Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Long-Term HIV/AIDS Survival Estimation in the Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy Era

Background. Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) prolongs short-term survival in patients with HIV/AIDS. HAART has only been available since 1996; thus, no longterm survival data are available. Computer simulation models extrapolating short-term survival data can provide estimates of long-term survival. These survival estimates may assist patients and clinicians in HAART treatment planning. The authors construct a computer simulation model based on observational data to estimate long-term survival in a cohort of HIV/AIDS patients undergoing treatment with HAART. Methods. The authors use data from the Collaboration in HIV Outcomes Research-US (CHORUS) observational cohort (N = 4791), the published literature, and US Life Tables to specify a computer simulation model of expected survival accounting for baseline CD4 cell count, progressive HAART treatment failure, progressive risk of HAART on treatment mortality, and age-associated mortality. Time to treatment failure for each of three rounds of HAART and risk of mortality on-treatment were estimated using parametric survival models with censoring of follow-up fit to CHORUS data. Off-treatment survival after HAART failure was estimated from the pre-HAART literature. Age-associated mortality was taken from US Life Tables. Results. Median projected survivals stratified by baseline CD4 cell count subgroups were CD4 > 200 cells/mm³, 15.4 years; CD4 ≤ 200 cells/mm³, 8.5 years; and CD4 ≤ 50 cells/mm³, 5.5 years. These values are 4 to 6 years longer than pre-HAART cohorts. The sensitivity analyses showed that the model survival predictions were most sensitive to the treatment failure rate, the on-treatment mortality rate, and the number of treatment rounds. Conclusions. Computer simulation modeling of long-term survival of patients with HIV/AIDS on HAART—accounting for differential treatment failure and death rates stratified by CD4 cell count and age-associated mortality—suggests a relatively consistent 4- to 6-year survival benefit over pre-HAAART therapies.
N′-(4-Bromophenylsulfonyl)isonicotinohydrazide

The title compound, C12H10BrN3O3S, crystallizes with two crystallographically independent molecules in the asymmetric unit. The dihedral angles between the two six-membered rings in the molecules are 34.1 (3) and 45.1 (2)°. In the crystal structure, molecules are connected via N—H⋯O and N—H⋯N hydrogen bonding.
Method The analysis employed the following classical procedure ( Bardin 1993 ) . The MARKOR and MKTOR scales were collected from published articles ( MARKOR : Kohli , Jaworski

Content analysis was used to compare the MKTOR and MARKOR market orientation scales in relation to the theoretical position that originally inspired their development. The underlying meanings of each scale appear to be significantly different. MARKOR integrates an organizational view of market orientation and develops an assessment the firm’s potentiality. MKTOR is more centered on the customer orientation and exhibits a “check list ” approach.
Use of albumin in the intensive care unit

Recent publications have renewed interest in albumin use in the ICU. Meta-analyses have been published that demonstrate the safety of albumin administration and even potential benefits. Hypoalbuminemia, which has long been considered a marker of disease, has been causally linked to the development of complications. Finally, advances have been made in our knowledge of the unique and potentially beneficial properties of albumin.
The Viral Bcl-2 Homologs of Kaposi's Sarcoma-Associated Herpesvirus and Rhesus Rhadinovirus Share an Essential Role for Viral Replication

