Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Isolation and characterization of a set of disease resistance-gene analogs (RGAs) from wild rice, Zizania latifolia Griseb. I. Introgression, copy number lability, sequence change, and DNA methylation alteration in several rice-Zizania introgression lines.

Eight resistance-gene analogs (RGAs) were isolated from wild rice, Zizania latifolia Griseb. , by degenerate primers designed according to conserved motifs at or around the nucleotide-binding site (NBS) of known NBS-containing plant resistance genes. The 8 RGAs were classified into 6 distinct groups based on their deduced amino acid sequence similarity of 60% or greater. Gel-blot hybridization of each of the RGAs to 4 rice - Z. latifolia intro gression lines indicated an array of changes at either introgressed Zizania RGAs or, more likely, their rice homologs. The changes included dramatic increase in copy number, modification at the primary DNA sequence, and alteration in DNA methylation patterns.
Determination of Ibuprofen and Paracetamol in Binary Mixture Using Chemometric-Assisted Spectrophotometric Methods

Three methods are presented for simultaneous determination of ibuprofen and paracetamol without previous separation. The first method depends on first derivative UV spectrophotometry, with zero-crossing measurement. The first derivative amplitudes at 230 and 290 nm were selected for the assay of ibuprofen and paracetamol, respectively. The second method depends on first derivative of the ratio-spectra by measurements of the amplitudes at 280 and 290 nm for ibuprofen and paracetamol, respectively. Calibration graphs were established in the range of 5-100 and 10-100 µg mL-1 for ibuprofen and paracetamol, respectively. The third method is the use of multivariate spectrophotometric calibration for the simultaneous determination of the analyzed mixture. The resolution of the studied binary mixture has been accomplished by using partial least squares (PLS) regression analysis. Although the components show an important degree of spectral overlap, they have been simultaneously determined with high accuracy, with no interference from pharmaceutical dosage form excipients. A comparison is presented with the related multivariate method of classical least squares (CLS) analysis, which is shown to yield less reliable results due to severe spectra overlap presented by the studied compounds. All of the proposed methods have been extensively validated. These methods allow a number of cost and time saving benefits. The described methods can be readily utilized for analysis of pharmaceutical formulations. There was no significant difference between the performance of all of the proposed methods regarding the mean values and standard deviations.
Mutations of the p 53 Gene Do Not Occur in Testis Cancer 1

To characterize the role of p53 in the development of testis cancer, we looked for mutations in the coding sequences of the p53 gene. DNA was obtained both from familial and sporadic testis cancer specimens, as well as from peripheral blood from members of a testis cancer kindred. Mu tations in the p53 gene were screened using a combination of constant dÃ©naturantgel electrophoresis and single-strand conformational polymor phism analysis, 2 screening methods that can detect single base changes. Abnormalities detected by these methods were confirmed by sequencing of the corresponding cloned polymerase chain reaction products. All con served regions of the p53 coding sequences were examined, encompassing all previously reported sites of mutations. No mutations were found in any of 22 germ cell cancers of the testis or in the germline DNA of 17 members of the testis cancer family. This is in striking contrast to most other human cancers, in which mutations of p53 are the most commonly described molecular event associated with tumorigenesis. We conclude that dysfunc tion of tumor suppressor gene or genes other than p53 may prove to play an important role in the development of germ cell cancers of the testis.
Influence of material properties and fingertip size on the power-law equation for soft fingers

We investigate the influence of size and material properties of fingertips on the power-law equation for soft-finger contacts. Fingertips made of different materials of various sizes were tested, and the parametric relationship between normal forces and radii of contact was found. The experimental results validate that the growth of contact radius, a, is a function of the normal force, N, according to the power law, that is, a=cN/sup /spl gamma//, for nonlinear elastic soft fingers with large deformation. The experimental results suggest that /spl gamma/ is a material-dependent constant, decreasing with the hardness of the soft-finger materials and ranges from 0 to 1/3. In addition to material properties, the constant c is dependent upon the size and geometry. Overall, the constant c increases as the soft finger becomes softer and larger, and decreases when the soft finger becomes harder and smaller. An INSTRON Model 1011 equipment was employed to conduct the experiments with different fingertip materials, loading rates, and ranges of normal force.
Interactive role of the cytopathologist in EUS-guided fine needle aspiration: an efficient approach.

