Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
High-intensity interval training in an adolescent with cystic fibrosis: A physiological perspective

Nutritional, musculoskeletal, and/or ventilatory status can lead to a decreased exercise capacity in children with cystic fibrosis (CF). Exercise training is already part of the usual care; however, the “optimal” intensity and volume of exercise training to improve exercise capacity is still unknown. Six weeks of high-intensity interval training (HIT) for a patient with CF with a ventilatory limitation was evaluated by a cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET). Peak oxygen uptake and peak workload increased 19% and 16%, respectively, and there was a rise in peak ventilation from 50 L/min to 75 L/min, with an increase in both breathing depth and respiratory rate. A relative short period of HIT resulted in a significant increase in exercise capacity. In patients with CF, HIT might be an effective and efficient training regimen, especially in CF patients with a ventilatory limitation. Further research is necessary to investigate whether HIT is a better alternative than traditional aerobic training programs especially in ventilatory limited patients with CF.
Antibody to the E3 Glycoprotein Protects Mice against Lethal Venezuelan Equine Encephalitis Virus Infection

ABSTRACT Six monoclonal antibodies were isolated that exhibited specificity for a furin cleavage site deletion mutant (V3526) of Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus (VEEV). These antibodies comprise a single competition group and bound the E3 glycoprotein of VEEV subtype I viruses but failed to bind the E3 glycoprotein of other alphaviruses. These antibodies neutralized V3526 virus infectivity but did not neutralize the parental strain of Trinidad donkey (TrD) VEEV. However, the E3-specific antibodies did inhibit the production of virus from VEEV TrD-infected cells. In addition, passive immunization of mice demonstrated that antibody to the E3 glycoprotein provided protection against lethal VEEV TrD challenge. This is the first recognition of a protective epitope in the E3 glycoprotein. Furthermore, these results indicate that E3 plays a critical role late in the morphogenesis of progeny virus after E3 appears on the surfaces of infected cells.
Energy intake and micronutrient intake in elderly Europeans: seeking the minimum requirement in the SENECA study.

OBJECTIVE To examine energy intake of elderly people participating in the Survey in Europe on Nutrition and the Elderly, a Concerted Action (SENECA) study in relation to the adequacy of micronutrient intake. DESIGN Data from eight countries on 486 men and 519 women who were 74-79 years old. Dietary intakes of energy, iron, thiamine, riboflavin and pyridoxine were calculated. RESULTS There was inadequate intake of one or more nutrients in 23.9% of men and 46.8% of women. The prevalence of inadequate intakes decreased gradually with higher energy intakes. Of all people with energy intakes exceeding 1500 kcal, 19% of men and 26% of women still had an inadequate intake of at least one micronutrient. CONCLUSION We found no single criterion ensuring level of energy intake with an adequate micronutrient supply. The prevalence of an inadequate intake of micronutrients was high at all energy intake levels, especially in women.
Improving call bell response times.

AIM To explore and compare call bell response times in two wards in a geriatric evaluation and management facility before and after the introduction of a suite of interventions aimed at decreasing patient falls. METHOD Data on call bell response times were collected over two periods. The first were before implementation of falls prevention initiatives. Data were retrieved from the call bell system that detailed the time taken to respond to every call bell activation. A second period of data collection was conducted six months after implementation of the initiatives. RESULTS Prioritising call bell response and raising staff awareness improved response to patient calls. There was a slight decrease in falls although call bell activations did not decrease. CONCLUSION Strong leadership is necessary from nurse managers to stress the importance of prompt call bell response. Visual surveillance of high-risk fallers is important as they are generally unable to ring for assistance when required.
Cryogen-Free Cryostat for Low Temperature Hundred Pixel Array Detectors

Enhancement of detection efficiency of low temperature detectors (LTDs) is quite important for biomolecular mass spectrometry. One solution to realize efficient analysing tools is to produce large-scale array detectors. In this case the wiring configuration in cryostats gets much more complex. For the purpose of detecting macromolecules efficiently, we are developing spectrometer systems with 100 pixel array superconducting tunnel junction detectors (STJs), infrared-blocking filters, and cryogen-free cryostats. Considering thermal leakage and signal attenuation through signal wires at each stage of a cryostat, the optimal combination of wiring cables and infrared-blocking filters was determined. Furthermore, from the point of view of cryostat handling, an easy exchange of detectors and simple maintenance are necessary for practical use of the spectrometers. In this study, the configuration of a cryogen-free cryostat and its cooling performance is presented.
Extranodal natural killer/T-cell lymphoma, nasal type: A great pretender

