Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
SEASONAL VARIATION OF P CONTENT AND MAJOR N POOLS IN PALMARIA PALMATA (RHODOPHYTA) 1

The annual variation of major nitrogen pools, phosphorus, carbon, ash, and thallus water content in relation to seasonal environmental changes was studied in two northern Spanish populations of the edible seaweed Palmaria palmata (Linnaeus) Kuntze. Observed patterns were investigated using Spearman rank order correlation coefficients. There were significant relationships between thallus nutrient content and nitrate and orthophosphate seawater concentration, irradiance, temperature, and wave force. The highest levels of total N and P and nitrogenous compounds were observed during autumn and winter because the thallus stored N‐ and P‐rich compounds in response to high nutrient seawater concentration when growth was limited by low light and temperature. Phycoerythrin and other proteins were the main N reserves. Thallus P content was higher in algae from the eutrophic site. During spring, reduced N and P thallus content and increased ash, water, and C content were observed in the growing fronds. N and P seawater concentrations were undetectable during summer when nutrient reserves were low and growth was reduced and eventually suppressed, suggesting nutrient limiting conditions. Palmaria palmata clearly could take advantage of elevated N and P concentrations to create storage reserves in winter to support early summer growth. This storage response reduced the dependence of algal nutrition on the external nutrient supply and supports the use of pulse fertilization to diminish summer nutrient limitation of cultured algae.
Effects of Carbohydrate Counting Method on Metabolic Control in Children with Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus

Objective: Medical nutritional therapy is important for glycemic control in children and adolescents with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM). Carbohydrate (carb) counting, which is a more flexible nutritional method, has become popular in recent years. This study aimed to investigate the effects of carb counting on metabolic control, body measurements and serum lipid levels in children and adolescents with T1DM. Methods: T1DM patients aged 7-18 years and receiving flexible insulin therapy were divided into carb counting (n=52) and control (n=32) groups and were followed for 2 years in this randomized, controlled study. Demographic characteristics, body measurements, insulin requirements, hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) and serum lipid levels at baseline and at follow-up were evaluated. Results: There were no statistically significant differences between the groups in mean HbA1c values in the year preceding the study or in age, gender, duration of diabetes, puberty stage, total daily insulin dose, body mass index (BMI) standard deviation score (SDS) and serum lipid values. While there were no differences in BMI SDS, daily insulin requirement, total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein and triglyceride values between the two groups (p>0.05) during the follow-up, annual mean HbA1c levels of the 2nd year were significantly lower in the carb counting group (p=0.010). The mean values of high-density lipoprotein were also significantly higher in the first and 2nd years in the carb counting group (p=0.02 and p=0.043, respectively). Conclusion: Carb counting may provide good metabolic control in children and adolescents with T1DM without causing any increase in weight or in insulin requirements.
Tissue‐specific mutant frequencies and mutational spectra in cyclophosphamide‐treated lacI transgenic mice

The induction and nature of mutations in the lacI transgene were evaluated in multiple tissues after exposure of adult male B6C3F1 lacI transgenic mice to cyclophosphamide (CP). Mice were given a single i.p. injection of 25 mg CP/kg, 100 mg CP/kg, or vehicle (PBS) and then necropsied 6 weeks after treatment to allow DNA extraction and lacI mutant recovery. Tissues evaluated included target tissues for tumorigenesis (lung, urinary bladder) and sites not susceptible to tumor formation in B6C3F1 mice (kidney, bone marrow, splenic T‐lymphocytes). After exposure to the high dose of CP, a significant increase in the mutant frequency (Mf) was detected in the lungs and urinary bladders, compared to the respective tissues from vehicle‐treated controls. In contrast, the Mfs in kidney, bone marrow, and splenic T cells from CP‐treated mice were not significantly different from controls. The spectra of mutations in lacI from lung and urinary bladder were significantly changed after high‐dose CP treatment, with a significant increase in the frequency of A · T → T · A transversions found in both tissues and a significantly elevated frequency of deletions in the lungs. Conversely, in vehicle‐treated mice, the two predominant classes of lacI mutations recovered in lung and urinary bladder were G · C → A · T transitions at CpG sites and G · C → T · A transversions. These CP exposures were also genotoxic as measured by the significant induction of micronuclei in peripheral blood 48 hr after exposure. These data indicate that under these study conditions, CP‐induced mutations are detectable in the lacI transgene in the target tissues, but not in nontarget tissues for CP‐induced cancer. With the lacI assay it is possible to study mutagenicity in a variety of critical tissues to provide mechanistic information related to genotoxicity and carcinogenicity in vivo. Environ. Mol. Mutagen. 34:154–166, 1999 © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Disruption of a recombinant yeast for the release of beta-galactosidase.

