Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Anatomo-Electrical Network Underlying Hypermotor Seizures

Purpose Hypermotor seizures (HMS) can be triggered by different epileptogenic foci and thus common symptomatic networks generating HMS may exist among these patients. The goal of the present study was to investigate the specialized networks underlying HMS by analyzing interictal 18FDG-PET imaging and ictal stereo-electroencephalography (SEEG) recordings. Methods Fourteen patients with HMS were retrospectively analyzed. HMS were classified into HMS1 and HMS2 according to the speed and intensity of the motor seizure behavior. Then, the interictal PET data of patients was compared with those of 18 healthy controls using statistical parametric mapping to identify regions with significant hypometabolism. Ictal SEEG recordings were reviewed to identify the spreading areas at the beginning of HMS occurrence. Results Compared to controls, patients with HMS presented significant hypometabolism in the bilateral anterosuperior insular lobes, mesial premotor cortex (MPMC), middle cingulate cortex (MCC), as well as in the bilateral caudate nuclei. When comparing patients in the two HMS subgroups with controls, more extensive hypometabolic areas were seen in HMS1 patients than in HMS2 patients, including the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), the temporal pole, and the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). OFC and ventromedial prefrontal cortex was also found significantly hypometabolic in patients with HMS1 when compared with HMS2 directly. SEEG recordings further suggested that insula, MCC, and MPMC were commonly recruited at the beginning of HMS. Conclusion We have identified a specialized interictal hypometabolic pattern in patients with HMS. A network involving the anterosuperior insula, mesiofrontal cortex (MCC-MPMC), and caudate nucleus may contribute to the generation of HMS. ACC, OFC, and temporal pole are possibly associated with the affective components of HMS. Our findings provide further insight into understanding the network basis of HMS semiology.
Gaussian-Based Smooth Dielectric Function: A Surface-Free Approach for Modeling Macromolecular Binding in Solvents

Conventional modeling techniques to model macromolecular solvation and its effect on binding in the framework of Poisson-Boltzmann based implicit solvent models make use of a geometrically defined surface to depict the separation of macromolecular interior (low dielectric constant) from the solvent phase (high dielectric constant). Though this simplification saves time and computational resources without significantly compromising the accuracy of free energy calculations, it bypasses some of the key physio-chemical properties of the solute-solvent interface, e.g., the altered flexibility of water molecules and that of side chains at the interface, which results in dielectric properties different from both bulk water and macromolecular interior, respectively. Here we present a Gaussian-based smooth dielectric model, an inhomogeneous dielectric distribution model that mimics the effect of macromolecular flexibility and captures the altered properties of surface bound water molecules. Thus, the model delivers a smooth transition of dielectric properties from the macromolecular interior to the solvent phase, eliminating any unphysical surface separating the two phases. Using various examples of macromolecular binding, we demonstrate its utility and illustrate the comparison with the conventional 2-dielectric model. We also showcase some additional abilities of this model, viz. to account for the effect of electrolytes in the solution and to render the distribution profile of water across a lipid membrane.
Year-round monitoring reveals prevalence of fatal bird-window collisions at the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center

Collisions with glass are a serious threat to avian life and are estimated to kill hundreds of millions of birds per year in the United States. We monitored 22 buildings at the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center (VTCRC) in Blacksburg, Virginia, for collision fatalities from October 2013 through May 2015 and explored possible effects exerted by glass area and surrounding land cover on avian mortality. We documented 240 individuals representing 55 identifiable species that died due to collisions with windows at the VTCRC. The relative risk of fatal collisions at all buildings over the study period were estimated using a Bayesian hierarchical zero-inflated Poisson model adjusting for percentage of tree and lawn cover within 50 m of buildings, as well as for glass area. We found significant relationships between fatalities and surrounding lawn area (relative risk: 0.96, 95% credible interval: 0.93, 0.98) as well as glass area on buildings (RR: 1.30, 95% CI [1.05–1.65]). The model also found a moderately significant relationship between fatal collisions and the percent land cover of ornamental trees surrounding buildings (RR = 1.02, 95% CI [1.00–1.05]). Every building surveyed had at least one recorded collision death. Our findings indicate that birds collide with VTCRC windows during the summer breeding season in addition to spring and fall migration. The Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) was the most common window collision species and accounted for 10% of deaths. Though research has identified various correlates with fatal bird-window collisions, such studies rarely culminate in mitigation. We hope our study brings attention, and ultimately action, to address this significant threat to birds at the VTCRC and elsewhere.
Determinants of Consumer eHealth Information Seeking Behavior

