Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
XBP 1 is Critical to Protect Cells from Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress : Evidence from Site-2 Protease-deficient Chinese Hamster Ovary Cells

XBP1 is a transcription factor downstream of IRE1, a transmembrane protein in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) which functions as a sensor and transducer of ER stress. XBP1 mRNA is constitutively expressed at a low level as an intron-containing precursor mRNA (unspliced mRNA), which is subject to IRE1-mediated splicing reaction upon ER stress to produce the active form of XBP1, pXBP1(S). Because the XBP1 promoter carries a perfect ER stress-response element, namely, the cis-acting element responsible for the induction of ER chaperones, and XBP1 mRNA is induced in response to ER stress with a time course similar to that of ER chaperone mRNAs, it is conjectured that transcription factor ATF6, activated immediately upon ER stress, induces the transcription of not only ER chaperone genes but also of XBP1 gene, such that pXBP1(S) produced by the splicing of an increased level of XBP1 mRNA escapes from proteasome-mediated degradation. Here, we examined this notion by determining the induction of XBP1 mRNA and pXBP1(S) in mutant Chinese hamster ovary (M19) cells deficient in Site-2 protease, which executes the last step of ER stress-induced activation of ATF6. We found that the induction of XBP1 mRNA and pXBP1(S) was greatly reduced in M19 cells as compared with wildtype cells, leading to a marked reduction in the extent of induction of XBP1-target gene. M19 cells were much more sensitive to ER stress than wild-type cells. Importantly, overexpression of XBP1 unspliced mRNA in M19 cells reversed all of these phenotypes. We concluded that ATF6-mediated induction of XBP1 mRNA is important to the production of pXBP1(S), activation of XBP1-target genes, and protection of cells from ER stress.
Comparison of different compressed sensing algorithms for low SNR 19F MRI applications—Imaging of transplanted pancreatic islets and cells labeled with perfluorocarbons

Transplantation of pancreatic islets is a possible treatment option for patients suffering from Type I diabetes. In vivo imaging of transplanted islets is important for assessment of the transplantation site and islet distribution. Thanks to its high specificity, the absence of intrinsic background signal in tissue and its potential for quantification, 19F MRI is a promising technique for monitoring the fate of transplanted islets in vivo. In order to overcome the inherent low sensitivity of 19F MRI, leading to long acquisition times with low signal‐to‐noise ratio (SNR), compressed sensing (CS) techniques are a valuable option. We have validated and compared different CS algorithms for acceleration of 19F MRI acquisition in a low SNR regime using pancreatic islets labeled with perfluorocarbons both in vitro and in vivo.
Discovering missing heritability and early risk prediction for type 2 diabetes: a new perspective for genome-wide association study analysis with the Nurses' Health Study and the Health Professionals' Follow-Up Study.

BACKGROUND/AIM Despite the rise in type 2 diabetes prevalence worldwide, we do not have a method for early risk prediction. The predictive ability of genetic models has been found to be little or negligible so far. In this study, we aimed to develop a better early risk prediction method for type 2 diabetes. MATERIALS AND METHODS We used phenotypic and genotypic data from the Nurses' Health Study and Health Professionals' Follow-up Study cohorts and analyzed them by using binary logistic regression. RESULTS Phenotypic variables yielded 70.7% overall correctness and an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.77. With regard to genotype, 798 single nucleotide polymorphisms with P-values of lower than 1.0E-3 yielded 90.0% correctness and an AUC of 0.965. This is the highest score in the literature, even including the scores obtained with phenotypic variables. The additive contributions of phenotype and genotype increased the overall correctness to 92.9% and the AUC to 0.980. CONCLUSION Our results showed that genotype could be used to obtain a higher score, which could enable early risk prediction. These findings present new possibilities for genome-wide association study analysis in terms of discovering missing heritability. These results should be confirmed by follow-up studies.
An Indoor Multi-Tag Cooperative Localization Algorithm Based on NMDS for RFID

