Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The effect of hearing impairment in older people on the spouse: Development and psychometric testing of The Significant Other Scale for Hearing Disability (SOS-HEAR)

The effects of hearing impairment on the person with the impairment and on their significant others are pervasive and affect the quality of life for all involved. The effect of hearing impairment on significant others is known as a third-party disability. This study aimed to develop and psychometrically test a scale to measure the third-party disability experienced by spouses of older people with hearing impairment. The Significant Other Scale for Hearing Disability (SOS-HEAR) was based on results of a previous qualitative study investigating the effect of hearing impairment on a spouse's everyday life. Psychometric testing with 100 spouses was conducted using item analysis, Cronbach's alpha, factor analysis, and test-retest reliability. Principal components analysis identified six key underlying factors. A combined set of 27 items was found to be reliable (alpha = 0.94), with weighted kappa for items ranging from fair to very good. The SOS-HEAR is a brief, easy to administer instrument that has evidence of reliability and validity. The SOS-HEAR could serve as a means of identifying spouses of older people with hearing impairment in need of intervention, directed towards either the couple or the spouse alone.
Supporting Online Material Materials and Methods Som Text Figs. S1 to S11 Schemes S1 to S10 Tables S1 and S2 a Global View of the Lithosphere-asthenosphere Boundary

isotopically chiral (S)-and (R)-2 eight and six times, respectively (table S1, entries 25 to 32 and 33 to 38). The results show the same stereochemical correlations without any exception (23). 13 C 6-phenylmethanol 3 were used as chiral initiators of asymmetric autocatal-ysis. When (S)-3 was used as the chiral trigger, enantioselective addition of i-Pr 2 Zn to pyrimidine-5-carbaldehyde 4 afforded (S)-pyrimidyl alkanol 5 with 95% ee in 96% yield (entry 25). In contrast , the reaction in the presence of (R)-3 gave (R)-alkanol 5 with 92% ee (entry 26). These correlations between the 13 C isotope chirality and the configuration of the produced alkanol 5 also showed strong reproducibility, with (S)-and (R)-3 inducing the production of (S)-and (R)-5, respectively (Table 1, entries 27 to 32, and table S1, entries 39 to 46) (23). In these enantioselective reactions, the initial formation of the zinc alkoxide of the isotopically chiral alcohol tips the enantiomeric balance of the initial i-Pr 2 Zn addition to aldehyde 4; thus, a small enantiomeric excess of the zinc alkoxide of 5 is induced. After this step, the subsequent auto-catalytic amplification of the small enantiomeric excess causes the zinc alkoxide of 5 to accumulate at enhanced ee, with an absolute configuration tied to that of the 13 C-labeled chiral alcohol (1, 2, or 3) used to trigger the process. Thus, the extremely small chiral effect generated by the substitution of the carbon isotope must be responsible , not for the amplification of the enan-tiomeric excess in the asymmetric autocatalysis, but for the enantioselection observed, that is, for the enantiomer produced in excess in the formation of the initial zinc alkoxide intermediate and therefore in the final production of 5. Only minute energy differences can be associated with the isotopically substituted enantiomer of 1, 2, or 3 in causing the tiny enantiomeric excess of the alkoxide that triggers the asymmetric autocatalysis arising from the dialkylzinc addition to 4 (Fig. 2). It has been recognized that such minute energy differences are not interpretable with the tools available to structural theory (15, 31). In the initial reaction stage, the minute energy differences have a tiny effect, which is then cooperatively amplified to the final large enantio-meric excess. It is therefore impossible to disclose a structural reason for the difference in frequency of these initial enantiotopic face selectivities. The " cooperation–amplification " effect, which has been discussed regarding the structural effect of hydrogen …
Nanoparticle-based delivery of small interfering RNA: challenges for cancer therapy

