Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Metformin Suppresses Diethylnitrosamine-Induced Liver Tumorigenesis in Obese and Diabetic C57BL/KsJ-+Leprdb/+Leprdb Mice

Obesity and related metabolic disorders, such as diabetes mellitus, raise the risk of liver carcinogenesis. Metformin, which is widely used in the treatment of diabetes, ameliorates insulin sensitivity. Metformin is also thought to have antineoplastic activities and to reduce cancer risk. The present study examined the preventive effect of metformin on the development of diethylnitrosamine (DEN)-induced liver tumorigenesis in C57BL/KsJ-+Leprdb/+Leprdb (db/db) obese and diabetic mice. The mice were given a single injection of DEN at 2 weeks of age and subsequently received drinking water containing metformin for 20 weeks. Metformin administration significantly reduced the multiplicity of hepatic premalignant lesions and inhibited liver cell neoplasms. Metformin also markedly decreased serum levels of insulin and reduced insulin resistance, and inhibited phosphorylation of Akt, mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), and p70S6 in the liver. Furthermore, serum levels of leptin were decreased, while those of adiponectin were increased by metformin. These findings suggest that metformin prevents liver tumorigenesis by ameliorating insulin sensitivity, inhibiting the activation of Akt/mTOR/p70S6 signaling, and improving adipokine imbalance. Therefore, metformin may be a potent candidate for chemoprevention of liver tumorigenesis in patients with obesity or diabetes.
Sodium Valproate Alleviates Neurodegeneration in SCA3/MJD via Suppressing Apoptosis and Rescuing the Hypoacetylation Levels of Histone H3 and H4

Spinocerebellar ataxia type 3 (SCA3) also known as Machado-Joseph Disease (MJD), is one of nine polyglutamine (polyQ) diseases caused by a CAG-trinucelotide repeat expansion within the coding sequence of the ATXN3 gene. There are no disease-modifying treatments for polyQ diseases. Recent studies suggest that an imbalance in histone acetylation may be a key process leading to transcriptional dysregulation in polyQ diseases. Because of this possible imbalance, the application of histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors may be feasible for the treatment of polyQ diseases. To further explore the therapeutic potential of HDAC inhibitors, we constructed two independent preclinical trials with valproic acid (VPA), a promising therapeutic HDAC inhibitor, in both Drosophila and cell SCA3 models. We demonstrated that prolonged use of VPA at specific dose partly prevented eye depigmentation, alleviated climbing disability, and extended the average lifespan of SCA3/MJD transgenic Drosophila. We found that VPA could both increase the acetylation levels of histone H3 and histone H4 and reduce the early apoptotic rate of cells without inhibiting the aggregation of mutant ataxin-3 proteins in MJDtr-Q68- expressing cells. These results collectively support the premise that VPA is a promising therapeutic agent for the treatment of SCA3 and other polyQ diseases.
Open Questions in the Management of Nodular Lymphocyte Predominant Hodgkin Lymphoma

Localized Nodular Lymphocyte Predominant Hodgkin Lymphoma is a rare disease with an overall good prognosis but frequent late relapses. Due to it's rarity there is no standard therapeutic approach and pathological diagnosis may be hard. In this paper we discuss the technical aspects of the radiation therapy and histological issues. The new fields reductions proposed for classical Hodgkin lymphoma cannot be applied to early stages Nodular Lymphocyte Predominant Hodgkin lymphomas which are usually treated with radiation therapy without systemic chemotherapy.
Ownership Structure and Analysts' Forecasts

In this paper, we develop a model of earnings management that sheds light onto empirical regularities in the behavior of institutions and insiders. We link the earnings management decision to insiders' stake and show how this may impact analysts' forecast accuracy and institutional trading. More precisely, whenever there is excessive earnings management we observe less optimistic analysts. Furthermore, institutional investors exhibit positive feedback trading behavior and appear to front-run these analysts' forecast errors. We then construct a data set to test the empirical implications of our model. Among our implications, positive feedback trading behavior has already been documented in previous empirical studies. The others are empirically verified here for the first time.
The Media in the 1984 and 1988 Presidential Campaigns

