Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Going, Going, Gone: Lost Internet References

The use of Internet references in academic literature is common, and Internet references are frequently inaccessible. The extent of Internet referencing and Internet reference activity in medical or scientific publications was systematically examined in more than 1000 articles published between 2000 and 2003 in the New England Journal of Medicine, The Journal of the American Medical Association, and Science. Internet references accounted for 2.6% of all references (672/25548) and in articles 27 months old, 13% of Internet references were inactive. Publishers, librarians, and readers need to reassess policies, archiving systems, and other resources for addressing Internet reference attrition to prevent further information loss.
A New Adaptive Component-Substitution-Based Satellite Image Fusion by Using Partial Replacement

Preservation of spectral information and enhancement of spatial resolution are regarded as important issues in remote sensing satellite image fusion. In previous research, various algorithms have been proposed. Although they have been successful, there are still some margins of spatial and spectral quality that can be improved. In addition, a new method that can be used for various types of sensors is required. In this paper, a new adaptive fusion method based on component substitution is proposed to merge a high-spatial-resolution panchromatic (PAN) image with a multispectral image. This method generates high-/low-resolution synthetic component images by partial replacement and uses statistical ratio-based high-frequency injection. Various remote sensing satellite images, such as IKONOS-2, QuickBird, LANDSAT ETM+, and SPOT-5, were employed in the evaluation. Experiments showed that this approach can resolve spectral distortion problems and successfully conserve the spatial information of a PAN image. Thus, the fused image obtained from the proposed method gave higher fusion quality than the images from some other methods. In addition, the proposed method worked efficiently with the different sensors considered in the evaluation.
Sharing tools on newspaper Web sites: an exploratory study

Many Web sites include buttons or links (sharing tools) that allow users to conveniently share news stories and other information with friends, family and colleagues via e‐mail. This paper reports on an exploratory study of the design and functional features of sharing tools on a sample of 11 US newspaper Web sites. The authors examined the appearance, location, and features of sharing tools that are provided to both senders and recipients. Sample news stories were also “shared” with one of the authors using each of the sharing tools, and data about the appearance and content of these messages were collected. The major findings of the study suggest that on the sampled Web sites: there is lack of standardisation in the visual design and placement of the sharing tools; insufficient information is provided to the user about how to use the tool; information about the security and privacy is absent or incomplete; and many tools cannot be user‐customized, and are not convenient to use.
Functional requirements of energy and ancillary service dispatch for the interim ISO New England electricity market

The purpose of this paper is to address the functional requirements of the energy and ancillary service dispatch application which supports the interim ISO New England (ISONE) electricity market. The requirements are partially extracted from the market rules and procedures approved by the Regional Market Operations Committee of New England power pool (NEPOOL). The application is required to provide both the pre-dispatch scheduling and the real-time dispatch functions in order to meet operational needs for different time horizons. It clears bids for the markets of energy, regulating capacity and reserves and determines real-time marginal prices and lost opportunity costs for settlement purposes. To cope with the rapidly changing deregulated environment, an iterative prototyping approach is taken to solicit and refine requirements along the course of this multi-phased ISONE project.
Quality Premiums For Australian Wheat In The Growing Asian Markets

An hedonic price function is applied to Australia's wheat exports to the growing Asian markets. The values for the quality characteristics in the wheat markets of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, and Thailand are estimated. The data base for the study is from the Australian Wheat Board shipments over the period 1984 to 1991. The sample is divided into two separate time periods to test the consistency in demand for export wheat and to trace recent trends in quality premiums. The implications of the results for wheat marketing and trade are explored.
A Maturity Model for B2B Integration (BIMM)

