Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Altered static and dynamic functional connectivity of habenula in first-episode, drug-naïve schizophrenia patients, and their association with symptoms including hallucination and anxiety

Background and objective The pathogenesis of schizophrenia (SCH) is related to the dysfunction of monoamine neurotransmitters, and the habenula participates in regulating the synthesis and release of dopamine. We examined the static functional connectivity (sFC) and dynamic functional connectivity (dFC) of habenula in first-episode schizophrenia patients using resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) in this study. Methods A total of 198 first-Episode, drug-Naïve schizophrenia patients and 199 healthy controls (HC) underwent rs-fMRI examinations. The sFC and dFC analysis with habenula as seed was performed to produce a whole-brain diagram initially, which subsequently were compared between SCH and HC groups. Finally, the correlation analysis of sFC and dFC values with the Positive and Negative Symptom Scale (PANSS) were performed. Results Compared with the HC groups, the left habenula showed increased sFC with the bilateral middle temporal gyrus, bilateral superior temporal gyrus, and right temporal pole in the SCH group, and the right habenula exhibited increased sFC with the left middle temporal gyrus, left superior temporal gyrus, and left angular gyrus. Additionally, compared with the HC group, the left habenula showed decreased dFC with the bilateral cuneus gyrus and bilateral calcarine gyrus in the SCH group. The PANSS negative sub-scores were positively correlated with the sFC values of the bilateral habenula with the bilateral middle temporal gyrus, superior temporal gyrus and angular gyrus. The PANSS general sub-scores were positively correlated with the sFC values of the right habenula with the left middle temporal gyrus and left superior temporal gyrus. The hallucination scores of PANSS were negatively correlated with the sFC values of the left habenula with the bilateral cuneus gyrus and bilateral calcarine gyrus; The anxiety scores of PANSS were positively correlated with the dFC values of the left habenula with the right temporal pole. Conclusion This study provides evidence that the habenula of the first-episode schizophrenia patients presented abnormal static functional connectivity with temporal lobe and angular gyrus, and additionally showed weakened stability of functional connectivity in occipital lobe. This abnormality is closely related to the symptoms of hallucination and anxiety in schizophrenia, which may indicate that the habenula involved in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia by affecting the dopamine pathway.
ICT Integration in Secondary School Physics and Teachers’ Attitude Towards Using ICT in Teaching Physics in Mombasa County, Kenya

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) provides an opportunity for Educational Institutions and other organisations to harness and use technology to complement and support the teaching and learning process. However, despite the enormous advocacy for ICT-aided teaching and learning, investment and donation of ICT equipment to schools, there is a challenge on how to transform students learning process to provide students with the skills to function effectively in this information-rich and dynamic environment. Unless ICT is effectively integrated in teaching and learning, the investment for the development of ICT in schools will be wasted. The school curriculum may also fail to achieve its mission to produce learners who are ready for the world of work, which is increasingly reliant on ICT- aided generation and dissemination of knowledge. This study was aimed at finding out the extent of ICT integration in secondary school Physics and the teachers’ attitude towards the using ICT in teaching Physics. Further. The study also assessed the extent to which the National ICT policy on education has been implemented in Mombasa County. It also assessed the teachers attitude towards teaching Physics using ICT. The study was done through administering questionnaires to 148 Physics teachers in public and private secondary schools, and conducting interviews with three (3) ICT champions in the county. The quantitative data based on a Likert Scale was analysed with the aid of the SPSS computer software (version 20) while the qualitative data was analysed using the Bryman’s Four Stage Qualitative Analysis. Keywords : Information and Communication Technology, Attitude. DOI : 10.7176/JEP/10-27-04 Publication date :September 30 th 2019
Targeting HIV-1 reservoirs in T cell subsets

