Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Extranuclear Estrogen Receptors Mediate the Neuroprotective Effects of Estrogen in the Rat Hippocampus

Background 17β-estradiol (E2) has been implicated to exert neuroprotective effects in the brain following cerebral ischemia. Classically, E2 is thought to exert its effects via genomic signaling mediated by interaction with nuclear estrogen receptors. However, the role and contribution of extranuclear estrogen receptors (ER) is unclear and was the subject of the current study. Methodology/Principal Findings To accomplish this goal, we employed two E2 conjugates (E2 dendrimer, EDC, and E2-BSA) that can interact with extranuclear ER and exert rapid nongenomic signaling, but lack the ability to interact with nuclear ER due to their inability to enter the nucleus. EDC or E2-BSA (10 µM) was injected icv 60 min prior to global cerebral ischemia (GCI). FITC-tagged EDC or E2-BSA revealed high uptake in the hippocampal CA1 region after icv injection, with a membrane (extranuclear) localization pattern in cells. Both EDC and E2-BSA exerted robust neuroprotection in the CA1 against GCI, and the effect was blocked by the ER antagonist, ICI182,780. EDC and E2-BSA both rapidly enhanced activation of the prosurvival kinases, ERK and Akt, while attenuating activation of the proapoptotic kinase, JNK following GCI, effects that were blocked by ICI182,780. Administration of an MEK or PI3K inhibitor blocked the neuroprotective effects of EDC and E2-BSA. Further studies showed that EDC increased p-CREB and BDNF in the CA1 region in an ERK- and Akt-dependent manner, and that cognitive outcome after GCI was preserved by EDC in an ER-dependent manner. Conclusions/Significance In conclusion, the current study demonstrates that activation of extranuclear ER results in induction of ERK-Akt-CREB-BDNF signaling in the hippocampal CA1 region, which significantly reduces ischemic neuronal injury and preserves cognitive function following GCI. The study adds to a growing literature that suggests that extranuclear ER can have important actions in the brain.
Crystal Structure Analysis of Warfarin Binding to Human Serum Albumin

Human serum albumin (HSA) is an abundant transport protein found in plasma that binds a wide variety of drugs in two primary binding sites (I and II) and can have a significant impact on their pharmacokinetics. We have determined the crystal structures at 2.5 Å-resolution of HSA-myristate complexed with the R-(+) and S-(−) enantiomers of warfarin, a widely used anticoagulant that binds to the protein with high affinity. The structures confirm that warfarin binds to drug site I (in subdomain IIA) in the presence of fatty acids and reveal the molecular details of the protein-drug interaction. The two enantiomers of warfarin adopt very similar conformations when bound to the protein and make many of the same specific contacts with amino acid side chains at the binding site, thus accounting for the relative lack of stereospecificity of the HSA-warfarin interaction. The conformation of the warfarin binding pocket is significantly altered upon binding of fatty acids, and this can explain the observed enhancement of warfarin binding to HSA at low levels of fatty acid.
Parallel Block Sequential Closed-Form Matting With Fan-Shaped Partitions

Applying alpha matting to large images is a challenging task because of its computational complexity. This paper provides a divide and conquer strategy for performing closed-form matting. The matting problem, defined for an entire image, is broken down into systems of linear equations defined for very small blocks of the image. The sizes of the small systems are small enough for us to find solutions efficiently using a direct sparse linear equation system solver. The small systems are solved following a sequential order such that the alpha matte grows from a user scribble. With the block sequential application, matting is performed on fan-shaped partitions in parallel on multiple processing cores. Experiments on large test images as well as on standard benchmark test images show that the proposed parallel block sequential matting provides high quality alpha mattes with good scalability.
Tools That Bind: Creating Integrated Environments

Software engineering tools are critical to the progress of software development, virtually defining the limits of what developers can accomplish. Each generation of tools is preceded by promises of shorter life cycles, greater productivity, greater portability and simplified maintenance. Unfortunately, these promises are often not realized, primarily because tool creators cannot overcome the difficulties associated with integrating tools into a cohesive environment one that is adaptable to both development and maintenance organizations. The paper discusses a list of considerations for managers when evaluating how well a tool fits the organisation's context. It considers integrated project support environments. >
Investigation of Conducted EMI in SiC JFET Inverters Using Separated Heat Sinks

This paper systematically investigates the conducted electromagnetic interference (EMI) using separated heat sinks for a silicon carbide (SiC) JFET inverter for motor drives. The inverter circuit layout is implemented with discrete SiC JFETs attached on top of the heat sink, which creates extensive capacitive couplings and moreover increases parasitic oscillations. To minimize the influence, the solution of using separated heat sinks is proposed. For better common mode performance, the high-side heat sink is grounded to avoid fast dv/dts that occur between the drain of the lower switch and the low-side heat sink. For better differential mode performance, the RC snubber circuit and ferrite beads are used to damp parasitic oscillations. Two 2.2 kW inverter prototypes, with six discrete SiC JFETs on one common heat sink and separated heat sinks, respectively, are built using the same circuit layout. Their EMI spectra are compared under unfiltered and filtered conditions. The experiments show that the separate heat sinks inverter system exhibits significantly reduced EMI. Last, three improved solutions are proposed, which effectively suppresses the emitted EMI to the target level.
Genetic and pharmacologic evidence links oxidative stress to ventilator-induced lung injury in mice.

