Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Theca cell monolayers that inhibit maturation of bovine oocytes show differences in their protein secretion pattern

A previous study reported that coculturing bovine cumulus‐oocyte complexes (COCs) with theca cell monolayers maintained oocytes in meiotic arrest. The present study evaluated whether the protein secretion pattern in this system is different between theca cells and granulosa cells and whether the presence of COCs influences their pattern of secretion. Follicular cells were isolated from 2‐ to 5‐mm follicles and cultured in TCM‐199 supplemented with 10% fetal calf serum. Theca cell monolayers maintained COCs but not denuded oocytes (DOs) in meiotic arrest. Monolayers were incubated for 6 hr in medium supplemented with radioactive L‐[35S]methionine. The patterns of protein secreted in the medium were analyzed by electrophoresis SDS‐PAGE 10%. These results showed that theca cell monolayers secreted two major proteins. This pattern was different from the protein pattern secreted by granulosa cell monolayers. The molecular weights of these proteins were estimated to be 214 and 190 kDa. Coculturing COCs with theca cell monolayers during the labeling revealed that COCs modulated the secretion of theca cell monolayers. When theca cells were grown on collagen‐coated wells, the monolayers did not maintain the oocytes at the germinal vesicle (GV) stage. The secretion of the 214‐kDa protein also decreased. Then, when theca cell monolayers are effective to maintain oocytes in meiotic arrest, the cells especially secreted the 214‐kDa protein. In conclusion, the 214‐kDa protein secreted by theca cell monolayers may play a role in the process of maintaining oocytes in meiotic arrest. Mol. Reprod. Dev. 50:200–206, 1998. © 1998 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
MoBots: A new generation of botnets on mobile devices and networks

Mobile devices are now well integrated with advanced capabilities and technologies such as the Internet. Today, mobile security has become a globally critical issue due to the high usage of mobile devices, their convenience and mobility. However, they are not properly protected compared to computer and computer networks, and the users pay less attention to the security updates. Recently, mobile devices and networks have been targeted by one of the most dangerous cyber threats, known as botnets. Mobile botnets have not yet been fully explored as they have only recently migrated to mobile infrastructures. Therefore, in this paper, we present an overview of mobile botnets including studies on the new command and control mechanisms, actual examples and malicious activities. We also review the current challenges and limitations of botnet detection in mobile environments, as well as existing solutions.
New constrained least squares approach for range-based positioning

The problem of finding the location of a target based on range measurements from an array of receivers is addressed. In the linear least squares (LLS) approach for range-based positioning, an extra range variable is usually introduced. In this paper, we derive a LLS algorithm with exploiting the known relation between the source position and range variable, which results in a simple constrained optimization problem. The optimality of the proposed algorithm at sufficiently small noise conditions is demonstrated by the theoretical analysis as well as computer simulations.
A study of terminal degeneration in the olfactory bulb of the rat.

An ultrastructural study of degeneration in axon terminals of the glomerular layer of the rat olfactory bulb is described, concentrating particularly on the sequence of degeneration in the olfactory nerve terminals and the long-term events in the degeneration process in several terminal types. Olfactory nerve terminal degeneration is divided into 5 stages, representing parts of the sequential changes taking place in the terminal after fibre section. The main features in the sequence are as follows: I. Swelling of the terminal and its vesicles. II. Initial shrinkage of the terminal, while vesicles remain swollen and some are distorted. III. Further shrinkage and darkening of the terminal, distortion of many of the vesicles and some mitochondrial swelling. IV. Extreme shrinkage of the terminal and loss of cytoplasmic detail; synaptic contact still intact or partially separated. V. Disappearance of the presynaptic terminal and persistence of the post-synaptic thickening. The validity of the observation of the persistence of post-synaptic membrane thickenings is considered and evidence adduced in its favour, both qualitative and quantitative. Characteristics of the newly apposed profiles are described, including cisternae and alveolate vesicles; the extracellular material of the synaptic cleft is considered in the light of its association with persisting thickenings. The relevance of these associated Structures is discussed in terms of function and development. Spontaneous degeneration of olfactory nerves and the degeneration of the vomeronasal nerves in the accessory olfactory bulb are described, as well as Stage V in the degeneration of other terminal types of the glomeruli, following various lesions; persistence of post-synaptic thickenings after the degeneration of terminals showing symmetrical membrane thickenings is included. Observations on the persistence of post-synaptic thickenings in various sites in the central and peripheral nervous systems are reviewed in the context of the present study; the problems arising out of the morphological identification of apposition or reinnervations are discussed.
Childhood Abuse and Neglect as Risk Factors for Central Adiposity: A Test of Association and Mediation Pathways

