Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Procedural and Clinical Outcomes with Catheter-Based Plaque Excision in Critical Limb Ischemia

Purpose: To examine the safety and efficacy of catheter-based plaque excision as an alternative therapy to surgery, conventional angioplasty, and/or stenting in high-risk patients with critical limb ischemia (CLI). Methods: Between August 2003 and August 2004, a prospective evaluation was conducted of consecutive patients with CLI (Rutherford category ≥5) who were treated with endovascular plaque excision at 7 institutions. This study enrolled 69 patients (37 women; mean age 70±12 years, range 43–93) with CLI involving 76 limbs. Clinical outcomes were prospectively followed for 6 months. The primary endpoint was major adverse events (death, myocardial infarction, unplanned amputation, or repeat target vessel revascularization) at 30 days. Visible healing of ulcerated tissue, avoidance of any amputation, and performance of less extensive amputation than initially planned were also assessed. Results: Procedural success was achieved in 99% of cases. Major adverse events occurred in 1% of patients at 30 days and 23% at 6 months. The target lesion revascularization rate was 4%, and there were no unplanned limb amputations. Amputation was less extensive than initially planned or avoided altogether in 92% of patients at 30 days and 82% at 6 months. Conclusion: Catheter-based plaque excision is a safe and effective revascularization method for patients with CLI. These findings support further study of this modality as a singular or adjunctive endovascular therapy for limb salvage in CLI.
Antigen‐specific cytotoxic T cell and antigen‐specific proliferating T cell clones can be induced to cytolytic activity by monoclonal antibodies against T3

T3 is a human differentiation antigen expressed exclusively on mature T cells. In this study it is shown that anti‐T3 monoclonal antibodies, in addition to their capacity to induce T cells to proliferate, are able to induce antigen‐specific cytotoxic T lymphocyte clones to mediate antigen nonspecific cytotoxic activity. It is furthermore shown that anti‐T3 reagents are able to trigger lytic activity in T cell clones characterized as noncytotoxic antigen‐specific proliferating T cells. The data presented indicate that perturbation of T3 can trigger the lytic machinery in cytolytic as well as noncytolytic T cell clones.
Analysis of Correlated MRC With Transmit Antenna Selection Under η-μ Fading

A wireless link considering correlated maximal ratio combining and transmit antenna selection under the general $\eta$ – $\mu$ fading is analyzed. Exact and asymptotic expressions for the cumulative distributing function (CDF) and probability density function (PDF) are derived. These new results are used to evaluate the outage capacity and the asymptotic average bit error rate for different binary modulations. The obtained theoretical results are validated through Monte Carlo simulations.
Regional and National Variations in Reasons for Gluten Avoidance

Background: Although studies have assessed the prevalence of celiac disease (CD), less is known about the prevalence of gluten avoidance because of nonceliac gluten sensitivity (GS). The avoidance of foods other than gluten is also understudied in these 2 groups. Methods: Participants visiting a web site for information about a newly developed portable gluten detection device (Nima) were instructed to complete questions about food and gluten avoidance patterns. We assessed the relative proportion of CD and GS across world regions and United States (US) regions and determined the distribution of food avoidance patterns. Results: CD was reported in 6474 respondents and GS in 2597 respondents. Within the United States, the majority of avoiders of gluten reported having CD (69.8%), with the highest ratio of CD to GS in the Northeast (CD: 74.3%; GS: 25.7%) and the lowest in the West (CD: 67.1%; GS: 32.9%) (P<0.0001). Compared with the United States, all other countries had lower proportions of GS, with the lowest in Argentina (CD: 94.7%; GS: 5.3%; P<0.0001). Food avoidances other than gluten were reported by 25% of respondents, with avoidance in all categories more common in GS than CD (P<0.0001). Conclusion: There is a significant difference in the relative rates of CD and GS within the United States and worldwide. Food avoidance other than gluten seems to be a more common component of GS than CD. Future research should focus on the causes of these international and US regional differences and the significance of other food avoidances.
Gouttes, films et jets : quand les écoulements modèlent les interfaces

