Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Myocardial blood flow measurement by PET: technical aspects and clinical applications.

The availability of plastic microspheres labeled with different -emitting isotopes has allowed the quantification of blood flow in different organs, including the heart (1). In the past 3 decades this has made it possible to study the changes in myocardial blood flow (MBF) under different physiologic and pathophysiologic conditions in experimental animals. In a similar fashion, the development of PET has allowed the noninvasive quantification of regional MBF in healthy humans and patients with different cardiovascular diseases. This article summarizes how PET measurement of MBF has contributed to advance our understanding of cardiac physiology and pathophysiology.
Methotrexate Causes Apoptosis in Postmitotic Endothelial Cells

Methotrexate (MTX) is a commonly used chemotherapy agent for a variety of cancers. However, therapeutic levels are associated with numerous untoward effects such as central nervous system damage in children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The purpose of this study was to determine if MTX caused injury to endothelial cells using cultured bovine pulmonary artery endothelial cells as a model. Light microscopy showed gaps between cells and reduced numbers of endothelial cells after exposure to MTX (10 M), a range consistent with therapeutic drug levels. Proliferation and viability of subconfluent and confluent MTX-treated endothelial cells were measured by colorimetric (MTS) assay. There was a significant decline in cell numbers in MTX-treated subconfluent (growing) cells cultured after 4 days of MTX exposure compared to controls, as expected. However, there was also an unexpected decline in cell numbers in MTX-treated postmitotic endothelial cells after 1, 3, and 4 days of drug exposure. This suggested that MTX induced endothelial cell death. Fluorescent ApoAlert™ Enhanced Annexin-V binding demonstrated apoptosis in endothelial cells after 1 day of MTX exposure. Apoptosis was confirmed by a DNA fragment assay. This is apparently the first report of MTX-induced apoptosis of postmitotic, cultured endothelial cells. The findings suggest that apoptosis may be one mechanism of MTX-induced injury to endothelial cells.
Behavior Analysis of Futures Trading Agents Using Fuzzy Rule Extraction

In this paper, we propose a fuzzy rule-based method that analyzes trading strategies for futures markets. Our purpose is to linguistically understand the behavior of trader agents that have high ability to make a profit. Fuzzy if-then rules are generated from the trade record of the target trader agent. An agent with an unknown trading strategy is used as a target trader agent for our analysis. In the fuzzy if-then rules in this paper, the time series data of stock prices are used as input. The consequent part of fuzzy if-then rules indicates a trading action such as buy, sell, and noaction. The degree of certainty is also included in the consequent part of fuzzy if-then rules in this paper. The number of generated fuzzy if-then rules by the proposed method depends on the number of the antecedent fuzzy sets for each input value. For each combination of antecedent fuzzy sets (i.e., for each fuzzy if-then rule), the consequent action and the grade of certainty are determined from the trading record of the target trader agent. By visualizing the extracted fuzzy rules we can linguistically understand the trading action of the trader agent. In the computer simulations of this paper, we examine the extracted rules from the trading history of the target trader agent. We also examine the trading performance of the extracted fuzzy if-then rules by comparing with that of the target trader agent
Public managers’ networking and innovative work behavior: the importance of career incentives

From theories on middle managers’ entrepreneurship in private organizations, it is known that the structural network position of middle managers influences their innovative work behavior. Our study investigates if in a governmental setting, the intra-organizational networking behavior of public managers has a similar positive influence on innovative work behavior. As networking mechanisms may depend on the particular context and organizational norms, we also investigate the influence of networking motivations. According to social network research in private enterprises, social network links can be used to advance individual careers. According to public management and Public Service Motivation theories, public managers have a collective orientation aimed at producing public goods. Therefore, we investigate if, next to intra-organizational networking, an individual career motive or a collective motivation for networking explains innovative work behavior. In a case study on public managers of a municipality in Mexico City, we find a strong influence of networking on innovative work behavior. We also find support for additional influences of individual career motives, but no evidence for collective motivations. Points for practitioners Intra-organizational networking of public managers leads to increased innovative behavior in a governmental setting. In addition, when aiming at increasing innovative behavior, individual career motives seem to have stronger positive effects than collective motivations (such as teamwork-related motivations).
Banks’ Discretion Over the Debt Valuation Adjustment for Own Credit Risk

