Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Neuromania: On the limits of brain science

Neuroeconomics, neuromarketing, neuroaesthetics, and neurotheology are just a few of the novel disciplines that have been inspired by a combination of ancient knowledge together with recent discoveries about how the human brain works. The mass media are full of news items featuring colour photos of the brain, that show us the precise location in which a certain thought or emotion, or even love occurs, hence leading us to believe that we can directly observe, with no mediation, the brain at work. But is this really so? Even throughout the developed world, the general public has been seduced into believing that any study, research article, or news report, accompanied by a brain image or two is more reliable and more scientific, than one featuring more mundane illustrations. This fascinating, accessible, and thought provoking new book questions our obsession with brain imaging. Written by two highly experienced psychologists, it discusses some of the familiar ideas usually associated wtih mind-body, brain-psyche, and nature-culture relationships, showing how the biased and unquestioning use of brain imaging technology could have significant cultural effects for all of us.
Life after heart transplantation: Risk perception in patients and their medical team

Progress in surgical technology and in postoperative therapy has remarkably increased life expectation after heart transplantation. Nevertheless, patients still show a resistance to resume a normal life after transplantation, for example, to return to work. In this study we assume that after surgery patients become risk averse because they achieve a positive frame of reference. Because of this propensity toward risk aversion, they withhold from engaging in behavior that their physical condition would allow them in principle. Coherent with this assumption we found that compared to the medical team patients overestimate the degree of risk for routine activities. The study also showed that the representation of risk by the patients could be captured by a dreadfulness factor and a voluntariness factor. Patients' risk judgments were strongly and specifically predicted by the perceived degree of dreadfulness of the activity and, to a lesser extent, by the perceived knowledge of the consequences. Implications fo.
Mitochondria and the pathogenesis of ALS.

Evidence implicating mitochondria as playing a crucial role in both necrotic and apoptotic cell death is rapidly accumulating. Mitochondria are essential in controlling specific apoptosis pathways (Green and Reed, 1998). Mitochondrial calcium uptake is required for glutamate excitotoxicity and there is a correlation between increases in mitochondrial calcium and increases in free radical generation, which are linked with cell death (Stout et al ., 1998). The mitochondrial permeability transition pore may be crucial in both necrotic and apoptotic cell death. Activation of the permeability transition pore increases the mitochondrial membrane permeability to solids with a molecular mass of up to 1.5 kDa (Bernardi, 1999). It is activated by increases in calcium, and free radicals and cyclosporin A inhibits its activation. Cyclosporin A blocks neuronal damage produced by hypoglycaemia and ischaemia in vivo (Friberg et al ., 1998). A potential role of mitochondria in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is gaining increasing support. In this issue of Brain , Vielhaber and colleagues report further evidence implicating mitochondrial dysfunction in ALS (Vielhaber et al ., 2000). The authors examined muscle biopsies of patients with ALS, compared with normal controls and …
Group Leadership of Experienced Middle School Counselors

GROUP LEADERSHIP OF EXPERIENCED MIDDLE SCHOOL COUNSLEORS by Robert E. Rice Middle school students experience biological, cognitive, and social changes as they struggle with identity formation, self-concept, self-esteem, and academic success. Psycho-educational groups are an effective and efficient method for confronting social/emotional or academic problems that prohibit middle school students from performing well in schools. An essential component in the successful counseling of middle school groups is the skill and experience of the group leader. Research on schoolbased groups has focused on all areas with the exception of group leadership. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to explore how experienced middle school group leaders approach and conduct psycho-educational groups. This qualitative study uses a grounded theory methodology to investigate the practices, experiences, and perceptions of fourteen middle school counselors. The theory that emerged is grounded in the data from the participants and represents how they were able to conduct small groups in schools despite barriers many other school counselors experienced. Through educational leadership, relationship building, and an understanding of the systems at work in schools, these participants were able to establish a group program in their schools. The participants in this study also reveal the experiences they used to develop their skills as group leaders. The results of this study may have important implications to middle school counselors, researchers, and counselor educators in understanding the group and educational leadership skills needed to conduct effective groups in a middle school setting.
Analysis of Relevance Feedback in Content Based Image Retrieval

