Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Economic Estimates of the Value of Life

This paper reviews the economic literature that, for policy evaluaton purposes, assigns a value to risking human lives. It argues the ethical justification for evaluating risk by observing how much people are willing to pay personally to avoid risks. Most willingness-to-pay figures are based on observations of how much compensation workers must be paid to work at a risky job. The conceptual and practical problems and biases in these figures are explained. The main studies of financial value of life calculation are reviewed in light of this discussion. The review concludes that a conservative estimate for the value of risking a life is $8 million (1984 dollars), a figure far greater than is typically used in policy analysis. Policy-makers are often required to weigh the benefits of instating safety precautions in a project or policy alternative against its costs. Making these tradeoffs requires an evaluation of the alternative relative risk, i.e., a translation of potential risks into dollars and cents. In this article, I will summarize and critically review from an economist's point of view the literature on the dollar value of risking life¿the ``value of life (VOL)''¿concentrating on the literature written by fellow economists. Evaluation of nonfatal injury and illness is just as critical a part of risk evaluation; however, space constraints prevent me from including it in this discussion. VOL figures are not meant to be equivalent to what you would pay in ransom money to a kidnapper in order to save your life.
Teaching Research Skills to Student Pharmacists in One Semester: An Applied Research Elective

Objectives. To implement and assess the effectiveness of a 15-week applied research elective that introduced students to secondary database analysis in clinical pharmacy. Design. In small groups, students learned, planned, developed and completed a secondary database study to answer an original research question. During one semester, they completed a basic research proposal and Institutional Review Board application, created and analyzed a National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) sample dataset, and reported the results in an abstract and poster presentation. Assessment. All deliverables resulted in high grades. Mean scores on a survey conducted following completion of the course revealed that students strongly agreed or agreed that they had high levels of confidence about performing research-related tasks. Eight student groups delivered poster presentations at professional conferences. Conclusions. Within one semester, student pharmacists with no or little research experience completed original research projects that contributed to pharmacy practice knowledge. They felt highly confident doing research-related tasks, and successfully disseminated their studies beyond the classroom.
Memory for Complex Emotional Material in Dissociative Identity Disorder

Eleven women with dissociative identity disorder (DID) participated in an experiment that included a variety of memory measures. DID participants were faster than a group of 13 female students at producing autobiographical memories in response to cue words. DID participants had difficulty answering detailed questions about a story containing fear compared with a neutral story; the student group did not. The DID group reported experiencing significantly more childhood trauma than did the student group. Effect sizes were moderate to high. This preliminary study uses a broad conceptualization of memory functioning, combining ecologically valid testing with experimental paradigms and addressing the impact of emotion on memory in trauma survivors.
A Long Peripheral Nerve Autograft Model in the Sheep Forelimb

BACKGROUND:Autologous nerve grafts remain the only proven means of bridging lengthy gaps in peripheral nerve. However, there is very little literature on a reliable long (> 5 cm) nerve autograft animal model. OBJECTIVE:To establish a reproducible long nerve gap and autograft animal model that is clinically relevant but not cost prohibitive. METHODS:The extent of nerve regeneration and electrophysiological recovery after segmental repair of a long nerve defect was evaluated with a sheep model. Thirteen Suffolk sheep were used. An 18-cm segment of radial sensory nerve was harvested from the forelimb, trimmed, divided into 2 equal segments of 7 cm each, and microsurgically repaired to a surgically created defect of 5 cm in the median nerve within the same forelimb. Electrophysiological studies were performed on 6 sheep at 6 months and 6 sheep at 9 months. Samples of the grafted segments were obtained for histology, immunohistochemistry, and morphometric analyses. Electric studies were also performed on an uninjured median nerve of a control animal in tissue that was similarly harvested and processed. RESULTS:At 6 and 9 months, all sheep had recordable robust nerve action potentials. Nerve conduction velocity and amplitude were slightly decreased compared with control, but the difference was statistically insignificant. Histomorphometric assessment demonstrated that the autografts contained a large number of regenerating axons through graft fascicles in all animals. CONCLUSION:The median nerve in the sheep forelimb is a reproducible and reliable model for assessing regeneration through long peripheral nerve grafts.
Proinflammatory Effect of TWEAK/Fn14 Interaction in Human Retinal Pigment Epithelial Cells

