Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Computing optical flow

The authors examine some computational aspects of determining optical flow. Both area- and curve-based approaches are discussed. Necessary and sufficient conditions are investigated for the existence and uniqueness of the smoothing spline from regularization schema prevalent. The authors discuss a variety of boundary constraints: free, Neuman, Dirichlet, and two-point boundary conditions. It is shown that both free and Neuman boundary problems are ill-conditioned, and are not appropriate for optical flow computation. This partly explains why practitioners have attested to the difficult of computing flow velocities using such regularization scheme. Therefore, it is necessary to use either Dirichlet boundary conditions or design different regularization schema. As a common practice in early vision, a continuous problem is formulated, and a discrete version of the problem is solved instead. The authors estimate the discretization errors, and compute the resulting discrete smoothing splines. They study efficient algorithms for solving the system of linear equations for the discrete smoothing splines. Among a variety of iterative algorithms, they propose the Chebyshev method for the computation of the area-based optical flow. <<ETX>>
Neoadjuvant immunochemotherapy for locally advanced resectable oral squamous cell carcinoma: a prospective single-arm trial (Illuminate Trial)

Background: Locally advanced oral squamous cell carcinoma (LAOSCC) is associated with a high rate of recurrence and poor survival. Given the recent successes of neoadjuvant immunochemotherapy (NAICT) in solid tumors, it is promising to use this treatment modality to achieve a better pathological response and improve the survival of LAOSCC, and clinical evidence is needed to assess its safety and efficacy. Patients and Methods: A prospective trial of NAICT with toripalimab (PD-1 inhibitor) and albumin paclitaxel/cisplatin (TTP) was conducted in patients with clinical stage III and IVA OSCC. Intravenous albumin paclitaxel (260 mg/m2), cisplatin (75 mg/m2), and toripalimab (240 mg) were given in sequence on day 1 of each 21 day cycle for two cycles, followed by radical surgery and risk-adapted adjuvant (chemo)radiotherapy. The primary endpoints were safety and major pathological response (MPR). Targeted next generation sequencing and multiplex immunofluorescence were performed to assess clinical molecular characteristics and the tumor immune microenvironment in the pre-NAICT and post-NAICT tumor samples. Results: Twenty patients were enrolled. NAICT was well-tolerated with a low incidence of grades 3–4 adverse events in three patients. The completion rates of NAICT and subsequent R0 resection were 100%. The MPR rate was 60%, including a 30% pathological complete response. MPR was achieved in all four patients with a combined positive score of PD-L1>10. The density of tertiary lymphatic structure in post-NAICT tumor samples predicted the pathological response to NAICT. During the median 23-month follow-up, the disease-free survival was 90%, and the overall survival was 95%. Conclusions: NAICT with the TTP protocol in LAOSCC is feasible and well tolerated, with a promising MPR and no obstruction on subsequent surgery. This trial is supportive of further randomized trials using NAICT in LAOSCC.
Fracture related infections

