Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Application of Metabolomics in Alzheimer’s Disease

Progress toward the development of efficacious therapies for Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is halted by a lack of understanding early underlying pathological mechanisms. Systems biology encompasses several techniques including genomics, epigenomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics. Metabolomics is the newest omics platform that offers great potential for the diagnosis and prognosis of neurodegenerative diseases as an individual’s metabolome reflects alterations in genetic, transcript, and protein profiles and influences from the environment. Advancements in the field of metabolomics have demonstrated the complexity of dynamic changes associated with AD progression underscoring challenges with the development of efficacious therapeutic interventions. Defining systems-level alterations in AD could provide insights into disease mechanisms, reveal sex-specific changes, advance the development of biomarker panels, and aid in monitoring therapeutic efficacy, which should advance individualized medicine. Since metabolic pathways are largely conserved between species, metabolomics could improve the translation of preclinical research conducted in animal models of AD into humans. A summary of recent developments in the application of metabolomics to advance the AD field is provided below.
Quality of Life and Deficit Identification in Dementia

Numerous studies have examined self-identification of deficits in persons with dementia. Few of these studies consider the influence of interpersonal and social factors on deficit identification, and most focus on whether or why deficits are ‘underreported’ by persons with dementia. In our studies, we found considerable variation in deficit identification within and among persons with dementia, and some ‘overreporting’ of deficits in comparison with caregiver reports across all of the domains studied. Thus, focusing on ‘underreporting’ and aggregate level data neglects information that could be important to measuring and understanding quality of life in dementia. Current approaches to measuring and understanding quality of life in dementia make divergent assumptions about the impact of deficit identification. Emerging phenomenological perspectives suggest that proactive interventions that treat deficit identification as an interpersonal and social challenge inherent in the experience of dementia would enhance the quality of life of caregiving dyads.
The Best Evolutionary Solution to the Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma

In this paper we discuss the methodology and program which won the contest of the Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma (IPD) which was held during the Congress on Evolutionary Computation 2000 (CEC2000) in San Diego, California in July of 2000. This results were recognized as the best during the congress but have not been published before. In the first part of the paper we make an introduction to the IPD problem. In the second part we describe the algorithm we used to tackle the problem. This algorithm is based on a co-evolutionary Genetic Algorithm (GA). In the third part we present our conclusions and possible lines of future research .
Automatic filtering non-English complaint emails in tourism industry using N-gram extraction and classification techniques

Over the decades, tourism is a rapidly growing industry and has become one of the largest economic sectors in the world which leads to the intensive competition among tourism businesses. Most businesses seek for effective strategies to increase a scale of customer base from both local and international markets by focusing on customer satisfaction as it is a key indicator of customer repurchase intention and loyalty. Due to this reason, businesses always provide customers the communication channels such as e-mail in order to perceive customer experiences. Consequently, large number of emails has been sent to the businesses. However, extracting complaint emails from huge amount of emails with different languages is very challenging. This paper proposes a novel methodology to automatically extract complaint emails from inbox for any language. N-gram extraction, which is language independent, and classification technique have been applied in the proposed technique. The experimental results show that the classification performance of the proposed technique is approximately 90%. This shows significant advantages for tourism businesses to immediately respond to customers who have negative experiences, in order to retain goodrelationship and gain larger number of customers.
Wholesale Power Price Dynamics Under Transmission Line Limits: A Use of an Agent-Based Intelligent Simulator

This research proposes a use of an agent-based intelligent simulator to numerically examine the influence of a transmission line limit on the dynamics of a wholesale power market. In the proposed simulator, all agents are equipped with learning capabilities. The power market is structured by multiple zones connected by transmission lines. The following business implications are found in this study. 1) The learning speed of reinforcement learning depends upon a dynamic change of market price. 2) The marketprice and volatility of electricity is increased by a line limit. The increase is influenced by not only a capacity limit but also a zone structure and an amount of demand. 3) The average price and volatility of electricity are influenced by the number of capacity-limited links. 4) There is no major difference between day-ahead (DA) and real-time (RT) markets in terms of the influence of a line limit. 5) There is a slightly increasing trend in average DA and RT market prices along with the percentage reduction of a current line limit.
Methyl Jasmonate Induces Traumatic Resin Ducts, Terpenoid Resin Biosynthesis, and Terpenoid Accumulation in Developing Xylem of Norway Spruce Stems1

