nils-herrmann/clean_scirepeval huggingface dataset:
Practices of self-selection in the graduate classroom: Extension, redirection, and disjunction

This study investigates the practices of student self-selection in the graduate-level American classroom. Self-selection is a crucial part of the learning process because it allows for the exchange of students’ and teachers’ views, analyses, and opinions, making these exchanges into a whole-classroom experience. Active students who make oral contributions in class are believed to learn more than those who do not (Weaver & Qi, 2005) and to enhance their critical thinking (Crone, 1997; Garside, 1996). In the graduate classroom, however, student self-selection may be challenging, as the material students tackle tends to be highly technical. Given the importance of student self-selection in this academically demanding context, more analytical attention must be devoted to uncovering the nature of participation. With 20 h of video data collected from graduate classes and analyzed through the lens of conversation analysis (CA), this study identifies three main practices employed by self-selecting speakers: extension by piling , contribution with hand-raising , and participation prefacing . Each occurs with different degrees of ‘fittedness’ to prior talk, in part evidenced in the different levels of mitigation use by the self-selectors. The findings of this study contribute to the small body of classroom discourse studies in the graduate classroom and provide a first step towards understanding how self-selections may be strategically managed or promoted.

Field of study: Education, Linguistics
A computer investigation of electron field emission from n-InSb at low temperatures

Electron transport in an n-InSb-vacuum emitter is investigated by means of the self-consistent solution of Poisson and Boltzmann equations using the Monte Carlo technique. Electron transport characteristics (energy distribution function, mean kinetic energy, etc) are evaluated at different values of the applied electric field and temperatures, since they influence the emitter performance. It is found that the emission current from n-InSb at low temperatures as well as at room temperatures is dominated by thermalized -valley electrons.

Field of study: Materials science
Selecting an appropriate multivariate source apportionment model result.

Two easily available multivariate source apportionment models, Unmix and positive matrix factorization (PMF), often produce nearly the same source apportionment. However, this paper gives two examples in which this is not the case: a simulated air pollution data set of 8 species and 200 samples and a water quality data set of 32 PCB congeners and 106 sediment core samples from Sheboygan River Inner Harbor, WI. In the first case, a basic form of PMF fails primarily because the source compositions do not have any species with zero or near zero concentrations. Unmix produces source compositions and contributions that are much closer to the true values. A version of PMF with an adjustable parameter also gives good results. In the second case, each model found 5 sources for the Sheboygan PCB sediment data. PMF determined sources compositions were consistent with the original 50/50% Aroclor 1248/1254 mixture, a previously determined prominent dechlorination profile (processes H' + M), and three other partially dechlorinated profiles. The Unmix determined source compositions were not as successful as the Unmix results depended heavily on just three data points. Source apportionment results favor Unmix when edges in the data are well-defined and PMF when several zeros are present in the loading and score matrices. Since both models are seen to have potential weaknesses, both should be applied in all cases. If the two methods do not produce similar results the methods given in the paper can be used to select the model result most likely to be closest to the truth.

Field of study: Environmental science
Pyrroles from ketoximes and acetylene. 41. Some reactions of 1-vinyl-2-(2-furyl)- and-(2-thienyl)pyrroles

We have studied the reaction of 1-vinyl-2-(2-furyl)- and -(2-thienyl)pyrroles with trifluoroacetic anhydride, with hydrogen in the presence of catalysts (Raney nickel, palladium black, palladous chloride), with propargyl alcohol in electrophilic conditions [catalysis by perfluorobutyric acid in the system azoisobutyrodinitrile (AIBN)-CCl4), and with alkane thiols with AIBN initiation. The products are novel substituted hetarylpyrroles.

Field of study: Chemistry
Clinical characteristics and disease course of alcoholics with inactive aldehyde dehydrogenase-2.

Inactive aldehyde dehydrogenase-2 (ALDH2) is known as a genetic negative risk factor for the development of alcoholism. In alcoholics with inactive ALDH2, unidentified factors that overcome the adverse reactions of high blood acetaldehyde concentration after drinking may increase such persons' susceptibility to alcoholism. Comparison of clinical characteristics, including sociofamilial backgrounds and psychopathologies, failed to show significant differences between alcoholics with inactive ALDH2 (inactive group) and those with active ALDH2 (active group). Examination of the temporal profile of disease development showed that the inactive group experienced each stage or event in the history of drinking and alcoholism 1 to 5 years later in life than the active group; however, not all comparisons reached statistically significant levels. Although preliminary, these results suggest that an inactive ALDH2-mediated delay in the occurrence of alcohol-related problems seems to contribute to the suppression of alcoholism development.

Field of study: Medicine
Human resources for health in Palestine: a policy analysis. Part I: Current situation and recent developments.

