Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Morphological and Electrochemical Characterization of Ti/MxTiySnzO2 (M = Ir or Ru) Electrodes Prepared by the Polymeric Precursor Method

This paper describes the effect of the composition of the oxide films on the properties of electrodes Ti/MxTiySnzO2 (M = Ir or Ru) prepared by the polymeric precursor method. XRD studies showed that the anodes are formed by solid solutions. The electrodes containing IrO2 exhibit lower activity for the oxygen evolution reaction. The doping of the electrode surface with SnO2 improves the catalytic properties of the anodes. However, it should be held in appropriate compositions, because the change in the atomic ratio of this element shows a marked effect on the stability of the oxides. Electrode Ti/Ir0.2Ti0. 3Sn0.5O2 has lower lifetime, i.e. 6 hours. The 20% decrease in the stoichiometric amount of SnO2 increases the time to a value above 70 hours, as observed for Ti/Ir0.3Ti0. 4Sn0.3O2. Electrode Ti/Ru0.3Ti0. 4Sn0.3O2 shows lifetime of 11 hours; therefore IrO2 is more stable than RuO2 under the conditions investigated. These results suggest that electrode Ti/Ir0.3Ti0. 4Sn0.3O2 is promising for different applications, such as water electrolysis, capacitors and organic electrosynthesis.
Tryptophan depletion as a mechanism of gamma interferon-mediated chlamydial persistence

Previous studies have shown that the immune-regulated cytokine gamma interferon (IFN-gamma) activates host cells to restrict intracellular growth of the bacterial pathogen Chlamydia trachomatis by induction of the tryptophan-catabolizing enzyme indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO). Recently, subinhibitory levels of IFN-gamma were used to generate an in vitro persistent chlamydial infection characterized by large aberrant, noninfectious reticulate bodies from which infectious progeny could be recovered following the removal of IFN-gamma. Studies were done to determine if the mechanism functioning to induce chlamydiae to enter a persistent state in the presence of low levels of IFN-gamma was similar to that reported to inhibit chlamydial growth. Host cells treated with levels of IFN-gamma required to induce persistence were assessed for IDO activity by high-performance liquid chromatography analysis of tryptophan and its catabolic products. Substantial tryptophan catabolism was detected in acid-soluble cellular pools, indicating that the intracellular availability of this essential amino acid was limited under these conditions. In addition, a mutant cell line responsive to IFN-gamma but deficient in IDO activity was shown to support C. trachomatis growth, but aberrant organisms were not induced in response to IFN-gamma treatment. Analyses of infected cells cultured in medium with incremental levels of exogenous tryptophan indicated that persistent growth was induced by reducing the amount of this essential amino acid. These studies confirmed that nutrient deprivation by IDO-mediated tryptophan catabolism was the mechanism by which IFN-gamma mediates persistent growth of C. trachomatis.
Aix Map Task corpus: The French multimodal corpus of task-oriented dialogue

This paper introduces the Aix Map Task corpus, a corpus of audio and video recordings of task-oriented dialogues. It was modelled after the original HCRC Map Task corpus. Lexical material was designed for the analysis of speech and prosody, as described in Astésano et al. (2007). The design of the lexical material, the protocol and some basic quantitative features of the existing corpus are presented. The corpus was collected under two communicative conditions, one audio-only condition and one face-to-face condition. The recordings took place in a studio and a sound attenuated booth respectively, with head-set microphones (and in the face-to-face condition with two video cameras). The recordings have been segmented into Inter-Pausal-Units and transcribed using transcription conventions containing actual productions and canonical forms of what was said. It is made publicly available online.
Development of a multiplex PCR for identification of mastitis causing organisms

