Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pregabalin relieves symptoms of painful diabetic neuropathy

Objective: Pregabalin, an alpha2-delta ligand with analgesic, anxiolytic, and anticonvulsant activity, has been evaluated for treatment of neuropathic pain. The authors assessed the efficacy and tolerability of pregabalin (75, 300, 600 mg/day) vs placebo in patients with diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN). Methods: Patients with a 1- to 5-year history of DPN and average weekly pain score of ≥4 on an 11-point numeric pain-rating scale were enrolled in a 5-week, double-blind, multicenter, placebo-controlled study. Patients (n = 338) were randomized to receive one of three doses of pregabalin or placebo TID. Pregabalin 600 mg/day was titrated over 6 days; lower doses were initiated on day 1. Results: Patients in the 300- and 600-mg/day pregabalin groups showed improvements in endpoint mean pain score (primary efficacy measure) vs placebo (p = 0.0001). Improvements were also seen in weekly pain score, sleep interference score, patient global impression of change, clinical global impression of change, SF-McGill Pain Questionnaire, and multiple domains of the SF-36 Health Survey. Improvements in pain and sleep were seen as early as week 1 and were sustained throughout the 5 weeks. Responders (patients with ≥50% reduction in pain compared to baseline) were 46% (300 mg/day), 48% (600 mg/day), and 18% (placebo). Pregabalin was well tolerated with a low discontinuation rate. The most common adverse events were dizziness and somnolence. Conclusions: In patients with diabetic peripheral neuropathy, pregabalin demonstrated early and sustained improvement in pain and a beneficial effect on sleep, which were confirmed by positive patient global impression. Pregabalin was well tolerated at all doses.
The Cognition of Deception: The Role of Executive Processes in Producing Lies

The cognitive processes used in deception have been largely overlooked in the literature on deception. The author's position in this review is that effortful executive processes (inhibition, working memory, and other mental management mechanisms) are central cognitive components for lie production. The author provides evidence from 3 bodies of literature: studies on lie detection, developmental research on cognition related to children's deception, and imaging research describing neural correlates of deception. In addition, the author reviews the available theories that implicate executive functions as core processes in deception. The author also discusses implications of this research as they relate to future research and applications on the psychology of deception.
Protein kinase A-mediated cardioprotection of Tongxinluo relates to the inhibition of myocardial inflammation, apoptosis, and edema in reperfused swine hearts.

BACKGROUND Our previous studies have demonstrated that Tongxinluo (TXL), a traditional Chinese medicine, can protect hearts against no-reflow and reperfusion injury in a protein kinase A (PKA)-dependent manner. The present study was to investigate whether the PKA-mediated cardioprotection of TXL against no-reflow and reperfusion injury relates to the inhibition of myocardial inflammation, edema, and apoptosis. METHODS In a 90-minute ischemia and 3-hour reperfusion model, minipigs were randomly assigned to sham, control, TXL (0.05 g/kg, gavaged one hour prior to ischemia), and TXL + H-89 (a PKA inhibitor, intravenously and continuously infused at 1.0 µg/kg per minute) groups. Myocardial no-reflow, necrosis, edema, and apoptosis were determined by pathological and histological studies. Myocardial activity of PKA and myeloperoxidase was measured by colorimetric method. The expression of PKA, phosphorylated cAMP response element-binding protein (p-CREB) (Ser(133)), tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α), P-selectin, apoptotic proteins, and aquaporins was detected by Western blotting analysis. RESULTS TXL decreased the no-reflow area by 37.4% and reduced the infarct size by 27.0% (P < 0.05). TXL pretreatment increased the PKA activity and the expression of Ser(133) p-CREB in the reflow and no-reflow myocardium (P < 0.05). TXL inhibited the ischemia-reperfusion-induced elevation of myeloperoxidase activities and the expression of TNF-α and P-selectin, reduced myocardial edema in the left ventricle and the reflow and no-reflow areas and the expression of aquaporin-4, -8, and -9, and decreased myocytes apoptosis by regulation of apoptotic protein expression in the reflow and no-reflow myocardium. However, addition of the PKA inhibitor H-89 counteracted these beneficial effects of TXL. CONCLUSION PKA-mediated cardioprotection of TXL against no-reflow and reperfusion injury relates to the inhibition of myocardial inflammation, edema, and apoptosis in the reflow and no-reflow myocardium.
Effects of HIV-1 and herpes simplex virus type 2 infection on lymphocyte and dendritic cell density in adult foreskins from Rakai, Uganda.

