Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Influence of training environment and cognitive deficits on use of feedback for motor learning in chronic stroke

Feedback provision is an essential component of motor learning for improving upper limb recovery in people with stroke. Along with sensorimotor impairments, many individuals post-stroke have cognitive deficits that can influence arm motor recovery. However, few studies have identified whether the training environment and presence of cognitive deficits influences the ability to use feedback in individuals post-stroke. We evaluated the influence of the training environment and cognitive impairments on the ability to use feedback to enhance arm motor recovery. Twenty-four subjects with chronic post-stroke upper limb hemiparesis were randomized to practice pointing movements in a 3D virtual environment (VE) or a similarly designed physical environment (PE; n=12/group) for 12 sessions (72 trials/session, 3 days/week). All participants were provided with feedback about movement speed (Knowledge of Results) and trunk displacement (Knowledge of Performance). Neurocognitive functioning was assessed only before task practice (PRE), while kinematic assessments were carried out at PRE, immediately after (POST) and 3 months (RET) after task practice. Repeated measures ANOVAs with mixed models assessed the changes in kinematic outcomes. Neurocognitive function was correlated with kinematic outcomes. Those training in the VE had greater endpoint speed and ranges of shoulder horizontal adduction, shoulder flexion and elbow extension. They also tended to use less trunk displacement. Kinematic deficits influenced the ability to use feedback in people with chronic stroke for upper limb motor learning and recovery. Information about the presence of these deficits can help in the selection of the most appropriate interventions for maximizing arm motor recovery and motor learning in chronic stroke.
High virulence in hamsters of four dominant Leptospira serovars isolated from rats in the Philippines.

Leptospirosis is caused by pathogenic species of Leptospira. The aim of this study was to determine and characterize the pathogenicity of four dominant Leptospira isolates prevailing among rats in the Philippines. The isolates were Leptospira interrogans serovar Manilae strain K64, L. interrogans serovar Losbanos strain K37, L. interrogans serovar Ratnapura strain K5 and Leptospira borgpetersenii serovar Javanica strain K6. Pathogenicities were studied using hamsters, which reproduce severe human leptospirosis. The minimum lethal doses were 10(0) ( = 1) leptospires for K64, K37 and K5, and 10(1) leptospires for K6. Weight loss amongst the Leptospira-infected hamsters was observed from 1 day before death (K64-, K37- and K5-infected hamsters) to as much as 1 week before death for K6-infected hamsters. Similar and varied gross and microscopic lesions were observed amongst infected hamsters, even for strains belonging to the same species (i.e. L. interrogans). The most significant and common histopathological findings were congestion of the glomerulus, disarrangement of hepatic cords and erythrophagocytosis. Other findings were foamy splenic macrophages for K6, severe petechial pulmonary haemorrhage for K64, and hematuria and severe pulmonary congestion for K37. Immunostaining and culture revealed the presence of leptospires in different organs of the infected hamsters. Based on these results, Leptospira isolates from rats in the Philippines were shown to be highly virulent, causing pulmonary haemorrhage, severe hepato-renal damage and death in hamsters even at lower doses. The present findings on experimental leptospirosis support clinical data showing that patients with severe manifestations of leptospirosis, such as pulmonary haemorrhage, are increasing in the Philippines. These findings may serve as a basis to strengthen the early diagnosis and treatment of human leptospirosis.
Gait parameters predicted by Timed Up and Go performance in stroke patients.

