Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Predictors of physical functioning among adults with severe mental illness.

OBJECTIVES Living conditions and treatment-related factors contribute to high rates of comorbid medical illness among adults with severe mental illness and undermine their physical well-being. This study examined physical functioning scores for this population and compared them with national norms. METHODS A total of 309 residential care clients completed interviews. Diagnostic and sociodemographic variables were examined for significant associations with physical functioning, which was assessed with the Medical Outcomes Health Survey Short Form 36 (SF-36), and selected variables were entered into a hierarchical multiple regression analyses. Cross-sectional comparisons examined differences in scores between ten-year age groups in this sample and in the national data for men and women. RESULTS In the final regression model, male gender, younger age, having earned income in the past six months, having less lifetime smoking, and having an admission diagnosis other than depression or schizophrenia spectrum disorders predicted better physical functioning. Functioning scores for the sample deviated from the national normed scores. Differences in functioning increased with each ten-year increment in age; study participants' functioning resembled that of cohorts ten to 20 years older. CONCLUSIONS Determinants of physical functioning in this sample included well-known demographic predictors of health outcomes. The more striking finding was a deviation from normative data that began for study participants at the age of 25 years, indicating an early onset of limitations. The consistent trend of poorer functioning with each successive age group raises questions about the pace of physical decline among adults with mental illness that may be addressed in longitudinal studies.
Elastin Synthesis and Fiber Assembly a

Elastin is found in most connective tissues in conjunction with other structural elements such as collagen and proteoglycans. When isolated in relatively pure form, fibers of elastin behave as rubber-like elastomers capable of being stretched to several times their length. The amino acid composition of elastin is unique, with one third of the amino acid residues being glycine and one ninth proline. In contrast to collagen, elastin contains very little hydroxyproline, no hydroxylysine, and a preponderance of the nonpolar amino acids alanine, valine, leucine, and isoleucine. In addition to its unusual physical properties, insoluble elastin is extremely stable under normal physiologic conditions, perhaps lasting for the life of the o r g a n i ~ m . ~ Elastin exhibits a rapid extensibility to two or three times its resting length under tension with an equally rapid recovery to the original size when the tension is released. Keys to the stability of this process are covalent cross-links that impart restriction to the molecule, so that while stretching, one chain is unable to slip past another. Several laboratories have shown that the cross-linkages in elastin originate through oxidative deamination of the &-amino group of specific lysine residues and the subsequent condensation of the aldehyde residue that is formed with amino groups or other aldehyde moieties.a Several excellent reviews address the chemical and physical properties of elastinl~*,~,~ as well as the complex process of cross-link formation. 1 3 9 9 1 0 The elastic fiber is a complex structure that consists of several components. Early in development, the elastic fiber consists of 10-12-nm fibers, termed microfibrils, that define fiber location and m ~ r p h o l o g y . ~ ~ ~ ~ Over time, tropoelastin accumulates within the bed of microfibrils where the enzyme lysyl oxidase covalently couples one tropoelastin molecule with another to form the functional, polymeric protein that is known as elastin. Biosynthesis of elastic fibers thus presents complex problems for the connective tissue cell. Elastin must be synthesized intracellularly in soluble form and posttranslationally modified, packaged, and secreted into the extracellular space for insolubilization and fiber assembly. During development, the cell must adjust both the temporal, qualitative, and quantitative pattern of its synthetic activities to coordinate the amount, type, and spatial organization of elastic fibers and other matrix components, so as to maintain the phenotypic composition typical of a particular connective tissue. The cell must also remain responsive to physiologic and pathologic stresses that necessitate modification of the matrix. It is now evident that this elastogenic pathway is an integrated system regulated at many points by the cell. which can respond to
Tourism in Africa’s economic development: policy implications

This paper assesses the progress that has been made in realizing the contributions of tourism to Africa’s economic development. It does this by examining the nature of tourism development and identifying problems that have inhibited this. Consequently, the paper highlights the need for intra‐African co‐operation for the provision of an enabling environment and mobilization of strategic resources. It concludes that successful tourism development in Africa is predicated on attention to a range of issues such as clear tourism development objectives, integration of these into national plans, local involvement and control, regional co‐operation and integration, tourism entrepreneurship, etc. Africa’s experience may have relevance to other developing countries seeking to encourage tourism development strategy.
Inter-household variations in environmental impact of food consumption in Finland

