Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Characterization of Oropharyngeal Carriage Isolates of Neisseria meningitidis in Healthy Korean Adolescents in 2015

The meningococcus carriage rate is age-dependent, with a high prevalence in adolescents and young adults. This cross-sectional study aimed to estimate the oropharyngeal carriage rate of meningococcus among healthy Korean adolescents and its relationship with several population characteristics. The survey was conducted from April to May 2015 among 1,460 first-year high-school students in 9 high schools located in Gyeonggi province, Korea. Each student answered a short questionnaire assessing risk factors for carriage, and posterior pharyngeal wall swab samples were obtained. These samples were cultured on meningococcus-selective media, with colonies resembling meningococci identified using the Vitek® MS system (bioMérieux, Marcy l'Etoile, France). All isolates were characterized by molecular serogrouping and multilocus sequence typing (MLST). Meningococci were identified from 3.4% (49/1,460) swabs. Current smokers had significantly higher carriage rates than non-smokers (8.2% vs. 2.9%, P = 0.002), and boys had significantly higher carriage rates than girls (4.4% vs. 1.6%, P = 0.004). Serogroup B was the most common serogroup, followed by serogroup C, then 29E and Y. Twenty-seven different sequence types (STs) were identified; the most common were ST-3091, ST-11278, and ST-44. These belonged to clonal complexes (CCs) 269, 32, and 41/44, respectively, known as the hypervirulent clones. Evaluating meningococcal carriage is important to understand the epidemiology of meningococcal disease; however, little data exist in Korea. Similar to western countries, meningococcal serogroup B has emerged in Korea, and hypervirulent clones were identified. It is necessary to monitor the genetic and serologic characteristics of circulating meningococci and to assess the potential strain coverage of meningococcal vaccines.
Deltaic deposits at Aeolis Dorsa: Sedimentary evidence for a standing body of water on the northern plains of Mars

A fundamental long‐standing question regarding Mars history is whether the flat and low‐lying northern plains ever hosted an ocean. The best opportunity to solve this problem is provided by stratigraphic observations of sedimentary deposits onlapping the crustal dichotomy. Here, we use high‐resolution imagery and topography to analyze a branching network of inverted channel and channel lobe deposits in the Aeolis Dorsa region, just north of the dichotomy boundary. Observations of stacked, cross‐cutting channel bodies and stratal geometries indicate that these landforms represent exhumed distributary channel deposits. Observations of depositional trunk feeder channel bodies, a lack of evidence for past topographic confinement, channel avulsions at similar elevations, and the presence of a strong break in dip slope between topset and foreset beds suggest that this distributary system was most likely a delta, rather than an alluvial fan or submarine fan. Sediment transport calculations using both measured and derived channel geometries indicate a minimum delta deposition time on the order of 400 years. The location of this delta within a thick and widespread clastic wedge abutting the crustal dichotomy boundary, unconfined by any observable craters, suggests a standing body of water potentially 105 km2 in extent or greater and is spatially consistent with hypotheses for a northern ocean.
Optimal Balance of the Striatal Medium Spiny Neuron Network

Slowly varying activity in the striatum, the main Basal Ganglia input structure, is important for the learning and execution of movement sequences. Striatal medium spiny neurons (MSNs) form cell assemblies whose population firing rates vary coherently on slow behaviourally relevant timescales. It has been shown that such activity emerges in a model of a local MSN network but only at realistic connectivities of and only when MSN generated inhibitory post-synaptic potentials (IPSPs) are realistically sized. Here we suggest a reason for this. We investigate how MSN network generated population activity interacts with temporally varying cortical driving activity, as would occur in a behavioural task. We find that at unrealistically high connectivity a stable winners-take-all type regime is found where network activity separates into fixed stimulus dependent regularly firing and quiescent components. In this regime only a small number of population firing rate components interact with cortical stimulus variations. Around connectivity a transition to a more dynamically active regime occurs where all cells constantly switch between activity and quiescence. In this low connectivity regime, MSN population components wander randomly and here too are independent of variations in cortical driving. Only in the transition regime do weak changes in cortical driving interact with many population components so that sequential cell assemblies are reproducibly activated for many hundreds of milliseconds after stimulus onset and peri-stimulus time histograms display strong stimulus and temporal specificity. We show that, remarkably, this activity is maximized at striatally realistic connectivities and IPSP sizes. Thus, we suggest the local MSN network has optimal characteristics – it is neither too stable to respond in a dynamically complex temporally extended way to cortical variations, nor is it too unstable to respond in a consistent repeatable way. Rather, it is optimized to generate stimulus dependent activity patterns for long periods after variations in cortical excitation.
Surveillance Video Processing Using Compressive Sensing

