Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Evaluation of electrospun PLLA/PEGDMA polymer coatings for vascular stent material

Abstract The field of percutaneous coronary intervention has seen a plethora of advances over the past few decades, which have allowed for its development into safe and effective treatments for patients suffering from cardiovascular diseases. However, stent thrombosis and in-stent restenosis remain clinically significant problems. Herein, we describe the synthesis and characterization of fibrous polymer coatings on stent material nitinol, in the hopes of developing a more suitable stent surface to enhance re-endothelialization. Electrospinning technique was used to fabricate polyethylene glycol dimethacrylate/poly l-lactide acid (PEGDMA/PLLA) blend fiber substrate with tunable elasticity and hydrophilicity for use as coatings. Attachment of platelets and arterial smooth muscle cells (SMC) onto the coatings as well as the secretory effect of mesenchymal stem cells cultured on the coatings on the proliferation and migration of arterial endothelial cells and SMCs were assessed. It was demonstrated that electrospun PEGDMA/PLLA coating with 1:1 ratio of the components on the nitinol stent-reduced platelet and SMC attachment and increased stem cell secretory factors that enhance endothelial proliferation. We therefore postulate that the fibrous coating surface would possess enhanced biological compatibility of nitinol stents and hold the potential in preventing stent failure through restenosis and thrombosis.
Electrostatic surface modifications to improve gene delivery

Importance of the field: Gene therapy has the potential to treat a wide variety of diseases, including genetic diseases and cancer. Areas covered in this review: This review introduces biomaterials used for gene delivery and then focuses on the use of electrostatic surface modifications to improve gene delivery materials. These modifications have been used to stabilize therapeutics in vivo, add cell-specific targeting ligands, and promote controlled release. Coatings of nanoparticles and microparticles as well as non-particulate surface coatings are covered in this review. Electrostatic principles are crucial for the development of multilayer delivery structures fabricated by the layer-by-layer method. What the reader will gain: The reader will gain knowledge about the composition of biomaterials used for surface modifications and how these coatings and multilayers can be utilized to improve spatial control and efficiency of delivery. Examples are shown for the delivery of nucleic acids, including DNA and siRNA, to in vitro and in vivo systems. Take home message: The versatile and powerful approach of electrostatic coatings and multilayers will lead to the development of enhanced gene therapies.
Social responsibility influence on customer trust in hotels: mediating effects of reputation and word-of-mouth

Purpose This paper aims to model and test the relationships between corporate social responsibility (CSR), corporate reputation (CR), word-of-mouth (WOM) behavior and customer trust (CT) within the hotel context. Design/methodology/approach A questionnaire survey was conducted among 300 hotel guests. Following a two-step approach, a measurement model was estimated and then a structural model was analyzed to test six proposed hypotheses. Findings The research results show that CSR has a direct and positive effect on CT, CR and WOM; CSR has an indirect and positive influence on CT via CR and WOM as mediating variables; CR is a significant antecedent of WOM; and CR and WOM are positively associated with CT. Originality/value The research examines the relationship among CSR, CR, WOM and CT, thus contributing to hospitality management literature theoretically. In addition, relevant implications are provided for managers as to how to improve CT in service industries.
Quantitative evaluation of noise reduction and vesselness filters for liver vessel segmentation on abdominal CTA images

Liver vessel segmentation in CTA images is a challenging task, especially in the case of noisy images. This paper investigates whether pre-filtering improves liver vessel segmentation in 3D CTA images. We introduce a quantitative evaluation of several well-known filters based on a proposed liver vessel segmentation method on CTA images. We compare the effect of different diffusion techniques i.e. Regularized Perona–Malik, Hybrid Diffusion with Continuous Switch and Vessel Enhancing Diffusion as well as the vesselness approaches proposed by Sato, Frangi and Erdt. Liver vessel segmentation of the pre-processed images is performed using a histogram-based region grown with local maxima as seed points. Quantitative measurements (sensitivity, specificity and accuracy) are determined based on manual landmarks inside and outside the vessels, followed by T-tests for statistic comparisons on 51 clinical CTA images. The evaluation demonstrates that all the filters make liver vessel segmentation have a significantly higher accuracy than without using a filter (p < 0.05); Hybrid Diffusion with Continuous Switch achieves the best performance. Compared to the diffusion filters, vesselness filters have a greater sensitivity but less specificity. In addition, the proposed liver vessel segmentation method with pre-filtering is shown to perform robustly on a clinical dataset having a low contrast-to-noise of up to 3 (dB). The results indicate that the pre-filtering step significantly improves liver vessel segmentation on 3D CTA images.
Population Changes and Persistence of Rhizobium phaseoli in Soil and Rhizospheres

