Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modifying effect of calcium/magnesium intake ratio and mortality: a population-based cohort study

Objectives Magnesium (Mg) and calcium (Ca) antagonise each other in (re)absorption, inflammation and many other physiological activities. Based on mathematical estimation, the absorbed number of Ca or Mg depends on the dietary ratio of Ca to Mg intake. We hypothesise that the dietary Ca/Mg ratio modifies the effects of Ca and Mg on mortality due to gastrointestinal tract cancer and, perhaps, mortality due to diseases occurring in other organs or systems. Design Prospective studies. Setting Population-based cohort studies (The Shanghai Women's Health Study and the Shanghai Men's Health Study) conducted in Shanghai, China. Participants 74 942 Chinese women aged 40–70 years and 61 500 Chinese men aged 40–74 years participated in the study. Primary outcome measures All-cause mortality and disease-specific mortality. Results In this Chinese population with a low Ca/Mg intake ratio (a median of 1.7 vs around 3.0 in US populations), intakes of Mg greater than US Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) levels (320 mg/day among women and 420 mg/day among men) were related to increased risks of total mortality for both women and men. Consistent with our hypothesis, the Ca/Mg intake ratio significantly modified the associations of intakes of Ca and Mg with mortality risk, whereas no significant interactions between Ca and Mg in relation to outcome were found. The associations differed by gender. Among men with a Ca/Mg ratio >1.7, increased intakes of Ca and Mg were associated with reduced risks of total mortality, and mortality due to coronary heart diseases. In the same group, intake of Ca was associated with a reduced risk of mortality due to cancer. Among women with a Ca/Mg ratio ≤1.7, intake of Mg was associated with increased risks of total mortality, and mortality due to cardiovascular diseases and colorectal cancer. Conclusions These results, if confirmed, may help to understand the optimal balance between Ca and Mg in the aetiology and prevention of these common diseases and reduction in mortality.
Enhanced tumor uptake in neuroendocrine tumors after intraarterial application of 131I-MIBG.

UNLABELLED 131I-labeled metaiodobenzylguanidine (MIBG) is an established treatment modality for neuroendocrine tumors. Because of low tumor doses, it has a predominantly palliative character. Our approach was to investigate whether intraarterial application of 131I-MIBG has the potential to enhance tumor uptake. METHODS Seventeen patients with primary or metastasized neuroendocrine tumors received intraarterial treatment with 131I-MIBG, and 12 of these patients also had intravenous treatment. Every patient underwent intravenous 131I-MIBG whole-body scanning before therapy. For quantification, a tumor-to-whole-body ratio was calculated from the diagnostic and 24-h posttreatment scans. RESULTS Compared with the intravenous application, intraarterial 131I-MIBG treatment provided an up to 4-fold higher tumor uptake. Mean uptake was enhanced by 69%, but this varied widely between patients. We did not observe any immediate complications from catheterization. Carcinoid-related side effects were noted in 7 of 17 patients and were not different from those seen with intravenous application. CONCLUSION Intraarterial treatment with 131I-MIBG is a safe alternative to intravenous application and provides a 69% higher mean tumor uptake. We propose to attempt intraarterial MIBG treatment in every patient to assess its potential benefit.
Improving Personalized Ranking in Recommender Systems with Multimodal Interactions

This paper proposes a conceptual framework which uses multimodal user feedback to generate a more accurate personalized ranking of items to the user. Our technique is a response to the actual scenario on the Web, where users can consume content following different interaction paradigms, such as rating, browsing, sharing, etc. We developed a post-processing step to ensemble rankings generated by unimodal-based state-of-art algorithms, using a set of heuristics which analyze the behavior of the user during consumption. We provide an experimental evaluation using the Movie Lens 10M dataset, and the results show that better recommendations can be provided when multimodal interactions are considered for profiling the preferences of the users.
May AI? Design Ideation with Cooperative Contextual Bandits

Design ideation is a prime creative activity in design. However, it is challenging to support computationally due to its quickly evolving and exploratory nature. The paper presents cooperative contextual bandits (CCB) as a machine-learning method for interactive ideation support. A CCB can learn to propose domain-relevant contributions and adapt their exploration/exploitation strategy. We developed a CCB for an interactive design ideation tool that 1) suggests inspirational and situationally relevant materials (“may AI? ”); 2) explores and exploits inspirational materials with the designer; and 3) explains its suggestions to aid reflection. The application case of digital mood board design is presented, wherein visual in-spirational materials are collected and curated in collages. In a controlled study, 14 of 16 professional designers preferred the CCB-augmented tool. The CCB approach holds promise for ideation activities wherein adaptive and steerable support is welcome but designers must retain full outcome control.
A radiometric analysis of projected sinusoidal illumination for opaque surfaces

