Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An assessment of sex work in Swaziland: barriers to and opportunities for HIV prevention among sex workers

The HIV situation in virtually all southern African countries is a generalised epidemic. Despite the fact that almost all adult age and social groups have high HIV prevalence estimates, sex workers are disproportionally affected, with prevalence estimates higher than the general population. In a qualitative study of 61 male and female sex workers in Swaziland, we found that while poverty drove many into sex work, others reported motivations of pleasure or “sensation seeking”, and freedoms from the burden of marriage as perceived benefits of sex work. We also found that penile-vaginal sex was not universal in male-female sexual encounters; and motivation by sex workers for non-condom use included intention to earn more money from unprotected sex, desire for sexual pleasure, and not having time to use condoms. Many sex workers expressed doubts over an alternative lifestyle, even if that change afforded them money to meet their daily necessities. The findings from this study suggest that treating sex workers as a homogenous group that is driven into, or maintain sex work only because of poverty may be problematic, and could hamper HIV-relevant interventions aimed at reducing their vulnerability to sexually transmitted infections.
Retrograde bilin signaling enables Chlamydomonas greening and phototrophic survival

The maintenance of functional chloroplasts in photosynthetic eukaryotes requires real-time coordination of the nuclear and plastid genomes. Tetrapyrroles play a significant role in plastid-to-nucleus retrograde signaling in plants to ensure that nuclear gene expression is attuned to the needs of the chloroplast. Well-known sites of synthesis of chlorophyll for photosynthesis, plant chloroplasts also export heme and heme-derived linear tetrapyrroles (bilins), two critical metabolites respectively required for essential cellular activities and for light sensing by phytochromes. Here we establish that Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, one of many chlorophyte species that lack phytochromes, can synthesize bilins in both plastid and cytosol compartments. Genetic analyses show that both pathways contribute to iron acquisition from extracellular heme, whereas the plastid-localized pathway is essential for light-dependent greening and phototrophic growth. Our discovery of a bilin-dependent nuclear gene network implicates a widespread use of bilins as retrograde signals in oxygenic photosynthetic species. Our studies also suggest that bilins trigger critical metabolic pathways to detoxify molecular oxygen produced by photosynthesis, thereby permitting survival and phototrophic growth during the light period.
Impact of a Mental Illness Stigma Awareness Intervention on Pharmacy Student Attitudes and Knowledge

Objective. To determine if exposure to an intervention course impacts pharmacy students’ mental health stigma (MHS) and mental health knowledge (MHK). Methods. A one-group pre/posttest intervention study of third-year pharmacy students (N=120) was conducted. Dependent variables were subdomains of MHS (recovery, safety, disclosure, separation, comfort) which were measured on a 5-point Likert scale (1=strongly disagree; 5=strongly agree). Mental health knowledge was measured with 10 true/false questions. The 2.5-hour intervention included presentations, videos, discussions, and active-learning exercises. Pre/posttests were administered, and data were analyzed using paired t tests and McNemar’s tests. Results. Among responding students (n=88; 73.3% response rate), the following stigma subdomains significantly decreased after the intervention for depression and schizophrenia: recovery, safety, separation, and comfort. Mental health knowledge scores significantly increased from 5.9 (1.5) to 6.8 (1.5). Conclusion. Pharmacy students’ MHS and MHK related to depression and schizophrenia can be improved through a brief and interactive anti-stigma intervention.
Project CHARM: An HIV Prevention Program for Adolescent Mothers

Effects were examined of a human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) prevention program for adolescent mothers offered in pregnant minor and parenting programs in Los Angeles County. The sample included young women (N = 497) of predominantly poor, Latina backgrounds who had complete data from baseline to the one-year follow-up. The treatment group demonstrated statistically significant improvements in AIDS knowledge and intentions to use condoms, and fewer sex partners at the six-month follow-up as compared to the control group. Findings related to the effects of the intervention on theoretical variables provide some support for selected concepts from Social Cognitive Theory and the Theory of Reasoned Action.
Inflammation in pulmonary arterial hypertension

Inflammatory mechanisms appear to play a significant role in some types of pulmonary hypertension (PH), including monocrotaline-induced PH in rats and pulmonary arterial hypertension of various origins in humans, such as connective tissue diseases (scleroderma, systemic lupus erythematosus, mixed connective disease), human immunodeficiency virus infection, or plasma cell dyscrasia with polyneuropathy, organomegaly, endocrinopathy, monoclonal (M) protein and skin changes (POEMS) syndrome. Interestingly, some patients with severe pulmonary arterial hypertension associated with systemic lupus erythematosus have experienced significant improvements with immunosuppressive therapy, emphasising the relevance of inflammation in a subset of patients presenting with PH. Patients with primary PH (PPH) also have some immunological disturbances, suggesting a possible role for inflammation in the pathophysiology of this disease. A subset of PPH patients have been shown to have circulating autoantibodies, including antinuclear antibodies, as well as elevated circulating levels of the pro-infammatory cytokines, interleukins ‐1 and ‐6. Lung histology has also revealed inflammatory infiltrates in the range of plexiform lesions in patients displaying severe PPH, as well as an increased expression of the chemokines regulated upon activation, normal T‐cell expressed and secreted (RANTES) and fractalkine. Further analysis of the role of inflammatory mechanisms is necessary to understand whether this component of the disease is relevant to its pathophysiology.
Pulseq: A rapid and hardware‐independent pulse sequence prototyping framework

