Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Rat endometrial bioelectric activity in vivo and in vitro: effects of adrenaline.

The transuterine potential difference (p.d.) generated by the endometrium was measured in vivo in anaesthetized, ovariectomized rats treated with 10 micrograms oestradiol‐17 beta each day for 3 days. Intravenous injection of adrenaline induced transient hyperpolarization of the p.d. ; sigmoid dose‐dependency was observed over the range 2‐40 micrograms/kg. Pre‐treatment of the rats with syrosingopine shifted the dose‐response curve to the left (enhancement) while combined propranolol (800 micrograms/kg) and phentolamine (800 micrograms/kg) shifted the dose‐response curve to the right (depression). Isoprenaline gave similar quantitative changes in the p.d. in vivo which displayed a similar time course and sigmoid dose‐dependency. Propranolol alone (800 micrograms/kg) shifted this dose‐response curve significantly to the right. Addition of adrenaline or isoprenaline to the serosal solution bathing uteri incubated in vitro after removal from oestradiol‐treated rats induced changes in endometrial bioelectric activity that exhibited sigmoid dose‐response curves for the transuterine p.d. and short‐circuit current (Isc). Propranolol significantly shifted the dose‐response curves for adrenaline to the right. Only adrenaline caused small but significant decreases in the uterine resistance but these were not dose‐dependent. Acetylcholine, 5‐hydroxytryptamine, noradrenaline and phenylephrine had no effect on the transuterine p.d. in vivo or in vitro or on the Isc in vitro. No significant electrical changes could be induced by adrenaline or any of the other drugs across the uteri from untreated ovariectomized rats either in vivo or in vitro. The transluminal membrane p.d. of surface endometrial cells measured with micro‐electrodes was depolarized by an addition of serosal adrenaline but only 41% of the cells successfully impaled responded in this way. The results indicate that endometrial cells under oestrogen stimulation possess electrogenic processes that can be modulated specifically by adrenaline through the mediation of a serosally sited beta‐adrenoceptor. The physiological role of the mechanism has yet to be established.
Effects of Depressive and Other Psychiatric Disorders on Anticoagulation Control in a Pharmacist-Managed Anticoagulation Clinic

Background: The impact of psychiatric disorders on International Normalized Ratio (INR) control and adverse events for patients receiving warfarin has not been fully elucidated. Objective: To determine the effect of depressive and other psychiatric disorders on anticoagulation control in a pharmacist-managed anticoagulation clinic. Methods: A retrospective chart review evaluated outcomes of patients with no history of psychiatric disorders and compare it with that of patients with either a history of depression or any form of psychiatric disorder. Data was obtained from patient medical records over a 24-month period. The primary outcome was a comparison of time in therapeutic range, calculated using 3 separate methods (percentage of INRs in therapeutic range, a modified Rosendaal’s linear interpolation, and mean INR in goal). Results: A total of 151 patients met the inclusion criteria (control = 79, psychiatric disorders = 72 patients). Control patients had a significantly greater proportion of INRs in the goal range compared with either the depression or psychiatric disorders groups (control, 55.7%; depression, 43.5%; psychiatric, 45.8%). Utilizing the Rosendaal’s method, patients with psychiatric disorders were in the goal range significantly less often than those in the control group (53.0% vs 61.3%). No differences were seen when adjusting for multiple comparisons or when comparing the control and depression groups (54.5% vs 61.3%). There was no difference between the groups when comparing percentages of patients with a mean INR in their goal range. Conclusions: Patients with psychiatric disorders who take warfarin may spend less time in the therapeutic range.
Kronecker-Basis-Representation Based Tensor Sparsity and Its Applications to Tensor Recovery

