Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Microfluidic Devices for Blood Fractionation

Abstract: Blood, a complex biological fluid, comprises 45% cellular components suspended in protein rich plasma. These different hematologic components perform distinct functions in vivo and thus the ability to efficiently fractionate blood into its individual components has innumerable applications in both clinical diagnosis and biological research. Yet, processing blood is not trivial. In the past decade, a flurry of new microfluidic based technologies has emerged to address this compelling problem. Microfluidics is an attractive solution for this application leveraging its numerous advantages to process clinical blood samples. This paper reviews the various microfluidic approaches realized to successfully fractionate one or more blood components. Techniques to separate plasma from hematologic cellular components as well as isolating blood cells of interest including certain rare cells are discussed. Comparisons based on common separation metrics including efficiency (sensitivity), purity (selectivity), and
The Perils-And Prospects-Of Public Administration

Every discipline periodically goes through a period of sometimes wrenching reassessment. For public administration, this reassessment has been nearly constant. Americans have always been distrustful of governmental power and, especially, administrative power. They have long believed that public administration is more inefficient and corrupt than private administration. Woodrow Wilson's memorable call to study the importance of running a constitution shows how, even in its earliest days, the modem study of American public administration has struggled for acceptance.
26G endo-siRNAs regulate spermatogenic and zygotic gene expression in Caenorhabditis elegans

Endogenous small interfering RNAs (endo-siRNAs) regulate diverse gene expression programs in eukaryotes by either binding and cleaving mRNA targets or mediating heterochromatin formation; however, the mechanisms of endo-siRNA biogenesis, sorting, and target regulation remain poorly understood. Here we report the identification and function of a specific class of germline-generated endo-siRNAs in Caenorhabditis elegans that are 26 nt in length and contain a guanine at the first nucleotide position (i.e., 26G RNAs). 26G RNAs regulate gene expression during spermatogenesis and zygotic development, and their biogenesis requires the ERI-1 exonuclease and the RRF-3 RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRP). Remarkably, we identified two nonoverlapping subclasses of 26G RNAs that sort into specific RNA-induced silencing complexes (RISCs) and differentially regulate distinct mRNA targets. Class I 26G RNAs target genes are expressed during spermatogenesis, whereas class II 26G RNAs are maternally inherited and silence gene expression during zygotic development. These findings implicate a class of endo-siRNAs in the global regulation of transcriptional programs required for fertility and development.
[Surveillance of antimicrobial susceptibility of Escherichia coli producing urinary tract infections in Galicia (Spain)].

OBJECTIVE Escherichia coli is the microorganism responsible for most of the community-acquired urinary tract infections (UTI). Our purpose was to determine the susceptibility of E. coli associated with UTI in Galicia and consider the most appropriate antibiotics for empirical treatment. METHODS Retrospective study during the period 2011- 2012 of the isolation of E. coli in urine samples from almost all the Galician population. Demographic variables, minimum inhibitory concentration, and reading data were collected: amoxicillin-clavulanate, cefotaxime, gentamicin, amikacin, ciprofloxacin, cotrimoxazole, nitrofurantoin and fosfomycin. The identification and susceptibility studies were mainly conducted by automated systems. The interpretation of the results was performed according to CLSI criteria. RESULTS During the study period 55,046 E. coli were isolated in UTI. The percentages of resistance were: cotrimoxazole, 30%; ciprofloxacin, 33%; amoxicillin-clavulanate, 23% and 10% for 3rd generation cephalosporins. Fosfomycin and nitrofurantoin showed the highest activity with more than 96% of susceptibility in our study. The linear trend of resistance regarding age was statistically significant (p <0.0001) as it was regarding males (p <0.00001) for all antibiotics. CONCLUSIONS In Galicia, the most active antibiotics against E. coli associated with UTI are fosfomycin and nitrofurantoin so they should be considered as empirical treatment of choice by the community-acquired UTI not complicated by E. coli.
Design and implementation of a patterns recognition system for analysis of biological liquids