Purpose: To investigate the expression and function of fibroblast growth factor-inducible 14 (Fn14) in human retinal pigment epithelial cells. Methods: A human retinal pigment epithelial cell line (RPE cells: ARPE-19) was used. Expression of Fn14 protein was assessed by flow cytometry. An antibody array and ELISA were used to detect chemokines and cytokines in the supernatant of RPE cells cultured with or without stimulation by TWEAK and/or TGF-β1. To explore the mechanism by which TWEAK stimulates RPE cells, we investigated phosphorylation of MAP kinase in TWEAK-stimulated cells. We also investigated whether TWEAK induced the migration of RPE cells by performing an in vitro wound assay. Results: RPE cells showed constitutive surface expression of Fn14 protein. FGF, VEGF, and TGF-β1 did not induce Fn14 expression by RPE cells. TWEAK increased the production of IL-8 and MCP-1 by RPE cells via Fn14, and TGF-β1 augmented TWEAK-induced production of these chemokines. TWEAK induced the phosphorylation of MAP kinase in RPE cells and promoted the migration of these cells via MAP kinase. Conclusion: TWEAK/Fn14 interaction may have proinflammatory effects in RPE cells.
An advanced defect-monitoring test structure for electrical measurements and defect localization

A new test structure for the detection and localization of short and open defects in LSI intra-layer wiring processes is proposed. In the structure, an open-monitoring element (OME) in the first metal layer meanders around lines of short-monitoring elements (SME) placed in contact with N-type diffusion regions to make the structure compact. The proposed structure allows defective test structures to be screened through electrical measurements and killer defects to be localized through voltage contrast or optical microscopy methods.
Introduction to the Special Section on Visual Computing in the Cloud: Cloud Gaming and Virtualization

Cloud gaming, the newest entry in the online gaming world, leverages the well-known concept of cloud computing to provide real-time gaming services to players. The idea in cloud gaming is to capture the game events from players and transmit them to the cloud, process those events and run the game logic in the cloud, render the game scene as video in the cloud, and stream that video to the players. The advantage is that as long as the client can display video, which pretty much all smartphones, tablets, game consoles, desktops, laptops, and mobile devices today do, the user can play the game without installing it locally, and without needing to have a machine with high-grade 3-D graphics rendering and powerful computing hardware and software. This makes cloud gaming accessible to a huge market of mass consumers. While some variations of cloud gaming systems stream 3-D graphics, in addition to or instead of video, the great majority of cloud gaming implementations are video based. Using the well-known concept of software as a service, cloud gaming is also sometimes referred to as gaming as a service, which is already available as commercial products, such as Sony’s PlayStation Now, Ubitus’s GameNow, G-Cluster, Crytek’s GFACE, PlayGiga, and LiquidSky, to name a few. There are also many efforts concentrating specifically on the underlying technology behind cloud gaming, such as NVIDIA’s Grid, OTOY, CiiNow, Kalydo, and GamingAnywhere [4], the latter being the only open source and free technology. Microsoft is also exploring cloud gaming technologies, with recent successes such as its Kahawai project [1].
Management of venous thromboembolism in pregnancy.

Pulmonary thromboembolism (PTE) is the major cause of maternal death in the UK, with recent trends showing an increase in the numbers of deaths. Underlying PTE is the problem of deep venous thrombosis (DVT). An appreciation of risk factors, particularly, thrombophilia, and signs or symptoms suggestive of thromboembolism, coupled with objective diagnosis and treatment should reduce mortality and morbidity. There are particular considerations with regard to the management of thrombosis in pregnancy, especially the use of anticoagulants. Low-molecular-weight heparins are now replacing unfractionated heparin for the treatment of DVT and PTE in pregnancy.
Phase I study of an oral histone deacetylase inhibitor, suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid, in patients with advanced cancer.

