Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Abnormal Spreading and Subunit Expression of Junctional Acetylcholine Receptors of Paraspinal Muscles in Scoliosis Associated With Syringomyelia

Study Design. A comparative study was performed among 2 groups of patients: Group A with scoliosis and syringomyelia and Group B with idiopathic scoliosis. Objective. To investigate the denervation of paraspinal muscles and analyze its association with scoliosis in patients with syringomyelia. Summary of Background Data. The mechanism by which scoliosis develops secondary to syringomyelia remains unclear. Some authors hypothesize that scoliosis may be caused by an alteration in the innervation of the trunk musculature. Few studies, however, have been reported to testify the presence of denervation of the paraspinal muscles in scoliotic patients with syringomyelia. Methods. Forty-one children were enrolled in the study and were divided into 2 groups. Group A consisted of 25 patients with scoliosis associated with syringomyelia. Group B included 16 adolescents with idiopathic scoliosis. Bilateral biopsy of paraspinal muscles was performed during scheduled spinal surgery. Distribution of acetylcholine receptors (AChRs) and acetylcholinesterase was investigated by immunofluorescence staining. RT-PCR was performed to determine the AChRs subunit mRNA expression. Results. Immunostaining showed that 56% patients in Group A were scored positive for the loss of localization of AChRs to neuromuscular junction, while all Group B patients were negative. &ggr;-AChR subunit expression was detected in 65% patients in Group A while absent in all samples in Group B. There was no statistical significance of both the positive rate of abnormal spreading and that of &ggr; subunit expression of AChRs between the convex and concave side in Group A. Conclusion. The denervation of paraspinal muscles is present in some patients with scoliosis associated with syringomyelia. The size of the syrinx and the degree of cerebellar tonsillar descent might seem to have no relation to the denervation of paraspinal muscles.
Cell-Wall Composition and Polysaccharide Synthase Activity Changes Following Photoinduction in Trichoderma viride

The differentiation and metabolism in the soil-borne saprophytic deuteromycete Trichoderma viride are subject to control by light. We have investigated the effect of illumination of mycelia on the activities of cell-wall synthesizing enzymes β-1,3-glucan synthase and chitin synthase and on the composition of cell walls. After 10 min illumination of dark-grown mycelia with white fluorescent light at 600 lx, a gradual rise in specific activity of membrane-bound enzymes β-1,3-glucan synthase by about 130% and a decrease in specific activity of chitin synthase by about 50% in relation to the dark control were observed. The changes in enzyme activities were caused by de novo synthesis of corresponding poly-saccharide synthases(s) and/or their regulatory components since they were not observed when protein synthesis was blocked with 50 μg/ml cycloheximide. The content of β-1,3-glucan in the cell walls of illuminated mycelia has increased by 35–50% in comparison to the dark control while the content of chitin remained practically unchanged.
Climate Patterns Governing the Presence and Permanence of Salmonellae in Coastal Areas of Bahia de Todos Santos, Mexico

ABSTRACT Despite the importance of salmonellae as one of the major causes of food-borne infections worldwide, data regarding the presence of these organisms in the environment are limited. We investigated the presence of Salmonella spp. in Bahia de Todos Santos (Baja California, Mexico) and evaluated the environmental factors that affect the occurrence of Salmonella spp. in this arid region. A total of 1,331 samples collected from 21 sites along the coast during a period of 3 years were analyzed for Salmonella spp. Geographical and seasonal distribution of Salmonella spp. was evaluated in association with environmental parameters and with human infections in the area. The incidence of Salmonella bacteria throughout the study was 4.8%, with the highest incidence detected in wastewater (16.2%), followed by stream water (10.6%), mollusks (7.4%), and seawater (2.3%). Twenty different serotypes were identified among the 64 Salmonella isolates. The dominant serotype was Typhimurium (23.4%), followed by Vejle (6.2%). The presence of Salmonella spp. in coastal areas was mostly confined to rainy periods and areas of stream discharges, and runoff was identified as the predominant factor influencing the transport of Salmonella bacteria from source points to the sea via streams. Isolation of Salmonella spp. was negatively and significantly associated with temperature, probably because of the effect of solar radiation in the decline of permanence of Salmonella bacteria. Conversely, human infections prevailed during the warmest months and were negatively correlated with the presence of Salmonella spp. in the marine environment.
Working Paper Series Monetary Policy and Unemployment in Open Economies

