Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Virtual Reality Exposure for PTSD （Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder）： A Systematic Review Virtual Reality PTSD Systematic Review

 The objective of the present study is a systematic review on the use of VRE (Virtual Reality Exposure) for PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder). The following keywords were used: PTSD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Virtual Reality in these databases: PsycINFO/PsycLIT, PubMed/Medline, EBSCO, ProQuest, ISI Web of Science, and SciELO/Pepsic. The studies included should have their own empirical data and the intervention should consist of exposure to virtual reality. A total of 241 publications were found, of which 28 were selected for this review: 11 case studies, eight uncontrolled case series, and nine randomized controlled trials. The treatment ranged between 3 and 22 VRE sessions ( M (Mean) = 9.09, SD (standard deviation) = 1.57). Among the case studies, the results were promising; all studies were able to reduce the PTSD symptomatology. As to the uncontrolled case series, overall they showed promising results. Regarding the randomized clinical trials, there was found a wide variation concerning the VRE intervention as well as the combined and control intervention. The majority of the studies presented significant results, except two which returned modest or non-significant results. The findings of this study suggest that the use of virtual reality as a tool for exposure therapy for PTSD can be an asset.
Finding Surprisingly Frequent Patterns of Variable Lengths in Sequence Data

We address the problem of ﬁnding ‘surprising’ patterns of variable length in sequence data, where a surprising pattern is deﬁned as a subsequence of a longer sequence, whose observed frequency is statistically signiﬁcant with respect to a given distribution. Finding statistically signiﬁcant patterns in sequence data is the core task in some interesting applications such as Biological motif discovery and anomaly detection. We show that the presence of few ‘true’ surprising patterns in the data could cause a large number of highly-correlated patterns to stand statistically signiﬁcant just because of those few signiﬁcant patterns. Our approach to solving the ‘redundant patterns’ problem is based on capturing the dependencies between patterns through an ‘ex-plain’ relationship where a set of patterns can explain the statistical signiﬁcance of another pattern. This allows us to address the problem of redundancy by choosing a few ‘core’ patterns which explain the signiﬁcance of all other signiﬁ-cant patterns. We propose a greedy algorithm for eﬃciently ﬁnding an approximate core pattern set of minimum size. Using both synthetic and real-world sequential data, chosen from diﬀerent domains including Medicine and Bioinformatics, we show that the proposed notion of core patterns very closely matches the notion of ‘true’ surprising patterns in data.
Estimating latency and concurrency of asynchronous real-time interactive systems using model checking

This article introduces model checking as an alternative method to estimate the latency and parallelism of asynchronous Realtime Interactive Systems (RISs). Five typical concurrency and synchronization schemes often found in concurrent Virtual Reality (VR) and computer game systems are identified as use-cases. These use-cases guide the development a) of software primitives necessary for the use-case implementation based on asynchronous RIS architectures and b) of a graphical editor for the specification of various concurrency and synchronization schemes (including the use-cases) based on these primitives. Several model-checking tools are evaluated against typical requirements in the RIS area. As a result, the formal model checking language Rebeca and its model checker RMC are applied to the specification of the use-cases to estimate latency and parallelism for each case. The estimations are compared to measured results achieved by classical profiling from a real-world application. The estimated results of the latencies by model checking approximated the measured results adequately with a minimal difference of 3.9% in the best case and -26.8% in the worst case. It also detected a problematic execution path not covered by the stochastic nature of the measured profiling samples. The estimated results of the degree of parallelization by model checking are approximated with an minimal difference of 9.3% and a maximal difference of -28.8%. Finally, the effort of model checking is compared to the effort of implementing and profiling a RIS.
Selective Re-Execution and its Implications for Value Speculation

