Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Hyperinsulinemia and Autonomic Nervous System Dysfunction in Obesity: Effects of Weight Loss

Background —Because hyperinsulinemia acutely stimulates adrenergic activity, it has been postulated that chronic hyperinsulinemia may lead to enhanced sympathetic tone and cardiovascular risk. Methods and Results —In 21 obese (body mass index, 35±1 kg/m2) and 17 lean subjects, we measured resting cardiac output (by 2-dimensional echocardiography), plasma concentrations and timed (diurnal versus nocturnal) urinary excretion of catecholamines, and 24-hour heart rate variability (by spectral analysis of ECG). In the obese versus lean subjects, cardiac output was increased by 22% (P <0.03), and the nocturnal drop in urinary norepinephrine output was blunted (P =0.01). Spectral power in the low-frequency range was depressed throughout 24 hours (P <0.04). During the afternoon and early night, ie, the postprandial phase, high-frequency power was lower, heart rate was higher; and the ratio of low to high frequency, an index of sympathovagal balance, was increased in direct proportion to the degree of hyperinsulinemia independent of body mass index (partial r =0.43, P =0.01). In 9 obese subjects who lost 10% to 18% of their body weight, cardiac output decreased and low-frequency power returned toward normal (P <0.05). Conclusions —In free-living subjects with uncomplicated obesity, chronic hyperinsulinemia is associated with a high-output, low-resistance hemodynamic state, persistent baroreflex downregulation, and episodic (postprandial) sympathetic dominance. Reversal of these changes by weight loss suggests a causal role for insulin.
Combinatorial Design of Key Distribution Mechanisms for Wireless Sensor Networks

Secure communications in wireless sensor networks operating under adversarial conditions require providing pairwise (symmetric) keys to sensor nodes. In large scale deployment scenarios, there is no priory knowledge of post deployment network configuration since nodes may be randomly scattered over a hostile territory. Thus, shared keys must be distributed before deployment to provide each node a key-chain. For large sensor networks it is infeasible to store a unique key for all other nodes in the key-chain of a sensor node. Consequently, for secure communication either two nodes have a key in common in their key-chains and they have a wireless link between them, or there is a path, called key-path, among these two nodes where each pair of neighboring nodes on this path have a key in common. Length of the key-path is the key factor for efficiency of the design. This paper presents novel deterministic and hybrid approaches based on Combinatorial Design for deciding how many and which keys to assign to each key-chain before the sensor network deployment. In particular, Balanced Incomplete Block Designs (BIBD) and Generalized Quadrangles (GQ) are mapped to obtain efficient key distribution schemes. Performance and security properties of the proposed schemes are studied both analytically and computationally. Comparison to related work shows that the combinatorial approach produces better connectivity with smaller key-chain sizes
The Role of Obesity Training in Medical School and Residency on Bariatric Surgery Knowledge in Primary Care Physicians

Objective. US primary care physicians are inadequately educated on how to provide obesity treatment. We sought to assess physician training in obesity and to characterize the perceptions, beliefs, knowledge, and treatment patterns of primary care physicians. Methods. We administered a cross-sectional web-based survey from July to October 2014 to adult primary care physicians in practices affiliated with the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). We evaluated survey respondent demographics, personal health habits, obesity training, knowledge of bariatric surgery care, perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs regarding the etiology of obesity and treatment strategies. Results. Younger primary care physicians (age 20–39) were more likely to have received some obesity training than those aged 40–49 (OR: 0.08, 95% CI: 0.008–0.822) or those 50+ (OR: 0.03, 95% CI: 0.004–0.321). Physicians who were young, had obesity, or received obesity education in medical school or postgraduate training were more likely to answer bariatric surgery knowledge questions correctly. Conclusions. There is a need for educational programs to improve physician knowledge and competency in treating patients with obesity. Obesity is a complex chronic disease, and it is important for clinicians to be equipped with the knowledge of the multiple treatment modalities that may be considered to help their patients achieve a healthy weight.
In Situ Small Scale Mechanical Characterization of Materials Under Environmental

In Situ Small Scale Mechanical Characterization of Materials Under Environmental Effects. (August 2010) Matthew Wayne Sanders, B.S., Texas A&M University Chair of Advisory Committee: Dr. Hong Liang This research investigates the mechanical properties and performance of structural materials at a small volume scale. In situ observation was made possible through the Small Punch Test (SPT) method as well as tribological testing. Experimentally, aluminum and titanium alloys were examined using those two techniques. Analysis of their behavior in comparison with their published mechanical properties made it possible to establish connections between test parameters and conventional uniaxial tensile test properties. Connections were generated between SPT parameters and tribological performance. This research used experimental approaches to develop an understanding of the material behaviors during small punch testing and apply them to hydrogen embrittlement. The SPT for such alloys were highly repeatable and specimen surface roughness did not have visible impacts on repeatability. Analysis indicated that there is a link between the SPT and conventional mechanical properties. The relationship between the applied force and the slop of the FvE curve is associated with the tensile strength and elastic modulus. It was found that the SPT can be used to qualitatively gage wear
Smart selective encryption of CAVLC for H.264/AVC video