Patients are increasingly using the Internet and other technologies to engage in their own healthcare, but little research has focused on the determinants of consumer eHealth behaviors related to Internet use. This study uses data from 115,089 respondents to four years of the National Health Interview Series to identify the associations between one consumer eHealth behavior (information seeking) and demographics, health measures, and Personal Health Information Management (PHIM) (messaging, scheduling, refills, and chat). Individuals who use PHIM are 7.5 times more likely to search the internet for health related information. Just as health has social determinants, the results of this study indicate there are potential social determinants of consumer eHealth behaviors including personal demographics, health status, and healthcare access.
Predictors of amputation in diabetics with foot ulcer: Single center experience in a large Turkish cohort

OBJECTIVEPrediction of diabetic foot ulcer outcome may be helpful for clinicians in optimizing and individualizing management strategy. The aim of the present study was to examine the possibility of predicting the outcome of patients with diabetic foot ulcers by using easily assessed clinical and laboratory parameters at baseline.DESIGNIn this observational study, data were collected prospectively in 670 consecutive diabetic foot ulcer episodes in 510 patients examined between January 1999 and June 2008 and were used to evaluate potential predictors of amputation retrospectively. After exclusion of patients who did not come to the hospital for follow-up for a minimum of six months, data of 574 foot ulcer episodes were evaluated.RESULTSLimb ischemia, osteomyelitis and presence of gangrene and ulcer depth, determined by the Wagner classification system, were the major independent predictors of overall and major amputations. Older age, presence of coronary artery disease, smoking and ulcer size were found to be associated with either overall or major amputations. Baseline levels of acute phase reactants (white blood cell count, polymorphonuclear leukocyte count, platelet count, erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), serum C-reactive protein (CRP) and albumin) and decreased hemoglobin levels were associated with amputation risk. Multivariate analysis showed that one standard deviation increase in baseline CRP and ESR levels were independent predictors of overall and major amputations, respectively.CONCLUSIONSThe presence of limb ischemia, osteomyelitis, local and diffuse gangrene and ulcer depth were independent predictors of amputation. Baseline levels of ESR and CRP appeared to be helpful for clinicians in predicting amputation.
The feasibility of salivary sample collection in an international pediatric cohort: The the TEDDY study

Saliva offers a relatively noninvasive method for measuring analytes such as cortisol, holding particular promise for use in pediatric populations on a large scale if a rigorous collection protocol is feasible in diverse settings. The Environmental Determinants of Diabetes in the Young study protocol, conducted in centers in the United States, Sweden, Finland, and Germany, used salivary collection to assess cortisol level as a physiologic marker of stress. Saliva was collected using Sorbettes from subjects at 3.5, 4.5, and 5.5 years of age. Parents collected a morning sample, and staff collected pre- and post-blood draw samples. Feasibility was assessed based on protocol completion, adherence with instructions, factors affecting adherence, and sufficiency of saliva sample for cortisol determination. Collection of saliva samples in a diverse pediatric population is feasible. Establishing non-invasive and acceptable methods for collecting physiological parameters of stress will allow better exploration of determinants of health in this important population.
Survey of neurodevelopmental allied health teams in Australian and New Zealand neonatal nurseries: Staff profile and standardised neurobehavioural/neurological assessment

