Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
MiR-107 and MiR-185 Can Induce Cell Cycle Arrest in Human Non Small Cell Lung Cancer Cell Lines

Background MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short single stranded noncoding RNAs that suppress gene expression through either translational repression or degradation of target mRNAs. The annealing between messenger RNAs and 5′ seed region of miRNAs is believed to be essential for the specific suppression of target gene expression. One miRNA can have several hundred different targets in a cell. Rapidly accumulating evidence suggests that many miRNAs are involved in cell cycle regulation and consequentially play critical roles in carcinogenesis. Methodology/Principal Findings Introduction of synthetic miR-107 or miR-185 suppressed growth of the human non-small cell lung cancer cell lines. Flow cytometry analysis revealed these miRNAs induce a G1 cell cycle arrest in H1299 cells and the suppression of cell cycle progression is stronger than that by Let-7 miRNA. By the gene expression analyses with oligonucleotide microarrays, we find hundreds of genes are affected by transfection of these miRNAs. Using miRNA-target prediction analyses and the array data, we listed up a set of likely targets of miR-107 and miR-185 for G1 cell cycle arrest and validate a subset of them using real-time RT-PCR and immunoblotting for CDK6. Conclusions/Significance We identified new cell cycle regulating miRNAs, miR-107 and miR-185, localized in frequently altered chromosomal regions in human lung cancers. Especially for miR-107, a large number of down-regulated genes are annotated with the gene ontology term ‘cell cycle’. Our results suggest that these miRNAs may contribute to regulate cell cycle in human malignant tumors.
Silk cocoons as composites

This thesis looks at the engineering aspects of silkworm cocoons as a structural biological composite system. A wide range of species of silk cocoons were studied for their morphologies, physical properties and mechanical behaviour. A silk cocoon can be described very broadly as a nonwoven fibre composite made of silk fibres bonded by sericin binder, although the a variety of species can show a diversity of structural features of the layers, porosity, degree of orientation, binding density and presence of crystals etc. These structural differences lead to diverse cocoon mechanical behaviour. Tensile and compressive properties of cocoons are tested and linked to their individual interfibre bonding, connectivity and density. Gas diffusion through the cocoon walls is controlled by the combination of thickness and density. In addition, a physically realistic quantitative model is developed, which links directly the structure and mechanical properties of silk cocoons. The gradual loss of connectivity of the interfibre bonding is the key mechanism for the deformation of cocoons. It can be quantified as a strain activated function of the bonding up to a failure criterion, where either a percolation threshold of 50% of these bonds or the failure stress of the binder arrives. For Bombyx mori cocoon, which has a graded-layer structure, the model was enhanced to include the contribution of interlayer and intralayer bonding in the system. This model can also be applied to other nonwoven fibre and particulate composites using a small number of physically realistic model parameters, and will be a valuable ‘bioinspired’ tool for the development of new composite systems. Based on the understanding of structure-mechanical property relationships in silkworm cocoons, an engineering approach was used for examining cocoon as an impact resistant structural material that provides mechanical protection from environmental threats. In addition, silk cocoons were used as a nonwoven reinforcement to develop an engineering composite by increasing the connectivity (more binder) in the cocoon. Using polyurethane or regenerated silk fibroin of medium concentration can increase the toughness of cocoons, and epoxy or regenerated silk fibroin of high concentration binding leads to a brittle system.
Noninvasive visualization and analysis of parafoveal capillaries in humans.