During our 2007 to 2015 sample period, firms recorded unrealized gains and losses on fair-valued liabilities attributable to changes in the firms’ own credit risk, referred to as the debt valuation adjustment (DVA), in earnings. Various parties criticized the inclusion of DVA in earnings as counterintuitive and manipulable. Using a small but comprehensive sample of European banks reporting nonzero DVA during this period, we decompose banks’ DVA into a normal portion explained by economic factors (e.g., changes in bond yield spreads) and an abnormal portion (the residual). Controlling for abnormal loan loss provisions (LLP) and realized securities gains and losses (RGL), we find that banks’ abnormal DVA is negatively associated with their premanaged earnings, consistent with banks exercising discretion over DVA to smooth earnings. We further find that banks that record larger LLP or RGL or that have histories of using LLP or RGL to smooth earnings are less likely to exercise discretion over DVA. These findings obtain in the financial crisis but not afterward. Collectively, our findings suggest that banks exercised discretion over DVA substitutably with discretion over LLP and RGL during the crisis. With the caveat that our analysis is limited by a small sample and the inherent difficulties of DVA decomposition, our findings have implications for how bank regulators and investors should interpret banks’ reported DVA, particularly in stress periods such as the crisis, and they provide support for the International Accounting Standards Board and Financial Accounting Standards Board’s (FASB) decisions to require firms to record DVA in other comprehensive income starting in 2018.
Complete-data spaces and generalized EM algorithms

Expectation-maximization (EM) algorithms have been applied extensively for computing maximum-likelihood and penalized-likelihood parameter estimates in signal processing applications. Intrinsic to each EM algorithm is a complete-data space (CDS)-a hypothetical set of random variables that is related to the parameters more naturally than the measurements are. The authors describe two generalizations of the EM paradigm: (i) allowing the relationship between the CDS and the measured data to be nondeterministic, and (ii) using a sequence of alternating complete-data spaces. These generalizations are motivated in part by the influence of the CDS on the convergence rate, a relationship that is formalized through a data-processing inequality for Fisher information. These concepts are applied to the problem of estimating superimposed signals in Gaussian noise, and it is shown that the new space alternating generalized EM algorithm converges significantly faster than the ordinary EM algorithm. <<ETX>>
Evaluation of Delayed Puberty in Adolescents with Cleft Lip/Palate

Objective To assess the frequency of delayed puberty in adolescents with cleft lip and/or cleft palate (CL/P). Design This was a cross-sectional study of 203 patients with CL/P and no associated syndromes treated at the Hospital for Rehabilitation of Craniofacial Anomalies, University of São Paulo, Bauru, Brazil. We evaluated boys aged 14-19 years and girls aged 13-18 years. The patients were classified according to Tanner stages of sexual development. The age of menarche was recorded. Patients were assigned to three groups according to cleft type: isolated cleft lip (CL), cleft lip and palate (CLP), and isolated cleft palate (CP). The results were expressed as frequencies and averages and compared with pubertal changes described for typically developing adolescents as reported in the literature. Results Subjects were 115 boys and 88 girls. All boys in the CL group and the CP group had already started puberty, and two boys in the CLP group (2.3%) had delayed puberty. All girls had started puberty. The average age at menarche was 12.3 years in the CL group, 12.1 years in the CLP group, and 12.5 years in the CP group. Conclusions The frequency of delayed puberty and the average age at menarche in adolescents with CL/P and no associated genetic syndromes or anomalies were within the expected range for typically developing adolescents (i.e., those without CL/P) in the same age group.
Association of transaortic approach and transoesophageal echocardiography as the primary imaging technique for improved results in transcatheter valve implantation.

OBJECTIVES The transaortic access has been proposed to perform transcatheter aortic valve implantation in patients with no other available access. We hypothesize that its coupling with transoesophageal echocardiographic guidance may further reduce procedure-related morbidity. METHODS Transoesophageal echocardiography was adopted as the primary imaging modality to produce high-resolution images and to guide the deployment of the transcatheter valve. This imaging modality allows continuous visualization not only of the prosthesis and of the delivery system, but also of the surrounding anatomical landmarks (aortic annulus, sinotubular junction and anterior mitral leaflet). RESULTS We report an initial series of eight patients, who were treated by a transaortic delivery of the transcatheter valve (SAPIEN Valve, Edwards Lifesciences Inc., Irvine, CA, USA) through an upper mini-sternotomy and guided by transoesophageal echocardiography. The procedure was uneventful in all patients; there were no cases of access site morbidity, periprocedural stroke or renal failure. CONCLUSIONS The association of the transaortic route and the transoesophageal echo guidance has the potential to improve the results of transcatheter valve implantation, and deserves further investigation.
Quality of life, mental health and self-esteem in hirsute adolescent females

Aims. The aim of the study was to evaluate the influence of hirsutism on general quality of life, self-esteem and the prevalence of anxiety and depressive symptoms among adolescent girls. Methods. Fifty adolescent females with hirsutism, aged 13–18 years, were enrolled in the research group. The control group comprised 50 non-hirsute adolescents. A specific questionnaire was used as the research tool. It included self-evaluation inventories: Short Form-36 Health Survey Version 2, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. Results. Quality of life indices for hirsute girls scored lower than for the controls and statistically significantly so with regard to physical functioning (p = 0.04), general health (p = 0.002) and social functioning (p = 0.007). Anxiety was diagnosed in 26% in the group of hirsute girls as compared with 10% of the controls (p = 0.03). The study analysis revealed more clinically significant problems of low self-esteem in hirsute adolescents compared with non-hirsute girls (14% vs. 2%). Conclusions. Hirsutism is associated with a decreased quality of life, a higher prevalence of anxiety disorder and lower self-esteem in adolescent females. The mother's level of education is associated with the quality of life in adolescent girls.
Volatile Sulphur Compounds in UHT Milk

