Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prey-capture strategies in sympatric web-building spiders

Arthropods in several orders use traps to capture prey. Such trap-building predators expend most of their foraging energy prior to any prey contact. Nevertheless, relative investments in trap construction and actual prey capture may vary among trap builders, and they are likely to face a trade-off between building very effective but energetically costly traps and building less effective traps requiring faster reaction times when attacking prey. We analysed this trade-off in a field experiment by comparing the prey capture behaviour of four different sympatric web-building spiders (Araneae: Araneidae, Nephilidae, Tetragnathidae, Theridiidae) with the retention times of five different prey types in the webs of these spiders. Retention times differed greatly among webs and among prey types. The vertical orb webs retained prey longer than the horizontal orb web and the sheet web, and active prey escaped more quickly than less active prey. Among spiders with orb webs, the spider with the web that retained prey for the shortest time was the fastest to capture prey, thus confirming the expected trade-off between building long-retaining webs and attacking slowly versus building short-retaining webs and attacking more rapidly. The sheet web, however, neither retained prey for an appreciable period of time nor facilitated rapid prey capture. We suggest that this low capture effectiveness of sheet webs is compensated by their lower maintenance costs.
Interaction of enterovirus infection and cow's milk‐based formula nutrition in type 1 diabetes‐associated autoimmunity

Enteral virus infections and early introduction of cow's milk (CM)‐based formula are among the suggested triggers of type 1 diabetes (T1D)‐associated autoimmunity, although studies on their role have remained contradictory. Here, we aimed to analyse whether interactions between these factors might clarify the controversies.
Evaluation of Short-Term Use of N-Acetylcysteine as a Strategy for Prevention of Anthracycline-Induced Cardiomyopathy: EPOCH Trial - A Prospective Randomized Study

Background and Objectives We investigate to determine whether N-acetylcysteine (NAC) can prevent anthracycline-induced cardiotoxicity. Subjects and Methods A total of 103 patients were enrolled in this prospective randomized open label controlled trial. They are patients first diagnosed with breast cancer or lymphoma, who require chemotherapy, including anthracycline like adriamycine or epirubicine. Patients were randomized to the NAC group {n=50; 1200 mg orally every 8 hours starting before and ending after the intravenous infusion of anthracycline in all chemotherapy cycles (3-6)} or the control group (n=53). Primary outcome was the decrease in left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) absolutely ≥10% from the baseline and concomitantly <50% at 6-month. Composite of all-cause death, heart failure and readmission were compared. Results The primary outcome was not significantly different in the NAC and control groups {3/47 (6.4%) vs. 1/52 (1.9%), p=0.343}. The mean LVEF significantly decreased in both the NAC (from 64.5 to 60.8%, p=0.001) and control groups (from 64.1 to 61.3%, p<0.001) after the completion of whole chemotherapy. The mean LVEF change did not differ between the two groups (-3.64% in NAC vs. -2.78% in control group, p=0.502). Left ventricular (LV) end systolic dimension increased with higher trend in NAC by 3.08±4.56 mm as compared with 1.47±1.83 mm in the control group (p=0.064). LV end diastolic dimension did not change in each group and change does not differ in both. Peak E, A and E/A ratio change and cardiac enzymes were comparable in two groups. Cumulative 12-month event rate was 6% and 3.8% in the NAC group and the control group, respectively, with no difference (p=0.672). Conclusion We cannot prove that NAC prevents anthracycline-induced cardiomyopathy.
Dynamics of Religion and Gender amongst Young British Muslims