Media Coverage of Presidential Campaigns as a Political Issue, by Guido H. Stempel III Newspaper Coverage of the 1984 and 1988 Campaigns, by Guido H. Stempel III and John W. Windhauser Watching the Campaigns on Network Television, by John W. Windhauser and Dru Riley Evarts How the News Magazines Covered the 1984 and 1988 Campaigns, by Guido H. Stempel III The Editorial Pages of Leading Newspapers in 1984, by David S. Myers The Editorial Pages of Leading Newspapers in 1988, by David S. Myers Public Attitudes About Coverage and Public Awareness of Editorial Endorsements, by Hugh M. Culbertson and Guido H. Stempel III The Total Picture: Press, Politicians, and the Public, by Guido H. Stempel III and John W. Windhauser Bibliography Index
Adaptive Coded Modulation Performance and Channel Estimation Tools for Flat Fading Channels

The need for spectrally efficient transmission on mobile and wireless channels is prevalent. A promising scheme for such transmission is adaptive coded modulation. In this thesis, techniques for assessing the performance of such systems are presented. One of the vulnerable points of such systems is the need for a reliable feedback channel. Channel prediction is proposed as a technique to combat the harmful effects of feedback delay.The Nakagami distribution is often employed in a model for the fading envelope of a wireless channel; this leads to a gamma-distributed signal-to-noise ratio. Nakagami (1960) provides expressions for the probability density function (PDF) of the product, sum, and ratio of two correlated gamma-distributed random variables (RVs). However, such an expression for the difference between two such RVs has not been provided by Nakagami. Anew expression for this PDF is provided in this dissertation, and it is shown that it is closely related to a distribution first described by McKay (1932). Applications of the new PDF include outage probability calculation in an environment with self-interference and assessment of the quality of certain channel estimation techniques.
The Comparison of Intrathecal Morphine and IV Morphine PCA on Pain Control, Patient Satisfaction, Morphine Consumption, and Adverse Effects in Patients Undergoing Reduction Mammoplasty

Background: Following breast reduction procedures, the level of postoperative pain can be severe, and sufficient pain control influences a patient's physiological, immunological, and psychological status. Objective: The aim of this study was to examine the use of intrathecal morphine (ITM) in breast reduction surgery with patient-controlled analgesia (PCA). Methods: Sixty-two female patients who underwent breast reductions with the same technique participated in this study. The study group (ITM + PCA) included 32 patients; a single shot (0.2 mg) of ITM and intravenous morphine with PCA were administered. In the control group, morphine PCA alone was intravenously administered to 30 patients. Comparisons between the groups of cumulative morphine consumption, visual analog scale scores, and patient satisfaction scores, which were the primary outcome measures, and adverse effects, which were the secondary outcome measures, were conducted. Results: The patients in the 2 groups had similar degrees of pain and satisfaction scores. The study group had lower cumulative morphine consumption (P = .001) than the PCA-only control group; there was no statistically significant difference in adverse effects between the 2 groups. Conclusion: Intrathecal morphine may effectively control pain with lower total morphine consumption following breast reduction surgery.
A Comparison of Transfer Learning Algorithms for Defect and Vulnerability Detection

Machine learning techniques for defect and vulnerability detection have the potential to quickly direct developers’ attention to software components with faulty implementations. Effective application of such defect prediction methods in practical software development environments requires transfer learning algorithms so that models built using existing projects can recognize defects as they emerge in a new project. Up until this study, comparing the efficacy of transfer learning algorithms was challenging because previous studies used differing data sets, baselines and performance metrics. By providing open source implementations and baseline performance metrics for several transfer learning algorithms on two different data sets, our project offers software engineers the tools to objectively compare methods and readily identify top performing transfer learning algorithms in the domain of both vulnerability and defect prediction.
Attitudinal and environmental influences on preferences for commerce and management courses

