Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Relationships between acylated ghrelin with growth hormone, insulin resistance, lipid profile, and cardio respiratory function in lean and obese men

BACKGROUND: Acylated ghrelin, biologically active form of ghrelin, activates growth hormone (GH) secretagogue receptor 1a and play a role in regulating of energy balance. The purpose of this study was to survey relationships between acylated ghrelin with GH, insulin resistance, lipid profile, and cardio respiratory function in lean and obese men. METHODS: Nineteen obese men (body mass index 31.0 ± 3.5 kg/m2, aged 27.5 ± 5.8 year) and the same number of lean men (body mass index = 18.47 ± 2.1 kg/m2, aged 26.9 ± 5.6 year) were selected if they had no experience of regular physical activity during six month ago. After 12 hour fasting, blood samples were collected and blood parameters as well as maximal oxygen uptake (as indicator of cardiorespiratory function) was assessed. RESULTS: Insulin levels and HOMA-IR (homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance) were higher, and GH, acylated ghrelin and maximal oxygen uptake levels were lower, in obese versus lean men (p < 0.01). No significant differences were observed in systolic and diastolic blood pressure, fasting blood glucose, and lipid profiles between the two groups (p > 0.01). Plasma acylated ghrelin concentrations in obese and lean men were negatively correlated to body weight (r= -0.50, r= -0.43, respectively), body fat percent (r = -0.53, r = -0.44, respectively), body mass index (r = -0.53, r = -0.49, respectively), insulin (r = -0.42, r = -0.40, respectively) and HOMA-IR (r = -0.48, r = -0.45, respectively), and positively correlated to GH levels (r = 0.37, r = 0.31, respectively) and maximal oxygen uptake (r = 0.33, r = 0.31, respectively) (p < 0.01). No significant correlations were observed between plasma acylated ghrelin concentrations and systolic and diastolic blood pressure, fasting blood glucose, and lipid profiles in both groups (p > 0.01). CONCLUSIONS: Obese and lean inactive young men had different levels of acylated ghrelin, GH, insulin, insulin resistance index, cardiorespiratory function and body fat percent. Body fat percent, insulin, and GH levels appear to be best determinant factors of acylated ghrelin levels. Also, in both obese and lean young men, higher levels of cardiovascular function were associated with higher levels of acylated ghrelin.
Routing and resource discovery in Phoenix Grid-enabled message passing library

We describe the design and implementation of a "Grid-enabled" message passing library, in the context of the Phoenix message passing model. It supports: (1) message routing between nodes not directly reachable due to firewalls and/or NAT; (2) resource discovery facilitating ease of configuration that allows nodes without static names; (e.g., DHCP nodes) to participate in computation without specific efforts; and (3) nodes dynamically joining/leaving computation at runtime. We argue that, in future Grid environments, all of the above functions, not just routing across firewalls, will become important issues of Grid-enabled message passing systems including MPI. Unlike solutions commonly proposed by previous work on a Grid-enabled MPI, our system runs a distributed resource discovery and routing table construction algorithm, rather than assuming all such pieces of information are available in a static configuration file or alike. Experimental results using 400 nodes in three LAN indicate that our algorithm is able to dynamically discover participating peers, connect them to each other and calculate a routing table. The elapsed time of our algorithm is only approximately twice as long as that of offline route calculation that just connects nodes based on a fully given configuration.
Optimal Uplink Access in Cognitive Femtocell Networks With Adaptive Modulation

In this letter, cognitive two-tier femtocell networks are considered, where each femtocell transmits over subchannels that are considered idle by spectrum sensing. Since femtocells transmit on the “idle” subchannels based on imperfect cognitive sensing, co-tier and cross-tier interference will arise. We derive the average uplink throughput of cognitive femtocell networks, where fractional power control and adaptive modulation are adopted. Besides, by maximizing the system throughput, the optimal channel access probability of each femtocell is obtained. Simulation results verify the validity of the analysis.
Selectivity estimation in spatial databases