During recent decades there have been remarkable advances and profound changes in cancer therapy. Many therapeutic strategies learned at the bench, including monoclonal antibodies and small molecule inhibitors, have been used at the bedside, leading to important successes. One of the most important advances in biology has been the discovery that small interfering RNA (siRNA) is able to regulate the expression of genes, by a phenomenon known as RNA interference (RNAi). RNAi is one of the most rapidly growing fields of research in biology and therapeutics. Much research effort has gone into the application of this new discovery in the treatment of various diseases, including cancer. However, even though these molecules may have potential and strong utility, some limitations make their clinical application difficult, including delivery problems, side effects due to off-target actions, disturbance of physiological functions of the cellular machinery involved in gene silencing, and induction of the innate immune response. Many researchers have attempted to overcome these limitations and to improve the safety of potential RNAi-based therapeutics. Nanoparticles, which are nanostructured entities with tunable size, shape, and surface, as well as biological behavior, provide an ideal opportunity to modify current treatment regimens in a substantial way. These nanoparticles could be designed to surmount one or more of the barriers encountered by siRNA. Nanoparticle drug formulations afford the chance to improve drug bioavailability, exploiting superior tissue permeability, payload protection, and the “stealth” features of these entities. The main aims of this review are: to explain the siRNA mechanism with regard to potential applications in siRNA-based cancer therapy; to discuss the possible usefulness of nanoparticle-based delivery of certain molecules for overcoming present therapeutic limitations; to review the ongoing relevant clinical research with its pitfalls and promises; and to evaluate critically future perspectives and challenges in siRNA-based cancer therapy.
Pharmacokinetics and dose proportionality of ceftibuten in men

The pharmacokinetics and dose proportionality of ceftibuten were evaluated in healthy male volunteers receiving single oral doses of 200, 400, and 800 mg of ceftibuten. The drug was absorbed with similar times to the maximum concentration of drug in plasma for all three doses. Concentrations of ceftibuten in plasma increased with increasing dose. Analysis of variance was carried out on the dose-adjusted values for the maximum concentration of drug in plasma and the area under the plasma concentration-time curve; the results indicated that the concentrations in plasma after the 200- and 400-mg doses were dose proportional, and after the 800-mg of dose they were less than dose proportional. The elimination half-life from plasma ranged from 2.0 to 2.3 h and was independent of dose. The total excretion of unchanged ceftibuten in urine accounted for 53 to 68% of the dose, and the renal clearance was estimated to be 53 to 61 ml/min after all doses. The amount of ceftibuten-trans, the major in vitro and in vivo conversion product of ceftibuten, was low in both plasma and urine.
Serum vitamin A in mothers and newborns in the city of Rio de Janeiro

Retinol and carotenoid levels were determined spectrophotometrically in the blood of 222 mothers at delivery and in the umbilical cord of the newborns. We observed an important prevalence of vitamin A deficiency (VAD) among mothers and newborns (25.4% and 46.2%, respectively) as well as carotenoid inadequacy (52.3% and 92.6% in mothers and newborns, respectively), and an increased risk of VAD development among newborns whose mothers had VAD (odds ratio = 4.79). We found an increased risk of carotenoid inadequacy when VAD was already present in both groups (odds ratio = 2.21 and odds ratio = 6.85 in mothers and newborns, respectively). There were relationships between previous abortion and maternal VAD (P=0.022) and lower carotenoid levels among newborns (P=0.019), as well as inadequate maternal serum carotenoid levels and interdelivery interval less than 18 months. These findings suggest the need for interventional actions to prevent retinol and carotenoid inadequacy, and low antioxidant reserves.
Retrieval of Similar Travel Routes Using GPS Tracklog Place Names

GPS tracklogs provide a valuable record of routes travelled. In this paper we describe initial experiments exploring the use of text information retrieval techniques for the location of similar trips from within a GPS tracklog. We performed the experiment on a dataset of 528 individual trips gathered over a seven month time period from a single user. The results of our preliminary study suggest that traditional text-based information retrieval techniques can indeed be used to locate similar and related tracklogs.
New Features for FrameNet - WordNet Mapping

