Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Outcome of donor biliary complications following living donor liver transplantation

Background/Aims Biliary complications are the most common donor complication following living donor liver transplantation (LDLT). The aim of this study is to investigate the long-term outcomes of biliary complications in right lobe adult-to-adult LDLT donors, and to evaluate the efficacy of endoscopic treatment of these donors. Methods The medical charts of right lobe donors who developed biliary complications between June 2000 and January 2008 were retrospectively reviewed. Results Of 337 right lobe donors, 49 developed biliary complications, including 36 diagnosed with biliary leakage and 13 with biliary stricture. Multivariate analysis showed that biliary leakage was associated with the number of right lobe bile duct orifices. Sixteen donors, five with leakage and 11 with strictures, underwent endoscopic retrograde cholangiography (ERC). ERC was clinically successful in treating eight of the 11 strictures, one by balloon dilatation and seven by endobiliary stenting. Of the remained three, two were treated by rescue percutaneous biliary drainage and one by conservative care. Of the five patients with leakage, four were successfully treated using endobiliary stents and one with conservative care. In overall, total 35 improved with conservative treatment. All inserted stents were successfully retrieved after a median 264 days (range, 142 to 502) and there were no recurrences of stricture or leakages during a median follow-up of 10.6 years (range, 8 to 15.2). Conclusions All donors with biliary complications were successfully treated non-surgically, with most improving after endoscopic placement of endobiliary stents and none showing recurrence on long term follow-up.
Transcriptome of interstitial cells of Cajal reveals unique and selective gene signatures

Transcriptome-scale data can reveal essential clues into understanding the underlying molecular mechanisms behind specific cellular functions and biological processes. Transcriptomics is a continually growing field of research utilized in biomarker discovery. The transcriptomic profile of interstitial cells of Cajal (ICC), which serve as slow-wave electrical pacemakers for gastrointestinal (GI) smooth muscle, has yet to be uncovered. Using copGFP-labeled ICC mice and flow cytometry, we isolated ICC populations from the murine small intestine and colon and obtained their transcriptomes. In analyzing the transcriptome, we identified a unique set of ICC-restricted markers including transcription factors, epigenetic enzymes/regulators, growth factors, receptors, protein kinases/phosphatases, and ion channels/transporters. This analysis provides new and unique insights into the cellular and biological functions of ICC in GI physiology. Additionally, we constructed an interactive ICC genome browser (http://med.unr.edu/physio/transcriptome) based on the UCSC genome database. To our knowledge, this is the first online resource that provides a comprehensive library of all known genetic transcripts expressed in primary ICC. Our genome browser offers a new perspective into the alternative expression of genes in ICC and provides a valuable reference for future functional studies.
Genetic and Environmental Influences on Chinese Language and Reading Abilities

This study investigated the etiology of individual differences in Chinese language and reading skills in 312 typically developing Chinese twin pairs aged from 3 to 11 years (228 pairs of monozygotic twins and 84 pairs of dizygotic twins; 166 male pairs and 146 female pairs). Children were individually given tasks of Chinese word reading, receptive vocabulary, phonological memory, tone awareness, syllable and rhyme awareness, rapid automatized naming, morphological awareness and orthographic skills, and Raven's Coloured Progressive Matrices. All analyses controlled for the effects of age. There were moderate to substantial genetic influences on word reading, tone awareness, phonological memory, morphological awareness and rapid automatized naming (estimates ranged from .42 to .73), while shared environment exerted moderate to strong effects on receptive vocabulary, syllable and rhyme awareness and orthographic skills (estimates ranged from .35 to .63). Results were largely unchanged when scores were adjusted for nonverbal reasoning as well as age. Findings of this study are mostly similar to those found for English, a language with very different characteristics, and suggest the universality of genetic and environmental influences across languages.
BCR/ABL mRNA targeting small interfering RNA effects on proliferation and apoptosis in chronic myeloid leukemia.

