Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Conformational changes in the catalytically inactive nucleotide-binding site of CFTR

A central step in the gating of the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) chloride channel is the association of its two cytosolic nucleotide-binding domains (NBDs) into a head-to-tail dimer, with two nucleotides bound at the interface. Channel opening and closing, respectively, are coupled to formation and disruption of this tight NBD dimer. CFTR is an asymmetric adenosine triphosphate (ATP)-binding cassette protein in which the two interfacial-binding sites (composite sites 1 and 2) are functionally different. During gating, the canonical, catalytically active nucleotide-binding site (site 2) cycles between dimerized prehydrolytic (state O1), dimerized post-hydrolytic (state O2), and dissociated (state C) forms in a preferential C→O1→O2→C sequence. In contrast, the catalytically inactive nucleotide-binding site (site 1) is believed to remain associated, ATP-bound, for several gating cycles. Here, we have examined the possibility of conformational changes in site 1 during gating, by studying gating effects of perturbations in site 1. Previous work showed that channel closure is slowed, both under hydrolytic and nonhydrolytic conditions, by occupancy of site 1 by N6-(2-phenylethyl)-ATP (P-ATP) as well as by the site-1 mutation H1348A (NBD2 signature sequence). Here, we found that P-ATP prolongs wild-type (WT) CFTR burst durations by selectively slowing (>2×) transition O1→O2 and decreases the nonhydrolytic closing rate (transition O1→C) of CFTR mutants K1250A (∼4×) and E1371S (∼3×). Mutation H1348A also slowed (∼3×) the O1→O2 transition in the WT background and decreased the nonhydrolytic closing rate of both K1250A (∼3×) and E1371S (∼3×) background mutants. Neither P-ATP nor the H1348A mutation affected the 1:1 stoichiometry between ATP occlusion and channel burst events characteristic to WT CFTR gating in ATP. The marked effect that different structural perturbations at site 1 have on both steps O1→C and O1→O2 suggests that the overall conformational changes that CFTR undergoes upon opening and coincident with hydrolysis at the active site 2 include significant structural rearrangement at site 1.
Bilateral Asymmetry in the Human Pelvis

Asymmetry of the human axial skeleton has received much less attention that of the limb skeleton. Pelvic morphology is subject to multiple selective factors, including bipedal locomotion and obstetrics, among others, as well as environmental factors such as biomechanical loading. How these various factors influence or restrict asymmetry of the pelvis is unknown and few studies have investigated levels and patterns of pelvic asymmetry. This study examines percentage directional (%DA) and absolute (%AA) asymmetry in 14 bilaterally paired dimensions of the pelvic canal, non‐canal pelvis, and femur in female (n = 111) and male (n = 126) skeletons from nine geographically dispersed skeletal samples. Directional asymmetries were uniformly low for all measures and lacked any consistent patterning across the variables, while %AA was highest in the pelvic canal, particularly the posterior aspects. Few sex differences and no population differences were found for %DA and %AA; however the latter was correlated with coefficients of variation across the 14 variables in both sexes. While sample mean %DA were low, standard deviations of the canal variables were high and the majority of individuals in both sexes displayed %DA values >±0.5, suggesting asymmetry is common, if not directionally consistent. Biomechanical loading of the pelvic girdle may influence asymmetry of both the canal and non‐canal aspects of the pelvis; however it is unlikely that these asymmetries negatively affect obstetric function, given the prevalence for %DA found in this study. Anat Rec, 300:653–665, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Maturity of nearby faults influences seismic hazard from hydraulic fracturing

