Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prognostic value of cytokines (TNF-α, IL-10, Leptin) and C-reactive protein serum levels in adult patients with nosocomial sepsis

Objectives: The purpose of this trial was to investigate in patients with sepsis, the correlation between prognosis of disease and factors, which influence prognosis like gender, focus of infection, bacterial growth in blood culture, growing pathogens in addition to serum levels of cytokines (TNF-a, IL-10, leptin) and C-reactive protein. Material and methods: Forty-six adult patients with sepsis and 55 healthy adults as control group were enrolled in this study. Serum cytokine (TNF-a, IL-10 and leptin) levels were determined by ELISA method and C-reactive protein (CRP) levels were measured by nephelometric method. Serum cytokine and CRP levels on day 0 (initial), day 3 and day 5 were compared in surviving sepsis patients and patients who died because of sepsis. Results: Serum IL-10 level on day 0 (initial) of adult patients who died as a result of sepsis was found to be higher than surviving patients and the difference was statistically significant (p=0.025). On 3rd day of treatment, serum TNF-a and CRP levels of patients who dies because of sepsis were higher than values of surviving patients (for TNF-a p=0.033, for CRP p=0.026). In adult patient group with sepsis who died on the 5th day of treatment, serum TNF-a level was significantly higher than levels in surviving patients (p=0.030). Conclusion: It was determined that in patients who died due to sepsis, initial serum IL-10 level, TNF- a and CRP levels on 3rd day of treatment and finally on 5th day of treatment, only serum TNF- a level was higher than surviving patients. We believe that determining serum TNF-a and IL-10 levels in patients with sepsis before and during treatment will help clinicians to clarify prognosis and enable them to implement appropriate treatment modifications.
Pharmacological characterization and antidiabetic activity of a long‐acting glucagon‐like peptide‐1 analogue conjugated to an antithrombin III‐binding pentasaccharide

To examine the biological characteristics of a novel glucagon‐like peptide‐1 (GLP‐1) conjugate, in which an antithrombin III (ATIII)‐binding pentasaccharide is conjugated to d‐Ala8GLP‐1 using a tetraethylene glycol linker.
Trust, Trustworthiness, and Information Sharing in Supply Chains Bridging China and the U.S.

Whether and how trust and trustworthiness differ between a collectivist society, e.g., China, and an individualistic one, e.g., the United States, generates much ongoing scientific debate and bears significant practical values for managing cross-country transactions. We experimentally investigate how supply chain members' countries of origin---China versus the United States---affect trust, trustworthiness, and strategic information sharing behavior in a cross-country supply chain. We consider a two-tier supply chain in which the upstream supplier solicits demand forecast information from the retailer to plan production; but the retailer has an incentive to manipulate her forecast to ensure abundant supply. The levels of trust and trustworthiness in the supply chain and supplier's capability to determine the optimal production quantity affect the efficacy of forecast sharing and the resulting profits. We develop an experimental design to disentangle these three aspects and to allow for real-time interactions between geographically distant and culturally heterogeneous participants. We observe that, when there is no prospect for long-term interactions, our Chinese participants consistently exhibit lower spontaneous trust and trustworthiness than their U.S. counterparts do. We quantify the differences in trust and trustworthiness between the two countries, and the resulting impact on supply chain efficiency. We also show that Chinese individuals exhibit higher spontaneous trust toward U.S. partners than Chinese ones, primarily because they perceive that individuals from the United States are more trusting and trustworthy in general. This positive perception toward U.S. people is indeed consistent with the U.S. participants' behavior in forecast sharing. In addition, we quantify that a Chinese supply chain enjoys a larger efficiency gain from repeated interactions than a U.S. one does, as the prospect of building a long-term relationship successfully sustains trust and trustworthiness by Chinese partners. We advocate that companies can reinforce the positive perception of westerners held by the Chinese population and commit to long-term relationships to encourage trust by Chinese partners. Finally, we also observe that both populations exhibit similar pull-to-center bias when solving a decision problem under uncertainty (i.e., the newsvendor problem). Data, as supplemental material, are available at http://dx.doi. org/10.1287/mnsc.2014. 1905 . This paper was accepted by Yossi Aviv, operations management.
Intrathecal baclofen in children with spastic cerebral palsy: a double‐blind, randomized, placebo‐controlled, dose‐finding study