BACKGROUND To investigate the effects of small interference RNA (siRNA) targeting BCR/ABL mRNA on proliferation and apoptosis in the K562 human chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) cell line and to provide a theoretical rationale and experimental evidence for its potential clinical application for anti-CML treatment. MATERIALS AND METHODS The gene sequence for BCR/ABL mRNA was found from the GeneBank. The target gene site on the BCR/ABL mRNA were selected according to Max-Planck-Institute (MPI) and rational siRNA design rules, the secondary structure of the candidate targeted mRNA was predicted, the relevant thermodynamic parameters were analyzed, and the targeted gene sequences were compared with BLAST to eliminate any sequences with significant homology. Inhibition of proliferation was evaluated by MTT assay and colony-formation inhibiting test. Apoptosis was determined by flow cytometry (FCM) and the morphology of apoptotic cells was identified by Giemsa-Wright staining. Western blotting was used to analyze the expression of BCR/ABL fusion protein in K562 cells after siRNA treatment. RESULTS The mRNA local secondary structure calculated by RNA structure software, and the optimal design of specific siRNA were contributed by bioinformatics rules. Five sequences of BCR/ABL siRNAs were designed and synthesized in vitro. Three sequences, siRNA1384, siRNA1276 and siRNA1786, which showed the most effective inhibition of K562 cell growth, were identified among the five candidate siRNAs, with a cell proliferative inhibitory rate nearly 50% after exposure to 12.5 nmol/L~50 nmol/L siRNA1384 for 24,48 and 72 hours. The 50% inhibitory concentrations (IC50) of siRNA1384, siRNA1276 and siRNA1786 for 24 hours were 46.6 nmol/L, 59.3 nmol/L and 62.6 nmol/L, respectively, and 65.668 nmol/L, 76.6 nmol/L, 74.4 nmol/L for 72 hours. The colony-formation inhibiting test also indicated that, compared with control, cell growth of siRNA treated group was inhibited. FCM results showed that the rate of cell apoptosis increased 24 hours after transfecting siRNA. The results of annexinV/PI staining indicated that the rate of apoptosis imcreased (1.53%, 15.3%, 64.5%, 57.5% and 21.5%) following treamtne with siRNAs (siRNA34, siRNA372, siRNA1384, siRNA1276 and siRNA1786). Morphological analysis showed td typical morphologic changes of apoptosis such as shrunken, fragmentation nucleus as well as "apoptotic bodies" after K562 cell exposure to siRNA. Western blot analysis showed that BCR/ABL protein was reduced sharply after a single dose of 50 nmol/L siRNA transfection. CONCLUSIONS Proliferation of K562 cells was remarkbly inhibited by siRNAs (siRNA1384, siRNA1276 and siRNA1786) in a concentration-dependent manner in vitro, with effective induction of apoptosis at a concentration of 50 nmol/L. One anti-leukemia mechanism in K562 cells appeared that BCR/ABL targeted protein was highly down-regulated. The siRNAs (siRNA1384, siRNA1276 and siRNA1786) may prove valuable in the treatment of CML.
HSPG-Deficient Zebrafish Uncovers Dental Aspect of Multiple Osteochondromas

