LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Magnetic resonance imaging with ferumoxil, a negative superparamagnetic oral contrast agent, in the evaluation of ulcerative colitis

OBJECTIVE:The introduction of new oral contrast agents that enhance image quality has increased the importance of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the management of ulcerative colitis. The aim of our study was to investigate the usefulness of a new negative superparamagnetic oral contrast (ferumoxil) alone or in association with gadolinium i.v. in the assessment of the disease.METHODS:Twenty-eight patients with clinically active ulcerative colitis and 10 control subjects entered the study. In each patient a clinical, endoscopic, histological, and MRI evaluation was performed. In particular, in 14 patients affected by ulcerative colitis (group A) and in five controls, magnetic resonance images were acquired 1 h after the oral administration of 900 ml of ferumoxil, while the remaining 14 patients (group B) and five controls were submitted to double-contrast MRI (ferumoxil and gadolinium). In both groups, wall thickness, length of affected bowel segments, and, in group B, also percent contrast enhancement were calculated.RESULTS:The comparison of endoscopic and MRI extent of disease was statistically significant. Wall thickness and, in group B, also percent contrast enhancement were significantly correlated with clinical and endoscopic activities. In each group wall thickness was significantly different in the activity phases of the disease.CONCLUSIONS:MRI with negative superparamagnetic oral contrast is comparable to endoscopy in the assessment of ulcerative colitis. The double-contrast imaging does not provide more information than single oral contrast, so we concluded that the latter is preferable in the follow-up of the disease and in patients unable or with a poor compliance to undergo endoscopy.
particle in gravitational field of a rotating body

Abstract The effective Lagrangian describing gravitational source spin-particle spin interactions is given. Cosmological and astrophysical consequences of such interaction are examined. Although stronger than expected, the spin-spin interactions do not change any cosmological effect observed so far. They are important for background primordial neutrinos.
Racism and health among urban Aboriginal young people

BACKGROUND
Racism has been identified as an important determinant of health but few studies have explored associations between racism and health outcomes for Australian Aboriginal young people in urban areas.


METHODS
Cross sectional data from participants aged 12-26 years in Wave 1 of the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service's Young People's Project were included in hierarchical logistic regression models. Overall mental health, depression and general health were all considered as outcomes with self-reported racism as the exposure, adjusting for a range of relevant confounders.


RESULTS
Racism was reported by a high proportion (52.3%) of participants in this study. Self-reported racism was significantly associated with poor overall mental health (OR 2.67, 95% CI 1.25-5.70, p = 0.01) and poor general health (OR 2.17, 95% CI 1.03-4.57, p = 0.04), and marginally associated with increased depression (OR 2.0; 95% CI 0.97-4.09, p = 0.06) in the multivariate models. Number of worries and number of friends were both found to be effect modifiers for the association between self-reported racism and overall mental health. Getting angry at racist remarks was found to mediate the relationship between self-reported racism and general health.


CONCLUSIONS
This study highlights the need to acknowledge and address racism as an important determinant of health and wellbeing for Aboriginal young people in urban areas of Australia.
Feasibility study of S-1 and intraperitoneal docetaxel combination chemotherapy for gastric cancer with peritoneal dissemination.

BACKGROUND
Gastric cancer with cancer cells on peritoneal cytology has very poor prognosis because of the existence of simultaneous peritoneal metastasis. Here we performed a dose-escalation study of intraperitoneal docetaxel (DTX) combined with S-1 to determine the maximum-tolerated dose (MTD) and recommended dose (RD) in gastric cancer with peritoneal dissemination.


PATIENTS AND METHODS
Twelve gastric cancer patients with positive cytology were enrolled in this study. Peritoneal lavage specimens were obtained under local anesthesia or staging laparoscopy before treatment and the combination chemotherapy was applied in patients with positive cytology. DTX was administered on day 1 intraperitoneally with initial dose of 40 mg/m(2), stepped up to 50 or 60 mg/m(2). S-1 was administered at a fixed dose of 80 mg/m(2)/day on days 1-14, followed by 7 days of rest. After two cycles of the combination chemotherapy, staging laparoscopy was performed to evaluate the effect of the chemotherapy. Simultaneous gastrectomy was performed in cases without peritoneal deposits at staging laparoscopy.