India Abstract: In the present study, a de novo multiplex polymerase chain reaction using genus specific primers for four organisms’ viz., E. coli , Klebsiella pneumoniae , Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus agalactiae were designed to identify and differentiate all the four organisms in a single reaction. Further, DNA was extracted from mastitic milk using three different methods and was subjected to multiplex polymerase chain reaction to compare and identify the best method out of these three methods based on the amplification results of multiplex polymerase chain reaction. It was observed from the study that multiplex PCR was able to amplify three organisms ( Streptococcus agalactiae , Klebsiella pneumoniae and E. coli ) successfully whereas was unable to amplify Staphylococcus aureus in the multiplex PCR. Mutiplex PCR when evaluated on the field samples using mastitic milk revealed SDS Triton DNA extraction method to be superior to Power Food Microbial DNA isolation Kit and Milk Bacterial DNA isolation kit method in isolating the bacterial DNA from the mastitic milk as indicated by amplification in multiplex PCR
Vitamin D receptor genetic polymorphisms and tuberculosis: updated systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND Host genetic susceptibility has been suggested as one of the most important explanations for inter-individual differences in tuberculosis (TB) risk. The vitamin D receptor (VDR) gene has been studied as a candidate locus due to genetic polymorphisms that affects the activity of the receptor and subsequent downstream vitamin D-mediated effects. METHODS We reviewed published studies on VDR polymorphisms and TB susceptibility up to 15 April 2009 and quantitatively summarised associations of the most widely studied polymorphisms (FokI, TaqI, ApaI and BsmI) using meta-analysis. RESULTS A total of 23 eligible studies were included in this review. Heterogeneous results were observed, which may be partly explained by the differences between populations. Among Asians, the FokI ff genotype showed a pronounced positive association (OR 2.0, 95%CI 1.3-3.2), a significant inverse association was observed for the BsmI bb genotype (OR 0.5, 95%CI 0.4-0.8), and marginal significant associations were found for TaqI and ApaI polymorphisms. However, none of the polymorphisms was significantly related to TB among Africans or South Americans. CONCLUSIONS The association of VDR polymorphisms with risk of TB observed in our analyses supports the hypothesis that vitamin D deficiency might play a role as risk factor during the development of TB.
Effects of Rest and Secondary Task on Simulated Truck-Driving Task Performance

The study was designed to examine the effects of extra task stimulation and extra rest on performance and fatigue of haul truck drivers engaged in a simulated driving task. Sixty male subjects, randomly selected from the population of truck drivers in a large mining company, operated a driving simulator for a period of 7 h. A 2 x 3 experimental design was employed including two levels of rest conditions and three levels of secondary-task manipulations. The results show that performance and perceived fatigue were significantly higher when a secondary task involving voice communication was added to the basic driving task, but an added vigilance task had less effect. An extra 30-minute rest period in the middle of the experimental session significantly alleviated the reported experience of fatigue but did not affect performance. The results are discussed in terms of their relevance to actual industrial driving tasks.
Multiple-Locus Variable-Number Tandem-Repeat Analysis as a Tool for Subtyping Listeria monocytogenes Strains

ABSTRACT Listeria monocytogenes, like many other food-borne bacteria, has certain strains that are commonly linked to outbreaks. Due to the relatively low numbers of affected individuals, outbreaks of L. monocytogenes can be difficult to detect. The current technique of molecular subtyping in PulseNet laboratories to identify genetically similar strains is pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). While PFGE is state-of-the-art, interlaboratory comparisons are difficult because the results are highly susceptible to discrepancies due to even minor variations in experimental conditions and the subjectivity of band marking. This research was aimed at the development of a multiple-locus variable-number tandem-repeat analysis (MLVA) that can be implemented in PulseNet laboratories to replace or complement existing protocols. MLVA has proven to be a rapid and highly discriminatory tool for subtyping many bacteria. In this study, a novel MLVA method for L. monocytogenes strains was developed utilizing eight loci multiplexed into two PCRs. The PCR products were separated by capillary gel electrophoresis for high throughput and accurate sizing, and the fragment sizes were analyzed and clustered based on the number of repeats. When tested against a panel of 193 epidemiologically linked and nonlinked isolates, this MLVA for L. monocytogenes strains demonstrates strong epidemiological concordance. Since MLVA is a high-throughput screening method that is fairly inexpensive, easy to perform, rapid, and reliable, it is well suited to interlaboratory comparisons during epidemiological investigations of food-borne illness.
In Vitro Evaluation of the Effect of Metered‐Dose Inhaler Administration Technique on Aerosolized Drug Delivery

