Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Does Fish Oil Lower Blood Pressure? A Meta‐Analysis of Controlled Trials

BackgroundIn a meta-analysis of 31 placebo-controlled trials on 1356 subjects, we examined the effect of w-3 fatty acids in fish oil on blood pressure by grouping studies that were similar in fish oil dose, length of treatment, health of the subjects, or study design. Methods and ResultsThe mean reduction in blood pressure caused by fish oil for the 31 studies was -3.0/-1.5 mm Hg (95% confidence intervals: systolic blood pressure: -4.5,-1.5; diastolic blood pressure: -2.2,-0.8). There was a statistically significant dose-response effect when studies were grouped by w-3 fatty acid dose: -13/-0.7 mm Hg at doses <3 g/d, -2.9/-1.6 mm Hg at 3.3 to 7 g/d, and -8.1/-5.8 mm Hg at 15 g/d. Both eicosapentaenoic acid and docosahexaenoic acid were significantly related to blood pressure response. There was no effect on blood pressure in eight studies of “healthy” persons (mean reduction, -0.4/-0.7 mm Hg) at an overall mean dose of 4.2 g w-3 fatty acids/d. By contrast, there was a significant effect of -3.4/-2.0 mm Hg in the group of hypertensive studies with a mean fish oil dose of 5.6 g/d and on systolic blood pressure only in six studies of hypercholesterolemic patients (-4.4/-1.1 mm Hg) with a mean dose of 4.0 g/d. A nonsignificant decrease in blood pressure was observed in four studies of patients with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (-63/-2.9 mm Hg). Variations in the length of treatment (from 3 to 24 weeks), type of placebo, and study design (crossover or parallel groups) did not appear to account for inconsistent findings among studies. ConclusionsThere is a dose-response effect of fish oil on blood pressure of -0.66/-035 mm Hg/g wt-3 fatty acids. The hypotensive effect may be strongest in hypertensive subjects and those with clinical atherosclerotic disease or hypercholesterolemia.
NUMERICAL OBSERVATION OF NONAXISYMMETRIC VESICLES IN FLUID MEMBRANES

By means of Surface Evolver, a software package of brute-force energy minimization over a triangulated surface developed by the geometry center of the University of Minnesota [Exp. Math 1, 141 (1992)], we have numerically searched the nonaxisymmetric shapes under the Helfrich spontaneous curvature (SC) energy model. We show that there are abundant mechanically stable nonaxisymmetric vesicles in the SC model, including both regular shapes with intrinsic geometric symmetry and complex irregular ones. We report in this paper a catalog of interesting shapes including a corniculate shape with six corns, a quadriconcave shape, a shape resembling sickle cells, a shape resembling acanthocytes, and two tubelike shapes. Most of these shapes can be related to experimental observations in red blood cells and other experiments in fluid membrane. [S1063-651X(98)06510-6].
Effects of prenatal multiple micronutrient supplementation on growth and cognition through 2 y of age in rural Bangladesh: the JiVitA-3 Trial.

BACKGROUND Childhood undernutrition may have prenatal origins, and the impact of prenatal interventions on postnatal growth is not well known. OBJECTIVE We assessed the effects of prenatal multiple micronutrient (MM) supplementation on child growth and cognitive development. DESIGN In a cluster-randomized controlled trial in rural Bangladesh, prenatal MM supplementation compared with iron-folic acid (IFA) supplementation was examined for its impact on growth assessed longitudinally from birth up to 24 mo of age (n = 8529) and, in a subsample (n = 734), on cognitive function at 24 mo of age by use of the Bayley scales of infant and toddler development-third edition test. RESULTS Prevalence of stunting at birth [length for age z score (LAZ): <-2] was 31.9% in the MM and 35.7% in the IFA groups (P < 0.001); however, LAZ increased during the first 3-4 mo in both groups. With the use of a linear random-effects model, prenatal MM-exposed children sustained a higher mean predicted LAZ of ∼0.10 at 1 and 3 mo and 0.06 at 6 mo of age compared with children in the IFA group. Supplementation reduced the prevalence of stunting at 1 (RR: 0.95; 95% CI: 0.92, 0.98) and 3 (RR: 0.91; 95% CI: 0.88, 0.94) mo of age. Differences between groups were absent by 6, 12, and 24 mo of age, when nearly 50% of children had stunted growth. Ponderal and linear growth velocities were somewhat slower from 3 to 12 mo of age in the MM group than in the IFA group, but not from 12 to 24 mo of age. There was no difference between groups on composite scores of cognition, language, and motor performance at 24 mo of age. CONCLUSIONS In this Bangladeshi trial, maternal pre- and postnatal MM supplementation resulted in improvements in LAZ and reduction in stunting through 3 mo of age, but not thereafter and had no impact on cognitive and motor function at 2 y. This trial was registered at clinicaltrials.gov as NCT000860470.
Overexpression of Hydroxynitrile Lyase in Cassava Roots Elevates Protein and Free Amino Acids while Reducing Residual Cyanogen Levels

