Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Quantization, Frobenius and Bi Algebras from the Categorical Framework of Quantum Mechanics to Natural Language Semantics

Compact Closed categories and Frobenius and Bi algebras have been applied to model and reason about Quantum protocols. The same constructions have also been applied to reason about natural language semantics under the name: ``categorical distributional compositional'' semantics, or in short, the ``DisCoCat'' model. This model combines the statistical vector models of word meaning with the compositional models of grammatical structure. It has been applied to natural language tasks such as disambiguation, paraphrasing and entailment of phrases and sentences. The passage from the grammatical structure to vectors is provided by a functor, similar to the Quantization functor of Quantum Field Theory. The original DisCoCat model only used compact closed categories. Later, Frobenius algebras were added to it to model long distance dependancies such as relative pronouns. Recently, bialgebras have been added to the pack to reason about quantifiers. This paper reviews these constructions and their application to natural language semantics. We go over the theory and present some of the core experimental results.
Decreased Degradation of Collagen and Fibronectin following Exposure of Proximal Cells to Glucose

Background/Aims: Thickening and reduplication of the tubular basement membrane has been reported as an early event in diabetic nephropathy. The aim of the work outlined here was to examine the effects and mechanisms involved in the modulation of renal proximal tubular type-IV collagen and fibronectin turnover by glucose. Methods: The effect of glucose on type-IV collagen and fibronectin generation was studied by exposure of primary cultures of human renal proximal tubular cells (HPTC) to elevated D-glucose concentrations. Subsequently the mechanism of modulation of fibronectin generation was examined in a polarised system utilising the porcine proximal tubular cell line LLC-PK1 grown on porous tissue culture inserts. Results: Incubation of confluent growth-arrested HPTC with 25 mM D-glucose led to the accumulation of both type-IV collagen and fibronectin. This increase was not dependent on new gene transcription for either protein. Exposure of HPTC to 25 mM D-glucose also led to the induction of tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases (TIMP-1 and TIMP-2) and also gelatinase A. There was, however, a net decrease in overall gelatinolytic activity. Incubation of confluent monolayers of LLC-PK1 cells grown on tissue culture inserts with 25 mM D-glucose on either their apical or basolateral aspect led to fibronectin accumulation seen only in the basolateral compartment. Under these experimental conditions, we can demonstrate polyol pathway activation, and furthermore the increase in fibronectin concentration in response to glucose was inhibited by the aldose reductase inhibitor sorbinil. Fibronectin accumulation was also demonstrated following both apical and basolateral addition of 1 mM sorbitol, but not following the addition of 25 mM galactose to either aspect of the cells. Conclusions: These data demonstrate that the glucose-induced accumulation of type-IV collagen and fibronectin was associated with alterations in the degradative pathway of these matrix components. In addition fibronectin generation in response to glucose was non-polar in terms of application of glucose, but polar in terms of fibronectin accumulation. The mechanisms of glucose-induced modulation of fibronectin were mediated by polyol pathway activation, and more specifically related to the metabolism of sorbitol to fructose.
Caspofungin: first approved agent in a new class of antifungals

Caspofungin (Cancidas®, Merck & Co. Inc.) is the first echinocandin antifungal agent to gain FDA-approval for use in the US. It has excellent clinical activity against Candida spp. and Aspergillus spp. but lacks significant activity against Cryptococcus neoformans. Caspofungin may have some activity against dimorphic fungi such as Histoplasma capsulatum and Coccidioides immitis, but no clinical data is available for treatment of these infections. Caspofungin has demonstrated poor activity against most filamentous fungi in vitro. Several clinical trials have demonstrated its efficacy in the treatment of oropharyngeal, oesophageal and invasive candidiasis, as well as invasive aspergillosis. As a result of caspofungin’s unique mechanism of action, and the high morbidity and mortality of invasive fungal infections, there is considerable interest in using this new antifungal agent as part of a combination antifungal therapy. In vitro studies and small case series indicate that caspofungin does not appear to be antagonistic when combined with other antifungals, such as itraconazole, voriconazole or amphotericin B against Aspergillus spp. Caspofungin exerts concentration-dependent killing effects in many different in vitro and animal models of disseminated fungal infection. The usual daily dose is 50 mg/day i.v. following a 70 mg i.v. loading dose. However, higher caspofungin doses have been safely administered and up to 70 mg/day can be administered for patients who fail to respond to lower doses. Caspofungin has an excellent safety profile with reduced toxicities, compared to other licensed antifungal agents. Fever, thrombophlebitis, headache and liver enzyme elevations were the most common drug-related side effects reported in clinical trials so far. Additional data are needed to document its safety in long-term use, and with higher doses in patients with invasive fungal infections. Caspofungin is a promising agent as first-line therapy for invasive candidiasis, and as salvage therapy for invasive aspergillosis. However, more clinical data are needed to define its role as primary therapy for invasive aspergillosis, and its role in combination antifungal therapy.
Feeding on Papaya Flowers Enhances Mating Competitiveness of Male Oriental Fruit Flies, Bactrocera dorsalis (Diptera: Tephritidae)

