Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Construct Validity of the Late-Life Function and Disability Instrument in African American Breast Cancer Survivors

Limited data exist on the validity of the Late-Life Function and Disability (LLFD) instrument in cancer survivors. We examined the construct validity of the abbreviated LLFD instrument in a sample of African-American breast cancer survivors. African American breast cancer survivors (n = 181) aged 50 years and older completed the abbreviated LLFD instrument and questions about sociodemographic and lifestyle characteristics. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), Cronbach alphas, and structural models were used to evaluate the construct validity of these measures. Minor modifications were made to the three-factor functional component portion of the inventory to improve model fit. Cronbach alpha’s (range 0.85–0.92) and inter-factor correlations (r = 0.3–0.5, all p < 0.05) were appropriate. The two-factor disability component fit the data and Cronbach alpha’s (0.91 and 0.98) were appropriate with a high inter-factor correlation (r = 0.95, p < 0.01). The average variance extracted (range = 0.55–0.93) and composite reliabilities (range = 0.86–0.98) were in acceptable ranges. Floor effects ranged from 7% for advanced lower function to 74% for personal role disability. Education and number of comorbidities were correlated significantly with functional outcomes. The abbreviated LLFD instrument had adequate construct validity in this sample of African American breast cancer survivors. Further studies are needed that examine the stability of the instrument over time.
Generalising and dualising the third list-homomorphism theorem: functional pearl

The third list-homomorphism theorem says that a function is a list homomorphism if it can be described as an instance of both a foldr and a foldl. We prove a dual theorem for unfolds and generalise both theorems to trees: if a function generating a list can be described both as an unfoldr and an unfoldl, the list can be generated from the middle, and a function that processes or builds a tree both upwards and downwards may independently process/build a subtree and its one-hole context. The point-free, relational formalism helps to reveal the beautiful symmetry hidden in the theorem.
Super wide viewer using catadioptrical optics

Many applications have used a head-mounted display (HMD), such as in virtual and mixed realities and telepresence. However, the field of view (FOV) of commercial HMD systems is too narrow for feeling immersion. In this paper, we propose a super-wide field of view head-mounted display consisting of an ellipsoidal mirror and a hyperboloidal curved mirror. The horizontal FOV of the proposed HMD is 180 degrees and includes the peripheral vision of humans. It increases the reality and immersion for users.
The Shaping of Citizenship Education in a Chinese Context.

The global flow of citizenship education in China has spurred much discussion in Chinese academic circles. This study explores the interaction between citizenship education and China’s the existing political-ideological education and moral education as a space is negotiated a space in the current “ideoscape. ” A qualitative approach is adopted to synthesize the literature coming from China on citizenship education from an interpretive and critical perspective. The research findings suggest: (a) The territory of orthodox political-ideological education is being narrowed down as its relationship with citizenship education is configured; (b) citizenship education and moral education are represented using different images to delineate their distinctions; and (c) the introduction of “global citizenship education” includes many new topics and competencies that expands the current ideoscape. This study argues that the ongoing debates on citizenship education are deeply rooted in China’s structural transformation, in which society tends to be separated from state. In negotiating its own territory, citizenship education reshapes China’s ideoscape in the education field. The paper concludes by suggesting that citizenship education should make a unique contribution to facilitating young citizens in a reexamination of the values imbedded in political-ideological education and moral education with a new social consensus being reached through the communication of ideas.
Social capital sites: understanding digital networks from a resource perspective

In this dissertation the influence of social networking sites (= SNSs) on the daily lives of their users was analyzed. In the theoretical part, the concept of online social capital was developed as a theoretical framework through which to understand and analyze the use of these websites. On the one hand, it was argued that SNSs facilitate the capacity and mobilization of individual information resources. On the other hand, a systematic overview of SNS-associated risks - social pressure, cyber-harassment, deleterious social comparisons, potential for conflict, network demand, data abuse, and problematic usage behaviors - was presented. In the empirical part of the thesis, the size and growth of users` digital facebook networks were analyzed using a facebook application, online surveys and samples of German university students. Results showed linear growth of networks of two contacts per week that was positively related to facebook use. Furthermore, larger networks at the beginning of the semester were positively related to users` number of offline contacts, distance to their last places of residence, Extraversion, identification with fellow students, and facebook use. Users` network sizes and the number of isolated contacts in those networks were positively connected to their perceived online social capital, while the number of isolated groups of contacts (components) and users` betweenness centrality were not. Results also showed that perceived online social capital is an empirically valid concept and positively connected to facebook use, satisfaction with the website, and communication. In general, users indicated little to medium use of facebook for seeking coping-related information and they reported low to medium perceptions of network demand. Theoretical, empirical, and methodological implications of the thesis were discussed.
Risa: Accurate And Efficient Placement Routability Modeling

