Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Abdominal aortic aneurysm, an absolute surgical indication?

In a retrospective study, 155 patients operated for infrarenal abdominal aortic aneurysm during a 5.5-year period (jan. 1986-->oct. 1991) were reviewed. In our series, 111 patients underwent elective (EL) surgery, 44 patients had an emergency (EM) operation. Male/female ratio was 10/1. Mean age in the EL group and EM was 68.1 years and 71.82 years respectively (p < 0.05). In the EL group, 68 (= 61%) patients were asymptomatic. All patients in the EM group had symptoms: shock + syncope in 28 patients, acute back pain in 4 patients, acute abdominal pain in 12 patients. Aneurysm diameter > or = 8 cm was present in 33% of the EL group, but in 57% of the EM group. Early mortality for the EL and EM group was 3.6% and 23% respectively (p < 0.001). Major postoperative complications were present in 13% in the EL group, in 55% in the EM group (p < 0.001). During a 5-year follow-up of 135 patients (= 96%), 22 patients died. Cardiac problems (7/22) and cancer (5/22) were most prominent. 5-year survival for the entire group was 83%; EL (85%) and EM (76%) were not significant. None of the patients subsequently underwent an operation related to the abdominal aortic intervention.
Arabic Retrieval Revisited: Morphological Hole Filling

Due to Arabic's morphological complexity, Arabic retrieval benefits greatly from morphological analysis -- particularly stemming. However, the best known stemming does not handle linguistic phenomena such as broken plurals and malformed stems. In this paper we propose a model of character-level morphological transformation that is trained using Wikipedia hypertext to page title links. The use of our model yields statistically significant improvements in Arabic retrieval over the use of the best statistical stemming technique. The technique can potentially be applied to other languages.
The vertical field border in hemianopia and its significance for fixation and reading.

PURPOSE The existence of macular sparing, a central seeing area of several degrees within the hemianopic field defect, has been controversial for a long time, because inaccurate fixation during perimetry can produce ambiguous results. The visual field border in hemianopia was studied to examine whether a vertical strip of hemifield overlap described in monkeys exists in humans and whether additional macular sparing could be found. METHODS Vertical triplets of dots were scanned on the retinas of eight patients (13 eyes) with hemianopia at different eccentricity from the vertical meridian during strict simultaneous fixation control using a scanning laser ophthalmoscope (SLO). Additionally, eye movements were measured by SLO and by an infrared reflection system while subjects read texts. RESULTS Macular sparing of 2 degrees to 5 degrees and absence of sparing were observed. The presence and amount of sparing influenced fixation behavior, reading performance, and reliability of conventional perimetry. The smaller the macular sparing, the less stable the fixation. In the absence of sparing, either central unstable fixation with frequent saccades toward the hemianopic side or eccentric fixation occurred, resulting in a shift of the field defect toward the hemianopic side. A vertical strip of sometimes partial perception was found in 12 eyes at 0.5 degrees from the midline. CONCLUSIONS Macular sparing and a slight vertical strip of hemifield overlap exists in humans. Adaptive strategies like eccentric fixation and predictive saccades improve reading performance and can augment rehabilitation.
Projective hulls and the projective Gelfand transform

We introduce the notion of a projective hull for subsets of complex projective varieties parallel to the idea of a polynomial hull in affine varieties. With this concept, a generalization of J. Wermer's classical theorem on the hull of a curve in C n is established in the projective setting. The projective hull is shown to have interesting properties and is related to various extremal functions and capacities in pluripotential theory. A main analytic result asserts that for any point x in the projective hull K of a compact set KP n there exists a positive current T of bidimension (1,1) with support in the closure of K and a probability measure µ on K with dd c T = µ �x. This result generalizes to any Kahler manifold and has strong consequences for the structure of K. We also introduce the notion of a projective spectrum for Banach graded algebras parallel to the Gelfand spectrum of a Banach algebra. This projective spectrum has universal properties exactly like those in the Gelfand case. Moreover, the projective hull is shown to play a role (for graded algebras) completely analogous to that played by the polynomial hull in the study of finitely generated Banach algebras. This paper gives foundations for generalizing many of the results on boundaries of varieties in C n to general algebraic manifolds.
Identification of regions within the Legionella pneumophila VipA effector protein involved in actin binding and polymerization and in interference with eukaryotic organelle trafficking

