Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Trichuris suis therapy for active ulcerative colitis: a randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND & AIMS Ulcerative colitis is most common in Western industrialized countries. Inflammatory bowel disease is uncommon in developing countries where helminths are frequent. People with helminths have an altered immunological response to antigens. In animal models, helminths prevent or improve colitis by the induction of regulatory T cells and modulatory cytokines. This study determined the efficacy and safety of the helminth Trichuris suis in therapy of ulcerative colitis. METHODS This was a randomized, double blind, placebo-controlled trial conducted at the University of Iowa and select private practices. Trichuris suis ova were obtained from the US Department of Agriculture. The trial included 54 patients with active colitis, defined by an Ulcerative Colitis Disease Activity Index of > or =4. Patients were recruited from physician participants and were randomly assigned to receive placebo or ova treatment. Patients received 2500 Trichuris suis ova or placebo orally at 2-week intervals for 12 weeks. RESULTS The primary efficacy variable was improvement of the Disease Activity Index to > or =4. After 12 weeks of therapy, improvement according to the intent-to-treat principle occurred in 13 of 30 patients (43.3%) with ova treatment compared with 4 of 24 patients (16.7%) given placebo (P = .04). Improvement was also found with the Simple Index that was significant by week 6. The difference in the proportion of patients who achieved an Ulcerative Colitis Disease Activity Index of 0-1 was not significant. Treatment induced no side effects. CONCLUSIONS Ova therapy seems safe and effective in patients with active colitis.
A general theory of composition for trace sets closed under selective interleaving functions

This paper presents a general theory of system composition for "possibilistic" security properties. We see that these properties fall outside of the Alpern-Schneider safety/liveness domain and hence, are not subject to the Abadi-Lamport composition principle. We then introduce a set of trace constructors called selective interleaving functions and show that possibilistic security properties are closure properties with respect to different classes of selective interleaving functions. This provides a uniform framework for analyzing these properties and allows us to construct a partial ordering for them. We present a number of composition constructs, show the extent to which each preserves closure with respect to different classes of selective interleaving functions, and show that they are sufficient for forming the general hook-up construction. We see that although closure under a class of selective interleaving functions is generally preserved by product and cascading, it is not generally preserved by feedback, internal system, composition constructs, or refinement. We examine the reason for this. <<ETX>>
Fatness biases the use of estimated leg length as an epidemiological marker for adults in the NHANES III sample.

BACKGROUND We analyse the NHANES III sample to assess the suitability of measured stature and sitting height to estimate leg length (tibia + femur) and predict fatness. High rates of overweight in the United States population may lead to greater gluteo-femoral fat mass which will increase sitting height and artificially decrease estimates of both absolute and relative leg length. METHODS The analyses include 3076 women and 3233 men, 20.0-49.9 years of age of White, Black or Mexican-American ethnicity. The poverty index ratio, measured stature, sitting height, upper leg length, weight, four skinfolds, buttocks circumference and elbow, biacromial and biiliac breadths were extracted from the database. The sitting height ratio, % body fatness, % upper leg length (ULL/stature), and other indices were estimated. Correlation and principle component analysis were used to assess the relationship between measures of body fatness, relative leg length and the other variables. RESULTS For adults in the NHANES III % body fat is more strongly correlated with buttocks circumference (r = 0.87 and 0.78 for women and men), than with any measure of estimated leg length (r's range from -0.28 to -0.10 for both sexes). Principle components analysis separates fatness, stature and estimated leg length into uncorrelated factors for this sample. CONCLUSION Reports of a negative association between leg length and fatness for adults of the NHANES III are likely spurious, due to greater gluteo-femoral fat thickness increasing sitting height. Future rounds of the NHANES, and similar surveys in other nations with high body fat populations, should measure lower extremity length directly to better assess its relationship to health and disease risk.
Non-linear Supersymmetry for non-Hermitian , non-diagonalizable Hamiltonians : II . Rigorous results

