Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pharmacokinetic Variability of Daptomycin during Prolonged Therapy for Bone and Joint Infections

ABSTRACT The interindividual and intraindividual variabilities in daptomycin pharmacokinetics were investigated in 23 patients (69 pharmacokinetic profiles) who were treated for several months for bone and joint infections. Population daptomycin clearance was significantly influenced by renal function and was significantly higher in male than in female patients. We observed significant intraindividual changes in daptomycin clearance, which were uncorrelated with changes in renal function, suggesting that therapeutic drug monitoring is important in patients receiving prolonged daptomycin therapy.
Development and validation of a multi-dimensional measure of intellectual humility

This paper presents five studies on the development and validation of a scale of intellectual humility. This scale captures cognitive, affective, behavioral, and motivational components of the construct that have been identified by various philosophers in their conceptual analyses of intellectual humility. We find that intellectual humility has four core dimensions: Open-mindedness (versus Arrogance), Intellectual Modesty (versus Vanity), Corrigibility (versus Fragility), and Engagement (versus Boredom). These dimensions display adequate self-informant agreement, and adequate convergent, divergent, and discriminant validity. In particular, Open-mindedness adds predictive power beyond the Big Six for an objective behavioral measure of intellectual humility, and Intellectual Modesty is uniquely related to Narcissism. We find that a similar factor structure emerges in Germanophone participants, giving initial evidence for the model’s cross-cultural generalizability.
Determination of Oestrous Cycle of the Rats by Direct Examination: How Reliable?

For determination of the oestrous cycle in rats classical Papanicolaou technique has long been used successfully. Instead of using many stains in Papanicolaou, staining the vaginal secretions with only methylene blue has also been defined. Recently a new technique in which vaginal samples are directly examined under light microscope has been introduced. The aim of this study was to assess the reliability of this new technique by comparing it with the classical staining techniques. From 20 Wistar rats 60 vaginal samples were collected with a micropipette, three from each. Briefly, the vagina was flushed two to three times then the fluid was placed onto a glass slide. The fluid was equally distributed onto three glass slides. The glass slides were coded. Two samples were stained with Papanicoloau and methylene blue while the other one was examined directly. Determination of the phases of the oestrous cycle was made by the same histologist who was blinded to the groups and coding system. After determination of the oestrous phase in all samples, the results were compared and it was found that the results were matching. In conclusion, the same results can be obtained with the direct examination technique and this technique is reliable, so there is no need to use relatively time‐consuming, less practical and more expensive techniques such as Papanicolaou or methylene blue.
BOFAR: buffer occupancy factor based adaptive router for mesh NoCs

If the route computation operation in an adaptive router returns more than one output channels, the selection strategy chooses one from them based on the congestion metric used. The effectiveness of a selection strategy depends on what metric is used to identify congestion and how precisely that metric captures the actual congestion. The number of cycles a flit stays in a router is a direct indication of the contention level of the output port it desires to move out. We propose buffer Occupancy Factor based Adaptive Router (BOFAR), wherein the history of cycles spent by flits in buffers is used as the congestion metric. BOFAR outperforms the baseline architectures built on minimal odd-even adaptive router model with conventional selection strategies like count of free downstream virtual channels at reachable neighbors, and fluidity of buffers in downstream neighbors. Our experiments on 4x4 mesh NoC with various synthetic traffic patterns show that BOFAR exceeds the performance of best baseline adaptive router with 21% average and 78% maximum latency reduction at saturation load. The reduced average packet latency, increased buffer fluidity fairness, and increased saturation point of BOFAR with minimal overhead in area, power, and wiring makes it a promising alternative to existing adaptive routers in mesh NoCs.
Improving RTT Fairness on CUBIC TCP

