Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Long short-term memory and Learning-to-learn in networks of spiking neurons

Recurrent networks of spiking neurons (RSNNs) underlie the astounding computing and learning capabilities of the brain. But computing and learning capabilities of RSNN models have remained poor, at least in comparison with artificial neural networks (ANNs). We address two possible reasons for that. One is that RSNNs in the brain are not randomly connected or designed according to simple rules, and they do not start learning as a tabula rasa network. Rather, RSNNs in the brain were optimized for their tasks through evolution, development, and prior experience. Details of these optimization processes are largely unknown. But their functional contribution can be approximated through powerful optimization methods, such as backpropagation through time (BPTT). A second major mismatch between RSNNs in the brain and models is that the latter only show a small fraction of the dynamics of neurons and synapses in the brain. We include neurons in our RSNN model that reproduce one prominent dynamical process of biological neurons that takes place at the behaviourally relevant time scale of seconds: neuronal adaptation. We denote these networks as LSNNs because of their Long short-term memory. The inclusion of adapting neurons drastically increases the computing and learning capability of RSNNs if they are trained and configured by deep learning (BPTT combined with a rewiring algorithm that optimizes the network architecture). In fact, the computational performance of these RSNNs approaches for the first time that of LSTM networks. In addition RSNNs with adapting neurons can acquire abstract knowledge from prior learning in a Learning-to-Learn (L2L) scheme, and transfer that knowledge in order to learn new but related tasks from very few examples. We demonstrate this for supervised learning and reinforcement learning.
Upregulation of SGLT-1 transport activity in rat jejunum induced by GLP-2 infusion in vivo.

The effect of in vivo infusion of the peptide hormone glucagon-like peptide 2 (GLP-2) on glucose transport across the rat jejunal brush-border membrane (BBM) was assessed using isolated membrane vesicles. A 2-h infusion of GLP-2 produced a marked acceleration of sodium-dependent glucose uptake into BBM vesicles with a significant overshoot. There was no change in vesicle space or permeability resulting from the hormone infusion. Kinetic analysis showed this stimulation to be the result of a threefold increase in the maximal rate of transport, with no consistent change in the affinity constant ( K m). The time course of this response showed that the effect was observable, but smaller, after only 30 min of hormone infusion and was maximal after 1 h. Sodium-dependent phloridzin binding to the membrane vesicles showed a parallel increase in maximal binding after 1 and 2 h of hormone infusion. Western blotting showed a similar increase in sodium-dependent glucose transporter 1 (SGLT-1) abundance. The effect of GLP-2 could be blocked by luminal brefeldin A or wortmannin. These results indicate that GLP-2 is able to induce trafficking of SGLT-1 from an intracellular pool into the BBM within 60 min and that phosphoinositol 3-kinase may well be involved in the intracellular signaling pathway in this response.
Psychosocial Functioning in Adolescents with Temporomandibular Disorders

OF DISSERTATION PSYCHOSOCIAL FUNCTIONING IN ADOLESCENTS WITH TEMPOROMANDIBULAR DISORDERS Psychosocial functioning is a key component of screening and treatment of Temporomandibular Disorders (TMD) in adults; however, psychosocial functioning in adolescents with TMD has received little empirical attention. The present study aims to examine group difference between adolescents and adults with TMD on pain and prominent psychosocial factors, such as anxiety, depression, and somatization, as well as to explore additional developmentally sensitive psychosocial factors that may be associated more with the adolescent TMD pain. Participants included 35 adolescents aged 12-17 (M=14.89 years, SD=1.84) with TMD muscle pain who completed pain questionnaires and a comprehensive dental examination. Patients and their primary caregivers completed behavioral questionnaires to examine psychosocial functioning. Thirty-five adults matched on gender, diagnosis, and duration of pain were selected from a large pre-existing database of previous orofacial pain patients. Adolescents and adults reported descriptively similar TMD pain and equivalent rates of anxiety, depression, and somatization; however, the relationship between these psychosocial factors and TMD pain appear to be more salient for adults compared to adolescents. In adolescents, increased pain-related interference was significantly associated with positive attitudes toward school, better anger control, and deficits in functional communication; whereas, more frequent TMD pain was significantly associated with sense of inadequacy and parent-reported withdrawal, though not in the expected direction. Screening for TMD in adults typically focuses on anxiety, depression, and somatization; however, these psychosocial factors overall did not appear as salient in adolescents as attitude toward school, anger control, sense of inadequacy, withdrawal, and functional communication, suggesting that adult psychosocial screen may need to be revised to include developmentally sensitive targets that may be particularly important for screening of TMD in adolescents.
Older adults’ marijuana use, injuries, and emergency department visits

