Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Oncologic and functional outcome following sacrectomy for sacral chordoma.

BACKGROUND Sacral chordoma is a rare, low to intermediate-grade tumor that poses substantial challenges in terms of timely diagnosis and adequate treatment. Few studies have examined the oncologic and functional outcomes of patients treated for sacral chordoma. METHODS The clinical records of sixteen patients who had undergone sacrectomy for chordoma between 1985 and 2001 were evaluated retrospectively. All patients underwent resection by means of a sequential combined anterior and posterior approach. Patients were followed clinically at six-month intervals following recovery from the index surgical procedure. The disease onset, treatment, hospital stay, recurrence rates, survival, adjuvant therapy, functional outcome measures, and complications were evaluated. RESULTS The average age at the time of diagnosis was sixty-one years. The mean tumor size was 15.2 cm in diameter, and all patients had a resection involving S1 or S2. The mean duration of follow-up was sixty-six months, and the tumor recurred in twelve of the sixteen patients. The mean time to metastasis was fifty months. Four patients were clinically disease-free at a mean follow-up of 94.5 months, while five patients died as a result of progressive local or metastatic disease at a mean follow-up of 31.4 months. Only one patient had normal bowel and bladder control postoperatively, and only three were able to walk without assistive devices. Eight patients had wound complications, and one patient had a deep-vein thrombosis. With the numbers available, neither negative margins at the time of initial tumor resection nor adjuvant radiation therapy had a significant impact on survival or local recurrence. More cephalad levels of resection were associated with significantly worse bowel (p = 0.01) and bladder (p = 0.01) control. Complications were frequent and were more common with a larger tumor size at the time of presentation (p = 0.034). CONCLUSIONS The treatment of sacral chordoma is an arduous clinical undertaking that requires a multidisciplinary approach and attention to detail from the outset. Despite aggressive well-planned surgical management and adherence to strict surveillance protocols, frequent recurrence and the late onset of metastatic disease are to be expected in a substantial proportion of patients, especially those with a very large chordoma or one at a more cephalad level. Adequate surgical treatment results in substantial functional impairment and numerous complications; however, it does offer the possibility of long-term disease-free survival. We advocate an attempt at complete resection, when there is still a possibility of cure, and aggressive treatment of local recurrences. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE Therapeutic Level IV. See Instructions to Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.
Mammalian evolution and biomedicine: new views from phylogeny

Recent progress resolving the phylogenetic relationships of the major lineages of mammals has had a broad impact in evolutionary biology, comparative genomics and the biomedical sciences. Novel insights into the timing and historical biogeography of early mammalian diversification have resulted from a new molecular tree for placental mammals coupled with dating approaches that relax the assumption of the molecular clock. We highlight the numerous applications to come from a well‐resolved phylogeny and genomic prospecting in multiple lineages of mammals, from identifying regulatory elements in mammalian genomes to assessing the functional consequences of mutations in human disease loci and those driving adaptive evolution.
Sentinel cases of community-acquired methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus onboard a naval ship.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is emerging as a community-acquired organism. A number of recent reports have documented its involvement in a variety of infections in which no risk factors for nosocomial transmission are present. This report presents the initial cases of a MRSA outbreak on a U.S. Navy ship. Each patient failed traditional antibiotic therapy and one required hospitalization. Their presentations evolved simultaneously and proved to be sentinel cases of an outbreak of cutaneous MRSA infections. The events of this outbreak emphasize the growing need to consider the prevalence of resistant organisms in outpatient settings, as well as the impact that infections from resistant organisms might have on the combat readiness of a military unit. Recommendations addressing infection-control guidelines for MRSA within close-quarter environments of healthy adults, such as military units, need to be developed and existing infection-control measures need to be regularly emphasized.
Development of a Strain-Specific Molecular Method for Quantitating Individual Campylobacter Strains in Mixed Populations

