Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Amendment history : Corrigendum ( April 2009 ) Adenosine signaling contributes to ethanol-induced fatty liver in mice

Fatty liver is commonly associated with alcohol ingestion and abuse. While the molecular pathogenesis of these fatty changes is well understood, the biochemical and pharmacological mechanisms by which ethanol stimulates these molecular changes remain unknown. During ethanol metabolism, adenosine is generated by the enzyme ecto-5¢nucleotidase, and adenosine production and adenosine receptor activation are known to play critical roles in the development of hepatic fibrosis. We therefore investigated whether adenosine and its receptors play a role in the development of alcohol-induced fatty liver. WT mice fed ethanol on the Lieber-DeCarli diet developed hepatic steatosis, including increased hepatic triglyceride content, while mice lacking ecto-5¢-nucleotidase or adenosine A1 or A2B receptors were protected from developing fatty liver. Similar protection was also seen in WT mice treated with either an adenosine A1 or A2B receptor antagonist. Steatotic livers demonstrated increased expression of genes involved in fatty acid synthesis, which was prevented by blockade of adenosine A1 receptors, and decreased expression of genes involved in fatty acid metabolism, which was prevented by blockade of adenosine A2B receptors. In vitro studies supported roles for adenosine A1 receptors in promoting fatty acid synthesis and for A2B receptors [. ] Research Article Gastroenterology
Processing Carbon Nanotubes

Due to their combined superior chemical and physical properties, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are recognized to have a huge potential in many fields of applications (Ajayan, 1999; Rao et al., 2001; Dai, 2002; Van Noorden, 2011). These molecular-scale tubes of graphitic carbon are one of the stiffest and strongest fibers known. Besides, they have remarkable electronic, optical, thermal and chemical properties. For these reasons their interest in both academic and industrial areas is unique. Nevertheless, the as-produced material is extremely difficult to process. Development of CNT-based devices or composites of interest for new applications has been consequently hindered. CNTs are hydrophobic and incompatible with a majority of solvents, including monomers and polymers; they indeed have a high tendency to agglomerate. Moreover, CNTs and especially single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) are assembled in bundles of generally several tens of tubes. Development of efficient processes and chemical treatments that are able to control the quality of the CNT samples and to induce both their dispersion and partial or complete debundling remains highly challenging. CNTs can be produced using different methods that basically consist in heating carboncontaining solid or gas. On the contrary to the preparation of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs), SWNT growing requires a metal catalyst. The characteristics of the samples depend on the control and the choice of the experimental parameters used for the synthesis. A better understanding of the growth mechanisms has permitted the development of mass production processes (Grobert, 2007). Nevertheless, their uniformity (length, diameter, chirality), the quality of their walls (number of defects) and also their purity are still partially controlled. The quality of the samples has to be improved in order to benefit of the exceptional properties of CNTs in new materials. Depending on the type and the synthesis method, the CNTs can differently behave through the applied chemical treatments. Whatever the synthesis method, CNT samples persistently contain several kinds of heterogeneities: (i) carbonaceous species like fullerenes, amorphous carbon, graphitic and carbon particles, . ; (ii) impurities such as residual metallic catalyst often protected by more or less graphitized carbon shells or polyhedra; (iii) defects at the CNT surface or oxygenated grafted functions, (iv) dispersion in diameter, chirality and morphology (aspect ratio) and (v) aggregation into bundles. These heterogeneities represent a major obstacle for both the establishment of universal behaviors and the development of efficient processing methods. Nano-scaled particles exhibit an enormous surface area being of several orders of magnitude larger than that of conventional fibers. This surface area can potentially act as a
A Study to the Blood Flow Model in the Micro-Channels Based on the Video and Image Processing Technology

