Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Accuracy of computerized automatic identification of cephalometric landmarks by a designed software.

OBJECTIVES The purpose of this study was to design software for localization of cephalometric landmarks and to evaluate its accuracy in finding landmarks. METHODS 40 digital cephalometric radiographs were randomly selected. 16 landmarks which were important in most cephalometric analyses were chosen to be identified. Three expert orthodontists manually identified landmarks twice. The mean of two measurements of each landmark was defined as the baseline landmark. The computer was then able to compare the automatic system's estimate of a landmark with the baseline landmark. The software was designed using Delphi and Matlab programming languages. The techniques were template matching, edge enhancement and some accessory techniques. RESULTS The total mean error between manually identified and automatically identified landmarks was 2.59 mm. 12.5% of landmarks had mean errors less than 1 mm. 43.75% of landmarks had mean errors less than 2 mm. The mean errors of all landmarks except the anterior nasal spine were less than 4 mm. CONCLUSIONS This software had significant accuracy for localization of cephalometric landmarks and could be used in future applications. It seems that the accuracy obtained with the software which was developed in this study is better than previous automated systems that have used model-based and knowledge-based approaches.
Perioperative gene expression analysis for prediction of postoperative sepsis.

BACKGROUND Postoperative sepsis is one of the main causes of death after major abdominal surgery; however, the immunologic factors contributing to the development of sepsis are not completely understood. In this study, we evaluated gene expression in patients who developed postoperative sepsis and in patients with an uncomplicated postoperative course. METHODS We enrolled 220 patients in a retrospective matched-pair, case-control pilot study to investigate the perioperative expression of 23 inflammation-related genes regarding their properties for predicting postoperative sepsis. Twenty patients exhibiting symptoms of sepsis in the first 14 days after surgery (case group) were matched with 20 control patients with an uncomplicated postoperative course. Matching criteria were sex, age, main diagnosis, type of surgery, and concomitant diseases. Blood samples were drawn before surgery and on the first and second postoperative days. Relative gene expression was analyzed with real-time reverse-transcription PCR. RESULTS Significant differences (P < 0.005) in gene expression between the 2 groups were observed for IL1B (interleukin 1, beta), TNF [tumor necrosis factor (TNF superfamily, member 2)], CD3D [CD3d molecule, delta (CD3-TCR complex)], and PRF1 [perforin 1 (pore forming protein)]. Logistic regression analysis and a subsequent ROC curve analysis revealed that the combination of TNF, IL1B, and CD3D expression had a specificity and specificity of 90% and 85%, respectively, and predicted exclusion of postoperative sepsis with an estimated negative predictive value of 98.1%. CONCLUSIONS These data suggest that gene expression analysis may be an effective tool for differentiating patients at high and low risk for sepsis after abdominal surgery.
Populism and the media: cross-national findings and perspectives

European media systems have gone through major changes in the last few decades, and these changes have included increased opportunity structures for the dissemination of populist messages. Chapter 12 (‘Switzerland’) rightly states that the disappearance of the traditional party press, increased media ownership concentration, dependence on advertising, and a stronger orientation toward news values have worked in favor of a growing populist discourse. The newly established online media are seen as having a high afnity to populism’s rhetorical persuasion because both aim for the “quick kick/click” with a broad audience. As was stated in Chapter 1 in this volume, the role that the media play in the dissemination of populism is largely under-explored. In the classical research literature dealing with populism (see, e.g., Canovan, 1981; Taggart, 2000), communication and media are not addressed at all. When political scientists make the media their subject, they see the media mostly only as a neutral platform for populist leaders’ appearances and messages. One exception is Mudde (2007), who dedicates at least a few pages to this topic in his book Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe (pp. 248-253). He elaborates in particular on the assumption that tabloids and commercial television share a close relationship with populist communication.
Conformational analysis and biological activity of leptocarpin and leptocarpin acetate.

