Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Testing Reciprocal Longitudinal Relations Between Peer Victimization and Depressive Symptoms in Young Adolescents

A 2-wave longitudinal study of young adolescents was used to test whether peer victimization predicts depressive symptoms, depressive symptoms predict peer victimization, or the 2 constructs show reciprocal relations. Participants were 598 youths in Grades 3 through 6, ages 8 to 14 (M = 10.9, SD = 1.2) at Wave 1. The sample was 50.7% female and 90.3% Caucasian. Participants completed self-reports of depressive symptoms, and self-reports and peer nomination measures of physical and relational peer victimization at 2 time points separated by 1 year. The results were as follows: (a) depressive symptoms predicted change in both physical and relational victimization, but neither type of peer victimization predicted change in depressive symptoms; (b) depressive symptoms were more predictive of physical victimization for boys than for girls; and (c) boys experienced more physical victimization, and girls experienced more relational victimization. Expression of some depressive symptoms may represent signs of vulnerability. For boys, they may also represent a violation of gender stereotypes. Both factors could be responsible for these effects. Implications for intervention include the possibility that treatment of depression in young adolescents may reduce the likelihood of peer victimization.
On abductive inference and delusional belief: Why there is still a role for patient experience within explanations of Capgras delusion

This paper aims to examine critically the explanatory model of delusional belief presented in Coltheart, Menzies, and Sutton's (2010) paper, “Abductive Inference and Delusional Belief”. The authors acknowledge that certain aspects of the model are speculative. In return, I speculate over the likelihood that the model's emphasis on subpersonal processing adequately and coherently explains the symptoms (as best we know them) of patients with delusional misidentification (specifically, the Capgras delusion) and nondeluded equivalent patient groups. In addition, I offer an account of the Capgras delusion that is compatible with many of the tenets of Coltheart et al.'s model, but which preserves an important explanatory role for patient experience absent, and erroneously so, I contend, from the aforementioned model. The more integrated explanation I am proposing here also provides a number of pertinent empirical questions and testable hypotheses that could inform future models of delusional belief.
Determinants of success of loading dose diazepam for alcohol withdrawal: A chart review

270 Journal of Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapeutics | July-September 2012 | Vol 3 | Issue 3 low score to the information received on the substitution of a brand name drug by a GD, similar to the results of other studies,[2-5] suggesting the need for greater health education. Possible study limitations include the fact that the results are only applicable to our organizational model and physicians, and cannot be easily generalized to other institutions. One limitation of the study may be due to recall bias, due to the time elapsed between the period of replacement of drug and the realization of the interview. However, all patients were taking a drug at the moment of interview. In conclusion, although the use of GD is vital in order to reduce pharmaceutical expenditure, patients who received substitute generic brands of amlodipine and simvastatin and the physicians who prescribed them both evidenced a worrying lack of information on their use.
Pathogenesis of Chagas' Disease: Parasite Persistence and Autoimmunity

SUMMARY Acute Trypanosoma cruzi infections can be asymptomatic, but chronically infected individuals can die of Chagas' disease. The transfer of the parasite mitochondrial kinetoplast DNA (kDNA) minicircle to the genome of chagasic patients can explain the pathogenesis of the disease; in cases of Chagas' disease with evident cardiomyopathy, the kDNA minicircles integrate mainly into retrotransposons at several chromosomes, but the minicircles are also detected in coding regions of genes that regulate cell growth, differentiation, and immune responses. An accurate evaluation of the role played by the genotype alterations in the autoimmune rejection of self-tissues in Chagas' disease is achieved with the cross-kingdom chicken model system, which is refractory to T. cruzi infections. The inoculation of T. cruzi into embryonated eggs prior to incubation generates parasite-free chicks, which retain the kDNA minicircle sequence mainly in the macrochromosome coding genes. Crossbreeding transfers the kDNA mutations to the chicken progeny. The kDNA-mutated chickens develop severe cardiomyopathy in adult life and die of heart failure. The phenotyping of the lesions revealed that cytotoxic CD45, CD8+ γδ, and CD8α+ T lymphocytes carry out the rejection of the chicken heart. These results suggest that the inflammatory cardiomyopathy of Chagas' disease is a genetically driven autoimmune disease.
Dietary intervention in infancy and later signs of beta-cell autoimmunity.

