Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pericardial Fat, Intrathoracic Fat, and Measures of Left Ventricular Structure and Function: The Framingham Heart Study

Background— Pericardial fat has been implicated in the pathogenesis of obesity-related cardiovascular disease. Whether the associations of pericardial fat and measures of cardiac structure and function are independent of the systemic effects of obesity and visceral adiposity has not been fully explored. Methods and Results— Participants from the Framingham Heart Study (n=997; 54.4% women) underwent chest and abdominal computed tomography and cardiovascular magnetic resonance imaging between 2002 and 2005. Pericardial fat, intrathoracic fat, and visceral adipose tissue quantified from multidetector computed tomography, along with body mass index and waist circumference, were examined in relation to cardiovascular magnetic resonance measures of left ventricular (LV) mass, LV end-diastolic volume, and left atrial dimension. In women, pericardial fat (r=0.20 to 0.35, P<0.001), intrathoracic fat (r=0.25 to 0.37, P<0.001), visceral adipose tissue (r=0.24 to 0.45, P<0.001), body mass index (r=0.36 to 0.53, P<0.001), and waist circumference (r=0.30 to 0.48, P<0.001) were directly correlated with LV mass, LV end-diastolic volume, and left atrial dimension. In men, pericardial fat (r=0.19 to 0.37, P<0.001), intrathoracic fat (r=0.17 to 0.31, P<0.001), visceral adipose tissue (r=0.19 to 0.36, P<0.001), body mass index (r=0.32 to 0.44, P<0.001), and waist circumference (r=0.34 to 0.44, P<0.001) were directly correlated with LV mass and left atrial dimension, but LV end-diastolic volume was not consistently associated with adiposity measures. Associations persisted after multivariable adjustment but not after additional adjustment for body weight and visceral adipose tissue, except for pericardial fat and left atrial dimension in men. Conclusions— Pericardial fat is correlated with cardiovascular magnetic resonance measures, but the association is not independent of or stronger than other ectopic fat stores or proxy measures of visceral adiposity. An important exception is left atrial dimension in men. These results suggest that the systemic effects of obesity on cardiac structure and function may outweigh the local pathogenic effects of pericardial fat.
Feature Extraction Based Classification Technique for Intrusion Detection System

The growth of internet environment has also achieved to increase in end user suspicious activities. Every user gets connected to the network environment which growths unauthorized activities in the system. For protecting data from unauthorized activities or detecting intrusions, there is a necessity to implement security mechanism for identifying unauthorized probable sign of events. Intrusion Detection System (IDS) is used for finding the above activities. Intrusion detection is the process of intelligently monitoring the system activities for identifying the conceivable signs of attack. So the primary aim of Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) is to protect the availability, confidentiality and integrity of network information systems. In this research classifier has been applied using Naïve Bayes, Bagging, Boosting, Stacking, and J48 on five attack categories as found in the NSL-KDD dataset intrusion detection dataset for novelty attacks as well as for Original dataset and prepossessed dataset. It compares the performance of different classification algorithms which may be categorized into five broad attacks namely Normal, Probe, DoS, U2R, and R2L.
Device-to-device collaboration through distributed storage

Video is the main driver for the inexorable increase in wireless data traffic. In this paper we analyze a new architecture in which device-to-device (D2D) communications is used to drastically increase the capacity of cellular networks for video transmission. Users cache popular video files and - after receiving requests from other users - serve these requests via D2D localized transmissions; the short range of the D2D transmission enables frequency reuse within the cell. We analyze the scaling behavior of the throughput with the number of devices per cell. The user content request statistics, as well as the caching distribution, are modeled by a Zipf distribution with parameters γr and γc, respectively. For the practically important case γr < 1 and γc > 1, we derive a closed form expression for the scaling behavior of the number of D2D links that coexist without interference. Our analysis relies on a novel Poisson approximation result for wireless networks obtained through the Chen-Stein Method.
Ultrastructure of the main excretory duct of the cat submandibular gland

The main excretory ducts (MED's) from the submandibular gland of adult cats were examined by electron microscopy. The ducts consisted of a pseudostratified epithelial lining surrounded by abundant connective tissue and numerous, small, longitudinally‐oriented blood vessels. The taller epithelial cells were closely coherent, without the luminal clefts between adjacent cells that are characteristic of rat MED's. In the cat, these cells lacked basal membrane specialization, but showed considerable lateral interdigitation. Some microvilli were present on the apical surface. In a'few rare cells, the luminal surface bore cilia of typical appearance. The smaller, pyramidal basal cells had irregular basal surfaces that gave rise to one or more long cytoplasmic processes. The basal surface of the pyramidal cells was studded with hemidesmosomes. The cytoplasm contained abundant tonofilaments, which sometimes aggregated in prominent perinuclear bundles. Occasional goblet cells were present in the duct wall.
Association between beat-to-beat blood pressure variability and vascular elasticity in normal young adults during the cold pressor test