For radio frequency identification (RFID) system, the location information is very important in many applications, such as Internet of Things, logistics, library management, and so on. Most of traditional RFID localization algorithms can only locate one tag at a time. However, multitag localization is desired in many RFID applications. In this paper, we propose a novel range-free algorithm named nonmetric multidimensional scaling (NMDS)-RFID(F), which combines NMDS algorithm and the fingerprinting localization algorithm to achieve indoor RFID multitag cooperative localization. The NMDS-RFID(F) algorithm firstly uses received signal strength Euclidean distance based on fingerprinting method to get the rank order of the distance for all pairs of tags, and then NMDS algorithm is used to generate the relative coordinates of tags. Finally, due to the coordinates of reference tags are known, we can use the coordinate system registration algorithm to get the absolute coordinates of tags. Simulation results show that the NMDS-RFID(F) algorithm outperforms some previous RFID localization algorithms.
Magnetic Brain Stimulation Upregulates Adhesion and Prevents Eae: MMP-2, ICAM-1, and VCAM-1 in the Choroid Plexus as a Target

Clinical signs appearance and significant increases of ICAM-1 and MMP-2 expressions with the clusters of VCAM-1+ immunoreactivity in the choroids plexus epithelium to transferred anti-myelin oligodendroglial antibodies into the third brain ventricle, indicate important role of choroids plexus in the induction of acute experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE). Magnetic brain stimulation with AKMA micro-magnet flux density of 60 miliTesla, 5 mm in diameter, implanted upon the pineal gland (PG), immediately after antibody injection, significantly decreases the expression of MMP-2 and ICAM-1 in the choroids plexus of the rat brain and abruptly suppresses the induction of acute EAE.
B-spline Patches Fitting on Surfaces and Triangular Meshes

In this paper a technique for the construction of quartic polynomial B-spline patches fitting on analytical surfaces and triangle meshes is presented. The input data are curvature values and principal directions at a given surface point which can be computed directly, if the surface is represented by a vector function. In the case of discrete surface representation, i.e. on a triangle mesh the required input data are computed from a circular neighborhood of a specified triangle facet. Such a surface patch may replace a well defined region of the mesh, and can be used e.g. in re-triangulation, meshsimplification and rendering algorithms.
Majorana spin liquids on a two-leg ladder

We realize a gapless Majorana orbital liquid (MOL) using orbital degrees of freedom and an SU(2)-invariant Majorana spin liquid (MSL) using both spin and orbital degrees of freedom in Kitaev-type models on a two-leg ladder. The models are exactly solvable by Kitaev's parton approach, and we obtain long-wavelength descriptions for both Majorana liquids. The MOL has one gapless mode and power-law correlations in energy at incommensuate wave vectors, while the SU(2) MSL has three gapless modes and power-law correlations in spin, spin-nematic, and local energy observables. We study the stability of such states to perturbations away from the exactly solvable points. We find that both MOL and MSL can be stable against allowed short-range parton interactions. We also argue that both states persist on allowing Z_2 gauge-field fluctuations, in that the number of gapless modes is retained, although with an expanded set of contributions to observables compared to the free parton mean field.
Mindless Eating Challenge: Retention, Weight Outcomes, and Barriers for Changes in a Public Web-Based Healthy Eating and Weight Loss Program

