Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Molecular cloning of a novel 97-kd Golgi complex autoantigen associated with Sjögren's syndrome.

OBJECTIVE To identify a Golgi complex autoantigen bound by Sjögren's syndrome (SS) autoantibodies. METHODS Serum from a patient with secondary SS and anti-Golgi antibodies was used as a probe to isolate a complementary DNA (cDNA) insert from a HeLa cDNA library. RESULTS A 3.7-kb cDNA encoding a 56-kd recombinant protein was immunoprecipitated by the human anti-Golgi serum and immune rabbit serum. Western blot analysis showed that the immune rabbit sera recognized a protein of 97 kd (golgin-97), suggesting that the isolated clone contained a partial cDNA. The 5' upstream sequence was obtained by rapid amplification of the cDNA ends. The complete cDNA contained 4,860 basepairs, encoding a protein with a calculated Mr of 88 kd. Antibodies to golgin-97 were found in 12 (20%) of 60 sera known to have anti-Golgi autoantibodies, and the majority of these sera (8 of 12, or 75%) were from patients who had secondary SS. CONCLUSION Golgin-97 is a unique Golgi complex antigen that appears to be a target of SS autoantibodies.
Power Doppler ultrasound evaluation of the shear rate and shear stress dependences of red blood cell aggregation

The use of power Doppler ultrasound at 10 MHz is evaluated as a method to study the shear rate and the shear stress dependences of red blood cell aggregation. This evaluation was based on 6 in vitro experiments conducted in a 1.27-cm diameter tube under steady flow conditions. Porcine whole blood was circulated in the flow model at flow rates ranging between 125 to 1500 ml/min (mean shear rate across the tube ranging between 6 and 74 s/sup -1/). For each flow condition, the variation of the Doppler power across the tube and the velocity profile were measured by moving the Doppler sample volume across the tube diameter. For each radial position, the shear rate within the Doppler sample volume was also determined by considering the radial power pattern of the ultrasound beam. To estimate the shear stress within the Doppler sample volume, the apparent viscosity of blood samples withdrawn from the flow model was measured for each experiment. The variation of the Doppler power as a function of the shear rate within the sample volume showed a rapid reduction of the power between 1 and 5 s/sup -1/, a transition region between 5 and 10 s/sup -1/, and a very slow reduction beyond 10 s/sup -1/. Little variation of the Doppler power was measured for shear stress higher than 2 dyn/cm. The maximum Doppler power for all flow rates was usually found near the center of the tube. Based on the ultrasonic scattering models, which predict that the Doppler power is related to the volume square of the scatterers, the method described in the present study showed a very high sensitivity to the presence of red blood cell aggregation for shear rates below 10 s/sup -1/.
Immune Responses Induced by Gene Gun or Intramuscular Injection of DNA Vaccines That Express Immunogenic Regions of the Serine Repeat Antigen from Plasmodium falciparum

ABSTRACT The liver- and blood-stage-expressed serine repeat antigen (SERA) of Plasmodium falciparum is a candidate protein for a human malaria vaccine. We compared the immune responses induced in mice immunized with SERA-expressing plasmid DNA vaccines delivered by intramuscular (i.m.) injection or delivered intradermally by Gene Gun immunization. Mice were immunized with a pcdna3 plasmid encoding the entire 47-kDa domain of SERA (amino acids 17 to 382) or the N-terminal domain (amino acids 17 to 110) of SERA. Minimal antibody responses were detected following DNA vaccination with the N-terminal domain of SERA, suggesting that the N-terminal domain alone is not highly immunogenic by this route of vaccine delivery. Immunization of mice by Gene Gun delivery of the 47-kDa domain of SERA elicited a significantly higher serum antibody titer to the antigen than immunization of mice by i.m. injection with the same plasmid did. The predominant isotype subclass of the antibodies elicited to the SERA protein following i.m. and Gene Gun immunizations with SERA plasmid DNA was immunoglobulin G1. Coimmunization of mice with SERA plasmid DNA and a plasmid expressing the hepatitis B surface antigen (pCMV-s) by the i.m. route resulted in higher anti-SERA titers than those generated in mice immunized with the SERA DNA plasmid alone. Vaccination with DNA may provide a viable alternative or may be used in conjunction with protein-based subunit vaccines to maximize the efficacy of a human malaria vaccine that includes immunogenic regions of the SERA protein.
Freemartins in cattle: the first steps of sexual organogenesis.