BACKGROUND Male circumcision reduces human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) acquisition, and HSV-2 infection is associated with an increased risk of HIV acquisition. To assess the cellular basis for these associations, we estimated immunologic cellular densities in foreskin tissue. METHODS Immunostained CD1a(+) dendritic cell and CD4(+) and CD8(+) T cell densities were quantified in foreskin samples obtained from medical circumcision in Rakai, Uganda (35 HIV-infected, HSV-2-infected men; 5 HIV-infected, HSV-2-uninfected men; 22 HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-infected men; and 29 HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-uninfected men. RESULTS CD1A(+) dendritic cell densities did not vary by HIV or HSV-2 status. Compared with densities in HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-uninfected men (mean, 26.8 cells/mm(2)), CD4(+) T cell densities were similar in the HIV-infected, HSV-2-infected group (mean, 28.7 cells/mm(2)), were significantly decreased in the HIV-infected, HSV-2-uninfected group (mean, 11.2; P < .05), and were increased in the HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-infected group (mean, 68.7; P < .05). Dermal CD8(+) T cell densities were higher in the HIV and HSV-2-coinfected group (mean, 102.9) than in the HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-uninfected group (mean, 10.0; P < .001), the HIV-infected, HSV-2-uninfected group (mean, 27.3; P < .001), and the HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-infected group (mean, 25.3; P < .005). DISCUSSION The increased CD4(+) cellular density in the HIV-uninfected, HSV-2-infected men may help to explain why HSV-2-infected men are at increased risk of HIV acquisition. The absence of this increase in men coinfected with both HIV and HSV-2 is likely in part the result of the progressive loss of CD4(+) cells in HIV infection. Conversely, HIV and HSV-2 coinfection appears to synergistically increase CD8(+) T cell densities.
Compatible Solutes Protect against Chaotrope (Ethanol)-Induced, Nonosmotic Water Stress

ABSTRACT Water stress is one of the major stresses experienced by cellular systems and can take a number of distinct forms. In response to turgor-related osmotic stress, cells produce compatible solutes that are macromolecule protectants and also counteract the outflow of water from stressed cells. In this report we show that the germination of conidia of Aspergillus nidulans, a sensitive indicator of water stress, in the presence of ethanol is correlated with the intracellular concentration of the compatible solutes glycerol and erythritol, which protect against both osmotic and nonturgor forms of water stress.
Two Birds With One Stone: A Unified Approach to Saliency and Co-Saliency Detection via Multi-Instance Learning

Saliency detection on an individual image as well as co-saliency detection from a group of images are currently popular topics or reflect future trends more recently due to their importance and challenging roles in computer vision. In many cases, co-saliency detection is usually dependent on the single-image saliency detection results. Nevertheless, most efforts have been made to tackle them separately and not much attention has been paid to tackling them together in a unified idea. Being aware of these two tasks are highly related, the difference from previous surveys is that this paper applies a unified framework by employing a multi-instance learning (MIL) algorithm to resolve both the issues, and formulating single-image saliency and co-saliency detection as top-down weakly supervised learning paradigm. Specifically, for single-image saliency detection, we utilize the evidence confidence-support vector machine algorithm to learn a discriminant model to predict the saliency on test images. For co-saliency detection from image group, we concatenate the EC values and saliency scores to obtain the final results of co-saliency detection. By observing the importance of the selection of negative bags in the MIL framework, we also introduce a novel selection strategy of negative bags to improve the robustness of the proposed method. Experimental results on publicly available image benchmark data sets have demonstrated that the proposed unified framework can achieve competitive performances as compared with the state-of-the-art algorithms in terms of accuracy and effectiveness.
Intake of animal products and stroke mortality in the Hiroshima/Nagasaki Life Span Study.

