Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Expression of the mouse Fgf15 gene is directly initiated by Sonic hedgehog signaling in the diencephalon and midbrain

Sonic hedgehog (Shh) is a secreted molecule that is thought to regulate tissue growth and patterning in vertebrate embryos. Although it has been reported that Gli transcription factors mediate Shh signaling to the nucleus, little is known about developmental target genes of Gli. In the previous genetic study, we showed that Shh is required for Fgf15 expression in the diencephalon and midbrain. Here, we examined whether Fgf15 is a direct target of Shh signaling through Gli. Shh was expressed in the midline cells and Fgf15 in the medial region of the diencephalon/midbrain by the seven‐somite stage. The Fgf15 expression domain coincided with that of Gli1 and overlapped with that of Gli2 at this stage. Fgf15 expression in the diencephalon/midbrain was greatly reduced in the seven‐somite Shh mutant embryos. Transgenic analysis showed that the 3.6‐kb 5′‐flanking region of the Fgf15 gene is sufficient for induction of Fgf15 in the medial/ventral diencephalon/midbrain. Luciferase assay showed that the 3.6‐kb Fgf15 enhancer/promoter was activated by Gli2. A Gli‐binding site was located 1 kb upstream of the transcription start site and was required for expression in the medial/ventral diencephalon/midbrain in transgenic embryos and for activation in luciferase assay. These findings indicate that Fgf15 is directly regulated by Shh signaling through Gli proteins. Developmental Dynamics 232:282–292, 2005. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Effect of Human Ovarian Tissue Vitrification/Warming on the Expression of Genes Related to Folliculogenesis

Background: Ovarian tissue cryopreservation is an alternative strategy to preserve the fertility of women predicted to undergo premature ovarian failure. This study was designed to evaluate the expression of folliculogenesis-related genes, including factor in the germline alpha (FIGLA), growth differentiation factor-9 (GDF-9), follicle-stimulating hormone receptor (FSHR), and KIT LIGAND after vitrification/warming of human ovarian tissue. Methods: Human ovarian tissue samples were collected from five transsexual women. In the laboratory, the ovarian medullary part was removed by a surgical blade, and the cortical tissue was cut into small pieces. Some pieces were vitrified and warmed and the others were considered as non-vitrified group (control). Follicular normality was assessed with morphological observation by a light microscope, and the expression of FIGLA, KIT LIGAND, GDF-9,, and FSHR genes was examined using real-time RT-PCR in both the vitrified and non-vitrified groups. Results: Overall, 85% of the follicles preserved their normal morphologic feature after warming. The percentage of normal follicles and the expression of FIGLA, KIT LIGAND, GDF-9, and FSHR genes were similar in both vitrified and non-vitrified groups (P > 0.05). Conclusion: Vitrification/warming of human ovarian tissue had no remarkable effect on the expression of folliculogenesis-related genes.
Informal Competition, Firms Productivity and Policy Reforms in Egypt

This paper investigates the effect of the competition stemmed from informal firms on formal firms productivity in Egypt. Using the World Banks Enterprise Surveys, we update the two-step methodology of Guiso et al. (2004) to build a regional indicator of informal competition intensity. Our estimation reports a positive effect of this indicator on formal firms productivity that remains valid to the instrumental variable approach and to multiple robustness check. This result is subject to factors accounting for the characteristics of the firm and is segmented by formal firms size. We also identify informal firms cost advantage as the main channel through which this effect occurs. Our results call on the importance of tax reforms and effective regulation to be implemented in Egypt.
Small coupled double loop antennas for dual band GPS arrays

Small footprint coupled double loop (CDL) antennas are presented for dual band anti-jam GPS arrays. Miniaturization is achieved by employing a readily available ε<inf>r</inf>=9.8 substrate and lumped coupling capacitors. A CDL GPS antenna prototype having 1″×1″ (λ<inf>0</inf>/9.6×λ<inf>0</inf>/9.6 at L2 band) footprint over a 0.5″ thick 1.6″×1.6″ substrate is shown to operate with 3.8dB and 3.3dB measured gains at the L2 and L1 bands, respectively. To realize the smallest possible GPS array, the performance parameters of the CDL antenna are investigated in detail as a function of its substrate size.
Maternal virus load and perinatal human immunodeficiency virus type 1 subtype E transmission, Thailand. Bangkok Collaborative Perinatal HIV Transmission Study Group.

