Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effectiveness of Occupational Therapy Strategies for Teaching Handwriting Skills to Kindergarten Children

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the Write direction handwriting skill development program implemented as a part of the general education curriculum in kindergarten classrooms. A convenience sample of 211 students in 14 kindergarten classes and 12 schools participated in the Write direction, a 14-week handwriting skill development program designed to use occupational therapy strategies to promote hand and finger skills, kinesthetic awareness of letter formation, directionality of letter formation, and visual-motor skills. A pretest–posttest design utilizing a matched comparison group (n = 171 students) was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the program to improve handwriting skills. Students who participated in the Write direction program showed a statistically greater improvement in handwriting skills pre- to postintervention (p < .05), including approximation, line orientation, proportion, and directionality, compared to students who did not participate in the program. The use of occupational therapy strategies to promote handwriting skill development as part of a kindergarten general education curriculum shows promise for improving handwriting skills.
Constructive Methods for Initialization and Handling Mixed State-Input Constraints in Optimal Control

Newmethodsarepresented toaddresstwoissuesin indirectoptimalcontrol:the calculationofastarting pointfor the numerical solution and the consideration of mixed state-input constraints. In the first method, an auxiliary optimal control problem is constructed from a given initial trajectory of the system. Its adjoint variables are simply zero. This auxiliary problem is then used within a homotopy approach to eventually reach the original optimal control problem and the desired optimal solution. The second method concerns the incorporation of mixed stateinput constraints into the dynamics of the considered optimal control problem. It uses saturation functions which strictly satisfy the constraints. In this way, the original constrained optimal control problem is transformed into an unconstrained one with an additional regularization term. The two approaches are derived within a general framework. For sake of illustration, they are applied to the space shuttle reentry problem, which represents a challenging benchmark due to its high numerical sensitivity and the presence of input and heating constraints. The reentryproblemissolvedwithacollocationmethodanddemonstratestheapplicabilityandaccuracyoftheproposed constructive methods.
Finding Witnesses for Stability in the Hospitals/Residents Problem

The Hospitals/Residents problem is a many-to-one generalization of the well-known Stable Marriage problem. Its instance consists of a set of residents, a set of hospitals, each resident’s preference list, each hospital’s preference list, and each hospital’s capacity (i.e., the number of available positions). It asks to find a stable matching between residents and hospitals. In this paper, we consider the problem of deciding, given residents’ preference lists and a matching, whether there are hospitals’ preference lists that make a given matching stable. We call this problem Stable Hospital’s Preference List problem (SHPL). It is easy to see that there always exists a solution if we allow arbitrary preference lists of hospitals. Considering more suitable situations, we pose a restricted version, called k-SHPL, in which there are only k kinds of preference lists of hospitals. We show that 1-SHPL is solvable in polynomial time, while k-SHPL is NP-complete for any k such that 2 ≤ k ≤ n1− , where n is the number of residents and is any positive constant. We also present four heuristics algorithms (first-fit algorithms) for 2-SHPL. We implement these algorithms and present a computational study using random instances.
Novel Reporter Alleles of GSK-3α and GSK-3β

Glycogen Synthase Kinase 3 (GSK-3) is a key player in development, physiology and disease. Because of this, GSK-3 inhibitors are increasingly being explored for a variety of applications. In addition most analyses focus on GSK-3β and overlook the closely related protein GSK-3α. Here, we describe novel GSK-3α and GSK-3β mouse alleles that allow us to visualise expression of their respective mRNAs by tracking β-galactosidase activity. We used these new lacZ alleles to compare expression in the palate and cranial sutures and found that there was indeed differential expression. Furthermore, both are loss of function alleles and can be used to generate homozygous mutant mice; in addition, excision of the lacZ cassette from GSK-3α creates a Cre-dependent tissue-specific knockout. As expected, GSK3α mutants were viable, while GSK3β mutants died after birth with a complete cleft palate. We also assessed the GSK-3α mutants for cranial and sternal phenotypes and found that they were essentially normal. Finally, we observed gestational lethality in compound GSK-3β−/−; GSK3α+/− mutants, suggesting that GSK-3 dosage is critical during embryonic development.
Investigations on the Mechanism of Epileptic Discharge in the Hippocampus

