Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Connectivity between the superior colliculus and the amygdala in humans and macaque monkeys: virtual dissection with probabilistic DTI tractography

It has been suggested that some cortically blind patients can process the emotional valence of visual stimuli via a fast, subcortical pathway from the superior colliculus (SC) that reaches the amygdala via the pulvinar. We provide in vivo evidence for connectivity between the SC and the amygdala via the pulvinar in both humans and rhesus macaques. Probabilistic diffusion tensor imaging tractography revealed a streamlined path that passes dorsolaterally through the pulvinar before arcing rostrally to traverse above the temporal horn of the lateral ventricle and connect to the lateral amygdala. To obviate artifactual connectivity with crossing fibers of the stria terminalis, the stria was also dissected. The putative streamline between the SC and amygdala traverses above the temporal horn dorsal to the stria terminalis and is positioned medial to it in humans and lateral to it in monkeys. The topography of the streamline was examined in relation to lesion anatomy in five patients who had previously participated in behavioral experiments studying the processing of emotionally valenced visual stimuli. The pulvinar lesion interrupted the streamline in two patients who had exhibited contralesional processing deficits and spared the streamline in three patients who had no deficit. Although not definitive, this evidence supports the existence of a subcortical pathway linking the SC with the amygdala in primates. It also provides a necessary bridge between behavioral data obtained in future studies of neurological patients, and any forthcoming evidence from more invasive techniques, such as anatomical tracing studies and electrophysiological investigations only possible in nonhuman species.
Francisella novicida Pathogenicity Island Encoded Proteins Were Secreted during Infection of Macrophage-Like Cells

Intracellular pathogens and other organisms have evolved mechanisms to exploit host cells for their life cycles. Virulence genes of some intracellular bacteria responsible for these mechanisms are located in pathogenicity islands, such as secretion systems that secrete effector proteins. The Francisella pathogenicity island is required for phagosomal escape, intracellular replication, evasion of host immune responses, virulence, and encodes a type 6 secretion system. We hypothesize that some Francisella novicida pathogenicity island proteins are secreted during infection of host cells. To test this hypothesis, expression plasmids for all Francisella novicida FPI-encoded proteins with C-terminal and N-terminal epitope FLAG tags were developed. These plasmids expressed their respective epitope FLAG-tagged proteins at their predicted molecular weights. J774 murine macrophage-like cells were infected with Francisella novicida containing these plasmids. The FPI proteins expressed from these plasmids successfully restored the intramacrophage growth phenotype in mutants of the respective genes that were deficient for intramacrophage growth. Using these expression plasmids, the localization of the Francisella pathogenicity island proteins were examined via immuno-fluorescence microscopy within infected macrophage-like cells. Several Francisella pathogenicity island encoded proteins (IglABCDEFGHIJ, PdpACE, DotU and VgrG) were detected extracellularly and they were co-localized with the bacteria, while PdpBD and Anmk were not detected and thus remained inside bacteria. Proteins that were co-localized with bacteria had different patterns of localization. The localization of IglC was dependent on the type 6 secretion system. This suggests that some Francisella pathogenicity island proteins were secreted while others remain within the bacterium during infection of host cells as structural components of the secretion system and were necessary for secretion.
The role of ceramide of human macrophage gangliosides in activation of human macrophages

