Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prolactin and growth hormone responses to photoperiod in heifers.

Serum PRL, GH, and progesterone were measured at 1300 h twice weekly in heifers exposed to natural length or 16-h light (16L)-8-h dark (8D) during Nov. 11 to March 9 (n = 20) and April 30 to Aug. 13 (n = 18). Heifers exposed to 16L–8D received fluorescent light between 0600–2200 h daily. Serum PRL increased 4-fold in response to 16 h of artificial illumination between Nov. 11 and March 9 (P < 0.01), and increased 1.6-fold between April 30 and Aug. 13 (P < 0.01). Serum PRL fluctuations in natural and 16L–8D photoperiods were synchronized and positively correlated (r = 0.36–0.53) with changes in ambient temperature. Overall, serum PRL concentrations increased (P < 0.01) within 16L–8D and natural length photoperiods as ambient temperatures increased from -7 to +29 C. When ambient temperatures were below 0 C, serum PRL concentrations were similar in heifers exposed to natural and 16L–8D photoperiods. As ambient temperatures increased, serum PRL concentrations increased synergistically in animals exposed to 16.
HIV viremia and changes in kidney function

Objective:To evaluate the effect of HIV infection on longitudinal changes in kidney function and to identify independent predictors of kidney function changes in HIV-infected individuals. Design:A prospective cohort. Methods:Cystatin C was measured at baseline and at the 5-year follow-up visit of the Study of Fat Redistribution and Metabolic Change in HIV infection in 554 HIV-infected participants and 230 controls. Control participants were obtained from the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults study. Glomerular filtration rate (eGFRcys) was estimated using the formula 76.7 × cysC−1.19. Results:Compared with controls, HIV-infected participants had a greater proportion of clinical decliners (annual decrease in eGFRcys > 3 ml/min per 1.73 m2; 18 versus 13%, P = 0.002) and clinical improvers (annual increase in eGFRcys > 3 ml/min per 1.73 m2; 26 versus 6%, P < 0.0001). After multivariable adjustment, HIV infection was associated with higher odds of both clinical decline (odds ratio 2.2; 95% confidence interval 1.3, 3.9, P = 0.004) and clinical improvement (odds ratio 7.3; 95% confidence interval 3.9, 13.6, P ≤ 0.0001). Among HIV-infected participants, a decrease in HIV viral load during follow-up was independently associated with clinical improvement; conversely, higher baseline and an increase in viral load during follow-up were associated with clinical decline. No individual antiretroviral drug or drug class appeared to be substantially associated with clinical decline or improvement. Conclusion:Compared with controls, HIV-infected persons were more likely both to have clinical decline and clinical improvement in kidney function during 5 years of follow-up. The extent of viremic control had a strong association with longitudinal changes in kidney function.
Unity from duality.

When, in the primeval sea, creatures first began to crawl, "right" and "left" came into being, yielding neuronal nets to control response to the sidedness of stimuli. In the half billion years of moving and sensing, two brains have evolved, the right and the left; and human experience now shows them to be roughly equivalent, potentially independent, conscious entities. This dramatic fact is evidenced by "split-brain" patients and by numerous cases of therapeutic removal of either hemisphere. Equally dramatic, of course, is that there is not the slightest sign of this duality in everyday experience, the right and left visual fields are seamlessly knit, and cross purpose is absent in the moment to moment operation of the two cerebral hemispheres. This unity is constantly synthesized by the 100,000,000 fibers passing from each hemisphere to the other; the vastness of that interchange emphasized upon comparison with the mere 1,000,000 fibers conveying all the visual world from each eye. With the large distances in the human brain some 100+ ms may commonly transpire for one hemisphere to send to and receive a response from the other. Efficiency thus demands that most neuronal calculation occur within rather than between hemispheres, thereby promoting differences in the characteristic capabilities of each alone, i.e., "hemispheric specialization". Despite this there is a bewildering bilaterality of activation revealed by fMRI for most cognitive tasks. In the absence of the forebrain commissures brainstem systems can be shown, in macaques, also to participate in the unification of behavioral result from the actions of the separated hemispheres. The system favors synthesis from congruent (visual) input to the two hemispheres; but in the face of incompatible hemispheric input, the two hemispheres are able to work out an accommodation in their control of subcortical systems.
On stochastic resonance in a model of double diffusion

