Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Heteronymous H-reflex in Temporal Muscle Motor Units

An electric stimulation of the masseteric nerve elicits a heteronymous H-reflex in the temporal muscle. The characteristics of this reflex response were investigated by analysis of the firing probability changes of single motor units. Eleven healthy subjects participated in the experiments. The heteronymous H-reflex of the temporal muscle was electrically elicited by stimulation of the masseteric nerve at 120% of the intensity needed for the maximal masseteric M-wave. From 8 to 24 motor units were sampled from the temporal muscle of each subject. Peri-stimulus time histograms of motor unit recordings were built with a 0.5-ms bin width. The mean firing probability was calculated for the 20 ms preceding the stimulus. The firing probability was considered increased when it exceeded the mean by 3 standard deviations. Of 104 sampled motor units, 40 motor units showed a significant increase of the firing probability, which lasted 1 ms or less in 29 of them. In 12 out of 16 motor units, a significant increase of firing probability also persisted at a lower stimulation intensity (120% of the threshold needed to elicit a masseteric M wave). These data indicate that: (1) some temporal muscle motor units are modulated by afferents from the masseter muscle, (2) the heteronymous H-reflex has a monosynaptic component, and (3) there might be a more complex than just monosynaptic organization serving the heteronymous temporal H-reflex. For the latter conclusion regarding synaptic wiring, however, PSTH studies like the present one can offer only indirect evidence, and this question could be better studied in animals.
Steroid-binding receptors in fungi: implication for systemic mycoses

It has been shown that some of the mycotic infections especially systemic mycoses show increased male susceptibility and some steroids have been known to influence the immune response. Researchers found that some fungi including yeasts use "message molecules" including hormones to elicit certain responses, especially in the sexual cycle, but until recently no evidence was available to link specific hormonal evidence to this pronounced sex ratio. More evidence needed to demonstrate that a steroid (s) might in some manner influence the pathogenicity of the fungus in vivo. Therefore, the aim of this review paper is to shed some light on this subject along with effort to make mycologists more aware of this research as a stimulus for the explore of new ideas and design further research in this area of medical mycology.
Prevalence of enzootic simian viruses among urban performance monkeys in Indonesia

Animal reservoirs are the most important sources of emerging infectious diseases that threaten human populations. Global travel and tourism bring ever‐increasing numbers of humans into contact with animals, increasing the likelihood of cross species transmission of infectious agents. Non‐human primates come into contact with humans in a variety of contexts and may harbor infectious agents with zoonotic potential. We investigated the prevalence of infection with enzootic simian viruses among 20 urban performance monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) in Jakarta, Indonesia. This report documents for the first time evidence of infection with four simian viruses in urban performance monkeys. Simian foamy virus was detected by PCR in 52.9% of the macaques. Antibodies to simian retrovirus were detected in 10.5% of the macaques. Antibodies to Cercopithecine Herpesvirus 1, were detected in 5.3% of the macaques. Similarly, antibodies to simian T‐cell lymphotropic virus were detected in 5.3% of the macaques. No evidence of infection with simian immunodeficiency virus was detected in these macaques. These results suggest that urban performance monkeys are a reservoir for enzootic simian viruses known to be capable of infecting humans.
Probable person-to-person transmission of avian influenza A (H5N1).

BACKGROUND During 2004, a highly pathogenic avian influenza A (H5N1) virus caused poultry disease in eight Asian countries and infected at least 44 persons, killing 32; most of these persons had had close contact with poultry. No evidence of efficient person-to-person transmission has yet been reported. We investigated possible person-to-person transmission in a family cluster of the disease in Thailand. METHODS For each of the three involved patients, we reviewed the circumstances and timing of exposures to poultry and to other ill persons. Field teams isolated and treated the surviving patient, instituted active surveillance for disease and prophylaxis among exposed contacts, and culled the remaining poultry surrounding the affected village. Specimens from family members were tested by viral culture, microneutralization serologic analysis, immunohistochemical assay, reverse-transcriptase-polymerase-chain-reaction (RT-PCR) analysis, and genetic sequencing. RESULTS The index patient became ill three to four days after her last exposure to dying household chickens. Her mother came from a distant city to care for her in the hospital, had no recognized exposure to poultry, and died from pneumonia after providing 16 to 18 hours of unprotected nursing care. The aunt also provided unprotected nursing care; she had fever five days after the mother first had fever, followed by pneumonia seven days later. Autopsy tissue from the mother and nasopharyngeal and throat swabs from the aunt were positive for influenza A (H5N1) by RT-PCR. No additional chains of transmission were identified, and sequencing of the viral genes identified no change in the receptor-binding site of hemagglutinin or other key features of the virus. The sequences of all eight viral gene segments clustered closely with other H5N1 sequences from recent avian isolates in Thailand. CONCLUSIONS Disease in the mother and aunt probably resulted from person-to-person transmission of this lethal avian influenzavirus during unprotected exposure to the critically ill index patient.
Serum cartilage oligomeric matrix protein reflects osteoarthritis presence and severity: the Johnston County Osteoarthritis Project.

