Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Application of stool-PCR test for diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori infection in children.

AIM To evaluate the usefulness of stool-PCR test for diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori (H pylori) infection in pediatric populations. METHODS Based on endoscopic features (including nodular gastritis, erosive duodenitis and ulcer) and/or a positive rapid urease test (RUT) obtained during endoscopy, 28 children from a group of children admitted to the Children's Medical Center of Tehran for persistent upper gastrointestinal problems were selected to compare biopsy-based tests with stool-PCR. Their gastric activity and bacterial density were graded by the updated Sydney system, and their first stool after endoscopy was stored at -70 degrees C. Biopsies were cultured on modified campy-blood agar plates and identified by gram-staining, biochemical tests, and PCR. Two methods of phenol-chloroform and boiling were used for DNA extraction from H pylori isolates. Isolation of DNA from stool was performed using a stool DNA extraction kit (Bioneer Inc, Korea). PCR was performed using primers for detection of vacA, cagA, and 16srRNA genes in both isolates and stool. RESULTS Sixteen out of 28 child patients (57%) were classified as H pylori positive by biopsy-based tests, of which 11 (39%) were also positive by stool-PCR. Sensitivity and specificity of stool-PCR was 62.5% and 92.3% respectively. H pylori was observed in histological sections for 10 out of 11 stool-positive patients. Association was observed between higher score of H pylori in histology and positivity of stool-PCR. Also association was observed between the more severe form of gastritis and a positive stool-PCR. CONCLUSION Association between higher score of H pylori in histology and a positive stool-PCR make it a very useful test for detection of H pylori active infection in children. We also suggest that a simple stool-PCR method can be a useful test for detection of H pylori virulence genes in stool.
Metabolic syndrome in peritoneal dialysis patients

Cardiovascular morbidity and mortality are common in peritoneal dialysis patients. Metabolic syndrome (MES) is a medical condition with a clustering of major risk factors for cardiovascular diseases. In this review article, the various diagnostic criteria used in MES are discussed. It is proposed to use a modified National Cholesterol Education Programme Adult Treatment Panel III (NCEP ATP III) criteria for the diagnosis of MES in peritoneal dialysis (PD) patients taking into consideration the scientific evidence and practicality. When three or more of the following criteria are satisfied in PD patients, obesity, high triglyceride, low high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), hypertension or dysglycaemia, they are diagnosed as having MES. Body mass index (BMI) with reference to ethnicity is suggested to replace waist circumference for diagnosing obesity. Epidemiology and outcome of PD patients with MES are highlighted. The adverse sequelae of obesity appear to be primarily due to fat mass rather than non-fat mass, possibly related to the pro-inflammatory effect of adipose tissue. Whilst there are therapies to tackle MES in PD patients, more conclusive data in human studies to see clinically improved outcomes with such strategies are needed.
A novel three-phase high-power soft switched DC/DC converter for low voltage fuel cell applications

An efficient DC/DC converter is needed as the interface between a low-voltage fuel cell source and a high-voltage bus for inverter operation. In this paper, a three-phase transformer-isolated DC/DC converter utilizing phase-shift modulation is proposed. The converter must be able to boost the voltage significantly and operate at current levels above 240 amps on the source side. Key features of the proposed converter include: reduced transformer turns-ratio by a factor of two while maintaining the same output voltage, reduced the size of passive components including output filter and input DC bus capacitor using three-phase interleaving, eliminated inductor current ripple at phase-shift angles above 120/spl deg/, and achieved soft switching over a wide load range without auxiliary circuitry. The proposed converter has been analyzed, simulated and implemented in hardware. An efficiency of above 96% was achieved using the prototype unit. Experimental results were used to verify all design and analysis.
Application-motivated combinations of fuzzy, interval and probability approaches, with application to geoinformatics, bioinformatics, and engineering

Since the 1960s, many algorithms have been designed to deal with interval uncertainty. In the last decade, there has been a lot of progress in extending these algorithms to the case when we have a combination of interval, probabilistic, and fuzzy uncertainty. We provide an overview of related algorithms, results, and remaining open problems.
Functional effects of caloxin 1c2, a novel engineered selective inhibitor of plasma membrane Ca2+-pump isoform 4, on coronary artery

