Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cost-effective Analysis of Subcutaneous vs Sublingual Immunotherapy From the Payor’s Perspective

Objective Compare the cost-effectiveness of subcutaneous immunotherapy (SCIT) and aqueous sublingual immunotherapy (SLIT) as treatment modalities for adult patients with allergic rhinitis and conjunctivitis who undergo testing and qualify for allergen immunotherapy (AIT). Methods A systematic review was performed to identify key statistics for analysis, including the compliance and efficacy rates for each treatment. The body of literature on this topic is highly heterogeneous, so ranges were obtained and assumptions stated clearly where they were made. Charges were derived from average commercial payor charges from a single hospital institution. A hypothetical 100 patients are examined for the study. Results A cost-effectiveness sensitivity analysis was then performed using a decision tree model to compare the modalities. A sensitivity and threshold analysis was then performed to assess the strength of recommendations after identifying results at baseline. Discussion Assuming an 80% compliance rate with allergen immunotherapy and an estimated efficacy (assumed to be clinically significant improvement in symptoms) of 70% for SLIT and 80% for SCIT, at the 12-month mark, the baseline total cost to the payor of SLIT per successful treatment outcome is $1196 while the charge of SCIT per successful treatment outcome is $2691. Our analysis favors SLIT as the more cost-effective modality per successful outcome. Implications for Practice When compared to SCIT, SLIT is economically favorable and should be considered the financially conscious option for patients with >40% adherence to therapy.
Impact of Job Crafting to Work Engagement: Mediating Role of Person-Job Fit and Job Resources on The Tour Guide

This research was conducted to examine the effect of job crafting to work engagement with person-job fit and job resources ad mediating variables. The population of this study is a tour guide in Jogjakarta, Indonesia with a sample of 125 people in This research was carried out in early January 2020. We used convenience sampling as the sampling technique. A 5-level Likert scale is used to measure respondents’ attitudes. Smart PLS (Partial Least Square) for windows processed the results were obtained with. Research showed that job resources act as a full mediation between the relationship between job crafting and work engagement. And person-job fit variable also has a fully mediating role in the relationship between job crafting and work engagement. The conclusion of this study is that the job resources owned by employees will balance the needs of workers and show a mediating effect so that employees can increase their involvement in work. Likewise, person job fit refers to the relationship between employee characteristics and job characteristics, which is a variable that can increase the job involvement of tour guides. Various practical implications are described in this paper.
Plusminus: Augmenting Physics to Promote Emergent Gameplay

Emergent behaviour occurs when simple systems result in complex behaviour. In games, this allows for more meth- ods of interaction, and lets the player explore in a way they want. It is challenging to design for emergence, as it typ- ically arises unexpectedly . With "Plusminus", we devel- oped a method of augmenting physics to promote emergent gameplay using magnetism. Initial playtests demonstrated that players came up with surprising ways to play, such as using magnets to launch themselves over walls and outside the designed play area. We demonstrate that by giving the player control over magnetism, we can design for emergent gameplay.
Synthesis and Biological Evaluation of Fluorescein-Tagged 1-Methyl-o-carborane for Boron Neutron Capture Therapy