OBJECTIVE To characterize serum cartilage oligomeric matrix protein (COMP) levels by age and gender for a radiographically defined population free of hip and knee osteoarthritis (OA), and to examine the potential utility of COMP as a diagnostic biomarker for knee OA. METHODS Serum samples and knee and hip radiographs were obtained at a baseline evaluation as part of the Johnston County Osteoarthritis Project, a population-based study of OA in rural North Carolina. A total of 291 Caucasian participants were randomly selected for COMP analysis, 143 patients with radiographic knee OA (Kellgren/Lawrence [K/L] grade > or = 2) and 148 controls with neither hip nor knee OA (K/L grade 0), evenly distributed by age and gender. COMP was quantified by competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay with monoclonal antibody 17-C10. The natural log-transformed COMP data were analyzed using general linear models. RESULTS Serum COMP levels were significantly elevated (P = 0.0001) in the age > or = 65 group (mean +/- SD 1,302.1 +/- 496.7 ng/ml) versus the age 45-54 and age 55-64 groups (1,058.1 +/- 432.4 and 1,038.6 +/- 313.3, respectively). Serum COMP levels of the OA group were significantly higher than those of the control group (1,208.57 +/- 487.47 ng/ml versus 1,061.83 +/- 370.58 ng/ml; P = 0.0093). Serum COMP levels also increased significantly with knee OA K/L grade (P = 0.0047), knee OA laterality (P = 0.0043), and number of knee and hip joints involved (P = 0.0001). There was no significant difference in serum COMP levels by gender or obesity. CONCLUSION We demonstrate that in a population-based sample, serum COMP levels can distinguish an OA-affected subgroup from an unaffected subgroup and can reflect disease severity and multiple joint involvement in OA.
Usability study of VUI consistent with GUI focusing on age-groups

We studied the usability of a Voice User Interface (VUI) that is consistent with a Graphical User Interface (GUI), and focused on its dependency with user age-groups. Usability tests were iteratively conducted on 245 Japanese subjects with age-groups from 20s to 60s using a prototype of an in-vehicle information application. Next we calculated and analyzed statistics of the usability tests. We discuss the differences in usability with respect to age-groups and how to handle them. We propose that it is necessary to make voice guidance straightforward and to devise a VUI consistent with a GUI (VGUI) in order to let users understand the system structure. Also we found that the default design of a VGUI should be as simple as possible so that elderly users, who may be slow to learn the new system structure, are able to easily learn it.
Reconstructing 3D Shape, Albedo and Illumination from a Single Face Image

The morphable model has been employed to efficiently describe 3D face shape and the associated albedo with a reduced set of basis vectors. The spherical harmonics (SH) model provides a compact basis to well approximate the image appearance of a Lambertian object under different illumination conditions. Recently, the SH and morphable models have been integrated for 3D face shape reconstruction. However, the reconstructed 3D shape is either inconsistent with the SH bases or obtained just from landmarks only. In this work, we propose a geometrically consistent algorithm to reconstruct the 3D face shape and the associated albedo from a single face image iteratively by combining the morphable model and the SH model. The reconstructed 3D face geometry can uniquely determine the SH bases, therefore the optimal 3D face model can be obtained by minimizing the error between the input face image and a linear combination of the associated SH bases. In this way, we are able to preserve the consistency between the 3D geometry and the SH model, thus refining the 3D shape reconstruction recursively. Furthermore, we present a novel approach to recover the illumination condition from the estimated weighting vector for the SH bases in a constrained optimization formulation independent of the 3D geometry. Experimental results show the effectiveness and accuracy of the proposed face reconstruction and illumination estimation algorithm under different face poses and multiple‐light‐source illumination conditions.
Personality Development Across the Life Course:The Argument for Change and Continuity

In this article we review answers to 5 questions concerning the development of personality across the life course: How early in the life course can we identify characteristics unique to individuals that will show continuity over time? When in the life course is personality fully developed? What life course factors moderate continuity and change in personality? What are the mechanisms that promote continuity in personality? And finally, what are the mechanisms that promote change in personality? Based on the answers to these 5 questions we conclude (a) that there is modest continuity from childhood to adulthood, (b) that personality traits do not become fixed at a certain age in adulthood and retain the possibility of change even into old age, and (c) that with time and age people become more adept at interacting with their environment such that personality consistency increases with age and is more common than change in midlife and old age.
The anticipated belief differences theory of prejudice: Analysis and evaluation