Cassava is the major source of calories for more than 250 million Sub-Saharan Africans, however, it has the lowest protein-to-energy ratio of any major staple food crop in the world. A cassava-based diet provides less than 30% of the minimum daily requirement for protein. Moreover, both leaves and roots contain potentially toxic levels of cyanogenic glucosides. The major cyanogen in cassava is linamarin which is stored in the vacuole. Upon tissue disruption linamarin is deglycosylated by the apolplastic enzyme, linamarase, producing acetone cyanohydrin. Acetone cyanohydrin can spontaneously decompose at pHs >5.0 or temperatures >35°C, or is enzymatically broken down by hydroxynitrile lyase (HNL) to produce acetone and free cyanide which is then volatilized. Unlike leaves, cassava roots have little HNL activity. The lack of HNL activity in roots is associated with the accumulation of potentially toxic levels of acetone cyanohydrin in poorly processed roots. We hypothesized that the over-expression of HNL in cassava roots under the control of a root-specific, patatin promoter would not only accelerate cyanogenesis during food processing, resulting in a safer food product, but lead to increased root protein levels since HNL is sequestered in the cell wall. Transgenic lines expressing a patatin-driven HNL gene construct exhibited a 2–20 fold increase in relative HNL mRNA levels in roots when compared with wild type resulting in a threefold increase in total root protein in 7 month old plants. After food processing, HNL overexpressing lines had substantially reduced acetone cyanohydrin and cyanide levels in roots relative to wild-type roots. Furthermore, steady state linamarin levels in intact tissues were reduced by 80% in transgenic cassava roots. These results suggest that enhanced linamarin metabolism contributed to the elevated root protein levels.
Formal verification of signature-monitoring mechanisms by model checking

In recent decades, reliability in the presence of transient faults has been a significant problem. To mitigate the effects of transient faults, fault-tolerant techniques are proposed. However, validating the effectiveness of fault-tolerant techniques is another problem. In this paper, we present an original approach to evaluate the effectiveness of signature-monitoring mechanisms. The approach is based on model-checking principles. First, the fault tolerant model is proposed using step-operational semantics. Second, the fault model is refined into a state transition system that is translated into the input program of the symbolic model checker NuSMV. Using NuSMV, two reprehensive signature-monitoring algorithms are verified. The approach avoids the state space explosion problem and the verification was completed with practical time. The verification results reveal some undetected errors, which have not been previously observed.
Uv Light from Young Stars in Gems Quasar Host Galaxies at 1.8 < Z < 2.75