Multiple pregnancies were obtained in cows treated with gonadotrophic hormones and the fetuses were removed 39 to 62 days after mating. This covers the period of sexual organogenesis in males from the initial differentiation of the testes to the final establishment of most male structures. Twenty-nine pregnancies resulting in heterosexual fetuses with fused chorions and vascular anastomoses provided forty-eight presumptive freemartins. The genital tract was studied histologically and gonadal size was determined by the paper weight method. No difference was observed between control females and presumptive freemartins up to 48 days. Thereafter, growth of the presumptive ovaries practically stopped in freemartins and the diameter of the upper part of their M\l=u"\llerianducts decreased, as in males. Contrary to older views, the first freemartin effects occurred at the same stage (49 to 52 days) in all the presumptive freemartins. Ovarian and M\l=u"\llerianinhibition begins simultaneously and a significant correlation between the degree of inhibition of both structures was obtained. The penis, scrotum and prostate were absent in all freemartins until Day 60. In only one case was the ano-genital distance slightly increased. A delayed appearance of seminal vesicles was found in three out of seven freemartins at 61 and 62 days. There was a notable absence of seminiferous tubules in the gonads of all these freemartins. It is suggested that if these tubules are present after birth it is because they have developed later. The factors responsible for the freemartin effect still remain to be discovered. Ovarian and M\l=u"\llerianinhibitions occur during the period of time when the external genitalia of males become masculinized. This suggests that a factor of male origin which inhibits both the ovaries and the M\l=u"\llerianducts and which is distinct from the masculinizing hormone could be involved. Other possibilities are also discussed.
A novel method for optimal life cycle management scheme with Markov model

Maintenance of equipment of a power system can enhance the health condition and result in the improvement of reliability of a power system. However, maintenance introduces additional cost into the total operating cost. A sophisticated maintenance strategy should be a tradeoff between maintenance costs and reliability enhancement. This paper addresses the optimal maintenance scheme for transmission equipment over their life cycles. The whole life cycle is divided into several intervals. The health states over all intervals are modeled as a Markov chain. The transformation probability between the states at interconnected intervals will be determined with different maintenance strategies. The model for optimal maintenance strategy considering minor maintenance costs, major maintenance costs, repair costs and equivalent load losses costs. Equivalent load losses are determined by Monte Carlo method based OPF algorithm associated with stochastic loads. To find solution within reasonable computing time, a space reduction approach is proposed based on the characteristics of the Markov chain. A test system is used to demonstrate the efficiency and accuracy of the method.
CCA-MAP and iCCA-MAP: stationary and mobile WSN localisation algorithms

Wireless Sensor Networks WSNs are usually randomly deployed in a region of interest. As a result, algorithms that can determine the location of sensor nodes within a WSN are of great importance. In recent years, several localisation algorithms have been proposed for stationary WSNs. Due to the growing number of applications requiring mobility, algorithms for localising mobile WSNs have also gained much interest as of late. In this paper, we present our recent works on localisation algorithms for WSNs. An algorithm for mobile WSNs, which extends the stationary CCA-MAP algorithm, is presented. The algorithm, called iCCA-MAP, applies an iterative and efficient nonlinear data mapping technique in order to localise the position of a mobile node within a WSN. Simulations detailing the performance of iCCA-MAP are outlined and discussed. We also describe the implementation of the CCA-MAP localisation algorithm on a real WSN testbed. Most localisation algorithms that have been proposed only provide simulation results and have never been implemented on a real testbed. The results obtained show that the implementation results are consistent with the simulation results.
Relative MTTF evaluation for present and future MV VFD topologies on ships

