Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
T Cells from Leishmania major-Susceptible BALB/c Mice Have a Defect in Efficiently Up-Regulating CXCR3 upon Activation1

Genetic background influences the outcome of Leishmania major infection. C57BL/6 mice mount a Th1 response and resolve infection. In contrast, BALB/c mice mount a Th2 response and develop chronic lesions. This susceptible phenotype is seen even though BALB/c mice generate IFN-γ-producing T cells at proportions similar to C57BL/6 mice in their lymph nodes (LN) early after infection. We had previously shown that chemokine receptor CXCR3 mediates immunity against L. major by recruiting IFN-γ-producing T cells to the lesions of C57BL/6 mice. Therefore, we hypothesized that IFN-γ-secreting T cells in BALB/c mice are unable to confer protection because they may be defective in up-regulating CXCR3. To test this hypothesis, we analyzed kinetics of CXCR3-expressing T cells in the LN and lesions of BALB/c and C57BL/6 mice during L. major infection. Additionally, we compared the ability of T cells from BALB/c and C57BL/6 mice to up-regulate CXCR3 upon activation. We found that resolution of L. major infection in C57BL/6 mice was associated with an increase in the proportion of CXCR3+ T cells in regional LN and lesions, whereas disease progression in BALB/c mice was associated with a decrease in these populations. Anti-CD3/CD28-activated T cells from naive BALB/c but not C57BL/6 mice were defective in up-regulating CXCR3. Impaired induction of CXCR3 on BALB/c T cells was not due to lack of IFN-γ and was mediated partially by IL-10 but not IL-4 or IL-13. We propose that defective CXCR3 up-regulation on T cells in BALB/c mice may contribute to L. major susceptibility.
Evaluation of Paraprofessional Home Visiting Services for Children with Special Needs and Their Families

This study evaluated the impact of supportive paraprofessional home visiting on mothers and their young children who had or were at risk for developmental disabilities and who were at risk for receiving inadequate parenting. Families were randomly assigned to intervention and comparison groups. Upon exit, mothers in the intervention group rated services as more helpful and demonstrated moderately better mental health than did mothers in the comparison group. Children in the intervention group were more likely to have received an Individualized Family Service Plan. The two groups did not differ in the quality of their home environments, service utilization, or child outcomes. The results of these findings are discussed in terms of the need for direct training of parents and the characteristics of families who can benefit most from the services that paraprofessionals provide.
Malnutrition in HIV-Infected Children Is an Indicator of Severe Disease with an Impaired Response to Antiretroviral Therapy

Abstract This observational study aimed to describe immunopathogenesis and treatment outcomes in children with and without severe acute malnutrition (SAM) and HIV-infection. We studied markers of microbial translocation (16sDNA), intestinal damage (iFABP), monocyte activation (sCD14), T-cell activation (CD38, HLA-DR) and immune exhaustion (PD1) in 32 HIV-infected children with and 41 HIV-infected children without SAM prior to initiation of antiretroviral therapy (ART) and cross-sectionally compared these children to 15 HIV-uninfected children with and 19 HIV-uninfected children without SAM. We then prospectively measured these markers and correlated them to treatment outcomes in the HIV-infected children at 48 weeks following initiation of ART. Plasma levels of 16sDNA, iFABP and sCD14 were measured by quantitative real time PCR, ELISA and Luminex, respectively. T cell phenotype markers were measured by flow cytometry. Multiple regression analysis was performed using generalized linear models (GLMs) and the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) approach for variable selection. Microbial translocation, T cell activation and exhaustion were increased in HIV-uninfected children with SAM compared to HIV-uninfected children without SAM. In HIV-infected children microbial translocation, immune activation, and exhaustion was strongly increased but did not differ by SAM-status. SAM was associated with increased mortality rates early after ART initiation. Malnutrition, age, microbial translocation, monocyte, and CD8 T cell activation were independently associated with decreased rates of CD4% immune recovery after 48 weeks of ART. SAM is associated with increased microbial translocation, immune activation, and immune exhaustion in HIV-uninfected children and with worse prognosis and impaired immune recovery in HIV-infected children on ART.
Effects of a Suppressor Tone on Distortion Product Otoacoustic Emissions Fine Structure: Why a Universal Suppressor Level Is Not a Practical Solution to Obtaining Single-Generator DP-Grams

