Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Coupled microstriplines with ENG metamaterial loading: physical concepts, design formulas, and numerical simulations

In this contribution, we present the analysis and design of coupled microstriplines loaded with proper epsilon negative (ENG) metamaterial slabs. The behavior of the proposed component is at first analyzed through a heuristic approach. The main result of this investigation is that, depending on the orientation of the ENG slab, it is possible to achieve either higher or very reduced coupled values. A conformal mapping technique is, then, applied in order to derive closed analytical forms for the effective permittivity and the mutual coupling as a function of the geometrical and electrical parameters for the different orientations of the ENG slab. Such formulas are used to design different components, such as power dividers, decoupled lines, coupled lines with anomalous values of coupling, etc. Finally, the electromagnetic behavior of these components expected from the analytical design has been compared to the one obtained through full-wave numerical simulations, showing a very good agreement.
Gene Transfer of Pro-opiomelanocortin Prohormone Suppressed the Growth and Metastasis of Melanoma: Involvement of α-Melanocyte-Stimulating Hormone-Mediated Inhibition of the Nuclear Factor κB/Cyclooxygenase-2 Pathway

Pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) is a prohormone of various neuropeptides, including corticotropin, α-melanocyte-stimulating hormone (α-MSH), and β-endorphin (β-EP). POMC neuropeptides are potent inflammation inhibitors and immunosuppressants and may exert opposite influences during tumorigenesis. However, the role of POMC expression in carcinogenesis remains elusive. We evaluated the antineoplastic potential of POMC gene delivery in a syngenic B16-F10 melanoma model. Adenovirus-mediated POMC gene delivery in B16-F10 cells increased the release of POMC neuropeptides in cultured media, which differentially regulated the secretion of pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines in lymphocytes. POMC gene transfer significantly reduced the anchorage-independent growth of melanoma cells. Moreover, pre- or post-treatment with POMC gene delivery effectively retarded the melanoma growth in mice. Intravenous injection of POMC-transduced B16-F10 cells resulted in reduced foci formation in lung by 60 to 70% of control. The reduced metastasis of POMC-transduced B16-F10 cells could be attributed to their attenuated migratory and adhesive capabilities. POMC gene delivery reduced the cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) expression and prostaglandin (PG) E2 synthesis in melanoma cells and tumor tissues. In addition, application of NS-398, a selective COX-2 inhibitor, mimicked the antineoplastic functions of POMC gene transfer in melanoma. The POMC-mediated COX-2 down-regulation was correlated with its inhibition of nuclear factor κB (NFκB) activities. Exogenous supply of α-MSH inhibited NFκB activities, whereas application of the α-MSH antagonist growth hormone-releasing peptide-6 (GHRP-6) abolished the POMC-induced inhibition of NFκB activities and melanoma growth in mice. In summary, POMC gene delivery suppresses melanoma via α-MSH-induced inhibition of NFκB/COX-2 pathway, thereby constituting a novel therapy for melanoma.
Anti-Apoptotic Effects of SERPIN B3 and B4 via STAT6 Activation in Macrophages after Infection with Toxoplasma gondii

Toxoplasma gondii penetrates all kinds of nucleated eukaryotic cells but modulates host cells differently for its intracellular survival. In a previous study, we found out that serine protease inhibitors B3 and B4 (SERPIN B3/B4 because of their very high homology) were significantly induced in THP-1-derived macrophages infected with T. gondii through activation of STAT6. In this study, to evaluate the effects of the induced SERPIN B3/B4 on the apoptosis of T. gondii-infected THP-1 cells, we designed and tested various small interfering (si-) RNAs of SERPIN B3 or B4 in staurosporine-induced apoptosis of THP-1 cells. Anti-apoptotic characteristics of THP-1 cells after infection with T. gondii disappeared when SERPIN B3/B4 were knock-downed with gene specific si-RNAs transfected into THP-1 cells as detected by the cleaved caspase 3, poly-ADP ribose polymerase and DNA fragmentation. This anti-apoptotic effect was confirmed in SERPIN B3/B4 overexpressed HeLa cells. We also investigated whether inhibition of STAT6 affects the function of SERPIN B3/B4, and vice versa. Inhibition of SERPIN B3/B4 did not influence STAT6 expression but SERPIN B3/B4 expression was inhibited by STAT6 si-RNA transfection, which confirmed that SERPIN B3/B4 was induced under the control of STAT6 activation. These results suggest that T. gondii induces SERPIN B3/B4 expression via STAT6 activation to inhibit the apoptosis of infected THP-1 cells for longer survival of the intracellular parasites themselves.
Fast Digital Convolutions using Bit-Shifts

