Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Study of Adenosine-Deaminase Genetic Polymorphism in Rheumatoid Arthritis

Recent investigations suggest that Adenosine Deaminase (ADA) could play a role in susceptibility to rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The purpose of our study is to investigate the possible role of genetic variability of ADA in the susceptibility to RA. We studied three intragenic ADA polymorphisms, ADA1, ADA2 and ADA6, in a sample of 91 subjects with RA and in 246 healthy subjects from the same Caucasian population and compared genotype and pairwise haplotype distributions between cases and controls. No statistically significant differences between RA and controls are observed for ADA genotypes. A border line difference for ADA1-ADA2 haplotype distribution is observed due to a decreased proportion of ADA1*2/ADA2*2 haplotype in RA compared to controls. Our data indicate a border line effect of ADA gene polymorphism on susceptibility to RA that need to be confirmed in other clinical settings.
ACC/AHA/ASE 2003 Guideline Update for the Clinical Application of Echocardiography: summary article. A report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines (ACC/AHA/ASE Committee to Update the 1997 Guidelines for the Clinical Application of Echoca

The previous guideline for the use of echocardiography was published in March 1997. Since that time, there have been significant advances in the technology of echocardiography and growth in its clinical use and in the scientific evidence leading to recommendations for its proper use. Each section has been reviewed and updated in evidence tables, and where appropriate, changes have been made in recommendations. A new section on the use of intraoperative transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) is being added to update the guidelines published by the American Society of Anesthesiologists and the Society of Cardiovascular Anesthesiologists. There are extensive revisions, especially of the sections on ischemic heart disease; congestive heart failure, cardiomyopathy, and assessment of left ventricular (LV) function; and screening and echocardiography in the critically ill. There are new tables of evidence and extensive revisions in the ischemic heart disease evidence tables. Because of space limitations, only those sections and evidence tables with new recommendations will be printed in this summary article. Where there are minimal changes in a recommendation grouping, such as a change from Class IIa to Class I, only that change will be printed, not the entire set of recommendations. Advances for which the clinical applications are still being investigated, such as the use of myocardial contrast agents and three-dimensional echocardiography, will not be discussed. The original recommendations of the 1997 guideline are based on a Medline search of the English literature from 1990 to May 1995. The original search yielded more than 3000 references, which the committee reviewed. For this guideline update, literature searching was conducted in Medline, EMBASE, Best Evidence, and the Cochrane Library for English-language meta-analyses and systematic reviews from 1995 through September 2001. Further searching was conducted for new clinical trials on the following topics: echocardiography in adult congenital heart disease, echocardiography for evaluation …
ADEPT: Addition of the AT1 receptor antagonist eprosartan to ACE inhibitor therapy in chronic heart failure trial: hemodynamic and neurohormonal effects.

BACKGROUND Persistent activation of the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone-system (RAAS) is known to occur in patients with chronic heart failure (CHF) despite treatment with angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor (ACE) therapy. When added to ACE inhibitors, angiotensin II type 1 (AT1) antagonists may allow more complete blockade of the RAAS and preserve the beneficial effects of bradykinin accumulation not seen with AT1 receptor blockade alone. METHODS Thirty-six patients with stable New York Heart Association class II-IV CHF receiving ACE inhibitor therapy were randomly assigned in a double-blind manner to receive either eprosartan, a specific competitive AT1 receptor antagonist (400 to 800 mg daily, n = 18) or placebo (n = 18) for 8 weeks. The primary outcome measure was left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) as measured by radionuclide ventriculography, and secondary measures were central hemodynamics assessed by Swan-Ganz catheterization and neurohormonal effects. RESULTS There was no change in LVEF with eprosartan therapy (mean relative LVEF percentage change [SEM] +10.5% [9.3] vs +10.1% [5.0], respectively; difference, 0.4; 95% confidence interval [CI], -20.8 to 21.7; P =.97). Eprosartan was associated with a significant reduction in diastolic blood pressure and a trend toward a reduction in systolic blood pressure compared with placebo (-7.3 mm Hg [95% CI, -14.2 to -0.4] diastolic; -8.9 mm Hg [95% CI, -18.6 to 0.8] systolic). No significant change in heart rate or central hemodynamics occurred during treatment with eprosartan compared with placebo. A trend toward an increase in plasma renin activity was noted with eprosartan therapy. Eprosartan was well tolerated, with an adverse event profile similar to placebo, whereas kidney function remained unchanged. CONCLUSIONS When added to an ACE inhibitor, eprosartan reduced arterial pressure without increasing heart rate. There was no change in LVEF after 2 months of therapy with eprosartan.
Viewing behaviour of spider phobics and non-phobics in the presence of threat and safety stimuli.

