Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Early Colonization with a Group of Lactobacilli Decreases the Risk for Allergy at Five Years of Age Despite Allergic Heredity

Background Microbial deprivation early in life can potentially influence immune mediated disease development such as allergy. The aims of this study were to investigate the influence of parental allergy on the infant gut colonization and associations between infant gut microbiota and allergic disease at five years of age. Methods and Findings Fecal samples were collected from 58 infants, with allergic or non-allergic parents respectively, at one and two weeks as well as at one, two and twelve months of life. DNA was extracted from the fecal samples and Real time PCR, using species-specific primers, was used for detection of Bifidobacterium (B.) adolescentis, B. breve, B. bifidum, Clostridium (C.) difficile, a group of Lactobacilli (Lactobacillus (L.) casei, L. paracasei and L. rhamnosus) as well as Staphylococcus (S.) aureus. Infants with non-allergic parents were more frequently colonized by Lactobacilli compared to infants with allergic parents (p = 0.014). However, non-allergic five-year olds acquired Lactobacilli more frequently during their first weeks of life, than their allergic counterparts, irrespectively of parental allergy (p = 0.009, p = 0.028). Further the non-allergic children were colonized with Lactobacilli on more occasions during the first two months of life (p = 0.038). Also, significantly more non-allergic children were colonized with B. bifidum at one week of age than the children allergic at five years (p = 0.048). Conclusion In this study we show that heredity for allergy has an impact on the gut microbiota in infants but also that early Lactobacilli (L. casei, L. paracasei, L. rhamnosus) colonization seems to decrease the risk for allergy at five years of age despite allergic heredity.
Susceptibilities of Haemophilus influenzae, Streptococcus pneumoniae, including serotype 19A, and Moraxella catarrhalis paediatric isolates from 2005 to 2007 to commonly used antibiotics.

OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to evaluate susceptibility to common paediatric antibiotics for Streptococcus pneumoniae, non-typeable Haemophilus influenzae and Moraxella catarrhalis isolated from 2005 through 2007. METHODS Microdilution MIC assays were performed using CLSI-approved methods. S. pneumoniae 19A strains were identified by quellung reaction. RESULTS Among 143 non-typeable H. influenzae, 42% produced beta-lactamase. By 2007 breakpoints (PK/PD:CLSI), percentage susceptibility for non-typeable H. influenzae was: ceftriaxone = cefixime = high-dose amoxicillin/clavulanate (all 100%:100%) > standard-dose amoxicillin/clavulanate (91.6%:100%) > cefuroxime axetil (88.1%:99.3%) > cefdinir (83.9%:100%) > trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole (73.4%:73.4%) >high-dose amoxicillin (58%:58%) > standard-dose amoxicillin (55.2%:58%) > cefprozil (28.7%:83.2%) > cefaclor (3.5%:83.2%) > azithromycin (0%:87.4%). Of 208 S. pneumoniae (42 serotype 19A), 86 were penicillin-susceptible, 60 were penicillin-intermediate and 62 were penicillin-resistant by 2007 CLSI breakpoints. Percentage susceptibility for all S. pneumoniae/19A by PD breakpoints was: ceftriaxone (95.2%/86.1%) > high-dose amoxicillin (89.4%/58.3%) > clindamycin (85%/58.3%) > standard-dose amoxicillin (73.5%/33.3%) > cefuroxime axetil (69.2%/36.1%), cefprozil (67.3%/33.3%) > cefdinir (59.1%/33.3%) > cefixime (57.7%/33.3%) > azithromycin (56.7%/33.3%) > trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole (50.5%/25%) > penicillin (41.3%/19.4%) > cefaclor (28.8%/8.3%). Percentage M. catarrhalis (n = 62) susceptibility by PK/PD breakpoints was: high-dose amoxicillin/clavulanate = cefixime (100%) > azithromycin (98.4%) > ceftriaxone (96.8%) > standard-dose amoxicillin/clavulanate (88.7%) > cefdinir (80.6%) > cefprozil = cefuroxime axetil (37.1%) > high-dose amoxicillin (11.2%) > cefaclor (6.5%) > standard-dose amoxicillin (4.8%). CONCLUSIONS Despite high rates of beta-lactamase production among non-typeable H. influenzae and M. catarrhalis, multiple oral treatment options exist for non-typeable H. influenzae and M. catarrhalis. Multidrug-resistant serotype 19A S. pneumoniae ( approximately 20%) limits treatment options for ambulatory S. pneumoniae respiratory disease.
Analysis of inflammation- and atherosclerosis-related gene polymorphisms in branch retinal vein occlusion

