Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Tabanid (Diptera) populations associated with an equine infectious anemia outbreak in an inapparently infected herd of horses.

Seven horses positive for antibodies to equine infectious anemia virus in the agar gel immunodiffusion test were maintained together with 8 test-negative horses in an isolated pasture in south Louisiana for 1 year. Although the test-positive horses were inapparently infected (exhibiting no clinical signs of equine infectious anemia), 6 of the 8 test-negative horses became test-positive during 1 vector season. Canopy trap surveillance revealed Hybomitra lasiophthalma as the only tabanid species present during 2 equine infectious anemia virus transmissions in March. A high population of Tabanus lineola was present during the remaining 4 virus transmissions in July, September, and October.
Increasing prevalences of overweight and obesity in Northern Plains American Indian children.

OBJECTIVES To report prevalences of overweight and obesity in a large sample of American Indian children from a survey in 2002-2003, and to evaluate the change in prevalences since 1995-1996 when children on the same reservations were measured. DESIGN Analysis of survey data. SETTING Aberdeen Area Indian Health Service (North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, and Nebraska). PARTICIPANTS A total of 11 538 American Indian children (aged 5-17 years) attending 55 schools on 12 reservations. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE Height and weight measured during the 2002-2003 school year by the same team as in the earlier survey. Prevalences of overweight (> or =85th percentile) and obesity (> or =95th percentile) were calculated on the basis of body mass index (calculated as weight in kilograms divided by the square of height in meters) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention growth charts. RESULTS At 5 years of age, 47% of boys and 41% of girls were overweight, and 24% of the children were obese. Prevalences of overweight and obesity exceeded those for the most recent available data for all US children at almost every age. In the intervening 7 to 8 years between surveys, prevalences of overweight and obesity continued to increase in the children by 4.5% and 4.3%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS Prevalences of overweight and obesity in the most recent sample of American Indian children indicate that they are at even higher risk for these conditions and their health-related sequelae than the best estimates for all US children, with prevalences as high as or higher than those for any other racial or ethnic groups of children reported in the most recent national surveys.
Effects of Asian Dust Storm Events on Daily Clinical Visits for Conjunctivitis in Taipei, Taiwan

In spring, windblown dust storms originating in the deserts of Mongolia and China make their way to Taipei city. These occurrences are known as Asian dust storm (ADS) events. The objective of this study was to assess the possible associations of ADS with daily clinic visits for conjunctivitis in residents in Taipei, Taiwan, during the period from 1997–2001. Forty-nine dust storm episodes were classified and classified as index days. Daily clinical visits for conjunctivitis on the index days were compared with clinical visits on the comparison (non-storm) days. Two comparison days for each index day, 7 d before the index days and 7 d after the index days, were selected. The effects of dust storms on clinic visits for conjunctivitis were prominent 4 d after the event. However, the association was not statistically significant. There may not have been enough power to detect associations resulting from the inadequate sample size of conjunctivitis visits on ADS events days. However, it seems worthwhile to pay more attention to the ADS events and health in the future.
Malassezia (Pityrosporum) folliculitis occurring with granuloma annulare and alopecia areata.

Pityrosporumfolliculitis has been described infrequently in the English language literature,1-3and, to our knowledge, has not been reported in association with other dermatologic disease. We recently encountered a patient with the clinicohistopathologic features of this entity occurring simultaneously with granuloma annulare and alopecia areata. We prefer the termMalasseziafolliculitis, since in its most recent manual the American Society for Microbiology states that "Malassezia furfuris now considered to be the valid name under which bothPityrosporum ovaleandP orbiculareare combined. "4-5 Report of a Case A 35-year-old man was seen in the dermatology department of the National Naval Medical Center in March 1981, with complaints of hair loss and an eruption on his back and chest, both of two-months' duration. The lesions on his back and chest were occasionally pruritic. His medical history was unremarkable and he was receiving no medications. Examination of the patient
Image classification and reconstruction using Markov Random Field modeling and sparsity

The medical imaging requires fast and accurate volume reconstruction. This may be used to evaluate, before any treatment, differences between previsions, formulated in an MRI scanner and the actual patient anatomy, captured with X-Ray shoots. Based on a set of input projections, the task is to define a value in each volume's position such that the reconstruction's projections are as close as possible to the inputs. In this thesis we investigate two volume reconstruction problems. The first is formulating in the Markov Random Field (MRF). The particular studied problem investigates the reconstruction with only two orthogonal projections. The MRF formulation makes possible to reconstruct a volume close to the target, even with this restricted set of projections. We present algorithmic solutions and graph formulations to reconstruct volumes with a known set of pixels efficiently. Also, this framework provides an efficient formulation to solve imaging recognition problems. We present a mathematical formalism and an algorithmic solution to extract biological roots efficiently. Then, we investigate another framework: Compressed Sensing. The presented solution aims to reconstruct an MRI volume efficiently with a minimal number of measurements. We present an evaluation of the quality of the reconstruction that uses only reconstruction's wavelet coefficients. This criterion makes possible to stop the acquisition process at constant quality, and to capture only the needed measurements. Also, in our particular scenario, we use the previous reconstructed slice as a prior knowledge and perform the reconstruction on a part of the support only. This improvement increases the quality of the reconstruction. All culminates in an efficient volume reconstruction with a dynamic restricted number of measurements.
A Lazy Model-Based Approach to On-Line Classication

