Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Fast separable nonlocal means

Abstract. We propose a simple and fast algorithm called PatchLift for computing distances between patches (contiguous block of samples) extracted from a given one-dimensional signal. PatchLift is based on the observation that the patch distances can be efficiently computed from a matrix that is derived from the one-dimensional signal using lifting; importantly, the number of operations required to compute the patch distances using this approach does not scale with the patch length. We next demonstrate how PatchLift can be used for patch-based denoising of images corrupted with Gaussian noise. In particular, we propose a separable formulation of the classical nonlocal means (NLM) algorithm that can be implemented using PatchLift. We demonstrate that the PatchLift-based implementation of separable NLM is a few orders faster than standard NLM and is competitive with existing fast implementations of NLM. Moreover, its denoising performance is shown to be consistently superior to that of NLM and some of its variants, both in terms of peak signal-to-noise ratio/structural similarity index and visual quality.
Effects of Plyometric Training on Achilles Tendon Properties and Shuttle Running During a Simulated Cricket Batting Innings

Abstract Houghton, LA, Dawson, BT, and Rubenson, J. Effects of plyometric training on achilles tendon properties and shuttle running during a simulated cricket batting innings. J Strength Cond Res 27(4): 1036–1046, 2013—The aim of this study was to determine whether intermittent shuttle running times (during a prolonged, simulated cricket batting innings) and Achilles tendon properties were affected by 8 weeks of plyometric training (PLYO, n = 7) or normal preseason (control [CON], n = 8). Turn (5-0-5-m agility) and 5-m sprint times were assessed using timing gates. Achilles tendon properties were determined using dynamometry, ultrasonography, and musculoskeletal geometry. Countermovement and squat jump heights were also assessed before and after training. Mean 5-0-5-m turn time did not significantly change in PLYO or CON (pre vs. post: 2.25 ± 0.08 vs. 2.22 ± 0.07 and 2.26 ± 0.06 vs. 2.25 ± 0.08 seconds, respectively). Mean 5-m sprint time did not significantly change in PLYO or CON (pre vs. post: 0.85 ± 0.02 vs. 0.84 ± 0.02 and 0.85 ± 0.03 vs. 0.85 ± 0.02 seconds, respectively). However, inferences from the smallest worthwhile change suggested that PLYO had a 51–72% chance of positive effects but only 6–15% chance of detrimental effects on shuttle running times. Jump heights only increased in PLYO (9.1–11.0%, p < 0.050). Achilles tendon mechanical properties (force, stiffness, elastic energy, strain, modulus) did not change in PLYO or CON. However, Achilles tendon cross-sectional area increased in PLYO (pre vs. post: 70 ± 7 vs. 79 ± 8 mm2, p < 0.01) but not CON (77 ± 4 vs. 77 ± 5 mm2, p > 0.050). In conclusion, plyometric training had possible benefits on intermittent shuttle running times and improved jump performance. Also, plyometric training increased tendon cross-sectional area, but further investigation is required to determine whether this translates to decreased injury risk.
La radiothérapie adaptative et guidée par imagerie avec la technologie Cone-Beam CT : mise en oeuvre en vue du traitement de la prostate

L'imagerie est maintenant partie integrante des traitements de radiotherapie. Avec la technologie CBCT embarquee sur les appareils de traitement, l'imagerie tomographique permet non seulement de repositionner fidelement le patient tout au long de son traitement mais aussi d'adapter la planification initiale aux modifications quotidiennes de volume. C'est la radiotherapie adaptative, objet des travaux de cette these. Nous avons etabli les limites techniques de precision de repositionnement des equipements utilise. Ensuite, a partir des acquisitions CBCT quotidiennes de patients traites pour la prostate, nous avons elabore une strategie de traitement basee sur une banque de plans personnalises. Nous avons mis au point une methode semi-automatique de selection du plan de traitement du jour qui a montre une efficacite superieure a la selection par des operateurs experimentes. Enfin, nous avons quantifie les doses additionnelles a la dose therapeutique associees a l'utilisation quotidienne de l'imagerie CBCT. En conclusion, on peut dire qu'avec l'imagerie CBCT embarquee, on peut voir ce que l'on veut traiter, irradier ce que l'on a vu et controler ce qu'on a traite.
Abdominal surgery induces Fos immunoreactivity in the rat brain

