Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Relatives of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus - antinuclear antibodies, immunological profile and risk of developing the disease

Systemic lupus erythematosus is a systemic autoimmune disease that begins years before its clinical onset with the appearance of antinuclear antibodies and immunological signs of dysregulation in the serum. At the same time, due to the tendency towards familial aggregation, the risk of developing the disease in the relatives of the patients is tens of times higher. In multiple studies, relatives of patients have high titers of antinuclear antibodies significantly more often than the general population, and a combination of increased pro-inflammatory and decreased regulatory cytokines may be predictive of at-risk individuals who should be protected from risk factors or even take prophylactic medication. This literature review offers a summary of current literature on the subject.
Species variation in the cartilaginous endplate of the lumbar intervertebral disc

Cartilaginous endplate (CEP) plays an essential role in intervertebral disc (IVD) health and disease. The aim was to compare the CEP structure of lumbar IVD and to reveal the detailed pattern of integration between the CEP and bony endplate (BEP) from different species.
Analysis of microarray data by genetic algorithm

Microarray gene expression data is used to understand the actions of thousands of genes. Just a few genes out of thousands have a significant impact in any cancer process. Finding these defective genes using experimental data is impractical. To locate the relevant genes, computational techniques are required. A method to identifying cancer candidate genes from microarray data is created. Clustering of similar genes is necessary to find co-expressed genes in different biological conditions. It is important to develop methods to find the few candidate genes for cancer. An optimization process is used for such purpose. A genetic algorithm employs the principles of evolution: selection, recombination, and mutation to solve an optimization problem. Mutual information is used to find the dependency between genes. The two genes are similar if their expression levels are comparable. The similarity as well as positive and negative correlations between genes is considered while clustering them. Interdependence measure tells how the genes are correlated. The genes responsible for a sick state have higher interdependence measures. These genes are defective genes having cancer diagnostic information. Here microarray gene expression datasets from gastric cancer and colon cancer from the public domain are considered.
Delaying a Biopsy With Serial Prostate-Specific Antigen Checkup Helps to Identify a Significant Prostate Cancer: A Strategy to Evade Unnecessary Procedures

Purpose: To differentiate a non-cancer-related temporary increase in prostate-specific antigen (PSA) triggering unnecessary biopsy, we intentionally delayed biopsy with a serial follow-up, then investigated the efficacy of this strategy in identifying a significant prostate cancer (PCa). Materials and Methods: Retrospective data of patients who initially presented with a suspicious level of serum PSA (3–20 ng/mL), managed using the delayed strategy, and then eventually underwent biopsy were obtained from 4 tertiary centers between 2018–2020.Results: The collected 271 subjects had a median (interquartile range) PSA, age, and prostate volume of 5.03 ng/mL (4.46–7.79 ng/mL), 67 years (61–73 years), and 38 g (28–50 g), respectively. During the delay period of 8 weeks (4–19 weeks), most were managed with alpha-blockers (85.6%, n=232). Ninety-four (34.7%) experienced a PSA decrease of 20.53% (8.82–38.16). Eventual biopsy revealed 115 PCa cases (42.5%) including 82 significant ones and 46 high-risk diseases. Men with a PSA decrease had a lower probability of PCa (31.9% vs. 48%, p=0.014), a significant disease (21.3% vs. 35.0%, p=0.026), and high-risk PCa (7.4% vs. 22.0%, p=0.002) than the PSA-elevated counterparts. However, the degree of PSA decrease was not associated with the presence or the severity of PCa. In patients with PSA normalization (≤3 ng/mL), though 4 patients of them (66%) had PCa including a single significant disease, none had high-risk disease.Conclusions: About one-third of individuals initially indicated for transrectal biopsy experienced a decrease in PSA, and their chance for significant PCa was diminished. This retrospective study suggests PSA normalization could be an acceptable notion, though requires further investigation.
Habitat Quality Assessment and Ecological Risks Prediction: An Analysis in the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal (Suzhou Section)