The main supporting evidence for Rokeach's theory of prejudice (the Anticipated Belief Differences Theory of Prejudice) comes from the strong belief effects obtained in a simple Race/Belief manipulation. Analysis shows that the theory is unfalsifiable with this paradigm and is therefore neither tested nor confirmed by the many studies purporting to do so. The Belief-undefined/Belief-partially-defined manipulation of Stein, Hardyck and Smith (1965) does test the theory. However, these authors' conclusion that favourable evidence was obtained is incorrect owing to the use of an inappropriate statistic. Although race effects can be incorporated within a theory of belief prejudice it is equally possible to incorporate belief effects within any theory of prejudice which is contingent on an initial categorization into in-group and out-group. An empirical distinction between Rokeach's theory and other theories of prejudice can be made using a Belief-undefined/Belief-partially-defined manipulation. Finally the theoretical adequacy of Rokeach's theory is discussed in terms of more general characteristics of prejudice.
Phaeochromocytoma Mimicking Scleroderma

We describe a patient with adrenal phaeochromocytoma who presented with peripheral vasospasm and ischaemia and other manifestations mimicking features of systemic sclerosis, which resolved after resection of the tumor. Phaeochromocytoma should be suspected in patients with features of scleroderma who are negative for auto-antibodies.
Using fractal encoding for image indexing

As already documented in the literature, fractal image encoding can be exploited to obtain good image indexing systems that are able to deal with the images in compressed form, which makes them suitable for use with large databases. The system proposed in this paper has the additional interesting property of being invariant under two classes of pixel intensity transformations. This property makes the system robust with respect to several types of image transformations that can happen in practical applications: the images can be retrieved even in the presence of illumination and/or color alterations. The system can be queried via both a query by sketch and a query by example paradigms.
Heuristics for Hard Disk Drive Component ’ s Yield Optimization Problem under Budget and Supplier ’ s Rating Constraints

problem for the components of Hard Disk Drive using meta-heuristics. This problem is constrained by the limited budget and the requirement on the suppliers rating for the components. The problem's objective is to maximize the total yield. This problem is considered as a NP-Hard problem with the formulation of a nonlinear integer programming problem. Algorithm (GA) and Tabu Search (TS), are proposed to solve this problem. IACO embeds the Neighborhood search and re-initialization technique. Using the data obtained from undisclosed HDD manufacturer, computational experiments are conducted under various budget constraints. The results from the experiments show that IACO can solve the problem with better efficiency compared with other methods under reasonable time.
The Effect of Missing Elements on the Performance of D3LS STAP Approach using Real Antenna Elements

Time Adaptive Processing (STAP) applied on signal received from different configurations of real elements using D3LS (Direct Data Domain Least Squares). We will discuss the impact of each typical element-missing on the performance of this approach and the precision of the estimated strength of the SOI. We are interested in five different antenna configurations which are uniform linear equal spaced array, exponential spaced linear array, semicircular array, sinusoidal spaced array and planar array. The mutual coupling between real elements will affect on the estimation of complex amplitude of Signal of Interest (SOI). It is necessary to use a transformation matrix to compensate for the strong mutual coupling that exists between the antenna elements. Then, we will apply D3LS STAP on the compensated voltages. Numerical simulations are done using the three main methods of D3LS namely the forward, backward, and the forward-backward methods.
Representing Uncertainty in Graph Edges: An Evaluation of Paired Visual Variables

When visualizing data with uncertainty, a common approach is to treat uncertainty as an additional dimension and encode it using a visual variable. The effectiveness of this approach depends on how the visual variables chosen for representing uncertainty and other attributes interact to influence the user's perception of each variable. We report a user study on the perception of graph edge attributes when uncertainty associated with each edge and the main edge attribute are visualized simultaneously using two separate visual variables. The study covers four visual variables that are commonly used for visualizing uncertainty on line graphical primitives: lightness, grain, fuzziness, and transparency. We select width, hue, and saturation for visualizing the main edge attribute and hypothesize that we can observe interference between the visual variable chosen to encode the main edge attribute and that to encode uncertainty, as suggested by the concept of dimensional integrality. Grouping the seven visual variables as color-based, focus-based, or geometry-based, we further hypothesize that the degree of interference is affected by the groups to which the two visual variables belong. We consider two further factors in the study: discriminability level for each visual variable as a factor intrinsic to the visual variables and graph-task type (visual search versus comparison) as a factor extrinsic to the visual variables. Our results show that the effectiveness of a visual variable in depicting uncertainty is strongly mediated by all the factors examined here. Focus-based visual variables (fuzziness, grain, and transparency) are robust to the choice of visual variables for encoding the main edge attribute, though fuzziness has stronger negative impact on the perception of width and transparency has stronger negative impact on the perception of hue than the other uncertainty visual variables. We found that interference between hue and lightness is much greater than that between saturation and lightness, though all three are color-based visual variables. We also found a compound relationship between discriminability level and the degree of dimensional integrality. We discuss the generalizability and limitation of the results and conclude with design considerations for visualizing graph uncertainty derived from these results, including recommended choices of visual variables when the relative importance of data attributes and graph tasks is known.
Mental Control of Anxious and Depressive Cognitions