Implementing new magnetic resonance experiments, or sequences, often involves extensive programming on vendor‐specific platforms, which can be time consuming and costly. This situation is exacerbated when research sequences need to be implemented on several platforms simultaneously, for example, at different field strengths. This work presents an alternative programming environment that is hardware‐independent, open‐source, and promotes rapid sequence prototyping.
The Development of Stresses during the Shaping of the Surface of Aspen Wood and Their Impact on the Quality of the Surface

This work investigates the influence of wedge shape and depth of pressing on creation of stresses, as well as the influence of these stresses on quality of wood surface during wood embossing. For the identification of stresses, SolidWorks software was used, through which a simulation was made for the progression of monitored stresses which occur when pressing the wedges with various shapes to different depths of pressing. Based on these findings, it was possible to monitor factors that were modified so that embossing would achieve the desired shape and dimensionally stable surface without undesirable quality defects.
Online and Minimum-Cost Delegation in Service Composition 1 , 2

The paradigm of automated service composition through the integration of existing services promises a fast and efficient development of new services in cooperative service (e.g., business) environments. Although the “why” part of this paradigm is well understood, many key pieces are missing to utilize the available opportunities. Recently “service communities” where service providers with similar interests can register their services are proposed toward realizing this goal. In these communities, requests for services posed by users can be processed by delegating them to existing services, and orchestrating their executions. We use the service framework of the “Roman” model and further extend it to integrate activity processing costs into the delegation computation. We investigate the problem of efficient processing of service requests in service communities and develop polynomial time delegation techniques guaranteeing optimality.
Safety and efficacy of 1 year of tacrolimus ointment monotherapy in adults with atopic dermatitis. The European Tacrolimus Ointment Study Group.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the safety and efficacy of using 0.1% tacrolimus ointment for long-term treatment of atopic dermatitis. DESIGN Open-label, noncomparative study with 6 to 12 months of follow-up. SETTINGS Outpatient departments in 30 study centers in 11 European countries. PATIENTS We enrolled 316 patients aged 18 years and older with moderate to severe atopic dermatitis, 200 for 6 months and 116 for 12 months; 77.5% of patients completed the study. INTERVENTION Twice-daily application of 0.1% tacrolimus ointment on all affected skin. Visits were scheduled on day 1; after 1, 2, and 4 weeks of treatment; and monthly thereafter. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Safety assessments included monitoring of adverse events, clinical laboratory values, and tacrolimus blood concentrations. Efficacy end points included a combined score (modified Eczema Area and Severity Index) and an investigator's global assessment. RESULTS Local irritation, adverse events such as burning sensation (47% of patients), pruritus (24% of patients), and erythema (12% of patients) were common but tended to occur only when initiating treatment. Laboratory values showed no marked changes over time. Systemic absorption was minimal, with the maximum tacrolimus blood concentration being less than 1 ng/mL in 76% of patients. All efficacy end points showed improvement. The mean (SD) modified Eczema Area and Severity Index score was 23.7 (12.6) at day 1, 13.5 (11.3) at week 1, 6.1 (9.2) at month 6, and 6.1 (8.1) at month 12. Marked or excellent improvement or clearance of disease was reported in 54%, 81%, and 86% of patients at week 1, month 6, and month 12, respectively. CONCLUSION Up to 1 year of tacrolimus ointment use was safe and effective in patients with atopic dermatitis. Arch Dermatol. 2000;136:999-1006
The public spheres of climate change advocacy networks: an ethnography of Climate Action Network International within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Climate change is the most important issue of our time due to its potential to very seriously disrupt the life sustaining systems of planet Earth as well as its intersec-tions with other important challenges facing humanity. The United Nations Frame-work Convention on Climate Change is the key platform upon which the political process of international climate change politics takes place. The aim of this work is to produce an analysis of the role of transnational climate change advocacy networks in this political process and their internal power dynamics and thus contributing to the understanding of a crucial aspect of this political process. To advance this aim, this thesis engages with two objectives. First, a detailed ethnography is developed which serves to illustrate the political work of the environmental advocacy NGOs involved within this process, especially those that are members of Climate Action Network International (CAN-I). This approach is suitable to uncover the internal dynamics and structures of that NGO network as well as its complex and multi-layered relationships within the larger political configuration of the UNFCCC treaty process. Secondly, the investigation is advanced by analysing this ethnography through the lens of a critical theory of the public sphere. In particular, this analysis features more contemporary conceptualisations of the public sphere which stress the multiplicity of the public sphere concept including notions such as internal and external public spheres, counterpublics, and nested public spheres. Owing to this research design, the thesis has a degree of hybridity: it is expressly both an empirical thesis, with strong empirical flavour imparted by the focus on the detailed ethnographic account, as well a theoretical thesis offering an original contribution that is advanced throughout the thesis. The main theoretical thesis and contribution is that the theory of the public sphere is appropriate to analyse the political practice of civil society engagement on a transnational level if it is further developed to allow for greater degree of multiplicity and a broader conceptualisation of the notions of the “centre of authority” and the translation of the public opinion.
Vincristine for Successful Treatment of Steroid-Dependent Infantile Hemangiomas