The Legionella pneumophila effector protein VipA is an actin nucleator that co‐localizes with actin filaments and early endosomes in infected macrophages and which interferes with organelle trafficking when expressed in yeast. To identify the regions of VipA involved in its subcellular localization and functions, we ectopically expressed specific VipA mutant proteins in eukaryotic cells. This indicated that the characteristic punctate distribution of VipA depends on its NH2‐terminal (amino acid residues 1–133) and central coiled‐coil (amino acid residues 133–206) regions, and suggested a role for the COOH‐terminal (amino acid residues 206–339) region in association with actin filaments and for the NH2‐terminal in co‐localization with early endosomes. Co‐immunoprecipitation and in vitro assays showed that the COOH‐terminal region of VipA is necessary and sufficient to mediate actin binding, and is essential but insufficient to induce microfilament formation. Assays in yeast revealed that the NH2 and the COOH‐terminal regions, and possibly an NPY motif within the NH2 region of VipA, are necessary for interference with organelle trafficking. Overall, this suggests that subversion of eukaryotic vesicular trafficking by VipA involves both its ability to associate with early endosomes via its NH2‐terminal region and its capacity to bind and polymerize actin through its COOH‐terminal region.
A-type lamins bind both hetero- and euchromatin, the latter being regulated by lamina-associated polypeptide 2 alpha

Lamins are components of the peripheral nuclear lamina and interact with heterochromatic genomic regions, termed lamina-associated domains (LADs). In contrast to lamin B1 being primarily present at the nuclear periphery, lamin A/C also localizes throughout the nucleus, where it associates with the chromatin-binding protein lamina-associated polypeptide (LAP) 2 alpha. Here, we show that lamin A/C also interacts with euchromatin, as determined by chromatin immunoprecipitation of euchromatin- and heterochromatin-enriched samples. By way of contrast, lamin B1 was only found associated with heterochromatin. Euchromatic regions occupied by lamin A/C overlap with those bound by LAP2alpha, and lack of LAP2alpha in LAP2alpha-deficient cells shifts binding of lamin A/C toward more heterochromatic regions. These alterations in lamin A/C-chromatin interactions correlate with changes in epigenetic histone marks in euchromatin but do not significantly affect gene expression. Loss of lamin A/C in heterochromatic regions in LAP2alpha-deficient cells, however, correlated with increased gene expression. Our data show a novel role of nucleoplasmic lamin A/C and LAP2alpha in regulating euchromatin.
ECOLOGICAL AND DEVELOPMENTAL CONTEXT OF NATURAL SELECTION: MATERNAL EFFECTS AND THERMALLY INDUCED PLASTICITY IN THE FROG BOMBINA ORIENTALIS

Abstract Variation in fitness generated by differences in functional performance can often be traced to morphological variation among individuals within natural populations. However, morphological variation itself is strongly influenced by environmental factors (e.g., temperature) and maternal effects (e.g., variation in egg size). Understanding the full ecological context of individual variation and natural selection therefore requires an integrated view of how the interaction between the environment and development structures differences in morphology, performance, and fitness. Here we use naturally occurring environmental and maternal variation in the frog Bombina orientalis in South Korea to show that ovum size, average temperature, and variance in temperature during the early developmental period affect body sizes, shapes, locomotor performance, and ultimately the probability of an individual surviving interspecific predation in predictable but nonadditive ways. Specifically, environmental variability can significantly change the relationship between maternal investment in offspring and offspring fitness so that increased maternal investment can actually negatively affect offspring over a broad range of environments. Integrating environmental variation and developmental processes into traditional approaches of studying phenotypic variation and natural selection is likely to provide a more complete picture of the ecological context of evolutionary change.
Difference in the Inhibitory Effect of Temozolomide on TJ905 Glioma Cells and Stem Cells