Previous neuropharmacological studies indicate that brain peptides are involved in mediating gastric stasis induced by abdominal surgery. Central pathways activated by abdominal surgery were investigated in the rat by using Fos protein as a marker of neuronal activation. Abdominal surgery (laparotomy alone or combined with cecal manipulation) was performed under brief enflurance anesthesia (7–8 minutes), and 1 hour later rats were killed and brains processed for Fos immunoreactivity. Double labeling with Fos and arginine vasopressin, oxytocin, or tyrosine hydroxylase antibodies was also performed. Abdominal surgery induced Fos staining in the nucleus tractus solitarii, paraventricular and supraoptic nuclei of the hypothalamus, locus coeruleus, and ventrolateral medulla. After abdominal surgery, 18–25% of vasopressin and 18–33% of oxytocin‐labeled cells were found to be Fos positive in the paraventricular nucleus and 15% of activated cells in the nucleus tractus solitarii were positive for tyrosine hydroxylase immunoreactivity. Enflurane alone induced c‐fos expression in the same brain area; however, the number of Fos‐positive cells and double‐labeled cells were decreased two‐to fivefold and three‐ to eightfold, respectively, compared with the abdominal surgery groups. These data show that abdominal surgery induced activation of specific hypothalamic, pontine, and medullary neurons. These findings may have implications for the understanding of central mechanisms involved in mediating gastric ileus following abdominal surgery. © 1994 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
The mechanism of interferon action in single cells: accumulation of intracellular virus.

Accumulation of intracellular mengovirus was studied in single, isolated mouse L cells. Pre-treatment with interferon delayed the initiation of virus replication in most cells, with the amount of delay varying widely from cell to cell. However, once the accumulation of intracellular virus began, it proceeded at an approximately normal rate. The data suggest that within a cell at any given moment, the action of interferon is usually all or nothing. That is, virus production is either totally inhibited, or free to proceed normally.
Occupational differences in computer-related anxiety: implications for the implementation of a computerized patient management information system

Abstract The present investigation was concerned with the implementation of an information system within a health care setting. A large number of staff required training on a new patient management information system (MIS). The aim of this study was to assess occupational differences on a number of psychological variables associated with MIS success. Computer anxiety was of primary concern due to its relationship to avoidance of computers. A total of 175 questionnaires were distributed, with 103 questionnaires being completed and returned for analysis (61.1%). It was found that clerical/administrative staff had significantly higher self-efficacy regarding computer use and more experience with computers. The nursing group experienced significantly more, computer anxiety, negative attitudes, and negative expectations than the clerical group. Self-efficacy was found to be the best predictor of computer related anxiety. The results have implications for MIS implementation strategies particularly in the areas .
Designing UbiComp Experiences for Spatial Navigation and Cross-Device Interactions

We are witnessing a considerable growth in number and density of powerful mobile devices around us. Such devices like smartphones and tablets are our everyday companions. If not already at hand, they often wait in our bags and pockets to provide us with a ubiquitous computing (UbiComp) experience. However, most of these devices are still blind to the presence of other devices and performing tasks among them is usually tedious due to the lack of guiding principles. This thesis closes with the gap as mentioned above by investigating in the design and evaluation of spatial and cross-device interactions. As a central theme, presented research fundamentally grounds on embodied practices by exploiting users’ pre-existing practical knowledge of everyday life for human-computer interaction. These embodied practices are often applied subconsciously in our daily activities, which unfolds new — yet unexplored — potentials for fun and joyful UbiComp experiences. Within this thesis, research is approached through both deductive and inductive reasoning. It begins with a brief history of UbiComp and its overarching vision. Contradicting opinions on this vision are discussed before leading over to recent theories and believes on embodied cognition and models on human spatial memory. This theoretical background eventually thrives arguments for yet unexplored and hidden potentials for spatial and cross-device interactions. Then, the application domain is narrowed down to academic libraries and knowledge work activities. In field studies at the Library of the University of Konstanz, the following two main knowledge work activities, and resonating issues are identified: literature & bibliographic search and reading & writing across documents. Together with the theoretical background the found issues are transformed into potentials for future knowledge work. Thereby, two fully functional research prototypes, Blended Shelf and Integrative Workplace, were implemented to explore the problem space further and to derive research questions covered in this thesis. The research questions are tackled through controlled experiments and implementation of low-cost enabling technology. In the first experiment, the optimal size of a spatially-aware peephole display is studied. As a finding, a relatively small tablet-sized peephole display serves as "sweet-spot" between navigation performance,
Accelerated detection of intracranial space-occupying lesions with CUDA based on statistical texture atlas in brain HRCT