We have performed HST imaging of a sample of 23 high-redshift (1.8 < z < 2.75) Active Galactic Nuclei, drawn from the COMBO-17 survey. The sample contains moderately luminous quasars (M B ∼ −23). The data are part of the GEMS imaging survey that provides high resolution optical images obtained with the Advanced Camera for Surveys in two bands (F606W and F850LP), sampling the rest-frame UV flux of the targets. To deblend the AGN images into nuclear and resolved (host galaxy) components we use a PSF subtraction technique that is strictly conservative with respect to the flux of the host galaxy. We resolve the host galaxies in both filter bands in 9 of the 23 AGN, whereas the remaining 14 objects are considered non-detections, with upper limits of less than 5 % of the nuclear flux. However, when we coadd the unresolved AGN images into a single high signal-to-noise composite image we find again an unambiguously resolved host galaxy. The recovered host galaxies have apparent magnitudes of 23.0 < F606W < 26.0 and 22.5 < F850LP < 24.5 with rest-frame UV colours in the range −0.2 < (F606W − F850LP) obs < 2.3. The rest-frame absolute magnitudes at 200 nm are −20.0 < M 200 nm < −22.2. The photometric properties of the composite host are consistent with the individual resolved host galaxies. We find that the UV colors of all host galaxies are substantially bluer than expected from an old population of stars with formation redshift z ≤ 5, independent of the assumed metallicities. These UV colours and luminosities range up to the values found for Lyman-break galaxies (LBGs) at z = 3. Our results suggest either a recent starburst, of e.g. a few per cent of the total stellar mass and 100 Myrs before observation, with mass-fraction and age strongly degenerate, or the possibility that the detected UV emission may be due to young stars forming continuously. For the latter case we estimate star formation rates of typically ∼6 M ⊙ yr −1 (uncorrected for internal dust attenuation), which again lies in the range of rates implied from the UV flux of LBGs. Our results agree with the recent discovery of enhanced blue stellar light in AGN hosts at lower redshifts.
Percutaneous device closure of patent ductus arteriosus with pulmonary artery hypertension: long-term results.

UNLABELLED Device closure of patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) is treatment of choice. But device closure in presence of pulmonary artery hypertension (PAH) remains a challenge. Data on patient selection, technical considerations, and complications are limited. AIM To know the challenges and efficacy of device closure of PDA with PAH. MATERIALS AND RESULTS Out of 1,325 cases of device closure of PDA, 246 (18.6%) with PAH formed the study material. To test the feasibility, chosen device is used to occlude PDA for ten minutes without oxygen inhalation. The device is released only if PAH reduced. PAH decreased in all except in 1 patient after closure with muscular ventricular septal occluder (MVSDO), pulmonary artery pressure (PAP) transiently increased (became supra-systemic), without significant reduction in aortic pressure. Device embolized in 8 patients (3.3%). Percutaneous retrieval was done in 4 (by snare in 2 and by fixing the cable to device in 2) and replaced with bigger devices. The surgical removal of the embolized MVSDO and ligation was done in 4 cases. All patients were on oral sildenafil and bosentan until PAP regressed to normal. Follow up was from 6 months to 9 years. No residual shunt in any patient on follow-up. The PAP regressed to normal in all except 5 cases (2.03%) of Down's syndrome with systemic PAP. CONCLUSIONS Device closure of PDA with PAH is feasible, safe in all age groups. Temporary PDA occlusion with device is effective and time saving for evaluating pulmonary vascular reactivity. Device embolization in aorta is higher with severe PAH. Novel method of retrieval is effective.
Comparative Advantage and Optimal Trade Policy

The theory of comparative advantage is at the core of neoclassical trade theory. Yet we know little about its implications for how nations should conduct their trade policy. For example, should import sectors with weaker comparative advantage be protected more? Conversely, should export sectors with stronger comparative advantage be subsidized less? In this paper we explore these issues in the context of a canonical Ricardian model. Our main results imply that optimal import tariffs should be uniform, whereas optimal export subsidies should be weakly decreasing with respect to comparative advantage, reflecting the fact that countries have more room to manipulate prices in their comparative-advantage sectors. Quantitative exercises suggest substantial gains from such policies relative to simpler tax schedules.
Functionalized milk-protein-coated magnetic nanoparticles for MRI-monitored targeted therapy of pancreatic cancer

