Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Altered Hippocampal Kainate-Receptor mRNA Levels in Temporal Lobe Epilepsy Patients

This study determined whether hippocampal kainate (KA) receptor mRNA levels were increased or decreased in temporal lobe epilepsy patients compared with nonseizure autopsies. Hippocampal sclerosis (HS; n = 17), nonsclerosis (non-HS; n = 11), and autopsy hippocampi (n = 9) were studied for KA1-2 and GluR5-7 mRNA levels using semiquantitative in situ hybridization techniques, along with neuron densities. Compared with autopsy hippocampi, HS and non-HS cases showed decreased GluR5 and GluR6 hybridization densities per CA2 and/or CA3 pyramid. Furthermore, HS patients demonstrated increased KA2 and GluR5 hybridization densities per granule cell compared with autopsy hippocampi. These findings indicate that chronic temporal lobe seizures were associated with differential changes in hippocampal KA1-2 and GluR5-7 hybridization densities that vary by subfield and pathology group. In temporal lobe epilepsy patients, these results support the hypothesis that pyramidal cell GluR5 and GluR6 mRNA levels are decreased as a consequence of seizures, and in HS patients granule cell KA2 and GluR5 mRNA levels are increased in association with aberrant fascia dentata mossy fiber sprouting and/or hippocampal neuronal loss.
Reinventing Macau tourism: gambling on creativity?

The paper identifies some major economic, social and environmental effects of gaming-related tourism in Macau, the world’s largest gaming location in respect of casino turnover. The main types of effects of casino development are typically those associated with growth machine theory. The paper also identifies major threats to the sustainable development of Macau as a gaming/tourism destination, arising from a narrow industrial base, competing destinations, community alienation, and what is referred to as the ‘China factor’. The paper discusses the types of strategies that are required if Macau tourism is to counter these threats and develop successfully as a ‘World Centre of Tourism and Leisure’. It is argued that Macau can most effectively achieve this goal if it develops its tourism and gaming industries to be consistent with the key attributes of a creative city.
Tree-based vehicle classification system

Nowadays, traffic surveillance systems are installed in major cities. They are usually used for two purposes, i.e. realtime traffic monitoring and archived events searching. For the latter purpose, the traffic surveillance systems can be used for police officers' benefits, such as vehicle identification in specific events including stolen vehicles or hit-and-run cases. In such circumstances, the officers are required to identify the vehicle in archived videos according to its appearances. This task is usually accomplished manually through visual perception. The problems arise from this approach Even though this approach results in good accuracy, it is time consuming and prone to error due to human fatigue for long duration videos. In order to solve these problems, a tree based vehicle classification system is proposed. This system consists of three modules, i.e. feature extraction, classification, and search manager. The feature extraction module is used for image and video processing. It extracts the desired features to be used further in the classification module. The classification module uses these features and results in pre-defined vehicle classes. The classification results are stored in the search manager module for further filtering according to user's query command. This paper focuses on the classification module. There are two features designed to be used in the proposed classification module, i.e. types and colors. Vehicles are classified into four classes of type and seven classes of color. Several tree based algorithms are applied to the dataset. The experimental results show that all the algorithms are comparable. However, the highest accuracy for type and color classification are obtained by using decision tree and bagged decision tree, respectively.
Endovascular management of recurrent aneurysms

Abstract As neuroendovascular interventions for both ruptured and unruptured intracranial aneurysms have come to the forefront, careful follow-up and strategies for retreatment of aneurysmal recurrences have become increasingly important. Endovascular approaches have also proven to be valuable adjuncts for managing recurrent aneurysms previously treated by open microsurgical approaches. Fortunately, retreatment of recurrent aneurysms can be performed safely, and the use of stents during retreatment has increased the proportion of durably retreated aneurysms. More recently, the spectrum of recurrent aneurysms readily amenable to endovascular therapy has been expanded by the widespread introduction of flow diverters.
Comparing the Effects of White Coat Hypertension and Sustained Hypertension on Mortality in a UK Primary Care Setting