BACKGROUND To determine whether intake of animal products was associated with a reduced risk of stroke mortality in a large-scale population-based cohort in Japan. METHODS A self-administered questionnaire, including questions on dietary habits, was mailed to the members of the Life Span Study, a cohort of people exposed and non-exposed to atomic bomb radiation, who were alive as of 1 September 1979. Animal products included frequency intake of beef/pork, chicken, ham/sausage, milk, dairy products, eggs, fish, and broiled fish. Responses were obtained from 40 349 people (72%): 15 350 men (mean age 54 years) and 24 999 women (mean age 58 years). The subjects were followed for 16 years, and deaths were ascertained by linkage to the nationwide family registration system of Japan. The associations between diet and stroke mortality were examined using a Cox proportional hazard model. RESULTS During the follow-up period, 1462 stroke deaths occurred. Four animal products comprising eggs, dairy products, fish, and broiled fish were independently associated with a decreased risk of stroke mortality; while beef/pork, chicken, ham/ sausage, and milk consumption were not associated with stroke death. A composite measure of eggs, dairy products, fish, and broiled fish intake was calculated, and the highest tertile was significantly inversely associated with total stroke mortality (Hazards Ratio [HR] = 0.80, 95% CI: 0.68, 0.93) compared with the lowest tertile. The protective effect of animal product intake on total stroke death was largely confined to intracerebral haemorrhage death; the RH of intracerebral haemorrhage death for the highest tertile of consumption was 0.72 (95% CI: 0.53-0.98) compared with the lowest tertile; animal products intake was not related to cerebral infarction mortality (HR = 0.84; 95% CI: 0.67-1.06). CONCLUSIONS Intake of animal products such as eggs, dairy products, and fish may be protective against intracerebral haemorrhage, but is not related to cerebral infarction mortality.
Periodic presumptive treatment of curable sexually transmitted infections among sex workers: a systematic review

Background:Unprotected sex work remains a major driver of HIV/sexually transmitted infection (STI) epidemics in many countries. STI treatment can lower disease burden, complications and prevalence of HIV cofactors. Periodic presumptive treatment (PPT) has been used with sex workers to reduce their high burden of largely asymptomatic STIs. The objective of this review is to assess benefits and harms of PPT among female sex workers. Methods:We searched MEDLINE for studies related to sex work and STIs during 1990–2010, extracted data from eligible studies in duplicate and conducted meta-analysis by study design using random effects models. Results:Two thousand, three hundred and fifteen articles were screened, 18 studies met inclusion criteria and 14 were included in meta-analyses. One published randomized controlled trial (RCT) reported significant reductions of gonorrhoea (Neisseria gonorrhoeae) [rate ratio (RR) 0.46, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.31–0.68] and chlamydia (Chlamydia trachomatis) (RR 0.38, 95%CI 0.26–0.57), but no effect on serologic syphilis (RR 1.02, 95%CI 0.54–1.95). Similar results were seen for N. gonorrhoeae and C. trachomatis in pooled analyses, including data from one unpublished RCT and across study designs, and correlated with initial prevalence (R2 = 0.155). One observational study reported genital ulcer disease (GUD) declines in sex workers, and two reported impact among male client populations for N. gonorrhoeae [odds ratio (OR) 0.60, 95% CI 0.38–0.94], C. trachomatis (OR 0.47, 95% CI 0.31–0.71) and GUD (OR 0.21, 95% CI 0.11–0.42). No studies reported evidence of risk compensation or antibiotic resistance. Conclusion:PPT can reduce prevalence of gonorrhoea, chlamydia and ulcerative STIs among sex workers in whom prevalence is high. Sustained STI reductions can be achieved when PPT is implemented together with peer interventions and condom promotion. Additional benefits may include impact on STI and HIV transmission at population level.
An Alternative to High School Tracking with an Opportunity for Student Personal Growth: The Independent English Honors Project at Cooper High School