Engineered nanocarriers have emerged as a promising platform for cancer therapy. However, the therapeutic efficacy is limited by low drug loading efficiency, poor passive targeting to tumors, and severe systemic side effects. Herein, we report a new class of nanoconstructs based on milk protein (casein)-coated magnetic iron oxide (CNIO) nanoparticles for targeted and image-guided pancreatic cancer treatment. The tumor-targeting amino-terminal fragment (ATF) of urokinase plasminogen activator and the antitumor drug cisplatin (CDDP) were engineered on this nanoplatform. High drug loading (~25 wt%) and sustained release at physiological conditions were achieved through the exchange and encapsulation strategy. These ATF-CNIO-CDDP nanoparticles demonstrated actively targeted delivery of CDDP to orthotopic pancreatic tumors in mice. The effective accumulation and distribution of ATF-CNIO-CDDP was evidenced by magnetic resonance imaging, based on the T2-weighted contrast resulting from the specific accumulation of ATF-CNIO-CDDP in the tumor. Actively targeted delivery of ATF-CNIO-CDDP led to improved therapeutic efficacy in comparison with free CDDP and nontargeted CNIO-CDDP treatment. Meanwhile, less systemic side effects were observed in the nanocarrier-treated groups than that in the group treated with free CDDP. Hematoxylin and Eosin and Sirius Red staining of tumor sections revealed the possible disruption of stroma during the treatment with ATF-CNIO-CDDP. Overall, our results suggest that ATF-CNIO-CDDP can be an effective theranostic platform for active targeting-enhanced and image-guided cancer treatment while simultaneously reducing the systemic toxicity.
A Hybrid Scheme for Face Template Protection

This paper proposes a hybrid scheme which combines modified shielding function with a one-way transformation technique known as matrix transformation. The modified shielding function is an improved version of the generic shielding function which eliminates the need for quantization and reliable bit selection. Concatenated error correction is applied to correct errors at the block level (burst errors) and bit level (bit errors within each block) unlike previous implementations of the shielding function which address only bit errors. The proposed matrix transformation technique is used to carry out a one-way, irreversible transformation of binary face templates before securing them with the shielding function. Experimental results show that the hybrid scheme has good recognition performance. Results from security analysis show that the scheme is resistant to guessing, replay, key exhaustion and template inversion attacks. It is also robust against privacy attacks such as decodability and cross-matching.
Correlation Between Concentrations of Fecal Calprotectin and Outcomes of Patients With Ulcerative Colitis in a Phase 2 Trial.

BACKGROUND & AIMS Accurate biomarkers of disease activity and therapeutic response can be valuable for clinical trials. We performed a post hoc analysis of data from a phase 2 trial to assess the relationship between the concentration of fecal calprotectin (FCP) and clinical and endoscopic outcomes of patients with moderate to severe ulcerative colitis receiving tofacitinib. METHODS In a double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 2 trial, 194 patients were assigned randomly to groups given tofacitinib (0.5, 3, 10, or 15 mg twice daily) or placebo. Clinical and endoscopic outcomes were assessed at week 8 using the Mayo scoring system. Receiver operating characteristics were used to evaluate the relationships between FCP concentration and clinical and endoscopic outcomes, and to determine the FCP cut-off concentration that correlated with patient outcome. RESULTS Week 8 median concentrations of FCP were significantly lower in responders than in nonresponders (P < .001): clinical response, 156 vs 725 mg/kg; clinical remission, 64 vs 617 mg/kg; endoscopic remission, 44 vs 489 mg/kg; and mucosal healing, 127 vs 753 mg/kg. Area-under-the-curve values for FCP receiver operating characteristic models were 0.80 for clinical remission, 0.81 for endoscopic remission, and 0.78 for mucosal healing. An FCP cut-off value of 150 mg/kg achieved the highest summation of sensitivity and specificity for clinical remission (0.68 and 0.79, respectively; κ coefficient, 0.44) and endoscopic remission (0.79 and 0.75, respectively; κ coefficient, 0.38). CONCLUSIONS Concentrations of FCP correlate with clinical and endoscopic outcomes of patients with moderate to severe ulcerative colitis receiving tofacitinib, although at an individual level the agreement was moderate. FCP concentration with a cut-off value of 150 mg/kg had only fair to good accuracy in classifying clinical and endoscopic outcomes in a clinical trial. ClinicalTrials.gov no: NCT00787202.
Improving the Performance of Multiple Description Coding Based on Scalar Quantization

We propose an algorithm that improves the performance of rate-distortion-based multiple description coding (RD-MDC). The gain is particularly significant in the high redundancy region, where RD-MDC suffers a major performance penalty with respect to MDC bounds. The improvement is obtained with negligible additional computational cost, by exploiting the coarse information also at the central decoder. The proposed method can be generalized to all MDC schemes that use scalar quantization, without modifying the quantizer structure. This feature guarantees the generation of descriptions that can be decoded without any modification of the decoder.
Social- and Mobility-Aware Device-to-Device Content Delivery

