Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Structure of the surface layer of the methanogenic archaean Methanosarcina acetivorans

Archaea have a self-assembling proteinaceous surface (S-) layer as the primary and outermost boundary of their cell envelopes. The S-layer maintains structural rigidity, protects the organism from adverse environmental elements, and yet provides access to all essential nutrients. We have determined the crystal structure of one of the two “homologous” tandem polypeptide repeats that comprise the Methanosarcina acetivorans S-layer protein and propose a high-resolution model for a microbial S-layer. The molecular features of our hexameric S-layer model recapitulate those visualized by medium resolution electron microscopy studies of microbial S-layers and greatly expand our molecular view of S-layer dimensions, porosity, and symmetry. The S-layer model reveals a negatively charged molecular sieve that presents both a charge and size barrier to restrict access to the cell periplasmic-like space. The β-sandwich folds of the S-layer protein are structurally homologous to eukaryotic virus envelope proteins, suggesting that Archaea and viruses have arrived at a common solution for protective envelope structures. These results provide insight into the evolutionary origins of primitive cell envelope structures, of which the S-layer is considered to be among the most primitive: it also provides a platform for the development of self-assembling nanomaterials with diverse functional and structural properties.
Modelling Extreme Financial Returns of Global Equity Markets

Extreme asset price movements appear to be more pronounced recently and have major consequences for an economy’s financial stability and monetary policies. This paper investigates the extreme behaviour of equity market returns and quantifies the probabilities of these losses. Taking fourteen major equity markets the study is able to ascertain similarities and divergences in the tail returns from around the world. To do so, it applies extreme value theory to equity indices representing American, Asian and European markets. The paper finds that all markets tail realisations are adequately modelled with the fat-tailed Frechet distribution. Furthermore tail realisations associated with the downside of a distribution are greater than those associated with the upside, and extreme returns for Asian markets are usually larger than their European and American counterparts.
Trait emotional intelligence, emotional labour, and burnout among Malaysian HR professionals

Purpose - – This study aims to examine the concepts of trait emotional intelligence (EI), emotional labour strategies and burnout among internal human resources (HR) service providers. It proposes a model to deepen our understanding of the processes explaining the protective effects of trait EI on employee burnout. Design/methodology/approach - – The present study comprises a sample of 143 HR professionals from a large Malaysian financial institution. Findings - – Results suggest that trait EI predicted personal- and work-related burnout but not client-related burnout. Trait EI was also found to be partly related to emotional labour (EL), exhibiting a negative relationship with surface acting but not with deep acting. While surface acting exhibited a significant relationship on all three forms of burnout, deep acting was only significantly related to client burnout. Moreover, mediation analyses revealed that surface acting partly mediated the relationship between EI and burnout. Originality/value - – This study examines the relationship between EI, EL and burnout in HR professionals. This study is the first in the literature to examine these relationships in the context of internal service providers and in a non-Western context. Our study enhances our understanding of the processes explaining the protective effects of trait EI on employee burnout in a non-Western context.
Mixins and Extenders for Modular Metamodel Customisation

Metamodelling is a practical yet rigorous formalism for modelling language definition with a metamodel being its pivotal engineering artifact. A multitude of domain-specific modelling languages (DSML) are engineered to cover various modelling domains. Metamodels of such languages evolve over time by introducing changes and extensions and are further customised to suite project-specific needs. While majority of DSML development techniques provide concepts for creating metamodels from scratch, composition concepts for metamodel customisation beyond class inheritance are sought towards more flexibility and reuse. In this paper, we introduce a modular approach for metamodel customisation based on the idea of mixins and extenders. While mixins allow for defining self-contained metamodel modules for reuse, extenders enable non-intrusive composition of such reusable modules on top of existing metamodels. We show how this approach can be applied in a metamodelling tool such as ADOxx and demonstrate its usefulness by customising the BPMN language. The benefit of the modular metamodel customisation is twofold. On the language engineering level, our approach significantly promotes reuse, flexibility and overall efficiency in language definition and customisation. On the modelling level, the approach leverages engineering flexibility to provide custom modelling languages that better suits enterprise modelling needs.
Patient-Specific Image-Based Computational Modeling in Congenital Heart Disease: A Clinician Perspective

Despite major advances in the understanding of congenital heart disease, the clinical decision-making process is still based on consensus opinion of experts, small prospective and retrospective studies, or registries. Furthermore, because the decision process is mainly supported by empirical data from cohorts of patients with similar conditions, it might not reflect the individual subject nor does it allow making predictions on the outcome in response to a variety of therapeutic options. In response to this need, the new paradigm of “predictive personalized medicine” postulates the use of computational tools that integrate patient-specific medical imaging (as well as other measurements) to simulate and quantify physiologic and pathophysiologic function of the cardiovascular system. The ultimate goal is to perform a subject-specific hemodynamic assessment and, when applicable, to predict the outcome of alternative treatment plans for an individual patient. In this article, we review image-based computational modeling in congenital heart disease. We remark that closer interactions between bioengineers and clinicians, and dedicated cross-disciplinary training are crucial to bridge the gap between image-based modeling and daily clinical scenarios.
Evaluation of preservative effectiveness in pharmaceutical products : the use of a wild strain of Pseudomonas cepacia