Micro-fluidic-System plays a great role in the blood processing. The blood flow properties are very difficult to describe with mathematic models because there are a mount of cells in it. The models of blood flow which pass through the micro-channels with varied size and shape must be studied to design the appropriate micro-structure and optimize operation. The laminar flow model and two-phase flow model are compared in this paper. The micro-channels-chip in the experiment system was made of silicon and glass using MEMS technology. The states of blood flow in the microchannels are observed and recorded with a high speed CCD camera. We adopt the digital video and image processing technology to analyze those image data obtained from the experiment. In contrast to the theoretical model, the experiment results showed that the two-phase flow model of the blood in the micro-channels is much more exact than the laminar flow. This result will be helpful to the structural design of the micro-fluidic system aiming to blood process.
CamTrackPoint: pointing stick for mobile device using rear camera

We present CamTrackPoint, a new input interface that can be controlled by index finger gestures captured by the rear camera of a mobile device. CamTrackPoint mounts a 3D-printed ring on the rear camera's bezel, and it senses the movement of the user's finger by tracking the light passed through the finger. The proposed method provides mobile devices with a new low cost input interface that offers physical force feedback like a pointing stick. The cost of our method is low as it needs only a simple ring-shaped part on the camera bezel. Moreover, if finger gestures are not being made, the camera has an unobscured view. We prototype the proposed method and evaluate its precision. This paper discusses the unique characteristics and possible applications of the proposed method.
Gαi protein-dependant extracellular signal-regulated kinase-1/2 activation is required for HIV-1 reverse transcription

Background:HIV-1 triggers infection through interaction with the CD4 receptor and the chemokine receptors, CCR5 or CXCR4, on host cells. The involvement of signaling via the chemokine receptors in viral infection remains an issue of debate. We have previously reported that Gαi1 is involved in the signaling triggered by R5 HIV-1 strains through CCR5 binding to facilitate viral replication in unstimulated peripheral blood mononuclear cells. In this study, we pursued the identification of the downstream signaling molecules in CCR5-mediated infection. We also questioned whether CXCR4 using HIV-1 strains induce the same signaling mechanism. Methods:We analyzed by western blotting the coreceptor-mediated activation of various mitogen-acitvated protein kinases, including extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK)1/2, p38 and c-jun N-terminal kinase in non-stimulated human peripheral blood mononuclear cells. The involvement of Gαi protein in ERK1/2 activation was tested using pertussis toxin. Using real-time PCR, we studied the role of ERK1/2 in the life cycle of HIV-1. Results:We found that pertussis toxin inhibited the replication of X4 as well as R5 strains. Furthermore, both strains activated a pertussis toxin-sensitive mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway involving mitogen-activated protein kinase kinases-1/2 and ERK1/2. The inhibition of ERK1/2 activation by U0126 and PD98059 blocked both R5 and X4 HIV-1 replication. Furthermore, ERK1/2 activity was required for the completion of HIV-1 reverse transcription. Conclusion:Our results show that R5 and X4 HIV-1 strains induce the same Gαi-dependent ERK pathway that facilitates reverse transcription. The identification of the signaling pathway required for optimal viral replication sheds a new light on HIV physiopathology and opens new therapeutic possibilities.
An overview of triangulation algorithms for simple polygons

Decomposing a simple polygon into simpler components is one of the basic tasks in computational geometry and its applications. The most important simple polygon decomposition is triangulation. Different techniques for triangulating a simple polygon were designed. The first part of the paper is an overview of triangulation algorithms based on diagonal insertion. In the second part, we present algorithms based on Delaunay triangulation. The basic ideas and approach for each algorithm are presented. Finally, some representative algorithms are compared by efficiency.
Helicobacter pylori CagA inhibits endocytosis of cytotoxin VacA in host cells

