Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Crosstalk between Red Blood Cells and the Immune System and Its Impact on Atherosclerosis

Atherosclerosis is a chronic multifactorial disease of the arterial wall characterized by inflammation, oxidative stress, and immune system activation. Evidence exists on a pathogenic role of oxidized red blood cells (RBCs) accumulated in the lesion after intraplaque hemorrhage. This review reports current knowledge on the impact of oxidative stress in RBC modifications with the surface appearance of senescent signals characterized by reduced expression of CD47 and glycophorin A and higher externalization of phosphatidylserine. The review summarizes findings indicating that oxidized, senescent, or stored RBCs, due to surface antigen modification and release of prooxidant and proinflammatory molecules, exert an impaired modulatory activity on innate and adaptive immune cells and how this activity contributes to atherosclerotic disease. In particular RBCs from patients with atherosclerosis, unlike those from healthy subjects, fail to control lipopolysaccharide-induced DC maturation and T lymphocyte apoptosis. Stored RBCs, accompanied by shedding of extracellular vesicles, stimulate peripheral blood mononuclear cells to release proinflammatory cytokines, augment mitogen-driven T cell proliferation, and polarize macrophages toward the proinflammatory M1 activation pathway. Collectively, literature data suggest that the crosstalk between RBCs with immune cells represents a novel mechanism by which oxidative stress can contribute to atherosclerotic disease progression and may be exploited for therapeutic interventions.
Unrecognized Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease: diagnostic difficulties in the assessment of recovery from paralysis.

C harcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMTD), Type 1, is a peripheral neuropathy characterized by a slowly progressive weakness and muscle atrophy, first affecting the feet and legs and much later the hands and forearms (1). From a neurophysiologic point of view, a prolonged latency of evoked responses should be expected both on proximal and distal muscles as a consequence of the diffuse myelinopathy, which is the primary defect in this disease (2); a further increase in the latency, as well as a decrease in the amplitude of responses, should be expected in distal muscles when their innervation is altered by the secondary axonopathy (3) of the longest nerve fibers (1). As a general rule, reinnervation phenomena, which typically are accompanied by an increased sensitivity to muscle relaxants (4-91, are much more frequent if the axonal damage occurs in a young patient (10).
Study of Serum Adenosine Deaminase and Transaminases in type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

Adenosine deaminase (ADA) is an enzyme present in most human tissues. It is also known as adenosine aminohydrolase and involved in purine metabolism. It is an important marker of inflammation. Elevation of the main serum transaminases, aspartate transaminase (AST) and alanine transaminase (ALT) levels indicates liver cell injury. Liver is the main organ that regulates carbohydrate metabolism. Diabetes mellitus is associated with increased risk of liver disease. The aims of the study is to measure serum ADA and transaminases levels in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) subjects and healthy controls. And to find out any correlation between ADA, fasting blood sugar (FBS), Glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c) and transaminases The study was carried out in 60 cases of T2DM and 30 healthy controls. Serum ADA was measured spectrophotometrically based on Guisti and Galanti method. FBS, HbA1c, ALT and AST were measured in all the study subjects. Statistical analysis was done by using SPSS version 20. In this study, the mean serum ADA was significantly increasely in T2DM as compared to controls. Mean FBS, HbA1c, AST and ALT were also significantly increased (p < 0.05) in T2DM as compared to controls. Serum ADA was found to have significant positive correlation with FBS and glycemic status in T2DM. No significant correlation was found between serum ADA and transaminases. The present study shows that there may be ongoing inflammation and hepatic injury in diabetic patients. Estimation of liver enzymes along with serum ADA may help in early detection of derangement of liver function and to prevent further complications.
Sonochemical Treatment of Water Polluted by Chlorinated Organocompounds. A Review

As one of several types of pollutants in water, chlorinated compounds have been routinely subjected to sonochemical analysis to check the environmental applications of this technology. In this review, an extensive study of the influence of the initial concentration, ultrasonic intensity and frequency on the kinetics, degradation efficiency and mechanism has been analyzed. The sonochemical degradation follows a radical mechanism which yields a very wide range of chlorinated compounds in very low concentrations. Special attention has been paid to the mass balance comparing the results from several analytical techniques. As a conclusion, sonochemical degradation alone is not an efficient treatment to reduce the organic pollutant level in waste water.
Impact of Corporate Ownership on Economic Performance of Agroholdings in Russia

This study conveys the impact of corporate ownership on economic performance of agroholdings – integrated agricultural, processing, marketing, financial and industrial business units in Russia’s agro-food sector. Using a unique database of the All-Russian Nikonov-Institute of Agrarian Problems and Informatics, we investigate 151 agroholdings in Russia and evaluate their economic performances for 2006. Applying the multiple linear regression analysis we were able to quantify corporate ownership and analyze a priori unobserved factors. The results of the econometric estimation reveal that state ownership exerts negative influence on the economic performance of agroholdings.
Analysis of microbial community functional diversity using sole-carbon-source utilisation pro ¢ les ^ a critique

