Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Impacts of the Affordable Care Act Dependent Coverage Provision on Health-Related Outcomes of Young Adults

The first major insurance expansion of the Affordable Care Act - a provision requiring insurers to allow dependents to remain on parents' health insurance until turning 26 - took effect in September 2010. We estimate this mandate's impacts on numerous outcomes related to health care access, preventive care utilization, risky behaviors, and self-assessed health. We estimate difference-in-differences models with 23-25 year olds as the treatment group and 27-29 year olds as the control group. For the full sample, the dependent coverage provision increased the probabilities of having health insurance, a primary care doctor, and excellent self-assessed health, while reducing body mass index. However, the mandate also increased risky drinking and did not lead to any significant increases in preventive care utilization. Subsample analyses reveal particularly large gains for men and college graduates.
NeuroScheme: Efficient Multiscale Representations for the Visual Exploration of Morphological Data in the Human Brain Neocortex

The analysis of data sets from such a complex domain as neuroscience is severely hampered by the brain complexity and by the huge amount of data originated in current experiments and simulations. The complexity of the brain stems not only from the enormous number of relevant entities that integrate it (for example, around 10 15 synapses), but also from the complex interrelations among brain structures, which have to be analyzed at the many different organizational levels of the brain. Visualization techniques have proven to be valuable in order to explore and analyze complex systems from a wide variety of areas. Nevertheless, their application to the ﬁeld of neuroscience must face some domain speciﬁc difﬁculties. In particular, the overwhelming amount of data poses a challenge to the current storage and processing capabilities, calling for compact data descriptions. Furthermore, the visual analysis of neural scenes requires the design of novel visual representations and techniques that help experts in their data exploration and interpretation activities, assisting them in ﬁghting complexity. In this paper we propose a visual exploratory framework that facilitates the process of knowledge extraction from complex neural scenes. This framework contains a multilevel structure, following the different organizational levels of the brain. Schematic or iconic symbols have been designed to portray the entities at each level, providing graphical representations that emphasize relevant features while hiding less important information. These schematic views, together with a multilevel organization, allow the exploration of the brain at different scales, combining in the same view different levels of abstraction whose entities can be either schematically represented (at different abstraction levels) or geometrically depicted at the ﬁnest level of detail. The fact that users can choose high geometric detail for just a fraction of brain structures results in a dramatic reduction of visual clutter, decreasing the difﬁculty of the visual exploration and interpretation task. The complexity due to sheer data size can be also reduced by generating the visual representations on the ﬂy from compact data representations. This work presents a ﬁrst implementation of this framework, focused on the representation of the morphological aspects of the brain cortex. The underlying multilevel structure and the design of the graphical schematic representations constitute an approach that provides organized and uncluttered views that facilitate visual analysis, a task much more difﬁcult (even unapproachable) if all brain structures were depicted at full geometric detail. Categories and Subject Descriptors (according to ACM CCS) : I.3. 3 [Computer Graphics]: una categoria—otra cate-goria
Formalizing Virtual Organizations

This work presents a formalization of Virtual Organizations, which are designed by means of their structural entities, such as roles, organizational units or norms, and the dynamic entities that change through time like agents and groups. Entities are grouped by means of the Organizational Dimensions, explicitly represented in the proposed formalization. Additionally, a study of existing formalizations of Organization Centered Multiagent Systems is presented.
Retrieval on parametric shape collections

While collections of parametric shapes are growing in size and use, little progress has been made on the fundamental problem of shape-based matching and retrieval for parametric shapes in a collection. The search space for such collections is both discrete (number of shapes) and continuous (parameter values). In this work, we propose representing this space using descriptors that have shown to be effective for single shape retrieval. While single shapes can be represented as points in a descriptor space, parametric shapes are mapped into larger continuous regions. For smooth descriptors, we can assume that these regions are bounded low-dimensional manifolds where the dimensionality is given by the number of shape parameters. We propose representing these manifolds with a set of primitives, namely, points and bounded tangent spaces. Our algorithm describes how to define these primitives and how to use them to construct a manifold approximation that allows accurate and fast retrieval. We perform an analysis based on curvature, boundary evaluation, and the allowed approximation error to select between primitive types. We show how to compute decision variables with no need for empirical parameter adjustments and discuss theoretical guarantees on retrieval accuracy. We validate our approach with experiments that use different types of descriptors on a collection of shapes from multiple categories.
Implementation of a scalable, web-based, automated clinical decision support risk-prediction tool for chronic kidney disease using C-CDA and application programming interfaces

