Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modelling and predicting User Engagement in mobile applications

The mobile ecosystem is dramatically growing towards an unprecedented scale, with an extremely crowded market and fierce competition among app developers. Today, keeping users engaged with a mobile app is key for its success since users can remain active consumers of services and/or producers of new contents. However, users may abandon a mobile app at any time due to various reasons, e.g., the success of competing apps, decrease of interest in the provided services, etc. In this context, predicting when a user may get disengaged from an app is an invaluable resource for developers, creating the opportunity to apply intervention strategies aiming at recovering from disengagement (e.g., sending push notifications with new contents). In this study, we aim at providing evidence that predicting when mobile app users get disengaged is possible with a good level of accuracy. Specifically, we propose, apply, and evaluate a framework to model and predict User Engagement (UE) in mobile applications via different numerical models. The proposed framework is composed of an optimized agglomerative hierarchical clustering model coupled to (i) a Cox proportional hazards, (ii) a negative binomial, (iii) a random forest, and (iv) a boosted-tree model. The proposed framework is empirically validated by means of a year-long observational dataset collected from a real deployment of a waste recycling app. Our results show that in this context the optimized clustering model classifies users adequately and improves UE predictability for all numerical models. Also, the highest levels of prediction accuracy and robustness are obtained by applying either the random forest classifier or the boosted-tree algorithm.
A π -Shaped Ultrasonic Actuator for the Noncontact Trapping of Small Particles

A π-shaped ultrasonic actuator is proposed for the noncontact trapping of small particles. In this actuator, two metal plates clamp a multilayer piezoelectric vibrator by a small bolt, and the metal plates are tapered in their lower parts so that a vibration gradient can be obtained. The flexural vibration of the metal plates is used to generate an acoustic field in the gap between the two tapered metal plates. At a driving frequency about 152.8kHz, small particles such as sugar crystal, rice powder, shrimp eggs and grass seeds can be trapped in the gap. It is observed that the particles with an average diameter less than several hundred microns can be trapped stably, without contact with the vibrator. Furthermore, the relationship between the amount of the trapped particles and the input power is investigated under various conditions. The amount of the trapped particles increases as the input power increases. The particles are ejected out of the actuator and therefore cannot be stably trapped if the input power is too large.
Transformer-based Model for Single Documents Neural Summarization

We propose a system that improves performance on single document summarization task using the CNN/DailyMail and Newsroom datasets. It follows the popular encoder-decoder paradigm, but with an extra focus on the encoder. The intuition is that the probability of correctly decoding an information significantly lies in the pattern and correctness of the encoder. Hence we introduce, encode –encode – decode. A framework that encodes the source text first with a transformer, then a sequence-to-sequence (seq2seq) model. We find that the transformer and seq2seq model complement themselves adequately, making for a richer encoded vector representation. We also find that paying more attention to the vocabulary of target words during abstraction improves performance. We experiment our hypothesis and framework on the task of extractive and abstractive single document summarization and evaluate using the standard CNN/DailyMail dataset and the recently released Newsroom dataset.
Chemical Carcinogenesis in Rat (Rattus norvegicus) Subman- dibular Gland Using DMBA

Objective: This paper aims to investigate the neoplasms produced after the injection of 9,10-Dimethyl-1,2-benzantracene (DMBA) in rat submandibular glands. Material and Methods: Twenty eight 3-month old male rats (Rattus norvegicus), approximate weight of 300g, were used. The animals were divided into four groups of seven subjects each. After anesthesia and proper preparation, all animals were injected with 0.1ml of 2% DMBA in the left submandibular gland. By the end of the fifth, tenth, fifteenth and twentieth weeks, the animals were sacrificed by lethal doses of anesthetics. Results: The results in the fifth week presented seven cases of chronic sialadenitis. After ten weeks, one case of ductal cell atypia was evident, along with two cases of squamous cell carcinoma and four cases of chronic sialadenitis. Between the fifteenth and twentieth weeks, the cases were diagnosed as follows: three cases of hyperemia; three cases of squamous cell carcinoma; one case of sarcoma and seven cases of carcinosarcomas. Conclusions: This study allowed the investigation of glandular carcinogenesis after DMBA injection, from the beginning of inflammatory changes to the neoplastic manifestation of tumors. Salivary carcinogenesis can provide beneficial material for the study of rare human salivary gland neoplasms like sarcomas, carcinomas and carcinosarcomas.
Cryptococcus gattii genotype AFLP6/VGII meningoencephalitis in an immunocompetent Filipino male in Kuwait: activation of a dormant infection