It is a common phrase in orthopaedic trauma literature that fracture related infections are devastating complications. Still most medical professionals, let alone the general public, are not aware of the true magnitude of the problem. The orthopaedic trauma surgeons know quite well that the magical 6 weeks healing time is not applicable for the complicated fractures. An infected nonunion often take years of treatment and multiple surgeries to heal. Most people are surprised to hear that a lower limb infected nonunion is associated with such a bad quality of life it can be compared to end stage heart disease. These patients cannot mobilise and are forced to spend their lives in and out of hospital. They rely heavily on health services and often cannot generate a normal income. Besides treating this severe complication, it is also the responsibility of orthopaedic surgeons to educate other health professionals and the general public. Moreover, funding bodies, insurance companies and health policy makers should be made aware of the magnitude of this problem. In many hospitals, orthopaedic surgeons are often alone in dealing with the daunting task of treating the infection. In the absence of effective microbiological insight, their efforts are deemed futile. There is an obvious need for multidisciplinary collaborations but beyond that we have to enhance our own knowledge in microbiology, infectious diseases, pharmacology and cell biology. The Journal of Orthopaedic Surgery’s current special issue on fracture related infections and our recent published scientific papers will help our readers stay updated and stimulated about this topic. The issue explores this field from multiple angles including an overview of the magnitude of the problem and possible key factors of the outcomes and a summary of our current knowledge on the causative organisms. Three excellent treatment-focused review articles address the relevance of surgical care to the prevention and treatment of fracture related infections, the currently available highest level of evidence to guide our practice and specific aspects on the utilisation of antibiotic coated nails. As editors of the trauma section of the Journal of Orthopaedic Surgery, we believe these reviews highlight some of our recently published exciting topics such as intramedullary antibiotic perfusion, the effect of timing of debridement on outcomes after open fractures and some rare pathogen identified in non-union after closed fracture management. We hope this special issue will help our readers with their treatment as well as provide guidance in their quest for new research ideas. It is our aim that orthopaedic surgeons can think more collaboratively, and at the same time strive to promote the best management of fracture related infections in our society.
Well‐posedness of integral equations for modeling electromagnetic scattering from cavities

Integral equations for modeling electromagnetic scattering from indented screens or cavity structures are proposed using a symmetric equivalent current model, which is based on image theory with a perfect electrically conducting (PEC) ground plane. The well posedness of the proposed integral equations is theoretically established in this paper. It is known that all resonance modes for cavity problems either due to the presence of a perfect magnetically conducting (PMC) open aperture or a PEC open aperture. In this paper, it is proved that both kinds of resonance modes cannot exist for the proposed integral equations without excitation. To numerically examine this well posedness, the condition numbers of resultant matrices from the generalized network formulation and proposed integral equations are analyzed as functions of frequency and the depth of cavity. The numerical analysis of the condition numbers obtained also shows that the integral equations proposed in this paper are immune to the problem of the interior resonance for three‐dimensional cavity problems. Moreover, simulation of scattering from standard cavity structures verifies the validity of the proposed integral equations.
Experimentally elicited productions: Differences and similarities between mixed effects and ANOVA analyses

Currently, many experimental studies of speech production use fully counterbalanced designs to examine variation in categorical (e.g., correct/incorrect) or relatively continuous measures (e.g., reaction times, voice onset times). These data present several challenges to ANOVA analyses. Some of these issues are well known to be the speech community; for example, the non-normality of dependent variables such as proportion correct. Others have been less extensively addressed; for example, many speech studies account for participant- but not item-specific contributions to variance. I’ll discuss the opportunities and challenges in using linear mixed effects models to address these issues. I’ll review some of the common issues that arise in using such models and discuss how to interpret and report their results.
ε-Conjugate maps and ε-conjugate duality in vector optimization with set-valued maps

The aim of this article is to develop an approximate (ε)-conjugate duality theory for a general vector optimization problem with set-valued maps on the basis of ε-weak efficiency. We first introduce the concepts of ε-conjugate maps and ε-weak subgradients for set-valued maps and establish several properties of them. Then we introduce an ε-conjugate dual problem for the vector set-valued optimization problem. Finally, we establish a weak duality theorem and a strong duality theorem for the relationship between the primal and the dual problems.
An Intention-Aware Markov Chain Based Method for Top-K Recommendation