Norway spruce (Picea abies L. Karst) produces an oleoresin characterized by a diverse array of terpenoids, monoterpenoids, sesquiterpenoids, and diterpene resin acids that can protect conifers against potential herbivores and pathogens. Oleoresin accumulates constitutively in resin ducts in the cortex and phloem (bark) of Norway spruce stems. De novo formation of traumatic resin ducts (TDs) is observed in the developing secondary xylem (wood) after insect attack, fungal elicitation, and mechanical wounding. Here, we characterize the methyl jasmonate-induced formation of TDs in Norway spruce by microscopy, chemical analyses of resin composition, and assays of terpenoid biosynthetic enzymes. The response involves tissue-specific differentiation of TDs, terpenoid accumulation, and induction of enzyme activities of both prenyltransferases and terpene synthases in the developing xylem, a tissue that constitutively lacks axial resin ducts in spruce. The induction of a complex defense response in Norway spruce by methyl jasmonate application provides new avenues to evaluate the role of resin defenses for protection of conifers against destructive pests such as white pine weevils (Pissodes strobi), bark beetles (Coleoptera, Scolytidae), and insect-associated tree pathogens.
Observation and Modeling for Environmental Sciences Validation of Surface Velocity Estimated from Satellite Images Validation of Surface Velocity Estimated from Satellite Images

This report concerns the validation of surface velocity estimated from satellite images. The estimation is obtained with a dynamic model based on shallow-water equations. We first compare the stationary assumption to the shallow-water heuristics to justify our choice. Second, we quantify the quality of the estimation by measuring the misfit between the model output and the al-timetry measures. Experiments are achieved on Sea Surface Temperature data acquired by the NOAA/AVHRR satellites over the Black Sea. The altimetry measures are obtained by two radar sensors: Envisat and GFO. The good adequacy between the shallow-water output and the altimetry data validates our motion estimation approach. Validation de la vitesse de surface estimée à partir d'images satellites Résumé : Ce rapport de recherche concerne la validation de l'estimation de la vitesse de surface à partir d'images satellite. Cette estimation est effectuée avec un modèle de la dynamique, basé sur les équations shallow-water. Nous comparons d'abord l'hypothèse de stationnarité aux équations shallow-water afin de justifier notre choix. Puis, nous quantifions la qualité des estimations en mesurant l'écart entre la sortie du modèle et les mesures d'altimétrie. Les expérimentations sont effectuées en utilisant des données de température de surface, acquises au-dessus de la Mer Noire avec les satellites NOAA/AVHRR. Les mesures altimétriques proviennent de deux capteurs radar : Envisat et GFO. La bonne adéquation entre la sortie du modèle shallow-water et les données altimétriques valide notre approche d'estimation du mouvement.
Does Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) Training Improve the Skills of Health Workers? A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background An estimated 6.9 million children die annually in low and middle-income countries because of treatable illneses including pneumonia, diarrhea, and malaria. To reduce morbidity and mortality, the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness strategy was developed, which included a component to strengthen the skills of health workers in identifying and managing these conditions. A systematic review and meta-analysis were conducted to determine whether IMCI training actually improves performance. Methods Database searches of CIHAHL, CENTRAL, EMBASE, Global Health, Medline, Ovid Healthstar, and PubMed were performed from 1990 to February 2013, and supplemented with grey literature searches and reviews of bibliographies. Studies were included if they compared the performance of IMCI and non-IMCI health workers in illness classification, prescription of medications, vaccinations, and counseling on nutrition and admistration of oral therapies. Dersminion-Laird random effect models were used to summarize the effect estimates. Results The systematic review and meta-analysis included 46 and 26 studies, respectively. Four cluster-randomized controlled trials, seven pre-post studies, and 15 cross-sectional studies were included. Findings were heterogeneous across performance domains with evidence of effect modification by health worker performance at baseline. Overall, IMCI-trained workers were more likely to correctly classify illnesses (RR = 1.93, 95% CI: 1.66–2.24). Studies of workers with lower baseline performance showed greater improvements in prescribing medications (RR = 3.08, 95% CI: 2.04–4.66), vaccinating children (RR = 3.45, 95% CI: 1.49–8.01), and counseling families on adequate nutrition (RR = 10.12, 95% CI: 6.03–16.99) and administering oral therapies (RR = 3.76, 95% CI: 2.30–6.13). Trends toward greater training benefits were observed in studies that were conducted in lower resource settings and reported greater supervision. Conclusion Findings suggest that IMCI training improves health worker performance. However, these estimates need to be interpreted cautiously given the observational nature of the studies and presence of heterogeneity.
Some thoughts on the Cognitive-Psychodynamic Self From a Cultural Perspective

