Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Discovering Patterns in Order to Detect Weak Signals and Define New Strategies

Competitive intelligence activities rely on collecting and analyzing data in order to discover patterns from data using sequence data mining. The discovered patterns are used to help decision-makers considering innovation and defining the strategy for their business. In this chapter we present four methods for discovering patterns in the competitive intelligence process: “correspondence analysis,” “multiple correspondence analysis,” “evolutionary graph,” and “multi-term method. ”
implications Hematopoietic origin of fibroblasts / myofibroblasts : its pathophysiologic

http://bloodjournal.hematologylibrary. org/content/108/9/2893.full. html Updated information and services can be found at: (166 articles) Stem Cells in Hematology  (145 articles) Perspectives  (3094 articles) Hematopoiesis and Stem Cells  Articles on similar topics can be found in the following Blood collections http://bloodjournal.hematologylibrary. org/site/misc/rights.xhtml#repub_requests Information about reproducing this article in parts or in its entirety may be found online at: http://bloodjournal.hematologylibrary. org/site/misc/rights.xhtml#reprints Information about ordering reprints may be found online at: http://bloodjournal.hematologylibrary. org/site/subscriptions/index.xhtml Information about subscriptions and ASH membership may be found online at:
Iris segmentation based on Fuzzy Mathematical Morphology, Neural Networks and ontologies

Segmentation is one of the most time-consuming steps within the whole process of Iris Recognition. By means of Fuzzy Mathematical Morphology and Neural Networks, this new algorithm can fulfill the task of isolating the Iris, not only with an acceptable accuracy, but also with a very high improvement in terms of time. Furthermore, this innovative scheme presents an ontology able to decide whether the features can be extracted, based on previous segmentation. This paper provides a detailed explanation of both the problem to be solved and how this new approach meets the required goals. Current Iris Recognition algorithms may benefit from this new approach, and what is more, the essence of the algorithm can be extended to other biometric segmentation procedures.
Contesting authentic practice and ethical authority in adventure tourism

ABSTRACT This paper examines the discourses of authenticity and ethics employed by adventure tourists regarding the use of the natural environment. In one case, full-time traveling rock climbers use their dedication to the sport and annual visits to the Red River Gorge as evidence for their authoritative voice on ethical climbing practice. While they identify the growing numbers of leisure climbers as a problem for sustainability, many also take up temporary employment as guides and are directly involved in the introduction of new climbers to the area. In another case, two groups of wilderness enthusiasts – “ADK 46ers” and “Summit Stewards” – lament the environmental and social impacts of other recreational users in the Adirondack Park. Despite being visitors themselves, Summit Stewards and 46ers use their sense of place and knowledge of Adirondack history and ecology to substantiate their authority as purveyors of ethical practice. In both cases, senses of responsibility are inspired by senses of place, but are articulated through notions of authenticity and used as justification for ethical authority. While validating their presence in these outdoor spaces, the use of such rhetoric also minimizes their own impacts yielding further tensions among user groups.
Toward Secure Data Sharing Protocols for Avoiding Global Eavesdropper in WSN

— While transformation of the data between communications system there is need for confidentiality of content and location. In existing work only capable of preserving the content and protection on a limited portion of the network at a time. This paper focuses on provision of protecting location against a global eavesdropper. Mobility prediction algorithm is the proposed technique which is implemented for preserving the location of nodes. It provides the confidentiality of the location in wireless sensor. Performance evaluation shows that our proposed method outperforms the existing method .
Topic connections and clustering in text mining: an analysis of the JADT network

In academic conferences, researchers usually discuss their work and clasp scientific collaborations. Conferences provide an important link for the exchange of information among scholars. Collaborations among scientists represent a prototype of social network. We present the macro (the whole network) and micro (both actor and topic centred) structure of collaboration in the last 20 years in International Conference JADT. We use centrality measures to evaluate roles of scholars and their topics and classify research topics. Key-words: centrality measures, cluster analysis, Social Network Analysis, text mining
Saturated Gain of Doped Multilayer Quantum Dot Semiconductor Optical Amplifiers

