Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Alternative Oxidase: A Mitochondrial Respiratory Pathway to Maintain Metabolic and Signaling Homeostasis during Abiotic and Biotic Stress in Plants

Alternative oxidase (AOX) is a non-energy conserving terminal oxidase in the plant mitochondrial electron transport chain. While respiratory carbon oxidation pathways, electron transport, and ATP turnover are tightly coupled processes, AOX provides a means to relax this coupling, thus providing a degree of metabolic homeostasis to carbon and energy metabolism. Beside their role in primary metabolism, plant mitochondria also act as “signaling organelles”, able to influence processes such as nuclear gene expression. AOX activity can control the level of potential mitochondrial signaling molecules such as superoxide, nitric oxide and important redox couples. In this way, AOX also provides a degree of signaling homeostasis to the organelle. Evidence suggests that AOX function in metabolic and signaling homeostasis is particularly important during stress. These include abiotic stresses such as low temperature, drought, and nutrient deficiency, as well as biotic stresses such as bacterial infection. This review provides an introduction to the genetic and biochemical control of AOX respiration, as well as providing generalized examples of how AOX activity can provide metabolic and signaling homeostasis. This review also examines abiotic and biotic stresses in which AOX respiration has been critically evaluated, and considers the overall role of AOX in growth and stress tolerance.
A Three-Dimensional Stacked-Chip Star-Wiring Interconnection for a Digital Noise-Free and Low-Jitter I/O Clock Distribution Network

Cascaded repeaters are indispensable circuit elements in conventional on-chip clock distribution networks due to heavy loss characteristics of on-chip global interconnections. However, cascaded repeaters cause significant jitter and skew problems in clock distribution networks when they are affected by power supply switching noise generated by digital logic blocks located on the same die. In this letter, we present a new three-dimensional (3-D) stacked-chip star-wiring interconnection scheme to make a clock distribution network free from both on-chip and package-level power supply noise coupling. The proposed clock distribution scheme provides an extremely low-jitter and low-skew clock signal by replacing the cascaded repeaters with lossless star-wiring interconnections on a 3-D stacked-chip package. We have demonstrated a 500-MHz input/output (I/O) clock delivery with 34-ps peak-to-peak jitter and a skew of 11ps, while a conventional I/O clock scheme exhibited a 146-ps peak-to-peak jitter and a 177-ps skew in the same power supply noise environment
Moderated mediation analysis: An illustration using the association of gender with delinquency and mental health.

PURPOSE When researchers find an association between two variables, it is useful to evaluate the role of other constructs in this association. While assessing these mediation effects, it is important to determine if results are equal for different groups. It is possible that the strength of a mediation effect may differ for males and females, for example - such an effect is known as moderated mediation. DESIGN Participants were 2532 adolescents from diverse ethnic/racial backgrounds and equally distributed across gender. The goal of this study was to investigate parental respect as a potential mediator of the relationship between gender and delinquency and mental health, and to determine whether observed mediation is moderated by gender. FINDINGS Parental respect mediated the association between gender and both delinquency and mental health. Specifically, parental respect was a protective factor against delinquency and mental health problems for both females and males. PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS Demonstrated the process of estimating models in Lavaan, using two approaches (i.e. single group regression and multiple group regression model), and including covariates in both models.
Effects of honeybee (Apis mellifera) venom on keratinocyte migration in vitro

Background: Since the ancient times the skin aging application of honeybee venom (BV) is practiced and persisted until nowadays. The present study evaluated the effect of the honeybee venom (BV) on keratinocyte migration in wound healing model in vitro. Objective: To access BV further as a cosmetic ingredient and a potential external application for topical uses, we performed studies to investigate the biologic effect of BV treatment on keratinocyte proliferation and migration in vitro. Material and Methods: BV cytotoxicity was assessed by using a 3-[4,5-dimethyl-2-thiazolyl]-2,5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay over 24 h. To assess BV genotoxicity, damage to human epidermal keratinocyte (HEK) was evaluated using the Comet assay. HEK migration was evaluated using a commercial wound healing kit. The skin pro-inflammatory cytokines interleukin (IL)-8 and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α were examined to evaluate the pro-inflammatory response to BV. Results: It was found that BV (<100 μg/ml) was not cytotoxic and stimulated more HEK proliferation and migration compared to negative control, and did not induce DNA damage. There were also decreases in IL-8 and TNF-α expression levels in HEK at all time points. Conclusion: These findings highlight the potential of topical application of BV for promoting cell regeneration and wound treatment.
Protection against myxomatosis and rabbit viral hemorrhagic disease with recombinant myxoma viruses expressing rabbit hemorrhagic disease virus capsid protein