To determine the rate and risk factors for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-1 subtype E perinatal transmission, with focus on virus load, pregnant HIV-infected women and their formula-fed infants were followed prospectively in Bangkok. Of 281 infants with known outcome, 68 were infected (transmission rate, 24.2%; 95% confidence interval, 19.3%-29.6%). Transmitting mothers had a 4.3-fold higher median plasma HIV RNA level at delivery than did nontransmitters (P<.001). No transmission occurred at <2000 copies/mL. On multivariate analysis, prematurity (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 4.5), vaginal delivery (AOR, 2.9), low NK cell percentage (AOR, 2.4), and maternal virus load were associated with transmission. As RNA quintiles increased, the AOR for transmission increased linearly from 4.5 to 24.8. Two-thirds of transmission was attributed to virus load>10,000 copies/mL. Although risk is multifactorial, high maternal virus load at delivery strongly predicts transmission. This may have important implications for interventions designed to reduce perinatal transmission.
Contracting Out for Municipal Human Resources: Analyzing the Role of Human Capital in the Make Or Buy Decision

Human capital continues to be a guiding force in the effort to tap the potential of employees for organizational excellence. This is especially true of public organizations that are eager to attract the right persons for the right jobs in an increasingly competitive labor market. Human capital theory also suggests that not all employees possess knowledge and skills that are of equal strategic importance to the organization. Thus, organizations will seek to retain and develop employees that are mission crucial, while pursuing service delivery alternatives such as contracting out for non-essential goals. Utilizing a national survey of local government human resource professionals, the present study assesses the role long-term and short-term human resource planning plays in the contracting out of human resource functions. The results suggest that contracting out human resource services may be less of a factor in long-term strategic management assessments. In contrast to local governments lacking workforce planning metrics, municipalities that have the capacity to engage in sophisticated long-term human resource planning may not face the same managerial, fiscal, and political pressures to contract out.
Selecting Social Media Responses to News: A Convex Framework Based On Data Reconstruction

With the explosive growth of social media, it has gained significantly increasing attention from both journalists and their readership in recent years by enhancing the reading experience with its timeliness, high participation, interactivity, etc. On the other hand, the popularity of social media services such as Twitter also leads to the challenge of information overload by generating thousands of responses (tweets) for each article of hot news, which will be overwhelming for readers. In this paper, we address the problem of selecting a representative subset of responses to news in order to deliver the most important information. We consider different criteria regarding the importance of the selected subset, and treat the problem from the data reconstruction perspective with concerns for both quality and generalizability of the selection. The intuition behind our work is that a good selection should be relevant from two levels: i) at the message level, it brings readers new information as much as possible or generalizes other people’s opinions comprehensively; ii) at the text level, it is able to reconstruct the corpus. Specifically, the task of selecting responses to news can be formulated as a convex optimization problem where sparse non-negative weights are introduced for all the responses indicating whether they are selected or not. Several gradient based optimization and step size selection methods are also investigated in this paper to achieve a faster rate of convergence. More importantly, the proposed framework evaluates the utility of a set of responses jointly and therefore is able to reduce redundancy of the selected responses. We evaluate our approach on real-world data obtained from Twitter, and the results demonstrate superior performance over the state of the art in both accuracy and generalizability.
Effect of Hydro-Alcoholic Extract of Nigella sativa on Gastric Acid and Mucus Secretion in Cyclooxygenase Inhibition Condition in Rats