RATIONALE Mechanical ventilation (MV) is an indispensable therapy for critically ill patients with acute lung injury and the adult respiratory distress syndrome. However, the mechanisms by which conventional MV induces lung injury remain unclear. OBJECTIVES We hypothesized that disruption of the gene encoding Nrf2, a transcription factor that regulates the induction of several antioxidant enzymes, enhances susceptibility to ventilator-induced lung injury (VILI) and that antioxidant supplementation attenuates this effect. METHODS To test our hypothesis and to examine the relevance of oxidative stress in VILI, we assessed lung injury and inflammatory responses in Nrf2-deficient (Nrf2(-/-)) mice and wild-type (Nrf2(+/+)) mice after an acute (2-h) injurious model of MV with or without administration of antioxidant. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS Nrf2(-/-) mice displayed greater levels of lung alveolar and vascular permeability and inflammatory responses to MV as compared with Nrf2(+/+) mice. Nrf2 deficiency enhances the levels of several proinflammatory cytokines implicated in the pathogenesis of VILI. We found diminished levels of critical antioxidant enzymes and redox imbalance by MV in the lungs of Nrf2(-/-) mice; however, antioxidant supplementation to Nrf2(-/-) mice remarkably attenuated VILI. When subjected to a clinically relevant prolong period of MV, Nrf2(-/-) mice displayed greater levels of VILI than Nrf2(+/+) mice. Expression profiling revealed lack of induction of several VILI genes, stress response and solute carrier proteins, and phosphatases in Nrf2(-/-) mice. CONCLUSIONS Our data demonstrate for the first time a critical role for Nrf2 in VILI, which confers protection against cellular responses induced by MV by modulating oxidative stress.
Data Overhead Impact of Multipath Routing for Multicast in Wireless Mesh Networks

Multipath routing has been proved effective in mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) for coping with link failures resulting from node mobility. In wireless mesh networks (WMNs) where routers are generally static, the traffic carried by the backup paths may adversely impact other flows and the multicast group itself, because these paths increase the number of transmissions and thus the level of interference and congestion in the network. This impact, however, has not been examined, especially for multicast routing. We present simulation results that quantify the impact of data overhead of multicast multipath routing compared with single-path routing.
Quality of life, socioeconomic profile, knowledge and attitude toward sexuality from the perspectives of individuals living with Human Immunodeficiency Virus.

OBJECTIVES to analyze the quality of life of "patients" with Human Immunodeficiency Virus and relate it to their socioeconomic profile, knowledge and attitudes toward sexuality. METHOD crosssectional and analytical study with 201 individuals who are 50 years old or older. The Targeted Quality of Life and Aging Sexual Knowledge and Attitudes Scales were applied during interviews. Multiple Linear Regression was used in data analysis. RESULTS dimensions of quality of life more strongly compromised were disclosure worries (39.0), sexual function (45.9), and financial worries (55.6). Scores concerning knowledge and attitudes toward sexuality were 31.7 and 14.8, respectively. There was significant correlation between attitudes and the domains of overall function, health worries, medication worries, and HIV mastery. CONCLUSION guidance concerning how the disease is transmitted, treated and how it progresses, in addition to providing social and psychological support, could minimize the negative effects of the disease on the quality of life of patients living with the Human Immunodeficiency Virus.
Predicting Binaural Speech Intelligibility from Signals Estimated by a Blind Source Separation Algorithm

State-of-the-art binaural objective intelligibility measures (OIMs) require individual source signals for making intelligibility predictions, limiting their usability in real-time online operations. This limitation may be addressed by a blind source separation (BSS) process, which is able to extract the underlying sources from a mixture. In this study, a speech source is presented with either a stationary noise masker or a fluctuating noise masker whose azimuth varies in a horizontal plane, at two speech-to-noise ratios (SNRs). Three binaural OIMs are used to predict speech intelligibility from the signals separated by a BSS algorithm. The model predictions are compared with listeners' word identification rate in a perceptual listening experiment. The results suggest that with SNR compensation to the BSS-separated speech signal, the OIMs can maintain their predictive power for individual maskers compared to their performance measured from the direct signals. It also reveals that the errors in SNR between the estimated signals are not the only factors that decrease the predictive accuracy of the OIMs with the separated signals. Artefacts or distortions on the estimated signals caused by the BSS algorithm may also be concerns.
Open Software Foundation Distributed Computing Environment

