LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
An ancient Chinese wisdom for metabolic engineering: Yin-Yang

In ancient Chinese philosophy, Yin-Yang describes two contrary forces that are interconnected and interdependent. This concept also holds true in microbial cell factories, where Yin represents energy metabolism in the form of ATP, and Yang represents carbon metabolism. Current biotechnology can effectively edit the microbial genome or introduce novel enzymes to redirect carbon fluxes. On the other hand, microbial metabolism loses significant free energy as heat when converting sugar into ATP; while maintenance energy expenditures further aggravate ATP shortage. The limitation of cell "powerhouse" prevents hosts from achieving high carbon yields and rates. Via an Escherichia coli flux balance analysis model, we further demonstrate the penalty of ATP cost on biofuel synthesis. To ensure cell powerhouse being sufficient in microbial cell factories, we propose five principles: 1. Take advantage of native pathways for product synthesis. 2. Pursue biosynthesis relying only on pathways or genetic parts without significant ATP burden. 3. Combine microbial production with chemical conversions (semi-biosynthesis) to reduce biosynthesis steps. 4. Create "minimal cells" or use non-model microbial hosts with higher energy fitness. 5. Develop a photosynthesis chassis that can utilize light energy and cheap carbon feedstocks. Meanwhile, metabolic flux analysis can be used to quantify both carbon and energy metabolisms. The fluxomics results are essential to evaluate the industrial potential of laboratory strains, avoiding false starts and dead ends during metabolic engineering.
Local clustering and threshold sensitive routing algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) is an excellent technology that can sense, measure, and gather information from the real world and, based on some local decision process transmit the sensed data to the user. These networks allow the physical environment to be measured at high resolutions, and greatly increase the quality and quantity of real-world data and information for applications like environment monitoring. The energy constraint of WSN makes energy conservation the most important goal of routing algorithms. LEACH (Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy) is a Proactive protocol and was proposed to organize a sensor network into a set of clusters so that energy consumption is evenly distributed among all sensor nodes. Despite the good performance of LEACH, it has the drawback that the TDMA scheduling assumes that nodes always have data to send. While another protocol TEEN(Threshold Sensitive Energy Efficient sensor Network) proposed for Reactive Networks sense the environment continuously, but transmit data only when a certain threshold is sensed. This protocol is suitable for time critical applications and also is energy efficient because transmission is done less frequently. But the disadvantage of TEEN is that if the thresholds are not reached, the nodes will never communicate, and the user will not get data from the network at all and will not come to know if all the nodes die. In this paper, a hybrid routing algorithm called LCTS(Local Clustering and Threshold Sensitive) is proposed, that takes the advantages of LEACH and TEEN and eliminates its drawbacks. LCTS makes use of symmetric propagation channels where Cluster Head (CH) advertisement heard with the largest signal strength is the cluster-head to whom minimum amount of transmitted energy is needed for communication. The Base Station (BS) selects the Cluster Heads based on location and then the clusters are formed by the Cluster Heads. The nodes communicate with the cluster head in TDMA and send their energy level even if the threshold is not reached and this ensures that the nodes are alive. The sensed data is compressed at the CH and sent to the Base Station.
Bilateral Horner's syndrome: detection and occurrence.

OBJECTIVE
To develop a method for the detection of bilateral Horner's syndrome in patients with bilateral interruption of the cervical sympathetic pathway or widespread autonomic neuropathy.


METHODS
Darkness pupil diameters and redilatation times during light reflexes have been recorded with infrared TV pupillometry in 65 healthy subjects, 47 patients with unilateral Horner's syndrome, and 20 patients with bilateral Horner's syndrome. The aetiologies of the last group were diabetic autonomic neuropathy (three cases), amyloidosis (four), pure autonomic failure (PAF) (four), dopamine-beta-hydroxylase deficiency (two), and one case each of hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy (HSAN) type III, carcinomatous sympathetic neuropathy, familial dysautonomia, multiple system atrophy, Anderson-Fabry disease, and anterior spinal artery thrombosis at C5,6 and one had had bilateral cervical sympathectomies.


RESULTS
Darkness diameters on the affected side were below normal in 12 patients with unilateral Horner's syndrome, the measurement yielding only 26% sensitivity for detection of the condition. By contrast, the time taken to reach three quarter recovery in the light reflex (T3/4) was abnormally prolonged (redilatation lag) in 33 of the same eyes. The measurement yielded 70% sensitivity and 95% specificity for detection of the condition. In 20 cases, diagnosed on clinical grounds as having bilateral Horner's syndrome of various aetiologies, pupil diameters were abnormally small on both sides in five and on one side in three patients. Fourteen of these patients had significant redilatation lag in both eyes, five patients in one eye, and one patient had it in neither eye. Measurement of redilatation lag was therefore a more sensitive diagnostic test than pupil diameter in both unilateral and bilateral Horner's syndrome.


