Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Gene transfer of extracellular SOD to the penis reduces O2-* and improves erectile function in aged rats.

Increased superoxide anion (O(2)(-). ) may contribute to vascular dysfunction in aging. In aged cavernosal tissue, lucigenin-enhanced chemiluminescence demonstrated a threefold increase in superoxide formation, and the oxidative fluorescent probe hydroethidine indicated higher superoxide levels throughout the aged penis. This increase in superoxide was associated with impaired cavernosal nerve-mediated and agonist-induced erectile responses, increased nitrotyrosine staining, and lower cGMP levels, but no compensatory change in cavernosal extracellular (EC)-superoxide dismutase (EC-SOD) mRNA or protein. In vivo adenoviral (Ad) gene transfer of EC-SOD to the penis resulted in higher expression of EC-SOD mRNA, protein, SOD activity, cGMP levels, and lower nitrotyrosine staining. Transfection with AdCMVEC-SOD resulted in a significant increase in erectile response to cavernosal nerve stimulation, ACh, and zaprinast to a magnitude similar to young rats. These data provide evidence in support of the hypothesis that erectile dysfunction associated with aging is related in part to an increase in cavernosal O(2)(-). formation. Gene-transfer of EC-SOD reduces superoxide formation and restores age-associated erectile function and may represent a novel therapeutic target for the treatment of erectile dysfunction.
Bilateral Lesions of the Suprachiasmatic Nuclei Alter the Nocturnal Melatonin Secretion in Sheep

The hypothalamic suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN) constitute both the biological clock of many circadian rhythms, and the first relay in the transmission of light cues from the retina to the pineal gland, which releases, via nocturnal melatonin secretion, an endocrine expression of the daylength. The aim of the present work was to investigate the precise role of the SCN in the entrainment of the nocturnal rhythm of melatonin (MEL) in sheep. Bilateral lesions of the SCN were performed via a transsinusal surgical approach in 10 adult rams submitted to a constant photoperiod (16L:8D). Lesioned rams were compared to 4 sham and 2 control animals. Blood samples were collected 8 days before, 8 days after, and one month after surgery. Plasma MEL levels were estimated using direct radioimmunoassay. At the end of the experiment, histology and immunohistochemistry of the suprachiasmatic area were performed, and the extent of lesions was evaluated using a computerized image analysis system. Six rams exhibited a complete lesion of the SCN, and in the four remaining animals, the lesions were restricted to the anterior part of the SCN. For all animals, the nocturnal melatonin secretion was altered, but depending on the extent of the lesion, two types of results were observed:
The PKC gene module: molecular biosystematics to resolve its T cell functions

Summary: The distinct protein kinase C (PKC) multigene family (PKC gene module) is known to be the ‘classic’ intracellular receptor for mitogenic phorbol esters, and it is widely accepted in the scientific community that the ‘PKC effect’ is essential in activation, differentiation, adhesion and motility, as well as in cellular survival, of T cells. Nevertheless, the first concepts about PKC isotype heterogeneity of cellular localization and function emerged only recently, when the PKC‐θ pathways were mapped to critical signaling networks that control T cell receptor (TCR)/CD3‐dependent interleukin (IL)‐2 production and proliferation in T lymphocytes. This review summarizes the current knowledge about T cell expressed PKC gene products, their known and/or suspected regulation and cellular effector pathways, as well as physiological functions in T lymphocytes (as determined by molecular cell biology and ongoing mouse genetic studies). Given PKCs integral role in T cell function but today's very fragmentary molecular understanding of directly PKC‐mediated effector functions in transmembrane signaling, a ‘molecular biosystematics’ approach is suggested to resolve the isotype‐selective functions of this PKC gene family. Such an approach has to be based not only on genomic/cytogenetic analysis to establish its genetic relationships but also on biochemical/cell biology and genetic studies to resolve its functional diversity and, ultimately, nonredundant roles in real T cell physiology.
A New Practical Approach to Transient Stability-Constrained Optimal Power Flow

