Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effective hydraulic parameters for steady state vertical flow in heterogeneous soils

In hydroclimate and land‐atmospheric interaction models, effective hydraulic properties are needed at large grid scales. In this study, the effective soil hydraulic parameters of the areally heterogeneous soil formation are derived by conceptualizing the heterogeneous soil formation as an equivalent homogeneous medium and assuming that the equivalent homogeneous soil will approximately discharge the same total amount of flux and produce same average pressure head profile in the formation. As compared to previous effective hydraulic property studies, a specific feature of this study is that the derived effective hydraulic parameters are mean‐gradient‐dependent (i.e., vary across depth). Although areal soil heterogeneity was formulated as parallel homogeneous stream tubes in this study, our results appear to be consistent with the previous findings of mean‐gradient unsaturated hydraulic conductivity [ Yeh et al., 1985a , 1985b ]. Three widely used hydraulic conductivity models were employed in this study, i.e., the Gardner model, the Brooks and Corey model, and the van Genuchten model. We examined the impact of parameter correlation, boundary condition (surface pressure head), and elevation above the water table on the effective saturated hydraulic conductivity and shape parameter. The correlation between the saturated hydraulic conductivity Ks and the shape parameter α increases the effective saturated hydraulic conductivity, while it does not affect the effective α. The effective α is usually smaller than the mean value of α, while the effective Ks can be smaller or larger than the mean value depending on no correlation or full correlation between Ks and α fields, respectively. An important observation of this study is that Gardner and van Genuchten functions resulted in effective parameters, whereas it is difficult to define effective parameters for the Brooks Corey model since this model uses a piecewise‐continuous profile for hydraulic conductivity.
Author ' s personal copy Excreted / secreted Schistosoma mansoni venom allergen-like 9 ( SmVAL 9 ) modulates host extracellular matrix remodelling gene expression

The Schistosoma mansoni venom allergen-like (SmVAL) protein family consists of 29 members, each possessing a conserved a-b-a sandwich tertiary feature called the Sperm-coating protein/Tpx-1/Ag5/PR-1/ Sc7 (SCP/TAPS) domain. While the SmVALs have been found in both excretory/secretory (E/S) products and in intra/sub-tegumental (non-E/S) fractions, the role(s) of this family in host/parasite relationships or schistosome developmental processes remains poorly resolved. In order to begin quantifying SmVAL functional diversity or redundancy, dissecting the specific activity (ies) of individual family members is necessary. Towards this end, we present the characterisation of SmVAL9; a protein previously found enriched in both miracidia/sporocyst larval transformation proteins and in egg secretions. While our study confirms that SmVAL9 is indeed found in soluble egg products and miracidia/sporocyst larval transformation proteins, we find it to be maximally transcribed/translated in miracidia and subsequently down-regulated during in vitro sporocyst development. SmVAL9 localisation within sporocysts appears concentrated in parenchymal cells/vesicles as well as associated with larval germinal cells. Furthermore, we demonstrate that egg-derived SmVAL9 carries an N-linked glycan containing a schistosome-specific difucosyl element and is an immunogenic target during chronic murine schistosomiasis. Finally, we demonstrate that recombinant SmVAL9 affects the expression of extracellular matrix, remodelling matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) and tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinase (TIMP) gene products in both Biomphalaria glabrata embryonic cell (BgMMP1) and Mus musculus bone marrow-derived macrophage (MmMMP2, MmMMP9, MmMMP12, MmMMP13, MmMMP14, MmMMP28, TIMP1 and TIMP2) in vitro cultures. These findings importantly suggest that excreted/secreted SmVAL9 participates in tissue reorganisation/extracellular matrix remodelling during intra-mammalian egg translocation, miracidia infection and intra-molluscan sporocyst development/migration. 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. on behalf of Australian Society for Parasitology Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
Quantitative magnetic resonance techniques as surrogate markers of Alzheimer’s disease

SummaryRecent advances in understanding the molecular biology of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) offer the promise of useful therapeutic intervention in the foreseeable future. Hence, improved methods for early diagnosis and noninvasive surrogates of disease severity in AD have become more imperative. Various quantitative magnetic resonance (MR) techniques that measure the anatomic, biochemical, microstructural, functional, and blood-flow changes are being evaluated as possible surrogate measures of disease progression. Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies indicate that MR-based volume measurements are potential surrogates of disease progression in AD, starting from the preclinical stages. The validity of MR-based volumetry as a surrogate marker for therapeutic efficacy in AD remains to be tested in a positive disease-modifying drug trial. Recent development of amyloid imaging tracers for positron emission tomography has been a major breakthrough in the field of imaging markers for AD. Efforts to image plaques are also underway in MR imaging. As with indirect MR measures, these approaches of directly imaging the pathological substrate will need to undergo a validation process with longitudinal studies to prove their usefulness as surrogate markers in AD.
Dietary Inadequacies in HIV-infected and Uninfected School-aged Children in Johannesburg, South Africa