ABSTRACT KS-Bcl-2 is a Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV)-encoded viral Bcl-2 (vBcl-2) homolog which has apoptosis- and autophagy-inhibiting activity when expressed in transfected cells. However, little is known about its function during viral infection. As KS-Bcl-2 is expressed during the lytic replication cycle, we used constitutively lytic and inducibly lytic KSHV mutants to investigate the role of KS-Bcl-2 during the lytic cycle. We show that KSHV cannot complete the lytic replication cycle and produce infectious progeny in the absence of KS-Bcl-2, indicating that the protein is essential for KSHV replication. Replacement of the KS-Bcl-2 coding sequence, ORF16, by sequences encoding a potent cellular apoptosis and autophagy inhibitor, Bcl-XL, or the cytomegalovirus mitochondrial inhibitor of apoptosis, vMIA, did not rescue KSHV replication, suggesting that KS-Bcl-2 has a function that goes beyond apoptosis and autophagy inhibition. Strikingly, the vBcl-2 proteins of the related γ2-herpesviruses murine herpesvirus 68 and herpesvirus saimiri did not rescue the replication of a KS-Bcl-2 deletion mutant, but rhesus rhadinovirus (RRV) vBcl-2 did. Deletion of ORF16 from the RRV genome abrogated viral replication, but its replacement by KSHV ORF16 rescued RRV replication, indicating that the essential vBcl-2 function is conserved between these two primate rhadinoviruses. We further show that the KSHV and RRV Bcl-2 homologs localize to the mitochondria and nuclei of infected cells. Deletion of 17 amino acids from the N terminus of KS-Bcl-2 abrogates nuclear localization and KSHV replication, suggesting that KS-Bcl-2 might execute its essential function in the nuclei of infected cells. IMPORTANCE Several viruses express proteins homologous to cellular Bcl-2. Viral Bcl-2 proteins have functions similar to those of cellular Bcl-2: they can inhibit apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death, and autophagy, a self-degradative process for the disposal of dysfunctional or unwanted components. This study shows that the vBcl-2 proteins of KSHV and RRV differ from other vBcl-2 proteins in that they are essential for viral replication. The essential function is separate from the apoptosis- and autophagy-inhibiting activity but correlates with an unusual localization within the cell nucleus, suggesting that these proteins exert a novel function in the nucleus.
Selection of Botrytis cinerea and Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains for the improvement and valorization of Italian passito style wines.

In order to improve the quality of Italian passito wine, produced from withered grapes that can be naturally infected by noble rot, in this study, a novel protocol was developed to select suitable cultures of both Botrytis cinerea to infect grapes (as noble rot) and of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to ferment grapes. A total of 16 B. cinerea isolated from withered grapes were typified by RAPD-PCR, and three representative strains were selected for physiological characterization. The strains showed different mycelial growth and enzymatic activities (i.e. polygalacturonase, protease, and laccase). A total of 15 yeasts were isolated from spontaneous fermented wines, these were identified as S. cerevisiae, and typified at strain level. Seven strains were selected according to RAPD-PCR profiles and tested for their fermentation performances. The effects of B. cinerea and S. cerevisiae cultures on the aroma profile of sweet style wine were preliminary evaluated fermenting artificially botrytized grapes induced with B. cinerea infection. The combination of selected fungi affected the aroma profile of wine according to the variation of the content of important molecules (i.e. alcohols, esters, and lactones). This study has provided valuable information to develop new natural cultures destined to induce grape botrytization and manage fermentation in passito winemaking.
The urinary proteome and peptidome of renal cell carcinoma patients: a comparison of different techniques

Renal cell carcinomas, originating from the renal cortex, account for about 80% of kidney primary malignancies. Small localized tumors rarely produce symptoms and diagnosis is often delayed until the disease is advanced. In contrast to other urological cancers, renal cell carcinomas are associated with a high degree of metastases and a low 5-year survival rate. The identification of diagnostic and prognostic markers, especially in the urine, remains an area of intense investigation. Different proteomic strategies have been applied so far to biomarker discovery in urine at the proteome or the peptidome level. Gel-based and gel-free strategies combined with mass spectrometry are the most-used strategies, have different success rates, and will be depicted here. We also prefigure a scenario in which the limitations of a single approach are overcome by applying new and complementary research strategies, relying on the excellent availability coupled to the intrinsic richness typical of urine samples.
An additional stabilizer for mitigating the instability in DC/DC cascaded system with constant power loads