This paper presents a new, significantly improved, approach to formulate a global transient stability-constrained optimal power flow (TSC-OPF), where the sets of dynamic and transient stability constraints to be considered in the optimization process are reduced to one single stability constraint. This constraint is derived from dynamic information provided by the SIngle Machine Equivalent (SIME) method and is only expressed in terms of steady-state variables, which allows us to diminish the length of the time-domain simulation to be included into the global TSC-OPF to a single (initial) time step. In this way, the size of the resulting optimization problem is reduced to one very similar to that of a conventional OPF, overcoming the main drawback of global TSC-OPF techniques (its huge dimension) while maintaining its accuracy and improving its practical application to real power networks. Effectiveness of the proposal is demonstrated by numerical examples on the WSCC three-machine, nine-bus system and the Mexican 46-machine, 190-bus system.
Chromosomes of Belonocnema treatae Mayr, 1881 (Hymenoptera, Cynipidae)

Abstract Chromosomes of the asexual and sexual generation of the gall wasp Belonocnema treatae Mayr, 1881 (Cynipidae) were analyzed. Females of both generations have 2n = 20, whereas males of the sexual generation have n = 10. Cyclical deuterotoky is therefore confirmed in this species. All chromosomes are acrocentric and form a continuous gradation in size. This karyotype structure is probably ancestral for many gall wasps and perhaps for the family Cynipidae in general. Chromosome no. 7 carries a characteristic achromatic gap that appears to represent a nucleolus organizing region.
Buckybowls as adsorbents for CO2, CH4, and C2H2: Binding and structural insights from computational study

Noncovalent functionalization of buckybowls sumanene (S), corannulene (R), and coronene (C) with greenhouse gases (GGs) such as CO2, CH4 (M), and C2H2 (A) has been studied using hybrid density functional theory. The propensity and preferences of these small molecules to interact with the concave and convex surfaces of the buckybowls has been quantitatively estimated. The results indicate that curvature plays a significant role in the adsorption of these small molecules on the π surface and it is observed that buckybowls have higher binding energies (BEs) compared with their planar counterpart coronene. The concave surface of the buckybowl is found to be more feasible for adsorption of small molecules. BEs of small molecules towards π systems is CO2 > A > M and the BEs of π systems toward small molecules is S > R > C. Obviously, the binding preference is dictated by the way in which various noncovalent interactions, such as π···π, lone pair···π, and CH···π manifest themselves on carbaneous surfaces. To delineate the intricate details of the interactions, we have employed Bader's quantum theory of atoms in molecule and localized molecular orbital energy decomposition analysis (LMO‐EDA). LMO‐EDA, which measures the contribution of various components and traces the physical origin of the interactions, indicates that the complexes are stabilized largely by dispersion interactions. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
A ray tracing algorithm using the discrete prolate spheroidal subspace

Ray tracing (RT) is an accurate propagation prediction tool that has been widely used to simulate channel characteristics in indoor environments. To date, the developed RT tool includes not only specular reflection, penetration through dielectric blocks and diffraction, but also diffuse scattering mechanisms. The accuracy, provided by a detailed modeling of the environment, comes at the cost of a high computational complexity, which directly scales with the number of propagation paths considered. We are interested in simulating the radio propagation conditions for a mobile terminal, communicating in a frame based communication system indoors with several fixed nodes. This communication shall be used to obtain the position of the mobile terminal in indoor scenario. Therefore, the correlated temporal and spatial evolution of the channel impulse response is of utmost concern. In this paper, we propose a method to significantly reduce the computational complexity of RT by using a projection of all propagation paths on a subspace spanned by two-dimensional discrete prolate spheroidal (DPS) sequences. With this method the computational complexity can be reduced by more than one order of magnitude for indoor scenarios. The accuracy of our low-complexity DPS subspace based RT algorithm is verified by numeric simulations.
Thermal and mechanical properties of Pt-Rh alloys

We utilize the many-body potentials developed by Sutton and Chen within the context of the tight-binding approach to study the bulk properties of metals and metal alloys in molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. In the simulations of PtRh alloys we used the MD algorithms based on an extended Hamiltonian formalism from the works of Andersen, Parrinello and Rahman, Nose, Hoover, and Cagin. The simulator program that we use generates information about various physical properties during the run time, along with critical trajectory and stepwise information which need to be analysed post production. The thermodynamical and mechanical properties are calculated using the statistical fluctuation expressions over the MD.
Late switch for post-tetanic potentiation: once again it's Ca2+. Focus on "An increase in calcium influx contributes to post-tetanic potentiation at the rat calyx of Held synapse".

