Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Successful treatment of refractory acute lupus haemophagocytic syndrome using rituximab: a case report

Abstract Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE)-associated haemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH) is called acute lupus haemophagocytic syndrome (ALHS), which is relatively rare but life-threatening. We present the case of a 43-year-old woman diagnosed with SLE with panniculitis, pleuritis, and autoimmune hepatitis. She was treated with high-dose glucocorticoids. Although disease activity temporarily improved, she developed fever, elevation of liver enzymes, hyperferritinemia, severe inflammatory response, and thrombocytopenia a month after starting glucocorticoids. Bone marrow biopsy was performed and haemophagocytosis was observed. She was diagnosed with ALHS on day 49. Since she developed ALHS during administration of glucocorticoids, her ALHS was determined to be refractory to glucocorticoid monotherapy; therefore, additional immunosuppressive agents were needed. She was treated with methylprednisolone pulse, plasma exchange and cyclosporine A (CyA). However, CyA was discontinued on day 54 because CyA-induced hypertensive encephalopathy was suspected. Subsequently, rituximab (RTX) was introduced to treat refractory ALHS on day 56; the disease activity subsequently reduced. After four courses of RTX, her ferritin levels and platelet counts were within the normal range and the glucocorticoid dose could be tapered to betamethasone 2.0 mg/day on day 132. No subsequent recurrence of SLE and ALHS was observed until day 132. RTX might therefore be an effective therapeutic option for refractory ALHS.
Proximity-Based Unification: An Efficient Implementation Method

Unification is a central concept in logic systems based on the resolution principle. As well, in knowledge representation, proximity relations (i.e., reflexive, symmetric, fuzzy binary relations) are useful for introducing semantics into a syntactic level by modeling the semantic closeness of different syntactic objects and managing vague or imprecise information. Proximity relations, in combination with the unification algorithm, make possible expressing certain forms of approximate reasoning in a logic programming framework. In this article, we use proximity relations in the context of a (fuzzy) logic programming system, called <monospace><bold>Bousi</bold><inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\sim$</tex-math></inline-formula><bold>Prolog</bold></monospace>, as a way of solving the limitations introduced by similarity relations (i.e., transitive proximity relations) to correctly represent fuzzy information. Recently, we introduced an accurate definition of proximity between expressions (terms or atomic formulas) and a new unification algorithm able to manage proximity relations properly. However, the so-called weak unification algorithm, which is an extension of Martelli and Montanari's unification algorithm supported by the new notion of proximity, does not have an efficient implementation. In this article, we present a method that facilitates such an efficient implementation, including an adaptation of the weak SLD resolution rule based on the new unification algorithm, and its integration and implementation into the fuzzy logic programming system <monospace><bold>Bousi</bold><inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\sim$</tex-math></inline-formula><bold>Prolog</bold></monospace>. A performance analysis to show its efficiency is also presented.
Pain and Psychological Distress Following Orthopedic Trauma: A Call for Collaborative Models of Care

Numerous studies have documented that orthopedic trauma patients’ experience long-term disability, even after complete clinical recovery. For many patients, the level of disability is not fully explained by the extent and severity of their injuries. These studies have also identified risk and protective factors that may explain why some patients experience full recovery while others suffer from life-long disability. Key factors that may play a central role as both predictors and mediators of disability are pain, depression, and anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Anxiety, which in this population can take the form of acute and PTSD, has gained particular attention in the past few decades and is the subject of intense study, particularly among veteran populations and those experiencing life-threatening injuries. Depression has been studied far longer and may constitute both a major risk factor preinjury and a detrimental factor in both the acute and long-term recovery phases. Pain has always been understood as a symptom of traumatic injuries, but is a focus of concern now also due to its role in the use of opioids and PTSD. In this manuscript we will briefly review the scope of the problem, discuss risk factors and potential intervention points, and broadly propose secondary prevention approaches suitable for implementation in the trauma setting, with a particular focus on the role of collaborative care models.
Directive Speech Acts in Academic Discourse: Ethnography of Communication from Gender Perspective in Higher Education

In spoken academic discourse, there are various directive speech acts forms and strategies both formal and informal. Based on the previous research with different focuses show that directive speech acts is one of speech acts types mostly used in daily conversation. The study of directive speech acts can also be found in classroom interaction as spoken academic discourse. The locutors’ and interlocutors’ expressions in spoken academic discourse are vary. Language variation involves direct and indirect strategies as well as literal and non-literal with small portion of local language use. The use of directive speech acts is affected by contextual socio-cultural factors within the conversation. The locutors sometimes use local language in conveying certain meaning to the interlocutors. The structure of dialogue, moreover, disallows the taking up of any position beyond the interlocutors from which they can be integrated into a larger totality.
Water footprint calculation and assessment of viscose textile