In this paper we present a new approach of selective encryption (SE) of video. SE is currently applied to video codec H.264/AVC in order to perform confidentiality and preserve bitrate and data size of the underlying video sequence. Our approach analyzes, each macro-block of a given video sequence, separately before its entropy encoding. In this way, the system decides whether it is necessary to or not to encrypt the current macro-block. On the former case, the selected macro-block is encrypted using the SE-CAVLC in the entropy encoder. This approach allows to encrypt a smaller part of the macro-blocks without disturbing the level of confidentiality.
Chinese Word Segmentation Using Various Dictionaries

Most of the Chinese word segmentation systems utilizes monolingual dictionary and are used for monolingual processing. For the tasks of machine translation (MT) and cross-language information retrieval (CLIR), another translation dictionary may be used to transfer the words of documents from the source languages to target languages. The inconsistencies resulting from the two types of dictionaries (segmentation dictionary and transfer dictionary) may produce some problems for MT and CLIR. This paper shows the effectiveness of the external resources (bilingual dictionary and word list) for Chinese word segmentations.
How Sweet Are Our Gut Beneficial Bacteria? A Focus on Protein Glycosylation in Lactobacillus

Protein glycosylation is emerging as an important feature in bacteria. Protein glycosylation systems have been reported and studied in many pathogenic bacteria, revealing an important diversity of glycan structures and pathways within and between bacterial species. These systems play key roles in virulence and pathogenicity. More recently, a large number of bacterial proteins have been found to be glycosylated in gut commensal bacteria. We present an overview of bacterial protein glycosylation systems (O- and N-glycosylation) in bacteria, with a focus on glycoproteins from gut commensal bacteria, particularly Lactobacilli. These emerging studies underscore the importance of bacterial protein glycosylation in the interaction of the gut microbiota with the host.
Enhancing iCVD Modification of Electrospun Membranes for Membrane Distillation Using a 3D Printed Scaffold

Electrospun membranes have shown promise for use in membrane distillation (MD) as they exhibit exceptionally low vapor transport. Their high porosity coupled with the occasional large pore can make them prone to wetting. In this work, initiated chemical vapor deposition (iCVD) is used to modify for electrospun membranes with increased hydrophobicity of the fiber network. To demonstrate conformal coating, we demonstrate the approach on intrinsically hydrophilic electrospun fibers and render the fibers suitable for MD. We enable conformal coating using a unique coating procedure, which provides convective flow of deposited polymers during iCVD. This is made possible by using a 3D printed scaffold, which changed the orientation of the membrane during the coating process. The new coating orientation allows both sides as well as the interior of the membrane to be coated simultaneously and reduced the coating time by a factor of 10 compared to conventional CVD approaches. MD testing confirmed the hydrophobicity of the material as 100% salt rejections were obtained.
PbSe quantum dots fiber amplifier based on sol-gel self-assembly method

A PbSe quantum dots (QDs) fiber amplifier has been demonstrated. The PbSe QDs were synthesized via sol-gel self-assembly method. The size of PbSe QDs was controlled to 5.5 nm through control of the reaction time as well as the growth temperature. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy were used to characterize the PbSe QDs samples. The fiber amplifier was fabricated by coating the QDs onto a tapered optical fiber coupler. Through evanescent wave, the QDs were excited to realize optical amplification. A 1550 nm semiconductor light emitting diode (SLED) as the signal source and a 980 nm laser diode (LD) source as the pump were injected into the fiber coupler simultaneously.
STCP: a generic transport layer protocol for wireless sensor networks

We consider the issue of designing a generic transport layer protocol for energy-constrained sensor networks. We present the requirements for such a transport protocol and propose sensor transmission control protocol (STCP). STCP is a generic, scalable and reliable transport layer protocol where a majority of the functionalities are implemented at the base station. STCP offers controlled variable reliability, congestion detection and avoidance, and supports multiple applications in the same network. We present the design and implementation of STCP and evaluate the protocol with different scenarios and network characteristics.
Effects of an energy-restrictive diet with or without exercise on abdominal fat, intermuscular fat, and metabolic risk factors in obese women.

