Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
[Validation of the Spanish versions of the Montgomery-Asberg depression and Hamilton anxiety rating scales].

BACKGROUND Affective and anxiety disorders (AfD & AnD) are the most common psychiatric diseases in the general population. This study's aim was to assess for the first time the psychometric properties of the Spanish translated versions of the Montgomery-Asberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS) and the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HARS), which are widely used both in medical care and clinical research. PATIENTS AND METHOD A cohort, observational, prospective and multicentre study was conducted in clinically stable or unstable patients with AfD and AnD. The scales were administered at baseline and in a second study visit one week or 2 months later (to stable or unstable patients, respectively). The internal consistency, temporary stability, inter-raters reliability, factorial structure, convergent and discriminant validity, and sensitivity to change were all assessed for both scales. RESULTS One hundred and eight AfD patients and 106 AnD patients were recruited in 10 psychiatry care centres from a wide geographical distribution. Both scales showed adequate properties in terms of: a) discriminant validity (MADRS/HARS-Clinical Global Impression: p < 0.001); b) convergent validity (MADRS-Hamilton Depression Rating Scale: p < 0.05 and 0.01; MADRS/HARS-EuroQoL 5D: p < 0.05; HARS-State Trait Anxiety Inventory: p < 0.05); c) internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha: MADRS = 0.88; HARS = 0.89); d) test-retest and inter-raters reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient: MADRS = 0.94 and 0.98, respectively; HARS = 0.92 and 0.92), and, e) sensitivity to change (effect size: MADRS = 2.05; HARS = 1.36). CONCLUSIONS Spanish versions of MADRS and HARS scales showed good psychometric properties, similar to those of the original scales. Therefore, these scales are suitable for use in clinical practice and research in Spain.
Effects of inactivation of the lateral pulvinar on response properties of second visual area cells in Cebus monkeys

1. In the present study, we investigated the influence of the pulvinar nucleus upon response properties of single cells in the second visual area (V2) of Cebus monkeys. The method used consisted of the inactivation of a portion of the lateral pulvinar by GABA injections while studying the response properties of cells in V2 at the same visuotopic location as that of the inactivation.
Role of Metazoan Mediator Proteins in Interferon-Responsive Transcription

ABSTRACT The interferon (IFN)-induced signal transduction and transcription activation complex, ISGF3, is assembled from three proteins, STAT1, STAT2, and IRF9. Of these components, STAT2 provides a fundamental and essential transcriptional activation function for ISGF3. In the present study, we show that ISGF3-mediated transcription is dependent on STAT2 interactions with DRIP150, a subunit of the multimeric Mediator coactivator complex. Other Mediator subunits, DRIP77 and DRIP130, were found either to bind STAT2 without augmenting ISGF3 transcriptional activity or to enhance ISGF3 transcription without binding STAT2, but only DRIP150 both enhanced IFN-dependent transcription and coimmunoprecipitated with STAT2. Endogenous DRIP150 and STAT2 were able to interact in solution, and DNA affinity chromatography and chromatin immunoprecipitation assays demonstrated that DRIP150 binds to the mature, activated ISGF3-DNA complex and is recruited to target gene promoters in an IFN-dependent fashion. IFN-dependent recruitment of DRIP130 to an ISGF3 target promoter and SRB10-STAT2 coprecipitation suggest indirect association with a multisubunit Mediator complex. The site of STAT2 interaction was mapped to DRIP150 residues 188 to 566, which are necessary and sufficient for interaction with STAT2. Expression of this DRIP150 fragment, but not DRIP150 fragments outside the STAT2 interaction region, suppressed ISGF3-mediated transcriptional activity in a dominant-negative fashion, suggesting a direct functional role of this domain in mediating STAT2-DRIP150 interactions. These findings indicate that the IFN-activated ISGF3 transcription factor regulates transcription through contact with DRIP150 and implicate the Mediator coactivator complex in IFN-activated gene regulation.
Phasing characteristics of variable size double rings of square or circular shape for design of a single layer microstrip reflectarray

