Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Early Childhood Characteristics, Parenting, and Contextual Influences on Preschoolers’ Behaviour and Developing Competencies: An Examination of Behavioural, Academic, and Social Adjustment

The present studies were designed to examine early emerging behaviour problems, temperament, parenting, maternal characteristics, and contextual influences on children’s developing competencies in a pooled sample of mother-child dyads, as well as links to academic and social adjustment following preschoolers’ transition to elementary school. Mothers from three independent Canadian samples participated with their preschool-aged offspring in data collection; questionnaire measures were employed in order to investigate temperament, behaviour problems, parenting, and maternal emotionality in early childhood (children aged 2-6), and classroom behaviour, interpersonal skills, social and attention problems in middle childhood (children aged 6-11). In addition to maternal and teacher-report questionnaires, report-card marks were collected at the conclusion of the academic year, and children completed standardized measures of verbal ability to assess school achievement and vocabulary, respectively. Results reflected the significance of child, parental, and familial influences on children’s early behaviour and subsequent adjustment following the school transition. In addition to direct effects, findings demonstrated indirect and interactive relationships between temperament, parenting, maternal emotionality, and familial socioeconomic stress in contributing to the early emergence of externalizing problems, and to academic and social adjustment outcomes in middle childhood. Further evidence of bidirectional associations between temperament and parenting was also indicated in the context of children’s externalizing behaviour at preschool age. The results highlight the complexity of relationships across a range of multi-level factors, and their direct, indirect, and interactive contributions to children’s early behaviour and subsequent adjustment at school age. Findings underscore the significance of early childhood in shaping social, behavioural, and academic outcomes, and have important implications for policies and programs that promote positive developmental outcomes. By pooling participants from three independent Canadian samples, results contribute valuable information to the field of early childhood development, and underscore the concurrent and longitudinal influences on preschoolers’ behaviour and school age adjustment.
Higher prevalence of exercise-associated hyponatremia in triple iron ultra-triathletes than reported for ironman triathletes.

"In a recent study of male and female ultra-marathoners in a 161-km ultra-marathon, the prevalence of exercise-associated hyponatremia (EAH) was higher than reported for marathoners. Regarding triathletes, the prevalence of EAH has been investigated in Ironman triathletes, but not in Triple Iron ultra-triathletes. The aim of this study was to investigate the prevalence of EAH in male ultra-triathletes competing in a Triple Iron ultra-triathlon over 11.4 km swimming, 540 km cycling, and 126.6 km running. Changes in body mass, fat mass, skeletal muscle mass, total body water, haematocrit, plasma volume, plasma sodium concentration ([Na ⁺ ]) and urine specific gravity were determined in 31 male athletes with (means ± standard deviation) 42.1 ± 8.1 years of age, 77.0 ± 7.0 kg body mass, 1.78 ± 0.06 m body height and a BMI of 24.3 ± 1.7 kg/m² in the 'Triple Iron Triathlon Germany'. Of the 31 finishers, eight athletes (26%) developed asymptomatic EAH. Body mass, fat mass, skeletal muscle mass, and haematocrit decreased, plasma volume increased ( P < 0.05), plasma [Na ⁺], total body water and urine specific gravity remained stable. The decrease in body mass was related to both the decrease in fat mass and skeletal muscle mass ( P < 0.05), but was not related to overall race time, the change in plasma [Na ⁺ ], post-race plasma [Na ⁺ ], or urine specific gravity. The prevalence of EAH was higher in these Triple Iron ultra-triathletes compared to existing reports on Ironman triathletes. Body fluid homeostasis remained stable in these ultra-triathletes although body mass decreased. "
Home-Based Activity Program for Older People With Depressive Symptoms: DeLLITE–A Randomized Controlled Trial

