Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Expression of Four Glutamine Synthetase Genes in the Early Stages of Development of Rainbow Trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) in Relationship to Nitrogen Excretion*

The incorporation of ammonia into glutamine, catalyzed by glutamine synthetase, is thought to be important in the detoxification of ammonia in animals. During early fish development, ammonia is continuously formed as yolk proteins and amino acids are catabolized. We followed the changes in ammonia and urea-nitrogen content, ammonia and urea-nitrogen excretion, glutamine synthetase activity, and mRNA expression of four genes coding for glutamine synthetase (Onmy-GS01–GS04) over 3–80 days post fertilization and in adult liver and skeletal muscle of the rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss). Both ammonia and urea-nitrogen accumulate before hatching, although the rate of ammonia excretion is considerably higher relative to urea-nitrogen excretion. All four genes were expressed during early development, but only Onmy-GS01 and -GS02 were expressed at appreciable levels in adult liver, and expression was very low in muscle tissue. The high level of expression of Onmy-GS01 and -GS03 prior to hatching corresponded to a linear increase in glutamine synthetase activity. We propose that the induction of glutamine synthetase genes early in development and the subsequent formation of the active protein are preparatory for the increased capacity of the embryo to convert the toxic nitrogen end product, ammonia, into glutamine, which may then be utilized in the ornithine-urea cycle or other pathways.
Validation of a Wearable Biometric System’s Ability to Monitor Heart Rate in Two Different Climate Conditions under Variable Physical Activities

Research has proven the importance of cooling garments in reducing heat stress, especially for workers in extreme environments. The currently available cooling capacity of these garments should be controlled for improving their efficiency and autonomy. In this study, we investigated the Hexoskin wearable biometric shirt’s capacity to monitor heart rate. Twelve male volunteers wore a Hexoskin biometric shirt and Polar® H7 heart rate sensor and they completed two identical tests under two different climate conditions (25°C ± 0.5°C; 39% ± 1% relative humidity and 31°C ± 0.5°C; 60% ± 1% relative humidity). The results from four different statistical methods show a high correlation and an absence of significant differences between the Polar? and Hexoskin systems in monitoring the subjects’ heart rates. The Hexoskin wearable biometric shirt can be used to monitor the heart rate of humans in moderate or hot and humid climates under variable physical activities, regardless of their age, weight or height.
Adaptation of motor unit contractile properties in rat medial gastrocnemius to treadmill endurance training: Relationship to muscle mitochondrial biogenesis

This study aimed at investigating the effects of 2, 4 and 8 weeks of endurance training on the contractile properties of slow (S), fast fatigue resistant (FR) and fast fatigable (FF) motor units (MUs) in rat medial gastrocnemius (MG) in relation to the changes in muscle mitochondrial biogenesis. The properties of functionally isolated MUs were examined in vivo. Mitochondrial biogenesis was judged based on the changes in mitochondrial DNA copy number (mtDNA), the content of the electron transport chain (ETC) proteins and PGC-1α in the MG. Moreover, the markers of mitochondria remodeling mitofusins (Mfn1, Mfn2) and dynamin-like protein (Opa1) were studied using qPCR. A proportion of FR MUs increased from 37.9% to 50.8% and a proportion of FF units decreased from 44.7% to 26.6% after 8 weeks of training. The increased fatigue resistance, shortened twitch duration, and increased ability to potentiate force were found as early as after 2 weeks of endurance training, predominantly in FR MUs. Moreover, just after 2 weeks of the training an enhancement of the mitochondrial network remodeling was present as judged by an increase in expression of Mfn1, Opa1 and an increase in PGC-1α in the slow part of MG. Interestingly, no signs of intensification of mitochondrial biogenesis assessed by ETC proteins content and mtDNA in slow and fast parts of gastrocnemius were found at this stage of the training. Nevertheless, after 8 weeks of training an increase in the ETC protein content was observed, but mainly in the slow part of gastrocnemius. Concluding, the functional changes in MUs’ contractile properties leading to the enhancement of muscle performance accompanied by an activation of signalling that controls the muscle mitochondrial network reorganisation and mitochondrial biogenesis belong to an early muscle adaptive responses that precede an increase in mitochondrial ETC protein content.
Targeting adenosine receptor 2B in triple negative breast cancer