The impact of legume cultivation on the establishment and persistence of an inoculant strain of Rhizobium phaseoli and its ability to compete with a resident population of R. phaseoli for nodule occupancy was examined utilizing strain-specific fluorescent antibodies. The soil (Hubbard loamy sand) was inoculated homogeneously with 5 × 105 cells per g of soil and confined in plastic cylinders kept in field plots. Inoculated and uninoculated cylinders were either left fallow or planted to two seeds of legumes. Two hosts, navy bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) cv. Seafarer and snap bean cv. Picker, as well as a nonhost, soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr. ) cv. Wilkin, were used. Inoculant Viking 1 was highly stimulated in all three rhizospheres sampled at 6 (flowering), 10 (podfill), and 17 (decay) weeks and in the following spring, whereas counts in fallow soil decreased rapidly. Although the overwintering population remained highest in the vicinity of decaying host roots, Viking 1 persisted, even in fallow soil, to produce abundant nodulation of host plants the following spring. Viking 1 was an excellent competitor for nodulation sites on the roots of the hosts; it thoroughly outcompeted the resident population of R. phaseoli, occupying virtually 100% of the nodules under inoculated conditions in all experiments.
Culture Differences and Challenges in Localization of Senior Executives of International Luxury Hotels in China

ABSTRACT With the rapid increase of international hotels in China, the importance of talent localization has widely been recognized, although empirical research is still limited. This paper explores the current situation of talent localization of international luxury hotels in China and its influencing factors from a cultural perspective through in-depth interviews with executives and senior managers of hotel associations, luxury hotels, and hotel owners. The findings indicate that the localization process of senior managers is still slow. One of the important barriers to the localization process is cultural differences, which are analyzed at the social, organizational, and individual levels. Contradictory pressures between standardization and localization and mistrust issues influenced by culture differences are further discussed. Practical implications are indicated.
An analog front-end circuit with spike detection for implantable neural recording system design

A low power, low noise implantable neural recording interface for use in a power harvested inductive coupling system is presented in this paper. A two stage neural amplifier, selective reference thresholder and a serial communication interface form the neural data logger. The midband gain of neural amplifier is 59.1dB with a 3dB bandwidth from 0.45 to 8 kHz. Input-referred noise and total power consumption are 8. 7μVrms and 3. 19μW respectively at less than 1 V. The thresholder detects/quantizes the amplified neural signal at sampling rate of 20 kHz with four code selectable reference voltages. The 8 bit serial digits are transmitted via light emitting diode (LED) to a photo detector interface. The chip is designed and fabricated in 0.18-μm process. The simulation result demonstrates the neural recording interface's suitability for instu neutral activity recording.
Relational division: four algorithms and their performance

Three known algorithms for relational division, the algebra operator used to express universal quantification (for-all conditions) and an algorithm called hash-division are outlined. By comparing the algorithms analytically and experimentally, it is shown that the algorithm provides performance competitive with or superior to that of techniques used to date, namely techniques using sorting or aggregate functions. Furthermore, the algorithm can eliminate duplicates in the divisor on the fly, ignores duplicates in the dividend, and allows two kinds of partitioning, either of which can be used to resolve hash table overflow or to efficiently implement the algorithm on a multiprocessor system. <<ETX>>
GNC University: A Case Study in Partnering Business and Education through Distance Learning

In 2002, General Nutrition Corporation, Inc. contacted the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition at the University of Florida to collaborate in offering a series of courses in introductory nutrition for GNC employees in order to equip them with basic nutrition knowledge. The purpose of this case study was to describe the GNC University program as a model for business-education partnerships via distance education, to describe student expectations for the GNC University experience, to describe student reactions to the GNC University experience, and to describe the reaction of teaching assistants to their experience with GNC University. There were several key findings in this study. Students’ expectations are to increase in nutrition knowledge, professionally and personally, and to increase in their technological skills. There is a need, in future evaluation of this program, to measure whether students feel their expectations of increased knowledge and technological skills are being met. Additionally, focus groups with teaching assistants revealed a need for greater preparation for assisting students with technical difficulties. Overall, this program shows promise for business-education partnerships through distance education. Authors Lisa K. Lundy, Tracy A. Irani, R. Elaine Turner, Susan S. Percival, and Britton McPherson This research is available in Journal of Applied Communications: https://newprairiepress.org/jac/vol88/iss2/3 GNC University: A Case Study in Partnering Business and Education through Distance Learning Lisa K. Lundy, Tracy A. Irani, R. Elaine Turner, Susan S. Percival, and Britton McPherson
Lipocalin 2, the TNF-like receptor TWEAKR and its ligand TWEAK act downstream of NFAT1 to regulate breast cancer cell invasion