AN ALTERNATIVE TO HIGH SCHOOL TRACKING WITH AN OPPORTUNITY FOR STUDENT PERSONAL GROWTH: THE INDEPENDENT ENGLISH HONORS PROJECT AT COOPER HIGH SCHOOL Ira Pernick Alex Posecznick Rather than offering honors courses in English, Cooper High School (CHS) provides students in grades 9 and 10 with an opportunity to pursue an Independent English Honors Project (EHP) as a means of earning Honors credit on their high school transcript. While most schools utilize a more traditional Honors class system that often identifies students as early as 3rd grade, the lack of Honors courses in English leads directly to English classes that are heterogeneously grouped. Cooper High School’s atypical approach to Honors English instruction, controversial among some CHS parents, raise important questions about the potential value of independent student work and the benefits, if any, of heterogeneous instruction. This model of Honors instruction, unlike other subject areas within CHS, is also a cause of great consternation for many within the community and district. This qualitative study, based on interviews and focus groups with students and teachers, seeks to better understand the perceptions of the EHP and its place at CHS. The study also addresses how students and teachers experience/perceive the EHP, those who choose to undertake it (or do not), and the heterogeneously grouped English classes that come with it. This study examined both those
The floral nectary of Hymenaea stigonocarpa (Fabaceae, Caesalpinioideae): structural aspects during floral development.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Considering that few studies on nectary anatomy and ultrastructure are available for chiropterophilous flowers and the importance of Hymenaea stigonocarpa in natural 'cerrado' communities, the present study sought to analyse the structure and cellular modifications that take place within its nectaries during the different stages of floral development, with special emphasis on plastid dynamics. METHODS For the structural and ultrastructural studies the nectary was processed as per usual techniques and studied under light, scanning and transmission electron microscopy. Histochemical tests were employed to identify the main metabolites on nectary tissue and secretion samples. KEY RESULTS The floral nectary consists of the inner epidermis of the hypanthium and vascularized parenchyma. Some evidence indicates that the nectar release occurs via the stomata. The high populations of mitochondria, and their juxtaposition with amyloplasts, seem to be related to energy needs for starch hydrolysis. Among the alterations observed during the secretory phase, the reduction in the plastid stromatic density and starch grain size are highlighted. When the secretory stage begins, the plastid envelope disappears and a new membrane is formed, enclosing this region and giving rise to new vacuoles. After the secretory stage, cellular structures named 'extrastomatic bodies' were observed and seem to be related to the nectar resorption. CONCLUSIONS Starch hydrolysis contributes to nectar formation, in addition to the photosynthates derived directly from the phloem. In these nectaries, the secretion is an energy-requiring process. During the secretion stage, some plastids show starch grain hydrolysis and membrane rupture, and it was observed that the region previously occupied by this organelle continued to be reasonably well defined, and gave rise to new vacuoles. The extrastomatic bodies appear to be related to the resorption of uncollected nectar.
Noise Immunity and its Temperature Characteristics Study of the Capacitive-Loaded Level Shift Circuit for High Voltage Gate Drive IC

A new level shift circuit featuring with capacitive load instead of resistive load is proposed and investigated in this paper. The proposed design can help the high voltage gate drive integrated circuit (HVIC) to achieve the high d Vs/dt noise immunity up to 85 V/ns and the allowable negative $V_{S}$ swing to −12 V at 15 V supply voltage. The temperature characteristic of the above reliability items of the HVIC with the proposed capacitive-loaded level shift (CLLS) circuit are investigated for the first time and are an improvement when compared to those of the conventional resistive-loaded level shift circuit, which is verified by numerous theoretic analyses and experiments. Moreover, although four high voltage lateral double-diffused metal-oxide-semiconductor transistors are used in the proposed CLLS circuit, no extra chip size is needed due to the fact that the transistors can be embedded in the high voltage isolation structure base on 0.5 μm Bipolar-CMOS-DMOS technology.
Bioeconomía en América Latina y el Caribe: contexto global y regional y perspectivas