Males of the oriental fruit fly, Bactrocera dorsalis (Hendel), are attracted to and feed on methyl eugenol. The goal of the present study was to determine whether feeding on a methyl eugenol-bearing plant, papaya ( Carica papaya L.) would result in a mating advantage for B. dorsalis males. Mating frequencies of males given access to flowers (treated) and flower-deprived males (control) were compared in trials con- ducted 2 and 7 d after treated males were exposed to the flowers. For both intervals, treated males accounted for a significantly larger number of matings than control males. A second experiment compared female attraction to control and treated males. When at a lek, males display vigorous wing-fanning behavior, presumably to increase dis- persal of the sex pheromone. Floral feeding resulted in a significant increase in wing- fanning activity but did not appear to affect the attractiveness of the pheromonal signal per se. A field experiment revealed that male captures in methyl eugenol-baited traps were not reduced by prior feeding on papaya flowers.
Changes in biochemical and hematological parameters and metabolic hormones in Tsigai ewes blood in the first third of lactation

The aim of this investigation is to determine changes in concentrations of biochemical and haematological parameters, as well as metabolic hormones in the blood of Tsigai ewes in the first third of lactation. The study included 10 ewes Tsigai breed monitored during three periods of lactation: 20 days, 40 and 60 days of lactation. Ewes were fed feed mixture (300 g/day) and meadow hay ad libitum. A significant decrease of concentrations of Ca and Na was recorded in the blood of sheep at the 40th day of lactation and later an increase at the 60th day of lactation. The opposite trend was determined for concentrations of P-inorganic. Also it was determined a significant decrease in Fe content and an increase in the concentrations of glucose, triglycerides and total protein in the first third of lactation. In the blood of ewes at 40th day of lactation it was found a significant decrease of the activity of AST and LDH in contrast to ewes at 20th day of lactation. Concentrations of T 3 and T 4 hormones were slightly increasing in the first third of lactation, but the differences were not significant. The blood insulin concentrations were significant increased in the first third of lactation. Haematological blood parameters in lactating ewes did not differ significantly and was within the reference values. Determining the concentration of biochemical and haematological parameters and concentrations of blood thyroid hormones and insulin in the first third of lactation are imposed as a precaution in order to better monitoring of Tsigai ewes during lactation.
Influence of scrotal bipartition on spermatogenesis yield and sertoli cell efficiency in sheep1