SUMMARY Helicobacter pylori, a common pathogen that causes chronic gastritis and cancer, has evolved to establish persistent infections in the human stomach. Epidemiological evidence suggests that H. pylori with both highly active vacuolating cytotoxin A (VacA) and cytotoxin-associated gene A (CagA), the major virulence factors, has an advantage in adapting to the host environment. However, the mechanistic relationship between VacA and CagA remains obscure. Here, we report that CagA interferes with eukaryotic endocytosis, as revealed by genome-wide screening in yeast. Moreover, CagA suppresses pinocytic endocytosis and the cytotoxicity of VacA in gastric epithelial cells without affecting clathrin-dependent endocytosis. Our data suggest that H. pylori secretes VacA to attack distant host cells while injecting CagA into the gastric epithelial cells to which the bacteria are directly attached, thereby protecting these attached host cells from the cytotoxicity of VacA and creating a local ecological niche. This mechanism might allow H. pylori to balance damage to one population of host cells with the preservation of another, allowing for persistent infection.
Functional characterization of GABAA receptor-mediated modulation of cortical neuron network activity in microelectrode array recordings

The numerous γ-aminobutyric acid type A receptor (GABAAR) subtypes are differentially expressed and mediate distinct functions at neuronal level. In this study we have investigated GABAAR-mediated modulation of the spontaneous activity patterns of primary neuronal networks from murine frontal cortex by characterizing the effects induced by a wide selection of pharmacological tools at a plethora of activity parameters in microelectrode array (MEA) recordings. The basic characteristics of the primary cortical neurons used in the recordings were studied in some detail, and the expression levels of various GABAAR subunits were investigated by western blotting and RT-qPCR. In the MEA recordings, the pan-GABAAR agonist muscimol and the GABABR agonist baclofen were observed to mediate phenotypically distinct changes in cortical network activity. Selective augmentation of αβγ GABAAR signaling by diazepam and of δ-containing GABAAR (δ-GABAAR) signaling by DS1 produced pronounced changes in the majority of the activity parameters, both drugs mediating similar patterns of activity changes as muscimol. The apparent importance of δ-GABAAR signaling for network activity was largely corroborated by the effects induced by the functionally selective δ-GABAAR agonists THIP and Thio-THIP, whereas the δ-GABAAR selective potentiator DS2 only mediated modest effects on network activity, even when co-applied with low THIP concentrations. Interestingly, diazepam exhibited dramatically right-shifted concentration-response relationships at many of the activity parameters when co-applied with a trace concentration of DS1 compared to when applied alone. In contrast, the potencies and efficacies displayed by DS1 at the networks were not substantially altered by the concomitant presence of diazepam. In conclusion, the holistic nature of the information extractable from the MEA recordings offers interesting insights into the contributions of various GABAAR subtypes/subgroups to cortical network activity and the putative functional interplay between these receptors in these neurons.
Challenges in Manufacturing Aluminium Based Metal Matrix Nanocomposites via Stir Casting Route

The influence of material processing conditions for preparing aluminium based metal matrix nanocomposites through stir casting route is reviewed. The role of particle size with respect to Brownian motion, Stokes settling velocity and strengthening mechanism is assessed from theoretical understandings. Variation of microstructural features and mechanical properties of the nanocomposites are predicted from theoretical concepts and related mathematical models. Experiments conducted to validate the theoretical predictions show that both Orowan and grain refinement strengthening mechanisms remain operative which is the key to the improved strength property of the nanocomposites.
Gender, Productivity, and the Nature of Work and Pay: Evidence from the Late Nineteenth‐Century Tobacco Industry

Women have, on average, been less well-paid than men throughout history. Prior to 1900, most economic historians see the gender wage gap as a reflection of men's greater strength and correspondingly higher productivity. This paper investigates the gender wage gap in cigar making around 1900. Strength was rarely an issue, but the gender wage gap was large. Two findings suggest that employers were not sexist. First, differences in earnings by gender for workers paid piece rates can be fully explained by differences in experience and other productivity-related characteristics. Second, conditioning on those characteristics, women were just as likely to be promoted to the better paying piece rate section. Neither finding is compatible with a simple model of sex-based discrimination. Instead, the gender wage gap can be decomposed into two components. First, women were typically less experienced, in an industry in which experience mattered. Second there were some jobs that required strength, for which men were better suited. Because strength was so valuable in the other jobs at this time, men commanded a wage premium in the general labour market, raising their reservation wage. Hiring a man required the firm to pay a 'man's wage'. This implies that firms that were slow to feminise their time rate workforce ended up with a higher cost structure than those that made the transition more quickly. We show that firms with a higher proportion of women in their workforce in 1863 were indeed more likely to survive 35 years later.
Link Prediction in Very Large Directed Graphs: Exploiting Hierarchical Properties in Parallel