CUBIC TPC is a congestion control algorithm for TCP. It is the current default TCP algorithm in Linux. Because many internet servers, such as web servers, are running on Linux operating systems, keeping throughput obtained with this TCP enough is quite important. Then, many performance studies have been published. However, most of these studies have been based on network simulators. Thus, evaluations using an actual TCP implementation and actual network elements are important in addition to these existing studies. In this paper, we focused on RTT fairness on CUBIC TCP, which is performance fairness among CUBIC TCP connections with different network delay times. Firstly, we present RTT fairness evaluation using actual TCP implementations and actual network elements and show that the fairness is not enough. Secondly, we discuss the cause of the unfairness based on CUBIC TCP behaviors. Thirdly, we propose a method for improving RTT fairness of CUBIC TCP. Finally, we present evaluation results and demonstrate that the proposed method provides better fairness than original CUBIC TCP implementation.
Lifestyle and Dietary Factors in Relation to Risk of Chronic Myeloid Leukemia in the NIH-AARP Diet and Health Study

Background: Aside from exposure to ionizing radiation and benzene, little is known about lifestyle risk factors for chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) in the general population. Methods: We examined the relation between lifestyle and dietary risk factors for CML in 493,188 participants (294,271 males and 198,917 females) aged 50 to 71 years who completed a baseline questionnaire in the National Institutes of Health-AARP Diet and Health Study in 1995 to 1996. Over a median of 10.5 years of follow-up, 178 incident cases of CML (139 males and 39 females) were ascertained from state registries. We used Cox proportional hazards models to estimate hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals for exposures of interest, adjusting for potential confounding variables. Results: In multivariable analysis of all participants combined, female sex, years of education, and vigorous physical activity (HR for ≥3 times/week vs. <1 time/week 0.70; 95% CI, 0.49–0.99) were inversely associated with risk of CML, whereas smoking intensity (HR for smokers of ≥20 cigarettes per day vs. never smokers: 1.53; 95% CI, 1.03–2.27) and body mass (HR for BMI ≥ 30 vs. <25 kg/m2 1.46; 95% CI, 0.95–2.23) were associated with increased risk. A range of dietary factors was not associated with disease. Conclusions: This study adds to the sparse information about lifestyle factors, which affect the risk of CML in the general population. Impact: If these findings are confirmed, it would suggest that CML may be amenable to preventive strategies. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev; 22(5); 848–54. ©2013 AACR.
Reversals of Age-Related Declines in Neuronal Signal Transduction, Cognitive, and Motor Behavioral Deficits with Blueberry, Spinach, or Strawberry Dietary Supplementation

Ample research indicates that age-related neuronal–behavioral decrements are the result of oxidative stress that may be ameliorated by antioxidants. Our previous study had shown that rats given dietary supplements of fruit and vegetable extracts with high antioxidant activity for 8 months beginning at 6 months of age retarded age-related declines in neuronal and cognitive function. The present study showed that such supplements (strawberry, spinach, or blueberry at 14.8, 9.1, or 18.6 gm of dried aqueous extract per kilogram of diet, respectively) fed for 8 weeks to 19-month-old Fischer 344 rats were also effective in reversing age-related deficits in several neuronal and behavioral parameters including: oxotremorine enhancement of K+-evoked release of dopamine from striatal slices, carbachol-stimulated GTPase activity, striatal Ca45buffering in striatal synaptosomes, motor behavioral performance on the rod walking and accelerod tasks, and Morris water maze performance. These findings suggest that, in addition to their known beneficial effects on cancer and heart disease, phytochemicals present in antioxidant-rich foods may be beneficial in reversing the course of neuronal and behavioral aging.
The Status and Associated Factors of Successful Aging among Older Adults Residing in Longevity Areas in China.

OBJECTIVE This study aims to assess the status of successful aging (SA) in longevity areas in China and explore multiple factors associated with SA among the young-old and oldest-old. METHODS A total of 2296 elderly people aged 65 and older were interviewed in the longevity areas sub-sample of the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS) in 2012. Baseline assessments included a researcher-administered questionnaire, physical examination, and laboratory testing. A logistic regression model was used to identify factors associated with SA. RESULTS The prevalence of SA was 38.81% in the CLHLS in 2012. There were significant differences between ages groups, with SA compromising 56.85% among ⋝65 years group and 20.31% among ⋝100 years group (χ2trend=126.73, P<0.01). The prevalence of SA among females was 33.59%, which was significantly lower than that among males (45.58%) (χ2gender=33.65, P<0.05). In the regression analysis, having anemia (OR=0.744, 95% CI: 0.609-0.910), poor lifestyle (OR=0.697, 95% CI: 0.568-0.854), poor sleep quality (OR=0.558, 95% CI: 0.456-0.682), and central obesity (OR=0.684, 95% CI: 0.556-0.841) were the main factors associated with SA. The promoting SA rate decreased as age increased, and the group of 65-79 years had higher odds than the other age group. CONCLUSION Preventing central obesity, improving sleep quality and promoting healthy lifestyle may contribute to achieve SA among the elderly.
From the Cover: Gas production in the Barnett Shale obeys a simple scaling theory