An exact, one-to-one transform is presented that not only allows digital circular convolutions, but is free from multiplications and quantisation errors for transform lengths of arbitrary powers of two. The transform is analogous to the Discrete Fourier Transform, with the canonical harmonics replaced by a set of cyclic integers computed using only bit-shifts and additions modulo a prime number. The prime number may be selected to occupy contemporary word sizes or to be very large for cryptographic or data hiding applications. The transform is an extension of the Rader Transforms via Carmichael's Theorem. These properties allow for exact convolutions that are impervious to numerical overflow and to utilise Fast Fourier Transform algorithms.
Penetrating Facial Trauma: A Management Plan

Penetrating wounds of the face present a spectrum of injuries and multiple management dilemmas. The surgeon's first concern remains the establishment of a proper airway and control of life-threatening injuries. Selected ancillary diagnostic procedures should be used to confirm vascular, aerodigestive, or central nervous system injuries. Diagnosis of injuries may require arteriography, endoscopic examination, barium studies, computerized tomography, and detailed ophthalmologic examination. We review 16 cases of penetrating facial trauma treated at the University of South Alabama Trauma Center over a one-year period. The injuries resulted from 13 gunshot wounds and three stab wounds. Injuries of the central nervous system occurred in three patients, mandibular fractures in four, optic nerve or globe injury in three, and maxillary sinus fracture in seven. Our experience with these patients demonstrates the spectrum of injuries and serves as a basis for a management algorithm.
Identification of Gaps in the Achievement of Undergraduate Anesthesia Educational Objectives Using High-Fidelity Patient Simulation

In this study we sought to identify educational gaps in medical students’ knowledge using human patient simulation. The Undergraduate Committee developed 10 scenarios based on anesthesia curriculum objectives. Checklists were designed by asking 15 faculty members involved in undergraduate education to propose expected performance items at a level appropriate for medical students. These items consisted of essential performance items as well as critical management omissions. Checklists were used to score students’ videotaped performances. Checklist items common to more than one scenario were grouped for data analysis and identification of gaps in achievement of educational objectives. Eighteen groupings of expected performance criteria and 8 groupings of critical management omissions were established. Performance data of 165 students were analyzed. Common management omissions were lack of adequate airway management, failure to check blood pressure, and failure to stop the anesthetic. Students reliably performed defibrillation, notation of vital signs, auscultation of lung fields, and administration of IV fluids. The most common critical omissions were failing to a) call for help, b) take a history/do physical examination, and c) prepare airway equipment. Management and critical omissions noted during performance assessments provide information regarding students’ educational needs, enabling faculty to focus attention on demonstrated areas of weakness.
Quantitation of monomeric and oligomeric forms of membrane-bound staphylococcal alpha-toxin by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay with a neutralizing monoclonal antibody

