Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Local Anesthetic Inhibition of m1 Muscarinic Acetylcholine Signaling

Background Local anesthetics inhibit lipid mediator signaling (lysophosphatidate, thromboxane) by acting on intracellular domains of the receptor or on the G protein. On receptors for polar agonists, the ligand-binding pocket could form an additional site of interaction, possibly resulting in superadditive inhibition. The authors therefore investigated the effects of local anesthetics on m1 muscarinic receptor functioning. Methods The authors expressed receptors in isolation using Xenopus oocytes. Using a two-electrode voltage clamp, the authors measured the effects of lidocaine, QX314 (permanently charged), and benzocaine (permanently uncharged) on Ca2+-activated Cl− currents elicited by methylcholine. The authors also characterized the interaction of lidocaine with [3H] quinuclydinyl benzylate ([3H]QNB) binding to m1 receptors. Results Lidocaine inhibited muscarinic signaling with a half-maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50 18 nm) 140-fold less than that of extracellularly administered QX314 (IC50 2.4 &mgr;m). Intracellularly injected QX314 (IC50 0.96 mm) and extracellularly applied benzocaine (IC50 1.2 mm) inhibited at high concentrations only. Inhibition of muscarinic signaling by extracellularly applied QX314 and lidocaine was the result of noncompetitive antagonism. Intracellularly injected QX314 and benzocaine inhibited muscarinic and lysophosphatidate signaling at similar concentrations, suggesting an action on the common G-protein pathway. Combined administration of intracellularly injected (IC50 19 &mgr;m) and extracellularly applied QX314 (IC50 49 nm) exerted superadditive inhibition. Lidocaine did not displace specific [3H]QNB binding to m1 receptors. Conclusions m1 Muscarinic signaling is inhibited by clinically relevant concentrations of lidocaine and by extracellularly administered QX314, suggesting that the major site of action is a extracellular domain of the muscarinic receptor. An additional less potent but superadditive inhibitory effect on the G-protein is suggested.
Pedestrian Dead Reckoning with Particle Filter for handheld smartphone

Commonly used Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) are inappropriate as Location Based Services (LBS) in indoor environment. Therefore research teams are developing different systems, which can be used as a suitable alternative. One of options is to use Inertial Navigation System (INS) which consists of inertial sensors and mathematic procedures. This concept has been known for a long time, but with arrival of Microelectro Mechanical System (MEMS) INS found wide use. Smartphones with inertial sensors, such as accelerometers and gyroscopes, allow us to use them as input devices for Pedestrian Dead Reckoning (PDR). In this paper we present PDR by using smartphone sensors. They can be classified as low-cost Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU), and have been compared with more precise and expensive Xsens IMU. Accuracy of inertial sensors has increased in the past few years, but they still cannot alone provide proper accuracy because of many negative effects, such as heading drift due to gyroscope bias. Particle Filter (PF) has been successfully used with map constraints to increase the accuracy of proposed location system. Presented results show that low-cost smartphone IMU combined with PF can be applicable as proper navigation system.
Deep Reinforcement Learning that Matters

In recent years, significant progress has been made in solving challenging problems across various domains using deep reinforcement learning (RL). Reproducing existing work and accurately judging the improvements offered by novel methods is vital to sustaining this progress. Unfortunately, reproducing results for state-of-the-art deep RL methods is seldom straightforward. In particular, non-determinism in standard benchmark environments, combined with variance intrinsic to the methods, can make reported results tough to interpret. Without significance metrics and tighter standardization of experimental reporting, it is difficult to determine whether improvements over the prior state-of-the-art are meaningful. In this paper, we investigate challenges posed by reproducibility, proper experimental techniques, and reporting procedures. We illustrate the variability in reported metrics and results when comparing against common baselines and suggest guidelines to make future results in deep RL more reproducible. We aim to spur discussion about how to ensure continued progress in the field by minimizing wasted effort stemming from results that are non-reproducible and easily misinterpreted.
A graphical review of noise-instability characterization in electronic systems

