LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Neuroprotective effect of lithium on hippocampal volumes in bipolar disorder independent of long-term treatment response.

BACKGROUND
Neuroimaging studies have demonstrated an association between lithium (Li) treatment and brain structure in human subjects. A crucial unresolved question is whether this association reflects direct neurochemical effects of Li or indirect effects secondary to treatment or prevention of episodes of bipolar disorder (BD).


METHOD
To address this knowledge gap, we compared manually traced hippocampal volumes in 37 BD patients with at least 2 years of Li treatment (Li group), 19 BD patients with <3 months of lifetime Li exposure over 2 years ago (non-Li group) and 50 healthy controls. All BD participants were followed prospectively and had at least 10 years of illness and a minimum of five episodes. We established illness course and long-term treatment response to Li using National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) life charts.


RESULTS
The non-Li group had smaller hippocampal volumes than the controls or the Li group (F 2,102 = 4.97, p = 0.009). However, the time spent in a mood episode on the current mood stabilizer was more than three times longer in the Li than in the non-Li group (t(51) = 2.00, p = 0.05). Even Li-treated patients with BD episodes while on Li had hippocampal volumes comparable to healthy controls and significantly larger than non-Li patients (t(43) = 2.62, corrected p = 0.02).


CONCLUSIONS
Our findings support the neuroprotective effects of Li. The association between Li treatment and hippocampal volume seems to be independent of long-term treatment response and occurred even in subjects with episodes of BD while on Li. Consequently, these effects of Li on brain structure may generalize to patients with neuropsychiatric illnesses other than BD.
Evaluating a new logMAR chart designed to improve visual acuity assessment in population-based surveys

AbstractAims This study aimed to evaluate a new chart designed to improve the collection of visual acuity data in population-based surveys. The Reduced logMAR E chart (RLME) employs three letters per line, ‘tumbling E’ optotypes, and conforms to accepted contemporary design principles.Methods The performance of the chart was assessed within a population-based glaucoma survey in Thailand. Performance indices were test–retest variability (TRV) and agreement with acuity data measured using the ETDRS logMAR chart which acted as the ‘gold standard’.ResultsThe 95% confidence limits for TRV of RLME acuity data were ±0.15 logMAR. This figure is consistent with published data on the TRV of acuities measured using five-letter-per-line logMAR charts. The mean difference between RLME and ETDRS acuity data was 0.00 logMAR (95% confidence intervals of ±0.05 logMAR) indicating that RLME acuities agreed well with those of the ETDRS chart. The chart and its method of use was readily accepted by the local ancillary staff who required only minimal training before acuity measurement could be delegated to them.Conclusions The study demonstrated that the RLME chart is capable of accurate and repeatable acuity measurements. Certain aspects of the design of the RLME chart may be particularly pertinent to the measurement of vision in population-based surveys.
The design of financial systems: An overview

I examine the multifaceted aspects of financial system design, focusing on the real effects of this design, My exploration of the key issues and my review of the related literature pertain to three dimensions of financial system design: (i) the permissible scope of activities for banks and other depository financial intermediaries, (ii) the regulations dictating the structure of the banking industry, and (iii) information disclosure requirements in the financial market. 1 address a diverse set of issues such as borrowers' choices of financing source and bow these are affected by financial system design, the impact of financial system design on the capital structure and corporate control decisions of nonfinancial firms, the relationship between financial system architecture and the liability claims of banks, the issues surrounding the desired permissible scope of banking and bank industry structure, and the overall design of a financial system. JEL class!fication: G I; G2; G32:G34
Current recommended 25-hydroxyvitamin D targets for chronic kidney disease management may be too low.

OBJECTIVE
It is uncertain whether increasing 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25-D) levels in chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients above those recommended by current guidelines result in progressive amelioration of secondary hyperparathyroidism. Our objective was to identify a potential therapeutic 25-D target which optimally lowers plasma parathyroid hormone (PTH) without producing excessive hypercalcemia or hyperphosphatemia in CKD.


