Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Association of Serum C3 Concentration and Histologic Signs of Thrombotic Microangiopathy with Outcomes among Patients with ANCA-Associated Renal Vasculitis.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Complement alternative pathway (cAP) activation has recently been recognized as a key pathogenic event in ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV). cAP dysregulation is also a major determinant of thrombotic microangiopathies (TMA), which can in turn complicate AAV. We explored the prognostic significance of cAP activation and of histologic evidence of TMA in a cohort of patients with renal AAV. DESIGN, SETTING, PARTICIPANTS, & MEASUREMENTS We studied 46 patients with AAV diagnosed between January 1990 and December 2011 at the Nephrology Unit of Parma University Hospital; 30 of them had undergone renal biopsy. We analyzed serum levels of C3 (sC3) and C4 (sC4) and, for 19 patients who had frozen plasma, plasma Bb and C5b-9 levels. We also reviewed all kidney biopsy specimens, specifically searching for histologic signs of TMA, and performed immunofluorescence or immunohistochemistry for C3d, C4d, Bb and C5b-9. RESULTS sC3 was below the lower limit of normal in 35% of the patients, whereas C4 was low in only 2%. Patients with low sC3 tended to be older (P=0.04) and to have lower eGFR at diagnosis (P=0.06). The median follow-up was 78 months (interquartile range, 18-135 months); 18 patients reached ESRD (10 of 14 and 8 of 26 in the low and normal sC3 groups, respectively). Death-censored renal survival was lower in the low sC3 group than in the normal sC3 group (log-rank test, P=0.01). Eight of the 30 patients who had undergone biopsy (27%) had histologic signs of TMA; these signs were more frequent in patients with low sC3 (5 of 10 versus 3 of 20; P=0.04). Notably, patients with histologic signs of TMA had a dramatically worse death-censored renal survival than patients without TMA (log-rank test, P=0.01), with ESRD occurring in 8 of 8 patients with TMA versus 8 of 22 patients without TMA. CONCLUSIONS Low sC3 levels and histologic signs of TMA are associated with a poor renal prognosis in patients with AAV.
Constructivism and pedagogical reform in China: issues and challenges

ABSTRACT This article critically discusses the constructivist ideas, assumptions and practices that undergird the current pedagogical reform in China. The pedagogical reform is part of a comprehensive curriculum reform that has been introduced across schools in Mainland China. Although the official documents did not specify the underpinning theories for the pedagogical reform, Chinese scholars and educators have identified constructivism as a dominant theory. The essay argues that the acceptance of constructivist views and logics has generated three key challenges for Chinese educators with respect to the content, teaching approach and assessment. The challenges are the concern that constructivism will undermine content mastery, the perceived incompatibility between constructivism and the traditional transmission approach, and the misalignment between constructivism and the prevailing assessment system in China. The example of China adds to the international body of literature on the attraction and borrowing of ‘modern’ educational theories and practices, and the tensions and difficulties engendered in the process.
Modeling the Evolution of Item Rating Networks Using Time-Domain Preferential Attachment

The understanding of the structure and dynamics of the intricate network of connections among people that consumes products through Internet appears as an extremely useful asset in order to study emergent properties related to social behavior. This knowledge could be useful, for example, to improve the performance of personal recommendation algorithms. In this contribution, we analyzed five-year records of movie-rating transactions provided by Netflix, a movie rental platform where users rate movies from an online catalog. This dataset can be studied as a bipartite user-item network whose structure evolves in time. Even though several topological properties from subsets of this bipartite network have been reported with a model that combines random and preferential attachment mechanisms [Beguerisse Diaz et al., 2010], there are still many aspects worth to be explored, as they are connected to relevant phenomena underlying the evolution of the network. In this work, we test the hypothesis that bursty human behavior is essential in order to describe how a bipartite user-item network evolves in time. To that end, we propose a novel model that combines, for user nodes, a network growth prescription based on a preferential attachment mechanism acting not only in the topological domain (i.e. based on node degrees) but also in time domain. In the case of items, the model mixes degree preferential attachment and random selection. With these ingredients, the model is not only able to reproduce the asymptotic degree distribution, but also shows an excellent agreement with the Netflix data in several time-dependent topological properties.
Micromachined CMOS LNA and VCO by CMOS-compatible ICP deep trench technology

