Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
In a matter of minutes, the eye can know which way to grow.

PURPOSE The fitting of chick eyes with positive or negative lenses causes eye growth to decelerate or accelerate, respectively, thereby minimizing the imposed blur. This study was conducted to determine whether the eye can initially assess the correct direction of growth or whether it relies on trial and error, reversing its direction if the magnitude of blur increases. The rapid changes in choroidal thickness in response to brief periods of defocus were measured. METHODS After their eyes were measured by ultrasound biometry, chicks wore either a +10-D lens over one eye for 10 minutes while restrained in the center of a 60-cm drum (to ensure myopic blur), or a negative lens (-7 or -8.6 D) over one eye for 10 minutes or 1 hour in a normal cage environment. They were then kept in darkness until they were remeasured 2 hours, 1 day, or 2 days after the first measurement. Other chicks wore +10 or -8.6-D lenses briefly and were measured several times over the next 7 hours in darkness. RESULTS Wearing positive or negative lenses for only 10 minutes produced significantly different effects on choroidal thickness measured 2 hours later. Wearing positive lenses for 10 minutes caused an increase in choroidal thickness (in 28 of 32 eyes) and a concomitant decrease in vitreous chamber depth, relative to the amount of change in the untreated fellow eye over the same period. Wearing negative lenses for 1 hour caused significant changes in the opposite direction. Wearing lenses for 2 hours resulted in choroidal changes that persisted in darkness for up to 6 hours after positive lens wear, but returned to normal after negative lens wear. Finally, 1 hour of positive lens wear caused significant inhibition of ocular elongation over the next 2 days. CONCLUSIONS The eyes of chicks require only a brief period of lens wear to initiate compensation in the appropriate direction. Because the refractive status changes little during the period of lens wear, the authors conclude that eyes can rapidly determine the sign of the imposed blur without resorting to a trial-and-error method.
Developmental and comparative aspects of posterior medial thalamocortical innervation of the barrel cortex in mice and rats

The thalamocortical projection to the rodent barrel cortex consists of inputs from the ventral posterior medial (VPM) and posterior medial (POm) nuclei that terminate in largely non‐overlapping territories in and outside of layer IV. This projection in both rats and mice has been used extensively to study development and plasticity of highly organized synaptic circuits. Whereas the VPM pathway has been well characterized in both rats and mice, organization of the POm pathway has only been described in rats, and no studies have focused exclusively on the development of the POm projection. Here, using transport of Phaseolus vulgaris leucoagglutinin (PHA‐L) or carbocyanine dyes, we characterize the POm thalamocortical innervation of adult mouse barrel cortex and describe its early postnatal development in both mice and rats. In adult mice, POm inputs form a dense plexus in layer Va that extends uniformly underneath layer IV barrels and septa. Innervation of layer IV is very sparse; a clear septal innervation pattern is evident only at the layer IV/Va border. This pattern differs subtly from that described previously in rats. Developmentally, in both species, POm axons are present in barrel cortex at birth. In mice, they occupy layer IV as it differentiates, whereas in rats, POm axons do not enter layer IV until 1–2 days after its emergence from the cortical plate. In both species, arbors undergo progressive and directed growth. However, no layer IV septal innervation pattern emerges until several days after the cytoarchitectonic appearance of barrels and well after the emergence of whisker‐related clusters of VPM thalamocortical axons. The mature pattern resolves earlier in rats than in mice. Taken together, these data reveal anatomical differences between mice and rats in the development and organization of POm inputs to barrel cortex, with implications for species differences in the nature and plasticity of lemniscal and paralemniscal information processing. J. Comp. Neurol. 509:239–258, 2008. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
On Topological Hierarchies of Temporal Properties