This study aims to determine the difference in the inhibitory effect of temozolomide (TMZ) on TJ905 glioma cells and stem cells. TJ905 cancer stem cells were isolated. Livin is a member of the inhibitor of apoptosis protein family. The TJ905 cells and cancer stem cells were transfected with a Livin-shRNA and negative-shRNA, respectively, and then treated with TMZ. At 48 h post-transfection, a cell counting kit 8 assay, flow cytometry, and real-time qPCR were performed to detect cell proliferation, the cell cycle, and the expression of the Caspase-3, -7, and -9 mRNAs, respectively. As a result, the suppressive effect of TMZ on TJ905 cells was more significant than its effect on TJ905 cancer stem cells. TMZ exerted an inhibitory effect on the growth of TJ905 glioma cells by arresting them at G0/G1 phase and arresting cancer stem cells at S phase in a dose-dependent manner. TMZ inhibited Livin mRNA expression and increased the expression of the Caspase-3, -7, and -9 mRNAs. Low Livin mRNA expression induced high levels of Caspase-3, -7, and -9 expressions, thus promoting the apoptosis of both TJ905 cells and cancer stem cells in response to TMZ treatment. The TJ905 cells transfected with the Livin-shRNA were more sensitive to TMZ, whereas the TJ905 glioma stem cells transfected with the Livin-shRNA showed no significant changes in their sensitivity to TMZ. In conclusion, the Livin gene may play an important role in the resistance mechanisms of TJ905 glioma cells and cancer stem cells. However, Livin had a more distinct role in TMZ resistance, cell proliferation, and the cell cycle in TJ905 glioma cells than in cancer stem cells.
Do Chinese Children Get Enough Micronutrients?

The aim of this study was to examine usual daily micronutrient intake of Chinese children based on data from the 2011 China Health and Nutrition Survey. We analyzed data from 4 to 17-year-old participants, who provided dietary data on three consecutive days combined with the household weighing method in 2011. Usual daily intake of each nutrient was estimated using a mixed effects model based on the China Food Composition published in 2009. The means, medians and percentages below Estimated Average Requirements (EAR) were reported for selected micronutrients, including calcium, sodium, potassium, iron, zinc, selenium, vitamin A, thiamine, riboflavin and vitamin C. For sodium and potassium, the means and the distribution of intakes were compared to the Adequate Intake (AI) level. The average usual daily intakes of all micronutrients increase with age, and the intakes of boys were found to be higher than girls in the same age group. The average calcium intake increased from 272 mg/day in 4–6 years to 391 mg/day in 14–17 years, but the percentage of inadequate calcium intake remained very high (>96%). The prevalence of inadequacy of calcium was the highest among the mineral nutrients reported in this study. As the requirements of micronutrients increased with age, the percentage of subjects with inadequate intake increased in the 11–17 years age groups. Among 14–17 years group, the percentages of study participants with dietary intakes of calcium, iron, zinc, selenium, vitamin A, thiamine, riboflavin and vitamin C below the EAR were 96.8%, 18.8%, 37.6%, 72.8%, 36.8%, 91.8%. 85.9% and 75.5%, respectively. Among 11–13 years group, the percentages of study participants with dietary intakes of iron, zinc and vitamin A below the EAR were 23.5%, 41.5%, and 41.6%, respectively. Thus, micronutrient deficiency is a problem in Chinese children. Nutrition education and intervention programs are needed to address these nutritional gaps.
Comparison of Proliferative and Multilineage Differentiation Potential of Sheep Mesenchymal Stem Cells Derived from Bone Marrow, Liver, and Adipose Tissue

