Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Stem cell sources for tooth regeneration: current status and future prospects

Stem cells are capable of renewing themselves through cell division and have the remarkable ability to differentiate into many different types of cells. They therefore have the potential to become a central tool in regenerative medicine. During the last decade, advances in tissue engineering and stem cell-based tooth regeneration have provided realistic and attractive means of replacing lost or damaged teeth. Investigation of embryonic and adult (tissue) stem cells as potential cell sources for tooth regeneration has led to many promising results. However, technical and ethical issues have hindered the availability of these cells for clinical application. The recent discovery of induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells has provided the possibility to revolutionize the field of regenerative medicine (dentistry) by offering the option of autologous transplantation. In this article, we review the current progress in the field of stem cell-based tooth regeneration and discuss the possibility of using iPS cells for this purpose.
TRAC: an architecture for real-time dissemination of vehicular traffic information

Traffic congestion is a major cause of concern in many cities. A real-time information dissemination system announcing current traffic conditions to travelers is increasingly becoming a necessity in this context. The recent DSRC research initiative[1] envisions a deployment of DSRC access points (APs) along the road side to enable Vehicle to Roadside Communication (VRC) for this purpose. However, even if such an infrastructure is deployed on the roadside, it is not trivial to design a system that distributes on-demand traffic information. Existing solutions employ a centrialized design where the traffic information is stored at a central database and the vehicles then query the database for information of their interest. Such solutions are simply not scalable due to the huge volume of queries the central database would have to handle. Moreover, such a communication architecture does not take into account the fact that traffic related queries are location sensitive and that the sources for a particular query also tend to be localized.
Turbo equalization with iterative online SNR estimation

Theoretically, it is necessary to estimate the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the channel when using a maximum a posteriori (MAP) or log-MAP turbo equalizer. In this paper, we study the effect of an SNR mismatch on the bit error rate (BER) performance of log-MAP and max-log-MAP turbo equalizers, and propose an iterative online SNR estimation scheme that effectively estimates the unknown SNR from each block of data. We show that this scheme gives performance very close to that with perfect knowledge of channel SNR for even short block lengths over high-loss channels.
Response to Comment on "Reconstructing Past Climate from Noisy Data"

We implemented a proxy-based method for reconstructing temperatures in the past millennium in simulations with two climate models using the pseudoproxy approach. We show results for detrended and nondetrended calibration using white-noise and red-noise pseudoproxies with realistic noise levels. In all cases, the method underestimates the low-frequency variability of the simulated Northern Hemisphere temperature.
Soil health in agricultural systems

Soil health is presented as an integrative property that reflects the capacity of soil to respond to agricultural intervention, so that it continues to support both the agricultural production and the provision of other ecosystem services. The major challenge within sustainable soil management is to conserve ecosystem service delivery while optimizing agricultural yields. It is proposed that soil health is dependent on the maintenance of four major functions: carbon transformations; nutrient cycles; soil structure maintenance; and the regulation of pests and diseases. Each of these functions is manifested as an aggregate of a variety of biological processes provided by a diversity of interacting soil organisms under the influence of the abiotic soil environment. Analysis of current models of the soil community under the impact of agricultural interventions (particularly those entailing substitution of biological processes with fossil fuel-derived energy or inputs) confirms the highly integrative pattern of interactions within each of these functions and leads to the conclusion that measurement of individual groups of organisms, processes or soil properties does not suffice to indicate the state of the soil health. A further conclusion is that quantifying the flow of energy and carbon between functions is an essential but non-trivial task for the assessment and management of soil health.
Randomized Comparison of GR-II Stent and Palmaz-Schatz Stent for Elective Treatment of Coronary Stenoses

BackgroundThis prospective multicenter randomized clinical trial was designed to evaluate the long-term angiographic and clinical outcomes of elective treatment with the GR-II stent compared with the Palmaz-Schatz (PS) stent in patients with coronary stenoses. Methods and ResultsSeven hundred fifty-five patients with myocardial ischemia and de novo native coronary stenoses in 3- to 4-mm vessels were randomly assigned to the PS (375 patients) or the GR-II stent (380 patients). The primary end point was 12-month target lesion revascularization (TLR)-free survival. Angiography was performed at baseline and at follow-up in the first 300 consecutive patients to assess the frequency of angiographic restenosis. Procedure success was 98.5% for the GR-II stent and 99.4% for the PS stent (P =0.19). At 30 days, patients assigned to the GR-II stent had a higher stent thrombosis rate (3.9% versus 0.3% for PS stent, P <0.001) and TLR rate (3.9% versus 0.5% for PS stent, P <0.001). The GR-II group had a higher follow-up restenosis frequency (47.3% versus 20.6% for the PS group, P <0.001) and a lower 12-month TLR-free survival rate (71.7% versus 83.9% for the PS group, P <0.001). Multivariate logistic regression analysis identified a smaller final stent minimal lumen diameter (odds ratio [OR] 2.49, 95% CI 1.56 to 3.98;P <0.001), diabetes mellitus (OR 2.14, 95% CI 1.42 to 3.22;P <0.001), and use of the GR-II stent (OR 1.78, 95% CI 1.20 to 2.64;P <0.01) as independent determinants of 12-month TLR. ConclusionsOn the basis of these long-term follow-up data, we conclude that use of the GR-II stent should be limited to the acute treatment of abrupt or threatened closure after failed conventional balloon angioplasty procedures.
EFFICIENCY OF WATER USE IN SUNFLOWER GROWN IN HYDROPONIC SYSTEM UNDER SALINE STRESS 1