Purpose Branch retinal vein occlusion (BRVO) is a common vision-threatening disease. Compression of the underlying retinal vein due to increased rigidity of the crossing artery has been implicated in the pathogenesis of BRVO. Among others, arterial hypertension and hypercholesterolemia, both of which contribute to atherogenesis, have been identified as risk factors. Atherosclerosis itself is a chronic low-grade inflammatory disease with a distinct pro-inflammatory cytokine pattern. In addition to their role in atherogenesis, some cytokines have been shown to exert procoagulatory effects, and may thus contribute to the development of BRVO by a second mechanism. Gene polymorphisms affecting the expression of inflammation-related cytokines are therefore candidates as potential risk factors for BRVO. The purpose of the present study was to investigate hypothesized associations between cytokine gene polymorphisms and the presence of BRVO. Methods The study comprised 398 patients with BRVO and 355 control subjects. Using 5′exonuclease assays (TaqMan), genotypes of the following functional single nucleotide polymorphisms were determined: interleukin 1 beta (IL1B) −511C>T, interleukin 1 receptor antagonist (IL1RN) 1018T>C, interleukin 4 (IL4) −584C>T, interleukin 6 (IL6) −174G>C, interleukin 8 (IL8) −251A>T, interleukin 10 (IL10) −592C>A, interleukin 18 (IL18) 183A>G, tumor necrosis factor (TNF) −308G>A, monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (CCL2) −2518A>G, and RANTES (CCL5) −403G>A. Results Neither genotype distributions nor allele frequencies of any of the investigated polymorphisms differed significantly between BRVO patients and controls (p>0.05). Arterial hypertension was found to be significantly more prevalent in BRVO patients than in controls (p<0.001). In a logistic regression analysis presence of arterial hypertension was associated with an odds ratio of 3.33 (95% confidence interval: 2.42–4.57) for BRVO. Conclusions As none of the investigated gene variants was significantly more prevalent in BRVO patients than among control subjects, our data suggest that these polymorphisms themselves are unlikely major risk factors for BRVO.
Endothelial recovery: the next target in restenosis prevention.

By most accounts, the field of interventional cardiology appears to have achieved one of its most elusive milestones, the virtual eradication of restenosis. In the present issue of Circulation, however, Hedman and colleagues 1 report the results of a pilot study of gene therapy with vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) for restenosis prevention. Are these authors attempting to develop a treatment for a disease that no longer exists? Or is it possible that the mounting exuberance anticipating the release of drug-eluting stents is ignoring a major liability of these otherwise promising therapies? See p 2677
Modeling people's place naming preferences in location sharing

Most location sharing applications display people's locations on a map. However, people use a rich variety of terms to refer to their locations, such as "home," "Starbucks," or "the bus stop near my house. " Our long-term goal is to create a system that can automatically generate appropriate place names based on real-time context and user preferences. As a first step, we analyze data from a two-week study involving 26 participants in two different cities, focusing on how people refer to places in location sharing. We derive a taxonomy of different place naming methods, and show that factors such as a person's perceived familiarity with a place and the entropy of that place (i.e. the variety of people who visit it) strongly influence the way people refer to it when interacting with others. We also present a machine learning model for predicting how people name places. Using our data, this model is able to predict the place naming method people choose with an average accuracy higher than 85%.
Users’ behavior on Facebook: A study of narcissistic and voyeuristic tendencies

