Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Targeting Behavior of Magnetic Particles Under Gradient Magnetic Fields Produced by Two Types of Permanent Magnets

Fully understanding the dynamics of particles induced by magnetic fields with considering particle-particle interaction is an interesting and important issue for delivering magnetic particles to a target site with a high efficiency. For this purpose, permanent magnets with horizontal and vertical magnetization directions respectively have been taken for generating two types of gradient magnetic fields, which are applied to produce similar gradient magnetic forces while with different magnetic interaction forces between particles. On this basis, the distributions of particles under the two gradient magnetic fields are investigated and compared using Monte Carlo simulations. The results show that the concentrated particles have chainlike structures and their distributions are configuration dependent with the magnetization direction of permanent magnets: parallel and perpendicular to the bottom line for horizontal and vertical magnetization directions, respectively. Above all, a detailed microscopy study reveals that the movement trajectories of magnetic particles are affected by both transport and aggregation behavior of particles and the microscopic visualizations of particle distributions in the target region are in agreement with simulation predictions.
An investigation of career development programs, job satisfaction, professional development and productivity: the case of Taiwan

This study attempts to develop career development programs capable of responding to career needs at different career stages. The current implementation status of these career development programs in Taiwanese businesses is then examined, along with the level of satisfaction of R&D personnel with available career development programs. The relationship between the career development programs and job satisfaction, professional development and productivity is then examined, revealing an association between high satisfaction of R&D personnel with career development programs and high job satisfaction, professional development and productivity.
Failure of stationary but not of flying honeybees (Apis mellifera) to respond to magnetic field stimuli.

Trained individual honeybees (Apis melliferd) to feed to repletion from a well of sucrose solution so constructed that shock could be delivered when the proboscis was in contact with the solution. If shock was signaled by vibration of the substrate or by an airstream, the animals learned readily to avoid it by breaking contact briefly, but there was no response to change (either constant or time-varying) in the ambient magnetic field. When, however, a magnetic field anomaly in the region of the food well signaled to flying animals that contact would be punished with shock, hesitation to settle was greater in presence than absence of the anomaly. Parallel results were obtained with light, to which flying Ss clearly responded but to which stationary Ss hardly responded at all. We conclude that stationary bees detect magnetic field stimuli but do not process them successfully in the training situation. In previous experiments (Walker & Bitterman, 1985), it has been shown that flying honeybees {Apis melliferd) can be trained to discriminate earth-strength magnetic fields; this evidence has set the stage for a detailed psychophysical analysis of magnetoreception. Out of an interest in achieving better control of stimulation than is possible in work with flying subjects (which must be depended on to expose themselves to the magnetic fields), we turned in the present experiments to a method of conditioning stationary bees that was developed recently in this laboratory (Abramson, 1986). The work is done with individual foragers that have been pretrained to fly back and forth between the hive and the sill of an open laboratory window, where they feed to repletion on a target containing a well of sucrose solution. During the feeding a conditioned stimulus (CS) is turned on and followed 5 s later by a brief shock (the unconditioned stimulus or US) that the animal can learn to avoid by breaking contact with the sucrose solution. (Typically, it flies up from the target for a short time.) With vibration of the substrate or a stream of air directed at the animal as the CS, conditioning is dependably rapid (Abramson, 1986; Abramson & Bitterman, 1986a, 1986b), and we hoped at the outset of this work that it would be rapid also with magnetic stimuli. In fact, however, the animals hardly responded at all, despite the fact that the magnetic stimuli (produced by passing direct currents through coils below the target) were exactly the same as those discrim
Spontaneously hypertensive rat: lymphoid depression is age dependent and mediated via a mononuclear cell subpopulation.