Multiple Osteochondromas (MO; previously known as multiple hereditary exostosis) is an autosomal dominant genetic condition that is characterized by the formation of cartilaginous bone tumours (osteochondromas) at multiple sites in the skeleton, secondary bursa formation and impingement of nerves, tendons and vessels, bone curving, and short stature. MO is also known to be associated with arthritis, general pain, scarring and occasional malignant transformation of osteochondroma into secondary peripheral chondrosarcoma. MO patients present additional complains but the relevance of those in relation to the syndromal background needs validation. Mutations in two enzymes that are required during heparan sulphate synthesis (EXT1 or EXT2) are known to cause MO. Previously, we have used zebrafish which harbour mutations in ext2 as a model for MO and shown that ext2−/− fish have skeletal defects that resemble those seen in osteochondromas. Here we analyse dental defects present in ext2−/− fish. Histological analysis reveals that ext2−/− fish have very severe defects associated with the formation and the morphology of teeth. At 5 days post fertilization 100% of ext2−/− fish have a single tooth at the end of the 5th pharyngeal arch, whereas wild-type fish develop three teeth, located in the middle of the pharyngeal arch. ext2−/− teeth have abnormal morphology (they were shorter and thicker than in the WT) and patchy ossification at the tooth base. Deformities such as split crowns and enamel lesions were found in 20% of ext2+/− adults. The tooth morphology in ext2−/− was partially rescued by FGF8 administered locally (bead implants). Our findings from zebrafish model were validated in a dental survey that was conducted with assistance of the MHE Research Foundation. The presence of the malformed and/or displaced teeth with abnormal enamel was declared by half of the respondents indicating that MO might indeed be also associated with dental problems.
Entity-Based Language Model Smoothing Approach for Smart Search

Smart search plays an important role in all walks of life, for example, according to business needs, accurate search of required knowledge from massive resources is an important way to enhance industrial intelligence. Smoothing of the language model is essential for obtaining high-quality search results because it helps to reduce mismatching and overfitting problems caused by data sparseness. Traditional smoothing methods lexically focus on the global corpus and locally cluster documents information without semantic analysis, which leads to deficiency of the semantic correlations between query statements and documents. In this paper, we propose an entity-based language model smoothing approach for smart search that uses semantic correlation and takes entities as bridges to build the entity semantic language model using a knowledge base. In this approach, entities in the documents are linked to an external knowledge base, such as Wikipedia. Then, the entity semantic language model is generated by using soft-fused and hard-fused methods. A two-level merging strategy is also presented to smooth the language model according to whether a given word is semantically relevant to the document or not, which integrates the Dir-smoothing and JM-smoothing methods. Experimental results show that the smoothed language model more closely approximates the word probability distribution under the document semantic theme and more accurately estimates the relevance between query and document.
Applying an Attentional Set to Perceived and Remembered Features

Previous research has examined our ability to attend selectively to particular features of perceptual objects, as well as our ability to switch from attending to one type of feature to another. This is usually done in the context of anticipatory attentional-set control, comparing the neural mechanisms involved as participants prepare to attend to the same stimulus feature as on the previous trial (“task-stay” trials) with those required as participants prepare to attend to a different stimulus feature to that previously attended (“task-switch” trials). We wanted to establish how participants maintain or switch attentional set retrospectively, as they attend to features of objects held in visual short-term memory (VSTM). We found that switching, relative to maintaining attentional set retrospectively, was associated with a performance cost, which can be reduced over time. This control process was mirrored by a large parietal and frontal amplitude difference in the event-related brain potentials (ERPs) and significant differences in global field power (GFP) between switch and stay trials. However, when taking into account the switch/stay GFP differences, thereby controlling for this difference in amplitude, we could not distinguish these trial types topographically. By contrast, we found clear topographic differences between preparing an anticipatory feature-based attentional set versus applying it retrospectively within VSTM. These complementary topographical and amplitude analyses suggested that anticipatory and retrospective set control recruited a qualitatively different configuration of underlying neural generators. In contrast, switch/stay differences were largely quantitative, with them differing primarily in terms of amplitude rather than topography.
New Stereo Video Quality Assessment Metric for Three Dimensional Video Systems

Since traditional two dimensional video quality metrics are not suitable for evaluating stereo video, a new stereo video quality metric based on support vector regression (SVR) for three dimensional video systems is proposed in this paper. Firstly, three factors affecting the quality of stereo video are analyzed, namely left-view video quality, right-view video quality and difference between two views. Then, each of these factors is calculated respectively with measuring the singular vectors’ similarity between original image blocks and distorted image blocks and with temporal weighting using fluctuations of video frames’ spatial quality. Then, SVR is used to learn the relationships between the factors and the overall perceived quality of stereo video. Finally, the relationship is applied to predict the objective quality of stereo video. By applying the proposed metric to stereo video database, Person’s linear correlation coefficient is higher than 0.82 for all types of distortions and 0.81 for individual distortion, which outperforms the other existing metrics. Experimental results also show that, the proposed metric can achieve stable performance for all kinds of distortions and predict human perception well.
UMLtoNoSQL: Automatic Transformation of Conceptual Schema to NoSQL Databases

