Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
REVERSAL LEARNING ENHANCED BY LYSERGIC ACID DIETHYLAMIDE (LSD): CONCOMITANT RISE IN BRAIN 5‐HYDROXYTRYPTAMINE LEVELS

1 Small doses of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) (12.5–50 μg/kg) consistently facilitated learning of a brightness discrimination reversal. 2 2‐Bromo‐lysergic acid diethylamide (BOL‐148), a structural analogue of LSD, with similar peripheral anti‐5‐hydroxytrypamine activity but no psychotomimetic properties, had no effect in this learning situation at a similar dose (25 μg/kg). 3 LSD, but not BOL‐148, caused a small but significant increase in brain 5‐hydroxytryptamine levels, but had no effect on the levels of catecholamines in the brain at 25 μg/kg.
Group Goals, Group Coordination, and Group Member Motivation

We examined the impact of specific, difficult, group-level performance goals on the work motivation of individual group members, testing the hypothesis that the effectiveness of setting such goals depends in part on whether the group is able to coordinate its goal-directed activity. Subjects participated in the study in three-person groups. Some groups labored under conditions that made it virtually impossible for them to coordinate their task activities, whereas others worked under conditions in which either the coordination re- quirements of the task were greatly reduced or coordination was facilitated by allowing the group to develop an action plan before engaging the task. We found that when the coordination requirements of the task were low or when the group developed an action plan to deal with the coordination problem, assigning a specific, difficult, group-level performance goal generated higher levels of work motivation among group members than did a "do best" (i.e., nonspecific) goal. However, t.
Using irregular pyramid for text segmentation and binarization of gray scale images

Compared to binary images that most text extraction methods work on, gray scale images provide much more information for the extraction task. On the other hand complication also arises in determining the subject textual content from its background region (i.e. thresholding) before the actual text extraction process can begin. Differing from the usual sequence of processes where document images are binarized before the actual text extraction, this paper proposes a new method by first segmenting individual subject areas with the help of an irregular pyramid to be followed by the binarization process. This permits the focus of attention only on the appropriate subject areas for the binarization process before text recognition. Our method overcomes the difficulty in global binarization to find a single value to fit all. It also avoids the common problem in most local thresholding technique of finding a suitable window size. As shown in our experimented result, our method performed well in both text segmentation and binarization by varying the sequence of processing.
Acute-Phase Serum Amyloid A: An Inflammatory Adipokine and Potential Link between Obesity and Its Metabolic Complications

Background Obesity is associated with low-grade chronic inflammation, and serum markers of inflammation are independent risk factors for cardiovascular disease (CVD). However, the molecular and cellular mechanisms that link obesity to chronic inflammation and CVD are poorly understood. Methods and Findings Acute-phase serum amyloid A (A-SAA) mRNA levels, and A-SAA adipose secretion and serum levels were measured in obese and nonobese individuals, obese participants who underwent weight-loss, and persons treated with the insulin sensitizer rosiglitazone. Inflammation-eliciting activity of A-SAA was investigated in human adipose stromal vascular cells, coronary vascular endothelial cells and a murine monocyte cell line. We demonstrate that A-SAA was highly and selectively expressed in human adipocytes. Moreover, A-SAA mRNA levels and A-SAA secretion from adipose tissue were significantly correlated with body mass index ( r = 0.47; p = 0.028 and r = 0.80; p = 0.0002, respectively). Serum A-SAA levels decreased significantly after weight loss in obese participants ( p = 0.006), as well as in those treated with rosiglitazone ( p = 0.033). The magnitude of the improvement in insulin sensitivity after weight loss was significantly correlated with decreases in serum A-SAA ( r = −0.74; p = 0.034). SAA treatment of vascular endothelial cells and monocytes markedly increased the production of inflammatory cytokines, e.g., interleukin (IL)-6, IL-8, tumor necrosis factor alpha, and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1. In addition, SAA increased basal lipolysis in adipose tissue culture by 47%. Conclusions A-SAA is a proinflammatory and lipolytic adipokine in humans. The increased expression of A-SAA by adipocytes in obesity suggests that it may play a critical role in local and systemic inflammation and free fatty acid production and could be a direct link between obesity and its comorbidities, such as insulin resistance and atherosclerosis. Accordingly, improvements in systemic inflammation and insulin resistance with weight loss and rosiglitazone therapy may in part be mediated by decreases in adipocyte A-SAA production.
Reinforcement learning for balancer embedded humanoid locomotion

