Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Iron–Nutrient Interactions within Phytoplankton

Iron limits photosynthetic activity in up to one third of the world’s oceans and in many fresh water environments. When studying the effects of Fe limitation on phytoplankton or their adaptation to low Fe environments, we must take into account the numerous cellular processes within which this micronutrient plays a central role. Due to its flexible redox chemistry, Fe is indispensable in enzymatic catalysis and electron transfer reactions and is therefore closely linked to the acquisition, assimilation and utilization of essential resources. Iron limitation will therefore influence a wide range of metabolic pathways within phytoplankton, most prominently photosynthesis. In this review, we map out four well-studied interactions between Fe and essential resources: nitrogen, manganese, copper and light. Data was compiled from both field and laboratory studies to shed light on larger scale questions such as the connection between metabolic pathways and ambient iron levels and the biogeographical distribution of phytoplankton species.
Lymphoid Aggregates That Resemble Tertiary Lymphoid Organs Define a Specific Pathological Subset in Metal-on-Metal Hip Replacements

Aseptic lymphocyte-dominated vasculitis-associated lesion (ALVAL) has been used to describe the histological lesion associated with metal-on-metal (M-M) bearings. We tested the hypothesis that the lymphoid aggregates, associated with ALVAL lesions resemble tertiary lymphoid organs (TLOs). Histopathological changes were examined in the periprosthetic tissue of 62 M-M hip replacements requiring revision surgery, with particular emphasis on the characteristics and pattern of the lymphocytic infiltrate. Immunofluorescence and immunohistochemistry were used to study the classical features of TLOs in cases where large organized lymphoid follicles were present. Synchrotron X-ray fluorescence (XRF) measurements were undertaken to detect localisation of implant derived ions/particles within the samples. Based on type of lymphocytic infiltrates, three different categories were recognised; diffuse aggregates (51%), T cell aggregates (20%), and organised lymphoid aggregates (29%). Further investigation of tissues with organised lymphoid aggregates showed that these tissues recapitulate many of the features of TLOs with T cells and B cells organised into discrete areas, the presence of follicular dendritic cells, acquisition of high endothelial venule like phenotype by blood vessels, expression of lymphoid chemokines and the presence of plasma cells. Co-localisation of implant-derived metals with lymphoid aggregates was observed. These findings suggest that in addition to the well described general foreign body reaction mediated by macrophages and a T cell mediated type IV hypersensitivity response, an under-recognized immunological reaction to metal wear debris involving B cells and the formation of tertiary lymphoid organs occurs in a distinct subset of patients with M-M implants.
Magnetic reconnection in kinked coronal loops

The resistive dissipation process triggered by the non linear development of the kink instability in a coronal loop is investigated using a three-dimensional MHD code in cylindrical geometry. An equilibrium flux tube carrying a zero net axial current is considered. The magnetic field lines are locally twisted in the central region and inertially anchored at the two photospheric end-plates. When the twist exceeds a critical value, the loop becomes kink unstable and an intense electric current concentration develops along the loop length (Baty et al. 1998). It is found that the system settles into a steady state where a magnetic reconnection of field lines consistent with the SweetParker model occurs, in spite of the three dimensional character of the present process. In particular, the Ohmic dissipation rate scales as the square root of the resistivity. The reconnection can release more than 50 percent of the free magnetic energy stored in the initial equilibrium. Consequences for the coronal activity are presented.
COURSE PORTFOLIO A STRATEGY FOR HIGH EDUCATION TEACHERS’ EVALUATION AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

