Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Identification and characterization of TnphoA mutants of Salmonella that are unable to pass through a polarized MDCK epithelial cell monolayer

Surface protein mutants of the invasive Salmonella species, S. choleraesuis, were generated using the transposon TnphoA. 626 alkaline phosphatase (PhoA+) fusion mutants were identified and screened for their ability to pass through (transcytose) polarized epithelial monolayers of Madin Darby canine kidney (MDCK) cells grown on membrane filters. Forty two mutants were unable to pass through this barrier. All of these transcytosis mutants were unable to adhere to or invade MDCK monolayers, yet these mutations were not in the genes encoding type 1 pili or mannose‐resistant haemagglutination (MRHA). These transcytosis mutants could be grouped into six classes. Class 1 mutants had altered lipopolysaccharide (LPS) O side‐chain structures while Class 2 mutants had defects in their LPS core. Mutants belonging to Classes 5 and 6 did not decrease the transepithelial electrical resistance of polarized MDCK cell mono‐layers, in contrast to the parental strain and the other mutants (Classes 1, 2, 3 and 4). Mutants belonging to Class 1 were less virulent in mice, while Class 2 (defective core) and Classes 4 and 5 (normal LPS) mutant strains were avirulent in mice. Mutants from Classes 3 and 6 were as virulent in mice as S. choleraesuis. These results suggest that the ability to pass through epithelial barriers may be an important virulence characteristic of Salmonella. These data indicate that bacterial adherence, internalization and monolayer transcytosis are closely linked events. It was also demonstrated that a mutant with decreased rates of intracellular replication still passed through the monolayer at rates similar to wild‐type S. choleraesuis.
Design, implementation and economic analysis of sustainable LED roadway lighting system in industrial environment

This paper discusses the results obtained from a solar powered LED roadway lighting system in a reputed manufacturing industry in India. This system is an alternative to conventional grid powered high pressure sodium vapour roadway lighting existing in the industry. Design of LED lighting system for replacing the existing high pressure sodium vapour lamp considering the pupil lumens is discussed in detail. Sizing of solar photovoltaic modules and battery capacity for the project along with development of charge controller and LED driver are deliberated in the paper. A few salient features of solar powered LED roadway lighting system such as module mounting design, operational performance, economic feasibility of the system etc. are also well documented in this work.
Identification of the Histidine Protein Kinase KinB inPseudomonas aeruginosa and Its Phosphorylation of the Alginate Regulator AlgB*

The exopolysaccharide alginate is an important virulence factor in chronic lung infections caused by the bacteriumPseudomonas aeruginosa. Two positive activators for alginate synthesis, algB and algR, are members of a superfamily of response regulators of the two-component regulatory system. AlgB belongs to the NtrC subfamily of response regulators and is required for high-level production of alginate. In this study, an open reading frame encoding a polypeptide of 66 kDa, designatedkinB, was identified immediately downstream ofalgB. The sequence of KinB is homologous to the histidine protein kinase members of two-component regulatory systems. Western blot analysis of a P. aeruginosa strain carrying akinB-lacZ protein fusion and studies ofkinB-phoA fusions indicate that KinB localizes to the inner membrane and has a NH2-terminal periplasmic domain. A KinB derivative containing the COOH terminus of KinB was generated and purified. In the presence of [γ-32P]ATP, the purified COOH-terminal KinB protein was observed to undergo progressive autophosphorylation in vitro. Moreover, the phosphoryl label of KinB could be rapidly transferred to purified AlgB. Substitutions of the residues conserved among histidine protein kinases abolished KinB autophosphorylation. These results provide evidence thatkinB encodes the AlgB cognate histidine protein kinase.
A Survey of Current Problems in Meta‐Analysis: Discussion from the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research Inter‐PORT Work Group on Literature Review/Meta‐Analysis

