Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A 24-week, randomized, double-blind study of donepezil in moderate to severe Alzheimer’s disease

Objective: To investigate the efficacy and safety of donepezil in patients with moderate to severe AD (standardized Mini-Mental State Examination [sMMSE] scores of 5 to 17; Functional Assessment Staging score ≤6 at baseline). Methods: Two-hundred ninety patients were randomized to treatment in this 24-week, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Patients received either donepezil 5 mg/day for the first 28 days and 10 mg/day thereafter as per the clinician’s judgment (n = 144) or placebo (n = 146). The primary outcome measure was the Clinician’s Interview-Based Impression of Change with caregiver input (CIBIC+). Results: Patients’ mean age was 73.6 years (range 48 to 92 years). Baseline demographics were similar between the treatment groups. Least squares (LS) mean ± SE sMMSE scores at baseline were 11.7 ± 0.35 for the donepezil group and 12.0 ± 0.34 for the placebo group. Patients receiving donepezil showed benefits on the CIBIC+, compared with placebo, at all visits up to week 24 (p < 0.001) and at week 24 last observation carried forward (LOCF) (p < 0.0001). All other secondary measures (including sMMSE, Severe Impairment Battery, Disability Assessment for Dementia, Functional Rating Scale, and Neuropsychiatric Inventory) showed significant differences between the groups in favor of donepezil at week 24 LOCF. Eighty-four percent of donepezil- and 86% of placebo-treated patients completed the trial. Adverse events (AE) were experienced by 83% of donepezil- and 80% of placebo-treated patients, the majority of which were rated mild in severity; 8% of donepezil- and 6% of placebo-treated patients discontinued because of AE. Laboratory and vital sign abnormalities were similar between the treatment groups. Conclusion: These data suggest that donepezil’s benefits extend into more advanced stages of AD than those previously investigated, with very good tolerability.
Two-dimensional metal-organic frameworks with blue luminescence.

Three new isostructural two-dimensional metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), [M(bpydc)(H(2)O). H(2)O](n) where M = Zn (1); Co (2); Ni (3) and the bpydc is 2,2'-bipyridine-5,5'-dicarboxylate), were prepared by various methods such as hydrothermal, ultrasonic and microwave-assisted synthetic methods. Microcrystalline could be obtained by using ultrasonification or microwave irradiation in a short time. Their solid-state structures were revealed by X-ray crystallography. The coordination environment of the metal ions is distorted octahedral geometry. The metal ions are coordinated by two nitrogen atoms from the bipyridyl moiety, two oxygen atoms from one carboxylate in a bidentate manner, one oxygen atom from another carboxylate in a monodentate manner, and one oxygen atom from the aqua ligand. The multiple coordination modes of the bpydc ligand led to a novel topologically interesting two-dimensional sheet structure; a 6-connected uninodal net with Schläfli symbol of 3(3). 4(4). 5(5). 6(2). 7. Thermal and luminescence properties of the three MOFs were also investigated. The weight maintained constant in the range 290-342 degrees C for 1, 250-470 degrees C for 2, and 275-470 degrees C for 3 after the initial weight loss related to the dehydration steps. In particular, [Zn(bpydc)(H(2)O). H(2)O](n) (1) displays strong solid state blue luminescence.
Rethinking Clinical Language Mapping Approaches: Discordant Receptive and Expressive Hemispheric Language Dominance in Epilepsy Surgery Candidates

