Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effect of episodic and working memory impairments on semantic and cognitive procedural learning at alcohol treatment entry.

BACKGROUND Chronic alcoholism is known to impair the functioning of episodic and working memory, which may consequently reduce the ability to learn complex novel information. Nevertheless, semantic and cognitive procedural learning have not been properly explored at alcohol treatment entry, despite its potential clinical relevance. The goal of the present study was therefore to determine whether alcoholic patients, immediately after the weaning phase, are cognitively able to acquire complex new knowledge, given their episodic and working memory deficits. METHODS Twenty alcoholic inpatients with episodic memory and working memory deficits at alcohol treatment entry and a control group of 20 healthy subjects underwent a protocol of semantic acquisition and cognitive procedural learning. The semantic learning task consisted of the acquisition of 10 novel concepts, while subjects were administered the Tower of Toronto task to measure cognitive procedural learning. RESULTS Analyses showed that although alcoholic subjects were able to acquire the category and features of the semantic concepts, albeit slowly, they presented impaired label learning. In the control group, executive functions and episodic memory predicted semantic learning in the first and second halves of the protocol, respectively. In addition to the cognitive processes involved in the learning strategies invoked by controls, alcoholic subjects seem to attempt to compensate for their impaired cognitive functions, invoking capacities of short-term passive storage. Regarding cognitive procedural learning, although the patients eventually achieved the same results as the controls, they failed to automate the procedure. Contrary to the control group, the alcoholic groups' learning performance was predicted by controlled cognitive functions throughout the protocol. CONCLUSION At alcohol treatment entry, alcoholic patients with neuropsychological deficits have difficulty acquiring novel semantic and cognitive procedural knowledge. Compared with controls, they seem to use more costly learning strategies, which are nonetheless less efficient. These learning disabilities need to be considered when treatment requiring the acquisition of complex novel information is envisaged.
Performance Evaluation Comparison of 3 Commercially Available PCR-based KRAS Mutation Testing Platforms

The identification of KRAS mutations in patients with certain types of cancer, including colonic adenocarcinoma and non–small cell lung carcinoma, has become increasingly important as these patients are contraindicated from receiving epidermal growth factor receptor-targeted therapies. Several polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based tests are commercially available for KRAS mutation testing including Applied Biosystems KRAS Mutation Analysis on the ABI3130xl, Qiagen therascreen KRAS RGQ PCR on the Rotor-Gene Q MDx, and Qiagen KRAS Pyro on the PyroMark Q24; however, these tests have not been compared side by side. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the performance characteristics and workflow for 3 PCR-based methods of detecting KRAS mutation status. We evaluated the performance characteristics and workflow for 3 commercially available KRAS mutation detection platforms. All of the 188 samples run were successful, with 29% being positive for the KRAS mutation. Of the positive tests, Applied Biosystems detected 84% of the positive cases, whereas Qiagen therascreen RGQ and Qiagen KRAS Pyro detected 100% of the positive cases. In cases of discrepancy between Applied Biosystems and therascreen RGQ, Pyro agreed with therascreen RGQ 95% of the time. Qiagen therascreen RGQ and Pyro were comparable in terms of sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and accuracy, with all values being 100%. All 3 techniques accurately identified the appropriate mutation in the known control specimens. In summary, all 3 tests are relatively comparable for detecting the KRAS mutation, with Applied Biosystems having a slightly lower sensitivity, negative predictive value, and accuracy than therascreen RGQ and Pyro.
SIGNAL: Mission Concept and Performance Assessment

SIGNAL (SAR for Ice, Glacier and oceaN globAL dynamics) is a proposal for an innovative Earth observation mission, under study at German Space Agency. The mission objectives include the determination of ice topography and its temporal changes, the monitoring of fast-flowing glaciers, and the characterisation of ocean currents, by using Ka-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR). Two approaches to the mission, including a single satellite with multiple antennas and two free flyers, are presented and critically discussed. A preliminary performance analysis for the key mission measurements has been performed and will be presented.
Hostility Catharsis: A Naturalistic Quasi-Experiment