Fine needle aspiration (FNA) is a minimally invasive method for cytologic sampling of peripheral and deep-seated mass lesions. The clinical utility of FNA continues to improve in direct proportion to the increasing sophistication of imaging techniques and the growing experience of radiologists, cytopathologists,1 and endoscopists. Image-guided FNA can yield near‐tissue-equivalent diagnostic material that can form the basis for therapeutic decisions. Minimal morbidity, low cost, and a rapid turnaround time that reduces patient anxiety make FNA a pre
[Epidemiological study of external genital diseases in 5172 adolescents].

OBJECTIVE To study the incidence of external genital diseases and the health status of external genitalia in male adolescents in china. METHODS 5172 male adolescents aged 7-22 were sampled randomly to examine the diseases and health status of external genitalia. According to the diagnostic criteria in textbook Surgery (3rd edition), all examinations were carried out by urologists. RESULTS The total incidence of redundant prepuce was 67.79%, phimosis 10.09%, varicocele 19.82%, hydrocele 0.87%, concealed penis 0.68%, cryptorchidism 0.39%. CONCLUSION The health status of external genitalia in male adolescents is bad. Redundant prepuce and phimosis are common diseases. The examination of external genitalia should be carried out in the physical examination of admission. This study may provide the theoretical evidence for prevention and treatment of male external genital disease as well as the important data for study on andrology.
Ictal EEG signal denoising by combination of a Semi-Blind Source Separation method and Multiscale PCA

Contamination of ictal Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals by muscle artifacts is one of the critical issues related to clinically diagnosing seizure. Over the past decade, several methods have been proposed in time, frequency and time-frequency domain to accurately isolate ictal EEG activities from artifacts. Among denoising approaches Canonical Correlation Analysis (CCA) and Independent Component Analysis (ICA) are widely used. Denoising based on Generalized EigenValue Decomposition (GEVD) is one of the Semi-Blind Source Separation (SBSS) methods which has been recently proposed. In the GEVD-based method, a couple of time-frequency covariance matrices are used. These time-frequency (TF) covariance matrices are calculated in the time-frequency domain using a special time-frequency mask. This time-frequency mask is extracted based on the time-frequency signature corresponding to the time-frequency spectrum of an ictal source obtained by CCA. In this paper, we use MultiScale Principal Component Analysis (MSPCA) in order to extract the time-frequency mask. To this end, a novel SBSS method, called CCA-MSPCA-TF-GEVD, is proposed and the efficacy of CCA-MSPCA-TF-GEVD compared with that of CCA, ICA and CCA-TF-GEVD is presented. The simulation results, using simulated data, validate the superiority of the proposed method compared with other methods. In addition, the applicability of the proposed denoising method for source localization is evaluated.
SYNTHESIS AND BINDING AFFINITY OF A CHIRAL PNA ANALOGUE

The synthesis of a chiral peptide nucleic acid (PNA), which is composed of N-aminoethyl-cis-4-nucleobase-L-proline units, was described. The chiral PNA monomers containing all four nucleobases (A, T, C and G) were steroselectively prepared. The x-ray diffraction data from a single crystal confirmed the configuration of a key intermediate. Binding activity of the oligomers with their complementary DNA targets was also investigated.
Preventing asthma epidemics due to soybeans by dust-control measures.

