Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Development of Five Factor Drinking Motive Questionnaire for Japanese(DMQ-J)

In the present study, we developed a Drinking Motive Questionnaire (DMQ-J) composed of 19 items to clarify the drinking motives of Japanese adults. Exploratory factor analysis revealed the following five reliable factors or subscales of drinking motives: “Coping” (drinking to regulate or reduce internally generated negative emotions), “Enhancement” (drinking to enhance internal positive mood), “Social” (drinking to obtain positive social, and thus external, rewards), “Meal” (drinking to enjoy one’s meal), and “Restraint” (reasons to restrain one’s drinking). Based on analysis of DMQ-J data from 1000 light-to-moderate drinkers, males scored higher than females on the “Coping” and lower on the “Restraint” subscales, which suggests that males have a relatively unhealthy drinking style. Moreover, females scored marginally higher than males on the “Meal” subscale, which suggests that females enjoy alcohol with their meal, but not to an unhealthy degree. In terms of generational differences, “Social” motive scores decreased but “Meal” motive scores increased with increases in age, suggesting that older people drink to enhance their internal pleasure and enjoy their meals, but not to obtain social rewards.
Burning Man Values Examined: Gratitude as a Culturally-Driven and Value-Based Organizational Mainstay

Gratitude expression is examined as a culturally-derived principle that can be adopted as a best practices strategy that can make organizations more dynamic and human relationships more meaningful. Burning Man is presented as an exemplar of gratitude implementation by crafting the expression of gratitude into an elevated organizational phenomenon (including a cultural principal of unconditional gifting). Burning Man has also crafted a “Culture of Appreciation” as a set of organizationally-derived practices complementary to processes of gratitude implementation. The paper concludes with a discussion of gratitude and appreciation as an organizational mainstay.
Concatenated Luby Transform Coding and Bit-Interleaved Coded Modulation Using Iterative Decoding for the Wireless Internet

In Bit-Interleaved Coded Modulation (BICM) the coding and modulation schemes were jointly optimized for the sake of attaining the best possible performance when communicating over fading wireless communication channels. The iterative decoding scheme of BICM (BICM-ID) invoking an appropriate bit-to-symbol mapping strategy enhances its achievable performance in both AWGN and Rayleigh channels. BICM-ID may be conveniently combined with Luby Transform (LT) codes, which were designed for handling packetized wireless Internet data traffic in erasure channels without retransmitting the corrupted packets. By jointly designing a serially concatenated LT-BICM-ID code, an infinitesimally low Bit Error Rate (BER) is achieved for Signal to Noise Ratios (SNR) in excess of 7.5dB over wireless Internet type erasure channels contaminated by AWGN.
Using a brain-computer interface for rehabilitation : a case study on a patient with implanted electrodes

Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) allow direct communication between men and computers thanks to the analysis of brain activity. Current applications of BCIs in assistive technologies are: palliative communication systems for patients with complete muscular paralysis and restoration of movement for people with a motor in firmity (orthetic or prosthetic devices controlled by the thought). It appears today that brain-computer interfaces can also be used in therapeutic approaches to rehabilitation or functional recovery through neurofeedback. In this paper we briefly review several therapeutic uses of brain-computer interfaces and present a clinical experiment with an hemiparetic patient who has used a BCI as a motor rehabilitation tool.
Kinesthetic teaching of humanoid motion based on whole-body compliance control with interaction-aware balancing

In this work we present a framework for kinesthetic teaching and iterative refinement of whole body motions. For detection of external forces we apply a momentum based disturbance observer known from manipulator control to the floating-base model of a humanoid robot. These external forces are used as a trigger for implementing a compliant behavior at the interaction point and are integrated into a predictive balancing algorithm. For representation of the motion data, a hidden Markov model is used, which allows for an iterative update of the discrete motion states as well as a smooth generation of continuous motion data. Finally, we present an application of these algorithms on the humanoid robot TORO.
A segment-based advertisement search method from TV stream

Searching of video clip from TV streams has significant commercial values, for example, the application of advertisement tracking in different TV channels. In this paper, a segment-based advertisement searching method is proposed. Robust visual features are first extracted to overcome some video transformations, and then two search strategies are presented for long AD clips and short ones. The experimental results indicate that the average search time of one query clip from a 24-hour TV stream is about 1 second, and the mean recall for 9 channels exceeds 98% while 100% precision is achieved. The evaluation results of copy detection task at TRECVID show the robustness and effectiveness.
Methods to improve efficacy of intravesical mitomycin C: results of a randomized phase III trial.