We continue our investigation of the non-linear SUSY for complex potentials started in the Part I [7] and prove the theorems characterizing its structure in the case of nondiagonalizable Hamiltonians. This part provides the mathematical basis of previous studies. The classes of potentials invariant under SUSY transformations for non-diagonalizable Hamiltonians are specified and the asymptotics of formal eigenfunctions and associated functions are derived. Several results on the normalizability of associated functions at infinities are rigorously proved. Finally the Index Theorem on relation between Jordan structures of intertwined Hamiltonians depending of the behavior of elements of canonical basis of supercharge kernel at infinity is proven.
Rubisco Activase Is Also a Multiple Responder to Abiotic Stresses in Rice

Ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase activase (RCA) is a nuclear gene that encodes a chloroplast protein that plays an important role in photosynthesis. Some reports have indicated that it may play a role in acclimation to different abiotic stresses. In this paper, we analyzed the stress-responsive elements in the 2.0 kb 5’-upstream regions of the RCA gene promoter and the primary, secondary and tertiary structure of the protein. We identified some cis-elements of multiple stress-related components in the RCA promoter. Amino acid and evolution analyses showed that the RCA protein had conserved regions between different species; however, the size and type varied. The secondary structures, binding sites and tertiary structures of the RCA proteins were also different. This might reflect the differences in the transcription and translation levels of the two RCA isoforms during adaptation to different abiotic stresses. Although both the transcription and translation levels of RCA isoforms in the rice leaves increased under various stresses, the large isoform was increased more significantly in the chloroplast stroma and thylakoid. It can be concluded that RCA, especially RCAL, is also a multiple responder to abiotic stresses in rice, which provides new insights into RCA functions.
Rebels Lead to the Doctrine of the Mean: Opinion Dynamic in a Heterogeneous DeGroot Model

We study an extension of the DeGroot model where part of the players may be rebels. The updating rule for rebels is quite different with that of normal players (which are referred to as conformists): at each step a rebel first takes the opposite value of the weighted average of her neighbors' opinions, i.e. 1 minus that average (the opinion space is assumed to be [0,1] as usual), and then updates her opinion by taking another weighted average between that value and her own opinion in the last round. We find that the effect of rebels is rather significant: as long as there is at least one rebel in every closed and strongly connected group, under very weak conditions, the opinion of each player in the whole society will eventually tend to 0.5.
Redundancy, Efficiency and Robustness in Multi-Robot Coverage

Area coverage is an important task for mobile robots, with many real-world applications. Motivated by potential efficiency and robustness improvements, there is growing interest in the use of multiple robots in coverage. Previous investigations of multi-robot coverage focuses on completeness and eliminating redundancy, but does not formally address robustness, nor examine the impact of the initial positions of robots on the coverage time. Indeed, a common assumption is that non-redundancy leads to improved coverage time. We address robustness and efficiency in a family of multi-robot coverage algorithms, based on spanning-tree coverage of approximate cell decomposition. We analytically show that the algorithms are robust, in that as long as a single robot is able to move, the coverage will be completed. We also show that non-redundant (non-back tracking) versions of the algorithms have a worst-case coverage time virtually identical to that of a single robot—thus no performance gain is guaranteed in non-redundant coverage. Moreover, this worst-case is in fact common in real-world applications. Surprisingly, however, redundant coverage algorithms lead to guaranteed performance which halves the coverage time even in the worst case.
Reliability and responsiveness of the Juvenile Arthritis MRI Scoring (JAMRIS) system for the knee

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Avascular Necrosis of the Talus

Persistent pain in the ankle after relatively minor trauma is common and usually resolves spontaneously. Two cases of persistent pain after minor trauma are presented that involved unusual characteristics of scintigraphic and magnetic resonance imaging, compatible with avascular necrosis of the talar body. This is a rare finding in the absence of steroid use or significant trauma to the foot. The unusual vascular anatomy of the talus is considered in the possible mechanism of injury.
Oral Tolerance: Therapeutic Implications for Autoimmune Diseases

