Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Relaxation of rabbit ventricular muscle by Na-Ca exchange and sarcoplasmic reticulum calcium pump. Ryanodine and voltage sensitivity.

We studied relaxation during rapid rewarming of rabbit ventricular muscles that had been activated by rapid cooling. Rewarming from 1 degree to 30 degrees C (in less than 0.5 second) activates mechanisms that contribute to the reduction of intracellular calcium concentration and thus relaxation (e.g., sarcoplasmic reticulum [SR] calcium pump and sarcolemmal Na-Ca exchange and calcium pump). Rapid rewarming in normal Tyrode's solution induces relaxation with a half-time (t1/2) of 217 +/- 14 msec (mean +/- SEM). During cold exposure, changing the superfusate to a sodium-free, calcium-free medium with 2 mM CoCl2 (to eliminate Na-Ca exchange) slightly slows relaxation upon rewarming in the same medium (t1/2 = 279 +/- 44 msec). Addition of 10 mM caffeine (which prevents SR calcium sequestration) to normal Tyrode's solution during cold superfusion slows relaxation somewhat more (t1/2 = 376 +/- 31 msec) than sodium-free, calcium-free solution. However, if both interventions are combined (sodium-free + caffeine) during the cold exposure and rewarming, the relaxation is greatly slowed (t1/2 = 2,580 +/- 810 msec). These results suggest that either the SR calcium pump or, to a lesser extent, sarcolemmal Na-Ca exchange can produce rapid relaxation, but if both systems are blocked, relaxation is very slow. If muscles are equilibrated with 500 nM ryanodine before cooling, relaxation upon rewarming is not greatly slowed (t1/2 = 266 +/- 37 msec) even if sodium-free, calcium-free solution is applied during the cold and rewarming phases (t1/2 = 305 +/- 66 msec). This result suggests that ryanodine does not prevent the SR from accumulating calcium to induce relaxation. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Energetics of stalk intermediates in membrane fusion are controlled by lipid composition

We have used X-ray diffraction on the rhombohedral phospholipid phase to reconstruct stalk structures in different pure lipids and lipid mixtures with unprecedented resolution, enabling a quantitative analysis of geometry, as well as curvature and hydration energies. Electron density isosurfaces are used to study shape and curvature properties of the bent lipid monolayers. We observe that the stalk structure is highly universal in different lipid systems. The associated curvatures change in a subtle, but systematic fashion upon changes in lipid composition. In addition, we have studied the hydration interaction prior to the transition from the lamellar to the stalk phase. The results indicate that facilitating dehydration is the key to promote stalk formation, which becomes favorable at an approximately constant interbilayer separation of 9.0 ± 0.5 Å for the investigated lipid compositions.
Transport control by coherent zonal flows in the core/edge transitional regime.

3D Braginskii turbulence simulations show that the energy flux in the core/edge transition region of a tokamak is strongly modulated-locally and on average-by radially propagating, nearly coherent sinusoidal or solitary zonal flows. Their primary drive is the anomalous transport together with the Stringer-Winsor term. The transport modulation and the flow excitation are due to wave-kinetic effects studied for the first time in turbulence simulations. The flow amplitudes and the transport sensitively depend on the magnetic curvature acting on the flows, which can be influenced, e.g., by shaping the plasma cross section.
Inverse association of testosterone and the metabolic syndrome in men is consistent across race and ethnic groups.

