Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Molecular Pathways of Neurodegeneration in Parkinson's Disease

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a complex disorder with many different causes, yet they may intersect in common pathways, raising the possibility that neuroprotective agents may have broad applicability in the treatment of PD. Current evidence suggests that mitochondrial complex I inhibition may be the central cause of sporadic PD and that derangements in complex I cause α-synuclein aggregation, which contributes to the demise of dopamine neurons. Accumulation and aggregation of α-synuclein may further contribute to the death of dopamine neurons through impairments in protein handling and detoxification. Dysfunction of parkin (a ubiquitin E3 ligase) and DJ-1 could contribute to these deficits. Strategies aimed at restoring complex I activity, reducing oxidative stress and α-synuclein aggregation, and enhancing protein degradation may hold particular promise as powerful neuroprotective agents in the treatment of PD.
The Use of an Oral Fluid Immunoglobulin G ELISA for the Detection of Helicobacter pylori Infection in Children

Background. Enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) evaluation of oral fluid immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies to Helicobacter pylori is a unique approach for both epidemiological studies and the diagnosis of infection, especially in children. The use of oral fluid sampling to evaluate specific H. pylori IgG antibodies has advantages over serum, including reduced biohazard risk and noninvasive collection. Oral fluid sampling is fast and involves minimal patient discomfort. Since children facilitate transmission of H. pylori infection, a simple, accurate, noninvasive diagnostic test is necessary for large epidemiologic studies. The aim of our study was to evaluate a new oral fluid ELISA for detection of IgG antibodies to H. pylori in children.
Aggregation protocols in light of reliable communication

Aggregation protocols allow for distributed lightweight computations deployed on ad-hoc networks in a peer-to-peer fashion. Due to reliance on wireless technology, the communication medium is often hostile which makes such protocols susceptible to correctness and performance issues. In this paper, we study the behavior of aggregation protocols when subject to communication failures: message loss, duplication, and network partitions. We show that resolving communication failures at the communication layer, through a simple reliable communication layer, reduces the overhead of using alternative fault tolerance techniques at upper layers, and also preserves the original accuracy and simplicity of protocols. The empirical study we drive shows that tradeoffs exist across various aggregation protocols, and there is no one-size-fits-all protocol.
ECG artifact and BIS in severe brain injury.

References 1. Fisher MM, Bowey CJ. Alleged allergy to local anaesthetics. Anaesth Intensive Care 1997;25:611–4. 2. Schatz M. Skin testing and incremental challenge in the evaluation of adverse reactions to local anesthetics. J Allergy Clin Immunol 1984;74:606–16. 3. Eggleston ST, Lush LW. Understanding allergic reactions to local anesthetics. Ann Pharmacother 1996;30:851–7. 4. Troise C, Voltolini S, Minale P, et al. Management of patients at risk for adverse reactions to local anesthetics: analysis of 386 cases. J Investig Allergol Clin Immunol 1998;8:172–5.
Design Aspects of High-Speed High-Power-Density Laminated-Rotor Induction Machines

This paper deals with the considerations associated with the design of high-speed high-power-density laminated-rotor induction machines (IMs). The considerations discussed are described by the design of an actual 10-kW machine, which runs at speeds of up to 75 kr/min with a rated power density of 28 MW/m3 for an electrically assisted turbocharger. Using a developed multidomain design environment which puts equal weight on the electromagnetic, mechanical, and thermal aspects, the rotor split ratio, electric and magnetic loadings, lamination material, rotor-bar material, and rotor-bar shape are identified as important and sensitive parameters in the design of high-speed IMs. Finally, general guidelines for designing high-speed high-power-density IMs are presented.
On the behavior of the solutions to autonomous linear difference equations with continuous variable

