Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Myodegeneration in EDA-A2 Transgenic Mice Is Prevented by XEDAR Deficiency

ABSTRACT EDA-A1 and EDA-A2 are members of the tumor necrosis factor family of ligands. The products of alternative splicing of the ectodysplasin (EDA) gene, EDA-A1 and EDA-A2 differ by an insertion of two amino acids and bind to distinct receptors. The longer isoform, EDA-A1, binds to EDAR and plays an important role in sweat gland, hair, and tooth development; mutations in EDA, EDAR, or the downstream adaptor EDARADD cause hypohidrotic ectodermal dysplasia. EDA-A2 engages the receptor XEDAR, but its role in the whole organism is less clear. We have generated XEDAR-deficient mice by gene targeting and transgenic mice expressing secreted forms of EDA-A1 or EDA-A2 downstream of the skeletal muscle-specific myosin light-chain 2 or skin-specific keratin 5 promoter. Mice lacking XEDAR were indistinguishable from their wild-type littermates, but EDA-A2 transgenic mice exhibited multifocal myodegeneration. This phenotype was not observed in the absence of XEDAR. Skeletal muscle in EDA-A1 transgenic mice was unaffected, but their sebaceous glands were hypertrophied and hyperplastic, consistent with a role for EDA-A1 in the development of these structures. These data indicate that XEDAR-transduced signals are dispensable for development of ectoderm-derived organs but might play a role in skeletal muscle homeostasis.
Inappropriate Pooling of Wealthy and Poor Countries in Empirical FDI Studies

This paper examines the question of whether less-developed countries' (LDCs') experiences with foreign direct investment (FDI) systematically different from those of developed countries (DCs). We do this by examining three types of empirical FDI studies that typically do not distinguish between LDCs and DCs in their analysis. First, we find that the underlying factors that determine the location of FDI activity across countries vary systematically across LDCs and DCs in a way that is not captured by current empirical models of FDI. Second, the effect of FDI on economic growth is one that is only supported for LDCs in the aggregate data, not DCs. Third, the evidence suggests that FDI is much less likely to crowd out (more likely to crowd in) domestic investment for LDCs than DCs.
Behaviour of house mice artificially selected for high levels of voluntary wheel running

We have developed a novel model to study the correlated evolution of behavioural and morphophysiological traits in response to selection for increased locomotor activity. We used selective breeding to increase levels of voluntary wheel running in four replicate lines of laboratory house mice, Mus domesticus, with four random-bred lines maintained as controls. The experiment presented here tested for correlated behavioural responses in the wheel-cage complex, with wheels either free to rotate or locked (environmental factor). After 13 generations, mice from selected lines ran 2.2 times as many revolutions/day as controls on days 5 and 6 of initial exposure to wheels (10 826 versus 4890 revolutions/day, corresponding to 12.1 and 5.5 km/day, respectively). This increase was caused primarily by mice from selected lines running faster, not more minutes per day. Focal-animal observations confirmed that the increase in revolutions/day involved more actual running (or climbing in locked wheels), not an increase in coasting (or hanging). Not surprisingly, access to free versus locked wheels had several effects on behaviour, including total time spent in wheels, sniffing and biting. However, few behaviours showed statistically significant differences between the selected and control lines. Selection did not increase the total time spent in wheels (either free or locked), the frequency of nonlocomotor activities performed in the wheels, nor the amount of locomotor activity in cages attached to the wheels; as well, selection did not decrease the amount of time spent sleeping. Thus, wheel running is, at the genetic level, a largely independent axis of behaviour. Moreover, the genetic architecture of overall wheel running and its components seem conducive to increasing total distance moved without unduly increasing energy or time-related costs. The selection experiment also offers a new approach to study the proximate mechanisms of wheel-running behaviour itself. For example, frequencies of sniffing and wire biting were reduced in selected females but not males. This result suggests that motivation or function of wheel running may differ between the sexes. Copyright 1999 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour.
Pilot symbol assisted BPSK on Rayleigh fading channels with diversity: performance analysis and parameter optimization

The loss due to imperfect channel estimation is derived for pilot symbol assisted binary phase-shift keying (BPSK) on fading channels with diversity. The presented approach, which holds for both narrow-band and spread spectrum communication, further provides an analytical optimization of pilot symbol spacing. The loss due to channel estimation is demonstrated to be low if the maximum Doppler frequency is significantly less than the bit rate.
Two-channel totally asymmetric simple exclusion processes