An Australian study attempted to uncover an explanatory model of high school students' expectations of enrolment in alternative business schools. The methodology is suggested as a general approach for further research in the American context. An application ofFishbein' sExtended Multi-Attribute model supported the notion that student's expectations of enrolment were associated more with attitudes towards the consequences of enrolment than with attitudes towards the institution itself. The views of parents and significant others had a marginal influence. The relationship was mediated by situational constraints: expected Tertiary Entrance score and the amount of Infonnation, students felt they had about an institution. Details of the survey and data analysis procedures are discussed and suggestions made for further research. 2 B o N D u N I v E R s I T y
The Digital Divide vs. The E-Government Divide: do Socio-Demographic Variables (Still) Impact E-Government Use among Onliners?

E-Government brings mutual benefits to both citizens and public administrations. However, there exists a gap between adopters and non-adopters of e-Government services. Most studies in this field explore e-Government acceptance on the basis of the entire population, while investigation of onliners rarely takes place. Against the background that the number of internet users is increasing steadily, we identify the need to differentiate general internet adoption (digital divide) effects and e-Governmentspecific divide effects. In our study, we thus develop a research framework, where the cumulative effect of e-Government adoption (among all people) is split into a) the digital divide effect and b) the e-Government divide effect (among internet users). We derive three corresponding research models and examine the influence of socio-demographic factors: age, gender, income, and education. We test our research framework using comprehensive survey data (n = 1930). Analysis of our results justifies the separation of the e-Government divide effect from the cumulative effect of e-Government adoption, because the factors influencing e-Government usage among the entire population and among onliners are proved to be different. Implications for theory and recommendations for practice are discussed.
Continuous improvement put into practice

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the existing body of knowledge about what distinguishes effective continuous improvement (CI) approaches and to explain some of the mechanisms which create a successful quality program.Design/methodology/approach – The empirical data were collected from interviews with employees at several levels in seven companies. The companies were deliberately selected to represent different types of resource consumption and outcome from a quality program.Findings – The implementation approaches of the studied companies were classified according to four different categories: parallel, integrated, coordinated and project approaches. Companies that adopt a project approach tend to fail to achieve anything more than minor improvements, while companies that take parallel and coordinated approaches realise significant improvements but use more resources than companies that utilise an integrated approach.Practical implications – This paper illustrates and explains why .
Current management and quality of life of patients with acute coronary syndrome undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention in Greece: 12-Month results from antiplatelet therapy observational study II (APTOR II).

INTRODUCTION We describe the current management of patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS) undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) over 12 months in Greece. METHODS This was a prospective observational study in ACS patients undergoing PCI from September 2008 to April 2009, capturing practices over 12 months at 22 sites that enrolled 558 eligible patients. RESULTS A total of 351 patients suffered from unstable angina or non-ST elevation myocardial infarction (UA/ NSTEMI), while 207 patients suffered from ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). For the UA/NSTEMI group, the median age was 64 years (interquartile range: 55-73), while for the STEMI group the median age was 56 years (interquartile range: 49-66). Stents were placed in 96.4% of patients: bare-metal stents alone were placed in 19% of patients, drug-eluting stents alone in 77.5% of patients, and both types of stent in 3.5% of patients. 74% of UA/NSTEMI patients and 87% of STEMI patients received the first antiplatelet loading dose within 1 day of the episode. 76% of UA/NSTEMI patients underwent PCI within 3 days following the initial ACS symptoms, while 67% of STEMI patients underwent PCI within 1 day of the ACS symptoms. Follow-up data were available for 540 (96.8%) patients. The percentages of patients on antiplatelet therapy and on other medications at the time of hospital discharge and at 12 months post-PCI were as follows: aspirin 98%, 97%; clopidogrel 99%, 96%; statins 81%, 79%; beta-blockers 73%, 72%; calcium blockers 11%, 11%; angiotensin II receptor blockers/angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors 64%, 62%; proton-pump inhibitors 39%, 35%. CONCLUSIONS In ACS patients treated with PCI in Greece, dual antiplatelet treatment is maintained in a very high percentage through 1 year post-procedure, and drug-eluting stent use is also high.
Do travelling band solutions describe cohesive swarms ? Aninvestigation for migratory

