Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Neighborhood Signaling Effects, Commuting Time, and Employment: Evidence from a Field Experiment

The question of whether and how living in a deprived neighborhood affects the labor market outcomes of its residents has been a subject of great interest for both policy makers and researchers. Despite this interest, empirical evidence of causal neighborhood effects on labor market outcomes is scant, and causal evidence on the mechanisms involved is even more scant. The mechanism that this study investigates is neighborhood signaling effects. Specifically, we ask whether there is unequal treatment in hiring depending on whether a job applicant signals living in a bad (deprived) neighborhood or in a good (affluent) neighborhood. To this end, we conducted a field experiment where fictitious job applications were sent to employers with an advertised vacancy. Each job application was randomly assigned a residential address in either a bad or a good neighborhood. The measured outcome is the fraction of invitations for a job interview (the callback rate). We find no evidence of general neighborhood signaling effects. However, job applicants with a foreign background have callback rates that are 42 percent lower if they signal living in a bad neighborhood rather than in a good neighborhood. In addition, we find that applicants with commuting times longer than 90 minutes have lower callback rates, and this is unrelated to the neighborhood signaling effect. Apparently, employers view information about residential addresses as important for employment decisions.
TESTICULAR GERM CELL TUMORS IN CHILDHOOD: Treatment Results of 52 Patients

We analysed the treatment results of 52 children with testicular germ cell tumors. Histopathological diagnoses were endodermal sinus tumor (63.4%), embryonal carcinoma (28.8%), teratocarcinoma (5.7%), and mixed tumors (2.1%). Radical inguinal orchiectomy was performed in 42 patients and retroperitoneal lymph node dissection in 10 (3/10 positive). Overall survival rates were: whole group: 71.2%; stage I: 89.7%; II: 68.5%; III: 31.2%; IV: 30% (p =. 001). Five-year overall survival rates were 85.8% and 100% for stage I patients who received chemotherapy or not (p =. 27); BEP regimen: 85.7%; classical VAC: 67.9%; vinblastine + bleomycin: 63.6%. Chemotherapy is not required in stage I. BEP regimen is effective in testicular germ cell tumors.
Systems Level Analysis of Histone H3 Post-translational Modifications (PTMs) Reveals Features of PTM Crosstalk in Chromatin Regulation*

Histones are abundant chromatin constituents carrying numerous post-translational modifications (PTMs). Such PTMs mediate a variety of biological functions, including recruitment of enzymatic readers, writers and erasers that modulate DNA replication, transcription and repair. Individual histone molecules contain multiple coexisting PTMs, some of which exhibit crosstalk, i.e. coordinated or mutually exclusive activities. Here, we present an integrated experimental and computational systems level molecular characterization of histone PTMs and PTM crosstalk. Using wild type and engineered mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs) knocked out in components of the Polycomb Repressive Complex 2 (PRC2, Suz12−/−), PRC1 (Ring1A/B−/−) and (Dnmt1/3a/3b−/−) we performed comprehensive PTM analysis of histone H3 tails (50 aa) by utilizing quantitative middle-down proteome analysis by tandem mass spectrometry. We characterized combinatorial PTM features across the four mESC lines and then applied statistical data analysis to predict crosstalk between histone H3 PTMs. We detected an overrepresentation of positive crosstalk (codependent marks) between adjacent mono-methylated and acetylated marks, and negative crosstalk (mutually exclusive marks) among most of the seven characterized di- and tri-methylated lysine residues in the H3 tails. We report novel features of PTM interplay involving hitherto poorly characterized arginine methylation and lysine methylation sites, including H3R2me, H3R8me and H3K37me. Integration of the H3 data with RNAseq data by coabundance clustering analysis of histone PTMs and histone modifying enzymes revealed correlations between PTM and enzyme levels. We conclude that middle-down proteomics is a powerful tool to determine conserved or dynamic interdependencies between histone marks, which paves the way for detailed investigations of the histone code. Histone H3 PTM data is publicly available in the CrossTalkDB repository at http://crosstalkdb.bmb. sdu.dk.
Postoperative cognitive disorders