Immune dysfunction has been reported in spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR), particularly in mature animals with established hypertension. The current study examined the time course of development of immune dysfunction and defined its cellular basis in male SHR and control normotensive Wistar-Kyoto rats (WKY). Mitogen-induced proliferative responses in lymphoid cells obtained from induced proliferative responses in lymphoid cells obtained from SHR thymus and spleen before (age 4 wk) and during the development of (ages 8 and 12 wk) hypertension and in age-matched normotensive WKY were monitored. A 50% reduction in concanavalin A (Con A)-induced proliferative responses was seen in SHR thymocytes compared with those of WKY at 12 wk only, suggesting differences in immature T-cell populations. Con A-induced T-cell proliferative responses in splenocytes also differed between strains: greatest (as much as 8-fold) decreases were found in 12-wk-old SHR. Similar findings were obtained in splenocytes stimulated with lipopolysaccharide (LPS), indicating differences in B-cell function. Mononuclear cells depleted of their adherent cell population were prepared from SHR and WKY at 12+ wk of age and assayed for their proliferative responses to LPS and Con A. The remaining nonadherent mononuclear cells of SHR had proliferative responses equal to or greater than those of WKY. Further, when SHR splenic mononuclear cells were allowed to adhere to plastic, and the adherent fraction was co-cultured with either SHR G-10 nonadherent or unfractionated SHR splenic mononuclear cells, proliferative responses were suppressed by as much as 88%. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Positive impact of IGF-1-coupled nanoparticles on the differentiation potential of human chondrocytes cultured on collagen scaffolds

Purpose In the present study, silica nanoparticles (sNP) coupled with insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) were loaded on a collagen-based scaffold intended for cartilage repair, and the influence on the viability, proliferation, and differentiation potential of human primary articular chondrocytes was examined. Methods Human chondrocytes were isolated from the hyaline cartilage of patients (n=4, female, mean age: 73±5.1 years) undergoing primary total knee joint replacement. Cells were dedifferentiated and then cultivated on a bioresorbable collagen matrix supplemented with fluorescent sNP coupled with IGF-1 (sNP–IGF-1). After 3, 7, and 14 days of cultivation, cell viability and integrity into the collagen scaffold as well as metabolic cell activity and synthesis rate of matrix proteins (collagen type I and II) were analyzed. Results The number of vital cells increased over 14 days of cultivation, and the cells were able to infiltrate the collagen matrix (up to 120 μm by day 7). Chondrocytes cultured on the collagen scaffold supplemented with sNP–IGF-1 showed an increase in metabolic activity (5.98-fold), and reduced collagen type I (1.58-fold), but significantly increased collagen type II expression levels (1.53-fold; P=0.02) after 7 days of cultivation compared to 3 days. In contrast, chondrocytes grown in a monolayer on plastic supplemented with sNP-IGF-1 had significantly lower metabolic activity (1.32-fold; P=0.007), a consistent amount of collagen type I, and significantly reduced collagen type II protein expression (1.86-fold; P=0.001) after 7 days compared to 3 days. Conclusion Collagen-based scaffolds enriched with growth factors, such as IGF-1 coupled to nanoparticles, represent an improved therapeutic intervention for the targeted and controlled treatment of articular cartilage lesions.
Eating Healthy or Feeling Empty? How the “Healthy = Less Filling” Intuition Influences Satiety

To help understand the unconscious drivers of overeating, we examine the effect of health portrayals on people’s judgments of the fillingness of food. An implicit association test and two consumption studies provide evidence that people hold an implicit belief that healthy foods are less filling than unhealthy foods, an effect we label the “healthy = less filling” intuition. The consumption studies provide evidence that people order greater quantities of food, consume more of it, and are less full after consuming a food portrayed as more versus less healthy. In addition, we demonstrate a novel tactic for reversing consumers’ intuitions: highlighting the nourishing aspects of healthy food mitigates the belief that it is less filling. Taken together, these findings add to the burgeoning body of work on the psychological causes of weight gain and obesity and point to a way of overturning the pernicious effects of the “healthy = less filling” intuition.
Identifying module biomarkers from gastric cancer by differential correlation network

Gastric cancer (stomach cancer) is a severe disease caused by dysregulation of many functionally correlated genes or pathways instead of the mutation of individual genes. Systematic identification of gastric cancer biomarkers can provide insights into the mechanisms underlying this deadly disease and help in the development of new drugs. In this paper, we present a novel network-based approach to predict module biomarkers of gastric cancer that can effectively distinguish the disease from normal samples. Specifically, by assuming that gastric cancer has mainly resulted from dysfunction of biomolecular networks rather than individual genes in an organism, the genes in the module biomarkers are potentially related to gastric cancer. Finally, we identified a module biomarker with 27 genes, and by comparing the module biomarker with known gastric cancer biomarkers, we found that our module biomarker exhibited a greater ability to diagnose the samples with gastric cancer.
On Weak Symmetries of Kaehler Manifolds

