Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Random species loss underestimates dilution effects of host diversity on foliar fungal diseases under fertilization

Abstract With increasing attention being paid to the consequences of global biodiversity losses, several recent studies have demonstrated that realistic species losses can have larger impacts than random species losses on community productivity and resilience. However, little is known about the effects of the order in which species are lost on biodiversity–disease relationships. Using a multiyear nitrogen addition and artificial warming experiment in natural assemblages of alpine meadow vegetation on the Qinghai‐Tibetan Plateau, we inferred the sequence of plant species losses under fertilization/warming. Then the sequence of species losses under fertilization/warming was used to simulate the species loss orders (both realistic and random) in an adjacently novel removal experiment manipulating plot‐level plant diversity. We explicitly compared the effect sizes of random versus realistic species losses simulated from fertilization/warming on plant foliar fungal diseases. We found that realistic species losses simulated from fertilization had greater effects than random losses on fungal diseases, and that species identity drove the diversity–disease relationship. Moreover, the plant species most prone to foliar fungal diseases were also the least vulnerable to extinction under fertilization, demonstrating the importance of protecting low competence species (the ability to maintain and transmit fungal infections was low) to impede the spread of infectious disease. In contrast, there was no difference between random and realistic species loss scenarios simulated from experimental warming (or the combination of warming and fertilization) on the diversity–disease relationship, indicating that the functional consequences of species losses may vary under different drivers.
The Genotype Determines the B Cell Response in Mercury–Treated Mice

Background: Mercury causes in mouse strains of the H–2s haplotype an autoimmune syndrome with antibodies to the nucleolar protein fibrillarin and systemic immune complex (IC) deposits. Other strains, like BALB/C (H–2d), develop only IC deposits, and most strains are resistant. However, mercury activates the murine immune system and causes lymphoproliferation in most strains: H–2s strains are high–responders also in this respect, while the relation between lymphoproliferation and autoimmune manifestations is unclear for other strains. We examined the B cell response to mercury in order to better understand the relation between lymphoproliferation and systemic autoimmunity, using the high–responder H–2s strains (A.SW and SJL), the intermediate responder strain BALB/C (H–2d), and the A.TL (H–2tl) and DBA/2 (H–2d) strains which are resistant to systemic autoimmunity. Methods: During 4–7 weeks of subcutaneous mercuric chloride injections, the number of B cells and the expression of cell surface activation and proliferation markers was monitored by flow cytometry. The number of cytoplasmic Ig+ splenocytes was determined by direct immunofluorescence technique on slides, and serum Ig isotype levels as well anti–ssDNA and anti–DNP antibodies were determined by ELISA. Serum ANA were monitored weekly by indirect immunofluorescence technique. Results: Mercury–treated A.SW and SJL mice (H–2s) developed an increased expression of the proliferation marker CD71 on B cells, an increased number of B cells in the spleen, and an early, strong, but transient increase in serum Ig concentrations of Th1– as well as Th2–regulated Ig isotypes. Mercury–treated H–2s mice rapidly developed a polyclonal B cell response including the IgM isotype, but also antinucleolar antibodies (ANoA) of the IgG isotype with a clumpy pattern, characteristic for antifibrillarin antibodies. The IgG ANoA response was of a long duration and high titer. The A.TL strain (H–2tl) showed only a slight, restricted B cell activation. The BALB/C strain developed a slight, transient B cell activation dominated by IgG1 and IgE, and antinuclear antibodies (ANA). The DBA/2 strain showed only a minimal B cell response without ANA. Conclusion: Mercury induces an early, transient, polyclonal B cell activation linked to the H–2A or H–2K locus in H–2s strains on the A background. This polyclonal response differs from the long–lasting, high–titered IgG autoantibody response to a nucleolar antigen with characteristics of fibrillarin in H–2s strains, which indicates that these responses arise from separate mechanisms. Another group of strains, exemplified by BALB/C (H–2d), responds to mercury with a slight, transient, Th2–dominated B cell response, a restricted antibody specificity targeting the cell nucleus, and systemic IC deposits. Another H–2d strain, DBA, is essentially resistant to mercury, illustrating the importance of non–H–2 genes for regulating the response to mercury.
Epithelial Deletion of Sulf2 Exacerbates Bleomycin‐Induced Lung Injury, Inflammation, and Mortality