Human Resources for Health Development (HRD) has been a priority and focus of attention in the Palestinian healthcare system since the changeover of authority on the system at the end of 1994. This analysis examines HRD between 1994 and 2001. The aim is to provide an insight into and better understanding of the issue in a conflicting and transitional context. The results of this analysis are presented in two parts. Part I looks at the current situation and recent developments in Human Resources for Health (HRH) in Palestine. On the one hand, it analyses the relationship between HRH deficiencies and major policy options and strategies. On the other hand, it examines the correlation between HRH policy development and the policy context. Particular attention is given to the links between national health policy priorities and health sector reform initiatives. Part II focuses on the process of HRH policy formulation and implementation.

Field of study: Medicine, Political science
Population-level toxicity of the insecticide, spinosad and the nonylphenol polyethoxylate, R-11, to the cladoceran species Ceriodaphnia dubia Richard

The effects of the natural insecticide, spinosad, and the agricultural adjuvant, R-11, were evaluated on populations of the water flea, Ceriodaphnia dubia after chronic 8-day exposures. The number of individuals used to start the chronic exposure studies (founders) and the number of offspring/surviving female were significantly reduced after exposure to spinosad concentrations ⩾ 2.5 μg/L. The final number of individuals was significantly reduced after exposure to spinosad concentrations ⩾ 1.0 μg/L. Population growth rate was significantly reduced after exposure to spinosad concentrations ⩾ 1 μg/L. Extinction occurred (defined as negative population growth rate) after exposure to spinosad concentrations of 10 μg/L. Therefore, negative effects were observed in C. dubia after exposure to spinosad at a concentration near the chronic expected environmental concentration (EEC) of 2.3 μg/L. R-11 was much less toxic to C. dubia than spinosad. The number of founders was not significantly reduced until C. dubia were exposed to 12,000 μg/L. The number of offspring/surviving female, final number of individuals, and population growth rate were significantly reduced after exposure to R-11 concentrations ⩾ 5,000 μg/L. Extinction occurred after exposure to R-11 concentrations of 12,000 μg/L which was above the EEC of 790 μg/L. These results indicate that spinosad and R-11 both have lethal and sublethal effects on C. dubia. However, spinosad appears to affect C. dubia at or near the EEC while R-11 does not negatively affect this species until concentrations are much higher than the EEC.

Field of study: Agricultural and Food sciences
Molecular monitoring of culturable bacteria from deep-sea sediment of the Nankai Trough, Leg 190 Ocean Drilling Program.

Culturable bacteria were detected in deep-sea sediment samples collected from the Nankai Trough site 1173 (Ocean Drilling Program, ODP, Leg 190) at 4.15 m below the seafloor with 4791 m of overlying water. In this deep ocean near surface sediment, mainly fermentative heterotrophs, autotrophic acetogens and sulfate-reducing bacteria were enriched by using two different non-selective enrichment culture media. Culturable bacterial population shifts within the deep marine sediment enrichments were monitored by using denaturating gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE). DGGE analysis revealed a decrease in the number of 16S rRNA gene fragments from high to low carbon concentrations, and from low to high dilution of inoculum, suggesting that fast-growing bacteria were numerically dominant in enrichment culture samples. The dominant 16S rRNA fragments observed in DGGE gels were assigned to the Firmicutes, Proteobacteria (gamma and delta subgroups) and Spirochaeta phyla. Continual sub-culture and purification resulted in two isolates which were phylogenetically identified as members of the genera Acetobacterium and Marinilactibacillus. Our results, which combine enrichment culturing with DGGE analysis, indicated that enrichment cultures derived from inoculum dilution and media with various concentrations of carbon could facilitate the detection and isolation of a greater number of environmentally relevant bacterial species than when using traditional enrichment techniques alone.

Field of study: Biology, Environmental science
Therapeutic Potential of Surface Functionalized Mn3O4 Nanoparticles Against Chronic Liver Diseases in Murine Model

Currently there is a great deal of interest on health benefits of inorganic nanoparticles. Although they have been successfully introduced against several diseases, their direct use in treatment of chronic diseases are sparse in literature. Chronic liver diseases are the fifth most common cause of death, affecting around 400 million people per year worldwide and have no effective medication. The aim of this study was to evaluate potential hepatoprotective activity of orally administered citrate functionalized Mn3O4 nanoparticles (C-Mn3O4 NPs) against CCl4 induced hepatotoxicity. Our results show that oral treatment of C-Mn3O4 NPs can effectively reduce severe chronic liver damage even fibrosis in CCl4-induced mice model. Further investigations revealed that C-Mn3O4 NPs show increased antioxidant activity upon acid treatment (both in vitro and in vivo i.e., stomach), which is in turn responsible for its hepatoprotective nature. Assessment of various liver function parameters along with histopathology and immunohistochemistry were performed to evaluate pathophysiological condition of the liver. To unravel the mechanisms involved in attenuation of liver injury by NPs, various antioxidant parameters (like superoxide dismutase, catalase, glutathione peroxidase, reduced glutathione etc.) were also examined. An in depth study of the effect of C-Mn3O4 NPs on mitochondria, the cellular mediator of oxidative stress further revealed the molecular mechanism behind its therapeutic efficacy. To best of our knowledge, this is the first study that demonstrates direct oral treatment of an inorganic NPs (i.e., C-Mn3O4 NPs) without any delivery system can efficiently reduce chronic hepatotoxicity and liver fibrosis through its antioxidant activity.