Recommender systems play significant roles in business, especially in e-commerce. Nevertheless, users’ behaviors are usually mixing and drifting, which is hard to tackle. Current sequential methods of item-wise interest extracting suffer from the intricacy and sparsity of data. Inspired by that category-wise interests may be intrinsic drivers of user behaviors and heterogeneous actions may reveal certain behavior patterns, we introduce intention as a tuple of category and action to address the data issues. In this paper, an intention-aware Markov chain based sequential recommendation model (IMRec) is proposed. We model the overall preferences of users as the integration of long-term preferences and short-term intents. In particular, the matrix factorization method is adopted to extract the long-term user-item preference. For the modeling of the short-term intents transition, we adopt high-order Markov chain based methods. A factorized mixture transition distribution model for high-order Markov chain approximation is leveraged in this paper to reduce the algorithm complexity. An auxiliary loss on intention representation is utilized, which brings considerable performance improvements. Experiments on real-world datasets demonstrate that our model outperforms state-of-the-art baseline models in terms of three common metrics, and shows superior stability, scalability, and training efficiency. Note to Practitioners—In e-commerce, sequential recommenders are essential to facilitate decision-making and promote business. A big challenge is to capture the sequential patterns from the mixing and drifting user-item interaction sequences. Customer behaviors are often driven by their inherent intentions, which may present more stable and reliable patterns. Motivated by that, we propose a novel intention-aware next-item recommendation algorithm with high performance. Our method models the user-item preferences as the integration of long-term preferences and short-term intents. More specifically, long-term preferences show the general tastes of users, which are modeled by latent factors of users and items. Additionally, the intention is defined as a tuple of category and action. We model the short-term intents as the intention transition from the past intentions by a high-order Markov chain. We further leverage a factorization-based mixture transition distribution model for high-order Markov chain approximation and reduce the algorithm complexity. The proposed model is validated in 4 real-world datasets and shows good recommendation performance, performance stability, model scalability, and training efficiency. Our model provides an effective recommendation method at low computational costs for e-commerce companies.
Elastic properties of single-walled carbon nanotubes in transverse directions

The elastic deformation of single-walled carbon nanotubes under hydrostatic pressure has been modeled using the molecular structural mechanics method. The computational results indicate that the radial direction elastic modulus deceases with the increase in tube diameter. The circumferential direction elastic modulus is insensitive to tube diameter, and roughly equal to the axial direction modulus. The hydrostatic pressure for tube buckling also deceases with increasing tube diameter and is in the range of 1.5-11 GPa for single-walled carbon nanotubes with diameters of 0.6-2.0 nm; this prediction is in good agreement with existing experimental results. The tube chirality has minor effect on the radial modulus and buckling strength.
Non-Hormonal Treatment Options for Regulation of Menstrual Cycle in Adolescents with PCOS

Menstrual irregularities are one of the main clinical symptoms caused by polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). Pharmacological treatment options for non-fertility indications to restore menstrual frequency play an important role in the management of PCOS. Oral contraceptive pills are commonly prescribed for adolescents with menstrual irregularities, however, when contraindicated or poorly tolerated, further pharmacological therapy is required. This systematic literature research aims to provide an overview concerning the effects of non-hormonal pharmacological treatment options on menstrual irregularities in adolescents suffering from PCOS. A systematic literature search in PubMed, Cochrane, Embase, Bio-SISS and Web of Science was performed, including literature from January 1998 to September 2022, using specific keywords in order to find related studies. n = 265 studies were identified of which n = 164 were eligible for further evaluation. Only four placebo-controlled studies were identified, with diverging inclusion and exclusion criteria. Available data on specific non-hormonal off-label use medication primarily consisted of metformin, Glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists, thiazolidinediones, anti-androgen agents (spironolactone, finasteride, flutamide) and supplements (chromium picolinate, myo-inositol). However, only a few have partly pointed out beneficial effects on improving menstrual frequency in patients diagnosed with PCOS. In summary, metformin in dosages of 1500–2550 g/day, GLP-1—analogues and supplements were effective in regulation of menstrual cycles in adolescents diagnosed with PCOS. Menstrual frequency in adolescents with PCOS is essential to prevent hypoestrogenism with long-term consequences. In this context, MET is the most effective and cost- efficient in overweight adolescent girls, also showing beneficial effects in the regulation of insulin sensitivity, especially if COCs are contraindicated or not well-tolerated. Further studies are needed to evaluate therapies in lean and normal-weight girls with PCOS.
Nanoscopic biodosimetry using plasmid DNA in radiotherapy with metallic nanoparticles

