Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Colchicine Impacts Leukocyte Trafficking in Atherosclerosis and Reduces Vascular Inflammation

Background Inflammation strongly contributes to atherosclerosis initiation and progression. Consequently, recent clinical trials pharmacologically targeted vascular inflammation to decrease the incidence of atherosclerosis-related complications. Colchicine, a microtubule inhibitor with anti-inflammatory properties, reduced cardiovascular events in patients with recent acute coronary syndrome and chronic coronary disease. However, the biological basis of these observations remains elusive. We sought to explore the mechanism by which colchicine beneficially alters the course of atherosclerosis. Methods and Results In mice with early atherosclerosis (Apoe-/- mice on a high cholesterol diet for 8 weeks), we found that colchicine treatment (0.25 mg/kg bodyweight once daily over four weeks) reduced numbers of neutrophils, inflammatory monocytes and macrophages inside atherosclerotic aortas using flow cytometry and immunohistochemistry. Consequently, colchicine treatment resulted in a less inflammatory plaque composition and reduced plaque size. We next investigated how colchicine prevented plaque leukocyte expansion and found that colchicine treatment mitigated recruitment of blood neutrophils and inflammatory monocytes to plaques as revealed by adoptive transfer experiments. Causally, we found that colchicine reduced levels of both leukocyte adhesion molecules and receptors for leukocyte chemoattractants on blood neutrophils and monocytes. Further experiments showed that colchicine treatment reduced vascular inflammation also in post-myocardial infarction accelerated atherosclerosis through similar mechanisms as documented in early atherosclerosis. When we examined whether colchicine also decreased numbers of macrophages inside atherosclerotic plaques by impacting monocyte/macrophage transitioning or in-situ proliferation of macrophages, we report that colchicine treatment did not influence macrophage precursor differentiation or macrophage proliferation using cell culture experiments with bone marrow derived macrophages. Conclusions Our data reveal that colchicine prevents expansion of plaque inflammatory leukocytes through lowering recruitment of blood myeloid cells to plaques. These data provide novel mechanistic clues on the beneficial effects of colchicine in the treatment of atherosclerosis and may inform future anti-inflammatory interventions in patients at risk.
Assessment of the ventilation efficiency in the breathing zone during sleep through computational fluid dynamics techniques

In developed countries, presence at home varies between 60% and 90% of the day, sleeping supposes 30%. Therefore, it is essential to ensure good indoor air quality that enhances health and benefits rest and recovery. In this context, it is necessary to achieve a balance between energy efficiency and air distribution parameters; thus, the influence exerted by the furniture of a bedroom on the air exchange efficiency, in the breathing zone during sleep, is assessed in this study. Computational fluid dynamics techniques, experimentally validated by the tracer gas (SF6) concentration decay method, are used to analyze 52 case studies corresponding to the same space, but varying both the number and the arrangement of the furniture inside. It is concluded that, in order to achieve a significant improvement in the air exchange efficiency, the number of elements included in the bedroom is not relevant, but the position of them. The highest increase in the ventilation efficiency in breathing zone is observed when the furniture is located avoiding the airflow obstruction in the area near the inlet and creating an unfilled volume of air in the area close to the outlet.
Pre-existing Proton Pump Inhibitor Treatment and Short-Term Prognosis of Acute Myocardial Infarction Patients

Introduction Evidence suspects proton pump inhibitor (PPI) use is a risk factor of poor prognosis of acute myocardial infarction (AMI). We aimed to investigate the association between pre-existing PPI use before emergency department (ED) visit and short-term prognosis of AMI patients. Materials and Methods AMI patients admitted to ED were included and categorized as cohorts with or without pre-existing PPI use. Hospital mortality, length of hospital stay, being admitted to intensive care unit (ICU), and length of (total) ICU stay were studied as prognostic outcomes. Multivariable logistic regression or linear regression were used to estimate the associations between pre-existing PPI use and the outcomes after adjusting for potential confounders. Results A total of 2001 AMI patients were included. No significant difference was found in hospital mortality and length of ICU stay between cohorts; patients with pre-existing PPI use showed a significantly longer length of hospital stay (median 3.81 vs. 3.20 days, P = 0.002) but lower proportion of being admitted to ICU (25.59% vs. 40.83%, P < 0.001) compared to those without pre-existing PPI use. Pre-existing PPI use was not associated with hospital mortality [odds ratio (OR) 1.08, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.58–1.99], length of hospital stay (β = 0.23, 95% CI −0.35 to 0.82), and length of ICU stay (β = −0.18, 95% CI −1.06 to 0.69), but was statistically significantly associated with lower risk of being admitted to ICU (OR 0.69, 95% CI 0.52–0.92). Conclusion The current study does not support newly diagnosed AMI patients with pre-existing PPI use before ED visit would experience worse short-term prognosis than those without.
Evaluating the Cumulative Effects of Livestock Grazing on Wildlife With an Integrated Population Model

