Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Impact of discourse on incremental comprehension processes: Event-related potential studies of word-by-word reading

The studies in this Dissertation used EEG/ERP to examine readers’ incremental, on-line reading comprehension. Study 1 tested the ability of words - as the closing elements of propositions - to trigger outdated mental representations. Participants read text passages in 3 conditions - Consistent, Inconsistent, and Causal. The Inconsistent condition differed from the Consistent condition due to protagonist inconsistencies. Additionally, the Causal condition differed from the Inconsistent condition by the addition of single-sentence causal justifications for the inconsistencies. Electrophysiological results indicated that readers were sensitive to inconsistencies from quite early in word processing, suggesting the functioning of semantically related attentional processes drawn to the meaning features of the input. At later time windows, both words in inconsistent passages and words in causal passages differed from those in consistent passages, with effects varying by scalp location, suggesting related but somewhat functionally distinct memorial processes. Overall, the responses are interpreted as reflecting on-line attentional and memorial mechanisms involved in detecting when a word “doesn’t fit” in a text or discourse, as well those involved when there is more than one available “interpretation” of a text. Study 2 tested the potential effects of contextually-guided referential semantics. Participants read two-sentence texts created to influence a representation that specified one conceptual feature in the first sentence. The second sentence contained a word that was either Consistent or Inconsistent with that feature. The results from Study 2 diverged from predictions in two ways. First, no N400 differences were found between conditions. This was similar to what was found in Study 1 and provides support for a connection between semantic binding and the N400 in connected text. Second, a frontal P600 was found, but in the opposite direction as predicted, with related words eliciting more positive responses than unrelated words. Potentially, this reflects the ability of words in the Feature Consistent texts to act as retrieval cues for related features in the first sentence. In both studies in this Dissertation, effects across levels of linguistic representation were observed, albeit to a lesser extent in Study 2. These findings provide on-line evidence of word-level processing during text comprehension.
Weak evidence for anticipatory parental effects in plants and animals

The evolution of adaptive phenotypic plasticity relies on the presence of cues that enable organisms to adjust their phenotype to match local conditions. Although mostly studied with respect to nonsocial cues, it is also possible that parents transmit information about the environment to their offspring. Such ‘anticipatory parental effects’ or ‘adaptive transgenerational plasticity’ can have important consequences for the dynamics and adaptive potential of populations in heterogeneous environments. Yet, it remains unknown how widespread this form of plasticity is. Using a meta‐analysis of experimental studies with a fully factorial design, we show that there is only weak evidence for higher offspring performance when parental and offspring environments are matched compared with when they are mismatched. Estimates of heterogeneity among studies suggest that effects, when they occur, are subtle. Study features, environmental context, life stage and trait categories all failed to explain significant amounts of variation in effect sizes. We discuss theoretical and methodological reasons for the limited evidence for anticipatory parental effects and suggest ways to improve our understanding of the prevalence of this form of plasticity in nature.
2D Wave Propagation Characteristics of the CIP Method with Amplitude Error Compensation

This paper considers the characteristics of 2D wave propagation analysis by the CIP (Constrained Interpolation Profile) method with amplitude error compensation. The amplitude compensation method based on the diversion relation of 1D-CIP method is applied to the 2D-CIP calculation scheme with directional splitting technique. It is shown that the compensation is effective for the analysis of EM propagation with the CIP method.
IODET: A HoL-blocking-aware Deterministic Routing Algorithm for Direct Topologies

In large parallel computers routing is a key design point to obtain the maximum possible performance out of the interconnection network. Routing can be classified into two categories depending on the number of routing options that a packet can use to go from its source to its destination. If the packet can only use a single predetermined path then the routing is deterministic, whereas if several paths are possible it is adaptive. It is a well-known fact that adaptive routing usually outperforms deterministic routing; but in this paper we take the challenge of developing a HOL-blocking-aware deterministic routing algorithm that can obtain a similar or even better performance than adaptive routing, while decreasing its implementation complexity and providing some inherent advantages to deterministic routing such as in-order delivery of packets. In this large computers regular direct topologies are widely-used, so in this paper we focus on meshes and tori.
Learning Cascaded Shared-Boost Classifiers for Part-Based Object Detection

