Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Light–Tissue Interaction of Pulse Oximetry

The underlying science of pulse oximetry is based on a simple manipulation of the Lambert–Beer law, which describes the attenuation of light traveling through a mixture of absorbers. Signals from detected red and infrared light that has traveled through blood-perfused tissues are used to estimate the underlying arterial hemoglobin oxygen saturation. However, light scatters in tissue and influences some of the simplifications made in determining this relationship. Under most clinical circumstances, the empirical process that manufacturers use to calibrate the system during its design readily accommodates this and results in accurate readings. The same tissue light scattering properties allow sensors to be configured for use on opposing or adjacent surfaces, provided that the placement sites offer sufficient signal strength and are absent factors known to influence accuracy. In this paper I review the light–tissue interaction in pulse oximetry and describe some of the assumptions made and their implications. Certain deviations from the nominal conditions, whether clinical in nature or misuse of the product, can affect system performance. Consequently, users should be cautious in modifying sensors and/or using them on tissue sites not intended by the manufacturer (off-label use). While perhaps helpful for obtaining pulsatile signals or extending the lifetime of a sensor, some practices can disrupt the optical integrity of the measurement and negatively impact the oxygen saturation reading accuracy.
Plasma Enhancement of In Vitro Attachment of Rat Bone-Marrow-Derived Stem Cells on Cross-Linked Gelatin Films

Abstract In this work, nitrogen, oxygen and air glow discharges powered by 50 Hz AC power supply are used for the treatment of type-A gelatin film cross-linked by a dehydrothermal (DHT) process. The properties of cross-linked gelatin were characterized by contact angle measurement, atomic force microscopy (AFM) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis. The results showed that the water contact angle of gelatin films decrease with increasing plasma treatment time. The treatment of nitrogen, oxygen and air plasma up to 30 s had no effects on the surface roughness of the gelatin film as revealed by AFM results. The XPS analysis showed that the N-containing functional groups generated by nitrogen and air plasma, and O-containing functional groups generated by oxygen and air plasmas were incorporated onto the film surface, the functional groups were found to increase with increasing treatment time. An in vitro test using rat bone-marrow-mesenchym-derived stem cells (MSCs) revealed that the number of cells attached on plasma-treated gelatin films was significantly increased compared to untreated samples. The best enhancement of cell attachment was noticed when the film was treated with nitrogen plasma for 15–30 s, oxygen plasma for 3 s, and air plasma for 9 s. In addition, among the three types of plasmas used, nitrogen plasma treatment gave the best MSCs attachment on the gelatin surface. The results suggest that a type-A gelatin film with water contact angle of 27–28° and an O/N ratio of 1.4 is most suitable for MSCs attachment.
Automatic extractive summarization on Indonesian parliamentary meeting minutes

Meeting minutes contain many important decisions and fact from a meeting. Since meeting minutes are unstructured document, summarization should be conducted in order to easily get the main information. Some works in this research area have been done for meeting minutes in English, but have not conducted yet in Indonesian. Therefore, this paper aims to develop extractive summarization system on Indonesian parliamentary meeting minutes using rule-based information extraction with regular expression. Summary structure is defined based on summaries from the House of Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia. Regular expressions are designed to recognize patterns in meeting minutes and then to fill 24 slot values in summary templates. Our summarizer consists of four main processes i.e.: preprocessing, information extraction, postprocess, and template filling. Our experimental results evaluated by the ROUGE summarization metrics achieves performance in terms of ROUGE-2 F-measure of 0.718.
Immunization of Mice with Single PspA Fragments Induces Antibodies Capable of Mediating Complement Deposition on Different Pneumococcal Strains and Cross-Protection

