Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Hazardous Alcohol Use in 2 Countries: A Comparison Between Alberta, Canada and Queensland, Australia

Objectives This article aimed to compare alcohol consumption between the populations of Queensland in Australia and Alberta in Canada. Furthermore, the associations between greater alcohol consumption and socio-demographic characteristics were explored in each population. Methods Data from 2500 participants of the 2013 Alberta Survey and the 2013 Queensland Social Survey were analyzed. Regression analyses were used to explore the associations between alcohol risk and socio-demographic characteristics. Results A higher rate of hazardous alcohol use was found in Queenslanders than in Albertans. In both Albertans and Queenslanders, hazardous alcohol use was associated with being between 18 and 24 years of age. Higher income, having no religion, living alone, and being born in Canada were also associated with alcohol risk in Albertans; while in Queenslanders, hazardous alcohol use was also associated with common-law marital status. In addition, hazardous alcohol use was lower among respondents with a non-Catholic or Protestant religious affiliation. Conclusions Younger age was associated with greater hazardous alcohol use in both populations. In addition, different socio-demographic factors were associated with hazardous alcohol use in each of the populations studied. Our results allowed us to identify the socio-demographic profiles associated with hazardous alcohol use in Alberta and Queensland. These profiles constitute valuable sources of information for local health authorities and policymakers when designing suitable preventive strategies targeting hazardous alcohol use. Overall, the present study highlights the importance of analyzing the socio-demographic factors associated with alcohol consumption in population-specific contexts.
Chikungunya virus infection and transmission in five species of mosquito.

Abstract Five species of mosquito were studied to compare their susceptibility to infection, ability to sustain infection, and vector efficiency over a 4- to 5-week period after being infected with an African strain of chikungunya virus. Aedes triseriatus and Aedes albopictus were readily infected with the virus and maintained the highest infection and transmission rates of the mosquitoes tested during the test period. Aedes togoi also maintained a very high infection rate, but was a poor transmitter. Eretmapodites chrysogaster exhibited fairly high infection rates throughout the test and relatively high transmission rates in the latter half of the 35-day test period. Surprisingly low infection and transmission rates were found for Aedes aegypti.
Near-optimal sample complexity bounds for circulant binary embedding

Binary embedding is the problem of mapping points from a high-dimensional space to a Hamming cube in lower dimension while preserving pairwise distances. An efficient way to accomplish this is to make use of fast embedding techniques involving Fourier transform e.g. circulant matrices. While binary embedding has been studied extensively, theoretical results on fast binary embedding are rather limited. In this work, we build upon the recent literature to obtain significantly better dependencies on the problem parameters. A set of N points in ℝ<sup>n</sup> can be properly embedded into the Hamming cube {±1}<sup>k</sup> with δ distortion, by using k ∼ δ<sup>−3</sup> logN samples which is optimal in the number of points N and compares well with the optimal distortion dependency δ<sup>−2</sup>. Our optimal embedding result applies in the regime logN ≲ n<sup>1/3</sup>. Furthermore, if the looser condition logN ≲ √n holds, we show that all but an arbitrarily small fraction of the points can be optimally embedded. We believe the proposed techniques can be useful to obtain improved guarantees for other nonlinear embedding problems.
Generating Intelligible Audio Speech From Visual Speech

This paper is concerned with generating intelligible audio speech from a video of a person talking. Regression and classification methods are proposed first to estimate static spectral envelope features from active appearance model visual features. Two further methods are then developed to incorporate temporal information into the prediction: A feature-level method using multiple frames and a model-level method based on recurrent neural networks. Speech excitation information is not available from the visual signal, so methods to artificially generate aperiodicity and fundamental frequency are developed. These are combined within the STRAIGHT vocoder to produce a speech signal. The various systems are optimized through objective tests before applying subjective intelligibility tests that determine a word accuracy of 85% from a set of human listeners on the GRID audio–visual speech database. This compares favorably with a previous regression-based system that serves as a baseline, which achieved a word accuracy of 33%.
Recovery stresses generated by NiTi shape memory wires under different constraint conditions