Selective removal of the silicon underneath the inductors in RF integrated circuits based on inductively coupled plasma (ICP) deep trench technology is demonstrated by a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) 5-GHz low-noise amplifier (LNA) and a 4-GHz voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO). Design principles of a multistandard LNA with flat and low noise figures (NFs) within a specific frequency range are also presented. A 2-dB increase in peak gain (from 21 to 23 dB) and a 0.5-dB (from 2.28 to 1.78 dB) decrease in minimum NF are achieved in the LNA while a 3-dB suppression of phase noise is obtained in the VCO after the ICP backside dry etching. These results show that the CMOS-process-compatible backside ICP etching technique is very promising for system-on-a-chip applications.
Knowledge Sharing Research

In response to the calls for more context-aware theorizing, in this essay we review the empirical research on individual knowledge sharing behavior in organizations, with a specific focus on the context in which employees share knowledge. We build on the “Who? / Where? / Why? / What? ” framework to “flesh out” the contexts of the empirical studies on individual knowledge sharing published in top-level journals. Mapping the researched contexts, we indicate several biases of the literature as well as point to under-investigated spaces, suggesting theoretical dimensions, their contrasts, and new empirical settings that are missing from the major stream of knowledge sharing studies. We also find that context has been scarcely accounted for in the existing literature, discuss the reasons for it, show how accounting for context can be used to re-interpret some contradictions in existing literature, and suggest some ways to move forward.
The Three-dimensional Structure of the Warm Local Interstellar Medium. I. Methodology

In this first in a series of papers, we develop a methodology for constructing three-dimensional models of the local interstellar cloud (LIC) and adjacent warm clouds in the local interstellar medium (LISM). Our models are based on the column density of neutral hydrogen gas (N) inferred primarily from measurements of the deuterium column density toward nearby stars obtained from the analysis of Hubble Space Telescope ultraviolet spectra. We also use values of N inferred from spectra of hot white dwarfs and B-type stars obtained by the Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer satellite. These very different methods give consistent results for the three white dwarf stars in common. We assume that along each line of sight all interstellar gas moving with a speed consistent with the LIC velocity vector has a constant density, N = 0.10 cm-3, and extends from the heliosphere to an edge determined by the value of N moving at this speed. A number of stars have velocities and/or depletions that indicate absorption by other warm clouds in their lines of sight. On this basis α Cen A and B and probably also ϵ Ind lie inside the Galactic center (G) cloud, HZ 43 and 31 Com lie inside what we call the north Galactic pole cloud, and β Cet is located inside what we call the south Galactic pole cloud. We show the locations of these clouds in Galactic coordinates. The Sun is located very close to the edge of the LIC toward the Galactic center and the north Galactic pole. The absence of Mg II absorption at the LIC velocity toward α Cen indicates that the distance to the edge of the LIC in this direction is ≤0.05 pc and the Sun should leave the LIC and perhaps enter the G cloud in less than 3000 yr. Comparison of LIC and total values of N toward pairs of stars with separations between 0. °9 and 20° reveals a pattern of good agreement so long as both stars lie within 60 pc of the Sun. Thus the LIC and perhaps also other nearby warm clouds have shapes that are smooth on these angular scales. In our second paper we will therefore fit the shape of the LIC with a set of smooth basis functions (spherical harmonics).
Control mechanisms for packet audio in the Internet

The Internet provides a single class best effort service. From an application's point of view, this service amounts in practice to providing channels with time-varying characteristics such as delay and loss distributions. One way to support real time applications such as interactive audio given this service is to use control mechanisms that adapt the audio coding and decoding processes based on the characteristics of the channels, the goal being to maximize the quality of the audio delivered to the destinations. In this paper, we describe and analyze a set of such control mechanisms. They include a jitter control mechanism and a combined error and rate control mechanism. These mechanisms have been implemented and evaluated over the Internet and the MBone. Experiments indicate that they make it possible to establish and maintain reasonable quality audioconferences even across fairly congested connections.
The Effect of Star Formation on the Far-Infrared-Radio Correlation within Galaxies