Cascaded DC converters are becoming widely used in DC distributed power system. When a DC converter is tightly regulated, it operates as a constant power load (CPL). In a cascaded system, instability problems usually occurs due to the negative incremental impedance characteristic caused by a CPL. In order to mitigate instability, this paper proposes a new approach by adding an additional stabilizer in parallel with the intermediate DC bus of the cascaded system. Composed of a resistor and a bi-directional Buck-Boost converter, this stabilizer is controlled to emulate a RC damper. By reducing the output impedance of source converter, impedance based stability criterion is satisfied. After applying this stabilizer, both stability and dynamic performance of the cascaded system are improved. Lastly, a simulation based on two cascaded Buck converters is presented to verify the effectiveness of the proposed stabilizer.
Humanoid robot assisted interactive sign language tutoring game

There is an on-going study which aims to assist in teaching Sign Language to hearing impaired children by means of non-verbal communication and imitation based interaction games between a humanoid robot and the child. In this study, the robot will be able to express a word in Sign Language among a set of chosen words using hand movements, body and face gestures and having comprehended the word, the child will give relevant feedback to the robot. This study proposes an interactive game between a NAO H25 humanoid robot and preschool children based on Sign Language. Currently the demo is in Turkish Sign Language (TSL) but it will be extended to ASL, too. Since the children do not know how to read and write, and are not familiar with sign language, we prepared a short story including special words where the robot realized the specially selected word with sign language as well as pronouncing the word verbally. After realizing every special word with sign language the robot waited for response from children, where the children were asked to show colour flashcards with the illustration of the word. If the flashcard and the word match the robot pronounces the word verbally and continues to tell the story. At the end of the story the robot realizes the words one by one with sign language in a random order and asks the children to put the sticker of the relevant flashcard on their play cards which include the story with illustrations of the flashcards. We also carried the game to internet and tablet pc environments. The aim is to evaluate the children's sign language learning ability from a robot, in different embodiments and make the system available to children disregarding the cost of the robot, transportation and knowhow issues.
Surgical Correction of Anatomic Abnormalities in Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome: Uvulopalatopharyngoplasty

Excessive daytime sleepiness and loud snoring are the major symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea, often leading to serious medical complications if unrecognized and untreated. Tracheostomy has been the only effective treatment in most adult cases. This paper reports on a new surgical approach to treat obstructive sleep apnea by uvulopalatopharyngoplasty designed to enlarge the potential airspace in the oropharynx. Twelve patients underwent this operation. In nine there was relief of symptoms and in eight there was objective improvement in nocturnal respiration and sleep pattern, demonstrated by polysomnography.
A Robust Repetitive-Control Design for a Class of Uncertain Stochastic Dynamical Systems

In this brief, we study the problem of output tracking for continuous-time stochastic dynamical systems with parametric uncertainties and aperiodic disturbances by using a modified repetitive controller (MRC). More precisely, the MRC is obtained based on the equivalent input disturbance (EID) technique such that the closed-loop modified repetitive-control system is asymptotically stable in the presence of uncertainties and aperiodic disturbances. The main advantage of the proposed controller is that it can incorporate an EID estimator, which estimates and eliminates disturbances in the repetitive-control systems. Finally, simulation is conducted to reveal that the proposed controller can effectively reject the aperiodic disturbance, reduce the stochastic noise, and track the reference signal without steady-state error.
Wildfire Risk Transmission in the Colorado Front Range, USA

Wildfires are a global phenomenon that in some circumstances can result in human casualties, economic loss, and ecosystem service degradation. In this article we spatially identify wildfire risk transmission pathways and locate the areas of highest exposure of human populations to wildland fires under severe, but not uncommon, weather events. We quantify varying levels of exposure in terms of population potentially affected and tie the exposure back to the spatial source of the risk for the Front Range of Colorado, USA. We use probabilistic fire simulation modeling to address where fire ignitions are most likely to cause the highest impact to human communities, and to explore the role that various landowners play in that transmission of risk. Our results indicated that, given an ignition and the right fire weather conditions, large areas along the Front Range in Colorado could be exposed to wildfires with high potential to impact human populations, and that overall private ignitions have the potential to impact more people than federal ignitions. These results can be used to identify high‐priority areas for wildfire risk mitigation using various mitigation tools.
Modélisation des performances technico-économiques et environnementales de l’atelier d’engraissement porcin à l’aide d’un modèle dynamique, mécaniste et stochastique

