Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Hunting for the cause: Evidence for prion-like mechanisms in Huntington’s disease

The hypothesis that pathogenic protein aggregates associated with neurodegenerative diseases spread from cell-to-cell in the brain in a manner akin to infectious prions has gained substantial momentum due to an explosion of research in the past 10–15 years. Here, we review current evidence supporting the existence of prion-like mechanisms in Huntington’s disease (HD), an autosomal dominant neurodegenerative disease caused by expansion of a CAG repeat tract in exon 1 of the huntingtin (HTT) gene. We summarize information gained from human studies and in vivo and in vitro models of HD that strongly support prion-like features of the mutant HTT (mHTT) protein, including potential involvement of molecular features of mHTT seeds, synaptic structures and connectivity, endocytic and exocytic mechanisms, tunneling nanotubes, and nonneuronal cells in mHTT propagation in the brain. We discuss mechanisms by which mHTT aggregate spreading and neurotoxicity could be causally linked and the potential benefits of targeting prion-like mechanisms in the search for new disease-modifying therapies for HD and other fatal neurodegenerative diseases.
Genome-wide identification, structural analysis and expression profiles of short internodes related sequence gene family in quinoa

Based on the whole genome data information of Chenopodium quinoa Willd, the CqSRS gene family members were systematically identified and analyzed by bioinformatics methods, and the responses of CqSRS genes to NaCl (100 mmol/L), salicylic acid (200 umol/L) and low temperature (4°C) were detected by qRT-PCR. The results showed that a total of 10 SHI related sequence genes were identified in quinoa, and they were distributed on 9 chromosomes, and there were four pairs of duplicated genes. The number of amino acids encoded ranged from 143 aa to 370 aa, and the isoelectric point ranged from 4.81 to 8.90. The secondary structure was mainly composed of random coil (Cc). Most of the SRS gene encoding proteins were located in the cytoplasm (5 CqSRS). Phylogenetic analysis showed that the CqSRS genes were divided into three groups, and the gene structure showed that the number of exons of CqSRS was between two-five. Promoter analysis revealed that there are a total of 44 elements related to plant hormone response elements, light response elements, stress response elements and tissue-specific expression in the upstream regin of the gene. Protein interaction showed that all 10 CqSRS proteins appeared in the known protein interaction network diagram in Arabidopsis. Expression profile analysis showed that CqSRS genes had different expression patterns, and some genes had tissue-specific expression. qRT-PCR showed that all SRS family genes responded to ABA、NaCl、drought and low-temperature treatments, but the expression levels of different CqSRS genes were significantly different under various stresses. This study lays a foundation for further analyzed the function of CqSRS genes.
Autophagy regulated by the HIF/REDD1/mTORC1 signaling is progressively increased during erythroid differentiation under hypoxia

For hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs), hypoxia is a specific microenvironment known as the hypoxic niche. How hypoxia regulates erythroid differentiation of HSPCs remains unclear. In this study, we show that hypoxia evidently accelerates erythroid differentiation, and autophagy plays a pivotal role in this process. We further determine that mTORC1 signaling is suppressed by hypoxia to relieve its inhibition of autophagy, and with the process of erythroid differentiation, mTORC1 activity gradually decreases and autophagy activity increases accordingly. Moreover, we provide evidence that the HIF-1 target gene REDD1 is upregulated to suppress mTORC1 signaling and enhance autophagy, thereby promoting erythroid differentiation under hypoxia. Together, our study identifies that the enhanced autophagy by hypoxia favors erythroid maturation and elucidates a new regulatory pattern whereby autophagy is progressively increased during erythroid differentiation, which is driven by the HIF-1/REDD1/mTORC1 signaling in a hypoxic niche.
Genome-Wide Characterization of Ascorbate Peroxidase Gene Family in Peanut (Arachis hypogea L.) Revealed Their Crucial Role in Growth and Multiple Stress Tolerance

