Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effects of Excess Energy Intake on Glucose and Lipid Metabolism in C57BL/6 Mice

Excess energy intake correlates with the development of metabolic disorders. However, different energy-dense foods have different effects on metabolism. To compare the effects of a high-fat diet, a high-fructose diet and a combination high-fat/high-fructose diet on glucose and lipid metabolism, male C57BL/6 mice were fed with one of four different diets for 3 months: standard chow; standard diet and access to fructose water; a high fat diet; and a high fat diet with fructose water. After 3 months of feeding, the high-fat and the combined high-fat/high-fructose groups showed significantly increased body weights, accompanied by hyperglycemia and insulin resistance; however, the high-fructose group was not different from the control group. All three energy-dense groups showed significantly higher visceral fat weights, total cholesterol concentrations, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations compared with the control group. Assays of basal metabolism showed that the respiratory quotient of the high-fat, the high-fructose, and the high-fat/high-fructose groups decreased compared with the control group. The present study confirmed the deleterious effect of high energy diets on body weight and metabolism, but suggested that the energy efficiency of the high-fructose diet was much lower than that of the high-fat diet. In addition, fructose supplementation did not worsen the detrimental effects of high-fat feeding alone on metabolism in C57BL/6 mice.
Germination of dry, airborne conidia of Monilinia laxa and disease expression on nectarine fruit

The growth and infection from dry Monilinia laxa conidia were studied on nectarine fruit (cultivar Flamekist) at different phenological stages. Fruit were dusted with dry conidia in a settling tower giving an average of five solitary conidia/mm2 and incubated for 3 to 48 h at high relative humidity (≥ 93%, humid fruit) or covered with a film of water (wet fruit). Germination of solitary conidia, appressorium formation and germling viability were examined by fluorescence microscopy after each incubation period. Inoculated fruit were left unsterile to detect the pathogen on the fruit surface or surface-sterilised to detectmycelia in the skin tissue. Unsterile or surface-sterilised fruit were selected for skin isolations onto potato-dextrose agar, paraquat treatment or dry incubation (≤56% RH). The tests were conducted to determine surface colonisation, penetration and symptom expression. Paraquat was used to terminate host resistance and to promote development and sporulation of M. laxa. Microscopical observations and findings of the fruit tests clearly showed that fruit at the pit hardening stage were resistant to penetration and disease expression. This indicates that infection at this stage should not contribute to a gradual build-up of secondary inoculum in nectarine orchards or to disease expression shortly before or after harvest. Results also showed that resistance to penetration and disease expression decreased with fruit maturity and with cold storage. Furthermore, increased wetness and wetness duration markedly increased penetration and disease expression on ripening fruit and should therefore be decisive in M. laxa epiphytotics in nectarine orchards.
The degree of dynamism for workforce scheduling problem with stochastic task duration

Real time dispatching strategies in a dynamic environment is a growing area of interest. Most of current work focuses mainly on two dynamic aspects of the problem, namely dynamic arrival of jobs and dynamic travel time. The degree of dynamism, for example is defined with respect to dynamic arrival of jobs. This paper focuses on another dynamic aspect, namely the duration of tasks. This aspect becomes important when tasks durations are relatively long and, in addition, one has to respect time windows. We characterize the degree of dynamism of such problems and show that it relates with the expected cost of a static scheduler which is reapplied in light of dynamic events. Furthermore, preliminary experiments indicate that the performance of the scheduler can be improved when the expected duration of a task is overestimated.
The race that precedes coactivation: development of multisensory facilitation in children.