After an expansionary monetary policy shock employment increases and unemployment falls. In standard New Keynesian models the fall in aggregate unemployment does not a¤ect employed workers at all. However, Lüchinger, Meier and Stutzer (2010) found that the risk of unemployment negatively a¤ects utility of employed workers: An increases in aggregate unemployment decreases workerssubjective wellbeing, which can be explained by an increased risk of becoming unemployed. I take account of this e¤ect in an otherwise standard New Keynesian open economy model with unemployment as in Galí (2010) and nd two important results with respect to expansionary monetary policy shocks: First, the usual wealth e¤ect in New Keynesian models of a declining labor force, which is at odds with the data as highlighted by Christiano, Trabandt and Walentin (2010), is shut down. Second, the welfare e¤ects of such shocks improve considerably, modifying the standard results of the open economy literature that set o¤ with Obstfeld and Rogo¤s (1995) redux model. Keywords: Open economy macroeconomics, monetary policy, unemployment JEL classi cation: E24, E52, F32, F41 Address: Freie Universität Berlin, Boltzmannstr. 20, 14195 Berlin, Germany, tel: +49-30-54632, email: philipp.engler@fu-berlin.de. A large part of the work on this paper was done during a visit to the National Centre of Econometric Research (NCER) at the School of Economics and Finance, Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane. I gratefully acknowledge the support and hospitality of my hosts, in particular Uwe Dulleck, and the support granted by the DAAD. I thank my discussant Gernot Müller and other participants of the Konstanz Seminar 2011 where I presented an earlier version of the paper for valuable comments and suggestions. I also thank Dominic Quint, Mathias Paustian, Wolfgang Strehl, Mathias Trabandt, Alexander Wul¤, and in particular Simon Lüchinger, for their comments and suggestions. Any errors, of course, are my own responsiblility.
Enhancing realistic fault secureness in parity prediction array arithmetic operators by I/sub DDQ/ monitoring

Parity prediction arithmetic operator schemes have been widely studied in the past. Recently, it has been demonstrated that this prediction scheme can achieve Fault-Secureness in arithmetic circuits for stuck-at and stuck-open faults. In this paper it is shown that the detection capability improves if a current monitoring technique is used in conjunction with the parity prediction scheme. With this scheme the fault-secure property extends to bridging faults. The technique is validated by the topological design and SPICE simulation of a multiplier circuit.
Numerical simulation of shot noise in disordered graphene

Following the intriguing results analytically obtained for the shot noise suppression in wide and short graphene samples with doped contacts, efforts were made to achieve an experimental verification, and, while one experiment yielded a clear confirmation of the theory, another one provided data with no clear dependence of the Fano factor on gate voltage. This was attributed to the presence of a disordered potential. Here we perform a numerical study, based on an envelope function analysis, of disordered graphene samples with different aspect ratios, focusing in particular on the dependence of shot noise suppression on gate voltage. We conclude that such a dependence should survive, unless disorder with an unrealistically large amplitude is considered.
Chemical Components, Biological Activities, and Toxicological Evaluation of the Fruit (Aril) of Two Precious Plant Species from Genus Taxus