Ascorbate peroxidase (APX), an important antioxidant enzyme, plays a significant role in ROS scavenging by catalyzing the decrease of hydrogen peroxide under various environmental stresses. Nevertheless, information about the APX gene family and their evolutionary and functional attributes in peanut (Arachis hypogea L.) was not reported. Therefore, a comprehensive genome-wide study was performed to discover the APX genes in cultivated peanut genome. This study identified 166 AhAPX genes in the peanut genome, classified into 11 main groups. The gene duplication analysis showed that AhAPX genes had experienced segmental duplications and purifying selection pressure. Gene structure and motif investigation indicated that most of the AhAPX genes exhibited a comparatively well-preserved exon-intron pattern and motif configuration contained by the identical group. We discovered five phytohormones-, six abiotic stress-, and five growth and development-related cis-elements in the promoter regions of AhAPX. Fourteen putative ah-miRNAs from 12 families were identified, targeting 33 AhAPX genes. Furthermore, we identified 3,257 transcription factors from 38 families (including AP2, ARF, B3, bHLH, bZIP, ERF, MYB, NAC, WRKY, etc.) in 162 AhAPX genes. Gene ontology and KEGG enrichment analysis confirm the role of AhAPX genes in oxidoreductase activity, catalytic activity, cell junction, cellular response to stimulus and detoxification, biosynthesis of metabolites, and phenylpropanoid metabolism. Based on transcriptome datasets, some genes such as AhAPX4/7/17/77/82/86/130/133 and AhAPX160 showed significantly higher expression in diverse tissues/organs, i.e., flower, leaf, stem, roots, peg, testa, and cotyledon. Likewise, only a few genes, including AhAPX4/17/19/55/59/82/101/102/137 and AhAPX140, were significantly upregulated under abiotic (drought and cold), and phytohormones (ethylene, abscisic acid, paclobutrazol, brassinolide, and salicylic acid) treatments. qRT-PCR-based expression profiling presented the parallel expression trends as generated from transcriptome datasets. Our discoveries gave new visions into the evolution of APX genes and provided a base for further functional examinations of the AhAPX genes in peanut breeding programs.
Why don't people with MCI approach memory clinics? The role of awareness in medical help-seeking

COPYRIGHT © 2022 Gigi and Papirovitz. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. Why don’t people with MCI approach memory clinics? The role of awareness in medical help-seeking
Who is more likely to start a business? Analysis of the factors influencing undergraduates’ entrepreneurial intentions

Entrepreneurial intention is an important condition for promoting substantive entrepreneurial behavior, which in turn alleviates employment pressure and promotes sustainable economic and social development. Based on national survey data of university students, descriptive statistical analysis of variables and binary logistic regression analysis were used to empirically analyze the factors influencing university students’ entrepreneurial intentions in five aspects, including innate endowment, acquired characteristics, entrepreneurship courses, and entrepreneurial practice, and social support. The regression results showed that both the factors of innate endowment and acquired characteristics passed the significance test. The entrepreneurship course factor had a significant impact on entrepreneurial intention, with the mean value of the number of entrepreneurship courses hitting 1.80, which is much lower than the other subdivision factors, indicating that there is a greater demand for entrepreneurship courses offered by university students, while the actual situation is less than satisfactory. The entrepreneurial practice factor is also an important factor, with an overall mean of 3 or more, and has a significant impact on entrepreneurial intentions, but in comparison, the factor of having an off-campus practice base for entrepreneurial practice has the lowest mean score, which shows that there is some room for improvement in the construction of off-campus practice bases. The social support factor significantly influences the willingness to start a business, and the mean score for each factor is above the medium level. By understanding which students are more willing to start a business and which factors are more likely to influence their willingness to start a business, we can further consider what kind of entrepreneurial skills and entrepreneurship education can lead to high-quality entrepreneurship and employment.
Peristaltic flow of a viscous fluid in a curved duct with a rectangular cross section

