Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Analysis of white blood cell dynamics in nailfold capillaries

Based on video data acquired with low-cost, portable microscopy equipment, we introduce a semi-automatic method to count visual gaps in the blood flow as a proxy for white blood cells (WBC) passing through nailfold capillaries. Following minimal user interaction and a pre-processing stage, our method consists in the spatio-temporal segmentation and analysis of capillary profiles. Besides the mere count information, it also estimates the speed associated with every WBC event. The accuracy of our algorithm is validated through the analysis of two capillaries acquired from one healthy subject. Results are compared with manual counts from four human raters and confronted with related physiological data reported in literature.
Determination of the in vivo carbon dioxide titration curve of anaesthetized man.

SUMMARY A comparison has been made between the pH changes in the arterial blood of anaesthetized patients exposed to changes of Pco 2 above and below the normal range, and those in the same blood equilibrated with similar changes of Pco 2 in vitro. Changes in the non-respiratory component as represented by standard bicarbonate, were derived from the in vitro equilibrations. There was a linear relationship between log Pa co2 and pH, and between pH and the plasma bicarbonate concentration, over the whole range studied in vivo. In the presence of wide variations of carbon dioxide tension, nitrous oxide anaesthesia of more than 2 hours duration, supplemented with a muscle relaxant and a potent analgesic, did not produce any significant alteration of the non-respiratory component of acid-base balance. Although changes of standard bicarbonate occurred in response to alterations of Pa co2 , these changes are not considered to represent true changes of the non-respiratory component. The application of parameters derived from in vitro equilibrations, to the behaviour of arterial blood in vivo is discussed. The mechanisms of extravascular buffering of induced changes of Pco 2 , are reviewed, and related to the behaviour of arterial blood in equilibrium with extracellular and intracellular tissue fluids.
An early warning system for groundwater flooding in the Chalk

Abstract An early warning system has been developed for groundwater flooding and trialled in the Patcham area of Brighton. It provides a fit-for-purpose approach for forecasting groundwater flood events in the Chalk and is capable of operating across longer time scales than had previously been possible. The method involves a set of nested steps or tasks. Initially, the catchment's response to recharge is determined and, using a representative hydrograph, a simple regression model that relates annual groundwater level minima and autumn and winter rainfall to subsequent annual maxima is developed. The regression model is then applied at the end of each summer recession using the observed annual minimum and estimates of winter rainfall to predict the following groundwater level maximum. Based on the results of this prediction a variety of steps may then be appropriate. Where the model predicts potentially high groundwater levels the frequency of groundwater level monitoring observations can be increased. A novel element of the method developed is the monitoring of changes in the matric potential of the unsaturated zone. Specific trigger levels to initiate either the next step of the method or promulgation of warnings of varying severity will be developed through experience of use of the system.
The Unmet Needs of the Elderly with Diabetes in Home Health Care

Abstract The implementation of the Prospective Payment System (PPS) in Medicare home health care has raised concern about health outcomes of elderly patients since its intention is to curb spending. This study examines the unmet needs of older diabetic patients while receiving home health care and post-discharge from home health care (N = 129) in order to explore any effects of PPS on patients' need. The study found that a higher proportion of elders had unmet needs 30 days post-discharge compared with while receiving home health care. The specific unmet needs identified by the elderly diabetic patients included social work services, home health aide, homemaker services, and need for medical equipment. The study explores the role of social work to better manage the unmet needs of diabetic elders who live in the community.
The effect of personality trait, age, and gender on the performance of automatic speech valence recognition

Individual differences have significant effects on the expression of emotions. One may express the emotions openly such that they are easily recognizable, and one may be less expressive. Consequently, an emotion recognizer system will be affected by the emotion expressions from different individuals. Knowing which human factors improve or deteriorate the performance of the emotion recognizer, we can train systems based on those factors and select one of those systems that corresponds to the detected human factor of the target person. In this paper, we investigate the effect of age, gender, and Big-Five personality traits (Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism) on the performance of a speech emotion recognizer. We found that, age is the paramount factor followed by gender. Conscientiousness and Neuroticism also have a substantial effect. These findings are in congruent with the literature, meaning that the performance of a speech emotion recognizer is closely correlated with the emotion expressivity of the individuals whose speech are used for training the recognition models. Additionally, based on these findings, we create a set of simple rules to select an appropriate trained model for new speech samples. This model selection approach yields higher emotion recognition accuracy.
Benefits and challenges brought by improved results from in vitro fertilization

