Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Growth pattern of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS): a retrospective analysis based on mammographic findings

The aim of this study was to obtain information concerning the direction and rates of growth of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS). The previous mammograms of 124 women diagnosed with DCIS were examined. If in retrospect calcifications were present on the previous examination, the exact size and position were recorded on both diagnostic and previous imaging. The rates of change and direction of change in extent of calcifications were calculated. 39 women with a diagnosis of DCIS in retrospect had calcifications visible on both their current and prior examinations; these formed the study group. For individual clusters of calcification, change occurred along an axis to the nipple at a mean of 5.5 mm y–1and along an axis at 90° to the nipple at 2.6 mm y–1. Increase in calcifications along the axis to the nipple occurred at 2.6 mm y–1toward and 2.8 mm y–1away from the nipple. Increase in the axis to the nipple occurred at 1.8 mm y–1for low grade, 4.2 mm y–1for intermediate grade and 7.1 mm y–1for high grade. DCIS growth along an axis to the nipple occurs at over twice the rate of growth in the other direction(s) and growth toward and away from the nipple occurred equally. Growth rates increased with increasing nuclear grade of DCIS. These results validate nuclear grading of DCIS. Additionally, the results suggest that increased importance should be placed on identifying the ‘nipple’ and ‘anti-nipple’ margins of DCIS represented by calcifications for both surgical excision and pathological scrutiny. © 2001 Cancer Research Compaign http://www.bjcancer. com
Preparation and Evaluation of Berberine Alginate Beads for Stomach-Specific Delivery

The purpose of this research was to prepare floating calcium alginate beads of berberine for targeting the gastric mucosa and prolonging their gastric residence time. The floating beads were prepared by suspending octodecanol and berberine in sodium alginate (SA) solution. The suspension was then dripped into a solution of calcium chloride. The hydrophobic and low-density octodecanol enhanced the sustained-release properties and floating ability of the beads. The bead formulation was optimized for different weight ratios of octodecanol and SA and evaluated in terms of diameter, floating ability and drug loading, entrapment and release. In vitro release studies showed that the floating and sustained release time were effectively increased in gastric media by addition of octodecanol. In vivo studies with rats showed that a significant increase in gastric residence time of beads had been achieved.
“I” Seek Pleasures and “We” Avoid Pains: The Role of Self-Regulatory Goals in Information Processing and Persuasion

In four experiments, we show that goals associated with approach and avoidance needs influence persuasion and that the accessibility of distinct self-views moderates these effects. Specifically, individuals with an accessible independent selfview are more persuaded by promotion-focused information that is consistent with an approach goal. In contrast, individuals whose interdependent self-view is more accessible are more persuaded by prevention focused information that is consistent with an avoidance goal. When the persuasive appeal is compatible with self-regulatory focus, individuals demonstrate greater recall of the message content and are more discerning regarding argument strength. These findings provide convergent evidence that central processing under goal compatible conditions underlies the persuasion effects.
Discovery of Dual-Action Membrane-Anchored Modulators of Incretin Receptors

Background The glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP) and the glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptors are considered complementary therapeutic targets for type 2 diabetes. Using recombinant membrane-tethered ligand (MTL) technology, the present study focused on defining optimized modulators of these receptors, as well as exploring how local anchoring influences soluble peptide function. Methodology/Principal Findings Serial substitution of residue 7 in membrane-tethered GIP (tGIP) led to a wide range of activities at the GIP receptor, with [G7]tGIP showing enhanced efficacy compared to the wild type construct. In contrast, introduction of G7 into the related ligands, tGLP-1 and tethered exendin-4 (tEXE4), did not affect signaling at the cognate GLP-1 receptor. Both soluble and tethered GIP and GLP-1 were selective activators of their respective receptors. Although soluble EXE4 is highly selective for the GLP-1 receptor, unexpectedly, tethered EXE4 was found to be a potent activator of both the GLP-1 and GIP receptors. Diverging from the pharmacological properties of soluble and tethered GIP, the newly identified GIP-R agonists, (i.e. [G7]tGIP and tEXE4) failed to trigger cognate receptor endocytosis. In an attempt to recapitulate the dual agonism observed with tEXE4, we conjugated soluble EXE4 to a lipid moiety. Not only did this soluble peptide activate both the GLP-1 and GIP receptors but, when added to receptor expressing cells, the activity persists despite serial washes. Conclusions These findings suggest that conversion of a recombinant MTL to a soluble membrane anchored equivalent offers a means to prolong ligand function, as well as to design agonists that can simultaneously act on more than one therapeutic target.
ASYMPTOTIC OPENING ANGLES FOR COLLIDING-WIND BOW SHOCKS: THE CHARACTERISTIC-ANGLE APPROXIMATION