CONTEXT Low sex hormone levels have been associated with the metabolic syndrome (MetS). OBJECTIVES Our objective was to determine whether the association between sex hormone levels and MetS varies by race/ethnicity among men and to investigate the relationship of sex hormones and individual components of MetS. DESIGN We conducted a population-based observational survey. PARTICIPANTS A multistage stratified design was used to recruit a random sample of 2301 racially/ethnically diverse men age 30-79 yr. Blood samples were obtained on 1899 men. Analyses were conducted on 1885 men with complete data on total testosterone (T), free T, and SHBG. INTERVENTIONS There were no interventions. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE MetS was defined using a modification of the Adult Treatment Panel III guidelines. The association between MetS and sex hormone levels was assessed using odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals estimated using logistic regression models. RESULTS A strong inverse association was observed, in both bivariate and multivariate analyses, between hormone levels and MetS. The odds of MetS increased about two-fold with a 1 sd decrease in hormone levels. The association between sex hormones and MetS was statistically significant across racial/ethnic groups. Although the magnitude of this association was largest among White men, racial/ethnic differences were not statistically significant. The strength of the association of sex hormones with individual components of MetS varied; stronger associations were observed with waist circumference and dyslipidemia and more modest associations with diabetes and elevated blood sugar. CONCLUSIONS A robust, dose-response relationship between sex hormone levels and odds of the metabolic syndrome in men is consistent across racial/ethnic groups.
Testing the mechanical resistance of timber used for construction in the marine environment

The paper describes refinements of rapid laboratory assessment of the mechanical performance of timbers used in the marine environment as regards their resistance to indentation, impact abrasion from smooth and sharp abrasives and to dynamic impact loads when wet. Ten tropical and home-grown hardwoods, five softwoods and a wood–polymer compound were examined. Brinell hardness, dynamic hardness, abrasion resistance, and the structural integrity in high-energy multiple impact tests were determined comparatively on dry and wet specimens. A trend was shown where softwoods show a decrease in abrasion resistance with wetting, whilst hardwoods did not. In dry conditions, impact abrasion using steel balls was higher than when using sharp grit. It is suggested that when wet, water in the cells has a hydraulic energy absorbing effect.
Agent-based virtual organisations for the Grid

The ability to create reliable, scalable virtual organisations (VOs) on demand in a dynamic, open and competitive environment is one of the challenges that underlie Grid computing. In response, in the CONOISE-G project, we are developing an infrastructure to support robust and resilient virtual organisation formation and operation. Specifically, CONOISE-G provides mechanisms to assure effective operation of agent-based VOs in the face of disruptive and potentially malicious entities in dynamic, open and competitive environments. In this paper, we describe the CONOISE-G system, outline its use in VO formation and perturbation, and review current work on dealing with unreliable information sources.
Ribavirin improves early responses to peginterferon through improved interferon signaling.

BACKGROUND & AIMS The therapeutic mechanisms of ribavirin for hepatitis C are unclear. Microarray analyses have shown that ribavirin increases induction of interferon-stimulated genes. We evaluated viral kinetics, serum cytokine expression, and viral mutagenesis during early stages of peginterferon therapy with and without ribavirin. METHODS Fifty patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection genotype 1 were randomly assigned to groups that were given peginterferon alpha-2a, with or without ribavirin, for 4 weeks; all patients then received an additional 44 weeks of combination therapy. First- and second-phase viral kinetics were evaluated. Serum levels of interferon-gamma-inducible protein-10 (IP10), monokine induced by interferon-gamma, and monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 were quantified as measures of the interferon-stimulated genes response. NS5A and NS5B were partially sequenced, and mutation rates were calculated. RESULTS The first-phase decrease in HCV RNA was similar between groups. Patients who received ribavirin had a more rapid second-phase decrease, compared with patients who did not receive ribavirin-particularly those with an adequate first-phase decrease (0.61 vs 0.35 log10 IU/mL/week; P = .018). At 12 hours, fold induction of serum IP10 was higher in patients given the combination therapy than those given peginterferon only (7.6- vs 3.8-fold; P = .01); however, the difference was greatest in patients with an adequate first-phase decrease in HCV RNA. IP10-induction correlated with first- and second-phase kinetics and with ribavirin serum concentrations on day 3. HCV mutation rates were similar between groups. CONCLUSIONS Ribavirin improves the kinetics of the early response to therapy in patients with an adequate initial response to peginterferon. Induction of interferon-stimulated cytokines correlates with viral kinetics following ribavirin therapy, suggesting that ribavirin promotes interferon signaling.
Negation Focus Identification with Contextual Discourse Information

