Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Longitudinal relationships among transtheoretical model constructs for smokers in the precontemplation and contemplation stages of change

Background: This study examined the pattern, direction, and magnitude of longitudinal relationships among the constructs involved in the Transtheoretical Model (TTM). Purpose: The goal was to explore within-TTM relationships to create an integrated structural model that adequately represents the change process.Method: Data were collected as part of a representative general adult population study in Germany. A total of 688 smokers in the precontemplation and contemplation stages of change were assessed two times, 6 months apart, with respect to the TTM constructs. Structural equation modeling was used and a step approach was employed to evaluate the relationships between cognitive-affective processes, behavioral processes, the pros and cons of smoking, and self-efficacy, stratified for baseline stage of change.Results: The model-building process resulted in two final structural equation models detailing longitudinal TTM relationships for precontemplation and contemplation. A structural invariance test showed that the precontemplation model also held for the contemplation sample and visa versa.Conclusions: The TTM constructs can be integrated in a longitudinal structural model. The findings provide empirical support for specific relationships that are posited in the TTM framework. However, differing relationships between TTM constructs for precontemplation and contemplation could not be established.
Pediatric clinical trials: a US perspective

(unported, v3.0) License. The full terms of the License are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/. Non-commercial uses of the work are permitted without any further permission from Dove Medical Press Limited, provided the work is properly attributed. Permissions beyond the scope of the License are administered by Dove Medical Press Limited. Information on how to request permission may be found at: http://www.dovepress. com/permissions.php Open Access Journal of Clinical Trials 2014:6 127–138 Open Access Journal of Clinical Trials Dovepress
Hepatic transcriptional changes in critical genes for gluconeogenesis following castration of bulls

Objective This study was performed to understand transcriptional changes in the genes involved in gluconeogenesis and glycolysis pathways following castration of bulls. Methods Twenty Korean bulls were weaned at average 3 months of age, and castrated at 6 months. Liver tissues were collected from bulls (n = 10) and steers (n = 10) of Korean cattle, and hepatic gene expression levels were measured using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. We examined hepatic transcription levels of genes encoding enzymes for irreversible reactions in both gluconeogenesis and glycolysis as well as genes encoding enzymes for the utilization of several glucogenic substrates. Correlations between hepatic gene expression and carcass characteristics were performed to understand their associations. Results Castration increased the mRNA (3.6 fold; p<0.01) and protein levels (1.4 fold; p< 0.05) of pyruvate carboxylase and mitochondrial phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase genes (1.7 fold; p<0.05). Hepatic mRNA levels of genes encoding the glycolysis enzymes were not changed by castration. Castration increased mRNA levels of both lactate dehydrogenase A (1.5 fold; p<0.05) and lactate dehydrogenase B (2.2 fold; p<0.01) genes for lactate utilization. Castration increased mRNA levels of glycerol kinase (2.7 fold; p<0.05) and glycerol-3-phosphate dehydrogenase 1 (1.5 fold; p<0.05) genes for glycerol utilization. Castration also increased mRNA levels of propionyl-CoA carboxylase beta (mitochondrial) (3.5 fold; p<0.01) and acyl-CoA synthetase short chain family member 3 (1.3 fold; p = 0.06) genes for propionate incorporation. Conclusion Castration increases transcription levels of critical genes coding for enzymes involved in irreversible gluconeogenesis reactions from pyruvate to glucose and enzymes responsible for incorporation of glucogenic substrates including lactate, glycerol, and propionate. Hepatic gluconeogenic gene expression levels were associated with intramuscular fat deposition.
Multiple breath washout of hyperpolarized 129Xe and 3He in human lungs with three‐dimensional balanced steady‐state free‐precession imaging

To compare quantitative fractional ventilation measurements from multiple breath washout imaging (MBW‐I) using hyperpolarized 3He with both spoiled gradient echo (SPGR) and balanced steady‐state free precession (bSSFP) three‐dimensional (3D) pulse sequences and to evaluate the feasibility of MBW‐I with hyperpolarized 129Xe.
Investigation of Obstructive Sleep Apnea Using Portable Monitors and Health Check Data in Japanese Drivers