Purpose of reviewThe elderly are the fastest growing segment of the population and undergo 25–30% of all surgical procedures. Postoperative cognitive problems are common in older patients following major surgery. The socioeconomic implications of these cognitive disorders are profound; cognitive decline is associated with a loss of independence, a reduction in the quality of life, and death. This review will focus on the two most common cognitive problems following surgery: postoperative delirium and postoperative cognitive dysfunction (POCD). Recent findingsFor years, preoperative geriatric consultation/screening was the only intervention proven to decrease postoperative delirium. There are, however, several recent publications indicating that preoperative and postoperative pharmacological and medical (hydration, oxygenation) management can reduce postoperative delirium. Spinal anesthesia with minimal propofol sedation has been shown to decrease the incidence of postoperative delirium in hip-fracture patients. Likewise, dexmedetomidine sedation in mechanically ventilated patients in the ICU is associated with less postoperative delirium and shorter ventilator times. Preoperative levels of education and brain function (cognitive reserve) may predict patients at risk for postoperative cognitive problems. Reduced white matter integrity is reported to place patients at a higher risk for both postoperative delirium and POCD. SummaryThe etiology of postoperative cognitive problems is unknown, but there is emerging evidence that decreased preoperative cognitive function contributes to the development of postoperative delirium and POCD. There is growing concern that inhalation anesthetics may be neurotoxic to the aging brain, but there are no human data evaluating this hypothesis to date. Randomized controlled trials evaluating interventions to improve long-term cognitive outcomes in elderly patients are urgently needed.
Background subtraction with multispectral video sequences

—Motion analysis of moving targets is an important issue in several applications such as video surveillance or robotics. Background subtraction is one of the simplest and widely used techniques for moving target detection in video sequences. In this paper, we investigate the advantages of using a multispectral video acquisition system of more than three bands for background subtraction over the use of trichromatic or monochromatic video sequences. To this end, we have established a dataset of multispectral videos with a manual annotation of moving objects. To the best of our knowledge, this is the ﬁrst publicly available dataset of multispectral video sequences. Experimental results indicate that using more than three spectral sub-bands provide better discrimination between foreground and background pixels. In particular, the use of the near infra-red (NIR) spectral band together with visible spectra provides the best results.
Diffusion tensor imaging in patients with acute onset of neuropsychiatric systemic lupus erythematosus: a prospective study of apparent diffusion coefficient, fractional anisotropy values, and eigenvalues in different regions of the brain

Purpose: To investigate whether apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC), fractional anisotropy (FA), and eigenvalues in neuropsychiatric systemic lupus erythematosus (NPSLE) patients differ from those of healthy controls. Material and Methods: Eight NPSLE patients (aged 23–55 years, mean 42.9 years) and 20 healthy age-matched controls (aged 22–59 years, mean 44.4 years) underwent conventional brain magnetic resonance (MR) and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). The ADC, FA, principal eigenvalue (λ∥), and the corresponding average perpendicular eigenvalue (λ⊥) ( = (λ2+λ3)/2) were measured in selected regions of normal appearing gray and white matter brain parenchyma. For statistical evaluation of differences between the two groups, a Student's t-test was used. The P value for statistical significance was set to P = 0.0025 after Bonferroni correction for multiple measurements. Results: Significantly increased ADC values were demonstrated in normal-appearing areas in the insular cortex (P<0.001), thalamus (P<0.001), and the parietal and frontal white matter (P<0.001 and P<0.001, respectively) in NPSLE patients. Significantly decreased FA values were demonstrated in normal-appearing thalamus (P<0.001), corpus callosum (P = 0.002), and in the parietal and frontal white matter (P<0.001 and P<0.001, respectively) in NPSLE patients compared to healthy controls. The λ⊥ was significantly higher in several of these regions in NPSLE patients compared to healthy controls. Conclusion: Our study demonstrates alterations in normal-appearing gray and white matter brain parenchyma of patients with NPSLE by means of abnormal ADC, FA, and eigenvalues. These alterations may be based on loss of tissue integrity in part due to demyelination. It is possible that DTI in the future could assist in the diagnosis of NPSLE and possibly help to further elucidate the pathogenesis of NPSLE.
Effects of anticoagulants and storage of blood samples on efficacy of the polymerase chain reaction assay for hepatitis C virus