BACKGROUND The Timed Up and Go (TUG) is a test of functional mobility which is routinely used in the assessment of hemiparetic patients. This easy and rapid to perform test includes motor tasks which occur frequently in daily life (stand up, walk, turn, sit down). Correlations between TUG performance and kinematic and kinetic gait parameters have never been studied. OBJECTIVE The aim of this study was to determine whether kinematic and kinetic gait parameters would be more related to TUG performance than spatio-temporal parameters in stroke patients. METHODS Sixty hemiparetic patients able to walk alone performed the TUG test and underwent 3D gait analysis and a clinical evaluation. A stepwise regression analysis was used to select the gait variables that best explained the variability in TUG performance. RESULTS The percentage of the gait cycle spent in single support phase on the paretic limb was the factor which was the most predictive and correlated with TUG performance, explaining 67% of the variance. No kinematic or kinetic gait parameters explained TUG performance. The results also suggested that TUG performance is mainly related to paretic lower limb motor function. CONCLUSIONS TUG performance in hemiparetic patients mainly depends on the motor ability of the paretic lower limb, particularly the single support phase on the paretic side. Kinematic and kinetic gait parameters do not predict the TUG performance in stroke patients.
Long-acting insulin analogues versus NPH insulin (human isophane insulin) for type 2 diabetes mellitus.

BACKGROUND Despite indications from epidemiological trials that higher blood glucose concentrations are associated with a higher risk for developing micro- and macrovascular complications, evidence for a beneficial effect of antihyperglycaemic therapy in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus is conflicting. Two large studies, the United Kingdom Prospective Diabetes Study (UKPDS) and the University Group Diabetes Program (UGDP), did not find a reduction of cardiovascular endpoints through improvement of metabolic control. The theoretical benefits of newer insulin analogues might result in fewer macrovascular and microvascular events. OBJECTIVES To assess the effects of long-term treatment with long-acting insulin analogues (insulin glargine and insulin detemir) compared to NPH insulin in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. SEARCH STRATEGY Studies were obtained from computerised searches of MEDLINE, EMBASE, The Cochrane Library and communication with experts in the field as well as insulin producing companies. SELECTION CRITERIA Studies were included if they were randomised controlled trials in adults with diabetes mellitus type 2 and had a trial duration of at least 24 weeks. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS Two authors independently assessed trial quality and extracted data. Pooling of studies by means of random-effects meta-analyses was performed. MAIN RESULTS Six studies comparing insulin glargine to NPH (Neutral Protamine Hagedorn) insulin and two studies comparing insulin detemir to NPH insulin were identified. In these trials, 1715 patients were randomised to insulin glargine and 578 patients to insulin detemir. Duration of the included trials ranged from 24 to 52 weeks. Metabolic control, measured by glycosylated haemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) as a surrogate endpoint, and adverse effects did not differ in a clinical relevant way between treatment groups. While no statistically significant difference for severe hypoglycaemia rates was shown in any of the trials, the rate of symptomatic, overall and nocturnal hypoglycaemia was statistically significantly lower in patients treated with either insulin glargine or detemir. No evidence for a beneficial effect of long-acting analogues on patient-oriented outcomes like mortality, morbidity, quality of life or costs could be obtained. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS Our analysis suggests, if at all only a minor clinical benefit of treatment with long-acting insulin analogues for patients with diabetes mellitus type 2 treated with "basal" insulin regarding symptomatic nocturnal hypoglycaemic events. Until long-term efficacy and safety data are available, we suggest a cautious approach to therapy with insulin glargine or detemir.
A medical case book: Leeds, 1781-84.

THIS paper is based on a manuscript notebook of 281 pages, dated 1781-84, of case histories of 122 patients treated as in-and outpatients at the General Infirmary at Leeds. Patients came from all over Yorkshire, and a few from Lancashire and Lincolnshire, particularly to consult Mr William Hey, FRS, senior surgeon to the Infirmary from 1773 to 1812. Patronage tickets were required. The notebook was discovered at the Liverpool Medical Institution by its archivist, Mr John A. Shepherd, FRCS, who kindly sent me a photostat copy. The Council of the Institution has given permission for publication of extracts, for which I am grateful. How the notebook reached Liverpool is not known. The notes must have been made by the apothecary (resident medical officer) at the time he examined the patients. They do not include all the patients treated during the period, and are, presumably, Eighteenth-century clinical records are rare, and those in this notebook are unusually full. The diagnoses of the illnesses of the 122 patients recorded are shown in Table 1. The ten case histories that follow were chosen purely for their interest and variety. Many more warranted inclusion, but space prevents it. Spelling and punctuation are exactly as in the original. PATIENT ONE This history is about a child of three years with stones in the bladder. The child was given opium after the operation. In these case histories this was usual, but it is curious that it never appears to have been given before surgery. Mr Hey Robt Mosely Aet 3 years, of Hunslet near Leeds, was admitted Octob r 6 a patient of the Infirmary, his complaint was a Stone in the Bladder which he had been afflicted with since birth.
On Optimized Uniform Quantization for SC Decoder of Polar Codes