Reinforcement learning (RL) applications in robotics are of great interest because of their wide applicability, however many RL applications suffer from large learning costs. We study a new learning-walking scheme where a humanoid robot is embedded with a primitive balancing controller for safety. In this paper, we investigate some RL methods for the walking task. The system has two modes: double stance and single stance, and the selectable action spaces (sub-action spaces) change according to the mode. Thus, a hierarchical RL and a function approximator (FA) approaches are compared in simulation. To handle the sub-action spaces, we introduce the structured FA. The results demonstrate that non-hierarchical RL algorithms with the structured FA is much faster than the hierarchical RL algorithm. The robot can obtain appropriate walking gaits in around 30 episodes (20∼30 min), which is considered to be applicable to a real humanoid robot.
Identifying Cancer Subjects With Acute Respiratory Failure at High Risk for Intubation and Mechanical Ventilation

BACKGROUND: We sought to identify risk factors for mechanical ventilation in patients with malignancies and acute respiratory failure (ARF). METHODS: We analyzed data from a previous randomized controlled trial in which nonintubated oncology and hematology subjects with ARF were randomized to early bronchoalveolar lavage or routine care in 16 ICUs in France. Consecutive patients with malignancies were admitted to the ICU for ARF in 2005 and 2006 with no intervention. RESULTS: During the study period, 219 patients were admitted to the ICU for ARF, and 8 patients were not included due to a nonintubation order. Data on the underlying disease, pulmonary involvement, and extrapulmonary organ dysfunctions were recorded at admission in the 211 remaining subjects. Ventilatory support included oxygen only (49 subjects), noninvasive ventilation (NIV) only (81 subjects), NIV followed by invasive mechanical ventilation (49 subjects), and first-line invasive mechanical ventilation (32 subjects). The 81 subjects who required invasive mechanical ventilation were compared with the 130 subjects who remained on oxygen or NIV. Factors associated with invasive mechanical ventilation by multivariate analysis were the oxygen flow required at ICU admission, the number of quadrants involved on chest x-ray, and hemodynamic dysfunction. Mortality rates for subjects who had NIV failure were 65.3% compared with 50% for subjects who were first-line intubated (P = .34). CONCLUSIONS: In cancer patients with ARF, hypoxemia, extent of pulmonary infiltration on chest x-ray, or hemodynamic dysfunction are risk factors for invasive mechanical ventilation. Mortality was not significantly different between NIV failure and first-line intubation.
The Matrix Protein of Marburg Virus Is Transported to the Plasma Membrane along Cellular Membranes: Exploiting the Retrograde Late Endosomal Pathway

ABSTRACT VP40, the matrix protein of Marburg virus, is a peripheral membrane protein that has been shown to associate with membranes of multivesicular bodies (MVBs) (L. Kolesnikova, H. Bugany, H.-D. Klenk, and S. Becker, J. Virol. 76:1825-1838, 2002). The present study revealed that VP40 is bound to cellular membranes rapidly after synthesis. Time course studies were performed to trace the distribution of VP40 during the course of expression. First, VP40 was homogenously distributed throughout the cytoplasm, although the majority of protein (70%) was already membrane associated. Next, VP40 accumulated in MVBs and in tubular protrusions emerging from MVBs. Finally, VP40 appeared in a patch-like pattern beneath the plasma membrane. These morphological results were supported by iodixanol density gradient analyses. The majority of VP40-positive membranes were first detected comigrating with small vesicles. VP40 was then shifted to fractions containing endosomal marker proteins, and later, to fractions containing plasma membrane marker proteins. Blocking of protein synthesis by use of cycloheximide at the time when VP40 was mainly associated with the small vesicles did not prevent the redistribution of VP40 to the late endosomes and further to the plasma membrane. The inhibition of intracellular vesicular trafficking by monensin significantly reduced the appearance of VP40 at the plasma membrane. In conclusion, we suggest that the transport of the Marburg virus matrix protein VP40 involves its accumulation in MVBs followed by the redistribution of VP40-enriched membrane clusters to the plasma membrane.
Electromagnetic scattering from grassland. I. A fully phase-coherent scattering model

