Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
FlyBase portals to human disease research using Drosophila models

ABSTRACT The use of Drosophila melanogaster as a model for studying human disease is well established, reflected by the steady increase in both the number and proportion of fly papers describing human disease models in recent years. In this article, we highlight recent efforts to improve the availability and accessibility of the disease model information in FlyBase (http://flybase.org), the model organism database for Drosophila. FlyBase has recently introduced Human Disease Model Reports, each of which presents background information on a specific disease, a tabulation of related disease subtypes, and summaries of experimental data and results using fruit flies. Integrated presentations of relevant data and reagents described in other sections of FlyBase are incorporated into these reports, which are specifically designed to be accessible to non-fly researchers in order to promote collaboration across model organism communities working in translational science. Another key component of disease model information in FlyBase is that data are collected in a consistent format – using the evolving Disease Ontology (an open-source standardized ontology for human-disease-associated biomedical data) – to allow robust and intuitive searches. To facilitate this, FlyBase has developed a dedicated tool for querying and navigating relevant data, which include mutations that model a disease and any associated interacting modifiers. In this article, we describe how data related to fly models of human disease are presented in individual Gene Reports and in the Human Disease Model Reports. Finally, we discuss search strategies and new query tools that are available to access the disease model data in FlyBase. Drosophila Collection: Drosophila melanogaster is well established as a model for studying human disease. Here, we highlight recent efforts to enhance the availability and accessibility of disease model data in FlyBase, the model organism database for Drosophila.
Guatemalan Ladinization and History

Recent years have seen a significant increase in the use of history by social scientists. It is less and less common that studies in anthropology, sociology, and political science evaluate variables without attention to their antecedents. There still survive, however, concepts and theories built originally on synchronic assumptions. One of these theories, ladinization, has been the subject of considerable contention. “Ladinization” derives from “Ladino,” a term used in Guatemala and adjacent areas of Mexico, El Salvador, and Honduras to refer to the non-Indian natives of those countries. I am not sure when “ladinization” entered the social science vocabulary, but it may have been with the work of North American anthropologists in the 1930s and 1940s. It described what observers thought of as a process whereby Indians were becoming Ladinos or more Ladino-like. The term was not favored by Guatemalan Ladinos, who generally spoke of “civilizing” the Indians, by which they meant that Indian customs should be discarded in favor of Ladino. In espousing this theme, Guatemalan indigenistas of the “generation of the 20s” often blurred the relation of race to culture; some argued that Indians were capable of being “civilized,” others that such changes could only be secured by introducing Europeans to interbreeding.
Between cultures: values, training and identity in a manufacturing firm

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to critically scrutinize the use of training interventions as a means of implementing corporate culture change and to assess the implications of such programs for employee identity.Design/methodology/approach – The paper uses empirical materials, observations and reflections from a two‐year ethnographic study in a manufacturing firm to discuss the organization's “core values” with specific attention directed to a particular organizational event – the running of a training program designed to educate the firms employees in the company's newly designed culture.Findings – The contested interaction between formally articulated corporate culture and the workplace experience of the employees is shown to demonstrate how cultural change programs can work to suppress employee's dissent and dialogue whilst being articulated in a language of inclusiveness and involvement.Practical implications – The paper provides a review of the complex and paradoxical implications of cultural.
Crowdsourced judgement elicitation with endogenous proficiency