1 Les auteurs ont étudié, chez le chat, des crises hippocampales produites par stimulation répétitive du cortex entorhinal ou de la bandelette de l'hippocampe. Des enregistrements ont été effectués avec des microélectrodes et amplification à courant continu. 2 Le profil du gradient de potentiel continu constaté dans l'hippocampe “au repos” révèle que les couches de cellules de l'hippocampe méme et du dentelé de l'hippocampe manifestent une négativité dépassant de plusieurs mV celle des couches dendritiques. 3 Des impulsions afférentes venues par la voie perforante dépolarisent les dendrites apicaux, ce qui produit, à travers la couche apicale dendritique, une réponse négative transitoire réfléchie en onde positive dans la couche pyramidale et le stratum oriens de l'hippocampe, ainsi que dans la couche de cellules granuleuses et le hile du dentelé de l'hippocampe. 4 Une stimulation répétitive du cortex entorhinal amène une dviation progressive du courant continu de méme polarité que la réponse transitoire principale, laquelle est aussi bipolaire, négative dans la couche apicale dendritique et positive dans la couche cellulaire. Un instant aprés, la direction de la déviation change et, aprés avoir traversé la ligne de base, conduit à une déviation du courant direct de polarité opposée se développant négativement dans la couche cellulaire et le stratum oriens et, positivement, dans la couche apicale dendritique. A ce moment, I'hippocampe est capable de supporter par lui‐měme la décharge d'une crise durant laquelle les déviations du courant continu sont méme accentudes. Les déviations du courant continu semblent résulter largement du total de la dépolarisation résiduelle des structures post‐synaptiques. 5 Durant la décharge d'une crise auto‐soutenue, des transitions rapides, typiques quant à l'activité conduite, se produisent dans la couche cellulaire tandis We les dendrites apicaux suivent, plus ou mains passivement, l'activité de la touche celldaire. 6 L'activité conduite de la touche cellulaire est redirigée vers d'autres celldes pyramidales via les voies collatérales. Ceci, ajouté & l'effet électronique exeré par la deviation négative du courant continu produite dans la couche cellulaire et le stratum oriens, semble représenter le mécanisme de base responsable de l'activité autor‐régénératrice de la crise. 7 Pendant la diminution de l'activité critique, durant la phase clonique, il peut survenir des reprises caractéristiques et réitérts du niveau du courant continu. Ces changements sont de l'ordre de plusieurs mV. Ils sont négatifs dans la couche cellulaire et positifs dans la couche apicale dendritique. Il y a des décharges cellulaires durant la reprise, lesquelles cessent leur bombardement dans les intervalles qui les séparent; ceci suggére l'idée que I'électrotonus négatif exercé lors de la reprise facilite la décharge cellulaire. 8 Des études de polarisation appuient l'opinion que les déviations du courant continu survenantes pendant les décharges d'une crise font partie du mécanisme d'activité auto‐soutenue de la crise.
Microsoft Cambridge at TREC-10: Filtering and Web Tracks

This report is concerned with the Adaptive Filtering and Web tracks. There are separate reports in this volume [1, 2] on the Microsoft Research Redmond participation in QA track and the Microsoft Research Beijing participation in the Web track. Two runs were submitted for the Adaptive Filtering track, on the adaptive filtering task only (two optimisation measures), and several runs for the Web track, both tasks (adhoc and home page finding). The filtering system is somewhat similar to the one used for TREC–9; the web system is a simple Okapi system without blind feedback, but the document indexing includes anchor text from incoming links.
Comparing RBF and Fuzzy Inference Systems on theoretical and practical basis