RESULTS
The MTD of intraperitoneal DTX was not determined and the RD was defined as 60 mg/m(2) because dose-limiting toxicity occurred in only one patient at level II (DTX: 50 mg/m(2)). Out of twelve patients given the combination chemotherapy, nine had cytologically negative peritoneal lavage and had no peritoneal metastases at surgery after chemotherapy.


CONCLUSION
The combined chemotherapy of S-1 plus intraperitoneal DTX was revealed to be safe and may be effective for gastric cancer with peritoneal dissemination.
Corpus callosum abnormalities, intellectual disability, speech impairment, and autism in patients with haploinsufficiency of ARID1B

Corpus callosum abnormalities, intellectual disability, speech impairment, and autism in patients with haploinsufficiency of ARID1B. Corpus callosum abnormalities are common brain malformations with a wide clinical spectrum ranging from severe intellectual disability to normal cognitive function. The etiology is expected to be genetic in as much as 30-50% of the cases, but the underlying genetic cause remains unknown in the majority of cases. By next-generation mate-pair sequencing we mapped the chromosomal breakpoints of a patient with a de novo balanced translocation, t(1;6)(p31;q25), agenesis of corpus callosum (CC), intellectual disability, severe speech impairment, and autism. The chromosome 6 breakpoint truncated ARID1B which was also truncated in a recently published translocation patient with a similar phenotype. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction (Q-PCR) data showed that a primer set proximal to the translocation showed increased expression of ARID1B, whereas primer sets spanning or distal to the translocation showed decreased expression in the patient relative to a non-related control set. Phenotype-genotype comparison of the translocation patient to seven unpublished patients with various sized deletions encompassing ARID1B confirms that haploinsufficiency of ARID1B is associated with CC abnormalities, intellectual disability, severe speech impairment, and autism. Our findings emphasize that ARID1B is important in human brain development and function in general, and in the development of CC and in speech development in particular.
ANN-Based Forecasting of Foreign Currency Exchange Rates

In this paper, we have investigated artificial neural networks based prediction modeling of foreign currency rates using three learning algorithms, namely, Standard Backpropagation (SBP), Scaled Conjugate Gradient (SCG) and Backpropagation with Bayesian Regularization (BPR). The models were trained from historical data using five technical indicators to predict six currency rates against Australian dollar. The forecasting performance of the models was evaluated using a number of widely used statistical metrics and compared. Results show that significantly close prediction can be made using simple technical indicators without extensive knowledge of market data. Among the three models, SCG based model outperforms other models when measured on two commonly used metrics and attains comparable results with BPR based model on other three metrics. The effect of network architecture on the performance of the forecasting model is also presented. Future research direction outlining further improvement of the model is discussed. Keywords-Neural network, ARIMA, financial forecasting, foreign exchange
Thermodynamics of spatiotemporal chaos: An experimental approach.

We report experimental evidence that, beyond the transition for spatiotemporal chaos, Rayleigh-Benard convection displays thermodynamic properties in Fourier space. It is shown that a generalized temperature may be defined using the natural fluctuations of the systems, and that a suitable free energy accounts for the experimental results
Multinational Banks and the Global Financial Crisis. Weathering the Perfect Storm

We use data on the 48 largest multinational banking groups to compare the lending of their 199 foreign subsidiaries during the Great Recession with lending by a benchmark group of 202 domestic banks. Contrary to earlier, more contained crises, parent banks were not a significant source of strength to their subsidiaries during the 2008-09 crisis. As a result, multinational bank subsidiaries had to slow down credit growth about twice as fast as domestic banks. This was in particular the case for subsidiaries of banking groups that relied more on wholesale market funding. Domestic banks were better equipped to continue lending because of their greater use of deposits, a relatively stable funding source during the crisis. We conclude that while multinational banks may contribute to financial stability during local crisis episodes, they also increase the risk of ‘importing’ instability from abroad.
PI3 kinase/Akt/HIF-1α pathway is associated with hypoxia-induced epithelial–mesenchymal transition in fibroblast-like synoviocytes of rheumatoid arthritis