Summary: Neuroimaging studies have shed light on cortical language organization, with findings implicating the left and right temporal lobes in speech processing converging to a left-dominant pattern. Findings highlight the fact that the state of theoretical language knowledge is ahead of current clinical language mapping methods, motivating a rethinking of these approaches. The authors used magnetoencephalography and multiple tasks in seven candidates for resective epilepsy surgery to investigate language organization. The authors scanned 12 control subjects to investigate the time course of bilateral receptive speech processes. Laterality indices were calculated for left and right hemisphere late fields ∼150 to 400 milliseconds. The authors report that (1) in healthy adults, speech processes activated superior temporal regions bilaterally converging to a left-dominant pattern, (2) in four of six patients, this was reversed, with bilateral processing converging to a right-dominant pattern, and (3) in three of four of these patients, receptive and expressive language processes were laterally discordant. Results provide evidence that receptive and expressive language may have divergent hemispheric dominance. Right-sided receptive language dominance in epilepsy patients emphasizes the need to assess both receptive and expressive language. Findings indicate that it is critical to use multiple tasks tapping separable aspects of language function to provide sensitive and specific estimates of language localization in surgical patients.
Some Thoughts about Feelings: A Study of the Role of Cognition and Emotion in Polygraph Testing

This manuscript is offered as a follow up to the work of Khan, Nelson and Handler (2009) that discussed emotion in psychophysiological detection of deception (PDD) testing. Our intent is to offer the interested reader a more in-depth discussion of the “cognitive appraisal theories” of emotion (Scherer, 2001) in hope of generating thought, debate and research. Our work here focuses on emotion, with the goal of expanding our profession’s knowledge, vocabulary and appreciation of this complex concept. We suggest that emotional states, along with cognition and behavioral learning, work synergistically to create or produce measurable responses to stimulus questions during PDD testing. We further suggest that our subjects appraise or evaluate the test questions against some type of goal that is at stake, and that these appraisals serve a mediating function for valence and salience of emotional and physiological response. We will offer descriptions of how these appraisals intertwine and connect in the moment, or result from a reinstatement of a previous evaluated conflict. Our paper scaffolds on the Khan et al. (2009) work by integrating the writings of many modern emotional researchers whose works are listed in the reference section. Describing versus defining emotion We find ourselves at a loss for locating a universally accepted definition of the word emotion. One reason for this is that definitions are generally used to describe tangible things or processes that can be observed. They do not include the need to describe systems before being able to describe what those systems do, as in the case of emotion. We will provide a basic concept of the constituent parts of an emotion, and then attempt to construct an explanation of emotion from that foundation. This description will be an amalgamation of the writings of several psychologists in the area of emotion research (Averil, 1994; Barlow, 2002; Bradley & Lang,
Using explicit reservations to arbitrate access to a metropolitan system of slotted interconnected rings combining TDMA and WDMA

A system of slotted interconnected wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM) rings controlled by a medium access control (MAC) protocol is shown to offer very high utilization within a queuing delay less than a few round-trip times, by means of a very-fast-reacting explicit reservation mechanism. The system can be used to provide interconnectivity in a metropolitan area transferring optical payloads on-the-fly without buffering or converting from the optical domain. All necessary control information is transferred on a dedicated wavelength and is processed in the electrical domain to provide both collision-free packet access at the ring nodes and contention resolution at the hub interconnecting the rings. The end result is a flexible and efficient metropolitan network suitable for bursty data services.
Discrete Fourier Transform of the signals recovered by using high-performance Event Timers

Approaches to representing in the frequency domain signals, reconstructed by using picosecond resolution Event Timers after compressive transmission of them, are investigated. The focus is on achieving high precision at complexity-reduced estimation of Fourier coefficients performed by using rectangular basis functions instead of sinusoidal. The factors leading to errors, degrading this type of Discrete Fourier Transform and limiting the frequency range of the input signal, are revealed. Developed two approaches to significant suppressing this type of errors are discussed.
Detection of KPC Carbapenem-Hydrolyzing Enzymes in Enterobacter spp. from Brooklyn, New York

ABSTRACT Enterobacter spp. are rarely resistant to carbapenems. In this report, one Enterobacter sp. isolate possessed blaKPC-3 and two possessed blaKPC-2. For all three strains, the imipenem MICs were dependent on the inoculum and testing method; two were reported by the clinical laboratories to be carbapenem susceptible. Improved detection methods will be necessary to identify these enzymes.
An improved affine projection algorithm and its application in echo cancellation