PURPOSE To demonstrate a noninvasive method to visualize and analyze the parafoveal capillary network in humans. METHODS An adaptive optics scanning laser ophthalmoscope was used to acquire high resolution retinal videos on human subjects. Video processing tools that enhance motion contrast were developed and applied to the videos to generate montages of parafoveal retinal capillaries. The capillary network and foveal avascular zone (FAZ) were extracted using video and image analysis algorithms. The capillary densities in the zone immediately outside the FAZ were calculated and the variation in density as a function of direction was investigated. Extracted FAZ geometries were used to calculate area and effective diameters. The authors also compared their method against fluorescein angiography (FA) for one subject. RESULTS The parafoveal capillaries were clearly visible when the motion contrast in noninvasive videos was enhanced. There was a marked improvement in the contrast of the parafoveal capillaries when compared to the unprocessed videos. The average FAZ area was 0.323 mm(2), with an average effective diameter of 633 microm. There was no variation in capillary density near the FAZ in different directions. CONCLUSIONS Using motion cues to enhance vessel contrast is a powerful tool for visualizing the capillary network, in the absence of contrast agents. The authors demonstrate a tool to study the microcirculation of healthy subjects noninvasively.
The Reconstruction of the Spheno-Orbital Region Using Latissimus Dorsi Flap and Costal Graft

AbstractTo minimize complications in skull base surgery, it is necessary to separate intracranial structures from the upper aerodigestive tract with well-vascularized tissue. The majority of defects can be reconstructed using local flaps using pericranium, galea, or temporalis muscle. However, there are conditions that affect the suitability of the previously mentioned flaps, for example, previous surgical procedures or radiotherapy. Local flaps may also be inadequate to reconstruct particularly large defects. Extensive bony demolitions produce aesthetic deformities that need accurate reconstructions. Orbital wall defects have to be reconstructed to avoid complications such as the transmission of cerebral pulsation, bulbar dystopias, diplopia, and ophthalmoplegia. The microvascular latissimus dorsi flap is ideal in all these cases, and the use of a costal graft allows simultaneous reconstruction of bony defects.From January 2000 to January 2008, 17 patients have undergone surgical ablation of the spheno-orbital region and reconstruction with latissimus dorsi flap and costal grafts.The flap survival rate was 100%. One patient required revision of the venous anastomosis. No cerebrospinal fluid leak or intracranial infections have been detected. The only complications registered were dystopias in 6 patients and diplopia in 4; all of these spontaneously resolved within 2 months.The microvascular latissimus dorsi flap with costal graft is an effective method for the reconstruction of the spheno-orbital region when local flaps are not indicated.It has a negligible donor-site morbidity, an ideal vascular pedicle, and an easy harvesting technique. The costal graft allows the simultaneous reconstruction of the orbital walls, giving good results.
Improving Personality Facet Scores With Multidimensional Computer Adaptive Testing

Narrowly defined personality facet scores are commonly reported and used for making decisions in clinical and organizational settings. Although these facets are typically related, scoring is usually carried out for a single facet at a time. This method can be ineffective and time consuming when personality tests contain many highly correlated facets. This article investigates the possibility of increasing the precision of the NEO PI-R facet scores by scoring items with multidimensional item response theory and by efficiently administering and scoring items with multidimensional computer adaptive testing (MCAT). The increase in the precision of personality facet scores is obtained from exploiting the correlations between the facets. Results indicate that the NEO PI-R could be substantially shorter without attenuating precision when the MCAT methodology is used. Furthermore, the study shows that the MCAT methodology is particularly appropriate for constructs that have many highly correlated facets.
Effect of Composition and Thickness on the Perpendicular Magnetic Anisotropy of (Co/Pd) Multilayers

Magnetic materials with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) have wide-ranging applications in magnetic recording and sensing devices. Multilayers comprised of ferromagnetic and non-magnetic metals (FM–NM) are interesting materials, as their magnetic anisotropy depends strongly on composition and growth parameters. In this context, (Co/Pd) multilayers have gained huge interest recently due to their robustness and tunable PMA. Here, we report a systematic study of the effect of composition on the magnetic anisotropy of (Co/Pd) multilayers grown by Direct Current (DC) magnetron sputtering. Four different series of (Co/Pd)×10 multilayers with different thicknesses of Co and Pd were examined. Vibrating sample magnetometery was used to determine the magnetic anisotropy of these films. X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy experiments were performed to understand the structural morphology of the films. Our results showed that (Co/Pd)×10 multilayers exhibit PMA when the Co to Pd ratio is less than or equal to 1 and the thickness of Co layers is not more than 5 Å. Maximum effective anisotropy energy is shown by the films with a Co to Pd ratio of 1/3.
Functional biomaterials : Design of novel biomaterials : Biomaterials

