Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
ASSESSMENT OF THE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS EMPLOYED BY KENYAN UNIVERSITIES IN PROMOTING QUALITY EDUCATION THAT MEETS THE NEEDS OF STUDENTS

: Quality Management Systems (QMS) refer to a framework of organized structures, methods, techniques, policies, procedures, processes, and resources established by organizations to ensure that responsibilities, schedules, relationships, contracts, and agreements are carried out as required to help them run effectively. Designing and implementing a quality management system in an organization is critical in meeting the customer’s requirements and expectations as well as instilling confidence in the organization, which in turn leads to more customers, more sales, and more repeat business. It further help to meet the organization's requirements, which ensures compliance with regulations and provision of products and services in effective and efficient manner, creating room for expansion, growth, and profit. A QMS also helps an organization to communicate to all staff a readiness to produce consistent results, prevent mistakes, reduce costs, ensure that processes are defined and controlled, and continually improve the organization's services. In a university, the focus of QMA activities is the achievement of relevant quality education. This study reviews literature on the QMS established by universities in Kenya to enhance quality improvement with a view to making recommendations on how the institutions could employ QMS to ensure that they offer relevant quality education that is responsive to the needs of students.
Scintigraphic validation of a magnetic resonance imaging method to study gastric emptying of a solid meal in humans

Background We have previously used a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) method to study gastric emptying of liquids. So far, however, it has not possible to assess solid gastric emptying with this technique. Aims To validate scintigraphically MRI as a method for measuring emptying of a mixed solid/liquid meal. Methods In eight healthy subjects, gastric emptying of a solid/liquid (SM) and a liquid meal (LM) of identical energy content and macronutrient composition was studied by scintigraphy and MRI for 120 minutes. Results MRI and scintigraphy agreed with respect to emptying profiles (intraclass correlation coefficient (RI) SM: 0.988, RI, LM: 0.917), t1/2 (SMMRI: 129 (9), SMScinti: 123 (11) minutes, NS; LMMRI: 100 (7), LMScinti: 110 (8) minutes, NS) and AUC (SMMRI: 8999 (232), SMScinti: 8788 (277) min%, NS; LMMRI: 8819 (368), LMScinti: 8891 (321) min%, NS). Conclusions MRI can be used to measure reliably gastric emptying not only of liquid but also of mixed solid/liquid meals in humans.
An endoluminal brush to detect the infected central venous catheter in situ: a pilot study

Catheter related sepsis is a potentially life threatening infection caused by an indwelling intravenous catheter, with the same organism cultured from peripheral blood and from the removed catheter. If such sepsis is suspected the catheter is usually removed, although subsequent bacterial culture shows most catheters to be sterile.1 2 We evaluated a new brush (Endoluminal, FAS Medical, London) for detecting infection in the lumen of a central venous catheter. The brush has nylon bristles wound tightly around the distal end of a stainless steel wire and slides along the lumen of the catheter to its distal (inner) end. It is then removed for culture. The technique is based on the principle that bacteria collect on the fibrin sleeve on the catheter's inner surface; fibrin thus becomes enmeshed in the brush's bristles. We studied …
Efficient boosting of the antiviral T cell response in B cell-depleted patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases following influenza vaccination.

OBJECTIVES Booster vaccination against 2009 H1N1 influenza virus was recommended for rheumatologic patients under immunosuppressive therapy during the 2009/2010 H1N1 pandemic. In this study we assessed whether B cell depletion with rituximab influences of the antiviral immune response in 2009 H1N1 influenza virus-vaccinated patients. METHODS Influenza virus-specific immune responses were analysed after the first and a booster vaccination with pandemrixTM in sixteen consecutive rituximab-treated patients with different rheumatic autoimmune disorders. Antibody titers were determined by a haemagglutination-inhibition assay and virus-specific T cell responses were evaluated by a flow cytometry-based intracellular cytokine-secretion assay. Patients showing clinical symptoms of influenza infection were excluded from this study. RESULTS Two out of seven patients with low (<10%) and four out of nine with normal (>10%) B cells developed significant antibody responses after the first vaccination. Booster vaccination led to an antibody response in one additional patient. After the first vaccination, virus-specific CD4+ and CD8+ T cell responses were significantly lower in patients with low B cells than in those with normal B cells. Of importance, the booster vaccination stimulated the antiviral T cell response only in patients with low B cells. CONCLUSIONS In the absence of a significant effect of booster vaccinations against 2009 H1N1 influenza virus on the humoral immune response in B cell-depleted patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases, enhanced antiviral T cell responses in patients with low B cells indicate that T cells, maybe, compensate for the impaired humoral immunity in these patients.
Plastics recycling worldwide: current overview and desirable changes