The HIV-1 reservoirs harbor the latent proviruses that are integrated into the host genome. It is a challenging task to eradicate the proviruses in order to achieve an HIV cure. We have described a strategy for the clearance of HIV-1 infection through selective elimination of host cells harboring replication-competent HIV (SECH), by inhibition of autophagy and promotion of apoptosis during viral re-activation. HIV-1 can infect various CD4+ T cell subsets, but it is not known whether the SECH approach is equally effective in targeting HIV-1 reservoirs in these different subsets in vivo. In a humanized mouse model, we found that treatments of HIV-1 infection by suppressive antiretroviral therapy (ART) led to the establishment of latent HIV reservoirs in naïve, central memory and effector memory T cells. Moreover, SECH treatments could clear latent HIV-1 reservoirs in these different T cell subsets of humanized mice. Co-culture studies showed that T cell subsets latently infected by HIV-1, but not uninfected bystander cells, were susceptible to cell death induced by SECH treatments. Our study suggests that the SECH strategy is effective for specific targeting of latent HIV-1 reservoirs in different T cell subsets.
Tuberculosis: Emerging skies in diagnostics, therapeutics and preventive strategies

The diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of tuberculosis (TB) are on the anvil of a paradigm shift. While the diagnosis and treatment are likely to undergo a remarkable change with genotypic (improved Genexpert ultra and line probe assay) methods which assure rapid and accurate identification of drug sensitive and drug resistant pulmonary tuberculosis, the focus of preventive strategy is likely to shift to effective vaccines in the making and possible diagnosis of latent tubercular infections through improved Interferon-Gamma Release Assays (IGRAs) that would allow elimination of the disease in the bud. A number of injectable and aerosol vaccines are currently undergoing human trials, and could be marketed as early as next year. Concurrently, the integration of high dose Rifapentine/Rifampicin to the treatment regimen has the capability to shorten the duration of TB treatment. The compliance of patients with drug resistant TB could improve dramatically with shortening of the length of MDR and XDR TB treatments to 6 and 9 months respectively.
Cycle-by-cycle variations in a spark ignition engine fueled with gasoline and natural gas

A comparative study of cycle-by-cycle variations (CCV) in a spark ignition (SI) engine fueled with gasoline and natural gas was conducted. The average peak cylinder pressure (PP), indicated mean effective pressure (IMEP) and maximum rate of pressure rise ((dp/dθ)max)are found to be low for engine fueled with natural gas in comparison to that of gasoline. However, the CCV of these parameters increases as engine operation is switched from gasoline to natural gas. The coefficient of variation (COV) of PP, IMEP and (dp/dθ)max significantly increases at very low load condition for both the fuels due to high residual gases. Natural gas engine shows more misfiring cycles in comparison to gasoline engine. Further, CCV increases with the increase of engine speed for both the fuels because of an increase in turbulence and instable combustion at high engine speed. As engine speed increases and engine load decreases the combustion based parameters become more independent of crank angle due to high CCV in these conditions.
Pengaruh Pelatihan terhadap Kinerja Karyawan pada Pt. Bank Rakyat Indonesia (Persero) Tbk. Unit Demangan Yogyakarta

Tujuan penelitian ini diakukan untuk mengetahui pengaruh pelatihan terhadap kinerja karyawan. Metode pengumpulan data dilakukan melalui penyebaran kuesioner kepada 17 responden. Jenis penelitian ini adalah kuantitatif dan menggunakan metode analisis deskriptif-kausalitas. Pengambilan sampel dilakukan dengan metode nonprobability sampling dengan jenis sampling jenuh. Analisis data yang digunakan adalah analisis deskriptif, uji asumsi klasik, dan analisis regresi linier sederhana. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa pelatihan berpengaruh secara signifikan sebesar 41,4% sisanya yaitu 58,6% dipengaruhi oleh variabel atau faktor lain yang tidak diteliti.
Comparison of initial learning algorithms for long short-term memory method on real-time respiratory signal prediction