Information on functional diversity (metabolic potential) is essential for understanding the role of microbial communities in different environments. Variations of the commercially available BIOLOG bacterial identification system plates are now widely used to assess functional diversity of microorganisms from environmental samples, based on utilisation patterns of a wide range (up to 95) of single carbon sources. There are many problems as well as benefits of using the approach, but the former are often disregarded. Here the basis of the approach is summarised, including type of plate to use, treatment of samples, replication, incubation conditions, monitoring of plates, and statistical analysis. The pros and cons of its use are critically assessed, inherent biases and limitations are pointed out and methodological difficulties are considered. Possible ways of overcoming some of the difficulties are suggested. 4 2002 Federation of European Microbiological Societies. Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Progress in classical and quantum variational principles

We review the development and practical uses of a generalized Maupertuis least action principle in classical mechanics in which the action is varied under the constraint of fixed mean energy for the trial trajectory. The original Maupertuis (Euler–Lagrange) principle constrains the energy at every point along the trajectory. The generalized Maupertuis principle is equivalent to Hamilton's principle. Reciprocal principles are also derived for both the generalized Maupertuis and the Hamilton principles. The reciprocal Maupertuis principle is the classical limit of Schrödinger's variational principle of wave mechanics and is also very useful to solve practical problems in both classical and semiclassical mechanics, in complete analogy with the quantum Rayleigh–Ritz method. Classical, semiclassical and quantum variational calculations are carried out for a number of systems, and the results are compared. Pedagogical as well as research problems are used as examples, which include nonconservative as well as relativistic systems. ‘… the most beautiful and important discovery of Mechanics. ’ Lagrange to Maupertuis (November 1756)
Fractional Dynamics

Modelling, simulation, and applications of Fractional Calculus have recently become increasingly popular subjects, with impressive growth concerning applications. The founding and limited ideas on fractional derivatives have achieved an incredibly valuable status. The variety of applications in mathematics, physics, engineering, economics, biology, and medicine, have opened new, challenging fields of research. For instance, in soil mechanics, a suitable definition of the fractional operator has shed some light on viscoelasticity, explaining memory effects on materials. Needless to say, these applications require the development of practical mathematical tools in order to extract quantitative information from models, newly reformulated in terms of fractional differential equations. Even confining ourselves to the field of ordinary differential equations, the well-known Bagley-Torvik model showed that fractional derivatives may actually arise naturally within certain physical models, and are not merely fanciful mathematical generalizations. This Special Issue focuses on the most recent advances in fractional calculus, applied to dynamic problems, linear and nonlinear fractional ordinary and partial differential equations, integral fractional differential equations, and stochastic integral problems arising in all fields of science, engineering, and other applied fields. In this issue, we have collected several significant papers devoted to applications of fractional methods with a focus on dynamical aspects. The applications range from theoretical mathematical-numerical aspects [1,2] to bio-medical subjects [3–7]. Applications to complex materials are investigated in [8], aiming at proposing a generalized definition of fractional operators. Special diffusion models are studied in [9–11].
Enabling Semantic User Context to Enhance Twitter Location Prediction

Prediction of user interest and behavior is currently an important research area in social network analysis. Most of the current prediction frameworks rely on analyzing user’s published contents and user’s relationships. Recently the dynamic nature of user’s modelling has been introduced in the prediction frameworks. This dynamic nature would be represented by time tagged attributes such as posts or location check-ins. In this paper, we study the relationships between geo-location information published by users at different times. This geo-location information was used to model user’s interest and behavior in order to enhance prediction of user locations. Furthermore, semantic features such as topics of interest and location category were extracted from this information in order to overcome sparsity of data. Several experiments on real twitter dataset showed that the proposed context-based prediction model which applies machine learning techniques outperformed traditional probabilistic location prediction model that only rely on words extracted from tweets associated with specific locations.
Cysteine protease is a major exotoxin of pathogenic luminous Vibrio harveyi in the tiger prawn, Penaeus monodon

The role of an extracellular cysteine protease, produced by pathogenic luminous Vibrio harveyi strain 820514 originally isolated from diseased tiger prawn (Penaeus monodon), in the disease process in the prawns was studied. The protease was lethal to P. monodon with an LD50 value of 0·3 μg protein g−1 prawn. The lethal toxicity of the extracellular products (ECP) of the bacterium was neutralized by pre‐incubation of the ECP with rabbit antiserum to the cysteine protease. Pre‐incubation of ECP with CuCl2 (an inhibitor of cysteine protease) also inhibited toxicity. This suggests that cysteine protease is the major toxin produced by the bacterium. The present protease is the first toxic cysteine protease to be found in Vibrio species.
Consistency maintenance in real-time collaborative graphics editing systems