In vitro fertilization (IVF), in which preimplantation‐stage embryos are produced after ovarian stimulation and retrieval of preovulatory oocytes, now accounts for almost 2% of all births in Australia. For clinics performing in the top quartile of national results, the chance of a live birth for a woman under 35 years from one round of egg retrieval and IVF treatment is greater than 50%, albeit still with a greater than 20% risk of twins or higher order multiple pregnancy. Similar or better live birth rates are now obtainable with the elective transfer of a single embryo at the stage of blastocyst (5–6 days in culture), a policy that if adopted for younger women can reduce the risk of twins in a clinic to less than 15%. Current developments centre around improvements to embryo culture and the testing of embryos for chromosomal normality and other genetic and epigenetic variables before transfer, made possible by licences for embryo research protocols now being issued under the Commonwealth's Research Involving Human Embryos Act 2002. (Intern Med J 2004; 35: 108–117)
The Hausa Language. An Encyclopedic Reference Grammar

This book is a comprehensive grammar of Hausa, one of the largest and most important languages of Africa. Hausa is spoken by some 35 million people as a first language and approximately 15 million more as a second language. Paul Newman, a world authority on the Hausa language, draws on two centuries of Hausa linguistic scholarship to provide the most authoritative and detailed grammar of the language ever written. Unlike other grammars, this book is organised alphabetically. Readers will appreciate the ease with which they can find the specific individual topics that interest them. The grammar covers such expected topics as tonology, noun plurals, and verbal tense/aspect as well as often neglected topics, including verbal idioms, proper names, and language games. Newman also incorporates historical linguistic notes that explain and explicate current Hausa phenomena, especially puzzling anomalies, in terms of their Chadic and Afroasiatic origins.
An evaluation of free/open source static analysis tools applied to embedded software

Static analysis can be a valuable strategy to improve the quality of embedded software at a lower development cost. In this paper, we have surveyed ten different free/open source tools that perform static software analysis and evaluated their use in embedded software. Experimental results show that the studied tools present widely different results, and most of them are not ready to be applied to embedded systems. Furthermore, we discuss possible directions to improve the use of static analysis tools in the embedded domain.
Deaths: injuries, 2002.

OBJECTIVES This report presents injury mortality data for 2002 using the external-cause-of-injury mortality matrix for the International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision (ICD-10). The external cause matrix is a detailed and comprehensive framework for tabulating and presenting injury deaths by mechanism and intent of death. Data are presented by age, sex, race, Hispanic origin, and State. In addition, trend data are shown for 1999-2002 by age, sex, and mechanism and intent of injury. This report also introduces the injury mortality diagnosis matrix. This latter is another framework that categorizes the nearly 1,200 injury diagnosis codes from ICD-10's chapter 19 according to body region and nature of the injury diagnosis information captured in the multiple-cause-of-death fields of the national mortality file. This report supplements the annual report of final mortality statistics. METHODS Data in this report are based on information from all death certificates filed in the 50 States and the District of Columbia in 2002. Causes of death and nature of injury are processed and coded in accordance with the ICD-10. RESULTS In 2002, 161,269 resident deaths occurred as the result of injuries. Of these injury deaths, 66.2 percent were classified as unintentional, 19.6 percent were suicides, 10.9 percent were homicides, 3.0 percent were of undetermined intent, and 0.3 percent involved legal intervention or operations of war. The five leading mechanisms of injury death were motor vehicle traffic, firearm, poisoning, falls, and suffocation, accounting for 81 percent of all injury deaths. The rate of poisoning deaths increased by 17.9 percent between 2001 and 2002, but the reader is advised to interpret these numbers cautiously as a portion of this increase is due to stricter procedures concerning data processing that were implemented in 2002. Thirty percent of injuries resulting in death were to the head and neck region with the vast majority of these classified as traumatic brain injury. Injuries involving the whole body system accounted for 28 percent of all injuries mentioned (17 percent were poisoning and 7 percent were other effects of external causes, such as submersion or asphyxiation). CONCLUSIONS Injury mortality data presented in this report using the external cause-of-injury mortality matrix for ICD-10 provide detail on the mechanism of death needed for research and other activities related to injury prevention. This report highlights the importance of multiple causes-of-death data when analyzing injury mortality--special attention is given to the issue of accuracy and completeness of information as it pertains to these data. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) is involved in several ongoing projects related to the study of injury and injury mortality.
MAPK3/1 (ERK1/2) in Ovarian Granulosa Cells Are Essential for Female Fertility

