Noun and verb knowledge in monolingual preschool children across 17 languages: Data from cross-linguistic lexical tasks (LITMUS-CLT)

This article investigates the cross-linguistic comparability of the newly developed lexical assessment tool Cross-linguistic Lexical Tasks (LITMUS-CLT). LITMUS-CLT is a part the Language Impairment Testing in Multilingual Settings (LITMUS) battery (Armon-Lotem, de Jong & Meir, 2015). Here we analyse results on receptive and expressive word knowledge tasks for nouns and verbs across 17 languages from eight different language families: Baltic (Lithuanian), Bantu (isiXhosa), Finnic (Finnish), Germanic (Afrikaans, British English, South African English, German, Luxembourgish, Norwegian, Swedish), Romance (Catalan, Italian), Semitic (Hebrew), Slavic (Polish, Serbian, Slovak) and Turkic (Turkish). The participants were 639 monolingual children aged 3;0-6;11 living in 15 different countries. Differences in vocabulary size were small between 16 of the languages; but isiXhosa-speaking children knew significantly fewer words than speakers of the other languages. There was a robust effect of word class: accuracy was higher for nouns than verbs. Furthermore, comprehension was more advanced than production. Results are discussed in the context of cross-linguistic comparisons of lexical development in monolingual and bilingual populations

Germline Variants Associated With Toxicity to Immune Checkpoint Blockade

Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have yielded remarkable responses but often lead to immune-related adverse events (irAEs). Although germline causes for irAEs have been hypothesized, no individual variant associated with developing irAEs has been identified. We carried out a genome-wide association study of 1,751 patients on ICIs across 12 cancer types. We investigated two irAE phenotypes: (1) high-grade (3-5) and (2) all-grade events. We identified 3 genome-wide significant associations (P \u3c 5 × 10-8) in the discovery cohort associated with all-grade irAEs: rs16906115 near IL7 (combined P = 3.6 × 10-11; hazard ratio (HR) = 2.1); rs75824728 near IL22RA1 (combined P = 3.5 × 10-8; HR = 1.8); and rs113861051 on 4p15 (combined P = 1.2 × 10-8, HR = 2.0); rs16906115 was replicated in 3 independent studies. The association near IL7 colocalized with the gain of a new cryptic exon for IL7, a critical regulator of lymphocyte homeostasis. Patients carrying the IL7 germline variant exhibited significantly increased lymphocyte stability after ICI initiation, which was itself predictive of downstream irAEs and improved survival

Impact of smoking status on clinical outcomes in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma treated with first-line immune checkpoint inhibitor-based regimens.

BACKGROUND: Current tobacco smoking is independently associated with decreased overall survival (OS) among patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC) treated with targeted monotherapy (VEGF-TKI). Herein, we assess the influence of smoking status on the outcomes of patients with mRCC treated with the current first-line standard of care of immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI)-based regimens. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Real-world data from the International Metastatic Renal Cell Carcinoma Database Consortium (IMDC) were collected retrospectively. Patients with mRCC who received either dual ICI therapy or ICI with VEGF-TKI in the first-line setting were included and were categorized as current, former, or nonsmokers. The primary outcomes were OS, time to treatment failure (TTF), and objective response rate (ORR). OS and TTF were compared between groups using the log-rank test and multivariable Cox regression models. ORR was assessed between the 3 groups using a multivariable logistic regression model. RESULTS: A total of 989 eligible patients were included in the analysis, with 438 (44.3%) nonsmokers, 415 (42%) former, and 136 (13.7%) current smokers. Former smokers were older and included more males, while other baseline characteristics were comparable between groups. Median follow-up for OS was 21.2 months. In the univariate analysis, a significant difference between groups was observed for OS (P = .027) but not for TTF (P = .9), with current smokers having the worse 2-year OS rate (62.8% vs 70.8% and 73.1% in never and former smokers, respectively). After adjusting for potential confounders, no significant differences in OS or TTF were observed among the 3 groups. However, former smokers demonstrated a higher ORR compared to never smokers (OR 1.45, P = .02). CONCLUSION: Smoking status does not appear to independently influence the clinical outcomes to first-line ICI-based regimens in patients with mRCC. Nonetheless, patient counseling on tobacco cessation remains a crucial aspect of managing patients with mRCC, as it significantly reduces all-cause mortality

Simulação de moagem mista por rede neural artificial

Esse artigo versa sobre a aplicação de um simulador de moagem mista baseado em redes neurais artificiais (do tipo perceptron multicamadas com treinamento supervisionado com o algoritmo retropropagação com momento). Os dados experimentais aqui utilizados provieram do trabalho atinente ao artigo intitulado "Seletividade na cominuição de mesclas de dolomita e quartzo". Para verificar a estabilidade estatística do processo de simulação, utilizou-se a carta de controle Shewhart para valores individuais, a qual se mostrou útil para orientar a aceitação dos treinamentos. Os resultados mostraram bom desempenho dessa ferramenta na simulação de moagem mista (moagem de mistura de componentes de diferentes moabilidades), problema de comum ocorrência no setor minerometalúrgico

A reappraisal of some simulation fundamentals

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:D36214/81 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Amostragem descritiva no apreçamento de opções européias através de simulação Monte Carlo: o efeito da dimensionalidade e da probabilidade de exercício no ganho de precisão

O objetivo deste trabalho é o de avaliar o efeito da dimensionalidade e da probabilidade de exercício de uma opção de compra européia, no ganho de precisão obtido com o uso da Amostragem Descritiva no apreçamento destas opções através de Simulação Monte Carlo, em lugar da abordagem tradicional da Amostragem Aleatória Simples. Após confirmar a ausência de viés nas estimativas, sua precisão foi avaliada pelo erro padrão destas estimativas. Os resultados obtidos mostram que a eficiência estatística das duas técnicas não é afetada pelo aumento da dimensionalidade do problema, não sofrendo perda de precisão com esta variação. No entanto, em relação ao preço de exercício, embora a Amostragem Descritiva tenha se mostrado mais eficiente do que a Amostragem Aleatória Simples, observou-se uma redução do ganho de precisão à medida que a probabilidade de exercício diminui. Embora os resultados aqui apresentados se atenham ao caso particular de uma opção européia, há evidências de que o mesmo tipo de comportamento em relação à dimensionalidade do problema e à probabilidade de exercício também se manifeste nos demais tipos de opção.<br>The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effect of dimensionality and probability of exercise of a European call option on the precision improvements obtained by the usage of Descriptive Sampling on a Monte Carlo Simulation to price such derivative as opposed to the use of traditional Simple Random Sampling. After verifying the absence of bias, the precision of the estimates was assessed by their standard error. The results show that the statistical efficiency of both techniques is unaffected by an increase of dimensionality and maintain their level of precision. However, as to the exercise price, although Descriptive Sampling proved to be more efficient than Simple Random Sampling, the improvement weakens as the option’s exercise probability declines. Although this work relates to European options, other options should behave similarly in regard to dimensionality and exercise price