Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Patterns of Cytokines and Soluble Cellular Receptors in the Sera of Children with Acute Chagas' Disease

ABSTRACT Cytokines and soluble cellular receptors are involved in inflammatory processes and probably in the pathogenesis of parasite and bacterial diseases. In a previous study, we reported increased levels of soluble receptors of interleukin-2 (sIL2-R) in children with acute Chagas' disease, one of the main parasitic infections that is endemic in Latin America. We sought to analyze the pattern of different cytokines and soluble receptors in the sera of children with chagasic infection. Children with acute and indeterminate stages of Chagas' disease, as well as nonchagasic children, were studied. Sera were assayed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay to measure the levels of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), IL-6, IL-2, IL-8, IL-12, sIL-2R, and the soluble receptors of CD8 and CD4 (sCD8 and sCD4). sIL-2R and sCD8 showed the highest levels in serum in acutely infected children, decreasing after specific antiparasite therapy. Chronic children showed a pattern similar to the one of nonchagasic children. Although they were not statistically significant, TNF-α, IL-6, and sCD4 showed a tendency to reach high levels in the acutely infected group, whereas IL-2, IL-8, and IL-12 did not reveal changes with respect to the noninfected children. In summary, we report here the patterns of cytokines and soluble receptors in in the sera of children infected with Trypanosoma cruzi; we found significantly increased levels of sIL-2R and sCD8 in acute infection that decreased after therapy, and high levels of TNF-α, IL-6, and sCD4 in some of the acute patients. The measurement of sIL-2R and sCD8 may provide a useful tool in the follow-up of children with Chagas' disease.
Calcium Uptake and Whole-plant Water Use Influence Pod Calcium Concentration in Snap Bean Plants

Understanding the mechanisms that regulate xylem transport of calcium (Ca) to snap bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) pods could allow approaches to increase pod Ca concentration and enhance the nutritional value of edible pods. Using the snap bean cultivars Hystyle and Labrador, which exhibit high and low pod Ca levels, respectively, we wished to determine whether there were differences between the two cultivars in stem xylem-sap Ca concentration and whether any differences in sap Ca concentration were related to differences in whole-plant water uptake or Ca import between the cultivars. Well-watered greenhouse-grown plants were placed in a growth chamber at a constant light intensity for an equilibration period. Pot weight loss was measured to determine whole-plant water use and stem xylem exudate was subsequently collected from the severed base of the shoot at fl owering and at two stages of pod develop- ment. ʻHystyleʼ displayed an exudate Ca concentration that was 50% higher than ʻLabradorʼ during pod development. ʻLabradorʼ showed 35% greater total water transport through the stem than ʻHystyleʼ. ʻLabradorʼ plants also showed a signifi cantly larger leaf area than ʻHystyleʼ plants. Additional plants were used to determine total, long-term Ca infl ux. No difference was observed between cultivars in total Ca infl ux into the aerial portion of the plant. With whole-shoot Ca infl ux being equivalent and pod transpiration rate identical in the two cultivars, our results suggest that the higher whole-plant water uptake in ʻLabradorʼ led to a dilution of Ca concentration in the xylem stream and thus less total Ca was transported to developing pods, relative to that in ʻHystyleʼ. Increased transpiration effi ciency, enhanced root uptake of Ca, or reduced Ca sequestration in the xylem pathway of the stem could lead to an enhancement in pod Ca concentration in future cultivars of snap bean.
Motion planning for spider robots

The authors consider a simple instance of the problem of planning motions of legged robots. The robot is modeled as a point where all its legs are attached, and the footholds where the robot can securely place its feet consist of a set of points in the plane. Efficient algorithms to compute stable motions in such situations are presented. <<ETX>>
Brain changes during the onset of schizophrenia: implications for neurodevelopmental theories

Neuroimaging studies of individuals at risk of psychosis have the potential to identify markers predictive of illness onset and features that progress with transition. To date, reduced brain volumes have shown weak predictive value for onset of psychotic illness. All published longitudinal studies of the transition to psychosis show progressive brain changes that are not seen in at‐risk individuals who do not develop the disorder. Although the cause of these changes is unclear, they challenge the conventional neurodevelopmental model of schizophrenia.
Multipurpose Internet shopping basket