Coronary artery smooth muscle expresses the plasma membrane Ca2+ pump (PMCA) isoforms PMCA4 and PMCA1. We previously reported the peptide inhibitor caloxin 1b1 that was obtained by using extracellular domain 1 of PMCA4 as the target (Am J Physiol Cell.290 [2006] C1341). To engineer inhibitors with greater affinity and isoform selectivity, we have now created a phage display library of caloxin 1b1‐like peptides. We screened this library by affinity chromatography with PMCA from erythrocyte ghosts that contain mainly PMCA4 to obtain caloxin 1c2. Key properties of caloxin 1c2 are (a) Ki = 2.3 ± 0.3 μM which corresponds to a 20× higher affinity for PMCA4 than that of caloxin 1b1 and (b) it is selective for PMCA4 since it has greater than 10‐fold affinity for PMCA4 than for PMCA1, 2 or 3. It had the following functional effects on coronary artery smooth muscle: (a) it increased basal tone of the de‐endothelialized arteries; the increase being similar at 10, 20 or 50 μM, and (b) it enhanced the increase in the force of contraction at 0.05 but not at 1.6 mM extracellular Ca2+ when Ca2+ extrusion via the Na+–Ca2+ exchanger and the sarco/endoplasmic reticulum Ca2+ pump were inhibited. We conclude that PMCA4 is pivotal to Ca2+ extrusion in coronary artery smooth muscle. We anticipate caloxin 1c2 to aid in understanding the role of PMCA4 in signal transduction and home‐ostasis due to its isoform selectivity and ability to act when added extracellularly.
Distinct Roles for Onset and Sustained Activity in the Neuronal Code for Temporal Periodicity and Acoustic Envelope Shape

Auditory neurons are selective for temporal sound information that is important for rhythm, pitch, and timbre perception. Traditional models assume that periodicity information is represented either by the discharge rate of tuned modulation filters or synchrony in the discharge pattern. Compelling evidence for an invariant rate or synchrony code, however, is lacking and neither of these models account for how the sound envelope shape is encoded. We examined the neuronal representation for envelope shape and periodicity in the cat central nucleus of the inferior colliculus (CNIC) with modulated broadband noise that lacks spectral cues and produces a periodicity pitch percept solely based on timing information. The modulation transfer functions of CNIC neurons differed dramatically across stimulus conditions with identical periodicity but different envelope shapes implying that shape contributed significantly to the neuronal response. We therefore devised a shuffled correlation procedure to quantify how periodicity and envelope shape contribute to the temporal discharge pattern. Sustained responses faithfully encode envelope shape at low modulation rates but deteriorate and fail to account for timing and envelope information at high rates. Surprisingly, onset responses accurately entrained to the stimulus and provided a means of encoding repetition information at high rates. Finally, we demonstrate that envelope shape information is accurately reflected in the population discharge pattern such that shape is readily discriminated for repetition frequencies up to ∼100 Hz. These results argue against conventional rate- or synchrony-based codes and provide two complementary temporal mechanisms by which CNIC neurons can encode envelope shape and repetition information in natural sounds.
Stimulation of bioluminescence in Noctiluca sp. using controlled temperature changes.

Bioluminescence induced by multifarious stimuli has long been observed and is remains under investigation because of its great complexity. In particular, the exact mechanism underlying bioluminescence is not yet fully understood. This work presents a new experimental method for studying Noctiluca sp. bioluminescence under temperature change stimulation. It is a study of Noctiluca sp. bioluminescence using controlled temperature changes in a tank. A characteristic of this experiment is the large volume of water used (1 m(3) in a tank of 2 × 1 × 1 m). Temperature changes were controlled by two methods. In the first, a flask filled with hot water was introduced into the tank and in the second, a water heater was used in the tank. Temperature changes were recorded using sensors. Noctiluca sp. bioluminescence was recorded using a Canon 5D Mark II and this allowed the characteristics of Noctiluca sp. bioluminescence under temperature change stimulation to be monitored.
Life at the Top: Rank and Stress in Wild Male Baboons

Alpha males have higher stress levels than beta males in a wild baboon society. In social hierarchies, dominant individuals experience reproductive and health benefits, but the costs of social dominance remain a topic of debate. Prevailing hypotheses predict that higher-ranking males experience higher testosterone and glucocorticoid (stress hormone) levels than lower-ranking males when hierarchies are unstable but not otherwise. In this long-term study of rank-related stress in a natural population of savannah baboons (Papio cynocephalus), high-ranking males had higher testosterone and lower glucocorticoid levels than other males, regardless of hierarchy stability. The singular exception was for the highest-ranking (alpha) males, who exhibited both high testosterone and high glucocorticoid levels. In particular, alpha males exhibited much higher stress hormone levels than second-ranking (beta) males, suggesting that being at the very top may be more costly than previously thought.
Metaphor, Inference, and Conceptualisation : On the Development of V-diao Construction in Mandarin