— The effect of the number of quantum dot (QD) layers on the saturated gain of doped QD semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs) has been studied using multi-population coupled rate equations. The developed model takes into account the effect of carrier coupling between adjacent layers. It has been found that increasing the number of QD layers (K) increases the unsaturated optical gain for K<8 and approximately has no effect on the unsaturated gain for K ≥ 8. Our analysis shows that the optimum p-type concentration that maximizes the unsaturated optical gain of the ground state is 3 . On the other hand, it has been found that the saturated optical gain for both the ground state and the excited state are strong function of both the doping concentration and K where we find that it is required to dope the dots with n-type concentration for very large K at high photon energy. development of high efficiency, high-speed optoelectronic devices and integrated circuits including heterojunction phototransistors, vertical cavity surface emitting microcavities, and modulators, tunable
Sable Research Group Precise , Partially-Compositional Analysis of the π-Calculus Sable Technical Report No . 2004-01

We present a new algorithm for computing control flow analysis on the π-calculus. Our approach is strictly more accurate then existing algorithms, while maintaining a polynomial running time. Our algorithm is also partially compositional, in the sense that the representational structure that results from analyzing a process can be efficiently reused in an analysis of the same process in another context.
Prevalence of Hypertension and Its Associated Risk Factors among 34,111 HAART Naïve HIV-Infected Adults in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Background. Elevated blood pressure has been reported among treatment naïve HIV-infected patients. We investigated prevalence of hypertension and its associated risk factors in a HAART naïve HIV-infected population in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Methods. A cross-sectional analysis was conducted among HAART naïve HIV-infected patients. Hypertension was defined as systolic blood pressure (SBP) ≥ 140 mmHg and/or diastolic blood pressure (DBP) ≥ 90 mmHg. Overweight and obesity were defined as body mass index (BMI) between 25.0–29.9 kg/m2 and ≥30 kg/m2, respectively. We used relative risks to examine factors associated with hypertension. Results. Prevalence of hypertension was found to be 12.5%. After adjusting for possible confounders, risk of hypertension was 10% more in male than female patients. Patients aged ≥50 years had more than 2-fold increased risk for hypertension compared to 30–39-years-old patients. Overweight and obesity were associated with 51% and 94% increased risk for hypertension compared to normal weight patients. Low CD4+ T-cell count, advanced WHO clinical disease stage, and history of TB were associated with 10%, 42%, and 14% decreased risk for hypertension. Conclusions. Older age, male gender, and overweight/obesity were associated with hypertension. Immune suppression and history of TB were associated with lower risk for hypertension. HIV treatment programs should screen and manage hypertension even in HAART naïve individuals.
Hormonal factors and risk of lung cancer among women?

BACKGROUND Gender differences in the histological distribution of lung carcinoma and a possibly greater susceptibility of women than men to tobacco carcinogens, suggest a possible influence of sex-specific hormones. This study examines endocrine factors and risk of lung cancer among women by smoking status and histology. METHODS We used data of a case-control study on lung cancer conducted from 1990 to 1996 in Germany, including 811 histologically confirmed female cases and 912 female population controls. Information on various menstrual and reproductive factors, use of oral contraceptives (OC), hormone replacement therapy (HRT), and smoking was gathered through personal interviews using a structured questionnaire. Odds ratios (OR) and 95% CI adjusted for age, region, smoking, and education were calculated via logistic regression. RESULTS A reduction in lung cancer risk was observed with the use of OC (OR = 0.69; 95% CI: 0.51-0.92), but no trend in risk with increasing duration of use, age at first use, or calendar year of first use was present. A history of HRT was associated with a reduced risk (OR = 0.83; 95% CI: 0.64-1.09), particularly after long duration (>/=7 years) (OR = 0.59; 95% CI: 0.37-0.93). No clear association was found with regard to age at menarche, length of menstrual cycle, number of live-births, and age at menopause. Overall results did not differ much by histological cell subtype. The reduction in lung cancer risk associated with the use of exogenous hormones was primarily seen among smoking women. CONCLUSIONS Our data provide evidence for a possible role of hormonal factors in the aetiology of lung cancer in women.
YY1 Is Required for Germinal Center B Cell Development

