Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Force Parameters for Skills Assessment in Laparoscopy

When equipped with motion and force sensors, box-trainers can be good alternatives for relatively expensive Virtual Reality (VR) trainers. As in VR trainers, the sensors in a box trainer could provide the trainee with objective information about his performance. Recently, multiple tracking systems were developed for classification of participants based on motion and time parameters. The aim of this study is the development of force parameters that reflect the trainee's performance in a suture task. Our second goal is to investigate if the level of the participant's skills can be classified as experts or novice level. In the experiment, experts (n = 11) and novices (n = 21) performed a two-handed needle driving and knot tying task on artificial tissue inside a box trainer. The tissue was mounted on the Force platform that was used to measure the force, which the subject applied on the tissue in three directions. We evaluated the potential of 16 different performance parameters, related to the magnitude, direction, and variability of applied forces, to distinguish between different levels of surgical expertise. Nine of the parameters showed significant differences between experts and novices. Principal Component Analysis was used to convert these nine partly correlating parameters, such as peak force, mean force, and main direction of force, into two uncorrelated variables. By performing a Leave-One-Out-Cross Validation with Linear Discriminant Analysis on each participants' score on these two variables, it was possible to correctly classify 84 percent of all participants as an expert or novice. We conclude that force measurements in a box trainer can be used to classify the level of performance of trainees and can contribute to objective assessment of suture skills.
Factors Predicting Nutrition and Physical Activity Behaviors Due to Cardiovascular Disease in Tehran University Students: Application of Health Belief Model

Background: Disease preventing methods focus mostly on lifestyle factors such as physical activity, healthy diet and not smoking. Previous studies verified using theory and models to change unhealthy behaviors, so that health belief model (HBM) is a useful framework for describing the healthy nutrition behavior. Objectives: This study aimed to predict factors related to unhealthy nutrition and inactive life in students of Tehran University, Tehran, Iran based on the Health Belief Model (HBM). Patients and Methods: In this cross sectional study, proportional quota sampling from three different educational levels was conducted from October to December 2012. A self-administered validated instrument based on the Health Belief Model (HBM) with 69 items and four sections was used to collect data. In this study through using linear and logistic regression, the effect of body mass index, age, gender, marriage, self-efficacy, cues to action, knowledge, perceived severity, susceptibility, benefits and barriers on nutrition and physical activity behavior were assessed. SPSS version 18 was used to analyze data. Results: Totally, 368 students including 318 female students (86.4%) and 50 male students (13.6%) with a mean age of 24.9 years (SD = 4.55) took part in the study. Among all independent variables, gender (P < 0.001), knowledge (P = 0.023) and perceived barriers (P = 0.004) predicted nutrition behavior. In case of physical activity, knowledge (P = 0.011), perceived severity (P = 0.009), perceived barriers (P = 0.019) and self-efficacy (P = 0.033) had significance association with physical activity behavior. Conclusions: This study indicated that health belief model contrasts could predict the risky behavior of university students due to heart disease. However, more researches are needed to verify the predictors of high risky behaviors in students.
Mapping Applications to Coarse-Grained Reconfigurable Architectures

Coarse grain reconfigurable architectures (CGRAs) are capable of achieving both goals of high performance and flexibility. CGRAs not only improve performance by exploiting the features of repetitive computations but also can adapt to diverse computations by dynamically changing configurations of an array of its internal processing elements (PEs) and their interconnections. Many CGRAs have been developed recently as programmable coprocessors, minimizing the overhead of the central processor in many computation-intensive applications. They act as co-processors for accelerating computation-intensive portions of embedded system applications. System designers are attracted to CGRAs because they bridge the gap between Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) and microprocessors by providing the high performance of ASICs with flexibility of reconfiguration of fine-grained FPGAs. Some of the application areas of these architectures are image processing, DSP, encryption, pattern recognition, and other multimedia applications. This paper surveys the methods of compiling applications to coarse grain reconfigurable architectures.
Cutting Edge: MicroRNA-223 Regulates Myeloid Dendritic Cell–Driven Th17 Responses in Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis

Myeloid cells play a crucial role in the induction and sustained inflammation in neuroinflammatory disorders, such as multiple sclerosis. miR-223, a myeloid cell–specific microRNA, is one of the most upregulated microRNAs in multiple sclerosis patients. We demonstrate that miR-223–knockout mice display significantly reduced active and adoptive-transfer experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis that is characterized by reduced numbers of myeloid dendritic cells (mDCs) and Th17 cells in the CNS. Knockout mDCs have increased PD-L1 and decreased IL-1β, IL-6, and IL-23 expression, as well as a reduced capacity to drive Th17, but not Th1, cell differentiation. Thus, miR-223 controls mDC-induced activation of pathologic Th17 responses during autoimmune inflammation.
Discourse-Driven Narrative Generation With Bipartite Planning

During content planning, a typical discourse generation system receives as input a library of facts and selects facts to include as the content for utterances. However, storytellers do not need to be completely constrained by a set of facts and instead can invent facts which support the storytellers goals, subsequently constructing the storyworld around those facts. We present a discourse-driven approach to narrative generation leveraging automated planning which can interleave construction of story and discourse while preserving modularity.
Privacy and camping: Closeness to the self vs. closeness to others

Abstract The “opportunities for solitude” provision of the Wilderness Act of 1964 has led to an interest in privacy by researchers and managers to determine carrying capacities for some types of areas. This study, following the theoretical approach of Altman, attempts to operationalize privacy to determine the extent to which privacy attitudes motivate wilderness use. By applying a set of privacy attitude scales, this comparison of car campers and backpackers shows that a lifestyle predisposition for privacy with units larger than one (e.g., with intimate friends or family), rather than being alone, is the meaning of solitude best predicting backcountry use. Implications suggested by our findings include (1) that managers should be scattering backpackers rather than clustering them at designated sites and (2) that leisure theory should look more to general social and psychological theory to explain the behavior patterns in leisure, which these data indicate reflect general lifestyle choices.
A Novel Neural Wiskott-Aldrich Syndrome Protein (N-Wasp) Binding Protein, Wish, Induces Arp2/3 Complex Activation Independent of Cdc42

We identified a novel adaptor protein that contains a Src homology (SH)3 domain, SH3 binding proline-rich sequences, and a leucine zipper-like motif and termed this protein WASP interacting SH3 protein (WISH). WISH is expressed predominantly in neural tissues and testis. It bound Ash/Grb2 through its proline-rich regions and neural Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome protein (N-WASP) through its SH3 domain. WISH strongly enhanced N-WASP–induced Arp2/3 complex activation independent of Cdc42 in vitro, resulting in rapid actin polymerization. Furthermore, coexpression of WISH and N-WASP induced marked formation of microspikes in Cos7 cells, even in the absence of stimuli. An N-WASP mutant (H208D) that cannot bind Cdc42 still induced microspike formation when coexpressed with WISH. We also examined the contribution of WISH to a rapid actin polymerization induced by brain extract in vitro. Arp2/3 complex was essential for brain extract–induced rapid actin polymerization. Addition of WISH to extracts increased actin polymerization as Cdc42 did. However, WISH unexpectedly could activate actin polymerization even in N-WASP–depleted extracts. These findings suggest that WISH activates Arp2/3 complex through N-WASP–dependent and –independent pathways without Cdc42, resulting in the rapid actin polymerization required for microspike formation.
Inducing human motion by visual manipulation

This paper reports a study of augmenting human motions by manipulating visual images displayed to users. The target motion is not only the motion that can be seen in the subject's views (i.e. hands or foots motion) but also the full-body motion that cannot be captured from their own perspective. As a result, it is shown that the motions are modulated without any physical contacts only by manipulated images.
If a Tree Falls in the Forest