La bioeconomia ha ganado importancia durante la ultima decada como marco de referencia para el diseno e implementacion de politicas de desarrollo productivo e innovacion. sobre todo, ante la necesidad de transitar a formas de produccion en las que se minimice o elimine la generacion de desechos y el uso de combustibles fosiles. El objetivo de este documento es contribuir a incrementar el conocimiento del tema en la region, sobre todo sus alcances como marco de referencia para las politicas publicas de desarrollo e innovacion y que contribuyen al cambio estructural.
Table-driven geographical routing using aggregate areas

Geographical routing protocols scale well in large ad-hoc and sensor networks but fall short with some topologies. This causes packet losses and a drop in network performance. In this paper, we propose to introduce topological information aiming to improve the quality of routing decision while keeping the protocol scalable. Every node maintains precise information for nearby nodes and aggregated information for farther nodes by means of aggregate areas. Evaluation demonstrates the scalability of the proposition and its efficiency compared to a pure geographical routing protocol.
Complete Genome Sequence of Xanthomonas arboricola pv. juglandis 417, a Copper-Resistant Strain Isolated from Juglans regia L.

ABSTRACT Here, we report the complete genome sequence of Xanthomonas arboricola pv. juglandis 417, a copper-resistant strain isolated from a blighted walnut fruit (Juglans regia L. cv. Chandler). The genome consists of a single chromosome (5,218 kb).
A Comparative Analysis of Home Advantage in the Olympic and Paralympic Games 1988–2018

Abstract In this paper we examine the extent to which nations that are awarded the right to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games benefit from success in elite sport through a quantifiable home advantage or host nation effect. The prevalence and size of home advantage in the Olympic and Paralympic Games is investigated over 16 editions (eight Summer Games and eight Winter Games) between 1988 and 2018 at an overall nation level and within ten sports. These include seven summer sports (archery, athletics, cycling, fencing, shooting, swimming and table tennis) and three winter sports (alpine skiing, biathlon and cross-country skiing). Our study supports the prevalence of a statistically significant overall host nation effect in the Olympic and Paralympic Games, which is also evident in Olympic archery, Paralympic athletics, Paralympic table tennis and Paralympic alpine skiing. At the same time, our analysis illustrates that the size of this effect did not differ significantly between able-bodied and para-sport events. Nations that experienced a large home advantage effect in the Olympic Games also had a large home advantage effect in the Paralympic Games. Our research contributes to the study of the impacts of hosting international multi-sport competitions, including the largely overlooked area of the Paralympic Games.
Finding the optimal place and size of an energy storage system for the daily operation of microgrids considering both operation modes simultaneously

This paper aims to find the optimal place and size of an energy storage system in a microgrid, considering the grid-connected mode and autonomous mode simultaneously. Energy storage systems are one of the most effective components in today's power grids to improve the power quality of power grids, therefore attracting more attention in this field. Specially, in microgirds which use various kinds of distributed generations, using energy storage systems is necessary to improve their power quality. Finding the optimal place and size of energy storage systems is a common action in microgrids. However, it should be noted that most microgrids can be operated in both of their operation modes and finding optimal place and size of an energy storage system for one of these operation modes doesn't mean that they are optimal for the other mode. This paper presents a new method to find the optimal place and size of an energy storage system for microgrids during daily operation, considering both grid-connected mode and autonomous mode simultaneously. The presented method is based on applying the AC-optimal power flow to find the optimal place and size of the energy storage system.
AnglaHindi: an English to Hindi machine-aided translation system

This paper presents a system overview of an English to Hindi Machine-Aided Translation System named AnglaHindi. Its beta-version has been made available on the internet for free translation at http://anglahindi.iitk. ac.in AnglaHindi is an English to Hindi version of the ANGLABHARTI translation methodology developed by the author for translation from English to all Indian languages. Anglabharti is a pseudo-interlingual rule-based translation methodology. AnglaHindi, besides using the rule-bases, uses example-base and statistics to obtain more acceptable and accurate translation for frequently encountered noun and verb phrasals. This way a limited hybridization of rule-based and example-based approaches has been incorporated.