ABSTRACT The double diffusion model was proposed in the late 1970s and extended in 1980s and 1990s by Aifantis and co-workers. It is a continuum model that assumes two local non-equilibrium concentration fields abiding separate mass–momentum equations mediated by a linear mass exchange term. The present work deals with stochastic double diffusion of two competing phase densities to study transport in nanocrystals. We show that the presence of surface inhomogeneities and temporal delay, represented by stochastic dynamics, could have substantial impact at the interface of the two phases. The effect is most pronounced at a critical point (stochastic resonance), where maximum energy transfer occurs, thereby quantifying the impact of surface imperfections in nanocrystal dynamics. The results have been favourably compared with experimental data. This is part of a thematic issue on Small Scale Mechanics - EUROMAT.
An Integrated Clinico-Metabolomic Model Improves Prediction of Death in Sepsis

A molecular signature, derived from integrated analysis of clinical data, the metabolome, and the proteome in prospective human studies, improved the prediction of death in patients with sepsis, potentially identifying a subset of patients who merit intensive treatment. Understanding Survival of the Fittest in Sepsis Differentiating mild infections from life-threatening ones is a complex decision that is made millions of times a year in U.S. emergency rooms. Should a patient be sent home with antibiotics and chicken soup? Or should he or she be hospitalized for intensive treatment? Sepsis—a serious infection that is associated with a generalized inflammatory response—is one of the leading causes of death. In two prospective clinical studies reported by Langley et al., patients arriving at four urban emergency departments with symptoms of sepsis were evaluated clinically and by analysis of their plasma proteome and metabolome. Survivors and nonsurvivors at 28 days were compared, and a molecular signature was detected that appeared to differentiate these outcomes—even as early as the time of hospital arrival. The signature was part of a large set of differences between these groups, showing that better energy-producing fatty acid catabolism was associated with survival of the fittest in sepsis. A test developed from the signature was able to predict sepsis survival and nonsurvival reproducibly and better than current methods. This test could help to make all important decisions in the emergency room more accurate. Sepsis is a common cause of death, but outcomes in individual patients are difficult to predict. Elucidating the molecular processes that differ between sepsis patients who survive and those who die may permit more appropriate treatments to be deployed. We examined the clinical features and the plasma metabolome and proteome of patients with and without community-acquired sepsis, upon their arrival at hospital emergency departments and 24 hours later. The metabolomes and proteomes of patients at hospital admittance who would ultimately die differed markedly from those of patients who would survive. The different profiles of proteins and metabolites clustered into the following groups: fatty acid transport and β-oxidation, gluconeogenesis, and the citric acid cycle. They differed consistently among several sets of patients, and diverged more as death approached. In contrast, the metabolomes and proteomes of surviving patients with mild sepsis did not differ from survivors with severe sepsis or septic shock. An algorithm derived from clinical features together with measurements of five metabolites predicted patient survival. This algorithm may help to guide the treatment of individual patients with sepsis.
A Maximum Entropy Approach to Biomedical Named Entity Recognition

Machine learning approaches are frequently used to solve name entity (NE) recognition (NER). In this paper we propose a hybrid method that uses maximum entropy (ME) as the underlying machine learning method incorporated with dictionary-based and rule-based methods for post-processing. Simply using ME for NER, inaccurate boundary detection of NEs and misclassification may occur. Some NEs are partially recognized by ME. In the post-processing stage, we use dictionary-based and rule-based methods to extend boundary of partially recognized NEs and to adjust classification. We use GENIA corpus 3.01 to conduct 10-fold cross-verification experiments. To evaluate the performance, we consider the longest NE annotations. We evaluate our approach using standard precision (P), recall (R), and F-score, where F-score is defined as 2PR/(P+R). The precision, recall and F-score ([P, R, F]) of our ME module for overall 23 categories is [0.512, 0.538, 0.525], and after the post-processing the performance becomes [0.729, 0.711, 0.72] for [P, R, F]. For protein, DNA and RNA classes, our method achieves [P, R, F] of [0.77, 0.80, 0.785], [0.653, 0.748, 0.7], and [0.716, 0.788, 0.752], respectively. The post-processing stage significantly improves the performance of our ME-based NER module.
Generalized Spatio-Chromatic Diffusion