The growing access to large amounts of structured observations allows for more opportunistic uses of this data. An example of this, is the prediction of an event’s class membership based on a database of observations. When these predictions are supported by a highlevel representation, we refer to these as knowledge based on-line classification tasks. Two common types of algorithms from machine learning research that may be applied to on-line classification tasks make use of either lazy instance-based (k-NN,IB1) or eager model-based (C4.5,CN2) approaches. Neither approach, however, appears to provide a complete solution for these tasks. This thesis proposes a lazy model-based algorithm, named DBPredictor, that is suited to knowledge based on-line classification tasks. The algorithm uses a greedy top-down search to locate a probabilistic IF-THEN rule that will classify the given event. Empirical investigation validates this match. DBPredictor is shown to be as accurate as IB1 and C4.5 against general datasets. Its accuracy however, is more robust to irrelevant attributes than IB1, and more robust to underspecified events than C4.5. Finally, DBPredictor is shown to solve a significant number of classification requests before C4.5 can satisfy its first request. These performance characteristics, along with the algorithm’s ability to avoid discretization of numerical attributes and its ability to be tightly-coupled with a relational database, suggests that DBPredictor is an appropriate algorithm for knowledge based on-line classification tasks.
Eléments de discussion pour une sociologie des bifurcations (contingences, évenements, et niveaux d'action)

Les sociologues sont souvent confrontes a des situations dans lesquelles les acteurs expliquent une situation par des « raisons historiques » ou evoquent l'« impossibilite de faire machine arriere » apres certains choix. Ou encore, les sociologues eux-memes ont le sentiment d'etre face a une « rupture importante », un « moment de redefinition », etc. C'est evidemment particulierement frequent lorsque l'on s'interesse a des changements, des temporalites, bref lorsqu'on se met en position de recueillir des « histoires ». Les approches biographiques (« histoires de vie », « recits de pratiques », etc.) et les etudes longitudinales sont particulierement propices au recueil de tels recits, mais ce ne sont pas les seules. Les recherches sur l'innovation scientifique et technique sont aussi par definition sensibles aux situations de changement brusque, ne serait-ce que parce que la notion meme d'innovation introduit un type d'interrogation favorable a la recherche des ruptures. Les etudes de mouvements sociaux evoquent parfois des « conversions » massives. Enfin la sociologie historique est aussi amenee a rendre compte de « revolutions », de « mutations », etc.
About Contact us My IOPscience

Modern infectious disease epidemiology has a strong history of using mathematics both for prediction and to gain a deeper understanding. However the study of infectious diseases is a highly interdisciplinary subject requiring insights from multiple disciplines, in particular a biological knowledge of the pathogen, a statistical description of the available data and a mathematical framework for prediction. Here we begin with the basic building blocks of infectious disease epidemiology—the SIS and SIR type models—before considering the progress that has been made over the recent decades and the challenges that lie ahead. Throughout we focus on the understanding that can be developed from relatively simple models, although accurate prediction will inevitably require far greater complexity beyond the scope of this review. In particular, we focus on three critical aspects of infectious disease models that we feel fundamentally shape their dynamics: heterogeneously structured populations, stochasticity and spatial structure. Throughout we relate the mathematical models and their results to a variety of real-world problems.
Hyponatremia treatment guidelines 2007: expert panel recommendations.

Plasma sodium is one of the most commonly measured analytes in laboratory medicine and hyponatraemia is frequently observed, occurring in 15–30% of hospital patients. Severe hyponatraemia is important because of its associated mortality and morbidity risks, and because its treatment also carries the risk of severe morbidity. Nevertheless, it is a complex subject and our understanding of its pathophysiology is incomplete. Although many authors have published in the area there is little in the way of evidence-based guidelines, and, except for part of a recent publication,1 no Australasian guidelines on diagnosis or management that this author could find.
A defence of functional modularity