&NA; The United States Agency for Health Care Policy and Research brought together representatives from each of the Patient Outcomes Research Teams (PORTs) as the Inter‐PORT Meta‐Analysis Work Group. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss a wide range of problems the panel had encountered in the area of meta‐analysis. Several actual problems were presented, and tentative solutions to those problems were given. The PORTs had to consider issues such as quality assessment, survival analysis, rare events, sensitivity and specificity, and random effects models. The solutions presented represent the methods used by several researchers who are active in the area of meta‐analysis.
Skoura – a genetic island for congenital insensitivity to pain and anhidrosis among Moroccan Jews, as determined by a novel mutation in the NTRK1 gene

Congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis (CIPA) or hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy type IV is a rare, autosomal recessive neurologic disorder, characterized by absence of reaction to painful stimuli, mental retardation, self‐ mutilating behavior, anhidrosis, and recurrent episodes of hyperthermia. Mutations in the neurotrophic tyrosine kinase receptor 1, a receptor phosphorylated by nerve growth factor, have been documented in diverse ethnic groups. We identified the same novel nonsense mutation in two unrelated families of Moroccan Jewish descent, each with two affected siblings. This possible founder mutation may trace to the rural Jewish village in southern Morocco from where both these families originated. Genetic screening for the causative mutation among 300 unrelated Moroccan Jews did not reveal carriers for the causative mutation, thus excluding high risk for CIPA in this ethnic subpopulation.
A method of grasp point selection from an item of clothing using hem element relations

This paper describes grasp point selection on an item of clothing randomly placed on a table. The input data for our proposed method are a set of range images captured from a fixed, 3D range camera. Hem elements are extracted from the data, and their relationships are characterized for both similarity measures and grasp point evaluation. Experiments using real images, targeting a piece of clothing, show the effectiveness of the proposed method. Graphical Abstract
Optimal power allocation for underground selective channel at 60 GHz

In this paper, we are interested in evaluating the capacity of an underground mine channel in the millimeter wave band. Using a vector network analyzer (VNA) and three carefully chosen antennas, one omni and two horn antennas, we performed measurements at 40 m and 70 m levels in the CANMET mine located in Val-d'Or, Canada. This mine has tunnels with a width varying between 2.5 and 4 m and a height varying between 3 and 4 m. Our work uses data for propagation in an underground mine obtained using a different setup from what was used previously. With both uniform and optimal power spectrum allocation (UPSA, OPSA) at the transmitter side, we have computed the capacity of the channel based on the measurements. By using optimal power allocation, we take into account the fading characteristics of the channel. The results prove that the capacity gain depends on the multipath characteristics. Also, they show the pertinence of the optimal power spectrum allocation for this type of channel.
Are racial categories racist

La Cour Supreme des Etats-Unis a juge les categories raciales comme suspectes et restreint leur usage aux politiques publiques uniquement si elles servent les interets de l'Etat. Recemment plusieurs voix se sont levees afin d'abandonner definitivement l'usage des classifications raciales. Dans cet article, l'A. presente trois appels qui vont dans ce sens : 1) Yehudi Webster (The Racialization of America) defend une position anti-realiste en respectant la notion de race et en suggerant que l'elimination des categories raciales est une strategie effective pour eliminer les problemes poses par la discrimination raciale ; 2) Naomi Zack (Race and Mixed race) adopte une strategie comparable en montrant que les categories raciales ne designent pas des traits naturels et que leur usage est necessairement nuisible ; 3) Anthony Appiah montre que les categories raciales n'existent pas et que leur elimination est la meilleure voie pour mettre fin a l'exclusion raciale. L'A. demontre que les arguments de ces trois chercheurs ne sont pas convaincants et que la negation des categories raciales n'eliminerait pas les effets du racisme. Meme si les categories raciales doivent cesser d'etre utilisees, la difference entre les individus n'est qu'une construction acquise culturellement et socialement au fondement de chaque identite.
Trans‐oceanic telerobotic surgery

