Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Toward an Interdisciplinary Probabilistic Theory of Measurement

Measurement plays a key role in science and technology in which it is a privileged way of gathering information from the real world and of validating scientific models. Is it possible to achieve a unified measurement theory for the different disciplines, ranging from physics to psychology, in which it is involved? A basic kernel for such a theory is surveyed and discussed. A probabilistic approach is followed in order to consider uncertainty as an inherent feature.
Schizophrenia following Withdrawal from Chronic Phenothiazine Administration: A Case Report*

The chronic administration of phenothiazines has come under increasing scrutiny recently, and the uncritical use of this form of treatment has been criticized. A case is presented illustrating the development of schizophrenia in a young adult following withdrawal from phenothiazines. As far as could be ascertained there was no evidence of schizophrenia prior to withdrawal of phenothiazines. The possibility that withdrawal of phenothiazines may have aetiological significance in this case is discussed.
Peer Reviewers of Academic Journals: Who Is Responsible for Our Professional Literature

Scholarly journals provide a record of the research, issues, and concerns of a field. Authors have their names associated with their individual articles, while editors are connected with a publication. However, there is another group of individuals who are often left out of the record, although their contributions are just as critical in the formation of scholarly journals. This article will take a look at this group of peer reviewers, to provide demographic data as well as understanding for the reasons individuals take on the duty of peer reviewer.
The safety of intracoronary ultrasound. A multicenter survey of 2207 examinations.

BACKGROUND Intracoronary ultrasound (ICUS) is increasingly used in clinical practice to study the natural history of coronary artery disease and to assess the effects of intracoronary, catheter-based interventions. However, the risk associated with the procedure is not well documented. METHODS AND RESULTS ICUS studies performed in 28 centers were retrospectively included; these centers agreed to contribute to the study among a total of 60 centers initially invited. Among the 2207 ICUS studies, 505 (23%) were performed in heart transplant recipients and 1702 (77%) in nontransplant patients. Indication for ICUS was diagnostic imaging in 915 (41%), drug testing in 244 (11%), and guidance for intracoronary interventions in 1048 patients (47%). There were no complications in 2034 patients (92.2%). In 87 patients (3.9%), complications occurred but were judged to be "not related" to ICUS by the operator. In 63 patients (2.9%), spasm occurred during ICUS imaging. In 9 patients (0.4%), complications other than spasm were judged to have a "certain relation" to ICUS, including acute procedural events in 6 (3 acute occlusion, 1 embolism, 1 dissection, and 1 thrombus) and major events in 3 patients (2 occlusion and 1 dissection; all resulting in myocardial infarction). In 14 patients (0.6%), complications with "uncertain relation" to ICUS were recorded, including acute procedural events in 9 (5 acute occlusion, 3 dissection, and 1 arrhythmia) and major events in 5 patients (2 myocardial infarction and 3 emergency coronary artery bypass surgery). The incidence of acute procedural or major complications judged to be associated with ICUS (uncertain relation or certain relation to ICUS) was compared in different patient groups. The complication rate was higher in patients with unstable angina or acute myocardial infarction (2.1% events) as compared with patients with stable angina pectoris and asymptomatic patients (0.8% and 0.4%, respectively; chi 2 = 10.9, P < .01). These complications were also more frequent in patients undergoing interventions (1.9%) as compared with transplant and nontransplant patients undergoing diagnostic ICUS imaging (0% and 0.6%, respectively; chi 2 = 13.5, P < .001). Adverse events were few, and no association was detected between these events and the size or type of ICUS catheter used. CONCLUSIONS ICUS is associated with (but not necessarily the direct cause of) a minor acute clinical risk. Vessel spasm is the most frequent event occurring during ICUS. Other complications predominantly occur in patients with acute coronary syndromes and during guidance for intervention.
Preservation of lexical tones in singing in a tone language

Lexical tones are important for expressing meaning and usually have high priority in tone languages. This can create conflicts with sentence intonation in spoken language and with melodic templates in singing since all of these are transmitted by pitch. The main question in this investigation is whether a language (in our case the Mon-Khmer language Kammu) with a simple two-tone system uses similar strategies for preserving lexical tones in singing and speech. We investigate the realization of lexical tones in a singing genre which can be described as recitation based on a partly predefined, though still flexible, melodic template. The contrast between High and Low tone is preserved, and is realized mainly at the beginning of the vowel. Apparently, the rest of the syllable rhyme serves either for strengthening the lexical contrast or for melodic purposes. Syllables are often reduplicated in singing, and the reduplicant ignores lexical tones. The preservation of lexical tones in Kammu singing, and their early timing close to the vowel onset, is very similar to what we have found for speech. (Less)
Investor Behavior in the Option Market

