Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Educational Blogging: The Case of Graduate MLIS Students in Kuwait

Abstract Blogging has been well-established as a communication tool, yet the literature documenting its use in education is still developing and lacks the theoretical underpinning to back it up. Blogging in education and for education has critics as well as promoters. This research is a phenomenological study that aims to create a framework and rationale for the use of blogs in higher education. It is a comparative descriptive analysis of two educational blogging experiences in Kuwait: one is a blog used by a faculty member in the Library and Information Science Department at Kuwait University that is shared with graduate students attending the courses of that faculty. The second is administered by a former graduate student of the MLIS program at Kuwait University and is open to both faculty and students. A comparison of the two experiences is the basis for the analysis and generalizations provided about the use of blogs as an educational tool and for drawing a framework for using blogs in education.
‘In and against’ lifelong learning: flexibility and the corrosion of character

This paper argues against the dominant discourse of lifelong learning. It is primarily a mode of social control that acts as a new disciplinary technology to make people more compliant and adaptable for work in the era of flexible capitalism. Whilst the main reference point is trends in the UK, the argument has a wider resonance. Lifelong learning diminishes the public sphere, undermines educational activity, introduces new mechanisms of self‐surveillance and reinforces the view that failure to succeed is a personal responsibility. It is ultimately a ‘deficit discourse’, which locates the responsibility of economic and political failure at the level of the individual, rather than at the level of systemic problems.
The Relationship Between a Mechanical Comprehension Test and Weapons-Training Tasks

The aim of the present study was to establish whether a relationship exists between recruit RT4 (mechanical comprehension) scores and a weapons-handling task from the Royal Marines (RM) recruit training course. This aim was achieved through the collection of subjective and objective performance data from RM recruits carrying out the tasks. Statistical analyses revealed that performance at weapons training was significantly related to RT4 score. On the basis of the findings, it was concluded that low mechanical comprehension scores appear to be related to difficulties with weapons-handling tasks. This is of interest given the known association between low mechanical comprehension scores and training wastage. It is recommended that the use of RT4 as a selection measure for RM training may reduce the number of recruits joining training who are at high risk of opting out at a later date. British Crown Copyright 2005/MOD. Published with the permission of the controller of Her Britannic Majesty's Stationery Office.
Recursive Dynamics Algorithms for Serial, Parallel, and Closed-chain Multibody Systems

In this paper, it is shown how to obtain recursive dynamics algorithms for multibody systems with serial, parallel, and closed-loop chains using the concept of Decoupled Natural Orthogonal Complement (DeNOC) matrices. The DeNOC is the product of two block matrices to yield the Natural Orthogonal Complement (NOC), which is a velocity transformation matrix orthogonal to the kinematic constraint matrix of the system at hand. Note that one of the two DeNOC matrices is a lower block triangular and the other one is a block diagonal. This representation allows one to compute the inverse and forward dynamics algorithms of the constrained multibody systems recursively, which was not possible with the original representation of the NOC. As a result, the computational complexities of the algorithms are reduced in many instances, particularly, in forward dynamics with large number of bodies in a system, e.g., space robots, parallel robots, vehicle systems, etc. Moreover, many physical interpretations are available, for example, articulated body inertia, etc., which can be exploited for debugging of a program and architecture design. Illustrations with several multibody systems, e.g., two six-degrees-of-freedom serial manipulators, a parallel manipulator, a carpet scrapping machine with general closed-chain, are presented.
Sources of parent-adolescent conflict: Content and form of parenting

Parent-adolescent conflicts are examined as a function of parental rule construction, use of reason at points of disagreement, and regulation of personal, moral, conventional, and prudential social domains. Multiple regression analyses of interviews with mothers, fathers, and adolescents revealed that, across all perspectives, variations in parental use of reason explain unique variance in conflict frequency above and beyond rule construction or regulation of domains. Furthermore, based on mothers’ reports about their parenting and adolescents’ reports of their mothers, the domains mothers regulate do not explain unique variance in conflict frequency but fathers’ reports about their parenting and adolescents’ reports of their fathers do. Differences in parents’ and adolescents’ perspectives are examined and it is concluded that content and form of parenting are both important in explaining conflict in differential ways between mother-adolescent and father-adolescent dyads.
Magnetic charge and the charge quantization conditions