Negative expressions are common in natural language text and play a critical role in information extraction. However, the performances of current systems are far from satisfaction, largely due to its focus on intrasentence information and its failure to consider inter-sentence information. In this paper, we propose a graph model to enrich intrasentence features with inter-sentence features from both lexical and topic perspectives. Evaluation on the *SEM 2012 shared task corpus indicates the usefulness of contextual discourse information in negation focus identification and justifies the effectiveness of our graph model in capturing such global information.
Authorship verification as a one-class classification problem

In the authorship verification problem, we are given examples of the writing of a single author and are asked to determine if given long texts were or were not written by this author. We present a new learning-based method for adducing the "depth of difference" between two example sets and offer evidence that this method solves the authorship verification problem with very high accuracy. The underlying idea is to test the rate of degradation of the accuracy of learned models as the best features are iteratively dropped from the learning process.
Dismantling the Lidcombe Program of early stuttering intervention: verbal contingencies for stuttering and clinical measurement.

BACKGROUND Data have accumulated to show that the Lidcombe Program of early stuttering intervention is a safe treatment with positive outcomes for preschoolers who stutter, and a randomized controlled trial is under way at the time of writing. Program components have not been investigated experimentally so the functionality of each component is unknown. AIMS The aim of this preliminary study was to establish the viability of a programme of research that would assess the clinical value of two program components. These components were parental verbal contingencies for stuttering and severity ratings. METHODS & PROCEDURES In the present preliminary experiment, 38 preschool children were randomized to an experiment involving a 4-week 'dose' of treatment followed by 4 weeks without treatment. The dependent variable was the percentage of syllables stuttered (%SS) obtained from the mean %SS score from recordings on three recording occasions. OUTCOMES & RESULTS Some preliminary indications were found that parental verbal contingencies for stuttering contributed to treatment outcomes. No preliminary evidence was found for the contribution of parent severity ratings to treatment outcomes. CONCLUSIONS It was concluded that a robust, statistical demonstration of these result would be desirable, but effect size estimates from the present data show that access to more than 650 families of stuttering preschool children would be required for such a study. Such a project would be beyond the resources of any one research group to complete in a timely manner, and a method to address this problem is proposed.
Outcomes for Older Patients With Hip Fractures: The Impact of Orthopedic and Geriatric Medicine Cocare

Objectives To assess the impact of a specifically designed model of orthopedic-geriatric cocare on hip fracture (HF) outcomes. Setting Tertiary teaching hospital (level I trauma center). Design Prospective observational study with a retrospective (historical) control. Data on 951 consecutive patients 60 years of age or older admitted to the authors' institution with a nonpathologic HF over a 7-year period (1995 to 2002) were analyzed. Between 1995 and 1997, medical problems were managed by a geriatric medicine (GM) consultation-only service (retrospective audit). In 1998, a GM registrar began overseeing daily medical care with weekly geriatrician consultant review (prospective study). Outcomes for 2 time periods were compared: a 3-year period before (no GM; 504 patients) and a 4-year period after (GM; 447 patients) the introduction of GM cocare. Main Outcome Measurements Postoperative medical complications, mortality, length of stay, discharge destination, use of thromboprophylaxis, and antiosteoporotic treatment. Results While comparing 2 periods (GM and no GM), significant reductions in postoperative medical complications and comorbid conditions (in total 49.5% vs. 71.0%, P<0.001) and mortality (4.7% vs. 7.7%, P<0.01) occurred and rehospitalization to medical wards within 6 months decreased (28% vs. 7.6%). However, no differences were observed in median length of hospital stay (10.8 vs. 11.0 days) or in discharge destination. Antiosteoporotic treatment (12% to 69%) and specific thromboprophylaxis (63% to 94%) increased in the GM period. Conclusions Orthopedic-geriatric cocare for the older patients with HF was associated with significant reductions in morbidity and mortality, and increases in optimal postoperative care. Options for further improvement of orthopedic-GM cocare need to be investigated.
National trends in asthma visits and asthma pharmacotherapy, 1978-2002.

