Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Naloxone reversed cognitive impairments induced by repeated morphine under heavy perceptual load in the 5‐choice serial reaction time task

Repeated opioids abuse may produce long‐lasting and complicated cognitive deficits in individuals. Naloxone is a typical mu‐opioid receptor antagonist widely used in clinical treatment for opioid overdose and opioid abuse. However, it remains unclear whether naloxone affects morphine‐induced cognitive deficits. Using the 5‐choice serial reaction time task (5‐CSRTT), the present study investigated cognitive profiles including attention, impulsivity, compulsivity, and processing speed in repeated morphine‐treated mice. Repeated morphine administration (10 mg/kg, i.p.) induced complex cognitive changes including decreased attention and increased impulsivity, compulsivity, processing speed. Systemic naloxone administration (5 mg/kg, i.p.) reversed these cognitive changes under the heavy perceptual load in 5‐CSRTT. Using the novel object recognition (NOR), Y‐maze and open‐field test (OFT), the present study investigated the memory ability and locomotor activity. Naloxone reversed the effect of morphine on recognition memory and locomotion but had no effect on working memory. In addition, repeated morphine administration decreased the expression of postsynaptic density protein 95 (PSD95) and cAMP response element binding protein (CREB) phosphorylation in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and hippocampus (HIP), and these effects were significantly reversed by naloxone in PFC. Our study suggests that repeated exposure to morphine affects multiple cognitive aspects and impairs synaptic functions. Systemic naloxone treatment reverses the mu‐opioids‐induced cognitive changes, especially under the heavy perceptual load, possibly by restoring the synaptic dysfunctions.
A functional decomposition of sex inconstancy in the dioecious, colonizing plant Mercurialis annua.

PREMISE Plants with separate sexes often show "inconstant" or "leaky" sex expression, with females or males producing a few flowers of the opposite sex. The frequency and degree of such inconstancy may reflect residual hermaphroditic sex allocation after an evolutionary transition from combined to separate sexes. Sex inconstancy also represents a possible first step in the breakdown of dioecy back to hermaphroditism. In the Mercurialis annua (Euphorbiaceae) species complex, monoecy and androdioecy have evolved from dioecy in polyploid populations. Here, we characterize patterns of sex inconstancy in dioecious M. annua and discuss how sex inconstancy may have contributed to the breakdown of separate sexes in the genus. METHODS We measured sex inconstancy in three common gardens of M. annua over 2 years using a modification of Lloyd's phenotypic gender in terms of frequency and degree, with the degree calibrating inconstancy against the sex allocation of constant males and constant females, yielding a measure of gender that does not depend on the distribution of gender in the population. RESULTS Unusually for dioecious plants, the frequency of sex inconstancy in M. annua was greater in females, but its degree was greater for males in the 2 years of study. We suggest that this pattern is consistent with the maintenance of inconstancy in dioecious M. annua by selection for reproductive assurance under mate limitation. CONCLUSIONS Our study illustrates the utility of decomposing measures of sex inconstancy into its frequency and its degree and throws new light on the origin of variation in sexual systems in Mercurialis.
catena-Poly[[[(2,2′-bipyridyl)copper(II)]-μ-l-alaninato] perchlorate monohydrate]

In the structure of the polymeric title complex, {[Cu(C3H6NO2)(C10H8N2)]ClO4·H2O}n, the carboxylate group of the chelating amino acid is further linked to a neighbouring Cu centre, generating a supramolecular single-stranded chain parallel to [010]. The structure displays intermolecular N—H⋯O and O—H⋯O hydrogen bonding, which consolidates the crystal packing.
Exploration of the rumen microbial diversity and carbohydrate active enzyme profile of black Bengal goat using metagenomic approach