BACKGROUND Early exposure to complex dietary proteins may increase the risk of beta-cell autoimmunity and type 1 diabetes in children with genetic susceptibility. We tested the hypothesis that supplementing breast milk with highly hydrolyzed milk formula would decrease the cumulative incidence of diabetes-associated autoantibodies in such children. METHODS In this double-blind, randomized trial, we assigned 230 infants with HLA-conferred susceptibility to type 1 diabetes and at least one family member with type 1 diabetes to receive either a casein hydrolysate formula or a conventional, cow's-milk-based formula (control) whenever breast milk was not available during the first 6 to 8 months of life. Autoantibodies to insulin, glutamic acid decarboxylase (GAD), the insulinoma-associated 2 molecule (IA-2), and zinc transporter 8 were analyzed with the use of radiobinding assays, and islet-cell antibodies were analyzed with the use of immunofluorescence, during a median observation period of 10 years (mean, 7.5). The children were monitored for incident type 1 diabetes until they were 10 years of age. RESULTS The unadjusted hazard ratio for positivity for one or more autoantibodies in the casein hydrolysate group, as compared with the control group, was 0.54 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.29 to 0.95), and the hazard ratio adjusted for an observed difference in the duration of exposure to the study formula was 0.51 (95% CI, 0.28 to 0.91). The unadjusted hazard ratio for positivity for two or more autoantibodies was 0.52 (95% CI, 0.21 to 1.17), and the adjusted hazard ratio was 0.47 (95% CI, 0.19 to 1.07). The rate of reported adverse events was similar in the two groups. CONCLUSIONS Dietary intervention during infancy appears to have a long-lasting effect on markers of beta-cell autoimmunity--markers that may reflect an autoimmune process leading to type 1 diabetes. (ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00570102.).
Chlorogenic acid and luteolin synergistically inhibit the proliferation of interleukin-1β-induced fibroblast-like synoviocytes through regulating the activation of NF-κB and JAK/STAT-signaling pathways

Abstract Context: Chlorogenic acid (CGA) and luteolin (Lut) are the predominant constituents of Caulis Lonicerae, which is usually used in the treatment for rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Objective: In this study, we investigated whether CGA and Lut could synergistically inhibit the proliferation of fibroblast-like synoviocytes (FLSs) in RA synovial tissues. Methods: Rat FLS cells (RSC-364) induced by interleukin (IL)-1β were treated by CGA, Lut or both of them. The apoptosis rates were detected by flow cytometer. Protein expression of key molecules of NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways were detected by Western blot. Results and discussion: Treatment with CGA and Lut inhibited the proliferation of RSC-364 cells stimulated by IL-1β significantly and induced cell apoptosis notably. The ratio of apoptosis in RSC-364 cells induced with IL-1β accompanied by both CGA and Lut increased approximately 7-fold compared with those incubated with IL-1β alone. The results of immunoblot analysis revealed that the key molecules involved in the NF-κB and JAK/STAT-signaling pathways, including NF-κB p50, p100, IKKα/β, gp103, JAK1 and STAT3, were decreased significantly in RSC-364 cells treated by IL-1β plus CAG and Lut compared with those incubated with IL-1β alone. Additionally, the amounts of phospho-IKKα/β and phospho-STAT3 were also decreased significantly in cells treated with CGA and Lut. Furthermore, the synergistic effect of CGA and Lut was superior to the effect of one of these two ingredients. Conclusion: Our finding suggested that the combination of CGA and Lut may be a potential therapeutic treatment for the inflammatory proliferation of synoviocytes in patients with RA.
Algorithmic aspects of bandwidth trading

