Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Male and female voices.

It is an interesting fact that the only difference between the male and female larynx is one of size, and, further, that within each voice category marked differences in size are to be observed. The cords of a soprano are shorter than those of a contralto, and the cords of a tenor are shorter than those of a bass. In this they follow the parallel of instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and bass fiddle. The larger the instrument and the longer the string, the lower the tone which can be produced. Conversely, the shorter the string the higher the tone the instrument can yield. Taken at its face value this would appear to be a very simple proposition. All that is necessary would be to examine the larynx and the length of the cords would indicate in which category a singer belongs. Unfortunately, however, the laryngoscope is hardly
Linking green product innovation, technological and human resource capabilities: A conceptual model

The sustainability concern has shaped a new approach to product innovation in 21st century. Greening the product innovation (GPI) is believed to positively impact the environment, as well as the economic growth. However, review of literatures indicates that firms are still ambiguous to embark on GPI, partly because they do not know what capabilities are required for such an effort. This paper aims to explore the relevant capabilities needed for GPI and propose a conceptual model to demonstrate their interplay. The model could provide a basis for further research in this domain.
How Much Information Is Too Much Information ? Lagged Disclosure , Bank Runs , and Risk Taking ∗

I study the effects of disclosing financial information on the occurrence of bank runs and on management risk-taking activities. The main trade-off is between the risk of bank runs, which increases with a disclosure delay, and managerial incentives for risk taking, which runs discipline. I find that the main policy consideration is the growth rate of bank assets. If bank assets grow sufficiently slowly, then the optimal policy is to disclose with a lag, in order to balance managerial risk taking and creditors’ coordination problems. When bank assets have high-growth rates, a disclosure lag increases the occurrence of runs and decreases bank value. ∗Find the most recent version of this paper at www.andrew. cmu.edu/user/cbotiach/jmp_cbotiach. pdf †camilobotia@cmu.edu. Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University. I would like to thank my advisors, Burton Hollifield and Rick Green, for their guidance and support. I would also like to thank Pierre Liang, Jack Stecher, Javier Peña, and Chester Spatt, for their helpful comments. This paper has improved thanks to comments from participants in the Finance seminar at Carnegie Mellon University, SAET meetings 2016, EFA Doctoral Tutorial 2016, the Olin School of Business professional development workshop, and the LBS trans-Atlantic doctoral conference. I thank Asaf Manela for helpful comments and the discussants of my paper, Joel Shapiro, Deeksha Gupta, and Pascal Golec. Web:www.andrew. cmu.edu/user/cbotiach/.
Shear Wave Ultrasound Elastography of the Prostate: Initial Results

Purpose This prospective study was to evaluate shear wave elastography (SWE) in the detection of prostate cancer (PC). Methods Patients scheduled for a transrectal ultrasound (TRUS) biopsy of the prostate because of elevated prostate-specific antigen levels or abnormal digital rectal examination result underwent a standard TRUS and SWE. A second TRUS examination and sextant biopsy by a second physician blinded to SWE results was then performed. Pathologic result was reviewed, and sensitivity, specificity, negative predictive value (NPV), and positive predictive value (PPV) were calculated. Results A total of 53 patients (318 sextants) participated in the study. Mean age was 64.2 years (range, 53–79 years). A total of 26 foci of PC were detected in 11 patients (20.7%). On the basis of the receiver operating characteristic curve, a value of 37 kPa was used as the cutoff between benign and malignant. This produced a sensitivity of 96.2% (25/26), a specificity of 96.2% (281/292), a PPV of 69.4% (25/36), and an NPV of 99.6% (281/282). Six (55%) of 11 false-positive samples were secondary to benign calcifications. The Young modulus of PC ranged from 30 to 110 kPa (mean [SD], 58.0 [20.7] kPa). At the patient level, if a cutoff of 40 kPa was used, all PCs would have been detected, and the positive biopsy rate would be 11 (50%) of 22 compared to 11 (20.8%) of 53 without SWE—a 140% increase in the positive biopsy rate. Conclusions Shear wave elastography has a high sensitivity, specificity, PPV, and NPV for the detection of PC. With a high PPV, patients with elevated prostate-specific antigen levels or abnormal results in the digital rectal examination and negative SWE may not require biopsy. This could significantly reduce the negative biopsy rate in PC detection.
La narrazione multilineare: una proposta di metodo per la formazione e lo sviluppo di una comunità scolastica

