Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Is normobaric hypoxia an effective treatment for sustaining previously acquired altitude acclimatization?

This study examined whether normobaric hypoxia (NH) treatment is more efficacious for sustaining high-altitude (HA) acclimatization-induced improvements in ventilatory and hematologic responses, acute mountain sickness (AMS), and cognitive function during reintroduction to altitude (RA) than no treatment at all. Seventeen sea-level (SL) residents (age = 23 ± 6 yr; means ± SE) completed in the following order: 1) 4 days of SL testing; 2) 12 days of HA acclimatization at 4,300 m; 3) 12 days at SL post-HA acclimatization (Post) where each received either NH (n = 9, [Formula: see text] = 0.122) or Sham (n = 8; [Formula: see text] = 0.207) treatment; and 4) 24-h reintroduction to 4,300-m altitude (RA) in a hypobaric chamber (460 Torr). End-tidal carbon dioxide pressure ([Formula: see text]), hematocrit (Hct), and AMS cerebral factor score were assessed at SL, on HA2 and HA11, and after 20 h of RA. Cognitive function was assessed using the SynWin multitask performance test at SL, on HA1 and HA11, and after 4 h of RA. There was no difference between NH and Sham treatment, so data were combined. [Formula: see text] (mmHg) decreased from SL (37.2 ± 0.5) to HA2 (32.2 ± 0.6), decreased further by HA11 (27.1 ± 0.4), and then increased from HA11 during RA (29.3 ± 0.6). Hct (%) increased from SL (42.3 ± 1.1) to HA2 (45.9 ± 1.0), increased again from HA2 to HA11 (48.5 ± 0.8), and then decreased from HA11 during RA (46.4 ± 1.2). AMS prevalence (%) increased from SL (0 ± 0) to HA2 (76 ± 11) and then decreased at HA11 (0 ± 0) and remained depressed during RA (17 ± 10). SynWin scores decreased from SL (1,615 ± 62) to HA1 (1,306 ± 94), improved from HA1 to HA11 (1,770 ± 82), and remained increased during RA (1,707 ± 75). These results demonstrate that HA acclimatization-induced improvements in ventilatory and hematologic responses, AMS, and cognitive function are partially retained during RA after 12 days at SL whether or not NH treatment is utilized.NEW & NOTEWORTHY This study demonstrates that normobaric hypoxia treatment over a 12-day period at sea level was not more effective for sustaining high-altitude (HA) acclimatization during reintroduction to HA than no treatment at all. The noteworthy aspect is that athletes, mountaineers, and military personnel do not have to go to extraordinary means to retain HA acclimatization to an easily accessible and relevant altitude if reexposure occurs within a 2-wk time period.
THE EFFECTS OF FORMING MULTI‐PREDICTOR COMPOSITES ON GROUP DIFFERENCES AND ADVERSE IMPACT

A common assumption exists which asserts that the formation of composites of predictors represents a method for dealing with adverse impact. It is often expected that including predictors that demonstrate smaller group differences with others that demonstrate larger group differences will help to alleviate the amount of adverse impact observed at the composite level. The purpose of this paper is to answer the question “If two or more predictors are combined to form a composite, what will be the magnitude of group differences and, consequently, of adverse impact, of using that composite for selection? ” In answering this question, a set of tables, figures, and formulas are presented that highlight variables influential in affecting how composites of predictors influence observed group differences. A number of conclusions are drawn that clarify the extent to which forming composites decreases group differences and subsequently adverse impact.
MIC231, a naturally occurring mobile insertion cassette from Bacillus cereus