Abstract Black Bengal goats possess a rich source of rumen microbiota that helps them to adapt for the better utilization of plant biomaterial into energy and nutrients, a task largely performed by enzymes encoded by the rumen microbiota. Therefore the study was designed in order to explore the taxonomic profile of rumen microbial communities and potential biomass degradation enzymes present in the rumen of back Bengal goat using Illumina Nextseq-500 platform. A total of 83.18 million high-quality reads were generated and bioinformatics analysis was performed using various tools and subsequently, the predicted ORFs along with the rRNA containing contigs were then uploaded to MG-RAST to analyze taxonomic and functional profiling. The results highlighted that Bacteriodetes (41.38–59.74%) were the most abundant phyla followed by Firmicutes (30.59–39.96%), Proteobacteria (5.07–7.61%), Euryarcheaota (0.71–7.41%), Actinobacteria (2.05–2.75%). Genes that encode glycoside hydrolases (GHs) had the highest number of CAZymes, and accounted for (39.73–37.88%) of all CAZymes in goat rumen. The GT families were the second-most abundant in CAZymes (23.73–23.11%) and followed by Carbohydrate Binding module Domain (17.65–15.61%), Carbohydrate Esterase (12.90–11.95%). This study indicated that goat rumen had complex functional microorganisms produce numerous CAZymes, and that can be further effectively utilised for applied ruminant research and industry based applications.
Photoexcited phytochrome B interacts with BZR1 to repress brassinosteroid signaling in Arabidopsis.

Photoreceptor phytochrome B (phyB) mediates a variety of light responses in plants. To further elucidate the molecular mechanisms of phyB-regulated hypocotyl elongation, we performed firefly luciferase complementation imaging (LCI) screening for phyB-interacting transcription factors (TFs). LCI assays showed that phyB possibly interacts with BZR1, BZR2, ARF6 and several WRKYs TFs in a red light-dependent manner. Furthermore, biochemical assays demonstrated that photoexcited phyB specifically interacts with non-phosphorylated BZR1, the physiologically active form of a master transcription factor in BR signaling, and this interaction can be competitively interfered by PIF4. Furthermore, we showed that phyB can directly interact with the DNA-binding domain of BZR1 and affect the enrichment of BZR1 on the chromatin of target genes. Moreover, our genetic evidence and RNA-seq analysis demonstrated that phyB negatively regulates BR signaling. Together, we revealed that photoexcited phyB directly interacts with the transcription factor BZR1 to repress brassinosteroid signaling in Arabidopsis. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Effect of lipopolysaccharide-induced immune stimulation and maternal fish oil and microalgae supplementation during late pregnancy on nursery pig hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal function.

The current study used Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS) to investigate whether maternal immune challenge during late gestation altered programming of the offspring hypothalamus and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPAA). Additionally, interactions of maternal diet, supplementation with fish oil (FO) or microalgae (AL), and complex vs. simple weaning diets were investigated. Briefly, Landrace x Yorkshire sows (N=48) were randomly assigned to diets supplemented with FO, AL or a standard gestation control diet (CON) from d 75 of gestation (gd 75) until parturition. On gd 112, half the sows from each dietary treatment were immune challenged with LPS (10 μg/kg BW) or saline as a control. At 21 d postpartum, the offspring were weaned, and half the animals from each maternal treatment were allocated to either a complex or simple weaning diet. At 28 d postpartum, the offspring's hourly fever and 2 h cortisol responses to LPS immune challenge (40 μg/kg BW) were measured to assess hypothalamus and HPAA function. Results indicated that the maternal temperature of sows on the FO diet returned to baseline levels faster than sows on the AL and CON diets after LPS immune challenge (P < 0.05). In contrast, there was no difference in the maternal cortisol response across the dietary treatments (P > 0.10). Regardless of the dietary treatments, the maternal LPS immune challenge induced a greater cortisol response in male offspring (P = 0.05), and a greater fever response in female offspring (P = 0.03) when they were LPS immune challenged post weaning. Male offspring from LPS-immune challenged sows fed the FO and AL diets had a greater fever response than male offspring from the maternal CON diet group (P ≤ 0.05). Lastly, no effect of the complex or simple weaning diets was observed for the nursery pig cortisol or fever responses to LPS immune challenge. In conclusion, LPS immune challenge during late pregnancy altered responsiveness of the offspring hypothalamus and HPAA to this same microbial stressor, and a sex-specific response was influenced by maternal dietary supplementation with FO and AL.
Multi-class support vector machines based on the mahalanobis distance