In this paper, we describe a lightweight protocol to support selective re-execution on the TRIPS processor. The protocol permits multiple waves of speculation to be traversing a dataflow graph simultaneously and in any order, with a cleanup “commit” wave propagating as well to determine completion of a group of instructions. The protocol is completely distributed, consisting of point-to-point messages and requiring no centralized control. Thus, recovery from value mis-speculations requires no additional fetching or decoding of instructions, and no issue of instructions that were independent of the faulting instruction. We describe briefly one way in which this protocol can be exploited: by allowing every instruction to use a decentralized last value predictor. Our results show that in this scheme up to 26% of all instructions can fire as soon as they are fetched, with 0.001% of instructions firing incorrectly.
Answering Questions about Moving Objects in Surveillance Videos

Current question answering systems succeed in many respects regarding questions about textual documents. However, information exists in other media, which provides both opportunities and challenges for question answering. We present results in extending question answering capabilities to video footage captured in a surveillance setting. Our prototype system, called Spot, can answer questions about moving objects that appear within the video. We situate this novel application of vision and language technology within a larger framework designed to integrate language and vision systems under a common representation. We believe that our framework will support the next generation of multimodal natural language information access systems.
Topographic Segmentation and Transit Time Estimation for Endoscopic Capsule Exams

The endoscopic capsule is a recent medical technology with important clinical benefits but suffering from a practical handicap: long exam annotation times. This paper shows how support vector machines can be used to segment the gastrointestinal tract into its four major topographic areas, allowing the automatic estimation of the clinically relevant gastric and intestinal transit times. According to medical specialists, this can reduce exam annotation times by up to 12%
Responsible Sourcing in Supply Chains

We analyze the sourcing decision of a buyer choosing between two supplier types: responsible suppliers are costly but adhere to strict social and environmental responsibility standards, whereas risky suppliers are less expensive but may experience responsibility violations. A segment of the consumer population, called socially conscious, is willing to pay a higher price for a product sourced from a responsible supplier and may not purchase in the event of a responsibility violation from a risky supplier. We identify four possible sourcing strategies that a buyer might employ: low cost sourcing (sourcing from the risky supplier), dual sourcing, responsible niche sourcing (sourcing from a responsible supplier and selling only to socially conscious consumers), and responsible mass market sourcing (sourcing responsibly and selling to all consumers). We determine when each strategy is optimal and show that efforts to improve supply chain responsibility that focus on consumers (by increasing their willingness t.
Human Mitogen-activated Protein Kinase CSBP1, but Not CSBP2, Complements a hog1 Deletion in Yeast (*)

CSBP1 and CSBP2 are human homologues of the Saccharomyces cerevisiae Hog1 mitogen-activated protein kinase which is required for growth in high osmolarity media. Expression of CSBP1, but not CSBP2, complemented a hog1Δ phenotype. A CSBP2 mutant (A34V) that complements hog1Δ was isolated and found to have 3-fold lower kinase activity than the wild-type CSBP2. Further analysis revealed that both the kinase activity and tyrosine phosphorylation of CSBP1 and CSBP2 (A34V) is regulated by salt. In contrast, wild-type CSBP2 is constitutively active but dependent on the upstream kinase, Pbs2. Mutagenesis studies showed that reduction or elimination of CSBP2 kinase activity restores salt responsiveness as measured by tyrosine phosphorylation suggesting that too high a level of kinase activity can result in desensitization of the host cell and inability to grow in high salt.
Development of a new 6 DOF parallel haptic interface for the rendering of elements and interior equipment in a car

We present the design, analysis, control and characterization of a general purpose, six degrees-of-freedom (DoF) haptic interface for the rendering of elements and interior equipment like sliders, drawers, eyeglass holders or gloveboxes in a car. One of the major challenges in the design of six DoF haptic interfaces is the trade-off between workspace size, stiffness, output capability, and bandwidth. In order to meet this challenge we propose a new kinematic structure that allows to cover a relatively large workspace in both rotational and translational degrees of freedom, while ensuring high velocity and force output capabilities to render a wide range of impedances. An admittance controller with model-based gravity and Coriolis compensation is implemented to render different types of elements and interior equipment in a car. Hardware-related performance measures like dexterous workspace and output capabilities are derived based on kinematic and dynamic simulations and are compared to state-of-the-art devices.
Mobile sensor deployment based on distributed flocking algorithm

