Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Romanian Public Servants on Public Administration Reforms

The present paper tries to assess the public administration reforms based on the opinions of public servants – the ones in charge with the actual implementation of the reforms. In November 2007 a mail survey was done in Romanian PA institutions. The opinions showed the necessity of the administrative reforms is accepted mainly as a request of the European Union. The way in which reforms were done is seen as a strenuous process, characterized by low coherence, with many changes of focus and done mainly through enacting new legislation over and over, which led to over-regulation. De-centralization (financial and managerial) has still a long way to go, legislative improvement also (especially streamlining rules and procedures), citizens/community is not seen as a real partnership. More optimistic answers are regarding the functioning of local institutions (especially along the organizational culture dimension), which are seen as functioning very well in the context of reforms (a cautionary note should be made – loyalty or subjectivity may have lead to such answers).
An on-line performance visualization technology

We present a new software technology for on-line performance analysis and visualization of complex parallel and distributed systems. Often heterogeneous, these systems need capabilities for flexible integration and configuration of performance analysis and visualization. Our technology is based on an object-oriented framework for rapid prototyping and development of distributable visual objects. The visual objects consist of two levels, a platform/device-specific low level, and an analysis- and visualization-specific high level. We have developed a very high-level, markup language, called VOML, and a compiler for component-based development of high-level visual objects. The VOML is based on a software architecture for on-line event processing and performance visualization called EPIRA. The technology lends itself to constructing high-level visual objects from globally distributed component definitions. We present details of the technology and tools used, and show how an example visual object can be rapidly prototyped from several reusable components.
Sustained-release fampridine for multiple sclerosis

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory and neurodegenerative disease of the central nervous system of unknown cause in which neurological impairment and disability result from demyelination and axonal loss. Physiologically, myelin loss leads to changes in axonal ion channels that cause conduction failure. Axonal loss leads to a reduction in signal strength in neuronal pathways. Fampridine (4-aminopyridine) is a potassium channel blocker that can increase action potential duration and amplitude, leading to improved conduction in demyelinated nerve fibers and to increased neurotransmitter release at synaptic endings. Fampridine treatment can improve ambulation in some MS patients, but can also cause seizures and other side effects. Pharmacokinetic studies show that improvement in neurological deficits is primarily related to the total fampridine dose, while seizure induction is related to peak serum levels. To reduce side effects, a slow-release (SR) formulation of fampridine was developed. Two Phase III studies of fampridine SR have now shown that treatment can improve leg strength and walking speed in patients with MS; a new drug application has been filed with the US FDA.
AD2US: an automated approach to generating usage scenarios from UML activity diagrams

Although attention has been given to the use of UML (Unified Modelling Language) activity diagrams in the generation of scenarios, thin-threads and test-cases, the processes described in the literature rely heavily on manual intervention either in the information extraction process or in the process of transforming them to an alternate structure. This paper introduces an approach that capture, store and output usage scenarios derived automatically from UML activity diagrams.
A large scale analytical study on efficacy of different photo(chemo)therapeutic modalities in the treatment of psoriasis, vitiligo and mycosis fungoides

Psoriasis, vitiligo, and mycosis fungoides (MF) are among the most frequently treated dermatological diseases by photo(chemo)therapy. The objectives are to determine which photo (chemo) therapeutic modality could achieve the best response in the treatment of psoriasis, vitiligo, and MF. The design used in this study is retrospective analytical study. The study included 745 patients' records; 293 with psoriasis, 309 with vitiligo, and 143 with early MF, treated in the Phototherapy Unit, Dermatology Department, Kasr El‐Aini Hospital, Cairo University by either psoralen and ultraviolet A (PUVA), narrow band ultraviolet B (NB‐UVB), psoralen and narrow band UVB (P‐NBUVB), broad band UVB (BB‐UVB), or broad band UVA (ΒΒ‐UVA). Data were retrieved from the computer database of the unit and statistically analyzed. In psoriasis, oral and topical PUVA and NB‐UVB were found to be equally effective, whereas oral PUVA had significantly better results than both UVA and BB‐UVB at the end of therapy. In generalized vitiligo, PUVA and P‐NBUVB had significantly better results than NB‐UVB alone. In early MF, there was no statistically significant difference between the response to oral PUVA and NB‐UVB. PUVA and NB‐UVB are good choices in patients with psoriasis and early stage MF, whereas PUVA appears the best choice in the treatment of vitiligo.
Effect of BMI on prediction of accelerometry-based energy expenditure in youth.