Plastic is one of the world’s most-used materials. Technically sophisticated, lightweight and cheap, plastics suit a broad spectrum of uses. The problem with plastic lies not in how it is used, which is generally harmless, but in end-of-life management of products made from it. Since 1950, close to half of all plastic has ended up in landfill or dumped in the wild, and only 9% of used plastic has been adequately recycled. Every year, it is estimated that 4 to 12 million metric tons of plastic waste ends up in the oceans. How plastic waste is processed remains extremely variable from country to country, and recycling remains considerably under-used. On the one hand, developed economies with regulations that encourage it have recycling rates around 30%. On the other hand, developing economies with a minimal industrial base have recycling rates close to 0%. And yet recycling is the best solution for processing plastic waste because it limits environmental impact and generates significant socioeconomic gains. However, at every stage of the plastic life cycle, there remain a large number of impediments to the development of recycling. By taking steps to promote recycling, manufacturers of plastic products, regulators, waste managers and consumers can all exert significant influence on the development of the recycling sector.
Framework for Data Management in Public Service Delivery Applications in Sri Lanka Using Blockchain Technology

: The research paper discusses about how data management issues found in the current Sri Lankan public service delivery systems namely, difficulties in data accessibility, data manipulation possibility, data loss and privacy preservation can be mitigated through the application of Blockchain technology. Three distinct public service delivery systems were analyzed in order to derive a common framework which can be used to design a Blockchain based solution for the public sector processes. Systems were redesigned using Blockchain technology and two prototypes were developed using two different existing platforms and qualitatively evaluated for the four criteria focused by the research. Based on the characteristics extracted from the selected systems, a Generic Guideline was designed comprising the six areas that need to be considered when selecting a Blockchain for Data Management in a Public Service Delivery application and five steps that should be followed in adopting a Blockchain for the specific needs of the government institution.
A New Advanced Topology for Photo Voltaic Applications

This article proposes a high efficient DC-DC step-up converter with a single switch. This is particularly suited for Photo Voltaic (PV) applications, automotive applications, battery operated vehicles etc., in which voltage is step up from 10V to 500V. This converter operates at 100 kHz due to which switching losses are comparatively high. This topology proposes a scheme to mitigate power losses across the switch and to achieve high efficiency by Zero Current Switching (ZCS) at “Turn ON and Turn OFF” states. Proposed converter uses a single switch to reduce the losses in the converter and observed 98% of overall efficiency in the converter. The proposed converter is verified by its experimental results.
Evaluation of a Portable Recording Device (Somnocheck®) for Use in Patients with Suspected Obstructive Sleep Apnoea

Background: Portable recording devices for the diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) should be carefully evaluated before being used on a routine basis in out-patients. Objective: This study was designed to evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of the new portable recording device, Somnocheck® (SC). Methods: Nocturnal polysomnographies (PSG) and SC recordings were performed simultaneously in the sleep laboratory in 51 patients with suspected OSA, and were analysed manually by a blinded investigator. Results: The apnoea/hypopnoea index (AHI) obtained by manual SC analysis correlated closely with that obtained by PSG (r = 0.98), but the correlation with AHI obtained by automatic SC analysis was markedly lower (r = 0.83). When an AHI ≧10 was defined as indicative of OSA, the sensitivity of manual SC analysis was 0.97 and its specificity 1.00. The sensitivity of automatic analysis was 0.83 and its specificity 0.95. Conclusions: In this experimental setting, the SC showed a very high diagnostic accuracy for the diagnosis of OSA and was able to define its severity precisely. The diagnostic accuracy of manual analysis was found to be superior to that of automatic analysis. Considering the results of this technical evaluation, the SC may also be expected to work reliably when it is used in an ambulatory setting.
The Effects of MPL-Ligand, Interleukin-6 and Interleukin-11 on Megakaryocyte and Platelet Alpha-granule Proteins

