Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Interventricular and intra-left ventricular electromechanical delays in right ventricular paced patients with heart failure: implications for upgrading to biventricular stimulation

Objective: To correlate, in patients with right ventricular pacing (RVP), the QRS width with electromechanical variables assessed by pulsed Doppler tissue imaging echocardiography. Secondly, to find reliable parameters for selecting RVP patients who would respond to biventricular pacing (BVP). Methods: 26 randomly selected control patients with RVP (mean (SD) ejection fraction 74 (3)%) (group A) were matched on sex and age criteria with 16 RVP patients with drug resistant heart failure (mean (SD) ejection fraction 27 (5)%) (group B). All patients were pacemaker dependent and all underwent pulsed Doppler tissue imaging echocardiography. This technique provided the intra-left ventricular (LV) electromechanical delay and the interventricular electromechanical delay. The Gaussian curve properties of data from group A patients provided the normal range of ECG and echographic parameters. Design: Prospective study. Setting: University hospital (tertiary referral centre). Results: Data from the control group showed that an interventricular electromechanical delay or an intra-LV electromechanical delay > 50 ms would identify patients with a significantly abnormal ventricular mechanical asynchrony (p < 0.05). In the same manner, a QRS width > 190 ms was considered significantly larger in group B patients (p < 0.05) than in controls. In Group B patients, there was no correlation between the QRS width and the interventricular electromechanical delay (r = −0.23, NS) or the intra-LV electromechanical delay (r = 0.19, NS). Seven group B patients (44%) were misclassified by ECG criteria for ventricular mechanical asynchrony identification: four patients (25%) had a QRS width similar to that of controls but with a significantly prolonged intra-LV electromechanical delay and interventricular electromechanical delay; and three patients (19%) had a QRS width significantly larger than that in controls but without significant ventricular mechanical asynchrony. Conclusions: The QRS width is not a reliable tool to identify RVP patients with ventricular mechanical asynchrony. In RVP patients, an interventricular electromechanical delay or intra-LV electromechanical delay > 50 ms reflects a significant ventricular mechanical asynchrony and should be required to select patients for upgrading to BVP.
The impact of marital status at diagnosis on cancer survival in patients with differentiated thyroid cancer

Previous studies have revealed that marital status influences the prognosis of patients with various types of cancer. We evaluated the influence of marriage on the survival outcomes in differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC). The Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database between 2002 and 2012 was used to compare cancer‐specific mortality in different marital status, and in each sex, age, and stage stratification by multivariate Cox regression model. In total, 61,077 eligible patients were identified. The widowed group had the highest proportion of women, elderly patients (≥45 years), and advanced stage III/IV tumor (P = 0.001), but the total thyroidectomy (TT) performed and radioisotopes therapy rates were lower than those in the married group. Married patients had a better cancer‐specific survival (CSS) than the unmarried (P < 0.05). Further analysis showed that widowed patients always presented the lowest CSS compared with other groups. Widowed patients had a significant increased risk for CSS compared with married patients in males [hazard ratio (HR) 2.72, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.59–4.65, P = 0.001], females (HR 2.02, 95% CI: 2.24–4.06, P = 0.001), young patients (<45, HR 28.12, 95% CI: 3.48–227.25, P = 0.002), elderly patients (≥45, HR 28.12, 95% CI: 2.97, 95% CI: 2.30–3.83, P = 0.001), stage I (HR 8.44, 95% CI: 4.05–17.59, P = 0.001), stage II (HR 3.64, 95% CI: 1.30–10.20, P = 0.014), stage III (HR 2.27, 95% CI: 1.08–4.78, P = 0.031), and stage IV (HR 2.63, 95% CI: 1.94–3.57, P = 0.001). These results showed that unmarried status, especially for widowhood, increased the risk of cancer mortality in DTC patients.
Estimation of interventional effects of features on prediction

