Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Insulin-like Growth Factor (IGF)-binding Protein-3 Induces Apoptosis and Mediates the Effects of Transforming Growth Factor-β1 on Programmed Cell Death through a p53- and IGF-independent Mechanism*

Insulin-like growth factor (IGF) binding protein-3 (IGFBP-3) is known to block IGF action and inhibit cell growth. IGFBP-3 is thought to act by sequestering free IGFs or, possibly, act via a novel IGF-independent mechanism. Supporting its role as a primary growth inhibitor, IGFBP-3 production has been shown to be increased by cell growth-inhibitory agents, such as transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β), and the tumor suppressor gene p53. In this paper, we demonstrate, for the first time, a novel function of IGFBP-3 as an apoptosis-inducing agent and show that this action is mediated through an IGF·IGF receptor-independent pathway. In the p53 negative prostate cancer cell line, PC-3, the addition of recombinant IGFBP-3 resulted in a dose-dependent induction of apoptosis.125I-IGFBP-3 bound with high affinity to specific proteins in PC-3 cell lysates and plasma membrane preparations. These membrane-associated molecules may serve as receptors that mediate the direct effect of IGFBP-3 on apoptosis. In addition, in an IGF receptor-negative mouse fibroblast cell line, treatment with recombinant IGFBP-3 as well as transfection of the IGFBP-3 gene induced apoptosis, suggesting that neither IGFs nor IGF receptors are required for this action. Furthermore, treatment with TGF-β1, a known apoptosis-inducing agent, resulted in the induction of IGFBP-3 expression 6–12 h before the onset of apoptosis. This effect of TGF-β1 was prevented by co-treatment with IGFBP-3-neutralizing antibodies or IGFBP-3-specific antisense thiolated oligonucleotides. These findings suggest that IGFBP-3 induces apoptosis through a novel pathway independent of either p53 or the IGF·IGF receptor-mediated cell survival pathway and that IGFBP-3 mediates TGF-β1 induced apoptosis in PC-3 cells.
Gravity-induced PIN transcytosis for polarization of auxin fluxes in gravity-sensing root cells

Auxin is an essential plant-specific regulator of patterning processes that also controls directional growth of roots and shoots. In response to gravity stimulation, the PIN3 auxin transporter polarizes to the bottom side of gravity-sensing root cells, presumably redirecting the auxin flux toward the lower side of the root and triggering gravitropic bending. By combining live-cell imaging techniques with pharmacological and genetic approaches, we demonstrate that PIN3 polarization does not require secretion of de novo synthesized proteins or protein degradation, but instead involves rapid, transient stimulation of PIN endocytosis, presumably via a clathrin-dependent pathway. Moreover, gravity-induced PIN3 polarization requires the activity of the guanine nucleotide exchange factors for ARF GTPases (ARF-GEF) GNOM-dependent polar-targeting pathways and might involve endosome-based PIN3 translocation from one cell side to another. Our data suggest that gravity perception acts at several instances of PIN3 trafficking, ultimately leading to the polarization of PIN3, which presumably aligns auxin fluxes with gravity vector and mediates downstream root gravitropic response.
Individual Risk Factors and Complexity Associated with Congenital Heart Disease in a Pediatric Medicaid Cohort

Objectives To determine the sex and race differences associated with specific congenital heart diseases (CHDs) and the patterns of concomitant conditions associated with eight severe, complex lesions. Methods A 15-year Medicaid dataset (1996–2010) from one state was analyzed for 14,496 patients aged 17 years and younger and diagnosed as having a CHD on one or more service visits to a pediatrician or pediatric cardiologist. Results Controlling for all other diagnosed CHDs, boys were more likely to be diagnosed as having transposition of the great arteries, hypoplastic left heart syndrome, aortic stenosis, and coarctation of the aorta, whereas African Americans were more likely to be diagnosed as having tricuspid regurgitation, atrial septal defect sinus venosus, coronary artery anomaly, and pulmonary stenosis. Ventricular septal defects, atrial septal defects secundum, patent ductus arteriosus, and pulmonary stenosis were the most prevalent isolated CHDs, whereas tetralogy of Fallot, atrioventricular canal/endocardial cushion defect, common/single ventricle, double outlet right ventricle, and transposition of the great arteries were the most prevalent severe, complex lesions. The complexity of some severe cardiac anomalies appears to be increasing over time. Conclusions Changes over time in pediatric CHD caseload mix may affect care management and result in prognosis or outcome differences. These changes present important opportunities for pediatricians and pediatric cardiologists to collaborate, especially in the care of the most severe anomalies.
Use of multiple international healthcare databases for the detection of rare drug‐associated outcomes: a pharmacoepidemiological programme comparing rosuvastatin with other marketed statins