Based on the variable step-size afïîne projection algorithm, the idea of multiple forgetting factors and variable projection order is proposed. On the one hand, the accurate estimation of error energy is realized in order to achieve faster convergence rate and lower final misalignment. On the other hand, the reduction of computational complexity can be achieved. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm achieves significant improvement in the convergence rate, misalignment and computational complexity compared with variable step-size affine projection algorithm, variable projection order affine projection algorithm and variable step-size and rojection order affine projection algorithm without multiple forgetting factors.
Sugarcane leaf disease detection and severity estimation based on segmented spots image

About 15% of sugarcane leaf is defective because of diseases, it reduces the quantity and quality of sugarcane production significantly. Early detection and estimation of plant disease is a way to control these diseases and minimize the severe infection. This paper proposes a model to identify the severity of certain spot disease which appear on leaves based on segmented spot. The segmented spot is obtained by thresholding a* component of L*a*b* color space. Diseases spots are extracted with maximum standard deviation of segmented spot that use for detection the type of disease using classification techniques. The classifier is a Support Vector Machine (SVM) which uses L*a*b* color space for its color features and Gray Level Co-Occurrence Matrix (GLCM) as its texture features. This proposed model capable to determine the types of spot diseases with accuracy of 80% and 5.73 error severity estimation average.
Central venous catheter-related blood stream infections: incidence, risk factors, outcome, and associated pathogens.

OBJECTIVE To determine the incidence, risk factors, outcome, and pathogens of central venous catheter-related bloodstream infections (CVC-BSIs). DESIGN Prospective study. SETTING Escorts Heart Institute and Research Centre, New Delhi, India. PARTICIPANTS One thousand three hundred fourteen consecutive patients undergoing cardiac operations who were admitted to the intensive care unit with CVC. INTERVENTIONS All patients were assigned into CVC-BSI (n = 35) and non-CVC-BSI (n = 1,279) groups. MEASUREMENT AND MAIN RESULTS Of the 1,314 patients in the study, 35 (2.6%) had CVC-BSI. On univariate analysis, significant risk factors were use of multilumen catheters, coexistent infections, intra-aortic balloon counterpulsation (IABC), total ventilation hours, emergency surgery, acute physiology, age, chronic health evaluation score (APACHE II), and steroids. On multivariate analysis, duration of catheterization (24.5 +/- 10.9 v 6.1 +/- 3.2; p < 0.001), coexistent infections (57.11% v 2.61%; p < 0.001), IABC (77.1% v 4.1%; p = 0.005), and temperature (38.2 +/- 0.6 v 37.4 +/- 0.3; p < 0.001) were independent predictors of CVC-BSI. Pathogens isolated were Escherichia coli (47%), Acinetobacter species (11.7%), Enterobacter species (5.8%), Proteus species (5.8%), methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus species (11.7%), coagulase-negative Staphylococcus species (5.8%), and Candida (11.7%). The mortality rate in CVC-BSI was 22.9% as compared with 0.2% in non-CVC-BSI cases (p < 0.001). CONCLUSION By univariate analysis, the risk factors for CVC-BSI were use of multilumen catheters, duration of catheterization, total ventilation hours, IABC, emergency surgery, APACHE II score, coexistent infections, and steroids. On multivariate analysis, duration of catheterization, IABC, coexistent infections, and temperature were independent predictors of CVC-BSI. The mortality was increased with CVC-BSI.
Sequential Fault Modeling and Test Pattern Generation for CMOS Iterative Logic Arrays

