Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Co-aerosolized Pulmonary Surfactant and Ambroxol for COVID-19 ARDS Intervention: What Are We Waiting for?

After more than 225 days of the first reports of the novel coronavirus from China, COVID-19 pandemic is still on surge. The search for an effective and efficient therapeutic and pharmaceutical intervention is as important and urgent now as it was on Day 1. Majority of the efforts in this direction are toward finding small molecule interventions via repurposing or redirecting the therapeutic approaches. This hypothesis proposes a physical intervention approach directed toward rescuing the complex lung pathology observed in COVID-19 related acute respiratory distress syndrome (CARDS). The loss of content as well as the synthesis and turnover of the surfactant in ARDS has been termed as a “collateral damage. ” A synergistic, early stage, cost-effective, pharmaceutically viable, safe, and immediately available solution is hence required. The effectiveness of exogenous surfactant treatment in ARDS has been marred with several limitations as pointed out in various clinical trials and require revised protocols related to surfactant dose and mode of delivery. This hypothesis proposes aerosolized surfactant delivery taking the optimal dosing and coating costs into account along with co-delivery of ambroxol to provide synergistic benefits. Ambroxol is reported to have anti-inflammatory, -oxidant, -viral, and -bacterial activities and has a direct impact on the production and secretion of the surfactant from the alveolar Type 2 cells. If aerosolized, atomized, or nebulized in the form of ambroxol-loaded phospholipid nanovesicles at the early stages of ARDS, depleted surfactant levels may be reinstated and surfactant turnover can be initiated and maintained. The ability to deliver both the components in aerosolized-nebulized form may have a huge impact on alleviating the healthcare burden in low resource settings where the availability of ventilators is limited. In conclusion, the surfactant-ambroxol co-aerosolized intervention approach hypothesized here has implications reaching to clinical and pharmaceutical translation worldwide.
Association of "#covid19" Versus "#chinesevirus" With Anti-Asian Sentiments on Twitter: March 9-23, 2020.

Objectives. To examine the extent to which the phrases, "COVID-19" and "Chinese virus" were associated with anti-Asian sentiments.Methods. Data were collected from Twitter's Application Programming Interface, which included the hashtags "#covid19" or "#chinesevirus. " We analyzed tweets from March 9 to 23, 2020, corresponding to the week before and the week after President Donald J. Trump's tweet with the phrase, "Chinese Virus. " Our analysis focused on 1 273 141 hashtags.Results. One fifth (19.7%) of the 495 289 hashtags with #covid19 showed anti-Asian sentiment, compared with half (50.4%) of the 777 852 hashtags with #chinesevirus. When comparing the week before March 16, 2020, to the week after, there was a significantly greater increase in anti-Asian hashtags associated with #chinesevirus compared with #covid19 (P < .001). Conclusions. Our data provide new empirical evidence supporting recommendations to use the less-stigmatizing term "COVID-19," instead of "Chinese virus. " (Am J Public Health. Published online ahead of print March 18, 2021: e1-e9. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306154).
VOLTAMMETRIC DETERMINATION OF MELATONIN AND PYRIDOXINE (VITAMIN B6) IN TABLETS

Melatonina y Vitamina B6 puede ser oxidada en el electrodo de carbono vitreo produciendo picos anodicos bien resueltos mediante Voltametria de Pulso diferencial. La Vitamina B6 revela un pico de oxidacion con un potencial de pico de 650 mV vs Ag/AgCl en tampon de amoniaco pH 9, mientras que melatonina produce un pico con un potencial de pico de 840 mV vs Ag/AgCl en el tampon Britton-Robinson pH 2. Ambos picos muestran una relacion lineal entre la corriente de pico y la concentracion que es utilizada para la cuantificacion.
Do Earnings Manipulations Matter Differently in Different Markets of China? Cost of Capital Consequences