Polar codes have a regular recursive structure which is feasible for hardware implementation in practice. Quantization is a critical issue in hardware implementation. In this paper, a quantization scheme for successive-cancellation (SC) decoding of polar codes is proposed based on the equivalent channel cutoff rate optimization. Moreover, a modified Gaussian approximation (GA) method exploiting the cutoff rate maximizing criterion is brought forward to construct polar codes and estimate frame error rate (FER) performance under the quantized decoding algorithms. Utilizing the modified GA, the optimal quantization bits can be determined. Simulation results demonstrate that a 6-bit uniform quantized SC decoder could achieve a near floating point performance. Compared with the existing results in the published literature, the proposed method consumes no more than 4.5 quantization bits and performs better.
Factores limitantes para el crecimiento y productividadd del arroz en Entre Ríos, Argentina

Esta tesis desarrolla un analisis cuantitativo del sistema cultivo del arroz en la provincia de Ente Rios, Argentina. Se analiza como la temperatura, la radiacion, las caracteristicas de los suelos, las aguas de riego y el manejo que realizan los agricultores determinan el rendimiento del arroz. El objetivo fue conocer el sistema de produccion arroz en Entre Rios y determinar cuales son los factores mas importantes que limitan el crecimiento y la productividad del cultivo; identificando la brecha entre el rendimiento actual y potencial a nivel de campo. Luego de un capitulo introductorio donde se presentan las generalidades del cultivo de arroz en Argentina, los fundamentos, los objetivos e hipotesis de la investigacion realizada; en el Capitulo II, se describe el medio fisico y las caracteristicas del area de estudio, asi como los aspectos de la fisiologia y la genetica del arroz. En el Capitulo III se presentan en detalle los materiales y metodos empleados. Se trata de 180 observaciones en campos de agricultores, durante 4 anos, donde se evaluaron variables de suelo, clima, agua, manejo, estructura del cultivo, absorcion de nutrientes. Mas de 80 variables fueron analizadas estadisticamente y mediante un proceso logico deductivo, que tiende a identificar los factores que determinan el rendimiento. El Capitulo IV muestra los resultados presentando los distintos factores en forma individual. Se analizo el efecto de las temperaturas extremas (frio y calor) sobre el rendimiento y de las temperaturas medias sobre la duracion de los periodos fenologicos. Se estimo el rendimiento potencial para Entre Rios en 14 Mg/ha, siendo la produccion media de 7 Mg/ha y habiendose registrado un maximo de 13,7 Mg/ha en ensayos experimentales. Con la genetica disponible existe una brecha explorable de 3 Mg/ha ente el rendimiento actual y el alcanzable. Los componentes del cultivo mas importantes fueron el numero de panojas por unidad de superficie y el numero de granos llenos por panoja. Los suelos no presentaron limitaciones importantes para el arroz, solo el pH elevado y la salinidad deprimieron el rendimiento en algunos sitios. Las aguas de riego en general fueron adecuadas y solo las bicarbonatadas calcicas III mostraron algun efecto negativo. Dentro de las practicas de manejo, el control de malezas y la fertilizacion con nitrogeno fueron los factores mas importantes. La concentracion de N y K en los tejidos de las plantas de arroz analizados en distintos momentos mostraron bajos valores limitando el rendimiento La discusion general de los resultados se puede ver en el Capitulo V y las conclusiones en el Capitulo VI. La informacion presentada en este trabajo es util para que agricultores, extensionistas y planificadores encuentren herramientas para la toma de decisiones de campo, asi como para los planes de desarrollo e investigaciones a llevar adelante en la zona.
Kerr nonlinearity compensation in a 5×28-GBd PDM 16-QAM WDM system using fiber-based optical phase conjugation

