Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Dengue virus serotypes in Jamaica, 2003-2007.

BACKGROUND Dengue virus (DENV) infection is increasing in prevalence and severity globally. The severity of dengue is influenced by several factors including the immune response, viral and host genetic factors. METHOD The DENV serotypes were determined in 770 serum samples from dengue immunoglobulin (Ig) M antibody positive (n = 469), dengue IgM negative (n = 185) and dengue antibody negative (n = 116) patients with suspected dengue who presented during (n = 150) or after (n = 620) the acute phase of illness during 2003-2007. Dengue antibodies were detected by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays and DENV RNA by reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) performed on serum and cell culture supernatants of C6/36 mosquito cells inoculated with acute phase serum (n = 150). RESULTS Based on serological profiles, 41% of acute phase sera and 66% of post acute sera were from patients with current primary or secondary dengue, while 41% and 35% of acute and post-acute phase sera, respectively, were from patients with secondary dengue or past exposure only. Dengue virus RNA was found in 20/770 samples (2.6%). Only 1.5% (9/620) of sera collected after the acute phase of illness tested positive for DENV RNA compared with 2.6% (4/150) of sera collected during the acute phase and 7.3% of cell culture supernatants inoculated with acute phase serum (11/150, p = 0.001). All four serotypes including DENV-1 (3/20, 15%), DENV-2 (7/20, 35%), DENV-3 (3/20, 15%) and DENV-4 (7/20, 35%) were identified over the five-year period. These results also showed that DENV-1, 2 and 4 were present during 2007 and that DENV-2 and DENV- 4 were the likely causative viruses of the 2007-2008 dengue outbreak in Jamaica. The three strains of DENV-3 were isolated from infants less than three years of age with primary infection during 2006. CONCLUSION This study highlights the increasing threat of dengue and severe dengue disease to the Jamaican population. Preventative measures including laboratory surveillance and vector control should be strictly maintained at the highest level.
Efficient Space Management for B-tree Structure-Modification Operations

In this paper, we present a new technique to manage the updating and logging of the space-map page when allocating and deallocating pages for B-link-tree structure modification (SM) operations such as page splits or page merges. In this technique, page allocation/deallocation and tree-structure modification operation are executed and logged separately using redo-undo and redo-only log records, respectively, and implemented as a nested-top-action. This technique enhances concurrency, avoids the problem of incorrect information in space-map page, and eliminates the need for a garbage-collection process
Exploiting parallelism for convolutional connections in processing-in-memory architecture

Deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are widely adopted in intelligent systems with unprecedented accuracy but at the cost of a substantial amount of data movement. Although recent development in processing-in-memory (PIM) architecture seeks to minimize data movement by computing the data at the dedicated nonvolatile device, how to jointly explore the computation capability of PIM and utilize the highly parallel property of neural network remains a critical issue. This paper presents Para-CONV, that exploits parallelism for deterministic convolutional connections in PIM architecture. Para-CONV achieves data-level parallelism for convolutions by fully utilizing the on-chip processing engine (PE) in PIM. The objective is to minimize data movement and data fetching from off-PE DRAM for inter-PE communications. We formulate this data allocation problem as a dynamic programming model and obtain an optimal solution. Para-CONV is evaluated through a set of benchmarks from both real-life CNN applications and synthetic task graphs. The experimental results show that Para-CONV can significantly improve the throughput and reduce data movement compared with the baseline scheme.
Dynamics and Seasonality in Quarterly Panel Data: An Analysis of Earnings Mobility in Spain

In this paper I present an empirical analysis of the dynamics of individual earnings using Spanish quarterly earnings. I propose a new econometric methodology to control for the seasonality in my dataset. Moreover, I apply this methodology to the study of earnings mobility in Spain, using transition probabilities among earnings quintiles for the period 1985-1996. I find substantial mobility from one year to the next. However, earnings changes are basically among adjacent quintiles. Workers with university education are more mobile than workers with primary and secondary education. On the other hand, I observe greater negative mobility among earnings quintiles and more persistence of low earnings situations over the nineties, and especially for workers with primary education.
The copy number of plasmid pLS1 is regulated by two trans‐acting plasmid products: the antisense RNA II and the repressor protein, RepA

