Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Bee Fauna and Floral Abundance Within Lawn-Dominated Suburban Yards in Springfield, MA

Abstract Private yards comprise a significant component of urban lands, with managed lawns representing the dominant land cover. Lawns blanket > 163,000 km2 of the United States, and 50% of urban and suburban areas. When not treated with herbicides, lawns have the capacity to support a diversity of spontaneous (e.g., not planted) flowers, with the potential to provide nectar and pollen resources for pollinators such as native bees. In order to determine the extent to which suburban lawns support these important species, we surveyed lawns in 17 suburban yards in Springfield, MA, between May and September 2013 and 2014. Householders participating in the study did not apply chemical pesticides or herbicides to lawns for the duration of the study. We collected 5,331 individual bees, representing 111 species, and 29% of bee species reported for the state. The majority of species were native to North America (94.6%), nested in soil (73%), and solitary (48.6%). Species richness was lower for oligolectic (specialists on a single plant; 9.9%) and parasitic species (12.6%). Abundance percentages for number of individuals were similar. We documented 63 plant species in the lawns, the majority of which were not intentionally planted. The most abundant lawn flowers were dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) and clover (Trifolium sp.). Nearly 30% of the spontaneous plant species growing in the lawns were native to North America. Our study suggests that the spontaneous lawn flowers could be viewed as supplemental floral resources and support pollinators, thereby enhancing the value of urban green spaces.
Living Alone Among Older Adults in Canada and the U.S.

Increasing proportions of people, including older adults, live alone. Studying living arrangements of the elderly is important because these affect and reflect general well-being of the elderly and inform communities’ response to elderly housing needs. We analyze data from the 2006 Canadian Census and the 2006 American Community Survey to examine living alone among non-married older adults aged 55 and older in Canada and the U.S. The paper has two parts. First, we compare native- and foreign-born elderly to see if immigrants are less likely to live alone. Second, we examine factors associated with living alone among older immigrants. While older immigrants in both countries are less likely to live alone, the large differences are substantially reduced once various explanatory variables are considered. Comparisons of four gender/country groups of older immigrants show the positive role of economic and acculturation factors on living alone among older immigrants. With few exceptions, predictors of living alone are similar for older immigrants in Canada and the U.S.: living alone is mainly explained by a combination of economic and acculturation factors, taking demographic variables into account. Findings underline the need for age-friendly housing with innovative design and technology that can accommodate older people who live alone, including older immigrants who may have different needs and cultural preferences.
An Optimal Uterine Closure Technique for Better Scar Healing and Avoiding Isthmocele in Cesarean Section: A Randomized Controlled Study

Abstract Objective: The aim of this study is to compare the effects of two different uterine closure techniques, used during cesarean section (CS) operations on isthmocele formation. Material and Methods: This prospective, randomized, controlled study was performed on 138 patients in a university hospital between the dates December 2016 and August 2017. Uterine closures were performed using the double-layer, far-far-near-near (FFNN) unlocked technique, in the study group (n = 70) and using a single-layer continuous locked (SLL) technique in the control group (n = 68). The presence of isthmocele, residual myometrial thickness (RMT), postmenstrual spotting, dysmenorrhea, chronic pelvic pain and uterus position were evaluated in postoperative sixth month. Results: Isthmocele formation was less frequent and RMT was greater in the study group when compared to the control group (p < 0.001 and p < 0.001, respectively). Duration of operation, amount of blood loss and additional hemostatic suture requirement were not significantly different between the two groups (p = 0.221, p = 0.520 and p = 0.930, respectively). Postmenstrual spotting was less common in FFNN group, while the rates of chronic pelvic pain and dysmenorrhea were not significantly different between the groups (p = 0.002, p = 0.205 and p = 0.490, respectively). Conclusion: The findings of the present study demonstrate that uterine closure using the FFNN technique is beneficial in terms of providing protection from isthmocele formation and ensuring sufficient RMT. This method has the potential to become the optimal uterine closure technique, but the findings of the present study should be supported by large-scale studies in the future.
Gated End-to-End Memory Networks

