Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Clinical and Oncological Value of Preoperative BMI in Gastric Cancer Patients: A Single Center Experience

Introduction. The impact of preoperative BMI on surgical outcomes and long-term survival of gastric cancer patients was investigated in various reports with contrasting results. Materials & Methods. A total of 378 patients who underwent a surgical resection for primary gastric cancer between 1994 and 2011 were retrospectively studied. Patients were stratified according to BMI into a normal group (<25, group A), an overweight group (25–30, group B), and an obesity group (≥30, group C). These 3 groups were compared according to clinical-pathological characteristics, surgical treatment, and long-term survival. Results. No significant correlations between BMI and TNM (2010), UICC stage (2010), Lauren's histological type, surgical results, lymph node dissection, and postoperative morbidity and mortality were observed. Factors related to higher BMI were male gender (P < 0.05), diabetes (P < 0.001), and serum blood proteins (P < 0.01). A trend to fewer lymph nodes retrieved during gastrectomy with lymphadenectomy in overweight patients (B and C groups) was observed, although not statistically significant. There was no difference in overall survival or disease-specific survival between the three groups. Conclusion. According to our data, BMI should not be considered a significant predictor of postoperative complications or long-term result in gastric cancer patients.
Review of nemonoxacin with special focus on clinical development

Nemonoxacin is a novel C-8-methoxy nonfluorinated quinolone with remarkably enhanced in vitro activity against a wide variety of clinically relevant pathogens, especially gram-positive bacteria, including multidrug-resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. It has a low propensity for selecting resistant pathogens than fluoroquinolones, since bacteria become resistant to nemonoxacin only when three different mutations occur in their quinolone resistance-determining regions. Nemonoxacin shows greater efficacy than most of the widely used fluoroquinolones in the murine model of systemic, pulmonary, or ascending urinary tract infection. Nemonoxacin has a sound PK profile in healthy volunteers. It rapidly reaches maximum concentration Cmax 1–2 hours after oral administration in the fasting state and has a relatively long elimination half-life of more than 10 hours, which is similar to fluoroquinolones. Approximately 60%–75% of the administered dose is excreted in unchanged form via kidneys over 24–72 hours. Phase II and III studies of oral nemonoxacin and Phase II studies of intravenous nemonoxacin have been completed in patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), before which the Phase I studies of oral and intravenous nemonoxacin indicated sound tolerance and safety with healthy volunteers. The published results demonstrate that an oral dose of either 500 mg or 750 mg nemonoxacin once daily for 7 days is as effective and safe as levofloxacin 500 mg once daily for 7 days. Nemonoxacin is well-tolerated in patients with CAP. The most common adverse events of oral administration are observed in the gastrointestinal and nervous system, the incidence of which is similar to levofloxacin treatment. The Phase III studies of intravenous nemonoxacin for treating CAP and oral nemonoxacin for diabetic foot infection has been registered with promising outcomes to be expected.
Electrostatic interactions in ubiquitin: stabilization of carboxylates by lysine amino groups.

To explore electrostatic interactions in ubiquitin, pK(a) values have been determined by NMR for all 12 carboxyl groups in wild-type ubiquitin and in variants where single lysines have been replaced by neutral residues. Aspartate pK(a) values in ubiquitin range from 3.1 to 3.8 and are generally less than model compound values. Most aspartate pK(a) values are within 0.2 pH unit of those predicted with a simple Tanford-Kirkwood model. Glutamate pK(a) values range from 3.8 to 4.5, close to model compound values and differing by 0.1-0.8 pH unit from calculated values. To determine the role of positive charges in modulating carboxyl pK(a) values, we mutated lysines at positions 11, 29, and 33 to glutamine and threonine. NMR studies with these six single-site mutants reveal significant interactions of Lys 11 and Lys 29 with Glu 34 and Asp 21, respectively: pK(a) values for Glu 34 and Asp 21 increase by approximately 0.5-0.8 pH unit, similar to predicted values, when the lysines are replaced by neutral residues. In contrast, the predicted interaction between Lys 33 and Glu 34 is not observed experimentally. In some instances, substitution of lysine by glutamine and threonine did not lead to the same changes in carboxyl pK(a) values. These may reflect new short-range interactions between the mutated residues and the carboxyl groups. Carboxyl pK(a) shifts > 0.5 pH unit result from mutations at groups that are <5 A from the carboxyl group. No interactions are observed at >10 A.
The Interaction Between Lentiviral Integrase and LEDGF: Structural and Functional Insights