This paper deals with the conformational study in solution of leptocarpin, a germacranolide with the heliangolide structure isolated from Leptocarpha rivularis D.C. The results obtained agree with the single crystal X-ray diffraction studies. Leptocarpin and leptocarpin acetate show 50% inhibition of [35S]-methionine uptake without affecting the (methyl-3H)thymidine and (5,6-3H)uridine incorporation, when assayed in HeLa cells.
When and Why Do Venture-Capital-Backed Companies Obtain Venture Lending?

I model the decision of an informed early-stage venture capital (VC) investor that considers involving an uninformed VC or venture lending (VL) investor to finance the late stage. Early-stage VC investors that own high-quality value companies tend to signal their quality and they frequently turn to VL investors. Early-stage VC investors prefer VC if the proportion of high-quality companies in the population is high, if their companies have a high upside potential, if they can benefit from the value that late-stage VC investors add, or if uncertainty is high. I find empirical evidence consistent with these predictions.
Sample Selection Bias, Return Moments, and the Performance of Optimal versus Naive Diversification

I examine the sample selection bias in portfolio horse race. Numerous studies propose mean-variance portfolio rules to outperform the naive 1/N portfolio rule. However, the outperformance is often justified by a small number of pre-selected datasets. Using a new performance test based on a large number of datasets, I compare thirteen "1/N outperformers" with the naive rule. Results show that not only a majority of the thirteen "1/N outperformers" on average underperform the 1/N rule significantly, but also none of these mean-variance rules significantly outperform the naive benchmark in more than 10% of the datasets. To further understand portfolio performance, this paper explores the theoretical relations between assets' return moments and the performance of optimal versus naive diversification. These relations not only imply strong performance predictability, but also can be exploited to deliver out-of-sample portfolio benefits.
The survival of neural precursor cell grafts is influenced by in vitro expansion

Embryonic neural precursor cells (ENPs) provide a potential alternative for transplantation in neurodegenerative diseases, as they can be expanded in culture, avoiding many of the practical obstacles that limit the application of transplanting primary neurones. However, grafts of ENPs into animal models show variable survival and limited differentiation into neurones. The effect of expansion time on their ability to survive and differentiate may be an important factor in this and has not been examined directly. In these experiments, murine and human ENPs were expanded for short (4 weeks) and long (20 weeks) periods before transplantation into the adult rat striatum. Whereas grafts of both short‐ and long‐term expanded human ENPs survived for 4 weeks following transplantation, by 20 weeks all long‐term expanded grafts had disappeared. Murine ENPs behaved similarly: only grafts of short‐term expanded ENPs survived at 12 weeks following transplantation. RT‐PCR analysis of ENP cultures after 4 and 20 weeks of expansion demonstrated changes in expression of a number of different groups of genes. We conclude that long‐term expansion of ENPs profoundly impairs their ability to survive long‐term after transplantation into the adult brain. This has implications for the potential use of these cells for neural transplantation strategies.
Pathogen roid rage: Cholesterol utilization by Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Abstract The ability of science and medicine to control the pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) requires an understanding of the complex host environment within which it resides. Pathological and biological evidence overwhelmingly demonstrate how the mammalian steroid cholesterol is present throughout the course of infection. Better understanding Mtb requires a more complete understanding of how it utilizes molecules like cholesterol in this environment to sustain the infection of the host. Cholesterol uptake, catabolism and broader utilization are important for maintenance of the pathogen in the host and it has been experimentally validated to contribute to virulence and pathogenesis. Cholesterol is catabolized by at least three distinct sub-pathways, two for the ring system and one for the side chain, yielding dozens of steroid intermediates with varying biochemical properties. Our ability to control this worldwide infectious agent requires a greater knowledge of how Mtb uses cholesterol to its advantage throughout the course of infection. Herein, the current state of knowledge of cholesterol metabolism by Mtb is reviewed from a biochemical perspective with a focus on the metabolic genes and pathways responsible for cholesterol steroid catabolism.
Effects of weight changes produced by exercise, food restriction, or overeating on body composition.