Childhood abuse and neglect are traumatic early-life stressors that may be risk factors for central adiposity. Our objective was to examine the association between childhood abuse/neglect and central adiposity and obesity in a sample of 311 women (106 Black, 205 White) from the Pittsburgh site of the Study of Women's Health Across the Nation (SWAN). SWAN included a baseline measurement of women in midlife (mean age = 45.7) and 8 follow-up visits during which waist circumference (WC) and body mass index (BMI) were measured. The Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, given at visit 8, retrospectively assessed 5 domains of abuse and neglect in childhood and adolescence: emotional, physical, and sexual abuse; emotional and physical neglect. ANCOVAs were used to determine whether a history of any abuse/neglect, or each type of abuse or neglect, was associated with WC, controlling for age. Results showed that women with a history of any abuse/neglect had significantly higher WC at visit 8 than women with no abuse history (M = 90.8, SE = 1.2; M = 96.1, SE = 1.5; F(1, 308)= 7.7, p = . 01). Of the specific types of abuse, only physical abuse was significantly related to WC at visit 8 (M = 91.7, SE = 1.0; M = 97.9, SE = 2.3; F(1,308)=6.2, p = . 01)]. Analyses for the outcome of BMI showed similar results, with the addition of sexual abuse being important for obesity. Histories of any abuse/neglect, or specific types of abuse or neglect, were not associated with increased WC from baseline to visit 8 in the full sample. However, among normal-weight and overweight women, a history of any abuse/neglect, emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, or physical neglect predicted increased WC over time. Additional mediation analyses showed that Trait Anger scores mediated some relationships between abuse/neglect and WC. This study suggests that traumatic early-life stressors are associated with adulthood body fat distribution, especially among normal-weight and overweight women. Supported by NIH/DHHS AG012546 and MHO59689. The content of this abstract is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIA, NIMH, or the NIH.
Simulation of the bias stress-induced hump, observed in the transfer characteristic of Amorphous Oxide Thin-Film Transistors

The deformation in the subthreshold region of the transfer characteristic observed in Amorphous Oxide Semiconductor (AOS) Thin-Film Transistors (TFTs) is simulated, analyzing its origin. We show that, when the density of positively charged states at the back interface between the active and the passivation layer becomes sufficiently high, a parallel current path is formed between drain and source at the back of the structure. This leakage current gives rise to a deformation or hump in the transfer curve. During DC bias stress, the density of charged back interface states can increase due to carrier trapping or trap creation, depending on the intensity and time duration of the applied gate bias, as well as on the materials of the passivation layer and fabrication conditions of the devices. This explanation is in agreement with experimental data for AOS TFTs.
Modeling software reliability growth with genetic programming

Reliability models are very useful to estimate the probability of the software fail along the time. Several different models have been proposed to estimate the reliability growth, however, none of them has proven to perform well considering different project characteristics. In this work, we explore genetic programming (GP) as an alternative approach to derive these models. GP is a powerful machine learning technique based on the idea of genetic algorithms and has been acknowledged as a very suitable technique for regression problems. The main motivation to choose GP for this task is its capability of learning from historical data, discovering an equation with different variables and operators. In this paper, experiments were conducted to confirm this hypotheses and the results were compared with traditional and neural network models
Difference that CEOs Make: An Assignment Model Approach

This paper presents an assignment model of CEOs and firms. The distributions of CEO pay levels and firms' market values are analyzed as the competitive equilibrium of a matching market where talents, as well as CEO positions, are scarce. It is shown how the observed joint distribution of CEO pay and market value can then be used to infer the economic value of underlying ability differences. The variation in CEO pay is found to be mostly due to variation in firm characteristics, whereas implied differences in managerial ability are small and make relatively little difference to shareholder value.
A Comparison of Texture Feature Algorithms for Urban Settlement Classification

Texture features derived using Haralick's Gray-Level Cooccurrence Matrix (GLCM) are by far the most popular in urban remote sensing research - but are they the best features for every application? In order to select the most appropriate texture algorithm for an automated informal settlement classification system, we performed an experiment to compare the performance of the GLCM with that of other texture features. The performance of a texture feature is measured by computing the classification accuracy achieved on a supervised set of images spread over 8 settlement classes, focusing on informal and low-cost housing. The results show that GLCMs perform very well, but that Local Binary Pattern texture features have a small advantage in this classification problem.
Long-Term Neural Correlates of Reversible Fear Learning in the Lateral Amygdala