Abstract: A thorough study of the noise processes characterization is made with simulated data by means of our nonclassical estimators. Individual and hybrid noise sequences, previously generated by seed functions, have been used to obtain a set of characterization graphs identifying the noise type by mean of the enveloping curve. It is also shown the case of a hidden noise. An real test situation is presented which involves a traceable characterization via a GPS receiver.
Optimizing Privacy Policy Videos to Mitigate the Privacy Policy Paradox

This research takes a design science approach to improving privacy policies through the design and use of mediated content, such as video. Research has emerged to indicate that privacy policies communicated through video (separate from—and in addition to—traditional textual privacy policy documents) are more effective at engendering trust, decreasing perceived risk, and encouraging information disclosure than textual privacy policies, which are seldom read or understood. We extend this research by examining design factors such as narrator gender, animation style, music tone, and color scheme. We implemented a field experiment and survey to determine how variations in these design elements affect consumers’ perceived risk, perceived benefits, and disclosure decisions. The results indicate that the most effective privacy policy videos use female narrators with vibrant color palettes and light musical tones. The animation style (animated imagery versus animated text) has no effect on consumers’ perceived risk/benefits or disclosure decisions.
Effects of power system stabilizer on inter-area oscillation in a longitudinal power system

Modern power systems bring many benefits but they may also contain many potential problems such as low-frequency oscillations which threat the stability of the system. The main objective of this paper is to report a preliminary study of the effects of power system stabilizer on the small-signal stability and the damping of low-frequency oscillations of a power system which is under fast development and has a longitudinal grid pattern. Spontaneous low-frequency oscillations are potential to occur in the exchange of regional power flow under normal operation, especially in the operation of an interconnected power system with a longitudinal network structure. The inter-area oscillations often have features of being low frequency, lightly damped, and affecting relatively more generating units located in multiple areas. The method of eigen-analysis is utilized to perform the study of the inter-area oscillations with an emphasis on the oscillation mode with low frequency and light damping. The eigenvalue, eigenvector, and participation factors associated with the inter-area oscillation mode are calculated in details and possible locations of PSS are chosen for study accordingly. The results demonstrate for the PSS the effectiveness in damping inter-area oscillatory modes and thus the contribution to the improvement of stability of the study system.
Treatment with a Nitric Oxide-Donating NSAID Alleviates Functional Muscle Ischemia in the Mouse Model of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy

In patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) and the standard mdx mouse model of DMD, dystrophin deficiency causes loss of neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOSμ) from the sarcolemma, producing functional ischemia when the muscles are exercised. We asked if functional muscle ischemia would be eliminated and normal blood flow regulation restored by treatment with an exogenous nitric oxide (NO)-donating drug. Beginning at 8 weeks of age, mdx mice were fed a standard diet supplemented with 1% soybean oil alone or in combination with a low (15 mg/kg) or high (45 mg/kg) dose of HCT 1026, a NO-donating nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory agent which has previously been shown to slow disease progression in the mdx model. After 1 month of treatment, vasoconstrictor responses to intra-arterial norepinephrine (NE) were compared in resting and contracting hindlimbs. In untreated mdx mice, the usual effect of muscle contraction to attenuate NE-mediated vasoconstriction was impaired, resulting in functional ischemia: NE evoked similar decreases in femoral blood flow velocity and femoral vascular conductance (FVC) in the contracting compared to resting hindlimbs (ΔFVC contraction/ΔFVC rest = 0.88±0.03). NE-induced functional ischemia was unaffected by low dose HCT 1026 (ΔFVC ratio = 0.92±0.04; P>0.05 vs untreated), but was alleviated by the high dose of the drug (ΔFVC ratio = 0.22±0.03; P<0.05 vs untreated or low dose). The beneficial effect of high dose HCT 1026 was maintained with treatment up to 3 months. The effect of the NO-donating drug HCT 1026 to normalize blood flow regulation in contracting mdx mouse hindlimb muscles suggests a putative novel treatment for DMD. Further translational research is warranted.
Formulation, release characteristics, and bioavailability study of gastroretentive floating matrix tablet and floating raft system of Mebeverine HCl