Infantile hemangiomas (IHs) are common, although systemic therapy has been generally limited to circumstances of potential compromise of vital functions (airway, vision, feeding, or cardiac), risk of disfigurement, or bleeding. IHs have previously been shown to express high levels of type III deiodinase, which catabolizes active thyroid hormone, resulting in a state of severe hypothyroidism, termed “consumptive hypothyroidism. ” We describe an infant with diffuse hepatic hemangiomas who developed consumptive hypothyroidism who was initially treated successfully with systemic glucocorticoids and β-blockers. Several efforts to wean her medications were unsuccessful. She subsequently developed severe growth restriction and treatment alternatives were sought. Although previously limited to treatment of life-threatening hemangiomas, a trial of vincristine was initiated. She was ultimately weaned from all systemic therapies, with recovery of a normal growth trajectory. This case highlights broader indications for vincristine as a safe and effective systemic therapy for treatment of IHs. It also stresses the importance of close anthropometric monitoring of infants and toddlers receiving glucocorticoid therapy and intervention when growth compromise becomes evident.
Differences in the self between real life and MMORPGs measured through the HEXACO personality model: A case of EVE Online

4 Introduction 5 EVE Online 6 History of MMORPGs 7 Virtual Communities 10 The Self 13 Computer-Mediated Communication 16 Personality 17 The HEXACO Personality Inventory 19 The HEXACO Personality Inventory – A Short History 21 Hypothesis and Implications 23 Method 25 Sampling and Participants 25 Design and Materials 26 Procedure 26 Results 28 Personality Differences 30 Miscellaneous Questions 33 Notable Findings 35
An Online Energy Saving Resource Optimization Methodology for Data Center

In order to reduce energy consumption of data centers while employing infrastructure resource effectively, a comprehensive resource management method using an improved online energy saving mapping algorithm for virtual machines of data centers is proposed. An intelligent feedback management framework is built for online resource optimization. We propose reinforcement learning and threshold based virtual machine migration to find the lowest energy consumption mapping between virtual machines and host of data centers dynamically and avoid the resources contention in physical machines. Our experimental results shows that the proposed effective online energy saving resource optimization methodology can reduce data center energy consumption by at least 30.3% compared to traditional random placement and save at least 10% running time compared to the offline Q-Learning scheduling algorithm.
CO 2 EMISSIONS TRADING OPTIMIZATION IN COMBINED HEAT AND POWER GENERATION

The EU emissions trading directive states that starting from year 2005, industrial activities that emit significant amounts of CO2 must have a permit to do so. Such industries will be allocated allowances for certain amounts of green house gas emissions during each calendar year. The individual actors must not exceed their allowances or they must pay a penalty fee for excess emissions. However, the actors are permitted to trade allowances within the EU. The emissions trading affects most severely energy companies that use fossil fuels as primary energy sources. The immediate effect of emissions trading is to favor fuels that cause little or no CO2 emissions, and to disfavor fuels that cause higher emissions. The price level of CO2 allowances will vary dynamically based on whether the market believes that the overall CO2 emissions will exceed or fall below the EU target. During each trading period, individual actors must try to estimate whether their CO2 emissions will exceed or fall below their allowances, and determine whether they should buy or sell allowances and when they should do so. The actors may also try to affect their emissions by altering their fuel mix or by adjusting their production levels. We formulate the CO2 emissions trading optimization of a combined heat and power producer as a multi-period stochastic optimization problem and solve the problem using a stochastic simulation and coordination technique. The proposed solution strategy achieves both good expected profit and worst-case profit. Aiying Rong, Henri Hakonen, Simo Makkonen,Otso Ojanen and Risto Lahdelma
Maternal speech and the child's development of syntax: a further look