Recent dissection of numerous plasmids and transposable elements has given more credence to the modular organization of these genetic and genomic entities. Although many variations on each theme exist, the number of basic functional cassettes is thought to be relatively limited. In this paper, a novel type of mobile cassette is described. A naturally occurring assemblage consisting of two left IS231 ends flanking a d‐stereospecific endopeptidase (adp ) gene was found in several natural isolates of Bacillus cereus. This 1.9 kb genetic entity was shown to transpose in the presence of IS231A transposase, not only in Escherichia coli but also in Bacillus. The acronym MIC231 is proposed for this mobile insertion cassette trans‐activated (teletransposed) by IS231. Using (d‐Phe)4 tetrapeptide as substrate, the endopeptidase activity of the MIC231 adp gene could be demonstrated in E. coli and B. subtilis. Interestingly, this d‐stereospecific endopeptidase activity was not limited to the original B. cereus isolates but was also detected in all but one of the 69 B. cereus sensu lato strains tested, indicating its important, yet dispensable, biological function. However, inactivation of the MIC231 adp gene in two B. cereus strains did not result in any detectable variation of their activity on (d‐Phe)4, suggesting the presence of other distantly related adp gene(s). Thus, although the exact role of MIC231 adp remains elusive, its presence inside a mobile cassette represents the archetype of a novel insertion sequence modular organization.
Rapid fractionation of wheat leaf protoplasts using membrane filtration : the determination of metabolite levels in the chloroplasts, cytosol, and mitochondria.

A technique is presented for measuring the in vivo metabolite levels in the chloroplast stroma, the cytosol, and the mitochondrial matrix of wheat (Triticum aestivum, var ;Timmo') leaf protoplasts, in which membrane filtration is used to prepare fractions enriched in the different subcellular fractions within 0.1 seconds after disruption of the protoplasts. By closing a syringe, protoplasts are forced through a net and disrupted, diluting the cytosol into the medium and also releasing intact chloroplasts and mitochondria which can then be immediately removed on membrane filters placed behind the nylon net. By varying the membrane filters, different filtrates are obtained corresponding to (a) mainly cytosol, or (b) cytosol and mitochondria with only low levels of chloroplasts; alternatively, (c) the entire protoplast contents are obtained by omitting the filters. The filtrates are immediately split, half flowing into HClO(4) where they are immediately quenched for subsequent metabolite analyses; the other half flows into detergent and is used to monitor the exact distribution of marker enzymes in each individual fractionation. Using the measured distributions of metabolite and of marker enzymes in the three filtrates, the subcellular distribution of the metabolite can be algebraically calculated. The method is presented using ATP as an example.The quench time (0.1 second) made possible by membrane filtration is considerably faster than has been possible in the previously developed techniques using silicone oil centrifugation for chloroplasts (1 second) or mitochondria (1 minute). This rapid quench makes it possible to investigate subcellular pools which have a rapid turnover, like the adenine nucleotides.
ANNEALING EFFECT ON FABRICATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF MIS STRUCTURE USING TiO2-SiO2 THIN FILM AS INSULATOR LAYER DEPOSITED BY LOW TEMPERATURE ARC VAPOR DEPOSITION PROCESS

Fabrication and characterization of a Pd/TiO2-SiO2/n-Si MIS structure have been reported in this paper. The TiO2 layer has been deposited on thermally grown SiO2 layer of n-Si substrate by implementing low temperature arc vapor deposition (LTAVD) technique. The films have been characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and FESEM. The current-voltage and capacitance-voltage characterization were studied at room temperature (300 K) for sample devices with TiO2 film annealed at different temperatures. The study reveals that the capacitance in the accumulation region has frequency dispersion at high frequencies. Different models of current conduction mechanism have been applied to study the measured data in a specific manner to understand the presence of the conduction model. It is found that Schottky–Richardson (SR) emission model is applicable at low bias voltage, Frenkel-Poole (FP) emission model at moderate bias voltage, Fowler–Nordheim (FN) tunneling dominates at high bias voltage.
Kerr/ads Correspondence in Diverse Dimensions

It was proposed recently that the near-horizon states of an extremal four-dimensional Kerr black hole could be identified with a certain chiral conformal field theory whose Virasoro algebra arises as an asymptotic symmetry algebra of the near-horizon Kerr geometry. Supportive evidence for the proposed duality came from the equality of the microscopic entropy of the CFT, calculated by means of the Cardy formula, and the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy of the extremal Kerr black hole. In this paper we examine the proposed Kerr/CFT correspondence in a broader context. In particular, we show that the microscopic entropy and the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy agree also for the extremal Kerr-AdS metric in four dimensions, and also for the extremal Kerr-AdS metrics in dimensions 5, 6 and 7. General formulae for all higher dimensions are also presented.
Thermal transport in lithium ion batteries: An experimental investigation of interfaces and granular materials