ABSTRACT Background: Despite increasing marijuana use among older adults, little research has been done on marijuana’s effects on their healthcare use. Objectives: To examine whether (1) marijuana use is associated with the likelihood of emergency department (ED) visits through increased injury risk, and (2) marijuana use patterns are associated with injury risk and ED visits among older adults. Methods: Using the 2012–2013 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Problems (N = 14,715 aged 50+; 6,379 men and 8,336 women), descriptive statistics were used to compare past-year marijuana users to nonusers on sociodemographic and physical/mental health characteristics. Structural equation modeling was used to simultaneously estimate whether injury mediates past-year marijuana use’s association with ED visits. Logistic regression analysis was used to examine associations of marijuana use patterns with injury and ED visits. Results: Past-year injury rates were 18.9% for nonusers and 28.8% for users (3.9% of the 50+ age group), and past-year ED visit rates were 23.5% for nonusers and 30.9% for users (p < .001). Logistic regression models showed that marijuana use was associated with injury (OR = 1.48, 95% CI = 1.18–1.85), and injury was associated with ED visits (OR = 6.14, 95% CI = 1.70–1.93). Mediation analysis found significant indirect effect (z = 2.86, p = .004) and direct effect not significantly differing from zero (OR = 1.16, 95% CI = 0.90–1.50), indicating that marijuana use increases the likelihood of ED visits through increased injury risk. Marijuana use patterns were not associated with injuries or ED visits. Conclusions: Healthcare providers should screen for marijuana and other substance use among older adults and provide education about associated injury risks.
Short Interval Intracortical Inhibition Responses to Low‐Frequency Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Under Multiple Interstimulus Intervals and Conditioning Intensities

The extent to which short interval intracortical inhibition (SICI) responds to low‐frequency repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) remains inconclusive with reports of increased, decreased and unchanged response following modulation. The aim of this study was to systematically investigate if the variability of SICI following rTMS is explained by the interstimulus interval (ISI) and/or the conditioning stimulus intensity (CSI).
Microphotographic Assessment of Enamel Surface using Self-Etching Primer and Conventional Phosphoric Acid: An In vitro Study

Introduction: Conventional acid-etching method irreversibly removes several microns of enamel surface and also involves many steps. Hence, a simplified technique that minimizes enamel loss, improves adhesion procedures, prevents saliva contamination, and saves chair time, thereby producing clinically useful bond strength, would be valuable. Aim: To assess and compare the bonding mechanism of a self-etching primer (SEP) to that of phosphoric acid on enamel of the human permanent teeth by a scanning electron microscope (SEM). Materials and Methods: Thirty freshly extracted premolars were randomly divided into two groups of fifteen teeth each – the control group I (phosphoric acid) and experimental group II (self-etching primer). Brackets were bonded using Transbond XT adhesive on the buccal surfaces of the teeth after etching and priming according to their respective protocols. The teeth were then sectioned and the samples were subjected to a protocol of demineralization cycles. After complete dissolution of dental tissues, the specimens were gold sputter coated and evaluated under SEM. Results: A characteristically uniform etch pattern was seen in the resin samples of the phosphoric acid/Transbond XT primer group, which revealed increased roughness and resin tags penetrating the demineralized enamel surface, whereas with Transbond Plus SEP, a regular resin tag distribution was observed which showed less magnitude when compared with the control group. Conclusion: From the study, it was concluded that Transbond Plus SEP produced an etch pattern which was more conservative than conventional phosphoric acid system.
The Bilingual Switching Advantage: Sometimes Related to Bilingual Proficiency, Sometimes Not

Abstract This study investigated the relationship between bilingualism and task switching ability using a standardized measure of switching and an objective measure of bilingual language proficiency. Heritage Language (HL) speaking Spanish-English and Mandarin-English bilinguals and English speaking monolinguals completed all four subtests of the Color-Word Interference Test (CWIT), an English verbal fluency task, and a picture naming test (the Multilingual Naming Test) in English. Bilinguals also named pictures in their HL to assess HL proficiency. Spanish-English bilinguals were advantaged in task switching, exhibiting significantly smaller switching cost than monolinguals, but were disadvantaged in verbal fluency and picture naming. Additionally, performance on these cognitive and linguistic tasks was related to degree of HL proficiency, so that increased ability to name pictures in Spanish was associated with greater switching advantage, and greater disadvantage in both verbal fluency and picture naming. Mandarin-English bilinguals, who differed from the Spanish-English bilinguals on several demographic and language-use characteristics, exhibited a smaller but statistically significant switching advantage, but no linguistic disadvantage, and no clear relationship between HL proficiency and the switching advantage. Together these findings demonstrate an explicit link between objectively measured bilingual language proficiency and both bilingual advantages and disadvantages, while also showing that consequences of bilingualism for cognitive and linguistic task performance can vary across different language combinations. (JINS, 2015, 21, 531–544)
Acoustic Trauma Changes the Parvalbumin-Positive Neurons in Rat Auditory Cortex

