Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Alcohol use, cigarette consumption and chronic post-traumatic stress disorder.

AIMS The relationship between alcohol consumption, cigarette smoking and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was studied in 147 male former members of the civilian resistance against the Nazi occupation of Holland during World War II. METHODS The subjects were interviewed at home. Measures included rating of current PTSD and a self-report measure of smoking and alcohol use. RESULTS The weekly alcohol consumption reported by veterans was substantially below that of the general population. Furthermore, there was no significant difference in self-reported alcohol consumption between veterans with and without current PTSD. Cigarette smoking, however, was more prevalent in those with current PTSD. CONCLUSIONS The absence in these veterans of a correlation between PTSD and alcohol consumption is contrary to the results of most studies on this subject. It may be related to the exclusion from organized resistance activities of people prone to the over-consumption of alcohol. It is hypothesized that, in trauma survivors, current substance use is associated with peri-traumatic patterns of psychological tension-reduction modes.
An improved broadband decoupling sequence for liquid crystals and solids.

Recently we developed an efficient broadband decoupling sequence called SPARC-16 for liquid crystals ¿J. Magn. Reson. 130, 317 (1998). The sequence is based upon a 16-step phase cycling of the 2-step TPPM decoupling method for solids ¿J. Chem. Phys. 103, 6951 (1995). Since then, we have found that a stepwise variation of the phase angle in the TPPM sequence offers even better results. The application of this new method to a liquid crystalline compound, 4-n-pentyl-4'-cyanobiphenyl, and a solid, L-tyrosine hydrochloride, is reported. The reason for the improvement is explained by an analysis of the problem in the rotating frame.
Two approaches to obtain the calibration line

One of the most substantial issues of evaluation a gauge calibration is to determine the calibration function. In pursued situation, it means to estimate the parameters of the linear function which express the dependence of the (errorless) measured values using the calibrated gauge on the true measured quantities. Of course, we are interested also in uncertainties of the estimated parameters. In contribution are shown two methods solving the problem. The first one is an approximative method using the linear model of indirect measurements. The second one is a proper approach using the linearized model of direct measurements with nonlinear conditions on the parameters.
The impact of androgen deprivation on quality of life after radical prostatectomy for prostate carcinoma

Androgen deprivation is commonly prescribed for men with a rising prostate specific antigen level after radical prostatectomy, despite scant evidence regarding its efficacy and side effects. In the current study, the authors compared measures of health‐related quality of life (HRQOL) in men who were treated with androgen deprivation after radical prostatectomy with those for men who underwent surgery but were not treated with androgen deprivation.
Line drawings via abstracted shading

We describe a GPU-based algorithm for rendering a 3D model as a line drawing, based on the insight that a line drawing can be understood as an abstraction of a shaded image. We thus render lines along tone boundaries or thin dark areas in the shaded image. We extend this notion to the dual: we render highlight lines along thin bright areas and tone boundaries. We combine the lines with toon shading to capture broad regions of tone. The resulting line drawings effectively convey both shape and material cues. The lines produced by the method can include silhouettes. creases, and ridges, along with a generalization of suggestive contours that responds to lighting as well as viewing changes. The method supports automatic level of abstraction, where the size of depicted shape features adjusts appropriately as the camera zooms in or out. Animated models can be rendered in real time because costly mesh curvature calculations are not needed.
Factors which contribute to fatigue associated with rheumatoid arthritis.

The purpose of this research was to identify the factors which people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) believed contributed to their fatigue. A second purpose was to examine the relationships among identified factors and the sensation of fatigue. One hundred people with RA were asked to identify verbally factors which they believed contributed to their fatigue. The three most frequently identified factors included RA disease activity, disturbed sleep and increased physical effort. These factors were operationalized and measured as joint pain using the Modified McGill Pain Inventory, fragmented sleep through overnight electroencephalographic (EEG) sleep studies, and reduced physical ability using walking time and grip strength measures. Fifteen of the original subjects with RA and 12 age and gender matched control subjects completed the second phase of the research. Five of the RA subjects were experiencing a disease flare while the remaining 10 were either in remission or their disease was midly active. Those subjects in flare had significantly (P less than 0.01) more joint pain, significantly (P less than 0.05) more fragmented sleep, and significantly reduced functional capacity as measured through walking time (P less than 0.05) and grip strength (P less than 0.05) when compared to non-flare and control subjects. Fatigue levels of the subjects in flare were positively correlated with joint pain (r = 0.62), fragmented sleep (r = 0.42) and grip strength of the right hand (r = 0.52) and left hand (r = 0.88). Fatigue levels of non-flare and control subjects were negatively correlated with the majority of measured variables. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Selective loss of the photopic negative response in patients with optic nerve atrophy.

