Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Impact of Barriers and Self-Efficacy on Self-Care Behaviors in Type 2 Diabetes

PURPOSE this cross-sectional, correlational study examined the relationships of diabetes-specific treatment barriers and self-efficacy with self-care behaviors. METHODS A total of 309 people with type 2 diabetes participated in this study. All of the factors were assessed by selfreport questionnaires. Self-care behaviors included exercise, diet, skipping medication, testing blood for glucose, adjusting insulin to avoid or correct hyperglycemia, and adjusting diet to avoid or correct hypoglycemia. RESULTS Perceived barriers to carrying out self-care behaviors were associated with worse diet and exercise behavior. Greater selfefficacy predicted more frequent blood glucose testing, less frequent skipping of medication and binge eating, and closer adherence to an ideal diet. Nontraditional dimensions of selfefficacy were associated with worse self-care. Self-efficacy explained 4% to 10% of the variance in diabetes self-care behaviors beyond that accounted for by patient characteristics and health beliefs about barriers. CONCLUSIONS The findings of this study provided support for Rosenstock's proposal that a person's self-perceived capability to carry out a behavior should be incorporated into an expanded health belief model.
The Influence of Number Magnitude on Vocal Responses

ABSTRACT The study investigated whether number magnitude can influence vocal responses. Participants produced either short or long version of the vowel [ɑ] (Experiment 1), or high or low-pitched version of that vowel (Experiment 2), according to the parity of a visually presented number. In addition to measuring reaction times (RT) of vocal responses, we measured the intensity, the fundamental frequency (f0) and the first and second formants of the vocalization. The RTs showed that the long and high-pitched vocal responses were associated with large numbers, while short and low-pitched vocal responses were associated with small numbers. It was also found that high-pitched vocalizations were mapped with the odd numbers, while the low-pitched vocalizations were mapped with the even numbers. Finally, large numbers increased the f0 values. The study shows systematic interactions between the processes that represent number magnitude and produce vocal responses.
A Parametric Study on the Processing and Physical Characterization of PLGA 50/50 Bioscaffolds

The ability to control the characteristics of scaffolds is important such that scaffolds can be fine tuned for specific applications. In this study, the effects of processing parameters on cell morphology and mechanical properties of PLGA 50/50 bioscaffolds for tissue engineering applications were investigated. Specifically, the effects of salt particle sizes and salt-to-polymer mass ratios on the scaffold relative density, average pore size and density, open-cell porosity, and mechanical properties were examined. The PLGA samples were processed using a salt leaching technique in a batch-foaming setup. Experiments showed that pore size and density were dependent on the salt particle size used, and that as the salt-to-polymer mass ratio increased, the porosity increased while the relative density decreased. The results showed that by varying the salt parameters during fabrication, the scaffold characteristics and morphology can be controlled.
Manufacturing of Industrial Fire Retardant Gloves using Blends of Cotton and Synthetic Fibers

The aim of this research work was to develop flame retardant gloves and describes the performance requirement as well as the design of specialized fabric to provide protection against thermal/flame hazards.Fabric flammability is affected by various factors such as Fibre composition, fabric construction, oxygen concentration and the environmental conditions (moisture content, heat, air flow), but the effects of finishing material fabrics cannot be overlooked. FR properties of 100 % knitted cellulose materials and their blends with Modacrylic fibres and Nomex were investigated in this paper. In order to design an optimal blending ratio different blend ratios were used. The flame behavior and thermal stability of knitted fabric were evaluated with different tests.
COMPARISON OF LIGHT TRAPS AND PLANKTON TOWS FOR SAMPLING BRACHYURAN CRAB LARVAE IN AN ALASKAN FJORD

