Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Intensity-modulated radiation therapy for patients with 1 to 3 brain metastases in recursive partitioning analysis class 3

Abstract The prognosis is extremely poor for patients with brain metastases in recursive partitioning analysis (RPA) class 3. It is not clear whether dose elevation for brain lesions in addition to whole-brain radiotherapy could improve survival for those patients. This study aimed to assess the efficacy and safety of dose elevation with intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) for patients with 1 to 3 brain metastases in RPA class 3. From January 2013 to December 2015, 24 patients with 1 to 3 brain metastases in RPA class 3 were included in this study. The median age was 60 (range 41–85) years and the mean graded prognostic assessment (GPA) score was 1.25 (range 0.5–2). Whole-brain radiotherapy (30 Gy) with a simultaneous integrated boost (SIB) to the brain metastases (totaling 40 Gy) was delivered in 10 fractions using IMRT technique. Survival times and overall safety were assessed. The significance of prognostic variables on survival was assessed by both univariate and multivariate analyses. All of the patients completed the planned SIB schedule. The overall response rate was 66.7%. The median survival time (MST) was 8 months for the entire group of patients. The MST was 5 months for patients with a GPA score of 0.5 to 1 (n = 11 patients) and 12 months with a GPA score of 1.5 to 2 (n = 13 patients). No acute or late toxicities greater than grade 2 were detected. Age and subsequent chemotherapy were significantly associated with MST on univariate and multivariate analyses. It is feasible to elevate radiation doses to 40 Gy using the IMRT technique in RPA class 3 patients with 1 to 3 brain metastases without serious toxicities. The preliminary results are encouraging and further studies with larger cohorts are warranted.
Perivascular cells expressing annexin A5 define a novel mesenchymal stem cell-like population with the capacity to differentiate into multiple mesenchymal lineages

The annexin A5 gene (Anxa5) was recently found to be expressed in the developing and adult vascular system as well as the skeletal system. In this paper, the expression of an Anxa5-lacZ fusion gene was used to define the onset of expression in the vasculature and to characterize these Anxa5-lacZ-expressing vasculature-associated cells. After blastocyst implantation, Anxa5-lacZ-positive cells were first detected in extra-embryonic tissues and in angioblast progenitors forming the primary vascular plexus. Later, expression is highly restricted to perivascular cells in most blood vessels resembling pericytes or vascular smooth muscle cells. Viable Anxa5-lacZ+ perivascular cells were isolated from embryos as well as adult brain meninges by specific staining with fluorescent X-gal substrates and cell-sorting. These purified lacZ+ cells specifically express known markers of pericytes, but also markers characteristic for stem cell populations. In vitro and in vivo differentiation experiments show that this cell pool expresses early markers of chondrogenesis, is capable of forming a calcified matrix and differentiates into adipocytes. Hence, Anxa5 expression in perivascular cells from mouse defines a novel population of cells with a distinct developmental potential.
Flow Experience and Mood States While Playing Body Movement-Controlled Video Games

Body movement-controlled video games (BMCVGs) are a genre of video gaming utilizing body movement to control game play that is becoming increasingly popular. Despite the popularity and widespread interest in BMCVGs, there is limited information available about the nature of the players’ experiences when they engage in BMCVG play. A total of 14 young adults played 6 different BMCVGs for 6 min each and performed traditional cycling exercise in a randomized order. After two familiarization sessions, on a third occasion, subjects rated their enjoyment and completed the Flow State Scale-2 questionnaire. The BMCVGs were rated more enjoyable than traditional cycling exercise and the Flow dimensions Challenge-Skill Balance and Merging of Action and Awareness scored significantly higher than the norms for exercise activity and instead corresponded more closely to the norms for sporting activity. These findings suggest that BMCVGs could therefore act as a gateway for sedentary individuals to become involved in sporting activities.
Review Paper: Cancer Chemopreventive Compounds and Canine Cancer

Canine cancer has become more prevalent in recent years because of increased life expectancy and greater attention to the health of pets. The range of cancers seen in dogs is as diverse as that in human patients, and despite more intensive therapeutic interventions, fatality rates remain unacceptably high in both species. Chemoprevention is therefore an important means of confronting this disease. Because domestic pets share our environment, greater cross-application and study of the protumorigenic and antitumorigenic factors in our shared environment will benefit all species, leading to the development of new families of less toxic antitumorigenic compounds based on novel and established molecular targets. Currently, the most interesting cancer preventive agents are nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ ligands, and dietary compounds. This article provides an overview of what is known about how these agents affect molecular signaling in neoplastic disease, with reference to reported application and/or study in dogs where available.
The concept of alienation: towards conceptual clarity

