Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Do the morphological characteristics of arteriovenous malformations affect the results of radiosurgery?

OBJECT The authors sought to determine which morphological features of arteriovenous malformations (AVMs) are statistically predictive of preradiosurgical hemorrhage, postradiosurgical hemorrhage, and neuroimaging-defined failure of radiosurgical treatment. In addition, correlation between computerized tomography (CT) scanning and angiography for the identification of AVM structures was investigated. METHODS Archived CT dosimetry and available angiographic and clinical data for 268 patients in whom AVMs were treated with linear accelerator radiosurgery were retrospectively reviewed. Many of the morphological features of AVMs, including location, volume, compact or diffuse nidus, neovascularity, ease of nidus identification, number of feeding arteries, location (deep or superficial) of feeding arteries, number of draining veins, deep or superficial venous drainage, venous stenoses, venous ectasias, and the presence of intranidal aneurysms, were analyzed. In addition, a number of patient and treatment factors, including patient age, presenting symptoms, radiation dose, repeated treatment, and radiological outcome, were subjected to multivariate analyses. Two hundred twenty-seven patients were treated with radiosurgery for the first time and 41 patients underwent repeated radiosurgery. Eighty-one patients presented with a history of AVM hemorrhage and 91 patients had AVMs in a periventricular location. Twenty-six patients (10%) experienced a hemorrhage following radiosurgery. Of the 268 patients, 81 (30%) experienced angiographically defined cures, and 37 (14%) experienced MR imaging-defined cures. Eighty-six patients (32%) experienced neuroimaging-defined treatment failure, and 64 underwent insufficiently long follow up. A larger AVM volume (odds ratio [OR] 0.349; p = 0.004) was associated with a decreased rate of pretreatment hemorrhage, whereas periventricular location (OR 6.358; p = 0.000) was associated with an increased rate of pretreatment hemorrhage. None of the analyzed factors was predictive of hemorrhage following radiosurgery. A higher radiosurgical dose was strongly correlated with neuroimaging-defined success (OR 3.743; p = 0.006), whereas a diffuse nidus structure (OR 0.246; p = 0.008) and associated neovascularity (OR 0.428; p = 0.048) were each associated with a lower neuroimaging-defined cure rate. A strong correlation between CT scanning and angiography was noted for both nidus structure (p = 0.000; Fisher exact test) and neovascularity (p = 0.002; Fisher exact test). CONCLUSIONS Patients presenting with AVMs that are small or periventricular were at higher risk for experiencing hemorrhage. A higher radiosurgical dose correlated strongly with neuroimaging-defined success. Patients in whom the AVM had a diffuse structure or associated neovascularity were at higher risk for neuroimaging-defined failure of radiosurgery. A strong correlation between CT scanning and angiography in the assessment of AVM structure was demonstrated.
Single-stage AC/DC converter based on sepic topology operating in continuous conduction mode

This paper presents the analysis of a single-phase single-stage switched-mode power supply based on a SEPIC converter operating in continuous conduction mode. The SEPIC converter with bridgeless configuration at the input has the benefit of having fewer semiconductors in conduction in a switching period when compared with the conventional topology. Thus, the overall efficiency is expected to increase. Moreover, the studied topology has high robustness, since to perform the AC-DC conversion with high power factor and high frequency galvanic isolation it uses only two transistors and two diodes. The theoretical analysis, the power stage design and numerical simulation results from a 300 W converter are presented. The converter was designed for a 127 V of input voltage, 200 V of output voltage and switching frequency of 50 kHz.
Higher harmonic oscillations in duffing - Van der Pol equation

Van der Pol equation submitted to an external driving force gives the bifurcation structure considered in this paper. This structure known as an isoordinal lips cascade is related to the higher harmonic predominance. It is shown that the study of the higher harmonic predominance in a parameter plane leads to conclude about the existence or non-existence of such a bifurcation structure.
Discovery of Novel Small Molecule Activators of β-Catenin Signaling

Wnt/β-catenin signaling plays a major role in embryonic development and adult stem cell maintenance. Reduced activation of the Wnt/β-catenin pathway underlies neurodegenerative disorders and aberrations in bone formation. Screening of a small molecule compound library with a β-galactosidase fragment complementation assay measuring β-catenin nuclear entry revealed bona fide activators of β-catenin signaling. The compounds stabilized cytoplasmic β-catenin and activated β–catenin-dependent reporter gene activity. Although the mechanism through which the compounds activate β-catenin signaling has yet to be determined, several key regulators of Wnt/β-catenin signaling, including glycogen synthase kinase 3 and Frizzled receptors, were excluded as the molecular target. The compounds displayed remarkable selectivity, as they only induced β-catenin signaling in a human osteosarcoma U2OS cell line and not in a variety of other cell lines examined. Our data indicate that differences in cellular Wnt/β-catenin signaling machinery can be exploited to identify cell type-specific activators of Wnt/β-catenin signaling.
SE-Sync: A certifiably correct algorithm for synchronization over the special Euclidean group