This paper aims at helping to clarify the current confusion raised by a lot of works comparing or merging neural net with fuzzy inference systems. On the theoretical side, we first show that a specific family of neural nets: Radial-Basis Functions (RBF) and a specific family of fuzzy inference systems: Tagaki-Sugeno fuzzy inference systems (FIS) are nearly equivalent structure although FIS can be seen as slightly more general including RBF as a result of some architectural options and simplifications. However the small differences which render FIS more general can lead to a different interpretation of the functioning of these methods. In order to resolve a problem more easily RBF projects the problem data into a new abstract space whereas FIS roughly try to decompose such a problem and thus to allow for a lot of local operations, smoothly combined in some overlapping regions. On the practical side, experimental comparisons will be presented on Benchmark problems of classification and identification. Current results seem to indicate that while it is worth maintaining the more simple and less parametrized RBF for problems of classification, the small structural additions leading to FIS can be of interest for function identification.
A Multilevel Hierarchical Image Segmentation Method for Urban Impervious Surface Mapping Using Very High Resolution Imagery

This paper presents a hierarchical image segmentation method that combines multichannel watershed transformation and dynamics of watershed contours for the segmentation of very high resolution (VHR) multispectral imagery. The image gradient was first extracted from a multispectral image using a multichannel morphological method, followed by classical watershed transformation to produce an initial segmentation result. The resulting watershed contours were then analyzed according to their relevance relative to the minima of the adjacent basins to construct an image containing information about their dynamics. By thresholding the image of the contour dynamics at different levels, multilevel hierarchical segmentation results with different levels of detail were achieved. The proposed method was evaluated by comparing with existing methods through visual inspection, quantitative measures and applications in urban impervious surface mapping, using two sets of VHR image data. The experimental results showed that the proposed method produced more accurate segmentation results compared to an existing single-level segmentation method, in terms of visual and quantitative evaluations. While used for urban impervious surface mapping, the proposed method achieved an overall accuracy significantly higher than the pixel based classification method, and also higher than the object based classification using a single-level segmentation result. Compared with the most widely used segmentation method implemented in the eCognition, the proposed method achieved a comparable performance, although they have different segmentation details. The proposed segmentation method can be used in relevant VHR image processing and applications.
A Content-Processing View of Hesitation Phenomena

Hesitation phenomena are intricately connected with prospective and retrospective speech-production tasks and mark critical points in processing. They are also causally related to types of quality control which can be expressed as conversational postulates governing wellformedness criteria. Corresponding to the concepts of forestalled versus committed errors (error-free or error-full output), two major hesitation categories suffice: stalls and repair. Supported by a corpus of English and German, the new taxonomy captures previously uncategorized information: the grammatical locus of repair operations and the structural changes they cause.
Modularity and Developmental Disorders

In this chapter, we consider the origin of uneven cognitive profiles in individuals with developmental disorders, including accounts from cognitive, brain, and genetic levels of description. We begin by introducing the main types of developmental disorder. We then discuss what is meant by the idea of modularity and the key issues surrounding it, outlining how modularity has been applied to explain deficits in developmental disorders. We illustrate competing theoretical positions by contrasting two developmental disorders, Williams syndrome (WS) and specific language impairment (SLI). In the first case, we consider cognitive deficits in WS with reference to modularity at a cognitive level and evidence from behavioral studies. In the second case, we consider SLI with reference to modularity at the neural level and evidence from brain imaging studies. We finish by considering the future for modular theories of atypical development, including the implication of recent findings from genetics and from computational modeling.
Optimization of the Digital Near-Field Beamforming for Underwater 3-D Sonar Imaging System

This paper proposes a novel approximation for the delays of digital near-field beamforming based on a planar array. An optimized algorithm for the underwater 3-D sonar imaging system based on the novel approximation will also be described. The algorithm is applied to both an evenly spaced planar array and an unevenly spaced planar array. A data path for the optimized algorithm will be illustrated. Comparisons of the memory and the computational requirements between the optimized algorithm and the direct method (DM) beamforming will be presented. Comparisons of the proposed approximation and the Fresnel approximation will also be demonstrated. This paper illustrates that the proposed approximation enlarges the validity region of the system's view scene as compared with the Fresnel approximation. The optimized algorithm has the advantage of reducing the memory requirements for parameter storage comparing with DM beamforming.
Lipid peroxidation in cord blood and neonatal outcome