Regulating Oocyte Maturation Understanding exactly how ovarian follicles mature to generate fertile eggs is key to many aspects of fertility treatment. When the pituitary surge of luteinizing hormone (LH) binds to its receptor on granulosa cells of preovulatory follicles, a cascade of signaling events triggers granulosa cells to become luteal cells and the oocyte to resume meiosis. Fan et al. (p. 938; see the Perspective by Duggavathi and Murphy), using the mouse as a model system, targeted disruption of the kinases ERK1 and ERK2 selectively in granulosa cells. The kinases were essential in vivo mediators of LH induction of ovulation and luteinization. Targeted disruption of the kinases derails the molecular events that mediate induction of female reproductive development. A surge of luteinizing hormone (LH) from the pituitary gland triggers ovulation, oocyte maturation, and luteinization for successful reproduction in mammals. Because the signaling molecules RAS and ERK1/2 (extracellular signal–regulated kinases 1 and 2) are activated by an LH surge in granulosa cells of preovulatory follicles, we disrupted Erk1/2 in mouse granulosa cells and provide in vivo evidence that these kinases are necessary for LH-induced oocyte resumption of meiosis, ovulation, and luteinization. In addition, biochemical analyses and selected disruption of the Cebpb gene in granulosa cells demonstrate that C/EBPβ (CCAAT/Enhancer-binding protein–β) is a critical downstream mediator of ERK1/2 activation. Thus, ERK1/2 and C/EBPβ constitute an in vivo LH-regulated signaling pathway that controls ovulation- and luteinization-related events.
"Population" approach improves parameter estimation of kinetic models from dynamic PET data

Kinetic modeling is used to indirectly measure physiological parameters from dynamic positron emission tomography (PET) data. Usually, the unknown parameters of the model are estimated, in any given region of interest (ROI), by least squares (LS). However, when the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of PET data is too low, LS does not allow reliable parameter estimation. To overcome this problem, we study in this paper the applicability of approaches originally developed in the pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic literature and referred to as "population approaches". In particular, we consider the iterative two stage (ITS) method, which, given a set of M ROIs drawn on PET images of a given individual, estimates the unknown model parameters of each ROI by exploiting the information contained in all the M ROIs. After having revised the theory behind ITS, we assess its performance versus LS by using Monte Carlo simulations which allow us to evaluate the bias of the two methods in a variety of situations. Then, we compare the performance of LS and ITS in two case studies on [/sup 18/F]FDG kinetics in human skeletal muscle. Both simulated and real case studies results show that a population approach is of potential in modeling PET images since it allows to reliably estimate model parameters also in those ROIs where either a bad SNR or a poor sampling (e.g., infrequent scanning and/or short experiment duration) make the use of LS unsuccessful.
Neural stability : A re fl ection of automaticity in reading

Automaticity, the ability to perform a task rapidly with minimal effort, plays a key role in reading fluency and is indexed by rapid automatized naming (RAN) and processing speed. Yet little is known about automaticity's neurophysiologic underpinnings. The more efficiently sound is encoded, the more automatic sound processing can be. In turn, this automaticity could free up cognitive resources such as attention and working memory to help build an integrative reading network. Therefore, we hypothesized that automaticity and reading fluency correlate with stable neural representation of sounds, given a larger body of literature suggesting the close relationship between neural stability and the integrative function in the central auditory system. To test this hypothesis, we recorded the frequency-following responses (FFR) to speech syllables and administered cognitive and reading measures to school-aged children. We show that the stability of neural responses to speech correlates with RAN and processing speed, but not phonological awareness. Moreover, the link between neural stability and RAN mediates the previously-determined link between neural stability and reading ability. Children with a RAN deficit have especially unstable neural responses. Our neurophysiological approach illuminates a potential neural mechanism specific to RAN, which in turn indicates a relationship between synchronous neural firing in the auditory system and automaticity critical for reading fluency.
Therapeutic effect of all-trans retinoic acid on rats with anti-GBM antibody glomerulonephritis.

BACKGROUND All-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) has antiproliferative and anti-inflammatory effects and is currently used in the treatment of leukemia and dermatologic diseases. We tested the therapeutic potential of ATRA on anti-glomerular basement membrane (GBM) glomerulonephritis rats. METHODS Glomerulonephritis was induced in male Wistar-Kyoto rats on day 0 by an intravenous injection of antirat GBM antibody. On day 14 after the induction of anti-GBM glomerulonephritis, some rats were sacrificed (N = 5). Another 10 rats were divided into two groups: the vehicle group (N = 5) and the ATRA treated group (N = 5). ATRA was orally administrated from day 14 to day 27 after disease induction. Blood pressure, body weight, urinary protein excretion, and blood chemistry was determined on days 1, 14, 21, and 27. Kidney samples were obtained on day 28. The kidneys were examined with periodic acid-Schiff staining (PAS) and immunohistochemistry using antibodies against the proliferative cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), rat monocyte and macrophage (ED-1), and alpha-smooth muscle actin (alpha-SMA). Glomerular RNA was extracted from isolated glomeruli, and reverse transcription (RT) followed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was performed. RESULTS ATRA administration produced a 55% reduction of proteinuria in glomerulonephritis rats. Light microscopic analysis revealed severe necrosis/crescent formation (>50% of the glomerulus) affecting 34% of glomeruli in vehicle rats, whereas ATRA treatment reduced the glomeruli showing severe change to 14%. ATRA also significantly reduced PCNA-positive cells, ED-1-positive cells and alpha-SMA-positive area in the glomeruli. RT-PCR analyses revealed that a wide variety of genes including inflammation related [tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha), interleukin-1beta (IL-1beta), and CCAAT enhancer-binding protein delta (C/EBPdelta)], cell proliferation-related [platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF)] and fibrosis-related [transforming growth factor-beta1 (TGF-beta1), type I collagen, and alpha-SMA) genes were suppressed in the glomeruli of ATRA-treated rats. CONCLUSION ATRA administration significantly reduced severe necrosis/crescent formation and urinary protein excretion in glomerulonephritis rats. Suppression of a wide variety of gene expression may partly explain the mechanism of ATRA's antiproliferative and anti-inflammatory effects. These data suggest a novel therapeutic application of ATRA toward glomerulonephritis.
Dentigerous cyst in a young child