In this paper, we present a method that detects intracranial space-occupying lesions in two-dimensional (2D) brain high-resolution CT images. Use of statistical texture atlas technique localizes anatomy variation in the gray level distribution of brain images, and in turn, identifies the regions with lesions. The statistical texture atlas involves 147 HRCT slices of normal individuals and its construction is extremely time-consuming. To improve the performance of atlas construction, we have implemented the pixel-wise texture extraction procedure on Nvidia 8800GTX GPU with Compute Unified Device Architecture (CUDA) platform. Experimental results indicate that the extracted texture feature is distinctive and robust enough, and is suitable for detecting uniform and mixed density space-occupying lesions. In addition, a significant speedup against straight forward CPU version was achieved with CUDA.
Incentive Regulation, Investments and Technological Change

Based on an idiosyncratic reading of the literature I propose intermediate (rather than tight or soft) regulation for balancing investment incentives with allocative efficiency and competition objectives. Intermediate regulation is compatible with incentive regulation and helps lengthening the regulatory commitment period necessary for incentives. However, such commitment for the whole time horizon of infrastructure or innovation investments is impossible. The compatibility of incentive regulation and efficient investment is thus in doubt. Incentive regulation for regular infrastructure investments therefore needs periodic updating based on rate-of-return regulation criteria. Innovative infrastructure investments may warrant regulatory holidays, which should be conditioned on strict criteria.
Chlorpromazine induces apoptosis in activated human lymphoblasts: a mechanism supporting the induction of drug-induced lupus erythematosus?

OBJECTIVE Drug-induced lupus erythematosus is a serious side effect of certain medications, such as procainamide, quinidine, hydralazine, chlorpromazine, and isoniazid, the underlying pathogenesis of which is unresolved. In this study, we examined the influence of these drugs on the regulation of apoptosis, or programmed cell death, in quiescent and activated human lymphocytes. We also discuss the dysregulation of apoptosis as a pathogenetic factor in systemic lupus erythematosus. METHODS Peripheral blood mononuclear cells or activated lymphoblasts from normal donors were incubated with different concentrations of each of the above-mentioned drugs. RESULTS We did not find induction of apoptosis in quiescent cells over a broad concentration range. In contrast, lymphoblasts readily underwent apoptosis when cultured with chlorpromazine, but not any of the other drugs, after stimulation with interleukin-2 (IL-2) in a dose-, time- and cell cycle-dependent manner. By several lines of evidence, toxicity was ruled out. Characteristic features of apoptosis-like incorporation of propidium iodide (PI), such as increased annexin V binding, changes in mitochondrial membrane potential, and induction of DNA breaks (as evidenced by TUNEL techniques), could be induced in lymphoblasts after chlorpromazine treatment. Chlorpromazine did not cause apoptosis by inhibition of cytokine binding or blockade of early intracellular signaling. The protease inhibitor Z-VAD and the ceramide inhibitor sphingosine 1-phosphate effectively blocked chlorpromazine-induced apoptosis (by PI staining and by externalization of phosphatidylserine), in contrast to the caspase 3/CPP32 inhibitor DEVD, which had only minor effects. Western blot analysis revealed IL-2-mediated phosphorylation of extracellular signal-regulated kinase, which was sensitive to chlorpromazine. Using lymphoblasts from a patient with Canale-Smith syndrome, we found that chlorpromazine-mediated apoptosis is Fas/ APO-1 independent. CONCLUSION These data suggest that chlorpromazine mediates apoptosis in human lymphoblasts through specific activation of intracellular proapoptotic signaling cascades. This mechanism might lead to an unsynchronized inflow of apoptotic break-down products and thereby to the induction of (auto)immunity against nuclear components.
A 5' 2-kilobase-pair region of the imprinted mouse H19 gene exhibits exclusive paternal methylation throughout development

