nils-herrmann/clean_scirepeval huggingface dataset:
Worldwide trends in diabetes since 1980: a pooled analysis of 751 population based studies with 4*4 million participants
Venue: The Lancet

One of the global targets for non communicable diseases is to halt, by 2025, the rise in the age standardised adult prevalence of diabetes at its 2010 levels. We aimed to estimate worldwide trends in diabetes, how likely it is for countries to achieve the global target, and how changes in prevalence, together with population growth and ageing, are affecting the number of adults with diabetes.  We pooled data from population based studies that had collected data on diabetes through measurement of its biomarkers. We used a Bayesian hierarchical model to estimate trends in diabetes prevalence defined as fasting plasma glucose of 7*0 mmol/L or higher, or history of diagnosis with diabetes, or use of insulin or oral hypoglycaemic drugs in 200 countries and territories in 21 regions, by sex and from 1980 to 2014. We also calculated the posterior probability of meeting the global diabetes target if post 2000 trends continue.  We used data from 751 studies including 4 372 000 adults from 146 of the 200 countries we make estimates for. Global age standardised diabetes prevalence increased from 4*3% (95% credible interval 2*4 7*0) in 1980 to 9*0% (7*2 11*1) in 2014 in men, and from 5*0% (2*9 7*9) to 7*9% (6*4 9*7) in women. The number of adults with diabetes in the world increased from 108 million in 1980 to 422 million in 2014 (28*5% due to the rise in prevalence, 39*7% due to population growth and ageing, and 31*8% due to interaction of these two factors) Age standardised adult diabetes prevalence in 2014 was lowest in northwestern Europe, and highest in Polynesia and Micronesia, at nearly 25% followed by Melanesia and the Middle East and north Africa. Between 1980 and 2014 there was little change in age standardised diabetes prevalence in adult women in continental western Europe, although crude prevalence rose because of ageing of the population. By contrast, age standardised adult prevalence rose by 15 percentage points in men and women in Polynesia and Micronesia. In 2014, American Samoa had the highest national prevalence of diabetes >30% in both sexes) with age standardised adult prevalence also higher than 25% in some other islands in Polynesia and Micronesia. If post 2000 trends continue, the probability of meeting the global target of halting the rise in the prevalence of diabetes by 2025 at the 2010 level worldwide is lower than 1% for men and is 1% for women. Only nine countries for men and 29 countries for women, mostly in western Europe, have a 50% or higher probability of meeting the global target.  Since 1980, age standardised diabetes prevalence in adults has increased, or at best remained unchanged, in every country. Together with population growth and ageing, this rise has led to a near quadrupling of the number of adults with diabetes worldwide. The burden of diabetes, both in terms of prevalence and number of adults affected, has increased faster in low income and middle income countries than in high income countries. Funding Wellcome Trust.
AIRE Deficient Patients Harbor Unique High Affinity Disease Ameliorating Autoantibodies
Venue: Cell

APECED patients are defined by defects in the autoimmune regulator (AIRE) that mediates central T cell tolerance to many self antigens. AIRE deficiency also affects B cell tolerance, but this is incompletely understood. Here we show that most APS1/APECED patients displayed B cell autoreactivity toward unique sets of approximately 100 self proteins. Thereby, autoantibodies from 81 patients collectively detected many thousands of human proteins. The loss of B cell tolerance seemingly occurred during antibody affinity maturation, an obligatorily T cell dependent step. Consistent with this, many APS1/APECED patients harbored extremely high affinity, neutralizing autoantibodies, particularly against specific cytokines. Such antibodies were biologically active in vitro and in vivo, and those neutralizing type I interferons (IFNs) showed a striking inverse correlation with type I diabetes, not shown by other anti cytokine antibodies. Thus, naturally occurring human autoantibodies may actively limit disease and be of therapeutic utility.
Marine mammals harbor unique microbiotas shaped by and yet distinct from the sea
Venue: Nature communications

