Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Low cost stereo system for imaging and 3D reconstruction of underwater organisms

This paper presents an autonomous low cost device for underwater stereo imaging and 3D reconstruction of marine organisms (benthos, fishes, macro and mega-zooplankton) and seabed with a high accuracy. The system is designed for deployments onboard autonomous, fixed and towed platforms. Internal hardware consists of two Raspberry Pi mini-PCs and two Raspberry camera modules. The operational pipeline is managed through a client/server paradigm. The 3D imaging acquisition system is fully programmable in acquisition scheduling and capture settings. When tested on sets of images containing objects of known size, the system returned an accuracy of metric measurements of the order of 2%. The system is intended as a prototype, and a collaboration with companies has been established in order to realize a complete commercial product.
Infradian awake and asleep systolic and diastolic blood pressure rhythms in humans

Background Blood pressure shows 24-h rhythms with a significant seasonal fluctuation. Objectives To characterize 2-month to 12-month infradian rhythms in the mean awake and asleep systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) in humans. Methods A total of 1689 participants underwent 24-h ambulatory blood pressure monitoring during different periods of the year. The mean daily temperature, humidity, barometric pressure and wind velocity values for the same time span and geographical location were obtained. Fourier analysis was used to fit 12-month, 6-month, 4-month, 3-month and 2-month rhythms to the mean awake and asleep SBP and DBP and to metereological variables. Results The awake mean SBP and DBP values showed significant 12-month and 3-month rhythms (respectively, R2 = 55%, P < 0.001 and R2 = 45% P < 0.001), with a peak in July (winter) and a trough–peak difference of 6.2 ± 1.6 mmHg (P < 0.001, SBP) and 4.2 ± 1.5 mmHg (P < 0.001, DBP). In contrast, asleep blood pressure means showed mainly 3-month rhythms (SBP, R2 = 19%, P < 0.02; DBP, R2 = 43% P < 0.02). Mean daily temperature and humidity showed at 12-month, 6-month, 4-month, 3-month and 2-month rhythms, barometric pressure showed 12-month and 6-month rhythms, and wind velocity showed 12-month and 3-month rhythms. Minimal temperature values and maximal humidity values coincided with elevated blood pressure values. Conclusion Awake blood pressure means exhibited mainly circannual fluctuations while asleep blood pressure means showed principally 3-month rhythms. Infradian blood pressure variations correlated with some meteorological variables.
Constant Elasticity of Variance Option Pricing Model With Time-Dependent Parameters

This paper provides a method for pricing options in the constant elasticity of variance (CEV) model environment using the Lie-algebraic technique when the model parameters are time-dependent. Analytical solutions for the option values incorporating time-dependent model parameters are obtained in various CEV processes with different elasticity factors. The numerical results indicate that option values are sensitive to volatility term structures. It is also possible to generate further results using various functional forms for interest rate and dividend term structures. Furthermore, the Lie-algebraic approach is very simple and can be easily extended to other option pricing models with well-defined algebraic structures.
Natural Killer Cell Activation Distinguishes Mycobacterium tuberculosis–Mediated Immune Reconstitution Syndrome From Chronic HIV and HIV/MTB Coinfection

BackgroundWith increased access to antiretroviral treatment (ART), immune reconstitution inflammatory syndrome (IRIS) in Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB)–infected populations remains a clinical challenge. We studied a cross-sectional cohort of HIV-infected subjects in Johannesburg (South Africa) to help define the immune correlates that best distinguish IRIS from ongoing MTB cases. MethodsWe studied HIV+ subjects developing MTB-related unmasking tuberculosis-related immune reconstitution inflammatory syndrome (uTB-IRIS) after ART initiation; control groups were subjects with HIV and HIV/tuberculosis-coinfected subjects with comparable ART treatment. Testing was conducted with whole blood–based 4-color flow cytometry and plasma-based Luminex cytokine assessment. ResultsNatural killer cell activation, C-reactive protein, and interleukin 8 serum concentration were significantly higher in uTB-IRIS subjects compared with both control groups. In addition, all MTB-coinfected subjects, independent of clinical presentation, had higher neutrophils and T-cell activation, together with lower lymphocytes, CD4+ T-cell, and myeloid dendritic cell counts. Using conditional inference tree analysis, we show that elevated natural killer cell activation in combination with lymphocyte count characterizes the immunological profile of uTB-IRIS. ConclusionOur results support a role for innate immune effectors in the immunopathogenesis of unmasking MTB-related IRIS and identify new immune parameters defining this pathology.
Selection Bias, Comparative Advantage and Heterogeneous Returns to Education