Soumises a des ecoulements, les interfaces des liquides peuvent subir des deformations importantes. Nous etudions dans la premiere partie les formes adoptees par des gouttes d'eau en chute dans l'air. En particulier, nous decrivons un mecanisme de desintegration des plus gros globules et proposons une loi d'evolution de cette forme. Nous nous penchons ensuite sur la dynamique de films fluides dans des environnements visqueux. Le temps de vie des antibulles est determine par le drainage du film d'air sous l'influence de la gravite. L'eclatement des films d'eau savonneuse ou d'air immerges dans un environnement tres visqueux est fortement affecte. Nous proposons un modele decrivant la dynamique de l'ouverture des trous dans ces films. Lors de l'eclatement, le fluide constituant le film est collecte dans un bourrelet qui, du fait de sa geometrie cylindrique et des ecoulements qu'il subit, se destabilise. Enfin, nous abordons le probleme de l'entrainement d'air lors de l'impact d'un jet liquide sur un bain du meme liquide. Nous montrons que le seuil d'entrainement est decale par l'evasement et le ralentissement du jet juste avant son impact. Un premier complement tente une approche experimentale simplifiee de la propulsion par un moteur pop-pop. Le second est un travail visant a comprendre le comportement de l'angle de contact dynamique au voisinage de la transition d'entrainement.
Séparation d'ondes en prospection sismique

Le probleme de la separation de melanges convolutifs de signaux a large bande de frequences recus sur une antenne de capteurs est courant en ts. Les signaux sismiques qui sont deterministes, colores et souvent correles (du fait des multi-trajets) s'inscrivent dans cette problematique ; la separation devant preceder toute interpretation. Si les techniques classiques menent souvent a de bons resultats, leurs limites peuvent surgir en contextes difficiles (ondes d'energies voisines et/ou de vitesses proches). Dans ce manuscrit, la recherche d'alternatives a ces methodes nous a conduit a explorer deux voies nouvelles: l'une passe par l'extension a l'ordre trois des methodes parametriques de traitement d'antenne utilisant les proprietes du maximum de vraisemblance, l'autre consiste en un traitement aveugle exploitant certains des concepts de la separation aveugle de sources independantes. Ces deux methodes ont ete appliquees a des donnees reelles issues de differentes experimentations sismiques. Le traitement aveugle effectue dans le domaine frequenciel est divise en deux etapes: la 1ere consiste a separer a tout canal de frequence les contributions des differentes ondes: apres avoir fourni une parametrisation de la matrice de propagation generale s'affranchissant de toute hypothese (onde plane ou autre), nous montrons qu'il est possible de retrouver les vecteurs directionnels des ondes recherchees en couplant la decomposition en valeurs propres (dvp) de la matrice interspectrale avec un critere de stationnarite local en distance de la phase des vecteurs d'ondes estimes. Ceci nous amene a detailler le principe de la dvp afin d'etablir les liens qui existent entre la base des vecteurs propres et celle des vecteurs directionnels. Nous discutons ensuite du pouvoir de resolution du filtrage matriciel, et expliquons pourquoi le cas d'ondes de meme energie est un cas critique. La seconde etape est dediee a la reconstruction: la classification est basee sur la continuite frequencielle de la phase des vecteurs d'ondes estimes
Sphere‐Derived Multipotent Progenitor Cells Obtained From Human Oral Mucosa Are Enriched in Neural Crest Cells

