Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Families and food: beyond the "cultural turn"?

This paper provides some personal reflections on the "cultural turn" in human geography including a tentative chronology of events. It outlines some of the characteristics of the "cultural turn" and some of the criticisms that have been levelled against it. In the body of the paper, I attempt to assess the value of the "cultural turn", conceptually and methodologically, as applied to two recent research projects on the geogra- phy of food and families. The paper concludes that the "cultural turn" greatly enriched the study of human geography through its analysis of discourse, representation and practice. But other approaches are required to explain broader changes in political-economy and the materiality of nature. While the "cultural turn" con- tributed to our understanding of materiality and our place in a more-than-human world, geographers are now also embracing other approaches such as those informed by actor-network theory and geographies of emotion, embodiment and a ect. The paper concludes with an agenda for future research on the political and moral economies of food, focusing on contemporary consumer anxieties at a range of geographical scales.
Maternal plasma vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations in normal and hypertensive pregnancies and their relationship to peripheral vascular resistance.

OBJECTIVE The aim of this study was to measure maternal plasma vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations during normal and hypertensive pregnancies and examine their relationship with maternal total peripheral resistance values. STUDY DESIGN Plasma concentrations of total immunoreactive vascular endothelial growth factor and total peripheral resistances were measured serially throughout pregnancy in 20 women with preeclampsia, 24 women with gestational hypertension, and 26 normotensive control women. One-way analysis of variance and a regression model were used to analyze the vascular endothelial growth factor levels in the groups and the relationship between vascular endothelial growth factor concentration and total peripheral resistance. RESULTS At 10 to 14 weeks' gestation plasma vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations in all subjects were 4 to 5 times greater than the levels measured post partum (P <.0001). Mean vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations were similar in the control and gestational hypertension groups; in both groups levels remained stable until 34 to 36 weeks' gestation, when levels increased a further 1.3-fold (P <.01). In comparison, vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations in subjects in the preeclampsia group were greater at 28 to 32 weeks' gestation (P =.002) and at 34 to 36 weeks' gestation (P <.001). Vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations were also increased during the 4 weeks that preceded the diagnosis of preeclampsia (P <.05). Vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations were associated with the elevated total peripheral resistance observed during the clinical disorder in the preeclampsia group but not in the other groups. CONCLUSION Maternal plasma vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations increased before the clinical onset of preeclampsia and were further elevated during the vasoconstricted state observed in this disorder. We speculate that the hyperdynamic circulation that characterizes the latent phase of preeclampsia causes vascular shear stress, which in turn increases the levels of circulating vascular endothelial growth factor. Because vascular endothelial growth factor normally acts as a vasodilator, its increase may represent an unsuccessful vascular rescue response.
Epidural Injections for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Low-Back Pain

Three hundred four consecutive patients with low-back pain were given epidural anesthetic and steroid injections. A prospective study demonstrated that selected patients had 87% short-term success and 34% relief of pain for as long as 6 months. No patient was cured by these injections. Needle placement during epidural injections was incorrect 25% of the time in experienced hands.
Ranking Location-dependent Keywords from Microblogs

The spread of microblogging services, such as Twitter, has made it possible to extract location-dependent context such as keywords specific to a geographical region, with fine granularity. The results of content analysis of microblogging services are affected by users who post excessive messages. In addition, because geographical granularity of users’ interests differs, it is preferable to support multiple levels of granularity for usability. Thus, we propose a ranking method of location-dependent keywords based on a term frequencyinverse document frequency method, which takes into account diversity of information sources and supports multiple zoom levels of geographical areas by approximation. We evaluated our ranking method with a real dataset from Twitter and showed its effectiveness. We also describe a prototype implementation of a system using our ranking method.
Optomotor control of speed and height by free-flying Drosophila.

