Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cyclin-dependent kinases as therapeutic targets for HIV-1 infection

ABSTRACT Introduction: A number of cyclin-dependent kinases (CDKs) mediate key steps in the HIV-1 replication cycle and therefore have potential to serve as therapeutic targets for HIV-1 infection, especially in HIV-1 cure strategies. Current HIV-1 cure strategies involve the development of small molecules that are able to activate HIV-1 from latent infection, thereby allowing the immune system to recognize and clear infected cells. Areas covered: The role of seven CDK family members in the HIV-1 replication cycle is reviewed, with a focus on CDK9, as the mechanism whereby the viral Tat protein utilizes CDK9 to enhance viral replication is known in considerable detail. Expert opinion: Given the essential roles of CDKs in cellular proliferation and gene expression, small molecules that inhibit CDKs are unlikely to be feasible therapeutics for HIV-1 infection. However, small molecules that activate CDK9 and other select CDKs such as CDK11 have potential to reactivate latent HIV-1 and contribute to a functional cure of infection.
Assessing the Required Risk Premium for North American Farmland Investment

In recent years, as North American farmland prices have continued to rise, a number of North American public farmland investment trusts have been formed to offer investors a liquid and marketable farmland investment vehicle. How risky are these farmland REITs? This paper compares the investment risk with other popular investment options such as bonds, stocks, gold, oil and real estate using several well-known and accepted methods of risk analysis, including overall yield variance, CAPM, Value at Risk (VAR), and Drawdown. North American Farmland REIT has less risk than gold, oil, REITs and stock markets.
Measurement of the magnetic characteristics of soft magnetic materials with the use of an iterative learning control algorithm

The quality of finite elements simulations is depending on the used magnetic characteristic curves and material coefficients on a high degree. Especially in the automotive industry the power density of electric machines are tending to increase. Thereby the quality of a whole design optimization process for highly saturated magnetic circuits is depending on the accuracy of the material data. To measure the magnetic characteristics of materials at high field strengths and high frequencies, the losses in the coil and the material has to be reduced because of thermal influences. On the one hand the influence of the heating itself is unwanted and on the other hand, especially when small test specimen are used, the maximum measuring time is limited to the temperature and sometimes leads to bad control accuracies. To overcome this problem an iterative measurement cycle is introduced in this paper.
Relationship between serum IGF-1 and skeletal muscle IGF-1 mRNA expression to phosphocreatine recovery after exercise in obese men with reduced GH.

CONTEXT GH and IGF-1 are believed to be physiological regulators of skeletal muscle mitochondria. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to examine the relationship between GH/IGF-1 and skeletal muscle mitochondria in obese subjects with reduced GH secretion in more detail. DESIGN Fifteen abdominally obese men with reduced GH secretion were treated for 12 weeks with recombinant human GH. Subjects underwent (31)P-magnetic resonance spectroscopy to assess phosphocreatine (PCr) recovery as an in vivo measure of skeletal muscle mitochondrial function and percutaneous muscle biopsies to assess mRNA expression of IGF-1 and mitochondrial-related genes at baseline and 12 weeks. RESULTS At baseline, skeletal muscle IGF-1 mRNA expression was significantly associated with PCr recovery (r = 0.79; P = .01) and nuclear respiratory factor-1 (r = 0.87; P = .001), mitochondrial transcription factor A (r = 0.86; P = .001), peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR)γ (r = 0.72; P = .02), and PPARα (r = 0.75; P = .01) mRNA expression, and trended to an association with PPARγ coactivator 1-α (r = 0.59; P = .07) mRNA expression. However, serum IGF-1 concentration was not associated with PCr recovery or any mitochondrial gene expression (all P > .10). Administration of recombinant human GH increased both serum IGF-1 (change, 218 ± 29 μg/L; P < .0001) and IGF-1 mRNA in muscle (fold change, 2.1 ± 0.3; P = .002). Increases in serum IGF-1 were associated with improvements in total body fat (r = -0.53; P = .04), trunk fat (r = -0.55; P = .03), and lean mass (r = 0.58; P = .02), but not with PCr recovery (P > .10). Conversely, increase in muscle IGF-1 mRNA was associated with improvements in PCr recovery (r = 0.74; P = .02), but not with body composition parameters (P > .10). CONCLUSION These data demonstrate a novel association of skeletal muscle mitochondria with muscle IGF-1 mRNA expression, but independent of serum IGF-1 concentrations.
Influence of a High-Fat Diet on Cardiac iNOS in Female Rats.