RATIONALE The facilitating effect of multisensory integration on motor responses in adults is much larger than predicted by race-models and is in accordance with the idea of coactivation. However, the development of multisensory facilitation of endogenously driven motor processes and its relationship to the development of complex cognitive skills in school-age children is largely unexplored. METHOD Twenty adults and 95 children where allocated into six age groups: 6, 7, 8, 9, 10-11 and adults. Participants' motor reaction times (MRTs) and accuracy in response to the detection of auditory, visual and audiovisual stimuli were recorded. Children's reading accuracy and nonverbal IQ were also assessed. RESULTS In general, MRTs of children were significantly slower with greater variability than those of adults. Although the average level of multisensory facilitation was similar for all age groups, mean cumulative density functions (CDFs) showed that multisensory facilitation in 6 and 10-11-year-olds is within the predictive limits of race-models. Where coactivation was seen in the CDF of individual children it was not as strong or as consistent as that in adults. The degree of multisensory facilitation did not correlate with age, reading accuracy or IQ. CONCLUSION The average level of multisensory facilitation to endogenously driven motor responses does not change gradually with age nor is it related to intelligence or reading accuracy. In general, multisensory integration remains immature until 10-11 years of age and lies within the predicted confines of race-models.
The Electoral Relevance of Local Party Organizations

We examine the role that one group of party units—county party organizations—play in electoral politics, based on electoral and county party organizational data collected during 1980–84. Local party chairs report their organizations are involved in a number of electorally relevant activities, including candidate recruitment, joint planning with candidate organizations, and various independent campaign activities. The data demonstrate that county party organizations are indeed effective. The probability of a minority party's running candidates for lower-level offices, which appears to contribute to higher vote totals for higher-level offices, is a function of the local strength and activity level of the party; whereas direct effects are seen to be small. These data suggest that even if mainly at the candidate recruitment stage of the process, party organizations play an important role in local electoral politics.
Urban spaces and lifestyles in Central Asia and beyond: an introduction

Chunkurchak is a marvellous place. Just 40 kilometres south of Kyrgyzstan’s capital, Bishkek, and into the forelands of the Tian Shan mountain range, its picturesque landscape offers everything that has come to be associated with a jailoo, a summer pasture: looking up, the snow-capped peaks appear closer than they are, a mountain river meanders through alpine meadows and passes forest belts – and in the further distance the Chuy Valley, with its bustling centre, Bishkek, seems far away in many ways. But Chunkurchak is more than that. It is a winter ski resort and features diverse dining and accommodation opportunities. Unique among them is Supara, an ‘ethno-style’ restaurant and hotel complex. It serves Kyrgyz national dishes, and the interior is dominated by wooden furniture with traditional ornament. Yet the main feature of Supara is that the architecture of both the restaurant building and the cottages offered for overnight stays resemble a boz ui (or yurt), the round felt tent that is a key element in Kyrgyzstan’s nomadic heritage. Supara is interesting for this volume because it connects to the city and to contemporary urban lifestyles in Bishkek in multiple ways. Nowadays, a place like Supara not only attracts ‘Western’ tourists, but is also a getaway for Bishkek’s affluent middle and upper classes. It caters to the recent trend of celebrating and commodifying Kyrgyz culture and ethnic identity, the conspicuous consumption of which has become an integral part of the urbanites’ self-presentation (Comaroff and Comaroff 2009). However, the interiors of the boz ui cottages at Supara have not kept to the actual simplicity of previous days, but offer such ‘modern’ comforts as a shower cabin, air conditioning and a flat-screen TV, with Kyrgyz-, Russianand English-language channels to choose from. These different materialities of Supara and the experience it aspires to convey to its clients aim at blurring the boundaries of rural authenticity and urban progress. Away from Chunkurchak or Supara, that exact binary opposing civilized city life to ‘backward’ rural existence has since the Socialist era remained essential for social classifications and antagonistic discourses within many of the urban domains presented in this volume. Besides, this brief reflection on Supara already alludes to some further themes that will become relevant in the following pages, notably the emergence of urbanmiddle-class subjectivities and their consumption of transnational lifestyle goods. The intention of this volume is to complement previous efforts towards an anthropology of post-Socialist urban spaces. These have been rather recent, as during the first decade of research on the former Soviet Central Asia and the Caucasus, urban phenomena
Maternal Separation during Breastfeeding Induces Gender-Dependent Changes in Anxiety and the GABA-A Receptor Alpha-Subunit in Adult Wistar Rats