Since its initial description as an HIV-1 integrase (IN) interactor seven years ago, LEDGF has become one of the best-characterized host factors involved in viral replication. Results of intensive studies in several laboratories indicated that the protein serves as a targeting factor for the lentiviral DNA integration machinery, and accounts for the characteristic preference of Lentivirus to integrate within active transcription units. The IN-LEDGF interaction has been put forward as a promising target for antiretroviral drug development and as a potential tool to improve safety of lentiviral vectors for use in gene therapy. Additionally, as a natural ligand of lentiviral IN proteins, LEDGF has been successfully used in structural biology studies of retroviral DNA integration. This review focuses on the structural aspects of the IN-LEDGF interaction and their functional consequences.
Atmospheric Temperature and Absolute Humidity Profiles over the Beaufort Sea and Amundsen Gulf from a Microwave Radiometer

AbstractA Radiometrics MP-3000A microwave radiometric profiler (MWRP) provided high temporal resolution atmospheric profiles for temperature and absolute humidity up to 10 km, while 113 radiosondes were launched (and 68 were used in the analysis) over sea ice and the open ocean during the 2008 Circumpolar Flaw Lead System Study and the 2009 ArcticNet Cruise in the western Canadian High Arctic. The profiles were categorized by season and by the underlying sea ice concentrations. The MWRP was validated against the radiosonde data, focusing on the lower 2 km, which are generally influenced by the nature of the underlying surface. Root-mean-square (RMS) differences for temperature averaged 1.79 K through the lowest 2 km for the winter season, 1.81 K for spring, 2.51 K for summer, and 2.47 K for fall. Average biases of +0.99, +1.19, +2.13, and +2.08 K, respectively, indicate that the MWRP measurements were colder than the raobs for the lower 2 km. The RMS difference for absolute humidity averaged 0.25 g m−3 in.
Quality of Life of Higher Education Students with Learning Disability Studying Online

Abstract This study examined how learning challenges encountered within online learning environments affected the quality of life of students with learning disability. A qualitative content analysis of semi-structured interviews conducted with eight students (mean age = 33.75 years; SD = 8.15), revealed that learning challenges had consequences on students quality of life with regards to levels of stress/anxiety, self-esteem, time available for other activities, personal relationships and financial pressures. A notable finding was that these quality of life concerns were frequently associated with the extra time and effort students invested in their studies as a way of managing the learning challenges encountered. The findings of this study provide valuable insights into the higher levels of anxiety and lower levels of self-esteem previously reported for students with learning disability; and underscore the importance of minimising learning barriers, providing study accommodations, and providing multifaceted support programmes that address both academic and emotional/personal concerns.
Identifying and Improving Dataset References in Social Sciences Full Texts

Scientific full text papers are usually stored in separate places than their underlying research datasets. Authors typically make references to datasets by mentioning them for example by using their titles and the year of publication. However, in most cases explicit links that would provide readers with direct access to referenced datasets are missing. Manually detecting references to datasets in papers is time consuming and requires an expert in the domain of the paper. In order to make explicit all links to datasets in papers that have been published already, we suggest and evaluate a semi-automatic approach for finding references to datasets in social sciences papers. Our approach does not need a corpus of papers (no cold start problem) and it performs well on a small test corpus (gold standard). Our approach achieved an F-measure of 0.84 for identifying references in full texts and an F-measure of 0.83 for finding correct matches of detected references in the da|ra dataset registry.
Aspects of Vowel Perception by Normal Hearing and Hearing Impaired Listeners.

The effect of durational differences on the identification of vowel tokens was studied using ten normal hearing and six hearing impaired subjects. Stimuli were synthetically generated and varied in duration of the steady state, durations of the initial and final transitions and F1/F2/F3 location. Listeners were required to identify the given vowel token from a set of ten possible alternatives. The results from the normal hearing group supported the established effects of duration on the perception of vowels. However, these effects were different depending on the frequency locations of F1/F2/F3. Further, changes in the duration of the initial transition had a greater effect than changes in the duration of the final transition. By way of comparison, the identification behavior of the normal hearing subjects was different from the identification behavior of hearing impaired subjects. In particular, the hearing impaired subjects' behavior was idiosyncratic. Further, not only were the subjects different from each other the labelling performance was different within the same subjects across the different vowels. Thus, the effects of durational changes on vowel identification by normal hearing and hearing impaired listeners differs as a function of formant frequency structure. In addition, the effects of durational changes were dependent on the portion of the vowel that was manipulated. Finally, hearing impaired listeners were not like the normal hearing listeners, nor were they like each other. The results, then can be interpreted to indicate that vowel perception by normal hearing and hearing impaired listeners is a complex multi-cued phenomenon.
On Fortification of General Games

