Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effect of various cryoprotective agents on the viability and reproductive efficiency of chicken spermatozoa.

Abstract Chicken spermatozoa were washed and resuspended in a buffer containing various concentrations of glycerol, dimethylsulphoxide (DMSO), and ethylene glycol and the following were measured: respiration, motility, fertility, and hatchability. Regardless of concentration (4, 8 or 12%), each compound maintained the endogenous respiration rate of spermatozoa for 120 min. incubation at 41° C. All cryoprotective agents a t a concentration of 4 or 8% increased respiration for at least 30 min. of incubation. All cryoprotective agents maintained normal levels of motility for only 15 min. at concentrations of 4 and 8%. Each cryoprotective agent regardless of level significantly reduced the fertilizing capacity of chicken spermatozoa. Equilibration of spermatozoa for 15 min. at 41° C. with either DMSO (8%) or ethylene glycol (4 and 8%) resulted in a further decrease in fertility. Hatchability of eggs was reduced by DMSO and ethylene glycol but was unaffected by glycerol.
Chronic nicotine‐induced changes in gene expression of delta and kappa‐opioid receptors and their endogenous ligands in the mesocorticolimbic system of the rat

Delta and kappa opioid receptors (DOR and KOR, respectively) and their endogenous ligands, proenkephalin (PENK) and prodynorphin (PDYN)‐derived opioid peptides are proposed as important mediators of nicotine reward. This study investigated the regulatory effect of chronic nicotine treatment on the gene expression of DOR, KOR, PENK and PDYN in the mesocorticolimbic system. Three groups of rats were injected subcutaneously with nicotine at doses of 0.2, 0.4, or 0.6 mg/kg/day for 6 days. Rats were decapitated 1 hr after the last dose on day six, as this timing coincides with increased dopamine release in the mesocorticolimbic system. mRNA levels in the ventral tegmental area (VTA), lateral hypothalamic area (LHA), amygdala (AMG), dorsal striatum (DST), nucleus accumbens, and medial prefrontal cortex were measured by quantitative real‐time PCR. Our results showed that nicotine upregulated DOR mRNA in the VTA at all of the doses employed, in the AMG at the 0.4 and 0.6 mg/kg doses, and in the DST at the 0.4 mg/kg dose. Conversely, PDYN mRNA was reduced in the LHA with 0.6 mg/kg nicotine and in the AMG with 0.4 mg/kg nicotine. KOR mRNA was also decreased in the DST with 0.6 mg/kg nicotine. Nicotine did not regulate PENK mRNA in any brain region studied.
Nano-sized carbon black exposure exacerbates atherosclerosis in LDL-receptor knockout mice.

BACKGROUND Associations between exposure to particulate matter and susceptibility to cardiovascular events have been reported. Although the underlying mechanisms are not fully understood, this association seems to be particularly exaggerated in the presence of atherothrombotic risk factors. The present study was undertaken in low-density lipoprotein receptor knockout (LDLR/KO) mice to test the hypothesis that long-term exposure to a high dose of nano-sized carbon black (CB) exacerbates atherosclerotic lesions. METHODS AND RESULTS LDLR/KO mice were subjected to a 10-week intratracheal dispersion of CB (1 mg/week) or air under a 0% or 0.51% cholesterol (Chol) diet. Development of aortic lipid-rich lesions was detected in mice under a 0.51% Chol diet with or without CB dispersion, but not in mice fed a 0% Chol diet with or without CB. Quantification of the area stained with oil red O revealed the highest percentage in CB-treated mice on a 0.51% Chol diet among the 4 groups. One-way ANOVA indicated CB-treated mice with 0.51% Chol diet had a significantly higher percentage of positive staining than vehicle-treated mice with 0.51% Chol diet (p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS In LDLR-deficient mice under a high Chol diet, exposure to CB resulted in acceleration of development of atherosclerosis.
Discrimination and sexual risk among Caribbean Latinx young adults

