Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Development of an Automated Method for Analyzing Communication Rate in Augmentative and Alternative Communication

A significant barrier to evidence-based practice in Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) is the lack of validated performance measures that can be used by speech-language pathologists and rehabilitation engineers to evaluate the communication and device use of AAC consumers. Recently an effort has been made to develop automated data-logging techniques to facilitate the transcription and analysis of the AAC speaker's device use. A major source of error for the automated measurement of communication rate is the presence of excessive Inter-Selection Intervals (ISIs) (i.e., pause times), for which no communicative activity is occurring. The goal of this study was to develop an automated technique to filter out extreme ISIs, while preserving true communication rate performance. AAC data log files were obtained from seven individuals participating in a 1-month field trial of an AAC technology. Two temporal filtering techniques (arbitrary and individual) were compared for their ability to eliminate excessive ISIs. Results indicated that use of an individualized temporal filter was more sensitive to performance variability than use of an arbitrary temporal filter. Further, the individualized temporal filter elevated the participants' communication rate (measured by words per minute) by a factor of 1.8 to 34.5 greater than that of the unfiltered communication rate estimate. In addition, the first AAC communication rate performance estimates taken from the field are presented. Implications for further research and the valid use of automated data logging and analysis are discussed.
The Vermont Diabetes Information System (VDIS): study design and subject recruitment for a cluster randomized trial of a decision support system in a regional sample of primary care practices

Background Despite evidence that optimal care for diabetes can result in reduced complications and improved economic outcomes, such care is often not achieved. The Vermont Diabetes Information System (VDIS) is a registry-based decision support and reminder system based on the Chronic Care Model and targeted to primary care physicians and their patients with diabetes. Purpose To develop and evaluate a regional decision support system for patients with diabetes. Methods Randomized trial of an information system with clustering at the practice level. Ten percent random subsample of patients selected for a home interview. Subject and setting includes 10 hospitals, 121 primary care providers, and 7348 patients in 55 Vermont and New York primary care practices. Results We report on the study design and baseline characteristics of the population. Patients have a mean age of 63 years and a mean glycosolated hemoglobin A1C of 7.1%. Sixty percent of the population has excellent glycemic control (A1C, 7%); 45% have excellent lipid control (serum LDL-cholesterol,100 mg /dL and serum triglycerides,400 mg/dL). Twenty-five percent have excellent blood pressure control (,130/80 mm Hg). These results compare favorably to recent national reports. However, only 8% are in optimal control for all three of hyperglycemia, lipids and blood pressure. Conclusions Our experience to date indicates that a low cost decision support and information system based on the Chronic Care Model is feasible in primary care practices that lack sophisticated electronic information systems. VDIS is well accepted by patients, providers and laboratory staff. If proven beneficial in a rigorous, randomized, controlled evaluation, the intervention could be widely disseminated to practices across America and the world with a substantial impact on the outcomes and costs of diabetes. It could also be adapted to other chronic conditions. We anticipate the results of the study will be available in 2006.
Phase Variation in the Phage Growth Limitation System of Streptomyces coelicolor A3(2)

ABSTRACT The phase-variable phage growth limitation (Pgl) system of Streptomyces coelicolor A3(2) is an unusual bacteriophage resistance mechanism that confers protection against the temperate phage φC31 and homoimmune relatives. Pgl is subject to phase variation, and data presented here show that this is at least partially due to expansion and contraction of a polyguanine tract present within the putative adenine-specific DNA methyltransferase gene, pglX. Furthermore, the pglX paralogue SC6G9.02, here renamed pglS, was shown to be able to interfere with the Pgl phenotype, suggesting that PglS could provide an alternative activity to that conferred by PglX.
Microgrid State Estimation and Control Using Kalman Filter and Semidefinite Programming Technique

The design of environment-friendly microgrids at the smart distribution level requires a stable behaviour for multiple state operations. This paper develops a Kalman filter based optimal feedback control method for the microgrid state estimation and stabilization. First, the microgrid is modelled by a discrete-time state space equation. Then the cost-effective smart sensors are deployed in order to obtain the required system information. From the communication point of view, the recursive systematic convolution code is adopted to add the redundancy in the system. At the end, the soft output Viterbi decoder is used to recover the system information from the noisy measurements and transmission uncertainties. Thereafter, the Kalman filter is utilized to estimate the system states, which acts as a precursor for applying the control algorithm. Finally, this paper proposes an optimal feedback control method to stabilize the microgrid based on semidefinite programming. The performance of the proposed approach is demonstrated by extensive numerical simulations .
Associations between host characteristics and antimicrobial resistance of Salmonella Typhimurium

SUMMARY A collection of Salmonella Typhimurium isolates obtained from sporadic salmonellosis cases in humans from Lower Saxony, Germany between June 2008 and May 2010 was used to perform an exploratory risk-factor analysis on antimicrobial resistance (AMR) using comprehensive host information on sociodemographic attributes, medical history, food habits and animal contact. Multivariate resistance profiles of minimum inhibitory concentrations for 13 antimicrobial agents were analysed using a non-parametric approach with multifactorial models adjusted for phage types. Statistically significant associations were observed for consumption of antimicrobial agents, region type and three factors on egg-purchasing behaviour, indicating that besides antimicrobial use the proximity to other community members, health consciousness and other lifestyle-related attributes may play a role in the dissemination of resistances. Furthermore, a statistically significant increase in AMR from the first study year to the second year was observed.
The indirect method of recording blood pressure.