Background Most dietary programs fail to produce lasting outcomes because participants soon return to their old habits. Small behavioral and environmental changes based on simple heuristics may have the best chance to lead to sustainable habit changes over time. Objective To evaluate participant retention, weight outcomes, and barriers for changes in a publicly available web-based healthy eating and weight loss program. Methods The National Mindless Eating Challenge (NMEC) was a publicly available, online healthy eating and weight loss program with ongoing recruitment of participants. This volunteer sample consisted of 2053 participants (mean age 39.8 years, 89% female, 90% white/Caucasian, BMI mean 28.14). Participants completed an initial profiling survey and were assigned three targeted habit change suggestions (tips). After each month, participants were asked to complete a follow-up survey and then receive new suggestions for the subsequent month. Results In terms of overall attrition, 75% (1549/2053) of participants who completed the intake survey never returned to follow up. Overall mean weight loss among returning participants was 0.4% of initial weight (P=.019). Participants who stayed in the program at least three calendar months and completed at least two follow-up surveys (38%, 189/504) lost on average 1.8 lbs (1.0%) of their initial weight over the course of the program (P=.009). Furthermore, participants who reported consistent adherence (25+ days/month) to the suggested changes reported an average monthly weight loss of 2.0 lbs (P<.001). Weight loss was less for those who discontinued after 1-2 months or who did not adhere to the suggested changes. Participants who reported having lost weight reported higher monthly adherence to suggestions (mean 14.9 days, SD 7.92) than participants who maintained (mean 12.4 days, SD 7.63) or gained weight (mean 12.0 days, SD 7.50; F=14.17, P<.001). Common reported barriers for changes included personally unsuitable or inapplicable suggestions, forgetting or being too busy to implement changes, unusual circumstances, and emotional eating. Conclusions Because the bulk of the free and commercially available online diet and nutritional tools conduct no evaluation research, it is difficult to determine which aspects of a program are successful and what are reasonable expectations of results. The results of this study suggest that online interventions based on small changes have the potential to gradually lead to clinically significant weight loss, but high attrition from publically available or “free” programs still remains a challenge. Adherence to and effectiveness of small habit changes may be improved through further tailoring to individual circumstances and psychological needs.
χ-Conotoxin and Tricyclic Antidepressant Interactions at the Norepinephrine Transporter Define a New Transporter Model*

Monoamine neurotransmitter transporters for norepinephrine (NE), dopamine and serotonin are important targets for antidepressants and analgesics. The conopeptide χ-MrIA is a noncompetitive and highly selective inhibitor of the NE transporter (NET) and is being developed as a novel intrathecal analgesic. We used site-directed mutagenesis to generate a suite of mutated transporters to identify two amino acids (Leu469 and Glu382) that affected the affinity of χ-MrIA to inhibit [3H]NE uptake through human NET. Residues that increased the Kd of a tricyclic antidepressant (nisoxetine) were also identified (Phe207, Ser225, His296, Thr381, and Asp473). Phe207, Ser225, His296, and Thr381 also affected the rate of NE transport without affecting NE Km. In a new model of NET constructed from the bLeuT crystal structure, χ-MrIA-interacting residues were located at the mouth of the transporter near residues affecting the binding of small molecule inhibitors.
Giant cavernous carotid aneurysm with spontaneous ipsilateral ICA occlusion: Report of 2 cases and review of literature

Giant aneurysms of the cavernous carotid artery are rare entities which present predominantly with features of compression of the adjacent neural structures, most commonly the III, IV, VI and V cranial nerves. Historically, treatment options included occlusion of the feeding vessel, direct surgery on the aneurysm, bypass procedures and in recent times, the use of endovascular devices. While intramural thrombus formation is commonly seen in giant aneurysms, we present 2 cases of giant cavernous aneurysms which on evaluation were found to have spontaneous occlusion of the feeding internal carotid artery secondary to thrombus formation, and review the available literature regarding the same.
An Efficient Fault Tolerant Location Based Service Discovery Protocol for Vehicular Networks

Recent studies on service discovery protocols in vehicular networks have shown promising results. However, very little work has been reported on how to integrate the fault tolerance feature into these mechanisms. This feature is vital for the success of the deployment of service discovery protocols in vehicular networks. Drivers on their cars should not have their requests dissatisfied or their connections dropped because a service provider or some components between the service provider and the service requester have failed. In this paper, we present a fault tolerant location based service discovery protocol for Vehicular Networks. The main advantages of our protocol is its ability to tolerate service providers failure, communication links failure and roadside routers failure. We present our fault tolerant protocol, and report on its performance evaluation. Our simulation experiments show that our proposed fault tolerant LocVSDP algorithm improves the success rate significantly over the basic LocVSDP. In fact, the success rate is improved in the roadside routers failures scenario and in the links failures scenarios by 50 percent and 30 percent respectively.
Stool Tagging Applied in Thin-slice Multidetector Computed Tomography Colonography