This paper focuses on the problem of detecting a number of different class objects in images. We present a novel part-based model for object detection with cascaded classifiers. The coarse root and fine part classifiers are combined into the model. Different from the existing methods which learn root and part classifiers independently, we propose a shared-Boost algorithm to jointly train multiple classifiers. This paper is distinguished by two key contributions. The first is to introduce a new definition of shared features for similar pattern representation among multiple classifiers. Based on this, a shared-Boost algorithm which jointly learns multiple classifiers by reusing the shared feature information is proposed. The second contribution is a method for constructing a discriminatively trained part-based model, which fuses the outputs of cascaded shared-Boost classifiers as high-level features. The proposed shared-Boost-based part model is applied for both rigid and deformable object detection experiments. Compared with the state-of-the-art method, the proposed model can achieve higher or comparable performance. In particular, it can lift up the detection rates in low-resolution images. Also the proposed procedure provides a systematic framework for information reusing among multiple classifiers for part-based object detection.
On Parallelization of a Video Mining System

As digital video data becomes more pervasive, mining information from multimedia data becomes increasingly important. Although researches in multimedia mining area have shown great potential in daily life, the huge computational requirement prohibits its wide use in practice. Since our personal computer is shifting from uniprocessors to multicore processors, exploiting thread level parallelism in multimedia mining applications is critical to utilize the hardware resources and accelerate the mining process. This paper presents three different parallel approaches (task level, data slicing and hybrid parallel) to parallelize one widely used application in video mining system. The hybrid scheme, with the exploration of data level and task level parallelism, delivers much better performance than other two schemes. We get 10x performance improvement on a 16-way multiprocessor system. Besides, we perform several efficient optimization techniques, such as subexpression optimization, SIMD, and data blocking, to improve the performance by more than 60%. Therefore, our parallelization and optimization of the application makes it 16x faster than it used to be. Our study shows that with proper parallelization and optimization, multimedia mining can be used widely in our daily life soon
Glycinergic feedback enhances synaptic gain in the distal retina

This study provides experimental evidence that glycinergic interplexiform cells create a centrifugal feedback loop in the vertebrate retina that regulates the transmission of glutamatergic signals between photoreceptors and second‐order neurons. This mechanism serves to reduce glutamate uptake and enhance glutamate release. Glycine receptors containing the GlyRα3 subunit are expressed on bipolar cell dendrites, and their activation leads to a depolarizing response in a group of rod‐dominated ON bipolar cells, and hyperpolarizing responses in OFF bipolar cells. Using strychnine to block endogenous glycine feedback reduces the amplitudes of light‐evoked responses in both ON and OFF bipolar cells, indicating that glycine feedback regulates signal propagation in the distal retina. Glycinergic feedback provides a neural mechanism that enhances synaptic gain and improves visual sensitivity.
Searching for Animal Sentience: A Systematic Review of the Scientific Literature

Simple Summary The emotional lives of animals is often doubted and questioned. Due to the subjective nature of animal emotions, many think that they are out of the reach of scientific measurement. In this systematic review, of over two decades of scientific literature, we found that this was not actually the case. By using a list of keywords, formed of both positive and negative emotions, and terminology relating to animal sentience, we reviewed the scientific literature. We found that the subjective lives of animals are not only a vital part of human medical research but are regularly measured and studied with scientific rigor. Abstract Knowledge of animal sentience is fundamental to many disciplines and imperative to the animal welfare movement. In this review, we examined what is being explored and discussed, regarding animal sentience, within the scientific literature. Rather than attempting to extract meaning from the many complex and abstract definitions of animal sentience, we searched over two decades of scientific literature using a peer-reviewed list of 174 keywords. The list consisted of human emotions, terminology associated with animal sentience, and traits often thought to be indicative of subjective states. We discovered that very little was actually being explored, and instead there was already much agreement about what animals can feel. Why then is there so much scepticism surrounding the science of animal sentience? Sentience refers to the subjective states of animals, and so is often thought to be impossible to measure objectively. However, when we consider that much of the research found to accept and utilise animal sentience is performed for the development of human drugs and treatment, it appears that measuring sentience is, after all, not quite as impossible as was previously thought. In this paper, we explored what has been published on animal sentience in the scientific literature and where the gaps in research lie. We drew conclusions on the implications for animal welfare science and argued for the importance of addressing these gaps in our knowledge. We found that there is a need for more research on positive emotional states in animals, and that there is still much to learn about taxa such as invertebrates. Such information will not only be useful in supporting and initiating legislative amendments but will help to increase understanding, and potentially positive actions and attitudes towards animals.
Practice parameters for the management of colon cancer.

