Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Asian/White differences in the relationship of maternal age to low birth weight: Analysis of the PRAMS Survey, 2004–2011

This study aimed to examine (a) maternal age patterns of low birth weight (LBW; birth weight < 2,500 g) for non-Hispanic (N-H) Asian and N-H White women, and (b) Asian–White gaps in LBW risk by maternal age and their mechanisms. Logistic regression analyses were performed on the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System data of N-H Asian and N-H White women who delivered their first singleton birth without birth defects in 13 states between 2004 and 2011. Ageand race/ethnicity-specific LBW risk was estimated, unadjusted and adjusted for maternal risk factors (e.g., marital status, maternal education, pregnancy intention, stress, maternal morbidities, smoking, and prenatal care) and their interactions with maternal age or race/ethnicity. The interaction between maternal age and race/ethnicity was statistically significant (p < .0001) with covariates and interactions held constant. N-H Asian women showed a reverse W-shaped maternal-age pattern of LBW with the highest risk in their late 30s (OR = 1.56, 95% CI [1.26, 1.94]) whereas N-H White women experienced a maternal age-related increase in LBW. N-H Asian women were more likely to deliver LBW infant than their N-H White counterparts between their late 20s and late 30s, with the greatest racial/ethnic gap in their late 20s (OR = 4.19, 95% CI [3.33, 5.29]). Preventive strategies should be developed targeting N-H Asian women aged 25 to 39 years to reduce the Asian–White disparities in LBW. Considering the known maternal risk factors failed to explain such disparities, future research is warranted to explore other risk factors unique to this at-risk population.
Accumulation of GD1α Ganglioside in MDA-MB-231 Breast Cancer Cells Expressing ST6GalNAc V

α-Series gangliosides define a particular sub-class of glycosphingolipids containing sialic acid α2,6-linked to GalNAc residue that was isolated as a minor compound from the brain. The sialyltransferase ST6GalNAc V was cloned from mouse brain and showed α2,6-sialyltransferase activity almost exclusively for GM1b, to form GD1α and is considered as the main enzyme involved in the biosynthesis of α-series gangliosides. Recently, ST6GALNAC5 was identified as one of the genes over-expressed in breast cancer cell populations selected for their ability to produce brain metastasis. However, the capacity of human breast cancer cells to produce α-series gangliosides has never been clearly demonstrated. Here, we show by stable transfection and MS-MS analysis of total glycosphingolipids that ST6GALNAC5 expressing MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells accumulate GD1α ganglioside (IV3Neu5Ac1, III6Neu5Ac1Gg4-Cer).
A Software and Integration Process Model for Offshore Vessels

Mobile Offshore Units (MOUs) are increasingly dependent on complex software-based controls and automation. However, the industry has been slow to adapt to this software-intensive environment. Delays in commissioning and operational downtime due to software and integration problems are commonplace. This article describes a new standard, OS D-203, Integrated Software Dependent Systems (ISDS), developed by DNV to help ensure the delivery of MOUs with greater reliability, availability, and safety. DNV's new rule helps to address both software and integration issues. This article provides an overview of ISDS and explains its relationship to the CMMI as well as Component-Based Software Engineering.
Model Checking Paxos in Spin

We present a formal model of a distributed consensus algorithm in the executable specification language Promela extended with a new type of guards, called counting guards, needed to implement transitions that depend on majority voting. Our formalization exploits abstractions that follow from reduction theorems applied to the specific case-study. We apply the model checker Spin to automatically validate finite instances of the model and to extract preconditions on the size of quorums used in the election phases of the protocol.
Gauging the Magnitude of Civilization Conflict

Multiple studies of Huntington’s suggestion of a clash of civilizations have found no support for it. This study does not reanalyze his thesis, but rather focuses on specific features of the different-civilization conflict he theorizes about. Using empirical analysis I find that different-civilization conflict is more prevalent than same-civilization conflict, and is therefore appropriate for continued scholarly examination. Even so, I conclude that over time it is not only shrinking as a percentage of the overall world conflict as previously reported but is doing so at a rate more pronounced than heretofore realized. My results support Roeder’s findings that the most contentious civilizations are the West, Orthodox, and Islam, with Western states as a group being more contentious than the other two. As for a most contentious civilization dyad, I find the probability of conflict to be about the same for Western-Islamic and Western-Orthodox states. Finally, I conclude that the contentiousness of Western states derives in large part from their tendency to band together or cooperate during violent conflict.
UMDAs for dynamic optimization problems

