Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Parenting stress and autism: The role of age, autism severity, quality of life and problem behaviour of children and adolescents with autism

While stress is a common experience for parents caring for a child with a developmental disability, current measures fail to distinguish between general stress in parents and the demands of parenting and perceptions of parenting skills (parenting stress). This study examined differences in ‘parenting stress’ reported by parents of children with autism and typically developing children. This study examined the role of child characteristics (age, autism severity, child quality of life and problem behaviour) on parenting stress in 150 parents of cognitively able children and adolescents with autism. The results revealed that child hyperactivity was the only factor significantly related to parenting stress in parents of children with autism, overruling measures of autism severity and child quality of life. This finding indicates the significant influence of problematic behaviours on parenting demands and perceptions of parenting skills in parents of children with autism, over other child characteristics conceived as within the parent’s control. Study implications for future research are discussed.
EFFECTS OF RAPID CHILLING OF CARCASSES AND EARLIER DEBONING post-mortem ON COLOUR OF PORK SEMIMEMBRANOSUS MUSCLE

The effect of rapid air chilling of carcasses, compared to conventional air chilling, and effect of earlier deboning, after rapid air chilling, on colour of pork M semimembranosus was investigated. During and at the end of chilling, compared to conventional chill treatment, carcasses that were rapid chilled had significantly (P 0.05) on average colour of M semimembranosus, but rapid chilling, compared to conventional chilling, resulted in reduced incidence of pale colour.
Canadian Association of Gastroenterology position statement: fecal microbiota transplant therapy.

The increasing public interest in fecal microbiota transplant (FMT) raises serious concerns, when the application of this treatment is still in its infancy and long-term safety is not yet established. Indeed, there is evidence that anecdotal reports of success from initial results of uncontrolled studies are encouraging patients to try this line of treatment in the absence of medical direction or supervision. It is important that medical practitioners, the media and the general public are made aware of the safety issues involved in ‘stool transplant’. While FMT has been widely used in veterinary practice and the exchange of intestinal contents in humans is documented back to the fouth century (1), this intervention requires the exchange of body fluids with all its known and unknown risks. In the early 1980s in Canada, tainted blood and blood products for the treatment of hemophilia led to the serious outbreak of hepatitis C and HIV (2). The stool microbiome is complex, containing, bacterial, viral and fungal components in addition to prions and potentially unknown biologically active substances (3,4). Several excellent studies have indicated the important role of the microbiome in a variety of diseases. In addition to Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), these include obesity, diabetes and behavioural disorders (5). There is an urgent requirement for further careful prospective and controlled research in a variety of these diseases but especially to protect the safety of patients who, understandably, may be frustrated with the poor efficacy of their current treatments. Here, we consider the evidence for the use of FMT in resistant C difficile infection and its current status as an intervention in IBD, together with a brief summary of the current evidence for the safety of FMT and recommendations for the future.
Impact of mechanical bowel preparation in elective colorectal surgery: A meta-analysis

AIM To analyse the effect of mechanical bowel preparation vs no mechanical bowel preparation on outcome in patients undergoing elective colorectal surgery. METHODS Meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials and observational studies comparing adult patients receiving mechanical bowel preparation with those receiving no mechanical bowel preparation, subdivided into those receiving a single rectal enema and those who received no preparation at all prior to elective colorectal surgery. RESULTS A total of 36 studies (23 randomised controlled trials and 13 observational studies) including 21568 patients undergoing elective colorectal surgery were included. When all studies were considered, mechanical bowel preparation was not associated with any significant difference in anastomotic leak rates (OR = 0.90, 95%CI: 0.74 to 1.10, P = 0.32), surgical site infection (OR = 0.99, 95%CI: 0.80 to 1.24, P = 0.96), intra-abdominal collection (OR = 0.86, 95%CI: 0.63 to 1.17, P = 0.34), mortality (OR = 0.85, 95%CI: 0.57 to 1.27, P = 0.43), reoperation (OR = 0.91, 95%CI: 0.75 to 1.12, P = 0.38) or hospital length of stay (overall mean difference 0.11 d, 95%CI: -0.51 to 0.73, P = 0.72), when compared with no mechanical bowel preparation, nor when evidence from just randomized controlled trials was analysed. A sub-analysis of mechanical bowel preparation vs absolutely no preparation or a single rectal enema similarly revealed no differences in clinical outcome measures. CONCLUSION In the most comprehensive meta-analysis of mechanical bowel preparation in elective colorectal surgery to date, this study has suggested that the use of mechanical bowel preparation does not affect the incidence of postoperative complications when compared with no preparation. Hence, mechanical bowel preparation should not be administered routinely prior to elective colorectal surgery.
Interlabial Contact Pressures Exhibited in Dysarthria following Traumatic Brain Injury during Speech and Nonspeech Tasks