A sodium benzoate‐sorbic acid preservative system of a pharmaceutical product was proved effective against a wild strain of Pseudomonas cepacia, following the official method of the Italian and British Pharmacopoeias. However, this preservative system was ineffective against a challenge of Ps. cepacia wild strain cells grown in the unpreserved pharmaceutical product and on culture media different from those described by the Pharmacopoeias. The adaptive resistance of the wild strain of Ps. cepacia was not demonstrated with a laboratory strain (ATCC 25609). In contrast, p‐hydroxybenzoate‐based preservative systems proved to be efficient in protecting the pharmaceutical product against a challenge of wild and laboratory strains of Ps. cepacia grown in the different conditions described above. The results obtained suggest the usefulness, in the official methods for testing pharmaceutical preservatives, of using wild microbial strains isolated from the pharmaceutical environment. Metabolic adaptive responses, capable of affecting the antimicrobial sensitivity of wild micro‐organisms used to challenge the preserved product, can be detected by using cells grown in the unpreserved pharmaceutical product.
An Intervention to Increase Social Support and Improve Performance

This study investigated the effects of a one-to-one intervention designed to increase social support and improve performance using a single-subject multiple baseline design. Participants were 3 high-level male golfers, mean age 25.0 years (SD = 2.6). All participants reported significantly higher levels of emotional, esteem, informational, and tangible support in the intervention phase compared to the baseline phase (ts = −2.35 to −21.80, ps < .01). The performance of all participants improved during the intervention phase compared to the baseline phase. Participant A improved by an average of . 90 shots per round, Participant B by 1.33 shots per round, and Participant C by 3.10 shots per round. The effectiveness of the intervention upon performance outcome was supported by a χ2 analysis (χ2 (1) = 4.80, p < . 05). The results indicate that a one-to-one intervention may be a useful strategy to increase social support and improve performance.
Variable length testing using the ordinal regression model

Health questionnaires are often built up from sets of questions that are totaled to obtain a sum score. An important consideration in designing questionnaires is to minimize respondent burden. An increasingly popular method for efficient measurement is computerized adaptive testing; unfortunately, many health questionnaires do not meet the requirements for this method. In this paper, a new sequential method for efficiently obtaining sum scores via the computer is introduced, which does not have such requirements and is based on the ordinal regression model. In the assessment, future scores are predicted from past responses, and when an acceptable level of uncertainty is achieved, the procedure is terminated. Two simulation studies were performed to illustrate the usefulness of the procedure. The first used artificially generated symptom scores, and the second was a post hoc simulation using real responses on the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression scale. In both studies, the sequential method substantially reduced the respondent burden while maintaining a high sum score quality. Benefits and limitations of this new methodology are discussed. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
The role of rigid motion in newborns' face recognition

The study investigated whether dynamic information promotes newborns' ability to recognize a face. After being habituated to a face undergoing an ordered sequential head rigid motion (Exp. 1), 1- to 3-day-old newborns fully recognized the familiar face shown in the profile pose, as documented by a preference for the profile pose of a novel face. When familiarized to an ordered sequence of different viewpoint static images of a face (Exp. 2), newborns failed to recognize the profile pose of the familiar face, their visual exploration of the familiar and novel faces being at chance. Habituation to a random head rigid motion (Exp. 3) allowed only a partial recognition of face identity, as newborns preferred the profile pose of the familiar, rather than the novel, face. Rigid head motion is an important source of information for newborns' face recognition, probably aiding the derivation of a three-dimensional face structure.
Evaluation of a quantitative food frequency questionnaire used in a group of Norwegian adolescents.

OBJECTIVE The study was conducted to assess the reproducibility and validity of a 190-item self-administered quantitative food frequency questionnaire, used in a nation-wide study of adolescents. DESIGN AND SUBJECTS Reproducibility study; 103 11th grade students (18 years) completed the questionnaire twice, with a 6-week interval. Validation study; 49 11th grade students filled in the questionnaire and kept 7-day weighed food records. RESULTS Spearman rank correlations between the nutrient intakes from the two questionnaires varied from 0.63 (sugar energy percentage) to 0.91 (alcohol). The median coefficient was 0.85. The first questionnaire produced generally higher nutrient intake estimates than the second. Correlations between nutrient intake values from the records and the questionnaire ranged from 0.14 (vitamin D, non-significant, cod liver oil not included) to 0.66 (monounsaturated fatty acids). The median coefficient was 0.52. Adjustment for energy intake did not materially affect the correlations. On average 41% of the subjects were classified in the same quartile in the questionnaire and the records, and 2% in the opposite quartiles. However, the percentage of subjects in the same/opposite quartiles for vitamin D and fibre were 33/12 and 22/6, respectively. CONCLUSIONS It is concluded that the questionnaire is able to rank subjects according to the tested nutrients, except vitamin D and fibre.
The social context of AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa.

