Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
valuation of several micro RNA ( miRNA ) levels in children and dolescents with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most prevalent childhood disorders, although disorders etiology and pathogenesis remains unknown, several theories about ADHD development have been proposed and many researchers believe that it is caused by both genetic and environmental factors. In this study we evaluated miR18a-5p, miR22-3p, miR24-3p, miR106b-5p, miR107, miR125b-5p and miR155a-5p levels in child and adolescent ADHD patients. The research sample consisted a group of 52 ADHD patients, and 52 healthy volunteer controls. There was no significant difference in age and sex between the two groups (p > 0.05). miRNA 18a-5p, 22-3p, 24-3p, 106b-5p and 107 levels were statistically significantly decreased in ADHD patients(p < 0.05). miRNA 155a-5p levels
A Review on Semantic Graph based Text Mining

— In the universal framework of knowledge discovery, Data Mining techniques are exhaustively devoted to information extraction from structured databases. On the other side, Text Mining techniques are keen to information extraction and retrieval from unstructured textual data. Several models have been introduced for effective text mining. One of the extensively used model is Vector Space Model (VSM) which is based on beg of words approach. Apart from its popularity, it suffers from a range of limitations, as it is based on frequency of the terms in the document, it losses the semantics of the terms in the document which may cause of mislead to several interpretations. To overcome from this, other data models based on the semantics are becoming very well-accepted. One of such data model is Ontology. In this paper we discuss an Ontology based approach to construct semantic graph for representing text document. Semantic graph explores the semantics of the document by considering semantic relations (derived from ontology) among the terms of the document. Once the text document is represented into semantic graph, it can be used for a number of applications of text mining relevance with text mining. The paper also discusses graph measures to extract linguistic properties of text document. We conclude the paper with the discussion on few state of the art work done in the same direction.
GIP-Overexpressing Mice Demonstrate Reduced Diet-Induced Obesity and Steatosis, and Improved Glucose Homeostasis

Glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP) is a gastrointestinal hormone that potentiates glucose-stimulated insulin secretion during a meal. Since GIP has also been shown to exert β-cell prosurvival and adipocyte lipogenic effects in rodents, both GIP receptor agonists and antagonists have been considered as potential therapeutics in type 2 diabetes (T2DM). In the present study, we tested the hypothesis that chronically elevating GIP levels in a transgenic (Tg) mouse model would increase adipose tissue expansion and exert beneficial effects on glucose homeostasis. In contrast, although GIP Tg mice demonstrated enhanced β-cell function, resulting in improved glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity, they exhibited reduced diet-induced obesity. Adipose tissue macrophage infiltration and hepatic steatosis were both greatly reduced, and a number of genes involved in lipid metabolism/inflammatory signaling pathways were found to be down-regulated. Reduced adiposity in GIP Tg mice was associated with decreased energy intake, involving overexpression of hypothalamic GIP. Together, these studies suggest that, in the context of over-nutrition, transgenic GIP overexpression has the potential to improve hepatic and adipocyte function as well as glucose homeostasis.
Women in Middle-Eastern organisations: career experiences, opportunities and work-life balance

This conceptual paper investigates work/career and family life experiences for women working in the Middle eastern region, and specifically the Gulf countries (GCC). Through a review of the literature on gender, work experiences and work-life balance this article argues that most research is conducted in western contexts and has been criticised for not acknowledging ethnicity, nationality, cultural and religious differences when examining work and career experiences and also when looking at conflicts and opportunities in balancing work and family life tasks and responsibilities (for example, Kamenou, 2008; Rana et al., 2008). Moreover, when examining research on women’s work experiences in the Arab World, there is a dearth of studies looking at women's career progression, leadership, the glass-ceiling and work-life balance in this region (with some notable exceptions, for example, Syed et al., 2005; Syed, 2010; Afiouni, 2014; Al Dajani, 2010; Hutchings et al., 2010; Moghadam, 2013; Metcalfe, 2010; Metcalfe et al. 2009). In response, this study seeks to provide a crucial insight into a very under-researched area relating to Middle Eastern women's participation in the labour market and their perceptions of the effects of work on their home life and vice versa. It pays particular attention to work identity, role expectations, ambitions and aspirations, career opportunities and barriers, employers’ policies and practices, quality of life for the women themselves, but also other family members, including parents, spouses and children. The research also explores the emotional dimensions of work/career and juggling work-life commitments. The authors argue that a theoretical framework which acknowledges structure, culture and agency in investigating women's careers and work-life balance experiences is appropriate and can be applied well in the Middle-Eastern context. The structural dimension of the framework include organisational and family structures and the agency dimension encompass the strategies, emotions and personal determination on career experiences and opportunities. The interdependency of structure and agency is extended by incorporating culture, which is interpreted as both organizational and social group culture (Kamenou, 2008; Evetts, 2000; Bhopal,1997). This paper focuses on literature on Arab Muslim women in the Middle East but it is envisaged that the future empirical work will include women from other regions, nationalities and religions as well as men, in exploring career experiences and work-life balance perceptions.
Reproductive Biology and Endocrinology Open Access Infertility Treatment Outcome in Sub Groups of Obese Population