Link prediction is a link mining task that tries to find new edges within a given graph. Among the targets of link prediction there is large directed graphs, which are frequent structures nowadays. The typical sparsity of large graphs demands of high precision predictions in order to obtain usable results. However, the size of those graphs only permits the execution of scalable algorithms. As a trade-off between those two problems we recently proposed a link prediction algorithm for directed graphs that exploits hierarchical properties. The algorithm can be classified as a local score, which entails scalability. Unlike the rest of local scores, our proposal assumes the existence of an underlying model for the data which allows it to produce predictions with a higher precision. We test the validity of its hierarchical assumptions on two clearly hierarchical data sets, one of them based on RDF. Then we test it on a non-hierarchical data set based on Wikipedia to demonstrate its broad applicability. Given the computational complexity of link prediction in very large graphs we also introduce some general recommendations useful to make of link prediction an efficiently parallelized problem.
GPU-accelerated deep shadow maps for direct volume rendering

Deep shadow maps unify the computation of volumetric and geometric shadows. For each pixel in the shadow map, a fractional visibility function is sampled, pre-filtered, and compressed as a piecewise linear function. However, the original implementation targets software-based off-line rendering. Similar previous algorithms on GPUs focus on geometric shadows and lose many important benefits of the original concept. We focus on shadows for interactive direct volume rendering, where shadow algorithms currently either compute additional per-voxel shadow data, or employ half-angle slicing to generate shadows during rendering. We adapt the original concept of deep shadow maps to volume ray-casting on GPUs, and show that it can provide anti-aliased high-quality shadows at interactive rates. Ray-casting is used for both generation of the shadow map data structure and actual rendering. High frequencies in the visibility function are captured by a pre-computed lookup table for piecewise linear segments. Direct volume rendering is performed with an additional deep shadow map lookup for each sample. Overall, we achieve interactive high-quality volume ray-casting with accurate shadows. To conclude, we briefly describe how semi-transparent geometry such as hair could be integrated as well, provided that rasterization can write to arbitrary locations in a texture. This would be a major step toward full deep shadow map functionality.
14-3-3 Proteins in Brain Development: Neurogenesis, Neuronal Migration and Neuromorphogenesis

The 14-3-3 proteins are a family of highly conserved, multifunctional proteins that are highly expressed in the brain during development. Cumulatively, the seven 14-3-3 isoforms make up approximately 1% of total soluble brain protein. Over the last decade, evidence has accumulated implicating the importance of the 14-3-3 protein family in the development of the nervous system, in particular cortical development, and have more recently been recognized as key regulators in a number of neurodevelopmental processes. In this review we will discuss the known roles of each 14-3-3 isoform in the development of the cortex, their relation to human neurodevelopmental disorders, as well as the challenges and questions that are left to be answered. In particular, we focus on the 14-3-3 isoforms and their involvement in the three key stages of cortical development; neurogenesis and differentiation, neuronal migration and neuromorphogenesis and synaptogenesis.
Specification of the neurobehavioral phenotype in males with fragile X syndrome.

