Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Early release of glycogen phosphorylase in patients with unstable angina and transient ST-T alterations.

OBJECTIVE--To determine whether transient ST-T alterations in patients with unstable angina are associated with an increase in plasma glycogen phosphorylase BB concentrations on admission to hospital. DESIGN--Prospective screening of patients with unstable angina for markers of myocardial cell damage. SETTING--Accident and emergency department of university hospital. PATIENTS--48 consecutive patients admitted for angina pectoris (18 with transient ST-T alterations). None of the patients had acute myocardial infarction according to standard criteria. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES--Creatine kinase and creatine kinase MB activities, creatine kinase MB mass concentration, and myoglobin, cardiac troponin T, and glycogen phosphorylase BB concentrations on admission. RESULTS--All variables except for creatine kinase and creatine kinase MB activities were significantly higher on admission in patients with unstable angina and transient ST-T alterations than in patients without. However, glycogen phosphorylase BB concentration was the only marker that was significantly (p = 0.0001) increased above its discriminator value in most patients (16). In the 18 patients with transient ST-T alterations creatine kinase MB mass concentration and troponin T and myoglobin concentrations were significantly (p = 0.0001) less commonly increased on admission (in five, three, and two patients, respectively). CONCLUSIONS--The early release of glycogen phosphorylase BB may help to identify high risk patients with unstable angina even on admission to an emergency department. Glycogen phosphorylase BB concentrations could help to guide decisions about patient management.
Mutual Information Bounds for MIMO Gaussian Channels

The mutual information between modulation- constrained input and its output through Gaussian channels has been studied for various purposes such as physical layer abstraction. While the capacity of multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) Gaussian channels is well understood and its simple formula exists, this modulation- constrained mutual information for MIMO Gaussian channels has only been computed numerically and its expression for online computation has not been found. To tackle this challenge, this paper proposes several new bounds on the mutual information for MIMO Gaussian channels, which can be used for approximation. The proposed bounds are expressed in the forms that can be computed online. Moreover, these bounds are improved by taking a minimum of upper bounds and a maximum of lower bounds. The proposed bounds are compared with the mutual information obtained through simulation.
Lower-Body Warming Mimics the Normal Epidural-Induced Reduction in the Shivering Threshold

BACKGROUND:Neuraxial anesthesia reduces the shivering threshold ≈0.6°C. This effect might be mediated by an apparent (as opposed to actual) increase in lower body temperature. Accordingly, sufficient lower body warming should result in thermoregulatory inhibition comparable to that exerted by epidural anesthesia. We tested the hypothesis that increasing leg skin temperature to 38°C mimics the normal ≈0.6°C reduction in the shivering threshold during epidural anesthesia. METHODS:Shivering threshold during internal body cooling was determined in nine female volunteers on two separate days: one unanesthetized control day, and one day with a T10-11 epidural block. On each study day, lower body skin temperature was maintained near 38°C and upper body skin temperature near 33°C. We assessed equivalency of the shivering thresholds on the control and epidural days using the two one-sided tests method. RESULTS:The thresholds on the control (35.8°C ± 0.5°C; mean ± sd) and epidural (35.8°C ± 0.5°C) days were shown to be equivalent because the 95% CI for the difference in means, 0.0 (−0.4, 0.4), was within our prespecified limits of −0.6°C to +0.6°C (P < 0.025 for both one-sided equivalency tests). CONCLUSIONS:Lower body warming mimics the normal epidural-induced reduction in the shivering threshold. Our results support a mechanism based on increased apparent lower body skin temperature during neuraxial anesthesia.
A Cultural Psychology Approach to “Drug Abuse” Prevention