Weakly symmetric Riemannian manifolds are generalizations of the locally symmetric manifolds, spaces of recurrent curvature and pseudo symmetric manifolds. These are manifolds in which the covariants derivative∇R of the curvature tensor R is a linear expression in R. The appearing coefficients of this expression are called associated 1-forms. They satisfy in the specified types of manifolds gradually weaker conditions. Weakly Ricci-symmetric Riemannian or Kaehler manifolds are defined by a similar representation of ∇S in place of ∇R, where S is the Ricci tensor. We prove several relations that exist between the properties of the weakly symmetric or weakly Ricci-symmetric Kaehler manifolds and the associated 1forms of these spaces. In these relations the Ricci tensor and its eigenvalues play the decisive role. Mathematics Subject Classification: 53C07, 53C25
Control of novel multilevel inverter

The focus of this paper is to develop and implement the new topology of multilevel inverter and study its performance The developed new MLI topology uses less number of switches and hence it is simple in control, cost effective and efficient. The proposed model is designed for 11-level and a prototype laboratory model is implemented. The input power source has been realized using 5 lead acid batteries of 12V, 42Ah along with the battery charger circuit. Control circuit of the proposed MLI is implemented by microcontroller atmega 8 using selective harmonic elimination method. The model is tested with various loads in hardware setup.
Angiogenic gene therapy with vascular endothelial growth factor — Hope or hype?

SummaryBackground: Angiogenesis is a promising novel therapeutic strategy to provide new venues for blood flow in patients with severe ischaemic heart and peripheral vascular diseases. Among several stimulators, the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2, basic FGF) have been most widely studied. Methods: Preclinical animal studies suggested the strong therapeutic potentials of VEGF, and such positive effects have also been confirmed in a limited number of phase I clinical trials. However, some animal studies suggest the existence of a considerable risk associated with angiogenic therapy. Results: VEGF is strongly expressed in human atherosclerotic plaques, it promotes atherosclerosis in animal models, and there is evidence indicating that the plaque growth is dependent on the formation of new blood vessels. Therefore, for a convincing demonstration of the safety and efficacy of VEGF gene therapy, the clinical effects need to be evaluated in larger randomized, double-blinded clinical trials. Conclusions: Further understanding of the mechanisms of activity of angiogenic growth factors and the formation of blood vessels is required, and improved gene transfer methods are necessary to introduce therapeutic angiogenesis in clinical practice.ZusammenfassungGrundlagen: Die Angiogenese ist eine vielversprechende neue therapeutische Strategie bei Patienten mit Myokardischämie und peripheren Gefäßerkrankungen. Unter den verschiedensten Stimulatoren sind der Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor (VEGF) und der Fibroblast Growth Factor-2 (FGF-2, basic FGF) am besten erforscht. Methodik: Vorklinische Tierversuche lassen ein großes therapeutisches Potential erwarten, und diese positiven Effekte werden von einer begrenzten Zahl von Phase-I-Studien bestätigt. Einige der experimentellen Studien lassen erhebliche Risiken in Verbindung mit einer angiogenetischen Therapie vermuten. Ergebnisse: VEGF wird von humanen atherosklerotischen Plaques verstärkt gebildet, fördert Atherosklerose am Tiermodell, und es gibt Anzeichen, daß das Plaquewachstum von der Bildung neuer Blutgefäße abhängig ist. Daher sollten die klinischen Effekte, um die Sicherheit und Effizienz einer VEGF-Gentherapie zu zeigen, in großen, randomisierten, doppelblinden, klinischen Studien evaluiert werden. Schlußfolgerungen: Um eine therapeutische Angiogenese in der klinischen Praxis anwenden zu können, ist ein genaueres Verständnis der Mechanismen der Aktivität von angiogenetischen Wachstumsfaktoren und der Bildung von Blutgefäßen und die Verbesserung der Gentransfermethoden nötig.
THE COMPREHENSION OF SOCIAL SITUATIONS IN A SMALL GROUP OF PATIENTS WITH FRONTOTEMPORAL DEMENTIA AND ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE

Marco Cavallo, Ivan Enrici3(A,D,E,F, Mauro Adenzato 1 Department of Medical Sciences, Amedeo Avogadro University of Eastern Piedmont, Novara, Italy 2 Department of Mental Health, San Luigi Gonzaga Hospital Medical School, University of Turin, Italy 3 Department of Psychology, Center for Cognitive Science, University of Turin, 4 Neuroscience Institute of Turin, Italy ORIGINAL ARTICLE ACTA Vol. 9, No. 2, 2011, 167-176
The Effect of Working Time Reduction on Short-Time Compensation: a French Empirical Analysis

The short-time compensation (STC) program aims to avoid lay-offs in case of short-term downturns. According to insurance models, STC is an instrument of both job security and flexibility. This paper investigates the impact of workweek reduction to 35 hours on the French STC recourse. We quantify the average decrease in the STC authorized days with kernel matching estimators assessed on a balanced panel of French establishments. We highlight a substitution effect between STC and working time reduction (WTR) due to their internal flexibility role. As a consequence, the WTR policy refocused STC on its initial job security function.
Perianal Crohn's Disease is Associated with Distal Colonic Disease, Stricturing Disease Behavior, IBD-Associated Serologies and Genetic Variation in the JAK-STAT Pathway

Background:Perianal Crohn's Disease (pCD) is a particularly severe phenotype associated with poor quality of life with a reported prevalence of 12%–40%. Previous studies investigating the etiology of pCD have been limited in the numbers of subjects and the intensity of genotyping. The aim of this study was to identify clinical, serological, and genetic factors associated with pCD. Methods:We performed a case–control study comparing patients with (pCD+) and without perianal (pCD−) involvement in CD; defined as the presence of perianal abscesses or fistulae. Data on demographics and clinical features were obtained by chart review. Inflammatory bowel disease-related serology was determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Genetic data were generated using Illumina genotyping platforms. Results:We included 1721 patients with CD of which 524 (30.4%) were pCD+ and 1197 were pPCD−. pCD was associated with distal colonic disease (Odds ratio 5.54 [3.23–9.52], P < 0.001), stricturing disease behavior (1.44 [1.14–1.81], P = 0.002) and family history of inflammatory bowel disease (4.98 [3.30–7.46], P < 0.001). pCD was associated with higher anti-sacharomyces cerevisae antibodies IgA (P < 0.001) and OmpC (P = 0.008) antibody levels. pCD was associated with known inflammatory bowel disease loci, including KIF3B, CRTC3, TRAF3IP2, JAZF1, NRIP1, MST1, FUT2, and PTGER (all P < 0.05). We also identified genetic association with genes involved in autophagy (DAPK1, P = 5.11 × 10−5), TNF alpha pathways (NUCB2, P = 8.68 × 10−5; DAPK1), IFNg pathways (DAPK1; NDFIP2, P = 8.74 × 10−5), and extracellular matrix and scaffolding proteins (USH1C, P = 8.68 × 10−5; NDFIP2; TMC07, P = 8.87 × 10−5). Pathway analyses implicated the JAK-Stat pathway (pc = 3.72 × 10−5). Conclusion:We have identified associations between pCD, more distal colonic inflammation, Crohn's disease-associated serologies, and genetic variation in the JAK-Stat pathway.
USA300 Genotype Community-Associated Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus as a Cause of Surgical Site Infections

ABSTRACT Community-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (CA-MRSA) strains are increasingly recovered from nosocomial settings. We conducted a retrospective study of surgical site infections (SSI) during 2004 and 2005 to determine the prevalence of CA-MRSA; 57% of MRSA strains tested belonged to the USA300 genotype. CA-MRSA has become a prominent cause of SSI at our institution.
Study of serum levels of superoxide dismutase in preeclampsia and eclampsia: role of the test as a predictive tool