PURPOSE To determine the safety, dosing schedules, pharmacokinetic profile, and biologic effect of orally administered histone deacetylase inhibitor suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid (SAHA) in patients with advanced cancer. PATIENTS AND METHODS Patients with solid and hematologic malignancies were treated with oral SAHA administered once or twice a day on a continuous basis or twice daily for 3 consecutive days per week. Pharmacokinetic profile and bioavailibity of oral SAHA were determined. Western blots and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays of histones isolated from peripheral-blood mononuclear cells (PBMNCs) pre and post-therapy were performed to evaluate target inhibition. RESULTS Seventy-three patients were treated with oral SAHA and major dose-limiting toxicities were anorexia, dehydration, diarrhea, and fatigue. The maximum tolerated dose was 400 mg qd and 200 mg bid for continuous daily dosing and 300 mg bid for 3 consecutive days per week dosing. Oral SAHA had linear pharmacokinetics from 200 to 600 mg, with an apparent half-life ranging from 91 to 127 minutes and 43% oral bioavailability. Histones isolated from PBMNCs showed consistent accumulation of acetylated histones post-therapy, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay demonstrated a trend towards a dose-dependent accumulation of acetylated histones from 200 to 600 mg of oral SAHA. There was one complete response, three partial responses, two unconfirmed partial responses, and 22 (30%) patients remained on study for 4 to 37+ months. CONCLUSIONS Oral SAHA has linear pharmacokinetics and good bioavailability, inhibits histone deacetylase activity in PBMNCs, can be safely administered chronically, and has a broad range of antitumor activity.
Longitudinal renal function in pediatric heart transplant recipients: 20‐years experience

This study was initiated to assess the temporal trends of renal function, and define risk factors associated with worsening renal function in pediatric heart transplant recipients in the immediate post‐operative period. We performed a single‐center retrospective study in children ≤18 yr receiving OHT (1993–2012). The AKIN's validated, three‐tiered AKI staging system was used to categorize the degree of WRF. One hundred sixty‐four patients qualified for inclusion. Forty‐seven patients (28%) were classified as having WRF after OHT. Nineteen patients (11%) required dialysis after heart transplantation. There was a sustained and steady improvement in renal function in children following heart transplantation in all age groups, irrespective of underlying disease process. The significant factors associated with risk of WRF included body surface area (OR: 1.89 for 0.5 unit increase, 95% CI: 1.29–2.76, p = 0.001) and use of ECMO prior to and/or after heart transplantation (OR: 3.50, 95% CI: 1.51–8.13, p = 0.004). Use of VAD prior to heart transplantation was not associated with WRF (OR: 0.50, 95% CI: 0.17–1.51, p = 0.22). On the basis of these data, we demonstrate that worsening renal function improves early after orthotopic heart transplantation.
Immunity to Onchocerciasis: Cells from Putatively Immune Individuals Produce Enhanced Levels of Interleukin-5, Gamma Interferon, and Granulocyte-Macrophage Colony-Stimulating Factor in Response to Onchocerca volvulus Larval and Male Worm Antigens

ABSTRACT Antigen-specific interleukin-5 (IL-5), gamma interferon (IFN-γ), and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) responses in individuals living in an area of hyperendemicity for onchocerciasis in Cameroon were examined. The responses against antigens prepared fromOnchocerca volvulus third-stage larvae (L3), molting L3 (mL3), and crude extract from adult males (M-OvAg) were compared to the responses against antigens from adult female worms and skin microfilariae. Cytokine responses for the putatively immune individuals (PI) and the infected individuals (INF) were compared. A differential cytokine profile of IL-5 (Th2 phenotype) and IFN-γ (Th1 phenotype) was found in these individuals in response to the antigens. In both the PI and the INF, Th2 responses against all the antigens tested were dominant. However, in the PI group as a whole, there was an enhanced Th2 response against the larval antigens and the adult male and adult female antigens, and a Th1 response in a subgroup of the PI (27 to 54.5%) against L3, mL3, and M-OvAg antigens was present. While the PI produced significantly higher levels of GM-CSF against L3, mL3, and M-OvAg antigens than the INF, there was no difference in the GM-CSF responses of the groups against the other antigens. The present study indicated that, in comparison to the INF, the PI have distinct larva-specific and adult male-specific cytokine responses, thus supporting the premise that immunological studies of the PI would lead to the identification of immune mechanisms and the target genes that play a role in protective immunity.
Comprehensive Performance Study of Existing Techniques in Hand Gesture Recognition System for Sign Languages

