Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Comments on potential health effects of MRI-induced DNA lesions: quality is more important to consider than quantity

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is increasingly being used in cardiology to detect heart disease and guide therapy. It is mooted to be a safer alternative to imaging techniques, such as computed tomography (CT) or coronary angiographic imaging. However, there has recently been an increased interest in the potential long-term health risks of MRI, especially in the light of the controversy resulting from a small number of research studies reporting an increase in DNA damage following exposure, with calls to limit its use and avoid unnecessary examination, according to the precautionary principle. Overall the published data are somewhat limited and inconsistent; the ability of MRI to produce DNA lesions has yet to be robustly demonstrated and future experiments should be carefully designed to optimize sensitivity and benchmarked to validate and assess reproducibility. The majority of the current studies have focussed on the initial induction of DNA damage, and this has led to comparisons between the reported induction of γH2AX and implied double-strand break (DSB) yields produced following MRI with induction by imaging techniques using ionizing radiation. However, γH2AX is not only a marker of classical double-ended DSB, but also a marker of stalled replication forks and in certain circumstances stalled DNA transcription. Additionally, ionizing radiation is efficient at producing complex DNA damage, unique to ionizing radiation, with an associated reduction in repairability. Even if the fields associated with MRI are capable of producing DNA damage, the lesions produced will in general be simple, similar to those produced by endogenous processes. It is therefore inappropriate to try and infer cancer risk by simply comparing the yields of γH2AX foci or DNA lesions potentially produced by MRI to those produced by a given exposure of ionizing radiation, which will generally be more biologically effective and have a greater probability of leading to long-term health effects. As a result, it is important to concentrate on more relevant downstream end points (e.g. chromosome aberration production), along with potential mechanisms by which MRI may lead to DNA lesions. This could potentially involve a perturbation in homeostasis of oxidative stress, modifying the background rate of endogenous DNA damage induction. In summary, what the field needs at the moment is more research and less fear mongering.
Modeling Foot Trajectories for Heavy Truck Ingress Simulation

Digital human figure models are a useful tool for simulation of driver ingress and egress for passenger cars, light trucks, and heavy commercial trucks. Simulation allows evaluation of the suitability of steps and handholds as a system. Accurate simulation requires detailed, validated algorithms to predict driver motions. One critical component of such an algorithm is the accurate prediction of foot trajectories. This paper presents an approach to foot trajectory simulation based on statistical analysis of driver motions from a laboratory study. The movements of 20 truck drivers were recorded as they entered a reconfigurable truck mockup. The foot trajectories were parameterized using Bezier curves, which accurately represent the important characteristics of the trajectories with relatively few parameters. Statistical analysis of the fitted parameters showed that the shapes of the trajectories, after normalizing for overall displacement, were independent of truck step configuration but affected by driver characteristics. The resulting models are designed for use with the Human Motion Simulation Framework, a software system previously applied to simulating a wide range of task-oriented human behavior, including passenger car ingress and egress.
A Critical Assessment of Marine Aquarist Biodiversity Data and Commercial Aquaculture: Identifying Gaps in Culture Initiatives to Inform Local Fisheries Managers

It is widely accepted that if well managed, the marine aquarium trade could provide socio-economic stability to local communities while incentivising the maintenance of coral reefs. However, the trade has also been implicated as having potentially widespread environmental impacts that has in part driven developments in aquaculture to relieve wild collection pressures. This study investigates the biodiversity in hobbyist aquaria (using an online survey) and those species currently available from an aquaculture source (commercial data and hobbyist initiatives) in the context of a traffic light system to highlight gaps in aquaculture effort and identify groups that require fisheries assessments. Two hundred and sixty nine species including clown fish, damsels, dotty backs, angelfish, gobies, sea horses and blennies, have reported breeding successes by hobbyists, a pattern mirrored by the European and US commercial organisations. However, there is a mismatch (high demand and low/non-existent aquaculture) for a number of groups including tangs, starfish, anemones and hermit crabs, which we recommend are priority candidates for local stock assessments. Hobbyist perception towards the concept of a sustainable aquarium trade is also explored with results demonstrating that only 40% of respondents were in agreement with industry and scientists who believe the trade could be an exemplar of a sustainable use of coral reefs. We believe that a more transparent evidence base, including the publication of the species collected and cultured, will go some way to align the concept of a sustainable trade across industry stakeholders and better inform the hobbyist when purchasing their aquaria stock. We conclude by proposing that a certification scheme established with government support is the most effective way to move towards a self-regulating industry. It would prevent industry “greenwashing” from multiple certification schemes, alleviate conservation concerns, and, ultimately, support aquaculture initiatives alongside well managed ornamental fisheries.
The rabbit nephrogenic zone in culture: past, present and future as a model to investigate causes of impaired nephrogenesis