Abstract Epithelial injury has been proposed to be the initiating factor in the pathogenesis of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). We have shown previously that heparan sulfate 6‐O‐endosulfatase (Sulf) 2 is overexpressed in the hyperplastic type II alveolar epithelial cells (AECs) in the IPF lungs. By removing 6‐O‐sulfates from specific heparan sulfate intrachain sites, Sulf2 modulates the functions of many growth factors and cytokines. In this study, we hypothesized that Sulf2 plays a regulatory role in alveolar epithelial injury and repair, using the murine bleomycin model. Consistent with our findings in human IPF lungs, bleomycin treatment in mice resulted in up‐regulation of Sulf2 mRNA in whole‐lung extracts and overexpression of Sulf2 protein in type II AECs on lung tissue sections. Sulf2 protein was detectable in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid at baseline, and its level was significantly increased after bleomycin exposure. To study the role of Sulf2 in alveolar injury and repair in vivo, we generated a doxycycline‐inducible epithelial‐specific Sulf2 conditional knockout (Sulf2 CKO) mouse line. After bleomycin exposure, Sulf2 CKO mice exhibited enhanced neutrophil infiltration in the lung, with elevated levels of total protein, lactate dehydrogenase, and cytokines (granulocyte colony‐stimulating factor and interferon‐&ggr;‐inducible protein 10) in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid compared with wild‐type littermates. We further showed that both the p53‐p21 DNA damage response and the transforming growth factor‐&bgr;1 signaling pathway were up‐regulated in Sulf2 CKO mice compared with wild‐type. Finally, Sulf2 CKO mice suffered increased mortality after bleomycin exposure. In conclusion, Sulf2 expression in type II AECs plays a protective role in epithelial injury, inflammation and mortality.
Implementasi dan Analisis Kompresi Hybrid pada Citra Medis Digital Hasil Rontgen Kanker Payudara

Kompresi citra digital merupakan upaya untuk melakukan transformasi terhadap data atau simbol penyusunan citra digital menjadi data atau simbol lain tanpa menimbulkan perubahan yang signifikan atas citra digital tersebut bagi mata manusia yang mengamatinya. Tujuannya adalah untuk mengurangi redudansi dari data-data yang terdapat dalam citra sehingga dapat disimpan atau ditransmisikan secaran efisien. Kanker Payudara merupakan kasus kanker terbanyak di Indonesia, dimana penatalaksanaannya membutuhkan banyak sekali data digital hasil rontgen. Penelitian ini dimaksudkan untuk mengompres data digital hasil rontgen kanker payudara dengan ukuran yang lebih efisien tanpa mengubah atau mengurangi informasi serta masih dapat dinilai oleh pandangan manusia (ekspertis). Penelitian ini menggunakan teknik hybrid, yaitu Metode 2D DCT (Two Dimensional Discret Cosine Transform) dan Huffman. Tenaga Medis memberikan nilai 3 dari 4 ketika hasil kompresi mencapai rasio kompresi 34,36% dengan PSNR terbaik sebesar 40dB. Hasil pengujian ini menggunakan kedalaman nilai nol sebesar 0 hingga 3 pada proses kuantsasi 2D DCT
Prevalence of synchronous bilateral tonsil squamous cell carcinoma: A retrospective study

The prevalence of synchronous bilateral tonsil cancer remains unexplored. To date, only 38 cases have been described in the literature. With an aim to substantiate the Danish recommendation of performing bilateral tonsillectomy in patients with suspected or proven tonsil cancer and in patients with cervical carcinoma metastasis from an unknown primary tumour, this study was undertaken to determine the prevalence of synchronous bilateral tonsil cancer.
LSTM-Based Hierarchical Denoising Network for Android Malware Detection

