Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Heart transplantation-associated perioperative ischemic myocardial injury. Morphological features and clinical significance.

BACKGROUND The frequency and clinical significance of perioperative ischemic myocardial injury (PIMI) after heart transplantation and the diagnostic features distinguishing PIMI from rejection are not well defined. METHODS AND RESULTS We evaluated PIMI in the first four weekly endomyocardial biopsies and/or autopsy myocardium from 140 consecutive orthotopic heart transplantation recipients (1984 to 1991) by grading the severity of coagulative myocyte necrosis (CMN) as absent, 0; mild-focal, 1; moderate-multifocal, 2; or severe-confluent, 3, and determining the evolution of morphological features of its healing. CMN (often with contraction bands) was noted in 124 patients (89%); 24 patients (17%) had grade 3 CMN, of which 4 died within 30 days of transplantation. Nevertheless, at 1 year after surgery, survival was similar in patients with and without severe injury. Increased cold ischemic time but neither donor age nor intensity of inotropic support correlated with more severe early ischemic injury. PIMI inflammation was characterized by a predominantly polymorphonuclear/histiocytic infiltrate that contained lymphocytes and plasma cells, expanding the interstitium but not encroaching upon and separable from adjacent viable myocytes. Histological features of PIMI developed and resolved more slowly than those of typical myocardial infarct necrosis in nonimmunosuppressed patients; at 4 weeks, CMN persisted in 20% of patients and residual healing in nearly half. Diagnostic rejection was observed concurrently with PIMI in 54 of 533 biopsies (10%). CONCLUSIONS Diagnosed by conventional histological criteria, PIMI is prevalent early after heart transplantation and has a protracted healing phase that can mimic or coexist with rejection. Extensive PIMI has deleterious impact on short-term survival, but the long-term impact of PIMI remains to be established.
Attentional shifts to emotionally charged cues: Behavioural and ERP data.

Abstract When information activated in memory involves emotional associations, the ability to shift attention away from an emotional cue is impaired compared to an emotionally neutral cue. The purpose of the present study was to investigate how emotional stimuli modulate attentional processes, and how this is reflected in localised brain electrical activity. Eight emotion and eight neutral words served as cues in a covert attention spatial orienting task. The cues were either valid or invalid indicators of which hemifield the target would be presented to. In the remaining trials, no cue was presented prior to the target. Twenty subjects were instructed to manually respond to the target as fast as possible. Event-related potentials (ERPs) showed an enhanced P3 component to the emotion words. The ERPs to the target showed enhanced P1 and P3 components on invalid trials, with emotional cues. There were faster reaction times (RTs) to validly cued targets, but only when the emotion words served as cues. The re.
Flexible Ureteroscopic Management of Horseshoe Kidney Renal Calculi

ABSTRACT Purpose: To evaluate the clinical efficacy of flexible ureteroscope (F-URS) combined with holmium laser lithotripter in treating renal calculi in horseshoe kidney. Materials and Methods: From November 2010 to December 2013, the medical history and charts of sixteen patients (mean age 42.9±11.6 years, range 26-66 years), including 13 males and 3 females were analyzed retrospectively. Mean stone burden was 29±8 mm (range 17-42 mm2). Mean stone digitized surface area (DSA) was 321±94 mm2 (range 180-538 mm2). Under spinal anesthesia in a modified lithotomy position with the head down, rigid ureteroscope was placed firstly into the ureter to reach the level of the pelvis, a zebra guide wire was inserted and following the removal of the rigid ureteroscope, an ureteral access sheath was positioned along the guide wire, then passed the URF P-5 flexible ureteroscope into the renal cavities over the guidewire. After locating the stones, holmium laser lithotripsy was performed. Results: The average operative time was 92±16 minutes (range 74-127 min.). No major complications were encountered. Ten patients obtained stone-free status with one session, four obtained stone-free status after two sessions. Single session stone-free rate was 62.5%, overall stone-free rate was 87.5%. Two patients have small residual stones in the lower pole. Conclusions: F-URS combined with holmium laser lithotripter and nitinol basket, is safe and effective in dealing with moderate stone diameter (<30 mm) in HSKs with high clearance rates and low complication rates.
A framework to determine the optimal weight parameter of RED in next‐generation Internet routers