The prevalence of net list synthesis tools raises great concern on routability of cell placement created with state-of-the-art placement techniques. In this paper, an accurate and efficient placement routability modeling technique is proposed and incorporated into the prevailing simulated annealing approach. This accurate and efficient modeling is based on the supply versus demand analysis of routing resource over an array of regions on a chip. Vertical and horizontal routability is analyzed separately due to the bias of routing resource in multiple-metal-layer ASIC designs. A special technique on net bounding box partitioning is also proposed and critical to the accuracy of this modeling at the presence of mega cells, which tend to cause local routing congestion. By incorporating this efficient modeling into the cost function of simulated annealing, experiments conducted on small to large industrial designs indicate that placement routability evaluated with a global router is greatly improved as a result of the proposed accurate modeling.
The Kundalini Experience: Psychosis or Transcendence

Imagine that you get such certain awesome experience and knowledge by only reading a book. How can? It seems to be greater when a book can be the best thing to discover. Books now will appear in printed and soft file collection. One of them is this book the kundalini experience psychosis or transcendence. It is so usual with the printed books. However, many people sometimes have no space to bring the book for them; this is why they can't read the book wherever they want.
An Integrated Scheme for Robust Distributed Speech Recognition Over Lossy Packet Networks

In this work we present a complete set of techniques devoted to offer robustness against frame losses in distributed speech recognition over packet-switched networks. The proposed scheme is composed of tree techniques, two of them are applied at the sender and the last one in the recognizer itself. On one hand, a media-specific forward error correction (FEC) technique is used to allow the recovery of information within the bursts. On the other hand, a recognizer-based technique well known by its remarkable ability to reduce the effects of long consecutive frame losses during recognition, the weighted Viterbi algorithm (WVA), is used to handle the additional information introduced by FEC codes. Moreover, a double stream strategy whereby interleaving can be applied along with FEC codes without any delay increase, is also applied. The application of interleaving allows to reduce the perceived burst length at the receiver, further improving the recognition performance. As a result, the proposed scheme can provide an acceptable performance even under extremely adverse channel conditions.
Latent Model Clustering and Applications to Visual Recognition

We consider clustering situations in which the pairwise affinity between data points depends on a latent "context" variable. For example, when clustering features arising from multiple object classes the affinity value between two image features depends on the object class that generated those features. We show that clustering in the context of a latent variable can be represented as a special 3D hyper- graph and introduce an algorithm for obtaining the clusters. We use the latent clustering model for an unsupervised multiple object class recognition where feature fragments are shared among multiple clusters and those in turn are shared among multiple object classes.
4-Coumarate:Coenzyme A Ligase Has the Catalytic Capacity to Synthesize and Reuse Various (Di)Adenosine Polyphosphates1

4-Coumarate:coenzyme A ligase (4CL) is known to activate cinnamic acid derivatives to their corresponding coenzyme A esters. As a new type of 4CL-catalyzed reaction, we observed the synthesis of various mono- and diadenosine polyphosphates. Both the native 4CL2 isoform from Arabidopsis (At4CL2 wild type) and the At4CL2 gain of function mutant M293P/K320L, which exhibits the capacity to use a broader range of phenolic substrates, catalyzed the synthesis of adenosine 5′-tetraphosphate (p4A) and adenosine 5′-pentaphosphate when incubated with MgATP−2 and tripolyphosphate or tetrapolyphosphate (P4), respectively. Diadenosine 5′,5‴,-P1,P4-tetraphosphate represented the main product when the enzymes were supplied with only MgATP2−. The At4CL2 mutant M293P/K320L was studied in more detail and was also found to catalyze the synthesis of additional dinucleoside polyphosphates such as diadenosine 5′,5‴-P1,P5-pentaphosphate and dAp4dA from the appropriate substrates, p4A and dATP, respectively. Formation of Ap3A from ATP and ADP was not observed with either At4CL2 variant. In all cases analyzed, (di)adenosine polyphosphate synthesis was either strictly dependent on or strongly stimulated by the presence of a cognate cinnamic acid derivative. The At4CL2 mutant enzyme K540L carrying a point mutation in the catalytic center that is critical for adenylate intermediate formation was inactive in both p4A and diadenosine 5′,5‴,-P1,P4-tetraphosphate synthesis. These results indicate that the cinnamoyl-adenylate intermediate synthesized by At4CL2 not only functions as an intermediate in coenzyme A ester formation but can also act as a cocatalytic AMP-donor in (di)adenosine polyphosphate synthesis.
Over de rol van positieve en negatieve emoties bij het welbevinden van managers: Een studie met de Job-related Affective Well-being Scale (JAWS)