We study algorithmic problems that are motivated by bandwidth trading in next-generation networks. Typically, bandwidth trading involves sellers (e.g., network operators) interested in selling bandwidth pipes that offer to buyers a guaranteed level of service for a specified time interval. The buyers (e.g., bandwidth brokers) are looking to procure bandwidth pipes to satisfy the reservation requests of end-users (e.g., Internet subscribers). Depending on what is available in the bandwidth exchange, the goal of a buyer is to either spend the least amount of money so as to satisfy all the reservations made by its customers, or to maximize its revenue from whatever reservations can be satisfied. We model this as a real-time nonpreemptive scheduling problem in which machine types correspond to bandwidth pipes and jobs correspond to end-user reservation requests. Each job specifies a time interval during which it must be processed, and a set of machine types on which it can be executed. If necessary, multiple machines of a given type may be allocated, but each must be paid for. Finally, each job has associated with it a revenue, which is realized if the job is scheduled on some machine. There are two versions of the problem that we consider. In the cost minimization version, the goal is to minimize the total cost incurred for scheduling all jobs, and in the revenue maximization version the goal is to maximize the revenue of the jobs that are scheduled for processing on a given set of machines. We consider several variants of the problems that arise in practical scenarios, and provide constant factor approximations.
Determination of the antibiofilm, antiadhesive, and anti-MRSA activities of seven Salvia species

Background: Several Salvia species are indigenous to Jordan and are widely used as beverages and spices and for their medicinal properties. The objective of the study was to establish the antimicrobial activities, including the antiadhesive and antibiofilm effects of seven different Salvia species. Materials and Methods: Methods used for planktonic culture included agar diffusion, broth microdilution, and minimal biocidal concentration determination while viable count was used for the determination of the antibiofilm and antiadhesion activities. Overnight cultures of reference strains of Candida albicans, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Staphylococcus aureus and clinical strains of methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) were used as test microorganisms. Results: An antimicrobial activity toward planktonic cultures demonstrated a significant bacteriocidal activity (≥4 log cycle reduction) for the S. triloba extract against S. aureus including MRSA. Its volatile oil exhibited an antimicrobial activity covering all tested microorganisms with the exception of P. aeruginosa. S. triloba extract and volatile oil were successful in preventing and controlling the biofilm, demonstrating antiadhesion and antibiofilm activities, respectively. Conclusion: These reported activities for S. triloba extract and volatile oil allows their listing as potential antibiofilm and anti-MRSA natural agents. This might suggest their use as an antiseptic in the prophylaxis and treatment of S. aureus-associated skin infections. The antimicrobial activity of the other tested Salvia species was negligible.
Incorporation of gridded data into the analysis of remotely-sensed images: Basic quantitative strategy to analyze defoerestation by population growth

This work reviews and straighten methodologies to explore functional forms of man-landcover interrelations. Tanaka and Nishii[7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13], Nishii and Tanaka[4, 6], Nishii, Miyata, and Tanaka[5] have engaged in the analysis of deforestation by human population interactions. The basic strategy has been to use landcover data mashed up with cell-formed population density data.
A New Method for Multiple Sperm Cells Tracking

Motion analysis or quality assessment of human sperm cell is great important for clinical applications of male infertility. Sperm tracking is quite complex due to cell collision, occlusion and missed detection. The aim of this study is simultaneous tracking of multiple human sperm cells. In the first step in this research, the frame difference algorithm is used for background subtraction. There are some limitations to select an appropriate threshold value since the output accuracy is strongly dependent on the selected threshold value. To eliminate this dependency, we propose an improved non-linear diffusion filtering in the time domain. Non-linear diffusion filtering is a smoothing and noise removing approach that can preserve edges in images. Many sperms that move with different speeds in different directions eventually coincide. For multiple tracking over time, an optimal matching strategy is introduced that is based on the optimization of a new cost function. A Hungarian search method is utilized to obtain the best matching for all possible candidates. The results show nearly 3.24% frame based error in dataset of videos that contain more than 1 and less than 10 sperm cells. Hence the accuracy rate was 96.76%. These results indicate the validity of the proposed algorithm to perform multiple sperms tracking.
A Conserved Apomixis-Specific Polymorphism Is Correlated with Exclusive Exonuclease Expression in Premeiotic Ovules of Apomictic Boechera Species1[W][OPEN]