Active buffer management can improve the performance of Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol‐based networks. Random early detection (RED), an active queue management scheme, has been proposed by the Internet Engineering Task Force for next‐generation Internet routers. RED uses a number of parameters, such as buffer thresholds, a packet drop probability and a weight parameter. RED suffers from low throughput and large delay/jitter and induces instability in networks. Previous attempts to improve the performance of RED were based on modifying the thresholds and drop probabilities. In this paper, we show that an optimal value of the weight parameter can improve the performance of RED, and then develop a framework to determine the optimal value of the weight parameter. We show that the optimal weight parameter obtained from our framework improves the performance of RED. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Homogeneous Velocity-Distance Data for Peculiar Velocity Analysis. I. Calibration of Cluster Samples

We have combined five Tully-Fisher (TF) redshift-distance samples for peculiar velocity analysis: the cluster data of Han, Mould and coworkers (1991-93, HM) and Willick (1991, W91CL), and the field data of Aaronson et al. (1992), Willick (1991), Courteau & Faber (1992), and Mathewson et al. (1992), totaling over 3000 spiral galaxies. We treat the cluster data in this paper, which is the first of a series; in Paper II we treat the field TF samples. These data are to be combined with elliptical data (e.g., Faber et al. 1989) to form the MARK III CATALOG OF GALAXY PECULIAR VELOCITIES, which we will present in Paper III. The catalog will be used as input for POTENT reconstruction of velocity and density fields, described in later papers, as well as for alternative velocity analyses. Our main goal in Papers I & II is to place the TF data onto a self-consistent system by (i) applying a uniform set of corrections to the raw observables, (ii) determining the TF slopes and scatters separately for each sample, and (iii) adjusting the TF zeropoints to ensure mutually consistent distances. The global zeropoint is set by the HM sample, chosen because of its depth and uniformity on the sky and its substantial overlap with each of the other samples. In this paper, we calibrate the ``forward'' and ``inverse'' TF relations for HM and W91CL. We study the selection criteria for these samples and correct for the resultant statistical biases. The bias corrections are validated by comparing forward and inverse cluster distances. We find that many sample clusters are better modeled as ``expanding'' than relaxed, which significantly affects the TF calibrations. Proper corrections for internal extinction are derived self-consistently from the data.
Oral Administration of Polaprezinc Attenuates Fluorouracil‐induced Intestinal Mucositis in a Mouse Model

5‐Fluorouracil (5‐FU) has broadly been applied to treat colorectal cancer as one of the most effective chemotherapeutic agents. However, it frequently causes intestinal mucosal injury and related side effects, such as abdominal pain and diarrhoea, which limit the use of 5‐FU in a clinic setting. Polaprezinc has gradually become known as a mucosal protective agent for the management of gastric ulcer. This study aimed to investigate the prophylactic efficacy of Polaprezinc administered orally against intestinal mucositis induced by 5‐FU in mice on the condition that the antitumour effect could not be compromised. We induced intestinal mucositis in SPF‐grade ICR mice with 5‐FU, and evaluated intestinal damage in the absence or presence of Polaprezinc. We examined the score of diarrhoea and the loss of weight after the 5‐FU treatment and assessed the integrity of villus and the proliferation of small intestine crypt cells by haematoxylin and eosin staining and PCNA immunohistochemical detection. The antitumour effect of 5‐FU on colorectal cancer was assessed with or without Polaprezinc in a xenograft model. The result showed that Polaprezinc significantly reduced the elevated diarrhoea score and the body‐weight loss caused by 5‐FU abolished histological abnormality and crypt cell hypoproliferation in a dose‐dependent manner, without affecting 5‐FU efficacy on colon xenograft tumour in mice. We conclude that Polaprezinc could inhibit 5‐FU‐induced diarrhoea and alleviate the weight loss during 5‐FU chemotherapy, as a possible candidate for treatment and prevention of intestinal mucositis, through protecting intestinal mucosa and improving the quality of life after chemotherapy.
ALTRUISM AND THE PROMOTION OF INDIVIDUAL AND COMMUNITY WELL-BEING: A CROSS-CULTURAL EXPLORATION