The imprinted mouse H19 gene is hypermethylated on the inactive paternal allele in somatic tissues and sperm. Previous observations from a limited analysis have suggested that methylation of a few CpG dinucleotides in the region upstream from the start of transcription may be the mark that confers parental identity to the H19 alleles. Here we exploit bisulfite mutagenesis coupled with genomic sequencing to derive the methylation status of 68 CpGs that reside in a 4-kb region 5' to the start of transcription. This method reveals a 2-kb region positioned between 2 and 4 kb upstream from the start of transcription that is strikingly differentially methylated in midgestation embryos. At least 12 of the cytosine residues in this region are exclusively methylated on the paternal allele in blastocysts. In contrast, a 350-bp promoter-proximal region is less differentially methylated in midgestation embryos and, like most of the genome, is largely devoid of methylation on both alleles in blastocysts. We also demonstrate exclusive expression of the maternal H19 allele in the embryos that exhibit paternal methylation of the upstream 2-kb region. These data suggest that the 2-kb differentially methylated region acts as a key regulatory domain for imprinted H19 expression.
Tuning rules for the PI gains of field-oriented controllers of induction motors

The authors have previously shown that field-oriented controllers for induction motors preserve stability under a wide range of variations of the motor and controller parameters. However, as is well known, the transient performance critically depends on the tuning of the gains of the proportional-integral (PI) velocity loop, a task which is rendered difficult because of the high uncertainty on the rotor resistance. The problem we address in this paper is how to develop an offline procedure to choose these gains. The main contribution of our work is a very simple frequency-domain test that, for each setting of the PI gains, evaluates the maximum range of the relative rotor resistance estimate for which global stability is guaranteed. In this way, we provide a quantitative estimate of the performance of the PI controller. The stability result may also be used in a dual manner, fixing now the range of the rotor resistance, and estimating an admissible interval for the PI gains that preserves global stability. Instrumental for our study is the exploitation of an energy dissipation (strict passivity) property of the system.
Quality Assurance in Immunohistochemistry: Results of an Interlaboratory Trial Involving 172 Pathologists

The practicability of quality assurance in immunohistochemistry and its integration into the diagnostic process were both tested in this Germany-wide interlaboratory trial. One hundred seventy-two pathologists received one hematoxylin and eosin and five unstained slides from five cases; all cases were selected by a panel because immunohistochemistry was required for their final diagnosis. Participants rendered a morphologic diagnosis and then substantiated it immunohistochemically. Stained slides and evaluation sheets were reviewed by the panel, and the diagnostic process was analyzed in individual steps: morphologic diagnosis, selection of antibodies, staining quality, interpretation of stained slides, conclusions, and final diagnosis. Diagnosis-independent immunohistochemical performance was tested using a multisample tissue block (30 samples) that was stained and evaluated for six common antigens. For individual cases, corresponding to their difficulty, 21–89% of the final diagnoses (altogether 57% from 828 diagnoses) were correct. In a statistical analysis, the tentative diagnosis, the interpretation of stains and conclusions drawn from immunohistochemistry, were independent factors in reaching the diagnosis. Sensitivity to detect estrogen receptors on the multisample tissue block was only 48%. However, 24% of the stains were interpreted as falsely negative. The low staining sensitivity was not correlated to the number of correct diagnoses. The major problem of applying immunohistochemistry in surgical pathology appears to be its integration into the diagnostic process and not the staining quality. Both future quality control projects and training will have to regard these integrative requirements. Multisample tissue blocks provide a promising tool to standardize quantitative immunohistochemical parameters, such as receptor or proliferation scores.
Cytosolic and plastidic chorismate mutase isozymes from Arabidopsis thaliana: molecular characterization and enzymatic properties.