Purpose – Although alienation as a concept has a rich history, it has suffered relative neglect in organizational studies and one possible reason for the same is its conceptual ambiguity vis‐a‐vis popular and long‐standing concepts of commitment/identification, satisfaction and engagement, that represent the positive experience of work and which have sometimes been equated as the opposite of work alienation. Similarly, the negative experience of work has traditionally been captured by concepts such as burnout/cynicism and counterproductive work behaviours/deviance. The purpose of this paper is to argue for refocusing attention on the concept of work alienation in management studies as distinct from other related concepts.Design/methodology/approach – The methodology integrated research from both quantitative and qualitative approaches.Findings – Through the analysis of the concept of alienation, along with other related concepts, the conceptual space for the study of alienation in organizational studies i.
Three‐dimensional dynamic rupture simulation with a high‐order discontinuous Galerkin method on unstructured tetrahedral meshes

[1] Accurate and efficient numerical methods to simulate dynamic earthquake rupture and wave propagation in complex media and complex fault geometries are needed to address fundamental questions in earthquake dynamics, to integrate seismic and geodetic data into emerging approaches for dynamic source inversion, and to generate realistic physics-based earthquake scenarios for hazard assessment. Modeling of spontaneous earthquake rupture and seismic wave propagation by a high-order discontinuous Galerkin (DG) method combined with an arbitrarily high-order derivatives (ADER) time integration method was introduced in two dimensions by de la Puente et al. (2009). The ADER-DG method enables high accuracy in space and time and discretization by unstructured meshes. Here we extend this method to three-dimensional dynamic rupture problems. The high geometrical flexibility provided by the usage of tetrahedral elements and the lack of spurious mesh reflections in the ADER-DG method allows the refinement of the mesh close to the fault to model the rupture dynamics adequately while concentrating computational resources only where needed. Moreover, ADER-DG does not generate spurious high-frequency perturbations on the fault and hence does not require artificial Kelvin-Voigt damping. We verify our three-dimensional implementation by comparing results of the SCEC TPV3 test problem with two well-established numerical methods, finite differences, and spectral boundary integral. Furthermore, a convergence study is presented to demonstrate the systematic consistency of the method. To illustrate the capabilities of the high-order accurate ADER-DG scheme on unstructured meshes, we simulate an earthquake scenario, inspired by the 1992 Landers earthquake, that includes curved faults, fault branches, and surface topography.
LEARNING RACE, SOCIALIZING BLACKNESS

Abstract Contemporary discourse about Black Americans questions the loyalties of younger Blacks to the advancement of the Black racial group. This discourse often compares the commitment of Black Americans who came of age during the Civil Rights Movement era to those who came of age during the post-Civil Rights Movement era. Fueling this discourse is a working assumption that somehow younger Black Americans have a different understanding about race and its role in Blacks' political interests. This begs the question whether there are generational differences in the ways that Black Americans learn about race, or racial socialization, perhaps with implications for distinct value orientations about Black politics. Using public opinion data from an original survey, the 2007 National Politics and Socialization Survey (NPSS), this paper compares the racial socialization experiences of four generations of Black Americans—(1) World War II generation (age 67 and older, born in and before 1940); (2) civil rights generation (ages 54–66, born 1953–1941); (3) mid-civil rights generation (ages 43–53, born 1964–1954); and (4) post-civil rights generation Black Americans (age 42 and under, born 1965 and after). Results of ordered probit regression analyses indicate minimal generational differences. Differences emerge in emphases on racial socialization messages about Black public behavior, Black intraracial relations, Black interracial relations, and composite factor loadings of Black consciousness and Black protectiveness messages.
Linguistic Practice and False‐belief Tasks

Jill de Villiers has argued that children's mastery of sentential complements plays a crucial role in enabling them to succeed at false-belief tasks. Josef Perner has disputed that and has argued that mastery of false-belief tasks requires an understanding of the multiplicity of perspectives. This paper attempts to resolve the debate by explicating attributions of desires and beliefs as extensions of the linguistic practices of making commands and assertions, respectively. In terms of these linguistic practices one can explain why desire-talk will precede belief-talk and why even older children will have difficulty attributing incompatible desires.
'Clandestino: institutional discourses and practices for the control and exclusion of migrants in contemporary Italy