Intrathecal baclofen (ITB) therapy can be very effective in the treatment of intractable spasticity, but its effectiveness and safety have not yet been thoroughly studied in children with cerebral palsy (CP). The aims of this double‐blind, randomized, placebo‐controlled, dose‐finding study were to select children eligible for continuous ITB infusion, to assess the effective ITB bolus dose, and to evaluate the effects, side effects, and complications. Outcome measures included the original Ashworth scale and the Visual Analogue Scale for individually formulated problems. We studied nine females and eight males, aged between 7 and 16 years (mean age 13y 2mo [SD 2y 9mo]). Twelve children had spastic CP and five had spastic‐dyskinetic CP. One child was classified on the Gross Motor Function Classification System at Level III, two at Level I V, and 14 at Level V. The test treatment worked successfully for all 17 children with an effective ITB bolus dose of 12. 5μg in one, 20μg in another, 25μg in 10, and 50μg in five children. ITB significantly reduced muscle tone, diminished pain, and facilitated ease of care. The placebo did not have these effects. Nine side effects of ITB were registered, including slight lethargy in seven children. Fourteen children had symptoms of lowered cerebrospinal fluid pressure. We conclude that ITB bolus administration is effective and safe for carefully selected children with intractable spastic CP.
Measuring Japanese EFL Student Perceptions of Internet-Based Tests with the Technology Acceptance Model.

The Internet has made it possible for teachers to administer online assessments with affordability and ease. However, little is known about Japanese English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students’ attitudes of internet-based tests (IBTs). Therefore, this study aimed to measure the perceptions of IBTs among Japanese English language learners with the technology acceptance model (TAM), the most influential and widely employed model to predict a user’s adoption of new technologies (Lee, Kozar, Larsen, 2003). However, TAM has yet to be utilized in the context of English education in Japan. Thus, the study also sought to determine the correlational relationships between three TAM variables – perceived usefulness (PU), perceived ease of use (PEOU), and the behavioral intention (BI) to use IBTs. An adapted TAM questionnaire was administered to 80 Japanese university students. The results showed that the relationships between PU, PEOU, and BI were positively and highly correlated. More importantly, students’ attitudes towards the PU, PEOU, and BI to use IBTs were found to be moderately favorable, with PU and BI more favorably perceived than PEOU. The findings verified that the four proposed hypotheses were supported, providing evidence that IBTs are viewed positively by Japanese EFL students.
Novel Multi-way Broadband Differential Phase Shifter With Uniform Reference Line Using Coupled Line Structure

Conventional passive differential phase shifters (DPSs) usually require different reference lines to realize varied differential phase shifts, this results in both complex structure and bulky size for multi-way poly-phase applications. To resolve the problem, a DPS configuration with uniform reference line is proposed. It is constructed using basic coupled lines with simplicity in both design and fabrication procedures. The delay lines of the phase shifter have a similar structure and maintain desired constant phase shift compared with the uniform reference line over a wide bandwidth. To verify the proposed configuration, a four-way DPS which is comprised of 3 delay lines and a reference line, is designed, fabricated and measured. The delay lines provide the corresponding constant phase shifts (45 °, 90 °, 135 ° compared to the reference line. Over a bandwidth of 45%, excellent performance is achieved with small insertion loss and phase deviation.
Stability and guaranteed cost control of uncertain discrete delay systems