Recovery stresses generated by neat shape memory wires under different constraint conditions have been studied in detail. The thermomechanical conditions applied in the experiments were very close to the biasing conditions in polymer composites with embedded shape memory wires. The parameters of the present experiments were the predeformation of the shape memory wires and two other parameters related to the effect of thermal expansion and the stiffness of matrix materials. The influence of these parameters on the course of the generated recovery stresses has been examined. The results are helpful for understanding the functional behavior of composites with embedded shape memory wires and/or some other shape memory applications with the type of constraint analyzed in this paper.
Experimental techniques for screening of antiosteoporotic activity in postmenopausal osteoporosis

Abstract Postmenopausal osteoporosis, a silent epidemic, has become a major health hazard, afflicting about 50% of postmenopausal women worldwide and is thought to be a disease with one of the highest incidences in senile people. It is a chronic, progressive condition associated with micro-architectural deterioration of bone tissue that results in low bone mass, decreased bone strength that predisposes to an increased risk of fracture. Women are more likely to develop osteoporosis than men due to reduction in estrogen during menopause which leads to decline in bone formation and increase in bone resorption activity. Estrogen is able to suppress the production of proinflammatory cytokines like interleukin (IL)-1, IL-6, IL-7 and tumor necrosis factor (TNF-α). This is why these cytokines are elevated in postmenopausal women. In this review article we have made an attempt to collate the various methods and parameters most frequently used for screening of antiosteoporotic activity in postmenopausal osteoporosis. Pertaining to ovariectomized animal model, this is the most appropriate model for studying the efficacy of different drugs to prevent bone loss in postmenopausal osteoporosis.
Glucose Deprivation Increases mRNA Stability of Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor through Activation of AMP-activated Protein Kinase in DU145 Prostate Carcinoma*

The induction of proangiogenic cytokines such as vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is a critical feature of tumor angiogenesis. In the present study, we examined the mechanisms of VEGF gene expression induced by glucose deprivation in cancer cells, a role of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) in the process, and the signal transduction pathway. AMPK functions as an energy sensor to provide metabolic adaptation under ATP-depleting conditions such as hypoxia and nutritional deprivation. Here, we show that glucose deprivation leads to a significant increase in the mRNA level of VEGF, GLUT1, and PFKFB3 genes in several cancer cells via a hypoxia-inducible factor-1-independent mechanism, and we demonstrate an essential role of AMPK in these gene expressions. Our data suggest that VEGF mRNA induction by glucose deprivation is due to an increase in mRNA stability, and the AMPK activity is necessary and sufficient to confer the stability to VEGF mRNA. We further show that reactive oxygen species is involved in glucose deprivation-induced AMPK activity in DU145 human prostate carcinomas, and c-Jun amino-terminal kinase acts as an upstream component in AMPK activation cascades under these conditions. LKB1, which was recently identified as a direct upstream kinase of AMPK, was not detected in DU145 cells. In conclusion, our results demonstrate a novel and major role of AMPK in the post-transcriptional regulation of VEGF, further implying its potential role in tumor angiogenesis.
Evaluating open source GIS for libraries

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of free and open source (FOSS) geographic information system (GIS) software within the broader contexts of the open source software movement and developments in GIS, and pose the question of whether libraries and academic departments should consider adopting FOSS GIS.Design/methodology/approach – The process of creating a basic thematic map was used to test six FOSS GIS software packages, as it is a multi‐step process and a good example of a common task GIS users would want to perform. The test demonstrates what the process of creating a thematic map using FOSS GIS involves and how it compares to proprietary software like ArcGIS.Findings – Each of the individual FOSS GIS packages had their own particular strengths and weaknesses and some performed well for thematic mapping. The FOSS packages generally were weaker compared to ArcGIS in terms of support for various projection and coordinate systems, joining attribute data to GIS files, and automa.
Prophylactic Saccharomyces boulardii in the prevention of antibiotic-associated diarrhea: a prospective study.