Aims: In various studies and also in traditional medicine, many properties for Nigella sativa, such as antioxidant effects and gastric mucosa protection have been reported. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of hydro-alcoholic extract of Nigella sativa on acid and mucus secretion in cyclooxygenase inhibition conditions. Materials & Methods: This interventional study was done using 40 Wistar rats. The rats were divided into 5 groups; positive control (distilled water), Ranitidine (50mg/kg) and three groups receiving Nigella sativa extract (100, 200 and 400mg/kg). The groups were treated by gavage for 5 days and on 6 th day Indomethacin was gavaged to cyclooxygenase inhibition and 6 hours later acid and mucus secretion were examined. Findings: No differences were observed in acid secretion between treated groups with Ranitidine, the extract and Indomethacin. But mucus secretion in groups of 100 and 200mg/kg doses of the extract was higher than the group receiving Indomethacin significantly. Conclusion: Nigella seed extract can protect the gastric mucosa against damages caused by cyclooxygenase inhibition, but is not able to reduce the acid secretion elevated by Indomethacin.
Abnormal anatomy of the lumbosacral region imaged by magnetic resonance in children with anorectal malformations.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the frequency of lumbosacral anomalies, the association with urogenital abnormalities, and the correlation with defaecation pattern by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). METHODS: A prospective analysis was performed of routine MRI in patients with anorectal malformations. Between 1990 and 1994, MRI was performed in 43 such patients: 31 boys and 12 girls. Twenty four had a high anorectal malformation, 16 had a low anorectal malformation, and three had Currarino's triad. MRI was performed before reconstruction in 26, and postoperatively in 17. Urogenital anomalies were found in 21. RESULTS: Abnormalities of the spinal cord and spine were found with MRI in 20 patients (46.5%); caudal regression syndrome in 10, tethered cord in two, a combination of both in three, and other spinal anomalies in five. These anomalies were found in 30% of the patients with low anorectal malformations, and in 50% with high anorectal malformations. In patients with urogenital malformations, MRI more often showed spinal anomalies (13/21, 62%) than in patients without (7/22, 32%). In high anorectal malformations, defaecation was more often a problem in patients with spinal anomalies (12/15, 80%) than in patients without (2/8, 25%). CONCLUSIONS: Spinal anomalies in the lumbosacral region were found with MRI in 46.5% of patients with anorectal malformations. Since presence of these anomalies seems to be related to clinical outcome, MRI should be performed routinely in all such patients.
Improving Automatic Image Annotation with Google Semantic Link

During the past few years, there has been a massive explosion of multimedia content such as un-annotated images on the web. Automatic image annotation is an important task for multimedia retrieval. By automatically allocating semantic concepts to un-annotated images, image retrieval can be performed over annotation concepts. In this work, we address the problem of automatic image annotation, namely automatically describing semantic content of image by concept classifier. Traditional approaches mainly consider the link between image and concept, but ignore the link between annotation concepts. We propose a novel Google Semantic link based image Annotation Model (GSAM), which can leverage the associated concept network (ACN) to enhance automatic semantic annotation performance. When several concepts appear in training set with high co-occurrence frequency, our model utilizes Google semantic link to increase the chances of predicting one concept if there is strong visual evidence for others. Additionally, the fusion between Google concept link and local concept link, and semantic links between single-concepts and multi-concepts are employed to improve annotation performance. In order to investigate the feasibility and effectiveness of our approach, we conduct experiments on Corel and IAPR datasets. The experimental results show that our approach considering semantic link outperforms existing state-of-the-art methods.
Thirdhand Smoke Identified as Potent, Enduring Carcinogen

According to Mohamad Sleiman, PhD, first author of the article and a colleague of Dr. Gundel, “The main finding here is that we’ve discovered that nicotine.can be converted to some potent and carcinogenic substances after it’s dissolved on indoor surfaces. ” Methods To evaluate the presence of TSNAs, the researchers conducted both laboratory and field testing. In the laboratory, cellulose was used as a model surface. “Cellulose substrates were exposed to vaporized nicotine in a tubular-flow reactor,” the authors write. In the field, the researchers examined the cabins of trucks belonging to 2 smokers. In both contexts, the researchers were able to detect nicotine residue and TSNAs on surfaces exposed to tobacco smoke.
Business Performance Evaluation on Large-Area TFT-LCD Panel Companies in Taiwan