YY1 has been implicated as a master regulator of germinal center B cell development as YY1 binding sites are frequently present in promoters of germinal center-expressed genes. YY1 is known to be important for other stages of B cell development including the pro-B and pre-B cells stages. To determine if YY1 plays a critical role in germinal center development, we evaluated YY1 expression during B cell development, and used a YY1 conditional knock-out approach for deletion of YY1 in germinal center B cells (CRE driven by the immunoglobulin heavy chain γ1 switch region promoter; γ1-CRE). We found that YY1 is most highly expressed in germinal center B cells and is increased 3 fold in splenic B cells activated by treatment with anti-IgM and anti-CD40. In addition, deletion of the yy1 gene by action of γ1-CRE recombinase resulted in significant loss of GC cells in both un-immunized and immunized contexts with corresponding loss of serum IgG1. Our results show a crucial role for YY1 in the germinal center reaction.
Reflections of Person-Centred Approach and Client-CentredTherapy in Positive Psychology and Psychotherapy

The expansion of positive psychology, a noticeable direction in current psychology and psychotherapy, has led to an increasing emphasis on the study and promotion of positive functioning in clinical psychology research and psychotherapy. This paper focuses on the importance of humanistic psychology as one of the most powerful sources of inspiration for positive psychology and psychotherapy. Positive psychology and particularly Rogers’ Person-Centred Approach (PCA) overlap in theoretical presuppositions and thematic content thanks to the extensive historical grounding of positive psychology within humanistic psychology. This paper gives a brief overview of positive psychology themes and points out the reflections, similarities and connections between the PCA and Client-Centred Therapy (CCT) with positive psychology and psychotherapy. The paper will accentuate the holistic approach in positive psychotherapy, which attempts to prevent and treat psychopathology as well as enhance well-being, and may be a central component of good psychotherapy.
Recommending Temporally Relevant News Content from Implicit Feedback Data

News has, in this day and age, transformed primarily into a digital format with leading newspapers and news agencies having a significant online presence. The speed at which news reaches the reader notwithstanding, the proliferation of blogs and microblogs to deliver specialized content has become the order of the day. Even highly engaged users tend to disengage with a website when the content they are served is unappealing to them. While recommendation systems have been used to ensure delivery of content to the user in tune with their tastes, these systems face an unprecedented challenge - the transient nature of 'popular' news and users' changing interests. Moreover, the challenge is compounded by the absence of explicit feedback. Most recommendation systems for recommending digital news content rely on inferring user engagement through 'clicks', which is not necessarily an accurate measure as it gives us no explicit information about the degree to which a user is interested in a news article. In this paper, we introduce and study the behavior of temporal and tag-based models for news article recommendation. Our experiments indicate that incorporating temporal and taginformation improves recommendation quality and increases user engagement. We argue through experimental evaluation that the improved performance is due to recommendation of more personalized news content by the tag-based recommendation algorithms as compared to other models that do not explicitly incorporate user-tag information.
Expression of pim-1 in Tumors, Tumor Stroma and Tumor-Adjacent Mucosa Co-Determines the Prognosis of Colon Cancer Patients

