Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Methodology to Evaluate Distributed Control Strategies used in Distributed Energy Resource Applications

This paper provides a taxonomy and method to evaluate distributed control strategies used in distributed energy resource (DER) applications in power distribution grid. The paper explains the design process and provides performance metrics concerning implementation and further discusses different possibilities in distributed control for providing grid services. It focuses on identifying distributed control strategies proposed in recently published research and ongoing research activities, in terms of their control architectures, mathematical methods, and operational features. The deployment of existing control technologies and research results are also discussed by reviewing recent smart grid demonstration projects.
Correlation of Surgical Pleth Index with Stress Hormones during Propofol-Remifentanil Anaesthesia

Eighty patients undergoing elective ear-nose-throat surgery were enrolled in the present study to investigate the relationship between surgical pleth index (SPI) and stress hormones (ACTH, cortisol, epinephrine, norepinephrine) during general anaesthesia which was induced and maintained with propofol and remifentanil using a target-controlled infusion. The study concluded that the SPI had moderate correlation to the stress hormones during general anaesthesia, but no correlation during consciousness. Furthermore, SPI values were able to predict ACTH values with high sensitivity and specificity.
Deoxynivalenol and its toxicity

Deoxynivalenol and its toxicity Deoxynivalenol (DON) is one of several mycotoxins produced by certain Fusarium species that frequently infect corn, wheat, oats, barley, rice, and other grains in the field or during storage. The exposure risk to human is directly through foods of plant origin (cereal grains) or indirectly through foods of animal origin (kidney, liver, milk, eggs). It has been detected in buckwheat, popcorn, sorgum, triticale, and other food products including flour, bread, breakfast cereals, noodles, infant foods, pancakes, malt and beer. DON affects animal and human health causing acute temporary nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, headache, dizziness, and fever. This review briefly summarizes toxicities of this mycotoxin as well as effects on reproduction and their antagonistic and synergic actions.
The safer tomorrows: Injury prevention and violence reduction projectÂ©

Children and adolescents (youth) may be exposed to various forms of violence and trauma in a number of ways. Research and clinical studies have revealed that youth may be significantly impacted by isolated, single or repetitive exposures to violence and trauma. Further, these exposures may ultimately impact the overall psycho-social-emotional, and mental health, as well as, the mental health care of this population of youth who self-report, who are at-risk and who may or may not be at risk for exposure to violence and trauma in their lives. Thus, consequently, health care providers (HCP’s) who do not view or understand that exposures to violence and trauma among youth, as well as, exposures to adverse environments or situations may pose as a serious or potential psychosocial-emotional and mental health care consequence for this population of youth may inadvertently impede or delay timely access to appropriate health care for this population. Hence, as a consequence of this delay in timely access to appropriate psycho-social-emotional and mental health care services for this population of youth, may significantly compromise their overall psycho-social-emotional and mental health care status. This article reviews the impact of exposures to violence and trauma among youth, with a focus on current empirical findings noted in the literature regarding victimized and traumatized children and adolescents, and the implications of these findings in promoting the healing and restoration for this population of youth for HCP’s. In addition, a brief discussion of an empirical evidence-based psycho-social-emotional intervention/project referred to as The Safer Tomorrows: Injury Prevention and Violence Reduction Project which has been designed for children and adolescents who may or may not be at-risk for exposures to violence and trauma is presented. The importance of early identification, screening, assessment and treatment among victimized and traumatized children and adolescents are also addressed.
PerfDoc: Automatic Performance Bug Diagnosis in Production Cloud Computing Infrastructures