With the fast pace of global urbanization, anthropogenic disturbances not only lead to frequent disasters, but also cause direct and indirect ecological and economic losses. To reduce the adverse effects of anthropogenic disturbances as part of sustainable ecosystem management, assessments of habitat quality and ecological risk are necessary. The objectives of this study are to analyze environmental conditions of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal (Suzhou section) for evaluating habitat quality and habitat degradation, and to conduct ecological-risk early warning assessment in this section. The Grand Canal is the longest and first canal in the world to be artificially excavated from natural rivers and lakes. By evaluating habitat quality using the InVEST suite of open-source software models for mapping and valuing the ecosystem, it was found that the natural lands with high habitat quality such as wetlands, forests and lakes along the Suzhou section of the Grand Canal have gradually decreased, while construction lands such as roads and buildings have gradually increased; there is a clear trend of decreasing areas with high habitat quality and increasing areas with low habitat quality, which is likely the result of urbanization. It was also found that the region has a high habitat degradation index, meaning that areas located at the junction of different land types are vulnerable to the surrounding environment due to narrow buffer zones that allow areas with high habitat quality to be easily affected by areas with low habitat quality. In terms of ecological risks, it was found that the natural land area with high habitat quality in the downstream locations was declining, thereby increasing the risks of pollution and flooding events while reducing the ecosystem’s resilience. The valuation model used in this study can be used as an effective decision-support tool to prioritize important ecological areas for conservation in the Grand Canal, and can also be adapted for use in the ecosystem management of other regions.
Fuzzy-Affine-Model-Based Filtering Design With Memory-Based Dynamic Event-Triggered Protocol

In this article, a novel dynamic event-triggered protocol is constructed to deal with the filtering problem for affine systems presented by Takagi–Sugeno (T–S) fuzzy model. Unlike the traditional fuzzy systems, a unified framework of T–S fuzzy affine systems is formulated, which is more capable of approximation over different operating regions. For achieving desirable performance while saving communication resources, the memory-based dynamic event-triggered protocol is constructed by flexibly exploiting a series of historically triggered packets. The fading channel is time-varying and described as a novel nonhomogeneous Markov process, in which a higher level deterministic switching signal regulates the variation of transition probabilities. By adopting the region-dependent Lyapunov theory, the mean-square exponentially stable, and expected $H_{\infty }$ performance for resulting systems is guaranteed. In the end, an inverted pendulum model is applied to verify the results of the theoretical analysis.
Computational fluid dynamics simulations of the flow field characteristics in a novel exhaust purification muffler of diesel engine

The purpose of this paper is to improve the emission performance of diesel engines. A novel exhaust purification muffler was proposed and designed. The flow field characteristics of the exhaust purification muffler were studied based on the finite volume method, the pressure loss of the exhaust purification muffler was 3315 Pa, and the pressure loss of the exhaust purification muffler was just 2% higher than the original muffler. Then, a three-dimensional numerical simulation model was established and used to investigate the effect of different expansion ratio, cavity length ratio, and ratio of length to diameter on the flow field characteristics in an exhaust purification muffler of diesel engine. The study was shown that the porous media (ceramic foam) had a great influence on the flow field distribution, where the air flow velocity was stable and the pressure distribution was trapezoidal, having a good pressure reduction and deceleration effect. With the increase of the expansion ratio parameter, the airflow cross-section area changed when air entered into the inlet silencing cavity, which had great influence on the velocity field and the pressure loss. Because of the improvement of cavity length ratio parameter, the flowing distance in the inlet silencing increased, which caused more local turbulence and pressure fluctuation. Also with the increase of the ratio of length to diameter parameter, the volume of inlet silencing chamber and the air flow space increased. The change of the structural parameters of each scheme had a certain influence on the pressure loss. The maximum pressure loss changing value among the expansion ratio schemes was 878 Pa, then the maximum pressure loss changing value among the cavity length ratio schemes was 328 Pa, and it was 89 Pa among the cavity length ratio schemes. The pressure loss caused by the expansion ratio parameter changed greatly, and the pressure loss changing value caused by the change of the cavity length ratio parameter and the ratio of length to diameter parameter was relatively small. In this paper, a muffler which contained a ceramic foam and had the functions of exhaust soot purification and noise elimination was supplied. The effects of the structure factors on flow field characteristics were studied. The guidance for the design and improvement of muffler is able to be supplied in this paper.
Comparative Effectiveness of Sacroiliac Belt versus Lumbar Orthosis Utilization on Nonspecific Low Back Pain: a Crossover Randomized Clinical Trial.

