Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Electrical Storm in Patients With Brugada Syndrome Is Associated With Early Repolarization

Background—Electrical storms (ESs) in patients with Brugada syndrome (BrS) are rare though potentially lethal. Methods and Results—We studied 22 men with BrS and ES, defined as ≥3 episodes/d of ventricular fibrillation (VF) and compared their characteristics with those of 110 age-matched, control men with BrS without ES. BrS was diagnosed by a spontaneous or drug-induced type 1 pattern on the ECG in the absence of structural heart disease. Early repolarization (ER) was diagnosed by J waves, ie, >0.1 mV notches or slurs of the terminal portion of the QRS complex. The BrS ECG pattern was provoked with pilsicainide. A spontaneous type I ECG pattern, J waves, and horizontal/descending ST elevation were found, respectively, in 77%, 36%, and 88% of patients with ES, versus 28% (P<0.0001), 9% (P=0.003), and 60% (P=0.06) of controls. The J-wave amplitude was significantly higher in patients with than without ES (P=0.03). VF occurred during undisturbed sinus rhythm in 14 of 19 patients (74%), and ES were controlled by isoproterenol administration. All patients with ES received an implantable cardioverter defibrillator and over a 6.0±5.4 years follow-up, the prognosis of patients with ES was significantly worse than that of patients without ES. Bepridil was effective in preventing VF in 6 patients. Conclusions—A high prevalence of ER was found in a subgroup of patients with BrS associated with ES. ES appeared to be suppressed by isoproterenol or quinidine, whereas bepridil and quinidine were effective in the long-term prevention of VF in the highest-risk patients.
A Lie Reveals the Truth: Quasimodes for Task-Aligned Data Presentation

Designers are often discouraged from creating data visualizations that omit or distort information, because they can easily be misleading. However, the same representations that could be used to deceive can provide benefits when chosen to appropriately align with user tasks. We present an interaction technique, Perceptual Glimpses, which allows for the transparent presentation of so-called 'deceptive' views of information that are made temporary using quasimodes. When presented using Perceptual Glimpses, message-level exaggeration caused by a truncated axis on a bar chart was reduced under some conditions, but users require guidance to avoid errors, and view presentation order may affect trust. When Perceptual Glimpses was extended to display a range of views that might otherwise be deceptive or difficult to understand if shown out of context, users were able to understand and leverage these transformations to perform a range of low-level tasks. Design recommendations and examples suggest extensions of the technique.
On assessing the presence of evaluation‐time bias in progression‐free survival in randomized trials

Evaluation (or assessment)–time bias can arise in oncology trials that study progression‐free survival (PFS) when randomized groups have different patterns of timing of assessments. Modelling or computer simulation is sometimes used to explore the extent of such bias; valid results require building such simulations under realistic assumptions concerning the timing of assessments. This paper considers a trial that used a logrank test where computer simulations were based on unrealistic assumptions that severely overestimated the extent of potential bias. The paper shows that seemingly small differences in assumptions can lead to dramatic differences in the apparent operating characteristics of logrank tests. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Personalizing the treatment of pediatric medulloblastoma: Polo-Like Kinase 1 (PLK1) as a molecular target for high-risk children.

Medulloblastoma (MB) is the most common malignant brain tumor in children. This disease is heterogeneous and it is comprised of four subtypes of MB (WNT, SHH, Group 3, and Group 4). An immediate goal is to identify novel molecular targets for the most aggressive forms of MB. Polo-like kinase 1 (PLK1) is an oncogenic kinase that controls cell cycle and proliferation making it a strong candidate for MB treatment. In this study, pediatric MBs were subtyped in two patient cohorts (Training cohort; n=65 patients, Validation cohort; n=57 patients) using NanoString nCounter analysis and PLK1 mRNA was assessed. We determined that the SHH and Group 3 subtypes were independently associated with poor outcomes in children as was PLK1 using Cox regression analyses. Further, we screened a library of 129 compounds in clinical trials using a model of pediatric MB and determined that PLK1 inhibitors were the most promising class of agents against the growth of MB. In patient-derived primary MB isolates, the PLK1 small molecule inhibitor BI2536 suppressed the self-renewal of PLK1-high but not PLK1-low expressing cells. PLK1 inhibition prevented MB cell proliferation, self-renewal, cell cycle progression, and induced apoptosis. In contrast, the growth of normal neural stem cells was unaffected by BI2536. Finally, BI2536 extended survival in MB-bearing mice with efficacy comparable to Headstart, a standard-of-care chemotherapy regime. We conclude that patients with MB expressing high levels of PLK1 are at elevated risk. These pre-clinical studies pave the way for improving the treatment of MB through PLK1 inhibition. BI2536 for 48hrs. Daoy cells were treated with 0.5-100nM BI2536 for 24, 48 and 72hrs then growth was assessed by Hoechst staining. Daoy cells were treated with 5nM BI2536 for 24hrs, subjected to flow cytometry
Personality Change Pre- to Post- Loss in Spousal Caregivers of Patients With Terminal Lung Cancer