The optomotor reactions of Drosophila have been studied intensively, with the conclusion that in flight there are two main types of response. One of these controls the course of the animal by adjusting the relative amplitudes of the wingbeats on the two sides of the body. The other controls the total thrust produced by the wings (Gotz, 1968). Drosophila do not change the direction of the thrust produced relative to the body axis (Gotz, 1968; Vogel, 1966; David, 1978) but do change the distribution of their total power output between lift and thrust by changing the inclination of the body axis (David, 1978). This could not, however, be observed in tethered fliers on which previous work had been done. Nevertheless, it has been implied that free fliers alter only their lift, so that the control of power output is used only to control height (Gotz, 1972; Buchner, Gotz & Straub, 1978). Here I report some experiments on free-flying Drosophila hydei Sturtevant showing that speed (and hence thrust) as well as height (and hence lift) are controlled by optomotor reactions to features of the surroundings. The flies were flown in the horizontal wind-tunnel built by the Agricultural Research Council Insect Physiology Group at Imperial College Field Station, Silwood Park, and described previously (David, 1978). They flew at about the same groundspeed when flying in still air and against winds of up to o-6 m s" 1 , thus compensating in large measure for the changes in wind speed. Flies flying downwind reduced their airspeed as the windspeed was increased, but not enough to compensate for the increase in groundspeed caused by the wind. The flies' groundspeed was shown to be controlled by visual reactions to the ground by moving the patterned floor of the tunnel beneath them. When it was accelerated downwind under flies progressing upwind they reduced their airspeed and could be held at one point in the tunnel or carried downwind whilst still facing upwind. When the floor was accelerated upwind the flies progressing upwind accelerated. The percentage of flies responding by floor-following speed changes increased as the speed to which the floor was accelerated increased: it was greater at any one rate of floor acceleration for floor movements in the direction of the flies' flight than for floor movements in the opposite direction (Fig. 1). Similar asymmetries in response have been reported from mosquitoes (Kennedy, 1940). Changes in airspeed of flies following the movement of the floor were used as an assay in determining which parts of the eyes were responsible for perceiving the floor movement. Different parts of the tunnel floor pattern were hidden from the flies under nlack paper masks and the proportion of flies responding to floor accelerations of a
Micromachined CMOS thermoelectric generators as on-chip power supply

As the power consumption of a large number of microelectronic devices has been continuously reduced in recent years, power supply units of a few microwatts have become sufficient for their operation. Our improved micro-scale thermoelectric generator (/spl mu/-TEG) is based on polysilicon surface micromachining and is designed to convert waste heat into electrical power. Since this device is compatible with standard CMOS fabrication processes, it can be easily integrated on chip level and matches the needs for low-cost and small-size systems. As thermoelectric materials, both, pure poly-Si and poly-Si/sub 70%/Ge/sub 30%/ have been investigated. Emphasis was placed on a thermally optimized design and the reduction of the total electrical resistance of the generator. As a result of these improvements, a voltage of 5 V and an electrical power output of 1 /spl mu/W for a matched consumer is achieved with generators of 1 cm/sup 2/ in size at a temperature drop of about 5 K.
A fortified follow-up formula for 3–4-year-olds reduces episodes of acute respiratory infection and antibiotic use compared with cow’s milk

Commentary on : Li F, Jin X, Liu B, et al. Follow-up formula consumption in 3- to 4-year-olds and respiratory infections: an RCT. Pediatrics 2014;133:e1533–40. [OpenUrl][1][Abstract/FREE Full Text][2] Respiratory infections and diarrhoea are major causes of childhood morbidity.1 The use of dietary supplements may have beneficial effects on the … [1]: {openurl}? query=rft.jtitle%253DPediatrics%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1542%252Fpeds.2013-3598%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Apmid%252F24843061%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [2]: /lookup/ijlink? linkType=ABST&journalCode=pediatrics&resid=133/6/e1533&atom=%2Febnurs%2F18%2F3%2F80.atom
Collective Cognition: When Entrepreneurial Teams, Not Individuals, Make Decisions

New venture success often depends on how the founding team collectively understands its world, estimates effects of possible actions, makes decisions, and allocates appropriate resources. Drawing on recent work in managerial cognition and entrepreneurship, this article argues for the importance of examining cognition at the team level. New venture strategy is used as a springboard to discuss collective cognition, although other important critical decision domains in new ventures may also be used to illustrate the arguments. In this and other such decision domains, collective cognition mediates between individual cognitions and firm actions and performance. A method for assessing entrepreneurial top management team cognition is developed and then tested in an exploratory study of technology–based new ventures. Two structural characteristics of collective cognition (differentiation and integration) are strongly related to firm performance, suggesting interesting opportunities for future entrepreneurship research in cognition.
Just Relax and Come Clustering! : A Convexification of k-Means Clustering

k-means clustering is a popular approach to clustering. It is easy to implement and intuitive but has the disadvantage of being sensitive to initialization due to an underlying nonconvex optimization problem. In this paper, we derive an equivalent formulation of k-means clustering. The formulation takes the form of a L0-regularized least squares problem. We then propose a novel convex, relaxed, formulation of k-means clustering. The sum-of-norms regularized least squares formulation inherits many desired properties of k-means but has the advantage of being independent of initialization.
Long-Term Outcome of Motor Vehicle Accident Injury