Significance Recent studies have focused on how wastewater disposal wells have caused dramatic increases in eastern US earthquakes. We focused instead on less common cases where hydraulic fracturing alone has caused earthquakes and found seismicity separated into two depth zones: a shallow zone on younger faults, with more small-magnitude earthquakes than expected, and a deeper zone on older faults, with larger magnitude earthquakes and seismicity continuing after fracturing stops. Hence, inducing deeper seismicity creates more hazard. Our observations are consistent with prior geologic, laboratory, and theoretical work indicating that age and maturity of faults causes the different seismicity patterns. We utilize data from well operators to demonstrate that both fluid pressure changes and rock stress transfer are needed to explain our observations. Understanding the causes of human-induced earthquakes is paramount to reducing societal risk. We investigated five cases of seismicity associated with hydraulic fracturing (HF) in Ohio since 2013 that, because of their isolation from other injection activities, provide an ideal setting for studying the relations between high-pressure injection and earthquakes. Our analysis revealed two distinct groups: (i) deeper earthquakes in the Precambrian basement, with larger magnitudes (M > 2), b-values < 1, and many post–shut-in earthquakes, versus (ii) shallower earthquakes in Paleozoic rocks ∼400 m below HF, with smaller magnitudes (M < 1), b-values > 1.5, and few post–shut-in earthquakes. Based on geologic history, laboratory experiments, and fault modeling, we interpret the deep seismicity as slip on more mature faults in older crystalline rocks and the shallow seismicity as slip on immature faults in younger sedimentary rocks. This suggests that HF inducing deeper seismicity may pose higher seismic hazards. Wells inducing deeper seismicity produced more water than wells with shallow seismicity, indicating more extensive hydrologic connections outside the target formation, consistent with pore pressure diffusion influencing seismicity. However, for both groups, the 2 to 3 h between onset of HF and seismicity is too short for typical fluid pressure diffusion rates across distances of ∼1 km and argues for poroelastic stress transfer also having a primary influence on seismicity.
Comparing UK, USA and Australian values for EQ-5D as a health utility measure of oral health.

OBJECTIVES Using generic measures to examine outcomes of oral disorders can add additional information relating to health utility. However, different algorithms are available to generate health states. The aim was to assess UK-, US- and Australian-based algorithms for the EuroQol (EQ-5D) in relation to their discriminative and convergent validity. Methods: Data were collected from adults in Australia aged 30-61 years by mailed survey in 2009-10, including the EQ-5D and a range of self-reported oral health variables, and self-rated oral and general health. RESULTS Responses were collected from n=1,093 persons (response rate 39.1%). UK-based EQ-5D estimates were lower (0.85) than the USA and Australian estimates (0.91). EQ-5D was associated (p<0.01) with all seven oral health variables, with differences in utility scores ranging from 0.03 to 0.06 for the UK, from 0.04 to 0.07 for the USA, and from 0.05 to 0.08 for the Australian-based estimates. The effect sizes (ESs) of the associations with all seven oral health variables were similar for the UK (ES=0.26 to 0.49), USA (ES=0.31 to 0.48) and Australian-based (ES=0.31 to 0.46) estimates. EQ-5D was correlated with global dental health for the UK (rho=0.29), USA (rho=0.30) and Australian-based estimates (rho=0.30), and correlations with global general health were the same (rho=0.42) for the UK, USA and Australian-based estimates. CONCLUSIONS EQ-5D exhibited equivalent discriminative validity and convergent validity in relation to oral health variables for the UK, USA and Australian-based estimates.
Training the Face: Strategic Practice as a Means to Regulate Affect-Induced Facial Muscle Contractions

Recently, it has been shown that the activation of affect-induced emotional reactions (i.e., manual approach/avoidance movements) can be modulated by strategic practice. The present study explored whether this modulation would also apply to affect-induced facial muscle contractions, which have been discussed to be relatively inflexibly linked to the processing of affective stimuli. In 2 experiments, participants conducted 2 different categorization tasks on positive and negative pictures of facial expressions (Experiment 1) or emotional scenes (Experiment 2) which were randomly framed in different colors. Black frames signaled to conduct an affective categorization which had to be executed either with a congruent or incongruent stimulus-response (S-R) mapping. Green or blue frames signaled to conduct a color classification (i.e., affective Simon task). Importantly, significant reductions of the affective Simon effect (that is, faster/more accurate positive [negative] responses to positive [negative] stimuli when categorizing a nonvalence stimulus feature) occurring after practice of incongruent (as compared with congruent) S-R mappings were observed for both manual and facial emotional responses. Importantly, the associative strength of long-term links does not limit the controllability of emotional responses through strategic practice. Thus, these results highlight the importance of practice as an effective means to even regulate facial muscle contractions.
Informal care: choice or constraint?