In preterm infants, intrauterine as well as extrauterine influences are held responsible for causing prematurity of renal parenchyma and impaired nephrogenesis, leading to a high incidence of severe kidney diseases later in life. Although involved noxae and resulting molecular effects are quite different, all of them converge to the nephrogenic zone which is restricted to the outer cortex of a developing kidney. Covered by the organ capsule, it consists of aligned ureteric bud-derived collecting duct (CD) ampullae containing epithelial stem cells, nephrogenic mesenchymal stem cells, renal vesicles and S-shaped bodies. Owing to the complex composition of the nephrogenic zone and the different noxae, it is appropriate to investigate impaired nephrogenesis with an adequate in vitro system. In this case, isolation and culture of the nephrogenic zone from neonatal rabbit kidney is particularly well-suited. As compared to human specimens, it exhibits to a large extend a comparable microarchitecture. However, a decisive advantage is that it can be easily and quickly isolated in original composition with microsurgical techniques. Thus, pieces of the explant are available to a variety of advanced culture experiments. Formation of renal spheroids can be used for drug toxicity testing. Mounting in a tissue carrier makes it possible to register functional differentiation of the CD epithelium. Perfusion culture within an artificial interstitium enables investigation of spatial development of tubules. The present article has been written to inform about past and present results, recognized risks and future challenges.
Haptic display of melodic intervals for musical applications

The focus of this study was to investigate the ability to discriminate between melodic intervals of the equal tempered scale based solely on vibrotactile stimulation. In music, a melodic interval is the musical distance between two pitches, or notes, that are played sequentially. This paper tests the hypothesis that people can detect melodic intervals that are presented to different body sites such as the fingertip of the index finger of the non-dominant hand, as well as to the flank, the lateral region between the ribcage and the hip bone. Vibrotactile stimuli on the flank were displayed through voice coils of different diameters (0 13 mm and 0 25 mm respectively), while those at the finger were displayed with a 0 13 mm diameter voice coil. Six melodic intervals ranging from a minor second (A/=100 cents) to a perfect fifth (A/=700 cents) were compared to the reference interval of a perfect prime (A/=0 cents) at a fundamental frequency (/) of 65 Hz. Discrimination was significant for intervals as small as a major second (A/=200 cents; i.e. 8Hz, or 12.3%), depending on the location of the body. Overall, results tend to suggest that larger intervals are less difficult to detect than smaller intervals.
Scientific Background Machinery Regulating Vesicle Traffic, A Major Transport System in our Cells

The 2013 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded to Dr. James E. Rothman, Dr. Randy W. Schekman and Dr. Thomas C. Südhof for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells. This represents a paradigm shift in our understanding of how the eukaryotic cell, with its complex internal compartmentalization, organizes the routing of molecules packaged in vesicles to various intracellular destinations, as well as to the outside of the cell. Specificity in the delivery of molecular cargo is essential for cell function and survival. This specificity is required for the release of neurotransmitters into the presynaptic region of a nerve cell to transmit a signal to a neighboring nerve cell. Likewise, specificity is required for the export of hormones such as insulin to the cell surface. While vesicles within the cell were long known to be critical components of this transportation scheme, the precise mechanism by which these vesicles found their correct destination and how they fused with organelles or the plasma membrane to deliver the cargo remained mysterious. The work of the three 2013 Laureates radically altered our understanding of this aspect of cell physiology. Randy W. Schekman used yeast genetics to identify a set of genes critical for vesicular trafficking. He showed that these genes were essential for life and could be classified into three categories regulating different aspects of vesicle transport. James E. Rothman embarked on a biochemical approach and identified proteins that form a functional complex controlling cell fusion. Proteins on the vesicle and target membrane sides bind in specific combinations, ensuring precise delivery of molecular cargo to the right destination. Thomas C. Südhof became interested in how vesicle fusion machinery was controlled. He unraveled the mechanism by which calcium ions trigger release of neurotransmitters, and identified key regulatory components in the vesicle fusion machinery. Together, Rothman, Schekman and Südhof have transformed the way we view transport of molecular cargo to specific destinations inside and outside the cell. Their discoveries explain a long-standing enigma in cell biology and also shed new light on how disturbances in this machinery can have deleterious effects and contribute to conditions such as neurological diseases, diabetes, and immunological disorders. Introduction
Efficacy of a synbiotic chewable tablet in the prevention of antibiotic-associated diarrhea