medical robots with a confirmed ability to carry out sophisticated surgical tasks, e.g. the Da Vinci TM and ZEUS TM systems. These robots have been used to assist in several urological procedures, e.g. radical prostatectomy, pyeloplasty and nephrectomy, in addition to widespread worldwide use by paediatric urologists and cardiac surgeons. Those in doubt about the advantages of robotic surgery need only examine the recent work by Menon [6] from the Vattikuti Urology Institute in Detroit. He describes a large series of >300 robotic radical retropubic prostatectomies, showing that the robotic procedure to be quicker, cause fewer complications and a shorter hospital stay than either the open or laparoscopic techniques, while maintaining good cancer control.
Umbelliferone Released from Hairy Root Cultures of Pharbitis nil Treated with Copper Sulfate and Its Subsequent Glucosylation

Hairy root cultures of Pharbitis nil treated with CuSO4 and methyl jasmonate (MeJA) produced umbelliferone (1) and scopoletin (2) in the culture medium, and skimmin (3), a β-D-glucopyranoside of 1, was isolated from the hairy roots. While 1 in the medium increased and reached a maximal level 16 h after the treatment with CuSO4, the amount of 3 in the hairy roots decreased, reaching a minimal level after 8 h, before recovering to a level higher than the basal level after 24 h and then continuously increasing. These observations suggest that 1 was released by the hydrolysis of 3. Umbelliferone (1) inhibited hairy root growth, while skimmin (3) did not. This result suggests that, after the release of 1 as a phytoalexin, the hairy roots glycosylated 1 for the detoxification and re-use of 3 as a source of phytoalexin.
An improved framework for automatic image mosaic

This paper describes an improved framework to generate seamless image mosaic automatically. The input images are classified into different image connectivity sets by using speeded features. For each set, the proposed method includes two parts: initial alignment and global optimization. The initial geometrical registration is obtained using the classical parameterization of homography. The photometric parameters among images are computed to balance the overall gain using the least square method. A good global optimization can be achieved with these initial information and multiple constraints between images. Besides, we also take the radial distortion into consideration. Mulitresolution blending combined with an optimal seam selection gives the final seamless mosaic. Various image sets illustrate the robustness of the proposed method in experimental results.
Carcinoma Arising in a Pharyngeal Pouch Previously Treated by Endoscopic Stapling

Objectives: A case is described in which squamous cell carcinoma was found during surgery for a recurrent pharyngeal pouch previously treated by endoscopic stapling. A search of the English language literature suggests this is the first reported case of a carcinoma developing in a pharyngeal pouch previously treated by endoscopic stapling.
Campus access control system based on RFID

In order to improve the campus securities and obtain the personnel information, and campus access control system is developed and introduced in this paper. TCP/IP, PPP, HTTP, HTML, POP3 and SMTP are used to constitute the basic network and transport layer to transmit real-time access information. The real-time access information is input by Network Connection Element (NCE) like radio frequency devices, surveillance camera devices, computers and routers. It's better to guarantee the safety of data storage and access when using ODBC to build the data source and using ADO to visit and manipulate database. Using the IE to enter in the system can be convenient for users. The personnel study or work in the campus can use the RFID card to passing in or out the campus smoothly. The application system only used the existing campus RFID card and need not any extra investment.
Knowledge Verification for LongTail Verticals

Collecting structured knowledge for real-world entities has become a critical task for many applications. A big gap between the knowledge in existing knowledge repositories and the knowledge in the real world is the knowledge on tail verticals (i.e., less popular domains). Such knowledge, though not necessarily globally popular, can be personal hobbies to many people and thus collectively impactful. This paper studies the problem of knowledge verification for tail verticals; that is, deciding the correctness of a given triple. Through comprehensive experimental study we answer the following questions. 1) Can we find evidence for tail knowledge from an extensive set of sources, including knowledge bases, the web, and query logs? 2) Can we judge correctness of the triples based on the collected evidence? 3) How can we further improve knowledge verification on tail verticals? Our empirical study suggests a new knowledge-verification framework, which we call Facty, that applies various kinds of evidence collection techniques followed by knowledge fusion. Facty can verify 50% of the (correct) tail knowledge with a precision of 84%, and it significantly outperforms state-of-the-art methods. Detailed error analysis on the obtained results suggests future research directions.
UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository) Significant Enhancement of Neutralino Dark Matter Annihilation from Electroweak

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Objective measurements of daily physical activity patterns and sedentary behaviour in older adults: Age, Gene/Environment Susceptibility-Reykjavik Study.