This study investigates whether and how a firm’s cost of equity capital is influenced by the extent of a firm’s real earnings management (REM). Using a large sample of Hong Kong and Chinese firms over the 9-year period 2009-2017, we find that our implied cost of equity estimates are positively associated with both the extent of REM and the extent of accrual-based earnings management (AEM), but the positive association is stronger for REM than for AEM. We also provide evidence suggesting that the effect of AEM and REM on the cost of equity is more pronounced for Hong Kong firms than Chinese firms, and within Chinese firms, it is less pronounced for the state-owned enterprises (SOEs). Collectively, our results suggest that while both REM and AEM exacerbate the quality of earnings used by outside investors, REM does so to a greater extent than AEM, and thus the market demands a higher risk premium for REM activities than for AEM activities and that this cost of capital-increase effect is more prominent in a developed market like Hong Kong and mitigated by state ownership in China because of investors’ expectations for a lower level of detriments to firm fundamentals by REM due to government’s protection in a less developed market like China. JEL classification: G14, M41, M43
Formative assessment, growth mindset, and achievement: examining their relations in the East and the West

ABSTRACT Both formative assessment and growth mindset scholars aim to understand how to enhance achievement. While research on formative assessment focuses on external teaching practices, work on growth mindset emphasises internal psychological processes. This study examined the interplay between three formative assessment strategies (i.e. sharing learning progressions, providing feedback, and instructional adjustments) and growth mindset in predicting reading achievement using the PISA2018 data. We focused specifically on samples from the West (the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) and the East (Mainland China, Hong Kong SAR, Macau SAR, Chinese Taipei, Japan and Korea) which comprised of 109,204 15-year old students. The results showed that formative assessment strategies were positively, albeit weakly, related to a growth mindset in the East, but not in the West. In contrast, growth mindset was positively related to reading achievement only in the West, but not in the East. The impacts of different formative assessment strategies on reading achievement demonstrated cross-cultural variability, but the strongest positive predictor was instructional adjustments. These findings highlight the potential synergy between formative assessment and growth mindset in enhancing academic achievement as well as the importance of cultural contexts in understanding their roles in student learning.
Technology life cycle and specialization patterns of latecomer countries: The case of the semiconductor industry

Catching-up, leapfrogging and falling behind in terms of output and productivity in hightech industries crucially depends on firms’ ability to keep pace with technological change. In fast changing industries today’s specialization does not guarantee tomorrow’s success as changes in the technological trajectories reward and punish firms’ specialization patterns. This highlights the importance of studying the relationship between technology life cycle and specialization patterns of new and incumbent innovators. From an empirical point of view life cycles have been extensively analysed at the industry and product level but not so deeply at the technology one (even though plenty of theoretical contributions exist). We define a methodology to describe the life cycle stages of the main technological paradigm within an industry and of the technological areas it is composed of. The methodology is based on the analysis of the age composition of the different areas and of the characteristics of their technological trajectories. We use the classification of the life cycle stages of the single areas to investigate specialization patterns of new and incumbent innovators. Our results show that up to the end of the 1990s firms from Taiwan, Korea and Singapore specialized mainly in areas at the later stages of their life cycles, whereas US and Japanese firms were comparatively better in younger areas. Specialization patterns changed in the beginning of the 2000s, when the Asian Tigers started to become comparatively stronger in emerging areas.
Between People and the State: The Ambivalence of Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fellowship in India

The Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fellowship (PMRDF), a flagship programme of the Ministry of Rural Development to facilitate development programme delivery in districts affected by Maoist violence, was introduced in 2011 and suspended in 2014. Though in a state of limbo at present, PMRDF created a complex template where binaries such as state/people, top-down/participatory and security/development were transcended and new ways of belonging generated, so as to make the developmental state an everyday reality in the lives of people. In this potential of PMRDF as a knowledge field to move beyond developmental platitudes, we encounter the limits of academic vocabulary to adequately capture how development matters on the ground. The article draws from critical literature on the postcolonial developmental state, secondary material on the experience of the PMRD Fellows as well as primary sources drawn from the authors’ interaction with a Fellow from Odisha. It is proposed that through PMRDF, the developmental state established its legitimacy by reaching out to people in underdeveloped regions even as it vernacularized its authority and undermined its own bureaucratic institutions. And the Fellows, far from being carriers of state power, and contrary to their representation in available literature, imagined themselves primarily as champions of people in need of development.
Factors Leading to Diagnostic and Therapeutic Delay of Rheumatoid Arthritis and Their Impact on Disease Outcome

Objective To identify the factors which lead to delay in diagnosis and initiation of disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients and their impact on disease outcome and functional ability. Methodology This cross-sectional study was conducted from June 2021 to May 2022 at the Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, Sheikh Zayed Hospital, Lahore. Inclusion criteria were patients aged >18 years who were diagnosed with RA, based on American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria 2010. Delay was defined as any sort of delay which leads to delay in diagnosis or initiation of treatment of more than three months. The factors and impact on disease outcome were measured by using Disease Activity Score-28 (DAS-28) for disease activity and Health Assessment Questionnaire-Disability Index (HAQ-DI) for functional disability. The collected data were analyzed with Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 24 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA). Results One hundred and twenty patients were included in the study. Mean delay in referral to a rheumatologist was 36.75±61.07 weeks. Fifty-eight (48.3%) patients with RA were misdiagnosed before presentation to a rheumatologist. Sixty-six (55%) patients had the perception that RA is a non-treatable disease. Delay in diagnosis of RA from onset of symptoms (lag 3) and delay in start of DMARDs from onset of symptoms (lag 4) were significantly associated with increased DAS-28 and HAQ-DI scores (p-value 0.001). Conclusion The factors which led to diagnostic and therapeutic delay were delayed consultation with a rheumatologist, old age, low education status and low socioeconomic status. Rheumatoid factor (RF) and anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide (anti-CCP) antibodies had no role in diagnostic and therapeutic delay. Many RA patients were misdiagnosed with gouty arthritis and undifferentiated arthritis before consulting a rheumatologist. This diagnostic and therapeutic delay compromises RA management leading to high DAS-28 and HAQ-DI in RA patients.
Cocaine Exposure Increases Excitatory Synaptic Transmission and Intrinsic Excitability in the Basolateral Amygdala in Male and Female Rats and across the Estrous Cycle

Introduction: Sex and ovarian hormones influence cocaine seeking and relapse vulnerability, but less is known regarding the cellular and synaptic mechanisms contributing to these behavioral sex differences. One factor thought to influence cue-induced seeking behavior following withdrawal is cocaine-induced changes in the spontaneous activity of pyramidal neurons in the basolateral amygdala (BLA). However, the mechanisms underlying these changes, including potential sex or estrous cycle effects, are unknown. Methods: Ex vivo whole-cell patch clamp electrophysiology was conducted to investigate the effects of cocaine exposure, sex, and estrous cycle fluctuations on two properties that can influence spontaneous activity of BLA pyramidal neurons: (1) frequency and amplitude of spontaneous excitatory postsynaptic currents (sEPSCs) and (2) intrinsic excitability. Recordings of BLA pyramidal neurons were conducted in adult male and female rats and across the estrous cycle following 2–4 weeks of withdrawal from extended-access cocaine self-administration (6 h/day for 10 days) or drug-naïve conditions. Results: In both sexes, cocaine exposure increased the frequency, but not amplitude, of sEPSCs and neuronal intrinsic excitability. Across the estrous cycle, sEPSC frequency and intrinsic excitability were significantly elevated only in cocaine-exposed females in the estrus stage of the cycle, a stage when cocaine-seeking behavior is known to be enhanced. Conclusions: Here, we identify potential mechanisms underlying cocaine-induced alterations in the spontaneous activity of BLA pyramidal neurons in both sexes along with changes in these properties across the estrous cycle.
Navigating the Web of Misinformation: A Framework for Misinformation Domain Detection Using Browser Traffic