The body weight of rats was reduced by exercise or by restriction of food intake over a period of 18 wk. Body composition was studied to determine if exercise protects against the loss of lean tissue that can occur as a result of a negative caloric balance. Rats weighing 706 +/-14 g were divided into four groups matched for weight. A baseline group was killed at the beginning of the study. An exercising group, fed ad lib. , was subjected to a program of swimming. A sedentary, free-eating group was provided with food ad lib. Two sedentary, paired-weight subgroups were calorie restricted so that they lost weight at the same rate as the exercisers. The protein intake of one paired-weight subgroup was matched with that of the exercising group. The other sedentary, paired-weight animals ate the standard diet. There was no significant difference in body composition between the two sedentary, paired-weight subgroups which were, therefore, pooled for comparison with the other groups. The exercisers lost 182+/-19 g as a result of both an increase in caloric expenditure and a decrease in appetite. The sedentary, food-restricted animals lost an average of 182+/-18 g. The sedentary, free-eating animals gained 118+/-13 g. The carcasses of the exercised animals contained significantly less fat and more lean tissue than those of the sedentary, paired-weight animals, providing evidence for a fat mobilizing and protein conserving effect of exercise. The composition of the body substance lost by the exercising animals was 78% fat, 5% protein, 1% minerals, and 16% water, compared to 62% fat, 11% protein, 1% minerals, and 26% water for the sedentary, food-restricted rats. Fat accounted for 87% and water for 10% of the weight gained by the sedentary, free-eating animals.
The investigation of cytogenetic and oxidative effects of diffractaic acid on human lymphocyte cultures

Diffractaic acid (DA) is a naturally occurring depside derivative found in several lichen species. It has a wide range of important biological effects such as analgesic and antiviral properties, although its cytotoxic, cytogenetic and oxidative effects have not been investigated in human blood tissue yet. Therefore, increasing concentrations (1, 5, 10, 25, 50, 100 and 200 mgL-1) of DA was added into human whole blood cultures. 3-(4.5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2.5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay was used to assess the cell viability and/or cytotoxicity and genotoxic damage potential of DA using chromosome aberration (CA) and micronucleus (MN) tests were performed. In addition, oxidative alterations were determined by the total antioxidant capacity (TAC) and total oxidant status (TOS) assays. The results revealed that DA reduced cell viability at higher concentrations than 50 mgL-1. The all tested concentrations of DA were non-genotoxic. In vitro treatments with DA led to increases of TAC levels in the cultured blood cells without changing the TOS levels as compared to the control group. Consequently, DA exhibited a significant non-mutagenic and antioxidant potential in vitro.
A Reduction of HbA1c after 3 Months Predicts 2-year Responsiveness to Sitagliptin Treatment.

OBJECTIVE This retrospective study evaluated the long-term efficacy of sitagliptin and the factors contributing to its glucose-lowering effect. METHODS Six hundred and sixteen dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitor-naïve outpatients with type 2 diabetes who began sitagliptin treatment between December 1, 2009 and December 31, 2011 were included in this study. The inclusion criteria were that the patient had regularly visited our hospital for a period of ≥700 days from the initiation of sitagliptin treatment and the measurement of hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) had been performed at 0, 3, 6, 12, 18, and 24 months after the initiation of treatment. From the population of 616 patients, 447 and 169 had received sitagliptin for ≥700 and <700 days, respectively. The primary endpoint was ΔHbA1c at 24 months. The factors associated with the hypoglycemic effect of sitagliptin were also investigated. RESULTS Sitagliptin treatment significantly decreased the level of HbA1c, and the hypoglycemic effect was sustained for at least 2 years. The baseline HbA1c level, duration of diabetes, Δbody weight value, and ΔHbA1c value at 3 months were independently associated with the hypoglycemic effect of sitagliptin. CONCLUSION Sitagliptin has a long-term hypoglycemic effect in type 2 diabetes patients. A patient's ΔHbA1c at 3 months may be a predictor of their ΔHbA1c at 24 months.
The Association Between Air Ambulance Distribution and Trauma Mortality