Given the great amount of data that are generated of the experiments that are made to analyze information of the extracted chemical fluids from the brain of a rodent, arises the necessity to design and to implement data mining systems to process this data. In this work is proposed a Fuzzy System for the Analysis of Biological Liquids (FSABL) that allows to analyze and to process the data, and this way, to know a series of disorders products of alterations, storage, and liberation of the Neurotransmitters. The FSABL is constructed under the paradigm of the Classifier Systems. Our system has been tested to determine the variation of the glutamate Neurotransmitter in the cerebral tonsil of the rats. It discovers and evaluates new rules, and it generates new solutions associated to clinical disorders.
Immunobiology and Conflicting Roles of the Human NKG2D Lymphocyte Receptor and Its Ligands in Cancer

Cancers adopt diverse strategies to safeguard their survival, which often involve blinding or incapacitating the immune response, thereby gaining battleground advantage against the host. In immune responses against cancer, an important stimulatory lymphocyte receptor is NKG2D because the tumor-associated expression of its ligands promotes destruction of malignant cells. However, with advanced human cancers profound changes unfold wherein NKG2D and its ligands are targeted or exploited for immune evasion and suppression. This negative imprinting on the immune system may be accompanied by another functional state wherein cancer cells coopt expression of NKG2D to complement the presence of its ligands for self-stimulation of tumor growth and presumably malignant progression. This review emphasizes these conflicting functional dynamics at the immunity–cancer biology interface in humans, within an overview of the immunobiology of NKG2D and mechanisms underlying the regulation of its ligands in cancer, with reference to instructive clinical observations and translational approaches.
Research on the improvement of Rao-Blackwellized particle filter for the incremental environment mapping and self-localization of a mobile robot

Aimed at the problem of the incremental environment mapping and self-localization of a mobile robot, the Rao-Blackwellized particle filter (RBPF) algorithm is improved to get the unite estimation of the pose of mobile robot and the position of the environmental landmarks. There are two parts in the RBPF algorithm to be studied. One is that the pose estimation of mobile robot is mended by adapting the resampling process grounded on the effective sample size (ESS) and by adopting mixture Gaussian distribution to approximate proposal distribution so as to improve the sample weight computation in obtaining ESS. The other is that the unscented Kalman filter with the adaptation estimation for the process noise is introduced into the position evaluation of the environmental landmarks. With mobile robot MORCS-1 as experimental platform, the validity of the proposed algorithm in this paper is proved.
Role of the two type II myosins, Myo2 and Myp2, in cytokinetic actomyosin ring formation and function in fission yeast.

The formation and contraction of a cytokinetic actomyosin ring (CAR) is essential for the execution of cytokinesis in fission yeast. Unlike most organisms in which its composition has been investigated, the fission yeast CAR contains two type II myosins encoded by the genes myo2(+) and myp2(+). myo2(+) is an essential gene whilst myp2(+) is dispensable under normal growth conditions. Myo2 is hence the major contractile protein of the CAR whilst Myp2 plays a more subtle and, as yet, incompletely documented role. Using a fission yeast strain in which the chromosomal copy of the myo2(+) gene is fused to the gene encoding green fluorescent protein (GFP), we analysed CAR formation and function in the presence and absence of Myp2. No change in the rate of CAR contraction was observed when Myp2 was absent although the CAR persisted longer in the contracted state and was occasionally observed to split into two discrete rings. This was also observed in myp2Delta cells following actin depolymerisation with latrunculin. CAR contraction in the absence of Myp2 was completely abolished in the presence of elevated levels of chloride ions. Thus, Myp2 appears to contribute to the stability of the CAR, in particular at a late stage of CAR contraction, and to be a component of the signalling pathway that regulates cytokinesis in response to elevated levels of chloride. To determine whether the presence of two type II myosins was a feature of cytokinesis in other fungi that divide by septation, we searched the genomes of two filamentous fungi, Aspergillus fumigatus and Neurospora crassa, for myosin genes. As in fission yeast, both A. fumigatus and N. crassa contained myosins of classes I, II, and V. Unlike fission yeast, both contained a single type II myosin gene that, on the basis of its tail structure, was more reminiscent of Myp2 than Myo2. The significance of these observations to our understanding of septum to formation and cleavage is discussed.
TRANSPONDERS: Effectiveness of Propagation Impairments Mitigation Techniques at Q/V Band