REZUMAT Water footprint calculation and assessment of viscose textile Water footprint is used as an indicator to quantify the impacts on water resource and water environment. Based on water footprint standards established by the International Standardization Organization (ISO), this paper proposed a new quantitative indicator for water alkalization, and calculated the water footprints involved in viscose textile production. In addition, water footprint accounting results were comprehensively evaluated by LCA polygon method which was developed to interpret LCA results. Results showed that: (1) water scarcity footprint of viscose textile production was 60.511 m3 H2O eq/ton, of which 85.71% was from the viscose fiber production; (2) water eutrophication footprint of viscose textile production was 12.439 kg PO4 eq/ton, the major contribution (84.37%) was given by COD and BOD5; (3) water acidification footprint and water alkaline footprint of viscose textile production were 81.453 kg SO2 eq/ton and 55.675 kg OH– eq/ton, mainly due to H2SO4 and NaOH input during the spinning process, respectively; (4) water ecotoxicity footprint of viscose textile production was 3828.169 km3 H2O eq/ton, mainly derived from Zn2+ in spinning wastewater; (5) LCA polygon analyses showed that environmental load in the spinning was the largest, followed by the pulping and then the dyeing.
Dispersal and development of beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.) in Ukraine

Introduction: The beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.) is a dangerous agricultural pest with high migratory and outbreak capacities. Its taxonomy at the generic level has been changed several times, the two most acknowledged genera being Loxostege and Pyrausta. The beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.), (Pyraloidea, Crambidae) is a dangerous outbreak pest, causing serious damage to the crops such as soybean, sugar beet, alfalfa and sunflower in Eurasia, including Northern China and steppe zones of European and Asian parts of Russia (Chen et al. 2008, Frolov et al. 2008). It was initially described as Pyralis sticticalis (Linnaeus 1761), later it was attributed by the different authors to the genera of Botys Latreille, 1802, Loxostege Hubner, 1825, Margaritia Stephens, 1827 and Phlyctaenodes Hampson, 1899. The combination Loxostege sticticalis is the one most widely accepted by the modern taxonomic summaries (de Jong 2011, Goater et al. 2005, Heppner 1998, Karsholt and Razowski 1996). Material and Methods: The field data was obtained in 2017 – 2018 at the research field in different regions of Ukraine. Adult moths of beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.) were caught by net at the meadows in Luhansk, Zaporizhia, Mykolaiv, Kherson regions. Commonly accepted methods of faunal studies in entomology and calculation of insect numbers, field and laboratory studies, modeling the population dynamics of insects were used in the research. The analysis of Department of Forecasting reports, Phytosanitary Diagnostics and Risk Analysis of Ukraine were conducted. Results: In 2018, the first spring generation had the most favorable conditions for development - enough moisture, moderate temperatures, presence of flowering vegetation, which led to a significant increase in the number of depredators, especially in the centers of the southeastern and sometimes central areas. The beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.) developed within three generation in most areas in the spreading zones, except Kharkiv, Poltava and Vinnytsia regions, where only two generations were noted. Conclusion: Considering the degree of the beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.) threat, it is necessary to observe the dynamics of their dispersal constantly, which would allow to avoid “unexpected” destruction of agricultural crops by caterpillars. In 2019 it is necessary to strengthen the beet webworm Loxostege sticticalis (L.) appearing, to monitor the depredator’s development and to use pesticides in time.
Novice Teachers’ Beliefs and Fears about Bullying in Schools in South Africa

Worldwide, and in developing countries like South Africa, bullying and violence in schools are a prevalent problem. Negotiating and managing bullying in schools has become progressively challenging for teachers, more so for novice teachers entering the profession. Through semistructured interviews, this interpretivist qualitative study explores the fears and beliefs of four novice teachers within the KwaZulu-Natal province in South Africa. Using narrative analysis, novice teachers attributed their understanding, worldviews, beliefs, fears and the manner in which they responded to bullying instances to: their biographical backgrounds, their personal beliefs and attitudes, social and contextual factors. They demonstrated an understanding of bullying, and recognised the prevalence and persisting problem of bullying in schools. They recalled from their growing up years how they experienced bullying, directly or indirectly, consciously or unconsciously, from their own personal histories, attitudes and beliefs. They expressed fears about not effectively identifying and responding to bullying behaviours. Lastly, teachers associated bullying with an imbalance of power. Although teachers were aware of informal anti-bullying interventions, they stressed the lack of concrete formal intervention strategies to reduce and stop bullying. The teachers recommended a collaborative and democratic process of all stakeholders deciding policies and crafting customised practical intervention strategies, rather than a generic approach to eliminating bullying and violence in schools.
Modelling of dual-port computing operations of a phase-change memory cell