The European Space of Higher Education convergence has stressed the importance of a potentially systemic shift in paradigms, away from what has been labelled the "instruction paradigm" towards the "learning paradigm", i.e. shifting the interest from the teacher to the student, thus leading to pedagogical implications which imply that teachers reflect upon their methodologies of teaching, evaluate the work they develop with their students and change their proceedings accordingly. We propose the course portfolio, a fraternal twin of the teaching portfolio as Cerbin, its inventor, has named it, as a strategy to:  evaluate (auto and hetero-evaluation) what teachers do;  promote critical reflection;  promote collaborative work among teachers;  improve teaching skills ;  document the progress teachers gradually accomplish through this strategy;  make teaching and learning visible as a scholarly activity. Although the construction of a portfolio is a much-personalised process, we believe that meeting together, sharing points of view and discussing strategies, will certainly bring benefits from the input of others (colleagues and experienced teachers). We acknowledge the importance of teachers’ critical reflection through dialogue within their community of practice. Teaching is a solitaire endeavour and working in co-operation with other minimizes that solitude and increases the possibility of feedback, maximizing, therefore, the possibility of change. This is the main strategy of the construction of the course portfolio, in this study. On the other hand, teaching, to be recognised, as a valuable and scholar activity needs to be open to public scrutiny, something that the portfolio will allow. In this paper we present the process of building a course portfolio in a Portuguese Higher Education institution that has at its core a formative approach to teaching. Teaching in Higher Education, in Portugal, does not require any kind of pedagogic or didactic preparation, so many of those who teach in universities and colleges have never been prepared for this professional activity that takes most of their time. A group of ten teachers accepted the challenge of producing a course portfolio in order to evaluate their performance and promote their professional development. We will describe the process and the preliminary outcomes of the study.
A Family of p-ary Binomial Bent Functions

For a prime p with p ≡ 3(mod 4) and an odd number m, the Bentness of the p-ary binomial function $f_{a,b}(x)={\\ m Tr}_{1}^n(ax^{p^m-1})+{\\ m Tr}_{1}^2(bx^{\\frac{p^n-1}{4}})$ is characterized, where n=2m, $a\\in \\bF_{p^n}^*$, and $b\\in \\bF_{p^2}^*$. The necessary and sufficient conditions of ƒa,b(x) being Bent are established respectively by an exponential sum and two sequences related to a and b. For the special case of p=3, we further characterize the Bentness of the ternary function ƒa,b(x) by the Hamming weight of a sequence.
The Blinded Bandit: Learning with Adaptive Feedback

We study an online learning setting where the player is temporarily deprived of feedback each time it switches to a different action. Such model of adaptive feedback naturally occurs in scenarios where the environment reacts to the player's actions and requires some time to recover and stabilize after the algorithm switches actions. This motivates a variant of the multi-armed bandit problem, which we call the blinded multi-armed bandit, in which no feedback is given to the algorithm whenever it switches arms. We develop efficient online learning algorithms for this problem and prove that they guarantee the same asymptotic regret as the optimal algorithms for the standard multi-armed bandit problem. This result stands in stark contrast to another recent result, which states that adding a switching cost to the standard multi-armed bandit makes it substantially harder to learn, and provides a direct comparison of how feedback and loss contribute to the difficulty of an online learning problem. We also extend our results to the general prediction framework of bandit linear optimization, again attaining near-optimal regret bounds.
Serum lactic dehydrogenase level has prognostic value in childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Serum lactic dehydrogenase (LDH) levels were measured at diagnosis in 293 children with "standard-risk" acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) to determine the prognostic value of this biologic feature. Standard risk assignment was based on an initial leukocyte count of less than 100 X 10(9)/L, the absence of a mediastinal mass, the absence of meningeal involvement, and the presence of lymphoblasts lacking sheep erythrocyte receptors or surface immunoglobulin. Serum LDH levels ranged from 97 to 6,595 U/L, with a mean of 547 U/L. Higher LDH levels were associated with higher leukocyte counts, lower blast cell DNA indices, lower platelet counts, a larger spleen size, and nonwhite race. LDH levels were not related to the percentage of marrow S-phase cells, liver size, French-American-British (FAB) classification, hemoglobin levels, age, sex, or the presence of the common ALL antigen on marrow blasts. Patients with the highest LDH levels (greater than 1,000 U/L) were most likely to fail treatment, whereas those with the lowest levels (less than 300 U/L) had the lowest risk of failure (P less than .0001). The prognostic significance of serum LDH level was retained in a subset of patients that included only those with leukocyte counts less than 25 X 10(9)/L (P = .0018). When 11 presenting characteristics were subjected to multivariate analysis, serum LDH level was found to have independent prognostic strength, contributing clinically important information to that gained from leukocyte count. Early measurement of serum LDH could be useful in identifying a group of standard-risk ALL patients with a high relapse hazard.
Brief announcement: transaction polymorphism