A framework for diffusion of color images is presented. The method is based on the theory of thermodynamics of irreversible transformations which provides a suitable basis for designing correlations between the different color channels. More precisely, we derive an equation for color evolution which comprises a purely spatial diffusive term and a nonlinear term that depends on the interactions among color channels over space. We apply the proposed equation to images represented in several color spaces, such as RGB, CIELAB, Opponent colors, and IHS.
Physical Mechanical Properties and Durability of Mortars Containing Tuff from Burkina Faso as Partial Substitution of CEM I

This paper presents the feasibility of using locally available limestone Tuff in Burkina Faso as a partial replacement for CEM I artificial Portland cement. To this end, standard tests were carried out in the laboratory on mortars containing variable proportions of Tuff in partial substitution of CEM I cement. These include heat of hydration, setting time, total shrinkage, compressive strength, capillary absorption and resistance to acid attack. The experimental results obtained show that Tuff can be used as a natural pozzolan. It is also noted that the incorporation of Tuff into cement has virtually no influence on the transfer properties of mortars. However, at a rate above 15% partial substitution of CEM I, the mechanical strength of mortars is considerably reduced. This is probably linked to the finesse of the Tuff used. A finer shredding improved the mechanical activity index. However, we note a better resistance to acid attack (sulphuric acid that can come from acid rain) of mortars containing Tuff compared to mortar based on artificial Portland cement. All these results have shown that the Tuff used in this work can be a solution for reducing CO2 emissions in cement production and also in reducing the price of cement in Burkina Faso.
Cardiovascular Mortality in Women With Obstructive Sleep Apnea With or Without Continuous Positive Airway Pressure Treatment

BACKGROUND Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a risk factor for cardiovascular death in men, but whether it is also a risk factor in women is unknown. OBJECTIVE To investigate whether OSA is a risk factor for cardiovascular death in women and assess whether continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) treatment is associated with a change in risk. DESIGN Prospective, observational cohort study. SETTING 2 sleep clinics in Spain. PATIENTS All women consecutively referred for suspected OSA between 1998 and 2007. INTERVENTION Every woman had a diagnostic sleep study. Women with an apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) less than 10 were the control group. Obstructive sleep apnea was diagnosed when the AHI was 10 or higher (classified as mild to moderate [AHI of 10 to 29] or severe [AHI ≥30]). Patients with OSA were classified as CPAP-treated (adherence ≥4 hours per day) or untreated (adherence <4 hours per day or not prescribed). Participants were followed until December 2009. MEASUREMENTS The end point was cardiovascular death. RESULTS 1116 women were studied (median follow-up, 72 months [interquartile range, 52 to 88 months]). The control group had a lower cardiovascular mortality rate (0.28 per 100 person-years [95% CI, 0.10 to 0.91]) than the untreated groups with mild to moderate OSA (0.94 per 100 person-years [CI, 0.10 to 2.40]; P = 0.034) or severe OSA (3.71 per 100 person-years [CI, 0.09 to 7.50]; P < 0.001). Compared with the control group, the fully adjusted hazard ratios for cardiovascular mortality were 3.50 (CI, 1.23 to 9.98) for the untreated, severe OSA group; 0.55 (CI, 0.17 to 1.74) for the CPAP-treated, severe OSA group; 1.60 (CI, 0.52 to 4.90) for the untreated, mild to moderate OSA group; and 0.19 (CI, 0.02 to 1.67) for the CPAP-treated, mild to moderate OSA group. LIMITATION The study was observational and not randomized, and OSA was diagnosed by 2 different methods. CONCLUSION Severe OSA is associated with cardiovascular death in women, and adequate CPAP treatment may reduce this risk. PRIMARY FUNDING SOURCE None.
The Role of LTST Hot Water immersion on Quality of Peach Fruit during Storage