A recent result of Moshkovitz [Mos14] presented an ingenious method to provide a completely elementary proof of the Parallel Repetition Theorem for certain projection games via a construction called fortification. However, the construction used in [Mos14] to fortify arbitrary label cover instances using an arbitrary extractor is insufficient to prove parallel repetition. In this paper, we provide a fix by using a stronger graph that we call fortifiers. Fortifiers are graphs that have both ‘1 and ‘2 guarantees on induced distributions from large subsets. We then show that an expander with sufficient spectral gap, or a bi-regular extractor with stronger parameters (the latter is also the construction used in an independent update [Mos15] of [Mos14] with an alternate argument), is a good fortifier. We also show that using a fortifier (in particular ‘2 guarantees) is necessary for obtaining the robustness required for fortification. Furthermore, we show that this can yield a similar parallel repetition theorem for robust general games and not just robust projection games on bi-regular graphs.
Direct effect of dasatinib on signal transduction pathways associated with a rapid mobilization of cytotoxic lymphocytes

It has been shown that an increase in cytotoxic lymphocyte counts in the peripheral blood occurs rapidly after taking dasatinib, but the underlying mechanism is not yet elucidated. To investigate the influence of dasatinib on signal transduction pathways, we investigated the changes in JAK‐STAT, mitogen‐activated protein kinase (MAPK), and AKT in cytotoxic lymphocytes, including natural killer (NK) cells and cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs), before and after dasatinib treatment in chronic myeloid leukemia patients. Among a total of 30 patients, 18 were treated with dasatinib, nine with imatinib, and three with nilotinib. At constitutive levels, the expression of phosphorylated proteins, pSTAT1, pSTAT3, and pERK in NK cells and pSTAT3 in CTLs, was significantly higher in dasatinib‐treated patients. Among the patients evaluated, only dasatinib‐treated patients showed inhibition of multiple signaling pathways after taking a tyrosine kinase inhibitor. The magnitude of pERK and pAKT inhibition was closely associated with an increase in NK cells and CTLs, respectively, after taking a tyrosine kinase inhibitor. Those responses were more evident in patients with cytomegalovirus IgG positivity. In this study, we demonstrated for the first time, the influence of dasatinib on cell events in cytotoxic lymphocytes in vivo and explained the possible underlying mechanism that results in lymphocyte mobilization after dasatinib treatment.
Does Pre-School Education Matter? Understanding the Lived Experiences of Parents and Their Perceptions of Preschool Education.

According to the United States Department of Education, approximately 4,172,347 fouryear-olds are eligible to attend publicly funded preschool programs. Of this number, only 1,709,607 of those eligible are enrolled in a publicly funded preschool program (U.S. Department of Education, 2014). Because of a lack of quantitative and qualitative data regarding parents’ positive and negative attitudes and beliefs about preschool, misconceptions arise regarding parental decisions to support or not to support their child’s academic, social, and emotional development prior to kindergarten. In a large urban district in the southeastern part of the United States, this qualitative phenomenological study investigated the perceptions of 12 parents, six of who elected and six of whom did not elect to send their children to preschool, and the lived experiences that contributed to those decisions. Unanswered questions linger about why so few children attend preschool. Further, the study examined the relationship between parent attitudes and beliefs about preschool and whether or not their lived experiences contributed to their perceptions of the values of preschool. Current research reveals that preschool programs have made a positive impact on early literacy, social emotional learning, and academic success (Barnett, Carolan, Fitzgerald, & Squires, 2012; Cunningham, 2010; Duncan & Magnuson, 2013; Invernizzi, Landrum, Teichman, & Townsend, 2010; U.S. Department of Education, 2014). In 2004, the U.S. Department of Education conducted an Early Childhood Longitudinal Study that identified a 60% school readiness gap between preschool-aged children in the highest socioeconomic group and the lowest socioeconomic group, before entering kindergarten (Robin & Schulman, 2004). The
Response of Wheat Growth Parameters to Co-Inoculation of Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) and Different Levels of Inorganic Nitrogen and Phosphorus

N-fixing and P-solubilizing bacteria playing a significant role as a plant growth-promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) in diverse crops. In order to evaluate efficiency of PGPR plus nitrogen and phosphorous chemical fertilizers on yield of wheat (cv. N-80-19) a field experiment was arranged in split-split plots based on randomized complete block design with three replications. The main and sub plot consisting of phosphorous (0, 25 and 50 kg ha ) and nitrogen (0, 50 and 100 kg ha ), respectively and sub sub-plot were considered PGPR 11 at four levels (control, inoculation with nitrogen fixing bacteria (PFB), phosphate solubilizing bacteria (PSB) and dual inoculation with PFB and PSB). Results showed that application of biofertilizers could increase grain yield and harvest index as much as 46.6 and 48.8% compared to control, respectively. Integrated treatments showed better performance in terms of grain number per spike, tiller number and shoot length by 35.57, 35.1 and 31.9% compared to separate treatments, respectively. Furthermore, biofertilizers significantly reduced P and N fertilizer application without any reduction in wheat yield related parameters. Generally, results of this study revealed that using of biofertilizers especially dual inoculation had effective and significant role in terms of all studied yield characteristics except spike length in given wheat cultivar.
Outstanding Scientific Achievement Award Lecture 2011: Defeating Diabesity