PURPOSE We examined all-cause mortality within a primary care setting in patients with white coat hypertension or sustained hypertension in whom blood pressure (BP) monitoring was indicated. METHODS This prospective multicenter study of ambulatory BP monitoring included 48 family practices in the county of Oxfordshire, United Kingdom. Mortality was compared for patients having white coat hypertension (mean of 3 clinic BP readings >140/90 mm Hg and daytime ambulatory readings =135/85 mm Hg) and patients having sustained hypertension (mean of 3 clinic readings >140/90 mm Hg and daytime ambulatory readings >135/85 mm Hg). RESULTS A routine primary care cohort consisting of 5,182 patients chosen to undergo ambulatory BP monitoring by their family physician was followed up for a median of 7.3 years (interquartile range, 5.8–8.9). There were 335 deaths (6.5%), corresponding to a mortality rate of 8.9 deaths (95% confidence interval [CI], 8.0–9.9) per 1,000 years of follow-up. Patients with white coat hypertension (n = 1,117) were more likely to be female and were on average younger than patients with sustained hypertension (n = 4,065). The unadjusted rate of all-cause mortality in patients with white coat hypertension was lower, at 4.4 deaths per 1,000 years of follow-up (95% CI, 3.1–6.0) than that in patients with sustained hypertension, at 10.2 deaths per 1,000 years of follow-up (95% CI, 9.1–11.4). This reduction in all-cause mortality was still clinically significant after adjustment for age, sex, smoking, use of antihypertensive medication, and practice-clustering effects (hazard ratio = 0.64; 95% CI, 0.42–0.97; P=.04). CONCLUSIONS White coat hypertension (elevation of clinic BP only) confers significantly less risk of death than sustained hypertension (elevation of both clinic and ambulatory BPs). Trials are now needed to evaluate the risk reduction achievable in patients who have white coat hypertension and are receiving BP-lowering therapy.
Cell differentiation in the retina of the mouse

Cell differentiation in the retina of the mouse during the postnatal period was studied by autoradiography. Animals were injected with 3H‐thymidine at ages extending from the day of birth through postnatal day 11. Six weeks later the distribution of labeled nuclei in the cells of the mature neural retina was analyzed to determine when these cells completed their final mitosis prior to differentiating. Central and peripheral zones were analyzed separately. Cell division ceases by 5–6 days in the center of the retina and by 11 days in the periphery. Among cells produced postnatally, 73% differentiate as rods, 20% as bipolar cells, 6% as Müller cells, and 1% as amacrine and ganglion cells. At all stages of embryogenesis, the differentiation of at least three and as many as six distinct types of specialized cells is initiated simultaneously within the ventricular cell population.
K-CPD: Learning of overcomplete dictionaries for tensor sparse coding

Recently sparse coding has received expressions of interest in the field of pattern recognition. Most existing methods take the data-as-vector formulation, and deal with images (the second order tensor) or volumes (the third order tensor) by vectorization. However, such kind of vectorization will lose the original structure of the data and reduce the reliability of post processing, leading a poor representation. In this paper, we propose a new algorithm of overcomplete dictionary learning for tensor sparse coding, named K-CPD, by extension of K-SVD [8] from vector formulation to tensor formulation. A multilinear orthogonal matching pursuit (MOMP) algorithm is also developed for calculating sparse representation of tensor signal. We evaluate the performance of K-CPD for image denoising, and the results demonstrate that the proposed method surpasses the conventional methods.
The endosymbiont (Buchnera sp.) of the aphid Diuraphis noxia contains plasmids consisting of trpEG and tandem repeats of trpEG pseudogenes