In the last decade, Support vector machine (SVM) has been deeply investigated and it is often used in Hilbert space by the measure of Euclidean distance. In this paper, we present the SVM with mahalanobis distance, and the details of how to compute the mahalanobis distance in the input and the feature space are described. Finally, we apply it to the image classification and compare the results of them. By this, we obtain a sound conclusion.
Research progress and clinical application of predictive biomarker for immune checkpoint inhibitors

ABSTRACT Introduction: Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have emerged as epochal milestones in the ﬁeld of anti-cancer immunotherapy. With promising clinical effectiveness, ICIs can significantly prolong the overall survival of patients with advanced cancer of different types. Although their remarkable effectiveness has been demonstrated in clinical application, ICIs display limitations in terms of unique response patterns. Only a subset of patients exhibits objective responses, while others show rapid disease progression. Considering that there is a fair representation of both subsets of patients (responders and non-responders), clinicians ought to effectively stratify patients who will potentially benefit from ICI therapy, and optimize a strategy for patient selection. Areas covered: In this review, the authors have summarized several key factors involved in the biomarker development of ICI therapy, such as neoantigen production and presentation, the tumor microenvironment, and alternation in specific gene signaling pathways. Expert opinion: Considering the extreme complexity of the immune system, a single biomarker may fail to appropriately stratify patients for ICI therapy. Therefore, future biomarker research should focus on designing an integrated biomarker system that will successfully guide combination therapies to overcome resistance to immunotherapy.
Development of R8 modified epirubicin–dihydroartemisinin liposomes for treatment of non-small-cell lung cancer

Abstract Presently, there are no few anticancer drugs that have been used clinically due to their poor targeting ability, short half-life period, non-selective distributions, generation of vasculogenic mimicry (VM) channels, high metastasis, and high recurrence rate. This study aimed to explore the effects of R8 modified epirubicin–dihydroartemisinin liposomes that could target non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cells, destroy VM channels, inhibit tumor metastasis, and explain the possible underlying mechanism. In vitro assays indicated that R8 modified epirubicin–dihydroartemisinin liposomes with ideal physicochemical characteristics could exhibit not only powerful cytotoxicity on A549 cells, but also the effective suppression of VM channels and tumor metastasis. Mechanistic studies manifested that R8 modified epirubicin–dihydroartemisinin liposomes could down-regulate the levels of VE-Cad, TGF-β1, MMP-2, and HIF-1α. In vivo assays indicated that R8 modified epirubicin–dihydroartemisinin liposomes could both increase the selective accumulation of chemotherapeutic drugs at tumor sites and show a targeting conspicuous of antitumor efficacy. In conclusion, the R8 modified epirubicin–dihydroartemisinin liposomes prepared in this study provide a treatment strategy with high efficiency for NSCLC.
Rapid Identification of Commonly Encountered Candida Species Directly from Blood Culture Bottles

ABSTRACT We report a rapid-cycle, real-time PCR method for identifying six Candida spp. directly from BACTEC blood culture bottles. Target sequences in the noncoding internal transcribed spacer regions of the rRNA operon were simultaneously amplified and interrogated with fluorescent probes to identify Candida albicans, C. glabrata, C. parapsilosis, C. tropicalis, C. krusei, and C. lusitaniae; these account for 88% of the yeast species isolated from positive blood cultures in our laboratory. Any of the first four species can be identified in a single reaction using two fluorescent hybridization probe sets. The antifungal-resistant species C. krusei and C. lusitaniae are detected in a second reaction, also with two probe sets. The assay was validated with DNA extracted from BACTEC blood culture bottles positive for yeasts (n = 62) and was 100% concordant with culture identification based on biochemical and morphological features of C. albicans (n = 22), C. parapsilosis (n = 10), C. tropicalis (n = 1) C. glabrata (n = 22), C. krusei (n = 2), and C. lusitaniae (n = 1). No cross-reactivity was observed in blood culture samples growing yeasts other than the above-mentioned species (n = 4), in those growing bacteria (n = 12), or in the absence of microbial growth. Our assay allows rapid (≤2 h) and specific detection of the most common Candida spp. directly from positive blood cultures and may facilitate delivery of optimal antifungal therapy.
Drone-Based Highway-VANET and DAS Service