A) Physical disappearance from its original position, with the V slot filled by physical verbs, such as tao-diao " escape " , diu-diao " throw away " , and so on. B) Disappearance from a certain conceptual domain, rather than from the physical space, with the V slot filled by less physically perceivable verbs, such as jie-diao " quit " , wang-diao " forget " and the like. C) The third category of V-diao involves speaker's subjective, always negative, attitude to the result. Examples include: lan-diao " rot " , ruan-diao " soften " , huang-diao " turn yellow " , and so forth. The meaning in Type C constructions cannot be gained by simply putting their component parts together, so in this study, I shall term V-diao as a construction (Goldberg 1995) rather than merely a resultative compound (Li and Thompson 1981). , is a plausible account of the polysemy between Type A and B. Type A denotes disappearance from physical space, while Type B disappearance from the conceptual space. I thus speculate on the mapping relation between the physical and the abstract, conceptual domain. Other than metaphor, pragmatic inference is claimed to be a major mechanism of such changes, context plays a crucial role. Frequent use of a grammatical or lexical unit in a particular context may lead to the inference that the context is an integral part of its meaning. The development of Type C V-diao may relate to frequent co-occurrence of negative verbs and-diao. (The reason why only negative verbs are allowed in the construction will be further addressed in the next section.) Consequently, negative connotation may spread to the entire construction and give rise to the constructional meaning.
Invasion of the leukocytes into the fetal‐maternal interface during pregnancy

No other organ in the body undergoes such an invasion of selective cells (leukocytes) and release of homing molecules, CAMs, proinflammatory cytokines, and mediators or undergoes similar extensive remodeling of tissues over such a short period of time as the pregnant uterus. This is especially interesting, as an infectious process involving microorganisms does not exist in a healthy pregnancy and delivery. Furthermore, after delivery of the baby and placenta, the uterus involutes and returns to its normal monthly cycling, and most of the leukocytes are swept away or leave. In this review, we discuss leukocyte infiltration and recruitment and the potential roles of each subpopulation of leukocytes in relation to pregnancy and the problems of preterm birth, pre‐eclampsia, and intrauterine growth restriction.
The Efficiency of Pulsed Radiofrequency Application on L5 and L6 Dorsal Roots in Rabbits Developing Neuropathic Pain

Background: Injury of a peripheral nerve may lead to neuropathic pain, a form of chronic pain that does not respond to traditional pain therapies. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of pulsed radiofrequency (PRF) applied to the L5 and L6 dorsal roots on the neuropathic pain that develops after sciatic nerve injury in rabbits. Methods: In this study, 18 New Zealand rabbits were used. These were divided into 3 groups. In groups 1 and 2, the left sciatic nerve was tightly ligated as a partial ligation model with 4-0 silk sutures. Group 3 was a sham group. Pulsed radiofrequency was applied to group 1 rabbits on both dorsal roots at 42°C for 8 mins. The responses of all the groups to thermal and mechanical stimuli were measured for a period of 4 weeks after this process. Results: Ten days after ligation of the left sciatic nerve and before PRF application, neuropathic pain occurred; the responses of groups 1 and 2 to the hot plate test and to the mechanical stimulus were lower (P < 0.005) when compared with the baseline values. There were no statistically significant differences between baseline values and group 1 rabbits' responses to the hot plate test 2 weeks after the application of PRF or to the mechanical stimulus 3 weeks after RF application. The decrease seen in group 2 persisted after 4 weeks (P < 0.001). Conclusions: The hyperalgesia that develops as a result of neuropathic pain in rabbits was observed to be reduced by PRF application.
Otitis media in children (acute).

INTRODUCTION In the UK, about 30% of children under 3 years of age visit their GPs each year with acute otitis media (AOM), and 97% of these receive antibiotics. In the USA, AOM is the most common reason for outpatient antibiotic treatment. Without antibiotics, AOM resolves within 24 hours in about 60% of children, and within 3 days in about 80% of children. METHODS AND OUTCOMES We conducted a systematic review and aimed to answer the following clinical questions: What are the effects of treatments for AOM in children; and what are the effects of interventions to prevent recurrence? We searched: Medline, Embase, The Cochrane Library and other important databases up to January 2007. (Clinical Evidence reviews are updated periodically; please check our website for the most up-to-date version of this review). We included harms alerts from relevant organisations such as the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). RESULTS We found 19 systematic reviews, RCTs, or observational studies that met our inclusion criteria. We performed a GRADE evaluation of the quality of evidence for interventions. CONCLUSIONS In this systematic review we present information relating to the effectiveness and safety of the following interventions: analgesics, antibiotics, delayed antibiotics, immediate antibiotics, long-term antibiotic prophylaxis, longer courses of antibiotics, myringotomy, pneumococcal vaccination, tympanostomy with ventilation tubes.
A Statistical Method for Integrated Data Cleaning and Imputation