In this paper, we propose a distributed deployment algorithm for mobile sensor networks. The algorithm imitates the flocking behavior to drive sensors to suitable positions around the target of interest (TOI), such that the distance between each pair of neighboring sensors approaches a desired value, which could be determined by practical communication model. The movement of each sensor is governed by a second-order dynamics. The stimulus to this system is controlled by a potential function constraining the inter-sensor distance, a velocity consensus term reflecting the group behavior of neighboring sensors, and a navigational feedback used to keep tracking the movement of the TOI. Simulation results demonstrate that, compared to the traditional flocking algorithm, the proposed algorithm can attain a more uniform deployment of sensors, whether or not the TOI is static.
Relation between the distance from the cementoenamel junction to the bone crest and the thickness of the facial bone in anterior maxillary teeth: A cross-sectional tomographic study

Background The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to evaluate radiologically, the relation between the distance from the cementoenamel junction (CEJ) to the facial bone crest (FBC), and the facial alveolar bone (FAB) width at maxillary anterior teeth. A further aim was to assess if the CEJ-FBC distance had an impact in the prevalence to find a FAB thickness greater than one mm. Material and Methods CBCT images were retrospectively obtained from the database of the Oral Surgery Unit of the University of Valencia. The teeth were divided in 3 groups according to the CEJ-FBC distance: Shorter (≤3mm), Middle (>3 ≤4.5 mm) and Larger (>4.5 mm). FAB thickness was measured by two different examiners at 1, 2 and 3 mm apical to the FBC. Normality of means were evaluated by Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and an ANOVA-type linear model was performed. Results 82 patients were included in the study, with 156 central incisors, 149 lateral incisors and 152 canines analyzed. A significant greater FAB thickness in Shorter (≤3mm CEJ-FBC) than Middle and Larger group was observed in all distances measured apical to the FBC. There was a significant inverse relation between the distance CEJ-FBC and FAB thickness at all distances measured. The prevalence of a FAB thickness equal or greater than one mm was 35.9% of all teeth analyzed from Shorter, 17.4% of Middle and 8.9% of Larger group at 1 mm apical to the FBC. Conclusions When the distance from the CEJ to the FBC is augmented, thinner FAB thickness has to be expected in all teeth of the anterior maxilla. The prevalence to find a FAB thicker than one mm decreases as the distance from the FBC to the CEJ increases. Key words:Facial bone, alveolar bone, cone-beam computed tomography, CEJ, maxillary teeth.
Economic value of improved quantification in global sources and sinks of carbon dioxide

On average, about 45 per cent of global annual anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions remain in the atmosphere, while the remainder are taken up by carbon reservoirs on land and in the oceans—the CO2 ‘sinks’. As sink size and dynamics are highly variable in space and time, cross-verification of reported anthropogenic CO2 emissions with atmospheric CO2 measurements is challenging. Highly variable CO2 sinks also limit the capability to detect anomolous changes in natural carbon reservoirs. This paper argues that significant uncertainty reduction in annual estimates of the global carbon balance could be achieved rapidly through coordinated up-scaling of existing methods, and that this uncertainty reduction would provide incentive for accurate reporting of CO2 emissions at the country level. We estimate that if 5 per cent of global CO2 emissions go unreported and undetected, the associated marginal economic impacts could reach approximately US$20 billion each year by 2050. The net present day value of these impacts aggregated until 2200, and discounted back to the present would have a mean value exceeding US$10 trillion. The costs of potential impacts of unreported emissions far outweigh the costs of enhancement of measurement infrastructure to reduce uncertainty in the global carbon balance.
Clinical decision making: dipyridamole thallium imaging.

