Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cultural, Transcriptomic, and Proteomic Analyses of Water-Stressed Cells of Actinobacterial Strains Isolated from Compost: Ecological Implications in the Fed-Batch Composting Process

This study was undertaken to examine the effects of water activity (aw) on the viability of actinobacterial isolates from a fed-batch composting (FBC) process by comparing culturability and stainability with 5-cyano-2,3-ditoryl tetrazolium chloride (CTC). The FBC reactor as the source of these bacteria was operated with the daily loading of household biowaste for 70 d. During this period of composting, aw in the reactor decreased linearly with time and reached approximately 0.95 at the end of operation. The plate counts of aerobic chemoorganotrophic bacteria were 3.2-fold higher than CTC-positive (CTC+) counts on average at the fully acclimated stage (after 7 weeks of operation), in which Actinobacteria predominated, as shown by lipoquinone profiling and cultivation methods. When the actinobacterial isolates from the FBC process were grown under aw stress, no significant differences were observed in culturability among the cultures, whereas CTC stainability decreased with reductions in aw levels. A cDNA microarray-based transcriptomic analysis of a representative isolate showed that many of the genes involved in cellular metabolism and genetic information processing were down-regulated by aw stress. This result was fully supported by a proteomic analysis. The results of the present study suggest that, in low aw mature compost, the metabolic activity of the community with Actinobacteria predominating is temporarily reduced to a level that hardly reacts with CTC; however, these bacteria are easily recoverable by exposure to a high aw culture medium. This may be a plausible reason why acclimated FBC reactors in which Actinobacteria predominate yields higher plate counts than CTC+ counts.
Interactions of visual odometry and landmark guidance during food search in honeybees

SUMMARY How do honeybees use visual odometry and goal-defining landmarks to guide food search? In one experiment, bees were trained to forage in an optic-flow-rich tunnel with a landmark positioned directly above the feeder. Subsequent food-search tests indicated that bees searched much more accurately when both odometric and landmark cues were available than when only odometry was available. When the two cue sources were set in conflict, by shifting the position of the landmark in the tunnel during test, bees overwhelmingly used landmark cues rather than odometry. In another experiment, odometric cues were removed by training and testing in axially striped tunnels. The data show that bees did not weight landmarks as highly as when odometric cues were available, tending to search in the vicinity of the landmark for shorter periods. A third experiment, in which bees were trained with odometry but without a landmark, showed that a novel landmark placed anywhere in the tunnel during testing prevented bees from searching beyond the landmark location. Two further experiments, involving training bees to relatively longer distances with a goal-defining landmark, produced similar results to the initial experiment. One caveat was that, with the removal of the familiar landmark, bees tended to overshoot the training location, relative to the case where bees were trained without a landmark. Taken together, the results suggest that bees assign appropriate significance to odometric and landmark cues in a more flexible and dynamic way than previously envisaged.
Performance of Fluid Balance as A Marker of Acute Kidney Injury in Children after Open Heart Surgery