Objective To compare thin-slice multidetector computed tomography colonography (CTC) that uses stool tagging with colonoscopy. Method One hundred fifty patients scheduled for colonoscopy underwent high-resolution CTC. An iodinated contrast agent was added to the preparation to tag the residual colonic fluid and stool. The effect of fluid tagging was assessed first. Sensitivity and specificity were calculated for two independent readers. In addition, values were recalculated separately for the first and last 75 patients. Results Tagging was optimal in 95.3% of the cases, and reader confidence was high. Sensitivities were 64.1%–66.7% (for the 2 readers) for 5- to 9-mm polyps and 91.7% for larger polyps. The overall specificity was 94.2% and 95%. Sensitivity improved during the study for both 5- to 9-mm polyps (from 54.2%–58.3% to 80%) and polyps larger than 9 mm (from 50% to 100%). Specificity changed nonuniformly. Conclusion The combination of fluid tagging and high-resolution scanning in CTC showed high sensitivity and specificity, especially concerning sensitivity for polyps of 10 mm and larger.
Automatic Ontology Construction for Manufacturing Knowledge and Information Management

Domain ontology is a natural approach for representing manufacturing domain knowledge. A large amount of manufacturing domain knowledge, entities and their properties is embodied in documents. Automatic construction of ontology from these documents is therefore essential for knowledge and information management. A graph-based approach to automate ontology construction for fixture design is presented. Each document in a collection is represented by a graph. The information contained in a term is estimated from both local and global perspectives. Methods are proposed to disambiguate terms with different meanings and group similar terms to produce concepts, and find arbitrary latent relations among them.
Effects of pre-germinated brown rice treatment high-fat diet-induced metabolic syndrome in C57BL/6J mice

To investigate using pre-germinated brown rice (PGBR) to treat metabolic syndrome, we fed one group of mice standard-regular-diet (SRD) for 20 weeks and another group of mice high-fat-diet (HFD) for 16 weeks. We subdivided them into HFD group and HFD + PGBR group whose dietary carbohydrate was replaced with PGBR for 4 weeks. The HFD group gained more weight, had higher blood pressure, heart rate, blood glucose and lipids, liver levels of TG, feces TG and bile acid, lower adipose levels of adipocytokine, lower skeletal muscle IR, IRS-1, IRS-2, PI3 K, Akt/PKB, GLUT-1, GLUT-4, GCK and PPAR-γ; higher liver SREBP-1, SCD-1, FAS, HMGCR, LDLR, CYP7α1 and PPAR-α, and higher adipose SREBP-1, SCD-1, FAS, and lower adipose PPAR-α and adiponectin. The HFD + PGBR group had clearly improved blood pressure, biochemical parameters and above proteins expressions. PGBR successful treatment of metabolic syndrome was achieved through improvements in glucose and lipid synthesis and metabolism. Graphical abstract PGBR treats HFD-induced metabolic syndrome through improving glucose and lipid synthesis and metabolism.
EVOLUTION OF PELVIC REDUCTION IN THREESPINE STICKLEBACK FISH: A TEST OF COMPETING HYPOTHESES

Reimchen hypothesized that pelvic reduction in threespine stickleback is favored by an absence of piscivorous fishes and the resulting increase in predation by insects, but Giles hypothesized that the predation regime is unimportant and that a low dissolved calcium concentration favors evolution of pelvic reduction. Substantial pelvic reduction in threespine stickleback sampled from 179 lakes around Cook Inlet, Alaska is strongly associated both with an absence of predatory fishes and a low calcium concentration. However, the association of pelvic reduction with low calcium concentration appears to be contingent on the absence of predatory fishes. These results emphasize the importance of interactions between seemingly unrelated environmental variables for selection of a single trait. However, these results also conflict with some observations elsewhere and do not rule out the possibility that other environmental factors are important for selection for pelvic reduction in threespine stickleback.
A handshake response motion model during active approach to a human