BACKGROUND The inhalation of soybean dust released during the unloading of soybeans into a silo caused outbreaks of asthma in Barcelona, Spain. This study was designed to determine morbidity due to asthma and serum IgE reactivity before and after the installation of filters in the silo. METHODS We measured soybean-allergen concentrations in 136 samples of air collected for 9 months before and 24 months after the installation of filters. We compared the number of days on which there was an unexpected increase in emergency room visits for asthma, the number of days on which the number of emergency room visits for asthma in one four-hour period was so high that it was unlikely to be due to chance, and the mean daily number of emergency room and intensive care unit admissions for asthma for a total of 60 months before and after filter installation. Serum IgE antibodies against soybean allergens were measured in 38 patients before and after filter installation. RESULTS The concentration of airborne soybean allergens on days when soybeans were unloaded decreased from 324 to 25 U per cubic meter after the installation of filters (P < 0.001). The number of days on which there was an unusually large number of visits to the hospital for asthma and the number of days on which asthma was epidemic both decreased significantly (both P < 0.001), from 29 to 6 and from 18 to 0, respectively. The mean daily number of emergency room and intensive care unit admissions for asthma on days when soybeans were unloaded decreased from 8.3 to 5.4 and from 0.26 to 0.01, respectively (both P < 0.001). The mean serum IgE antibody concentrations in the 38 patients studied decreased from 2 Pharmacia reference units per milliliter to 1 (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS Installing filters on silos to prevent airborne dissemination of allergenic soybean dust eliminates outbreaks of asthma caused by inhalation of the dust, thus supporting the idea that the avoidance of allergens helps prevent asthma.
N-k Induced Cascading Contingency Screening

This letter proposes a novel method for N-k induced cascading contingency screening based on random vector functional-link (RVFL) neural network and quantum inspired multi-objective evolutionary algorithm (QMEA). This method can conduct reliable and simultaneous screening for various N-k contingencies. The proposed method has been proved to be highly effective through a preliminary case study using the New England 39-bus system.
Glucose deprivation inhibits multiple key gene expression events and effector functions in CD8+ T cells

We recently reported that differentiation of CD8+ T cells from the naïve to the effector state involves the upregulation of glucose‐dependent metabolism. Glucose deprivation or inhibition of glycolysis by 2‐deoxy‐D‐glucose (2‐DG) selectively inhibited production of IFN‐γ but not of IL‐2. To determine a more global role of glucose metabolism on effector T‐cell function, we performed gene array analysis on CD8+ effector T cells stimulated in the presence or absence of 2‐DG. We observed that expression of only 10% of genes induced by TCR/CD28 signaling was inhibited by 2‐DG. Among these were genes for key cytokines, cell cycle molecules, and cytotoxic granule proteins. Consistent with these results, production of IFN‐γ and GM‐CSF, cell cycle progression, upregulation of cyclin D2 protein, cytolytic activity, and upregulation of granzyme B protein and also conjugate formation were exquisitely glucose‐dependent. In contrast to glucose, oxygen was little utilized by CD8+ effector T cells, and relative oxygen deprivation did not inhibit these CTL functional properties. Our results indicate a particularly critical role for glucose in regulating specific effector functions of CD8+ T cells and have implications for the maintenance of the effector phase of cellular immune responses in target tissue microenvironments such as a solid tumor.
Variational Analysis in Sobolev and BV Spaces - Applications to PDEs and Optimization, Second Edition

Preface to the second edition Preface to the first edition 1. Introduction Part I. Basic Variational Principles: 2. Weak solution methods in variational analysis 3. Abstract variational principles 4. Complements on measure theory 5. Sobolev spaces 6. Variational problems: some classical examples 7. The finite element method 8. Spectral analysis of the Laplacian 9. Convex duality and optimization Part II. Advanced Variational Analysis: 10. Spaces BV and SBV 11. Relaxation in Sobolev, BV, and Young measure spaces 12. GAMMA-Convergence and applications 13. Integral functionals of the calculus of variations 14. Applications in mechanics and computer vision 15. Variational problems with a lack of coercivity 16. An introduction to shape optimization problems 17. Gradient flows Bibliography Index.
The role of interleukin‐10 promoter polymorphisms in primary Sjögren's syndrome