OBJECTIVE To determine how the photopic negative response (PhNR) is altered in patients with optic nerve atrophy. METHODS Ten patients with optic nerve atrophy induced by compression, trauma, or inflammation were examined. There were 6 men and 4 women with a mean age of 52.4 years. Ten age-matched control subjects were examined with the same protocol. Full-field electroretinograms were recorded, and the retinal nerve fiber layer thickness surrounding the optic nerve head was measured by means of optical coherence tomography. RESULTS The amplitudes of the rod, maximum, cone, and 30-Hz flicker electroretinograms of the affected eyes were not different from those of the corresponding waves of the contralateral unaffected eyes or control eyes. In contrast, the amplitude of the PhNR was significantly smaller in the affected eyes than in the contralateral (P =.005) or control (P<.001) eyes. The decrease in amplitude of the PhNR preceded thinning of the retinal nerve fiber layer. There was a significant correlation between the PhNR amplitude and retinal nerve fiber layer thickness in eyes with optic nerve atrophy (r = 0.879; P<.001). CONCLUSIONS Selective reduction and loss of the PhNR amplitude was found in eyes with optic nerve atrophy, which suggests that the PhNR can be used to evaluate the function of ganglion cells or their axons.
Extracting trade-off boundaries of CMOS two-stage op-amp using particle swarm optimization

In this paper, a multi-objective particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is implemented to unveil trade-off margins of the CMOS two-stage op-amp. Power, area, slew rate, unity gain frequency (UGF) were used as objectives. Width and length of the gate of MOSFETS are free parameters. Simulation results reveal the design trade-off margins of the two-stage op-amp as expected theoretically.
Application of Subtype-Specific Monoclonal Antibodies for Rapid Detection and Identification of Influenza A and B Viruses

ABSTRACT We established a rapid method for the identification of influenza A and B virus strains: the peroxidase-antiperoxidase (PAP) staining method with two subtype-specific murine monoclonal antibodies, C179 (H1 and H2 specific) and F49 (H3 specific), and an anti-influenza B virus rabbit polyclonal serum. The types and subtypes of 160 strains were examined, and 158 strains were identified to be the same by the hemagglutination-inhibition (HI) test and the PAP method. In contrast to the results by the HI test, two strains were revealed to be a mixture of two subtypes (H1 and H3) by the PAP method, which was confirmed by plaque cloning. We further analyzed clinical specimens by the PAP method by directly inoculating specimens into Madin-Darby canine kidney cells in microplates. After 40 h of incubation, the types and subtypes of viruses in 52 of 152 specimens were clearly identified. Since the reactivities of the two monoclonal antibodies are not influenced by the antigenic drift of influenza virus, the newly developed method should be applicable not only for rapid diagnosis but also for the epidemiological study of influenza.
Higher education students' perspectives on the use of ePortfolios.: An exploratory study in the context of the Degree in Basic Education

This article is part of a study conducted within the scope of an ERASMUS+ KA2 project titled Empowering ePortfolio Process. The goal of the project is to study the practices employed in the use of ePortfolios as learning and assessment tools in higher education in the five partner-countries involved in the project. Aiming to understand the students' views on the use of ePortfolios, interviews were carried out with Portuguese students with previous experience in the use of ePortfolios in the Curricular Unit (CU) “Portuguese Language and Information and Communication Technologies”, which is part of the curriculum of the Degree in Basic Education. According to data analysis, the students highlight, in reference to this CU, the collaborative learning and the discovery of new work-methods, more focused on the students, recognizing them as a significant context for learning.
Characterization of EDTA‐soluble polysaccharides from the scape of Musa paradisiaca (banana)

The polysaccharide components present in the scape of Musa paradisiaca (banana) were fractionated into water‐soluble (WSP), EDTA‐soluble (EDTA‐SP), alkali‐soluble (ASP) and alkali‐insoluble (AISP) polysaccharide fractions [Anjaneyalu, Jagadish and Raju (1997) Glycoconj. J. 14, 507–512]. The EDTA‐SP was further fractionated by iso‐amyl alcohol into EDTA‐SP‐A and EDTA‐SP‐B. The homogeneity of these two polysaccharides was established by repeated precipitation with iso‐amyl alcohol, gel‐filtration chromatography and sedimentation analysis. The polysaccharides were characterized by monosaccharide composition analysis, methylation linkage analysis, iodine affinity, ferricyanide number, blue value, hydrolysis with α‐amylase, gold‐electron microscopy and X‐ray diffraction spectroscopy. Data from all of these studies suggest that EDTA‐SP‐A is a branched amylose‐type α‐D‐glucan and that EDTA‐SP‐B is a highly branched amylopectin‐type polymer. The nature of the branching patterns of these polysaccharides suggests that they are unique to M. paradisiaca .
A new framework for interactive quality assessment with application to light field coding