The general model of a phase-change memory (PCM) cell is very complex due to electrical property, thermal transfer and crystal growth. In this paper the general model is equivalent to an RC circuit, via which the dependence of the cell resistance on the number of pulses (Set or Reset) was investigated. Moreover, as for dual-port asynchronous operations of a pore-type PCM cell, a double-capacitor-based cell model was proposed. By simulation on the model we verified feasibility of the cell’s logic and arithmetic operations. In addition, the simulation results of addition and subtraction show that the resistance changes linearly with a short pulse sequence.
Temperature compensated magnetic field sensor based on love waves

A temperature compensated magnetic field sensor based on the combination of CoFeB ferromagnetic thin films and Quartz/ZnO Love waveguide platform is developed and optimized. The Love wave is a shear horizontal guided wave and therefore provides an optimal interaction with magnetization in the magneto-elastic thin film resulting in higher acoustic wave magneto-elastic coupling compared to the conventional Rayleigh wave based devices. ST-cut Quartz was chosen as substrate, ZnO as insulating layer for Love wave generation and temperature coefficient of frequency (TCF) compensation and CoFeB as the magnetostrictive layer sensitive to magnetic field. Experimental results show a magneto-acoustic sensitivity of 15.53 MHz T−1 with almost zero TCF.
Non-blind deconvolution with an alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) after noise reduction in nondestructive testing

To ensure the quality of material, nondestructive testing is necessary, and radiography testing is the nondestructive technique most commonly used today. For inspection, the quality of a radiographic image is critical, and there are many image artifacts that can reduce inspection accuracies such as noise or blurring. The deterioration in spatial resolution caused by blur in both the X-ray imaging itself and the noise reduction process are particular problems. To tackle them, we implemented a non-blind deconvolution method that employs the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) after noise reduction. Experimental results confirm that the proposed algorithm effectively restores edge sharpness. The 50% modulation transfer function of the restored image of a slit-camera was about 3.54 line-pairs per mm, which is about 2.5 times higher than that of the denoised image. Moreover, the edge preservation index values are about 0.82, 0.54, and 0.75 for the restored, denoised, and acquired images, respectively. Consequentially, the proposed method has the potential to increase inspection efficiency in industrial applications.
Probabilistic Framework for Behavior Characterization of Traffic Participants Enabling Long Term Prediction

This research aims at developing new methods that predict the behaviors of the human driven traffic participants to enable safe operation of autonomous vehicles in complex traffic environments. Autonomous vehicles are expected to operate amongst human driven conventional vehicles in the traffic at least for the next few decades. For safe navigation they will need to infer the intents as well as the behaviors of the human traffic participants using extrinsically observable information, so that their trajectories can be predicted for a time horizon long enough to do a predictive risk analysis and gracefully avert any risky situation. This research approaches above challenge by recognizing that any maneuver performed by a human driver can be divided into four stages that depend on the surrounding context: intent determination, maneuver preparation, gap acceptance and maneuver execution. It builds on the hypothesis that for a given driver, the behavior not only spans across these four maneuver stages, but across multiple maneuvers. As a result, identifying the driver behavior in any of these stages can help characterize the nature of all the subsequent maneuvers that the driver is likely to perform, thus resulting in a more accurate prediction for a longer time horizon. To enable this, a novel probabilistic framework is proposed that couples the different maneuver stages of the observed traffic participant together and associates them to a driving style. To realize this framework two candidate Multiple Model Adaptive Estimation approaches were compared: AutonomousMultipleModel (AMM) and Interacting Multiple Model (IMM) filtering approach. The IMM approach proved superior ii to the AMM approach and was eventually validated using a trajectory extracted from a real world dataset for efficacy. The proposed framework was then implemented by extending the validated IMM approach with contextual information of the observed traffic participant. The classification of the driving style of the traffic participant (behavior characterization) was then demonstrated for two use case scenarios. The proposed contextual IMM (CIMM) framework also showed improvements in the performance of the behavior classification of the traffic participants compared to the IMM for the identified use case scenarios. This outcome warrants further exploration of this framework for different traffic scenarios. Further, it contributes towards the ongoing endeavors for safe deployment of autonomous vehicles on public roads.
The Establishment of the Emergency Department Intensive Care Unit