A microwave scattering formulation is presented for grassland and other short vegetation canopies. The fact that the constituent elements of these targets can be as large as the vegetation layer make this formulation problematic. For example, a grass element may extend from the soil surface to the top of the canopy, and thus the upper portion of the element can be illuminated with far greater energy than the bottom. By modeling the long, thin elements of this type of vegetation as line dipole elements, this nonuniform illumination can be accounted for. Additionally, the stature and structure of grass plants can result in situations where the average inner-product of coherent terms are significant at lower frequencies. As a result, the backscattering coefficient cannot be modeled simply as the incoherent addition of the power from each element and scattering mechanism. To determine these coherent terms, a coherent model that considers scattered fields, and not power, is provided. This formulation is then used to provide a solution to the multiple coherent scattering terms, terms which include the correlation of the scattering between both dissimilar constituent elements and dissimilar scattering mechanisms. Finally, a major component of the grass family are cultural grasses, such as wheat and barley. This vegetation is often planted in row structures, a periodic organization that can likewise result in significant coherent scattering effects, depending on the frequency and illumination pattern. Therefore, a formulation is also provided that accounts for the unique scattering of these structures.
Correlation between Facebook usage and loneliness and depression

Facebook has emerged into our society within the last couple years as a powerful social phenomenon. 11.5% of the world population are active users of Facebook while there is a serious lack of psychological theory relating to functions or effects of Facebook. Researchers began realizing the importance of investigating the usage of Facebook and how that might be related to different personality traits. However, not much research has been done on how Facebook use could be related to our social well-beings. The current study aims to investigate how the use of Facebook influences loneliness and depression. The results showed that people with more Facebook friends tend to be less lonely. And the more time spent on Facebook predicts a higher level of loneliness and depression. Our results also revealed that there is no gender differences in total time spent on Facebook and number of Facebook friends. Further research on how Facebook users can be best benefited by Facebook without negatively influenced by it should be conducted. It is also hoped that research on other social networks will be carried out.
Indentifying Risk Factor for Low out Come in General Surgical Practice Using Portsmouth Possum Scoring System

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The aim of the present study was to compare the outcome of various surgical modalities using the Physiological and Operative Severity Score for the enumeration of Mortality and morbidity (POSSUM) and its modification the Portsmouth POSSUM. It should be quick and easy to use and should be applicable to all general surgical procedure in both the emergency and elective situation. It should be of use in all type of hospital and should provide educational information. In this prospective study, the validity of P-POSSUM was test in patient undergoing for major surgery and identifying the risk factor for low out come were noted. METHODS: Prospective study on 75 patients undergoing major surgeries both in emergency and elective sitting . The disease severity was assessed in all patient using P-POOSUM scoring system. Predicted post operative mortality rates was calculated using the P-POSSUM equation by linear analysis method. It was then compared with the actual out comes and also the risk factors as scored in the possum criteria were noted. RESULTS: By Applying linear analysis, an observed to expected ratio of 0.96 was obtained this indicating a significant fit for predicting the post operative adverse outcome. There was no significant difference between the observed and predicted mortality rates (x2 = 1.667, 9 d.f.,P = 0.9957). It was found to be comparable to other studies. In all the risk factors studied, a positive correlation was found between deaths and higher POSSUM scores. INTERPRETATION AND CONCLUSION: To conclude, the present study suggest that the out come of surgical patients is reasonably good. Portsmouth POSSUM scoring system serves as a good predictor of post operative outcome in major general surgical procedures and was applicable even in our setup and be used for comparing various treatment modalities and assessing the quality of care provided.
Revisiting the Variable Projection Method for Separable Nonlinear Least Squares Problems

Variable Projection (VarPro) is a framework to solve optimization problems efficiently by optimally eliminating a subset of the unknowns. It is in particular adapted for Separable Nonlinear Least Squares (SNLS) problems, a class of optimization problems including low-rank matrix factorization with missing data and affine bundle adjustment as instances. VarPro-based methods have received much attention over the last decade due to the experimentally observed large convergence basin for certain problem classes, where they have a clear advantage over standard methods based on Joint optimization over all unknowns. Yet no clear answers have been found in the literature as to why VarPro outperforms others and why Joint optimization, which has been successful in solving many computer vision tasks, fails on this type of problems. Also, the fact that VarPro has been mainly tested on small to medium-sized datasets has raised questions about its scalability. This paper intends to address these unsolved puzzles.
Analytical Model for Residual Bond Strength of Corroded Reinforcement in Concrete Structures