06 CHAPTER 1: POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY AND THE PURSUIT OF WELL-BEING 09 1.1. The Birth of Positive Psychology 09 1.2. Characteristics of Positive Psychology 10 1.3. The Pursuit of Well-being – Two Traditions 11 1.4. Individual and Collective Well-being 12 1.4. 1. Separate Dimensions 13 1.4. 2. Inter-connected Dimensions 14 1.5. Towards an Inter-connected Perspective of Well-being 17 1.5. 1. Problem of a Binary Epistemology 19 1.5. 2. Problem of a Seesaw Methodology 20 1.6. Ṛta and Eudaimonia 23 1.7. At the Crossroads 25 CHAPTER 2: ALTRUISM – A REVIEW OF LITERATURE 28 2.1. Altruism Studies – Past and Present 28 2.1.1. Evolutionary Biology 28 2.1.2. Social Psychology 29 2.1.3. Positive Psychology 30 2.1.3.1. Altruism and Well-being 31 2.2. The Altruism Debate 33 2.2.1. An Issue of Definition 33 2.2.2. An Issue of Mistaken Perspective of Self/Other 34 2.2.2.1. Dichotomized and Polarizied Entities 34 2.2.2.2. Hierarchically Related Entities 35 2.3. Research Gaps and Point of Departure 36 2.3.1. Neglect of Altruism Concept 36 2.3. 2. Behavioural Reductionism 37 2.3. 3. Moving Beyond the Binary Perspective 38
Sperm protamine levels as indicators of fertilising potential in sexually mature male rats

We have earlier reported that administration of cyproterone acetate, fluphenazine decanoate, tamoxifen citrate, oestradiol valerate to adult male rats, at doses of 50, 5.77, 0.71, 0.28 μmol kg−1 body weight given for periods of 15, 60, 60, 10 days, respectively, partially suppressed/reduced availability of one or more reproductive hormones viz. LH, FSH, testosterone and reduced their siring ability. The reduction in epididymal sperm counts was not considerable after treatment with these drugs, but conventional methods of assessment of spermatozoa quality viz. sperm chromatin structure assay (SCSA), nuclear chromatin decondensation (NCD) assay, monobromobimane (mBBr) uptake, had shown quantifiable changes in caput sperm chromatin compaction and reduced the testicular levels of protamine 1. The present follow‐up study attempts to quantify changes in caudal sperm chromatin which has undergone compaction in the epididymis, in the altered hormonal microenvironment of rats treated with cyproterone acetate, tamoxifen citrate, fluphenazine decanoate, oestradiol valerate, at doses of 50, 5.77, 0.71, 0.28 μmol kg−1 body weight respectively given for periods of 15, 60, 60, 10 days, with a view to correlating these changes to reduction in their fertilising potential. During the androgen‐dependent transit of spermatozoa from caput to cauda epididymis, thiol group oxidation and tyrosine phosphorylation of protamine occurs in maturing sperms concomitant with development of fertilising ability. The results indicate that conventional methods viz. SCSA, NCD, mBBr uptake fail to detect changes induced by hormone deficits in sperm chromatin condensation, as a result of maturation during transit from caput to cauda epididymis. Absence of protamine 1 in epididymal sperm was observed in either testosterone or FSH deficient rats that correlated with reduced fertilising potential. The study suggests that changes in LH/T or FSH affect a hitherto unknown common molecular mechanism in the testis, underlying the protamination of rat spermatozoa. In conclusion, loss of P1 occurs in adult male rats deprived of T or FSH and is a reliable detectable change in epididymal sperm indicative of chromatin condensation defects associated with endocrine imbalance and poor fertility status.
Inversin relays Frizzled-8 signals to promote proximal pronephros development

Mutations of inversin cause type II nephronophthisis, an infantile autosomal recessive disease characterized by cystic kidney disease and developmental defects. Inversin regulates Wnt signaling and is required for convergent extension movements during early embryogenesis. We now show that Inversin is essential for Xenopus pronephros formation, involving two distinct and opposing forms of cell movements. Knockdown of Inversin abrogated both proximal pronephros extension and distal tubule differentiation, phenotypes similar to that of Xenopus deficient in Frizzled-8. Exogenous Inversin rescued the pronephric defects caused by lack of Frizzled-8, indicating that Inversin acts downstream of Frizzled-8 in pronephros morphogenesis. Depletion of Inversin prevents the recruitment of Dishevelled in response to Frizzled-8 and impeded the accumulation of Dishevelled at the apical membrane of tubular epithelial cells in vivo. Thus, defective tubule morphogenesis seems to contribute to the renal pathology observed in patients with nephronophthisis type II.
Developing effective supervisors : concepts of research supervision