Aim This study aimed to examine the effect of the weight initializers on the respiratory signal prediction performance using the long short-term memory (LSTM) model. Methods Respiratory signals collected with the CyberKnife Synchrony device during 304 breathing motion traces were used in this study. The effectiveness of four weight initializers (Glorot, He, Orthogonal, and Narrow-normal) on the prediction performance of the LSTM model was investigated. The prediction performance was evaluated by the normalized root mean square error (NRMSE) between the ground truth and predicted respiratory signal. Results Among the four initializers, the He initializer showed the best performance. The mean NRMSE with 385-ms ahead time using the He initializer was superior by 7.5%, 8.3%, and 11.3% as compared to that using the Glorot, Orthogonal, and Narrow-normal initializer, respectively. The confidence interval of NRMSE using Glorot, He, Orthogonal, and Narrow-normal initializer were [0.099, 0.175], [0.097, 0.147], [0.101, 0.176], and [0.107, 0.178], respectively. Conclusions The experiment results in this study indicated that He could be a valuable initializer in the LSTM model for the respiratory signal prediction.
French Horn Players’ Attitudes Regarding the Accurate Application of Anatomical Knowledge in Optimal Playing Philosophies

This thesis entitled “French Horn Players’ Attitudes Regarding the Accurate Application of Anatomical Knowledge in Optimal Playing Philosophies” written in requirement of a Master of Philosophy (Medicine), University of Sydney, was instigated by a desire to overcome my own artistic limitations as a French Horn player and to explore the role accurately applied anatomical knowledge might play in understanding and overcoming these limitations. Through a literature review, concepts around the application of accurate anatomical information from various sources to inform optimal playing philosophies were explored. An in-depth understanding of anatomical structures was acquired and followed by the development of 3D modelled anatomical resources in consultation with Dr Bronwen Ackermann, PhD, MPH, BAppSc(PT) and Dr Mark Halaki, PhD, MSc, Bsc. These were used as a resource to support gathering both qualitative and quantitative data. The attitudes of French Horn players were examined in a mixed method study including surveys and in-depth interviews with professional and highly regarded French Horn players. Data showed that French Horn players have limited knowledge of functional anatomy and that this could potentially contribute to the development of Playing Related Medical Disorders (PRMDs). The study also identified that aspiring horn players would value more knowledge of functional anatomy, demonstrated the important role of medical professionals in mediating this knowledge, and recommends that it would be appropriate that study of functional anatomy be incorporated into tertiary study of the French Horn, however applicability, appropriacy and context are also contributing factors to the usefulness of this data.
A Positive Feedback-Based Op-Amp Gain Enhancement Technique for High-Precision Applications

A power-efficient, voltage gain enhancement technique for op-amps has been described. The proposed technique is robust against Process, Voltage and Temperature (PVT) variations. It exploits a positive feedback-based gain enhancement technique without any latch-up issue, as opposed to the previously proposed conductance cancellation techniques. In the proposed technique, four additional transconductance-stages (gm stages) are used to boost the gain of the main gm stage. The additional gm stages do not significantly increase the power dissipation. A prototype was designed in 65[Formula: see text]nm CMOS technology. It results in 81[Formula: see text]dB voltage gain, which is 21[Formula: see text]dB higher than the existing gain-boosting technique. The proposed op-amp works with as low a power supply as 0.8[Formula: see text]V, without compromising the performance, whereas the traditional gain-enhancement techniques start losing gain below a 1.1[Formula: see text]V supply. The circuit draws a total static current of 295[Formula: see text][Formula: see text]A and occupies 5000[Formula: see text][Formula: see text]m2 of silicon area.
On implicit program constructs