ABSTRACT PspA is an important candidate for a vaccine with serotype-independent immunity against pneumococcal infections. Based on sequence relatedness, PspA has been classified into three families comprising six clades. We have previously addressed the cross-reactivity of antibodies against PspA fragments containing the N-terminal and proline-rich regions of PspA from clades 1 to 5 (PspA1, PspA2, PspA3, PspA4, and PspA5) by Western blot analysis and reported that anti-PspA4 and anti-PspA5 were able to recognize pneumococci expressing PspA proteins from all of the clades analyzed. We have now analyzed the functional capacity of these antibodies to bind and to mediate complement deposition on intact bacteria in vitro. Our results show that both PspA4 and PspA5 elicit antibodies that are able to bind and to mediate complement deposition efficiently on pneumococcal strains bearing PspA proteins from clades 1 to 5. Moreover, mice immunized with PspA4 and PspA5 were protected against an intranasal lethal challenge with strains expressing PspA proteins from the two major families. PspA4 and PspA5 are thus able to induce antibodies with a high degree of cross-reactivity in vitro, which is reflected in cross-protection of mice. We have also analyzed the contribution of the nonproline (NonPro) block within the conserved proline-rich region to the reactivity of anti-PspA antibodies, and the results indicate that N-terminal α-helical region, the blocks of proline repeats, and the NonPro region can influence the degree of cross-reactivity of antibodies to PspA.
Nutritional supplementation of elderly hip fracture patients. A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.

BACKGROUND undernourishment is common in elderly hip fracture patients and has been linked to poorer recovery and increased post-operative complications. OBJECTIVE to determine whether a nutritional supplement may (i) help elderly patients return to pre-fracture functional levels 6 months post-fracture and (ii) decrease fracture-related complications and mortality. DESIGN a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial. SETTING a county hospital near Barcelona. SUBJECTS 171 patients, aged 70 and older, hospitalized for hip fracture between July 1994 and July 1996. METHODS we randomized patients to intervention (n = 85) or control (n = 86) group. Patients received a nutritional supplement containing 20 g of protein and 800 mg of calcium or placebo for 60 days. We determined functional levels by the Barthel index, the mobility index and by the use of walking aids. We performed assessments during hospitalization and at 2 and 6 months post-fracture. FINDINGS the two groups were comparable at study entry. We observed no differences in return to functional status 6 months post-fracture (61% intervention group vs 55% in control group) nor in fracture-related mortality (13% in intervention group vs 10% in control group). The intervention group suffered fewer in-hospital [odds ratio 1.88 (95% CI 1.01 - 3.53), P = 0.05] and total complications [odds ratio 1.94 (95% CI 1.02-3.7), P = 0.04] than the control group. CONCLUSION based on our results, we cannot recommend routine nutritional supplementation of all elderly hip fracture patients. While nutritional supplementation may be useful in decreasing complications, this reduction does not result in improvement in functional recovery and nor does it decrease fracture-related mortality. Selected patients may, however, benefit from nutritional supplementation.
Treating the climacteric symptoms in Indian women with an integrated approach to yoga therapy: a randomized control study

Objective: To study the effect of yoga on the climacteric symptoms, perceived stress, and personality in perimenopausal women. Design: One hundred twenty participants (ages 40-55 y) were randomly divided into two study arms, ie, yoga and control. The yoga group practiced an integrated approach to yoga therapy comprising surya namaskara (sun salutation) with 12 postures, pranayama (breathing practices), and avartan dhyan (cyclic meditation), whereas the control group practiced a set of simple physical exercises under supervision of trained teachers for 8 weeks (1 h daily, 5 days per week). The assessments were made by Greene Climacteric Scale, Perceived Stress Scale, and Eysenck's Personality Inventory before and after the intervention. Results: Of the three factors of the Greene Climacteric Scale, the Mann-Whitney test showed a significant difference between groups (P < 0.05) in the vasomotor symptoms, a marginally significant difference (P = 0.06) in psychological factors but not in the somatic component. Effect sizes were higher in the yoga group for all factors. There was a significantly greater degree of decrease in Perceived Stress Scale scores (P < 0.001, independent samples t test) in the yoga group compared with controls (between-group analysis) with a higher effect size in the yoga group (1.10) than the control (0.27). On the Eysenck's Personality Inventory, the decrease in neuroticism was greater (P < 0.05) in the yoga group (effect size = 0.43) than the control group (effect size = 0.21) with no change in extroversion in either the yoga or control group. Conclusions: Eight weeks of an integrated approach to yoga therapy decreases climacteric symptoms, perceived stress, and neuroticism in perimenopausal women better than physical exercise.
Image segmentation by object color: a unifying framework and connection to color constancy.

