Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The relationship between obesity and sleep timing behavior, television exposure, and dinnertime among elementary school-age children.

STUDY OBJECTIVES The daily lifestyle behaviors of children have been shown to be associated with obesity. There are limited studies on the association of sleep timing behavior and body mass index (BMI), specifically in elementary school-age children. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between obesity and sleep timing patterns, television exposure time, and dinnertime among elementary school-age children. METHODS Children (n = 169) aged 6 to 10 years who were residents of Alabama were recruited for this study. The questionnaires were used to determine the bedtime, wake-up time, television exposure time, and dinnertime of the participants. The participants were categorized into four groups depending on the bedtime and wake-up time behavior habits: early bed/early wake-up (EE); early bed/late wake-up (EL); late bed/early wake-up (LE); and late bed/late wake-up (LL) time. The BMI z-score, television exposure time, and dinnertime of these groups were compared. RESULTS The LL group had a significantly higher BMI z-score compared to the EE group. The higher BMI z-score in the LL group may be associated with late bedtime and not late wake-up time. Approximately 71% of children with late bedtime (8:48 pm), 75% of children who watch television for more than 1 hour, and 54% of children who have dinner after 7:00 pm have obesity. CONCLUSIONS Daily behavior habits such as late bedtime, increased television exposure, and late dinnertime are associated with obesity.
Effects of genistein on lipopolysaccharide-induced injury of mouse alveolar epithelial cells and its mechanism

ABSTRACT Alveolar and bronchial epithelial cells have critical functions in acute respiratory distress syndrome progress. Genistein could protect the lungs from acute lung injury, however, whether genistein protects the alveolar epithelial cells from LPS-induced injury was less studied. Spectrophotometric method 3-[4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl]-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) were performed to detect cell viability and levels of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleukin-1β (IL-1β), and IL-6. Flow cytometry and western blot assay were performed to detect cells apoptosis and protein levels. In LPS-induced model of mouse lung epithelial (MLE)-12 cells, PBEF (proinflammatory cytokine) expression, and cell apoptosis were increased and cell viability was decreased, whereas NF-κB was activated and expression levels of TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-6 were increased. However, genistein partly reversed the effect of LPS, and it plays a protective role in lung injury by reducing expression of PBEF, inhibiting the activation of NF-κB and alleviating inflammatory response of cells. Graphical abstract LPS increased the alveolar epithelial cell injury, and GEN suppressed the activation of NF-κB by reducing the of PBEF expression, reducing the inflammatory response of cell.
Application of Structured‐Light 3‐D Scanning to the Documentation of Plastic Fingerprint Impressions: A Quality Comparison with Traditional Photography

Plastic fingerprint impressions found at crime scenes are often too delicate for collection, leaving photography as the best option for documentation. However, traditional photography techniques can be inadequate in documenting minute 3‐D details due to limitations of the camera and lighting conditions. This study investigated the feasibility of applying commercially available structured‐light 3‐D scanners in the documentation of plastic prints. Attempts were made to develop a procedure to extract curvature features from 3‐D scanned fingerprints and flatten the friction ridge features into two‐dimensional (2‐D) images to allow direct comparison with the traditional photography in the CSIpix® Matcher and NFIQ 2.0 software. Two 3‐D scanners were evaluated a Dentsply Sirona inEos X5® and an Artec Space Spider. In this study, 3‐D scanners demonstrated robustness as well as efficiency in the collection of plastic fingerprint impressions in select substrates. One of the developed methods utilizing a discrete geometry operator and convexity features outperformed traditional photography, achieving higher software detection scores in minutiae count and match quality, while traditional photography could not always capture enough high‐quality minutiae for comparisons, even after digital enhancement.
Dark exposure affects plasticity‐related molecules and interneurons throughout the visual system during adulthood

Several experimental manipulations, including visual deprivation, are able to induce critical period‐like plasticity in the visual cortex of adult animals. In this regard, many studies have analyzed the effects of dark exposure in adult animals, but still little is known about the role of interneurons and plasticity‐related molecules on such mechanisms. In this study, we analyzed the effects of 10 days of dark exposure on the connectivity and structure of interneurons, both in the primary visual cortex and in the rest of cerebral regions implicated in the transmission of visual stimulus. We found that this environmental manipulation induces changes in the expression of synaptic molecules throughout the visual pathway and in the structure of interneurons in the primary visual cortex. Moreover, we found altered expression in the polysialylated form of the neural cell adhesion molecule and in perineuronal nets surrounding parvalbumin expressing interneurons, suggesting that these plasticity‐related molecules may be involved in the changes produced by dark exposure. Together, our findings indicate that dark exposure produces an important alteration of inhibitory circuits and molecules related to their plasticity, not only in the visual cortex but throughout the visual pathway.
IB Diploma Programme Study: Factors influencing students to earn a Bilingual Diploma