BACKGROUND Intravesical chemotherapy (i.e., placement of the drug directly in the bladder) with mitomycin C is beneficial for patients with superficial bladder cancer who are at high risk of recurrence, but standard therapy is empirically based and patient response rates have been variable, in part because of inadequate drug delivery. We carried out a prospective, two-arm, randomized, multi-institutional phase III trial to test whether enhancing the drug's concentration in urine would improve its efficacy. METHODS Patients with histologically proven transitional cell carcinoma and at high risk for recurrence were eligible for the trial. Patients in the optimized-treatment arm (n = 119) received a 40-mg dose of mitomycin C, pharmacokinetic manipulations to increase drug concentration by decreasing urine volume, and urine alkalinization to stabilize the drug. Patients in the standard-treatment arm (n = 111) received a 20-mg dose without pharmacokinetic manipulations or urine alkalinization. Both treatments were given weekly for 6 weeks. Primary endpoints were recurrence and time to recurrence. Treatment outcome was examined by use of Kaplan-Meier analysis with log-rank tests. Statistical tests were two-sided. RESULTS Patients in the two arms did not differ in demographics or history of intravesical therapy. Dysuria occurred more frequently in the optimized arm but did not lead to more frequent treatment termination. In an intent-to-treat analysis, patients in the optimized arm showed a longer median time to recurrence (29.1 months; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 14.0 to 44.2 months) and a greater recurrence-free fraction (41.0%; 95% CI = 30.9% to 51.1%) at 5 years than patients in the standard arm (11.8 months; 95% CI = 7.2 to 16.4 months) and 24.6% (95% CI = 14.9% to 34.3%) (P =.005, log-rank test for time to recurrence). Improvements were found in all risk groups defined by tumor stage, grade, focality, and recurrence. CONCLUSIONS This study identified a pharmacologically optimized intravesical mitomycin C treatment with statistically significantly enhanced efficacy.
Automatic Extraction Methodology for Accurate Measurements of Effective Channel Length on 65-nm MOSFET Technology and Below

The length of MOSFET channels is an important circuit design parameter, and this paper focuses on a new industrially-compatible technique using gate-to-channel measurements Cgc(Vg) to provide accurate extraction of the channel length. Thanks to fully-automatic probers, the technique provides large scale extractions and so, statistical-based results can be extracted with a maximized reliability. An in-depth study of parasitic capacitances has been performed to improve the extraction accuracy to within a few nanometers.
Braking Process in Automobiles: Investigation of the Thermoelastic Instability Phenomenon

During the braking action, the kinetic energy produced at the wheel is transformed into heat energy, which doesn’t dissipate fast enough into the air stream from the brake to the brake disk; as a result, the thermal conductivity plays a critical role in handling such heat generated. Thermal judder, which is a result of non-uniform contact cycles between the pad and the disk brake rotor, which is primarily an effect of the localized Thermo-Elastic Instabilities (TEI) at the disk brake rotor surface. Localized TEI act at the friction ring surface generating intermittent hot bands around the rubbing path which may in turn leads to the development of so-called hot spots. In this chapter a case study regarding a transient analysis of the thermoelastic contact problem for disk brakes with frictional heat generation, performed using the finite element analysis (FEA) method is described in details. The computational results are presented for the distribution of the temperature on the friction surface between the contacting bodies (the disk and the pad). Also, the influence of the material properties on the thermoelastic behavior, represented by the maximum temperature on the contact surface is compared among different types of brake disk materials found in the literature, such as grey cast iron (grey iron grade 250, high-carbon grade iron, titanium alloyed grey iron, and compact graphite iron (CGI)), Aluminum metal matrix composites (Al-MMC’s), namely Al2O3 Al-MMC and SiC Al-MMC (Ceramic brakes). This comparison was performed in order to improve the conceptual design of the disk brakes. The results obtained from the suggested model are compared with actual measurements obtained from experiments performed by Cueva et al.(2003). The FEA results were in excellent agreement with the actual measurements reported by Cueva et al. for all of the suggested brake disk materials. A comparison between two different brake disk rotor designs was performed as well in order to study the effect of the perforated brake disks on the maximum temperature, the temperature distribution, and the heat flux produced under the same braking conditions.
Material to : Seasonal Versus Permanent Thermocline Warming by Tropical Cyclones