Objective: To determine the impact of a broad spectrum of different polymorphisms within the interleukin‐10 (IL‐10) promoter gene on disease susceptibility to primary Sjögren's syndrome (pSS), clinical manifestations, and autoantibody production. Methods: We genotyped 111 unrelated German Caucasian patients with pSS and 145 healthy controls for the single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) at positions −2849, −2776, −2769, −2763, −1349, −1082, −851, −819, −657, and −592 and for the microsatellites IL10.R and IL10.G. Allele and haplotype distributions were compared between patients and controls and between subgroups of patients with different clinical and laboratory findings. Results: We found no significant differences in the allele or haplotype frequencies between pSS patients and healthy controls. After Bonferroni correction we found a significant association of the ACC haplotype (at the −1082, −819, and −592 loci) with immunoglobulin (Ig)A antibodies to anti‐α‐fodrin. Conclusion: Overall we found no associations of IL‐10 promoter polymorphisms with the susceptibility to pSS in our cohort. The finding that the production of IgA anti‐α‐fodrin antibodies is associated with polymorphisms within the IL‐10 promoter region suggests a genetic contribution to the generation of these antibodies.
Permanent Expression of a Cyclin B Homologue in the Cell Cycle of the Dinoflagellate Karenia brevis

Abstract The eukaryotic cell cycle is driven by a set of cyclin-dependent kinases associated with their regulatory partners, the cyclins, which confer activity, substrate specificities and proper localization of the kinase activity. We describe the cell cycle of Karenia brevis and provide evidence for the presence of a cyclin B homologue in this dinoflagellate using two antibodies with different specificities. This cyclin B homologue has an unusual behavior, since its expression is permanent and it has a cytoplasmic location throughout the cell cycle. There is no evidence for translocation to the nucleus during mitosis. However, it appears also to be specifically bound to the nucleolus throughout the cell cycle. The permanent expression and the cytoplasmic localization during mitosis of this cyclin B homologue is similar to p56, a cyclin B homologue previously described in a different species of dinoflagellate, Crypthecodinium cohnii. Here we discuss this unusual behavior of the cyclin B homologue in dinoflagellates, its relationship to the unusual characteristics of dinomitosis, and its potential implications regarding the evolution of cell cycle regulation among eukaryotes.
Ovarian Cancer: the Prospect of Development of Vaccines Therapy

Ovarian cancer is the seventh most common cancer in women worldwide (18 most common cancer overall), with 239,000 new cases diagnosed in 2012. In the USA, estimated new cases of ovarian cancer in 2014: 21,980, and estimated deaths from ovarian cancer in 2014: 14,270. Ovarian cancer often has no symptoms at the early stages, so the disease is generally advanced when it is diagnosed. The 5-year survival rate (which compares the 5-year survival of people with the cancer to the survival of others at the same age who do not have cancer) ranges from approximately 30 to 50 per cent.
General parental education in Sweden: participants and non-participants

Scand J Prim Health Care 2002;20:xxx-xx. ISSN 0281-3432 Objective - To study factors of importance for participation in parental education within routine child health care. Design - All parents of children born during 1 year were invited by the district nurse to participate in parental education; their participation during the infant year was registered. Setting - Catchment area of two health centres in Växjö, Sweden. Subjects - 221 infants and their parents. Main outcome measures - Number of educational sessions for mothers and fathers. Results - 63% of mothers and 20% of fathers attended at least one session. These mothers attended a mean of 5.7 (SD 2.2) sessions and these fathers a mean of 2.8 (SD 2.3) sessions. Logistic regression analyses showed that the only variable of significance for participation was being a first-time parent (odds ratio 3.9 for the mothers and 3.7 for the fathers). Odds ratios above 2.0 (non-significant) were found for married mothers and Swedish mothers, as well as for Swedish fathers. Conclusion - It is still a considerable problem to get certain groups involved in routine parental education in Swedish child healthcare programmes.
Anaerogenic Fermentation with Paratyphoid Bacilli