BACKGROUND Interest to probiotics for the prevention and treatment of antibiotic-associated diarrhea is increasing gradually. The most promising seems to be Saccharomyces boulardii . Using a double-blind controlled study, we investigated the preventive effect of S. boulardii on the development of antibiotic-associated diarrhea in patients under antibiotherapy but not requiring intensive care therapy. MATERIAL/METHODS All the patients were hospitalized at the Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Department of Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology. S. boulardii was given twice daily during the course of antibiotic therapy and application was initiated in all patients as late as after 48 hours of antibiotic therapy. A total of 151 patients completed the study. RESULTS The antibiotic-associated diarrhea development ratio in placebo group was 9% (7/78) and in the study group 1.4% (1/73) (p < 0.05). Stool samples from the patients with antibiotic-associated diarrhea were stored at -70 degrees C and Clostiridium difficile toxin A assay was performed using Enzyme Immune Assay as late as in seven days. C. difficile toxin A assay yielded positive results in two (2/7) stool samples from the patients with antibiotic-associated diarrhea in the placebo group and a negative result in the only patient who developed antibiotic-associated diarrhea in the study group. CONCLUSIONS The results implied that prophylactic use of Saccharomyces boulardii resulted in reduced, with no serious side effects, antibiotic-associated diarrhea in hospitalized patients.
Evaluation of the ability of petri net centralized implementation techniques

In this work we present an evaluation of the ability of interpreted and centralized implementation techniques of Petri nets. The main purpose of this work is the analysis of the performance of the Petri Net execution algorithms, comparing the performance of algorithms through a parameter that does not depend on the execution platform. This parameter is the ability of the implementation that is independent of the execution platform. Firstly there is a study of the size of data structures of the Petri Net execution algorithms. There is also a review of the term ability, defining the ability of the Representing Places technique, therefore allowing a comparative study of the ability of the different techniques.
Critical Amino Acids within the Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 Envelope Glycoprotein V4 N- and C-Terminals Contribute to Virus Entry

The importance of the fourth variable (V4) region of the human immunodeficiency virus 1 (HIV-1) envelope glycoprotein (Env) in virus infection has not been well clarified, though the polymorphism of this region has been found to be associated with disease progression to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). In the present work, we focused on the correlation between HIV-1 gp120 V4 region polymorphism and the function of the region on virus entry, and the possible mechanisms for how the V4 region contributes to virus infectivity. Therefore, we analyzed the differences in V4 sequences along with coreceptor usage preference from CCR5 to CXCR4 and examined the importance of the amino acids within the V4 region for CCR5- and CXCR4-tropic virus entry. In addition, we determined the influence of the V4 amino acids on Env expression and gp160 processing intracellularly, as well as the amount of Env on the pseudovirus surface. The results indicated that V4 tended to have a shorter length, fewer potential N-linked glycosylation sites (PNGS), greater evolutionary distance, and a lower negative net charge when HIV-1 isolates switched from a coreceptor usage preference for CCR5 to CXCR4. The N- and C-terminals of the HIV-1 V4 region are highly conserved and critical to maintain virus entry ability, but only the mutation at position 417 in the context of ADA (a R5-tropic HIV-1 strain) resulted in the ability to utilize CXCR4. In addition, 390L, 391F, 414I, and 416L are critical to maintain gp160 processing and maturation. It is likely that the hydrophobic properties and the electrostatic surface potential of gp120, rather than the conformational structure, greatly contribute to this V4 functionality. The findings provide information to aid in the understanding of the functions of V4 in HIV-1 entry and offer a potential target to aid in the development of entry inhibitors.
Properties of Bulk Sintered Silver As a Function of Porosity