A handshake is an embodied interaction for displaying closeness through physical contact. In this study, we develop a handshake response motion model for a handshake during active approach to a human on the basis of analysis of handshake motions between humans. We also develop a handshake robot system that uses the proposed model. A sensory evaluation is performed for analyzing the time lag preferred by humans between the approaching motion and the hand motion generated by the robot system. Another sensory evaluation is performed for determining the preferred timing of a handshake motion that is accompanied by a voice greeting. The evaluation results demonstrate that the proposed model can generate a handshake response motion during active approach that is preferred by humans. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the proposed model is demonstrated.
MR microcirculation assessment in cervical cancer: Correlations with histomorphological tumor markers and clinical outcome

This article reviews the experience available to date on microcirculation assessment in cancer of the cervix including correlation studies of magnetic resonance (MR) microcirculatory parameters with histo‐morphometric predictors and direct correlation with patient outcome. The data suggest that MR microcirculation parameters do not always correlate with histo‐morphometric parameters, while there is evidence that MR parameters predict patients' treatment outcome. These observations raise the issue that perhaps the histo‐morphometric parameters, accepted gold standards for tumor angiogenesis and prognostic factors, reflect anatomical information at a “static” single time point and may not always provide sufficient information on the “dynamic” microcirculation function of the tumor. MR microcirculation assessment reflects both anatomical and functional information and may provide this additional information on the “dynamic” angiogenic and metabolic status of a tumor. Therefore, assessment of tumor microcirculation may augment the individual risk profile in cervical cancer patients and has the potential to impact on therapy selection and treatment outcome. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 1999;10:267–276. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
In vivo antitumor effect of the mTOR inhibitor CCI‐779 and gemcitabine in xenograft models of human pancreatic cancer

Mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) is considered to be a major effector of cell growth and proliferation that controls protein synthesis through a large number of downstream targets. We investigated the expression of the phosphatidylinositol 3′‐kinase (PI3K)/mTOR signaling pathway in human pancreatic cancer cells and tissues, and the in vivo antitumor effects of the mTOR inhibitor CCI‐779 with/without gemcitabine in xenograft models of human pancreatic cancer. We found that the Akt, mTOR and p70 S6 kinase (S6K1) from the PI3K/mTOR signaling pathway were activated in all of the pancreatic cancer cell lines examined. When surgically resected tissue specimens of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma were examined, phosphorylation of Akt, mTOR and S6K1 was detected in 50, 55 and 65% of the specimens, respectively. Although CCI‐779 had no additive or synergistic antiproliferative effect when combined with gemcitabine in vitro, it showed significant antitumor activity in the AsPC‐1 subcutaneous xenograft model as both a single agent and in combination with gemictabine. Furthermore, in the Suit‐2 peritoneal dissemination xenograft model, the combination of these 2 drugs achieved significantly better survival when compared with CCI‐779 or gemcitabine alone. These results demonstrate promising activity of the mTOR inhibitor CCI‐779 against human pancreatic cancer, and suggest that the inhibition of mTOR signaling can be exploited as a potentially tumor‐selective therapeutic strategy. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
An Optimization for Distance Estimation in Real-Time with DM 6437

The passive ranging system on monocular has earned its bright application prospect in modern opto-electronic countermeasures and traffic monitoring. This technology is characterized by using the imaging direction and the distance-related features in the target image to estimate distance by solving a proper equation . The distance-related features could be obtained by making use of complex image processing algorithms . Limited by the complexity and time-consuming of the algorithm, to realize such an algorithm in real-time is much difficult. To solve this problem, in addition to using high-performance image processing chip, optimization on program body is also a quite effective method. Taking into account the hardware characteristics of DM6437, the DSP chip, a simplified [3] Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT ) image matching algorithm was developed. On the other hand, a lot of effort has been done for optimization subroutine itself based on the characteristics of C64x+ DSP core, such as using intermediate variables, intrinsic operations, word access to short type data, the compiler settings, software pipelining and linear assembly. It is showed by our final experiments that the operation speed has been significantly improved. For an image sequence with size of 256×256 pixels, the operation speed was improved from 4 seconds per frame to 25 frames per second, which meets the requirements of real-time location algorithm perfectly while the ranging error is less than 7%.