Many applications in the context of natural language processing or information retrieval may be largely improved if they were able to fully exploit the rich semantic information annotated in high-quality, publicly available resources such as the FrameNet and the WordNet databases. Nevertheless, the practical use of similar resources is often biased by the limited coverage of semantic phenomena that they provide. A natural solution to this problem would be to automatically establish anchors between these resources that would allow us 1) to jointly use the encoded information, thus possibly overcoming limitations of the individual corpora, and 2) to extend each resource coverage by exploiting the information encoded in the others. In this paper, we present a supervised learning framework for the mapping of FrameNet lexical units onto WordNet synsets based on a reduced set of novel and semantically rich features. The automatically learnt mapping, which we call MapNet, can be used 1) to extend frame sets in the English FrameNet, 2) to populate frame sets in the Italian FrameNet via MultiWordNet and 3) to add frame labels to the MultiSemCor corpus. Our evaluation on these tasks shows that the proposed approach is viable and can result in accurate automatic annotations.
A Computational Study on Thiourea Analogs as Potent MK-2 Inhibitors

Mitogen-activated protein kinase-activated protein kinase 2 (MK-2) has been identified as a drug target for the treatment of inflammatory diseases. Currently, a series of thiourea analogs as potent MK-2 inhibitors were studied using comprehensive computational methods by 3D-QSAR, molecular docking and molecular dynamics simulations for a further improvement in activities. The optimal 3D models exhibit high statistical significance of the results, especially for the CoMFA results with r2ncv, q2 values of 0.974, 0.536 for the internal validation, and r2pred, r2m values of 0.910, 0.723 for the external validation and Roy’s index, respectively. In addition, more rigorous validation criteria suggested by Tropsha were also employed to check the built models. Graphic representation of the results, as contoured 3D coefficient plots, also provides a clue to the reasonable modification of molecules: (i) The substituent with a bulky size and electron-rich group at the C5 position of the pyrazine ring is required to enhance the potency; (ii) The H-bond acceptor group in the C3 position of the pyrazine ring is likely to be helpful to increase MK-2 inhibition; (iii) The small and electropositive substituent as a hydrogen bond donor of the C2 position in the oxazolone ring is favored; In addition, several important amino acid residues were also identified as playing an important role in MK-2 inhibition. The agreement between 3D-QSAR, molecular docking and molecular dynamics simulations also proves the rationality of the developed models. These results, we hope, may be helpful in designing novel and potential MK-2 inhibitors.
Structural basis for recruitment of mitochondrial fission complexes by Fis1

Mitochondrial fission controls mitochondrial shape and physiology, including mitochondrial remodeling in apoptosis. During assembly of the yeast mitochondrial fission complex, the outer membrane protein Fis1 recruits the dynamin-related GTPase Dnm1 to mitochondria. Fis1 contains a tetratricopeptide repeat (TPR) domain and interacts with Dnm1 via the molecular adaptors Mdv1 and Caf4. By using crystallographic analysis of adaptor-Fis1 complexes, we show that these adaptors use two helices to bind to both the concave and convex surfaces of the Fis1 TPR domain. Fis1 therefore contains two interaction interfaces, a binding mode that, to our knowledge, has not been observed previously for TPR domains. Genetic and biochemical studies indicate that both binding interfaces are important for binding of Mdv1 and Caf4 to Fis1 and for mitochondrial fission activity in vivo. Our results reveal how Fis1 recruits the mitochondrial fission complex and will facilitate efforts to manipulate mitochondrial fission.
Clinical Investigation : Lymphoma Involved-Site Image-Guided Intensity Modulated Versus 3 D Conformal Radiation Therapy in Early Stage Supradiaphragmatic Hodgkin Lymphoma

Involved-Site Image-Guided Intensity Modulated Versus 3D Conformal Radiation Therapy in Early Stage Supradiaphragmatic Hodgkin Lymphoma Andrea Riccardo Filippi, MD,* Patrizia Ciammella, MD,y Cristina Piva, MD,* Riccardo Ragona, MSc,* Barbara Botto, MD,z Paolo Gavarotti, MD,x Francesco Merli, MD,k Umberto Vitolo, MD,z Cinzia Iotti, MD,y and Umberto Ricardi, MD* *Department of Oncology, University of Torino, Torino, Italy; yRadiation Therapy Unit, Department of Oncology and Advanced Technology, ASMN Hospital IRCCS, Reggio Emilia, Italy; zHematology, Città della Salute e della Scienza, Torino, Italy; xHematology, University of Torino and Città della Salute e della Scienza, Torino, Italy; and kHematology Unit, ASMN Hospital IRCCS, Reggio Emilia, Italy
Fishing Season of Large Tuna from Purse Seine Fishery in Tumumpa, Manado, North Sulawesi

