Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Allergenic Relevance of Cupressus arizonica Pollen Extract and Biological Characterization of the Allergoid

Background: Cupressaceae (cypress) pollens can cause pollinosis in winter. However, the lack of specific commercial extracts combined with the early pollination period of cypress trees make a precise diagnosis difficult. The need for a reliable and effective cypress extract for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes is increasingly felt. Methods: Mixed or single Cupressus arizonica, lusitanica and sempervirens pollen extracts precipitated with ammonium sulfate (PPT) were compared by direct RAST, RAST inhibition and SDS-PAGE techniques. The major allergen of C. arizonica (Cup a 1), purified by anion exchange chromatography, was checked by immunoblotting experiments before chemical modification, in parallel with a C. arizonica extract, with potassium cyanate (KCNO) to obtain a monomeric allergoid. The allergoid extract was characterized for its biological, chemico-physical and immunological features by RAST inhibition, SDS-PAGE and ELISA assays. Results: Direct RAST, RAST inhibition, and SDS-PAGE data indicated that the PPT C. arizonica pollen extract showed the most allergenic potential, and it can be considered representative of the Cupressus spp. Immunoblotting data confirmed Cup a 1 as a major allergen. RAST inhibition and ELISA showed that modified PPT C. arizonica extract had less IgE reactivity than the native, non-modified extract, while preserving the immunogenic capacity typical for an allergoid. Finally, the SDS-PAGE profile of Cup a 1 allergoid was similar to native Cup a 1 allergen, suggesting the modified C. arizonica extract shows the characteristics of a monomeric allergoid. Conclusions: The PPT C. arizonica pollen extract shows good in vitro diagnostic potential and its chemically modified form offers the features of a monomeric allergoid. It might therefore lend itself to the development of a product to be administered by the sublingual or oromucosal route for immunotherapy of individuals with cypress pollinosis.
Surface properties of nanocrystalline TiO2 coatings in relation to the in vitro plasma protein adsorption

This study reports on the selective adsorption of whole plasma proteins on hydrothermally (HT) grown TiO2-anatase coatings and its dependence on the three main surface properties: surface charge, wettability and roughness. The influence of the photo-activation of TiO2 by UV irradiation was also evaluated. Even though the protein adhesion onto Ti-based substrates was only moderate, better adsorption of any protein (at pH = 7.4) occurred for the most negatively charged and hydrophobic substrate (Ti non-treated) and for the most nanorough and hydrophilic surface (HT Ti3), indicating that the mutual action of the surface characteristics is responsible for the attraction and adhesion of the proteins. The HT coatings showed a higher adsorption of certain proteins (albumin ‘passivation’ layer, apolipoproteins, vitamin D-binding protein, ceruloplasmin, α-2-HS-glycoprotein) and higher ratios of albumin to fibrinogen and albumin to immunoglobulin γ-chains. The UV pre-irradiation affected the surface properties and strongly reduced the adsorption of the proteins. These results provide in-depth knowledge about the characterization of nanocrystalline TiO2 coatings for body implants and provide a basis for future studies on the hemocompatibility and biocompatibility of such surfaces.
Epidemiology of Pseudomonas aeruginosa keratitis in contact lens wearers

SUMMARY This study evaluated the epidemiology of Pseudomonas aeruginosa keratitis in contact lens (CL) wearers; the relationships between CL storage case contamination and CL hygiene practice and between CL hygiene and the development of keratitis. Sixteen CL wearers with keratitis were compared with 44 asymptomatic controls. Lens hygiene practice was assessed and CL care materials, domestic water sites and endogenous sites were evaluated microbiologically. Poor CL hygiene was not associated with Ps. aeruginosa keratitis. There was an association between keratitis and bacterial contamination of the CL and storage case (P < 0·0005). Lens and storage case contamination were not significantly associated with poor hygiene. No domestic or endogenous source for Ps. aeruginosa was found. Causative organisms may be derived from other sources, but CLs and CL storage cases provide a favourable environment for Ps. aeruginosa colonization. Changing the CL care environment to one less favourable for Ps. aeruginosa may help to eliminate this problem.
A Summary of Meeting Proceedings on Addressing Variability around the Cut Point in Serial Interferon-γ Release Assay Testing

On June 13, 2012, a group of key stakeholders, leaders, and national experts on tuberculosis (TB), occupational health, and laboratory science met in Atlanta, Georgia, to focus national discussion on the higher than expected positive results occurring among low-risk, unexposed healthcare workers undergoing serial testing with interferon-γ release assays (IGRAs). The objectives of the meeting were to present the latest clinical and operational research findings on the topic, to discuss evaluation and treatment algorithms that are emerging in the absence of national guidance, and to develop a consensus on the action steps needed to assist programs and physicians in the interpretation of serial testing IGRA results. This report summarizes its proceedings.
7Alpha-methyl-19-nortestosterone maintains sexual behavior and mood in hypogonadal men.