Sadiq Khan1, Irfan Ullah1, Nadeem Khan2, Amjad Iqbal2,3*, Tariq Shah4, Farooq Shah2, Badshah Islam2, Arshad Ali2 and Rashad Waseem Khan Qadri3,5 1Department of Horticulture, The University of Agriculture Peshawar, Pakistan 2Department of Agriculture, Abdul Wali Khan University, Mardan, Pakistan 3Coconut Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Wenchang City, 571339, Hainan, China 4College of Economics and Land Management, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, Hubei 430070, China 5Institute of Horticulture, University of Agriculture Faisalabad, Pakistan
Viral load of patients with hantavirus pulmonary syndrome in Argentina

Hantavirus causes severe illness including pneumonia, which leads to hospitalization and often death. At present, there is no specific treatment available. The hantavirus pathogenesis is not well understood, but most likely both virus‐mediated and host‐mediated mechanisms, are involved. The aim of this study was to correlate viral load in samples of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome cases and hantavirus infected individuals, with clinical epidemiological parameters and disease outcome. The variables that could potentially be related with viral load were analyzed. The retrospective study included 73 cases or household contacts, with different clinical evolution. Viral load was measured by reverse‐transcription and real time polymerase chain reaction. There was no statistically significant association between blood viral RNA levels and severity of disease. However, viral load was inversely correlated with IgG response in a statistically significant manner. The level of viral RNA was significantly higher in patients infected with Andes virus South lineage, and was markedly low in persons infected with Laguna Negra virus. These results suggest that the infecting viral genotype is associated with disease severity, and that high viral load is associated with a low specific IgG response. Sex, age and disease severity were not related with viral load. Further investigations increasing strikingly the number of cases and also limiting the variables to be studied are necessary. J. Med. Virol. 87:1823–1830, 2015. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Single-Center Experience with Adjustable Annuloplasty Ring in Degenerative Mitral Regurgitation

Objective Owing to the complex anatomy of the mitral valve, successful surgical repair of degenerative regurgitation remains a challenging procedure in cardiac surgery. Methods This paper aimed to report on our single-center experience with 20 patients who received an adjustable annuloplasty ring (Cardinal ring, ValtechCardio Ltd, Or Yehuda, Israel) as part of their mitral valve repair procedure. The device allows for intraoperative echocardiography-guided ring size adjustments under beating-heart conditions. Results All of the 20 patients left the operating room without any residual mitral regurgitation. There was no risk of systolic anterior movement (SAM) because of image-guided fine tuning of the ring before weaning the patient from bypass. Conclusions Further multicenter data are required to prove the concept of adjustable annuloplasty devices.
The UV Properties of SDSS-Selected Quasars

We present an analysis of the broadband UV and optical properties of z ≲ 3.4 quasars matched in the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) General Data Release 1 (GR1) and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Data Release 3 (DR3). Of the 6371 SDSS DR3 quasars covered by 204 GALEX GR1 tiles, 5380 (84%) have near-UV detections, while 3034 (48%) have both near-UV and far-UV detections using a matching radius of 7″. Most of the DR3 sample quasars are detected in the near-UV until z ∼ 1.7, with the near-UV detection fraction dropping to ∼50% by z ∼ 2. Statistical tests performed on the distributions of nondetections indicate that the optically selected quasars missed in the UV tend to be optically faint or at high redshift. The GALEX positions are shown to be consistent with the SDSS astrometry to within an rms scatter of 0.6″-0.7″ in each coordinate, and the empirically determined photometric errors from multiepoch GALEX observations significantly exceed the Poissonian errors quoted in the GR1 object catalogs. The UV-detected quasars are well separated from stars in UV-optical color-color space, with the UV-optical relative colors suggesting a marginally detected population of reddened objects due to absorption along the line of sight or dust associated with the quasar. The resulting spectral energy distributions (SEDs) cover ∼350-9000 Å (rest frame), where the overall median SED peaks near the Lyα emission line, as found in other UV quasar studies. The large sample size allows us to construct median SEDs in small bins of redshift and luminosity, and we find that the median SED becomes harder (bluer) at UV wavelengths for quasars with lower continuum luminosity. The detected UV-optical flux as a function of redshift is qualitatively consistent with attenuation by intervening Lyman-absorbing clouds. A table containing the 6371 DR3 quasars covered by GALEX GR1 and the results of the matching is available in the electronic edition of the journal, and a table containing the overall median SED is also available.
Minimizing flow completion times in data centers