Background Background: Despite major progress in our general knowledge related to the application of adult stem cells, finding alternative sources for bone marrow Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs) has remained to be challenged. In this study successful isolation, multilineage differentiation, and proliferation potentials of sheep MSCs derived from bone marrow, adipose tissue, and liver were widely investigated. Methods The primary cell cultures were prepared form tissue samples obtained from sheep 30-35 day fetus. Passage-3 cells were plated either at varying cell densities or different serum concentrations for a week. The Population Doubling Time (PDT), growth curves, and Colony Forming Unit (CFU) of MSCs was determined. The stemness and trilineage differentiation potential of MSCs were analyzed by using molecullar and cytochemical staining approaches. The data was analyzed through one way ANOVA using SigmaStat (ver. 2). Results The highest PDT and lowest CFU were observed in adipose tissue group compared with other groups (p<0.001). Comparing different serum concentrations (5, 10, 15, and 20%), irrespective of cell sources, the highest proliferation rate was achieved in the presence of 20% serum (p<0.001). Additionally, there was an inverse relation between cell seeding density at culture initiation and proliferation rate, except for L-MSC at 300 cell seeding density. Conclusion All three sources of fetal sheep MSCs had the identical trilineage differentiation potential. The proliferative capacity of liver and bone marrow derived MSCs were similar at different cell seeding densities except for the higher fold increase in B-MSCs at 2700 cells/cm 2 density. Moreover, the adipose tissue derived MSCs had the lowest proliferative indices.
A Patient-Centered Decision-Support Tool Informed by History of Interpersonal Violence

The Probability of Treatment Benefit (PTB) chart is a decision-support tool that quantifies, in absolute terms, the probability that an individual patient will benefit from a psychological treatment based on the individual’s pre-treatment characteristics. The demand for such a tool has increased with the growing emphasis on personalized medicine and the need for selecting a treatment from an expanding list of evidence-based models. This method has the potential to provide clinicians and mental health consumers with a practical and interpretable means of comparing treatment options for individuals whose benefit from a particular treatment may differ substantially. We provide a practice update and demonstrate how to develop a PTB chart using data from a randomized controlled trial examining the efficacy of two approaches for treating posttraumatic stress disorder based on patients’ pre-treatment exposure to multiple types of interpersonal violence. Step-by-step instructions for applying the PTB method are provided.
CoFe2O4 on Mica Substrate as Flexible Ethanol Gas Sensor in Self-Heating Mode

In this study, a novel flexible ethanol gas sensor was created by the deposition of a CoFe2O4 (CFO) thin film on a thin mica substrate using the pulsed laser deposition technique. Transition electron microscopy (TEM) investigations clearly demonstrated the successful growth of CFO on the mica, where a well-defined interface was observed. Ethanol gas-sensing studies showed optimal performance at 200 °C, with the highest response of 19.2 to 100 ppm ethanol. Operating the sensor in self-heating mode under 7 V applied voltage, which corresponds to a temperature of approximately 200 °C, produced a maximal response of 19.2 to 100 ppm ethanol. This aligned with the highest responses observed during testing at 200 °C, confirming the sensor’s accuracy and sensitivity to ethanol under self-heating conditions. In addition, the sensor exhibited good selectivity to ethanol and excellent flexibility, maintaining its high performance after bending and tilting up to 5000 times. As this is the first report on flexible self-heated CFO gas sensors, we believe that this research holds great promise for the future development of high-quality sensors based on this approach.
Performance of IEEE 802.11 in wireless mesh networks

This paper addresses the performance of the IEEE 802.11 MAC protocol in a wireless mesh network. The aim is to assess under which conditions the protocol's performance might be acceptable, in particular for delay sensitive traffic. A number of different scenarios is considered, with varying number of gateways, different sizes for the group of users, as well as different transmission and carrier sensing ranges. It is shown that the IEEE 802.11 performs poorly on heavy traffic, in particular for data flows subject to multiple hops. In addition, the protocol fails to dispense the available bandwidth fairly to the available bandwidth fairly to the requesting nodes. Improvements can be obtained by minimizing the number of hops required for the traffic to reach its destination. This can be achieved by increasing the number of gateways. Another alternative is to increase the transmission range, at the cost of spatial reuse. However, the latter option only translates into better performance if the carrier sense range is also decreased.
Relaxant effect of a novel calcium‐activated potassium channel modulator on human myometrial spontaneous contractility in vitro