Extranodal natural killer/T-cell lymphoma, nasal type (ENKTCL) is a rare Epstein–Barr virus associated lymphoma seen predominantly in Asian population with a 5 years survival rate ranging from 10% to 75% depending on the stage of presentation. In this case report, we describe an unusual presentation of ENKTCL, which in its early stages was clinically misdiagnosed as buccal space infection and later on histologically as inflammatory myofibroblastic pseudotumor owing to manifold reasons. Postoperative biopsy specimen showed characteristic feature of ENKTCL both histologically and immunophenotypically. This case report underlines the importance of adequate sampling and the unusual presentation of ENKTCL nasal type with oral manifestations.
EVOLUTION OF THE MAGNITUDE AND TIMING OF INBREEDING DEPRESSION IN PLANTS

Estimates of inbreeding depression obtained from the literature were used to evaluate the association between inbreeding depression and the degree of self‐fertilization in natural plant populations. Theoretical models predict that the magnitude of inbreeding depression will decrease with inbreeding as deleterious recessive alleles are expressed and purged through selection. If selection acts differentially among life history stages and deleterious effects are uncorrelated among stages, then the timing of inbreeding depression may also evolve with inbreeding. Estimates of cumulative inbreeding depression and stage‐specific inbreeding depression (four stages: seed production of parent, germination, juvenile survival, and growth/reproduction) were compiled for 79 populations (using means of replicates, N = 62) comprising 54 species from 23 families of vascular plants. Where available, data on the mating system also were collected and used as a measure of inbreeding history. A significant negative correlation was found between cumulative inbreeding depression and the primary selfing rate for the combined sample of angiosperms (N = 35) and gymnosperms (N = 9); the correlation was significant for angiosperms but not gymnosperms examined separately. The average inbreeding depression in predominantly selfing species (δ = 0.23) was significantly less (43%) than that in predominantly outcrossing species (δ = 0.53). These results support the theoretical prediction that selfing reduces the magnitude of inbreeding depression. Most self‐fertilizing species expressed the majority of their inbreeding depression late in the life cycle, at the stage of growth/reproduction (14 of 18 species), whereas outcrossing species expressed much of their inbreeding depression either early, at seed production (17 of 40 species), or late (19 species). For species with four life stages examined, selfing and outcrossing species differed in the magnitude of inbreeding depression at the stage of seed production (selfing δ = 0.05, N = 11; outcrossing δ = 0.32, N = 31), germination (selfing δ = 0.02, outcrossing δ = 0.12), and survival to reproduction (selfing δ = 0.04, outcrossing δ = 0.15), but not at growth and reproduction (selfing δ = 0.21, outcrossing δ = 0.27); inbreeding depression in selfers relative to outcrossers increased from early to late life stages. These results support the hypothesis that most early acting inbreeding depression is due to recessive lethals and can be purged through inbreeding, whereas much of the late‐acting inbreeding depression is due to weakly deleterious mutations and is very difficult to purge, even under extreme inbreeding.
Stimulation of Prostacyclin Synthesis by Physical Exercise in Type I Diabetes

We examined the effect of short- and long-term exercise on prostacyclin (prostaglandin l2 [PGI2]) and thromboxane A2 (TXA2) synthesis in type I (insulindependent) diabetic patients and healthy control subjects. PGI2 synthesis was assessed by determining the urinary excretion of 6-keto-PGF1α and 2,3-dinor-6-keto- PGF1α and TX synthesis by measuring TXB2 in serum and urine. In the resting state, prostanoid excretion and concentrations were similar in diabetic and control subjects. During 40 min of ergometric cycling exercise, the urinary excretion of 6-keto-PGF1α (a hydration product of vasodilatory PGI2) increased 5.8-fold more in the 12 control subjects than in the 15 diabetic patients (P < .02). Serum TXB2 concentration rose similarly in diabetic patients and control subjects (P < .05). During a 75-km competitive cross-country ski race (7 h, 30 min), urinary excretion of 6-keto-PGF1α rose 1.9-fold in 7 diabetic (P < .05) and 3.3-fold in 10 control (P < .001) subjects, whereas urinary dinor excretion, reflecting vascular PGI2 synthesis more closely, increased only in the control subjects (P < .01). Urinary TXB2 excretion remained unchanged in both groups during long-term exercise. These data suggest that diabetic patients have normal PGI2 and TXA2 synthesis in the resting state but diminished PGI2 response to both acute and prolonged exercise.
Which distance-decay function for migration and which one for commuting? A case study of Slovenia

