Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Relationship Between Carotid Artery Stiffness and Retinal Arteriolar Narrowing in Healthy Middle-Aged Persons

Background and Purpose— Both carotid atherosclerosis and cerebral arteriolosclerosis are associated with stroke. However, the relationship between carotid atherosclerosis and cerebral arteriolosclerosis is unknown. We examined the association between carotid artery stiffness, a marker of early atherosclerosis, and retinal arteriolar narrowing, a marker of arteriolosclerosis, in healthy middle-aged people. Methods— This population-based, cross-sectional study involved 8031 men and women 45 to 64 years of age. Carotid arterial stiffness was estimated from high-resolution ultrasonic echo tracking of the left common carotid artery and was defined as adjusted arterial diameter change (AADC, &mgr;, adjusted for diastolic blood pressure, pulse pressure and pulse pressure squared, and diastolic arterial diameter and height, with smaller AADC reflecting greater arterial stiffness). Generalized retinal arteriolar narrowing was estimated from measurements of diameters of retinal vessels from digitized retinal photographs and summarized as the arteriole-to-venule ratio (AVR, with smaller AVR indicating greater retinal arteriolar narrowing). Results— After controlling for age, sex, ethnicity, hypertension, diabetes, and cigarette smoking, decreasing AADC was associated with decreasing AVR. The mean AADCs, comparing the lowest and highest quartiles of AVR, were 394 (SE, 4) and 409 (SE, 4) &mgr;, respectively (P <0.01). The pattern of the graded association between carotid arterial stiffness and generalized retinal arteriolar narrowing was similar among persons with and without hypertension. Conclusions— Greater stiffness of the carotid arteries is related to generalized narrowing of the retinal arterioles independent of blood pressure and other vascular factors. This supports a relationship between macrovascular and microvascular disease processes important in stroke pathogenesis.
Implementation and Performance Analysis of SEAL Encryption on FPGA, GPU and Multi-core Processors

Accelerators, such as field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and graphics processing units (GPUs), are special purpose processors designed to speed up compute-intensive sections of applications. FPGAs are highly customizable, while GPUs provide massive parallel execution resources and high memory bandwidth. In this paper, we compare the performance of these architectures, presenting a performance study of SEAL, a fast, software-oriented encryption algorithm on a Virtex-6 FPGA, a Graphics Processor Unit (GPU), and Intel Core i7, a 2-way hyper-threaded, 4-core processor. We show that each platform has relative competitive advantages in encrypting an input plaintext using SEAL.
Randomized controlled trial of the effect on Quality of Life of second- vs first-generation antipsychotic drugs in schizophrenia: Cost Utility of the Latest Antipsychotic Drugs in Schizophrenia Study (CUtLASS 1).

CONTEXT Second-generation (atypical) antipsychotics (SGAs) are more expensive than first-generation (typical) antipsychotics (FGAs) but are perceived to be more effective, with fewer adverse effects, and preferable to patients. Most evidence comes from short-term efficacy trials of symptoms. OBJECTIVE To test the hypothesis that in people with schizophrenia requiring a change in treatment, SGAs other than clozapine are associated with improved quality of life across 1 year compared with FGAs. DESIGN A noncommercially funded, pragmatic, multisite, randomized controlled trial of antipsychotic drug classes, with blind assessments at 12, 26, and 56 weeks using intention-to-treat analysis. SETTING Fourteen community psychiatric services in the English National Health Service. PARTICIPANTS Two hundred twenty-seven people aged 18 to 65 years with DSM-IV schizophrenia and related disorders assessed for medication review because of inadequate response or adverse effects. INTERVENTIONS Randomized prescription of either FGAs or SGAs (other than clozapine), with the choice of individual drug made by the managing psychiatrist. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Quality of Life Scale scores, symptoms, adverse effects, participant satisfaction, and costs of care. RESULTS The primary hypothesis of significant improvement in Quality of Life Scale scores during the year after commencement of SGAs vs FGAs was excluded. Participants in the FGA arm showed a trend toward greater improvements in Quality of Life Scale and symptom scores. Participants reported no clear preference for either drug group; costs were similar. CONCLUSIONS In people with schizophrenia whose medication is changed for clinical reasons, there is no disadvantage across 1 year in terms of quality of life, symptoms, or associated costs of care in using FGAs rather than nonclozapine SGAs. Neither inadequate power nor patterns of drug discontinuation accounted for the result.
CMOS data converters for communications [Book Reviews]