All too frequently, laboratory studies of aggression have led to erroneous or unsubstantiated assumptions about aggressive behavior in the real world. The purpose of this paper was to use a natural setting to empirically test the theory of hostility catharsis. Theorists of hostility catharsis usually maintain that instigation to aggression is lowered by aggressive actions. The roots of this thesis lie in classical psychoanalytic theory, which hypothesized that pent-up emotions could be &dquo;purged&dquo; by expressing one’s feelings. Popular writers, such as Lorenz (1966), have extended this catharsis theory, hypothesizing that people release the aggressive feelings within them by acting out in some way. This theory is based upon an energy model of motivation. Supposedly people are constantly generating some excitation (either chemical or emotional) which goads them to aggressive acts. This force must be released through some action, or else the drive will accumulate until it results in an aggressive act. This energy model of motivation has fallen into
Privacy-Preserving Filtering and Covering in Content-Based Publish Subscribe Systems

Content-Based Publish-Subscribe (CBPS) is an asynchronou s messaging paradigm that supports a highly dynamic and many-to-many communication pattern ba sed on the content of the messages themselves. In general, a CBPS system has three distinct par ties -Content Publishers, Content Brokers , andSubscribersworking in a highly decoupled fashion. The ability to seaml essly scale on demand has made CBPS systems the choice of distributing messages/documents produced byContent Publishersto many SubscribersthroughContent Brokers . Most of the current systems assume that Content Brokers are trusted for the confidentiality of the data published by Content Publishersand the privacy of the subscriptions, which specify their interests, made by Subscribers . However, with the increased use of technologies, such as service oriented architectures and c lou omputing, essentially outsourcing the broker functionality to third-party providers, one can no l onger assume the trust relationship to hold. The problem of providing privacy/confidentiality in CBPS syste ms is challenging, since the solution to the problem should allowContent Brokersto make routing decisions based on the content without revea ling the content to them. The problem may appear unsolvable since it involves conflicting goals, but in this paper, we propose a novel approach to preserve the privacy of the subscriptions made by Subscribers and confidentiality of the data published by Content Publishersusing cryptographic techniques when third-partyContent Brokersare utilized to make routing decisions based on the content. We analyze the security of our approach to show that it is indeed sound and pr ovide experimental results to show that it is practical.
Fermentation couples Chloroflexi and sulfate-reducing bacteria to Cyanobacteria in hypersaline microbial mats

Past studies of hydrogen cycling in hypersaline microbial mats have shown an active nighttime cycle, with production largely from Cyanobacteria and consumption from sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB). However, the mechanisms and magnitude of hydrogen cycling have not been extensively studied. Two mats types near Guerrero Negro, Mexico—permanently submerged Microcoleus microbial mat (GN-S), and intertidal Lyngbya microbial mat (GN-I)—were used in microcosm diel manipulation experiments with 3-(3,4-dichlorophenyl)-1,1-dimethylurea (DCMU), molybdate, ammonium addition, and physical disruption to understand the processes responsible for hydrogen cycling between mat microbes. Across microcosms, H2 production occurred under dark anoxic conditions with simultaneous production of a suite of organic acids. H2 production was not significantly affected by inhibition of nitrogen fixation, but rather appears to result from constitutive fermentation of photosynthetic storage products by oxygenic phototrophs. Comparison to accumulated glycogen and to CO2 flux indicated that, in the GN-I mat, fermentation released almost all of the carbon fixed via photosynthesis during the preceding day, primarily as organic acids. Across mats, although oxygenic and anoxygenic phototrophs were detected, cyanobacterial [NiFe]-hydrogenase transcripts predominated. Molybdate inhibition experiments indicated that SRBs from a wide distribution of DsrA phylotypes were responsible for H2 consumption. Incubation with 13C-acetate and NanoSIMS (secondary ion mass-spectrometry) indicated higher uptake in both Chloroflexi and SRBs relative to other filamentous bacteria. These manipulations and diel incubations confirm that Cyanobacteria were the main fermenters in Guerrero Negro mats and that the net flux of nighttime fermentation byproducts (not only hydrogen) was largely regulated by the interplay between Cyanobacteria, SRBs, and Chloroflexi.
Voices Inside Schools - A Charter to Educate or a Mandate to Train: Conflicts between Theory and Practice