Gaitonde, Aalok Jaisheela Uday M.S.M.E, Purdue University, December 2016. Thermal Transport in Lithium Ion Batteries: An Experimental Investigation of Interfaces and Granular Materials. Major Professor: Amy M. Marconnet, School of Mechanical Engineering. Increasing usage and recent accidents due to lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries exploding or catching on fire has inspired research on the characterization and thermal management of these batteries. In cylindrical 18650 cells, heat generated during the battery’s charge/discharge cycle is poorly dissipated to the surrounding through its metallic case due to the poor thermal conductivity of the jelly roll, which is spirally wound with many interfaces between electrodes and the polymeric separator. This work presents a technique to measure the thermal conduction across the metallic case-plastic separator interface, which ultimately limits heat transfer out of the jelly roll. The polymeric separator and metallic case are harvested from discharged commercial 18650 battery cells for thermal testing. A miniaturized version of the reference bar method enables measurements of the interface resistance between the case and the separator by establishing a temperature gradient across a multilayer stack consisting of two reference layers of known thermal conductivity and the case-separator sample. The case-separator interfacial conductance is reported for a range of case temperatures and interface pressures. The mean thermal conductance across the case-separator interface is 670±275 W/(mK) and no significant temperature or pressure dependence is observed. The effective thermal conductivity of the battery stack is measured to be 0.27 W/m/K and 0.32 W/m/K in linear and radial configurations, respectively. Many techniques for fabricating battery electrodes involve coating particles of the active materials on metallic current collectors. The impact of mechanical shearing on
A General Animation Framework for Gaseous Phenomena

This paper presents a new animation framework for the modeling of gaseous phenomena. We combine particle and grid based techniques in an innovative way. Based on this framework, our system allows for an incremental design of animations. In the first stage, an animator uses particle methods to model the evolution and appearance of gases. Grid based techniques are subsequently employed to compute high quality animations. Central to the success of our technique is a new algorithm to efficiently advect densities on grids. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach, we have included many animations.
Placental weight and birth weight to placental weight ratio in monochorionic and dichorionic growth-restricted and non-growth-restricted twins

OBJECTIVE: The aim of the present study was to compare the placental weight and birth weight/placental weight ratio for intrauterine growth-restricted and non-intrauterine growth-restricted monochorionic and dichorionic twins. METHODS: This was a retrospective analysis of placentas from twin pregnancies. Placental weight and the birth weight/placental weight ratio were compared in intrauterine growth-restricted and non-intrauterine growth-restricted monochorionic and dichorionic twins. The association between cord insertion type and placental lesions in intrauterine growth-restricted and non-intrauterine growth-restricted monochorionic and dichorionic twins was also investigated. RESULTS: A total of 105 monochorionic (intrauterine growth restriction=40; non-intrauterine growth restriction=65) and 219 dichorionic (intrauterine growth restriction=57; non-intrauterine growth restriction=162) placentas were analyzed. A significantly lower placental weight was observed in intrauterine growth-restricted monochorionic (p=0.022) and dichorionic (p<0.001) twins compared to non-intrauterine growth-restricted twins. There was no difference in the birth weight/placental weight ratio between the intrauterine growth restriction and non-intrauterine growth restriction groups for either monochorionic (p=0.36) or dichorionic (p=0.68) twins. Placental weight and the birth weight/placental weight ratio were not associated with cord insertion type or with placental lesions. CONCLUSION: Low placental weight, and consequently reduced functional mass, appears to be involved in fetal growth restriction in monochorionic and dichorionic twins. The mechanism by which low placental weight influences the birth weight/placental weight ratio in intrauterine growth-restricted monochorionic and dichorionic twins needs to be determined in larger prospective studies.
Growth and Bone Mineralization of Very Preterm Infants at Term Corrected Age in Relation to Different Nutritional Intakes in the Early Postnatal Period