Gangliosides of macrophages have immunoregulatory and structural attributes, distinct from neural gangliosides. We previously produced a monoclonal antibody to human macrophage gangliosides (HMG; mAb25F4), which inhibited macrophage migration and recognized a surface‐accessible epitope. We investigated expanded immunoregulatory properties and molecular domains for antibody recognition. mAb25F4 directly induced human macrophage production of proinflammatory cytokines, interleukin‐1β, and tumor necrosis factor α. Conditions were established for selective, reversible depletion of HMG with D‐threo‐(R, R)‐1‐phenyl‐2‐decanoyl‐amino‐3‐morpholine‐1‐propa‐nol. mAb25F4 had diminished recognition for ganglioside‐depleted macrophages, which was restored with regeneration of gangliosides. Although desialylation of HMG did not impair mAb25F4 recognition, enzymatic cleavage of ceramide abolished antibody binding. Antibody recognition was specific for the ceramide fraction, with preferential recognition or ceramide of HMG and murine macrophage gangliosides and limited recognition for neural tissue ceramide and gangliosides. This study underscores the importance of structurally distinct ceramide of macrophage gangliosides as a critical domain for ganglioside‐mediated activation of human macrophages.
The influence of subjects' personality traits on personal spatial zones in a human-robot interaction experiment

In the present study we investigated human-robot and robot-human approach distances. We found that subjects' personality profiles influence personal spatial zones in human-robot interaction experiments. We tested two hypotheses: first, we predicted that approach distances preferred by humans when interacting with a robot would be comparable to those preferred when humans interact socially with each other. Our experiments involving humans interacting with a mobile robot confirm this hypothesis. However, surprisingly, a large minority of subjects in the experiments took up positions which were significantly closer, suggesting that they were not treating the robot as a "social entity". We then tested the hypothesis that common personality factors exist which could be used to predict subjects' likely approach distance preferences. The subjects' personalities were assessed using several traits from the three-factor Eysenck personality model. Further analysis of the data identified four new factors, different from Eysenck's model, tentatively labeled "proactiveness", "social reluctance", "timidity" and "nervousness". When testing for correlations between approach distances and personality data, "proactiveness" correlates with social distance, i.e. subjects that score higher on this factor come less close to the robot. We discuss the potential suitability of personality factors to predict approach distances in human-robot interaction experiments.
Patterns of morning and evening fatigue among adults with HIV/AIDS.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES Describe patterns of morning and evening fatigue in adults with HIV and examine their relationship to demographic and clinical factors and other symptoms. BACKGROUND Most studies of HIV-related fatigue assess average levels of fatigue and do not address its diurnal fluctuations. Patterns of fatigue over the course of the day may have important implications for assessment and treatment. DESIGN A cross-sectional, correlational design was used with six repeated measures over 72 hours. METHOD A convenience sample of 318 HIV-infected adults was recruited in San Francisco. Socio-demographic, clinical and symptom data were collected with questionnaires. CD4+ T-cell count and viral load were obtained from medical records. Participants completed a four-item version of the Lee Fatigue Scale each morning and evening for three consecutive days. Participants were grouped based on their diurnal pattern of fatigue (high evening only, high morning only, high morning and evening and low morning and evening). Group comparisons and logistic regression were used to determine the unique predictors of each fatigue pattern. RESULTS The high evening fatigue pattern was associated with anxiety and the high morning pattern was associated with anxiety and depression. The morning fatigue pattern showed very little fluctuation between morning and evening, the evening pattern showed the largest fluctuation. The high morning and evening pattern was associated with anxiety, depression and sleep disturbance and this group reported the most fatigue-related distress and interference in functioning. CONCLUSIONS These results provide initial evidence for the importance of assessing the patient's daily pattern of fatigue fluctuation, as different patterns were associated with different symptom experiences and perhaps different aetiologies. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE Different fatigue patterns may benefit from tailored intervention strategies. Management of depressive symptoms could be tested in patients who experience high levels of morning fatigue.
Approaches to language identification using Gaussian mixture models and shifted delta cepstral features

Published results indicate that automatic language identification (LID) systems that rely on multiple-language phone recognition and n-gram language modeling produce the best performance in formal LID evaluations. By contrast, Gaussian mixture model (GMM) systems, which measure acoustic characteristics, are far more efficient computationally but have tended to provide inferior levels of performance. This paper describes two GMM-based approaches to language identification that use shifted delta cepstra (SDC) feature vectors to achieve LID performance comparable to that of the best phone-based systems. The approaches include both acoustic scoring and a recently developed GMM tokenization system that is based on a variation of phonetic recognition and language modeling. System performance is evaluated on both the CallFriend and OGI corpora.
Cellular and Humoral Immunity Protect against Vaginal Zika Virus Infection in Mice