The classification of properties of concurrent programs into safety and liveness was first proposed by Lamport [22]. Since then several characterizations of hierarchies of properties have been given, see e.g. [3, 20, 9, 21]; this includes syntactic characterizations (in terms classes of formulas of logics such as the linear temporal logic) as well as extensional (as sets of computations in some abstract domain). The latter often admits a topological characterization with respect to the natural topologies of the domain of computations. We introduce a general notion of a linear time model of computation which consists of partial and completed computations satisfying certain axioms. The model is endowed with a natural topology. We show that the usual topologies on strings, Mazurkiewicz traces and pomsets arise as special cases. We then introduce a hierarchy of properties including safety, liveness, guarantee, response and persistence properties, and show that our definition subsumes the hierarchies of: Alpern & Schneider [3]; Chang, Manna & Pnueli [9]; and Kwiatkowska, Peled & Penczek [21]. Syntactic characterizations of the properties in the hierarchy in terms of temporal logic are also studied.
Language is not Just for Talking

In addition to having communicative functions, verbal labels may play a role in shaping concepts. Two experiments assessed whether the presence of labels affected category formation. Subjects learned to categorize “aliens” as those to be approached or those to be avoided. After accuracy feedback on each response was provided, a nonsense label was either presented or not. Providing nonsense category labels facilitated category learning even though the labels were redundant and all subjects had equivalent experience with supervised categorization of the stimuli. A follow-up study investigated differences between learning verbal and nonverbal associations and showed that learning a nonverbal association did not facilitate categorization. The findings show that labels make category distinctions more concrete and bear directly on the language-and-thought debate.
Role of COUP‐TFI during retinoic acid‐induced differentiation of P19 cells to endodermal cells

Retinoic acid (RA) is a positive regulator of P19 cell differentiation. Silencing of pre‐B cell leukemia transcription factors (PBXs) expression in P19 cells (AS cells) results in a failure of these cells to differentiate to endodermal cells upon RA treatment. Chicken Ovalbumin Upstream Promoter Transcription Factor I (COUP‐TFI) is an orphan member of the steroid‐thyroid hormone superfamily. RA treatment of wild type P19 cells results in a dramatic increase in the expression of COUP‐TFI; however, COUP‐TFI mRNA levels fail to be elevated upon RA treatment of AS cells indicating that PBX expression is required for elevation in COUP‐TFI expression. To study the role of COUP‐TFI during RA‐dependent differentiation of P19 cells, AS cells that inducibly express various levels of COUP‐TFI were prepared. Exogenous expression of COUP‐TFI in AS cells, in a dose‐dependent fashion, leads to growth inhibition, modest cell cycle disruption, and early apoptosis. Furthermore, AS cells can overcome the blockage in RA‐dependent differentiation to endodermal cells when either pharmacological levels of COUP‐TFI are expressed or a combination of both the expression of physiological levels of COUP‐TFI and RA treatment. Additionally, the mRNA level of several pluripotency associated genes including OCT‐4, DAX‐1, and SF‐1 in the COUP‐TFI expressing AS cells are reduced. Moreover, analysis of the expression of primary RA response genes indicates that COUP‐TFI is involved in the regulatory modulation of the expression of at least two genes, CYP26A1 and HoxA1. These studies demonstrate that COUP‐TFI functions as a physiologically relevant regulator during RA‐mediated endodermal differentiation of P19 cells. J. Cell. Physiol. 228: 791–800, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
A Comprehensive Immunological Analysis in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

A detailed analysis of cell‐mediated and antibody‐mediated immunity was performed in 20 CDC‐defined patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and 20 age‐ and sex‐matched healthy controls. CD3 +, CD4 +, CD8 +, and CD20+ lymphocytes were comparable in two groups. Natural killer cells as defined by CD16, CD56 and CD57 antigens were significantly reduced in CFS. A significant increase in the proportions orCD4+ICAM 1+ T cells was observed in CFS. Monocytes from CFS displayed increased density (as determined by mean fluorescence channel numbers) of intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM‐1) and lymphocyte function associated antigen 1 (LFA‐1). but showed decreased enhancing response to recombinant interferon‐γ in vitro. The lymphocyte DNA synthesis in response lo phytohaemoglobulin (PHA). Concanavalin A (Con A) and pokeweed mitogen (PWM) was normal but the response to soluble antigens was significantly reduced. Serum IgM. IgG, IgA, and IgG sublclasses were normal. In vivo specific antibody response to pneumococcus vaccine was depressed in CFS. Forty percent of patients showed titres of anti‐human herpes virus 6 (anli‐HHV‐6) antibody higher than that in the controls (≤ 1/80). These data suggest immunological dysfunction in patients with chronic fatigue syndrome. The significance of these observations is discussed.
Functional asymmetry and effective connectivity of the auditory system during speech perception is modulated by the place of articulation of the consonant- A 7T fMRI study