PURPOSE We wanted to assess the effectiveness of a home-based physical activity program, the Depression in Late Life Intervention Trial of Exercise (DeLLITE), in improving function, quality of life, and mood in older people with depressive symptoms. METHODS We undertook a randomized controlled trial involving 193 people aged 75 years and older with depressive symptoms at enrollment who were recruited from primary health care practices in Auckland, New Zealand. Participants received either an individualized physical activity program or social visits to control for the contact time of the activity intervention delivered over 6 months. Primary outcome measures were function, a short physical performance battery comprising balance and mobility, and the Nottingham Extended Activities of Daily Living scale. Secondary outcome measures were quality of life, the Medical Outcomes Study 36-item short form, mood, Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15), physical activity, Auckland Heart Study Physical Activity Questionnaire, and self-report of falls. Repeated measures analyses tested the differential impact on outcomes over 12 months’ follow-up. RESULTS The mean age of the participants was 81 years, and 59% were women. All participants scored in the at–risk category on the depression screen, 53% had a Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders or International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision diagnosis of major depression or scored more than 4 on the GDS-15 at baseline, indicating moderate or severe depression. Almost all participants, 187 (97%), completed the trial. Overall there were no differences in the impact of the 2 interventions on outcomes. Mood and mental health related quality of life improved for both groups. CONCLUSION The DeLLITE activity program improved mood and quality of life for older people with depressive symptoms as much as the effect of social visits. Future social and activity interventions should be tested against a true usual care control.
On the Other Side of an Ethnocratic State? lgbt Activism in Post-Dayton Bosnia and Herzegovina

Operating inside the complex state apparatus that has been constructed in a way which perpetuates ethnic divisions, LGBT activism in BiH has to face the relatively uninformed and homophobic public, on the one hand, and the poorly coordinated state institutions that are often not accountable to the citizens whom they are supposed to represent and protect, on the other. Sexual matters in the still highly patriarchal BiH socio-political context struggle to find a way out of religious doctrines and nationalist agendas. As the country’s political deadlock regarding its integration into the EU provides little hope for a meaningful improvement of the current state of political and economic affairs, LGBT advocacy could hold a certain creative potential to, in cooperation with other progressive forces, imagine a different—non-ethnocratic—kind of BiH polity.
The ATM protein: The importance of being active

The ataxia telangiectasia mutated (ATM) protein kinase regulates the cellular response to deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) double-strand breaks by phosphorylating numerous players in the extensive DNA damage response network. Two papers in this issue (Daniel et al. 2012. J. Cell Biol. http://dx.doi.org/10.1083/jcb201204035; Yamamoto et al. 2012. J. Cell Biol. http://dx.doi.org/10.1083/jcb201204098) strikingly show that, in mice, the presence of a catalytically inactive version of ATM is embryonically lethal. This is surprising because mice completely lacking ATM have a much more moderate phenotype. The findings impact on basic cancer research and cancer therapeutics.
A Study of the Predictive Validity of Self-esteem for Subjective Well-being with the Approach of Implicit Social Cognition

Objective:To examine the predictive validity of self-esteem for SWB with the approach of implicit social cognition.Methods:With the Implicit Association Test(IAT) and scales such as Index of well -being,Affect scales,SWLS,a total of 111 university students were tested.Results:①Self-esteem consisted of dual components which involved an implicit component and an explicit component. ②SWB showed a model of dual components which involved an implicit component and an explicit component. ③Explicit self-esteem could only predict explicit SWB,while implicit self-esteem could predict both the explicit and implicit SWB.Conclusion:The model of self-esteem predicting SWB shows that explicit self-esteem can only predict explicit SWB,while implicit self-esteem can predict both the explicit and implicit SWB.
Clinical Correlates of Very Fast Beta Activity in the EEG