Considerable attention has been given to young British Asian Muslim identity in recent years. Whilst much of the literature has addressed the diasporic and transnational nature of British Muslim identity there has been a growing recognition of the need to address the national context in which this identity is formed. However, there is still a comparative lacuna of information about how religion features in the internal dynamics of this grouping, particularly the gender dynamics involved in the articulation of British Muslim men and women's identities.This article presents extracts from discussions with young British Asian Muslim men and women to explore how religion is mobilized as a power resource in the construction of their gender identity. It discusses how the mobilization of religion is often ambivalent, contradictory and intersected with other social differences, particularly class. The article uses Bourdieu's concepts of capital and field to explore the respondents' interviews.
Herpes simplex virus (HSV)-specific proliferative and cytotoxic T-cell responses in humans immunized with an HSV type 2 glycoprotein subunit vaccine

Studies were undertaken to determine whether immunization of humans with a herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) glycoprotein-subunit vaccine would result in the priming of both HSV-specific proliferating cells and cytotoxic T cells. Peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) from all eight vaccines studied responded by proliferating after stimulation with HSV-2, HSV-1, and glycoprotein gB-1. The PBL of five of these eight vaccines proliferated following stimulation with gD-2, whereas stimulation with gD-1 resulted in relatively low or no proliferative responses. T-cell clones were generated from HSV-2-stimulated PBL of three vaccinees who demonstrated strong proliferative responses to HSV-1 and HSV-2. Of 12 clones studied in lymphoproliferative assays, 9 were found to be cross-reactive for HSV-1 and HSV-2. Of the approximately 90 T-cell clones isolated, 14 demonstrated HSV-specific cytotoxic activity. Radioimmunoprecipitation-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis analyses confirmed that the vaccinees had antibodies only to HSV glycoproteins, not to proteins which are absent in the subunit vaccine, indicating that these vaccinees had not become infected with HSV. Immunization of humans with an HSV-2 glycoprotein-subunit vaccine thus results in the priming of T cells that proliferate in response to stimulation with HSV and its glycoproteins and T cells that have cytotoxic activity against HSV-infected cells. Such HSV-specific memory T cells were detected as late as 2 years following the last boost with the subunit vaccine.
0.18um CMOS Low-Noise Amplifier with two 2nd-order notch filters for Ultra-Wideband Wireless Receiver

In this paper a CMOS dual-wideband low-noise amplifier (LNA) is designed for ultra-wideband (UWB) wireless receiver radio system. The design consists of a wideband input impedance matching network, two stage cascode amplifiers with shunt-peaked load, two 2nd-order notch filters and an output buffer for measurement purpose. It is simulated in TSMC 0.18 mum standard RF CMOS process. The LNA gives 13.1 dB maximum power gain between 3.0 GHz-4.9 GHz and 15.5 dB maximum power gain between 6.2 GHz-10.2 GHz while consuming 21.9 mW through a 1.8 V supply. Over the 3.1 GHz-4.9 GHz frequency band and the 6.2 GHz-10.2 GHz, a minimum noise figure is 2.5 dB and 2.8 dB. Input return loss lower than -6.4dB in all bandwidth have been achieved.
Measuring E-Commerce Web Site Quality: An Empirical Examination

Web sites are being widely deployed commercially; however, the factors that affect customer’s perceptions on the quality and acceptance of a Web site are unclear. Through a literature review, this article examines and integrates four sets of factors that capture e-commerce Website quality: system quality, information quality, service quality, and attractiveness. Based on TAM, a framework is developed relating Web site quality to customers’ beliefs (perceived usefulness and ease of use), attitudes (preferences for the site), and intentions (to revisit the site). A set of instruments of Web site quality has been developed and empirically validated by factor analysis. Guidelines for Web interface design are proposed for Web designers and managers.
THE NERVOUS SYSTEM HAVE A GROUND STATE ? A DESCRIPTION OF HIGH EEG COHERENCE EVENTS IN A SINGLE SUBJECT

Periods of overall high EEG coherence were found during the practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique. These periods of high coherence were correlated with the subjective experience of pure consciousness, the simplest state of awareness, during Transcendental Meditation. The author proposes that the state of pure consciousness corresponds to the ground state of central nervous system functioning. -EDITORS
Percutaneous Abscess Drainage: Current Applications for Critically Ill Patients