Abstract We compared the effectiveness of light traps and plankton tows for sampling brachyuran crab larvae in Bartlett Cove, Glacier Bay, Alaska, U.S.A. during three nights each in July and August 2001 and June, August, and September 2002. Proportions of species and stages were used to compare larvae caught by light traps and plankton tows. Absolute numbers of larvae are difficult to compare because of the difference in sampling volume and duration of each method. Both methods captured early and late-stage larvae of four brachyuran families, Cancridae, Grapsidae, Pinnotheridae, and Majidae. However, light traps collected many late-stage (megalopae) cancrid larvae, which were rarely collected by plankton tows, suggesting that late-stage larvae may be undersampled by plankton tows. In contrast, plankton tows collected many early stage (zoeae) pinnotherid larvae, which may be undersampled by light traps. These results follow the same pattern as that found for tropical fish larvae, that light traps are a useful sampling device for settlement-size larvae. Light traps provide a simple method to collect high resolution temporal data on late-stage larval abundance, and their use has improved our ability to discern recruitment dynamics for decapod crustaceans.
Decentralisation and health services delivery in Tanzania: Analysis of decision space in planning, allocation, and use of financial resources

While decentralisation of health systems has been on the policy agenda in low-income and middle-income countries since the 1970s, many studies have focused on understanding who has more decision-making powers but less attention is paid to understand what those powers encompass. Using the decision space approach, this study aimed to understand the amount of decision-making space transferred from the central government to institutions at the periphery in the decentralised health system in Tanzania. The findings of this study indicated that the decentralisation process in Tanzania has provided authorities with a range of decision-making space. In the areas of priority setting and planning, district health authorities had moderate decision space. However, in the financial resource allocation and expenditure of funds from the central government, the districts had narrow decision-making space. The districts, nevertheless, had wider decision-making space in mobilising and using locally generated financial resources. However, the ability of the districts to allocate and use locally generated resources was constrained by bureaucratic procedures of the central government. The study concludes that decentralisation by devolution which is being promoted in the policy documents in Tanzania is yet to be realised at the district and local levels. The study recommends that the central government should provide more space to the decentralised district health systems to incorporate locally defined priorities in the district health plans.
A COMPUTER AIDED DIAGNOSIS SYSTEM FOR LUNG CANCER DETECTION USING SVM

Computer aided diagnosis is starting to be implemented broadly in the diagnosis and detection of many varieties of abnormities acquired during various imaging procedures. The main aim of the CAD systems is to increase the accuracy and decrease the time of diagnoses, while the general achievement for CAD systems are to find the place of nodules and to determine the characteristic features of the nodule. As lung cancer is one of the fatal and leading cancer types, there has been plenty of studies for the usage of the CAD systems to detect lung cancer. Yet, the CAD systems need to be developed a lot in order to identify the different shapes of nodules, lung segmentation and to have higher level of sensitivity, specifity and accuracy. This challenge is the motivation of this study in implementation of CAD system for lung cancer detection. In the study, LIDC database is used which comprises of an image set of lung cancer thoracic documented CT scans. The presented CAD system consists of CT image reading, image pre-processing, segmentation, feature extraction and classification steps. To avoid losing important features, the CT images were read as a raw form in DICOM file format. Then, filtration and enhancement techniques were used as an image processing. Otsu’s algorithm, edge detection and morphological operations are applied for the segmentation, following the feature extractions step. Finally, support vector machine with Gaussian RBF is utilized for the classification step which is widely used as a supervised classifier.
Integration of MODIS land and atmosphere products with a coupled‐process model to estimate gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration from 1 km to global scales

