Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Phagocytosis of Giardia lamblia trophozoites by human colostral leukocytes

Aim: To determine the phagocytic activity of the polymorphonuclear and mononuclear cells present in human colostrum, and to verify the influence of opsonins in the adherence, ingestion and killing of Giardia lamblia trophozoites. Methods: Polymorphonuclear and mononuclear phagocytes were incubated with G. lamblia trophozoites, in the presence as well as the absence of supernatant of human colostrum (the source of opsonins) for 30, 60 and 120 min. The trophozoites/phagocytes ratio was 1:1, and the percentage of phagocytosed trophozoites was determined by microscopic examination of acridine orange‐stained cells. Results: The mononuclear phagocytes presented more functional activity than the polymorphonuclear. The highest indexes of adherence (77.6±5.1), ingestion (68.9±5.5) and killing (48.5±4.9) were obtained through the incubation of mononuclear cells in the presence of colostrum supernatant for 120 min.
Lumbar Paraspinal Compartment Syndrome: A Case Report with Physiologic and Anatomic Studies

A 24-year-old man presented with severe low-back pain and paraspinal muscle spasm after exertion. Elevation in temperature, white blood cell count, serum muscle enzymes, and urine myoglobin, as well as computer tomographic evidence of paraspinal muscle edema and necrosis, were present. No etiology could be documented, and the possibility of an acute exertional compartment syndrome was entertained. Subsequently, cadaveric dissections indicated that the erector spinae muscles are contained within a well-developed fascial sheath. Continuous slit catheter pressure measurements within this compartment in eight healthy male subjects were subsequently carried out. These indicated a physiologic behavior similar to other known compartments for which compartment syndromes have been described. Variation in intracompartmental pressure occurred as a function of body posture, erector spinae isometric contraction, and active intra-abdominal pressurization. We suggest this patient had a paraspinal compartment syndrome and have described pressure characteristics of this compartment in normal men.
Inability to assess Absorption of Iron from Plasma Radioiron Curves

FOLLOWING the administration of a large dose of iron by mouth there is a prompt increase in the concentration of iron in the plasma. This fact has been used by several workers in studying iron absorption (Jasinski, 1949; Thedering, 1949; Hein and Keibl, 1950; Jasinski and Ott, 1951; Crawley, 1952; Smith, 1952; Begemann, Keiderling and Walter, 1953 ; Thedering and Beck, 1953; Grace, Doig and WolK 1954). In most investigations it has been assumed that there is a relation between the level to which the plasma iron is raised and the actual quantity absorbed. However, Yuile and his colleagues (1950) gave small doses of labelled iron to dogs and found that neither the height nor shape of the plasma radioiron curves correlated well with the amount absorbed. This is not surprising since the character of tolerance curves depends not only on the amount absorbed but on the rate of absorption and the rate of removal of iron from the plasma (Cartwright et al., 1946; Smith, 1952). In the present study radioactive iron was used to find out whether a more accurate index of iron absorption could be obtained from the amount appearing in the plasma if corrections were made for the rate of removal of iron. The corrected figures for absorption were compared with those obtained by estimating the quantity of unabsorbed radioactivity in the faeces. The results of the investigation form the substance of this paper.
Aggregate data meta‐analysis with time‐to‐event outcomes

In a meta‐analysis of randomized controlled trials with time‐to‐event outcomes, an aggregate data approach may be required for some or all included studies. Variation in the reporting of survival analyses in journals suggests that no single method for extracting the log(hazard ratio) estimate will suffice. Methods are described which improve upon a previously proposed method for estimating the log(HR) from survival curves. These methods extend to life‐tables. In the situation where the treatment effect varies over time and the trials in the meta‐analysis have different lengths of follow‐up, heterogeneity may be evident. In order to assess whether the hazard ratio changes with time, several tests are proposed and compared. A cohort study comparing life expectancy of males and females with cerebral palsy and a systematic review of five trials comparing two anti‐epileptic drugs, carbamazepine and sodium valproate, are used for illustration. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
ASReml Update. What's new in Release 3.00