© The Author(s) 2018. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, for any purpose, even commercially, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. Targeting adenosine receptor 2B in triple negative breast cancer
Bird Radar Validation in the Field by Time-Referencing Line-Transect Surveys

Track-while-scan bird radars are widely used in ornithological studies, but often the precise detection capabilities of these systems are unknown. Quantification of radar performance is essential to avoid observational biases, which requires practical methods for validating a radar’s detection capability in specific field settings. In this study a method to quantify the detection capability of a bird radar is presented, as well a demonstration of this method in a case study. By time-referencing line-transect surveys, visually identified birds were automatically linked to individual tracks using their transect crossing time. Detection probabilities were determined as the fraction of the total set of visual observations that could be linked to radar tracks. To avoid ambiguities in assigning radar tracks to visual observations, the observer’s accuracy in determining a bird’s transect crossing time was taken into account. The accuracy was determined by examining the effect of a time lag applied to the visual observations on the number of matches found with radar tracks. Effects of flight altitude, distance, surface substrate and species size on the detection probability by the radar were quantified in a marine intertidal study area. Detection probability varied strongly with all these factors, as well as species-specific flight behaviour. The effective detection range for single birds flying at low altitude for an X-band marine radar based system was estimated at ∼1.5 km. Within this range the fraction of individual flying birds that were detected by the radar was 0.50±0.06 with a detection bias towards higher flight altitudes, larger birds and high tide situations. Besides radar validation, which we consider essential when quantification of bird numbers is important, our method of linking radar tracks to ground-truthed field observations can facilitate species-specific studies using surveillance radars. The methodology may prove equally useful for optimising tracking algorithms.
Utility and safety of endobronchial ultrasound-guided transbronchial needle aspiration in patients with mediastinal and hilar lymphadenopathy: Western region experience

AIMS: The aim of the study was to evaluate the clinical utility and safety of endobronchial ultrasound-guided transbronchial needle aspiration (EBUS-TBNA) in patients with mediastinal and hilar lymphadenopathy and to explicitly describe the utility of this procedure in patient's outcome. METHODS: A retrospective review and analysis was conducted on 52 patients with mediastinal or hilar lymphadenopathy who underwent EBUS-TBNA from June 2012 to June 2016. All the patients were evaluated by computed tomography (CT) chest with contrast before EBUS examination. Enlarged mediastinal or hilar lymph node was defined as >1 cm short axis on the enhanced CT. RESULTS: Among the 52 patients studied, 57.7% were presented with mediastinal or hilar lymphadenopathy for diagnosis and 42.3% presented with suspected mediastinal malignancy. Paratracheal stations were the most common site for puncture in 33 lymph nodes (43%). The best diagnostic yield was obtained from subcarinal stations and the lowest yield from the hilar stations. Surgical biopsies confirmed lymphoma in six patients, tuberculosis (TB) in three, sarcoidosis in two and one had metastatic adenocarcinoma of unknown primary. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value of EBUS-TBNA for diagnosis of mediastinal and hilar lymph node abnormalities were 78.6%, 100%, 100%, and 80%, respectively. The diagnostic yield of EBUS-TBNA in malignant and benign conditions was 79.0%. CONCLUSIONS: EBUS-TBNA is a safe and efficacious procedure which can be performed using conscious sedation with high yields. It can be used for the staging of malignancies as well as for the diagnosis of inflammatory and infectious conditions such as sarcoidosis and TB.
Association of comorbidities with breast cancer: An observational study