Electronic data exchange along the supply chain has been discussed in the information systems (IS) academic literature for many years and remains a practical problem for enterprises worldwide. In this paper we present a Maturity Model for B2B Integration (BIMM). The model is a result of a longitudinal research project on B2B integration. The BIMM was developed to assess the capability level for electronic document exchange of players in a supply chain and addresses current limitations of existing maturity models. The BIMM was developed a-priori from an extensive literature review and an explorative study of 112 company cases. In the next stage of the research the model will be validated using real-world data from leading B2B integration providers.
Water Channel Protein AQP3 Is Present in Epithelia Exposed to the Environment of Possible Water Loss

Aquaporins (AQPs) are membrane water channel proteins expressed in various tissues in the body. We surveyed the immunolocalization of AQP3, an isoform of the AQP family, in rat epithelial tissues. AQP3 was localized to many epithelial cells in the urinary, digestive, and respiratory tracts and in the skin. In the urinary tract, AQP3 was present at transitional epithelia. In the digestive tract, abundant AQP3 was found in the stratified epithelia in the upper part, from the oral cavity to the forestomach, and in the simple and stratified epithelia in the lower part, from the distal colon to the anal canal. In the respiratory tract, AQP3 was present in the pseudostratified ciliated epithelia from the nasal cavity to the intrapulmonary bronchi. In the skin, AQP3 was present in the epidermis. Interestingly, AQP3 was present at the basal aspects of the epithelia: in the basolateral membranes in the simple epithelia and in the multilayered epithelia at plasma membranes of the basal to intermediate cells. During development of the skin, AQP3 expression commenced late in fetal life. Because these AQP3-positive epithelia have a common feature, i.e., they are exposed to an environment of possible water loss, we propose that AQP3 could serve as a water channel to provide these epithelial cells with water from the subepithelial side to protect them against dehydration.
Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics of a 0.1 mg/kg Dose of Cisatracurium Besylate in Children During N2O/O2/Propofol Anesthesia

We studied the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of cisatracurium in 9 children (mean weight, 17.1 kg) aged 1–6 yr (mean, 3.75 yr) during propofol-nitrous oxide anesthesia. Neuromuscular monitoring was performed. Venous samples were taken before injection of a 0.1 mg/kg dose of cisatracurium and then at 2, 5, 10, 30, 60, 90, and 120 min. Cisatracurium plasma concentrations were determined by high performance liquid chromatography. Onset time was 2.5 ± 0.8 min, recovery to 25% of baseline twitch height was 37.6 ± 10.2 min, and the 25%–75% recovery index was 10.9 ± 3.7 min. Distribution and elimination half-lives were 3.5 ± 0.9 min and 22.9 ± 4.5 min, respectively. Steady-state volume of distribution (0.207 ± 0.031 L/kg) and total body clearance (6.8 ± 0.7 mL/min/kg) were significantly larger than those published for adults. Pharmacodynamic results were comparable to those obtained in pediatric studies during halothane or opioid anesthesia with the exception of a longer recovery to 25% baseline. Although the plasma-effect compartment equilibration rate constant was twofold faster (0.115 ± 0.025 min−1) than that published for cisatracurium in adults, the effect compartment concentration corresponding to 50% block was similar (129 ± 27 ng/mL).
Rapid high‐resolution electrophoresis of multimeric von Willebrand Factor using a thermopiloted gel apparatus

Rapid and highly reproducible nonreducing agarose gel electrophoresis (NRAGE) of von Willebrand Factor (vWF) multimers was performed using a thermostated minigel apparatus that monitors and precisely controls internal gel temperature. The substitution of lithium dodecyl sulfate (LiDS) for sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) allowed electrophoresis to be performed below the 16°C Krafft point of SDS and facilitated NRAGE of vWF over the entire range of 0–35°C. Internal gel temperature was regulated by a thermocouple probe inserted directly into the gel during electrophoresis which interfaced with a thermopilot that continually measures and adjusts temperature to within ± 0.5°C. At 10°C operative temperature, NRAGE at 1.5% agarose concentration was completed in 20 min at 250 V. Electrophoresis could be performed in only 10 min at 500 V, but at such high voltages, localized temperature fluctuations as much as 6°C resulted in perturbation of banding patterns in those vicinities. In the optimized method, both high molecular weight multimers and proteolytic fragments of vWF were separable suggesting clinical applicability of this system for the diagnosis of von Willebrand Disease and thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura.
Prevalences, Genotypes, and Risk Factors for HIV Transmission in South America

