Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Nonurban Male Homosexuals: Epidemiologic, Immunologic and Virologic Characteristics

Twenty asymptomatic male homosexuals living in North Carolina were evaluated looking at epidemiologic, immunologic and virologic characteristics. In ten subjects selected for inhalant nitrite use a significantly higher frequency of multiple drug abuse and a trend toward greater sexual promiscuity was found in comparison with ten nonnitrite users. None of the 20 subjects had chronic lymphadenopathy. Cytomegalovirus (CMV) was not found in urine, blood or throat washings, but was found in 29% of the subjects' semen specimens—a finding that was significantly linked (P <.05) to the presence of CMV IgM antibody in serum. There were no abnormal helper lymphocytes: suppressor ? lymphocyte ratios (all > 1.3) and lymphocyte mitogen stimulations were not different from heterosexual controls in contrast to frequent abnormalities reported in male homosexuals in metropolitan areas. If these immunologic findings are reproducible, they may be important in understanding why the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome has clustered in large cities.
Applications of Nanotechnology in Cancer: A Literature Review of Imaging and

Recent advances in the application of nanotechnology in medicine, often referred to as nanomedicine, may revolutionize our approach to healthcare. Cancer nanotechnology is a relatively novel interdisciplinary area of comprehensive research that combines the basic sciences, like biology and chemistry, with engineering and medicine. Nanotechnology involves creating and utilizing the constructs of variable chemistry and architecture with dimensions at the nanoscale level comparable to those of biomolecules or biological vesicles in the human body. Operating with submolecular interactions, it offers the potential for unique and novel approaches with a broad spectrum of applications in cancer treatment including areas such as diagnostics, therapeutics, and prognostics. Nanotechnology also opens pathways to developing new and efficient therapeutic approaches to cancer treatment that can overcome numerous barriers posed by the human body compared to conventional approaches. Improvement in chemotherapeutic delivery through enhanced solubility and prolonged retention time has been the focus of research in nanomedicine. The submicroscopic size and flexibility of nanoparticles offer the promise of selective tumor access. Formulated from a variety of substances, nanoparticles are configured to transport myriad substances in a controlled and targeted fashion to malignant cells while minimizing the damage to normal cells. They are designed and developed to take advantage of the morphology and characteristics of a malignant tumor, such as leaky tumor vasculature, specific cell surface antigen expression, and rapid proliferation. Nanotechnology offers a revolutionary role in both diagnostics (imaging, immune-detection) and treatment (radiation therapy, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, thermotherapy, photodynamic therapy, and anti-angiogenesis). Moreover, nanoparticles may be designed to offer a multifunctional approach operating simultaneously as an effective and efficient anticancer drug as well as an imaging material to evaluate the efficacy of the drug for treatment follow-up. In recent years, nanomedicine has exhibited strong promise and progress in radically changing the approach to cancer detection and treatment.
Development of Acute Edema Following Cerebral Hypoxia-Ischemia in Neonatal Compared with Juvenile Rats Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging

We hypothesized that the evolution of cerebral edema accompanying cerebral hypoxia-ischemia is dependent on age and that such differences would be detectable using magnetic resonance imaging methods. Thus we examined in immature and juvenile rats the relationship between hypoxic-ischemic changes in T1 and T2 and the alterations in brain water content, as assessed by differences in tissue wet-dry weights. One- and 4-wk-old rats were anesthetized and subjected to unilateral carotid artery occlusion and subsequent exposure to hypoxia (8% oxygen). T1 and T2 maps were acquired at 9.4 T, and then brain water content was measured in sham controls or in hypoxic-ischemic animals before, during, and 1 or 24 h after hypoxia-ischemia. In sham controls, T1, T2, and proton density decreased with increasing age, corresponding to an ontogenic decrease in water content. In 1-wk-old rats, increases in T1 and T2 were observed during and at 1 and 24 h after hypoxia-ischemia, corresponding to elevations in water content. In 4-wk-old rats, T1 and water content increased during and at 1 and 24 h after hypoxia-ischemia whereas T2 was not increased until 24 h after hypoxia-ischemia. Regression analysis showed that T1 correlated better with total water content than T2. In both immature and older brain, an increase in total brain water develops acutely and persists after an episode of cerebral hypoxia-ischemia, and T1 imaging detects this change better than T2. Hypoxic-ischemic changes in T2 are age dependent, reflecting other physicochemical changes of water in the tissue than water content alone.
Finding Homologous Sequences in Genomic Databases