As a promising way for analyzing data, sparse modeling has achieved great success throughout science and engineering. It is well known that the sparsity/low-rank of a vector/matrix can be rationally measured by nonzero-entries-number ($l_0$ norm)/nonzero- singular-values-number (rank), respectively. However, data from real applications are often generated by the interaction of multiple factors, which obviously cannot be sufficiently represented by a vector/matrix, while a high order tensor is expected to provide more faithful representation to deliver the intrinsic structure underlying such data ensembles. Unlike the vector/matrix case, constructing a rational high order sparsity measure for tensor is a relatively harder task. To this aim, in this paper we propose a measure for tensor sparsity, called Kronecker-basis-representation based tensor sparsity measure (KBR briefly), which encodes both sparsity insights delivered by Tucker and CANDECOMP/PARAFAC (CP) low-rank decompositions for a general tensor. Then we study the KBR regularization minimization (KBRM) problem, and design an effective ADMM algorithm for solving it, where each involved parameter can be updated with closed-form equations. Such an efficient solver makes it possible to extend KBR to various tasks like tensor completion and tensor robust principal component analysis. A series of experiments, including multispectral image (MSI) denoising, MSI completion and background subtraction, substantiate the superiority of the proposed methods beyond state-of-the-arts.
Overexpression of phosphodiesterases in experimental autoimmune myasthenia gravis: suppression of disease by a phosphodiesterase inhibitor

Myasthenia gravis (MG) and experimental autoimmune MG (EAMG) are T cell‐dependent antibody‐mediated autoimmune disorders, in which the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (AChR) is the major autoantigen. DNA microarray analysis revealed increased levels of several phosphodiesterase (PDE) subtypes in lymph node cells (LNC) and muscles of EAMG rats compared with healthy controls. Quantitative real‐time PCR analysis indicated that EAMG is characterized by an increase of PDE subtypes 1, 3, 4, and 7 in LNC and of PDE subtypes 2, 3, 4, and 7 in muscles. Pentoxifylline (PTX), a general PDE inhibitor, inhibited the progression of EAMG when treatment started at either the acute or chronic stages of disease. This suppression was associated with down‐regulation of humoral and cellular AChR‐specific responses, as well as down‐regulation of PDE4, TNF‐α, IL‐18, IL‐12, and IL‐10 in LNC and of PDEs 1, 4, 7, and TNF‐α in muscles. The expression of Foxp3, a transcription factor essential for CD4+CD25+ regulatory T cell function, was increased in splenocytes although the number of these cells remained unchanged. PTX also reduced the expression of the endopeptidase cathepsin‐l, a marker of muscle damage, in EAMG muscles. This study demonstrates the involvement of PDE regulation in EAMG pathogenesis and suggests that PDE inhibitors may be considered for immunotherapy of MG.
Catastrophic Failure After Open Reduction Internal Fixation of Femoral Neck Fractures With a Novel Locking Plate Implant

Objectives: To determine if the use of a novel proximal femoral locking plate could reduce the incidence of femoral neck shortening and improve clinical outcomes after open reduction internal fixation (ORIF) for femoral neck fractures as compared with historical controls. Design: Single surgeon, retrospective case–control study. Setting: Academic level I trauma center. Patients/Participants: Twenty-one femoral neck fractures treated with the posterolateral femoral locking plate (Synthes, Inc, Paoli, PA) were eligible for inclusion. Eighteen met inclusion/exclusion criteria with a mean follow-up of 16 months. Intervention: ORIF of femoral neck fracture with the posterolateral femoral locking plate. This consists of a side plate with multiple locking screws directed into the femoral head at converging/diverging angles and a single shaft screw. Intraoperative compression was achieved with partially threaded screws before locking screw insertion. Main Outcome Measurements: Maintenance of reduction was assessed by comparing immediate postoperative and final follow-up radiographs. Clinical outcome was assessed with Harris Hip Scores after 1 year. Complications and secondary operations were noted. Results: Seven (36.8%) of 18 patients experienced catastrophic failure. Five of these patients required total hip replacement, whereas the remaining 2 died before further treatment. The remaining 11 patients (61.1%) achieved bony union; the average displacement of the center of the head did not differ when compared with historical controls (0.78 mm inferiorly, 1.62 mm medially, and 2.4 degrees of increased varus vs. 0.86 mm, 1.23 mm, and 0.6 degree). Complications in this group include 1 instance of screw fracture, 2 total hip replacements, and a peri-implant subtrochanteric femur fracture. The average patient age and proportion of displaced fractures did not differ between the historical control and experimental groups. Fracture displacement was strongly associated with catastrophic failure in the experimental group only. Average Harris Hip Scores was significantly worse compared with that of historical controls (67.9 vs. 84.7, P = 0.05). Conclusions: ORIF of femoral neck fractures using a locking plate construct yielded unacceptably poor outcomes in this patient population. We hypothesize that the stiffness of this construct prevents any fracture site micromotion, placing the mechanical burden on the implant, which can result in failure at the bone–screw interface or fatigue failure of the implant itself. Level of Evidence: Therapeutic Level III. See Instructions for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.
Diagnosing minimal adenocarcinoma on prostate needle biopsy by real-time dynamic telepathology through the internet: evaluation of an economic technology for remote consultation.