Background: The aim of this study was to describe the prevalence of comorbidity in newly diagnosed female breast cancer patients in north-west India. The second end point of the study was compliance for multimodality treatment. Comorbidity assessed by counting the number of coexisting diseases diagnosed in a cancer patient or by using a comorbidity index that combines the number and severity of the diseases. The most widely used index is the Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI). Materials and Methods: The data of female patients with breast cancer were recorded, having comorbidities during the cancer registration or comorbidities diagnosed during the treatment at the host institute between January and December 2012. The patients were distributed on the basis of physical parameters such as age, stage, tumor grade, hormone receptor status, ECOG status at diagnosis and CCI. Scores of CCI are summed to provide a total score to predict mortality. Results: During the period of January to December 2012, 156 biopsy-proven breast cancer patients were included in the study. During this period, female breast cancer patients enrolled were 13.94% out of total patient enrollment. The most prevalent comorbidities associated with breast cancer are hypertension (21.8%), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (19.9%), rheumatologic disease (18.6%), and diabetes mellitus (16.7%), all four conditions have been reported in around 75% of the cases. The planning of multimodality management in comorbidity arm was significantly lower (P > 0.01) as compared to patients without comorbidity. Conclusions: The planning of multimodality management in comorbidity arm was significantly lower as compared to patients without comorbidity. Because of the comorbid condition, the definitive treatment of breast cancer was not given so this will also affect the treatment of breast cancer. When the CCI score increases with an increase in the number of comorbidities will decrease survival.
Pelee: A Real-Time Object Detection System on Mobile Devices

An increasing need of running Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) models on mobile devices with limited computing power and memory resource encourages studies on efficient model design. A number of efficient architectures have been proposed in recent years, for example, MobileNet, ShuffleNet, and MobileNetV2. However, all these models are heavily dependent on depthwise separable convolution which lacks efficient implementation in most deep learning frameworks. In this study, we propose an efficient architecture named PeleeNet, which is built with conventional convolution instead. On ImageNet ILSVRC 2012 dataset, our proposed PeleeNet achieves a higher accuracy and over 1.8 times faster speed than MobileNet and MobileNetV2 on NVIDIA TX2. Meanwhile, PeleeNet is only 66% of the model size of MobileNet. We then propose a real-time object detection system by combining PeleeNet with Single Shot MultiBox Detector (SSD) method and optimizing the architecture for fast speed. Our proposed detection system2, named Pelee, achieves 76.4% mAP (mean average precision) on PASCAL VOC2007 and 22.4 mAP on MS COCO dataset at the speed of 23.6 FPS on iPhone 8 and 125 FPS on NVIDIA TX2. The result on COCO outperforms YOLOv2 in consideration of a higher precision, 13.6 times lower computational cost and 11.3 times smaller model size.
Machinability studies on Al 7075/BN/Al2O3 squeeze cast hybrid nanocomposite under different machining environments

ABSTRACT Enforcement of stricter environmental policies demands alternative methods that could reduce the usage of cutting fluid during machining. Thus, dry machining and minimum quantity lubrication (MQL) machining are gaining practical importance. Due to enhanced mechanical and thermal properties, aluminium based nanocomposites have wide application in aerospace and automobile industries. In this work, asqueeze cast hybrid nanocomposite is developed with the reinforcement of 0.5 wt% hexagonal boron nitride and 1 wt% alumina particles in the base matrix of Al 7075 that is subjected to a squeezing pressure of 150 MPa. During the turning of this hybrid nanocomposite, thefeed rate is varied (0.1, 0.2, and 0.3 mm/rev)and its influence on the generated forces, tool wear and surface roughness under dry and MQL environments is performed. The results are compared with squeeze cast unreinforced aluminium alloy and presented.
A mobile scaffolding-aid-based bird-watching learning system

In this paper, we develop a mobile scaffolding-aid-based bird-watching learning system, which aims to construct an outdoor mobility-learning activity under the up-to-date wireless technology. The proposed bird-watching learning (BWL) system is designed on the wireless mobile ad-hoc network. In the BWL system, each learner device has PDA (personal digital assistances) with a Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11b) card, within a WLAN environment. Specially, the BWL system contains a mobile learn sheet sub-system, which integrates the scaffolding-aid learn model into the BWL system. Finally, we conduct a formative evaluation to provide statistical results, which is evaluated for the following two purposes; (1) to explore the possible roles and scaffolding aids that the mobile PDA of the BWL system can play and offer in the bird-watching activities, (2) to investigate if the affective and cognitive learning could be possibly benefited from the mobility, portability, and individualization of the mobile PDA of the BWL system.
Mechanisms of Diabetes-Induced Endothelial Cell Senescence: Role of Arginase 1