This study examines the effect of grievances on organizational effectiveness characteristics. Using data from the 2000 Merit Principles Survey, the author constructs three measures of organizational effectiveness characteristics: attitudinal indices on performance appraisal, job satisfaction, and efficacy. These serve as dependent variables in regression analyses testing perceptions of adverse events (fair treatment and being misled), filing of formal complaints, and being subject to retaliation. This allows an examination of whether withdrawal (a decline in organizational effectiveness characteristics) is because of the initial event (measured as lack of fair treatment or being misled) or because of participation in the formal grievance process or later retaliation.
Christian Abolitionism: The American Missionary Association and the Florida Negro.

As a result of the Civil War, approximately 3,754,000 ex-slaves were removed from a condition of total dependence and thrown upon their own resources to fight the battle for existence in a society which was growing more complicated with the passing of each year. The former bondsmen were ill prepared for their new status. Slavery had provided little exposure to formal learning and the newly liberated freedmen's responsibility for their own livelihood and welfare necessitated education. Fortunately, a majority of Negroes were eager for knowledge.
Electromagnetic finite element design of axial flux permanent magnet machines for low speed applications

The higher torque to volume ratio of Axial Flux Permanent Magnet (AFPM) machines, when compared with their radial flux counterparts, is enhanced in multi pole design, making them suitable for low speed applications. This paper presents a comprehensive approach to the finite element-aided electromagnetic design of a double-sided AFPM machine with internal rotor. The Finite Element (FE) model is included in a coupled electromagnetic-thermal design procedure. Special attention is given to leakage fluxes, synchronous and armature reaction inductances and no-load electromotive force computation. The evaluation of the FE model routine of the design procedure is performed through experimental validation of a prototype machine.
Automatic Pattern Construction For Web Information Extraction

This paper describes a domain independent approach for automatically constructing information extraction patterns for semi-structured web pages. Given a randomly chosen page from a web site of similarly structured pages, the system identifies a region of the page that has a regular "tabular" structure, and then infers an extraction pattern that will match the "rows" of the region and identify the data elements. The approach was tested on three corpora containing a series of tabular web sites from different domains and achieved a success rate of at least 80%. A significant strength of the system is that it can infer extraction patterns from a single training page and does not require any manual labeling of the training page.
Measuring Cognitive Load in Multimedia Instruction : A Comparison of Two Instruments

The current study looks to review two popular self-report measures (NASA Task Load indeX, and Paas’ self-report instrument) and identify not only if they are consistent with one another, but also to discover whether both are equally sensitive across changes in levels of cognitive load. The two subclasses looked at in this study are intrinsic load, which is related to element interactivity, and extraneous load, which is influenced by the instructional design itself. Results from this study indicate that the NASA-Task Load index, as a weighted multi-dimensional rating scale, differs in measurement of the demands faced by learners in a PC-based, multimedia-learning environment from the more traditional, singlequestions short subjective instrument. Windell & Wiebe (2007) **Do not Redistribute** 2
Differential mechanisms of action of the novel γ-aminobutyric acid receptor antagonist ectoparasiticides fluralaner (A1443) and fipronil.

BACKGROUND Fluralaner (A1443) is an isoxazoline ectoparasiticide that is a novel antagonist of γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) receptors (GABARs), with a potency comparable to that of fipronil, a phenylpyrazole ectoparasiticide. To clarify the biological effectiveness of fluralaner against fipronil-resistant pests, differences in the actions of fluralaner and fipronil on GABARs that possess resistance to dieldrin (rdl)-type mutations were evaluated. RESULTS Fipronil had neither pest control nor GABAR-antagonistic activities against two-spotted spider mites (Tetranychus urticae) that had two different rdl-type amino acids (A(301) → H and T(350) → A: Drosophila melanogaster GABAR numbering) and against small brown planthoppers (Laodelphax striatellus) that had a novel rdl-type (A(283) → N) mutation in GABARs. In contrast, fluralaner showed not only high pest control activities against these pests, but also excellent antagonistic activities for these rdl-type GABARs. CONCLUSION The findings indicate that rdl-type fipronil-resistant pests do not show cross-resistance to fluralaner owing to the differential actions of fluralaner and fipronil on the GABAR.
Childhood maltreatment, the corticotropin‐releasing hormone receptor gene and adult depression in the general population