In this article, Johanna Elena Hadden distinguishes between two very different ideas of teaching — a charter to educate and a mandate to train — through a retelling of her experience as a fifth- and sixth-grade teacher in Utah. On the one hand, Hadden asserts, some critical theorists suggest that teachers should be given a charter to educate in which they are encouraged, and expected, to challenge normative practices and policy. On the other hand, teachers are routinely given a mandate to train that requires them to follow administrative dictates without question or challenge. Hadden contends that by establishing and supporting a mandate to train, many school environments constrain teachers — through overt and hidden forms of control — from thinking and acting independently and, in turn, from training students to think and act independently. She further argues that the pressures created by administrative expectations frustrate teachers who may ultimately be forced to choose between compliance with pedagog.
Fighting game skill evaluation method using surface EMG signal

Fighting game is one of the video games which 2 players fighting in screen by controlling characters. While skilled fighting game players are perceived to have great reflex or judgment like chess players, there is no precise skill evaluation method. In this paper, we suggested surface EMG signal as fighting game skill evaluation method. In the experiment, we divide 10 subjects into skilled group and unskilled group by inputting trial. Furthermore, we measured EMG of their left arms and derived average rectified value. As a result, there were no significant difference of input power, but were input timing between 2 groups.
Creative China ? The University , Human Capital and the Creative Class in Chinese Regional Development

The relationships between talent, technology and regional development have been widely examined in the advanced economies. While there is a general consensus as to the important role talent plays in regional development, debate has emerged on two key issues. The first involves the efficacy of educational (i.e. human capital) versus occupational (i.e. the creative class) measures of talent; the second involves the factors affecting the distribution of talent. In this study, we have used structural equation models and path analysis. We employed both educational and occupational measures of talent to examine the relationships between talent, technology and regional economic performance in China, and to isolate the effects of tolerance, differing levels of consumer service amenities, and the location of universities on the distribution of talent. Contrary to the findings of empirical studies on the developed economies, we found the relationships between the distribution of talent and technology and between the distribution of talent and regional economic performance in China to be weak. We found the presence of universities – a factor highly influenced by government policy – and the actual stock of talent to be strongly related. We also found that tolerance, as measured by the “Hukou index,” plays an important role in the distribution of talent and technology in China. JEL: O3 P3 R1 R2 J24
Gallic acid, a phenolic compound, exerts anti-angiogenic effects via the PTEN/AKT/HIF-1α/VEGF signaling pathway in ovarian cancer cells

Gallic acid (GA), a polyphenol, is widely found in numerous fruits and vegetables, particularly in hickory nuts. In the present study, we found that gallic acid, a natural phenolic compound isolated from fruits and vegetables, had a more potent growth inhibitory effect on two ovarian cancer cell lines, OVCAR-3 and A2780/CP70, than the effect on a normal ovarian cell line, IOSE-364. These results demonstrated that GA selectively inhibits the growth of cancer cells. Gene expression was examined by ELISA and western blot analysis, and gene pathways were examined by luciferase assay. It was found that GA inhibited VEGF secretion and suppressed in vitro angiogenesis in a concentration-dependent manner. GA downregulated AKT phosphorylation as well as HIF-1α expression but promoted PTEN expression. The luciferase assay results suggest that the PTEN/AKT/HIF-1α pathway accounts for the inhibitory effect of GA on VEGF expression and in vitro angiogenesis. These findings provide strong support for the high potential of GA in the prevention and therapy of ovarian cancer.
Augmenting English Adjective Senses with Supersenses