Statins (inhibitors of 3‐hydroxy‐3‐methyl‐glutaryl‐CoA reductase) are associated with rare but serious adverse events involving the muscle, kidney and liver. To compare the safety profile of rosuvastatin with other marketed statins, four pharmacoepidemiological studies were conducted using different national healthcare databases. These studies used a coordinated methodology to facilitate future meta‐analysis.
Emerging integrase inhibitor resistance mutations in raltegravir-treated HIV-1-infected patients with low-level viremia

Background:The emergence of integrase strand-transfer inhibitor (INSTI) resistance-associated mutations was examined in patients with low-level viremia after switching from enfuvirtide to raltegravir in the ANRS 138-Easier trial. Methods:Integrase genes of plasma virus from raltegravir-treated patients in the Easier trial with low-level viremia (50–500 copies/ml) were sequenced to determine INSTI resistance-associated mutations. Baseline viral load, baseline and nadir CD4 cell count, antiretroviral treatment, genotypic susceptibility score, level of viremia and degree of treatment adherence during the study period were also analyzed. Results:Forty-nine patients experienced at least one episode of low-level viremia while receiving raltegravir; integrase genotyping was successful in samples from 39 individuals (80%). Among them, three [7.7%, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.6–20.9%] had significant INSTI resistance mutations consisting of N155H in two and P145S in one. Absence of these mutations from proviral DNA at baseline suggested selection of INSTI resistance during episodes of low-level viremia. No specific factors significantly associated with emergence of INSTI resistance mutations during low-level viremia were identified. Conclusion:Emergence of INSTI resistance mutations can occur during episodes of low-level viremia in patients receiving raltegravir-containing regimens.
Corrections of Humidity Measurement Errors from the Vaisala RS80 Radiosonde—Application to TOGA COARE Data

A series of laboratory tests have been conducted on several different batches of Vaisala RS80 radiosondes to understand and develop methods to correct six humidity measurement errors, including chemical contamination, temperature dependence, basic calibration model, ground check, sensor aging, and sensor arm heating. The contamination and temperature-dependence (TD) errors dominate total errors. The chemical contamination error produces a dry bias, and is due to the occupation of binding sites in the sensor polymer by nonwater molecules emitted from the sonde packaging material. The magnitude of the dry bias depends on sensor polymer type (RS80-A and RS80H), age of the sonde, relative humidity (RH), and temperature, and it exists throughout the troposphere. The contamination error generally increases with age and RH, and is larger for the RS80-H than the RS80-A. It is ;2% and ;10% at saturation for 1-yr-old RS80-A and RS80-H sondes, respectively. The TD error for the RS80-A results from an approximation of a linear function of temperature to the actual nonlinear temperature dependence of the sensor, and also introduces a dry bias. The TD error mainly exists at temperatures below 2208C, increases substantially with decreasing temperatures below 2308C, and is much larger for the RS80-A than the RS80-H. The RS80-A’s TD correction (CTA) dominates the total correction at temperatures below 2408C and has a correction factor [CTA 5 (RH) (CTApfactor)] of 0.15, 0.75, and 2.3 at 2408, 2608, and 2808C, respectively. The correction methods are applied to 8129 Vaisala RS80 soundings collected during the Tropical Ocean and Global Atmosphere (TOGA) Coupled Ocean‐Atmosphere Response Experiment (COARE) and are applicable to RS80 radiosonde data from other field experiments and historical and operational radiosonde datasets. The methods are validated by examining various summary plots of the TOGA COARE data and comparing them with other independent data. The corrections greatly improve the accuracy of the TOGA COARE radiosonde dataset. These correction methods have their own uncertainties and may not correct all errors in Vaisala RS80 humidity data. Analyses of these uncertainties are presented in the paper.
A Comparison of the Costs and Efficacy of Ondansetron and Dolasetron in the Prophylaxis of Postoperative Vomiting in Pediatric Patients Undergoing Ambulatory Surgery