PURPOSE The objective of this study is to determine the effect of body mass index (BMI) on level of agreement between six previously established prediction equations for three commonly used accelerometers to predict summary measures of energy expenditure (EE) in youth. METHODS One hundred and thirty-one youth between the ages of 10-17 yr and BMI from 15 to 44 kg·m were outfitted with hip-worn ActiGraph GT1M (Pensacola, FL), Actical (MiniMiter/Respironics, Bend, OR), and RT3 (StayHealthy, Monrovia, CA) accelerometers and spent approximately 24 h in a whole-room indirect calorimeter while performing structured and self-selected activities. Five commonly used regression and one propriety equations for each device were used to predict the minute-to-minute EE (normalized to METs), daily physical activity level (PAL), and time spent in sedentary, light, moderate, and vigorous physical activity intensity categories. The calculated values were compared with criterion measurements obtained from the room calorimeter. RESULTS All predictive equations, except RT3, significantly over- or underpredicted daily PAL (P < 0.001), with large discrepancies observed in the estimate of sedentary and light activity. Discrepancies between actual and estimated PAL ranged from 0.05 to 0.68. In addition, BMI represented a modifier for two ActiGraph predictive equations (AG1 and AG2), affecting the accuracy of physical activity-related EE predictions. CONCLUSION ActiGraph (AG3) and the RT3 closely predicted overall PAL (within 4.2% and 6.8%, respectively) as a group. When adjusting for age, sex, and ethnicity, Actical (AC1 and AC2) and ActiGraph (AG3) were not influenced by BMI. However, a gap between some hip-worn accelerometer predictive and regression equations was demonstrated compared with both criterion measurement and each other, which poses a potential difficulty for interstudy (e.g., different accelerometers) and intrastudy (e.g., BMI and adiposity) comparisons.
Development and Validation of an ELISA at Acidic pH for the Quantitative Determination of IL-13 in Human Plasma and Serum

A novel sandwich ELISA for the quantitative and sensitive determination of IL-13 in human serum and plasma was established. The assay employs an incubation step at acidic pH, which was shown to decrease nonspecific binding and interference from IL-13 binding proteins. The assay was validated and was shown to be accurate and precise over the entire quantification range (0.59 to 68.4 pg/mL in human EDTA plasma). The validated assay was successfully applied to samples from healthy volunteers and patients with atopic seasonal rhinitis. The assay is suitable for use in clinical trials to monitor efficacy or pharmacodynamic effects of drug candidates.
Postoperative analgesic requirements after subarachnoid or epidural anesthesia with ropivacaine 0.75% in cesarean section. A double-blind randomized trial

Abstract Objective: Postoperative analgesic requirements and pain scores were compared after subarachnoid versus epidural anesthesia with plain ropivacaine 0.75% for elective cesarean section. Study design: Ropivacaine 0.75% was randomly administered for subarachnoid or epidural anesthesia in 108 parturients, scheduled for cesarean section. Times for the sensory block to reach T4 level and to regress to T6 level were recorded. At 2, 4, 8 and 24 h postoperatively, pain scores at rest and cough, morphine consumption as well as patient satisfaction, incidence of headache, nausea and/or vomiting were measured. Results: Median (min–max) time for the sensory block to reach T4 was 7 (3–0) min versus 24 (16–73) min and to regress to T6 was 126 (70–332) min versus 200 (98–439) min in the subarachnoid and epidural groups, respectively (p = 0.001). Although the subarachnoid had more analgesic consumption than the epidural group at 2 and 4 h postoperatively (7.3 ± 4.7 vs. 1.8 ± 2.4 mg, p = 0.001 and 9 ± 5.7 vs. 3.3 ± 3.8 mg, p = 0.001, respectively) no difference was observed at 8 or 24 h postoperatively (p = 0.14 and p = 0.38, respectively). VAS scores at rest and after cough (p = 0.56, p = 0.35, respectively), patient satisfaction (p = 0.61), incidence of headache (p = 1.0), nausea and/or vomiting (p = 0.78) did not differ between the two groups. Conclusions: Postoperative pain, analgesic requirements, patient satisfaction and adverse effects did not differ when subarachnoid or epidural anesthesia with ropivacaine 0.75% was used for elective cesarean section. Nevertheless, subarachnoid provides faster onset and offset of the block, compared to epidural anesthesia. The key limitation of this study is the lack of postoperative serum ropivacaine measurements taken with concurrent pain score measurements.
Real-time learner expressive gestures analysis using in EMASPEL framework

Emotions recognition is a young field, where a growing maturity implies new needs in terms of modelling and integration in the existing models. Based on our previous work (EMASPEL) and expressive gesture analysis; this paper deals with the problem of Emotion Recognition System (ERS); using a camera and no other special tools, we suggest an architecture for an embedded ERS with learner motion analyses detected in a learning framework.
Eliminating Leakage Currents in Neutral Point Clamped Inverters for Photovoltaic Systems