Provirus integration site for Moloney murine leukemia virus (pim-1) is a proto-oncogene that is linked to the development and progression of several cancers. In this study, we evaluated pim-1 expression in tumors, tumor stroma and tumor-adjacent mucosa together as an independent prognostic factor for colon cancer patients. The study included 343 colon cancer patients. Immunohistochemical staining was used to detect pim-1. Multivariate cox regression for disease-free survival (DFS) were used to identify independent prognostic factors. Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) was used to calculate the weight of pim-1 in tumors, tumor stroma and tumor-adjacent mucosa in order to obtain a Pim-1 total score (PTS) for recurrence and survival. Kaplan–Meier DFS curves and OS curves for patients with different pim-1 expression levels were compared using the log-rank test. In this study, four independent prognostic factors were identified for colon cancer patients: pim-1 expression in tumors, tumor stroma, tumor-adjacent mucosa, as well as tumor stage. It has been established that clinical stage is an important prognostic factor for colon cancer patients. However, PTS can identify the patients who are likely to recur not only in the whole radical excision group but also within each stage of this group. Based on the results of this study we can conclude that the PTS combined with clinical staging system may be a better predictor of colon cancer patients’ prognosis than using the clinical stage system alone. Clinical Trials Gov. Number: ChiCTR-PRCH-12002842
An occultation event in the nucleus of the planetary nebula M 2-29

Aims. Eclipses and occultations of post-AGB stars provide a powerful method of exploring the near-stellar environment, including close companions and circumstellar debris disks. Only six eclipsing systems and one dust-occultation system are currently known. New cases are important for our understanding of binary evolution during the AGB mass-loss phase. Methods. We study the post-AGB central star of the (bipolar) Galactic bulge planetary nebula M 2-29. We have obtained additional HST imaging and SAAO spectroscopy of the object. Results. The star showed a pronounced, long-lasting occultation with subsequent recovery. The event lasted almost 3 years, with a secondary minimum 9 years later. The photometric behavior of M 2-29 resembles the dust-occultation events seen in NGC 2346, and is modeled as an occultation by a circumbinary disk, where the binary period is 18 yr. Modulation during the decline shows evidence of another companion with a period of 23 days. Conclusions. M 2-29 is the first eclipsing disk system among post-AGB stars. Close binaries with periods of around 1 month, as found in M 2-29, have been proposed to supply the energy needed to create the tori of bipolar planetary nebulae.
The convergence challenge : an analysis of the ecosystem of open-signal TV in Brazil

The rising pace of innovation that characterizes today’s business reality and the convergence of a series of industries mean that strategies must increasingly rely on tools that can monitor the exchange of information and of resources within and among industries, recognizing eventual adversaries and possible allies clearly and ahead of time. To this end, this study presents tools that help one to analyze more broadly and critically the outlook for TV networks in Brazil, using Ecosystem Analysis to compare the reactions of these enterprises to the progress of adjacent industries and technologies in two different periods: the 1980s and today. Using metrics based on the concepts of Iyer et al. (2006) and the complementary metrics proposed by the authors (Relative Density, the Number of Pathways between Content and Consumer, and the Distance between Content Distributor and Consumer), the ecosystem that encompasses the Brazilian TV networks is outlined and analyzed. This study indicates that Brazilian TV networks have been losing their influence not only within their industry, but in related sectors as well. This might jeopardize their competitiveness and capacity to react to a constantly changing world in a relatively near future.
Evaluation of the Oh, Dubois and IEM Backscatter Models Using a Large Dataset of SAR Data and Experimental Soil Measurements