ABSTRACT Zika virus (ZIKV), which can cause devastating disease in fetuses of infected pregnant women, can be transmitted by mosquito inoculation and sexual routes. Little is known about immune protection against sexually transmitted ZIKV. In this study, we show that previous infection through intravaginal or subcutaneous routes with a contemporary Brazilian strain of ZIKV can protect against subsequent intravaginal challenge with a homologous strain. Both routes of inoculation induced high titers of ZIKV-specific and neutralizing antibody in serum and the vaginal lumen. Virus-specific T cells were recruited to and retained in the female reproductive tract after intravaginal and subcutaneous ZIKV infection. Studies in mice with genetic or acquired deficiencies in B and/or T cells demonstrated that both lymphocyte populations redundantly protect against intravaginal challenge in ZIKV-immune animals. Passive transfer of ZIKV-immune IgG or T cells significantly limited intravaginal infection of naive mice, although antibody more effectively prevented dissemination throughout the reproductive tract. Collectively, our experiments begin to establish the immune correlates of protection against intravaginal ZIKV infection, which should inform vaccination strategies in nonpregnant and pregnant women. IMPORTANCE The recent ZIKV epidemic resulted in devastating outcomes in fetuses and may affect reproductive health. Unlike other flaviviruses, ZIKV can be spread by sexual contact as well as a mosquito vector. While previous studies have identified correlates of protection for mosquito-mediated infection, few have focused on immunity against sexual transmission. As exposure to ZIKV via mosquito bite has likely occurred to many living in areas where ZIKV is endemic, our study addresses whether this route of infection can protect against subsequent sexual exposure. We demonstrate that subcutaneous ZIKV infection can protect against subsequent vaginal infection by generating both local antiviral T cell and antibody responses. Our research begins to define the immune correlates of protection for ZIKV infection in the vagina and provides a foundation for testing ZIKV vaccines against sexual transmission.
Gender and age at drinking onset affect voluntary alcohol consumption but neither the alcohol deprivation effect nor the response to stress in mice.

BACKGROUND Epidemiological studies suggest that initiation of alcohol drinking at an early age is associated with an increased risk of developing an alcohol use disorder later in life. Nevertheless, relatively few studies using animal models have investigated the relationship between age of onset of drinking and ethanol drinking patterns in adulthood. Besides age at drinking onset, other factors such as gender could also affect the pattern of development of alcohol consumption. In rodents, many studies have shown that females drink more than males. However, even if it is assumed that hormonal changes occurring at puberty could explain these differences, only one study performed in rats has investigated the emergence of sex-specific alcohol drinking patterns in adolescence and the transition from adolescence to adulthood. The aim of the present study was to compare the acquisition of voluntary alcohol consumption, relapse-like drinking (the Alcohol Deprivation Effect-ADE) and stress-induced alcohol drinking in male and female outbred mice that acquired alcohol consumption during adolescence or adulthood. METHODS Separate groups of naïve female and male WSC-1 mice aged +/- 28 days (adolescents) or +/-70 days (adults) were given ad libitum access to water and 6% ethanol solution for 8 weeks (1st to 8th week) before undergoing a 2-week deprivation phase (9th and 10th week). After the deprivation period, 2-bottle preference testing (ethanol vs. water) resumed for 3 weeks (11th to 13th). During the 13th week, all animals were subjected to restraint stress for 2 consecutive days. RESULTS Over the entire time course of the experiment, ethanol intake and preference increased in females (both adults and adolescents). Adolescent animals (both females and males) showed a transient increase in alcohol consumption and preference compared to adults. However, by the end of continuous alcohol exposure (when all mice were adults), ethanol intake was not affected by age at drinking onset. A deprivation phase was followed by a rise in ethanol intake (ADE) that was not affected by sex or age. Finally, stress did not alter alcohol self-administration either during or after its occurrence. CONCLUSIONS Emergence of greater alcohol consumption in adult females does not seem to be limited to a specific developmental period (i.e., puberty). Age of voluntary drinking onset (adolescence vs. adulthood) does not affect eventual alcohol intake in adult WSC-1 mice and does not modify the transient increase in ethanol consumption after alcohol deprivation.
Shrimps that pay attention: saccadic eye movements in stomatopod crustaceans