Computer-aided telepathology was introduced about 10 years ago, but has not yet met with worldwide acceptance. Recently, the internet has been used for image transmission in telepathology. We set up an easily assembled system comprising a common microscope, a charge-coupled device (CCD) camera, a personal computer, and a commercial internet surveillance program with internet accessibility. The consultant then views the real-time images using a common web browser at the remote site. The purpose of the study was to assess the ability of the system to transmit images of sufficient quality to achieve high concordance between the diagnoses made at the home base and at the remote site. We chose cases of minimal adenocarcinoma on prostate needle biopsy, because these lesions are liable to be overlooked and, even if discovered, are subject to differences in interpretation due to their limited size and subtle histologic changes. One hundred prostate needle biopsy specimens, including 45 minimal adenocarcinoma, 11 atypical small acinar proliferation, and 44 benign lesions, were tested. Two pathologists, unaware of the final diagnoses, were recruited to provide intra- and interinstitutional consultation. The overall concordance rates between telepathology diagnoses and final diagnoses were 97% and 94% for the two pathologists, respectively. Our results demonstrate that this method is effective for teleconsultation. Similar systems using the internet can be easily set up by ordinary pathology laboratories to facilitate remote consultation.
In vitro metabolism of terfenadine by a purified recombinant fusion protein containing cytochrome P4503A4 and NADPH-P450 reductase. Comparison to human liver microsomes and precision-cut liver tissue slices.

The metabolism of terfenadine was studied with a cDNA-expressed/purified recombinant fusion protein containing human liver microsomal cytochrome P4503A4 (CYP3A4) linked to rat NADPH-P450 reductase (rF450[mHum3A4/mRatOR]L1) and was compared with that observed in the presence of human liver microsomes and precision-cut human liver tissue slices. In all three cases, [3H]terfenadine was metabolized to at least three major metabolites. LC/MS (electrospray) analysis confirmed that these metabolites were alpha, alpha-diphenyl-4-piperidinomethanol (M5), t-butyl hydroxy terfenadine (M4), and t-butyl carboxy terfenadine (M3), although the level of M5 detected in the presence of fusion protein was greater than that found with microsomes or tissue slices. Two additional metabolites, M1 (microsomes and tissue slices) and M2 (fusion protein), were also detected, but remain uncharacterized. Consumption of parent drug (microsomes: KM = 9.58 +/- 2.79 microM, Vmax = 801 +/- 78.3 pmol/min/nmol CYP; fusion protein: KM = 14.1 +/- 1.13 microM, Vmax = 1670 +/- 170 pmol/min/nmol CYP) and t-butyl hydroxylation to M4 (microsomes: KM = 12.9 +/-3.74 microM, Vmax = 643 +/- 62.5 pmol/min/nmol CYP, ; fusion protein: KM = 30.0 +/- 2.55 microM, Vmax = 1050 +/- 141 pmol/min/nmol CYP) obeyed Michaelis-Menten kinetics over the terfenadine concentration range of 1-200 microM. Ketoconazole, a well-documented CYP3A inhibitor, effectively inhibited terfenadine metabolism in all three models. The conversion of M4 to M3, studied with human liver microsomes and fusion protein, was NADPH-dependent and inhibited by ketoconazole. It is concluded that cDNA-expressed CYP3A4, in the form of a NADPH-P450 reductase-linked fusion protein, may also serve as a model for studying the metabolism of terfenadine in vitro and many other drugs.
The Representation of Shape in the Context of Visual Object Categorization Tasks