Many important geometric estimation problems naturally take the form of synchronization over the special Euclidean group: estimate the values of a set of unknown group elements x 1 , … , x n ∈ SE ( d ) given noisy measurements of a subset of their pairwise relative transforms x i − 1 x j . Examples of this class include the foundational problems of pose-graph simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) (in robotics), camera motion estimation (in computer vision), and sensor network localization (in distributed sensing), among others. This inference problem is typically formulated as a non-convex maximum-likelihood estimation that is computationally hard to solve in general. Nevertheless, in this paper we present an algorithm that is able to efficiently recover certifiably globally optimal solutions of the special Euclidean synchronization problem in a non-adversarial noise regime. The crux of our approach is the development of a semidefinite relaxation of the maximum-likelihood estimation (MLE) whose minimizer provides an exact maximum-likelihood estimate so long as the magnitude of the noise corrupting the available measurements falls below a certain critical threshold; furthermore, whenever exactness obtains, it is possible to verify this fact a posteriori, thereby certifying the optimality of the recovered estimate. We develop a specialized optimization scheme for solving large-scale instances of this semidefinite relaxation by exploiting its low-rank, geometric, and graph-theoretic structure to reduce it to an equivalent optimization problem defined on a low-dimensional Riemannian manifold, and then design a Riemannian truncated-Newton trust-region method to solve this reduction efficiently. Finally, we combine this fast optimization approach with a simple rounding procedure to produce our algorithm, SE-Sync. Experimental evaluation on a variety of simulated and real-world pose-graph SLAM datasets shows that SE-Sync is capable of recovering certifiably globally optimal solutions when the available measurements are corrupted by noise up to an order of magnitude greater than that typically encountered in robotics and computer vision applications, and does so significantly faster than the Gauss–Newton-based approach that forms the basis of current state-of-the-art techniques.
Baby carriers: a comparison of traditional sling and front-worn, rear-facing harness carriers

Abstract The baby sling is a traditional baby carrier in Asia and the front-worn harness carriers are adapted in modern society. We compared the baby sling with front-worn harness carrier in terms of the physiological responses of the baby caregiver. Ten females (aged 23–32 years) and 10 males (aged 23–35 years) were recruited to participate in this study. Each subject was asked to carry two different weight baby dummies (7 and 10 kg) using three different baby carriers. The electromyography (EMG), shoulder tactile pressure, skin temperatures as well as heart rate were measured during baby carrying. The traditional baby sling and the two front-worn harness carriers showed little differences in EMG activities, shoulder tactile pressure and exercise intensity. Carrying two different weighted baby dummies caused significant differences in EMG and shoulder tactile pressure. Based on the findings of this study, recommendations about the improved baby carrier design are proposed. Practitioner Summary: This study compared traditional sling and front-worn harness baby carriers using caregivers’ physiological responses including electromyography, shoulder tactile pressure, skin temperature and heart rate. Differences found between the carriers provide valuable information for baby carrier design and recommendations for the baby-carrying task.
The spatial structure of resting state connectivity stability on the scale of minutes

Resting state functional MRI (rsfMRI) connectivity patterns are not temporally stable, but fluctuate in time at scales shorter than most common rest scan durations (5–10 min). Consequently, connectivity patterns for two different portions of the same scan can differ drastically. To better characterize this temporal variability and understand how it is spatially distributed across the brain, we scanned subjects continuously for 60 min, at a temporal resolution of 1 s, while they rested inside the scanner. We then computed connectivity matrices between functionally-defined regions of interest for non-overlapping 1 min windows, and classified connections according to their strength, polarity, and variability. We found that the most stable connections correspond primarily to inter-hemispheric connections between left/right homologous ROIs. However, only 32% of all within-network connections were classified as most stable. This shows that resting state networks have some long-term stability, but confirms the flexible configuration of these networks, particularly those related to higher order cognitive functions. The most variable connections correspond primarily to inter-hemispheric, across-network connections between non-homologous regions in occipital and frontal cortex. Finally we found a series of connections with negative average correlation, but further analyses revealed that such average negative correlations may be related to the removal of CSF signals during pre-processing. Using the same dataset, we also evaluated how similarity of within-subject whole-brain connectivity matrices changes as a function of window duration (used here as a proxy for scan duration). Our results suggest scanning for a minimum of 10 min to optimize within-subject reproducibility of connectivity patterns across the entire brain, rather than a few predefined networks.
The hidden consequences of fire suppression