The administration of aerosolized metered‐dose inhalers (MDIs) to mechanically ventilated patients is labor intensive due to the large number of activations required and the currently recommended 30‐ to 60‐second “wait and shake” between each puff. No studies have been published that assess the relationship between this delay between puffs and drug delivery. To address this issue, we conducted an in vitro, randomized, single‐blind study using fenoterol MDI containing technetium‐99m pertechnetate. Four modes of MDI administration were tested in triplicate by random sequence. Eight activations of the MDI were performed for each mode according to the following procedures: rapid succession (5 sec apart); 30‐second intervals and shaking MDI between two rapid activations; 30‐second intervals and shaking between each activation; and 60‐second intervals and shaking between each activation. Two closed in vitro systems were designed to collect and measure the radiolabeled aerosol. In the first system, the MDI was activated into a plastic collection container; with the second system, the MDI was administered through an aerosol holding chamber with attached circuit filter positioned on the inspiratory line of the ventilator circuit. Sixty‐second intervals between each activation were not tested with the second system. Radioactivity was measured before and after each mode of testing. No difference was found between the various modes of administration other than a 14% decrease in the amount of radioactivity released with the 60‐second waiting period between puffs, compared with their rapid succession when using the plastic collection container system. Our results support the hypothesis that the delay after each activation of a MDI may not be necessary.
Depressive symptoms and cognitive decline in a community population of older persons.

BACKGROUND An association between depressive symptoms and cognitive decline has been observed in selected cohorts of older people, but studies of defined populations have had conflicting results. OBJECTIVE To test whether the level of depressive symptoms predicted the rate of cognitive decline in a biracial community of older persons. METHODS 4392 older people (88% of those eligible) from a defined community in Chicago completed two or three structured interviews at approximately three year intervals for an average of 5.3 years. At the baseline interview, the number of depressive symptoms was assessed with a 10 item version of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression scale. Cognitive function was assessed at each interview with four performance tests, from which a previously established measure of global cognition was derived. Random effects models were used to assess change in cognition and its relation to depressive symptoms, controlling for age, sex, race, education, and baseline cognitive function. RESULTS Participants reported a median of one depressive symptom at baseline (interquartile range, 0 to 2). For each depressive symptom, the rate of cognitive decline increased by a mean of about 5%. Results were not substantially changed when persons with cognitive impairment at baseline were excluded, or when chronic illness or participation in cognitively stimulating activities was controlled, and the association was not modified by age, sex, race, or education. CONCLUSIONS The results suggest that depressive symptoms predict cognitive decline in old age.
Leukoedema of the buccal mucosa - A case report

A 28-year-old male patient complains of grayish-white patch on the left and right buccal mucosae. The patient gave a history of smoking six cigarettes per day for 6 years. The patch was noticed accidentally while brushing teeth. The general physical examination was non-contributory and the lesion was asymptomatic. On examination, the lesion is grayish-white in color with irregular borders which present at the level of occlusal plane in both the right and left buccal mucosae extending to retromolar trigone area [Figure 1]. Lesion was non-scrapable and persisted after stretching the mucosa. Based on the clinical examination and prevalent smoking habit, provisional diagnosis of leukoplakia was given. Biopsy of the lesion was performed to confirm the diagnosis. Histopathology
Frequency of fokI and taqI polymorphism of vitamin D receptor gene in Indian population and its association with 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels

BACKGROUND: The VDR protein is at the centre of the vitamin D endocrine system, a complex physiological system with substantial feedback regulatory mechanisms involved in maintaining serum calcium and 1, 25 dihydroxy vitamin D3. Variations in VDR gene are shown to have implications in several diseases and have also been implicated as an important genetic factor affecting bone mass. AIM: To determine the frequency of Fok I and Taq I variants in healthy Indian individuals and its association with 25-OH-Vitamin D levels. SETTINGS AND DESIGN: Blood samples were collected from 143 unrelated normal individuals (Male-84 and Female-59) and their genotypes determined. MATERIALS AND METHODS: After amplification by polymerase chain reaction, each polymorphism was genotyped by restriction fragment length polymorphism. For 100 normal healthy individuals 25-hydroxyvitamin D estimation was done using DiaSorin kit method. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS: Graph pad software was used to calculate the P values from the Chi-square. RESULTS: Out of 143 samples analyzed for FokI and TaqI polymorphisms the following genotypic frequency was obtained FF 59%, Ff 36%, ff 5% and TT 49%, Tt 43%, tt 8% respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Results indicate that the distribution of the polymorphic loci Fok I and Taq I vary considerably not only in different populations, but also within India. Furthermore, when the genotypes were analyzed with respect to 25-OH-Vitamin D levels, a significant association was seen for the Taq 1 SNP but not with the Fok I.
Oxidative Stress in Cardiovascular Inflammation: Its Involvement in Autoimmune Responses