Although belief in the existence of mental modules of some form is widespread among cognitive researchers, neurally sophisticated researchers commonly resist the view that cognitive processing involves modules that are functionally independent of one another. Moreover, within the past few years, at least three noted researchers (Fodor, Kosslyn and Uttal) have called into serious question the existence of distinct modules in broad areas of human cognition. This paper offers a defence of the existence of functionally independent modules, which, though spatially distributed, communicate via traditionally conceived input/output channels. This defence proceeds: (i) by showing that the anti-modularity arguments of Fodor, Kosslyn and Uttal are not compelling; (ii) by presenting theoretically-grounded reasons why any connectionist is committed, via the most basic tenets of connectionism, to accepting the existence of functionally independent modules; (iii) by presenting holistically inclined connectionists with a novel challenge, namely, to demonstrate that a single, holistic network could display strong levels of generalization as a side-effect of multiple, previously acquired skills. In the course of these arguments, I examine a recent generalization challenge posed by Phillips (2000, Connection Science, 12: 1–19) to eliminative connectionists.
Association between PrP genotypes and selected growth traits of Hungarian Merino and German Mutton Merino rams.

Abstract. In sheep, susceptibility to scrapie is associated with the prion protein (PrP) gene polymorphism. In this study the association between selected growth traits (daily weight gain from birth to weaning and in farm fattening performance test, as well as body weight at one and two years) and PrP genotypes ARR/ARR, ARR/XXX and XXX/XXX (XXX representing AHQ, ARQ, ARH or VRQ) has been investigated in Hungarian Merino (n=286) and German Mutton Merino (n=215) rams. No significant association was found among the studied growth traits and the PrP genotypes in the Hungarian Merino breed. In case of a group of German Mutton Merino rams lamb daily gain was significantly (P≤0.05) – but in a small extent – associated with PrP genotype, which influenced the daily gain values by 9.6 %.
Toxic nodular goiter with thyroid papillary microcarcinoma

The coincidence of thyroid microcarcinoma and hyperthyroidism is not common. However, toxic nodular goiter (Plummer disease) is a subgroup of hyperthyroidism, and is reported to have a higher risk for thyroid carcinoma than Graves’ hyperthyroidism. Meanwhile, autoimmune thyroiditis is also reported to be related to thyroid carcinoma. We here find the case of a 47-year-old woman with nodular goiter of the right anterior neck without prominent evidence of hyperthyroidism. However, a thyroid Iradioactive iodine scan revealed a hot nodule with a faint outline for remaining suppressed thyroid tissue. When right total thyroidectomy was carried out, the pathology revealed a nodular goiter, with incidental thyroid papillary microcarcinoma and autoimmune thyroiditis which were masked by the toxic nodular goiter before thyroidectomy. A hot nodule on a thyroid Iscan is often considered to be a benign lesion. Occult thyroid carcinomas are usually found incidentally during surgical intervention for toxic nodular goiter. The reasons for this could be: (i) thyroid carcinoma behaves as an autonomously hyperfunctioning nodule; (ii) cancer cells located in a toxic nodular goiter; (iii) microcarcinoma occurring near the toxic nodules (as in our patient); and (iv) metastatic lesions from the contralateral lobe. The incidence of thyroid carcinoma combined with toxic nodular goiter also varies considerably, but the trend indicated the coincidence of malignancy and toxic nodular goiter (Table 1). In previous reports, the association between thyroid cancer and hyperthyroidism was more frequent in toxic adenoma or toxic nodular goiter than other types of hyperthyroidism. Because thyroid carcinoma is not an unusual finding with toxic nodular goiter, surgical intervention should be considered as a substitute for conventional radioactive iodine ablative therapy.
Broadside Radiation by Excitation of EBG Leaky Mode

A broadside radiation from an electromagnetic band-gap (EBG) waveguide is achieved. The EBG waveguide, which operates around 30 GHz, is designed using a square lattice of metal vias to build a spatial power combiner. A surface mode was excited by adding a row of holes to the square lattice of metal vias. The row of holes was modulated to couple the surface mode to a leaky mode that radiates in free space. The return loss of the optimized structure is less than -10 dB around a frequency of 30 GHz, and the radiation pattern has the main beam along the broadside. The measured data of the fabricated structure confirm the directional radiation pattern.
Outcomes for elderly, advanced-stage non small-cell lung cancer patients treated with bevacizumab in combination with carboplatin and paclitaxel: analysis of Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group Trial 4599.