Marine mammals play crucial ecological roles in the oceans, but little is known about their microbiotas. Here we study the bacterial communities in 337 samples from 5 body sites in 48 healthy dolphins and 18 healthy sea lions, as well as those of adjacent seawater and other hosts. The bacterial taxonomic compositions are distinct from those of other mammals, dietary fish and seawater, are highly diverse and vary according to body site and host species. Dolphins harbour 30 bacterial phyla, with 25 of them in the mouth, several abundant but poorly characterized Tenericutes species in gastric fluid and a surprisingly paucity of Bacteroidetes in distal gut. About 70% of near full length bacterial 16S ribosomal RNA sequences from dolphins are unique. Host habitat, diet and phylogeny all contribute to variation in marine mammal distal gut microbiota composition. Our findings help elucidate the factors structuring marine mammal microbiotas and may enhance monitoring of marine mammal health.
Global Survey of Corneal Transplantation and Eye Banking.
Venue: JAMA ophthalmology

Corneal transplantation restores visual function when visual impairment caused by a corneal disease becomes too severe. It is considered the world's most frequent type of transplantation, but, to our knowledge, there are no exhaustive data allowing measurement of supply and demand, although such data are essential in defining local, national, and global strategies to fight corneal blindness.  To describe the worldwide situation of corneal transplantation supply and demand.  Data were collected between August 2012 and August 2013 from a systematic review of published literature in parallel with national and international reports on corneal transplantation and eye banking. In a second step, eye bank staff and/or corneal surgeons were interviewed on their local activities. Interviews were performed during international ophthalmology or eye banking congresses or by telephone or email. Countries' national supply/demand status was classified using a 7 grade system. Data were collected from 148 countries.  Corneal transplantation and corneal procurements per capita in each country.  In 2012, we identified 184,576 corneal transplants performed in 116 countries. These were procured from 283,530 corneas and stored in 742 eye banks. The top indications were Fuchs dystrophy (39% of all corneal transplants performed) a primary corneal edema mostly affecting elderly individuals; keratoconus (27% a corneal disease that slowly deforms the cornea in young people; and sequellae of infectious keratitis (20% The United States, with 199.10 6 corneal transplants per capita, had the highest transplantation rate, followed by Lebanon (122.10 6) and Canada (117.10 6) while the median of the 116 transplanting countries was 19.10 6. Corneas were procured in only 82 countries. Only the United States and Sri Lanka exported large numbers of donor corneas. About 53% of the world's population had no access to corneal transplantation.  Our survey globally quantified the considerable shortage of corneal graft tissue, with only 1 cornea available for 70 needed. Efforts to encourage cornea donation must continue in all countries, but it is also essential to develop alternative and/or complementary solutions, such as corneal bioengineering.
BENEFITS OF THE PROPRIOCEPTIVE TRAINING IN RECOVERY AFTER KNEE SPRAIN THEORETICAL GROUNDS

We intend to make a theoretical review about proprioceptive training and its benefits. The aim of this paper is to realize a brief review on the benefits of the proprioceptive training. Proprioceptive training is used in the rehabilitation after injuries and begins to be recognized as an important element in preventing them, regardless of the sport. We allege that the goal of the proprioceptive training is also to develop muscle strength and neuromuscular control, so that the finality is represented by a better control and a more effective protection of the knee joint during stresses over physical effort.  All the papers that we are reviewing have a main conclusion the proprioceptive training is effective in improving and recovering proprioception. And also in increasing muscular strength and power.
INFLUENCE OF PROPRIOCEPTIVE TRAINING ON THE STRENGHT OF THE LOWER LIMB IN WOMEN SOCCER PLAYERS