This work evaluates how redundancy and device voltage rating affects the reliability of the neutral-point piloted (NPP) and modular multilevel converter (MMC) topologies in medium voltage variable-frequency drive (VFD) applications. Reliability block diagrams are used along with relative Failure in Time (FIT) rates to look at the effect redundancy and reduced parts count due to higher voltage devices has on overall VFD reliability. The analysis demonstrates that MMC converters with redundancy are very competitive in terms or reliability despite increased parts count. Additionally, the results indicate that 10kV wide bandgap semiconductor devices with FIT values approximately twice as high as today's 4.5kV devices may still make sense in niche applications for the NPP due to the reduced parts count at higher voltages.
Hydration of metal surfaces can be dynamically heterogeneous and hydrophobic

We have applied molecular dynamics and methods of importance sampling to study structure and dynamics of liquid water in contact with metal surfaces. The specific surfaces considered resemble the 100 and 111 faces of platinum. Several results emerge that should apply generally, not just to platinum. These results are generic consequences of water molecules binding strongly to surfaces that are incommensurate with favorable hydrogen-bonding patterns. We show that adlayers of water under these conditions have frustrated structures that interact unfavorably with adjacent liquid water. We elucidate dynamical processes of water in these cases that extend over a broad range of timescales, from less than picoseconds to more than nanoseconds. Associated spatial correlations extend over nanometers. We show that adlayer reorganization occurs intermittently, and each reorganization event correlates motions of several molecules. We show that soft liquid interfaces form adjacent to the adlayer, as is generally characteristic of liquid water adjacent to a hydrophobic surface. The infrequent adlayer reorganization produces a hydrophobic heterogeneity that we characterize by studying the degrees by which different regions of the adlayers attract small hydrophobic particles. Consequences for electrochemistry are discussed in the context of hydronium ions being attracted from the liquid to the metal–adlayer surface.
The Efficiency of Resource Allocation Mechanisms for Budget-Constrained Users

We study the efficiency of mechanisms for allocating a divisible resource. Given scalar signals submitted by all users, such a mechanism decides the fraction of the resource that each user will receive and a payment that will be collected from her. Users are self-interested and aim to maximize their utility (defined as their value for the resource fraction they receive minus their payment). Starting with the seminal work of Johari and Tsitsiklis [Operations Research, 2004], a long list of papers studied the price of anarchy (in terms of the social welfare --- the total users' value) of resource allocation mechanisms for a variety of allocation and payment rules. Here, we further assume that each user has a budget constraint that invalidates strategies that yield a payment that is higher than the user's budget. This subtle assumption, which is arguably more realistic, constitutes the traditional price of anarchy analysis meaningless as the set of equilibria may change drastically and their social welfare can be arbitrarily far from optimal. Instead, we study the price of anarchy using the liquid welfare benchmark that measures efficiency taking budget constraints into account. We show a tight bound of 2 on the liquid price of anarchy of the well-known Kelly mechanism and prove that this result is essentially best possible among all multi-user resource allocation mechanisms. This comes in sharp contrast to the no-budget setting where there are mechanisms that considerably outperform Kelly in terms of social welfare and even achieve full efficiency. In our proofs, we exploit the particular structure of worst-case games and equilibria, which also allows us to design (nearly) optimal two-player mechanisms by solving simple differential equations.
Short Text Classification Based on Latent Topic Modeling and Word Embedding

With the rapid development of the social network and e-commerce, we are exposed to enormous short text every day, ranging from twitters, movie comments, search snippets to news summaries. To classify the short and sparse text accurately is always the basic need for us to deal with information efficiently. However, previous methods fail to achieve high performance due to the sparseness and meaningless of the representation of text. The key breakout lies on the appropriate representation of the words, on which we excogitate a new framework. By discovering the latent topics in the related data crawled from the web, topic distribution can describe the text content in general. Combining with the word embedding generated from the online universal data, the proposed method is a more dense representation, containing semantic information from two different aspects. With this semantic representation of the texts, this framework greatly outperform the previous methods even using the most common SVM classifier, improving the accuracy by 11.58% on standard data set.
Attenuation of PI3K/Akt-Mediated Tumorigenic Signals through PTEN Activation by DNA Vaccine-Induced Anti-ErbB2 Antibodies