ABSTRACT The identification of sites resulting in cross-contamination of poultry flocks in the abattoir and determination of the survival and persistence of campylobacters at these sites are essential for the development of intervention strategies aimed at reducing the microbial burden on poultry at retail. A novel molecule-based method, using strain- and genus-specific oligonucleotide probes, was developed to detect and enumerate specific campylobacter strains in mixed populations. Strain-specific oligonucleotide probes were designed for the short variable regions (SVR) of the flaA gene in individual Campylobacter jejuni strains. A 16S rRNA Campylobacter genus-specific probe was also used. Both types of probes were used to investigate populations of campylobacters by colony lift hybridization. The specificity and proof of principle of the method were tested using strains with closely related SVR sequences and mixtures of these strains. Colony lifts of campylobacters were hybridized sequentially with up to two labeled strain-specific probes, followed by the generic 16S rRNA probe. SVR probes were highly specific, differentiating down to 1 nucleotide in the target sequence, and were sufficiently sensitive to detect colonies of a single strain in a mixed population. The 16S rRNA probe detected all Campylobacter spp. tested but not closely related species, such as Arcobacter skirrowi and Helicobacter pullorum. Preliminary field studies demonstrated the application of this technique to target strains isolated from poultry transport crate wash tank water. This method is quantitative, sensitive, and highly specific and allows the identification and enumeration of selected strains among all of the campylobacters in environmental samples.
Depth from Defocus vs . Stereo : How Different Really Are They ?

Depth from Focus (DFF) and Depth from Defocus (DFD) methods are theoretically unified with the geometric triangulation principle. Fundamentally, the depth sensitivities of DFF and DFD are not different than those of stereo (or motion) based systems having the same physical dimensions. Contrary to common belief, DFD does not inherently avoid the matching (correspondence) problem. Basically, DFD and DFF do not avoid the occlusion problem any more than triangulation techniques, but they are more stable in the presence of such disruptions. The fundamental advantage of DFF and DFD methods is the two-dimensionality of the aperture, allowing more robust estimation. We analyze the effect of noise in different spatial frequencies, and derive the optimal changes of the focus settings in DFD. These results elucidate the limitations of methods based on depth of field and provide a foundation for fair performance comparison between DFF/DFD and shape from stereo (or motion) algorithms.
Screening for dementia by memory testing

Enhanced cued recall provides a simple and clinically useful memory test for identifying dementia in the elderly. Because this test induces semantic processing and coordinates encoding and retrieval for maximum recall, genuine memory deficits due to impairment of specific memory processes can be distinguished from apparent memory deficits due to use of inefficient strategies or impairment of other cognitive processes. Since genuine memory deficits in the elderly are usually associated with dementia, their identification is highly predictive of clinical dementia. The present study validates the use of enhanced cued recall as a screening test for dementia in 70 aged subjects. All but one person with a pure amnesia were correctly classified. Enhanced cued recall correctly classified 97% of the 120 subjects in this and the previous study. Enhanced cued recall shows learning not revealed by free recall, providing more accurate measurement of memory, and distinguishes demented from nondemented elderly more accurately than either free recall or recognition.
How much white space is there ?

This paper uses data from the FCC and the 2000 USA Census to estimate the actual white space (in terms of area/population recovered) available for cognitive radios in TV bands in the continental USA. The available white space is the intersection of white spaces resulting from two different viewpoints. The “pollution” viewpoint reflects the cognitive radios’ perspective: where is interference from the primary tolerable? The primary users’ perspective is called the “protection” viewpoint: where can a secondary operate without generating excessive ‘harmful interference’ to the primary? For most practical systems that may operate in the TV bands, it turns out that the operational limit comes from the pollution-oriented view within the channel itself but from the protection-oriented view for adjacent channels. The amount of white space resulting from the protectionoriented view is greatly effected by the level of ‘harmful interference’ tolerated. Harmful interference is crisply quantified by the primary user’s fading margin potentially eroded by the secondary’s operation. This is connected to the idea of interference temperature. Based on the FCC’s November 14 th ruling in 2008, the median (across TV towers) erosion of the fading margin is ∼ 1dB. Furthermore, the available white space depends on the scale of secondary users — while the current DTV channel allocation cannot accommodate new TV stations, about five channels are available for 4W fixed transmitters (averaged over the population distribution). We propose a principled way for regulators to choose the protection margin for primaries that can be eroded by secondary operation. This approach quantifies the political tradeoff between person-channels gained for potential whitespace usage versus person-channels lost for broadcasters as we vary the protection margin. For the choice of protection margin(s) used by the FCC, the overall tradeoff is at least 30:1 while being approximately 3:1 at the margin — that is three additional people gain a channel for potential white-space use for every additional person that potentially loses reception of a channel of broadcast television. Finally, the data validates the conservatism of fixed threshold rules for white-space detection — the -114dBm rule for ATSC signals fails to recover most available white space except in areas of low population density.
Activation of Healthy Hemisphere in Poststroke Recovery: A Transcranial Doppler Study