Abstract. Homologous sequences contain invaluable information about evolution. To search for homologous sequences in genomic databases, or homology search, is one of the most fundamental and crucial tasks in bio-logical knowledge discoveries, and required in many biological applications. With exponentially increasing database size and number of queries, efficient algorithms and tools for homology search are required. In this paper, we will introduce some famous and important approaches in the context of finding homologous se-quences. Keyword: homologous sequences, homologous search, GenBank database, filter algorithms 1 Background Based on the assumption of the theory of evolution and natural selection, almost all species shared a common ancestor at some point in time. Random mutations in the DNA of some organisms lead to differently structured proteins. If such a change gave rise to advantages in survival, the change prevailed in the gene pool. Over time, species with different needs and abilities evolved in this way. A consequences of evolution is that if we find suf-ficiently similar DNA sequences within different species, we can conclude that the corresponding proteins in the species have similar biological functions [1,2,3,4]. Sequences are called homologous if they have significant similarity and evolved from a common ancestral se-quence. Given query sequences, homology searches are to find their similar, or homologous, sequences in ge-nomic databases. To search for homologies is one of the most fundamental and essential tasks in biological knowledge discoveries. Homology searches are required in several applications, for example [5,6,7]: 1. Function determination. It is assumed that sufficiently high sequence similarity implies functional simi-larity. For example, the comparative analysis of the predicted proteins suggests that nearly 30% of the fly genes have putative orthologs in the worm genome [8]. Nearly 20% of the fly proteins have a puta-tive ortholog in both worm and yeast; these shared proteins probably perform functions common to all eukaryotic cells. 2. Conserved region identification. Proteins are often different identifiable domains, and domains can oc-cur in different combinations within different proteins. Short sequence similarities reflect conserved do-mains within proteins. The domains are likely to correspond to essential sites for the structure or func-tion of the sequence.
Followership: The Forgotten Kingmaker for Effective Leadership

Extensive studies have been carried out and theories expounded on leadership, yet no agreement has been reached on both definition and standards of leadership. The researcher takes the view that all the effort put on the study of leadership should have been directed toward the study of “followership”. The characteristics and types of followers are central to the success of any leadership in the particular environment. In this study, followership is classified as voluntary and not coerced. The leadership would therefore depend on the nature of the followers and their expectations, meaning that followers predetermine the nature of leadership. Critical to this is the nature of the power used by the leader in relation to the power of the followers. A continuum of followership is constructed along the extremes of transactional and transformational leadership styles. The continuum is a useful tool and model for effective leadership, effective leadership is therefore dependent on the level of the maturity of the followers and the agreeableness and congruency between the leader and the followers. The article concludes that effectiveness of leadership is a direct result of the willingness of the followers to be led in that particular fashion. Broadly speaking, effective leadership styles are customised to meet the followers’ demands and expectations.
Effect of the enamel matrix derivative Emdogain on the growth of periodontal pathogens in vitro.

OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of Emdogain (EMD), used for periodontal regeneration, on the growth of periodontal pathogens like Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans, Porphyromonas gingivalis and Prevotella intermedia. For comparison, we studied the effect of EMD on several microbes associated with other oral diseases as well as its effect on non-pathogenic oral inhabitants. METHODS Freshly prepared EMD or its vehicle propylene glycol alginate (PGA) alone were added to calibrated suspensions of microbes. As a control, imitating the post-surgical subgingival situation after flap closure, a serum/NaCl-solution mixture was used. Aliquots for growth assays were taken at scheduled times for calculation of colony-forming units and cell densities over an observation period of 24 h. Additionally, EMD was spotted onto selected, newly seeded microbes growing on agar plates to see if growth inhibition zones could be produced. RESULTS The study revealed a marked inhibitory effect of EMD on the growth of the gram-negative periodontal pathogens. A. actinomycetemcomitans showed a significant decrease (p=0.012) in viable counts after 24 h when EMD was added at baseline. P. gingivalis and P. intermedia also showed a marked growth reduction in the presence of EMD and in these cultures no viable microbes could be detected anymore after 24 h. In contrast, no significant growth inhibition was observed in gram-positive bacteria. CONCLUSIONS The results suggest that EMD has a positive effect on the composition of bacterial species in the post-surgical periodontal wound, by selectively restricting growth of periopathogens that could hamper the wound healing and reduce the outcome of regenerative procedures.
Automatic surrogate model type selection during the optimization of expensive black-box problems

The use of Surrogate Based Optimization (SBO) has become commonplace for optimizing expensive black-box simulation codes. A popular SBO method is the Efficient Global Optimization (EGO) approach. However, the performance of SBO methods critically depends on the quality of the guiding surrogate. In EGO the surrogate type is usually fixed to Kriging even though this may not be optimal for all problems. In this paper the authors propose to extend the well-known EGO method with an automatic surrogate model type selection framework that is able to dynamically select the best model type (including hybrid ensembles) depending on the data available so far. Hence, the expected improvement criterion will always be based on the best approximation available at each step of the optimization process. The approach is demonstrated on a structural optimization problem, i.e., reducing the stress on a truss-like structure. Results show that the proposed algorithm consequently finds better optimums than traditional kriging-based infill optimization.
Visual Perception of Performance Manner in the Movements of Solo Musicians