Selectivity estimation of queries is an important and well-studied problem in relational database systems. In this paper, we examine selectivity estimation in the context of Geographic Information Systems, which manage spatial data such as points, lines, poly-lines and polygons. In particular, we focus on point and range queries over two-dimensional rectangular data. We propose several techniques based on using spatial indices, histograms, binary space partitionings (BSPs), and the novel notion of spatial skew. Our techniques carefully partition the input rectangles into subsets and approximate each partition accurately. We present a detailed experimental study comparing the proposed techniques and the best known sampling and parametric techniques. We evaluate them using synthetic as well as real-life TIGER datasets. Based on our experiments, we identify a BSP based partitioning that we call Min-Skew which consistently provides the most accurate selectivity estimates for spatial queries. The Min-Skew partitioning can be constructed efficiently, occupies very little space, and provides accurate selectivity estimates over a broad range of spatial queries.
Padé approximation for coverage probability in cellular networks

Coverage probability is one of the most important metrics for evaluating the performance of wireless networks. However, the spatial stochastic models for which a computable expression of the coverage probability is available are restricted (such as the Poisson based or α-Ginibre based models). Furthermore, even if it is available, the practical numerical computation may be time-consuming (in the case of α-Ginibre based model). In this paper, we propose the application of Padé approximation to the coverage probability in the wireless network models based on general spatial stationary point processes. The required Maclaurin coefficients are expressed in terms of the moment measures of the point process, so that the approximants are expected to be available for a broader class of point processes. Through some numerical experiments for the cellular network model, we demonstrate that the Padé approximation is effectively applicable for evaluating the coverage probability.
Developmental relationships between trigeminal ganglia and trigeminal motoneurons in chick embryos. II. Ganglion axon ingrowth guides motoneuron migration

In the chick embryo the trigeminal (V) sensory ganglion cells send axons into the metencephalon a few hours before the V motoneurons migrate from the midline to form a lateral nucleus adjacent to the ingrowing sensory axons. This relationship suggests that the ganglion axons may influence the initiation and direction of V motoneuron migration. In the present experiment the development of the ganglion axons was retarded by removing the neural crest anlage of the V ganglion. Subsequently, V ganglion cells which were derived from the ectodermal placode anlage sent axons into the metencephalon up to 2 days later than normal. The lateral migration of the V motoneurons was similarly delayed, commencing only after the central axons from the placodal ganglia penetrated the metencephalon. This study demonstrates that the presence of V ganglion perikarya alone is not sufficient to guide the appropriate migration of V motoneurons. This migration occurs only after the axons from the V sensory ganglion cells have penetrated the brainstem.
Pan-HER, an Antibody Mixture Simultaneously Targeting EGFR, HER2, and HER3, Effectively Overcomes Tumor Heterogeneity and Plasticity

Purpose: Accumulating evidence indicates a high degree of plasticity and compensatory signaling within the human epidermal growth factor receptor (HER) family, leading to resistance upon therapeutic intervention with HER family members. Experimental Design/Results: We have generated Pan-HER, a mixture of six antibodies targeting each of the HER family members EGFR, HER2, and HER3 with synergistic pairs of antibodies, which simultaneously remove all three targets, thereby preventing compensatory tumor promoting mechanisms within the HER family. Pan-HER induces potent growth inhibition in a range of cancer cell lines and xenograft models, including cell lines with acquired resistance to therapeutic antibodies. Pan-HER is also highly efficacious in the presence of HER family ligands, indicating that it is capable of overcoming acquired resistance due to increased ligand production. All three target specificities contribute to the enhanced efficacy, demonstrating a distinct benefit of combined HER family targeting when compared with single-receptor targeting. Conclusions: Our data show that simultaneous targeting of three receptors provides broader efficacy than targeting a single receptor or any combination of two receptors in the HER family, especially in the presence of HER family ligands. Pan-HER represents a novel strategy to deal with primary and acquired resistance due to tumor heterogeneity and plasticity in terms of HER family dependency and as such may be a viable alternative in the clinic. Clin Cancer Res; 21(18); 4110–22. ©2015 AACR. See related commentary by Yarden and Sela, p. 4030
Visualization and performance prediction of multithreaded Solaris programs by tracing kernel threads

