Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
UVB-Stimulated TNFα Release from Human Melanocyte and Melanoma Cells Is Mediated by p38 MAPK

Ultraviolet (UV) radiation activates cell signaling pathways in melanocytes. As a result of altered signaling pathways and UV-induced cellular damage, melanocytes can undergo oncogenesis and develop into melanomas. In this study, we investigated the effect of UV-radiation on p38 MAPK (mitogen-activated protein kinase), JNK and NFκB pathways to determine which plays a major role in stimulating TNFα secretion in human HEM (melanocytes) and MM96L (melanoma) cells. MM96L cells exhibited 3.5-fold higher p38 activity than HEM cells at 5 min following UVA + B radiation and 1.6-fold higher JNK activity at 15–30 min following UVB+A radiation, while NFκB was minimally activated in both cells. Irradiated HEM cells had the greatest fold of TNFα secretion (UVB: 109-fold, UVA + B: 103-fold & UVB+A: 130-fold) when co-exposed to IL1α. The p38 inhibitor, SB202190, inhibited TNFα release by 93% from UVB-irradiated HEM cells. In the UVB-irradiated MM96L cells, both SB202190 and sulfasalazine (NFκB inhibitor) inhibited TNFα release by 52%. Although, anisomycin was a p38 MAPK activator, it inhibited TNFα release in UV-irradiated cells. This suggests that UV-mediated TNFα release may occur via different p38 pathway intermediates compared to those stimulated by anisomycin. As such, further studies into the functional role p38 MAPK plays in regulating TNFα release in UV-irradiated melanocyte-derived cells are warranted.
Subunit Composition of Functional Nicotinic Receptors in Dopaminergic Neurons Investigated with Knock-Out Mice

Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) expressed by dopaminergic (DA) neurons have long been considered as potential therapeutic targets for the treatment of several neuropsychiatric diseases, including nicotine and cocaine addiction or Parkinson's disease. However, DA neurons express mRNAs coding for most, if not all, neuronal nAChR subunits, and the subunit composition of functional nAChRs has been difficult to establish. Immunoprecipitation experiments performed on mouse striatal extracts allowed us to identify three main types of heteromeric nAChRs (α4β2*, α6β2*, and α4α6β2*) in DA terminal fields. The functional relevance of these subtypes was then examined by studying nicotine-induced DA release in striatal synaptosomes and recording ACh-elicited currents in DA neurons fromα4, α6, α4α6, and β2 knock-out mice. Our results establish that α6β2* nAChRs are functional and sensitive to α-conotoxin MII inhibition. These receptors are mainly located on DA terminals and consistently do not contribute to DA release induced by systemic nicotine administration, as evidenced by in vivo microdialysis. In contrast, (nonα6)α4β2* nAChRs represent the majority of functional heteromeric nAChRs on DA neuronal soma. Thus, whereas a combination of α6β2* and α4β2* nAChRs may mediate the endogenous cholinergic modulation of DA release at the terminal level, somato-dendritic (nonα6)α4β2* nAChRs most likely contribute to nicotine reinforcement.
Transmembrane helix predictions revisited

Methods that predict membrane helices have become increasingly useful in the context of analyzing entire proteomes, as well as in everyday sequence analysis. Here, we analyzed 27 advanced and simple methods in detail. To resolve contradictions in previous works and to reevaluate transmembrane helix prediction algorithms, we introduced an analysis that distinguished between performance on redundancy‐reduced high‐ and low‐resolution data sets, established thresholds for significant differences in performance, and implemented both per‐segment and per‐residue analysis of membrane helix predictions. Although some of the advanced methods performed better than others, we showed in a thorough bootstrapping experiment based on various measures of accuracy that no method performed consistently best. In contrast, most simple hydrophobicity scale‐based methods were significantly less accurate than any advanced method as they overpredicted membrane helices and confused membrane helices with hydrophobic regions outside of membranes. In contrast, the advanced methods usually distinguished correctly between membrane‐helical and other proteins. Nonetheless, few methods reliably distinguished between signal peptides and membrane helices. We could not verify a significant difference in performance between eukaryotic and prokaryotic proteins. Surprisingly, we found that proteins with more than five helices were predicted at a significantly lower accuracy than proteins with five or fewer. The important implication is that structurally unsolved multispanning membrane proteins, which are often important drug targets, will remain problematic for transmembrane helix prediction algorithms. Overall, by establishing a standardized methodology for transmembrane helix prediction evaluation, we have resolved differences among previous works and presented novel trends that may impact the analysis of entire proteomes.
Adenomatoid odontogenic tumor with dentigerous cyst: Report of a rare case with review of literature