This paper investigates the behavior of investors in the equity option market using a unique and detailed dataset of open interest and volume for all contracts listed on the Chicago Board Options Exchange over the 1990 through 2001 period. We document major stylized facts about the option market activity of three types of non-market maker investors over this time period and also investigate how their trading changed during the stock market bubble of the late 1990s and early 2000. Our key findings are: (1) non-market maker investors have about four times more long call than long put open interest, (2) these investors have more short than long open interest in both calls and puts, (3) each type of investor purchases more calls to open brand new positions when the return on underlying stocks are higher over horizons ranging from one week to two years into the past, (4) the least sophisticated group of investors substantially increased their purchases of calls on growth but not value stocks during the stock market bubble of the late 1990s and early 2000, and (5) none of the investor groups significantly increased their purchases of puts during the bubble period in order to overcome short sales constraints in the stock market.
Contextual paradigm for ad hoc retrieval of user-centric web data

The choice of the term-weighting technique and the combination of term weights during retrieval is an important aspect of the web information retrieval (WebIR) system. At their heart, most WebIR models utilise some form of term frequency-based term-weighting technique. The notion is that the more often a query term occurs in a document, the more likely it is that the document meets an information need. We examine an alternative. We propose a model, which assesses the presence of a term in a document not by looking at the actual occurrence of that term, but by a set of non-independent supporting terms, that is context. We expound contextual proximity model (CPM), a novel context-based paradigm, which when used as a part of the web retrieval process, will improve retrieval effectiveness in response to a given multi-term input query. This work is concerned with a non-iterative retrieval process, that is one without query refinement or relevance feedback.
A new technique for reducing cogging torque in EPS permanent magnet brushless DC motor

This paper establishes a mathematical model to fast compute the cogging torque in permanent magnet brushless DC (BLDC) motor. A novel rotor structure is presented to reduce the cogging torque effectively, and the computing waveforms of cogging torque are drawn. The validity of this technique is proved by the comparison of cogging torque for many cases with and without split skewed rotor.
Basic Statistical Concepts for Analysis of Random Cable Coupling Problems

Electromagnetic pulse (EMP) internal interaction analysis is complicated by the presence of many random parameters which preclude the deterministic solution for induced excitations at particular load points. The objective of this communication is to discuss a fundamental technique for the statistical analysis of load excitations induced on an N-wire random cable via use of the reciprocity theorem in conjuction with subset representation of a statistical ensemble.
Pretreatment evaluation of chronic hepatitis C: risks, benefits, and costs.

CONTEXT Chronic hepatitis C (CHC) infection affects nearly 4 million people in the United States. Treatment with interferon alfa-2b has been limited by its cost and low likelihood of long-term response. OBJECTIVE To examine the cost-effectiveness of alternative pretreatment management strategies for patients with CHC. DESIGN Decision and cost-effectiveness analysis using a Markov model to examine prevalence of genotypes, viral load, and histological characteristics in relation to the sustained response rate with treatment. Data were based on a previously published decision model and a MEDLINE literature search for hepatitis C, biopsy, and liver from 1966 to 1996. PATIENTS A hypothetical population of patients with CHC infection and elevated serum alanine aminotransferase level. INTERVENTIONS Combinations of liver biopsy, genotyping, and quantitative viral load determination prior to a single 6-month course of interferon alfa-2b; empirical interferon treatment; and conservative management. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Proportion of sustained responders, lifetime costs, life expectancy, and quality-adjusted life expectancy. RESULTS Strategies involving hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA testing had marginal cost-effectiveness ratios up to $4400 per discounted quality-adjusted life-year gained but would miss up to 36% of sustained responders. Empirical interferon treatment had a marginal cost-effectiveness ratio of $12400 per discounted quality-adjusted life-year gained and reached all potential sustained responders. Strategies involving liver biopsy were more expensive and would miss 6% of sustained responders and yield slightly lower life expectancies. CONCLUSIONS Routine liver biopsy before treatment with interferon increases the cost of managing patients with CHC without improving health outcomes. Using quantitative HCV RNA testing to guide therapy misses some potential sustained responders. Empirical interferon treatment has a marginal cost-effectiveness ratio within the bounds of other commonly accepted therapies and misses none of the sustained responders.
Lifecycle optimal investment policy for pension funds with transaction costs

In this paper,lifecycle investmentof a Constant Relative Risk Aversion (CRRA) investor as a representative of pension plan participants is investigated. The investor has a finite investment horizon and is subject to the proportional transaction costs and a constant rate of return. Attempt is made to maximize the investor’s utility by trading between stock and money market account. A set of partial differential equations are derived and closed form solution proffered. The effects of the volatility of the risky asset are investigated and it shows that a zero value of the volatility resulted to the value function equals zero and its unit value with the drift parameterξ equals the discount rate k, gave an indeterminate value for the value function. Precise conditions are obtained which determine the growth rate of the value function in the sell and buy regions.
Mortgage‐pricing determinants