The promiscuous plasmid pLS1 encodes two transacting elements that regulate its copy number: protein RepA and antisense RNA II. In vitro transcription showed that RNAs for both repressors are synthesized from two promoters, PAB and PII From PAB, genes encoding RepA (transcriptional repressor) and RepB (initiator of replication) are cotranscribed, the target of RepA being located within PAB Mutants in repA or in PAB are still sensitive to RepA. However, cloning of the repA gene in a compatible replicon did not result in incompatibility towards pLS1. From PII, the 50‐nucleotide RNA II is synthesized. The main incompatibility determinant towards pLS1 corresponds to the coding sequence for RNA II. The RNA II target could be reduced to 21 nucleotides, including the RepB initiation of translation signals. We propose that plasmids of the pLS1 family (pE194, pADB201, and pLB4) share functional and structural characteristics for the regulation of their copy numbers.
Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia in a child with familial Pelger‐Huet anomaly

A case of familial Pelger‐Huet anomaly in a 3‐year‐old boy with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia is described. This unique association was investigated through serial observations of the peripheral blood smear and bone marrow obtained during the child's treatment with chemotherapy. The average lobe index (ALI) of neutrophils was 1·42 with no three‐lobed forms at the time of the initial diagnosis. During antimetabolite maintenance therapy with 6‐mercaptopurine and methotrexate the ALI was 1·87 and three‐lobed forms were present. The behaviour of the P‐HA cells to heat induced radial hypersegmentation of the nucleus was examined in other family members. The mechanism by which heat and folate deficiency induce neutrophil segmentation is preserved in the familial Pelger‐Huet anomaly.
Automatic Measurements of Surface Resistance of Superconductors using Two Modes in a Dielectric Rod Resonator

An automatic measurements system is developed to measure the temperature T dependence of the surface resistance Rs of high Tc superconductors, by using two resonant modes TE012 and TE021 in a dielectric rod resonator placed between these two parallel plates. The relative permitivity and loss tangent of the dielectric rod, in addition to Rs, can be determined separately from measuring the resonant frequency and unloaded Q for these modes only one time as a function of T. It is demonstrated that excellent reproducibility of measurements can be obtained.
From Jollibee to BeeBee: “Lifestyle” and Chronic Illness in Southeast Asia

Throughout Southeast Asia, the number of people living with chronic conditions and degenerative disease has increased proportionately and absolutely. Public health interventions and effective medical treatment and surgeries have increased life expectancy. Concurrently, social and economic conditions have led to the rapid escalation of lifelong illnesses, characterized as “lifestyle” conditions. Drawing on ethnographic and survey research conducted in Southeast Asia, the authors illustrate the multiple factors contributing to people’s health. Changes in food production; the organization, nature, and conditions of work; living conditions; and other factors affecting contemporary living increase vulnerability to noncommunicable diseases. These factors are largely beyond the control of most people. Efforts to reduce chronic illnesses predominantly focus on individual interventions, overlooking the lack of individual capacity to address the structural and institutional factors that compromise people’s health.
Information Use in a Business Game

The use of information is studied by altering the available information for firms playing a business game. It is found that the firms used information about market demand and the exact number of periods that the game is played, but to a lesser extent information in reports. The alterations of available information did not have a significant effect on profits. The decisions in the business game can generally be characterized by dispersion and rigidity, which is similar to what has been observed in real markets.
Water management in India: the multiplicity of views and solutions

Abstract There is very limited scientific evidence to support some of the ideas in the water sector that guide India’s government policies in these sectors. Further, the interdisciplinary perspective required for the design of economic instruments, institutions, and laws and regulations to implement existing policies is lacking in social scientists. This article discusses the growing debate on water management options for India, the tone and tenor of policy debate and the inconsistency. It summarizes 10 scholarly articles from various authors which reflect the multiplicity of views on water issues and solutions for water management in the country.
An improved denoising method for speech signal

Collected the speech signal that mixed with large quantity noise will seriously influence the signal processing and analysis with affected of environment, equipment and voice clarity and so on. Based on wavelet packet and rearrangement distribution of de-noising scheme is raised to the white noise of the speech signal. Simulation results show that this scheme effectively reduce the white noise of the speech signal and obtain satisfied signal spectrum in low SNR.
Characterizing the climate issue context in Mexico: reporting on climate change in Mexican newspapers, 1996–2009

Mexico stands out as an exception in the climate policy arena. In 2012, the Mexican government legislated a long-term greenhouse gas emissions reduction target, a feat which other large emerging economies (and many industrialized countries) have not been able to match. An analysis of newspaper coverage of climate change in Mexico from 1996 to 2009 offers insight on the issue context within which Mexico pursued its unilateral action. Like in many developing countries, climate change news coverage in Mexico increased steadily over the 15-year study period, with a significant increase in attention to the issue in 2007. Initially, news coverage of climate change in Mexico was dominated by framings tying climate change to weather patterns and adverse impacts at national and sub-national levels. As news coverage of the climate issue matured, there was an increase in frames linking climate change to domestic economic and energy concerns. A review of the secondary literature on climate change news coverage in other countries in the Global South suggests this domestic focus, in discussions both of climate impacts and of greenhouse gas emissions drivers, is unusual and may offer some insight into the antecedents of Mexico’s climate policy leadership.
Performance and Stability of Two‐Stage Anaerobic Digestion