The synthetic steroid 7alpha-methyl-19-nortestosterone (MENT) is a potent androgen that is resistant to 5alpha-reductase. It thus has decreased activity at the prostate and may have advantages over testosterone-based regimens in long term treatment or as part of a male contraceptive. Administration to eugonadal men results in suppression of gonadotropins, but its ability to support androgen-dependent behavior has not been investigated. For sustained release administration, MENT acetate was used, because its diffusion characteristics were more suitable for use in implants. However, upon release the acetate is rapidly hydrolyzed, and MENT is the biologically active moiety in circulation. We studied the effects of MENT on sexual interest and activity, spontaneous erection, and mood states in comparison with testosterone enanthate (TE) in 20 Caucasian and Chinese hypogonadal men recruited in Edinburgh and Hong Kong (n = 10 in each center). Outcomes were measured using a combination of daily diaries, semistructured interviews, and questionnaires. Nocturnal penile tumescence (NPT) was also recorded in the Edinburgh group. After withdrawal of androgen replacement treatment (wash-out phase) for a minimum of 6 weeks, subjects were randomized to two groups in a cross-over design. Drug treatment regimens were of 6-week duration and consisted of two implants, each containing 115 mg MENT acetate, inserted s.c. into the upper arm and removed after 6 weeks and two injections of TE (200 mg, i.m.) 3 weeks apart. MENT treatment resulted in stable plasma MENT concentrations of 1.4 +/- 0.1 nmol/L after 3 weeks and 1.3 +/- 0.1 nmol/L after 6 weeks (mean +/- SEM; all men). Nadir testosterone concentrations were 3.6 +/- 0.6 nmol/L at the end of the wash-out phase and 9.4 +/- 0.6 nmol/L 3 weeks after each injection. There were no differences in hormone concentrations between centers. There were no adverse toxicological effects. There were only minor differences between the two treatments. Both MENT and TE treatment resulted in significant increases in sexual interest and activity, spontaneous erection (both by self-report and NPT measurement), and increases in positive moods, with decreases in negative moods in the Edinburgh group. In the Hong Kong group, both treatments increased waking erection, with a trend toward increased sexual interest and activity. Mood states appeared to be less affected during the wash-out phase than in Edinburgh men and showed no significant response to either treatment. These results demonstrate that MENT has similar effects on sexual activity and mood states as testosterone in hypogonadal men. As NPT is a physiological androgen-dependant outcome, these data provide further evidence for the androgenicity of MENT. The lack of detected effect of either androgen in Hong Kong men other than on waking erection illustrates the importance of the cultural context of symptomatology and its measurement. The appropriate dose of MENT remains to be determined, but these results support its development as a potential androgen replacement therapy.
Radiographic and clinical evaluation of single-tooth Biolok implants: a 5-year study.

PURPOSE The purpose of this prospective clinical and radiographic study was to evaluate Biolok implants used for single-tooth replacement during 5 years of function. MATERIALS AND METHODS Thirty-nine patients received Biolok implants for single-tooth replacement. Clinical and radiographic recordings were made at baseline (placement of restoration) and at 1, 3, and 5 years. Plaque Index (PI), Gingival Index (GI), and clinical attachment level were the clinical parameters recorded. Clinical attachment level was measured using a customized probing template and a standard pressure electronic probe. Bone level changes were measured from standardized radiographs. Clinical attachment level and bone level were recorded to the nearest 0.1 mm. Correlations between clinical attachment level, bone level, PI, and GI were evaluated. RESULTS The cumulative survival rate was 97.4% (38 of 39 implants). The mean clinical attachment level change over 5 years was a loss of 0.17+/-0.23 mm. Significant correlations between clinical attachment level change and PI were found at 3 and 5 years (P < .015). Significant correlations between clinical attachment level change and GI were not found (P >.05). Mean bone loss was 0.83+/-0.03 mm from baseline to 1 year, 0.26+/-0.03 mm from 1 year to 3 years, and 0.14+/-0.04 mm from 3 to 5 years. Significant correlations between bone level changes and PI or GI were not found (P > .05). DISCUSSION Over a 5-year evaluation period, the bone levels and clinical attachment levels were stable. These results were consistent with other studies of single-tooth implants. CONCLUSIONS After 5 years of function, the results suggest that Biolok implants can be successfully used for single-tooth replacement.
Stimulation of Toll-like Receptor 2 by Coxiella burnetii Is Required for Macrophage Production of Pro-inflammatory Cytokines and Resistance to Infection*