Cpurpose of this article is to provide an exposition of a clinical problem facing nuclear medicine physi cians today and provide a discussion of the specific role of the radionuclide procedure in answering the clinical question. Since clinical decisions require careful inte gration of the history, physical examination, and the results of appropriate laboratory investigations, the case will be presented from the perspective of the clinician caring for the patient.
Two-dimensional range search based on the voronoi diagram

This paper studies the two-dimensional range search problem, and constructs a simple and efficient algorithm based on the Voronoi diagram. In this problem, a set of points and a query range are given, and we want to enumerate all the points which are inside the query range as quickly as possible. In most of the previous researches on this problem, the shape of the query range is restricted to particular ones such as circles, rectangles and triangles, and the improvement on the worst-case performance has been pursued. On the other hand, the algorithm proposed in this paper is designed for a general shape of the query range, and is intended to accomplish a good average-case performance. This performance is actually observed by numerical experiments. We can observe that our algorithm shows the better performance in almost all the cases.
Image Representation Using 2D Gabor Wavelets

This paper extends to two dimensions the frame criterion developed by Daubechies for one-dimensional wavelets, and it computes the frame bounds for the particular case of 2D Gabor wavelets. Completeness criteria for 2D Gabor image representations are important because of their increasing role in many computer vision applications and also in modeling biological vision, since recent neurophysiological evidence from the visual cortex of mammalian brains suggests that the filter response profiles of the main class of linearly-responding cortical neurons (called simple cells) are best modeled as a family of self-similar 2D Gabor wavelets. We therefore derive the conditions under which a set of continuous 2D Gabor wavelets will provide a complete representation of any image, and we also find self-similar wavelet parametrization which allow stable reconstruction by summation as though the wavelets formed an orthonormal basis. Approximating a "tight frame" generates redundancy which allows low-resolution neural responses to represent high-resolution images.
Incompatibility of connexin 40 and 43 Hemichannels in gap junctions between mammalian cells is determined by intracellular domains.

Murine connexin 40 (Cx40) and connexin 43 (Cx43) do not form functional heterotypic gap junction channels. This property may contribute to the preferential propagation of action potentials in murine conductive myocardium (expressing Cx40) which is surrounded by working myocardium, expressing Cx43. When mouse Cx40 and Cx43 were individually expressed in cocultured human HeLa cells, no punctate immunofluorescent signals were detected on apposed plasma membranes between different transfectants, using antibodies specific for each connexin, suggesting that Cx40 and Cx43 hemichannels do not dock to each other. We wanted to identify domains in these connexin proteins which are responsible for the incompatibility. Thus, we expressed in HeLa cells several chimeric gene constructs in which different extracellular and intracellular domains of Cx43 had been spliced into the corresponding regions of Cx40. We found that exchange of both extracellular loops (E1 and E2) in this system (Cx40*43E1,2) was required for formation of homotypic and heterotypic conductive channels, although the electrical properties differed from those of Cx40 or Cx43 channels. Thus, the extracellular domains of Cx43 can be directed to form functional homo- and heterotypic channels. Another chimeric construct in which both extracellular domains and the central cytoplasmic loop (E1, E2, and C2) of Cx43 were spliced into Cx40 (Cx40*43E1,2,C2) led to heterotypic coupling only with Cx43 and not with Cx40 transfectants. Thus, the central cytoplasmic loop of Cx43 contributed to selectivity. A third construct, in which only the C-terminal domain (C3) of Cx43 was spliced into Cx40, i.e., Cx40*43C3, showed neither homotypic nor heterotypic coupling with Cx40 and Cx43 transfectants, suggesting that the C-terminal region of Cx43 determined incompatibility.
Emergence of Clostridium difficile infection due to a new hypervirulent strain, polymerase chain reaction ribotype 078.