A single gene characterized by a conserved apomixis-specific polymorphism is exclusively expressed in the ovules of genetically diverse apomictic Boechera species while being repressed in ovules of sexuals. Apomixis (asexual seed production) is characterized by meiotically unreduced egg cell production (apomeiosis) followed by its parthenogenetic development into offspring that are genetic clones of the mother plant. Fertilization (i.e. pseudogamy) of the central cell is important for the production of a functional endosperm with a balanced 2:1 maternal:paternal genome ratio. Here, we present the APOLLO (for apomixis-linked locus) gene, an Aspartate Glutamate Aspartate Aspartate histidine exonuclease whose transcripts are down-regulated in sexual ovules entering meiosis while being up-regulated in apomeiotic ovules at the same stage of development in plants of the genus Boechera. APOLLO has both “apoalleles,” which are characterized by a set of linked apomixis-specific polymorphisms, and “sexalleles. ” All apomictic Boechera spp. accessions proved to be heterozygous for the APOLLO gene (having at least one apoallele and one sexallele), while all sexual genotypes were homozygous for sexalleles. Apoalleles contained a 20-nucleotide polymorphism present in the 5′ untranslated region that contains specific transcription factor-binding sites for ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA HOMEOBOX PROTEIN5, LIM1 (for LINEAGE ABNORMAL11, INSULIN1, MECHANOSENSORY PROTEIN3), SORLIP1AT (for SEQUENCES OVERREPRESENTED IN LIGHT-INDUCED PROMOTERS IN ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA1), SORLIP2AT, and POLYA SIGNAL1. In the same region, sexalleles contain transcription factor-binding sites for DNA BINDING WITH ONE FINGER2, DNA BINDING WITH ONE FINGER3, and PROLAMIN BOX-BINDING FACTOR. Our results suggest that the expression of a single deregulated allele could induce the cascade of events leading to asexual female gamete formation in an apomictic plant.
Asymptotic behaviour of solutions to the generalized Becker–Döring equations for general initial data

We prove the following asymptotic behaviour for solutions to the generalized Becker–Döring system for general initial data: under a detailed balance assumption and in situations where density is conserved in time, there is a critical density ρs such that solutions with an initial density ρ0≤ρs converge strongly to the equilibrium with density ρ0 and solutions with initial density ρ0>ρs converge (in a weak sense) to the equilibrium with density ρs. This extends the previous knowledge that this behaviour happens under more restrictive conditions on the initial data. The main tool is a new estimate on the tail of solutions with density below the critical density.
Fast feature selection using fractal dimension

Dimensionality curse and dimensionality reduction are two key issues that have retained high interest for data mining, machine learning, multimedia indexing, and clustering. In this paper we present a fast, scalable algorithm to quickly select the most important attributes (dimensions) for a given set of n-dimensional vectors. In contrast to older methods, our method has the following desirable properties: (a) it does not do rotation of attributes, thus leading to easy interpretation of the resulting attributes; (b) it can spot attributes that have either linear or nonlinear correlations; (c) it requires a constant number of passes over the dataset; (d) it gives a good estimate on how many attributes should be kept. The idea is to use the ‘fractal' dimension of a dataset as a good approximation of its intrinsic dimension, and to drop attributes that do not affect it. We applied our method on real and synthetic datasets, where it gave fast and correct results.
Randomized controlled trials.

receding articles in this series have provided a great deal of information concerning research design and methodology, including research protocols, statistical analyses, and assessment of the clinical importance of radiologic research studies. Many methods of research design have already been presented, including descriptive studies (e.g., case reports, case series, and cross-sectional surveys), and some analytical designs (e.g., cohort and case-control studies). Case-control and cohort studies are also called observational studies, which distinguishes them from interventional (experimental) studies because the decision to seek one treatment or another, or to be exposed to one risk or another, was made by someone other than the experimenter. Consequently, the researcher’s role is one of observing the outcome of these exposures. By contrast, in experimental studies, the researcher (experimenter) controls the exposure. The most powerful type of experimental study is the randomized controlled trial. The basic principles of randomized controlled trials will be discussed in this article.
In vitro model for IgE mediated food allergy