Several volatile sulphur compounds have been detected in raw and processed milk. These are hydrogen sulphide, methanethiol, carbonyl sulphide, dimethyl sulphide, carbon disulphide, dimethyl disulphide, dimethyl trisulphide, dimethyl sulphoxide, and dimethyl sulphone. Many of these increase in milk during heat processing and are associated with the cooked flavor of heat-treated milks, particularly UHT and sterilized milk. Several researchers have attempted to explain the origin of these volatiles in both raw and processed milk, and how to reduce the associated cooked flavor that has a negative impact on consumer acceptability of processed milk. These compounds are difficult to detect and analyze due to their high volatility, sensitivity to oxidation and heat, and in some cases, their very low concentrations. However, methods of detection and quantification have improved in recent years. Pre-concentration methods such as solid phase microextraction (SPME) together with gas chromatography equipped with sulphur-selective detectors now enable low concentrations of these compounds to be analyzed. In this review, methods of extraction and analyzis of these volatile sulphur compounds are comared, and their occurrence in milk is reviewed.
TOM1 is a PI5P effector involved in the regulation of endosomal maturation

ABSTRACT Phosphoinositides represent a major class of lipids specifically involved in the organization of signaling cascades, maintenance of the identity of organelles and regulation of multiple intracellular trafficking steps. We previously reported that phosphatidylinositol 5-monophosphate (PI5P), produced by the Shigella flexneri phosphatase IpgD, is implicated in the endosomal sorting of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR). Here, we show that the adaptor protein TOM1 is a new direct binding partner of PI5P. We identify the domain of TOM1 involved in this interaction and characterize the binding motif. Finally, we demonstrate that the recruitment of TOM1 by PI5P on signaling endosomes is responsible for the delay in EGFR degradation and fluid-phase bulk endocytosis. Taken together, our data strongly suggest that PI5P enrichment in signaling endosomes prevents endosomal maturation through the recruitment of TOM1, and point to a new function of PI5P in regulating discrete maturation steps in the endosomal system.
Modeling correction of severe urea cycle defects in the growing murine liver using a hybrid recombinant adeno‐associated virus/piggyBac transposase gene delivery system

Liver‐targeted gene therapy based on recombinant adeno‐associated viral vectors (rAAV) shows promising therapeutic efficacy in animal models and adult‐focused clinical trials. This promise, however, is not directly translatable to the growing liver, where high rates of hepatocellular proliferation are accompanied by loss of episomal rAAV genomes and subsequently a loss in therapeutic efficacy. We have developed a hybrid rAAV/piggyBac transposon vector system combining the highly efficient liver‐targeting properties of rAAV with stable piggyBac‐mediated transposition of the transgene into the hepatocyte genome. Transposition efficiency was first tested using an enhanced green fluorescent protein expression cassette following delivery to newborn wild‐type mice, with a 20‐fold increase in stably gene‐modified hepatocytes observed 4 weeks posttreatment compared to traditional rAAV gene delivery. We next modeled the therapeutic potential of the system in the context of severe urea cycle defects. A single treatment in the perinatal period was sufficient to confer robust and stable phenotype correction in the ornithine transcarbamylase–deficient Spfash mouse and the neonatal lethal argininosuccinate synthetase knockout mouse. Finally, transposon integration patterns were analyzed, revealing 127,386 unique integration sites which conformed to previously published piggyBac data. Conclusion: Using a hybrid rAAV/piggyBac transposon vector system, we achieved stable therapeutic protection in two urea cycle defect mouse models; a clinically conceivable early application of this technology in the management of severe urea cycle defects could be as a bridging therapy while awaiting liver transplantation; further improvement of the system will result from the development of highly human liver‐tropic capsids, the use of alternative strategies to achieve transient transposase expression, and engineered refinements in the safety profile of piggyBac transposase‐mediated integration. (Hepatology 2015;62:417–428
Soft error study on DDR4 SDRAMs using a 480 MeV proton beam

This paper is a soft error study on logic upset in control logic, using a 480 MeV proton beam on commercial DDR4 SDRAM components from two different manufacturers. Samples with the same density and speed showed a 1.9x difference in logic cross section depending on the manufacturer. Compared to DDR3 SDRAM, DDR4 SDRAM from the same manufacturer showed about 45% SBU cross-section increase, and 17% logic upset decrease. To understand how the storage capacitance of down-scaling DDR technologies affects soft error, soft error bits were compared to retention weak bits. No evidence was found that indicated that retention weak bits were more sensitive to soft error.
The Design of Backend Classifiers in PPRLM System for Language Identification