Background: Periventricular–intraventricular hemorrhage, necrotizing enterocolitis, chronic lung disease and retinopathy of prematurity have been referred to as oxygen radical diseases (ORD) because they are thought to be related to excess oxidant stress relative to anti‐oxidant defenses in premature infants. 8‐Isoprostane is a product of lipid peroxidation that can be used as a measure of free radical exposure or injury. The aim of the present study was to determine whether fetal oxidant stress is associated with adverse effects in preterm infants.
Rate-Adaptive Framing for Interfered Wireless Networks

The majority of existing wireless rate controls are based on the implicit assumption that frames are corrupted due to the random, arbitrary environmental and thermal noises. They generally reduce the channel rate on frame losses, trading lower efficiency in frequency band utilization for more robust modulation so that the current noise level may be tolerable. In highly interfered wireless networks where frames are lost mainly due to interference from other wireless transceivers, simply reducing the channel rate prolongs the frame transmission time and therefore aggravates frame loss ratio. This positive feedback in the rate control loop quickly diverges the interfered transceivers into a suboptimal channel rate and drives the network into a state with high interference. In the worst case, interfered transceivers can be starved. In this paper we present RAF, the rate-adaptive framing that jointly controls the channel rate and frame size according to the observed interference patterns and noise level at the receiver. Based on the inputs from physical layer carrier sense, the receiver derives the optimal channel rate and frame size that maximize throughput, and informs the transmitter of such optimal configuration in a few bits in the per-frame acknowledgement. Through intensive simulations we show that RAF consistently outperforms ARF, RBAR, and OAR in all simulated scenarios.
Phonotactic restrictions in disordered child phonology: A case study

This study presents a data sample elicited from an English-speaking boy aged 9;0, with disordered phonological development. Detailed phonetic and phonological analyses using procedures selected from Phonological Assessment of Child Speech (Grunwell, 1985) reveal a well-developed segmental phonetic repertoire in conjunction with extremely restricted phonotactic structures. This unusual disordered pattern in child phonology is discussed in the light of other information about the child's capabilities. It is suggested that the phonotactic restrictions are probably attributable to an identified motor-programming problem which is possibly associated with an underlying neurological dysfunction. Notwithstanding these observations, it is proposed that the regularity of the child's pronunciation patterns indicates that the phonotactic restrictions may also now reflect an organizational limitation on the child's productive phonology.
Appraisal and Coping: Mediators between Caregiver Stress and Psychological Wellbeing.

by ELIZABETH K. STEVENS Using a sample of 618 (414 females, 204 males) informal dementia caregivers, the relationships between the stressor (care recipient dementia severity), appraisal (overload, loss, gain, competence, satisfaction), coping (problem-focused, emotionfocused), and psychological wellbeing (positive affect, negative affect, depression) were assessed. Simple and multiple mediation analyses were performed. Caregiver appraisals mediated the effects of stress on coping, and coping mediated the effects of appraisal on wellbeing. Loss was the strongest predictor of emotion-focused coping, and emotionfocused coping predicted negative wellbeing. Positive appraisals predicted problemfocused coping, which predicted positive wellbeing. Competence predicted a third type of coping, acceptance, and acceptance was adaptive for both male and female caregivers. However, caregiver gender moderated the relationship between coping and psychological outcomes under specific circumstances. Structural equation modeling was used to model the multiple mediation results; but the complex nature of the caregiving stress and coping process precluded the development of a practically useful model.
Genome-Wide Association Study Identifies Novel Loci Associated with Circulating Phospho- and Sphingolipid Concentrations