To differentiate between stop-consonants, the auditory system has to detect subtle place of articulation (PoA) and voice-onset time (VOT) differences between stop-consonants. How this differential processing is represented on the cortical level remains unclear. The present functional magnetic resonance (fMRI) study takes advantage of the superior spatial resolution and high sensitivity of ultra-high-field 7 T MRI. Subjects were attentively listening to consonant–vowel (CV) syllables with an alveolar or bilabial stop-consonant and either a short or long VOT. The results showed an overall bilateral activation pattern in the posterior temporal lobe during the processing of the CV syllables. This was however modulated strongest by PoA such that syllables with an alveolar stop-consonant showed stronger left lateralized activation. In addition, analysis of underlying functional and effective connectivity revealed an inhibitory effect of the left planum temporale (PT) onto the right auditory cortex (AC) during the processing of alveolar CV syllables. Furthermore, the connectivity result indicated also a directed information flow from the right to the left AC, and further to the left PT for all syllables. These results indicate that auditory speech perception relies on an interplay between the left and right ACs, with the left PT as modulator. Furthermore, the degree of functional asymmetry is determined by the acoustic properties of the CV syllables.
On the differences between child and adult analysis

The goals and central methodological requirements of psychoanalysis (neutrality, abstinence, a fixed setting, awareness of transference and the related analyst's interest in the inner world of the analysand, the use of one's own psyche as a “working tool”, etc.) do not depend on the analysand's age. In this paper, I study the similarities and differences between child and adult analyses, with particular emphasis on the methodological differences arising from the child-adult level. The perspective opens from the viewpoint of two psychoanalytic treatment paradigms: firstly, the developmental process and secondly, self-observation, and how they are made possible. A theoretical discussion is followed by a comparison between two cases of analysis, one of which began when the analysand was 6-years-old and the other when the analysand was 30-years-old Both analysands had the same key problem: sadomasochistic tendencies in life. In the comparison, the psychoanalytic process is found the same, but differences in the methodological questions emerge from the analysands' different ways of communication and possibilities for self-observation, as well as the more layered and rigid psychic structure adults have compared with children, whose psychic structure is more plastic, though it may have become fixed at a very early stage There are several differences in the external frame of the psychoanalyses.
Current State of Glacier Changes, Glacial Lakes, and Outburst Floods in the Ile Ala-Tau and Kungöy Ala-Too Ranges, Northern Tien Shan Mountains

Remote-Sensing Instrument for Stereo Mapping (PRISM) and Advanced Visible and Near-Infrared Radiometer type 2 (AVNIR-2) satellite data from the Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS) for 16 August 2006 and 17 September 2007. The PRISM sensor includes nadir, forward, and backward sensors and generates a stereoscopic data set 35×35 ㎞ (triplet mode) and 70×35 ㎞ (nadir only) in width with a spatial resolution of 2.5 m (JAXA, 2009). The AVNIR-2 image has four bands collected by a visible to near-infrared radiometer with spatial resolution of 10 m. Distribution of glaciers and glacial lakes in the 1970s was extracted using Corona KH-4B images (spatial resolution 1.8 m) for 17 and 23 September 1971. Glacial lake area after GLOFs in the 1970s was extracted using Hexagon KH-9 (spatial resolution 6-9 m) for 7 September 1980. Recent changes in glacial lake area (glacier No. 128) in the Kara-Say river drainage on the northern ﬂank of the Kungöy Ala-Too range was investigated using Hexagon KH-9, Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM), Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+), and ALOS (PRISM/ AVNIR-2) satellite data for 7 September 1980, 29 October 1991, 8 August 1999, 3 October 2002, 21 June 2005, 17 September 2007, and 01 September 2008. using ground control points from 1:50,000 topographic maps (reference data) and Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) 3 data using PCI Geomatica version 10.1 software. Orthorectiﬁcation resulted in a root mean square error (RMSE) of less than 30 m for satellite data. Glaciers (>0.01 ㎞ 2 ) and glacial lakes (>0.0001 ㎞ 2 ) were extracted in detail manually using ArcGIS 9.2. Pro-glacial lakes with areas >0.0001 ㎞ 2
Maintenance of Islet Morphology Is Beneficial for Transplantation Outcome in Diabetic Mice