Objectives: The World Health Organization recommends that human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected children increase energy intake and maintain a balanced macronutrient distribution for optimal growth and nutrition. Few studies have evaluated dietary intake of HIV-infected children in resource-limited settings. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional analysis of the dietary intake of 220 perinatally HIV-infected children and 220 HIV-uninfected controls ages 5 to 9 years in Johannesburg, South Africa. A standardized 24-hour recall questionnaire and software developed specifically for the South African population were used to estimate intake of energy, macronutrients, and micronutrients. Intake was categorized based on recommendations by the World Health Organization and Acceptable Macronutrient Distribution Ranges established by the IOM. Results: The overall mean age was 6.7 years and 51.8% were boys. Total energy intake was higher in HIV-infected than HIV-uninfected children (1341 vs 1196 kcal/day, P = 0.002), but proportions below the recommended energy requirement were similar in the 2 groups (82.5% vs 85.2%, P = 0.45). Overall, 51.8% of the macronutrient energy intake was from carbohydrates, 13.2% from protein, and 30.8% from fat. The HIV-infected group had a higher percentage of their energy intake from carbohydrates and lower percentage from protein compared with the HIV-uninfected group. Intakes of folate, vitamin A, vitamin D, calcium, iodine, and selenium were suboptimal for both groups. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that the typical diet of HIV-infected children and uninfected children in Johannesburg, South Africa, does not meet energy or micronutrient requirements. There appear to be opportunities for interventions to improve dietary intake for both groups.
Motivation Moderates the Effects of Social Support Visibility

Social support can sometimes have negative consequences for recipients. One way of circumventing these negative effects is to provide support in an ‘invisible’ or indirect manner, such that recipients do not construe the behavior as a supportive act. However, little is known about how recipients’ motivational states influence when visible (direct) support or invisible support is more beneficial. Using the framework of Regulatory Mode Theory, we predicted that recipients motivated to engage in critical evaluation (i.e., those with a predominant assessment motivation) would find invisible support more beneficial than visible support, whereas recipients motivated to initiate action (i.e., those with a predominant locomotion motivation) would find visible support more beneficial than invisible support. Findings from one 2 × 2 experiment (Study 1), two laboratory experiments (Studies 2–3), one dyadic study involving support conversations between friends (Study 4), and a meta-analysis aggregating data from all four studies supported these hypotheses. As predicted, support outcomes were better for assessment predominant recipients following invisible support, but were better for locomotion predominant recipients following visible support. Results indicate that support attempts could be made more effective by considering both support visibility and recipient motivation.
Evidence from clinical trials: Can we do better?

SummaryRandomized clinical trials provide the most internally valid evidence for medical decision-making. In many areas of neurology, results from clinical trials showing which therapies are and are not effective have had a substantial impact on patient care. Relative to observational methods, the central advantage of clinical trials is control of bias attributable to unmeasured differences between patients. However, trials also have clear limitations, including a historical failure to include a representative cross-section of patients with a given disease, and highly structured treatment regimes that are difficult to replicate in normal practice settings. These limitations tend to reduce the generalizability of results from clinical trials. This article reviews some ways in which the design and application of clinical trials could be improved so that the evidence produced would be more relevant to health-care providers and other decision makers.
SKUP3: 6 and 24 months follow‐up of changes in respiration and sleepiness after modified UPPP

Our previous randomized controlled trial of patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) showed that modified uvulopalatopharyngoplasty (UPPP), including tonsillectomy, significantly improved nocturnal respiration, daytime sleepiness, and quality of life in the intervention group compared to controls who had delayed surgery after 6 months. This is the continuous report with the 6‐ and 24‐month postoperative results.
Network integration and limits to social inheritance in vervet monkeys