Recently, it has become clear that atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disease in which inflammation and immune responses play a key role. Accelerated atherosclerosis has been reported in patients with autoimmune diseases, suggesting an involvement of autoimmune mechanisms in atherogenesis. Different self-antigens or modified self-molecules have been identified as target of humoral and cellular immune responses in patients with atherosclerotic disease. Oxidative stress, increasingly reported in these patients, is the major event causing structural modification of proteins with consequent appearance of neoepitopes. Self-molecules modified by oxidative events can become targets of autoimmune reactions, thus sustaining the inflammatory mechanisms involved in endothelial dysfunction and plaque development. In this paper, we will summarize the best characterized autoantigens in atherosclerosis and their possible role in cardiovascular inflammation.
Transplantation of dental tissue-derived mesenchymal stem cells ameliorates nephritis in lupus mice.

Background Recently, clinical studies have suggested that transplantation of umbilical cord mesenchymal stem cells (UC-MSCs) were able to alleviate clinical symptoms of refractory systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). Although dental tissue derived MSCs, including dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs) and periodontal ligament stem cell (PDLSCs), have been reported to possess immunomodulatory functions, whether they can ameliorate SLE symptoms as UC-MSCs remains to be elucidated. Methods We assessed the abilities of DPSCs and PDLSCs to treat SLE, cells were transferred intravenously to 28-week old B6/lpr mice. Ten weeks later, mice were sacrificed. Serum anti-dsDNA antibodies and anti-nuclear antibodies (ANA) were measured by ELISA. Renal pathology was analyzed by H&E, PAS and MASSON staining. Aggregation of IgG and IgM in the glomerulus was examined by immunofluorescence. Frequencies of Th1, Th2, Treg, Th17, Tfh, and plasma cells were determined by surface and intracellular staining. Serum IL-6, IL-10, IL-17 and MCP-1 were measured by Milliplex® MAP technology. Results Same as UC-MSCs, both DPSCs and PDLSCs could efficiently downregulate 24-h proteinuria, anti-dsDNA antibodies and glomerular IgG/IgM in B6/lpr mice. However, DPSCs but not PDLSCs could ameliorate the glomerular lesion in B6/lpr mice. Compared to the phosphate buffered saline (PBS) group, percentages of Th1 (CD4+IFNγ+) cells and plasma (B220-CD138+) cells in the spleen were significantly decreased in DPSCs and PDLSCs groups. There was no significant difference in Th2 (CD4+IL4+), Th17 (CD4+IL17+), Tfh (CD4+PD-1+CXCR5+) and Treg (CD4+CD25+Foxp3+) cells. Serum IL-6, IL-10, IL-17 and MCP-1 levels didn't change after MSCs transplantation. Conclusions Our results show that both DPSCs and PDLSCs can alleviate the disease symptoms of lupus-prone B6/lpr mice. DPSCs are also effective in reducing kidney glomerular lesion and perivascular inflammation infiltration as well as UC-MSCs, suggesting that DPSCs might be another choice for SLE treatment.
Down‐regulated SOX4 Expression Suppresses Cell Proliferation, Metastasis and Induces Apoptosis in Xuanwei Female Lung Cancer Patients