CONCLUSIONS
Provided that the pupils are not tonic, bilateral Horner's syndrome can be diagnosed on the basis of redilatation lag. It occurs clinically in some generalised autonomic neuropathies and with interruption of the local sympathetic nerve supplies to the two eyes.
Obesity and the skin: skin physiology and skin manifestations of obesity.

UNLABELLED
Obesity is widely recognized as an epidemic in the Western world; however, the impact of obesity on the skin has received minimal attention. The purpose of this article is to highlight the association between obesity and dermatologic conditions. We review the impact of obesity on the skin, including skin physiology, skin manifestations of obesity, and dermatologic diseases aggravated by obesity. Obesity is responsible for changes in skin barrier function, sebaceous glands and sebum production, sweat glands, lymphatics, collagen structure and function, wound healing, microcirculation and macrocirculation, and subcutaneous fat. Moreover, obesity is implicated in a wide spectrum of dermatologic diseases, including acanthosis nigricans, acrochordons, keratosis pilaris, hyperandrogenism and hirsutism, striae distensae, adiposis dolorosa, and fat redistribution, lymphedema, chronic venous insufficiency, plantar hyperkeratosis, cellulitis, skin infections, hidradenitis suppurativa, psoriasis, insulin resistance syndrome, and tophaceous gout. We review the clinical features, evidence for association with obesity, and management of these various dermatoses and highlight the profound impact of obesity in clinical dermatology.


LEARNING OBJECTIVE
After completing this learning activity, participants should be aware of obesity-associated changes in skin physiology, skin manifestations of obesity, and dermatologic diseases aggravated by obesity, and be able to formulate a pathophysiology-based treatment strategy for obesity-associated dermatoses.
Predictors of asthma exacerbation among patients with poorly controlled asthma despite inhaled corticosteroid treatment.

BACKGROUND
Asthma exacerbations are associated with decreased quality of life and increased health care usage. Identification of characteristics that predict increased risk of future exacerbations in patients with suboptimal control of asthma could guide treatment decisions.


OBJECTIVE
To examine patient characteristics associated with risk of asthma exacerbations in patients with uncontrolled persistent asthma.


METHODS
A retrospective analysis of adults and children with inadequately controlled asthma despite asthma controller therapy and enrolled in 2 randomized trials was conducted. Baseline characteristics of subjects who experienced an asthma exacerbation during the treatment period were compared with those of subjects who did not experience an exacerbation.


RESULTS
Of 718 subjects (402 adults and 295 children), 108 adults (27%) and 110 children (37%) experienced an asthma exacerbation during the study period. Unscheduled health care visits for asthma or use of oral corticosteroids in the previous year were significantly associated with asthma exacerbation during the study period (P < .01). Adult subjects who experienced an exacerbation had significantly lower forced expiratory volume in 1 second compared with those who did not (2.3 vs 2.5 L, respectively, P = .02). Children who experienced an exacerbation had lower baseline pre- and post-bronchodilator ratios of forced expiratory volume in 1 second to forced vital capacity (77% vs 81%, P < .01; 82% vs 86%, P < .001, respectively). Symptom scores on validated questionnaires were significantly worse in adults but not in children who developed an exacerbation.


CONCLUSION
Spirometric measurements can help identify adults and children at increased risk for asthma exacerbation. Symptom scores could be helpful in identifying adults who are at high risk for exacerbations but could be less helpful in children.
The Adulteress's Child: Authorship and Desire in the Nineteenth-Century Novel

1. Introduction. 2. Recits. 3. Patrilinear Mothers. 4. Matrilinear Mothers. 5. Conclusion. Notes. Bibliography. Index.
Using data mining predictive models to classify credit card applicants

Credit scoring using predictive models can help in the process of assessing credit worthiness during the credit evaluation process. The objective of credit scoring models is to assign credit risk score to determine if a customer is likely to default on the financial obligation. Construction of credit scoring models requires data mining techniques. Using historical data on payments, demographic characteristics and statistical techniques, credit scoring models can help identify the important demographic characteristics related to credit risk and provide a score for each customer. This paper illustrates the construction and comparison of three credit scoring models: logistic regression (LR) model, classification and regression tree (CART) model and neural network (NN) model to discriminate between rejected and accepted credit card applicants of a bank. Results show that Neural Network model has a slightly higher validation predictive accuracy rate (LR = 74.56%, NN = 76.46%, CART = 73.66%).
Chips on Wafers

