julilili42/papers huggingface dataset:
Specific measures for older employees and late career employment
2016-01-28

We analyse the effects of specific measures for older employees (SMOE) on employment duration of workers aged 40 and above. Using longitudinal employer-employee data for German establishments, we account for worker and establishment heterogeneity and correct for stock-sampling. We find a positive effect of mixed-aged team work on employment duration and a negative effect of a part-time scheme addressed at older workers. Employment duration does not appear to be related to other SMOE, such&#13;\\nas training and specific equipment of workplaces.
Propeller effect in action in the ultraluminous accreting magnetar M82 X−2
2016-01-29

We present here the first convincing observational manifestation of a magnetar-like magnetic field in an accreting neutron star in binary system – the first pulsating ultraluminous X-ray source X−2 in the galaxy M82. Using the &lt;it&gt;Chandra&lt;/it&gt; X-ray observatory data, we show that the source exhibit the bimodal distribution of the luminosity with two well-defined peaks separated by a factor of 40. This behaviour can be interpreted as the action of the ‘propeller regime’ of accretion. The onset of the propeller in a 1.37 s pulsar at luminosity of ∼1040 erg s−1 implies the dipole component of the neutron star magnetic field of ∼1014 G.
From genomic medicine to precision medicine: highlights of 2015
2016-01-29

2015 has been an exciting year for genomic medicine.We asked our Section Editors to discuss the breakthroughs in their fields of expertise, and what these might mean for the future.As in previous years, exome and whole-genome sequencing are leading the way in our understanding of disease mechanisms, their diagnosis and treatment, while information about the protein products of the genome has also grown, driven by novel technological advances.Precision medicine is now taking off as an important topic in the public health sphere and in education, and no discussion of 2015 would be complete without a mention of the huge advances in gene editing technologies, the implications of which have dominated ethics and policy debate.
You eat what you are: personality‐dependent filial cannibalism in a fish with paternal care
2016-01-29

Abstract Many animal parents invest heavily to ensure offspring survival, yet some eventually consume some or all of their very own young. This so‐called filial cannibalism is known from a wide range of taxa, but its adaptive benefit remains largely unclear. The extent to which parents cannibalize their broods varies substantially not only between species, but also between individuals, indicating that intrinsic behavioral differences, or animal personalities, might constitute a relevant proximate trigger for filial cannibalism. Using a marine fish with extensive paternal care, the common goby ( Pomatoschistus microps ) , we investigated the influence of animal personality on filial cannibalism by assessing (1) behavioral consistency across a breeding and a nonbreeding context; (2) correlations between different breeding (egg fanning; filial cannibalism) and nonbreeding (activity) behaviors, and, in a separate experiment; (3) whether previously established personality scores affect filial cannibalism levels. We found consistent individual differences in activity across contexts. Partial filial cannibalism was independent of egg fanning but correlated strongly with activity, where active males cannibalized more eggs than less active males. This pattern was strong initially but vanished as the breeding season progressed. The incidence of whole clutch filial cannibalism increased with activity and clutch size. Our findings indicate that filial cannibalism cannot generally be adjusted independently of male personality and is thus phenotypically less plastic than typically assumed. The present work stresses the multidimensional interaction between animal personality, individual plasticity and the environment in shaping filial cannibalism.
Spiro-fused carbohydrate oxazoline ligands: Synthesis and application as enantio-discrimination agents in asymmetric allylic alkylation
2016-01-29