The main contribution of this paper is the proposal of new modulation techniques for three-phase transformerless neutral point clamped inverters to eliminate leakage currents in photovoltaic systems without requiring any modification on the multilevel inverter or any additional hardware. The modulation techniques are capable of reducing the leakage currents in photovoltaic systems by applying three medium vectors or using only two medium vectors and one specific zero vector to compose the reference vector. In addition, to increase the system utilization, the three-phase neutral point clamped inverter can be designed to also provide functions of active filter using the p-q theory. The proposed system provides maximum power point tracking and compensation of current harmonics and reactive power. To validate the simulation models, an experimental three-phase inverter is used to evaluate leakage currents and the dc link voltage control.
Reconstructing Ancestral Genomic Sequences by Co-Evolution: Formal Definitions, Computational Issues, and Biological Examples

The inference of ancestral genomes is a fundamental problem in molecular evolution. Due to the statistical nature of this problem, the most likely or the most parsimonious ancestral genomes usually include considerable error rates. In general, these errors cannot be abolished by utilizing more exhaustive computational approaches, by using longer genomic sequences, or by analyzing more taxa. In recent studies, we showed that co-evolution is an important force that can be used for significantly improving the inference of ancestral genome content. In this work we formally define a computational problem for the inference of ancestral genome content by co-evolution. We show that this problem is NP-hard and hard to approximate and present both a Fixed Parameter Tractable (FPT) algorithm, and heuristic approximation algorithms for solving it. The running time of these algorithms on simulated inputs with hundreds of protein families and hundreds of co-evolutionary relations was fast (up to four minutes) and it achieved an approximation ratio of <1.3. We use our approach to study the ancestral genome content of the Fungi. To this end, we implement our approach on a dataset of 33, 931 protein families and 20, 317 co-evolutionary relations. Our algorithm added and removed hundreds of proteins from the ancestral genomes inferred by maximum likelihood (ML) or maximum parsimony (MP) while slightly affecting the likelihood/parsimony score of the results. A biological analysis revealed various pieces of evidence that support the biological plausibility of the new solutions. In addition, we showed that our approach reconstructs missing values at the leaves of the Fungi evolutionary tree better than ML or MP.
PVA: a self-adaptive personal view agent system

In this paper, we present PVA, an adaptive personal view information agent system to track, learn and manage, user's interests in Internet documents. When user's interests change, PVA, in not only the contents, but also in the structure of user profile, is modified to adapt to the changes. Experimental results show that modulating the structure of user profile does increase the accuracy of personalization systems.
Long-term evolution of transposable elements

Transposable elements are often considered parasitic DNA sequences, able to invade the genome of their host thanks to their self-replicating ability. This colonization process has been extensively studied, both theoretically and experimentally, but their long-term coevolution with the genomes is still poorly understood. In this work, we aim to challenge previous population genetics models by considering features of transposable elements as quantitative, rather than discrete, variables. We also describe more realistic transposable element dynamics by accounting for the variability of the insertion effect, from deleterious to adaptive, as well as mutations leading to a loss of transposition activity and to nonautonomous copies. Individual-based simulations of the behavior of a transposable-element family over several thousand generations show different ways in which active or inactive copies can be maintained for a very long time. Results reveal an unexpected impact of genetic drift on the “junk DNA” content of the genome and strongly question the likelihood of the sustainable long-term stable transposition-selection equilibrium on which numerous previous works were based.
Seven Traps of the Common Core State Standards

Using sociologist C. Wright Mill's analogy of the trap, this piece invites readers to think about the Common Core State Standards beyond the classroom, outward toward its historical and political context. The traps describe the connection between larger social issues related to the implementation of the Common Core and changes at the classroom level with immediate impact on teachers' and students' daily lives. Within the analysis of the seven traps is critical examination of the production of both the Common Core and the Publisher's Criteria and how the documents represent literacy generally, reading and writing specifically, and children's literature. The analysis positions both documents as open and changeable texts waiting for the thoughtful input of teachers, parents, community members, and students.
Amplification of a Cytochrome P450 Gene Is Associated with Resistance to Neonicotinoid Insecticides in the Aphid Myzus persicae