ABSTRACT Objectives: Discrimination, such as being treated unfairly due to race, contributes to stress. Individuals may cope with this by engaging in risky behaviors. Consistent with this premise, prior studies found that discrimination is associated with substance use. Research has also shown that sex while ‘high’ on alcohol and drugs is associated with increased risk for HIV and other STIs. The present study examines the relationship between discrimination and sexual risk. We investigate whether discrimination is associated with sex while high on alcohol and drugs. Design: Analyses focus on a sample of 356 Caribbean Diasporic young adults, primarily Caribbean Latinx, aged 18 to 25 who participated in the Drug Use and HIV Risk among Youth Survey carried out from 1997 to 2000 in Brooklyn, New York. Logistic regression examined the association between self-reported discrimination and sex while high. Results: More than half (52.3%) of respondents reported moderate discrimination. Sex while high was also reported: 35.7% for alcohol, 43.3% for marijuana, and 32.6% for heroin/cocaine. Discrimination was associated with increased risk of sex while high on (1) marijuana and (2) heroin/cocaine, but was not with alcohol. Conclusions: Discrimination may be a risk factor for engaging in sex while high on drugs, which may put individuals at risk for HIV as well as other STIs. Future research should explore relationships between discrimination and sex while high on alcohol and drugs among various racial/ethnic groups and Diasporas, while also assessing how this relationship may contribute to HIV incidence.
Effect of dietary fat source on antibody production and lymphocyte proliferation in chickens.

The purpose of the present study was to assess the effect of fat source on the immune response of chickens. One-day-old pullets were fed corn and soybean meal-based diets containing 7% by weight one of the following fat sources: lard, corn oil, canola oil, linseed oil (LO), or fish oil (FO). After being fed experimental diets for 3 wk, humoral and cellular immune responses were assessed. Chicks were injected with SRBC and antibody titers were measured, 7 days later, by hemagglutination. Concanavalin A (Con A), pokeweed mitogen (PWM), or lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated proliferation of splenocytes was assessed by [3H]thymidine incorporation. Results demonstrated that antibody titers in FO-fed chicks were higher (P less than .005) compared with titers in chicks fed the other fat sources. The proliferative response to Con A and PWM were 30 to 50% lower (P less than .13 and P less than .05, respectively) in chicks fed the oils rich in omega-3 fatty acids, LO and FO. The response to LPS was poor. The effect of dietary fats source on lymphocyte proliferation was completely abrogated when autologous chicken serum was excluded from the culture medium. Fat source also seemed to affect growth and feed intake of the chickens. In conclusion, dietary fat source has a significant impact on the immune response of chickens.
Synomones of two sympatric species deter attack by the pine engraver, Ips pini (Coleoptera: Scolytidae)

The capture of pine engravers, Ipspini (Say), in ipdienol-baited, multiple-funnel traps in British Columbia was significantly reduced when devices releasing ipsenol or verbenone were placed in the traps. These results suggest that ipsenol and verbenone are synomones released by Ipslatidens (LeC.) and the mountain pine beetle, Dendroctonusponderosae Hopk. , respectively. When verbenone and ipsenol were released together from five stations 2 m apart on felled trees, at 50 and 1.5 mg per day per tree, respectively, there was a 66.7% reduction in the number of logs attacked and a 98.8% reduction in attack density. The same treatment caused a 74.1% reduction in attack density on standing trees surrounded by a 4 × 4 grid of 16 release devices at 5- m centres. The antiaggregant composition of verbenone plus ipsenol has considerable operational potential for use in precommercial thinnings and in areas where standing pines are of high value; e.g., in rural subdivisions, shelterbelts, and recreational forests.
A Multi-Country Study of Harms to Children Because of Others' Drinking.