Q/V band frequencies are expected to play a key role in enabling challenging and unproven broadband communications missions for a wide range of applications. In the perspective to exploit these frequencies, several satellite missions have been proposed to explore the physics of the satellite channel. The strategic importance of probing higher and higher frequencies has been recognized by the Italian Space Agency through the ITALSAT mission that up to date has been the major contributor to the advancement of the Q/V band propagation knowledge. In 2004 ASI funded a feasibility study (phase A study), called TRANSPONDERS, Italian acronym for "research, analysis and study of Q/V payloads for telecommunications", whose main objectives were the improvement of the knowledge of propagation impairments at Q/V band and the evaluation of the effectiveness of PIMTs (Propagation Impairment Mitigation Techniques) in very high frequency band operation. In this paper, after an overview of the potential applications in Q/V band and the top level mission architecture relative to the selected applicative mission at these frequencies, the applicability of three selected PIMTs, such as site diversity, power control and Adaptive Coding and Modulation (ACM), in a Q/V band scenario is discussed and main challenges and key issues are identified.
Paediatric Occupational Therapists' Reflections on Meaning in Professional Practice: A Phenomenological Study

Background. The construct of meaning plays an important role in the theories and models that inform occupational therapy; yet little research has examined the construct of meaning within the professional practices of occupational therapists. Purpose. The purpose of this research is to gain a deeper understanding of the meanings occupational therapists identify within their professional practice occupations. Methods. A phenomenological methodology was adopted for this study. Eight paediatric occupational therapists participated in in-depth, semi-structured interviews, which were tape-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed. Findings. Seven major themes were identified: Relating to clients as human beings, making a positive difference, working as a team, permission to have fun, congruency of values, support in the workplace, and artistry of practice. Implications. The study contributes to knowledge about accounts of meaning in the working lives of paediatric occupational therapists and highlights potential implications for therapists, clients, teams, organizations, and for the profession.
Unilateral spatial neglect in degenerative brain pathology.

OBJECTIVE In an attempt to interpret neglect as a disconnection syndrome, it is currently proposed that the disorder results from disorganization of large-scale networks involved in attentional spatial processes rather than of individual brain areas. We hypothesize that as degenerative brain diseases are "system pathologies," degeneration could be restricted to some of the neural subsystems implicated in the functional organization of spatial attention and different neglect syndromes could emerge depending on the patterns of the subsystems involved. METHOD We studied five neglect patients: one with corticobasal degeneration (CBD), three with Posterior Cortical Atrophy (PCA) and one with frontotemporal dementia (FTD). RESULTS The patient with CBD and left parietoccipital atrophy showed right allocentric neglect; the three patients with PCA mostly distributed in the right posterior regions showed left egocentric extrapersonal neglect; the patient with FTD, who displayed more severe frontotemporal atrophy on the right, had left motor-executive neglect for both personal and extrapersonal space. All patients also presented a deep breakdown of spatial working memory. CONCLUSION Our data would confirm that left neglect is more frequent than right neglect also in degenerative pathology and that damage to different neural substrates can produce different types of neglect. Our findings are also consistent with the hypothesis that both lateralized and nonlateralized attention disorders contribute to generate the syndrome. We suggest that evidence from degenerative diseases may contribute to construction of models of spatial attention.
Identiﬁcation and Molecular Characterization of a Putative Regulatory Locus That Affects Autolysis in Staphylococcus aureus