This report summarizes a study where various properties of bulk-sintered silver were investigated over a range of porosity. This work was conducted within the National Transportation Research Center's Power Device Packaging project that is part of the DOE Vehicle Technologies Advanced Power Electronics and Electric Motors Program. Sintered silver, as an interconnect material in power electronics, inherently has porosity in its produced structure because of the way it is made. Therefore, interest existed in this study to examine if that porosity affected electrical properties, thermal properties, and mechanical properties because any dependencies could affect the intended function (e.g., thermal transfer, mechanical stress relief, etc.) or reliability of that interconnect layer and alter how its performance is modeled. Disks of bulk-sintered silver were fabricated using different starting silver pastes and different sintering conditions to promote different amounts of porosity. Test coupons were harvested out of the disks to measure electrical resistivity and electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, coefficient of thermal expansion, elastic modulus, Poisson's ratio, and yield stress. The authors fully recognize that the microstructure of processed bulk silver coupons may indeed not be identical to the microstructure produced in thin (20-50 microns) layers of sintered silver. However, measuring these same propertiesmore » with such a thin actual structure is very difficult, requires very specialized specimen preparation and unique testing instrumentation, is expensive, and has experimental shortfalls of its own, so the authors concluded that the herein measured responses using processed bulk sintered silver coupons would be sufficient to determine acceptable values of those properties. Almost all the investigated properties of bulk sintered silver changed with porosity content within a range of 3-38% porosity. Electrical resistivity, electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, elastic modulus, Poisson's ratio, and yield stress all depended on the porosity content in bulk-sintered silver. The only investigated property that was independent of porosity in that range was coefficient of thermal expansion. « less
Emotion Recognition from Electromyography and Skin Conductance

The evocation and detection of the user’s emotional state is becoming a crucial element in the aim for developing more effective interfaces between humans and computers, especially in applications such as games and elearning tools. In this paper, we describe a model that allows us to determine emotion in real time, based on Electromyography (EMG) and skin conductance. The developed emotion recognition component has been used in a joint research project with the University of Bielefeld [1] that intends to address affective gaming by adding real time emotion detection to a game scenario between a human user and a 3D humanoid agent called Max. Keywords—Emotion Recognition, Biosignal Interpretation, Affective Computing.
Laminar shear stress upregulates the complement-inhibitory protein clusterin : a novel potent defense mechanism against complement-induced endothelial cell activation.

BACKGROUND The complement system is implicated in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. Complement has been shown to activate endothelial cells (ECs) by inducing a proinflammatory response. Physiological levels of shear stress exert potent antiatherosclerotic effects. Therefore, we investigated whether shear stress antagonizes the effects of complement on ECs. METHODS AND RESULTS Incubation of ECs with nonlytic concentrations of complement serum (CS: 0.2 U/mL for 6 hours) resulted in an upregulation of interleukin-8 (IL-8) (165+/-12%) and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) mRNA expression (267+/-34%). Preexposure of ECs for 18 hours with laminar shear stress (15 dyne/cm(2)) abrogated CS-induced IL-8 release to 106+/-10% (P<0.001) and reduced CS-induced MCP-1 expression (170+/-31%; P<0.05). To examine the mechanism of the protective effect of shear stress, expression of the complement-inhibitory protein clusterin was analyzed under shear exposure. Shear stress increased clusterin mRNA (225+/-76%, 6 hours) and protein expression (164+/-22%, 18 hours). Specific inhibition of clusterin by transfection with antisense oligonucleotides reversed the protective effect of shear stress on CS-induced MCP-1 and IL-8 upregulation (P<0.05 versus sense-transfected cells). Moreover, clusterin overexpression inhibited CS-induced EC activation. CONCLUSIONS Shear stress abrogates the complement-induced proinflammatory response of ECs by upregulation of the complement-inhibitory protein clusterin. Upregulation of clusterin may contribute to the potent antiatherosclerotic effects of shear stress by preventing endothelial activation through the complement cascade.
Summary Processing of Radiophysical Complex MRTHR Signals - Multifractal Analisys of the Brain Microwave Radiation and Heart Rate Variability