Much research on the etiology of adolescent drug use has focused on posited risk and protective factors at the level of the individual or small group. However, those proximal influences exist within a cultural context that also influences drug use. To prevent drug use in the diverse population of the United States, research is needed on the influence of the cultural context on adolescent drug use, including the effects of immigrating from one cultural or sociodemographic context to another, as well as the effects of living within two different cultural systems simultaneously. Theoretical models and research methods from cultural psychology and cultural sociology are well-suited to examine the cultural context of drug use. We examine causal mechanisms by which acculturation might affect drug use by using two paradigms to conceptualize culture: a stress/coping paradigm and a cultural values paradigm. Implications of cultural risk and protective factors for transdisciplinary research on drug abuse prevention are also discussed.
The Penguin book of Southern African verse

This volume includes the work of over 120 poets of Southern Africa which includes Angola, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Many items are translations into English - from Afrikaans, Dutch, Portuguese, San, Shona, Sotho, Tswana, Xhosa and Zulu.
Evaluation of Three Commercial Varicella-Zoster Virus IgG Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assays in Comparison to the Fluorescent-Antibody-to-Membrane-Antigen Test

ABSTRACT Commercial serologic assays for varicella-zoster virus (VZV), which enable reliable determination of VZV immune status and are amenable to automation, are needed. The present study compares the automated performance of the VZV whole-cell enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) Enzygnost anti-VZV/IgG, the Euroimmun anti-VZV ELISA (IgG) based on highly purified viral proteins, and the VZV glycoprotein (gp)-based Serion ELISA Classic VZV IgG. The fluorescent-antibody-to-membrane-antibody (FAMA) test was used as a reference. A total of 638 serum samples from VZV-negative children, blood donors, varicella vaccinees, and bone marrow transplant recipients were included. The Enzygnost anti-VZV/IgG and the Serion ELISA Classic VZV IgG showed sensitivities of 99.6% and 99.2%, respectively, and the Euroimmun anti-VZV ELISA (IgG) had a significantly lower sensitivity of 90.5%. Specificity was calculated as 100% for both the Euroimmun anti-VZV ELISA (IgG) and for the Enzygnost anti-VZV/IgG, and the Serion ELISA Classic VZV IgG had a significantly lower specificity of 89.4%. Quantitative results of all ELISAs correlated well, but there was a poor quantitative correlation between the ELISAs and FAMA. In conclusion, this study does not show any superiority of a gp- and a protein-based ELISA compared to a whole-cell ELISA for the automated detection of VZV-specific IgG. The automated performance of the Enzygnost anti-VZV/IgG assay correlated best with the FAMA reference assay.
Long-term consequences of spinal cord injury on social participation: the occurrence of handicap situations

Purpose : Handicap situations in daily life of persons with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) is rarely evaluated in spite of their impact on long-term health. The purpose of the present study was to identify the occurrence of potential handicap situations in individuals with SCI and to determine the potential associations between the level of social participation and some characteristics of the person. Methods : Four hundred and eighty-two individuals completed a mailed questionnaire that comprised the 'assessment of life habits', a tool developed to assess social participation in persons with disabilities. Results : Significant disruptions were particularly observed in home maintenance, participation in recreational and physical activities as well as in productive activities and the achievement of sexual relations. However, many individuals successfully achieved various social roles despite the presence of disabilities. No indications of a potential impact of premature ageing on the accomplishment of life habits were observed. Conclusions : The severity of injury seems to significantly increase the occurrence of handicap situations as the individuals with tetraplegia reported carrying out their life habits with much more difficulty or requiring more assistance than those with a less severe impairment.
Endothelial cells and macrophages, partners in atherosclerotic plaque progression

Abstract Heart disease and stroke, the main cardiovascular diseases (CVD), have become global epidemics in our days. High levels of cholesterol and other abnormal lipids are among the main risk factors of atherosclerosis, the number one killer in the world. However, recent advances in CVD treatment together with improvements in surgical techniques have increased the quality of life and reduced premature death rates and disabilities. Nevertheless, they still add a heavy burden to the rising global costs of health care. The medical priorities highlight not only the need for early recognition of the warning signs of a heart attack, but also the need for early biomarkers for prevention. Two active partners in the development and progression of atherosclerotic plaques are the macrophages and endothelial cells that influence each other and modify the microenvironment composition of the plaque leading to either rapid progression or regression of individual lesions in patients. In this review we address two specific aspects related to atherosclerosis: i) the way in which folic acid and folic acid conjugates may be helpful to identify activated macrophages and ii) the high potential of proteomic analysis to evidence and identify the multiple changes induced in activated vascular cells.
Toll-Like Receptor 4 (TLR4) Expression and Stimulation in a Model of Intervertebral Disc Inflammation and Degeneration