To prolong the residence time of dosage forms within the gastrointestinal tract until all drug is released at the desired rate is one of the real challenges for oral controlled-release drug delivery systems. This study was designed to develop a controlled-release floating matrix tablet and floating raft system of Mebeverine HCl (MbH) and evaluate different excipients for their floating behavior and in vitro controlled-release profiles. Oral pharmacokinetics of the optimum matrix tablet, raft system formula, and marketed Duspatalin® 200 mg retard as reference were studied in beagle dogs. The optimized tablet formula (FT-10) and raft system formula (FRS-11) were found to float within 34±5 sec and 15±7 sec, respectively, and both remain buoyant over a period of 12 h in simulated gastric fluid. FT-10 (Compritol/HPMC K100M 1:1) showed the slowest drug release among all prepared tablet formulations, releasing about 80.2% of MbH over 8 h. In contrast, FRS-11 (Sodium alginate 3%/HPMC K100M 1%/Precirol 2%) had the greatest retardation, providing sustained release of 82.1% within 8 h. Compared with the marketed MbH product, the Cmax of FT-10 was almost the same, while FRS-11 maximum concentration was higher. The tmax was 3.33, 2.167, and 3.0 h for marketed MbH product, FT-10, and FRS-11, respectively. In addition, the oral bioavailability experiment showed that the relative bioavailability of the MbH was 104.76 and 116.01% after oral administration of FT-10 and FRS-11, respectively, compared to marketed product. These results demonstrated that both controlled-released floating matrix tablet and raft system would be promising gastroretentive delivery systems for prolonging drug action.
Seasonal Movements of Female Snowy Owls Breeding in the Western North American Arctic

Abstract The Snowy Owl (Bubo scandiacus) is a circumpolar raptor that nests in Arctic tundra. Satellite tracking of nesting Snowy Owls in Alaska and eastern Canada has allowed researchers to document the widely nomadic movements of these owls between summer and winter ranges. This study expands that knowledge for Snowy Owls in the western Canadian Arctic. Based on previous studies, we predicted that owls: (1) would not have strong fidelity to specific winter or summer ranges; (2) would travel widely in search of breeding and nonbreeding areas at which they would settle for considerable time (months); (3) would choose areas to settle based on prey concentration; and (4) would use a mix of overwintering strategies, with some staying in Arctic and boreal regions, and some migrating south. Movement patterns of four female owls captured at nesting sites on Herschel Island, Yukon Territory, Canada, supported the first two predictions. The third prediction was partly supported: some sites of summer settlement were located where prey was relatively abundant, whereas other selected sites did not appear to have enough prey for successful nesting. The latter sites may have been the best available in those areas, however. Sites of winter settlement generally overlapped regions with high abundance of snowshoe hares (Lepus americanus) or ptarmigan (Lagopus spp.), and were located in relatively open alpine, subalpine, or wetland environments, where prey were likely most accessible. Contrary to our last prediction, all four study owls settled in boreal Alaska and the northern Yukon Territory. This pattern contrasts with observations that eastern North American Snowy Owls rarely wintered in the boreal biome. This study highlights the need to better understand the habitat choices and food habits of wintering Snowy Owls in the northern boreal mountains.
Riffle: optimized shuffle service for large-scale data analytics

The rapidly growing size of data and complexity of analytics present new challenges for large-scale data processing systems. Modern systems keep data partitions in memory for pipelined operators, and persist data across stages with wide dependencies on disks for fault tolerance. While processing can often scale well by splitting jobs into smaller tasks for better parallelism, all-to-all data transfer---called shuffle operations---become the scaling bottleneck when running many small tasks in multi-stage data analytics jobs. Our key observation is that this bottleneck is due to the superlinear increase in disk I/O operations as data volume increases. We present Riffle, an optimized shuffle service for big-data analytics frameworks that significantly improves I/O efficiency and scales to process petabytes of data. To do so, Riffle efficiently merges fragmented intermediate shuffle files into larger block files, and thus converts small, random disk I/O requests into large, sequential ones. Riffle further improves performance and fault tolerance by mixing both merged and unmerged block files to minimize merge operation overhead. Using Riffle, Facebook production jobs on Spark clusters with over 1,000 executors experience up to a 10x reduction in the number of shuffle I/O requests and 40% improvement in the end-to-end job completion time.
Nicotinic acid supplementation in diet favored intramuscular fat deposition and lipid metabolism in finishing steers