Efficient performance tuning of parallel programs is often hard. We present a performance prediction and visualization tool called VPPB. Based on a monitored uni-processor execution, VPPB shows the (predicted) behaviour of a multithreaded program using any number of processors and the program behaviour is visualized as a graph. The first version of VPPB was unable to handle I/O operations. This version has, by an improved tracing technique, added the possibility to trace activities at the kernel level as well. Thus, VPPB is now able to trace various I/O activities, e.g., manipulation of OS internal buffers, physical disk I/O, socket I/O, and RPC. VPPB allows flexible performance tuning of parallel programs developed for shared memory multiprocessors using a standardized environment; C/C++ programs that uses the thread package in Solaris 2.X.
An antibody against secretogranin I (chromogranin B) is packaged into secretory granules

We have investigated the sorting and packaging of secretory proteins into secretory granules by an immunological approach. An mAb against secretogranin I (chromogranin B), a secretory protein costored with various peptide hormones and neuropeptides in secretory granules of many endocrine cells and neurons, was expressed by microinjection of its mRNA into the secretogranin I-producing cell line PC12. An mAb against the G protein of vesicular stomatitis virus--i.e., against an antigen not present in PC12 cells--was expressed as a control. The intracellular localization and the secretion of the antibodies was studied by double-labeling immunofluorescence using the conventional and the confocal microscope, as well as by pulse-chase experiments. The secretogranin I antibody, like the control antibody, was transported along the secretory pathway to the Golgi complex. However, in contrast to the control antibody, which was secreted via the constitutive pathway, the secretogranin I antibody formed an immunocomplex with secretogranin I, was packaged into secretory granules, and was released by regulated exocytosis. Our results show that a constitutive secretory protein, unaltered by genetic engineering, can be diverted to the regulated pathway of secretion by its protein-protein interaction with a regulated secretory protein. The data also provide the basis for immunologically studying the role of luminally exposed protein domains in the biogenesis and function of regulated secretory vesicles.
Purification and properties of beta-lactamase from Bacteroides fragilis

Beta-Lactamase activity was detected either biologically or using the chromogenic cephalosporin 87/312 in 20 clinical isolates of Bacteroides fragilis with penicillin G minimal inhibitory concentrations of 10 to 100 micrograms/ml. Strain AM78 (minimal inhibitory concentration, greater than 1,000 micrograms/ml) was used to optimize the conditions for production, assay, and storage of the enzyme. The enzymes are cell associated, with less than 1% of activity being found in culture fluids during growth, and can be released from the cell surface by modified osmotic shock procedure. This procedure causes concomitant release of cyclic phosphodiesterase activity. Substrate profiles and the effects of inhibitors were determined for enzymes partially purified by osmotic shock release and gel filtration. The enzymes are cephalosporinases with some penicillinase activity and are inhibited by p-chloromercuribenzoate, cloxacillin, and carbenicillin. The molecular weight, as determined by gel filtration, is 29,000 to 31,000. A method for the purification of the beta-lactamase from strain AM78 is described: the specific activity of the purified enzyme was 3,424 U/mg, about 3,000-fold that of the crude, cell-associated enzyme.
Modular synthesis of mobile device applications from domain-specific models