Electronic commerce on the Web is developing rapidly with more and more companies offering online shopping facilities, as Internet shopping baskets. But curiously, each server implements its own shopping basket, which makes impossible for a user to gather items from several sites into a single basket and then to commit atomically his whole purchase. This paper describes a Multipurpose Internet Shopping Basket, whose features include the gathering of items from several vendors sites, the atomicity of the purchase (all the items are bought, or none at all), the fault tolerance and the security of the process. The application is based on I-Transaction, which is a new transaction model, enhanced to cope with the Internet pitfalls. It integrates secure communications, authentication of users and non-repudiation of exchanges. In addition, it implements a secure distributed atomic commitment protocol to cope with failures. Thanks to the introduction of agencies in its architecture, the shopping basket application is scalable, with strong security features and efficient fault tolerance that make it attractive for large networks such as the Internet.
Potential molecular targets for Ewing's sarcoma therapy

Abstract Ewing′s sarcoma (ES) is a highly malignant tumor of children and young adults. Modern therapy for Ewing′s sarcoma combines high-dose chemotherapy for systemic control of disease, with advanced surgical and/or radiation therapeutic approaches for local control. Despite optimal management, the cure rate for localized disease is only approximately 70%, whereas the cure rate for metastatic disease at presentation is less than 30%. Patients who experience long-term disease-free survival are at risk for significant side-effects of therapy, including infertility, limb dysfunction and an increased risk for second malignancies. The identification of new targets for innovative therapeutic approaches is, therefore, strongly needed for its treatment. Many new pharmaceutical agents have been tested in early phases of clinical trials in ES patients who have recurrent disease. While some agents led to partial response or stable disease, the percentages of drugs eliciting responses or causing an overall effect have been minimal. Furthermore, of the new pharmaceuticals being introduced to clinical practice, the most effective agents also have dose-limiting toxicities. Novel approaches are needed to minimize non-specific toxicity, both for patients with recurrence and at diagnosis. This report presents an overview of the potential molecular targets in ES and highlights the possibility that they may serve as therapeutic targets for the disease. Although additional investigations are required before most of these approaches can be assessed in the clinic, they provide a great deal of hope for patients with Ewing′s sarcoma.
Developmental screening: (still) expecting the impossible?

The widespread popularity of the Denver Developmental Screening Test (DDST) during the past 25 years has been accompanied by considerable scrutiny. Certain criticisms, such as the lack of updated norms, the limited extent to which norms may apply to groups such as disadvantaged children, and the difficulty in administering some items, appear justified.1 However, a number of studies critical of the DDST examine applications beyond the intended purpose of this instrument, such as identifying developmental delay among biologically vulnerable infants, screening for speech and language problems, and identifying children with moderate to severe delays.2 The inaccurate or inappropriate way in which the test has been administered and interpreted has troubled the test's developers.3
Dependency Types Validation of Precedence Diagram Method Using Ontology

Precedence Diagram Method (PDM) is a visual representation technique that depicts the activities involved in a project. It is a tool for scheduling activities using nodes to represent activities and their connections with arrows to illustrate activity dependencies. During project execution, activities in the project may be considered to change and may lead to inconsistency of dependency types. Consequently, dates and deadlines are missed so these mistakes could prove very costly. Since an ontology describes the relationship between the concepts within a domain. Thus, the ontology could be used to represent knowledge of PDM. This paper proposes PDM Ontology in OWL and rules for inferring the new knowledge from existing PDM and validating PDM using SWRL.
PROSIDIS: a special purpose processor for protein similarity discovery