We have recently found that diabetes-induced premature senescence of retinal endothelial cells is accompanied by NOX2-NADPH oxidase-induced increases in the ureohydrolase enzyme arginase 1 (A1). Here, we used genetic strategies to determine the specific involvement of A1 in diabetes-induced endothelial cell senescence. We used A1 knockout mice and wild type mice that were rendered diabetic with streptozotocin and retinal endothelial cells (ECs) exposed to high glucose or transduced with adenovirus to overexpress A1 for these experiments. ABH [2(S)-Amino-6-boronohexanoic acid] was used to inhibit arginase activity. We used Western blotting, immunolabeling, quantitative PCR, and senescence associated β-galactosidase (SA β-Gal) activity to evaluate senescence. Analyses of retinal tissue extracts from diabetic mice showed significant increases in mRNA expression of the senescence-related proteins p16INK4a, p21, and p53 when compared with non-diabetic mice. SA β-Gal activity and p16INK4a immunoreactivity were also increased in retinal vessels from diabetic mice. A1 gene deletion or pharmacological inhibition protected against the induction of premature senescence. A1 overexpression or high glucose treatment increased SA β-Gal activity in cultured ECs. These results demonstrate that A1 is critically involved in diabetes-induced senescence of retinal ECs. Inhibition of arginase activity may therefore be an effective therapeutic strategy to alleviate diabetic retinopathy by preventing premature senescence.
Joint Inventory and Cash Management for Multidivisional Supply Chains

This paper develops a centralized supply chain model that integrates material flows with cash flows. The supply chain is owned by a single firm with two divisions. The downstream division (headquarters), facing random customer demand, replenishes materials from the upstream division. The firm installs a financial services platform that pools the divisions’ cash into a master account managed by the headquarters. In each period, cash is received from customers and paid to the outside vendor after materials are delivered. The headquarters determines how much cash to retain for inventory replenishment. The objective is to determine an optimal joint inventory replenishment and cash retention policy for the entire supply chain. We prove that the optimal policy has a surprisingly simple structure—both divisions implement a base-stock policy for inventory replenishment; the headquarters monitors the corporate working capital and implements a two-threshold policy for cash retention. This result is obtained by extending the well-known Clark-Scarf decomposition with newly derived cash-related penalty functions. The optimal policy enables us to investigate the interaction between cash and inventory decisions. We show that in the presence of transaction costs, a firm may stock more even if the inventory holding cost increases. To quantify the value of financial integration, we compare the cash pooling model with systems under different levels of financial integration. Our study suggests that the value of cash pooling can be significant when demand is increasing (respectively, stationary) and the internal transfer price is low (respectively, high). Nevertheless, a significant amount of cash pooling benefit may be recovered if the headquarters can optimize the internal transfer price.
Clinical Significance of Reddish Depressed Lesions Observed in the Gastric Mucosa after Helicobacter pylori Eradication

Background and Aim: Reddish depressed lesions (RDLs) frequently observed in patients following Helicobacter pylori eradication are indistinguishable from gastric cancer. We examined the clinical and histological feature of RDLs and its relevant endoscopic diagnosis including magnifying narrow-band imaging (M-NBI). Methods: We enrolled 301 consecutive patients with H. pylori eradication who underwent endoscopy using white light imaging (WLI). We examined the prevalence and host factors contributing to the presence of RDLs. Next, we used M-NBI in 90 patients (104 RDLs), and compared the diagnostic efficacy between M-NBI and WLI groups using propensity-score matching analysis. Results: In 301 patients after eradication, 117 (39%) showed RDLs. Male, open-type atrophy, and gastric cancer history were risk factors for RDLs. A gastric biopsy was needed in 83 (71%) during WLI observation and only 2 were diagnosed with adenocarcinoma. In M-NBI group, a biopsy was performed in 21 (20%), and 9 were diagnosed with adenocarcinoma. A biopsy was required in fewer patients, and the positive predictive value of a biopsy was statistically higher in M-NBI than in the WLI group (p < 0.01). Conclusions: RDLs are frequently observed in high-risk patients for gastric cancer after eradication. M-NBI demonstrated significantly superior diagnostic efficacy with respect to RDL.
Robust Defibrillator Deployment Under Cardiac Arrest Location Uncertainty via Row-and-Column Generation