Summary NFAT1 is a transcription factor that elicits breast carcinoma cells to become invasive, thus contributing to metastasis. The molecular mechanisms by which NFAT1 operates in this respect are still poorly known. Here, we report that NFAT1 increases lipocalin 2 (LCN2) mRNA and protein expression by binding to specific sites in the LCN2 gene promoter region. We show that the LCN2 protein is required downstream of NFAT1 to increase breast cancer cell invasion. We demonstrate that the NFAT1-LCN2 axis is sufficient to regulate expression of the TNF-like receptor TWEAKR at the RNA level and of its ligand, TWEAK, at the protein level. We show, however, that TWEAKR mediates an anti-invasive effect in breast cancer cells whereas, depending on LCN2 expression, TWEAK has either anti- or pro-invasive capacities. Thus, we identify LCN2 and TWEAKR-TWEAK as crucial downstream effectors of NFAT1 that regulate breast cancer cell motility and invasive capacity.
Development of Web-Based Japanese Mimicry and Onomatopoeia Learning Assistant System with Sensor Network

In this paper, we propose a web-based Japanese mimicry and onomatopoeia learning assistant system (JAMIOLAS). In our previous studies, we have proposed context-aware language learning assistant systems that used wearable sensor and sensor network respectively, and attended good results. In order to use this learning model in broader area and more general scene, we are trying to realize the system on website, and using on-line information as sensor data from global sensor network. Besides, in order to support more words, we are also using on-line multimedia such as video or picture to create the context for learning.
Two-tiered coupling between flowing actin and immobilized N-cadherin/catenin complexes in neuronal growth cones

Significance Using state-of-the-art micropatterning technology and single-molecule imaging, we revisited a prevalent paradigm in cell locomotion, the molecular clutch, which states that the intracellular actin motile machinery is dynamically coupled to transmembrane adhesion, allowing cells to move forward by applying forces on the substrate. We combined primary neuronal cultures on micropatterned substrates to trigger selective micron-scale N-cadherin adhesions, with single-molecule mapping of actin, N-cadherin, and α-catenin at the ventral surface of growth cones using photoconvertible fluorescent proteins. We demonstrate that actin filaments transit on a time scale of seconds between a flowing state and a state bound to immobilized N-cadherin/catenin complexes. These transient connections represent the first direct evidence for an intrinsic molecular clutch mechanism underlying growth cone locomotion. Neuronal growth cones move forward by dynamically connecting actin-based motility to substrate adhesion, but the mechanisms at the individual molecular level remain unclear. We cultured primary neurons on N-cadherin–coated micropatterned substrates, and imaged adhesion and cytoskeletal proteins at the ventral surface of growth cones using single particle tracking combined to photoactivated localization microscopy (sptPALM). We demonstrate transient interactions in the second time scale between flowing actin filaments and immobilized N-cadherin/catenin complexes, translating into a local reduction of the actin retrograde flow. Normal actin flow on micropatterns was rescued by expression of a dominant negative N-cadherin construct competing for the coupling between actin and endogenous N-cadherin. Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) experiments confirmed the differential kinetics of actin and N-cadherin, and further revealed a 20% actin population confined at N-cadherin micropatterns, contributing to local actin accumulation. Computer simulations with relevant kinetic parameters modeled N-cadherin and actin turnover well, validating this mechanism. Such a combination of short- and long-lived interactions between the motile actin network and spatially restricted adhesive complexes represents a two-tiered clutch mechanism likely to sustain dynamic environment sensing and provide the force necessary for growth cone migration.
The level and time course of disability: Trajectories of disability in adults and young elderly

Objectives. The objectives of this study were: (i) to identify trajectories in the level and time course of disability, (ii) to determine the relative frequency of each trajectory, and (iii) to assess the relationship of these trajectories with age, sex and the presence of four chronic diseases (asthma/chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), heart disease, severe low back complaints and diabetes mellitus). Methods. We used six measurements of disability and information on mortality from a longitudinal study in Dutch persons aged 15 – 74. We used cluster analyses to group persons with similar levels and time courses of disability into disability trajectories. Deaths were classified into a separate trajectory. Multinomial regression was used to assess the relationship of the trajectories with age, sex and the four chronic diseases. Information on disability in the last year(s) prior to death was used to examine disability prior to death. Results. Nine trajectories of disability were identified, while all deaths were classified into a separate trajectory; 74% was entirely non-disabled. The size of the other trajectories varied from 10% (permanently mildly disabled) to 0.5% (severely disabled with large increase in disability). Significant associations were found with age and, correcting for age and sex, with asthma/COPD, heart disease and low back complaints, but not with diabetes. The ORs were generally highest for trajectories characterized by severe disability, although disease-specific associations were also found. Among the deaths, 41% of the trajectories were associated with disability prior to death. Disability prior to death was more prevalent among persons with heart disease, back complaints, and asthma/COPD. Conclusions. These findings suggest that disability is a dynamic process, and that important differences exist within the ‘disabled’ population. This is important for assessing the need for care and shows the limitations of modeling disability change based on two measurements only.
Influence of Material and Geometry of the Dielectric on the Characteristics of the Tank Circuit Resonators for High-Tc RF-SQUID-Based System

