Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Platelets: Physiology and Biochemistry

Platelets are specialized blood cells that play central roles in physiologic and pathologic processes of hemostasis, inflammation, tumor metastasis, wound healing, and host defense. Activation of platelets is crucial for platelet function that includes a complex interplay of adhesion and signaling molecules. This article gives an overview of the activation processes involved in primary and secondary hemostasis, for example, platelet adhesion, platelet secretion, platelet aggregation, microvesicle formation, and clot retraction/stabilization. In addition, activated platelets are predominantly involved in cross talk to other blood and vascular cells. Stimulated "sticky" platelets enable recruitment of leukocytes at sites of vascular injury under high shear conditions. Platelet-derived microparticles as well as soluble adhesion molecules, sP-selectin and sCD40L, shed from the surface of activated platelets, are capable of activating, in turn, leukocytes and endothelial cells. This article focuses further on the new view of receptor-mediated thrombin generation of human platelets, necessary for the formation of a stable platelet-fibrin clot during secondary hemostasis. Finally, special emphasis is placed on important stimulatory and inhibitory signaling pathways that modulate platelet function.
To avoid or not to avoid? Gender and the emotional experience of relationship conflict

Relationship conflict has detrimental effects, and scholars advise avoiding these conflicts. However, little is known about the emotional experience of relationship conflict and the intrapersonal consequences of conflict avoidance. In a field study of a long-term healthcare organization, we developed and tested a model examining the emotional experience of relationship conflict, and, in particular, the role of gender and conflict avoidance. We proposed that gender will influence the negative emotional experience of relationship conflict, the amount of emotional labor associated with hiding these emotions, and the effectiveness of avoidance as a conflict management strategy. Findings revealed that women experienced significantly more negative emotions from relationship conflict than men. For women, conflict avoidance led to increased emotional labor, whereas for men, conflict avoidance did not influence emotional labor. Overall, results indicated that relationship conflict elicited negative affective effects, ultimately leading to emotional exhaustion, which were exacerbated by conflict avoidance for
Reading aloud a connected text : how affects sentence-final lengthening Japanese

Languages differ as to which factors have the greatest effect on durational patterning, although some wordand sentence-level factors are known to be important in many languages. This experiment focuses on a factor operating over larger size units, and tests the extent to which the topic organization of a text affects durational patterns when speakers of English, French and Japanese read aloud. The pattern examined is sentence-final lengthening, which was measured by comparing the duration of words in sentence-final position in continuous text with their duration in sentence-medial position in a control sentence constructed for comparison. The results from all three languages provide evidence that topic structure affects the amount of final lengthening, but the languages appear to differ as to which types of transitions between topics favor more or less lengthening. Other results may be explained by structural differences among the languages.
Virtual memory CD8 T cells display unique functional properties

Previous studies revealed the existence of foreign antigen-specific memory phenotype CD8 T cells in unimmunized mice. Considerable evidence suggests this population, termed “virtual memory” (VM) CD8 T cells, arise via physiological homeostatic mechanisms. However, the antigen-specific function of VM cells is poorly characterized, and hence their potential contribution to immune responses against pathogens is unclear. Here we show that naturally occurring, polyclonal VM cells have unique functional properties, distinct from either naïve or antigen-primed memory CD8 T cells. In striking contrast to conventional memory cells, VM cells showed poor T cell receptor-induced IFN-γ synthesis and preferentially differentiated into central memory phenotype cells after priming. Importantly, VM cells showed efficient control of Listeria monocytogenes infection, indicating memory-like capacity to eliminate certain pathogens. These data suggest naturally arising VM cells display unique functional traits, allowing them to form a bridge between the innate and adaptive phase of a response to pathogens.
Automatic Acquisition of Domain Knowledge for Information Extraction

In developing an Information Extraction (IE) system for a new class of events or relations, one of the major tasks is identifying the many ways in which these events or relations may be expressed in text. This has generally involved the manual analysis and, in some cases, the annotation of large quantities of text involving these events. This paper presents an alternative approach, based on an automatic discovery procedure, EXDISCO, which identifies a set of relevant documents and a set of event patterns from un-annotaled text, starting from a small set of "seed patterns. " We evaluate EXDISCO by comparing the performance of discovered patterns against that of manually constructed systems on actual extraction tasks.
How does an axon grow?

