Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
GATA-3 Dose-Dependent Checkpoints in Early T Cell Commitment

GATA-3 expression is crucial for T cell development and peaks during commitment to the T cell lineage, midway through the CD4−CD8− (double-negative [DN]) stages 1–3. We used RNA interference and conditional deletion to reduce GATA-3 protein acutely at specific points during T cell differentiation in vitro. Even moderate GATA-3 reduction killed DN1 cells, delayed progression to the DN2 stage, skewed DN2 gene regulation, and blocked appearance of the DN3 phenotype. Although a Bcl-2 transgene rescued DN1 survival and improved DN2 cell generation, it did not restore DN3 differentiation. Gene expression analyses (quantitative PCR, RNA sequencing) showed that GATA-3–deficient DN2 cells quickly upregulated genes, including Spi1 (PU.1) and Bcl11a, and downregulated genes, including Cpa3, Ets1, Zfpm1, Bcl11b, Il9r, and Il17rb with gene-specific kinetics and dose dependencies. These targets could mediate two distinct roles played by GATA-3 in lineage commitment, as revealed by removing wild-type or GATA-3–deficient early T lineage cells from environmental Notch signals. GATA-3 worked as a potent repressor of B cell potential even at low expression levels, so that only full deletion of GATA-3 enabled pro–T cells to reveal B cell potential. The ability of GATA-3 to block B cell development did not require T lineage commitment factor Bcl11b. In prethymic multipotent precursors, however, titration of GATA-3 activity using tamoxifen-inducible GATA-3 showed that GATA-3 inhibits B and myeloid developmental alternatives at different threshold doses. Furthermore, differential impacts of a GATA-3 obligate repressor construct imply that B and myeloid development are inhibited through distinct transcriptional mechanisms. Thus, the pattern of GATA-3 expression sequentially produces B lineage exclusion, T lineage progression, and myeloid-lineage exclusion for commitment.
Characteristics of Protease Production by Cephalosporium sp

We investigated protease formation by Cephalosporium sp. strain KM388, which produced trypsin inhibitor in the same cultures, in medium containing polypeptone, meat extract, and glucose (natural medium) and in medium containing NaNO3, glucose, and yeast extract (semisynthetic medium). In natural medium, protease was secreted into the culture broth after cessation of growth caused by consumption of the polypeptone, the growth-limiting substrate. Enzyme formation in the stationary growth phase was due to de novo and so-called preferential synthesis, because cycloheximide immediately inhibited enzyme formation. In semisynthetic medium, protease was produced in parallel with mycelial growth, but production was repressed by the addition of polypeptone to the medium; protease production began after the added polypeptone was consumed. On the other hand, if glucose was eliminated from natural medium, the lag period of initiation of enzyme production was reduced until the late exponential phase. The addition of phosphate up to a concentration of 1.0% to natural medium also shortened the lag period and damped the pH change of the broth during cultivation.
Platelet-rich plasma injections for the treatment of refractory Achilles tendinopathy: results at 4 years.

BACKGROUND Chronic Achilles tendinopathy is responsible for a severe reduction in physical performance and persistent pain. There is currently a number of therapeutic options and the local administration of growth factors is an emerging treatment strategy. In particular, platelet-rich plasma (PRP) is a widely used way to provide a local regenerative stimulus for tendon healing. The aim of this study was to document the mid-term results obtained after treating recalcitrant Achilles tendinopathy with injections of high concentrate, leucocyte-rich PRP. MATERIALS AND METHODS Twenty-seven patients (mean age: 44.6 years; 22 men and 5 women) affected by chronic mid-portion Achilles tendinopathy (7 bilateral, for a total of 34 tendons), refractory to previous treatments, were enrolled. Patients were treated with three ultrasound-guided intra-tendinous injections of PRP at 2-week intervals. Patients were prospectively evaluated at baseline, and then at 2, 6, and up to a mean of 54.1 months of follow-up (minimum 30 months), using the following tools: Blanzina, VISA-A, EQ-VAS for general health, and Tegner scores. RESULTS The VISA-A score showed a significant improvement: the baseline score of 49.9±18.1 increased to 62.9±19.8 at 2 months (p=0.002), with a further improvement at 6 months (84.3±17.1, p<0.0005), and stable results at 4.5 years (90.0±13.9). The EQ-VAS score also showed a similar positive trend. An evaluation of the activity level confirmed these findings, showing a significant improvement in the Tegner score over time (p=0.017 for the final evaluation). The longer duration of symptoms before treatment was associated with a slower return to sport (p=0.041). DISCUSSION PRP injections produced good overall results for the treatment of chronic recalcitrant Achilles tendinopathy with a stable outcome up to a medium-term follow-up. Longer symptom duration was related with a more difficult return to sporting activity.
NONLINEAR DISCRETE‐TIME RISK‐SENSITIVE OPTIMAL CONTROL