In the present work, we describe a convenient synthesis of spiro-fused D- fructo - and D- psico -configurated oxazoline ligands and their application in asymmetric catalysis. The ligands were synthesized from readily available 3,4,5-tri- O -benzyl-1,2- O -isopropylidene-β-D-fructopyranose and 3,4,5-tri- O -benzyl-1,2- O -isopropylidene-β-D-psicopyranose, respectively. The latter compounds were partially deprotected under acidic conditions followed by condensation with thiocyanic acid to give an anomeric mixture of the corresponding 1,3-oxazolidine-2-thiones. The anomeric 1,3-oxazolidine-2-thiones were separated after successive benzylation, fully characterized and subjected to palladium catalyzed Suzuki–Miyaura coupling with 2-pyridineboronic acid N -phenyldiethanolamine ester to give the corresponding 2-pyridyl spiro-oxazoline (PyOx) ligands. The spiro-oxazoline ligands showed high asymmetric induction (up to 93% ee) when applied as chiral ligands in palladium-catalyzed allylic alkylation of 1,3-diphenylallyl acetate with dimethyl malonate. The D- fructo -PyOx ligand provided mainly the ( R )-enantiomer while the D- psico -configurated ligand gave the ( S )-enantiomer with a lower enantiomeric excess.
Stability of hearing preservation and regeneration capacity of the cochlear nerve following vestibular schwannoma surgery via a retrosigmoid approach
2016-01-29

OBJECTIVE The purpose of this research was to examine the stability of long-term hearing preservation and the regeneration capacity of the cochlear nerve following vestibular schwannoma (VS) surgery in a prospective study. METHODS A total of 112 patients were recruited for a randomized multicenter trial between January 2010 and April 2012 to investigate the efficacy of prophylactic nimodipine treatment versus no prophylactic nimodipine treatment in VS surgery. For the present investigation, both groups were pooled to compare hearing abilities in the early postoperative course and 1 year after the surgery. Hearing was examined using pure-tone audiometry with speech discrimination, which was performed preoperatively, in the early postoperative course, and 12 months after surgery and was subsequently classified by an independent otorhinolaryngologist using the Gardner-Robertson classification system. RESULTS Hearing abilities at 2 time points were compared by evaluation in the early postoperative course and 1 year after surgery in 102 patients. The chi-square test showed a very strong association between the 2 measurements in all 102 patients (p &lt; 0.001) and in the subgroup of 66 patients with a preserved cochlear nerve (p &lt; 0.001). CONCLUSIONS There is no significant change in cochlear nerve function between the early postoperative course and 1 year after VS surgery. The result of hearing performance, as evaluated by early postoperative audiometry after VS surgery, seems to be a reliable prognosticator for future hearing ability. Clinical trial registration nos.: 2009-012088-32 ( clinicaltrialsregister.eu ) and DRKS 00000328 (“AkNiPro,” drks-neu.uniklinik-freiburg.de/drks_web/ )
The pattern of lipids and lipoproteins during the menopausal transition in Chinese women
2016-01-29

Objective To investigate changes in levels of lipids and lipoproteins in Chinese women during perimenopause and postmenopause as primary study endpoints, for the first time including lipoprotein(a). Methods The retrospective study was performed in 1015 women without hormone therapy aged 34-76 years from 20 provinces of China who visited the Beijing Obstetrics & Gynecology hospital. Menopausal status was defined by the criteria of the 2011 Stages of Reproductive Aging Workshop. Results Levels of total cholesterol, triglycerides and low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol increased and that of high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol decreased in the postmenopausal compared to the perimenopausal group. In the women with body mass index (BMI) ≥ 25 kg/m(2), total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol increased, HDL cholesterol decreased and changes in triglyceride levels were not significant. In the women with BMI < 25 kg/m(2), the increase in triglyceride levels during the transition was significant. Changes in lipoprotein(a), apolipoprotein A1 and apolipoprotein B were not significant. Comparing the groups with BMI ≥ 25 kg/m(2) vs. BMI < 25 kg/m(2), only the differences for apolipoprotein A1 and for triglycerides were significant. Triglycerides correlated positively with follicle stimulating hormone and BMI, and total cholesterol correlated positively with follicle stimulating hormone and age (all p < 0.05). Conclusions Some changes in lipids can be related to menopausal status, some to increasing age, some to both; especially triglycerides and apolipoprotein A1 were found also to be related to BMI. Surprisingly lipoprotein(a) did not change either with increasing age or during the transition despite known possible interference with estrogenic status.
A Neurophysiological Investigation of Non-native Phoneme Perception by Dutch and German Listeners
2016-01-29