The volume of social interactions like migration and commuting between two locations depends significantly on the distance between them. In the paper, we analysed the shape and parameters of several distance-decay functions for commuting and for migration flows, respectively. The analysis was performed for inter-municipal interactions in Slovenia in 2010–2011. The functions considered were power, exponential, normal, square root exponential, hyperbolic, power-exponential, and normalized power-exponential distance-decay functions. Distance was considered in three ways: as the Euclidean distance, as the shortest road distance, and as the fastest road distance between municipal centres under consideration. The analysis was performed for the whole set of interactions in the state, as well as for interactions to specific urban centres. We demonstrate that the power-exponential distance-decay function fits best for all analysed cases. The determination coefficients for this type of function are low when analysing all data together, but they increase significantly when distance-decay functions are modelled for urban centres at different levels of consideration.
Modulating Expanded Polytetrafluoroethylene Vascular Graft Host Response via Citric Acid‐Based Biodegradable Elastomers

Atherosclerotic vascular disease, in the form of coronary artery and peripheral vascular disease, remains the leading cause of mortality in the United States. [1] For many patients, suitable vein autografts are not available. [2] Synthetic grafts made from Dacron (polyethylene terephthalate) or expanded polytetrafluoroethylene (ePTFE) are mostly used in large-diameter (>6 mm inner diameter) blood-vessel applications. However, their use in small-diameter blood vessels has been fraught with poor patency due to early graft occlusion from thrombosis. [3,4] Surface-modification protocols mostly target ePTFE vascular grafts, the current standard-of-care, as their innate surface is thrombogenic and their intrinsic hydrophobicity can limit endothelium formation. [3,5–8] Modifications to improve the thromboresistance of the graft have focused on the coating or immobilization of biomacromolecules or nondegradable polymers to promote endothelialization of the graft’s lumen. [6,9–19] However, concerns regarding changes to the graft’s compliance, host responses to the coating material, transmission of pathogens, high costs, and long-term patency still remain. [3,20] To date, no one has investigated the use of synthetic biodegradable polymers as a means to tissue-engineer a functional endothelium on ePTFE grafts. We demonstrate that the biodegradable elastomer poly(1,8-octanediol citrate) (POC) can confer improved biocompatibility characteristics on ePTFE vascular grafts without affecting graft compliance. The approach ultimately aims to improve early thromboresistance and perhaps inhibit neointimal hyperplasia by promoting POC-mediated mechanical interlocking be
Concept of optimisation of the radiation protection system in the nuclear sector: management of individual cancer risks and providing targeted health care

The paper discusses the provision of targeted health care to nuclear workers in Russia based on radiation-epidemiological estimates of cancer risks. Cancer incidence rates are analysed for the workers of the Institute of Physical Power Engineering (the first nuclear installation in the world) who were subjected to individual dosimetric monitoring from 1950 to 2002. The value of excess relative risk for solid cancers was found to be ERR Gy−1 = 0.24 (95% CI: −4.22; 7.96). It has been shown that 81.8% of the persons covered by individual dosimetric monitoring have potential attributive risk up to 5%, and the risk is more than 10% for 3.7% of the workers. Among the detected cancer cases, 73.5% of the individuals show an attributive risk up to 5% and the risk is in excess of 10% for 3.9% of the workers. Principles for the provision of targeted health care, given voluntary health insurance, are outlined.
Scene Segmentation Using Polarisation Information

This thesis draws its hypothesis from the quantitative description of reflection and refraction of light at interfaces, given by the Fresnel theory. According to the theory, initially unpolarised light is partially polarised upon reflection from a smooth dielectric surface. Hence, variations in the polarisation properties of reflected and scattered light must indicate a change in properties of the reflecting surface. Assuming internal changes in refractive index can be neglected, any substantial change in the polarisation of light is thus indicative of a change in the material remitting the light. The contribution of this thesis is to develop a method for image segmentation based on surface material characteristics. The novel aspects of the method are the expression of intensity distribution as a function of the surface zenith and azimuth angles, and the expansion of this function using spherical harmonics to estimate surface characteristics. The method begins with estimating shape from polarisation using the work of Atkinson and Hancock. The surface normals obtained are used in combination with pixel intensities to form a three dimensional function that describes intensity changes in the image. This function is then expanded as a harmonic series and the constants of the expansion are used as features to characterize image regions and to segment the image based on the hypothesis. Experimental evidence is presented through analysis of polarisation images and segmentation of images of different objects.
On the Merits of Bicircular Polarization for Stereo Color TV

A 3-D viewing system based on bicircular polarization for channelizing the stereo pair of images to discern the 3-D color image from conventional 2-D color picture tube screens is proposed. Suitable 3-D color TV system compatible to the conventional 2-D color TV standards and equipments is described for generating bicircularly polarized optical images. This viewing system unlike the orthogonally plane polarized ones does not restrict the head movements of the viewer while seeing the picture tube for 3-D perception. The supremacy of bicircular polarization over orthogonal polarization is proved analytically.
Multi-class image segmentation via convex and biconvex optimization