The proliferation of misinformation and propaganda is a global challenge, with profound effects during major crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Understanding the spread of misinformation and its social impacts requires identifying the news sources spreading false information. While machine learning (ML) techniques have been proposed to address this issue, ML models have failed to provide an efficient implementation scenario that yields useful results. In prior research, the precision of deployment in real traffic deteriorates significantly, experiencing a decrement up to ten times compared to the results derived from benchmark data sets. Our research addresses this gap by proposing a graph-based approach to capture navigational patterns and generate traffic-based features which are used to train a classification model. These navigational and traffic-based features result in classifiers that present outstanding performance when evaluated against real traffic. Moreover, we also propose graph-based filtering techniques to filter out models to be classified by our framework. These filtering techniques increase the signal-to-noise ratio of the models to be classified, greatly reducing false positives and the computational cost of deploying the model. Our proposed framework for the detection of misinformation domains achieves a precision of 0.78 when evaluated in real traffic. This outcome represents an improvement factor of over ten times over those achieved in previous studies.
Distribution and clinical features of lymphomas involving skin in Taiwan

A wide variety of primary and secondary lymphoma types involves the skin. However, reports with comparisons between both groups are limited in Taiwan. We retrospectively enrolled all cutaneous lymphomas and evaluated their clinicopathologic features. There were 221 cases of lymphoma: 182 (82.3%) primary and 39 (17.7%) secondary. Mycosis fungoides was the most common primary T‐cell lymphoma, 92 (41.7%) cases, followed by CD30‐positive T‐cell lymphoproliferative disorders including lymphomatoid papulosis (n = 33, 14.9%) and cutaneous anaplastic large cell lymphoma (n = 12, 5.4%). The most frequent primary B‐cell lymphomas were marginal zone lymphoma (n = 8, 3.6%) and diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma (DLBCL), leg type (n = 8, 3.6%). DLBCL including variants was the most common secondary lymphoma involving skin. Most primary lymphomas presented at low‐stage (T‐cell, 86%; B‐cell, 75%), whereas the majority of secondary lymphomas presented at high‐stage (T‐cell, 94%; B‐cell, 100%). Patients with secondary lymphomas had an older mean age, more frequent B symptoms, lower serum albumin and hemoglobin, and a higher frequency of atypical lymphocytes in blood than those with primary lymphomas. In primary lymphomas, older age, lymphoma types, decreased lymphocyte counts and atypical lymphocytes in blood were poorer prognostic factors. In secondary lymphoma patients, lymphoma types, high serum lactate dehydrogenase and low hemoglobin levels predicted poorer survival. We found that the distribution of primary cutaneous lymphomas in Taiwan mirrors that of other Asian countries but shows some differences as compared with Western countries. Primary cutaneous lymphomas have a better prognosis than secondary lymphomas. Histologic classification of lymphomas highly correlated with disease presentation and prognosis.
Awareness of prevention of teenage pregnancy amongst secondary school learners in Makhado municipality