The stability, capacity, and solids destruction efficiency of single versus two‐stage anaerobic digestion was studied in bench‐scale reactors using combined waste activated and primary sludge. Laboratory staged mesophilic digesters showed an improved volatile solids and volatile suspended solids destruction efficiency over a single‐stage system (at the same total solids retention time [SRT]) of approximately 3.2 and 5.8 percentage points, respectively. To quantify stability and capacity, a new digester monitoring method was introduced that measured the digester maximum acetate utilization capacity, V max, ac, and was used to investigate the potential for digester instability at different transient loadings. The ratio of the V max, ac value to the estimated acetate production rate for a given digester loading was termed the acetate capacity number (ACN). Values greater than 1.0 indicate excess acetate utilization capacity. The first stage of the laboratory two‐stage mesophilic system (10‐day SRT for each stage) had an ACN number of 1.3 compared with a value of 1.8 for the single‐stage 20‐day SRT digester. Thus, while a staged mesophilic system can improve solids destruction efficiency, it demonstrates a lower capacity for metabolizing highly variable loads.
Speech emotion recognition with skew-robust neural networks

We propose a neural-network training algorithm that is robust to data imbalance in classification. In our proposed algorithm, weights are introduced to training examples, effectively modifying the trajectory traversed in the parameter space during the learning process. Furthermore, the proposed algorithm would reduce to the normal stochastic gradient decent learning if the data is balanced. On the FAU-Aibo database, which is known to be used in Interspeech Emotion Challenge, the proposed method achieves an unweighted average (UA) recall rate of 45.3% on the 5-class speech emotion recognition task. Within the static modeling framework, where each example is represented as a fixed-length vector, this performance is one of the best performance ever achieved on the 5-class task.
Looking Back to the Future

Abstract The emergence of climate change as a central political issue around the world, along with growing concern for the environment more generally, has raised the challenge to achieve sustainability as a high order social goal. Yet over the 20 y since the publication of the landmark Brundtland Report on sustainable development, humanity has moved further away from sustainability in many important aspects, particularly at the global scale. This paper provides an overview of the current understanding of how the human-environment relationship has evolved through time, analyzes the quest for sustainability in contemporary society, and briefly explores the implications of these analyses for the trajectory of the human-environment relationship in the twenty-first century. The focus is on an Earth systems perspective. Exploration of the human-environment relationship through time shows a fundamental switch about 200 y ago, when human society shifted from being largely the recipient of changes in Earth system functioning to becoming a global geophysical force itself, rivaling the great forces of nature in magnitude. Contemporary human societies are now on a demonstrably nonsustainable trajectory, especially with regard to climate change, with no sign at the global scale of any change in trajectory. An analysis of the sustainability gap suggests that a crucial missing component in our quest for sustainability is a failure to engage the humanities, along with the biophysical and social sciences, economics, and technology, in the search for solutions. An examination of the ways in which past civilizations have responded to external stresses and the analysis of the contemporary sustainability gap have come to the same conclusion. Those societies that respond to environmental and other stresses by transformation rather than collapse have the capability to question their core values if they become dysfunctional and to drive fundamental shifts in those values, leading to more adaptive and resilient societies.
Government Policies and Sex Work Realities: : Human Trafficking in the Regulated Sex Industry

In the Netherlands selling sexual services for money is accepted by law under certain conditions. Some sex workers, however, are tricked out of their money by people using manipulation, fraud or coercion. This crime, the exploitation of sex workers, constitutes human trafficking.Several government agencies deal with the prevention and prosecution of human trafficking in the sex industry, and with the protection of victims. However, people who are identified as victims often decline the assistance that is offered to them. How can this be explained? Does it mean that the way in which human trafficking is dealt with fails to meet the needs and problems of sex workers? This dissertation explores these questions by zooming in on the red-light district in Amsterdam and reveals the relationships between pimps and sex workers, the informal economy and the criminal investigation of human trafficking. It shows that the perspective of sex workers on exploitation and on government policy is relevant for a better understanding of effective anti-trafficking policy.
Strength and functional characteristics of men and women 65 years and older.