Ten years ago, US natural gas cost 50% more than that from Russia. Now, it is threefold less. US gas prices plummeted because of the shale gas revolution. However, a key question remains: At what rate will the new hydrofractured horizontal wells in shales continue to produce gas? We analyze the simplest model of gas production consistent with basic physics of the extraction process. Its exact solution produces a nearly universal scaling law for gas wells in each shale play, where production first declines as 1 over the square root of time and then exponentially. The result is a surprisingly accurate description of gas extraction from thousands of wells in the United States’ oldest shale play, the Barnett Shale.
CMOS RF integrated circuits at 5 GHz and beyond

A strong demand for wireless products, an insatiable thirst for spectrum that pushes carrier frequencies ever upward, and the constant quest for higher performance at lower power and cost, have recently driven the development of radio frequency integrated circuit (RFIC) technology in unprecedented ways. These pressures are stimulating novel solutions that allow RFICs to enjoy more of the benefits of Moore's law than has been the case in the past. In addition to regular raw transistor speed increases, the growing number of interconnect layers allows the realization of improved inductors, capacitors, and transmission lines. A deeper understanding of noise at both the device and circuit level has improved the performance of low noise amplifiers (LNAs) and oscillators. Finally, an appropriate raiding of circuit ideas dating back to the vacuum tube era enables excellent performance, even when working close to the limits of a technology. This paper surveys some of these developments in the context of low-power RF CMOS technology, with a focus on an illustrative implementation of a low-power 5-GHz wireless LAN receiver in 0.25-/spl mu/m CMOS. Thanks to these recent advances in passive components and active circuits, the blocks comprising the receiver consume a total of approximately 37 mW. These blocks include an image-reject LNA, image-reject downconverter, and a complete frequency synthesizer. The overall noise figure is 5 dB, and the input-referred third-order intercept (IIP3) is -2 dBm. To underscore that 5 GHz does not represent an upper bound by any means, this paper concludes with a look at active circuits that function beyond 15-20 GHz, and a characterization of on-chip transmission lines up to 50 GHz, all in the context of how scaling is expected to shape future developments.
Malaria vectors in Bioko Island (Equatorial Guinea): PCR determination of the members of Anopheles gambiae Giles complex (Diptera: Culicidae) and pyrethroid knockdown resistance (kdr) in An. gambiae sensu stricto.

Anopheles gambiae sensu lato Giles, 1902 and Anophelesfunestus Giles, 1900 are the main malaria vectors on the island of Bioko (Equatorial Guinea). This study was carried out to determine: a) members of the An. gambiae complex that may be present on the island of Bioko and, b) the sensitivity of An. gambiae sensu stricto to pyrethroids. The analysis by PCR detected the presence of An. gambiae s.s. as the major vector of the complex and the "forest chromosomal form" was demonstrated by cytogenetic analysis. The presence of Anopheles melas in the southwest, north and southeast of the island justifies its study as a vector. The molecular characterization of pyrethroid knockdown resistance (kdr) showed that the populations of An. gambiae s.s. were sensitive and no mutations were found. This fact justifies the implementation on a large scale of pyrethroid-impregnated bednets within the framework of the Malaria Control Program of Equatorial Guinea.
The efficacy of capacitive radio-frequency diathermy in reducing buttock and posterior thigh cellulite measured through the cellulite severity scale