Most flow systems in the human body are duct shaped, such as the pancreatic, bile, and gallbladder ducts. Such flow systems are also common in industrial applications like HVAC systems. This study presents a novel mathematical model to analyze the peristaltic motion of a viscous fluid in a three-dimensional curved duct with a rectangular cross section; specifically, such geometries are used more in industrial and medical applications. In the current investigation, the constraints of lubrication theory are considered, and a perturbation technique is used to solve the Navier–Stokes partial differential equations. The major focus of this work is on the aspect ratio of the duct and curvature of the flow axis. Curvilinear coordinates of cylindrical systems are considered for the derivations because of the curved geometry; homogeneous no-slip boundary conditions are proposed at the flexible surfaces, and the expression for pressure increase is found numerically using the NIntegrate tool of computing software Mathematica. A comprehensive graphical discussion is presented to determine the effects of all salient physical factors related to the problem. The results show that the large curvature and aspect ratio reduce the fluid speed gradually but that the flow rate promotes fluid velocity. The pumping rate is a decreasing function of the curvature and aspect ratio; however, reverse pumping can occur for large curvature values. Streamline evaluations suggest that large wave amplitudes increase the number of circulating boluses.
Health-related quality of life in long-term differentiated thyroid cancer survivors: A cross-sectional Tunisian-based study

Background and Aim The incidence of differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC) has risen dramatically worldwide. Despite an excellent prognosis, the growing DTC survivors’ community often features poor health-related quality of life (HRQoL), which challenges long-term DTC care, particularly in developing Southern Mediterranean and African countries. We aimed to assess the HRQoL and to investigate its determinants in disease-free Tunisian DTC survivors. Methods We conducted a three-month cross-sectional study that included 266 patients diagnosed with DTC. We assessed the HRQoL in eligible participants using the short form–36 health survey, in comparison with 76 healthy controls. Results The 86 eligible DTC survivors were predominantly female (89.5%) with an average age of 44.3 ± 12.5 years. Physical-functioning (PF), role-physical (RP), and pain domains were substantially altered compared to the reference population. Age was negatively associated with PF, RP, role-emotional (RE), and social functioning (SF). Tumor size and lymph node metastases affected general health and PF, respectively. The cancer-free survival duration was positively correlated with mental health (MH). Poor neck scar healing and persistent post-operative hypoparathyroidism significantly deteriorate MH. Pain perception was positively correlated with the radioactive iodine cumulative dose. Subclinical hyperthyroidism significantly reduced PF and RP scores. TSH suppression was negatively and strongly correlated with MH and SF scores. Conclusion HRQoL is substantially reduced in DTC survivors compared to the normative Tunisian population. These results could be extrapolated to similar individuals in other South Mediterranean and African countries. The development of coordinated multidisciplinary aftercare interventions in this region is warranted to preserve HRQoL in DTC survivors.
Rates of protein synthesis are maintained in brain but reduced in skeletal muscle during dietary sulfur amino acid restriction

Dietary interventions such as sulfur amino acid restriction (SAAR) target multiple drivers of aging, and show promise for preventing or delaying the onset of chronic diseases. SAAR promotes metabolic health and longevity in laboratory animals. The effects of SAAR on proteostasis remain relatively unexplored. We previously reported that SAAR promotes mitochondrial proteostatic maintenance, despite suppression of global protein synthesis, in two peripheral tissues, the liver and skeletal muscle. However, the brain, a tissue vulnerable to age-related neurodegenerative diseases due to the loss of proteostasis, has not been thoroughly studied. Therefore, we sought to reveal proteostatic responses in the brains of mice fed SAAR for 35 days. Here, we demonstrate that male C57Bl/6J mice fed two levels of SAAR maintained rates of protein synthesis in all sub-cellular fractions of the pre-frontal cortex. In comparison, rates of skeletal muscle protein synthesis in SAAR fed mice were slower than control-fed mice. To gain mechanistic insight, we examined several key nutrient/energy sensitive signaling proteins: AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK), eukaryotic initiation factor 2 (eIF2), and ribosomal protein S6 (rpS6). SAAR had minimal to modest effects on the total abundance and phosphorylation of these proteins in both tissues. Our results indicate that the pre-frontal cortex in brain is resistant to perturbations in protein synthesis in mice fed SAAR, unlike skeletal muscle, which had a reduction in global protein synthesis. The results from this study demonstrate that proteostatic control in brain is of higher priority than skeletal muscle during dietary SAAR.
Biofortification of oil quality, yield, and nutrient uptake in Indian mustard (Brassica juncea L.) by foliar application of boron and nitrogen