DISEASES OF THE COLON & RECTUM VOLUME 55: 8 (2012) The American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons is dedicated to ensuring high-quality patient care by advancing the science, prevention, and management of disorders and diseases of the colon, rectum, and anus. The Standards Committee is composed of Society members who are chosen because they have demonstrated expertise in the specialty of colon and rectal surgery. This Committee was created to lead international efforts in defining quality care for conditions related to the colon, rectum, and anus. This is accompanied by developing Clinical Practice Guidelines based on the best available evidence. These guidelines are inclusive, and not prescriptive. Their purpose is to provide information on which to base decisions, rather than dictate a specific form of treatment. These guidelines are intended for the use of all practitioners, health care workers, and patients who desire information about the management of the conditions addressed by the topics covered in these guidelines. It should be recognized that these guidelines should not be deemed inclusive of all proper methods of care or exclusive of methods of care reasonably directed to obtaining the same results. The ultimate judgment regarding the propriety of any specific procedure must be made by the physician in light of all of the circumstances presented by the individual patient.
The Association Between Current Helicobacter pylori Infection and Coronary Artery Disease

Background The role of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) in the pathogenesis of coronary artery disease (CAD) is still controversial, and the relation between current H. pylori infection and CAD has not been fully examined. This study evaluated the relation between H. pylori infection as confirmed by gastroduodenoscopic biopsy and CAD. Methods We determined the presence of H. pylori infections, via gastroduodenoscopy, in 88 patients of the normal coronary angiographic group and also in 175 patients of the CAD group, and the latter patients had more than 50% coronary stenosis angiographically demonstrated. We excluded those patients with a history of previous H. pylori eradication and/or malignancy. A small piece of tissue from the antrum, which was obtained by gastroduodenoscopic biopsy, was stained by Warthin-starry silver stain. We defined a negative staining result that there was no stained tissue in the sample and the stained tissue was also positive for H. pylori infection. Results There was no significant difference, except for gender, age, smoking and high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-c), of the demographic and laboratory characteristics between the groups. Twenty seven (30.7%) patients of the normal control group and 71 (40.6%) patients of the CAD group were positive of H. pylori infection, yet there was no statistical difference. We angiographically followed up the 80 patients of the CAD group who were treated by percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) at 6 to 9 months after their primary intervention. Twenty two (37.9%) of the 58 patients of the H. pylori negative group and 10 (45.5%) of the 22 patients of the H. pylori positive group were treated with reintervention, but reintervention was also not significantly different between the group with H. pylori infection and the group without the infection. Conclusions These data indicated that H. pylori infection had a modest influence on CAD and progressive atheroma, but the showed a tendency to increase. Further studies are needed to evaluate the relationship between H. pylori infection and CAD.
The CB2 cannabinoid agonist AM‐1241 prolongs survival in a transgenic mouse model of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis when initiated at symptom onset

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neurodegenerative disease characterized by progressive motor neuron loss, paralysis and death within 2–5 years of diagnosis. Currently, no effective pharmacological agents exist for the treatment of this devastating disease. Neuroinflammation may accelerate the progression of ALS. Cannabinoids produce anti‐inflammatory actions via cannabinoid receptor 1 (CB1) and cannabinoid receptor 2 (CB2), and delay the progression of neuroinflammatory diseases. Additionally, CB2 receptors, which normally exist primarily in the periphery, are dramatically up‐regulated in inflamed neural tissues associated with CNS disorders. In G93A‐SOD1 mutant mice, the most well‐characterized animal model of ALS, endogenous cannabinoids are elevated in spinal cords of symptomatic mice. Furthermore, treatment with non‐selective cannabinoid partial agonists prior to, or upon, symptom appearance minimally delays disease onset and prolongs survival through undefined mechanisms. We demonstrate that mRNA, receptor binding and function of CB2, but not CB1, receptors are dramatically and selectively up‐regulated in spinal cords of G93A‐SOD1 mice in a temporal pattern paralleling disease progression. More importantly, daily injections of the selective CB2 agonist AM‐1241, initiated at symptom onset, increase the survival interval after disease onset by 56%. Therefore, CB2 agonists may slow motor neuron degeneration and preserve motor function, and represent a novel therapeutic modality for treatment of ALS.
DEPENDABILITY ATTRIBUTES FOR SPACE COMPUTER SYSTEMS