Radiologically guided percutaneous abscess drainage (PAD) was first reported in 1977. Since this time, technological advances in imaging, improved catheter technology, and increased experience with the procedure have resulted in a tremendous expansion of the indications for PAD. This procedure currently has applications in nearly every organ system of the body. These changes have also contributed to improved success rates, with concurrent minimization of procedure-related complications. The advantages of PAD include simple, rapid performance; feasibility of bedside intensive care unit (ICU) performance; safety; avoidance of general anesthesia; and well-documented efficacy. This procedure has now become well entrenched in clinical medicine and probably ranks with the development of effective antibiotics as the most significant improvement in the treatment of abscesses in the past century. PAD is ideally suited for the treatment of critically ill ICU patients. We discuss technical developments over the past 15 years; general principles of patient preparation and catheters are also reviewed. Current applications of PAD in each organ system are discussed.
Implementing Level-3 BLAS Routines in OpenCL on Different Processing Units

Report Date: Written Language: Any Other Identifying Information of this Report: Distribution Statement: Supplementary Notes: The University of Aizu Aizu-Wakamatsu Fukushima 965-8580 Japan 10/22/2014 English First Issue: 10 copies Kazuya Matsumoto, Naohito Nakasato, and Stanislav Sedukhin Implementing Level-3 BLAS Routines in OpenCL on Different Processing Units Level-3 BLAS, GPU, multi-core CPU, many-core processor, OpenCL, performance porting, auto-tuning This paper presents an implementation of different matrix-matrix multiplication routines in OpenCL. We utilize the high-performance GEMM (GEneral Matrix-Matrix Multiply) implementation from our previous work for the present implementation of other matrix-matrix multiply routines in Level-3 BLAS (Basic Linear Algebra Subprograms). The other routines include SYMM (Symmetric MatrixMatrix Multiply), SYRK (Symmetric Rank-K Update), SYR2K (Symmetric Rank-2K Update), and TRMM (Triangular Matrix-Matrix Multiply). A key in our approach is to copy given matrix data by copying OpenCL kernels into a form such that a high-performance GEMM kernel can be utilized for computation. We use a previously developed auto-tuning system for the highly optimized copying kernels as well as for GEMM kernel. The performance evaluation of our implementation is conducted on four different GPUs (AMD Radeon R9 290X, FirePro W9100, Radeon HD 7970, and NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan), a many-core processor (Intel Xeon Phi 5110P), and a multi-core processor (Core i7 3960X). The evaluation results show that the tuning on the copying kernels is effective and contributes to develop high-performance BLAS3 routines. Distributed Parallel Processing Laboratory
BCON: Back pressure based congestion avoidance model for Named Data Networks

Queue management in Named Data Networks (NDN) has gained a lot of attention recently. Unlike the traditional IP architecture, the transport mechanism in NDN is intricate and comprises of in-network caching of data packets at routers. Hence, the most effective avoidance of congestion can occur at the routers itself. In this paper, we make two contributions: first, we propose a back pressure based congestion avoidance model for NDN which leverages the benefits of Active Queue Management (AQM) mechanisms. Using this model, we apply the existing AQM mechanisms like Random Early Detection (RED), Adaptive RED (ARED), Controlled Delay (CoDel) and Proportional Integral controller Enhanced (PIE) in NDN. Second, we study the effectiveness of our proposed model by performing simulations using ndnSIM. Our simulation results indicate that the proposed model successfully balances the tradeoff between link utilization and Data drop rate.
Árvores de Decisão Desequilibradas para deteção de erros em transações de comércio externo usando técnicas de data mining