Previous research have found relationships between the use of Facebook and different personality traits. Two of these traits that have been studied are voyeurism and narcissism. Narcissism refers to the desire to show off and to get confirmation from others. Voyeurism refers to the exaggerated willingness to look for things that otherwise is inaccessible, lurking. Studies show that narcissism and voyeurism is normal to different degrees and that narcissism is considered a positive trait to some degree because it, among other, makes individuals have a goal-setting. In this study, (N=216) Facebook users answered a survey with the aim to investigate users’ perception of Facebook as a place for narcissists and voyeurists. The findings suggest that Facebook users show tendencies of narcissistic and voyeuristic personality traits.
Essays on Subjective Well-Being: Applications in International Migration, Poverty Alleviation Programs, and Inequality of Opportunity

This dissertation examines questions pertaining to international migration, participation in poverty alleviation programs, and inequality of opportunity using a subjective well-being approach. The theoretical objective of this dissertation is twofold -(i) to examine subjective well-being as a factor that induces individuals to make critical decisions and (ii) to examine whether seeking agency or a better life affects subjective well-being. Chapter 1 examines the effect of life satisfaction on intention to migrate abroad using survey data on 18 Latin American countries. Three key findings emerge that support life satisfaction as a significant driver of intention to migrate abroad. First, the findings suggest that reporting high life satisfaction is negatively associated with intention to migrate abroad controlling for education and other background factors. Second, I find a consistently negative and significant effect of the interaction between high life satisfaction and education suggesting that more educated individuals reporting high life satisfaction are less likely to consider migrating abroad as compared to more educated individuals reporting low life satisfaction. And third, even after controlling for relative deprivation the negative effect of the high life satisfaction and education interaction term on intention to migrate abroad remains statistically significant suggesting that international migration decisions of those with higher education are not solely driven by economic motives. In addition, I find that those who are highly educated (college and higher) are more likely to consider migrating abroad, controlling for life satisfaction and relative deprivation, mainly due to weak economic outlook of and low wages in the home country. Chapter 2 uses non-experimental regression models and quasi-experimental propensity score matching models to examine the effect of being a recipient of livelihood protecting in-kind social transfers and livelihood promoting microfinance on subjective and objective economic well-being. I find that being a microfinance recipient has significant positive effect on subjective economic well-being of the very poor households. This implies that being a recipient of livelihood promoting poverty alleviation programs makes poor households " feel less poor ". Further, being a microfinance recipient also has a significant positive effect on the consumption or objective economic well-being of the very poor households. Disaggregating the positive effect on consumption reveals that being a microfinance recipient significantly increases human capital development expenditures, particularly education and health. In contrast, there is a significant negative effect on the subjective economic well-being of recipients of livelihood protecting social transfers, but the effect does not hold for households …
Null point of discrimination in crustacean polarisation vision

The polarisation of light is used by many species of cephalopods and crustaceans to discriminate objects or to communicate. Most visual systems with this ability, such as that of the fiddler crab, include receptors with photopigments that are oriented horizontally and vertically relative to the outside world. Photoreceptors in such an orthogonal array are maximally sensitive to polarised light with the same fixed e-vector orientation. Using opponent neural connections, this two-channel system may produce a single value of polarisation contrast and, consequently, it may suffer from null points of discrimination. Stomatopod crustaceans use a different system for polarisation vision, comprising at least four types of polarisation-sensitive photoreceptor arranged at 0, 45, 90 and 135 deg relative to each other, in conjunction with extensive rotational eye movements. This anatomical arrangement should not suffer from equivalent null points of discrimination. To test whether these two systems were vulnerable to null points, we presented the fiddler crab Uca heteropleura and the stomatopod Haptosquilla trispinosa with polarised looming stimuli on a modified LCD monitor. The fiddler crab was less sensitive to differences in the degree of polarised light when the e-vector was at −45 deg than when the e-vector was horizontal. In comparison, stomatopods showed no difference in sensitivity between the two stimulus types. The results suggest that fiddler crabs suffer from a null point of sensitivity, while stomatopods do not.
Does Services Liberalization Benefit Manufacturing Firms? Evidence from the Czech Republic