The University of Adelaide, Waite Campus, PMB 1, Glen Osmond SA, 5064, Australia School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, 2550, Australia Computational Informatics, CSIRO Canberra ACT, Australia VSN International Centre for Mathematical and Computational Biology, and Department of Biomathematics and Bioinformatics, Rothamsted Research, Harpenden AL5 2JQ, United Kingdom
Optimum Receiver Filters for Optical Fiber Systems With Polarization Mode Dispersion

We use a semi-analytical receiver model combined with importance sampling applied to first-order polarization-mode dispersion (PMD) to show that the performance of optical fiber systems whose optical and electrical receiver filter bandwidths are optimized for polarization-mode dispersion in practical on-off-keyed systems is equivalent to the performance of the same systems in which the receiver filters are optimized for operation in the absence of PMD. We also observed an increase in the sensitivity of the performance with respect to variations in the receiver filter bandwidths in the return-to-zero format in systems with PMD when compared with PMD-free operation.
Music to measure: symbolic representation in children's composition.

Eisner maintains that the arts education community needs "empirically grounded examples of artistic thinking related to the nature of the tasks students engage in, the material with which they work, the context's norms and the cues the teachers provide to advance their students' thinking" (2000, p. 217). This paper reflects on the results of collaborative action research between teachers and university researchers in New Zealand who have been investigating how children develop and refine their ideas and related skills in music. The paper focuses specifically on the results of action research in which the impact of symbolic representation on idea development and refinement in music is examined. It raises some issues and points of tension for generalist and specialist teachers when fostering creative idea development in music. This paper describes an investigation into how a sample of New Zealand primary school children set out to develop and refine their musical ideas, using symbolic representation (symbols used to represent sounds) as part of the process. Whether the use of these symbols aided or hindered the development of their sound ideas was subsequently examined. The study was part of a more comprehensive project on children's development of ideas in the arts. Development in this sense means the generation, exploration, extension and refinement of arts ideas, where both process and final product are honoured. In this research, three university researchers and 10 generalist primary school teacher-researchers collaborated over two years, to jointly identify and devise aims, methodology, analysis and related action research phases. Such collaboration corroborates a worldwide trend in educational research, which is moving away from research done to teachers towards working with teachers (Lankshear & Knobel, 2004) on questions which teachers identify as important in their practice. The project drew on ethnographic, case study, self-study and action research traditions of educational research. In keeping with naturalistic inquiry, the project recognised that "meaning arises out of social situations and is handled through interpretive processes" (Cohen, Manion & Morrison, 2000, p. 138). In the first phase of the project, we investigated what selected, generalist teacher-researchers had been teaching and what children had been learning in each
Testing to check success of treatment to eradicate H pylori

EDITOR,—Two letters1 comment on our paper assessing the use of dyspeptic symptoms as a test for eradication of Helicobacter pylori2 and cite work that is supposedly at variance with our results.3 4 The authors fail, however, to appreciate important differences between these studies and our paper. Both of the quoted studies investigated patients with duodenal and gastric ulceration,3 4 whereas we studied only patients with uncomplicated duodenal ulceration. Patients with haemorrhage and perforation were included in one of …
Relationships between Interlibrary Loan and Research Activity in Canada

Interlibrary Loan borrowing rates in academic libraries are influenced by an array of factors. This article explores the relationship between interlibrary loan borrowing activity and research activity at 42 Canadian academic institutions. A significant positive correlation was found between interlibrary loan borrowing activity and measures of research activity. The degree of correlation observed depended on the category of institution, with undergraduate and comprehensive universities showing the largest correlations. This is the first study to quantify the relationship between interlibrary loan and research activity, and the findings suggest that interlibrary loan plays a role in supporting academic research at Canadian universities.
Human Papillomavirus DNA in Invasive Carcinoma of the Vagina