By considering the advection and interaction of the vector momentum flux in highly supersonic spherically diverging winds, we derive a simple analytic description of the asymptotic opening angle of a wind-collision shock cone, in the approximation that the shocked gas is contained in a cone streaming out along a single characteristic opening angle. Both highly radiative and highly adiabatic limits are treated, and their comparison is the novel result. Analytic closed-form expressions are obtained for the inferred wind momentum ratios as a function of the observed shock opening angle, allowing the conspicuous shape of the asymptotic bow shock to be used as a preliminary constraint on more detailed modeling of the colliding winds. In the process, we explore from a general perspective the limitations in applying to the global shock geometry the so-called Dyson approximation, which asserts a local balance in the perpendicular ram pressure across the shock.
Image Quality Assessment Based on Gradient Similarity

In this paper, we propose a new image quality assessment (IQA) scheme, with emphasis on gradient similarity. Gradients convey important visual information and are crucial to scene understanding. Using such information, structural and contrast changes can be effectively captured. Therefore, we use the gradient similarity to measure the change in contrast and structure in images. Apart from the structural/contrast changes, image quality is also affected by luminance changes, which must be also accounted for complete and more robust IQA. Hence, the proposed scheme considers both luminance and contrast-structural changes to effectively assess image quality. Furthermore, the proposed scheme is designed to follow the masking effect and visibility threshold more closely, i.e., the case when both masked and masking signals are small is more effectively tackled by the proposed scheme. Finally, the effects of the changes in luminance and contrast-structure are integrated via an adaptive method to obtain the overall image quality score. Extensive experiments conducted with six publicly available subject-rated databases (comprising of diverse images and distortion types) have confirmed the effectiveness, robustness, and efficiency of the proposed scheme in comparison with the relevant state-of-the-art schemes.
A machine‐learning approach to negation and speculation detection for sentiment analysis

Recognizing negative and speculative information is highly relevant for sentiment analysis. This paper presents a machine‐learning approach to automatically detect this kind of information in the review domain. The resulting system works in two steps: in the first pass, negation/speculation cues are identified, and in the second phase the full scope of these cues is determined. The system is trained and evaluated on the Simon Fraser University Review corpus, which is extensively used in opinion mining. The results show how the proposed method outstrips the baseline by as much as roughly 20% in the negation cue detection and around 13% in the scope recognition, both in terms of F1. In speculation, the performance obtained in the cue prediction phase is close to that obtained by a human rater carrying out the same task. In the scope detection, the results are also promising and represent a substantial improvement on the baseline (up by roughly 10%). A detailed error analysis is also provided. The extrinsic evaluation shows that the correct identification of cues and scopes is vital for the task of sentiment analysis.
Intrusion detection based on Core Vector Machine and ensemble classification methods

With the widespread use of Internet, the possibilities of exposing confidential data to invaders or attackers increases. Intrusion Detection System (IDS) is used for detecting various intrusions in network environment and to prevent data from malicious attackers. In this paper, a combined algorithm based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Core Vector Machine (CVM), which is an extremely fast classifier, is proposed for intrusion detection. PCA is used as feature extraction technique to select principal features from the intrusion detection KDDCup'99 dataset and an intrusion detection model is constructed by CVM algorithm. The effectiveness of the features selected is also tested on ensemble based classifiers and the results are compared with the standard classifiers.
Sensory Input-Dependent Changes in Glutamatergic Neurotransmission- Related Genes and Proteins in the Adult Rat Trigeminal Ganglion