In questo lavoro viene presentata un’esperienza di formazione e sviluppo di una comunita scolastica, svolta mediante un progetto di narrazione multilineare. I dati quantitativi raccolti tra gli alunni coinvolti e i dati osservativi, elaborati durante l’esperienza, evidenziano l’efficacia della proposta.
Everyday Life, Online: U.S. College Students' Use of the Internet

The goal of this study was to learn about how college students are using the Internet and to compare their use of it to that of college students as reported in 2002 by replicating and extending previous research. A survey of college students at 40 U.S. higher education institutions was conducted, along with observations and interviews at several Midwestern universities. For comparison to the general population a nationwide telephone survey was undertaken. The study found that Internet use had predictably increased but that college students continued to prefer using multiple methods of communication to stay in touch with friends and family. College students continue to be early adopters of new Internet tools and applications in comparison to the general U.S. Internet-using population. For U.S. college students, Internet technologies have become so ubiquitous as to seem invisible.
Bioactive Compounds in Cranberries and their Biological Properties

Cranberries are healthy fruit that contribute color, flavor, nutritional value, and functionality. They are one of only three fruits native to America. Over the past decade, public interest for the North American cranberry (Vaccinium macrocarpon) has been rising with reports of their potential health benefits linked to the numerous phytochemicals present in the fruit—the anthocyanins, the flavonols, the flavan-3-ols, the proanthocyanidins, and the phenolic acid derivatives. The presence of these phytochemicals appears to be responsible for the cranberry property of preventing many diseases and infections, including cardiovascular diseases, various cancers, and infections involving the urinary tract, dental health, and Helicobacter pylori-induced stomach ulcers and cancers. Recent years have seen important breakthroughs in our understanding of the mechanisms through which these compounds exert their beneficial biological effects, yet these remain to be scientifically substantiated. In this paper these characteristics, as well as the antioxidant, radical scavenging, antibacterial, antimutagen, and anticarcinogen properties of cranberry major bioactive compounds are explained.
Blocking of α1β1 and α2β1 adhesion molecules inhibits eosinophil migration through human lung microvascular endothelial cell monolayer.

INTRODUCTION In cell trafficking to the airways in asthma, among integrins the most important are those containing α4 and β2 subunits. We have previously shown that also blocking of collagen receptors, α1β1 and α2β1 integrins, inhibits transmigration of eosinophils of asthmatic subjects through a monolayer of skin microvascular endothelial cells seeded on collagen IV coated inserts. However, it was not clear whether this observation was limited to asthma or depended on the type of microvascular cell and collagen IV used as a base. MATERIALS & METHODS In the current study we performed a transmigration assay using human lung microvascular endothelial cells seeded directly on a plastic surface as a base and blood cells isolated from 12 representatives of each of two groups, asthmatics and healthy donors, by gradient centrifugation, followed by immunomagnetic negative separation of eosinophils. Isolated eosinophils and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) were inhibited by snake venom-derived integrin antagonists including viperistatin and VP12, as inhibitors of α1β1 and α2β1 integrin, respectively, and VLO5 and VLO4, as inhibitors of α4β1 and α5β1 integrin, respectively. RESULTS All snake venom-derived anti-adhesive proteins were effective in inhibiting eosinophil transmigration, whilst only VLO5 and VLO4 reduced PBMC mobility in this assay. This observation was similar in both groups of subjects studied. DISCUSSION α1β1 and α2β1 integrins could be involved in transmigration of eosinophil to the inflammatory site. Migratory inhibition was observed in asthma subjects as well as in healthy donors, and did not depend on origin of endothelial cells or the extracellular matrix component used as a base.
Adaptive mesh refinement and coarsening for cohesive zone modeling of dynamic fracture