The world region most likely to record the greatest numbers of deaths from Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) is sub-Saharan Africa where most transmission of the HIV virus is heterosexual. Drawing extensively on the primarily anthropological often scattered literature and on their own research the authors argue that sexual activity in sub-Saharan Africa has not been subject to the same moral and religious constraints as in the West. Sexuality has been treated in a more matter-of-fact way and sexual relations quite distinct from prostitution often involve material transactions. The pervasiveness of this transactional element means that sudden changes in sexual networking will lead to the deterioration of the situation of many socially marginal women and their children. The lesser constraints on acceptable sexual activity have resulted in a high level of heterosexual networking which provides both a considerable risk of HIV transmission and a strong resistance to the control of AIDS through the enforcement of monogamy. The parameters of likely change areunknown because of the inadequacy of social scientific research into the nature and extent of African sexual networks. (authors)
Association of variants in the LIPC and ABCA1 genes with intermediate and large drusen and advanced age-related macular degeneration.

PURPOSE Intermediate and large drusen usually precede advanced age-related macular degeneration (AMD). There is little information about which genes influence drusen accumulation. Discovery of genetic variants associated with drusen may lead to prevention and treatments of AMD in its early stages. METHODS A total of 3066 subjects were evaluated on the basis of ocular examinations and fundus photography and categorized as control (n = 221), intermediate drusen (n = 814), large drusen (n = 949), or advanced AMD (n = 1082). SNPs in the previously identified CFH, C2, C3, CFB, CFI, APOE, and ARMS2/HTRA1 genes/regions and the novel genes LIPC, CETP, and ABCA1 in the high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol pathway were genotyped. Associations between stage of AMD and SNPs were assessed using logistic regression. RESULTS Controlling for age, sex, education, smoking, body mass index, and antioxidant treatment, the number of minor (T) alleles of the genes LIPC and ABCA1 were significantly associated with a reduced risk of intermediate drusen (LIPC [P trend = 0.045], ABCA1 [P = 4.4 × 10(-3)]), large drusen (LIPC [P = 0.041], ABCA1 [P = 7.7 × 10(-4)]), and advanced AMD (LIPC [P = 1.8 × 10(-3)], ABCA1 [P = 3 × 10(-4)]). After further adjustment for known genetic factors, the protective effect of the TT genotype was significant for intermediate drusen (LIPC [odds ratio (OR), 0.56; 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.33-0.94], ABCA1 [OR, 0.48; 95% CI, 0.27-0.85]), large drusen (LIPC [OR, 0.58; 95% CI, 0.34-0.98)], ABCA1 [OR, 0.41; 95% CI, 0.23-0.74)]), and advanced AMD (LIPC [OR, 0.39; 95% CI, 0.21-0.74)], ABCA1 [OR, 0.35; 95% CI, 0.17-0.71)]). CFH, C3, C2, and ARMS2/HTRA1 were associated with large drusen and advanced AMD. CONCLUSIONS LIPC and ABCA1 are related to intermediate and large drusen, as well as advanced AMD. CFH, C3, C2, and ARMS2/HTRA1 are associated with large drusen and advanced AMD. Genes may have varying effects on different stages of AMD.
Is it my overactive imagination? The effects of contextually activated attachment insecurity on sexual fantasies

Three studies examined the effects of explicit and implicit insecurity priming on the content of sexual fantasies. In all studies, participants described a sexual fantasy narratively (Studies 1 and 2) or completed a fantasy checklist (Study 3) following contextual activation of attachment representations. In Study 1, explicit insecurity priming led to fantasies that involved interpersonal distance and hostility themes. This pattern was particularly pronounced among anxiously attached men, implying that they use distancing strategies when confronted with insecurity. In Studies 2 and 3, implicit insecurity priming led to similar distancing themes, regardless of attachment orientations. These findings suggest that sexual expressions constitute a unique route for coping with insecurities, which manifests the goals that are most likely to be challenged.
Students' Perceptions of Efficacy and Preference for Two Lecture Formats

Active and collaborative learning can be facilitated in large lectures through structured and well-planned interventions such as small group work (Felder, 1997). This may be an effective strategy as it encourages students to become more critical and responsible in their learning. However, students may not prefer this method or view it as useful, which could lead to hostility and obstruction of the methodology. This report details an evaluation of student perceptions of two lecture approaches: traditional lecturing and lectures using ‘small group’ work. Students preferred the ‘small group’ work and perceived it to be useful to their learning. Themes that emerged from the analysis complemented social constructivist literature.
Design and evaluation of an optically-tracked single-CCD laser range scanner.