Migration and invasion of fibroblast-like synoviocytes (FLSs) are critical in the pathogenesis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Hypoxic conditions are present in RA joints, and hypoxia has been extensively studied in angiogenesis and inflammation. However, its effect on the migration and invasion of RA-FLSs remains unknown. In this study, we observed that RA-FLSs exposed to hypoxic conditions experienced epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT), with increased cell migration and invasion. We demonstrated that hypoxia-induced EMT was accompanied by increased hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)-1α expression and activation of Akt. After knockdown or inhibition of HIF-1α in hypoxia by small interfering RNA or genistein (Gen) treatment, the EMT transformation and invasion ability of FLSs were regained. HIF-1α could be blocked by phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K) inhibitor, LY294002, indicating that HIF-1α activation was regulated by the PI3K/Akt pathway. Administration of LY294002 (20 mg/kg, intra-peritoneally) twice weekly and Gen (25 mg/kg, by gavage) daily for 3 weeks from day 20 after primary immunization in a collagen-induced arthritis rat model, markedly alleviated the clinical signs, radiology progression, synovial hyperplasia, and inflammatory cells infiltration of joints. Thus, results of this study suggest that activation of the PI3K/Akt/HIF-1α pathway plays a pivotal role in mediating hypoxia-induced EMT transformation and invasion of RA-FLSs under hypoxia.
Effect of adjuvant chemotherapy with fluorouracil plus folinic acid or gemcitabine vs observation on survival in patients with resected periampullary adenocarcinoma: the ESPAC-3 periampullary cancer randomized trial.

CONTEXT
Patients with periampullary adenocarcinomas undergo the same resectional surgery as that of patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. Although adjuvant chemotherapy has been shown to have a survival benefit for pancreatic cancer, there have been no randomized trials for periampullary adenocarcinomas.


OBJECTIVE
To determine whether adjuvant chemotherapy (fluorouracil or gemcitabine) provides improved overall survival following resection.


DESIGN, SETTING, AND PATIENTS
The European Study Group for Pancreatic Cancer (ESPAC)-3 periampullary trial, an open-label, phase 3, randomized controlled trial (July 2000-May 2008) in 100 centers in Europe, Australia, Japan, and Canada. Of the 428 patients included in the primary analysis, 297 had ampullary, 96 had bile duct, and 35 had other cancers.


INTERVENTIONS
One hundred forty-four patients were assigned to the observation group, 143 patients to receive 20 mg/m2 of folinic acid via intravenous bolus injection followed by 425 mg/m2 of fluorouracil via intravenous bolus injection administered 1 to 5 days every 28 days, and 141 patients to receive 1000 mg/m2 of intravenous infusion of gemcitabine once a week for 3 of every 4 weeks for 6 months.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
The primary outcome measure was overall survival with chemotherapy vs no chemotherapy; secondary measures were chemotherapy type, toxic effects, progression-free survival, and quality of life.


RESULTS
Eighty-eight patients (61%) in the observation group, 83 (58%) in the fluorouracil plus folinic acid group, and 73 (52%) in the gemcitabine group died. In the observation group, the median survival was 35.2 months (95%% CI, 27.2-43.0 months) and was 43.1 (95%, CI, 34.0-56.0) in the 2 chemotherapy groups (hazard ratio, 0.86; (95% CI, 0.66-1.11; χ2 = 1.33; P = .25). After adjusting for independent prognostic variables of age, bile duct cancer, poor tumor differentiation, and positive lymph nodes and after conducting multiple regression analysis, the hazard ratio for chemotherapy compared with observation was 0.75 (95% CI, 0.57-0.98; Wald χ2 = 4.53, P = .03).


CONCLUSIONS
Among patients with resected periampullary adenocarcinoma, adjuvant chemotherapy, compared with observation, was not associated with a significant survival benefit in the primary analysis; however, multivariable analysis adjusting for prognostic variables demonstrated a statistically significant survival benefit associated with adjuvant chemotherapy.


TRIAL REGISTRATION
clinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT00058201.
Memory and communication support in dementia: research-based strategies for caregivers.