While there is considerable empirical evidence on the impact of liberalizing trade in goods, the effects of services liberalization have not been empirically established. Using firm-level data from the Czech Republic for the period 1998-2003, this study examines the link between services sector reforms and the productivity of domestic firms in downstream manufacturing. Several aspects of services reform are considered and measured, namely, the increased presence of foreign providers, privatization, and enhanced competition. The manufacturing-services linkage is measured using information on the degree to which manufacturing firms in a particular industry rely on intermediate inputs from specific services sectors. The econometric results lead to two conclusions. First, the study finds that services policy matters for the productivity of manufacturing firms relying on services inputs. This finding is robust to several econometric specifications, including controlling for unobservable firm heterogeneity and for other aspects of openness. Second, it finds evidence that opening services sectors to foreign providers is a key channel through which services liberalization contributes to improved performance of downstream manufacturing sectors. This finding is robust to instrumenting for the extent of foreign presence in services industries. As most barriers to foreign investment today are not in goods but in services sectors, the findings may strengthen the argument for reform in this area.
Effective Utilization of User Resources in PA-VoD Systems with Channel Heterogeneity

Nowadays, peer-assisted video on-demand (PA-VoD) systems offer high-definition (HD) channels to online users. However, the quality of service in such HD channels is usually not comparable to the standard-definition (SD) ones, as HD channels have to seek more bandwidth support and cache space from peers, which is a challenging task. In this paper, we focus on peer cache and upload bandwidth management at the same time for multi-channel PA-VoD systems with heterogeneous video playback rates, i.e., HD and SD channels coexist with different bandwidth and cache requirements. We first take user viewing behaviors into account and derive the statistical performance bounds on server bandwidth consumption, which lead to the conclusion that such behaviors can easily affect the provisioning for HD channels, even if there is enough upload bandwidth from SD peers. We then formulate bandwidth allocation as a linear programming problem to calculate the tight lower bound at any time instant, with global information available and system-wide coordination possible (e.g., through a tracker). Next, we design heuristic algorithms for peer cache replacement and upload bandwidth allocation to fit with the nature of a P2P structure, and the results are compared with the statistical and instance performance bounds through extensive simulation, which shows the efficacy of the proposed algorithms in dynamic scenarios.
User oriented Approach to Building a Video Community in a Distributed Workplace

In this paper we present experiences from a two-month prestudy on the possible creation of a communication environment (Media Space) between the three different locales of a distributed Call Centre. A spectrum of useroriented methods was used in the study, and the staff at the Call Centre took part through interviews, discussions, and a workshop. The approach yielded useful information, and the feedback from the user group was very positive. Some pitfalls and risks were identified, such as technology focus, and to come up with solutions rather than to reflect on needs. A useful foundation was laid for the continuation of the project, which includes continued co-operative design work and the establishment of a communication environments in the workplaces.
Effects of supplementing methionine hydroxy analogue in soybean meal and distiller's dried grain‐based diets on the performance and nutrient retention of rainbow trout [Oncorhynchus mykiss (Walbaum)]

Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the effects of supplementing methionine hydroxy analogue (MHA) on the performance, body composition, and nutrition retention of rainbow trout. In experiment 1, a 2 � 4 factorial arrangement with two MHA supplemental levels (with and without) and four ¢sh meal replacement levels (25%, 50%, 75%, and 100%, replaced with soybean meal (SBM) and wheat gluten) was used. A ¢sh meal diet was included as a control. Results showed that ¢sh meal replacement levels had signi¢cant eiects on ¢sh weight gain (WG), feed conversion ratio (FCR), body moisture, crude protein, crude fat, and ash (Po0.05). In experiment 2, a ¢sh meal reference diet and seven other diets were made using SBM and distiller’s dried grain with solubles supplemented with 0, 0, 0.55, 1.1, 1.65, 2.2, and 2.75 g MHA kg � 1 diet to replace 50% of ¢sh meal. WG, FCR, and apparent retention of crude protein and phosphorus were signi¢cantly improved in rainbow trout fed the diet containing 1.65 g MHA kg � 1 diet compared with ¢sh fed an equivalent diet without MHA.
An evaluation of k-nearest neighbour imputation using Likert data