Abstract Nanoscopic lesions (complex damages), are the most lethal lesions for the cells. As nanoparticles have become increasingly popular in radiation therapy and the importance of analyzing nanoscopic dose enhancement has increased, a reliable tool for nanodosimetry has become indispensable. In this regard, the DNA plasmid is a widely used tool as a nanodosimetry probe in radiobiology and nano‐radiosensitization studies. This approach is helpful for unraveling the radiosensitization role of nanoparticles in terms of physical and physicochemical effects and for quantifying radiation‐induced biological damage. This review discusses the potential of using plasmid DNA assays for assessing the relative effects of nano‐radiosensitizers, which can provide a theoretical basis for the development of nanoscopic biodosimetry and nanoparticle‐based radiotherapy.
Optimization of an active noise control system using spherical harmonics expansion of the primary field

The design of an active noise control system involves several steps. One of the most important is to find the best locations of the control sources and error sensors according to the primary source distribution and its spectrum. Thus the first step in this optimization problem is to obtain an analytical expression for the primary sound field. In this work this was done by using a spherical harmonics expansion, determined on the basis of measurements of the primary field. It is shown how, by using such an expansion, a method can be developed for optimizing the transducer locations for the case of free field radiation of a period general primary source. Finally it is shown how this measurement database can be used to choose a good compromise between the number and the locations of the error sensors.
Diagnostic efficacy of aneuploidy markers correlated with early onset preeclampsia

Low-dose aspirin administration before 16 weeks of gestation can prevent preeclampsia (PE) more effectively. In order to determine if aspirin should be administered, this study aimed to investigate the predictive value of pregnancy-associated plasma protein A (PAPP-A) and aneuploidy markers for the onset period of PE. 1053 singleton pregnant women were included in the study, and serum PAPPA-A and aneuploidy markers were analyzed between 3 group (normotensive, late-onset PE, and early-onset PE). The utility of these markers for predicting early-onset preeclampsia (EOPE) was compared using each marker and their combination. Alpha-fetoprotein (AFP)/PAPP-A > 6.89 and human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG)/PAPP-A > 7.94 were associated with EOPE with a positive likelihood ratio (LR) (6.52, 95% confidence interval [CI] 4.9–7.1), and (5.77, 95% CI 3.9–6.4). The combination of markers could predict EOPE more accurately compared to the single markers. AFP/PAPP-A > 6.89 and hCG/PAPP-A > 7.94had a predictive ability for EOPE, and these cutoff values can help determine the use of aspirin at an earlier gestational age (GA).
Particles and the Universe

The early stages of the universe evolution are discussed according to the hot big bang model and the grand unified theories. The shortcomings of big bang are summarized and their resolution by inflationary cosmology is sketched. Cosmological inflation, the subsequent oscillation and decay of the inflaton field, and the resulting reheating of the universe are studied in some detail. The density perturbations produced by inflation and the temperature fluctuations of the cosmic microwave background radiation are introduced. Baryogenesis via non-thermal leptogenesis is analyzed and dark energy and matter in the universe are presented. Quantum gravity and string theory are very briefly introduced. The problem of initial conditions for inflation is discussed in the light of string theory and the possibly detectable primordial gravity waves from inflation are mentioned.
Outcomes of adrenalectomy performed in regional New South Wales, Australia

Centralization of subspeciality procedures in Australia is difficult due to a vast geographical span and in the appropriate patient group, surgery in regional centres should be considered. Our study reviews the safety of adrenalectomy performed at a low‐volume regional centre in regards to length of hospital admission, operative time, complication rate and conversion to open rate.
Isolation and molecular characterization of enterococci from different animal species

