Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Characteristics of diabetic nephropathy patients without diabetic retinopathy

Abstract The purpose of the current study was to investigate the characteristics of patients with diabetic nephropathy (DN) without diabetic retinopathy (DR). One hundred four patients with biopsy-proven DN, and 52 patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) without DR who were diagnosed as membranous nephropathy by renal biopsy were retrospectively included. We compared the clinical and laboratory parameters of DN patients with and without DR. Furthermore, among the DM patients without DR, we compared those with DN and with membranous nephropathy. Among patients with DN, including those with pure DN and DN coexisting with nondiabetic renal disease, compared with patients with DR, those without DR had significantly higher levels of serum albumin and hemoglobin (31.72 ± 7.97 vs 28.49 ± 6.30 g/L, P = .023; 128.11 ± 21.87 vs 113.06 ± 22.03 g/L, P = .001, respectively), and significantly lower level of serum creatinine and prevalence of diabetic neuropathy (148.56 ± 99.19 vs 203.75 ± 145.36 &mgr;mol/L, P = .028; 7.30% vs 32.70%, P = .001, respectively). Among patients with pure DN, compared with patients with DR, those without DR had significantly higher level of serum albumin (33.91 ± 5.79 vs 29.32 ± 5.42 g/L, P = .012). Among DM patients without DR, patients with membranous nephropathy had significantly lower levels of serum albumin and serum creatinine, and significantly higher levels of high-density lipoprotein and cholesterol than those with DN. In conclusion, DN patients without DR may have less serious renal damage and less diabetic complication than those with DR. In the absence of DR, there is still a lack of effective indicators suggesting diabetic nephropathy or nondiabetic glomerulopathy, and renal biopsy is indispensable for diagnosis in such circumstances.
Seasonality, Household Food Security, and Nutritional Status in Dinajpur, Bangladesh

Background The influence of seasonality on food security and nutritional status is widely accepted. However, research has typically focused on rural households and has not explored the specific mechanisms underlying seasonal effects. Objective To investigate the role of seasonality in determining the food security and nutritional status of low-income urban households and to isolate specific pathways through which seasonality has its impact. Methods Secondary panel data from CARE/IFPRI were utilized. Three rounds of data were collected from approximately 600 households in low-income areas of Dinajpur, Bangladesh, from 2002 through 2003, twice during the monsoon season and once in the dry season. Household-level surveys collected data on income and expenditure, employment, urban agriculture, health, and assets. Height and weight measurements were taken from children between the ages of 6 and 72 months. Paired t-tests and logistic fixed-effects modeling were then used to explore the role of seasonality. Results The prevalence rates of food insecurity, wasting, and inadequate growth were all significantly higher during the monsoon season as compared with the dry season. Dietary diversity and lost work due to the weather were identified as specific pathways through which season affected household food security. However, mechanisms hypothesized to contribute to seasonal declines in nutritional status, such as child illness, were not found to be significant. Conclusions Season had a significant effect on both food security and nutritional status in Dinajpur, with households consistently worse off during the monsoon season. Initiatives to promote food market development, support employment during the hunger season, and prevent seasonal declines in nutritional status should be implemented.
Dynamic compressive loading differentially regulates chondrocyte anabolic and catabolic activity with age

Dynamic loading has emerged as an important part of cartilage tissue engineering strategies for enhancing tissue production and producing cartilage with functionally competent mechanical properties. As patients in need of cartilage span a range of age groups, questions arise as to the role of age in a cell's ability to respond to dynamic loading. Therefore, this study's goal was to characterize age‐related anabolic and catabolic responses of chondrocytes to dynamic compressive loading. Bovine chondrocytes isolated from juvenile (3‐week‐old) and adult (2‐ to 3‐year‐old) donors were encapsulated in poly(ethylene glycol) hydrogels and subjected to dynamic loading applied intermittently in a sinusoidal waveform at 1 or 0.3 Hz with 5 or 10% amplitude strain up to 2 weeks. Loading significantly enhanced total sulfated glycosaminoglycan (sGAG) production by 220% for juvenile chondrocytes with 0.3 Hz/5% loading and by 88% for adult chondrocytes with 1 Hz/5% loading, while all other loading regimes did not affect or inhibited total sGAG production. Contrarily, deposition of larger matrix molecules of aggrecan and collagen II was either not affected or inhibited by loading. Collagen VI deposition was significantly upregulated by loading but only in adult chondrocytes and under different loading regimes (1 Hz/10% and 0.3 Hz/5%) when compared to total sGAGs. Both cell populations displayed catabolic activity, which appeared to be stimulated by loading. Taken together, findings from this study suggest that loading differentially regulates matrix synthesis and the response is highly dependent on donor age. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2013; 110: 2046–2057. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Good friends are hard to find? The social networks of people with mental illness 12 years after deinstitutionalisation