Postoperative vomiting (POV) after ambulatory surgery remains a major problem. We designed this study to determine the smallest dose of dolasetron equivalent to the Food and Drug Administration approved dose of ondansetron 100 &mgr;g/kg IV, for the prophylaxis of POV in children undergoing surgery. In this double-blinded controlled study, 204 healthy ASA I–II children aged 2–12 yr, undergoing superficial ambulatory (day-case) surgery, were randomized to receive either ondansetron 100 &mgr;g/kg IV, or dolasetron 45, 175, 350, or 700 &mgr;g/kg IV during a standardized perioperative regimen. The primary end-point was the incidence of complete response, defined as the absence of POV symptoms. Costs were calculated from the perspective of the hospital using a previously described model. The incidence of early (0–6 h) and 24-h emesis was more frequent in the dolasetron 45 &mgr;g/kg group compared with the dolasetron 350 and 700 &mgr;g/kg groups and with the ondansetron group. Repeated POV occurred more often when dolasetron was used in a dose <350 &mgr;g/kg. There were no significant differences in emesis rates between the dolasetron 175, 350, and 700 &mgr;g/kg groups or between these groups and the ondansetron 100 &mgr;g/kg group. The smallest dose of dolasetron with acceptable equivalent efficacy and patient satisfaction scores to ondansetron 100 &mgr;g/kg was 350 &mgr;g/kg. Institutional costs for managing POV were less with dolasetron 350 &mgr;g/kg than with ondansetron.
Micro-electro-mechanical resonant tilt sensor

This paper reports a micro-electro-mechanical tilt sensor based on resonant sensing principles. The tilt sensor measures orientation by sensing the component of gravitational acceleration along a specified input axis. Design aspects of the tilt sensor are first introduced and a design trade-off between sensitivity, resolution and robustness is addressed. A prototype sensor is microfabricated in a foundry process. The sensor is characterized to validate predictive analytical and FEA models of performance. The prototype is tested over tilt angles ranging over ±90 degrees and the linearity of the sensor is found to be better than 1.4% over the tilt angle range of ±20°. The noise-limited resolution of the sensor is found to be approximately 0.00026 degrees for an integration time of 0.6 seconds.
Making Sense of Basic Education Statistics in Tanzania: Emerging Issues and Implications for Future Practice

This paper contains reflections on the basic education statistics in Tanzania with a view to highlighting the emerging issues by making sense of data. The paper adopts document review analysis methodological procedures to reflect on the data and examine key factors that constrain the provision of basic education in Tanzania. The paper further reveals a number of factors that emerge from basic education statistics, which include the prevalence of teachers with low qualification, shortage of teaching and learning resources, prevalence of children living in vulnerable environment and the prevalence of high dropout rates. Overall, this paper interrogates the existing dilemma between educational stakeholders on policy statements such as fee free education and the smooth implementation of these statements to create a common understanding. A shared vision in redefining basic education so as to meet both national and global priorities, seems to be a vital priority. On this basis, the paper recommends a collaborative partnership in investing in education, improvement in allocating adequate financial resources in the education sector, the need to improve the livelihood of people and creating awareness among educational stakeholders on effective strategies for a smooth transition from home to school among students.
Una aproximación multidimensional al comportamiento antisocial durante la adolescencia