Field of study: Materials science
The conductor-insulator transition as a result of antiferromagnetic ordering in monosulfides of 3d metals

The electron-energy structure of the structure of monosulfides of 3d metals is calculated using a modified LAPW + lo technique that allows for the antiferromagnetic ordering in different crystallographic layers. It is shown that the splitting of d-states of the transition metal with regard to the antiferromagnetic ordering in layers leads to a transition of VS, MnS, CoS, NiS, and FeS monosulfides in the troilite structure from metallic to semiconducting state.

Field of study: Physics
[Emotional disorders in patients with controlled hypertension].

To conduct a comprehensive examination of patients with controlled hypertension, including assessment of the functional state of the cardiovascular system, vegetative and psycho-emotional status.



The study involved 80 patients (51 men, 29 women) divided into 2 groups: 60 patients with essential hypertension (EH) without concomitant severe pathology and normal blood pressure during the preceding 3 months (group 1) and 20 healthy patients without EH (group 2). Anthropometric parameters (height, weight, body mass index), parameters of central hemodynamic (heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure), vegetative status (vegetative Kerdo index), mental and emotional status (SCL-90R, Leonhard questionnaire, HADS, SF-36, MPQ) were assessed.



There were significant differences in the psycho-emotional status between patients with hypertension and patients with normal blood pressure. Significant correlations between anthropometric indicators, the state of the autonomic nervous system and psycho-emotional status of patients with hypertension were shown.

Field of study: Medicine, Psychology
A Reflection on the Security of Two-Party Key Establishment Protocols

Two-party key establishment has been a very fruitful research area in cryptography, with many security models and numerous protocols proposed. In this paper, we take another look at the YAK protocol and the HMQV protocols and present some extended analysis. Motivated by our analysis, we reflect on the security properties that are desired by two-party key establishment protocols, and their formalizations. In particular, we take into account the interface between a key establishment protocol and the applications which may invoke it, and emphasize the concept of session and the usage of session identifier. Moreover, we show how to design a two-party key establishment protocol to achieve both key authentication and entity authentication properties in our security model.

Field of study: Computer science, Mathematics
“Optimal” Estimation of Correlated Response Variance under Additive Models

Additive models are often employed to measure the impact of response errors on the accuracy of survey estimates. An important feature of these models is that the correlated errors from specified error sources, such as interviewers and coders, contribute additive components, called correlated response variance (CRV) components, to the total variance of a survey estimator. As a result of these correlated components, the usual estimators of variance of a mean or a total are negatively biased, thus overstating the reliability of estimates. The underestimation, however, can be reduced or eliminated if estimates of CRV components are available. Further, the estimated CRV components can be employed as measures of quality of the particular operation(s) under investigation, for example, interviewer performance. The method of minimum norm quadratic unbiased estimation, due to C. R. Rao, is applied to obtain “optimal” estimators of CRV from interviewer variance experiments involving both interpenetrated and...

Field of study: Mathematics
Behavior and Achievement of Mainstreamed Junior High Special Class Students

Junior high students from selfxontained special education classes mainstreamed in regular aca- demic classes were compared to regular class stu- dents. Mainstreaming occurred in low achieving classes where the mildly handicapped students functioned similarly to their nonhandicapped peers. Significant differences were found in the observed behaviors of discussion and not paying attention. No differences were found in teacher ratings of classroom behavior or report card grades. Achievement test differences were large but not significant. Lack of differences in the two groups may be due to placement of students in low achieving classes, use of modified criteria for grading mainstreamed students, andlor a lack of real differences between the two groups.

Field of study: Education
John Knox: Reformation Rhetoric and the Traditions of Scots Prose 1490-1570 (review)

that the queen’s councilors attempted to pressure her to act, Mears apparently overlooked the Babington Plot, nurtured by Sir Francis Walsingham. Finally, while claiming Elizabeth was not Sir John Neale’s successful monarch, Mears does reject Christopher Haigh’s mean-spirited characterization. Surely, however, Mears incorrectly judges that all Elizabeth’s queenship had going for it was luck and longevity. She does concede that Elizabeth failed to make decisions on some difficult issues, including her marriage, the succession, and Mary Stewart because they “were highly problematic and their remedies equally so” (258). Perhaps Elizabeth realized that the possible solutions would be more troublesome than putting up with the problems and, therefore, helped to make her now-celebrated luck possible. RETHA M. WARNICKE Arizona State University

Field of study: History
Compound optical crosspoint with low crosstalk.