Een veelgebruikt model om emoties te classificeren gaat uit van twee onderliggende dimensies: activatie (arousal) en welbehagen (pleasure). Deze beide dimensies liggen ook ten grondslag aan de Job-related Affective Well-being Scale (JAWS), een vragenlijst die gebruikt wordt om emoties op het werk te meten. De onderhavige studie bij 815 managers heeft een tweeledig doel. In de eerste plaats de introductie en validatie van de Nederlandse versie van de JAWS. Daarbij blijkt dat de oorspronkelijke versie, die uit 30 items bestaat, kan worden teruggebracht tot 12 items, zonder noemenswaardig verlies aan informatie. Verder wordt de predictieve validiteit van de JAWS geïllustreerd door het feit dat positieve emoties (negatief) met de duur en met de frequentie van het toekomstige ziekteverzuim van de managers samenhangen. In de tweede plaats wordt er met succes een model getoetst dat ervan uitgaat dat positieve en negatieve emoties een verschillende rol spelen met betrekking tot het welbevinden van de managers. Negatieve emoties hebben een sleutelrol in een stressproces dat kan uitmonden in burnout en gezondheidsklachten, terwijl – andersom – positieve emoties een sleutelrol hebben in een motivatieproces dat juist kan leiden tot welbevinden in de zin van bevlogenheid en positieve attitudes ten opzichte van de organisatie.
Do Loan Officers' Incentives Lead to Lax Lending Standards?

To understand better the role of loan officers' incentives in the origins of the financial crisis, we study a controlled field experiment conducted by a large bank. In the experiment, the incentive structure of a subset of small business loan officers was altered from fixed salary to volume-based pay. We use a diff-in-diff design to show that while the characteristics of loan applications did not change, incentive-paid loan officers book 19% loans with dollar amounts larger by 19%. We show that treated loan officers use their discretion more in the booking decision. Although loans booked by incentive-paid loan officers have better observable credit quality, they are 28% more likely to default. The increase in default is concentrated in loans that wouldn't have been booked in the absence of commission-based compensation, and in loans with excessive dollar amount. Our results support the idea that the explosion in mortgage volume during the housing bubble and the deterioration of underwriting standards can be partly attributed to the incentives of loan officers.
Transesophageal Doppler echocardiography evaluation of coronary blood flow velocity in baseline conditions and during dipyridamole-induced coronary vasodilation.

Transesophageal echocardiography allows the evaluation of proximal coronary artery anatomy and coronary blood flow velocity (CBFV). To assess the potential of transesophageal echocardiography in evaluating CBFV and its variations induced by coronary-active drugs, we studied 15 patients by high-quality pulsed wave Doppler recordings of CBFV. In these patients, transesophageal Doppler evaluation of CBFV was performed before, 2 minutes after cessation of dipyridamole infusion (0.56 mg/kg in 4 minutes), and 2 minutes after aminophylline infusion (240 mg injected 4 minutes after cessation of dipyridamole infusion). The following CBFV parameters were evaluated at each of the three steps of the study protocol: maximal and mean diastolic velocities and maximal and mean systolic velocities. Furthermore, the following indexes of coronary flow reserve were evaluated: the ratio between maximal diastolic velocity recorded after and before dipyridamole administration and the ratio between mean diastolic velocity recorded after and before dipyridamole administration. Nine of the 15 patients had a normal left anterior descending coronary artery (group A), whereas the remaining six had significant (less than or equal to 75%) stenosis (group B). In group A patients, all CBFV parameters increased significantly during dipyridamole infusion and returned to near baseline values after aminophylline infusion. In group B patients, on the other hand, none of the CBFV parameters increased after dipyridamole infusion. Dipyridamole/baseline maximal diastolic velocity and mean diastolic velocity ratios were, respectively, 3.22 +/- 0.96 and 3.04 +/- 0.88 in group A and 1.46 +/- 0.45 (p less than 0.01 versus group A) and 1.48 +/- 0.49 (p less than 0.01 versus group A) in group B patients. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
On the Impossibility of Learning the Missing Mass

This paper shows that one cannot learn the probability of rare events without imposing further structural assumptions. The event of interest is that of obtaining an outcome outside the coverage of an i.i. d. sample from a discrete distribution. The probability of this event is referred to as the “missing mass”. The impossibility result can then be stated as: the missing mass is not distribution-free learnable in relative error. The proof is semi-constructive and relies on a coupling argument using a dithered geometric distribution. Via a reduction, this impossibility also extends to both discrete and continuous tail estimation. These results formalize the folklore that in order to predict rare events without restrictive modeling, one necessarily needs distributions with “heavy tails”.
Sparse dictionary-based representation and recognition of action attributes