A compressive sensing method combined with decomposition of a matrix formed with image frames of a surveillance video into low rank and sparse matrices is proposed to segment the background and extract moving objects in a surveillance video. The video is acquired by compressive measurements, and the measurements are used to reconstruct the video by a low rank and sparse decomposition of matrix. The low rank component represents the background, and the sparse component is used to identify moving objects in the surveillance video. The decomposition is performed by an augmented Lagrangian alternating direction method. Experiments are carried out to demonstrate that moving objects can be reliably extracted with a small amount of measurements.
Lifestyle intervention: results of the Treatment of Mild Hypertension Study (TOMHS).

BACKGROUND Questions regarding the efficacy of nonpharmacologic approaches for the treatment of stage 1 hypertension were addressed as part of the Treatment of Mild Hypertension Study (TOMHS), a 4-year, randomized clinical trial (N = 902). This report describes the lifestyle intervention program used in TOMHS, presents data on the lifestyle changes observed, and focuses on the effect of weight loss on blood pressure and blood lipid levels. METHODS Participants were randomly assigned to receive either placebo or one of five different antihypertensive medications. All took part in a lifestyle intervention program to reduce weight and sodium and alcohol intake and to increase physical activity. RESULTS Substantial changes from baseline levels were achieved for all lifestyle intervention variables. Mean weight change was -10.5 lb (-5.6%) at 1 year, -8.5 lb (-4.5%) at 2 years, -7.4 lb (-4.0%) at 3 years, and -5.7 lb (-3.0%) at 4 years. At 4 years, 70% of participants remained below baseline weight and 34% maintained a weight loss of 10 lb or greater. Mean change in urinary sodium excretion was -12.5 mmol/8 hr (-23%) at 1 year, -10.7 mmol/8 hr (-20%) at 2 years, -8.4 mmol/8 hr (-16%) at 3 years, and -4.6 mmol/8 hr (-9%) at 4 years. Alcohol intake declined by 1.6 drinks/week among drinkers at 4 years. Reported leisure physical activity increased by 86% at 1 year and remained 50% above baseline at 4 years. Beneficial changes in blood pressure and serum lipids were associated with these changes. CONCLUSIONS These results support a role for lifestyle interventions as the initial treatment for stage 1 hypertension and demonstrate that such interventions can be successfully implemented in the clinical setting.
Identifying the Direct Effect of Experience and the Moderating Effect of Satisfaction in the Greek Online Market

The scope of this paper is to examine the perceptions which induce the Greek customers to purchase over the Internet, testing the direct effect of experience and the moderating effect of satisfaction. A review of research conducted in the Greek online market demonstrates that satisfaction, self-efficacy, and trust keep a prominent role in the Greek customersâ€™ shopping behavior. To increase understanding of this behavior, two parameters of the UTAUT model, performance expectancy and effort expectancy, are incorporated. The findings demonstrate that customersâ€™ perceptions about all of the parameters do not remain constant, as the experience acquired from past purchases increases. Moreover, the relationship of experience with self-efficacy and intention to repurchase changes, as satisfaction gained from previous purchases increases. The implications of this study are interesting not only for the Greek but also for the Meditterranean researchers and e-retailers, since the Mediterranean ebusiness market shares several cultural similarities with the Greek market.
Low plasma level of atrial natriuretic peptide predicts development of diabetes: the prospective Malmo Diet and Cancer study.