Robust stability and the guaranteed cost control problem are considered for discrete-time systems with time-varying delays from given intervals. A new construction of Lyapunov–Krasovskii functionals (LKFs), which has been recently introduced in the continuous-time case, is applied. To a nominal LKF, which is appropriate to the system with nominal delays, terms are added that correspond to the system with the perturbed delays and that vanish when the delay perturbations approach zero. The nominal LKF is chosen in the form of the descriptor type and is applied either to the original or to the augmented system. The delay-independent result is derived via the Razumikhin approach. Guaranteed cost state-feedback control is designed. The advantage of the new tests is demonstrated via illustrative examples.
HUMAN AMNIOTIC MEMBRANE TRANSPLANTATION IN THE TREATMENT OF FELINE CORNEAL SEQUESTRUM : PRELIMINARY RESULTS

Amniotic membrane transplantation is used in both human and veterinary ophthalmology for ocular surface reconstruction after certain ocular diseases in order to regain corneal transparency and to improve visual outcome. Feline corneal sequestrum is a disease unique to the cat, characterized by the presence of an area of corneal necrosis, brown coloured, sometimes accompanied by vascularization and edema, usually located in the center of the cornea. Depending on the stage of the disease, treatment can be medical or surgical. This pilot study aims to evaluate the clinical outcome after lamellar keratectomy and amniotic membrane transplantation in cases of feline corneal sequestrum. The study was conducted in the Opthalmology Department of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in Bucharest and in Oftalmovet Private Practice in Valencia for a period of two years. During this time, six cats with corneal sequestrum underwent superficial keratectomy associated with human amniotic membrane transplantation fixed with OcuSeal Liquid Ocular Bandage (Beaver Visitec). In all the cases, a third eyelid flap was used to protect the graft. Good corneal clarity and improved vision was obtained in all the cases. Amniotic membrane transplantation after lamellar keratectomy was an optimal choice for the treatment of corneal sequestrum in cats. There was no recurrence of the disease in our follow-up period (3-15 months).
Developmental toxic effects of antifungal flusilazole administered by gavage to mice.

BACKGROUND The developmental toxicity of flusilazole was studied in CD-1 mice after oral administration. METHODS Pregnant mice were given flusilazole at doses of 0 (corn oil), 10, 20, and 40 mg/kg/day, by gavage, on gestational days (GD) 6-15. RESULTS Maternal toxicity, as evidenced by reduction in body weight gain and signs of toxicity, was observed at the middle- and high-dose groups. No significant incidence of resorptions or death was observed in any of dose groups. There was a pronounced reduction in fetal weight, which was significantly lower than control from 20 and 40 mg/kg/day. There was no significant increase in the incidence of fetuses with external or visceral malformations in any of dose groups, but there was a significant increase in the incidence of skeletal malformations was observed at 20 and 40 mg/kg/day. CONCLUSIONS The results of this study reported marked maternal toxicity, growth retardation, and skeletal abnormalities in the mid- and high-dose groups. It seems likely that marked maternal toxicity contributed to the observed alterations in fetal growth retardation and skeletal development. The no-observed-effect level in the present study for maternal and developmental toxicity was 10 mg/kg/day.
Continuous Age-Dependent Reference Ranges for Thyroid Hormones in Neonates, Infants, Children and Adolescents Established Using the ADVIA(r) Centaur(tm) Analyzer