Infection by Clostridium difficile, a complication of treatment with antibiotics, causes antibiotic- associated diarrhea (AAD) and can lead to colitis and pseudomembranous colitis. Incidence of C. difficile infection is increasing among the elderly undergoing antibiotics therapy confined to health care facilities, conditions that are expensive to treat, decrease the quality of life and are life threatening. Use of probiotics has been proposed as a method to decrease the incidence of AAD in health care facilities. To examine the efficacy of using probiotics, 120 nursing home residents undergoing antibiotic therapy were provided with a synbiotic tablet containing two probiotics, Saccharomyces boulardii and Bacillus coagulans, and a prebiotic, fructooligosaccharide. Residents were evaluated retrospectively for AAD and C. difficile infection. It was found that 95% of residents treated with antibiotics and taking the synbiotic tablet were free of AAD. More than 97% of the residents did not become infected with C. difficile. No adverse effects were reported. Minor side effects, gastrointestinal upset and nausea, were reported by less than 6% of the residents. The cause of the minor side effects was not known. Only 2.5% of the residents stopped taking the synbiotic tablet because of the gastrointestinal upset. These Results suggest that use of the synbiotic tablet prevents AAD and C. difficile infection in nursing home residents undergoing antibiotic therapy. It is concluded that this synbiotic tablet provides an easy to administer and safe approach to controlling AAD and C. difficile infection in residents in nursing homes.
A COMIDA E A SOCIABILIDADE NA CULTURA POMERANA

Este artigo objetiva identificar as comidas de origem pomerana e as tradicoes a elas associadas, explorando o processo de construcao continuada das tradicoes culinarias nos rituais, nas festas e no cotidiano dos pomeranos. Trata-se de uma etnografia realizada em duas comunidades rurais do estado do Espirito Santo - Brasil. As comidas tipicas pomeranas e as tradicoes associadas a culinaria local estao repletas de significados e podem ser consideradas como uma linguagem que fala sobre familia, relacoes sociais, trabalho, genero e religiao. A reciprocidade, troca e doacoes de comida sao muito presentes no cotidiano e nos rituais pomeranos, envolvendo nao so a comida, mas tambem sementes e ate o emprestimo de utensilios de cozinha para a organizacao das festividades. Nesse sentido, nas comunidades pomeranas estudadas, alem de alimentar o corpo fisico, a comida alimenta o corpo social, amalgamando as relacoes sociais e afetivas.
Voting for related entities

Entity search is an emerging research topic in Information Retrieval, where the goal is to rank not documents, but entities in response to a given query. A particularly challenging example of this search scenario is when a user's underlying information need is for a list of entities related to a given entity, represented in the query. In this paper, we propose to tackle this problem as a voting process, by considering the occurrence of an entity among the top ranked documents for a given query as a vote for the existence of a relationship between this and the entity in the query. Our proposed approach is evaluated using a large Web test collection, in the context of the TREC 2009 Entity track. The results attest the effectiveness of our approach when compared to the top participants at TREC, with unparalleled gains in terms of recall. Moreover, through a comprehensive failure analysis, we uncover important issues to be considered when tackling this new search scenario and draw valuable insights towards achieving an effective related entity search performance.
Control robusto paramétrico QFT del sistema del formador de onda en un molino de laminación en caliente

In the present work, two single loop controllers are designed by Quantitative Feedback Theory control technique to keep stability and performance in the presence of parametric uncertainties in a hot rolling mill. The controllers are designed for the strip tension and looper angular position loops. Their performance is evaluated and compared against Proportional-Integral controllers as well as those that currently exist in most of the hot strip mills. Simulations are carried out by connecting the controllers as a diagonal control and tested in the 2 × 2 multivariable model of the lopper system, thus to assess the controllers’ capabilities for reducing interactions as well.
Usability and performance of the leap motion controller and oculus rift for interior decoration

At present common problems in interior design involve in many aspects such as customer's satisfaction not met, understanding mismatch between designers and customers since they are not on the same page. Therefore, we aim to develop a VR application for interior decoration in order to let customers decorate a virtual room according to their preferences and be able to share the image of their design to the designer and evaluate usability of the application. The principle of the application is to simulate the Virtual Reality (VR) via Oculus Rift CV1 cooperating a Leap Motion controller, a hand movement and gesture detection device which help users easily design, arrange, and move 3D objects (furniture) in the virtual environment. There are three main functionalities of the application. First, creating a floor plan to define an interior design area. Second, placing the furniture on the scene, which they cannot be overlapped. Third, user movement can be done by the virtual joystick controlled by hand movement. When the design is not complete, the user can save his/her work in XML format in order to work on the design later. Once the design is finished, the user can capture a bird's eye view of the work for better understanding between designers and customers. The performance evaluation of the application can be categorized into two groups: 1) Quantitative method: by assigning tasks to the tester users in order to evaluate the application in learnability aspect. 2) Qualitative method: using Bipolar Laddering (BLA), a participatory subjective exploration method on user experience, to find strengths and weaknesses of the application. The result of the evaluation shows that the average score of learnability is 4.58 out of 5.0 which means that the users would be able to create a floor plan and place furniture as they wish easily on the scene. The application gives the users more realistic view, and the design output can be used in the real world.
Health insurance coverage with or without a nurse-led task shifting strategy for hypertension control: A pragmatic cluster randomized trial in Ghana