METHODS
We performed a cross-sectional analysis of 14,289 unselected stage 1-5 CKD patients from US primary care and nephrology practices utilizing a laboratory-based CKD clinical decision support service between September 2008 and May 2012. Estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), plasma PTH, and serum 25-D, calcium, and phosphorus results were analyzed.


RESULTS
In CKD stages 3-5, progressively higher 25-D pentiles contained progressively lower mean PTH levels. Regression analysis of log PTH on 25-D was significant in all CKD stages with no evidence of a decreasing effect of 25-D to lower PTH until 25-D levels of 42-48 ng/ml. Progressively higher 25-D concentrations were not associated with increased rates of hypercalcemia or hyperphosphatemia.


CONCLUSIONS
We found evidence for an optimal level of 25-D above which suppression of PTH progressively diminishes. This level is more than twice that currently recommended for the general population. We found no association between these higher 25-D levels and hyperphosphatemia or hypercalcemia. Additional prospective trials seem appropriate to test the idea that 25-D levels around 40-50 ng/ml could be a safe and effective treatment target for secondary hyperparathyroidism in CKD.
Association of FKBP51 with Priming of Autophagy Pathways and Mediation of Antidepressant Treatment Response: Evidence in Cells, Mice, and Humans

BACKGROUND
FK506 binding protein 51 (FKBP51) is an Hsp90 co-chaperone and regulator of the glucocorticoid receptor, and consequently of stress physiology. Clinical studies suggest a genetic link between FKBP51 and antidepressant response in mood disorders; however, the underlying mechanisms remain elusive. The objective of this study was to elucidate the role of FKBP51 in the actions of antidepressants, with a particular focus on pathways of autophagy.


METHODS AND FINDINGS
Established cell lines, primary neural cells, human blood cells of healthy individuals and patients with depression, and mice were treated with antidepressants. Mice were tested for several neuroendocrine and behavioral parameters. Protein interactions and autophagic pathway activity were mainly evaluated by co-immunoprecipitation and Western blots. We first show that the effects of acute antidepressant treatment on behavior are abolished in FKBP51 knockout (51KO) mice. Autophagic markers, such as the autophagy initiator Beclin1, were increased following acute antidepressant treatment in brains from wild-type, but not 51KO, animals. FKBP51 binds to Beclin1, changes decisive protein interactions and phosphorylation of Beclin1, and triggers autophagic pathways. Antidepressants and FKBP51 exhibited synergistic effects on these pathways. Using chronic social defeat as a depression-relevant stress model in combination with chronic paroxetine (PAR) treatment revealed that the stress response, as well as the effects of antidepressants on behavior and autophagic markers, depends on FKBP51. In human blood cells of healthy individuals, FKBP51 levels correlated with the potential of antidepressants to induce autophagic pathways. Importantly, the clinical antidepressant response of patients with depression (n = 51) could be predicted by the antidepressant response of autophagic markers in patient-derived peripheral blood lymphocytes cultivated and treated ex vivo (Beclin1/amitriptyline: r = 0.572, p = 0.003; Beclin1/PAR: r = 0.569, p = 0.004; Beclin1/fluoxetine: r = 0.454, p = 0.026; pAkt/amitriptyline: r =  -0.416, p = 0.006; pAkt/PAR: r =  -0.355, p = 0.021; LC3B-II/PAR: r = 0.453, p = 0.02), as well as by the lymphocytic expression levels of FKBP51 (r = 0.631, p<0.0001), pAkt (r =  -0.515, p = 0.003), and Beclin1 (r = 0.521, p = 0.002) at admission. Limitations of the study include the use of male mice only and the relatively low number of patients for protein analyses.