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the most used radar backscattering models (Integral Equation Model “IEM”, Oh, Dubois, and Advanced Integral Equation Model “AIEM”) using a wide dataset of SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) data and experimental soil measurements. These forward models reproduce the radar backscattering coefficients ( σ 0 ) from soil surface characteristics (dielectric constant, roughness) and SAR sensor parameters (radar wavelength, incidence angle, polarization). The analysis dataset is composed of AIRSAR, SIR-C, JERS-1, PALSAR-1, ESAR, ERS, RADARSAT, ASAR and TerraSAR-X data and in situ measurements (soil moisture and surface roughness). Results show that Oh model version developed in 1992 gives the best fitting of the backscattering coefficients in HH and VV polarizations with RMSE values of 2.6 dB and 2.4 dB, respectively. Simulations performed with the Dubois model show a poor correlation between real data and model simulations in HH polarization (RMSE = 4.0 dB) and better correlation with real data in VV polarization (RMSE = 2.9 dB). The IEM and the AIEM simulate the backscattering coefficient with high RMSE when using a Gaussian correlation function. However, better simulations are performed with IEM and AIEM by using an exponential correlation function (slightly better fitting with AIEM than IEM). Good agreement was found between the radar data and the simulations using the calibrated version of the IEM modified by Baghdadi (IEM_B) with bias less than 1.0 dB and RMSE less than 2.0 dB. These results confirm that, up to date, the IEM modified by Baghdadi (IEM_B) is the most adequate to estimate soil moisture and roughness from SAR data.
Comparing effects of rigid, flexible, and actuated series-elastic spines on bounding gait of quadruped robots

Spinal actuation is necessary for quadruped robots to achieve rapid leg locomotion. In this paper, effect of flexible spinal actuation on the bounding gait is investigated. By defining a performance criterion for the bounding gait, a quadruped robot (Ghostdog) is tested in four different case studies; namely rigid spine, flexible passive spine, actuated spine, and series elastic actuated spine. We show that the robot with a series elastic actuator in its spinal joint has the best performance criterion and is the best robot in terms of bounding power consumption. On the other hand, it is shown that by using spinal actuation not only the speed of locomotion increases considerably, but also the pattern of bounding becomes more similar to real fast felines.
Novel LNAs with transformerless positive feedback

The prominent inventions of D. E. Norton [1,2] and also other similar schematics till now have a wide application in different circuits of amplifiers and mixers. However the presence of the broadband feedback transformer in these circuits still hampers their application in high-frequency integrated circuits (IC). We propose new configuration schematics of the transformer-less amplifiers with similar properties and admittance positive feedback (APF). Just now we understand that implicitly this opportunity was already contained in our previous patents and papers [3-8]. Here it is considered in detail the circuit of low noise amplifier (LNA) with a resistive positive feedback (RPF). RPF and CB amplifiers are compared. It is shown, that LNA RPF provides more than twofold lower noise temperature, good level of input and output matching, greater frequency band and high stability gain, despite of a positive feedback.
Inflammatory responses to individual microorganisms in the lungs of children with cystic fibrosis.

BACKGROUND We hypothesized that the inflammatory response in the lungs of children with cystic fibrosis (CF) would vary with the type of infecting organism, being greatest with Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus aureus. METHODS A microbiological surveillance program based on annual bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) collected fluid for culture and assessment of inflammation was conducted. Primary analyses compared inflammation in samples that grew a single organism with uninfected samples in cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses. RESULTS Results were available for 653 samples from 215 children with CF aged 24 days to 7 years. A single agent was associated with pulmonary infection (≥10(5) cfu/mL) in 67 BAL samples, with P. aeruginosa (n = 25), S. aureus (n = 17), and Aspergillus species (n = 19) being the most common. These microorganisms were associated with increased levels of inflammation, with P. aeruginosa being the most proinflammatory. Mixed oral flora (MOF) alone was isolated from 165 BAL samples from 112 patients, with 97 of these samples having a bacterial density ≥10(5) cfu/mL, and was associated with increased pulmonary inflammation (P < .001). For patients with current, but not past, infections there was an association with a greater inflammatory response, compared with those who were never infected (P < .05). However, previous infection with S. aureus was associated with a greater inflammatory response in subsequent BAL. CONCLUSIONS Pulmonary infection with P. aeruginosa, S. aureus, or Aspergillus species and growth of MOF was associated with significant inflammatory responses in young children with CF. Our data support the use of specific surveillance and eradication programs for these organisms. The inflammatory response to MOF requires additional investigation.