With the increasing number of patients admitted to emergency department (ED) there is a raise in ratio of patients with severe conditions, who have not yet been admitted to other specialist services or their disposition to other departments has not been done due to overcrowding; therefore, the need for providing intensive care in ED is felt more than ever. Patient overcrowding in ED is one of the most common international concerns. Delays in admission and disposition of patients to intensive care unit (ICU) happen in most crowded hospitals that lack free ICU beds. This problem is not restricted to our country and can even be seen in many developed countries. ICU beds only make up an average of 1.2 – 6.3% of all beds in a hospital, while more than 15-20% of the hospital budget is dedicated to them. Studies have shown that patients with severe conditions in need of intensive care stay longer in ED and insufficient monitoring and non-standard care in this department can jeopardize the safety of these patients and result in side effects and undesirable outcomes for them. Long ED stay of patients in need of intensive care leads to increase in ventilator-induced pneumonia and mortality. Most EDs lack the required human resources for providing the care patients with severe conditions need. Therefore, providing cares such as changing the position of patients for reducing the chance of developing bedsore or keeping mouth hygiene in those under mechanical ventilation in a crowded ED is very difficult if not impossible. Patients with potentially reversible severe diseases reap the most benefit from intensive care. Based on type and quality of care provided, 2 to 80% of patients in ICU are only under cardiopulmonary monitoring and not receiving a vital and effective treatment. Currently, considering the increased number of severely ill patients in need of intensive care and their long ED stay, providing equipment and resources needed such as cardiac monitoring, ventilator, and trained staff for providing intensive care for severely ill patients is necessary in ED. This has been tested and proved successful in many countries, which have a longer history in providing intensive care in ED. Nowadays there is a critical care unit in many developed EDs. In addition, emergency physicians that have been trained in the field of critical care are working in these units as emergency critical care specialists. It seems that establishing critical care training courses for emergency physicians and initiating an intensive care fellowship course with high capacity for providing intensive care is necessary in our country. Existence of these specialists not only provides compensation for scarcity of intensive care specialists, but also increases the quality of critical care in ED and facilitates coordination between ED and ICU.
Legacy nitrate in the deep loess deposits after conversion of arable farmland to non‐fertilized land uses for degraded land restoration

The legacy nitrate–nitrogen (NO3−−N) in the soils is a long‐term threat to groundwater in regions with thick unsaturated zones, and it is thus important to investigate the amounts and sources of NO3−−N for effective environmental management. Given the substantial conversions of arable farmlands to non‐fertilizer land uses for the restoration of degraded land, the legacy effects of NO3−−N in thick loessial unsaturated zones in China remain uncertain. We collected soil samples from loess profiles >13‐m deep under arable farmland and grassland, apricot, pine, peashrub, willow, and poplar converted from arable farmland over 15–35 years. We determined their nitrate content and isotope compositions to quantify the accumulation and sources of the former and its potential threat to groundwater. The seven NO3−−N profiles exhibited a parabolic shape with peak depths at 2.6–9.2 m. Greater peak depths corresponded to greater NO3−−N values, and the peak nitrate level varied from 0 to 10 m. The total NO3−−N accumulation ranged 3,181–9,018 kg N ha−1, and the non‐fertilizer profiles accounted for 35–73% of the arable farmland. The nitrate sources varied with depths. According to the isotope mass balance, the nitrate above, near, and below the peak depths mainly originated from atmospheric NO3− (25–34%), synthetic N fertilizer (49–68%), and soil organic N and manure (50–73%). The estimated residence time of nitrate in the soil ranged from 270 to 620 years. As such, the nitrate legacy effects should be given considerable attention for the protection of the soil and groundwater environment.
Risk Perceptions of Common Technologies

Perceived risk is an important component of technology acceptance and adoption. Research has explored perceived risk, and its relation to technology acceptance. However, only limited work has considered common technologies, or assessed different types of risk. This study explored perceptions of risk within 5 types (financial, performance, physical, psychological, social) and overall perceived risk, for 23 common technologies. 178 participants rated the technologies across all the types of risk. In general, the technologies were rated as mildly risky for all categories of risk, but ratings were even lower for psychological, physical, and social risk. However, individual technologies varied in their rankings. This study emphasizes the need to understand not just overall perceived risk, but also type of perceived risk. This insight can assist developers and others (e.g., marketers) to understand what types of risk must be mitigated through redesign, training, or other means to promote technology acceptance.
Experimental Determination of Axial Viscoelasticity of Braided Steel Cables Through the Design of a Special Purpose Machine

Braided steel cables have the potential for improving the mechanisms providing them several advantages in comparison with rigid elements. Nevertheless, a limitation in the use of cable mechanism is that due to the inherent flexibility, the problem of vibration arises. In this research, we investigate the axial viscoelastic behavior of 1/32″ braided steel cables. The essential idea is to determine the parameters of elasticity (k) and viscosity (b) as a function of the length of the cable in its axial direction. It was achieved through the design and construction of a test bench and the design of an experiment. The test bench is a free vibration particular design machine. One end of the cable is fixed to the structure, and in the other end, a load is attached. Then, the load is released, and the free vibration of the cable in the axial direction is registered. The factor of the experiment is the length of the cable. There are six levels, and these were repeated four times. We demonstrated that the braided steel cables have a viscoelastic behavior like a Kelvin-Voigt. Also, we found a relation between the effective length of the cables and the parameters of elasticity and viscosity.