This paper uses newly available Chinese micro data to estimate the return to college education for late 20th century China when allowing for heterogeneous returns among individuals selecting into schooling based on these differences. We use recently developed semiparametric methods to identify the parameters of interest. We demonstrate that heterogeneity among people in returns to schooling is substantial. People sort into schooling on the basis of the principle of comparative advantage, which we document to be an empirically important phenomenon in modern Chinese labor markets. Standard least squares or instrumental variable methods do not properly account for this sorting. Using new methods that do, we estimate the effect on earnings of sending a randomly selected person to college is a 43% increase in lifetime earnings (nearly 11% annually) in 2000 for young people in urban areas of six provinces of China. The effect of college on those who go is 13%. Our evidence, and simple least squares evidence, suggests that after 20-plus years of economic reform with market orientation, the return to education has increased substantially in China, compared to the returns measured in the 1980's and the early 1990's.
Making sense of financialization

Since the early 2000s, scholars from a variety of disciplines have used the concept of financialization to describe a host of structural changes in the advanced political economies. Studies of financialization interrogate how an increasingly autonomous realm of global finance has altered the underlying logics of the industrial economy and the inner workings of democratic society. This paper evaluates the insights of more than a decade of scholarship on financialization. Three approaches will be discussed: the emergence of a new regime of accumulation, the ascendency of the shareholder value orientation and the financialization of everyday life. It is argued that a deeper understanding of financialization will lead to a better understanding of organized interests, the politics of the welfare state, and processes of institutional change.
Recent advances in the management of congenital diaphragmatic hernia

Purpose of review Congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) is a rare developmental defect resulting in variable degrees of lung and pulmonary vasculature hypoplasia. Whereas many high-volume centers have recently reported increased survival rates, this has not been the collective trend. One potential explanation for this is inconsistent perinatal care among centers. Recent findings Significant efforts have been made to identify prenatally those fetuses that will be most severely affected. A number of radiologic features have shown promise for achieving this goal as well as identifying fetuses that may benefit from prenatal intervention. When CDH is antenatally diagnosed, early referral to a tertiary center is recommended. Centers that routinely use postnatal management protocols have demonstrated improved overall survival rates including increased survival in high-risk CDH patients. Summary As a result of advancements in perinatal care, more severely affected newborns with CDH are now surviving. These patients may experience a number of associated morbidities which affect not only their health but overall quality of life. A multidisciplinary approach to the long-term care of these patients will allow early identification and management of these morbidities.
[Epidemiologic characteristics of dyslipidemia in people aged 18 years and over in China].

OBJECTIVE To study the difference in prevalence of dyslipidemia, hypercholesterolemia, hypertriglyceridemia and low blood high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) between the residents of urban and rural areas of varied regions in China. METHODS Fasting plasma levels of total cholesterol, triglyceride and HDL-C were determined with the enzyme methods for 49,252 subjects aged 18 and over during August to December, 2002. RESULTS Prevalence of dyslipidemia in Chinese adults aged 18 and over was 18.6%, with 17.0%, 22.9% and 23.4% in the groups of 18-44, 45-59 and over 60 years old, respectively, 22.2% and 15.9% in males and females, respectively, and 21.0% and 17.7% in urban and rural areas, respectively. Prevalence of hypercholesterolemia, hypertriglyceridemia and low blood HDL-C in those aged 18 and over was 2.9%, 11.9% and 7.4%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS Dyslipidemia has become one of important risk factors threatening health of Chinese people, with hypertriglyceridemia and low blood HDL-C as two major types in those aged 18 and over. Prevalence of dyslipidemia was nearly the same in the middle-aged and in the elderly people, and not significantly different in those living in urban areas from those in rural areas. It is very important to pay more attention to earlier comprehensive prevention and control of dyslipidemia.
Remaking the American Mainstream: Assimilation and Contemporary Immigration

In this age of multicultural democracy, the idea of assimilation - that the social distance separating immigrants and their children from the mainstream of American society closes over time - seems outdated and, in some forms, even offensive. But, as Richard Alba and Victor Nee show in their systematic treatment of assimilation, it continues to shape the immigrant experience, even though the geography of immigration has shifted from Europe to Asia, Africa and Latin America. Institutional changes, from civil rights legislation to immigration law, have provided a more favourable environment for non-white immigrants and their children than in the past. Assimilation is still driven, in claim, by the decisions of immigrants and the second generation to improve their social and material circumstances in America. But they also show that immigrants, historically and in the contemporary world, have profoundly changed American society and culture in the process of becoming Americans. Surveying a variety of domains - language, socio-economic attachments, residential patterns and inter-marriage - Alba and Nee demonstrate the continuing importance of assimilation in American life. They predict that it will blur the boundaries among the major, racially defined populations, as non-whites and Hispanics are increasingly incorporated into the mainstream.
Evaluating Timeframe Expectancies in Physical Activity Social Cognition: Are Short- and Long-Term Motives Different?