We develop a supersense taxonomy for adjectives, based on that of GermaNet, and apply it to English adjectives in WordNet using human annotation and supervised classification. Results show that accuracy for automatic adjective type classification is high, but synsets are considerably more difficult to classify, even for trained human annotators. We release the manually annotated data, the classifier, and the induced supersense labeling of 12,304 WordNet adjective synsets.
An increasing work rate test for assessing the physiological strain of submaximal exercise.

SUMMARY 1. A progressive exercise test was performed on forty-four male and twenty-nine female healthy Europeans, aged between 20 and 64 years. Values for cardiac frequency (f H) and ventilation (V) were interpolated to standard (submaximal) oxygen uptakes (Vo,) of 0.75 l/min and 1.0 l/min. The tidal volume ( VT) at a ventilation of 20 and 30 1 BTPS/min was also determined (VT 20 and VT 30 respectively). 2. The slope of the linear relationship between cardiac frequency or ventilation and oxygen uptake (SfH and SV respectively) can be used as a measure of the fitness of an individual, as it indicates the increase in fH or fr that is obligatory for an increase in energy expenditure equivalent to an additional oxygen uptake of 1.0 l/min (about the increase necessary for walking on the level at a normal speed). By analogy with the responses of an athlete, a ‘fit’ subject is one in whom responses are economically low, i.e. SfH and SV are lower than in sedentary individuals. Measures of SfH and SV can also be used to indicate the demands of everyday activities on fH and fr. 3. When SfH and SV are related to the individual’s capacity to adapt fH and V from resting to predicted maximum values (‘adaptation capacity’ ACfH and ACT respectively), the resulting index (SfH x 100/ACfH or Sfr x 100/ACQ expresses the percentage of the adaptation capacity used for an additional energy expenditure equivalent to a To, of 1.0 l/min, and can be considered a measure of the ‘physiological strain’ of exercise. The effects on exercise responses of differences in body muscle can be allowed for by multiplying this index by lean body mass (LBM). The lower the (size-adjusted) physiological strain index, the fitter the individual subject.
How Do People Conceptualize and Use Forgiveness? the Forgiveness Attitudes Questionnaire

This study was completed for 2 purposes: to explore how people use and conceptualize interpersonal forgiveness and to introduce the Forgiveness Attitudes Questionnaire (FAQ), an instrument designed to explore forgiveness. The instrument was administered to 155 students from 2 midwestern colleges. Results suggest that the FAQ shows early promise as an instrument for exploring interpersonal forgiveness, although further validity studies are required. The implications of the results are discussed and suggestions for future research are provided.
Nucleoid restructuring in stationary‐state bacteria

The textbook view of the bacterial cytoplasm as an unstructured environment has been overturned recently by studies that highlighted the extent to which non‐random organization and coherent motion of intracellular components are central for bacterial life‐sustaining activities. Because such a dynamic order critically depends on continuous consumption of energy, it cannot be perpetuated in starved, and hence energy‐depleted, stationary‐state bacteria. Here, we show that, at the onset of the stationary state, bacterial chromatin undergoes a massive reorganization into ordered toroidal structures through a process that is dictated by the intrinsic properties of DNA and by the ubiquitous starvation‐induced DNA‐binding protein Dps. As starvation proceeds, the toroidal morphology acts as a structural template that promotes the formation of DNA–Dps crystalline assemblies through epitaxial growth. Within the resulting condensed assemblies, DNA is effectively protected by means of structural sequestration. We thus conclude that the transition from bacterial active growth to stationary phase entails a co‐ordinated process, in which the energy‐dependent dynamic order of the chromatin is sequentially substituted with an equilibrium crystalline order.
Are the Mental Images of Fantasy-Prone Persons Really More “Real”?

