Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Age-Dependent Estimates of the Epidemiological Impact of Pandemic Influenza (H1N1-2009) in Japan

The total number of influenza cases with medical attendance has been estimated from sentinel surveillance data in Japan under a random sampling assumption of sentinel medical institutions among the total medical institutions. The 2009 pandemic offered a research opportunity to validate the sentinel-based estimation method using the estimated proportion of infections measured by the population-wide seroepidemiological survey employing hemagglutinin inhibition (HI) assay. For the entire population, we estimated the age-standardized proportion of infections at 28.5% and 23.5% using cut-off values of HI titer at 1 : 20 and 1 : 40, respectively. Investigating the age profiles, we show that the estimated influenza-like illness (ILI) cases with medical attendance exceeded the estimated infections among those aged from 0 to 19 years, indicating an overestimation of the magnitude by sentinel-based estimation method. The ratio of estimated cases to estimated infections decreased as a function of age. Examining the geographic distributions, no positive correlation was identified between the estimated cases and infections. Our findings indicate a serious technical limitation of the so-called multiplier method in appropriately quantifying the risk of influenza due to limited specificity of ILI and reporting bias. A seroepidemiological study should be planned in advance of a pandemic.
Acute pancreatitis: recent advances through randomised trials

Acute pancreatitis is one of the most common GI conditions requiring acute hospitalisation and has a rising incidence. In recent years, important insights on the management of acute pancreatitis have been obtained through numerous randomised controlled trials. Based on this evidence, the treatment of acute pancreatitis has gradually developed towards a tailored, multidisciplinary effort, with distinctive roles for gastroenterologists, radiologists and surgeons. This review summarises how to diagnose, classify and manage patients with acute pancreatitis, emphasising the evidence obtained through randomised controlled trials.
Capturing ghosts: predicting the used IPv4 space by inferring unobserved addresses

The pool of unused routable IPv4 prefixes is dwindling, with less than 4% remaining for allocation at the end of June 2014. Yet the adoption of IPv6 remains slow. We demonstrate a new capture-recapture technique for improved estimation of the size of "IPv4 reserves" (allocated yet unused IPv4 addresses or routable prefixes) from multiple incomplete data sources. A key contribution of our approach is the plausible estimation of both observed and unobserved-yet-active (ghost) IPv4 address space. This significantly improves our community's understanding of IPv4 address space exhaustion and likely pressure for IPv6 adoption. Using "ping scans", network traces and server logs we estimate that 6.3 million /24 subnets and 1.2 billion IPv4 addresses are currently in use (roughly 60% and 45% of the publicly routed space respectively). We also show how utilisation has changed over the last 2--3 years and provide an up-to-date estimate of potentially-usable remaining IPv4 space.
The diversity of citrus endophytic bacteria and their interactions with Xylella fastidiosa and host plants

Abstract The bacterium Xylella fastidiosa is the causal agent of citrus variegated chlorosis (CVC) and has been associated with important losses in commercial orchards of all sweet orange [Citrus sinensis (L.)] cultivars. The development of this disease depends on the environmental conditions, including the endophytic microbial community associated with the host plant. Previous studies have shown that X. fastidiosa interacts with the endophytic community in xylem vessels as well as in the insect vector, resulting in a lower bacterial population and reduced CVC symptoms. The citrus endophytic bacterium Methylobacterium mesophilicum can trigger X. fastidiosa response in vitro, which results in reduced growth and induction of genes associated with energy production, stress, transport, and motility, indicating that X. fastidiosa has an adaptive response to M. mesophilicum. Although this response may result in reduced CVC symptoms, the colonization rate of the endophytic bacteria should be considered in studies that intend to use this endophyte to suppress CVC disease. Symbiotic control is a new strategy that uses symbiotic endophytes as biological control agents to antagonize or displace pathogens. Candidate endophytes for symbiotic control of CVC must occupy the xylem of host plants and attach to the precibarium of sharpshooter insects to access the pathogen. In the present review, we focus on interactions between endophytic bacteria from sweet orange plants and X. fastidiosa, especially those that may be candidates for control of CVC.
Monte Carlo simulation of electron beams from an accelerator head using PENELOPE