Summary Thrombopoietin (Mpl ligand), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and interleukin-11 (IL-11) differ in their effects on megakaryocyte maturation and development. In the present study, the impact of these thrombocytopoietic cytokines on biochemical and structural granule and membrane components was examined. Western blotting was performed on equivalent amounts of isolated megakaryocyte or platelet protein and the relative intensities of the enhanced chemiluminescent-visualized bands were quantitated by densitometry. Megakaryocyte growth and development factor (MGDF), a recombinant thrombopoietin-related molecule, significantly increased megakaryocyte fibronectin (72%), thrombospondin (55%), von Willebrand factor (28%) and p-selectin (CD62p) (37%) when compared to equivalent amounts of protein from saline-treated controls (p < 0.01). Megakaryocyte fibrinogen was not increased. Ultrastructurally, there was a marked increase in ribosomes and rough endoplasmic reticulum even in mature-appearing megakaryocytes. Platelets from MGDF-treated mice showed small increases in fibronectin (8%), and CD62p (18%), but did not show increases in other measured α-granule proteins. Neither IL-6 nor IL-11 increased megakaryocyte or platelet α-granule proteins over levels observed in saline controls. IL-11 treated megakaryocytes, while also exhibiting an increase in ribosomes, were characterized by prominent cytoplasmic fragmentation. The study demonstrates the impact of Mpl ligand in increasing synthesized megakaryocyte α-granule proteins and of IL-11 in promoting megakaryocyte fragmentation.
Order Effects on the Perception of Relative Prominence

The paper reports on a perception experiment in German investigating the relative prominence of target words in two positions in a sentence. Listeners judged for each position which of four prominence levels were perceived as accented or unaccented. While subjects clearly distinguished between strongly accented and unaccented (i.e. postlexically stressed and unstressed) words in both positions, we found an order effect for weak pitch accents. They were not perceived as accents in prenuclear but they were in nuclear position. In general, listeners proved to be less sensitive to categorical prominence judgements in prenuclear position (also reflected in longer reaction times) than in nuclear position, which confirms the special functional status of nuclear pitch accents.
Image Smoothing By Low Gradient Minimization

We present a new image smoothing method by eliminating a manageable degree of low-amplitude structures while sharpening major edges by increasing the steepness of transition of edges. The use of low gradient minimization globally controls how many non-zero gradients are resulted in to approximate prominent structure in a sparsity control manner. Our method doesn’t depend on local features like other edge-preserving methods.
Video games as a medium for software education

Educational video games may be used as a medium for software visualisation and visual programming to provide highly enjoyable, self-motivating and inquiry-based pedagogical tools. An educational game has been developed and tested on university-level students in three iterations. Players are required to solve puzzles by programming the solutions; the game introduces syntax, conditional statements and logical operators. An integrated analytics system is used to store the time taken, the number of lines of code, and players' solutions to each level. Qualitative feedback indicates that the tool is very easy to learn because of the help system and user interface. A software quiz was administered before and after participants played the game. When tested on 14 applied computing students (who had formal exposure to programming), there was no increase in the average grade. In a group of 32 electrical engineering students (who had no exposure to programming at university), the game helped about 60% of participants increase their grade, by an average of 11%.
Protection dans les architectures de systèmes flexibles