Abstract Background. In intestinal food allergy, the non-specificity of gastrointestinal symptoms and the limited access to the reacting organ are the reasons for the limited understanding of the pathophysiology of this disease and the difficulties in establishing an appropriate diagnosis in the individual patient. Objective. To develop an in vitro model reproducing pathophysiological mechanisms of IgE mediated food allergy. Methods. Distal duodenum biopsies of nine patients with food allergy and 10 control subjects were cultured for 3 h with medium alone and with 1mg/ml of peptic-tryptic digest of wheat gliadin, wheat albumins, and apple proteins. Each biopsy was used for conventional histological examination and for immunohistochemical detection of IgE-positive cells. We have also analyzed the expression of tight junction proteins, occludin, claudin-1, and ZO-1 by immunoconfocal microscopy. Histamine and tryptase release were measured in the culture medium and collected at 0, 30 min, and 3 h of culture using an enzyme and radio immunoassay, respectively. Results. Exposure of small intestinal biopsy specimens of patients with food allergy to food allergens led to a significative increase of IgE-positive cells with a significative increase of histamine and tryptase release and an altered expression of tight junction proteins. No differences were found in intestinal biopsies of controls, cultured with or without food antigens. Conclusions. Small intestinal organ culture is a functional model of food allergy and could be considered as an in vitro oral food challenge, with evident reduction of costs and risks for the patients.
Direct Uncertainty Minimization Framework for System Performance Improvement in Model Reference Adaptive Control

Inthispaper, adirectuncertaintyminimizationframeworkisdevelopedanddemonstrated for model reference adaptive control laws. The proposed framework consists of a novel architecture involvingmodiﬁcationtermsintheadaptivecontrollawandtheupdatelaw. Inparticular,theseterms areconstructedthroughagradientminimizationprocedureinordertoachieveimprovedclosed-loop system performance with adaptive control laws. The proposed framework is ﬁrst developed for adaptive control laws with linear reference models and then generalized to adaptive control laws with nonlinear reference models. Two illustrative numerical examples are included to demonstrate the efﬁcacy of the proposed framework.
Thermo-Mechanical Modelling of Wire-Arc Additive Manufacturing (WAAM) of Semi-Finished Products

Additive manufacturing processes have been investigated for some years, and are commonly used industrially in the field of plastics for small- and medium-sized series. The use of metallic deposition material has been intensively studied on the laboratory scale, but the numerical prediction is not yet state of the art. This paper examines numerical approaches for predicting temperature fields, distortions, and mechanical properties using the Finite Element (FE) software MSC Marc. For process mapping, the filler materials G4Si1 (1.5130) for steel, and AZ31 for magnesium, were first characterized in terms of thermo-physical and thermo-mechanical properties with process-relevant cast microstructure. These material parameters are necessary for a detailed thermo-mechanical coupled Finite Element Method (FEM). The focus of the investigations was on the numerical analysis of the influence of the wire feed (2.5–5.0 m/min) and the weld path orientation (unidirectional or continuous) on the temperature evolution for multi-layered walls of miscellaneous materials. For the calibration of the numerical model, the real welding experiments were carried out using the gas-metal arc-welding process—cold metal transfer (CMT) technology. A uniform wall geometry can be produced with a continuous welding path, because a more homogeneous temperature distribution results.
Predicting Web site access: an application of time series

The Internet and Web pervasiveness are changing the landscape of several different areas ranging from information gathering/managing and commerce to software development. This paper presents a case study where time series were adopted to forecast future Web site access. In order to measure the applicability of time series to the prediction of Web site accesses, an experimental activity was performed. The log-access file of an academic Web site (http://www.ing.unisannio.it) was analyzed and its data used as test set. The analyzed Web site contains general information about the Faculty of Engineering of University of Sannio at Benevento (Italy). Preliminary results were encouraging: the average number of connections per week could be predicted with an acceptable error.