Most aphids are dependent for their survival on prokaryotic endosymbionts assigned to the genus Buchnera. Among the functions of Buchnera species is the synthesis of tryptophan, which is required by the aphid host. In Buchnera species from the aphid Diuraphis noxia, the genes for anthranilate synthase (trpEG) were found on a plasmid which consisted of seven tandem repeats of a 3.2-kb unit and one 2.6-kb unit which differed in containing a 0.6-kb deletion. One of the 3.2-kb units contained open reading frames corresponding to trpEG; the remaining units contained trpEG pseudogenes (psi). The nucleotide sequence upstream of trpE contained a region that has characteristics of an origin of replication (ori). Relative to trpB (a chromosomal gene), there were about two copies of the trpEG-containing plasmid. Comparisons of the nucleotide sequences of the 3.2-kb units containing trpEG and psi trpEG indicated that most changes occurred in a 700-nucleotide segment that included the region upstream of trpE and the portion of this gene coding for the N terminus. The consequence of these changes was the silencing of trpEG by inactivation of the putative promoter region and premature termination of the TrpE peptide. In contrast, the nucleotide sequence of the segment corresponding to ori was conserved in the units containing trpEG and psi trpEG. We offer a number of speculations on the evolutionary pressure in this lineage which resulted in the silencing of most of trpEG while still retaining the regions resembling ori.
Internet scrapbook: creating personalized world wide web pages

This paper describes an information personalization system, called Internet Scrapbook, which enables users to create a personal page by clipping and merging their necessary data gathered from multiple Web pages. Even when the source Web pages are modified, the system updates the personal page, replacing with the latest data extracted from the source pages. Therefore, once a user creates their personal pages, she can browse her necessary information only.
Gestational weight gain and pregnancy outcomes in 481 obese glucose-tolerant women.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the effect of gestational weight gain in obese glucose-tolerant women. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS We performed a historical cohort study of 481 women with prepregnancy BMI > or = 30 kg/m2 and a normal 2-h 75-g oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) during the third trimester (according to World Health Organization criteria). Data on OGTT results and clinical outcomes were collected from medical records. Four groups were defined according to weight gain: group 1, <5.0 kg (n = 93); group 2, 5.0-9.9 kg (n = 134); group 3, 10.0-14.9 kg (n = 132); and group 4, > or = 15.0 kg (n = 122). RESULTS Birth weight increased significantly with increasing weight gain (mean grams +/- SD): group 1, 3,456 +/- 620; group 2, 3,624 +/- 675; group 3, 3,757 +/- 582; and group 4, 3,784 +/- 597 (P < 0.001). The birth weight in group 1 was similar to that of the background population of primarily normal-weight women (3,478 g). In multivariate analyses, increasing weight gain was associated with significantly higher rates of hypertension (OR 4.8 [95% CI for group 4 vs. group 1: 1.7-13.1]), cesarean section (3.5 [1.6-7.8]), induction of labor (3.7 [1.7-8.0]), and large-for-gestational-age infants (4.7 [2.0-11.0]). There was no difference in rates of small-for-gestational-age infants. Significant predictors for birth weight (determined by multiple linear regression) were gestational weight gain, 2-h OGTT result, pre-gestational BMI, maternal age, gestational age, and smoking. CONCLUSIONS Increasing weight gain in obese women is associated with increasing pregnancy complications. Our data suggest that minimal gestational weight gain might normalize birth weight. Prospective studies should be performed to clarify the safety of recommending limited gestational weight gain.
Real Exchange Rate Misalignment in a Collapsing Economy: An Anatomy of the Equilibrium Exchange Rate in Zimbabwe Currency

Real exchange rate (RER) misalignment, defined as a sustained deviation of the RER from its long run equilibrium is a very serious problem in developing countries. Moreover, it is prominently argued that the post-2000 economic crisis in Zimbabwe was a result of a chain of events that has its roots in the failure by monetary authorities to maintain an ‘appropriate’ level of the RER. This paper adopts the single equation reduced form behavioural approach to equilibrium RER (ERER), pioneered by Edwards (1989) to estimate the ERER and level of misalignment for Zimbabwe from 1985 to 2004. The findings indicate significant evidence of prolonged and very high levels of RER overvaluation during the entire sample period. Episodes of RER misalignment are particularly pronounced during the fixed exchange rate eras. They reach extreme levels of up to 95 percent in 2003-2004 – a period during which the economic also severely deepened. Despite sample period and data limitations, the findings nevertheless provide valuable insight as to what would have been the state of the Zimbabwean dollar in the lead up to its eventual abandonment in January 2009.
Modelling Two Possible Mechanisms for the Regulation of the Germinal Center Dynamics1

