Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Somatosensory assessment and conditioned pain modulation in temporomandibular disorders pain patients

Abstract The pathophysiology and underlying pain mechanisms of temporomandibular disorders (TMD) are poorly understood. The aims were to assess somatosensory function at the temporomandibular joints (TMJs) and to examine whether conditioned pain modulation (CPM) differs between TMD pain patients (n = 34) and healthy controls (n = 34). Quantitative sensory testing was used to assess the somatosensory function. Z-scores were calculated for patients based on reference data. Conditioned pain modulation was tested by comparing pressure pain thresholds (PPTs) before, during, and after the application of painful and nonpainful cold stimuli. Pressure pain thresholds were measured at the most painful TMJ and thenar muscle (control). Data were analyzed with analyses of variance. Most (85.3%) of the patients exhibited at least 1 or more somatosensory abnormalities at the most painful TMJ with somatosensory gain with regard to PPT and punctate mechanical pain stimuli, and somatosensory loss with regard to mechanical detection and vibration detection stimuli as the most frequent abnormalities. There was a significant CPM effect (increased PPT) at both test sites during painful cold application in healthy controls and patients (P < 0.001). There was no significant difference in the relative CPM effect during painful cold application between groups (P = 0.227). In conclusion, somatosensory abnormalities were commonly detected in TMD pain patients and CPM effects were similar in TMD pain patients and healthy controls.
SAFETY FACTORS FOR XYLEM FAILURE BY IMPLOSION AND AIR-SEEDING WITHIN ROOTS, TRUNKS AND BRANCHES OF YOUNG AND OLD CONIFER TREES

The cohesion-tension theory of water transport states that hydrogen bonds hold water molecules together and that they are pulled through the xylem under tension. This tension could cause transport failure in at least two ways: collapse of the conduit walls (implosion), or rupture of the water column through air-seeding. The objective of this research was to elucidate the functional significance of variations in tracheid anatomical features, earlywood to latewood ratios and wood densities with position in young and old Douglas-fir and ponderosa pine trees in terms of their consequences for the safety factors for tracheid implosion and air-seeding. For both species, wood density increased linearly with percent latewood for root, trunk and branch samples. However, the relationships between anatomy and hydraulic function in trunks differed from those in roots and branches. In roots and branches increased hydraulic efficiency was achieved at the cost of increased vulnerability to air-seeding. Mature wood of trunks had earlywood with wide tracheids that optimized water transport and had a high percentage of latewood that optimized structural support. Juvenile wood had higher resistance to air-seeding and cell wall implosion. The two safety factors followed similar axial trends from roots to terminal branches and were similar for both species studied and between juvenile and mature wood.
Superior antimicrobial activity of trisodium citrate over heparin for catheter locking.

BACKGROUND Haemodialysis catheters used for vascular access are frequently complicated by infection and catheter-related thrombosis. Improvement of interdialytic locking solutions could reduce these problems. Trisodium citrate (TSC) has been advocated in recent years because it might have antimicrobial qualities. METHODS Antimicrobial efficacy of four concentrations of TSC (2.2, 7.5, 15 and 30%) was compared with three equi-osmolal sodium chloride (NaCl) concentrations, unfractionated heparin 5000 IU/ml and a solution of gentamicin 1 mg/ml in TSC 7.5%. We analysed antimicrobial properties by two classical in vitro susceptibility tests. All tests were performed in triplicate by incubation of test fluids with Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermidis, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Candida albicans. RESULTS Increasing TSC concentrations effectively killed the staphylococcal strains in both assays. For E.coli and P.aeruginosa complete killing was achieved only with TSC 30%. TSC 30% was also the only solution that significantly inhibited growth of C.albicans. Heparin manifested no antimicrobial effect of any significance. Adding gentamicin to TSC provided superior bacterial growth inhibition but had no effect on yeast growth. TSC solutions manifested superior antimicrobial activity compared with iso-osmolal NaCl solutions in both assays. CONCLUSION This in vitro study demonstrates superior antimicrobial activity of TSC, especially in higher concentrations, in contrast to heparin. The mechanism seems to differ from hyperosmolality. Ca(2+) and Mg(2+) chelating effects are probably more important. Adding gentamicin provided the most potent antimicrobial solution. However, for reasons concerning development of bacterial resistance and sensitization of the patient, continuous exposition to aminoglycosides seems not advisable.
Impact of Hidden Profiles on Distributed Cognition in Spatially Distributed Decision-Making Teams