The interpretability of prediction mechanisms with respect to the underlying prediction problem is often unclear. While several studies have focused on developing prediction models with meaningful parameters, the causal relationships between the predictors and the actual prediction have not been considered. Here, we connect the underlying causal structure of a data generation process and the causal structure of a prediction mechanism. To achieve this, we propose a framework that identifies the feature with the greatest causal influence on the prediction and estimates the necessary causal intervention of a feature such that a desired prediction is obtained. The general concept of the framework has no restrictions regarding data linearity; however, we focus on an implementation for linear data here. The framework applicability is evaluated using artificial data and demonstrated using real-world data.
Cytotoxic T Lymphocyte Antigen 4 (CTLA-4) Interferes with Extracellular Signal-regulated Kinase (ERK) and Jun NH2-terminal Kinase (JNK) Activation, but Does Not Affect Phosphorylation of T Cell Receptor ζ and ZAP70

Cytotoxic T lymphocyte antigen 4 (CTLA-4) is an important regulator of T cell homeostasis. Ligation of this receptor leads to prominent downregulation of T cell proliferation, mainly as a consequence of interference with IL-2 production. We here report that CTLA-4 engagement strikingly selectively shuts off activation of downstream T cell receptor (TCR)/CD28 signaling events, i.e., activation of the microtubule-associated protein kinase (MAPKs) ERK and JNK. In sharp contrast, proximal TCR signaling events such as ZAP70 and TCR-ζ chain phosphorylation are not affected by CTLA-4 engagement on activated T cells. Since activation of the ERK and JNK kinases is required for stimulation of interleukin (IL)-2 transcription, these data provide a molecular explanation for the block in IL-2 production imposed by CTLA-4.
Differential expression of human globin genes introduced in K562 cells.

We have constructed a series of hybrid globin genes between the 5′ half of the human epsilon‐, gamma‐ and beta‐globin genes, and the 3′ half of the rabbit beta‐globin gene. These hybrid genes were introduced into the cell line K562. Analysis of the hybrid mRNA populations show that only the hybrid epsilon‐ and gamma‐globin genes are expressed in these cells in concordance with the endogenous K562 globin gene expression. It is therefore likely that these cells contain transcriptional factors which allow the specific expression of introduced epsilon‐ and gamma‐, but not beta‐globin genes, irrespective of their chromosomal localization.
An Unsupervised Local Outlier Detection Method for Wireless Sensor Networks

Recently, wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have provided many applications, which need precise sensing data analysis, in many areas. However, sensing datasets contain outliers sometimes. Although outliers rarely occur, they seriously reduce the precision of the sensing data analysis. In the past few years, many researches focused on outlier detection. However, many of them ignored one factor that WSNs are usually deployed in a dynamic environment that changes with time. Thus, we propose a new method, which is an unsupervised learning method based on mean-shift algorithm, for outlier detection that can be used in a dynamic environment for WSNs. To make our method adapt to a dynamic environment, we define two new distances for outlier detection. Moreover, the simulation shows that our method performed on real sensing dataset has ideal results; it finds outliers with a low false positive rate and has a high recall. For generality, we also test our method on different synthetic datasets.
Intersectionality and disciplinarity: reflections from an international perspective

The concept of intersectionality generates much debate amongst interdisciplinary feminist scholars. The paradigm has become a central disciplinary device for feminist scholarship. Indeed, the National Women’s Studies Association identifies “the conceptual claims and theoretical practices of intersectionality” as a foundation of the “discipline” of Women’s Studies.1 Meanwhile, intersectional approaches have also begun to transform feminist approaches within the conventional disciplines.2 Intersectionality has become a defining discursive device within feminist scholarship, often serving, variously, as a symbolic marker of inclusion, multiculturalism, difference, and race. The increasingly ubiquitous use of “intersectionality” has sparked a growing debate on the precise meaning, applicability, and value of the concept. Much of this debate occurs with relatively surface references to individual authors and is devoid of a deeper understanding of the intellectual history and conceptual depth of the term. Ange-Marie Hancock’s An Intellectual History of Intersectionality provides a welcome corrective to some of the quagmires of this debate. The book provides an important analysis of the development of the concept in both activist and intellectual contexts and helps us move beyond some of the problems that have arisen as intersectionality has gained currency within the US academy. It navigates such questions through a complex analysis that addresses both disciplinary and interdisciplinary debates and seeks to integrate frameworks of discussion that address both US and international issues. One of the most powerful dimensions of Hancock’s book is her framing of her intellectual history as an ethical project of stewardship rather than a territorial claim of ownership of the concept of intersectionality. As she eloquently notes,
Proton and cation transport activity of the M2 proton channel from influenza A virus