The transcription factor SOX4 has functional importance in foetal lung maturation and tumorigenesis in a number of cancers. However, its biological functions in the progression of lung tumorigenesis remain unclear. In this study, we found that the expression levels of SOX4 mRNA and protein were significantly higher in Xuanwei female lung cancer tissues than in benign lung lesions. The patients with high expression of the SOX4 protein had a higher pathological grade, lymph node (LN) metastasis, poor tumor differentiation and worse prognosis than those patients with low expression of SOX4. Knockdown of the SOX4 gene in the Xuanwei female lung cancer cell line XWLC‐05 resulted in apoptotic morphological changes, decreased cell proliferation, invasion and migration. Furthermore, knockdown of the SOX4 gene resulted in obvious sub‐G1 peaks and induction of apoptosis through upregulation of caspase‐3 expression, while in cells treated with a caspase‐3 inhibitor, apoptosis induced by silencing SOX4 expression was inhibited. In vivo analysis in nude mice further confirmed that knockdown of SOX4 suppressed tumor growth. In conclusion, SOX4 appears to be an important tumor suppressor gene in the regulation of Xuanwei female lung cancer cell proliferation, apoptosis and metastases, and it may be a potential target for effective lung cancer therapy. J. Cell. Biochem. 116: 1007–1018, 2015. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Automatic Sleep Stage Scoring with Single-Channel EEG Using Convolutional Neural Networks

We used convolutional neural networks (CNNs) for automatic sleep stage scoring based on single-channel electroencephalography (EEG) to learn task-specific filters for classification without using prior domain knowledge. We used an openly available dataset from 20 healthy young adults for evaluation and applied 20-fold cross-validation. We used class-balanced random sampling within the stochastic gradient descent (SGD) optimization of the CNN to avoid skewed performance in favor of the most represented sleep stages. We achieved high mean F1-score (81%, range 79-83%), mean accuracy across individual sleep stages (82%, range 80-84%) and overall accuracy (74%, range 71-76%) over all subjects. By analyzing and visualizing the filters that our CNN learns, we found that rules learned by the filters correspond to sleep scoring criteria in the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) manual that human experts follow. Our method's performance is balanced across classes and our results are comparable to state-of-the-art methods with hand-engineered features. We show that, without using prior domain knowledge, a CNN can automatically learn to distinguish among different normal sleep stages.
Characterization of effective primary voice therapy for dysphonia

Despite advances in the development of voice outcome measures, there is no methodology to define and quantify the elements of the complex process of speech therapy. The components of therapy given by one therapist to the intervention limb of a controlled trial werecharacterized according to a list of five minutes. The intervention was of proven benefit compared with a control period of observation. Indirect approaches comprised two thirds of therapy time. The types and duration of intervention were assessed but no treatment category seemed moreassociated with a favourable outcome. The design shows that it is possible to perform a prospective, structured analysis of the components of voice therapy. The method appears viable for thefuture comparison of the widely varying techniques current in voice therapy practice.
Lightning NO2 simulation over the contiguous US and its effects on satellite NO2 retrievals

Abstract. Lightning is an important NOx source representing ∼10 % of the global source of odd N and a much larger percentage in the upper troposphere. The poor understanding of spatial and temporal patterns of lightning contributes to a large uncertainty in understanding upper tropospheric chemistry. We implement a lightning parameterization using the product of convective available potential energy (CAPE) and convective precipitation rate (PR) coupled with the Kain–Fritsch convective scheme (KF/CAPE-PR) into the Weather Research and Forecasting-Chemistry (WRF-Chem) model. Compared to the cloud-top height (CTH) lightning parameterization combined with the Grell 3-D convective scheme (G3/CTH), we show that the switch of convective scheme improves the correlation of lightning flash density in the southeastern US from 0.30 to 0.67 when comparing against the Earth Networks Total Lightning Network; the switch of lightning parameterization contributes to the improvement of the correlation from 0.48 to 0.62 elsewhere in the US. The simulated NO2 profiles using the KF/CAPE-PR parameterization exhibit better agreement with aircraft observations in the middle and upper troposphere. Using a lightning NOx production rate of 500 mol NO flash−1, the a priori NO2 profile generated by the simulation with the KF/CAPE-PR parameterization reduces the air mass factor for NO2 retrievals by 16 % on average in the southeastern US in the late spring and early summer compared to simulations using the G3/CTH parameterization. This causes an average change in NO2 vertical column density 4 times higher than the average uncertainty.