The Mismatch Negativity (MMN) response has often been used to measure memory traces for phonological representations and to show effects of long-term native language (L1) experience on neural organization. We know little about whether phonological representations of non-native (L2) phonemes are modulated by experience with distinct non-native accents. We used MMN to examine effects of experience with L2-accented speech on auditory brain responses. Specifically, we tested whether it is long-term experience with language-specific L2 pronunciations or instead acoustic similarity between L2 speech sounds that modulates non-native phoneme perception. We registered MMN responses of Dutch and German proficient L2 speakers of English to the English interdental fricative /θ/ and compared it to its non-native pronunciations /s/ (typical pronunciation of /θ/ for German speakers) and /t/ (typical pronunciation of /θ/ for Dutch speakers). Dutch and German listeners heard the English pseudoword thond and its pronunciation deviants sond and tond. We computed the identity Mismatch Negativity (iMMN) by analyzing the difference in ERPs when the deviants were the frequent vs. the infrequent stimulus for the respective group of L2 listeners. For both groups, tond and sond elicited mismatch effects of comparable size. Overall, the results suggest that experience with deviant pronunciations of L2 speech sounds in foreign-accented speech does not alter auditory memory traces. Instead, non-native phoneme perception seems to be modulated by acoustic similarity between speech sounds rather than by experience with typical L2 pronunciation patterns.
Observing local turbulence and anisotropy during the afternoon transition with an unmanned aerial system – a case study
2016-01-29

Abstract. The article analyses airborne observations of turbulence in vertical and horizontal direction during the afternoon transition from turbulently mixed to stably stratified atmospheric conditions. The data were obtained during four flights at 14:30, 16:30, 18:30 and 20:30 UTC with the Meteorological Mini Aerial Vehicle M2AV during the BLLAST field experiment in summer 2011, which corresponds to 16:30, 18:30, 20:30 and 22:30 local time. Sunset was at 19:42 UTC. The anisotropy ratio defined here as the ratio of the variance of horizontal to vertical wind speed changes during the afternoon transition from a mean value about 1 to a mean value around 2 about one hour before sunset and then to a mean value around 8 at around one hour after sunset. The strongly enhanced horizontal wind speed variance during stable conditions in the lowermost 400 m is explained by a nocturnal Low-Level Jet (LLJ) as a source for turbulence in the horizontal direction. The gradient Richardson number indicates the generation of turbulence for the first and last flight only, where turbulence was created by thermal convection during the first flight, and by wind shear during the last flight. The development and small-scale inhomogeneous distribution of an LLJ was further analysed with frequent radiosonde and wind profiler observations.
Twist-3 spin observables for single-hadron production in DIS
2016-01-29

Recently, three twist-3 spin asymmetries for single-inclusive hadron production in deep-inelastic lepton-nucleon scattering have been computed using collinear factorization and the leading order approximation.Here we summarize the main findings of these studies.
News Sources and Follow-up Communication
2016-01-30

For sports actors, social media provide the opportunity to bypass sports journalism's gatekeeping function and to disseminate sports-related information to target groups directly. Thus, social media have been conceptualized as a competitor to journalism. We argue that the relation is much more diverse. We differentiate between competitive, integrative, and complementary facets of the relationship between sports journalism and social media. Our study focuses on complementarity and analyzes how far social and mainstream media serve as sources for each other. Therefore, we combine an online survey among 122 German sports journalists, an analysis of the Twitter networks of German sports journalists during the Winter Olympics 2014, and a content analysis of the most popular news items in social media. Results suggest that sports journalists perceive social media accounts of athletes as beneficial news sources, especially to gather inside information. Huge sports events influence the social media activities of sports journalists as they tend to have stronger connections to athletes at these times. Whereas social media appear to be significant sources for sports journalism, sports media content receives little attention in social media. However, our results indicate that sports journalism and social media indeed maintain a complementary relation.
How can Writing Tasks be Characterized in a way serving Pedagogical Goals and Automatic Analysis Needs?
2016-01-30

