Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prophylactic tranexamic acid in low‐risk parturients

Sir, We read with interest the meta-analysis regarding prophylactic use of tranexamic acid (TXA) in low-risk parturients by Heesen et al. The authors claim that the meta-analysis was based on ‘high quality–low bias’ studies. We question this statement and are concerned about several issues with the included studies in terms of registration, allocation concealment and blinding, sample size calculation, as well as definition and follow-up on secondary outcomes. None of the studies were registered in a public trial registry before recruitment of the first subject. The anaesthetist was not blinded in the study of Shahid and Khan. The method of allocation concealment and blinding is missing in one study, and labelling of infusion bags as A or B may introduce bias in another study. Sample size calculation is missing in two studies and impossible to reproduce in four. All studies lack definition and systematic follow-up on secondary outcomes. The mode of data collection is generally insufficient. Only three studies state the timing when thromboembolic events were recorded. In at least three studies, the assessors of thromboembolic events were not blinded. Information on patients lost to follow-up is also missing. Transfusion policy was only specified by Movafegh et al. and Xu et al. Transfusion in both studies was performed at Hb < 8 g/dl. However, information on the number of patients actually transfused is missing in one of them. Only three studies provide data on post-partum haemorrhage (PPH). Two of the studies define PPH as blood loss > 1000 ml after both vaginal delivery and caesarean section, while the third one defines PPH as blood loss > 500 ml after elective caesarean section, likely explaining the extraordinary high PPH rate of > 30% in this study. In conclusion, we do not agree that this metaanalysis is based on high quality–low bias studies and question the inclusion of studies with insufficient allocation concealment and blinding, as well as the value of the meta-analysis of thromboembolic events, transfusion rate and PPH. We acknowledge that the author’s conclusion regarding estimated blood loss seems robust in a selected group of healthy parturients without risk factors for thromboembolism and PPH undergoing normal labour or elective caesarean section. We question, though, whether a reduced blood loss by 100–200 ml is clinically relevant in this population. Twice as many women die from thromboembolism compared with PPH in a western country, and conclusion about thromboembolic side effects of prophylactic TXA cannot be drawn yet. TXA crosses the placenta readily, and giving TXA prophylactic implies considerations regarding yet unknown side effects on the neonate, too. We agree with the authors of this review that further evidence about therapeutic use of TXA in PPH is keenly awaited. Prophylactic use of TXA in healthy parturients remains experimental.
Properties of dust in the Martian atmosphere from the Imager on Mars Pathfinder

The Imager for Mars Pathfinder (IMP) returned sequences of images of the Martian sky characterizing the size distribution, optical constants, and nature of the aerosols suspended in the atmosphere of Mars. These sequences were executed when the solar elevation angle was approximately 15° and consisted of images near the elevation of the Sun, spanning a range in azimuth from about 4° to 180° from the Sun. Images were obtained at four wavelengths from 444 to 965 nm. From one sequence of observations, results are shown from a comparison of absolute photometry of the Martian sky with multiple scattering models. Results include the following. (1) The geometric cross-section-weighted mean particle radius is 1.6 ± 0.15 μm almost independent of the assumed width (variance) of the size distribution. (2) The imaginary refractive index shows a steep increase with wavelength from 670 nm to shorter wavelengths, and a shallow increase toward longer wavelengths, consistent with the reflection spectrum observed by IMP for Martian soil. (3) For each assumed variance, two parameters governing the slope and curvature of the portion of the phase function due to internally transmitted light are found uniquely as functions of wavelength. (4) The variance of the gamma size distribution is difficult to constrain from these observations alone. The shape of the single scattering phase functions derived from the IMP observations is compared to laboratory measurements of powder samples. One sample of irregular particles has a single scattering phase function quite similar to that derived for Mars. Overall, the results for the mean cross-section-weighted size and imaginary refractive index as a function of wavelength are in remarkably good agreement with the revised analysis by Pollack et al. [1995] of the observations made by the Viking lander 20 years earlier.
Surface deformation resulting from subduction and slab detachment