The proprioceptive training has an important role in developing and maintaining the force of the lower limbs. The proprioceptive training rapidly gained attention in the sport performance for both the prevention and recovery of muscular injuries and increasing physical performance.  The aim of this study was to prove that a 15 minutes of proprioceptive training performed at the beginning of the training sessions has a good influence on force of the lower limb in women soccer players.  Participants were 18 active women soccer players, age 20.75 4.59 years old. The task of the experimental group consisted to performed a 15 minutes of proprioceptive exercises, special designed for soccer game, at the beginning of the training sessions, two times a week. For the measurement of the forces of the lower limbs we used Hop test.  The experimental group has recorded better results than the control ones, on the Hop test (p
The Impact of Data Normalization on Stock Market Prediction: Using SVM and Technical Indicators
Venue: SCDS

Predicting stock index and its movement has never been lack of attention among traders and professional analysts, because of the attractive financial gains. For the last two decades, extensive researches combined technical indicators with machine learning techniques to construct effective prediction models. This study is to investigate the impact of various data normalization methods on using support vector machine (SVM) and technical indicators to predict the price movement of stock index. The experimental results suggested that, the prediction system based on SVM and technical indicators, should carefully choose an appropriate data normalization method so as to avoid its negative influence on prediction accuracy and the processing time on training.
A Survey on Stock Market Prediction Using SVM

A lot of studies provide strong evidence that traditional predictive regression models face significant challenges in out of sample predictability tests due to model uncertainty and parameter instability. Recent studies introduce particular strategies that overcome these problems. Support Vector Machine (SVM) is a relatively new learning algorithm that has the desirable characteristics of the control of the decision function, the use of the kernel method, and the sparsity of the solution. In this paper, we present a theoretical and empirical framework to apply the Support Vector Machines strategy to predict the stock market. Firstly, four company specific and six macroeconomic factors that may influence the stock trend are selected for further stock multivariate analysis. Secondly, Support Vector Machine is used in analyzing the relationship of these factors and predicting the stock performance. Our results suggest that SVM is a powerful predictive tool for stock predictions in the financial market.  Classification; Data Mining; Support Vector Machine; Forecasting
Exploring Avatar Facial Fidelity and Emotional Expressions on Observer Perception of the Uncanny Valley
Venue: SimTecT/ISAGA

Avatars or digital human characters are traditionally associated with digital games, where they enhance story based interaction and player engagement. However, interest in accurate and cost effective avatar development has increased in fields such as serious gaming and simulation training. The interest from these fields stems from training needs where avatars, used create human emotional experiences, could aid in appropriate education. In this context, the area of avatar emotional expression is not well understood. Applications often result in avatars that produce feelings of uncanniness in end users, which may have a negative impact on training outcomes. This paper aims to firstly explore how avatar fidelity or realism could influence the emotional experience of interactions between end users and virtual humans. Secondly, we examine how avatar facial features displaying emotional expressions affect participants perceived valence of the avatar. These affects were assessed through a combination of experimental and survey methodologies. An existing 'Godspeed' survey was used to measure an end users' perception of an avatars 'humanness' 'eeriness' and 'attractiveness, together with a three part experiment that measured participants' startle reflex responses to avatars with differing fidelity and emotional expressions. The results indicated that participant gender played a role in their perception of avatars. Also, the gender of the avatar appeared to have a significant impact on participant responses. Avatars displaying sad expressions emerged as less unpleasant and possibly less uncanny than smiling expressions. This research represents an entry point in a broad, cross disciplinary area of research. While there are important findings and a significant amount of data generated, these elements pose questions for future work in this area.
Efficient and Regioselective Synthesis of b GalNAc/GlcNAc Lactose by a Bifunctional Transglycosylating b N Acetylhexosaminidase from Bifidobacterium bifidum
Venue: Applied and Environmental Microbiology