Different models of rodent maternal separation (MS) have been used to investigate long-term neurobiological and behavioral changes, associated with early stress. However, few studies have involved the analysis of sex-related differences in central anxiety modulation. This study investigated whether MS during breastfeeding affected adult males and females in terms of anxiety and brain GABA-A receptor-alpha-subunit immunoreactivity. The brain areas analyzed were the amygdale (AM), hippocampus (HP), medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), medial preoptic area (POA) and paraventricular nucleus (PVN). Rats were housed under a reversed light/dark cycle (lights off at 7∶00 h) with access to water and food ad libitum. Animals underwent MS twice daily during the dark cycle from postnatal day 1 to postnatal day 21. Behavior was tested when rats were 65–70 days old using the elevated plus maze and after brains were treated for immunohistochemistry. We found that separated females spent more time in the open arms and showed more head dipping behavior compared with controls. The separated males spent more time in the center of the maze and engaged in more stretching behavior than the controls. Immunohistochemistry showed that separated females had less immunostained cells in the HP, mPFC, PVN and POA, while separated males had fewer immunolabeled cells in the PFC, PVN and AM. These results could indicate that MS has gender-specific effects on anxiety behaviors and that these effects are likely related to developmental alterations involving GABA-A neurotransmission.
The Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis Diagnosis and Treatment Cascade in Bangladesh

Objectives To determine, in areas supported by BRAC, Bangladesh i) the pre-diagnosis and pre-treatment attrition among presumptive and confirmed Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis (MDR-TB) patients and ii) factors associated with attrition. Methods This was a retrospective cohort study involving record review. Presumptive MDR-TB patients from peripheral microscopy centres serving 60% of the total population of Bangladesh were included in the study. Attrition and turnaround time for MDR-TB diagnosis by Xpert MTB/RIF and treatment initiation were calculated between July 2012 and June 2014. Results Of 836 presumptive MDR-TB patients referred from 398 peripheral microscopy centres, 161 MDR-TB patients were diagnosed. The number of diagnosed MDR-TB patients was less than country estimates of MDR-TB patients (2000 cases) during the study period. Among those referred, pre-diagnosis and pre-treatment attrition was 17% and 21% respectively. Median turnaround time for MDR-TB testing, result receipt and treatment initiation was four, zero and five days respectively. Farmers (RR=2.3, p=0.01) and daily wage laborers (RR=2.1, p=0.04) had twice the risk of having pre-diagnosis attrition. Poor record-keeping and unreliable upkeep of presumptive MDR-TB patient databases were identified as challenges at the peripheral microscopy centres. Conclusion There was a low proportion of pre-diagnosis and pre-treatment attrition in patients with presumptive and confirmed MDR-TB under programmatic conditions. However, the recording and reporting system did not detect all presumptive MDR-TB patients, highlighting the need to improve the system in order to prevent morbidity, mortality and transmission of MDR-TB in the community.
Measurement based ray launching for analysis of outdoor propagation

Clustering is a key concept of existing MIMO channel models, such as the COST 2100 model. Parameter based clustering has been studied for a while, but how parameter based clusters relate to the physical environment is not well known yet. A measurement based ray launching tool is developed and used for studying clustering and its relation to physical scatterers. By using estimated angles and delays of multi-path components as input to the ray launching tool, the physical scatterers along the propagation paths are visualized. After the physical scatterers are grouped, we notice that when the receiver moves, some physical scatterers continue to contribute to the channel response while others disappear and sometimes also later re-appear as represented by the cluster life time and common clusters in the COST 2100 model. Our measurement based ray launching tool shows significant advantages for further channel analysis and modeling.
Benefits from revascularisation therapy in the elderly with acute myocardial infarction. Comparative analysis of patients hospitalised in 1992-1996 and in 2005-2006.