Livestock grazing can shape temperate grassland ecosystems, with both positive and negative effects on wildlife documented depending on a variety of grazing and site factors. Historically, research investigating the impacts of livestock grazing on wildlife has been limited by a narrow focus on simple “grazed” vs. “ungrazed” treatments or examining how grazing affects only a single vital rate in isolation. To overcome these limitations, we used a two-stage class, female-based integrated population model (IPM) to examine whether three grazing management regimes (season-long, rest-rotation, and summer rotation) differentially impacted population growth rates of sharp-tailed grouse (Tympanachus phasianellus) in eastern Montana and western North Dakota. We estimated 14 vital rates related to survival and fecundity and examined whether subtle cumulative effects of livestock grazing were present but not detected in prior analyses focused on single vital rates. While the management regimes did not differentially impact survival or fecundity of female grouse in our study system, we found evidence for significant cumulative impacts of grazing regime on population growth rates that were only apparent when all vital rates were evaluated concurrently. Population growth rates were higher in areas managed with season-long livestock grazing. The IPM framework encourages comprehensive investigations into the influence of covariates on critical components of species life histories and can assist in guiding management decisions in a world of limited resources. This integrated approach allowed us to more efficiently use multiple data types to provide a more complete picture of the effects of management on an important indicator species.
The Flare of Rheumatic Disease After SARS-CoV-2 Vaccination: A Review

As the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic continues worldwide, vaccination has been considered an effective measure to protect people from the COVID-19 and end the pandemic. However, for patients with rheumatic diseases (RD), concern for the induction of RD flare may combat the enthusiasm for vaccination. In general, current evidence doesn’t support the increased risk of disease flare after COVID-19 vaccination. However, the disease flare of RDs may be triggered by COVID-19 vaccinations, especially for patients with high disease activity. Most of these flares after vaccination are mild and need no treatment escalation. Considering the benefits and risks, RD patients are recommended to receive the COVID-19 vaccination but should be vaccinated when the RDs are in stable states.
Decadal Trends in the Migration Phenology of Diadromous Fishes Native to the Burrishoole Catchment, Ireland

Migration is an important ecological trait that allows animals to exploit resources in different habitats, obtaining extra energy for growth and reproduction. The phenology (or timing) of migration is a highly heritable trait, but is also controlled by environmental factors. Numerous studies have reported the advancement of species life-events with climate change, but the rate and significance of such advancement is likely to be species specific, spatially variable and dependent on interactions with population and ecosystem changes. This is particularly true for diadromous fishes which are sentinels of change in both freshwater and marine domains, and are subject to considerable multiple stressors including overfishing and habitat degradation. Here, we describe trends in the migration phenology of three native Irish migratory fishes over half a century, Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar), brown trout (Salmo trutta) and European eel (Anguilla anguilla). The trends were derived from daily counts of 745,263 fish moving upstream and downstream through the fish traps of the Burrishoole catchment, an internationally important monitoring infrastructure allowing a full census of migrating fish. We found that the start of the seaward migration of eel has advanced by one month since 1970. The commencement of the salmon smolt migration has advanced by one week, although the rest of the migration, and the entirety of the trout smolt run has remained stable. The beginning of the upstream migration of trout to freshwater has advanced by 20 days, while the end of the run is more than one month later than in the 1970’s. The greatest phenological shift has been in the upstream migration of adult salmon, with at least half of migrating fish returning between one and two months earlier from the marine environment compared to the 1970’s. The earlier return of these salmon is coincident with reduced marine survival and decreasing body size, indicating considerable oceanic challenges for this species. Our results demonstrate that the impacts of climate change on the phenology of diadromous fish are context-dependent and may interact with other factors. The mobilization of long-term datasets are crucial to parse the ecological impacts of climate change from other anthropogenic stresses.
Lipoprotein(a) in Cardiovascular Diseases: Insight From a Bibliometric Study

Lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] is a complex polymorphic lipoprotein comprised of a low-density lipoprotein particle with one molecule of apolipoprotein B100 and an additional apolipoprotein(a) connected through a disulfide bond. The serum concentration is mostly genetically determined and only modestly influenced by diet and other lifestyle modifications. In recent years it has garnered increasing attention due to its causal role in pre-mature atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease and calcific aortic valve stenosis, while novel effective therapeutic options are emerging [apolipoprotein(a) antisense oligonucleotides and ribonucleic acid interference therapy]. Bibliometric descriptive analysis and mapping of the research literature were made using Scopus built-in services. We focused on the distribution of documents, literature production dynamics, most prolific source titles, institutions, and countries. Additionally, we identified historical and influential papers using Reference Publication Year Spectrography (RPYS) and the CRExplorer software. An analysis of author keywords showed that Lp(a) was most intensively studied regarding inflammation, atherosclerosis, cardiovascular risk assessment, treatment options, and hormonal changes in post-menopausal women. The results provide a comprehensive view of the current Lp(a)-related literature with a specific interest in its role in calcific aortic valve stenosis and potential emerging pharmacological interventions. It will help the reader understand broader aspects of Lp(a) research and its translation into clinical practice.
University of Birmingham Social media, political uncertainty, and stock markets

