Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Analysis of the bacterial communities associated with two ant–plant symbioses

Insect fungiculture is practiced by ants, termites, beetles, and gall midges and it has been suggested to be widespread among plant–ants. Some of the insects engaged in fungiculture, including attine ants and bark beetles, are known to use symbiotic antibiotic‐producing actinobacteria to protect themselves and their fungal cultivars against infection. In this study, we analyze the bacterial communities on the cuticles of the plant–ant genera Allomerus and Tetraponera using deep sequencing of 16S rRNA. Allomerus ants cultivate fungus as a building material to strengthen traps for prey, while Tetraponera ants cultivate fungus as a food source. We report that Allomerus and Tetraponera microbiomes contain >75% Proteobacteria and remarkably the bacterial phyla that dominate their cuticular microbiomes are very similar despite their geographic separation (South America and Africa, respectively). Notably, antibiotic‐producing actinomycete bacteria represent a tiny fraction of the cuticular microbiomes of both Allomerus and Tetraponera spp. and instead they are dominated by γ‐proteobacteria Erwinia and Serratia spp. Both these phyla are known to contain antibiotic‐producing species which might therefore play a protective role in these ant–plant systems.
Public Spending and Economic Growth: An Empirical Analysis of Developed Countries

: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of public spending on economic growth and examine the sources of economic growth in developed countries since the 1990s. This paper analyses whether public spending effect on economic growth based on Cobb-Douglas Production Function with the two econometric models with Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) and Dynamic Fixed Effect (DFE) for 21 developed countries (high-income OECD countries), over the period 1990-2013. Our models results are parallel to each other and the models support that public spending has an important role for economic growth. This result is accurate with theories and previous empirical studies.
Applying SVM to build supplier evaluation model - comparing likert scale and fuzzy scale

This research was performed to generate a supplier evaluation (SE) model in order to enhance an enterprise's competitiveness, and apply this model to solve practical business problems. Through past studies, we applied representative supplier evaluation principles while designing supplier evaluation questionnaire, and classified the suppliers into three categories: perform excellently (class 1), perform ordinary (class 2), and perform poorly (class 3). The Likert scale and fuzzy scale are applied individually to compute a score according to these principles. We then apply the support vector machine (SVM) to build the supplier evaluation classifier, and observe under SVM whether using the Likert or fuzzy scale produces better classification performance. The result revealed that the performance is invariant under both scales. Therefore, we find SVM combined with efficient feature reduction to be a better strategy for building a supplier evaluation model.
Some theoretical aspects of econometric inference with heteroskedastic models

This Thesis is concerned with econometric inference in parametric heteroskedastic models. Each moment of the conditional distribution can be seen as a source of information which provides an estimating equation for the parameter vector. Different issues arise in the different moments concerning the identifiability of parameters, the observability of the dependent variable of the estimating equation, and the positivity restrictions implicit in even order moments. Estimators of the identifiable functions of the parameter vector are obtained from orthogonality conditions in each moment. Under symmetry of the distribution, the sources of information corresponding to the first two conditional moments are independent, at least asymptotically, and the information about common parameters is combined in estimation by constructing a matrix weighted average. Estimation procedures under normality are viewed in a maximum likelihood framework, and generalized method of moments estimation provides the setup for the analysis of more general distributions. The separation of the information into its moment source constitutes a basic element for diagnostic testing of the model. The implications of different forms of misspecification are analyzed and robustness properties are established for some leading cases, especially the ARCH class of models. A general framework is presented for diagnostic testing of heteroskedastic models, which includes tests of the coherency of the information contributed by the two moments, a family of 'consistency tests' which concentrates on the assessment of the first two moments, and a family of 'efficiency tests' which concentrates on checking the specification of moments of order three and higher. The consistency and efficiency tests may be constructed without using information external to the model and thus may be reported with standard computer output, but these families also include many LM tests against specific departures by suitable choice of the test parameters. Tests for autocorrelation, dynamics, parameter stability, different types of
Population-Level Impact of Ontario’s Infant Rotavirus Immunization Program: Evidence of Direct and Indirect Effects