Using data obtained for 12 galaxies as part of the Spitzer Infrared Nearby Galaxies Survey (SINGS) and the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT) SINGS radio continuum survey, we study how star formation activity affects the far-infrared-radio correlation within galaxies by testing a phenomenological model that describes the radio image as a smeared version of the far-infrared image. The physical basis of this description is that cosmic-ray (CR) electrons will diffuse measurably farther than the mean free path of dust-heating photons before decaying by synchrotron radiation. This description works well in general. Galaxies with higher infrared surface brightnesses have best-fit smoothing scale lengths of a few hundred parsecs, substantially shorter than those for lower surface brightness galaxies. We interpret this result to suggest that galaxies with higher disk-averaged star formation rates have had a recent episode of enhanced star formation and are characterized by a higher fraction of young CR electrons that have traveled only a few hundred parsecs from their acceleration sites in supernova remnants compared to galaxies with lower star formation activity.
Lateralized caudate metabolic abnormalities in adolescent major depressive disorder: a proton MR spectroscopy study.

OBJECTIVE Proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy ((1)H-MRS) has been increasingly used to examine striatal neurochemistry in adult major depressive disorder. This study extends the use of this modality to pediatric major depression to test the hypothesis that adolescents with major depression have elevated concentrations of striatal choline and creatine and lower concentrations of N-acetylaspartate. METHOD Fourteen adolescents (ages 12-19 years, eight female) who had major depressive disorder for at least 8 weeks and a severity score of 40 or higher on the Children's Depression Rating Scale-Revised and 10 healthy comparison adolescents (six female) group-matched for gender, age, and handedness were enrolled. All underwent three-dimensional 3-T (1)H-MRS at high spatial resolution (0.75-cm(3) voxels). Relative levels of choline, creatine, and N-acetylaspartate in the left and right caudate, putamen, and thalamus were scaled into concentrations using phantom replacement, and levels were compared for the two cohorts. RESULTS Relative to comparison subjects, adolescents with major depressive disorder had significantly elevated concentrations of choline (2.11 mM versus 1.56 mM) and creatine (6.65 mM versus 5.26 mM) in the left caudate. No other neurochemical differences were observed between the groups. CONCLUSIONS These findings most likely reflect accelerated membrane turnover and impaired metabolism in the left caudate. The results are consistent with prior imaging reports of focal and lateralized abnormalities in the caudate in adult major depression.
Association of N-Linked Glycoprotein Acetyls and Colorectal Cancer Incidence and Mortality

Background Acute phase proteins highlight the dynamic interaction between inflammation and oncogenesis. GlycA, a novel nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) inflammatory marker that identifies primarily circulating N-acetyl glycan groups attached to acute phase proteins, may be a future CRC risk biomarker. Methods We examined the association between GlycA and incident CRC and mortality in two prospective cohorts (N = 34,320); Discovery cohort: 27,495 participants from Women's Health Study (WHS); Replication cohort: 6,784 participants from Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA). Multivariable Cox models were adjusted for clinical risk factors and compared GlycA to acute phase proteins (high-sensitivity C-reactive protein [hsCRP], fibrinogen, and soluble intercellular adhesion molecule-1 [sICAM-1]). Results In WHS (median follow-up 19 years, 337 cases, 103 deaths), adjusted HRs (95% CIs) per SD increment of GlycA for CRC incidence and mortality were 1.19 (1.06–1.35; p = 0.004) and 1.24 (1.00–1.55; p = 0.05), respectively. We replicated findings in MESA (median follow-up 11 years, 70 cases, 23 deaths); HRs (95% CIs) per SD of GlycA for CRC incidence and mortality were 1.32 (1.06–1.65; p = 0.01) and 1.54 (1.06–2.23; p = 0.02), respectively, adjusting for age, sex, and race. Pooled analysis, adjusted HR (95% CI) per SD of GlycA for CRC incidence and mortality was 1.26 (1.15–1.39; p = 1 x 10−6). Other acute phase proteins (hsCRP, fibrinogen, and sICAM-1) had weaker or no association with CRC incidence, while only fibrinogen and GlycA were associated with CRC mortality. Conclusions The clinical utility of GlycA to personalize CRC therapies or prevention warrants further study. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov: WHS NCT00000479, MESA NCT00005487
FlashBlox: Achieving Both Performance Isolation and Uniform Lifetime for Virtualized SSDs

