Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The transcriptional repressor GATAD2B mediates progesterone receptor suppression of myometrial contractile gene expression

The mechanisms whereby progesterone (P4), acting via the progesterone receptor (PR), inhibits proinflammatory/contractile gene expression during pregnancy are incompletely defined. Using immortalized human myometrial (hTERT-HM) cells stably expressing wild-type PR-A or PR-B (PRWT), we found that P4 significantly inhibited IL-1β induction of the NF-κB target genes, COX-2 and IL-8. P4–PRWT transrepression occurred at the level of transcription initiation and was mediated by decreased recruitment of NF-κB p65 and RNA polymerase II to COX-2 and IL-8 promoters. However, in cells stably expressing a PR-A or PR-B DNA-binding domain mutant (PRmDBD), P4-mediated transrepression was significantly reduced, suggesting a critical role of the PR DBD. ChIP analysis of hTERT-HM cells stably expressing PRWT or PRmDBD revealed that P4 treatment caused equivalent recruitment of PRWT and PRmDBD to COX-2 and IL-8 promoters, suggesting that PR inhibitory effects were not mediated by its direct DNA binding. Using immunoprecipitation, followed by MS, we identified a transcriptional repressor, GATA zinc finger domain–containing 2B (GATAD2B), that interacted strongly with PRWT but poorly with PRmDBD. P4 treatment of PRWT hTERT-HM cells caused enhanced recruitment of endogenous GATAD2B to COX-2 and IL-8 promoters. Further, siRNA knockdown of endogenous GATAD2B significantly reduced P4–PRWT transrepression of COX-2 and IL-8. Notably, GATAD2B expression was significantly decreased in pregnant mouse and human myometrium during labor. Our findings suggest that GATAD2B serves as an important mediator of P4–PR suppression of proinflammatory and contractile genes during pregnancy. Decreased GATAD2B expression near term may contribute to the decline in PR function, leading to labor.
Study of energy harvester consisting of a laminated substrate integrated with thin film coil

現在の自動車においては,電子化の進展に伴い,あ らゆる情報をセンシングし高度な制御に適用すること で燃費向上や予防安全など自動車の高機能化を図って いる. 車両に搭載されるセンサ,アクチュエータ,そ れらを制御する ECU(Electronic Control Unit)と呼 ばれるマイコンの数は年々増大傾向にあり,現在,高 級車では 100を超える ECUが搭載されている. これ らセンサ,アクチュエータ,ECUはワイヤーハーネ スで接続された有線ネットワークでデータ通信および 電力供給されている. そのため,車両に搭載されるワ イヤーハーネスの数も増大の一途であり,例えばある 車種では 1台あたりのワイヤーハーネスが約 2000本, 重量にして約 20kgにまで増加している. したがって, 搭載スペース確保が困難であることや,重量増大によ る燃費悪化につながるという課題がある. このような課題を解決する技術として,近年注目を 浴びているエネルギーハーベスティング技術が挙げら れる. 環境に存在する熱や振動,光,電磁波などのエ ネルギーを回収し,電力に変換して使用する技術であ るが,車両内に存在する振動エネルギーなどから発電 し,電力利用することで,有線での電源供給が不要と なるため,増大するワイヤーハーネスを削減,軽量 化し,自動車の省燃費に貢献できる. 車両の重量が 100kgで約 1km/l燃費が変わるといった試算もあり, ワイヤーハーネス削減の省燃費への影響は少なくない と言える. また,例えばタイヤ内など,電源供給が困難な場所 へもセンサや無線機の搭載が可能になる. 現在,タイ ヤ空気圧モニタリングシステムと呼ばれるシステムが 車両に搭載され,市販されている. タイヤ空気圧とタ 積層基板型小型コイルを用いた エネルギーハーベスタの研究
Image compression using PCA with clustering

Principal component analysis (PCA), a statistical processing technique, transforms the data set into a lower dimensional feature space, yet retain most of the intrinsic information content of the original data. In this paper, we apply PCA for image compression. In the PCA computation, we adopt the neural network architecture in which the synaptic weights, served as the principal components, are trained through generalized Hebbian algorithm (GHA). Moreover, we partition the training set into clusters using K-means method in order to obtain better retrieved image qualities.
Software aging in mobile devices: Partial computation offloading as a solution