Session types are a well-established approach to ensuring protocol conformance and the absence of communication errors such as deadlocks in message passing systems. Implicit parameters, introduced by Haskell and popularised in Scala, are a mechanism to improve program readability and conciseness by allowing the programmer to omit function call arguments, and have the compiler insert them in a principled manner at compile-time. Scala recently gave implicit types first-class status (implicit functions), yielding an expressive tool for handling context dependency in a type-safe manner. DOT (Dependent Object Types) is an object calculus with path-dependent types and abstract type members, developed to serve as a theoretical foundation for the Scala programming language. As yet, DOT does not model all of Scala’s features, but a small subset. Among those features of Scala not yet modelled by DOT are implicit functions. We ask: can type-safe implicit functions be generalised from Scala’s sequential setting to message passing computation, to improve readability and conciseness of message passing programs? We answer this question in the affirmative by generalising the concept of an implicit function to an implicit message, its concurrent analogue, a programming language construct for session-typed concurrent computation. We explore new applications for implicit program constructs by integrating theminto four novel calculi, each demonstrating a new use case or theoretical result for implicits. Firstly, we integrate implicit functions and messages into the concurrent functional language LAST, Gay and Vasconcelos’s calculus of linear types for asynchronous sessions. We demonstrate their utility by example, and explore use cases for both implicit functions and implicit messages. We integrate implicit messages into two pi calculi, further demonstrating the robustness of our approach to extending calculi with implicits. We show that implicit messages are possible in the absence of lambda calculus, in languages with concurrency primitives only, and that they are sound not only in binary session-typed computation, but also in multi-party context. Finally we extend DOT to include implicit functions. We show type safety of the resulting calculus by translation to DOT, lending a higher degree of confidence to the correctness of implicit functions in Scala. We demonstrate that typical use cases for implicit functions in Scala are typably expressible in DOT when extended with implicit functions.
Fabrication and Characterization of Nanoscale Pillar Arrays With Engineered Phononic and Photonic Properties

Author(s): Huang, Chun Yu Tammy | Advisor(s): Balandin, Alexander A; Kargar, Fariborz | Abstract: This dissertation reports the results of the investigation of nanoscale pillar structures with engineered phononic and photonic properties. It has been proven that phonon states in semiconductors can be tuned by external boundaries, either as a result of phonon confinement effects in individual nanostructures or as a result of artificially induced external periodicity, e.g., phononic crystals. The possibility of engineering acoustic phonon spectrum is of ultimate importance from scientific and application perspectives since they are the main heat carriers in nonmagnetic semiconductor and insulator materials. The change in acoustic phonon dispersion would affect the heat transport properties, alter the electron-phonon interactions, and affect the optical properties of the material system. It has been recently suggested that periodic structures with properly tuned dimensions can act simultaneously as phononic and photonic crystals, strongly affecting the light-matter interactions. In this dissertation research, I prepared nanoscale pillar structure samples and investigated their properties. The “pillar with hat” structures were fabricated using electron beam lithography on silicon substrates followed by inductively-coupled plasma cryogenic dry etching. The hats of the pillars were created with a unique design to have exactly the same orientation plane as the substrate. The structures were inspected with scanning electron microscopy. I used Brillouin-Mandelstam spectroscopy to measure the dispersion of acoustic phonons with energies in the range from 2 GHz up to 20 GHz through the entire second and higher order Brillouin zones. I analyzed the spectral signatures resulting from the surface ripple mechanism which dominates the light scattering in these specific samples. I found clear signatures of the phonon spectrum modification in the appearance of localized phonon sub-bands at energies between 2˗20 GHz. The variable angle ellipsometry measurements indicated modification of light scattering due to nanostructuring. The experimental data confirmed the dual functionality of the structure with engineered phononic-photonic properties. The results obtained in this dissertation research have important implications for the next generation of photonic and optoelectronic device technologies.
The Usage of Social Media to Enhance Effective Communication Among Secondary School Teachers and Principals in Ampang

Social media has become a medium of communication in today's educational organisations. It is seen to be relevant in encouraging effective communication. This study aims to identify the level of frequency in utilising social media among teachers, level of communication between principals and teachers, plus the relationship between social media and effective communication practices between teachers and principals in schools. Quantitative method was used through administration of a survey questionnaire and findings were analysed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) Version 25.0. A total of 312 respondents answered the questionnaire. The findings of the study found the level of frequency in utilising social media amongst teachers is high (mean=4.15, SD=.49), whereas the level of frequency of communication between principals and teachers is moderate (mean=3.56, SD=.54). Furthermore, the relationship between the utilisation of social media and effective communication between teachers and principal is weak (r = .503, N 312, p < 0.01). Hence, it can be concluded that although teachers have a high level of social media usage, it is only moderately used for educational communications, and consequently does not necessarily impact or encourage effective communication between teachers and principals in the schools. Keywords—social media in schools; effective communication
Antimicrobial Resistance : A Physician's Nemesis