This thesis is divided into two parts. Both cope with multi-class image segmentation and utilize non-smooth optimization algorithms. The topic of the first part, namely unsupervised segmentation, is the application of clustering to image pixels. Therefore, we start with an introduction of the biconvex center-based clustering algorithms c-means and fuzzy c-means, where c denotes the number of classes. We show that fuzzy c-means can be seen as an approximation of c-means in terms of power means. Since noise is omnipresent in our image data, these simple clustering models are not suitable for its segmentation. To this end, we introduce a general and finite dimensional segmentation model that consists of a data term stemming from the aforementioned clustering models plus a continuous regularization term. We tackle this optimization model via an alternating minimiza- tion approach called regularized c-centers (RcC). Thereby, we fix the centers and optimize the segment membership of the pixels and vice versa. In this general setting, we prove convergence in the sense of set-valued algorithms using Zangwill’s Theory [172]. Further, we present a segmentation model with a total variation regularizer. While updating the cluster centers is straightforward for fixed segment memberships of the pixels, updating the segment membership can be solved iteratively via non-smooth, convex optimization. Thereby, we do not iterate a convex optimization algorithm until convergence. Instead, we stop as soon as we have a certain amount of decrease in the objective functional to increase the efficiency. This algorithm is a particular implementation of RcC providing also the corresponding convergence theory. Moreover, we show the good performance of our method in various examples such as simulated 2d images of brain tissue and 3d volumes of two materials, namely a multi-filament composite superconductor and a carbon fiber reinforced silicon carbide ceramics. Thereby, we exploit the property of the latter material that two components have no common boundary in our adapted model. The second part of the thesis is concerned with supervised segmentation. We leave the area of center based models and investigate convex approaches related to graph p-Laplacians and reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces (RKHSs). We study the effect of different weights used to construct the graph. In practical experiments we show on the one hand image types that are better segmented by the p-Laplacian model and on the other hand images that are better segmented by the RKHS-based approach. This is due to the fact that the p-Laplacian approach provides smoother results, while the RKHS approach provides often more accurate and detailed segmentations. Finally, we propose a novel combination of both approaches to benefit from the advantages of both models and study the performance on challenging medical image data.
The inhibition of human pathogens: Trichophyton rubrum and Trichoderma harzianum by a natural product

Problem statement: A number of studies have recently conducted to identify novel and potent antifungal components from natural products. One of the reasons is to overcome the antifungal resistant developed against most of commercially available drugs. Studies confirmed that mung beans have increased phenolic compounds and enhanced defenses during germination. Approach: We hypothesized that antifungal activities might be found in sprouts of mung beans, or Vigna radiate (L.) R. Wilczek. The screening method was conducted using disc diffusion assay against 12 fungi. It was followed by the evaluation of the minimum inhibitory concentration and the minimum fungicidal concentration. Results: The screening results revealed a potential antifungal activity by mung bean sprout extract against 2 out of 12 fungi including remarkable antifungal activity against human fungal pathogens, Trichophyton rubrum and Trichoderma harzianum. The potential antifungal activity of mung bean sprout reflects effective quality/quantity of polyphenolic compounds present after bean germination. Conclusion/Recommendations: This unprecedented study showed that mung bean sprout extract is a potential source for novel antifungal compound (s) that is inexpensive and readily available at a large scale for pharmaceutical companies.
Quality of Service Enhancement via compression technique for congested low bandwidth network

Achieving the required Quality of Service (QoS) is an important requirement in a communication network. In recent years, VSAT technology has become one of the popular means to interconnect with people around the world. However, VSAT satellite network has high latency constraint and provides low and limited bandwidth. These limitations caused network congestion when the bandwidth-intensive real-time interactive applications are running over the low bandwidth link. High packet drop incurred by the network congestion leads to degradation of the QoS of the communication link. Therefore, this paper proposes a real-time adaptive packet compression scheme especially for a congested low bandwidth network. This scheme is intended to further enhance the QoS of the low bandwidth network and improve the user experience. Simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed scheme in enhancing the QoS of the congested low bandwidth network.
Breast Density Classification Using Multiple Feature Selection

Mammography as an x-ray method usually gives good results for lower density breasts while higher breast tissue densities significantly reduce the overall detection sensitivity and can lead to false negative results. In automatic detection algorithms knowledge about breast density can be useful for setting an appropriate decision threshold in order to produce more accurate detection. Because the overall intensity of mammograms is not directly correlated with the breast density we have decided to observe breast density as a texture classification problem. In this paper we propose breast density classification using feature selection process for different classifiers based on grayscale features of first and second order. In feature selection process different selection methods were used and obtained results show the improvement on overall classification by choosing the appropriate method and classifier. The classification accuracy has been tested on the mini-MIAS database and KBD-FER digital mammography database with different number of categories for each database. Obtained accuracy stretches between 97.2 % and 76.4 % for different number of categories.