Previously in our laboratory, a PCR-based strategy was used to isolate potential sensor gene fragments from the Staphylococcus aureus genome. One DNA fragment was isolated that shared strong sequence similarity to genes encoding bacterial sensor proteins, indicating that it originated from within a potential staphylococcal sensor protein gene. In this study, the DNA surrounding the PCR product origin was cloned and sequenced. This analysis revealed the presence of two genes, termed lytS and lytR , whose deduced amino acid sequences were similar to those of members of the two-component regulatory system family of proteins. S. aureus cells containing an insertional disruption of lytS exhibited a marked propensity to form aggregates in liquid culture, suggesting that alterations in cell surface components exist in this strain. Transmission electron microscopic examination of these cells revealed that the cell surface was rough and diffuse and that a large proportion of the cell population had lysed. The lytS mutant also exhibited increased autolysis and an altered level of murein hydrolase activity produced compared with the parental strain, NCTC 8325-4. These data suggest that the lytS and lytR gene products control the rate of autolysis in S. aureus by affecting the intrinsic murein hydrolase activity associated with the cell.
HLA-E is a major ligand for the natural killer inhibitory receptor CD94/NKG2A.

We previously showed that the availability of a nonamer peptide derived from certain HLA class I signal sequences is a necessary requirement for the stabilization of endogenous HLA-E expression on the surface of 721.221 cells. This led us to examine the ability of HLA-E to protect HLA class I transfectants from natural killer (NK) cell-mediated lysis. It was possible to implicate the CD94/NKG2A complex as an inhibitory receptor recognizing this class Ib molecule by using as target a . 221 transfectant selectively expressing surface HLA-E. HLA-E had no apparent inhibitory effect mediated through the identified Ig superfamily (Ig-SF) human killer cell inhibitory receptors or ILT2/LIR1. Further studies of CD94/NKG2+ NK cell-mediated recognition of . 221 cells transfected with different HLA class I allotypes (i.e., -Cw4, -Cw3, -B7) confirmed that the inhibitory interaction was mediated by CD94/NKG2A recognizing the surface HLA-E molecule, because only antibodies directed against either HLA-E, CD94, or CD94/NKG2A specifically restored lysis. Surface stabilization of HLA-E in cold-treated . 221 cells loaded with appropriate peptides was sufficient to confer protection, resulting from recognition of the HLA class Ib molecule by the CD94/NKG2A inhibitory receptor. Consistent with the prediction that the ligand for CD94/NKG2A is expressed ubiquitously, our examination of HLA-E antigen distribution indicated that it is detectable on the surface of a wide variety of cell types.
Integrating Ligand-Based and Protein-Centric Virtual Screening of Kinase Inhibitors Using Ensembles of Multiple Protein Kinase Genes and Conformations

The rapidly growing wealth of structural and functional information about kinase genes and kinase inhibitors that is fueled by a significant therapeutic role of this protein family provides a significant impetus for development of targeted computational screening approaches. In this work, we explore an ensemble-based, protein-centric approach that allows for simultaneous virtual ligand screening against multiple kinase genes and multiple kinase receptor conformations. We systematically analyze and compare the results of ligand-based and protein-centric screening approaches using both single-receptor and ensemble-based docking protocols. A panel of protein kinase targets that includes ABL, EGFR, P38, CDK2, TK, and VEGFR2 kinases is used in this comparative analysis. By applying various performance metrics we have shown that ligand-centric shape matching can provide an effective enrichment of active compounds outperforming single-receptor docking screening. However, ligand-based approaches can be highly sensitive to the choice of inhibitor queries. Employment of multiple inhibitor queries combined with parallel selection ranking criteria can improve the performance and efficiency of ligand-based virtual screening. We also demonstrated that replica-exchange Monte Carlo docking with kinome-based ensembles of multiple crystal structures can provide a superior early enrichment on the kinase targets. The central finding of this study is that incorporation of the template-based structural information about kinase inhibitors and protein kinase structures in diverse functional states can significantly enhance the overall performance and robustness of both ligand and protein-centric screening strategies. The results of this study may be useful in virtual screening of kinase inhibitors potentially offering a beneficial spectrum of therapeutic activities across multiple disease states.
Arbitrage-Free Shifting of Price Forward Curves - An Efficient and Generic Algorithm