The aims of this study were to examine the context of BD implementation in schools, to investigate academic outcomes for BD students and to explore perceptions and factors that encourage or discourage students from pursuing the BD in IB World Schools. This multi-method study included three phases: (1) a survey of IB World School staff, (2) analysis of student record and performance data and (3) an in-depth study of BD implementation in a small number of schools.
Optimizing the use of the hyperCVAD regimen: Clinical vignettes and practical management

INTRODUCTION The hallmark of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) treatment is the use of multi-agent chemotherapy based on a backbone including vincristine, anthracyclines, and corticosteroids. The addition of hyperfractionated cyclophosphamide improved remission rates and overall survival in patients with Burkitt lymphoma and ALL. The hyperCVAD combination alternating with high-dose methotrexate (MTX) and cytarabine for a total of 8 intensive courses was first described in 1986. The initial regimen, limited by infectious complications, induction mortality, and high rates of relapse in select populations has since been modified to improve outcomes and safely incorporate the newest agents in the antileukemic armamentarium. These changes, which include modifying maintenance and intensification therapy, incorporating novel monoclonal antibodies, BCR-ABL tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs), and the use of growth factors, have resulted in improved complete remission rates, overall survival, and decreased induction mortality. Although hyperCVAD is a commonly used regimen in ALL, its proper administration and associated standard supportive care practices are not well known outside of large academic centers. We herein provide clinical insight regarding several clinical scenarios that are particularly challenging.
Mechanistic understanding of cellular responses to genomic stress

Within the past half century we have learned of multiple pathways for repairing damaged DNA, based upon the intrinsic redundancy of information in its complementary double strands. Mechanistic details of these pathways have provided insights into environmental and endogenous threats to genomic stability. Studies on bacterial responses to ultraviolet light led to the discovery of excision repair, as well as the inducible SOS response to DNA damage. Similar responses in eukaryotes promote upregulation of error‐prone translesion DNA polymerases. Recent advances in this burgeoning field include duplex DNA sequencing to provide strikingly accurate profiling of mutational signatures, analyses of gene expression patterns in single cells, CRISPR/Cas9 to generate changes at precise genomic positions, novel roles for RNA in gene expression and DNA repair, phase‐separated aqueous environments for specialized cellular transactions, and DNA lesions as epigenetic signals for gene expression. The Environmental Mutagenesis and Genomics Society (EMGS), through the broad range of expertise in its membership, stands at the crossroad of basic understanding of mechanisms for genomic maintenance and the field of genetic toxicology, with the need for regulation of exposures to toxic substances. Our future challenges include devising strategies and technologies to identify individuals who are susceptible to specific genomic stresses, along with basic research on the underlying mechanisms of cellular stress responses that promote disease‐causing mutations. As the science moves forward it should also be a responsibility for the EMGS to expand its outreach programs for the enlightenment and benefit of all humans and the biosphere. Environ. Mol. Mutagen. 61:25–33, 2020. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Theoretically Feasible QoS in a MIMO Cellular Network Compared to the Practical LTE Performance

—The objective is to build a global analytical approach for the evaluation of the quality of service perceived by the users in wireless cellular networks which is calibrated in some reference cases. To do so, a model accounting for interference in a MIMO cellular system is ﬁrstly described. An explicit expression of users bit-rates theoretically feasible from the information theory point of view is then deduced. The comparison between these bit-rates and practical LTE performance permits to obtain the progress margins for potential evolution of the technology. Moreover, it leads to an analytical approximate expression of the system performance which is calibrated with the practical one. This expression is the keystone of a global analytical approach for the evaluation of the QoS perceived by the users in the long run of users arrivals and departures in the network. We illustrate our approach by calculating the users QoS as function of the cell radius in different mobility and interference cancellation scenarios.
Efficient Implementation of Causal Consistent Transactions in the Cloud

Distributed key-value storage systems, which offer weak coherence models, have emerged as a strategy for increasing the performance and scalability of systems in the cloud. However, weak consistency makes application development difficult, and there is a keen interest in offering other coherence models that are useful to developers without compromising scalability. The Transactional Causal Consistency (TCC) model is particularly relevant in this context. In this article, we introduce FastCCS, a new algorithm to support TCC in fewer communication rounds than previous work. Experimental results, in which we compare the performance of FastCCS with the performance of other systems proposed in the literature, show that FastCCS can support a rate of higher than the previous systems.
Auto-encoder factorizing into transform invariants and transform parameters*