BACKGROUND Research is limited on physicians' compliance with recent clinical guidelines for asthma treatment. OBJECTIVE Our purpose was to investigate the relationships among clinical guidelines, asthma pharmacotherapy, and office-based visits through use of nationally representative data. METHODS Nationally representative data on prescribing patterns by office-based US physicians were extracted from the National Disease and Therapeutic Index. We tracked 1978-2002 trends in the frequency of asthma visits and patterns of asthma pharmacotherapy, focusing on the use of controller and reliever medications. RESULTS The estimated annual number of asthma visits in the United States increased continuously from 1978 through 1990 (18 million visits); since 1990, it has remained relatively stable. Controller medication use increased 8-fold between 1978 and 2002, inhaled corticosteroids manifesting the biggest increases. The use of reliever medications, particularly short-acting oral beta(2)-agonists, decreased modestly over this period. The aggregate use of controllers (83% of visits) superseded that of relievers (80%) for the first time in 2001. Improved appropriateness of asthma pharmacotherapy was also suggested by an increase in the controller-to-reliever ratio, which reached 92% in 2002. Xanthines, which once dominated asthma therapy (63% of visits in 1978), were used in only 2% of visits in 2002. More recent drug entrants have been adopted rapidly, single-entity long-acting inhaled beta(2)-agonists being used in 9% of visits and leukotriene modifiers in 24% of visits in 2002. CONCLUSION Asthma pharmacotherapy has changed extensively in the past 25 years. Practices over the last decade are increasingly consistent with evidence-based guidelines. These changes in medication use might have contributed to the lack of a recent increase in asthma visits.
Free mRNA in excess upon polysome dissociation is a scaffold for protein multimerization to form stress granules

The sequence of events leading to stress granule assembly in stressed cells remains elusive. We show here, using isotope labeling and ion microprobe, that proportionally more RNA than proteins are present in stress granules than in surrounding cytoplasm. We further demonstrate that the delivery of single strand polynucleotides, mRNA and ssDNA, to the cytoplasm can trigger stress granule assembly. On the other hand, increasing the cytoplasmic level of mRNA-binding proteins like YB-1 can directly prevent the aggregation of mRNA by forming isolated mRNPs, as evidenced by atomic force microscopy. Interestingly, we also discovered that enucleated cells do form stress granules, demonstrating that the translocation to the cytoplasm of nuclear prion-like RNA-binding proteins like TIA-1 is dispensable for stress granule assembly. The results lead to an alternative view on stress granule formation based on the following sequence of events: after the massive dissociation of polysomes during stress, mRNA-stabilizing proteins like YB-1 are outnumbered by the burst of nonpolysomal mRNA. mRNA freed of ribosomes thus becomes accessible to mRNA-binding aggregation-prone proteins or misfolded proteins, which induces stress granule formation. Within the frame of this model, the shuttling of nuclear mRNA-stabilizing proteins to the cytoplasm could dissociate stress granules or prevent their assembly.
Packet-Oriented Routing in Delay-Tolerant Vehicular Sensor Networks

Currently, vehicular sensor network (VSN) has been paid much attention for moni-toring the physical world of urban areas. We have studied VSNs by utilizing about 4000 taxis and 1000 buses equipped with GPS-based mobile sensors in Shanghai to constitute a virtual vehicular sensor network. The communication-connection intermittence makes the routing issue nontrivial when delay-tolerant applications are deployed in VSNs. The existing DTN routing protocols can be categorized as “neighbor-oriented” and how to select a neighbor candidate was always neglected. In this paper, we present a new DTN routing protocol for Delay-Tolerant Vehicular Sensor Networks, Packet-Oriented Rout-ing protocol (POR), which is designed to emphasize neighbor selection based on aware-ness of packets to be sent and in consideration of probability to complete transferring of these packets. Our results show that POR performs much better than the ordinary Epi-demic routing, as well as other popular routing protocols applied in a similar setting.
From ARIES to MARS: transaction support for next-generation, solid-state drives