The study was undertaken to determine the occurrence of Enterococcus spp. with special reference to vancomycin resistant enterococci (VRE) in bovines, equines and poultry; detection of vancomycin resistance gene markers by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and to compare VRE isolates by means of pulse field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). In this study, 60 VRE were isolated from 150 faecal samples. Besides vancomycin sensitivity, isolates were also tested for 6 more antimicrobial drugs by MIC. Significant number of isolates exhibited intermediate level of resistance to vancomycin (70%), norfloxacin (50%) and cephalothin (43.3%). Multidrug resistance (MDR) was observed in 37 (61.6%) isolates. Multiplex PCR revealed vanC1 (14), vanC2/3 (9), van C1 + vanC2/3 (11) but no vanA or vanB genes. Further genotyping of the VRE isolates carrying vanC genes using pulse field gel electrophoresis revealed ~73% homology.
Ameliorative effect of herbal extracts on lipid profile in albino rats, Rattus norvegicus exposed to metanil yellow

Synthetic food colours are used as key component by food manufacturers to increase the consumer acceptance towards food items and beverages as well as for having certain properties like low cost, high colour intensity and more colour stability. These food items and beverages may have more than recommended amount of permitted food colours or some non-permitted synthetic food colours, which may lead to several health problems like disturbances in biochemical parameters, allergic reaction, cancer, mutations etc. Some herbs are having active chemical components and could be used regularly to ameliorate the toxic effect of synthetic food colours. The aim of this study was to analyse the effect of garlic and turmeric extract as a herbal antihyperlipidemic agent in albino rats fed on an azo dye, metanil yellow. The albino rats were divided into four groups (6 rats in each group). Group I (Negative control) fed on normal pellet diet, Group II (Positive control) fed on metanil yellow (MY), Group III fed on MY+ garlic extract and Group IV fed on MY+ turmeric extract. All experimental group fed on normal pellet diet and water ad libitum. Total cholesterol (TC), LDL, HDL and triglycerides (TG) were observed in serum of albino rats from all the groups. The results showed that administration of garlic and turmeric extract raise the level of HDL and lowered the level of LDL, TC and TG in blood serum of albino rats exposed to metanil yellow for 12 and 24 weeks of exposure periods. Garlic was found to be more potent in correcting the lipid profile of metanil yellow fed albino rats in comparison to turmeric extract. However, it has been concluded that both the herbs could be used as antihyperlipidemic agent to avoid health risk in human beings caused by chronic consumption of food colours in different food types consumed daily.
An Economic Study of The Wadi Rehabilitation Impact on The Society’s Welfare in Matrouh Governorate (Case Study- Kharouba Wadi)

This paper aims to analyze the impact of Wadi Kharouba rehabilitation on the society’s welfare through: (1) econometric estimation of the impact of the Wadi’ add-value and households ’demographic variables on per capita expenditure per month as a proxy variable of beneficiaries ‘welfare; and (2) identifying the preference between individual welfare indicators and collective welfare indicators from farmers and society’ points of views. A census of the Agarma tribe households benefited from Wadi rehabilitation is surveyed by in-depth interview questionnaire in July, 2022. Two-Stages Least SquareInstrumental Variable (2SLS-IV) technique is applied to overcome the endogeneity problem. The empirical results show that as the Wadi add -value increases by 1%, the per capita expenditure increase by 37.225%. Furthermore, demographic characteristics such as household head’ age, household size, education, and dependency ratio significantly influence the add value and then per capita expenditure variables. Another purposive sample of experts is surveyed to identify the preference between individual and collective welfare criteria and indicators of Wadi Kharouba. Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) show that the highest preference is assigned to individual welfare criterion (53%) which indicates the priority of Bedouin’s economic outcomes in trade off collective welfare criterion of society and environment (47%). High priorities are given to three indicators: “farm income to total income” (32.1%), “add food and fodder production” (26.8%) and “abating of land common conflicts” (17.8%). The findings suggest that scaling up the rehabilitation activities, specifically irrigation facilities will enhance per capita expenditure, livelihood and household welfare in the marginalized Bedouin communities.