Shifted sinusoidal illumination patterns are useful for appearance capture because they simultaneously separate local and non-local reflections and allow the recovery of surface geometry. Here we show that the same illumination patterns can be used to estimate the local surface reflectance (BRDF) as well, provided that an appropriate correction factor is applied. We derive a closed-form expression for this correction factor, validate it experimentally, and discuss its implications.
Supermassive black holes in the early universe

ABSTRACT The emergence of the first black holes during the first billion years of cosmic history marks a key event in cosmology. Their formation is part of the overall process of ending the cosmic dark ages, when the first stars appeared in low-mass dark matter haloes about a few 100 million years after the Big Bang. The first stars, galaxies, and black holes transformed the Universe from its simple initial state into one of ever increasing complexity. We review recent progress on our emerging theoretical picture of how the first black holes appeared on the cosmic scene, and how they impacted the subsequent history of the Universe. Our focus is on supermassive black holes, in particular assessing possible pathways to the formation of the billion-solar-mass black holes inferred to power the luminous quasars at high redshifts. We conclude with a discussion of upcoming empirical probes, such as the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), further ahead in time.
Genome-Wide PhoB Binding and Gene Expression Profiles Reveal the Hierarchical Gene Regulatory Network of Phosphate Starvation in Escherichia coli

The phosphate starvation response in bacteria has been studied extensively for the past few decades and the phosphate-limiting signal is known to be mediated via the PhoBR two-component system. However, the global DNA binding profile of the response regulator PhoB and the PhoB downstream responses are currently unclear. In this study, chromatin immunoprecipitation for PhoB was combined with high-density tiling array (ChIP-chip) as well as gene expression microarray to reveal the first global down-stream responses of the responding regulator, PhoB in E. coli. Based on our ChIP-chip experimental data, forty-three binding sites were identified throughout the genome and the known PhoB binding pattern was updated by identifying the conserved pattern from these sites. From the gene expression microarray data analysis, 287 differentially expressed genes were identified in the presence of PhoB activity. By comparing the results obtained from our ChIP-chip and microarray experiments, we were also able to identify genes that were directly or indirectly affected through PhoB regulation. Nineteen out of these 287 differentially expressed genes were identified as the genes directly regulated by PhoB. Seven of the 19 directly regulated genes (including phoB) are transcriptional regulators. These transcriptional regulators then further pass the signal of phosphate starvation down to the remaining differentially expressed genes. Our results unveiled the genome-wide binding profile of PhoB and the downstream responses under phosphate starvation. We also present the hierarchical structure of the phosphate sensing regulatory network. The data suggest that PhoB plays protective roles in membrane integrity and oxidative stress reduction during phosphate starvation.
The Role of Semantic Information in Learning Question Classifiers

Question Classification is commonly used in question answering systems to perform a semantic classification of the target answer in an effort to provide additional information to downstream processes. It is different from the common text categorization task in the sense that questions are relatively short and contain less word-based information compared with classification of the entire text. This work presents a machine learning approach to this task. Our approach is to augment the questions with syntactic and semantic analysis, as well as external semantic knowledge, as input to the text classifier. It is shown that, in the context of question classification, augmenting the input of the classifier with appropriate semantic category information results in significant improvements to classification accuracy.
"Everything's the Phone": Understanding the Phone's Supercharged Role in Parent-Teen Relationships

Through focus groups (n=61) and surveys (n=2,083) of parents and teens, we investigated how parents and their teen children experience their own and each other's phone use in the context of parent-teen relationships. Both expressed a lack of agency in their own and each other's phone use, feeling overly reliant on their own phone and displaced by the other's phone. In a classic example of the fundamental attribution error, each party placed primary blame on the other, and rationalized their own behavior with legitimizing excuses. We present a conceptual model showing how parents' and teens' relationships to their phones and perceptions of each other's phone use are inextricably linked, and how, together, they contribute to parent-teen tensions and disconnections. We use the model to consider how the phone might play a less highly charged role in family life and contribute to positive connections between parents and their teen children.
Karaoke scoring apparatus analyzing singing voice relative to melody data

OK score one kind of karaoke apparatus, comprising a first detector sequentially detects a live concert to extract therefrom the actual utterance feature sample data this singer; second detector sequentially detects the melody data to extract therefrom representative of this karaoke music OK differential data comparator sequentially sampled data and the reference data compared to each other to produce a difference between the utterance and the correct indication of the actual utterance;; and time data representative of the progress of the correct utterance correct reference data and a processor, the reference time data to process the data to produce difference data points.
Learning classifiers without negative examples: A reduction approach