BACKGROUND
Difficulties with memory and communication are prominent and distressing features of dementia which impact on the person with dementia and contribute to caregiver stress and burden. There is a need to provide caregivers with strategies to support and maximize memory and communication abilities in people with dementia. In this project, a team of clinicians, researchers and educators in neuropsychology, psychogeriatrics, nursing and speech pathology translated research-based knowledge from these fields into a program of practical strategies for everyday use by family and professional caregivers.


METHODS
From the available research evidence, the project team identified compensatory or facilitative strategies to assist with common areas of difficulty, and structured these under the mnemonics RECAPS (for memory) and MESSAGE (for communication). This information was adapted for presentation in a DVD-based education program in accordance with known characteristics of effective caregiver education.


RESULTS
The resultant DVD comprises (1) information on the nature and importance of memory and communication in everyday life; (2) explanations of common patterns of difficulty and preserved ability in memory and communication across the stages of dementia; (3) acted vignettes demonstrating the strategies, based on authentic samples of speech in dementia; and (4) scenarios to prompt the viewer to consider the benefits of using the strategies.


CONCLUSION
Using a knowledge-translation framework, information and strategies can be provided to family and professional caregivers to help them optimize residual memory and communication in people with dementia. Future development of the materials, incorporating consumer feedback, will focus on methods for enabling wider dissemination.
Implicit feedback for inferring user preference: a bibliography

Relevance feedback has a history in information retrieval that dates back well over thirty years (c.f. [SL96]). Relevance feedback is typically used for query expansion during short-term modeling of a user’s immediate information need and for user profiling during long-term modeling of a user’s persistent interests and preferences. Traditional relevance feedback methods require that users explicitly give feedback by, for example, specifying keywords, selecting and marking documents, or answering questions about their interests. Such relevance feedback methods force users to engage in additional activities beyond their normal searching behavior. Since the cost to the user is high and the benefits are not always apparent, it can be difficult to collect the necessary data and the effectiveness of explicit techniques can be limited.
Effects of enalapril in systolic heart failure patients with and without chronic kidney disease: insights from the SOLVD Treatment trial.

BACKGROUND
Angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors improve outcomes in systolic heart failure (SHF). However, doubts linger about their effect in SHF patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD).


METHODS
In the Studies of Left Ventricular Dysfunction (SOLVD) Treatment trial, 2569 ambulatory chronic HF patients with left ventricular ejection fraction ≤ 35% and serum creatinine level ≤ 2.5mg/dl were randomized to receive either placebo (n=1284) or enalapril (n=1285). Of the 2502 patients with baseline serum creatinine data, 1036 had CKD (estimated glomerular filtration rate <60 ml/min/1.73 m(2)).


RESULTS
Overall, during 35 months of median follow-up, all-cause mortality occurred in 40% (502/1252) and 35% (440/1250) of placebo and enalapril patients, respectively (hazard ratio {HR}, 0.84; 95% confidence interval {CI}, 0.74-0.95; p=0.007). All-cause mortality occurred in 45% and 42% of patients with CKD (HR, 0.88; 95% CI, 0.73-1.06; p=0.164), and 36% and 31% of non-CKD patients (HR, 0.82; 95% CI, 0.69-0.98; p=0.028) in the placebo and enalapril groups, respectively (p for interaction=0.615). Enalapril reduced cardiovascular hospitalization in those with CKD (HR, 0.77; 95% CI, 0.66-0.90; p<0.001) and without CKD (HR, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.70-0.91; p<0.001). Among patients in the enalapril group, serum creatinine elevation was significantly higher in those without CKD (0.09 versus 0.04 mg/dl in CKD; p=0.003) during first year of follow-up, but there was no differences in changes in systolic blood pressure (mean drop, 7 mm Hg, both) and serum potassium (mean increase, 0. /L, both).