Crowdsourcing is now widely used to replace judgement or evaluation by an expert authority with an aggregate evaluation from a number of non-experts, in applications ranging from rating and categorizing online content all the way to evaluation of student assignments in massively open online courses (MOOCs) via peer grading. A key issue in these settings, where direct monitoring of both effort and accuracy is infeasible, is incentivizing agents in the 'crowd' to put in effort to make good evaluations, as well as to truthfully report their evaluations. We study the design of mechanisms for crowdsourced judgement elicitation when workers strategically choose both their reports and the effort they put into their evaluations. This leads to a new family of information elicitation problems with unobservable ground truth, where an agent's proficiency--- the probability with which she correctly evaluates the underlying ground truth--- is endogenously determined by her strategic choice of how much effort to put into the task. Our main contribution is a simple, new, mechanism for binary information elicitation for multiple tasks when agents have endogenous proficiencies, with the following properties: (i) Exerting maximum effort followed by truthful reporting of observations is a Nash equilibrium. (ii) This is the equilibrium with maximum payoff to all agents, even when agents have different maximum proficiencies, can use mixed strategies, and can choose a different strategy for each of their tasks. Our information elicitation mechanism requires only minimal bounds on the priors, asks agents to only report their own evaluations, and does not require any conditions on a diverging number of agent reports per task to achieve its incentive properties. The main idea behind our mechanism is to use the presence of multiple tasks and ratings to estimate a reporting statistic to identify and penalize low-effort agreement--- the mechanism rewards agents for agreeing with another 'reference' report on the same task, but also penalizes for blind agreement by subtracting out this statistic term, designed so that agents obtain rewards only when they put in effort into their observations.
Reciprocal peer learning with task cards: analysis of behaviour and verbal interactions in structured and unstructured dyads

Background: This study is a part of a larger research project where the effect of instructional guidance in terms of role definition and role switching was investigated on students’ learning of Basic Life Support (BLS) during a 20-minute reciprocal learning episode with task cards. BLS is a lifesaving skill consisting of nine sub skills to be performed in a correct order. Students’ BLS performance was individually assessed before (baseline), immediately after (intervention) and two weeks later (retention). BLS assessments were conducted on a Laerdal Resusci Anne manikin connected to a laptop to register the quality of chest compressions and rescue breathings. Data from the software together with qualitative data from trained BLS observers were entered into a scoring system to obtain individual BLS scores, ranging from 18 to 73 points. Results demonstrated that skill retention was enhanced in the structured group (i.e. the group where role switching and role definition was implemented; n = 18) compared to the unstructured group (i.e. the group where students were free to organize themselves the activity; n = 18). Instructing learners how to behave as doers and observers as well as prompting them to switch roles improves learning compared to when no guidance is offered. Purpose: In the present study, the author investigates this effect further by mapping and analysing the behaviours and verbal interactions of learners with and without instructional guidance on role definition and role switching. Methods: Behaviours and interactions of learners in both groups were analysed during the 20-minute learning intervention for acquiring BLS with task cards. All variables were analysed and reported on the level of frequency and duration. The latter was expressed in percentages of the 20-minute intervention time. Results and discussion: It was found that without guidance, learners spent significantly more time in reading the task cards in silence (27% vs. 6%). Although the frequency of motor time-on-task was significantly higher in the unstructured group (23 vs. 13), the percentage of time of motor time-on-task was significantly higher in the structured compared to the unstructured dyads (42% vs. 30%). Additionally, learners engaged more in the provision of instructions in the structured group (18% vs. 5%). Evaluating activities during learning correlated positively with students’ performance of BLS at intervention. Asking for help irrelevant for learning the task and unsolicited feedback correlated negatively with student performance at intervention. Conclusion: Increased motor time-on-task and the provision of instructions together with could, therefore, be important factors in explaining short-term skill retention in structured peer learning settings. Future research could elaborate the effect of motor and cognitive evaluating activities in reciprocal peer learning.
Acinetobacter baumannii Septicemia in a Recipient of an Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation

Acinetobacter baumannii is a gram-negative, nonfermentative coccobacillus that causes infections in immunocompromised and chronically ill patients and is associated with multidrug resistance. Two days before receiving her nonmyeloablative stem cell allograft, a patient with acute myeloid leukemia developed Acinetobacter baumannii bacteremia that caused septic shock which was successfully treated with imipenem and removal of the central venous catheter. To our knowledge, this is the first report of Acinetobacter baumannii septicemia in a hematopietic stem cell transplantation recipient.
Contribution of the PhoP-PhoQ and PmrA-PmrB Two-Component Regulatory Systems to Mg2+-Induced Gene Regulation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa

ABSTRACT When grown in divalent cation-limited medium, Pseudomonas aeruginosa becomes resistant to cationic antimicrobial peptides and polymyxin B. This resistance is regulated by the PhoP-PhoQ and PmrA-PmrB two-component regulatory systems. To further characterize Mg2+ regulation in P. aeruginosa, microarray transcriptional profiling was conducted to compare wild-type P. aeruginosa grown under Mg2+-limited and Mg2+-replete conditions to isogenic phoP and pmrA mutants grown under Mg2+-limited conditions. Under Mg2+-limited conditions (0.02 mM Mg2+), approximately 3% of the P. aeruginosa genes were differentially expressed compared to the expression in bacteria grown under Mg2+-replete conditions (2 mM Mg2+). Only a modest subset of the Mg2+-regulated genes were regulated through either PhoP or PmrA. To determine which genes were directly regulated, a bioinformatic search for conserved binding motifs was combined with confirmatory reverse transcriptase PCR and gel shift promoter binding assays, and the results indicated that very few genes were directly regulated by these response regulators. It was found that in addition to the previously known oprH-phoP-phoQ operon and the pmrHFIJKLM-ugd operon, the PA0921 and PA1343 genes, encoding small basic proteins, were regulated by Mg2+ in a PhoP-dependent manner. The number of known PmrA-regulated genes was expanded to include the PA1559-PA1560, PA4782-PA4781, and feoAB operons, in addition to the previously known PA4773-PA4775-pmrAB and pmrHFIJKLM-ugd operons.
Pediatric tuberculosis in Alberta First Nations (1991-2000): outbreaks and the protective effect of bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine.

BACKGROUND The tuberculosis control strategy of vaccinating First Nations newborns with BCG (bacille Calmette-Guerin) is currently undergoing re-evaluation in Canada. Review of recent pediatric tuberculosis morbidity could inform this re-evaluation. METHODS Potential source cases and pediatric cases of tuberculosis from Alberta First Nations were identified over the 10 years 1991-2000. The distribution of pediatric disease was described. The effect of BCG on tuberculosis morbidity in two large outbreaks was determined. RESULTS A total of 57 potential source cases and 41 pediatric cases of tuberculosis were reported from 17 (41.5%) and 8 (19.5%) of the 41 on-reserve First Nation Community Health Centres, respectively. Three outbreaks traceable to three source cases accounted for 34 (18, 3, and 13, respectively) of the 41 (82.9%) pediatric cases. Each outbreak was spatially and temporally separate from the other. Each outbreak strain of Mycobacterium tuberculosis had a unique DNA fingerprint. In the largest outbreaks, disease-to-infection ratios (secondary case rates) were higher in newly infected unvaccinated versus vaccinated close pediatric contacts (12/13 [92.3%] versus 7/15 [46.7%], p=0.02), but the infection rate was almost certainly falsely high in the BCG vaccinated. One unvaccinated child had a brain tuberculoma in addition to primary pulmonary tuberculosis. CONCLUSION For most Alberta First Nations communities, the spatial and temporal distribution of disease, and the meager impact on morbidity, challenge the rationale for continued use of BCG.
Social Connectedness of Deaf Retirees