This work presents the architecture of PROSIDIS, a special purpose processor designed to search for the occurrence of substrings similar to a given 'template string' within a proteome. The paper recalls the basis of the PHG tool, developed within the framework of the HADES project, which automatically designs a parallel hardware starting from recurrence equations. In this work we present a special purpose processor, designed by PHG, which faces the protein similarity discovery problem. Some results are given, reporting the time spent by several microprocessors and by the PROSIDIS processor to solve the same protein analysis problem.
Integrated Double Buck–Boost Converter as a High-Power-Factor Driver for Power-LED Lamps

: The IDBB converter features just one controlled switch and two inductors and is able to supply a solid-state lamp from the mains providing high power factor and good efficiency. And with a careful design of the converter the filter capacitances can be made small enough so that film capacitors may be used. Thus the converter mean time between failures can be made as high as that of the solid-state lamp. The integrated double buck–boost (IDBB) converter will power-LED lamps from the ac mains providing high power factor, low LED current ripple and high efficiency. The operation of the converter is equivalent to two buck–boost converters in cascade, in which the controlled switch is shared by the two stages.
The Effects of Urethane on Rat Outer Hair Cells

The cochlea converts sound vibration into electrical impulses and amplifies the low-level sound signal. Urethane, a widely used anesthetic in animal research, has been shown to reduce the neural responses to auditory stimuli. However, the effects of urethane on cochlea, especially on the function of outer hair cells, remain largely unknown. In the present study, we compared the cochlear microphonic responses between awake and urethane-anesthetized rats. The results revealed that the amplitude of the cochlear microphonic was decreased by urethane, resulting in an increase in the threshold at all of the sound frequencies examined. To deduce the possible mechanism underlying the urethane-induced decrease in cochlear sensitivity, we examined the electrical response properties of isolated outer hair cells using whole-cell patch-clamp recording. We found that urethane hyperpolarizes the outer hair cell membrane potential in a dose-dependent manner and elicits larger outward current. This urethane-induced outward current was blocked by strychnine, an antagonist of the α9 subunit of the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor. Meanwhile, the function of the outer hair cell motor protein, prestin, was not affected. These results suggest that urethane anesthesia is expected to decrease the responses of outer hair cells, whereas the frequency selectivity of cochlea remains unchanged.
Content Based Image Retrieval with Multiresolution Salient Points

This paper presents a robust technique for Content Based Image Retrieval (CBIR) using salient points of an image. The salient points are extracted from different levels of the unsegmented image. Local contrast information at different resolution is embedded along with shape information. Fuzzy compactness vector is computed from the signature obtained at different thresholds. The resemblance of two images is defined as the similarity between the computed feature vectors.
Myostatin deficiency is associated with an increase in number of total axons and motor axons innervating mouse tibialis anterior muscle

Introduction: Myostatin (Mstn) is a secreted protein that acts as a negative regulator of skeletal muscle mass. However, a critical evaluation of neuromuscular aspects of hypertrophied muscles induced by Mstn deficiency has not been done. Methods: We compared the tibialis anterior muscle–nerve interrelationships in wild‐type and Mstn‐null mice of both genders by immunohistochemical analyses, which allowed us to count the number of total axons and motor axons and estimate the size of motor units and the innervation ratio of the tibialis anterior muscle (TAm). Results: There was an increase in the number of total axons and motor axons, and higher values in both the motor unit size and the innervation ratio of Mstn‐null TAm compared with those of wild‐type TAm. Conclusions: We found that myostatin is involved either directly in the control of neuromuscular interrelationships or indirectly through its effect on muscle size. Muscle Nerve, 2012
Difference in vocal tract shape between upright and supine postures: Observations by an open-type MRI scanner

Tatsuya Kitamura , Hironori Takemoto, Kiyoshi Honda, Yasuhiro Shimada, Ichiro Fujimoto, Yuko Syakudo, Shinobu Masaki, Kagayaki Kuroda, Noboru Oku-uchi and Michio Senda ATR Human Information Science Laboratories, 2–2–2 Hikaridai, ‘‘Keihanna Science City,’’ Kyoto, 619–0288 Japan ATR Brain Activity Imaging Center, 2–2–2 Hikaridai, ‘‘Keihanna Science City,’’ Kyoto, 619–0288 Japan The Institute of Biomedical Research and Innovation, 2–2 Minatojima Minamimachi, Chuo-ku, Kobe, 650–0047 Japan
A regrowth-free, facetless multiple quantum wells AlInGaAs semiconductor laser suitable for photonic integration