Computer systems are increasingly used in critical applications in the space area where a failure can have serious consequences such as loss of mission, properties or lives. One way to improve quality of space computer projects is through the use of dependability attributes such as reliability, availability, safety, etc. to assist the identification of non-functional requirements. This work presents and discusses a minimum set of dependability attributes, selected for software applications, to be used in space projects. These attributes resulted from a research carried out on factors extracted from practices, standards and safety models both from international institutions of the aerospace field such as ESA, NASA and MOD (UK Ministry of Defense), as well as renowned authors in the area. An example illustrates the use of dependability attributes to identify dependability requirements.
Feature Selection with the Boruta Package

This article describes a R package Boruta, implementing a novel feature selection algorithm for finding emph{all relevant variables}. The algorithm is designed as a wrapper around a Random Forest classification algorithm. It iteratively removes the features which are proved by a statistical test to be less relevant than random probes. The Boruta package provides a convenient interface to the algorithm. The short description of the algorithm and examples of its application are presented.
Dissecting the chemical interactions and substrate structural signatures governing RNA polymerase II trigger loop closure by synthetic nucleic acid analogues

The trigger loop (TL) of RNA polymerase II (Pol II) is a conserved structural motif that is crucial for Pol II catalytic activity and transcriptional fidelity. The TL remains in an inactive open conformation when the mismatched substrate is bound. In contrast, TL switches from an inactive open state to a closed active state to facilitate nucleotide addition upon the binding of the cognate substrate to the Pol II active site. However, a comprehensive understanding of the specific chemical interactions and substrate structural signatures that are essential to this TL conformational change remains elusive. Here we employed synthetic nucleotide analogues as ‘chemical mutation’ tools coupling with α-amanitin transcription inhibition assay to systematically dissect the key chemical interactions and structural signatures governing the substrate-coupled TL closure in Saccharomyces cerevisiae Pol II. This study reveals novel insights into understanding the molecular basis of TL conformational transition upon substrate binding during Pol II transcription. This synthetic chemical biology approach may be extended to understand the mechanisms of other RNA polymerases as well as other nucleic acid enzymes in future studies.
Research findings on fathers and their involvement with social care services

This publication Fathers Matter is the culmination of a two year project which has looked at the largely neglected area of fathers involved with social care agencies because of child welfare needs or concerns. The publication includes a series of research reports, including new analyses of fathers’ experiences, an international literature review and the results of a survey of local authorities. The publication considers the implications of this research and sets out clear recommendations for Children’s Services Departments, health services and national government.
Towards public events image content understanding

In this paper, we explore the problem of content understanding of public events images, and our objective is preventing malicious utilization of public events image in the Internet to impose negative effect on the public opinion. Towards this goal, we propose a public events image content understanding approach, which is based on the object combination feature. We first identify the typical objects of the public events image, then employ SVM to classify the public events image according to the image content and finally succeed to recognize the public events image. Experiments validate the effectiveness of our approach.
Twenty-First Century Behavioral Medicine: A Context for Empowering Clinicians and Patients With Diabetes

In the past decades, the sophistication of treatments for diabetes has increased dramatically, and evidence for effective interventions has proliferated. As a result, it is now possible to achieve excellent glucose control and reduce the risk of many of the complications associated with the disease. Despite these advances, however, many people with diabetes have less than optimal metabolic control and continue to suffer from preventable complications. The gap between optimal evidence-based medicine and actual practice can be great, dependent not only on the ability of the clinician to make changes in practice patterns but also on the central role of the patient in implementing optimal management plans in daily life. With recognition of the centrality of patients’ actions to achieve optimal outcomes must come awareness that those actions reflect much more than simple “self-control. ” In addition to individual characteristics, the environment in which behaviors are enacted has great influence, from family eating patterns to the design of neighborhoods to workplace and national health policies. For patients and clinicians, these factors create the context or environment in which behaviors are enacted. Diabetes provides a prime example of this fundamental interaction of individual characteristics with the ecological or contextual factors. For example, Pima Indians living in the U.S. have the highest prevalence of type 2 diabetes of any population in the world, yet Pimas living traditional lifestyles in Mexico have relatively low levels of diabetes. Ample evidence links genetics to diabetes within the Pima population, but exposure to an obesogenic environment is critical to expression of this very strong genetic propensity (1). This interplay between the individual and the context in which he or she behaves is commonly cited in discussions of personal health choices and health and social policies. These perspectives have shifted in …