In order to identify alternatives for the use of saline water in agricultural production, the effects of the use of brackish water in the preparation of the nutrient solution for the cultivation of sunflower (cv. EMBRAPA 122-V2000) were studied in hydroponic system on consumption and efficiency of water use for the production of achenes and biomass. A completely randomized design was used, analyzed in a 5x2 factorial scheme with three replications. The factors studied were five levels of salinity of nutrient solution (1.7 – control; 4.3; 6.0; 9.0; and 11.5dS m) and two plant densities – one or two plants per vessel. It was concluded that the water consumption of sunflower is a variable sensitive to the salinity of the nutrient solution, especially after the fourth week of crop, and that the efficiency of water use in the production of achenes and biomass of sunflower is greater when the plant density increases from one to two plants per vessel, even under saline stress.
Colorization by Patch-Based Local Low-Rank Matrix Completion

Colorization aims at recovering the original color of a monochrome image from only a few color pixels. A state-of-the-art approach is based on matrix completion, which assumes that the target color image is low-rank. However, this low-rank assumption is often invalid on natural images. In this paper, we propose a patch-based approach that divides the image into patches and then imposes a low-rank structure only on groups of similar patches. Each local matrix completion problem is solved by an accelerated version of alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM), and each AD-MM subproblem is solved efficiently by divide-and-conquer. Experiments on a number of benchmark images demonstrate that the proposed method outperforms existing approaches.
Mr & Mrs: How 'I do' impacts physical activity in married individuals

Mr and Mrs: How ‘I Do’ Impacts Physical Activity in Married Individuals. (May 2012) Kacy Lane Michel, B.A., Oklahoma State University; M.A., Texas A&M University Chair of Advisory Committee: Dr. B. E. Pruitt This dissertation presents three separate studies designed to investigate the relationship between marriage and physical activity behavior. First, a systematic literature review of nineteen articles presents qualitative and quantitative articles from 2000 to 2010 that focus on the relationship between marriage and physical activity and/or exercise. Based on the findings from the review, social support (or lack of support), culturally-determined gender roles, environmental factors such as income level, and intrapersonal factors such as self-efficacy each influenced spousal physical activity. Secondly, a qualitative study based on interviews and photographs from twentyfour married individuals utilized Social Cognitive Theory to explore the mechanisms, determinants, and influences of spousal physical activity. Findings indicate verbal persuasion by husbands encouraged wives, yet verbal persuasion by wives was perceived as nagging by men. While verbal persuasion by husbands increased a small number of wives’ sense of self-efficacy, the majority of women felt that persuasion increased motivation, not necessarily confidence. Findings also highlighted the power of
Effects of Interface States and Positive Charges on NBTI in Silicon-Oxynitride p-MOSFETs

p-MOSFET negative bias temperature instability (NBTI) has become the most critical reliability issue for state-of-the-art CMOS technology. This paper investigates the effects of interface states (Nit) and oxide positive charges (PCs) on NBTI. Evidence shows how the importance of and PC is affected by stress temperature. PC has a dominative contribution to the NBTI at lower temperatures (< 373 K), whereas increases obviously above 373 K. Two kinds of PC are distinguished by the generation and recovery dynamics. One is the trapped holes (THs) which is the main part of PC at lower temperatures. The other is the generated PC of which generation is accelerated by temperature. NBTI recovery mainly results from TH detrapping. To find out the hole's influence on NBTI, the hole-injection and hole-energy effects on and PC formation are studied. It will be shown that the case is different to and PC. In addition, on-the-fly technique is used to eliminate the recovery during measurements. Analysis shows that is unimportant and that PC dominates the NBTI when measured by the nonrecovery technique. Moreover, the behaviors of TH, such as saturation and temperature independent, are also explained in this paper.
Physiological approach to neuropsychiatric diseases; role of autonomic nervous system and melatonin