Transaction-based systems often rely on write-ahead logging (WAL) algorithms designed to maximize performance on disk-based storage. However, emerging fast, byte-addressable, non-volatile memory (NVM) technologies (e.g., phase-change memories, spin-transfer torque MRAMs, and the memristor) present very different performance characteristics, so blithely applying existing algorithms can lead to disappointing performance. This paper presents a novel storage primitive, called editable atomic writes (EAW), that enables sophisticated, highly-optimized WAL schemes in fast NVM-based storage systems. EAWs allow applications to safely access and modify log contents rather than treating the log as an append-only, write-only data structure, and we demonstrate that this can make implementating complex transactions simpler and more efficient. We use EAWs to build MARS, a WAL scheme that provides the same as features ARIES [26] (a widely-used WAL system for databases) but avoids making disk-centric implementation decisions. We have implemented EAWs and MARS in a next-generation SSD to demonstrate that the overhead of EAWs is minimal compared to normal writes, and that they provide large speedups for transactional updates to hash tables, B+trees, and large graphs. In addition, MARS outperforms ARIES by up to 3.7 x while reducing software complexity.
Face recognition under varying pose

Researchers in computer vision and pattern recognition have worked on automatic techniques for recognizing human faces for the last 20 years. While some systems, especially template-based ones, have been quite successful on expressionless, frontal views of faces with controlled lighting, not much work has taken face recognizers beyond these narrow imaging conditions. Our goal is to build a face recognizer that works under varying pose, the difficult part of which is to handle face relations in depth. Building on successful template-based systems, our basic approach is to represent faces with templates from multiple model views that cover different poses from the viewing sphere. To recognize a novel view, the recognizer locates the eyes and nose features, uses these locations to geometrically register the input with model views, and then uses correlation on model templates to find the best match in the data base of people. Our system has achieved a recognition rate of 98% on a data base of 62 people containing 10 testing and 15 modeling views per person. <<ETX>>
Syntaxin Isoform Specificity in the Regulation of Renal H+-ATPase Exocytosis*

Intercalated and inner medullary collecting duct (IMCD) cells of the kidney mediate the transport of H+ by a plasma membrane H+-ATPase. The rate of H+ transport in these cells is regulated by exocytic insertion of H+-ATPase-laden vesicles into the apical membrane. We have shown that the exocytic insertion of proton pumps (H+-ATPase) into the apical membrane of rat IMCD cells, in culture, involves SNARE proteins (syntaxin (synt), SNAP-23, and VAMP). The membrane fusion complex observed in IMCD cells with the induction of proton pump exocytosis not only included these SNAREs but also the H+-ATPase. Based on these observations, we suggested that the targeting of these vesicles to the apical membrane is mediated by an interaction between the H+-ATPase and a specific t-SNARE. To evaluate this hypothesis, we utilized a “pull-down” assay in which we identified, by Western analysis, the proteins in a rat kidney medullary homogenate that complexed with glutathione S-transferase (GST) fusion syntaxin isoforms attached to Sepharose 4B-glutathione beads. The syntaxin isoforms employed were 1A, 1B, 2, 4, 5, and also 1A that was truncated to exclude the H3 SNARE binding domain (synt-1AΔH3). All full-length syntaxin isoforms formed complexes with SNAP-23 and VAMP. Neither GST nor synt-1AΔH3 formed complexes with these SNAREs. H+-ATPase (subunits E, a, and c) bound to syntaxin-1A and to a lesser extent to synt-1B but not to synt-1AΔH3 or synt-2, -4, and -5. In cultured IMCD cells transfected to express syntaxin truncated for the membrane binding domain (synt-ΔC), expression of synt-1AΔC, but not synt-4ΔC, inhibited H+-ATPase exocytosis. In conclusion, because all full-length syntaxins examined bound VAMP-2 and SNAP-23, but only non-H3-truncated syntaxin-1 bound H+-ATPase, and synt-1AΔC expression by intact IMCD cells inhibited H+-ATPase exocytosis, it is likely that the H+-ATPase binds directly to the H3 domain of syntaxin-1 and not through VAMP-2 or SNAP-23. Interaction between the syntaxin-1A and H+-ATPase is important in the targeted exocytosis of the proton pump to the apical membrane of intercalated cells.