Abstract Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a serious complication in the perioperative period and is consistently associated with increased morbidity and case fatality rate. This has been best studied in the cardiac surgery setting where it has been shown that up to 11.5–86.0% of patients exposed to cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) will develop AKI, with 2.0–18.9% requiring renal replacement therapy (RRT). A prospective uncontrolled cohort study was conducted between 2011 and 2015, in which 93 children with various congenital heart lesions undergoing CPB were enrolled. Serum creatinine (SCr) level was determined by Jaffé’s method (Cobas 6000 analyser, Roche). Postoperative fluid balance was estimated as the difference between fluid intake and output. Data for further processing were retrieved from anaesthesia and intensive care data management system flowsheets (IntelliView, Philips). AKI developed in 42 patients (45.6%) by meeting at least KDIGO (Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes) stage I criteria (with SCr rise by more than 50% from the baseline). Thirty eight patients complied with the 1st stage of AKI, three with 2nd stage and two with 3rd stage, according the KDIGO classification and staging system. One patient having severity stage II and two patients having severity stage III of AKI required initiation of RRT using peritoneal dialysis. Two patients from the RRT group survived, one died. The median intraoperative urine output was 2.32 ml/kg/h, (range from 0.42–5.87 ml/kg/h). Median CPB time was 163 min., median aortic cross-clamping time was 97.9 min., cooling during CPB to 29.5 °C. The diagnosis of AKI using SCr was delayed by 48 hours after CPB. Median fluid balance (FB) on the first postoperative day in non-AKI patients was 13.58 ml/kg (IQR 0–37.02) vs 49.38 ml/kg (IQR 13.20–69.32) in AKI patients, p < 0.001. AKI is a frequent complication after open heart surgery in children with congenital heart lesions. From 93 patients included in the study, 42 (45.2%) met at least KDIGO Stage I criteria for AKI. FB is a sensitive marker of kidney dysfunction. Median FB in the 1st postoperative day significantly differed between AKI patients: 49.38 ml/kg (13.20–69.32) versus 13.58 ml/kg in patients with intact kidney function (AUC = 0.84; p = 0.001). Thus it can be used as a marker of AKI.
Controlled synchronization via nonlinear integral coupling

This paper considers the problems of controlled synchronization and regulation of oscillatory systems. For a specific class of nonlinear systems, namely for minimum phase systems with relative degree one, we propose a systematic design procedure for finding nonlinear couplings between the systems - both unidirectional and bidirectional - that guarantee asymptotic synchronization of the systems' states for arbitrary initial conditions. The corresponding coupling has the form of an integral and it can be considered as a generalized distance between the outputs of the coupled systems. It combines both the low- and the high-gain coupling design in one nonlinear function. The results are illustrated with simulations of coupled Hindmarsh-Rose neuron oscillators.
Shape Memory Alloy Microactuation of tf-LIFEs: Preliminary Results

In this paper, a new approach aimed at improving the performance of intraneural longitudinal interfaces (tf-LIFEs) with the peripheral nervous system (PNS) is presented. Our goal is to develop a movable interface by embedding microactuators into the flexible tf-LIFEs structure. In this way, the optimal position of the electrical contacts can be searched inside the PNS and lost connections with neural cells could be replaced. For this purpose a thin film of shape memory alloy (tf-SMA) was selected. A multisegmented SMA was realized and embedded between two polyimide thin films in order to simulate the tf-LIFE structure. Thermal evaluation, fabrication procedure, the first characterization and preliminary experimental results of the new movable interface are described in the manuscript. A total controllable stroke of about 10mum was obtained for the presented prototype
AIS Electronic Library (AISeL)

The focus of organizations’ internal communication and collaboration infrastructures has recently been extended from conventional intranets to enterprise social software platforms (ESSPs). However, as ESSPs rely on content creation and interaction through users, many platforms struggle. Previous research suggests that organizational climate plays an important role during IS adoption. Accordingly, our study quantitatively explores the influence of organizational climate on both contributive ESSP usage (knowledge sharing) and consumptive ESSP usage (knowledge consumption). Our results indicate that organizational climate – measured by the dimensions of trust, collaboration norms, and community identification – influences employees’ ESSP usage behaviors to a certain extent. In addition, collaboration norms appear to have a stronger impact on consumptive ESSP usage than on contributive ESSP usage. Lastly, trust was found to primarily support consumptive ESSP usage, not con-tributive usage.
Quetiapine in the treatment of psychotic adolescents: A case series of 23 patients with severe early onset psychosis