Objectives: The use of a suppressor tone has been proposed as the method of choice in obtaining single-generator distortion product (DP) grams, the speculation being that such DP grams will be more predictive of hearing thresholds. Current distortion product otoacoustic emissions (DPOAE) theory points to the ear canal DPOAE signal being a complex interaction between multiple components. The effectiveness of a suppressor tone is predicted to be dependent entirely on the relative levels of these components. We examine the validity of using a suppressor tone through a detailed examination of the effects of a suppressor on DPOAE fine structure in individual ears. Design: DPOAE fine structure, recorded in 10 normal-hearing individuals with a suppressor tone at 45, 55, and 65 dB SPL, was compared with recordings without a suppressor. Behavioral hearing thresholds were also measured in the same subjects, using 2-dB steps. Results: The effect of the suppressor tone on DPOAE fine structure varied between ears and was dependent on frequency within ears. Correlation between hearing thresholds and DPOAE level measured without a suppressor was similar to previous reports. The effects of the suppressor are explained in the theoretical framework of a model involving multiple DPOAE components. Conclusions: Our results suggest that a suppressor tone can have highly variable effects on fine structure across individuals or even across frequency within one ear, thereby making the use of a suppressor less viable as a clinical tool for obtaining single-generator DP grams.
Comprehensive assessment of automatic structural alignment against a manual standard, the scop classification of proteins

We apply a simple method for aligning protein sequences on the basis of a 3D structure, on a large scale, to the proteins in the scop classification of fold families. This allows us to assess, understand, and improve our automatic method against an objective, manually derived standard, a type of comprehensive evaluation that has not yet been possible for other structural alignment algorithms. Our basic approach directly matches the backbones of two structures, using repeated cycles of dynamic programming and least‐squares fitting to determine an alignment minimizing coordinate difference. Because of simplicity, our method can be readily modified to take into account additional features of protein structure such as the orientation of side chains or the location‐dependent cost of opening a gap. Our basic method, augmented by such modifications, can find reasonable alignments for all but 1.5% of the known structural similarities in scop, i.e., all but 32 of the 2,107 superfamily pairs. We discuss the specific protein structural features that make these 32 pairs so difficult to align and show how our procedure effectively partitions the relationships in scop into different categories, depending on what aspects of protein structure are involved (e.g., depending on whether or not consideration of side‐chain orientation is necessary for proper alignment). We also show how our pairwise alignment procedure can be extended to generate a multiple alignment for a group of related structures. We have compared these alignments in detail with corresponding manual ones culled from the literature. We find good agreement (to within 95% for the core regions), and detailed comparison highlights how particular protein structural features (such as certain strands) are problematical to align, giving somewhat ambiguous results. With these improvements and systematic tests, our procedure should be useful for the development of scop and the future classification of protein folds. Supplementary material is available at http://bioinfo.mbb. yale.edu/align.
Matrix Metalloproteinase-1 and Tissue Inhibitors Do Not Predict Incident Coronary Artery Disease in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities ( ARIC )

Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) and tissue inhibitors of matrix metalloproteinases (TIMPs) are thought to be associated with coronary artery disease. The association of these markers with incident coronary artery disease has not been well described. Using a case–cohort design, we selected 216 individuals who had incident coronary artery disease (case group) and 225 individuals from a cohort random sample (comparison group) from participants enrolled in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study. We measured plasma levels of MMP-1 and TIMP-1, traditional risk factors, and other markers of inflammation. We found no significant difference in TIMP-1 levels between the case group (827.8 ± 23.8 ng/mL) and the comparison group (819.31 ± 16.1 ng/mL) (P=0.77), and no significant difference in the frequency of MMP-1 levels that were dichotomized at the minimum detectable value of 1.7 ng/mL (P=0.49). In models adjusted for age, sex, race, body mass index, hypertension, diabetes, total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides, fibrinogen, von Willebrand factor, and white blood cell count, the hazard-rate ratio for incident coronary artery disease was 1.14 (95% confidence interval, 0.63–2.04; P=0.67) for individuals whose TIMP-1 levels were above, versus at or below the mean, and 1.17 (95% confidence interval, 0.63–2.19; P=0.62) for individuals whose MMP-1 levels were above 1.7 ng/mL. We conclude that TIMP-1 and MMP-1 levels in plasma were not predictive of incident coronary artery disease in a case–cohort random sample of the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study, a population study of asymptomatic middle-aged adults who had no prevalent atherosclerosis upon enrollment. (Tex Heart Inst J 2008;35(4):388-94)
Reactions to a traumatic event: The good, the bad and the ugly?

Abstract In developing an aetiological model of the human response to trauma, most research is focused on the negative consequences. Amid this, there has been research which reports people perceiving benefits from their trauma experience. This paper reports the use of the Post-Traumatic Growth Inventory with people who have been admitted to hospital following an accident or an assault. This new instrument is intended to assess positive life changes in people who have experienced any type of trauma. Reliability data from this sample are compared with the reliability reported by the instruments' authors for an undergraduate sample. Results also showed an association with the Impact of Event Scale. This finding is discussed in terms of how a positive response might inform our understanding of the human processing of trauma.
Testing the Moderation Effect of Hotel Ambience on the Relationships Among Social Comparison, Affect, Satisfaction, and Behavioral Intentions