Business performance evaluation is a key topic toward developing international strategic alliances, international investment and as a reference for countries to derive their individual industry policy to enhance international competency. In Taiwan, the Thin-FilmTransistor Liquid-Crystal Display (TFT-LCD) industry has become the world's second-largest maker from 2002 till the present. Five TFT-LCD panel companies were evaluate and compared their business performance, including AU Optronics (AUO), Chi Mei Optoelectronics (CMO), Chunghwa Picture Tubes (CPT), HannStar Display (HSD) and Quanta Display Inc. (QDI). The results indicate that the main concern for TFT-LCD business performance is ‘competition dimension’, the second is ‘financial performance’; the third is ‘innovation capacity’, followed by ‘supply chain relationships’ and the last is ‘manufacturing capacity’. The synthetic evaluation results show AUO is the best company in terms of business performance, followed by CMO, CPT, HSD and QDI.
Business Plan for an African Restaurant in Lappeenranta

Mediatrice Nyiramugisha Business Plan for Restaurant in Lappeenranta 41 pages, 2 appendices Saimaa University of Applied Sciences Business and Culture, Imatra Faculty of Tourism and Hospitality Degree Programme in Hotel, Restaurant and Tourism Management Bachelor’s Thesis 2017 Instructor: Jukka Sirkiä, Lecturer; Saimaa University of Applied Sciences The title of the thesis is “Business Plan for an African Restaurant in Lappeenranta”. It was focusing on an ethnic restaurant offering meals from Asian and African cuisine. The purpose of this thesis is to prepare a business plan for a restaurant and to find out how an entrepreneur can achieve success in restaurant business. While writing the thesis, I made a research about how much people from Lappeenranta are interested in trying other culture’s cuisine, estimate the amount of potential customers I could have when I start, and get to know what kind of image people in Lappeenranta have about Asian and African cuisine. Thesis includes introduction, theoretical chapter, research methodology consisting of survey based on distribution of questionnaires and focus group discussion about customers’ satisfaction with other restaurants in Lappeenranta; interviews with owners of ethnic restaurants in other cities in Finland such as Helsinki, Jyväskylä, Kouvola and Kotka.
Chapter 19 DOPPLER SONAR OBSERVATIONS OF LANGMUIR CIRCULATION

It has become increasingly clear that air-sea coupling is important to the earth's weather and climate [e.g., Grotzner et al. 1998, Xu et al. 1998]. The oceanic surface mixed layer is the link by which the air and sea are coupled. Further, the form and strength of the mixing motion are important to important concerns such as the fluxes of gases and nutrients and the growth and health of marine life. Improved understanding of all these processes depends in some measure on our understanding mechanisms and dynamics of the mixed layer. One-dimensional “slab-models” of the mixed layer have performed remarkably well [e.g., Pollard et al. 1973, Price et al. 1986, O'Brien et al. 1991, Large et al. 1994, Li et al. 1995]. Under active mixing, the oceanic density profile erodes from the surface downward, producing a uniform layer over the remaining deeper profile. This mixed layer is approximately uniform in both velocity and density, with “jumps” occurring in both at the relatively sharp thermocline at the layer’s base (like a “slab”). Horizontal gradients are assumed a priori to be of secondary importance. The erosion rate is then set to maintain a threshold value of the bulk Richardson number, depending only on the depth of the layer and the jumps in velocity and density at the base [Pollard, et al. 1973]. Some additional improvement is attained by permitting the erosion to penetrate smoothly into the thermocline over a depth proportional to the total mixed layer depth [Large, et al. 1994]. Additional deepening occurs when water at the surface is made denser by surface buoyancy fluxes; conversely, restratification occurs when heating
Energy requirement for pullulanase secretion by the main terminal branch of the general secretory pathway