Clinical efficacy, safety and tolerability of quetiapine in the treatment of 23 hospitalized psychotic adolescents were evaluated retrospectively. Twelve patients were changed to quetiapine from another antipsychotic medication during their hospital stay. In these patients, CGI-S improved from 4.75±0.87 to 2.92±0.67 (observation period 3.7±1.6 months). The most common adverse events were transient tachycardia and sedation. Mild EPS occurred only in one patient under quetiapine monotherapy. Transaminase increases more than threefold above norm were observed in two patients. fT4 values were slightly below the norm in 67% of the cases. In 11 patients, quetiapine was initiated using a rapid titration schedule with high dosages in the acute phase. Receiving a mean maximum daily dose of 927±300 mg, CGI-S improved from 6.00±0.63 to 3.18±1.25 (observation period 2.9±1.8 months). Severe adverse events did not occur. Besides applying lorazepam temporarily in nine of the 11 patients, antipsychotic co-medication was not necessary in this group. In line with other studies, quetiapine may be considered as an effective treatment for adolescents with a severe psychotic disorder showing a favourable side-effect profile. Our preliminary data suggest that a rapid initiation with high doses could be a promising approach in acute psychotic adolescents.
Validity of a PCR assay in CSF for the diagnosis of neurocysticercosis

Objective: To prospectively evaluate the validity of a PCR assay in CSF for the diagnosis of neurocysticercosis (NC). Methods: We conducted a multicenter, prospective case-control study, recruiting participants from 5 hospitals in Cuenca, Ecuador, from January 2015 to February 2016. Cases fulfilled validated diagnostic criteria for NC. For each case, a neurosurgical patient who did not fulfill the diagnostic criteria for NC was selected as a control. CT and MRI, as well as a CSF sample, were collected from both cases and controls. The diagnostic criteria to identify cases were used as a reference standard. Results: Overall, 36 case and 36 control participants were enrolled. PCR had a sensitivity of 72.2% (95% confidence interval [CI] 54.8%–85.8%) and a specificity of 100.0% (95% CI 90.3%–100.0%). For parenchymal NC, PCR had a sensitivity of 42.9% (95% CI 17.7%–71.1%), and for extraparenchymal NC, PCR had a sensitivity of 90.9% (95% CI 70.8%–98.9%). Conclusions: This study demonstrated the usefulness of this PCR assay in CSF for the diagnosis of NC. PCR may be particularly helpful for diagnosing extraparenchymal NC when neuroimaging techniques have failed. Classification of evidence: This study provides Class III evidence that CSF PCR can accurately identify patients with extraparenchymal NC.
Diversity of bacteriorhodopsins in different hypersaline waters from a single Spanish saltern.

Haloarchaeal rhodopsins are a diverse group of transmembrane proteins that use light energy to drive several different cellular processes. Two rhodopsins, bacteriorhodopsin and halorhodopsins, are H+ and Cl- ion pumps, respectively, and two rhodopsins, sensory rhodopsin I and II, regulate phototaxis. Bacteriorhodopsin is of special interest as it is a non-chlorophyll-based type of phototrophy (i.e. generation of chemical energy from light energy). However, very little is known about the diversity and distribution of rhodopsin genes in hypersaline environments. Here, we have used environmental PCR and cloning techniques to directly retrieve rhodopsin genes from three different salinity ponds located in a sea salt manufacturing facility near Alicante, Spain. Our survey resulted in the discovery of previously concealed variation including what is hypothesized to be bacteriorhodopsin genes from the uncultivated square morphotype that dominates these environments. In some instances, identical genes were discovered in seemingly different habitats suggesting that some haloarchaea are present over widely varying concentrations of salt.
The Effect of Nutritional Status in the Pathogenesis of Critical Illness Myopathy (CIM)

The muscle wasting and loss of specific force associated with Critical Illness Myopathy (CIM) is, at least in part, due to a preferential loss of the molecular motor protein myosin. This acquired myopathy is common in critically ill immobilized and mechanically ventilated intensive care patients (ICU). There is a growing understanding of the mechanisms underlying CIM, but the role of nutritional factors triggering this serious complication of modern intensive care remains unknown. This study aims at establishing the effect of nutritional status in the pathogenesis of CIM. An experimental ICU model was used where animals are mechanically ventilated, pharmacologically paralysed post-synaptically and extensively monitored for up to 14 days. Due to the complexity of the experimental model, the number of animals included is small. After exposure to this ICU condition, animals develop a phenotype similar to patients with CIM. The results from this study show that the preferential myosin loss, decline in specific force and muscle fiber atrophy did not differ between low vs. eucaloric animals. In both experimental groups, passive mechanical loading had a sparing effect of muscle weight independent on nutritional status. Thus, this study confirms the strong impact of the mechanical silencing associated with the ICU condition in triggering CIM, overriding any potential effects of caloric intake in triggering CIM. In addition, the positive effects of passive mechanical loading on muscle fiber size and force generating capacity was not affected by the nutritional status in this study. However, due to the small sample size these pilot results need to be validated in a larger cohort.
Lung Hyaluronan and Water Content in Preterm and Term Rabbit Pups Exposed to Oxygen or Air

