Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Obesity and Type II diabetes mellitus: Is resistin the link?

There has been much effort recently to explore the role of adipocytokines in the interaction between adipose tissue, inflammation, and immunity. Tumor necrosis factor-alpha, interleukin-6, resistin, and many other adipocytokines are the soluble mediators derived mainly from adipocytes (fat cells). They are known to influence insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism profoundly, thus providing a molecular link between increased adiposity and insulin resistance (IR). Resistin, an adipocytokine, is a member of a class of cysteine-rich proteins, collectively termed resistin-like molecules. They were initially discovered in rodents. It is present in gross visceral fat deposits and is released by adipocytes in humans. Owing to the regional variation in the expression of resistin mRNA and protein levels in humans, the highest levels have been noted in the abdominal depot. It is interesting to note that resistin also gets released from infiltrating white blood cells subsequent to subclinical chronic low-grade inflammatory response, accompanying obesity. This convergence of adipocyte and macrophage function in obese Type II diabetics has paved its role in molecular linkage of obesity, inflammation and metabolic syndrome (MetS) risk. Resistin, being a pro-inflammatory adiopokine, contributes to atherosclerosis. High serum resistin levels have been found, although with some inconsistencies, in cardiovascular patients, labeling it as a cardiovascular disease (CVD) marker, to predict incident cardiovascular events. Both IR and inflammation are the pathogenic factors contributing to increased risk of CVD, associated with diabetes, thus tagging resistin as a potential MetS marker. In conclusion, resistin is a fascinating new hormone awaiting further research in the obesity – IR – diabetes – MetS link.
Statistical approaches to viral phylodynamics

The recent years have witnessed a rapid increase in the quantity and quality of genomic data collected from human and animal pathogens, viruses in particular. When coupled with mathematical and statistical models, these data allow us to combine evolutionary theory and epidemiology to understand pathogen dynamics. While these developments led to important epidemiological questions being tackled, it also exposed the need for improved analytical methods. In this thesis I employ modern statistical techniques to address two pressing issues in phylodynamics: (i) computational tools for Bayesian phylogenetics and (ii) data integration. I detail the development and testing of new transition kernels for Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) for time-calibrated phylogenetics in Chapter 2 and show that an adaptive kernel leads to improved MCMC performance in terms of mixing for a range of data sets, in particular for a challenging Ebola virus phylogeny with 1610 taxa/sequences. As a trade-off, I also found that the new adaptive kernels have longer warm up times in general, suggesting room for improvement. Chapter 3 shows how to apply state-of-the-art techniques to visualise and analyse phylogenetic space and MCMC for time-calibrated phylogenies, which are crucial to the viral phylodynamics analysis pipeline. I describe a pipeline for a typical phylodynamic analysis which includes convergence diagnostics for continuous parameters and in phylogenetic space, extending existing methods to deal with large time-calibrated phylogenies. In addition I investigate different representations of phylogenetic space through multi-dimensional scaling (MDS) or univariate distributions of distances
Antecedent-Based Interventions for Restricted Repetitive Behaviors in School-Aged Children Diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Antecedent-based interventions are a way of reducing the occurrence of restricted repetitive behaviors demonstrated by children with autism spectrum disorder by altering or removing the stimulus that occurs before the behavior typically occurs. The following research seeks to provide teachers with a selection of antecedent-based interventions that can be implemented in the classroom in order to reduce the occurrence of RRBs. The following literature review analyzed twenty research articles acquired through searching three databases: EBSCO Host, Google Scholar, and Articles +. The research articles were then sorted by category, number of participants, diagnosis of participants, age of participants, target behavior, setting of intervention, implementer of intervention, duration of intervention, and year of publication. These factors were then analyzed for trends in order to illustrate how each contributed to the overall efficacy of an intervention. Through interpreting these data, this review provides teachers with antecedentbased interventions that teachers can use to reduce a wide variety of restricted repetitive behaviors in the classroom.
Does the association of school experiences and marijuana use differ based on age of African American high school students?

ABSTRACT African American adolescents are disproportionately involved in marijuana use. This study investigated whether the association of school experiences and recent marijuana use (past 30 days) differed based on age of African American adolescents. A secondary analysis of the 2012 National Survey on Drug Use and Health was conducted. Multivariable logistic regression models were performed for 14–15-year olds and 16–17-year olds. Results revealed that students at highest risk for recent marijuana use were those who earned poor grades and felt that all or most of the students in their grade used marijuana. Of those who felt that all or most of the students in their grade used marijuana, 16–17-year olds were 3 times and 14–15-year olds were 6 times more likely to have recently used marijuana. Public health educators and prevention specialists can use these findings to assist them in further developing and implementing substance abuse programs which are culturally competent in nature. Future research is needed to further explore the association between perceived peer marijuana use and individual marijuana use among African American students.
Natural selection shapes codon usage in the human genome