Dysregulations of the hypothalamic‐pituitary‐adrenal (HPA) axis have been implicated in the pathogenesis of depressive disorders and the corticotropin‐releasing hormone (CRH) was found to modulate emotional memory consolidation. Recently, two studies have reported an interaction between childhood abuse and the TAT–haplotype of the CRH‐Receptor Gene (CRHR1) connecting childhood adversities and genetic susceptibility to adult depression. We tested the hypothesis of an interaction of childhood maltreatment with single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and haplotypes of the CRHR1 gene not previously investigated. Caucasian subjects (n = 1,638) from the German general population (Study of Health in Pomerania, SHIP) were analyzed. As in the previous studies, childhood abuse and neglect were assessed with the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) and depression with the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI‐2). The CRHR1‐SNPs were genotyped on the Affymetrix Genome‐Wide Human SNP Array 6.0 platform. We identified an interaction between the TAT–haplotype and childhood physical neglect. The interaction with physical neglect showed significant (P < 0.05) results in 23 of the 28 SNPs, with rs17689882 (P = 0.0013) reaching “gene‐wide” significance. Although we did not replicate the specific interaction of abuse and the TAT–haplotype of the CRHR1 gene we confirmed the relevance of an interplay between variants within the CRHR1 gene and childhood adversities in the modulation of depression in adults. The largest effect was found for rs17689882, a SNP previously not analyzed. Relevant sample differences between this and prior studies like lower BDI‐2 scores, less childhood maltreatment and higher psychosocial functioning may account for the differences in gene–environment interaction findings. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Hepatocyte Growth Factor Acts as a Motogen and Guidance Signal for Gonadotropin Hormone-Releasing Hormone-1 Neuronal Migration

Reproduction in mammals is under the control of the hypothalamic neuropeptide gonadotropin hormone-releasing hormone-1 (GnRH-1). GnRH-1-secreting neurons originate during embryonic development in the nasal placode and migrate into the forebrain along olfactory nerves. Gradients of secreted molecules may play a role in this migratory process. In this context, hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is a potential candidate, because it promotes cell motility in developing brain and has been shown previously to act as a motogen on immortalized GnRH-1 neurons (GN11). In this study, the role of HGF and its receptor Met during development of the GnRH-1 system was examined. GnRH-1 cells express Met during their migration and downregulate its expression once they complete this process. Tissue-type plasminogen activator (tPA), a known HGF activator, is also detected in migratory GnRH-1 neurons. Consistent with in vivo expression, HGF is present in nasal explants, and GnRH-1 neurons express Met. HGF-neutralizing antibody was applied to explants to examine the role of the endogenous growth factor. Migration of GnRH-1 cells and olfactory axon outgrowth were significantly reduced, in line with disruption of a guidance gradient. Exogenous application of HGF to explants increased the distance that GnRH-1 cells migrated, suggesting that HGF also acts as a motogen to GnRH-1 neurons. Functional experiments, performed on organotypic slice cultures, show that creation of an opposing HGF gradient inhibits GnRH-1 neuronal migration. Finally, tPA−/−:uPA−/− (urokinase-type plasminogen activator−/−) knock-out mice exhibit strong reduction of the GnRH-1 cell population. Together, these data indicate that HGF signaling via Met receptor influences the development of GnRH-1.
The bZIP Transcription Factor HAC-1 Is Involved in the Unfolded Protein Response and Is Necessary for Growth on Cellulose in Neurospora crassa