Rabbit pups were delivered by cesarean section 1 or 2 d before term, or vaginally around term, and then reared in room air or exposed to intermittent or continuous hyperoxia (>85%) for up to 9 d. Pups were killed at different ages, and lung hyaluronan (HA; µg/g of dry lung weight) and lung water content, measured as wet/dry lung weight, were determined. Compared with the day of birth, the lung HA concentration did not change significantly on succeeding days in pups kept in air delivered 2 d (-2 d) or 1 d (-1 d) before term, whereas the water content decreased significantly. Continuous exposure to hyperoxia resulted in a significantly raised lung HA concentration 6 d postterm in both -2 d and -1 d pups, and intermittent exposure to hyperoxia resulted in a significantly raised HA concentration 6 d postterm in -1 d pups, compared with the groups exposed to room air. These increases were accompanied by significantly elevated wet/dry lung weight ratios. Microscopic examination revealed significantly increased HA staining scores in alveoli, arterioles, and bronchioli in both hyperoxia-exposed groups of -2 d pups 6 d postterm, and nonsignificantly higher scores in -1 d and vaginally delivered pups of comparable age, compared with the scores at birth. The results indicate that oxygen exposure neonatally may result in an increase in lung HA accompanied by an increase in lung water content. The increase in lung HA concentration in our study may be an affect of oxygen free radicals or oxygen-induced stimulation of inflammatory mediators.
Learning and tuning fuzzy logic controllers through reinforcements

A method for learning and tuning a fuzzy logic controller based on reinforcements from a dynamic system is presented. It is shown that: the generalized approximate-reasoning-based intelligent control (GARIC) architecture learns and tunes a fuzzy logic controller even when only weak reinforcement, such as a binary failure signal, is available; introduces a new conjunction operator in computing the rule strengths of fuzzy control rules; introduces a new localized mean of maximum (LMOM) method in combining the conclusions of several firing control rules; and learns to produce real-valued control actions. Learning is achieved by integrating fuzzy inference into a feedforward network, which can then adaptively improve performance by using gradient descent methods. The GARIC architecture is applied to a cart-pole balancing system and demonstrates significant improvements in terms of the speed of learning and robustness to changes in the dynamic system's parameters over previous schemes for cart-pole balancing.
Packet-level traffic measurements from the Sprint IP backbone

Network traffic measurements provide essential data for networking research and network management. In this article we describe a passive monitoring system designed to capture GPS synchronized packet-level traffic measurements on OC-3, OC-12, and OC-48 links. Our system is deployed in four POP in the Sprint IP backbone. Measurement data is stored on a 10 Tbyte storage area network and analyzed on a computing cluster. We present a set of results to both demonstrate the strength of the system and identify recent changes in Internet traffic characteristics. The results include traffic workload, analyses of TCP flow round-trip times, out-of-sequence packet rates, and packet delay. We also show that some links no longer carry Web traffic as their dominant component to the benefit of file sharing and media streaming. On most links we monitored, TCP flows exhibit low out-of-sequence packet rates, and backbone delays are dominated by the speed of light.
Helicobacter pylori eradication treatment does not benefit patients with nonulcer dyspepsia