Personality is relatively stable in adulthood but could change in response to life transitions, such as caring for a spouse with a terminal illness. Using a case–control design, spousal caregivers (n = 31) of patients with terminal lung cancer completed the NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) twice, 1.5 years apart, before and after the patient’s death. A demographically matched sample of community controls (n = 93) completed the NEO-FFI on a similar time frame. Based on research and theory, we hypothesized that bereaved caregivers would experience greater changes than controls in interpersonal facets of extraversion (sociability), agreeableness (prosocial and nonantagonistic), and conscientiousness (dependability). Consistent with hypotheses, bereaved caregivers experienced an increase in interpersonal orientation, becoming more sociable, prosocial, and dependable (Cohen’s d = .48–.67), though there were no changes in nonantagonism. Changes were not observed in controls (ds ≤ .11). These initial findings underscore the need for more research on the effect of life transitions on personality.
Knowledge of algebra for teaching: a framework of knowledge and practices

Defining what teachers need to know to teach algebra successfully is important for informing teacher preparation and professional development efforts. Based on prior research, analysis of video, interviews with teachers, and analysis of textbooks, we define categories of knowledge and practices of teaching for understanding and assessing teachers’ knowledge for teaching algebra. The three categories of knowledge—school, advanced, and teaching—build on the work of Ball and others for elementary school teaching and take into account the recommendations of the Conference Board of the Mathematical Sciences (2001, 2012) for secondary school teachers’ knowledge of post-secondary mathematics. Three categories of teaching practices—trimming, bridging, and decompressing—address mathematical uses of knowledge specific to teaching. We argue that the combination of categories and practices must be covered in assessments of teacher knowledge, if the assessments are to be used in research that investigates the presumed links among teachers’ content preparation, their knowledge, their practice, and student learning.
Randomised controlled trial comparing percutaneous radiofrequency thermal ablation, percutaneous ethanol injection, and percutaneous acetic acid injection to treat hepatocellular carcinoma of 3 cm or less

Aims: The aim of this study was to compare the outcomes of radiofrequency thermal ablation (RFTA), percutaneous ethanol injection (PEI), and percutaneous acetic acid injection (PAI) in the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Patients and methods: A total of 187 patients with HCCs of 3 cm or less were randomly assigned to RFTA (n = 62), PEI (n = 62), or PAI (n = 63). Tumour recurrence and survival rates were assessed. Results: One, two, and three year local recurrence rates were 10%, 14%, and 14% in the RFTA group, 16%, 34%, and 34% in the PEI group, and 14%, 31%, and 31% in the PAI group (RFTA v PEI, p = 0.012; RFTA v PAI, p = 0.017). One, two, and three year survival rates were 93%, 81%, and 74% in the RFTA group, 88%, 66%, and 51% in the PEI group, and 90%, 67%, and 53% in the PAI group (RFTA v PEI, p = 0.031; RFTA v PAI, p = 0.038). One, two, and three year cancer free survival rates were 74%, 60%, and 43% in the RFTA group, 70%, 41%, and 21% in the PEI group, and 71%, 43%, and 23% in the PAI group (RFTA v PEI, p = 0.038; RFTA v PAI, p = 0.041). Tumour size, tumour differentiation, and treatment methods (RFTA v PEI and PAI) were significant factors for local recurrence, overall survival, and cancer free survival. Major complications occurred in 4.8% of patients (two with haemothorax, one gastric perforation) in the RFTA group and in none in two other groups (RFTA v PEI and PAI, p = 0.035). Conclusions: RFTA was superior to PEI and PAI with respect to local recurrence, overall survival, and cancer free survival rates, but RFTA also caused more major complications.
Mutational spectrum of the NF2 gene: a meta‐analysis of 12 years of research and diagnostic laboratory findings