This paper investigates how the Univariate Marginal Distribution Algorithm (UMDA) behaves in non-stationary environments when engaging in sampling and selection strategies designed to correct diversity loss. Although their performance when solving Dynamic Optimization Problems (DOP) is less studied than population-based Evolutionary Algorithms, UMDA and other Estimation of Distribution Algorithms may follow similar schemes when tracking moving optima: genetic diversity maintenance, memory schemes, niching methods, and even reinicialization of the probability vectors. This study is focused on diversity maintenance schemes. A new update strategy for UMDA's probability model, based on Ant Colony Optimization transition probability equations, is presented and empirically compared with other strategies recently published that aim to correct diversity loss in UMDA. Results demonstrate that loss correction strategies delay or avoid full convergence, thus increasing UMDA's adaptability to changing environments. However, the strategy proposed in this paper achieves a higher performance on the DOP test set when compared with other methods. In addition, the new strategy incorporates two parameters that control the diversity of the probability model.
Probiotics and the Microbiome in Celiac Disease: A Randomised Controlled Trial

Background. There is limited research investigating the composition of the gastrointestinal microbiota in individuals with celiac disease (CoeD) reporting only partial symptom improvement despite adherence to a strict gluten-free diet (GFD). The aim of this research was to determine if the gastrointestinal microbiota could be altered by probiotic bacteria and provide a potential new therapy for this subgroup. Methods. A multicentre RCT was conducted between January and August 2011 in Australia. Participants included 45 people with CoeD reporting only partial symptom improvement despite adherence to a strict GFD for a minimum of 12 months. Participants took 5 g of VSL#™ probiotic formulation (n = 23) or 5 g placebo (n = 22) orally twice daily for 12 weeks. The main outcome measured was the efficacy of the probiotic formula in altering faecal microbiota counts between baseline and week 12. Safety was determined by safety blood and monitoring adverse events. Results. SPSS™ multivariate repeated measures analysis (95th confidence level) revealed no statistically significant changes between the groups in the faecal microbiota counts or blood safety measures over the course of the study. Conclusion. The probiotic formula when taken orally over the 12-week period did not significantly alter the microbiota measured in this population. The trial was registered with Australian and New Zealand Clinical Trials Register ACTRN12610000630011.
Mining the human gut microbiome for novel stress resistance genes

With the rapid advances in sequencing technologies in recent years, the human genome is now considered incomplete without the complementing microbiome, which outnumbers human genes by a factor of one hundred. The human microbiome, and more specifically the gut microbiome, has received considerable attention and research efforts over the past decade. Many studies have identified and quantified “who is there? ,” while others have determined some of their functional capacity, or “what are they doing? ” In a recent study, we identified novel salt-tolerance loci from the human gut microbiome using combined functional metagenomic and bioinformatics based approaches. Herein, we discuss the identified loci, their role in salt-tolerance and their importance in the context of the gut environment. We also consider the utility and power of functional metagenomics for mining such environments for novel genes and proteins, as well as the implications and possible applications for future research.
The moderating role of positive and negative emotions in relationship between positive psychological capital and subjective well-being among adolescents

The current research was aimed to investigate the moderating role of positive and negative emotions between the relationship of PsyCap and subjective well-being (SWB) among adolescents. Sample was comprised 616 school adolescents of rural and urban areas. Urdu version of Trait Well-being Inventory by Fatima (2004) and PANAS (Watson, Clark & Tellegen, 1988) were used to measure the constructs, whereas PsyCap scale for adolescents was used to measure PsyCap (Afzal, 2013). Moderated hierarchical regression analysis depicted that low level negative emotions moderated the relationship of self-efficacy, hope and optimism with SWB. Further results of study also illustrated that high level of positive emotions strengthen the relationship between hope and SWB, whereas positive emotions did not yield significant moderating role in relationships between the optimism and self-efficacy with SWB.
From Mentoring to Co-Mentoring: Establishing Collaborative Relationships

Frances K. Kochan is director of the Truman Pierce Institute and associate professor of education at Auburn University; Susan B. Trimble is assistant professor of education at Georgia Southern University. I WISH I COULD BE OPENLY VERBAL about my ideas in my research course. Tonight I tried but the professor looked away, two students shuffled their papers, and I clammed up. I felt inadequate. I am only a teacher. What can I say about research? (journal entry, Susan Trimble, November 1992)
Les sciences sociales au défi de la santé publique

La sante publique, responsable de la mise sur pied des programmes de prevention de la maladie et de promotion de la sante, fut systematiquement analysee par les sciences sociales au cours des vingt-cinq dernieres annees en tant qu’entreprise normative dediee a l’acculturation des masses aux valeurs promues par l’ideologie « sanitariste ». Ce texte propose d’elargir le programme de recherche en sciences sociales de la sante publique pour integrer des questions qui postulent certaines contributions positives de la sante publique. Neuf exemples sont invoques allant de la promotion de valeurs fondamentales dans des societes a la recherche de reperes, a l’affranchissement face au destin sanitaire ou a la promotion d’une nouvelle responsabilite individuelle engagee.
Crystal: Analyzing Predictive Opinions on the Web