Although isolation of oral mucosal stromal stem cells has been previously reported, complex isolation methods are not suitable for clinical application. The neurosphere culture technique is a convenient method for the isolation of neural stem cells and neural crest stem cells (NCSCs); neurosphere generation is a phenotype of NCSCs. However, the molecular details underlying the isolation and characterization of human oral mucosa stromal cells (OMSCs) by neurosphere culture are not understood. The purpose of the present study was to isolate NCSCs from oral mucosa using the neurosphere technique and to establish effective in vivo bone tissue regeneration methods. Human OMSCs were isolated from excised human oral mucosa; these cells formed spheres in neurosphere culture conditions. Oral mucosa sphere‐forming cells (OMSFCs) were characterized by biological analyses of stem cells. Additionally, composites of OMSFCs and multiporous polylactic acid scaffolds were implanted subcutaneously into immunocompromised mice. OMSFCs had the capacity for self‐renewal and expressed neural crest‐related markers (e.g., nestin, CD44, slug, snail, and MSX1). Furthermore, upregulated expression of neural crest‐related genes (EDNRA, Hes1, and Sox9) was observed in OMSFCs, which are thought to contain an enriched population of neural crest‐derived cells. The expression pattern of α2‐integrin (CD49b) in OMSFCs also differed from that in OMSCs. Finally, OMSFCs were capable of differentiating into neural crest lineages in vitro and generating ectopic bone tissues even in the subcutaneous region. The results of the present study suggest that OMSFCs are an ideal source of cells for the neural crest lineage and hard tissue regeneration.
Constellations matched to the Rayleigh fading channel

We introduce a new technique for designing signal sets matched to the Rayleigh fading channel, In particular, we look for n-dimensional (n/spl ges/2) lattices whose structure provides nth-order diversity. Our approach is based on a geometric formulation of the design problem which in turn can be solved by using a number-geometric approach. Specifically, a suitable upper bound on the pairwise error probability makes the design problem tantamount to the determination of what is called a critical lattice of the body S={x=(x/sub 1/, /spl middot//spl middot//spl middot/, x/sub n/)/spl isin/R/sup n/, |/spl Pi//sub i=1//sup n/x/sub i/|/spl les/1}. The lattices among which we search for an optimal solution are the standard embeddings in R/sup n/ of the number ring of some totally real number field of degree n over Q. Simulation results confirm that this approach yields lattices with considerable coding gains.
Design of a Bidirectional Energy Storage System for a Vanadium Redox Flow Battery in a Microgrid with SOC Estimation

This paper used a Vanadium Redox flow Battery (VRB) as the storage battery and designed a two-stage topology of a VRB energy storage system in which a phase-shifted full bridge dc-dc converter and three-phase inverter were used, considering the low terminal voltage of the VRB. Following this, a model of the VRB was simplified, according to the operational characteristics of the VRB in this designed topology of a VRB energy storage system (ESS). By using the simplified equivalent model of the VRB, the control parameters of the ESS were designed. For effectively estimating the state of charge (SOC) of the VRB, a traditional method for providing the SOC estimation was simplified, and a simple and effective SOC estimation method was proposed in this paper. Finally, to illustrate the proper design of the VRB ESS and the proposed SOC estimation method, a corresponding simulation was designed by Simulink. The test results have demonstrated that this proposed SOC estimation method is feasible and effective for indicating the SOC of a VRB and the proper design of this VRB ESS is very reasonable for VRB applications.
Children with Craniopharyngioma

ABSTRACT. Pre‐ and postoperative growth was analyzed in 22 children with craniopharyngioma. In 19 children a growth failure preceded the diagnosis by a mean of 4 years. Six children were obese preoperatively. During the first 3 postoperative months relative weight increased 7gt;10% in 14/21 children (there was one surgical death). One year after surgery 13/21 were obese. Neither the size of the tumor nor the mode of surgery was decisive in the development of the obesity. Serum insulin and insulin‐like growth factor I (IGF‐I) were assessed in four children with growth hormone deficiency (GHD) who, after surgery for craniopharyngioma, were growing normally without GH substitution. One of them was normal in weight and had normal insulin and IGF‐I levels; the others were obese and had supranormal insulin and subnormal IGF‐I levels. One of the four and two other children with unsubstituted GHD reached final height SDS ‐0.8, ‐2.0 and ‐2.4. One child with normal postoperative GH response reached final height SDS ‐0.7. Final height SDS ≧‐2.5 was gained with GH substitution by 6/11 children. It was >2.0 SD below the height SDS expected from the heights of the parents in 7/11. An adequate monitoring of children's growth would lead to earlier diagnosis and probably better outcome.
A Framework for the Evaluation of Cybersecurity Effectiveness of Abu Dhabi Government Entities