Relevance feedback in content based image retrieval (CBIR) has been an active field of research for quite some time now. Many schemes and techniques of relevance feedback exist with many assumptions and operating criteria. Yet there exist few ways of quantitatively measuring and comparing different relevance feedback algorithms. Such analysis is necessary if a CBIR system is to perform consistently. In this paper we propose an abstract model of a CBIR system where the effects of different modules over the entire system is observed. Using this model we thoroughly analyse performance a set of basic relevance feedback algorithms. Besides using standard measures like precision and recall we also suggest two new measures to gauge the performance of any contemporary CBIR system
Autoregulation of Nodulation in Soybean Plants

Soybean (Glycine max [L.] Merr.) seeds contain a high concentration of protein and oil. Therefore, soybean is an important source of protein and calories for humans and livestock in the world. Although to cultivate soybean is in need of a large amount of nitrogen, soy‐ bean plants can form root nodules which are symbiotic organs with soil bacteria bradyrhizo‐ bia. The partner bradyrhizobia fix atmospheric nitrogen in nodules, and then the plants can use the fixed nitrogen. So soybean plants can grow well even in the absence of soil nitrogen. On the other hand, the plants give photosynthate to the bradyrhizobia. Substantial amounts of photosynthate are required for nitrogen fixation activity in matured nodules. The forma‐ tion of excess nodules might be a disadvantage because of decreasing the carbon supply each nodule. Therefore, the number of nodule is strictly regulated by the host soybean plant. This system is referred to as the autoregulation of nodulation. The nodule growth of later infection site is suppressed by the rapid response to the earlier rhizobial infection and subse‐ quent nodule initiation. In this chapter, we discuss the autoregulation of nodulation in soy‐ bean plants.
The eukaryotic promoter database in its 30th year: focus on non-vertebrate organisms

We present an update of the Eukaryotic Promoter Database EPD (http://epd.vital-it.ch), more specifically on the EPDnew division, which contains comprehensive organisms-specific transcription start site (TSS) collections automatically derived from next generation sequencing (NGS) data. Thanks to the abundant release of new high-throughput transcript mapping data (CAGE, TSS-seq, GRO-cap) the database could be extended to plant and fungal species. We further report on the expansion of the mass genome annotation (MGA) repository containing promoter-relevant chromatin profiling data and on improvements for the EPD entry viewers. Finally, we present a new data access tool, ChIP-Extract, which enables computational biologists to extract diverse types of promoter-associated data in numerical table formats that are readily imported into statistical analysis platforms such as R.
Oliver, Michael J. 1999. "Capitalism, disability and ideology: A materialist critique of the Normalization principle."

The oppression that disabled people face is rooted in the economic and social structures of capitalism. Materialist social theory offers disabled people the opportunity to transform their own lives and in so doing to transform the society in which they live into one in which all roles are valued. Oliver, Professor of Disability Studies, University of Greenwich, London, well-known disability rights advocate, sociologist and author. Dr. Oliver has a disability.
The Wonders of Phosphodiesterase-5 Inhibitors: A Majestic History