How do axons grow during development, and why do they fail to regrow when injured? In the complicated mesh of our nervous system, the axon is the information superhighway, carrying all of the data we use to sense our environment and carry out behaviors. To wire up our nervous system properly, neurons must elongate their axons during development to reach their targets. This is no simple task, however. The complex morphology of axons and dendrites puts neurons among the most intricate and beautiful cells in the body. Knowledge of how neurons extend axons and dendrites, elongate at a particular rate, and stop growing at the proper time is critical to understanding the development of our nervous system, yet the regulation of these processes is poorly understood. Considerable attention in recent years has focused on understanding how growth cones are guided and steered through complicated pathways (for review, see Schmidt and Hall 1998; Mueller 1999), and even how neurons initiate new processes (for review, see Da Silva and Dotti 2002), but what mechanisms are involved in elongation itself? Are environmental signals needed to drive axon growth and, if so, what are the intracellular molecular mechanisms by which they induce elongation? What controls the rate of axon growth? How do CNS neurons know whether to extend axons or dendrites? Is the signaling of axon versus dendrite growth attributable to different extracellular signals, different neuronal states, or both? All of these questions bear critically on our understanding of axon growth and here I review recent answers and approaches to the above questions, and highlight their relevance during development, injury, and disease. How does an axon grow? Axons are generally on the scale of 1 µm thick and some are more than 1 m long, making neurons the largest cells in the body by both volume and surface area. Sustaining such massive growth, however, requires the interplay of many factors—producing membrane and cytoplasmic elements in the proper proportions; shipping these building blocks to the right compartment and inserting them into the growing axon; and coordinating the timing of all of these with the growth cone’s moment-by-moment de
Distinct roles for angiotensin‐converting enzyme 2 and carboxypeptidase A in the processing of angiotensins within the murine heart

Angiotensin‐converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), a homologue of angiotensin‐converting enzyme (ACE), converts angiotensin (Ang) I to Ang(1–9) and Ang II to Ang(1–7), but does not directly process Ang I to Ang II. Cardiac function is compromised in ACE2 null mice; however, the importance of ACE2 in the processing of angiotensin peptides within the murine heart is not known. We determined the metabolism of angiotensins in wild‐type (WT), ACE (ACE−/−) and ACE2 null mice (ACE2−/−). Angiotensin II was converted almost exclusively to Ang(1–7) in the cardiac membranes of WT and ACE−/− strains, although generation of Ang(1–7) was greater in the ACE−/− mice (27.4 ± 4.1 versus 17.5 ± 3.2 nmol−1 mg h−1 for WT). The ACE2 inhibitor MLN4760 significantly attenuated Ang II metabolism and the subsequent formation of Ang(1–7) in both strains. In the ACE2−/− hearts, Ang II metabolism and the generation of Ang(1–7) were significantly attenuated; however, the ACE2 inhibitor reduced the residual Ang(1–7)‐forming activity in this strain. Angiotensin I was primarily converted to Ang(1–9) (WT, 28.9 ± 3.1 nmol−1 mg h−1; ACE−/−, 49.8 ± 5.3 nmol−1 mg h−1; and ACE2−/−, 35.9 ± 5.4 nmol−1 mg h−1) and to smaller quantities of Ang(1–7) and Ang II. Although the ACE2 inhibitor had no effect on Ang(1–9) formation, the carboxypeptidase A inhibitor benzylsuccinate essentially abolished the formation of Ang(1–9) and increased the levels of Ang I in cardiac membranes. In conclusion, our studies in the murine heart suggest that ACE2 is the primary pathway for the metabolism of Ang II and the subsequent formation of Ang(1–7), a peptide that, in contrast to Ang II, exhibits both antifibrotic and antiproliferative actions.
Correlation of creep strength and microstructural evolution of a boron alloyed 9Cr3W3CoVNb steel in as-received and welded condition