Background ‘Choice’ is increasingly pursued as a goal of social policy. However, the degree to which choice is exercised when entering an informal caring role is open to debate. Aim In this study, we examined the degree of choice and constraint in entering a caring role, and the relationship between choice and carers’ well‐being. Methods Data were derived from 1100 responses to a postal survey conducted in a British city. Statistical tests of association and multivariable regression modelling were applied to study the factors associated with choice in entering a caring role and the association that choice in entering a caring role had with carers’ well‐being. Results We found that informal care was generally perceived to be a free choice, albeit in most cases, a choice was also constrained by duty, financial or social resources. Having a sense of free choice in entering care was strongly and positively associated with the carer's well‐being. Conclusion The study findings are consistent with a view that enabling individuals to have more choice in their caring roles may be beneficial.
Hybrid Precoding Based on Non-Uniform Quantization Codebook to Reduce Feedback Overhead in Millimeter Wave MIMO Systems

In this paper, we focus on the design of the hybrid analog/digital precoding in millimeter wave multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems. To reduce the feedback overhead, we propose two nonuniform quantization (NUQ) codebook based hybrid precoding schemes for two main hybrid precoding implementations, i.e., the full-connected structure and the sub-connected structure. Specifically, we firstly group the angles of the arrive/departure (AOAs/AODs) of the scattering paths into several spatial lobes by exploiting the sparseness property of the millimeter wave in the angular domain, which divides the total angular domain into effective spatial lobes’ coverage angles and ineffective coverage angles. Then, we map the quantization bits non-uniformly to different coverage angles and construct NUQ codebooks, where high numbers of quantization bits are employed for the effective coverage angles to quantize AoAs/AoDs and zero quantization bit is employed for ineffective coverage angles. Finally, two low-complexity hybrid analog/digital precoding schemes are proposed based on NUQ codebooks. Simulation results demonstrate that, the proposed two NUQ codebook based hybrid precoding schemes achieve near-optimal spectral efficiencies and show the superiority in reducing the feedback overhead compared with the uniform quantization (UQ) codebook based works, e.g., at least 12.5% feedback overhead could be reduced for a system with 144/36 transmitting/receiving antennas.
Impact of acupuncture on antihistamine use in patients suffering seasonal allergic rhinitis: secondary analysis of results from a randomised controlled trial

Background Seasonal allergic rhinitis (SAR) is a common disease that has detrimental effects on the quality of life (QoL) of affected individuals. Approximately 18% of patients try to alleviate their symptoms through acupuncture. The ACUSAR (ACUpuncture in Seasonal Allergic Rhinitis) study (ClinicalTrials.gov registration no. NCT00610584) assessed the impact of acupuncture on SAR, showing significant improvements in rhinitis-specific QoL (RQoL) and in rescue medication (RM) use. Objective A secondary analysis of SAR patients’ use of antihistamine. Methods Patients were randomised into three study groups: acupuncture plus RM, sham acupuncture plus RM, and RM alone. The patients documented their medication use before and during the intervention period (8 weeks). The main outcome was the number of days with antihistamine use. Statistical analyses were conducted using parametric and non-parametric tests. The robustness of the results was tested by sensitivity analyses using non-parametric bootstrapping. Results The data from 414 patients were analysed. The acupuncture group used antihistamines significantly less often compared with the other groups (acupuncture vs sham acupuncture: mean difference −4.49 days, p=0.01; acupuncture vs RM: mean difference −9.15 days, p<0.001). Approximately 38% of the acupuncture group did not use any antihistamine in contrast to only 16% in the RM group. The pre-post comparison suggested that the acupuncture patients did not need to increase the days of antihistamine use to alleviate their symptoms, unlike the other groups. Conclusions Acupuncture appeared to significantly reduce the number of days of antihistamine use while improving RQoL and SAR symptoms; it can therefore be considered a valuable, additional treatment option for patients with SAR. Trial Registration Number NCT00610584; Post-results.
Effect of wood flour as nucleating agent on the isothermal crystallization of poly(lactic acid)