The paper reports on the investigations into phasing characteristics of a unit cell of a single-layer microstrip reflectarray including variable size double rings of square or circular shape. It is shown that if the rings are printed on a conventional dielectric substrate, the phasing characteristics of the unit cell exhibit the phase range well in excess of 360deg but with a sharp slope. By printing the double ring elements on a thick composite substrate formed by a thin laminate and thick foam a slower slope and a reduced range but still covering 360deg can be obtained. The use of such a unit cell can lead to a wideband design of a single layer microstrip reflectarray.
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^Äëíê~ÅíK= The paper presents the novel idea in process tomography which is the combination of dual modality; electrical capacitance and optical tomography for monitoring solid/gas flow measurement. Dual Modality Tomography (DMT) system consists of eight electrodes of capacitance sensor and 16 pairs of optical sensor in one sensor plane. The data obtained from both sensors were inseries transfer to PC with control and triggered by data acquisition system. The data obtained from both sensors will then be reconstructed into image using Linear Back Projection or Iterative Reconstruction Algorithm. In this project, the DMT produces an image fusion, which is developed based on the adjustment of pixel values and the detection region of pixel images reconstruction between capacitance and optical tomography sensor. Series of error analyses will determine the feasibility of the DMT sensors to perform as an instrument in solid flow visualization.
Novel aspects in cutaneous biology of acetylcholine synthesis and acetylcholine receptors

Abstract: Extraneuronal acetylcholine (ACh) has been demonstrated to influence a plethora of cutaneous cell functions in an autocrine, paracrine and endocrine fashion. Through the differentiation‐specific expression of its different nicotinic (nACh‐R) and muscarinic (mACh‐R) receptors, ACh acts upon keratinocyte proliferation and migration, terminal differentiation and barrier formation, sweat and sebum secretion as well as microcirculation and angiogenesis. Only very recently it has been recognized that acetylcholinesterase, but not cholineacetyltransferase, activity is regulated by hydrogen peroxide. Considering that the outer layer of the human skin can be a target for UV‐generated H2O2 in the millimolar range, this mechanism needs to be taken into account for the regulation of ACh homeostasis in skin biology. Consequently, ACh can accumulate, as shown, for example, in the depigmentation process in vitiligo. There is a highly regulated distribution of ACh‐R in human epidermis and adnexal structures, supporting previously observed effects of cholinergic compounds on keratinocyte biology. Most significantly, the regulated expression of ACh‐R in sebaceous glands advocates a role for ACh in sebum production and as a promoter of sebocyte differentiation, thus offering an explanation for skin diseases associated with altered sebum production after chronic nicotine exposure. So far, ACh‐induced sweat production has been thought to be under the exclusive control of mACh‐R. However, recently, the presence of both different nACh‐R and mACh‐R in myoepithelial and acinar cells of eccrine sweat glands has been documented, indicating a more complex regulation of sweat production and expulsion.
Household Formation and Unrelated Housemates

An economic approach to household formation in the United States among unrelated individuals not living in consensual unions is presented. Data are from the March 1980 Current Population Survey. Factors considered include income and housing costs. The results suggest that the incidence of unrelated housemates is more common among householders who are male; unmarried; living in the west, north central, or southern regions of the United States; and living outside the largest SMSAs.
Molecular mechanisms controlling the fibrotic repair phenotype in cornea: implications for surgical outcomes.