CONCLUSIONS
To our knowledge, these findings provide the first evidence for the molecular mechanism of FKBP51 in priming autophagic pathways; this process is linked to the potency of at least some antidepressants. These newly discovered functions of FKBP51 also provide novel predictive markers for treatment outcome, consistent with physiological and potential clinical relevance. Please see later in the article for the Editors' Summary.
Access to lexical meaning in pitch-flattened Chinese sentences: An fMRI study

Chinese is a tonal language in which variation in pitch is used to distinguish word meanings. Thus, in order to understand a word, listeners have to extract the pitch patterns in addition to its phonemes. Can the correct word meaning still be accessed in sentence contexts if pitch patterns of words are altered? If so, how is this accomplished? The present study attempts to address such questions with event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Native speakers of Mandarin Chinese listened to normal and pitch-flattened (monotone) speech inside the scanner. The behavioral results indicated that they rated monotone sentences as intelligible as normal sentences, and performed equally well in a dictation test on the two types of sentences. The fMRI results showed that both types of sentences elicited similar activation in the left insular, middle and inferior temporal gyri, but the monotone sentences elicited greater activation in the left planum temporale (PT) compared with normal sentences. These results demonstrate that lexical meaning can still be accessed in pitch-flattened Chinese sentences, and that this process is realized by automatic recovery of the phonological representations of lexical tones from the altered tonal patterns. Our findings suggest that the details of spoken pitch patterns are not essential for adequate lexical-semantic processing during sentence comprehension even in tonal languages like Mandarin Chinese, given that listeners can automatically use additional neural and cognitive resources to recover distorted tonal patterns in sentences.
Review: Information Technology and Organizational Performance: An Integrative Model of IT Business Value

IBM Corporation. We thank seminar participants at UC Irvine and Boston College for their thoughtful insights and suggestions pertaining to early versions of this paper. We appreciate the guidance and patience of Jane Webster and Rick Watson, the critical remarks of three anonymous reviewers, and the many who generously gave of their time to comment on drafts of the manuscript, including
Data mining techniques - for marketing, sales, and customer support

When there are many people who don't need to expect something more than the benefits to take, we will suggest you to have willing to reach all benefits. Be sure and surely do to take this data mining techniques for marketing sales and customer support that gives the best reasons to read. When you really need to get the reason why, this data mining techniques for marketing sales and customer support book will probably make you feel curious.
Advancing the field of 3 D biomaterial printing

3D biomaterial printing has emerged as a potentially revolutionary technology, promising to transform both research and medical therapeutics. Although there has been recent progress in the field, on-demand fabrication of functional and transplantable tissues and organs is still a distant reality. To advance to this point, there are two major technical challenges that must be overcome. The first is expanding upon the limited variety of available 3D printable biomaterials (biomaterial inks), which currently do not adequately represent the physical, chemical, and biological complexity and diversity of tissues and organs within the human body. Newly developed biomaterial inks and the resulting 3D printed constructs must meet numerous interdependent requirements, including those that lead to optimal printing, structural, and biological outcomes. The second challenge is developing and implementing comprehensive biomaterial ink and printed structure characterization combined with in vitro and in vivo tissueand organ-specific evaluation. This perspective outlines considerations for addressing these technical hurdles that, once overcome, will facilitate rapid advancement of 3D biomaterial printing as an indispensable tool for both investigating complex tissue and organ morphogenesis and for developing functional devices for a variety of diagnostic and regenerative medicine applications. PAPER 5 Contributed equally to this work. REcEivEd
Scholarly communication trends in the digital age: Informal scholarly publishing and dissemination, a grounded theory approach

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate scholars’ attitudes toward informal publishing and dissemination to provide a view of the challenges and advantages of using such channels. Although considerable research has been carried out in relation to peer-reviewed scholarly publishing, relatively few studies have investigated the adoption of informal scholarly communication platforms in the scholarly publishing process. Design/methodology/approach – The paper deployed a grounded theory approach using semi-structured interviews as a qualitative research tool. A theoretical sample of 40 researchers in 4 universities were interviewed to gather data regarding informal publishing, platforms, factors that affect the researchers’ decision and the use of informal channels in dissemination. Findings – Results of the interviews suggest that there is an increasing trend among researchers toward informal publishing and dissemination throughout the scholarly communication cycle. The paper shows that there are three types of scholars who are involved in the scholarly communication process: conventional, modern and liberal scholars. Each of these scholars carries different beliefs regarding the scholarly communication process. Research limitations/implications – This paper was conducted on a relatively small sample of academic researchers, and therefore, the results cannot be easily generalized into a wider community of scholars. Originality/value – The paper provides insight into informal scholarly publishing practices using a grounded theory approach. This approach helped to capture the changes in both scholarly publishing practices and the adoption of informal techniques among the scholarly community.
Conhecimento e atitudes: componentes para a educação em diabetes