Emergence of New Delhi Metallo-beta-lactamase-1 (NDM1) gene in 2010 ticked a global alarm of newer mechanisms of resistance evolving in bacteria and becoming a worldwide public health problem [1]. This was an eyeopener and raises an important issue of antimicrobial resistance. It is estimated that around about 700,000 people die every year from drug resistant strains of common bacterial infections and the cost exceeds 20 billion USD. It is likely that by 2050 around 10 million lives each year may die and cost may rise to 100 trillion USD [2]. It has been almost six decades since the physicians have been battling the antimicrobial resistance when it was first detected with appearance of penicillin resistant staphylococci. Modifications to the existing antimicrobials by altering structure, pharmacokinetics, and drug action have been attempted, time and time again. But each time, resistance to the new mechanisms have risen, inflicting more severe infection to the patients. Today, existence of a “superdrug” seems a mirage, rather than a possibility. But emergence of “superbug” appears to be winning over making us to think new strategies. “Prevention is better than cure” is the motto today, in clinical practice of antimicrobials. However, the preventive approach has been threatened by inappropriate practices by prescribers. A recent European Union report suggested, significant multidrug resistance to common antibiotics is on rise in bacteria in different regions in Europe [3]. The CANWARD 2008 study in Canadian hospitals assessed prevalence of antimicrobial resistance of pathogens and reported high prevalence of MRSA 27.0% [4]. Even developed nations have not escaped the clutches of antimicrobial resistance.
Timeliness of diagnosis of HIV: a quantitative and qualitative study

Introduction: A CD4 count <200 at diagnosis results in negative health outcomes and suggests delays in HIV testing. Objectives: To describe the timeliness of HIV diagnosis in Newfoundland and Labrador (NL) and explore the reasons for delay. Methods: Demographic and clinical information from new HIV diagnoses in NL between 2006- 2016 were collected (n=58). Subjects were invited to interviews regarding testing barriers. Results: At diagnosis the mean age was 40.6, 53/58 (91.4%) were male, 33/58 (56.9%) were men who have sex with men, and 21/58 (36.2%) had a CD4 count <200. For 39/58 (67.2%), their first test was positive, though 55/58 (94.8%) had previous healthcare contact. Heterosexuals were more likely to present late (p=0.049). Barriers to testing were negative healthcare interactions, stigma, being unaware of their risk, and fear of the diagnosis. Conclusions: We defined missed opportunities for testing. Heterosexual men are more likely to test late. Late diagnosis may be prevented if testing is normalized.
Monolith GaAsP/Si dual-junction solar cells grown by MBE

The growth of monolith GaAsP/Si dual-junction solar cells on Si substrates by molecular-beam epitaxy is demonstrated. The technological method for the formation of a highly doped tunnel p+/n+ junction was developed. An obvious increase in the value of the open-circuit voltage indicating the contribution of the top-junction in the total open-circuit voltage monolithic dual-junction solar cells was found.
European Economics and the Early Years of the 'International Seminar on Macroeconomics'

L’International Seminar on Macroeconomics (ISoM) est une conference annuelle co-financee, pendant 15 ans (1978-1993), par l’EHESS et le NBER. Cet article expose les dynamiques institutionnelles et scientifiques sous-jacentes a cette cooperation. Nous suggerons que les macroeconomistes rassembles par l’ISoM contribuerent grandement a la constitution d’un reseau europeen d’economistes, partageant certains standards intellectuels et professionnels. Nous montrons que l’ISoM se situait au croisement de deux types d’« internationalisation » de l’economie : l’integration au niveau europeen des communautes de recherche nationales, ainsi qu’un processus d’« americanisation » de la discipline. Alors que la litterature existante sur l’« internationalisation » se concentre plutot sur le niveau national, notre article etudie ce processus a l’echelle europeenne. A cet egard, nous mettons en evidence le role cle joue par deux programmes de recherches en macroeconomie : la modelisation macroeconometrique a grande echelle et la theorie du desequilibre.