Two myxoma virus-rabbit hemorrhagic disease virus (RHDV) recombinant viruses were constructed with the SG33 strain of myxoma virus to protect rabbits against myxomatosis and rabbit viral hemorrhagic disease. These recombinant viruses expressed the RHDV capsid protein (VP60). The recombinant protein, which is 60 kDa in size, was antigenic, as revealed by its reaction in immunoprecipitation with antibodies raised against RHDV. Both recombinant viruses induced high levels of RHDV- and myxoma virus-specific antibodies in rabbits after immunization. Inoculations by the intradermal route protected animals against virulent RHDV and myxoma virus challenges.
FPGA based implementation of elliptic curve cryptography

Elliptic curve cryptography is a public key cryptography technique based on the algebraic structure of elliptic curves over finite fields. It provides the same level of security that other alternatives provide, but it performs its process in less time, less memory, less computations and less power consumption. Thus it is suitable for environments with constraints like computing power, memory and battery life. Typical examples of such environments are: embedded devices, wireless devices and real time applications. On the other hand, FPGA is considered as the modern-day technology for building prototypes where the chip can be configured by the end user to realize different designs by programming logic blocks and interconnects. The hardware implementation of elliptic curve cryptography using FPGA enhances the system performance since FPGA technology is faster by nature and much more secure than software implementations. This paper presents an elliptic curve cryptosystem developed by programming Spartan 3E FPGA kit then tested by implementing Elgamal encryption scheme on it.
Estrogen Increases Mitochondrial Efficiency and Reduces Oxidative Stress in Cerebral Blood Vessels

We report here that estrogen (E2) modulates mitochondrial function in the vasculature. Mitochondrial dysfunction is implicated in the etiology of vascular disease; thus, vasoprotection by estrogen may involve hormonal effects on the mitochondria. To test this hypothesis, mitochondria were isolated from cerebral blood vessels obtained from ovariectomized female rats, with or without E2 replacement. Estrogen receptor-α (ER-α) was detected in mitochondria by immunoblot and confocal imaging of intact vessels. E2 treatment in vivo increased the levels of specific proteins in cerebrovascular mitochondria, such as ER-α, cytochrome c, subunit IV of complex IV, and manganese superoxide dismutase, all encoded in the nuclear genome, and subunit I of complex IV, encoded in the mitochondrial genome. Levels of glutathione peroxidase-1 and catalase, however, were not affected. Functional assays of mitochondrial citrate synthase and complex IV, key rate-limiting steps in energy production, showed that E2 treatment increased enzyme activity. In contrast, mitochondrial production of hydrogen peroxide was decreased in vessels from E2-treated animals. In vitro incubation of cerebral vessels with 10 nM 17β-estradiol for 18 h also elevated levels of mitochondrial cytochrome c. This effect was blocked by the estrogen receptor antagonist fulvestrant (ICI-182,780, Faslodex) but was unaffected by inhibitors of nitric-oxide synthase or phosphoinositide-3-kinase. Nuclear respiratory factor-1 protein, a primary regulator of nuclear gene-encoded mitochondrial genes, was significantly increased by long-term estrogen treatment in vivo. In summary, these novel findings suggest that vascular protection by E2 is mediated, in part, by modulation of mitochondrial function, resulting in greater energy-producing capacity and decreased reactive oxygen species production.
Learning to Play K-armed Bandit Problems

We propose a learning approach to pre-compute K-armed bandit playing policies by exploiting prior information describing the class of problems targeted by the player. Our algorithm first samples a set of K-armed bandit problems from the given prior, and then chooses in a space of candidate policies one that gives the best average performances over these problems. The candidate policies use an index for ranking the arms and pick at each play the arm with the highest index; the index for each arm is computed in the form of a linear combination of features describing the history of plays (e.g., number of draws, average reward, variance of rewards and higher order moments), and an estimation of distribution algorithm is used to determine its optimal parameters in the form of feature weights. We carry out simulations in the case where the prior assumes a fixed number of Bernoulli arms, a fixed horizon, and uniformly distributed parameters of the Bernoulli arms. These simulations show that learned strategies perform very well with respect to several other strategies previously proposed in the literature (UCB1, UCB2, UCB-V, KL-UCB and en-GREEDY); they also highlight the robustness of these strategies with respect to wrong prior information.
Development of doxorubicin resistant rat prostate cancer cell lines.

BACKGROUND One possible mechanism of chemotherapeutic resistance in patients with metastatic prostate cancer is the overexpression of P-glycoprotein. Additional tumor models are necessary to study this phenomenon. MATERIALS AND METHODS Doxorubicin resistant rat prostate cancer cell lines were developed by increasing doxorubicin levels in cell culture. RESULTS The MDR lines (AT3B-1, AT3B-2, MLLB-1, and MLLB-2) were more resistant to vinblastine compared to controls. When P-glycoprotein was blocked, the AT3 MDR lines demonstrated efflux activity. Injection of AT3 MDR lines into rats followed by doxorubicin treatment produced larger tumors compared to the parental controls. CONCLUSIONS MDR rat prostate cancer cells were developed. AT3B-1 and AT3B-2 cell lines have drug efflux pump ability, whereas the MLLB-1 and MLLB-2 may not, suggesting alternative key mechanisms other than P-glycoprotein overexpression. These new cell lines are being used to study chemotherapy resistance in prostate cancer.
Architecture design and timing analysis of GNC system based on time-triggered architecture

Traditionally, most spacecrafts with high security requirement use hardware redundancy to improve the system-level performance. However, the data exchange process and the coordination of multiple agents are very difficult to realize. In this paper, a Byzantine fault-tolerant GNC (Guidance, Navigation and Control) system is proposed based on the time-triggered architecture (TTA). This improved GNC system architecture applies the pairwise comparison algorithm, and is more simplified than the traditional one. Simulations are conducted on both SCADETM toolset and Simulink/Matlink platforms to verify the performance of the system.
Antioxidant and Radical Scavenging Activity of Human Colostrum, Transitional and Mature Milk

Human milk from healthy women contains numerous nutrients such as antioxidants which are necessary for newborns. The aim of this study was to evaluate the changes of total antioxidant capacity (TAC) and free radical scavenging activity in human milk during the first six month period of lactation and also its relationship to maternal plasma. A total of 505 milk samples (colostrum, transitional and mature milks) collected from 115 healthy women with full term newborns. Blood plasma was obtained from 58 women at 3 months postpartum. The TAC of samples were measured by Ferric Reducing/Antioxidant Power assay and free radical scavenging activity were evaluated using 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radicals. TAC was obviously higher in colostrums than transitional and mature milks. Similar results were observed for DPPH radical scavenging activity of the samples. There was a high significant correlation between the results of these two methods. The relationship between the antioxidant content of human milk and maternal plasma was also significant. These data suggest that using colostrum, with high antioxidant potential during the first days of life is vital; moreover, reduction in total TAC during the course of lactation may needs more attention about nutritional status.
Local Graph Clustering With Network Lasso

We study the statistical and computational properties of a network Lasso method for local graph clustering. The clusters delivered by nLasso can be characterized elegantly via network flows between cluster boundaries and seed nodes. While spectral clustering methods are guided by a minimization of the graph Laplacian quadratic form, nLasso minimizes the total variation of cluster indicator signals. As demonstrated theoretically and numerically, nLasso methods can handle very sparse clusters (chain-like) which are difficult for spectral clustering. We also verify that a primal-dual method for non-smooth optimization allows to approximate nLasso solutions with optimal worst-case convergence rate.
Assessment of Co-Occurring Disorders in Veterans Diagnosed With Traumatic Brain Injury

Aims:The co-occurrence of psychiatric disorders and other somatic disorders poses a significant challenge for the individual clinician working with veterans who report a history of mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). In this article, common co-occurring symptoms and disorders will be described in relation to the population of veterans with mTBI, using a retrospective analysis of data from initial screening and secondary level evaluation for traumatic brain injury (TBI) in an urban Veteran's Affairs Medical Center. Participants:Four hundred two veterans of the recent conflicts who received secondary level evaluation for TBI following positive TBI screening. Outcomes:Significant differences were detected in symptom reporting between those who screened positive and those who screened negative on psychiatric screening. Those with positive posttraumatic stress disorder and depression screens endorsed more cognitive and affective symptoms; individuals screening positive for alcohol abuse did not report significantly more symptoms. Individuals without positive psychiatric screens reported fewer symptoms than those with positive screens. Consideration of these data in the context of a clinical case will be used to elucidate the challenge this presents to the clinical team. Conclusion:The presence of co-occurring disorders should be considered in the etiology of a veteran's continued symptomatic complaints following TBI.
Data Warehouse Governance Programs in Healthcare Settings: A Literature Review and a Call to Action

Purpose: Given the extensive data stored in healthcare data warehouses, data warehouse governance policies are needed to ensure data integrity and privacy. This review examines the current state of the data warehouse governance literature as it applies to healthcare data warehouses, identifies knowledge gaps, provides recommendations, and suggests approaches for further research. Methods: A comprehensive literature search using five data bases, journal article title-search, and citation searches was conducted between 1997 and 2012. Data warehouse governance documents from two healthcare systems in the USA were also reviewed. A modified version of nine components from the Data Governance Institute Framework for data warehouse governance guided the qualitative analysis. Results: Fifteen articles were retrieved. Only three were related to healthcare settings, each of which addressed only one of the nine framework components. Of the remaining 12 articles, 10 addressed between one and seven framework components and the remainder addressed none. Each of the two data warehouse governance plans obtained from healthcare systems in the USA addressed a subset of the framework components, and between them they covered all nine. Conclusions: While published data warehouse governance policies are rare, the 15 articles and two healthcare organizational documents reviewed in this study may provide guidance to creating such policies. Additional research is needed in this area to ensure that data warehouse governance polices are feasible and effective. The gap between the development of data warehouses in healthcare settings and formal governance policies is substantial, as evidenced by the sparse literature in this domain.
Shape fitting with outliers

Given a set <i>H</i> of <i>n</i> hyperplanes in <i>R<sup>d</sup></i>, we present an algorithm that <i>e</i>-approximates the extent between the top and bottom <i>k</i> levels of the arrangement of <i>H</i> in time <i>O(n + (k/e)<sup>c</sup>)</i>, where <i>c</i> is a constant depending on <i>d</i>. The algorithm relies on computing a subset of <i>H</i> of size. <i>O(k/e<sup>d-1</sup>)</i>, in near linear time, such that the <i>k</i>-level of the arrangement of the subset approximates that of the original arrangement. Using this algorithm, we propose efficient approximation algorithms for shape fitting with outliers for various shapes. This is the first algorithms to handle outliers efficiently for the shape fitting problems considered.
Compositions and Abundances of Sulfate-Reducing and Sulfur-Oxidizing Microorganisms in Water-Flooded Petroleum Reservoirs with Different Temperatures in China

Sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) have been studied extensively in the petroleum industry due to their role in corrosion, but very little is known about sulfur-oxidizing bacteria (SOB), which drive the oxidization of sulfur-compounds produced by the activity of SRB in petroleum reservoirs. Here, we surveyed the community structure, diversity and abundance of SRB and SOB simultaneously based on 16S rRNA, dsrB and soxB gene sequencing, and quantitative PCR analyses, respectively in petroleum reservoirs with different physicochemical properties. Similar to SRB, SOB were found widely inhabiting the analyzed reservoirs with high diversity and different structures. The dominant SRB belonged to the classes Deltaproteobacteria and Clostridia, and included the Desulfotignum, Desulfotomaculum, Desulfovibrio, Desulfobulbus, and Desulfomicrobium genera. The most frequently detected potential SOB were Sulfurimonas, Thiobacillus, Thioclava, Thiohalomonas and Dechloromonas, and belonged to Betaproteobacteria, Alphaproteobacteria, and Epsilonproteobacteria. Among them, Desulfovibrio, Desulfomicrobium, Thioclava, and Sulfurimonas were highly abundant in the low-temperature reservoirs, while Desulfotomaculum, Desulfotignum, Thiobacillus, and Dechloromonas were more often present in high-temperature reservoirs. The relative abundances of SRB and SOB varied and were present at higher proportions in the relatively high-temperature reservoirs. Canonical correspondence analysis also revealed that the SRB and SOB communities in reservoirs displayed high niche specificity and were closely related to reservoir temperature, pH of the formation brine, and sulfate concentration. In conclusion, this study extends our knowledge about the distribution of SRB and SOB communities in petroleum reservoirs.
Glycemic control and acute coronary syndrome: the debate continues.

Acute myocardial infarction (AMI) is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in worldwide population.1 Patients admitted to Emergency Care Unit and/or Intensive Coronary Care Unit remain at high risk of recurrent events, hospitalization, and cardiovascular death.1 In last decades, diabetic mellitus (DM) affected patients have been diagnosed as one of four patients with AMI.2 New randomized controlled trials have investigated pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic management strategies to reduce all-cause mortality for patients with diabetes and AMI. In fact, the International American and European guidelines1,2 have reported evidence-based recommendations for treating AMI and DM. Parallel to an innovative and broader use of anti-ischaemic and anti-remodelling drugs to treat AMI, the primary angioplasty [primary percoutaneous coronary intervention (pPCI)] therapeutical development has drastically reduced the mortality in affected patients.1 The not discussable percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) impact in AMI patients prognosis is not so great as expected in DM patients.3 Moreover, we have to consider DM patients, as a population of patients with different clinical characteristics, that render more difficult the best clinical pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment (pPCI) to reduce worse prognosis during AMI. For these reasons, we have to improve current clinical diagnosis and treatment, and planning future strategies for DM affected by AMI. In the current study,4 Singh and co-workers evidenced that ‘despite rapid revascularization and treatment of hyperglycaemia, patients with acute hyperglycaemia (AH) continue to have …
Oscillating focus of SopA associated with filamentous structure guides partitioning of F plasmid

The F plasmid is actively partitioned to daughter cells by the sopABC gene. To elucidate the partitioning mechanisms, we simultaneously analysed movements of the plasmid and the SopA ATPase in single living cells. SopA, which is a putative motor protein assembled densely near nucleoid borders and formed a single discrete focus associated with less dense filamentous distribution along the long axis of the cell. The dense SopA focus oscillates between cell poles. The direction of the plasmid motion switches as the SopA focus switches its position. The velocity of the plasmid motion stays constant while it oscillates moving towards the SopA focus. The low density filamentous distribution of SopA persisted throughout the SopA oscillation. The focus associated with filamentous distribution of SopA was also observed in a cell without nucleoid. The SopA filament may guide the movement of the plasmid as a railway track and lead it to cell quarters.
Slow Rates of Molecular Evolution in Birds and the Metabolic Rate and Body Temperature Hypotheses

It has long been hypothesized that the rate of molecular evolution in birds is slow relative to other tetrapods, particularly mammals, based on small genetic distances between bird taxa (e.g., Prager et al. 1974; Britten 1986). These studies rely heavily, however, on accurate dating of fossils or biogeographic events in estimating taxonomic divergence times. Adachi, Cao, and Hasegawa (1993) used a relative rate test, not dependent on dating, and found a significantly slower rate of mitochondrial amino acid substitution in chicken relative to human. Relative rate tests for birds have not yet been applied to either mitochondrial or nuclear DNAs.