Blood samples from 11 patients with posttransfusion hepatitis C virus infection were collected. Each sample was divided into three fractions to obtain sera, sodium-citrated plasma, and heparinized plasma and then tested for HCV RNA by a nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Of them, eight sodium-citrated plasma samples, seven serum samples, and no heparinized plasma samples were PCR positive. Eight PCR-positive sodium-citrated plasma samples were exposed to different physical conditions and semiquantified for HCV RNA after serial dilutions. Samples stored at -70 degrees C showed the best preservation of HCV RNA, and storage at the other conditions resulted in only minimal loss of the PCR signal. Therefore, serum or sodium-citrated plasma specimens are satisfactory for detecting HCV RNA by PCR, but heparinized blood specimens are not.
Identification of amide protons of glutathione in MR spectra of tumour cells

Signals attributable to amide protons and used in previous studies to measure intracellular pH were observed in the low‐field region of the 1H‐MR spectra of four tumour cell lines: T98G, MCF‐7, A172 and HeLa. The signals were more intense in the spectra of the two cell lines (T98G and MCF‐7) characterised by higher concentrations of glutathione (GSH). After comparison with 1H‐MR spectra of GSH in solution at different pH values, the peaks were attributed to NHs of the Cys and Gly residues of GSH. Modification of the intracellular concentration of GSH by treatment with buthionine sulfoximine produced comparable decreases in the intensity of aliphatic signals of GSH and NHs under examination. The assignment was therefore confirmed. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Cerebral aneurysmal arteriopathy in childhood AIDS

Objective: To identify cerebral aneurysmal arteriopathy in children with longstanding AIDS. Background: Five cases are described from the authors' experience, and eight additional cases are reviewed from the literature. Details are presented in regard to the clinical picture as well as brain imaging with cerebral angiography and magnetic resonance angiography in some cases. Autopsy information is available in four cases, including one of the authors' patients. Results: Seven patients acquired HIV infection perinatally, five patients were infected by blood transfusions, and one patient had both risk factors. In the four postmortem patients, the vascular pathology was similar, showing ectasia and aneurysmal dilatation confined to the large arteries of the circle of Willis. Medial fibrosis and loss of muscularis with destruction of the internal elastic lamina and intimal hyperplasia was common. The latency period following infection varied from 2 to 11 years. Once a diagnosis of aneurysmal arteriopathy was made, the patients deteriorated rapidly, with death occurring in less than 6 months. Conclusions: The development of cerebral aneurysmal arteriopathy in childhood AIDS tends to occur after a prolonged delay and is usually followed by death in a short period of time. The etiology for the vasculitis is unknown. Varicella zoster virus may be the etiology in some of the cases because of its potential to cause this pathology and the striking unilateral arterial involvement found in Case 5. HIV vasculitis is also a possibility, as suggested by the detection of HIV protein or genomic material in two of the four autopsy cases.
Ethylmalonic acid modulates Na+, K+‐ATPase activity and mRNA levels in rat cerebral cortex

Ethylmalonic acid (EMA) accumulates in tissues of patients affected by short‐chain acyl‐CoA dehydrogenase deficiency and ethylmalonic encephalopathy, illnesses characterized by variable neurological symptoms. In this work, we investigated the in vitro and in vivo EMA effects on Na+,K+‐ATPase (NAK) activity and mRNA levels in cerebral cortex from 30‐day‐old rats. For in vitro studies, cerebral cortex homogenates were incubated in the presence of EMA at 0.5, 1, or 2.5 mM concentrations for 1 h. For in vivo experiments, animals received three subcutaneous EMA injections (6 μmol g−1; 90‐min interval) and were killed 60 min after the last injection. After that, NAK activity and its mRNA expression were measured. We observed that EMA did not affect this enzyme activity in vitro. In contrast, EMA administration significantly increased NAK activity and decreased mRNA NAK expression as assessed by semiquantitative reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction when compared with control group. Considering the high score of residues prone to phosphorylation on NAK, this profile can be associated with a possible regulation by specific phosphorylation sites of the enzyme. Altogether, the present results suggest that NAK alterations may be involved in the pathophysiology of brain damage found in patients in which EMA accumulates. Synapse, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Detection of Replay Attacks Using Single Frequency Filtering Cepstral Coefficients