Background While community care is now well established in England, the development and maintenance of social networks of people with long-term mental illness remains a major challenge to services. Aims To investigate the size of the social networks of people with long-term mental illness and the types of social support they receive in relation to their age and accommodation. Sample Thirty-nine men and 46 women (mean age: 61 years; range: 38–88). Forty nine (60%) were 65 years or under and 32 (40%) were over 65. Methods Participants were interviewed using the Social Network Guide. Comparisons were made using generalised linear modelling. Results Social networks (median 19; range 2–85) were generally larger than those reported in previous studies. Older residents (over 65 years) had closer ties than younger residents. Congregate types of community settings were relatively devoid of social supports. Conclusion Appropriate activities and social contexts are still needed to facilitate the social networks of people with mental illness, in particular, for those aged under 65 years.
Comparative study of hydrophilic and hydrophobic ionic liquids for observing cultured human cells by scanning electron microscopy

An ionic liquid (IL) is a salt that remains in the liquid state at room temperature. It does not vaporize under vacuum and imparts electrical conductivity to samples for observation by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Recently, the usefulness of ILs has been widely recognized. In our previous study, one of the ILs 1‐ethyl‐3‐methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate (EtMelm+BF4−) was used for SEM analysis of biological samples. In comparison with the conventional method, samples prepared using EtMelm+BF4− provided more detailed SEM images of the cell ultrastructure, enabling the observation of protrusions. In addition, the IL treatment is a less time consuming and simple method that does not include dehydration, drying, and conductivity treatments, which are an essential parts of the conventional method. In this study, we compared the usefulness of four hydrophobic and three hydrophilic ILs for SEM to observe fixed cultured human A549 cells. All ILs worked well to prevent “charge‐up” effect for SEM observation. However, the hydrophilic ILs tended to provide clearer images than the hydrophobic ILs. We concluded that various ILs can be used for SEM sample preparation and their application to a wide range of fields is anticipated in future. Microsc. Res. Tech., 2011. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Quantification of Thrombocyte Growth Factors in Platelet Concentrates Produced by Discontinuous Cell Separation

Platelet concentrates (PC) are increasingly used to increase bone regeneration in pre-prosthetic surgery. Although it is generally appreciated that certain growth factors (PDGF, TGF, EGF, and ECGF) are present in thrombocyte preparations, relatively little is known about these components in quantitative terms. The study reported here analysed the amounts of growth factors in PC produced under standard conditions from healthy volunteers. All the blood samples (237 in total) were analysed using Quantikine ELISA kits (R and D). The mean - SD platelet count in whole blood from these donors was 262,000 - 58,000/ w l, while in PC produced by discontinuous cell separation it was 1,419,000 - 333,000/ w l. The mean growth factor concentrations in PC preparations in ng/ml were as follows: PDGF-AB 125 - 55 ng/ml; TGF- g 1 221 - 92 ng/ml; IGF-I 85 - 25 ng/ml; PDGF-BB 14 - 9 ng/ml; TGF- g 2 0.4 - 0.3 ng/ml. These growth factor concentrations typically covered a 3-10 fold range: PDGF-AB 29-277 ng/ml; PDGF-BB 2-33 ng/ml; TGF- g 1 32-397 ng/ml; TGF- g 2 0.1-1.2 ng/ml; IGF-I 40-138 ng/ml. Platelet counts in PC were slightly higher for women (Mann-Whitney Test all p <0.001 ) than for men, while the concentrations of growth factors in PC exhibited no gender-related difference of any statistical significance.
Transformation Networks for Target-Oriented Sentiment Classification