ABSTRACT This study incorporated the social service environment in the hotel guest affect–satisfaction–behavioral intention model in order to elucidate the effect of social comparison on consumption-based affect by factoring in the moderation effect of hotel ambience on relationships. Structural equation modeling of survey data from hotel guests revealed that social comparison significantly influences hotel guests’ affect, and that affect has a critical role in inducing satisfaction and behavioral intentions. Hotel ambience moderates the model’s relationships – high ambience strengthens the relationships more so than low ambience. Results affirm the inclusion of social environments in predicting hotel guest experiences and shed light on managerial implications for bettering service provision.
Market Liquidity as Dynamic Factors

We study market liquidity via daily close relative spreads and daily traded volumes in a sample of 426 S&P500 constituents recorded over the years 2004-2006, a period of “normal” liquidity conditions. We use recent results on the Generalized Dynamic Factor Model (GDFM) with block structure to provide a sound definition of unobservable market liquidity and to assess the complementarity of those two liquidity measures. The advantage of defining market liquidity as dynamic factors is that, contrary to other definitions that can be found in the literature, it tackles time dependence and commonness at the same time, without making any restrictive assumptions on the underlying data generating process. Both relative spread and volume in the dataset under study appear to be driven by the same one-dimensional common shocks, which therefore naturally qualify as the unobservable market liquidity shocks.
‘Taking Care of Myself’

The purpose of this randomized study was to test the efficacy of an intervention programme entitled ‘Taking Care of Myself’ on selected indicators of mental health of daughter caregivers of elderly parents with dementia living in a long-term care setting. The programme is based on an empowerment perspective and on a stress and coping theoretical framework. Three groups of caregivers were compared: one took part in the experimental programme (EG, N= 45), one in a comparison programme offered by a Quebec Alzheimer Society (AG, N = 51), and another was a control group (CG, N = 41). Two successful outcomes are unique to the EG condition, that is, competence dealing with health care staff and perceived challenge of the caregiver role. Prediction analyses also provide statistical support for the efficacy of the EG and AG conditions to produce successful outcomes with respect to common indicators (perceived threat and role overload, control by self, informal/formal social support, and use of the coping strategy of reframing). These results provide avenues of intervention for promoting the mental health of caregivers of an institutionalized relative.
The Closer we Look the more we See? Quantitative Microscopic Analysis of the Pulmonary Surfactant System

The surfactant system of the lung has essential biophysical and immunomodulatory functions. Only at the electron microscopic level does surfactant reveal its morphological complexity - and beauty. Therefore, morphological tools are indispensible to characterize the surfactant system in health and disease. Stereology provides the gold standard for obtaining quantitative (morphometric) data in microscopy. The combination of microscopy and stereology allows for qualitative and quantitative analysis of the intraalveolar as well as the intracellular surfactant pool, both in its preserved microorganization and localization within the lung. Surfactant-producing alveolar epithelial type II cells can be counted and sampled for size estimation with physical disectors at a high magnification light microscopic level. The number of their surfactant storing lamellar bodies can be estimated using physical disectors at the electron microscopic level. Electron tomography allows for high resolution 3D visualization of lamellar body fusion pores. Intraalveolar surfactant subtypes can be quantitated in situ, thus reflecting the functional state of the intraalveolar surfactant pool. By immunoelectron microscopy, surfactant protein distribution can be analyzed. These methods allow for a comprehensive quantitative analysis of surfactant (ultra-)structure. Here, we give an overview on the analysis of the normal and disordered surfactant system by electron microscopy and stereology.
Information processing and synaptic plasticity at hippocampal mossy fiber terminals

Granule cells of the dentate gyrus receive cortical information and they transform and transmit this code to the CA3 area via their axons, the mossy fibers (MFs). Structural and functional complexity of this network has been extensively studied at various organizational levels. This review is focused on the anatomical and physiological properties of the MF system. We will discuss the mechanism by which dentate granule cells process signals from single action potentials (APs), short bursts and longer stimuli. Various parameters of synaptic interactions at different target cells such as quantal transmission, short- and long-term plasticity (LTP) will be summarized. Different types of synaptic contacts formed by MFs have unique sets of rules for information processing during different rates of granule cell activity. We will investigate the complex interactions between key determinants of information transfer between the dentate gyrus and the CA3 area of the hippocampus.
Threonine-4 of the budding yeast RNAP II CTD couples transcription with Htz1-mediated chromatin remodeling