Adaptive mesh refinement and coarsening schemes are proposed for efficient computational simulation of dynamic cohesive fracture. The adaptive mesh refinement consists of a sequence of edge‐split operators, whereas the adaptive mesh coarsening is based on a sequence of vertex‐removal (or edge‐collapse) operators. Nodal perturbation and edge‐swap operators are also employed around the crack tip region to improve crack geometry representation, and cohesive surface elements are adaptively inserted whenever and wherever they are needed by means of an extrinsic cohesive zone model approach. Such adaptive mesh modification events are maintained in conjunction with a topological data structure (TopS). The so‐called PPR potential‐based cohesive model (J. Mech. Phys. Solids 2009; 57:891–908) is utilized for the constitutive relationship of the cohesive zone model. The examples investigated include mode I fracture, mixed‐mode fracture and crack branching problems. The computational results using mesh adaptivity (refinement and coarsening) are consistent with the results using uniform mesh refinement. The present approach significantly reduces computational cost while exhibiting a multiscale effect that captures both global macro‐crack and local micro‐cracks. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Emotion feature selection from physiological signals using tabu search

A method of feature selection based on tabu search is proposed for recognizing affective states (joy, anger, sadness, pleasure). After combining with knear neighbour classifier, the tabu search heuristic algorithm achieved good recognition performance in the affective states classification , obtained the robust feature subsets which belong to 4 physiological signals (ECG, EMG, SC, RSP). Simulation showed that it is feasible and effective to recognize emotion using tabu search algorithm.
Aging: a theory based on free radical and radiation chemistry.

The phenomenon of growth, decline and death—aging—has been the source of considerable speculation (1, 8, 10). This cycle seems to be a more or less direct function of the metabolic rate and this in turn depends on the species (animal or plant) on which are superimposed the factors of heredity and the effects of the stresses and strains of life—which alter the metabolic activity. The universality of this phenomenon suggests that the reactions which cause it are basically the same in all living things. Viewing this process in the light of present day free radical and radiation chemistry and of radiobiology, it seems possible that one factor in aging may be related to deleterious side attacks of free radicals (which are normally produced in the course of cellular metabolism) on cell constituents. * Irradiation of living things induces mutation, cancer, and aging (9). Inasmuch as these also arise spontaneously in nature, it is natural to inquire if the processes might not be similar. It is believed that one mechanism of irradiation effect is through liberation of OH and HO 2 radicals (12). There is evidence, although indirect, that these two highly active free radicals are produced normally in living systems. In the first place, free radicals are present in living cells; this was recently demonstrated in vivo by a paramagnetic resonance absorption method (3). Further, it was shown that the concentration of free radicals increased with increasing metabolic activity in conformity with the postulates set forth some years ago that free radicals were involved in biologic oxidation-reduction reactions (11, 13). Are some of these free radicals OH and/or HO2, or radicals of a similar high order of reactivity, and where might they arise in the cell? The most likely source of OH and HO2 radicals, at least in the animal cell, would be the interaction of the respiratory enzymes involved
The clinical significance of surface antigen variants of hepatitis B virus

Summary. Hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) is not only critical to the biology of hepatitis B virus (HBV), it is also the basis of the currently available vaccines, assays to detect it in serum are crucial for diagnosis of infection and antibodies against it are used clinically to suppress infection of transplanted livers. All of these rely on antigenic interactions between HBsAg and HBsAb. Thus, it should not be a surprise that changes in epitopes will affect all these situations. It is useful to classify such changes simplistically as variants, found in natural isolates, and mutants, which are observed to emerge, usually under immunological pressure, often medical in origin. The former tend to affect the sensitivity of diagnostic assays and the latter allow escape of viruses in vaccinees and those being treated with HBsAb. The majority of these changes cluster in the hydrophilic central core of HBsAg, from aa99 up to 169. They are gaining importance as causes of mistaken diagnosis and are associated with infection of vaccinees and transplanted livers. There is a danger that they will become the dominant strains as vaccination becomes universal. More data are required on the epidemiology and antigenicity of these changes.
Electronic books: a survey of users in the UK