Study Design. We measured the expression and responses of Toll-Like Receptor 4 (TLR4) activation in the intervertebral disc (IVD) in vitro and in vivo. We hypothesize that stimulation of the IVD with the TLR4 ligand lipopolysaccharide (LPS) results in upregulation of a coordinated set of proinflammatory mediators and inhibition of matrix expression, both consistent with a molecular profile of degeneration. Objective. To characterize early inflammatory and morphological changes induced by TLR4 activation in the IVD. Summary of Background Data. TLR4 is a pattern recognition receptor activated in innate immunity that has been implicated in disease mechanisms of inflammatory cartilaginous degeneration. However, no study to date has examined the expression and responses of TLR4 in the IVD. Methods. IVD cells were stimulated with LPS in a dose-dependent manner, and inflammatory cytokine levels were measured by quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction. Histological and inflammatory changes due to in vivo injection of LPS into the rat caudal IVD were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and immunoblotting. Results. Baseline TLR4 expression in IVD tissue varied according to cell type. LPS stimulation resulted in significant increases in tumor necrosis factor &agr; (TNF)-&agr;, interleukin (IL)-1&bgr;, IL-6, and nitric oxide levels and significant inhibition in aggrecan and collagen-2. Intradiscal injection of LPS was found to cause moderate degenerative changes in the IVD, with increases in tissue levels of IL-1&bgr;, TNF-&agr;, high mobility group box 1 protein (HMGB1), and macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF). Conclusion. This study provides the first evidence that IVD cells express TLR4 and are responsive to TLR4 activation by upregulating a coordinated set of inflammatory cytokines. This study suggests that intradiscal injection of LPS offers a model for triggering inflammation of the IVD, demonstrating that inflammatory insults alone may potentially trigger degenerative changes of the IVD.
Beyond ɅCDM: A Viable Alternative?

We are encouraged to look beyond ɅCDM as there are no satisfactory explanations for either dark energy or dark matter. A data centred phenomenological approach supports an explanation where dark energy is Holographic Dark Information Energy, HDIE. HDIE explains many effects attributed separately to Ʌ and CDM. HDIE mimics Ʌ with sufficient energy and an equation of state parameter, w= -1.03±0.05 at redshifts z ~1.35, HDIE was phantom, w = -1.82±0.08, enabling the model to be falsified. HDIE fits Planck dark energy wo-wa plots at least as well as Ʌ, and is consistent with other results that suggest dark energy was phantom at earlier times. A new w-parameterisation is proposed, as the usual CPL parameterisation is biased and unsuitable for distinguishing between HDIE/baryon and ɅCDM models.
Nitrogen and Phosphorus Accumulation and Biomass Production by Scirpus sylvaticus and Phragmites australis in a Horizontal Subsurface Flow Constructed Wetland