Sudden cardiac arrest is a significant public health concern. Successful treatment of cardiac arrest is extremely time sensitive, and use of an automated external defibrillator (AED) where possible significantly increases the probability of survival. Placement of AEDs in public locations can improve survival by enabling bystanders to treat victims of cardiac arrest prior to the arrival of emergency medical responders, thus shortening the time between collapse and treatment. However, since the exact locations of future cardiac arrests cannot be known a priori, AEDs must be placed strategically in public locations to ensure their accessibility in the event of an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest emergency. In this paper, we propose a data-driven optimization model for deploying AEDs in public spaces while accounting for uncertainty in future cardiac arrest locations. Our approach involves discretizing a continuous service area into a large set of scenarios, where the probability of cardiac arrest at each locat.
A Novel Rabbit Monoclonal Antibody Platform To Dissect the Diverse Repertoire of Antibody Epitopes for HIV-1 Env Immunogen Design

ABSTRACT The majority of available monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) in the current HIV vaccine field are generated from HIV-1-infected people. In contrast, preclinical immunogenicity studies have mainly focused on polyclonal antibody responses in experimental animals. Although rabbits have been widely used for antibody studies, there has been no report of using rabbit MAbs to dissect the specificity of antibody responses for AIDS vaccine development. Here we report on the production of a panel of 12 MAbs from a New Zealand White (NZW) rabbit that was immunized with an HIV-1 JR-FL gp120 DNA prime and protein boost vaccination regimen. These rabbit MAbs recognized a diverse repertoire of envelope (Env) epitopes ranging from the highly immunogenic V3 region to several previously underappreciated epitopes in the C1, C4, and C5 regions. Nine MAbs showed cross-reactivity to gp120s of clades other than clade B. Increased somatic mutation and extended CDR3 were observed with Ig genes of several molecularly cloned rabbit MAbs. Phylogenic tree analysis showed that the heavy chains of MAbs recognizing the same region on gp120 tend to segregate into an independent subtree. At least three rabbit MAbs showed neutralizing activities with various degrees of breadth and potency. The establishment of this rabbit MAb platform will significantly enhance our ability to test optimal designs of Env immunogens to gain a better understanding of the structural specificity and evolution process of Env-specific antibody responses elicited by candidate AIDS vaccines.
Next Generation Sequencing expression profiling of mitochondrial subunits in men with Klinefelter syndrome

Objectives: Klinefelter syndrome (KS) is one of the most common sex-chromosome disorders as it affects up to 1 in every 600-1000 newborn males. Men with KS carry one extra X chromosome and they usually present a 47,XXY karyotype, but less frequent variants have also been reported in literature. KS typical symptoms include tall stature, gynecomastia, broad hips, hypogonadism and absent spermatogenesis. The syndrome is also related to a wide range of cognitive deficits, among which language-based learning disabilities and verbal cognition impairment are frequently diagnosed. The present study was carried out to investigate the role of mitochondrial subunits in KS, since the molecular mechanisms underlying KS pathogenesis are not fully understood. Methods: The study was performed by the next generation sequencing analysis and qRT-PCR assay. Results: We were able to identify a significant down-expression of mitochondrial encoded NADH: ubiquinone oxidoreductase core subunit 6 (MT-ND6) in men with KS. Conclusion: It is known that defects of the mtDNA encoding mitochondrial subunits are responsible for the malfunction of Complex I, which will eventually lead to the Complex I deficiency, the most common respiratory chain defect in human disorders. Since it has been shown that decreased Complex I protein levels could induce apoptosis, wehypothesizethat the above-mentioned MT-ND6 down-expression contributes to the wide range of phenotypes observed in men with KS.