Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Reading Between the Lines: Representations and Constructions of Youth and Crime in Aotearoa/New Zealand

In this thesis, I examine constructions of youth deviance in Aotearoa/New Zealand, 2002. In 2002, New Zealand had a national election in which adult commentators and observers concentrated and speculated on the reasons for a supposed increase in youth deviance and a spate of extraordinarily violent youth crimes. Youth-at-risk, early intervention, the family, and education were words that emerged continuously in commentator discussions. There was no critique of these words, or the practices they implied, and very little discussion of the implications the use of these words and practices posed for young people. In this thesis, I address this gap in the discussion by critically exploring the ways in which authors in institutional contexts constructed deviant youth and the implications of these constructions for youth. In this research, I sampled published texts in 2002 from academia, government, and media; three institutions which produce and reproduce knowledge in New Zealand. I applied a form of discourse analysis to the texts to explore and contextualise evident constructions. This analysis involved a bricolage of poststructural methodologies in the attempt to make an accessible argument, which effectively addressed the purposes of the research. I found that authors did not apply a knowledge devoid of power. Whether used to construct a picture of the deviant youth, or to describe necessary interventions into deviance, they used knowledge to construct the deviant youth as powerless effects of development and risk. Authors used knowledge to divide young people into the abnormally-deviant youth-at-risk and the normally-deviant adolescent. Applying knowledge allowed those writing about youth crime to construct and position young people as powerless. Authors reinforced this when they used knowledge to inform practices and interventions, which allowed adults to control the young person’s access to, and use of, power. In particular, authors and other experts saw mass education as a powerful practice of control and socialisation. Through education, adult society could remove the abnormallydeviant youth from the dysfunctional family environment and re-socialise the young person into conformity. Those writing applied a similar reasoning in other described interventions such as surveillance, conferencing, and early intervention. Interventions allowed adults to control the deviance of youth. I finish this thesis by arguing that interventions and contradictions in constructions show that power is not one-sided. That is, power is not always in the hands of adults. Rather, sociological theory can be applied to demonstrate and explore a power struggle between adults and young people where resistance coexists with power. I argue that resistance can provide an alternative explanation to the dominant ideas held by those working with, and talking about, deviant youth. Resistance allows for a concept of agency in which both deviance and non-deviance can be seen as a reactive response by the young person.
Dependence of perceptual choice on number of response alternatives and fidelity of evidence

The study of perceptual decisions has been developed as a substitute for investigating more complex multiple attribute decisions. However, little attention has been paid to the similarity of results between the two literatures. Four separate behavioral experiments and a secondary trial- by-trial analysis investigated the sensitivity of perceptual decisions. Results were compared to both previous perceptual decision research and that of multiple attribute decisions in an effort to bridge the divide. The first experiment examined the effect of increasing the similarity of available response alternatives on accuracy and reaction time. The results suggest that high levels of similarity can begin to degrade the decision process by lowering accuracy and slowing reaction time; however these changes may be dependent on the extent to which the alternatives use overlapping neuronal pools. The second experiment examined the effect of increasing the number of response alternatives available for a single decision. The results suggest that increasing the number of alternatives may not affect performance until some critical point (in this case, eight alternatives). The third experiment examined how delay in the presentation of evidence compared to the start of the decision process affects the overall accuracy and reaction time once information is given. The results demonstrate that as the decision process extends in time, decisions are made faster and less accurately. Finally, the fourth experiment examined how the interrupting the incoming stream of information with either highly informative or highly misleading evidence would affect the decision. The results illustrated a complicated picture in which highly informative evidence accelerated decisions but misleading evidence failed to slow decisions. In addition to the individual aims, a secondary analysis investigated potential trial-by- trial variation in performance. There was some evidence that participants made ongoing adjustments to their strategy dependent on performance, but only when feedback was available; previous trial status (e.g., highly informative vs. highly misleading evidence) did not affect current trial performance. In sum the results demonstrate that perceptual decisions do show high levels of sensitivity to a variety of manipulations, but fail to replicate many of the results from more complicated multiple attribute decisions.
Therapeutic effects of the euglenoid ichthyotoxin, euglenophycin, in colon cancer