The effect of wood flour (WF) as an efficient nucleating agent on the isothermal melt crystallization and isothermal cold crystallization behavior of poly(lactic acid) (PLA) was investigated by differential scanning calorimeter and polarized optical microscopy. It was found that the incorporation of 4 wt% WF promoted the crystallization of PLA about 4.2%. Polarized optical microscopy results showed the Maltese cross of the samples. The presence of the 4 wt% WF may increase the nucleation density, leading to the increase of the spherulites; however, the size of the spherulites decreased, and the structure became incomplete. The Avrami model was applied to analyze the isothermal crystallization kinetics. It is concluded that the addition of WF modified the crystallization process of PLA (the value of Avrami exponent changed). Various parameters, such as the crystallization half time and crystallization rate constant, reflect that 4 wt% WF significantly improves the crystallization process. The observations in this article indicate that WF is an efficient nucleating agent of PLA. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Phase Diagram of Restricted Boltzmann Machines and Generalised Hopfield Networks with Arbitrary Priors

Restricted Boltzmann machines are described by the Gibbs measure of a bipartite spin glass, which in turn can be seen as a generalized Hopfield network. This equivalence allows us to characterize the state of these systems in terms of their retrieval capabilities, both at low and high load, of pure states. We study the paramagnetic-spin glass and the spin glass-retrieval phase transitions, as the pattern (i.e., weight) distribution and spin (i.e., unit) priors vary smoothly from Gaussian real variables to Boolean discrete variables. Our analysis shows that the presence of a retrieval phase is robust and not peculiar to the standard Hopfield model with Boolean patterns. The retrieval region becomes larger when the pattern entries and retrieval units get more peaked and, conversely, when the hidden units acquire a broader prior and therefore have a stronger response to high fields. Moreover, at low load retrieval always exists below some critical temperature, for every pattern distribution ranging from the Boolean to the Gaussian case.
Lipopolysaccharide-binding protein (LBP) can reverse the amyloid state of fibrin seen or induced in Parkinson's disease

The thrombin-induced polymerisation of fibrinogen to form fibrin is well established as a late stage of blood clotting. It is known that Parkinson’s Disease (PD) is accompanied by dysregulation in blood clotting, but it is less widely known as a coagulopathy. In recent work, we showed that the presence of tiny amounts of bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS) in healthy individuals could cause clots to adopt an amyloid form, and this could be observed via scanning electron microscopy (SEM) or via the fluorescence of thioflavin-T. This could be prevented by the prior addition of lipopolysaccharide-binding protein (LBP). We had also observed by SEM this unusual clotting in the blood of patients with Parkinson’s Disease. We hypothesised, and here show, that this too can be prevented by LBP in the context of PD. This adds further evidence implicating inflammatory microbial cell wall products as an accompaniment to the disease, and may be part of its aetiology. This may lead to novel treatment strategies in PD designed to target microbes and their products.
Effect of Urea Treated Groundnut Shells on Feed Intake, Digestibility, Nitrogen Retention and Economic Value in Growing Rabbits

The experiment of the current study was performed at Rabbitry of Poultry Science Department and the chemical analysis was carried out at Department of Animal Nutrition, Faculty of Animal Husbandry and veterinary sciences, The University of Agriculture, Peshawar. The recent study examines the effect of different level of Urea (UR) and Soybean Meal (SBM) treated groundnut shells on rabbit’s performance and economic evaluation of the experimental diet. A total of sixteen male local black and white rabbit’s of Mini Rex breed weaning age 35 + 5 of having body weight range from 10651170g were selected at random to four treatments, with each treatment diet for four rabbit’s. Metabolic cages were provided for each group of rabbits with separate facility for the feces and urine collection. Four diet’s were formulated for the current experiment which contain 0% urea treated groundnut shells (UR-0%), 1%urea treated groundnut shells (UR-1%), 2% urea treated groundnut shells(UR-2%) and 2% urea + 2% soybean meal treated groundnut shells (UR-2% +SBM-2%)respectively. The soybean meal was used as urease source. The formulated diets were tasted for 56 days. The present result showed that the feed intake in group D containing urea and SBM treated groundnut shells were significantly higher than the experimental diet A, B and C. The digestibility coefficient of dry matter (70.91) organic matter (78.89), crude protein (80.63), ash (73.96), NDF (72.12), ADF (58.13) and ADL (42.10) were more significant (p < 0.05) in experimental diet D as compare to B, C and control group. The enhancement in feed intake and nutrient digestibility may be due to the addition of SBM as urease source which increase the urea hydrolyzation. The nitrogen retention was significantly higher in experimental diet B, C and D as compare to control one. The highest value of retained nitrogen (2.00) was observed in experimental diet D. The average body weight gain (5.12) and feed conversion ratio (3.11) were significantly improved for group of rabbit’s fed by diet D than the experimental diet A, B and C. Maximum profitability was observed in experimental diet D (Rs. 63.92) and was followed by experimental diet C, B and control one. From the present experiment it was concluded that the use of different level of urea and soybean meal treated groundnut shells increased the feed intake, nutrient digestibility, retention of nitrogen and body weight gain in experimental animals.
Effects of formic acid or calcium formate in feed on performance and microbiological characteristics of broilers.