OBJECTIVE This study aims to ascertain and compare the prevalence and correlates of alcohol-related harms to children cross-nationally. METHOD National and regional sample surveys of randomly selected households included 7,848 carers (4,223 women) from eight countries (Australia, Chile, Ireland, Lao People's Democratic Republic [PDR], Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam). Country response rates ranged from 35% to 99%. Face-to-face or telephone surveys asking about harm from others' drinking to children ages 0-17 years were conducted, including four specific harms: that because of others' drinking in the past year children had been (a) physically hurt, (b) verbally abused, (c) exposed to domestic violence, or (d) left unsupervised. RESULTS The prevalence of alcohol-related harms to children varied from a low of 4% in Lao PDR to 14% in Vietnam. Alcohol-related harms to children were reported by a substantial minority of families in most countries, with only Lao PDR and Nigeria reporting significantly lower levels of harm. Alcohol-related harms to children were dispersed sociodemographically and were concentrated in families with heavy drinkers. CONCLUSIONS Family-level drinking patterns were consistently identified as correlates of harm to children because of others' drinking, whereas sociodemographic factors showed few obvious correlations.
Pollinator body size mediates the scale at which land use drives crop pollination services

Summary Ecosystem services to agriculture, such as pollination, rely on natural areas adjacent to farmland to support organisms that provide services. Native insect pollinators depend on natural or semi-natural land surrounding farms for nesting and alternative foraging resources. Despite interest in conserving pollinators through habitat restoration, the scale at which land use affects pollinators and thus crop pollination services is not well understood. We measured abundance of native, wild bee pollinators and the pollination services they provided to highbush blueberry Vaccinium corymbosum L. crops at 16 sites that varied in the proportion of surrounding agricultural land cover at both the field scale (300-m radius) and the landscape scale (1500-m radius). We designed our study such that agricultural land cover at the field scale was uncorrelated with agricultural cover at the landscape scale across sites. We used model selection to determine which spatial scale better predicted aggregate bee abundance, abundance of large versus small bees and crop pollination services. We found that, overall, bees responded more strongly to field-scale than to landscape-scale land cover, but the scale at which land cover had the strongest effect varied by bee body size. Large bees showed a negative response to increasing agricultural cover at both scales, but were most strongly affected by the landscape scale. Small bees were negatively affected by agricultural land cover but only at the field scale, while they had a small positive response to agricultural cover at the landscape scale. Aggregate pollination services from native bees were more strongly influenced by field-scale agricultural cover, due to the combined effects of both large and small bees responding at that scale. Synthesis and applications. Bee abundance and pollination services were strongly determined by field-scale agricultural cover, suggesting that field-scale set-asides may provide significant benefits to pollination services. Further, we found that pollinators respond differently to land use depending on body size, but all groups of bees benefit from decreasing agricultural cover at the field scale. Therefore, small-scale modifications to habitat can have significant impacts on both pollinator abundance and pollination services to crop plants.
Debloating Software through Piece-Wise Compilation and Loading

Programs are bloated. Our study shows that only 5% of libc is used on average across Ubuntu Desktop environment (>2200 programs); the heaviest user, vlc media player, only used 18%. This is striking because bloating presents a vulnerable attack surface for software exploitation and imposes undue burden on defenses (e.g., CFI defenses). In this paper: (1) We present a debloating framework built on a compiler toolchain that can successfully debloat software (shared/static libraries and executables). Our solution can successfully compile and load most libraries on Ubuntu Desktop 16.04. (2) We demonstrate an elimination of over 84% code from coreutils and 85% code from SPEC CPU 2006 benchmark programs without affecting functionality. We show that even complex COTS programs (e.g., FireFox, Curl) can be debloated {without a need to recompile}. (3) We demonstrate the security impact of our system by eliminating over 70% of reusable code gadgets from coreutils suite, and show that unused code that contain {real-world vulnerabilities} can be successfully eliminated without adverse effects on the program. (4) Our solution imposes a low load time overhead.
Long‐term organic carbon sequestration in tidal marsh sediments is dominated by old‐aged allochthonous inputs in a macrotidal estuary