CONTEXT The cardiac natriuretic peptides are involved in blood pressure regulation, and large cross-sectional studies have shown lower plasma levels of N-terminal pro-natriuretic peptide levels [N-terminal atrial natriuretic peptide (N-ANP) and N-terminal brain natriuretic peptide (N-BNP)] in patients with insulin resistance, obesity, and diabetes. OBJECTIVE In this study, we prospectively tested whether plasma levels of mid-regional ANP (MR-ANP) and N-BNP predict new-onset diabetes and long-term glucose progression. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PATIENTS MR-ANP and N-BNP were measured in 1828 nondiabetic individuals of the Malmö Diet and Cancer cohort (mean age 60 yr; 61% women) who subsequently underwent a follow-up exam including an oral glucose tolerance test after a median follow-up time of 16 yr. Logistic regression was used to adjust for covariates. RESULTS During follow-up, 301 subjects developed new-onset diabetes. After full multivariate adjustment, MR-ANP was significantly inversely associated with incident diabetes (OR = 0.85; 95% CI = 0.73-0.99; P = 0.034) but not N-BNP (OR = 0.92; 95% CI = 0.80-1.06; P = 0.262). In fully adjusted linear regression models, the progression of fasting glucose during follow-up was significantly inversely related to baseline levels of MR-ANP (P = 0.004) but not N-BNP (P = 0.129). Quartile analyses revealed that the overall association was mainly accounted for by excess risk of incident diabetes in subjects belonging to the lowest quartile of MR-ANP. After full adjustment, the odds ratio for incident diabetes in the bottom compared with the top quartile of MR-ANP was 1.65 (OR = 1.08-2.51, P = 0.019) and 1.43 (OR = 1.04-1.96, P = 0.027) compared with all other subjects. CONCLUSION Low plasma levels of MR-ANP predict development of future diabetes and glucose progression over time, suggesting a causal role of ANP deficiency in diabetes development.
Transoesophageal echocardiography accurately detects cardiac output variation: a prospective comparison with thermodilution in cardiac surgery

Background and objective: Intraoperative Doppler ultrasound can be used to measure cardiac output by transoesophageal echocardiography. Recently, its reliability, when compared to the thermodilution technique, has been questioned. The purpose of this study was to compare intraoperative changes in cardiac output measured by echo‐Doppler and by thermodilution in cardiac surgery. We also assessed the agreement between the techniques. Methods: Fifty cardiac surgical patients (38 male, 12 female, mean age of 63.4 ± 14.3 yr) were prospectively included after approval by the Ethics Committee of the Institution. Cardiac output was assessed by thermodilution, with 10 mL saline at 12°C, and simultaneously and blindly by echo‐Doppler in deep transgastric view with pulsed wave Doppler at the level of the left ventricular outflow tract. Matched thermodilution cardiac output and echo‐Doppler cardiac output measurements were taken three times at the end of expiration, both pre‐ and post‐cardiopulmonary bypass. Results: Echo‐Doppler measurements were obtained in 44 patients (88%). In three patients, Doppler recordings could not be obtained adequately, and three developed left ventricular outflow tract obstruction after bypass. Bland‐Altman analysis revealed a bias of 0.015 L min−1, with narrow limits of agreement (−1.21 to 1.22 L min−1) and 29.1% error. Echo‐Doppler was accurate (92% sensitivity and 71% specificity, P = 0.008 by receiver operating characteristic curves) for detecting more than 10% of change in thermodilution cardiac output. There were no complications related to the study. Conclusions: The agreement between cardiac output by echo‐Doppler and by thermodilution is clinically acceptable and transoesophageal echocardiography is a reliable tool to assess significant cardiac output changes in a population of selected patients.
Radiation and Smoking Effects on Lung Cancer Incidence among Atomic Bomb Survivors