Rodrigues R.T. G.A. , Santos J.R. S. , Azerêdo L.M.S., Rocha E.F. , Carvalho M.A.M., Portal M.J.I.D. , Sousa O. B. & Menezes D.J.A. 2016. Influence of scrotal bipartition on spermatogenesis yield and Sertoli cell efficiency in sheep. Pesquisa Veterinária Brasileira 36(4):258-262. Unidade Acadêmica de Medicina Veterinária, Centro de Saúde e Tecnologia Rural, Universidade Federal de Campina Grande, Avenida Universitária s/n, Santa Cecília, Patos, PB 58708-110, Brazil. E-mail: mdanayres@gmail.com With the objective to assess the effect of scrotal bipartition on spermatogenesis in sheep, the testes were used from 12 crossbred rams of sheep farms in the municipality of Patos, Paraíba, Brazil, distributed into two groups: GI with six rams with scrotal bipartition, and GII with six rams without scrotal bipartition. The testicular biometry was measured and the testes were collected, fixed in Bouin and fragments were processed to obtain histological slides. The spermatogenesis yield and the Sertoli cell efficiency was estimated by counting the cells of the spermatogenetic line at stage one of the seminiferous epithelium cycle and the Sertoli cells. The results were submitted to analysis of variance with the ASSISTAT v.7. 6 program and the mean values were compared by the Student-Newman-Keuls test (SNK) at 5% significance. The testicular biometric parameters did not show statistical difference (p>0.05) between the groups. The meiotic, spermatogenetic and Sertoli cell efficiency were higher in bipartitioned rams (p<0.05), while the mitotic yield did not differ (p>0.05) between GI and GII. The results indicated that there is superiority in the spermatogenetic parameters of bi-partitioned rams, suggesting that these sheep present, as reported in goats, indication of better reproductive indices.
Haplotype Analysis of the Engrailed-2 Gene in Young-Onset Parkinson’s Disease

Background/Aims: Engrailed-2 is a homeobox transcription factor that is expressed in mesencephalic dopaminergic neurons from development to adulthood and probably plays an important role in the survival of these neurons. Methods: Here, we investigated six single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the promoter region (rs1345514) or transcribed part (rs3735653, rs6460013, rs1861972, rs2361689, and rs3808330) of the engrailed-2 gene, respectively, in 103 discordant pairs with young-onset Parkinson’s disease (YOPD). Results: The nominally significant p values in the single-marker and haplotype-based association analysis were suggestive of an association of SNP rs1345514 with YOPD. Conclusion: Altogether, our data suggest the possibility that variations of the engrailed-2 gene are implicated in the development of YOPD, although our results with respect to SNP rs1345514 should be verified in an independent sample.
Admission Cardiotocography as a screening test to predict foetal outcome and mode of delivery

Background: A screening test is ideally needed at the time of onset of labour which can detect the already existing compromise on the foetus and which can also predict its well-being for following hours in labour, which will pave way for timely intervention that will curtail the neurological damage and death. Assessment of foetal wellbeing in labour ward through admission cardiotocography (CTG) helps us to look for already prevailing high risk factors vigilantly and also new factors that have recently appeared. Aim: To ascertain admission CTG as an effective tool in predicting the foetal outcome and mode of delivery. Materials and Methods: In this study 400 women’s Admission CTG’s will be compared for pregnancy and neonatal outcomes such as mode of delivery, APGAR score, admission into neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and duration of stay in NICU. Statistical analysis is done using Chi square test and p<0.05 is considered as statistically significant. Sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values, diagnostic accuracy of the admission CTG is also measured. Results: There is a statistically significant co-relation between the admission CTG and the mode of delivery, APGAR score and NICU stay of the neonates. Conclusion: We conclude that the admission test can be used as a useful tool to analyse CTG tracings of women in early labour to give quality care and to predict the mode of delivery and foetal outcome.
Indonesian Twitter Sentiment Analysis Using Word2Vec

Sentiment is an opinion of someone on certain topics, products, or services. Sentiment analysis is used to analyze opinions to decide whether positive or negative. Twitter is used by Indonesian to express their opinion in the form of tweets. This study used word2vec method to extract features by converting data into vector. Word2Vec has the advantage of being able to see semantic relationship between words. This study used support vector machine (SVM) for the classification method. Sentiment classification process was done through processing training data in the form of tweets then turned into a model to be tested with the test data. First, tweets were collected by crawling them via Twitter API. Keywords and hashtags that are related to disasters in Indonesia were prepared to get relevance tweets for this study. For word2vec model, this study used Wikipedia in Bahasa Indonesia as a large amount corpus for model training. The training used Continuous Bag–of–Words (CBOW) and skip-gram as word2vec model architecture that in the last evaluation would be compared for the best classification result. Feature extraction was done by view each word in tweets to its vector score on the word2vec model that had already been trained. After that, the features passed to classification step. The implementation of word2vec and SVM generated the precision of 64,4%, recall of 58%, and an f-score of 61,1%.
IMMUNOTOXINS FOR THE TREATMENT OF LEUKAEMIA