In recent years, light field has experienced a surge of popularity, mainly due to the recent advances in acquisition and rendering technologies that have made it more accessible to the public. Thanks to image-based rendering techniques, light field contents can be rendered in real time on common 2D screens, allowing virtual navigation through the captured scenes in an interactive fashion. However, this richer representation of the scene poses the problem of reliable quality assessments for light field contents. In particular, while subjective methodologies that enable interaction have already been proposed, no work has been done on assessing how users interact with light field contents. In this paper, we propose a new framework to subjectively assess the quality of light field contents in an interactive manner and simultaneously track users behaviour. The framework is successfully used to perform subjective assessment of two coding solutions. Moreover, statistical analysis performed on the results shows interesting correlation between subjective scores and average interaction time.
Advanced Border Intrusion Detection and Surveillance Using Wireless Sensor Network Technology

Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) has been emerging in the last decade as a powerful tool for connecting physical and digital world. WSN has been used in many applications such habitat monitoring, building monitoring, smart grid and pipeline monitoring. In addition, few researchers have been experimenting with WSN in many mission-critical applications such as military applications. This paper surveys the literature for experimenting work done in border surveillance and intrusion detection using the technology of WSN. The potential benefits of using WSN in border surveillance are huge; however, up to our knowledge very few attempts of solving many critical issues about this application could be found in the literature.
Gypsy: a component-based mobile agent system

Gypsy is a component-based, dynamically extensible environment for mobile agent systems. The runtime environment consists of lightweight servers that provide a distributed execution environment for agents, and a remote administration tool that supports the set-up and shutdown of servers and agents. A server hosts a number of places to which agents may move to execute their functions. Each place is specialized to support a particular service. A supervisor agent may contain several worker agents that may execute concurrently. A supervisor agent travels from place to place according to its itinerary and launches its workers at appropriate places. A mobile agent is the basic abstraction from which all other components, including servers and supervisor agents, are constructed. The primary goal of the Gypsy project is to build a multi-language, extensible environment for experimenting with mobile agents as a programming paradigm. The environment is implemented in Java and currently supports agents written in the Java or Python programming languages. This paper presents an overview of the Gypsy project, the current system architecture and the design of the important components of the Gypsy system.
Correcting the influence of autocorrelated errors in linear regression models

The paper presents the case often met in a regression model, the autocorrelated errors. In the first part of the paper are summarized some theoretical issues about the sources of appearance of autocorrelated errors, some statistic tests to identify the autocorrelation and there are presented in more detail three alternatives of the classical methods for estimating parameters, methods that are better suited to the given situation: the Cochrane-Orcutt method (with its variant Yule-Walker method), the Durbin method and the Hildreth-Lu method. The second part of the paper presents an example of a regression model with autocorrelated errors and uses a method for correcting the influence of the autocorrelation on the estimated parameters, using the statistical package SAS 9.1.
Perceived Social Support among Greek - Cypriot Mothers of Children with Cancer and Mothers of Healthy Children

Background: Social support may play a critical and protective role in the physical and psychological well - being of mothers of children with cancer (MCC), enhancing their adjustment and coping with the care giving demands. The way social support is conceptualized and operationalized differs widely between several studies. Aim: To assess the psychometric properties of the Greek translation of the 19 - item MOS Social Support Survey - Greek version (MOS – SSS - G) and investigate the perceived functional social support as we ll as reported sources of support among mothers of children with cancer (MCC) as compared to mothers of healthy children (MHC). Sample and Methods: A descriptive comparative study with a purposive sample of 52 MCC and 208 MHC was used. Exploratory factor analysis was used to assess the construct validity of the tool. Differences in reported sources of support and perceived social support between the study groups and in terms of socio - demographic characteristics were investigated. Results: A clear structur e of three factors has been identified, explaining 79% of the total variance – tangible (4 items, Cronbach’s α=0.92), emotional/informational (8 items, α=0.95) and positive social interaction/affectionate support (7 items, α=0.96). In both groups, consiste ntly lower social support was reported by unmarried mothers, those with lower educational attainment, lower income, not owning their house and higher residential mobility. While no statistical significant differences were observed in terms of overall perce ived social support between the comparison groups, MCC tended to report lower emotional/ informational support but higher tangible support, lending support to the tool’s scale discriminant validity. Family was identified as the foremost source of support f ollowed by other parents of children with cancer while health care professionals ranked very low. Conclusions: The MOS - SSS appears to be a valid and reliable measure of functional aspects of social support among Greek - speaking Cypriot mothers, further sup porting the cross - cultural applicability of the tool.
Balance self-efficacy in older adults following inpatient rehabilitation