Hand Gesture Recognition System (HGRS) has been proved to be a powerful communication tool for deaf and dumb users, irrespective of geographical differences. HGRS is fragmented in six consequent phases applied on captured image namely; Hand Detection, Hand Tracking, Region Extraction, Feature Extraction, Feature Matching, and Pattern Recognition. We have studied various techniques in HGRS for sign languages and now present the analysis of performance of existing techniques in HGRS. Our study is presented on the basis of fragmentation used in HGRS and includes the strength and the scope of improvements for each technique. These observations will be highly useful to the researchers putting efforts in the domain of recognition of sign languages for improving the recognition rate particularly. Keywords— CAMSHIFT, GMM, Histogram, 3D Model-based detection, Particle filtering, BLOB, Kalman filter, Template matching, SVM, HMM, ArSL, ASL, DSL.
Osseointegration of hydroxyapatite and remodeling‐resorption of tricalciumphosphate ceramics

Background: Cancellous bone defects surrounded by still intact bone structures never heal. Ceramics offer a solution providing osteoconductive scaffolds. Purpose: The purpose of the study is to evaluate whether structured β‐TCP and HA implants can reconstruct cancellous bone defects, which role micro‐ and macro‐porosity, stiffness and surface area play; finally the indication for both materials based on its resorbability. Material & Methods: 10 German Shepard dogs were operated on both tibial heads implanting shell‐like fully interconnected ceramic cylinders, using a wet grinding hollow drill coated with diamonds. β‐TCP was compared with HA. A polychromatic sequential labelling with 4 different fluorochromes controlled bone formation dynamics. Non‐decalcifying histology after perfusion fixation and vessel casting was performed. μ‐CT was combined with high resolution microradiography and histology on thin ground crossections. The stages after 6 weeks, 2, 3, 4 months and 15 months were evaluated. Results: In spite of osseointegration of HA and β‐TCP, the osseointegration of both materials was completely different. Both shell‐like bone void fillers were osseointegrated in a sandwich‐like manner. HA yielded primarily a reinforcement of the recipient's cancellous‐bone bed and full osseointegration after 4 months, whereas β‐TCP‐implants were fully osseointegrated after 6 weeks. HA did not show signs of resorption. The resorption of the β‐TCP resulted during remodelling. The final stage showed restitution “ad integrum” of the β‐TCP defects with a physiological architecture, whereas HA was integrated in the cancellous bone construction providing 600 μm measuring macropores showing osteoinductive properties. Microsc. Res. Tech. 76:370–380, 2013. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
A family of turn-on and turn-off nondissipative passive snubbers for soft-switching single-phase rectifier with reduced conduction losses

This paper presents a family of nondissipative passive snubbers applied to the single-phase rectifier with reduced conduction losses, for applications in power supply for telecommunication and UPS. The family of lossless passive snubbers presented in this paper guarantees soft-commutation during the turn-on and the turn-off intervals of the switch. The snubber not only should slow the di/dt and dv/dt rates of the active switch, but also losslessly recover the energy stored in the zero-current inductor and in the zero-voltage capacitor, leading to reduced voltage stress across the switch and diodes. A methodology to generate the family of passive snubbers for the single-phase rectifier with reduced conduction losses is also presented. Simulation and experimental results for a single-phase rectifier 3000 W laboratory prototype using one snubber of the family are also presented.
Simultaneous multislice acquisition of MR images