Presents the results of an empirical study that investigates comparatively the mortgage‐pricing determinants of national, regional and local building societies. Considers and discusses the importance of the three main generic strategies (focus, differentiation and cost leadership) and building societies′ main pricing objectives – profit margins, market share, and mutuality. The findings suggest that building societies′ mortgage pricing is influenced primarily by internal industry determinants – such as “costs” and “competitors′ prices” – and to a lesser extent by market‐related factors (customers′ perception of value and elasticity of demand). A large majority of building societies view profit margins, rather than market share, as their primary pricing objective. In order to facilitate this pricing objective, societies select strategies that match their size and market characteristics. Local building societies employ primarily a focus strategy, while national and regional building societies aim at achievi.
Comparing the antibody responses against recombinant hemagglutinin proteins of avian influenza A (H5N1) virus expressed in insect cells and bacteria

The hemagglutinin (HA) of influenza A virus plays an essential role in mediating the entry of the virus into host cells. Here, recombinant full‐length HA5 protein from a H5N1 isolate (A/chicken/hatay/2004(H5N1)) was expressed and purified from the baculovirus‐insect cell system. As expected, full‐length HA5 elicits strong neutralizing antibodies, as evaluated in micro‐neutralization tests using HA5 pseudotyped lentiviral particles. In addition, two fragments of HA5 were expressed in bacteria and the N‐terminal fragment, covering the ectodomain before the HA1/HA2 polybasic cleavage site, was found to elicit neutralizing antibodies. But the C‐terminal fragment, which covers the remaining portion of the ectodomain, did not. Neutralizing titer of the anti‐serum against the N‐terminal fragment is only four times lower than the anti‐serum against the full‐length HA5 protein. Using a novel membrane fusion assay, the abilities of these antibodies to block membrane fusion were found to correlate well with the neutralization activities. J. Med. Virol. 80:1972–1983, 2008. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Biophysical and Molecular Docking Studies of Human Serum Albumin Interactions with a Potential Anticancer Pt(II) Complex

The interaction between [Pt(phen)(pyrr-dtc)]NO3 (where phen = 1,10-phenanthroline and pyrr-dtc =pyrrolidinedithiocarbamat) with human serum albumin (HSA) was studied by ﬂuorescence, UV–vis absorption, circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy and molecular docking technique under like physiological condition in Tris–HCl buffer solution at pH 7.4. UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy indicates that the protein chain was unfolded upon the addition of Pt(II) complex. Experimental results imply that the Pt(II) complex has a strong ability to quench the intrinsic ﬂuorescence of HSA through a static quenching process. Binding constants (Kb = 2.8, 2.6 and 2.5 ×105 M-1) and the number of binding sites (n ~ 1) were calculated. According to van't Hoff equation, the thermodynamic parameters revealed that hydrophobic forces played a major role when Pt(II) complex interacted with HSA. From the qualitative analysis data of CD spectra, the binding of Pt(II) complex to HSA induced conformational changes in this protein. Finally, a molecular docking was employed for identification of the active site residues and critical interactions involved.
Transparency in Central Bank Operations in the Foreign Exchange Market

Transparency in the economic sphere involves making public sector action visible and understandable to the private sector. Transparency in central bank operations can be seen a complement to the greater transparency being established in policy formulation. Among the most important areas in this regard and the central bank’s operations in the foreign exchange market. This paper looks at the respective roles of overt and covert foreign exchange market operations, and considers that each may be appropriate under particular conditions. Reconciling covert operations with transparency requires rules for full disclosure with as short a lag as possible.
Explore Wine Tourism: Management, Development & Destinations

Getting the books Explore Wine Tourism Management Development Destinations now is not type of inspiring means. You could not by yourself going taking into account book amassing or library or borrowing from your connections to contact them. This is an totally simple means to specifically get lead by on-line. This online pronouncement Explore Wine Tourism Management Development Destinations can be one of the options to accompany you taking into account having extra time.
AllenNLP: A Deep Semantic Natural Language Processing Platform

This paper describes AllenNLP, a platform for research on deep learning methods in natural language understanding. AllenNLP is designed to support researchers who want to build novel language understanding models quickly and easily. It is built on top of PyTorch, allowing for dynamic computation graphs, and provides (1) a ﬂexible data API that handles intelligent batching and padding, (2) high-level abstractions for common operations in working with text, and (3) a modular and extensible experiment framework that makes doing good science easy. It also includes reference implementations of high quality approaches for both core semantic problems (e.g. semantic role labeling (Palmer et al., 2005)) and language understanding applications (e.g. machine comprehension (Rajpurkar et al., 2016)). AllenNLP is an ongoing open-source effort maintained by engineers and researchers at the Allen Institute for Artiﬁcial Intelligence.
On incorporating subjective interestingness into the mining process