Acoustic trauma is being reported to damage the auditory periphery and central system, and the compromised cortical inhibition is involved in auditory disorders, such as hyperacusis and tinnitus. Parvalbumin-containing neurons (PV neurons), a subset of GABAergic neurons, greatly shape and synchronize neural network activities. However, the change of PV neurons following acoustic trauma remains to be elucidated. The present study investigated how auditory cortical PV neurons change following unilateral 1 hour noise exposure (left ear, one octave band noise centered at 16 kHz, 116 dB SPL). Noise exposure elevated the auditory brainstem response threshold of the exposed ear when examined 7 days later. More detectable PV neurons were observed in both sides of the auditory cortex of noise-exposed rats when compared to control. The detectable PV neurons of the left auditory cortex (ipsilateral to the exposed ear) to noise exposure outnumbered those of the right auditory cortex (contralateral to the exposed ear). Quantification of Western blotted bands revealed higher expression level of PV protein in the left cortex. These findings of more active PV neurons in noise-exposed rats suggested that a compensatory mechanism might be initiated to maintain a stable state of the brain.
High-energy turnover at low temperatures: recovery from exhaustive exercise in Antarctic and temperate eelpouts.

Earlier work on Notothenioids led to the hypothesis that a reduced glycolytic capacity is a general adaptation to low temperatures in Antarctic fish. In our study this hypothesis was reinvestigated by comparing changes in the metabolic status of the white musculature in two related zoarcid species, the stenothermal Antarctic eelpout Pachycara brachycephalum and the eurythermal Zoarces viviparus during exercise and subsequent recovery at 0°C. In both species, strenuous exercise caused a similar increase in white muscle lactate, a drop in intracellular pH (pHi) by about 0.5 pH units, and a 90% depletion of phosphocreatine. This is the first study on Antarctic fish that shows an increase in white muscle lactate concentrations. Thus the hypothesis that a reduced importance of the glycolytic pathway is characteristic for cold-adapted polar fish cannot hold. The recovery process, especially the clearance of white muscle lactate, is significantly faster in the Antarctic than in temperate eelpout. Based on metabolite data, we calculated that during the first hour of recovery aerobic metabolism is increased 6.6-fold compared with resting rates in P. brachycephalum vs. an only 2.9-fold increase in Z. viviparus. This strong stimulation of aerobic metabolism despite low temperatures may be caused by a pronounced increase of free ADP levels, in the context of higher levels of pHi and ATP, which is observed in the Antarctic species. Although basal metabolic rates are identical in both species, the comparison of metabolic rates during situations of high-energy turnover reveals that the stenothermal P. brachycephalum shows a higher degree of metabolic cold compensation than the eurythermal Z. viviparus. Muscular fatigue after escape swimming may be caused by a drop of the free energy change of ATP hydrolysis, which is shown to fall below critical levels for cellular ATPases in exhausted animals of both species.
Behavioural Modelling of High Temperature Superconducting Wires and Coils for Power Engineering Applications

Many aspects of the behaviour of high temperature superconducting (HTS) wires are well understood for dc applications. However, models of HTS suitable for use in circuit analysis by power engineers designing HTS applications are not readily available. This paper describes the initial development of suitable models for HTS wire. The V-I characteristics for wires carrying dc transport current can be empirically determined using a power law V=kIn. Experimentally measured V-I characteristics are fitted using the above power law. This enables the simulation of the behaviour of Bi-2223/Ag wire using the well-known circuit simulator PSpice. Other factors affecting the dc critical current density of the wire, such as bending diameter and some aspects of perpendicular and parallel applied magnetic fields have also been considered in the model. The performance of the model with dc current is compared with experimental results from a non-inductive pancake coil prepared using Bi-2223/Ag 27-core multifilament tape, as well as two short HTS tapes with different critical current ratings.
Identifying Semantic Divergences in Parallel Text without Annotations

Recognizing that even correct translations are not always semantically equivalent, we automatically detect meaning divergences in parallel sentence pairs with a deep neural model of bilingual semantic similarity which can be trained for any parallel corpus without any manual annotation. We show that our semantic model detects divergences more accurately than models based on surface features derived from word alignments, and that these divergences matter for neural machine translation.
The burden of hepatorenal syndrome among commercially insured and Medicare patients in the United States