Abstract The creep strength of martensitic 9% chromium steels is strongly coupled with the formation and interaction of different precipitate populations like MX (Nb,V)(C,N), M23C6, laves phase and modified Z-phase. Changes in microstructure can be correlated to a change in creep strength. Within this work, a boron-nitrogen balanced 9Cr3W3CoVNb steel is investigated in normalised and tempered (as-received), creep exposed and welded condition. Microstructural characterisation of as-received and creep exposed samples have been carried out by elemental mapping techniques in transmission electron microscopy. The creep strength of the base material has been evaluated at 650°C up to a current testing duration of 24,000 hours. Comparison of creep rupture strength after 20,000 hours shows a benefit in strength of the new grade of about 25 MPa compared to conventional steel grade P92 and 45 MPa to grade P91. The results of the microstructural investigation show only very little changes of the initial microstructure after 10,000 h of creep exposure. The investigations imply a higher microstructural stability of the new steel, compared to other 9% chromium steel grades. In welded condition, the steel shows unique formation of its heat-affected zone. Although the steel experiences several phase transformations during the weld thermal cycle, the original base material grain structure is almost completely retained in the heat-affected zone. The formation of a homogeneous grain refined region is suppressed and, therefore, less susceptibility to Type IV cracking is expected. Creep tests of crossweld specimens at 650°C and various stress levels show similar creep strength to grade P91 base material.
Prison medicine.

Prisoners in U.S. correctional facilities constitute a unique patient population in need of health services. Physicians who provide medical services to inmates also must interact with prison officials. Drug withdrawal, self-destructive behavior and infectious diseases, including acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, are a few of the challenges to be met.
Improving protein secondary structure prediction using a simple k-mer model

Motivation: Some first order methods for protein sequence analysis inherently treat each position as independent. We develop a general framework for introducing longer range interactions. We then demonstrate the power of our approach by applying it to secondary structure prediction; under the independence assumption, sequences produced by existing methods can produce features that are not protein like, an extreme example being a helix of length 1. Our goal was to make the predictions from state of the art methods more realistic, without loss of performance by other measures. Results: Our framework for longer range interactions is described as a k-mer order model. We succeeded in applying our model to the specific problem of secondary structure prediction, to be used as an additional layer on top of existing methods. We achieved our goal of making the predictions more realistic and protein like, and remarkably this also improved the overall performance. We improve the Segment OVerlap (SOV) score by 1.8%, but more importantly we radically improve the probability of the real sequence given a prediction from an average of 0.271 per residue to 0.385. Crucially, this improvement is obtained using no additional information. Availability: http://supfam.cs.bris.ac.uk/kmer Contact: gough@cs.bris.ac.uk
Fast Heuristic Minimization of Exclusive-Sums-of-Products

Exclusive-Sums-Of-Products (ESOPs) play an important role in logic synthesis and design-for-test. This paper presents an improved version of the heuristic ESOP minimization procedure proposed in [1,2]. The improvements concern three aspects of the procedure: (1) computation of the starting ESOP cover; (2) increase of the search space for solutions by applying a larger set of cube transformations; (3) development of specialized datastructures for robust manipulation of ESOP covers. Comparison of the new heuristic ESOP minimizer EXORCISM-4 with other minimizers (EXMIN2 [3], MINT [4], EXORCISM-2 [1] and EXORCISM–3 [2]) show that, in most cases, EXORCISM-4 produces results of comparable or better quality on average ten times faster.
Wolbachia infection reduces sperm competitive ability in an insect