Discovering that a shrimp can flick its eyes over to a fish and follow up by tracking it or flicking back to observe something else implies a ‘primate-like’ awareness of the immediate environment that we do not normally associate with crustaceans. For several reasons, stomatopods (mantis shrimp) do not fit the general mould of their subphylum, and here we add saccadic, acquisitional eye movements to their repertoire of unusual visual capabilities. Optically, their apposition compound eyes contain an area of heightened acuity, in some ways similar to the fovea of vertebrate eyes. Using rapid eye movements of up to several hundred degrees per second, objects of interest are placed under the scrutiny of this area. While other arthropod species, including insects and spiders, are known to possess and use acute zones in similar saccadic gaze relocations, stomatopods are the only crustacean known with such abilities. Differences among species exist, generally reflecting both the eye size and lifestyle of the animal, with the larger-eyed more sedentary species producing slower saccades than the smaller-eyed, more active species. Possessing the ability to rapidly look at and assess objects is ecologically important for mantis shrimps, as their lifestyle is, by any standards, fast, furious and deadly.
The Use of Resilience Strategies in Crowd Management at a Music Festival : and the safety organization’s role in avoiding crowd conflict

Each year people are injured and even die in crowd related accidents, often during planned events. Recent studies have emphasized the need for using a systems approach to study these events. In this study the systems approach of resilience theory is combined with the crowd psychology-models Extended Social Identity Model and the Aggravation and Mitigation Model to examine event safety at a music festival, a domain previously largely unexplored by these perspectives. By using an ethnographic approach as well as interviewing visitors the study set out to answer questions about when and how the safety organization adjusted itself under conditions relating to crowds. Another goal was to study the social identity of the visitors as well as the interaction between the safety organization and the visitors at the festival to explain the presence or absence of crowd conflict. Using thematic analysis several situations were identified where the safety organization adjusted itself, as well as the strategies that the organization used in these different circumstances. It was also concluded that the absence of crowd conflict could best be explained by three factors. First of all, no history of crowd conflict existed between the safety organization and the visitors, secondly, there were no groups present with the goal of creating conflict, and thirdly, the social processes taking place between the safety organization and the visitors were all mitigating in nature. The mitigating nature of the social processes was partly attributable to the strategies identified for adjusting to crowd conditions.
Evidence of Multiple Virulence Subtypes in Nosocomial and Community-Associated MRSA Genotypes in Companion Animals from the Upper Midwestern and Northeastern United States