OBJECTIVES To determine whether spider phobics and spider non-phobics differ in attending to threat and safety stimuli in close proximity, or spatially separated. METHOD A sample group of 16 spider-phobic and 16 spider-non-phobic volunteers were drawn from a student population on the basis of their scores on Watts and Sharrock's Spider Phobia Questionnaire. Attention was assessed by way of participants' viewing behaviour using an ASL 501 head-mounted eye-tracking system. In a control condition, participants viewed a neutral stimulus (a TV video) in the absence of the threat stimulus. In two experimental conditions, the threat stimulus (a live Chilean rose tarantula) was introduced (a) immediately beside the safety stimulus (the only exit of the experimental room), or (b) away from the safety stimulus. RESULTS In the experimental conditions, phobics reduced their viewing of the TV and increased their viewing of the tarantula and of the exit; the biggest changes occurred when tarantula and exit were together. Phobics also made more eye motions across the experimental room. CONCLUSION Our results are consistent with previous research employing reaction time to a neutral stimulus as dependent measure. In addition, our results suggest that phobics scan the environment as part of safety behaviour. We suggest that exposure treatments to reduce spider phobia may be facilitated by encouraging patients to stop environmental scanning.
People Detection and Re-Identification in Complex Environments

This paper presents an automatic system for detecting and re-identifying people moving in different sites with non-overlapping views. We first propose an automatic process for silhouette extraction based on the combination of an adaptive background subtraction algorithm and a motion detection module. Such a combination takes advantage of both approaches and is able to tackle the problem of particular environments. The silhouette extraction results are then clustered based on their spatial belonging and colorimetric characteristics in order to preserve only the key regions that effectively represent the appearance of a person. The next important step consists in characterizing the extracted silhouettes by the appearance-based signatures. Our proposed descriptor, which includes both color and spatial feature of objects, leads to satisfying results compared to other descriptors in the literature. Since the passage of a person needs to be characterized by multiple frames, a large quantity of data has to be processed. Thus, a graph-based algorithm is used to realize the comparison of passages of people in front of cameras and to make the final decision of re-identification. The global system is tested on two real and difficult data sets recorded in very different environments. The experimental results show that our proposed system leads to very satisfactory results.
Mouse Features for DDoS Attacks Detection in the Application Layer

DDoS attacks are a threat to the security of the network. In recent years these attacks have been directed especially against the application layer. This phenomenon is mainly due to the large number of existing tools available for the easy generation of this type of attack. The methods used in the application layer reach detection rates of between 98.5 and 98.32%. Therefore, the problem of detecting DDoS attacks persists. In this work we propose a detection alternative based on the dynamism of the web user. To do this, two mouse characteristics are evaluated: movement and right click. A dataset of 11055 applications was also used, from which the two characteristics were extracted and entered into a classification algorithm. To this end, a Java application was developed for the classification of real users and those behind DDoS attacks. The results show that the proposed characteristics achieve an efficiency of 100%. It is concluded that these characteristics reveal the dynamism of the user and can be used as a method of detection of DDoS attacks.
Financial Statements Demystified: A Self-Teaching Guide

QUESTIONS about STATEMENTS? Find All the Answers Here! Are you considering buying a small business? Do you want to invest in a Fortune 500 company? Are you trying to sell your own business? Balance sheets and income statements are essential to helping you make informed decisions regarding important business transactions. But unless you're an accountant, these documents can be intimidating hodgepodges of columns, rows, and numbers. Don't fret. Financial Statements Demystified is just the tool you need. Devoid of confusing business jargon, this engaging and easy-to-follow guide defines basic financial statement terminology and explains the components of the four most common financial statements: Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Statement of Stockholders' Equity, and Statement of Cash Flows. You will learn how to read, interpret, and use pivotal data from these sources--each of which will help you make accurate financial decisions without having to go back to school. This confusion-busting guide covers: An overview of financial statements--what they are and what they tell us Easy-to-understand explanations of profit and loss Statement of cash flows and special reporting issues How to spot fraudulently misstated financial statements Quizzes at the end of each chapter to help test your knowledge Simple enough for a novice but in-depth enough for a seasoned investor, Financial Statements Demystified will help you understand the four main financial statements.
Building Social Capital : A Learning Agenda for the Twenty-® rst Century