Totally asymmetric simple exclusion processes, consisting of two coupled parallel lattice chains with particles interacting with hard-core exclusion and moving along the channels and between them, are considered. In the limit of strong coupling between the channels, the particle currents, density profiles and a phase diagram are calculated exactly by mapping the system into an effective one-channel totally asymmetric exclusion model. For intermediate couplings, a simple approximate theory, that describes the particle dynamics in vertical clusters of two corresponding parallel sites exactly and neglects the correlations between different vertical clusters, is developed. It is found that, similarly to the case of one-channel totally asymmetric simple exclusion processes, there are three stationary state phases, although the phase boundaries and stationary properties strongly depend on inter-channel coupling. Extensive computer Monte Carlo simulations fully support the theoretical predictions.
Vasodilation and Mechanism of Action of Propofol in Porcine Coronary Artery

BackgroundA decrease in myocardial perfusion pressure may reduce myocardial blood flow. However, it may not significantly affect myocardial perfusion when in presence of a concurrent coronary artery vasodilation. However, the effects of propofol in coronary arteries are not well determined. In this study, the effects of propofol on porcine coronary artery responses to vasoactive agents that operate through voltage- and receptor-mediated calcium mechanisms were investigated. MethodsHearts of adult pigs (n = 103) were obtained from a slaughter house, and the left anterior descending coronary arteries were dissected. The arteries were cut into vessel rings and prepared with and without the endothelium organ chambers filled with buffered salt solution. The effect of propofol (10–7, 10–6, 10–5, and 10–4M) on vascular smooth muscle contraction caused by intracellular Ca2+-influx through voltage- and receptor-mediated mechanism also was studied at a cellular level. ResultsPropofol relaxed coronary rings that were contracted by KCI, norepinephrine (NE), serotonin (5-HT), or carbachol (CCh). The minimal concentrations of propofol that produced significant vasorelaxation ranged from 3.16 X 10–7 M to 3.16 X 10–6 M. Vasodilation was more pronounced in rings contracted by NE, 5-HT, and CCh than by KCI. Propofol (10–5 M) attenuated coronary vasoconstriction in response to cumulative concentrations of KCI, NE, 5-HT, and acetylcholine. Maximal contractions produced by NE and 5-HT were inhibited to a greater degree than contractions produced by KCI. Propofol at concentrations of 10–5 M and higher attenuated a contraction in response to CaCl2 in vascular rings depolarized by KCI, but concentrations of 10–5 M did not attenuate contractions. Vasoconstriction in response to calcium entry in the presence of NE (and nifedipine 10–6 M) was attenuated by propofol at concentrations of 10–6 M and higher. Caffeine-induced contraction, caused by intracellular calcium release, was attenuated only at 10–4 M of propofol. ConclusionsPropofol possesses vasodilator effect and attenuates the effects of vasoconstrictor agents in porcine coronary artery. Further, an antagonism of calcium channels may be responsible for these effects of propofol.
Cardiac involvement in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus and correlation of valvular lesions with anti-Ro/SS-A and anti-La/SS-B antibody levels

The aim of this study was to evaluate the incidence of morphologic and functional cardiac abnormalities in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and to correlate the findings with levels of anti-Ro/SS-A, anti-La/SS-B, and anti-cardiolipin antibody (aCL). Sixty-two patients with SLE were enrolled in this study. All patients underwent complete history taking, clinical assessment, and standard two-dimensional and Doppler echocardiography. Anti-Ro/SS-A, anti-La/SS-B, and aCL levels were measured using a standardized ELISA test. The patients were subdivided into two subgroups based on the presence or absence of valvular involvement. The two subgroups were then compared. Valvular involvement was present in 19 patients (30.6%), pericardial effusion in 12 patients (19.4%), impaired left ventricular relaxation abnormalities in 2 patients (3.2%), and pulmonary hypertension in 3 patients (4.8%). More patients in the valvular involvement group had positive anti-Ro/SS-A antibodies than in the valvular noninvolvement group (7/19 vs. 4/43). The difference was significant, with P ≪ 0.01. Serum levels of anti-Ro/SS-A levels were significantly higher in the valvular involvement group (33.7 ± 36.0 vs. 13.7 ± 25.1; P ≪ 0.01), as were the serum anti-La/SS-B levels (21.9 ± 23.5 vs. 10.7 ± 17.8; P ≪ 0.05). The results suggest a causative correlation between anti-Ro/SS-A and anti-La/SS-B antibodies and the pathogenesis of the valvular lesions in SLE patients.
Ultra-low power sensor platform with wireless charging system

In this paper, we propose a power autonomous sensor platform with ultra-low power radio frequency (RF) transceiver and wireless charging. The ultra-low power RF transceiver consists of super-regenerative receiver and direct-modulation transmitter with multi-cell power amplifier. Although the proposed transmitter and receiver only consume 1.79 and 0.683 mW, respectively, the wearable sensor platform requires more power efficient transmitter, due to the limited capacity of rechargeable thin film battery, e.g, 50 ~ 250 mWhr [1]. Therefore, we apply wireless charging in order to prolong the lifetime and investigate the impact of wireless power transfer on the power autonomy of sensor platform.
Long-term alpha-tocopherol supplementation is associated with lower serum vascular endothelial growth factor levels.