A unifying framework is presented for algorithms that use the bands of a multispectral image to segment the image at material (i.e., reflectance) boundaries while ignoring spatial inhomogeneities incurred by accidents of lighting and viewing geometry. The framework assumes that the visual stimulus (image field) from a uniformly colored object is the sum of a small number of terms, each term being the product of a spatial and a spectral part. Based on this assumption, several quantities depending on the reflected light can be computed that are spatially invariant within object boundaries. For an image field either from two light sources on a matte surface or from a single light source on a dielectric surface with highlights, the invariants are the components of the unit normal to the plane in color space spanned by the pixels from the object. In some limited cases the normal to the plane can be used to estimate spectral-reflectance parameters of the object. However, in general the connection of color-constancy theories with image segmentation by object color is a difficult problem. The concomitant constraints on segmentation and color-constancy algorithms are discussed in light of this fact.
Phase II Study of the Multitargeted Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitor XL647 in Patients with Non–Small-Cell Lung Cancer

Purpose: XL647 is an oral small-molecule inhibitor of multiple receptor tyrosine kinases, including endothelial growth factor receptor (EGFR), vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2, HER2 and Ephrin type-B receptor 4 (EphB4). We undertook an open-label, multi-institutional Phase II study to investigate the efficacy and safety of XL647 in treatment-naive non–small-cell lung cancer patients clinically enriched for the presence of EGFR mutations. Methods: Eligibility included patients with advanced-stage treatment-naive lung adenocarcinoma with a known sensitizing mutation of EGFR or patients with at least one of the following criteria: being Asian, female, or having minimal or no smoking history. Two dosing schedules were evaluated; in the “intermittent 5 & 9 dosing” cohort, XL647 350 mg for 5 days every 14 days was given; and in the “daily dosing” cohort, XL647 300 mg daily for 28 days was administered. Tumor EGFR mutation status was determined on available tissue. The primary end point was confirmed objective response rate. Results: Forty-one patients were treated on the intermittent 5 & 9 dosing- and 14 on the daily-dosing schedule. The majority of patients were eligible on the basis of smoking history. The response rate and progression-free survival for the two schedules combined were 20% and 5.3 months (90% confidence interval, 3.7–6.7), respectively. Thirty-eight patients (69%) had material available for mutation testing and 14 EGFR-sensitizing mutations were detected. The response rate and progression-free survival for EGFR-mutation–positive patients were 57% (8/14) and 9.3 months (90% confidence interval, 5.5–11.7). The toxicities were comparable between the two schedules; the most common adverse effects being diarrhea, nausea, and fatigue. Conclusions: XL647 administered on an intermittent or daily-dosing schedule demonstrated antitumor activity in patients with EGFR-activating mutations. The adverse-event profile was similar for the two dosing schedules.
Fear of stigmatization as barrier to voluntary HIV counselling and testing in South Africa.

OBJECTIVE The objective of this qualitative study was to identify psychosocial correlates of HIV voluntary counselling and testing (VCT), with an emphasis on the association between fear of AIDS-related stigma and willingness to have an HIV test. METHODS The study was executed in Limpopo Province at University of Limpopo, Polokwane, South Africa. Focus group interviews were held among 72 students, divided over 10 groups. RESULTS Results showed that participants had different levels of knowledge about HIV/AIDS and VCT, and that AIDS was still strongly associated with 'death'. Results further demonstrate that HIV/AIDS related stigma is still a very serious problem in South Africa. Lack of HIV/AIDS related knowledge, blaming persons with HIV/AIDS for their infection, and the life-threatening character of the disease were seen as the most important determinants of AIDS-related stigma. The main benefit to go for VCT was 'knowing your HIV status', whereas main barriers for testing were 'fear of being stigmatised' and 'fear of knowing your HIV positive status'. CONCLUSION Fear of stigmatization is an important barrier to HIV testing and has negative consequences for AIDS prevention and treatment. Interventions to reduce HIV-related stigma are needed in order to foster voluntary HIV counselling and testing in South Africa
Study on temperature sensing properties of different fiber Bragg grating at low temperature