The fruit (aril) of the endangered genus Taxus plants is an abandoned herbal resource. Traditionally, people enthusiastically focus on its bark, its renewable, tremendous arils fall into the soil with seeds after they are mature. The present research investigated the fruit of two species from the genus Taxus, Taxus chinensis var. mairei, and Taxus media, with regards to their antioxidant and antihyperglycaemic activities, safety, and bioactive constituents. Results showed that T. chinensis var. mairei and T. media both had certain biological activities with T. chinensis var. mairei better in antioxidant activity and T. media better in antihyperglycaemic activity. Correlation analysis revealed that the differences in bioactivities depended on content of their mainly chemical components. The mice acute oral toxicity test indicated that the methanol extracts of the two biotypes of Taxus were safe. And nineteen compounds were tentatively assigned from the two varieties, via tandem mass spectrometry using a LC‐ESI‐Q‐TOF‐MS instrument, which included phenols, flavonoids, and terpenes. These results indicate a possible application of Taxus fruit extracts in various fields like in food industry, however, this still needs further investigations.
Information display interface in hypermedia design

The purpose of this study is to examine whether the types of information display interface in hypermedia design (window-scroll versus frame-based) are perceived, manipulated, or processed identically by their users. The subjects of the study were 18 undergraduates with similar experience in the computer and content domain. A two-condition, independent subject design was employed using the presentation format as the independent variable. The dependent variables were the lesson completion time, accuracy rates, and times at which movement switched. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to analyze the data. The results show that the different display formats do not affect the subjects' performance on any of the dependent variables analyzed. The study concludes by some suggestions for future study.
Transcatheter Arterial Chemoembolization (TACE) as a Treatment for Primary or Metastatic Liver Malignancies

Embolization is a procedure to block blood flow. When the material used to block the blood flow contains chemotherapy agents as well, it is a way to treat liver cancer in some situations. This treatment is usually known as TACE. In this procedure a catheter (a long, thin, hollow tube) is inserted in an artery near the groin. It’s threaded to the tumor’s blood supply. Chemotherapy and tiny particles are then sent directly into the tumor. The particles block off — embolize — the artery feeding the tumor, causing it to shrink. The chemotherapy works to kill the cancer cells. This treatment can be used in the liver because it has two sources of blood: the portal vein and the hepatic artery. The portal vein supplies most of the blood to the liver. The hepatic artery supplies a lesser amount, and tumors that grow in the liver usually get their blood supply from the hepatic artery. As a result, TACE can be used to starve the blood supply of the tumor usually without affecting the blood supply to the rest of the liver. This policy describes when TACE may be considered medically necessary.
STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS OF INTEGRATION OF A NON-CYLINDRICAL CNG FUEL TANK

The purpose of this study is to computationally model and analyze the vehicle frame which is mounted with a non-conventional, non-cylindrical compressed natural gas (CNG) fuel tank. Integration of this tank in the vehicle underbody will resolve the issue of reduced storage space which is observed in a conventional CNG powered vehicle. This research will ultimately result in making CNG a good alternative to gasoline and reducing the increasing dependency on a single fuel. This tank will be developed in two phases: phase I design of the tank will be a standard rectangular outer box shape with Schwarz P-surface inner structure and phase II will be a complex and conformable shaped tank. This study will only include phase I tanks and the only load case considered is a simple linear static case. Modifications are made to the vehicle frame using a computer aided design (CAD) software in order to accommodate the tank. The results obtained from the finite element analysis of the frame support the design modifications made to the frame and shows the ability of the frame to handle a heavier tank.
Artemisinin inhibits extracellular matrix metalloproteinase inducer (EMMPRIN) and matrix metalloproteinase‐9 expression via a protein kinase Cδ/p38/extracellular signal‐regulated kinase pathway in phorbol myristate acetate‐induced THP‐1 macrophages

1. Overexpression of extracellular matrix metalloproteinase inducer (EMMPRIN) and matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) by monocytes/macrophages has been proposed to play a significant role in atherosclerotic plaque progression and rupture. The aim of the present study was to explore whether artemisinin, a natural extract from Artemisia annua, could decrease EMMPRIN and MMP‐9 expression in phorbol myristate acetate (PMA)‐induced macrophages by regulating the protein kinase (PK) Cδ/c‐Jun N‐terminal kinase (JNK)/p38/extracellular signal‐regulated kinase (ERK) pathway.
A particle-based policy for the optimal control of Markov decision processes