The presence of human papillomavirus (HPV) DNA in invasive carcinomas of the vagina, in their lymph node metastases, and in corresponding normal tissue was investigated by Southern blot hybridization with 32P-labeled HPV DNA. Tumor tissue from ten of 18 patients with vaginal carcinoma contained HPV DNA. Three of the 18 patients had a history of cervical neoplasia more than 14 years before the diagnosis of vaginal carcinoma. Five of 15 primary squamous cell carcinomas, one primary adenocarcinoma, and a vulvar recurrence of a vaginal squamous carcinoma contained HPV 16. A primary squamous carcinoma yielded HPV-related sequences. The HPV copy number varied from 0.5 to 50 per cellular genome. Four histologically positive inguinal lymph nodes from three patients contained HPV DNA. In six tumor-free control tissues from four patients, no HPV DNA was detected. No relationship was established between HPV positivity, HPV type, or copy number of the tumor and the grade of differentiation or keratinization or the clinical stage. After a median follow-up of 13 months, five of nine HPV-positive patients were alive without recurrence, whereas all seven HPV-negative patients had died because of disease. The results of this study indicate a possible major role of HPV in the development of vaginal cancer
Effect of the Thrombin Inhibitor Argatroban in Acute Cerebral Thrombosis

Argatroban is a direct antithrombin agent developed for the first time by Okamoto et al in 1978. Unlike heparin, it manifests its anticoagulant effect by binding directly to the active site of thrombin. A phase II double-blind comparative study was conducted in 52 facilities with a placebo control. The drug was administered by a slow intravenous infusion at 60 mg/d for the first 2 days and then at 10 mg twice daily for the subsequent 5 days. Glycerol was used concomitantly as a basic therapy for both the argatroban and placebo groups. The results demonstrated superior improvements, particularly in neurological symptoms (motor paralysis) and daily living activities (walking, standing up, continuous sitting, and eating), in the argatroban group compared with the placebo group. These improvements were observed from the early stage of administration. It was also found that administration of the drug in the early stage of the disease gave better results. In the present study, although a hemorrhagic cerebral infarct occurred in one case in the argatroban group, this seemed to be no different from a spontaneous incidence, as it also occurred in two cases in the placebo group. Symptoms were not aggravated in any of the cases. These results indicate that argatroban is an effective and safe drug for the treatment of acute cerebral thrombosis.
Hepatitis B surface antigen binds to human serum albumin cross‐linked by transglutaminase

It has been postulated that polymerized human serum albumin may play a role in the infection of hepatocytes by hepatitis B virus, because both the envelope of hepatitis B virus (HBsAg) and hepatocytes exhibit binding activity for human serum albumin after cross‐linking by glutaraldehyde. Since glutaraldehyde‐dependent cross‐linking of albumin molecules is not likely to occur in vivo, we considered the possibility that albumin may be polymerized by the action of transglutaminase enzymes present in plasma as activated factor XIII or released into plasma from tissues. Guinea pig liver transglutaminase covalently cross‐linked human serum albumin molecules into dimers, trimers and polymers up to hexamers as shown by polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis in sodium dodecyl sulfate. HBsAg particles bound transglutaminase‐cross‐linked as well as glutaralde‐hyde‐cross‐linked human serum albumin as demonstrated by radioimmunoassay and immunoelectron microscopy. The binding was blocked by preincubation of HBsAg with transglutaminase‐or glutaraldehyde‐cross‐linked human serum albumin, anti‐HBs or monoclonal anti‐pre‐S2, but not by polymerized bovine or rat serum albumin or by monomeric human serum albumin. These data indicate that HBsAg particles contain specific binding sites for transglutaminase‐cross‐linked human serum albumin, but it remains to be determined whether the albumin polymers play a role in the attachment of hepatitis B virus to hepatocytes.
The Social Psychiatry of Later Life