CIRCUIT ANALYSIS By J. David Irwin and C.H. Wu. Prentice Hall, 1999,976 pages. (ISBN 013792714-2) Basic Engineering Circuit Analysis by J. David Irwin and C.H. Wu is an introductory textbook to electrical engineering circuit analysis suitable for students in many engineering disciplines, including electrical engineering, computer engineering, and computer science. It provides a solid foundation of basic electrical concepts and circuits. A broad range of topics are covered in well-organized, self-contained parts starting from all the basic concepts in electrical engineering and circuit analysis to more sophisticated, specialized topics. The materials covered include components, Ohm’s law, Kirchhoffs laws, series and parallel c i r c u i t s , noda l a n d loop analysis , Thevenin’s and Norton’s equivalent circuits, resistive and reactive circuits, trans i e n t analysis , a c c i r c u i t analysis , poly-phase circuits, mutual inductance, Laplace transform, and Fourier analysis. Several worked examples and applications are included throughout the book, which clarify the theory and strengthen the basic concepts. The integration of relevant up-to-date practical applications emphasizes the usefulness of the material and completes the picture in the student’s minds. The textbook is presented in an excellent and clear way that helps the student and the instructor through the abundance ofworked examples, drill problems and extension exercises, chapter summaries, problem-solving strategies, and practice problems with nice hints. My only remark about this excellent book is to extend the treatment of operational amplifiers and to give introduction to nonlinear electronic circuits. Also, I’d prefer if the book included a simulation tool and more illustrated examples, which are already handled by the author, but in a short way. Finally, the book is very useful and a remarkable contribution to the field of electrical engineering.
Enhancing the low quality images using Unsupervised Colour Correction Method

Underwater images are affected by reduced contrast and non-uniform colour cast due to the absorption and scattering of light in the aquatic environment. This affects the quality and reliability of image processing and therefore colour correction is a necessary pre-processing stage. In this paper, we propose an Unsupervised Colour Correction Method (UCM) for underwater image enhancement. UCM is based on colour balancing, contrast correction of RGB colour model and contrast correction of HSI colour model. Firstly, the colour cast is reduced by equalizing the colour values. Secondly, an enhancement to a contrast correction method is applied to increase the Red colour by stretching red histogram towards the maximum (i.e., right side), similarly the Blue colour is reduced by stretching the blue histogram towards the minimum (i.e., left side). Thirdly, the Saturation and Intensity components of the HSI colour model have been applied for contrast correction to increase the true colour using Saturation and to address the illumination problem through Intensity. We compare our results with three well known methods, namely Gray World, White Patch and Histogram Equalisation using Adobe Photoshop. The proposed method has produced better results than the existing methods.
Automatic Lighting System Using Multiple Robotic Lamps

Intelligent lighting refers to stage lighting that has automated or mechanical abilities beyond those of traditional, stationary illumination. Although the most advanced intelligent lights can produce extraordinarily complex effects, the intelligence lies with the programmer of the show rather than the instruments or the lighting operator. For this reason, intelligent lighting is also known as automated lighting, moving lights or moving heads. This paper proposes Global System for Mobile Communications [GSM] based security system and automatic lighting system by using 3 degree of freedom [DOF] spherical type Robotic lamp. This integrated security system can provide motion in 3 directions for illuminating, tracking and capturing the movements of the human in confined area as well as to send an additional SMS alert to the concerned authority . The robotic lamp consists of three stepper motors for controlling the direction of orientation and also to control the intensity of light by zooming in and out. Also, it has infrared sensor to identify the location of person. The actuation of motor is done using microcontroller based system. When sensors of the security integrated system detect a person, signals are transmitted to the microcontroller to control the actuation of the motors, and sends SMS to the mobile number through the GSM. Lamp will illuminate, track and captures the movements of the human body. The two major functions of this integrated system are illuminating, tracking and recording the exact location of a person in the security enabled area and instantaneous sending of SMS alert to the concerned telephone number. ,
A SIMPLE HARDWARE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE TABU SEARCH HEURISTIC FOR DSP APPLICATIONS

Tabu Search heuristic is an optimization technique suitable for many DSP applications such as finite word length filter design or adaptive, linear or non-linear filters. In this paper a simple hardware implementation of the proposed algorithm is presented in order to try to tackle its main and well known bottleneck due to a high computational load. The presented system can be addressed to many DSP applications where we are supposed to solve an optimization task.
Mitochondrial genome phylogeny among Asiatic black bear Ursus thibetanus subspecies and comprehensive analysis of their control regions