Mobile security is an important issue on Android platform. Most malware detection methods based on machine learning models heavily rely on expert knowledge for manual feature engineering, which are still difficult to fully describe malwares. In this paper, we present LSTM-based hierarchical denoise network (HDN), a novel static Android malware detection method which uses LSTM to directly learn from the raw opcode sequences extracted from decompiled Android files. However, most opcode sequences are too long for LSTM to train due to the gradient vanishing problem. Hence, HDN uses a hierarchical structure, whose first-level LSTM parallelly computes on opcode subsequences (we called them method blocks) to learn the dense representations; then the second-level LSTM can learn and detect malware through method block sequences. Considering that malicious behavior only appears in partial sequence segments, HDN uses method block denoise module (MBDM) for data denoising by adaptive gradient scaling strategy based on loss cache. We evaluate and compare HDN with the latest mainstream researches on three datasets. The results show that HDN outperforms these Android malware detection methods,and it is able to capture longer sequence features and has better detection efficiency than -gram-based malware detection which is similar to our method.
Morphologic predictors of pathological complete response to neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy in locally advanced rectal cancer

Purpose To evaluate the value of morphological parameters that can be obtained conveniently by MRI for predicting pathologically complete response (pCR) in patients with rectal cancer. Materials and Methods A cohort of 101 patients was examined using MRI before and after Neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (nCRT). Morphological parameters including maximum tumor area (MTA), maximum tumor length (MTL) and maximum tumor thickness (MTT), as well as cylindrical approximated tumor volume (CATV), distance to anal verge (DTA), and the reduction rates were evaluated by two experienced readers independently. Results Post-nCRT MTA and MTL, reduction rates and pre-nCRT DTA were proved to be significantly different between pCR and non-pCR with the AUCs of 0.672-0.853. The sensitivity and specificity for assessing pCR were 61.1-89.9% and 59.0-80.7% respectively. No significant correlation between pre-nCRT size measurements and pCR was obtained. Conclusion The convenient morphological measurements may be useful for predicting pCR with moderate sensitivity and specificity. Combining these predictors with the aim of building diagnostic model should be explored.
Performance of Laboratory Professionals Working on Malaria Microscopy in Tigray, North Ethiopia

Background Microscopic analysis of stained blood smear is the most suitable method of malaria diagnosis. However, gaps were observed among clinical laboratory professionals in microscopic diagnosis of malaria. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted in December 2015 among 46 laboratory professionals. Data was collected via on-site assessment and panel testing. The slide panel testing was composed of positive and negative slides. The kappa score was used to estimate the agreement between participants and reference reader. Results The overall agreement between the study participants and the reference reader in malaria detection was 79% (kappa = 0.62). Participating in refresher training on malaria microscopy (Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR = 7, CI = 1.5–36.3)) and malaria epidemic investigation (AOR = 4.1 CI = 1.1–14.5) had statistical significant association with detection rate of malaria parasites. Conclusion Laboratory professionals showed low performance in malaria microscopy. Most of the study participants were graded “in-training” in laboratory diagnosis of malaria.
Androgyny : Another Look ANNELIES KNOPPERS

The reconceptualization of sex role classification to include psychological androgyny is presented. An explanation of this concept is followed by a summary of related research and a critique of instruments which purport to assess sex role orientation. The implications of the results of sex role research for athletics as well as future directions in such research are discussed. The discussion centers on the difficulties encountered in the implementation of the theoretical construct of androgyny to the athletic setting.
The Inhibitory Role of α2,6-Sialylation in Adipogenesis*

