has been made to identify SIV of subtypes other than the H1N1 subtype in the Korean swine population. In December 1998, an outbreak of acute respiratory disease was identified in a commercial swine farm located in the Kyunggi province of South Korea. A causative agent, which agglutinated rooster red blood cells, was detected from the lungs of 3 piglets from the index herd and was determined to be type A influenza virus using a commercial influenza virus typing kit. Hemagglutination activity (HA) of the isolates was completely inhibited by a swine antiserum against a recent US H3N2 SIV isolate (A/Sw/IA/41305/1998) but not by H1N1 swine antiserum (A/Sw/IA/1979). Reverse transcription–polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) revealed all 3 isolates were H3 SIV subtypes. Sequence analysis of hemagglutinin gene PCR products supported the belief that the Korean H3 SIV isolates were genetically similar to the known mammalian H3 influenza viruses. This is the first report on a clinical outbreak of swine influenza caused by the H3N2 virus in Korea.
Syringyl-Rich Lignin Renders Poplars More Resistant to Degradation by Wood Decay Fungi

ABSTRACT In order to elucidate the effects of lignin composition on the resistance of wood to degradation by decay fungi, wood specimens from two transgenic poplar lines expressing an Arabidopsis gene encoding ferulate 5-hydroxylase (F5H) driven by the cinnimate-4-hydroxylase promoter (C4H::F5H) that increased syringyl/guaiacyl (S/G) monolignol ratios relative to those in the untransformed control wood were incubated with six different wood decay fungi. Alterations in wood weight and chemical composition were monitored over the incubation period. The results showed that transgenic poplar lines extremely rich in syringyl lignin exhibited a drastically improved resistance to degradation by all decay fungi evaluated. Lignin monomer composition and its distribution among cell types and within different cell layers were the sole wood chemistry parameters determining wood durability. Since transgenic poplars with exceedingly high syringyl contents were recalcitrant to degradation, where wood durability is a critical factor, these genotypes may offer improved performance.