Objective:To determine whether increasing distance between helicopter ambulance airbase and either home residence or referring facility is associated with an increased risk of injury-related mortality. Background:A dramatic increase in the absolute number and utilization of Helicopter Emergency Medical Services transports has occurred in the management of the critically injured patients. HEMS are resource intensive, and the most efficient geographic distribution of airbases necessary to improve patient outcomes is unknown. Methods:We performed a retrospective analysis of 244,293 adult trauma patients who were treated at a designated trauma center (TC) in Pennsylvania during the period 1997 to 2007, using the Pennsylvania Trauma Outcomes Study data set. We performed a multivariate analysis, adjusting for differences in case mix, to determine whether airbase proximity to either residence or referring facility is associated with injury-related mortality. Results:For patients residing distant (>20 miles) from a TC, increasing distance from an airbase is associated with an increased risk of death; for each mile, the risk of mortality increases by approximately 1% (adjusted odds ratio, 1.011; 95% confidence interval, 1.002–1.018; P = 0.02). There is no additional benefit to living close (<25 miles) to more than 1 airbase. However, most airbases are positioned near TC and other airbases. Despite the proliferation of helicopter ambulances, 18.1% of patients who did not live near a TC also did not live near airbase. Conclusions:For individuals residing distant from a TC, proximity to 1 airbase is associated with reduced risk of death. No additional benefit is observed when airbases are positioned close to a TC or other airbases.
SCUT: Multi-class imbalanced data classification using SMOTE and cluster-based undersampling

Class imbalance is a crucial problem in machine learning and occurs in many domains. Specifically, the two-class problem has received interest from researchers in recent years, leading to solutions for oil spill detection, tumour discovery and fraudulent credit card detection, amongst others. However, handling class imbalance in datasets that contains multiple classes, with varying degree of imbalance, has received limited attention. In such a multi-class imbalanced dataset, the classification model tends to favour the majority classes and incorrectly classify instances from the minority classes as belonging to the majority classes, leading to poor predictive accuracies. Further, there is a need to handle both the imbalances between classes as well as address the selection of examples within a class (i.e. the so-called within class imbalance). In this paper, we propose the SCUT hybrid sampling method, which is used to balance the number of training examples in such a multi-class setting. Our SCUT approach oversamples minority class examples through the generation of synthetic examples and employs cluster analysis in order to undersample majority classes. In addition, it handles both within-class and between-class imbalance. Our experimental results against a number of multi-class problems show that, when the SCUT method is used for pre-processing the data before classification, we obtain highly accurate models that compare favourably to the state-of-the-art.
Information Technology and Learning On-the-Job

Economists disagree how much technology raises demand for workers with pre-existing skills. But technology might affect wages another way: through skills learned on the job. Using instrumental variables on 9 panels of workers from 1989 to 2013, this paper estimates that workers who use information technology (IT) have wage growth that is about 2% greater than non-IT workers, all else equal, implying substantial learning. This effect persists over time, implying sustained productivity growth from IT. Also, it benefits workers both with and without college degrees. Because many more college-educated workers use IT, college wages grow faster, contributing to economic inequality.
Key Enabling Technologies for Optical–Wireless Networks: Optical Millimeter-Wave Generation, Wavelength Reuse, and Architecture

The integration of optical and wireless systems is considered to be one of the most promising solutions for increasing the existing capacity and mobility as well as decreasing the costs in next-generation optical access networks. In this paper, several key enabling technologies for hybrid optical-wireless access networks are described, including optical millimeter-wave (mm-wave) generation, upconversion, and transmission in a downlink direction, and full-duplex operation based on wavelength reuse by using a centralized light source in an uplink direction. By employing these enabling technologies, we design and experimentally demonstrate an optical-wireless testbed that is simultaneously delivering wired and wireless services in the integrated optical-wireless and wavelength-division-multiplexing passive-optical-network access networks. The actual applications consisting of 270-Mb/s uncompressed standard-definition TV signal and 2.5-Gb/s data channels for downstream are successfully transmitted over a 25-km fiber and a 10.2-m indoor wireless link with less than a 1.5-dB power penalty. The results show that this integrated system is a practical solution to deliver superbroadband information services to both stationary and mobile users.
Thrombopoietin Signal Transduction Requires Functional JAK2, Not TYK2*