Abstract Background: Cellulite, despite its high prevalence in women, has been subjected to very little research, while the majority has been carried out using unvalidated evaluation tools. Objectives: To determine the efficacy of capacitive radio-frequency diathermy (CRFD) in reducing buttock and posterior thigh cellulite and to verify its relationship with the reduction of body weight. Methods: Design: Experimental clinical study consists of two parallel groups. Sample: Totally 54 lower limbs of 27 women (26.41 ± 6.16 years) were considered with each patient's two limbs being assigned one to each group via simple random distribution. First group received local application of CRFD (30 min) and the second received the same treatment followed by a supplementary whole-segment application of CRFD (20 min). Each limb received 20 sessions, twice a week. Variables: Cellulite Severity Scale dimensions score, weight and Body Mass Index (BMI) were taken for the evaluation of the study. Results: A significance of p less than 0.01 was observed for all the variables in both groups, thereby demonstrating the effectiveness of both the treatments; no significant differences were observed between groups (p > 0.05). Conclusions: Monopolar static application of CRFD is effective in reducing buttock and posterior thigh cellulite. It appears that there is not necessarily any relationship between weight loss, decreased BMI and reduction in cellulite.
A New Strategy for Aedes aegypti (Diptera: Culicidae) Control with Community Participation using a New Fumigant Formulation

ABSTRACT Dengue and dengue hemorrhagic fever are mosquito-borne viral diseases that coincide with the distribution of Aedes aegypti (L.), the primary vector in the tropical and semitropical world. With no available vaccine, controlling the dengue vector is essential to avoid epidemics. This study evaluates the efficacy of a new smoke-generating formulation containing pyriproxyfen and permethrin in Puerto Libertad, Misiones, Argentina. A fumigant tablet (FT) was applied inside the houses by the community members and compared with a professional application. A treatment combining the application of fumigant tablets indoors and ultralow volume fumigation outdoors was also assessed. The community perceptions and practices about dengue disease and the acceptance of this new nonprofessional FT were evaluated through surveys. Results show >90% adult emergence inhibition and 100% adult mortality with these treatments. More than 80% of the residents applied the FT and preferred participating in a vector control program by using a nonprofessional mosquito control tool, instead of attending meetings and workshops promoting cultural changes.
Assessing bacterial diversity in a seawater-processing wastewater treatment plant by 454-pyrosequencing of the 16S rRNA and amoA genes

The bacterial community composition of activated sludge from a wastewater treatment plant (Almería, Spain) with the particularity of using seawater was investigated by applying 454‐pyrosequencing. The results showed that Deinococcus‐Thermus, Proteobacteria, Chloroflexi and Bacteroidetes were the most abundant retrieved sequences, while other groups, such as Actinobacteria, Chlorobi, Deferribacteres, Firmicutes, Planctomycetes, Spirochaetes and Verrumicrobia were reported at lower proportions. Rarefaction analysis showed that very likely the diversity is higher than what could be described despite most of the unknown microorganisms probably correspond to rare diversity. Furthermore, the majority of taxa could not be classified at the genus level and likely represent novel members of these groups. Additionally, the nitrifiers in the sludge were characterized by pyrosequencing the amoA gene. In contrast, the nitrifying bacterial community, dominated by the genera Nitrosomonas, showed a low diversity and rarefaction curves exhibited saturation. These results suggest that only a few populations of low abundant but specialized bacteria are responsible for removal of ammonia in these saline wastewater systems.
Regulation of myosin heavy chain gene expression after short-term diaphragm inactivation

LIYING YANG,1,2 JOHANNE BOURDON,1,2 STEWART B. GOTTFRIED,1,2 WALTER A. ZIN,3 AND BASIL J. PETROF1,2 1Respiratory Division, McGill University Health Centre, Montreal, Quebec H3A 1A1; 2Respiratory Muscle Biology Group, Meakins-Christie Laboratories, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H2X 2P2; and 3Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Instituto de Biofisica Carlos Chagas Filho, 21949-900 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Prediction and Diagnosis of Heart Disease by Data Mining Techniques