The auto-encoder method is a type of unsupervised dimensionality reduction method. However, it is difficult to use an ordinary auto-encoder for encoding a spatial pattern itself because such ordinary one encodes an image and its spatially dilated/reduced versions into descriptors far from each other. This will be a problem when focusing on a pattern itself. To solve this, we proposed a transform invariant auto-encoder based on a cost function evaluating transform invariance. By the method, we can extract a transform invariant descriptor from an input, but we need an additional regressor to extract transform parameters required to restore the input. In addition, the cost function requires high computation cost by computational explosion when considering multiple types of transforms. In this publication, we propose a novel auto-encoder that separates an input into a transform invariant descriptor and transform parameters. The proposed method does not require an additional regressor and it will overcome combinational explosion. The proposed method can be applied to various auto-encoders without requiring any special modules or labeled training samples. By applying it to dilation transforms, we can achieve a spatial pattern descriptor and its relative scale. By some experiments, we demonstrate that the method can generate a pair of a transform invariant descriptor and a set of parameters for restoring the original input.
Online reflection journals: Learning through assessment

The present study was conducted to investigate the extent to which students believe that journal writing contributes to improving their learning. The research was conducted at a post-secondary institution which organises its curriculum around principles of problembased learning, and in which students have to reflect on their learning daily. In the particular curriculum, reflection journals form a part of the daily assessment. To that end, a questionnaire was developed containing statements derived from the literature, about the effects of journal writing on students’ learning. It was then pilot-tested on a group of second- year students (n = 327). Analyses of the data collected showed that students were able to identify the four latent constructs underlying the 15-item questionnaire, as indicated by the fit of the hypothesised model. Construct reliability values of the four scales gave evidence of good reliability in terms of internal consistency. Correlation coefficients computed for the questionnaire scales were positively correlated and statistically significant. Students, who believed that journal writing enables them to think and write reflectively, agreed that frequent journal writing improves their learning. These students are also more likely to use their journals as a tool to manage the impressions of their facilitators, and to feedback about the contributions of their peers towards team work. These findings suggest that the use of online reflection journals provides many opportunities for students to reflect on their learning. Facilitators can also monitor students’ progress through their reflections, and to provide specific, detailed feedback to aid students in their learning.
Synergy, Diversification and Firm Performance in Mergers and Acquisitions

Synergy from merger and acquisition (M&A) theoretically increases firm performance. However, diversification leads to coinsurance effect which reduces firm value. This study aims to analyze the relationship between synergy and firm performance measured using return on assets (ROA) and Tobin’s Q, with diversification as moderating variable. Analysis was carried out using data from 33 M&A cases by non-financial firms listed in the Indonesia Stock Exchange, done between 2010 and 2016. Results show that synergy has a positive effect on both ROA and Tobin’s Q. Meanwhile, diversification moderates the impact of synergy towards both ROA and Tobin’s Q, thereby decreasing firm performance. Keywords—Merger, Acquisition, Synergy, Diversification, Firm Performance
Disciplinary Histories, Funders’ Priorities, and Competing Research Approaches: Organizational Communication Forces that Influence the Emerging Design of Cyberinfrastructure in the Early 21

Over the last decade or so, the emerging phenomenon of cyberinfrastructure (CI) and e-science has received much attention, enthusiasm, and funding support in the scientific community in the US and the world. While the vision is compelling, CI is still in its early development stages. This study investigates the organizational communication forces (i.e., disciplinary histories, funders’ priorities, and competing research approaches) that drive early CI designs, and the ways in which these forces manifest between institutions and agents involved in CI projects. Theoretically, the paper concludes with a call to pursue studying infrastructures in organizational and applied communication research. Practically, the paper provides specific recommendations for how stakeholder groups (i.e., professional associations in various disciplines, universities that host supercomputing centers, etc.) can actively shape the trajectories of future CI designs to promote a healthy CI ecosystem.
Novel Generalized Three-Step Phase-Shifting Interferometry with a Slight-Tilt Reference

A convenient and powerful method is proposed and presented to find the unknown phase shifts in three-step generalized phase-shifting interferometry. A slight-tilt reference of 0.1 degrees is employed. As a result, the developed theory shows that the unknown phase shifts can be simply extracted by subtraction operations. Also, from the theory developed, the tilt angle of the tilt reference can also be calculated, which is important as it allows us to extract the object wave precisely. Numerical simulations and optical experiments were performed to demonstrate the validity and efficiency of the proposed method. The proposed slight-tilt reference allows the full and efficient use of the space-bandwidth product of the limited resolution of digital recording devices as compared to the situation in standard off-axis holography where typically several degrees for off-axis angle is employed.
Cross-Modal Mapping for Generalized Zero-Shot Learning by Soft-Labeling