A set of rectangles S is said to be grid packed if there exists a rectangular grid (not necessarily regular) such that every rectangle lies in the grid and there is at most one rectangle of S in each cell. The area of a grid packing is the area of a minimal bounding box that contains all the rectangles in the grid packing. We present an approximation algorithm that given a set S of rectangles and a real constant ε > 0 produces a grid packing of S whose area is at most (1 + ε) times larger than an optimal packing in polynomial time. If ε is chosen large enough the running time of the algorithm will be linear. We also study several interesting variants, for example the smallest area grid packing containing at least k ≤ n rectangles, and given a region A grid pack as many rectangles as possible within A. Apart from the approximation algorithms we present several hardness results.
IX. Inclusion And Exclusion. The Difference In The Notion Of ‘National’ In The Framework Of Minority Rights Regimes

This chapter strives to enlighten one particular aspect, namely the notion of the term 'national' within the concept of minority rights and protection regimes. It overviews grasp some argumentative lines concerning the question if the rights granted in contemporary concepts of minority protection are purely individual or group rights and which areas the rights comprise. Secondly the duty question shall be elaborated, which mainly asks if the minority rights regime imposes a positive duty on the state to take action or if it merely demands non-intervention from the state. The chapter focuses on the introduction of the different minority rights systems and regimes. It is dedicated to elaborate the particular instruments and mechanisms within the scope of the Council of Europe and the OSCE with regard to minorities, analysing the connotation of the term national within the particular instruments. Keywords: Europe area; minority rights regime; National Minorities; OSCE
Factors influencing clients in the selection of offshore software outsourcing vendors: An exploratory study using a systematic literature review

Context: Offshore software development outsourcing is a modern business strategy for developing high quality software at low cost. Objective: The objective of this research paper is to identify and analyse factors that are important in terms of the competitiveness of vendor organisations in attracting outsourcing projects. Method: We performed a systematic literature review (SLR) by applying our customised search strings which were derived from our research questions. We performed all the SLR steps, such as the protocol development, initial selection, final selection, quality assessment, data extraction and data synthesis. Results: We have identified factors such as cost-saving, skilled human resource, appropriate infrastructure, quality of product and services, efficient outsourcing relationships management, and an organisation’s track record of successful projects which are generally considered important by the outsourcing clients. Our results indicate that appropriate infrastructure, cost-saving, and skilled human resource are common in three continents, namely Asia, North America and Europe. We identified appropriate infrastructure, cost-saving, and quality of products and services as being common in three types of organisations (small, medium and large). We have also identified four factors-appropriate infrastructure, cost-saving, quality of products and services, and skilled human resource as being common in the two decades (1990–1999 and 2000–mid 2008). Conclusions: Cost-saving should not be considered as the driving factor in the selection process of software development outsourcing vendors. Vendors should rather address other factors in order to compete in as sk the OSDO business, such and services.
FACTORS AFFECTING LOAN DELINQUENCY IN MICROFINANCE INSTITUTIONS IN KENYA

The main goal of every microfinance institution (MFI) is to operate profitably in order to maintain its stability and improve growth and sustainability. However, existence of high levels of loan delinquency problem in microfinance industry negatively affect the level of private investment and constrain the scope of microfinance institution credit to borrowers as MFIs have to compensate for loan delinquency losses. The success of individual MFIs in credit risk management is largely reflected in the proportion of delinquency’s loans to gross lending. External and internal economic environments are viewed as critical drivers of loan delinquency occurrence. In this regard, this empirical analysis investigates on external factors, MFIs and self help groups’ (SHGs) specific factors, to establish which of these factors significantly affects loan delinquency performance in MFIs in Kenya. The study used primary data. The study target population comprised 49 MFIs registered by Association of Microfinance Institutions of Kenya (AMFIK). A survey research design was used and a census of the 49 MFIs was taken. The data was collected through a self developed structured questionnaire and administered to MFIs loan officers for response. Multiple regression analysis was used to establish relationship between loan delinquency and microfinance institutions, self help groups and external factors in MFIs in Kenya. The estimated regression coefficients and tvalues were interpreted. The study found evidence that there exist a positive and significant (β= 9.937, t-value 5.016) relationship between loan delinquency and microfinance institutions specific factor. In addition self help groups specific factor was found positive and significantly (β= 6.090, tvalue 3.097) related to loan delinquency. Further external factor was found positive and significantly (β = 2.549, t-value 2.069) related to loan delinquency performance in microfinance institutions in Kenya. These results support Dinos & Ashta (2010) and Saloner (2007) findings. The study concludes that microfinance institutions and self help groups’ specific factors and external factors significantly affect loan delinquency performance among microfinance institutions in Kenya. The study recommends that MFIs portfolios management strategies focus more on the internal causes of delinquency which they have more control over and seek practical and achievable solutions to redress delinquency problems. JEL classification:G32 Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
Gut microbiota as a regulator of energy homeostasis and ectopic fat deposition: mechanisms and implications for metabolic disorders.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW
To examine the role of gut microbiota in the regulation of host energy homeostasis and its role in the pathogenesis of obesity, diabetes and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).