Performance bugs are difficult to diagnose in production cloud computing environments. Because the performance bugs often only appear under specific conditions are hard to be reproduced and provide little diagnostic information. In this paper, we propose PerfDoc, an automatic performance bugs online diagnosing tool. PerfDoc helps developers analyze software performance anomalies and identify the causes of performance anomalies. PerfDoc leverages system calls produced by the softwares to model the system call behavior of the software based on the self-organizing map, and identifies anomalous system calls with the behavior model by comparing the difference between the different execution units. PerfDoc does not require source code or any runtime instrumentation to the software. We have implemented a prototype of PerfDoc and tested it using real-world performance bugs on five popular open source server systems (Apache, Tomcat, Hadoop, HDFS, and MySQL). The results show that PerfDoc is able to locate the most suspicious system calls that are related to the performance bugs. Moreover, PerfDoc only imposes trivial runtime overhead (2.2%, averagely) on the tested softwares.
Event-based re-training of statistical contention models for heterogeneous multiprocessors

Embedded single-chip heterogeneous multiprocessor (SCHM) systems experience frequent system events such as task preemption, power-saving voltage/frequency scaling, or arrival of new events/data from the outside world. Traditionally, the designers model these events by explicitly coupling them to corresponding simulation events within environments such as SystemC. However, this approach places a burden on the designer to identify which events are important enough to be captured by simulation, resulting in an overly conservative selection of events to model. This work presents a technique for de-coupling of system events from simulation events, removing the burden from the designer to determine which events significantly affect the system performance model, while decreasing simulation runtime. Enabling this de-coupling is a prediction model that quantifies the magnitude of changes introduced by system events, and identifies those important enough to be considered simulation events. The prediction model is evaluated by over 4000 separate scenarios featuring dynamic event changes to processor speed, bus speed, application type, and application input data, finding that almost 70% of tested events impacted contention modeling by less than 10%. Without resorting to detailed simulation, the prediction model captures the system event effects to within 5% of actual measured error, while staying within 18% in 95% of all tests.
The dysplastic pulmonary valve: a new roentgenographic entity; with a discussion of the anatomy and radiology of other types of valvular pulmonary stenosis.

An atypical form of valvular pulmonic stenosis is described.In this dysplasia there are characteristic clinical and angiographic findings which allow differentiation from typical pulmonic stenosis.Pathologically the dysplastic valve is tricuspid, unfused, markedly thickened and inflexible, and literally stuffs up a hypoplastic pulmonary annulus.The angiographic signs of valve dysplasia are: irregular doming; excessive thickness; hypoplastic annulus; narrowed sinuses; and very little change between diastolic and systolic configuration. Post-stenotic dilatation is uncommon.If the condition is unrecognized by the angiographer and the surgeon, and if standard valvulotomy is carried out, the results will be unsatisfactory.
Getting there first : real-time detection of real-world incidents on Twitter

Social networking and micro-blogging services such as Twitter have become a valuable source of information on current events. Widespread use of Twitter on mobile devices and personal computers enables users to share short messages on any subject in real-time, thus making it suitable for early detection of unexpected events where fast response is critical. In this paper, we present an online method for detection of real-world events in Twitter data, such as natural disasters or man-made catastrophes, by analyzing Twitter data. Our method combines different textual and frequency components that represent or approximate interesting semantic aspects of an event. We use visualization as a validation vehicle, which allows us to understand which components are relevant and what impact the parameters have on the results of our event detection algorithm.
Supply Chain Management for Improved Energy Efficiency: Review and Opportunities