BACKGROUND objectively measured population physical activity (PA) data from older persons is lacking. The aim of this study was to describe free-living PA patterns and sedentary behaviours in Icelandic older men and women using accelerometer. METHODS from April 2009 to June 2010, 579 AGESII-study participants aged 73-98 years wore an accelerometer (Actigraph GT3X) at the right hip for one complete week in the free-living settings. RESULTS in all subjects, sedentary time was the largest component of the total wear time, 75%, followed by low-light PA, 21%. Moderate-vigorous PA (MVPA) was <1%. Men had slightly higher average total PA (counts × day(-1)) than women. The women spent more time in low-light PA but less time in sedentary PA and MVPA compared with men (P < 0.001). In persons <75 years of age, 60% of men and 34% of women had at least one bout ≥10 min of MVPA, which decreased with age, with only 25% of men and 9% of women 85 years and older reaching this. CONCLUSION sedentary time is high in this Icelandic cohort, which has high life-expectancy and is living north of 60° northern latitude.
Determination of Neurologic Prognosis and Clinical Decision Making in Adult Patients With Severe Traumatic Brain Injury: A Survey of Canadian Intensivists, Neurosurgeons, and Neurologists*

Objectives:Accurate prognostic information in patients with severe traumatic brain injury remains limited, but mortality following the withdrawal of life-sustaining therapies is high and variable across centers. We designed a survey to understand attitudes of physicians caring for patients with severe traumatic brain injury toward the determination of prognosis and clinical decision making on the level of care. Design, Setting, and Participants:We conducted a cross-sectional study of intensivists, neurosurgeons, and neurologists that participate in the care of patients with severe traumatic brain injury at all Canadian level 1 and level 2 trauma centers. Intervention:None. Measurements:The main outcome measure was physicians’ perceptions of prognosis and recommendations on the level of care. Main Results:Our response rate was 64% (455/712). Most respondents (65%) reported that an accurate prediction of prognosis would be most helpful during the first 7 days. Most respondents (>80%) identified bedside monitoring, clinical exam, and imaging to be useful for evaluating prognosis, whereas fewer considered electrophysiology tests (<60%) and biomarkers (<15%). In a case-based scenario, approximately one-third of respondents agreed, one-third were neutral, and one-third disagreed that the patient prognosis would be unfavorable at one year. About 10% were comfortable recommending withdrawal of life-sustaining therapies. Conclusions:A significant variation in perceptions of neurologic prognosis and in clinical decision making on the level of care was found among Canadian intensivists, neurosurgeons, and neurologists. Improved understanding of the factors that can accurately predict prognosis for patients with traumatic brain injury is urgently needed.
Controlling Blinding Trachoma in the Egyptian Delta: Integrating Clinical, Epidemiological and Anthropological Understandings

Trachoma is a leading cause of preventable blindness in the world. The disease is hyperendemic in rural Egypt, where more than 75% of children show signs of having had at least one episode of infectious trachoma during the first year of life. Earlier anthropological and epidemiological observations suggested that trachoma prevalence would decrease if children had their faces washed with soap and water at least once each day. We conducted a community-based intervention to increase face washing in order to control trachoma. In this paper we describe the overall design of this intervention trial and discuss how we integrated anthropological methods and ethnographic data into the design of this successful multi-disciplinary, cross-cultural project to prevent trachoma.
A Novel Algorithm for Fast and Efficient Speed-Sensorless Maximum Power Point Tracking in Wind Energy Conversion Systems