The deliberate effort to prevent, avoid, dismiss, or suppress unwanted distressing thoughts, images, and memories is considered a critical factor in the persistence of anxiety and depression in newer reformulated cognitive and “third wave” behavioral therapies. This paper provides an introduction to the six articles in this special section on mental control of anxious and depressive cognitions. The nature of mental control, its consequences and its impact on depressive cognitions, trauma-related intrusions, worry, and normal daily distressing thoughts are reviewed in some articles, empirically investigated in others but critically analyzed and elaborated by all of the contributors to this section.
Pedestrian Detection Based on Blob Motion Statistics

Pedestrian detection based on video analysis is a key functionality in automated surveillance systems. In this paper, we present efficient detection metrics that consider the fact that human movement presents distinctive motion patterns. Contrary to several methods that perform an intrablob analysis based on motion masks, we approach the problem without necessarily considering the periodic pixel motion inside the blob. As such, we do not analyze periodicity in the pixel luminances, but in the motion statistics of the tracked blob as a whole. For this, we propose the use of the following cues: 1) a cyclic behavior in the blob trajectory, and 2) an in-phase relationship between the change in blob size and position. In addition, we also exploit the relationship between blob size and vertical position, assuming that the camera is positioned sufficiently high. If the homography between the camera and the ground is known, the features are normalized by transforming the blob size to the real person size. For improved performance, we combine these features using the Bayes classifier. We also present a theoretical statistical analysis to evaluate the system performance in the presence of noise. We perform online experiments in a real industrial scenario and also with videos from well-known databases. The results illustrate the applicability of the proposed features.
I: Formulation

The paper presents a new general constitutive law for creep in which the aging due to continuing hydration of cement is taken into account in a manner that is both simpler and physically better justified than in existing theories. Mi-cromechanical analysis of the solidification process is used to show that the aging may be modeled as a growth of the volume fraction of load-bearing solidified matter (hydrated cement), which itself is treated as nonaging and thus is describ-able as a nonaging viscoelastic material. The analysis shows that a history integral should be used to express the rate, rather than the total value, of the viscoelastic strain component. Material functions can be chosen in a way that yields previously established simple laws, i.e., the double power law, logarithmic law and log-double power law, as special asymptotic cases. The creep strain is obtained as a sum of aging and nonaging viscoelastic strains and an aging viscous strain (flow). Non-linearity is introduced by modifying the current creep rate as a function of the current stress. Verification by test results and numerical application is left to Part II, which follows. INTRODucnON The creep of concrete is profoundly influenced by the process of cement hydration. This influence, commonly called aging, causes the creep at constant stress to decrease significantly as the age at loading increases. The decrease is not confined to young concrete, but occurs through the entire lifetime of structures. Modeling of the aging aspect of creep has proven to be a major complicating factor. Although integral as well as differential formulations that take the aging into account are available and used in practice ("Mathematical" 1986; "Conclusions" 1987; "Finite" 1982; BaZant 1982), they have several serious shortcomings. 1. The presently used forms of the creep law with aging are not guaranteed to satisfy thermodynamic restrictions. From the theoretical viewpoint this is, in the least, discomforting. The aging is generally described by considering certain material properties to be functions of the age, t', of concrete. Although ther-modynamic potentials can still be formulated (Bafant 1979), the laws of ther-modynamics can be written only for systems of substances whose properties do not vary in time. 2. For the differential form of the creep law based on a rheologic model, the implication of aging is that the spring moduli, depend on time. This is a major complication for numerical solutions, and is a questionable approach from the thermodynamic …
A corpus callosal deficit in sequential analysis by schizophrenics.

This preliminary study evaluated interhemispheric (i.e., corpus callosal) information processing by chronic schizophrenic and normal subjects. In right-handed normals the left hemisphere has been reported to be superior in temporal sequential analysis. Consequently temporal information presented to the right hemisphere requires time to cross to the left hemisphere for analysis. Measurement of hemispheric laterality and corpus callosal transfer time were evaluated by a two-pulse temporal discrimination task. Two dot stimuli were presented with decreasing temporal separation during bilateral and unilateral conditions. Subjects were required to judge perceived simultaneity and nonsimultaneity of dot onset. The results indicate that left hemisphere function in chronic schizophrenic and normal controls is superior to the right hemisphere in temporal analysis. Corpus callosal transfer time was significantly slower for chronic schizophrenics than for normal controls.