Machine reading using differentiable reasoning models has recently shown remarkable progress. In this context, End-to-End trainable Memory Networks (MemN2N) have demonstrated promising performance on simple natural language based reasoning tasks such as factual reasoning and basic deduction. However, other tasks, namely multi-fact question-answering, positional reasoning or dialog related tasks, remain challenging particularly due to the necessity of more complex interactions between the memory and controller modules composing this family of models. In this paper, we introduce a novel end-to-end memory access regulation mechanism inspired by the current progress on the connection short-cutting principle in the field of computer vision. Concretely, we develop a Gated End-to-End trainable Memory Network architecture (GMemN2N). From the machine learning perspective, this new capability is learned in an end-to-end fashion without the use of any additional supervision signal which is, as far as our knowledge goes, the first of its kind. Our experiments show significant improvements on the most challenging tasks in the 20 bAbI dataset, without the use of any domain knowledge. Then, we show improvements on the Dialog bAbI tasks including the real human-bot conversion-based Dialog State Tracking Challenge (DSTC-2) dataset. On these two datasets, our model sets the new state of the art.
Serum Procalcitonin Levels in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Patients in North Indian Population

Background: Exacerbations in Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have a considerable impact on morbidity, mortality, and quality of life. Procalcitonin (PCT) a polypeptide normally produced in neuroendocrine cells of the thyroid and lungs is a marker of systemic inflammation and bacterial infection. Objectives: The aim of this study was to determine the levels of PCT in serum of acute exacerbation of COPD patients (AECOPD) and stable COPD patients in North Indian population. Materials and Methods: The study was conducted on 80 AECOPD and 80 stable COPD patients in respiratory medicine department at tertiary care hospital in north India. PCT levels were measured in serum by ELISA kit. GraphPad Prism version 6.01 (GraphPad software Inc.; La, Jolla, CA, USA) was used for analysis of data. Results: The present study showed that mean serum PCT levels were significantly higher in AECOPD group (1.31 ± 0.79) as compared to stable COPD group (0.1 ± 0.09) (P < 0.001). Conclusion: The study confirms that PCT levels were higher in AECOPD patients as compared to stable COPD patients. PCT could be used as a biomarker of exacerbations of COPD and can be used to target management and guiding the treatment in patients with acute exacerbations of COPD.
Virus-induced pathogenesis, vaccine development, and diagnosis of novel H7N9 avian influenza A virus in humans: a systemic literature review

H7N9 avian influenza virus (AIV) caused human infections in 2013 in China. Phylogenetic analyses indicate that H7N9 AIV is a novel reassortant strain with pandemic potential. We conducted a systemic review regarding virus-induced pathogenesis, vaccine development, and diagnosis of H7N9 AIV infection in humans. We followed PRISMA guidelines and searched PubMed, Web of Science, and Google Scholar to identify relevant articles published between January 2013 and December 2018. Pathogenesis data indicated that H7N9 AIV belongs to low pathogenic avian influenza, which is mostly asymptomatic in avian species; however, H7N9 induces high mortality in humans. Sporadic human infections have recently been reported, caused by highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses detected in poultry. H7N9 AIVs resistant to adamantine and oseltamivir cause severe human infection by rapidly inducing progressive acute community-acquired pneumonia, multiorgan dysfunction, and cytokine dysregulation; however, mechanisms via which the virus induces severe syndromes remain unclear. An H7N9 AIV vaccine is lacking; designs under evaluation include synthesized peptide, baculovirus-insect system, and virus-like particle vaccines. Molecular diagnosis of H7N9 AIVs is suggested over conventional assays, for biosafety reasons. Several advanced or modified diagnostic assays are under investigation and development. We summarized virus-induced pathogenesis, vaccine development, and current diagnostic assays in H7N9 AIVs.
Abnormal Sperm in Mice Lacking the Taf7l Gene