Abstract In neonates, infants, children and adolescents serum concentrations of the thyroid hormones show a clear age dependency. Currently, age-dependent thyroid hormone reference ranges for the new ADVIA® Centaur™ immunoanalyzer are not available. Thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), free thyroxine (FT4), total thyroxine (T4), free triiodothyronine (FT3) and total triiodothyronine (T3) were determined in the sera of 460 healthy children aged 0 days to 18 years from an inland (n=308) and a seaside city (n=152) using the Bayer ADVIA® Centaur™ analyzer. Square root functions defining the upper and lower limit of the continuous age-dependent reference range and the median line for each thyroid hormone were estimated applying a parametric regression technique. Continuous age-dependent reference ranges show a better fit to the obtained data than discontinuous reference ranges. The median TSH and FT4 concentrations decrease within the first year of life and are nearly constant until 18 years of age. The median T4 decreases within the entire age interval, whereas the median FT3 is constant. The median T3 increases within the first year of life and decreases afterwards. The calculated continuous reference ranges for T4, T3 and partly FT4 are consistent with published reference ranges. However, the reference ranges obtained for FT3 and partly TSH differed considerably, compared to published reference ranges. No significant residence- or sex-specific effects on age-adjusted hormone concentrations were found except for a slight residence-specific effect on age-adjusted FT4, which was probably due to assay imprecision. Due to the lack of international standardization, the assay-specific evaluation of reference ranges is very important. Continuous age-dependent reference ranges comply better with the biological reality and are more reliable than discontinuous reference ranges.
Thrombophilia and antithrombotic therapy in women with recurrent spontaneous abortions.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the association between thrombophilia and recurrent spontaneous abortions (RSAs) and to evaluate the efficacy of anticoagulant treatment. STUDY DESIGN All couples with a history of RSAs were studied by immunologic tests and determination of coagulation factors. Low-molecular-weight heparin and low-dose aspirin daily during pregnancy were used in 29 selected cases with acquired and inherited thrombophilia. The control group included 23 women with a history of RSAs and tests positive for thrombophilia who declined to receive medication during pregnancy. RESULTS All couples with a history of RSAs were studied by immunologic tests and determination of coagulation factors. Low-molecular-weight heparin and low-dose aspirin daily during pregnancy were used in 29 selected cases with acquired and inherited thrombophilia. The control group included 23 women with a history of RSAs and tests positive for thrombophilia who declined to receive medication during pregnancy. CONCLUSION All couples with RSAs require screening for thrombophilia. Low-molecular-weight heparin and low-dose aspirin daily during pregnancy appear to have a favorable effect on pregnancy outcome in selected women with RSAs and acquired or inherited thrombophilia.
Multimodal Emotion Integration in Bipolar Disorder: An Investigation of Involuntary Cross-Modal Influences between Facial and Prosodic Channels

Abstract The ability to integrate information from different sensory channels is a vital process that serves to facilitate perceptual decoding in times of unimodal ambiguity. Despite its relevance to psychosocial functioning, multimodal integration of emotional information across facial and prosodic modes has not been addressed in bipolar disorder (BD). In light of this paucity of research we investigated multimodal processing in a BD cohort using a focused attention paradigm. Fifty BD patients and 52 healthy controls completed a task assessing the cross-modal influence of emotional prosody on facial emotion recognition across congruent and incongruent facial and prosodic conditions, where attention was directed to the facial channel. There were no differences in multi-modal integration between groups at the level of accuracy, but differences were evident at the level of response time; emotional prosody biased facial recognition latencies in the control group only, where a fourfold increase in response times was evident between congruent and incongruent conditions relative to patients. The results of this study indicate that the automatic process of integrating multimodal information from facial and prosodic sensory channels is delayed in BD. Given that interpersonal communication usually occurs in real time, these results have implications for social functioning in the disorder. (JINS, 2014, 20, 1–9)
Enhancing Self-efficacy for Optimized Patient Outcomes Through the Theory of Symptom Self-management

Background: In today’s world, greater patient empowerment is imperative because 90 million Americans live with 1 or more chronic conditions such as cancer. Evidence reveals that healthy behaviors such as effective symptom self-management can prevent or reduce much of the suffering from cancer. Oncology nurses play a pivotal role in developing a symptom self-management plan that is critical to optimizing a patient’s symptom self-management behaviors. Objective: This article uses exemplars to describe how oncology nurses can apply a tested middle-range theory, the Theory of Symptom Self-management, to clinical practice by incorporating interventions to increase a patient’s perceived self-efficacy to optimize patient outcomes. Methods: The Theory of Symptom Self-management provides a means to understand the dynamic aspects of symptom self-management and provides a tested framework for the development of efficacy-enhancing interventions for use by oncology nurses in clinical practice. Results: Exemplars based on the Theory of Symptom Self-management depict how oncology nursing can use perceived self-efficacy–enhancing symptom self-management interventions to improve the functional status and quality of life of their patients. Conclusion: Guided by a theoretical approach, oncology nurses can have a significant positive impact on the lives of their patients by reducing the symptom burden associated with cancer and its treatment. Implications for Practice: Oncology nurses can partner with their patients to design tailored approaches to symptom self-management. These tailored approaches provide the ability to implement patient-specific behaviors that recognize, prevent, relieve, or decrease the timing, intensity, distress, concurrence, and unpleasant quality of symptoms.
Melatonin potentiates rod signals to ON type bipolar cells in fish retina