Introduction Cases of Cryptococcus gattii infections are being increasingly recognized in geographical regions that were traditionally regarded as non-endemic. Here, we describe a case of C. gattii meningoencephalitis in an immunocompetent Filipino male diagnosed in Kuwait. Case presentation: A 34-year-old healthy Filipino male presented with a history of progressive generalized headache, nausea and repeated episodes of vomiting. The patient had continuously lived and worked in Kuwait for three consecutive years before developing the disease. The diagnosis of meningoencephalitis was established by demonstrating capsulated budding yeast cells in cerebrospinal fluid, isolating C. gattii in culture and detecting cryptococcal polysaccharide antigen in serum and cerebrospinal fluid specimens. Molecular characterization of the isolate confirmed its identity as C. gattii, genotype AFLP6/VGII. The isolate showed reduced susceptibility to fluconazole and was treated suboptimally until flucytosine became available. Conclusions: A case of C. gattii meningoencephalitis in a healthy Filipino male, who apparently acquired the infection in his native country, is described. The infection remained dormant for several years before becoming clinically apparent. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of C. gattii meningitis diagnosed in Kuwait.
RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING AND EFFECTS ON SENIOR NURSING STUDENTS' SELF-EFFICACY AND KNOWLEDGE: A NON-EXPERIMENTAL PREDICTIVE CORRELATION MULTIPLE REGRESSION ANALYSIS

Preparing nursing students to transition into the professional registered nurse role is the task of nurse educators. These educators must train students to function in multiple nursing specialties post-graduation, to include critical care. As more nursing graduates enter into areas such as intensive care units and emergency rooms, nurse educators must prepare them to work with critically ill patients. Increased exposure to critical care clinical experiences and simulations may be one method to prepare them for these complex, high-acuity patient situations. In order to determine whether or not a relationship exists between increased hours of experience and effects on self-efficacy and knowledge, the Nursing Student Self-Efficacy Scale (NSSES) and the Basic Knowledge Assessment Test-8 (BKAT-8) was administered to senior nursing students in a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) pre-licensure program during their final semester. Hierarchical regression analysis evaluated each variable in the regression model. Control variables included age, gender, ethnicity, prior experience, and preferred initial job placement. Predictor variables (independent variables) were clinical hours and simulation hours. Data indicates a positive relationship for each predictive variable to both the NSSES and BKAT-8. Additionally, clinical hours and simulation hours do contribute to the overall predictive model for NSSES and BKAT-8 outcomes. Practical implications and suggestions for future research are addressed.
Medicinal plants as a source of anti-pyretic agents - a review.

Fever is a complex physiologic response triggered by infectious or aseptic stimuli. Elevations in body temperature occur when concentrations of prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) increase within certain areas of the brain. These elevations alter the firing rate of neurons that control thermoregulation in the hypothalamus. Although fever benefits the nonspecific immune response to invading microorganisms, it is also viewed as a source of discomfort and is commonly suppressed with antipyretic medication. Antipyretics such as aspirin have been widely used since the late 19th century, but the mechanisms by which they relieve fever have only been characterized in the last few decades. It is now clear that most antipyretics work by inhibiting the enzyme cyclooxygenase and reducing the levels of PGE2 within the hypothalamus. Various medicinal plants are used as an antipyretic agent from the ancient time. In this review we have enlisted around 50 medicinal plants which are used as an antipyretic agent which can be one of the good alternatives for the traditional allopathic antipyretic agents.
Respostas de freqüência cardíaca, consumo de oxigênio e sensação subjetiva ao esforço em um exercício de hidroginástica executado por mulheres em diferentes situações com e sem o equipamento aquafins