By studying BALB/c mice deficient in immune components, we show that the protective immunity to rat ErbB2+ tumors rests on the Ab response elicited by the electroporation of a DNA vaccine encoding the extracellular and transmembrane domains of rat ErbB2. In vivo, the adoptive transfer of vaccine-elicited anti-rat ErbB2 Abs protected against a challenge of rat ErbB2+ carcinoma cells (TUBO cells). In vitro, such Abs inhibited TUBO cell growth by impairing cell cycle progression and inducing apoptosis. To correlate intrinsic mechanisms of Ab action with their tumor-inhibitory potential, first we showed that TUBO cells constitutively express phosphorylated transgenic ErbB2/autochthonous ErbB3 heterodimers and exhibit a basal level of Akt phosphorylation, suggesting a constitutive activation of the PI3K/Akt pathway. Treatment with anti-ErbB2 Abs caused a drastic reduction in the basal level of Akt phosphorylation in the absence of an impairment of PI3K enzymatic activity. Notably, the same Ab treatment induced an increase in PTEN phosphatase activity that correlated with a reduced PTEN phosphorylation. In conclusion, vaccine-induced anti-ErbB2 Abs directly affected the transformed phenotype of rat ErbB2+ tumors by impairing ErbB2-mediated PI3K/Akt signaling.
Selective expression of histamine receptors H1R, H2R, and H4R, but not H3R, in the human intestinal tract

Background and aims: Histamine is known as a regulator of gastrointestinal functions, such as gastric acid production, intestinal motility, and mucosal ion secretion. Most of this knowledge has been obtained from animal studies. In contrast, in humans, expression and distribution of histamine receptors (HR) within the human gastrointestinal tract are unclear. Methods: We analysed HR expression in human gastrointestinal tissue specimens by quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction and immunostaining. Results: We found that H1R, H2R, and H4R mRNA were expressed throughout the gastrointestinal tract, while H3R mRNA was absent. No significant differences in the distribution of HR were found between different anatomical sites (duodenum, ileum, colon, sigma, and rectum). Immunostaining of neurones and nerve fibres revealed that H3R was absent in the human enteric nervous system; however, H1R and H2R were found on ganglion cells of the myenteric plexus. Epithelial cells also expressed H1R, H2R and, to some extent, H4R. Intestinal fibroblasts exclusively expressed H1R while the muscular layers of human intestine stained positive for both H1R and H2R. Immune cells expressed mRNA and protein for H1R, H2R, and low levels of H4R. Analysis of endoscopic biopsies from patients with food allergy and irritable bowel syndrome revealed significantly elevated H1R and H2R mRNA levels compared with controls. Conclusions: We have demonstrated that H1R, H2R and, to some extent, H4R, are expressed in the human gastrointestinal tract, while H3R is absent, and we found that HR expression was altered in patients with gastrointestinal diseases.
The effect of assessments and examinations on the learning of medical students

This paper describes a situation where an alteration in the final‐year assessment scheme led to changes in student learning activities which were the exact opposite of those intended. Students were seen to be spending a disproportionate amount of time studying the theoretical components of the course relative to the practical and clinical aspects. The paramount importance of the assessments and examinations in influencing student learning behaviour led the departments concerned to develop a new clinical examination which more clearly reflected the objectives of the course.
Comparative Analysis of Mollusc Assemblages from Different Hard Bottom Habitats in the Central Tyrrhenian Sea