Adenomatoid odontogenic tumor (AOT) is a benign lesion derived from the complex system of dental lamina or its remnant. It is categorized into three variants (follicular, extrafollicular, and peripheral). We present a rare case of AOT arising from a dentigerous cyst around the unerupted canine in a 28-year-old female. We believe that this case z an odontogenic cyst with neoplastic development, containing both epithelial and mesenchymal components. As more cases accumulate, we will be able to study these rare lesions further whether the AOTs derived from an odontogenic cyst could represent a distinct “hybrid” variant separate to the three variants described thus far.
Energy-Aware Cache Management for Content-Centric Networking

In-network caching for CCN (Content-Centric Networking)is expected to achieve an adaptive content delivery in the network and to reduce traffic by storing content data on each router. Reducing traffic is also important because power consumption in networks has been increasing yearly year. Therefore, in-network caching is beneficial in view of energy-efficiency. However, in order to improve energy efficiency of the network, it is necessary to cache content appropriately in consideration of both power consumption of content caching and transmission of traffic. Moreover for a distributed cache framework such as CCN, content caching should be autonomously controlled by distributed cache nodes. In this paper, we propose a distributed cache management mechanism to control energy-efficient cache locations of content. Furthermore, we demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed mechanism by simulations.
Short- and Long-Term Outcomes of Adult Audiological Rehabilitation

Objective: To examine short- and long-term subjective benefits of providing a counseling-oriented audiological rehabilitation (AR) program as an adjunct to hearing aid intervention for individuals with adult-onset hearing loss. Design: One hundred six veterans (68 men and 38 women), fit binaurally with digitally programmable analog hearing aids, participated. The Communication Profile for the Hearing Impaired (CPHI; Demorest & Erdman, 1987) was administered to all participants before hearing aid fitting. Half the patients were randomly assigned to receive hearing aids alone (i.e., control); the other patients were assigned to participate in a 4-wk group AR program in conjunction with receiving hearing aids (i.e., HA+AR). At the end of the AR program, the CPHI was again administered to all participants to assess short-term benefit and at 6 mo and 1 yr after hearing aid fitting to assess long-term benefit. Results: A separate repeated-measures version of the general linear model was used to examine short- and long-term benefits for the CPHI factor scores (communication importance, communication performance, adjustment, interaction, and reaction) and for individual importance ratings and scale scores. Hearing aid use improved both short- and long-term self-perception of communication performance, with no additional benefits from participation in the AR program. Consistent with the goals of a counseling-oriented AR program, differential short-term treatment effects were found for communication strategy usage, which led to differential short-term benefits for the interaction and reaction factors. Although failing to reach strict criteria for statistical significance, there was an observable difference in short-term outcomes between the two groups for the adjustment factor, with greater improvements occurring for the HA+AR group. Over the course of the year, benefits measured for the HA+AR group remained stable, whereas scores for the control group continued to increase, resulting in no differences in factor scores between groups at 1 yr after intervention. Conclusions: The finding of a short-term differential treatment benefit for AR in terms of interaction and reaction, and possibly for adjustment, was important, as better outcomes in these areas may be important in the decision to keep hearing aids. If this is the case, then the data support the inclusion of a counseling-oriented AR program. Differential treatment effects in interaction and reaction appeared to result from communication strategy use, indicating that the AR program is meeting many of its goals in this area. The lack of long-term differential effects appeared as the result of continued changes in adjustment, interaction, and reaction with continued hearing aid experience.
Design and Management of Complex Technical Processes and Systems by Means of Computational Intelligence Methods Approximating Minimum Multicuts by Evolutionary Multi-objective Algorithms Approximating Minimum Multicuts by Evolutionary Multi-objective Algorithms

It has been shown that simple evolutionary algorithms are able to solve the minimum cut problem in expected polynomial time when using a multi-objective model of the problem. In this paper, we generalize these ideas to the NP-hard minimum multicut problem. Given a set of k terminal pairs, we prove that evolutionary algorithms in combination with a multi-objective model of the problem are able to obtain a k-approximation for this problem in expected polynomial time.
Biochemical modulation of cell energy by 2-deoxyglucose and malonate in 7,12-dimethylbenz(a)anthracene-induced carcinogenesis in rats