OBJECTIVE The primary objective was to examine whether the combination of diet and aerobic exercise (DA) or diet and resistance exercise (DR) is associated with greater improvements in metabolic risk factors by comparison to diet only (DO) in obese women. A second objective considered whether reductions in metabolic risk factors are related to concurrent changes in abdominal and/or intermuscular fat distribution. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS A total of 38 premenopausal obese women were randomly assigned to one of three 16-week treatments: DO (n=13), DA (n=11), or DR (n=14). Plasma glucose, insulin, and lipid levels were measured in a fasting state and after a 75-g oral glucose challenge (oral glucose tolerance test [OGTT]). Total, abdominal subcutaneous, visceral, and intermuscular fat were measured by magnetic resonance imaging. RESULTS Significant reductions (P < 0.02) in body weight (approximately 10 kg or 10%) and in total, abdominal subcutaneous, visceral, and intermuscular fat were observed within each group. Fasting and OGTT insulin, total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, and apolipoprotein B also decreased within each group (P < or = 0.02). The changes in the body fat and metabolic variables were not different across treatment (P > 0.05). Visceral fat alone was related to the metabolic risk factors both before and after the treatment. CONCLUSIONS Weight loss was associated with reductions in metabolic risk factors in obese women. The improvement in the metabolic profile was not enhanced by the addition of aerobic or resistance exercise. The findings reinforce the importance of diminished visceral fat in the treatment of insulin resistance.
Epidemiology of Dislocation after Total Hip Arthroplasty

Instability after total hip arthroplasty is an important complication. It usually occurs in the immediate postoperative period, but the risk also increases with time. There are numerous surgical treatment options, but they have relatively unpredictable outcomes. Numerous factors are associated with dislocation, but research has mainly focused on surgical factors. Epidemiological factors remain the subject of much debate. We aimed to establish the most significant epidemio- logical factors in Scotland and in particular the dislocation rate in neuromuscular conditions. The Scottish National arthroplasty nonvoluntary registry is based on SMR01 records (Scottish Morbidity Record) data. We analyzed the Scottish National Arthroplasty Project to find patients' dislocation rates up to 1 year postoperatively for surgeon volume, age, gender, previous surgery, diagnosis, and followup duration. There were 14,314 total hip arthroplasties performed from April 1996 to March 2004 with an annual incidence of dislocation of 1.9%. We found an association between rate of dislocation with age, surgical volume, and previous fracture. However, there was no increase in the rate of dislocation associated with gender or with diagnoses of stroke or Parkinson's disease. Our prognostic assessment of dislocation risk allows assessment for methods of reducing dislocation in high risk patients.Level of Evidence: Prognostic study, level II-1 (retrospective comparative study). See Guidelines for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.
The combination of umeclidinium bromide and vilanterol in the management of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: current evidence and future prospects

The defining feature of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is progressive airflow limitation that causes air trapping and hyperinflation. The increasing hyperinflation results in dyspnea along with associated inability to engage in the activities of daily living. The American Thoracic Society (ATS), European Respiratory Society (ERS) and Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) treatment guidelines all place bronchodilators as the foundation of pharmacological management of COPD. In patients with moderate-to-very-severe respiratory impairment, adding regular treatment with one or more long-acting bronchodilators is recommended [long-acting β2-agonists (LABAs) or long-acting muscarinic antagonists (LAMAs)]. A growing body of evidence shows that LAMA and LABA co-administration is more effective than either drug class alone in managing stable COPD to improve lung function, symptoms and health status. Recently, new drug applications (NDAs) for a fixed-dose combination (FDC) of umeclidinium (UMEC), a LAMA, and vilanterol (VI), a LABA, at UMEC/VI doses of 125/25 and 62.5/25 µg have been submitted by sponsors to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and to the European Medicines Agency (EMA). Thus, UMEC/VI has become the first FDC LAMA/LABA product that has reached a regulatory approval stage. Other LAMA/LABA once-daily combinations coming through development include FDCs of tiotropium and olodaterol, glycopyrronium and indacaterol, and twice-daily aclidinium and formoterol. The aim of this review is to explore currently available data for once-daily UMEC/VI in the context of the evolving standards of COPD management.
Microinjection of biotin-tubulin into anaphase cells induces transient elongation of kinetochore microtubules and reversal of chromosome-to- pole motion