Two viewpoints concerning magnetic charge are distinguished: that of Dirac, which is unsymmetrical, and the symmetrical one, which embodies invariance under charge rotation. It is pointed out that the latter is not in conflict with the empirical asymmetry between electric and magnetic charge. The discussion is based on an action principle that uses field strengths and the vector potential A as independent variables; a second vector potential 8 is defined nonlocally in terms of the field strengths. This nonlocality is described by an arbitrary vector function f"(y), subject only to the restrictions„f"(y) = 8(y) and the additional requirement of oddness, in the symmetrical formulation. The charge quantization conditions for a pair of idealized charges, a and b, are inferred by examining the dependence of the action W on the choice of the arbitrary mathematical function f, and requiring the uniqueness of exp f iWJ. For the unsymmetrical viewpoint the half-integer condition of Dirac is obtained, e,gb/4m = ~~, while the symmetrical formulation requires the integer condition (e,gb —ebg, )/4m' = n. The Dirac injunction, "a string must never pass through a charged particle, " is criticized as unnecessarily restrictive, owing to its origin in a classical action context. As simplified by a restriction to small momentum transfers, permitting the neglect of form-factor and vacuum-polarization effects, the dynamics of a realistic system of two spin— dyons is shown to involve the same interaction structure used in the idealized discussion.
Investigation of Impatiens necrotic spot virus outbreaks in New Zealand

Impatiens necrotic spot virus (INSV) was first detected in New Zealand in August 2003 in Freesia refracta plants growing in a nursery on the South Island of New Zealand. Surveys were conducted to determine the extent of spread of the virus within the nursery and to other sites around the country. INSV was confirmed by a newly developed reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) in impatiens (Impatiens walleriana), primula (Primula obconica) and Ranunculus sp. at the original site and in impatiens (I. walleriana) at two additional North Island sites. Infected material was destroyed and a management program established with the industry. However, in June 2006 a begonia (Begonia × tuberhybrida) specimen from a fourth North Island nursery was received which was found to be infected with INSV. Other species confirmed by RT-PCR to be infected at this site include cyclamen (Cyclamen persicum), gardenia (Gardenia jasminoides), gerbera (Gerbera jamesonii), as well as hibiscus (Hibiscus rosa-sinensis), which is a new host for INSV. Partial nucleotide sequences obtained by RT-PCR were found to be closely related to published sequences.
Historical Archive Ontologies Requirements, Modeling and Visualization

— Most ontology development methodologies and tools for ontology management deal with ontology snapshots, i.e. they model and manage only the most recent version of ontologies, which is inadequate for contexts where the history of the ontology is of interest, such as historical archives. This work presents a set of requirements for the modeling and visualization of a temporal ontology used as a tool for the representation of historical information. In accordance to these requirements, a visualization plug-in was designed and implemented, featuring a set of tools that enable users to efficiently examine ontology temporal characteristics such as class and instance evolution along the timeline.
Multi-assignment clustering for Boolean data

Conventional clustering methods typically assume that each data item belongs to a single cluster. This assumption does not hold in general. In order to overcome this limitation, we propose a generative method for clustering vectorial data, where each object can be assigned to multiple clusters. Using a deterministic annealing scheme, our method decomposes the observed data into the contributions of individual clusters and infers their parameters. Experiments on synthetic Boolean data show that our method achieves higher accuracy in the source parameter estimation and superior cluster stability compared to state-of-the-art approaches. We also apply our method to an important problem in computer security known as role mining. Experiments on real-world access control data show performance gains in generalization to new employees against other multi-assignment methods. In challenging situations with high noise levels, our approach maintains its good performance, while alternative state-of-the-art techniques lack robustness.
An Economic Analysis of Interregional Commodity Flows