Objective To define the psychological outcome at 5 years of a sample of non-head-injured motor vehicle accident victims and identify baseline predictors. Methods Self-report questionnaires were completed by 111 consecutive subjects who had been injured in a motor vehicle accident 5 years earlier and who had been assessed previously in a prospective 1-year study. Results Although most subjects reported a good outcome, a substantial minority described continuing social, physical, and psychological difficulties and a quarter of those studied suffered phobic anxiety about travel as a driver or passenger. There was little change in quality of life outcome and effects on travel between assessments at 3 months, 1 year, and 5 years. The prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder remained approximately 10% throughout the follow-up; most early cases had remitted by 5 years, and a similar number of delayed new onsets had occurred between 1 year and 5 years. PTSD at 5 years was predicted by physical outcome and by postaccident intrusive memories and emotional distress. Compensation proceedings were initiated by 66 subjects and were often prolonged and a cause of distress. There were no significant associations with outcome. Trends for a poor outcome in claimants, especially those not settled at 5 years, may be due to their having more serious physical problems. Conclusion Psychological complications are important and persistent after injury in a motor vehicle accident, are associated with adverse effects on everyday activities, and pose a challenge for consultation-liaison psychiatry.
The Rise of a Tax State: Portugal, 1371-1401

This paper uses the case of fourteenth-century Portugal to question a common assumption of fiscal history literature, namely the linear relationship between war-related fiscal demands increase the level of taxation. It is shown that this relationship is not straightforward and that not all wars decisively affect fiscal systems. In fact, as some contemporaries suggested, the effects of war on state revenues are essentially negative. As such, the rise of a tax state does not necessarily imply higher revenues. These two general contributions are grounded in a revision of the fiscal bargaining that took place between sovereign and subjects and in a revision of the existing quantitative evidence for the period 1367-1401. The paper makes use of unpublished data and also offers a critical review of the adoption of sales taxes (sisas) as a form of permanent taxation.
Collaborative Evaluation of Optimal Antifungal Susceptibility Testing Conditions for Dermatophytes

ABSTRACT A multicenter study was conducted to define the most suitable testing conditions for antifungal susceptibility of dermatophytes. Broth microdilution MICs of clotrimazole, itraconazole, and terbinafine were determined in three centers against 60 strains of dermatophytes. The effects of inoculum density (ca. 103 and 104 CFU/ml), incubation time (3, 7, and 14 days), endpoint criteria for MIC determination (complete [MIC-0] and prominent [MIC-2] growth inhibition), and incubation temperature (28 and 37°C) on intra- and interlaboratory agreement were analyzed. The optimal testing conditions identified were an inoculum of 104 CFU/ml, a temperature of incubation of 28°C, an incubation period of 7 days, and MIC-0.
Dietary Flavonoids, Antioxidant Vitamins, and Incidence of Stroke: The Zutphen Study

Background: Epidemiological studies suggested that consumption of fruit and vegetables may protect against stroke. The hypothesis that dietary antioxidant vitamins and flavonoids account for this observation is investigated in a prospective study. Methods: A cohort of 552 men aged 50 to 69 years was examined in 1970 and followed up for 15 years. Mean nutrient and food intake was calculated from crosscheck dietary histories taken in 1960, 1965, and 1970. The association between antioxidants, selected foods, and stroke incidence was assessed by Cox proportional hazards regression analysis. Adjustment was made for confounding by age, systolic blood pressure, serum cholesterol, cigarette smoking, energy intake, and consumption of fish and alcohol. Results: Forty-two cases of first fatal or nonfatal stroke were documented. Dietary flavonoids (mainly quercetin) were inversely associated with stroke incidence after adjustment for potential confounders, including antioxidant vitamins. The relative risk (RR) of the highest vs the lowest quartile of flavonoid intake (≥28.6 mg/d vs Conclusions: The habitual intake of flavonoids and their major source (tea) may protect against stroke. (Arch Intern Med. 1996;154:637-642)
Target tracking algorithms for UWB radar network

Recently, it has been shown that UWB radar networks (UWB-RN) represent a strong tool for a short-range detection and localization of moving persons. In order to improve the accuracy of the target localization, a target tracking is usually implemented as the final phase of the radar signal processing. For the target tracking by a single UWB sensor, the linear Kalman filter is used frequently. On the other hand, in the case of UWB-RN, a target tracking can be implemented simultaneously within several nodes. Moreover, it can be combined with point-to-track and track-to-track association algorithms. In this paper, three algorithms of the target tracking by UWB-RN with a centralized architecture are introduced and compared. The proposed algorithms consist of two steps. Firstly, a standard tracking algorithm is used within multiple target tracking algorithm implemented in the basic nodes of UWB-RN. For that purpose, the linear Kalman filter, the modified gain Kalman filter and the H-infinity a posteriori filter will be considered. Then, a track-to-track association and multiple track fusion are implemented in the central node of UWB-RN. The proposed approach of the target tracking has been analyzed for through-the-wall multiple target tracking by two-node UWB-RN. The obtained results indicate that the application of the modified gain Kalman filter overcomes the performance of the other tested algorithms.
HyperBIRD: a sensitivity-enhanced approach to collecting homonuclear-decoupled proton NMR spectra.