The goal of this study was to explore the impact of 2-deoxglucose or malonate individually or in combination on the level of cell energy (adenosine-5′-triphosphate) and oxidative stress in 7,12-dimethylbenz(a)anthracene (DMBA)-induced mammary proliferation in rats. A total of 60 adult female Sprague Dawley rats were randomly divided into five groups (12 rats each): group I serves as the control group. Rats in groups (II–V) were administrated intragastrically a single dose of 50 mg/kg body weight (bw) of DMBA. A day after DMBA administration, rats in group III were injected intraperitoneally (ip) with 100 mg 2-deoxyglucose (2-DG)/kg bw daily. Rats in group IV were injected ip with 10 mg sodium malonate/kg bw daily. Rats in group V were injected ip with 100 mg 2-DG/kg bw and 10 mg sodium malonate/kg bw (treatment for 90 days). The results obtained showed that DMBA induced oxidative stress by decreasing the activities of glutathione reductase (GRase) and superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and elevating the levels of malondialdehyde (MDA) and nitric oxide (NO) in mammary tissues when compared with control. The combined treatment protected against the previous deleterious changes by a significant elevation in the activities of GRase and SOD, GPx and lowering the levels of MDA and NO more potentially when compared with individual treatment. Apoptosis, as indicated by a significant release of cytochrome c from mitochondria into the cytosol, observed in DMBA-injected rats was positively significantly correlated with the elevation of the level of NO. These data explained the possible additive effect of 2-DG and malonate by depleting the cell energy by their protective effects against the earlier stages of carcinogenesis.
The Contralateral Unimpaired Arm as a Control for Upper Extremity Kinematic Analysis in Children With Brachial Plexus Birth Palsy

Background: Kinematic studies of abnormal upper extremity (UE) motion provide the unique and valuable perspective of motion analysis during simulated functional tasks. However, they require comparison with healthy control data. Obtaining this control data usually entails testing a healthy population, which can be costly and time consuming, requiring separate subject inclusion criteria, recruitment, and institutional review board approval. The kinematics of the unimpaired UE in people with unilateral impairment have not been analyzed and documented. The purpose of this study was to compare UE motion during activities of daily living in the contralateral unimpaired arm of subjects with brachial plexus birth palsy (BPBP) with an age-matched control population. Methods: The contralateral arms of 40 subjects with unilateral BPBP were compared with the arms of 15 healthy subjects using an established 3-dimensional upper extremity motion analysis protocol. Results: There were no significant differences between the 2 arms on 17 of 19 motion parameters. The 2 differences that were statistically significant (P < 0.05) were not clinically meaningful. Conclusions: The contralateral arms of children with unilateral BPBP can be used as controls for future upper extremity motion analysis studies of this population, and further recruitment of age-matched controls is not necessary for comparison with 5- to 8-year-old children with BPBP. Level of Evidence: This is a retrospective study, investigating whether the contralateral unimpaired arm can be used as a control for upper extremity kinematic analysis in children with BPBP, with a level 2 evidence rating.
Improving training needs assessment processes via the Internet: system design and qualitative study

Purpose – The goal of this research is to demonstrate how web‐based applications improve the effectiveness of a very important human resource (HR) function. It proposes a framework of a web‐based training needs assessment system for HR professionals to effectively assess employee needs for competency‐based training.Design/methodology/approach – A conceptual framework of a survey‐based training needs assessment using the Internet was developed. A use case detailing a walkthrough of a prototype system developed under this proposed framework was created to illustrate how this system works. A two‐phased operation test of the prototype system was then conducted to assess how well human resource (HR) managers would accept and adopt this technology to develop organizational competencies. The first phase involved demonstrating the use case to a group of experienced HR managers and polling their opinion toward the system. The second phase involved one‐on‐one interviews with three select HR managers who were asked .
A New Key Establishment Protocol for Limited Resource Wireless Sensor Networks

Key establishment is a critical security issue for wireless sensor networks. Due to resource constraints on the sensors, public key based protocols are not suitable. In addition, conventional symmetric encryption based protocols require significant sensor memory. In this paper, we propose a new hybrid key establishment protocol based on a scheme by Blom and random key pre-distribution. In the proposed protocol, we use deployment knowledge and a new model to distribute key materials among sensors. The network area is divided into non-overlapping hexagonal cells, and key establishment between sensors in a cell is provided by the Blom scheme. Key establishment between sensors residing in neighboring cells is provided via pre-distributed random keys. The proposed protocol provides excellent performance with efficient resource consumption.
Co-Authorship and Bibliographic Coupling Network Effects on Citations