The paper works out and addresses a central question in the field of Intelligent Computer-Assisted Language Learning (ICALL): How can language learning tasks be conceptualized and made explicit in a way that supports the pedagogical goals in modern Foreign Language Teaching and Learning (FLTL) and at the same time provides an explicit characterization of the Natural Language Processing (NLP) requirements to provide feedback to learners completing those tasks? We argue that the successful implementation of language learning tasks to be automatically assessed by means of NLP-based feedback generation strategies demands a design process considering both pedagogical and computational requirements as equally important. Extending well-established work in Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) and TBLT testing we propose a framework that helps us (i) elucidate the formal features of foreign language learning activities, (ii) characterize the gap between expected and actually elicited learner language, and (iii) assess how variability in learner responses impacts computational techniques for the automatic analysis of learner language. To validate our approach we apply our framework to two specific writing tasks for learners of English as a Foreign Language (EFL). Our analysis highlights the relevance of spelling out the pedagogical and linguistic goals of language learning tasks in order to successfully characterize the language variation in learner responses needed to design effective pedagogical and NLP strategies.Given the combination of design- and data-driven perspectives, the framework supports an iterative approach to the creation of language learning tasks and ICALL materials.
Neuronavigated left temporal continuous theta burst stimulation in chronic tinnitus
2016-01-30

Purpose: Clinical effects of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) in chronic tinnitus are moderate. More precise coil localisation strategies, innovative stimulation protocols, and identification of predictors for treatment response were proposed as promising attempts to enhance treatment efficacy. In this pilot study we investigated neuronavigated continuous theta burst TMS (cTBS). Methods: Twenty-three patients received neuronavigated cTBS over the left primary auditory cortex in a randomized sham-controlled trial (verum = 12; sham = 11). Treatment response was evaluated with tinnitus questionnaires and numeric rating scales. Immediate change in numeric rating scales during the first session was used as predictor for treatment response. Results: Tinnitus was significantly reduced after treatment, but there were no superior effects between verum vs. sham treatment. Immediate change in the first treatment session predicted the response to treatment only in the verum group. Conclusions: In our study, verum cTBS was not superior to sham which highlights the persistent need for improving non-invasive brain stimulation techniques for the treatment of tinnitus. Future research should focus on the transfer of positive single session effects to daily treatment trials.
Quantum channel-estimation with particle loss: GHZ versus W states
2016-01-30

Abstract We consider quantum channel-estimation for depolarizing channels and phase-flip channels extended by ancilla qubits and fed with a GHZ orWstate. After application of the channel one or several qubits can be lost, and we calculate the impact of the loss on the quantum Fisher information that determines the smallest uncertainty with which the parameters of these channels can be estimated.
Arsenic(V) Incorporation in Vivianite during Microbial Reduction of Arsenic(V)-Bearing Biogenic Fe(III) (Oxyhydr)oxides
2016-02-01

The dissolution of arsenic-bearing iron(III) (oxyhydr)oxides during combined microbial iron(III) and arsenate(V) reduction is thought to be the main mechanism responsible for arsenic mobilization in reducing environments. Besides its mobilization during bioreduction, arsenic is often resequestered by newly forming secondary iron(II)-bearing mineral phases. In phosphate-bearing environments, iron(II) inputs generally lead to vivianite precipitation. In fact, in a previous study we observed that during bioreduction of arsenate(V)-bearing biogenic iron(III) (oxyhydr)oxides in phosphate-containing growth media, arsenate(V) was immobilized by the newly forming secondary iron(II) and iron(II)/iron(III)mineral phases, including vivianite. In the present study, changes in arsenic redox state and binding environment in these experiments were analyzed. We found that arsenate(V) partly replaced phosphate in vivianite, thus forming a vivianite-symplesite solid solution identified as Fe3(PO4)1.7(AsO4)0.3·8H2O. Our data suggests that in order to predict the fate of arsenic during the bioreduction of abiogenic and biogenic iron(III) (oxyhydr)oxides in arsenic-contaminated environments, the formation of symplesite-vivianite minerals needs to be considered. Indeed, such mineral phases could contribute to a delayed and slow release of arsenic in phosphate-bearing surface and groundwater environments.
The Specification of Geometric Edges by a Plant Rab GTPase Is an Essential Cell-Patterning Principle During Organogenesis in Arabidopsis
2016-02-01