Fluorescein was conjugated with 1-methyl-o-carborane and the resulting bioconjugate was biologically evaluated through microscopic and fl ow cytometric studies in pancreatic cancer and squamous cell carcinoma cell lines. The uniform distribution of this bioconjugate, as well as its moderate cytotoxicity and higher boron content relative to present boronated delivery agents sodium borocaptate (BSH) and boronophenylalanine (BPA), provide justifi cation for its further evaluation as a potential delivery agent for BNCT. Short Communication Synthesis and Biological Evaluation of Fluorescein-Tagged 1-Methyl-o-carborane for Boron Neutron Capture Therapy Lucas A Kuzmanic1, Lauren E Zuidema1, Jason A Misurelli2 Kazuko Uno3, Sherine F Elsawa2,4*, Masao Takagaki3,5* and Narayan S Hosmane1* 1Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115, USA 2Department of Biological Sciences, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115. USA 3Louis Pasteur Center for Medical Research, Tanakamonzen-cho, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8225, Japan 4Molecular, Cellular and Biomedical Sciences, University of New Hampshire, Durham, NH 03824, USA 5Graduate School of Human & Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Nihonmatsu, Yoshida, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan *Address for Correspondence: Sherine F Elsawa, Deparment of Molecular, Cellular and Biomedical Sciences, University of New Hampshire, Durham, NH 03824, USA, Email: sherine.elsawa@unh.edu Narayan Hosmane, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115, USA, Email: hosmane@niu.edu Masao Takagaki, Graduate School of Human & Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Nihonmatsu, Yoshida, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan, Email: takagaki.masao. 67x@st.kyoto-u.ac. jp Submitted: 11 October 2018 Approved: 25 October 2018 Published: 26 October 2018 Copyright: © 2018 Kuzmanic LA, et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited
Model Predictive Control for Autonomous Driving Vehicles

The field of autonomous driving vehicles is growing and expanding rapidly. However, the control systems for autonomous driving vehicles still pose challenges, since vehicle speed and steering angle are always subject to strict constraints in vehicle dynamics. The optimal control action for vehicle speed and steering angular velocity can be obtained from the online objective function, subject to the dynamic constraints of the vehicle’s physical limitations, the environmental conditions, and the surrounding obstacles. This paper presents the design of a nonlinear model predictive controller subject to hard and softened constraints. Nonlinear model predictive control subject to softened constraints provides a higher probability of the controller finding the optimal control actions and maintaining system stability. Different parameters of the nonlinear model predictive controller are simulated and analyzed. Results show that nonlinear model predictive control with softened constraints can considerably improve the ability of autonomous driving vehicles to track exactly on different trajectories.
Implicit Measures

In contrast to the reliance on self-reports in explicit measures, implicit measures infer mental contents from responses on performance-based tasks. The current chapter provides an introduction to implicit measures, their use in basic and applied psychology, and the theoretical meaning of their measurement outcomes. Expanding on an overview of available instruments, the chapter discusses various factors that lead to converging versus diverging outcomes on implicit and explicit measures
L-Lysine α-Oxidase: Enzyme with Anticancer Properties

L-lysine α-oxidase (LO), one of L-amino acid oxidases, deaminates L-lysine with the yield of H2O2, ammonia, and α-keto-ε-aminocaproate. Multiple in vitro and in vivo studies have reported cytotoxic, antitumor, antimetastatic, and antitumor activity of LO. Unlike asparaginase, LO has a dual mechanism of action: depletion of L-lysine and formation of H2O2, both targeting tumor growth. Prominent results were obtained on murine and human tumor models, including human colon cancer xenografts HCT 116, LS174T, and T47D with maximum T/C 12, 37, and 36%, respectively. The data obtained from human cancer xenografts in immunodeficient mice confirm the potential of LO as an agent for colon cancer treatment. In this review, we discuss recently discovered molecular mechanisms of biological action and the potential of LO as anticancer enzyme.
Distance Metrics to Aid Rāga-selection in Subjective Studies

Recent studies corroborate the beliefs that listening to Indian music is beneficial in terms of mental abilities or mental health. These studies are also akin to those on other genres of music, where similar benefits have been observed. Studies relating to specific rāgas, however, are not as conclusive. The rāga is a key concept in Indian music, and comparable to a mode or scale in Western music. Rāgas are significantly richer than modes/scales due to the deliberate use of continuous pitch variation called gamakas. While most rāgas seem real distinguishable entities, distinctions between some rāgas appear to be due to conditioning. In this paper, we propose a quantitative measure of distance between the histograms of anchor notes in a rāga. Anchor notes were introduced recently to study the nature of gamakas. We consider several distance measures on anchorand CPN-histograms. For each rāga, other rāgas falling in the lower one-third of the range of distances to that rāga are counted as confused. Out of 1560 possible pairs of confusion, 178 (11%), 434 (28%), and 956 (61%) are confused according to, respectively, the Euclidean, cosine and KL-divergence distances between anchor histograms. CPN-histograms show a higher confusion. The Euclidean and cosine distance metrics between anchor-histograms thus help narrow down the choice of rāgas, such as for the experimental and control groups, in studies relating to the mind.
Time, Parties and Budgetary Change: Fiscal Decisions in English Cities, 1974–88