For provisioning large-scale online applications such as web search, social networks and advertisement systems, data centers face extreme challenges in providing low latency for short flows (that result from end-user actions) and high throughput for background flows (that are needed to maintain data consistency and structure across massively distributed systems). We propose L2DCT, a practical data center transport protocol that targets a reduction in flow completion times for short flows by approximating the Least Attained Service (LAS) scheduling discipline, without requiring any changes in application software or router hardware, and without adversely affecting the long flows. L2DCT can co-exist with TCP and works by adapting flow rates to the extent of network congestion inferred via Explicit Congestion Notification (ECN) marking, a feature widely supported by the installed router base. Though L2DCT is deadline unaware, our results indicate that, for typical data center traffic patterns and deadlines and over a wide range of traffic load, its deadline miss rate is consistently smaller compared to existing deadline-driven data center transport protocols. L2DCT reduces the mean flow completion time by up to 50% over DCTCP and by up to 95% over TCP. In addition, it reduces the completion for 99th percentile flows by 37% over DCTCP. We present the design and analysis of L2DCT, evaluate its performance, and discuss an implementation built upon standard Linux protocol stack.
Variation reduction for multistage manufacturing processes: a comparison survey of statistical‐process‐control vs stream‐of‐variation methodologies

The performance of Multistage Manufacturing Processes (MMPs) can be measured by quality, productivity and cost, which are inversely related to the variation of key product characteristics (KPCs). Therefore, it is crucial to reduce KPCs' variations by not only detecting the changes of process parameters, but also identifying the variation sources and eliminating them with corrective actions. Recent developments in the Stream‐of‐Variation (SoV) and Statistical‐Process‐Control (SPC) methodologies significantly improve the variation reduction for MMPs. This paper provides a review on the reported methodologies by comparing these two categories of methodologies in terms of their variation propagation modeling, process monitoring and diagnostic capability. With an illustrative case study, it is concluded that the recent advancements of SoV and SPC methodologies significantly improve the effectiveness of variation reduction. The discussion on the drawbacks of both methodologies also suggests the future research directions. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Circadian Variation of Cardiac K+ Channel Gene Expression

Background—Many cardiac arrhythmias have their own characteristic circadian variations. Because the expression of many genes, including clock genes, is regulated variably during a day, circadian variations of ion channel gene expression, if any, could contribute to the fluctuating alterations of cardiac electrophysiological characteristics and subsequent arrhythmogenesis. Methods and Results—To examine whether cardiac K+ channel gene expression shows a circadian rhythm, we analyzed the mRNA levels of 8 Kv and 6 Kir channels in rat hearts every 3 hours throughout 1 day. Among these channels, Kv1.5 and Kv4.2 genes showed significant circadian variations in their transcripts: ≈2-fold increase of Kv1.5 mRNA from trough at Zeitgeber time (ZT) 6 to peak at ZT18 and a completely reverse pattern in Kv4.2 mRNA (≈2-fold increase from trough at ZT18 to peak at ZT6). Actually, along with the variations in the immunoreactive proteins, the density of the transient outward and steady-state currents in isolated myocytes and the responses of atrial and ventricular refractoriness to 4-aminopyridine in isolated-perfused hearts showed differences between ZT6 and ZT18, a circadian pattern comparable to that of Kv1.5 and Kv4.2 gene expression. Reversal of light stimulation almost inverted these circadian rhythms, although pharmacological autonomic blockade only partially attenuated the rhythm of Kv1.5 but not of Kv4.2 transcripts. Conclusions—Among all the cardiac K+ channels, Kv1.5 and 4.2 channels are unique in showing characteristic circadian patterns in their gene expression, with Kv1.5 increase during the dark period partially dependent on &bgr;-adrenergic activities and Kv4.2 increase during the light period independent of the autonomic nervous function.