Les elevages porcins sont soumis a des enjeux economiques et environnementaux grandissants. Pour repondre a ces enjeux, differentes methodes d’evaluation des performances des systemes de production ont ete developpees. Des travaux recents montrent que simuler la variabilite des performances entre les porcs ameliore la precision des resultats, en comparaison de l’utilisation d’un modele de l’animal moyen. L’objectif de ce travail etait de developper un modele de l’atelier d’engraissement integrant les effets des interactions entre la variabilite inter-individuelle des porcs, la structure de l’elevage et les pratiques de l’eleveur, sur les performances de l’atelier. Les pratiques d’elevage ont ete representees dans le modele a partir d’une typologie portant sur la conduite en bandes, les regles de mise en lots, l’alimentation et la gestion des departs a l’abattoir. Les porcs ont ete representes par un modele individu-centre adapte du modele InraPorc. Pour illustrer son fonctionnement, quatre simulations ont ete realisees en faisant varier le plan de rationnement (ad libitum ou restriction a 2,5 kg/j) et la sequence alimentaire (biphase ou multiphase). Une analyse de variance a ete effectuee sur les indicateurs technico-economiques et environnementaux (calcules par Analyse de Cycle de Vie) calcules par le modele. Les effets du plan de rationnement et de la sequence alimentaire sont significatifs (P < 0,001). Le scenario combinant restriction et multiphase apporte la meilleure marge par porc engraisse (16,9 €/porc) et les plus faibles impacts environnementaux par kg de porc produit. A l’inverse, le scenario combinant ad libitum et biphase induit la plus faible marge (11,3 €/porc) et les plus forts impacts environnementaux. Une experimentation virtuelle basee sur le modele complete cette etude en determinant les effets combines des differentes pratiques.
CMIP5 model simulations of the Pacific meridional mode and its connection to the two types of ENSO

This study examines the Pacific meridional mode (PMM) simulated in the pre‐industrial simulations of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5). The spatial pattern and intensity of the PMM were found to be reasonably simulated by CMIP5 models, as was the subtropical atmosphere–ocean coupling associated with the PMM. However, the persistence of the coupling, which sustains the PMM's duration and extends its pattern equatorward, was found to be underestimated in most of the CMIP5 models. Many of the simulated PMMs do not have a pattern that extends far enough into the tropical Pacific to influence El Niño‐Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The CMIP5 models that do produce longer persistence for the PMM coupling show a higher correlation of the PMM with the Central‐Pacific (CP) type of ENSO than with the Eastern‐Pacific (EP) type of the ENSO. This study concludes that (1) the PMM and its associated subtropical Pacific ocean–atmosphere coupling are important to the generation of the CP type of ENSO; (2) the so‐called seasonal footprinting mechanism that sustains an equatorward extension of the PMM is not well simulated in a majority of the CMIP5 models; and (3) the persistence of the subtropical Pacific coupling is more important than the other properties in gauging a model's skill in the PMM simulation.
Investigating the Relationship between Classification Quality and SMT Performance in Discriminative Reordering Models

Reordering is one of the most important factors affecting the quality of the output in statistical machine translation (SMT). A considerable number of approaches that proposed addressing the reordering problem are discriminative reordering models (DRM). The core component of the DRMs is a classifier which tries to predict the correct word order of the sentence. Unfortunately, the relationship between classification quality and ultimate SMT performance has not been investigated to date. Understanding this relationship will allow researchers to select the classifier that results in the best possible MT quality. It might be assumed that there is a monotonic relationship between classification quality and SMT performance, i.e., any improvement in classification performance will be monotonically reflected in overall SMT quality. In this paper, we experimentally show that this assumption does not always hold, i.e., an improvement in classification performance might actually degrade the quality of an SMT system, from the point of view of MT automatic evaluation metrics. However, we show that if the improvement in the classification performance is high enough, we can expect the SMT quality to improve as well. In addition to this, we show that there is a negative relationship between classification accuracy and SMT performance in imbalanced parallel corpora. For these types of corpora, we provide evidence that, for the evaluation of the classifier, macro-averaged metrics such as macro-averaged F-measure are better suited than accuracy, the metric commonly used to date.
A Fast Molecular Nondestructive Protocol for Evaluating Aerobic Bacterial Load on Fresh-Cut Lettuce