The ideological differences between the Labour and Conservative parties in the 1980s are greater than at any time in the postwar era. Consequently one would expect party control at the local level to have an increasing effect on local government decisions. Using an approach to cross-time analysis that avoids some of the major shortcomings of other studies, the relationship between party control and local fiscal decisions in English cities between 1974 and 1988 can be traced. The method allows not only an exploration of the direct effect of party control, but also its indirect effects, mediated through grant penalties and rate-capping. Under Mrs Thatcher's administration the impact of party on local fiscal decisions has increased quite substantially.
The effect of Farnesoid X receptor agonist tropifexor on liver damage in rats with experimental obstructive jaundice

ABSTRACT Purpose: To investigate experimentally the effects of Tropifexor, a farnesoid X receptor agonist, on liver injury in rats with obstructive jaundice. Methods: Forty healthy Wistar albino female rats were divided randomly in selected groups. These groups were the sham group, control group, vehicle solution group, Ursodeoxycholic acid group and Tropifexor group. Experimental obstructive jaundice was created in all groups, except the sham one. In the blood samples obtained, aspartate transaminase (AST), alanine transaminase (ALT), alkaline phosphatase (ALP), gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT), total bilirubin and direct bilirubin levels were established and recorded. Additionally, liver malondialdehyde, myeloperoxidase and catalase enzyme activity in the tissue samples were studied. Histopathological analysis was also performed. Results: No statistical difference was found between the control group and the Tropifexor group when AST, ALT and ALP values were compared. However, it was found that the Tropifexor group had statistically significant decreases in the values of GGT, total bilirubin and direct bilirubin (p < 0.05). Additionally, Tropifexor decreased the median values of malondialdehyde and myeloperoxidase, but this difference was not statistically significant compared to the control group. Finally, the Tropifexor group was statistically significant in recurring histopathological liver damage indicators (p < 0.05). Conclusions: Tropifexor reduced liver damage due to obstructive jaundice.
Social Network Types and Depressive Symptoms among Older Korean Men and Women

This study explores the social network types of older Korean men and women, and the relationship of those networks to depressive symptoms. A population of 4608 older adults who participated in the Living Profiles of Older People Survey (LPOPS) were included in the study. Seven criterion variables—marital status, living arrangements, frequency of contact with children, close friends, and close relatives, participation in social activities, and total network size—were included in a K-means cluster analysis. Multivariable logistic regression analysis of the impact of social network type on depressive symptoms was conducted. We identified two “diverse type” social networks (diverse-married and diverse-unmarried) in women, and one diverse type and one “social-activity-focused type” network in men. Family focused type and two “restricted type” social networks (restricted-couple-focused, and restricted-unmarried) were identified in both men and women. The restricted-unmarried and restricted-couple-focused networks were associated with more depressive symptoms in both men and women. However, the family focused type was associated with more depressive symptoms only in women. The results indicated that social network types, and their impact on depressive symptoms, differ by gender. There is a need for further research on gender differences in the social network types of older adults across diverse cultures.
Phylogenomics in the Hard Pines (Pinus subsection Ponderosae; Pinaceae) Confirms Paraphyly in Pinus ponderosa, and Places Pinus jeffreyi with the California Big Cone Pines