The three aromatic amino acids phenylalanine, tyrosine, and tryptophan are synthesized in the plastids of higher plants. There is, however, biochemical evidence that a cytosolic isoform exists of the enzyme catalysing the first step of that branch of the pathway which is specific for the synthesis of phenylalanine and tyrosine, i.e. chorismate mutase (CM). We now report on the isolation of a cDNA clone encoding a cytosolic CM isozyme from Arabidopsis thaliana that was identified by complementing a CM-deficient Escherichia coli strain. The deduced amino acid sequence of this isozyme was 50% identical to that of a previously isolated plastidic CM, and 41% identical to that of yeast CM. The organ-specific expression patterns of the two CM genes were rather similar, but only the gene encoding the plastidic isozyme was elicitor- and pathogen-inducible. The plastidic CM expressed in E. coli was activated by tryptophan and inhibited by phenylalanine and tyrosine, whereas the cytosolic isozyme was insensitive. The existence of a cytosolic CM isozyme implies that either a cytosolic pathway (partial or complete) for the biosynthesis of phenylalanine and tyrosine exists, or that prephenate, originating from chorismate in the cytosol, is utilized for the synthesis of metabolites other than these two aromatic amino acids.
Ceramide Inhibits Phospholipase D in a Cell-free System*

Recent evidence in whole cells has implicated ceramide in the regulation of phospholipase D (PLD). In intact HL-60 cells, phorbol myristate acetate (PMA) activated PLD as measured by [3H]palmitate-labeled phosphatidylcholine conversion to phosphatidylethanol in the presence of 2% ethanol. C6-Ceramide completely inhibited PLD activation after 4 h of treatment and was maximally active at 10 μM. The activity was structurally specific in that the structural analogs 4,5-dihydro-C6-ceramide and dioctanoylglycerol were inactive. Although ceramide inhibited PMA-induced activation of PLD, it did not inhibit translocation of protein kinase C (PKC) to the membrane in response to PMA. In a cell-free system, we confirmed that PLD is activated by guanosine 5′-O-(3-thiotriphosphate (GTPγS); however, ceramide had no effect on this activity under a variety of conditions. Activation of PLD by GTPγS was synergistically enhanced by the addition of PKC activators. This upstream effect was inhibited rapidly and specifically by ceramide (30 μM). Recombinant ARF plus PKCα substituted for crude cytosol in the activation of PLD, and this activity was inhibited by C6-ceramide. Taken together, these data show that ceramide interferes with PKC-mediated activation of PLD.
Longitudinal Effects of Anterior Cruciate Ligament Injury and Patellar Tendon Autograft Reconstruction on Neuromuscular Performance

We examined persons after anterior cruciate ligament injury and for 1.5 years after anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction to analyze changes in anterior knee laxity, lower extremity muscle strength, endurance, and several parameters of neuromuscular function. Sixteen men and nine women (average age, 23.8 years) were evaluated preoperatively, then underwent intraarticular autogenous patellar tendon anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction by the same surgeon and were evaluated at 6, 12, and 18 months postoperatively. Muscle strength was measured isokinetically and neuromuscular function was quantified with simultaneous anterior tibial translation and surface electromyography tests. Forty subjects (26 men and 14 women; average age, 23.5 years) with no known knee abnormalities served as the control group. Subjective questionnaire results showed that by 18 months postoperatively, 20 subjects (80%) believed they had regained their preoperative levels of function. Unfortunately, muscle function in most subjects had not returned to normal. At 12 to 18 months postoperatively, when knee rehabilitation was terminated, significant deficiencies in muscle performance persisted in most patients. Interestingly, in this group of stable knees, quadriceps and hamstring muscle reaction times appeared to be the best objective indicators of subjective knee function.