Synonymous codon usage has been identified as an important determinant of translational efficiency and mRNA stability in model organisms and human cell lines. However, to date, population genetics studies have failed to observe evolutionary constraint on human codon usage, and synonymous variation has been largely overlooked as a component of human genetic diversity. Using genetic sequencing data from nearly 200,000 individuals, we uncover clear evidence that natural selection optimizes codon content in the human genome. We derive intolerance metrics to quantify gene-level constraint on synonymous variation and demonstrate that dosage-sensitive, DNA damage response, and cell cycle regulated genes are more intolerant to synonymous variation than other genes in the genome. Notably, we illustrate that reductions in codon optimality can attenuate the function of BRCA1. Our results reveal that synonymous mutations likely play an important and underappreciated role in human variation.
Connectomic Identification and Three-Dimensional Color Tuning of S-OFF Midget Ganglion Cells in the Primate Retina

In the trichromatic primate retina, the “midget” retinal ganglion cell is the classical substrate for red–green color signaling, with a circuitry that enables antagonistic responses between long (L)- and medium (M)-wavelength-sensitive cone inputs. Previous physiological studies showed that some OFF midget ganglion cells may receive sparse input from short (S)-wavelength-sensitive cones, but the effect of S-cone inputs on the chromatic tuning properties of such cells has not been explored. Moreover, anatomical evidence for a synaptic pathway from S cones to OFF midget ganglion cells through OFF midget bipolar cells remains ambiguous. In this study, we address both questions for the macaque monkey retina. First, we used serial block-face electron microscopy to show that every S cone in the parafoveal retina synapses principally with a single OFF midget bipolar cell, which in turn forms a private-line connection with an OFF midget ganglion cell. Second, we used patch electrophysiology to characterize the chromatic tuning of OFF midget ganglion cells in the near peripheral retina that receive combined input from L, M, and S cones. These “S-OFF” midget cells have a characteristic S-cone spatial signature, but demonstrate heterogeneous color properties due to the variable strength of L, M, and S cone input across the receptive field. Together, these findings strongly support the hypothesis that the OFF midget pathway is the major conduit for S-OFF signals in primate retina and redefines the pathway as a chromatically complex substrate that encodes color signals beyond the classically recognized L versus M and S versus L+M cardinal mechanisms. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The first step of color processing in the visual pathway of primates occurs when signals from short (S)-, middle (M)-, and long (L)-wavelength-sensitive cone types interact antagonistically within the retinal circuitry to create color-opponent pathways. The midget (L versus M or “red-green”) and small bistratified (S vs L+M, or “blue-yellow”) ganglion cell pathways appear to provide the physiological origin of the cardinal axes of human color vision. Here we confirm the presence of an additional S-OFF midget circuit in the macaque monkey fovea with scanning block-face electron microscopy and show physiologically that a subpopulation of S-OFF midget cells combine S, L, and M cone inputs along noncardinal directions of color space, expanding the retinal role in color coding.
Transport-level transactions : simple consistency for complex scalable low-latency cloud applications

The classical move from single-server applications to scal able cloud services is to split the application state along certain dimensions int o smaller partitions independently absorbable by a separate server in terms of size and load. Maintaining data consistency in the face of operations that cross par tition boundaries imposes unwanted complexity on the application. While for mos t applications many ideal partitioning schemes readily exist, First-Person Sh ooter (FPS) games and Relational Database Management Systems (RDBMS) are instance s of applications whose state can’t be trivially partitioned. For any partiti oning scheme there exists an FPS/RDBMS workload that results in frequent cross-parti tion operations. In this thesis we propose that it is possible and effective to provide unpartitionable applications with a generic communication infrastruc ture that enforces strong consistency of the application’s data to simplify cross-pa rtition communications. Using this framework the application can use a sub-optimal p artitioning mechanism without having to worry about crossing boundaries. We a pply our thesis to take a head-on approach at scaling our target applications. We build three scalable systems with competitive performances, used for storing da ta in a key/value datastore, scaling fast-paced FPS games to epic sized battles co nsisting of hundreds of players, and a scalable full-SQL compliant database used for storing tens of millions of items.
Lead Molecules as Novel Aromatase Inhibitors: In Silico De Novo Designing and Binding Affinity Studies