Abstract Background and Objective Clinical decision support tools for risk prediction are readily available, but typically require workflow interruptions and manual data entry so are rarely used. Due to new data interoperability standards for electronic health records (EHRs), other options are available. As a clinical case study, we sought to build a scalable, web-based system that would automate calculation of kidney failure risk and display clinical decision support to users in primary care practices. Materials and Methods We developed a single-page application, web server, database, and application programming interface to calculate and display kidney failure risk. Data were extracted from the EHR using the Consolidated Clinical Document Architecture interoperability standard for Continuity of Care Documents (CCDs). EHR users were presented with a noninterruptive alert on the patient’s summary screen and a hyperlink to details and recommendations provided through a web application. Clinic schedules and CCDs were retrieved using existing application programming interfaces to the EHR, and we provided a clinical decision support hyperlink to the EHR as a service. Results We debugged a series of terminology and technical issues. The application was validated with data from 255 patients and subsequently deployed to 10 primary care clinics where, over the course of 1 year, 569 533 CCD documents were processed. Conclusions We validated the use of interoperable documents and open-source components to develop a low-cost tool for automated clinical decision support. Since Consolidated Clinical Document Architecture–based data extraction extends to any certified EHR, this demonstrates a successful modular approach to clinical decision support.
Affordable loss: behavioral economic aspects of the plunge decision

Affordable loss involves decision makers estimating what they might be able to put at risk and determining what they are willing to lose in order to follow a course of action. Using the entrepreneur's new venture plunge decision, this article combines insights from behavioral economics to develop a detailed analysis of the affordable loss heuristic. Specifically, we develop propositions to explain how individuals: (1) decide what they can afford to lose; and (2) what they are willing to lose in order to plunge into entrepreneurship. The article also discusses the implications of affordable loss for the economics of strategic entrepreneurship. Copyright © 2009 Strategic Management Society.
Multiscale simulation of molecular processes in cellular environments

We describe the recent advances in studying biological systems via multiscale simulations. Our scheme is based on a coarse-grained representation of the macromolecules and a mesoscopic description of the solvent. The dual technique handles particles, the aqueous solvent and their mutual exchange of forces resulting in a stable and accurate methodology allowing biosystems of unprecedented size to be simulated. This article is part of the themed issue ‘Multiscale modelling at the physics–chemistry–biology interface’.
Lime stabilization for native rural roads In Tanzania

Tanzania has two seasons in a year (dry and rain seasons), the problem of road impassability in rural areas of Tanzania throughout a year was studied under site investigation (field testing) and laboratory tests. The study investigated mineralogical reactive of native rural roads soil with lime, materials properties and characteristics of lime stabilized layers under critical structural performances of strength, permanent deformation, resilient properties, durability, fracture and fatigue.
Marble Initiative - Monitoring the Impact of Events on Customers Opinion

Social networks have become a major source of information, opinions and sentiments about almost any subject. The purpose of this work is to provide evidences of the applicability of opinion mining methods to find out how some events may impact into public opinion about a brand, product or service. We report an experiment that mined Twitter data related to two particular brands during specific periods that have been selected from events that was supposed to affect the user’s perception. To find out conclusions, the methodology of the experiment applies several pre-processing techniques to extract sentiment information from the posts (e.g., case alterations, Part-of-Speech tagging using a Natural Language Toolkit, symbols removal, sentence and n-gram separation). The SenticNet 2 Corpus is used for polarity classification by means of a supervised algorithm where several threshold values are defined to mark positive, negative and neutral opinions. A longitudinal inspection of the polarized results on histograms allows identifying the "hot spots" and relating them to real world events. Although this paper shows the finding in our initial experiments, the ultimate goal of the research initiative, which we call Marble, is to provide a cloud solution for early detection of opinion shifts by the automatic classification of events according to their impact on opinion (propagation speed, intensity and duration), and its relationship with the normal behavior around a brand, product or service.
Do gender differences affect the doctor-patient interaction during consultations in general practice? Results from the INTERMEDE study.

OBJECTIVE The aim of the study was to ascertain whether disagreement between GPs and patients on advice given on nutrition, exercise and weight loss is related to patient-doctor gender discordance. Our hypothesis is that a patient interacting with a physician of the same gender may perceive more social proximity, notably on health care beliefs and may be more inclined to trust them. METHODS The analysis used the Intermede project's quantitative data collected via mirrored questionnaires at the end of the consultation. Multilevel logistic regressions were carried out to explore associations between patient-doctor gender discordance and their disagreement on advice given during the consultation adjusted on patients' and physicians' characteristics. The sample consists of 585 eligible patients and 27 GPs. RESULTS Disagreement on advice given on nutrition was observed less often for female concordant dyads: OR = 0.25 (95% CI = 0.08-0.78), and for female doctors-male patients dyads: OR = 0.24 (95% CI = 0.07-0.84), taking the male concordant dyads as reference. For advice given on exercise, disagreement was found less often for female concordant dyads OR = 0.38 (95% CI = 0.15-0.98) and an interdoctor effect was found (P < 0.05). For advice given on weight loss, the probability of disagreement was significantly increased (OR: 2.87 95% CI = 1.29-6.41) when consultations consisted of female patient and male GP. CONCLUSION Patient-doctor gender concordance/discordance is associated with their agreement/disagreement on advice given during the consultation. Physicians need to be conscious that their own demographic characteristics and perceptions might influence the quality of prevention counseling delivered to their patients.
VRCS: integrating version control and module management using interactive three-dimensional graphics