Hoje em dia e frequente existirem grandes quantidades de dados de onde sao extraidos diferentes tipos de conhecimento, para posteriormente se tomarem diversas decisoes. Um grande problema existente nesses dados e a existencia de anomalias. A deteccao dessas anomalias pode ser utilizada numa grande variedade de aplicacoes tais como, deteccao de fraudes de cartoes de credito, deteccao de intrusos em termos de seguranca na internet, deteccao de falhas em sistemas criticos, entre outras. Um exemplo de um desses problemas sao as estatisticas do comercio externo publicadas pelo Instituto Nacional de Estatisticas. Assim, e importante que as anomalias criadas por erros nas declaracoes feitas pelas organizacoes ao Instituto Nacional de Estatitsticas, sejam detectadas para garantir que essas estatisticas sao fiaveis. Para a deteccao dessas anomalias serao estudadas e utilizadas variantes de arvores de decisao, que sao algoritmos de datamining e machine learning. Embora as arvores de decisao nao tenham sido originalmente desenvolvidas para a deteccao de anomalias, foram propostas algumas adaptacoes com esse fim. Assim, este projecto tem dois objectivos: realizar um estudo empirico sobre o desempenho de variantes de arvores de decisao no problema de deteccao de anomalias; e, com base nos resultados desse estudo, propor uma nova variante, implementa-la e testa-la.
MÉTODO PARA VALIDAÇÃO DA PREDIÇÃO DA PERDA DE CARGA EM CICLONES COM BASE EM RESULTADOS DE CFD

Ciclones sao equipamentos vastamente utilizados para separacao de particulas solidas suspensas em uma fase gasosa. Tal fase gasosa serve como transporte para as particulas solidas, sendo assim a principal responsavel pelo comportamento giratorio e de alta intensidade de turbulencia do escoamento multifasico observado em ciclones. Esses dispositivos sao avaliados com base em dois parâmetros de desempenho, a eficiencia de coleta e a perda de carga, sendo o ultimo relacionado ao custo operacional. Portanto, o presente estudo tem como objetivo analisar a forma mais apropriada de se aferir a perda de carga em ciclones atraves de resultados de CFD, a fim de validar tais predicoes. Neste trabalho, realizou-se experimentos fisicos e simulacoes numericas para predizer a perda de carga do escamento monofasico em uma faixa de velocidade entre 8 e 16 m/s. As simulacoes numericas foram efetuadas utilizando-se uma modelagem RANS (Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes) e o modelo RSM (Reynolds Stress Model) para fechamento da turbulencia. Dos resultados simulados, avaliou-se a perda de carga atraves de dois metodos, a diferenca entre a pressao media em planos na entrada e na saida e a diferenca entre uma media em quatro pontos definidos na entrada e na saida do ciclone. Comparando os dois metodos com os dados experimentais, observou-se que os resultados da media nos pontos ficaram mais proximos dos resultados experimentais frente ao metodo com a media no plano. Sendo assim, mostrando-se a forma mais eficiente para a validacao da perda de carga.
Risk of Basal and Squamous Cell Carcinomas of the Skin in Sion, Switzerland: A Case-control Study

Aims and Background Non-melanocytic skin cancers are the most common cancers in white populations. Studies on populations of Anglo-Saxon and Mediterranean origins highlighted different patterns of risk of basal-cell carcinoma and squamous-cell carcinoma in relation to sunlight exposure, skin characteristics and phenotype susceptibility. In Sion, and in Switzerland as a whole, the high incidence suggests the possible presence of additional risk factors or of a different pattern of exposure to solar radiation as well as different composition of pigmentary traits and skin sensitivity to sun. Methods and Study Design We conducted a case-control study of 146 cases (73% of eligible cases) and 144 controls (81% of eligible subjects) to further evaluate the relationship between nonmelanocytic skin cancer and risk factors in the Sion population. Interviews were conducted by trained interviewers with a standardized questionnaire. Results Pigmentary characteristics such as blonde and red hair as well as tendency to sunburn without tanning and number of sunburns showed a statistically significant and independent risk increase in basal-cell carcinoma. Sun exposure during recreational activities (outdoor sports) showed a risk increase in basal-cell carcinoma with borderline statistical significance. Analysis of squamous-cell carcinoma risk was limited by the small number of cases, but it was positively associated with lifetime exposure to sun during outdoor work and with skin characteristics. Conclusions Results confirmed previous suggestions of a different mechanism leading to malignant transformation of target cells from the basal and squamous epidermal layers, mediated by different phenotypes, and conditioning the ability to develop an effectively protective tan.
Polyelectrolyte-Functionalized Nanofiber Mats Control the Collection and Inactivation of Escherichia coli