Characteristics of a lumped element L-C tank circuit resonator of high-Tc rf-SQUIDs, which plays an important role in the device operation, have been experimentally investigated, according to the corresponding simulations obtained by COMSOL Multiphysics. We experimentally investigated the characteristics of the resonators by measuring their scattering parameters, as well as evaluating the rf-SQUID signal. Our SQUIDs are made of sputtered YBCO thin films with 3-mm-diameter washer areas. Different configurations of the resonator are investigated, and it is observed that, by increasing the thickness of the dielectric in a specific range, the reflection coefficient (S11) increases. For the experimental verifications, we constructed resonators with different dielectric thicknesses and different configurations. The resonators are made of a dielectric board with a hole in its middle to hold the inductors for close coupling to the SQUID mounted on the backside. An increase in the thickness of the dielectric board confines the RF field distribution close to the SQUID, while also making further distance between the contact pads and the SQUID reducing their parasitic effects on the device signal. This is observed to improve the stability of the operating point of the SQUIDs, while also reducing the noise for measured frequency range of 0.1 to 100 Hz.
Contracting Models for P2P Content Distribution

In recent years, peer‐to‐peer (P2P) networks have become an increasingly popular method for distributing digital content. In this study, we consider the development of optimal contracts for a P2P network by a profit‐seeking provider to support the operations of an online file exchange service. By utilizing the principal‐agent model of incentive theory, we propose appropriate reward and pricing schemes for profit‐seeking P2P content distribution networks. We show that when peers are homogeneous, upload compensation increases with propagation delay uncertainty, maximum uploading nodes allowed, peers' provision cost and disutility of download delay, but decreases with the network size and content availability. We also characterize a general contracting model where there are a countable number of peer classes which are heterogeneous in their provisioning costs. For the case of two peer classes where optimal delays are separable, we derive the optimal upload compensations under different scenarios and show that the impact of operational parameters is quite similar to the case of homogeneous peers, lending support to the robustness of our analysis.
Lateralized effects of self-induced sadness and happiness on corticospinal excitability

We studied the changes in excitability of the corticospinal projection evoked by self-induced sad and happy thoughts. Corticospinal excitability was probed using focal, single-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) applied to the optimal scalp position for evoking motor potentials in the contralateral first dorsal interosseus muscle. Fourteen right-handed subjects were studied while counting mentally, thinking sad thoughts, or thinking happy thoughts. In each of these three conditions TMS was applied in each subject randomly, 20 times to the right and 20 times to the left hemisphere. Sad thoughts resulted in a significant facilitation of the motor potentials evoked by left-hemispheric stimulation, while happy thoughts facilitated motor potentials evoked by right-hemispheric TMS, but decreased the amplitude of those evoked by left-hemispheric TMS. In two subjects an additional experiment using H-reflex measurements suggests that these changes are caused by changes in cortical rather than spinal excitability. These results further illustrate the lateralized control of mood in normal volunteers.
Aquatic animals promote antibiotic resistance gene dissemination in water via conjugation: Role of different regions within the zebra fish intestinal tract, and impact on fish intestinal microbiota

The aqueous environment is one of many reservoirs of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs). Fish, as important aquatic animals which possess ideal intestinal niches for bacteria to grow and multiply, may ingest antibiotic resistance bacteria from aqueous environment. The fish gut would be a suitable environment for conjugal gene transfer including those encoding antibiotic resistance. However, little is known in relation to the impact of ingested ARGs or antibiotic resistance bacteria (ARB) on gut microbiota. Here, we applied the cultivation method, qPCR, nuclear molecular genetic marker and 16S rDNA amplicon sequencing technologies to develop a plasmid‐mediated ARG transfer model of zebrafish. Furthermore, we aimed to investigate the dissemination of ARGs in microbial communities of zebrafish guts after donors carrying self‐transferring plasmids that encode ARGs were introduced in aquaria. On average, 15% of faecal bacteria obtained ARGs through RP4‐mediated conjugal transfer. The hindgut was the most important intestinal region supporting ARG dissemination, with concentrations of donor and transconjugant cells almost 25 times higher than those of other intestinal segments. Furthermore, in the hindgut where conjugal transfer occurred most actively, there was remarkable upregulation of the mRNA expression of the RP4 plasmid regulatory genes, trbBp and trfAp. Exogenous bacteria seem to alter bacterial communities by increasing Escherichia and Bacteroides species, while decreasing Aeromonas compared with control groups. We identified the composition of transconjugants and abundance of both cultivable and uncultivable bacteria (the latter accounted for 90.4%–97.2% of total transconjugants). Our study suggests that aquatic animal guts contribute to the spread of ARGs in water environments.