Abstract Background: This study evaluated the characteristics, healthcare resource utilization (HCRU), and costs, from the payer perspective, of hepatorenal syndrome (HRS) patients covered by commercial and Medicare insurance. Mortality was assessed as a secondary outcome. Methods: Patients were identified from claims databases of commercially insured patients (OptumHealth Care Solutions Inc.) in 1998–2014 and Medicare beneficiaries in 2009–2013 (5% Standard Analytic Files). At the time of their first inpatient admission (“index date”) with an HRS diagnosis (ICD-9 code 572.4), commercially insured patients must be aged 18–64 and Medicare patients must be aged 65 and older. Results: A total of 784 commercially insured and 1061 Medicare HRS patients met the sample selection criteria. Patients were disproportionately male (commercial: 63.0%; Medicare: 57.9%) with a mean age of 54.1 among commercially insured and 74.1 among Medicare patients. Within the first 30 days, the average hospital length of stay (LOS) was 12.3 days among commercially insured and 10.8 days among Medicare patients. Based on Kaplan–Meier analyses, 36% of commercially insured and 26% of Medicare patients were readmitted within the next 30 days. During follow-up, many patients received dialysis (commercial: 33.0%; Medicare: 22.1%) or liver transplant (commercial: 10.7%; Medicare: 1.6%). Average costs within the 90 day follow-up were $157,665 for commercially insured and $48,322 for Medicare patients, with 68.3% and 78.3% of the costs incurred within the first 30 days. The primary cost driver was inpatient visits (commercial: 90.3% of costs; Medicare: 83.1% of costs), with differences between the populations consistent with lower mortality, higher dialysis rates, and higher transplant rates (both liver and kidney) among the commercially insured. Using US population and prevalence statistics, these results suggest that HRS imposes an annual total direct medical cost burden of approximately $3.0–$3.8 billion to payers over the period. Conclusions: HRS imposes a significant economic burden.
Lateralization of Sucrose Responsiveness and Non-associative Learning in Honeybees

Lateralization is a fundamental property of the human brain that affects perceptual, motor, and cognitive processes. It is now acknowledged that left–right laterality is widespread across vertebrates and even some invertebrates such as fruit flies and bees. Honeybees, which learn to associate an odorant (the conditioned stimulus, CS) with sucrose solution (the unconditioned stimulus, US), recall this association better when trained using their right antenna than they do when using their left antenna. Correspondingly, olfactory sensilla are more abundant on the right antenna and odor encoding by projection neurons of the right antennal lobe results in better odor differentiation than those of the left one. Thus, lateralization arises from asymmetries both in the peripheral and central olfactory system, responsible for detecting the CS. Here, we focused on the US component and studied if lateralization exists in the gustatory system of Apis mellifera. We investigated whether sucrose sensitivity is lateralized both at the level of the antennae and the fore-tarsi in two independent groups of bees. Sucrose sensitivity was assessed by presenting bees with a series of increasing concentrations of sucrose solution delivered either to the left or the right antenna/tarsus and measuring the proboscis extension response to these stimuli. Bees experienced two series of stimulations, one on the left and the other on the right antenna/tarsus. We found that tarsal responsiveness was similar on both sides and that the order of testing affects sucrose responsiveness. On the contrary, antennal responsiveness to sucrose was higher on the right than on the left side, and this effect was independent of the order of antennal stimulation. Given this asymmetry, we also investigated antennal lateralization of habituation to sucrose. We found that the right antenna was more resistant to habituation, which is consistent with its higher sucrose sensitivity. Our results reveal that the gustatory system presents a peripheral lateralization that affects stimulus detection and non-associative learning. Contrary to the olfactory system, which is organized in two distinct brain hemispheres, gustatory receptor neurons converge into a single central region termed the subesophagic zone (SEZ). Whether the SEZ presents lateralized gustatory processing remains to be determined.
Histopathological Effects of Bt and TcdA Insecticidal Proteins on the Midgut Epithelium of Western Corn Rootworm Larvae (Diabrotica virgifera virgifera)

Western corn rootworm (WCR, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera LeConte) is a major corn pest in the United States, causing annual losses of over $1 billion. One approach to protect against crop loss by this insect is the use of transgenic corn hybrids expressing one or more crystal (Cry) proteins derived from Bacillus thuringiensis. Cry34Ab1 and Cry35Ab1 together comprise a binary insecticidal toxin with specific activity against WCR. These proteins have been developed as insect resistance traits in commercialized corn hybrids resistant to WCR feeding damage. Cry34/35Ab1 is a pore forming toxin, but the specific effects of Cry34/35Ab1 on WCR cells and tissues have not been well characterized microscopically, and the overall histopathology is poorly understood. Using high-resolution resin-based histopathology methods, the effects of Cry34/35Ab1 as well as Cry3Aa1, Cry6Aa1, and the Photorhabdus toxin complex protein TcdA have been directly visualized and documented. Clear symptoms of intoxication were observed for all insecticidal proteins tested, including swelling and sloughing of enterocytes, constriction of midgut circular muscles, stem cell activation, and obstruction of the midgut lumen. These data demonstrate the effects of these insecticidal proteins on WCR midgut cells, and the collective response of the midgut to intoxication. Taken together, these results advance our understanding of the insect cell biology and pathology of these insecticidal proteins, which should further the field of insect resistance traits and corn rootworm management.