A recombinant yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, expressing Escherichia coli beta-galactosidase gene under the control of CYC1 constitutive promoter of the yeast, was disrupted in a continuous flow, high speed, bead mill for the release of intracellular beta-galactosidase (EC 3.2.1.23). Release of the beta-galactosidase activity was characterized with respect to glass bead loading in the grinding chamber (70-85% of chamber volume), diameter of the beads (0.25-0.75 mm), number of passes of the cell slurry through the mill (0-6 passes), flow rate of the slurry (25-250 mL.min-1), cell concentration in the slurry (5-20 gDW.L-1), the agitation rotor speed (1000-4000 rpm) and the pH of the slurry (pH 5-10). The optimal conditions for the release of the enzyme were pH 6.0-9.0, 85% loading of 0.5 mm diameter beads and an agitation speed of 2000 rpm. The enzyme release followed first-order kinetics. For otherwise fixed conditions, the extent of cell disruption increase with increasing bead load, number of passes and agitation rotor speed. Cell concentration did not affect disruption. The release of beta-galactosidase activity declined with increasing flow rate of the cell slurry through the mill, but the disruption rate constant increased with flow rate. Under optimal condition, three passes through the grinding chamber were sufficient to release all of the enzyme. In comparison with disruption in the bead mill, chloroform-sodium dodecyl sulfate induced lysis of cells was ineffective in releasing the enzyme quantitatively.
Dietary Patterns and Depressive Symptoms over Time: Examining the Relationships with Socioeconomic Position, Health Behaviours and Cardiovascular Risk

Introduction Recent research suggests that diet quality influences depression risk; however, a lack of experimental evidence leaves open the possibility that residual confounding explains the observed relationships. The aim of this study was to document the cross-sectional and longitudinal associations between dietary patterns and symptoms of depression and to undertake a detailed examination of potential explanatory factors, particularly socioeconomic circumstances, in the diet-depression relationship. Methods Data were drawn from the Personality and Total Health (PATH) Through Life Study, a longitudinal community study following three age cohorts (20+; 40+; 60+yrs) from south-eastern Australia over three assessment periods (n = 3663). Regression analyses evaluated the cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships between dietary patterns, depressive symptoms, age, detailed measures of socioeconomic circumstances, other health behaviours, and cardiovascular risk factors. Results The lowest tertile of prudent (healthy) dietary pattern and the highest tertile of western (unhealthy) dietary pattern were associated with an increased likelihood of depressive symptoms. However, these contemporaneous associations were explained by adjustment for detailed measures of socioeconomic circumstances and physical activity. In prospective analyses, lower scores on the healthy dietary pattern and higher scores on the unhealthy dietary pattern independently predicted increased depressive symptoms across time, before and after adjustment for potential confounders and baseline depressive symptoms, but only for those in the oldest cohort. Dietary patterns did not explain the relationship between socioeconomic position and depressive symptoms. Conclusion The results of this study confirm that the relationship between habitual dietary intake and depressive symptoms is somewhat explained by socioeconomic circumstances and other health behaviours, but suggest that long term exposure to unhealthy dietary habits independently predisposes to depression over the lifecourse.
The social brain meets the reactive genome: neuroscience, epigenetics and the new social biology