Automatic speaker verification systems are vulnerable to spoofing attacks. Recently, various countermeasures have been developed for detecting high technology attacks such as speech synthesis and voice conversion. However, there is a wide gap in dealing with replay attacks. In this paper, we propose a new feature for replay attack detection based on single frequency filtering (SFF), which provides high temporal and spectral resolution at each instant. Single frequency filtering cepstral coefficients (SFFCC) with Gaussian mixture model classifier are used for the experimentation on the standard BTAS-2016 corpus. The previously reported best result, which is based on constant Q cepstral coefficients (CQCC) achieved a half total error rate of 0.67 % on this data-set. Our proposed method outperforms the state of the art (CQCC) with a half total error rate of 0.0002 %.
Integrative and distinctive coding of perceptual and conceptual object features in the ventral visual stream

A tremendous body of research in cognitive neuroscience is aimed at understanding how object concepts are represented in the human brain. However, it remains unknown whether and where the visual and abstract conceptual features that define an object concept are integrated. We addressed this issue by comparing the neural pattern similarities among object-evoked fMRI responses with behavior-based models that independently captured the visual and conceptual similarities among these stimuli. Our results revealed evidence for distinctive coding of visual features in lateral occipital cortex, and conceptual features in the temporal pole and parahippocampal cortex. By contrast, we found evidence for integrative coding of visual and conceptual object features in perirhinal cortex. The neuroanatomical specificity of this effect was highlighted by results from a searchlight analysis. Taken together, our findings suggest that perirhinal cortex uniquely supports the representation of fully-specified object concepts through the integration of their visual and conceptual features.
Ultrastructural characterization of membranous torovirus replication factories

Plus‐stranded RNA viruses replicate in the cytosol of infected cells, in membrane‐bound replication complexes containing the replicase proteins, the viral RNA and host proteins. The formation of the replication and transcription complexes (RTCs) through the rearrangement of cellular membranes is currently being actively studied for viruses belonging to different viral families. In this work, we identified double‐membrane vesicles (DMVs) in the cytoplasm of cells infected with the equine torovirus Berne virus (BEV), the prototype member of the Torovirus genus (Coronaviridae family, Nidovirales order). Using confocal microscopy and transmission electron microscopy, we observed a close relationship between the RTCs and the DMVs of BEV. The examination of BEV‐infected cells revealed that the replicase proteins colocalize with each other and with newly synthesized RNA and are associated to the membrane rearrangement induced by BEV. However, the double‐stranded RNA, an intermediate of viral replication, is exclusively limited to the interior of DMVs. Our results with BEV resemble those obtained with other related viruses in the Nidovirales order, thus providing new evidence to support the idea that nidoviruses share a common replicative structure based on the DMV arranged clusters.
Differential Regulation of Rad18 through Rad6-dependent Mono- and Polyubiquitination*

Rad18 is involved in postreplication repair mainly through monoubiquitination of proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA). Here we show that Rad18 protein was detected in human cells as two major bands at 75 and 85 kDa by Western blot. The bands were identified as nonubiquitinated and monoubiquitinated forms of Rad18, respectively, by mass spectrometry. Multiple ubiquitinated bands of Rad18 were detected in vitro in the presence of E1, E2 (Rad6), and methylated ubiquitin, indicating that Rad18 was monoubiquitinated at multiple sites through autoubiquitination. Rad18 self-associates, and this interaction was abolished by replacing one of the conserved cysteine residues with phenylalanine in the zinc finger domain (C207F). In the C207F mutant Rad18, monoubiquitination of Rad18 was not observed in vivo, suggesting that self-association was critical for monoubiquitination. Monoubiquitinated Rad18 was detected mainly in the cytoplasm, whereas nonubiquitinated Rad18 was detected predominantly in the nuclei. Furthermore, Rad18 was shown to be polyubiquitinated in cells treated with proteasome inhibitors. Purified Rad18 was also polyubiquitinated in an in vitro system containing E1, E2 (Rad6), and ubiquitin, and it was degraded by the addition of proteasomes. These results suggest that the amount of Rad18 in the nucleus is regulated differentially by mono- and polyubiquitination.
Extracellular Matrix Proteins as Early Markers in Diabetic Nephropathy