BACKGROUND We previously reported that daily supplementation with alpha-tocopherol reduced prostate cancer risk in a large, randomized trial, the Alpha-Tocopherol, Beta-Carotene Cancer Prevention (ATBC) Study. One potential mechanism explaining this is that alpha-tocopherol inhibited tumor angiogenesis, an effect demonstrated in animal models. PATIENTS AND METHODS We evaluated whether long-term supplementation with alpha-tocopherol modified serum vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) levels, a cytokine integrally involved in angiogenesis, in men who were not diagnosed with cancer and had baseline and follow-up blood available. One hundred of these men who received alpha-tocopherol (50 mg daily) were randomly selected and matched on age, study center and time between blood draws to 100 men who received placebo (median follow-up 3.7 years). VEGF levels were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The effect of alpha-tocopherol supplementation on serum VEGF was evaluated using a matched-paired t-test for differences in the change in VEGF over the intervention period between groups. RESULTS There was an 11% reduction in VEGF levels in the alpha-tocopherol group as compared with a 10% increase in the placebo group (p=0.03). CONCLUSION Our findings suggest that one of the mechanisms behind the inhibition of prostate carcinogenesis by alpha-tocopherol in the ATBC Study may have been through reduced VEGF concentrations and the suppression of tumor angiogenesis and therefore growth.
Test Selection with Equivalence Class Partitioning

Software maintenance activities account for as much as two-thirds of the overall costs on an average. A way to select a subset from a test suite is thus extremely essential to save cost and provide confidence that the program modifications are correct. Though substantial research results on test selection techniques have been reported in the literature, very few software industries deploy systematic test selection strategies or automation support. The expert judgment is the most often used in the industry for identification of relevant cases for re-testing that is usually difficult and inefficient. This paper introduces an agile strategy that divides a test suite with Equivalence Classification Partition (ECP) into sub-domains. The subset selected from the sub-domains provides a complete and comprehensive coverage of test criteria. The ECP is expressed with Classification Tree Method (CTM) and easy to be adjusted for different goals flexibly, e.g., re-test for modified function, delivery deadline or human resource limit. Our method is implemented as a tool and evaluated on two projects experimentally. The results demonstrated that this method can improve the efficiency and effectiveness of re-testing greatly.
Survey: Software Search in Serious Games Development

The interest in serious games (games that can educate, train, and motivate) has grown very fast in the last decade, yet the research community rarely studies serious game development. For instance, previous work has mainly investigated non-game developers’ search practice and has proposed techniques and tools for general purpose software engineering. This paper reports on a pilot user study that was used to understand the thoughts and needs of (serious) game developers. We asked serious game developers “what”, “how”, and “why” they usually search online to develop their games. Our study reveals that software search for serious games development is mostly related to finding game-specific tools, documentation, and algorithms for AI, animation, rendering, and learning analytics. Also, specific web platforms (like web tutorials, Q&A sites, and public software repositories) are very relevant for serious games development. Finally, our analysis of serious game developers’ search habit informs about the need for more advanced search engines with sophisticated query and filtering facilities.
Maternal Exposure to Cadmium and Manganese Impairs Reproduction and Progeny Fitness in the Sea Urchin Paracentrotus lividus

Metal contamination represents one of the major sources of pollution in marine environments. In this study we investigated the short-term effects of ecologically relevant cadmium and manganese concentrations (10-6 and 3.6 x 10-5 M, respectively) on females of the sea urchin Paracentrotus lividus and their progeny, reared in the absence or presence of the metal. Cadmium is a well-known heavy metal, whereas manganese represents a potential emerging contaminant, resulting from an increased production of manganese-containing compounds. The effects of these agents were examined on both P. lividus adults and their offspring following reproductive state, morphology of embryos, nitric oxide (NO) production and differential gene expression. Here, we demonstrated that both metals differentially impaired the fertilization processes of the treated female sea urchins, causing modifications in the reproductive state and also affecting NO production in the ovaries. A detailed analysis of the progeny showed a high percentage of abnormal embryos, associated to an increase in the endogenous NO levels and variations in the transcriptional expression of several genes involved in stress response, skeletogenesis, detoxification, multi drug efflux processes and NO production. Moreover, we found significant differences in the progeny from females exposed to metals and reared in metal-containing sea water compared to embryos reared in non-contaminated sea water. Overall, these results greatly expanded previous studies on the toxic effects of metals on P. lividus and provided new insights into the molecular events induced in the progeny of sea urchins exposed to metals.
Using a Communication Model to Collect Measurement Data through Mobile Devices