Over the last twenty years, the management of a series of complex questions raised by the growing presence of foreign immigrants in Italy has been carried out via the “invention” of specific social problems and their accompanying discourse categories. From its first appearance the term “clandestino” (or irregular immigrant) has assumed a dual significance as a concept widely adopted in public discourse and as the pillar of an ideology that comprises a very specific set of political positions regarding the management of immigration. Moreover, to the extent that the clandestino was interpreted as a threat or problem to be eliminated or solved, it very rapidly became a discursive and practical focal point for the institutions that play a crucial role in immigration management and control. Drawing on my research from late 1990s on immigration policies and control in Italy, I show how and to what extent some institutional everyday activities of the police have been reshaped by discourses and practice that focus on dealing with irregular immigrants. This reorganization contributed to generating a complex web of knowledge, discourses and practices that produced the essential vocabulary and the hegemonic frameworks for public debates about immigration in Italy. It also makes the need and urgency to cope with irregular immigration both a political centre of gravity and a basic strategy to reproduce social order. Keywords: Immigration discourse; immigration policies; immigrants’ criminalisation; police practices; Italy
Human rights studied as social representations in a cross-national context

A questionnaire study using the 30 Articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was conducted in 35 countries (N=6791 students). The basic assumption was that human rights can be studied as social representations following the model of Doise, Clemence, & Lorenzi-Cioldi (1993). The existence of a shared meaning system concerning the 30 articles in different countries was demonstrated. Individual attitudes toward the whole set of rights were proven to be highly consistent. However, individuals differed systematically in beliefs about their own and the government's efficacy in having human rights respected. An individual-level and a pancultural analysis (Kenny & La Voie, 1985; Leung & Bond, 1989) converged in the definition of four groups of respondents: advocates (most favorable responses towards human rights), sceptics (less favorable responses), personalists (high personal involvement and scepticism about governmental efficacy) and governmentalists (low personal involvement and strong belief in governmental efficacy). Analyses of anchoring started either from assessing individual positionings or from maximizing between-country differences. Individual-level analyses show that positionings are anchored in value choices as well as in perception and experience of social conflicts. Pancultural analyses confirm the importance of national context concerning the attitudes of scepticism or advocacy, personalism and governmentalism. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Laparoscopic Splenectomy and Esophagogastric Devascularization Is a Safe, Effective, Minimally Invasive Alternative for the Treatment of Portal Hypertension With Refractory Variceal Bleeding

Open splenectomy and esophagogastric devascularization (OSED) is a typical surgery for portal hypertension. Because of the high morbidity associated with it, it is desirable to develop a minimally invasive alternative. To investigate the safety and effect of laparoscopic splenectomy and esophagogastric devascularization (LSED), we performed LSED for 24 patients suffering from portal hypertension with refractory variceal bleeding while conducting OSED for 30 patients. The perioperative data and follow-up results were analyzed. Operation times were similar in both groups. Less intraoperative blood and faster return of gastrointestinal function were found in the LSED group. The LSED group had lower levels of alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase, and total bilirubin after surgery. In both groups, the levels of platelet count, white blood cell count, or hemoglobin were increased after operation dramatically. During the follow-up period (range = 3-36 months), no patient had recurrent hypersplenism or variceal bleeding. Hence, LSED is a safe and minimally invasive intervention for portal hypertension with refractory variceal bleeding.
Deficient Sumoylation of Yeast 2-Micron Plasmid Proteins Rep1 and Rep2 Associated with Their Loss from the Plasmid-Partitioning Locus and Impaired Plasmid Inheritance

The 2-micron plasmid of the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae encodes copy-number amplification and partitioning systems that enable the plasmid to persist despite conferring no advantage to its host. Plasmid partitioning requires interaction of the plasmid Rep1 and Rep2 proteins with each other and with the plasmid-partitioning locus STB. Here we demonstrate that Rep1 stability is reduced in the absence of Rep2, and that both Rep proteins are sumoylated. Lysine-to-arginine substitutions in Rep1 and Rep2 that inhibited their sumoylation perturbed plasmid inheritance without affecting Rep protein stability or two-hybrid interaction between Rep1 and Rep2. One-hybrid and chromatin immunoprecipitation assays revealed that Rep1 was required for efficient retention of Rep2 at STB and that sumoylation-deficient mutants of Rep1 and Rep2 were impaired for association with STB. The normal co-localization of both Rep proteins with the punctate nuclear plasmid foci was also lost when Rep1 was sumoylation-deficient. The correlation of Rep protein sumoylation status with plasmid-partitioning locus association suggests a theme common to eukaryotic chromosome segregation proteins, sumoylated forms of which are found enriched at centromeres, and between the yeast 2-micron plasmid and viral episomes that depend on sumoylation of their maintenance proteins for persistence in their hosts.
Value and Consequences of Routine Intraoperative Cholangiography During Cholecystectomy