As aulas de hidroginastica estao cada vez mais diversificadas com o uso de materiais apropriados ao meio aquatico. Entretanto, poucos estudos verificaram a influencia da utilizacao de tais materiais nas respostas cardiorrespiratorias. O objetivo foi analisar as respostas de frequencia cardiaca, consumo de oxigenio e sensacao subjetiva ao esforco em mulheres durante a execucao de um exercicio de hidroginastica em diferentes situacoes com e sem o equipamento resistivo Aquafins®. Onze mulheres realizaram o exercicio deslize frontal com a flexao e extensao horizontal de ombros em quatro situacoes: sem equipamento resistivo (S-FINS), com Aquafins nos membros inferiores (FINS-MIs), com Aquafins nos membros superiores (FINS-MSs) e com Aquafins nos membros superiores e inferiores (FINS-MIs/MSs). Em todas as situacoes foi verificado a FC, o VO2 e a SSE. Utilizou-se ANOVA para medidas repetidas, com post-hoc de Bonferroni (p < 0,05). A FC foi significativamente mais elevada nas situacoes FINS-MIs/MSs (159 ± 12bpm) e FINS-MIs (147 ± 18bpm), comparando-as com as demais situacoes. No entanto, a situacao FINS-MIs apresentou FC similar a FINS-MSs (148 ± 16 bpm). Por sua vez, as tres situacoes com o Aquafins foram diferentes da situacao S-FINS (131 ± 14bpm). Para o VO2 houve diferenca significativa entre a situacao FINS-MIs/MSs (22,77 ± 3,58ml.kg-1.min-1), comparando-a com as demais. As situacoes FINS-MSs (19,67 ± 4,29ml.kg-1.min-1) e FINS-MIs (20,38 ± 3,99ml.kg-1.min-1) apresentaram VO2 significativamente maior que S-FINS (15,18 ± 4,67ml.kg-1.min-1). A SSE foi significativamente maior na situacao FINS-MIs/MSs (16 ± 1,55), comparando-a com FINS-MIs (14 ± 0,9) e S-FINS (13 ± 1,29), entretanto, nao foi diferente da FINS-MSs (14 ± 1,57). Portanto, a utilizacao de equipamentos que promovam resistencia ao movimento na hidroginastica e indicada para melhorias no sistema cardiorrespiratorio.
Influência da correção cirúrgica da catarata na percepção laborativa

Objetivo: Analisar o beneficio gerado nas atividades profissionais apos a cirurgia de catarata. Metodos: Foi realizado um estudo prospectivo, randomizado, no Hospital das Clinicas da Universidade de Sao Paulo. Os pacientes foram submetidos a facoemulsificacao (FACO) e a extracao extracapsular (EECP). Resultados: A amostra foi composta de 205 pacientes, destes, 101 realizaram cirurgia pela tecnica de facoemulsificacao. A media de idade no grupo da facoemulsificacao foi de 68,3 anos ± 9 anos e de 69,1 anos ± 8,5 anos no grupo da extracao extracapsular (p=0,70). A porcentagem de pacientes empregados no grupo facoemulsificacao foi de 16,83%, e no outro grupo de 13,46%. A maioria dos pacientes que nao remunerados formalmente sentiu-se motivada a procurar trabalho. A maioria dos analisados relatou aumento da produtividade no trabalho apos a cirurgia, 82,50% no grupo facoemulsificacao e 78,60% no grupo extracao extracapsular (p=0,20). Conclusao: A cirurgia de catarata por ambas as tecnicas proporcionou melhora da produtividade no trabalho, e estimulou individuos economicamente inativos a procurar trabalho remunerado.
Endovascular strategy or open repair for ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm: one-year outcomes from the IMPROVE randomized trial.