This study proposes a new measure of firm-level uncertainty exposure around important political events. More specifically, we construct a degree of (dis)agreement among social media users who jointly mention firms and politicians. We study a sample of over 23 million tweets mentioning both a firm from the S&P 500 composite and ‘Trump’ from October 2016 to May 2017. We then analyze the relationship between the (dis)agreement measure and individual stock features. The results suggest that increased disagreement among such tweets is associated with heightened stock price volatility and trading volume. This link is observed before the US Presidential Inauguration in January 2017 but not afterwards. The finding is confirmed by further robustness checks based on filtered tweets with policy keywords and policy-sensitive industries. Abstract This study proposes a new measure of firm-level uncertainty exposure around important political events. More specifically, we construct a degree of (dis)agreement among social media users who jointly mention firms and politicians. We study a sample of over 23 million tweets mentioning both a firm from the S&P 500 composite and ‘Trump’ from October 2016 to May 2017. We then analyze the relationship between the (dis)agreement measure and individual stock features. The results suggest that increased disagreement among such tweets is associated with heightened stock price volatility and trading volume. This link is observed before the US Presidential Inauguration in January 2017 but not afterwards. The finding is confirmed by further robustness checks based on filtered tweets with policy keywords and policy-sensitive industries. show the agreement measure derived from such tweets is associated with stock price volatility and trading volume after controlling for message sentiment and the size of information flows. The impact is statistically significant before Trump’s Inauguration 2017. We perform similar analysis for Twitter messages with ‘Trump’, a firm name, and a policy keyword. There are significant relations between the agreement measure and stock price volatility as well as trading volume. We also perform an analysis based on companies from policy-sensitive industries and obtain even stronger results.
S -Glutathionylation of estrogen receptor alpha affects dendritic cell function

Glutathione S-transferase P (GSTP) is a thiolase that catalyzes the addition of glutathione (GSH) to receptive cysteines in target proteins, producing an S-glutathionylated residue. Accordingly, previous studies have reported that S-glutathionylation is constitutively decreased in cells from mice lacking GSTP ( Gstp1/p2 -/- ). Here, we found
Endothelial Cells as a Key Cell Type for Innate Immunity: A Focused Review on RIG-I Signaling Pathway

The vascular endothelium consists of a highly heterogeneous monolayer of endothelial cells (ECs) which are the primary target for bacterial and viral infections due to EC’s constant and close contact with the bloodstream. Emerging evidence has shown that ECs are a key cell type for innate immunity. Like macrophages, ECs serve as sentinels when sensing invading pathogens or microbial infection caused by viruses and bacteria. It remains elusive how ECs senses danger signals, transduce the signal and fulfil immune functions. Retinoic acid-inducible gene-I (RIG-I, gene name also known as DDX58) is an important member of RIG-I-like receptor (RLR) family that functions as an important pathogen recognition receptor (PRR) to execute immune surveillance and confer host antiviral response. Recent studies have demonstrated that virus infection, dsRNA, dsDNA, interferons, LPS, and 25-hydroxycholesterol (25-HC) can increase RIG-1 expression in ECs and propagate anti-viral response. Of translational significance, RIG-I activation can be inhibited by Panax notoginseng saponins, endogenous PPARγ ligand 15-PGJ2, tryptanthrin and 2-animopurine. Considering the pivotal role of inflammation and innate immunity in regulating endothelial dysfunction and atherosclerosis, here we provided a concise review of the role of RIG-I in endothelial cell function and highlight future direction to elucidate the potential role of RIG-I in regulating cardiovascular diseases as well as virus infectious disease, including COVID-19. Furthered understanding of RIG-I-mediated signaling pathways is important to control disorders associated with altered immunity and inflammation in ECs.
Bulk RNA Sequencing With Integrated Single-Cell RNA Sequencing Identifies BCL2A1 as a Potential Diagnostic and Prognostic Biomarker for Sepsis