Elaboration of minimally processed or fresh-cut vegetables requires a quick and reliable method for detection of bacterial contamination over the recommended limits. PCR-based methods fulfil these requirements, but amplification from DNA preparations of the food product is often hampered due to inhibiting substances. The purpose of this study was to develop a fast quantitative PCR (qPCR)-based method for aerobic bacterial enumeration in fresh-cut lettuce, using as reference the centrifugation water (CW) that comes up during processing instead of the food matrix itself. Comparisons between bacterial numbers on lettuce leaves before processing and bacterial numbers in the CW both for naturally occurring bacterial populations and for artificially inoculated lettuce were performed. On an average, 35% of the natural bacterial population and 64% of inoculated bacteria were recovered in the CW. Bacterial number in CW was proportional to initial lettuce contamination suggesting that measures on CW allow a narrow estimation of lettuce contamination. In qPCR, a 23S rDNA region was amplified from bacterial DNA present in the CW, followed by melting peak analyses and quantification. Enumeration of cell number by qPCR did not differ significantly from plate assay and might therefore replace it. The proposed protocol, which includes sample taking, DNA extraction and qPCR from the CW can be performed within less than 5 h. The resulting quantification might be used as a proxy of initial lettuce contamination, allowing direct intervention measures before fresh-cut commodity is shipped from the factory.
On 2-adically extended projective geometry based codes and their efficient decoding architecture

In this paper we consider a new class of codes over rings obtained through 2-adically extending the Projective Geometry (PG) codes by means of lifting. We also propose an elegant and configurable bit-serial Majority Logic (MLG) decoding architecture consisting of simple blocks, making it amenable for Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI). Some preliminary performance results are also provided to demonstrate the utility of the coding scheme in random and burst error scenarios. The proposed code and the associated decoder appears to be a useful candidate for both communications involving power and complexity constrained devices as well as in storage systems, especially nanoscale memories.
Neurotrophic effect of a novel TrkB agonist on retinal ganglion cells.

PURPOSE Retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) die in glaucoma and virtually all optic neuropathies. Recently, novel tropomyosin-related kinase B (TrkB) monoclonal antibodies have been shown to activate TrkB receptors and exert neuroprotective and neurotrophic effects. In the present study, the authors examined the ability of one of them, 29D7, to elicit RGC survival and neurite growth both in culture and in vivo. METHODS RGCs from postnatal day (P)3 to P4 Sprague-Dawley rats were isolated by sequential immunopanning using a monoclonal antibody to Thy1. RGCs were cultured in serum-free defined medium in 96-well plates. RGC viability was assessed after 1 to 3 days by MTT assay. Activation of TrkB and downstream signaling molecules was confirmed by Western blot analysis. Intravitreal injections of 29D7 were performed after optic nerve axotomy, and subsequent RGC survival was quantified using beta-III tubulin immunostaining. Regeneration was assessed using retrograde fluorogold tracing in an optic nerve-peripheral nerve graft model. RESULTS Similar to brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), the 29D7 antibody strongly promoted RGC survival and neurite growth in vitro compared with medium alone or control IgG. Forskolin, which weakly supported RGC survival on its own, potentiated the effect of 29D7. Intravitreal injection of 29D7 enhanced RGC survival but not regeneration in vivo 2 weeks after optic nerve injury. CONCLUSIONS Together, these findings demonstrate the potential for antibody-mediated TrkB agonism as a potential therapeutic approach to enhance RGC survival after optic nerve injury. Further studies are needed to elucidate the mechanistic differences between this TrkB agonist and BDNF.