Convergence of lithospheric plates is accommodated at active margins by one plate moving beneath the other into the Earth's mantle. Changes in this subduction process may cause variations in the topography of the Earth's surface near a convergent plate margin. The focus of this thesis lies on surface displacements which occur during ongoing subduction and in the final stages of a subduction process. During continuing subduction, surface displacements may, for example, be due to changes in buoyancy or plate velocity. In the last phase of a subduction process, surface uplift may result from detachment of subducted lithosphere from the lithosphere at the surface. This study was motivated by indications of slab detachment in regional tomographic images of the Mediterranean region. In general, study of the dynamics of subduction may add to understanding the origin of processes at the Earth's surface, for example, the formation of mountains and basins. Vice versa, analysis of surface data may contribute to insight in the physics of subduction.
Mitigation of Radiation Effects in SRAM-Based FPGAs for Space Applications

The use of static random access memory (SRAM)-based field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) in harsh radiation environments has grown in recent years. These types of programmable devices require special mitigation techniques targeting the configuration memory, the user logic, and the embedded RAM blocks. This article provides a comprehensive survey of the literature published in this rich research field during the past 10 years. Furthermore, it can also serve as a tutorial for space engineers, scientists, and decision makers who need an introduction to this topic.
The Effectiveness of Crataegus orientalis M Bieber. (Hawthorn) Extract Administration in Preventing Alveolar Bone Loss in Rats with Experimental Periodontitis

The purpose of this animal study was to evaluate the effects of hawthorn (Crataeus orientalis M Bieber.) extract on serum oxidative status and alveolar bone loss in experimental periodontitis. Twenty-seven Wistar rats were assigned to one of the following groups: non- ligated+placebo (saline) (NL, n = 9), ligature only+placebo (saline) (LO, n = 9), and ligature and treated with hawthorn extract in saline (H, n = 9) (100 mg/kg orogastrically, once a day for 11 days). Periodontitis was induced by submerging a 4/0 silk ligature in the sulcus of the mandibular right first molars of rats, and the animals were sacrificed after 11 days. Micro-CT examinations were performed for linear and volumetric parameter assessment of alveolar bone. Periodontal tissues were histopathologically examined to assess the differences among the study groups. Levels of serum total antioxidant status (TAS)/total oxidant status (TOS), and oxidative stress index (OSI) were also analyzed. Alveolar bone loss was significantly reduced by hawthorn administration compared to LO group (p<0.05). The number of inflammatory cells and osteoclasts in the LO group was significantly higher than that of the NL and H groups (p< 0.05). The number of osteoblasts in the LO and H groups was significantly higher than that of the NL group (p<0.05). TOS and OSI levels were significantly reduced in H group compared to LO group (P <0.05) and TAS levels were similar in H and NL group (p< 0.05). Hawthorn extract showed inhibitory effect on periodontal inflammation and alveolar bone loss by regulating TAS, TOS and OSI levels in periodontal disease in rats when administered systemically.
A process‐based model for methane emission predictions from flooded rice paddies

Estimation and prediction of methane emission from flooded rice paddies is impaired by the large spatial and temporal variability in methane emissions and by the dynamic nonlinear relations between processes underlying methane emissions. This paper describes a process‐based model on methane emission prediction from flooded rice paddies that can be used for extrapolation. The model is divided into two compartments; rhizosphere, which is a function of root length density, and bulk soil. The production of carbon substrates drives methane emission and originates from soil organic matter mineralization, organic fertilizer decomposition, in both compartments, and root exudation and root decay, in the rhizosphere compartment only. It is assumed that the methanogens are completely outcompeted for acetate by nitrate and iron reducers but that competition takes place with sulfate reducers. Produced methane is transported to the root surface in the rhizosphere or the soil‐water interface in the bulk soil. Transport time coefficients are different for the two compartments. Part of the methane is oxidized, a constant fraction of produced methane in the bulk soil, whereas the oxidation fraction varies according to root activity dynamics in the rhizosphere. The remaining methane is emitted to the atmosphere. The model was validated with independent field measurements of methane emissions at sites in the Philippines, China, and Indonesia with only few generally available site‐specific input parameters. The model properly predicts methane emission dynamics and total seasonal methane emission for the sites in different seasons and under different inorganic and organic fertilizer conditions. A sensitivity analysis on model assumptions showed that the assumptions made in this model are reasonable and that the division into two compartments was necessary to obtain good results with this model. The combination of proper prediction and the necessity of few input parameters allow model application at regional and global scales.
Diagnosis and management of chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalitis in black and minority ethnic people: a qualitative study

