Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Understanding Mortality and the Life of the Ancestors in Rural Madagascar

Across two studies, a wide age range of participants was interviewed about the nature of death. All participants were living in rural Madagascar in a community where ancestral beliefs and practices are widespread. In Study 1, children (8-17 years) and adults (19-71 years) were asked whether bodily and mental processes continue after death. The death in question was presented in the context of a narrative that focused either on the corpse or on the ancestral practices associated with the afterlife. Participants aged 8 years and older claimed that death brings an end to most bodily and mental processes. Nevertheless, particularly in the context of the religious narrative, they claimed that certain mental processes continue even after death. This assertion of an afterlife was more evident among adults than children, especially with respect to cognitive processes, such as knowing and remembering. In Study 2, 5- and 7-year-olds were asked similar questions in connection with the death of a bird and a person. Seven-year-olds consistently claimed that bodily and mental processes cease at death, whereas 5-year-olds were unsystematic in their replies. Together, the two studies replicate and extend findings obtained with Western children showing that, in the course of development, different conceptions of death are elaborated-a biological conception in which death terminates living processes and a religious conception in which death marks the beginning of a new form of spiritual existence.
3D video formats and coding methods

The introduction of first 3D systems for digital cinema and home entertainment is based on stereo technology. For efficiently supporting new display types, depth-enhanced formats and coding technology is required, as introduced in this overview paper. First, we discuss the necessity for a generic 3D video format, as the current state-of-the-art in multi-view video coding cannot support different types of multi-view displays at the same time. Therefore, a generic depth-enhanced 3D format is developed, where any number of views can be generated from one bit stream. This, however, requires a complex framework for 3D video, where not only the 3D format and new coding methods are investigated, but also view synthesis and the provision of high-quality depth maps, e.g. via depth estimation. We present this framework and discuss the interdependencies between the different modules.
Developments in Internet financial reporting : review and analysis, across five developed countries

Internet based corporate reporting is wide spread amongst companies of all sizes in most countries around the world. The development of online reporting practice has been rapid, largely mirroring, and motivated by, the development of the world-wide-web since 1994, being the primary Internet medium for online reporting. A number of studies of these developments have occurred over this time seeking to plot how companies are exploiting the media of the Internet and how they are developing their reporting practices in response to this ubiquitous route to current and potential investors, and other stakeholders. In this paper, we develop this literature further by extending the benchmarks that have been created to monitor this activity since the mid 1990s. This study focuses on the very largest companies in five countries around the world. It examines online reporting practices of 250 companies at the end of 2001 and in early 2002 by creating a detailed attribute analysis of common factors across the companies examined. In addition to illustrating developments in online reporting practices since the previous extensive studies were conducted in 1999 and early 2000, the results provide new insight into recent changes in this domain. It particularly illustrates how newer, more interactive, aspects of Internet technologies are now being exploited to enable us to benchmark these activities to follow their use in the near future. The paper then addresses the relationship between the size of companies and its level of reporting practices, and the differences between reporting practices of large companies listed primarily in the different countries examined. These results illustrate that reporting practices differ significantly between companies in different domains.
Innovative methods in soil phosphorus research: A review

Phosphorus (P) is an indispensable element for all life on Earth and, during the past decade, concerns about the future of its global supply have stimulated much research on soil P and method development. This review provides an overview of advanced state-of-the-art methods currently used in soil P research. These involve bulk and spatially resolved spectroscopic and spectrometric P speciation methods (1 and 2D NMR, IR, Raman, Q-TOF MS/MS, high resolution-MS, NanoSIMS, XRF, XPS, (µ)XAS) as well as methods for assessing soil P reactions (sorption isotherms, quantum-chemical modeling, microbial biomass P, enzymes activity, DGT, 33P isotopic exchange, 18O isotope ratios). Required experimental set-ups and the potentials and limitations of individual methods present a guide for the selection of most suitable methods or combinations.
Subtle Gardeners: Inland Predators Enrich Local Topsoils and Enhance Plant Growth