The problem of PU Learning, i.e., learning classifiers with positive and unlabelled examples (but not negative examples), is very important in information retrieval and data mining. We address this problem through a novel approach: reducing it to the problem of learning classifiers for some meaningful multivariate performance measures. In particular, we show how a powerful machine learning algorithm, support vector machine, can be adapted to solve this problem. The effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed approach have been confirmed by our experiments on three real-world datasets.
An Energy-Efficient Data Collection Framework for Wireless Sensor Networks by Exploiting Spatiotemporal Correlation

Limited energy supply is one of the major constraints in wireless sensor networks. A feasible strategy is to aggressively reduce the spatial sampling rate of sensors, that is, the density of the measure points in a field. By properly scheduling, we want to retain the high fidelity of data collection. In this paper, we propose a data collection method that is based on a careful analysis of the surveillance data reported by the sensors. By exploring the spatial correlation of sensing data, we dynamically partition the sensor nodes into clusters so that the sensors in the same cluster have similar surveillance time series. They can share the workload of data collection in the future since their future readings may likely be similar. Furthermore, during a short-time period, a sensor may report similar readings. Such a correlation in the data reported from the same sensor is called temporal correlation, which can be explored to further save energy. We develop a generic framework to address several important technical challenges, including how to partition the sensors into clusters, how to dynamically maintain the clusters in response to environmental changes, how to schedule the sensors in a cluster, how to explore temporal correlation, and how to restore the data in the sink with high fidelity. We conduct an extensive empirical study to test our method using both a real test bed system and a large-scale synthetic data set.
Characterization of the early endosome and putative endocytic carrier vesicles in vivo and with an assay of vesicle fusion in vitro

We have investigated two aspects of membrane traffic at early stages of endocytosis: membrane fusion and microtubule-dependent transport. As a marker, we have used the trans-membrane glycoprotein G of vesicular stomatitis virus implanted into the plasma membrane and then internalized for different times at 37 degrees C. The corresponding endosomal fractions were immunoisolated using the cytoplasmic domain of the G protein as antigen. These fractions were then used in an in vitro assay to quantify the efficiency of fusion between endosomal vesicles. To identify the vesicular partners of the fusion, these in vitro studies were combined with in vivo biochemical and morphological experiments. Internalized molecules were delivered to early endosomal elements, which corresponded to a network of tubular and tubulovesicular structures. Rapid recycling back to the plasma membrane and routing to late stages of the pathway occurred from these early endosomal elements. These elements exhibited a high and specific fusion activity with each other in vitro, suggesting that individual elements of the early endosomal compartment interact with each other in vivo. After their appearance in the early endosome, the molecules destined to be degraded were observed at the next stage of the pathway in distinct spherical vesicles (0.5 micron diam) and then in late endosomes and lysosomes. When the microtubules were depolymerized with nocodazole, endocytosis proceeded as in control cells. However, internalized molecules remained in the spherical vesicles and did not appear in late endosomes or lysosomes. These spherical vesicles had relatively little fusion activity with each other or with early endosomal elements in vitro. Our observations suggest that the spherical vesicles mediate transport between the early endosome and late endosomes and that this process requires intact microtubules.
Performance Comparison of MIMO Systems over AWGN and Rician Channels with Zero Forcing Receivers

Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) systems have been emerged as a technical breakthrough for high-data-rate wireless transmission. The performance of MIMO system can be improved by using different antenna selection so as to provide spatial diversity. In this paper, the performance of MIMO system over AWGN (Additive White Gaussian Noise) and Rician fading channels with ZF receiver is analyzed using different antenna configurations. The bit error rate performance characteristics of ZeroForcing (ZF) receiver is studied for M-PSK (M-ary Phase Shift Keying) modulation technique using AWGN and Rician channels for the analysis purpose and their effect on BER (Bit Error Rate) have been presented.
The effect of wrist position and hand-grasp pattern on virtual prosthesis task performance