Drawing on the broad, extensive literature on the psychoanalytic and social-cognitive self, Westen reaffirms the central role of self in understanding a wide variety of psychological phenomena including social cognition, social motivation, emotion, and psychopathology. Along with other related efforts in recent years (e.g., Horowitz, 1989), his review articulates the points of agreement and disagreement between the psychoanalytic approach and the socialcognitive approach to self and, in so doing, contributes significantly to the much awaited cross-fertilization between the two camps. Indeed, the review is notable for its breadth of coverage, the clarity with which diverse materials are integrated, and especially for the intriguing questions it raises. This essay aims at drawing attention to three such mutually related questions. My first point concerns a particular model of the person implicit in the current Western literature of self and, inevitably, in Westen's review of this literature. I explore another, different mode of human existence and thus an alternative model or construal of self. Second, I address the role of affect and emotion in self-processes, arguing that missing in the current literature is the realization that even such primitive affective tendencies as "Freudian" wishes or "behavioral" fears are afforded personal significance by virtue of their being embedded in social relations. Furthermore, these social relations are framed in terms of culturally constructed and shared models of the person. Therefore, my second point converges with the first to suggest the potential power and importance of a cultural model of the person in shaping psychological processes. This brings me to my third pointnamely, the inseparability of "process" from "content" of self. Although it is surely true that process can produce content, it is the very content of self that organizes and gives form to a variety of psychological processes.
High‐performance work practices, work social support and their effects on job embeddedness and turnover intentions

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose and test a research model that examines whether job embeddedness mediates the effects of high‐performance work practices and work social support on turnover intentions.Design/methodology/approach – Based on data gathered from 174 full‐time frontline employees in the four‐ and five‐star hotels, with a time lag of two weeks in Iran, the relationships were tested using LISREL 8.30 through structural equation modeling.Findings – Results suggest that job embeddedness fully mediates the effects of high‐performance work practices and work social support on turnover intentions. Specifically, frontline employees with high‐performance work practices and work social support are more embedded in their jobs, and therefore, are unlikely to display intentions to leave the organization.Research limitations/implications – Testing hope as a moderator of the effects of high‐performance work practices and work social support on job embeddedness in future studies would add to .
Priming the trait category “hostility”: The moderating role of trait anxiety

Recent studies on affective priming with the naming task have revealed an influence of trait anxiety on the direction of affective priming effects (e.g., Berner & Maier, 2004). This moderating role of trait anxiety was further investigated in a study employing a conceptual priming task. After masked presentation of either hostile or neutral primes, participants performed a person judgment task. As expected, the direction of the hostility rating difference score, defined as the difference between hostility ratings of a target person in the hostility priming condition and in the neutral priming condition, changed from positive to negative with increasing levels of self-reported trait anxiety. The findings are interpreted in terms of salience-dependent overcorrection processes (Glaser & Banaji, 1999). Implications for our understanding of the cognitive functioning in high trait anxiety are discussed.
Ventral striatum dysfunction in children and adolescents with reactive attachment disorder: functional MRI study

Background Child maltreatment is a major risk factor for psychopathology, including reactive attachment disorder (RAD). Aims To examine whether neural activity during reward processing was altered in children and adolescents with RAD. Method Sixteen children and adolescents with RAD and 20 typically developing (TD) individuals performed tasks with high and low monetary rewards while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging. Results Significantly reduced activity in the caudate and nucleus accumbens was observed during the high monetary reward condition in the RAD group compared with the TD group (P=0.015, family-wise error-corrected cluster level). Significant negative correlations between bilateral striatal activity and avoidant attachment were observed in the RAD and TD groups. Conclusions Striatal neural reward activity in the RAD group was markedly decreased. The present results suggest that dopaminergic dysfunction occurs in the striatum of children and adolescents with RAD, leading towards potential future risks for psychopathology.
The Concept of a System of Cities: A Comment on Rutledge Vining's Paper

Professor Vining has given an admirably lucid and graphic exposition of several basic features of the distribution pattern of cities. These include population and buying-power densities; density gradients; the rank-size rule; the center and its hinterland; Christaller's hierarchy of "central places"; the concepts of market areas and supply areas; and length-of-haul distributions. We are all indebted to him for the pains he has taken to show all these, not merely as theoretical constructs, but in terms of observed data.
Fairness in routing and load balancing