Iterative Logic Arrays (ILAs) are widely used in the datapath parts of digital circuits, like general purpose microprocessors, embedded processors, and digital signal processors. Testing strategies based on more comprehensive fault models than the traditional combinational fault models have become an imperative need in CMOS technology. In this paper, first, we introduce a comprehensive, cell-level, sequential fault model suitable for ILAs, termed Realistic Sequential Cell Fault Model (RS-CFM). RS-CFM drastically reduces test complexity compared to exhaustive two-pattern testing proposed so far in the literature for sequential ILA testing, without sacrificing test quality. In addition, it favors robustness of sequential test sets both at the cell and the array levels. Second, a new Automatic Test Pattern Generator (ILA-ATPG) based on RS-CFM for the case of one-dimensional ILAs is presented. ILA-ATPG can handle all classes of one-dimensional ILAs: unilateral or bilateral ILAs, with or without vertical inputs/outputs. Based on a graph model, ILA-ATPG explores the C-testability and linear-testability of the ILA under test and resolves the test invalidation problem constructing robust test sequences. The efficiency of ILA-ATPG is demonstrated through a comprehensive set of experimental results over all classes of one-dimensional ILAs, including all practical one-dimensional ILAs, as well as a number of more complex benchmarks.
Distribution of AAV2-hAADC-transduced cells after 3 years in Parkinsonian monkeys

The present report describes for the first time, the stability of recombinant adeno-associated virus serotype 2 (AAV2) human aromatic L-amino acid decarboxylase (hAADC) gene transfer after 3-year survival time in a non-human primate model of Parkinson's disease. 1-Methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine-lesioned monkeys were treated with six injections of 30 μl/site of AAV2-hAADC at a concentration of 2×1012 vg/ml into the caudate and putamen. Stereological analysis revealed a 46.6% increase in the total number of AAV2-hAADC-transduced cells in the striatum between 8 weeks and 3 years after gene transfer survival time. In the 8-week animals, the distribution of the AADC+ cells was dispersed and heterogeneous, whereas in the 3-year animals it was widespread and homogenous. Confocal analysis demonstrated that approximately 85% of the AADC+ cells were neuronal nuclei immunoreactive.
Cryopreservation of red blood cell units with a modified method of glycerolization and deglycerolization with the ACP 215 device complies with American and European requirements

Abstract Current red blood cell (RBC) glycerolization with the ACP 215 device is followed by volume reduction of the glycerolized RBCs before freezing. We investigated a modified method of glycerolization and deglycerolization which eliminates the final centrifugation step that reduces glycerolized RBC supernatant. A total of 37 RBC units collected from healthy volunteers were analyzed. After removal of the supernatant, RBCs were glycerolized using the high glycerol method and stored at –80°C. After deglycerolization, RBCs were preserved with either SAG-M or AS3 and stored for at least 10 or 14 days, respectively. Quality of stored RBCs was assessed by measuring osmolarity, blood cell counts, free hemoglobin, adenosine triphosphate (ATP), hemolysis, and glucose. The overall RBC mass recovery after deglycerolization was 86 ± 7.6 percent, and the osmolarity was 336 ± 23 mOsml/kg H2O. The hemolysis for stored components at the end of their shelf life was 0.21 ± 0.08 percent for AS3-preserved RBCs and 0.25 ± 0.08 percent for RBCs preserved with SAG-M. On expiration, 32 percent of initial ATP values were measured in AS3-preserved RBCs vs. 62 percent in SAG-M–preserved RBCs. This modified method of glycerolization and deglycerolization meets the quality requirements of the European Council and the AABB standards. The prolonged storage of thawed RBCs enables optimized transfusion management for patients with rare blood groups. Immunohematology2012;28:67–73.
Unwarranted Optimism in Media Portrayals of Genetic Research on Addiction Overshadows Critical Ethical and Social Concerns

The cost of addiction in the United States, in combination with a host of new tools and techniques, has fueled an explosion of genetic research on addiction. Because the media has the capacity to reflect and influence public perception, there is a need to examine how treatments and preventive approaches projected to emerge from addiction genetic research are presented to the public. The authors conducted a textual analysis of 145 news articles reporting on genetic research on addiction from popular print media in the United States and from popular news and medical internet sites. In articles that report on prevention, the media emphasize vaccine development and identifying individuals at genetic risk through population screening. Articles that emphasize treatment often promote current pharmaceutical solutions and highlight the possibility of tailoring treatments to specific genetic variants. The authors raise concerns about the tendency of this coverage to focus on the benefits of pharmaceutical treatments and genetic-based approaches to prevention while neglecting or downplaying potential risks and ethical issues. This analysis suggests a need for more balanced, evidence-based media reporting on the potential outcomes of genetic research.
Role of beta-turn in proteolytic processing of peptide hormone precursors at dibasic sites.