Objective To evaluate the direct and indirect population impact of rotavirus (RV) immunization on hospitalizations and emergency department (ED) visits for acute gastroenteritis (AGE) in Ontario before and after the publicly-funded RV immunization program. Methods Administrative data was used to identify ED visits and hospitalizations for all Ontarians using ICD-10 codes. We used two outcome definitions: RV-specific AGE (RV-AGE) and codes representing RV-, other viral and cause unspecified AGE (“overall AGE”). The pre-program and public program periods were August 1, 2005 to July 31, 2011; and August 1, 2011 to March 31, 2013, respectively. A negative binominal regression model that included the effect of time was used to calculate rates and rate ratios (RRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for RV-AGE and overall AGE between periods, after adjusting for age, seasonality and secular trends. Analyses were conducted for all ages combined and age stratified. Results Relative to the pre-program period, the adjusted RRs for RV-AGE and overall AGE hospitalizations in the public program period were 0.29 (95%CI: 0.22–0.39) and 0.68 (95%CI: 0.62–0.75), respectively. Significant reductions in RV-AGE hospitalizations were noted overall and for the following age bands: < 12 months, 12–23 months, 24–35 months, 3–4 years, and 5–19 years. Significant declines in overall AGE hospitalizations were observed across all age bands, including older adults > = 65 years (RR 0.80, 95%CI: 0.72–0.90). The program was associated with adjusted RRs of 0.32 (95% CI: 0.20–0.52) for RV-AGE ED visits and 0.90 (95% CI: 0.85–0.96) for overall AGE ED visits. Conclusions This large, population-based study provides evidence of the impact of RV vaccine in preventing hospitalizations and ED visits for RV-AGE and overall AGE, including herd effects.
Approche statistique versus approche linguistique pour l'indexation sémantique des documents multilingues

Dans cet article nous presentons une approche statistique d’indexation semantique des documents multilingues. L’approche que nous proposons est composee de trois etapes : extraction des termes, detection des concepts et detection des relations a partir des couples de concepts. Notre approche est validee par un ensemble d’experimentations sur la collection ImageCLEFmed 2007 et une comparaison avec une approche linguistique. Nous montrons ainsi que l’approche statistique obtient des resultats equivalents a l’approche linguistique sans adapter la phase d’indexation a la langue du document.
A Trial Using Early Preoperative Administration of Cefonicid for Antimicrobial Prophylaxis with Hysterectomies

A single dose of cefonicid given 3.5–5.0 hours or 0.5–1.0 hour preoperatively was compared with cefoxitin given as five doses beginning 0.5–1.0 hour preoperatively for prophylaxis of infection in 202 patients undergoing vaginal or abdominal hysterectomy. The administration of cefonicid 3.5–5.0 hours preoperatively was intended to simulate situations where surgery may be delayed or prolonged. The trial was double-blind, and patients were randomized to one of the three regimens. Operative site infections were noted in 6.2 percent of patients (7/113) who received cefonicid 3.5–5.0 hours preoperatively, in 7.0 percent of patients (3/43) who received cefonicid 0.5–1.0 hour preoperatively, and in 4.3 percent of patients (2/46) who received cefoxitin (p > 0.05). Enterococci were isolated most frequently from operative-site infections. When administered 3.5–5.0 hours preoperatively, cefonicid was as effective as more traditional regimens.
The Biomechanics of Long Versus Short Fixation for Thoracolumbar Spine Fractures