Samples prepared following dissolution dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP) enable the detection of NMR spectra from low-γ nuclei with outstanding sensitivity, yet have limited use for the enhancement of abundant species like (1)H nuclei. Small- and intermediate-sized molecules, however, show strong heteronuclear cross-relaxation effects: spontaneous processes with an inherent isotopic selectivity, whereby only the (13)C-bonded protons receive a polarization enhancement. These effects are here combined with a recently developed method that delivers homonuclear-decoupled (1)H spectra in natural abundance samples based on heteronuclear couplings to these same, (13)C-bonded nuclei. This results in the HyperBIRD methodology; a single-shot combination of these two effects that can simultaneously simplify and resolve complex, congested (1)H NMR spectra with many overlapping spin multiplets, while achieving 50-100 times sensitivity enhancements over conventional thermal counterparts.
Dual-Energy Computed Tomography Imaging of Atherosclerotic Plaques in a Mouse Model Using a Liposomal-Iodine Nanoparticle Contrast Agent

Background— The accumulation of macrophages in inflamed atherosclerotic plaques has long been recognized. In an attempt to develop an imaging agent for detection of vulnerable plaques, we evaluated the feasibility of a liposomal-iodine nanoparticle contrast agent for computed tomography imaging of macrophage-rich atherosclerotic plaques in a mouse model. Methods and Results— Liposomal-iodine formulations varying in particle size and polyethylene glycol coating were fabricated and shown to stably encapsulate the iodine compound. In vitro uptake studies using optical and computed tomography imaging in the RAW 264.7 macrophage cell line identified the formulation that promoted maximal uptake. Dual-energy computed tomography imaging using this formulation in apolipoprotein E–deficient (ApoE−/−) mice (n=8) and control C57BL/6 mice (n=6) followed by spectral decomposition of the dual-energy images enabled imaging of the liposomes localized in the plaque. Imaging cytometry confirmed the presence of liposomes in the plaque and their colocalization with a small fraction (≈2%) of the macrophages in the plaque. Conclusions— The results demonstrate the feasibility of imaging macrophage-rich atherosclerotic plaques using a liposomal-iodine nanoparticle contrast agent and dual-energy computed tomography.
Body mass index and mortality.

• Many of the oldest old still die in hospital, which may not be their preferred place of death. • Community services need to evolve to be able to manage end-of-life care for those with relapsing-remitting illness; this will require specialist support for primary care teams. • Providing good end-of-life care in hospitals remains a core role for geriatricians, but risks being lost among the multiple calls on geriatricians time. • Interface geriatrics provides an opportunity to both support community teams and augment hospital care to ensure a good death in the right place for the oldest old.
Prototype of a second language writing tool for French speakers writing in English

Language tools that help people with their writing are now usually included in today's word processors. Although these various tools provide increasing support to native speakers of a language, they are much less useful to non-native speakers who are writing in their second language (e.g. French speakers writing in English). Real errors may go undetected and potential errors or non-errors that are flagged by the system may be taken to be genuine errors by the non-native speaker. In this paper, we present the prototype of an English writing tool which is aimed at helping speakers of French write in English. We first discuss the kind of problems non-native speakers have when writing in a second language. We then explain how we collected a corpus of errors which we used to build a typology of errors needed in the various stages of the project. This is followed by an overview of the prototype which contains a number of writing aids (dictionaries, on-line grammar helps, verb conjugator, etc.) and two checking tools: a problem word highlighter which lists all the potentially difficult words that cannot be dealt with correctly by the system (false friends, confusions, etc.) and a grammar checker which detects and corrects morphological and syntactic errors. We describe in detail the automata formalism we use to extract linguistic information, test syntactic environments and detect and correct errors. Finally, we present a first evaluation of the correction capacity of our grammar checker as compared to that of commercially available systems.
Information Security Technology? Don't Rely on It. A Case Study in Social Engineering

Many companies spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to ensure corporate computer security. The security protects company secrets, assists in compliance with federal laws, and enforces privacy of company clients. Unfortunately, even the best security mechanisms can be bypassed through Social Engineering. Social Engineering uses very low cost and low technology means to overcome impediments posed by information security measures. This paper details a Social Engineering attack performed against a company with their permission. The attack yielded sensitive company information and numerous user passwords, from many areas within the company, giving the attackers the ability to cripple the company despite extremely good technical information security measures. The results would have been similar with almost any other company. The paper concludes with recommendations for minimizing the Social Engineering threat.