ABSTRACT TFIID is a general transcription factor required for transcription of most protein-coding genes by RNA polymerase II. TAF7L is an X-linked germ cell-specific paralogue of TAF7, which is a generally expressed component of TFIID. Here, we report the generation of Taf7l mutant mice by homologous recombination in embryonic stem cells by using the Cre-loxP strategy. While spermatogenesis was completed in Taf7l−/Y mice, the weight of Taf7l−/Y testis decreased and the amount of sperm in the epididymides was sharply reduced. Mutant epididymal sperm exhibited abnormal morphology, including folded tails. Sperm motility was significantly reduced, and Taf7l−/Y males were fertile with reduced litter size. Microarray profiling revealed that the abundance of six gene transcripts (including Fscn1) in Taf7l−/Y testes decreased more than twofold. In particular, FSCN1 is an F-action-bundling protein and thus may be critical for normal sperm morphology and sperm motility. Although deficiency of Taf7l may be compensated in part by Taf7, Taf7l has apparently evolved new specialized functions in the gene-selective transcription in male germ cell differentiation. Our mouse studies suggest that mutations in the human TAF7L gene might be implicated in X-linked oligozoospermia in men.
Effects of TCF7L2 rs7903146 variant on metformin response in patients with type 2 diabetes.

The response to metformin, the most commonly used drug for the treatment of type 2 diabetes (T2D), is highly variable. The common variant rs7903146 C>T within the transcription factor 7 like 2 gene (TCF7L2) is the strongest genetic risk factor associated with T2D to date. In this study we explored the effects of TCF7L2 rs7903146 genotype on metformin response in T2D. The study included 86 newly diagnosed patients with T2D, incident users of metformin. Levels of fasting glucose, insulin, HbA1c, total cholesterol, HDL-cholesterol, LDL-cholesterol, triglycerides, and anthropometric parameters were measured prior to metformin therapy, and 6 and 12 months after the treatment. Genotyping of TCF7L2 rs7903146 was performed by the Sequenom MassARRAY® iPLEX® platform. At baseline, the diabetes risk allele (T) showed an association with lower triglyceride levels (p = 0.037). After 12 months of metformin treatment, the T allele was associated with 25.9% lower fasting insulin levels (95% CI 10.9-38.3%, p = 0.002) and 29.1% lower HOMA-IR index (95% CI 10.1-44.1%, p = 0.005), after adjustment for baseline values. Moreover, the T allele was associated with 6.7% lower fasting glucose levels (95% CI 1.1-12.0%, p = 0.021), adjusted for baseline glucose and baseline HOMA-%B levels, after 6 months of metformin treatment. This effect was more pronounced in TT carriers who had 16.8% lower fasting glucose levels (95% CI 7.0-25.6%, p = 0.002) compared to the patients with CC genotype. Our results suggest that TCF7L2 rs7903146 variant affects markers of insulin resistance and glycemic response to metformin in newly diagnosed patients with T2D within the first year of metformin treatment.
NRG1 Gene Fusions Are Recurrent, Clinically Actionable Gene Rearrangements in KRAS Wild-Type Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma

Purpose: Gene fusions involving neuregulin 1 (NRG1) have been noted in multiple cancer types and have potential therapeutic implications. Although varying results have been reported in other cancer types, the efficacy of the HER-family kinase inhibitor afatinib in the treatment of NRG1 fusion–positive pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma is not fully understood. Experimental Design: Forty-seven patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma received comprehensive whole-genome and transcriptome sequencing and analysis. Two patients with gene fusions involving NRG1 received afatinib treatment, with response measured by pretreatment and posttreatment PET/CT imaging. Results: Three of 47 (6%) patients with advanced pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma were identified as KRAS wild type by whole-genome sequencing. All KRAS wild-type tumors were positive for gene fusions involving the ERBB3 ligand NRG1. Two of 3 patients with NRG1 fusion–positive tumors were treated with afatinib and demonstrated a significant and rapid response while on therapy. Conclusions: This work adds to a growing body of evidence that NRG1 gene fusions are recurrent, therapeutically actionable genomic events in pancreatic cancers. Based on the clinical outcomes described here, patients with KRAS wild-type tumors harboring NRG1 gene fusions may benefit from treatment with afatinib. See related commentary by Aguirre, p. 4589
Obstacle avoidance using an octree in the configuration space of a manipulator