Nicotinic acid (NA) acting as the precursor of NAD+/NADH and NADP+/NADPH, participates in many biochemical processes, e.g. lipid metabolism. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of dietary NA on carcass traits, meat quality, blood metabolites, and fat deposition in Chinese crossbred finishing steers. Sixteen steers with the similar body weight and at the age of 24 months were randomly allocated into control group (feeding basal diet) and NA group (feeding basal diet + 1000 mg/kg NA). All experimental cattle were fed a 90% concentrate diet and 10% forage straw in a 120-day feeding experiment. The results showed that supplemental NA in diet increased longissimus area, intramuscular fat content (17.14% vs. 9.03%), marbling score (8.08 vs. 4.30), redness (a*), and chroma (C*) values of LD muscle, but reduced carcass fat content (not including imtramuscular fat), pH24 h and moisture content of LD muscle, along with no effect on backfat thickness. Besides, NA supplementation increased serum HDL-C concentration, but decreased the serum levels of LDL-C, triglyceride, non-esterified fatty acid, total cholesterol, and glycated serum protein. In addition, NA supplementation increased G6PDH and ICDH activities of LD muscle. These results suggested that NA supplementation in diet improves the carcass characteristics and beef quality, and regulates the compositions of serum metabolites. Based on the above results, NA should be used as the feed additive in cattle industry.
Association between Chronic Rhinosinusitis and Health-Related Quality of Life in Adults with Cystic Fibrosis.

RATIONALE Over the past four decades, the median age of survival has nearly doubled for individuals living with cystic fibrosis (CF). Chronic diseases such as chronic rhinosinusitis increase in prevalence with age. In the non-CF population, chronic rhinosinusitis is associated with reduced health-related quality of life. OBJECTIVES Our objectives were to determine the prevalence of chronic rhinosinusitis among adults with CF and to evaluate the impact of chronic rhinosinusitis on health-related quality of life. METHODS Individuals from a large academic teaching hospital in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, were eligible to participate in this cross-sectional study. Included subjects were at least 19 years of age, had a confirmed diagnosis of CF, and attended the CF clinic between September 2013 and April 2014. Participants completed a CF-specific health-related quality of life questionnaire (the Cystic Fibrosis Questionnaire-Revised for adolescents and adults over 14 years of age [CFQ-R 14+]) and underwent symptom and endoscopic assessment for diagnosis of chronic rhinosinusitis. Medical charts were reviewed for potential confounders, including sociodemographic (age, sex, and body mass index) and clinical (age at CF diagnosis, type of CF mutation, lung function, and chronic Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection) factors. Multivariable linear regression was used to model the relationship between chronic rhinosinusitis and CFQ-R 14+ domains, adjusted for potential confounders. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS A total of 121 individuals were contacted in the clinic, of whom 113 (93.4%) consented to participate. The prevalence of chronic rhinosinusitis was found to be 59.2% (95% confidence interval [CI], 49.6-68.2%). Sociodemographic and clinical factors were similarly distributed between chronic rhinosinusitis-positive and chronic rhinosinusitis-negative groups. Lung function, as measured by FEV1 (% predicted value), did not significantly differ between participants with versus those without chronic rhinosinusitis (mean difference, 2.0%; 95% CI, -8.1% to 13.0%). Following adjustment for sex and lung function, individuals with chronic rhinosinusitis reported significantly worse scores on the respiratory symptoms domains compared with their counterparts without chronic rhinosinusitis (regression coefficient, -3.93; 95% CI, -8.02 to 0.15). CONCLUSIONS The majority of adults with CF have evidence of concomitant chronic rhinosinusitis. Chronic rhinosinusitis is independently associated with worse respiratory symptom on the CFQ-R 14+. Chronic rhinosinusitis should be diagnosed and managed to optimize the health-related quality of life of adults with CF. Clinical trial registered with clinicaltrials.gov (NCT02003079).
Surface treatment of silica nanoparticles for stable and charge-controlled colloidal silica