Today, Data mining is rapidly growing in wide range of applications. One of the important data mining fields is medical data mining. There is a wealth of data available in healthcare but there is no effective analysis tool to discover hidden relationships in data. Although millions of people die of heart disease annually, application of data mining techniques in heart disease diagnosis seems to be essential. Discovered Knowledge can help physicians in diagnosis of heart disease. The objective of this paper is to evaluate different classification techniques in heart disease diagnosis. Classifiers like J48 Decision Tree, K Nearest Neighbors(KNN), Naive Bayes(NB), and SMO are used to classify dataset. After classification, some performance evaluation measures like accuracy, precision, sensitivity, specificity, F-measure and area under ROC curve are evaluated and compared. The comparison results show that J48 Decision tree is the best classifier for heart disease diagnosis on the existing dataset. Keywords—Data Mining; Classification; Heart Disease; Decision Tree
Decreased Probability of Initial Pain Cessation in Classic Trigeminal Neuralgia Treated With Gamma Knife Surgery in Case of Previous Microvascular Decompression: A Prospective Series of 45 Patients With >1 Year of Follow-up.

BACKGROUND Microvascular decompression (MVD) is the reference technique for pharmacoresistant trigeminal neuralgia (TN). OBJECTIVE To establish whether the safety and efficacy of Gamma Knife surgery for recurrent TN are influenced by prior MVD. METHODS Between July 1992 and November 2010, 54 of 737 patients (45 of 497 with >1 year of follow-up) had a history of MVD (approximately half also with previous ablative procedure) and were operated on with Gamma Knife surgery for TN in the Timone University Hospital. A single 4-mm isocenter was positioned in the cisternal portion of the trigeminal nerve at a median distance of 7.6 mm (range, 3.9-11.9 mm) anterior to the emergence of the nerve. A median maximum dose of 85 Gy (range, 70-90 Gy) was delivered. RESULTS The median follow-up time was 39.5 months (range, 14.1-144.6 months). Thirty-five patients (77.8%) were initially pain free in a median time of 14 days (range, 0-180 days), much lower compared with our global population of classic TN (P = .01). Their actuarial probabilities of remaining pain-free without medication at 3, 5, 7, and 10 years were 66.5%, 59.1%, 59.1%, and 44.3%. The hypoesthesia actuarial rate at 1 year was 9.1% and remained stable until 12 years (median, 8 months). CONCLUSION Patients with previous MVD showed a significantly lower probability of initial pain cessation compared with our global population with classic TN (P = .01). The toxicity was low (only 9.1% hypoesthesia); furthermore, no patient reported bothersome hypoesthesia. However, the probability of maintaining pain relief without medication was 44.3% at 10 years, similar to our global series of classic TN (P = .85).
Alternative Coreceptor Requirements for Efficient CCR5- and CXCR4-Mediated HIV-1 Entry into Macrophages

ABSTRACT Macrophage tropism of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) is distinct from coreceptor specificity of the viral envelope glycoproteins (Env), but the virus-cell interactions that contribute to efficient HIV-1 entry into macrophages, particularly via CXCR4, are not well understood. Here, we characterized a panel of HIV-1 Envs that use CCR5 (n = 14) or CXCR4 (n = 6) to enter monocyte-derived macrophages (MDM) with various degrees of efficiency. Our results show that efficient CCR5-mediated MDM entry by Env-pseudotyped reporter viruses is associated with increased tolerance of several mutations within the CCR5 N terminus. In contrast, efficient CXCR4-mediated MDM entry was associated with reduced tolerance of a large deletion within the CXCR4 N terminus. Env sequence analysis and structural modeling identified amino acid variants at positions 261 and 263 within the gp41-interactive region of gp120 and a variant at position 326 within the gp120 V3 loop that were associated with efficient CXCR4-mediated MDM entry. Mutagenesis studies showed that the gp41 interaction domain variants exert a significant but strain-specific influence on CXCR4-mediated MDM entry, suggesting that the structural integrity of the gp120-gp41 interface is important for efficient CXCR4-mediated MDM entry of certain HIV-1 strains. However, the presence of Ile326 in the gp120 V3 loop stem, which we show by molecular modeling is located at the gp120-coreceptor interface and predicted to interact with the CXCR4 N terminus, was found to be critical for efficient CXCR4-mediated MDM entry of divergent CXCR4-using Envs. Together, the results of our study provide novel insights into alternative mechanisms of Env-coreceptor engagement that are associated with efficient CCR5- and CXCR4-mediated HIV-1 entry into macrophages.