Throughout the two million years of human existence, it is without precedent that the elderly should now constitute such a large proportion of the world's population. Although it is already trite to emphasise this remarkable change in the global population structure, the increase is nothing less than an awesome imperative for public health as a socially responsible science. By the year 2025 AD, the United Kingdom will have 14 million persons aged over 60, which would be 26% of the population. Just under two million of them will be over 80 years old (United Nations, 1985). In Australia and New Zealand, 24.8% of the population will be aged 60 years or more. About one million Australians will be 80 years or over. West Germany will have 2.4 million aged over 80, the USA 7.7 million. The People's Republic of China will have 19.3% of its 1.5 billion people who will be aged over 60, and over 25 million will be over 80 years.
Hypnosis Decreases Presurgical Distress in Excisional Breast Biopsy Patients

BACKGROUND:Excisional breast biopsy is associated with presurgical psychological distress. Such distress is emotionally taxing, and may have negative implications for postsurgical side effects and satisfaction with anesthesia. We investigated the ability of a brief hypnosis session to reduce presurgical psychological distress in excisional breast biopsy patients. METHODS:Ninety patients presenting for excisional breast biopsy were randomly assigned to receive either a 15-minute presurgery hypnosis session (n = 49, mean age: 46.4 (95% CI: 42.3–50.4)) or a 15-minute presurgery attention control session (n = 41, mean age: 45.0 (95% CI: 40.8–49.2)). The hypnosis session involved suggestions for increased relaxation and decreased distress. The attention control session involved nondirective empathic listening. Presurgery distress was measured using visual analog scales (VAS) and the short version of the Profile of Mood States (SV-POMS). Data were analyzed using analysis of variance and &khgr;2 procedures. RESULTS:Groups did not differ in terms of the following: demographics (age, education, ethnicity, marital status, all P’s > 0.28); medical variables (presurgery diagnosis, previous excisional biopsy, previous breast cancer, all P’s > 0.11); or preintervention distress (SV-POMS P > 0.74) assessed on the day of surgery. Postintervention, and before surgery, patients in the hypnosis group had significantly lower mean values for presurgery VAS emotional upset (16.5 vs 38.2, P < 0.0001, d = .85), VAS depressed mood (6.6 vs 19.9, P < 0.02, d = .67), and SV-POMS anxiety (10.0 vs 5.0, P < 0.0001, d = 0.85); and significantly higher levels for VAS relaxation (75.7 vs 54.2, P < 0.001, d = −0.76) than attention controls. CONCLUSIONS:The study results indicate that a brief presurgery hypnosis intervention can be an effective means of controlling presurgical distress in women awaiting diagnostic breast cancer surgery.
Bronchoalveolar lavage fluid protein composition in patients with sarcoidosis and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis: A two‐dimensional electrophoretic study

We used two‐dimensional (2‐D) electrophoresis to analyze the protein composition of fluid recovered by bronchoalveolar lavage (BALF) from patients with sarcoidosis and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, two forms of interstitial lung disease with different cellular composition and cytokine profile in BALF. They are also characterized by different pathogenesis and clinical evolution, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis being less favorable than sarcoidosis due to rapidly progressive pulmonary fibrosis. Thirty‐eight proteins or protein fragments, never previously assigned in BALF samples, were identified by various methods including mass fingerprinting of tryptic digests. Comparison of the BALF protein maps of the two groups of patients showed 32 spots with statistically significant disease‐related variations in relative abundance. In sarcoidosis we found an increase in the amount of several plasma proteins, while in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis we observed a statistically significant increase in low‐molecular‐weight proteins, many of which are involved in inflammatory processes (such as MIF and calgranulin) or antioxidant response (such as antioxidant peroxysomal enzyme and thioredoxin peroxidase 2). 2‐D electrophoresis allowed us to identify new BALF proteins and to characterize protein composition in patients with sarcoidosis and idiophatic pulmonary fibrosis. Comparison of the gels of the two diseases showed that they differ in BALF protein profiles as they do in type of immune response.
Refinement of habituation procedures in diet-induced obese mice

