Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
TLR‐mediated B cell activation results in ectopic CLIP expression that promotes B cell‐dependent inflammation

Infectious pathogens produce compounds called Toll ligands that activate TLRs on lymphocytes. Acute activation triggered by certain TLRs appears to “jump start” the innate immune response, characterized by the release of inflammatory cytokines and cellular expansion. In some individuals, there is a failure to control acute inflammation, resulting in postinfectious, chronic inflammation. Susceptibility to chronic inflammation is strongly associated with an individualˈs MHC genes. Recent clinical trials for several autoimmune diseases characterized by chronic inflammation suggest that B lymphocyte depletion therapies dampen chronic immune activation. However, currently, there is no known mechanism that accounts for the correlation among TLR activation, MHC genetics, and a pathological role for B‐lymphocytes. Our hypothesis is that TLR‐activated B cells (B cells that have been polyclonally activated in the absence of antigen‐specific signals) are not controlled properly by T cell‐dependent B cell death, thereby causing B cell‐dependent chronic inflammation. Here, we show that treatment with Toll ligands results in polyclonal B cell activation accompanied by ectopic expression of CLIP. Furthermore, by adoptively transferring purified CLIP+ B cells in syngeneic animals, we find that CLIP+ B cells induce production of TNF‐α by host T cells. Finally, we demonstrate that CLIP‐targeted peptide competition results in the death of polyclonally activated CLIP+ B cells.
What do Finnish and Central Bavarian Have in Common? Towards an Acoustically Based Quantity Typology

The aim of this study was to investigate vowel and consonant quantity in Finnish, a typical quantity language, and to set up a reference corpus for a large-scale project studying the diachronic development of quantity contrasts in German varieties. Although German is not considered a quantity language, both tense and lax vowels and voiced and voiceless stops are differentiated by vowel and closure duration, respectively. The role of these cues, however, has undergone different diachronic changes in various German varieties. To understand the conditions for such prosodic changes, the present study investigates the stability of quantity relations in an undisputed quantity language. To this end, recordings of words differing in vowel and stop length were obtained from seven older and six younger L1 Finnish speakers, both in a normal and a loud voice. We then measured vowel and stop duration and calculated the vowel to vowel-plus-consonant ratio (a measure known to differentiate German VC sequences) as well as the geminate-to-singleton ratio. Results show stability across age groups but variability across speech styles. Moreover, VC ratios were similar for Finnish and Bavarian German speakers. We discuss our findings against the background of a typology of vowel and consonant quantity.
Transparent Time-Delayed Bilateral Teleoperation Using Wave Variables

Besides stability, a high degree of transparency is also an essential requirement in order to enable operators to safely and precisely perform bilateral teleoperation tasks. An existing approach based on the wave transformation technique can make a two-channel teleoperation system insensitive to time delays by making the time-delayed communication channel passive. In this paper, we propose a novel method for incorporating this technique in a four-channel architecture, which is the optimal architecture from a transparency point of view, and derive the corresponding absolute stability condition. It is analytically demonstrated that the proposed teleoperation architecture is capable of providing ideal transparency when transmission delays are present, and criteria for its stable operation are derived. We also show that a three-channel variant of the proposed four-channel control architecture can offer a comparable performance with less implementational complexity. Experimental results in support of the developed theory are provided.
Emotional Persuasion: When the Valence versus the Resource Demands of Emotions Influence Consumers’ Attitudes

Can properties of emotions other than valence influence consumers' responses to emotional ads? We show that consumers' processing motivation moderates whether their attitudes are based on the valence of or the resource demands imposed by the emotion featured in an ad. When motivation is low, consumers respond more favorably to positively versus negatively valenced emotional ads. However, when motivation is high, attitudes are more favorable when the magnitude of allocated resources matches that required to process the ad. Three studies identify three distinct properties of emotions (univalence, purity, and self-consciousness) that can influence the resource demands of an ad. (c) 2009 by JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH, Inc.
Failure of optimized dual proton pump inhibitor amoxicillin therapy: What now?