The Monte Carlo code PENELOPE has been used to simulate electron beams from a Siemens Mevatron KDS linac with nominal energies of 6, 12 and 18 MeV. Owing to its accuracy, which stems from that of the underlying physical interaction models, PENELOPE is suitable for simulating problems of interest to the medical physics community. It includes a geometry package that allows the definition of complex quadric geometries, such as those of irradiation instruments, in a straightforward manner. Dose distributions in water simulated with PENELOPE agree well with experimental measurements using a silicon detector and a monitoring ionization chamber. Insertion of a lead slab in the incident beam at the surface of the water phantom produces sharp variations in the dose distributions, which are correctly reproduced by the simulation code. Results from PENELOPE are also compared with those of equivalent simulations with the EGS4-based user codes BEAM and DOSXYZ. Angular and energy distributions of electrons and photons in the phase-space plane (at the downstream end of the applicator) obtained from both simulation codes are similar, although significant differences do appear in some cases. These differences, however, are shown to have a negligible effect on the calculated dose distributions. Various practical aspects of the simulations, such as the calculation of statistical uncertainties and the effect of the `latent' variance in the phase-space file, are discussed in detail.
Perforated appendicitis in children: benefits of early laparoscopic surgery.

INTRODUCTION The aim of this study was to analyse the feasibility, safety and benefits of laparoscopic appendicectomy (LA) in comparison with open appendicectomy (OA) for perforated appendicitis (PA) in children. MATERIALS AND METHODS A retrospective analysis of all consecutive cases of PA who underwent OA or LA between July 2001 and April 2004 was done. The patient demographics, duration of symptoms and operative findings were noted and the feasibility, safety and benefits of LA were analysed with respect to postoperative recovery and complications. RESULTS One hundred and thirty-seven consecutive patients with PA underwent either OA (n = 46) or LA (n = 91). Both groups were comparable with respect to patient demographics, duration of symptoms and operative findings. The mean operative time was 106.5 min (95% CI, 100.2 - 112.8) in the LA group and 92.8 min (95% CI, 82.9-102.7) in the OA group (P = 0.02). The return to afebrile status after surgery was significantly faster in the LA group [mean, 45.4 hours (95% CI, 36.8-54)] than the OA group [mean, 77 hours (95% CI 56.7-97.3)] (P = 0.007). The mean duration for postoperative opioid analgesia was 2.5 days (95% CI, 2.2-2.7) for LA and 3.2 days (95% CI, 2.9- 3.6) for OA (P = 0.001). The resumption of oral feeds after surgery was at 3.1 days (95% CI, 2.8-3.3) for LA and 3.7 days (3.4-4.1) for OA (P = 0.005). The length of the hospital stay was shorter in the LA group [mean, 6.5 days (95% CI, 6.1-6.8)] as compared to that of the OA group [mean, 8.2 days (95% CI, 7.1-9.3)] (P = 0.006). Postoperative complications included wound infection, adhesive intestinal obstruction and pelvic abscess formation. The incidence of these complications was 5.6% in the LA group and 19.6% in the OA group (P = 0.01). Nine patients (9.8%) needed conversion to open surgery in the LA group. None of the LA patients had wound infection. CONCLUSION LA is feasible, safe and beneficial in children with PA.
Resolving Objects at Higher Resolution from a Single Motion-blurred Image

Motion blur can degrade the quality of images and is considered a nuisance for computer vision problems. In this paper, we show that motion blur can in-fact be used for increasing the resolution of a moving object. Our approach utilizes the information in a single motion-blurred image without any image priors or training images. As the blur size increases, the resolution of the moving object can be enhanced by a larger factor, albeit with a corresponding increase in reconstruction noise. Traditionally, motion deblurring and super-resolution have been ill-posed problems. Using a coded-exposure camera that preserves high spatial frequencies in the blurred image, we present a linear algorithm for the combined problem of deblurring and resolution enhancement and analyze the invertibility of the resulting linear system. We also show a method to selectively enhance the resolution of a narrow region of high-frequency features, when the resolution of the entire moving object cannot be increased due to small motion blur. Results on real images showing up to four times resolution enhancement are presented.
Endothelin-1, superoxide and adeninediphosphate ribose cyclase in shark vascular smooth muscle