The NF2 tumor suppressor gene on chromosome 22 is a member of the protein 4.1 family of cytoskeletal elements. A number of single‐ and multiple‐tumor phenotypes have been linked to alterations of NF2 since its characterization in 1993. We present a meta‐analysis of 967 constitutional and somatic NF2 alterations from 93 published reports, along with 59 additional unpublished events identified in our laboratory and 115 alterations identified in clinical samples submitted to the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Neurogenetics DNA Diagnostic Laboratory. In total, these sources defined 1,070 small genetic changes detected primarily by exon scanning, 42 intragenic changes of one whole exon or larger, and 29 whole gene deletions and gross chromosomal rearrangements. Constitutional single‐exon events (N=422) were significantly more likely to be nonsense or splice site changes than somatic events (N=533), which favored frameshift changes (χ2 test; P<0.001). Somatic events also differed markedly between tumors of different pathology, most significantly in the tendency of somatic events in meningiomas to lie within the 5′ FERM domain of the transcript (Fisher's exact test; P<0.01 in comparison to schwannomas) with a complete absence of mutations in exons 14 and 15. There was no statistically significant difference in mutation type or exon distribution between published constitutional events and those found by the clinical laboratory. Less than 10% of all published and unpublished small alterations are nontruncating (N=63) and these changes are clustered in exons 2 and 3, suggesting that this region may be especially crucial to tumor suppressor activity in the protein. Hum Mutat 28(1), 1–12, 2007. Published 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Genetic Deletion of Rnd3/RhoE Results in Mouse Heart Calcium Leakage Through Upregulation of Protein Kinase A Signaling

Rationale: Rnd3, a small Rho GTPase, is involved in the regulation of cell actin cytoskeleton dynamics, cell migration, and proliferation. The biological function of Rnd3 in the heart remains unexplored. Objective: To define the functional role of the Rnd3 gene in the animal heart and investigate the associated molecular mechanism. Methods and Results: By loss-of-function approaches, we discovered that Rnd3 is involved in calcium regulation in cardiomyocytes. Rnd3-null mice died at the embryonic stage with fetal arrhythmias. The deletion of Rnd3 resulted in severe Ca2+ leakage through destabilized ryanodine receptor type 2 Ca2+ release channels. We further found that downregulation of Rnd3 attenuated &bgr;2-adrenergic receptor lysosomal targeting and ubiquitination, which in turn resulted in the elevation of &bgr;2-adrenergic receptor protein levels leading to the hyperactivation of protein kinase A (PKA) signaling. The PKA activation destabilized ryanodine receptor type 2 channels. This irregular spontaneous Ca2+ release can be curtailed by PKA inhibitor treatment. Increases in the PKA activity along with elevated cAMP levels were detected in Rnd3-null embryos, in neonatal rat cardiomyocytes, and noncardiac cell lines with Rnd3 knockdown, suggesting a general mechanism for Rnd3-mediated PKA signaling activation. &bgr;2-Adrenergic receptor blocker treatment reduced arrhythmia and improved cardiac function. Conclusions: Rnd3 is a novel factor involved in intracellular Ca2+ homeostasis regulation in the heart. Deficiency of the protein induces ryanodine receptor type 2 dysfunction by a mechanism that attenuates Rnd3-mediated &bgr;2-adrenergic receptor ubiquitination, which leads to the activation of PKA signaling. Increased PKA signaling in turn promotes ryanodine receptor type 2 hyperphosphorylation, which contributes to arrhythmogenesis and heart failure.
Effect of parameter values on fingerprint filtering