Older adults discharging from inpatient rehabilitation were investigated to determine change in self-efficacy at 1 month after discharge, the relationship with discharge balance performance and physical function, and the influence of diagnosis. A prospective cohort of 101 adults older than 50 years of age, 43% men, average age 75.84 (SD 9.8) years, were recruited at discharge from inpatient rehabilitation. Balance self-efficacy was assessed using Activities-specific Balance Confidence (ABC) scale at discharge and 1 month following discharge. Balance and physical function were measured at discharge using the Functional Independence Measure, Balance Outcome Measure for Elder Rehabilitation, Modified Elderly Mobility Scale and gait speed. At discharge, balance self-efficacy was moderate (ABC score 62, SD 23) and did not change at follow-up. When grouped by discharge self-efficacy (ABC scores: low<50; moderate 51–80; high>80), significant between-group differences were found for balance (P=0.005) and physical function (P=0.035). At the 1-month follow-up, those with low discharge balance self-efficacy showed improvement (mean-change ABC score 12, 95% confidence interval 2–22) and those with high discharge balance self-efficacy had lower scores (mean-change ABC score 18, 95% confidence interval −8 to −28). Differences in ABC change scores were also found between diagnostic groups (F=3.740, P=0.03), with the orthopaedic group improving (ABC mean change=8) and the general frailty group showing a decrease in confidence (ABC mean change=10). The differences in balance self-efficacy change at 1 month following discharge were related to self-efficacy level at discharge and clinical group requiring rehabilitation. Clinicians need to be aware of these changes as patients are prepared for discharge.
Nurses' perceptions of depression in patients with cancer

Abstract Objective: Our study aimed at examining nurses' perceptions of depression in cancer patients and their role in its management. Method: We employed questionnaire-based semi-directed interviews. Participants were asked to classify 22 symptoms (related and specific to depression in cancer patients, related but not specific, and unrelated) as “very important,” “important,” “less important,” or “not important” for the diagnosis of depression in cancer patients at two different timepoints (baseline and after a video education program). They were also asked to complete a questionnaire exploring their perceptions about depression and of their role in its systematic screening. We recruited nurses caring for cancer patients from four different departments (palliative care unit, hematology, medical oncology, and thoracic oncology) at an academic medical center. Results: We interviewed 18 nurses and found that they had a good general knowledge of depression in cancer patients, with the majority of them being able to distinguish specific and important symptoms from nonspecific symptoms. Some nurses considered depression as a second-line symptom, and most did not employ a screening tool in their daily practice. All considered that they had a role to play in the management of depression, even as they acknowledged lacking specific training for that task. Significance of results: Our results suggest that limited resources—especially lack of training—affects nurses' ability to correctly manage depression in their cancer patients.
Quantitative evaluation of morpholino‐mediated protein knockdown of GFP, MSX1, and PAX7 during tail regeneration in Ambystoma mexicanum

Vertebrate regeneration is a fascinating but poorly understood biological phenomena. Urodele amphibians such as Ambystoma mexicanum (the axolotl) can functionally regenerate complex body structures such as the limb and tail, including the spinal cord, throughout life. So far, molecular studies on regeneration have been limited due to the paucity of tools for knocking‐down gene and protein function. In this article, we quantitatively assessed the ability of morpholinos to specifically down‐regulate protein expression in both cultured urodele cells and in vivo. We focused on the down‐regulation of green fluorescent protein and two axolotl proteins, MSX1 and PAX7. Our data show that the expression of these proteins can be efficiently reduced by morpholinos. MSX1 has been hypothesized to be involved in muscle dedifferentiation based on experiments using cultured myotubes. Our studies in in vivo muscle fibers so far have shown no influence of overexpressing or down‐regulating MSX1 on the dedifferentiation process. Developmental Dynamics 232:162–170, 2005. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.