SUMMARY In vascular smooth muscle (VSM) of Squalus acanthias, endothelin-1 (ET-1) signals via the ETB receptor. In both shark and mammalian VSM, ET-1 induces a rise in cytosolic Ca2+ concentration ([Ca2+]i) via activation of the inositol trisphosphate (IP3) receptor (IP3R) and subsequent release of Ca2+ from the sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR). IP3R-mediated release of SR Ca2+ causes calcium-induced calcium release (CICR) via the ryanodine receptor (RyR), which can be sensitized by cyclic adeninediphosphate ribose (cADPR). cADPR is synthesized from NAD+ by a membrane-bound bifunctional enzyme, ADPR cyclase. We have previously shown that the antagonists of the RyR, Ruthenium Red, high concentrations of ryanodine and 8-Br cADPR, diminish the [Ca2+]i response to ET-1 in shark VSM. To investigate how ET-1 might influence the activity of the ADPR cyclase, we employed inhibitors of the cyclase. To explore the possibility that ET-1-induced production of superoxide (O2.-) might activate the cyclase, we used an inhibitor of NAD(P)H oxidase (NOX), DPI and a scavenger of O2. -, TEMPOL. Anterior mesenteric artery VSM was loaded with fura-2AM to measure [Ca2+]i. In Ca2+-free shark Ringers, ET-1 increased [Ca2+]i by 104±8 nmol l-1. The VSM ADPR cyclase inhibitors, nicotinamide and Zn2+, diminished the response by 62% and 72%, respectively. Both DPI and TEMPOL reduced the response by 63%. The combination of the IP3R antagonists, 2-APB or TMB-8, with DPI or TEMPOL further reduced the response by 83%. We show for the first time that in shark VSM, inhibition of the ADPR cyclase reduces the [Ca2+]i response to ET-1 and that superoxide may be involved in the activation of the cyclase.
Relationship of the Major Constituents of the Neurospora crassa Cell Wall to Wild-Type and Colonial Morphology

Mahadevan, P. R. (The Rockefeller Institute, New York, N.Y.), and E. L. Tatum. Relationship of the major constituents of the Neurospora crassa cell wall to wild-type and colonial morphology. J. Bacteriol. 90:1073–1081. 1965. —The relationship of cell wall to morphology in Neurospora crassa was studied by correlating the levels of structural polymers of the cell wall with wild-type and colonial morphology. The cell wall of N. crassa contains at least four major complexes: a peptide-polysaccharide complex; two glucose polymers, one of which was found to be a laminarinlike β-1,3-glucan; and, lastly, chitin. The levels of one or more of these structural polymers are consistently altered in single-gene mutants with colonial growth, and in sorbose-induced colonial growth. The proportions of these polymers, particularly of the peptide-polysaccharide complex and the β-1,3-glucan, appear to be important to morphology.
INDUCTION OF CYP3A IN PRIMARY CULTURES OF HUMAN HEPATOCYTES BY GINKGOLIDES A AND B

1 The present study was designed to determine the effects of ginkgolide A, ginkgolide B and quercetin on CYP3A protein expression and enzyme activity in primary cultures of human hepatocytes. 2 Hepatocytes were pretreated with ginkgolide A, ginkgolide B and quercetin (at 1, 3, 10 and 30 µmol/L) for 48 h and then exposed to testosterone (250 µmol/L) for 30 min. Rifampin (10 µmol/L) and phenobarbital (2 mmol/L) were used as positive controls. The CYP3A activity was measured by the amount of 6β‐hydroxytestosterone in the culture medium and CYP3A protein in hepatocyte lysate was semiquantified by immunoblotting. 3 Compared with the vehicle control, ginkgolides A and B, at 30 µmol/L, significantly induced CYP3A protein expression (2.1‐ and 2‐fold, respectively; both P < 0.01) and markedly induced CYP3A‐mediated testosterone 6β‐hydroxylation (2.5‐fold each; P < 0.05 for ginkgolide A; P > 0.05 for ginkgolide B). Quercetin had no apparent induction. 4 Ginkgolide A and ginkgolide B can induce CYP3A protein expression and enzyme activity in primary cultures of human hepatocytes at higher doses.
The Effect of Stress Nonuniformity and Size on the Strength of Composite Materials