1. Anaerogenic races of B. paratyphosus B are stable in ordinary artificial culture. 2. Aerogenic variants of anaerogenic strains can be produced (though the anaerogenic strain persists) by growth in dextrose or mannitol with a relatively large amount of sodium formate. Such variants can then produce gas from all the other “sugars” fermentable by B. paratyphosus B. 3. Failure to produce gas from sugars by anaerogenic races is due to deficiency in the power of breaking down the formate produced in the first stage of fermentation. 4. A mixture of dextrose and formate in peptone water reveals the latent capacity for gas production in anaerogenic races of B. paratyphosus B. This confirms the observations of Grey (1914, 1920, 1924). Since this work was done, we have seen the paper of Pot and Tasman (1932) in which they succeed in isolating aerogenic variants from anaerogenic cultures of B. paratyphosus B by continued cultivation in 2 per cent. calcium formate, in a somewhat similar manner as we have done with the mixture of dextrose and sodium formate.
Treatment of knee osteoarthritis with platelet-rich plasma plus hyaluronic acid in comparison with platelet-rich plasma only

Background: The exact outcome of the combined use of hyaluronic acid (HA) and platelet-rich plasma (PRP) in the treatment for osteoarthritis remains unclear. The goal of this paper was to compare the efficacy of PRP + HA with those of a cohort of patients treated with platelet-rich plasma only. Materials and methods: A total of 126 Subjects with knee osteoarthritis were enrolled: 63 cases in PRP plus HA group and 63 cases in PRP group. After clinical and radiographic evaluation, patients received a weekly intra-articular injection of HA added with PRP or of only PRP for 3 weeks. Follow-up was carried out at 1, 3, 6, and 12 months. Results: In the participants treated with PRP plus HA and with PRP only, VAS scores decreased significantly, and accordingly, knee function (WOMAC) improved, compared to the status of patients prior to treatment. Regarding to VAS and WOMAC, no significant difference were observed between the two groups; however, there is a trend that could obtain better functional scores in PRP plus HA group (VAS, P = 0.392; WOMAC, P = 0.082). Six failures occurred in the PRP plus HA group and 11 in PRP group. No major adverse events or complications were observed in both groups. Conclusions: The association of PRP and HA is effective and safe in the management of patients suffering from mild to moderate KOA. Although no differences in functional outcomes were shown between the groups, there is a trend that PRP plus HA could obtain relatively better functional scores.
Integrative Functions of Lactational Hormones in Social Behavior and Stress Management a

For mammalian reproduction to succeed, self-defense and asociality must be subjugated to positive social behaviors, at least during birth, lactation, and sexual behavior. Perhaps the important task of regulating the interaction between social and agonistic behaviors is managed, in part, by interactions between two related neurochemical systems that incorporate oxytocin and vasopressin in their functions. The neuropeptides oxytocin and vasopressin participate in important reproductive functions, such as parturition and lactation, and homeostatic responses, including modulation of the adrenal axis. Recent evidence also implicates these hormones in social aspects of reproductive behaviors. For example, oxytocin is important for a variety of positive social behaviors, including the regulation of maternal-infant interactions. In adult animals, oxytocin may facilitate both social contact and selective social interactions associated with social attachment and pair bonding, and it participates in the regulation of parasympathetic functions. Vasopressin, in contrast, is associated with behaviors that might be broadly classified as "defensive" including enhanced arousal, attention, or vigilance, increased aggressive behavior, and a general increase in sympathetic functions. On the basis of the literature on the functions of these hormones and our own recent findings, we propose that dynamic interactions between oxytocin and vasopressin are components of a larger system which integrates the neuroendocrine and autonomic changes associated with mammalian social behaviors and the concurrent regulation of the stress axis. In addition, studies of lactating females provide a valuable model for understanding the more general neuroendocrinology of the stress axis. Peptide hormones, including oxytocin and vasopressin, do not readily cross the blood-brain barrier and must be administered centrally (i.c.v.) to reach the brain. Nasal sprays have been used to promote milk let down and have been used in some behavioral studies, but the extent to which such compounds reach the brain is not known. Therefore, virtually nothing is known regarding the effects in humans of centrally administered oxytocin. The study of human lactation, in conjunction with animal research, provides an opportunity to begin to develop viable hypotheses regarding the behavioral effects of oxytocin.