For a decade following the initial description of dual amoxicillin–proton pump inhibitor (PPI) therapy by Unge et al.,[1] investigators attempted to optimize the doses and duration of this regimen in an attempt to reliably achieve >90% cure rates (reviewed in Dore et al.). [2] When given twice daily PPI and amoxicillin cured approximately 62% patients (range 60–64%),[3] and increasing the omeprazole dosage from 20 to 60 mg b.i. d. did not reliably improve outcome. [4] For example, even amoxicillin 750 mg t.i. d. with omeprazole 40 mg b.i. d. or 40 mg t.i. d. for 14 days cured only approximately 80% of cases. [5] Labenz et al.[6] gave 40–80 mg of omeprazole with amoxicillin 500 mg q.i. d. for 2 weeks with 82.8% success. In the USA, dual therapy with 1 g amoxicillin and 30 mg lansoprazole, each given every 8 h produced a 60–70% cure rate[7,8] and even this low cure rate was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Identifying Groups of Strongly Correlated Variables through Smoothed Ordered Weighted L1-norms

The failure of LASSO to identify groups of correlated predictors in linear regression has sparked signiﬁcant research interest. Recently, various norms [1, 2] were proposed, which can be best described as instances of ordered weighted ℓ 1 norms (OWL) [3], as an alternative to ℓ 1 regularization used in LASSO. OWL can identify groups of correlated variables but it forces the model to be constant within a group. This artifact induces unnecessary bias in the model estimation. In this paper we take a submodular perspective and show that OWL can be posed as the Lov´asz extension of a suitably deﬁned submodular function. The submodular perspective not only explains the group-wise constant behavior of OWL, but also suggests alternatives. The main contribution of this paper is smoothed OWL (SOWL), a new family of norms, which not only identiﬁes the groups but also allows the model to be ﬂexi-ble inside a group. We establish several algorithmic and theoretical properties of SOWL including group identiﬁcation and model consistency. We also provide algorithmic tools to compute the SOWL norm and its proximal operator, whose computational complexity O ( d log d ) is signiﬁcantly better than that of general purpose solvers in O ( d 2 log d ). In our experiments, SOWL compares favorably with respect to OWL in the regimes of interest.
Feed-Forward Regulation of Microbisporicin Biosynthesis in Microbispora corallina

ABSTRACT Lantibiotics are ribosomally synthesized, posttranslationally modified peptide antibiotics. Microbisporicin is a potent lantibiotic produced by the actinomycete Microbispora corallina and contains unique chlorinated tryptophan and dihydroxyproline residues. The biosynthetic gene cluster for microbisporicin encodes several putative regulatory proteins, including, uniquely, an extracytoplasmic function (ECF) σ factor, σMibX, a likely cognate anti-σ factor, MibW, and a potential helix-turn-helix DNA binding protein, MibR. Here we examine the roles of these proteins in regulating microbisporicin biosynthesis. S1 nuclease protection assays were used to determine transcriptional start sites in the microbisporicin gene cluster and confirmed the presence of the likely ECF sigma factor −10 and −35 sequences in five out of six promoters. In contrast, the promoter of mibA, encoding the microbisporicin prepropeptide, has a typical Streptomyces vegetative sigma factor consensus sequence. The ECF sigma factor σMibX was shown to interact with the putative anti-sigma factor MibW in Escherichia coli using bacterial two-hybrid analysis. σMibX autoregulates its own expression but does not directly regulate expression of mibA. On the basis of quantitative reverse transcriptase PCR (qRT-PCR) data, we propose a model for the biosynthesis of microbisporicin in which MibR functions as an essential master regulator and the ECF sigma factor/anti-sigma factor pair, σMibX/MibW, induces feed-forward biosynthesis of microbisporicin and producer immunity.
How Health Behaviors Relate to Academic Performance via Affect: An Intensive Longitudinal Study