In this paper, in order to understand the fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensor's temperature sensing properties with different coating materials and packaging materials at low temperature, and choose a FBG sensor for engineering application, an experimental platform is designed at first, the temperature sensing performance of five different type of FBG sensors at low temperature (77K-296K) is studied, and then the wavelength-temperature curve and temperature sensitive coefficient curve of these five FBG sensors is analyzed. At last, a nonlinear fitting for the best wavelength-temperature curve is made to provide a reference for practical application. It is concluded that polyimide-coated FBG sensor can be used normally at low temperature, and the temperature sensitive coefficient increases 4.32pm/K as reference to bare FBG, packaging has few effect on the sensor's performance of grating sensors. The OS4200 whose wavelength-temperature curve's cubic curve fitting is better than quadratic curve fitting has high accuracy and good stability, it can meet the requirement in practical engineering.
School travel mode use: direct and indirect effects through parental attitudes and transport priorities

Considering both direct and indirect associations, this study investigated a structural framework linking social cognition latent variables, and socioeconomic, built environment and demographic characteristics to parental mode choice on children's school travels. A total of 1078 questionnaires were completed by the parents of 7–9-year-old pupils in nine schools. We tested two separate SEM models to explain walking and car use on school trips. Findings showed that higher educated mothers, owning more cars, less physical exercise, shorter distance to schools and lack of access to school services and public transport were directly and indirectly related to car use on school trips. Enhancing safety knowledge among less-educated parents, those with limited access to public transport and those whose children study in public schools could be related with more walking on school trips. Pull factors were suggested to reduce private car use in the study area.
Electrically yielding Collective Hybrid Bonding for 3D stacking of ICs

The production of non-monolithic 3D-systems by stacking and interconnecting components through substrate vias (TSVs) is intrinsically limited to the stacking of thin dies, typically ranging from 100µm down to 15µm. Since dies or wafers of such thickness are no longer rigid, it is an important requirement that the bond guarantees mechanical stability and rigidity to the thin stacked die or wafer. The route followed here combines the fixation of a thin wafer or die by means of a dielectric adhesive with the formation of a metallic interconnect. This process is called Hybrid Bonding. The introduction of a tacky polymer as an intermediate glue layer in the direct bonding scheme offers the possibility for die-to-wafer throughput optimization: the opportunity lies in the separation of die pick-and-place and bonding operations. This process is called Collective Hybrid Bonding. Two polymers have been selected (so called polymer A and polymer B) according to their reflowing and bonding properties, and a die pick and place procedure has been defined and optimized for each of them, allowing a fast and reliable operation. Moreover, electrical measurements of daisy chains showed a comparable and reproducible yield of 80% working chains up to 1000 TSVs.
Learning Deep Architectures via Generalized Whitened Neural Networks

Whitened Neural Network (WNN) is a recent advanced deep architecture, which improves convergence and generalization of canonical neural networks by whitening their internal hidden representation. However, the whitening transformation increases computation time. Unlike WNN that reduced runtime by performing whitening every thousand iterations, which degenerates convergence due to the ill conditioning, we present generalized WNN (GWNN), which has three appealing properties. First, GWNN is able to learn compact representation to reduce computations. Second, it enables whitening transformation to be performed in a short period, preserving good conditioning. Third, we propose a data-independent estimation of the covariance matrix to further improve computational efficiency. Extensive experiments on various datasets demonstrate the benefits of GWNN.
Paracrine signaling through the epithelial estrogen receptor α is required for proliferation and morphogenesis in the mammary gland