AIMS: To report the longer term outcomes following either a strategy of endovascular repair first or open repair of ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm, which are necessary for both patient and clinical decision-making. METHODS AND RESULTS: This pragmatic multicentre (29 UK and 1 Canada) trial randomized 613 patients with a clinical diagnosis of ruptured aneurysm; 316 to an endovascular first strategy (if aortic morphology is suitable, open repair if not) and 297 to open repair. The principal 1-year outcome was mortality; secondary outcomes were re-interventions, hospital discharge, health-related quality-of-life (QoL) (EQ-5D), costs, Quality-Adjusted-Life-Years (QALYs), and cost-effectiveness [incremental net benefit (INB)]. At 1 year, all-cause mortality was 41.1% for the endovascular strategy group and 45.1% for the open repair group, odds ratio 0.85 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.62, 1.17], P = 0.325, with similar re-intervention rates in each group. The endovascular strategy group and open repair groups had average total hospital stays of 17 and 26 days, respectively, P < 0.001. Patients surviving rupture had higher average EQ-5D utility scores in the endovascular strategy vs. open repair groups, mean differences 0.087 (95% CI 0.017, 0.158), 0.068 (95% CI -0.004, 0.140) at 3 and 12 months, respectively. There were indications that QALYs were higher and costs lower for the endovascular first strategy, combining to give an INB of £3877 (95% CI £253, £7408) or €4356 (95% CI €284, €8323). CONCLUSION: An endovascular first strategy for management of ruptured aneurysms does not offer a survival benefit over 1 year but offers patients faster discharge with better QoL and is cost-effective. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN 48334791.
Pre-diabetic Clinical Changes Induced by Low Doses of Alloxan-Streptozotocin Cocktail in Rabbits

Background & Objectives: Alloxan & streptozotocin are used for inducing diabetic models. Their combination has been used to reduce the individual chemical dosage and minimize the side effects. Present investigation was aimed at studying pre-diabetic clinical changes induced by low doses of Alloxan-STZ cocktail in rabbits. Materials and Methods: New Zealand White rabbits, 1-1.5 kg body weight, were administered alloxan (@50 mg/kg b.w.) and STZ (@ 35mg/kg b.w.) cocktail, as single intravenous dose. Blood glucose levels were monitored (0 h, 20 min, 1 h, and then hourly up to 9 h) and clinical signs noted. Rabbits surviving up to 9 hours were given glucose therapy. Results: The cocktail caused immediate transient hypoglycaemia, followed by hyperglycaemia, and then progressively severe hypoglycaemia. Hypoglycaemia caused characteristic behavioural alterations from lethargy, through aesthesia, muscular weakness to recumbency. Severely affected rabbits revealed intermittent convulsions and died in coma. Conclusion: Low dose Alloxan-STZ cocktail induced triphasic immediate response in rabbits. The behavioural changes reflected glycaemic status serving as a guide for institution of glucose therapy.
UNDERGRADUATE SPIRITUALITY AND THE UNIVERSITY ENVIRONMENT: A QUALITATIVE STUDY

By Luke Andrew Jones, MA Washington State University December 2003 Chair: Willie Heggins III Results are reported from a qualitative study of five undergraduate students who have indicated spiritual growth as a high priority during their college education. Data were also collected from a focus group and an e-mail survey. Data reveal these students succeed in their spiritual growth despite a challenging environment because they take responsibility to get involved in a supportive community and find ways to grow and develop. These students did not have expectations that a state university would play a role in their spiritual development, so they made it their personal responsibility to seek out a supportive community as well as a challenge environment where they could find encouragement. Administrators can support these students by providing spaces for students to dialog, transformative experiences, exposure for student groups, and by collaborating with student groups on programming. Faculty can be more open to sharing their spiritual journeys, incorporate relevant appropriate spiritual themes in the class, and collaborate with administration in creating mentoring environments.
Towards Quantification of Explainability in Explainable Artificial Intelligence Methods

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become an integral part of domains such as security, finance, healthcare, medicine, and criminal justice. Explaining the decisions of AI systems in human terms is a key challenge--due to the high complexity of the model, as well as the potential implications on human interests, rights, and lives . While Explainable AI is an emerging field of research, there is no consensus on the definition, quantification, and formalization of explainability. In fact, the quantification of explainability is an open challenge. In our previous work, we incorporated domain knowledge for better explainability, however, we were unable to quantify the extent of explainability. In this work, we (1) briefly analyze the definitions of explainability from the perspective of different disciplines (e.g., psychology, social science), properties of explanation, explanation methods, and human-friendly explanations; and (2) propose and formulate an approach to quantify the extent of explainability. Our experimental result suggests a reasonable and model-agnostic way to quantify explainability
Modeling the magnetized Local Bubble from dust data