We have previously shown that co-transplantation of islets and Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs) improves islet graft function and revascularisation, which was associated with the maintenance of normal islet morphology. The aim of the current study was to determine whether maintaining islet morphology in the absence of additional islet-helper cells would improve transplantation outcome in diabetic mice. Islets were isolated from C57BL/6 mice. Recipient streptozotocin-diabetic C57BL/6 mice were transplanted with a minimal mass of 150 islets as a single pellet or islets that were either manually dispersed or dispersed within a matrigel plug beneath the kidney capsule. Blood glucose concentrations were monitored for one month. Islet graft morphology and vascularisation were analysed by histology. Islets dispersed either alone or within matrigel plugs maintained near normal morphology, in contrast to pelleted islets, where individual islets fused to form large endocrine aggregates. The vascularisation of manually dispersed islets and islets dispersed within matrigel plugs was increased relative to respective control pelleted islet grafts. After one month 1/6 mice transplanted with pelleted islets cured compared to 5/6 mice transplanted with manually dispersed islets. The curative capacity of islets dispersed in matrigel was also better than that of pelleted islets (5/8 islet-matrigel implanted mice vs. 1/7 mice transplanted with pelleted islets cured by one month). Therefore, this study demonstrates that the maintenance of islet morphology is associated with improved graft function and revascularisation in diabetic mice.
Couples Behavior Modeling and Annotation Using Low-Resource LSTM Language Models

Observational studies on couple interactions are often based on manual annotations of a set of behavior codes. Such annotations are expensive, time-consuming, and often suffer from low inter-annotator agreement. In previous studies it has been shown that the lexical channels contain sufficient information for capturing behavior and predicting the interaction labels, and various automated processes using language models have been proposed. However, current methods are restricted to a small context window due to the difficulty of training language models with limited data as well as the lack of frame-level labels. In this paper we investigate the application of recurrent neural networks for capturing behavior trajectories through larger context windows. We solve the issue of data sparsity and improve robustness by introducing out-of-domain knowledge through pretrained word representations. Finally, we show that our system can accurately estimate true rating values of couples interactions using a fusion of the frame-level behavior trajectories. The ratings predicted by our proposed system achieve inter-annotator agreements comparable to those of trained human annotators. Importantly, our system promises robust handling of out of domain data, exploitation of longer context, on-line feedback with continuous labels and easy fusion with other modalities.
Early fracture callus displays smooth muscle‐like viscoelastic properties ex vivo: Implications for fracture healing

Cells of early, fibrous callus in bone fractures possess much alpha smooth muscle actin. This callus contracts and relaxes; however, active and passive components of its force production have yet to be defined. We aimed to establish whether passive viscoelastic properties of early soft fracture callus are smooth muscle‐like in nature. Under anesthesia one rib was fractured in rats and calluses removed 7 days later for analysis. Urinary bladder detrusor muscle and Achilles tendon were also resected and analyzed. Force production in these tissues was measured using a force transducer when preparations were immersed in calcium‐free Krebs‐Henseleit solution (pH 7.4, 22°C). Viscoelastic responses were measured in each preparation in response to 50 µN increases and decreases in force after achieving basal tissue tension by preconditioning. Callus, bladder, and tendon all displayed varying, reproducible degrees of stress relaxation (SR) and reverse stress relaxation (RSR) (n = 7 for all groups). Hysteresis was observed in callus, with the first SR response significantly larger than that produced in subsequent stretches (p < 0.05). Callus SR responses were greater than tendon (p < 0.001) but less than bladder (p < 0.001). Callus RSR responses were greater than tendon (p < 0.001), but no significant difference was seen between RSR of callus and bladder. We concluded that early, soft callus displayed significant SR and RSR phenomena similar to smooth muscle tissue, and SR and RSR may be important in maintenance of static tension in early callus by promoting osteogenesis and fracture healing. © 2009 Orthopaedic Research Society. Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Orthop Res 27:1508–1513, 2009
Comparative Sucrose Responsiveness in Apis mellifera and A. cerana Foragers