The Nobel Prize winning discovery of nitric oxide (NO) in 1986 was the starting point for a new innovation in drug discovery. NO acting as a mediator at different physiological systems is believed to be involved in many physiological and pathological conditions through the formation of the second messenger cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP). cGMP-dependent vasodilation effect of NO is important in regulating pulmonary and systemic pressures, maintaining penis erection, preventing atherosclerosis, preventing platelet aggregation, and protecting and controlling cardiac functions. The main enzyme involved in the termination of cGMP effects is phosphodiesterase enzyme 5 (PDE-5), which is overexpressed in ventricular hypertrophy and heart failure. A milestone in drug discovery was the selective inhibitors of PDE-5 that developed to be a multibillion dollar blockbuster in drug market. PDE-5 inhibitors are approved for the treatment of erectile dysfunctions (EDs), pulmonary hypertension, and benign prostatic hypertrophy. They are also under clinical trials for their cardiac protection against damage induced by ischemia or heart failure. This review article is an update about the pharmacotherapeutics of PDE-5 inhibitors and the majestic history that led to their discovery. The information reported in this review was obtained from the electronic sources of different databases such as PubMed Central, Google Scholar, and Scopus. Keywords used for search included cGMP (mechanisms and functions), EDs (drugs used), nitric oxide, and PDE-5 inhibitors (clinical applications). A total of 165 articles were studied, of which 45 articles were referred to in this review.
Hunk is required for HER2/neu-induced mammary tumorigenesis.

Understanding the molecular pathways that contribute to the aggressive behavior of human cancers is a critical research priority. The SNF1/AMPK-related protein kinase Hunk is overexpressed in aggressive subsets of human breast, ovarian, and colon cancers. Analysis of Hunk(–/–) mice revealed that this kinase is required for metastasis of c-myc–induced mammary tumors but not c-myc–induced primary tumor formation. Similar to c-myc, amplification of the proto-oncogene HER2/neu occurs in 10%–30% of breast cancers and is associated with aggressive tumor behavior. By crossing Hunk(–/–) mice with transgenic mouse models for HER2/neu-induced mammary tumorigenesis, we report that Hunk is required for primary tumor formation induced by HER2/neu. Knockdown and reconstitution experiments in mouse and human breast cancer cell lines demonstrated that Hunk is required for maintenance of the tumorigenic phenotype in HER2/neu-transformed cells. This requirement is kinase dependent and resulted from the ability of Hunk to suppress apoptosis in association with downregulation of the tumor suppressor p27(kip1). Additionally, we find that Hunk is rapidly upregulated following HER2/neu activation in vivo and in vitro. These findings provide what we believe is the first evidence for a role for Hunk in primary tumorigenesis and cell survival and identify this kinase as an essential effector of the HER2/neu oncogenic pathway.
Estimating Hydroxyl Radical Content in Rat Brain Using Systemic and Intraventricular Salicylate: Impact of Methamphetamine

Abstract: Free radicals have been implicated in the etiology of many neurodegenerative conditions. Yet, because these species are highly reactive and thus short‐lived it has been difficult to test these hypotheses. We adapted a method in which hydroxyl radicals are trapped by salicylate in vivo, resulting in the stable and quantifiable products, 2,3‐dihydroxybenzoic acid (DHBA) and 2,5‐DHBA. After systemic (100 mg/kg i.p.) or intraventricular (4 µmol) administration of salicylate, the amount of DHBA in striatal tissue correlated with tissue levels of salicylate. After systemic salicylate, the ratio of total DHBA to salicylate in neostriatum was at least 10‐fold higher than that observed after central salicylate. In addition, systemic salicylate resulted in considerably higher concentrations of 2,3‐ and 2,5‐DHBA in plasma than in brain. Therefore, a large portion of the DHBA present in brain after systemic salicylate may have been formed in the periphery. A neurotoxic regimen of methamphetamine increased the concentration of DHBA in neostriatum after either central or systemic administration of salicylate. The increase in 2,3‐DHBA after the central administration of salicylate was significant at 2 h, but not at 4 h, after the last dose of methamphetamine. These results suggest that (1) when assessing specific events in brain, it is preferable to administer salicylate centrally, and (2) neurotoxic doses of methamphetamine increase the hydroxyl radical content in brain in a time‐dependent manner.
Biomedical Imaging Modality Classification Using Combined Visual Features and Textual Terms