Many prior studies have documented the role of calcium in the induction of posttetanic potentiation (PTP). In this issue of the Journal of Neurophysiology (p. 2868–2876), Habets and Borst now elucidate the effect of Ca2+ during the expression of PTP. Ingenious fine tuning of the Ca2+ imaging
Abnormal Early Gamma Responses to Emotional Faces Differentiate Unipolar from Bipolar Disorder Patients

This study investigates the cortical abnormalities of early emotion perception in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) and bipolar disorder (BD) using gamma oscillations. Twenty-three MDD patients, twenty-five BD patients, and twenty-four normal controls were enrolled and their event-related magnetoencephalographic responses were recorded during implicit emotional tasks. Our results demonstrated abnormal gamma activity within 100 ms in the emotion-related regions (amygdala, orbitofrontal (OFC) cortex, anterior insula (AI), and superior temporal pole) in the MDD patients, suggesting that these patients may have dysfunctions or negativity biases in perceptual binding of emotional features at very early stage. Decreased left superior medial frontal cortex (smFC) responses to happy faces in the MDD patients were correlated with their serious level of depression symptoms, indicating that decreased smFC activity perhaps underlies irregular positive emotion processing in depressed patients. In the BD patients, we showed abnormal activation in visual regions (inferior/middle occipital and middle temporal cortices) which responded to emotional faces within 100 ms, supporting that the BD patients may hyperactively respond to emotional features in perceptual binding. The discriminant function of gamma activation in the left smFC, right medial OFC, right AI/inferior OFC, and the right precentral cortex accurately classified 89.6% of patients as unipolar/bipolar disorders.
HRPT2 mutations are associated with malignancy in sporadic parathyroid tumours

Background: Hyperparathyroidism is a common endocrinopathy characterised by the formation of parathyroid tumours. In this study, we determine the role of the recently identified gene, HRPT2, in parathyroid tumorigenesis. Methods: Mutation analysis of HRPT2 was undertaken in 60 parathyroid tumours: five HPT-JT, three FIHP, three MEN 1, one MEN 2A, 25 sporadic adenomas, 17 hyperplastic glands, two lithium associated tumours, and four sporadic carcinomas. Loss of heterozygosity at 1q24-32 was performed on a subset of these tumours. Results:HRPT2 somatic mutations were detected in four of four sporadic parathyroid carcinoma samples, and germline mutations were found in five of five HPT-JT parathyroid tumours (two families) and two parathyroid tumours from one FIHP family. One HPT-JT tumour with germline mutation also harboured a somatic mutation. In total, seven novel and one previously reported mutation were identified. “Two-hits” (double mutations or one mutation and loss of heterozygosity at 1q24-32) affecting HRPT2 were found in two sporadic carcinomas, two HPT-JT-related and two FIHP related tumours. Conclusions: The results in this study support the role of HRPT2 as a tumour suppressor gene in sporadic parathyroid carcinoma, and provide further evidence for HRPT2 as the causative gene in HPT-JT, and a subset of FIHP. In light of the strong association between mutations of HRPT2 and sporadic parathyroid carcinoma demonstrated in this study, it is hypothesised that HRPT2 mutation is an early event that may lead to parathyroid malignancy and suggest intragenic mutation of HRPT2 as a marker of malignant potential in both familial and sporadic parathyroid tumours.
Ca 2-independent insulin exocytosis induced by α-latrotoxin requires latrophilin , a G protein-coupled receptor