Aim This study aims to explore the possible reasons for the lower levels of diagnosis of chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalitis (CFS/ME) in the black and minority ethnic (BME) population, and the implications for management. Background Population studies suggest CFS/ME is more common in people from BME communities compared with the White British population. However, the diagnosis is made less frequently in BME groups. Methods Semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with 35 key stakeholders in NW England. Interviews were analysed using open explorative thematic coding. Findings There are barriers at every stage to the diagnosis and management of CFS/ME in people from BME groups. This begins with a lack of awareness of CFS/ME among BME respondents. Religious beliefs and the expectation of roles in the family and community mean that some people in BME groups may choose to manage their symptoms outside primary care using alternative therapies, prayer or spiritual healing. When accessing primary care, all participants recognised the possible influence of language barriers in reducing the likelihood of a diagnosis of CFS/ME. Stereotypical beliefs, including labels such as ‘lazy’ or ‘work shy’ were also believed to act as a barrier to diagnosis. Patients highlighted the importance of an on-going relationship with the general practitioner (GP), but perceived a high turnover of GPs in inner city practices, which undermined the holistic approach necessary to achieve a diagnosis. Conclusion Training is required for health professionals to challenge inaccurate assumptions about CFS/ME in BME groups. The focus on the individual in UK primary care may not be appropriate for this group due to the role played by the family and community in how symptoms can be presented and managed. Culturally sensitive, educational resources for patients are also needed to explain symptoms and legitimise consultation.
Oral tranexamic acid for the treatment of melasma.

BACKGROUND Melasma poses a great challenge as its treatment is unsatisfactory and recurrence is high. Treatment of melasma using tranexamic acid (oral, topical or intralesional) is a novel concept. OBJECTIVE To compare the efficacy of oral tranexamic acid with routine topical therapies for the treatment of melasma. METHODS It is a prospective, interventional, randomized controlled trial conducted among 260 melasma patients. Patients were divided into two groups consisting of 130 patients each. First group (Group A) was given routine treatment measures and oral Tranexamic Acid while second group (Group B) was treated only with routine topical measures. Capsule Tranexamic Acid was prescribed at a dose of 250 mg twice a day for three months and cases were followed for three months. Response was evaluated on the basis of Melasma Assessment Severity Index (MASI). Mean scores between the two groups were then compared. RESULTS Statistically significant decrease in the mean Melasma Assessment Severity Index from baseline to 8 and 12 weeks was observed among group A patients (11.08±2.91 vs 8.95±2.08 at week 8 and vs. 7.84±2.44 at week 12; p<0.05 for both). While among group B patients the decrease in mean score was significant at 8 weeks and insignificant at 12 weeks follow up (11.60±3.40 vs 9.9±2.61 at 8 weeks and vs. 9.26±3 at 12 weeks; p<0.05 for former but p>0.05 for later). CONCLUSION Addition of oral tranexamic acid provides rapid and sustained improvement in the treatment of melasma.
Effect of Head Orientation on the Diagnostic Sensitivity of Posturography in Patients with Compensated Unilateral Lesions