Background Back braces are commonly utilized in the management of low back pain (LBP). Objective The aim of this study is to evaluate (1) user satisfaction with a sacroiliac belt versus a lumbar orthosis and (2) the effect of a sacroiliac belt versus a lumbar orthosis on pain, functional disability status, and analgesic use for subjects with subacute or chronic non-specific LBP. Methods This is a prospective randomized crossover study. For the two-week study period, control group subjects wore the Horizon 627 Lumbar Brace ("lumbar orthosis") during the first week and the Serola Sacroiliac Belt ("sacroiliac belt") during the second week; experimental group subjects wore the sacroiliac belt during the first week and the lumbar orthosis during the second week. User satisfaction (Quebec User Evaluation of Satisfaction with Assistive Technology 2.0 [QUEST 2.0] score), functional disability status (Oswestry Disability Index [ODI]), pain, and analgesic use were recorded. Results Overall, the sacroiliac belt demonstrated significantly higher user satisfaction than the Horizon brace (QUEST Score = 20.31 vs. 16.17, p = 0.0375) for the entire study period. Significant negative correlations were identified between user satisfaction and functional disability (t = -4.71, p < 0.0001), pain magnitude (t = -6.81, p < 0.0001) as well as pain frequency (t = -6.66, p < 0.0001). Conclusion In this prospective randomized crossover study, subject satisfaction was associated with improvements in functional disability, pain magnitude and pain frequency. The sacroiliac belt demonstrated significantly higher user satisfaction and similar effectiveness compared to the lumbar orthosis.
New Statistical Methods For Association Studies And Genomic Predictio

Extended Abstract "Selective genotyping" is a very famous concept in genetics. It was introduced by Lebowitz et al. (1987) and was studied more in details by Lander and Botstein (1989). It consists in genotyping (collecting DNA information at specific positions) only the individuals with extreme phenotypes. Indeed, Lebowitz et al. (1987) noticed that the highest or the lowest observations contain most of the signal on Quantitative Trait Loci (QTL), i.e. genes with quantitative effect on a trait. Today, although the genotyping costs have drastically dropped, selective genotyping is still heavily used (e.g. [1]) since we can optimize the statistical experiment by focusing on extreme individuals instead of "random" individuals. Although "selective genotyping" was introduced in the eighties, biologists are still missing tools to analyze properly data sampled from this experimental design. Indeed, classical methods such as penalized regression (e.g. Lasso [2]) are not dedicated to extreme observations. As a consequence, we introduced recently the SgenoLasso [3], a new L1 penalized regression that models explicitly the extremes. SgenoLasso on the ``Interval Mapping" a famous concept in genetics that consists in scanning the genome by testing the presence of a QTL at each location. From a statistical point of view, SgenoLasso is based on new limiting results on stochastic processes along the genome. SgenoLasso presents all the nice properties of Lasso since we have replaced the problem in a
Industrial property management in manufacturing enterprises – an attempt to construct a definition of the concept for use within management sciences