Quantifying the effect that nanofiber mat chemistry and hydrophilicity have on microorganism collection and inactivation is critical in biomedical applications. In this study, the collection and inactivation of Escherichia coli K12 was examined using cellulose nanofiber mats that were surface-functionalized using three polyelectrolytes: poly (acrylic acid) (PAA), chitosan (CS), and polydiallyldimethylammonium chloride (pDADMAC). The polyelectrolyte functionalized nanofiber mats retained the cylindrical morphology and average fiber diameter (~0.84 µm) of the underlying cellulose nanofibers. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and contact angle measurements confirmed the presence of polycations or polyanions on the surface of the nanofiber mats. Both the control cellulose and pDADMAC-functionalized nanofiber mats exhibited a high collection of E. coli K12, which suggests that mat hydrophilicity may play a larger role than surface charge on cell collection. While the minimum concentration of polycations needed to inhibit E. coli K12 was 800 µg/mL for both CS and pDADMAC, once immobilized, pDADMAC-functionalized nanofiber mats exhibited a higher inactivation of E. coli K12, (~97%). Here, we demonstrate that the collection and inactivation of microorganisms by electrospun cellulose nanofiber mats can be tailored through a facile polyelectrolyte functionalization process.
Beyond dichotomous thinking: a process perspective on diabetic foot disease

ABSTRACT Background: Diabetic foot (DF) disease causes severe suffering around the world, and appropriate self-care activities are needed to prevent and treat this condition. However, all too often, self-care activities are less than optimal and clinicians find themselves unable to influence them in a positive direction. Clinicians’ and researchers’ mental models of the DF tend to be dichotomous: either the patient has or does not have an active ulcer or other DF disease. This mode of thinking hides the long-term perspective of DF disease, where patients’ previous experiences and expectations for the future influence their current behavior. Thus, there is a need for a different perspective on DF disease to better understand patients’ perspectives and thereby improve self-care, leading to more effective prevention and treatment. Objective: To present a novel framework, the process perspective on the DF, which can explain inadequate self-care behaviors not easily understood with a dichotomous perspective, and how they can be changed. Results: Three fictive clinical examples are used to illustrate how the process perspective on the DF can be used to understand how patients’ previous experiences and expectations for the future influence their current behavior. In particular, this process perspective is used to understand how patients’ beliefs and behaviors are sometimes self-reinforcing, resulting in stable behavior patterns, here referred to as ‘DF cycles’. These cycles are quite common in clinical practice but are difficult to analyze using a dichotomous perspective on DF disease. The process perspective on the DF is used to analyze specific ‘vicious’ DF cycles of inadequate patient behavior and to find ways to transform them into ‘virtuous’ DF cycles, resulting in effective prevention and treatment. Conclusions: The process perspective on the DF seems suitable for understanding inadequate patient behaviors not easily understood with a dichotomous perspective on DF disease, opening up new avenues for clinical practice and research to help patients live a life with long remission phases, few relapses, and a high quality of life.
Compressed Bit-sliced Signature Files An Index Structure for Large Lexicons

We use the signature file method to search for partially specified terms in large lexicons. To optimize efficiency, we use the concepts of the partially evaluated bit-sliced signature file method and memory resident data structures. Our system employs signature partitioning, compression, and term blocking. We derive equations to obtain system design parameters, and measure indexing efficiency in terms of time and space. The resulting approach provides good response time and is storage-efficient. In the experiments we use four different lexicons, and show that the signature file approach outperforms the inverted file approach in certain efficiency aspects.