The environmental impact of food consumption depends on the type of foods consumed and the amount of food wasted. It follows that dietary change represents one means of directing food systems towards greater environmental sustainability. The difficulty, however, lies in developing ways of motivating people to modify what they purchase and eat, as many constraints potentially hinder changes in behaviour, including established habits, limited income, lack of information on environmental impact, cognitive limitations, or the difficulty of accessing environmentally friendly foods. In order to understand those constraints better, and identify potential target groups for intervention, we have analysed the environmental impact of food consumption at household level in Finland, paying particular attention to lower socio-demographic groups. The data originates from the Finnish Household Budget Survey 2006, which gives a detailed record of the foods (259 aggregates) consumed by over 4000 households. The food quantity data are matched to indicators of greenhouse gas emissions and eutrophication, as well as a food composition database. Tests of differences in means of the environmental indicators identify the socio-demographic groups that are statistically different in terms of their environmental impact of food consumption. The total environmental impact is decomposed further into a diet composition effect (i.e., what foods households consume) and a quantity effect (i.e., how much food households consume). Results indicate that the environmental impact varies widely across households, and that this heterogeneity relates both to the types and quantities of foods consumed. We find significant differences in impacts among socio-demographic groups. For instance, household income is strongly and positively associated with greenhouse gas emissions from food consumption (i.e., relatively better off households have a relatively larger climate change impact). Educational level is also positively associated with greenhouse gas emissions, although the relationship is not as strong as with income. On the other hand, differences in environmental impact for household types defined in terms of occupational status are small. Overall, and on the basis of the two indicators considered, the lower socio-demographic groups have a relatively smaller ecological footprint of food consumption than households belonging to relatively higher groups. The results suggest that there is no decoupling of household income growth and environmental impact of food consumption. The relatively better-off and better educated should be targeted for behavioural change in order to promote sustainable food consumption in Finland. Further research is needed to identify the causal mechanisms underlying the associations that we describe and assess how various policies (e.g., labelling regulation, environmental education) would affect the ecological footprint of the Finnish diet.
Phototropins Mediate Blue and Red Light-Induced Chloroplast Movements in Physcomitrella patens1

Phototropin is the blue-light receptor that mediates phototropism, chloroplast movement, and stomatal opening in Arabidopsis. Blue and red light induce chloroplast movement in the moss Physcomitrella patens. To study the photoreceptors for chloroplast movement in P. patens, four phototropin genes (PHOTA1, PHOTA2, PHOTB1, and PHOTB2) were isolated by screening cDNA libraries. These genes were classified into two groups (PHOTA and PHOTB) on the basis of their deduced amino acid sequences. Then phototropin disruptants were generated by homologous recombination and used for analysis of chloroplast movement. Data revealed that blue light-induced chloroplast movement was mediated by phototropins in P. patens. Both photA and photB groups were able to mediate chloroplast avoidance, as has been reported for Arabidopsis phot2, although the photA group contributed more to the response. Red light-induced chloroplast movement was also significantly reduced in photA2photB1photB2 triple disruptants. Because the primary photoreceptor for red light-induced chloroplast movement in P. patens is phytochrome, phototropins may be downstream components of phytochromes in the signaling pathway. To our knowledge, this work is the first to show a function for the phototropin blue-light receptor in a response to wavelengths that it does not absorb.
Review Paper: The Evolution of Definitions for Nursing Informatics: A Critical Analysis and Revised Definition

Despite the fact that nursing informatics is entering its third decade as a specialty within nursing, many definitions still exist to describe the field. This paper offers a rationale for a definition for nursing informatics and a critical analysis of past definitions. An organizing framework of technology-oriented, conceptual, and role-oriented definitions is used to critique these definitions. Subsequently, a revised definition is proposed. This evolutionary definition integrates critical concepts from past work and adds components that are currently missing--patients, information communication, information structures, and decision making. A separate role specification for informatics nurse specialists is provided.
A Human Mitochondrial Ferritin Encoded by an Intronless Gene*

Ferritin is a ubiquitous protein that plays a critical role in regulating intracellular iron homoeostasis by storing iron inside its multimeric shell. It also plays an important role in detoxifying potentially harmful free ferrous iron to the less soluble ferric iron by virtue of the ferroxidase activity of the H subunit. Although excess iron is stored primarily in cytoplasm, most of the metabolically active iron in cells is processed in mitochondria. Little is yet known of how these organelles regulate iron homeostasis and toxicity. Here we report an unusual intronless gene on chromosome 5q23.1 that encodes a 242-amino acid precursor of a ferritin H-like protein. This 30-kDa protein is targeted to mitochondria and processed to a 22-kDa subunit that assembles into typical ferritin shells and has ferroxidase activity. Immunohistochemical analysis showed that it accumulates in high amounts in iron-loaded mitochondria of erythroblasts of subjects with impaired heme synthesis. This new ferritin may play an important role in the regulation of mitochondrial iron homeostasis and heme synthesis.
The quality of quality measurement in U.S. nursing homes.