: The purpose of this article is an attempt to define the concept of industrial property management based on literature research and the author’s own conceptual work devoted to the problem of defining this area. As a result of the conducted analyses, the author concludes that the hitherto and inconsistent interpretations of the notion of industrial property , as well as their detachment from management sciences, and giving them a character proper to legal sciences, gives rise to significant problems in the understanding and implementation of management processes in this area, and more importantly, also in the understanding of the importance and significance of this area for the proper management of a manufacturing enterprise. The author presents the view that the concept of industrial property must be understood more extensively in management sciences and, at the same time, broadly enough to allow for an unambiguous definition of industrial property management that would serve its stakeholders in a key way that does not raise any substantial doubts.
Prevalence of Risk of Sarcopenia in Polish Elderly Population—A Population Study

Sarcopenia in the elderly population is a public health challenge, and there are few data on its prevalence in Europe. In this study, we investigated the prevalence of sarcopenia in the elderly Polish population and its association with the level of obesity and co-existing diseases. We conducted a population-based cross-sectional study involving 823 men and 1177 women aged 65 years and older, randomly selected from the population living in the territory of the Republic of Poland between 2017 and 2020. We analyzed the results of body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC), waist-to-hip ratio (WHR), and waist-to-height ratio (WHtR). Risk of sarcopenia was assessed with the simple questionnaire to rapidly diagnose sarcopenia (SARC-F), and sarcopenic obesity risk was defined as the combination of anthropometry and SARC-F results. In addition, we collected disease data with an author questionnaire. The prevalence of risk of sarcopenia was 18.6% (22.3% in women and 13.2% in men), and its incidence significantly increased with age in both sexes. The risk of sarcopenic obesity was more common in women than in men, and it was higher in the older age group, except for sarcopenic obesity diagnosed by the WHR criteria. The group of elderly with concomitant diseases had a higher risk of developing sarcopenia, which emphasizes the need to monitor sarcopenia when concomitant diseases are diagnosed. In both groups, risk of sarcopenia was associated with motor and respiratory system diseases, type 2 diabetes, and neurological diseases. This study highlights that the risk of sarcopenia in the elderly population affects women to a greater extent than men. It is important to identify the elderly at risk of sarcopenia in routine clinical practice to develop long-term prevention strategies.
Public Expenditure and Economic Development in Nigeria

The main objective of this study was to investigate the impact of public expenditure on economic development in Nigeria. The design adopted for this study was ex-post-facto; data used for analysis were elicited from Central Bank Statistical Bulletin and Federal Ministry of Finance. To achieve this broad objective, a model was formulated based on empirical and theoretical reviews. The model used Human Development Index (HDI) as the dependent variable while public capital expenditure, public recurrent expenditure and external borrowing were the independent variables in the model. This study employed the Fully Modified Least Squares (FMOLS) Model to analyze data. The findings elicited from this study revealed that public capital expenditure, public recurrent expenditure and external borrowing all had positive and significant impact on human development index within the scope of this study. Inferential result deduced that public expenditure had positive and significant impact on economic development in Nigeria. The study recommended that urgent need to instill fiscal discipline in government expenditures by initiating far reaching effective internal control measures and more proactive economic management coordination and implementation as well as discouraging all non-productive activities and expenditures in all tiers of government forthwith. Government recurrent expenditure should be channeled to have effects on the economy, enhancing and promoting growth and development in the process. All non- productive activities and expenditure need to be reviewed forthwith while the role of government should be reappraised with more emphasis on providing the enabling policy environment for private sector initiatives.
The Computational Fallacy: A New Model for Understanding the Role of Computers in Humanities