Composition, trophic structure, and species-substrate relationships of molluscan assemblages inhabiting different hard bottom habitats (Sabellaria alveolata reef, photophilic bottoms, Phyllophora crispa sciaphilic assemblage, and coralligenous bioconstruction) were studied in two different sites of the Tyrrhenian Sea. In particular, molluscs from the Sabellaria alvevolata (Linnaeus, 1767) reef and coralligenous concretion were investigated, testing the hypothesis that bioconstructions increase the diversity and abundance of associated biota compared to the surrounding habitats. A total of 3134 individuals belonging to the classes of Polyplacophora (5 species, 24 individuals), Bivalvia (39 sp., 2734 ind.), and Gastropoda (53 sp., 376 ind.) were identified. These three taxonomic groups showed different distribution patterns in the studied habitats. Multivariate analyses revealed significant inter-habitat differences in the composition of mollusc assemblages, especially between bioconstructions and the other habitats. S. alveolata and coralligenous host the highest rich molluscan fauna when compared to the neighboring hard bottom habitats characterized by photophilic and sciaphilic assemblages. The first ones were dominated by bivalve suspension feeders, mainly represented by sessile and sedentary organisms, which act as bio-constructors, bio-eroders, or simply inhabit the several microhabitats provided by the bioconstructions, while the second ones host a rich molluscan fauna dominated by gastropod grazers and predators. The present study increases the comparative knowledge of molluscan assemblages inhabiting habitats of littoral plans of the Mediterranean Sea, providing pivotal information regarding biodiversity of coastal zones.
Semi-Fragile Image Watermarking, Authentication and Localization Techniques for Law Enforcement Applications

With the tremendous growth and use of digital cameras and video devices, the need to verify the collected digital content for law enforcement applications such as crime scene investigations and traffic violations, becomes paramount if they are to be used as evidence in courts. Semi-fragile watermarking has become increasingly important within the past few years as it can be used to verify the content of images by accurately localising the tampered area and tolerating some non-malicious manipulations. There have been a number of different transforms used for semi-fragile image watermarking. In this chapter, we present two novel transforms for semi-fragile watermarking, using the Slant transform (SLT) as a block-based algorithm and the wavelet-based contourlet transform (WBCT) as a non-block based algorithm. The proposed SLT is compared with existing DCT and PST semi-fragile watermarking schemes. Experimental results using standard test images and simulated law enforcement images indicate that the SLT is more accurate for copy and paste attacks with non-malicious manipulations, such as additive Gaussian noise. For the proposed WBCT method, watermarking embedding is performed by modulating the parent-children relationship in the contourlet domain. Again, experimental results using the same test images have demonstrated that our proposed WBCT method achieves good performances in localising the tampered regions, even when the image has been subjected to non-malicious manipulations such as JPEG/JPEG2000 compressions, Gaussian noise, Gaussian filtering, and contrast stretching. The average miss detection rate is found to be approximately 1% while maintaining an average false alarm rate below 6.5%.
Detecting Textual Information in Images from Onion Domains Using Text Spotting

espanolDebido a los esfuerzos de diferentes autoridades en la lucha contra las actividades ilegales en las redes Tor, los comerciantes han desarrollado nuevas formas de eludir las herramientas de monitoreo utilizadas para obtener evidencia de dichas actividades. En particular, la incorporacion de contenido textual en objetos graficos evita que el analisis de texto, utilizando algoritmos de Procesamiento de Lenguaje Natural (NLP), se pueda usar para ver dichos contenidos web de cebolla. En este documento, presentamos un marco de Text Spotting dedicado a detectar y reconocer informacion textual en imagenes alojadas en dominios de cebolla. Encontramos que la Red de propuestas de texto conexionista y la Red neuronal recurrente convolucional alcanzan 0.57 F-Measure cuando se ejecuta la tuberia combinada en un subconjunto de 100 imagenes etiquetadas manualmente obtenidas del conjunto de datos TOIC. Tambien identificamos los parametros que tienen una influencia critica en los resultados de Text Spotting. La tecnica propuesta podria apoyar herramientas para ayudar a las autoridades a detectar estas actividades. EnglishDue to the efforts of different authorities in the fight against illegal activities in the Tor networks, the traders have developed new ways of circumventing the monitoring tools used to obtain evidence of said activities. In particular, embedding textual content into graphical objects avoids that text analysis, using Natural Language Processing (NLP) algorithms, can be used for watching such onion web contents. In this paper, we present a Text Spotting framework dedicated to detecting and recognizing textual information within images hosted in onion domains. We found that the Connectionist Text Proposal Network and Convolutional Recurrent Neural Network achieve 0.57 F-Measure when running the combined pipeline on a subset of 100 images labeled manually obtained from TOIC dataset. We also identified the parameters that have a critical influence on the Text Spotting results. The proposed technique might support tools to help the authorities in detecting these activities.