Energy efficiency represents a key resource for economic and social development, providing substantial benefits to different stakeholders, ranging from the entities which develop energy efficient measures to everyone in society. In addition to cost savings, multiple benefits can be achieved by supporting a better alignment between energy issues and strategic business priorities: e.g., improved competitiveness, profitability, quality, etc. Thus, energy efficiency can be a strategic advantage, not just a marginal issue, for companies. However, most firms, especially small and medium enterprises (SMEs), face many problems and, in some cases, hostility when trying to effectively implement energy efficiency actions. The most dominant barriers are the access to capital and the lack of awareness (especially in terms of life cycle cost effects). The supply chain viewpoint represents one of the main opportunities for overcoming those barriers and improving energy performance even for weaker companies. Since the current literature on energy efficiency and practical approaches to ensure energy efficiency mainly focus on energy performance on a single-firm basis, this paper aims to provide a systematic review of papers on the integration of energy efficiency in supply chain design and management published in academic journal, thereby defining potential research streams to close the gaps in the literature. A number of literature reviews have been published focusing on specific aspects of sustainable or on green supply chain management; however, to the best of our knowledge, no review has focused on the energy efficiency issue. Firstly, the present paper shows how considering energy consumption in supply chain management can contribute to more energy-efficient processes from a systemic point of view. Then, the review methodology used is defined and the sampled papers are analyzed and categorized based on the different approaches they propose. From these analyses, potential future research streams are outlined.
Globular Adiponectin Protected ob/ob Mice from Diabetes and ApoE-deficient Mice from Atherosclerosis*

The adipocyte-derived hormone adiponectin has been shown to play important roles in the regulation of energy homeostasis and insulin sensitivity. In this study, we analyzed globular domain adiponectin (gAd) transgenic (Tg) mice crossed with leptin-deficient ob/ob or apoE-deficient mice. Interestingly, despite an unexpected similar body weight, gAd Tg ob/ob mice showed amelioration of insulin resistance and β-cell degranulation as well as diabetes, indicating that globular adiponectin and leptin appeared to have both distinct and overlapping functions. Amelioration of diabetes and insulin resistance was associated with increased expression of molecules involved in fatty acid oxidation such as acyl-CoA oxidase, and molecules involved in energy dissipation such as uncoupling proteins 2 and 3 and increased fatty acid oxidation in skeletal muscle of gAd Tg ob/ob mice. Moreover, despite similar plasma glucose and lipid levels on an apoE-deficient background, gAd Tg apoE-deficient mice showed amelioration of atherosclerosis, which was associated with decreased expression of class A scavenger receptor and tumor necrosis factor α. This is the first demonstration that globular adiponectin can protect against atherosclerosis in vivo. In conclusion, replenishment of globular adiponectin may provide a novel treatment modality for both type 2 diabetes and atherosclerosis.
Experimental Biodiversity Enrichment in Oil-Palm-Dominated Landscapes in Indonesia

Tropical biodiversity is threatened by the expansion of oil-palm plantations. Reduced-impact farming systems such as agroforests, have been proposed to increase biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. In regions where oil-palm plantations already dominate the landscape, this increase can only be achieved through systematic ecological restoration. However, our knowledge about the underlying ecological and socio-economic processes, constraints, and trade-offs of ecological restoration in oil-palm landscapes is very limited. To bridge this gap, we established a long-term biodiversity enrichment experiment. We established experimental tree islands in a conventional oil-palm plantation and systematically varied plot size, tree diversity, and tree species composition. Here, we describe the rationale and the design of the experiment, the ecosystem variables (soil, topography, canopy openness) and biotic characteristics (associated vegetation, invertebrates, birds) of the experimental site prior to the establishment of the experiment, and initial experimental effects on the fauna. Already one year after establishment of the experiment, tree plantings had an overall positive effect on the bird and invertebrate communities at the plantation scale. The diversity and abundance of invertebrates was positively affected by the size of the tree islands. Based on these results, we expect a further increase of biodiversity and associated ecological functions in the future. The long-term interdisciplinary monitoring of ecosystem variables, flora, fauna, and socio-economic aspects will allow us to evaluate the suitability of tree islands as a restoration measure. Thereof, guidelines for ecologically improved and socio-economically viable restoration and management concepts could be developed.
A single‐center study of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for primary immune deficiencies (PIDD)

DiNardo L, Brown V, Perez E, Bunin N, Sullivan KE. A single‐center study of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for primary immune deficiencies (PIDD). Pediatr Transplantation 2012: 16: 63–72. © 2011 John Wiley & Sons A/S.
Unveiling the structure and composition of titanium oxide nanotubes through ion exchange chemical reactions and thermal decomposition processes