Aim: To report serum levels of superoxide dismutase in women with preeclampsia and eclampsia. To document the use of the value as a predictive tool for deciding the time of onset of subsequent convulsions with fulminating eclampsia and use of the value as a marker for obstetric intervention in clinical severe preeclampsia and eclampsia.
SOCIAL COHESION: MEASUREMENT BASED ON THE EVS MICRO DATA

The purpose of the present study is to create a measurement of social cohesion using the micro data from the 1999 European Values Study. That 1999 study contains a great number of subjective and objective items that measure attitudes toward and behaviour regarding social relations, participation, and trust at many levels of social reality as well as in many spheres/domains of everyday life. Empirical analyses/construction of social cohesion indicators is realized by employing multidimensional scaling and confirmatory factor analysis.
Lowering Minimum Supply Voltage for Power-Efficient Cache Design by Exploiting Data Redundancy

Voltage scaling is known to be an efficient way of saving power and energy within a system, and large caches such as LLCs are good candidates for voltage scaling considering their constantly increasing size. However, the VCCMIN problem, in which the lower bound of scalable voltage is limited by process variation, has made it difficult to exploit the benefits of voltage scaling. Lowering VCCMIN incurs multibit faults, which cannot be efficiently resolved by current technologies due to their high complexity and power consumption. We overcame the limitation by exploiting the data redundancy of memory hierarchy. For example, cache coherence states and several layers of cache organization naturally expose the existence of redundancy within cache blocks. If blocks have redundant copies, their VCCMIN can be lowered; although more faults can occur in the blocks, they can be efficiently detected by simple error detection codes and recovered by reloading the redundant copies. Our scheme requires only minor modifications to the existing cache design. We verified our proposal on a cycle accurate simulator with SPLASH-2 and PARSEC benchmark suites and found that the VCCMIN of a 2MB L2 cache can be further lowered by 0.1V in 32nm technology with negligible degradation in performance. As a result, we could achieve 15.6% of reduction in dynamic power and 15.4% of reduction in static power compared to the previous minimum power.
Stereo Matching for Slanted and Low Texture Plane: A Reliability Confidence Inference Approach

The aim of the stereo matching is to get the accurate disparity. But for the slanted and low textured plane, the ambiguity is increased. To get the more accurate disparity, most constraints are applied. In this paper, the statistical probability method (SPT) is applied to inferring disparity. The reliable confidence (RC) based on the SPT measures how the pixel disparity is reliable. The unreliable disparity of the pixel is inferred from reliable disparity through adjacent segment cooperative optimization. The adjacent segment geometric constraint and gradient information are incorporated into two new local and global energy functions respectively. Experimental results demonstrate the good performance of the proposed method.
From sequences to shapes and back: a case study in RNA secondary structures

RNA folding is viewed here as a map assigning secondary structures to sequences. At fixed chain length the number of sequences far exceeds the number of structures. Frequencies of structures are highly non-uniform and follow a generalized form of Zipf’s law: we find relatively few common and many rare ones. By using an algorithm for inverse folding, we show that sequences sharing the same structure are distributed randomly over sequence space. All common structures can be accessed from an arbitrary sequence by a number of mutations much smaller than the chain length. The sequence space is percolated by extensive neutral networks connecting nearest neighbours folding into identical structures. Implications for evolutionary adaptation and for applied molecular evolution are evident: finding a particular structure by mutation and selection is much simpler than expected and, even if catalytic activity should turn out to be sparse in the space of RNA structures, it can hardly be missed by evolutionary processes.
Content-Based Image Retrieval Based on Electromagnetism-Like Mechanism

Recently, many researchers in the field of automatic content-based image retrieval have devoted a remarkable amount of research looking for methods to retrieve the best relevant images to the query image. This paper presents a novel algorithm for increasing the precision in content-based image retrieval based on electromagnetism optimization technique. The electromagnetism optimization is a nature-inspired technique that follows the collective attraction-repulsion mechanism by considering each image as an electrical charge. The algorithm is composed of two phases: fitness function measurement and electromagnetism optimization technique. It is implemented on a database with 8,000 images spread across 80 classes with 100 images in each class. Eight thousand queries are fired on the database, and the overall average precision is computed. Experimental results of the proposed approach have shown significant improvement in the retrieval performance in regard to precision.