Background Sexuality plays a very significant role in the lives of both boys and girls. It is, therefore, considered important for schools to recognise and accept sexuality as part of the development process of the child. Professor Kader Asmal (previous South African Minister of Education) suggested that the earlier the school begins to teach learners about sexuality, the better because they can be easily misled by their peers if proper guidance regarding their sexuality is not given. Aim The current study was conducted to assess the awareness of teenagers on the prevention of teenage pregnancy (TP) in six secondary school learners situated in the Soutpansberg-West circuit, Makhado Municipality in Limpopo province. Setting The study was conducted at six secondary schools situated in the Soutpansberg-West circuit, Makhado Municipality in Limpopo province in 2014. Methodology A quantitative descriptive survey study was conducted where data were collected, using self-administered questionnaires, from 381 systematically sampled participants from six secondary schools situated in the Soutpansberg-West circuit, Makhado Municipality in Limpopo province. Data were analysed descriptively using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software, version 22.0. Necessary approval procedures and ethical clearance were obtained prior to data collection. Results Ninety-four percent of participants agreed that TP can be prevented through abstaining from sex, whilst 65% of participants agreed that TP could be prevented by using contraceptives such as pills and injections. Eighty-three percent of participants agreed that TP could be prevented through the use of condoms. Seventy-four percent participants disagreed that bathing after sex prevents teenage pregnancies. Furthermore, 28% participants agreed that TP can be prevented by oral sex. Conclusion The conclusion drawn was that learners are aware of the measures for preventing TP.
Modeling the Dynamics of the EU Stock Indices Based on the Analysis of Structural Market Data

The last several years were quite challenging for the whole world. People, businesses, and governments must adapt to new realities and find new ways to survive. The shock of the world pandemic brought uncertainty to quotidian life, then the Russian-Ukrainian war forced people to accept new obstacles. Meanwhile, governments must look for paths to keep calm, not only nations but also make everything possible to keep low economic indicators such as interest rate, inflation, unemployment, etc. within all these periods. In this study, the statistical importance of dependence of earlier mentioned and statistical metrics including exchange rate, current account, inflow and outflow of portfolio investment on the price of the stock indexes of Germany, France, Italy, and Greece is examined. These EU countries have been strategically selected due to their pivotal roles in the European economic landscape, coupled with their acute susceptibility to instability-triggered fluctuations. For instance, the resonance of social mass protests in France, and the intricate interplay of national debt increasing in Italy and Greece, make them particularly interesting cases for this analysis. By examining the interplay between economic indicators and stock index movements in these nations, this study sheds light on the relationship between macroeconomic variables and financial market performance. Through rigorous statistical analysis, the aim of this research is to uncover potential patterns and dependencies that might offer valuable insights into the ways in which economic dynamics interact with stock market trends in times of upheaval. Ultimately, this research aspires to contribute to a deeper understanding of the mechanisms underpinning the equilibrium between economic fundamentals and financial market behavior during tumultuous periods.
Vehicular fuel composition and atmospheric emissions in South China

Vehicular fuel composition and atmospheric emissions in South China: Hong Kong, Macau, Guangzhou, and Zhuhai W. Y. Tsai, L. Y. Chan, D. R. Blake, and K. W. Chu Department of Civil and Structural Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China Department of Chemistry, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA Received: 7 February 2006 – Accepted: 9 March 2006 – Published: 10 May 2006 Correspondence to: L. Y. Chan (celychan@polyu.edu.hk)
New Television, Globalisation, and the East Asian Cultural Imagination

Challenging assumptions that have underpinned critiques of globalization and combining cultural theory with media industry analysis, Keane, Fung and Moran give a groundbreaking account of the evolution of television in the post-broadcasting era, and how programming ideas are creatively redeveloped and franchised in East Asia. In this first comprehensive study of television program adaptation across cultures, the authors argue that adaptation, transfer, and recycling of content are multiplying to the point of marginalising other economic and cultural practices. This is happening in television, but also in many other media and related areas of cultural production. Looking at China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea and Taiwan, this study details practices that are variously referred to as formatting, franchising, imitation, adaptation, hybridity, bricolage, and even emulation. The authors show that significant re-modelling of local TV production practices occur when adaptation is genuinely responsive to local values. Examples of East Asian format adaptations include Survivor, Who Wants to be a Millionaire? , The Weakest Link, Coronation Street, and Idol. The book offers alternatives models of media flow that demonstrate how Hollywood is losing its global grip. It deals with the history of the TV format trade, a movement that has coincided with the rise of alternative centres of television production and distribution outside the US.