Long running applications on resource-constrained mobile devices can lead to software aging, which is a critical impediment to the mobile users due to its pervasive nature. Mobile offloading that migrates computation-intensive parts of applications from mobile devices onto resource-rich cloud servers, is an effective way for enhancing the availability of mobile services as it can postpone or prevent the software aging in mobile devices. Through partitioning the execution between the device side and the cloud side, the mobile device can have the most benefit from offloading in reducing utilisation of the device and increasing its lifetime. In this paper, we propose a path-based offloading partitioning (POP) algorithm to determine which portions of the application tasks to run on mobile devices and which portions on cloud servers with different cost models in mobile environments. The evaluation results show that the partial offloading scheme can significantly improve performance and reduce energy consumption by optimally distributing tasks between mobile devices and cloud servers, and can well adapt to changes in the environment.
Resveratrol as a Bioenhancer to Improve Anti-Inflammatory Activities of Apigenin

The aim of this study was to improve the anti-inflammatory activities of apigenin through co-treatment with resveratrol as a bioenhancer of apigenin. RAW 264.7 cells pretreated with hepatic metabolites formed by the co-metabolism of apigenin and resveratrol (ARMs) in HepG2 cells were stimulated with lipopolysaccharide (LPS). ARMs prominently inhibited (p < 0.05) the production of nitric oxide (NO), prostaglandin E2 (PGE2), interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α. Otherwise no such activity was observed by hepatic metabolites of apigenin alone (AMs). ARMs also effectively suppressed protein expressions of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2). Co-administration of apigenin (50 mg/kg) and resveratrol (25 mg/kg) also showed a significant reduction of carrageenan-induced paw edema in mice (61.20% to 23.81%). Co-administration of apigenin and resveratrol led to a 2.39 fold increase in plasma apigenin levels compared to administration of apigenin alone, suggesting that co-administration of resveratrol could increase bioavailability of apigenin. When the action of resveratrol on the main apigenin metabolizing enzymes, UDP-glucuronosyltransferases (UGTs), was investigated, resveratrol mainly inhibited the formation of apigenin glucuronides by UGT1A9 in a non-competitive manner with a Ki value of 7.782 μM. These results suggested that resveratrol helps apigenin to bypass hepatic metabolism and maintain apigenin’s anti-inflammatory activities in the body.
Influenza Virus Neuraminidase Inhibitors: Generation and Comparison of Structure-Based and Common Feature Pharmacophore Hypotheses and Their Application in Virtual Screening

X-ray crystallographic data of the influenza virus neuraminidase in complex with different inhibitors were used to generate chemical feature-based pharmacophore models of the binding site of this enzyme. The models were built using the software package Catalyst. Pharmacophore hypotheses derived from the 3-D structure of ligands cocrystallized with the enzyme were then compared with automatically generated common feature pharmacophore hypotheses for neuraminidase inhibitors. The latter models were found to contain fewer features and exhibited lower selectivity in virtual screening experiments. Some functions of the inhibitors obviously participate in more than one mode of interaction with the enzyme (charge-charge interaction and hydrogen bond) or form hydrogen bonds to several amino acids. Since such multiple interactions of one chemical function cannot be included into the Catalyst data format, strategies are presented to overcome these limitations. Finally, the results of 3-D database searching experiments using these hypotheses are described.
Improved Methods for Characterizing the Alternative Hypothesis using Minimum Verification Error Training for LLR-Based Speaker Verification