Matthias H. Tschop, MD, from Munich, Germany, received the American Diabetes Association’s prestigious 2011 Outstanding Scientific Achievement Award. The award was presented at the Association’s 71st Scientific Sessions in San Diego, California in June 2011. The Outstanding Scientific Achievement Award recognizes distinguished scientific achievement in the field of diabetes, taking into consideration independence of thought and originality. Currently holding the Alexander von Humboldt Professorship and Chair of Metabolic Diseases at the Technical University Munich as well as Director of the Institute of Diabetes and Obesity at the Helmholtz Center in Munich, Dr. Tschop is internationally recognized for his work on how gut-brain communication regulates appetite and metabolism and for combining groundbreaking discovery with translational potential. A review of his peer-reviewed publication record and the breadth of his co-authors is a testament to his ability to build teams to advance science. Early in his career, Dr. Tschop reported on the orexigenic, adipogenic, and metabolic effects of ghrelin. This added a pathway to the model of body weight and glucose control and established a novel set of drug targets for the treatment of the metabolic syndrome. His report of the efficacy of novel gut hormone coagonists targeting glucagon-like peptide 1 and glucagon receptors to reduce body weight and improve glucose tolerance broke new ground and offered novel clinical approaches for the treatment of diabetes and obesity. Dr. Tschop is an influential voice explaining diabetes to the public and describing the scientific progress being made to improve lives. Professor Richard D. DiMarchi is the Cox Professor for Chemistry and Gill Chair in Biomolecular Sciences at Indiana University and is Dr. Tschop’s key collaborator, providing transformative scientific vision and discovering a wealth of innovative molecules for their joint research successes toward novel therapeutics for the prevention and treatment of diabetes. Professor DiMarchi has invented …
The Emic and Etic Conceptualizations of Organizational Citizenship Behaviour (OCB): Exploring Sri Lankan University Lecturers Perceptions of Their Work

Calls for examining conceptualizations of organizational citizenship behaviour (OCB) across country contexts are based on the belief that these behaviours are context specific and should vary depending on where they are examined. Thus, to better understand the nature of OCB in Sri Lanka and to further explore the nature of OCB across country contexts, the present study was carried out. Academic staff perceptions of what constitutes OCB in their jobs were examined. Academic staff members were studied because the substantial role discretion afforded in academic jobs would likely provide a wide variation of OCBs in this context. Out of the responses of 97 participants, 482 items were generated. These items were content analyzed and coded into 8 major dimensions. The etic and emic nature of the dimensions were examined by comparing the eight dimensions with those derived from other studies. Of the dimensions, conscientiousness, altruism and civic virtue were found in all other studies using similar methods. They constituted a majority of initially generated response items. The five other dimensions were reported in at least one other study. No unique dimensions were found in the present context. The results indicate that a large aspect of OCBs is etic in nature, but that a smaller proportion of OCBs tend to fluctuate based on the context. No clear pattern emerged in the variations across studies.
High-performance sorting on networks of workstations

We report the performance of NOW-Sort, a collection of sorting implementations on a Network of Workstations (NOW). We find that parallel sorting on a NOW is competitive to sorting on the large-scale SMPs that have traditionally held the performance records. On a 64-node cluster, we sort 6.0 GB in just under one minute, while a 32-node cluster finishes the Datamation benchmark in 2.41 seconds. Our implementations can be applied to a variety of disk, memory, and processor configurations; we highlight salient issues for tuning each component of the system. We evaluate the use of commodity operating systems and hardware for parallel sorting. We find existing OS primitives for memory management and file access adequate. Due to aggregate communication and disk bandwidth requirements, the bottleneck of our system is the workstation I/O bus.
A robust frontend for VAD: exploiting contextual, discriminative and spectral cues of human voice

Reliable automatic detection of speech/non-speech activity in degraded, noisy audio signals is a fundamental and challenging task in robust signal processing. As various speech technology applications rely on the accuracy of a Voice Activity Detection (VAD) system for their effectiveness and robustness, the problem has gained considerable research interest over the years. It has been shown that in highly distorted conditions, an accurate segmentation of the target speech can be achieved by combining multiple feature streams. In this paper, we extract four one-dimensional streams each attempting to separate speech from the disturbing background by exploiting a different speech-related characteristic, i.e. (i) the spectral shape, (ii) spectro-temporal modulations, (iii) the periodicity structure due to the presence of pitch harmonics, and (iv) the long-term spectral variability proﬁle. The information from these streams is then expanded over long duration context windows and applied to the input layer of a standard Multilayer Perceptron classiﬁer. The proposed VAD was evaluated on the DARPA RATS corpora and shows to be very competitive to current state-of-the art systems.