Estradiol is a major regulator of postnatal mammary gland development and thought to exert its effects through estrogen receptor α (ERα) expressed in the mammary gland stroma and epithelium. Previous studies, however, were confounded by the use of an ERα mutant strain that retains some of the protein with transactivation activity. Here, we use an ERα−/− mouse strain in which no ERα transcript can be detected to analyze mammary gland development in the complete absence of ERα signaling. The ERα−/− females show no development beyond a rudimentary ductal system. By grafting ERα−/− epithelium or stroma in combination with ERα WT stroma or epithelium, we show that the primary target for estradiol is the mammary epithelium, whereas a direct response of the mammary stroma is not required for mammary gland development to proceed normally. Mammary glands reconstituted with ERα−/− mammary epithelium exposed to pregnancy hormones show increased transcription of milk protein genes, indicating that ERα signaling is not an absolute requirement for a transcriptional response to pregnancy hormones. When ERα−/− mammary epithelial cells are in close vicinity to ERα WT cells, they proliferate and contribute to all aspects of mammary gland development, indicating that estradiol, like progesterone, orchestrates proliferation and morphogenesis by a paracrine mechanism, affecting nearby cells in the mammary epithelium.
[Evaluation of pharmacopoeia methods for determination of antimicrobial agents, especially of natural substances].

Microbiological assays referring to antibiotics were first mentioned in 1955 in the US Pharmacopedia XV and in the Pharmacopedia of India I. In the pharmacopedias two general methods are employed: The first group of methods is grounded on diffusion (disc assay, cylinder-plate and hole-plate assay), the second one is based on the determination of optical density (turbidimetric method). Both methods involve certain problems, particularly with respect to the testing of low-active natural substances. In the course of our investigations those test methods were evaluated and the advantages and disadvantages discussed. The methods were compared to test systems not being described in the pharmacopedias (microdilution test, bioautographic TLC assay). In addition to that we examined spectrophotometrically (OD580nm) the influence of an antimicrobial substance and of a solutizer on the bacterial growth. Tetracycline hydrochloride was used as reference and naringenin as test substance. The results were analyzed with statistical methods cited in the pharmacopedias, e.g. straight-line method and compared to other common methods, e.g. analysis of variance.
The effects of metformin on inflammatory mediators in obese adolescents with insulin resistance: controlled randomized clinical trial

Abstract Objective: To compare serum concentrations of inflammatory cytokines, interleukin 6 (IL-6), high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), adiponectin, and tumor necrosis factor α (TNFα), before and after 3 months treatment with metformin in obese adolescents with insulin resistance (IR). Design and subjects: This was a randomized, double-blinded, clinical trial of two groups of obese adolescents with IR, aged 9–18 years: a placebo group (n=14) and a metformin group (n=12) who received 500 mg metformin every 12 h for 3 months. Anthropometric and biochemical (metabolic and inflammatory cytokines) assessments were compared at the beginning and end of treatment. Results: After 3 months of treatment, body mass index (kg/m2) was reduced in both groups: placebo group (32.82±6.37–32.10±6.52; p=0.011) and metformin group (33.44±5.82–32.71±5.77; p=0.015). Serum fasting insulin concentrations (pmol/L) increased in the placebo group (189.45±112.64–266.06±167.79; p=0.01) and showed a slight decrease in the metformin group (256.82±113.89–229.25±86.53; p=0.64). Adiponectin concentrations (μg/mL) decreased in the placebo group (13.17±7.31–5.65±6.69; p=0.02), while these remained stable in the metformin group (8.57±3.98–7.86±6.23; p=0.64). In the metformin group, significant reductions were found in the variances of serum TNFα concentrations (p=0.006; Levene test). Conclusion: These results suggest that treating obese adolescents with IR using metformin for 3 months is an option for patients without response to traditional lifestyle change because metformin improves inflammatory activity, which is an etiological factor in cardiovascular disease development.