Melatonin is involved in regulation of a variety of physiological functions through activation of specific G‐protein coupled receptors. However, the neuromodulatory role of melatonin, released from photoreceptors in the retina, is poorly understood. Here we show that melatonin enhances the sensitivity of the rod signal pathway by potentiating signal transfer from rod photoreceptors to ON bipolar cells (Rod‐ON‐BCs). Whole‐cell patch‐clamp recordings showed that melatonin induced a sustained inward current from Rod‐ON‐BCs, through activation of the melatonin MT2 receptor, which was identified as one mediated by a cGMP‐dependent cation channel. Consistent with this, melatonin was found, using immunocytochemistry, to increase intracellular cGMP levels, which was identified due to an inhibition of phosphodiesterase. Physiologically, melatonin potentiated responses of Rod‐ON‐BCs to simulated light flashes (brief puffs of CPPG, an mGluR6 antagonist, in the presence of l‐AP4, an mGluR6 agonist), which was mediated by cGMP‐dependent kinase, and increased the amplitude of the scotopic electroretinographic b‐wave, a reflection of Rod‐ON‐BC activity. These results suggest that melatonin, being at a higher level at night, may improve the signal/noise ratio for rod signals in the outer retina by enhancing signal transfer from rods to BCs.
Quantitative structure‐activity relationships for predicting soil‐sediment sorption coefficients for organic chemicals

Sorption coefficients are used to describe the equilibrium distribution of a chemical between a soil or sediment and the aqueous phase that it is in contact with. Although sorption coefficients for a particular organic chemical vary greatly from soil to soil, the observation has been made that sorption generally increases as the organic carbon content of the soil and the hydrophobicity of the chemical increases. This general observation resulted in the acceptance of organic carbon normalized sorption coefficients (Koc) as unique properties or constants of organic chemicals. In turn, Koc values have been estimated by quantitative structure‐activity relationships (QSARs) developed by correlation with a variety of physical or chemical properties and structural descriptors related to the hydrophobicity of the chemical such as octanol‐water partition coefficients, aqueous solubilities, molecular connectivity indices, molecular weight, molecular surface area, and reverse‐phase high‐performance liquid chromatography retention times. The selection and application of the most appropriate QSAR for predicting Koc depend on several factors, including the availability of required input, the appropriateness of model to chemical of interest, and the methodology for calculating the necessary topological or structural information. A review of the existing QSARs for predicting Koc and the limitations of using the Koc approach to estimate sorption coefficients will be presented.
O IS NOT ENOUGH

We examine the closure conditions of the probabilistic consequence relation of Hawthorne and Makinson, specifically the outstanding question of completeness in terms of Horn rules, of their proposed (finite) set of rules O. We show that on the contrary no such finite set of Horn rules exists, though we are able to specify an infinite set which is complete.
Product Labeling, Quality and International Trade 1

This paper analyzes the reasons why countries may pursue different labeling policies in autarky and how this affects countries’ welfare in the context of international trade. In an asymmetric information environment where producers know the quality of the goods they are selling and consumers are not able to distinguish between them, the quality governments choose to protect by a label depends on consumer preferences for and production costs of different qualities. Countries with different distributions of tastes and/or different production functions will thus decide to label differently. When they trade, welfare effects will be different on the country as a whole and on different types of consumers within each country depending on whether countries choose to mutually recognize each others labeling policy or to harmonize their policies. In particular it will be the case that a country with weak preferences for high quality will oppose the introduction of an international, harmonized label as it is better off under a regime of mutual recognition. When countries only differ in their costs of producing quality instead, none of the trading partners will lose from a move towards trade under an international, harmonized label.