The field of biomaterials has recently been focused on the design of intelligent materials. Toward this goal, materials have been developed that can provide specific bioactive signals to control the biological environment around them during the process of materials integration and wound healing. In addition, materials have been developed that can respond to changes in their environment, such as a change in pH or cell-associated enzymatic activity. In designing such novel biomaterials, researchers have sought not merely to create bio-inert materials, but rather materials that can respond to the cellular environment around them to improve device integration and tissue regeneration.
Ebola Virus VP30-Mediated Transcription Is Regulated by RNA Secondary Structure Formation

ABSTRACT The nucleocapsid protein VP30 of Ebola virus (EBOV), a member of the Filovirus family, is known to act as a transcription activator. By using a reconstituted minigenome system, the role of VP30 during transcription was investigated. We could show that VP30-mediated transcription activation is dependent on formation of a stem-loop structure at the first gene start site. Destruction of this secondary structure led to VP30-independent transcription. Analysis of the transcription products of bicistronic minigenomes with and without the ability to form the secondary structure at the first transcription start signal revealed that transcription initiation at the first gene start site is a prerequisite for transcription of the second gene, independent of the presence of VP30. When the transcription start signal of the second gene was exchanged with the transcription start signal of the first gene, transcription of the second gene also was regulated by VP30, indicating that the stem-loop structure of the first transcription start site acts autonomously and independently of its localization on the RNA genome. Our results suggest that VP30 regulates a very early step of EBOV transcription, most likely by inhibiting pausing of the transcription complex at the RNA structure of the first transcription start site.
Influence of Anchor Management on Anchored Navigation in Mobile Maps

Map-based services have increasingly become more important in our daily life, especially mobile maps. However, the screen constraints on mobile devices significantly increases the mode-switching between panning and zooming when trying to retrieve map data which negatively affects the user experience. The Anchored Zoom (AZ) is one of the techniques that have been proposed to overcome this problem, but it has some limitations concerning the use of its anchor point, i.e. a point of reference that serves as a major tool to control zooming in this technique. This paper presents the Anchored Zoom with Anchor Management (AZAM), a new technique that extends AZ by adding an anchor management to it, i.e., by adding new features that better exploit the use of anchors, improving the choice of new anchors and access to the previous ones. We evaluated both techniques, AZ and AZAM, and we also investigated their relevance in comparison with the popular Pinch to Zoom (PZ) technique. The study reveals that AZAM is superior to AZ in perceived satisfaction and that it serves as a complement to PZ during visual search tasks.
Large Strain Behavior of Thin Unidirectional Composite Flexures

The large strain flexure of 0.135 mm, 0.259 mm and 0.383 mm thick unidirectional carbon fiber reinforced epoxy plates was investigated. Coupons were folded in a U-shape and compressed between parallel platens while platen separation and load were measured up to failure. The test was modeling numerically using a geometrically nonlinear elastica solution method in combination with a two parameter nonlinear elastic material constitutive model based on graphite crystallite reorientation. Using a curve fitting method, the test data was used to estimate model parameters. Test results show a nonlinear material response resulting in bending stiffness softening as curvature increases. Bending failure strains were larger than expected and increased as coupon thickness decreased, ranging from 2.15% to 2.75%. Also unexpected, the failure occurred in a tensile mode on the outside coupon surface, not in a compressive mode. The results indicate thin flexures can be used at strains and curvatures larger than previously thought.
How can multimodal cues from child-directed interaction reduce learning complexity in robots?