Background and Purpose The possible involvement of the healthy hemisphere in functional recovery in stroke hemiplegia is still controversial. This study of patients who had suffered ischemic stroke assessed circulatory changes in the healthy hemisphere by transcranial Doppler ultrasonography during opposition exercise of fingers that had recovered movement. Methods Measurements of flow velocity in the middle cerebral arteries were recorded in 12 recovered hemiplegic stroke patients and 12 healthy sex- and age-matched control subjects during a 2-minute sequential thumb-to-finger opposition task, alternatively performed with normal and recovered fingers. The effects of the motor task on heart rate, blood pressure, and end-tidal Pco2 were also evaluated. Results With respect to the basal values, a comparable increase of flow velocity (%mean±SD) in the contralateral middle cerebral artery occurred in patients during movement of normal (9.7 ±2.7%) and recovered fingers (10.4±5.1%) and in controls (113±4.9%). However, in the middle cerebral artery ipsilateral to the hand performing the motor task, the increase of flow velocity was significantly higher (P<.001, two-way analysis of variance) during movement of the recovered hand in patients (10.5±4.6%) than during the movement of the normal hand in both patients (1.7±3.7%) and controls (1.8±4.5%). No significant difference of changes in heart rate, blood pressure, and end-tidal Pco2 was observed for patients or normal control subjects during the various phases of the study. Conclusions Our data suggest that activation of the healthy hemisphere contributes toward functional recovery of motor deficit after stroke and confirms the ability of transcranial Doppler ultrasonography to correlate cerebral artery flow dynamics with selective cerebral activation. (Stroke. 1993;24:1673-1677.)
Reasoning about Truthfulness of Agents Using Answer Set Programming

We propose a declarative framework for representing and reasoning about truthfulness of agents using answer set programming. We show how statements by agents can be evaluated against a set of observations over time equipped with our knowledge about the actions of the agents and the normal behavior of agents. We illustrate the framework using examples and discuss possible extensions that need to be considered.
Home BP Monitoring Using a Telemonitoring System is Effective for Controlling BP in a Remote Island in Japan

The purpose of this study was to assess whether a home blood pressure (HBP) telemonitoring system could improve BP control and overcome the problems of HBP monitoring in a remote location. The authors enrolled 60 subjects and randomized them to either a Telemonitoring group or a Control group. The outcomes were changes in HBP level, adherence to HBP monitoring, and visual analog scale (VAS; score 0–100) as a measure of the motivation to perform HBP measurements. The reductions in morning systolic BP (−5.5±0.9 mm Hg vs 0.7±0.7 mm Hg, P<.001) and evening systolic BP (−4.6±1.0 mm Hg vs 1.0±1.1 mm Hg, P<.001) and the change in VAS (12.8±3.3 vs −1.6±2.2, P=.001) were significantly greater in the Telemonitoring group than in the Control group. The measure of the adherence to HBP monitoring tended to be better (P=.064) in the Telemonitoring group than in the Control group. These results indicate that an HBP telemonitoring system would be a beneficial healthcare measure in remote geographical locations.
Lactic acid levels in pleural fluid from patients with bacterial pleuritis