Research on the germinal center has tried to unravel the mechanisms that control its dynamics. In this study we focus on the termination of the germinal center reaction, which is still an open problem. We propose two hypothetical biological mechanisms that may be responsible for the control of germinal center dynamics and analyze them through mathematical models. The first one is based on the differentiation of follicular dendritic cells and/or T cells. Interaction of these cells in the differentiated state with germinal center B cells would promote B cell differentiation into memory B cells and Ab-forming cells, ending the germinal center reaction. The second mechanism applies only to a scenario without recycling and consists of the decay of a hypothetical proliferation signal for centroblasts that limits the number of cell divisions. Each of the models makes predictions that can be experimentally tested.
Prostate stromal cell telomere shortening is associated with risk of prostate cancer in the placebo arm of the Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial

Telomeres are repetitive nucleoproteins that help maintain chromosomal stability by inhibiting exonucleolytic degradation, prohibiting inappropriate homologous recombination, and preventing chromosomal fusions by suppressing double‐strand break signals. We recently observed that men treated for clinically localized prostate cancer with shorter telomeres in their cancer‐associated stromal cells, in combination with greater variation in cancer cell telomere lengths, were significantly more likely to progress to distant metastases, and die from their disease. Here, we hypothesized that shorter stromal cell telomere length would be associated with prostate cancer risk at time of biopsy.
Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia and Congenital Heart Disease

Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia (CDH) is a severe and life threatening condition which can occur in isolation or with associated malformations. Congenital Heart Disease may be associated in up to 40% of cases with these infants often having a poor prognosis. This chapter aims to explore the association between CDH and congenital heart disease exploring the frequency of association, echocardiographic findings, prenatal diagnosis, use of cardiovascular biomarkers, surgical management and finally long term outcomes.
Differential impact of age, sex steroid hormones, and obesity on basal versus pulsatile growth hormone secretion in men as assessed in an ultrasensitive chemiluminescence assay.

A chemiluminescence-based GH assay with 30- to 100-fold increased sensitivity recently disclosed combined basal and pulsatile GH secretion in men. However, how age, sex steroid hormones, and obesity singly and jointly influence the basal vs. pulsatile modes of GH release is not known. We used the foregoing assay (detection threshold, 0.002-0.005 microgram/L) and high sensitivity and specificity (> or = 90% each) deconvolution analysis to quantitate basal and pulsatile GH secretion from 24-h serum GH concentration profiles in 26 healthy lean and obese men, whose ages spanned 18-63 yr and whose percentage body fat ranged from 12-47%. Concentrations of serum insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I), IGF-I-binding protein-1 (IGFBP-1), and IGFBP-3 were related to specific measures of basal or pulsatile GH release. We observed that mean (24-h) serum GH concentrations embraced a 140-fold range from 0.013-1.8 micrograms/L and were related negatively to age (r = -0.50; P < 0.01), percentage body fat (r = -0.620; P < 0.01), and their interaction (r = -0.610; P < 0.01). In contrast, testosterone was a robustly positive statistical determinant of mean serum GH values (r = 0.628; P = 0.0006). Stepwise multivariate regression analysis disclosed that percentage body fat alone and jointly with the serum testosterone concentration controlled, respectively, 38% and 50% of the total variability in GH levels (P = 0.0013 and P = 0.0008). As assessed by deconvolution analysis, GH secretory burst mass was negatively related to percentage body fat (r = -0.621; P < 0.01) and positively to serum testosterone (r = 0.529; P = 0.0054). The calculated half-life of GH correlated positively with serum estradiol (r = 0.447; P = 0.032), and negatively with percentage body fat (r = -0.437; P = 0.048). Basal GH secretion rates were negatively related to serum estradiol (r = -0.485; P = 0.016). In contrast, GH secretory burst frequency and duration were unrelated to age, percentage body fat, or sex steroids. The fraction of total GH secreted in bursts was negatively correlated with the body mass index (r = -0.540; P < 0.01). Serum IGF-I concentrations were positively related to total pulsatile GH secretion (r = 0.690; P = 0.0011) and negatively to age (r = -0.597; P = 0.007) and percentage body fat (r = -0.611; P = 0.009). (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)
Stress and vulnerability to posttraumatic stress disorder in children and adolescents.