Real-world databases often contain both syntactic and semantic errors, in spite of integrity constraints and other safety measures incorporated into standard DBMSs. This is primarily due to the broad scope of incorrect data values that are difficult to fully express using the general types of constraints available. As a result many errors are subtle, and laborious to detect with manually-specified rules. However, combining statistical methods with extensions to conventional integrity constraints makes it possible to develop automated data cleaning methods for a variety of relational dependencies. In this work, we focus on exploiting the statistical dependencies among tuples in relational domains such as sensor networks, supply chain systems, and fraud detection. We identify potential statistical dependencies among the data values of related tuples and develop algorithms to automatically estimate these dependencies, utilizing them to jointly fill in missing values at the same time as identifying and correcting errors. The key features of our method are that (1) it uses an efficient approximate inference algorithm that is easily implemented in standard DBMSs and scales well to large databases sizes, and (2) it uses shrinkage and joint inference to accurately infer correct values even in the presence of both missing and corrupt values. We evaluate the method empirically on both synthetic and real-world genealogy data and compare to a baseline statistical method that uses Bayesian networks with exact inference. The results show that our algorithm achieves accuracy comparable to the baseline with respect to inferring missing values. However, our algorithm scales linearly rather than exponentially and can also simultaneously identify and correct corrupted values with high accuracy.
Material Characterization of Glass, Carbon, and Hybrid-Fiber SCRIMP Panels

The purpose of this study was to generate the material database for carbon and glass composite panels created by the SCRIMP process. The materials tested were glass/polyester composites, two types of carbon/polyester composites, and carbon and glass hybrid composites. The differences between the two types of carbon/polyester, which we call Type 1 and Type 2, are the ply thickness (.037 inch/ply and .048 inch/ply) and slightly different treatment of polyester resin. The tests that were performed for this study are four-point-bending tests, tension tests, panel warping tests, and beam bend-twist coupling tests. The material properties of interest were basic longitudinal and transverse stiffness and strength, residual stress due to curing, and the effect of bend-twist coupling. The bend-twist coupling is a feature that can be added to the composite laminate or structure, such that when it is bent, it will also twist.
Multiatlas segmentation of thoracic and abdominal anatomy with level set‐based local search

Segmentation of organs at risk (OARs) remains one of the most time‐consuming tasks in radiotherapy treatment planning. Atlas‐based segmentation methods using single templates have emerged as a practical approach to automate the process for brain or head and neck anatomy, but pose significant challenges in regions where large interpatient variations are present. We show that significant changes are needed to autosegment thoracic and abdominal datasets by combining multi‐atlas deformable registration with a level set‐based local search. Segmentation is hierarchical, with a first stage detecting bulk organ location, and a second step adapting the segmentation to fine details present in the patient scan. The first stage is based on warping multiple presegmented templates to the new patient anatomy using a multimodality deformable registration algorithm able to cope with changes in scanning conditions and artifacts. These segmentations are compacted in a probabilistic map of organ shape using the STAPLE algorithm. Final segmentation is obtained by adjusting the probability map for each organ type, using customized combinations of delineation filters exploiting prior knowledge of organ characteristics. Validation is performed by comparing automated and manual segmentation using the Dice coefficient, measured at an average of 0.971 for the aorta, 0.869 for the trachea, 0.958 for the lungs, 0.788 for the heart, 0.912 for the liver, 0.884 for the kidneys, 0.888 for the vertebrae, 0.863 for the spleen, and 0.740 for the spinal cord. Accurate atlas segmentation for abdominal and thoracic regions can be achieved with the usage of a multi‐atlas and perstructure refinement strategy. To improve clinical workflow and efficiency, the algorithm was embedded in a software service, applying the algorithm automatically on acquired scans without any user interaction. PACS numbers: 87.57. nm, 87.57. N‐, 87.57. Q‐
Experimental study of multi-damage detection in a plate based on non-modal method

Many published damage localization indices require structural modal identification and mathematical model of the undamaged structure. However, it is somewhat inconvenient for use in practical engineering. In this study, an efficient localization index has been presented, named as image flexibility of frequency response function, for damage detection in plate-like structures. In order to avoid the finite element model error, two-dimensional gapped smoothing method is employed without the need for the baseline data from a presumably undamaged structure. To assess the effectiveness of the proposed scheme, experimental studies on a multi-damage steel plate are carried out. Meanwhile, the effects of damage magnitude and boundary condition on detection results are also discussed. The results show the effectiveness and robustness of the non-modal method compared to those found in the literature.