We describe an approach for the automatic modality classification in medical image retrieval task of the 2010 CLEF cross-language image retrieval campaign (ImageCLEF). This paper is focused on the process of feature extraction from medical images and fuses the different extracted visual features and textual feature for modality classification. To extract visual features from the images, we used histogram descriptor of edge, gray, or color intensity and block-based variation as global features and SIFT histogram as local feature. For textual feature of image representation, the binary histogram of some predefined vocabulary words from image captions is used. Then, we combine the different features using normalized kernel functions for SVM classification. Furthermore, for some easy misclassified modality pairs such as CT and MR or PET and NM modalities, a local classifier is used for distinguishing samples in the pair modality to improve performance. The proposed strategy is evaluated with the provided modality dataset by ImageCLEF 2010.
Learning read-once formulas with queries

A read-once formula is a Boolean formula in which each variable occurs, at most, once. Such formulas are also called μ-formulas or Boolean trees. This paper treats the problem of exactly identifying an unknown read-once formula using specific kinds of queries. The main results are a polynomial-time algorithm for exact identification of monotone read-once formulas using only membership queries, and a polynomial-time algorithm for exact identification of general read-once formulas using equivalence and membership queries (a protocol based on the notion of a minimally adequate teacher [1]). The results of the authors improve on Valiant's previous results for read-once formulas [26]. It is also shown, that no polynomial-time algorithm using only membership queries or only equivalence queries can exactly identify all read-once formulas.
A performance comparison of MD5 authenticated routing traffic with EIGRP, RIPv2, and OSPF

Routing is the process of forwarding data across an inter-network from a designated source to a final destination. Along the way from source to destination, at least one intermediate node is considered. Due to the major role that routing protocols play in computer network infrastructures, special cares have been given to routing protocols with built-in security constraints. In this paper, we conduct performance evaluation comparisons on message digest 5 authenticated routing traffic with respect to EIGRP, RIPv2 and OSPF protocols. A network model of four Cisco routers has been employed with an ON/OFF traffic model used to describe text files transmissions over the network. Eventually, analysis tool has been developed and used to measure the average delay time and average jitter. The collected results show that the average delay time and jitter in the secured message digest 5 case can become significantly larger when compared to the non-secured case even in steady state conditions. Among all, the secured OSPF protocol shows the highest performance even when the system is extremely overloaded.
The effect of marination on lactic acid bacteria communities in raw broiler fillet strips

Marination with marinade containing salt, sugar, and acetic acid is commonly used in Finland to enhance the value of raw broiler meat. In this study, we investigated the effect of marination, marinade components and storage time on composition of bacterial communities in modified atmosphere-packaged (MAP) broiler fillet strips. The communities were characterized using two culture-independent methods: 16S rRNA gene fragment sequencing and terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism. In unmarinated broiler fillet strips, Lactococcus spp. and Carnobacterium spp. predominated at the early storage phase but were partially replaced by Lactobacillus spp. and Leuconostoc spp. when the chilled storage time was extended. In the marinated fillet strips, Lactobacillus spp. and Leuconostoc spp. predominated independent from the storage time. By mixing the different marinade components with broiler meat, we showed that marination changed the community composition and favored Leuconostoc spp. and Lactobacillus spp. by the combined effect of carbohydrates and acetic acid in marinade. Marination increased the maximum level of lactic acid bacteria in broiler meat and enhanced CO2 production and acidification of meat during the chilled storage. Accumulation of CO2 in package head-space due to the enhanced growth of Leuconostoc spp. in marinated meat may lead to bulging of packages, which is a spoilage defect frequently associated with marinated and MAP raw broiler preparations in Finland.
Neuroblastomas of infancy exhibit a characteristic ganglioside pattern

Gangliosides are membrane‐bound glycolipid molecules particularly prominent in neural tissue. Changes in ganglioside expression during embryologic development result from a shift in biosynthesis from the fetal b pathway to the adult a pathway. Tumor gangliosides may play a role in the clinical behavior of certain subtypes of neuroblastoma. Because neuroblastoma, which presents in infancy, has a different biologic and clinical phenotype than that which presents in older children, the authors determined whether differences in ganglioside biosynthesis exist between these two neuroblastoma subgroups.
Energino: A hardware and software solution for energy consumption monitoring