An automatic system for planning safe trajectories for a computer controlled manipulator among obstacles is a key component of robot assembly operations. This paper describes an algorithm transforming cartesian obstacles into obstacles in the space of the first three joints of a manipulator with six revolute joints (e.g. a ACMA-CRIBIER V80), and giving a hierarchical description of the free space by mean of an octree. Such a description is very useful in testing for collision between the arm of the manipulator end obstacles since it is represented by a point in this space.
Mid-term results of MR-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound treatment for relapsing superficial desmoids

Abstract Purpose: Desmoids are locally infiltrative, nonmalignant soft tissue tumors. Surgery, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy have been the mainstay of treatment, but relapse is common and side effects can result in significant morbidity. MR-HIFU is increasingly recognized as an alternative treatment modality. We assessed the success rate of MR-HIFU for the treatment of extra-abdominal desmoids at our institute. Materials and methods: Five patients with relapsing desmoid tumors (three males, two females; age range 40–79 years) were treated using the Sonalleve system in an outpatient setting without general anesthesia. Changes in total tumor volumes were measured with a tumor tracking software. Adverse events were documented. Results: MR-HIFU was successful in all patients without severe side effects. Follow up ranged from 13 to 60 months. Three patients required more than one treatment session. In 3 patients with small lesions (mean = 9.7 mL), complete ablation was achieved with no evidence of viable tumor on follow up MRI at an average of 35.7 months, while in two patients with larger lesions (mean = 46 mL) the targeted tumor volumes decreased by 73% at 14 months. Skin injuries comprised first- and second-degree burns and were observed with short distance to skin (mean = 0.9 cm) and proximity to bone (i.e. ribs). Skin burns healed within weeks with topical treatment. Conclusion: MR-HIFU shows good mid-term result for extra-abdominal desmoids with complete response for small lesions and stabilization of larger lesions. MR-HIFU for desmoids can be performed under regional anesthesia/sedation as outpatients.
Positive effects of a Clostridium butyricum-based compound probiotic on growth performance, immune responses, intestinal morphology, hypothalamic neurotransmitters, and colonic microbiota in weaned piglets.

Weaning stress in piglets can lead to poor health outcomes and reduced production. We investigated the effects of probiotics, one potential antibiotic alternative, on the growth performance, serum biochemical parameters, intestinal morphology, mucosal immunity, hypothalamic neurotransmitters, and colonic microflora in weaned piglets. Thirty-six weaned piglets were fed a basal diet, a diet supplemented with colistin sulphate antibiotic, or a diet supplemented with probiotics including Clostridium butyricum, Bacillus subtilis, and B. licheniformis. Probiotics significantly increased the feed : gain ratio, improved the average day gain from day 1 to day 28, and decreased the diarrhoea index. Probiotics also lowered the serum concentrations of AST, ALT, and ALP on day 14 and lowered the serum concentration of ALT on day 28 compared with the control. Probiotic supplementation caused fewer ileal apoptotic cells. The serum and ileal concentrations of TNF-α and IL-1β on day 28 were significantly lowered, and the serum concentrations of IL-6 were significantly lowered on days 14 and 28. Probiotic-fed piglets exhibited higher contents of hypothalamic serotonin and dopamine as well as serum γ-aminobutyric acid along with higher colonic concentrations of butyrate and valerate on day 28. High-throughput sequencing showed 972 core operational taxonomic units among all groups, of which 48 were unique to the probiotic-treated group. The relative abundance of genus Bacillus and species Bacillus velezensis was enriched in probiotic piglets; the phylogenetic investigation of communities by the reconstruction of unobserved states indicated that amino acid metabolism, DNA repair, replication and recombination proteins, and secretion systems were enriched with probiotics. In conclusion, the Clostridium butyricum-based probiotics improved growth performance, enhanced intestinal morphology, changed hypothalamic neurotransmitters and modulated colonic microflora in weaned piglets.
Recommendations for Measurement and Management of an Elite Athlete