Abstract The beat-to-beat blood pressure (BP) monitoring parameters, such as average beat-to-beat BP, BP variability (BPV), could have an influence on the vascular elasticity. This study hypothesized that the elevated beat-to-beat BPV could evoke the reduction of the vascular elasticity independent of BP levels. We measured the beat-to-beat BP recordings and total arterial compliance (TAC), which was used to assess the vascular elasticity, in 80 young healthy adults during the cold pressor test (CPT). The CPT included 3 phases: baseline phase, cold stimulus phase, recovery phase. Six parameters were used to estimate BPV. In bivariate correlation analysis, TAC showed a significant correlation with systolic BP (SBP) and diastolic BP (DBP) in the cold stimulus phase; and 4 indices of SBP variability (SBPV) were associated with TAC (r = 0.271∼0.331, P ⩽ 0.015) in the recovery phase; similarly, 2 indices of DBP variability (DBPV) were also correlated with TAC (r = 0.221∼0.285, P ⩽ 0.048) in the recovery phase. In multivariate regression analysis, DBPV (&bgr; = 0.229, P = 0.001) was a determinant of TAC independent of average DBP, sex, and weight. In addition, both beat-to-beat BP and BPV values increased in the cold stimulus phase (P < 0.01); whereas, the TAC decreased in the cold stimulus phase (P < 0.01). In conclusion, these data suggest that the beat-to-beat DBPV shows an independent association with the vascular elasticity in young normal adults during the CPT.
Incentivizing collaborative learning through visual feedback about conflict in Wiki

Conflict emerging from collaboration in wiki can be helpful to achieve a better quality of collaborative learning. However, few studies have utilized conflict to support collaborative learning and wiki systems themselves have limitations. This paper proposes to provide visual feedback about conflict in wiki based on the “page history” to create a sense of audience, psychological ownership and support information seeking. Theoretical model is built upon literature, and the Partial Least Squares (PLS) results from a survey study (208 responses) indicate that conflict awareness can motivate students to participate, achieve better conflict resolution and improve the quality of learning. The results also show that the new design is well accepted by students and can significantly enhance the influence of conflict awareness on participation and conflict resolution.
Laser assisted drug delivery: a review

The topical route for the delivery of drugs is essential in dermatology: it optimizes the penetration of medicaments, and when performed with the assistance of lasers, it takes place in a uniform and controlled manner. The degree of evidence of drug delivery is being investigated for many drugs. Moreover, the technique combines outstandingly with lasers for rejuvenation and treatment of skin diseases. It is therefore possible to conclude that the use of lasers for drug delivery is promising. While there are clinical studies on some substances that allow their indication and use, others require further controlled analyses, with longer follow-up periods, aimed at allowing thorough evaluations.
Alterations in splenic function and gene expression in mice with depressive-like behavior induced by exposure to corticosterone

Depressed patients present with increased cortisol levels and attenuated immune responses. However, little is known about the association between depression and the spleen, as this is the largest peripheral immune organ. In this study, we examined alterations in splenic function and gene expression in mice with depressive-like behavior, well as the expression of certain proteins in related pathways. A mouse model of depression was established with the use of corticosterone. Splenic function and histopathology were assessed using Wright and H&E staining. The Agilent Whole Mouse Genome Oligo Microarray containing >41,174 transcript probes was used to measure the levels of gene-expression in the spleens from control and model mice, and the levels of certain proteins associated with depression were measured by western blot analysis in the brain and spleen separately. We found that splenic function and immunity in the mice with depressive-like behavior were markedly impaired. A total of 53 genes exhibited a differential response in the mice with depressive-like behavior, 11 of which were more notable, including collagen, type VI, α5 (Col6a5), immunoglobulin superfamily, member 11 (Igsf11), D site albumin promoter binding protein (Dbp), tachykinin 2 (Tac2) and γ-aminobutyric acid B receptor 2 (Gabbr2). Pathway analysis revealed that the amino acid biosynthesis and the clock gene pathways were more meaningful among these genes. The levels of GABBR2, DBP and substance P (SP; encoded by the Tac2 gene) related proteins in the brain were markedly downregulated, and similar results were observed in the spleen. The anti-depressant, fluoxetine, reversed the changes in the levels of these proteins. The findings of our study regarding changes occurring in the spleen during depression may indirectly elucidate and shed light into the pathogenesis of depression and depressive-like behavior.
INHERITED RETINAL DETACHMENT