Subjective interestingness is at the heart of the successful discovery of association rules. To determine what is subjectively interesting, users' domain knowledge must be applied. The author (1999) introduced an approach that requires very little domain knowledge and interaction to eliminate the majority of the rules that are subjectively not interesting. In this paper we investigate how this approach can be incorporated into the mining process, the benefits and disadvantages of doing so, and examine the results of its application to real databases.
Natural History and Topographic Pattern of Progression of Coronary Calcification in Symptomatic Patients: An Electron-Beam CT Study

Abstract —Electron-beam CT may assess the progression of coronary atherosclerosis by visualizing changes in calcification. The present investigation analyzes (1) the rate of progression of calcification in symptomatic patients, (2) the topographic pattern, and (3) the influence of baseline plaque burden and risk factors. Progression of calcification during a mean (median) interval of 18 (15) months was measured in 102 symptomatic outpatients (aged 59±9 years, 80% male) with calcification. In 4 patient groups with a baseline total score (Agatston criteria) of 1 to 30, >30 to 100, >100 to 400, and >400, the median was 3.1, 26.1, 58.9, and 109.7, respectively, for absolute annual progression of the score (P <0.05) and 57%, 49%, 32%, and 15%, respectively, for relative progression (P <0.05). On the coronary segmental level, changes were largely restricted to typical predilection sites of coronary atherosclerosis. The presence of angiographically defined coronary narrowing influenced absolute, but not relative, progression. Of the risk factors, only low density lipoprotein cholesterol levels showed a trend, although not significant, for predicting progression. These data indicate that baseline plaque burden determines the rate of progression of calcification. This appears to be a coronary systemic process, reflecting the natural history of coronary atherosclerosis.
Value Relevance of Financial Reporting on the Warsaw Stock Exchange

The paper is associated with value relevance research, investigating whether information from financial reports is reflected in the value of listed companies. The study includes annual reports of 440 companies listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange in the years from 2000 to 2010. Models describing the relationship between information from financial reports and a measure of stock prices are based, in part, on a factor analysis. Validation of models on the test sample confirmed their effectiveness. The results show that the value relevance models may be one of the tools in building investment strategies.File-Format: Application/pdf
Double Negative ( CD 3 + 4 2 8 2 ) TCR ab Splenic Cells from Young NOD Mice Provide Long-Lasting Protection against Type 1 Diabetes

Background: Double negative CD348 TCRab splenic cells (DNCD3) can suppress the immune responses to allo and xenografts, infectious agents, tumors, and some autoimmune disorders. However, little is known about their role in autoimmune diabetes, a disease characterized by the reduction of insulin production subsequent to destruction of pancreatic b-cells by a polyclonal population of self-reactive T-cells. Herein, we analyzed the function and phenotype of DNCD3 splenic cells in young NOD mice predisposed to several autoimmune disorders among which, the human-like autoimmune diabetes. Methodology/Principal Findings: DNCD3 splenic cells from young NOD mice (1) provided long-lasting protection against diabetes transfer in NOD/Scid immunodeficient mice, (2) proliferated and differentiated in the spleen and pancreas of NOD/ Scid mice and pre-diabetic NOD mice into IL-10-secreting TR-1 like cells in a Th2-like environment, and (3) their antidiabetogenic phenotype is CD3(CD4CD8)CD28CD69CD25 Foxp3 iCTLA-4TCRab with a predominant Vb13 gene usage. Conclusions/Significance: These findings delineate a new T regulatory component in autoimmune diabetes apart from that of NKT and CD4CD25 Foxp3T-regulatory cells. DNCD3 splenic cells could be potentially manipulated towards the development of autologous cell therapies in autoimmune diabetes. Citation: Duncan B, Nazarov–Stoica C, Surls J, Kehl M, Bona C, et al. (2010) Double Negative (CD348) TCRab Splenic Cells from Young NOD Mice Provide Long-Lasting Protection against Type 1 Diabetes. PLoS ONE 5(7): e11427. doi:10.1371/journal.pone. 0011427 Editor: Derya Unutmaz, New York University, United States of America Received December 9, 2009; Accepted June 7, 2010; Published July 2, 2010 This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Public Domain declaration which stipulates that, once placed in the public domain, this work may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose. Funding: This work was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health (DK61927 & DK61326) to T. -D.B. , and (DK077521 and JDRF-12002-1151) to S.C. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. * E-mail: tbrumeanu@usuhs.edu