Preterm infants often have a reduced bone mineral content (BMC) with increased risk of metabolic bone disease. After birth it is difficult to supply calcium (Ca) and phosphorus (P) comparable to the high fetal accretion rate. It is not known whether high supplementation of minerals in the early postnatal period improves growth and bone mineralization. The aim of this study was to evaluate growth and bone mineralization at term corrected age (TCA) in very and extremely preterm infants who received different enteral Ca and P intakes during the first 10 days of life. Infants (n = 109) with birth weights below 1500 g were randomly assigned to one of three groups that differed in the nutritional protocols delivered until day 10: Group A, mother’s own milk (MOM) and donor milk (unfortified); Group B, MOM (unfortified) and preterm formula; Group C, MOM (start fortification >50 mL/day) and preterm formula. Due to the earlier commencement of fortification, Group C received higher intakes of calcium and phosphorus and protein (p < 0.001) until day 10. At TCA weight, length, BMC and bone mineral density (BMD), measured by dual-X-ray absorptiometry, were not different between the groups. Nutritional intake of P was positively associated with length (β; (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.20 (0.001; 0.393); p-value = 0.048), whereas Ca intake was negatively associated with BMC (−1.94 (−2.78; −1.09); p-value < 0.001). A small interaction between Ca and P intake was only found for BMD (0.003 (0.00002; 0.00006); p-value = 0.036). The volume of human milk per kg provided during the first 10 days was positively associated with BMC (β; (95% CI): 0.013 (0.002; 0.023); p < 0.017). Higher intakes of Ca and P during the first 10 days, as provided in this study, did not improve bone mineralization at term corrected age.
Extracting bilingual terminologies from comparable corpora

In this paper we present a method for extracting bilingual terminologies from comparable corpora. In our approach we treat bilingual term extraction as a classification problem. For classification we use an SVM binary classifier and training data taken from the EUROVOC thesaurus. We test our approach on a held-out test set from EUROVOC and perform precision, recall and f-measure evaluations for 20 European language pairs. The performance of our classifier reaches the 100% precision level for many language pairs. We also perform manual evaluation on bilingual terms extracted from English-German term-tagged comparable corpora. The results of this manual evaluation showed 60-83% of the term pairs generated are exact translations and over 90% exact or partial translations.
A Control Map for a Bidirectional PWM Plus Phase-Shift-Modulated Push–Pull DC–DC Converter

In this paper, a bidirectional push–pull converter is investigated with new add-on feature of three-level PWM plus phase-shift (PPS) control scheme, and a control map is proposed to assist converter operation and design in the optimized region. The PPS control strategy is adopted to reduce peak current of the transistors, to increase the input-voltage-variation range and to expand the soft-switching region. A comprehensive analysis of operation principle, transmission capability, and soft-switching operation in 12 different operation modes is presented. Based on the complete analysis, a control map is proposed to assist converter operation that can effectively avoid high-circulating-current regions, low-power-transmission-capability regions, and hard-switched regions. In the control map, a circuit parameter k is signified and its range is found, beyond which the PPS converter no longer operates normally. The proposed control map and the circuit parameter k are general to all PPS converters, providing a meaningful analyzing method to design and operate all PPS converters. A 30∼48 V/380 V prototype rated at 100–1000 W was built under the guideline. The analysis is verified by both simulation and experimental results.
Methods of increasing the sensitivity of the haemagglutination inhibition test for rabies virus antibody.

A new method for the removal of non-specific inhibitors of rabies virus haemagglutinin has been developed. Treatment with colloidal silicic acid (Aerosil) or with acetone plus Aerosil reduced the non-specific inhibitors in human, mouse, and dog sera to a level that was undetectable at the 1:4 starting dilution in the haemagglutination inhibition test.Bromelain-treated goose erythrocytes were much more susceptible to haemagglutination by rabies virus than were untreated erythrocytes, and the sensitivity of the haemagglutination inhibition test was considerably increased by using bromelain-treated erythrocytes. Low levels of antibodies in sera from immunized human subjects were detected with higher sensitivity by combining Aerosil treatment of the sera with the use of bromelain-treated goose erythrocytes in the haemagglutination inhibition test.
The Relationship of Triphasic Waves with Intracranial Pressure as a Possible Prognostic Marker in Traumatic Brain Injury