PURPOSE Incisional or ablation injury to the corneal stroma is repaired by deposition of a fibrotic tissue produced by activated keratocytes, whereas cells lost from the underlying stroma after epithelial abrasion are simply replaced by keratocyte replication without expression of fibrotic markers. The purpose of this study was to investigate mechanisms that determine this differential keratocyte response. METHODS A penetrating keratectomy rabbit model was adapted for mice to study the fibrotic repair response. A mouse epithelial abrasion model was applied to study the stromal cell replacement response. A primary rabbit corneal cell culture model and an organotypic culture model were also used. RESULTS When the epithelium was prevented from resurfacing the cornea after penetrating keratectomy, expression of fibrotic markers was considerably reduced. TGF-beta2 was determined to be a major substance produced by corneal epithelial cells capable of inducing the fibrotic phenotype. In the intact mouse cornea, TGF-beta2 was confined to the uninjured epithelium, but was released into the stroma during fibrotic repair. By contrast, TGF-beta1 was never found in the epithelium. When epithelial cells were cultured on a basement-membrane-like gel or allowed to deposit their own basement membrane in organotypic culture, TGF-beta2 production was reduced. Return of a basement membrane after wounding in vivo correlated with loss of the fibrotic phenotype. In the epithelial debridement injury model in which the basement membrane was left intact, TGF-beta2 remained confined to the corneal epithelium, consistent with the absence of a fibrotic phenotype. CONCLUSIONS These data suggest that integrity of the basement membrane is a deciding factor in determining the regenerative character of corneal repair.
Rediscovering Rana onca: Evidence for Phylogenetically Distinct Leopard Frogs from the Border Region of Nevada, Utah, and Arizona

Abstract Remnant populations of leopard frogs within the Virgin River drainage and adjacent portions of the Colorado River (Black Canyon) in northwestern Arizona and southern Nevada either represent the reportedly extinct taxon Rana onca or northern, disjunct Rana yavapaiensis. To determine the evolutionary distinctiveness of these leopard frogs, we evaluated mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) restriction site variation (RFLP), mtDNA control region sequences, randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers, and morphological characters. Individuals from the Virgin River drainage and Black Canyon represented a single RFLP haplotype and were identical for nucleotides along a portion of control region sequence. Evaluations of RAPD data demonstrated high levels of similarity among individuals and populations from this region. Leopard frogs from the Virgin River drainage and Black Canyon differed from R. yavapaiensis from west-central Arizona and northern Mexico in maximum parsimony and distance analyses of RFLP and control region sequence data and in maximum-likelihood analysis of the sequence data. Multidimensional scaling of RAPD data provided a similar and congruent indication of this separation. Analysis of principal component scores demonstrated significant morphological differentiation between leopard frog specimens from the Virgin River drainage and R. yavapaiensis. Parallel patterns of divergence observed in the mtDNA, RAPD, and morphological analyses indicate that leopard frogs from the Virgin River drainage and adjacent portions of the Colorado River are phylogenetically distinct. These leopard frogs should be recognized as a lineage separate from southern populations of R. yavapaiensis and classified as the species R. onca.
SAR Sensor Trajectory Deviations: Fourier Domain Formulation and Extended Scene Simulation of Raw Signal

Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) raw signal simulation is a useful tool for SAR system design, mission planning, processing algorithm testing, and inversion algorithm design. A two-dimensional (2-D) Fourier domain SAR raw signal simulator, exploiting the efficiency of fast Fourier transform algorithms, has been presented some years ago and is able to generate the raw signal corresponding to extended scenes. However, it cannot account for the effects of sensor trajectory deviations with respect to the nominal straight-line path. This paper explores the possibility of extending the efficient Fourier domain simulation approach to the case of sensor trajectory deviations, which is more realistic for airborne SAR systems. We first of all obtain a general and compact Fourier domain formulation of the SAR raw signal in the presence of arbitrary trajectory deviations, and show that in this general case no efficient simulation scheme can be devised. However, we demonstrate that, if a narrow beam and slow trajectory deviation assumption is made, a full 2-D Fourier domain simulation can be used. This approach can be applied only to some SAR systems and/or trajectory deviations, but it has the advantage that processing time is practically not increased with respect to the nominal trajectory case. The validity limits of the approach are analytically evaluated. Some simulation results are finally presented in order to verify the effectiveness of the proposed simulation scheme. In another paper, which is the second part of this work, it will be shown that the narrow beam-slow deviation assumption can be relaxed, at the expense of computation efficiency, if a one-dimensional azimuth Fourier domain processing followed by a range time-domain integration is used
Docosahexaenoic acid reduces suppressive and migratory functions of CD4CD25 regulatory T-cells