Target-oriented sentiment classification aims at classifying sentiment polarities over individual opinion targets in a sentence. RNN with attention seems a good fit for the characteristics of this task, and indeed it achieves the state-of-the-art performance. After re-examining the drawbacks of attention mechanism and the obstacles that block CNN to perform well in this classification task, we propose a new model that achieves new state-of-the-art results on a few benchmarks. Instead of attention, our model employs a CNN layer to extract salient features from the transformed word representations originated from a bi-directional RNN layer. Between the two layers, we propose a component which first generates target-specific representations of words in the sentence, and then incorporates a mechanism for preserving the original contextual information from the RNN layer.
Sagittal plane rotation of the pelvis during lumbar posteroanterior loading.

OBJECTIVE To determine the extent of sagittal plane rotation of the pelvis during lumbar spine posteroanterior loading. DESIGN Quantitative study. SETTING Biomechanics Laboratory, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Sydney. PARTICIPANTS Ten male and female subjects with no recent history of significant low back pain. INTERVENTION A mechanical device was used to apply forces to the L3 spinous process. Data were collected during slow cyclical loading. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE The stiffness of the posteroanterior movement at the point of loading was measured, together with the sagittal plane rotation of the pelvis and the resistance to rotation provided by the bed on which the subject lay. RESULTS Mean pelvic rotation was 2.1 degrees per 100 N applied force (SD 1.01 degrees/100 N). Mean posteroanterior stiffness was 13.4 N/mm (SD 3.13 N/mm) and resistance to pelvic rotation was 2.71 Nm/degree of pelvic rotation (SD 0.84 Nm/degree). CONCLUSION During posteroanterior force application there is pelvic rotation of a magnitude that may be sufficient to have clinical significance. Abnormalities found during lumbar posteroanterior force application may originate in tissues caudad to the lumbar spine itself.
The Informational Role of Housing Market Liquidity

I propose a novel channel for the emergence of spatial correlation in housing market liquidity. Using micro-level panel data on both actual transactions and household valuations of their own non-traded properties, I find that market thinness and perceived house price growth rates are strongly linked across neighbouring areas, consistent with a framework in which spillovers arise through spatial learning. The mechanisms have the potential to explain the regional clustering of house prices, feedback effects, and the aggregate transmission of shocks from narrow segments of the market.
Patterns of regional inflation persistence in a C.E.E. country. The case of Poland

Abstract This paper investigates patterns of regional inflation persistence in Poland, a representative Central and Eastern European (C.E.E.) country. This study first argues that the C.E. E. perspective is relevant in the context of this study, due to the recent transitions, incomplete processes of forming forward-looking inflation expectations and pronounced spatial inequalities. Using individual and panel regressions on disaggregate data, this study provides evidence of the aggregation bias and marked differences in inflation persistence across product categories. Furthermore, it shows that cross-regional differences in inflation persistence remain, even after controlling for the product category. While this study generally confirms the earlier finding of Vaona and Ascari that more backward regions exhibit higher consumer price index inflation persistence, we also show that the picture is more nuanced at the product category level.
Effect of orthodontic treatment on saliva, plaque and the levels of Streptococcus mutans and Lactobacillus.

OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to identify changes in the oral environment with clinical, salivary and bacterial risk markers after placement of fixed orthodontic appliances on permanent dentition. MATERIAL AND METHODS With ethical approval, we used different techniques to analyzed clinical, salivary and bacterial risk markers in 34 patients (mean age, 16.7+5.2 years), 14 males and 20 females; before starting orthodontic treatment and 1 month after. Clinical risk markers (decayed, missing, and filled surfaces [DMFS], O'Leary's plaque index, and plaque pH); salivary markers (unstimulated and stimulated saliva flow rate, buffer capacity, pH, and occult blood in saliva) and bacterial counts (Streptococcus mutans and Lactobacillus). Data were analyzed by paired t-test and X2 test. RESULTS This study showed that orthodontic appliances increased the stimulated salivary flow rate (p=0.0001), buffer capacity (p=0.0359), salivary pH (p=0.0246) and occult blood in saliva (p=0.0305). Bacterial levels increased slightly after 1 month of treatment, without statistical significance. Between genders, initially we observed differences in: stimulated saliva (p=0.0019), buffer capacity (p=0.0381) and plaque pH (p=0.0430); after treatment the unstimulated saliva (p=0.0026) showed differences. CONCLUSIONS Orthodontic treatment changes the oral environmental factors, promotes an increase in stimulated flow rate, buffer capacity and salivary pH, which augment the anti caries activity of saliva. In contrast, increased occult blood indicated more gingival inflammation, apparently because augmented the retentive plaque surfaces and the difficult to maintain a good oral hygiene, rinsed the bleeding in saliva by periodontal damage.
Risk Aversion and Prudence in Contests

I examine the impact of risk preferences on efforts and winning probabilities in generalised Tullock contests between two players. The theoretical analysis yields two main results. First, I specify a sufficient condition on the agents’ comparative prudence under which a higher common level of risk aversion leads to lower aggregate effort in symmetric contests. Second, I show that for a certain range of parameters in asymmetric contests, higher risk-aversion will be a disadvantage if the agent is comparatively prudent.
Immediate Hip Spica Casting for Femur Fractures in Pediatric Patients: A Review of 175 Patients

Immediate closed reduction and application of a well-molded hip spica cast is a safe and effective treatment option for closed, isolated femur fractures in children who weigh between 10 and 100 pounds. Between 1988 and 1996, 190 immediate hip spica casts were placed on children with isolated femoral shaft fractures who weighed between 10 and 100 pounds. Fifteen patients were lost to followup leaving 175 children who were evaluated and followed up for at least 2 years after the hip spica cast was removed (range 2-10 years). The femur fractures were reduced closed and placed in a 1 1/2 hip spica cast in the emergency room with the patient under conscious sedation or in the operating room with the patient under general anesthesia. All of the children returned home within 24 hours of the procedure. All 175 femur fractures united within 8 weeks. The only complication was a refracture in a 25 pound child who fell 1 week after the cast was removed. No significant residual angular deformities were present in any of the children at last followup. None of the children required external shoe lifts, epiphysiodesis, antibiotics, irrigation and debridements, or limb lengthening procedures for leg length inequalities. The authors think that immediate closed reduction and placement of a well-molded hip spica cast is a safe and reliable treatment option for isolated, closed femur fractures in children from birth to 10 years of age who weigh less than 80 pounds.
Incentivize It and They Will Come? How Some of the Busiest U.S. Airports Are Building Air Service With Incentive Programs

Problem, research strategy, and findings: In the 1990s, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) prohibited airport sponsors (local authorities managing airports) from diverting airport revenue to general municipal budgets and allowed the busiest airports to create air service incentive programs (ASIPs) to induce airlines to launch new air service. These incentive programs have not been evaluated, although planners need information on their long-term effectiveness. Few data, however, are available on ASIP programs; I created a database to identify which airports have ASIPs, which new airline services received incentives, and the services that continued after incentives ended. I find that 26 of 44 airports with ASIPs that recruited new routes spent $171.5 million combined between 2012 and the first quarter of 2015, 40% on routes that were not retained when the incentive ended. The busiest airports in the largest cities with growing populations, relatively independent of local economic status, were most able to recruit and retain new airline services. Small and medium airports, particularly in stagnant areas, were not able to recruit and retain new air services. Takeaway for practice: The FAA should require airport sponsors to submit comprehensive information on their ASIP programs—the routes recruited and retained, as well as detailed estimates of the costs and benefits of each route—to provide planners with needed information. The FAA also should loosen the constraints on the use of non-aeronautical airport revenues so that communities can choose between spending on incentives to increase air service and other programs to increase local economic development.
Examining the Use of Neural Networks for Feature Extraction: A Comparative Analysis using Deep Learning, Support Vector Machines, and K-Nearest Neighbor Classifiers