Version control and module management are very important in practical software development. In UNIX, the Revision Control System (RCS) or the Source Code Control System (SCCS) is used in general as a version control tool. However, they (1) lack the ability to explicitly display version changes; (2) require complicated commands to be typed; and (3) lack the ability to manage multiple files and modules. This paper proposes a solution for these issues by applying 3D visualization. A prototype system called VRCS (Visual RCS) was developed, in which each piece of version information stored in an RCS history file is displayed as a 2D tree by taking the z-axis as time. Other 2D trees are laid out in 3D space in the same way. In our visualization, files which compose a certain release of the software are connected by a line called a relation-link. By using GUIs, users can check in/out each version easily and interactively. More importantly, just by choosing the relation-link, a certain release is rebuilt automatically.
Complete Genome Sequence of the Novel Escherichia coli Phage phAPEC 8

Bacteriophage phAPEC8 is an Escherichia coli-infecting myovirus, isolated on an avian pathogenic Escherichia coli (APEC) strain. APEC strains cause colibacillosis in poultry, resulting in high mortality levels and important economic losses. Genomic analysis of the 147,737-bp double-stranded DNA phAPEC8 genome revealed that 53% of the 269 encoded proteins are unique to this phage. Its closest relatives include the Salmonella phage PVP-SE1 and the coliphage rv5, with 19% and 18% similar proteins, respectively. As such, phAPEC8 represents a novel, phylogenetically distinct clade within the Myoviridae, with molecular properties suitable for phage therapy applications.
Fly photoreceptors I. Physical separation of two visual pigments in Calliphora retinula cells 1-6

The two peaks of the spectral sensitivity curves of Calliphora correspond to two visual pigments. The peak sensitivity to polarized light for the u. v. sensitive pigment is at an angle to that for the green-sensitive pigment. The change in angle of the maximum polarization sensitivity as a function of wavelength occurs near 400 nm; in this transition the curves do not follow a cos2 function. The angle between the two maxima is different for each retinula cell. The only explanation of this phenomenon is that there are two visual pigments in different parts of the receptor, and one part is twisted relative to the other. There are therefore two metarhodopsins and the adaptation mechanisms are partially separate for the two peaks of the spectral sensitivity. The inference of two separated pigments modifies the interpretation of much previous work on fly photoreceptors.
Generation of humanoid Robot's Facial Expressions for Context-Aware Communication

Communication between humans and robots is a very important aspect in the field of Humanoid Robotics. For a natural interaction, robots capable of nonverbal communication must be developed. However, despite the most recent efforts, robots still can show only limited expression capabilities. The purpose of this work is to create a facial expression generator that can be applied to the 24 DoF head of the humanoid robot KOBIAN-R. In this manuscript, we present a system that based on relevant studies of human communication and facial anatomy can produce thousands of combinations of facial and neck movements. The wide range of expressions covers not only primary emotions, but also complex or blended ones, as well as communication acts that are not strictly categorized as emotions. Results showed that the recognition rate of expressions produced by this system is comparable to the rate of recognition of the most common facial expressions. Context-based recognition, which is especially important in case of more complex communication acts, was also evaluated. Results proved that produced robotic expressions can alter the meaning of a sentence in the same way as human expressions do. We conclude that our system can successfully improve the communication abilities of KOBIAN-R, making it capable of complex interaction in the future.
An automated large-scale culture system of Plasmodium falciparum using tangential flow filtration for medium change

Summary Asexual stages and mature gametocytes of Plasmodium falciparum have been produced in a 500 ml suspension culture system containing 6–10% red cells. Medium change was automated and was accomplished using a tangential flow filtration unit. The rate of multiplication of the parasite (isolate NF 54) was consistently high when compared with static cultures and ranged from 6·4 × to 15·3 × per cycle in 8 experiments. Mature gametocytes were present in up to 2% of red cells in 14-day-old cultures. Only minor modifications would be required to further scale-up the volume of the culture.
Response of the endangered tropical dry forests to climate change and the role of Mexican Protected Areas for their conservation