Purpose – This study provides insights into the early market for e‐books in the UK through survey research with members of a large online panel.Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected from an online panel established by a leading commercial internet research company. Members of the panel are signalled each week to take part in web surveys. Respondents completed an online questionnaire posted on the company's web site. Questions explored awareness, trialling, purchase and borrowing of e‐books, examining the frequency of such behaviour and types of publications accessed and/or obtained.Findings – A significant proportion of respondents (85 per cent) were aware of e‐books. Among these respondents, around half (49 per cent) had made trial use of them, nearly four in ten (38 per cent) had bought at least one e‐book, and one in seven (13 per cent) had borrowed an e‐book from a library. Technical books and non‐fiction publications related to hobbies and interests were among those most popularly used an.
Low Power Consumption 8 MHz-Low-Pass CT Combined Technology ARC-Filter

Low power consumption devices, especially analog CT ARC-fllters, are of a great significance for employing in areas of communication, instrumentation, security systems, etc. The traditional design of such filters for the MHz-band contains creation of a complex CMOS schematic including a frequency tuning system. A non-tuning pioneer SC-filter also is known. Both these types of filter have not very low power consumption because of rather complex schematics. Meanwhile the ARC-filter, based upon a ladder RC-circuit and having the minimal number of active elements, is rather convenient because of its really low power consumption. The principles of the design procedure of such type filters are considered. The procedure is illustrated with the designing of the LPF for 8 MHz-band; the supply voltage is 2.5 V, the power consumption is 1.5 mW. In this work we show the possibility to solve the design problem in a simple schematic basis.
Surgical Outcome of Colon Interposition in Esophageal Cancer Surgery: Analysis of Risk Factors for Conduit-Related Morbidity

Abstract Background We aimed to assess the feasibility, surgical outcomes, and conduit-related complications of colon interposition in patients with esophageal cancer. Methods Patients with esophageal cancer who underwent colon interposition for esophageal reconstruction between June 2000 and June 2013 were retrospectively reviewed. Results A total of 67 consecutive patients (mean age, 62.2 ± 7.9 years) were enrolled. During this time period, 944 patients underwent esophageal reconstruction using gastric conduit. Twelve patients (17.9%) also received neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (nCRT). The median follow-up duration was 44 months (range, 1–168 months); median survival duration was 63 months (range, 1–168 months); and 3- and 5-year overall survival rates were 61.6 and 49.4%, respectively. A total of 43 patients (64.2%) experienced at least 1 postoperative morbidity. According to the Clavien–Dindo grading system, 36 patients (54%) experienced postoperative morbidity of higher than Grade III. Pulmonary complications were most commonly observed complications among the patients (18 patients, 26.9%). Anastomosis site leakage developed in 11 patients (16.4%), and 3 of these patients (6.0%) eventually experienced graft failure. On multivariate analysis, nCRT was determined as a significant risk factor for conduit-related complications (leakage, graft failure, fistula, and stricture). Conclusion Colon interposition is associated with relatively high complication rates, whereas nCRT is associated with conduit morbidity.
Wideband chirp generation techniques in digital phase-locked loops

In this paper in-depth analysis and comparison of two popular FM techniques, namely, two-point modulation and pre-emphasis of the modulation signal are presented. Both modulation enhancement techniques were implemented in the time domain model of an all-digital phase-locked loop (ADPLL). Their performance is evaluated based on Matlab simulations for different type of chirps. Obtained results show that chirps with the period of 0.1ms and peak-to-peak bandwidth of 1GHz can be generated with linearity better than 1% by employing either of these techniques. Additionally, advantages of two-point modulation with respect to ADPLL building block requirements are demonstrated.
Obligate herbivory in an ancestrally carnivorous lineage: the giant panda and bamboo from the perspective of nutritional geometry