Neste trabalho reportamos reacoes de troca ionica e decomposicao termica em nanotubos de oxido de titânio, obtidos pelo tratamento hidrotermico de TiO 2 e NaOH. Considerando os resultados obtidos, sugerimos uma nova composicao quimica para os nanotubos: Na 2 Ti 3 O 7 ·nH 2 O. Os resultados tambem indicam que a estrutura da parede dos nanotubos seria isoestrutural as lamelas observadas para o Na 2 Ti 3 O 7 bulk. Dependendo da natureza da lavagem (agua deionizada ou solucao acida) executada no nanotubo apos o tratamento hidrotermico a concentracao de ions Na + pode ser modificada atraves de um processo de troca ionica do Na + por H + . Tais resultados permitem sugerir a seguinte formula quimica geral para os nanotubos obtidos: Na 2-x H x Ti 3 O 7 ·nH 2 O (0≤ x ≤2), sendo x dependente das condicoes de lavagens. In this paper we report the ion exchange reactions and the thermal decomposition of titanium oxide nanotubes, obtained by hydrothermal treatment of TiO 2 and NaOH. Based on these results we propose a new composition for the as-prepared nanotubes as Na 2 Ti 3 O 7 ·nH 2 O. Our results also suggest that nanotube walls have structure similar to those observed in the layer of the bulk Na 2 Ti 3 O 7 . Depending on how the washing process is performed on the nanotubes (water or acid solutions) the Na + content can be modified via the exchange reaction of Na
Towards Optimal Database Maintenance in Wireless Communication Systems

To ensure the consistency of database subsystems involved in wireless communication systems, appropriate scheduled maintenance policies are necessary. However, the short-persistence of most of the data stored in the database and the highly dynamic evolution of the environmental conditions, which characterize such target systems, pose relevant issues in devising efficient maintenance policies. Aiming at deriving optimal maintenance strategies, this paper tackles the problem in two steps. First, a method is outlined to identify the most rewarding choice of audits frequency and combinations, given a setting for relevant parameters involved in the database of wireless communication systems (e.g., mean number of user calls and data corruption rates). Second, a learning approach is presented to dynamically adapt the maintenance policy at varying database and environmental parameter values leading to select, in each time period, the optimal maintenance policy.
Acute renal failure in people with cystic fibrosis

Time to reflect on antibiotic strategies for CF lung infection The putative gene in cystic fibrosis (CF) encodes a protein, cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator ( CFTR ), which has an important role in transepithelial salt transport.1 The major organ affected in CF is the lung, with remorseless and intense chronic airway infection resulting from disabled clearance of dehydrated airway surface liquid.2 Airway inflammation leading to end stage lung damage is associated with respiratory morbidity and early death. The outlook for people with CF has improved considerably with a proactive approach to treatment of airway infection as one of the cornerstones of its management. Recent data from the US CF registry suggest a continuing improvement in median predicted survival to over 35 years (http://www.cff.org/research/2006NACFC/Plenary III). With an improving outlook, perspectives have changed and expectations of people with CF and their carers have broadened. A survey of acute renal failure (ARF) in patients with CF published in this issue of Thorax ( see p 541 ) is particularly timely when reflecting on how best to achieve the goal of increased survival while balancing risks to patients.3 There are several reasons why people with CF are at risk of ARF. The salt transport defect makes people with CF prone to salt loss and consequently fluid imbalance and dehydration.4,5 The impact of CFTR dysfunction on pancreatic function and architecture results in significant hypoinsulinaemia (CF-related diabetes) in a significant proportion of older patients with CF, again posing a challenge to fluid balance and the long-term possibility of diabetic kidney disease.6,7 Finally, as a cohort, these patients are exposed to industrial quantities of potentially nephrotoxic chemotherapeutic agents (in our CF centre some children have received a cumulative intravenous dose of over 300 g of the aminoglycoside tobramycin). Given cumulative exposure to potentially …
Association between Participation in an Intensive Longitudinal Assessment Program and Performance on a Cognitive Examination in the Maintenance of Certification in Anesthesiology Program®