Basement membrane thickening and mesangial expansion characterize the renal involvement in diabetes mellitus and precede any symptoms of renal dysfunction, e.g., albuminuria and changes in glomerular filtration rate. Since the morphological changes can only be diagnosed by biopsy, this study was designed to investigate whether the urinary excretion of renal extracellular matrix proteins might reflect the morphological alterations. To specify the extent of renal involvement in diabetes, the patients, type I as well as type II diabetics, were classified according to their urinary albumin excretion: normal albumin excretion below 30 micrograms/min, microalbuminuria from 30 to 300 micrograms/min, and overt albuminuria above 200 micrograms/min. Laminin, collagen IV, and fibronectin, all intrinsic components of the renal extracellular matrix, were determined in serum and urine by radioimmunoassay or enzyme-linked-immunosorbent-assay, respectively. The results are given as median values (mean). Additionally, the urinary fragment pattern of fibronectin was analysed qualitatively by immunoblotting. Laminin concentrations in serum and in urine did not change in diabetics. Collagen IV decreased in serum of patients with increased albumin excretion (controls: mean = 255 micrograms/l, normoalbuminuric patients: mean = 56 micrograms/l, microalbuminuric patients: mean = 52 micrograms/l, and patients with overt albuminuria: mean = 70 micrograms/l; alpha < 0.01) and increased in urine (controls, normoalbuminuric and microalbuminuric patients: not detectable, patients with overt albuminuria: mean = 5 ng/12 h; apha < 0.001). (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Uncertainty and Contradiction: An Essay on the Business Cycle

The paper develops a model of economic fluctuations in the medium run and their relation with the short-run macroeconomic equilibrium. The business cycle is the result of two separate forces. On the one hand, there is Harrodian instability. On the other hand, this instability is contained by the inherent contradictions of capitalism. I focus on two of these contradictions: the profit-squeeze that results from the tightening of the labor market as employment and utilization increase, and the financial instability hypothesis as formulated by Hyman Minsky. With the inclusion of overhead labor, the model can explain the U-shaped behavior of the wage share along the business cycle (wage share decreases for low levels of utilization and increases for higher levels) that prevailed in most of the post-WWII period, as well as the decrease in the wage share as utilization increases that has been observed in the most recent cycles.
DIETARY PROTEIN , AMINO ACID SUPPLEMENTS , AND RECOVERY FROM EXERCISE Sports

Amino acids are always a minor source of fuel, usually accounting for less than 5% of total energy expenditure. If enough carbohydrate is ingested, i.e., ~1.2 g·kg-1·h-1 (0.55 g·lb-1·h-1) in 15-30 min intervals during the first 2-5 h of recovery, protein supplementation does not further increase muscle glycogen replenishment. However, if no food or too little carbohydrate is consumed, ingestion of protein or specific amino acids during recovery from prolonged exercise may accelerate glycogen resynthesis.
Living at the Crossroads of Cultural Worlds: The Experience of Normative Conflicts by Second Generation Immigrant Youth

The children of immigrants are often referred to as second-generation youth. Although there is tremendous diversity among them, they often share the common experience of being bicultural by holding both heritage and mainstream cultural identities. Given that cultures generally promote similar expectations for youth (e.g., showing respect for parents), holding two cultural identities is not necessarily problematic. Even when cultural expectations do differ, these individuals can typically switch between cultural identities (e.g., South Asian at home; mainstream Canadian at school) as a strategy to avoid conflict. For some issues, however, switching between identities will not resolve the conflict because fulfilling the normative expectations associated with one identity is done at the expense of the ones of the other identity (e.g., choosing a romantic partner that is either from the heritage culture or from mainstream culture). The current paper presents a normative approach to understanding the experience of culturally-based conflicts among second-generation youth. In addition, research stemming from this normative approach in the area of intimate relationships is presented to further illustrate the value of the model in understanding the potential cultural conflicts of second-generation youth and how they may be negotiated.