Abstract While radiation increases the risk of lung cancer among members of the Life Span Study (LSS) cohort of atomic bomb survivors, there are still important questions about the nature of its interaction with smoking, the predominant cause of lung cancer. Among 105,404 LSS subjects, 1,803 primary lung cancer incident cases were identified for the period 1958–1999. Individual smoking history information and the latest radiation dose estimates were used to investigate the joint effects of radiation and smoking on lung cancer rates using Poisson grouped survival regression methods. Relative to never-smokers, lung cancer risks increased with the amount and duration of smoking and decreased with time since quitting smoking at any level of radiation exposure. Models assuming generalized interactions of smoking and radiation fit markedly better than simple additive or multiplicative interaction models. The joint effect appeared to be super-multiplicative for light/moderate smokers, with a rapid increase in excess risk with smoking intensity up to about 10 cigarettes per day, but additive or sub-additive for heavy smokers smoking a pack or more per day, with little indication of any radiation-associated excess risk. The gender-averaged excess relative risk per Gy of lung cancer (at age 70 after radiation exposure at 30) was estimated as 0.59 (95% confidence interval: 0.31–1.00) for nonsmokers with a female : male ratio of 3.1. About one-third of the lung cancer cases in this cohort were estimated to be attributable to smoking while about 7% were associated with radiation. The joint effect of smoking and radiation on lung cancer in the LSS is dependent on smoking intensity and is best described by the generalized interaction model rather than a simple additive or multiplicative model.
The Capacity of Visual Short-Term Memory is Set Both by Visual Information Load and by Number of Objects

Previous research has suggested that visual short-term memory has a fixed capacity of about four objects. However, we found that capacity varied substantially across the five stimulus classes we examined, ranging from 1.6 for shaded cubes to 4.4 for colors (estimated using a change detection task). We also estimated the information load per item in each class, using visual search rate. The changes we measured in memory capacity across classes were almost exactly mirrored by changes in the opposite direction in visual search rate (r2 = .992 between search rate and the reciprocal of memory capacity). The greater the information load of each item in a stimulus class (as indicated by a slower search rate), the fewer items from that class one can hold in memory. Extrapolating this linear relationship reveals that there is also an upper bound on capacity of approximately four or five objects. Thus, both the visual information load and number of objects impose capacity limits on visual short-term memory.
Image partial blur detection and classification

In this paper, we propose a partially-blurred-image classification and analysis framework for automatically detecting images containing blurred regions and recognizing the blur types for those regions without needing to perform blur kernel estimation and image deblurring. We develop several blur features modeled by image color, gradient, and spectrum information, and use feature parameter training to robustly classify blurred images. Our blur detection is based on image patches, making region-wise training and classification in one image efficient. Extensive experiments show that our method works satisfactorily on challenging image data, which establishes a technical foundation for solving several computer vision problems, such as motion analysis and image restoration, using the blur information.
Weld appearance and microstructural characteristics of friction stir butt barrier welded joints of aluminium alloy to copper

Friction stir butt barrier welding, an improved method based on the friction stir butt welding process, in which a barrier was configured on the butt plate, was applied to the Cu–Al combination. The resultant Cu–Al joints presented good appearance when Al was adopted as the barrier. The pin shifting towards the Al side could improve the interior quality of the weld. However, the effect was limited when the pin offset increased to a certain value. As the tool rotation rate increased, the amount and size of the voids decreased first and then increased. There were two types of joint depending on the interfacial morphology: the smooth interface and the chaotic interface. When the pin offset was zero, the interface was occupied by large Cu fragments. As the pin offset increased, the joint interface transited first to the smooth type and then to the chaotic type. As the rotation rate increased, the laminate density around the interface decreased, and the sublayers in the laminates thinned.
Androgen Regulation of Renal Uridine Diphosphoglucuronosyltransferase 1A1 in Rats