Background: Obesity is a common disorder with a negative impact on IVF treatment outcome. It is not clear whether morbidly obese women (BMI >= 35 kg/m2) respond to treatment differently as compared to obese women (BMI = 30–34.9 kg/m2) in IVF. Our aim was to compare the outcome of IVF or ICSI treatments in obese patients to that in morbidly obese patients.
Concussions Among University Football and Soccer Players

ObjectiveA study to examine the incidence and characteristics of concussions among Canadian university athletes during 1 full year of football and soccer participation. DesignRetrospective survey. ParticipantsThree hundred eighty Canadian university football and 240 Canadian university soccer players reporting to 1999 fall training camp. Of these, 328 football and 201 soccer players returned a completed questionnaire. Main Outcome MeasuresBased on self-reported symptoms, calculations were made to determine the number of concussions experienced during the previous full year of football or soccer participation, the duration of symptoms, the time for return to play, and any associated risk factors for concussions. ResultsOf all the athletes who returned completed questionnaires, 70.4% of the football players and 62.7% of the soccer players had experienced symptoms of a concussion during the previous year. Only 23.4% of the concussed football players and 19.8% of the concussed soccer players realized they had suffered a concussion. More than one concussion was experienced by 84.6% of the concussed football players and 81.7% of the concussed soccer players. Examining symptom duration, 27.6% of all concussed football players and 18.8% of all concussed soccer players experienced symptoms for at least 1 day or longer. Tight end and defensive lineman were the positions most commonly affected in football, while goalies were the players most commonly affected in soccer. Variables that increased the odds of suffering a concussion during the previous year for football players included a history of a traumatic loss of consciousness or a recognized concussion in the past. Variables that increased the odds of suffering a concussion during the previous year for soccer players included a past history of a recognized concussion while playing soccer and being female. ConclusionsUniversity football and soccer players seem to be experiencing a significant amount of concussions while participating in their respective sports. Variables that seem to increase the odds of suffering a concussion during the previous year for football and soccer players include a history of a recognized concussion. Despite being relatively common, symptoms of concussion may not be recognized by many players.
3D BUILDING RECONSTRUCTION FROM LIDAR POINT CLOUDS BY ADAPTIVE DUAL CONTOURING

This paper presents a novel workflow for data-driven building reconstruction from Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) point clouds. The method comprises building extraction, a detailed roof segmentation using region growing with adaptive thresholds, segment boundary creation, and a structural 3D building reconstruction approach using adaptive 2.5D Dual Contouring. First, a 2D-grid is overlain on the segmented point cloud. Second, in each grid cell 3D vertices of the building model are estimated from the corresponding LiDAR points. Then, the number of 3D vertices is reduced in a quad-tree collapsing procedure, and the remaining vertices are connected according to their adjacency in the grid. Roof segments are represented by a Triangular Irregular Network (TIN) and are connected to each other by common vertices or - at height discrepancies - by vertical walls. Resulting 3D building models show a very high accuracy and level of detail, including roof superstructures such as dormers. The workflow is tested and evaluated for two data sets, using the evaluation method and test data of the “ISPRS Test Project on Urban Classification and 3D Building Reconstruction” (Rottensteiner et al., 2012). Results show that the proposed method is comparable with the state of the art approaches, and outperforms them regarding undersegmentation and completeness of the scene reconstruction.
Gender Differences in Patellofemoral Load during the Epee Fencing Lunge

Clinical analyses have shown that injuries and pain linked specifically to fencing training/competition were prevalent in 92.8% of fencers. Patellofemoral pain is the most common chronic injury in athletic populations and females are considered to be more susceptible to this pathology. This study aimed to examine gender differences in patellofemoral contact forces during the fencing lunge. Patellofemoral contact forces were obtained from eight male and eight female club level epee fencers using an eight-camera 3D motion capture system and force platform data as they completed simulated lunges. Independent t-tests were performed on the data to determine whether gender differences in patellofemoral contact forces were present. The results show that females were associated with significantly greater patellofemoral contact force parameters in comparison with males. This suggests that female fencers may be at greater risk from patellofemoral pathology as a function of fencing training/competition.
Model systems of thought: A neuroscience perspective on cognitive framework