La presente tesis estudio el comportamiento antisocial en la adolescencia a traves de dos propositos de investigacion: (1) Diseno y validacion psicometrica de instrumentos para evaluar comportamiento social y riesgos en poblacion chilena. (2) Caracterizacion de adolescentes chilenos con conductas de adaptacion y desadaptacion social, en cuatro areas que juegan un rol activo en el origen, persistencia y desistimiento de los comportamientos antisociales. La investigacion se desarrolla a traves de seis estudios entre los anos 2007 y 2013, en cuatro regiones del centro sur de Chile, en 7 muestras diferentes de corte transversal que suman 3.412 participantes, con una metodologia cuantitativa y cualitativa para el sexto estudio. Los principales resultados obtenidos permiten concluir que: (a) existe una alta frecuencia de comportamientos prosociales y antisociales reportados por los adolescentes chilenos y se comprueba que el proceso adolescente cumple un rol activo en la desadaptacion social b) Las variables de personalidad intervienen en la persistencia de conductas antisociales en tres cluster identificados desde el modelo de Millon: Explosivo Autodestructivo, Antisocial Estabilizado y Pasivo Desesperanzado (c) Los factores de riesgos criminogenicos son significativamente mas altos en adolescentes infractores persistentes y reincidentes, y los recursos de proteccion mas elevados en delincuencia transitoria (d) Se confirman diferencias de genero en prevalencia de conductas prosociales por sobre antisociales, recursos e intereses, y en las variables psicologicas con mayor predominio de dano emocional; esta evidencia se complementa con un estudio cualitativo donde las adolescentes refieren experiencias subjetivas de alta victimizacion en su infancia asociada a la socializacion de genero y la conducta antisocial como via de salida.
Optimized Regressor Forest for Image Super-Resolution

The goal of image super-resolution is to recover missing high frequency details of an image given single or multiple low-resolution images. It is a well-known ill-posed problem and requires mature prior knowledges or enough examples to restore high-quality high-resolution images. Recently, many methods formulate image super-resolution as a regression problem. Input image patches are classified into pre-trained clusters, and cluster-dependent mapping functions are employed to super-resolve input patches. In this paper, for further improving the reconstructed image quality, an optimized regressor forest framework is proposed, which leverages the discriminative power of random forest. There are three major contributions of the proposed framework. (i) The proposed scheme overturns existing approaches by training the regressors first and learning the way to find the best regressor to avoid quality degradation introduced from the classification outliers. (ii) We propose to employ EM-algorithm to optimize regressors by jointly optimizing the clustering results as well as the regression functions. (iii) In order to find the most appropriate regressor for an input patch at the testing stage, random forest is adopted to accurately classify patches into their best clusters (regressors). The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method generates high-quality high-resolution images and yields state-of-the-art results.
Associations of Fatty Liver Disease and Other Factors Affecting Serum SHBG Concentrations: A Population Based Study on 1657 Subjects

Abstract Sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG) is a glycoprotein expressed predominantly in the hepatocytes. It regulates the transport of sex steroid hormones in the blood stream to their target tissues. The expression of the SHBG gene is subject to multifactorial regulation including hormonal, metabolic, and nutritional aspects. Against this background, we investigated the effect of fatty liver and metabolic syndrome, together with other parameters, on serum SHBG concentrations in a population-based cohort in Germany. This cross-sectional study included 870 women and 787 men (average age 42.3±12.8 years), who underwent ultrasound screening for fatty liver in addition to providing a complete medical history and undergoing physical and laboratory examination. Fatty liver was diagnosed on ultrasound criteria in 159 women (18.3%) and 287 men (36.5%). Fatty liver was shown to exert a significant influence on serum SHBG concentrations in men and in premenopausal women. Men with grade 1 fatty liver had a 1.96-fold increased risk (95%-confidence interval=1.28–3.02; p=0.0022) and postmenopausal women with grade 1 fatty liver a 2.4-fold risk (95%-confidence interval=1.11–5.27; p=0.0267) for low SHBG concentrations. Among metabolic parameters, HDL-C represented as affecting factor in men (p=0.0058) and premenopausal women (p=0.0002), while cholesterol only showed an association in premenopausal women (p=0.0439) and triglyceride in postmenopausal women (p=0.0436). No association of concentrations of SHBG and metabolic syndrome was observed. Age, BMI and waist-to-hip ratio also influence the SHBG concentration. Based on these findings, we conclude that fat accumulation in the liver influences SHBG concentrations in men and premenopausal women.
Assessing vulnerability to poverty : concepts , empirical methods and illustrative examples