ABSTRACT b N Acetylhexosaminidases have attracted interest particularly for oligosaccharide synthesis, but their use remains limited by the rarity of enzyme sources low efficiency, and relaxed regioselectivity of transglycosylation. In this work, genes of 13 b N acetylhexosaminidases, including 5 from Bacteroides fragilis ATCC 25285, 5 from Clostridium perfringens ATCC 13124, and 3 from Bifidobacterium bifidum JCM 1254, were cloned and heterogeneously expressed in Escherichia coli. The resulting recombinant enzymes were purified and screened for transglycosylation activity. A b N acetylhexosaminidase named BbhI, which belongs to glycoside hydrolase family 20 and was obtained from B. bifidum JCM 1254, possesses the bifunctional property of efficiently transferring both GalNAc and GlcNAc residues through b1 3 linkage to the Gal residue of lactose. The effects of initial substrate concentration, pH, temperature, and reaction time on transglycosylation activities of BbhI were studied in detail. With the use of 10 mM pNP b GalNAc or 20 mM pNP b GlcNAc as the donor and 400 mM lactose as the acceptor in phosphate buffer (pH 5.8) BbhI synthesized GalNAcb1 3Galb1 4Glc and GlcNAcb1 3Galb1 4Glc at maximal yields of 55.4% at 45degC and 4 h and 44.9% at 55degC and 1.5 h, respectively. The model docking of BbhI with lactose showed the possible molecular basis of strict regioselectivity of b1 3 linkage in b N acetylhexosaminyl lactose synthesis.  Oligosaccharides play a crucial role in many biological events and therefore are promising potential therapeutic agents. However, their use is limited because large scale production of oligosaccharides is difficult. The chemical synthesis requires multiple protecting group manipulations to control the regio and stereoselectivity of glycosidic bonds. In comparison, enzymatic synthesis can produce oligosaccharides in one step by using glycosyltransferases and glycosidases. Given the lower price of their glycosyl donor and their broader acceptor specificity, glycosidases are more advantageous than glycosyltransferases for large scale synthesis. b N Acetylhexosaminidases have attracted interest particularly for b N acetylhexosaminyl oligosaccharide synthesis, but their application is affected by having few enzyme sources, low efficiency, and relaxed regioselectivity of transglycosylation. In this work, we describe a microbial b N acetylhexosaminidase that exhibited strong transglycosylation activity and strict regioselectivity for b N acetylhexosaminyl lactose synthesis and thus provides a powerful synthetic tool to obtain biologically important GalNAcb1 3Lac and GlcNAcb1 3Lac.
Wastewater Treatment and Reclamation: A Review of Pulp and Paper Industry Practices and Opportunities

The pulp and paper (P&P) industry worldwide has achieved substantial progress in treating both process water and wastewater, thus limiting the discharge of pollutants to receiving waters. This review covers a variety of wastewater treatment methods, which provide P&P companies with cost effective ways to limit the release of biological or chemical oxygen demand, toxicity, solids, color, and other indicators of pollutant load. Conventional wastewater treatment systems, often comprising primary clarification followed by activated sludge processes, have been widely implemented in the P&P industry. Higher levels of pollutant removal can be achieved by supplementary treatments, which can include anaerobic biological stages, advanced oxidation processes, bioreactors, and membrane filtration technologies. Improvements in the performance of wastewater treatment operations often can be achieved by effective measurement technologies and by strategic addition of agents including coagulants, flocculants, filter aids, and optimized fungal or bacterial cultures. In addition, P&P mills can implement upstream process changes, including dissolved air flotation (DAF) systems, filtration save alls, and kidney like operations to purify process waters, thus reducing the load of pollutants and the volume of effluent being discharged to end of pipe wastewater treatment plants.
A review and investigation of the effect of nanophotocatalytic ozonation process for phenolic compound removal from real effluent of pulp and paper industry
Venue: Environmental Science and Pollution Research