Orogastric gavage, while a common method for delivering experimental substances in mice, has been shown to induce stress. To minimize the associated stress with this procedure, sham gavage prior to the start of experiment is a common method for habiutating mice. We investigated whether handling and restraint could replace sham treatment in the acclimatization protocol. Mice were either undisturbed, hand-restrained for 10 s or sham-gavaged daily for six days prior to eight days of twice daily gavage. The results showed that repetitive restraint and gavage had no differences in body weight after eight days of treatment compared with the body weights at the start of treatment, whereas animals left undisturbed lost significant weight once treatment began. These data suggest that procedure refinement by replacing sham treatment with hand restraint is sufficient to acclimatize mice to the stress associated with gavage.
Human C-type Lectin Domain Family 4, Member C (CLEC4C/BDCA-2/CD303) Is a Receptor for Asialo-galactosyl-oligosaccharides*

Background: The type II C-type lectin CLEC4C inhibits IFNα production by plasmacytoid dendritic cells; its natural ligand is unknown. Results: Asialo-oligosaccharides with terminal residues of galactose bind CLEC4C and inhibit IFNα production. Conclusion: CLEC4C-mediated suppression of IFNα production is regulated by the masking/unmasking of galactose moieties. Significance: This represents a new potential strategy for regulating immune responses in pathological conditions. Plasmacytoid dendritic cells are specialized in the production of type I interferon (type I IFN), which promotes antiviral and antitumor responses, as well as autoimmune disorders. Activation of type I IFN secretion depends on the pattern recognition receptors TLR7 and TLR9, which sense microbial RNA and DNA, respectively. Type I IFN production is modulated by several receptors, including the type II C-type lectin domain family 4, member C (CLEC4C). The natural ligand of CLEC4C is unknown. To identify it, here we probed a glycan array with a soluble form of the CLEC4C ectodomain. We found that CLEC4C recognizes complex type sugars with terminal galactose. Importantly, soluble CLEC4C bound peripheral blood leukocytes and tumor cells that express glycans with galactose residues at the non-reducing ends. The positive and negative modulation of galactose residues on cell membranes was paralleled by the regulation of type I IFN secretion by plasmacytoid dendritic cells in co-culture experiments in vitro. These results suggest that the modulation in the expression of non-sialylated oligosaccharides by invading pathogens or transformed cells may affect type I IFN response and immune surveillance.
Increased expression of chemokines (MCP‐1, MIP‐1α, RANTES) after peripheral nerve transection

Abstract After nerve injury, recruitment of circulating macrophages into the endoneurium is essential for degeneration and subsequently for successful regeneration. However, the factors leading to macrophage recruitment are not known in detail. Chemokines are one of many possible factors influencing recruitment. In this study we wanted to examine, immunohistochemically, the expression of MCP‐1, MIP‐1α and RANTES from 6 hours up to 4 weeks after transection of rat sciatic nerve. An increased expression of MCP‐1 was noted already 6 hours after transection, mainly in Schwann cells. Later, the MCP‐1 positive staining was seen also in macrophages, fibroblast‐like cells and endothelial cells. An increased number of MIP‐1α positive cells could be noticed after 24 hours, the maximum expression in Schwann cells was noted at the 5‐day timepoint. Later, part of the positive cells appeared to be macrophages. RANTES was mainly expressed in inflammatory cells. Endothelial cells in the epi‐ and endoneurium showed positive staining for every chemokine studied after transection. The contralateral non‐operated nerves showed an increased number of positive cells for MCP‐1 and MIP‐1α. In the control nerves MCP‐1 and MIP‐1α positive cells were scattered throughout the endoneurium. This study shows that increased expression of chemokines takes place within endoneurium after peripheral nerve transection. Thus, it is probable that chemokines can take part in the recruitment of macrophages. It further shows that there is an increased expression of the studied chemokines in the non‐operated contralateral nerves. Even in normal conditions chemokines are needed, probably to keep resident macrophages within endoneurium.