Summary Herbivores face various nutritional challenges in their life cycles, challenges that may become increasingly acute under ongoing environmental changes. Here, focusing on calcium, phosphorus and nitrogen, we used nutritional geometry to analyse individual-based data on foraging and extraction efficiencies, and combined these with data on reproduction and migratory behaviour to understand how a large herbivorous carnivore can complete its life cycle on a narrow and seemingly low quality bamboo diet. Behavioural results showed that pandas during the year switched between four main food categories involving the leaves and shoots of two bamboo species available. Nutritional analysis suggests that these diet shifts are related to the concentrations and balances of calcium, phosphorus and nitrogen. Notably, successive shifts in range use and food type corresponded with a transition to higher concentrations and/or a more balanced intake of these multiple key constituents. Our study suggests that pandas obligatorily synchronize their seasonal migration and reproduction with the disjunct nutritional phenologies of two bamboo species. This finding has potentially important implications for habitat conservation for this species and, more generally, draws attention to the need for understanding the nutritional basis of food selection in devising management plans for endangered species.
Percutaneous coronary interventions in Assam, North East India: procedure indications and outcome

Objective: There is a paucity of data on the procedure indications and outcome of Percutaneous Coronary Interventions (PCI) performed in centres from North East India. Therefore, this study was conducted to determine the procedure indications and in hospital and 30 days outcome of PCI procedures performed in the cardiac catheterization laboratory of Gauhati Medical College Hospital during the early period of its inception. Methods: We conducted an observational descriptive study on 151 symptomatic coronary artery disease patients, who underwent primary, rescue or elective PCI with stent deployment in Gauhati Medical College Hospital, from January 2010 to December 2011. The primary objective of the study was to identify the procedure indications, clinical profile, pattern of stent use and to document the in hospital and 30 days adverse outcomes. The patients were followed for one month and complications were noted. Results: The mean age of sample was 54.9 ±10.6 years, 87.4% of them were male. The indications for PCI were stable angina (59.6%), unstable angina (4.6%), Post MI (21.19%), Primary PCI (11.92%) and Others (CHF) (2.6%). The outcomes were mortality (0.66%), Peri procedural MI (0.66%), Contrast induced-acute kidney injury (0.66%), Arrhythmia requiring treatment-VT/VF (2.64%), Complete heart block (1.98%), Local vascular complications (1.32%), probable sub acute stent thrombosis (0.66%) and Discharge from hospital after a successful PCI procedure (99.33%). None required referral for CABG surgery or reported any major bleeding. Conclusion: Our in hospital and 30 days outcome after PCI are comparable with the National data. Stable angina was a major indication in our study probably reflecting a more conservative approach towards patient selection during the initial period of starting the cardiac cath lab. Brady and tachy-arrhythmias were the major complications observed. The results of our study suggest that favourable outcome with PCI can be achieved in our setting, which is at par with the National level.
Effects of natural flavones on membrane properties and citotoxicity of HeLa cells

The aim of this study was to determine whether eupafolin and hispidulin, flavones extracted from Eupatorium littorale Cabrera, Asteraceae, have the ability to change properties of biological membranes and promote cytotoxic effects. Eupafolin (50-200 µM) decreased approximately 30% the rate and total amplitude of valinomycin induced swelling and 60-100% the energy-dependent mitochondrial swelling. Moreover, eupafolin (200 µM) reduced 35% the mitochondrial permeability transition, and hispidulin did not change this parameter in any of the doses tested. The evaluation of phase transition of DMPC liposomes with the probe DPH demonstrated that hispidulin and eupafolin affect gel and fluid phase. With mitochondrial membrane as model, hispidulin increased the polarization of fluorescence when used DPH-PA probe. Eupafolin and hispidulin (100 µM) promoted a reduction of 40% in cellular viability of HeLa cells in 24 h. Our results suggest that eupafolin and hispidulin have cytotoxic effects that can be explained, in part, by alterations promoted on biological membranes properties and mitochondrial bioenergetics.