BACKGROUND Resistance training programs for older adults (>65 years) are an effective method to counteract the loss of muscle mass, strength, and function associated with aging. Nevertheless, limited normative strength and functional data exist for the comparison and stratification of older adults. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to establish normative strength and functional data for males and females 64-69 years, 70-74 years, and 75+ years old, using commonly available equipment and procedures. METHODS At total of 110 males and 191 females completed upper and lower body strength and functional performance testing. Measurements were compared across gender and age groups (65-69, 70-74, and 75+ years). RESULTS All strength measures, absolute and relative (to body and lean muscle mass), were significantly (p < 0.01) greater in males compared with females. Additionally, younger participants were stronger (p < 0.01) compared with older participants. Similar findings were observed for the functional performance tests. Quartile ranking for relative strength and functional measures provides comparative data for clinical and research assessments. CONCLUSIONS This study provides additional normative data for strength and functional performance in males and females aged 65-69, 70-74, and 75+ years and confirms lower performance in females and with aging even when adjusted for lean muscle mass.
Quasi-static simulation method for evaluation of energy consumption in hybrid light rail vehicles

The presented article will describe an 'effect-cause' model for the purpose of simulating the energy consumption of DC fed light rail vehicles. The model will assess the advantages of hybrid vehicles in terms of energy consumption, network power and voltage variations, line current and losses; and will help sizing and designing a supercapacitor based energy storage system (ESS) for both on-board, and stationary applications. The proposed modeling needs to allow the ESS sizing according to the objective that needs to be achieved, being braking energy recovery, voltage drop compensation and peak power shaving the most common goals of ESS use in hybrid vehicles. The needed power and energy levels will vary in function of the vehicle features and the driving cycle followed. This all can be determined by the quasi-static simulation tool to ease the design process. Another objective of the modeling tool is to evaluate the behaviour of the vehicle power flow controller, which manages the power from/to the ESS in function of the state of several variables.
Timor-Leste’s foreign policy approach to the Timor Sea disputes: pipeline or pipe dream?

ABSTRACT Over recent years, Australia and Timor-Leste’s bilateral relationship has been consumed by contested maritime boundary claims in the resource-rich Timor Sea. Intractable disagreements over the right to build a petroleum export pipeline have led Timor-Leste to reinvigorate its pursuit of permanent maritime boundaries as ‘a national priority’. This article examines Timor-Leste’s interests in the Timor Sea and assesses its strategies for achieving its foreign policy goals. It argues that Timor-Leste’s attainment of its stated goals relies on Australia shifting its Timor Sea policy, which has been largely consistent since the 1970s. Timor-Leste’s key strategy is a public diplomacy campaign that positions permanent maritime boundaries as the final stage of its independence struggle, and presents Timor-Leste as owning the disputed Greater Sunrise gas field under international law. While the public diplomacy campaign aims to win enough Australian ‘hearts and minds’ to put pressure on the Australian government, it ultimately fails to negotiate the strategic and historical realities of the interests that define Australia’s realpolitik approach to the Timor Sea.
Prevention of bone loss in survivors of breast cancer: A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial.

BACKGROUND Few data are available on the safety and efficacy of once-weekly oral bisphosphonate therapy in breast cancer survivors. OBJECTIVE Our objective was to determine whether risedronate, 35 mg weekly, is efficacious and safe in preventing bone loss associated with chemotherapy-induced menopause. DESIGN The study was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial over 12 months. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS Participants included 87 newly postmenopausal women with status post chemotherapy, recruited from a breast cancer clinic in an academic medical center. INTERVENTION Participants were randomly assigned to receive risedronate 35 mg/wk or placebo. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES The primary outcomes were the 12-month changes in spine and hip bone mineral density. Secondary outcomes included changes in markers of bone resorption (urine N-telopeptide cross-linked collagen type I) and formation (osteocalcin, N-terminal propeptide of type I procollagen, and bone-specific alkaline phosphatase). RESULTS After 12 months, bone mineral density increased by 1.2% at the spine and 1.3% at the hip in women on risedronate vs. significant decreases for women in the placebo group of 0.9% at the spine and 0.8% at the hip (P < 0.01, difference between groups). N-telopeptide cross-linked collagen type I, a marker of bone resorption, decreased by 19.3%, and N-terminal propeptide of type I procollagen, a marker of bone formation, decreased by 26.6% in participants on active therapy compared with increases in the control group. Risedronate was well tolerated, and the retention rate was 95% at 1 yr. CONCLUSIONS Risedronate once weekly prevented bone loss and reduced bone turnover in women with breast cancer treated with chemotherapy. Early measures to prevent bone loss should be considered in this cohort of breast cancer survivors.