Objective: Not much is known about the zoonotic transmission of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) in companion animals in the United States. We report the rate of prevalence of S. aureus and MRSA recovered from clinical samples of animals requiring treatment at veterinary clinics throughout the upper midwestern and northeastern United States. Design: We compared phenotypes, genotypes, and virulence profiles of the MRSA isolates identified in companion animals, such as cats, dogs, horses, and pigs, with typical human nosocomial and community-associated MRSA (CA-MRSA) genotypes to assess implied zoonotic transmission or zooanthroponosis. Five hundred thirty-three coagulase-positive staphylococci (CPS) isolates recovered between 2006 and 2008 from a variety of animal-source samples were screened for S. aureus by S. aureus-specific 16S rDNA primers and were screened for methicillin-resistance. All MRSA isolates were genotyped by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE), multilocus sequence typing (MLST), and spa typing. They were also screened for common staphylococcal enterotoxin and adhesion genes by multiplex and singleplex PCR. Results: Among the 533 CPS isolates recovered, 66 (12.4%) were determined to be S. aureus and 24 (4.5%) were MRSA. The percent of animals that were positive for S. aureus were as follows: 6.6% (32 of 487) dogs, 39.6% (19 of 48) cats, 83.3% (10 of 12) horses, and 100% of pigs, rabbits, hamsters and rats. Notably, 36.4% of all S. aureus identified were MRSA. Methicillin-resistant S. aureus was present in clinical samples from 12 of 487 dogs (2.5%), 6 of 48 cats (12.5%), 5 of 12 horses (42%), and 1 of 2 pigs (50%). The 24 MRSA isolates resolved into 4 PFGE clones: USA100 (50%), USA300 (16.7%), USA500 (20.8%) and USA800 (12.5%) and 6 sequence types (ST5, ST8, ST105, ST830, and ST986) or 2 clonal complexes, CC5 and CC8. Five major virulence profiles (clusters A to E) were observed in these MRSA isolates. Genotypic and virulence profiles of cats and dogs were more similar to each other than to those of horses. A Panton-Valentine leukocidin positive isolate with ST8:USA300 background was identified in a pig causing skin and soft infection. Conclusion: The presence of human MRSA clones in these animals suggests possible reverse zoonotic transmission. This study reports the first case of a USA300 genotype in a pig. Presence of multiple virulence profiles within a MRSA genotype in these animals suggests the potential of emergence of new MRSA clones by gaining or losing additional virulence genes.
Cytokine-Stimulated GTP Cyclohydrolase I Expression in Endothelial Cells Requires Coordinated Activation of Nuclear Factor-&kgr;B and Stat1/Stat3

Endothelial production of nitric oxide (NO) is dependent on adequate cellular levels of tetrahydrobiopterin (BH4), an important cofactor for the nitric oxide synthases. Vascular diseases are often characterized by vessel wall inflammation and cytokine treatment of endothelial cells increases BH4 levels, in part through the induction of GTP cyclohydrolase I (GTPCH I), the rate-limiting enzyme for BH4 biosynthesis. However, the molecular mechanisms of cytokine-mediated GTPCH I induction in the endothelium are not entirely clear. We sought to investigate the signaling pathways whereby cytokines induce GTPCH I expression in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). Interferon-&ggr; (IFN-&ggr;) induced endothelial cell GTPCH I protein and BH4 modestly, whereas high-level induction required combinations of IFN-&ggr; and tumor necrosis factor-&agr; (TNF-&agr;). In the presence of IFN-&ggr;, TNF-&agr; increased GTPCH I mRNA in a manner dependent on nuclear factor-&kgr;B (NF-&kgr;B), as this effect was abrogated by overexpression of a dominant-negative I&kgr;B construct. HUVEC IFN-&ggr; treatment resulted in signal transducer and activator of transcription 1 (Stat1) activation and DNA binding in a Jak2-dependent manner, as this was inhibited by AG490. Conversely, overexpression of Jak2 effectively substituted for IFN-&ggr; in supporting TNF-&agr;–mediated GTPCH I induction. The role of IFN-&ggr; was also Stat1-dependent as Stat1-null cells exhibited no GTPCH I induction in response to cytokines. However, Stat1 activation with oncostatin M failed to support TNF-&agr;–mediated GTPCH I induction because of concomitant Stat3 activation. Consistent with this notion, siRNA-mediated Stat3 gene silencing allowed oncostatin M to substitute for IFN-&ggr; in this system. These data implicate both NF-&kgr;B and Stat1 in endothelial cell cytokine-stimulated GTPCH I induction and highlight the role of Stat3 in modulating Stat1-supported gene transcription. Thus, IFN-&ggr; and TNF-&agr; exert distinct but cooperative roles for BH4 biosynthesis in endothelium that may have important implications for vascular function during vascular inflammation.