In this paper, we present an election prediction system (Crystal) based on web users’ opinions posted on an election prediction website. Given a prediction message, Crystal first identifies which party the message predicts to win and then aggregates prediction analysis results of a large amount of opinions to project the election results. We collect past election prediction messages from the Web and automatically build a gold standard. We focus on capturing lexical patterns that people frequently use when they express their predictive opinions about a coming election. To predict election results, we apply SVM-based supervised learning. To improve performance, we propose a novel technique which generalizes n-gram feature patterns. Experimental results show that Crystal significantly outperforms several baselines as well as a non-generalized n-gram approach. Crystal predicts future elections with 81.68% accuracy.
A Massive Warm Baryonic Halo in the Coma Cluster

Several deep PSPC observations of the Coma Cluster reveal a very large scale halo of soft X-ray emission, substantially in excess of the well-known radiation from the hot intracluster medium. The excess emission, previously reported in the central region of the cluster using lower sensitivity Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer (EUVE) and ROSAT data, is now evident out to a radius of 2.6 Mpc, demonstrating that the soft excess radiation from clusters is a phenomenon of cosmological significance. The X-ray spectrum at these large radii cannot be modeled nonthermally but is consistent with the original scenario of thermal emission from warm gas at ~106 K. The mass of the warm gas is on par with that of the hot X-ray-emitting plasma and significantly more massive if the warm gas resides in low-density filamentary structures. Thus, the data lend vital support to current theories of cosmic evolution, which predict that at low redshift ~30%-40% of the baryons reside in warm filaments converging at clusters of galaxies.
Temporal properties of low power wireless links: modeling and implications on multi-hop routing

Recently, several studies have analyzed the statistical properties of low power wireless links in real environments, clearly demonstrating the differences between experimentally observed communication properties and widely used simulation models. However, most of these studies have not performed in depth analysis of the temporal properties of wireless links. These properties have high impact on the performance of routing algorithms.Our first goal is to study the statistical temporal properties of links in low power wireless communications. We study short term temporal issues, like lagged autocorrelation of individual links, lagged correlation of reverse links, and consecutive same path links. We also study long term temporal aspects, gaining insight on the length of time the channel needs to be measured and how often we should update our models.Our second objective is to explore how statistical temporal properties impact routing protocols. We studied one-to-one routing schemes and developed new routing algorithms that consider autocorrelation, and reverse link and consecutive same path link lagged correlations. We have developed two new routing algorithms for the cost link model: (i) a generalized Dijkstra algorithm with centralized execution, and (ii)a localized distributed probabilistic algorithm.
Towards the stabilization of an underactuated underwater vehicle in the presence of unknown disturbances

In this paper a dynamic model based control scheme is proposed for the stabilization of an underactuated underwater vehicle, in the presence of slowly varying, unknown disturbances. An unscented Kalman filter (UKF), based on the vehicle's dynamic model, is applied for the sensor fusion process to provide an estimation of the full state vector of the system. External disturbances and unmodeled phenomena are included in the dynamic model as zero-mean Gaussian white noise processes. The estimation of the state vector is used as feedback for the proposed control scheme, which stabilizes the vehicle to the desired position and orientation. The proposed methodology is experimentally implemented using a 3-DOF underactuated vehicle. The efficiency of the methodology under various environmental conditions is demonstrated by simulation results. The overall system can be used for inspection tasks of sea platforms, e.g. during the inspection of a ship hull for possible damage tracking.
An Essential Role for CD44 Variant Isoforms in Epidermal Langerhans Cell and Blood Dendritic Cell Function

Upon antigen contact, epidermal Langerhans cells (LC) and dendritic cells (DC) leave peripheral organs and home to lymph nodes via the afferent lymphatic vessels and then assemble in the paracortical T cell zone and present antigen to T lymphocytes. Since splice variants of CD44 promote metastasis of certain tumors to lymph nodes, we explored the expression of CD44 proteins on migrating LC and DC. We show that upon antigen contact, LC and DC upregulate pan CD44 epitopes and epitopes encoded by variant exons v4, v5, v6, and v9. Antibodies against CD44 epitopes inhibit the emigration of LC from the epidermis, prevent binding of activated LC and DC to the T cell zones of lymph nodes, and severely inhibit their capacity to induce a delayed type hypersensitivity reaction to a skin hapten in vivo. Our results demonstrate that CD44 splice variant expression is obligatory for the migration and function of LC and DC.
A PoF and statistics combined reliability prediction for LED arrays in lamps