Three experiments were conducted to determine the effects of feeding broilers formic acid (FA) or calcium formate (CF) on performance and microbiological characteristics of broilers. Live bird performance was not adversely affected by feeding up to 1.0% FA or 1.45% CF. In Experiment 1, levels of salmonellae in carcass and cecal samples were significantly reduced by feeding birds . 36% CF. Salmonellae were not isolated from any of the carcasses of birds fed . 36% CF. Similar reductions were not noted for total organisms or presumptive coliforms. In Experiment 2, feeding . 36% CF nonsignificantly reduced levels of salmonellae in carcass and cecal samples, but again, levels of total organisms and coliforms were not reduced. In Experiment 3, salmonellae in the ceca or in the carcass rinse fluid were not reduced by feeding . 36% CF.
The impact of a short educational movie on promoting chronic pain health literacy in school: A feasibility study

School‐based health education programs on chronic pain providing information about the proper management of recurrent and chronic pain may increase health literacy in terms of pain knowledge, may thereby prevent dysfunctional coping and may decrease the risk of pain chronification. The aim of the present feasibility study was to evaluate the effectiveness of an educational movie on recurrent and chronic pain in increasing pain knowledge among students.
An Object-Oriented Verification of Three NWP Model Formulations via Cluster Analysis: An Objective and a Subjective Analysis

Abstract Recently, an object-oriented verification scheme was developed for assessing errors in forecasts of spatial fields. The main goal of the scheme was to allow the automatic and objective evaluation of a large number of forecasts. However, processing speed was an obstacle. Here, it is shown that the methodology can be revised to increase efficiency, allowing for the evaluation of 32 days of reflectivity forecasts from three different mesoscale numerical weather prediction model formulations. It is demonstrated that the methodology can address not only spatial errors, but also intensity and timing errors. The results of the verification are compared with those performed by a human expert. For the case when the analysis involves only spatial information (and not intensity), although there exist variations from day to day, it is found that the three model formulations perform comparably, over the 32 days examined and across a wide range of spatial scales. However, the higher-resolution model formulatio.
Near Infrared Plasmonic Gas Sensing with Doped Metal Oxide Nanocrystals

In this paper, we demonstrate the application of ZnO doped with gallium (GZO), aluminum (AZO) and germanium (GeZO) nanocrystals as novel plasmonic and chemiresistive sensors for the detection of hazardous gases including hydrogen (H2) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2). GZO, AZO and GeZO nanocrystals are obtained by non-aqueous colloidal heat-up synthesis with high transparency in the visible range and strong localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) in the near IR range, tunable with dopant concentration (up to 20% mol nominal). Thanks to the strong sensitivity of the LSPR to chemical and electrical changes occurring at the surface of the nanocrystals, such optical features can be used to detect the presence of toxic gases. By monitoring the changes in the dopant-induced plasmon resonance in the near infrared, we demonstrate that GZO, AZO and GeZO thin films prepared depositing an assembly of highly doped ZnO colloids are able to optically detect both oxidizing and reducing gases at mild (<100 °C) operating temperatures. Combined optical and electrical measurements show that the dopants within ZnO nanocrystals enhance the gas sensing response compared to undoped ZnO.