One of the core issues in psychology and neuroscience research is that the nervous systems and behavior of human beings are complex, yet laboratory experiments must be kept relatively simple in order to be well-controlled and thus provide definitive answers to research questions. In this chapter, I first discuss how “model organisms” are used to reduce the complexity of scientific investigations in low-level (cellular) neuroscience research; that is, even if researchers are ultimately interested in the human mind and brain, it is often easier to begin by asking reduced forms of their questions about animals with simpler nervous systems, and attempt to build towards an understanding of increasingly complex systems. A similar approach can be taken in psychological studies of human beings. It is impossible to simultaneously examine all the multitude of factors that drive human behavior, so instead we must study individual facets of human behavior in the laboratory, and hope to build towards a more unified understanding. Here, I argue for a “component process” approach to studying human thought, wherein we use extremely simple laboratory tasks in an effort to identify fundamental “building blocks” of cognition that may form the basis of more complex thoughts and behaviors.
AN INVITATION TO RIGIDITY THEORY

This survey is dedicated to Professor Anatole Katok on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday. He has made numerous important contributions to dynamics and ergodic theory proper. During the last two decades, he was one of the key researchers in the field of rigidity or geometric rigidity. My goal here is to give a bird’s eye view of this subject with particular attention to the many ideas and topics Professor Katok has been directly involved with. Rigidity theory is now in its fifth decade. It started with conjectures of A. Selberg and the early local rigidity theorems of A. Weil as well as E. Calabi and E. Vesentini in the early sixties. Mostow’s celebrated Strong Rigidity Theorem in 1968 was a spectacular breakthrough and inspired whole new areas of research for rigidity phenomena in geometry, group theory and dynamics. After a brief review of this early history, we will discuss these new areas and topics. Rigidity theory by now is a large field with many branches and connections, and it is impossible to even just mention all important developments in one short survey. We refer to [91, 145, 146, 160, 190] for more intensive introductions to this field, and will refer to other more specialized surveys as we go along.
The eHealth Behavior Management Model: A Stage-based Approach to Behavior Change and Management

Although the Internet has become an important avenue for disseminating health information, theory-driven strategies for aiding individuals in changing or managing health behaviors are lacking. The eHealth Behavior Management Model combines the Transtheoretical Model, the behavioral intent aspect of the Theory of Planned Behavior, and persuasive communication to assist individuals in negotiating the Web toward stage-specific information. It is here — at the point of stage-specific information — that behavioral intent in moving toward more active stages of change occurs. The eHealth Behavior Management Model is applied in three demonstration projects that focus on behavior management issues: parent-child nutrition education among participants in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children; asthma management among university staff and students; and human immunodeficiency virus prevention among South African women. Preliminary results have found the eHealth Behavior Management Model to be promising as a model for Internet-based behavior change programming. Further application and evaluation among other behavior and disease management issues are needed.
Capturing Personal and Crowd Behavior with Wi-Fi Analytics

We present a solution for analysing crowds at events such as conferences where people have networking opportunities. Often, potential social relations go unexploited because no business cards were exchanged or we forget about interesting people we met earlier. We created a solution built on top of ubiquitous Wi-Fi signals that is able to create a memory of human trajectories and touch points. In this paper we elaborate on the technological assets we designed to perform crowd anlaytics. We present small wearable Wi-Fi badges that last for the duration of an event (up to 3 days) with a single charge, as well as network equipment that senses the signals radiating from these badges and contemporary mobile devices.
Spread-Spectrum Multiple-Access Performance of Orthogonal Codes: Linear Receivers

This paper analyzes a direct-sequence, spread-spectrum, multiple-access (SSMA) communication system which assigns a set of M orthogonal sequences to each user. With all direct sequence SSMA systems, K users share a channel by phase modulating their transmissions with signature sequences. However, the users of our system transmit log_{2}M bits of information/sequence. This contrasts classical SSMA schemes which use a pair of antipodal sequences and transmit 1 bit/sequence. In this paper, we assume that the channel noise is a combination of additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) and multiple-access interference. We employ the optimum (single-user) demodulator for orthogonal signals in Gaussian noise. The multiple-user performance of this receiver is analyzed. We obtain approximations for the multiuser probability of error by using a Gaussian approximation for the multiple-access interference. We also obtain an upper bound on the exact probability by using characteristic functions. Our SSMA system is Well suited for application at the lower radio frequencies. Therefore, a companion paper describes a realistic model for low-frequency radio noise, modifies the receiver to include a zero-memory nonlinearity, and studies the performance of the nonlinear receiver.
Implementation of Decoupled Model-Based Controller in a 2-DOF Pneumatic Platform Used in Low-Cost Driving Simulators