ABSTRACT The present study compared four categories of maternal utterances that were found in a previous study (Hoff-Ginsberg, 1986) to predict children's rates of syntax development to a category of maternal utterances that was unrelated to syntax development. The comparisons were designed to test the hypotheses that maternal utterances which benefit syntax development do so by providing syntactically rich data or by eliciting conversation from the child. Data-providing and conversation-eliciting characteristics of the selected categories of maternal utterances were assessed from the same transcripts of 22 mothers interacting with their 2½-year-old children that had provided the database for the earlier study of predictive relations. Each of the three positive predictor categories of maternal utterances differed from the unrelated category — in more frequently illustrating the affected aspect of syntax development, in eliciting more speech from the child, or both. Neither of these characteristics was true of the negative predictor category. The pattern of results suggested that maternal speech supports the child's development of syntax by engaging the child in linguistic interaction and also by providing illustrations of the structures the child acquires.
How revealing are eye-movements for understanding web engagement in young children

This paper presents a critical review of eye tracking as a research approach and evaluates its potential for usability testing in pre-school children. We argue that eye-tracking data is useful for assessing web engagement in this age-group, but only if triangulated against other usability methods. Recommendations for potential usability methods to use in tandem with eye-tracking are presented as part of a work in progress within a joint partner project between the University of Salford (UK) and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) exploring best-fit methodologies for understanding web engagement in young children.
Recovery of forensically important insect larvae from human cadavers in Malaysia (1993-1996).

Forensically important entomological specimens recovered from 95 forensic cases of human cadavers from April 1993 to May 1996 in Malaysia were identified and analysed. The results indicated that 73.7% of these specimens were Chrysomya species, occurring either as single or mixed infestations. Of these, the most prominent species were Ch megacephala (F.) and Ch rufifacies (Macquart). Other fly maggots recovered included Sarcophaga spp. , Lucilia spp. and Hermetia spp. , mostly occurring together with other calliphorine flies. A member of Muscidae fly, Ophyra spp. was also recovered for the first time.
Civic Purpose: An Integrated Construct for Understanding Civic Development in Adolescence

This article introduces civic purpose as a construct for learning about civic development in adolescence. Civic purpose, defined as a sustained intention to contribute to the world beyond the self through civic or political action, integrates the components of motivation, civic activity, and future-oriented civic intention. We present results from a mixed methods longitudinal study that used the civic purpose framework in which 1,578 high school seniors took a survey, 50 participated in an interview, and 9 additional adolescent “civic exemplars” participated in both the survey and the interview. Two years later, 480 participants took the survey again, and 34 participated in a second interview. A small percentage of the study subjects exhibited full civic purpose across three different types of civic activity (political, community service, expressive), while a larger percentage demonstrated precursory forms of civic purpose, with evidence of some but not all components of civic purpose. Key contributors to the development of civic purpose were: identity salience, beliefs and values, and invitation from one or more adults.
Estimating Long-Term Behavior of Flows without Trajectory Integration: The Infinitesimal Generator Approach

The long-term distributions of trajectories of a flow are described by invariant densities, i.e., fixed points of an associated transfer operator. In addition, global slowly mixing structures, such as almost-invariant sets, which partition phase space into regions that are almost dynamically disconnected, can also be identified by certain eigenfunctions of this operator. Indeed, these structures are often hard to obtain by brute-force trajectory-based analyses. In a wide variety of applications, transfer operators have proven to be very efficient tools for an analysis of the global behavior of a dynamical system. The computationally most expensive step in the construction of an approximate transfer operator is the numerical integration of many short-term trajectories. In this paper, we propose to directly work with the infinitesimal generator instead of the operator, completely avoiding trajectory integration. We propose two different discretization schemes: a cell based discretization and a spectral coll.
Anorexia nervosa and related eating disorders in childhood and adolescence

Part 1: Personal Experiences. T. Haggiag, The Broken Jigsaw: A Child's Perspective. M. MacDonald, Bewildered, Blamed and Broken-hearted: Parents' Views of Anorexia Nervosa. Part 2: Context and Course of Early Onset Eating Disorders. R. Bryant-Waugh, Overview of the Eating Disorders. J. Doyle, R. Bryant-Waugh, Epidemiology. B. Lask, Aetiology. M. Neiderman, Prognosis and Outcome. Part 3: Assessment and Treatment. D. Christie, B. Watkins, B. Lask, Assesment. D. Nicholls, R. de Bruyn, I. Gordon, Physical Assessment and Complications. B. Lask, Overview of Management. P. Honig, Family Work. D. Christie, Cognitive-behavioural Therapeutic Techniques for Children with Eating Disorders. J. Magagna, Individual Psychotherapy. P. Honig, W. Sharman, Inpatient Management. M. Close, Physiotherapy and Exercise. S. Wright, Group Work. A. Tate, Schooling. M. Bentovim, Ethical and Legal Issues. Epilogue. Index of Cases. Author Index. Subject Index.