The design approach for classifying the backend features of the PPRLM (Parallel Phone Recognition and Language Modeling) system is demonstrated in this paper. A variety of features and their combinations extracted by language dependent recognizers were evaluated based on the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Language Recognition Evaluation (LRE) 2003 corpus. Three well-known classifiers: Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM), Support Vector Machine (SVM), and feed forward neural network (NN) are proposed to compartmentalize these high level features which are generated by n-gram language model scoring and one pass decoding based on acoustic model in PPRLM system. Finally, the log-likelihood radio (LLR) normalization is applied to backend processing to the target language scores and the performance of language recognition is enhanced.
OFDM-MIMO system using optimized differential Cayley unitary space time coding

In this paper, we optimize the OFDM-MIMO system using Cayley differential unitary space-time coding. The overall system combines the advantages of the OFDM modulation, MIMO channel and Cayley codes. A high transmission rate is one of the main advantages of the Cayley code, in addition to the simplicity of the encoder-decoder design, without the need for channel information. The mapping parameters and the basis matrices are the main components of the Cayley code. The optimization process of the Cayley code, with respect to the mapping parameters, is performed for the MIMO channel model represented by the downlink from a base station (BS) to a given user, with the scatterers arranged in the form of circular rings around the transmitter and the receiver.
Quantal Mechanisms in Cardiac Contraction*

SERENDIPITY and technology have combined forces to reveal a phenomenon of striking proportions. What may prove to be the quantum element underlying contraction was discovered by chance, following the development of a high-resolution optical diffractometer designed to follow the dynamics of shortening in isolated cardiac muscle. Records showed a most unusual feature: periods of sarcomere shortening were punctuated by periods of pause during which there was little or no length change, conferring a staircase-like character on the shortening waveform. Could shortening really occur in discrete quanta? To find precedent for quantal behavior one need not look far. Nearby, at the myoneural junction, for example, a detailed understanding of the mechanism of intercellular communication followed the discovery that acetylcholine was discharged in quantal packets. These packets sum to form the end plate potential in much the same way that the steps apparently sum to give the shortening waveform. In the latter case, however, an unfathomable implication has impeded acceptance. The difficulty is that stepwise shortening implies a colossal degree of synchrony. Why so? The optical diffraction pattern reflects the behavior of a sizable fraction of sarcomeres ranging over the field illuminated by the laser. This ensemble could pause in either of two ways. In the complicated way, some sarcomeres would shorten while others lengthened in such a way that the average velocity remained zero for a period; this situation would then recur fortuitously time and again as contraction progressed to give the observed cascade of pauses and steps. In fact, this possibility is now ruled out; even when the sampled volume is diminished extraordinarily, the pauses remain in evidence (see below). The alternative way is simpler. It implies that mem-
Design and Analysis of a Spoke-Type Hybrid Permanent Magnet Motor for Electric Vehicles

This paper proposes a new spoke-type hybrid permanent magnet brushless (H-PMBL) motor for potential applications in electric vehicles, where the high-energy rare-earth PM and the cost-effective ferrite-PM are combined. In order to realize low-cost design and improve the operating points of the rare-earth PM and the ferrite-PM, the proposed motor is designed based on the calculation of PM cost and analysis on the operating points. Moreover, to fairly estimate electromagnetic performances of the H-PMBL motor, a conventional spoke-type non-rare-earth ferrite-PMBL motor with the same overall dimensions is also analyzed and compared using the finite element method. The simulation results indicate that the H-PMBL motor cannot only retain low PM cost, but also exhibit better flux-weakening ability and enhanced demagnetization withstand capability.
Genetic characterization of Silond catfish, Silonia silondia (Hamilton, 1822) inferred from two mitochondrial markers

Abstract Silonia silondia is a commercially important food fish. Samples collected through commercial catches from four rivers in India are described by sequence analysis of two molecular markers. Cytochrome b (1140 bp) and ATPase 6/8 (842 bp) genes were analyzed, which represented high level of genetic differentiation within populations of S. silondia. The sequence alignments of cytochrome b and ATPase 6/8 genes revealed 13 and 11 different haplotypes, respectively. The sequences of both the mitochondrial regions revealed high haplotype and low nucleotide diversities. The patterns of genetic diversity and haplotype networks clearly indicated two distinct mitochondrial lineages, however, haplotypes from both the lineages were not specifically assigned to any population. The results confirm the utility of molecular markers generating baseline information, useful for planning effective strategies for conservation, management and sustainability of Silond catfish fishery.