The primary aim of this study was to establish how many neonatal nurseries in Australia and New Zealand had a neurodevelopmental allied health team, to ascertain the disciplines involved, their qualifications and experience. The secondary aim was to evaluate which standardised neurobehavioural/neurological assessments were currently being implemented, and the existing practice in relation to their use.
Conservation of Distinct Genetically-Mediated Human Cortical Pattern

The many subcomponents of the human cortex are known to follow an anatomical pattern and functional relationship that appears to be highly conserved between individuals. This suggests that this pattern and the relationship among cortical regions are important for cortical function and likely shaped by genetic factors, although the degree to which genetic factors contribute to this pattern is unknown. We assessed the genetic relationships among 12 cortical surface areas using brain images and genotype information on 2,364 unrelated individuals, brain images on 466 twin pairs, and transcriptome data on 6 postmortem brains in order to determine whether a consistent and biologically meaningful pattern could be identified from these very different data sets. We find that the patterns revealed by each data set are highly consistent (p<10−3), and are biologically meaningful on several fronts. For example, close genetic relationships are seen in cortical regions within the same lobes and, the frontal lobe, a region showing great evolutionary expansion and functional complexity, has the most distant genetic relationship with other lobes. The frontal lobe also exhibits the most distinct expression pattern relative to the other regions, implicating a number of genes with known functions mediating immune and related processes. Our analyses reflect one of the first attempts to provide an assessment of the biological consistency of a genetic phenomenon involving the brain that leverages very different types of data, and therefore is not just statistical replication which purposefully use very similar data sets.
“Dignity”: A central construct in nursing home staff understandings of quality continence care

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES To explore nursing home staff members' beliefs and expectations about what constitutes "quality continence care" for people living in nursing homes. BACKGROUND Most nursing home residents require assistance to maintain continence or manage incontinence. Best practice guidelines promote active investigation of incontinence, treatment of underlying potentially reversible causes, and initial conservative interventions to prevent, minimise and/or treat incontinence. Despite research showing the positive benefits of implementing active interventions, translating the findings of research into practice in nursing homes has been modest. Understanding the perspectives of individuals who provide continence care may help bridge the gap between evidence and practice. DESIGN A qualitative exploratory descriptive design. METHODS Qualitative interviews were conducted with 19 nursing home staff: eight registered nurses, four enrolled nurses and seven personal care workers working in a nursing home in Australia between 2014-2015. Data were analysed inductively to identify themes and subthemes that described and explained staff beliefs about quality continence care in nursing homes. FINDINGS Participants' understanding and expectations about quality continence care were linked to beliefs about incontinence being an intractable and undignified condition in nursing homes. The key theme to emerge was "protecting residents' dignity" which was supported by the following six subthemes: (i) using pads, ii) providing privacy, (iii) knowing how to "manage" incontinence, (iv) providing timely continence care, (v) considering residents' continence care preferences and (vi) communicating sensitively. CONCLUSION The findings provide new insight into the basis for continence care practices in nursing homes. Education about continence care should challenge beliefs that limit continence care practice to cleaning, containing and concealing incontinence. There is a need for a multidimensional framework that is informed by social, psychological and biomedical research about incontinence, research about the fundamental elements of care, care-dependent individuals' expectations about care, and values about dignity and care. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE The in-depth exploration led to an understanding of the basis for continence care practices that centre on cleaning, containing and concealing residents' incontinence in some nursing homes. There is a need to review the quality of education for the aged care workforce about incontinence to ensure it equips them with a broad understanding of the fundamentals of care and how to enact dignity in continence care through a resident-centred approach.
Identifying Language Origin of Person Names With N-Grams of Different Units