The maternally inherited bacterium Wolbachia pipientis imposes significant fitness costs on its hosts. One such cost is decreased sperm production resulting in reduced fertility of male Drosophila simulans infected with cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI) inducing Wolbachia. We tested the hypothesis that Wolbachia infection affects sperm competitive ability and found that Wolbachia infection is indeed associated with reduced success in sperm competition in non-virgin males. In the second male role, infected males sired 71% of the offspring whereas uninfected males sired 82% of offspring. This is the first empirical evidence indicating that Wolbachia infection deleteriously affects sperm competition and raises the possibility that polyandrous females can utilize differential sperm competitive ability to bias the paternity of broods and avoid the selfish manipulations of Wolbachia. This suggests a relationship between Wolbachia infection and host reproductive strategies. These findings also have important consequences for Wolbachia population dynamics because the transmission advantage of Wolbachia is likely to be undermined by sperm competition.
The Relationship Between Reported Sleep Quality and Sleep Hygiene in Italian and American Adolescents

Objective. The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship between self-reported sleep quality and sleep hygiene in Italian and American adolescents and to assess whether sleep-hygiene practices mediate the relationship between culture and sleep quality. Methods. Two nonprobability samples were collected from public schools in Rome, Italy, and Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Students completed the following self-report measures: Adolescent Sleep-Wake Scale, Adolescent Sleep Hygiene Scale, Pubertal Developmental Scale, and Morningness/Eveningness Scale. Results. The final sample included 776 Italian and 572 American adolescents 12 to 17 years old. Italian adolescents reported much better sleep hygiene and substantially better sleep quality than American adolescents. A moderate-to-strong linear relationship was found between sleep hygiene and sleep quality in both samples. Separate hierarchical multiple regression analyses were performed on both samples. Demographic and individual characteristics explained a significant proportion of the variance in sleep quality (Italians: 18%; Americans: 25%), and the addition of sleep-hygiene domains explained significantly more variance in sleep quality (Italians: 17%; Americans: 16%). A final hierarchical multiple regression analysis with both samples combined showed that culture (Italy versus United States) only explained 0.8% of the variance in sleep quality after controlling for sleep hygiene and all other variables. Conclusions. Cross-cultural differences in sleep quality, for the most part, were due to differences in sleep-hygiene practices. Sleep hygiene is an important predictor of sleep quality in Italian and American adolescents, thus supporting the implementation and evaluation of educational programs on good sleep-hygiene practices.
Exposure to High Doses of Lipopolysaccharide during Ovalbumin Sensitization Prevents the Development of Allergic Th2 Responses to a Dietary Antigen

Food allergies are driven by aberrant T helper (Th) 2 cells. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) influences the development of Th2-mediated diseases, but its role in food allergy and tolerance remains unclear. To address this issue, we established mouse models presenting allergic or tolerant responses to ovalbumin (OVA). Mice sensitized with crude OVA developed Th2 responses including acute diarrhea, increases in serum OVA-specific IgE, dominant production of serum OVA-specific IgG1, increases in Th2-type cytokines and proliferation of mast cells in duodenal and colonic tissues. Sensitization of mice with crude OVA and LPS abrogated Th2-type responses observed in allergic mice. The level of OVA-specific proliferation in mesenteric lymph node CD4+ T cells was comparable in allergic and tolerant mice, indicating that the tolerance is not caused by anergy and apoptosis of antigen-primed T cells. Expression of Th1- and Th2-type cytokines was suppressed in whole spleen cells and/or purified spleen CD4+ T cells of tolerant mice, indicating that the tolerance was not caused by the shift from Th2 to Th1. On the other hand, interleukin (IL)-10, a regulatory cytokine produced by regulatory T cells, was upregulated in whole spleen cells and purified spleen CD4+ T cells of tolerant mice. Furthermore, spleen CD4+ T cells from tolerant mice suppressed the growth of CD4+ T cells from DO11.10 mice in co-culture. These results indicate that tolerance is induced in allergic mice by simultaneous exposure to LPS during sensitization with OVA and that a population of T cells producing IL-10 plays an important role in the tolerance induction.
Learning When Training Data are Costly: The Effect of Class Distribution on Tree Induction