An attempt was made to control the surface charge of colloidal silica nanoparticles with 20 nm and 100 nm diameters. Untreated silica nanoparticles were determined to be highly negatively charged and have stable hydrodynamic sizes in a wide pH range. To change the surface to a positively charged form, various coating agents, such as amine containing molecules, multivalent metal cation, or amino acids, were used to treat the colloidal silica nanoparticles. Molecules with chelating amine sites were determined to have high affinity with the silica surface to make agglomerations or gel-like networks. Amino acid coatings resulted in relatively stable silica colloids with a modified surface charge. Three amino acid moiety coatings (L-serine, L-histidine, and L-arginine) exhibited surface charge modifying efficacy of L-histidine > L-arginine > L-serine and hydrodynamic size preservation efficacy of L-serine > L-arginine > L-histidine. The time dependent change in L-arginine coated colloidal silica was investigated by measuring the pattern of the backscattered light in a Turbiscan™. The results indicated that both the 20 nm and 100 nm L-arginine coated silica samples were fairly stable in terms of colloidal homogeneity, showing only slight coalescence and sedimentation.
Efficacy and safety of bupropion for smoking cessation and reduction in schizophrenia: systematic review and meta-analysis

Background The benefits and harms of bupropion as an aid for smoking cessation in schizophrenia remain uncertain. Aims To summarise the current evidence for efficacy and safety of bupropion as treatment for nicotine dependence in schizophrenia. Method Systematic review and random-effects meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) comparing bupropion with placebo or alternative therapeutic control in adult smokers with schizophrenia. Results Twenty-one reports from seven RCTs were included. Biochemically verified self-reported smoking cessation rates after bupropion were significantly higher than placebo at the end of treatment (risk ratio (RR) = 2.57, P = 0.004) and at 6 months (RR = 2.78, P = 0.05). Expired carbon monoxide level was significantly lower with bupropion at the end of therapy (P = 0.002) but not at 6 months (P = 0.37). There was no significant difference in positive (P = 0.28) or negative symptoms (P = 0.49) between the bupropion and the placebo group. Conclusions Bupropion increases the rates of smoking abstinence in smokers with schizophrenia, without jeopardising their mental state.
The use of computed tomography in pediatrics and the associated radiation exposure and estimated cancer risk.

IMPORTANCE Increased use of computed tomography (CT) in pediatrics raises concerns about cancer risk from exposure to ionizing radiation. OBJECTIVES To quantify trends in the use of CT in pediatrics and the associated radiation exposure and cancer risk. DESIGN Retrospective observational study. SETTING Seven US health care systems. PARTICIPANTS The use of CT was evaluated for children younger than 15 years of age from 1996 to 2010, including 4 857 736 child-years of observation. Radiation doses were calculated for 744 CT scans performed between 2001 and 2011. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES Rates of CT use, organ and effective doses, and projected lifetime attributable risks of cancer. RESULTS The use of CT doubled for children younger than 5 years of age and tripled for children 5 to 14 years of age between 1996 and 2005, remained stable between 2006 and 2007, and then began to decline. Effective doses varied from 0.03 to 69.2 mSv per scan. An effective dose of 20 mSv or higher was delivered by 14% to 25% of abdomen/pelvis scans, 6% to 14% of spine scans, and 3% to 8% of chest scans. Projected lifetime attributable risks of solid cancer were higher for younger patients and girls than for older patients and boys, and they were also higher for patients who underwent CT scans of the abdomen/pelvis or spine than for patients who underwent other types of CT scans. For girls, a radiation-induced solid cancer is projected to result from every 300 to 390 abdomen/pelvis scans, 330 to 480 chest scans, and 270 to 800 spine scans, depending on age. The risk of leukemia was highest from head scans for children younger than 5 years of age at a rate of 1.9 cases per 10 000 CT scans. Nationally, 4 million pediatric CT scans of the head, abdomen/pelvis, chest, or spine performed each year are projected to cause 4870 future cancers. Reducing the highest 25% of doses to the median might prevent 43% of these cancers. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE The increased use of CT in pediatrics, combined with the wide variability in radiation doses, has resulted in many children receiving a high-dose examination. Dose-reduction strategies targeted to the highest quartile of doses could dramatically reduce the number of radiation-induced cancers.