Inland vertebrate predators could enrich of nutrients the local top soils in the area surrounding their nests and dens by depositing faeces, urine, and prey remains and, thus, alter the dynamics of plant populations. Surprisingly, and in contrast with convincing evidence from coastal habitats, whether and how this phenomenon occurs in inland habitats is largely uncertain even though these habitats represent a major fraction of the earth's surface. We investigated during two consecutive breeding seasons the potential enrichment of the top-soils associated with inland ground-nesting eagle owls Bubo bubo, as well as its possible consequences in the growth of two common annual grasses in southern Spain. Top-soils associated with owl nests differed strongly and significantly from control top-soils in chemical parameters, mainly fertility-related properties. Specifically, levels of available phosphorus, total nitrogen, organic matter, and available potassium were 49.1, 5.6, 3.1, and 2.7 times higher, respectively, in top-soils associated with owl nests as compared to control top-soils. Germination experiments in chambers indicated that nutrient enrichment by nesting owls enhanced seedling growth in both annual grasses (Phalaris canariensis and Avena sativa), with seedling size being 1.4–1.3 times higher in owl nest top-soils than in control top-soils. Our experimental study revealed that pervasive inland, predatory birds can profoundly enrich the topsoil around their nests and, thus, potentially enhance local vegetation growth. Because diverse inland vertebrate predators are widespread in most habitats they have a strong potential to enhance spatial heterogeneity, impinge on plant communities, and exert an overlooked effect on primary productivity worldwide.
Beyond relevance in marketplace search

In this paper we study diversity and its relations to search relevance in the context of an online marketplace. We conduct a large-scale log-based study using click-stream data from a leading eCommerce site. We introduce 3 main metrics -- selection (diversity), trust, and value. In our analysis we also show how these interact with relevance in different ways. We study the benefits of diversity and also show why guaranteeing diversity is important.
A Thresholding Approach for Text Extraction in Handwritten Historical Documents Using Adaptive Morphology

The aim of preserving historical handwritten documents is to restore the degraded text containing information. But generally global threshold fails to restore the text adequately. Adaptive (local) thresholding is required for preserving the text in these documents. In recent past many standard adaptive thresholding methods have been proposed for binarization of handwritten text document images. We propose a new adaptive thresholding method using locally adaptive mathematical morphology. Formulation of an adaptive structural element is a challenging work and addressed recently by some researchers. Our method at initial step binarizes the image applying global threshold. The residual background image below threshold containing low intensity texts mixed with noise is further processed. A new approach for constructing spatially variant operator corresponding to local variances is proposed. Gaussian surface is selected as an adaptive gray-scale structuring element for mathematical morphological operations (opening and closing), whose parameters base and height depends on local variance. The proposed method successfully demises various kinds of degraded documents enhancing textures with clear background. Experimental result on real historical handwritten document and artificial images show that our method outperforms several other existing methods both visually and using some evaluation metrics.
THE ROLE OF PATTERN DETABASES IN SEQUENCE ANALYSIS

In the wake of the numerous now-fruitful genome projects, we are entering an era rich in biological data. The field of bioinformatics is poised to exploit this information in increasingly powerful ways, but the abundance and growing complexity both of the data and of the tools and resources required to analyze them are threatening to overwhelm us. Databases and their search tools are now an essential part of the research environment. However, the rate of sequence generation and the haphazard proliferation of databases have made it difficult to keep pace with developments. In an age of information overload, researchers want rapid, easy to use, reliable tools for functional characterization of newly determined sequences. But what are those tools? How do we access them? Which should we use? This review focuses on a particular type of database that is increasingly used in the task of routine sequence analysis the so-called pattern database. The paper aims to provide an overview of the current status of pattern databases in common use, outlining the methods behind them and giving pointers on their diagnostic strengths and weaknesses.
Commentary: promoting health and well-being in pediatric primary care settings: using health and behavior codes at routine well-child visits.

Pediatric primary care provides an optimal setting for the practice of pediatric psychology and the use of health and behavior codes to capture this practice. Pediatric primary care settings provide continuous and comprehensive medical services that are readily accessible to the vast majority of children in the United States and their families (Centers for Disease Control, 2004). These settings are ideally suited to promote optimal development and well-being through the provision of expanded services that address parental concerns, developmental tasks, psychosocial factors, and behavioral health issues in the context of trusting relationships with familiar providers. Pediatric psychologists integrated into primary care settings are able to promote health and well-being of children and families in a manner directly aligned with the mandates and guidelines of the practice of pediatric primary care (American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and American Academy of Pediatrics, 2009). Pediatric primary care is often the only available port of entry into service systems for vulnerable children and their families. Although the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and Bright Futures provide systematic guidelines and outline methods for comprehensive surveillance and screening during well-child checks, most pediat-ric practices and providers are overwhelmed by the complex risk factors presented during ''routine'' visits lasting an average of 18 min (Olson et al., 2004) and may be reluctant to solicit information about behavioral and psy-chosocial matters because they are unable to adequately address them or receive reimbursement for treating them (American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and American Academy of Pediatrics, 2009). Consequently, children facing significant risk factors that impinge upon development and profoundly impact family functioning remain unidentified. Even when risk or early disturbance is identified, families often have difficulty ac-cessing necessary community resources. Pediatric psychologists in primary care engage in activities that ''improve the health-related quality of life of children and their families'' (Noll & Fischer, 2004). Such activities include: (a) promoting health and well-being and providing anticipatory guidance during routine well-child visits; (b) screening, early identification, and referral around developmental and behavioral health issues; (c) providing early treatment for issues that, left untreated, could lead to significant impairment; and (d) triaging, referring to, and coordinating with community resources when higher levels of care are necessary. Pediatric psychologists help improve adherence, promote healthy behaviors and reduce behaviors that increase health risks, and improve communication between healthcare providers and the children and families they serve (Noll & Fischer, 2004). …
Role of Sphingosine-1-Phosphate Phosphohydrolase 1 in the Regulation of Resistance Artery Tone