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Information Product Creation Through Open Source Encyclopedias

The same open source philosophy that has been traditionally applied to software development can be applied to the collaborative creation of non-software information products, such as encyclopedias, books, and dictionaries. Most notably, the eight-year-old Wikipedia is a comprehensive general encyclopedia, comprising over 12 million articles in over 200 languages. It becomes increasingly important to rigorously investigate the workings of the open source process to understand its benefits and motivations. This paper presents a research program funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada with the following objectives: (1) Survey open source encyclopedia participants to understand their motivations for participating and their demographic characteristics, and compare them with participants in traditional open source software projects; (2) investigate the process of open source encyclopedia development in a live community to understand how their motivations interact in the open source framework to create quality information products.
Flow Cytometric Quantification of All Phases of the Cell Cycle and Apoptosis in a Two-Color Fluorescence Plot

An optimal technology for cell cycle analysis would allow the concomitant measurement of apoptosis, G0, G1, S, G2 and M phases in combination with cell surface phenotyping. We have developed an easy method in flow cytometry allowing this discrimination in an only two-color fluorescent plot. It is based on the concomitant use of 7-amino-actinomycin D and the antibodies anti-Ki67 and anti-phospho(Ser10)-histone H3, both conjugated to Alexa Fluor®488 to discriminate G0 and M phases, respectively. The method is particularly valuable in a clinical setting as verified in our laboratory by analyzing human leukemic cells from marrow samples or after exposure to cell cycle modifiers.
Comparison of failure detectors and group membership: performance study of two atomic broadcast algorithms

Protocols that solve agreement problems are essential building blocks for fault tolerant distributed systems. While many protocols have been published, little has been done to analyze their performance, especially the performance of their fault tolerance mechanisms. In this paper, we present a performance evaluation methodology that can be generalized to analyze many kinds of fault-tolerant algorithms. We use the methodology to compare two atomic broadcast algorithms with different fault tolerance mechanisms: unreliable failure detectors and group membership. We evaluated the steady state latency in (1) runs with neither crashes nor suspicions, (2) runs with crashes and (3) runs with no crashes in which correct processes are wrongly suspected to have crashed, as well as (4) the transient latency after a crash. We found that the two algorithms have the same performance in Scenario 1, and that the group membership based algorithm has an advantage in terms of performance and resiliency in Scenario 2, whereas the failure detector based algorithm offers better performance in the other scenarios. We discuss the implications of our results to the design of fault tolerant distributed systems.
Capacitor Voltage Balancing of Three-Phase Neutral-Point-Clamped Rectifier Using Modified Reference Vector

This paper presents a control strategy using optimized switching sequences which results in capacitor voltage balancing of a three-phase neutral-point-clamped rectifier. In front end rectifiers, magnitude and lag angle of reference current vector (w.r.t supply voltage vector) varies depending upon amount of reactive power compensation and load current. Accordingly, the effectiveness of small and medium vectors (using SVPWM) for same switching state varies in each sector and its regions. This observation along with detailed analysis of current pattern for both the capacitors and their effect on neutral point voltage forms the basis of the proposed approach, which is to modify the reference vector for changing the number of sampling periods within each sector and its regions. The rectifier exhibits excellent performance in terms of other critical parameters like unity input power factor, low input current THD, minimum possible switching losses, reduced-rippled, and well-regulated dc-bus voltage, particularly, the capacitor voltage balancing. The proposed control algorithm is tested through exhaustive simulations and validated through experimental results obtained from a laboratory prototype of the rectifier.
Finding Outliers in Models of Spatial Data

Statistical models fit to data often require extensive and challenging re-estimation before achieving final form. For example, outliers can adversely affect fits. In other cases involving spatial data, a cluster may exist for which the model is incorrect, also adversely affecting the fit to the "good" data. In both cases, estimate residuals must be checked and rechecked until the data are cleaned and the appropriate model found. In this article, we demonstrate an algorithm that fits models to the largest subset of the data that is appropriate. Specifically, if a hypothesized linear regression model fits ninety percent of the data, our algorithm can not only find an excellent fit as if only that "good" data were presented, but will also highlight the ten percent of the "bad" data that is not fit. Our work in digital government has focused on mapping data. Thus we illustrate how models fit to census track data work, and how the data in the "bad" set can be viewed spatially through ArcView or other tools. This approach greatly simplifies the task of modeling spatial data, and makes us of advanced map visualization tools to understand the nature of subsets of the data for which the model is not appropriate.
Density Functional ab-initio study of passivated nonpolar wurtzite CdSe surfaces