BACKGROUND Overexpression of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) is a key link between high-fat (HF) diet induced obesity and cardiovascular disease. Oestradiol has cardioprotective effects that may be mediated through reduction of iNOS activity/expression. METHODS In the present study, female Wistar rats were fed a standard diet or a HF diet (42% fat) for 10 weeks. iNOS gene and protein expressions were measured in heart tissue. HF-fed rats exhibited a significant increase in cardiac iNOS mRNA by 695% (p<.05), iNOS protein level by 248% (p<0.01), without changes in nitrate/nitrite levels. Expression of CD36 protein in plasma membranes was increased by 37% (p<0.05), while the concentration of free fatty acids (FFA) was reduced by 25% (p<0.01) in HF-fed rats. Expression of the p50 subunit of nuclear factor-kB (NFkB-p50) in heart was increased by 77% (p<0.01) in HF-fed rats. Expression of protein kinase B (Akt) and extracellular signalregulated kinases 1/2 (ERK1/2) were unchanged between the groups. There was a significant increase in the ratio of phospho-Akt/total Akt but not for phospho-ERK1/2/total ERK1/2 in HF-fed rats. Estrogen receptor-α levels (by 50%; p<0.05) and serum oestradiol concentrations (by 35%; p<0.05) were shown to be significantly reduced in HF-fed rats. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION Our results revealed that a HF diet led to increased iNOS expression, most likely via a mechanism involving Akt and NFκB-p50 proteins. Decreased levels of oestradiol and ERα protein in the HF-fed group, in combination with increased iNOS levels are consistent with the hypothesis that oestradiol has a cardioprotective effect through its ability to regulate iNOS expression.
A low-power 50-GHz LC-VCO in a 65-nm CMOS technology

A low-power 50-GHz LC-VCO has been presented. Throughout EM analysis, an inductor having a quality factor of 14.3 was implemented with a microstrip line. The analyzed characteristics of a MOS varactor limit the LC tank performance due to its low quality factor. In order to overcome the LC tank performance and operate at low-power consumption, the negative transconductance stage was evaluated in various ways and found at the condition of the optimized MOSFET size and bias point. The proposed VCO was implemented in a 65-nm CMOS technology. The measurement results show a frequency range of 48.61 GHz ~ 50.84 GHz and an output power of -10 dBm. The required VCO current is about 4.7 mA from a 0.7 V supply.
Strategy and generation of value in Colombian service-providing companies

This research aims to identify the relationship between strategy and value generation in service-providing companies that have won the Premio Colombiano a la Calidad (Colombian Management Quality Award) from the Ministerio de Comercio, Industria y Turismo (Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism) in the period 2013-2014, an accolade created to stimulate companies that stand out for having a practical approach towards aspects such as the creation of value for stakeholders. The methodology is of deductive, exploratory and descriptive nature, while information was obtained from seven companies through multiple case analysis. The results indicate that the studied companies display a direct relationship between strategy and value generation, have an integral, holistic and systemic vision, have a formal strategic process of formulation, implementation and control, bestow some participation onto their stakeholders, and acknowledge human talent, corporate image and financial resources as strategic factors. We concluded that the strategic orientation of companies for the generation of value is focused on the type of product or service, size and growth, profitability and market category. Moreover, the analyzed companies reckon fundamental elements in their value-creating system to generate a competitive advantage.
Hematology Testing in Mice

The mouse is an increasingly important system for the study of both normal and aberrant hematopoiesis. As a model organism, the mouse recapitulates much of human hematopoiesis; however, there are some important differences. Here, the basic approaches for analyzing hematopoiesis in mice are described. In particular, methods are provided for the collection and analysis of peripheral blood, flow cytometry analysis of peripheral blood, bone marrow, and spleen cells, and isolation and transplantation of bone marrow stem cells. Curr. Protoc. Mouse Biol. 1:323‐346 © 2011 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
IMPROVED SEMLIKI FOREST VIRUS VECTORS FOR RECEPTOR RESEARCH AND GENE THERAPY