SUMMARY This paper is devoted to the study of the connections among risk-sensitive stochastic optimal control, dynamic game optimal control, risk-neutral stochastic optimal control and deterministic optimal control in a nonlinear, discrete-time context with complete state information. The analysis worked out sheds light on the profound links among these control strategies, which remain hidden in the linear context. In particular, it is shown that, under suitable parameterizations, risk-sensitive control can be regarded as a control methodology which combines features of both stochastic risk-neutral control and deterministic dynamic game control.
VALIDATION OF TURBULENCE MODELS FOR SIMULATION OF AXIAL FLOW COMPRESSOR

The aim of this work is to show the use of different turbulence models applied to CFD simulation of turbulent flow inside a rotor of an axial flow compressor of which flow field has been obtained experimentally in laboratory test. Turbulence models that provide the simulation results in good agreement with experimental data may be used in the design of new axial flow compressors. The turbulence models that were chosen are κ− , κ− ω, and SST. The results that came closer to the experimental data were the SST results, which allows us to conclude that this model is the most appropriate for the simulation of an axial flow compressor rotor.
Feature Grouping-Based Outlier Detection Upon Streaming Trajectories

Outlier detection acts as one of the most important analysis tasks for trajectory stream. In stream scenarios, such properties as unlimitedness, time-varying evolutionary, sparsity, and skewness distribution of trajectories pose new challenges to outlier detection technique. Trajectory outlier detection techniques mainly focus on finding trajectory that is dissimilar to the majority of the others, which is based on the hypothesis that they are probably generated by a different mechanism. Most distance-based methods tend to utilize a function (e.g., weighted linear sum) to measure the similarity of two arbitrary objects provided that representative features have been extracted in advance. However, this kind of method is not tailored to identify the outlier which is close to its neighbors according to some features, but behaves significantly different from its neighbors in terms of the other features. To address this issue, we propose a feature grouping-based mechanism that divides all the features into two groups, where the first group (Similarity Feature) is used to find close neighbors and the second group (Difference Feature) is used to find outliers within the similar neighborhood. According to the feature differences among local adjacent objects in one or more time intervals, we present two outlier definitions, including local anomaly trajectory fragment (TF-outlier) and evolutionary anomaly moving object (MO-outlier ). We devise a basic solution and then an optimized algorithm to detect both types of outliers. Experimental results show that our proposal is both effective and efficient to detect outliers upon trajectory data streams.
Effect of robot’s gaze behaviors for attracting and controlling human attention

Abstract Controlling someone’s attention can be defined as shifting his/her attention from the existing direction to another. To shift someone’s attention, gaining attention and meeting gaze are two most important prerequisites. If a robot would like to communicate a particular person, it should turn its gaze to him/her for eye contact. However, it is not an easy task for the robot to make eye contact because such a turning action alone may not be effective in all situations, especially when the robot and the human are not facing each other or the human is intensely attending to his/her task. Therefore, the robot should perform some actions so that it can attract the target person and make him/her respond to the robot to meet gaze. In this paper, we present a robot that can attract a target person’s attention by moving its head, make eye contact through showing gaze awareness by blinking its eyes, and directs his/her attention by repeating its eyes and head turns from the person to the target object. Experiments using 20 human participants confirm the effectiveness of the robot actions to control human attention.
Context and History: the Cat's cradle network.