A longstanding goal of SSD virtualization has been to provide performance isolation between multiple tenants sharing the device. Virtualizing SSDs, however, has traditionally been a challenge because of the fundamental tussle between resource isolation and the lifetime of the device - existing SSDs aim to uniformly age all the regions of flash and this hurts isolation. We propose utilizing flash parallelism to improve isolation between virtual SSDs by running them on dedicated channels and dies. Furthermore, we offer a complete solution by also managing the wear. We propose allowing the wear of different channels and dies to diverge at fine time granularities in favor of isolation and adjusting that imbalance at a coarse time granularity in a principled manner. Our experiments show that the new SSD wears uniformly while the 99th percentile latencies of storage operations in a variety of multi-tenant settings are reduced by up to 3.1x compared to software isolated virtual SSDs.
Prevalence of Astroviruses in a Children’s Hospital

ABSTRACT An enzyme immunoassay for astrovirus was used to screen 357 stool samples from 267 symptomatic inpatients at a tertiary-care children’s hospital. Thirty stool samples from 26 patients contained astrovirus antigen, while rotavirus was found in 34 samples andClostridium difficile toxin was found in 40. Half of the astrovirus infections were nosocomial. Additional pathogens were identified in six of the astrovirus antigen-positive stool samples. Most (80%) of the astroviruses recovered were of serotype 1. Astrovirus infections were significantly more common than rotavirus orC. difficile infections in very young infants and in those with surgical short-bowel syndrome.
Subunit D of RNA Polymerase from Methanosarcina acetivorans Contains Two Oxygen-labile [4Fe-4S] Clusters

Background: RNAP from several species of Archaea and Eukarya is predicted to contain Fe-S clusters. Results: We show here that Subunit D of RNAP from M. acetivorans contains two redox-active and oxygen-labile [4Fe-4S] clusters. Conclusion: The [4Fe-4S] clusters are not required for D-L heterodimer formation but affect the stability of the heterodimer. Significance: The [4Fe-4S] clusters may regulate the assembly and activity of RNAP in an oxidant-dependent manner. Subunit D of multisubunit RNA polymerase from many species of archaea is predicted to bind one to two iron-sulfur (Fe-S) clusters, the function of which is unknown. A survey of encoded subunit D in the genomes of sequenced archaea revealed six distinct groups based on the number of complete or partial [4Fe-4S] cluster motifs within domain 3. Only subunit D from strictly anaerobic archaea, including all members of the Methanosarcinales, are predicted to bind two [4Fe-4S] clusters. We report herein the purification and characterization of Methanosarcina acetivorans subunit D in complex with subunit L. Expression of subunit D and subunit L in Escherichia coli resulted in the purification of a D-L heterodimer with only partial [4Fe-4S] cluster content. Reconstitution in vitro with iron and sulfide revealed that the M. acetivorans D-L heterodimer is capable of binding two redox-active [4Fe-4S] clusters. M. acetivorans subunit D deleted of domain 3 (DΔD3) was still capable of co-purifying with subunit L but was devoid of [4Fe-4S] clusters. Affinity purification of subunit D or subunit DΔD3 from M. acetivorans resulted in the co-purification of endogenous subunit L with each tagged subunit D. Overall, these results suggest that domain 3 of subunit D is required for [4Fe-4S] cluster binding, but the [4Fe-4S] clusters and domain 3 are not required for the formation of the D-L heterodimer. However, exposure of two [4Fe-4S] cluster-containing D-L heterodimer to oxygen resulted in loss of the [4Fe-4S] clusters and subsequent protein aggregation, indicating that the [4Fe-4S] clusters influence the stability of the D-L heterodimer and therefore have the potential to regulate the assembly and/or activity of RNA polymerase in an oxidant-dependent manner.
Primary Care in Indonesia