In this work, we present transaction polymorphism, a synchronization technique that consists of providing more control to the programmer than traditional (i.e., monomorphic) transactions to achieve comparable performance to generic lock-based and lock-free solutions. We prove the following results: (i) Lock-based synchronization enables strictly higher concurrency than monormophic transactions. (ii) Polymorphic transactions enable strictly higher concurrency than monomorphic transactions. The former result indicates that there exist some transactional programs that will never perform as well as their lock-based counterparts, whatever improvement could be made at the hardware level to diminish the overhead associated with transactional accesses. The latter result shows, however, that transaction polymorphism is a promising solution to cope with this issue.
The evaluation of β‐(1 → 3)‐nonaglucoside as an anti‐Candida albicans immune response inducer

Synthetically prepared bovine serum albumin (BSA) conjugate of linear β‐(1 → 3)‐nonaglucoside ligand (G9) has been applied as a biological response immunomodulator in vivo and ex vivo. Active immunization of Balb/c mice revealed effective induction of specific humoral responses in comparison with Candida β‐D‐glucan and Candida whole cells. Induced post‐vaccination serum exhibited a growth‐inhibition effect on the multi‐azole‐resistant clinical strain Candida albicans CCY 29‐3‐164 in experimental mucocutaneous infection ex vivo. Evaluation of immune cell proliferation and the cytotoxic potential of the G9‐ligand has revealed its bioavailability and an immunostimulative effect in vaccination‐sensitized Balb/c mice splenocytes and RAW 264.7 macrophages.
The Efficiency of Specialist Outreach Clinics in General Practice: Is Further Evaluation Needed?

Objectives: To assess the need for further evaluation of general practice-based outreach clinics in two specialties using data from a UK pilot study to model their cost-effectiveness. Methods: A pilot study was undertaken comparing one outreach and one outpatient clinic held by three dermatology specialists and three orthopaedic specialists. Information was collected on waiting times, costs to patients, casemix and resource use. Results: Only dermatology outreach clinic patients experienced significantly shorter waiting times for first appointments than their hospital counterparts. Outreach clinic patients incurred lower costs in attending appointments in either specialty but the differences were not statistically significant. Evidence of a difference in casemix between patients attending outreach and outpatient clinics meant that treatment costs incurred in both types of clinic could not be compared. Outreach clinics in both specialties were significantly more costly in terms of staff, staff travel and associated opportunity costs compared with outpatient clinics. Sensitivity analysis showed that outreach and outpatient clinics had the same marginal cost if the number of patients per outreach clinic increased greatly or attendance fell considerably at outpatient clinics. Conclusions: This study has found no evidence that outreach clinics in these two specialties are cost-effective in terms of costs and benefits. A more definitive conclusion could only be made if studies estimated other costs and benefits not accounted for in this study. Further research is required to see whether outreach clinics in other specialties or clinics with different configurations to those studied are efficient.
A Typed Functional Calculus With State

We extend the simple typed \lambda-calculus with statements. A statement (which can also be thought of as a method or transition) is an abstraction similar to function abstraction: it can be instantiated by providing it with a source state, whereafter it yields a pair of values consisting of an output value and a target state. We obtain a strongly normalising typed calculus for state-based functional programming.
Human Papillomavirus Vaccine Intentions Among Men Participating in a Human Papillomavirus Natural History Study Versus a Comparison Sample