Wireless communications between vehicles are a focus of research in both the academic research community and automobile industry. Using unmanned aerial vehicles or drones in wireless communications and vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs) have started to attract attention. This paper proposes a routing protocol that uses the infrastructure drones for boosting VANET communications to achieve a minimum vehicle-to-drone packet delivery delay. This paper also proposes a closed-form expression for the probability distribution of the vehicle-to-drone packet delivery delay on a two-way highway. In addition, based on that closed-form expression, we can calculate the minimum drone density (maximum separation distance between two adjacent drones) that stochastically limits the worst case of the vehicle-to-drone packet delivery delay. Moreover, this paper proposes a drones-active service that is added to the location service in a VANET. This service dynamically and periodically obtains the required number of active drones based on the current highway connectivity state by obtaining the maximum distance between each two adjacent drones while satisfying a probabilistic constraint for vehicle-to-drone packet delivery delay. Our analysis focuses on two-way highway VANET networks with low vehicular density. The simulation results show the accuracy of our analysis and reflect the relation between the drone density, vehicular density and speed, other VANET parameters, and the vehicle-to-drone packet delivery delay.
Modeling multi-agent systems with hybrid interacting dynamics

We present a new framework for describing multi-agent systems with hybrid interacting dynamics, where the interaction between agents occurs at both the continuous and discrete levels. We define multi-agent systems as Interconnected Hybrid Systems, recast fundamental hybrid concepts such as hybrid execution and reachability in this new interconnected hybrid systems framework, and prove a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence and uniqueness of the interconnected hybrid executions, extending previous work on hybrid systems. We provide conditions on each agent's hybrid model that guarantee the multi-agent system's existence and uniqueness property. Finally, we provide an example that shows how to apply the existence and uniqueness conditions in the design of the agents' dynamics.
Size Economies in Australian Agriculture

Theoretical, conceptual and estimational issues relevant to economies of size studies are discussed in this paper. Some of the issues discussed are the effects of technological change on the position and shape of the average cost curve over time, the relationship between farm size and relative economic efficiency and frontier versus average estimation techniques. There is also a brief review of various measurement and specification problems. In addition, empirical estimates of the extent of size economies were derived from a flexible translog production function using ASIS data for the New South Wales Wheat/Sheep Zone for the years 1966-67, 1975-76 and 1976-77. Estimation of the production function revealed that, when the relatively fixed inputs of operator and family labour were excluded, the sample exhibited constant returns to scale. On the other hand, when operator and family labour were included, the cost curve exhibited the familiar L shape found in earlier agricultural studies.
Accounting for HIV Health Disparities: Risk and Protective Factors Among Older Gay and Bisexual Men

Objective: This study examines whether disparities exist in poor health and depressive symptomatology among older gay/bisexual men (50+) with (n = 371) and without (n = 973) HIV. If so, what risk/promoting factors account for those disparities? Method: These cross-sectional analyses used 2014 data from the Aging With Pride: National Health, Aging, and Sexuality/Gender Study. Results: Those with HIV reported poorer health and more depressive symptomatology accounted for by lower income, resilience and social support, and more lifetime victimization. Poorer health among those with HIV was associated with more chronic conditions. Higher depressive symptomatology was associated with diagnosed anxiety and drug addiction. Community engagement reduced disparities in poor health and depression. Implications: Older gay/bisexual men living with HIV infection are at greater risk for physical and mental health issues. Assessments should be conducted with attention to these risk factors. Interventions for improving social support, resilience, and community engagement are warranted.
Melatonin and its derivatives counteract the ultraviolet B radiation‐induced damage in human and porcine skin ex vivo