Effective Kerr nonlinearity mitigation is experimentally demonstrated using optical phase conjugation in the middle of an 800-km dispersion-compensated link for a 5-channel WDM 28-GBd PDM 16-QAM signal. A Q-factor improvement of 0.9 dB over no mitigation allows a BER<;3.8×10-3.
Spatial co-adaptation of cortical control columns in a micro-ECoG brain–computer interface

Objective. Electrocorticography (ECoG) has been used for a range of applications including electrophysiological mapping, epilepsy monitoring, and more recently as a recording modality for brain–computer interfaces (BCIs). Studies that examine ECoG electrodes designed and implanted chronically solely for BCI applications remain limited. The present study explored how two key factors influence chronic, closed-loop ECoG BCI: (i) the effect of inter-electrode distance on BCI performance and (ii) the differences in neural adaptation and performance when fixed versus adaptive BCI decoding weights are used. Approach. The amplitudes of epidural micro-ECoG signals between 75 and 105 Hz with 300 μm diameter electrodes were used for one-dimensional and two-dimensional BCI tasks. The effect of inter-electrode distance on BCI control was tested between 3 and 15 mm. Additionally, the performance and cortical modulation differences between constant, fixed decoding using a small subset of channels versus adaptive decoding weights using the entire array were explored. Main results. Successful BCI control was possible with two electrodes separated by 9 and 15 mm. Performance decreased and the signals became more correlated when the electrodes were only 3 mm apart. BCI performance in a 2D BCI task improved significantly when using adaptive decoding weights (80%–90%) compared to using constant, fixed weights (50%–60%). Additionally, modulation increased for channels previously unavailable for BCI control under the fixed decoding scheme upon switching to the adaptive, all-channel scheme. Significance. Our results clearly show that neural activity under a BCI recording electrode (which we define as a ‘cortical control column’) readily adapts to generate an appropriate control signal. These results show that the practical minimal spatial resolution of these control columns with micro-ECoG BCI is likely on the order of 3 mm. Additionally, they show that the combination and interaction between neural adaptation and machine learning are critical to optimizing ECoG BCI performance.
Analysis of the sensitivity of AC magnetic ranging systems to environmental configurations

The influence of the environmental configuration on AC magnetic distance-measurement systems, which are based on inductive coupling of tuned resonators, is experimentally analyzed. The main aspects that affect accuracy in such systems are the conductivity of the terrain and the presence of metallic materials near the resonators. It is shown that such aspects are frequency-dependent, and a tradeoff is to be considered between maximum operating range and error. Moreover, a strategy to detect if measurement results are corrupted by environmental configuration is presented. This strategy is crucial to improve the integrity of positioning systems.
Applications of molecular modeling in the design of new insect repellents targeting the odorant binding protein of Anopheles gambiae

Mosquitoes are responsible for conveying various diseases caused by viruses, parasites and helminthes. Considering the cost and complexity of the treatment of these diseases, the use of repellents for protection from the mosquito vectors becomes an interesting alternative. In the present work, docking and molecular dynamics (MD) studies were performed on potential ligands to the odorant binding protein of the mosquito Anopheles gambiae (AgOBP1), the main vector of malaria. The binding modes on AgOBP1 of molecules with known attractive activities and the main components of the oil of indian clove (Syzygium aromaticum) with potential repellent activities were compared to the known repellent N,N-diethyl-3-methylbenzamide (DEET). Results suggest the eugenyl acetate as a better repellent than DEET and also reveal the main features of the binding site of AgOBP1 important to the design of new and more efficient repellents.
Protein Analysis of Glioblastoma Primary and Posttreatment Pairs Suggests a Mesenchymal Shift at Recurrence