A murine monoclonal antibody generated against staphylococcal alpha-toxin was shown to react only with the monomeric (native), 3S form of the toxin. A sensitive sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) constructed with this antibody permitted detection of 0.25 to 0.5 ng of native toxin per ml. Toxin oligomers formed either by heat aggregation in solution, on target erythrocyte membranes, or on phosphatidylcholine-cholesterol liposomes were unreactive in the ELISA when membranes were solubilized with the nondenaturing detergent Triton X-100. After dissociation of the oligomers by boiling in sodium dodecyl sulfate, however, the ELISA reactivity of the liberated 3S toxin was fully restored. Parallel determinations of membrane-bound toxin with sodium dodecyl sulfate and Triton X-100 solubilization thus permitted direct quantitation of total and monomeric toxin, respectively; the difference between these two values was represented by toxin oligomers. The detection limits for membrane-bound oligomeric and monomeric toxin on erythrocyte membranes are in the order of 100 molecules and 1 molecule per cell, respectively. Using this ELISA, we show that over 90% of alpha-toxin molecules bound to target membranes at 37 degrees C are in oligomeric form. Evidence is given that the monoclonal antibody neutralizes alpha-toxin by inhibiting its binding to both rabbit and human erythrocytes. This ELISA is the first assay that quantitatively discriminates between mono- and oligomeric forms of a pore-forming protein on target cell membranes.
Study of bias in antenatal clinic HIV-1 surveillance data in a high contraceptive prevalence population in sub-Saharan Africa, by Gregson et al.

Objective: To describe patterns, sources and consequences of bias in antenatal clinic (ANC) HIV prevalence estimates in a high contraceptive prevalence population. Background: HIV surveillance in Africa relies on data from pregnant women attending ANCs. HIV estimates from pregnant women understate female infection levels in low income, high fertility populations. Bias in high contraceptive use, delayed sexual debut populations remains undescribed. Design and method: Comparison of parallel cross-sectional population and antenatal survey data from rural Zimbabwe, where 60% of women are recent contraceptive users. Results: HIV prevalence in recently pregnant women (25.7%; n = 576) and all women (25.5%; n = 5138) is similar over the age-range 15-44 years. As in high fertility populations, HIV prevalence is higher in pregnant women at young ages and lower at older ages but the crossover point occurs later due to delayed sexual activity. HIV understatement at older ages due to HIV-associated infertility is mitigated by less HIV infection and less frequent ANC attendance in contraceptive users. The local ANC HIV prevalence estimate is lower [21.2%; n = 1215; risk ratio versus pregnant women in the general population, 0.8; 95% confidence interval (Cl), 0.7-1.0], possibly because women from more remote areas are included. ANC estimates overstate the relative risk of HIV in more educated women (age-adjusted odds ratio, 1.1; 95% Cl, 0.8-1.4 versus 0.7; 95% Cl, 0.6-0.9). Conclusions: ANC estimates understate female HIV prevalence in this low fertility population but, here, the primary cause is not selection of pregnant women. ANC estimate adjustment procedures that control for contraceptive use and age at first sex are needed.
Efficient frame-level pipelined array architecture for full-search block-matching motion estimation

Motion estimation plays an important role in video compression to remove temporal redundancies between successive frames. An efficient frame-level pipelined FSBM (full-search block-matching) motion estimation systolic array architecture for the search range p=kN (k>1/2) is proposed. Design efforts are made to remove data broadcasting operations, to achieve 100% processor utilization and to reduce the hardware overhead while still keeping the scalability of the search range. It compares favorably with existing motion estimation architectures in terms of hardware cost, performance and complexity of architecture. As such, this architecture offers a feasible solution for digital TV and HDTV video picture formats.
T Cell Tolerance Following Bacterial Glutamic Acid Decarboxylase (GAD) Feeding in Streptozotocin-Induced Diabetes.