BACKGROUND Coronary artery disease in the elderly is associated with multilevel atherosclerosis and chronic co-morbidities. AIM To determine benefits from revascularisation in the elderly. METHODS A total of 830 patients over 65 years with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) were included. Of them, 339 admitted in 1992-1996 (38.5% STEMI population hospitalised in 1992-1996) (group 1) and 491 (55.2% STEMI population) admitted in 2005-2006 (group 2) were compared. We examined patient characteristics, the course of hospitalisation, the type of therapy and its effect on in-hospital and long-term prognosis (6-month follow-up). RESULTS The proportion of patients over 65 has increased significantly from 38.5% in 1992-1996 to 55.2% in 2005-2006 (p < 0.001). In 1992-1996 fibrinolysis was administered in 11.2% of patients while 88.8% received conservative treatment. In 2005-2006 reperfusion therapy was used in 52.2% of patients (15.1% fibrinolysis, 37.1% primary angioplasty). The in-hospital and 6-month mortality tended to be lower in the more recent group (21.5% v. 18.5% and 28% v. 23.8%, NS, respectively). In group 1 there were 22.6% of deaths among those receiving conservative treatment versus 13.2% in patients submitted to reperfusion (p = 0.18). In group 2 in-hospital mortality was the lowest in patients undergoing invasive treatment which was associated with a 62% decrease in 6-month mortality as compared with those receiving conservative treatment (p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS Invasive treatment significantly improves in-hospital and long-term survival in older patients with STEMI. Lack of mortality reduction was related to worse clinical presentation of the currently hospitalised older patient.
Implicit Cognition and Addiction

Extensive recent research has begun to unravel the more implicit or automatic cognitive mechanisms in addiction. This effort has increased our understanding of some of the perplexing characteristics of addictive behaviors. The problem, often, is not that substance abusers do not understand that the disadvantages of continued use outweigh the advantages; rather, they have difficulty resisting their automatically triggered impulses to use their substance of abuse. Existing interventions may help to moderate these impulses. In addition, new techniques aimed at directly modifying implicit cognitive processes in substance abuse are being developed.
Dietary fat and postmenopausal invasive breast cancer in the National Institutes of Health-AARP Diet and Health Study cohort.

BACKGROUND Although ecologic association and animal studies support a direct effect of dietary fat on the development of breast cancer, results of epidemiologic studies have been inconclusive. METHODS We prospectively analyzed the association between fat consumption and the incidence of postmenopausal invasive breast cancer in the National Institutes of Health-AARP Diet and Health Study, a US cohort comprising 188,736 postmenopausal women who completed a 124-item food-frequency questionnaire in 1995-1996. Hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated using Cox proportional hazards regression models with adjustment for energy and potential confounding factors. All statistical tests were two-sided. RESULTS Over an average follow-up of 4.4 years, the cohort yielded 3501 cases of invasive breast cancer. The hazard ratio of breast cancer for the highest (median intake, 40.1% energy from total fat; 434 cases per 100,000 person-years) versus the lowest (median intake, 20.3% energy from total fat; 392 cases per 100,000 person-years) quintile of total fat intake was 1.11 (95% CI = 1.00 to 1.24; P(trend) = . 017). The corresponding hazard ratio for a twofold increase in percent energy from total fat on the continuous scale was 1.15 (95% CI = 1.05 to 1.26). Positive associations were also found for subtypes of fat (hazard ratio for a twofold increase in percent energy from saturated fat = 1.13; 95% CI = 1.05 to 1.22; from monounsaturated fat, HR = 1.12; 95% CI = 1.03 to 1.21; from polyunsaturated fat, HR = 1.10, 95% CI = 1.01 to 1.20). Correction for measurement error in nutrient intakes, on the basis of a calibration substudy that used two 24-hour dietary recalls, strengthened the associations, yielding an estimated hazard ratio for total fat of 1.32 (95% CI = 1.11 to 1.58). Secondary analyses showed that associations between total, saturated, and monounsaturated fat intakes were confined to women who were not using menopausal hormone therapy at baseline. CONCLUSION In this large prospective cohort with a wide range of fat intake, dietary fat intake was directly associated with the risk of postmenopausal invasive breast cancer.
Healthy monozygous twins do not recognize identical T cell epitopes on the myelin basic protein autoantigen