Immunological tolerance is one of the fundamental aspects of the immune system. The CD4+CD25+ regulatory T (Treg) cells have emerged as key players in the development of tolerance to self and foreign antigens. However, little is known about the endogenous factors and mechanisms controlling their suppressive capacity on immune response. In this study, we observed that docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), an n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid, diminished, in a dose-dependent manner, the capacity of Treg cells to inhibit the CD4+CD25− effector T-cell proliferation. DHA not only reduced the migration of Treg cells toward chemokines but also downregulated the mRNA expression of CCR-4 and CXCR-4 in Treg cells. DHA also curtailed ERK1/2 and Akt phosphorylation and downregulated the Smad7 levels in these cells. Contradictorily, DHA upregulated the mRNA expression of Foxp3, CTLA-4, TGF-β, and IL-10; nonetheless, this fatty acid increased the expression of p27KIP1 mRNA, known to be involved in Treg cell unresponsiveness. In Foxp3-immunoprepitated nuclear proteins, DHA upregulated histone desacetylase 7 levels that would again participate in the unresposnsiveness of these cells. Finally, a DHA-enriched diet also diminished, ex vivo, the suppressive capacity of Treg cells. Altogether, these results suggest that DHA, by diminishing Treg cell functions, may play a key role in health and disease.
Pregnancy and chronic kidney disease: a challenge in all CKD stages.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a challenge for pregnancy. Its recent classification underlines the importance of its early phases. This study's aim was to evaluate outcomes of pregnancy according to CKD stage versus low-risk pregnancies followed in the same center. DESIGN, SETTING, PARTICIPANTS, & MEASUREMENTS The prospective analysis was conducted from January 2000 to May 2009 with the start of observation at referral and end of observation 1 month after delivery. Ninety-one singleton deliveries were studied; 267 "low-risk" singleton pregnancies served as controls. Because of the lack of hard end points (death, start of dialysis), surrogate end points were analyzed (cesarean section, prematurity, neonatal intensive care). RESULTS CKD outcome was worse than physiologic pregnancies: preterm delivery (44% versus 5%); cesarean section (44% versus 25%); and need for neonatal intensive care (26% versus 1%). The differences were highly significant in stage 1 CKD (61 cases) versus controls (CKD stage 1: cesarean sections = 57%, preterm delivery = 33%, intensive care = 18%). In CKD, proteinuria and hypertension were correlated with outcomes [proteinuria dichotomized at 1 g/24 h at referral: need for intensive care, relative risk (RR) = 4.16 (1.05 to 16.46); hypertension: preterm delivery, RR = 7.24 (2.30 to 22.79); cesarean section, RR = 5.70 (1.69 to 19.24)]. Statistical significance across stages was reached for preterm delivery [RR = 3.32 (1.09 to 10.13)]. CONCLUSIONS CKD is a challenge for pregnancy from early stages. Strict follow-up is needed for CKD patients, even when there is normal renal function.
Cannabidiol enhances microglial phagocytosis via transient receptor potential (TRP) channel activation

Microglial cells are important mediators of the immune response in the CNS. The phytocannabinoid, cannabidiol (CBD), has been shown to have central anti‐inflammatory properties, and the purpose of the present study was to investigate the effects of CBD and other phytocannabinoids on microglial phagocytosis.
THE METABOLISM OF BIOLOGICALLY IMPORTANT RADIONUCLIDES. VI. A SURVEY OF THE METABOLISM OF CAESIUM IN MAN.