The researchers have used ab-initio density functional theory to study prototypical nonpolar facets of CdSe nanocrystals. The (10bar10) and (11bar20) facets were passivated with NH2 -, PH2 - and SH-, which are rudiments of the organic ligands used to passivate the nanocrystals during growth. The electronic properties of the surface/ligand systems are presented via preliminary results from electronic density of states and full (and partial) charge densities. Some results included N states inside the band gap.
A Phosphorylcholine-Containing Glycolipid-like Antigen Present on the Surface of Infective Stage Larvae of Ascaris spp. Is a Major Antibody Target in Infected Pigs and Humans

Background The pig parasite Ascaris suum plays and important role in veterinary medicine and represents a suitable model for A. lumbricoides, which infects over 800 million people. In pigs, continued exposure to Ascaris induces immunity at the level of the gut, protecting the host against migrating larvae. The objective of this study was to identify and characterize parasite antigens targeted by this local immune response that may be crucial for parasite invasion and establishment and to evaluate their protective and diagnostic potential. Methodology/Principal Findings Pigs were immunized by trickle infection for 30 weeks, challenged with 2,000 eggs at week 32 and euthanized two weeks after challenge. At necropsy, there was a 100% reduction in worms recovered from the intestine and a 97.2% reduction in liver white spots in comparison with challenged non-immune control animals. Antibodies purified from the intestinal mucus or from the supernatant of cultured antibody secreting cells from mesenteric lymph nodes of immune pigs were used to probe L3 extracts to identify antibody targets. This resulted in the recognition of a 12kDa antigen (As12) that is actively shed from infective Ascaris L3. As12 was characterized as a phosphorylcholine-containing glycolipid-like antigen that is highly resistant to different enzymatic and chemical treatments. Vaccinating pigs with an As12 fraction did not induce protective immunity to challenge infection. However, serological analysis using sera or plasma from experimentally infected pigs or naturally infected humans demonstrated that the As12 ELISA was able to detect long-term exposure to Ascaris with a high diagnostic sensitivity (98.4% and 92%, respectively) and specificity (95.5% and 90.0%) in pigs and humans, respectively. Conclusions/Significance These findings show the presence of a highly stage specific, glycolipid-like component (As12) that is actively secreted by infectious Ascaris larvae and which acts as a major antibody target in infected humans and pigs.
The Acid Coagulation of Milk

It is well known that when milk is allowed to sour, the rise in acidity is not directly proportional to the increase in the number of acid-forming bacteria. There is a distinct phase in the process during which numerical increase of these organisms takes place, accompanied only by slight acid production, after which the acidity rises very rapidly to a maximum.
Implicit Role Linking on Chinese Discourse: Exploiting Explicit Roles and Frame-to-Frame Relations

There is a growing interest in researching null instantiations, which are those implicit semantic arguments. Many of these implicit arguments can be linked to referents in context, and their discoveries are of great benefits to semantic processing. We address the issue of automatically identifying and resolving implicit arguments in Chinese discourse. For their resolutions, we present an approach that combines the information about overtly labeled arguments and frame-to-frame relations defined by FrameNet. Experimental results on our created corpus demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.
AtOSA1, a Member of the Abc1-Like Family, as a New Factor in Cadmium and Oxidative Stress Response1[W][OA]

The analysis of gene expression in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) using cDNA microarrays and reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction showed that AtOSA1 (A. thaliana oxidative stress-related Abc1-like protein) transcript levels are influenced by Cd2+ treatment. The comparison of protein sequences revealed that AtOSA1 belongs to the family of Abc1 proteins. Up to now, Abc1-like proteins have been identified in prokaryotes and in the mitochondria of eukaryotes. AtOSA1 is the first member of this family to be localized in the chloroplasts. However, despite sharing homology to the mitochondrial ABC1 of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, AtOSA1 was not able to complement yeast strains deleted in the endogenous ABC1 gene, thereby suggesting different function between AtOSA1 and the yeast ABC1. The atosa1-1 and atosa1-2 T-DNA insertion mutants were more affected than wild-type plants by Cd2+ and revealed an increased sensitivity toward oxidative stress (hydrogen peroxide) and high light. The mutants exhibited higher superoxide dismutase activities and differences in the expression of genes involved in the antioxidant pathway. In addition to the conserved Abc1 region in the AtOSA1 protein sequence, putative kinase domains were found. Protein kinase assays in gelo using myelin basic protein as a kinase substrate revealed that chloroplast envelope membrane fractions from the AtOSA1 mutant lacked a 70-kD phosphorylated protein compared to the wild type. Our data suggest that the chloroplast AtOSA1 protein is a new factor playing a role in the balance of oxidative stress.