Fear conditioning and extinction are behavioral models that reflect the association and dissociation of environmental cues to aversive outcomes, both known to involve the lateral amygdala (LA). Accordingly, responses of LA neurons to conditioned stimuli (CS) increase after fear conditioning and decrease partially during extinction. However, the long-term effects of repeated fear conditioning and extinction on LA neuronal firing have not been explored. Here we show, using stable, high signal-to-noise ratio single-unit recordings, that the ensemble activity of all recorded LA neurons correlates tightly with conditioned fear responses of rats in a conditioning/extinction/reconditioning paradigm spanning 3 d. This CS-evoked ensemble activity increased after conditioning, decreased after extinction, and was repotentiated after reconditioning. Cell-by-cell analysis revealed that among the LA neurons that displayed potentiated responses after initial fear conditioning, some exhibited weakened CS responses after extinction (extinction-susceptible), whereas others remained potentiated (extinction-resistant). The majority of extinction-susceptible neurons exhibited strong potentiation after reconditioning, suggesting that this distinct subpopulation (reversible fear neurons) encodes updated CS–unconditioned stimulus (US) association strength. Interestingly, these reversible fear neurons displayed larger, more rapid potentiation during reconditioning compared with the initial conditioning, providing a neural correlate of savings after extinction. In contrast, the extinction-resistant fear neurons did not show further increases after reconditioning, suggesting that this subpopulation encodes persistent fear memory representing the original CS–US association. This longitudinal report on LA neuronal activity during reversible fear learning suggests the existence of distinct populations encoding various facets of fear memory and provides insight into the neuronal mechanisms of fear memory modulation.
Case of Pseudomembranous Necrotizing Tracheobronchial Aspergillosis in an Immunocompetent Host

A 44-year-old Korean male died of rapidly progressive respiratory failure and refractory hypoxemia in 8 days after being admitted with a fever and dyspnea. The patient was diagnosed with pseudomembranous necrotizing tracheobronchial aspergillosis by fibroptic bronchoscopy and it was not related to an invasion of the pulmonary parenchyma. To the best of our knowledge, this case represents a patient with pseudomembranous necrotizing tracheobronchial aspergillosis that developed in an immunocompetent host, rapidly resulting in airway obstruction with acute respiratory failure and refractory hypoxemia without an invasion of the pulmonary parenchyma.
A TRP homolog in Saccharomyces cerevisiae forms an intracellular Ca2+-permeable channel in the yeast vacuolar membrane

The molecular identification of ion channels in internal membranes has made scant progress compared with the study of plasma membrane ion channels. We investigated a prominent voltage-dependent, cation-selective, and calcium-activated vacuolar ion conductance of 320 pS (yeast vacuolar conductance, YVC1) in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Here we report on a gene, the deduced product of which possesses significant homology to the ion channel of the transient receptor potential (TRP) family. By using a combination of gene deletion and re-expression with direct patch clamping of the yeast vacuolar membrane, we show that this yeast TRP-like gene is necessary for the YVC1 conductance. In physiological conditions, tens of micromolar cytoplasmic Ca2+ activates the YVC1 current carried by cations including Ca2+ across the vacuolar membrane. Immunodetection of a tagged YVC1 gene product indicates that YVC1 is primarily localized in the vacuole and not other intracellular membranes. Thus we have identified the YVC1 vacuolar/lysosomal cation-channel gene. This report has implications for the function of TRP channels in other organisms and the possible molecular identification of vacuolar/lysosomal ion channels in other eukaryotes.
Income, neural executive processes, and preschool children's executive control

Abstract This study aimed to specify the neural mechanisms underlying the link between low household income and diminished executive control in the preschool period. Specifically, we examined whether individual differences in the neural processes associated with executive attention and inhibitory control accounted for income differences observed in performance on a neuropsychological battery of executive control tasks. The study utilized a sample of preschool-aged children (N = 118) whose families represented the full range of income, with 32% of families at/near poverty, 32% lower income, and 36% middle to upper income. Children completed a neuropsychological battery of executive control tasks and then completed two computerized executive control tasks while EEG data were collected. We predicted that differences in the event-related potential (ERP) correlates of executive attention and inhibitory control would account for income differences observed on the executive control battery. Income and ERP measures were related to performance on the executive control battery. However, income was unrelated to ERP measures. The findings suggest that income differences observed in executive control during the preschool period might relate to processes other than executive attention and inhibitory control.
The Practice of Korean Medicine: An Overview of Clinical Trials in Acupuncture

Acupuncture, one of the Oriental medical therapeutic techniques that can be traced back at least 2500 years, is growing in popularity all over the world. Korea has continued to develop its own unique tradition of medicine throughout its long history, and has formed different types of acupuncture methods. The purpose of this review is to summarize clinical case studies in acupuncture and related therapies, such as acupressure, electric acupuncture, auricular acupuncture and moxibustion in Korea. A survey of Korean journals revealed that a total of 124 studies were published from 1983 to 2001. Results obtained from the survey showed that most clinical studies using acupuncture, electric acupuncture, moxibustion and other traditional therapies could alleviate a relatively broad range of medical problems. However, it should be emphasized that almost all clinical case studies published in various local journals did not follow the ‘good clinical practice’ with respect to regulatory aspects. Since they were not conducted using the randomized double-blinded controls with a large sample size, all the results should be considered as therapeutic indications. This review is an attempt to show the scope of acupuncture in our country and the kind of diseases, after many years of clinical experience, that were deemed valid targets for clinical trials.
Strontium 89 Combined with Gemcitabine in Androgen-Resistant Prostate Cancer: Results of a Phase I-II Study