Domain-specific modelling enables modelling using constructs familiar to experts of a specific domain. Domain-specific models (DSms) can be automatically transformed to various lower-level artifacts such as configuration files, documentation, executable programs and performance models. Although many researchers have tackled the formalization of various aspects of model-driven development such as model versioning, debugging and transformation, very little attention has been focused on formalizing how artifacts are actually synthesized from DSms. State-of-the-art approaches rely on ad hoc coded generators which essentially use modelling tool APIs to programmatically iterate through model entities and produce the final artifacts. In this work, we propose a more structured approach to artifact generation where layered model transformations are used to modularly isolate, compile and re-combine various aspects of DSms. We demonstrate our technique by detailing the synthesis of running Google Android applications from DSms, and discuss how it may be applied in addressing the characteristic non-functional requirements (e.g. timing constraints, resource utilization) of modern embedded systems.
Genome-Wide Identification of Two-Component System Genes in Cucurbitaceae Crops and Expression Profiling Analyses in Cucumber

Cucumber and watermelon, which belong to Cucurbitaceae family, are economically important cultivated crops worldwide. However, these crops are vulnerable to various adverse environments. Two-component system (TCS), consisting of histidine kinases (HKs), phosphotransfers (HPs), and response regulator proteins (RRs), plays important roles in various plant developmental processes and signaling transduction in responses to a wide range of biotic and abiotic stresses. No systematic investigation has been conducted on TCS genes in Cucurbitaceae species. Based on the completion of the cucumber and watermelon genome draft, we identified 46 and 49 TCS genes in cucumber and watermelon, respectively. The cucumber TCS members included 18 HK(L)s, 7 HPs, and 21 RRs, whereas the watermelon TCS system consisted of 19 HK(L)s, 6 HPs, and 24 RRs. The sequences and domains of TCS members from these two species were highly conserved. Gene duplication events occurred rarely, which might have resulted from the absence of recent whole-genome duplication event in these two Cucurbitaceae crops. Numerous stress- and hormone-responsive cis-elements were detected in the putative promoter regions of the cucumber TCS genes. Meanwhile, quantitative real-time PCR indicated that most of the TCS genes in cucumber were specifically or preferentially expressed in certain tissues or organs, especially in the early developing fruit. Some TCS genes exhibited diverse patterns of gene expression in response to abiotic stresses as well as exogenous trans-zeatin (ZT) and abscisic acid (ABA) treatment, suggesting that TCS genes might play significant roles in responses to various abiotic stresses and hormones in Cucurbitaceae crops.
Inverse Optimal Control for Humanoid Locomotion

In this paper, we present a method for learning the reward function for humanoid locomotion from motioncaptured demonstrations of human running. We show how an approximate, local inverse optimal control algorithm can be used to learn the reward function for this high dimensional domain, and demonstrate how trajectory optimization can then be used to recreate dynamic, naturalistic running behaviors in new environments. Results are presented in simulation on a 29DoF humanoid model, and include running on flat ground, rough terrain, and under strong lateral perturbation.
Towards Optimized Fine-Grained Pricing of IaaS Cloud Platform

Although many pricing schemes in IaaS platform are already proposed with pay-as-you-go and subscription/spot market policy to guarantee service level agreement, it is still inevitable to suffer from wasteful payment because of coarse-grained pricing scheme. In this paper, we investigate an optimized fine-grained and fair pricing scheme. Two tough issues are addressed: (1) the profits of resource providers and customers often contradict mutually; (2) VM-maintenance overhead like startup cost is often too huge to be neglected. Not only can we derive an optimal price in the acceptable price range that satisfies both customers and providers simultaneously, but we also find a best-fit billing cycle to maximize social welfare (i.e., the sum of the cost reductions for all customers and the revenue gained by the provider). We carefully evaluate the proposed optimized fine-grained pricing scheme with two large-scale real-world production traces (one from Grid Workload Archive and the other from Google data center). We compare the new scheme to classic coarse-grained hourly pricing scheme in experiments and find that customers and providers can both benefit from our new approach. The maximum social welfare can be increased up to 72.98 and 48.15 percent with respect to DAS-2 trace and Google trace respectively.
Efficient Path Kernels for Reaction Function Prediction