This paper analyzes interregional commodity flows in order to clarify the characteristics of trade structures for the regional economy in Japan. Two types of analytical model are indicated according to two different objectives. One is to characterize the role of each industrial sector, the other is to take into account the relative connectivity of the interregional relationships under study. Even these simple models provide some useful information for regional development and planning, as demonstrated in this paper by using data from the 1970 interregional input—output table.
Software Quality Assessment of Open Source Software

The open source software ecosystem comprises more than a hundred thousand applications of varying quality. Individuals and organizations wishing to use open source software packages have scarce objective data to evaluate their quality. However, open source development projects by definition allow anybody to read, and therefore evaluate their source code. In addition, most projects also publish process-related artefacts, such as bug databases, mailing lists, and configuration management system logs. The software quality observatory is a platform that uses these product and process data sources to automatically evaluate the quality of open source projects. A plugin-based service-oriented architecture allows the mixing and matching of metrics extraction suites, source code repositories, and transformation filters. The resulting platform is aimed at it consultants and managers, the open source community, and researchers.
Decreased expression of p38 MAPK mediates protective effects of hydrogen sulfide on hepatic fibrosis.

AIM To investigate the in vitro and in vivo effects of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) on activated hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) and carbon tetrachloride (CCl4)-induced hepatic fibrosis rats. To explore the in vitro and in vivo expression of Phospho-p38, Phospho-Akt and NF-kB in HSCs treated with H2S. MATERIALS AND METHODS HSC-T6 cells were incubated and activated with 500 µg/L ferric nitrilotriacetate (Fe-NTA), and then were incubated with NaHS, an H2S-releasing molecule for 6, 12, 24 and 48 h. MTT assay was performed to detect cell viability. Propidium iodide (PI) staining was used to determine cell cycle by flow cytometry. Apoptosis was detected with Annexin-V FITC (fluorescein isothiocyanate) and PI (propidium iodide) double staining. Western blotting was performed to detect protein expressions of Phospho-p38, Phospho-Akt and NF-kB. Hepatic fibrosis model was established by intraperitoneal injection of CCl4 in male Wistar rats, and rats were randomly divided into three groups, including healthy control, rats treated with CCl4 + saline, and rats treated with CCl4 + NaHS. Immunohistochemistry analysis was performed to measure protein expression of Phospho-p38 and Phospho-Akt in rat hepatic samples. RESULTS NaHS inhibited the proliferation of Fe-NTA (nitrilotriacetic acid)-induced HSC-T6 cells in a dose-dependent way at 6, 12, 24 and 48 h. NaHS (500 µmol/L) induced G1 phase cell cycle arrest and promoted survival in Fe-NTA-induced HSC-T6 cells. NaHS decreased Phospho-p38 and increased Phospho-Akt expressions in Fe-NTA-induced HSC-T6 cells and CCl4-induced liver fibrosis rats. CONCLUSIONS Exogenous H2S inhibits activated HSC-T6 cells and induces cell cycle arrest and apoptosis. Decreased Phospho-p38 and increased Phospho-Akt expressions may mediate the anti-fibrosis effect by exogenous H2S.
Learning Style of Students and Practitioners in Five Health Professions

This study investigated the learning styles of students and practitioners in Israel within five health professions—occupational therapy, social work, nursing, physical therapy, and clinical psychology. The study included 629 subjects. Kolb's (1976) Learning Style Inventory was used. The findings suggest greater variance in learning styles among the students as compared to practitioners. Occupational therapy students were found to be the least abstract among all groups. Both occupational therapy students and practitioners show an accommodator type. The findings hold implications for the educational process of occupational therapists.
The Role of Radiotherapy and Chemotherapy in the Treatment of Primary Adult High Grade Gliomas: Assessment of Patients for These Treatment Approaches and the Common Immediate Side Effects