Wireless systems and services have undergone remarkable development since the first mobile phone system was introduced in the early 1980s. The use of sensors in an Ambient Intelligence approach is a great solution in a medical environment. We define a communication architecture to facilitate the information transfer between all connected devices. This model is based in layers to allow the collection of measurement data to be used in our framework monitoring architecture. An overlay-based solution is built between network elements in order to provide an efficient and highly functional communication platform that allows the connection of a wide variety of devices and technologies, and serves also to perform additional functions such as the possibility to perform some processing in the network that may help to improve overall performance.
ESTIMATING SPECIATION AND EXTINCTION RATES USING PHYLOGENIES : DEVELOPMENT AND IMPLEMENTATION OF A PROBABILISTIC MODEL August 14

Abstract Diversification rate, i.e. the speed at which lineages speciate or go extinct, is one of the most important metric in ecology and evolutionary biology. Approaches have been developed to estimate rates of speciation and extinction using the molecular phylogenies of extant species (tree describing the evolutionary relationships among species). The general approach consists in deriving the likelihood of birth-death models of cladogenesis given a phylogenetic tree, and to estimate the corresponding birth (speciation) and death (extinction) rates by maximum likelihood. So far, these likelihood approaches have focused on using either the branching times in phylogenies, or the age and size of clades, but not both simultaneously. Here, we develop an approach that uses information on both branching times and clade age/size to improve our estimation of speciation and extinction rates from phylogenies. We derive the joint likelihood of branching times and clade age/size, test the performance of the approach on simulated trees, and apply the approach to the empirical phylogeny of the cetaceans.Diversification rate, i.e. the speed at which lineages speciate or go extinct, is one of the most important metric in ecology and evolutionary biology. Approaches have been developed to estimate rates of speciation and extinction using the molecular phylogenies of extant species (tree describing the evolutionary relationships among species). The general approach consists in deriving the likelihood of birth-death models of cladogenesis given a phylogenetic tree, and to estimate the corresponding birth (speciation) and death (extinction) rates by maximum likelihood. So far, these likelihood approaches have focused on using either the branching times in phylogenies, or the age and size of clades, but not both simultaneously. Here, we develop an approach that uses information on both branching times and clade age/size to improve our estimation of speciation and extinction rates from phylogenies. We derive the joint likelihood of branching times and clade age/size, test the performance of the approach on simulated trees, and apply the approach to the empirical phylogeny of the cetaceans.
MMS: A “R” Package for Metabolomic Markers Search in Stress Response Studies

In stress response studies, metabolomics tries to individuate spectral areas or metabolites whose response to a specific stress is particularly significant. This evaluation is normally carried out with a series of tedious and time consum- ing comparisons of spectral areas obtained from cells subject to different stress intensities. MMS is a package written in "R" language able to individuate which part of metabolomic spectra have a statistically significant response giving as out- put the diagrams of the R 2 and of the slope calculated from regression analysis between a vector describing the intensity of the stress and a matrix containing all spectra from differently challenged cells.
FTV 720A mediates reduction of lymphocyte counts in human renal allograft recipients by an apoptosis‐independent mechanism

Abstract The novel immunosuppressive compound FTY 720A posseses a mode of action which is different from all other immunosuppressive drugs. The most prominent feature is a reversible decrease in peripheral lymphocyte counts observed in animal experiments. We investigated in the first human trial (phase 1) whether FTY 720A induces apoptosis of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) in stable renal allograft recipients. Monitoring of lymphocyte counts revealed a significant and dose‐dependent decrease within 6 h post‐FTY 720A dose: placebo 5.1%; 0.25 mg 36.4%; 0.5 mg 40.8%; 0.75 mg 39.4%; 1 mg 45.8%; 2 mg 67.2%; 3.5 mg 64.9%. PBMC apoptosis rates did not change, as determined before intake of FTY 720A and 2 h, 6 h, 24 h and 96 h post‐FTY 720A dose. We detected no significant difference in apoptosis rates between patients who received placebo or FTY 720A. However, in vitro experiments showed that high concentrations of FTY 720 A induced apoptosis in human PBMC.
Using Color Difference with Shape Context for Logo Recognition

Logos belonging to the same brand can be diverse in shape and color, so logo recognition is a challenging research topic. Because of the diversity of logos, if we consider only the shapes of logos in the recognition process, we will suffer from the high cost in terms of the overall execution time. In this paper, we propose to use shapes as well as colors of logos in the recognition process. Before using shapes of logos to recognize the brand of an interested logo image, we calculate the color difference between it and the brand logo images in the database. Then, we select from the database the images to which the interested logo image is similar according to their color difference, and we measure the similarity between the shape of the interested logo image and the shape of each of the selected images. We recognize the interested logo image as the brand logo that is most similar to it. The experimental results show the following: Compared to that we use only shapes in the recognition process, if we use color difference before using shape, then we can save a significant amount of time, and the proposed approach has the potential to improve the overall recognition rate. Index Terms—Color difference, logo recognition, shape context