α-Latrotoxin (α-LTX) induces exocytosis of small synaptic vesicles (SSVs) in neuronal cells both by a calcium-independent mechanism and by opening cation-permeable pores. Since the basic molecular events regulating exocytosis in neurons and endocrine cells may be similar, we have used the exocytosis of insulin-containing large dense core vesicles (LDCVs) as a model system. In primary pancreatic β-cells and in the derived cell lines INS-1 and MIN6, α-LTX increased insulin release in the absence of extracellular calcium, but the insulin-secreting cell lines HIT-T15 and RINm5F were unresponsive. α-LTX did not alter membrane potential or cytosolic calcium, and its stimulatory effect on exocytosis was still observed in prepermeabilized INS-1 cells kept at 0.1 μM Ca2 . Consequently, pore formation or ion fluxes induced by αLTX could be excluded. The Ca2 -independent α-LTXbinding protein, latrophilin, is a novel member of the secretin family of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCR). Sensitivity to α-LTX correlated with expression of latrophilin, but not with synaptotagmin I or neurexin Iα expression. Moreover, transient expression of latrophilin in HIT-T15 cells conferred α-LTX-induced exocytosis. Our results indicate that direct stimulation of exocytosis by a GPCR mediates the Ca2 -independent effects of α-LTX in the absence of altered ion fluxes. Therefore, direct regulation by receptor-activated heterotrimeric G proteins constitutes an important feature of the endocrine exocytosis of insulin-containing LDCVs and may also apply to SSV exocytosis in neurons.
Factors Affecting the Survival of Patients with Gastric Cancer Undergone Surgery at Iran Cancer Institute: Univariate and Multivariate Analyses

Abstract Background Gastric cancer is the most prevalent cancer among men and the third most prevalent cancer among women in Iran. Its most important reason for death is its belated diagnosis at the advanced stages of the disease. Various factors can be effective on the survival of these patients after surgery, which are the major concern in this study. Methods Data from 330 patients with Gastric cancer who had undergone surgery at Iran Cancer Institute from 1995 to 1999 were analyzed. The Survival Time of patients was determined after surgery and the effect of individual and demographic; clinical and diagnostic; and treatment and post-surgical factors on patients’ survival was studied. For data analysis, Kaplan- Meier, Log-Rank test and Proportional Hazards Model were used. Results The median of survival time was 16.33 months. The one-year, three-year, and five-year survival rates were, 0.66, 0.31, and 0.21. Based on univariate analysis results of age(P<0.001), metastases(P=0.012), disease stage(P=0.016), and number of renewed treatments(P<0.001), as well as multivariate analysis which was used to investigate the simultaneous effect of influencing variables on patients’ survival showed that age(61−70:HR=1.40,>70:HR=2.08), marital status(HR=0.39), number of renewed treatments(1:HR=0.54, 2:HR=0.30, 3:HR=0.22), relapse(HR=1.51), type of gastrectomy (Subtotal: HR=1.12, Distal:HR=0.49, Partial:HR=0.94, Proximal:HR=0.52), liver metastases (HR=1.79), distance metastases(HR=1.84), and disease stage(II:HR=1.28, III:HR=2.12, IV:HR=1.90) variables had a significant effect on patients’ survival. Conclusion Patients who call on doctors in early stages of disease will have a higher survival rate due to early diagnosis whereas disease progression will increase the risk and will decrease the survival. Identifying factors affecting patients’ survival and improving diagnostic methods can prevent disease progression and increase survival rate.
Efferent connections of the ventral auditory area in the rat cortex: implications for auditory processing related to emotion