HIV cross-sectional studies were conducted among high-risk populations in 9 countries of South America. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay screening and Western blot confirmatory testing were performed, and env heteroduplex mobility assay genotyping and DNA sequencing were performed on a subset of HIV-positive subjects. HIV prevalences were highest among men who have sex with men (MSM; 2.0%-27.8%) and were found to be associated with multiple partners, noninjection drug use (non-IDU), and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). By comparison, much lower prevalences were noted among female commercial sex workers (FCSWs; 0%-6.3%) and were associated mainly with a prior IDU and STI history. Env subtype B predominated among MSM throughout the region (more than 90% of strains), whereas env subtype F predominated among FCSWs in Argentina and male commercial sex workers in Uruguay (more than 50% of strains). A renewed effort in controlling STIs, especially among MSM groups, could significantly lessen the impact of the HIV epidemic in South America.
Limited Irrigation Adoption and Water Leasing in Colorado

Burgeoning populations are increasing municipal water demand in the West, a phenomena that is changing rural and urban economies. Agricultural water is a preferred source for meeting growing demands, but transfers often require formerly irrigated land to be fallowed removing a key base industry from rural regional economies. It is no surprise that large scales transfers are greeted with highly-charged, emotionally contentious debates. One alternative to 'buy and dry' strategies is gaining interest. The alternative allows farmers to lease a portion of their water portfolio to cities. Leased water is generated as farmers reduce the consumptive use of their cropping operations by limiting irrigation. Examples of limited irrigation strategies include timing irrigations during vegetative growth and adopting innovative crop rotations. Importantly, the limited irrigation cropland remains in production so that rural economies suffer reduced effects vis a vis buy and dry activity. But will farmers adopt limited irrigation strategies if water lease markets materialize? This research examines producers' potential adoption of limited irrigations strategies and their perceptions of lease arrangements. Potential adoption is gauged from a producer survey of South Platte River Basin farmers in Colorado, a basin experiencing significant population growth in the midst of significant agricultural production. More than 60% or respondents indicate a willingness to lease garnering between 50,000 and 60,000 acre feet of potential water supplies.
Cognitive functioning in young people with first episode psychosis: relationship to diagnosis and clinical characteristics.

OBJECTIVE To examine the extent and nature of neuropsychological deficits in adolescents and young people with first episode psychosis (FEP), and to determine whether the pattern and extent of neuropsychological deficits varied according to diagnosis. METHOD A total of 83 FEP subjects aged 13-25 years, and 31 healthy controls completed a comprehensive battery of neuropsychological tests, grouped into 10 cognitive domains. First episode psychosis subjects were stratified into three diagnostic groups (schizophrenia, affective disorders, substance-induced psychosis) and differences in cognitive profiles were examined. The contribution of demographic and clinical characteristics to cognitive performance was also explored. RESULTS The schizophrenia group demonstrated significantly worse performance on tasks of verbal learning and memory than the affective disorders group. Compared to healthy controls, the schizophrenia group also demonstrated global impairment across the majority of cognitive domains. The substance-induced group's performance lay between that of the schizophrenia and affective disorders groups. Analyses of differential deficits revealed that verbal learning, verbal memory and current intellectual functioning were selectively impaired in the schizophrenia group, whereas the affective disorders group demonstrated a selective deficit in speeded processing. Premorbid intellectual functioning, negative symptomatology and medication levels were the strongest predictors of cognitive performance in FEP subjects. CONCLUSIONS Verbal memory deficits differentiate individuals with schizophrenia from those with psychotic affective disorders. Although significant cognitive deficits are evident across all diagnostic FEP groups, individuals with schizophrenia appear to have more generalized impairment across a broad array of cognitive functions than other psychotic diagnoses. Lower premorbid intellectual functioning does not appear to contribute to greater cognitive deterioration following onset of psychosis, but severity of illness may be a more important factor than levels of mood disturbance.
Current-Driven Domain Wall Motion, Nucleation, and Propagation in a Co/Pt Multi-Layer Strip with a Stepped Structure