Educating our early career researchers is becoming more complex. The range of doctoral degrees, the fast moving nature of knowledge, internationalisation, the demands of funding bodies and employers are all pulling on Ph.D. supervisors. The untrained Ph.D. supervisor will copy (or avoid copying) the way that they were supervised themselves. Current literature on Ph.D. supervision focuses either on lists of tasks that the supervisor must undertake or on conceptions of research. There is a need for a conceptual approach to research supervision. This phenomenological review of the literature relating to research supervision identifies six main concepts all of which contribute to our understanding. These are not competing concepts. Supervisors, supervisory teams and co-supervisors might use them to define or illuminate their practice. It is proposed that the range and depth of concepts that a supervisor holds will dictate how they supervise and the type of researcher who emerges at the end of the process. In an age of supercomplexity, when demands of academic and other employers are unpredictable, the skills of the effective researcher, and thus their supervisor, are likely to become even more important. South African Journal of Higher Education Vol. 21 (4) 2007: pp. 680-693
Spectroscopic studies of D-α-tocopherol concentration-induced transformation in egg phosphatidylcholne vesicles

The effects of embedding up to 60 mol% of α-tocopherol (α-Toc) on the morphology and structure of the egg phosphatidylcholine (PC) membrane were studied using spectroscopic techniques. The resulting vesicles were subjected to turbidometric and dynamic light scattering measurements to evaluate their size distribution. The α-Toc intrinsic fluorescence and its quenching was used to estimate the tocopherol position in the membrane. Optical microscopy was used to visualize morphological changes in the vesicles during the inclusion of tocopherol into the 2 mg/ml PC membrane. The incorporation of up to 15 mol% of tocopherol molecules into PC vesicles is accompanied by a linear increase in the fluorescence intensity and the simultaneous formation of larger, multilamellar vesicles. Increasing the tocopherol concentration above 20 mol% induced structural and morphological changes leading to the disappearance of micrometer-sized vesicles and the formation of small unilamellar vesicles of size ranging from 30 to 120 nm, mixed micelles and non-lamellar structures.
Hippocampal Injections of Amyloid β-Peptide 1-40 Impair Subsequent One-Trial/Day Reward Learning

The injection of amyloid beta-peptide (Abeta) into rat CNS has been reported to induce cellular neuropathology. The present study investigated whether multiple intrahippocampal injections of Abeta 1-40 would impair one-trial/day reward learning 14 days later. Twenty-four male Sprague-Dawley rats, 3-4 months old, were injected with either Abeta 1-40 or distilled water into seven hippocampal sites bilaterally. Ten rats received 3 nmol Abeta 1-40 in 2 microl of distilled water per injection site, while 14 rats received distilled water alone. Following a 9-day recovery period, rats were gradually food deprived to 82% of their initial body weight. Fourteen days after the intrahippocampal injection, all rats received an initial training trial and three subsequent daily retention trials. Rats receiving Abeta 1-40 were significantly impaired on the second retention trial in terms of accuracy (number of unbaited alleys entered) and on the second and third retention trials in terms of speed (reciprocal of latency to reward). Histological analysis showed that Abeta 1-40 injections produced significant neuronal loss and gliosis. Abeta 1-40 immunoreactivity persisted locally at the injection site and in macrophages 2 weeks following the hippocampal injections. These effects appear to be sequence-specific; rats receiving Abeta 1-42 with a scrambled peptide sequence did not differ significantly from rats receiving distilled water alone in retention of the learning task or degree of histological damage.
EDEN: Evolutionary deep networks for efficient machine learning