Volume, Variety and Velocity are the three dimensions that have definitely changed the tools we need to store and process Big Data effectively, giving rise to NoSQL systems for faster data access, better scalability and higher flexibility. While NoSQL systems have proven their efficiency to handle Big Data, it is still an unsolved problem how the automatic storage of Big Data in NoSQL systems could be done. One solution for addressing this problem is to model Big Data, and then define mapping rules towards the physical level. This paper proposes an automatic MDAbased approach that translates conceptual models expressed using the Unified Modeling Language (UML) into NoSQL physical models. Our approach rely on an intermediate logical model compatible with column, document and graph oriented systems which allows to choose the system type that suits the best with business rules and technical constraints.
Safety and Immunogenicity Study of Multiclade HIV-1 Adenoviral Vector Vaccine Alone or as Boost following a Multiclade HIV-1 DNA Vaccine in Africa

Background We conducted a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled Phase I study of a recombinant replication-defective adenovirus type 5 (rAd5) vector expressing HIV-1 Gag and Pol from subtype B and Env from subtypes A, B and C, given alone or as boost following a DNA plasmid vaccine expressing the same HIV-1 proteins plus Nef, in 114 healthy HIV-uninfected African adults. Methodology/Principal Findings Volunteers were randomized to 4 groups receiving the rAd5 vaccine intramuscularly at dosage levels of 1×1010 or 1×1011 particle units (PU) either alone or as boost following 3 injections of the DNA vaccine given at 4 mg/dose intramuscularly by needle-free injection using Biojector® 2000. Safety and immunogenicity were evaluated for 12 months. Both vaccines were well-tolerated. Overall, 62% and 86% of vaccine recipients in the rAd5 alone and DNA prime - rAd5 boost groups, respectively, responded to the HIV-1 proteins by an interferon-gamma (IFN-γ) ELISPOT. The frequency of immune responses was independent of rAd5 dosage levels. The highest frequency of responses after rAd5 alone was detected at 6 weeks; after DNA prime - rAd5 boost, at 6 months (end of study). At baseline, neutralizing antibodies against Ad5 were present in 81% of volunteers; the distribution was similar across the 4 groups. Pre-existing immunity to Ad5 did not appear to have a significant impact on reactogenicity or immune response rates to HIV antigens by IFN-γ ELISPOT. Binding antibodies against Env were detected in up to 100% recipients of DNA prime - rAd5 boost. One volunteer acquired HIV infection after the study ended, two years after receipt of rAd5 alone. Conclusions/Significance The HIV-1 rAd5 vaccine, either alone or as a boost following HIV-1 DNA vaccine, was well-tolerated and immunogenic in African adults. DNA priming increased the frequency and magnitude of cellular and humoral immune responses, but there was no effect of rAd5 dosage on immunogenicity endpoints. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT00124007
Penfluridol suppresses glioblastoma tumor growth by Akt-mediated inhibition of GLI1