A miniature pressure transducer was used to assess the interlabial contact pressures produced by a group of 19 adults (mean age 30.6 years) with dysarthria following severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) during a set of speech and nonspeech tasks. Ten parameters relating to lip strength, endurance, rate of movement and lip pressure accuracy and stability were measured from the nonspeech tasks. The results attained by the TBI group were compared against a group of 19 age- and sex-matched control subjects. Significant differences between the groups were found for maximum interlabial contact pressure, maximum rate of repetition of maximum pressure, and lip pressure accuracy at 50 and 10% levels of maximum pressure. In regards to speech, the interlabial contact pressures generated by the TBI group and control group did not differ significantly. When expressed as percentages of maximum pressure, however, the TBI group’s interlabial pressures appeared to have been generated with greater physiological effort.
p21-activated Kinase-1 Signaling Regulates Transcription of Tissue Factor and Tissue Factor Pathway Inhibitor*♦

Background: TF and TFPI, two primary components of the coagulation cascade, play important roles in nonhomeostatic and pathological events. Results: PAK1 stimulates and represses the expression of TF and TFPI, respectively, and promotes TF procoagulant activity. Conclusion: PAK1 is identified as an important player in the coagulation processes. Significance: Targeting PAK1 might lead to a novel therapeutic strategy in the control of coagulation. Tissue factor (TF) is a cell-surface glycoprotein responsible for initiating the coagulation cascade. Besides its role in homeostasis, studies have shown the implication of TF in embryonic development, cancer-related events, and inflammation via coagulation-dependent and -independent (signaling) mechanisms. Tissue factor pathway inhibitor (TFPI) plays an important role in regulating TF-initiated blood coagulation. Therefore, transcriptional regulation of TF expression and its physiological inhibitor TFPI would allow us to understand the critical step that controls many different processes. From a gene profiling study aimed at identifying differentially regulated genes between wild-type (WT) and p21-activated kinase 1-null (PAK1-KO) mouse embryonic fibroblasts (MEFs), we found TF and TFPI are differentially expressed in the PAK1-KO MEFs in comparison with wild-type MEFs. Based on these findings, we further investigated in this study the transcriptional regulation of TF and TFPI by PAK1, a serine/threonine kinase. We found that the PAK1·c-Jun complex stimulates the transcription of TF and consequently its procoagulant activity. Moreover, PAK1 negatively regulates the expression of TFPI and additionally contributes to increased TF activity. For the first time, this study implicates PAK1 in coagulation processes, through its dual transcriptional regulation of TF and its inhibitor.
A novel PEGylation of chitosan nanoparticles for gene delivery

CS (chitosan) has emerged as a promising non‐viral vector for gene delivery because of its ability to form complexes with pDNA (plasmid DNA) and enhance its transport across cellular membranes through endocytosis. Complexes of CS and pDNA may improve transfection efficiency; however, they are not capable of sustained DNA release and prolonging gene transfer. In order to achieve prolonged delivery of CS–DNA complexes, we prepared CS NP (nanoparticle) and CS–DNA complexes. α‐Methoxy‐ω‐succinimidylpoly(ethylene glycol) was then conjugated to the surface of CS–DNA complexes using an active ester scheme; finally, the potential of PEGylation [poly(ethylene glycol)ylation] of CS NP as a non‐viral gene‐delivery vector to transfer exogenous genes in vitro and in vivo were examined. Electrophoretic analysis suggested that CS NPs could protect the DNA from nuclease degradation. The pDNA carried by CS NPs could enter and be expressed in HepG2 cells. However, the transfection efficiency was very low and the highest dose of DNA transferred was 1.6 μg. The transfection activities of CS–DNA–PEG were preserved and a higher dose (2.4 μg) of pDNA was transferred. This indicated that the transfection efficiency of the PEGylated complexes had been improved. In vivo experiments also showed that CS–DNA–PEG complexes mediated higher gene expression in tissues than did CS–DNA complexes, and that gene expression in tumours induced by CS–DNA–PEG complexes was the highest of all. These results suggested that PEGylation of CS–DNA complexes improves non‐viral gene delivery in vitro or in vivo and has the potential to deliver therapeutic genes directly into hepatoma tissues.
Antibacterial activity of fractions from three Chumash medicinal plant extracts and in vitro inhibition of the enzyme enoyl reductase by the flavonoid jaceosidin