Gliomas are the commonest primary brain tumours in adults. They are usually classified and graded according to the criteria by the World Health Organisation. High-grade gliomas are the most malignant primary brain tumours. Conventional therapies include surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. The tumours often demonstrate high levels of resistance to these conventional therapies, and in spite of treatment advances the prognosis remains poor.
Fixed Food Eruption Caused by Actinidia arguta (Hardy Kiwi): A Case Report and Literature Review

Fixed drug eruption (FDE) is a common hypersensitivity reaction characterized by recurrent, well-circumscribed, erythematous patches that arise at the same site as a result of systemic drug exposure. However, fixed food eruption (FFE), a lesion triggered by food ingestion, is a rare allergy that was first defined in 1996. Based on their anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties, the fruit and leaves of Actinidia arguta, the hardy kiwi, are widely consumed across Korea, Japan, and China. This report describes the first case of FFE caused by hardy kiwi leaves, known as Daraesun in Korean, confirmed by oral provocation tests and skin biopsy.
Challenges and Opportunities in the Software Process Improvement in Small and Medium Enterprises: A Field Study

The characteristics and profiles of organizations are important issues for the planning of their software process improvement. It supports the alignment with organizational culture as well as with the consolidation of best practices already implemented. This paper presents the results of a field study to identify the perception of the industry about challenges and opportunities of software process improvement faced by Small and Medium Enterprises. This field study aimed at identifying the profile and perception of a group of software development firms concerning software process improvement. The results indicated a list of challenges and activities faced and performed by the companies toward the software process improvement journey.
Robust adaptive optimal control modification with large adaptive gain

A new adaptive control modification is presented that can achieve robust adaptation with a large adaptive gain without incurring high-frequency oscillations as with the standard model-reference adaptive control. The modification is based on an optimal control formulation that minimizes the L2 norm of the tracking error. The optimality condition is used to derive the modification using the gradient method. The adaptive optimal control modification results in a stable adaptation and allows a large adaptive gain to be used for better tracking performance with improved stability robustness. Simulations demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed modification.
IDDM Epidemiology: Next Generation of Research

1. Haynal A, Schulz P: Compliance: one aspect of the doctorpatient relationship: an overview. In Diabetes Education: How to Improve Patient Education. Assal JP, Berger M, Gay N, Canivet J, Eds. Amsterdam, Excerpta Med., 1983, p. 239-71 (Proc. 2nd Eur. Symp. Diabetes Educ. Study Group, Geneva, 3-6 June 1982) 2. Ziegler O, Kolopp M, Got I, Genton P, Debry G, Drouin P: Reliability of self-monitoring of blood glucose by CSIItreated patients with type I diabetes. Diabetes Care 12:184— 88, 1989 3. Mazze RS, Shamoon RR, Pasmantier R, Lucido D, Murphy J, Harmann K, Kuykendall V, Lopatin W: Reliability of blood glucose monitoring by patients with diabetes mellitus. Am ) Med 77:211-17, 1984 4. Williams CD, Scobie IN, Till S, Crane R, Lowy C, Sonksen PH: Use of memory meters to measure reliability of self blood glucose monitoring. Diabetic Med 5:459-62, 1988
Reciprocity and Change within the Affective Family Environment in Early Adolescence

This study examined: (1) the extent and change of affective relationships between young adolescents and their parents over a two-year period; and (2) the amount of reciprocity or concordance of family feelings. Relationship patterns were examined longitudinally from the child’s sixth to eighth grade in school (Petersen, 1984). Mothers, fathers, and adolescents completed the Lowman Inventory of Family Feelings (LIFF; Lowman, 1974, 1980). The results are based on a longitudinal sample of 54 complete triads and between 128 and 284 dyads depending on measurement point and informant. Family feelings were positive overall, but declined by eighth grade. Here, no differences in results depending on the gender of the adolescent or the parent were detected. Nonreciprocity of family feelings was only present in sixth grade but not in eighth grade. At sixth grade, boys especially, shared less positive family feelings. Results indicate the importance of studying the quality and change of parent-offspring relationships across adolescence.
Upregulation of glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide and its receptor in the retina of streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats

The pathology of diabetic retinopathy includes dilatation and beading of retinal vessels, and vascular sheathing. To gain a better understanding of the molecular events leading to diabetic retinopathy, we investigated disease-specific gene responses by screening differential expression using cDNA microarray. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were intraperitoneally injected with streptozotocin (STZ, 50 mg/kg) or the control buffer and were maintained for 6 weeks. Total RNA extracted from the retinas of both groups was used for cDNA microarray analysis. Signals from all the spots representing hybridized DNA were quantified and compared between the normal and diabetic rat retinas. Among 1176 genes analyzed, the retinal expression of glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP) was found to increase in STZ-induced diabetic rats compared to controls. GIP is a secreted protein, known to be released from the small intestine, which potentiates glucoseinduced insulin secretion from the pancreas. However, the expression of GIP and its receptor (GIPR) has not been previously noted in the rat retina. To further validate the expression of GIP in the rat retina and to determine its possible role in the development of early diabetic retinopathy, we investigated its expression by RT-PCR, Northern blotting, and immunohistochemistry in normal and diabetic rat retinas. GIP mRNA and protein are not only expressed in the rat retina, but their levels are greater in the diabetic rat as compared to controls. And GIPR expression was also upregulated in the retinas of STZ-induced diabetic rats. We here demonstrate for the first time the expression of GIP and GIPR in the rat retina. And we also revealed some genetic events in the early stage of diabetic retinopathy including the de novo increment of GIP and GIPR expression in the retina.
A Novel Method to Handle the Effect of Uneven Sampling Effort in Biodiversity Databases

How reliable are results on spatial distribution of biodiversity based on databases? Many studies have evidenced the uncertainty related to this kind of analysis due to sampling effort bias and the need for its quantification. Despite that a number of methods are available for that, little is known about their statistical limitations and discrimination capability, which could seriously constrain their use. We assess for the first time the discrimination capacity of two widely used methods and a proposed new one (FIDEGAM), all based on species accumulation curves, under different scenarios of sampling exhaustiveness using Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analyses. Additionally, we examine to what extent the output of each method represents the sampling completeness in a simulated scenario where the true species richness is known. Finally, we apply FIDEGAM to a real situation and explore the spatial patterns of plant diversity in a National Park. FIDEGAM showed an excellent discrimination capability to distinguish between well and poorly sampled areas regardless of sampling exhaustiveness, whereas the other methods failed. Accordingly, FIDEGAM values were strongly correlated with the true percentage of species detected in a simulated scenario, whereas sampling completeness estimated with other methods showed no relationship due to null discrimination capability. Quantifying sampling effort is necessary to account for the uncertainty in biodiversity analyses, however, not all proposed methods are equally reliable. Our comparative analysis demonstrated that FIDEGAM was the most accurate discriminator method in all scenarios of sampling exhaustiveness, and therefore, it can be efficiently applied to most databases in order to enhance the reliability of biodiversity analyses.
Structural Abnormalities and Deficient Maintenance of Peripheral Nerve Myelin in Mice Lacking the Gap Junction Protein Connexin 32

Mutations affecting the connexin 32 (Cx32) gene are associated with the X-linked form of the hereditary peripheral neuropathy Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease (CMTX). We show that Cx32-deficient mice develop a late-onset progressive peripheral neuropathy with abnormalities comparable to those associated with CMTX, thus providing proof of the critical role of Cx32 in the maintenance of peripheral nerve myelin and an animal model for CMTX. Frequently observed features include abnormally thin myelin sheaths, cellular onion bulb formation reflecting myelin degeneration-induced Schwann cell proliferation, and enlarged periaxonal collars while nerve conductance properties are altered only slightly. These observations are consistent with earlier hypotheses suggesting a function of Cx32 as a channel-forming protein that facilitates the communication between the abaxonal and adaxonal aspects of Schwann cell cytoplasm.