Le but de ce travail est de montrer qu'il est possible de concilier securite et flexibilite dans un noyau de systeme d'exploitation. Nous demontrons qu'il est possible de garantir a la fois la flexibilite et la securite d'un systeme, en separant la gestion de la politique de securite des outils servant a sa mise en oeuvre. Notre travail se decoupe en deux partie. Dans la premiere nous proposons des outils elementaires de protection ayant pour role de proteger le systeme contre certains types d'attaques choisis tout en restant totalement independants de la politique de securite mise en oeuvre dans le systeme. Dans la deuxieme partie nous presentons le canevas logiciel securise que nous avons implante, et notamment le composant charge de la gestion des politiques de securite que nous appelons gestionnaire de securite. Nos resultats sont valides sur des exemples mettant en evidence la flexibilite de la protection dans le systeme.
Etifoxine Promotes Glia-Derived Neurite Outgrowth In Vitro and In Vivo

Abstract Background Peripheral nerve injuries usually require a graft to facilitate axonal regeneration into the distal nerve stump. Acellular nerve grafts are good candidates for nerve repair, but clinical outcomes from grafts are not always satisfactory. Etifoxine is a ligand of the 18-kDa translocator protein (TSPO) and has been demonstrated to serve multiple functions in nervous system. Methods This study aimed to determine the optimal concentration of etifoxine for neurite outgrowth using PC12 cells and verify whether etifoxine could enhance in vivo peripheral nerve regeneration. PC12 cells were exposed to various concentrations of etifoxine (5, 10, 20, and 40 µM). Neuronal-like outgrowth and glia-derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF) mRNA expression were measured, and a rat sciatic nerve transection model was employed. Histological examination was used to evaluate the efficacy of nerve regeneration, and real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) evaluated changes in mRNA levels after etifoxine treatment. Results Our data show that etifoxine increased neuronal-like outgrowth in PC12 cells in a dose-dependent manner; however, GDNF expression peaked at 20 µM etifoxine (1.97-fold increase compared with control, p = 0.0046). In vivo studies demonstrated that etifoxine improved sciatic nerve regeneration, modulated immune responses, and boosted neurotrophin expression. Conclusions Because of etifoxine's adverse effects, we suggest an optimal etifoxine concentration of 20 µM. Its beneficial role may lie in increased neurotrophin expression, and etifoxine may be a promising therapeutic for patients with peripheral nerve injuries.
Behavioral and neural consequences of prenatal exposure to nicotine.

OBJECTIVE To review evidence for the neurodevelopmental effects of in utero exposure to nicotine. Concerns about long-term cognitive and behavioral effects of prenatal exposure to nicotine arise from reports of increased rates of disruptive behavioral disorders in children whose mothers smoked during pregnancy. The relatively high rate of tobacco smoking among pregnant women (25% of all pregnancies in the U.S.) underlines the seriousness of these concerns. METHOD This review examines the largest and most recent epidemiological and clinical studies that investigated the association of prenatal nicotine exposure with health, behavioral, and cognitive problems. Because of the numerous potential confounding variables in human research, findings from animal studies, in which environmental factors are strictly controlled, are also discussed. Finally, neural and molecular mechanisms that are likely to underlie neurodevelopmental disruptions produced by prenatal nicotine exposure are outlined. RESULTS A dose-response relationship between maternal smoking rates and low birth weight (potentially associated with lower cognitive ability) and spontaneous abortion is consistently found, whereas long-term developmental and behavioral effects in the offspring are still controversial, perhaps because of the difficulty of separating them from other genetic and environmental factors. Despite the wide variability of experimental paradigms used in animal studies, common physical and behavioral effects of prenatal exposure to nicotine have been observed, including low birth weight, enhanced locomotor activity, and cognitive impairment. Finally, disturbances in neuronal pathfinding, abnormalities in cell proliferation and differentiation, and disruptions in the development of the cholinergic and catecholaminergic systems all have been reported in molecular animal studies of in utero exposure to nicotine. CONCLUSIONS Prenatal exposure to nicotine may lead to dysregulation in neurodevelopment and can indicate higher risk for psychiatric problems, including substance abuse. Knowledge of prenatal exposure to nicotine should prompt child psychiatrists to closely monitor at-risk patients.
Enhancing Organizational Performance by Knowledge Sharing