Many phase I and II enzymes are under hormonal regulation, resulting in sex-related expression patterns. This sex-related enzyme expression can result in differential metabolism of physiologically active endogenous substances, altered xenobiotic clearance, and differences in susceptibility to drug toxicities. Treatment of female Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats with 5 mg testosterone propionate/kg/day, 2 ml/kg s.c. for 8 days resulted in induction of renal uridine diphosphoglucuronosyltransferase (UGT) 1A1, as determined by immunoblot and probe substrate activity. Glucuronidation activity for mycophenolic acid, a substrate for rat UGT1A1, 1A6, and 1A7, was significantly elevated approximately 2-fold in renal microsomes from testosterone propionate-treated animals. Protein expression of rat UGT1A1 was also dramatically increased, whereas 1A6 and 1A7 remained unchanged as a result of treatment. Male SD rats were determined to express greater renal UGT1A1 than age-matched female rats. These data support the androgen regulation of rat renal UGT1A1.
On-Shoe Wearable Sensors for Gait and Turning Assessment of Patients With Parkinson's Disease

Assessment of locomotion through simple tests such as timed up and go (TUG) or walking trials can provide valuable information for the evaluation of treatment and the early diagnosis of people with Parkinson's disease (PD). Common methods used in clinics are either based on complex motion laboratory settings or simple timing outcomes using stop watches. The goal of this paper is to present an innovative technology based on wearable sensors on-shoe and processing algorithm, which provides outcome measures characterizing PD motor symptoms during TUG and gait tests. Our results on ten PD patients and ten age-matched elderly subjects indicate an accuracy ± precision of 2.8 ± 2.4 cm/s and 1.3 ± 3.0 cm for stride velocity and stride length estimation compared to optical motion capture, with the advantage of being practical to use in home or clinics without any discomfort for the subject. In addition, the use of novel spatio-temporal parameters, including turning, swing width, path length, and their intercycle variability, was also validated and showed interesting tendencies for discriminating patients in ON and OFF states and control subjects.
Cataract extraction and intraocular lens implantation in children with uveitis

AIM To evaluate the long term results of cataract surgery with intraocular lens implantation (IOL) in children with uveitis. METHODS The study included 10 eyes in seven children (age 3.5–10 years, mean 6.5 years). The cataract surgery included capsulorhexis of the anterior and the posterior capsule, anterior vitrectomy in some eyes, and implantation of a heparin surface modified (HSM) poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) IOL into the capsular bag. RESULTS Follow up periods ranged from 1 to 5 years. Best corrected visual acuity after surgery reached 20/50–20/20 in all but two eyes. Opacities or membranes requiring reoperation developed in seven eyes. Glaucoma developed in three eyes after the cataract operation. CONCLUSION These results suggest that implantation of a HSM PMMA IOL is an alternative to correct aphakia also in children with uveitis.
Scene-Level Analysis for Tennis Sports Video using Weighted Linear Combination of Visual Cues

We present a scene-level analysis system that takes TV broadcasted tennis footage as input and produces a behavior analysis of the moving-players in the scene. To achieve this functionality, our algorithm relies on two modular blocks. The first one detects and tracks a number of key objects in the image domain, like moving-players and the playing-field. Afterwards, a camera-calibration algorithm is applied that uses the lines of the court as a reference and transforms image coordinates to physical positions to compute the camera parameters. The second block firstly models several important events of a tennis game, such as service and net-approach, based on four real-world visual features provided by the first block. This paper proposes a new improved model, since it weights the importance of each visual cue to different events, rather than providing a simple combination of these four visual cues as was done in previous work. Based on the new model, we can accurately determine what kind of event the current input frame belongs to. Furthermore, we detect the start time and end time of each event using a simple but efficient temporal filter. Our proposed system is capable of classifying each tennis play into three semantic categories, which are popular and familiar to most viewers. This paper presents details of the system, together with results on a number of tennis video sequences.