Abstract We studied plant biomass production and nutrient accumulation by wood club-rush (Scirpus sylvaticus) and reed (Phragmites australis) in a horizontal subsurface flow constructed wetland in 2001 and 2002. The wetland consists of two beds, one with dry and another with wetter conditions. From both beds, 5 above-ground, below-ground, and litter samples were taken in the summer, during the maximum flowering period of the dominant species. The average dry biomass of whole plant and litter was considerable higher in 2002 (3071 g m− 2) than in 2001 (620 g m− 2) due to the climatic conditions. The average dry weight biomass of 5 plots in 2001 was 513 g m−2 in the dry bed and 729 g m− 2 in the wet bed. In 2002 these values were 2,520 and 3,765, respectively. Variations in biomasses will also appear in values for nutrient accumulation, in all cases the N and P accumulation was higher in 2002. The average nitrogen accumulation by plants was 16.6 g m− 2 in the wet and 10.7 g m− 2 in the dry bed in 2001, and 51.7 and 83.5 g m− 2 in 2002 respectively. Phosphorus accumulation was higher in the wet bed during 2001—2.8 g m− 2, in the dry bed this value was 1.9 g m− 2. In 2002, the phosphorus accumulation was higher in the dry bed—12.8 g m− 2, in the wet bed it was 12.43 g m− 2. The total biomass at the same conditions in the wet bed was slightly higher in case of wood club-rush—765 g m− 2 in 2001 and 3846 g m− 2 in 2002, same values for reed were 674 g m− 2 and 3,646, respectively.
Novel features of telomere biology revealed by the absence of telomeric DNA methylation

Cytosine methylation regulates the length and stability of telomeres, which can affect a wide variety of biological features, including cell differentiation, development, or illness. Although it is well established that subtelomeric regions are methylated, the presence of methylated cytosines at telomeres has remained controversial. Here, we have analyzed multiple bisulfite sequencing studies to address the methylation status of Arabidopsis thaliana telomeres. We found that the levels of estimated telomeric DNA methylation varied among studies. Interestingly, we estimated higher levels of telomeric DNA methylation in studies that produced C-rich telomeric strands with lower efficiency. However, these high methylation estimates arose due to experimental limitations of the bisulfite technique. We found a similar phenomenon for mitochondrial DNA: The levels of mitochondrial DNA methylation detected were higher in experiments with lower mitochondrial read production efficiencies. Based on experiments with high telomeric C-rich strand production efficiencies, we concluded that Arabidopsis telomeres are not methylated, which was confirmed by methylation-dependent restriction enzyme analyses. Thus, our studies indicate that telomeres are refractory to de novo DNA methylation by the RNA-directed DNA methylation machinery. This result, together with previously reported data, reveals that subtelomeric DNA methylation controls the homeostasis of telomere length.
Characterization of a Novel Flavivirus from Mosquitoes in Northern Europe That Is Related to Mosquito-Borne Flaviviruses of the Tropics

ABSTRACT A novel flavivirus was isolated from mosquitoes in Finland, representing the first mosquito-borne flavivirus from Northern Europe. The isolate, designated Lammi virus (LAMV), was antigenically cross-reactive with other flaviviruses and exhibited typical flavivirus morphology as determined by electron microscopy. The genomic sequence of LAMV was highly divergent from the recognized flaviviruses, and yet the polyprotein properties resembled those of mosquito-borne flaviviruses. Phylogenetic analysis of the complete coding sequence showed that LAMV represented a distinct lineage related to the Aedes sp. -transmitted human pathogenic flaviviruses, similarly to the newly described Nounané virus (NOUV), a flavivirus from Africa (S. Junglen et al., J. Virol. 83:4462-4468, 2009). Despite the low sequence homology, LAMV and NOUV were phylogenetically grouped closely, likely representing separate species of a novel group of flaviviruses. Despite the biological properties preferring replication in mosquito cells, the genetic relatedness of LAMV to viruses associated with vertebrate hosts warrants a search for disease associations.
Evolutionary computation for feature selection in classification problems

Feature subset selection (FSS) has received a great deal of attention in statistics, machine learning, and data mining. Real world data analyzed by data mining algorithms can involve a large number of redundant or irrelevant features or simply too many features for a learning algorithm to handle them efficiently. Feature selection is becoming essential as databases grow in size and complexity. The selection process is expected to bring benefits in terms of better performing models, computational efficiency, and simpler more understandable models. Evolutionary computation (EC) encompasses a number of naturally inspired techniques such as genetic algorithms, genetic programming, ant colony optimization, or particle swarm optimization algorithms. Such techniques are well suited to feature selection because the representation of a feature subset is straightforward and the evaluation can also be easily accomplished through the use of wrapper or filter algorithms. Furthermore, the capability of such heuristic algorithms to efficiently search large search spaces is of great advantage to the feature selection problem. Here, we review the use of different EC paradigms for feature selection in classification problems. We discuss details of each implementation including representation, evaluation, and validation. The review enables us to uncover the best EC algorithms for FSS and to point at future research directions. WIREs Data Mining Knowl Discov 2013, 3:381–407. doi: 10.1002/widm.1106
Multiple blinded reviews of the same two manuscripts. Effects of referee characteristics and publication language.