Estudo transversal, realizado em um centro de pesquisa e extensão universitária brasileiro, no período de março a novembro de 2007. O objetivo foi verificar conhecimentos e atitudes de pessoas com diabetes mellitus que participavam de um programa de educação para o autocuidado em diabetes. Como método usouse amostra constituída por 82 adultos com diabetes mellitus. Para coleta de dados foram utilizadas versões portuguesas dos questionários Diabetes Knowledge Questionnaire (DKN-A) e Diabetes Attitude Questionnaire (ATT-19). Os resultados mostraram que 78,05% tiveram escores superiores a 8 em relação ao conhecimento em diabetes, indicando conhecimento e compreensão acerca da doença. Quanto à atitude, os escores variaram entre 25 e 71 pontos, sugerindo dificuldade no enfrentamento da doença. Conclui-se que, apesar de os participantes terem obtido bom escore para o conhecimento, ainda assim não modificaram a atitude para o enfrentamento mais adequado da doença.
Factors influencing physicians' detection of cancer patients' and relatives' distress: can a communication skills training program improve physicians' detection?

PURPOSE
This study aimed to assess the impact on physicians' detection of patients' and relatives' distress of six 3-h consolidation workshops (CW) following a 2.5-day communication skills basic training (BT) program and to investigate factors associated with detection of distress.


METHODS
Physicians, after BT, were randomized to CW or to a waiting list. Physicians' detection of patients' and relatives' distress was measured through differences between physicians' ratings of patients' and relatives' distress (VAS) and patients' and relatives' self-reported distress (HADS). Communication skills were analysed according to the CRCWEM.


RESULTS
Mixed-effects modelling of physicians' detection of patients' distress showed a positive group by time effect in favour of physicians in the CW group. Detection of patients' distress was associated negatively with patients' distress, positively with physicians' concurrent use of psychological assessment and supportive skills, and negatively with general assessment skills. Mixed-effects modelling of physicians' detection of relatives' distress showed no significant group by time effect. Detection of relatives' distress was associated negatively with relatives' distress and with general assessment skills.


CONCLUSION
CW following a 2.5-day BT are needed to improve physicians' detection of patients' distress in three-person interviews. Results indicate the need to further improve physicians' detection of relatives' distress.
Ant colony optimization for finding the global minimum

The ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithms are multi-agent systems in which the behaviour of each ant is inspired by the foraging behaviour of real ants to solve optimization problem. This paper presents the ACO based algorithm to find global minimum. Algorithm is based on that each ant searches only around the best solution of the previous iteration. This algorithm was experimented on test problems, and successful results were obtained. The algorithm was compared with other methods which had been experimented on the same test problems, and observed to be better. 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Scientists’ transition to academic entrepreneurship: Economic and psychological determinants

This study investigated academic scientists’ transition to entrepreneurship by studying their academic entrepreneurial intentions (to found a business in order to market their research knowledge) and actual founding behavior. We developed and tested a conceptual model integrating both economic and psychological perspectives. Applying the theory of planned behavior, we examined the economic factors (scientists’ human capital, social capital, expected entrepreneurial benefits) as distal predictors (background factors) of academic entrepreneurial intentions. The psychological factors (entrepreneurial attitudes, norms, control perceptions) were examined as proximal intention predictors. Findings were derived from a path analysis utilizing archival and survey data on German scientists (N = 496). We found that attitudes and perceived control predicted entrepreneurial intentions. Social norms in turn had no effect. As regards the economic factors, human and social capital exhibited indirect effects on intentions via entrepreneurial attitudes and control perceptions, while additional direct effects of both capitals showed up significantly as well. Expected benefits from engaging in academic entrepreneurship (i.e., expected financial and reputational gain) only showed indirect effects on intentions via attitudes and perceived control. In addition, longitudinal results indicated that entrepreneurial intentions indeed forecasted entrepreneurial behavior, while certain barriers have a diminishing influence on this relationship. Our results are discussed with an emphasis on the long-neglected importance of the interplay of economic and psychological determinants for scientists’ transition to academic entrepreneurship.
Renewable energy transmission through multiple routes in a mobile electrical grid

Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) technology utilizes the stored energy in electric vehicle batteries to contribute electricity back to the grid. The energy in batteries can move with electric vehicles (EVs). Combining V2G and the mobility of vehicles, EVs can provide a natural energy transmission architecture called mobile electrical grid. The main idea of this paper focuses on multiple energy transmission route in mobile electrical grid from solar energy sources to places as capacity of every energy route is limited. The features of energy route in mobile electrical grid are analyzed and a minimum cost flow algorithm is presented. Simulations using real-world transporting data in Manhattan. Simulations show that this method is efficient.
A randomized trial of preexercise stretching for prevention of lower-limb injury.

PURPOSE
This study investigated the effect of muscle stretching during warm-up on the risk of exercise-related injury.


METHODS
1538 male army recruits were randomly allocated to stretch or control groups. During the ensuing 12 wk of training, both groups performed active warm-up exercises before physical training sessions. In addition, the stretch group performed one 20-s static stretch under supervision for each of six major leg muscle groups during every warm-up. The control group did not stretch.


RESULTS
333 lower-limb injuries were recorded during the training period, including 214 soft-tissue injuries. There were 158 injuries in the stretch group and 175 in the control group. There was no significant effect of preexercise stretching on all-injuries risk (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.95, 95% CI 0.77-1.18), soft-tissue injury risk (HR = 0.83, 95% CI 0.63-1.09), or bone injury risk (HR = 1.22, 95% CI 0.86-1.76). Fitness (20-m progressive shuttle run test score), age, and enlistment date all significantly predicted injury risk (P < 0.01 for each), but height, weight, and body mass index did not.


CONCLUSION
A typical muscle stretching protocol performed during preexercise warm-ups does not produce clinically meaningful reductions in risk of exercise-related injury in army recruits. Fitness may be an important, modifiable risk factor.
Cold snare polypectomy versus cold forceps polypectomy for diminutive and small colorectal polyps: a randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND
The optimal technique for removal of diminutive or small colorectal polyps is debatable.


OBJECTIVE
To compare the complete resection rates of cold snare polypectomy (CSP) and cold forceps polypectomy (CFP) for the removal of adenomatous polyps ≤7 mm.


DESIGN
Prospective randomized controlled study.


SETTING
A university hospital.


PATIENTS
A total of 139 patients who were found to have ≥1 colorectal adenomatous polyps ≤7 mm.


INTERVENTIONS
Polyps were randomized to be treated with either CSP or CFP. After the initial polypectomy, additional EMR was performed at the polypectomy site to assess the presence of residual polyp tissue.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASUREMENTS
Absence of residual polyp tissue in the EMR specimen of the polypectomy site was defined as complete resection.


RESULTS
Among a total of 145 polyps, 128 (88.3%) were adenomatous polyps. The overall complete resection rate for adenomatous polyps was significantly higher in the CSP group compared with the CFP group (57/59, 96.6% vs 57/69, 82.6%; P = .011). Although the complete resection rates for adenomatous polyps ≤4 mm were not different (27/27, 100% vs 31/32, 96.9%; P = 1.000), the complete resection rates for adenomatous polyps sized 5 to 7 mm was significantly higher in the CSP group compared with the CFP group (30/32, 93.8% vs 26/37, 70.3%; P = .013).


LIMITATIONS
Single-center study.


CONCLUSION
CSP is recommended for the complete resection of colorectal adenomatous polyps ≤7 mm. (


CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER
NCT01665898.).