In a group of 50 healthy young females, pressure was determined from the right brachial artery using a direct recording technique and a standard indirect sphygmomanometer. Simultaneous recordings showed that there was a close correlation between the onset of Korotkoff sounds (phase I) and systolic pressure. Disappearance (phase V) correlated with diastolic pressure better than muffling (phase IV), but there was a very wide variation for both.
Constructive challenge : employee voice performance

This study examines the effect and task performance) on supervisory reward recommendations. In a laboratory setting, n=216 research participants engaged in a managerial that was created to simulate the types of decisions that managers are faced with on a daily basis. While performing this task, participants were simulated subordinates engaging in high or low levels of voice, helping and task performance. After completion of the simulation, p which a particular subordinate was worthy of a variety of rewards including a promotion and readiness for valuable t performance, helping and voice each contributed independently to recommendations. This finding supports the growing body of literature on the importance of employee voice on rater assessments of employee contribution to the o
Non-native English speech recognition using bilingual English lexicon and acoustic models

This paper proposes an English speech recognition system which can recognize both non-native (i.e. Japanese) and native English speaker's pronunciation of English speech. The system uses a bilingual pronunciation lexicon in which each word has both English and Japanese phoneme transcriptions. The Japanese transcription is constructed considering typical Japanese pronunciation of English. Japanese and English acoustic models are used in recognizing both transcriptions, and the highest-likelihood word sequence obtained in combining with native English- and Japanese-pronounced words is the recognition results. Continuous speech recognition experiments show that the proposed system greatly improves Japanese-English speech recognition performance while maintaining the same performance levels as that of a purely native English recognition system.
Multidimensional spectrofluorometry characterization of dissolved organic matter in arsenic-contaminated shallow groundwater

Multidimensional spectrofluorometry was employed to characterize dissolved organic matter (DOM) in arsenic-contaminated shallow aquifers at Jianghan Plain (JHP), central China, to better understand the effect of biogeochemical processes on arsenic mobilization. The microbial humic quinone and amino acid components identified indicate the importance of microbially mediated processes in the reduction of iron oxyhydroxides. The relationship of quinone and amino acid-like components with Fe2+ and S2− helps us understand the sequential redox transformation (SRT) in the high arsenic aquifer system and the origin of bicarbonate in groundwater. Correlation between DOM components and dissolved arsenic and Fe suggests that arsenic mobilization could be linked to the microbial reduction of iron oxyhydroxides with liable DOM as electron donors as well as to the electron shuttling function served by humic quinones.
[Importance of cytopathology].

众所周知,病理学主要由组织病理学和细胞病理学所组成,组织病理学得到了我国广大病理学工作者的普遍高度重视,改革开放30年来有了长足的进步,有关组织病理学诊断的知识不断更新,大量的新技术在组织病理学诊断和研究中广泛应用,为许多疾病的早期诊断、指导治疗和判断预后提供了可能性。
Adaptive Parallel Model Combination for reduced environmental mismatch in noisy speech recognition

Due to environmental mismatch, speech recognition systems often exhibit drastic performance degradation in noisy conditions. This paper presents a model based technique termed adaptive parallel model combination (APMC) which compensates the initial acoustic models to reduce the discrepancy. APMC used the well-known PMC technique to composite a set of corrupted speech models, while fine tuning the mean parameter of the models using a transformation-based adaptation technique called Maximum Likelihood Spectral Transformation (MLST). Evaluated on a context-independent phone recognition task, APMC was found to be superior to both PMC and MLST, especially in non-stationary noisy conditions. On average, APMC has achieved 48.81% improvement over the initial models, whereas PMC and MLST have improved the accuracy by 34.12% and 35.23% respectively.
Membrane perforations inhibit lysosome fusion by altering pH and calcium in Listeria monocytogenes vacuoles