Knowledge on seasonal fishing pattern is essential in fisheries research in order to increase the effectiveness of fishing and at the same time protecting the fishing ground from excessive fishing practices. Determining the seasonal fishing pattern of large pelagic fishes, namely large tuna (yellowfin and bigeye), small tuna (mackerel) and skipjack tuna were the objective of this study. Data from the 2013-2015 fishing operation time series were used to analyze the fishing season using the percentage average per unit effort (CPUE) method. The main focus of this study was purse seine fishery. The research showed that high fishing season of large pelagic fishes allegedly occurred during May to July, which reached its peak on May. On the other hand, low fishing season occurred during January to April, with the lowest on March. There were similarities between large tuna, small tuna and skipjack in term of their seasonal fishing pattern, although they did not show any good correlation (r<0.5). This might due to fact that even tough large tuna, small tuna and skipjack tuna shared the same ecological niche but apparently, they did not show any interaction (symbiosis) but competition.
B Cell: T Cell Interactions Occur within Hepatic Granulomas during Experimental Visceral Leishmaniasis

Hepatic resistance to Leishmania donovani infection in mice is associated with the development of granulomas, in which a variety of lymphoid and non-lymphoid populations accumulate. Although previous studies have identified B cells in hepatic granulomas and functional studies in B cell-deficient mice have suggested a role for B cells in the control of experimental visceral leishmaniasis, little is known about the behaviour of B cells in the granuloma microenvironment. Here, we first compared the hepatic B cell population in infected mice, where ≈60% of B cells are located within granulomas, with that of naïve mice. In infected mice, there was a small increase in mIgMlomIgD+ mature B2 cells, but no enrichment of B cells with regulatory phenotype or function compared to the naïve hepatic B cell population, as assessed by CD1d and CD5 expression and by IL-10 production. Using 2-photon microscopy to quantify the entire intra-granuloma B cell population, in conjunction with the adoptive transfer of polyclonal and HEL-specific BCR-transgenic B cells isolated from L. donovani-infected mice, we demonstrated that B cells accumulate in granulomas over time in an antigen-independent manner. Intra-vital dynamic imaging was used to demonstrate that within the polyclonal B cell population obtained from L. donovani-infected mice, the frequency of B cells that made multiple long contacts with endogenous T cells was greater than that observed using HEL-specific B cells obtained from the same inflammatory environment. These data indicate, therefore, that a subset of this polyclonal B cell population is capable of making cognate interactions with T cells within this unique environment, and provide the first insights into the dynamics of B cells within an inflammatory site.
Neuronal long-range temporal correlations and avalanche dynamics are correlated with behavioral scaling laws

Scale-free fluctuations are ubiquitous in behavioral performance and neuronal activity. In time scales from seconds to hundreds of seconds, psychophysical dynamics and the amplitude fluctuations of neuronal oscillations are governed by power-law-form long-range temporal correlations (LRTCs). In millisecond time scales, neuronal activity comprises cascade-like neuronal avalanches that exhibit power-law size and lifetime distributions. However, it remains unknown whether these neuronal scaling laws are correlated with those characterizing behavioral performance or whether neuronal LRTCs and avalanches are related. Here, we show that the neuronal scaling laws are strongly correlated both with each other and with behavioral scaling laws. We used source reconstructed magneto- and electroencephalographic recordings to characterize the dynamics of ongoing cortical activity. We found robust power-law scaling in neuronal LRTCs and avalanches in resting-state data and during the performance of audiovisual threshold stimulus detection tasks. The LRTC scaling exponents of the behavioral performance fluctuations were correlated with those of concurrent neuronal avalanches and LRTCs in anatomically identified brain systems. The behavioral exponents also were correlated with neuronal scaling laws derived from a resting-state condition and with a similar anatomical topography. Finally, despite the difference in time scales, the scaling exponents of neuronal LRTCs and avalanches were strongly correlated during both rest and task performance. Thus, long and short time-scale neuronal dynamics are related and functionally significant at the behavioral level. These data suggest that the temporal structures of human cognitive fluctuations and behavioral variability stem from the scaling laws of individual and intrinsic brain dynamics.
The simplest ENSO recharge oscillator