The M2 protein is a small, single-span transmembrane (TM) protein from the influenza A virus. This virus enters cells via endosomes; as the endosomes mature and become more acidic M2 facilitates proton transport into the viral interior, thereby disrupting matrix protein/RNA interactions required for infectivity. A mystery has been how protons can accumulate in the viral interior without developing a large electrical potential that impedes further inward proton translocation. Progress in addressing this question has been limited by the availability of robust methods of unidirectional insertion of the protein into virus-like vesicles. Using an optimized procedure for reconstitution, we show that M2 has antiporter-like activity, facilitating K+ or Na+ efflux when protons flow down a concentration gradient into the vesicles. Cation efflux is very small except under conditions mimicking those encountered by the endosomally entrapped virus, in which protons are flowing through the channel. This proton/cation exchange function is consistent with the known high proton selectivity of the channel. Thus, M2 acts as a proton uniporter that occasionally allows K+ to flow to maintain electrical neutrality. Remarkably, as the pH inside M2-containing vesicles (pHin) decreases, the proton channel activity of M2 is inhibited, but its cation transport activity is activated. This reciprocal inhibition of proton flux and activation of cation flux with decreasing pHin first allows accumulation of protons in the early stages of acidification, then trapping of protons within the virus when low pHin is achieved.
Towards fully autonomous energy efficient Coverage Path Planning for autonomous mobile robots on 3D terrain

Coverage Path Planning (CPP) is an essential problem in many applications of robotics, including but not limited to autonomous de-mining and farming. Most works on CPP address time efficiency or coverage completeness in a bi-dimensional and flat environment, not taking the terrain relief into account. In this paper we use a Genetic Algorithm to optimize the solution to the CPP problem in terms of energy consumption, taking into account the constraints of natural terrains: obstacles and relief. Instead of requiring an elevation map of the environment, we also propose an autonomous sparse sampling of the environment which is used in conjunction with Kriging to successfully model the relief of the environment. Field tests confirm our energy consumption model for the robot, and simulation results show that our approach is effective in reducing energy consumption of a mobile robot performing CPP.
The efficacy of psychotherapy, pharmacotherapy and their combination on functioning and quality of life in depression: a meta-analysis

Background There is growing recognition of the importance of both functioning and quality of life (QoL) outcomes in the treatment of depressive disorders, but the meta-analytic evidence is scarce. The objective of this meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) was to determine the absolute and relative effects of psychotherapy, pharmacotherapy and their combination on functioning and QoL in patients with depression. Method One hundred and fifty-three outcome trials involving 29 879 participants with depressive disorders were identified through database searches in Pubmed, PsycINFO and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials. Results Compared to control conditions, psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy yielded small to moderate effect sizes for functioning and QoL, ranging from g = 0.31 to g = 0.43. When compared directly, initial analysis yielded no evidence that one of them was superior. After adjusting for publication bias, psychotherapy was more efficacious than pharmacotherapy (g = 0.21) for QoL. The combination of psychotherapy and medication performed significantly better for both outcomes compared to each treatment alone yielding small effect sizes (g = 0.32 to g = 0.39). Both interventions improved depression symptom severity more than functioning and QoL. Conclusion Despite the small number of comparative trials for some of the analyses, this study reveals that combined treatment is superior, but psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy alone are also efficacious for improving functioning and QoL. The overall relatively modest effects suggest that future tailoring of therapies could be warranted to better meet the needs of individuals with functioning and QoL problems.
FISHING FOR FOLLOWERS: USING HASHTAGS AS LIKE BAIT IN SOCIAL MEDIA