The remarkable delivery system afforded by monoclonal antibodies has been strategically combined with the powerful native toxicity of numerous plant and bacterial proteins to produce a new generation of therapeutic agents known a5 immunotoxins. Toxins are selected for their catalytic nature and structural features that affect potency as well as safety. In broad terms, toxins chosen for study may be categorized as single chain or two chain. (A notable exception is Pseudornor i m exotoxin, which has three structural domains.) Ricin and diphtheria toxins are examples of native two-chain proteins that are of interest for cancer therapy. The A chain of these toxins is the cytotoxic portion that inhibits ribosomal protein synthesis and destroys the cell after entering the cytosol. The B chain binds to cell surface receptors and facilitates passage of the A chain into the cytosol (Olsnes & Sandvig, 1983). Hemitoxins are single-chain ribosome-inhibiting proteins that act on eukaryotic ribosomes by inactivating the 60s subunit, resulting in irreversible cessation of cellular protein synthesis at the level of peptide elongation. Hemitoxins have been isolated from many plants including soapwort (Saponaria officinalis), bitter gourd (Momordica charantia), wheat (Triticuni vulgaris. Geloniutn niulijlorutn) and pokeweed (Phytolacen arnericnnrz). Pokeweed antiviral protein (PAP) exists in three immunologically distinct forms: PAP from spring leaves of Phytolacca americana, PAP-I1 from late summer leaves, and PAP-S from seeds of the plant. The pokeweed plant is widely distributed and easily identifiable. The three species of PAP have approximately the same molecular weight (29 000) and inhibit the activity of eukaryotic ribosomes with similar efficacy (Irvin. 1983). Unlike ricin. PAP does not bind to cell surface receptors and is therefore less prone to nonspecific toxicities. All of these toxins acquire their target selectivity and therapeutic potential as immunotoxins by conjugation to the appropriate monoclonal antibody. The choice of monoclonal antibody is based on the surface antigen profile of a malignancy as determined by analysis of clonogenic blasts. For the past decade, immunotoxins have been under investigation for the treatment of various cancers, and more recently for the treatment of immunological disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).
Imaging of Ca2+‐induced cytoplasmic Ca2+ responses in normal and pathological parathyroid cells

Ca2+‐induced changes in the cytoplasmic Ca2+ concentration ([Ca2+]i) were studied in bovine and normal and pathological human parathyroid cells using digital image analysis of fura‐2‐loaded cells. When raising external Ca2+ from 0.5 to 3.0 mmol L−1, about 95% of all cells reacted rapidly and simultaneously with sustained elevation of [Ca2+]i. In approximately two out of three bovine parathyroid cells, normal human cells and cells from most patients with hyperparathyroidism (HPT) the sustained phase was preceded by an overshooting [Ca2+]i transient. The proportion of cells with such a transient was decreased in cells from severe cases of uraemic parathyroid hyperplasia only. However, pathological human cells from adenomas and normal‐sized glands associated with adenomas, as well as cells from primary and uraemic hyperplasias, had lower peak and sustained levels than normal human and bovine cells. The results indicate that both normal and pathological parathyroid cells exhibit heterogeneity in their [Ca2+]i responses to elevation of external Ca2+. The Ca2+‐induced [Ca2+]i transients and the sustained elevations are attenuated in pathological human parathyroid cells. However, the presence of the overshooting transient represents physiological variability rather than being a consequence of the pathophysiology associated with HPT.
An Adenylyl Cyclase-mAKAPβ Signaling Complex Regulates cAMP Levels in Cardiac Myocytes*