We have proposed detecting a domain wall behavior in a strip with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy by measuring both extraordinary Hall effect and domain wall resistance with unique placement of three via contacts. By using this detecting technique, we have confirmed that the domain wall can be initialized at the boundary of the stepped structure of a Co/Pt multilayer strip. We have observed nucleation independent of the current direction and the propagation depending on it. We could not find any domain wall motion by spin-transfer torque from the boundary until 1.8 times 1012 A/m2, probably because of the smaller polarization and/or the larger damping constant of the Co/Pt multilayer.
Deletion of the cell adhesion adaptor protein vinculin disturbs the localization of GFAP in Bergmann glial cells

Astrocytes operate in close spatial relationship to other cells including neurons. Structural interaction is controlled by a dynamic interplay between actin‐based cell motility and contact formation via cell–cell and cell–extracellular matrix adhesions. A central player in the control of cell adhesion is the cytoskeletal adaptor protein Vinculin. Incorporation of Vinculin affects mechanical properties and turnover of cell adhesion sites. To study the in vivo function of Vinculin in astrocytes, a mouse line with astrocyte specific and inducible deletion of vinculin was generated. Deletion of vinculin decreased the expression of the glial acidic fibrillary protein (GFAP) in Bergmann glial cells in the cerebellum. In addition, localization of GFAP to Bergmann glial endfeet was disturbed, indicating a role for vinculin in controlling its expression and localization. In contrast, vimentin expression, morphology, activation state and polarity of the targeted cells as well as the localization of the extracellular matrix protein laminin was not compromised. Furthermore, stab wound lesions were performed in the cerebellar cortex. In both wildtype and vinculin knockout mice GFAP expression was upregulated in Bergmann glial cells of the lesioned area with no differences observed between genotypes in expression and localization of GFAP. These results propose a selective requirement for vinculin in cellular events related to cell adhesion in vivo. As in vitro data suggested a major role for vinculin in the control of the cytoskeletal connection affecting mechanical stability and cell motility, our data add a note of caution to the extrapolation of in vitro data to in vivo function.
Contusion segmentation from subjects with Traumatic Brain Injury: A random forest framework

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) occurs when a sudden injury causes trauma to the brain. Contusions are one of the most common types of lesion that arise after TBI, and they can be observed on a subject's MRI or CT. Since it is hypothesised that indices such as contusion load may be potential biomarkers for TBI, the ability to segment contusions is highly desirable. Currently, we are not aware of any fully automated methods that address this segmentation task. In this paper we present a completely automated random-forest based approach to contusion segmentation that uses multi-modality MRI. Given a training set of MR images and ground-truth segmentations, a set of features is derived for each voxel that describe both the local neighbourhood and longer-range contextual information in the images. A random forest is trained using these features and the ground-truth voxel labels, and used to produce an automatic contusion segmentation of an unseen test subject. We evaluate the method using 6-fold cross-validation on a dataset consisting of 23 subjects, obtaining a mean DICE overlap of 0.60.
Chieftaincy and democratic local governance in rural South Africa: Natural resources management in QwaQwa

This paper examines the changing role of chieftaincy in relation to democratic institutions of local governance in QwaQwa in the Eastern Free State and in particular the implications for the management of natural resources. Referring to a case study of grass usage, the paper identifies the shift from chieftaincy to democratic local governance as one of the factors that have undermined the chiefs' control over the use of natural resources, as infrastructural development takes precedence over management of natural resources in municipal planning and service delivery. The ensuing absence of control over the use of grass broadly reflects the unclear institutional framework for natural resources management on communal land in rural South Africa. However, despite the power struggle that generally goes on between chiefs and elected councillors of QwaQwa, there is potential for building on areas of common interest to improve natural resources management in the area.
Tissue-specific distribution of a novel C-terminal truncation retinoic acid receptor mutant which acts as a negative repressor in a promoter- and cell-type-specific manner