We sampled 130 individuals (2 to 25 per taxon) of Pinus subsections Ponderosae and Sabinianae. Nucleotide sequences were obtained by targeting 703 low copy nuclear genes. From the unenriched portion of the short reads, we assembled nearly complete plastome nucleotide sequences. We used 600 nuclear genes and the plastome sequences to create phylogenies and species trees that we compared to evaluate cytonuclear concordance and reticulation. We found that Pinus jeffreyi belongs with Pinus subsect. Sabinianae based on morphological synapomorphiesas well as strong molecular phylogenetic support. Pinus ponderosa sensu lato is paraphyletic, and we suggest treatment as three species: P. ponderosa sensu stricto (with P. ponderosa var. ponderosa, P. ponderosa var. benthamiana, and P. ponderosa var. washoensis), P. scopulorum, and P. brachyptera. The persistence of lineages with the footprints of ancient nuclear introgression (labeled bpw in clade N4) and chloroplast capture (labeledbpw in clade P1) should caution species identification in Pinus subsection Ponderosae based on limited molecular data. The hybrid frequency was low based on cytonuclear discordance, and the persistence of an ancient P1 plastid clade is a better explanation than hybridization betweenP. ponderosa and P. jeffreyi for unexpected plastid associations in the western Sierra Nevada, USA. We identified a new potential zone of ancient admixture between P. ponderosa and P. scopulorum in Idaho, USA. Some populations of P. arizonica, P. brachyptera, P. engelmannii, and P. scopulorum in the USA are more closely related to taxa with distributions limited to Mexico than they are to each other. To integrate phylogeny and taxonomy, future work should sample widely in Mexico and the USA, score morphological characters (including seedling characters from the known seed parent), on the same individual as used for molecular data, and use methods that are based on individuals rather than population frequencies.
Defect classification of railway fasteners using image preprocessing and alightweight convolutional neural network

: Railway fasteners are used to securely fix rails to sleeper blocks. Partial wear or complete loss of these components can lead to serious accidents and cause train derailments. To ensure the safety of railway transportation, computer vision and pattern recognition-based methods are increasingly used to inspect railway infrastructure. In particular, it has become an important task to detect defects in railway tracks. This is challenging since rail track images are acquired using a measuring train in varying environmental conditions, at different times of day and in poor lighting conditions, and the resulting images often have low contrast. In this study, a new method is proposed for the classification of defects on rail track fasteners. The proposed approach uses image enhancement to first filter the rail images and obtain a high contrast image. Then, the rail track and sleeper positions are determined from the high contrast image. The location of the fastener is determined by applying the line local binary pattern method and the defects of the fastener are classified using an improved lightweight convolutional neural network (LCNN) model. Features are extracted from two fully connected layers of the developed LCNN model and the feature vector is constructed by concatenating these layers. The concatenated features are processed using a number of machine learning methods and the optimum classifier is chosen. Experimental results show that Cubic SVM gives the best results with a detection accuracy rate of 99.7%.
Clinical and Laboratory Characteristics of Patients infected by Listeria monocytogenes at a Tertiary Hospital in Hefei City, China

Background Human listeriosis is a severe foodborne infection caused by Listeria monocytogenes and the data of patients with this infection are largely limited for the Hefei population. Purpose This is a retrospective study that evaluated the clinical and laboratory data of patients with listeriosis at a tertiary hospital in Hefei City. Patients and Methods A total of 24 listeriosis patients were admitted to the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University from January 2003 to July 2021. Data from all patients were collected from the hospital’s electronic medical records. Results The most common symptom of all patients was fever (91.7%), followed by altered consciousness (50.0%), rashes (45.8%), respiratory distress symptoms (37.5%), nuchal rigidity (29.2%), and headaches (20.8%). Laboratory results also indicated elevated C-reactive protein (CRP) (79.1%), hypoproteinemia (75.0%), anemia (62.5%), leukocytosis (45.8%), and neutrophilia (45.8%). The mean value of 5.1 μg/mL (SD, 3.8) for D‐dimer (D‐D) was significantly higher than the normal value ((0.00–0.50) μg/mL), while both altered consciousness (6 vs 4, P = 0.034) and headaches (4 vs 1, P = 0.036) occurred more frequently in the neurolisteriosis group compared with the bacteremia one. Additionally, the mean maximal body temperature (°C) (40.5 ± 0.7) as well as white blood cell (WBC) (15.3 vs 7.5 ×109/L, P = 0.014) and neutrophil (NEUT#) (13.2 vs 6.1 ×109/L, P = 0.026) counts of neurolisteriosis patients were higher than those of bacteremia (39.4 ± 0.4) (P = 0.001). Of all patients, four (50%) from the maternal-neonatal group remained uncured. Conclusion Listeriosis is a rare disease with extremely variable clinical characteristics in Hefei City. Our data indicated that unexplained fever, altered consciousness, hypoproteinemia, anemia, elevated CRP and DD should be considered to assist diagnosis of listeriosis for early treatment interventions.
Phenotypic and genetic parameters of productive traits in Rahmani and Romanov sheep and crossbreds