OBJECTIVES:The aim of this study was to assess the still controversial role of treatment of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection in patients with nonulcer dyspepsia.METHODS:We conducted a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled, multicenter trial comparing the efficacy of 7 days of eradication treatment (lansoprazole 15 mg b.i.d., amoxicillin 1 g b.i.d., and clarithromycin 500 mg b.i.d.) with a control treatment (lansoprazole 15 mg b.i.d. and placebo) in H. pylori-infected patients with nonulcer dyspepsia. 13C breath tests were performed at baseline and during follow-up. We assessed patient symptoms, health status (based on the SF-12 questionnaire), patient satisfaction, drug consumption, health care consultation behavior, and absenteeism related to dyspepsia over a 1-yr period.RESULTS:A total of 74 patients randomized to eradication treatment and 70 patients randomized to placebo were compared. The rate of eradication of H. pylori infection was 75% in the active treatment group and 4% in the placebo group (p < 0.005). The symptom score improved to a similar extent in the group receiving active treatment (−4.0; 95% CI =− 5.0 to −3.0) and placebo (−3.6; 95% CI =− 4.5 to −2.7). Treatment response was not related to the severity or duration of initial symptoms or to the severity of gastritis on histology. Quality of life scores were comparable at 12 months. There was no significant difference in dyspepsia-related absenteeism or satisfaction with management of NUD. Patients receiving active treatment were more likely not to have had to use any dyspepsia treatment over the 12 months (60.8% vs 44.3%; p = 0.047). CONCLUSIONS:This study did not demonstrate any substantial benefit of curing H. pylori infection in patients with nonulcer dyspepsia. The study adds further evidence that H. pylori is not the main pathogenetic or therapeutic target in these patients.
Targeting Tumor-Associated Endothelial Cells: Anti-VEGFR2 Immunoliposomes Mediate Tumor Vessel Disruption and Inhibit Tumor Growth

Purpose: Angiogenesis is a key process in tumor progression. By binding VEGF, VEGF receptor-2 (VEGFR2) is a main signaling transducer in tumor-associated angiogenesis. Accordingly, therapeutic approaches against the VEGF/VEGFR2 signaling axis have been designed. However, an efficient and specific chemotherapeutic targeting of tumor-associated endothelial cells has not yet been achieved. Experimental Design: We have employed anti-VEGFR2 antibodies covalently linked to pegylated liposomal doxorubicin (PLD) to specifically ablate tumor-associated endothelial cells in the Rip1Tag2 mouse model of insulinoma, in the MMTV-PyMT mouse model of breast cancer, and in the HT-29 human colon cancer xenograft transplantation model. Results: In each model, anti-VEGFR2–targeted immunoliposomes (ILs) loaded with doxorubicin (anti-VEGFR2-ILs-dox) were superior in therapeutic efficacy to empty liposomes, empty anti-VEGFR2-ILs, antibodies alone, and PLD. Efficacy was similar to that of the oral VEGFR1, -2, and -3 inhibitor PTK787. Detailed histopathologic and molecular analysis revealed a strong antiangiogenic effect of anti-VEGFR2-ILs-dox, and the observed antiangiogenic therapy was significantly more efficient in reducing tumor burden in well-vascularized transgenic mouse models as compared with the less-vascularized xenograft model. Conclusions: Anti-VEGFR2 ILs provide a highly efficient approach to selectively deplete VEGFR2-expressing tumor vasculature. They offer a novel and promising anticancer strategy. Clin Cancer Res; 18(2); 454–64. ©2011 AACR.
Modelling a family of systems for crisis management with concern‐oriented reuse

Concern‐oriented reuse (CORE) proposes the concern as a new unit of model‐based reuse encapsulating software artefacts pertaining to a domain of interest that span multiple development phases and levels of abstraction. With CORE, a concern encapsulates multiple reusable features, while allowing its generic models to be customized to problem‐specific contexts. We report on our experience of designing a family of crisis management systems (CMS) with the help of reusable concern libraries. The collected metrics show a considerable amount of reuse in our CMS design. The study provides encouraging evidence that CORE's vision to create large‐scale, generic and reusable entities that are expressed with the most appropriate modelling formalisms at the right level of abstraction is feasible. We present our experience in the design of the CMS and elaborate on the advantages as well as the efforts required to adopt CORE in an industrial setting. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.