OBJECTIVE A controlled clinical study was designed to identify the neurobehavioral profile that is specific to males with fragile X syndrome. DESIGN Thirty-one males with fragile X syndrome and 30 age and IQ-matched male controls were evaluated with instruments that assess multiple domains of adaptive functioning and problem behaviors. The Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales and the Aberrant Behavior Checklist were selected for their dimensional scaling of behavioral ratings. RESULTS Parent and Teacher versions of the Aberrant Behavior Checklist demonstrated a profile of behaviors specific to males with fragile X syndrome characterized by significantly higher levels of hyperactivity, stereotypic movements, and unusual speech. The Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales revealed no fragile X-specific profile of adaptive skills development. CONCLUSIONS The distinct pattern of aberrant behavior observed among males with fragile X emphasizes the importance of drawing subtype distinctions within the classification of individuals with mental retardation on the basis of underlying etiology. For clinical research, specifying the fragile X phenotype is a vital part in the effort to elucidate the neurodevelopmental pathways of normal behavior and psychopathology. Understanding the fragile X symptom pattern is essential for designing symptom-specific treatment interventions, as well as for research into the efficacy of interventions strategies.
The effect of release-etch processing on surface microstructure stiction

A passive polysilicon microstructure is described which has been used to evaluate the stiction or unwanted adhesion occurring after release etch, rinse and dry processing. The results are interpreted in terms of particle adhesion theory. A residue dissolved in the water and redeposited during drying is responsible for one form of adhesion, by solid bridging. A reaction at silicon surfaces immersed in water is suggested as the source of this residue. Formation of a chemical oxide layer to protect the silicon surfaces alleviates adhesion due to this mechanism. Use of a hydrophobic, low surface energy coating that is applied as part of the rinse process is also described. <<ETX>>
Di usion on Social Networks

We analyze a model of di usion on social networks. Agents are connected according to an undirected graph (the network) and choose one of two actions (e.g., either to adopt a new behavior or technology or not to adopt it). The return to each of the actions depends on how many neighbors an agent has, which actions the agent's neighbors choose, and some agent-speci c cost and bene t parameters. At the outset, a small portion of the population is randomly selected to adopt the behavior. We analyze whether the behavior spreads to a larger portion of the population. We show that there is a threshold where \tipping" occurs: if a large enough initial group is selected then the behavior grows and spreads to a signi cant portion of the population, while otherwise the behavior collapses so that no one in the population chooses to adopt the behavior. We characterize the tipping threshold and the eventual portion that adopts if the threshold is surpassed. We also show how the threshold and adoption rate depend on the network structure. Applications of the techniques introduced in this paper include marketing, epidemiology, technological transfers, and information transmission, among others. JEL classi cation: C45, C70, C73, D85, L15.
Investigation of the structure and optical properties of LiNb1-xTaxO3

The structure and and optical properties of lithium niobate-tantalate have been studied with a focus on the Ta-rich end of the solid solution series. Structural studies using a range of X-ray and neutron powder diffraction measurements between -230 and 820 C have been performed on the full compositional range. Rietveld refinements of the collected diffraction data have allowed the structural changes to be investigated as a function of temperature and Ta content. To complement the structural investigations, the effect of the changes in the Li content in lithium tantalate has also been investigated. As the Li content is decreased or the temperature is increased, the Ta displacement and the octahedral tilt decrease which coincides with an increase in the birefringence. Crystals of lithium niobate-tantalate, across the full compositional range have been made using a lithium vanadate flux growth technique. Single-crystal diffraction measurements confirmed the results of the powder diffraction measurements; the Nb/Ta displacement and octahedral tilt both decrease as the Ta content is increased. This also results in a decrease in the lattice parameters from lithium niobate to lithium tantalate. Birefringence measurements on the crystals as a function of temperature have been used to determine the point that the crystals become zero-birefringent and by comparison with the structural studies, have shown that the structures remain polar through the zero-birefringence points. Finally, a series of DFT calculations on the structures determined using Rietveld refinements of the neutron powder diffraction measurements on LT have been used to investigate the effect of each atom on the optical properties. The optical properties are insensitive to the position of the Li and depend on the O and Ta positions. The position of the Ta atom has the largest effect on the optical properties and the calculated birefringence increases with increasing temperature as expected from experimental measurements.