The most basic and important object for any company trading energy commodities is a so-called Price Forward Curve, or PFC, providing prices in a fine granularity for a future period of time. Clearly, the PFC must be free of arbitrage with respect to the relevant set of forward prices at all times as it is used very frequently and in many different places in a company. Thus, there is need for a fully generic and efficient algorithm producing this arbitrage-free forward curve - a subject yet uncovered by the literature. The algorithm presented in this paper uses techniques from linear algebra and we demonstrate how typical problems and issues from practice such as complicated calendar arithmetics, incorporating bid/ask prices and interplay with Monte-Carlo frameworks are covered. Furthermore, as a by-product, the algorithm produces matrices that allow to change freely between two fundamental representation of the energy market at hand - one being the space of observed forward products, the other being a synthetic world that eases greatly calculations such as pricing, hedging and risk management.
Promoting Perioperative Metabolic and Nutritional Care

Surgery represents a major stressor that disrupts homeostasis and can lead to loss of body cell mass. Integrated, multidisciplinary medical strategies, including enhanced recovery programs and perioperative nutrition support, can mitigate the surgically induced metabolic response, promoting optimal patient recovery following major surgery. Clinical therapies should identify those who are poorly nourished before surgery and aim to attenuate catabolism while preserving the processes that promote recovery and immunoprotection after surgery. This review will address the impact of surgery on intermediary metabolism and describe the clinical consequences that ensue. It will also focus on the role of perioperative nutrition, including preoperative nutrition risk, carbohydrate loading, and early initiation of oral feeding (centered on macronutrients) in modulating surgical stress, as well as highlight the contribution of the anesthesiologist to nutritional care. Emerging therapeutic concepts such as preoperative glycemic control and prehabilitation will be discussed.
The human brm protein is cleaved during apoptosis: The role of cathepsin G

The human brm (hbrm) protein (homologue of the Drosophila melanogaster brahma and Saccharomyces cervisiae SNF-2 proteins) is part of a polypeptide complex believed to regulate chromatin conformation. We have shown that the hbrm protein is cleaved in NB4 leukemic cells after induction of apoptosis by UV-irradiation, DNA damaging agents, or staurosporine. Because hbrm is found only in the nucleus, we have investigated the nature of the proteases that may regulate the degradation of this protein during apoptosis. In an in vitro assay, the hbrm protein could not be cleaved by caspase-3, -7, or -6, the “effector” caspases generally believed to carry out the cleavage of nuclear protein substrates. In contrast, we find that cathepsin G, a granule enzyme found in NB4 cells, cleaves hbrm in a pattern similar to that observed in vivo during apoptosis. In addition, a peptide inhibitor of cathepsin G blocks hbrm cleavage during apoptosis but does not block activation of caspases or cleavage of the nuclear protein polyADP ribose polymerase (PARP). Although localized in granules and in the Golgi complex in untreated cells, cathepsin G becomes diffusely distributed during apoptosis. Cleavage by cathepsin G removes a 20-kDa fragment containing a bromodomain from the carboxyl terminus of hbrm. This cleavage disrupts the association between hbrm and the nuclear matrix; the 160-kDa hbrm cleavage fragment is less tightly associated with the nuclear matrix than full-length hbrm.
A nonlinear latent class model for joint analysis of multivariate longitudinal data and a binary outcome

We consider a joint model for exploring association between several correlated longitudinal markers and a clinical event. A nonlinear growth mixture model exhibits the different latent classes of evolution of the latent quantity underlying the correlated longitudinal markers and a logistic regression models the probability of occurence of the clinical event according to the latent classes. By introducing a flexible nonlinear transformation including parameters to be estimated between each marker and the latent process, the model also deals with non‐Gaussian continuous markers. Through an application on cognitive ageing, the two advantages of the model are underlined: (1) the latent profiles of evolution associated with the clinical event are described including covariate effects in the longitudinal model but also in the probability of class membership and in the probability of occurence of the event, and (2) a diagnostic and a prognostic tools are derived from the model for early detection of the clinical event using any available information about the longitudinal markers. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.