The heat uptake in TC cold wakes is computed along cross-sections centered on each of the 6-hourly Best Track locations. For storms moving predominantly meridionally (i.e. within 45) we compute zonal cross-sections and for storms moving predominantly zonally, we compute meridional cross-sections. The heat uptake per unit area along each 6-hourly cross-section is then multiplied by the distance to the next 6-hourly location. To calculate the total heat transport we now need to integrate across the wake, which poses a question as to what is an appropriate choice for the width of the cross sections. In the absence of any background variability of SST, the heat uptake estimate would not depend on this choice, as long as the width is sufficiently large to include the whole TC signal. However, background variability in SST will bias the heat uptake estimate high, especially far from the wake center. The reason is that equations (1) and (2) return a positive heat uptake estimate whenever there is a decrease in SST, but zero heat uptake when there is an increase in SST. This is appropriate if the SST anomalies are associated with the passage of the storm but not if the SST variations are due to background variability. Background SST variations are not expected to correspond to a net heat uptake, but our algorithm always returns positive values associated with warming of cold anomalies and zero values
Simultaneous Analysis of Cytokines and Costimulatory Molecules Concentrations by ELISA Technique and of Probabilities of Measurable Concentrations of Interleukins IL-2, IL-4, IL-5, IL-6, CXCL8 (IL-8), IL-10, IL-13 Occurring in Plasma of Healthy Blood Donors

Background. The cytokine network remarkably influences homeostasis. There is not a complex analysis describing physiological values of soluble cytokines in healthy individuals. Methods. Authors used the ELISA method to detect soluble cytokines and costimulatory molecules simultaneously in the plasma of 30 blood donors. Results. Data are shown as (a range of concentrations; median) IL-2 (0–74.48 pg/mL; 0), IL-4 (0–65.18 pg/mL; 0), IL-5 (0–86.69 pg/mL; 0), IL-6 (0–73.17 pg/mL; 0), IL-8 (0–74.8 pg/mL; 0), IL-10 (0–12.6 pg/mL; 0), IL-13 (0–3.9 pg/mL; 0), sCD40L (0–3.5 ng/mL; 0), and TNF-α (0–67.6; 0). For the IL-6 receptor, the concentration was 75.89 ± 35.83 ng/mL (average ± SD), sCD23 28.9 ± 15.22 ng/mL, and TGFβ1 14.98 ± 12.39 ng/mL. A special approach was taken for the analysis of values, which had median 0. A model for the probability of detectable level's occurrence for each interleukin was formulated with intervals of confidence. Conclusion. These results provide reference values for cytokine levels in the plasma of healthy individuals.
Impact of trapping effects on GaN HEMT based Doherty PA load-pull ratios

This paper presents an explanation for the higher efficiencies commonly obtained from GaN HEMT based Doherty power amplifiers (PAs), when subjected to wider load-pull ratios as compared with their Si LDMOS counterparts, the two main players in base-station PA technology. The analysis starts with the recently derived theory of efficiency dependence on load impedance and quiescent current, to then relate them to the self-biasing effects introduced by GaN HEMT charge trapping phenomena. For validation purposes, measured load-pull ratios of two 15W Si LDMOS and GaN HEMTs transistors are used.
The mediation of eye movements by spoken language

Many factors can influence eye movements around a visual scene. Here, we consider the influence of spoken language. The first part of the chapter reviews a range of studies which illustrate how eye movements can illuminate aspects of spoken language understanding. The second presents a hypothesis of how spoken language mediates visual attention. The chapter then considers how this mediation might depend on the participant’s goals, including consideration of what the timing of these eye movements might, or might not, tell us about their generalizability. Methodological issues, including how to depict the dynamically changing eye movement record, and how to analyse it, are considered next. The chapter concludes with some issues that are likely to dominate the field in future years.
Vision-based handwriting recognition for unrestricted text input in mid-air