Wilderness managers need a way to quantify and monitor the effects of suppressing lightning-caused wildfires, which can alter natural fire regimes, vegetation, and habitat. Using computerized models of fire spread, weather, and fuels, it is now possible to quantify many of the hidden consequences of fire suppression. Case study watersheds in Yosemite and Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Parks were used to simulate where fires might have spread if they had not been suppressed, and what effects those fires would have had on fuels.
Comparison of apparent power consumption in Synchronous Reluctance and Induction Motor under vector control

The advances in power electronics devices have opened the possibility of counting on Synchronous Reluctance Motors (SynRM) where variation of speed is required. However, Induction Motors (IM) have successfully supplied this demand in industrial applications. As for traction applications, SynRM aided by Permanent Magnet is also an alternative to Interior Permanent Magnet Motors (IPM). In this study, a 55kW Inverter-Driven Induction Motor (IDIM) was designed and evaluated through Indirect Field Oriented Current Control (IFOCC) strategy. Likewise, an equivalent Synchronous Reluctance Motor with inductance ratio in the range of 6-10 was also designed by using the same stator as IDIM. A Vector Control (VC) strategy based upon the point of maximum power factor was implemented to test its performance. Both motors optimized for variable speed applications were compared under the same variations of load, voltage and frequency in order to assess their consumption from an input apparent power point of view. By assuming a limit for the input power provided by the same Variable Frequency Driver (VFD), the Induction Motor was able to bear a higher overload, whereas the Synchronous Reluctance Motor compared favorably and showed lower power consumption in average under intermittent loads.
Coxibs and Other Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs in Animal Models of Cancer Chemoprevention

Coxibs, including celecoxib, and other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAID), including aspirin, are among the most promising cancer chemopreventive agents in development today. This article examines the data on the efficacy of these agents in animal model studies of cancer prevention carried out by the authors. The studies evaluated here are restricted to our rodent models of colon/intestinal, bladder, and nonmelanoma skin cancer, in which celecoxib and other NSAIDs were administered as either cancer preventive or therapeutic agents. These studies may shed light on several questions. Is celecoxib unique compared with other NSAIDs, and if so, what implications would this have for human use? Are standard NSAIDs (which inhibit both COX-1 and COX-2) as effective as celecoxib in animal studies? Is the efficacy of celecoxib in particular or NSAIDs in general due to their off-target effects or to their effects on COX-1 and COX-2? What is the likely efficacy of low-dose aspirin? Some questions raised by human trials and epidemiology are discussed and related to our observations in animal model studies. We also discuss the problem of cardiovascular (CV) events associated with coxibs and certain other NSAIDs and whether results in animal models are predictive of efficacy in humans. On the basis of epidemiologic studies and its CV profile, aspirin seems to be the most promising NSAID for preventing human colorectal, bladder, and skin cancer, although the animal data for aspirin are less clear. A comprehensive understanding of the results of coxibs and other NSAIDs in animal studies may help inform and shape human trials of these commonly employed, relatively inexpensive, and highly effective compounds. Cancer Prev Res; 4(11); 1728–35. ©2011 AACR.
Multi-Functional and Biological Reliability of Wetlands

They are an important resource, not only for their value to humans but also as a habitat for many plants and animals which have adapted to living in such a waterlogged environment. Indeed, they are vital to the many waterbirds, fish, crustaceans, reptiles, amphibians and invertebrates who spend some or all of their lifecycles in them. Wetlands have for a long time been taken for granted and have been seen in the past as areas of wasteland, sources of water during drought or as areas to be developed for human use. They have been neglected and have become degraded. Only in recent years have we come to appreciate the many important functions that wetlands perform and their social and economic value, yet they still remain very threatened environments.
Comment on ”Interaction of Io with its torus: Does Io have an internal magnetic field?” by Krishan K. Khurana, Margaret G. Kivelson and Christopher T. Russell