Colorectal cancer (CRC) remains one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers and the 3rd leading cause of cancer-related mortality. The emergence of drug resistance poses a major challenge in CRC care or treatment. This can be addressed by determining cancer mechanisms, discovery of druggable targets, and development of new drugs. In search for novel agents, aquatic microorganisms offer a vastly untapped pharmacological source that can be developed for cancer therapeutics. In this study, we characterized the anti-colorectal cancer potential of euglenophycin, a microalgal toxin from Euglena sanguinea. The toxin (49.1-114.6 μM) demonstrated cytotoxic, anti-proliferative, anti-clonogenic, and anti-migration effects against HCT116, HT29, and SW620 CRC cells. We identified G1 cell cycle arrest and cell type - dependent modulation of autophagy as mechanisms of growth inhibition. We validated euglenophycin’s anti-tumorigenic activity in vivo using CRL:Nu(NCr)Foxn1nu athymic nude mouse CRC xenograft models. Intraperitoneal toxin administration (100 mg/kg; 5 days) decreased HCT116 and HT29 xenograft tumor volumes (n=10 each). Tumor inhibition was associated with reduced expression of autophagy negative regulator mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) and decreased trend of serum pro-inflammatory cytokines. Together, these results provide compelling evidence that euglenophycin can be a promising anti-colorectal cancer agent targeting multiple cancer-promoting processes. Furthermore, this study supports expanding natural products drug discovery to freshwater niches as prospective sources of anti-cancer compounds.
Adaptive filtering approach to improve wheelchair driving performance

This paper describes a novel adaptive filter approach to reduce the handicap a patient may experience when navigating an electric wheelchair. The filter automatically adapts to the specific handicap the patient has by training a connectionist structure that converts the joystick signal of the patient to the signal a reference user would give in the same context. Experimental results show that for various handicaps the filter improves the driving performance significantly
On the Consistency of Minimum Complexity Nonparametric Estimation

Nonparametric estimation is usually inconsistent without some form of regularization. One way to impose regularity is through a prior measure. Barron and Cover (1991) have shown that complexity based prior measures can insure consistency, at least when restricted to countable dense subsets of the infinite-dimensional parameter (i.e., function) space. Strangely, however, these results are independent of the actual complexity assignment: the same results hold under an arbitrary permutation of the match-up of complexities to functions. We show that this phenomenon is related to the weakness of the convergence measures used. Stronger convergence can only be achieved through complexity measures that relate to the actual behavior of the functions.
Xmrk, Kras and Myc Transgenic Zebrafish Liver Cancer Models Share Molecular Signatures with Subsets of Human Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Previously three oncogene transgenic zebrafish lines with inducible expression of xmrk, kras or Myc in the liver have been generated and these transgenic lines develop oncogene-addicted liver tumors upon chemical induction. In the current study, comparative transcriptomic approaches were used to examine the correlation of the three induced transgenic liver cancers with human liver cancers. RNA profiles from the three zebrafish tumors indicated relatively small overlaps of significantly deregulated genes and biological pathways. Nevertheless, the three transgenic tumor signatures all showed significant correlation with advanced or very advanced human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Interestingly, molecular signature from each oncogene-induced zebrafish liver tumor correlated with only a small subset of human HCC samples (24–29%) and there were conserved up-regulated pathways between the zebrafish and correlated human HCC subgroup. The three zebrafish liver cancer models together represented nearly half (47.2%) of human HCCs while some human HCCs showed significant correlation with more than one signature defined from the three oncogene-addicted zebrafish tumors. In contrast, commonly deregulated genes (21 up and 16 down) in the three zebrafish tumor models generally showed accordant deregulation in the majority of human HCCs, suggesting that these genes might be more consistently deregulated in a broad range of human HCCs with different molecular mechanisms and thus serve as common diagnosis markers and therapeutic targets. Thus, these transgenic zebrafish models with well-defined oncogene-induced tumors are valuable tools for molecular classification of human HCCs and for understanding of molecular drivers in hepatocarcinogenesis in each human HCC subgroup.
RN / 17 / 06 A Stone-Type Duality Theorem for Separation Logic via its Underlying Bunched Logics 12 June , 2017

Stone-type duality theorems, which relate algebraic and relational/topological models, are important tools in logic because — in addition to elegant abstraction — they strengthen soundness and completeness to a categorical equivalence, yielding a framework through which both algebraic and topological methods can be brought to bear on a logic. We give a systematic treatment of Stone-type duality theorems for the structures that interpret bunched logics, starting with the weakest systems, recovering the familiar Boolean BI, and concluding with Separation Logic. Our results encompass all the known existing algebraic approaches to Separation Logic and prove them sound with respect to the standard storeheap semantics. We additionally recover soundness and completeness theorems A Stone-Type Duality Theorem for Separation Logic via its Underlying Bunched Logics Simon Docherty David Pym of the specific truth-functional models of these logics as presented in the literature. This approach synthesises a variety of techniques from modal, substructural and categorical logic and contextualises the ’resource semantics’ interpretation underpinning Separation Logic amongst them. As a consequence, theory from those fields — as well as algebraic and topological methods — can be applied to both Separation Logic and the systems of bunched logics it is built upon. Conversely, the notion of indexed resource frame (generalizing the standard model of Separation Logic) and its associated completeness proof can easily be adapted to other non-classical predicate logics.
Primary Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 2 (HIV-2) Isolates, Like HIV-1 Isolates, Frequently Use CCR5 but Show Promiscuity in Coreceptor Usage