We propose the Breathing Earth System Simulator (BESS), an upscaling approach to quantify global gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration using MODIS with a spatial resolution of 1–5 km and a temporal resolution of 8 days. This effort is novel because it is the first system that harmonizes and utilizes MODIS Atmosphere and Land products on the same projection and spatial resolution over the global land. This enabled us to use the MODIS Atmosphere products to calculate atmospheric radiative transfer for visual and near infrared radiation wave bands. Then we coupled atmospheric and canopy radiative transfer processes, with models that computed leaf photosynthesis, stomatal conductance and transpiration on the sunlit and shaded portions of the vegetation and soil. At the annual time step, the mass and energy fluxes derived from BESS showed strong linear relations with measurements of solar irradiance (r2 = 0.95, relative bias: 8%), gross primary productivity (r2 = 0.86, relative bias: 5%) and evapotranspiration (r2 = 0.86, relative bias: 15%) in data from 33 flux towers that cover seven plant functional types across arctic to tropical climatic zones. A sensitivity analysis revealed that the gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration computed in BESS were most sensitive to leaf area index and solar irradiance, respectively. We quantified the mean global terrestrial estimates of gross primary productivity and evapotranpiration between 2001 and 2003 as 118 ± 26 PgC yr−1 and 500 ± 104 mm yr−1 (equivalent to 63,000 ± 13,100 km3 yr−1), respectively. BESS‐derived gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration estimates were consistent with the estimates from independent machine‐learning, data‐driven products, but the process‐oriented structure has the advantage of diagnosing sensitivity of mechanisms. The process‐based BESS is able to offer gridded biophysical variables everywhere from local to the total global land scales with an 8‐day interval over multiple years.
Involvement of Avidity for Major Histocompatibility Complex in Homeostasis of Naive and Memory T Cells

The requirements for survival and self-renewal of peripheral T cells and the nature of mechanisms controlling the size of the naive and memory pool are not completely understood. Here, we examine the involvement of the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) in survival and homeostatic expansion of naive and memory T cells. We show that the homeostatic behavior of naive T cell receptor (TCR)-transgenic T cells can be deduced by the expression levels of TCR and CD5, a negative regulator of TCR signaling. Both these factors determine the strength of TCR stimulation by MHC-derived signals. We further show that, similarly to naive T cells, MHC-derived signals influence the homeostatic expansion capacity of memory T cells under lymphopenic conditions. In contrast to naive T cells, however, memory T cells can reach a homeostatic equilibrium, in which survival/self-renewal of each clone is dissociated from their avidity for MHC-derived signals.
Investigating the effects of conscientiousness on daily stress, affect and physical symptom processes: a daily diary study.

OBJECTIVES Higher conscientiousness (C) predicts better health outcomes. Recent research suggests that stress may play an important role in explaining this relationship. The current study aimed to establish whether C moderates the relationship between daily hassle appraisals, daily affect, and physical symptoms. DESIGN AND METHODS A daily diary design was used, where participants (N = 103) completed a baseline measure of C followed by a 14-day daily diary, providing daily details of hassles (primary and secondary appraisals) experienced as well as positive and negative affect and physical symptoms. RESULTS Hierarchical linear modelling revealed that Total C (as well as two facets of C: Order and Industriousness) moderated the relationship between stress appraisals and positive affect. Specifically, the negative association between the daily appraisal of hassles as stressful (i.e., where perceived demands outweighed perceived resources) and positive affect was stronger for lower and average levels of C, Order, and Industriousness. No significant moderated effects were found for negative affect or physical symptoms. The Order facet was also found to be an important factor predicting attrition. CONCLUSIONS The current study provided evidence that C and two of its facets can moderate the relationship between hassle appraisal and positive affect. C may exert part of its influence on health by modifying the effects of daily stressors. STATEMENT OF CONTRIBUTION What is already known on this subject? Conscientiousness has a significant positive effect on longevity and health status. While the performance of health behaviours may partially account for this relationship, evidence suggests that it does not fully mediate the effect. Research has begun to look at stress as a possible additional explanatory variable, and there is evidence that Conscientiousness moderates the relationship between stress and health behaviours. What does this study add? Shows that Conscientiousness and two of its facets (Order and Industriousness) moderate the relationship between hassle appraisal and positive affect. Highlights the importance of studying lower order facets of personality in health research. Suggests that Conscientiousness may exert part of its influence on health by modifying the effects of daily stressors.
TESTS OF 1-D TRANSPORT MODELS , AND THEIR PREDICTIONS FOR ITER