Social networks can be adaptive for members and a recent model (Ilany and Akçay 2016 Nat. Comm. 7, 12084 (doi:10.1038/ncomms12084)) has demonstrated that network structure can be maintained by a simple process of social inheritance. Here, we ask how juvenile vervet monkeys integrate into their adult grooming networks, using the model to test whether observed grooming patterns replicate network structure. Female juveniles, who are philopatric, increased their grooming effort towards adults more than males, although this was not reciprocated by the adults themselves. While more consistent maternal grooming networks, together with maternal network strength, predicted increasing similarity in the patterning of mother–daughter grooming allocations, daughters' grooming networks generally did not match closely those of their mothers. However, maternal networks themselves were not very consistent across time, thus presenting youngsters with a moving target that may be difficult to match. Observed patterns of juvenile female grooming did not replicate the adult network, for which increased association with adults not groomed by their mothers would be necessary. These results suggest that network flexibility, not stability, characterizes our groups and that juveniles are exposed to, and must learn to cope with, temporal shifts in network structure. We hypothesize that this may lead to individual variation in behavioural flexibility, which in turn may help explain why and how variation in sociability influences fitness.
Tyrosine hydroxylase replacement in experimental Parkinson’s disease with transvascular gene therapy

SummaryTransvascular gene therapy of Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a new approach to the gene therapy of PD and involves the global distribution of a therapeutic gene to brain after an intravenous administration and transport across the blood-brain barrier (BBB). This is enabled with the development of a nonviral gene transfer technology that encapsulates plasmid DNA inside pegylated immunoliposomes or PILs. An 85- to 100-nm liposome carries the DNA inside the nanocontainer, and the liposome surface is conjugated with several thousand strands of 2000-Da polyethyleneglycol (PEG). This PEGylation of the liposome stabilizes the structure in the blood stream. The liposome is targeted across the BBB via attachment to the tips of 1–2% of the PEG strands of a receptor-specific monoclonal antibody (mAb) directed at a BBB receptor, such as the insulin receptor or transferrin receptor (TfR). Owing to the expression of the insulin receptor or the TfR on both the BBB and the neuronal plasma membrane, the PIL is able to reach the neuronal nuclear compartment from the circulation. Brain-specific expression is possible with the combined use of the PIL gene transfer technology and brain-specific gene promoters. In the 6-hydroxydopamine rat model of experimental PD, striatal tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) activity is completely normalized after an intravenous administration of TfRmAb-targeted PILs carrying a TH expression plasmid. A treatment for PD may be possible with dual gene therapy that seeks both to replace striatal TH gene expression with TH gene therapy, and to halt or reverse neurodegeneration of the nigro-striatal tract with neurotrophin gene therapy.
Modeling fear‐conditioned bradycardia in humans

Abstract Across species, cued fear conditioning is a common experimental paradigm to investigate aversive Pavlovian learning. While fear‐conditioned stimuli (CS+) elicit overt behavior in many mammals, this is not the case in humans. Typically, autonomic nervous system activity is used to quantify fear memory in humans, measured by skin conductance responses (SCR). Here, we investigate whether heart period responses (HPR) evoked by the CS, often observed in humans and small mammals, are suitable to complement SCR as an index of fear memory in humans. We analyze four datasets involving delay and trace conditioning, in which heart beats are identified via electrocardiogram or pulse oximetry, to show that fear‐conditioned heart rate deceleration (bradycardia) is elicited and robustly distinguishes CS+ from CS−. We then develop a psychophysiological model (PsPM) of fear‐conditioned HPR. This PsPM is inverted to yield estimates of autonomic input into the heart. We show that the sensitivity to distinguish CS+ and CS− (predictive validity) is higher for model‐based estimates than peak‐scoring analysis, and compare this with SCR. Our work provides a novel tool to investigate fear memory in humans that allows direct comparison between species.
Brand trust and brand extension acceptance: the relationship

Purpose – This UK‐based research aims to build on the US‐based work of Keller and Aaker, which found a significant association between “company credibility” (via a brand's “expertise” and “trustworthiness”) and brand extension acceptance, hypothesising that brand trust, measured via two correlate dimensions, is significantly related to brand extension acceptance.Design/methodology/approach – Discusses brand extension and various prior, validated influences on its success. Focuses on the construct of trust and develops hypotheses about the relationship of brand trust with brand extension acceptance. The hypotheses are then tested on data collected from consumers in the UK.Findings – This paper, using 368 consumer responses to nine, real, low involvement UK product and service brands, finds support for a significant association between the variables, comparable in strength with that between media weight and brand share, and greater than that delivered by the perceived quality level of the parent brand.Origi.
Reoperation Rates in Ductal Carcinoma In Situ vs Invasive Breast Cancer After Wire-Guided Breast-Conserving Surgery