A facetless, semiconductor laser suitable for photonic integration is presented in this paper. The laser fabrication process employs contact lithography and regrowth-free process. Moreover, the laser cavity is monolithically integrated with a semiconductor optical amplifier. OCIS codes: 250.5300, 250.5960, 110.5220, 140.3410,
SNORW biosensor for measuring glucose level in blood samples

A silicon nanowire waveguide based glucose sensor has been proposed and analyzed. It uses minimal invasive approach to measure the glucose level in a very small blood sample, where, Ethylene-diamine-tetraacetic acid (EDTA) as an anticoagulant, sodium fluoride as preservative and blood sample measurand are added in the ratio of 8:1:1. As the glucose concentration in the blood sample varies, the refractive index (RI) of blood changes, accordingly the refractive index of the solution with 10% blood also gets altered, which in turn to deviated response of the biosensor. The prediction of glucose level is affirmed by taking this solution as a cladding measurand of waveguide. Silicon Nanowire Optical Rectangular Waveguide (SNORW) is proposed for the first time in bio-sensing application for the detection of blood glucose. It works on the principle of detecting changes in refractive index for various concentrations of glucose level ranging from 10 mg/dl to 200 mg/dl. Additionally, SNORW sensor characteristics are compared accordingly with the slot waveguide sensors.
A knowledge based approach for representing and reasoning about signaling networks

MOTIVATION In this paper we propose to use recent developments in knowledge representation languages and reasoning methodologies for representing and reasoning about signaling networks. Our approach is different from most other qualitative systems biology approaches in that it is based on reasoning (or inferencing) rather than simulation. Some of the advantages of our approach are, we can use recent advances in reasoning with incomplete and partial information to deal with gaps in signal network knowledge; and can perform various kinds of reasoning such as planning, hypothetical reasoning and explaining observations. RESULTS Using our approach we have developed the system BioSigNet-RR for representation and reasoning about signaling networks. We use a NFkappaB related signaling pathway to illustrate the kinds of reasoning and representation that our system can currently do. AVAILABILITY The system is available on the Web at http://www.public. asu.edu/~cbaral/biosignet
Multi-User Proportional Fair Scheduling for Uplink Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access (NOMA)

Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is a promising radio access technique for LTE release 13 and beyond. In this paper, we focus on the investigation of the system performance for uplink NOMA with an advanced successive interference cancellation (SIC) receiver applied in the base station side. In NOMA, more than one user can be multiplexed simultaneously in the same frequency bandwidth, which demands multi-user scheduling. In our study, we propose an enhanced proportional fair (PF) based scheduling scheme for non-orthogonal multiplexed users with contiguous resource allocation to retain the SC-FDM property. In order to reduce the scheduling complexity for non-orthogonal multiple access, a greedy consecutive resource allocation method is adopted. Moreover, since the interference condition becomes more complicated in NOMA, we consider the application of fractional frequency reuse (FFR) to NOMA to further enhance the performance of cell-edge users. In simulation results, the system performance of NOMA by using the proposed PF-based scheduling algorithm is evaluated. The results show that NOMA significantly enhances the uplink system performance compared to the conventional orthogonal multiple access.
Molecular Cloning and Characterization of CYP719, a Methylenedioxy Bridge-forming Enzyme That Belongs to a Novel P450 Family, from cultured Coptis japonica Cells*