The simultaneous multislice technique is a method of imaging multiple parallel slices with the number of echoes normally used to image a single slice. Images of 16 slices have been obtained from a single 128‐echo acquisition. The distance between the slices can be decreased to approximately 15% of the field of view in the readout direction with the cost of significant image blurring. The image blurring is negligible when the distance between the slices approaches the field of view in the readout direction. The trade‐offs are de‐ scribed, and equations and images are presented. © 1988 Academic Press, Inc.
A Modified PDAMA Protocol for Mobile Satellite Communication Systems

Random multiple access and reservation multiple-access protocols which are currently employed in most satellite communication systems have some merits and demerits according to the type of users and traffic. A modified packet demand assignment multiple access (PDAMA) protocol with better characteristics is proposed and analyzed. Using simulation with approximate analysis, the performance of the modified PDAMA is compared with that of a modified random-access protocol as well as the original PDAMA in terms of delay and throughput. For small packet arrival rate, the performance of the proposed access protocol is shown to be similar to that of the modified random-access protocol, and better than that of the PDAMA protocol. While the packet arrival rate increases, the performance of the proposed access protocol is improved greatly compared with that of the PDAMA protocol. >
Technology Roadmaps on the Ballistic Transport in Straln Engineered Nanoscale CMO0S Devices

As device channel length continues to scale beyond 90nm, carrier transport in the ballistic regime becomes critically important. In this paper, the strain engineering and its correlation to the ION current enhancement of CMOS devices in the ballistic regime has been examined. It was characterized by two parameters, the ballistic transport efficiency and the injection velocity. Experimental verifications on very high mobility n- and p-MOSFET channel/substrate orientations with various strains have been made. For nMOSFETs, it shows that uniaxial tensile-stress using CESL is more efficient in current enhancement than the biaxial stress with bulk strained-SiGe technique. For the pMOSFETs, compressive stress using uniaxial or biaxial has been evaluated for various structures. It was found that both ballistic efficiency and the injection velocity can be enhanced in a specific pMOS structure with appropriate combination of CESL and biaxial strain. The technology roadmaps have then been established from advanced 65 nm CMOS devices. These results provide a guideline for designing high performance strained technology for CMOS devices in the sub-100 nm regime.
Identification of Novel SH3 Domain Ligands for the Src Family Kinase Hck

The importance of the SH3 domain of Hck in kinase regulation, substrate phosphorylation, and ligand binding has been established. However, few in vivo ligands are known for the SH3 domain of Hck. In this study, we used mass spectrometry to identify ∼25 potential binding partners for the SH3 domain of Hck from the monocyte cell line U937. Two major interacting proteins were the actin binding proteins Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome protein (WASP) and WASP-interacting protein (WIP). We also focused on a novel interaction between Hck and ELMO1, an 84-kDa protein that was recently identified as the mammalian ortholog of the Caenorhabditis elegansgene, ced-12. In mammalian cells, ELMO1 interacts with Dock180 as a component of the CrkII/Dock180/Rac pathway responsible for phagocytosis and cell migration. Using purified proteins, we confirmed that WASP-interacting protein and ELMO1 interact directly with the SH3 domain of Hck. We also show that Hck and ELMO1 interact in intact cells and that ELMO1 is heavily tyrosine-phosphorylated in cells that co-express Hck, suggesting that it is a substrate of Hck. The binding of ELMO1 to Hck is specifically dependent on the interaction of a polyproline motif with the SH3 domain of Hck. Our results suggest that these proteins may be novel activators/effectors of Hck.
Small Phytoplankton and Carbon Export from the Surface Ocean

Autotrophic picoplankton dominate primary production over large oceanic regions but are believed to contribute relatively little to carbon export from surface layers. Using analyses of data from the equatorial Pacific Ocean and Arabian Sea, we show that the relative direct and indirect contribution of picoplankton to export is proportional to their total net primary production, despite their small size. We suggest that all primary producers, not just the large cells, can contribute to export from the surface layer of the ocean at rates proportional to their production rates.