Patients with retinal detachment and their relatives with the same disease (Group F) are compared to a group of unselected cases of retinal detachment from the Swedish population (Group C). The prevalence of bilaterality is greater in Group F. The age‐distribution shows younger patients. Myopic refraction is common. More cases with aphakia, lattice degeneration and large tears are found. All these differences are highly significant. Multiple retinal holes are also significantly more common in Group F. After operation, healing is achieved in 78.8% which is not significantly different in comparison with the cure rate in Group C. (83.4%).
The Role of Expectation and Probabilistic Learning in Auditory Boundary Perception: A Model Comparison

Grouping and boundary perception are central to many aspects of sensory processing in cognition. We present a comparative study of recently published computational models of boundary perception in music. In doing so, we make three contributions. First, we hypothesise a relationship between expectation and grouping in auditory perception, and introduce a novel information-theoretic model of perceptual segmentation to test the hypothesis. Although we apply the model to musical melody, it is applicable in principle to sequential grouping in other areas of cognition. Second, we address a methodological consideration in the analysis of ambiguous stimuli that produce different percepts between individuals. We propose and demonstrate a solution to this problem, based on clustering of participants prior to analysis. Third, we conduct the first comparative analysis of probabilistic-learning and rule-based models of perceptual grouping in music. In spite of having only unsupervised exposure to music, the model performs comparably to rule-based models based on expert musical knowledge, supporting a role for probabilistic learning in perceptual segmentation of music.
Exceeding expectations and clustering uncertain data

Database technology is playing an increasingly important role in understanding and solving large-scale and complex scientific and societal problems and phenomena, for instance, understanding biological networks, climate modeling, electronic markets, etc. In these settings, uncertainty or imprecise information is a pervasive issue that becomes a serious impediment to understanding and effectively utilizing such systems. Clustering is one of the key problems in this context. In this paper we focus on the problem of clustering, specifically the k-center problem. Since the problem is NP-Hard in deterministic setting, a natural avenue is to consider approximation algorithms with a bounded performance ratio. In an earlier paper Cormode and McGregor had considered certain variants of this problem, but failed to provide approximations that preserved the number of centers. In this paper we remedy the situation and provide true approximation algorithms for a wider class of these problems. However, the key aspect of this paper is to devise general techniques for optimization under uncertainty. We show that a particular formulation which uses the contribution of a random variable above its expectation is useful in this context. We believe these techniques will find wider applications in optimization under uncertainty.
Evidence of Infection by H5N2 Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza Viruses in Healthy Wild Waterfowl

The potential existence of a wild bird reservoir for highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) has been recently questioned by the spread and the persisting circulation of H5N1 HPAI viruses, responsible for concurrent outbreaks in migratory and domestic birds over Asia, Europe, and Africa. During a large-scale surveillance programme over Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, we detected avian influenza viruses of H5N2 subtype with a highly pathogenic (HP) viral genotype in healthy birds of two wild waterfowl species sampled in Nigeria. We monitored the survival and regional movements of one of the infected birds through satellite telemetry, providing a rare evidence of a non-lethal natural infection by an HP viral genotype in wild birds. Phylogenetic analysis of the H5N2 viruses revealed close genetic relationships with H5 viruses of low pathogenicity circulating in Eurasian wild and domestic ducks. In addition, genetic analysis did not reveal known gallinaceous poultry adaptive mutations, suggesting that the emergence of HP strains could have taken place in either wild or domestic ducks or in non-gallinaceous species. The presence of coexisting but genetically distinguishable avian influenza viruses with an HP viral genotype in two cohabiting species of wild waterfowl, with evidence of non-lethal infection at least in one species and without evidence of prior extensive circulation of the virus in domestic poultry, suggest that some strains with a potential high pathogenicity for poultry could be maintained in a community of wild waterfowl.
Modeling malware spreading dynamics

In this paper we present analytical techniques that can be used to better understand the behavior of malware, a generic term that refers to all kinds of malicious software programs propagating on the Internet, such as e-mail viruses and worms. We develop a modeling methodology based on Interactive Markov Chains that is able to capture many aspects of the problem, especially the impact of the underlying topology on the spreading characteristics of malware. We propose numerical methods to obtain useful bounds and approximations in the case of very large systems, validating our results through simulation. An analytic methodology represents a fundamentally important step in the development of effective countermeasures for future malware activity. Furthermore, we believe our approach can help to understand a wide range of "dynamic interactions on networks", such as routing protocols and peer-to-peer applications.
Placental transfer of antibody and its relationship to vaccination in pregnancy