Tidal marshes are vegetated coastal ecosystems that are often considered as hotspots of atmospheric CO2 sequestration. Although large amounts of organic carbon (OC) are indeed being deposited on tidal marshes, there is no direct link between high OC deposition rates and high OC sequestration rates due to two main reasons. First, the deposited OC may become rapidly decomposed once it is buried and, second, a significant part of preserved OC may be allochthonous OC that has been sequestered elsewhere. In this study we aimed to identify the mechanisms controlling long‐term OC sequestration in tidal marsh sediments along an estuarine salinity gradient (Scheldt estuary, Belgium and the Netherlands). Analyses of deposited sediments have shown that OC deposited during tidal inundations is up to millennia old. This allochthonous OC is the main component of OC that is effectively preserved in these sediments, as indicated by the low radiocarbon content of buried OC. Furthermore, OC fractionation showed that autochthonous OC is decomposed on a decadal timescale in saltmarsh sediments, while in freshwater marsh sediments locally produced biomass is more efficiently preserved after burial. Our results show that long‐term OC sequestration is decoupled from local biomass production in the studied tidal marsh sediments. This implies that OC sequestration rates are greatly overestimated when they are calculated based on short‐term OC deposition rates, which are controlled by labile autochthonous OC inputs. Moreover, as allochthonous OC is not sequestered in‐situ, it does not contribute to active atmospheric CO2 sequestration in these ecosystems. A correct assessment of the contribution of allochthonous OC to the total sedimentary OC stock in tidal marsh sediments as well as a correct understanding of the long‐term fate of locally produced OC are both necessary to avoid overestimations of the rate of in‐situ atmospheric CO2 sequestration in tidal marsh sediments.
The effect of a regular walking program on dyspnoea severity and quality of life in normal weight, overweight, and obese patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

AIM The objective was to determine the effect of a regular walking program on physical activity (the number of steps and walking duration), dyspnoea severity, and quality of life in normal weight, overweight, and obese patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. METHOD An experimental study; 50 patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease admitted to the respiratory clinic of a public hospital in Turkey between November 2014 and July 2015 were included. All the patients underwent a regular walking program (at least 30 minutes every day) using a pedometer for 16 weeks under the supervision of a nurse. RESULTS After the regular walking program, the respiratory function test results of the obese patients were significantly improved. The walking duration, the number of steps taken per day, and the quality of life of all participants improved significantly, and dyspnoea severity was reduced in all participants. CONCLUSION The regular walking program reduced dyspnoea severity and improved quality of life in all participants. Nurses' efforts to increase activity levels in all patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and particularly those with obesity, through a regular walking program may contribute to reduce the severity of dyspnoea and improve quality of life.
2-Hydroxy-4 (methylthio) butanoic acid as a drinking water supplement for broiler chicks.

Two experiments were conducted to study the effects on chick performance of a commercially available liquid methionine analog [2-hydroxy-4 (methylthio) butanoic acid; HMB] supplied through drinking water. Methionine activities of . 025 and . 05% were added to drinking water and compared with levels of . 03, . 06, or . 09% included in a low-methionine basal diet from 0 to 21 days of age. Mortality was not significantly altered by any dietary treatment. Neither feed nor water intake was affected adversely by HMB inclusion in drinking water. Only male body weight in Experiment 1 did not respond to HMB feed supplementation. Equivalent levels of total sulfur amino acid intake among water treatments were associated with significantly heavier body weights than the control. In both experiments, body weight and feed efficiency of birds receiving . 05% methionine activity as HMB in water were equal or superior to those of groups that received supplemented feed. The results indicate that, under the study conditions, HMB provided in drinking water can be effectively assimilated by broiler chicks, at least through 21 days of age.
Sulfur amino acid requirements and interactions in broilers during two growth periods.