BACKGROUND Since 2005, an increase in the prevalence of Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) due to polymerase chain reaction ribotype 078 has been noticed in The Netherlands. This strain has also been identified as the predominant strain in pigs and calves. METHODS CDI caused by type 078 was studied in relation to CDI caused by the hypervirulent type 027 and by types other than 027 and 078. Human and porcine isolates were further investigated and characterized by multilocus variable number tandem repeat analysis. RESULTS From February 2005 through February 2008, the incidence of type 078 among isolates obtained from 1687 patients increased from 3% to 13%. Compared with patients infected with type 027, patients infected with type 078 were younger (67.4 vs. 73.5 years; P < .01) and more frequently had community-associated disease (17.5% vs. 6.7%; odds ratio, 2.98; 95% confidence interval, 2.11-8.02); rates of severe diarrhea (38.9% vs. 40.0%) and attributable mortality (3.8% vs. 4.0%) were similar in both groups. Compared with patients infected with other types, patients infected with type 078 more frequently received fluoroquinolone therapy (29.4% vs. 19.8%; odds ratio, 2.17; 95% confidence interval, 1.06-4.44). Type 078 isolates contained genes for toxin A, toxin B, binary toxin, and a 39-base pair deletion in toxin regulator gene (tcdC), as well as a point mutation at position 184, resulting in a stop codon. Multilocus variable number tandem repeat analysis of 54 human and 11 porcine isolates revealed 4 clonal complexes containing both porcine and human isolates. CONCLUSIONS CDI due to type 078 and CDI due to type 027 present with similar severity, but CDI due to type 078 affects a younger population and is more frequently community associated. C. difficile type 078 isolates from humans and pigs are highly genetically related.
Flow Cytometric Enumeration of Parasitemia in Cultures of Plasmodium falciparum Stained with SYBR Green I and CD235A

A flow cytometric (FACS) detection method for Plasmodium falciparum cultures (P. falciparum) was developed using SYBR Green I and CD235A and compared against the Giemsa stained microscopic examination. The cultured P. falciparum were spiked into red blood cells (RBCs) to yield parasitemia, ranging from 0.01% to 22.0%. FACS analysis demonstrated a clear separation between P. falciparum infected and uninfected RBCs. The measured percentage of parasitemia by FACS revealed higher precision (CV of 2.2–37.2%) with the sensitivity of 0.01% parasitemia than Giemsa stained microscopic examination (CV of 7.2–66.0%). High correlation of measured parasitaemia (r = 0.98, P < 0.05) was observed between FACS and Giemsa stained microscopic analyses. The higher levels of parasitaemia detection were observed in all ranges by FACS in comparison to Giemsa stained microscopic analysis. The currently reported FACS method using SYBR Green I and CD235A is potentially useful for measuring parasitemia in treating patients.
Biochemical markers of cartilage metabolism are associated with walking biomechanics 6‐months following anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction

The purpose of our study was to determine the association between biomechanical outcomes of walking gait (peak vertical ground reaction force [vGRF], vGRF loading rate [vGRF‐LR], and knee adduction moment [KAM]) 6 months following anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (ACLR) and biochemical markers of serum type‐II collagen turnover (collagen type‐II cleavage product to collagen type‐II C‐propeptide [C2C:CPII]), plasma degenerative enzymes (matrix metalloproteinase‐3 [MMP‐3]), and a pro‐inflammatory cytokine (interleukin‐6 [IL‐6]). Biochemical markers were evaluated within the first 2 weeks (6.5 ± 3.8 days) following ACL injury and again 6 months following ACLR in eighteen participants. All peak biomechanical outcomes were extracted from the first 50% of the stance phase of walking gait during a 6‐month follow‐up exam. Limb symmetry indices (LSI) were used to normalize the biomechanical outcomes in the ACLR limb to that of the contralateral limb (ACLR/contralateral). Bivariate correlations were used to assess associations between biomechanical and biochemical outcomes. Greater plasma MMP‐3 concentrations after ACL injury and at the 6‐month follow‐up exam were associated with lesser KAM LSI. Lesser KAM was associated with greater plasma IL‐6 at the 6‐month follow‐up exam. Similarly, lesser vGRF‐LR LSI was associated with greater plasma MMP‐3 concentrations at the 6‐month follow‐up exam. Lesser peak vGRF LSI was associated with higher C2C:CPII after ACL injury, yet this association was not significant after accounting for walking speed. Therefore, lesser biomechanical loading in the ACLR limb, compared to the contralateral limb, 6 months following ACLR may be related to deleterious joint tissue metabolism that could influence future cartilage breakdown. © 2017 Orthopaedic Research Society. Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Orthop Res 35:2288–2297, 2017.