We have modified Semliki Forest virus (SFV) vectors to broaden their application range. Here we describe a series of site-directed mutagenesis experiments on the SFV subgenomic 26S promoter to down-regulate the heterologous gene expression. Several mutants showed a dramatic effect on transgene expression levels in BHK cells. The luciferase activity was reduced to approximately 30%, 3%, and 1% compared to the wild type promoter. Similarly, a decrease in β-galactosidase activity was observed in BHK cells and after injection into the striatum of male Wistar rats. Novel non-cytopathogenic and temperature-sensitive SFV vectors have recently been developed by introduction of point mutations in the viral nonstructural genes nsP2 and nsP4. These vectors do not show the typical shut down of host cell protein synthesis after SFV infections and therefore allow for a substantially prolonged survival of host cells. Both the mutant vectors demonstrating lower and more physiological expression levels and the non-cytopathogenic vectors should be valuable tools for various applications within receptor research. Furthermore, recent studies suggest that SFV vectors can be efficient gene delivery vehicles for gene therapy applications.
Reversibility of asymmetric catalyzed C–C bond formation by benzoylformate decarboxylase

Benzoylformate decarboxylase (BFD) from Pseudomonas putida catalyzed the formation of 2-hydroxy-1-phenylpropanone (2-HPP), a 2-hydroxy ketone, from the kinetic resolution of rac-benzoin in the presence of acetaldehyde. The formation rate of 2-HPP via kinetic resolution of benzoin was 700-fold lower compared to the formation via direct carboligation of benzaldehyde and acetaldehyde. Further investigations revealed that BFD not only accepts (R)-benzoin but also 2-HPP as the substrate. A typical Michaelis–Menten type kinetics was observed starting from enantiopure (S)- or (R)-2-HPP. The formation of racemic 2-HPP while using benzoin as the donor in the presence of acetaldehyde and the racemization of (R/S)-2-HPP were detected. The equilibrium constant determined, showed favoured conditions towards the product side i.e. (R)-benzoin and 2-HPP. In the end, an extended reaction mechanism was proposed by supplementing the already known mechanism with the C–C bond cleavage activity of BFD towards 2-hydroxy ketones.
Integrating source-side semantic roles into a phrase-based statistical machine translation

Most of the statistical machine translation (SMT) systems suffer from lack of proper understanding about the meaning of input sentence, confusion of semantic roles or semantic ambiguities. In this paper, we propose semantic features for phrase-based SMT (PB-SMT) using source-side semantic roles. The objective of proposed features is to employ predicate-argument information in an English-Persian SMT, which is a sample of low-resource language pairs. Then these features serve to re-rank list of n-best translations produced by the translation system. The first proposed feature tries to preserve the correlation between predicate-argument structures (PAS) among two languages, while the second one aims to preserve the internal cohesion of semantic roles. Both of these features use direct annotation projection to transfer semantic roles from the source to the target language. For extracting the last feature, the Persian Semantic Role Labeling (SRL) is used which is trained on Persian semantic annotated data. We create the training data by automatically projecting the annotation from English to Persian using in-house parallel data, filtering out uncertain labels and also by bootstrapping. To our knowledge, this is the largest Persian corpus annotated with the semantic roles. Evaluations show that these features cause an improvement of 0.65 BLEU score over the baseline. Human evaluation of the translation results also shows the positive influence of these features on translation quality. Preliminary results from experiments demonstrate the importance of predicate-argument semantics in machine translation.
EXTERNAL CREDIT AND ECONOMIC GROWTH: ANY RELATIONSHIP FOR NIGERIA?