The recent magnetic field observations by the Galileo spacecraft at Io (Kivelson et al., 1996a,b) have been interpreted by the authors as evidence for the existence of an internal magnetic field of dynamo origin. On the other hand Frank et al. (1997) have taken the position that the observations can be explained by plasma currents alone. To shed further light on the issue Khurana et al. (1997) have computed the magnetic field signature due to plasma currents along the Galileo trajectory as the sum of a local magnetic field and the field of an Alfv6n wing current system. They estimate a current of magnitude ! = 3.52 x 106A using an expression by Neubauer (1980) in every of the four parts of the Alfv6n wing system consisting of a northern wing current ! and a southern wing current ! toward Io's Jupiter pointing hemisphere and a current I directed away from Io's opposite hemisphere toward the northern hemisphere of Jupiter and a current I toward the southern hemisphere of Jupiter. Because of the source-free character of the current the total current 2 ! in the wings toward Io must be connected to the current 2 ! away from Io by a closure current of magnitude 2 ! This closure current must exist no matter what its nature is, i.e. whether it is due to pick-up, elastic collisions between charged particles and neutrals or polarization currents. It is this total current that determines the magnetic field signature of the Alfv•n wing. Khurana et al. (1997) argue that only half of the closure current, i.e. ! , is active in determining the magnetic signature on the Galileo trajectory. On page 2393, left column, they state: "As discussed later, roughly half of this current from each of the Alfv•n wing closes into Io's conducting layer". There is no later physical discussion, however, merely some statement of unproven assumptions on the branching of the closure currents. On page 2393, right column, they state: "The ionospheric current is modelled with sinusoidal variation that peaks on Io's flanks and has a net value of 3.52 x 106A. " Thus the model calculation violates Amp•re's law, because the magnetic signature of the other half of the closure current is ignored completely. Hence the magnetic field signature of the Alfv•n wing current system in their Fig. 2 must roughly be doubled.
Resource Clustering Based Decentralized Resource Discovery Scheme in Computing Grid

Resource discovery is one of the basic services in grid. In large-scale grid environment, traditional centralized resource discovery approaches limit scalability and result performance bottleneck. Based on the peer-to-peer protocol and the idea of resource clustering, a decentralized resource discovery scheme is introduced to overcome the deficiencies of the centralized resource discovery mechanism. Resources with the same resource type and the similar resource performance get together with the resource clusters that are the minimum units of resource management. Based on the resource clusters, the whole resource space is mapped into two index sub-spaces. A hierarchical and P2P hybrid resource discovery framework is developed to make advantage of the centralized and distributed topologies of the Internet. The algorithm of resource discovery is described. Theoretic analysis and simulation result show that this approach discovers desired resource efficiently.
Analysis and Comparison of Some Frequency Compounding Algorithms for the Reduction of Ultrasonic Clutter

When ultrasonically imaging sharp-edged targets en- closed by a strongly scattering medium, such as flaws in grainy metal or organ outlines in tissue, the target signal is frequently obscured by time-invariant "clutter" echoes generated by the microstructure of the environment. The target visibility with respect to the clutter can be improved by compounding statistically independent echoes of each re- gion of the medium. Algorithms for accomplishing this are analyzed and compared, in which the independent signals are obtained by split- ting each ,4-line echo into nonoverlapping frequency bands. One of these algorithms, in which compounding is performed by choosing the min- imum squared signal at each range, is found to provide considerable improvement in signal to clutter ratio and mixed results in receiver operating characteristic at the expense of resolution.
Morphological and functional identifications of catfish retinal neurons. III. Functional identification.

TWO MAIN QUESTIONS arise naturally in the study of neural systems: “What does the system do? ” and its logical companion and sequel, “How does the system do this? ” Answering the first question involves the ability to predict the system response to any stimulus, and it is therefore usually carried out through the performance of suitable stimulus-response experiments. As this endeavor is directed to the discovery of the system function (in its processing of stimuli signals into response signals), we term it functional identification of the system. In this series of papers (parts I, II, and III) we attempt to answer both of these questions for the neural systems in the catfish retina. While part I (24) dealt with answering the structural question and part II (28) dealt with answering the functional question by traditional methods, part III (this paper) concentrates on answering the functional question with the white-noise analysis technique and with pooling the results of parts I, II, and III for the comprehensive identification of the vertebrate retinal neurons. Twenty years ago, approximately, Wiener (49) proposed that a nonlinear system could be identified functionally by stimulating it with a Gaussian white-noise input, i.e., a random signal containing all frequencies within the system bandwidth with equal power (and whose amplitude is distributed in Gaussian fashion). Wiener’s proposal was based on the idea that, since the principle of superposition does not hold for nonlinear system, we would need to test such a system exhaustively with all possible inputs; this is exactly what a white-noise
Educacion, Desarrollo y Emigracion en Africa. Nuevas politicas de cooperacion europea e internacional

Se presenta un analisis comparativo del crecimiento de la produccion en Africa y en otras areas del mundo durante el siglo veinte, destacando el deficit educativo como la causa principal del exceso de crecimiento demografico y de la pobreza de la mayoria de los paises africanos. Se presenta ademas un analisis comparativo entre las distintas areas africanas y se destaca la necesidad de intensificar la cooperacion europea e internacional en el ambito educativo y en el desarrollo industrial, como medidas necesarias para evitar la pobreza y la emigracion en las proximas decadas. We present a comparison of economic development in Africa and main world areas during the 20th century, emphasizing the educative deficit as the main cause of excessive fertility and poverty of the majority of African areas. The article also analyses the levels of production by sector in different areas within Africa and points out the necessity of improving European and international cooperation on education expenditure and industrial development, as these measures are needed to avoid poverty and emigration in the next decades.