Fingerprint is presently the most significant biometric for human verification and identification. The reason being its highest degree of uniqueness, availability, durability and consistency when compared with other biometrics such as face, nose, iris, ear, palm print and signature. The use of fingerprint in human identity management spans through stages of enrolment, enhancement, feature extraction and pattern matching. The enhancement stage involves ridge segmentation, normalization, orientation estimation, frequency estimation, filtering, binarization and thinning. Filtering is the stage at which all forms of noise and contaminations introduced into the image during enrolment are removed. The removal of noise and contaminations is necessary for accurate feature extraction and pattern matching. In some of the existing fingerprint image filtering algorithms, accurate and appropriate parameter selections are essential for obtaining optimal and satisfactory results. In this research, the existing Gabor filter was modified and the values of some standard parameters were varied. Experimental study on the adequacy of the modified algorithm and its parameter values on fingerprint filtering were investigated on the standard FVC2002 fingerprint database. Comparative analysis of the obtained results with what were obtained from some existing algorithms shows satisfactory and acceptable performances of the modified algorithm.
Unraveling duality violations in hadronic tau decays

There are some indications from recent determinations of the strong coupling constant alpha_s and the gluon condensate that the Operator Product Expansion may not be accurate enough to describe non-perturbative effects in hadronic tau decays. This breakdown of the Operator Product Expansion is usually referred to as being due to"Duality Violations. " With the help of a physically motivated model, we investigate these duality violations. Based on this model, we argue how they may introduce a non-negligible systematic error in the current analysis, which employs finite-energy sum rules with pinched weights. In particular, this systematic effect might affect the precision determination of alpha_s from tau decays. With a view to a possible future application to real data, we present an alternative method for determining the OPE coefficients that might help estimating, and possibly even reducing, this systematic error.
The universe from scratch

A fascinating and deep question about nature is what one would see if one could probe space and time at smaller and smaller distances. Already the 19th century founders of modern geometry contemplated the possibility that a piece of empty space that looks completely smooth and structureless to the naked eye might have an intricate microstructure at a much smaller scale. Our vastly increased understanding of the physical world acquired during the 20th century has made this a certainty. The laws of quantum theory tell us that looking at spacetime at ever smaller scales requires ever larger energies and, according to Einstein's theory of general relativity, this will alter spacetime itself: it will acquire structure in the form of curvature. What we still lack is a definitive theory of quantum gravity to give us a detailed and quantitative description of the highly curved and quantum-fluctuating geometry of spacetime at this so-called Planck scale. This article outlines a particular approach to constructing such a theory, that of Causal Dynamical Triangulations, and its achievements so far in deriving from first principles why spacetime is what it is, from the tiniest realms of the quantum to the large-scale structure of the universe.
Does a change in talker identity help listeners resolve lexical competition? Evidence from phonological priming

In this study, we examined whether the lexical competition process embraced by most of models of spoken word recognition is sensitive to talker variation. We used a long lag priming experiment in which primes and targets sharing all except the last phoneme (e.g. /bagaR/ "fight" vs /bagaƷ/ "luggage") were presented in two separate blocks of stimuli. Our results showed clear inhibitory priming effects with slower response times when target words were preceded by a phonologically related prime in comparison to a control prime. However, we also observed that the magnitude of the inhibitory priming effect was of the same magnitude whether the prime competitor and the target word were spoken by different talkers or by the same talker. The results are discussed in reference to other studies showing talker specificity-effects and in which access to talker-specific representations was demonstrated.
Phenolics in Potato Peels: Extraction and Utilization as Natural Antioxidants

The total phenolics content of potato peel extracts of five different solvents (water, ethanol, hexane, methanol and acetone) and two solvent extraction methods (Solvent and ultrasound-assisted) were studied. The content of total phenolics in the extracts was determined spectrometrically according to the Folin-Ciocalteu procedure and calculated as gallic acid equivalents. Antioxidant activity of methanolic extracts was determined by using the Oven (63°C) and Rancimat (90,120,150°C) methods on refined soybean oil and compared with the effects of synthetic antioxidants ( BHA, BHT and TBHQ). Peroxide values and 2-thiobarbituric acid values were used to assess lipid peroxidation. The greatest amount of extract was obtained with water but the greatest amounts of phenolic acids resulted when potato peels was extracted with methanol. Using ultrasound improved the total phenolic compounds of the potato peel extract. After 16 days storage at 63°C, 5.00g of soybean oil containing either the methanolic extract (800, 1600 ppm) or BHA (200 ppm) and BHT (200 ppm) reached peroxide values (PV) of 37.35, 24.65, 33.20 and 28.88 meq/kg respectively. Also the Rancimat method revealed that TBHQ was the best antioxidant but potato peel extract was as good as BHA and BHT.
Antiprotozoal, antimycobacterial and cytotoxic potential of twenty‐three British and Irish red algae