Abstract Data of 651 lambs (68 Romanov, 49 Rahmani, 151 [♀1/2 Rahmani X ♂1/2 Romanov) and 383 (♀3/4 Rahmani and 1/4♂ Romanov]) were collected from Mehalet Mousa Farm, belonging to Animal Production Research Institute from the period of 2009 to 2016 to estimate phenotypic and genetic parameters. The traits studied were birth weight (BW), body weight at four week (BW4), body weight at eight weeks (BW8) and body weight at twelve weeks (BW12) or weaning weight. Least squares analysis of variance shows significance of the effects of breed groups, gender of lambs, birth type; month of birth and year of birth on all traits studied. Rahmani lambs had heavier BW, BW4, BW8 and BW12 while Romanov lambs had the lowest ones. The first generation (♀1/2 Rhamani X ♂1/2 Romanov) had heavier body weights than Romanov and the second generation (♀3/4 Rahmani X ♂1/4 Roamnov). Gender of lambs had highly significant effect on body weights. Males were significantly (p < 0.01) heavier than females for all traits studied. Least square means of BW, BW4, BW8 and BW12 for single lambs were 2.69, 10.43, 13.53 and 16.10 kg, respectively. Least square means of BW, BW4, BW8 and BW12 for twin lambs were 2.50, 9.37, 12.5 and 15.16 kg, respectively, while least square means of BW, BW4, BW8 and BW12 for triple lambs were 2.09, 7.86, 10.83 and 13.67 kg, respectively. Estimates of direct heritability measured by single trait animal model were 0.14, 0.23, 0.25 and 0.26 for BW, BW4, BW8 and BW12, respectively, and the corresponding measured by multi trait animal model were 0.17, 0.24, 0.32 and 0.36 for the same traits, respectively. All genetic and phenotypic correlations among different traits studied are positive and significant.
Digitally Transforming Electronic Governments into Smart Governments: SMARTGOV, an Extended Maturity Model

Smart government aims to provide intelligent and agile personalized public services to government stakeholders. Over the past few years, governments seek to employ innovative technologies, such as blockchain, analytics, artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), cloud computing, robotics process automation, and machine learning (ML), to improve citizens’ experiences and quality of life as well as government decision-making processes. They also aim to increase the efficiency of business processes and to transform the delivery of public services. However, the extant e-government literature lacks an inclusive digital government maturity model that can be used as a unified reference for guiding public organizations through the journey to smart government. Accordingly, the main aim of this paper is to develop a smart government maturity model by extending and revising the extant literature related to e-government. The developed model is then used to empirically evaluate the smart government initiative in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). We applied the model on 41 UAE federal governments’ websites/portals and measured their maturity level using 73 indicators. The findings indicate that the UAE is quite advanced with regard to smart government, as the majority of governmental entities scored “High” and above on the use of innovative and disruptive technologies in various domains. The smart government maturity model proved its efficacy and value in evaluating the UAE's smart government initiative.