To investigate the role of human fusiform gyrus in shape processing, we determined the effect of shape degradation on BOLD contrast in this region with fMRI during three tasks requiring subjects to determine either whether two successively presented nonsense shapes had the same global orientation (OR task); whether two successively presented meaningful objects belonged to the same basic level category (CAT task); or whether two successively presented objects represented the same exemplar of a category (EX task). On the behavioral level, shape degradation by locally shifting the pixels constituting the lines of stimuli had no effect on performance in the OR task, while it was detrimental to performance in the CAT and EX tasks. In comparison to the OR task, both the CAT and EX tasks were associated with activations in the occipitotemporal and parietal cortex. When shape degradation was applied, activation in the middle fusiform gyrus was reduced in all tasks. The occurrence of this effect in the OR task indicates that it is independent of memory representations. The persistence of the effect in both tasks that showed a behavioral effect of degradation suggests that it does not reflect the amount of shape processing performed on the stimuli, but rather the specificity of the final perceptual representation that can be built from the shape information that is available. Other studies have shown effects of stimulus familiarity and task requirements in the fusiform gyrus, suggesting that there is no need to assume different modules for perceptual representation and representation in memory.
The comparative study of intravenous Ondansetron and sub-hypnotic Propofol dose in control and treatment of intrathecal Sufentanil-induced pruritus in elective caesarean surgery

Objective: Pruritus is a common and disturbing side effect of neuraxial opioids after cesarean section. The purpose of this study was to compare the efficacy of intravenous ondansetron and sub-hypnotic dose of propofol in control and treatment of intrathecal sufentanil induced pruritus in cesarean surgery. Methods: Totally, 90 parturient with American Society of Anesthesiology physical status grade I-II, undergoing spinal anesthesia with 2.5 μg sufentanil and 10 mg bupivacaine 0.5% were enrolled to this randomized, prospective, double-blind study. The women were randomly assigned to two groups who received 8 mg ondansetron or 10 mg propofol to treat pruritus grade ≥3. The patient was evaluated after 5 min and in the lack of successful treatment, the doses of two drugs repeated and if the pruritus is on-going, the exact treatment with naloxone was done. Findings: The incidence of pruritus was 69.3%. Both groups were well-matched. The peak time pruritus was 30-75 min after injection. The percentage of individuals consumed naloxone were 6.8% and 15.9% in ondansetron and propofol groups, respectively (P = 0.18). The mean score of satisfaction (according to visual analog scale criteria) was 9.09 ± 1.1 in ondansetron group and 9.3 ± 1.07 in the propofol group (P = 0.39). Conclusion: Ondansetrone and sub-hypnotic dose of propofol are both safe and well-tolerated. Due to their same efficacy in the treatment of intrathecal sufentanil-induced pruritus, they can be widely used in clinical practice.
Evaluation of variations in sensory and pain threshold assessments by electrocutaneous stimulation

Assessed sensory and pain thresholds can change consequently to disturbances associated with ongoing pain. Such assessments could be an additional method in the daily clinical evaluation of perceived pain. To study the test–retest variability within-day and between-day of such procedures a newly developed instrument producing electrocutaneous stimulation, PainMatcher (PM), was used to assess the electrical sensory thresholds (EST) and pain thresholds (EPT) in healthy volunteers and in patients with pain. The produced data were considered ordinal and analyzed with rank-invariant statistics with properties of analyzing systematic disagreement, bias, and individual variations. The percentage agreements within ±1PM value for EST were in the two groups of healthy volunteers and patients in pain 94% and 92%, and for EPT assessments 49% and 78%, respectively. The variability in the EST assessments is possibly explained by a slight bias while the individual variations were negligible between the two occasions. The assessed EPT were unbiased in both groups while individual variations were significant among the healthy volunteers but negligible among the patients in pain. The EST was found to be increased in pain patients compared to healthy volunteers, p < 0.03, and the EPT decreased in pain patients compared to healthy volunteers, p < 0.001. The results in this study indicate stable and reliable assessments of EST and EPT except for a possible bias. The threshold assessment procedure followed in this study may be a valuable tool in the clinical evaluation of sensory and pain assessments in pain patients.
Reduction of hexavalent uranium from organic complexes by sulfate- and iron-reducing bacteria