In the European honey bee, Apis mellifera, pollen foragers have a higher sucrose responsiveness than nectar foragers when tested using a proboscis extension response (PER) assay. In addition, Africanized honey bees have a higher sucrose responsiveness than European honey bees. Based on the biology of the Eastern honey bee, A. cerana, we hypothesized that A. cerana should also have a higher responsiveness to sucrose than A. mellifera. To test this hypothesis, we compared the sucrose thresholds of pollen foragers and nectar foragers in both A. cerana and A. mellifera in Fujian Province, China. Pollen foragers were more responsive to sucrose than nectar foragers in both species, consistent with previous studies. However, contrary to our hypothesis, A. mellifera was more responsive than A. cerana. We also demonstrated that this higher sucrose responsiveness in A. mellifera was not due to differences in the colony environment by co-fostering two species of bees in the same mixed-species colonies. Because A. mellifera foragers were more responsive to sucrose, we predicted that their nectar foragers should bring in less concentrated nectar compared to that of A. cerana. However, we found no differences between the two species. We conclude that A. cerana shows a different pattern in sucrose responsiveness from that of Africanized bees. There may be other mechanisms that enable A. cerana to perform well in areas with sparse nectar resources.
Influence of ocean warming and acidification on trace metal biogeochemistry

Rising atmospheric CO2 concentrations will have profound effects on atmospheric and hydrographic processes, which will ultimately modify the supply and chemistry of trace metals in the ocean. In addition to an increase in sea surface temperatures, higher CO2 also results in a decrease of seawater pH, known as ocean acidification, with implications for inorganic trace metal chemistry. Furthermore, direct or indirect effects of ocean acidification and ocean warming on marine biota will also affect trace metal biogeochemistry via alteration of biological trace metal uptake rates and metal binding to organic ligands. Currently, we still lack a holistic understanding of the impacts of decreasing seawater pH and rinsing temperatures on different trace metals and marine biota, which complicates projections into the future. Here, we outline how ocean acidification and ocean warming will influence the inputs and cycling of Fe and other biologically relevant trace metals globally, and regionally in high and low latitudes of the future ocean, discuss uncertainties, and highlight essential future research fields.
Exhaled and non-exhaled non-invasive markers for assessment of respiratory inflammation in patients with stable COPD and healthy smokers

We aimed at comparing exhaled and non-exhaled non-invasive markers of respiratory inflammation in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and healthy subjects and define their relationships with smoking habit. Forty-eight patients with stable COPD who were ex-smokers, 17 patients with stable COPD who were current smokers, 12 healthy current smokers and 12 healthy ex-smokers were included in a cross-sectional, observational study. Inflammatory outcomes, including prostaglandin (PG) E2 and 15-F2t-isoprostane (15-F2t-IsoP) concentrations in exhaled breath condensate (EBC) and sputum supernatants, fraction of exhaled nitric oxide (FENO) and sputum cell counts, and functional (spirometry) outcomes were measured. Sputum PGE2 was elevated in both groups of smokers compared with ex-smoker counterpart (COPD: P < 0.02; healthy subjects: P < 0.03), whereas EBC PGE2 was elevated in current (P = 0.0065) and ex-smokers with COPD (P = 0.0029) versus healthy ex-smokers. EBC 15-F2t-IsoP, a marker of oxidative stress, was increased in current and ex-smokers with COPD (P < 0.0001 for both) compared with healthy ex-smokers, whereas urinary 15-F2t-IsoP was elevated in both smoker groups (COPD: P < 0.01; healthy subjects: P < 0.02) versus healthy ex-smokers. FENO was elevated in ex-smokers with COPD versus smoker groups (P = 0.0001 for both). These data suggest that the biological meaning of these inflammatory markers depends on type of marker and biological matrix in which is measured. An approach combining different types of outcomes can be used for assessing respiratory inflammation in patients with COPD. Large studies are required to establish the clinical utility of this strategy.