Phospho- and sphingolipids are crucial cellular and intracellular compounds. These lipids are required for active transport, a number of enzymatic processes, membrane formation, and cell signalling. Disruption of their metabolism leads to several diseases, with diverse neurological, psychiatric, and metabolic consequences. A large number of phospholipid and sphingolipid species can be detected and measured in human plasma. We conducted a meta-analysis of five European family-based genome-wide association studies (N = 4034) on plasma levels of 24 sphingomyelins (SPM), 9 ceramides (CER), 57 phosphatidylcholines (PC), 20 lysophosphatidylcholines (LPC), 27 phosphatidylethanolamines (PE), and 16 PE-based plasmalogens (PLPE), as well as their proportions in each major class. This effort yielded 25 genome-wide significant loci for phospholipids (smallest P-value = 9.88×10−204) and 10 loci for sphingolipids (smallest P-value = 3.10×10−57). After a correction for multiple comparisons (P-value<2.2×10−9), we observed four novel loci significantly associated with phospholipids (PAQR9, AGPAT1, PKD2L1, PDXDC1) and two with sphingolipids (PLD2 and APOE) explaining up to 3.1% of the variance. Further analysis of the top findings with respect to within class molar proportions uncovered three additional loci for phospholipids (PNLIPRP2, PCDH20, and ABDH3) suggesting their involvement in either fatty acid elongation/saturation processes or fatty acid specific turnover mechanisms. Among those, 14 loci (KCNH7, AGPAT1, PNLIPRP2, SYT9, FADS1-2-3, DLG2, APOA1, ELOVL2, CDK17, LIPC, PDXDC1, PLD2, LASS4, and APOE) mapped into the glycerophospholipid and 12 loci (ILKAP, ITGA9, AGPAT1, FADS1-2-3, APOA1, PCDH20, LIPC, PDXDC1, SGPP1, APOE, LASS4, and PLD2) to the sphingolipid pathways. In large meta-analyses, associations between FADS1-2-3 and carotid intima media thickness, AGPAT1 and type 2 diabetes, and APOA1 and coronary artery disease were observed. In conclusion, our study identified nine novel phospho- and sphingolipid loci, substantially increasing our knowledge of the genetic basis for these traits.
Gravitational-Wave Inspiral of Compact Binary Systems to 7/2 Post-Newtonian Order

The inspiral of compact binaries, driven by gravitational-radiation reaction, is investigated through 7/2 post-Newtonian (3.5PN) order beyond the quadrupole radiation. We outline the derivation of the 3.5PN-accurate binary’s center-of-mass energy and emitted gravitational flux. The analysis consistently includes the relativistic effects in the binary’s equations of motion and multipole moments, as well as the contributions of tails, and tails of tails, in the wave zone. However the result is not fully determined because of some physical incompleteness, present at the 3PN order, of the model of point-particle and the associated Hadamard-type self-field regularization. The orbital phase, whose prior knowledge is crucial for searching and analyzing the inspiral signal, is computed from the standard energy balance argument.
Plant Reactome: a resource for plant pathways and comparative analysis

Plant Reactome (http://plantreactome.gramene.org/) is a free, open-source, curated plant pathway database portal, provided as part of the Gramene project. The database provides intuitive bioinformatics tools for the visualization, analysis and interpretation of pathway knowledge to support genome annotation, genome analysis, modeling, systems biology, basic research and education. Plant Reactome employs the structural framework of a plant cell to show metabolic, transport, genetic, developmental and signaling pathways. We manually curate molecular details of pathways in these domains for reference species Oryza sativa (rice) supported by published literature and annotation of well-characterized genes. Two hundred twenty-two rice pathways, 1025 reactions associated with 1173 proteins, 907 small molecules and 256 literature references have been curated to date. These reference annotations were used to project pathways for 62 model, crop and evolutionarily significant plant species based on gene homology. Database users can search and browse various components of the database, visualize curated baseline expression of pathway-associated genes provided by the Expression Atlas and upload and analyze their Omics datasets. The database also offers data access via Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and in various standardized pathway formats, such as SBML and BioPAX.