Since the introduction of laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC), an increase in accidental common bile duct (CBD) injuries of up to 1.2–1.6% has been reported. In the present prospective study of 1,710 patients undergoing cholecystectomy (1,241 LC procedures and 469 open cholecystectomies [OC]), we tested the predicative value of routine intraoperative cholangiography (IOC). The IOC was feasible in 92.4% of the cases in the LC group and in 83% of cases in the OC group and presented a complete depiction of the extrahepatic bile system in 98.3%. Anatomic variations of the bile duct system, which influenced the operative management, were found in 13.2% of cases (13.4% LC versus 12.8% OC). In 2.5% of the patients, preoperatively undetected CBD stones were also found. Method-specific complications did not occur in any of the patients. Additionally, in a controlled subgroup analysis of 163 patients, we evaluated preoperative intravenous cholangiography (IVC) and IOC. Intravenous cholangiography showed only 72.4% of the operation-relevant anatomic variations (vs. 100% by IOC); in 6.1% of the cases, there were reactions to the dye (vs. none in IOC), and in only 28.6% of the patients, CBD stones were detected (vs. 71.4% IOC). There were four bile duct injuries (0.29%) during LC and two (0.4%) during OC. All injuries were detected intraoperatively and fixed in the same setting without postoperative complications. In conclusion, we recommend the use of routine IOC during cholecystectomy. By this technique, anatomic variations of the bile duct system will be visualized and therefore accidental injuries will be avoided.
Social preferences and competition

There is a general presumption that social preferences can be ignored if markets are competitive. Market experiments (Smith 1962) and recent theoretical results (Dufwenberg et al. 2008) suggest that competition forces people to behave as if they were purely self-interested. We qualify this view. Social preferences are irrelevant if and only if two conditions are met: separability of preferences and completeness of contracts. These conditions are often plausible, but they fail to hold when uncertainty is important (financial markets) or when incomplete contracts are traded (labor markets). Social preferences can explain many of the anomalies frequently observed on these markets.
The effect of disocclusion time-reduction therapy to treat chronic myofascial pain: A single group interventional study with 3 year follow-up of 100 cases

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the longevity of reduced disclusion time in treating and removing myofascial pain dysfunction symptoms following the T-Scan-based, immediate complete anterior guidance development (ICAGD) coronoplasty. This measured occlusal adjustment has been shown to reduce the muscle hyperactivity of myofascial pain. Methods: Myofascial pain symptomatic patients were recruited as per the diagnostic criteria for temporomandibular disorders (TMDs), including the clinical protocol and assessment instruments outlined by the international RDC/TMD consortium network (version: January 20, 2014) to assess the efficacy of reduced disclusion time in left and right lateral excursions to resolve the myofascial pain symptoms. As per the inclusion and exclusion criteria, 100 cases were treated with ICAGD in three visits, each 1 week apart. Recall disclusion time measurements were recorded every 3 months over 3 years. The RDC/TMD questionnaire was used for symptom assessment at every recall visit. ICAGD brought pretreatment prolonged disclusion time down to <0.4 s, as quantified from T-Scan force and time data records, while the subjects were assessed for symptom relief. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used for statistical analysis (P < 0.05). Results: Changes in the intensity of many symptoms from reducing the disclusion time to <0.4 s were statistically significant from treatment day 1, and onward through the 3-year period of observation (P < 0.05). Conclusion: The results indicate that ICAGD reduces the musculoskeletal symptoms of myofascial pain, such that this methodology increases clinical therapeutic success.
Reversal in fatigued athletes of a defect in interferon γ secretion after administration of Lactobacillus acidophilus

Background: Fatigue and impaired performance in athletes is well recognised and has been loosely linked to “overtraining”. Reduced concentration of IgA in the saliva and increased shedding of Epstein Barr virus (EBV) have been associated with intense training in elite athletes. Objective: To determine whether athletes presenting with fatigue and impaired performance had an immune defect relevant to defective containment of EBV infection, and whether a probiotic preparation (Lactobacillus acidophilus) shown to enhance mucosal immunity in animal models could reverse any detected abnormality. Results: The fatigued athletes had clinical characteristics consistent with re-activation of EBV infection and significantly (p = 0.02) less secretion of interferon (IFN) γ from blood CD4 positive T cells. After one month of daily capsules containing 2 × 1010 colony forming units of L acidophilus, secretion of IFNγ from T cells had increased significantly (p = 0.01) to levels found in healthy control athletes. A significant (p = 0.03) increase in salivary IFNγ concentrations in healthy control athletes after the one month course of L acidophilus demonstrated in man the capacity for this probiotic to enhance the mucosal IFNγ concentration. Conclusion: This is the first evidence of a T cell defect in fatigued athletes, and of its reversal following probiotic therapy.