Speaker verification based on the log-likelihood ratio (LLR) is essentially a task of modeling and testing two hypotheses: the null hypothesis and the alternative hypothesis. Since the alternative hypothesis involves unknown imposters, it is usually hard to characterize a priori. In this paper, we propose a framework to better characterize the alternative hypothesis with the goal of optimally separating client speakers from imposters. The proposed framework is built on either a weighted arithmetic combination or a weighted geometric combination of useful information extracted from a set of pre-trained anti-speaker models. The parameters associated with the combinations are then optimized using minimum verification error training such that both the false acceptance probability and the false rejection probability are minimized. Our experiment results show that the proposed framework outperforms conventional LLR-based approaches.
A 1.8V 11μW CMOS smart humidity sensor for RFID sensing applications

A fully-integrated humidity sensor for a smart RFID sensor platform has been realized in 0.16μm standard CMOS technology. It consists of a top-metal finger-structure capacitor covered with a humidity-sensitive layer, combined with a micro-power flexible sensor interface based on a second-order incremental delta-sigma converter. The interface can be easily reconfigured to compensate for process variation of the sensing element. In a measurement time of 10.2 ms, the interface performs a 13-bits capacitance-to-digital conversion while consuming only 5.85 μA from 1.8 V supply. In combination with the co-integrated sensor capacitor, it thus provides a humidity-to-digital conversion with a resolution of 0.1% RH in the range of 20% to 90% RH at only 107 nJ per measurement. This represents a significant improvement in energy efficiency compared to existing capacitive-sensor interfaces with comparable performance.
To what extent estimated or measured GFR could predict subclinical graft fibrosis: a comparative prospective study with protocol biopsies

Monitoring of allograft function entails methods more accurate than serum creatinine and creatinine‐based GFR equations (eGFR). This prospective trial aimed at investigating the diagnostic accuracy of creatinine‐ and cystatin C‐based eGFR with measured GFR (mGFR) and compared them with graft fibrosis detected by protocol biopsies (PBx). Forty‐four kidney transplant recipients were enrolled. PBx were obtained postengraftment and at 6th and 12th months. GFR was measured by Tc‐99m DTPA at 3th, 6th, and 12th months after transplantation. Significant correlation existed between eGFR and mGFR at 3, 6, and 12 months (P < 0.0001). Cystatin C‐based Hoek and Larsson equations had the lowest bias and highest accuracy. The sum of interstitial fibrosis and tubular atrophy score increased from implantation to 6th and 12th months (0.52 ± 0.79, 0.84 ± 0.88, 1.50 ± 1.35). This was accompanied by reduction of mGFR from 54.1 ± 15.2 to 49.9 ± 15.2 and 46.8 ± 16.5 ml/min/1.73 m2, while serum creatinine, cystatin C, and eGFR remained stable. Neither creatinine‐ nor cystatin C‐based GFR equations are reliable for detecting insidious graft fibrosis. In the first year after transplantation, mGFR, with its best proximity to histopathology, can be used to monitor allograft function and insidious graft fibrosis.
Is There a Bidirectional Relationship Between Maternal Well‐Being and Child Behavior Problems in Autism Spectrum Disorders? Longitudinal Analysis of a Population‐Defined Sample of Young Children

The aim of this study was to examine whether the relationship between maternal psychological well‐being and behavior problems in children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is bidirectional. Data were available at 9 months, 3 years, and 5 years old for 132 children with ASD, identified from a population‐representative sample of UK children. Three‐wave cross‐lagged models examined reciprocal effects between child behavior and maternal well‐being (psychological distress, physical health functioning, and life satisfaction). Results indicated that the relationships between maternal well‐being and child problem behaviors were not bidirectional. Specifically, findings suggested that while early behavior problems are not a risk factor for later maternal well‐being, maternal psychological distress, physical health limitations, and lower life satisfaction are risk factors for later child behavior problems. Autism Res 2013, 6: 201–211. © 2013 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Coronary brachytherapy: Center or not center?