Innate and adaptive immune responses are initiated upon recognition of microbial molecules by Toll-like receptors (TLRs). We have investigated the importance of these receptors in the induction of pro-inflammatory cytokines and macrophage resistance to infection with Coxiella burnetii, an obligate intracellular bacterium and the etiological agent of Q fever. By using a Chinese hamster ovary/CD14 cell line expressing either functional TLR2 or TLR4, we determined that C. burnetii phase II activates TLR2 but not TLR4. Macrophages deficient for TLR2, but not TLR4, produced less tumor necrosis factor-α and interleukin-12 upon C. burnetii infection. Furthermore, it was found that TLR2 activation interfered with C. burnetii intracellular replication, as macrophages from TLR2-deficient mice were highly permissive for C. burnetii growth compared with macrophages from wild type mice or TLR4-deficient mice. Although LPS modifications distinguish virulent C. burnetii phase I bacteria from avirulent phase II organisms, electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry analysis showed that the lipid A moieties isolated from these two phase variants are identical. Purified lipid A derived from either phase I or phase II LPS failed to activate TLR2 and TLR4. Indeed, the lipid A molecules were able to interfere with TLR4 signaling in response to purified Escherichia coli LPS. These studies indicate that TLR2 is an important host determinant that mediates recognition of C. burnetii and a response that limits growth of this intracellular pathogen.
Intracerebral Sources of Human Auditory-Evoked Potentials

Evoked potentials to brief 1,000-Hz tones presented to either the left or the right ear were recorded from 30 electrodes arrayed over the head. These recordings were submitted to two different forms of source analysis: brain electric source analysis (BESA) and variable-resolution electromagnetic tomography (VARETA). Both analyses showed that the dominant intracerebral sources for the late auditory-evoked potentials (50–300 ms) were in the supratemporal plane and lateral temporal lobe contralateral to the ear of stimulation. The analyses also suggested the possibility of additional sources in the frontal lobes.
Trade and Inequality in a Directed Search Model with Firm and Worker Heterogeneity

This paper integrates the insight that exporting firms are typically more productive and employ higher-skilled workers into a directed search model of the labour market. The model generates a skill premium as well as residual wage inequality among identical workers. A trade liberalization increases the skill premium and likely increases residual inequality among high-skilled workers. The calibrated model generates results consistent with the prior literature examining the effect of the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement on the Canadian labour market: a significant decrease in employment in manufacturing, but only a small change in unemployment and wages.
Value of Learning and Acting On Customer Information

The rapid growth in demand and supply of sophisticated data mining and analytical decision tools calls for research to understand the value of learning, as well as how learning interacts with firms’ day-to-day marketing strategies. In this paper, we consider a market in which the firm can reduce its service cost when it matches the right product with the right customer. Facing uncertainty about customer types, the firm can gradually learn using observed service costs realized from recent interactions as noisy signals. On the basis of the most updated information, the firm makes matching and selection decisions to maximize its long-term profit. By solving the closed form solution to the fully dynamic optimization problem with infinite horizon, we analytically investigate the dynamic and endogenous nature of learning processes, the interaction between learning and decision making, and the evolution of profit over time. We also examine how optimal decision paths, market size in steady states and the evolution of profit are affected by parameters such as discount rate and the precision of information. Extending the model to a setting in which the precision of signals is proportional to the units of goods, we study how firms can endogenize the speed of learning. Our results shed light on the value of learning and acting on information, the time point to discontinue service to a customer, the duration and amount of short-term financial losses before learning pays off, and how the firm can modify its decisions to speed up the learning process.
An experimental study on ultrasonic machining of pure titanium using designed experiments

In the present research work, the effect of several process parameters on the machining characteristics of pure titanium (ASTM Grade-I) has been reported. The machining characteristics that are being investigated are tool wear rate and the quality of the machined surface in terms of the surface finish. The mechanism of material removal was has also been correlated with the machining conditions. Four different process parameters were undertaken for this study; Tool material, abrasive material, grit size of the slurry used and power rating of the machine. The optimal settings of parameters are determined through experiments planned, conducted and analyzed using Taguchi method. The significant parameters are also identified and their effect on tool wear rate and surface roughness is studied. The results obtained have been validated by conducting the confirmation experiments.
Vehicle Detection by a Context-Aware Multichannel Feature Pyramid