Identifying the language origin of a name in English is important for generating its correct pronunciation. In this paper, N-grams of syllable-based letter clusters are proposed for the task. The performance of the N-gram model of a set of frequently used letter clusters (correspond to syllables) is compared to that of letter N-gram model in a four-language task: English, German, French, and Portuguese. On average, the letter cluster N-gram, which has 26% error rate, is slightly better than the letter N-gram, which has 27.2% error rate. Furthermore, it is found that the error distributions from the two N-grams have fairly large differences. Therefore, AdaBoost is used to combine the results from N-grams of different units. The error rate is reduced to 22.5% or a relative 17.5% error reduction is achieved after the combination
Gallbladder cancer epidemiology, pathogenesis and molecular genetics: Recent update

Gallbladder cancer is a malignancy of biliary tract which is infrequent in developed countries but common in some specific geographical regions of developing countries. Late diagnosis and deprived prognosis are major problems for treatment of gallbladder carcinoma. The dramatic associations of this orphan cancer with various genetic and environmental factors are responsible for its poorly defined pathogenesis. An understanding to the relationship between epidemiology, molecular genetics and pathogenesis of gallbladder cancer can add new insights to its undetermined pathophysiology. Present review article provides a recent update regarding epidemiology, pathogenesis, and molecular genetics of gallbladder cancer. We systematically reviewed published literature on gallbladder cancer from online search engine PubMed (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed). Various keywords used for retrieval of articles were Gallbladder, cancer Epidemiology, molecular genetics and bullion operators like AND, OR, NOT. Cross references were manually searched from various online search engines (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed,https://scholar.google.co.in/, http://www.medline.com/home.jsp). Most of the articles published from 1982 to 2015 in peer reviewed journals have been included in this review.
Preparation and mineralization of a biocompatible double network hydrogel

Abstract Double network (DN) hydrogels have shown favorable toughness and strength and been harnessed as scaffolding materials in tissue engineering, particularly, mineralized DN hydrogels may be potential scaffolds in bone tissue engineering. In this paper, DN hydrogels were fabricated from poly(ethylene glycol) diacrylate (PEGDA) and methacrylated poly(γ-glutamic acid) (mPGA). This DN hydrogel not only showed excellent mechanical properties but also good cytocompatibility as evidenced by the characterizations in terms of swelling ratio, mechanical strength/modulus, and cytotoxicity. Further, the DN hydrogels were subjected to mineralization in simulated body fluid, during which hydroxyapatite or analogues formed within the DN hydrogels; the DN hydrogels may be potentially harnessed as bone tissue engineering scaffold. Schematic illustration for the hydrogel synthesis and images of DN2 hydrogel (as prepared and mineralized).
A bioluminescent imaging mouse model for Marburg virus based on a pseudovirus system

ABSTRACT Marburg virus (MARV) can cause lethal hemorrhagic fever in humans. Handling of MARV is restricted to high-containment biosafety level 4 (BSL-4) facilities, which greatly impedes research into this virus. In this study, a high titer of MARV pseudovirus was generated through optimization of the HIV backbone vectors, the ratio of backbone vector to MARV glycoprotein expression vector, and the transfection reagents. An in vitro neutralization assay and an in vivo bioluminescent imaging mouse model for MARV were developed based on the pseudovirus. Protective serum against MARV was successfully induced in guinea pigs, which showed high neutralization activity in vitro and could also protect Balb/c mice from MARV pseudovirus infection in vivo. This system could be a convenient tool to enable the evaluation of vaccines and therapeutic drugs against MARV in non-BSL-4 laboratories.
Breast-feeding duration and child eating characteristics in relation to later vegetable intake in 2–6-year-old children in ten studies throughout Europe