Objective This intensive longitudinal study examined how sleep and physical activity relate to university students’ affect and academic performance during a stressful examination period. Methods On 32 consecutive days, 72 first-year students answered online questionnaires on their sleep quality, physical activity, positive and negative affect, learning goal achievement, and examination grades. First-year university students are particularly well-suited to test our hypotheses: They represent a relatively homogeneous population in a natural, but controlled setting, and simultaneously deal with similar stressors, such as examinations. Data were analyzed using multilevel structural equation models. Results Over the examination period, better average sleep quality but not physical activity predicted better learning goal achievement. Better learning goal achievement was associated with increased probability of passing all examinations. Relations of average sleep quality and average physical activity with learning goal achievement were mediated by experienced positive affect. In terms of day-to-day dynamics, on days with better sleep quality, participants reported better learning goal achievement. Day-to-day physical activity was not related to daily learning goal achievement. Daily positive and negative affect both mediated the effect of day-to-day sleep quality and physical activity on daily learning goal achievement. Conclusion Health behaviors such as sleep quality and physical activity seem important for both academic performance and affect experience, an indicator of mental health, during a stressful examination period. These results are a first step toward a better understanding of between- and within-person variations in health behaviors, affect, and academic performance, and could inform prevention and intervention programs for university students.
Prosthetic vision simulating system and its application based on retinal prosthesis

Retinal prosthesis provides a promising solution for retinitis pigmentosa (RP) and aged-related macular degeneration (AMD), which are the two major retinal degenerative diseases that cause a loss of vision. Clinical trials reported different irregular characteristics of phosphene map elicited by retinal prosthesis including irregular shaped phosphene, distorted phosphene array and dropout phenomenon. Psychological experiments under simulated prosthetic vision can be carried out to evaluate the ability of performing daily activities for prosthesis wearers. A prosthetic vision simulating system for retinal prosthesis is established based on a digital signal processor (DSP) TMS320DM642. In this system, external images captured by a microcamera are processed on the DSP and the simulation results are presented in a head-mounted display (HMD) after several image processing steps. Mathematic models are used to create phosphene maps with irregular characteristics including irregular shaped phosphene, distortion and dropout. This system can achieve a processing speed of 24 frames per second which can meet the requirement of the real-time processing. The portability and the real-time processing ability allow extensive psychological experiments to be conducted based on this system.
Analysis and Construction of Optimal Multivariate Biorthogonal Wavelets with Compact Support

In applications, it is well known that high smoothness, small support, and high vanishing moments are the three most important properties of a biorthogonal wavelet. In this paper, we shall investigate the mutual relations among these three properties. A characterization of $L_p\, (1\le p \le \infty)$ smoothness of multivariate refinable functions is presented. It is well known that there is a close relation between a fundamental refinable function and a biorthogonal wavelet. We shall demonstrate that any fundamental refinable function, whose mask is supported on [1-2r,2r-1]s for some positive integer r and satisfies the sum rules of optimal order 2r, has Lp smoothness not exceeding that of the univariate fundamental refinable function with the mask br. Here the sequence br on ${\Bbb Z}$ is the unique univariate interpolatory refinement mask which is supported on [1-2r,2r-1] and satisfies the sum rules of order 2r. Based on a similar idea, we shall prove that any orthogonal scaling function, whose mask is .
Parents' voices: “Our process of advocating for our child with autism.” A meta‐synthesis of parents' perspectives

BACKGROUND Advocacy has been described by parents of children with autism as an important coping strategy, enabling them to move forward by redirecting emotions into actions. A key factor in the development of collaborative and constructive partnerships between service providers and parents is having an understanding of how parents engage in advocacy and the support needed to do so. This meta-synthesis was undertaken to consolidate in-depth qualitative data from parents' perspectives of the process that they use to advocate for their children with autism. METHODS A qualitative meta-synthesis was conducted, whereby 15 databases were systematically searched. Thirty-one studies were identified and appraised using an adapted version of the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme tool. Data were synthesized into themes through the steps of review, meta-aggregation, integration, and interpretation. RESULTS The voices of 1,662 parents are presented describing the process of advocacy in the stages of seeking a diagnosis, seeking self-education, and taking action. Taking action includes 2 subthemes: seeking, access, and use of support services and community engagement and educating others. CONCLUSIONS Results highlight the significant impact that positive experiences with first-line professionals have during the diagnosis process and how these experiences lay the foundation for all future relationships with other service providers. Important implications arise from this meta-synthesis for service providers in supporting parents' advocacy and hence building constructive relationships with families with a child with autism.
Plasma Biomarkers for Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis*

Objective:Numerous studies have focused on biomarkers for acute lung injury and acute respiratory distress syndrome. Although several biomarkers have been identified, their relative performance is unclear. We aim to provide a quantitative overview of plasma-derived biomarkers associated with acute respiratory distress syndrome diagnosis or mortality. Data Sources:MEDLINE (inception to January 2012) and personal databases. Study Selection:English-language studies on plasma biomarkers associated with acute respiratory distress syndrome diagnosis or mortality. Data Extraction:Demographic variables, plasma levels of biomarker, statistical data, acute respiratory distress syndrome occurrence, and mortality rates were retrieved. The methodological quality was assessed with the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies score. Clinical outcomes included 1) diagnosis of acute respiratory distress syndrome in the at-risk population and 2) mortality in acute respiratory distress syndrome patients. For each biomarker, pooled odds ratios for clinical outcome were calculated by meta-analysis, and biomarkers were ranked according to pooled odds ratio. Data Synthesis:Fifty-four studies appeared eligible for meta-analysis, together including 3,753 patients. We identified 20 biomarkers for diagnosis of acute respiratory distress syndrome in the at-risk population and 19 biomarkers for mortality of acute respiratory distress syndrome patients. The biomarkers most strongly associated with acute respiratory distress syndrome diagnosis in the at-risk population, when increased, were Krebs von den Lungen-6 (odds ratio [95% CI], 6.1 [3.0–12.1]), lactate dehydrogenase (5.7 [1.7–19.1]), soluble receptor for advanced glycation end products (3.5 [1.7–7.2]), and von Willebrand Factor (3.1 [2.0–5.2]). The biomarkers most strongly associated with acute respiratory distress syndrome mortality, when increased, were interleukin-4 (18.0 [6.0–54.2]), interleukin-2 (11.8 [4.3–32.2]), angiopoietin-2 (6.4 [1.3–30.4]), and Krebs von den Lungen-6 (5.1 [3.0–12.2]). Decreased levels of Protein C were associated with increased odds for acute respiratory distress syndrome diagnosis and mortality. Conclusions:This meta-analysis provides a unique ranking of plasma biomarkers according to their strength of association with acute respiratory distress syndrome diagnosis or acute respiratory distress syndrome mortality. The relative performance of biomarkers among studies shown in this ranking may help to improve acute respiratory distress syndrome diagnosis and outcome prediction.
Social skills and theory of mind in children with traumatic brain injury

This thesis investigated the social competencies of children with traumatic brain injury (TBI) by investigating the predictors of social functioning and developing a measure of affective theory of mind (ToM). Study 1 examined the biopsychosocial predictors of social functioning in 56 children (7 - 16 years) with TBI. Using Beauchamp and Anderson’s (2010) socio-cognitive integration of abilities (SOCIAL) model, the study investigated the predictive abilities of family functioning, socio-economic status, children’s internal behaviours, executive functions, communication and social-cognitive abilities. A series of hierarchical multiple regression analyses showed that family functioning, internal behaviours, ecological executive functions and ToM made significant unique and collective contributions to the prediction of children’s socialisation skills and social behaviours. In light of the importance ToM has on children’s social functioning, Study 2 developed a measure of affective ToM and trialled its use on 17 children with TBI and a control group of 59 typically developing children (4 – 6.5 years). A visual and verbal version of a story book was developed to ask children a series of factual and emotional questions which were designed to assess their understanding of others’ feelings during social interactions. A series of analyses of variance were run, controlling for children’s receptive language skills. Although there was no significant difference between children with TBI and typically developing children on the factual and emotional questions, the results showed that children correctly answered significantly more emotional questions when the story was conveyed verbally as opposed to visually. There was no significant difference between book types on the fact questions. Furthermore, the results showed that affective ToM is a skill that develops with age, particularly during the preschool years. Both Study 1 and 2 have implications for the development of social rehabilitation techniques in children with TBI. In particular, Study 1 highlights the importance of family therapy and rehabilitation that targets children’s mood and understanding of others’ beliefs. Study 2 built on the concept of addressing ToM, and the findings have implications for teaching children about emotions and highlight the importance of language.
A Study of Consistent and Inconsistent Changes to Code Clones

Code cloning is regarded as a threat to software maintenance, because it is generally assumed that a change to a code clone usually has to be applied to the other clones of the clone group as well. However, there exists little empirical data that supports this assumption. This paper presents a study on the changes applied to code clones in open source software systems based on the changes between versions of the system. It is analyzed if changes to code clones are consistent to all code clones of a clone group or not. The results show that usually half of the changes to code clone groups are inconsistent changes. Moreover, the study observes that when there are inconsistent changes to a code clone group in a near version, it is rarely the case that there are additional changes in later versions such that the code clone group then has only consistent changes.
Stimulus and Response: the Law of Initial Value

Stimulus and Response: The Law of Initial Value. By Joseph Wilder, MD. Price, $14.50. Pp 352. The Williams and Wilkins Co., 428 E Preston St, Baltimore, 1967. For nearly 40 years Dr. Joseph Wilder has been writing and speaking about "The Law of Initial Value" (LIV); for the most part, at least until recently, his statements have made little impact. (One is tempted to describe his as a voice in the wilderness! ) In this country the principle was ignored by psychiatric researchers until brought to our attention by Lacey in 1956. Yet it remains far less widely known than it should be. The "Law" is simple enough. It indicates that: Given a standard stimulus and a standard period of time, the extent and direction of response of a physiological function at rest depends to a large measure on its initial (pre-experimental) level. The relations are as follows: the higher the initial value, the smaller the response to function-raising, and the larger the response to function-depressing stimuli. Beyond a certain medium range of initial values there is
Stomatal Blue Light Response Is Present in Early Vascular Plants1[OPEN]

Blue light responses of stomata occur in a wide lineage of plants except the fern species of Polypodiopsida. Light is a major environmental factor required for stomatal opening. Blue light (BL) induces stomatal opening in higher plants as a signal under the photosynthetic active radiation. The stomatal BL response is not present in the fern species of Polypodiopsida. The acquisition of a stomatal BL response might provide competitive advantages in both the uptake of CO2 and prevention of water loss with the ability to rapidly open and close stomata. We surveyed the stomatal opening in response to strong red light (RL) and weak BL under the RL with gas exchange technique in a diverse selection of plant species from euphyllophytes, including spermatophytes and monilophytes, to lycophytes. We showed the presence of RL-induced stomatal opening in most of these species and found that the BL responses operated in all euphyllophytes except Polypodiopsida. We also confirmed that the stomatal opening in lycophytes, the early vascular plants, is driven by plasma membrane proton-translocating adenosine triphosphatase and K+ accumulation in guard cells, which is the same mechanism operating in stomata of angiosperms. These results suggest that the early vascular plants respond to both RL and BL and actively regulate stomatal aperture. We also found three plant species that absolutely require BL for both stomatal opening and photosynthetic CO2 fixation, including a gymnosperm, C. revoluta, and the ferns Equisetum hyemale and Psilotum nudum.