Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Ambient Temperature and the Pituitary Hormone Responses to Exercise in Humans

Pituitary hormones have an important role during exercise yet relatively little is known about the stimulus for their release. Body temperature progressively increases during prolonged steady‐state exercise in the heat and we have investigated the role that this may play in the release of prolactin, growth hormone and cortisol (as an indicator of adrenocorticotropic hormone) into the circulation. Fit young male subjects exercised at 73 %O2,max until volitional fatigue at 20 °C and at 35 °C (30 % relative humidity at both temperatures). Rectal temperature and mean skin temperature were monitored and blood samples analysed for lactate, glucose, cortisol, growth hormone and prolactin concentrations. During the first 20 min, core temperature rose continuously and to a similar extent at both temperatures, while mean skin temperature was approximately 4 °C lower during exercise in the cool. Blood glucose concentration was essentially constant throughout the period of exercise while lactate concentration increased in the first 10 min and then remained constant with very similar changes in the two exercise conditions. Prolactin and growth hormone concentrations both increased during the exercise period while the concentration of cortisol declined slightly before rising slightly over the 40 min period. Prolactin release was significantly greater when exercise was carried out in the heat while there was no difference in the release of growth hormone or cortisol in the two conditions. When plotted as a function of rectal temperature, growth hormone concentration showed a linear relationship which was the same at ambient temperatures of 35 °C and 20 °C. Prolactin concentration had a curvilinear relationship with rectal temperature and this differed markedly at the two ambient temperatures. Cortisol concentration showed no dependence on any measure of body temperature. Our results are consistent with some aspect of body temperature being a stimulus for growth hormone and prolactin secretion; however, the precise mechanism clearly differs between the two hormones and we suggest that skin temperature modulates prolactin release, but does not affect the release of growth hormone.
Modulation of intestinal and liver fatty acid‐binding proteins in Caco‐2 cells by lipids, hormones and cytokines

Intestinal and liver fatty acid binding proteins (I‐ and L‐FABP) are thought to play a role in enterocyte fatty acid (FA) trafficking. Their modulation by cell differentiation and various potential effectors was investigated in the human Caco‐2 cell line. With the acquisition of enterocytic features, Caco‐2 cells seeded on plastic progressively increased L‐FABP quantities, whereas I‐FABP was not detectable even very late in the maturation process. On permeable filters that improved differentiation markers (sucrase, alkaline phosphatase, transepithelial resistance), Caco‐2 cells furthered their L‐FABP content and expressed I‐FABP. Western blot analysis showed a significant increase in I‐ and L‐FABP expression following an 8‐hour incubation period with butyric acid, oleic acid, and phosphatidylcholine. However, in all cases, I‐FABP levels were higher than L‐FABP concentrations regardless of the lipid substrates added. Similarly, hydrocortisone and insulin enhanced the cellular content of I‐ and L‐FABP whereas leptin triggered I‐FABP expression only after an 8‐hour incubation. Finally, tumor necrosis factor‐α was more effective in increasing the cytosolic amount of I‐FABP levels. In conclusion, our data demonstrate that I‐FABP expression is limited to fully differentiated Caco‐2 cells and can be more easily regulated than L‐FABP by lipids, hormones, and cytokines. J. Cell. Biochem. 81: 613–620, 2001. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
What Behaviors Do Young Heterosexual Australians See in Pornography? A Cross-Sectional Study

This study investigated how frequently a group of young heterosexual Australians (ages 15 to 29) saw a range of behaviors represented in pornography over the previous 12 months. Participants were recruited to an anonymous online survey. Those who reported having viewed pornography in the past 12 months (n = 517) indicated how frequently they saw each of a list of 17 behaviors when they watched pornography in the past 12 months. Men’s pleasure (83%) was seen frequently by the highest proportion of young people surveyed, followed by a man being portrayed as dominant (70%). Women were more likely to report frequently seeing violence toward a woman (p < 0.01). Men were more likely to report frequently seeing heterosexual anal sex (p < 0.01), ejaculation onto a woman’s face (p < 0.01), women portrayed as dominant (p < 0.01), a man being called names or slurs (p < 0.01), and violence toward a man that appears consensual (p < 0.01). Younger age was significantly associated with frequently seeing women’s pleasure (p < 0.05), violence toward women which appeared consensual, and all types of violence (p < 0.01). Older age was associated with frequently seeing men’s pleasure (p < 0.01) and heterosexual anal sex (p < 0.05). Our findings draw attention to the gendered ways that behaviors in pornography are seen and identified by young heterosexual audiences.
Myeloma stem cell concepts, heterogeneity and plasticity of multiple myeloma