BACKGROUND Autoimmune type 1 diabetes mellitus is caused by the T-cell mediated immune destruction of the insulin-producing beta-cell in pancreatic islets of Langerhans. The specificity of the auto-antibodies and of the auto-reactive T cells has been investigated, in which several auto-antigens were proposed. OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to determine whether glutamic acid decarboxylase (GAD) feeding would induce oral tolerance of either the T cell or B cell compartment in streptozotocin (STZ) diabetic rats. METHODS Experimental rats were fed 2 mg/kg of GAD (extracted from Escherichia coli) 14 days before being given intra-peritoneal injections of streptozotocin (STZ, 30 mg/kg body weight for 5 consecutive days). Of the two control groups, one was the diabetic control, which underwent STZ injections without being given the GAD; and the second was the normal control group. Systemic responses were compared between the three groups. T cell responses were assessed by a proliferation assay of spleen cells, and those of the B cell, by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay ELISA for anti-GAD specific Abs in serum. RESULTS Compared with the diabetic control group, a significant reduction was observed only in the proliferative response of spleen cells, but not in the level of anti-GAD antibody. CONCLUSION We concluded that GAD feeding induces systemic T cell tolerance in STZ-induced diabetes.
ON THE USE AND FUTURE OF ALTERNATIVE TESTING STRATEGIES IN REGULATORY TOXICOLOGY

ii Acknowledgments.iii List of Tables . v List of Figures . vii Chapter I: Introduction . 1 Chapter II: A review of the literature with respect to the research outlined in this dissertation . 10 Chapter III: EPA’s methodology to inform TSCA PMN decisionmaking: an analysis and critique . 37 Chapter IV: Network motifs that recur across species: gene regulatory and protein-protein interaction networks . 68 Chapter V: In vitro perturbation of the transcription factor e2f is a strong predictor of in vivo hepatocarcinogenesis resulting from chemical exposure . 97 Chapter VI: Conclusion . 131 Curriculum vitae . 144
Incidental Discovery of Multiorgan Extramedullary Plasmacytomas in the Setting of Newly Diagnosed Multiple Myeloma and Delayed Hemolytic Transfusion Reaction

Extramedullary plasmacytomas (EMPs) are defined by the presence of clonal plasma cell proliferation outside of the bone marrow, portending an overall poor prognosis. This case highlights extramedullary plasmacytomas as an unusual presenting manifestation of multiple myeloma. Through incidental discovery during a delayed hemolytic transfusion reaction workup, EMPs were found in the liver, spleen, and possibly the lung. Though rare at presentation, this case emphasizes that the presence of EMPs should be considered at the outset as it not only impacts the treatment regimen for such patients but also considerably affects prognosis.
MK-AMI: Efficient multi-group key management scheme for secure communications in AMI systems

The Smart Grid (SG) is widely considered to be the informationization of the power grid. Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) has been regarded as a key component of the SG. The critical role of AMI in the SG has made this system a privileged target of cyber attacks. Consequently, AMI security is of very high importance for the security of the SG. For this reason, Key Management has been identified as one of the most challenging topics in AMI development because of the great scale of SG and dynamism of connected clients with respect to tariff programs. This paper proposes a new efficient Multi-group Key management for AMI (MK-AMI) to secure data communications in the smart grid. It is a novel key management scheme that can support unicast, multicast and broadcast communications. An analysis of security and performance, and a comparison of our scheme with recently proposed schemes illustrate that MK-AMI achieves efficient key management and induces low storage and communications overheads compared to existing solutions.
Automated generation of hybrid system models for reachability analysis of nonlinear analog circuits

We address the problem of formally verifying nonlinear analog circuits with an uncertain initial set by computing their reachable set. A reachable set contains the union of all possible system trajectories for a set of uncertain states and as such can be used to provably check whether undesired behavior is possible or not. Our method is based on local linearizations of the nonlinear circuit, which naturally results in a piecewise-linear system. To substantially limit the number of required locations, our approach computes linearized locations on-the-fly depending on which states are reachable. We can show that without the proposed on-the-fly technique, the conversion to piecewise-linear systems is infeasible even for a few nonlinear semiconductor devices (discrete state-space explosion problem). Our method is fully automatic and only requires a circuit netlist. Piecewise-linear systems have gained popularity not only for verification, but also for accelerated simulation of nonlinear circuits. Our method provides a guaranteed bound on the number of linearization locations that have to be explicitly computed for such a nonlinear circuit.
JPEG 2000 : The Next Generation Still Image Compression Standard