The principles of processing signals of Radiophysical complex MRTHR for studying the role of autonomic regulation in the formation of the brain microwave radiation during the treatment process are presented. The feature of this complex is the possibility of registration and analysing the non-stationary short-term time series of the brain microwave radiation and heart rate variability signals. The processing is implemented via the method of multifractal cross-correlation analysis. The results of the fluctuation and cross-correlation Hurst exponent estimations of these signals are shown. The estimates for a group of relatively healthy patients have low levels of systemic discrepancy. For the patients group with ischemic stroke before treatment the systematic discrepancy of estimations are significantly larger than those of healthy patients. After rehabilitation course, the discrepancy between these estimates are reduced.
Gastroparesis in Children: The Benefit of Conducting 4-hour Scintigraphic Gastric-Emptying Studies

Background and Aim: Scintigraphic gastric emptying study (GES) is the criterion standard for diagnosis of gastroparesis. Adult studies demonstrated that extending GES to 4 hours increases its ability to diagnose delayed gastric emptying. Most pediatric centers assess GES up to 2 hours postmeal. The aim of the present study was to assess the effect of extending GES from 2 to 4 hours in evaluation of children with suspected gastroparesis. Methods: We conducted a chart review of all children who had a 4-hour GES with standard radiolabeled solid meal in 2009–2010. Results of GES at 1, 2, and 4 hours were compared. Patients were diagnosed as having gastroparesis using adult criteria: if gastric retention of meal was >90%, 60%, and 10% at 1, 2 and 4 hours, respectively. A telephone survey assessed GES time at top 20 pediatric gastroenterology centers in the United States. Cost of evaluation of patients diagnosed as having gastroparesis was estimated. Full-time equivalents of nuclear medicine technicians and number of nuclear medicine studies done at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago from 2007 to 2010 were examined. Results: A total of 71 patients (32 boys, average age 10.8 years) were studied. Sixty-two percent (n = 44) children had abnormal GES; 23% (8/35) of them who had normal values at 2 hours had abnormal GES at 4 hours (P < 0.0001). Twenty-eight percent of patients had delayed GES at 1 hour: all persisted to have abnormal GES at 2 and 4 hours. Cost of evaluation of a child for gastroparesis was $9014. Only 5 of the top 20 pediatric gastroenterology centers in the United States conducted 4-hour GES. Transitioning from 2 hours to 4 hours only required scheduling adjustments and did not result in limitation in the number of scheduled patients. Conclusions: Extending GES to 4 hours results in a considerable increase in diagnosis of gastroparesis.
Autophagosomal Membrane Serves as Platform for Intracellular Death-inducing Signaling Complex (iDISC)-mediated Caspase-8 Activation and Apoptosis*

Background: It remains a matter of debate whether autophagy contributes to apoptosis. Results: Atg5 and p62 are required for an intracellular death-inducing signaling complex (iDISC) formation on autophagosomal membranes for caspase-8 self-processing. Conclusion: Autophagosome serves as a platform for the intracellular activation of caspase-8. Significance: Induction of iDISC formation may shift cytoprotective autophagy to apoptosis for more effective cancer therapies. Autophagy and apoptosis are two evolutionarily conserved processes that regulate cell fate in response to cytotoxic stress. However, the functional relationship between these two processes remains far from clear. Here, we demonstrate an autophagy-dependent mechanism of caspase-8 activation and initiation of the apoptotic cascade in response to SKI-I, a pan-sphingosine kinase inhibitor, and bortezomib, a proteasome inhibitor. Autophagy is induced concomitantly with caspase-8 activation, which is responsible for initiation of the caspase cascade and the mitochondrial amplification loop that is required for full execution of apoptosis. Inhibition of autophagosome formation by depletion of Atg5 or Atg3 results in a marked suppression of caspase-8 activation and apoptosis. Although caspase-8 self-association depends on p62/SQSTM1, its self-processing requires the autophagosomal membrane. Caspase-8 forms a complex with Atg5 and colocalizes with LC3 and p62. Moreover, FADD, an adaptor protein for caspase-8 activation, associates with Atg5 on Atg16L- and LC3-positive autophagosomal membranes and loss of FADD suppresses cell death. Taken together, these results indicate that the autophagosomal membrane serves as a platform for an intracellular death-inducing signaling complex (iDISC) that recruits self-associated caspase-8 to initiate the caspase-8/-3 cascade.