During the last few years, a number of articles has been appeared in the literature, which are motivated by the old but very interesting papers by Driver [7, 8] and Driver, Sasser and Slater [10] dealing with the asymptotic behavior and the stability of the solutions of delay differential equations. See [2, 4, 5, 12, 13, 17-21, 27-41, 44]. These articles are concerned with the asymptotic behavior (and, more general, the behavior) and the stability for delay differential equations, neutral delay differential equations and (neutral or non-neutral) integrodifferential equations with unbounded delay as well as for delay difference equations (with discrete or continuous variable), neutral delay difference equations and (neutral or non-neutral) Volterra difference equations with infinite delay. In the above list of articles, there are only three of them dealing with difference equations with continuous variable; see [31, 44] and the last section of [33]. For some related results, the reader is referred to [3, 9, 14, 15, 26, 42, 43]. In the present paper, we continue the study in [17-21, 27-41] to difference equations with continuous variable. In the last two decades, the study of difference equations has attracted significant interest by many researchers. This is due, in a large part, to the rapidly increasing number of applications of the theory of difference equations to various fields of applied sciences and technology. For the basic theory of difference equations, we refer to the books by Agarwal [1], Elaydi [11], Kelley and Peterson [16],
A comparison of bioelectricity in microbial fuel cells with aerobic and anaerobic anodes

Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) can, besides running on wastewater, also derive energy directly from certain aquatic plants. However, few studies have focussed on electricity generation using aerobic anodes. This study presents a comparison of the MFC performances of an anaerobic-anode MFC (ana-MFC) and an aerobic-anode MFC (aa-MFC), and shows their individual conditions for optimal operation. Results show that the maximum power density of 7.07±0.45 mW/m2 for the ana-MFC occurred at 500 Ω, whereas the aa-MFC had a maximum power density of 2.34±0.16 mW/m2 at 2200 Ω. The ana-MFC generally achieved high electricity generation, and the aa-MFC achieved relatively high electricity generation when fed with a diluted substrate. In the ana-MFC, the optimal substrate for electricity generation was glucose (fermentable substrate); however, glucose and acetic acid (non-fermentable substrate) were both suitable substrates for the aa-MFC. The optimal gas retention times of the ana-MFC and the aa-MFC were 9 and 120 s, respectively. This retention time is an important limiting factor of electricity generation for the ana-MFC. The aa-MFCs fed with different substrates exhibited non-significant differences between bacterial communities. We observed the relative diversities of bacterial communities in the ana-MFC fed with various substrates. The results of denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis analysis suggest that Ochrobactrum intermedium, Delftia acidovorans, and Citrobacter freundii may be potential electrogenic bacteria. To our knowledge, this is the first study comparing the MFC performances of anaerobic and aerobic anodes.
Plasma von Willebrand factor level as a prognostic indicator of patients with metastatic colorectal carcinoma.

AIM To evaluate the correlations of plasma von Willebrand factor (vWF) level with the distant metastasis and prognosis of patients with colorectal cancer. METHODS A total of 86 patients with histologically confirmed metastatic colorectal cancers receiving treatment at Taipei Veterans General Hospital were enrolled. All patients had measurable metastatic lesions and life expectancies of more than 3 mo. Plasma vWF levels were measured by immuno-turbidimetric assay and compared with results from 40 non-metastatic colorectal cancer patients and 22 healthy controls. Patients with metastatic colorectal cancer were divided into two groups according to serum vWF levels and the differences between these two groups were analyzed using chi2 test. Data on age, gender, performance status, location of primary tumor, extent of metastasis, site of metastases, histological differentiation, serum CEA and plasma vWF levels were analyzed to determine association with survival. Survival curves were constructed by Kaplan-Meier product limit method and the data was analyzed using log-rank test on a microcomputer. Multivariate analysis using the Cox's proportional hazards regression model was then performed to determine the independent prognostic indicators among all of the possible variables. RESULTS Colorectal cancer patients were identified as having significantly higher plasma vWF concentrations than healthy controls (P<0.05). Moreover, higher vWF plasma levels were associated with advanced tumor stage (P<0.05) and the presence of multiple metastases (P = 0.014). Patients with lower vWF plasma levels (< or =160%) survived significantly longer than those with a higher plasma vWF level (log-rank test, P = 0.0043). By multivariate analysis, plasma vWF levels (P<0.001), the extent of metastasis (P = 0.012), and the performance status (P = 0.014) were identified as independent prognostic factors. CONCLUSION Our data indicates that high plasma vWF concentrations correlate with advanced diseases and significantly poor prognosis of patients with metastatic colorectal carcinoma. It may serve as a potential biological marker of disease progression in these patients.
Linking Resilience Theory and Diffusion of Innovations Theory to Understand the Potential for Perennials in the U.S. Corn Belt