The construct, “fantasy-proneness” [1], has important implications for theories of mental imagery and personality. The present study used a procedure with minimal experimental demand to compare the characteristics of mental images in subjects who differed in fantasy-proneness and vividness of visual imagery. Results revealed that high fantasizers, even those who reported vivid imagery, were no more likely than other subjects to perform in a fashion indicative of “picture-like” visual images. Implications of these findings for the construct of fantasy-proneness and interpretations of self-report measures of imagination and visual imagery are discussed.
The political economy of risk and the new governance of youth crime

Despite heated debate over levels of convergence and diversity, risk assessment and behaviour management have become central themes of international youth justice strategies in several jurisdictions. However such strategies represent more than a new formula for the governance of delinquent youth as they also offer a novel framework for articulating class discipline within the context of a reconfigured style of socio-political and economic leadership. Postmodern social theory has rendered old-fashioned any attempts to meta-theorize about class in criminological research and it is therefore not intended to rekindle the grand narratives generated form orthodox Marxism. Nevertheless, class inequalities, along with those generated by other social forces, continue to structure many social relations and this article will explore the complex micro-processes by which class interests are articulated in youth justice relations through the twin processes of the individualization of risk and the responsibilization of young offenders. The argument is illustrated through research on the outcomes of government sponsored education, training and employment programmes for young offenders in England and Wales.
Do Security Analysts Speak in Two Tongues?

Why do security analysts issue overly positive recommendations? We propose a novel approach to distinguish strategic motives (e.g., generating small-investor purchases and pleasing management) from nonstrategic motives (genuine overoptimism). We argue that nonstrategic distorters tend to issue both positive recommendations and optimistic forecasts, while strategic distorters "speak in two tongues," issuing overly positive recommendations but less optimistic forecasts. We show that the incidence of strategic distortion is large and systematically related to proxies for incentive misalignment. Our "two-tongues metric" reveals strategic distortion beyond those indicators and provides a new tool for detecting incentives to distort that are hard to identify otherwise.
Genetic Effect on Blood Pressure Is Modulated by Age: The Hypertension Genetic Epidemiology Network Study

Genome-wide linkage analysis was performed for systolic and diastolic blood pressures in the Hypertension Genetic Epidemiology Network. We investigated the role of gene-age interactions using a recently developed variance components method that incorporates age variation in genetic effects. Substantially improved linkage evidence, in terms of both the number of linkage peaks and their significance levels, was observed. Twenty-six linkage peaks were identified with maximum logarithm of odds scores ranging between 3.0 and 4.6, 15 of which were cross-validated by the literature. The chromosomal region 1p36 that showed the highest logarithm of odds score in our study was found to be supported by evidence from 3 studies. The new method also led to vastly improved validation across ethnic groups. Ten of the 15 supported linkage peaks were cross-validated between 2 different ethnic groups, and 2 peaks on chromosomal region 1q31 and 16p11 were validated in 3 ethnic groups. In conclusion, this investigation demonstrates that genetic effects on blood pressure vary by age. The improved genetic linkage results presented here should help to identify the specific genetic variants that explain the observed results.
Head segmentation in vertebrates

Classic theories of vertebrate head segmentation clearly exemplify the idealistic nature of comparative embryology prior to the 20th century. Comparative embryology aimed at recognizing the basic, primary structure that is shared by all vertebrates, either as an archetype or an ancestral developmental pattern. Modern evolutionary developmental (Evo-Devo) studies are also based on comparison, and therefore have a tendency to reduce complex embryonic anatomy into overly simplified patterns. Here again, a basic segmental plan for the head has been sought among chordates. We convened a symposium that brought together leading researchers dealing with this problem, in a number of different evolutionary and developmental contexts. Here we give an overview of the outcome and the status of the field in this modern era of Evo-Devo. We emphasize the fact that the head segmentation problem is not fully resolved, and we discuss new directions in the search for hints for a way out of this maze.