Aromatase inhibitors emerged as a pivotal moiety to selectively block estrogen production, prevention and treatment of tumour growth in breast cancer. De novo drug design is an alternative approach to blind virtual screening for successful designing of the novel molecule against various therapeutic targets.In the present study, we have explored the de novo approach to design novel aromatase inhibitors.The e-LEA3D, a computational-aided drug design web server was used to design novel drug-like candidates against the target aromatase. For drug-likeness ADME parameters (molecular weight, H-bond acceptors, H-bond donors, LogP and number of rotatable bonds) of designed molecules were calculated in TSAR software package, geometry optimization and energy minimization was accomplished using Chem Office. Further, molecular docking study was performed in Molegro Virtual Docker (MVD). Among 17 generated molecules using the de novo pathway, 13 molecules passed the Lipinski filter pertaining to their bioavailability characteristics. De novo designed molecules with drug-likeness were further docked into the mapped active site of aromatase to scale up their affinity and binding fitness with the target. Among de novo fabricated drug like candidates (1-13), two molecules (5, 6) exhibited higher affinity with aromatase in terms of MolDock score (-150.650, -172.680 Kcal/mol, respectively) while molecule 8 showed lowest target affinity (-85.588 Kcal/mol). The binding patterns of lead molecules (5, 6) could be used as a pharmacophore for medicinal chemists to explore these molecules for their aromatase inhibitory potential.
Analysis of the Buccal Bone Plate, Root Inclination and Alveolar Bone Dimensions in the Jawbone. A Descriptive Study Using Cone-Beam Computed Tomography

ABSTRACT Objectives This study aims to determine if there are enough buccal alveolar bone thickness to perform an immediate dental implant placement in anterior and posterior maxillary teeth. Material and Methods A total of 1463 teeth were examined, from 202 cone-beam computed tomography scans with voxel sizes of 0.15 mm. On each tooth, the following measures were determined: the alveolar bone thickness in two locations; the vertical distance between the buccal alveolar crest and cementoenamel junction; the angle between the tooth’s long axis and the alveolar bone axial inclination in the sagittal plane. Results In the most coronal location of maxillary teeth, the thickness of alveolar bone was lower than 0.6 (SD 0.6) mm in 50% of the teeth, and in the middle of the root the bone thickness was, on average, 0.96 (SD 0.6) mm. For the same maxillary teeth, the vertical distance between the buccal alveolar crest and cementoenamel junction and the angulation measured were, on average, 3.6 (SD 1.2) mm and 12. 1º (SD 1.4º), respectively. Conclusions The present study revealed that in most cases the thickness of buccal alveolar bone was less than 1 mm. Consequently, in such cases, immediate dental implant placement operation is not recommended, or should be combined with bone regeneration techniques.
Morphoanatomical profile of five species of Piper L. from Bangladesh and its taxonomic significance

The present study explores detailed morphoanatomical features of five species of Piper L. , viz. P. betle L. , P. longum L. , P. nigrum L. , P. retrofractum Vahl and P. sylvaticum Roxb. Each species is supplemented by detailed updated nomenclature, vernacular names, diagnostic characters, phenology, ecology and representative specimens. Maximum number of cortical and medullary vascular bundles have been observed in P. nigrum and P. retrofractum, respectively. In contrast, minimum number of cortical and medullary vascular bundles have been found in P. sylvaticum. Glandulartrichomes are found on the midrib of P. betle, P. longum, and P. sylvaticum, whereas trichomes are lacking in P. nigrum and P. retrofractum. The highest number of collateral vascular bundles have been found in P. retrofractum followed by P. nigrum, while P. betle and P. longum contain single collateral vascular bundle. P. betle can easily be distinguished from other species by its oval stem, non-glandular multicellular trichome with pointed tip, and presence of idioblasts and oil droplets. P. longum is distinct from remaining species by its diacytic stomata. Keys to the species based on morphological and anatomical characters are provided for easy identification of the studied species.
Archaeal communities in sponge, sediment and water from marine lakes and open water habitats

ABSTRACT Marine lakes are characterized by higher temperatures and lower pH and salinity values compared to open-water environments. Microbial communities in these habitats are, thus, subjected to distinct environmental conditions. Understanding how these conditions influence marine lake microbial composition and function can be illuminating since global phenomena such as ocean acidification are predicted to profoundly affect the marine environment. Here we investigated the archaeal community composition and putative function in three biotopes (water, sediment, the sponge Biemna fortis) in three distinct habitats (Kakaban and Haji Buang Lakes and the surrounding open-water habitat of Berau, Indonesia). Both biotope and habitat were shown to be important predictors of variation in archaeal composition and higher taxon abundance, but habitat only proved to be a significant factor for water and sediment. The compositional differences among habitats were mainly driven by differences in sediment archaea. These differences were not only prevalent at a higher taxonomic level, but also at the level of OTU identity, suggesting a degree of environmental specialization of distinct Cenarchaeum symbiosum phylotypes. There were also differences in the abundance of predicted relative gene counts among biotopes and habitats with functions that favour the adaptation to stressful environmental conditions enriched in samples from marine lakes.
Role of N-Acetylcysteine in Clearance of Secretions in Mechanical Ventilated Patients