Beta activity of 30-40 hz is rarely encountered, and has been reported to be more common in retarded individuals and those with psychiatric disorders. Of 3752 records in 1982-83, 0.8 percent demonstrated beta activity of 30 hz or faster, with a disproportionate representation of psychiatric symptoms and mental retardation in comparison with the general EEG referral population. No other specific correlations were evident, but the activity also occurred in neurologically and psychiatrically normal individuals. Although these findings may imply an association between very fast beta activity and psychiatric illness or mental subnormality, that association may be spurious or nonspecific in view of the small and heterogenous population demonstrating this type of beta activity. Controversy concerning very fast beta activity, as well as other infrequent or controversial patterns, may be lessened by application of spectral analysis and statistical techniques which are increasingly available for clinical EEG studies.
Learning misinformation from fictional sources: Understanding the contributions of transportation and item-specific processing

People often pick up incorrect information about the world from movies, novels and other fictional sources. The question asked here is whether such sources are a particularly potent source of misinformation. On the one hand, story-reading involves transportation into a fictional world, with a possible reduction in access to one's prior knowledge (likely reducing the chances that the reader will notice errors). On the other hand, stories encourage relational processing as readers create mental models, decreasing the likelihood that they will encode and remember more peripheral details like erroneous facts. To test these ideas, we examined suggestibility after readers were exposed to misleading references embedded in stories and lists that were matched on a number of dimensions. In two experiments, suggestibility was greater following exposure to misinformation in a list of sentences rather than a coherent story, even though the story was rated as more engaging than the list. Furthermore, processing the story with an item-specific processing task (inserting missing letters) increased later suggestibility, whereas this task had no impact on suggestibility when misinformation was presented within a list. The type of processing used when reading a text affects suggestibility more than engagement with the text.
Visual unrolling of network evolution and the analysis of dynamic discourse

A new method for visualizing the class of incrementally evolving networks is presented. In addition to the intermediate states of the network it conveys the nature of the change between them by unrolling the dynamics of the network. Each modification is shown in a separate layer of a three-dimensional representation, where the stack of layers corresponds to a time line of the evolution. We focus on discourse networks as the driving application, but our method extends to any type of network evolving in similar ways.
Comparative Study of Different Methods for Detection of Helicobacter Pylori in Gastric Biopsies

Introduction elicobacter pylori represent one of the most common and medically important infections worldwide. Infection with this micro aerobic, gramnegative bacterium has been established as the etiologic factor in the development of peptic ulcer disease. In addition, H. pylori infection has been established firmly with the development of gastric neoplasia, including gastric adenocarcinoma and gastric mucosaassociated lymphoid tissue lymphomas. 1
DNA-Damaging Imidazoacridinone C-1311 Induces Autophagy followed by Irreversible Growth Arrest and Senescence in Human Lung Cancer Cells

Imidazoacridinone 5-diethylaminoethylamino-8-hydroxyimidazoacridinone (C-1311) is an antitumor inhibitor of topoisomerase II and FMS-like tyrosine kinase 3 receptor. In this study, we describe the unique sequence of cellular responses to C-1311 in human non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cell lines, A549 and H460. In A549 cells, C-1311 (IC80 = 0.08 µM) induced G1 and G2/M arrests, whereas H460 cells (IC80 = 0.051 µM) accumulated predominantly in the G1 phase. In both cell lines, cell cycle arrest was initiated by overexpression of p53 but was sustained for an extended time by elevated levels of p21. Despite prolonged drug exposure (up to 192 hours), no apoptotic response was detected in either cell line. Instead, cells developed a senescent phenotype and did not resume proliferation even after 2 weeks of post-treatment, indicating that C-1311–triggered senescence was permanent. When cell cycle arrest was evident but there were no signs of senescence, C-1311 significantly induced autophagic cells. Pharmacological inhibition of autophagy by 3-methyladenine profoundly reduced the senescent phenotype and slightly sensitized cancer cells to C-1311 by increasing cell death, suggesting a link between both autophagy and senescence. However, a small interfering RNA–mediated knockdown of the autophagy-associated Beclin 1 and ATG5 genes attenuated but failed to block development of senescence. Taken together, our studies suggest that in NSCLC, a C-1311–induced senescence program is preceded and corroborated but not exclusively determined by the induction of autophagy.
Measurement Techniques for Red Blood Cell Deformability: Recent Advances