The rise of molecular epigenetics over the last few years promises to bring the discourse about the sociality and susceptibility to environmental influences of the brain to an entirely new level. Epigenetics deals with molecular mechanisms such as gene expression, which may embed in the organism “memories” of social experiences and environmental exposures. These changes in gene expression may be transmitted across generations without changes in the DNA sequence. Epigenetics is the most advanced example of the new postgenomic and context-dependent view of the gene that is making its way into contemporary biology. In my article I will use the current emergence of epigenetics and its link with neuroscience research as an example of the new, and in a way unprecedented, sociality of contemporary biology. After a review of the most important developments of epigenetic research, and some of its links with neuroscience, in the second part I reflect on the novel challenges that epigenetics presents for the social sciences for a re-conceptualization of the link between the biological and the social in a postgenomic age. Although epigenetics remains a contested, hyped, and often uncritical terrain, I claim that especially when conceptualized in broader non-genecentric frameworks, it has a genuine potential to reformulate the ossified biology/society debate.
Constraints on ``rare'' dyon decays

We obtain the complete set of constraints on the moduli of = 4 superstring compactifications that permit ``rare'' marginal decays of ¼-BPS dyons to take place. The constraints are analysed in some special cases. The analysis extends in a straightforward way to multi-particle decays. We discuss the possible relation between general multi-particle decays and multi-centred black holes.
Post-acute surgical ward round proforma improves documentation

Abstract In health care, record keeping of doctor-patient encounters is vital for quality patient care and medico-legal reasons. We audited the documentation of post-acute consultant ward round (PACWR) in our department before and six months after an introduction of a proforma (standard form). The clinical notes of all patients admitted acutely under General Surgery over a period of one week before and one week after the introduction of a proforma were reviewed to note whether time and date, signature, impression and dietary plan were documented after PACWR. The nurses were also surveyed on the day of the PACWR for their certainty regarding the dietary plan of their patients and whether they had to contact the surgical team for clarification. There were 108 and 103 patients eligible for the first and second study periods respectively. After the introduction of the proforma, there was a statistically significant improvement in the documentation of time and date (37% vs. 72%, p-value <0.01) and impression (40% vs. 61%, p-value <0.01). Improvement in the documentation of the dietary plan reached statistical significant only when the analysis was restricted to the cases where a proforma was filled out (78 out of 103 patients). Introduction of the proforma had no statistically significant impact on the nurses' certainty regarding their patients' dietary plan and the number of times they had to contact the surgical teams. In conclusion, PACWR proforma improves overall documentation. This will help in avoiding adverse effects on patient care and medico-legal ramifications.
Pt monolayer coating on complex network substrate with high catalytic activity for the hydrogen evolution reaction

A deposition process has been developed to fabricate a complete-monolayer Pt coating on a large-surface-area three-dimensional (3D) Ni foam substrate using a buffer layer (Ag or Au) strategy. The quartz crystal microbalance, current density analysis, cyclic voltammetry integration, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy results show that the monolayer deposition process accomplishes full coverage on the substrate and the deposition can be controlled to a single atomic layer thickness. To our knowledge, this is the first report on a complete-monolayer Pt coating on a 3D bulk substrate with complex fine structures; all prior literature reported on submonolayer or incomplete-monolayer coating. A thin underlayer of Ag or Au is found to be necessary to cover a very reactive Ni substrate to ensure complete-monolayer Pt coverage; otherwise, only an incomplete monolayer is formed. Moreover, the Pt monolayer is found to work as well as a thick Pt film for catalytic reactions. This development may pave a way to fabricating a high-activity Pt catalyst with minimal Pt usage.
Data.dcs: Converting Legacy Data into Linked Data