The complete mitochondrial genome (16,824 bp) of an Asiatic black bear Ursus thibetanus ussuricus (Mammalia, Carnivora, Ursidae) was newly sequenced and characterized in detail. It is the second mitochondrial genome from this subspecies which has been completely sequenced. The two U. t. ussuricus individuals were compared with each other and then with individuals from the other four U. thibetanus subspecies and the other nine ursid species, focusing especially on the control regions in the 14 mitochondrial genomes. Within these control regions, tandem repeats of basically 10 bp (5′-ACGCACGTGT-3′ or its derivatives) were found in Domain II. Plausible secondary structures of the repeat region were compared between the North and South Korean individuals of U. t. ussuricus. According to the maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference trees inferred from the nucleotide sequences of 13 protein-coding and two rRNA genes, the ursine members within the monophyletic ursid clade can be divided into at least three groups: A, B, and C. According to this analysis, U. thibetanus subspecies were found with Ursus americanus and Ursus malayanus within Group A, showing the following relationships with nodal bootstrap values above 91% and Bayesian posterior probabilities of 1.00: ([(U. t. thibetanus, U. t. formosanus), U. t. spp. ], U. t. ussuricus), U. t. mupinensis. In addition, we present a hypothetical scenario of the evolution of the major repeat motifs in the control region.
Extracellular Signal-regulated Kinases 1/2 Are Serum-stimulated “BimEL Kinases” That Bind to the BH3-only Protein BimEL Causing Its Phosphorylation and Turnover*

Bim, a “BH3-only” protein, is expressed de novo following withdrawal of serum survival factors and promotes cell death. We have shown previously that activation of the ERK1/2 pathway promotes phosphorylation of BimEL, targeting it for degradation via the proteasome. However, the nature of the kinase responsible for BimEL phosphorylation remained unclear. We now show that BimEL is phosphorylated on at least three sites in response to activation of the ERK1/2 pathway. By using the peptidylprolyl isomerase, Pin1, as a probe for proline-directed phosphorylation, we show that ERK1/2-dependent phosphorylation of BimEL occurs at (S/T)P motifs. ERK1/2 phosphorylates BimEL, but not BimS or BimL, in vitro, and mutation of Ser65 to alanine blocks the phosphorylation of BimEL by ERK1/2 in vitro and in vivo and prevents the degradation of the protein following activation of the ERK1/2 pathway. We also find that ERK1/2, but not JNK, can physically associate with GST-BimEL, but not GST-BimL or GST-BimS, in vitro. ERK1/2 also binds to full-length BimEL in vivo, and we have localized a potential ERK1/2 “docking domain” lying within a 27-amino acid stretch of the BimEL protein. Our findings provide new insights into the post-translational regulation of BimEL and the role of the ERK1/2 pathway in cell survival signaling.
A Proximity-Aware Load Balancing Algorithm in P2P Systems

In structured P2P systems, the heterogeneity of node capacity and semantic relativity of keys can cause load imbalance among nodes. Aiming at the problem of tasks distributed unbalancedly among nodes in large-scale DHT networks, an efficient proximity - aware algorithm is presented in this paper. The node with light load constructs a star-like structure with other nodes physically close to it. The physical location information is generated by network positioning algorithm. And then, load can be transferred within the star-like structure. Simulation experiments show that the algorithm can achieve good load balance and the load movement cost reduction rate is above 40%.
Molecular techniques for the detection of Chlamydia trachomatis

A DNA probe assay (PACE; Gen-Probe, San Diego, Calif.) was compared with a culture reference method for the detection of Chlamydia trachomatis. Using stock isolates of each of the 15 serovars (A to K, Ba, L1, L2, and L3) of C. trachomatis, the lower limit of sensitivity for the DNA probe ranged between 1,086 inclusion-forming units (IFU) for serovar E (Bour) to 2,930 IFU for serovar L1 (440), with the only exception being serovar C (TW-3), with which 99 IFU was detected. There was no cross-reactivity with Chlamydia psittaci (Texas turkey) and Chlamydia pneumoniae (TWAR-183). Bacterial and fungal isolates representing 14 species of normal vaginal flora as well as Neisseria gonorrhoeae gave negative results with the DNA probe when tested at a level of 1.5 X 10(7) CFU/ml. In addition, the DNA probe, a direct fluorescent-antibody stain (DFA) (MicroTrak; Syva Corp., Palo Alto, Calif.), and an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (Chlamydiazyme; Abbott Laboratories, North Chicago, Ill.) were compared with culture for the detection of C. trachomatis, using 196 clinical cervical samples. Of the 196 samples, 20 (10%) were culture positive. Of the 176 culture-negative samples, 1 was not evaluated by DNA probe and 4, because of a lack of cellular material, were not evaluated by DFA. The sensitivities of the DNA probe, DFA, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay were 60, 75, and 85%, respectively, and specificities were 95, 99, and 97%, respectively. Of the false-positive direct results, there was only one specimen with which more than one direct method was positive, and with this specimen all three direct methods were positive. The majority of false-negative results by the direct methods were from specimens which by the culture method gave <100 IFU per culture.
Endogenous VEGF Is Required for Visual Function: Evidence for a Survival Role on Müller Cells and Photoreceptors