Glioblastomas (GBM) are aggressive brain tumors that inevitably recur despite surgical resection, chemotherapy, and radiation. The degree to which recurrent GBM retains its initial immunophenotype is incompletely understood. We generated tissue microarrays of paired initial and posttreatment GBM (3 pairs positive and 17 negative for IDH1R132H) from the same patients and made comparisons in the IDH1R132H-negative group for immunohistochemical and gene expression differences between primary and recurrent tumors. In initial tumors, immunopositivity for Ki-67 in > 20% of tumor cells was associated with shorter progression-free and overall survival. Recurrent tumors showed decreased staining for CD34 suggesting lower vessel density. A subset of tumors showed increased staining for markers associated with the mesenchymal gene expression pattern, including CD44, phosphorylated STAT3, and YKL40. Recurrent tumors with the greatest increase in mesenchymal marker expression had rapid clinical progression, but no difference in overall survival after second surgery. Comparison of protein and gene expression data from the same samples revealed a poor correlation. A subset of tumors (15%) showed loss of neurofibromin protein in both initial and recurrent tumors. These data support the notion that GBM progression is associated with a shift toward a mesenchymal phenotype in a subset of tumors and this may portend a more aggressive behavior.
Evolutionary passive optical ring architectures for user-empowered MANs

The continuously increasing bandwidth and QoS demand, together with the increased availability of dark fiber infrastructures that some competitive carriers are starting to sell or long-term lease at reasonable prices, is driving many organizations to behave as local network operators to deploy and manage their own independent optical high-speed metro access networks, rather than relying on the service-based offerings from traditional carriers. In this scenario passive optical network (PON) technology is emerging as the best solution for cost-effective delivery of high bandwidth data directly to the customers. In this paper we propose a WDM-based multi-ring PON architecture which may be in our opinion, a suitable model for small-to-medium scale customer-empowered metro networks.
Near‐field Raman spectroscopy using a sharp metal tip

Near‐field Raman spectroscopy with a spatial resolution of 20 nm is demonstrated by raster scanning a sharp metal tip over the sample surface. The method is used to image vibrational modes of single‐walled carbon nanotubes. By combining optical and topographical signals rendered by the single‐walled carbon nanotubes, we can separate near‐field and far‐field contributions and quantify the observed Raman enhancement factors.
Work in Progress - Teaching Opportunity Identification

Engineers need to understand not only how to design products but also how to identify promising product opportunities. This knowledge allows engineers to move from supporting product innovation to driving innovation. By understanding and participating in the process engineers will be better able to understand customer needs, select product architectures compatible with future product goals and complete the product development process with less iteration. This paper describes two exercises which the authors have developed to guide students through the opportunity identification process. The first method is a big picture approach. Students are asked to identify significant macro changes in the larger environment. Students use these changes to identify future unmet needs. Finally product opportunities are created to meet the identified unmet needs. The second method focuses on identifying opportunities created by a designated macro environmental change such as the aging of the developed world. The methods presented allow engineering educators to easily implement opportunity identification material in their classes.
Low cost intelligent notification and alarming system for ambient assisted living applications

In this paper we will propose a solution for home setup of sensors and actuators that are required for appropriate functioning of any Ambient Assisted Living application. The proposed installation solution is low cost, easy to install, modular and reliable. Detailed analysis of sensor states is performed as well as analysis of different in home scenarios. Additionally an algorithm for Intelligent Notification and Alarming System for analysing data acquired from the sensors is proposed as well. The presented system may represent a good starting point for further elaboration and exploitation.