The issue of context has long troubled the endeavour of modelling and representing knowledge, and today is central to the effective management of digital assets. The deep semantics associated with usage of particular digitised artefacts must be represented to a degree sufficient to avoid intentional or unintentional misrepresentation through the repurposing enabled by digital technologies. Any representational issue of relating context to digital objects involves linking in some form, and the assumptions about how linking occurs determines implementation strategy. We describe four models that may be distinguished in approaching implementations of linked documents: the causal, the associative or attributive, the purposive (usage based) and the communal, and contend that most, if not all, current knowledge modelling schemes can in principle be shown to reduce to a formal equivalence of one or other of these. We argue that the communal model is the candidate most likely to provide satisfactory contextualisation, and that an historically contextualised network of communally grounded linkages provides the most adequate mechanism for modelling knowledge provenance. We propose the concept of the ‘cat’s cradle network’ as a model for such an historicised contextualising network.
IceMorph : An Automated Morphological Analyzer and English-Language Lookup Tool for Old Icelandic 1

1. Funding for IceMorph was provided through NSF #BCS-0921123; NSF #IIS0122491 / EU IST2001–32745, with additional support from UCLA’s Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, the UCLA Council on Research, and the UCLA Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research. Jackson Crawford (UCLA), Zoe Borovsky (UCLA), David Gabriel (UCLA), and Monit Tyagi (UCLA) all contributed to the development of IceMorph. More information about the project can be found at www.purl. org/icemorph/index.
Sex‐Biased Dispersal: A Result of a Sex Difference in Breeding Site Availability

Sex‐biased dispersal is often explained by assuming that the resource‐defending sex pays greater costs of moving from a familiar area. We hypothesize that sex‐biased dispersal may also be caused by a sex bias in breeding site availability. In avian resource‐defense mating systems, site availability is often more constrained for females: males can choose from all vacant sites, whereas females are restricted to sites defended by males. Using data on breeding dispersal of a migratory passerine, we show that average number of available breeding options and availability of the previous year’s territory was greater for males than females. The female bias in site unavailability may explain the female bias in probability of breeding dispersal because there was no sex bias in dispersal among birds with their previous year’s territory available. We suggest that sex biases in the availability of breeding options may be an important factor contributing to observed variation in sex‐biased dispersal patterns.
Antemortem diagnosis of diffuse Lewy body disease

Using the presence of widespread cortical Lewy bodies (LB) as the pathologic criteria of diffuse Lewy body disease (DLBD), we describe serial neurologic and mental status examinations in 6 patients with DLBD, 3 patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD), and 1 patient with Parkinson's disease (PD). The 6 patients with DLBD included 3 with neocortical neurofibrillary tangles (NFT) consistent with coincident AD. Most patients with DLBD had gait impairment concurrent with mild to moderate dementia. Abnormalities of tone or resting tremor were also prominent early symptoms in the subjects with DLBD, but not AD. Patients with DLBD frequently had abnormal EEGs with background posterior slowing and a frontally dominant burst pattern at the time of mild to moderate dementia. Agitation, hallucinations, and delusions were frequent early symptoms in DLBD patients. Patients with DLBD without concomitant AD had numerous Alz-50 negative cortical plaques. Patients with DLBD have a distinct clinical syndrome that can be differentiated from AD. Pathologic features, including the absence of Alz-50 immunoreactivity, also differentiate DLBD from AD.
YBCO Coated Conductors for Fusion Magnets

Coated conductors (CCs) are considered as an alternative to low temperature superconductors in fusion magnets. High magnetic fields are needed to confine the plasma, which can be generated by YBCO coated conductors at relatively high temperatures (50-77 K). The critical current densities of CCs improved continuously during the last few years and the production was scaled up. The conductors will be exposed to neutron radiation in a fusion magnet, which could potentially improve or degrade their properties. Industrial YBCO coated conductors were characterized by magnetization and direct transport measurements in magnetic fields of up to 15 Tesla and at temperatures between 50 and 85 K. The critical current, its anisotropy and the irreversibility line were determined. The measurements were performed on different samples, which were sequentially irradiated up to a fluence of 2 times 1022 m-2 (two times the ITER specification). The measurements were repeated after each irradiation step to investigate the change in the superconducting parameters. Depending on the production process of the CC and on the actual operation conditions, an increase or a decrease of the critical current density is observed. The measurements show that the performance of the CC nearly reaches the required specification for ITER conductors at present. Neutron irradiation generally does not degrade their properties in the operating range of fusion magnets.
Gene Expression Induced by Copper Stress in the Diatom Thalassiosira pseudonana