Objective: to determine the role of nebulized N-acetylcysteine in mechanical ventilation in clearing the airway of these patients. Study Design : A Randomized Control Trial. Place and Duration of Study : Department of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Unit Quid e Azam Medical College Bahawalpur. From January 2018 to June 2019. Methods: In this project total 50 patients were enrolled by consecutive sampling who remained on mechanical ventilation for more than 24 hours and were between age 15 to 80 years old. Written consent of this project was taken from relative of each patient. These patients were divided into two groups by lottery method into case and control. The case group received 2 ml of NAC 20% with 8 ml normal saline 3 times a day for 1 day. The control group only received 10 ml normal saline via their nebulizers 3 times a day at 8 AM, 2 PM, and 9 PM. Data was collected and was analyzed. SPSS 22 was used for this purpose. All numerical variables of this research such as mean FiO 2 , mean peak and plateau pressure of airway, mean blood pressure, mean age and importantly mean density of secretions were calculated. In these values t test was applied and p value was calculated. If it was less than . 005, then it was considered significant. Similarly, qualitative data such as type of disease were calculated in percentage and chi square test was used to check the significance. Results: The mean O2 saturation of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the controls was 93.84±2.28, 94.27±2.33 and 94.08±1.81 respectively. The mean peak airway pressure of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the controls was 23.16±3.49, 25.38±8.86 and 24.01±4.91 respectively. The mean plateau airway pressure of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the controls was 19.04±7.79, 21.37±4.86 and 21.85±8.93 respectively. The mean secretion density of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the controls was 1.04±0.024, 1.05±0.03 and 1.03±0.002 respectively. While, the mean O2 saturation of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the cases was 93.08±2.37, 94.61±2.56 and 94.11±2.34 respectively. The mean peak airway pressure of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the cases was 26.58±5.81, 23.81±8.28 and 24.34±6.15 respectively. The mean plateau airway pressure of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the cases was 21.88±78.01, 24.88±6.67 and 23.51±7.55 respectively. The mean secretion density of baseline, 12 hours and 24 hours of the cases was 1.01±0.021, 1.08±0.022 and 1.008±0.0195 respectively. The differences were statistically insignificant. P-value ≤ 0.05 is considered as significant. Conclusion: It is concluded from our observations that use of N-acetylcysteine in patients on mechanical ventilation is very effective in clearance of secretion and to maintain airway clear. Key words: N-acetylcysteine, mechanical ventilation, airway clearance, normal saline DOI : 10.7176/JMPB/56-02 Publication date :May 31 st 2019
Response of some Soybean Cultivars to Different Systems of Phosphorus Fertilizers in North Delta Region

An experiment was carried out at the Experimental Farm of Sakha Agricultural Research Station, Kafr El-Sheikh, Egypt during the two successive seasons of 2015 and 2016 to investigate the effect of different systems of phosphorus fertilizer, either alone or in combination with biofertilizer (biofertal) on growth, yield, yield components and seed quality of four cultivars of soybean. The experimental design was split plot design with four replications, the main plots were devoted to soybean cultivars (Giza 21, Giza 35, Giza 111 and Crawford). While, the sub-plots were occupied with different sources of phosphorus fertilizer ; application of 150 kg super phosphate fed. -1 . , 100 kg super phosphate fed. -1 + biofertal, 100 kg super phosphate fed. -1 + spraying of super phosphate at 4%, 100kg super phosphate fed. -1 + biofertal+ spraying of super phosphate at 4%, 50 kg super phosphate fed. -1 + biofertal, 50 kg super phosphate fed. -1 + spraying of super phosphate at 4%, 50 kg super phosphate fed. -1 + biofertal+ spraying of super phosphate at 4%. The results showed marked difference of soybean cultivars were observed, among these cultivars, Giza 121 cv . recorded the highest seed yield followed by Giza 21 and Giza 35 while, the lowest seed yield was recorded with Crawford cv . at the two growing seasons. On the other hand, application of 100 kg P 2 O 5 fed . -1 combined with inoculation with biofertal and foliar spray with 4% P 2 O 5 fed. -1 recorded the highest values of photosynthetic pigments, dry weight plant -1 , plant height, number of pods plant -1 , 100-seed weight, seed yield and seed oil percentage at the two growing seasons. The recommendation of the obtained results is application of 100 kg P 2 O 5 fed. -1 combined with inoculation with biofertal and foliar spray with 4 % P 2 O 5 fed. -1 with soybean Giza 111 cv. under the same conditions in the study.