The T cell response against myelin basic protein (MBP) has been extensively studied in humans because of its putative role in the pathophysiology of multiple sclerosis (MS). Higher concordance rates in monozygous twins as well as an increased risk in relatives suggest the role of genetic factors in MS susceptibility. Very little is known about the shaping of T cell repertoire towards self antigens in humans and their contribution to disease susceptibility in autoimmune disorders. Here we report the comparative T cell epitope recognition patterns towards the MBP auto‐antigen in healthy identical twins. We have established MBP‐specific T cell lines from eight sets of twins and characterized their fine epitope specificity. Intra‐pair comparison showed the co‐existence of shared as well as distinct epitopes in six of eight pairs and a complete absence of concordant epitope recognition within two other pairs. These findings indicate that important differences in T cell repertoires against a self antigen may be observed between genetically identical healthy individuals, rendering difficult the interpretation of the differences which may be observed between identical twins discordant for an autoimmune disease.
Viral and Cellular Factors Involved in Phloem Transport of Plant Viruses

Phloem transport of plant viruses is an essential step in the setting-up of a complete infection of a host plant. After an initial replication step in the first cells, viruses spread from cell-to-cell through mesophyll cells, until they reach the vasculature where they rapidly move to distant sites in order to establish the infection of the whole plant. This last step is referred to as systemic transport, or long-distance movement, and involves virus crossings through several cellular barriers: bundle sheath, vascular parenchyma, and companion cells for virus loading into sieve elements (SE). Viruses are then passively transported within the source-to-sink flow of photoassimilates and are unloaded from SE into sink tissues. However, the molecular mechanisms governing virus long-distance movement are far from being understood. While most viruses seem to move systemically as virus particles, some viruses are transported in SE as viral ribonucleoprotein complexes (RNP). The nature of the cellular and viral factors constituting these RNPs is still poorly known. The topic of this review will mainly focus on the host and viral factors that facilitate or restrict virus long-distance movement.
A preliminary study of natural‐fill radiotelemetered ovine fetal cystometry

To determine whether fetal cystometric studies by radiotelemetry are feasible in the fetal lamb, and potentially suitable for chronically monitoring fetal bladder pressures in an experimental fetal model of bladder outlet obstruction (BOO), as in utero BOO (e.g. caused by posterior urethral valves) results in significant postnatal bladder dysfunction but the pathophysiological progression of fetal bladder maldevelopment remains poorly understood.
Effects of febuxostat on metabolic and renal alterations in rats with fructose-induced metabolic syndrome.

Increased fructose consumption is associated with hyperuricemia, metabolic syndrome, and renal damage. This study evaluated whether febuxostat (Fx), an investigational nonpurine, and selective xanthine oxidase inhibitor, could alleviate the features of metabolic syndrome as well as the renal hemodynamic alterations and afferent arteriolopathy induced by a high-fructose diet in rats. Two groups of rats were fed a high-fructose diet (60% fructose) for 8 wk, and two groups received a normal diet. For each diet, one group was treated with Fx (5-6 mg.kg(-1). day(-1) in the drinking water) during the last 4 wk (i.e., after the onset of metabolic syndrome), and the other received no treatment (placebo; P). Body weight was measured daily. Systolic blood pressure and fasting plasma uric acid (UA), insulin, and triglycerides were measured at baseline and at 4 and 8 wk. Renal hemodynamics and histomorphology were evaluated at the end of the study. A high-fructose diet was associated with hyperuricemia, hypertension, as well as increased plasma triglycerides and insulin. Compared with fructose+P, fructose+Fx rats showed significantly lowered blood pressure, UA, triglycerides, and insulin (P < 0.05 for all comparisons). Moreover, fructose+Fx rats had significantly reduced glomerular pressure, renal vasoconstriction, and afferent arteriolar area relative to fructose+P rats. Fx treatment in rats on a normal diet had no significant effects. In conclusion, normalization of plasma UA with Fx in rats with metabolic syndrome alleviated both metabolic and glomerular hemodynamic and morphological alterations. These results provide further evidence for a pathogenic role of hyperuricemia in fructose-mediated metabolic syndrome.