ABSTRACT Coreceptor usage of primary human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) isolates varies according to biological phenotype. The chemokine receptors CCR5 and CXCR4 are the major coreceptors that, together with CD4, govern HIV-1 entry into cells. Since CXCR4 usage determines the biological phenotype for HIV-1 isolates and is more frequent in patients with immunodeficiency, it may serve as a marker for viral virulence. This possibility prompted us to study coreceptor usage by HIV-2, known to be less pathogenic than HIV-1. We tested 11 primary HIV-2 isolates for coreceptor usage in human cell lines: U87 glioma cells, stably expressing CD4 and the chemokine receptor CCR1, CCR2b, CCR3, CCR5, or CXCR4, and GHOST(3) osteosarcoma cells, coexpressing CD4 and CCR5, CXCR4, or the orphan receptor Bonzo or BOB. The indicator cells were infected by cocultivation with virus-producing peripheral blood mononuclear cells and by cell-free virus. Our results show that 10 of 11 HIV-2 isolates were able to efficiently use CCR5. In contrast, only two isolates, both from patients with advanced disease, used CXCR4 efficiently. These two isolates also promptly induced syncytia in MT-2 cells, a pattern described for HIV-1 isolates that use CXCR4. Unlike HIV-1, many of the HIV-2 isolates were promiscuous in their coreceptor usage in that they were able to use, apart from CCR5, one or more of the CCR1, CCR2b, CCR3, and BOB coreceptors. Another difference between HIV-1 and HIV-2 was that the ability to replicate in MT-2 cells appeared to be a general property of HIV-2 isolates. Based on BOB mRNA expression in MT-2 cells and the ability of our panel of HIV-2 isolates to use BOB, we suggest that HIV-2 can use BOB when entering MT-2 cells. The results indicate no obvious link between viral virulence and the ability to use a multitude of coreceptors.
Physical activity and risk of coronary heart disease in India.

BACKGROUND Physical exercise has been inversely associated with coronary heart disease (CHD) risk in Western populations; however, the association has not been examined in India where physical inactivity levels in urban areas are now comparable with the West. METHODS We conducted a hospital-based case-control study and collected data from 350 cases of acute myocardial infarction and 700 controls matched on age, gender, and hospital in New Delhi and Bangalore. We used conditional logistic regression to control for the matching and other risk factors. RESULTS Of the controls, 48% participated in some form of leisure-time exercise compared with 38% of cases. In age- and sex-adjusted analyses, people in the highest level of leisure-time exercise (>145 metabolic equivalents [MET]-minutes per day, equivalent to 36 minutes of brisk walking per day) had a relative risk of 0.45 (95% CI: 0.31, 0.66) compared with non-exercisers. Multivariate adjustment for other risk factors did not substantially alter the association. We observed a positive association between non-work sedentary activity and CHD risk; people with >3.6 hours per day of sedentary activity (for example, television viewing) had an elevated risk of 1.88 (95% CI: 1.09, 3.20) compared with <70 minutes per day in multivariate analysis. CONCLUSION Leisure-time exercise, including as much as 35-40 minutes per day of brisk walking, was protective for CHD risk and sedentary lifestyles were positively associated with risk of CHD. Given limited resources for care of CHD in India and the important role of physical exercise in disease risk in urban India, improvements in physical activity should be promoted.
Fudan University at TRECVID 2010 : Semantic Indexing

In this notebook paper we describe our participation in the NIST TRECVID 2010 evaluation. We took part in semantic indexing task of benchmark this year. For semantic indexing, we submitted 3 automatic runs using only IACC training data: Fudan.TV10. 3: this run is based on visual features of keyframes. Fudan.TV10. 2: this run is based on visual features of keyframes and object detection. Fudan.TV10. 1: this run is based on Fudan.TV10. 2 and metadata of video.
Unfavorable Effects of Resistance Training on Central Arterial Compliance: A Randomized Intervention Study