The paper tries to counter some misassumptions about the computer and computation especially in relation to humanities and human behavior and they amount to what the author calls “the computational fallacy. The paper discusses a number of points such as the physiology of the computer, the Etymology of basic terms in the field, and the current approaches especially in mainstream digital humanities which reduce computation to a set of “tools”. The paper then proceeds to discuss some counter arguments such as rethinking the notion of programmability which should substitute “calculation” as the core of computation, considering the transformative nature of the computer and its media using the ideas of some theorists like Manovich and Drucker, and some new approaches that view computation differently like Computational Thinking, Algorithmic criticism, and Speculative computing.Cet article essaie de contrer quelques suppositions erronées sur l’ordinateur et la computation, plus particulièrement leur relation aux sciences humaines et au comportement humain qui équivaut à ce que l’auteur appelle « the computational fallacy » ou l’erreur computationnelle. Cet article aborde de nombreux points, tels que la physiologie de l’ordinateur, l’étymologie de termes de base dans ce domaine, ainsi que les approches courantes, particulièrement les approches dominantes dans les humanités numériques qui réduisent la computation comme un ensemble « d’outils ». Ensuite, l’article poursuit en discutant les contre-arguments comme les nouvelles réflexions des notions de programmation qui devraient substituer le calcul au cœur de la computation, considérant la nature transformante de l’ordinateur et ses médias utilisant les idées de quelques théoristes dont Manovich et Drucker, et quelques nouvelles approches qui voient la computation différemment comme « Computational Thinking » ou la pensée computationnelle, « Algorithmic criticism » ou la critique algorithmique et « Speculative computing » ou la computation spéculative.
Knowledge Gains and Losses to Organizational Resilience, from Intellectual Capital

Understood that knowledge loss is an imminent risk to organizations as it occurs when employees with valuable knowledge leave the organization, when there are problems with codified knowledge or when the organization does not properly manage knowledge. In this context, organizational resilience can be affected, since intangible resources enable organizational responses to the unexpected. Considering that the aspects that generate losses can be common to organizations, it is also important to identify what are the possible gains that the system has, as a result of these situations. Thus, the objective of this article is to understand the state of the art under knowledge loss in the context of organizational resilience and to identify the possible gains arising from these critical situations. As a proposal, a classification according to the concept of Intellectual Capital based on the three main dimensions: Human Capital, Structural Capital and Relational Capital. Thus, a literature review was carried out in order to identify the impacts of the loss of knowledge on resilient responses, as well as the gains for the organizational system. This theoretical study aimed to contribute to the scientific advancement of knowledge loss, to the advancement of organizational resilience aspects, as well as to Intellectual Capital. Also, it was proposed to advance in the understanding of knowledge gains, since regular aspects to organizations such as turnover, waste of knowledge, low volume of specialists and absences from work generate risks to critical knowledge. These, in turn, affect the resilience and structures of the IC. Presenting knowledge vulnerabilities makes it possible to identify possible positive impacts, in order to ensure proper knowledge management, in favor of organizational resilience and its sustainability. As a result, the study showed that the loss of knowledge is mainly from Human Capital, however there are direct and positive impacts on the structural and relational capital of the organization, as loss mitigation strategies lead to strategies for strengthening relationships and internal improvements in its structure. Furthermore, the creation of unlearning and organizational learning environments can contribute to the resilience of the system.
Superconductivity and Hydrogen Economy: A Roadmap to Synergy

Hydrogen as an energy carrier is a promising alternative to fossil fuels, and it becomes more and more popular in developed countries as a carbon-free fuel. The low boiling temperature of hydrogen (20 K or −253.15 °C) provides a unique opportunity to implement superconductors with a critical temperature above 20 K such as MgB2 or high-temperature superconductors. Superconductors increase efficiency and reduce the loss of energy, which could compensate for the high price of LH2 to some extent. Norway is one of the pioneer countries with adequate infrastructure for using liquid hydrogen in the industry, especially in marine technology where a superconducting propulsion system can make a remarkable impact on its economy. Using superconductors in the motor of a propulsion system can increase its efficiency from 95% to 98% when the motor operates at full power. The difference in efficiency is even greater when the motor does not work at full power. Here, we survey the applications of liquid hydrogen and superconductors and propose a realistic roadmap for their synergy, specifically for the Norwegian economy in the marine industry.