OBJECTIVE This study examined the experiential factors and interacting vulnerabilities that contribute to the development of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in children and adolescents. METHOD Of 100 consecutive referrals to an inner-city child and adolescent psychiatry clinic, 59 had experienced a trauma that qualified as a precipitant of PTSD. For those with trauma, ages ranged from 3 to 18 years (mean=9.9, SD=4.10); 39 (66%) were males. The authors used a series of multiple regression analyses to examine the contribution of demographic characteristics, the nature of the stressor(s), and the role of preexisting clinical signs in the development of PTSD. RESULTS Twenty-two percent of the 59 children who had been traumatized met full criteria for PTSD, 32% had some symptoms of PTSD but did not meet full criteria, and 46% had no symptoms of PTSD. Witnessing domestic violence or being physically abused predicted severity of PTSD. Children with preexisting aggressive behavior were more likely to be victims of physical abuse. CONCLUSIONS Traumatic experience interacts with factors in the child and family to contribute to the development of PTSD. Trauma that threatens family integrity appears to make a strong contribution to the development of PTSD. Increased understanding of the factors contributing to PTSD may provide additional opportunities for developing effective interventions.
“Accessibility passports” service in information environment for persons with disabilities

The paper describes development process of information environment for persons with disabilities. Introduction gives a base understanding of the project idea. The first section of the main part describes common infrastructure architecture. Services are divided on government and public. The public part is presented by various services, based on the information collected by government service. Government service is presented by information system “Accessibility passports”, which in details is described in second section of main part. The “Accessibility passports” is a service for initial collection of data about accessibility of the social infrastructure facilities for people with disabilities. In the last section of the main part presented a mathematical method for measuring level of accessibility of the social infrastructure facilities for people with disabilities. Method is based on probability theory and provide possibility for formal ranging of the social infrastructure facilities according to the level of accessibility for persons with limited mobility.
Patterned ballistic movements triggered by a startle in healthy humans

1 The reaction time to a visual stimulus shortens significantly when an unexpected acoustic startle is delivered together with the ‘go’ signal in healthy human subjects. In this paper we have investigated the physiological mechanisms underlying this effect. If the commands for the startle and the voluntary reaction were superimposed at some level in the CNS, then we would expect to see alterations in the configuration of the voluntary response. Conversely, if the circuit activated by the startling stimulus is somehow involved in the execution of voluntary movements, then reaction time would be sped up but the configuration of the motor programme would be preserved. 2 Fourteen healthy male and female volunteers were instructed to react as fast as possible to a visual ‘go’ signal by flexing or extending their wrist, or rising onto tiptoe from a standing position. These movements generated consistent and characteristic patterns of EMG activation. In random trials, the ‘go’ signal was accompanied by a very loud acoustic stimulus. This stimulus was sufficient to produce a startle reflex when given unexpectedly on its own. 3 The startling stimulus almost halved the latency of the voluntary response but did not change the configuration of the EMG pattern in either the arm or the leg. In some subjects the reaction times were shorter than the calculated minimum time for processing of sensory information at the cerebral cortex. Most subjects reported that the very rapid responses were produced by something other than their own will. 4 We conclude that the very short reaction times were not produced by an early startle reflex adding on to a later voluntary response. This would have changed the form of the EMG pattern associated with the voluntary response. Instead, we suggest that such rapid reactions were triggered entirely by activity at subcortical levels, probably involving the startle circuit. 5 The implication is that instructions for voluntary movement can in some circumstances be stored and released from subcortical structures.