In this issue, Maeng et al. report on an animal study with an important topic for the interventional cardiologist: Is centering of the radiation source essential for an optimal outcome of coronary brachytherapy? As the authors pointed out in their discussion, most of the previously gathered experimental and clinical findings indicate that centering improves dose distribution within the target area of radiotherapy and thus results in a better long-term outcome with less in-stent restenosis. Yet the reduction in in-stent late loss may be of marginal clinical relevance if treatment using a noncentered device is applied with higher doses than those normally required for the inhibition of neointimal proliferation. If and when sufficiently high radiation doses and a centering strategy are applied together, as presented by Waksman et al. [1] using a radioactive balloon introduced in the BRITE 1 study, the long-term results may be even better after coronary brachytherapy than previously reported. The question at what expense we may need centering remains open after reading the article by Maeng et al. If a centering device by itself causes edge effects, we better not overemphasize a reduction of neointimal in-growth within the stent after coronary brachytherapy. If the centering device is a centering balloon, it may cause vessel injury even beyond the balloon ends determined during fluoroscopy due to microtrauma in the perivascular space increasing inflammation [2]. Research on radioactive stents showed us that edge effects may start very shortly beyond the stent ends in a dose fall-off zone, especially with stent delivery balloons that are constructed with a large balloon overhang [3]. Therefore, extension of the radiation area should not be referred to the point where the stent ends but rather to the end of the stent delivery balloon, or even to the ends of a centering balloon of the radiation source. However, if the safety margins of radiation therapy need to be further extended up to 10 or 15 mm beyond each end of the injury zone, we may not be able to treat each long and diffuse in-stent restenosis of multiple stents sufficiently. In summary, more research is required to understand the interaction of radiation dose and vascular injury not just in the stented region but most importantly beyond the stent borders.
Analysis of Parallel Computing Environment Overhead of OpenMP for Loop with Multi-core Processors

This paper analyze the parallel computing environment overhead of OpenMP for loop with multi-core processors including the case of data-race. The different solutions of data-race are discussed in present paper, such as critical pragma, atomic pragma and reduction clause. A new method is also presented in this paper which produces the least parallel environment overhead compared with other methods and the codes are presented too. The conclusions and discussions are beneficial to save computing time and improve the computational efficiency.
Discrete Wavelet Transform and Gradient Difference Based Approach for Text Localization in Videos

The text detection and localization is important for video analysis and understanding. The scene text in video contains semantic information and thus can contribute significantly to video retrieval and understanding. However, most of the approaches detect scene text in still images or single video frame. Videos differ from images in temporal redundancy. This paper proposes a novel hybrid method to robustly localize the texts in natural scene images and videos based on fusion of discrete wavelet transform and gradient difference. A set of rules and geometric properties have been devised to localize the actual text regions. Then, morphological operation is performed to generate the text regions and finally the connected component analysis is employed to localize the text in a video frame. The experimental results obtained on publicly available standard ICDAR 2003 and Hua dataset illustrate that the proposed method can accurately detect and localize texts of various sizes, fonts and colors. The experimentation on huge collection of video databases reveal the suitability of the proposed method to video databases.
Evolution of Daily Gene Co-expression Patterns from Algae to Plants

Daily rhythms play a key role in transcriptome regulation in plants and microalgae orchestrating responses that, among other processes, anticipate light transitions that are essential for their metabolism and development. The recent accumulation of genome-wide transcriptomic data generated under alternating light:dark periods from plants and microalgae has made possible integrative and comparative analysis that could contribute to shed light on the evolution of daily rhythms in the green lineage. In this work, RNA-seq and microarray data generated over 24 h periods in different light regimes from the eudicot Arabidopsis thaliana and the microalgae Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and Ostreococcus tauri have been integrated and analyzed using gene co-expression networks. This analysis revealed a reduction in the size of the daily rhythmic transcriptome from around 90% in Ostreococcus, being heavily influenced by light transitions, to around 40% in Arabidopsis, where a certain independence from light transitions can be observed. A novel Multiple Bidirectional Best Hit (MBBH) algorithm was applied to associate single genes with a family of potential orthologues from evolutionary distant species. Gene duplication, amplification and divergence of rhythmic expression profiles seems to have played a central role in the evolution of gene families in the green lineage such as Pseudo Response Regulators (PRRs), CONSTANS-Likes (COLs), and DNA-binding with One Finger (DOFs). Gene clustering and functional enrichment have been used to identify groups of genes with similar rhythmic gene expression patterns. The comparison of gene clusters between species based on potential orthologous relationships has unveiled a low to moderate level of conservation of daily rhythmic expression patterns. However, a strikingly high conservation was found for the gene clusters exhibiting their highest and/or lowest expression value during the light transitions.
TWO UNLINKED GENETIC LOCI INTERACT TO CONTROL THE HUMAN IMMUNE RESPONSE TO TYPE III GROUP B STREPTOCOCCAL ANTIGEN