Melatonin and its derivatives (N1‐acetyl‐N2‐formyl‐5‐methoxykynurenine [AFMK] and N‐acetyl serotonin [NAS]) have broad‐spectrum protective effects against photocarcinogenesis, including both direct and indirect antioxidative actions, regulation of apoptosis and DNA damage repair; these data were primarily derived from in vitro models. This study evaluates possible beneficial effects of melatonin and its active derivatives against ultraviolet B (UVB)‐induced harm to human and porcine skin ex vivo and to cultured HaCaT cells. The topical application of melatonin, AFMK, or NAS protected epidermal cells against UVB‐induced 8‐OHdG formation and apoptosis with a further increase in p53ser15 expression, especially after application of melatonin or AFMK but not after NAS use. The photoprotective action was observed in pre‐ and post‐UVB treatment in both human and porcine models. Melatonin along with its derivatives upregulated also the expression of antioxidative enzymes after UVB radiation of HaCaT cells. The exogenous application of melatonin or its derivatives represents a potent and promising tool for preventing UVB‐induced oxidative stress and DNA damage. This protection results in improved genomic, cellular, and tissue integrity against UVB‐induced carcinogenesis, especially when applied prior to UV exposure. In addition, our ex vivo experiments provide fundamental justification for further testing the clinical utility of melatonin and metabolites as protectors again UVB in human subjects. Our ex vivo data constitute the bridge between vitro to vivo translation and thus justifies the pursue for further clinical utility of melatonin in maintaining skin homeostasis.
Pulsed Power Driven Flash X-ray Sources for the Hydrus Project at AWE

Summary form only given. The Hydrus project will provide an enhancement of the flash radiographic diagnostics available in the Hydrodynamics Department at AWE as part of new facilities for hydrodynamics research. The X-ray sources for the experiments carried out at AWE are provided by focused electron beam diodes driven by pulsed power accelerators. The most attenuating objects to be radiographed require an X-ray spectrum and dose that can only be provided by pulsed power machines operating at 7 to 14 MV. A design for a 14 MV IVA (induction voltage adder) has been completed by L3 Communications Pulse Sciences for AWE and three such machines are about to be manufactured to provide the main radiographic capability in the new facility. Research currently being conducted by AWE and international collaborators aims to also develop improved electron beam diodes to meet the requirements for higher radiographic resolution being demanded. Other experiments performed at AWE require a softer X-ray spectrum and hence a lower voltage pulsed power driver, two of which will be provided in a second area of the same facility. It has been determined that the optimum radiographic source will have a sub-100 ns pulse , a diameter of 1 mm or less, an X-ray dose of at least 15R at 1 metre and an X-ray spectrum end point energy of 1-1.5 MeV. An electron beam diode that has demonstrated performance o f this order is the plasma filled rod pinch driven by the Gamble II accelerator at NRL. After a concept study and discuss ions with possible vendors it has been decided procure two machines similar in performance to Gamble II. They will feature a Marx generator charging a single water pulse forming line which will in turn drive the diode via a 3 ohm water insulated output line.
Learning Vector Quantisation based recognition of offline handwritten signatures

Biometrics, which refers to the identification of an individual based on his or her physiological or behavioural characteristics, has the capability to reliably distinguish between an authorised person and an imposter. This paper presents a low-cost and high-speed Artificial Neural Network (ANN) based offline recognition system of handwritten signatures that is trained with low-resolution and small-sized scanned signature images. The proposed architecture recognises mixed (both Arabic and English) handwritten signatures based on varying parameters and eliminating redundant hidden layer units that learns the correlation of patterns. Empirical results yield an accuracy rate of 98.7% for an unseen 150 signatures of varying covered areas of 10 persons on the network that is trained with another 120 images. The robustness of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated by calculating standard deviation of 50 classifiers.