Social capital creates local economic prosperity. This ® nding by Putnam (1993a), Fukuyama (1995), Coleman (1988, 1990) and other social scientists has lent legitimacy to what those involved in community economic development have known intuitively for years: the level of inter-personal trust, civic engagement and organisational capability in a community counts. Their research indicates that the lack of, or decline in, social capital lies behind the psychological, spiritual and economic malaise in communities throughout the world. While there is a rich literature deploring the lack of civic commitment and the rise of individualism (Bellah et al., 1985, 1991; Etzioni, 1994; Lappe and DuBois, 1994), the social capital literature gives the issue a more compelling rationale for urgency: the bottom line. Just as the inter-personal aspects of total quality management (TQM) ushered in trustbuilding and team-building to the private and public sectors (Deming, 1982; Osborne and Gaebler, 1992), the concept of social capital brings these same values centre stage in the so-called third sector: civil society. The recognition of social capital as a determinant of local economic development directs the attention of development planners to a very intangible goal. In addition to creating jobs, disbursing loans, generating income, training the labour force and delivering services, development planners must now confront head on the fuzzy task of shaping levels of inter-personal trust, feelings of belonging and responsibility, and the quality and ef® cacy of civic engagement in a community. These intangibles can no longer be relegated to quaint touchy-feely by-products of community economic development. A central task for development planners is now social capital formationÐ i.e. communitybuilding itself.
Population-Based Sample Reveals Gene–Gender Interactions in Blood Pressure in White Americans

The influence of genetic contributors, such as common single nucleotide polymorphisms, on blood pressure and essential hypertension may vary with the gender. We used the power of a large, community-based sample to probe whether gender interacts with genes in contributing to extremes of blood pressure in 611 male and 656 female age-matched white Americans within the top and bottom 5th percentiles of blood pressure among >53 000 people in a health maintenance program. This approach has >90% statistical power to detect genes contributing as little as 3% to trait (blood pressure) variation. We scored ≈60 000 genotypes in the subjects: 48 single nucleotide polymorphisms at 33 autosomal and 2 X-linked genes in adrenergic and renal pathways that regulate blood pressure. Six individual variants significantly affected blood pressure and demonstrated gene-by-gender interaction, yielding different effects of the single nucleotide polymorphism on blood pressure in males and females. In females, polymorphisms at β1-adrenergic receptor and α2A-adrenergic receptor contributed to blood pressure, whereas in men, polymorphisms at β2-adrenergic receptor and angiotensinogen were associated. An α2A-adrenergic receptor haplotype influenced blood pressure in women, whereas 2 angiotensinogen haplotypes were associated in men. We also detected gene-by-gene, gender-specific interactions (epistasis) in pathophysiological pathways. This study reveals gender-specific effects of single nucleotide polymorphisms, haplotypes, and gene-by-gene interactions that determine blood pressure in white Americans. Such genetic variants may define genetically and etiologically distinct subgroups of men and women with essential hypertension and may have implications for rational treatment selection.
Hierarchical verification of chip-level ESD design rules

Verification of net-oriented ESD rules is rapidly becoming critical for nanometer design. To meet chip-level complexity and size challenges, a novel approach using topology-aware net types is developed to enable fast, hierarchical verification. This is applied to ESD design rules for power/ground interfaces and successfully adopted in production verification flows.
Effects of Chinese Jianpi herbs on cell apoptosis and related gene expression in human gastric cancer grafted onto nude mice.

AIM To explore the mechanism of the Sijunzi decoction and another Chinese herbal recipe (SRRS) based mainly on the Sijunzi decoction in treatment of gastric cancer. METHODS A human gastric adenocarcinoma cell line SGC-7901 grafted onto nude mouse was used as the animal model. The mice were divided into 3 groups, one control and the two representative experimental conditions. Animals in the two experimental groups received either Sijunzi decoction or SRRS over a 40-day period starting at 1st day after grafting. Control animals received saline on an identical schedule. Animals were killed 41 days after being grafted. The effect of therapy was assessed by two ways: (1) tumor size was periodically measured during the life of the animals; (2) tumor weight was determined by a electron balance immediately after the animals killed. For detection of apoptotic cells, apoptotic indices(AI) were examined by the terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase-mediated deoxyuridine triphosphate fluorescence nick end labeling (TUNEL) method. Morphological alterations were observed with electron microscopy. S-P immunohistochemical method was used to detect the expression of Ki-67 in xenografts. Expression of bcl-2 and p53 was semiquantitatively detected using a reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) technique. RESULTS When compared with controls, tumor growth (size and weight) was significantly inhibited by treatment with the Sijunzi decoction (P<0.05) or SRRS (P<0.01). The tumor inhibitory rate in the Sijunzi decoction group was 34.33 % and SRRS group 46.53 %. AI of human gastric cancer xenografts in nude mice was significantly increased to 16.24+/-3.21 % using TUNEL method and 11.38+/-6.46 % by FACScan in the Sijunzi decoction group compared with the controls (TUNEL: 2.63+/-1.03 %, P<0.01; FACScan: 7.15+/- 1.32 %, P<0.05). SRRS group was also found a significantly increased AI by using TUNEL method and flow cytometry analysis compared with the controls (TUNEL: 13.18+/-3.05 %, P<0.05; FACScan: 11.58+/-5.71 % (P<0.05). Under electron microscope, cell shrinkage, nuclear chromatin condensation, formation of membrane blebs and apoptotic bodies were frequently observed in Sijunzi decoction group and SRRS group. The average labeling index (LI) for Ki-67 in SRRS group was significantly decreased to 8.43+/-2.22 % compared with the control group (10.37+/-4.91 %) (P<0.05). The average labeling index for Ki-67 in sijunzi decoction group was 7.95+/- 2.54 % which was lower than that of the control group, but showed no significance (P=0.07). The expression level of p53 mRNA was lower in both Sijunzi decoction group and SRRS group than that in control group (P<0.05; P<0.01). The expression of bcl-2 mRNA was also decreased in SRRS group compared with the control (P<0.01). CONCLUSION The inhibition of gastric cancer cell growth in vivo by Chinese Jianpi herbs and SRRS is related to induction of the cell apoptosis which may be involved in aberrant expression of p53 and bcl-2 genes.
Multi-objective optimisation and decision-making of space station logistics strategies