Listeria monocytogenes (Lm) evade microbicidal defences inside macrophages by secreting a pore‐forming cytolysin listeriolysin O (LLO), which allows Lm to escape vacuoles. LLO also inhibits Lm vacuole fusion with lysosomes, which indicates LLO alters vacuole chemistry prior to release of Lm into cytoplasm. Using fluorescent probes to measure membrane permeability, calcium and pH, we identified small membrane perforations in vacuoles containing wild‐type but not LLO‐deficient (hly‐) Lm. The small membrane perforations released small fluorescent molecules and persisted for several minutes before expanding to allow exchange of larger fluorescent molecules. Macropinosomes and hly‐ Lm vacuoles acidified and increased their calcium content ([Ca2+]vac) within minutes of formation; however, the small perforations made by LLO‐expressing bacteria increased vacuolar pH and decreased [Ca2+]vac shortly after infection. Experimental increases in vacuolar pH inhibited Lm vacuole fusion with lysosomes. The timing of perforation indicated that LLO‐dependent delays of Lm vacuole maturation result from disruption of ion gradients across vacuolar membranes.
Exploring Search Behaviour in Microblogs

Microblogging sites, like Twitter, have become a common means to share information, participate in topical debate, and express opinions about events or entities. However, the way people search for information in microblogs, and interact with the bearers of this information, is still under-explored, especially when it comes to looking for opinions for a decision-making process. We propose a task-based user study to investigate the search behaviour of users when looking for opinions. We capture users’ clicks and ratings and create a query log dataset. The analysis of this data can provide insights about what elements of a tweet are deemed relevant while searching for opinionated information.
A whole blood solubility and centrifugation test for sickle cell hemoglobin: a clinical trial.

A rapid whole blood solubility and centrifugation test for the detection of sickle cell hemoglobin was recently described. The method is based on the insolubility of reduced sickle cell hemoglobin, but is capable of distinguishing the sickle cell trait from sickle cell anemia and hence represents an advance over existing solubility tests. The performance of this test has been assessed in 400 blood samples, which included a variety of sickle hemoglobinopathy conditions. Samples were simultaneously checked by starch gel electrophoresis. The solubility test correctly indicated the presence of hemoglobin S in all cases and, depending on the amount of soluble hemoglobin, permitted a distinction between cases containing approximately 50% hemoglobin S(AS and SC) and those containing higher concentrations (SS and sickle thalassemia). The test proved to be inexpensive, reliable, and rapid, and is well suited to screening programs for large populations.
Individual and combined biochemical and histological effect of Cypermethrin and Carbendazim in male albino rats

Cypermethrin (CYP) and Carbendazim (CAR) are synthetic pesticides that have been in use for more than a decade. A study of a low-dose exposure of these pesticides in rat administered different doses of each of these compounds, individually and in combination, followed by investigation of the biochemical and histological status of the rat brain, will highlight early enzymatic and histological changes that generally accompanied a toxic response in the animal. Thus, even though CYP was used at 5, 10, 25 and 50mM, for durations of 12 and 24hr in the different groups of rats, results of the study indicate that simultaneous with changes in enzyme activity, histological sections of specific rat brain yielded observations suggestive of degenerating tissue morphology and architecture even at the low-dose levels. Tissue specific changes in the activities of these marker enzymes were suggestive of the lack of tissue resistance to pyrethroids or carbamates.
Pharmacokinetics of etravirine, raltegravir and darunavir/ritonavir in treatment experienced patients

Etravirine is an enzyme inducer and could lower the concentration of combined drugs. Ten HIV-1-infected patients with multiple treatment failure received raltegravir (400 mg, twice daily) and darunavir/ritonavir (600/100 mg, twice daily). Addition of etravirine (200 mg, twice daily) leads to a significant increase in raltegravir and darunavir trough concentrations (405 vs. 118 and 3837 vs. 2241 ng/ml) and darunavir area under the curve (AUC12h) (50 083 vs. 36 277 ng h/ml). All pharmacokinetic parameters appeared to be highly variable regardless to the addition of etravirine.
Identification of Physician-Diagnosed Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias in Population-Based Administrative Data: A Validation Study Using Family Physicians' Electronic Medical Records.

BACKGROUND Population-based surveillance of Alzheimer's and related dementias (AD-RD) incidence and prevalence is important for chronic disease management and health system capacity planning. Algorithms based on health administrative data have been successfully developed for many chronic conditions. The increasing use of electronic medical records (EMRs) by family physicians (FPs) provides a novel reference standard by which to evaluate these algorithms as FPs are the first point of contact and providers of ongoing medical care for persons with AD-RD. OBJECTIVE We used FP EMR data as the reference standard to evaluate the accuracy of population-based health administrative data in identifying older adults with AD-RD over time. METHODS This retrospective chart abstraction study used a random sample of EMRs for 3,404 adults over 65 years of age from 83 community-based FPs in Ontario, Canada. AD-RD patients identified in the EMR were used as the reference standard against which algorithms identifying cases of AD-RD in administrative databases were compared. RESULTS The highest performing algorithm was "one hospitalization code OR (three physician claims codes at least 30 days apart in a two year period) OR a prescription filled for an AD-RD specific medication" with sensitivity 79.3% (confidence interval (CI) 72.9-85.8%), specificity 99.1% (CI 98.8-99.4%), positive predictive value 80.4% (CI 74.0-86.8%), and negative predictive value 99.0% (CI 98.7-99.4%). This resulted in an age- and sex-adjusted incidence of 18.1 per 1,000 persons and adjusted prevalence of 72.0 per 1,000 persons in 2010/11. CONCLUSION Algorithms developed from health administrative data are sensitive and specific for identifying older adults with AD-RD.
Inhibition of Rho-Associated Kinase Prevents Pathological Wound Healing and Neovascularization After Corneal Trauma