Background: Human papillomavirus (HPV), the most common sexually transmitted virus in the United States, remains a considerable public health problem. HPV has been associated with anogenital warts and cancers in males and females, affecting the cervix, penis, anus, vulvar, and vaginal regions; and more recently, has been associated with oropharyngeal cancers. In 2006, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a prophylactic quadrivalent HPV vaccine for females (9–26 years); in 2009, this approval extended to males of this same age group. However, limited research has examined attitudes and other factors related to males' intention to receive the vaccine. Methods: Factors associated with HPV vaccination intentions/willingness were examined among: (1) males (N = 296) participating in a HPV natural history study with repeated exposure to HPV information; and (2) male University students (N = 198) “unexposed” to intense HPV messages and testing. Results: About 94% of HPV study participants and 62% of University males reported intentions/willingness toward vaccination, respectively. In multivariate analyses, among HPV study males, concerns about getting an appointment (odds ratio [OR], 0.06; confidence interval [CI], 0.01–0.68), getting time off (OR, 0.14; CI, 0.03–0.63), and “other” barriers (OR, 0.04; CI, 0.01–0.17) were negatively associated with vaccine intentions. Among University males, vaccine awareness (OR, 0.06; CI, 0.02–0.17), low risk perceptions (OR, 0.11; CI, 0.04–0.33), and unimportance of provider recommendations (OR, 9.66; CI, 2.69–34.68) were negatively associated with willingness to vaccinate. Conclusion: Repeated exposure to HPV information and provider recommendations may be critical for male vaccine promotion. Future research is needed to increase understanding of factors that may prevent men from receiving HPV vaccination.
Treatment of distal radius fractures.

BACKGROUND In light of the Norwegian Orthopaedic Association's wish to prepare guidelines for treatment of distal radius fractures, we have reviewed the knowledge base for the provision of such treatment. METHOD The paper is based on systematic reviews of treatment of distal radius fractures from literature search in the following databases: the Cochrane Library, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (DARE Cochrane), the Health Technology Assessment (HTA) database, PreMedline, Medline and Embase. RESULTS There is evidence for recommending percutaneous pinning of unstable, dorsally displaced distal radius fractures rather than conservative treatment, but which pinning method is best remains uncertain. There is also documentation to support the use of external fixation rather than conservative treatment. There is insufficient documentation available to draw conclusions regarding the relative efficacy of the various methods of external fixation, but external fixation in combination with adjuvant pinning of the fracture fragment enhances the result compared to external fixation alone. The evidence indicates that plates may enhance functional short-term results for unstable distal radius fractures compared to external fixation. INTERPRETATION There is evidence in support of differentiated treatment of distal radius fractures. However, many questions remain unanswered, and good prospective, randomised multi-centre trials are needed.
Measurement of transient pulses on high-voltage automotive power networks

Due to the high number of electronic devices and components in limited space, the Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) is an important issue in motor vehicles. In modern electrically powered cars high power has to be transmitted over the vehicle's electrical power system. This leads to enhanced requirements for the EMC as well as new methods for characterization of Electromagnetic Interferences (EMI) are necessary. In this contribution a measuring system is described which can be used to measure transient voltage and current pulses on high-voltage (HV) power networks in normal driving conditions. The devices of the system are tested of its electrical characteristics and some measuring examples conduced at a hybrid car are shown.
Negation in context: Evidence from the visual world paradigm

Literature assumes that negation is more difficult to understand than affirmation, but this might depend on the pragmatic context. The goal of this paper is to show that pragmatic knowledge modulates the unfolding processing of negation due to the previous activation of the negated situation. To test this, we used the visual world paradigm. In this task, we presented affirmative (e.g., her dad was rich) and negative sentences (e.g., her dad was not poor) while viewing two images of the affirmed and denied entities. The critical sentence in each item was preceded by one of three types of contexts: an inconsistent context (e.g., She supposed that her dad had little savings) that activates the negated situation (a poor man), a consistent context (e.g., She supposed that her dad had enough savings) that activates the actual situation (a rich man), or a neutral context (e.g., her dad lived on the other side of town) that activates neither of the two models previously suggested. The results corroborated our hypothesis. Pragmatics is implicated in the unfolding processing of negation. We found an increase in fixations on the target compared to the baseline for negative sentences at 800 ms in the neutral context, 600 ms in the inconsistent context, and 1450 ms in the consistent context. Thus, when the negated situation has been previously introduced via an inconsistent context, negation is facilitated.
Development of Experimental Methodology for Highly Efficient Wafer-Level Evaluation of X-Ray Radiation Effects on Semiconductor Devices