Experience-dependent plasticity induces lasting changes in the structure of synapses, dendrites, and axons at both molecular and anatomical levels. Whilst relatively well studied in the cortex, little is known about the molecular changes underlying experience-dependent plasticity at peripheral levels of the sensory pathways. Given the importance of glutamatergic neurotransmission in the somatosensory system and its involvement in plasticity, in the present study, we investigated gene and protein expression of glutamate receptor subunits and associated molecules in the trigeminal ganglion (TG) of young adult rats. Microarray analysis of naïve rat TG revealed significant differences in the expression of genes, coding for various glutamate receptor subunits and proteins involved in clustering and stabilization of AMPA receptors, between left and right ganglion. Long-term exposure to sensory-enriched environment increased this left–right asymmetry in gene expression. Conversely, unilateral whisker trimming on the right side almost eliminated the mentioned asymmetries. The above manipulations also induced side-specific changes in the protein levels of glutamate receptor subunits. Our results show that sustained changes in sensory input induce modifications in glutamatergic transmission-related gene expression in the TG, thus supporting a role for this early sensory-processing node in experience-dependent plasticity.
The Convergence of Ethernet and Ethernot: A 10-Gigabit Ethernet Perspective

Recently, a vast number of interconnect technologies such as InﬁniBand, Myrinet and Quadrics have been introduced into the system-area network (SAN) environment; the primary driving requirements of this environment being high-performance and a feature-rich interface. Ethernet, on the other hand, is already the ubiquitous technology for wide-area network (WAN) environments. Traditionally, SAN technologies had been shut off from the WAN environment due to their incompatibility with the existing Ethernet compatible infrastructure. Similarly, Ethernet has traditionally not been considered a SAN interconnect due to its close to order-of-magnitude performance gap compared to other SAN interconnects such as InﬁniBand, Myrinet and Quadrics (informally called Ethernot networks). However, recently there has been a signiﬁcant push from both ends of the Ethernet-Ethernot spectrum leading to a convergence of Ethernet and Ethernot. For example, Ethernot networks such as Myrinet and Quadrics are attempting work-arounds in their technologies to allow Ethernet and hence WAN compatibility. Ethernet, on the other hand, is focusing on reaching the performance capabilities of Ethernot networks by utilizing the recently introduced 10-Gigabit Ethernet (10GigE) network and providing hardware ofﬂoaded protocol stacks (in particular hardware ofﬂoaded TCP/IP or TOE) similar to the other Ethernot networks. In this paper, we focus on the later approach and try to study the potential of 10GigE TOEs in bridging the Ethernet-Ethernot performance gap; speciﬁcally compared to the InﬁniBand and Myrinet networks. We carry out this evaluation in two stages. First, we compare the performance of the host-based TCP/IP stack over 10GigE to that of 10GigE TOEs in order to understand the performance gains achievable through the use of hardware ofﬂoaded protocol stacks for 10GigE. Next, we compare the performance of 10GigE TOEs with that of the other Ethernot networks providing similar hardware ofﬂoaded protocol stacks such as InﬁniBand and Myrinet. We carry out this evaluation using an extensive micro-benchmark suite as well as several sample real applications from various domains. Our experimental results demonstrate that not only can the performance of basic 10GigE be signiﬁcantly improved by utilizing the hardware ofﬂoaded protocol stack, but also the aforementioned Ethernet-Ethernot performance gap can be largely bridged between 10GigE, IBA, and Myrinet via the sockets interface.
Schistosoma mansoni Stomatin Like Protein-2 Is Located in the Tegument and Induces Partial Protection against Challenge Infection