This paper analyzes the effects of the co-authorship and bibliographic coupling networks on the citations received by scientific articles. It expands prior research that limited its focus on the position of co-authors and incorporates the effects of the use of knowledge sources within articles: references. By creating a network on the basis of shared references, we propose a way to understand whether an article bridges among extant strands of literature and infer the size of its research community and its embeddedness. Thus, we map onto the article – our unit of analysis – the metrics of authors' position in the co-authorship network and of the use of knowledge on which the scientific article is grounded. Specifically, we adopt centrality measures – degree, betweenneess, and closeness centrality – in the co-authorship network and degree, betweenness centrality and clustering coefficient in the bibliographic coupling and show their influence on the citations received in first two years after the year of publication. Findings show that authors' degree positively impacts citations. Also closeness centrality has a positive effect manifested only when the giant component is relevant. Author's betweenness centrality has instead a negative effect that persists until the giant component - largest component of the network in which all nodes can be linked by a path - is relevant. Moreover, articles that draw on fragmented strands of literature tend to be cited more, whereas the size of the scientific research community and the embeddedness of the article in a cohesive cluster of literature have no effect.
ANTI-INFLAMMATORY AND ANTIBACTERIAL EVALUATION OF EXTRACTS OF LEUCAS ASPERA USING IN VITRO MODELS

Objective: To evaluate the potential antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and antibacterial activities of aqueous and methanolic extracts of leaves of Leucas aspera (Thumbae). Methods: Phytochemical screening of the leaves of L. aspera was followed by analysis of antioxidant activity by means of DPPH (2, 2-diphenyl-1picrylhydrazyl) radical scavenging activity. In vitro anti-inflammatory activity was evaluated using lipoxygenase inhibition, albumin denaturation assay, membrane stabilization assay and proteinase inhibitory activity at different concentrations. Aspirin was used as a standard drug for the study of anti-inflammatory activity. Linear regression analysis was used to calculate half maximal inhibitory concentration, IC50 value. The zone of inhibition was performed against common pathogens to determine the antimicrobial activity at different concentrations of plant extracts (60%, 70%, 80%). Results: The phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of carbohydrates, amino acid, alkaloids, tannins, flavonoids, glycosides, xanthoproteins, and phenols. The total phenolic and flavonoid content was found to be 2.25±0.04 mg GAE/g (gallic acid equivalents) and 1.2±0.05 mg QE/g (Quercetin equivalents) of fresh weight tissue respectively. The IC50 values for hydrogen peroxide scavenging activity were found to be 244.6 μg/ml. The extract inhibited the lipoxygenase enzyme activity with an IC50 value of 356.3 μg/ml. Maximum inhibition of heat-induced protein denaturation of 69% was observed at 400 μg/ml, IC50 249.6 μg/ml. Proteinase activity was also significantly inhibited (IC50 = 421.6 μg/ml). Membrane stabilization assay attributed minor protection by the leaf extract with an IC50 of 206.7. It was observed that E. coli were inhibited at all concentrations, followed by Klebsiella and Pseudomonas. Conclusion: Results indicate that L. aspera possess anti-inflammatory properties due to the strong occurrence of polyphenolic compounds such as alkaloids, flavonoids, tannins and steroids that serve as free radical inhibitors or scavenger. Compounds of the plant L. aspera may hence be used as lead compounds for designing potent anti-inflammatory drug which can be used for treatment of various diseases.
Performance evaluation of TCP-Reno, TCP-Newreno and TCP-Westwood on burstification in an OBS network

In a TCP/OBS network the burst is formed with TCP data aggregated at the ingress node based on time dependent mechanism or quantity dependent mechanism. In the former scheme the size of the burst is dependent on the time allotted for burstification, where as in the latter one the burst is formed with a precise amount of data. Hence time is not a major constraint in quantity based mechanism for formation of burst. When the type of data sent is non-real-time and if TCP sender is slow, when Quantity based mechanism is preferred, TCP source may not generate data since the time of burstification is long and the data generated by TCP is waiting for burstification. This impediment in aggregation of data is due to delay in formation of data by the TCP source. As a result, burstification cannot be done at a time and OBS edge node is compelled to wait for completion of burstification process. The delay caused due to burstification at the ingress node may influence the performance of TCP variants as it influence the calculation of RTT and consequently size of the congestion window. In this backdrop an experimental study was made to compare the performance of TCP variants like TCP-Reno, TCP-Newreno and TCP-Westwood using Network simulator NS-2.
Lexicografía computacional y lexicografía de corpus

In this paper we provide an overview of a number of interrelated disciplines that have changed traditional methodologies in language studies, namely, computational lexicography and corpus lexicography. We stress the importance of deriving the description of a language from the naturally-occurring linguistic evidence that can be obtained through the analysis of corpora. We then describe some outstanding computational tools for the analysis of corpora and the ways they are used in the compilation of dictionaries, both monolingual and bilingual. Computational lexicons are also dealt with, as well as those aspects of lexical knowledge representation relevant for the classification we put forward: machine readable dictionaries, lexical data bases and lexical knowledge bases. Palabras clave: lexicografia computacional, lexicografia de corpus, lexicones computacionales, diccionarios en formato electronico, extraccion, representacion del conocimiento.