Real-time collaborative graphics editing systems allow a group of users to view and edit the same graphics document at the same time from geographically dispersed sites connected by communication networks. Consistency maintenance in the face of concurrent accesses to shared objects is one of the core issues in the design of these types of systems. In this article, we propose an object-level multiversioning approach to consistency maintenance in real-time collaborative graphic editors. This approach is novel in achieving intention preservation and convergence, in preserving the work concurrently produced by multiple users in the face of conflict, and in minimizing the number of object versions for conflict resolution. Major technical contributions of this work include a formal specification of a unique combined effect for an arbitrary group of conflict and compatible operations, a distributed algorithm for incremental creation of multiple object versions, a consistent object identification scheme for multiple object versions, and a convergent layering scheme for overlapping objects. All algorithms and schemes presented in this article have been implemented in an Internet-based GRACE (graphics collaborative editing) system.
Endurance exercise and growth hormone improve bone formation in young and growth-retarded chronic kidney disease rats.

BACKGROUND Childhood chronic kidney disease (CKD) is associated with both short stature and abnormal bone mineralization. Normal longitudinal growth depends on proper maturation of epiphyseal growth plate (EGP) chondrocytes, leading to the formation of trabecular bone in the primary ossification centre. We have recently shown that linear growth impairment in CKD is associated with impaired EGP growth hormone (GH) receptor signalling and that exercise improved insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) signalling in CKD-related muscle atrophy. METHODS In this study, 20-day-old rats underwent 5/6 nephrectomy (CKD) or sham surgery (C) and were exercised with treadmill, with or without GH supplementation. RESULTS CKD-related growth retardation was associated with a widened EGP hypertrophic zone. This was not fully corrected by exercise (except for tibial length). Exercise in CKD improved the expression of EGP key factors of endochondral ossification such as IGF-I, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), receptor activator of nuclear factor kappa-B ligand (RANKL) and osteocalcin. Combining GH treatment with treadmill exercise for 2 weeks improved the decreased trabecular bone volume in CKD, as well as the expression of growth plate runt-related transcription factor 2, RANKL, metalloproteinase 13 and VEGF, while GH treatment alone could not do that. CONCLUSIONS Treadmill exercise improves tibial bone linear growth, as well as growth plate local IGF-I. When combined with GH treatment, running exercise shows beneficial effects on trabecular bone formation, suggesting the potential benefit of this combination for CKD-related short stature and bone disease.
SECURE MULTI-OWNER DATA SHARING FOR DYNAMIC GROUPS IN THE CLOUD

Cloud computing is associate degree raising computing paradigm within which resources of the computing infrastructure area unit provided as services over the net. As promising because it is, this paradigm conjointly brings forth several new challenges for knowledge security and access management once users confidential against un trusted servers, existing solutions sometimes apply crypto logical ways by revealing knowledge cryptography keys solely to approved users. One among the largest considerations with cloud knowledge storage is that of knowledge integrity verification at un trusted servers. To preserve knowledge privacy, a basic resolution is to encode knowledge files, so transfer the encrypted knowledge into the cloud. To resolve this downside recently the simplest economical technique Anglesey given for secured multi owner knowledge sharing in but we have a tendency to known some limitations within the same approach in terms of responsibleness and quantifiability. Therefore during this paper we have a tendency to area unit more extending the fundamental Anglesey by adding the responsibleness still as raising the quantifiability by increasing the quantity of cluster managers dynamically.
GIS-Assisted Modelling of Soil Erosion in a South African Catchment: Evaluating the USLE and SLEMSA Approach

Soil erosion – the detachment and transportation of particles from soil aggregates by erosive agents (Stocking, 1984) – is regarded as one of South Africa’s most significant environmental problems (Meadows, 2003). In South Africa, roughly 6 million households derive all or some of their income from agriculture (South African Department of Agriculture, 2007). Roughly 25 % of the population is directly dependant on agriculture, an activity that utilises about 80% of the total surface area of the country (Lutchmaih, 1999). The implications of high soil erosion rates are reflected in agricultural costs as well as social welfare costs where the de‐ cline in soil productivity causes the migration of the workers to urban areas. For a develop‐ ing country, such as South Africa, these social impacts further burden the national economy.
Coronary ischemia related to alemtuzumab therapy.