For large, real-world inductive learning problems, the number of training examples often must be limited due to the costs associated with procuring, preparing, and storing the training examples and/or the computational costs associated with learning from them. In such circumstances, one question of practical importance is: if only n training examples can be selected, in what proportion should the classes be represented? In this article we help to answer this question by analyzing, for a fixed training-set size, the relationship between the class distribution of the training data and the performance of classification trees induced from these data. We study twenty-six data sets and, for each, determine the best class distribution for learning. The naturally occurring class distribution is shown to generally perform well when classifier performance is evaluated using undifferentiated error rate (0/1 loss). However, when the area under the ROC curve is used to evaluate classifier performance, a balanced distribution is shown to perform well. Since neither of these choices for class distribution always generates the best-performing classifier, we introduce a "budget-sensitive" progressive sampling algorithm for selecting training examples based on the class associated with each example. An empirical analysis of this algorithm shows that the class distribution of the resulting training set yields classifiers with good (nearly-optimal) classification performance.
Fifteen‐to Twenty‐Year Study of One Thousand Patients Undergoing Closed Mitral Valvuloplasty

A study is reported of an annual follow-up over a 15- to 20-year period of the survivors of the first 1,000 patients undergoing closed mitral valvuloplasty for mitral stenosis. In addition to a report of the status of the patients at each year of follow-up, a detailed analysis has been made of the factors influencing results of surgery 15 years after operation. The most important factor adversely influencing long-term results is significant mitral valve calcification. This is true regardless of age, sex, preoperative status, concomitant mitral insufficiency or minor degrees of aortic valve disease. A beneficial effect of younger age (below 40 years at surgery) or lack of associated mitral insufficiency is apparent only in Group III patients with noncalcific valves, and in these two subgroups the results were 41 and 37 percent improved, respectively. These figures do not include the large number of patients who have again been improved following a second or even third operation. Late systemic embolization occurs infrequently after such surgery. (1.1% per patient year of follow-up). In patients without significant valvular calcification and without substantial mitral incompetence or significant associated valvular disease, closed mitral valvuloplasty is the operation of choice. The indications for closed versus open operation for mitral stenosis are discussed in detail.
Satisfaction of Polynomial Constraints over Finite Domains using Function Values

This paper shows how the solutions of constraint satisfaction problems that involve only polynomial constraints over finite domains can be enumerated by computing the values of related polynomial functions at appropriate points. The proposed algorithm first transforms constraints, which are expressed as equalities, inequalities, and disequalities of polynomials with integer coefficients and integer variables, into a canonical form that uses only inequalities. Then, starting from a bounding box, which is supposed to be known, the algorithm recursively subdivides the box into disjoint boxes and it records boxes whose elements satisfy all constraints. The subdivision is driven by the study of the sign of polynomial functions over boxes, which is performed by means of a method that uses only the coefficients of polynomials and the values of functions at the corners of boxes.
Dependence of exchange bias in Ni 81 Fe 19 / Pt x Mn 1 x ( 0 o x o 0 . 2 ) bilayers on composition and microstructure

The exchange coupling between ferromagnetic Ni81Fe19 and antiferromagnetic PtxMn1 x films prepared by RF magnetron sputtering has been investigated. The study has focused on the relationship between the exchange bias and the structural characteristics of the PtxMn1 x films, such as crystallinity, texture, and granularity. The Pt content of the PtxMn1 x film is in the range of 0 at%oxo20 at%. The exchange bias in this system is associated with the stabilization of the g-phase with a disordered FCC structure in the PtxMn1 x films. Although the texture of the polycrystalline PtxMn1 x films improves with increasing Pt content, a relatively large exchange field of 64Oe at room temperature and a high blocking temperature of about 2001C were found in Ni81Fe19 (15 nm)/Pt8Mn92 (30 nm). The exchange bias of the of Ni81Fe19/PtxMn1 x bilayers is dependent on the intrinsic properties of the PtxMn1 x films, such as the exchange coupling between the antiferromagnetic moments and the magnetocrystalline anisotropy, which decrease with the Pt doping concentration. r 2002 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. PACS: 75.70. Cn; 75.30. Gw; 75.60. Ej; 75.50. Ss