The study of music perception has focused almost exclusively on sound, ignoring the role of seeing the performer's body movements. Whilst anecdotes frequently refer to the importance of the performer's movements, there is scant psychological evidence to support this finding. The closest equivalent work in visual event perception research has shown that covert mental dispositions (for instance, an intention to deceive an observer) are specified in body movements, and therefore provide important information for the observer. With these findings in mind, this article investigates the information conveyed by the movements of a musical performer when s/he is asked to play-the same piece in three different expressive manners. These performance manners are presented to observers in three modes: vision alone, sound alone and sound and vision together to investigate the relative contributions of the different perceptual modes. The results reveal that not only is vision a useful source of information about manner, but that it actually more clearly specifies manner than the other modes. These findings emphasise the need to consider visual as well as sound information in psychological enquiries into music perception.
Population fragmentation leads to spatial and temporal genetic structure in the endangered Spanish imperial eagle

The fragmentation of a population may have important consequences for population genetic diversity and structure due to the effects of genetic drift and reduced gene flow. We studied the genetic consequences of the fragmentation of the Spanish imperial eagle (Aquila adalberti) population into small patches through a temporal analysis. Thirty‐four museum individuals representing the population predating the fragmentation were analysed for a 345‐bp segment of the mitochondrial control region and a set of 10 nuclear microsatellite loci. Data from a previous study on the current population (N = 79) were re‐analysed for this subset of 10 microsatellite markers and results compared to those obtained from the historical sample. Three shared mitochondrial haplotypes were found in both populations, although fluctuations in haplotype frequencies and the occurrence of a fourth haplotype in the historical population resulted in lower current levels of haplotype and nucleotide diversity. However, microsatellite markers revealed undiminished levels of nuclear diversity. No evidence for genetic structure was observed for the historical Spanish imperial eagle population, suggesting that the current pattern of structure is the direct consequence of population fragmentation. Temporal fluctuations in mitochondrial and microsatellite allelic frequencies were found between the historical and the current population as well as for each pairwise comparison between historical and current Centro and historical and current Parque Nacional de Doñana nuclei. Our results indicate an ancestral panmictic situation for the species that management policies should aim to restore. A historical analysis like the one taken here provides the baseline upon which the relative role of recent drift in shaping current genetic patterns in endangered species can be evaluated and this knowledge is used to guide conservation actions.
La maladie d’Alzheimer, les spécialistes et les débats éthiques sur les tests génétiques

La decouverte, au milieu des annees quatre-vingt-dix, de l’association entre l’allele ApoEe4 et un risque accru de developper la forme tardive de la maladie d’Alzheimer, a ete annoncee a l’epoque, a la fois dans la presse scientifique et dans les medias, comme un resultat significatif. Pourtant, ceux qui traitent la maladie d’Alzheimer considerent que cette decouverte scientifique est sans interet au plan clinique. Cet article montre comment la communaute des specialistes de la maladie d’Alzheimer en est arrivee a cette conclusion, en analysant le developpement d’un consensus contre les tests cliniques de depistage de l’ApoEe4. L’argument principal de l’article est que, bien que cette opposition soit formulee en termes techniques, il s’agit d’une prise de position ethique qui, en tant que telle, souleve la question des rapports entre experts scientifiques, d’un cote, et bioethiciens de l’autre.
First-line oral capecitabine therapy in metastatic colorectal cancer: a favorable safety profile compared with intravenous 5-fluorouracil/leucovorin.

PURPOSE To evaluate the safety profile of capecitabine using data from a large, well-characterized population of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer treated in two phase II studies. In these trials, capecitabine achieved significantly superior response rates, equivalent time to disease progression and equivalent survival compared with 5-fluorouracil (5-FU)/leucovorin. PATIENTS AND METHODS Patients (n = 1207) were randomized to either oral capecitabine (1250 mg/m2 twice daily, on days 1-14 every 21 days) or intravenous (i.v.) bolus 5-FU/leucovorin (Mayo Clinic regimen). RESULTS Capecitabine demonstrated a safety profile superior to that of 5-FU/leucovorin, with a significantly lower incidence of diarrhea, stomatitis, nausea, alopecia and grade 3 or 4 neutropenia leading to significantly fewer neutropenic fever/sepsis cases and fewer hospitalizations. All patients in the capecitabine group received a starting dose of 1250 mg/m2 twice daily and the majority (66%) did not require dose modification for adverse events. In the 5-FU/leucovorin group, 58% of patients did not require dose reduction for toxicities. The capecitabine dose-modification scheme reduced the recurrence of key toxicities without compromising efficacy. In both treatment arms, patients with moderate renal impairment at baseline (estimated creatinine clearance 30-50 ml/min) experienced a higher incidence of grade 3 or 4 toxicities. This increase was more pronounced with 5-FU/leucovorin. CONCLUSIONS Capecitabine is at least as effective, better tolerated and more convenient than i.v. 5-FU/leucovorin as treatment for patients with metastatic colorectal cancer. Analysis of data from two large phase III trials demonstrates that efficacy is not compromised in patients requiring a dose reduction for adverse events. The phase III data and an additional pharmacokinetic study support a lower starting dose in patients with moderate renal impairment at baseline (calculated creatinine clearance 30-50 ml/min) and a contra-indication in patients with severely impaired creatinine clearance at baseline (<30 ml/min). For patients with normal or mildly impaired renal function at baseline, the standard starting dose is well tolerated. The incidence and severity of adverse events in patients with moderate renal impairment at baseline who were treated with 5-FU/leucovorin was more pronounced, indicating that capecitabine provides a better-tolerated alternative.
Captive chimpanzees share diminishing resources