Proteolytic activation of prohormones and proproteins occurs most frequently at the level of basic amino acids arranged in doublets. Previous predictions by Rholam et al. [Rholam, M. , Nicolas, P., & Cohen, P. (1986) FEBS Lett. 207. 1-6] have indicated, on the basis of 20 prohormone sequences containing 53 dibasic potential processing sites, that dibasic sites situated in, or next to, beta-turns were cleaved in vivo, whereas sites included in ordered structures like beta-sheets or alpha-helices were not. We have used peptide analogs of the proocytocin/neurophysin processing domain and a purified preparation of the putative proocytocin convertase from bovine tissues as a model to demonstrate that (1) processing at dibasic sites is associated with a prohormone sequence organized in a beta-turn structure; (2) the beta-turn is an interchangeable motif since the original sequence could be replaced by an heterologous one possessing the ability to organize as a beta-turn; and (3) this particular secondary structure participates in the catalytic reaction, most likely by favoring the interactions of the substrate with the processing endoprotease. It is concluded that, in addition to the dibasic and other amino acids around the cleavage loci, the beta-turn constitutes a key feature in the proteolytic processing reaction in participating as the favorable conformation for optimal substrate-enzyme active site recognition.
The Effect of Intravenous Metformin on Glucose Metabolism During Hyperglycaemia in Type 2 Diabetes

A stepped intravenous metformin infusion was used in conjunction with the hyperglycaemic clamp technique to study the dose‐response relationship of plasma metformin concentration with hepatic glucose production and peripheral glucose disposal in nine patients with Type 2 diabetes. The study was of double‐blind crossover design, using NaCl infusion as control. Plasma metformin concentrations spanning the therapeutic range (1.64 ± 0.13 mg I−1 and 6.57 ± 0.61 mg I−1) were achieved. No differences in peripheral glucose disposal were demonstrated when compared with NaCl infusion (3.4 ± 0.1 vs 3.6 ± 0.2 (±SE) mg kg−1 min−1 and 3.4 ± 0.2 vs 3.3 ± 0.2 mg kg−1 min−1, respectively). There was also no difference in basal hepatic glucose production during metformin and NaCl infusion (2.7 ± 0.3 vs 2.8 ± 0.2 mg kg−1 min−1). No acute effect of metformin on hepatic glucose production or peripheral glucose disposal was observed, implying that a chronic persistent effect is more important in these respects than immediate effects consequent upon changes in plasma drug level.
Cloning of the glutamine synthetase gene from group B streptococci

The glnA gene from the human pathogen Streptococcus agalactiae was cloned from a genomic library prepared with the lambda phage vector lambdaDASHII. A 4.6-kb DNA fragment of one of the recombinant phages was subcloned in pUC18. This Escherichia coli clone expressed a 52-kDa protein encoded by a 1,341-bp open reading frame. The nucleotide sequence of the open reading frame and the deduced amino acid sequence shared a significant degree of homology with the sequences of other glutamine synthetases (GS). The highest homology was between our deduced protein and GS of gram-positive bacteria such as Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus cereus, and Staphylococcus aureus. Plasmids with the cloned streptococcal glnA were able to complement E. coli glnA mutants grown on minimal media. Rabbit antisera to streptococcal GS recombinant protein recognized not only the recombinant protein but also a similar-sized band in mutanolysin extracts of all group B streptococcal strains tested, regardless of polysaccharide type or surface protein profile. The amino acid sequence of the deduced protein had similarities to other streptococcal cell-surface-bound proteins. The possible functional role of the immunological features of streptococcal GS is discussed.