Indian mustard (Brassica juncea L.) is an essential oilseed crop that offers important nutrients to human beings. However, the concurrent micronutrient deficiencies including boron (B), sulfur (S), and nitrogen (N) could pose a significant threat to public health. Therefore, this study was conducted at the Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, with nine treatments, i.e., T1-Control (recommended NPK only), T2- borax (0.5%) at flowering, T3-borax (1.0%) at flowering,T4- borax (0.5%) + urea (1.0%) at flowering,T5-borax (1.0%) + urea (1.0%) at flowering, T6-borax (0.5%) at flowering + capsule formation, T7-borax (1.0%) at flowering + capsule formation, T8-borax (0.5%) + urea (1.0%) at flowering + capsule formation, T9-borax (1.0%) + urea (1.0%) at flowering + Capsule formation, replicated three times in a randomized block design for 2 years (2020–2021 and 2021–2022). The foliar application of borax (1.0%) + urea (1.0%) at the flowering and capsule formation stage (treatment T9) was highly efficient in increasing food quality parameters such as crude fiber, total soluble solids (TSS), and protein content with maximum values of 3.77, 24.9, and 27.53%, respectively. Also, maximum yields of seed as well as stover for treatment T9 were 1.376 and 6.625 kg ha−1, respectively. Similarly, the results for B, S, and N concentrations in seed (27.71 mg kg−1, 17.69 mg kg−1, and 2.35%), as well as stover (25.92 mg kg−1, 17.31 mg kg−1, and 0.33%), were maximum in treatment T9. Also, B, S, and N uptake by seed (38.18 g ha−1, 24.40 g ha−1, and 32.05 Kg ha−1) and stover (172.55 g ha−1, 115.44 g ha−1, and 21.99 Kg ha−1) were maximum for the treatment T9 involving borax (1.0%) + urea (1.0%) at the flowering and capsule formation stage. Whereas, the concentration and uptake decreased in the treatments involving the sole application of borax and urea. Therefore, the application of borax (1.0%) and urea (1.0%) at the flowering and capsule formation stage significantly improved the quality parameters, seed and stover yield, nutrient concentration, and uptake over control and could be used to alleviate the B, S, and N deficiency in Indian mustard.
Non-thermal Emission from Galaxies

I developed and tested a framework to calculate the non-thermal emission from simulated galaxies originating from cosmic rays (CR). This comprises the synchrotron, inverse Compton (IC) and bremsstrahlung emission from CR electrons, as well as the gamma-ray emission from neutral pion decay resulting from hadronic interactions of CR protons with the ambient medium. Moreover, the secondary electron and positron production is calculated and their contribution to the non-thermal emission is evaluated. The resulting code is applied to magneto-hydrodynamic simulations of galaxies, which include a self-consistent treatment of CRs, that are injected at remnants of core-collapse supernovae, within a sub-grid physics treatment. Assuming steady-state and neglecting explicit spatial diffusion and advection of CR electrons, we take into account all relevant energy loss processes and obtain an equilibrium spectrum for the primary and secondary electrons and positrons. In addition to the CMB, we also account for the stellar radiation field as seed photons for IC scattering. We show the resulting multifrequency spectra and the corresponding radioand gamma-ray emission maps for four simulated galaxies, i.e., a dwarf galaxy and a Milky-Way like galaxy at two evolutionary stages, respectively. These indicate a minor contribution of primary to secondary emission. While the obtained luminosities agree with the observed FIR-gamma-ray relation, they can not reproduce the observed FIR-radio correlation, since the magnetic field of the analyzed galaxies is still in the early phase that is characterized by exponential growth. Hence, the magnetic dynamo has not saturated yet, in contrast to the low-redshift galaxies we observe today. Further improvement of the code will enable the post-processing of simulations with higher resolution at more time steps in order to obtain further insight into the underlying physics of the observed FIR-radio and FIR-gamma-ray relations and to test the impact of CR feedback on galaxy formation.
Measurement by Proxy: On the Accuracy of Online Marketplace Measurements