A multimode electrooptical switch that has high isolation between channels has been demonstrated experimentally in a 70-microm-thick plate of Z-cut LiTaO(3). The fiber-compatible four-port switch is intended for integration into an optical matrix. The crosspoint consists of an in-plane crossover, two simple optical switches, and a curved connecting waveguide. For convergent input light with a 0.07 numerical aperture, 10% of the initially channeled light was transferred into the crosschannel, and the optical switching ratio of that channel was 26 dB using 450-V dc for control.

Field of study: Physics
Design and Simulation Analysis of Lightweight HDPE Milk Bottle

A lightweight design is proposed for a 2800 ml HDPE milk bottle. In designing the bottle, a three-dimensional elastic-plastic dynamic finite element model is first constructed to explore the effect of the bottle thickness on the critical load and stress distribution. The validity of the proposed model is confirmed by comparing the numerical results for the load-displacement response of the bottle with the experimental results. A parametric analysis is then performed to examine the effects of the body thickness and bottom thickness on the critical load and weight of the HDPE bottle. The results show that the critical load increases with an increasing body thickness, but is insensitive to the bottom thickness. Finally, a lightweight design is proposed in which the structural shape of the original bottle is retained, but the thickness is varied in different regions of the body in order to reduce the weight. It is shown that the redesigned bottle achieves the same maximum top-load 315 N, but reduces the weight by 21.4% compared to the reference design obtained in the parametric analysis.

Field of study: Materials science
Meta-Analysis Identification of Highly Robust and Differential Immune-Metabolic Signatures of Systemic Host Response to Acute and Latent Tuberculosis in Children and Adults

Whole blood expression profiling is a mainstay for delineating differential diagnostic signatures of infection yet is subject to high variability that reduces power and complicates clinical usefulness. To date, confirmatory high confidence expression profiling signatures for clinical use remain uncertain. Here we have sought to evaluate the reproducibility and confirmatory nature of differential expression signatures, comprising molecular and cellular pathways, across multiple international clinical observational studies investigating children and adult whole blood transcriptome responses to tuberculosis (TB).  A systematic search and quality control assessment of gene expression repositories for human TB using whole blood resulted in 11 datasets with a total of 1073 patients from Africa, Europe, and South America. A non-parametric estimation of percentage of false prediction was used for meta-analysis of high confidence differential expression analysis. Deconvolution analysis was applied to infer changes in immune cell proportions and enrichment tests applied using pathway database resources. Meta-analysis identified high confidence differentially expressed genes, comprising 372 in adult active-TB versus latent-TB (LTBI), 332 in adult active-TB versus controls (CON), five in LTBI versus CON, and 415 in childhood active-TB versus LTBI. Notably, these confirmatory markers have low representation in published signatures for diagnosing TB. Pathway biology analysis of high confidence gene sets revealed dominant metabolic and innate-immune pathway signatures while suppressed signatures were enriched with adaptive signaling pathways and reduced proportions of T and B cells. Childhood TB showed uniquely strong inflammasome antagonist signature (IL1RN and ILR2), while adult TB patients exhibit a significant preponderance type I and type II IFN markers. Key limitations of the study include the paucity of data on potential confounders.  Meta-analysis identified high confidence confirmatory immune-metabolic and cellular expression signatures across studies regardless of the population resource setting, HIV status and circulating endemic pathogens. Notably, previously identified diagnostic signature markers for TB show limited concordance with the confirmatory meta-analysis. Overall, our results support the use of the confirmatory expression signatures for guiding optimized diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic monitoring modalities in TB.

Field of study: Biology
Making Employee Recognition a Tool for Achieving Improved Performance: Implication for Ghanaian Universities

Many organisations are increasingly making use of employee recognition to motivate employees to achieve high performance and productivity. Research has shown that effective recognition occurs in organisations that have strong supportive culture, understand the psychology of praising employees for their good work, and apply the principles of employee recognition. This paper examined employee recognition, its benefits and the various types of employee recognition programs. It also sought to propose that employee recognition looked at from the perspective of formal, informal and day-to-day, could motivate staff to ensure high performance in Ghanaian universities. It is thus, recommended that management of Ghanaian universities should commit credible resources to the design and implementation of employee recognition programs to yield the needed outcome.  Employee recognition, employee recognition programs, performance, management, Ghanaian universities

Field of study: Education