Multiple myeloma (MM) is a haematological malignancy characterized by the accumulation of clonal plasma cells (PCs) in the bone marrow (BM). Although novel therapeutic strategies have prolonged survival of patients, the disease remains difficult to treat with a high risk of relapse. The failure of therapy is thought to be associated with a persistent population of the so‐called MM stem cells or myeloma initiating cells (MIC) that exhibit tumour‐initiating potential, self‐renewal and resistance to chemotherapy. However, the population responsible for the origin and sustainability of tumour mass has not been clearly characterized so far. This review summarizes current myeloma stem cell concepts and suggests that high phenotypic and intra‐clonal heterogeneity, together with plasticity potential of MM might be other contributing factors explaining discrepancies among particular concepts and contributing to the treatment failure.
A Model of the Indirect Effect of Crime on the Demand for Money

(Un Modelo del Efecto Indirecto del Crimen en la Demanda de Dinero) Este documento estudia la relacion indirecta entre la demanda de dinero y el crimen, la cual emerge de la defensa de empresas en contra de clientes criminales. Se construye un modelo de teoria de busqueda en el cual empresas comercian con clientes criminales que consumen sin pagar, permitiendose la contratacion de seguridad privada. El modelo produce dos equilibrios en estrategias puras. Primero, si el costo de seguridad es alto, las empresas no contratan seguridad privada y los compradores criminales no portan dinero. Segundo, si el costo de seguridad es bajo, el estado de alta demanda de dinero se reestablece. Este constructo se formaliza en un modelo teorico puro, que genera proposiciones comprobables empiricamente, estableciendo una futura linea de investigacion. Es importante notar que el efecto indirecto descrito no se ha discutido en la literatura relevante. Como resultado, se demuestra la existencia de un canal indirecto entre crimen y dinero, que surge de una externalidad de mercado: la demanda de las empresas por seguridad privada determina endogenamente la demanda de dinero de la economia.
Reinforcement of cell junctions correlates with the absence of hair cell regeneration in mammals and its occurrence in birds

Debilitating hearing and balance deficits often arise through damage to the inner ear's hair cells. For humans and other mammals, such deficits are permanent, but nonmammalian vertebrates can quickly recover hearing and balance through their innate capacity to regenerate hair cells. The biological basis for this difference has remained unknown, but recent investigations in wounded balance epithelia have shown that proliferation follows cellular spreading at sites of injury. As mammalian ears mature during the first weeks after birth, the capacity for spreading and proliferation declines sharply. In seeking the basis for those declines, we investigated the circumferential bands of F‐actin that bracket the apical junctions between supporting cells in the gravity‐sensitive utricle. We found that those bands grow much thicker as mice and humans mature postnatally, whereas their counterparts in chickens remain thin from hatching through adulthood. When we cultured utricular epithelia from chickens, we found that cellular spreading and proliferation both continued at high levels, even in the epithelia from adults. In contrast, the substantial reinforcement of the circumferential F‐actin bands in mammals coincides with the steep declines in cell spreading and production established in earlier experiments. We propose that the presence of thin F‐actin bands at the junctions between avian supporting cells may contribute to the lifelong persistence of their capacity for shape change, cell proliferation, and hair cell replacement and that the postnatal reinforcement of the F‐actin bands in maturing humans and other mammals may have an important role in limiting hair cell regeneration. J. Comp. Neurol. 511:396–414, 2008. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Vision-guided motion primitives for humanoid reactive walking: Decoupled versus coupled approaches

This paper proposes a novel visual servoing approach to control the dynamic walk of a humanoid robot. Online visual information is given by an on-board camera. It is used to drive the robot towards a specific goal. Our work is built upon a recent reactive pattern generator that make use of model predictive control (MPC) to modify footsteps, center of mass and center of pressure trajectories to track a reference velocity. The contribution of the paper is to formulate the MPC problem considering visual feedback. We compare our approach with a scheme decoupling visual servoing and walking gait generation. Such a decoupled scheme consists of, first, computing a reference velocity from visual servoing; then, the reference velocity is the input of the pattern generator. Our MPC-based approach allows to avoid a number of limitations that appears in decoupled methods. In particular, visual constraints can be introduced directly inside the locomotion controller, while camera motions do not have to be accounted for separately. Both approaches are compared numerically and validated in simulation. Our MPC method shows a faster convergence.
Transmembrane Protein 184A Is a Receptor Required for Vascular Smooth Muscle Cell Responses to Heparin*

Vascular cell responses to exogenous heparin have been documented to include decreased vascular smooth muscle cell proliferation following decreased ERK pathway signaling. However, the molecular mechanism(s) by which heparin interacts with cells to induce those responses has remained unclear. Previously characterized monoclonal antibodies that block heparin binding to vascular cells have been found to mimic heparin effects. In this study, those antibodies were employed to isolate a heparin binding protein. MALDI mass spectrometry data provide evidence that the protein isolated is transmembrane protein 184A (TMEM184A). Commercial antibodies against three separate regions of the TMEM184A human protein were used to identify the TMEM184A protein in vascular smooth muscle cells and endothelial cells. A GFP-TMEM184A construct was employed to determine colocalization with heparin after endocytosis. Knockdown of TMEM184A eliminated the physiological responses to heparin, including effects on ERK pathway activity and BrdU incorporation. Isolated GFP-TMEM184A binds heparin, and overexpression results in additional heparin uptake. Together, these data support the identification of TMEM184A as a heparin receptor in vascular cells.
Standing up with denervated muscles in humans using functional electrical stimulation.