Background Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is well known for its role in normal and pathologic neovascularization. However, a growing body of evidence indicates that VEGF also acts on non-vascular cells, both developmentally as well as in the adult. In light of the widespread use of systemic and intraocular anti-VEGF therapies for the treatment of angiogenesis associated with tumor growth and wet macular degeneration, systematic investigation of the role of VEGF in the adult retina is critical. Methods and Findings Using immunohistochemistry and Lac-Z reporter mouse lines, we report that VEGF is produced by various cells in the adult mouse retina and that VEGFR2, the primary signaling receptor, is also widely expressed, with strong expression by Müller cells and photoreceptors. Systemic neutralization of VEGF was accomplished in mice by adenoviral expression of sFlt1. After 14 days of VEGF neutralization, there was no effect on the inner and outer retina vasculature, but a significant increase in apoptosis of cells in the inner and outer nuclear layers. By four weeks, the increase in neural cell death was associated with reduced thickness of the inner and outer nuclear layers and a decline in retinal function as measured by electroretinograms. siRNA-based suppression of VEGF expression in a Müller cell line in vitro supports the existence of an autocrine role for VEGF in Müller cell survival. Similarly, the addition of exogenous VEGF to freshly isolated photoreceptor cells and outer-nuclear-layer explants demonstrated VEGF to be highly neuroprotective. Conclusions These results indicate an important role for endogenous VEGF in the maintenance and function of adult retina neuronal cells and indicate that anti-VEGF therapies should be administered with caution.
COLOMBOS: Access Port for Cross-Platform Bacterial Expression Compendia

Background Microarrays are the main technology for large-scale transcriptional gene expression profiling, but the large bodies of data available in public databases are not useful due to the large heterogeneity. There are several initiatives that attempt to bundle these data into expression compendia, but such resources for bacterial organisms are scarce and limited to integration of experiments from the same platform or to indirect integration of per experiment analysis results. Methodology/Principal Findings We have constructed comprehensive organism-specific cross-platform expression compendia for three bacterial model organisms (Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis, and Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium) together with an access portal, dubbed COLOMBOS, that not only provides easy access to the compendia, but also includes a suite of tools for exploring, analyzing, and visualizing the data within these compendia. It is freely available at http://bioi.biw. kuleuven.be/colombos. The compendia are unique in directly combining expression information from different microarray platforms and experiments, and we illustrate the potential benefits of this direct integration with a case study: extending the known regulon of the Fur transcription factor of E. coli. The compendia also incorporate extensive annotations for both genes and experimental conditions; these heterogeneous data are functionally integrated in the COLOMBOS analysis tools to interactively browse and query the compendia not only for specific genes or experiments, but also metabolic pathways, transcriptional regulation mechanisms, experimental conditions, biological processes, etc. Conclusions/Significance We have created cross-platform expression compendia for several bacterial organisms and developed a complementary access port COLOMBOS, that also serves as a convenient expression analysis tool to extract useful biological information. This work is relevant to a large community of microbiologists by facilitating the use of publicly available microarray experiments to support their research.
Handling Outlandish Occurrences: Using Rules and Lexicons for Correcting NLP Articles

This article describes the experiments we performed during our participation in the HOO Challenge. We present the adaption we made on two systems, mainly designing new grammatical rules and completing a lexicon. We focused our work on some of the most common errors in the corpus: missing punctuation and inaccurate prepositions. Our best experiment achieved a 0.1097 detection score, a 0.0820 recognition score, and a 0.0557 correction score on the test corpus.
Fingerprint Based Single-Site Localization for Massive MIMO-OFDM Systems

Fingerprint techniques are promising localization strategies in rich scattering environments, such as urban areas and indoor corridors. However, most existing approaches rely on multiple base station (BS) cooperation and suffer from multipath propagation. In this paper, we propose a fingerprint based single-site localization method for massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) systems. The new angle delay channel power matrix (ADCPM) fingerprint is extracted from instantaneous channel state information (CSI) by taking full advantage of the high resolution in the angle and delay domains for massive MIMO-OFDM systems. The applicable fingerprint similarity criterion，, as well as location estimation method, are proposed to reduce measurement, storage, and matching overheads. Numerical results demonstrate the desirable performance of the proposed localization method.
Increasing Visual Search Accuracy by Being Watched

In daily life, huge costs can arise from just one incorrect performance on a visual search task (e.g., a fatal accident due to a driver overlooking a pedestrian). One potential way to prevent such drastic accidents would be for people to modify their decision criterion (e.g., placing a greater priority on accuracy rather than speed) during a visual search. The aim of the present study was to manipulate the criterion by creating an awareness of being watched by another person. During a visual search task, study participants were watched (or not watched) via video cameras and monitors. The results showed that, when they believed they were being watched by another person, they searched more slowly and accurately, as measured by reaction times and hit/miss rates. These findings also were obtained when participants were videotaped and they believed their recorded behavior would be watched by another person in the future. The study primarily demonstrated the role of being watched by another on the modulation of the decision criterion for responding during visual searches.