AbstractPhenol and its derivatives are the major environmental pollutants discharged from paper and pulp industries into water bodies. All these compounds and chlorinated phenolic compounds in particular are very toxic to fauna and flora, even at relatively low concentration. This study aimed to investigate the removal rate of phenolic compounds from the effluent of pulp and paper industries using a combination of ozonation and photocatalytic processes. Firstly, a certain volume from the effluent of paper and pulp industries containing certain phenol concentrations was obtained and fed into a prefabricated reactor at laboratory scale. Then, the combined and separate effects of zinc oxide dosage (ZnO) ozone flow rate (O3) and pH under ultra violet radiation for 30 min were evaluated. The concentration of phenolic compounds and the produced ozone gas flow rate were measured by a spectrophotometry and iodometric method, respectively. The results showed that the phenolic removal rate increased at acidic PHs compared with alkaline PHs; it was also decreased with the increase in ZnO dosages. Furthermore, the highest phenolic compound's removal rate was 99% at the optimal condition (pH 5, ZnO dosage of 0.1 g L 1 at the 30 min with UV C illumination of 125 W) Finally, Daphnia toxicity test showed that treated effluent was safe and met the standards to the extent that it can be discharged into the receiving waters.
Empirical representations of probability distributions via kernel mean embeddings

How to represent probability distributions is a fundamental issue in statistical methods, as this determines all the subsequent estimation procedures. In this thesis, we focus on the approach using positive definite kernels and reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces (RKHS) namely the framework of kernel mean embeddings. In this framework, any probability distribution is represented as an element in an RKHS, which is called the kernel mean. Since each kernel mean contains all the information about the embedded distribution, statistical inference can be conducted by estimating the kernel means of distributions which one is interested in. In general, a finite sample estimate of a kernel mean is given as a weighted sum of feature vectors. Therefore an empirical kernel mean is expressed by a weighted sample, and thus it is similar to an empirical distribution. In this thesis, we investigate this similarity between empirical kernel means and empirical distributions, and show that empirical kernel means can be treated as empirical distributions; this enables us to incorporate Monte Carlo methods into the framework of kernel mean embeddings. We first prove that a sampling method can be applied to empirical kernel means, as is commonly done to empirical distributions in the field of Monte Carlo methods. Based on this theoretical result, we develop a novel method for filtering in a state space model, which effectively combines the sampling method and a nonparametric learning approach of kernel mean embeddings. We also prove that empirical kernel means can be used for estimating expectations of functions of a broad class, similarly to empirical distributions.
Selective removal of cesium and strontium using porous frameworks from high level nuclear waste.
Venue: Chemical communications

Efficient and cost effective removal of radioactive (137)Cs and (90)Sr found in spent fuel is an important step for safe, long term storage of nuclear waste. Solid state materials such as resins and titanosilicate zeolites have been assessed for the removal of Cs and Sr from aqueous solutions, but there is room for improvement in terms of capacity and selectivity. Herein, we report the Cs( and Sr(2+ exchange potential of an ultra stable MOF, namely, MIL 101 SO3H, as a function of different contact times, concentrations, pH levels, and in the presence of competing ions. Our preliminary results suggest that MOFs with suitable ion exchange groups can be promising alternate materials for cesium and strontium removal.
Loading Actinides in Multilayered Structures for Nuclear Waste Treatment: The First Case Study of Uranium Capture with Vanadium Carbide MXene.
Venue: ACS applied materials interfaces

Efficient nuclear waste treatment and environmental management are important hurdles that need to be overcome if nuclear energy is to become more widely used. Herein, we demonstrate the first case of using two dimensional (2D) multilayered V2CTx nanosheets prepared by HF etching of V2AlC to remove actinides from aqueous solutions. The V2CTx material is found to be a highly efficient uranium (U(VI) sorbent, evidenced by a high uptake capacity of 174 mg g( 1) fast sorption kinetics, and desirable selectivity. Fitting of the sorption isotherm indicated that the sorption followed a heterogeneous adsorption model, most probably due to the presence of heterogeneous adsorption sites. Density functional theory calculations, in combination with X ray absorption fine structure characterizations, suggest that the uranyl ions prefer to coordinate with hydroxyl groups bonded to the V sites of the nanosheets via forming bidentate inner sphere complexes.