CONCLUSIONS
Enalapril reduces mortality and hospitalization in SHF patients without significant heterogeneity between those with and without CKD.
Interatomic distances in molecules of gaseous alkali metal halides

SummaryOne of the possible methods of comparative calculation was used for calculating interatomic distancesd in gaseous alkali halides. The average deviation of the calculated values ofd from experimental values was 0.0012 A (for 15 substances).
Image-Grounded Conversations: Multimodal Context for Natural Question and Response Generation

Visual Context Textual Context Oh my gosh, i’m so buying this shirt. I found a cawaii bird. Stocking up!! Only reason I come to carnival. Question Where did you see this for sale? Are you going to collect some feathers? Ayee! what the prices looking like? Oh my God. How the hell do you even eat that? Response Midwest sports There are so many crows here I’d be surprised if I never found one. Only like 10-20% off..I think I’m gonna wait a little longer. They are the greatest things ever chan. I could eat 5!
Neural Networks for Continuous Online Learning and Control

This paper proposes a new hybrid neural network (NN) model that employs a multistage online learning process to solve the distributed control problem with an infinite horizon. Various techniques such as reinforcement learning and evolutionary algorithm are used to design the multistage online learning process. For this paper, the infinite horizon distributed control problem is implemented in the form of real-time distributed traffic signal control for intersections in a large-scale traffic network. The hybrid neural network model is used to design each of the local traffic signal controllers at the respective intersections. As the state of the traffic network changes due to random fluctuation of traffic volumes, the NN-based local controllers will need to adapt to the changing dynamics in order to provide effective traffic signal control and to prevent the traffic network from becoming overcongested. Such a problem is especially challenging if the local controllers are used for an infinite horizon problem where online learning has to take place continuously once the controllers are implemented into the traffic network. A comprehensive simulation model of a section of the Central Business District (CBD) of Singapore has been developed using PARAMICS microscopic simulation program. As the complexity of the simulation increases, results show that the hybrid NN model provides significant improvement in traffic conditions when evaluated against an existing traffic signal control algorithm as well as a new, continuously updated simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation-based neural network (SPSA-NN). Using the hybrid NN model, the total mean delay of each vehicle has been reduced by 78% and the total mean stoppage time of each vehicle has been reduced by 84% compared to the existing traffic signal control algorithm. This shows the efficacy of the hybrid NN model in solving large-scale traffic signal control problem in a distributed manner. Also, it indicates the possibility of using the hybrid NN model for other applications that are similar in nature as the infinite horizon distributed control problem
Internal Nasal Valve Incompetence Is Effectively Treated Using Batten Graft Functional Rhinoplasty

Introduction. Internal nasal valve incompetence (INVI) has been treated with various surgical methods. Large, single surgeon case series are lacking, meaning that the evidence supporting a particular technique has been deficient. We present a case series using alar batten grafts to reconstruct the internal nasal valve, all performed by the senior author. Methods. Over a 7-year period, 107 patients with nasal obstruction caused by INVI underwent alar batten grafting. Preoperative assessment included the use of nasal strips to evaluate symptom improvement. Visual analogue scale (VAS) assessment of nasal blockage (NB) and quality of life (QOL) both pre- and postoperatively were performed and analysed with the Wilcoxon signed rank test. Results. Sixty-seven patients responded to both pre- and postoperative questionnaires. Ninety-one percent reported an improvement in NB and 88% an improvement in QOL. The greatest improvement was seen at 6 months (median VAS 15 mm and 88 mm resp., with a P value of <0.05 for both). Nasal strips were used preoperatively and are a useful tool in predicting patient operative success in both NB and QOL (odds ratio 2.15 and 2.58, resp.). Conclusions. Alar batten graft insertion as a single technique is a valid technique in treating INVI and produces good outcomes.
Effective Focused Crawling Based on Content and Link Structure Analysis

A focused crawler traverses the web selecting out relevant pages to a predefined topic and neglecting those out of concern. While surfing the internet it is difficult to deal with irrelevant pages and to predict which links lead to quality pages. In this paper, a technique of effective focused crawling is implemented to improve the quality of web navigation. To check the similarity of web pages w.r.t. topic keywords, a similarity function is used and the priorities of extracted out links are also calculated based on meta data and resultant pages generated from focused crawler. The proposed work also uses a method for traversing the irrelevant pages that met during crawling to improve the coverage of a specific topic. Keywords-focused crawler, metadata, weight table, World-Wide Web, Search Engine, links ranking.