Purpose: To investigate the effect of AMA0526, a specific inhibitor of rho-associated protein kinase (ROCK), on corneal neovascularization (NV) and scarring in different in vitro and in vivo experimental models. Methods: The effect of AMA0526 on cell viability, proliferation, and migration of human umbilical vein endothelial cells was determined. Its in vivo topical effect on NV was investigated in the corneal micropocket mouse model (bevacizumab as a control). The vessel length, clock hours, and NV area were measured on photographs. The effect of AMA0526 on pathological wound healing was investigated in the alkali burn mouse model (dexamethasone as a control). Corneas were scored for corneal opacity (CO) and NV after burn injury. Immunohistochemistry was performed to study inflammation, blood vessel density, and collagen III deposition after 7 days. Results: ROCK inhibition significantly inhibited vascular endothelial cell proliferation and migration in vitro in a dose-dependent manner. In the micropocket model, NV was significantly reduced by AMA0526 (37% reduction, P < 0.05) comparable to bevacizumab. CO and NV were reduced after AMA0526, compared with the vehicle (P < 0.05 at all time points from day 3) after chemical burn. AMA0526 resulted in decreased inflammatory cell infiltration (26% reduction, P < 0.01), angiogenesis (47% reduction, P < 0.01), and collagen III deposition (27% reduction, P = 0.009) in the alkali burn model. AMA0526 administration showed results similar to those of dexamethasone with an additional antifibrotic effect. Conclusions: The ROCK inhibitor, AMA0526, efficiently inhibited angiogenesis in vitro, reduced CO and NV, and controlled the complete process of wound healing in vivo. These results warrant further investigation of the therapeutic potential of AMA0526 for corneal NV and scarring.
Minimal reductions of monomial ideals in dimension two

The concept of reduction is tightly connected with the integral closure, since given two ideals J ⊆ I we know that J is a reduction of I if and only if I is contained in the integral closure of J . It is well known that minimal reductions exist in local rings. We present a process of determining a minimal reduction of monomial ideals in two variables generalized to certain ideals in a two-dimensional local ring. The method is then generalized to some classes of ideals in integral domains and applied to monomial subrings.
Dusty Tori of Seyfert Nuclei Probed by the Water Vapor Maser Emission: How Large Are the Dusty Tori?

Geometrical and physical properties of dusty tori of Seyfert nuclei probed by the water vapor maser emission at 22 GHz are discussed. We assume that the dusty torus has a simple cylindrical form, and that the maser emission can be detected only when we observe the torus from almost edge-on views. The observed low frequency of occurrence of the water vapor maser emission (less than 10%) suggests that the torus is a vertically thin cylinder whose outer radius between a few parsecs and ~10 pc. However, the observed masing regions are concentrated in the inner 1 pc regions of the torus. A possible explanation for this property is that only the inner a few pc regions have physical conditions enough to cause the maser emission; the temperature is as high as several hundred K, and the density is as high as ~1010 cm-3.
Modifying Network Coding with TCP for media streaming in multi-hop wireless networks

The paper focuses on using Network Coding (NC) with TCP for multi-hop wireless networks to provide fault-tolerant and timely delivery of streaming data. The paper shows that there is an inherent latency in video playback when TCP with random linear NC is employed. With the objective of reducing latency and jitter at the receiver, the paper proposes a Variable Bucket size based Network Coding (VBNC) technique that modifies the TCP congestion control to adapt to the arriving traffic and dynamic network conditions. Simulation results demonstrate that on an average the proposed algorithm reduces observed latency at playback by 80% and jitter by more than 50% over standard TCP. More importantly, a significant reduction in the initial start-up delay is observed which enhances the performance of streaming services.
Sub‐population analysis of human cancer vaccine cells—ultra scale‐down characterization of response to shear

The allogeneic whole cell therapy field presents a novel challenge for cell line selection. Large numbers of candidates will he screened for desirable traits including cell growth rates and maintenance of critical product attributes. Screening cell lines for susceptibility to large scale processing conditions has become of increasing importance; innovators do not wish to face the quandary of clinically efficacious cell lines that show poor manufacturability.