Abstract Objective Breast-feeding is thought to facilitate young children’s acceptance of new foods, including vegetables, but the evidence for this relationship appears inconsistent across studies. Increasing children’s vegetable intake remains challenging; therefore the present study aimed to investigate whether breast-feeding duration predicts vegetable intake in 2–6-year-old children. Design Actual vegetable intake was measured in studies across three European countries. General linear model analyses with breast-feeding duration, sex and age of the child and maternal education as variables were used to predict children’s vegetable intake per country. Additionally, the relationships between child eating behaviour characteristics (asked through the Child Eating Behaviour Questionnaire) and vegetable intake were investigated via Pearson correlations. Setting Daycare centres, schools and home settings in Denmark, Greece and the Netherlands. Subjects Children aged 2–6 years (n 750). Results Breast-feeding duration was positively associated with children’s vegetable intake at 2–6 years old in Denmark (P<0·01) and the Netherlands (P<0·05), but not in Greece (P=0·17). Age of the child, maternal education and sex of the child did not predict vegetable intake in our sample. All countries showed an inverse relationship between food neophobia and children’s vegetable intake and a positive relationship between vegetable liking and intake. Conclusions The present study found that breast-feeding duration is a predictor of later vegetable intake, but that current child eating behaviour characteristics, such as vegetable liking, food neophobia and enjoyment of food, also influence vegetable intake. Besides encouragement of breast-feeding duration, strategies that support vegetable liking and food enjoyment and decrease food neophobia are needed to support young children’s vegetable intake.
Recurrent transcriptional loss of the PCDH17 tumor suppressor in laryngeal squamous cell carcinoma is partially mediated by aberrant promoter DNA methylation

Protocadherins are cell‐cell adhesion molecules encoded by a large family of genes. Recent reports demonstrate recurrent silencing of protocadherin genes in tumors and provide strong arguments for their tumor supresor functionality. Loss of protocadherins may contribute to cancer development not only by altering cell‐cell adhesion, that is a hallmark of cancer, but also by enhancing proliferation and epithelial mesenchymal transition of cells via deregulation of the WNT signaling pathway. In this study we have further corroborated our previous findings on the involvement of PCDH17 in laryngeal squamous cell carcinoma (LSCC). We used bisulfite pyrosequencing to analyze a cohort of primary LSCC tumors for alterations in PCDH17 promoter DNA methylation as an alternative gene inactivation mechanism to the homozygous deletions reported earlier. Moreover, we analyzed primary LSCC samples by immunohistochemistry for PCDH17 protein loss. We identified recurrent elevation of PCDH17 promoter DNA methylation in 32/81 (40%) primary tumors (P < 0.001) and therein hypermethylation of 12 (15%) cases in contrast to no tumor controls (n = 24) that were all unmethylated. Importantly, DNA demethylation by decitabine has restored low level PCDH17 expression in LSCC cell lines. In conclusion, we provide a mechanistic explanation of recurrently observed PCDH17 silencing in LSCC by demonstrating the role of promoter methylation in this process. In light of these findings and recent reports showing that PCDH17 methylation is detectable in serum of cancer patients we suggest that testing PCDH17 DNA methylation might serve as a potential biomarker in LSCC.
REDIdb 3.0: A Comprehensive Collection of RNA Editing Events in Plant Organellar Genomes

RNA editing is an important epigenetic mechanism by which genome-encoded transcripts are modified by substitutions, insertions and/or deletions. It was first discovered in kinetoplastid protozoa followed by its reporting in a wide range of organisms. In plants, RNA editing occurs mostly by cytidine (C) to uridine (U) conversion in translated regions of organelle mRNAs and tends to modify affected codons restoring evolutionary conserved aminoacid residues. RNA editing has also been described in non-protein coding regions such as group II introns and structural RNAs. Despite its impact on organellar transcriptome and proteome complexity, current primary databases still do not provide a specific field for RNA editing events. To overcome these limitations, we developed REDIdb a specialized database for RNA editing modifications in plant organelles. Hereafter we describe its third release containing more than 26,000 events in a completely novel web interface to accommodate RNA editing in its genomics, biological and evolutionary context through whole genome maps and multiple sequence alignments. REDIdb is freely available at http://srv00.recas. ba.infn. it/redidb/index.html