Background Schistosomiasis affects more than 200 million individuals worldwide, with a further 650 million living at risk of infection, constituting a severe health problem in developing countries. Even though an effective treatment exists, it does not prevent re-infection, and the development of an effective vaccine still remains the most desirable means of control for this disease. Methodology/Principal Findings Herein, we report the cloning and characterization of a S. mansoni Stomatin-like protein 2 (SmStoLP-2). In silico analysis predicts three putative sites for palmitoylation (Cys11, Cys61 and Cys330), which could contribute to protein membrane association; and a putative mitochondrial targeting sequence, similar to that described for human Stomatin-like protein 2 (HuSLP-2). The protein was detected by Western blot with comparable levels in all stages across the parasite life cycle. Fractionation by differential centrifugation of schistosome tegument suggested that SmStoLP-2 displays a dual targeting to the tegument membranes and mitochondria; additionally, immunolocalization experiments confirm its localization in the tegument of the adult worms and, more importantly, in 7-day-old schistosomula. Analysis of the antibody isotype profile to rSmStoLP-2 in the sera of patients living in endemic areas for schistosomiasis revealed that IgG1, IgG2, IgG3 and IgA antibodies were predominant in sera of individuals resistant to reinfection as compared to those susceptible. Next, immunization of mice with rSmStoLP-2 engendered a 30%–32% reduction in adult worm burden. Protective immunity in mice was associated with specific anti-rSmStoLP-2 IgG1 and IgG2a antibodies and elevated production of IFN-γ and TNF-α, while no IL-4 production was detected, suggesting a Th1-predominant immune response. Conclusions/Significance Data presented here demonstrate that SmStoLP-2 is a novel tegument protein located in the host-parasite interface. It is recognized by different subclasses of antibodies in patients resistant and susceptible to reinfection and, based on the data from murine studies, shows protective potential against schistosomiasis. These results indicate that SmStoLP-2 could be useful in a combination vaccine.
Medical Image Visual Appearance Improvement Using Bihistogram Bezier Curve Contrast Enhancement: Data from the Osteoarthritis Initiative

Well-defined image can assist user to identify region of interest during segmentation. However, complex medical image is usually characterized by poor tissue contrast and low background luminance. The contrast improvement can lift image visual quality, but the fundamental contrast enhancement methods often overlook the sudden jump problem. In this work, the proposed bihistogram Bezier curve contrast enhancement introduces the concept of “adequate contrast enhancement” to overcome sudden jump problem in knee magnetic resonance image. Since every image produces its own intensity distribution, the adequate contrast enhancement checks on the image's maximum intensity distortion and uses intensity discrepancy reduction to generate Bezier transform curve. The proposed method improves tissue contrast and preserves pertinent knee features without compromising natural image appearance. Besides, statistical results from Fisher's Least Significant Difference test and the Duncan test have consistently indicated that the proposed method outperforms fundamental contrast enhancement methods to exalt image visual quality. As the study is limited to relatively small image database, future works will include a larger dataset with osteoarthritic images to assess the clinical effectiveness of the proposed method to facilitate the image inspection.
Experiments on multistrategy learning by meta-learning

In this paper, we propose meta-leaming as a general technique to combine the results of multiple learning algorithms, each applied to a set of training data. We detail several metalearning strategies for combining independently learned classifiers, each computed by different algorithms, to improve overall prediction accuracy. The overall resulting classifier is composed of the classifiers generated by the different learning algorithms and a meta-classifier generated by a meta-learning strategy. The strategies described here are independent of the learning algorithms used. Preliminm-y experiments using different strategies and learning algorithms on two molecular biology sequence analysis data sets demonstrate encouraging results. Machine learning techniques are central to automated knowledge discovery systems and hence our approach can enhance the effectiveness of such systems.
Measuring School Capacity, Maximizing School Improvement