Partial-hand amputees are often able to use their wrist when performing daily activities, but this wrist movement can interfere with electromyogram (EMG) pattern recognition of functional hand-grasps while controlling myoelectric prostheses. These grasp patterns also commonly require activation of similar muscle sets, resulting in poor discrimination and more frequent misclassification. In our recent work, we developed a classifier training paradigm and control system that improves real-time control of a virtual prosthesis capable of selecting between 4 grasps in multiple wrist positions. However, it is unclear if there were adverse effects associated with operating the virtual prosthesis in certain wrist positions or with attempting to select specific grasps. The primary purpose of this study is to determine whether the required wrist position or grasp affected task timeout rates, and to determine the number of grasp selection attempts for both a baseline pattern recognition controller and our proposed controller. We show that the specific wrist position of a given task does not significantly affect performance for either the baseline controller (p>0.575) or the proposed controller (p>0.459). However, while the grasp required for a task significantly affects a user's ability to complete the task when using the baseline controller (p<;0.05), this is not the case with the proposed controllers (p>0.429). Thus, subjects using the proposed controllers were more easily able to complete tasks involving grasps difficult to select with the baseline controller.
Overview: a comparison of withdrawal symptoms from different drug classes.

Whereas early formulations of addictive behaviour placed great emphasis upon withdrawal as a defining feature, current views focus more upon compulsive use as its central characteristic. However, the withdrawal syndrome continues to occupy an important place in the study of the addictions. It is interesting both in its own right and in relation to the development and maintenance of the compulsive use of drugs. Despite the attention devoted to withdrawal phenomena over many years, precise demarcation of the withdrawal symptoms associated with drugs of dependence has proved difficult to achieve. Withdrawal from all drugs of dependence appears to lead to mood disturbances although the extent to which these are due to the pharmacological actions of the drugs or to other physiological or psychological processes is unclear. Sleep disturbance is also common, although again direct links with the pharmacological actions of the withdrawn drug are yet to be established. Withdrawal from alcohol, benzodiazepines and opiates is often associated with somatic symptoms. In the former two cases, these can involve sweating, tremor and occasionally seizures. Perceptual disturbances have also been reported. In the case of opiates, flu-like symptoms are often reported, including muscle aches and gastric disturbances. In the case of nicotine, heightened irritability has been established as a direct pharmacological withdrawal effect. Characterization of stimulant withdrawal is still uncertain. There is little evidence of somatic symptoms but depression may occur as a result of a physiological rebound. There is also uncertainty over what role pharmacological withdrawal symptoms play in maintaining compulsive use. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Robust Adaptive Control for Nonlinear Systems with Hα Tracking Performance: Dynamic Surface Design Approach

The authors propose the robust controller via Hinfin approach for a class of uncertain nonlinear systems in the parametric strict-feedback form. The controller incorporated with adaptive dynamic surface technique and the Hinfin control technique is developed to reduce the influence of the parameter uncertainties and external disturbances on system performance. Finally, the one-link flexible joint manipulator is simulated to confirm the effectiveness and applicability of the proposed control scheme
Pharmacological treatment of the ion transport defect in cystic fibrosis

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is a lethal monogenetic disease characterised by impaired water and ion transport over epithelia. The lung pathology is fatal and causes death in 95% of CF patients. The genetic basis of the disease is a mutation in the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR), a cAMP-regulated chloride channel. The most common mutation, ΔF508, results in a protein that cannot properly be folded in the endoplasmic reticulum, is destroyed and hence does not reach the apical cell membrane. This paper will discuss those pharmacological approaches that are directed at correcting the defect in ion transport. At present, no clinically effective drug is available, although research has defined areas in which progress might be made. These are the following: (1) the drug 4-phenylbutyrate (4PBA) increases the expression of ΔF508-CFTR in the cell membrane, probably by breaking the association between ΔF508-CFTR and a chaperone; (2) a number of xanthines, in particular 8-cyclopentyl-1, 3-dipropylxanthine (CPX), are effective in activating CFTR, presumably by direct binding and also possibly by correcting the trafficking defect; (3) the isoflavone genistein can activate both wild-type and mutant CFTR, probably through direct binding to the channel; (4) purinergic agonists (ATP and UTP) can stimulate chloride secretion via a Ca2+-dependent chloride channel and in this way compensate for the defect in CFTR, but stable analogues will be required before this type of treatment has clinical significance; (5) treatment with inhaled amiloride may correct the excessive absorption of Na+ ions and water by airway epithelial cells that appears connected to the defect in CFTR; although clinical tests have not been very successful so far, amiloride analogues with a longer half-life may give better results. The role of CFTR in bicarbonate secretion has not yet been established with certainty, but correction of the defect in bicarbonate secretion may be important in clinical treatment of the disease. Currently, major efforts are directed at developing a pharmacological treatment of the ion transport defect in CF, but much basic research remains to be done, in particular, with regard to the mechanism by which defective CFTR is removed in the endoplasmic reticulum by the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway, which is a central pathway in protein production and of significance for several other diseases apart from CF.