In this work, a physics-of-failure (PoF) reliability prediction methodology is combined with statistical models to consider the interaction between the lumen depreciation and catastrophic failures of LEDs. The current in each LED may redistribute when the catastrophic failure occurs in one of LEDs in an array, thus affecting the operation conditions of the entire LED array. A physics-of-failure based reliability prediction methodology is combined with statistical models to consider the interaction between the lumen depreciation and the catastrophic failure. Electronic-thermal simulations are utilized to obtain operation conditions, including temperature and current. Meanwhile, statistical models are applied to calculate possibilities of the catastrophic failure in different operation conditions.
Gender Differences in Spiritual Experiences, Religious Practices, and Congregational Support for Individuals with Significant Health Conditions

This study sought to identify gender differences among medical patients for their spiritual/religious beliefs/practices and their associations with health. Patients (N = 168) completed the Brief Multidimensional Measure of Religiousness/Spirituality (BMMRS), and SF-36 general health perception (GHP) and general mental health (GMH) scales. No gender differences were found in endorsement of spiritual experiences, religious practices, or congregational support. For men, religious/spiritual coping significantly correlated with GHP and GMH, and religious support significantly correlated with GMH. For women, measures of spiritual experiences, religious practices, and congregational support were significantly correlated with GMH, but no significant correlations with GHP were noted. Regression analyses revealed that the interaction between gender and BMMRS was a significant predictor for GMH and GHP. Follow-up analyses suggested that for women, GMH was associated with religious/spiritual coping, religious support, daily spiritual experiences, forgiveness, and organizational religion. In contrast, GHP was only significantly predicted by religious support and only for men. Although no gender differences were noted in endorsement of religious/spiritual experiences/practices, gender differences in relationships between spirituality beliefs/practices and health may exist among individuals with chronic health issues.
Reversing chemoresistance by small molecule inhibition of the translation initiation complex eIF4F

Deregulation of cap-dependent translation is associated with cancer initiation and progression. The rate-limiting step of protein synthesis is the loading of ribosomes onto mRNA templates stimulated by the heterotrimeric complex, eukaryotic initiation factor (eIF)4F. This step represents an attractive target for anticancer drug discovery because it resides at the nexus of the TOR signaling pathway. We have undertaken an ultra-high-throughput screen to identify inhibitors that prevent assembly of the eIF4F complex. One of the identified compounds blocks interaction between two subunits of eIF4F. As a consequence, cap-dependent translation is inhibited. This compound can reverse tumor chemoresistance in a genetically engineered lymphoma mouse model by sensitizing cells to the proapoptotic action of DNA damage. Molecular modeling experiments provide insight into the mechanism of action of this small molecule inhibitor. Our experiments validate targeting the eIF4F complex as a strategy for cancer therapy to modulate chemosensitivity.
Aid and Growth: What Does the Cross-Country Evidence Really Show?

We examine the effects of aid on growth in cross-sectional and panel dataafter correcting for the possible bias that poorer (or stronger) growth may draw aid contributions to recipient countries. Even after this correction, we find little robust evidence of a positive (or negative) relationship between aid inflows into a country and its economic growth. We also find no evidence that aid works better in better policy or geographical environments, or that certain forms of aid work better than others. Our findings suggest that for aid to be effective in the future, the aid apparatus will have to be rethought.
Linear-Algebraic List Decoding for Variants of Reed–Solomon Codes

Folded Reed-Solomon (RS) codes are an explicit family of codes that achieve the optimal tradeoff between rate and list error-correction capability: specifically, for any ε > 0, Guruswami and Rudra presented an nO(1/ ε) time algorithm to list decode appropriate folded RS codes of rate R from a fraction 1-R-ε of errors. The algorithm is based on multivariate polynomial interpolation and root-finding over extension fields. It was noted by Vadhan that interpolating a linear polynomial suffices for a statement of the above form. Here, we give a simple linear-algebra-based analysis of this variant that eliminates the need for the computationally expensive root-finding step over extension fields (and indeed any mention of extension fields). The entire list-decoding algorithm is linear-algebraic, solving one linear system for the interpolation step, and another linear system to find a small subspace of candidate solutions. Except for the step of pruning this subspace, the algorithm can be implemented to run in quadratic time. We also consider a closely related family of codes, called (order m) derivative codes and defined over fields of large characteristic, which consist of the evaluations of f as well as its first m-1 formal derivatives at N distinct field elements. We show how our linear-algebraic methods for folded RS codes can be used to show that derivative codes can also achieve the above optimal tradeoff. The theoretical drawback of our analysis for folded RS codes and derivative codes is that both the decoding complexity and proven worst-case list-size bound are nΩ(1/ ε). By combining the above idea with a pseudorandom subset of all polynomials as messages, we get a Monte Carlo construction achieving a list-size bound of O(1/ ε2) which is quite close to the existential O(1/ ε) bound (however, the decoding complexity remains nΩ(1/ ε)). Our work highlights that constructing an explicit subspace-evasive subset that has small intersection with low-dimensional subspaces-an interesting problem in pseudorandomness in its own right-could lead to explicit codes with better list-decoding guarantees.