The aphid Myzus persicae is a globally significant crop pest that has evolved high levels of resistance to almost all classes of insecticide. To date, the neonicotinoids, an economically important class of insecticides that target nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs), have remained an effective control measure; however, recent reports of resistance in M. persicae represent a threat to the long-term efficacy of this chemical class. In this study, the mechanisms underlying resistance to the neonicotinoid insecticides were investigated using biological, biochemical, and genomic approaches. Bioassays on a resistant M. persicae clone (5191A) suggested that P450-mediated detoxification plays a primary role in resistance, although additional mechanism(s) may also contribute. Microarray analysis, using an array populated with probes corresponding to all known detoxification genes in M. persicae, revealed constitutive over-expression (22-fold) of a single P450 gene (CYP6CY3); and quantitative PCR showed that the over-expression is due, at least in part, to gene amplification. This is the first report of a P450 gene amplification event associated with insecticide resistance in an agriculturally important insect pest. The microarray analysis also showed over-expression of several gene sequences that encode cuticular proteins (2–16-fold), and artificial feeding assays and in vivo penetration assays using radiolabeled insecticide provided direct evidence of a role for reduced cuticular penetration in neonicotinoid resistance. Conversely, receptor radioligand binding studies and nucleotide sequencing of nAChR subunit genes suggest that target-site changes are unlikely to contribute to resistance to neonicotinoid insecticides in M. persicae.
Joint Routing and Energy Management in UnderWater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Interest in underwater acoustic sensor networks (UW-ASNs) has rapidly increased with the desire to control the large portion of the world covered by oceans. Fundamental differences between underwater acoustic propagation and terrestrial radio propagation may impose the design of new networking protocols and management schemes. In this paper, we focus on these fundamental differences in order to conceive a balanced routing strategy that overcomes the energy holes problem. Indeed, energy management is one of the major concerns in UW-ASNs due to the limited energy budget of the underwater sensor nodes. In this paper, we tackle the problem of energy holes in UW-ASNs while taking into consideration the unique characteristics of the underwater channel. The main contribution of this study is an in-depth analysis of the impact of these unique underwater characteristics on balancing the energy consumption among all underwater sensors. We prove that we can evenly distribute the transmission load among sensor nodes provided that sensors adjust their communication power when they send or forward the periodically generated data. In particular, we propose a balanced routing strategy along with the associated deployment pattern that meticulously determines the load weight for each possible next hop, that leads to fair energy consumption among all underwater sensors. Consequently, the energy holes problem is overcome and hence the network lifetime is improved.
Significant overexpression of urokinase‐type plasminogen activator in pancreatic adenocarcinoma using real‐time quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction

Background and Aims: Overexpression of urokinase‐type plasminogen activator (uPA) has been shown to be strongly associated with an increased metastatic potential and poor prognosis in a variety of human malignancies. It was hypothesized that uPA would be overexpressed in highly metastatic pancreatic cancer. The aims of this study were to analyze uPA mRNA expression in pancreatic cancer and to correlate this to the expression of uPA protein and to the stage of the disease.
Generating the Johnson filtration

For k >= 1, let Torelli_g^1(k) be the k-th term in the Johnson filtration of the mapping class group of a genus g surface with one boundary component. We prove that for all k, there exists some G_k >= 0 such that Torelli_g^1(k) is generated by elements which are supported on subsurfaces whose genus is at most G_k. We also prove similar theorems for the Johnson filtration of Aut(F_n) and for certain mod-p analogues of the Johnson filtrations of both the mapping class group and of Aut(F_n). The main tools used in the proofs are the related theories of FI-modules (due to the first author together with Ellenberg and Farb) and central stability (due to the second author), both of which concern the representation theory of the symmetric groups over Z.
Haploinsufficiency of Sox9 results in defective cartilage primordia and premature skeletal mineralization

In humans, SOX9 heterozygous mutations cause the severe skeletal dysmorphology syndrome campomelic dysplasia. Except for clinical descriptions, little is known about the pathogenesis of this disease. We have generated heterozygous Sox9 mutant mice that phenocopy most of the skeletal abnormalities of this syndrome. The Sox9+/− mice died perinatally with cleft palate, as well as hypoplasia and bending of many skeletal structures derived from cartilage precursors. In embryonic day (E)14.5 heterozygous embryos, bending of radius, ulna, and tibia cartilages was already prominent. In E12.5 heterozygotes, all skeletal elements visualized by using Alcian blue were smaller. In addition, the overall levels of Col2a1 RNA at E10.5 and E12.5 were lower than in wild-type embryos. We propose that the skeletal abnormalities observed at later embryonic stages were caused by delayed or defective precartilaginous condensations. Furthermore, in E18.5 embryos and in newborn heterozygotes, premature mineralization occurred in many bones, including vertebrae and some craniofacial bones. Because Sox9 is not expressed in the mineralized portion of the growth plate, this premature mineralization is very likely the consequence of allele insufficiency existing in cells of the growth plate that express Sox9. Because the hypertrophic zone of the heterozygous Sox9 mutants was larger than that of wild-type mice, we propose that Sox9 also has a role in regulating the transition to hypertrophic chondrocytes in the growth plate. Despite the severe hypoplasia of cartilages, the overall organization and cellular composition of the growth plate were otherwise normal. Our results suggest the hypothesis that two critical steps of the chondrocyte differentiation pathway are sensitive to Sox9 dosage. First, an early step presumably at the stage of mesenchymal condensation of cartilage primordia, and second, a later step preceding the transition of chondrocytes into hypertrophic chondrocytes.