Significance When cells sense changes in their environment, molecular pathways relay information to the transcriptional machinery, which induces gene expression changes that allow for adaptation to the new conditions. In this paper, the C-terminal domain (CTD) of the RNA polymerase II largest subunit is shown to be involved in adaptation of yeast cells to conditions of low phosphate levels and where galactose is the primary fuel source. Specifically, threonine residues within the repeated CTD structure are required for induction of genes involved in phosphate and galactose metabolism, by stimulating the eviction of the histone variant Htz1 from the gene promoters. This finding reveals a role for the CTD in chromatin remodeling that facilitates expression of specific genes. The C-terminal domain (CTD) of the largest subunit of RNA polymerase II (RNAP II) consists of repeated YSPTSPS heptapeptides and connects transcription with cotranscriptional events. Threonine-4 (Thr4) of the CTD repeats has been shown to function in histone mRNA 3′-end processing in chicken cells and in transcriptional elongation in human cells. Here, we demonstrate that, in budding yeast, Thr4, although dispensable for growth in rich media, is essential in phosphate-depleted or galactose-containing media. Thr4 is required to maintain repression of phosphate-regulated (PHO) genes under normal growth conditions and for full induction of PHO5 and the galactose-induced GAL1 and GAL7 genes. We identify genetic links between Thr4 and the histone variant Htz1 and show that Thr4, as well as the Ino80 chromatin remodeler, is required for activation-associated eviction of Htz1 specifically from promoters of the Thr4-dependent genes. Our study uncovers a connection between transcription and chromatin remodeling linked by Thr4 of the CTD.
Sexist Bias in Eight Newspapers

W Various groups have monitored the portrayal of women by television in the past decade, but how newspapers portray women has not been the focus of extensive research. In response to the women's movement, some newspapers redesigned their women's sections. Some changed the names, but not the content. Othefs left out advice columns, marital news and club notes, filling the space with expanded entertainment coverage. And because the new sections were generally smaller than the old sections, readers found less coverage of lifestyle or consumer issues than before.2 Feminist criticism of newspapers has focused on their coverage of the women's movement and feminist activities. It is claimed to be disproportionately sparse, trivializing and condescending in tone? It was disproportionate coverage of the Equal Rights Amendment by the Doily Oklahoman which suggested a research project at the University of Oklahoma. When Indiana ratified the Equal Rights Amendment in 1977, the Oklahoman ran two inches on page 28. A day or two later when another state failed to ratify, the story was played on page 1 with a multicolumn headline. This study, a content analysis of eight newspapers, involved three broad research questions: I) Do the mechanical aspects of the story
Combined Effect of Subchondral Drilling and Hyaluronic Acid with/without Diacerein in Full-Thickness Articular Cartilage Lesion in Rabbits

The osteochondral healing potential of hyaluronic acid (HA) plus diacerein was evaluated in subchondral-drilling- (SCD-) induced fibrocartilage generation in rabbits. A full-thickness chondral defect was created along the patellar groove of both knees and then SCD was subsequently performed only in the left knee. A week later, the rabbits were allocated into 3 groups to receive weekly intra-articular (IA) injection for 5 weeks with normal saline solution (NSS) (group 1) or with HA (group 2 and group 3). Starting at the first IA injection, rabbits were also gavaged daily for 9 weeks with NSS (group 1 and group 2) or with diacerein (group 3). The animals were then sacrificed for evaluation. The newly formed tissue in SCD lesions showed significantly better histological grading scale and had higher content of type II collagen in HA-treated group compared to NSS control. In addition, adding oral diacerein to HA injection enhanced healing potential of HA.
Conflict Resolution or Informational Response? An Empirical Analysis of the Determinants of Governance Choice in Business Process Outsourcing Relationships

This study integrates perspectives from neo-institutional economics, organization theory and information systems to examine why firms choose different governance structures across business process outsourcing (BPO) relationships. In particular, we focus on the information processing (IP) requirements that must be managed during the course of the BPO relationship and antecedent uncertainty in the business environment, outsourced business process, and BPO relationship that influence governance choice through their impact on such IP requirements. Further, we theorize that the influence of IP requirements on governance choice is moderated by the choice of technological capabilities. Survey data on 130 BPO initiatives provide empirical support for our hypotheses. Our results emphasize that in modern information intensive BPO relationships, hierarchical controls embedded in the governance structure are an important IP mechanism that helps the user firm effectively respond to IP requirements of the relationship and resolve incentive and cognitive conflict between the participant firms.
Comparison of Vocational Identity Factor Structures Among African American and White American College Students

The purpose of this study was to investigate the cultural equivalence of the construct of vocational identity, as measured by the Vocational Identity Scale of My Vocational Situation, through an examination of the equivalence of factor structures across two socioracial groups. Specifically, this study is interested in the extent to which this instrument is able to demonstrate structural equivalence across samples of African American and White American students. Confirmatory factor analyses determined that a one-factor model, as suggested by Holland, Daiger, and Power, provided adequate fit for the African American and each of the two White American groups. However, a test of multigroup invariance indicated that the vocational identity factor structures were not equivalent across these groups. Implications for practice and research are discussed. In addition, the group invariance method of assessing cultural equivalence is critically examined.