Aims: The identification and appropriate management of commercial motor vehicle (CMV) drivers with unrecognized obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a major public health concern and priority; OSA among drivers has not been fully investigated in Japan, and a better understanding of this undiagnosed disease is warranted. Therefore, we evaluated the prevalence of OSA and the factors related to apnea–hypopnea index (AHI) in Japanese CMV drivers. Methods: This retrospective study included 1309 Japanese CMV drivers aged 40–69 years. All the subjects received type IV portable sleep monitors (PMs) with Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) and a periodic health check including anthropometrical and laboratory measurements, and a questionnaire of medical history, smoking status, and life style, following which variables related to AHI were analyzed. Results: Of all the subjects, 23.9% had moderate to severe OSA (AHI ≥ 15). Age, body mass index (BMI), LogeHbA1c and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) showed significance with AHI in 1309 subjects. The following factors were found to have significant odds ratio (OR) for AHI of ≥ 15 in 1309 subjects: age, ESS, DBP, and LogeHbA1c. Conclusion: Notably, drivers with undiagnosed OSA exist. In these subjects, AHI was related to obesity, hypertension, and diabetes. For the early diagnosis and intervention of OSA, BMI, blood pressure, and HbA1c measurements may be helpful, particularly for drivers. Furthermore, when performing an objective assessment of the suspected OSA, evaluating these parameters during routine medical check-ups may be useful and feasible in the detection of drivers with latent OSA.
An Empirical Study on Downstream Workarounds for Cross-Project Bugs

GitHub has fostered complicated and enormous software ecosystems, in which projects depend on and co-evolve with each other. An error in an upstream project may affect its downstream projects through inter-dependencies, forming crossproject bugs. Though the upstream developers should fix the bugs on their side, proposing a workaround, i.e., a temporary solution in the downstream project is a common practice for the downstream developers. In this study, we empirically investigated the characteristics of downstream workarounds in the scientific Python ecosystem. Combining the statistical comparisons and manual inspection, we have the following three main findings. First, in general, the workarounds and the corresponding upstream fixes are significantly different in code size and code structure. Second, there are three kinds of crossproject bugs that the downstream developers usually work around. Last, four types of common patterns are identified from the investigated workarounds. The findings of this study lead to better understanding of cross-project bugs and the practices of developers in software ecosystems.
The times they are a-changing: Self-directed long-term services and supports and gerontological social work

ABSTRACT The Partnerships for Person-Centered (PC) and Participant-Directed (PD) Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) Project (Partnerships Project) was a three-year effort funded by the New York Community Trust to develop and implement social work curriculum that would better prepare students for the changing practice demands of the aging and disability services network for self-directed LTSS (SD-LTSS). This article first describes the growth of SD-LTSS and the need for trained social workers on this service delivery model. The paper then describes the Partnerships Project that involved schools of social work along and aging and disability network organization partners in nine states. This description includes the major activities of the project including the creation of SD-LTSS competencies for social work education, the infusion of these competencies in beginning and advanced social work classes, and student assessment of their attainment of these competencies. This article then discusses the challenges to institutionalizing such curricular changes within social work programs and the need for a national strategy to train social workers for the demands of SD-LTSS.
On Horizontal and Vertical Separation in Hierarchical Text Classification

Hierarchy is an effective and common way of organizing data and representing their relationships at different levels of abstraction. However, hierarchical data dependencies cause difficulties in the estimation of "separable" models that can distinguish between the entities in the hierarchy. Extracting separable models of hierarchical entities requires us to take their relative position into account and to consider the different types of dependencies in the hierarchy. In this paper, we present an investigation of the effect of separability in text-based entity classification and argue that in hierarchical classification, a separation property should be established between entities not only in the same layer, but also in different layers. Our main findings are the followings. First, we analyse the importance of separability on the data representation in the task of classification and based on that, we introduce "Strong Separation Principle" for optimizing expected effectiveness of classifiers decision based on separation property. Second, we present Significant Words Language Models (SWLM) which capture all, and only, the essential features of hierarchical entities according to their relative position in the hierarchy resulting in horizontally and vertically separable models. Third, we validate our claims on real world data and demonstrate that how SWLM improves the accuracy of classification and how it provides transferable models over time. Although discussions in this paper focus on the classification problem, the models are applicable to any information access tasks on data that has, or can be mapped to, a hierarchical structure.
Point-of-Care B-Type Natriuretic Peptide and Neutrophil Gelatinase-Associated Lipocalin Measurements for Acute Resuscitation: A Pilot Study