A number of proposed tokamak thermal transport models are tested by comparing their predictions with measurements from several tokamaks. The necessary data have been provided for a total of 75 discharges from C-mod, DIII-D, JET, JT-60U, T10, and TFTR. A standard prediction methodology has been developed, and three codes have been benchmarked; these 'standard' codes have been relied on for testing most of the transport models. While a wide range of physical transport processes has been tested, no single model has emerged as clearly superior to all competitors for simulating H-mode discharges. In order to winnow the field, further tests of the effect of sheared flows and of the 'stiffness' of transport are planned. Several of the models have been used to predict ITER performance, with widely varying results. With some transport models ITER's predicted fusion power depends strongly on the 'pedestal' temperature, but ~ 1GW (Q=10) is predicted for most models if the pedestal temperature is at least 4 keV.
Roll‐to‐Roll Production of Graphene Hybrid Electrodes for High‐Efficiency, Flexible Organic Photoelectronics

Despite nearly two decades of research, the absence of ideal, flexible, and transparent electrodes has been the biggest bottleneck for realizing flexible and printable electronics via roll‐to‐roll (R2R) method. A fabrication of poly(3,4‐ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(styrene sulfonate):graphene:ethyl cellulose (PEDOT:PSS:G:EC) hybrid electrodes by R2R process, which allows for the elimination of strong acid treatment. The high‐performance flexible printable electrode includes a transmittance (T) of 78% at 550 nm and a sheet resistance of 13 Ω sq−1 with excellent mechanical stability. These features arise from the PSS interacting strongly with the ethyoxyl groups from EC promoting a favorable phase separation between PEDOT and PSS chains, and the highly uniform and conductive G:EC enable rearrangement of the PEDOT chains with more expanded conformation surrounded by G:EC via the π–π interaction between G:EC and PEDOT. The hybrid electrodes are fully functional as universal electrodes for outstanding flexible electronic applications. Organic solar cells based on the hybrid electrode exhibit a high power conversion efficiency of 9.4% with good universality for active layer. Moreover, the organic light‐emitting diodes and photodetector devices hold the same level to or outperform those based on indium tin oxide flexible transparent electrodes.
Equivalent effective population size mating as a useful tool in the genetic management of the Ibicenco rabbit breed (Conill Pages d'Eivissa)