In this paper we present findings from an on-going study of mobile social photography with a focus on how Instagram users describe the practice of hashtagging as a way to gain likes and followers. There is a recognised connection between using hashtags and gaining likes and followers both among those who use hashtags and those who do not. Based on interviews with 16 Instagram users, we show how underlying norms regulate this practice. For example, it is technically possible to attract more views through the use of hashtags within Instagram. However, due to social norms some users dismiss that possibility.
Epstein-Barr virus antibody in cases and contacts of infectious mononucleosis; a family study

SUMMARY Serological investigations were carried out on 147 patients with Paul—Bunnell positive infectious mononucleosis (IM) from the general population. All possessed antibody to the Epstein—Barr virus (EBV) and 63% showed serological evidence of recent infection. Contacts of 132 patients, 306 in all, were followed serologically; within 6 months of the index cases' illness twenty one contacts developed evidence of EBV infection or re-infection and of these five developed overt IM. The secondary attack rate of EBV infection among susceptible contacts was at least 19%; the corresponding figure for clinically apparent IM was 6%. EBY antibody prevalence among patients' siblings was significantly lower than among age-matched controls, suggesting that cases of IM come from families with a lower than normal previous experience of the virus. Of thirteen patients with persistently Paul—Bunnell negative ‘glandular fever’ four had serological evidence of recent EBV infection and two had probable cytomegalovirus mononucleosis. Recent EBV infection may have been associated with the illnesses of five of the remaining patients.
A Unified Meta-Model for Concept-Based Reverse Engineering

While programming is modeling the reality, reverse engineering is concerned with recovering it from the code. Parts of this reality can be formalized as concepts and relations among them. As previous research suggests, the identification of these concepts is a key issue in automating program analysis. Their central role requires advance reverse engineering tasks to consider them first-class citizens. In this paper we unify the classical, structure-based reverse engineering meta-models with a meta-model describing concepts and their relations. Our unified meta-model establishes an explicit mapping between concepts and their implementations in a program. Instances of the meta-model are built in a semi-automatic manner by analyzing the program’s identifiers. Using this model allows us to raise the abstraction level by viewing the program from the perspective of concepts it implements. This enables a higher degree of automation in the reverse engineering endeavor.
The antibody 2B4 directed against the Epstein–Barr virus (EBV)‐encoded nuclear antigen 1 (EBNA1) detects MAGE‐4: implications for studies on the EBV association of human cancers

We have previously developed two monoclonal antibodies against the Epstein–Barr Virus (EBV) nuclear antigen 1 (EBNA1), designated 1H4 and 2B4. Both detect EBNA1 by in situ staining in established EBV‐positive tumours, e.g. Hodgkin's lymphoma and nasopharyngeal carcinoma. An association of EBV with other tumours, notably breast carcinomas, has been reported but remains controversial. Using the antibody 2B4, a nuclear protein has been detected in breast carcinomas that were EBV‐negative by other methods, suggesting cross‐reactivity with a cellular protein. Furthermore, an association of EBV with various other carcinomas has been reported on the basis of 2B4 immunohistochemistry. Here we show that 2B4 also binds to MAGE‐4, a cancer testis antigen expressed in a variety of tumour cells, including breast carcinoma, seminoma and EBV‐negative cases of Hodgkin's lymphoma. We conclude that the 2B4 antibody is not suitable for the detection of EBV infection but that additional techniques, particularly in situ hybridization for the detection of the EBV‐encoded RNAs (EBERs), should be employed to confirm the presence of EBV. Our results add to the evidence indicating that breast cancer is not an EBV‐associated disease. Copyright © 2006 Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Characterization of Immunoreactive Thyrotropin Releasing Hormone in Human Fetal Cerebellum