ABSTRACT Space station logistics strategy optimisation is a complex engineering problem with multiple objectives. Finding a decision-maker-preferred compromise solution becomes more significant when solving such a problem. However, the designer-preferred solution is not easy to determine using the traditional method. Thus, a hybrid approach that combines the multi-objective evolutionary algorithm, physical programming, and differential evolution (DE) algorithm is proposed to deal with the optimisation and decision-making of space station logistics strategies. A multi-objective evolutionary algorithm is used to acquire a Pareto frontier and help determine the range parameters of the physical programming. Physical programming is employed to convert the four-objective problem into a single-objective problem, and a DE algorithm is applied to solve the resulting physical programming-based optimisation problem. Five kinds of objective preference are simulated and compared. The simulation results indicate that the proposed approach can produce good compromise solutions corresponding to different decision-makers’ preferences.
Job creation by local initiatives: effects of special zones for structural reform

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of deregulation policies initiated by local government on the creation of local employment. When local governments, such as prefectural and municipal governments tried to implement an industrial or employment policy in Japan, nationwide systems and regulations were treated as given conditions in the past. In the case where any discriminating system (for example, tax system) was applied, it was usually introduced as part of the regional development policy initiated by the central government. In this sense, the “special zones for structural reform,” which has continued up to now since the first special zone was approved in 2003, is an entirely new attempt that seeks to revitalize local economies by introducing the “special zones where exceptions to unified regulations are applied in response to regional characteristics and on the basis of the ideas created voluntarily by local authorities or private business firms. ” In the process of approving special zones for structural reform, desires for deregulation related to a proposal of the special zone are brought to the Office
Automatic brain tumor segmentation based on features of separated local square

Brain tumor segmentation from magnetic resonance images is a critical step for early tumor diagnosis and treatment. However, accurate and general segmentation of brain tumor is still a challenging task due to complicated characteristics of brain tumor in magnetic resonance images. To solve this problem, we proposed a novel method for brain tumor segmentation based on features of separated local square. The proposed method basically consists of three steps: superpixel segmentation, feature extraction and segmentation model construction. In the first step, the superpixel segmentation algorithm was used to partition an image into homogeneous regions with approximately similar characteristics and size. In the second step, gray statistical characteristic and texture features were extracted. Finally, by applying support vector machine (SVM), superpixels were classified as either tumor regions or nontumor regions in the segmentation model construction step. The brain tumor segmentation method takes the advantage of the superpixel-wise features and the ability of SVM. For verifying the proposed method, we select 20 images from BRATS 2013 dataset. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness and robustness of our proposed method.
A new grid-connected PV system based on cascaded H-bridge quasi-Z source inverter

A new scheme for grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) interface by combination of a quasi-Z source inverter (qZSI) into cascaded H-bridge (CHB) is proposed in this paper. The proposed scheme enables PV string voltage boost to a higher level, and solves the imbalance problem of DC-link voltage in traditional CHB inverters. A multilevel voltage waveform of inverter output is generated by an improved phase shifted sinusoidal pulse width modulation (PS-SPWM) algorithm, which introduces shoot-through states into the conventional zero states to control qZS-CHB module. The effective control schemes are proposed to regulate the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) of each string, and control the DC-link voltage of each H-bridge, respectively. Grid injected power is controlled corresponding to the proportionality factors of each PV string output power. A 1.5 kW system is built in MATLAB/SIMULINK, and the simulation results verify the proposed novel multilevel PV interface inverter and its control principles.