ABSTRACT Utilizing a PCR-based subtractive cDNA approach, we demonstrated that the marine diatom Thalassiosira pseudonana exhibits a rapid response at the gene level to elevated concentrations of copper and that this response attenuates over 24 h of continuous exposure. A total of 16 copper-induced genes were identified, 11 of which were completely novel; however, many of the predicted amino acid sequences had characteristics suggestive of roles in ameliorating copper toxicity. Most of the novel genes were not equivalently induced by H2O2- or Cd-induced stress, indicating specificity in response. Two genes that could be assigned functions based on homology were also induced under conditions of general cellular stress. Half of the identified genes were located within two inverted repeats in the genome, and novel genes in one inverted repeat had mRNA levels induced by ∼500- to 2,000-fold by exposure to copper for 1 h. Additionally, some of the inverted repeat genes demonstrated a dose-dependent response to Cu, but not Cd, and appear to belong to a multigene family. This multigene family may be the diatom functional homolog of metallothioneins.
Postural Stability of Athletes in Special Olympics

To assess body equilibrium in athletes with intellectual disability, 60 adults with intellectual disability (30 Down syndrome, 30 nonsyndromic) participating in the 2005 Italian Special Olympics games were tested, and data for 30 healthy control adults were tested. Each subject performed four posturographic tests with open eyes, open eyes and cotton rolls between antagonist teeth, and closed eyes and cotton rolls between teeth. For each subject and test, oscillations of the body's center of foot pressure on a force platform were measured. Comparisons of the center of foot pressure sway area between groups were computed. Ratios of the sway area for the center of foot pressure among experimental conditions were compared for all athletes. The athletes with Down syndrome had larger sway of center of foot pressure area than controls and smaller than that of athletes for the nonsyndromic. All participants oscillated less with open eyes than with closed eyes. The cotton rolls reduced the sway area for the center of foot pressure by participants, while athletes with intellectual disability showed larger body sway than healthy ones, but cotton rolls between the teeth seemed to improve their postural performance.
The Association Between Physiologic Dead-Space Fraction and Mortality in Subjects With ARDS Enrolled in a Prospective Multi-Center Clinical Trial

BACKGROUND: We tested the association between pulmonary dead-space fraction (ratio of dead space to tidal volume [VD/VT]) and mortality in subjects with ARDS (Berlin definition, PaO2/FIO2 ≤ 300 mm Hg; PEEP ≥ 5 cm H2O) enrolled into a clinical trial incorporating lung-protective ventilation. METHODS: We conducted a prospective, multi-center study at medical-surgical ICUs in the United States. A total of 126 ALI subjects with acute lung injury were enrolled into a phase 3 randomized, placebo-controlled study of aerosolized albuterol. VD/VT and pulmonary mechanics were measured within 4 h of enrollment and repeated daily on study days 1 and 2 in subjects requiring arterial blood gases for clinical management. RESULTS: At baseline, non-survivors had a trend toward higher VD/VT compared with survivors (0.62 ± 0.11 vs 0.56 ± 0.11, respectively, P = .08). Differences in VD/VT between non-survivors and survivors became significant on study days 1 (0.64 ± 0.12 vs 0.55 ± 0.11, respectively, P = .01) and 2 (0.67 ± 0.12 vs 0.56 ± 0.11, respectively, P = .004). Likewise, the association between VD/VT and mortality was significant on study day 1 (odds ratio per 0.10 change in VD/VT [95% CI]: 6.84 [1.62–28.84] P = .01; and study day 2: 4.90 [1.28–18.73] P = .02) after adjusting for VD/VT, PaO2/FIO2, oxygenation index, vasopressor use, and the primary risk for ARDS. Using a Cox proportional hazard model, VD/VT was associated with a trend toward higher mortality (HR = 4.37 [CI 0.99–19.32], P = .052) that became significant when the analysis was adjusted for daily oxygenation index (HR = 1.74 [95% CI 1.12–3.35] P = .04). CONCLUSIONS: Markedly elevated VD/VT (≥ 0.60) in early ARDS is associated with higher mortality. Measuring VD/VT may be useful in identifying ARDS patients at increased risk of death who are enrolled into a therapeutic trial.
Exploring the Effects of Personality on Collaboration Technology Transition