We present an approach for dictionary learning of action attributes via information maximization. We unify the class distribution and appearance information into an objective function for learning a sparse dictionary of action attributes. The objective function maximizes the mutual information between what has been learned and what remains to be learned in terms of appearance information and class distribution for each dictionary item. We propose a Gaussian Process (GP) model for sparse representation to optimize the dictionary objective function. The sparse coding property allows a kernel with a compact support in GP to realize a very efficient dictionary learning process. Hence we can describe an action video by a set of compact and discriminative action attributes. More importantly, we can recognize modeled action categories in a sparse feature space, which can be generalized to unseen and unmodeled action categories. Experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach in action recognition applications.
Finitely generated algebraic structures with various divisibility conditions

Abstract. Infinite fields are not finitely generated rings. A similar question is considered for further algebraic structures, mainly commutative semirings. In this case, purely algebraic methods fail and topological properties of integral lattice points turn out to be useful. We prove that a commutative semiring that is a group with respect to multiplication can be two-generated only if it belongs to the subclass of additively idempotent semirings; this class is equivalent to $\ell $-groups.
Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 Replication in Dendritic Cell-T-Cell Cocultures Is Increased upon Incorporation of Host LFA-1 due to Higher Levels of Virus Production in Immature Dendritic Cells

ABSTRACT Dendritic cells (DCs) act as a portal for invasion by human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1). Here, we investigated whether virion-incorporated host cell membrane proteins can affect virus replication in DC-T-cell cocultures. Using isogenic viruses either devoid of or bearing host-derived leukocyte function-associated antigen 1 (LFA-1), we showed that HIV-1 production is augmented when LFA-1-bearing virions are used compared to that for viral entities lacking this adhesion molecule. This phenomenon was observed in immature monocyte-derived DCs (IM-MDDCs) only and not in DCs displaying a mature phenotype. The increase is not due to higher virus production in responder CD4+ T cells but rather is linked with a more important productive infection of IM-MDDCs. We provided evidence that virus-associated host LFA-1 molecules do not affect a late event in the HIV-1 life cycle but rather exert an effect on an early step in virus replication. We demonstrated that the enhancement of productive infection of IM-MDDCs that is conferred by virus-anchored host LFA-1 involves the protein kinase A (PKA) and PKC signal transduction pathways. The biological significance of this phenomenon was established by performing experiments with virus stocks produced in primary human cells and anti-LFA-1 antibodies. Together, our results indicate that the association between some virus-bound host proteins and their natural cognate ligands can modulate de novo HIV-1 production by IM-MDDCs. Therefore, the additional interactions between virus-bound host cell membrane constituents and counter receptors on the surfaces of DCs can influence HIV-1 replication in IM-MDDC-T-cell cocultures.
Alcohol-Related Morbidity and Mortality

Alcohol use is related to a wide variety of negative health outcomes including morbidity, mortality, and disability. Research on alcohol-related morbidity and mortality takes into account the varying effects of overall alcohol consumption and drinking patterns. The results from this epidemiological research indicate that alcohol use increases the risk for many chronic health consequences (e.g., diseases) and acute consequences (e.g., traffic crashes), but a certain pattern of regular light-to-moderate drinking may have beneficial effects on coronary heart disease. Several issues are relevant to the methodology of studies of alcohol-related morbidity and mortality, including the measurement of both alcohol consumption and the outcomes studied as well as study design. Broad summary measures that reflect alcohol’s possible effects on morbidity, mortality, and disability may be more useful than measures of any one outcome alone.
A Dialectical Approach to Studying Long-Distance Maintenance Strategies

Using both qualitative and quantitative methodology, this thesis investigates the tactics used by long-distance relational partners, the differences in use of the tactics between long-distance and proximal partners, the relationship among the maintenance tactics, and the relationship of the tactics to relational satisfaction. Seven relational maintenance strategies were identified from the investigation: affirmation, expression, high tech mediated communication, low tech mediated communication, future thought, negative disclosure, and together-time. Significant differences in the use of maintenance tactics between long-distance and proximal partners were discovered and several tactics were found to correlate with relational satisfaction for both relationship types. It is concluded that relational maintenance should be viewed from a multi-dimensional perspective that recognizes the impact relational dialectics have on relationships.
Time is Money and Money Needs Time? A Secondary Analysis of Time-Budget Data in Germany

Leisure activity budgets, temporal patterns, and perception of leisure allocation differ between people with different leisure and income budgets. Focusing on individuals who are gainfully employed we examine the inequalities of leisure time and perception of time use in addition to income inequalities. This research follows the tradition of Linder (1970) which has been further applied by, among others, Lindskog and Brege (2003) and Bonke, Deding, and Lausten (2004), for example. Using data of the German Time Use Survey 2001/2002, a typology of lifestyle groups was generated using cluster analysis. Three types were found which differed in their leisure budgets, activities, temporal patterns, perception of time use, and sociodemograpic structure.