It has long been known that the strength of brittle materials like ceramics depends on the volume of stressed material and the nature of the stress distribution. Both of these effects arise because brittle materials are flaw-sensitive, and flaw severity is generally statistical in nature. As the probability of finding a serious flaw increases with increasing material volume, large brittle bodies tend to fail at lower stress levels than do smaller ones when both are subjected to the same kind of uniform stress field, such as pure tension. The dependence of strength on stress distribution arises because the stress in the region of at least one flaw must equal its critical value for failure to occur. In this paper, we refer to this phenomenon as a “nonuniformity effect. ”
Genome-Wide Identification of Schistosoma japonicum MicroRNAs Using a Deep-Sequencing Approach

Background Human schistosomiasis is one of the most prevalent and serious parasitic diseases worldwide. Schistosoma japonicum is one of important pathogens of this disease. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a large group of non-coding RNAs that play important roles in regulating gene expression and protein translation in animals. Genome-wide identification of miRNAs in a given organism is a critical step to facilitating our understanding of genome organization, genome biology, evolution, and posttranscriptional regulation. Methodology/Principal Findings We sequenced two small RNA libraries prepared from different stages of the life cycle of S. japonicum, immature schistosomula and mature pairing adults, through a deep DNA sequencing approach, which yielded ∼12 million high-quality short sequence reads containing a total of ∼2 million non-redundant tags. Based on a bioinformatics pipeline, we identified 176 new S. japonicum miRNAs, of which some exhibited a differential pattern of expression between the two stages. Although 21 S. japonicum miRNAs are orthologs of known miRNAs within the metazoans, some nucleotides at many positions of Schistosoma miRNAs, such as miR-8, let-7, miR-10, miR-31, miR-92, miR-124, and miR-125, are indeed significantly distinct from other bilaterian orthologs. In addition, both miR-71 and some miR-2 family members in tandem are found to be clustered in a reversal direction model on two genomic loci, and two pairs of novel S. japonicum miRNAs were derived from sense and antisense DNA strands at the same genomic loci. Conclusions/Significance The collection of S. japonicum miRNAs could be used as a new platform to study the genomic structure, gene regulation and networks, evolutionary processes, development, and host-parasite interactions. Some S. japonicum miRNAs and their clusters could represent the ancestral forms of the conserved orthologues and a model for the genesis of novel miRNAs.
The Cascade is a MMS Instanton

Wrap m D5-branes around the 2-cycle of a conifold, place n D3-branes at a point and watch the system relax. The D5-branes source m units of RR 3-form flux on the 3-cycle, which cause dielectric NS5-branes to nucleate and repeatedly sweep out the 3-cycle, each time gaining m units of D3-charge while the stack of D5-branes loses m units of D3-charge. A similar description of the Klebanov-Strassler cascade has been proposed by Kachru, et al. when m>>m-n. Using the T-dual MQCD we argue that the above process occurs for any m and n and in particular may continue for more than one step. The nonbaryonic roots of the SQCD vacua lead to new cascades because, for example, the 3-cycle swept does not link all of the D5's. This decay is the S-dual of a MMS instanton, which is the decay into flux of a brane that is trivial in twisted K-theory. This provides the first evidence for the S-dual of the K-theory classification that does not itself rely upon any strong/weak duality.
Modelling reputation-based resource pooling in P2P systems

P2P systems have a very loose social structure and lack a central authority that enforces cooperative behavior. If peers choose not to contribute but to free ride, detecting and punishing misbehaviour is hard. Several solutions have been proposed that make anti-social behavior less profitable, all with different applications in mind. The two basic categories are payment schemes and reputation mechanisms.In this paper, we propose a new model for P2P systems and use it to analyse the effects of different reputation mechanisms on performance of the application. We identify basic classes of peers, reputation functions, resource distribution strategies, and adversary types, and present simultation results for a few systems composed of these building blocks. Finally, we expose an antagonism between the goal of establishing a distributed data structure with mostly noise-free reputation information and the goal of punishing free riders that all methods will have to face.
Neurophysiological Findings in Vibration-Exposed Male Workers