Neural networks in many varieties are touted as very powerful machine learning tools because of their ability to distill large amounts of information from different forms of data, extracting complex features and enabling powerful classification abilities. In this study, we use neural networks to extract features from both images and numeric data and use these extracted features as inputs for other machine learning models, namely support vector machines (SVMs) and k-nearest neighbor classifiers (KNNs), in order to see if neural-network-extracted features enhance the capabilities of these models. We tested 7 different neural network architectures in this manner, 4 for images and 3 for numeric data, training each for varying lengths of time and then comparing the results of the neural network independently to those of an SVM and KNN on the data, and finally comparing these results to models of SVM and KNN trained using features extracted via the neural network architecture. This process was repeated on 3 different image datasets and 2 different numeric datasets. The results show that, in many cases, the features extracted using the neural network significantly improve the capabilities of SVMs and KNNs compared to running these algorithms on the raw features, and in some cases also surpass the performance of the neural network alone. This in turn suggests that it may be a reasonable practice to use neural networks as a means to extract features for classification by other machine learning models for some datasets.
Arginine Decarboxylase Is Localized in Chloroplasts

Plants, unlike animals, can use either ornithine decarboxylase or arginine decarboxylase (ADC) to produce the polyamine precursor putrescine. Lack of knowledge of the exact cellular and subcellular location of these enzymes has been one of the main obstacles to our understanding of the biological role of polyamines in plants. We have generated polyclonal antibodies to oat (Avena sativa L.) ADC to study the spatial distribution and subcellular localization of ADC protein in different oat tissues. By immunoblotting and immunocytochemistry, we show that ADC is organ specific. By cell fractionation and immunoblotting, we show that ADC is localized in chloroplasts associated with the thylakoid membrane. The results also show that increased levels of ADC protein are correlated with high levels of ADC activity and putrescine in osmotically stressed oat leaves. A model of compartmentalization for the arginine pathway and putrescine biosynthesis in active photosynthetic tissues has been proposed. In the context of endosymbiote-driven metabolic evolution in plants, the location of ADC in the chloroplast compartment may have major evolutionary significance, since it explains (a) why plants can use two alternative pathways for putrescine biosynthesis and (b) why animals do not possess ADC
Combined Immunohistochemistry of PLK1, p21, and p53 for Predicting TP53 Status: An Independent Prognostic Factor of Breast Cancer

It is difficult to predict the TP53 status by p53 immunohistochemistry (IHC). We aimed to improve the accuracy of p53 IHC with p53-regulated proteins for predicting the TP53 mutation status. TP53 mutations were detected in 19 of 38 breast cancer patients (50%). Five of 7 cases of protein-truncating mutation of TP53 were completely negative for p53 IHC, whereas 11 of 12 cases of TP53 point mutation were strongly positive for p53 IHC. Therefore, to avoid false negatives, we extracted p53-dependent universally downregulated genes using microarray analysis from 38 breast cancer patients and 2 p53-inducible cell lines. From 9 commonly repressed genes, we evaluated 3 genes, baculoviral IAP repeat-containing 5 (BIRC5), polo-like kinase 1 (PLK1), and BUB1 mitotic checkpoint serine/threonine kinase (BUB1), which were previously identified as p53-dependent repressed genes. PLK1≥Allred total score (TS) 5 showed the highest correlation with TP53 mutation. To decrease false positivity, we evaluated p21 IHC. Although strong staining of p21 was observed in 4 cases (10.5%), all 4 were wild-type TP53. Thus, p53 mutation-like (p53mt-like) IHC was identified by p53 TS7,8 with PLK1≥TS 5 and p21 TS⩽6. p53 mt-like IHC correlated with TP53 mutation (predictive value=0.94). In other 157 breast cancer cases, p53 mt-like was an independent prognostic marker in multivariate analysis and a strong prognostic factor. Stratification with p53 mt-like IHC identified patients with a poorer prognosis. In conclusion, we identified reliable IHC conditions to predict the TP53 status of breast cancer patients.