OBJECTIVE To study the association between referee characteristics and their manuscript assessments, the influence of manuscript language on referees' judgments, and the usefulness, quality, and extent of referees' free-text comments. DESIGN Two nonauthentic, but realistic, short manuscripts with a number of common methodological flaws were sent to 180 Scandinavian referees. Through randomization, each referee received one of the manuscripts in English and the other manuscript in the national language. A structured assessment of the manuscript quality was expressed on a 5-point scale, and the impact of referee characteristics (age, gender, experience, and so on) was analyzed by multiple linear regression. MAIN OUTCOME Manuscript quality assessed by referees. RESULTS A total of 312 reviews from 156 referees could be used for the study of referee characteristics and language. With increasing experience, the referees gave lower quality scores (P < .05). A tendency toward stricter assessment with younger age was seen (P < .05). No influence of referees' gender, specialty, or nationality was found. For the test manuscript of the poorest quality, the English version was assessed to be better than the national-language version (P < .05). A total of 159 of 312 reviews included free-text comments applicable for the methodological study. In 54 reviews (34%), no methodological comments accompanied the assessment, and in six reviews they were only incomplete. Wrong sampling unit was mentioned by one fourth of 80 referees. Only one referee mentioned the incorrect use of a parametric test in the analysis of data whose distribution was nonparametric. CONCLUSIONS Experienced and young referees gave a stricter assessment of the manuscripts than their less experienced and older colleagues. An English version seemed to be accepted more easily than a national-language version of the same manuscript. Most referees spontaneously mentioned the shortcomings of the manuscripts only as part of their overall judgment.
Phenotypic and genotypic characterization of Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains isolated from mastitis outbreaks in dairy herds

During 1998–2002 outbreaks of Pseudomonas sp. mastitis among more than 15 Israeli sheep and goat dairy herds were observed. The animals presented a wide spectrum of clinical signs ranging from subclinical to gangrenous udder. Ninety-five isolates of Pseudomonas sp. were isolated from clinical and subclinical mastitis of 47 sheep, 17 goats and 31 cows from 34 different farms. Biochemical and genetic analyses revealed that the all-causative organism was Ps. aeruginosa. Selections of isolates were further analysed on the bases of colony morphology, biochemical traits and capacity to form biofilm. All the strains displayed a wide heterogeneity in all the tested traits. No association between bacterial isolates, farm of origin and type of animal was found. Pulsed-field gel electrophoresis and cluster analysis showed no clonality among the tested strains. The present study revealed that a large variety of Ps. aeruginosa strains may cause mastitis outbreaks in sheep, goat and cattle in Israel.
The Spanish Inquisition Protocol—Model based transmission reduction for wireless sensor networks

The Spanish Inquisition Protocol (SIP) reduces Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) energy cost by transmitting only unexpected information and is so-named because “nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! ” SIP extends prior Dual Prediction Scheme (DPS) algorithms that model phenomena at both node and sink. SIP's key advancement is that it transmits a state vector estimate rather than individual readings. SIP can be tuned according to the desired estimate accuracy, with lower desired accuracy typically leading to fewer transmitted packets. In simulation with real data, less than 5% of the samples needed to be transmitted to provide the sink with an accurate estimate of the sensor value (within 0.5 °C, in the case of temperature). SIP also significantly outperforms prior DPS results when using the same data sets. In deployment on Telos motes, SIP shows similar performance to the simulations.