The majority of the existing appearance-based vehicle-detection systems make use of local features for detection purposes, such as Haar-like, histograms of oriented gradients, scale-invariant feature transform, and so forth. However, these local features have limitations when dealing with illuminations, scale, shape variations, and complex background situations. It is desirable for a vehicle to have discriminative and robust features. For this purpose, a novel context-aware multichannel feature pyramid has been proposed in this paper. The main contribution of this paper is proposing two context-aware structural descriptors, termed as a context-aware difference sign transform feature and context-aware difference magnitude transform feature. An image has been tiled with a dense grid of the cells, and each cell is described by both local details and context-aware structural descriptors. The context-aware structural descriptors have the ability to capture the context-aware structural information of cells. The proposed context-aware multichannel feature pyramid is able to provide more effective features for vehicle detection. The results of the two public traffic analysis datasets show that the proposed approach leads to better performances when compared with the current state-of-the-art methods. Moreover, the experimental results are determined to be satisfactory, even for the images containing vehicles that have undergone scale variations and camera viewpoint changes, as well as for images that were photographed with complex backgrounds.
Quantum vortex configurations in three dimensions.

We examine the kinematics of quantum vortex configurations in three-dimensional space for an ideal incompressible fluid. The permitted quantum configurations are shown to be {ital surfaces} of vorticity, characterized topologically not only by their knottedness, but also by additional global properties such as twists and holes. Our results, obtained by representing an infinite-dimensional group of diffeomorphisms, contradict conclusions reached by approximating the infinite-dimensional system with finitely many degrees of freedom.
Localization of RFI Sources for the SMOS Mission: A Means for Assessing SMOS Pointing Performances

Artificial sources emitting in the protected part of the L-band are contaminating the retrievals of the soil moisture and ocean salinity (SMOS) satellite launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in November 2009. Detecting and pinpointing such sources is crucial for the improvement of SMOS science products as well as for the identification of the emitters. In this contribution, we present a method to obtain snapshot-wise information about sources of radio-frequency interference (RFI). The localization accuracy of this method is also assessed for observed RFI sources. We also show that RFI localizations constitute a useful data set for assessing the pointing performance of the satellite, and present how it is possible, using the results of this method, to identify and estimate two systematic errors in the geo-location of the satellite field of view. The potential causes and the approaches to mitigate both these errors are discussed.
Deladenus posteroporus n. sp. (Nematoda: Neotylenchidae) Isolated from Packaging Wood from Canada and White Pine (Pinus monticola) Lumber from the United States and Intercepted in Ningbo, China

Abstract Deladenus posteroporus n. sp. isolated from packaging wood originated from Canada and from white pine lumber from the United States, both intercepted in the port of Ningbo, China, is described and illustrated. Both mycetophagous and infective forms were recovered from the Canadian sample, whereas only the mycetophagous form was found in the U.S. sample. The new species is characterized by the posteriorly positioned excretory pore relative to the hemizonid in both mycetophagous and infective forms, by a broadly rounded tail end in mycetophagous females and lateral fields with 11 to 12 lines midbody in both mycetophagous females and males. The partial 18S, complete internal transcribed spacer, and partial 28S D2/D3 rRNA genes were amplified and sequenced. Phylogenetic analyses of the genes grouped the new species with previously sequenced species of Deladenus in a fully supported clade. This is the first report of Deladenus species with a known infective stage to have the excretory pore positioned posterior to the hemizonid.
High prevalence of candiduria due to non‐albicans Candida species among diabetic patients: A matter of concern?

Among the fungal pathogens, Candida species are the most common cause of urinary tract infection (UTI). Some predisposing factors such as diabetes mellitus, urinary retention, urinary stasis, renal transplantation, and hospitalization can increase the risk of candiduria. The aim of this cross‐sectional study was to evaluate candiduria among type 2 diabetic patients and identification of the Candida isolates.
Laser capture microdissection‐based expression profiling identifies PD1‐ligand as a target of the nude locus gene product

T cell development requires the interaction of developing thymocytes with thymic epithelial cells. Thymic epithelial cells acquire their unique phenotype under the control of the winged‐helix transcription factor Whn, which is lacking in the nude mouse. Whn‐dependent genes may therefore be important regulators of lympho‐epithelial interactions. To identify Whn target genes we isolated RNA populations of wild‐type and nude thymic anlagen from embryonic day 12.5 embryos by laser capture microdissection and compared them by gene expression profiling on microarrays representing 22,000 transcripts. All cDNA with expression differences confirmed by quantitative RT‐PCR using RNA from individual anlagen and by in situ hybridization were found to be present in wild‐type and absent in nude samples. Three of eight confirmed transcripts were of hematopoietic origin; these transcripts emanate from hematopoietic precursors which have just entered the thymic anlage. Five transcripts were of epithelial origin; one of these corresponds to the recently identified PD‐1 ligand (PD‐L1), the receptor of which is known to modulate positive selection and to play a role in the control of autoimmunity, and the remaining transcripts code for novel genes. The presented results support our prediction that this systematic approach by gene expression profiling yields regulators of thymopoiesis.