Purpose of review Vaccination in pregnancy boosts maternal vaccine-specific antibody concentration and therefore increases transplacental transfer of antibody to optimize protection of the infant. The purpose of this review is to describe what is known about placental transfer of antibody in the context of vaccination in pregnancy, focussing on the recent literature and areas of debate, particularly about the timing of vaccination. Recent findings There is a debate about the timing of pertussis vaccination in pregnancy with some studies reporting that vaccination in the third trimester results in higher pertussis antigen-specific IgG concentrations in cord blood and others finding that the concentration is higher following vaccination in the second trimester. The impact of timing of vaccination on antibody avidity in cord blood has also been investigated and one study suggests that avidity may be increased following vaccination at 27–30+6 gestational weeks compared with later vaccination. Summary Understanding placental transfer of antibody is vital in informing maternal vaccination strategy. There has been recent research about the timing of pertussis vaccination in pregnancy that has implications for the timing of both current and future vaccines to be used in pregnancy.
The effect of talker age and gender on speech perception of pediatric hearing aid users

Even though pediatric hearing aid (HA) users listen most often to female talkers, clinicallyused speech tests primarily consist of adult male talkers' speech. Potential effects of age and/or gender of the talker on speech perception of pediatric HA users were examined using two speech tests, hVdvowel identification and CNC word recognition, and using speech materials spoken by four talker types (adult males, adult females, 10-12 year old girls, and 5-7 year old girls). For the nine pediatric HA users tested, word scores for the male talker's speech were higher than those for the female talkers, indicating that talker type can affect word recognition scores and that clinical tests may over-estimate everyday speech communication abilities of pediatric HA users.
Optimizing Schema Languages for XML: Numerical Constraints and Interleaving

The presence of a schema offers many advantages in processing, translating, querying, and storage of XML data. Basic decision problems like equivalence, inclusion, and non-emptiness of intersection of schemas form the basic building blocks for schema optimization and integration, and algorithms for static analysis of transformations. It is thereby paramount to establish the exact complexity of these problems. Most common schema languages for XML can be adequately modeled by some kind of grammar with regular expressions at right-hand sides. In this paper, we observe that apart from the usual regular operators of union, concatenation and Kleene-star, schema languages also allow numerical occurrence constraints and interleaving operators. Although the expressiveness of these operators remain within the regular languages, their presence or absence has significant impact on the complexity of the basic decision problems. We present a complete overview of the complexity of the basic decision problems for DTDs, XSDs and Relax NG with regular expressions incorporating numerical occurrence constraints and interleaving. We also discuss chain regular expressions and the complexity of the schema simplification problem incorporating the new operators.
Improved results for directed multicut

We give a simple algorithm for the Minimum Directed Multicut problem, and show that it gives an <i>O</i>(√<i>n</i>)-approximation. This improves on the previous approximation guarantee of <i>O</i>(√<i>n</i> log <i>k</i>) of Cheriyan, Karloff and Rabani [1], which was obtained by a more sophisticated algorithm.
Submotions for Hidden Markov Model Based Dynamic Facial Action Recognition

Video based analysis of a persons' mood or behavior is in general performed by interpreting various features observed on the body. Facial actions, such as speaking, yawning or laughing are considered as key features. Dynamic changes within the face can be modeled with the well known hidden Markov models (HMM). Unfortunately even within one class examples can show a high variance because of unknown start and end state or the length of a facial action. In this work we therefore perform a decomposition of those into so called submotions. These can be robustly recognized with HMMs, applying selected points in the face and their geometrical distances. Additionally the first and second derivation of the distances is included. A sequence of submotions is then interpreted with a dictionary and dynamic programming, as the order may be crucial. Analyzing the frequency of sequences shows the relevance of the submotions order. In an experimental section we show, that our novel submotion approach outperforms a standard HMM with the same set of features by nearly 30% absolute recognition rate.
The Effect of Social Trust on Citizens’ Health Risk Perception in the Context of a Petrochemical Industrial Complex

Perceived risk of environmental threats often translates into psychological stress with a wide range of effects on health and well-being. Petrochemical industrial complexes constitute one of the sites that can cause considerable pollution and health problems. The uncertainty around emissions results in a perception of risk for citizens residing in neighboring areas, which translates into anxiety and physiological stress. In this context, social trust is a key factor in managing the perceived risk. In the case of industrial risks, it is essential to distinguish between trust in the companies that make up the industry, and trust in public institutions. In the context of a petrochemical industrial complex located in the port of Castellón (Spain), this paper primarily discusses how trust—both in the companies located in the petrochemical complex and in the public institutions—affects citizens’ health risk perception. The research findings confirm that while the trust in companies negatively affects citizens’ health risk perception, trust in public institutions does not exert a direct and significant effect. Analysis also revealed that trust in public institutions and health risk perception are essentially linked indirectly (through trust in companies).