Adequate resuscitation is paramount to burn patient survival and recovery. Novel biomarkers of intravascular volume and renal perfusion may augment resuscitation strategies. The purpose of this study is to characterize serum B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) during burn resuscitation and correlate to clinical assessments of volume status. We hypothesize that BNP and NGAL will help predict inadequate resuscitation during the first 48 hours following burn injury. We conducted a pilot observational study recruiting 15 adult (age ≥18 years) patients with ≥20% TBSA burns. Paired serial BNP, NGAL, and creatinine measurements were performed using point-of-care testing. Samples were tested every 4 hours for the first 48 hours following admission. Acute kidney injury (AKI) was defined by the RIFLE criteria. Over-resuscitation was defined as developing compartment syndrome. Demographics and TBSA were similar between AKI (n = 7) vs non-AKI (n = 8), and over-resuscitated (n = 5) vs adequately resuscitated groups (n = 10). NGAL (184.9 ± 72.2 vs 110.8 ± 35.8 ng/ml, P = .004) and BNP (25.3 ± 17.3 vs 8.8 ± 5.2 pg/ml, P = .033) values were significantly higher in AKI patients. Creatinine values were similar between AKI and non-AKI patients. NGAL levels suggested presence of AKI 12 hours earlier than creatinine levels. BNP values (23.1 ± 21.9 vs 13.9 ± 13.4 pg/ml, P < .001) were significantly higher in over-resuscitated patients. Point-of-care BNP, NGAL, and creatinine measurements aid in the assessment of vascular volume and renal function during acute burn resuscitation. Further studies are warranted to determine BNP and NGAL cut-offs for guiding burn resuscitation.
A secure cloud framework for ICMetric based IoT health devices

Wearable devices are an important part of internet of things (IoT)with many applications in healthcare. Prevalent security concerns create a compelling case for a renewed approach by incorporating the ICMetric technology in IoT healthcare. The ICMetric technology is a novel security approach and uses the features of a device to form the basis of cryptographic services like key generation, authentication and admission control. Cryptographic systems designed using ICMetric technology use unique measurable device features to form a root of trust. This paper uses the MEMS bias in a body wearable Shimmer sensor to create a device ICMetric. The ICMetric identity is used to generate cryptographic key to perform encryption and decryption of patients data which is being communicated to health professionals. The cloud based component of the proposed framework provides much needed distributed data processing and availability. The proposed schemes have been simulated and tested for conformance to high levels of security and performance.
Text-Mining Techniques and Tools for Systematic Literature Reviews: A Systematic Literature Review

Despite the importance of conducting systematic literature reviews (SLRs) for identifying the research gaps in software engineering (SE) research, SLRs are a complex, multi-stage, and time-consuming process if performed manually. Conducting an SLR in line with the guidelines and practice in the SE domain requires considerable effort and expertise. The objective of this SLR is to identify and classify text-mining techniques and tools that can help facilitate SLR activities. This study also investigates the adoption of text-mining (TM) techniques to support SLR in the SE domain. We performed a mixed search strategy to identify relevant studies published from January 1, 2004, to December 31, 2016. We shortlisted 32 papers into the final set of relevant studies published in the SE, medicine and social science disciplines. The majority of the text-mining techniques attempted to support the study selection stage. Only 12 out of the 14 studies in the SE domain applied text-mining techniques, focusing primarily on facilitating the search and study selection stages. By learning from the experience of applying TM techniques in clinical medicine and social science fields, we believe that SE researchers can adopt appropriate SLR automation strategies for use in the SE field.
OF THE EFFECTS OF HIGH FREQUENCY OSCILLATION AND CONTROLLED MECHANICAL VENTILATION ON HYALINE MEMBRANE FORMATION IN A RABBIT MODEL OF THE NEONATAL RESPIRATORY DISTRESS SYNDROME

The characteristic features of the neonatal respiratory distress syndrome (NRDS) are surfactant deficiency and alveolar capillary damage. These changes lead to leakage of fluid into the pulmonary interstitium and alveoli and regional reductions in lung compliance, which result in non-uniformity of lung expansion and intra-regional stresses when the lungs are ventilated. It has been postulated that such stresses occurring during controlled mechanical ventilation (CMV) may play an important role in the aetiology of pulmonary damage and may result in hyaline membrane formation
Microfluidic Channels Formed by Collapse of Soft Stamp

Fabricating straight and robust micro- or nanofluidic channels with an adjustable cross-section area represents a challenge for conventional fabrication techniques. Recently, it was discovered that when a soft elastomeric stamp comes in contact with a stiff substrate under pressure, the extensive deformation may lead to various geometries of internal channels (pores) that are bounded by the stamp material. However, the mechanical principles behind this new technique are still fuzzy. We use finite-element simulations to study the detailed char- acteristics of channels that are self-assembled by the collapse of a compliant stamp. Side collapse and slide-buckling mechanisms are analyzed. The key parameters controlling the channel formation and those governing the pore geometrical shapes and dimensions are iden- tified and correlated. Simplified theoretical models are established to predict the critical collapse stress, and these models show a good consistency with empirical results. We further propose a new technique for fabricating microfluidic channels with nearly circular profiles. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)NM.2153-5477.0000024. © 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers.
On the Learnability of Programming Language Semantics