Promoting maintenance of regular physical activity (PA) is a public health priority; however, to the authors' knowledge, no researchers to date have examined whether the expectancies of proximal PA enactment are similar to the expectancies of longer maintenance. Thus, the authors' purpose in this study was to evaluate whether PA expectancies, measured with constructs of the theory of planned behavior (TPB), varied as a function of time frame (no time frame, next week, next month, next 6 months). Undergraduate students (N = 409) completed randomly distributed self-report measures of the TPB; the authors then compared results across the 4 groups (formed on the basis of time frame). Analysis of variance tests showed that 13 of 37 constructs were significantly (p <.05) different, and post hoc follow-up tests identified that the proximal time frame (ie, next week) had the significantly lowest mean value. Chi-square tests of independent correlations, however, revealed few differences in TPB-intention correlations by time frame. The results suggest that social cognitive correlates of PA intention are robust to timeframe deviations but that time frame may affect the absolute values of some constructs. Overall, this is a positive finding because it suggests that PA promotion efforts focused on increasing expectancies do not have to be tailored to proximal or more distal maintenance applications.
ABNORMAL EYE MOVEMENTS IN HYPERKINETIC CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITY

Eye movements were studied in 29 school children aged 6--12 years diagnosed as having Hyperactivity (HA) with Learning Disabilities (LD) and compared to an age matched control group of 32 children. The children had to track a moving target on a metronome and a canopy, to maintain eye fixation on a stationary target and to read a standard reading material. Accuracy, nystagmoid, reversal and overshoot movements were observed, as well as head movements and blinks. Persistence and deviations were monitored during fixation; duration, accuracy, number of fixations and reversals were monitored during reading. The tracking accuracy and fixation persistence were significantly inferior in the HA-LD children as compared to the control group in most items. This correlated well with the inferior performance on the reading task. This study supports the hypothesis that children with MBD and learning disabilities have primary defects in the motor control of eye movements which contribute significantly to their reading difficulties.
Understanding the Role of Social Media in Incident/Crisis Communication

How organisations communicate with their audience during an incident or crisis is important because it can adversely affect corporate reputation if mishandled. With the advent of social media, organisations have only a few "golden minutes" rather than "golden hours" to communicate with their audience as an incident/crisis unfolds. However, while social media usage by the general population is increasing rapidly, most organisations are not ready to manage incidents or crises via the use of social media. Theoretical knowledge is still lacking in this regard This study provides a conceptual fl·mnework for investigating how organisations communicate with their audience via social media during an incident or crisis and aims to identifY the important factors relating to the use of social media in a negative situation.
An early biomarker and potential therapeutic target of RUNX 3 hypermethylation in breast cancer, a system review and meta-analysis

Runt-related transcription factor 3 (RUNX3) methylation plays an important role in the carcinogenesis of breast cancer (BC). However, the association between RUNX3 hypermethylation and significance of BC remains under investigation. The purpose of this study is to perform a meta-analysis and literature review to evaluate the clinicopathological significance of RUNX3 hypermethylation in BC. A comprehensive literature search was performed in Medline, Web of Science, EMBASE, Cochrane Library Database, CNKI and Google scholar. A total of 10 studies and 747 patients were included for the meta-analysis. Pooled odds ratios (ORs) with corresponding confidence intervals (CIs) were evaluated and summarized respectively. RUNX3 hypermethylation was significantly correlated with the risk of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) and invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC), OR was 50.37, p < 0.00001 and 22.66, p < 0.00001 respectively. Interestingly, the frequency of RUNX3 hypermethylation increased in estrogen receptor (ER) positive BC, OR was 12.12, p = 0.005. High RUNX3 mRNA expression was strongly associated with better relapse-free survival (RFS) in BC patients. In summary, RUNX3 methylation could be a promising early biomarker for the diagnosis of BC. High RUNX3 mRNA expression is correlated to better RFS in BC patients. RUNX3 could be a potential therapeutic target for the development of personalized therapy.
Perpetration of violence, violent victimization, and severe mental illness: balancing public health concerns.

OBJECTIVE This review examined U.S. empirical studies published since 1990 of the perpetration of violence and of violent victimization among persons with severe mental illness and their relative importance as public health concerns. METHODS MEDLINE, PsycINFO, and Web of Science were searched for published empirical investigations of recent prevalence or incidence of perpetration or victimization among persons with severe mental illness. Studies of special populations were included if separate rates were reported for persons with and without severe mental illness. RESULTS The search yielded 31 studies of violence perpetration and ten studies of violent victimization. Few examined perpetration and victimization in the same sample. Prevalence rates varied by sample type and time frame (recall period). Half of the studies of perpetration examined inpatients; of these, about half sampled only committed inpatients, whose rates of perpetration (17%-50%) were higher than those of other samples. Among outpatients, 2% to 13% had perpetrated violence in the past six months to three years, compared with 20% to 34% who had been violently victimized. Studies combining outpatients and inpatients reported that 12% to 22% had perpetrated violence in the past six to 18 months, compared with 35% who had been a victim in the past year. CONCLUSIONS Perpetration of violence and violent victimization are more common among persons with severe mental illness than in the general population. Victimization is a greater public health concern than perpetration. Ironically, the discipline's focus on perpetration among inpatients may contribute to negative stereotypes.
Reinforcement Learning and Episodic Memory in Humans and Animals: An Integrative Framework