PURPOSE Acquisition of laser range scans of an organ surface has the potential to efficiently provide measurements of geometric changes to soft tissue during a surgical procedure. A laser range scanner design is reported here which has been developed to drive intraoperative updates to conventional image-guided neurosurgery systems. METHODS The scanner is optically-tracked in the operating room with a multiface passive target. The novel design incorporates both the capture of surface geometry (via laser illumination) and color information (via visible light collection) through a single-lens onto the same charge-coupled device (CCD). The accuracy of the geometric data was evaluated by scanning a high-precision phantom and comparing relative distances between landmarks in the scans with the corresponding ground truth (known) distances. The range-of-motion of the scanner with respect to the optical camera was determined by placing the scanner in common operating room configurations while sampling the visibility of the reflective spheres. The tracking accuracy was then analyzed by fixing the scanner and phantom in place, perturbing the optical camera around the scene, and observing variability in scan locations with respect to a tracked pen probe ground truth as the camera tracked the same scene from different positions. RESULTS The geometric accuracy test produced a mean error and standard deviation of 0.25 ± 0.40 mm with an RMS error of 0.47 mm. The tracking tests showed that the scanner could be tracked at virtually all desired orientations required in the OR set up, with an overall tracking error and standard deviation of 2.2 ± 1.0 mm with an RMS error of 2.4 mm. There was no discernible difference between any of the three faces on the lasers range scanner (LRS) with regard to tracking accuracy. CONCLUSIONS A single-lens laser range scanner design was successfully developed and implemented with sufficient scanning and tracking accuracy for image-guided surgery.
Assessing Aggression Using Conditional Reasoning

In a time characterized by wars, students and employees being shot at their desks, and corporate executives raiding pension funds, aggression has taken on considerable prominence in our society. Aggressive people capture our interest because they are the ones who desire to harm others. Considerable progress has been made in recent years in understanding the aggressive personality. Psychology now has a much better idea of the defensive cognitive processes that aggressive people use to create a false sense of rationality for their aggressive acts. This knowledge of defensive processes was used to design a new measurement system to identify aggressive individuals. The new measurement system is based on a “cover” task in the form of an inductive reasoning problem. The use of reasoning to cover the measurement of aggression is made possible because aggressive people use the illusion of rational analyses to create defenses for their harming of others. The measurement system builds on this process by constructing answers to inductive reasoning problems that are grounded in the same defensive, self-illusionary thinking that aggressive people use to rationalize harming others. Aggressive people tend to be drawn to these answers (the answers in the previous sentence). This is because people who habitually engage in creating falsely rational defenses find reasoning based on the same types of protective thinking to be logically compelling.
Initializations for the Nonnegative Matrix Factorization

The need to process and conceptualize large sparse matrices effectively and efficiently (typically via low-rank approximations) is essential for many data mining applications, including document and image analysis, recommendation systems, and gene expression analysis. The nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) has many advantages to alternative techniques for processing such matrices, but its use comes with a caveat: the NMF must be initialized and the initialization selected is crucial to getting good solutions. It is well-known that good initializations can improve the speed and accuracy of the solutions of many NMF algorithms [43]. Add to this the fact that many NMF algorithms are sensitive with respect to the initialization of one or both NMF factors, and the impact of initializations becomes very important. In this paper, we compare the results of six initialization procedures (two standard and four new) on two alternating least squares algorithms, which we presented in [27].
User Participation When Users have Mental and Cognitive Disabilities

Persons with cognitive or mental disabilities have difficulties participating in or are excluded from IT development and assessments exercises due to the problems finding good ways to efficiently collaborate on equal terms. In this paper we describe how we worked closely together with persons that have mental and cognitive disabilities in order to test and develop methods for participation in assessments and in processes for developing, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) products and services. More than 100 persons with mental and cognitive disabilities participated in the study (people with diagnoses such as depression, anxiety disorder, bipolarity, and schizophrenia). To explore the conditions for a more equal and fair participation we have developed and elaborated a set of methods, tools and approaches. By combining scientific research methods with well-established methods for empowerment and participation we have developed methods that are cost effective and that easily can be incorporated in existing processes. We believe that our approach have taken steps to implement possibilities for persons with mental and cognitive disabilities to take part where user participation is needed in order not to discriminate or exclude but also to improve the overall quality of the end result. The results clearly show that it is possible to include persons with mental and cognitive disabilities. A mixed method -- mixed tool approach can increase the possibility for participation. The results also show that the quality of the analysis phase increases if the collaborative approach is extended to also embrace the data analysis phase.