Adaptation is a continuous process between the genes of a particular species and its environment. Although a couple of weeks are long enough to adapt to some environmental changes, sometimes several generations are needed to adapt. Rapid and sustained environmental changes, however, exceed the adaptation capacity of species and cause gene-environment discordance. Genomes of individuals, who live at the beginning of such discordance, are adapted to the previous environment and therefore physiological mechanisms of the organism are insuenced by this novel circumstance. The disrupted interaction between individual and environment appears as diseases, increased morbidity, and mortality in the phenotype. Diseases of civilizations which are the resections of gene-environment discordance tend to accumulate into several main groups such as metabolic (e.g., cardiovascular, diabetes, hypertension, obesity and metabolic syndrome), reproductive (male and female infertility), neurodegenerative (e.g., Alzheimer, dementia) and some psychiatric disorders (e.g., major depression, bipolar disorders). In spite of the fact that the pathophysiology of many neuropsychiatric disorders are not well known, since symptoms including sleep and appetite problems, fatigue, loss of libido and concentration as well as metabolic disorders may coexist, it is considered that neuropsychiatric disorders may have a complex neurobiological basis. Some scientists have referred to this situation as a ? neuropsychiatric syndrome? or ? type II metabolic syndrome? Data obtained from metabolic syndrome studies may be adapted to type II metabolic syndrome to clarify the biological basis of the disease. As seen in metabolic syndrome, the neuropsychiatric syndrome may also develop in a broken physiological infrastructure. Some of the disrupted physiological mechanisms shown in metabolic syndrome may be summarized as the mismanaged autonomic nervous system (ANS), reduced central and peripheral GABA production, and epigenetic perturbations which have recently become very popular. ANS dysregulation is closely related to recent treatment modalities such as vagal nevre stimulation (VNS) and light therapy (LT). Both modalities are based on the re-regulation of an already dysregulated autonomic rhythm. Secretion of melatonin from the pineal gland is one of the effective mechanisms in the regulation of ANS. Since melatonin is only used for the treatment of jet-lag and sleep problems, the range of treatment indications with melatonin has remained limited for years. Nevertheless, central effects of melatonin play an important role in the treatment of depression and similar disorders. Therefore, melatonin has been recently used to treat neuropsychiatric syndrome. Moreover, a severe familial tendency in neuropsychiatric disorders has long been recognised. Even so, no genetic defects (e.g., mutation, deletion and insertion) have been found to explain the familial tendency. Therefore, it was hypothesized tha
Outcomes after lung retransplantation in the modern era.

RATIONALE Characteristics of and survival estimates for recipients of lung retransplantation in the modern era are unknown. OBJECTIVES To compare lung retransplant patients in the modern era with historical retransplant patients, to compare retransplant patients with initial transplant patients in the modern era, and to determine the predictors of the risk of death after lung retransplantation. METHODS We performed a retrospective cohort study of patients who underwent lung retransplantation between January 2001 and May 2006 in the United States (modern retransplant cohort). The characteristics and survival of this cohort were compared with those of patients who underwent first lung retransplantation between January 1990 and December 2000 (historical retransplant cohort) and patients who underwent initial lung transplantation between January 2001 and May 2006 (modern initial transplant cohort). MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS Modern retransplant recipients (n = 205) had a lower risk of death compared with that of the historical retransplant cohort (n = 184) (hazard ratio, 0.7; 95% confidence interval, 0.5-0.9; P = 0.006). However, modern retransplant recipients had a higher risk of death than that of patients who underwent initial lung transplantation (n = 5,657) (hazard ratio, 1.3; 95% confidence interval, 1.2-1.5; P = 0.001), which appeared to be explained by a higher prevalence of certain comorbidities. Retransplantation at less than 30 days after the initial transplant procedure was associated with worse survival. CONCLUSIONS Outcomes after lung retransplantation have improved; however, retransplantation continues to pose an increased risk of death compared with the initial transplant procedure. Retransplantation early after the initial transplant poses a particularly high mortality risk.
QuIET: A Text Classification Technique Using Automatically Generated Span Queries

We propose a novel algorithm, QuIET, for binary classification of texts. The method automatically generates a set of span queries from a set of annotated documents and uses the query set to categorize unlabeled texts. QuIET generates models that are human understandable. We describe the method and evaluate it empirically against Support Vector Machines, demonstrating a comparable performance for a known curated dataset and a superior performance for some categories of noisy local businesses data. We also describe an active learning approach that is applicable to QuIET and can boost its performance.
Circulating n-3 fatty acids and trans-fatty acids, PLA2G2A gene variation and sudden cardiac arrest