The energy requirement for the second step in pullulanase secretion by the general secretory pathway was studied in Escherichia coli. In order to uncouple the two steps in the secretion pathway (across the cytoplasmic and outer membranes, respectively) and to facilitate kinetic analysis of secretion, a variant form of pullulanase lacking its N‐terminal fatty acid membrane anchor was used. The transport of the periplasmic secretion intermediate form of this protein across the outer membrane was not inhibited by concentrations of sodium arsenate in excess of those required to reduce ATP levels to ≤10% of their normal value. Pullulanase secretion was inhibited by the protonophore carbonyl cyanide m‐chlorophenyl hydrazone at concentrations which were similar to those reported by others to be required to prevent solute uptake or the export and processing of preproteins across the cytoplasmic membrane, but which were in excess of those required to fully dissipate the proton‐motive force and to reduce lactose uptake to a significant extent.
Localization of electrical activity in the cat retina by an electrode marking method

One of the greatest advantages of an intraretinal electrode is the possibility of identifying a given type of electrical activity with a given retinal layer or type of cell; this advantage cannot be realized, however, unless the electrode can be localized accurately within the retina. Thus localization of the electrode tip has been a persistent problem since electrodes became available which were small enough for intraretinal work. The earliest method of electrode location was measurement of electrode advancement beyond the vitreal or choroidal surface of the retina. Although refinements have improved this technique (Tomita & Torihama, 1956; Brown & Wiesel, 1959), the method at best seems unreliable because of inability to control the angle of the electrode path after it has entered the retina. Thus a number of authors have introduced staining material into the retina fromthe electrode tip and recovered the stain spots in histological sections (MacNichol & Svaetichin, 1958; Mitarai, 1958, 1960; Oikawa, Ogawa & Motokawa, 1959; Tomita, Murakami, Sato & Hashimoto, 1959; Gouras, 1960). Although electrode staining methods can be very accurate, they have two fundamental disadvantages. First, the electrode position is not known until after the experiment is completed and the animal has been killed. For many purposes it is important to know the electrode position at the time of the electrical recording. Secondly, these methods are inconvenient because they require considerable time, equipment and specialized skill to obtain definitive results. Physiological methods of electrode localization, developed by Brown & Wiesel (1959) in the retina of the intact cat eye, overcome both these disadvantages of electrode staining methods. Although the term 'physiological methods' is not precise, it is used to designate a general technique which uses many kinds of information, much of which is physiological in nature. These physiological methods appear to be very accurate and have been used to localize many types of electrical activity within the retina
Processing of the Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy-Specific Prion Protein by Dendritic Cells

ABSTRACT Dendritic cells (DC) are suspected to be involved in transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, including bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). We detected the disease-specific, protease-resistant prion protein (PrPbse) in splenic DC purified by magnetic cell sorting 45 days after intraperitoneal inoculation of BSE prions in immunocompetent mice. We showed that bone marrow-derived DC (BMDC) from wild-type or PrP-null mice acquired both PrPbse and prion infectivity within 2 h of in vitro culture with a BSE inoculum. BMDC cleared PrPbse within 2 to 3 days of culture, while BMDC infectivity was only 10-fold diminished between days 1 and 6 of culture, suggesting that the infectious unit in BMDC is not removed at the same rate as PrPbse is removed from these cells. Bone marrow-derived plasmacytoid DC and bone marrow-derived macrophages (BMM) also acquired and degraded PrPbse when incubated with a BSE inoculum, with kinetics very similar to those of BMDC. PrPbse capture is probably specific to antigen-presenting cells since no uptake of PrPbse was observed when splenic B or T lymphocytes were incubated with a BSE inoculum in vitro. Lipopolysaccharide activation of BMDC or BMM prior to BSE infection resulted in an accelerated breakdown of PrPbse. Injected by the intraperitoneal route, BMDC were not infectious for alymphoid recombination-activated gene 20/common cytokine γ chain-deficient mice, suggesting that these cells are not capable of directly propagating BSE infectivity to nerve endings.
Linkage of the Horizontally Acquired ypm and pil Genes in Yersinia pseudotuberculosis

ABSTRACT The superantigen-encoding ypm gene and the pil gene cluster governing type IV pilus biogenesis have been laterally acquired by Yersinia pseudotuberculosis. PCR assays on 270 unrelated strains from various environmental and animal sources revealed a significant association of ypm and pil in isolates.