Study Design. Literature review. Objective. Provide an overview of biomechanical strengths and weaknesses of long and short fixation constructs applied in thoracolumbar fractures, along with a discussion of specific indications for selecting an instrumentation construct for a given fracture. Summary of Background Data. Previous clinical and biomechanical studies have shown that segmental spinal instrumentation provides superior torsional, axial, and sagittal stability relative to nonsegmental systems. Multilevel fixation (long constructs) has proven reliable and effective in treating thoracic injuries, with or without anterior reconstruction. Short-segment pedicle instrumentation (short constructs) have proven effective in stabilizing thoracolumbar and lumbar fractures while limiting the disruption of lower lumbar motion segments. Loss of anterior column integrity leads to fixation failure when short constructs are not supplemented with further fixation or an anterior reconstruction. Methods. Review of the applicable clinical and biomechanical literature. Conclusions. Long constructs serve well in thoracic and thoracolumbar fractures, while short-segment fixation offers advantages in selected thoracolumbar and lumbar fractures. Anterior column integrity determines the risk of sagittal collapse and kyphosis at the thoracolumbar junction. Recognition of fundamental biomechanical principles is necessary to make either construct work reliably.
Finding Extract Method Refactoring Opportunities by Analyzing Development History

Refactoring is an important technique to improve maintainability of software, and developers often use this technique during a development process. Before now, researchers have proposed some techniques finding refactoring opportunities for developers. Finding refactoring opportunities means identifying locations to be refactored. However, there are no specific criteria for developers to determine where they should refactor because the criteria differ from project to project and from developer to developer. In this study, we propose a technique to find refactoring opportunities in source code by using machine learning techniques. Machine learning techniques enable to flexibly find refactoring opportunities by the characteristics of target projects and developers. Our proposed technique learns information on the features of refactorings conducted in the past. Then, based on this information, it suggests some refactorings on given the source code to developers. We investigated three research questions with five open source projects. As a result, we confirmed that the proposed technique was able to find refactorings with high accuracy.
Cure fraction estimation from the mixture cure models for grouped survival data

Mixture cure models are usually used to model failure time data with long‐term survivors. These models have been applied to grouped survival data. The models provide simultaneous estimates of the proportion of the patients cured from disease and the distribution of the survival times for uncured patients (latency distribution). However, a crucial issue with mixture cure models is the identifiability of the cure fraction and parameters of kernel distribution. Cure fraction estimates can be quite sensitive to the choice of latency distributions and length of follow‐up time. In this paper, sensitivity of parameter estimates under semi‐parametric model and several most commonly used parametric models, namely lognormal, loglogistic, Weibull and generalized Gamma distributions, is explored. The cure fraction estimates from the model with generalized Gamma distribution is found to be quite robust. A simulation study was carried out to examine the effect of follow‐up time and latency distribution specification on cure fraction estimation. The cure models with generalized Gamma latency distribution are applied to the population‐based survival data for several cancer sites from the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) Program. Several cautions on the general use of cure model are advised. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Monetary and Fiscal Policy in England During the French Wars (1793-1821)

The French Wars (1793-1815) exerted unprecedented pressures on Britain's fiscal and monetary policy settings. Policy makers had to constantly adjust the policy mix as events unfolded. This meant implementing monetary and fiscal policy innovations, such as the suspension of the gold standard and the instauration of Britain's first income tax. These adjustments signalled the government's commitment to undertake the necessary to win the war, without jeopardizing fiscal sustainability. Drawing on new hand-collected data, we also show that the Bank of England played an essential role in two successive phases of the war. The Bank granted ample liquidity to the domestic payment system, by discounting large amounts of private bills. It also financed the decisive phase of the wars by purchasing large amounts of public debt. The successful winding down of the balance sheet and the resumption of the gold standard influenced the Bank's policies and shaped the political and financial landscape for the century to come.
Prevocational training situation of young people with special educational needs (SEN) in Germany