The growing economic linkage between Nigeria and western economies has raised the important issue of susceptibility of Nigerian economy to the adverse effects of structural changes in advanced economies. The need for increasing external credit flows to boost economic activity has exposed Nigeria to the negative effects of external structural changes. Therefore, an important question of concern in this study is, how does the Nigerian economy grow when there is decline in external credit? This study attempted to answer this question by comparing flow of external credit to economic activity. This is a distinction from previous studies that had compared stock of external credit to economic activity. Using annual data covering thirty-six years for the period 1980-2015. The study adopted the neoclassical growth model and estimated the model using Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) approach. The study argued that, to the extent that expenditure is credit financed, GDP should be a function of credit flow, which is new borrowing. The implication of this is that economic growth should be more related to changes in the flow of credit rather than stock of credit, in the period of economic crisis.
A novel single phase DC-AC inverter

This paper presents a new topology of single phase full-bridge dc-ac inverter. In this topology, a switch is connected at the lower arm of the full-bridge switches to control the output voltage across the full-bridge inverter. The switch at the lower arm of the full-bridge controls the output of full-bridge inverter by increasing or reducing the voltage level at the lower arm of the bridge. This switch of lower arm is controlled by a high frequency SPWM switching signal. While the power switches of full-bridge inverter operate with square wave switching signal at a frequency of 50 Hz. Hence, a sinusoidal shape of output voltage is achieved from the proposed inverter. Both computer simulation and experiment were carried out to verify the performance of proposed topology. From the presented results, it is shown that new topology has nearly sinusoidal output voltage and current waveforms. Thus the output voltage of proposed topology has very less total harmonics distortion.
ISEcp1B-Mediated Transposition of blaCTX-M in Escherichia coli

ABSTRACT Several expanded-spectrum β-lactamase blaCTX-M genes are associated with ISEcp1-like elements in Enterobacteriaceae. We found that ISEcp1B was able to mobilize the adjacent blaCTX-M-19 gene by a transpositional mechanism in Escherichia coli by recognizing a variety of DNA sequences as right inverted repeats.
Civil War as State-Making: Strategic Governance in Civil War

Abstract Why do some rebel groups provide governance inclusively while most others do not? Some insurgencies divert critical financial and personnel resources to provide benefits to anyone, including nonsupporters (Karen National Union, Eritrean People's Liberation Front). Other groups offer no services or limit their service provision to only those people who support, or are likely to support, the insurgency. The existing literature examines how insurgencies incentivize recruitment by offering selective social services, yet no research addresses why insurgencies provide goods inclusively. I argue that inclusive provision of services legitimates insurgents’ claim of sovereignty to domestic and international audiences, and thus is a strategic tool secessionist rebels use to achieve their long-term goal of independence. With new and original data, I use a large-N analysis to test this hypothesis. The results of the analysis support the hypothesis, underscoring the importance insurgent nonviolent behavior and addressing key issues such as sovereignty and governance.
Performance Evaluation of Enterprise Big Data Platforms with HiBench

In this paper, we evaluate the performance of DataStax Enterprise (DSE) using the HiBench benchmark suite and compare it with the corresponding Cloudera's Distribution of Hadoop (CDH) results. Both systems, DSE and CDH were stress tested using CPU-bound (WordCount), I/O-bound (Enhanced DFSIO) and mixed (HiveBench) workloads. The experimental results showed that DSE is better than CDH in writing files, whereas CDH is better than DSE in reading files. Additionally, for DSE the read and write throughput difference is very minor, whereas for CDH the read throughput is much higher than the write throughput. The results we obtained show that the HiBench benchmark suite, developed specifically for Hadoop, can be successfully executed on top of the DataStax Enterprise (DSE).
Integrating the Kinect camera, gesture recognition and mobile devices for interactive discussion

The Microsoft Kinect camera is a revolutionary and useful depth camera giving new user experience of interactive gaming on the Xbox platform through gesture or motion detection. Besides the infrared-based depth camera, an array of built-in microphones for voice command is installed along the horizontal bar of the Kinect camera. As a result, there are increasing interests to apply the Kinect camera for various real-life applications including the control of squirt guns for outdoor swimming pools. In additional to the Kinect camera, mobile devices such as the smartphones readily integrated with motion sensors have been used for different real-time control tasks like the remote control of robots. In this project, we propose to integrate the Microsoft Kinect camera together with the smartphones as intelligent control for interactive discussion or presentation for the future e-learning system. To demonstrate the feasibility of our proposal, a prototype of our proposed gesture recognition and command specification software is built using the C# language on the MS . NET platform, and will be evaluated with a careful plan. Furthermore, there are many interesting directions for further investigation of our proposal.
Antagonists of the Platelet‐activating Factor Receptor Block Long‐term Potentiation in Hippocampal Slices