A household’s observed poverty level is an ex-post measure of a household’s well-being (or lack thereof). But poverty is a stochastic phenomenon and the current poverty level of a household, may not necessarily be a good guide to the household’s expected poverty in the future. For thinking about appropriate forward-looking anti-poverty interventions (i.e., interventions that aim to go beyond the alleviation of current poverty to prevent or reduce future poverty), the critical need then is to go beyond a cataloging of who is currently poor and who is not, to an assessment of households’ vulnerability to poverty. In this paper, we make the case for broadening the scope of poverty assessments to take account of vulnerability to poverty and outline a conceptual and empirical approach for doing so. The paper has two broad aims: first, to provide a conceptual and methodological overview of the uses and empirical implementation of vulnerability assessments using household-level data; and second, to demonstrate, through a number of illustrative examples as well as two more detailed country studies, how the general methodological approach can be usefully applied and tailored to particular contexts and data, to yield policy-relevant insights about the nature and extent of vulnerability.
The fundamental profile of winner and looser portfolios at Bovespa between 1995 and 2002

The controversy involving the efficiency market hypothesis opens space to different proposals of how to evaluate assets, as well as the possibility of predicting stock returns. The empirical analysis conducted in this work follow the fundamental analysis rationale, where we seek to outline portfolio winners and losers profile traded at Bovespa from January of 1995 to December of 2002. We analyzed 37 variables in portfolios built based on monthly returns of stocks. Among the portfolios analyzed, the results pointed out to a better characterization of the profile of lower performance portfolios. The main characteristics found for these portfolios are: high volatility, low debt, small size, low return on assets and equity, besides of being trade at high prices relative to profit, dividends, and EBITDA. The winner portfolios are characterized by high market risk, positive trend on equity return and low performance relative to the market in the previous month.
A transimpedance amplifier using a widely tunable PVT-independent pseudo-resistor for high-performance current sensing applications

In this paper, we present a pseudo-resistor-based transimpedance amplifier (TIA) whose transimpedance value is PVT-independent and continuously tuneable over a wide range. The nonlinearity of the pseudo-resistors is mitigated by connecting a large number of elements in series and the effect of process variations on the pseudo-resistor is canceled by a biasing network based on a pseudo current mirror. The design is also first order temperature compensated exploiting the PTAT behavior of the proposed pseudo-resistor and using a PTAT current reference for its biasing. The proposed architecture is verified using a prototype manufactured in a 0.18 μm CMOS SOI technology. In this prototype, the transimpedance can be adjusted between approximately 1ΜΩ and 1 GΩ. The achievable bandwidth varies inversely proportional with the transimpedance value from around 7 kHz for a value of 1 GΩ up to an opamp-limited maximum of 2 MHz. In the white region, the input referred noise is equal to that of a TIA using an equivalent ohmic resistor. A minimum value of 5 fA/√Hz is achieved for a transimpedance of 1 GΩ. Over a temperature range from −40 °C to 125 °C, the transimpedance varies less than 10% for 1 ΜΩ. The TIA occupies a chip area of 0.07 mm2. At room temperature, the power consumption is 9.5 mW from a single 1.8 V supply of which the pseudo-resistor consumes 0.2 mW.
Fixation Prediction for 360° Video Streaming in Head-Mounted Virtual Reality

We study the problem of predicting the Field-of-Views (FoVs) of viewers watching 360° videos using commodity Head-Mounted Displays (HMDs). Existing solutions either use the viewer's current orientation to approximate the FoVs in the future, or extrapolate future FoVs using the historical orientations and dead-reckoning algorithms. In this paper, we develop fixation prediction networks that concurrently leverage sensor- and content-related features to predict the viewer fixation in the future, which is quite different from the solutions in the literature. The sensor-related features include HMD orientations, while the content-related features include image saliency maps and motion maps. We build a 360° video streaming testbed to HMDs, and recruit twenty-five viewers to watch ten 360° videos. We then train and validate two design alternatives of our proposed networks, which allows us to identify the better-performing design with the optimal parameter settings. Trace-driven simulation results show the merits of our proposed fixation prediction networks compared to the existing solutions, including: (i) lower consumed bandwidth, (ii) shorter initial buffering time, and (iii) short running time.