over 200 million in 2005, and lives on the over 13,000 islands that make up the archipelago lying to the north-west of Australia (Central Intelligence Agency, 2005). The main island, Java, from where the country is administered, is the most densely populated piece of land on earth, with over 120 million people living on a piece of land slightly larger than Ireland. Indonesia is home to over 35 different cultural and racial groups; consequently, there are many different views on health accomplishment. Eighty-eight percent of the people are Muslim, and the other officially recognised religions are Hinduism (mainly on Bali), Christianity and Buddhism. Indonesia’s history has been marked by 450 years of Dutch colonial rule which ended in a war in 1946, followed by independence under Sukarno and then dictatorship under Suharto. A relatively peaceful revolution in 1997 saw the successful implementation of democracy in this proud nation whose recorded history goes back at least 3,000 years. The rich cultural heritage has been supported by the national philosophy of Pancasila, which is based on belief in God, humanism, universal justice, national unity, and democracy (Gimon, 2001). Implicit in this is freedom of religion and of speech, and these principles have become a valued part of life in Indonesia. Children have always played an important role in Indonesian society. Children are highly valued and respected members of a family. They are brought up to believe in respect for others, the importance of education, achievement through hard work and a love of their country. Young people will seek out educational opportunities in other countries through scholarships and aid schemes, and young people and adults alike will separate from their families under considerable hardship, loneliness and cultural differences to study for many years in developed countries, believing that this will provide them with high quality education, opportunities for development and benefit to Indonesia. EDITORIAL
A Molecular Selection Index Method Based on Eigenanalysis

The traditional molecular selection index (MSI) employed in marker-assisted selection maximizes the selection response by combining information on molecular markers linked to quantitative trait loci (QTL) and phenotypic values of the traits of the individuals of interest. This study proposes an MSI based on an eigenanalysis method (molecular eigen selection index method, MESIM), where the first eigenvector is used as a selection index criterion, and its elements determine the proportion of the trait's contribution to the selection index. This article develops the theoretical framework of MESIM. Simulation results show that the genotypic means and the expected selection response from MESIM for each trait are equal to or greater than those from the traditional MSI. When several traits are simultaneously selected, MESIM performs well for traits with relatively low heritability. The main advantages of MESIM over the traditional molecular selection index are that its statistical sampling properties are known and that it does not require economic weights and thus can be used in practical applications when all or some of the traits need to be improved simultaneously.
Effects of Ketamine on Levels of Inflammatory Cytokines IL-6, IL-1β, and TNF-α in the Hippocampus of Mice Following Acute or Chronic Administration

Ketamine is an injectable anesthetic and recreational drug of abuse commonly used worldwide. Many experimental studies have shown that ketamine can impair cognitive function and induce psychotic states. Neuroinflammation has been suggested to play an important role in neurodegeneration. Meanwhile, ketamine has been shown to modulate the levels of inflammatory cytokines. We hypothesized that the effects of ketamine on the central nervous system are associated with inflammatory cytokines. Therefore, we set out to establish acute and chronic ketamine administration models in C57BL/6 mice, to evaluate spatial recognition memory and emotional response, to analyze the changes in the levels of the inflammatory cytokines interleukin-6 (IL-6), interleukin-1β (IL-1β), and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) in the mouse hippocampus, employing behavioral tests, Western blot, quantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) and immunohistochemistry. Our results showed that ketamine at the dose of 60 mg/kg induced spatial recognition memory deficit and reduced anxiety-like behaviors in mice after chronic administration. Moreover, we found that ketamine increased the hippocampal levels of IL-6 and IL-1β after single, multiple and long-term administration in a dose-dependent manner. However, the expression level of TNF-α differed in the mouse hippocampus under different conditions. Single administration of ketamine increased the level of TNF-α, whereas multiple and long-term administration decreased it significantly. We considered that TNF-α expression could be controlled by a bi-directional regulatory pathway, which was associated with the dose and duration of ketamine administration. Our results suggest that the alterations in the levels of inflammatory cytokines IL-6, IL-1β, and TNF-α may be involved in the neurotoxicity of ketamine.