This study presents a solution for the control of a 2-DOF platform with two electro-pneumatic actuators. This solution is currently used by the SIMPRO Company in low-cost driving simulators. The control of a pneumatic servo system is a complex task due to the highly non-linear dynamics of the electro-pneumatic actuators; furthermore the multivariable character of the multi-DOF system complicates the problem. First, the dynamic description of the actuators, analytically or by experimental identification, considering its dependence from the piston position, is obtained. From this model, a linear controller is synthesized by pole placement, performance indexes with a high disturbance rejection are established, as well as the capacity for tracking to a ramp-type reference with a low settling time. The synthesis method of the controller is applied to the 2-DOF pneumatic platform in a decoupled manner for each actuator. The whole solution is then implemented in an embedded controller showing adequate performance.
TRAINING ENGLISH LISTENERS TO IDENTIFY PITCH-ACCENT PATTERNS IN TOKYO JAPANESE

The high-variability training paradigm (multiple words, phonetic contexts, and talkers) has been successful for perceptual learning of tone contrasts. Here, it is extended to training native English listeners on Tokyo Japanese pitch-accent contrasts. Participants had no previous experience with lexically contrastive pitch patterns. They learned to identify three pitch patterns in disyllabic Japanese words: 1st-syllable accented, 2nd-syllable accented, and unaccented. Immediate feedback was provided to the training group but not to the control group. The results showed an effect of training on pitch-pattern identification accuracy that was also generalized to new words spoken in new contexts. In contrast, the control group improved only on the 1st-syllable accented pattern. Error analysis suggested that the unaccented pattern is the most difficult to identify. The results are discussed in terms of native language bias and individual bias affecting second language learning in the prosodic domain.
Global localization in a dense continuous topological map

Vision-based topological maps for mobile robot localization traditionally consist of a set of images captured along a path, with a query image then compared to every individual map image. This paper introduces a new approach to topological mapping, whereby the map consists of a set of landmarks that are detected across multiple images, spanning the continuous space between nodal images. Matches are then made to landmarks, rather than to individual images, enabling a topological map of far greater density than traditionally possible, without sacrificing computational speed. Furthermore, by treating each landmark independently, a probabilistic approach to localization can be employed by taking into account the learned discriminative properties of each landmark. An optimization stage is then used to adjust the map according to speed and localization accuracy requirements. Results for global localization show a greater positive location identification rate compared to the traditional topological map, together with enabling a greater localization resolution in the denser topological map, without requiring a decrease in frame rate.
The Laplacian spectrum of some digraphs obtained from the wheel

The problem of distinguishing, in terms of graph topology, digraphs with real and partially non-real Laplacian spectra is important for applications. Motivated by the question posed in [R. Agaev, P. Chebotarev, Which digraphs with rings structure are essentially cyclic? , Adv. in Appl. Math. 45 (2010), 232–251], in this paper we completely list the Laplacian eigenvalues of some digraphs obtained from the wheel digraph by deleting some arcs.
The Extended Star Formation History of the First Generation of Stars and the Reionization of Cosmic Hydrogen

Population III star formation (SF) is thought to be quenched when the metallicity of the star-forming gas has reached a critical level. At high redshift, when the general intergalactic medium (IGM) was enriched with metals, the fraction of primordial gas that had already collapsed in minihalos was significantly larger than the fraction of primordial gas that had already been involved in Population III SF. We argue that this reservoir of minihalo gas remained largely in a metal-free state until these minihalos merged into large systems and formed stars. As a result, the era of Population III SF was significantly prolonged, leading to a total integrated Population III SF an order of magnitude larger than expected for an abrupt transition redshift. We find that the contribution of Population III SF to the reionization of hydrogen could have been significant until z ~ 10 and may have extended to redshifts as low as z ~ 6. Our modeling allows for gradual enrichment of the IGM, feedback from photoionization, and screening of reionization by minihalos. Nevertheless, the extended epoch of Population III SF may result in complex reionization histories. The relative contribution of Population III stars to reionization can be quantified and will be tested by three-year WMAP results, showing (1) if Population III stars do not contribute to reionization, τes ≤ 0.05-0.06 and a rapid reionization at z ~ 6 are expected, with the mean neutral fraction quickly exceeding 50% at z ~ 8; (2) if the product of star formation efficiency and escape fraction for Population III stars is significantly larger than that for Population II stars, then a maximum τes = 0.21 is achievable; and (3) where the product of star formation efficiency and escape fraction for Population III stars is comparable to that for Population II stars, τes = 0.09-0.12, with reionization histories characterized by an extended ionization plateau from z = 7-12, where the mean neutral fraction stays in a narrow range of 0.1-0.3.