Abstract Whether genetic factors influence the associations of fatty acids with the risk of sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) is largely unknown. To investigate possible gene–fatty acid interactions on SCA risk, we used a case-only approach and measured fatty acids in erythrocyte samples from 1869 SCA cases in a population-based repository with genetic data. We selected 191 SNP in ENCODE-identified regulatory regions of fifty-five candidate genes in fatty acid metabolic pathways. Using linear regression and additive genetic models, we investigated the association of the selected SNP with erythrocyte levels of fatty acids, including DHA, EPA and trans-fatty acids among the SCA cases. The assumption of no association in non-cases was supported by analysis of publicly available datasets containing over 8000 samples. None of the SNP–fatty acid associations tested among the cases reached statistical significance after correction for multiple comparisons. One SNP, rs4654990 near PLA2G2A, with an allele frequency of 0·33, was nominally associated with lower levels of DHA and EPA and higher levels of trans-fatty acids. The strongest association was with DHA levels (exponentiated coefficient for one unit (1 % of total fatty acids), 0·90, 95 % CI 0·85, 0·97; P = 0·003), indicating that for subjects with a coded allele, the OR of SCA associated with one unit higher DHA is about 90 % what it is for subjects with one fewer coded allele. These findings suggest that the associations of circulating n-3 and trans-fatty acids with SCA risk may be more pronounced in carriers of the rs4654990 G allele.
Wiskott–Aldrich syndrome: diagnosis, current management, and emerging treatments

Wiskott–Aldrich syndrome (WAS) is a rare X-linked primary immunodeficiency disorder characterized by the triad of eczema, thrombocytopenia, and severe and often recurrent infections. Despite the rarity of this disorder, our understanding of the molecular and cellular pathogenesis of WAS has continued to increase. Advances in the use of diagnostic tools, the provision of supportive care, and improvements in allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation have significantly reduced the morbidity and mortality associated with this disorder. Exciting advancements in the care of patients with WAS have also occurred, including the successful application of autologous gene-modified hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.
Collateral Effects of a Peer Relationship Intervention for Children With Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder on Typically Developing Classmates

Abstract. General education teachers often implement classroom practices to address the needs of selected children with clinically significant behavior problems. The extent to which such practices affect the classmates of the selected children is an important question. Making Socially Accepting Inclusive Classrooms (MOSAIC) is a teacher-delivered classroom intervention, designed for and validated to improve the peer relationships of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The current study examined the collateral effects of MOSAIC on 113 typically developing (TD) classmates (ages 6.8–9.8, 47% boys) of the children with ADHD; TD children did not meet criteria for any clinical disorder. All children were enrolled in a summer program containing 16 classrooms with teachers randomly assigned to MOSAIC or to an active comparison intervention condition. Results indicated that TD children showed reduced negative sociometric nominations from peers, increased reciprocated friendships, and reduced negative interactions with peers in MOSAIC. The positive effects of MOSAIC were accentuated for TD children with higher levels of disruptive behavior. In sum, the benefits of a peer relationship intervention targeted for children with ADHD may extend to TD classmates.
[Multiplex ligation dependent probe amplification analysis of KAL1, GNRH1, GNRHR, PROK2 and PROKR2 in male patients with idiopathic hypogonadotropic hypogonadism].

INTRODUCTION The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of KAL1, GNRH1, GNRHR, PROK2, and PROKR2 copy numbervariations in patients with idiopathic hypogonadotropic hypogonadism (IHH). MATERIAL AND METHODS 86 hypogonadal males (76 diagnosed with normosmic idiopathic hypogonadotropic hypogonadism [nIHH] andten with Kallmann syndrome [KS]) and 95 healthy control individuals were studied for the presence of aforementioned genomic rearrangements,using multiplex ligation dependent probe amplification (MLPA). RESULTS We detected that of the 86 patients, three with KS had a deletion of the KAL1 gene in exon 9, one of whom also carried a duplicationin exon 11; and three with nIHH had a duplication of the PROK2 gene in exon 3; a deletion of the GNRHR gene in exon 1; anda duplication of the same gene in exon 2, respectively. No abnormalities were found in the patient group for the PROKR2 and GNRH1genes. In addition, no genomic rearrangements were identified in the healthy control individuals for the described genes. CONCLUSIONS Defining the genetic basis of disease is essential to improve our understanding of this complex disorder, and could be usefulfor genetic counselling and for directing therapy. In addition, discovering the association between genetic mutations and disease isimportant for our better understanding of normal reproductive functions.
Event-driven system for fall detection using body-worn accelerometer and depth sensor

The authors present efficient and effective algorithms for fall detection on the basis of sequences of depth maps and data from a wireless inertial sensor worn by a monitored person. A set of descriptors is discussed to permit distinguishing between accidental falls and activities of daily living. Experimental validation is carried out on the freely available dataset consisting of synchronised depth and accelerometric data. Extensive experiments are conducted in the scenario with a static camera facing the scene and an active camera observing the same scene from above. Several experiments consisting of person detection, tracking and fall detection in real-time are carried out to show efficiency and reliability of the proposed solutions. The experimental results show that the developed algorithms for fall detection have high sensitivity and specificity.