Serum samples were collected from 30 healthy adult Caucasian volunteers before and after immunization with native type III polysaccharide of group B streptococcus. Serum antibody to this polysaccharide was measured and sera were typed for several Gm and Km(1) allotypes. A significant interactive effect of Gm(23) and Km(1) was found on immune responsiveness to native type III group B streptococcus polysaccharide antigen.
Management of anaphylaxis in primary care: Canadian expert consensus recommendations

To cite this article: Waserman S, Chad Z, Francoeur MJ, Small P, Stark D, Vander Leek TK, Kaplan A, Kastner M. Management of anaphylaxis in primary care: Canadian expert consensus recommendations. Allergy 2010; 65: 1082–1092.
Compulsion, Craft, or Commodity? Education Services Trade in the Larger Context

The role of education in fostering economic growth and social development is universally recognized. Although history places the provision of education firmly within national control, countries increasingly search outside national borders for alternative distribution frameworks. Tellingly, the World Trade Organization recently included education as service trade sector in the General Agreement for Trade in Services (GATS) negotiations. Such activity increases debate about control as countries struggle to create policies that balance nationalism with economic responsiveness. This study employed multivariate data to question whether trade openness in 162 countries was associated with openness to trade in education, and whether countries' commitments to lower barriers to education trade paralleled the strength of their commitments to lower barriers to all trade. Among the findings were the following: (a) On average, countries with education commitments experienced slightly higher levels of general trade openness than those without education commitments; (b) in lower-middle-income countries, education trade openness and general trade openness were positively related; and (c) when controlling for education, population, geography, and income, lower levels of education trade barriers were the single best predictor of countries' having made education commitments under GATS. A model for systemic improvement in education trade policymaking is also presented.
Translational control of puf operon expression in Rhodobacter sphaeroides 2.4.1.

The puf operon of Rhodobacter sphaeroides 2.4. 1 encode the beta- and alpha-polypeptides of the B875 complex, the L and M polypeptides of the reaction centre and the pufX gene product. A previous report from the authors' laboratory indicated the potential existence of a 20-codon open reading frame (orfK, now designated pufK) located immediately upstream of the pufB structural gene. It is now demonstrated that pufK is translated in vivo and that the specific levels or nature of the rare codons within pufK affect the expression of pufK. Using a series of pufK-specific mutations, both in trans as lacZ translational fusions and incorporated into the genome in single copy, evidence has been obtained that translation initiation through pufK may be essential to translation of pufB. Further, the abundance, quality and distribution of rare codons within pufK may serve to 'gate' the entry of ribosomes at pufB. The data also suggest that translation of pufB is uncoupled from that of pufA, with the latter capable of being produced in excess of the former. It is also revealed that the secondary structure at the 5' end of the large and small puf transcripts may play a role in mRNA stability and that stability of the small puf transcript is independent of translation.
Analysis of Server Provisioning for Distributed Interactive Applications

Increasing geographical spreads of modern distributed interactive applications (DIAs) make distributed server deployment vital for combating network latency and improving the interactivity among participants. In this paper, we investigate the server provisioning problem that concerns where to place servers for DIAs. We formulate the server provisioning problem with an objective of reducing the network latency involved in the interaction between participants. We prove that the problem is NP-hard under several scenarios. We analyze the performance of the classical k-median server placement for DIAs and propose a new greedy server provisioning heuristic for DIAs. Theoretical analysis shows that the approximation ratio of the proposed greedy algorithm is much lower than that of the k-median placement. Experiments using real Internet latency data also show that our proposed algorithm significantly outperforms the k-median and other baseline server placements.