Deep neural networks continue to show improved performance with increasing depth, an encouraging trend that implies an explosion in the possible permutations of network architectures and hyperparameters for which there is little intuitive guidance. To address this increasing complexity, we propose Evolutionary DEep Networks (EDEN), a computationally efficient neuro-evolutionary algorithm which interfaces to any deep neural network platform, such as TensorFlow. We show that EDEN evolves simple yet successful architectures built from embedding, 1D and 2D convolutional, max pooling and fully connected layers along with their hyperparameters. Evaluation of EDEN across seven image and sentiment classification datasets shows that it reliably finds good networks — and in three cases achieves state-of-the-art results — even on a single GPU, in just 6–24 hours. Our study provides a first attempt at applying neuro-evolution to the creation of 1D convolutional networks for sentiment analysis including the optimisation of the embedding layer.
Soft tissue characteristics for the reconstruction of ruminant phylogeny

In the attempt to derive phylogenetic relationships from the most comprehensive of character matrices, not only molecular, biochemical and osteological, but also data from less frequently used domains such as behaviour, life history, physiology and soft tissue anatomy are sought. Here, soft tissue traits that have been used in ruminant phylogenetic analyses, and that are potentially available for such analyses, are reviewed. The use of certain measures, such as the presence of an ileocaecal gland or certain skin glands, or the number of colic coils, appears unfounded. Using the presence of the gall bladder as a family trait disregards notable exceptions in the Bovidae. The largest set of potential, easily available soft tissue data appears to be related to the digestive tract, but has so far not been utilized. Generally, the paucity of recent anatomical studies is striking, which means that many available anatomical reports or drawings stem from the beginning of the 20th century. Currently no dataset exists that describes soft tissue anatomy for various organ systems in the same specimens (as is standard for osteological traits taken from whole skeletons). Suggestions are presented how data evaluation and scoring can be performed avoiding circular reasoning, and a plea is made for using data on a species, not a family level. The importance of assessing data independence and correcting for body mass-related effects is emphasized. For most organ systems, new, coordinated, systematic dissections are necessary before a reliable inclusion of soft tissue traits will become possible.
Transcriptional and Functional Analysis of the Neisseria gonorrhoeae Fur Regulon

ABSTRACT To ensure survival in the host, bacteria have evolved strategies to acquire the essential element iron. In Neisseria gonorrhoeae, the ferric uptake regulator Fur regulates metabolism through transcriptional control of iron-responsive genes by binding conserved Fur box (FB) sequences in promoters during iron-replete growth. Our previous studies showed that Fur also controls the transcription of secondary regulators that may, in turn, control pathways important to pathogenesis, indicating an indirect role for Fur in controlling these downstream genes. To better define the iron-regulated cascade of transcriptional control, we combined three global strategies—temporal transcriptome analysis, genomewide in silico FB prediction, and Fur titration assays (FURTA)—to detect genomic regions able to bind Fur in vivo. The majority of the 300 iron-repressed genes were predicted to be of unknown function, followed by genes involved in iron metabolism, cell communication, and intermediary metabolism. The 107 iron-induced genes encoded hypothetical proteins or energy metabolism functions. We found 28 predicted FBs in FURTA-positive clones in the promoters and within the open reading frames of iron-repressed genes. We found lower levels of conservation at critical thymidine residues involved in Fur binding in the FB sequence logos of FURTA-positive clones with intragenic FBs than in the sequence logos generated from FURTA-positive promoter regions. In electrophoretic mobility shift assay studies, intragenic FBs bound Fur with a lower affinity than intergenic FBs. Our findings further indicate that transcription under iron stress is indirectly controlled by Fur through 12 potential secondary regulators.
Occurrence and virulence factors of non‐O157 Shiga toxin‐producing Escherichia coli in retail meat in Dunedin, New Zealand

H.J.L. BROOKS, B.D. MOLLISON, K.A. BETTELHEIM, K. MATEJKA, K.A. PATERSON AND V.K. WARD. 2001. Retail raw meat was sampled for the presence of Shiga toxin‐producing Escherichia coli (STEC) using enrichment culture and Vero cell assay. The STEC obtained were serotyped and tested for enterohaemolysin (Ehly) production and the eae gene. The presence of Shiga toxin genes (stx) was confirmed by polymerase chain reaction. A total of 18 STEC were isolated accounting for 12% of beef, 17% of lamb and 4% of pork samples. Five isolates produced Ehly but none possessed the eae gene. Five isolates were identified which possessed the stx2 gene and belonged to serotypes associated with severe infection.