Background Sepsis is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide in the intensive care unit (ICU). The prognosis of the disease strongly depends on rapid diagnosis and appropriate treatment. Thus, some new and accurate sepsis-related biomarkers are pressing needed and their efficiency should be carefully demonstrated. Methods Differential expression analysis and weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) were applied to detect sepsis and monocyte/macrophage-related genes. Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) and random forest regression analyses were used in combination to screen out prognostic genes. Single-cell RNA sequence profiling was utilized to further verify the expression of these genes on a single cell level. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve and decision curve analysis (DCA) were also applied to verify the diagnostic value of the target biomarkers. Results The intersections of the genes detected by differential expression and WGCNA analyses identified 141 overlapping candidate genes that were closely related to sepsis and macrophages. The LASSO and random forest regression analyses further screened out 17 prognostic genes. Single-cell RNA sequencing analysis detected that FCGR1A and BCL2A1 might be potential biomarkers for sepsis diagnosis and the diagnostic efficacy of BCL2A1 was further validated by ROC curve and DCA. Conclusions It was revealed that BCL2A1 had good diagnostic and prognostic value for sepsis, and that it can be applied as a potential and novel biomarker for the management of the disease.
Study of Meat Species Adulteration in Indonesian Commercial Beef Meatballs Related to Halal Law Implementation

Meatballs are processed meat products that are susceptible to adulteration. Indonesia enforces a halal product guarantee regulation so that all products in circulation are free from non-halal ingredients. This study aimed to detect with the PCR method the contamination by pork and chicken of commercial beef meatballs. The samples of commercial meatballs were obtained from 36 meatball shops in Bojonegoro Regency, East Java, and Boyolali Regency, Central Java Province, Indonesia. Reference meatballs as a positive control were prepared in the laboratory. DNA isolation was performed on commercial sample meatballs, reference meatballs, and 13 species of fresh meat for specificity tests. DNA concentrations were measured using a spectrophotometer, and visualization of the isolation and PCR results was conducted using agarose gel electrophoresis and a UV transilluminator. DNA isolates were amplified by PCR using gene targets 1.711B bovine repeat for identifying bovine species, CR1 SINE repeat element for identifying chicken species, and mitochondrial gene subunit ND1 for identifying pork species. The results showed that there was contamination by chicken meat in meatballs labeled as beef meatballs in 30 of 36 samples in Bojonegoro Regency and 33 of 36 samples in Boyolali Regency. The results also showed that 22 samples of commercial beef meatballs in the Boyolali Regency contained pork. The implementation of the PCR method using the three specific primers proved the presence of meat contamination that did not match the label on the meatballs circulating in the Indonesian market. The contamination by pork if beef meatballs has violated the regulation on halal product guarantees.
Efficacy of New Mindfulness-Based Swinging Technique Intervention: A Pilot Randomised Controlled Trial Among Women With Breast Cancer

Objective Combining 3rd-wave-therapies with Cognitive-Behavioural-Therapy (CBT) has increased in recent years. Usually these therapies require longer sessions which therefore increases the psychotherapy drop-out rate for cancer patients for multiple medical reasons. This inspired intervention of a shorter 20 min-long mindfulness-therapy (MBST) to be developed for Breast-Cancer-patients (BC). Method This pilot randomised controlled trial was to assess the immediate-outcome of the MBST-intervention for its efficacy for BC-patients by using the Pearson Chi-square test, Fisher–Freeman–Halton exact test, and McNemar test for categorical variables; Mann–Whitney U and Wilcoxon test for the continuous variables. The Emotion Thermometer, State Trait Anxiety Inventory, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Self-Efficacy for Managing Chronic Disease, and Beck’s Hopelessness Scale were used for measuring the intervention outcomes. One hundred seventy-three BC patients were randomly assigned in two-groups (equal-mean-age, p = 0.417). Control-Group (CG, n = 82) received cognitive-disputation-technique a form-of-CBT, and Intervention-Group (IG, n = 74) received MBST. The directives are given to IG: psychoeducation about Mindfulness, and to imagine themselves swinging-in a peaceful environment. When the patients imagine their swing going up, they physically take a deep-breath, and when going down they physically release their breath, and this process is repeated. Result Outcomes post-treatment showed significant higher-improvement in IG in all the assessed-measurements, with large-effect-size: anxiety (p < 0,05, r = 0,67) and depression-levels (p < 0,05, r = 0,71); anxiety-trait (p < 0,05; r = 0,79) reduced, it increases self-efficacy for managing-disease (p < 0,05, r = 0,82) as-well-as hopefulness (p < 0,05, r = 0,61) and saturation-level measured by pulse-meter/oximeter (p < 0,05, r = 0,51). Conclusion MBST is an efficacious intervention to reduce psychotherapy session time for immediate relief from clinical anxiety and hopelessness as well as increase self-efficacy and improve tranquillity for BC-women. It may have a particular clinical significance for supporting patient’s adherence to treatment. Although in this pilot sample MBST was found to be effective for short-term-outcome, its efficacy for longer-term-outcome should be examined in future trials. Additionally, breathing laps can be increased possibly for a greater result on rise of saturation levels of patients.