the combination granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) + 2-weekly CHOP allows the clinician to increase dose intensity by delivering chemotherapy every 14 days and decreases the infectious complications, which elderly patients are more exposed to [2]. Two-weekly CHOP + G-CSF significantly improves the complete response and EFS when compared to the traditional CHOP (every 21 days) or to other more complex regimens. As shown in Table 1, there are no significant differences in the results achieved with R-CHOP or with 2-weekly CHOP + G-CSF. Although the results are comparable, 2-weekly CHOP + G-CSF shows a reduced toxic death rate and a shorter duration of the treatment. As shown in Table 1, we calculated and compared the cost of these two treatments at our institution, finding a significantly lower cost in 2-weekly CHOP + G-CSF. Of note, in R-CHOP cost-assessment, we have not included the additional expense for the G-CSF eventually delivered during this treatment (employed in more than one-third of patients) [1]. Waiting for the ongoing trials comparing these two approaches, the current data in the literature and the estimate of expenses seem to suggest the use of 2-weekly CHOP + G-CSF in the treatment of aggressive lymphomas in the elderly.
The 2014 Surgeon General's report: “The Health Consequences of Smoking–50 Years of Progress”: A paradigm shift in cancer care

On rare occasions, clinicians are presented with evidence supporting a paradigm shift in clinical care. On January 17, 2014, the Surgeon General’s report (SGR), “The Health Consequences of Smoking–50 Years of Progress,” was published updating the evidence of the adverse effects of tobacco on health. Of course, the evidence linking smoking to a wide range of health consequences has been well established for decades. However, what was new in this report, and that is specifically relevant to clinicians involved in caring for patients with cancer, is the finding that tobacco smoking is causally associated with adverse health outcomes in patients with cancer. As noted in the executive summary and described in detail in the section on cancer, the report concludes the following:
Inexact iteration of averaged operators for non-strongly convex stochastic optimization

We focus on inexact iteration of averaged operators with stochastic errors, and we give conditions for a sublinear O (1 /K) convergence rate for this class of iteration. Then, we show that our general development gives convergence rate analysis for sampling-based algorithms for non-strongly convex stochastic optimization including minimization, saddle-point problems, and constrained optimization.
Online educational environments and ICT tools in higher education: Teacher survey

: The role of the Internet and digital tools in higher education are incontestable at the beginning of the 21 st century. The technological development creates quick changes in this area. Due to the globalized environment and the innovations in IT, the participants of the educational system have to face new challenges. New questions and problems are appearing that need to be solved. How do the changes of technological opportunities and needs transform higher education? Is it possible to use web 2.0 applications for education? How and to what extent should digital tools be inserted into education? The paper and the related research attempt to discover the the opinion of teachers and students about web 2.0 Web 2.0 applications’ learning / teaching purposes. Could these tools be used in education to contribute to individual and collective knowledge building? Scientific studies show that students’ habits of using Internet are not homogenous. Teachers require different attributes, they need a different kind of higher education. The survey also seeks to discover what the real differences are between different generations’ attitudes toward learning and Internet usage.
Alar cartilage deformity correction using conchal cartilage in patients with unilateral cleft lip-nose

Background: Rhinoplasty in patients with cleft lip and palate is a challenging surgery to the plastic surgeon because it involves the correction of multiple factors associated with an altered anatomy. Methods: A retrospective analysis of 15 patients that were submitted to surgery performed by the author, between February 2009 and January 2012, was performed. Investigated parameters included age, gender, and type of cleft. Results: All patients were subjected to open rhinoplasty using a “folded” conchal cartilage for alar cartilage deformity correction on the cleft side, with satisfactory results. Necrosis of the columella, which healed by secondary intention, was reported in a single case (6.7%). Conclusions: The “folded” conchal cartilage graft is a good option for correcting alar cartilage deformities in patients with cleft lip or unilateral clef lip and palate.
ERP Effects of Subject–Verb Agreement Violations in Patients with Broca’s Aphasia

& This article presents electrophysiological data on on-line syntactic processing during auditory sentence comprehension in patients with Broca’s aphasia. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded from the scalp while subjects listened to sentences that were either syntactically correct or contained violations of subject–verb agreement. Three groups of subjects were tested: Broca patients (n = 10), nonaphasic patients with a right-hemisphere (RH) lesion (n = 5), and healthy agedmatched controls (n = 12). The healthy, control subjects showed a P600/SPS effect as response to the agreement violations. The nonaphasic patients with an RH lesion showed essentially the same pattern. The overall group of Broca patients did not show this sensitivity. However, the sensitivity was modulated by the severity of the syntactic comprehension impairment. The largest deviation from the standard P600/SPS effect was found in the patients with the relatively more severe syntactic comprehension impairment. In addition, ERPs to tones in a classical tone oddball paradigm were also recorded. Similar to the normal control subjects and RH patients, the group of Broca patients showed a P300 effect in the tone oddball condition. This indicates that aphasia in itself does not lead to a general reduction in all cognitive ERP effects. It was concluded that deviations from the standard P600/SPS effect in the Broca patients reflected difficulties with on-line maintaining of number information across clausal boundaries for establishing subject–verb agreement. &