Human red blood cells (RBCs) or erythrocytes have remarkable deformability. Upon external forces, RBCs undergo large mechanical deformation without rupture, and they restore to original shapes when released. The deformability of RBCs plays crucially important roles in the main function of RBCs oxygen transport through blood circulation. RBCs must withstand large deformations during repeated passages through the microvasculature and the fenestrated walls of the splenic sinusoids (Waugh and Evans, 1979). RBC deformability can be significantly altered by various pathophysiological conditions, and the alterations in RBC deformability in turn influence pathophysiology, since RBC deformability is an important determinant of blood viscosity and thus blood circulation. Hence, measuring the deformability of RBCs holds the key to understanding RBC related diseases. For the past years, various experimental techniques have been developed to measure RBC deformability and recent technical advances revolutionize the way we study RBCs and their roles in hematology. This chapter reviews a variety of tools for measuring RBC deformability. For each technique, we seek to provide insights how these deformability measurement techniques can improve the study of RBC pathophysiology.
Role of CR1 Knops polymorphism in the pathophysiology of malaria: Indian scenario.

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES Plasmodium falciparum is the leading cause of mortality and causes cerebral malaria associated with sequestration caused by cytoadherence of the trophozoite and schizont-infected erythrocytes to the endothelial cells of the deep vascular beds in the brain. Pathophysiology of malaria is complicated by rosetting. Rosetting is a process of binding of uninfected erythrocytes to the erythrocytes infected with mature asexual parasites and is controlled by expression of complement receptor 1 (CR1) on RBC surface. Various polymorphic forms of CR1 are known including molecular weight polymorphism, red blood cell expression levels/density polymorphism and Knops (KN) polymorphism. The Knops blood group includes several allelic pairs; Knops a and b (Kna and Knb), McCoy a and b (McCa, McCb), Swain-Langley (Sla), and Villien (Vil). Knops phenotype Sl (a-) has been found to rosette less effectively than Sl (a+) and hence suggested to be more protective. P. falciparum cases have not reduced much as compared to the reduction in the total number of malaria cases in the past few years. In addition, P. falciparum is the leading cause for all mortality and most of the morbidity in India. We, therefore, investigated the role of CR1 Knops polymorphism in the pathophysiology of malaria in Indian population. METHODS A case control approach was used for this study. CAPS (Cleaved amplified polymorphic sequence) methodology was adopted. A total of 100 normal individuals (free from any ailment) and 100 individuals suffering from P. falciparum infection (uncomplicated malaria) were recruited for this study. RESULTS We found that in Indian population (normal individuals and P. falciparum-infected individuals), only the wild type allele is present. INTERPRETATION & CONCLUSION We concluded that the process of rosetting in the Indian context could be occurring independently of the effect of Knops polymorphism and in part could be controlled by other polymorphisms of the CR1 gene (density and structural polymorphism).
Down-Regulation of DNA Mismatch Repair Enhances Initiation and Growth of Neuroblastoma and Brain Tumour Multicellular Spheroids

Multicellular tumour spheroid (MCTS) cultures are excellent model systems for simulating the development and microenvironmental conditions of in vivo tumour growth. Many documented cell lines can generate differentiated MCTS when cultured in suspension or in a non-adhesive environment. While physiological and biochemical properties of MCTS have been extensively characterized, insight into the events and conditions responsible for initiation of these structures is lacking. MCTS are formed by only a small subpopulation of cells during surface-associated growth but the processes responsible for this differentiation are poorly understood and have not been previously studied experimentally. Analysis of gene expression within spheroids has provided clues but to date it is not known if the observed differences are a cause or consequence of MCTS growth. One mechanism linked to tumourigenesis in a number of cancers is genetic instability arising from impaired DNA mismatch repair (MMR). This study aimed to determine the role of MMR in MCTS initiation and development. Using surface-associated N2a and CHLA-02-ATRT culture systems we have investigated the impact of impaired MMR on MCTS growth. Analysis of the DNA MMR genes MLH1 and PMS2 revealed both to be significantly down-regulated at the mRNA level compared with non-spheroid-forming cells. By using small interfering RNA (siRNA) against these genes we show that silencing of MLH1 and PMS2 enhances both MCTS initiation and subsequent expansion. This effect was prolonged over several passages following siRNA transfection. Down-regulation of DNA MMR can contribute to tumour initiation and progression in N2a and CHLA-02-ATRT MCTS models. Studies of surface-associated MCTS differentiation may have broader applications in studying events in the initiation of cancer foci.
First‐trimester Down's syndrome screening using nuchal translucency: a prospective study in patients undergoing chorionic villus sampling