Abstract— High concentrations (411 ± 30 pg/mg protein; mean ± S.E., n= 12) of immunoreactive TRH (TRHi) were detected in extracts of human fetal cerebellum (13‐26 weeks gestation). The TRHi in the cerebellar extracts, when subjected to gel filtration and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), co‐migrated with synthetic TRH. In each instance, no TRHi was detected which did not share identical chromatographic mobilities with synthetic TRH. Like synthetic TRH, the TRHi in extracts of fetal cerebellum and hypothalamus was insoluble in diethyl ether and was efficiently degraded when incubated at 37°C with adult rat serum. No significant degradation of TRHi occurred when the incubation was conducted at 0°C or when the extracts were incubated with rat serum that had been preheated at 60°C for 20 min. Neither synthetic TRH nor TRHi in extracts of fetal cerebellum or hypothalamus was degraded when incubated with human umbilical cord serum at 37°C or 0°C. The results of this study are supportive of the view that the TRHi in extracts of human fetal cerebellum is identical to TRH.
The effects of anger management on children’s social and emotional outcomes: A meta-analysis

The occurrence of violent behaviors and bullying in schools continues to be a recognized problem among students and school personnel. The concern caused by these behaviors have led many schools to implement anger management and other impulse control based programs for at-risk students in an effort to prevent many of these incidences. This study was a comprehensive, meta-analytic synthesis of the literature to assess the effectiveness of these interventions, using a total of 60 studies from 1979–2010 for analysis. Results indicated an overall effect size (ES) of −0.27, showing a small to moderate intervention effect in reducing children’s negative emotional and behavioral outcomes including anger, aggression, and loss of self control. Many different types of anger management components were found to be effective in promoting positive outcomes. Implications for school psychologists are discussed.
Student Voice Contribution in Determining the 'Effective English Language Teacher': A Collective Case Study as a Concept Paper

Instructional and personal qualities of the ‘effective English language teacher’ expounded by English language experts still surprisingly produced average English language proficiency in a majority of Malaysian students, instead of the targeted excellent. Therefore, this concept paper aimed to find out the extent to which student voice: agreed with expert opinion in its description of both the instructional qualities and personal qualities of the ‘effective English language teacher,’ tallied with expert opinion when suggesting how the English language teacher/lecturer could have been a more ‘effective’ teacher/lecturer, as well as through its student psychology sanctioned expert opinion on the developmental psychology of children, adolescents and of adults, in its description of how it deemed the English language teacher/lecturer ‘effective. ’ In short, student voice in this concept paper is invaluable as an add-on to the current store of expert knowledge of what it takes to be a truly ‘effective English language teacher. ’
How speech processing can help with beat-to-beat heart rate estimation in ballistocardiograms

Unobtrusive sensors for monitoring patients' heart rate and other physiological rhythms often produce signals which are challenging to analyze from a signal processing point of view. This is particularly true for bed-mounted ballistocardiography (BCG) sensors. In this paper, we discuss how methods, which are commonly used for pitch tracking in speech processing, can be applied to the problem of beat-to-beat heart rate estimation from BCGs. In particular, we introduce a novel adaptive window autocorrelation method in order to improve the estimation of individual beat-to-beat intervals. Furthermore, we discuss the application of dynamic programming to the extraction of a smooth beat-to-beat interval series from time-varying correlograms. The proposed methods are evaluated with respect to RR-intervals obtained from a reference ECG. Based on the recordings of 5 subjects, the proposed adaptive window method achieved a mean beat-to-beat heart rate interval error of 0.75%.
Optimal monetary policy: is price‐level targeting the next step?

We examine whether inflation targeting should be regarded as optimal. Targeting inflation implies (undesirably) that price level variance tends to infinity: we produce some evidence from both a representative agent model and a long-used forecasting model that, once an endogenous indexation response is allowed for, price level targeting imposes no extra costs of macro variability, indeed gives significant gains. Copyright (c) Scottish Economic Society 2003.