Importance New techniques for preoperative localization of nonpalpable breast lesions may decrease the reoperation rate in breast-conserving surgery (BCS) compared with rates after surgery with the standard wire-guided localization. However, a valid reoperation rate for this procedure needs to be established for comparison, as previous studies on this procedure include a variety of malignant and benign breast lesions. Objectives To determine the reoperation rate after wire-guided BCS in patients with histologically verified nonpalpable invasive breast cancer (IBC) or ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) and to examine whether the risk of reoperation is associated with DCIS or histologic type of the IBC. Design, Setting, and Participants This nationwide study including women with histologically verified IBC or DCIS having wire-guided BCS performed between January 1, 2010, and December 31, 2013, used data from the Danish National Patient Registry that were cross-checked with the Danish Breast Cancer Group database and the Danish Pathology Register. Main Outcomes and Measures Reoperation rate after wire-guided BCS in patients with IBC or DCIS. Results Wire-guided BCS was performed in 4118 women (mean [SD] age, 60.9 [8.7] years). A total of 725 patients (17.6%) underwent a reoperation: 593 were reexcisions (14.4%) and 132 were mastectomies (3.2%). Significantly more patients with DCIS (271 of 727 [37.3%]) than with IBC (454 of 3391 [13.4%]) underwent a reoperation (adjusted odds ratio, 3.82; 95% CI, 3.19-4.58; P < .001). After the first reexcision, positive margins were still present in 97 patients (16.4%). The risk of repeated positive margins was significantly higher in patients with DCIS vs those with IBC (unadjusted odds ratio, 2.21; 95% CI, 1.42-3.43; P < .001). The risk of reoperation was significantly increased in patients with lobular carcinoma vs those with ductal carcinoma (adjusted odds ratio, 1.44; 95% CI 1.06-1.95; P = .02). A total of 202 patients (4.9%) had a subsequent completion mastectomy, but no difference was found in the type of reoperation between patients with DCIS and those with IBC. Conclusions and Relevance A lower reoperation rate after wire-guided BCS was found in this study than those shown in previous studies. However, the risk of reoperation in patients with DCIS was 3 times higher than in those with IBC. The widespread use of mammographic screening will increase the number of patients diagnosed with DCIS, making a precise localization of nonpalpable DCIS lesions even more important.
Porous concrete basic property criteria as rigid pavement base layer adjusting field gradation

Porous concrete has been widely used for many purposes in this couple of days. In reality, it might be difficult to create an ideal uniform graded porous concrete mixture proportion with the field gradation circumstances. The aim of this study was to find a porous concrete mix-design proportion that could adjust field gradation and meet Specifications requirements by utilizing continuous graded aggregate. Compressive strength and vertical permeability produced by porous concrete using continuous graded aggregate stayed above the minimum limit for base layer required by Specifications. Continuous graded porous concrete from mix-design variation II produced higher compressive strength, but lower void content and vertical permeability compared to mix design variation I at the age of 28-days. It was found that continuous graded porous concrete from both mix-design variations had an optimum basic parameters in specific value as well. Porous concrete that adjust the field gradation gave a better basic property criteria compared to ideal gradation. The relationship between void content and vertical permeability from continuous graded porous concrete had a similar behavior with uniform graded porous concrete. Overall, the use of continuous graded porous concrete would be very helpful in Indonesia because it can adjust the gradation on the field.
Improving patient safety and efficiency of medication reconciliation through the development and adoption of a computer-assisted tool with automated electronic integration of population-based community drug data: the RightRx project

Abstract Background and Objective Many countries require hospitals to implement medication reconciliation for accreditation, but the process is resource-intensive, thus adherence is poor. We report on the impact of prepopulating and aligning community and hospital drug lists with data from population-based and hospital-based drug information systems to reduce workload and enhance adoption and use of an e-medication reconciliation application, RightRx. Methods The prototype e-medical reconciliation web-based software was developed for a cluster-randomized trial at the McGill University Health Centre. User-centered design and agile development processes were used to develop features intended to enhance adoption, safety, and efficiency. RightRx was implemented in medical and surgical wards, with support and training provided by unit champions and field staff. The time spent per professional using RightRx was measured, as well as the medication reconciliation completion rates in the intervention and control units during the first 20 months of the trial. Results Users identified required modifications to the application, including the need for dose-based prescribing, the role of the discharge physician in prescribing community-based medication, and access to the rationale for medication decisions made during hospitalization. In the intervention units, both physicians and pharmacists were involved in discharge reconciliation, for 96.1% and 71.9% of patients, respectively. Medication reconciliation was completed for 80.7% (surgery) to 96.0% (medicine) of patients in the intervention units, and 0.7% (surgery) to 82.7% of patients in the control units. The odds of completing medication reconciliation were 9 times greater in the intervention compared to control units (odds ratio: 9.0, 95% confidence interval, 7.4-10.9, P < .0001) after adjusting for differences in patient characteristics. Conclusion High rates of medication reconciliation completion were achieved with automated prepopulation and alignment of community and hospital medication lists.