Predicting the successful introduction of collaboration technologies has been a challenge for both researchers and practitioners. Prior research suggests that personality characteristics may represent antecedents to technology acceptance, adoption, and sustained use. This study explored the influence of personality on technology transition. The Five Factor Model of personality and the Technology Transition Model (TTM) were used to test several hypotheses and research questions looking for associations between the respective dimensionality of these constructs. Results evinced several moderate correlations between Big 5 dimensions and TTM dimensions. Only the Big 5 dimension of neuroticism appears to have no association with the TTM. Implications are discussed.
Feasibility of Administering Aminoglycoside Antibiotics by Continuous Intravenous Infusion

Eleven patients each received gentamicin sulfate, tobramycin, and sisomicin by continuous intravenous infusion after an initial loading dose. Subsequent doses of antibiotic were adjusted in an attempt to maintain constant serum concentrations. There was considerable variation in the serum concentration from patient to patient and in the same patient from day to day with each drug. Although the dosages of gentamicin sulfate and tobramycin were similar, the serum concentrations of the latter drug were consistently lower. Despite the daily administration of doses of at least 300 mg of gentamicin and tobramycin per m2 and 160 mg of sisomicin per m2, nephrotoxicity occurred in only three patients. This is a low frequency of nephrotoxicity, considering the dosages of drug administered. Although therapeutic efficacy was not an objective of this study, 8 of 11 documented infections were cured. This approach to the administration of aminoglycoside antibiotics deserves therapeutic trials.
Locus Coeruleus and Neuronal Plasticity in a Model of Focal Limbic Epilepsy

Summary: Purpose: A lesion of the noradrenergic nucleus Locus Coeruleus (LC) converts sporadic seizures evoked by microinfusion of bicuculline into the anterior piriform cortex (APC) of rats into limbic status epilepticus (SE). The purpose of this study was to evaluate the chronic effects of this new model of SE on the onset of secondary epileptogenesis. We further related the loss of noradrenaline (NE) with hippocampal mossy fiber sprouting.
Clinical laboratory applications of monoclonal antibodies

Monoclonal antibody (MAb) technology is well recognized as a significant development for producing specific serologic reagents to a wide variety of antigens in unlimited amounts. These reagents have provided the means for developing a number of highly specific and reproducible immunological assays for rapid and accurate diagnosis of an extensive list of diseases, including infectious diseases. The impact that MAbs have had in characterizing infectious disease pathogens, as well as their current and future applications for use in clinical microbiology laboratories, is reviewed. In addition, the advantages (and disadvantages) of the use of MAbs in a number of immunoassays, such as particle agglutination, radioimmunoassays, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays, immunofluorescent-antibody assays, and immunohistology, are explored, including the use of these reagents in novel test system assays. Also, nucleic acid probe technology is compared with the use of MAbs from the perspective of their respective applications in the diagnosis of infectious disease agents. There is no question that hybridoma technology has the potential to alter significantly the methods currently used in most clinical microbiology laboratories.
Investigation of Clade B New World Arenavirus Tropism by Using Chimeric GP1 Proteins

ABSTRACT Clade B of the New World arenaviruses contains both pathogenic and nonpathogenic members, whose surface glycoproteins (GPs) are characterized by different abilities to use the human transferrin receptor type 1 (hTfR1) protein as a receptor. Using closely related pairs of pathogenic and nonpathogenic viruses, we investigated the determinants of the GP1 subunit that confer these different characteristics. We identified a central region (residues 85 to 221) in the Guanarito virus GP1 that was sufficient to interact with hTfR1, with residues 159 to 221 being essential. The recently solved structure of part of the Machupo virus GP1 suggests an explanation for these requirements.