PURPOSE This article examines various technical challenges inherent in the design, implementation, and dissemination of health care quality performance measures. DESIGN AND METHODS Using national and state-specific Minimum Data Set data from 1999, we examined sample size, measure stability, creation of ordinal ranks, and risk adjustment as applied to aggregated facility quality indicators. RESULTS Nursing home Quality Indicators now in use are multidimensional and quarterly estimates of incidence-based measures can be relatively unstable, suggesting the need for some averaging of measures over time. IMPLICATIONS Current public reports benchmarking nursing homes' performances may require additional technical modifications to avoid compromising the fairness of comparisons.
Presentation, diagnosis, and management of multiple system atrophy in Europe: Final analysis of the European multiple system atrophy registry

Multiple system atrophy (MSA) is a Parkinson's Disease (PD)‐like α‐synucleinopathy clinically characterized by dysautonomia, parkinsonism, cerebellar ataxia, and pyramidal signs in any combination. We aimed to determine whether the clinical presentation of MSA as well as diagnostic and therapeutic strategies differ across Europe and Israel. In 19 European MSA Study Group centres all consecutive patients with a clinical diagnosis of MSA were recruited from 2001 to 2005. A standardized minimal data set was obtained from all patients. Four‐hundred thirty‐seven MSA patients from 19 centres in 10 countries were included. Mean age at onset was 57.8 years; mean disease duration at inclusion was 5.8 years. According to the consensus criteria 68% were classified as parkinsonian type (MSA‐P) and 32% as cerebellar type (MSA‐C) (probable MSA: 72%, possible MSA: 28%). Symptomatic dysautonomia was present in almost all patients, and urinary dysfunction (83%) more common than symptomatic orthostatic hypotension (75%). Cerebellar ataxia was present in 64%, and parkinsonism in 87%, of all cases. No significant differences in the clinical presentation were observed between the participating countries. In contrast, diagnostic work up and therapeutic strategies were heterogeneous. Less than a third of patients with documented orthostatic hypotension or neurogenic bladder disturbance were receiving treatment. This largest clinical series of MSA patients reported so far shows that the disease presents uniformly across Europe. The observed differences in diagnostic and therapeutic management including lack of therapy for dysautonomia emphasize the need for future guidelines in these areas. © 2010 Movement Disorder Society
Political Parties and Governors as Determinants of Legislative Behavior in Brazil's Chamber of Deputies, 1988–2006

Abstract This article examines the relative importance of regional and national forces in shaping the behavior of Brazilian legislators at the national level. A widely held view is that national legislators respond to state pressures in making decisions, rather than pressures from the national government. Governors not only can influence national debates but also can determine outcomes by exerting control over their states' legislative delegations. This article examines a dataset of all roll-call votes in the Chamber of Deputies between 1989 and 2006 to isolate and evaluate the impact of local pressures on legislative voting. Spanning the terms of five presidents and five different congresses, the data show that the local influence is weaker than the national on the voting decisions of individual legislators and the voting cohesion of state delegations. Alternative institutional resources allow the central government to counteract the centrifugal pressures of federalism and other institutional influences.
Wind speed and sea ice motion retrieval in the marginal ice zone from RADARSAT-2 HH-HV images

We present a new model for wind speed retrieval from HH-HV RADARSAT-2 dual-polarization imagery which have been developed, based on a large body of statistics on buoy observations collocated and coincided with SAR images. The model's predictors are co-polarization (HH), cross-polarization (HV) radar backscatter, instrument noise floor, and incidence angle. We found that the proposed models without wind direction input demonstrated a significantly better accuracy compared to the CMOD5.N model, which requires wind direction input. Furthermore, we showed that the developed wind speed retrieval models, in conjunction with our previously developed ice motion tracking algorithm, can be a useful tool for studying sea ice dynamics processes in the Arctic Ocean marginal ice zone (MIZ).
Monitoring and Pay

The shirking model of efficiency wages has been thought to imply that monitoring and pay are substitute instruments for motivating workers. We demonstrate that this result is not generally true. As monitoring becomes cheaper, a given effort level will be implemented with more monitoring and less pay, but it is typically also optimal to implement a higher effort. The article provides conditions under which the latter “scale effect” dominates the former “substitution effect” and vice versa. If the ease of monitoring varies across occupations, the model predicts a nonmonotonic relationship between the wage level and workers’ rents.
Infusion of propofol ('Diprivan') as sedative technique for colonoscopies.