JPEG 2000, an emerging standard for still image compression, is discussed at length. To commence, a high-level introduction to JPEG 2000 is given. This is followed by a detailed technical description of the JPEG-2000 codec. Next, the codec is evaluated. The complexity of its various components is analyzed, and its performance is compared to other existing standards. With its excellent coding performance and many attractive features, JPEG 2000 will no doubt become a widely used standard in the years to come. EDICS Category: 1-STAN Please address all correspondence concerning this manuscript to: Michael D. Adams Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering University of British Columbia 2356 Main Mall Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6T 1Z4 Phone: 604-822-2872, Fax: 604-822-5949 Email: mdadams@ece.ubc. ca
Automated image registration: I. General methods and intrasubject, intramodality validation.

PURPOSE We sought to describe and validate an automated image registration method (AIR 3.0) based on matching of voxel intensities. METHOD Different cost functions, different minimization methods, and various sampling, smoothing, and editing strategies were compared. Internal consistency measures were used to place limits on registration accuracy for MRI data, and absolute accuracy was measured using a brain phantom for PET data. RESULTS All strategies were consistent with subvoxel accuracy for intrasubject, intramodality registration. Estimated accuracy of registration of structural MRI images was in the 75 to 150 microns range. Sparse data sampling strategies reduced registration times to minutes with only modest loss of accuracy. CONCLUSION The registration algorithm described is a robust and flexible tool that can be used to address a variety of image registration problems. Registration strategies can be tailored to meet different needs by optimizing tradeoffs between speed and accuracy.
Implementation Strategy for Coral Reef Transplantation Methods in Support of Natural Resource Planning, Management and NEPANESDI Project Number 491

Abstract : This study provides a roadmap for making decisions when formulating mitigation packages presented to regulatory agencies. Natural resource planners, range managers, and other environmental team members can refer to the Coral Reef Transplant Method Implementation Strategy (CRTMIS) for scientific evidence to determine coral reef transplant and mitigation methods. Conversely, CRTMIS provides information that would argue against the transplantation option under certain conditions. Overall, CRTMIS will serve as a tool to help meet the following Navy goals: keep submerged training lands available for use by the Navy, lower mitigation costs, provide scientifically defensible data to be used in National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) consultations/agreements, and help select transplantation methods that will lead to an increase of genetic diversity among coral reefs and stronger, resilient ecosystems.
Signal Processing in Random Access A cross-layer perspective in an uncharted path

he design of medium access control (MAC) protocols has traditionally been separated from that of the physical (PHY) layer. To a MAC protocol designer, the PHY layer is a black box satisfying the so-called collision model: when only one user transmits, the packet arrives at the receiving node error free. But when transmissions are simultaneous, packets are lost due to collision. Until recently, the theory of random access was based on such an idealized model, and random access protocols were viewed as collision resolution or collision avoidance techniques. In practice, the collision model is both optimistic and pessimistic: optimistic, for it ignores channel effects such as fading and noise on reception, and pessimistic, because it does not accommodate the possibility that packets may be successfully decoded in the presence of simultaneous transmissions. Given the advances in multiuser communications at the PHY layer, the collision model no longer represents all the characteristics of the PHY layer, missing some of its most important properties. Is there a need to go beyond the collision model for wireless networks? Should the MAC layer assume a multiuser PHY layer and be designed with a cross-layer principle in mind? Is the gain of a cross-layer design significant enough to justify replacing a well-tested protocol with a more sophisticated one? Will the cross-layer design be too complicated to implement, and too sensitive to channel changes to be useful? The idea of cross-layer design has been brought to the fore by the phenomenal growth in wireless applications and a continuing push for broadband access. The fundamental challenge, as noted by Gallager in 1985 [1] and more recently by Ephremides T