Abstract We have investigated the in vitro antibacterial bioactivity of dichloromethane-soluble fractions of Artemisia californica, Trichostema lanatum, Salvia apiana, Sambucus nigra ssp. cerulea and Quercus agrifolia Née against a ΔtolC mutant strain of Escherichia coli. These plants are traditional medicinal plants of the Chumash American Indians of Southern California. Bioassay-guided fractionation led to the isolation of three flavonoid compounds from A. californica: jaceosidin (1), jaceidin (2), and chrysoplenol B (3). Compounds 1 and 2 exhibited antibacterial activity against E. coli ΔtolC in liquid cultures. The in vitro activity of 1 against the enoyl reductase enzyme (FabI) was measured using a spectrophotometric assay and found to completely inhibit FabI activity at a concentration of 100 μM. However, comparison of minimum inhibitory concentration values for 1–3 against E. coli ΔtolC and an equivalent strain containing a plasmid constitutively expressing fabI did not reveal any selectivity for FabI in vivo.
Unsupervised Structured Data Extraction from Template-generated Web Pages

This paper studies structured data extraction from template-generated Web pages. Such pages contain most of structured data on the Web. Extracted structured data can be later integrated and reused in very big range of applications, such as price comparison portals, business intelligence tools, various mashups and etc. It encourages industry and academics to seek automatic solutions. To tackle the problem of automatic structured Web data extraction we present a new approach - structured data extraction based on clustering visually similar Web page elements. Our method called ClustVX combines visual and pure HTML features of Web page to cluster visually similar Web page elements and then extract structured Web data. ClustVX can extract structured data from Web pages where more than one data record is present. With extensive experimental evaluation on three benchmark datasets we demonstrate that ClustVX achieves better results than other state-of-the-art automatic structured Web data extraction methods.
Lymphangiomyoma: Clinicopathologic study and ultrastructural confirmation of its histogenesis

Two new cases of lymphangiomyoma are added to 28 cases previously reported. One of these was studied ultrastructurally, with findings that support the designation “lymphangiomyoma,” i.e., smooth muscle and lymphatic channels. The disease seems to occur exclusively in females, is not infrequently associated with endocrine disorders, has some features analogous to tuberous sclerosis, and may represent an incomplete expression or forme fruste of Bourneville's disease. The condition consists of one or more nodules of tumor‐like proliferation of smooth muscle fascicles, divided from each other by lymphatic channels, and involves major lymphatic trunks in the retroperitoneum or mediastinum, lymph nodes in these regions and, in about two thirds of cases, lymphatics of the lungs. The most common complaints are referable to chylous effusions, pulmonary insufficiency, and pneumothorax. Three patients have been followed for over 14 years after excision of the nodules and postoperative radiotherapy.
On‐Pump and Off‐Pump Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting in the Elderly: Predictors of Adverse Outcome

Objective: To establish the role that coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) without cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) may have in improving perioperative outcomes of patients 70 years of age and older. Background: Coronary revascularization in elderly patients is associated with morbidity and mortality rates higher than those observed in younger patients. The impact of CABG without CPB on perioperative outcomes has not been clearly established. Methods: This retrospective, nonrandomized study consisted of 1872 CABG patients. Of these, 1389 underwent CABG with CPB (CPB group) and 483 patients underwent CABG without CPB (off‐pump group). Preoperative variables and outcomes were compared between the two groups. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was used to identify independent predictors of mortality, stroke, and adverse outcome. Results: Demographics, Canadian Cardiovascular Society staging, operative priority, and other preoperative variables were comparable between the two groups. The prevalence of previous myocardial infarction was higher in the CPB group (62.6% vs 56.7%; p < 0.005), whereas the prevalence of calcified aorta and preoperative renal failure were higher in the off‐pump group (5.4% vs 9.5%; p = 0.04 and 1.7% vs 3.3%; p = 0.04, respectively). Although the graft/patient ratio was higher in the CPB group (3.4 vs 1.9), these patients displayed more extensive coronary artery involvement. At univariate analysis, patients in the off‐pump group had a higher rate of freedom from complications (88.2% vs 81.3%; p < 0.005) and a lower incidence of stroke (2.1% vs 4.2%; p = 0.034) than patients in the CPB group. Although there was a trend for a higher actual mortality in the off‐pump group (4.8% vs 3.7%; p = ns), the risk adjusted mortality in this group was lower (1.9% vs 2.1%). Multivariate analysis showed that while the use of CPB correlated independently with an increased risk of overall complications, it was not associated with a higher probability of death or stroke. Conclusions: This investigation suggests that elderly patients undergoing CABG may benefit from off‐pump revascularization, as the use of CPB correlated independently with an increased risk of overall complications. However, CPB did not emerge as an independent predictor of death or stroke at multivariate analysis.
Sex Differences in Suicides among Children and Youth: The Potential Impact of Help-Seeking Behaviour