Adipose tissue plays critical roles in obesity and related diseases such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Previous reports suggest that glycans, the most common posttranslational modifications, are involved in obesity-related diseases, but what type of glycan regulates adipogenesis during obesity remains unclear. In this study, we first quantified the mRNA levels of 167 genes (encoding 144 glycosyltransferases and 23 related enzymes) in visceral adipose tissues (VATs) from control mice and high-fat diet (HFD)-induced obese mice. We found that a gene encoding β-galactoside α2,6-sialyltransferase-1 (St6gal1), a key enzyme responsible for the biosynthesis of α2,6-linked sialic acid in N-linked glycans, was most down-regulated in VATs from obese mice. We confirmed the reduction in α2,6-sialic acid in VATs from obese mice and differentiated adipocyte model 3T3-L1 cells. Using proteomic analysis, integrin-β1 was identified as one of the target α2,6-sialylated proteins in adipose tissues, and phosphorylation of its downstream molecule focal adhesion kinase was found to be decreased after HFD feeding. St6gal1 overexpression in differentiating 3T3-L1 cells inhibited adipogenesis with increased phosphorylation of focal adhesion kinase. Furthermore, St6gal1 knockout mice exhibited increased bodyweight and VAT weight after HFD feeding. The down-regulation of St6gal1 during adipogenesis was canceled by treatment with a DNA methyltransferase inhibitor, suggesting an involvement of epigenetic DNA methylation in St6gal1 silencing. Our findings suggest that ST6GAL1 has an inhibitory role in adipogenesis through integrin-β1 activation, providing new insights into the roles and regulation mechanisms of glycans in adipocytes during obesity.
The Uremic Toxin Indoxyl-3-Sulfate Induces CYP1A2 In Primary Human Hepatocytes.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) generally impacts clearance of renally eliminated drugs but growing evidence shows that it can influence clearance of hepatically eliminated drugs and a complete mechanistic understanding of this phenomenon is still lacking. CKD leads to accumulation of uremic toxins, including indoxyl- 3-sulfate (3-INDS) and indole-3-acetic acid (3-IAA). OBJECTIVE In this study, we evaluated the potential of 3-INDS and 3-IAA (10, 30 and 100 μM) to induce liver cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes CYP1A2, 2B6 and 3A4/5 using cultured primary human hepatocytes following once daily treatment for 3 days. RESULTS 3-INDS potently induced CYP1A2 mRNA and enzyme activity in a dose-dependent manner but did not induce CYP2B6 or 3A4. At 100 μM, a concentration observed in humans under uremic conditions, 3-INDS increased CYP1A2 mRNA and activity by 93% and 292% respectively when compared with prototypical inducer omeprazole. However, 3-IAA did not induce CYP1A2, 2B6 or 3A4. CONCLUSION These results suggest that the uremic toxin, 3-INDS, is a potent CYP1A2 inducer and lends valuable mechanistic basis for how kidney disease can affect hepatic metabolism.
Understanding the pro-cyclicality of capital flows Rudrani Bhattacharya

Emerging economies are characterised by frictions in domestic financial system, costly foreign borrowing and permanent income shocks. These generate pro cyclical capital flows. In a model for India, an emerging economy, we find that, at an intermediate stage of financial development and partly open capital account, an increase in financial integration and financial development lowers the pro cyclicality of capital flows. At the same, with an increase in financial integration and financial development, we find that output volatility declines. However the absolute and relative volatility of consumption may go up beyond a threshold level of financial openness and financial development. JEL Classification: E10, E32
Assessment of Interleukin-17A, Interleukin-10 and Transforming Growth Factor-Beta1 Serum Titers in Relapsing Remitting Multiple Sclerosis Patients Treated with Avonex, Possible Biomarkers for Treatment Response.

INTRODUCTION Individual response to interferon beta (IFN-β) 1a treatment is heterogeneous in multiple sclerosis (MS). Our objective was to find a connection between serum levels of interleukin (IL)-10, IL-17 and transforming growth factor beta (TGF-β)1 in MS patients treated with IFN-β in order to identify the nonresponders (NR). MATERIAL AND METHODS We included in the study 32 healthy subjects and 32 MS patients: 10 naive, 10 early treated and 12 late treated with INF-β1a. Serum determination of cytokines and brain MRI were performed at the beginning of the study, after 6 and 12 months. Rio score was calculated at the end of the study. RESULTS MS patients had initially a significant higher level of IL-17 and a lower level of TGF-β1 compared to healthy subjects. IL-17 level in early treated patients was significantly lower compared to the naive and late treated groups. INF-β1a treatment significantly increased IL-10 and decreased IL-17 levels. Initial low levels of IL-10 were associated with an increase in physical disability. IL-17 levels positively correlated with the number of relapses and MRI activity. Nine patients were NR to Avonex. Patients with a Rio score of 3 had higher initial levels of IL-17 and those with a Rio score of 0 had higher initial levels of IL-10 and TGF-β1. CONCLUSION IFN-β1a decreased IL-17 and increased IL-10 seric levels; IL-17 significantly correlated with MS activity; TGF-β1 activity is titer-dependent, increased levels were associated with IL-17 inhibition; NR patients to IFN-β1a will have initial high IL-17 and low IL-10 and TGF-β seric levels.
Preoperative Clinical and Sonographic Predictors for Lateral Cervical Lymph Node Metastases in Sporadic Medullary Thyroid Carcinoma.