Abstract When the state dimension is large, classical approximate dynamic programming techniques may become computationally unfeasible, since the complexity of the algorithm grows exponentially with the state space size (curse of dimensionality). Policy search techniques are able to overcome this problem because, instead of estimating the value function over the entire state space, they search for the optimal control policy in a restricted parameterized policy space. This paper presents a new policy parametrization that exploits a single point (particle) to represent an entire region of the state space and can be tuned through a recently introduced policy gradient method with parameter-based exploration. Experiments demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed approach in high dimensional environments.
Telecommunication e‐services orchestration enabling business process management

The Internet's widespread popularity and the ubiquity of the World Wide Web have revolutionized the face of business, especially in the telecommunications industry. With the emergence of business process management and of service‐oriented architecture, the focus has shifted to the development of electronic services that integrate business processes and that diversify functionalities available to customers. Most of these worldwide telecom corporations have many kinds of operations support systems in the backend environment. In this research, we present a research framework, a collaboration model and a collaboration layer to describe the method of new generation operations systems and software. This research method achieves the desired properties of telecom e‐services of business process management. Then, we use several illustrations to explain the generality of our method, and we focus on how international telecom corporations have become too concerned with the agility and the integration underlying e‐services integration based on new generation operations systems and software. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Brain abnormalities in extremely low gestational age infants: a Swedish population based MRI study

Aims: Brain abnormalities are common in preterm infants and can be reliably detected by magnetic resonance (MR) imaging at term equivalent age. The aim of the present study was to acquire population based data on brain abnormalities in extremely low gestational age (ELGA) infants from the Stockholm region and to correlate the MR findings to perinatal data, in order to identify risk factors.
CS 224 W : Final Project Gupta , Ray & Wang Characterization and Time-Series Prediction of Alternative News Propagation

News exposure and opinion formation increasingly occurs through social media channels, and more specifically, alternative news has been enjoying increased popularity and readership. Alternative news sources tend to focus more on sensationalized and highly opinionated content, often with a lower regard for journalistic standards and unbiased analysis/reporting. While alternative news itself is not a new phenomenon, social networks provide a channel where information diffusion occurs rapidly, where news is difficult to tie to a source, and where the required level of journalistic quality is falling [9]. Moreover, the spread of alternative news has also been tied to the advancing of malicious agendas such as the spread of misleading of political information.
Complete Code Generation from UML State Machine

An event-driven architecture is a useful way to design and implement complex systems. The UML State Machine and its visualizations are a powerful means to the modeling of the logical behavior of such an architecture. In Model Driven Engineering, executable code can be automatically generated from state machines. However, existing generation approaches and tools from UML State Machines are still limited to simple cases, especially when considering concurrency and pseudo states such as history, junction, and event types. This paper provides a pattern and tool for complete and efficient code generation approach from UML State Machine. It extends IF-ELSE-SWITCH constructions of programming languages with concurrency support. The code generated with our approach has been executed with a set of state-machine examples that are part of a test-suite described in the recent OMG standard Precise Semantics Of State Machine. The traced execution results comply with the standard and are a good hint that the execution is semantically correct. The generated code is also efficient: it supports multi-thread-based concurrency, and the (static and dynamic) efficiency of generated code is improved compared to considered approaches.
Hydroxydiether Lipid Structures in Methanosarcina spp. and Methanococcus voltae

Hydroxylated diether lipids are the most abundant lipids in Methanosarcina acetivorans, Methanosarcina thermophila, and Methanosarcina barkeri MS and Fusaro, regardless of the substrate used for growth. Structural analysis of the lipid moiety freed of polar head groups revealed that the hydroxydiether lipids of all the Methanosarcina strains were hydroxylated at position 3 of sn-2 phytanyl chains. The finding that Methanosarcina strains synthesize the same hydroxydiether structure suggests that this is a taxonomic characteristic of the genus. Methanococcus voltae produced minor amounts of the 3-hydroxydiether characteristic of Methanosarcina spp. and also the 3′-hydroxydiether described previously for Methanosaeta concilii.
The Epidemiology of Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury in British Columbia, Canada