Pleural fluid lactic acid estimations were carried out on 60 samples by gas-liquid chromatography. Lactic acid levels in 12 patients with bacterial pleural infection were statistically significantly higher (mean, 287 mg/dl; range, 135 to 482 mg/dl) than in 18 patients with malignancy (mean, 71 mg/dl; range, 24 to 157 mg/dl) and 30 other patients with pleural effusions (mean, 19 mg/dl; range, 10 to 57 mg/dl). The determination of pleural fluid lactic acid may help in differentiating between empyema and nonbacterial pleural effusions in most cases. It is of particular value when antibiotic therapy has commenced before specimen collection and may be useful for monitoring therapy.
An online optimization for dynamic power management

In this paper, we combine a spherical coordinate method and a gradient learning optimization algorithm to solve the dynamic power management (DPM) problem. In our approach, the DPM is modeled as a constrained SMDP problem with unknown model parameters. By utilizing an augmented Lagrange multiplier method, we provide an online optimization method for the DPM. This method may estimate the gradient of the augmented Lagrange function with respect to the policy parameters and optimize the performance in an online way. The simulation tests show that the method has better convergence property and higher efficiency.
2004 AANP National Nurse Practitioner Sample Survey, Part I: An Overview

In August 2004, the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) completed the 2004 AANP National Nurse Practitioner Sample Survey. The purpose of this survey was to identify the characteristics and practices of nurse practitioners (NPs). The survey consisted of 65 questions and replicated earlier surveys conducted by AANP in 1989 and 1999, with minor adaptations. Items addressed NP clinical specialization, educational preparation, patient populations, practice communities and settings, prescriptive practices, salaries and benefits, marketing strategies, liability experiences, and other variables. Adaptations to the 1989 and 1999 surveys were made to ensure relevance to current practice (such as the addition of newer specialties), while allowing for trending and comparisons over time. The five-page survey and an explanatory coversheet were mailed to a randomly selected sample of 23,850 NPs. The survey was blinded to ensure anonymous responses. The sample was drawn from the AANP National NP Database, which includes essentially the universe of U.S. NPs and which documented approximately 97,000 individual NPs recognized to practice in the United States in early 2004; thus, the sample represented 25% of the total NP population. The stratified random sample was limited to NPs who indicated that they maintained a clinical NP practice when responding to the 2003–2004 AANP National NP Practice Site Survey in order tomaximize participation by practicing NPs. It was further stratified to reflect the clinical specialty distribution of the overall NP population. There was slight oversampling of the smallest specialties, such as school and occupational health NPs, with slight undersampling of the largest group, family NPs. While many respondents had multiple specialties, each identified one area of clinical practice as their main specialty and the main specialty was the variable by which the sample was stratified. Completed surveys were returned by 16,543 NPs (response rate 69%), and 16,062 respondents were actively practicing at the time of the survey. This report is limited to the NP respondents who were in active clinical NP practice, representing approximately 17% of the total NP population. Table 1 compares the true distribution of NP specialty based on the AANP National NP Database statistics (AANP, 2004) with the respondent sample and demonstrates the variation based on sampling strategy and responses. The 2004 AANP National NP Sample Survey is the largest survey of NPs with this degree of detail conducted to date. Owing to the sheer volume of data collected and analyzed through the 2004 AANP National NP Sample Survey, a series of articles will be published describing the findings. This overview will be followed by more in-depth reports discussing more detailed variation based on variables such as practice settings and communities, educational preparation, clinical specialization, and time in role.
Post hoc analysis of the relationship between baseline white blood cell count and survival outcome in a randomized Phase III trial of decitabine in older patients with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia

Background In a Phase III trial, 485 patients (≥65 years) with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia received decitabine 20 mg/m2 intravenously for 5 days every 4 weeks or a treatment choice (supportive care or cytarabine 20 mg/m2 subcutaneously for 10 days every 4 weeks). Materials and methods We summarized overall and progression-free survival by baseline white blood cell count using two analyses: <1, 1–5, >5×109/L; ≤10 or >10×109/L. Results There were 446 deaths (treatment choice, n=227; decitabine, n=219). Median overall survival was 5.0 (treatment choice) versus 7.7 months (decitabine; nominal P=0.037). Overall survival differences between white blood cell groups were not significant; hazard ratios (HRs) favored decitabine. Significant progression-free survival differences favored decitabine for groups 1–5×109/L (P=0.005, HR =0.67), greater than 5×109/L (P=0.027, HR =0.71), and up to 10×109/L (P=0.003, HR =0.72). Conclusion There was a trend toward improved outcome with decitabine, regardless of baseline white blood cell count.
Three-dimensional imaging of the intracellular assembly of a functional viral RNA replicase complex

ABSTRACT Positive-strand RNA viruses, which can be devastating pathogens in humans, animals and plants, replicate their genomes on intracellular membranes. Here, we describe the three-dimensional ultrastructural organization of a tombusvirus replicase in yeast, a valuable model for exploring virus–host interactions. We visualized the intracellular distribution of a viral replicase protein using metal-tagging transmission electron microscopy, a highly sensitive nanotechnology whose full potential remains to be developed. These three-dimensional images show how viral replicase molecules are organized when they are incorporated into the active domains of the intracellular replication compartment. Our approach provides a means to study protein activation mechanisms in cells and to identify targets for new antiviral compounds. Summary: Study of virus and cell functions by molecular mapping and three-dimensional imaging of a viral replication complex using a clonable tag for electron microscopy analysis.
Latent Space Sparse Subspace Clustering

We propose a novel algorithm called Latent Space Sparse Subspace Clustering for simultaneous dimensionality reduction and clustering of data lying in a union of subspaces. Specifically, we describe a method that learns the projection of data and finds the sparse coefficients in the low-dimensional latent space. Cluster labels are then assigned by applying spectral clustering to a similarity matrix built from these sparse coefficients. An efficient optimization method is proposed and its non-linear extensions based on the kernel methods are presented. One of the main advantages of our method is that it is computationally efficient as the sparse coefficients are found in the low-dimensional latent space. Various experiments show that the proposed method performs better than the competitive state-of-the-art subspace clustering methods.
Aberrant Subcellular Localization of Peroxisomal 3-Ketoacyl-CoA Thiolase in the Zellweger Syndrome and Rhizomelic Chondrodysplasia Punctata

ABSTRACT: Fibroblasts from patients with the inherited disorder Zellweger syndrome have few or no peroxisomes; multiple biochemical processes that normally occur in this organelle are defective. Rhizomelic chondrodysplasia punc-tata (RCDP) is another inherited disorder in which two unrelated peroxisomal metabolic processes, plasmalogen synthesis and phytanic acid oxidation, are impaired despite the normal appearance of peroxisomal structure. It was previously reported that one of the enzymes of peroxisomal fatty acid β-oxidation, 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase (β-keto-thiolase), was present in precursor rather than mature form in both of these diseases. Immunofluorescent staining for peroxisomal β-ketothiolase showed the immunoreactivity to be localized in subcellular particles in fibroblasts from both Zellweger syndrome and RCDP patients, even though the former lack normal peroxisomes. Immunoblot studies were performed to determine the subcellular location of the thiolase precursor in fractionated fibroblasts from Zellweger and RCDP patients. In both disorders, thiolase immunoreactivity was detected in subcellular fractions having a lower density than normal peroxisomes and mitochondria, and was resistant to digestion by proteinase K. The density of the thiolase precursor-containing fractions was similar to that of peroxisomal membrane “ghost” fractions recently described by Santos et al. (J Biol Chem 263:10502–10509, 1988). Our results suggest that these are not empty membrane vesicles but contain at least one peroxisomal matrix protein. Furthermore, they exist not only in cells in which normal peroxisomes fail to form (Zellweger syndrome), but also in some cells which have catalase-containing peroxisomes (RCDP).