The intergenerational connectedness that has traditionally bound members of the Deaf community to each other is changing amidst the current technological and cultural landscape. This study explores perceptions of Deaf retirees concerning their usefulness to younger generations and their need to stay connected to each other despite increasing isolation due to implications of aging. Factors such as communication networks, transportation availability, proximity to families and friends, technology, and vital connections to the local residential school for children who are deaf are discussed as emergent themes from two focus groups conducted with 14 Deaf retirees. This exploratory study sought to discover how the dynamics between the generations have evolved and the positive and negative impact of such changes. The voices of the retirees in this study shed light on the complicating issues surrounding communication as a lifeline between generations of Deaf people who are native users of American Sign Language. Additionally, the traditions of social connectedness upheld by the Deaf community are similar to those of other collectivist cultures that also may experience shifting social networks within their own communities.
An ultra low energy 9T half-select-free subthreshold SRAM bitcell

Operating both logic and memory at subthreshold supply voltages reduces energy dissipation for portable medical devices where battery life is critical. In this paper, we propose a 9T half-select-free subthreshold bitcell that has 2.05X lower mean read energy, 12.39% lower mean write energy, and 28% lower mean leakage current than conventional 8T bitcells at the TT_0. 4V_27C corner. Our bitcell also supports the bitline interleaving technique that can cope with soft errors.
Studying civil society across the world: Exploring the Thorny issues of conceptualization and measurement

Abstract The debate about the usefulness of the civil society concept for social analysis has reached a critical stage and calls for its abandonment are mounting. To prove its relevance for policy, practice and research, better operational concepts and more rigorous empirical research on civil society are required. This article examines the possibilities and pitfalls of cross-national civil society research as a crucial area of empirical civil society studies. It explores the definition, conceptualization, operationalization and measurement of civil society through a critical examination of existing international efforts at comparative civil society analysis. A functional approach to defining civil society and a two-dimensional operational concept of civil society, according to its (1) structural and (2) cultural features, are proposed as suitable tools to study the phenomenon cross-nationally. The article also reviews the Civicus Civil Society Index as an innovative tool to assess the state of civil society and discusses the insights and challenges emerging from its current application in more than 50 countries. The paper concludes that international comparative civil society studies are both possible and necessary, but cautions that more attention needs to be paid to the development of appropriate operational concepts and measurement models.
Children with autism align syntax in natural conversation

Previous experimental work has shown that verbal children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) converge linguistically, or align, with an interlocutor, and to the same extent as typical children. However, it is not known whether ASD children align in natural conversation. The studies presented in this paper aimed to address this issue. We measured syntactic alignment in ASD children, first using an experimental task, and second in natural conversation. We found that ASD and typical children aligned to the same extent in both tasks, suggesting that experimental findings about alignment in ASD are ecologically valid. We argue, however, that the experimental measurement of alignment overstates the prevalence of syntactic alignment in children's conversations.
Variegated neoliberalization: geographies, modalities, pathways

Across the broad field of heterodox political economy, ‘neoliberalism’ appears to have become a rascal concept – promiscuously pervasive, yet inconsistently defined, empirically imprecise and frequently contested. Controversies regarding its precise meaning are more than merely semantic. They generally flow from underlying disagreements regarding the sources, expressions and implications of contemporary regulatory transformations. In this article, we consider the handling of ‘neoliberalism’ within three influential strands of heterodox political economy – the varieties of capitalism approach; historical materialist international political economy; and governmentality approaches. While each of these research traditions sheds light on contemporary processes of market-oriented regulatory restructuring, we argue that each also underplays and/or misreads the systemically uneven, or ‘variegated’, character of these processes. Enabled by a critical interrogation of how each approach interprets the geographies, modalities and pathways of neoliberalization processes, we argue that the problematic of variegation must be central to any adequate account of marketized forms of regulatory restructuring and their alternatives under post-1970s capitalism. Our approach emphasizes the cumulative impacts of successive ‘waves’ of neoliberalization upon uneven institutional landscapes, in particular: (a) their establishment of interconnected, mutually recursive policy relays within an increasingly transnational field of market-oriented regulatory transfer; and (b) their infiltration and reworking of the geoinstitutional frameworks, or ‘rule regimes’, within which regulatory experimentation unfolds. This mode of analysis has significant implications for interpreting the current global economic crisis.
Process-Aware Interrupt Scheduling and Accounting