Eastern Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) and mean equatorial Pacific thermocline depth are key variables in El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). A linear fit to observations leads to a remarkably simple picture: ENSO can be represented by a classical damped oscillator, with SST and thermocline depth playing the roles of momentum and position, respectively. An independent fit of observed relationships between western and eastern thermocline depth, central wind stress and eastern Pacific SST yields the same picture and supports a recharge oscillator interpretation. The oscillation arises from the interaction between the recharge time of the Warm Pool and the time delay between east and west Pacific. Both finite Kelvin wave speed and SST dynamics contribute to the time delay. Including seasonality in the description, we find two periods of relative instability: boreal spring, with a large phase progression, and autumn, with nearly stationary phase.
Preparation of Silver- and Zinc-Doped Mullite-Based Ceramics Showing Anti-Bacterial Biofilm Properties

Zinc- and silver-doped mullite ceramic discs were prepared and tested as potentially resistant materials against bacterial adhesion and biofilm formation. Elemental analysis and X-ray diffraction studies showed that zinc ions were incorporated in the structural framework of the mullite, while silver ions remained outside the mullite crystal lattice, which allowed their slow (0.02 ppm/24 hours) leaching into the surrounding aqueous environment. In agreement with this behavior, silver-doped mullite showed potent resistance against surface attachment of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, while on the other hand, zinc-doped mullite failed to stop bacterial attachment.
Toward Cost-Efficient 100G Metro Networks Using IM/DD, 10-GHz Components, and MLSE Receiver

We demonstrate the generation and transmission of 28-Gb/s data employing inexpensive, off-the-shelf, 10-GHz 3-dB bandwidth optical components, intensity modulation (IM), direct detection (DD), and a digital signal processing-based receiver over uncompensated fiber links. We prove that the proposed technology is an enabler for next-generation 100-G cost-efficient point-to-point dispersion compensation fiber (DCF)-free metro networks up to 80 km, as well as for multispan metro-ring networks up to 400 km, consisting of cascaded erbium-doped fiber amplifiers and DCFs as in real-field implementations. Key techniques to enable transmission are the employment of signal predistortion in the transmitter to compensate for the components' limited bandwidth, a maximum likelihood sequence estimator (MLSE)-based receiver, and a high-performance sampling phase adjustment algorithm. Furthermore, we show that performance can be optimized, while at the same time the complexity of the electronic dispersion compensation part is significantly reduced by exploiting a simplified variant of MLSE that makes use of a reduced number of states. Results in this paper reveal the potentiality of our proposed scheme for a low-cost transition to 100 Gb/s ( $4 \times 28$ Gb/s) wavelength division multiplexed, point-to-point, metro-core, and multispan metro-ring networks, employing inexpensive optical components and the traditional cost-efficient IM/DD scheme.
Differential susceptibilities of U-937 cell clones to infection by human immunodeficiency virus type 1

Single-cell clones derived from the U-937 monocytic cell line were studied for susceptibility to infection by human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1). Of four such clones, we found that three (UC12, UC14, and UC18) supported replication of HIV-1 more efficiently than parental U-937 cells, as measured by reverse transcriptase activity and p24 core antigen production. In contrast, another clone (UC11) showed only baseline infection throughout an 8-week culture period, before finally becoming positive for expression of viral antigen. This differential susceptibility to infection directly correlated with accumulation of intracellular viral DNA. Furthermore, the UC11 clone expressed lower levels of Sendai virus-inducible tumor necrosis factor alpha mRNA than did the UC12 or UC18 clones. Susceptibility to infection did not correlate with expression of cell surface CD4, since all clones expressed similar levels of CD4 mRNA and surface membrane CD4 protein. Prior exposure of both susceptible UC18 and resistant UC11 clones to Leu3a antibody completely blocked infection by HIV-1, suggesting that no other independent receptors were recognized by the virus.