Oral tolerance is classically defined as the suppression of immune responses to antigens (Ag) that have been administered previously by the oral route. Multiple mechanisms of tolerance are induced by oral Ag. Low doses favor active suppression, whereas higher doses favor clonal anergy/deletion. Oral Ag induces Th2 (IL-4/IL-10) and Th3 (TGF-β) regulatory T cells (Tregs) plus CD4+CD25+ regulatory cells and LAP+T cells. Induction of oral tolerance is enhanced by IL-4, IL-10, anti-IL-12, TGF-β, cholera toxin B subunit (CTB), Flt-3 ligand, anti-CD40 ligand and continuous feeding of Ag. In addition to oral tolerance, nasal tolerance has also been shown to be effective in suppressing inflammatory conditions with the advantage of a lower dose requirement. Oral and nasal tolerance suppress several animal models of autoimmune diseases including experimental allergic encephalomyelitis (EAE), uveitis, thyroiditis, myasthenia, arthritis and diabetes in the nonobese diabetic (NOD) mouse, plus non-autoimmune diseases such as asthma, atherosclerosis, colitis and stroke. Oral tolerance has been tested in human autoimmune diseases including MS, arthritis, uveitis and diabetes and in allergy, contact sensitivity to DNCB, nickel allergy. Positive results have been observed in phase II trials and new trials for arthritis, MS and diabetes are underway. Mucosal tolerance is an attractive approach for treatment of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases because of lack of toxicity, ease of administration over time and Ag-specific mechanism of action. The successful application of oral tolerance for the treatment of human diseases will depend on dose, developing immune markers to assess immunologic effects, route (nasal versus oral), formulation, mucosal adjuvants, combination therapy and early therapy.
The Impact of Motivation, Trust, and National Cultural Differences on Knowledge Sharing within the Context of Electronic Mail

The goal of this research is to examine the impact of trust, motivation, and national culture on knowledge sharing within the context of electronic mail. This study is quantitative and survey based. In order to conduct the research, 200 students from a leading university in New Zealand were chosen randomly to participate in a questionnaire survey. Motivation and trust were found to be significantly and positively related to knowledge sharing. The research findings illustrated that face saving, face gaining, and individualism positively moderates the relationship between motivation and knowledge sharing. In addition, collectivism culture negatively moderates the relationship between motivation and knowledge sharing. Moreover, the research findings reveal that face saving, individualism, and collectivism culture positively moderate the relationship between trust and knowledge sharing. In addition, face gaining culture negatively moderates the relationship between trust and knowledge sharing. This study sets out several implications for researchers and practitioners. The study produces an integrative model that shows how attributes of national culture impact knowledge sharing through the use of emails. A better understanding of the relationship between knowledge sharing and trust, motivation, and national culture differences will increase individuals’ ability to make wise choices when sharing knowledge with those from different cultures. Keywords—Knowledge sharing, motivation, national culture, trust.
Innate immunity and chronic rhinosinusitis: What we have learned from animal models

Chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) is a heterogeneous and multifactorial disease characterized by dysregulated inflammation. Abnormalities in innate immune function, including sinonasal epithelial cell barrier function, mucociliary clearance, response to pathogen‐associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) via pattern recognition receptors, and the contribution of innate immune cells, will be highlighted in this review.
Probabilistic shaping and non-binary codes

We generalize probabilistic amplitude shaping (PAS) with binary codes [1] to the case of non-binary codes defined over prime finite fields. Firstly, we introduce probabilistic shaping via time sharing where shaping applies to information symbols only. Then, we design circular quadrature amplitude modulations (CQAM) that allow to directly generalize PAS to prime finite fields with full shaping.
Identification and characterization of a G protein-coupled receptor homolog encoded by murine cytomegalovirus