It is an oft-heard refrain in schools: “These schools lack the capacity they need. ” Or, “We need to build capacity in schools so that students can achieve. ” In district offices, statehouses, and elsewhere, the sentiment is repeated in various forms, but the term “capacity” is almost always used. But what do education leaders mean when they use the word capacity? Some people use the word to mean the intangible behaviors or characteristics that are needed for a school to improve, while others use capacity as a synonym for ability or knowledge. Meanwhile, economists often talk about capacity in terms of quantities or outcomes that an organization is able to produce.
Association Between Toll-Like Receptors/CD14 Gene Polymorphisms and Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Korean Population

The innate immune response in patients who develop inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) may be abnormal. However, the exact role of Toll-like receptors (TLRs) / CD14 gene in the pathogenesis of IBD has not been fully elucidated. We aimed to investigate the association between polymorphisms of TLR1, 2, 4, 6, and CD14 gene and susceptibility to IBD in Korean population. A total 144 patients of IBD (99 patients with ulcerative colitis, 45 patients with Crohn's disease) and 178 healthy controls were enrolled. Using a PCR-RFLP, we evaluated mutations of TLR1 (Arg80Thr), TLR2 (Arg753Gln and Arg677Trp), TLR4 (Asp299Gly and Thr399Ile), TLR6 (Ser249Pro) genes and the -159 C/T promoter polymorphism of CD14 gene. No TLR polymorphisms were detected in Korean subjects. T allele and TT genotype frequencies of CD14 gene were significantly higher in IBD patients than in healthy controls. In subgroup analysis, T allelic frequency was higher in pancolitis phenotype of ulcerative colitis. In Korean population, the promoter polymorphism at -159 C/T of the CD14 gene is positively associated with IBD, both ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease.
Public space and the geography of the modern city

Public space is often seen as problem space in the modern city: it is now as it has always been a space of contention. It is the visible and accessible venue wherein the public – comprising institutions and citizens acting in concert – enact rituals and make claims designed to win recognition. This article discusses two theses which regard the public realm in the modern city from very different perspectives. It then seeks to understand the strikingly contrary conclusions about the public sphere by exploring several of the issues which proponents of the two viewpoints interpret differently.
TAF10 is required for the integrity of TFIID and SAGA complexes but is initially dispensable for somitogenesis in the mouse embryo

Cell fate and patterning during development are controlled by gene expression. Pre-initiation complex (PIC) formation at promoters is crucial to recruit the transcriptional machinery. The PIC has mainly been studied in vitro, and little is known about its composition and function during development. TAF10 is a subunit of TFIID and of the transcriptional co-activator SAGA. Here we characterized TFIID and SAGA's composition during mouse development. Our data indicate that TAF10 is required for TFIID and SAGA stability. To analyse TAF10-dependent gene regulation during development, we conditionally deleted Taf10 in the mesoderm. Our results provide evidence for a time window during which Taf10 loss in the presomitic mesoderm (PSM) does not prevent cyclic gene transcription or PSM patterning while lateral plate differentiation is profoundly altered. During this period, global steady state mRNA levels are not significantly affected in the PSM although the expression of a subset of specific genes is dysregulated. Together, our data demonstrate a differential sensibility of mesodermal tissues to the lack of TAF10. This supports a differential requirement for TAF10 by the general transcriptional machinery during different developmental processes.
Mutual Intercultural Relations among University Students in Canada.

Increasing the number of international students is part of the government’s plan to meet Canada’s economic needs, to offset an aging population and low birthrate, and to sustain the workforce. International students bring with them many benefits to Canada, including increased revenues to educational institutions and communities and enhanced diversity to learning environments (CBIE, 2014). In addition to these benefits to Canada, international students also benefit from living in Canada. Their education and school experience can help them to better access the work force if they choose to remain in Canada; and they may have a better work opportunity in their country of origin due to their study experience abroad. However, studying overseas may also present many challenges, including the experience of acculturative stress which is related to forming friendship with local students, perception of discrimination, feelings of loneliness, and academic concerns (CBIE, 2014; Chavajay & Skowronek, 2008; Safdar & Berno, in press).