BACKGROUND Total thyroidectomy and cervical lymph node (LN) dissection is generally recommended in patients with medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC). However, there is no clear evidence for whom to perform prophylactic lateral neck dissection in MTC patients without evident lateral cervical lymph node (LCLN) metastasis in preoperative images. This study evaluated the preoperative features for predicting the LCLN metastasis of MTC. METHODS The study included 26 MTC patients with LCLN metastasis at initial surgery (N1b group) and 47 MTC patients without any LN metastasis or recurrence of disease (N0-NED group). The association between LCLN metastasis and preoperative clinical and sonographic characteristics (size, location, solid component, shape, margin, echogenicity, calcification, and subcapsular location of the tumor) were evaluated. RESULTS There were no significant differences in age and sex between the N1b and N0-NED groups. Preoperative serum levels of calcitonin >65 pg/mL were associated with LCLN metastasis (p < 0.001). In preoperative neck ultrasonography (US), patients in the N1b group were more commonly found with a larger tumor (>1.5 cm) of irregular shape with a spiculated margin and a subcapsular location than those in the N0-NED group (p = 0.029, p < 0.001, p < 0.001, and p < 0.001, respectively). Increases in the number of these LCLN metastasis-related features were significantly associated with higher risk for LCLN metastasis (p < 0.001). The presence of two or more predictors was an appropriate cutoff point for predicting LCLN metastasis of MTC with 73.1% sensitivity and 91.5% specificity. CONCLUSIONS MTC tumors with high preoperative calcitonin levels (>65 pg/mL), larger size (>1.5 cm), irregular shape, spiculated margins, and subcapsular locations in the neck US are at higher risk for LCLN metastasis. MTC patents with fewer than two predictors might be suitable for treatment without prophylactic LCLN dissection.
The Effects of Post-Loading Rest on Acoustic Parameters with Special Reference to Gender and Ergonomic Factors

It is a common experience that vocal quality changes during a break in vocal loading. The purpose of the present study was (1) to analyse the effects of a short post-loading vocal rest in terms of changes in a large variety of voice parameters and (2) to assess the possible effects of gender and exposure factors on these changes. The voices of a randomly chosen group of 40 female and 40 male young students were loaded by having them read aloud a novel. Two sets of voice samples were recorded: a post-loading sample after three times 45-min vocal loading during the morning and a post-resting sample after a 45-min lunch break. The material recorded consisted of /pa:ppa/ words produced normally, as softly and as loudly as possible in this order. The long /a/ vowel of the test word was inverse-filtered to obtain the glottal flow waveform. Time-domain parameters of the glottal flow [open quotient, closing quotient (ClQ), speed quotient (SQ), fundamental frequency (F₀)], amplitude-domain parameters of the glottal flow [glottal flow, minimum of the first derivative of glottal flow, amplitude quotient (AQ)], intraoral pressure and sound pressure level (SPL) values of the phonations were analysed. Voice range profiles and the singer’s formant (g/G, a/A, c∣/c, e∣/e, g∣/g for females/males) of the loud phonations were also measured. The subjects were divided into eight exposure groups (5 females and 5 males per cell) according to different combinations of the following exposure factors: (1) low (25 ± 5%) or high (65 ± 5%) relative humidity of ambient air, (2) low [<65 dB(A)] or high [>65 dB(A)] speech output level during vocal loading and (3) sitting or standing posture during vocal loading. Statistically significant differences between the post-loading and post-resting samples could be observed in many parameters (the values of intraoral pressure in the soft phonations decreased, the values of SPL and SQ in the normal phonations decreased and the values of AQ, F₀ and ClQ in the normal phonations increased). Most of the differences reflected a shift towards softer phonation. Gender and exposure factors also had significant effects.
Cochrane systematic review and meta‐analysis of the impact of psychological treatments for people with epilepsy on health‐related quality of life

Given the significant impact epilepsy can have on health‐related quality of life (HRQoL) of individuals with this condition and their families, there is great clinical interest in evidence‐based psychological treatments aimed at enhancing well‐being in people with epilepsy (PWE). An evaluation of the current evidence is needed to assess the effects of psychological treatments for PWE on HRQoL outcomes to inform future therapeutic recommendations and research designs.