Background Continuous electroencephalography (CEEG) monitoring is used for detection of convulsive and nonconvulsive seizures and assessing the degree of encephalopathy in critically ill patients. A commonly seen encephalopathic pattern on CEEG is generalized periodic discharges with triphasic wave (TW) morphology. The underlying role and prognostic significance of TW in relationship to intracranial pressure (ICP) remain unknown. We present a case highlighting the relationship of TW with ICP in a case with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). Method Case report. Results A patient with severe TBI and no underlying metabolic abnormalities was admitted to the neurocritical care unit. TW were seen on CEEG. The TW diminished during episodes of intracranial hypertension but reappeared with reduction of the intracranial pressure. Conclusion This study highlights a possible favorable prognostic marker of finding TW in a patient with intracranial hypertension. We have proposed a preliminary understanding of the relationship between TW and intracranial hypertension, which may be helpful in formulating future studies involving larger cohorts.
Tracking an Extended Object Modeled as an Axis-Aligned Rectangle

In many tracking applications, the extent of the target object is neglected and it is assumed that the received measurements stem from a point source. However, modern sensors are able to supply several measurements from different scattering centers on the target object due to their high-resolution capability. As a consequence, it becomes necessary to incorporate the target extent into the estimation procedure. This paper introduces a new method for tracking the smallest enclosing rectangle of an extended object with an unknown shape. At each time step, a finite set of noisy position measurements that stem from arbitrary, unknown measurement sources on the target surface may be available. In contrast to common approaches, the presented approach does not have to make any statistical assumptions on the measurement sources.
Whose cache line is it anyway?: operating system support for live detection and repair of false sharing

As hardware parallelism continues to increase, CPU caches can no longer be considered as a transparent, hardware-level performance optimization. Cache impact on performance, in particular in the face of false sharing, is completely dependent on the software that is executing. To effectively support parallel workloads on cache coherent hardware, the operating system must begin to treat the CPU cache like other shared hardware resources, and manage it appropriately. We demonstrate a prototype example of such support by describing Plastic, a software-based system that detects, diagnoses, and transparently repairs false sharing as it occurs in running applications. Plastic solves two challenging problems. First, it is capable of rapid, low-overhead detection and diagnosis of false sharing in unmodified, running applications. Second, it resolves identified instances of false sharing by providing a sub-page granularity memory remapping facility within the system. Our implementation is capable of identifying and repairing pathological false sharing in under one second of execution and achieves speedups of 3-6x on known examples of false sharing in parallel benchmarks.
Quality of life of patients with Crohn's disease

Objective: To assess the quality of life of Crohn's disease patients treated at the clinic of the University Hospital from Piauí. Methods: Exploratory and cross-sectional study in the University Hospital of Piauí Brazil, from July to December 2015, with a sample of 52 Crohn's disease patients. A form was applied to characterize the sociodemographic and clinical profile, and the instrument "Inflammatory Bowel Disease Questionnaire" was used to assess the quality of life. Results: Most participants were females, adults, self-declared brown-skinned, married, with family income of two minimum wages, with high school education and non-smokers and alcohol drinkers. Diagnostic time was longer than five years, and patients are partly in remission of the disease. Few patients had marked weight loss, diarrhea and abdominal pain in the last three months. Patients had been hospitalized due to Crohn's disease, a quarter of them had undergone surgical resection of the bowel and had had complications such as fistulas, more often. As drug treatment, association of immunomodulators and aziotioprina was used. Most had performed laboratory tests for control, followed by colonoscopy and they had never abandoned treatment. Patients presented regular quality of life and the response "never" was the most scored in the instrument. Quality of life was regular in the domains of systemic symptoms, emotional and social aspects, and in the intestinal symptoms, it was satisfactory with an average 56.15. Conclusion: Patients with Crohn's disease have a regular quality of life.