&NA; We review the psychology and neuroscience of reinforcement learning (RL), which has experienced significant progress in the past two decades, enabled by the comprehensive experimental study of simple learning and decision‐making tasks. However, one challenge in the study of RL is computational: The simplicity of these tasks ignores important aspects of reinforcement learning in the real world: (a) State spaces are high‐dimensional, continuous, and partially observable; this implies that (b) data are relatively sparse and, indeed, precisely the same situation may never be encountered twice; furthermore, (c) rewards depend on the long‐term consequences of actions in ways that violate the classical assumptions that make RL tractable. A seemingly distinct challenge is that, cognitively, theories of RL have largely involved procedural and semantic memory, the way in which knowledge about action values or world models extracted gradually from many experiences can drive choice. This focus on semantic memory leaves out many aspects of memory, such as episodic memory, related to the traces of individual events. We suggest that these two challenges are related. The computational challenge can be dealt with, in part, by endowing RL systems with episodic memory, allowing them to (a) efficiently approximate value functions over complex state spaces, (b) learn with very little data, and (c) bridge long‐term dependencies between actions and rewards. We review the computational theory underlying this proposal and the empirical evidence to support it. Our proposal suggests that the ubiquitous and diverse roles of memory in RL may function as part of an integrated learning system.
Price Support versus Input Subsidy for Food Self-Sufficiency in Developing Countries

Self-sufficiency in food grains has been a publicized goal of government policy in many developing countries. Among various alternatives to achieve this goal, two policy options, output price support and input subsidy, both characterized by the government intervention into market pricing, are evaluated by applying a simple demand-supply model to the Philippine rice economy. The results demonstrate a possibility that a subsidy applied to modern inputs, such as fertilizer, that are being used below optimum can be more beneficial than supporting product prices.
Predictors of well-being among significant others of persons with multiple sclerosis

Objective To examine patient and significant other characteristics as predictors of significant other well-being. Methods A total of 74 persons with multiple sclerosis (MS) and their significant others participated. Executive functioning was measured using neuropsychological tests. Awareness of cognitive deficit was measured as the discrepancy between the patient's reports of their abilities and objective test results. Awareness of functional deficit was measured as the discrepancy between the patient's and significant other's reports of the patient's functional abilities. Patient neurobehavioral disturbance was measured using a significant-other rated questionnaire. Significant other perceived social support and well-being (ie, psychological distress, life satisfaction, and general health status) were assessed using questionnaires filled out by the significant other. Results Executive dysfunction, neurobehavioral disturbance, and lack of awareness of functional deficits in patients were associated with poor well-being outcomes; whereas, lack of awareness of cognitive deficits was only weakly related to well-being. Social support was associated with positive well-being outcomes. Conclusions Diminished insight regarding functional limitations may increase significant others’ supervisory burden as patients attempt activities independently, whereas lack of awareness of cognitive deficits may not be directly associated with behavior-relevant impairments that significant others find distressing. Social support appears to be a powerful aid in diffusing the distress among significant others of MS patients. Multiple Sclerosis 2007; 13: 238–249. http://msj.sagepub. com
The spectacle of saving: conservation voluntourism and the new neoliberal economy on Utila, Honduras

Drawing on ethnographic research on Utila, Honduras, this paper suggests that conservation volunteerism suffers from “fictitious conservation”, surrounded by “spectacle”. The “spectacle of saving” associated with the promotion of conservation voluntourism advances the creation of new neoliberal citizens while further concealing the micropolitics of commodified nature. Volunteer conservation tourism creates value in the trade of experiences in or with “nature” while detracting from the labour and value produced through grounded local interactions with natural resources. While voluntourists are busy “saving” endangered species, they are also collecting the entrepreneurial skills and competencies to be successful as the new neoliberal economy. Thus, as a site of fictitious conservation under neoliberalism, conservation voluntourism advances the creation of new neoliberal citizens while justifying its own existence by furthering ecological devastation, obscuring uneven development processes and devaluing local labour and relationships to natural resources. The paper closes with a proposal to reconfigure volunteer arrangements to move nature-based voluntourism towards a rights-based conservation approach through three strategies: (1) collaborative programme design by embracing “friction”, (2) expanded understanding of local impacts, and (3) redesigning volunteer activities to embed a social justice pedagogy using the steps of transformative learning.