The use of electrical stimulation for denervated muscles is still considered to be a controversial issue by many rehabilitation facilities and medical professionals because prior clinical experience has shown that treating denervated muscle tissue using exponential current over a long time period constitutes an impossible task. Despite this fact, we managed to evoke tetanic contractions in denervated muscle using a long duration stimulation with anatomically shaped electrodes and sufficiently high amplitudes. The pulse amplitudes, which were being used for this purpose, exceeded by far the MED-GV and EC regulations (300 mJ/impulse). For this reason, an application has recently been submitted to have the EC regulations changed accordingly. It takes a tetanic contraction to achieve the desired muscle fiber tension, constituting a hypertrophic stimulus. It is also an appropriate means of exercise, which is capable of creating the metabolic and structural conditions needed (e.g, increased mitochondrial volume and capillary density) to obtain satisfactory muscle performance. With patients suffering from a complete spinal cord injury at level D12/L1, having motor and sensory loss in both lower extremities, we were able to train denervated muscle using long-duration stimulation, evoking single muscle contractions at first, soon followed by tetanic contractions against gravity. To increase the efficacy of this functional electrical stimulation (FES) strengthening program, we used ankle weights. With daily FES training over a period of 1-2 years, denervated muscle was exercised until it produced torques between 16 and 38 Nm in the m. quadriceps. With that muscle force, it is possible to stand up from a sitting position in parallel bars. Our results show that denervated muscle in humans is indeed trainable and can perform functional activities with FES. Furthermore, this method of stimulation can assist in decubitus prevention and significantly improve the mobility of paraplegics.
Low birth weight, family history of diabetes, and glucose intolerance in Swedish middle-aged men.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the association between low birth weight and glucose intolerance in relation to family history of diabetes. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS We conducted a population-based cross-sectional study of 2,237 men born in 1938-1957 in four municipalities in the outskirts of Stockholm, 50% of whom had a family history of diabetes (at least one first-degree or two second-degree relatives with diabetes). Oral glucose tolerance testing detected 35 cases of type 2 diabetes, 102 cases of impaired glucose tolerance, and 57 cases of impaired fasting glucose. RESULTS In subjects without a family history of diabetes, low (< or = 3,000 g) birth weight was associated with an odds ratio of 2.3 (95% confidence intervals = 0.4-14.4) for diabetes, 1.8 (0.7-4.3) for impaired glucose tolerance, and 3.3 (1.0-10.4) for impaired fasting glucose. In subjects with a family history of diabetes, the corresponding figures were approximately similar, except for diabetes, for which the odds ratio was 5.4 (2.0-14.9). For men with low birth weight in combination with a family history of diabetes, the odds ratio was 10.9 (2.9-41.2) for diabetes, 2.4 (1.1-5.6) for impaired glucose tolerance, and 5.9 (2.1-16.3) for impaired fasting glucose. CONCLUSIONS This study indicated that low birth weight is associated with type 2 diabetes, impaired glucose tolerance, and impaired fasting glucose in men. This finding was most pronounced in subjects with diabetes in the family, but it was also indicated in those without a family history of diabetes. Men with the combination of low birth weight and family history of diabetes seem to be at particularly high risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
New Double-Layer-per-Phase Isolated Switched Reluctance Motor: Concept, Numerical Analysis, and Experimental Confirmation

This paper presents a new configuration for switched reluctance motor (SRM) which can be proposed as a suitable candidate for high-torque and low-flux-leakage SRMs. Unlike the conventional SRMs, this configuration has no direct windings wrapped on the stator poles. This motor consists of three different sets, and each set has one concentric independent winding, two layers of the stator poles, and three layers of the rotor poles in which the middle rotor layer acts as a core for phase winding. To evaluate the motor performance, two types of analysis, namely, numerical technique and experimental study, have been utilized. In the numerical analysis, the 3-D finite-element method is employed, whereas in the experimental study, a prototype motor has been fabricated and tested in the laboratory. Finally, experimental results are compared to conventional SRM to verify the advantages of the proposed motor and show its applicability.
SOX2 expression and amplification in gliomas and glioma cell lines.