Objective: To describe sex differences in health service use among children and youth who died by suicide. Method: This is a retrospective study of children and youth (aged 10 to 25 years) living in Ontario who died by suicide between April 1, 2003, and December 31, 2007. Coroner records were individually linked to outpatient physician visit, emergency department (ED) presentation, and inpatient stay administrative health care records for 724 people (192 girls and 532 boys). Only 77 (10.6%) were aged 10 to 15 years. The health services types used, number of contacts made, and the last contact were compared in boys and girls. Results: About 80% of subjects had contact with the health care system in the year before their death, typically to an outpatient physician and (or) the ED. However, not all were seen for mental health reasons. Girls had more outpatient physician and ED contact than boys and closer in time to their death. Further, girls were more likely than boys to have contact in more than one setting. Still, boys and girls did not differ in their use of an outpatient psychiatrist, some ED presentations, and in the nature and number of inpatient stays. Conclusions: While most people were seen by an outpatient physician and (or) in the ED in the year before their death, not all received mental health care. Further research is needed to determine whether boys and girls who died by suicide differ from their peers in their health service use to guide preventive interventions.
THE TANGENTIAL ORGANIZATION OF THE VISUAL CORTEX.

The internal organization of the cerebral cortex has been extensively studied by numerous investigators (see Sholl, 1956). All existing detailed morphological descriptions of cortical neurons, however, draw their information only from sections cut at right angles to the pial surface. Each one of such sections shows only one dimension of the spread of fibres tangential to the pial surface. Although theoretically the total tangential organization could be reconstructed from this material, this organization has never been adequately described and indeed it can only be directly visualized and ultimately confirmed on sections cut tangential to the pial surface. Study of such sections is essential for an adequate three dimensional description of cortical neurons and their branches. A better understanding of the tangential organization is particulary important in such situations as the primary visual cortex where the topographical projection of the retina upon the cortex is such that a map of the 'cortical retina' is displayed tangential to the pial surface. The relationships between the various points of the map can only be adequately seen in sections cutting successively through each 'horizontal' cortical layer in that plane. A study of the dendritic fields of the neurons of the optic lobe of the octopus has shown that they are elongated in shape in the tangential plane with orientations mainly in two directions at right angles to each other, with few obliques (Young, 1960). The author has related this morphological organization to the mechanism of pattern discrimination suggested by the behavioural evidence in this animal which has difficulty in discriminating between two obliquely orientated rectangles but can easily distinguish between a horizontal and a vertical rectangle (Sutherland, 1957). A similar study is rendered particularly interesting in the cat in view of the physiological properties of individual cortical cells recently described by Hubel & Wiesel (1959, 1962). The authors have shown that, though the visual fields of individual cells of the retina and lateral geniculate body are circular in shape, the centre and periphery having different excitatory and inhibitory polarities (Hubel, 1960), those of cortical cells are elongated in shape. They have suggested that the mechanism responsible for this transformation lies in the convergence of lateral geniculate cell axons, having receptive fields arranged along a straight line on the retina, upon a single cortical cell ('simple fields'). This convergence could be achieved in either of two ways. Either: (1) the axons from a specific set of geniculate neurons (say a row) make their own way to each
Multiple Functions of Jab1 Are Required for Early Embryonic Development and Growth Potential in Mice*

Jab1 interacts with a variety of signaling molecules and regulates their stability in mammalian cells. As the fifth component of the COP9 signalosome (CSN) complex, Jab1 (CSN5) plays a central role in the deneddylation of the cullin subunit of the Skp1-Cullin-F box protein ubiquitin ligase complex. In addition, a CSN-independent function of Jab1 is suggested but is less well characterized. To elucidate the function of Jab1, we targeted the Jab1 locus by homologous recombination in mouse embryonic stem cells. Jab1-null embryos died soon after implantation. Jab1-/- embryonic cells, which lacked other CSN components, expressed higher levels of p27, p53, and cyclin E, resulting in impaired proliferation and accelerated apoptosis. Jab1 heterozygous mice were healthy and fertile but smaller than their wild-type littermates. Jab1+/- mouse embryonic fibroblast cells, in which the amount of Jab1-containing small subcomplex, but not that of CSN, was selectively reduced, proliferated poorly, showed an inefficient down-regulation of p27 during G1, and was delayed in the progression from G0 to S phase by 3 h compared with the wild-type cells. Most interestingly, in Jab1+/- mouse embryonic fibroblasts, the levels of cyclin E and deneddylated Cul1 were unchanged, and p53 was not induced. Thus, Jab1 controls cell cycle progression and cell survival by regulating multiple cell cycle signaling pathways.
Cell Cycle Arrest Drastically Extends the Duration of Gene Silencing After Transient Expression of Short Hairpin RNA

We thank Dr. Didier Trono, Dr. Luk Van Parijs, and Dr. Preet Chaudhary for the gifts of plasmids, Dr. Bey-Dih Chang for cell lines and helpful discussions, and Dr. James Mittler and Dr. Chang Lim for assistance with flow cytometry, and Jennifer Huntington for assistance with some experiments. This work was supported by NIH grant R33 CA95996 (I.B.R.).