Kernels for structured data are rapidly becoming an essential part of the machine learning toolbox. Graph kernels provide similarity measures for complex relational objects, such as molecules and enzymes. Graph kernels based on walks are popular due their fast computation but their predictive performance is often not satisfactory, while kernels based on subgraphs suffer from high computational cost and are limited to small substructures. Kernels based on paths offer a promising middle ground between these two extremes. However, the computation of path kernels has so far been assumed computationally too challenging. In this paper we introduce an effective method for computing path based kernels; we employ a Burrows-Wheeler transform based compressed path index for fast and space-efficient enumeration of paths. Unlike many kernel algorithms the index representation retains fast access to individual features. In our experiments with chemical reaction graphs, path based kernels surpass state-of-the-art graph kernels in prediction accuracy.
Secure resource allocation for OFDMA two-way relay networks

In this paper, we consider the problem of secure resource allocation in orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) two-way relay networks. Multiple sources exchange information with the assistance of an amplify-and-forward (AF) relay node in the presence of an eavesdropper. The joint subcarrier allocation, subcarrier pairing and power allocation problem aims to maximize the secrecy capacity for legitimate sources subject to limited power budget and orthogonal subcarrier allocation constraints. The optimization problem is modeled as a mixed integer programming problem, and then solved in an asymptotically optimal manner based on the dual method. Moreover, a suboptimal algorithm is proposed to reduce the complexity. Simulations are conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed near optimal and suboptimal algorithms.
Impact of Mucosal Inflammation on Oral Simian Immunodeficiency Virus Transmission

ABSTRACT Mucosal tissues are the primary route of transmission for most respiratory and sexually transmitted diseases, including human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). There is epidemiological evidence that genital mucosal inflammation leads to enhanced HIV type 1 (HIV-1) transmission. The objective of this study was to assess the influence of periodontal inflammation on oral HIV transmission using a nonhuman primate model of teeth ligature-induced periodontitis. Simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) was nontraumatically applied to the gingiva after moderate gingivitis was identified through clinical and immunologic analyses (presence of inflammatory cytokines). Overall oral SIV infection rates were similar in the gingivitis-induced and control groups (5 infections following 12 SIV administrations for each), although more macaques were infected with multiple viral variants in the gingivitis group. SIV infection also affected the levels of antiviral and inflammatory cytokines in the gingival crevicular fluid, and a synergistic effect was observed, with alpha interferon and interferon-inducible protein 10 undergoing significant elevations following SIV infection in macaques with gingivitis compared to controls. These increases in antiviral and inflammatory immune modulators in the SIV-infected gingivitis macaques could also be observed in blood plasma, although the effects at both compartments were generally restricted to the acute phase of the infection. In conclusion, while moderate gingivitis was not associated with increased susceptibility to oral SIV infection, it resulted in elevated levels of cytokines in the oral mucosa and plasma of the SIV-infected macaques. These findings suggest a synergy between mucosal inflammation and SIV infection, creating an immune milieu that impacts the early stages of the SIV infection with potential implications for long-term pathogenesis.
Electrospinning fabrication and characterization of poly(vinyl alcohol)/layered double hydroxides composite fibers

Nanofibers of poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)/layered double hydroxide (Mg-Al LDH) composites are prepared by the electrostatic fiber spinning using water as the solvent at a high voltage of 21 kV. Either inorganic LDH carbonate (LDH-CO3) or L-lactic acid-modified LDH (Lact-LDH) is used for incorporating with PVA. Scanning electron microscopy SEM investigations on the nanofibers suggest that the average diameters of PVA/LDH composite fibers are smaller than that of neat PVA. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) investigations indicate that the dispersity of the LDH in PVA matrix is much improved after modification with L-lactic acid. The mechanical properties of the PVA/LDH fibers are obviously enhanced compared to that of neat PVA. For example, the tensile stress and elongation at break of the PVA/Lact-LDH electrospun fibrous mat with 5 wt % Lact-LDH are 31.7 MPa and 36.7%, respectively, which are significantly higher than those of neat PVA, and also higher than those of PVA/LDH-CO3 owing to the better dispersity of Lact-LDH nanoparticles. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2012