RECENT FINDINGS
Experimental models highlight several mechanisms connecting gut microbiota to host energy metabolism: increased energy harvesting from the diet, regulation of appetite through gut peptide, secretion, regulation of tissue-free fatty acid composition and uptake, storage and oxidation, modulation of intestinal barrier by glucagon-like peptide-2 secretion, activation of innate immunity and hepatic fibrogenesis through the lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-toll-like receptor-4 axis.Gut microbiota manipulation through antibiotics, prebiotics and probiotics yields encouraging results for the treatment of obesity, diabetes and NAFLD in animal models, but data in humans are currently scarce.


SUMMARY
Gut microbiota manipulation yielded encouraging results for the treatment of different metabolic disorders in experimental models. However, changing intestinal microbiota may be more difficult in free-living individuals compared to standardized laboratory models, and its long-term consequences are unknown. To safely and effectively change human gut microflora, future research should highlight the complex hormonal, immunomodulatory and metabolic mechanisms underlying microbiota-host interactions in different tissues and candidate treatments should be evaluated in well designed trials with patient-oriented end-points.
Epidemiology of scabies prevalence in the U.K. from general practice records.

BACKGROUND
Scabies is a contagious parasitic infestation which causes an allergic reaction to just a few mites.


OBJECTIVES
To examine the epidemiology of scabies consultations in the U.K. by age, sex, region of the country and time.


METHODS
Data were obtained from the THIN (The Health Information Network) database provided by EPIC U.K. in which each consultation episode is coded according to a 'READ' code. Data were available for 1997-2005 inclusive (9 years) for approximately 8·5% of the U.K. population from 12 regions of the U.K. We used harmonic analysis to model the data over time and derived cycle amplitudes and phases for each region in the U.K.


RESULTS
There was a significantly greater infestation rate among females with a relative risk of 1·24 (P < 0·001) relative to males. The age group 10-19 years had the highest infestation rates (with rates of 4·55 per 1000 and 5·92 per 1000 for males and females, respectively). The middle age groups had the smallest infestation rates. A cycle with length of between 15 and 17 years was derived, and the phase times of the cycles for each region suggested a progression of the disease originating from the North East, spreading to Northern parts of the U.K. and then to the Midlands and the South.


CONCLUSIONS
The study confirms earlier studies with regard to the age/sex distribution of scabies. We suggest a contagious pattern of spread of scabies infestation in the U.K. with an epidemic cycle length of 15-17 years.
Depression, stress and anxiety in medical students: A cross-sectional comparison between students from different semesters.

OBJECTIVE
To compare the prevalence of anxiety, depression, and stress in medical students from all semesters of a Brazilian medical school and assess their respective associated factors.


METHOD
A cross-sectional study of students from the twelve semesters of a Brazilian medical school was carried out. Students filled out a questionnaire including sociodemographics, religiosity (DUREL - Duke Religion Index), and mental health (DASS-21 - Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale). The students were compared for mental health variables (Chi-squared/ANOVA). Linear regression models were employed to assess factors associated with DASS-21 scores.


RESULTS
761 (75.4%) students answered the questionnaire; 34.6% reported depressive symptomatology, 37.2% showed anxiety symptoms, and 47.1% stress symptoms. Significant differences were found for: anxiety - ANOVA: [F = 2.536, p=0.004] between first and tenth (p=0.048) and first and eleventh (p=0.025) semesters; depression - ANOVA: [F = 2.410, p=0.006] between first and second semesters (p=0.045); and stress - ANOVA: [F = 2.968, p=0.001] between seventh and twelfth (p=0.044), tenth and twelfth (p=0.011), and eleventh and twelfth (p=0.001) semesters. The following factors were associated with (a) stress: female gender, anxiety, and depression; (b) depression: female gender, intrinsic religiosity, anxiety, and stress; and (c) anxiety: course semester, depression, and stress.


CONCLUSION
Our findings revealed high levels of depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms in medical students, with marked differences among course semesters. Gender and religiosity appeared to influence the mental health of the medical students.