Studies in many different fields of research suffer from the problem of missing data. With missing data, statistical tests will lose power, results may be biased, or analysis may not be feasible at all. There are several ways to handle the problem, for example through imputation. With imputation, missing values are replaced with estimated values according to an imputation method or model. In the k-nearest neighbour (k-NN) method, a case is imputed using values from the k most similar cases. In this paper, we present an evaluation of the k-NN method using Likert data in a software engineering context. We simulate the method with different values of k and for different percentages of missing data. Our findings indicate that it is feasible to use the k-NN method with Likert data. We suggest that a suitable value of k is approximately the square root of the number of complete cases. We also show that by relaxing the method rules with respect to selecting neighbours, the ability of the method remains high for large amounts of missing data without affecting the quality of the imputation.
BUILDING ACADEMIC STAFF CAPACITY TO SUPPORT ONLINE LEARNING IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in Africa face the challenge of responding to the expanding demand for tertiary education while maintaining or enhancing the quality of their course offerings. This has led to some HEIs introducing interactive web technologies to support their distance teaching and learning practices. However, academic staff at these institutions may struggle to provide sufficient support to online learners in part due to inadequate staff capacity in terms of familiarity with and use of online communication tools. This paper reports the practical experiences of building academic staff capacity within three southern Africa institutions, in order to initiate skills development and introduce foundational concepts in support of engaging online learners. The design of the course material is discussed and the experiences of the facilitators and participants are examined.
THE REWARDS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL CONSCIENTIOUSNESS IN THE U . S . CAPITAL MARKETS

Do capital markets reward companies for their environmental policies, goals and activities or their efforts at reducing the release of toxic substances? This paper examines the relationship between environmental conscientiousness scores and stock returns. It appears that the US capital markets have only weakly rewarded environmentally conscientious companies. However, companies with the worst environmental conscientiousness scores have shown lower average performance.
Automated Discovery of Valid Test Strings from the Web Using Dynamic Regular Expressions Collation and Natural Language Processing

Classic approaches to test input generation -- such as dynamic symbolic execution and search-based testing -- are commonly driven by a test adequacy criterion such as branch coverage. However, there is no guarantee that these techniques will generate meaningful and realistic inputs, particularly in the case of string test data. Also, these techniques have trouble handling path conditions involving string operations that are inherently complex in nature. This paper presents a novel approach of finding valid values by collating suitable regular expressions dynamically that validate the format of the string values, such as an email address. The regular expressions are found using web searches that are driven by the identifiers appearing in the program, for example a string parameter called email Address. The identifier names are processed through natural language processing techniques to tailor the web queries. Once a regular expression has been found, a secondary web search is performed for strings matching the regular expression. An empirical study is performed on case studies involving String input validation code from 10 open source projects. Compared to other approaches, the precision of generating valid strings is significantly improved by employing regular expressions and natural language processing techniques.
Intraprocedural static slicing of binary executables

Program slicing is a technique for determining the set of statements of a program that potentially affect the value of a variable at some point in the program. Intra and interprocedural slicing of high level languages has greatly been studied in the literature; both static and dynamic techniques have been used to aid in the debugging, maintenance, parallelization, program integration, and dataflow testing of programs. We explain how to apply conventional intraprocedural static analysis to binary executables for the purposes of static analysis of machine code and assembly code, such as debugging code and determining the instructions that affect an indexed jump or an indirect call on a register. This analysis is useful in the decoding of machine instructions phase of reverse engineering tools of binary executables, such as binary translators, disassemblers, binary profilers and binary debuggers