Background Poor access to care and physician shortage are major barriers to hypertension control in sub-Saharan Africa. Implementation of evidence-based systems-level strategies targeted at these barriers are lacking. We conducted a study to evaluate the comparative effectiveness of provision of health insurance coverage (HIC) alone versus a nurse-led task shifting strategy for hypertension control (TASSH) plus HIC on systolic blood pressure (SBP) reduction among patients with uncontrolled hypertension in Ghana. Methods and findings Using a pragmatic cluster randomized trial, 32 community health centers within Ghana’s public healthcare system were randomly assigned to either HIC alone or TASSH + HIC. A total of 757 patients with uncontrolled hypertension were recruited between November 28, 2012, and June 11, 2014, and followed up to October 7, 2016. Both intervention groups received health insurance coverage plus scheduled nurse visits, while TASSH + HIC comprised cardiovascular risk assessment, lifestyle counseling, and initiation/titration of antihypertensive medications for 12 months, delivered by trained nurses within the healthcare system. The primary outcome was change in SBP from baseline to 12 months. Secondary outcomes included lifestyle behaviors and blood pressure control at 12 months and sustainability of SBP reduction at 24 months. Of the 757 patients (389 in the HIC group and 368 in the TASSH + HIC group), 85% had 12-month data available (60% women, mean BP 155.9/89.6 mm Hg). In intention-to-treat analyses adjusted for clustering, the TASSH + HIC group had a greater SBP reduction (−20.4 mm Hg; 95% CI −25.2 to −15.6) than the HIC group (−16.8 mm Hg; 95% CI −19.2 to −15.6), with a statistically significant between-group difference of −3.6 mm Hg (95% CI −6.1 to −0.5; p = 0.021). Blood pressure control improved significantly in both groups (55.2%, 95% CI 50.0% to 60.3%, for the TASSH + HIC group versus 49.9%, 95% CI 44.9% to 54.9%, for the HIC group), with a non-significant between-group difference of 5.2% (95% CI −1.8% to 12.4%; p = 0.29). Lifestyle behaviors did not change appreciably in either group. Twenty-one adverse events were reported (9 and 12 in the TASSH + HIC and HIC groups, respectively). The main study limitation is the lack of cost-effectiveness analysis to determine the additional costs and benefits, if any, of the TASSH + HIC group. Conclusions Provision of health insurance coverage plus a nurse-led task shifting strategy was associated with a greater reduction in SBP than provision of health insurance coverage alone, among patients with uncontrolled hypertension in Ghana. Future scale-up of these systems-level strategies for hypertension control in sub-Saharan Africa requires a cost–benefit analysis. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01802372
Carcinogenicity of Captafol in F344/DuCrj Rats

Captafol was administered at dietary levels of 0 (control), 750 and 1,500 parts per million (ppm) to groups of 50 male and 50 female F344/DuCrj rats for 104 weeks, and then all animals were maintained without captafol for a further 8 weeks, and killed in week 113. Renal cell carcinoma was found in eight of 50 male rats treated with 1,500 ppm and in one of 50 male rats treated with 750 ppm of captafol. The incidences of renal adenomas, including micro‐adenomas, and basophilic altered cell tubules were significantly higher in both sexes treated with captafol than in controls, and the increases were apparently dose‐dependent except that of adenomas in females. The incidences of neoplastic and preneoplastic lesions of the kidney in captafol‐treated animals were higher in males than in females. Captafol also induced hepatocellular carcinomas in four of 50 female rats in the 1,500 ppm group. The incidences of hyperplastic (neoplastic) nodules and foci of cellular alterations in the liver were also significantly increased in both sexes treated with captafol, the increases being dose‐dependent. In conclusion, captafol induced renal cell carcinomas in male rats and hepatocellular carcinomas in female rats.
Imaging Atomic Structure and Dynamics with Ultrafast X-ray Scattering

Measuring atomic-resolution images of materials with x-ray photons during chemical reactions or physical transformations resides at the technological forefront of x-ray science. New x-ray–based experimental capabilities have been closely linked with advances in x-ray sources, a trend that will continue with the impending arrival of x-ray–free electron lasers driven by electron accelerators. We discuss recent advances in ultrafast x-ray science and coherent imaging made possible by linear-accelerator–based light sources. These studies highlight the promise of ultrafast x-ray lasers, as well as the technical challenges and potential range of applications that will accompany these transformative x-ray light sources.