In the last 200 yr, more than 80% of the land in the U.S. Corn Belt agro-ecosystem has been converted from natural perennial vegetation to intensive agricultural production of row crops. Despite research showing how re-integration of perennial vegetation, e.g., cover crops, pasture, riparian buffers, and restored wetlands, at strategic landscape positions can bolster declining regional ecosystem functions, the amount of land area devoted to row crop production in the Corn Belt continues to increase. As this region enters a time of fast-paced and uncertain reorganization driven by the emerging bioeconomy, changes in land use will continue to take place that will impact the resilience of the Corn Belt's linked social and ecological systems for years to come. Both resilience theory and the diffusion of innovations theory investigate how change is brought about in systems through the adaptation and innovation of social actors. In this paper, we integrate these two frameworks in the analysis of 33 in-depth interviews to improve our understanding of how rural Corn Belt stakeholders make conservation decisions in the midst of an uncertain future. Interview data indicate that the adoption of conservation practices is based not only on immediate profitability but also on the interplay between contextual factors at three distinct levels of the system: compatibility with farm priorities, profitability, practices, and technologies; community-level reinforcement through local social networks, norms, and support structures; and consistent, straightforward, flexible, and well-targeted incentives and regulations issuing from regional institutions. Interviewees suggest that the multiscale drivers that currently support the continued expansion of row crop production could be realigned with conservation objectives in landscapes of the future. Adaptation of social actors through collaborative learning at the community level may be instrumental in brokering the sort of multiscale system change that would lead to more widespread adoption of perennial cover types in the Corn Belt.
Resource Based View in a Swedish Railway Maintenance Project Assessing the Intangible Aspects of Resource Planning

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate and understand the planning processes, systems and actors that are part of railway maintenance projects. In addition, the aim was to identify challenges and success factors for an efficient planning of maintenance activities. The information was gathered through interviews with different actors at a private railway company operating in Sweden. The investigation led to a focus on resources such as personnel, machines, competence and the ability to share knowledge. Factors that affect these resources were identified as; planning, leadership, culture, HR practices and collective approach. These focus areas were analysed through the theoretical lenses of the Resource Based View and Dynamic Capabilities framework, which emphasise on optimising internal resources for the benefit of a competitive advantage. The dynamic nature of maintenance in railway poses unique challenges in planning, therefore conventional project management techniques become tricky to use. In comparison to construction of new railways, maintenance of railways requires time slots to be approved in advance, which is found to be the main bottleneck when trying to plan long-term. This puts much pressure on the ability to organise internal resources. Since there has not been much emphasis and academic research on cultivating internal resources within the railway industry, this thesis provides some insights to the matter.
Identification of Positive Cells to Interleukin‐4 in Bovine Haemal Nodes

The bovine haemal nodes are lymphatic organs located in the haemal circulation. Their parenchyma is represented by plasma cells, macrophages and B and T lymphocytes. The T helper type 2 (Th2) CD4 lymphocyte can be found within the T lymphocytes. The activated Th2 CD4 lymphocyte produces interleukin‐4 (IL‐4), a peptidic hormone involved in the acute‐phase immune response. This interleukin can promote either B‐lymphocyte differentiation and T‐lymphocyte proliferation or it can promote the type of immunoglobulin that can be liberated. Our results have shown, by immunostaining with anti‐IL‐4, not only the presence and localization of these lymphocytes in bovine haemal nodes but also the participation of polymorphonuclear cells (neutrophils) in the storage of IL‐4. These results give value to the humoral and cellular immunological importance of haemal nodes in bovines and they can serve as a contribution to determine the cross‐reactivity of bovine IL‐4 with the human anti‐serum used in this work.
An epigenetic marker panel for screening and prognostic prediction of ovarian cancer

Aberrant CpG island hypermethylation is a common finding of cancers, which might be detectable in the tissue or serum of affected patients. We analyzed DNA methylation by methylation‐specific polymerase chain reaction of 7 genes, which included secreted frizzled receptor proteins 1, 2, 4, 5 (SFRP1, 2, 4, 5), SRY‐box 1 (SOX1), paired box gene 1 (PAX1) and LIM homeobox transcription factor 1, alpha (LMX1A) in primary tumor samples from 126 patients with ovarian cancer, 75 with a benign tumor and 14 with borderline malignancy of an ovarian tumor, and in the serum from 26 patients with ovarian cancer and 20 with a benign tumor. Six of 7 genes had higher methylation rates in patients with ovarian cancer than in borderline malignancy or benign tumor (p < 0.001). The methylation of SFRP1, SFRP2, SOX1 and LMX1A genes correlated with recurrence and overall survival of ovarian cancer patients. Combining the data for SFRP1, SFRP2 and SOX1 genes gave a relative risk for recurrence of 3.19 (p = 0.013) in patients with at least one gene methylation, and combining the data for SFRP1, SOX1 and LMX1A gave an RR for cancer‐related death of 6.09 (p = 0.010). Methylation analysis of tissues and serum revealed a significant correlation (kappa values, 0.332–0.598) and a highly sensitivity and specificity rates (73.08 and 75%) as a screening marker. In conclusion, promoter hypermethylation of specific genes in critical pathways is common in ovarian cancer and has potential as a prognostic factor and a promising serum marker for early screening. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
An Overview of U.S. Property-liability Insurer Earnings Management via Loss Reserves

This study provides an overview of U.S. property-liability insurers’ earnings management using estimated liabilities for unpaid claims called loss reserves. With three aspects of loss reserves: direction, magnitude, and volatility, this paper compares insurer’s earnings management with real activity measurement and discretionary/non-discretionary accruals. The current literature suggests various incentives such as income smoothing, tax, financial weakness, regulatory scrutiny avoidance, contracts, capital markets, external monitoring and executive compensation motivations. In this paper, we offer not only a thorough review but also an empirical analysis to investigate those motivations and show consistent evidence with prior studies. Future researchers in this area will benefit from this paper as it merits its need and potential research areas to explore.
Pretreatment of Parsley Suspension Cultures with Salicylic Acid Enhances Spontaneous and Elicited Production of H2O2

Suspension-cultured cells of parsley (Petroselinum crispum L.) were used to study the regulation of extracellular H2O2. After resuspension, the washed cells regulated the H2O2 concentration spontaneously to a constant level that was greatly increased when the cultures were pretreated for 1 d with salicylic acid (SA). The H2O2 level was further increased on addition of a fungal elicitor preparation, macromolecular chitosan, the sterol-binding polyene macrolide amphotericin B, the G protein-activating peptide mastoparan, or La3+. In all cases, this induced H2O2 burst was also greatly enhanced in cell suspensions pretreated with SA. Both the spontaneous and the induced H2O2 production were decreased by the protein kinase inhibitor K-252a. It is suggested that production of extracellular H2O2 occurs by an endogenously controlled plasma membrane enzyme complex that requires continuous phosphorylation for function and whose activity is increased by pretreatment of the cells with SA. This system can also receive various external stimuli, including those resulting from binding of fungal elicitor. SA can induce acquired resistance against pathogens. The conditioning of the parsley suspension culture by SA represents, therefore, a model for the long-term regulation of apoplastic H2O2 concentration by this signal substance, as suggested previously for the wound hormone methyl jasmonate.
Do complex pitch gestures induce syllable lengthening in Catalan and Spanish