Cyberspace has become one of the new frontiers for countries to demonstrate their power to survive in the digitized world. The UAE has become a major target for cyber conflicts due to the rapid increase in economic activity and technology. Further, the widespread use of internet in the region to the tune of 88% by the end of 2014 has exposed the critical infrastructure to all forms of cyber threats. In this dissertation, the researcher presents a detailed study of the existing cybersecurity defences globally and an investigation into the factors that influence effectiveness of cybersecurity defences in Abu Dhabi government entities. Further, the role of cybersecurity education, training and awareness in enhancing effectiveness of cybersecurity and the role of senior management in providing strategic direction to government entities on cybersecurity are evaluated in addition to determining the contribution of strategic planning and technology level in ensuring an effective cybersecurity system. The study has evaluated the level of Cybersecurity Effectiveness (CSE) in Abu Dhabi Government Entities and the results show that Science and Technology entity performed better than all other Entities with CSE Mean = 4.37 while Public Order showed the least performance with CSE Mean = 3.83 and the combined model of six factors with R-square value 0.317 after multiple regression implying that 32% change in CSE in the government entities is occurring due to the six (6) independent variables used in the study. Further, results show that management has the responsibility of putting in place strategies, frameworks and policies that respond appropriately to the prevention, detection and mitigation of cyberattacks. Results
Fiber interferometer combining sub-nm displacement resolution with miniaturized sensor head

The presented interferometer concept enables high-accuracy target displacement measurement in difficult accessible locations and the development of small fiber optic sensor to measure other physical parameters e.g. pressure, vibration, gravity force, etc. Furthermore, this configuration is basically insensitive to disturbances to the lead fiber between the passive sensor head and the measurement system including the electro-optical parts and the detection interferometer. Two test setups are built and tested to demonstrate the feasibility of high-speed measurement up to 50 kHz, low system drift of ∼0.5 nm over 500 s and a low displacement noise level down to 2.8 pm/V Hz.
Work-home interface stress: an important predictor of emotional exhaustion 15 years into a medical career

The importance of work-home interface stress can vary throughout a medical career and between genders. We studied changes in work-home interface stress over 5 yr, and their prediction of emotional exhaustion (main dimension of burn-out), controlled for other variables. A nationwide doctor cohort (NORDOC; n=293) completed questionnaires at 10 and 15 yr after graduation. Changes over the period were examined and predictors of emotional exhaustion analyzed using linear regression. Levels of work-home interface stress declined, whereas emotional exhaustion stayed on the same level. Lack of reduction in work-home interface stress was an independent predictor of emotional exhaustion in year 15 (β=−0.21, p=0.001). Additional independent predictors were reduction in support from colleagues (β=0.11, p=0.04) and emotional exhaustion at baseline (β=0.62, p<0.001). Collegial support was a more important predictor for men than for women. In separate analyses, significant adjusted predictors were lack of reduction in work-home interface stress among women, and reduction of collegial support and lack of reduction in working hours among men. Thus, change in work-home interface stress is a key independent predictor of emotional exhaustion among doctors 15 yr after graduation. Some gender differences in predictors of emotional exhaustion were found.
Contract Interpretation and Contextual Asymmetry

A problem in economic contract theory is to know when parties can create efficient investment incentives with contracts. A problem in legal contract theory is to develop rules to guide courts in interpreting contracts. These problems are related because the law’s interpretive rules affect how parties describe what they want to trade in their contracts, and when parties will offer evidence at trial of their ex ante intentions. The more illuminating contacts and evidence production are, the better contracting works. Hence, some interpretive rules are more efficient than others. We study these rules and show, among other things, that (a) an optimal interpretive rule trades off accuracy in recovering the parties’ ex ante intentions against the costs of contract writing and evidence production; (b) an optimal rule sometimes prevents parties from introducing relevant evidence and deters some parties from writing contracts (in these cases, communicating the parties’ intentions to an adjudicator would not be worth its costs); (c) different enforcement institutions — courts and arbitrators — exist in equilibrium; (d) contract writing and evidence production are substitutes, while enforcer expertise (appropriately defined) and contract writing are complements; (e) under an optimal enforcement scheme, parties need not give interpretive instructions to enforcers because the enforcers and the parties share the same goal (to create efficient incentives to invest); and (f) current courts are more interested in accuracy than in incentives, so parties may want to send interpretive instructions to them.
Better public housing management in Ghana : An approach to improve maintenance and housing quality