The effects of antagonists and agonists of the platelet‐activating factor (PAF) receptor on the formation of long‐term potentiation (LTP) were examined in slices of rat hippocampus. The antagonist trans‐BTD (trans‐2,5‐bis‐(3,4,5‐trimethoxyphenyl)‐1,3‐dioxolane) at concentrations of 8–16 μM blocked LTP in field CA1 while the same concentration of a stereo isomer (cis‐BTD) with low affinity for PAF receptors was without effect. CV3988, an antagonist structurally related to PAF, also attenuated LTP. The blockade of LTP by trans‐BTD was partially reversed by simultaneous application of the non‐metabolizable receptor agonist carbamyl‐PAF. Trans‐BTD did not change the following physiological measures: (i) paired‐pulse facilitation, (ii) responses occurring during the short bursts given to induce LTP, (iii) N‐methyl‐d‐aspartate receptor‐mediated responses, and (iv) potentiation measured during the first minute after high‐frequency stimulation. It thus appears that trans‐BTD interferes with LTP at some step after induction and initial expression. These results suggest that activation of PAF receptors contributes to the stabilization of LTP, possibly via an effect on intracellular calcium levels.
Speciation and Dispersal of Tribolodon Species (Pisces, Cyprinidae) around the Sea of Japan

Abstract Gene products of 22 protein coding loci from 29 populations of a uniquely sea-going cyprinid genus Tribolodon, T. hakonensis (anadromous and/or river-resident), T. brandtii (anadromous), T. ezoe (freshwater) and T. nakamurai (freshwater), were analyzed in order to infer the genetic divergence and dispersal of Tribolodon species around the Sea of Japan. According to the genetic distance, T. brandtii is located near the center between T. hakonensis and T. ezoe-T. nakamurai cluster. The outgroup root (Pseudaspius leptocephalus, Rhynchocypris lagowskii and Leuciscus waleckii) is attached between T. hakonensis-T. brandtii and the T. ezoe-T. nakamurai clusters. The origin of the genus Tribolodon and its salinity tolerance may date back to the Miocene Sea-of-Japan Lake and the Pliocene Paleo-Sea-of-Japan, respectively, as judged from the divergence time between Tribolodon and the outgroups. The genetic relationships and distribution pattern of Tribolodon species suggest they speciated on the Sakhalin-Japan side, and the continental populations of T. hakonensis and T. brandtii originated from anadromous colonizers. A new faunal element of Japanese freshwater fishes, the Sakhalin-Japan sub-element, is proposed for Tribolodon and some other fishes.
Novel 3D model for prioritising the attributes of port service quality: cases involving major container ports in Asia

The evaluation of port service quality (PSQ) has become a critical issue in port management. However, previous studies neglect the difficulties in so doing by relying on the resources and capability available at the shipping companies. This study proposes and reports on the testing of a 3D model for prioritising PSQ attributes by introducing a novel dimension called 'goal difficulty' into the port service contributory improvement index. The index represents the composite satisfaction index derived from Kano's model and the standardised weight derived from IPA. The data for testing the proposed 3D model were collected from the managers of five major container ports in Asia. The test results were compared against those acquired using 2D methods (e.g., IPA), and managerial implications were drawn. The newly developed model is expected to help port managers allocate their limited resources efficiently in their prioritisation of PSQ improvement and in optimising port service user needs.
Self-constructing compact parametric macromodels for efficient electronic design

We propose a modeling technique able to generate very efficient parametric macromodels in an automated way. The design space samples needed to build the parametric macromodels are chosen automatically by means of a suitable adaptive sampling algorithm. The size of the parametric macromodels does not increase with the number of design parameters, which leads to compact models. Stability and passivity are preserved over the design space of interest. Pertinent numerical results validate the proposed approach.