In both Spanish and Catalan, narrow contrastive focus and presentational broad focus in nuclear position have different pitch accent choices, namely a rising or a falling pitch accent, respectively. In words with final stress, narrow contrastive focus displays a rise-fall complex pitch gesture in the last syllable of the utterance. This article investigates the effects of the complexity of such a pitch pattern on the durational properties of the syllables in both languages when compared to the simpler falling pitch movement. The results of the production experiment reveal that, in general, the presence of a complex pitch pattern tends to have a lengthening effect on the target syllable. Yet we also find that some instances of this complex contour can be partially truncated, in which case it does not trigger lengthening. In sum, even though truncation and compression have been claimed to be language- and dialect-specific strategies (Ladd 1996; Grabe 1998; Grabe et al. 2000), in our data, truncation can be considered a speaker phonetic realization strategy that interacts with timing in such a way that there is a trade-off relationship between the two factors.
Disentangling supply chain management competencies and their impact on performance: A knowledge-based view

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to extend the understanding of supply chain management (SCM) competencies by splitting them into individual and organizational components and measuring their impact on SCM performance. Design/methodology/approach Hypothesized relationships are tested using structural equation modeling and bootstrapping mediation analysis based on a multi-national survey with 273 managers while drawing on the theory of knowledge management and literature streams of individual competencies in the fields of SCM and human resource management (HRM), respectively. Findings The analysis reveals that individual SCM competencies and organizational SCM knowledge positively influence SCM performance to a similar magnitude. Moreover, organizational learning enhances individual competencies and organizational knowledge significantly and equally while corporate training programs fall surprisingly short of expectations. The disentanglement of SCM competencies renders HRM’s contribution to SCM visible by revealing the impact of HRM and learning practices on competencies, knowledge, and performance. Research limitations/implications To validate the findings, future research could apply different research methods such as case studies and focus on more countries to reduce potential methodological and regional biases. Practical implications The results suggest that corporate training programs need further development. Organizational learning’s strong direct and indirect effects have two main implications: first, it should serve as motivation for organizations to constantly improve their learning capabilities. Second, these only tap its true potential for enhancing SCM performance if they first elevate individual competencies and organizational knowledge. Originality/value This is the first paper to distinguish between individual competencies and organizational knowledge on finely nuanced levels. While the organizational knowledge level effect on performance has been studied before, this paper extends this effect to also hold true for the individual level.
The effect of financial misreporting on corporate mergers and acquisitions

In this paper, we investigate how misreporting influences merger and acquisition decisions. We analyze a sample of 283 firms accused of committing accounting fraud by the SEC between 1985 and 2003. During the alleged fraud period, these firms pursued over 300 acquisitions valued at $305 billion in the aggregate. Managers that pursue acquisitions increase the risk that the fraud will be discovered during negotiations. On the other hand, successful transactions conceal misreporting by complicating the firm’s accounting information after the transaction closes. Our results suggest that these concealment benefits outweigh the incremental detection costs: Fraud firms are more likely than non-fraud firms to acquire another company and are also more likely to acquire firms that have less public information, are harder to value, and have less similar operations. In addition, we find that fraud firms negotiate provisions that increase the likelihood of deal success and accelerate the closing date to speed up the consolidation of the target’s and fraud firm’s financial statements. Taken as a whole, our results suggest that managers engaged in accounting manipulation use acquisitions in an ex ante attempt to conceal misreporting and that these concealment benefits outweigh the increase in detection risk. We appreciate comments from Jerry Zimmerman and workshop participants at National University of Singapore, Penn State University, SUNY Buffalo, Yale University, University of Alabama, and the Information, Markets and Organizations conference at Harvard University. Mengjie Huang provided valuable research assistance.