Plant organogenesis requires control over division planes and anisotropic cell wall growth, which each require spatial patterning of cells. Polyhedral plant cells can display complex patterning in which individual faces are established as biochemically distinct domains by endomembrane trafficking. We now show that, during organogenesis, the Arabidopsis endomembrane system specifies an important additional cellular spatial domain: the geometric edges. Previously unidentified membrane vesicles lying immediately beneath the plasma membrane at cell edges were revealed through localization of RAB-A5c, a plant GTPase of the Rab family of membrane-trafficking regulators. Specific inhibition of RAB-A5c activity grossly perturbed cell geometry in developing lateral organs by interfering independently with growth anisotropy and cytokinesis without disrupting default membrane trafficking. The initial loss of normal cell geometry can be explained by a failure to maintain wall stiffness specifically at geometric edges. RAB-A5c thus meets a requirement to specify this cellular spatial domain during organogenesis.
The effect of content and language integrated learning on students' English and history competences – Killing two birds with one stone?
2016-02-01

Abstract By failing to appropriately control for selection effects, most previous research has overestimated the effects of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) on the development of students' foreign language skills. Furthermore, the CLIL-effect on the content subject is still widely unknown. Therefore, the present study investigated skill development of 1806 German CLIL and non-CLIL eighth-graders in English and History controlling for a wide range of student, classroom and teacher characteristics. Results of multilevel modelling confirmed that CLIL-classrooms showed greater increases in English listening comprehension but not general English skills as measured by a C-test than non-CLIL-classrooms. In History, the increases in subject knowledge over one school year were comparable despite CLIL-students' larger amount of instruction (three instead of two hours per week). The results confirm previous, differential findings for English. For the content subject, they indicate that CLIL-classrooms need to invest substantially more time to achieve comparable learning outcomes.
The Bardeen–Cooper–Schrieffer functional of superconductivity and its mathematical properties
2016-02-01

We review recent results concerning the mathematical properties of the Bardeen–Cooper–Schrieffer (BCS) functional of superconductivity, which were obtained in a series of papers, partly in collaboration with R. Frank, E. Hamza, S. Naboko, and J. P. Solovej. Our discussion includes, in particular, an investigation of the critical temperature for a general class of interaction potentials, as well as a study of its dependence on external fields. We shall explain how the Ginzburg–Landau model can be derived from the BCS theory in a suitable parameter regime.
Joint inference of groundwater–recharge and hydraulic–conductivity fields from head data using the ensemble Kalman filter
2016-02-01

Abstract. Regional groundwater flow strongly depends on groundwater recharge and hydraulic conductivity. Both are spatially variable fields, and their estimation is an ongoing topic in groundwater research and practice. In this study, we use the ensemble Kalman filter as an inversion method to jointly estimate spatially variable recharge and conductivity fields from head observations. The success of the approach strongly depends on the assumed prior knowledge. If the structural assumptions underlying the initial ensemble of the parameter fields are correct, both estimated fields resemble the true ones. However, erroneous prior knowledge may not be corrected by the head data. In the worst case, the estimated recharge field resembles the true conductivity field, resulting in a model that meets the observations but has very poor predictive power. The study exemplifies the importance of prior knowledge in the joint estimation of parameters from ambiguous measurements.