The article presents the analysis of educational situation of young people with Special Educational Needs (SEN) in Germany based on the example of Prevocational Training in a Vocational Training Institute. German Federal Law is discussed in the context of Germany Federal States regulations that have their own cultural sovereignty. Systems of special and regular education, performing vocational training and prevocational counselling are discussed in parallel with pupils having special educational needs education and preparation for the labour market relationships. Case of Vocational Training Institute Kirchseeon/Berufsbildungswerk Kirchseeon (BBW Kirchseeon) refects compatibility of the needs of individual pupils with SEN and possibilities to get into labour market and general state regulations. On this basis, vocational education has the task to fnd ways for a precisely ftting promotion.
Enhanced functional activity in thyroid adenomas in vitro

The majority of thyroid adenomas have been shown to be of clonal origin. In a portion of them, somatic or germline point mutations leading to altered TSH receptor or Gs alpha-proteins have been found. The constitutive activation of these proteins consecutively stimulate cAMP-levels. Expression of the TSH receptor mutants in mammalian cells leads to increased cAMP-production compared to cells transfected with the wild type receptor. Presently, the role of these mutations in the development and growth of such tumours is still unclear. In our own investigations we made an attempt to evaluate the functional significance of these observations. In nodular tissue derived from patients with functioning autonomous adenoma we found significantly higher basal and TSH stimulated thyroid hormone releasing activity than in the surrounding paranodular tissue and in thyroid tissue derived from patients with euthyroid goiter. These findings indicate a functional relevance of constitutively activated intracellular signal transducing cascade in thyroid adenomas that may lead to hyperthyroidism in the presence or absence of external thyroid stimulators.
Dysfunction of the locus coeruleus–norepinephrine system and related circuitry in Parkinson's disease-related dementia

Although resting tremor, cogwheel rigidity, hypokinesia/bradykinesia and postural instability usually dominate the clinical picture of sporadic Parkinson's disease (PD), both clinical and epidemiological data reveal that a wide variety of additional symptoms impair patients’ quality of life considerably, parallel to the chronic progressive neurodegenerative movement disorder. Autopsy based retrospective studies have shown that α-synuclein immunoreactive Lewy pathology (LP) develops in the locus coeruleus (LC) of patients with neuropathologically confirmed sporadic PD, as well as in individuals with incidental (prodromal or premotor) Lewy body disease but not in age and gender matched controls. Using five case studies, this review discusses the possible role of LP (axonopathy, cellular dysfunction and nerve cell loss) in the LC, catecholaminergic tract and related circuitry in the development of PD-related dementia. The contribution of noradrenergic deficit to cognitive dysfunction in PD has been underappreciated. Noradrenergic therapeutic interventions might not only alleviate depressive symptoms and anxiety but also delay the onset of cognitive decline.
Phylogenetic Origin of Hepatitis B Virus Strains with Precore C-1858 Variant

ABSTRACT Mutations that prevent the expression of the hepatitis B e antigen frequently emerge in the immunoreactive phase of infection. The predominant mutation, the precore G→A-1896 mutation, is restricted by the variability at position 1858 and is rare in strains with cytosine at nucleotide 1858. The C-1858 variant is characteristic of genotype A. It also occurs in genotypes C and F, but not in B, D, or E, explaining the geographical variation in the prevalence of precore mutants. C-1858 strains have been frequently observed in southeast Asia, but have not been phylogenetically characterized. By sequencing eight complete hepatitis B virus genomes, C-1858 variants of east Asian origin were found to constitute a phylogenetic entity within genotype C that probably diverged several hundred years ago. Further study of the distribution of this variant is warranted.
Effects of noradrenaline on membrane currents and action potential shape in smooth muscle cells from guinea‐pig ureter.