Athletes who merit the title ‘elite’ are rare and differ both quantitatively and qualitatively from athletes of lower qualifications. Serving and studying elite athletes may demand non-traditional approaches. Research involving elite athletes suffers because of the typical nomothetic requirements for large sample sizes and other statistical assumptions that do not apply to this population. Ideographic research uses single-athlete study designs, trend analyses, and statistical process control. Single-athlete designs seek to measure differences in repeated measurements under prescribed conditions, and trend analyses may permit systematic monitoring and prediction of future outcomes. Statistical process control uses control charting and other methods from management systems to assess and modify training processes in near real-time. These methods bring assessment and process control into the real world of elite athletics.
Reply to "On the need of considering cardiorespiratory fitness when examining the influence of sex on dynamic cerebral autoregulation".

REPLY : We thank Labrecque et al. (9) for their thoughtful comments and excellent point that cardiorespiratory ﬁtness may be an important factor to consider when assessing sex differences in cerebral autoregulation. We agree with the authors that this observation may provide a possible explanation for the discrepancies between our recent works and high-lights that further research is necessary for understanding sex differences in cerebrovascular control mechanisms.
ST-SAGE

With the rapid development of location-based social networks (LBSNs), spatial item recommendation has become an important mobile application, especially when users travel away from home. However, this type of recommendation is very challenging compared to traditional recommender systems. A user may visit only a limited number of spatial items, leading to a very sparse user-item matrix. This matrix becomes even sparser when the user travels to a distant place, as most of the items visited by a user are usually located within a short distance from the user’s home. Moreover, user interests and behavior patterns may vary dramatically across different time and geographical regions. In light of this, we propose ST-SAGE, a spatial-temporal sparse additive generative model for spatial item recommendation in this article. ST-SAGE considers both personal interests of the users and the preferences of the crowd in the target region at the given time by exploiting both the co-occurrence patterns and content of spatial items. To further alleviate the data-sparsity issue, ST-SAGE exploits the geographical correlation by smoothing the crowd’s preferences over a well-designed spatial index structure called the spatial pyramid. To speed up the training process of ST-SAGE, we implement a parallel version of the model inference algorithm on the GraphLab framework. We conduct extensive experiments; the experimental results clearly demonstrate that ST-SAGE outperforms the state-of-the-art recommender systems in terms of recommendation effectiveness, model training efficiency, and online recommendation efficiency.
Burnout and satisfaction with work-life balance among US physicians relative to the general US population.

BACKGROUND Despite extensive data about physician burnout, to our knowledge, no national study has evaluated rates of burnout among US physicians, explored differences by specialty, or compared physicians with US workers in other fields. METHODS We conducted a national study of burnout in a large sample of US physicians from all specialty disciplines using the American Medical Association Physician Masterfile and surveyed a probability-based sample of the general US population for comparison. Burnout was measured using validated instruments. Satisfaction with work-life balance was explored. RESULTS Of 27 276 physicians who received an invitation to participate, 7288 (26.7%) completed surveys. When assessed using the Maslach Burnout Inventory, 45.8% of physicians reported at least 1 symptom of burnout. Substantial differences in burnout were observed by specialty, with the highest rates among physicians at the front line of care access (family medicine, general internal medicine, and emergency medicine). Compared with a probability-based sample of 3442 working US adults, physicians were more likely to have symptoms of burnout (37.9% vs 27.8%) and to be dissatisfied with work-life balance (40.2% vs 23.2%) (P < .001 for both). Highest level of education completed also related to burnout in a pooled multivariate analysis adjusted for age, sex, relationship status, and hours worked per week. Compared with high school graduates, individuals with an MD or DO degree were at increased risk for burnout (odds ratio [OR], 1.36; P < .001), whereas individuals with a bachelor's degree (OR, 0.80; P = .048), master's degree (OR, 0.71; P = .01), or professional or doctoral degree other than an MD or DO degree (OR, 0.64; P = .04) were at lower risk for burnout. CONCLUSIONS Burnout is more common among physicians than among other US workers. Physicians in specialties at the front line of care access seem to be at greatest risk.