Accurate measurement of energy consumption of practical wireless deployments is vital to the research community to develop pragmatic simulators and analytical models for the synthesis of new energy-aware and energy-efficient protocols and algorithms for wireless networks. However, there is considerable dearth in the availability of affordable and scalable energy consumption monitoring tools for the research community. In this paper, we introduce Energino, a scalable and affordable solution for energy consumption monitoring in wireless networks. The Energino power meter is a standalone plug-load meter based on the Arduino platform providing high resolution and sampling rate capabilities. We evaluate the capabilities and distinctive features of the Energino power meter in a real WLAN network. Results show that our solution is capable of isolating high resolution/frequency dynamics that can not be analyzed using commercially available tools. We also release both the hardware schematics and the software with a permissive license in order to encourage the research community to use and extend it.
An efficient refinement for relative pose estimation with unknown focal length from two views

This paper describes the relative pose estimation problems in a semi-calibrated case. It is well known that the fundamental matrix completely encapsulates the epipolar geometry between two perspective views. Through the parameterization of the fundamental matrix with the minimal parameters of pose and focal length, we formulate the problem as the minimum cost estimation problem with the aid of the principle of maximum likelihood. The corresponding analytical differentiation and optimization algorithm are proposed as means for efficient computation. Experiments on simulated and real data show that the accuracy of this approach is more or less comparable to bundle adjustment and its implementation performs much better in terms of computational cost.
A Predictive Model for Imitation Learning in Partially Observable Environments

Learning by imitation has shown to be a powerful paradigm for automated learning in autonomous robots. This paper presents a general framework of learning by imitation for stochastic and partially observable systems. The model is a Predictive Policy Representation (PPR) whose goal is to represent the teacher's policies without any reference to states. The model is fully described in terms of actions and observations only. We show how this model can efficiently learn the personal behavior and preferences of an assistive robot user.
Measurement of renal dimensions in vivo: A critical appraisal

Kidney volume is regarded as the most precise indicator of kidney size. However, volume assessment is not widely used clinically because its measurement is difficult due to the complex kidney shape. Apart from the conventional methods of measurement of renal dimensions from X-rays, ultrasound scan, computed tomography scan and magnetic resonance imaging have evolved as the three best modalities for this purpose currently. Assessment of kidney size should also be made individually since many factors like body mass index, height, gender, age, position of kidneys, sex, stenoses and number of renal arteries influence the measurements. In this paper, we have critically analysed the advantages and disadvantages of the various methods of renal morphometry, by reviewing the literature spanning over the period of 1976 – 2009.
Memory Management Scheme to Improve Utilization Efficiency and Provide Fast Contiguous Allocation without a Statically Reserved Area

Fast allocation of large blocks of physically contiguous memory plays a crucial role to boost the performance of multimedia applications in modern memory-constrained portable devices, such as smartphones, tablets, etc. Existing systems have addressed this issue by provisioning a large statically reserved memory area (SRA) in which only dedicated applications can allocate pages. However, this in turn degrades the performance of applications that are prohibited to utilize the SRA due to the reduced available memory pool. To overcome this drawback while maintaining the benefits of the SRA, we propose a new memory management scheme that uses a special memory region, called page-cache-preferred area (PCPA), in concert with a quick memory reclaiming algorithm. The key of the proposed scheme is to enhance the memory utilization efficiency by enabling to allocate page-cached pages of all applications in the PCPA until predetermined applications require to allocate big chunks of contiguous memory. At this point, clean page-cached pages in the PCPA are rapidly evicted without write-back to a secondary storage. Compared to the SRA scheme, experimental results show that the average launch time of real-world applications and the execution time of I/O-intensive benchmarks are reduced by 9.2% and 24.7%, respectively.