Sixty male and female patients, scheduled for colonoscopy were premedicated with glycopyrrolate 0.4 mg intramuscularly. Anaesthesia was induced with 2 mg/kg propofol ('Diprivan') and maintained with a continuous infusion of propofol at a rate of 3, 6 or 9 mg/kg/h randomly allocated. Patients lost consciousness within 60.6 +/- 18.7 (s.d.) s. Preservation of the hypnotic effect was infusion-rate dependent as 15, 40 and 85% of the patients were unconscious on infusion rates of 3, 6 or 9 mg/kg/h propofol, respectively. A high degree of sedation was observed in the remaining patients with an incidence of 40, 35 and 0% in the different series. Sedation was light in the remainder of the patients. To increase the acceptability of the procedure, a supplemental bolus of propofol and/or an increase in the infusion rate were required in 40, 15 and 10% of the 3, 6 and 9 mg/kg/h infusion rate groups, respectively. The incidence of amnesia was similar in all three groups (80, 90 and 95%, respectively). Recovery was significantly longer with increasing infusion rate, but remained rapid. The longest time was 7.3 +/- 4.0 min to open eyes on command and 10.6 +/- 4.6 min to answer correctly. The most important side effects were pain on injection (50%) and some restlessness during maintenance (25%). Blood pressure decreased, but heart rate was unaffected. Patients breathed room-air spontaneously. Respiratory rate slowed after induction then increased rapidly above baseline values. The incidence of apnoea was 48% with a mean duration of 51 +/- 22s (s.d.). The technique was evaluated as good or adequate in 95% of the cases. We suggest than an analgesic premedication followed by an average of 6 mg/kg/h propofol by infusion might be a simple and convenient method of achieving good conditions for colonoscopy.
Accountability for Human Rights Violations by International Organisations

With the proliferation of international organisations and their ever increasing role in a wide range of policy fields, situations multiply in which human rights are threatened or violated through the actions, operations or policies of such organisations. The present book, with carefully selected contributions from many prominent scholars and practitioners, is the first to explore these problems in a comprehensive manner and to examine the accountability mechanisms that are available. In a first, cross-cutting part, the contributions study general concepts, such as the accountability of international organisations as an evolving legal concept, international organisations as independent actors, the logic of sliding scales in the law of international responsibility and the relations between the international organisations and their Member States in regard to their respective obligations and responsibilities. The subsequent parts of the book focus on the accountability for human rights violations attributable to international organisations in four areas: (i) peace and humanitarian operations; (ii) international civil administration; (iii) economic governance; and (iv) staff of international organisations.
Modeling Attacks on Photo-ID Documents and Applying Media Forensics for the Detection of Facial Morphing

Since 2014, a novel approach to attack face image based person verification designated as face morphing attack has been actively discussed in the biometric and media forensics communities. Up until that point, modern travel documents were considered to be extremely hard to forge or to successfully manipulate. In the case of template-targeting attacks like facial morphing, the face verification process becomes vulnerable, making it a necessity to design protection mechanisms. In this paper, a new modeling approach for face morphing attacks is introduced. We start with a life-cycle model for photo-ID documents. We extend this model by an image editing history model, allowing for a precise description of attack realizations as a foundation for performing media forensics as well as training and testing scenarios for the attack detectors. On the basis of these modeling approaches, two different realizations of the face morphing attack as well as a forensic morphing detector are implemented and evaluated. The design of the feature space for the detector is based on the idea that the blending operation in the morphing pipeline causes the reduction of face details. To quantify this reduction, we adopt features implemented in the OpenCV image processing library, namely the number of SIFT, SURF, ORB, FAST and AGAST keypoints in the face region as well as the loss of edge-information with Canny and Sobel edge operators. Our morphing detector is trained with 2000 self-acquired authentic and 2000 morphed images captured with three camera types (Canon EOS 1200D, Nikon D 3300, Nikon Coolpix A100) and tested with authentic and morphed face images from a public database. Morphing detection accuracies of a decision tree classifier vary from 81.3% to 98% for different training and test scenarios.
The organisational morphology of rural industries and its dynamics in liberalised India: a study of West Bengal

The paper presents an empirical investigation into alternative forms of organisation of rural industries and their dynamics in the post-reform period of India by means of a field survey carried out in the state of West Bengal in 2001--02. The selected industries (handloom, brassware, hornware, clay works, conchshell and lac works) all belong to traditional crafts. The major organisational forms are 'independent units' and 'tied units', the latter being tied to traders and/or master enterprises for raw materials and work-orders, each of which account for more than 40% of our sample units. The third form, 'cooperative units', is clearly in the decline. Tied units appear to define the upcoming trend bringing the forces released by 'liberalisation', e.g., the growth of exports, drawn to the level of village-artisans. In particular, the system appears to be a vehicle for product-differentiation and innovation, both of which are very much evident in our study area. Copyright The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Cambridge Political Economy Society. All rights reserved. , Oxford University Press.