PURPOSE Fit elderly patients with advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) benefit from platinum-based, two-drug chemotherapy. Bevacizumab (B) in combination with carboplatin (C) and paclitaxel (P) improves survival for advanced, nonsquamous NSCLC, as evidenced in Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) 4599. We conducted a subset analysis of ECOG 4599 to determine the outcome for elderly patients. PATIENTS AND METHODS ECOG 4599 randomly assigned patients with advanced nonsquamous NSCLC to PC or to PCB. We analyzed outcome in patients who were at least 70 years of age at the time of study entry. Patient characteristics, efficacy, and toxicity data were compared between PC and PCB for the elderly. Outcomes for elderly and younger patients (< 70 years) treated with PCB were also compared. RESULTS Among elderly patients (n = 224; 26%), there was a trend towards higher response rate (29% v 17%; P = .067) and progression-free survival (5.9 v 4.9 months; P = .063) with PCB compared with PC, although overall survival (PCB = 11.3 months; PC = 12.1 months; P = .4) was similar. Grade 3 to 5 toxicities occurred in 87% of elderly patients with PCB versus 61% with PC (P < .001), with seven treatment-related deaths in the PCB arm compared with two with PC. Elderly patients had higher incidence of grade 3 to 5 neutropenia, bleeding, and proteinuria with PCB compared with younger patients. CONCLUSION In elderly NSCLC patients, PCB was associated with a higher degree of toxicity, but no obvious improvement in survival compared with PC. Data from this unplanned, retrospective analysis justify prospective evaluation of the therapeutic index of PCB regimen in elderly patients.
Forbidden penta‐peptides

There are 3,200,000 amino acid sequences of length 5 (penta‐peptides). Statistically, we expect to see a distribution of penta‐peptides that is determined by the frequency of the participating amino acids. We show, however, that not only are there thousands of such penta‐peptides that are absent from all known proteomes, but many of them are coded for multiple times in the non‐coding genomic regions. This suggests a strong selection process that prevents these peptides from being expressed. We also show that the characteristics of these forbidden penta‐peptides vary among different phylogenetic groups (e.g., eukaryotes, prokaryotes, and archaea). Our analysis provides the first steps toward understanding the “grammar” of the forbidden penta‐peptides.
Divergent host plant specialization as the critical driving force in speciation between populations of a phytophagous ladybird beetle

Detecting the isolating barrier that arises earliest in speciation is critically important to understanding the mechanism of species formation. We tested isolating barriers between host races of a phytophagous ladybird beetle, Henosepilachna diekei (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae: Epilachnine), that occur sympatrically on distinct host plants. We conducted field surveys for the distribution of the beetles and host plants, rearing experiments to measure six potential isolating factors (adult host preference, adult and larval host performance, sexual isolation, egg hatchability, F1 hybrid inviability, and sexual selection against F1 hybrids), and molecular analyses of mitochondrial ND2 and the nuclear ITS2 sequences. We found significant genetic divergence between the host races, and extremely divergent host preference (i.e. habitat isolation) and host performance (i.e. immigrant inviability), but no other isolating barriers. The fidelity to particular host plants arises first and alone can prevent gene flow between differentiating populations of phytophagous specialists.
Enhanced Test Case Generation with the Classification Tree Method

To make a statement on software quality, a methodical approach on software testing is absolutely necessary. One common approach is the classification tree method introduced in 1993. All relevant test aspects of a system under test and their characteristics are divided into disjoint subsets. Test cases are then generated by combining specific characteristics of each aspect. Depending on the size (cardinality) and number of different aspects, the number of possible combinations grows exponentially. Therefore tools for applying the classification tree method offer coverage criteria for automated test case generation. Typically current coverage criteria are minimal or complete combination. Additionally, test case generation needs to consider specific dependencies between characteristics of test aspects. Existing approaches do not offer a prioritization of certain test aspects during test case generation. However, prioritization of test aspects is important for a number of different reasons: Test resources may be limited, testing can be expensive, as it may be destructive, or it may be desirable to only use a subset of test cases as an initial test. Current approaches can be divided into deterministic and non-deterministic techniques. The current classification tree editor uses a non-deterministic technique to generate test cases. Resulting test suites vary in size and composition. During test case generation, dependencies and the classification tree itself are stored in different data structures. Therefore, test cases additionally need to be validated against the dependency rules during test case generation. Up to now, no approach supports the automated generation of test sequences from classification trees. Test sequences can however be defined manually by the user. This work presents a new approach for qualifying the classification tree with test aspects of importance (e.g. test costs, test duration, probabilites etc.). These numbers can be used for prioritized test case generation and to optimize test suites and, therefore, to reduce their size. For dependency handling, we use an integrated data structure holding both the classification tree and its dependency rules. The data structure is also used for a new deterministic test case generation, which handles dependencies directly during the process of test case generation. The resulting test suite should be equal or smaller in size while generation should be as fast as or even faster than current generation approaches. Finally, a new approach for automatic test sequence generation from classification trees is presented as well. We identify parameters for test sequence generation and develop new dependency rules and new generation rules. Results are then compared using common algorithms and standard benchmarks.