Data.dcs is a project intended to produce Linked Data describing the University of Sheffield’s Department of Computer Science. At present the department’s web site contains important legacy data describing people, publications and research groups. This data is distributed and is provided in heterogeneous formats (e.g. HTML documents, RSS feeds), making it hard for machines to make sense of such data and query it. This paper presents an approach to convert such legacy data from its current form into a machine-readable representation which is linked into theWeb of Linked Data. The approach describes the triplification of legacy data, coreference resolution and interlinking with external linked datasets.
Prothrombotic State in Patients With a Left Atrial Appendage Thrombus of Unknown Origin and Cerebrovascular Events

Background and Purpose— We hypothesized that formation of left atrial appendage (LAA) thrombi of unknown origin is associated with altered fibrin clot properties and blood hypercoagulability. Methods— In a case–control study, we investigated 32 patients with a history of LAA thrombus after successful anticoagulant treatment versus 32 control subjects matched for age, sex, and diabetes mellitus. All subjects had previous ischemic stroke, transient ischemic attack, or migraine associated with patent foramen ovale. Patients with documented atrial fibrillation were excluded. We determined plasma fibrin clot permeability, fibrinolytic efficiency, thrombin generation, platelet and endothelial markers. Stroke or transient ischemic attack were assessed during a median follow-up of 74 (range 19–98) months. Results— Compared with controls, patients with LAA thrombus more frequently were smokers (43.8% versus 18.8%) and had 20% prolonged clot lysis time, lower plasminogen (−14%), and higher plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (+17%), thrombin–antithrombin complexes (+17%), CD40 ligand (+30%), P-selectin (+29%), and von Willebrand factor (+30%, all P<0.05). Occurrence of LAA thrombus was predicted by von Willebrand factor (&bgr;=0.038, P=0.004), plasminogen (&bgr;=−0.048, P=0.01), plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (&bgr;=−0.161, P=0.03), and clot permeability (&bgr;=−1.076, P=0.03). During follow-up, cerebrovascular events occurred in 10 (33.33%) of the 30 available patients in the LAA thrombus group, including 7 (23.3%) with recurrent LAA thrombus and 4 (13.33%) with documented atrial fibrillation. Recurrent LAA thrombus was associated with lower baseline Ks and higher thrombin generation, fibrinogen, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1, and soluble CD40 ligand (all P<0.05). Conclusions— Prothrombotic blood alterations could be involved in the LAA thrombus formation in patients without documented atrial fibrillation and are associated with increased risk of stroke or transient ischemic attack during follow-up.
A Novel Configuration for Both Mulitwavelength Mode-locking and Optical Clock Division

Sextuple-wavelength mode-locking at 10 GHz and stable 2<sup>nd</sup>, 3<sup>rd</sup> and 4<sup>th</sup> clock divisions are realized exploiting the same configuration by incorporating dispersion compensation fiber with injected mode-locked fiber ring laser.
Closed-form stereo image rectification

Stereo image rectification transforms a pair of images into a new pair such that the epipolar lines in the transformed images have the same direction as the image rows and matching epipolar lines in different images have the same row index to enable an efficient and reliable dense stereo matching. In this paper we propose a first closed-form algorithm to automatically rectify stereo images just using the fundamental matrix. The algorithm involves only direct and purely geometric transformation processes. There is no iterative or optimization processes for the rectification parameter estimation in our method. Real images have been used for testing purposes, and convincing results have been obtained from our algorithm. Comparison with the state-of-the-art method shows that our method produces better rectification results.
EPIC–Oxford:lifestyle characteristics and nutrient intakes in a cohort of 33 883 meat-eaters and 31 546 non meat-eaters in the UK