A high-speed experimental method to evaluate the X-ray radiation damage of a large number of transistors has been developed. In this method, test-element groups (TEGs), including approximately 10,000 metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) transistors, were formed on a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafer and irradiated with X-rays using novel equipment. After irradiation, fuses on the wafer were cut to isolate each transistor, and the transistor characteristics were measured by an automatic probe station. This method can provide approximately 10,000 lines of I-V curves of the transistors under 31 irradiation dose conditions in 10 days. Radiation damages are known to largely depend on the bias voltage conditions of the devices. In this method, the TEGs are located apart from one another on the wafer; then, the X-ray doses and bias voltage can be controlled specifically by each TEG. Using this equipment, a large amount of experimental data can be effectively acquired. The statistical data analysis enables highly effective radiation-resistant semiconductor development and reliability examination.
Bare Metal Stents for Treatment of Extracranial Internal Carotid Artery Aneurysms

Purpose: To examine the long-term outcomes of bare metal stent placement for exclusion of extracranial internal carotid artery (ICA) aneurysms. Methods: From 2006 to 2011, 7 consecutive symptomatic patients (4 men; mean age 52 years) with surgically inaccessible extracranial ICA aneurysms were treated with a bare stent at a single center. Patients received clopidogrel for 3 months after the procedure and aspirin for life. Clinical follow-up with duplex ultrasound and/or computed tomographic angiography was performed at 3, 6, and 12 months and yearly thereafter. Results: All procedures were technically successful; no neurological complications occurred. After 6 months, there was complete thrombosis of the aneurysm in all except one case. In this asymptomatic patient, the residual active flow was successfully obliterated by additional coil embolization. Over a mean follow-up of 57±22 months, all patients were alive and free of local or central neurological symptoms. All stents were patent, and thrombosis of the aneurysms was complete. Conclusion: In this small series, treatment of extracranial ICA aneurysms with a bare stent seems technically feasible and safe. All treated extracranial ICA aneurysms were excluded by primary intervention or secondary coil embolization.
Error detection by selective procedure call duplication for low energy consumption

As commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components are used in system-on-chip (SoC) design technique that is widely used from cellular phones to personal computers, it is difficult to modify hardware design to implement hardware fault-tolerant techniques and improve system reliability. Two major concerns of this paper are to: (a) improve system reliability by detecting transient errors in hardware, and (b) reduce energy consumption by minimizing error-detection overhead. The objective of this new technique, selective procedure call duplication (SPCD) is to keep the system fault-secured (preserve data integrity) in the presence of transient errors, with minimum additional energy consumption. The basic approach is to duplicate computations and then to compare their results to detect errors. There are 3 choices for duplicate computation: (1) duplicating every statement in the program and comparing results, (2) re-executing procedures through duplicated procedure calls, and comparing results, and (3) re-executing the whole program, and comparing the final results. SPDC combines choices (1) and(2). For a given program, SPCD analyzes procedure-call behavior of the program, and then determines which procedures can have duplicated statements [choice(1)] and which procedure calls can be duplicated [choice (2)] to minimize energy consumption with reasonable error-detection latency. Then, SPCD transforms the original program into a new program that can detect errors with minimum additional energy consumption by re-executing the statements or procedures. SPCD was simulated with benchmark programs; it requires less than 25% additional energy for error detection than previous techniques that do not consider energy consumption.