During prometaphase and metaphase of mitosis, tubulin subunit incorporation into kinetochore microtubules occurs proximal to the kinetochore, at the plus-ends of kinetochore microtubules. During anaphase, subunit loss from kinetochore fiber microtubules is also thought to occur mainly from microtubule plus-ends, proximal to the kinetochore. Thus, the kinetochore can mediate both subunit addition and loss while maintaining an attachment to kinetochore microtubules. To examine the relationship between chromosome motion and tubulin subunit assembly in anaphase, we have injected anaphase cells with biotin-labeled tubulin subunits. The pattern of biotin-tubulin incorporation was revealed using immunoelectron and confocal fluorescence microscopy of cells fixed after injection; chromosome motion was analyzed using video records of living injected cells. When anaphase cells are examined approximately 30 s after injection with biotin-tubulin, bright "tufts" of fluorescence are detected proximal to the kinetochores. Electron microscopic immunocytochemistry further reveals that these tufts of biotin-tubulin-containing microtubules are continuous with unlabeled kinetochore fiber microtubules. Biotin- tubulin incorporation proximal to the kinetochore in anaphase cells is detected after injection of 3-30 mg/ml biotin-tubulin, but not in cells injected with 0.3 mg/ml biotin-tubulin. At intermediate concentrations of biotin-tubulin (3-5 mg/ml), incorporation at the kinetochore can be detected within 15 s after injection; by approximately 1 min after injection discrete tufts of fluorescence are no longer detected, although some incorporation throughout the kinetochore fiber and into nonkinetochore microtubules is observed. At higher concentrations of injected biotin-tubulin (13 mg/ml), incorporation at the kinetochore is more extensive and occurs for longer periods of time than at intermediate concentrations. Incorporation of biotin-tubulin proximal to the kinetochore can be detected in cells injected during anaphase A, but not during anaphase B. Analysis of video records of microinjection experiments reveals that kinetochore proximal incorporation of biotin- tubulin is accompanied by a transient reversal of chromosome-to-pole motion. Chromosome motion is not altered after injection of 0.3 mg/ml biotin-tubulin or 5 mg/ml BSA. These results demonstrate that kinetochore microtubules in anaphase cells can elongate in response to the elevation of the tubulin concentration and that kinetochores retain the ability to mediate plus-end-dependent assembly of KMTs and plus-end- directed chromosome motion after anaphase onset.
Distributed MPC: Guaranteeing Global Stabilizability from Locally Designed Tubes

This paper studies a fundamental relation that exists between stabilizability assumptions usually employed in distributed model predictive control implementations, and the corresponding notions of invariance implicit in such controllers. The relation is made explicit in the form of a theorem that presents sufficient conditions for global stabilizability. It is shown that constraint admissibility of local robust controllers is sufficient for the global closed-loop system to be stable, and how these controllers are related to more complex forms of control such as tube-based distributed model predictive control implementations.
The Effect of Dye Density on the Efficiency of Photosensitization of TiO2 Films: Light-Harvesting by Phenothiazine-Labelled Dendritic Ruthenium Complexes

A family of dendritic tris-bipyridyl ruthenium coordination complexes incorporating two or four carboxylate groups for binding to a TiO2 surface site and another dendritic linker between the metal complex and highly absorptive dyes were formulated as thin films on TiO2 coated glass. The family included phenothiazine-substituted dendrons of increasing structural complexity and higher optical density. The dye-loaded films were characterized by steady-state emission and absorption measurements and by kinetic studies of luminescence and transient absorption. Upon photoexcitation of the bound dyes, rapid electron injection into the metal oxide film was the dominant observed process, producing oxidized dye that persisted for hundreds of milliseconds. Complex decay profiles for emission, transient absorption, and optical bleaching of the dendritic dyes point to highly heterogeneous behavior for the films, with observed persistence lifetimes related directly to structurally enhance electronic coupling between the metal oxide support and the dendritic dyes.
Incremental robot learning of new objects with fixed update time

We consider object recognition in the context of lifelong learning, where a robotic agent learns to discriminate between a growing number of object classes as it accumulates experience about the environment. We propose an incremental variant of the Regularized Least Squares for Classification (RLSC) algorithm, and exploit its structure to seamlessly add new classes to the learned model. The presented algorithm addresses the problem of having an unbalanced proportion of training examples per class, which occurs when new objects are presented to the system for the first time. We evaluate our algorithm on both a machine learning benchmark dataset and two challenging object recognition tasks in a robotic setting. Empirical evidence shows that our approach achieves comparable or higher classification performance than its batch counterpart when classes are unbalanced, while being significantly faster.
Bayesian neural networks for bivariate binary data: an application to prostate cancer study

Prostate cancer is one of the most common cancers in American men. The cancer could either be locally confined, or it could spread outside the organ. When locally confined, there are several options for treating and curing this disease. Otherwise, surgery is the only option, and in extreme cases of outside spread, it could very easily recur within a short time even after surgery and subsequent radiation therapy. Hence, it is important to know, based on pre‐surgery biopsy results how likely the cancer is organ‐confined or not.