High protein secretion capacity in filamentous fungi requires an extremely efficient system for protein synthesis, folding and transport. When the folding capacity of the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is exceeded, a pathway known as the unfolded protein response (UPR) is triggered, allowing cells to mitigate and cope with this stress. In yeast, this pathway relies on the transcription factor Hac1, which mediates the up-regulation of several genes required under these stressful conditions. In this work, we identified and characterized the ortholog of the yeast HAC1 gene in the filamentous fungus Neurospora crassa. We show that its mRNA undergoes an ER stress-dependent splicing reaction, which in N. crassa removes a 23 nt intron and leads to a change in the open reading frame. By disrupting the N. crassa hac-1 gene, we determined it to be crucial for activating UPR and for proper growth in the presence of ER stress-inducing chemical agents. Neurospora is naturally found growing on dead plant material, composed primarily by lignocellulose, and is a model organism for the study of plant cell wall deconstruction. Notably, we found that growth on cellulose, a substrate that requires secretion of numerous enzymes, imposes major demands on ER function and is dramatically impaired in the absence of hac-1, thus broadening the range of physiological functions of the UPR in filamentous fungi. Growth on hemicellulose however, another carbon source that necessitates the secretion of various enzymes for its deconstruction, is not impaired in the mutant nor is the amount of proteins secreted on this substrate, suggesting that secretion, as a whole, is unaltered in the absence of hac-1. The characterization of this signaling pathway in N. crassa will help in the study of plant cell wall deconstruction by fungi and its manipulation may result in important industrial biotechnological applications.
Epithelial-mesenchymal transition: potential regulator of ABC transporters in tumor progression

Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) can directly contribute to some malignant phenotypes of tumor cells including invasion, metastasis and resistance to chemotherapy. Although EMT is widely demonstrated to play a critical role in chemoresistance and metastasis, the potential signaling network between EMT and drug resistance is still unclear. The distribution of drugs in the internal and external environment of the tumor cells is tightly linked with ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporters. Recent studies have shown that ABC transporters expression changed continuously during EMT. We believe that EMT is an important regulator of ABC transporters. In this review, we discuss how EMT regulates ABC transporters and their potential linkages. And we hope the knowledge of EMT and ABC transporters will offer more effective targets to experimental research.
Analytic Ordering for Theoretical Purposes

This article discusses why and how to make explicit the linkages between interaction and conditions affecting both the interaction and its consequences. The discussion aims at (a) extending the range of conditions/conseguences considered by researchers; (b) forcing self-consciousness in their analytic choices among these; (c) helping to trace the often-intricate connections among them, thus (d) facilitating their ordering into explanatory hypotheses and their testing; (e) ensuring, or raising the probability, that explanations encompass variation; and (f) ultimately enabling presentation of a more orderly, com plete, and persuasive explanatory account. To this end, an updated version of our conditional matrix and what are now termed connectivity paths are outlined and illustrated.
Some men like it black, some women like it pink: consumer implications of differences in male and female website design

The World Wide Web doubles in size roughly every 2–3 months and dramatic claims are made about the effectiveness of Web-based commercial efforts. The centrality of non-price mechanisms of differentiation to the perception, enjoyment and ease of use felt using websites is acknowledged but the only statistically rigorous studies of factors such as form and content have been conducted within a universalist paradigm of aesthetics. This paper reports on an interactionist approach to web aesthetics involving an analysis of 60 male- and female-produced websites. The analysis reveals statistically significant differences between the male- and female-produced websites on 13 out of the 23 factors analysed. These differences span issues of navigation as well as linguistic and visual content. The paper argues that the appeal of websites can be maximised if they mirror the needs and interests of their target populations and that websites targeted at male or female dominated markets need to reflect the aesthetic diversity found in the male- and female-produced websites analysed here. It also presents information on the demographics of the IT profession, showing that there is a potential imbalance between the percentage of women involved online and those involved in the IT profession. This suggests that the male domination of the IT profession could be a barrier to the effective mirroring of female Website preferences. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.