We propose a vision-based system that recognizes handwriting in mid-air. The system does not depend on sensors or markers attached to the users and allows unrestricted character and word input from any position. It is the result of combining handwriting recognition based on Hidden Markov Models with multi-camera 3D hand tracking. We evaluated the system for both quantitative and qualitative aspects. The system achieves recognition rates of 86.15% for character and 97.54% for small-vocabulary isolated word recognition. Limitations are due to slow and low-resolution cameras or physical strain. Overall, the proposed handwriting recognition system provides an easy-to-use and accurate text input modality without placing restrictions on the users.
Analysis, Blind Identification, and Correction of Frequency Response Mismatch in Two-Channel Time-Interleaved ADCs

In this paper, novel blind identification and compensation architectures for the frequency response mismatch of a two-channel time-interleaved analog-to-digital-converter (TI-ADC) are proposed. First, detailed modeling of the frequency response mismatch is carried out, establishing a direct connection and similarity to the well-known in-phase/quadrature mismatch problem. Stemming from this modeling, the proposed blind mismatch identification and compensation architectures are then developed building on complex statistical signal processing. Compared to the existing methods in the literature, the proposed solutions can identify and correct the frequency response mismatch in a fully blind manner for the full digital bandwidth (BW) of the ADC system, and are also applicable in sub-sampling TI-ADC devices and RF sampling. The efficiency of the proposed solutions is verified and demonstrated using comprehensive measurements of actual RF-sampling TI-ADC hardware with gigahertz-scale instantaneous BW.
A Ciência Política nas Propostas Curriculares Estaduais de Sociologia para o Ensino Médio

O presente artigo tem por objetivo analisar a presenca dos conteudos de Ciencia Politica nas propostas curriculares de Sociologia do Ensino Medio, tomando como objeto de analise as propostas dos estados da federacao. Tal analise busca identificar, dentre outras questoes, quais tematicas comuns a Ciencia Politica sao normalmente sugeridas nas propostas curriculares e em quais series deveriam ser abordadas pelos professores de Sociologia. Dentre as observacoes realizadas, destacamos que os temas recorrentes da Ciencia Politica mais presentes nas propostas curriculares de Sociologia sao cidadania, movimentos sociais, Estado, democracia e poder. Ainda que tais tematicas estejam presentes em todo o Ensino Medio, nota-se uma maior intensidade no ultimo ano. The present article has as its objective an analysis of the presence of Political Science content in the curricular proposals of High School Sociology, taking as object of analysis the proposals of the states of the federation. This analysis seeks to identify, among other issues, which common themes are Political Science topics are commonly suggested in the curricular proposals and in which grades they should be addressed by Sociology teachers. Among the observations made, we point out that the common themes of Political Science most present in the curricular proposals of Sociology are "citizenship", "social movements", "State", "democracy, and "power". Even though such themes are present throughout High School, their presence will occur with greater intensity in the last year.
The associations between socio-demographic factors and environmental knowledge in the city of Toyota, Japan

ABSTRACT This study analyzes relationships between socio-demographic factors (age, sex, education, and household income) and environmental awareness related to the eco-policy in Toyota City, Japan. Previous research has shown that citizens' environmental awareness improved significantly after the city was designated as an environmental model city by the Japanese government in 2009. However, this research did not consider socio-demographic factors, which may be linked to variations in environmental awareness. Using a questionnaire survey, this study addresses this research gap. The findings suggest that education and household income are significantly associated with environmental awareness. Some recommendations for promoting eco-policy are discussed.
Comparison of the safety and efficacy of a fixed-dose combination regimen and separate formulations for pulmonary tuberculosis treatment