Robots have to deal with an enormous amount of sensory stimuli. One solution in making sense of them is to enable a robot system to actively search for cues that help structuring the information. Studies with infants reveal that parents support the learning-process by modifying their interaction style, dependent on their child's developmental age. In our study, in which parents demonstrated everyday actions to their preverbal children (8–11 months old), our aim was to identify objective parameters for multimodal action modification. Our results reveal two action parameters being modified in adult–child interaction: roundness and pace. Furthermore, we found that language has the power to help children structuring actions sequences by synchrony and emphasis. These insights are discussed with respect to the built-in attention architecture of a socially interactive robot, which enables it to understand demonstrated actions. Our algorithmic approach towards automatically detecting the task structure in child-designed input demonstrates the potential impact of insights from developmental learning on robotics. The presented findings pave the way to automatically detect when to imitate in a demonstration task.
Crafting Normative Messages to Protect the Environment

It is widely recognized that communications that activate social norms can be effective in producing societally beneficial conduct. Not so well recognized are the circumstances under which normative information can backfire to produce the opposite of what a communicator intends. There is an understandable, but misguided, tendency to try to mobilize action against a problem by depicting it as regrettably frequent. Information campaigns emphasize that alcohol and drug use is intolerably high, that adolescent suicide rates are alarming, and—most relevant to this article—that rampant polluters are spoiling the environment. Although these claims may be both true and well intentioned, the campaigns' creators have missed something critically important: Within the statement “Many people are doing this undesirable thing” lurks the powerful and undercutting normative message “Many people are doing this. ” Only by aligning descriptive norms (what people typically do) with injunctive norms (what people typically approve or disapprove) can one optimize the power of normative appeals. Communicators who fail to recognize the distinction between these two types of norms imperil their persuasive efforts.
Traumatic brain injury is associated with the development of deep vein thrombosis independent of pharmacological prophylaxis.

INTRODUCTION Deep venous thrombosis (DVT) is common among trauma patients. If left untreated it may result in lethal pulmonary thromboembolism. Previous studies have suggested that intracranial hemorrhage serves as an independent risk factor for the development of DVT. These studies were not able to exclude anticoagulation therapy as a confounding variable in their analysis. Our objective was to determine the association of traumatic brain injury (TBI) to the formation of DVT irrespective of the use of anticoagulation therapy. METHODS All patients admitted to an academic level I Trauma Center between 2000 and 2007 with blunt or penetrating injuries were selected for inclusion in this study. Patients who died or who were discharged within 24 hours of admission were excluded in the analysis. TBI was defined as any intraparenchymal hemorrhage or extra-axial intracranial bleeding identified on radiographic imaging or both. Anticoagulation therapy was defined as the uninterrupted use of either subcutaneous lovenox or heparin. Risk ratios and 95% confidence intervals compared the risk of DVT among patients with and without TBI according to the initiation of anticoagulation therapy (no therapy, <24 hours, 24-48 hours, and >48 hours) adjusted for age, gender, race, injury severity, mechanism of injury, spinal injury, and lower extremity fracture. RESULTS Irrespective of the time of initiation of pharmacologic prophylaxis, TBI is independently associated with the formation of DVT. A threefold to fourfold increased risk of DVT formation is consistent across all prophylaxis groups among patients with TBI. CONCLUSION The incidence of DVT among injured patients with TBI is significantly higher than those patients without head injury independent of anticoagulation therapy. Rigorous surveillance to detect DVT among trauma patients with TBI should be undertaken and where appropriate alternate means for pulmonary thromboembolism prevention used.
Effect of Gibberellic Acid and 2,4- Dichlorophenoxyacetic Acid on Fruit Development and Fruit Quality of Wax Apple