1. The effects of noradrenaline (NA) on action potential shape and underlying membrane currents were examined in single smooth muscle cells freshly isolated from the ureter of the guinea‐pig. 2. The voltage‐dependent Ca2+ current (ICa) elicited upon depolarization from ‐50 to 0 mV was reduced by 27% upon application of 10 microM NA. This reduction was inhibited or converted to potentiation by internal application of low molecular weight heparin or 5 mM EGTA, indicating that it may be mediated by Ca(2+)‐dependent Ca2+ channel inactivation via inositol 1,4,5‐trisphosphate production and subsequent Ca2+ release from intracellular Ca2+ storage sites. 3. In contrast, Ba2+ current (IBa) through Ca2+ channels was potentiated by 36% in the presence of 10 microM NA. Internal application of GTP gamma S made it difficult to remove potentiation of IBa by wash‐out; internal application of GDP beta S abolished potentiation. 4. NA caused a greater reduction in the transient Ca(2+)‐dependent K+ current (IK(Ca)) upon depolarization than it did in ICa. This reduction was inhibited by internally applied heparin, suggesting that the amount of releasable Ca2+ in the storage sites was markedly reduced in the presence of NA. The sustained component of IK(Ca) which gradually increased during depolarization was also reduced by NA. 5. Action potential duration, which was recorded in a standard solution containing Ca2+, was prolonged by the application of NA. 6. It can be concluded that Ca2+ channel activity in ureter smooth muscle cells is regulated by a dual mechanism: Ca(2+)‐dependent inhibition and GTP‐binding protein‐mediated potentiation. Under physiological conditions, both ICa and IK(Ca) were reduced by NA but the reduction of IK(Ca) was much larger than that of ICa; this results in an increase in net inward current during the action potential plateau and prolongs the action potential.
Polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxin and dibenzofuran concentrations in the serum samples of workers at continuously burning municipal waste incinerators in Japan

OBJECTIVES To find whether concentrations of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins (PCDDs) and polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDFs) in serum increased in workers at municipal incinerators that burn continuously. METHODS 30 Workers employed at three municipal waste incineration plants (incinerator workers) and 30 control workers were studied. The incinerator workers had worn dust masks or airline masks during the periodic repair work inside the incinerators. Previous job, dietary habit, smoking habit, distance from residence to the incineration plant, and body weight and height were obtained from a questionnaire survey. Concentrations of PCDDs/PCDFs were measured in the serum of the workers and the dust deposited in the plants. The influence of various factors on serum concentrations of PCDDs/PCDFs was examined by multiple regression analysis. RESULTS Dust analysis showed the greatest amount of octachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (OCDD), followed by 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-heptachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (HpCDD), 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-heptachlorodibenzofuran (HpCDF), and octachlorodibenzofuran (OCDF). The toxicity equivalents (TEQs) of PCDDs and PCDFs in the deposited dust were 4.8, 1.0, and 6.4 ng TEQs/g, respectively, for plants A, B, and C. The mean serum TEQs of PCDDs and PCDFs in the incinerator workers and control workers were 19.2 and 22.9 pg TEQs/g lipid, respectively, for area A, 28.8 and 24.5 pg TEQs/g lipid for area B, and 23.4 and 23.6 pg TEQs/g lipid for area C. No significant differences were found between the incinerator workers and the controls for TEQs of PCDDs and PCDFs separately, and TEQs of PCDDs and PCDFs together. However, the serum 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDF concentration was significantly higher in the incinerator workers than in the controls for all the three areas. When the exposure index to 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDF is defined as the product of the concentration of 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDF in the deposited dust and duration of employment, the concentration of 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDF in serum increased as the exposure index increased. Multivariate analysis suggested that the serum concentration of HpCDF increased with duration of employment at the incineration plants and OCDF increased with employment of ⩾21 years. The other significant variables (p<0.01 or p<0.001) were area for hexachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (HxCDD) and tetrachlorodibenzofuran (TCDF), Brinkman index for HpCDD, and body mass index (BMI) for tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD), HpCDD, and TEQs of PCDDs. CONCLUSION The serum TEQs of PCDDs and PCDFs was not significantly higher among the incinerator workers, but the serum concentration of 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDF was. This suggests that the incinerator workers had inhaled dust containing PCDDs and PCDFs while working in plants equipped with incinerators that burn continuously.