Background:As part of the Maintenance of Certification in Anesthesiology Program® (MOCA®), the American Board of Anesthesiology (Raleigh, North Carolina) developed the MOCA Minute program, a web-based intensive longitudinal assessment involving weekly questions with immediate feedback and links to learning resources. This observational study tested the hypothesis that individuals who participate in the MOCA Minute program perform better on the MOCA Cognitive Examination (CE) compared with those who do not participate. Methods:Two separate cohorts of individuals eligible for July 2014 and January 2015 CEs were invited to participate in this pilot. The CE scores for each cohort were compared between those who did and did not participate, controlling for the factors known to affect performance. For the first cohort, examination performances for topics covered and not covered by the MOCA Minute were analyzed separately. Results:Six hundred sixteen diplomates in July 2014 and 684 diplomates in January 2015 took the CE for the first time. In multiple regression analysis, those actively participating scored 9.9 points (95% CI, 0.8 to 18.9) and 9.3 points (95% CI, 2.3 to 16.3) higher when compared with those not enrolled, respectively. Compared to the group that did not enroll in MOCA Minute, those who enrolled but did not actively participate demonstrated no improvement in scores. MOCA Minute participation was associated with improvement in both questions covering topics included the MOCA Minute and questions not covering these topics. Conclusions:This analysis provides evidence that voluntary active participation in a program featuring frequent knowledge assessments accompanied by targeted learning resources is associated with improved performance on a high-stakes CE.
Prescription errors in the National Health Services, time to change practice

Introduction Medication error is a major source of iatrogenic illness. Error in prescription is the most common form of avoidable medication error. We present our study, performed at two, UK, National Health Services Hospitals. Material and methods The prescription practice of junior doctor’s working on general medical and surgical wards in National Health Service District General and University Teaching Hospitals in the UK was reviewed. Practice was assessed against standard hospital prescription charts, developed in accordance with local pharmacy guidance. Results A total of 407 prescription charts were reviewed in both initial audit and re-audit one year later. In the District General Hospital, documentation of allergy, weight and capital-letter prescription was achieved in 31, 5 and 40% of charts, respectively. Forty-nine per cent of discontinued prescriptions were properly deleted and signed for. In re-audit significant improvement was noted in documentation of the patient’s name 100%, gender 54%, allergy status 51% and use of generic drug name 71%. Similarly, in the University Teaching Hospital, 82, 63 and 65% compliance was achieved in documentation of age, generic drug name prescription and capital-letter prescription, respectively. Prescription practice was reassessed one year later after recommendations and changes in the prescription practice, leading to significant improvement in documentation of unit number, generic drug name prescription, insulin prescription and documentation of the patient’s ward. Conclusion Prescription error remains an important, modifiable form of medical error, which may be rectified by introducing multidisciplinary assessment of practice, nationwide standardised prescription charts and revision of current prescribing clinical training.
A hand-held instrument for in vivo probe-based confocal laser endomicroscopy during Minimally Invasive Surgery

Probe-based confocal laser endomicroscopy (pCLE) provides high resolution imaging of tissue in vivo. Maintaining a steady contact between target tissue and pCLE probe tip is important for image consistency. In this paper, a new prototype hand-held instrument for in vivo pCLE during Minimally Invasive Surgery (MIS) is presented. The proposed instrument incorporates adaptive force sensing and actuation, allowing improved image consistency and force control, thus minimizing tissue deformation and induced micro-structural variations. The performance and accuracy of the contact force control are evaluated in detailed laboratory settings and in vivo validation of the device during transanal microsurgery in a live porcine model further demonstrates the potential clinical value of the device.