In the rat auditory cortex, ventral (VA) and posterodorsal (PD) areas are the two major auditory fields that receive thalamic afferents from the dorsal division of the medial geniculate body (MGD). VA and PD are presumed to serve distinct functions in tandem as the pair of major cortical recipients of extralemniscal thalamic inputs. To deduce the functional significance of VA, efferent connections of VA were examined with the anterograde tracer biocytin. VA lies primarily in the ventral margin of area Te1 and represents frequencies primarily < 15 kHz [Donishi, T. , Kimura, A. , Okamoto, K. & Tamai, Y. (2006) Neuroscience, 141, 1553–1567. ] Biocytin was iontophoretically injected into cortical regions which were defined as VA based on histological location, auditory response and thalamocortical connectivity. Anterograde labelling revealed two important aspects of cortical projections. First, VA sent a projection to a well‐confined region in the caudal end of the insular cortex (Ins) pivotal for fear memory formation during aversive conditioning. Second, VA sent parallel projections to cortical regions that probably comprise the other nonprimary auditory fields, including PD. The results suggest that VA relays auditory input from the MGD to the Ins for affective memory formation and at the same time dispatches the auditory signal, which may represent emotional content, to the remaining nonprimary auditory fields. PD is assumed to play a pivotal role in auditory spatial processing for directed attention ( Kimura et al., 2004 ). As the counterpart of PD, VA is assumed to give rise to another major stream of cortical information processing, most probably related to emotion.
The Relation Between Perception and Production in L2 Phonological Processing

Seventeen French-English bilinguals read aloud a set of English sentences and performed an ABX discrimination task that assessed their perception of the English //-/i/ contrast. Global nativelikeness in production correlated with pronunciation accuracy for the vowels // and /i/, and both production measures correlated with self-estimated pronunciation skills. However, performance on the perception task did not correlate with either global nativelikeness or /,i/ pronunciation accuracy. These results are discussed in light of theories about the relation between perception and production in L2 phonological processing. Index Terms: speech perception, speech production, bilingualism, L2, phonology, phonetics, English vowels
Pathological changes of testicular tissue in normal adult mice: A retrospective analysis

Mouse testicular experimental models are widely used in the study of andrology, reproductive toxicology and pharmacology. Under physiological conditions, a normal adult mouse is usually considered to have normal testes. However, whether normal adult mouse testes exhibit pathological changes has not been evaluated. The objective of this study was to investigate the pathological changes of testicular tissues in normal adult mice. A retrospective analysis of 720 adult male Kunming mice, used in previous studies as controls, was performed. Bilateral testicular tissues were stained with hematoxylin and eosin for pathological examinations. Among the 720 mice, nine had abnormal testes, an incidence of 1.3%. The nine mice with abnormal testes included two with microrchidia (22.2%) while the others had a normal testicular size. The observed pathological changes associated with microrchidia were seminiferous epithelial vacuolation, spermatogenesis arrest at the spermatocyte stage and the absence of sperm in all tubules. In other abnormal testes, pathological alterations included seminiferous epithelial vacuolation, severe hypospermatogenesis and symplasts composed of collapsed spermatids in tubules. The results demonstrate that normal adult male mice exhibit testicular pathological changes. Therefore, the possibility of abnormal testes in normal adult mice must be considered when using mice to establish a testicular experimental model.
Changing Concepts of “Latent Tuberculosis Infection” in Patients Living with HIV Infection

One third of the world's population is estimated to be infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, representing a huge reservoir of potential tuberculosis (TB) disease. Risk of progression to active TB is highest in those with HIV coinfection. However, the nature of the host-pathogen relationship in those with “latent TB infection” and how this is affected by HIV coinfection are poorly understood. The traditional paradigm that distinguishes latent infection from active TB as distinct compartmentalised states is overly simplistic. Instead the host-pathogen relationship in “latent TB infection” is likely to represent a spectrum of immune responses, mycobacterial metabolic activity, and bacillary numbers. We propose that the impact of HIV infection might better be conceptualised as a shift of the spectrum towards poor immune control, higher mycobacterial metabolic activity, and greater organism load, with subsequent increased risk of progression to active disease. Here we discuss the evidence for such a model and the implications for interventions to control the HIV-associated TB epidemic.
Simultaneous inference for the mean function based on dense functional data

A polynomial spline estimator is proposed for the mean function of dense functional data together with a simultaneous confidence band which is asymptotically correct. In addition, the spline estimator and its accompanying confidence band enjoy oracle efficiency in the sense that they are asymptotically the same as if all random trajectories are observed entirely and without errors. The confidence band is also extended to the difference of mean functions of two populations of functional data. Simulation experiments provide strong evidence that corroborates the asymptotic theory while computing is efficient. The confidence band procedure is illustrated by analysing the near-infrared spectroscopy data.