Assuming that co‐distributed species are exposed to similar environmental conditions, ecological niche models (ENMs) of bird and plant species inhabiting tropical dry forests (TDFs) in Mexico were developed to evaluate future projections of their distribution for the years 2050 and 2070. We used ENM‐based predictions and climatic data for two Global Climate Models, considering two Representative Concentration Pathway scenarios (RCP4.5/RCP8.5). We also evaluated the effects of habitat loss and the importance of the Mexican system of protected areas (PAs) on the projected models for a more detailed prediction of TDFs and to identify hot spots that require conservation actions. We identified four major distributional areas: the main one located along the Pacific Coast (from Sonora to Chiapas, including the Cape and Bajío regions, and the Balsas river basin), and three isolated areas: the Yucatán peninsula, central Veracruz, and southern Tamaulipas. When considering the effect of habitat loss, a significant reduction (~61%) of the TDFs predicted area occurred, whereas climate‐change models suggested (in comparison with the present distribution model) an increase in area of 3.0–10.0% and 3.0–9.0% for 2050 and 2070, respectively. In future scenarios, TDFs will occupy areas above its current average elevational distribution that are outside of its present geographical range. Our findings show that TDFs may persist in Mexican territory until the middle of the XXI century; however, the challenges about long‐term conservation are partially addressed (only 7% unaffected within the Mexican network of PAs) with the current Mexican PAs network. Based on our ENM approach, we suggest that a combination of models of species inhabiting present TDFs and taking into account change scenarios represent an invaluable tool to create new PAs and ecological corridors, as a response to the increasing levels of habitat destruction and the effects of climate change on this ecosystem.
A Phone Verification Approach to Pronunciation Quality Assessment for Spoken Language Learning

—Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) is a form of computer-based assisted learning used in teaching to facilitate the language learning process. One major aspect of CALL for spoken language learning is the automatic assessment of pronunciation quality. It greatly relies on speech recognition technology to provide gradings for the pronunciation quality of the given input speech. This paper introduces a phone veriﬁcation approach which allows the detection of mispronunciations at phone level. The detection thresholds can be determined based on the equal error rate (EER) metric using a database containing only native speech. In addition this approach also allows aggregation of assessment scores at sentence and speaker levels by computing the average phone rejection rates. This paper compares three different methods of generating goodness of pronunciation conﬁdence scores. In addition, this paper also examines both unsupervised versus supervised adaptation techniques to improve the veriﬁcation performance. Experimental results are reported based on the EER metric.
RNA Multimerisation in the DNA Packaging Motor of Bacteriophage φ29

The use of bacteriophages as experimental tools allows the investigation of interactions between components at the molecular level that are often not possible in more complex virus systems. The bacteriophage φ29 acts as a molecular machine to package its own genomic DNA during viral assembly. Self-associating RNA molecules, called pRNA, have an essential role in the function of this machine. This paper reports the characterization of this self-association (which leads to multimerisation of wild-type and truncated variant pRNAs) by analytical ultracentrifugation (including determination of the partial specific volume of the pRNA), together with an investigation into the domains of the molecule important for multimerisation by the use of complementary DNA probes.
2-Aminopyridinium diphenylphosphinate monohydrate

In the crystal of the title hydrated salt, C5H7N2 +·C12H10O2P−·H2O, the cations, anions and water molecules connected by N—H⋯O and O—H⋯O hydrogen bonds into a layer along the bc plane; the phenyl rings protrude into the space between the layers. The dihedral angle between rings of anion is 86.1 (1)°.
A low serum level of soluble tumor necrosis factor receptor p55 predicts response to thalidomide in advanced multiple myeloma.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Thalidomide modulates the production of tumor necrosis factor (TNF-alpha). Soluble TNF receptors, TNFR p55 and TNFR p75, modify TNF-alpha activity. In this study, we explored the relation between soluble TNF receptors and outcome in patients with advanced multiple myeloma treated with thalidomide. DESIGN AND METHODS The levels of soluble TNF receptor p55 and p75 were assessed in serum from 34 myeloma patients with relapsed or refractory disease before starting thalidomide treatment. Serial measurements were performed for 16 patients in serum collected during treatment. RESULTS The pre-treatment serum level of soluble TNFR p55 in thalidomide responders was significantly lower than that in non-responders (median 1.75 ng/mL (range 1.19-2.84) vs. 2.79 ng/mL (1.36-5.51), p=0.004). The levels of p55 declined significantly during treatment. The levels of p75 showed the same pattern as p55, but the differences were not significant. The median survival of myeloma patients with pre-treatment levels of p55 < 2.79 ng/mL was 404 days; the median survival of patients with pre-treatment levels >or= 2.79 ng/mL was shorter (65 days, log-rank test p=0.02). INTERPRETATION AND CONCLUSIONS We conclude that soluble TNFR p55 is an adverse prognostic factor in myeloma patients with relapsed or refractory disease treated with thalidomide. Patients with a low pre-treatment level of this receptor have a better response rate and a longer overall survival.