Background—Reductions in the compliance of central arteries exert a number of adverse effects on cardiovascular function and disease risk. Endurance training is efficacious in increasing arterial compliance in healthy adults. We determined the effects of resistance training on carotid arterial compliance using the intervention study design. Methods and Results—Twenty-eight healthy men 20 to 38 years old were randomly assigned to the intervention group (n=14) and the control group (n=14). Control subjects were instructed not to alter their normal activity levels throughout the study period. Intervention subjects underwent 3 supervised resistance training sessions per week for 4 months and detraining for a subsequent 4 months. The resistance training increased maximal strength in all muscle groups tested (P<0.001). There were no significant differences in baseline arterial compliance and &bgr;-stiffness index between the intervention and control groups. In the intervention group, carotid arterial compliance decreased 19% (P<0.05), and &bgr;-stiffness index increased 21% (P<0.01) after resistance training. These values returned completely to the baseline levels during the detraining period. Arterial compliance did not change in the control group. In both groups, there were no significant changes in brachial and carotid blood pressure, carotid intima-media thickness, lumen diameter, and femoral arterial compliance. Changes in carotid artery compliance were significantly and negatively related to corresponding changes in left ventricular mass index (r=−0.56, P<0.001) and left ventricular hypertrophy index (r=−0.68, P<0.001). Conclusions—In marked contrast to the beneficial effect of regular aerobic exercise, several months of resistance training “reduces” central arterial compliance in healthy men.
p38 and Extracellular Signal-Regulated Kinases Regulate the Myogenic Program at Multiple Steps

ABSTRACT The extracellular signals which regulate the myogenic program are transduced to the nucleus by mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs). We have investigated the role of two MAPKs, p38 and extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK), whose activities undergo significant changes during muscle differentiation. p38 is rapidly activated in myocytes induced to differentiate. This activation differs from those triggered by stress and cytokines, because it is not linked to Jun–N-terminal kinase stimulation and is maintained during the whole process of myotube formation. Moreover, p38 activation is independent of a parallel promyogenic pathway stimulated by insulin-like growth factor 1. Inhibition of p38 prevents the differentiation program in myogenic cell lines and human primary myocytes. Conversely, deliberate activation of endogenous p38 stimulates muscle differentiation even in the presence of antimyogenic cues. Much evidence indicates that p38 is an activator of MyoD: (i) p38 kinase activity is required for the expression of MyoD-responsive genes, (ii) enforced induction of p38 stimulates the transcriptional activity of a Gal4-MyoD fusion protein and allows efficient activation of chromatin-integrated reporters by MyoD, and (iii) MyoD-dependent myogenic conversion is reduced in mouse embryonic fibroblasts derived from p38α−/− embryos. Activation of p38 also enhances the transcriptional activities of myocyte enhancer binding factor 2A (MEF2A) and MEF2C by direct phosphorylation. With MEF2C, selective phosphorylation of one residue (Thr293) is a tissue-specific activating signal in differentiating myocytes. Finally, ERK shows a biphasic activation profile, with peaks of activity in undifferentiated myoblasts and postmitotic myotubes. Importantly, activation of ERK is inhibitory toward myogenic transcription in myoblasts but contributes to the activation of myogenic transcription and regulates postmitotic responses (i.e., hypertrophic growth) in myotubes.
A circuit-breaker use-case operated by a humanoid in aircraft manufacturing

Automation of large-scale aircraft manufacturing with wheeled or embedded platforms requires costly changes of the manufacturing process and the environment. Humanoid robots could address this issue. We present a use-case of HRP-4 humanoid operating circuit-breakers. We show the feasibility of using visual feedback and force control in an integrated and unified multi-contact and multimodal task space quadratic programming (QP) whole-body control framework to enable HRP-4 to perform the task. We discuss the experimental results and outline the limitations of the current platform design and control implementation.
Evaluating the Power of Flexible Packet Processing for Network Resource Allocation

Recent hardware switch architectures make it feasible to perform flexible packet processing inside the network. This allows operators to configure switches to parse and process custom packet headers using flexible match+action tables in order to exercise control over how packets are processed and routed. However, flexible switches have limited state, support limited types of operations, and limit per-packet computation in order to be able to operate at line rate. Our work addresses these limitations by providing a set of general building blocks that mask these limitations using approximation techniques and thereby enabling the implementation of realistic network protocols. In particular, we use these building blocks to tackle the network resource allocation problem within datacenters and realize approximate variants of congestion control and load balancing protocols, such as XCP, RCP, and CONGA, that require explicit support from the network. Our evaluations show that these approximations are accurate and that they do not exceed the hardware resource limits associated with these flexible switches. We demonstrate their feasibility by implementing RCP with the production Cavium CNX880xx switch. This implementation provides significantly faster and lower-variance flow completion times compared with TCP.
2 1 3 Ju n 20 07 On the construction of QED using ERG

Abstract. It has been known for some time that a smooth momentum cutoff is compatible with local gauge symmetries. In this paper we show concretely how to construct QED using the exact renormalization group (ERG). First, we give a new derivation of the Ward identity for the Wilson action using the technique of composite operators. Second, parameterizing the theory by its asymptotic behavior for a large cutoff, we show how to fine-tune the parameters to satisfy the identity. Third, we recast the identity as invariance of the Wilson action under a non-linear BRST transformation.