Total sulfur amino acid (TSAA) requirements and methionine and cystine combinations were investigated during two growth phases (0 to 21 days and 21 to 42 days) of broilers using practical-type diets. For the first growth phase (0 to 21 days), the basal diet contained . 62% TSAA to which increasing increments of DL-methionine were added. Both overall growth and feed efficiency improved as methionine levels increased to a level of . 82% TSAA. When methionine-cystine combinations were used with the same basal diet, it was found that cystine could supply 54% of the TSAA content. When expressed on a millimolar basis, the methionine requirement was 41%, while cystine could account for 59% of the TSAA's. During the second growth phase (21 to 42 days) a basal diet consisting of . 52% TSAA was used along with DL-methionine supplements to determine sulfur amino acid requirements. The trend was towards a slight decrease in requirement from . 82% during the first growth period, to between . 70% and . 76% TSAA in the diet, represented mainly by methionine. When sulfur amino acid combinations were used during this period it appeared the replacement value of cystine for methionine decreased to between 38 and 43% of the TSAA level. Results also suggested that a more efficient way to express the sulfur amino acid requirement may be on a mole per unit of feed basis.
Treatment patterns, health care resource utilization, and costs in Japanese adults with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder treated with atomoxetine

Objective To describe the characteristics and medication treatment patterns of adult patients with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) prescribed atomoxetine in Japan. Materials and methods A retrospective analysis of insurance claims data was conducted using the Japan Medical Data Center database. Adults (≥18 years) with ADHD who had ≥1 atomoxetine claim from January 1, 2013 to December 31, 2014, and ≥180 to ≤900 days of follow-up were included. First atomoxetine claim defined the index date. Patient characteristics included age, gender, and comorbid conditions. Treatment patterns assessed included rates of atomoxetine discontinuation, switching, persistence, adherence (assessed via the medication possession ratio), and use of concomitant medications. Results A total of 457 adults met all the inclusion criteria. Mean (SD) age was 32.7 (10.4) years, and 61.0% of patients were male. Nearly 72.0% of the patients had at least one comorbid mental health condition in the baseline period; depression (43.8%) and insomnia (40.7%) were the most common mental health comorbidities. Most common physical comorbidities were chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (14.4%) and diabetes (12.9%). Non-ADHD-specific psychotropics were prescribed to 59.7% of patients during the baseline period and to 65.9% during the follow-up period; 6.6% were prescribed non-ADHD-specific psychotropics concomitantly with atomoxetine. Overall, 40.0% of adults discontinued atomoxetine during the entire follow-up period and 65.9% were persistent with atomoxetine therapy at 3 months post-index date. Mean (SD) atomoxetine medication possession ratio was 0.57 (0.25), and 25.4% switched to an alternative ADHD therapy; methylphenidate (22.4%) and non-ADHD-specific psychotropics (77.6%) were the most common medication alternatives. Nearly 8% augmented atomoxetine with methylphenidates, non-stimulants, or non-ADHD-specific psychotropics. Conclusion In this observational study, a majority of adults with ADHD treated with atomoxetine were still persistent with therapy at 3 months post-index date, with one quarter switching to alternative ADHD therapy. High proportions of mental health comorbidities, along with high use of non-ADHD-specific psychotropic medications in both the baseline and follow-up periods, were observed among patients with ADHD prescribed atomoxetine.
Non-idempotent types for classical calculi in natural deduction style

In the first part of this paper, we define two resource aware typing systems for the $\lambda\mu$-calculus based on non-idempotent intersection and union types. The non-idempotent approach provides very simple combinatorial arguments --based on decreasing measures of type derivations-- to characterize head and strongly normalizing terms. Moreover, typability provides upper bounds for the lengths of the head-reduction and the maximal reduction sequences to normal-form. In the second part of this paper, the $\lambda\mu$-calculus is refined to a resource aware interpretation called $\lambda\mu$r, which is inspired by the substitution at a distance paradigm. The small-step $\lambda\mu$r-calculus turns out to be compatible with a natural extension of the non-idempotent interpretations of $\lambda\mu$, i.e. $\lambda\mu$r-reduction preserves and decreases typing derivations in an extended appropriate typing system. We thus derive a simple arithmetical characterization of strongly $\lambda\mu$r-normalizing terms by means of typing.