Fractionated nerve conduction, vibrotactile sense, and temperature thresholds were studied in 73 symptomatic vibration-exposed male workers. Three symptomatic groups were distinguished: patients with isolated sensorineural symptoms; with isolated vasospastic problems; and with both. Clinical carpal tunnel syndrome occurred in 14 patients and abnormal cold intolerance (without blanching of the fingers) in 23. In the group as a whole, nerve conduction studies were abnormal in the median nerve but not in the ulnar nerve and vibration perception and temperature thresholds were impaired. Of the three symptomatic groups, patients with isolated sensorineural symptoms differed from controls. No differences were seen between patients with and without clinical carpal tunnel syndrome. With severe sensorineural symptoms the vibration perception thresholds, but not the values of the nerve conduction studies, were further impaired. The results indicated two injuries that are easily confused: one at receptor level in the fingertips and one in the carpal tunnel. Careful clinical assessment, neurophysiological testing, and examination of vibrotactile sense are required before carpal tunnel release should be considered in these patients.
Geometry of Locally Compact Groups of Polynomial Growth and Shape of Large Balls

We get asymptotics for the volume of large balls in an arbitrary locally compact group G with polynomial growth. This is done via a study of the geometry of G and a generalization of P. Pansu's thesis. In particular, we show that any such G is weakly commensurable to some simply connected solvable Lie group S, the Lie shadow of G. We also show that large balls in G have an asymptotic shape, i.e. after a suitable renormalization, they converge to a limiting compact set which can be interpreted geometrically. We then discuss the speed of convergence, treat some examples and give an application to ergodic theory. We also answer a question of Burago about left invariant metrics and recover some results of Stoll on the irrationality of growth series of nilpotent groups.
Learning Switching Linear Models of Human Motion

The human figure exhibits complex and rich dynamic behavior that is both nonlinear and time-varying. Effective models of human dynamics can be learned from motion capture data using switching linear dynamic system (SLDS) models. We present results for human motion synthesis, classification, and visual tracking using learned SLDS models. Since exact inference in SLDS is intractable, we present three approximate inference algorithms and compare their performance. In particular, a new variational inference algorithm is obtained by casting the SLDS model as a Dynamic Bayesian Network. Classification experiments show the superiority of SLDS over conventional HMM's for our problem domain.
MDL Denoising Revisited

We refine and extend an earlier minimum description length (MDL) denoising criterion for wavelet-based denoising. We start by showing that the denoising problem can be reformulated as a clustering problem, where the goal is to obtain separate clusters for informative and noninformative wavelet coefficients, respectively. This suggests two refinements, adding a code-length for the model index, and extending the model in order to account for subband-dependent coefficient distributions. A third refinement is the derivation of soft thresholding inspired by predictive universal coding with weighted mixtures. We propose a practical method incorporating all three refinements, which is shown to achieve good performance and robustness in denoising both artificial and natural signals.
Wallgraft Endoprosthesis for the Percutaneous Treatment of Femoral and Popliteal Artery Aneurysms

Purpose: To evaluate the safety and efficacy of the Wallgraft Endoprosthesis for the treatment of femoropopliteal artery aneurysms. Methods: From October 1997 to April 2000, 17 patients (13 men; mean age 73.5 ± 7.1 years) with 7 femoral and 13 popliteal artery aneurysms underwent percutaneous aneurysm exclusion using the Wallgraft Endoprosthesis as part of a larger clinical trial. The mean aneurysm diameters were 37.6 ± 12.9 mm and 22.3 ± 8.7 mm, respectively. Results: Acute procedural success was 100% for femoral aneurysms and 92.3% (12/13) in the popliteal artery owing to one endoleak that resolved after 1 month. There were no complications, and the mean length of stay was 2.2 ± 3.8 days. Six-month and 1-year aneurysm exclusion rates were 100% for both locations, but 4 (31%) popliteal stent-grafts thrombosed in follow-up. Three were recanalized, but the fourth underwent bypass grafting after 3 thrombotic episodes. The 1-year primary and secondary patency rates were both 100% for the femoral aneurysms and 69% and 92%, respectively, for popliteal repairs. No procedure or device-related deaths occurred. Conclusions: Treatment of aneurysms in the femoropopliteal segment appears to be safe and effective with the Wallgraft Endoprosthesis, although longer follow-up in a larger patient group will be needed to determine this technique's potential versus surgical repair.