In Ghana, public housing which is provided mainly for government employees plays an important role in socio-economic development. For instance, civil servants are more likely to accept transfers to areas where their services are most needed. Unfortunately, attention to public housing in Ghana has diminished over the years largely due to shift in policy focus towards the enablement approach. That is, private-sector-led housing production. The result is that, public housing conditions and quality continuous to deteriorate due largely to lack of maintenance. This is evident in many research and news publications, and the visible signs of deterioration such as leaking roofs, rotten ceilings, cracked walls, faded paint, and dysfunctional electrical and plumbing systems. Therefore, this thesis proposes an approach to management by local authorities that may bring about maintenance and lead to better conditions/quality of public housing. The approach proposes a defined structure with roles, responsibilities and relationships for the district assembly, the district coordinating director, the housing unit of the local authority, the works department, and tenants. It outlines a defined protocol for addressing repairs and maintenance including mechanisms to receive and respond to everyday repairs from tenants. Furthermore, it proposes that district assemblies should be fully responsible for determining and collecting rents so as to ensure reliable and secure finance for maintenance. It recommends the participation of tenants in management through mechanisms such as regular meetings or tenant representatives. Finally, it recommends mechanisms such as planning, budgeting, and submission of annual accounts to monitor and ensure that rents are spent on maintenance.
Generating Business Intelligence Through Social Media Analytics: Measuring Brand Personality with Consumer-, Employee-, and Firm-Generated Content

Abstract Social media platforms provide an enormous public repository of textual data from which valuable information can be extracted. We show that firms can extract business intelligence from social media data bearing on an important business application, measuring brand personality. Specifically, we develop a text analytics framework that integrates different distinct sources of social media data generated by consumers, employees, and firms, to measure brand personality. Based on Elastic-Net regression analyses of a large corpus of social media data, including self-descriptions of 1,996,214 consumers who followed the sample of brands on social media, 312,400 employee reviews of the brands’ firms, and 680,056 brand official tweets, we develop a brand personality model that achieves prediction accuracy as high as 0.78. Among key insights, we find that the profile of individuals who choose to associate with brands on social media is an important predictor of brand personality; this provides the first real-world evidence for a consumer identity-brand personality link. We also identify a link between an organization’s internal corporate environment as perceived by employees and brand personality as judged by consumers. We further illuminate the practical implication of our predictive model by building a cloud-based information system that allows managers and analysts to explore and track personality of their own brands and their competitors’ brands.
Psychoanalysis, Phenomenological Anthropology and Religion

Preface. Acknowledgements. PART I: PSYCHOANALYSIS AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY. Religion after the critique of psychoanalysis. Psychology of religion as the study of the conflict between belief and unbelief. Myth as manifestation. Moral law and original sin in the light of psychoanalysis. Projection and intolerance versus symbolisation. Passion for the origin and quest for the original: ideology and religious truth. Experience of the divine, experience of God. PART II: CLINICAL PERSPECTIVE. Aspects of religious life. Jesus of Nazareth and the psychology of religion. The humanization of the priest. A psychological interpretation of the Antonian Phenomenon. Folk catholicism: its significance, value and ambiguities. The constitution of the subject and the trinitarian articulations of the Christian faith. Mental health and religion. The mysticism of Theresia of Avila (1515-1582). Religion, pathology, healing. Visions and apparitions: a psychological approach. Subject-index. Name-index.
An Extensive Evaluation of Portfolio Approaches for Constraint Satisfaction Problems

In the context of Constraint Programming, a portfolio approach exploits the complementary strengths of a portfolio of different constraint solvers. The goal is to predict and run the best solver(s) of the portfolio for solving a new, unseen problem. In this work we reproduce, simulate, and evaluate the performance of different portfolio approaches on extensive benchmarks of Constraint Satisfaction Problems. Empirical results clearly show the benefits of portfolio solvers in terms of both solved instances and solving time.