Sphingosine-1-phosphate (S1P), which mediates pleiotropic actions within the vascular system, is a prominent regulator of microvascular tone. By virtue of its S1P-degrading function, we hypothesized that S1P-phosphohydrolase 1 (SPP1) is an important regulator of tone in resistance arteries. Hamster gracilis muscle resistance arteries express mRNA encoding SPP1. Overexpression of SPP1 (via transfection of a SPP1wt) reduced resting tone, Ca2+ sensitivity, and myogenic vasoconstriction, whereas reduced SPP1 expression (antisense oligonucleotides) yielded the opposite effects. Expression of a phosphatase-dead mutant of SPP1 (SPP1H208A) had no effect on any parameter tested, suggesting that catalytic activity of SPP1 is critical. The enhanced myogenic tone that follows overexpression of S1P-generating enzyme sphingosine kinase 1 (Sk1wt) was functionally antagonized by coexpression with SPP1wt but not SPP1H208A. SPP1 modulated vasoconstriction in response to 1 to 100 nmol/L exogenous S1P, a concentration range that was characterized as S1P2-dependent, based on the effect of S1P2 inhibition by antisense oligonucleotides and 1 &mgr;mol/L JTE013. Inhibition of the cystic fibrosis transmembrane regulator (CFTR) (1) restored S1P responses that were attenuated by SPP1wt overexpression; (2) enhanced myogenic vasoconstriction; but (3) had no effect on noradrenaline responses. We conclude that SPP1 is an endogenous regulator of resistance artery tone that functionally antagonizes the vascular effects of both Sk1wt and S1P2 receptor activation. SPP1 accesses extracellular S1P pools in a manner dependent on a functional CFTR transport protein. Our study assigns important roles to both SPP1 and CFTR in the physiological regulation of vascular tone, which influences both tissue perfusion and systemic blood pressure.
Agent-Based Modeling to Inform Online Community Theory and Design: Impact of Discussion Moderation on Member Commitment and Contribution

In this article, we advocate a new approach in theory development by translating and synthesizing insights from multiple social science theories in an agent-based model to understand challenges in building online communities. To demonstrate the utility of this approach, we use it to examine the effects of three types of discussion moderation in conversation-based communities: no moderation, in which all members are exposed to all messages, community-level moderation, in which off-topic messages are deleted for everyone in the group, and personalized moderation, in which people see different messages based on their interests. Our results suggest that personalized moderation out-performs the others in increasing members’ contribution and commitment, especially in topically broad communities and those with high message volume. In comparison, community-level moderation increases commitment but not contribution. Our results also reveal a critical trade-off be-tween informational and relational benefits. This research demonstrates the value of agent-based modeling in synthesizing more narrowly-focused theories to describe and prescribe behaviors in a complex system, to generate novel theoretical insights that were out of scope for the component theories, and to use these insights to inform the design of online communities.
An adaptive geometrically-complemented approach for ECG signal denoising

This paper proposes a geometrical criterion for denoising a single-lead ECG signal. It was designed to ease the use of heuristic procedures for removing the most common types of noises from ANSI/AAMI-compliant ECG signals. However, in this paper, only the system-noise was considered to illustrate how this geometrical criterion is applied to the signal. The proposal here presented relies on a voltage-level slope detector that marks where the signal starts to increase, decrease or remain at the same level in order to perform an abstract segmentation of the ECG signal. The resulting segments are quantitatively classified as significant segments or noisy segments by analyzing their amplitude and time duration according to a previously defined threshold-level with the intention of helping the algorithm to decide its own operational parameters. The system-noise filter proposed here has five different operation modes. The main one is based on the arithmetic mean operation to smooth out short-term fluctuations; additionally, it is complemented with geometrical estimations for preserving the physiological characteristics of the ECG signal. The other operation modes are purely based on geometric estimations to calculate the filter output. The geometrical criterion described here differs from many other approaches presented until now owing to its low mathematical complexity and low computational consumption since all calculations can be performed with raw ADC readings and arithmetical operations, characteristics that make this filter easy to implement on embedded systems. This denoising approach was designed for online processing applications but it also works well with previously recorded signals.
Modification by drugs used in anaesthesia of CNS stimulation induced in mice by laudanosine and strychnine.