The Sun is embedded in the so-called Local Bubble (LB) – a cavity of hot plasma created by supernova explosions and surrounded by a shell of cold, dusty gas. Knowing the local distortion of the Galactic magnetic field associated with the LB is critical for the modeling of interstellar polarization data at high Galactic latitudes. In this his paper, we relate the structure of the Galactic magnetic field on the LB scale to three-dimensional (3D) maps of the local interstellar medium (ISM). First, we extracted the geometry of the LB shell, its inner surface, in particular from 3D dust extinction maps of the local ISM. We expanded the shell inner surface in spherical harmonics, up to a variable maximum multipole degree, which enabled us to control the level of complexity for the modeled surface. Next, we applied an analytical model for the ordered magnetic field in the shell to the modeled shell surface. This magnetic field model was successfully fitted to the Planck 353 GHz dust polarized emission maps over the Galactic polar caps. For each polar cap, the direction of the mean magnetic field derived from dust polarization (together with the prior that the field points toward longitude 90° ± 90°) is found to be consistent with the Faraday spectra of the nearby diffuse synchrotron emission. Our work presents a new approach to modeling the local structure of the Galactic magnetic field. We expect our methodology and our results to be useful both in modeling the local ISM as traced by its different components and in modeling the dust polarized emission, which is a long-awaited input for studies of the polarized foregrounds for cosmic microwave background.
Low-variance Black-box Gradient Estimates for the Plackett-Luce Distribution

Learning models with discrete latent variables using stochastic gradient descent remains a challenge due to the high variance of gradient estimates. Modern variance reduction techniques mostly consider categorical distributions and have limited applicability when the number of possible outcomes becomes large. In this work, we consider models with latent permutations and propose control variates for the Plackett-Luce distribution. In particular, the control variates allow us to optimize black-box functions over permutations using stochastic gradient descent. To illustrate the approach, we consider a variety of causal structure learning tasks for continuous and discrete data. We show that our method outperforms competitive relaxation-based optimization methods and is also applicable to non-differentiable score functions.
Multi-scale observations of thermal non-equilibrium cycles in coronal loops

Context. Thermal non-equilibrium (TNE) is a phenomenon that can occur in solar coronal loops when the heating is quasi-constant and highly-stratified. Under such heating conditions, coronal loops undergo cycles of evaporation and condensation. The recent observations of ubiquitous long-period intensity pulsations in coronal loops and their relationship with coronal rain have demonstrated that understanding the characteristics of TNE cycles is an essential step in constraining the circulation of mass and energy in the corona. Aims. We report unique observations with the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and the Swedish 1-m Solar Telescope (SST) that link the captured thermal properties across the extreme spatiotemporal scales covered by TNE processes. Methods. Within the same coronal loop bundle, we captured 6 h period coronal intensity pulsations in SDO/AIA and coronal rain observed off-limb in the chromospheric Hα and Ca II K spectral lines with SST/CRISP and SST/CHROMIS. We combined a multi-thermal analysis of the cycles with AIA and an extensive spectral characterisation of the rain clumps with the SST. Results. We find clear evidence of evaporation-condensation cycles in the corona which are linked with periodic coronal rain showers. The high-resolution spectroscopic instruments at the SST reveal the fine-structured rain strands and allow us to probe the cooling phase of one of the cycles down to chromospheric temperatures. Conclusions. These observations reinforce the link between long-period intensity pulsations and coronal rain. They also demonstrate the capability of TNE to shape the dynamics of active regions on the large scales as well as on the smallest scales currently resolvable.
Background Suppression Network for Weakly-supervised Temporal Action Localization

Weakly-supervised temporal action localization is a very challenging problem because frame-wise labels are not given in the training stage while the only hint is video-level labels: whether each video contains action frames of interest. Previous methods aggregate frame-level class scores to produce video-level prediction and learn from video-level action labels. This formulation does not fully model the problem in that background frames are forced to be misclassified as action classes to predict video-level labels accurately. In this paper, we design Background Suppression Network (BaS-Net) which introduces an auxiliary class for background and has a two-branch weight-sharing architecture with an asymmetrical training strategy. This enables BaS-Net to suppress activations from background frames to improve localization performance. Extensive experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of BaS-Net and its superiority over the state-of-the-art methods on the most popular benchmarks – THUMOS'14 and ActivityNet. Our code and the trained model are available at https://github.com/Pilhyeon/BaSNet-pytorch.