Study Design. Retrospective observational study utilizing prospectively collected population-based data. Objective. To describe the epidemiology and demographics of all patients with traumatic spinal cord injury (TSCI) treated at a single institution, which represents the sole referral center and specialized SCI unit for a population of 4 million people. Summary of Background Data. Although many studies report on the epidemiology of TSCI, studies in which patients are prospectively characterized in the acute setting with precise recording of their baseline neurological impairment are uncommon. Methods. Data on all patients admitted to a level 1 trauma center with TSCI between 1995 and 2004 were prospectively collected using a customized, fully relational, locally designed, spine database. Results. The incidence of TSCI averaged 35.7 per million and did not change substantially during 10 years of data collection. However, the median age of TSCI patients increased from 34.5 to 45.5 years during this period. The men-to-women ratio was 4.4:1. In those older than 55 years, cervical-level injuries with incomplete American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA) Impairment Scale (AIS) scores C and D were most common, with men demonstrating predominantly lower cervical injuries and women more likely to exhibit upper cervical injuries. Increasing rates of surgical treatment during 10 years of this study (61.8%–86.4%) were not associated with improvements in mortality rate or length of hospital stay. Patients older than 75 years who presented with an acute TSCI had a mortality rate of 20% while in hospital. Conclusion. The incidence of TSCI in our population has remained remarkably stable, and age-related changes mirror those in the population across 10 years. An increased tendency to surgical treatment during the 10 years of this study has not resulted in concomitant changes in patients' in-hospital mortality or length of stay.
On the Release of von Willebrand Factor from Endothelial Cells after Venous Occlusion

(Perkin Elmer, Foster City, CA) using an ALF red automatic DNA sequencer (Pharmacia, Sweden). The distribution of genotypes of the three protein C promoter polymorphisms (T/C, A/G, and A/T) is shown in Table 1. Of the 27 possible genotypes, only 14 were observed. The TT/AA/AA genotype was the most frequent (53% of the 93 subjects), while the CC/GG/TT genotype was found in only 2 subjects (2%). In Caucasians, the former genotype was found in 28 (12%) of 240 subjects, while the latter was found in 40 subjects (17%) (1). The mean protein C level of those with the CC/GG/TT genotype was 23% lower than that of those with the TT/AA/AA genotype, and the risk of thrombotic disease was 1.6-1.9times higher in the former than in the latter. Thus, the higher frequency of TT/AA/AA and the lower frequency of CC/GG/TT in Japanese subjects compared with Caucasians might partly contribute to the much lower incidence of venous thrombotic diseases in Japanese, in addition to the absence of Leiden mutation of factor V in Japanese (5). Concerning arterial diseases, ischemic stroke, especially lacunar stroke associated with hypertension, is more frequent in Japanese, while ischemic heart disease is much less frequent, compared with Caucasians. The distribution of thrombomodulin in the cerebral artery was restricted compared with arteries of other organs. Thus, the CC/GG/TT genotype appears to be more frequent in the Japanese patients with ischemic stroke than in those without stroke. However, in the present study, there was no significant difference in the distribution of each polymorphism between the two groups (T/C: x = 3.81, p = 0.149; A/G: x = 2.07, p = 0.355; A/T: x = 2.05, p = 0.359). Thus, these polymorphisms of the protein C gene promoter region seems to have a less important influence on hypertensive cerebrovascular diseases in Japan. Kazuomi Kario, Rohit Kumar Pokharel, Satoshi Hoshide, Kazuyuki Shimada, Masafumi Matsuo From the Department of Cardiology, Jichi Medical School, Yakushiji, Minamikawachi, Kawachi, Tochigi, Japan, and the Division of Genetics, International Center for Medical Research, Kobe University School of Medicine, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan