Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Assessment of individual bruising dynamics by pulsed photothermal radiometry and inverse Monte Carlo analysis

Objective determination of bruise age is still done mainly by visual inspection, however, because of insufficient information the method provides, another mode is desired. In this study, determination of bruise dynamics parameters with a four-layer model and individually determined scattering parameters was carried out. Pulsed photometric radiometry signals and diffuse reflectance spectra were recorded during the healing process for volunteers with accidental bruises. Parameters of healthy skin were obtained and used as input parameters for the bruise model. Hence, the difference in signals would be fully attributed to changes caused by the injury. Results of three bruises on the arm and the analysis of one on the outer side of the arm are presented showing bruise dynamics parameters and their dependency on bruise severity. Objective determination of bruise dynamics parameters is achieved by use of pulsed photothermal radiometry via a four-layer optical model of human skin and inverse Monte Carlo analysis with predetermined input parameters of healthy skin.
An Approach for the Metamodel of the Framework for a Partial Agile Method Adaptation

Today, such information system development methods as Extreme Programming, Scrum, Dynamic Systems Development Method, Crystal family, Agile modeling, OpenUP and others are being positioned as proven alter-natives to the more traditional plan-driven approaches. However, although there are a variety of agile methods to choose from, the formal methods for their partial adaptation and customization are lacking. The main aim of this paper is to present a metamodel of the framework for a partial agile method adaptation. The paper presents the process of metamodel construction from the concepts that are both direct and indirect solutions to the sub-problems of the partial agile method adaptation. The presented paper extends some of our earlier and more fragmented findings that have been described in our previous work. http://dx.doi. org/10.5755/j01.itc. 40.1. 194
Immune complex activation of rat glomerular mesangial cells: dependence on the Fc region of antibody.

Glomerulonephritis is frequently associated with immunoglobulin deposition in the mesangium. We had previously shown that contractile, rat mesangial cells in culture synthesize superoxide anion after binding immune complexes (IC) in a manner dependent on the Fc region of immunoglobulin G (IgG). We now studied the effects of soluble IC on mesangial cell cytosolic free calcium ([Ca2+]i) and phosphatidylinositol turnover as putative mechanisms of transmembrane signaling as well as prostaglandin biosynthesis and contraction. IC (500 micrograms specific antibody) raised [Ca2+]i in mesangial cells loaded with fura-2 from resting levels of 100.4 +/- 8.0 to a peak of 282.3 +/- 31.5 nM in a dose-dependent manner. Removal of extracellular Ca2+ by ethylene glycol-bis(beta-aminoethyl ether)-N,N,N',N'-tetraacetic acid only slightly reduced peak, IC-stimulated [Ca2+]i to 236 +/- 18 nM but prevented the sustained phase of the response, indicating that IC both mobilized Ca2+ from intracellular stores and increased the influx of Ca2+ across the plasma membrane. IC did not increase water-soluble inositol phosphates, measured by anion-exchange chromatography of trichloroacetic acid-extracted cells but markedly stimulated PGE2 and thromboxane B2 synthesis in a dose- and time-dependent manner. Finally, IC (250 micrograms specific antibody) induced 45.8 +/- 10.1% of the cells to contract with an average decrease in cross-sectional surface area of 20.0 +/- 1.8% of basal as assessed by image-analysis microscopy. IC formed with F(ab')2 fragments of antibody and antigen or mixtures of antigen and nonimmune whole molecule antibody did not alter [Ca2+]i, induce prostaglandin synthesis, or stimulate mesangial cell contraction. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Direct visualization of a stratified epithelium reveals that wounds heal by unified sliding of cell sheets

Observing cells in their original niche is a key link between the information gleaned from planar culture and in vivo physiology and pathology. A new approach combining the transparency of the cornea, Hoffman modulation optics, and digital imaging allowed movements of individual corneal cells to be viewed directly in situ. 3‐Dimensional time‐lapse movies imaging unstained cells within the stratified corneal epithelium during wound healing were made. Tracking cell movements dynamically provided a definitive answer to the long‐standing question: does a stratified epithelium heal by “sliding” of cell sheets as a coherent unit or do individual cells “leap frog” each other at the wound margin? A wound in the corneal epithelium healed primarily by sliding of the whole epithelium, with ~95% of cells moving with similar speed and trajectories and with little change in their relative position. Only 5% of cells changed layers, with equal proportions moving up or down. Epithelial healing in situ occurred in three phases: a latency, migration, and reconstruction phase. This model provides a unique system to study the behaviors of individual cells in their original niche. It shows that cells slide into a wound as a unified unit to heal a stratified epithelium. —Zhao, M. , Song, B. , Pu, J., Forrester, J. V. , McCaig, C. D. Direct visualization of a stratified epithelium reveals that wounds heal by unified sliding of cell sheets. FASEB J. 17, 397–406 (2003)
Antigenic diversity in the circumsporozoite protein of Plasmodium falciparum abrogates cytotoxic-T-cell recognition

Genetic analysis of field isolates of Plasmodium falciparum has shown selective accumulation of point mutations within the immunologically sensitive sites of the circumsporozoite (CS) protein, a vaccine candidate against malaria. This raised concern whether a vaccine containing the sequence of a selected strain of P. falciparum would be able to confer protection against other variant parasites. The answer to this question remained speculative, and in this study, we have formally tested the immunological impact of such natural variations within a known cytotoxic-T-cell (CTL) epitope, which is recognized by both human and murine CTLs. With a murine model, CTLs were generated against the 7G8 strain of P. falciparum. The ability of these CTLs to lyse histocompatible targets that were pulsed with synthetic peptides corresponding to polymorphic sequences of Brazilian, Papua New Guinean, and The Gambian isolates was determined. While these CTLs were able to recognize three of the four variant CS sequences found in Brazil and Papua New Guinea, they failed to recognize four of the five variant CS sequences found in The Gambia. Among the peptides that lost their reactivity to 7G8-specific CTL, all except one had amino acid variation in more than one residue. On the other hand, only one of the four peptides that showed a positive reaction had amino acid substitutions in more than a single residue. Thus, our findings demonstrate that natural amino acid variations in the CS protein abrogate CTL recognition. Therefore, it is important to consider the implications of these results in designing CS protein-based vaccines.
A Physical Model of a Single-Reed Wind Instrument, Including Actions of the Player

For the Physical Modeling Synthesis of wind instruments, we choose to design a model adapted to time domain simulation which takes into account the main part of the physical phenomena, including instrument/player interactions. The virtual instrument is designed as a set of lumped elements, e.g. the mouth, the key or the bell, connected to each other by two-ports representing the tube. The sounds obtained show that the accuracy of the modeling of a specific mechanism is less important than the modeling, even simplified, of all the significant actions of the player on his instrument.
Neural Networks with Quadratic VC Dimension

This paper shows that neural networks which use continuous activation functions have VC dimension at least as large as the square of the number of weightsw. This results settles a long-standing open question, namely whether the well-knownO(wlogw) bound, known for hard-threshold nets, also held for more general sigmoidal nets. Implications for the number of samples needed for valid generalization are discussed.
Low SexuaL DeSire in women anD men

While something is known about how to generate sexual desire—for example, creation of a new intimacy in a conflicted relationship, education in how to sexually stimulate one another, and provision of permission to engage in sensuous activity—the therapist knows far less than the patient thinks about how to catalyze the appearance of (sexual desire) . A sexual desire problem begins as a mystery to both patient and doctor. Levine, 1988
Mesenchymal Stem Cell Carriers Protect Oncolytic Measles Viruses from Antibody Neutralization in an Orthotopic Ovarian Cancer Therapy Model

Purpose: Preexisting antiviral antibodies in cancer patients can quickly neutralize oncolytic measles virus (MV) and decrease its antitumor potency. In contrast to “naked” viruses, cell-associated viruses are protected from antibody neutralization. Hence, we hypothesized that measles virotherapy of ovarian cancer in measles-immune mice might be superior if MV-infected mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) carriers are used. Experimental Design: Antimeasles antibodies titers in ovarian cancer patients were determined. The protection of MV by MSC from antimeasles antibodies, the in vivo biodistribution profiles, and tumor infiltration capability of MSC were determined. Measles-naïve or immune tumor–bearing mice were treated with naked virus or MSC-associated virus and mice survivals were compared. Results: MSC transferred MV infection to target cells via cell-to-cell heterofusion and induced syncytia formation in the presence of high titers of antimeasles antibody, at levels that completely inactivated naked virus. Athymic mice bearing i.p. human SKOV3ip.1 ovarian tumor xenografts passively immunized with measles-immune human serum were treated with saline, naked MV, or MV-infected MSC. Bioluminescent and fluorescent imaging data indicated that i.p. administered MSC localized to peritoneal tumors, infiltrated into the tumor parenchyma, and transferred virus infection to tumors in measles naïve and passively immunized mice. Survival of the measles-immune mice was significantly enhanced by treatment with MV-infected MSC. In contrast, survivals of passively immunized mice were not prolonged by treatment with naked virus or uninfected MSC. Conclusions: MSC should be used as carriers of MV for intraperitoneal virotherapy in measles-immune ovarian cancer patients. (Clin Cancer Res 2009;15(23):7246–55)
How to promote and preserve eyelid health

Disorders of the lacrimal functional unit are common in ophthalmological practice, with meibomian gland dysfunction, blepharitis, and dry eye forming a significant part of the general ophthalmologist’s practice. The eyelid and its associated structures form a complex organ designed to protect the fragile corneal surface and improve visual acuity. This organ is subject to a number of disorders, including meibomian gland dysfunction, dry eye syndrome, anterior blepharitis, allergic and dermatological conditions, and disorders associated with contact lens use. Although commonly described separately, disorders of the lacrimal function unit are better considered as a group of interacting pathologies that have inflammatory mediators as a central feature. Eyelid hygiene, in the sense of routine cleansing and massage of the eyelids, is well accepted in the management of many disorders of the eyelid. However, a broader concept of eyelid health may be appropriate, in which eyelid cleansing is but a part of a more complete program of care that includes screening and risk assessment, patient education, and coaching. The ophthalmologist has an important role to play in helping patients persist with routine eyelid care that may be long-term or lifelong. A number of preparations exist to make routine eyelid care both more effective and more pleasant, and might also improve compliance. Several such preparations have been devised, and are being assessed in clinical studies, and appear to be effective and preferred by patients over traditional soap and water or baby shampoo.
Studies on radiation processing of rice viscous dispersions for potential applications in encapsulation and edible packaging

Two rice cultivars (PR 121 and PR 116) were tested for engineering properties at three different levels of processing, and physicochemical, rheological, thermal and pasting properties of rice flours prepared by dry grinding were studied. The value for arithmetic mean diameter was higher for paddy of PR 121 cultivar and lowest for PR 116 white rice. Sphericity and aspect ratio were lower in paddy cultivars and higher in brown and white rice for both the cultivars. The flour from PR 121 had higher mean volume, modal diameter and median diameter than PR 116 flour and the average mass flow rate was higher for PR 121 flour. The onset gelatinization temperature (65.40 ̊C), peak gelatinization temperature (68.34 ̊C) and conclusion temperature (74.18 ̊C) were lower for PR 121 flour than for PR 116. The storage modulus for PR 121 was (G / peak =787 Pa), loss modulus was (G // peak = 75.6 Pa) and tan δ was 0.97 which were lower than that for PR 116. Irradiation resulted in a significant decrease in apparent amylose content, swelling power and pasting properties with an increase in carboxyl content and solubility. The granule morphology and A-type X-ray diffraction pattern were not altered by irradiation. Irradiated starch had higher encapsulation efficiency with significant differences in the cold water solubility of spray-dried powders. Rice starch films with EDTA showed higher antimicrobial efficacy for E coli. The solubility and WVP increased with addition of EDTA with low water solubility in control sample.
Comparing Chebyshev and Butterworth Filter for Designing 2-D Recursive Digital Filter

This paper compares the Chebyshev filter and butterworth filter for designing 2D recursive digital filters starting from a doubly-terminated analog Bridged-T network. This network contains inductive and capacitive reactance elements in s1 and s2 domains. Starting from transfer function of a Bridged-T network in the analog domain which is VSHP, 2D recursive digital filters can be obtained through the application of the double generalized bilinear transformations with the coefficients in their specified ranges. The impedance values of the transfer function of the Bridged-T network can be obtained with compare to the fourth order Butterworth polynomial or Chebyshev polynomial. For different impedance values of the Bridged-T network which are obtained with compare to Chebyshev and butterworth filter, we can get different types of filter output, depending on the starting network and the coefficients of the generalized bilinear transformations
Vitamin D supplementation and total mortality: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.

BACKGROUND Ecological and observational studies suggest that low vitamin D status could be associated with higher mortality from life-threatening conditions including cancer, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes mellitus that account for 60% to 70% of total mortality in high-income countries. We examined the risk of dying from any cause in subjects who participated in randomized trials testing the impact of vitamin D supplementation (ergocalciferol [vitamin D(2)] or cholecalciferol [vitamin D(3)]) on any health condition. METHODS The literature up to November 2006 was searched without language restriction using the following databases: PubMed, ISI Web of Science (Science Citation Index Expanded), EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library. RESULTS We identified 18 independent randomized controlled trials, including 57 311 participants. A total of 4777 deaths from any cause occurred during a trial size-adjusted mean of 5.7 years. Daily doses of vitamin D supplements varied from 300 to 2000 IU. The trial size-adjusted mean daily vitamin D dose was 528 IU. In 9 trials, there was a 1.4- to 5.2-fold difference in serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D between the intervention and control groups. The summary relative risk for mortality from any cause was 0.93 (95% confidence interval, 0.87-0.99). There was neither indication for heterogeneity nor indication for publication biases. The summary relative risk did not change according to the addition of calcium supplements in the intervention. CONCLUSIONS Intake of ordinary doses of vitamin D supplements seems to be associated with decreases in total mortality rates. The relationship between baseline vitamin D status, dose of vitamin D supplements, and total mortality rates remains to be investigated. Population-based, placebo-controlled randomized trials with total mortality as the main end point should be organized for confirming these findings.
Combination of Document Priors in Web Information Retrieval

Query-independent features (also called document priors), such as the number of incoming links to a document, its Page-Rank, or the type of its associated URL, have been successfully integrated into Web Information Retrieval systems in order to enhance the retrieval effectiveness. The combination of several document priors could further enhance the retrieval performance. However, most current combination of priors approaches are based on heuristics, and often ignore the possible dependence between the document priors. In this paper, we present a novel and robust method for conditionally combining document priors in a principled way. The approach adjusts the distribution of document priors for one source of evidence according to the distribution of document priors for other sources of evidence. We investigate the retrieval performance attainable by our combination of priors method, in comparison to the use of single priors and to a heuristic combination of document priors method, which assumes that document priors are independent. Furthermore, we investigate how sensitive the proposed method is to the training data. Using two standard Web test collections, including the large-scale. GOV2 test collection, we find that some of the document priors used in our experiments, have a considerably high correlation, suggesting that the dependency between documents priors should indeed be taken into account. Through extensive experiments on these two large-scale collections, we observe that our proposed conditional combination method is overall effective and robust.
Doping-induced bandwidth enhancement in metal-semiconductor-metal photodetectors

A novel technique is demonstrated for enhancing metal-semiconductor-metal photodetector bandwidths without reducing responsivity. The authors have observed bandwidth increases of up to 10 GHz from control to enhanced photodetectors which corresponds to about 70% enhancement. This technique involves modifying the internal electric field structure, by introducing a buried n-type doped layer that is completely depleted, to reduce the relatively long hole transit time. <<ETX>>
Developing New Specialty Grains for Ruminants

SUMMARY Corn, soybean, and sunflower hybrids with improved agronomic and nutritional traits are grown widely today. Barring increased concern about genetically altered crops, production of specialty grains is likely to increase because novel traits possessed by many new hybrids are desired by both grain producers and grain users. Most specialty grains available today possess improved altered " input traits " that enhance either agronomic or production characteristics. More recently, hybrids with enhanced " output traits, " with increased value for specific users (millers, brewers, starch or oil extractors, livestock feeders), have been developed and are being released. Grain growers readily adopt varieties with improved input traits (insect or herbicide resistance) when they have an assured grain market. In contrast, grain with improved output traits usually does not increase yield or reduce input cost for the grain growers. Indeed, to realize their full nutritional value, grains with improved output traits cannot be marketed through " commodity " channels, but instead must be " identity preserved " both during production and marketing. To compensate growers for any added production and management cost (i.e., identity preservation of the crop; assays for specific traits) associated with producing grain or silage with improved nutritional traits, price premiums or production contracts between producers and users often are developed. For swine and poultry, grain hybrids richer in total oil, in specific amino or fatty acids, or in available phosphorus have immense potential. For ruminants, high oil grain hybrids can be very useful, hybrids with greater starch availability hold promise, and new hybrids with higher protein content or phosphorus availability may have potential. Although silage hybrids selected for leafiness and greater fiber digestibility often can increase milk yield by lactating cows, reduced forage yields currently limit their economic potential. Even though alterations in certain plant characteristics (e.g., higher grain yield, " stay green " , slow kernel drying rate, waxy starch) may improve the nutritional value of corn silage, management factors (stage of silage harvest, grain processing during harvest, inoculation) probably exert even greater impacts on the nutritional value of silage. Dairy producers and cattle feeders who grow their own grain or silage are ideally situated to use hybrids with improved nutritional traits. Only when the economic value to the end user exceeds any increased cost of production will the trait-altered grain prove beneficial economically. However, economic value depends on local conditions. Increased production and management costs must …
Perforation Rates of Cervical Pedicle Screw Insertion by Disease and Vertebral Level

Background: Different perforation rates for cervical pedicle screws by disease are expected in relation to bone quality and pedicle morphology; however, no report comparing pedicle screw perforation rate by disease had previously been published. This study investigated the perforation rates of pedicle screws inserted to cervical pedicle by disease and vertebral level using a CT-based navigation system. Materials/Methods: Fifty-three patients who underwent cervical pedicle screw insertion using CT based navigation system were studied. Diseases included rheumatoid arthritis (RA) (24 cases), destructive spondyloarthropathy (DSA) (10), cervical spondylotic myelopathy (CSM) (9), spine tumor (6), and cervical spondylotic myelopathy associated with athetoid cerebral palsy (CP) (4). Screw perforation rates for cervical pedicle screws were studied. Major perforation was defined as perforation 50% of screw diameter or more. Results: Major perforation rate by disease from C3 to C7 was as follows: spine tumor (0/24, 0%), RA (2/59, 3.4%), DSA (3/65, 4.6%), CP (2/20, 10.0%), and CSM (6/40, 15.0%). There were no clinically important complications such as vertebra arterial injury, spinal cord injury, or nerve root injury caused by any screw perforation. Major perforation rate by vertebral level was: C2(2/30, 6.7%), C3(4/49, 8.2%), C4(6/43, 14.0%), C5(1/32, 3.1%), C6(1/41, 2.4%), and C7(1/45, 2.2%), showing highest rate for C4, followed by C3. Conclusions: Cervical pedicle screw perforation rate by disease was higher in CSM compared to RA and DSA. The perforation rate by vertebral level was higher for C4 and C3, in this order.