Patients with compensated unilateral vestibular lesions often have no detectable abnormality on conventional posturography. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a change in head orientation could improve the diagnostic sensitivity of the test for these patients. Twenty-four patients with known unilateral vestibulopathy and twenty-four normal controls were tested on the EqulTest apparatus in four head positions: head centered, head tilted right, head tilted left, and head extended. The sensory organization test was performed for each head position, using a single trial for each sensory condition. The test sequence was randomized to account for simple order effects. The subject's equilibrium was quantified by a performance index and a composite score of all sensory conditions was calculated for each head position. Patients with unilateral vestibulopathy had more postural sway with the head tilted contralateral to the side of lesion. The difference between the mean composite scores for ipsilateral and contralateral head tilts was statistically significant (p < 0.05). When individual trials were compared, equilibrium scores were significantly different only for sensory conditions that required vestibular input. Head extension increased postural sway in both patients and controls. Equilibrium scores were significantly different for all sensory conditions in which the support was sway-referenced. We suggest that the results of head extension in patients are similar to those found in normal individuals. However, equilibrium scores for right-left head flits are sensitive to the side of lesion and can provide additional information for patients with unilateral vestibulopathy.
MICROZONATION FOR SEISMIC GEOTECHNICAL HAZARDS AND ACTUAL DAMAGE DURING THE 2005 FUKUOKA-KEN SEIHO-OKI EARTHQUAKE

The 2005 Fukuoka-ken Seiho-oki earthquake caused damage to structures due to liquefaction, slope failure and strong shaking in Fukuoka City. One of the authors had conducted microzonation for liquefaction, slope failure and strong shaking about 17 years before the earthquake. After the earthquake, the authors compared the zoning map with the actual damage. The results showed that liqueˆed sites coincided fairly well with predicted zones in the reclaimed lands. However, they were slightly diŠerent in a big sand spit named Uminonakamichi. Failure occurred at several slopes inside the predicted areas, while damage to buildings occurred due to strong shaking along the Kego Fault. The damaged area was slightly diŠerent from the predicted area. Furthermore, a liquefaction analysis was conducted and the results of this analysis were compared with the results of microzonation in 1988. In this paper, the authors discuss the validity of microzonation based on this comparison.
Information fusion in wireless sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are commonly treated as a distributed database system that is accessed by means of a query language. However, the computation of such queries are usually performed by information fusion techniques. Information fusion has been used by applications to detect/classify events, track targets, and filter noisy measurements. In this tutorial, we discuss some of the information fusion techniques that are currently used in WSNs.
Expressiveness of Rectifier Networks

Rectified Linear Units (ReLUs) have been shown to ameliorate the vanishing gradient problem, allow for efficient backpropagation, and empirically promote sparsity in the learned parameters. They have led to state-of-the-art results in a variety of applications. However, unlike threshold and sigmoid networks, ReLU networks are less explored from the perspective of their expressiveness. This paper studies the expressiveness of ReLU networks. We characterize the decision boundary of two-layer ReLU networks by constructing functionally equivalent threshold networks. We show that while the decision boundary of a two-layer ReLU network can be captured by a threshold network, the latter may require an exponentially larger number of hidden units. We also formulate sufficient conditions for a corresponding logarithmic reduction in the number of hidden units to represent a sign network as a ReLU network. Finally, we experimentally compare threshold networks and their much smaller ReLU counterparts with respect to their ability to learn from synthetically generated data.
ITS policy strategies for urban regions: a creative exploration

This paper explores future concepts of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) for passenger transport. ITS systems are divided into the three main categories: Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), Advanced Traveler Information Systems (ATIS) and Advanced Traffic Management Systems (ATMS). There is much evidence that future ITS concepts will depend upon technological improvement of ADAS and integration between ADAS and ATMS and ATIS. To explore the future of ITS concepts the method of morphological analysis is used. The outcome of this analysis has resulted in five sets of plausible ITS concepts that range from an ITS based public transport scenario to controlled car driving within activity areas of urban regions.
Zonas de subducción y vulcanismo asociado en el nororiente de Suramérica