Aim: To investigate the effect of 4,5‐dichloro‐1,3‐diethyl‐1,3‐dihydro‐benzoimidazol‐2‐one (NS4591), a novel SK/IK channels positive modulator, on human myometrial activity.
Mechanisms of resistance to azole antifungal agents in Candida albicans isolates from AIDS patients involve specific multidrug transporters

Azole antifungal agents, and especially fluconazole, have been used widely to treat oropharyngeal candidiasis in patients with AIDS. An increasing number of cases of clinical resistance against fluconazole, often correlating with in vitro resistance, have been reported. To investigate the mechanisms of resistance toward azole antifungal agents at the molecular level in clinical C. albicans isolates, we focused on resistance mechanisms related to the cellular target of azoles, i.e., cytochrome P450(14DM) (14DM) and those regulating the transport or accumulation of fluconazole. The analysis of sequential isogenic C. albicans isolates with increasing levels of resistance to fluconazole from five AIDS patients showed that overexpression of the gene encoding 14DM either by gene amplification or by gene deregulation was not the major cause of resistance among these clinical isolates. We found, however, that fluconazole-resistant C. albicans isolates failed to accumulate 3H-labelled fluconazole. This phenomenon was reversed in resistant cells by inhibiting the cellular energy supply with azide, suggesting that resistance could be mediated by energy-requiring efflux pumps such as those described as ATP-binding cassette (ABC) multidrug transporters. In fact, some but not all fluconazole-resistant clinical C. albicans isolates exhibited up to a 10-fold relative increase in mRNA levels for a recently cloned ABC transporter gene called CDR1. In an azole-resistant C. albicans isolate not overexpressing CDR1, the gene for another efflux pump named BENr was massively overexpressed. This gene was cloned from C. albicans for conferring benomyl resistance in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Therefore, at least the overexpression or the deregulation of these two genes potentially mediates resistance to azoles in C. albicans clinical isolates from AIDS patients with oropharyngeal candidiasis. Involvement of ABC transporters in azole resistance was further evidenced with S. cerevisiae mutants lacking specific multidrug transporters which were rendered hypersusceptible to azole derivatives including fluconazole, itraconazole, and ketoconazole.
A Large Deviation Inequality for Functions of Independent, Multi-Way Choices

Often when analysing randomized algorithms, especially parallel or distributed algorithms, one is called upon to show that some function of many independent choices is tightly concentrated about its expected value. For example, the algorithm might colour the vertices of a given graph with two colours and one would wish to show that, with high probability, very nearly half of all edges are monochromatic. The classic result of Chernoff [3] gives such a large deviation result when the function is a sum of independent indicator random variables. The results of Hoeffding [5] and Azuma [2] give similar results for functions which can be expressed as martingales with a bounded difference property. Roughly speaking, this means that each individual choice has a bounded effect on the value of the function. McDiarmid [9] nicely summarized these results and gave a host of applications. Expressed a little differently, his main result is as follows.
Geochemical Evolution of Ferruginous Bauxite Deposits in Northwestern Oregon and Southwestern Washington

This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of PDXScholar. For more information, please contact pdxscholar@pdx.edu. Recommended Citation Fassio, Joseph Michael, "Geochemical Evolution of Ferruginous Bauxite Deposits in Northwestern Oregon and Southwestern Washington" (1990). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 3821.
Mining and Ranking Biomedical Synonym Candidates from Wikipedia

Biomedical synonyms are important resources for Natural Language Processing in Biomedical domain. Existing synonym resources (e.g., the UMLS) are not complete. Manual efforts for expanding and enriching these resources are prohibitively expensive. We therefore develop and evaluate approaches for automated synonym extraction from Wikipedia. Using the inter-wiki links, we extracted the candidate synonyms (anchor-text e.g., “increased thirst”) in a Wikipedia page and the title (e.g., “polyuria”) of its corresponding linked page. We rank synonym candidates with word embedding and pseudo-relevance feedback (PRF). Our results show that PRF-based reranking outperformed word embedding based approach and a strong baseline using interwiki link frequency. A hybrid method, Rank Score Combination, achieved the best results. Our analysis also suggests that medical synonyms mined from Wikipedia can increase the coverage of existing synonym resources such as UMLS.