OBJECTIVES: Fixed-dose combination formulations, which simplify the administration of drugs and prevent the development of drug resistance, have been recommended as a standard anti-tuberculosis treatment regimen. However, the composition and dosage recommendations for fixed-dose combination formulations differ from those for separate formulations. Thus, questions about the effectiveness and side effects of combination formulations remain. The aim of this study was to compare the safety and efficacy of these two types of anti-tuberculosis regimens for pulmonary tuberculosis treatment. METHOD: A prospective, randomized controlled study was conducted using the directly observed treatment short-course strategy. Patients were randomly allocated to one of two short-course regimens. One year after completing the treatment, these patients' outcomes were analyzed. ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT00979290. RESULTS: A total of 161 patients were enrolled, 142 of whom were evaluable for safety assessment. The two regimens had a similar incidence of adverse effects. In the per-protocol population, serum bilirubin concentrations at the peak level, at week 4, and at week 8 were significantly higher for the fixed-dose combination formulation than for the separate formulations. All patients had negative sputum cultures at the end of the treatment, and no relapse occurred after one year of follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: In this randomized study, transient higher serum bilirubin levels were noted for the fixed-dose combination regimen compared with the separate formulations during treatment. However, no significant difference in safety or efficacy was found between the groups when the directly observed treatment short-course strategy was used.
ADAPTATION USING TRANSFORMATION SPACE MODEL EVOLUTION

This paper presents a new approach to online speaker adaptation based on transformation space model evolution. This approach extends the previous idea of speaker space model evolution [11] by applying the a priori knowledge of training speakers to the speaker-dependent maximum likelihood linear regression (MLLR) matrix parameters. A quasi-Bayes (QB) estimation algorithm is devised to incrementally update the hyperparameters of the transformation space model and the regression matrices simultaneously. Experiments on supervised speaker adaptation demonstrate that the proposed approach is more effective compared with the conventional quasi-Bayes linear regression (QBLR) technique when a small amount of adaptation data is available.
Caudal Granular Insular Cortex and the Maintenance of Allodynic behavior in the Rat

4 Introduction.5 Methods.7 Somatosensory Evoked Potential Mapping.8 Insular Excitotoxic Lesions.9 Chronic Constriction Injury.9 Behavioral Measures – Von Frey Test, Calibrated Toe Pinch.10 Spinal Laminar Multi-Unit Recording.11 Analysis and Groups.12 Results.14 Functional Mapping of CGIC.14 Functional Lesion Verification.14 Behavioral Effect of CGIC Lesion Before and After CCI.14 Spinal Laminar Multi-Unit Responses to CGIC Inactivation.16 Discussion.18 Two-Phase Model of Allodynia.19 Running Head: CAUDAL INSULA AND ALLODYNIA 3 Chronological Analysis of Cortically and Sciatic-Evoked Spinal MUA.21 Proposed Mechanism of Maintenance of Allodynia.23 References.26 Figures.29 Running Head: CAUDAL INSULA AND ALLODYNIA 4
Sentient Objects for Designing and Controlling Service Robots

Abstract Services related to healthcare and the support for elderly people become more and more important. Autonomous or semi-autonomous robots may play an important role in this area. From a control system point of view these robots are networks of distributed smart components to perceive their environment and react on it in real time. The problem of developing or extending such a robot often is that the designer has to start from scratch struggling with low level issues, where reusability of already designed components would be highly desirable. The paper describes a robot application in the area of a meals distribution service that combines two design worlds. One is the conventional world of modelling the functional properties without any structural considerations, the other is the world of cooperating sentient objects. We explain how the notion of sentient objects will assist the design, simulation and also later extensions and adaptations of the robot.
RAAS blockade in combination with diuretic therapy increases urine excretion, which in turn increases drinking and thus reduces erythropoietin and proteinuria.

Pierre Delanaye Etienne Cavalier Jean-Marie Krzesinski Christophe Mariat Department of Nephrology, Dialysis, Hypertension, Transplantation, University of Liège, CHU Sart Tilman, Liège, Belgium Department of Clinical Chemistry, University of Liège, CHU Sart Tilman, Liège, Belgium Department of Nephrology, Dialysis, Hypertension, Transplantation, University of Saint-Etienne, Hopital Nord, Saint-Etienne, France E-mail: pierre_delanaye@yahoo.fr