Present knowledge of the metabolism of caesium in man is reviewed; data on stable caesium in autopsy materials, as well as on radioactive caesium both in autopsy material and in vivo are considered. Caesium is distributed widely throughout the body but is mainly in the soft tissues; the concentration in rib appears to be higher than in cortical bone (femur). Uptake of caesium chloride from the gastrointestinal tract is rapid and essentially complete. Excretion is principally via the urine, but there is a continuing loss in the faeces whether the administration was by ingestion or intravenous injection. The urinary/faecal excretion ratio ranges from less than 2 to more than 10 among individuals, but is reasonably constant in any one subject. The wholebody retention of caesium can be expressed by a twocomponent exponential function of time; some 6–15 (mean about 10) per cent of a single oral dose is excreted with a short half-life (1–2 days), but the major part has a half-life between 50 and 150 (mean 110 d.
Culturally tailored interventions of chronic disease targeting Korean Americans: a systematic review

Objective Because little is known about promising interventions to prevent and control chronic disease in Korean Americans, we conducted a systematic literature review to investigate: (1) theoretical frameworks and strategies employed by interventions targeting Korean Americans; (2) cultural factors considered by these interventions; and (3) the extent of their success in engaging Korean participants and improving their health. Design Following the PRISMA guidelines, PubMed, PsycInfo, and Web of Science were searched to identify primary research articles evaluating interventions to prevent or control chronic disease, tailored to Korean Americans, and published from 1980 through 2011. Of 238 articles identified, 21 articles describing16 unique intervention tests met inclusion criteria. These interventions targeted cancer (10), hypertension (2), diabetes (1), mental health (1), tobacco cessation (1), and general health (1). Results All included studies were published since 2000, reflecting the relatively recent establishment of intervention research with Korean Americans. All 16 programs delivered linguistically appropriate messages and education. The 11 programs that realized significant intervention effects also provided or coordinated social support from culturally relevant and well-trained lay health workers, nurses, or family members during an intervention and/or follow-up period. Conclusions Culturally matched and linguistically appropriate messages and education may not be enough to prevent or control chronic disease among immigrant Korean Americans. Culturally sensitive and committed social support should be provided to catalyze behavioral changes and sustain the effect of the interventions.
Mortals and Immortals: Collected Essays

Jean-Pierre Vernant has profoundly transformed our perceptions of ancient Greece. Published in 1991, this collection of nineteen essays probes deeply into themes of enduring interest--death, the body, the soul, the individual, and relations between mortals and immortals; the mask, the mirror, the image, and the imagination; the self and the other, and, more broadly, the concept of otherness itself, or "alterity. "
Evaluation of the Early Childhood Oral Health Impact Scale in an Australian preschool child population.

BACKGROUND Early childhood caries has significant impacts on children and their families. The Early Childhood Oral Health Impact Scale (ECOHIS) is an instrument for capturing the complex dimensions of preschool children's oral health. This study aimed to evaluate the reliability and validity of the instrument among Australian preschool children. METHODS Parents/children dyads (n = 286) participating in a treatment trial on early childhood caries completed the scale at baseline, and 33 parents repeated the questionnaire 2-3 weeks later. The validity and reliability of the ECOHIS was determined using tests for convergent and discriminant validity, internal reliability of the instrument and test-retest reliability. RESULTS Scale impacts were strongly correlated with global oral health ratings (Spearman's correlations; r = 0.51, total score; r = 0.43, child impact; and r = 0.49, family impact; p < 0.001). The scale was significantly associated with children's caries experience, p < 0.001. Cronbach's alpha values were 0.87, 0.89 and 0.74 for the total, the child and the family domains, respectively. Test-retest reliability was 0.92, 0.89 and 0.78 for the total, child and family domains, respectively. CONCLUSIONS The scale demonstrated acceptable validity and reliability for assessing the impact of early childhood caries among Australian preschool children.
Spider Silk – a Versatile Biomaterial for Tissue Engineering and Medical Applications

Spider silk, well-known for its mechanical characteristics as high elasticity, extreme dilatability and tensile strength, offers a broad spectrum of medical applications. The Spidersilk Laboratory focuses on the use of spider silk for regenerative applications. Predominantly used is the so called dragline silk. The silk showed an excellent biocompatibility in all tested cell culture and animal models. The material is completely degradable and does not cause any inflammatory reactions. Spider silk is an ideal basic material for biomatrices. Various applications and medical devices have been and are going to be developed.