1 ABSTRACT We explore several hypotheses for the swarming behaviour in locusts, with a goal of understanding how swarm cohesion can be maintained by the huge population of insects (up to 10 9 individuals) over long distances (up to thousands of miles) and long periods of time (over a week). The mathematical models that correspond to such hypotheses are generally partial diierential equations that can be analysed for travelling wave solutions. The nature of a swarm (and the fact that it contains a nite number of individuals) mandates that we seek travelling band (pulse) solutions. However, most biologically reasonable models fail to produce such ideal behaviour unless unusual and unrealistic assumptions are made. The failure of such models, general diiculties encountered with similar models of other migratory phenomena, and possible approaches to alleviate these problems are described and discussed. 2 INTRODUCTION Social aggregations such as swarms, herds, schools, and ocks are known to have profound consequences for basic ecological processes such as predation, reproduction, and disease transmission. The eeects of sociality, its associated evolutionary costs and beneets, and the mechanics of how social groups assemble and operate in nature are the subjects of a large body of biological and mathematical literature. However, social interactions are inherently diicult to approach experimentally, so our knowledge of how organisms interact in social groups is incomplete. Furthermore, from a theoretical perspective, social interactions involve highly non-linear interactions between numerous individuals. Making tractable mathematical descriptions of these behaviours raises profound and interesting theoretical challenges. We are particularly interested in exploring the phenomenon of locust plagues. Locusts are known for their remarkable and devastating swarms, and their ability to migrate over long distances as a single coherent unit. The internal motions of the individuals in the swarm are not completely understood, but it appears that under many circumstances, there is continual interchange between locusts resting on the ground and those ying overhead. How this swarm forms, and under what conditions it can migrate are interesting problems in their own right. Here we mostly concern ourselves with the forces that hold the swarm together once it is formed. We ask what types of interactions account for a cohesive band despite the prevalence of random eeects that would tend to cause dispersal. To move as a unit, without the \pressure" of a population wave sustaining migration from some source, means that both a sharp wave front and wave …
Activation of α-7 Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptor Reduces Ischemic Stroke Injury through Reduction of Pro-Inflammatory Macrophages and Oxidative Stress

Activation of α-7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (α-7 nAchR) has a neuro-protective effect on ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke. However, the underlying mechanism is not completely understood. We hypothesized that α-7 nAchR agonist protects brain injury after ischemic stroke through reduction of pro-inflammatory macrophages (M1) and oxidative stress. C57BL/6 mice were treated with PHA568487 (PHA, α-7 nAchR agonist), methyllycaconitine (MLA, nAchR antagonist), or saline immediately and 24 hours after permanent occlusion of the distal middle cerebral artery (pMCAO). Behavior test, lesion volume, CD68+, M1 (CD11b+/Iba1+) and M2 (CD206/Iba1+) microglia/macrophages, and phosphorylated p65 component of NF-kB in microglia/macrophages were quantified using histological stained sections. The expression of M1 and M2 marker genes, anti-oxidant genes and nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) oxidase were quantified using real-time RT-PCR. Compared to the saline-treated mice, PHA mice had fewer behavior deficits 3 and 7 days after pMCAO, and smaller lesion volume, fewer CD68+ and M1 macrophages, and more M2 macrophages 3 and 14 days after pMCAO, whereas MLA's effects were mostly the opposite in several analyses. PHA increased anti-oxidant genes and NADPH oxidase expression associated with decreased phosphorylation of NF-kB p65 in microglia/macrophages. Thus, reduction of inflammatory response and oxidative stress play roles in α-7 nAchR neuro-protective effect.
Adhesion formation after laparoscopic surgery: what do we know about the role of the peritoneal environment?