Zero-Shot Learning (ZSL) is a classiﬁcation task where some classes referred as unseen classes have no labeled training images. Instead, we only have side information (or description) about seen and unseen classes, often in the form of semantic or descriptive attributes. Lack of training images from a set of classes restricts the use of standard classiﬁcation techniques and losses, including the popular cross-entropy loss. Visual information from the training images and textual data as the semantic information offer a challenging multi-modal problem. State-of-the-art approaches aim to link visual and semantic spaces by learning a cross-modal transfer/embedding and then performing classiﬁcation in the embedding space. In this paper, we propose a novel architecture of casting ZSL as a standard neural-network with cross-entropy loss to embed visual space to semantic space. During training in order to introduce unseen visual information to the network, we utilize soft-labeling based on semantic similarities between seen and unseen classes. To the best of our knowledge, such similarity based soft-labeling is not explored for cross-modal transfer and ZSL. We evaluate the proposed model on four benchmark datasets for zero-shot learning, AwA, aPY, SUN and CUB datasets, and show that our model achieves signiﬁcant improvement over the state-of-the-art methods in Generalized-ZSL setting on all of these datasets consistently.
Advanced Common-Mode Control Techniques for Low Voltage Analog Signal Processors

The control of the common-mode (CM) component of two voltage signals for low voltage (LV) analog signal processors, is addressed in this tutorial. In particular it is shown that for large input and output signal swings, the CM component must be well controlled in very LV Fully-Differential (FD) amplifiers. Then, appropriate common-mode feedback (CMFB) loops are unavoidable needed. The general requirements of such CMFB networks are derived and design solutions for input and output LV CMFBs are revised. In addition, an efficient CMFB loop suitable for OTA-C based circuits is described.
Global and Regional IUCN Red List Assessments: 8

In this contribution, the conservation status assessment of four vascular plants according to IUCN categories and criteria are presented. It includes the assessment of Ophrys normanii J.J.Wood at global level, and the regional assessment of Genista anglica L. , Helianthemum lippii (L.) Dum.Cours. , and Scrophularia lucida L. (Italy).
Gesture in the Communication and Control of Musical Timing

Musical gestures are an integral part of music performance and can play an important role in communicating and controlling musical expressions and intentions. These expressive intentions are also communicated to co-performers when playing in a musical ensemble. An important mechanism in music performance is the prediction and control of, and the adaption to the expected and perceived musical timing. When performing, musicians are involved in a complex system of mutual adaptation, which is not completely understood so far. In this study, we investigated the role of sound-producing gestures of musicians in the mediation process of (interpersonal) musical timing in a duet performance. Therefore, we designed a study were musicians had to tap a simple melody on a pad using three different movement strategies, with and without visual contact and in two different tempi. The results show that gestures can monitor the control and communication of musical timing which leads to a more stable performance, especially in slower tempi and when musicians can communicate visually. Moreover, expressive gestures may improve the prediction of expressive timing patterns of a co-performer, which suggest that the body is an active controller of time and plays an important role in the entrainment process between performing musicians.
A Simple Baseline for Visual Commonsense Reasoning

Reasoning is an important ability that we learn from a very early age. To develop models with better reasoning abilities, recently, the new visual commonsense reasoning (VCR) task has been introduced. Not only do models have to answer questions, but also do they have to provide a reason for the given answer. Baselines achieve compelling results via a meticulously designed model composed of LSTM modules and attention nets. Here we show that a much simpler model can perform better with half the number of trainable parameters. By associating visual features with attribute information and better text to image grounding, we obtain further improvements for our simpler & effective baseline, TAB-VCR . Our approach results in a 5.3%, 4.4% and 6.5% absolute improvement over previous state-of-the-art [37] on question answering, answer justiﬁcation and holistic VCR. The extended version [26] of this workshop paper and the code is available at https: //deanplayerljx.github. io/tabvcr .
Community size effect in artificial learning systems

Motivated by theories of language and communication that explain why communities with large numbers of speakers have, on average, simpler languages with more regularity, we cast the representation learning problem in terms of learning to communicate . Our starting point sees the traditional autoencoder setup as a single encoder with a ﬁxed decoder partner that must learn to communicate. Generalizing from there, we introduce community -based autoencoders in which multiple encoders and decoders collectively learn representations by being randomly paired up on successive training iterations. We ﬁnd that increasing community sizes reduce idiosyncrasies in the learned codes, resulting in representations that better encode concept categories and correlate with human feature norms.