This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of gibberellic acid and 2,4dichlorophenoxyacetic acid on flower number, fruit growth and fruit quality of wax apple. GA3 and 2,4-D were applied at small bud and petal fall stage. Number of flower, fruit set, fruit drop, fruit crack, fruit growth and fruit quality were recorded. Results indicated that spraying with 10 ppm GA3 had the best results in number of flower. GA3 spray at 30 ppm gave the faster rate of fruit growth than the other treatments. Fruit set, fruit size as well as fruit weight markedly improved by spraying 30 ppm GA3, followed by 10 ppm GA3 compared to untreated control. Moreover, spray GA3 at 30 ppm was the most effective and increased total soluble solids, reduced titratable acidity and fruit drop. On the other hand, it was noticed that with 10 ppm 2,4-D application also enhanced the fruit growth rate, improved physiological and biochemical characters of fruit compared to untreated control. It was concluded that both GA3 and 2,4-D spray have positive effects on fruit development, reduced fruit drop, fruit crack and improved fruit quality of wax apple under field conditions. Keywords—Wax apple, GA3, 2,4-D, fruit growth, fruit quality.
Latent Data Association: Bayesian Model Selection for Multi-target Tracking

We propose a novel parametrization of the data association problem for multi-target tracking. In our formulation, the number of targets is implicitly inferred together with the data association, effectively solving data association and model selection as a single inference problem. The novel formulation allows us to interpret data association and tracking as a single Switching Linear Dynamical System (SLDS). We compute an approximate posterior solution to this problem using a dynamic programming/message passing technique. This inference-based approach allows us to incorporate richer probabilistic models into the tracking system. In particular, we incorporate inference over inliers/outliers and track termination times into the system. We evaluate our approach on publicly available datasets and demonstrate results competitive with, and in some cases exceeding the state of the art.
Offline Signature Verification Using Local Radon Transform and Support Vector Machines

In this paper, we propose a new method for signature verification using local Radon Transform. The proposed method uses Radon Transform locally as feature extractor and Support Vector Machine (SVM) as classifier. The main idea of our method is using Radon Transform locally for line segments detection and feature extraction, against using it globally. The advantages of the proposed method are robustness to noise, size invariance and shift invariance. Having used a dataset of 600 signatures from 20 Persian writers, and another dataset of 924 signatures from 22 English writers, our system achieves good results. The experimental results of our method are compared with two other methods. This comparison shows that our method has good performance for signature identification and verification in different cultures.
The SNL/MSU/DOE Fatigue of Composite Materials Database: Recent Trends

Trends of recent test data in three areas are described for wind blade materials in the SNL/MSU/DOE fatigue of composite materials database 1 . First, a complete 3-D set of static elastic constants and strength properties is given for a thick infused glass fabric/epoxy laminate. Second, results are presented which explore the effects of fabric structure and resin type on the tensile fatigue resistance. Using aligned strand structure as a baseline, the efficiency of stitched fabric reinforcement is quantified for static and fatigue properties, and the origins of poor fatigue performance with some resins are identified. Third, an overall comparison is given of the tensile fatigue sensitivity of various blade materials including laminate in-plane and interlaminar failure, epoxy based blade adhesives and core materials. Comparisons of fiber dominated and resin dominated failure modes show clear trends in the fatigue exponent, depending on the resin system.
Expression of a human cytomegalovirus receptor correlates with infectibility of cells

Previous studies have demonstrated that human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) specifically binds to a fibroblast membrane glycoprotein(s) with a molecular mass from 30 to 34 kDa. In this study, the distribution of the putative receptor proteins was analyzed in a variety of cell types, including cell types representative of those that are infected in vivo. Using a sensitive microbinding assay (to score virus attachment) and an indirect detection method (to score HCMV-binding proteins), we found that the 34- and 32-kDa HCMV binding proteins are ubiquitous molecules, broadly distributed among diverse cell types. In addition, the level of virus attachment was found to correlate with the abundance of the 34- and 32-kDa cellular proteins, while the ability of the virus to penetrate cells and initiate infection did not. The results support the hypothesis that the 34- and 32-kDa cellular proteins represent the HCMV (attachment) receptor. The data also support the notion that additional cellular components are required for virus entry and fusion.