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common brain tumor with poor survival rate. Our results show that penfluridol, an antipsychotic drug significantly reduced the survival of ten adult and pediatric glioblastoma cell lines with IC50 ranging 2–5 μM after 72 hours of treatment and induced apoptosis. Penfluridol treatment suppressed the phosphorylation of Akt at Ser473 and reduced the expression of GLI1, OCT4, Nanog and Sox2 in several glioblastoma cell lines in a concentration-dependent manner. Inhibiting Akt with LY294002 and siRNA, or inhibiting GLI1 using GANT61, cyclopamine, siRNA and CRISPR/Cas9 resulted in enhanced cell growth suppressive effects of penfluridol. On the other hand, overexpression of GLI1 significantly attenuated the effects of penfluridol. Our results further demonstrated that penfluridol treatment inhibited the growth of U87MG tumors by 65% and 72% in subcutaneous and intracranial in vivo glioblastoma tumor models respectively. Immunohistochemical and western blot analysis of tumors revealed reduced pAkt (Ser 473), GLI1, OCT4 and increase in caspase-3 cleavage and TUNEL staining, confirming in vitro findings. Taken together, our results indicate that overall glioblastoma tumor growth suppression by penfluridol was associated with Akt-mediated inhibition of GLI1.
Vitamin E Microspheres Embedded Within a Biocompatible Film for Planar Delivery

We demonstrate a new one‐batch approach to the fabrication of a biocompatible Ca‐alginate film with embedded vitamin E‐loaded microspheres that could be used for planar dermal drug delivery. Stable vitamin E microspheres, coated with gum acacia, are produced by ultrasonic treatment of a two‐phase liquid system. The Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy indicates an interaction between biopolymer functional groups induced by ultrasonication. Confocal laser fluorescence microscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) demonstrate a homogeneous microsphere distribution within the Ca‐alginate polymer film. The kinetics of in vitro vitamin E release found for the polymer film with entrapped microspheres was much more sustained (100% in 96 h) compared to the polymer film with vitamin E embedded in the free state (100% in 5 h). The novelty of the proposed research involves the ultrasonic fabrication of loaded microspheres and formation of biodegradable coating directly doped with microspheres.
Hearing the Sound in the Brain: Influences of Different EEG References

If the scalp potential signals, the electroencephalogram (EEG), are due to neural “singers” in the brain, how could we listen to them with less distortion? One crucial point is that the data recording on the scalp should be faithful and accurate, thus the choice of reference electrode is a vital factor determining the faithfulness of the data. In this study, music on the scalp derived from data in the brain using three different reference electrodes were compared, including approximate zero reference—reference electrode standardization technique (REST), average reference (AR), and linked mastoids reference (LM). The classic music pieces in waveform format were used as simulated sources inside a head model, and they were forward calculated to scalp as standard potential recordings, i.e., waveform format music from the brain with true zero reference. Then these scalp music was re-referenced into REST, AR, and LM based data, and compared with the original forward data (true zero reference). For real data, the EEG recorded in an orthodontic pain control experiment were utilized for music generation with the three references, and the scale free index (SFI) of these music pieces were compared. The results showed that in the simulation for only one source, different references do not change the music/waveform; for two sources or more, REST provide the most faithful music/waveform to the original ones inside the brain, and the distortions caused by AR and LM were spatial locations of both source and scalp electrode dependent. The brainwave music from the real EEG data showed that REST and AR make the differences of SFI between two states more recognized and found the frontal is the main region that producing the music. In conclusion, REST can reconstruct the true signals approximately, and it can be used to help to listen to the true voice of the neural singers in the brain.
Taking Transactions Mainstream : Social Failure Modes and Recovery ”

The last half of the 1990's saw a concerted effort to take transactions out of the database and shove them into mass-market programming environments. Both Microsoft and Sun heralded their respective offerings (MTS and EJB) as "the answer. " However, by the end of the decade, it was no longer clear that the right question was being asked nor that the average developer liked the answer they were getting all that much. This talk looks at the successes and failures of this "transactions + objects" wave and tries to identify a few key areas we need to get right in the "transactions + memory" wave that is looming on the horizon. Bio: Don Box is one of the original four developers of SOAP, a basic messaging layer for web services. Don Box is currently a programmer with a blossoming advertising business in the Pacific Northwest that also sells operating systems and applications. Don's first assignment with the firm was to work on Microsoft's implementation of SOAP, Windows Communication Foundation (a.k.a. Indigo). Don's current assignment is focused on making it more efficient for people to make their computers do what they want. Don is also a series editor with Addison Wesley where he's written four books in the area of software integration.