El oriente del Pacifico ecuatorial esta sujeto a mecanismos de separacion en la placa oceanica generando subduccion. Se observa que un hotspot es la causa de la formacion de las islas Galapagos asi como de otras caracteristicas asismicas en las placas segmentadas que estan siendo subducidas. Una parte de la corteza oceanica ha sido abducida a lo largo de las costas de Colombia y Ecuador dando origen a la cordillera occidental. Algunos estudios de la ofiloita y muestras de roca indican consistencia con datos de refraccion marina. Un modelo sismico sintetico contribuye al conocimiento de la estructura de la corteza oceanica. Las rocas volcanicas en la parte norte de la cordillera de Los Andes estan correlacionadas con la inclinacion de la zona de Benioff la cual muestra coherencia entre el vulcanismo andesitico observado y la subduccion que se esta presentando en esta compleja area del noroccidente de Suramerica.
Employees' use of social media technologies: a methodological and thematic review

With the ubiquity of social media in all aspects of daily life, research interest in the topic has been on the rise. Within the existing body of research on these tools, part of the literature focuses on the use of social technologies by employees. This article employs a systematic literature review methodology, with the objective of identifying the main methodologies and themes of research on employees' usage of social technologies. A total of 66 articles were included in this review, covering five major research themes, that is, legal aspects and policies, human resources management, knowledge management and sharing, learning, and communication. In terms of methodological choices, research on the use of social technologies by employees is found to be fragmented and in need of further quantitative studies, mixed-methods approaches, and theory-based research. Suggestions for future research are provided based on both thematic and methodological considerations.
UBF levels determine the number of active ribosomal RNA genes in mammals

In mammals, the mechanisms regulating the number of active copies of the ∼200 ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes transcribed by RNA polymerase I are unclear. We demonstrate that depletion of the transcription factor upstream binding factor (UBF) leads to the stable and reversible methylation-independent silencing of rRNA genes by promoting histone H1–induced assembly of transcriptionally inactive chromatin. Chromatin remodeling is abrogated by the mutation of an extracellular signal-regulated kinase site within the high mobility group box 1 domain of UBF1, which is required for its ability to bend and loop DNA in vitro. Surprisingly, rRNA gene silencing does not reduce net rRNA synthesis as transcription from remaining active genes is increased. We also show that the active rRNA gene pool is not static but decreases during differentiation, correlating with diminished UBF expression. Thus, UBF1 levels regulate active rRNA gene chromatin during growth and differentiation.
O petrografii i genezie gytii ze złoża węgla Bełchatów

W weglach brunatnych z gornej serii weglowej zloza Belchatow stwierdzono duzą ilośc weglanow (do 20%), na podstawie czego określono je jako gytie humusowe. Za pomocą badan petrograficznych oznaczono zawartośc glownych maceralow: atrynitu, densynitu i tekstynitu. Badania paleobotaniczne wykazaly, ze material fitogeniczny gytii pochodzi z obszaru bagnisk typu Bruch-Wald. ON PETROGRAPHY AND GENESIS OF GYTTJA IN THE BEŁCHATOW BROWN COAL DEPOSITS Carbonate-rich brown coals occurring in the upper coal series (Upper Miocene) in the Belchatow deposit are interpreted as of the humus gyttja type. The paper presents petrographic and micropaleontological characteristics of these coals, based on studies on their selected samples. Petrographic and quantitative micropetrographic (QMA) analyses made possible description of the major macerals and estimations of their qualitative share in gyttjas, and qualitative and quantitative characteristics of inorganic admixtures. The major macerals include atrinite, densinite and textinite, the share of which ranges from 10 to 50 weight % of all the components. The share of inorganic matter (mainly carbonates) is about 20 w. %. Micropaleontological studies showed that phytogenic material of the gyttjas comes from both Angiospermae and Coniferae , as well as Monocotyledonae and planktonic forms. The position of gyttjas in general mechanism of origin of the seam is discussed.