The value of the measurement of nuchal translucency thickness for predicting fetal Down's syndrome and other aneuploidies was prospectively evaluated at 8–15 weeks of gestation in 1819 consecutive pregnancies scheduled for karyotyping by chorionic villus sampling. In 43 cases, a chromosomal unbalanced aberration was found. Two teams of ultrasonologists who examined patients attending either National Health Service (Series 1) or private practice clinics (Series 2) were involved in the study. The same type of ultrasound machine and standardized approach were used in both study groups. In those cases in which the maximum subcutaneous thickness of the translucency was 3 mm or greater, the incidence of chromosomal aberration was 18.6% compared to 1.7% in the cases in which this was below 3 mm. The sensitivity, specificity and relative risk for all aneuploidies were 30%, 96% and 10.83, respectively, and no difference was found between trisomy 21 and other types of aneuploidy. The sensitivity and specificity and relative risk were significantly higher at 9–10 weeks than between 11 and 15 weeks. The results were concordant in the two series; however, the overall values for sensitivity (20% vs. 39%), specificity (94% vs. 98%) and relative risk (4.13 vs. 24.20) were clearly higher in the group of private patients. The results obtained confirm the potential application of the measurement of nuchal translucency thickness for fetal aneuploidy screening before the end of the first trimester and suggest that a multiplicity of individual, structural and organizational factors may interact and play a crucial role in determining the actual efficiency of ultrasound screening programs. Copyright © 1995 International Society of Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology
Deep sequencing of virus-infected cells reveals HIV-encoded small RNAs

Small virus-derived interfering RNAs (viRNAs) play an important role in antiviral defence in plants, insects and nematodes by triggering the RNA interference (RNAi) pathway. The role of RNAi as an antiviral defence mechanism in mammalian cells has been obscure due to the lack of viRNA detection. Although viRNAs from different mammalian viruses have recently been identified, their functions and possible impact on viral replication remain unknown. To identify viRNAs derived from HIV-1, we used the extremely sensitive SOLiDTM 3 Plus System to analyse viRNA accumulation in HIV-1-infected T lymphocytes. We detected numerous small RNAs that correspond to the HIV-1 RNA genome. The majority of these sequences have a positive polarity (98.1%) and could be derived from miRNAs encoded by structured segments of the HIV-1 RNA genome (vmiRNAs). A small portion of the viRNAs is of negative polarity and most of them are encoded within the 3′-UTR, which may represent viral siRNAs (vsiRNAs). The identified vsiRNAs can potently repress HIV-1 production, whereas suppression of the vsiRNAs by antagomirs stimulate virus production. These results suggest that HIV-1 triggers the production of vsiRNAs and vmiRNAs to modulate cellular and/or viral gene expression.
Brownian ratchets in physics and biology

Thirty years ago Feynman et al. presented a paradox in the Lectures on Physics: an imagined device could let Brownian motion do work by allowing it in one direction and blocking it in the opposite direction. In the chapter Feynman et al. eventually show that such ratcheting can only be achieved if there is, in compliance with the basic conservation laws, some energy input from an external source. Now that technology is going into ever smaller dimensions, ratcheting Brownian motion seems to be a real possibility in nanotechnological applications. Furthermore, Brownian motion plays an essential role in the action of motor proteins (individual molecules that convert chemical energy into motion).