BACKGROUND The transcription factor SOX2 controls gene expression during development and has roles in both neurogenesis and gliogenesis. MATERIALS AND METHODS The current study utilized immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence, molecular genetics (gene copy number analysis) and Western blotting to examine SOX2 expression in surgical samples from 133 brain gliomas of different grades of malignancy, and in cell lines from 16 glioblastomas. RESULTS Our results reveal a positive correlation between SOX2 expression and malignancy grade in gliomas and identify the hypercellular and hyperproliferative areas of glioblastomas as the areas with the highest SOX2 expression. SOX2 gene amplification was found in neurospheres and 14.4% and 11.1% of glioblastomas and anaplastic oligodendrogliomas, respectively. In contrast, SOX2 expression was not observed in neuronal tumors and varied in medulloblastomas depending upon their neuronal differentiation status. CONCLUSION It is concluded that SOX2 is a marker for undifferentiated and proliferating cells and that its expression is up-regulated in the most anaplastic areas of glioblastomas and oligodendrogliomas. The hypothesis is that antigenic and genetic analogy exist between these areas and neurospheres and that glioblastoma stem cells may actually be dedifferentiated tumor cells that re-acquire a stem cell-like status.
IMPACT OF FDI ON POVERTY REDUCTION IN AFRICA: ARE THERE REGIONAL DIFFERENCES?*

The current financial and economic crisis has reanimated the debate on the importance of foreign direct investments (FDI) for economic growth and poverty reduction in developing countries, especially in Africa. Many financial economists agree on the fact that the current financial crisis may have stronger negative effects on economic growth in Africa because of the potential reduction in foreign capital flows. Although, the literature bonds on papers that study the causal link and relationship between FDI and economic growth, the key basic assumption common in these papers is that economic growth is a good proxy for welfare. Moreover, fewer of these papers have been devoted to Africa and its regional disparities on attracting foreign investments. This paper intends to re-examine the relationship between FDI flows and poverty reduction in Africa across regions. We use as key FDI and welfare variables, respectively, the FDI net inflows per capita and the UNDP human development index (HDI). Our analyses confirm the positive significant relationship between FDI net inflows and poverty reduction in Africa. Nevertheless, this relationship is significantly different between African regions and between Africa and other parts of the World. For instance, while the relationship remains positive and significant for economic communities in Central and East Africa, it is non significant in North and South Africa and ambiguous in West Africa. Our results are robust to many model specifications. JEL classification code:
The Joint Hedging and Leverage Decision

This study’s modeling analysis indicates that optimal hedging and optimal leverage decisions are patently different if undertaken jointly than when undertaken in isolation. The most striking result is that the optimal joint hedging and leverage strategy entails reduced hedging for a weak price outcome for production output. This risk-seeking behavior does not have a classic asset substitution impetus because, by set-up, the debt-holders are fairly compensated for the increased risk. Given a weak output price outcome, it is the presence of unhedgeable risk that makes the operational benefit of a subsequent output price rise vulnerable to the financial risk posed by leverage and the fact that the hedge portfolio would lose value; that is, an output price rebound actually entails adversely high risk of bankruptcy and consequential foregone profitable production. To counter this, some reduction of the overall hedge position increases the likelihood of avoiding bankruptcy in the event of an output price rebound.
Critical Role of Cyclophilin A and Its Prolyl-Peptidyl Isomerase Activity in the Structure and Function of the Hepatitis C Virus Replication Complex

ABSTRACT Replication of hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA occurs on intracellular membranes, and the replication complex (RC) contains viral RNA, nonstructural proteins, and cellular cofactors. We previously demonstrated that cyclophilin A (CyPA) is an essential cofactor for HCV infection and the intracellular target of cyclosporine's anti-HCV effect. Here we investigate the mechanism by which CyPA facilitates HCV replication. Cyclosporine treatment specifically blocked the incorporation of NS5B into the RC without affecting either the total protein level or the membrane association of the protein. Other nonstructural proteins or viral RNAs in the RC were not affected. NS5B from the cyclosporine-resistant replicon was resistant to this disruption of RC incorporation. We also isolated membrane fractions from both naïve and HCV-positive cells and found that CyPA is recruited into membrane fractions in HCV-replicating cells via an interaction with RC-associated NS5B, which is sensitive to cyclosporine treatment. Finally, we introduced point mutations in the prolyl-peptidyl isomerase (PPIase) motif of CyPA and demonstrated a critical role of this motif in HCV replication in cDNA rescue experiments. We propose a model in which the incorporation of the HCV polymerase into the RC depends on its interaction with a cellular chaperone protein and in which cyclosporine inhibits HCV replication by blocking this critical interaction and the PPIase activity of CyPA. Our results provide a mechanism of action for the cyclosporine-mediated inhibition of HCV and identify a critical role of CyPA's PPIase activity in the proper assembly and function of the HCV RC.