We consider the issue of network routing subject to explicit fairness conditions. The optimization of fairness criteria interacts in a complex fashion with the optimization of network utilization and throughput; in this work, we undertake an investigation of this relationship through the framework of approximation algorithms. In this work we consider the problem of selecting paths for routing so as to provide a bandwidth allocation that is as fair as possible (in the max-min sense). We obtain the first approximation algorithms for this basic optimization problem, for single-source unsplittable routings in an arbitrary directed graph. Special cases of our model include several fundamental load balancing problems, endowing them with a natural fairness criterion to which our approach can be applied. Our results form an interesting counterpart to the work of Megiddo (1974), who considered max-min fairness for single-source fractional flow. The optimization problems in our setting become NP-complete, and require the development of new techniques for relating fractional relaxations of routing to the equilibrium constraints imposed by the fairness criterion.
Determination of the Ex Vivo Rates of Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 Reverse Transcription by Using Novel Strand-Specific Amplification Analysis

ABSTRACT Replication of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), like all organisms, involves synthesis of a minus-strand and a plus-strand of nucleic acid. Currently available PCR methods cannot distinguish between the two strands of nucleic acids. To carry out detailed analysis of HIV-1 reverse transcription from infected cells, we have developed a novel strand-specific amplification (SSA) assay using single-stranded padlock probes that are specifically hybridized to a target strand, ligated, and quantified for sensitive analysis of the kinetics of HIV-1 reverse transcription in cells. Using SSA, we have determined for the first time the ex vivo rates of HIV-1 minus-strand DNA synthesis in 293T and human primary CD4+ T cells (∼68 to 70 nucleotides/min). We also determined the rates of minus-strand DNA transfer (∼4 min), plus-strand DNA transfer (∼26 min), and initiation of plus-strand DNA synthesis (∼9 min) in 293T cells. Additionally, our results indicate that plus-strand DNA synthesis is initiated at multiple sites and that several reverse transcriptase inhibitors influence the kinetics of minus-strand DNA synthesis differently, providing insights into their mechanism of inhibition. The SSA technology provides a novel approach to analyzing DNA replication processes and should facilitate the development of new antiretroviral drugs that target specific steps in HIV-1 reverse transcription.
The Polyol Pathway as a Mechanism for Diabetic Retinopathy: Attractive, Elusive, and Resilient

The polyol pathway is a two-step metabolic pathway in which glucose is reduced to sorbitol, which is then converted to fructose. It is one of the most attractive candidate mechanisms to explain, at least in part, the cellular toxicity of diabetic hyperglycemia because (i) it becomes active when intracellular glucose concentrations are elevated, (ii) the two enzymes are present in human tissues and organs that are sites of diabetic complications, and (iii) the products of the pathway and the altered balance of cofactors generate the types of cellular stress that occur at the sites of diabetic complications. Inhibition (or ablation) of aldose reductase, the first and rate-limiting enzyme in the pathway, reproducibly prevents diabetic retinopathy in diabetic rodent models, but the results of a major clinical trial have been disappointing. Since then, it has become evident that truly informative indicators of polyol pathway activity and/or inhibition are elusive, but are likely to be other than sorbitol levels if meant to predict accurately tissue consequences. The spectrum of abnormalities known to occur in human diabetic retinopathy has enlarged to include glial and neuronal abnormalities, which in experimental animals are mediated by the polyol pathway. The endothelial cells of human retinal vessels have been noted to have aldose reductase. Specific polymorphisms in the promoter region of the aldose reductase gene have been found associated with susceptibility or progression of diabetic retinopathy. This new knowledge has rekindled interest in a possible role of the polyol pathway in diabetic retinopathy and in methodological investigation that may prepare new clinical trials. Only new drugs that inhibit aldose reductase with higher efficacy and safety than older drugs will make possible to learn if the resilience of the polyol pathway means that it has a role in human diabetic retinopathy that should not have gone undiscovered.
When Should Carpools in HOV Lanes be Encouraged ?

A variety of policies to encourage carpooling in high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes have been adopted by state and local governments in the US. These policies can either increase or decrease total congestion depending on whether congestion relief in mainline lanes outweighs increased HOV lane congestion. We estimate congestion cost functions for mainline and HOV lanes in Los Angeles and find congestion costs vary substantially across routes and hours of the day. Costs also vary substantially during a single peak hour from day to day on each route. Whether encouraging or discouraging HOV lane use lowers costs critically depends on realtime traffic conditions. Importantly, entry of new drivers via induced travel demand can counteract the congestion benefits of increased carpooling. ∗The authors thank Tania Barham, Harrison Fell, Craig McIntosh, Edward Morey and seminar participants at the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists summer meeting, LAMETA Montpellier, the NBER Summer Institute, Resources for the Future, Stanford University, the Triangle Resource and Environmental Economics Seminar Series and the University of Pittsburgh for helpful comments. Department of Economics, University of Colorado at Boulder, Box 0256 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309. Email: jonathan.e. hughes@colorado.edu, Telephone: (303) 735-0220, Fax: (303) 492-8960