We have investigated in mice the effects of several drugs which may be administered as part of an anaesthetic technique on the convulsive threshold to laudanosine and to strychnine, which is reported to have a similar mechanism of action. I.v. administered propofol, thiopentone and midazolam increased the dose of convulsant necessary to produce seizure when administered 2 min before the convulsive stimulus. In contrast, methohexitone and etomidate exhibited a proconvulsant effect, although with the latter this was significant only in laudanosine-treated mice. Pethidine was proconvulsant in both laudanosine- and strychnine-treated mice, but morphine was proconvulsant only in strychnine-treated mice. The effects of morphine, but not pethidine, were antagonized by naloxone 1 mg kg-1. Laudanosine, but not strychnine caused arousal from anaesthesia in subconvulsive doses. This and other evidence suggests that the mechanism of the CNS excitation produced by strychnine and laudanosine are not the same.
The Vagus Nerve is One Route of Transneural Invasion for Intranasally Inoculated Influenza A Virus in Mice

Intranasally inoculated neurotropic influenza viruses in mice infect not only the respiratory tract but also the central nervous system (CNS), mainly the brain stem. 26 , 34 Previous studies suggested that the route of invasion of virus into the CNS was via the peripheral nervous system, especially the vagus nerve. To evaluate the transvagal transmission of the virus, we intranasally inoculated unilaterally vagectomized mice with a virulent influenza virus (strain 24a5b) and examined the distribution of the viral protein and genome by immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridization over time. An asymmetric distribution of viral antigens was observed between vagal (nodose) ganglia: viral antigen was detected in the vagal ganglion of the vagectomized side 2 days later than in the vagal ganglion of the intact side. The virus was apparently transported from the respiratory mucosa to the CNS directly and decussately via the vagus nerve and centrifugally to the vagal ganglion of the vagectomized side. The results of this study, thus, demonstrate that neurotropic influenza virus travels to the CNS mainly via the vagus nerve.
A Holistic XML-to-RDBMS Mapper (Demonstration)

Over the past few years, XML’s powerful and flexible data formatting capabilities have made it a dominant standard for information exchange between applications, especially on the Internet. As an increasing amount of XML data is being processed, efficient and reliable storage of XML data has become an important issue. For persistently storing information from XML sources, there are primarily two technological choices available: A specialized native XML store (e.g. Tamino [13], Timber [6]), or a standard relational engine (e.g. IBM DB2 [5], Oracle [9], MSSQL Server [3]). From a pragmatic viewpoint, the latter approach brings with it the benefits of highlyfunctional, efficient, and mature technology. Therefore, a rich body of literature has emerged in the last five years on the mechanics of hosting XML documents on relational backends. Specifically, there have been several proposals for generating efficient mappings between XML schema (e.g. DTDs or XML Schema) and relational schema. A common limitation of much of the prior work is that it has focused on isolated components of the relational schema, typically the table configurations. A complete relational schema, however, consists of much more than just table configurations – it also includes integrity constraints, indices, triggers, and views. Therefore, viable XML-to-relational systems that intend to support real-world applications need to provide a holistic mapping that incorporates all fundamental aspects of relational schemas. In this demonstration, we will present a walkthrough of a prototype system called ELIXIR (Establishing hoLIstic schemas for XML In Rdbms) that produces holistic relational schemas tuned to the application workload. The prototype is built using Ocamlc (Objective Caml) [8], a strongly-typed functional programming language, around the well-known LegoDB XML-to-RDBMS framework [1, 4, 11], and uses the IBM DB2 database engine as the relational backend.
An African Theory of Good Leadership

This article draws on the indigenous African tradition of philosophy to ground a moral-philosophical theory of leadership that is intended to rival accounts in the East Asian and Western traditions. After providing an interpretation of the characteristically sub-Saharan value of communion, the article advances a philosophical account of a good leader as one who creates, sustains, and enriches communal relationships and enables others to do so. The article then applies this account to a variety of topics, including what the proper final end of an organization is, how decisions ought to be made within it, who counts as a stakeholder, and how to deal with non-performing or misbehaving employees. For each topic, the article notes respects in which the African theory of good leadership entails approaches that differ from other, more internationally familiar ones, and suggests that its implications are prima facie attractive relative to them.