A number of recent studies have investigated online anonymous (“dark web”) marketplaces. Almost all leverage a “measurement-by-proxy” design, in which researchers scrape market public pages, and take buyer reviews as a proxy for actual transactions, to gain insights into market size and revenue. Yet, we do not know if and how this method biases results. We build a framework to reason about marketplace measurement accuracy, and use it to contrast estimates projected from scrapes of Hansa Market with data from a back-end database seized by the police. We further investigate, by simulation, the impact of scraping frequency, consistency and rate-limits. We ﬁnd that, even with a decent scraping regimen, one might miss approximately 46% of objects – with scraped listings differing signiﬁcantly from not-scraped listings on price, views and product categories. This bias also impacts revenue calculations. We ﬁnd Hansa’s total market revenue to be US $50M, which projections based on our scrapes un-derestimate by a factor of four. Simulations further show that studies based on one or two scrapes are likely to suffer from a very poor coverage (on average, 14% to 30%, respectively).
Appendiceal Schistosomiasis Presenting as an Appendiceal Mass

Background: Schistosomiasis has been noted to be one of the most widespread parasitic diseases in the world. It is commonest in developing countries and 85% of the infections have been reported in Sub-Saharan Africa. Presentation with an appendiceal mass has been a rarity among the cases reported thus far. Case Presentation: We report the case of a 23-year-old man who presented with an appendiceal mass that responded to conservative treatment and had interval appendicectomy with histological confirmation of schistosomal appendicitis. He received post-operative medical therapy for schistosomiasis and had no sequelae thereafter. Conclusion: Appendiceal mass from schistosomal appendicitis responds to initial conservative management, followed by interval appendicectomy and post-operative anti-schistosomal medications serving as adequate treatment subsequently.
Laser dicing of electronics printed circuit boards using a DPSS UV Nd:YVO4 laser

Laser cutting of electronics printed circuit board (PCB) substrates including FR4, and BT/Epoxy-based PCB substrates with 355 nm DPSS UV laser was investigated. The effects of various laser conditions such as scanning speed, assisting gas, repetition rate, and interval between scans on the heat affected zone (HAZ) and charring were studied. The quality and morphology of laser cut PCB substrates were evaluated with optical microscope, and scanning electron microscope (SEM). It was found that multi-pass cutting at high scanning speed can achieve high quality cutting with little charring. It was also found that with O2 assist gas, a certain amount of interval time between scans and higher repetition rate led to less heat affected zone and less charring. High quality laser cutting of PCB substrates with no delamination, very little charring and minimum HAZ was demonstrated. The developed process has important potential applications in the electronics industry.Laser cutting of electronics printed circuit board (PCB) substrates including FR4, and BT/Epoxy-based PCB substrates with 355 nm DPSS UV laser was investigated. The effects of various laser conditions such as scanning speed, assisting gas, repetition rate, and interval between scans on the heat affected zone (HAZ) and charring were studied. The quality and morphology of laser cut PCB substrates were evaluated with optical microscope, and scanning electron microscope (SEM). It was found that multi-pass cutting at high scanning speed can achieve high quality cutting with little charring. It was also found that with O2 assist gas, a certain amount of interval time between scans and higher repetition rate led to less heat affected zone and less charring. High quality laser cutting of PCB substrates with no delamination, very little charring and minimum HAZ was demonstrated. The developed process has important potential applications in the electronics industry.