Background: Strontium 89 (Sr89), a beta-emitter particle that precipitates in bone, has a palliative role in the treatment of painful bony metastases in androgen-resistant prostate cancer (ARPC) patients. Questionable additional benefit has been reported when it was combined with chemotherapy. Aim: To evaluate the efficacy of Sr89 given in combination with gemcitabine in ARPC patients with painful bony metas-
The Potential of Fluorescent and Spin-labeled Steroid Analogs to Mimic Natural Cholesterol*

Cholesterol analogs are often used to investigate lipid trafficking and membrane organization of native cholesterol. Here, the potential of various spin (doxyl moiety) and fluorescent (7-nitrobenz-2-oxa-1,3-diazol-4-yl (NBD) group) labeled cholesterol analogs as well as of fluorescent cholestatrienol and the naturally occurring dehydroergosterol to mimic the unique properties of native cholesterol in lipid membranes was studied in 1-palmitoyl-2-oleoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (POPC) membranes by electron paramagnetic resonance, nuclear magnetic resonance, and fluorescence spectroscopy. As cholesterol, all analogs undergo fluctuating motions of large amplitude parallel to the bilayer normal. Native cholesterol keeps a strict orientation in the membrane with the long axis parallel to the bilayer normal. Depending on the chemical modification or the position of the label, cholesterol analogs may adopt an “up-side-down” orientation in the membrane or may even fluctuate between “upright” and up-side-down orientation by rotational motions about the short axis not typical for native cholesterol. Those analogs are not able to induce a comparable condensation of phospholipid membranes as known for native cholesterol revealed by 2H nuclear magnetic resonance. However, cholesterol-induced lipid condensation is one of the key properties of native cholesterol, and, therefore, a well suited parameter to assess the potential of steroid analogs to mimic cholesterol. The study points to extreme caution when studying cholesterol behavior by the respective analogs. Among seven analogs investigated, only a spin-labeled cholesterol with the doxyl group at the end of the acyl chain and the fluorophore cholestatrienol mimic cholesterol satisfactorily. Dehydroergosterol has a similar upright orientation as cholesterol and could be used at low concentration (about 1 mol %), at which its lower potential to enhance lipid packing density does not perturb membrane organization.
FoxP3+CD4+CD25+ T cells with regulatory properties can be cultured from colonic mucosa of patients with Crohn's disease

CD4+CD25+ regulatory T cells (Tregs) are involved in the maintenance of peripheral tolerance and ensure a balanced immune response competent of fighting pathogens and at the same time recognizing commensals as harmless. This feature is lost in Crohn's disease (CD). The forkhead/winged helix transcription factor FoxP3 is a master gene for Treg function and defects in the FoxP3 gene lead to a clinical picture similar to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Murine colitis can be cured by adoptive transfer of Tregs and ex vivo‐generated gut‐specific Tregs represent an attractive option for therapy in CD. Thus, defective Tregs could contribute to the development of CD. We cultured biopsies of colonic mucosa in the presence of high concentrations of interleukin (IL)‐2 and IL‐4 to overcome the anergic nature of naturally occurring CD4+CD25+ Tregs in the mucosa. We investigated the expression of FoxP3 and regulatory potential of gut‐derived CD4+CD25+ T cells cultured from patients with CD and healthy individuals. The FoxP3 expression was analysed by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT‐PCR), and the suppressive effect of FoxP3+CD4+CD25+ T cells on proliferation and cytokine production of autologous CD4+ T cells was assessed by flow cytometry. Cultured gut‐derived T cells with CD4+CD25+ phenotype expressed FoxP3 and were able as the freshly isolated Tregs from peripheral blood to suppress proliferation and cytokine production of autologous CD4+ T cells. Thus, we demonstrate that FoxP3+CD4+CD25+ T cells with regulatory properties can be propagated in vitro from inflamed mucosa of CD patients, which may be of interest in adoptive immunotherapy.
News Feature: Microplastics present pollution puzzle

When Mark Browne set out to study the plastic waste that litters the oceans, he hadn’t planned on doing laundry in the name of science. Browne, an ecologist at the University of New South Wales, Australia, was aiming to chart the quantities and types of plastic fragments washing up on shores worldwide. Five years ago, he and his colleagues had already found a surprisingly large amount of nylon and polyester fibers, particularly near heavily populated areas. When they sampled sewage effluent, as well as decades-old sewage dumps, Browne and his colleagues found the same range of fibers, in exactly the same proportions of polymers used by the clothing industry.