The Ibicenco rabbit (Conill Pages D'Eivissa) is a rare breed mainly located on Ibiza Island, in rural areas. Today breeders are looking for a sustainable use and alternative routes for profitability of the population to avoid its extinction. The breed presents some variety in coat colour (brown, black, orange, and grey), and breeders would like to maintain these characteristics. The objectives of this study were to develop a method to design matings in a population with unbalanced pedigree depth in a scenario of maintaining the variety of coat colours, and to analyze the genealogical information of the Ibicenco rabbit to ascertain the genetic structure of the population. Equivalent effective population size mating was developed as a useful parameter to design the mating in this particular scenario. Results obtained by the initial application showed that this population was properly managed for maintaining the maximum genetic variability. This mating method is recommended to manage the genetic variability of this small rabbit population in a scenario of partial permanent colour structure. For the pedigree analysis, a reference population formed by 143 animals available for reproduc - tion was used. A demographic study, a probability gene origin analysis, computation of inbreeding and effec - tive size, and an analysis of genetic structure were done. The generation interval was approximately one year (11.8 months). The average number of equivalent generations was 3.4. The effective numbers of founders and ancestors were 10 and 11, respectively, and the founder genome equivalent was 6. The average inbreeding was 10.8%, but the mean inbreeding seems to have stopped increasing as a consequence of deeper monitoring in the mating design. The realized effective size was 9.6 (via inbreeding) and 17.5 (via coancestry). Regarding the genetic structure, the orange and black groups are the most distant genetically while grey and blacks are closer.
IgE-Api m 4 Is Useful for Identifying a Particular Phenotype of Bee Venom Allergy.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE Different clinical behaviors have been identified in patients allergic to bee venom. Compound-resolved diagnosis could be an appropriate tool for investigating these differences. The aims of this study were to analyze whether specific IgE to Api m 4 (sIgE-Api m 4) can identify a particular kind of bee venom allergy and to describe response to bee venom immunotherapy (bVIT). METHODS Prospective study of 31 patients allergic to bee venom who were assigned to phenotype group A (sIgE-Api m 4 <0.98 kU/L), treated with native aqueous (NA) extract, or phenotype group B (sIgE-Api m 4 ≥0.98 kU/L), treated with purified aqueous (PA) extract. Sex, age, cardiovascular risk, severity of preceding sting reaction, exposure to beekeeping, and immunological data (intradermal test, sIgE/sIgG4-Apis-nApi m 1, and sIgE-rApi m 2-Api m 4 were analyzed. Systemic reactions (SRs) during bVIT build-up were analyzed. Immunological and sting challenge outcomes were evaluated in each group after 1 and 2 years of bVIT. RESULTS Phenotype B patients had more severe reactions (P=.049) and higher skin sensitivity (P=.011), baseline sIgE-Apis (P=.0004), sIgE-nApi m 1 (P=.0004), and sIgG4-Apis (P=.027) than phenotype A patients. Furthermore, 41% of patients in group B experienced SRs during the build-up phase with NA; the sting challenge success rate in this group was 82%. There were no significant reductions in serial intradermal test results, but an intense reduction in sIgE-nApi m 1 (P=.013) and sIgE-Api m 4 (P=.004) was observed after the first year of bVIT. CONCLUSION Use of IgE-Api m 4 as the only discrimination criterion demonstrated differences in bee venom allergy. Further investigation with larger populations is necessary.
Effects of Cadmium Exposure on DNA Methylation at Imprinting Control Regions and Genome-Wide in Mothers and Newborn Children

Background: Imprinted genes are defined by their preferential expression from one of the two parental alleles. This unique mode of gene expression is dependent on allele-specific DNA methylation profiles established at regulatory sequences called imprinting control regions (ICRs). These loci have been used as biosensors to study how environmental exposures affect methylation and transcription. However, a critical unanswered question is whether they are more, less, or equally sensitive to environmental stressors as the rest of the genome. Objectives: Using cadmium exposure in humans as a model, we aimed to determine the relative sensitivity of ICRs to perturbation of methylation compared to similar, nonimprinted loci in the genome. Methods: We assayed DNA methylation genome-wide using bisulfite sequencing of 19 newborn cord blood and 20 maternal blood samples selected on the basis of maternal blood cadmium levels. Differentially methylated regions (DMRs) associated with cadmium exposure were identified. Results: In newborn cord blood and maternal blood, 641 and 1,945 cadmium-associated DMRs were identified, respectively. DMRs were more common at the 15 maternally methylated ICRs than at similar nonimprinted loci in newborn cord blood (p=5.64×10−8) and maternal blood (p=6.22×10−14), suggesting a higher sensitivity for ICRs to cadmium. Genome-wide, Enrichr analysis indicated that the top three functional categories for genes that overlapped DMRs in maternal blood were body mass index (BMI) (p=2.0×10−5), blood pressure (p=3.8×10−5), and body weight (p=0.0014). In newborn cord blood, the top three functional categories were BMI, atrial fibrillation, and hypertension, although associations were not significant after correction for multiple testing (p=0.098). These findings suggest that epigenetic changes may contribute to the etiology of cadmium-associated diseases. Conclusions: We analyzed cord blood and maternal blood DNA methylation profiles genome-wide at nucleotide resolution in individuals selected for high and low blood cadmium levels in the first trimester. Our findings suggest that ICRs may be hot spots for perturbation by cadmium, motivating further study of these loci to investigate potential mechanisms of cadmium action. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP2085