Abstract Objective: To describe the lifestyle characteristics and nutrient intakes of the Oxford cohort of the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC). Design: Cohort of men and women recruited through general practices or by post to include a high proportion of non meat-eaters. Dietary, anthropometric and lifestyle data were collected at baseline and four diet groups were defined. Setting: United Kingdom. Participants: In total, 65 429 men and women aged 20 to 97 years, comprising 33 883 meat-eaters, 10 110 fish-eaters, 18 840 lacto-ovo vegetarians and 2596 vegans. Results: Nutrient intakes and lifestyle factors differed across the diet groups, with striking differences between meat-eaters and vegans, and fish-eaters and vegetarians usually having intermediate values. Mean fat intake in each diet group was below the UK dietary reference value of 33% of total energy intake. The mean intake of saturated fatty acids in vegans was approximately 5% of energy, less than half the mean intake among meat-eaters (10–11%). Vegans had the highest intakes of fibre, vitamin B1, folate, vitamin C, vitamin E, magnesium and iron, and the lowest intakes of retinol, vitamin B12, vitamin D, calcium and zinc. Conclusions: The EPIC–Oxford cohort includes 31 546 non meat-eaters and is one of the largest studies of vegetarians in the world. The average nutrient intakes in the whole cohort are close to those currently recommended for good health. Comparisons of the diet groups show wide ranges in the intakes of major nutrients such as saturated fat and dietary fibre. Such variation should increase the ability of the study to detect associations of diet with major cancers and causes of death.
Forecasting responses of seagrass distributions to changing water quality using monitoring data

Extensive data sets on water quality and seagrass distributions in Florida Bay have been assembled under complementary, but independent, monitoring programs. This paper presents the landscape-scale results from these monitoring programs and outlines a method for exploring the relationships between two such data sets. Seagrass species occurrence and abundance data were used to define eight benthic habitat classes from 677 sampling locations in Florida Bay. Water quality data from 28 monitoring stations spread across the Bay were used to construct a discriminant function model that assigned a prob- ability of a given benthic habitat class occurring for a given combination of water quality variables. Mean salinity, salinity variability, the amount of light reaching the benthos, sediment depth, and mean nutrient concentrations were important predictor variables in the discriminant function model. Using a cross-validated classification scheme, this discrimi- nant function identified the most likely benthic habitat type as the actual habitat type in most cases. The model predicted that the distribution of benthic habitat types in Florida Bay would likely change if water quality and water delivery were changed by human engineering of freshwater discharge from the Everglades. Specifically, an increase in the seasonal delivery of freshwater to Florida Bay should cause an expansion of seagrass beds dominated by Ruppia maritima and Halodule wrightii at the expense of the Thalassia testudinum-dominated community that now occurs in northeast Florida Bay. These statistical techniques should prove useful for predicting landscape-scale changes in community com- position in diverse systems where communities are in quasi-equilibrium with environmental drivers.
Substantial regional differences in human herpesvirus 8 seroprevalence in sub‐Saharan Africa: Insights on the origin of the “Kaposi's sarcoma belt”

Equatorial Africa has among the highest incidences of Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) in the world, thus earning the name “KS Belt. ” This was the case even before the HIV epidemic. To date, there is no clear evidence that HHV‐8 seroprevalence is higher in this region but interpretation of the available literature is tempered by differences in serologic assays used across studies. We examined representatively sampled ambulatory adults in Uganda, which is in the “KS Belt,” and in Zimbabwe and South Africa which are outside the Belt, for HHV‐8 antibodies. All serologic assays were uniformly performed in the same reference laboratory by the same personnel. In the base‐case serologic algorithm, seropositivity was defined by reactivity in an immunofluorescence assay or in 2 enzyme immunoassays. A total of 2,375 participants were examined. In Uganda, HHV‐8 seroprevalence was high early in adulthood (35.5% by age 21) without significant change thereafter. In contrast, HHV‐8 seroprevalence early in adulthood was lower in Zimbabwe and South Africa (13.7 and 10.8%, respectively) but increased with age. After age adjustment, Ugandans had 3.24‐fold greater odds of being HHV‐8 infected than South Africans (p < 0.001) and 2.22‐fold greater odds than Zimbabweans (p < 0.001). Inferences were unchanged using all other serologic algorithms evaluated. In conclusion, HHV‐8 infection is substantially more common in Uganda than in Zimbabwe and South Africa. These findings help to explain the high KS incidence in the “KS Belt” and underscore the importance of a uniform approach to HHV‐8 antibody testing.