In most operating systems, the handling of interrupts is typically performed within the address space of the kernel. Moreover, interrupt handlers are invoked asynchronously during the execution of arbitrary processes. Unfortunately, this allows for a process's time quantum to be consumed by arbitrary interrupt handling. To avoid significant impact to process execution and also to respond quickly enough to interrupts, interrupt servicing is usually split into two parts: a "top" and "bottom" half. The top half executes at interrupt time and is meant to be short enough to complete all necessary actions at the time of the interrupt. In contrast, the bottom half can be deferred to a more suitable point in time to complete servicing of a prior interrupt. Systems such as Linux may defer bottom half handling to a schedulable thread that may be arbitrarily delayed until there are no other processes to execute. A better approach would be to schedule bottom halves in accordance with the priorities of processes that are affected by their execution. Likewise, bottom half processing should be charged to the CPU-time usage of the affected process, or processes, where possible, to ensure fairer and more predictable resource management. This paper describes some of our approaches, both algorithmically and in terms of implementation on a Linux system, to combine interrupt scheduling and accountability. We show significant improvements in predictability of a Linux system by modifying the kernel to more accurately account for interrupt servicing costs and more precisely control when and to what extent interrupts can be serviced
Quantification of adult cerebral hemodynamics by near-infrared spectroscopy.

Near-infrared spectroscopy was used to measure global cerebral blood flow and volume in 10 healthy adult volunteers. High- and low-cerebral blood flow compartments were detected with mean flows for all 10 subjects of 59 +/- 21 (SD) and 11 +/- 4 ml.100 g-1.min-1, respectively. The mean cerebral blood volume of the group was 2.85 +/- 0.97 ml/100 g. Analysis of spontaneous changes in the cerebral concentrations of oxyhemoglobin and deoxyhemoglobin demonstrated strong correlations between respiratory rate and the oscillation frequency of cerebral oxyhemoglobin concentration (r = 0.99) and arterial oxygen saturation (SaO2) (r = 0.99). An estimate of the mean cerebral oxygen saturation for all subjects averaged 59.4 +/- 12.4% when their mean SaO2 was 91.8 +/- 2.4% (equivalent to 67.6 +/- 13.8% at a normoxic SaO2 of 98%). These results demonstrate that near-infrared spectroscopy can be used as a noninvasive bedside technique for both qualitative and quantitative evaluation of cerebral hemodynamics and oxygenation in adults.
Social psychiatry and social policy for the 21st century ‐ new concepts for new needs: the ‘psychologically‐informed environment’

Although the idea of a therapeutic community (TC) has lost none of its dynamism, there are many modern‐day environments in which the original TC model has been unable to make headway. In recent years, new ideas have been emerging for the development of institutions and services that can be adapted to a wide range of psychological needs and settings, such as homelessness hostels and refuges. The psychologically‐informed environment (PIE) arises from the scope for reflective practice, leading to changes in day‐to‐day working ‐ including a more planned variant for high secure services. The PIE approach seems to offer greater flexibility in scope than the TC model. Nevertheless, such new approaches may yet need a clear values base; and the next article in this series will explore new ideas for the creation of ‘enabling environments’ in a still wider range of settings.
Mannosyl Glycodendritic Structure Inhibits DC-SIGN-Mediated Ebola Virus Infection in cis and in trans

ABSTRACT We have designed a glycodendritic structure, BH30sucMan, that blocks the interaction between dendritic cell-specific intercellular adhesion molecule 3-grabbing nonintegrin (DC-SIGN) and Ebola virus (EBOV) envelope. BH30sucMan inhibits DC-SIGN-mediated EBOV infection at nanomolar concentrations. BH30sucMan may counteract important steps of the infective process of EBOV and, potentially, of microorganisms shown to exploit DC-SIGN for cell entry and infection.