As part of our continuing research on seaweeds, we have screened the crude extracts of 23 red marine algae collected from England and Ireland. The clinically important blood‐stage life forms of Trypanosoma brucei rhodesiense, T. cruzi, Leishmania donovani and Mycobacterium tuberculosis were used as test organisms in the in vitro assays. The selectivity of the extracts was determined by using mammalian skeletal myoblast (L6) cells. All algal extracts showed activity against T. brucei rhodesiense, with Corallina officinalis and Ceramium virgatum being the most potent (IC50 values 4.8 and 5.4 μg/ml), whilst none of the algal extracts inhibited the growth of T. cruzi. Except for Porphyra leucosticta, extracts from all seaweeds also showed leishmanicidal activity with IC50 values ranging from 16.5 to 85.6 μg/ml. Only the crude extract of Calliblepharis jubata showed some weak activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MIC value 256 μg/ml), while the others were inactive at this concentration. Corallina officinalis was the only seaweed that displayed some marginal cytotoxicity (IC50 value 88.6 μg/ml), and all remaining extracts were non‐toxic towards L6 cells at 90 μg/ml concentration. To our knowledge, this is the first study reporting antiprotozoal and antimycobacterial activity of British and Irish red algae. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Regulation of Channels by the Serum and Glucocorticoid-Inducible Kinase - Implications for Transport, Excitability and Cell Proliferation

The serum and glucocorticoid-inducible kinase SGK1 stimulates the Na+ channels ENaC and SCN5A, the K+ channels ROMK1, Kv1.3, and KCNE1/KCNQ1, the cation conductance induced by 4F2/LAT1 and the chloride conductance induced by CFTR. The isoforms SGK2 and SGK3 have similarly been shown to regulate ENaC, SCN5A, Kv1.3 and KCNE1/KCNQ1. The kinases regulate channel abundance in the plasma membrane in part by inhibition of the ubiquitin ligase Nedd4-2 and in part by interaction with trafficking molecules such as the Na+/H+ exchanger regulating factor NHERF2. An in vivo role of SGK1 mediated ENaC channel regulation in renal salt excretion and blood pressure control is documented by the impaired ability of SGK1 knockout mice to adequately reduce renal Na+ output and maintain blood pressure during dietary salt restriction and by enhanced blood pressure in individuals carrying certain polymorphisms in the SGK1 gene. The in vivo physiological significance of SGK dependent regulation of the other channels remains to be shown even though circumstantial evidence points to involvement in the regulation of epithelial transport, cell volume, cell proliferation, cardiac action potential and neuroexcitability. There is little doubt that further channels will be identified which are modulated by the SGKs and that further in vivo physiological functions will be defined where channel regulation by the SGKs plays a critical role.
Impact of imperfect channel estimation on the performance of amplify-and-forward relaying

In this paper, we investigate the error rate performance of amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying with imperfect channel estimation. We consider a single-relay scenario with orthogonal and non-orthogonal AF (OAF and NAF) cooperative protocols. Two pilot-symbol-assisted receiver architectures are studied: in the mismatched-coherent receiver, the complex fading channel coefficients (i.e., both phase and amplitude) are estimated based on a linear minimum-mean-squared-error estimation approach and fed to a coherent sub-optimal maximum likelihood decoder as if the channels were perfectly known. In the partially-coherent receiver, channel amplitude is ignored and phase is estimated by a phase locked loop. For both receiver types, we analyze the achievable diversity orders for cooperative protocols under consideration and quantify the impact of channel estimation through the derivation of pairwise error probability. Our performance analysis reveals that a second order diversity order is obtained for the considered single-relay scenario indicating that full diversity is extracted. Our simulation results demonstrate that the performance degradation due to channel estimation with respect to the genie bound (i.e., perfect channel state information) is as small as 1.1 dB based on the employed detector. Performance results further show that partially-coherent receiver presents a similar performance to mismatched-receiver for sufficiently large loop SNRs although channel amplitude is completely ignored.