This study continues research from McNeese (2000) and was designed to examine the effects of hidden knowledge profiles on perceptually anchored team cognition and knowledge transfer in distributed teams. Previous work showed that individuals in perceptually anchored distributed teams were able to quickly access applicable knowledge, then transfer that knowledge to answer similarly situated problems. Perceptual anchors provide the basis for formulating team mental models, which can be used to assess situations and resolve differences in individual, unique knowledge. In the present experiment, it was again hypothesized that individuals working in perceptually anchored distributed teams would be better able to transfer knowledge, than teams without anchors. It was also hypothesized that perceptually anchored distributed teams would be better able to share uniquely held information, make better decisions, identify information discrepancies, and overcome the presence of hidden knowledge profiles better than non-perceptually anchored teams. Preliminary findings are discussed.
Male antifertility compounds: efficacy of U-5897 in primates (Macacamulatta).

Summary. Six, mature, male rhesus monkeys were given U-5897 (3\x=req-\ chloro-1,2-propanediol), 30\m=. \0 mg/kg/day, orally. Antifertility efficacy was assessed by comparing pre-treatment fertility (fourteen of twenty\x=req-\ eight matings fertile) with treatment fertility (one of twenty-four matings fertile). The dose was near the anticipated maximum tolerated level, therefore side effects were not unexpected. Three of the six experimental animals showed no detectable toxicity, death of two of the other three was apparently due to bone marrow depression. Sperm motility and morphology were not detectably altered in five of the six animals. Unaltered spermatogenesis and the short time required to attain efficacy in the present experiment imply a post-testicular site of action. Reversibility was demonstrated in three males by post-treatment matings (three of three matings fertile).
Incidence of Post-Cesarean Uterine Infection in relation to Methods of Placental Management

Objectives:To study the rate of uterine infection following cesarean delivery with respect to mode of placental delivery and the practice of removal of residual membranes.Material and Methods:In 318 women undergoing elective cesarean delivery grouped based on placental management into four groups, viz., those with manual removal with uterine wiping (n=102), manual removal without uterine wiping (n=65), spontaneous extraction with uterine wiping (n=79), and spontaneous extraction without uterine wiping (n=72; taken as control group)were prospectively studied. The cases were monitored for 7 post-cesarean days for evidence of uterine infection. Uterine infection was considered to be present if at least two of the parameters with one of them being laboratory evidence, were positive.Results:Incidence of uterine infection was (65/ 318 cases, 20.4%). Occurrence of uterine infection did not differ when placenta was managed either manually or not (p=1). Uterine infection was apparently higher when residual membranes were not removed after placental delivery (p=0.4). Proportion of cases with uterine infection appeared to be lower in the group who had manual placental delivery and removal of residual membranes (17.7%) than in manual manual placental removal with no uterine wiping groups (24.6%). And there was no influence of post-placental removal of residual membranes in the cohort with unaided placental delivery (p=0.854). Conclusion:The practices of either manual removal of placenta or uterine wiping to clear the residual placental membranes do not increase the rate of post cesarean uterine infection rate after elective surgeries.
An intergroup phase III randomized study of doxorubicin and dacarbazine with or without ifosfamide and mesna in advanced soft tissue and bone sarcomas.

PURPOSE AND METHODS Doxorubicin alone or with dacarbazine (DTIC; AD) is considered the best available therapy for metastatic adult sarcomas. Ifosfamide is active in sarcomas that have failed to respond to a doxorubicin-based regimen. This study was designed to determine if ifosfamide added to doxorubicin and DTIC (ADI) significantly effects toxicity, response rate, and survival. Patients with measurable metastatic or unresectable sarcoma were randomized to receive AD or ADI. Patients with chondrosarcomas, fibrosarcomas, and other sarcomas of bone were eligible, although those with osteosarcoma, rhabdomyosarcoma, Ewing's sarcoma, Kaposi's sarcoma, and mesothelioma were excluded, as were patients with prior chemotherapy for sarcoma or prior doxorubicin. RESULTS Between 1987 and 1989, 340 eligible patients were randomized. Significantly more myelosuppression, a higher response rate (17% v 32%; P < .002) and longer time to progression (4 v 6 months; P < .02) were observed for patients who received ifosfamide. An overall survival advantage for the two-drug regimen (12 v 13 months; P = .04) was not significant by multivariate analysis. CONCLUSION In all three randomized trials of doxorubicin with and without ifosfamide (Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group [ECOG], European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer [EORTC], and this study), the response rate was higher for the ifosfamide-containing arm, significantly so in this and the ECOG studies. An improved response rate may be particularly important for the preoperative management of high-grade, borderline resectable lesions or pulmonary metastases, particularly in younger patients. In older patients, or for low-to intermediate-grade lesions, doxorubicin and DTIC followed by ifosfamide on progression is preferred.
New self-aligned planar resonant-tunneling diodes for monolithic circuits

Resonant-tunneling diodes (RTDs) with a new planar configuration have been fabricated with a new self-aligned process that is compatible with that of silicon integrated-circuits technology. The size of the RTD is determined by a shallow boron implant, and the individual RTDs are isolated by a deep proton implant. There is no deep mesa etch. Because of the self-alignment nature of the process, the peak current and voltage of the RTDs are highly uniform. The mean of the standard deviation of the peak current for 4-/spl mu/m/sup 2/ RTDs is 2.3% and the smallest RTDs fabricated are less than 1 /spl mu/m/sup 2/.
Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 Superinfection Was Not Detected following 215 Years of Injection Drug User Exposure

ABSTRACT Evidence for human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) superinfection was sought among 37 HIV-1-positive street-recruited active injection drug users (IDUs) from the San Francisco Bay area. HIV-1 sequences from pairs of samples collected 1 to 12 years apart, spanning a total of 215 years of exposure, were generated at p17 gag, the V3-V5 region of env, and/or the first exon of tat and phylogenetically analyzed. No evidence of HIV-1 superinfection was detected in which a highly divergent HIV-1 variant emerged at a frequency >20% of the serum viral quasispecies. Based on the reported risk behavior of the IDUs and the HIV-1 incidence in uninfected subjects in the same cohort, a total of 3.4 new infections would have been expected if existing infection conferred no protection from superinfection. Adjusted for risk behaviors, the estimated relative risk of superinfection compared with initial infection was therefore 0.0 (95% confidence interval, 0.00, 0.79; P = 0.02), indicating that existing infection conferred a statistically significant level of protection against superinfection with an HIV-1 strain of the same subtype, which was between 21 and 100%.
Cervical Ripening and Induction of Labor: Awareness, Knowledge, Perception and Attitude of Antenatal Care-Seeking Women at Zagazig University Hospital, Zagazig, Egypt

To assess awareness, knowledge and perceptions of antenatal care-seeking women about cervical ripening (CR) and induction of labor (IOL), and their attitude towards these interventions. Methods: An observational descriptive cross-sectional study which was conducted at an Egyptian teaching hospital. A questionnaire-based interview covered items on women’s demographic and clinical data, as well as their awareness, knowledge, perception and attitude towards specific methods of CR and IOL. Results: A total of 853 questionnaires were analyzed, and 442 respondents (51.8%) were aware of CR and IOL. Knowledge of Oxytocin use was noted in 215 participants (48.6%), of membrane sweeping in 85 (19.2%), of Foley’s catheter in 110 (24.9%) and of Misoprostol in 84 (19.0%). The procedures were perceived to prevent cesarean section in 219 respondents (49.5%). History of previous IOL was a predictor of awareness (OR: 5.19, 95% CI: 1.6 – 11.23, p = 0.001*). Conclusion: This study showed that only a slightly more than 50% of participants were aware of CR and IOL, and the overall knowledge and perception were sub-optimal. Nevertheless, the attitudes towards the procedures were positive. Improved counselling is required in order to further increase knowledge about CR and IOL, and also correct misbelieves particularly in women at risk of undergoing IOL.
Structural Analysis of Modified Forms of Recombinant IFN-β Produced under Stress-Simulating Conditions

Abstract The present study focused on the investigation of the chemical stability of recombinant human interferon-β (rhIFN-β) tested in vitro by chemical treatments that simulate stress-induced conditions that may occur during handling, storage or ageing of protein samples. Mild oxidation and/or alkylation of the recombinant protein showed that the four methionines occurring in the interferon displayed different chemical susceptibility in that Met36 and Met117 were fully modified, whereas Met1 showed only little modification and Met62 was completely resistant. Moreover, incubation of rhIFN-β under alkaline conditions resulted in the formation of a covalent dimeric species stabilised by an intermolecular disulphide bridge involving the free SH group of Cys17 from each polypeptide chain. Analysis of biological activity of the different IFN-β derivatives showed that rhIFN-β fully retains its specific activity following mild oxidation treatments whereas reaction with a high concentration of alkylating agents or incubation under alkaline conditions strongly reduce its specific antiviral activity.
Nano-Diamond Hybrid Materials for Structural Biomedical Application

The development of new diamond based bio-mechanically active hybrid nano-structured scaffolds for cartilage cells tissue engineering are proposed in this study. Innovative tissue engineering biomimetic materials based on hydrogel have shown attractive physical, biological and mechanical properties in several biomedical applications. A highly biocompatible novel hybrid material based on nanodiamonds and hydrophilic poly-(hydroxyl-ethyl-methacrylate) (pHEMA) is proposed. The aim of this paper is to describe the chemical and analytical procedures for the preparation of nanofilled hybrid composites possessing biomimetic, osteoconductive and osteoinductivity properties that can be useful in the design of bio-mechanically active innovative bone scaffolding systems for stem cell differentiation and growth. A more rigid and rubber transparent hybrid nano-composites are predicted to posses improved mechanical strength overwhelming one of the major weaknesses of hydrogels, which is due their poor mechanical characteristics, for applications in biomedical structural application.
A Compact Wideband Bandpass Filter Using Transversal Resonator and Asymmetrical Interdigital Coupled Lines

A compact wideband microstrip bandpass filter using transversal resonator and asymmetrical interdigital coupled lines is proposed in this letter. A wide passband is first constructed using transversal signal-interference technique, resulting a pair of transmission zeros at each side of the desired passband. By driving this transversal resonator with two asymmetrical interdigital coupled lines at two sides, five extra transmission zeros are generated in the lower/upper stopbands with excellent dc-choked property, thus making up a wide passband with improved out-of-band performance. This wideband microstrip filter is then designed, implemented and experimented. Good insertion/return losses, flat group delay and good out-of-band rejections are achieved as demonstrated in both simulation and experiment.
Time - frequency iterative multiuser detection in time - frequency-domain spread multicarrier DS-CDMA systems over Nakagami-m fading channels

In this paper, we propose and study a novel Time–frequency-domain iterative multiuser detector (TF-IMUD) for the multicarrier direct-sequence code-division multiple-access (DS-CDMA) systems employing both time (T)-domain and frequency (F)-domain spreading, which, for brevity, are referred to as the TF/MC DS-CDMA systems. This novel TFIMUD consists of a set of T-domain soft-input soft-output MUDs (SISO-MUDs) and a set of F-domain SISO-MUDs, where information is exchanged between the T-domain and F-domain through two multiuser interference (MUI) cancellation units. The T-domain and F-domain SISO-MUDs are operated under the maximum likelihood (ML) principles, and they are facilitated to be implemented using parallel signal processing techniques. In this paper, the complexity of the TF-IMUD and the bit error rate (BER) performance of the TF/MC DS-CDMA systems employing the proposed TF-IMUD are investigated and also compared with the other existingMUDschemes, including the optimum ML-MUD and the joint/separate minimum mean-square error (MMSE)-MUDs. Our study and simulation results showthat the TF-IMUD is capable of achieving nearly the same BER performance as the optimum ML-MUD, but at significantly lower complexity.
Multiple solutions in supersymmetry and the Higgs

Weak-scale supersymmetry is a well-motivated, if speculative, theory beyond the Standard Model of particle physics. It solves the thorny issue of the Higgs mass, namely: how can it be stable to quantum corrections, when they are expected to be 1015 times bigger than its mass? The experimental signal of the theory is the production and measurement of supersymmetric particles in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) experiments. No such particles have been seen to date, but hopes are high for the impending run in 2015. Searches for supersymmetric particles can be difficult to interpret. Here, we shall discuss the fact that, even given a well-defined model of supersymmetry breaking with few parameters, there can be multiple solutions. These multiple solutions are physically different and could potentially mean that points in parameter space have been ruled out by interpretations of LHC data when they should not have been. We shall review the multiple solutions and illustrate their existence in a universal model of supersymmetry breaking.
Learning affects top down and bottom up modulation of eye movements in decision making

Repeated decision making is subject to changes over time such as decreases in decision time and information use and increases in decision accuracy. We show that a traditional strategy selection view of decision making cannot account for these temporal dynamics without relaxing main assumptions about what defines a decision strategy. As an alternative view we suggest that temporal dynamics in decision making are driven by attentional and perceptual processes and that this view has been expressed in the information reduction hypothesis. We test the information reduction hypothesis by integrating it in a broader framework of top down and bottom up processes and derive the predictions that repeated decisions increase top down control of attention capture which in turn leads to a reduction in bottom up attention capture. To test our hypotheses we conducted a repeated discrete choice experiment with three different information presentation formats. We thereby operationalized top down and bottom up control as the effect of individual utility levels and presentation formats on attention capture on a trial-by-trial basis. The experiment revealed an increase in top down control of eye movements over time and that decision makers learn to attend to high utility stimuli and ignore low utility stimuli. We furthermore find that the influence of presentation format on attention capture reduces over time indicating diminishing bottom up control.
Role of alcohol and genetic polymorphisms of CYP2E1 and ALDH2 in breast cancer development.

OBJECTIVE We examined the potential association between alcohol consumption and genetic polymorphisms in the alcohol metabolizing enzymes, CYP2E1 and ALDH2, in individual susceptibility to breast cancer in a Korean study population. METHODS Three hundred and forty-six histologically confirmed breast cancer patients and 377 controls with no present or previous history of cancer were recruited from several teaching hospitals in Seoul during 1995-2001. The CYP2E1 RsaI polymorphism was determined by a real time PCR method, and the ALDH2 Glu487 Lys polymorphism was determined by a PCR method with confronting two-pair primers (PCR-CTPP). RESULTS The drinking women had a 1.4-fold risk for breast cancer (95% CI = 0.99-2.11) compared to never drinkers after adjustment for age and family history of breast cancer. No statistically significant overall differences were seen in the genotype frequencies between breast cancer cases and controls. However, the "ever"-drinking women with the CYP2E1 c2 allele containing genotypes had a 1.9-fold risk (95% CI = 0.99-3.83) for developing breast cancer compared to non-drinkers with the CYP2E1 c1/c1 genotype (P for interaction = 0.043). CONCLUSION This study therefore suggests that the CYP2E1 c2 allele may influence the individual susceptibility to breast cancer in alcohol-consuming women.