This paper proposes a novel solution to the problems that exist in the conventional hill climb searching (HCS) maximum power point tracking (MPPT) algorithm for the wind energy conversion system. The presented solution not only solves the tracking speed versus control efficiency tradeoff problem of HCS but also makes sure that the changing wind conditions do not lead HCS in the wrong direction. It intelligently adapts the variable step size to keep up with the rapid changes in the wind and seizes the perturbation at the maxima to yield 100% control efficiency. For this purpose, a novel peak detection capability has been devised which, in contrast with conventional peak detection, can work robustly under changing wind conditions. The proposed MPPT performs self-tuning to cope with the nonconstant efficiencies of the generator-converter subsystems-a phenomenon quite rarely discussed in research papers so far. In addition, a smart speed-sensorless scheme has been developed to avoid the use of mechanical sensors. The experimental results confirm that the proposed algorithm is remarkably faster and more efficient than the conventional HCS.
Role of reactive oxygen species in regulation of glucose transport in skeletal muscle during exercise

Glucose derived from extracellular sources serves as an energy source in virtually all eukaryotic cells, including skeletal muscle. Its contribution to energy turnover increases with exercise intensity up to moderately heavy workloads. However, at very high workloads, the contribution of extracellular glucose to energy turnover is negligible, despite the high rate of glucose transport. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are involved in the stimulation of glucose transport in isolated skeletal muscle preparations during intense repeated contractions. Consistent with this observation, heavy exercise is associated with significant production of ROS. However, during more mild to moderate stimulation or exercise conditions (in vitro, in situ and in vivo) antioxidants do not affect glucose transport. It is noteworthy that the production of ROS is limited or not observed under these conditions and that the concentration of the antioxidant used was extremely low. The results to date suggest that ROS involvement in activation of glucose transport occurs primarily during intense short‐term exercise and that other mechanisms are involved during mild to moderate exercise. What remains puzzling is why ROS‐mediated activation of glucose transport would occur under conditions where glucose transport is highest and utilization (i.e. phosphorylation of glucose by hexokinase) is low. Possibly ROS production is involved in priming glucose transport during heavy exercise to accelerate glycogen biogenesis during the initial recovery period after exercise, as well as altering other aspects of intracellular metabolism.
Symptom Cluster of Fatigue and Depression in HIV/AIDS

SUMMARY Fatigue and depression are among the most frequently rated symptoms of people with HIV/AIDS. This study aimed: (1) to describe severity of fatigue and depression in an outpatient sample (n = 372) of men and women with HIV/AIDS, (2) to evaluate sensitivity and discriminant validity for two fatigue and three depression scales and (3) to investigate whether fatigue and depression are conceptually distinct concepts or reciprocally dependent. This was a secondary analysis of a descriptive, cross-sectional study with convenience sampling. Fatigue was assessed with the fatigue factor score of the revised Sign and Symptom Checklist HIV (SSC-HIVrev), and the fatigue scale of the Self-Care Symptom Management for Living with HIV/AIDS Scale (SCSMS-F). Depression was assessed with the depression factor score of the SSC-HIVrev, the depression scale of the SCSMC-D and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Most of the participants were male (67%), with a mean age of 39.9 years, and of African American decent (73%). Dependent on the instrument, the average fatigue severity was moderate and the average depression severity was moderate to severe. Women experienced higher fatigue and depression severity scores than men. The scores on the same instruments for fatigue and depression showed significant correlations (SSC-HIVrev fatigue and depression r = 0.62; SCSMS fatigue and depression r = 0.64), indicating that both concepts are closely related. Patients seeking help for fatigue and/or depression should always be evaluated for both symptoms. Future research is needed to identify dimensions in different fatigue and depression scales in order to differentiate the impact of both symptoms on people living with HIV/AIDS.