In spite of the approaches that have been proposed to reduce postoperative peritoneal adhesions, they remain a major clinical problem because of the associated intestinal obstruction, chronic pelvic pain, female infertility and difficulties at the time of reoperation. The pathogenesis of the process have been focused almost exclusively on the local events induced by the surgical trauma, and the strategies for adhesion prevention thus focused on barriers to separate surgically denuded areas. The important role of the peritoneal cavity environment only recently became apparent and is not yet incorporated in adhesion reducing strategies. Recent data demonstrate that, in the presence of a direct surgical trauma, the entire peritoneal environment is quantitatively the most important factor in adhesion formation and hence adhesion prevention after both open and laparoscopic surgery. Indeed mesothelial hypoxia (CO2 pneumoperitoneum) or hyperoxia (open surgery), desiccation and surgical manipulation have been identified as factors cumulatively enhancing adhesions. The clinical implication is especially relevant for laparoscopic surgery because the pneumoperitoneum, being a closed environment, can be easily conditioned. Although human studies are lacking, animal data indicate that peritoneal adhesions can be reduced by over 80% with a good surgical technique, with adequate pneumoperitoneum conditioning as adding 3-4% of oxygen to the CO2 pneumoperitoneum, prevention of desiccation and slight cooling. Adhesion prevention barriers remain additionally effective, although quantitatively less important. The relevance of all these strategies for adhesion prevention still have to be confirmed in humans, but since it seems that the peritoneal environment is quantitatively much more important than the surgical trauma, adhesion prevention research and strategies should be directed more to conditioning the peritoneal cavity than to the use of agents.
Measurements uncertainty and modeling reliability of GaN HEMTs

In this paper, an important factors for accurate modeling of GaN HEMT is presented. Measurement uncertainty and frequency range as rules of thumb for reliable extraction of the small-signal model parameter is demonstrated. Determining the optimal pinch-off bias condition as a key point for reliable extraction of the reactive extrinsic parameters of the model is also investigated. The results of this study, which is carried out on high-power large size (in the order of 1mm gate width) devices, shows that the mentioned three points should be considered during modeling process.
A randomized controlled trial of a mindfulness-based intervention program for people with schizophrenia: 6-month follow-up

Mindfulness-based interventions have been increasingly evidenced to be effective in different mental illnesses but limited in schizophrenia. This single-blind, multisite randomized controlled trial tested the effects of a mindfulness-based psychoeducation group program (MPGP in addition to usual care) versus a conventional psychoeducation group program (CPGP) versus treatment-as-usual (TAU) alone, in schizophrenia spectrum disorders over a 6-month follow-up. In each of the two study sites (outpatient clinics), 69 outpatients with schizophrenia or its subtypes (N=138) were randomly allocated to one of the three study groups (n=46) after baseline measurements and underwent 6 months of intervention. Primary outcomes including patients’ mental state and rehospitalization rate and other secondary outcomes were assessed at entry and at 1 week and 6 months. One hundred and thirty-one (95%) participants completed the interventions assigned and one to two post-tests. Multivariate analyses of variance (followed by univariate contrast tests) indicated that the MPGP participants reported greater reductions in their psychotic symptoms (P=0.003) and length/duration of rehospitalizations (P=0.005) at 6-month follow-up. Patients in the MPGP group also reported greater improvements in their insight into illness/treatment (P=0.0008) and level of functioning (P=0.002) than the CPGP and TAU alone at the 1-week and 6-month follow-up. Overall, the findings suggest that MPGP can be useful in improving the short- to medium-term clinical outcomes of outpatients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders, not only in terms of their mental state and risk of relapse but also their insight into illness/treatment and psychosocial functioning.