Game semantics is a powerful method of semantic analysis for programming languages. It gives mathematically accurate models ("fully abstract") for a wide variety of programming languages. Game semantic models are combinatorial characterisations of all possible interactions between a term and its syntactic context. Because such interactions can be concretely represented as sets of sequences, it is possible to ask whether they can be learned from examples. Concretely, we are using long short-term memory neural nets (LSTM), a technique which proved effective in learning natural languages for automatic translation and text synthesis, to learn game-semantic models of sequential and concurrent versions of Idealised Algol (IA), which are algorithmically complex yet can be concisely described. We will measure how accurate the learned models are as a function of the degree of the term and the number of free variables involved. Finally, we will show how to use the learned model to perform latent semantic analysis between concurrent and sequential Idealised Algol.
Facilitated Dissociation of a Nucleoid Protein from the Bacterial Chromosome

ABSTRACT Off-rates of proteins from the DNA double helix are widely considered to be dependent only on the interactions inside the initially bound protein-DNA complex and not on the concentration of nearby molecules. However, a number of recent single-DNA experiments have shown off-rates that depend on solution protein concentration, or “facilitated dissociation. ” Here, we demonstrate that this effect occurs for the major Escherichia coli nucleoid protein Fis on isolated bacterial chromosomes. We isolated E. coli nucleoids and showed that dissociation of green fluorescent protein (GFP)-Fis is controlled by solution Fis concentration and exhibits an “exchange” rate constant (kexch) of ≈104 M−1 s−1, comparable to the rate observed in single-DNA experiments. We also show that this effect is strongly salt dependent. Our results establish that facilitated dissociation can be observed in vitro on chromosomes assembled in vivo. IMPORTANCE Bacteria are important model systems for the study of gene regulation and chromosome dynamics, both of which fundamentally depend on the kinetics of binding and unbinding of proteins to DNA. In experiments on isolated E. coli chromosomes, this study showed that the prolific transcription factor and chromosome packaging protein Fis displays a strong dependence of its off-rate from the bacterial chromosome on Fis concentration, similar to that observed in in vitro experiments. Therefore, the free cellular DNA-binding protein concentration can strongly affect lifetimes of proteins bound to the chromosome and must be taken into account in quantitative considerations of gene regulation. These results have particularly profound implications for transcription factors where DNA binding lifetimes can be a critical determinant of regulatory function.
The Global Mental Health movement and its impact on traditional healing in India: A case study of the Balaji temple in Rajasthan

This article considers the impact of the global mental health discourse on India's traditional healing systems. Folk mental health traditions, based in religious lifeways and etiologies of supernatural affliction, are overwhelmingly sought by Indians in times of mental ill-health. This is despite the fact that the postcolonial Indian state has historically considered the popularity of these indigenous treatments regressive, and claimed Western psychiatry as the only mental health system befitting the country's aspirations as a modern nation-state. In the last decade however, as global mental health concerns for scaling up psychiatric interventions and instituting bioethical practices in mental health services begin to shape India's mental health policy formulations, the state's disapproving stance towards traditional healing has turned to vehement condemnation. In present-day India, traditional treatments are denounced for being antithetical to global mental health tenets and harmful for the population, while biomedical psychiatry is espoused as the only legitimate form of mental health care. Based on ethnographic research in the Hindu healing temple of Balaji, Rajasthan, and analysis of India's mental health policy environment, I demonstrate how the tenor of the global mental health agenda is negatively impacting the functioning of the country's traditional healing sites. I argue that crucial changes in the therapeutic culture of the Balaji temple, including the disappearance of a number of key healing rituals, are consequences of global mental health-inspired policy in India which is reducing the plural mental health landscape.
A hybrid approach to enhance data security in cloud storage

Cloud storage is evolving into a reliable storage but there are substantial security issues which prevail in cloud storage as well as in cloud computing such as ensuring confidentiality, integrity and privacy. Even though cloud providers use different authentication policies, the sensitive data is still prone to attacks. In order to provide confidentiality, integrity and privacy, cloud users employ encryption schemes, there are various encryption technique used. Each of these encryption techniques has its own hindrance such as AES is a time consuming encryption algorithm. Hence, whichever encryption used, should satisfy data confidentiality and integrity. Homomorphic encryption is a reliable encryption technique which ensures data confidentiality and integrity. I propose a novel encryption and decryption technique which satisfies data confidentiality and integrity. This paper uses Homomorphic encryption and Location-based decryption as two different techniques to provide data security in cloud storage. The encryption process is based on Homomorphic encryption and decryption is based on user location. The location-based decryption enhances the data security in this framework. I also propose data classification model for cloud users as well as for cloud providers. The proposed framework provides a secure protection for sensitive data in cloud storage.