The Janus family of tyrosine kinases (JAKs) plays a critical role in signal transduction by members of the cytokine receptor superfamily. In response to ligand-receptor interaction, these nonreceptor tyrosine kinases are rapidly phosphorylated and activated, triggering tyrosine phosphorylation and activation of downstream signaling intermediates. Upon binding to its receptor, the product of the proto-oncogene c-mpl, thrombopoietin (TPO) activates both JAK2 and TYK2 in multiple cell lines as well as megakaryocytes and platelets. To study whether one or both of these kinases are essential for TPO signal transduction, we engineered a parental human sarcoma cell line (2C4) as well as sarcoma cell lines that are deficient in JAK2 expression (γ2A) or TYK2 expression (U1A) to express the wild-type Mpl receptor. The ability of TPO to induce tyrosine phosphorylation of Mpl and multiple intracellular substrates in each cell line was then examined. Our results demonstrate that JAK2-deficient cells (γ2A-Mpl) are unable to initiate TPO-mediated signaling. In contrast, cells that are TYK2-deficient (U1A-Mpl) are able to induce tyrosine phosphorylation of Mpl, JAK2, STAT3, and Shc as efficiently as parental cells (2C4-Mpl). These data indicate that JAK2 is an essential component of Mpl signaling and that, in the absence of JAK2, TYK2 is incapable of initiating TPO-induced tyrosine phosphorylation.
Development of brain systems for nonsymbolic numerosity and the relationship to formal math academic achievement

A central question in cognitive and educational neuroscience is whether brain operations supporting nonlinguistic intuitive number sense (numerosity) predict individual acquisition and academic achievement for symbolic or “formal” math knowledge. Here, we conducted a developmental functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study of nonsymbolic numerosity task performance in 44 participants including 14 school age children (6–12 years old), 14 adolescents (13–17 years old), and 16 adults and compared a brain activity measure of numerosity precision to scores from the Woodcock–Johnson III Broad Math index of math academic achievement. Accuracy and reaction time from the numerosity task did not reliably predict formal math achievement. We found a significant positive developmental trend for improved numerosity precision in the parietal cortex and intraparietal sulcus specifically. Controlling for age and overall cognitive ability, we found a reliable positive relationship between individual math achievement scores and parietal lobe activity only in children. In addition, children showed robust positive relationships between math achievement and numerosity precision within ventral stream processing areas bilaterally. The pattern of results suggests a dynamic developmental trajectory for visual discrimination strategies that predict the acquisition of formal math knowledge. In adults, the efficiency of visual discrimination marked by numerosity acuity in ventral occipital–temporal cortex and hippocampus differentiated individuals with better or worse formal math achievement, respectively. Overall, these results suggest that two different brain systems for nonsymbolic numerosity acuity may contribute to individual differences in math achievement and that the contribution of these systems differs across development. Hum Brain Mapp 36:804–826, 2015. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Dynamic modeling of partial shading on photovoltaic arrays

Static partial shading on large photovoltaic arrays has already been modeled by many researchers over the last two decades. However, little research has been devoted to dynamic partial shading that is more realistic in practice. This project investigates an efficient MATLAB-based model that incorporates the dynamic characteristics of a photovoltaic (PV) module under a non-ideal moving shadow which has different degrees of shading. It is found that shadows with the same shape and transmittance configuration but different moving characteristics (such as initial point, speed and path) could transform the power-voltage curve of a PV array in different ways. This dynamic model can be used as a common platform to evaluate the effectiveness of the different MPP tracking algorithms and controllers under dynamically moving shadow conditions. Experimental results have been obtained to validate the model.