Two cytochrome P450 (P450) cDNAs involved in the biosynthesis of berberine, an antimicrobial benzylisoquinoline alkaloid, were isolated from cultured Coptis japonica cells and characterized. A sequence analysis showed that one C. japonica P450 (designated CYP719) belonged to a novel P450 family. Further, heterologous expression in yeast confirmed that it had the same activity as a methylenedioxy bridge-forming enzyme (canadine synthase), which catalyzes the conversion of (S)-tetrahydrocolumbamine ((S)-THC) to (S)-tetrahydroberberine ((S)-THB, (S)-canadine). The other P450 (designated CYP80B2) showed high homology to California poppy (S)-N-methylcoclaurine-3′-hydroxylase (CYP80B1), which converts (S)-N-methylcoclaurine to (S)-3′-hydroxy-N-methylcoclaurine. Recombinant CYP719 showed typical P450 properties as well as high substrate affinity and specificity for (S)-THC. (S)Scoulerine was not a substrate of CYP719, indicating that some other P450, e.g. (S)-cheilanthifoline synthase, is needed in (S)-stylopine biosynthesis. All of the berberine biosynthetic genes, including CYP719 and CYP80B2, were highly expressed in selected cultured C. japonica cells and moderately expressed in root, which suggests coordinated regulation of the expression of biosynthetic genes.
Relation between blood lipid levels and angiographically evaluated obstructions in coronary arteries.

Ananalysis hasbeenmadeof7Ipatients studied byselective coronarycine-angiography inwhomcoronary artery disease wasdiagnosed onthebasis ofclinical findings. Forty-six patients hadaprovenhistory ofprevious myocardial infarction, while theremaining 25patients hadangina pectoris without myocardial infarction. Thedegree ofobstruction ofallthree maincoronaryarteries, asrevealed bytheangiograms, hasbeen correlated with the fasting level ofserumcholesterol andtriglycerides. Wewereunable tofind anysignificant correlation between the serumlipids andtheseverity oftheobstructive disease. This does notnecessarily mean that theblood lipids areofnoimportance inthedevelopment ofcoronaryatherosclerosis. Fromourstudy itis evident that inpatients withdeveloped coronaryartery disease, therole ofthe serumlipids may bemodified toan extent which makes anycorrelation between lipid levels andtheangiographic findings impossible. Selective cine-angiography today represents astandardmethod fortheassessment ofthepresence and severity ofstructural changes inthecoronary arteries, andhasproved tobeavaluable adjunct to thediagnosis andevaluation ofatherosclerotic heart disease. Ofconsiderable interest inthis connexion arestudies designed toevaluate therelation between theseverity ofatheromatous degeneration andblood lipids. Previous studies inthis field havegiven controversial results. Someinvestigators state that the incidence ofnormal coronary arteriograms ishigher insubjects whoseserumcholesterol islowcompared withsubjects withraised serumcholesterol (Proudfit, Shirey, andSones, I967). However, Cram6r, Paulin, andWerk0(I966) found nosignificant relation between serumcholesterol values andcoronary artery changes, while raised triglyceride levels were morecommonamongthosewithsevere coronary atherosclerosis. Eliasch etal. (I967) concluded that neither serumcholesterol nortriglycerides influencedsignificantly theseverity ofarterial obstruction. Inthestudies referred toabove, various systemsofscoring thestructural changes observed on theangiograms wereused, andthemethods and circumstances inwhichbloodwasanalysed were also different. Recently, Banks, Raftery, andOram(I97I) used
Relationship of Stroke to Other Cardiovascular Disease

The frequencies of prior cardiovascular abnormalities were compared in 117 stroke patients and 234 control subjects. All were residents of a retirement community who had been examined initially and followed in the local medical clinic before the strokes occurred. Cases and controls were matched for age, sex, length of residence, and blood pressure.Prior coronary, rheumatic, and hypertensive heart disease were all more frequent in cases than in controls, as were cardiac enlargement, congestive heart failure, and digitalis therapy. There was a stronger association of stroke with atrial fibrillation than with other cardiac abnormalities, suggesting that atrial fibrillation in the elderly is an important precursor of stroke and should not be regarded lightly.Aortic calcification and intermittent claudication were also more frequent among the stroke cases than the controls. Since the blood pressures of cases and controls were matched, the association of both cardiac disease and noncerebral atherosclerosis with stroke is independent of blood pressure and is not attributable to the fact that hypertension predisposes to all of these conditions.