Protein kinase A-anchoring proteins (AKAPs) play important roles in the compartmentation of cAMP signaling, anchoring protein kinase A (PKA) to specific cellular organelles and serving as scaffolds that assemble localized signaling cascades. Although AKAPs have been recently shown to bind adenylyl cyclase (AC), the functional significance of this association has not been studied. In cardiac myocytes, the muscle protein kinase A-anchoring protein β (mAKAPβ) coordinates cAMP-dependent, calcium, and MAP kinase pathways and is important for cellular hypertrophy. We now show that mAKAPβ selectively binds type 5 AC in the heart and that mAKAPβ-associated AC activity is absent in AC5 knock-out hearts. Consistent with its known inhibition by PKA phosphorylation, AC5 is inhibited by association with mAKAPβ-PKA complexes. AC5 binds to a unique N-terminal site on mAKAP-(245–340), and expression of this peptide disrupts endogenous mAKAPβ-AC association. Accordingly, disruption of mAKAPβ-AC5 complexes in neonatal cardiac myocytes results in increased cAMP and hypertrophy in the absence of agonist stimulation. Taken together, these results show that the association of AC5 with the mAKAPβ complex is required for the regulation of cAMP second messenger controlling cardiac myocyte hypertrophy.
Low frequency of myocilin mutations in Indian primary open‐angle glaucoma patients

Glaucoma is one of the major causes of blindness in the Indian population. Mutations in the myocilin (MYOC) gene have been reported in different populations. However, reports on MYOC mutations in Indian primary open‐angle glaucoma (POAG) patients and juvenile open‐angle glaucoma (JOAG) patients are sparse. We therefore screened 100 unrelated POAG/JOAG patients for MYOC mutations. Patients with POAG/JOAG were clinically diagnosed. Genomic DNA from such patients was collected and studied for MYOC mutations by direct sequencing. Nucleotide variations were compared with unrelated healthy controls by restriction enzyme digestion. Secondary structure prediction for the sequence variants was performed by Chou–Fasman method. A novel mutation in exon 1 (144 G→Α) resulting in Gln48His substitution was observed in 2% of the patients. Four other polymorphisms were also observed. The novel mutation was seen in four other affected family members of a JOAG patient. The novel mutation was found to alter the secondary structure in the glycosaminoglycan initiation site of the protein. MYOC mutations were found in 2% of the population studied. MYOC gene may not be playing a significant role in causing POAG in the Indian population.
Model Checking the Quantitative μ-Calculus on Linear Hybrid Systems

In this work, we consider the model-checking problem for a quantitative extension of the modal µ-calculus on a class of hybrid systems. Qualitative model checking has been proved decidable and implemented for several classes of systems, but this is not the case for quantitative questions, which arise naturally in this context. Recently, quantitative formalisms that subsume classical temporal logics and additionally allow to measure interesting quantitative phenomena were introduced. We show how a powerful quantitative logic, the quantitative µ-calculus, can be model-checked with arbitrary precision on initialised linear hybrid systems. To this end, we develop new techniques for the discretisation of continuous state spaces based on a special class of strategies in model-checking games and show decidability of a class of counter-reset games that may be of independent interest.
Vector soup: high‐throughput identification of Neotropical phlebotomine sand flies using metabarcoding

Phlebotomine sand flies are haematophagous dipterans of primary medical importance. They represent the only proven vectors of leishmaniasis worldwide and are involved in the transmission of various other pathogens. Studying the ecology of sand flies is crucial to understand the epidemiology of leishmaniasis and further control this disease. A major limitation in this regard is that traditional morphological‐based methods for sand fly species identifications are time‐consuming and require taxonomic expertise. DNA metabarcoding holds great promise in overcoming this issue by allowing the identification of multiple species from a single bulk sample. Here, we assessed the reliability of a short insect metabarcode located in the mitochondrial 16S rRNA for the identification of Neotropical sand flies, and constructed a reference database for 40 species found in French Guiana. Then, we conducted a metabarcoding experiment on sand flies mixtures of known content and showed that the method allows an accurate identification of specimens in pools. Finally, we applied metabarcoding to field samples caught in a 1‐ha forest plot in French Guiana. Besides providing reliable molecular data for species‐level assignations of phlebotomine sand flies, our study proves the efficiency of metabarcoding based on the mitochondrial 16S rRNA for studying sand fly diversity from bulk samples. The application of this high‐throughput identification procedure to field samples can provide great opportunities for vector monitoring and eco‐epidemiological studies.