Wild chimpanzees routinely share high-value resources such as meat obtained through hunting and fruit procured from raiding crops. Although it is predicted that the proximate mechanisms for sharing behaviour are the result of reciprocity, interchange and mutualism, examinations of these factors in captivity have not mirrored the degree to which they are found in the wild. The goal of the current study was to investigate how a group of seven captive chimpanzees responded when a highly desirable and monopolizable resource diminished over the course of eight months. To do this we measured the amount of time that was spent sharing food at an artificial termite mound as well as the relationship between dyads that spent time sharing. Our results contradicted our predictions that rates of aggression would increase and the number of individuals fishing at the termite mound would decrease when resources diminished, as we observed no difference in either variable over time. We did, though, find an increase in the amount of sharing as the number of baited holes decreased. We also found a correlation between the strength of dyadic relationships outside of the study and the amount of time that individuals spent sharing with each other.
The Use of Social Networking Sites among Malaysian University Students

Social networking sites (SNSs) have increasingly become an important tool for young adults to interact and socialize with their peers. As most of these young adults are also learners, educators have been looking for ways to understand the phenomena in order to harness its potential for use in education. This is especially relevant in Malaysia where SNSs are popular among the youths, yet there is little data available to describe patterns of use for the wider segment of the target population. This study presents the results of a nationwide survey on tertiary level students in Malaysia. The results show that SNSs penetration is not at full 100% as initially assumed. The respondents spend the most time online for social networking and learning. The results also indicate that while the respondents are using SNS for the purpose of informal learning activities, only half (50.3%) use it to get in touch with their lecturers in informal learning contexts. The respondents also reported spending more time on SNS for socializing rather than learning and they do not believe the use of SNS is affecting their academic performance.
A avaliação da aprendizagem como um ato amoroso: o que o professor pratica?

The study makes an analysis of teachers' conceptions of the 3rd series of the fundamental teaching II of the city of Ribeirao/PE about evaluation of the learning. The research, of qualitative approach, used as collection methodology the semi-structured interview. The analysis of the data, based in the principles of the evaluation as loving act of mediation between teaching and learning protected by Luckesi, makes possible to us the conclusion of that in spite of the identification of some elements in those teachers' pedagogic action that represented reception, integration and inclusion, the evaluation significance as punctual, classificatory and selective moment is still quite evident. In that way we believe that the way to a real change in the conceptions, and consequently in those teachers' pedagogic action, is in a formation as much initial as continuous coherent with that pedagogic proposal.
Evaluation of delegation plan effectiveness: Case study in branches of a bank

The present study evaluates effectiveness of delegation plan on managing different branches of Bank Melli Iran (BMI ) in Mazandaran province (north of Iran). The study tries to answer this basic question: Has this plan had its desired effect in managing BMI branch affairs in the province, after being implemented? Results of the data analysis showed that the mentioned plan could have a significant impact on meeting the organizationspsila objectives, enhancing employeespsila motivation, job satisfaction, and decreasing bureaucracy; however, it could not have a significant impact on creating variety in doing the tasks and enhancing the employeespsila contribution in making decisions.
Derechos Laborales y de la Seguridad Social para las mujeres en Colombia en cumplimiento de la Ley 1257 de 2008

Este articulo busca contribuir con la sensibilization, pero fundamentalmente con la divulgation, de una normativa que suele desconocerse y que desarrolla el derecho de las mujeres a una vida libre de violencias y de discriminacion, y hacer evidente el compromiso del Estado y de sus instituciones de garantizarlos y respetarlos como derechos humanos; por ello da a conocer de manera integral y concisa las normas relacionadas en la Ley 1257 de 2008, en consonancia con las normas vigentes del derecho del trabajo y de la seguridad social en salud en Colombia, teniendo como base las convenciones internacionales suscritas por Colombia.