Dentigerous cyst is a type of odontogenic cysts and generally occurs in the ages of twenties or thirties. Dentigerous cyst always includes a tooth which cannot complete the eruption process and occurs around the crown by the fluid accumulation between the layers of enamel organ. In rare cases, dentigerous cyst occurs in the first decade of life and develops in an immature permanent tooth as a result of a chronic inflammation of overlying nonvital primary tooth. In this report, a case of dentigerous cyst in primary dentition in a 5-year-old child patient and its treatment were presented. The dentigerous cyst was totally enucleated, and the unerupted permanent first premolar tooth was removed from the primary mandibular right premolar region. There was no recurrence observed after 18 months follow-up.
Effect of carotenoid oxidation products on neutrophil viability and function

Human neutrophils are short‐lived cells that play important roles in host defense and acute inflammation by releasing hydrolytic and cytotoxic proteins and reactive oxygen derivatives. Apoptosis, a physiological mechanism for cell death, regulates both production and survival of neutrophils, representing a basic biological mechanism for this type of cells. Carotenoids may react with toxic oxygen metabolites released by neutrophils to form a multitude of carotenoid cleavage products that exert, in turn, relevant prooxidative biological effects. Recent data suggest that carotenoid oxidation products may affect neutrophil viability and function by exerting proapoptotic activity and interfering with superoxide production by activated cells. The prooxidant and proapoptotic activities of carotenoid oxidation products could account, at least in some cases, for the procancerogenic properties of carotenoid rich diet.
SEXUAL SELECTION AND SEXUAL DIFFERENCES IN MORMON CRICKETS (ORTHOPTERA: TETTIGONIIDAE, ANABRUS SIMPLEX)

Darwin (1871) suggested that differences in the intensity of sexual selection on the sexes was a cause of secondary sexual differences. He proposed that behavioral and morphological traits possessed by males had evolved in the context of sexual competition, because fertilizable females are typically in short supply. Emlen and Oring (1977) pointed to several factors that are expected to change the ratio of fertilizable females to sexually active males (the operational sex ratio) and thus, the intensity of sexual selection on the sexes; theoretically both the investment of the sexes in offspring (parental investment; Trivers, 1972) and certain features of the social and physical environment are important. Parental investment theory (Trivers, 1972) predicts that females in species where males invest most in individual offspring should exhibit typically masculine traits by competing for access to sexually active males and males should exhibit typically feminine traits by being selective of mates. In vertebrate species where males provide the majority of parental care there is good evidence for a role-reversal in courtship behavior (Wittenberger, 1979; Petrie, 1983). In insects, paternal care of eggs and offspring is rare (Smith, 1980) but males of several groups supply their mates with nutritious prey items or glandular products (Thornhill, 1976a). These male efforts represent mating effort, as they apparently function in acquiring copulations (Alexander and Borgia, 1979). They are, however, "nonpromiscuous" mating efforts, potentially able to limit female reproduction (Thormhill, 1976b; Gwynne, 1984a) and thus are expected to influence the evolution of sexual differences in a similar way to male parental investment (Gwynne, 1984b). Males of many katydids (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae) feed their mates with a large spermatophore which enhances female reproduction (Gwynne, 1984a). Mormon cricket males (Anabrus simplex Haldeman) produce a large spermatophore (Gillette, 1904), investing some fifth of their body weight in a single mating. I reported a reversal in the typical courtship roles for this species; females competed for access to singing males and males discriminated among females by selecting heavier individuals as mates (Gwynne, 1981). Here I show that this courtship rolereversal is found at certain sites but not at others. I examine sexual selection and its consequences at different sites by (1) testing the prediction that sexual selection on females, as estimated by variance in mating success, should be greater at sites where sexual competition among females is observed, (2) detailing the differences in courtship behavior between sites that have apparently resulted from differences in sexual selection, (3) testing the prediction that female body size should be greater at role-reversed sites as a consequence of intersexual selection for larger females, and (4) describing possible environmental differences between sites that have caused interpopulation variation in sexual differences.