Mobile online social network services have seen a rapid increase, in which the huge amount of user-generated social media contents propagating between users via social connections has significantly challenged the traditional content delivery paradigm: First, replicating all of the contents generated by users to edge servers that well "fit" the receivers becomes difficult due to the limited bandwidth and storage capacities. Motivated by device-to-device (D2D) communication that allows users with smart devices to transfer content directly, we propose replicating bandwidth-intensive social contents in a device-to-device manner. Based on large-scale measurement studies on social content propagation and user mobility patterns in edge-network regions, we observe that (1) Device-to-device replication can significantly help users download social contents from nearby neighboring peers; (2) Both social propagation and mobility patterns affect how contents should be replicated; (3) The replication strategies depend on regional characteristics ({\em e.g.}, how users move across regions). Using these measurement insights, we propose a joint \emph{propagation- and mobility-aware} content replication strategy for edge-network regions, in which social contents are assigned to users in edge-network regions according to a joint consideration of social graph, content propagation and user mobility. We formulate the replication scheduling as an optimization problem and design distributed algorithm only using historical, local and partial information to solve it. Trace-driven experiments further verify the superiority of our proposal: compared with conventional pure movement-based and popularity-based approach, our design can significantly ($2-4$ times) improve the amount of social contents successfully delivered by device-to-device replication.
Principal Elements of the Initial Work-up in Adult Patients With Suspected Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura * History Bleeding symptoms Type of bleeding Severity of bleeding Duration of bleeding

Individual reprints of this article are not available. Address correspondence to Roberto Stasi, MD, Department of Medical Sciences, “Regina Apostolorum” Hospital, Via S. Francesco, 50, 00041 Albano Laziale, Italy (e-mail: roberto.stasi@libero.it). ITP = immune thrombocytopenic purpura; IVIg = intravenous immunoglobulin Primary immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP), also referred to as idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, is an organ-specific autoimmune disorder in which antibodycoated or immune complex–coated platelets are destroyed prematurely by the reticuloendothelial system, resulting in peripheral blood thrombocytopenia. The disease is heterogeneous with regard to its severity and clinical course and is unpredictable in its response to therapy. Although the basic underlying pathophysiology of ITP has been known for more than 50 years, current treatment guidelines are based on expert opinion rather than on evidence because of a lack of high-quality clinical trials and research. The only patients for whom treatment is clearly required are those with severe bleeding and/or extremely low platelet counts (<10 × 10/L). Treatment of patients with ITP refractory to corticosteroids and splenectomy requires careful evaluation of disease severity, patient characteristics related to risk of bleeding, and adverse effects associated with treatment. Clinical trials with numerous new agents are under way, which we hope will add more effective and targeted strategies to our therapeutic armamentarium. We describe a logical and structured approach to the clinical management of ITP in adults, based on a literature review and our personal experience. Mayo Clin Proc. 2004;79:504-522
Reply to “Which chaos in the rainfall-runoff process?”

The authors thank Schertzer et al. (2002) for their comment on their work (Sivakumar et al., 2001) on the investigation of the possible presence of low-dimensional chaotic behaviour (the term "chaos" was used therein to denote the low-dimensional chaos) in the rainfall-runoff process in the Gota River basin in Sweden. The authors respond to this discussion with respect to: (a) the purpose of the study by Sivakumar et al. (2001), and the results achieved and conclusions drawn therein; and (b) the argument by Schertzer et al. (2002) regarding the possibility of finite correlation dimensions resulting from stochastic processes when the data size is small. The issue of minimum data size requirement for a reliable estimation of correlation dimension is discussed and the deficiencies in the existing guidelines that relate the data size to the embedding dimension are pointed out. While the authors agree with Schertzer et al. (2002) that low correlation dimensions might also result from stochastic processes, they opine that this is true only when the data size is extremely small. The authors argue that the low correlation dimension obtained by Schertzer et al. (2002) for the stochastic series is not due to the small data size.