Knowledge management can be regarded as one of the key processes of organizational learning. It is well accepted that learning organizations can enhance their capability and hence competitiveness and performance through learning. Recognizing the importance of knowledge management, researchers are interested in exploring knowledge sharing activities because such activities are the cornerstone of other knowledge management activities. It is argued that a fundamental purpose of managing knowledge is to establish a shared context in organizations. As such, what factors affect interpersonal knowledge sharing and how they affect interpersonal knowledge sharing in organizations are critical and worth noting. A preliminary model from an organizational behavior perspective is proposed which will serve as the framework for further study.
Analyse a priori des consequences de la modification de systemes logiciels : de la theorie a la pratique

Longtemps consideree comme une besogne de second ordre dans l'ombre d'activites bien plus nobles, la maintenance du logiciel, au dela de la simple correction d'erreurs, revele aujourd'hui d'autres facettes, comme la reutilisation de composants ou l'adaptation des systemes a des evolutions de besoins ou d'environnement, qui contribuent a en faire un des points cles de l'amelioration de la competitivite de l'industrie du logiciel. Toutefois, les couts de la maintenance etant generalement sous estimes, la maintenance ne se fait pas dans de bonnes conditions et les logiciels vieillissent mal, devenant des edifices instables, la moindre modification pouvant en compromettre l'equilibre. Il est donc primordial de pouvoir prevoir les consequences d'une modification avant meme de la realiser, ce qui est l'objectif de l'analyse d'impact. Nous presentons dans ce memoire une nouvelle approche generique de l'analyse d'impact, basee sur une propagation automatique, controlee par des regles, d'evenements sur un graphe des dependances modelisant le systeme. Elle permet de concilier la simplicite et la puissance des analyses automatiques a la precision des analyses manuelles. De plus, au travers de la realisation d'un outil implementant cette technique, puis de sa mise en oeuvre sur divers systemes representatifs, nous montrons que cette approche est particulierement adaptee a des systemes logiciels volumineux, necessitant un haut niveau de qualite, tels que ceux que l'on rencontre dans l'industrie spatiale. Mots cles : maintenance de logiciels, maitrise des evolutions, analyse d'impact.
Electromagnetic imaging for a conducting cylinder buried in a slab medium by the genetic algorithm

This article presents a computational approach to the imaging of a perfectly conducting cylinder buried in a slab. A conducting cylinder of unknown shape buried in a slab scatters the incident wave from outside. The scattered field is recorded outside the slab. Based on the boundary condition and the measured scattered field, a set of nonlinear integral equations is derived, and the imaging problem is reformulated into an optimization problem. The genetic algorithm is then employed to determine global extreme solution of the cost function. Numerical results demonstrated that, even when the initial guess is far removed from the exact one, good reconstruction can be obtained. In such a case, the gradient‐based methods often are trapped in a local extreme. In addition, the effect of Gaussian noise on the reconstruction is investigated. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Imaging Syst Technol 14, 1–7, 2004; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/ima.20000
ATM–Dependent MiR-335 Targets CtIP and Modulates the DNA Damage Response

ATM plays a critical role in cellular responses to DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs). We describe a new ATM–mediated DSB–induced DNA damage response pathway involving microRNA (miRNA): irradiation (IR)-induced DSBs activate ATM, which leads to the downregulation of miR-335, a miRNA that targets CtIP, which is an important trigger of DNA end resection in homologous recombination repair (HRR). We demonstrate that CREB is responsible for a large portion of miR-335 expression by binding to the promoter region of miR-335. CREB binding is greatly reduced after IR, corroborating with previous studies that IR-activated ATM phosphorylates CREB to reduce its transcription activity. Overexpression of miR-335 in HeLa cells resulted in reduced CtIP levels and post-IR colony survival and BRCA1 foci formation. Further, in two patient-derived lymphoblastoid cell lines with decreased post-IR colony survival, a “radiosensitive” phenotype, we demonstrated elevated miR-335 expression, reduced CtIP levels, and reduced BRCA1 foci formation. Colony survival, BRCA1 foci, and CtIP levels were partially rescued by miRNA antisense AMO-miR-335 treatment. Taken together, these findings strongly suggest that an ATM–dependent CREB–miR-335–CtIP axis influences the selection of HRR for repair of certain DSB lesions.