Bond strength deterioration in corrosion-damaged reinforced concrete structures significantly affects serviceability and load-carrying capacity in their remaining service life. This paper presents a new analytical model for predicting the cracking development in the surrounding concrete and the residual bond strength of rebar in concrete structures due to reinforcement corrosion. The proposed analytical method adopts the thick-walled cylinder model for the cover concrete and considers the realistic properties of the corrosion-induced cracked concrete such as anisotropic behavior, residual tensile strength, and reduced tensile stiffness. As corrosion progresses, three phases for bond strength evolution associated with concrete cracking development are defined and the corresponding corrosion levels in each phase are determined. By using the constructed new governing equation, the crack width growth in the concrete cover and the radial bursting pressure at the bond interface are evaluated. The ultimate bond strength is then estimated from the contributions of adhesion, confinement, and corrosion pressure as a function of corrosion level. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed analytical model is demonstrated by comparing the predicted results with experimental data available, and the results show that the proposed model is useful for predicting the bond strength evolution of the corroded rebar in concrete structures.
Therapeutic Use of Rituals with Stepfamilies

Rituals allow for multiple meanings and the "trying on for size" of new ways of understanding and doing things. They are also important mechanisms for establishing group identity, clarifying boundaries and roles, creating stability in times of change, expressing and containing strong emotions, healing pains, and providing continuity between past, present, and future. Rituals are thus an important part of family living.
Cell wall mechanics and growth control in plants: the role of pectins revisited

How is the extensibility of growing plant cell walls regulated? In the past, most studies have focused on the role of the cellulose/xyloglucan network and the enigmatic wall-loosening agents expansins. Here we review first how in the closest relatives of the land plants, the Charophycean algae, cell wall synthesis is coupled to cell wall extensibility by a chemical Ca2+-exchange mechanism between Ca2+–pectate complexes. We next discuss evidence for the existence in terrestrial plants of a similar “primitive” Ca2+–pectate-based growth control mechanism in parallel to the more recent, land plant-specific, expansin-dependent process.
Tolerance of Acinetobacter calcoaceticus RAG-1 to the cationic surfactant cetyltrimethylammonium bromide: role of the bioemulsifier emulsan

Emulsan, the polyanionic heteropolysaccharide bioemulsifier produced by Acinetobacter calcoaceticus RAG-1, was found to enhance the tolerance of RAG-1 cells to the toxic effects of the cationic detergent cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB). Emulsan-mediated tolerance was obtained with the purified deproteinated apoemulsan; ca. 9 micrograms of apoemulsan neutralized 1 microgram of CTAB. Deesterified apoemulsan was only half as effective in protecting the cells from CTAB toxicity. Tolerance was also mediated by the cell-associated emulsan minicapsule. Mutants lacking this capsule were more sensitive to CTAB than the corresponding parent. The growth of mutants and parent cells in mixed-culture experiments demonstrated that the cell-associated polymer mediates CTAB tolerance in the early stages of growth. Once sufficient cell-free polymer has been released into the aqueous medium (ca. 0.5 micrograms/ml), this extracellular emulsan also plays a role in CTAB tolerance.
Sheer Numbers: Critical Representation Thresholds and Women's Political Representation

Studies of women in legislatures indicate that achieving a “critical mass” of women may have the effect of changing the legislative priorities of women, increasing the number of legislative initiatives dealing with women and the passage rate of such initiatives, and altering the legislative priorities of men. In the absence of a critical mass, “token” women may be so constrained by their minority status as to be unable to respond proactively to their environment. Popular wisdom suggests that a critical mass may be necessary for women to make a difference as women in a legislature. Yet, critical mass is both problematic and under-theorized in political science research. The critical mass threshold is debated, the mechanism of effect is unspecified, possible negative consequences are overlooked, and the potential for small numbers of elected women to effect political change on behalf of women is neglected. Beyond sheer numbers, what are the conditions that govern the ability of women legislators to make a difference? We argue that two major contextual factors beyond the sheer numbers are likely to govern the extent to which female legislators serve to represent women. Relying on the secondary literature, this article maps parliamentary and civil society contexts to sheer numbers of women to locate conditions in which female legislators are most likely to have policy successes.Karen Beckwith is the Flora Stone Mather Professor of Political Science at Case Western Research University and Editor, with Lisa Baldez, of Politics & Gender (karen.beckwith@case.edu). Her published work includes Women's Movements Facing the Reconfigured State (Cambridge 2003, with Lee Ann Banaszak and Dieter Rucht), Political Women and American Democracy (forthcoming, with Christina Wolbrecht and Lisa Baldez), and articles on gender and politics in the European Journal of Political Research, Politics & Society, and Signs, among others. Kimberly Cowell-Meyers is Assistant Professor in the Department of Government at American University (kcowell@american.edu). She is author of Religion and Politics: The Party Faithful in Ireland and Germany (Greenwood, 2002) and articles published in Women & Politics, Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, and Irish Political Studies among others. She has worked in the British Parliament and the United States Institute of Peace.