A cDNA clone which encodes a truncation form of the gamma subtype of the retinoic acid receptor (RAR gamma) has been isolated. The mutant RAR gamma (RAR gamma Bm382) has lost its 65 C-terminal amino acids, thus truncating a part of the dimerization and activation domains. By using a reverse transcription-coupled PCR technique, it was shown that RAR gamma Bm382 is expressed at different levels in various mouse tissues and that the level of its expression does not correlate with that of normal RAR gamma B. Cotransfection studies revealed that RAR gamma Bm382 acts as a repressor of normal RARs in a promoter- and cell-type-specific manner. Transcription of beta RARE and TREinv promoters was inhibited by RAR gamma Bm382 in both HeLa and F9 cells. Unlike these two promoters, however, RAR gamma Bm382 did not inhibit transcription of the TREpal promoter in HeLa cells but did so in F9 cells. Moreover, while transcription of the lamRARE promoter was inhibited by RAR gamma Bm382 in both HeLa and F9 cells, the inhibition was not observed when F9 cells were induced to differentiate with retinoic acid and dibutyryl cyclic AMP. DNA-binding analysis revealed that RAR gamma Bm382 is able to form a heterodimer with the retinoid X receptor and bind to the different types of retinoic acid response elements with almost the same efficiency as normal RAR. By comparison with effects of other truncation mutants created in vitro, it was suggested that the C-terminal end of the ligand binding domain of RAR is crucial for determining the specificity of transactivation by RAR. Given these observations, we discuss the possibility that protein factors which mediate retinoic acid response element- and cell-type-specific transactivation by RAR are present.
Myocyte/capillary mismatch in the heart of uremic patients.

Experiments indicate that capillary density is reduced in the hypertrophied left ventricle of rats with subtotal nephrectomy compared to control rats with similar BP and left ventricular hypertrophy, suggesting that in uremia, hypertrophying cardiomyocytes outgrow their capillary supply. No information on myocardial capillary supply in humans is currently available. The hearts of nine dialyzed patients, nine patients with essential hypertension, and 10 normotensive control subjects at postmortem were obtained. Subjects with stenosing coronary lesions and left ventricular pump failure were excluded. Special sampling procedures were used to exclude stereologic artefacts. Capillaries were specifically stained with ulex lectin and analyzed by stereologic techniques. Length density of myocardial capillaries (Lv; mm/mm3) was significantly (P < 0.001) lower in dialyzed patients (1483 +/- 238) than in patients with essential hypertension (1872 +/- 243) or in normotensive control patients (2898 +/- 456). In parallel, myocyte diameter and volume density of myocardial interstitial tissue were significantly (P < 0.001) increased in uremic patients compared to patients with essential hypertension and control patients, respectively. Diminished left ventricular capillary supply in renal failure must increase critical oxygen diffusion distance in the myocardium, thus exposing cardiomyocytes to the risk of hypoxia. It is unknown whether such reduced ischemia tolerance can be reversed by increasing oxygen supply (e.g., by reversing anemia).
Integrative approaches and frameworks of lean Six Sigma: a literature perspective

In this paper, an attempt has been made to provide a comprehensive perspective of the integrative approaches and frameworks. For this purpose, the subjects of lean and Six Sigma have been demonstrated separately and compared, and then their integration approaches and frameworks have been studied and discussed. The outcomes imply that integrating lean and Six Sigma creates a win-win situation. The combination of both can provide the philosophy and the effective tools to solve problems and create rapid transformational improvement at lower cost. Potentially, this could increase efficiency and effectiveness, which in turn leads to higher performance.