The influence of organic-hexavalent-uranium [U(VI)] complexation on U(VI) reduction by a sulfate-reducing bacterium (Desulfovibrio desulfuricans) and an iron-reducing bacterium (Shewanella alga) was evaluated. Four aliphatic ligands (acetate, malonate, oxalate, and citrate) and an aromatic ligand (tiron [4,5-dihydroxy-1,3-benzene disulfonic acid]) were used to study complexed-uranium bioavailability. The trends in uranium reduction varied with the nature and the amount of U(VI)-organic complex formed and the type of bacteria present. D. desulfuricans rapidly reduced uranium from a monodentate aliphatic (acetate) complex. However, reduction from multidentate aliphatic complexes (malonate, oxalate, and citrate) was slower. A decrease in the amount of organic-U(VI) complex in solution significantly increased the rate of reduction. S. alga reduced uranium more rapidly from multidentate aliphatic complexes than from monodentate aliphatic complexes. The rate of reduction decreased with a decrease in the amount of multidentate complexes present. Uranium from an aromatic (tiron) complex was readily available for reduction by D. desulfuricans, while an insignificant level of U(VI) from the tiron complex was reduced by S. alga. These results indicate that selection of bacteria for rapid uranium reduction will depend on the organic composition of waste streams.
Person recognition for service robotics applications

The acceptance of service robots comes along with the ability to adapt to user specific preferences. This requires that a robot can determine the identity of the user. As for humans, robust user recognition is based on the identification of the face. However, despite the plethora of published work on face recognition that is robust against real world noise such a illumination, head alignment or facial expressions there is no robust off-the-shelf non-commercial software available to be used in typical robotics applications. Hence, this paper introduces a ready-to-use open-source ROS package providing a face detection and identification system that is comprising novel and state-of-the-art solutions to various aspects of face recognition while utilizing modern RGB-D sensors. This work demonstrates a solution for face recognition in robotic settings that is robust against varying illumination, gaze directions of the head, and facial expressions while operating with online performance. The paper provides a thorough evaluation of the face recognition system based on standard database tests and on real world scenarios regarding these criteria.
Physiological arginine vasopressin levels do not enhance baroreflex function in normal humans.

Physiological increases in arginine vasopressin (AVP) have been shown to potentiate baroreflex activity in experimental animals. Pharmacological amounts of AVP have been shown to decrease sympathetic nervous system activity in humans, whereas the role of smaller increases in plasma AVP is unclear, either for baroreflex function or sympathetic activity. The present study tested the hypotheses that in normal humans physiological increases in plasma AVP would 1) decrease basal sympathetic nervous system activity as measured by systemic venous norepinephrine (NE) spillover; 2) enhance or restrain the increases in heart rate (HR), forearm vascular resistance, and NE spillover during baroreceptor unloading during head-up tilt; and 3) augment the decline in HR and NE spillover during baroreceptor loading with head-down tilt and/or with phenylephrine infusion plus head-down tilt. In the baroreceptor unloading studies, HR, arterial pressure, forearm blood flow, plasma NE, NE clearance, and NE spillover were assessed during infusions of AVP (plasma AVP 16-20 pg/ml) or vehicle (given double blind) in the supine position. All variables then were assessed during 15 min of head-up tilt. In the baroreflex loading studies, the same assessments (except forearm blood flow) were made during 15 min of head-down tilt followed by 15 min of head-down tilt plus phenylephrine. Compared with vehicle, AVP had no effect on the responses of any variable in the supine position or on the expected reflex responses during head-up tilt and head-down tilt plus phenylephrine. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)