This report describes the identification of a murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV) G protein-coupled receptor (GCR) homolog. This open reading frame (M33) is most closely related to, and collinear with, human cytomegalovirus UL33, and homologs are also present in human herpesvirus 6 and 7 (U12 for both viruses). Conserved counterparts in the sequenced alpha- or gammaherpesviruses have not been identified to date, suggesting that these genes encode proteins which are important for the biological characteristics of betaherpesviruses. We have detected transcripts for both UL33 and M33 as early as 3 or 4 h postinfection, and these reappear at late times. In addition, we have identified N-terminal splicing for both the UL33 and M33 RNA transcripts. For both open reading frames, splicing results in the introduction of amino acids which are highly conserved among known GCRs. To characterise the function of the M33 in the natural host, two independent MCMV recombinant viruses were prepared, each of which possesses an M33 open reading frame which has been disrupted with the beta-galactosidase gene. While the recombinant M33 null viruses showed no phenotypic differences in replication from wild-type MCMV in primary mouse embryo fibroblasts in vitro, they showed severely restricted growth in the salivary glands of infected mice. These data suggest that M33 plays an important role in vivo, in particular in the dissemination to or replication in the salivary gland, and provide the first evidence for the function of a viral GCR homolog in vivo.
Recombinational cloning vectors for regulated expression in Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

Figure 1. Plasmid maps. Representative plasmid maps (A) with 6×HIS and V5 epitope tag and (B) without tags are shown. Restriction sites used in the construction of the vectors or unique restriction sites in multiple cloning sites are shown. Sites in parentheses were destroyed during construction. Bold restriction sites in the polylinker are available for cloning in all auxotrophic versions of the vector; others are found in at least one auxotrophic marker. We have constructed a series of galactose-inducible centromere-based yeast expression vectors to take advantage of the ability to quickly exchange cloned genes between vectors using Gateway ® technology (Invit-rogen, Carlsbad, CA, USA). Unlike pYES-DEST52 (Invitrogen) and other yeast vectors (1) that contain the 2-µm origin of replication, these vectors are based on CEN6 for plasmid maintenance because we observed the loss of 2 µm-based plasmids when expressing genes that are lethal to the cell (2). These eight plasmids complement the CEN-based vectors recently constructed by Van Mullem et al. (3) and add significantly to the repertoire of CEN-based yeast plasmids available for use with Gateway technology. Two sets of constructs were created (Figure 1) based on previously tested galactose-inducible plasmids (4). Constructs in both sets contain an ampicillin resistance cassette, a chloram-phenicol resistance cassette for negative selection of unrecombined vector, an f1 origin, CEN6, ARSH4 replicon, GAL1 promoter, and an auxotrophic marker (HIS3, TRP1, LEU2, or URA3). The four constructs in the first set (Figure 1A, one for each auxotrophic marker) are based on the previously published pJG485 (2) and contain a V5 epitope (5) and a 6×His tag as a C-terminal fusion to the expressed protein. The four analogous constructs in the second set (Figure 1B) lack the V5 epitope and the 6×His tag. These four constructs are similar to those constructed by Funk et al. (1) and Van Mullem et al. (3) except that each contains additional restriction sites before and after the Gateway recombi-nation sites. These restriction sites in combination with the Gateway insert allow for the insertion of genes or gene fragments for creating fusion proteins in combination with the Gateway insert. Likewise, these sites may be used to clone additional epitope tags N-terminal or C-terminal to a gene of interest. The constructs were made as described in the supplementary material available at the BioTechniques' web site at www.BioTechniques. com/ March2005/GeiserSupplementary. html. Vectors were confirmed by 382 BioTechniques sequencing and by the ability of the …
Template Aware Coverage - taking coverage analysis to the next level

Understanding the relationship between coverage and test-templates (a generic term we use to describe the inputs for the random stimuli generator) is an important layer in understanding the state and progress of the verification process. Today, this is extremely hard to achieve and is based on expert knowledge. Template Aware Coverage (TAC) is a novel approach to meeting this challenge. Based on collecting statistics of the relations between coverage and test-templates, TAC maintains these statistics in efficient data structures. It also introduces analytics means to provide useful information based on this data. Template Aware Coverage is currently being used in the verification of a high-end processor systems, where it significantly helps hitting hard-to-hit coverage events as well as never hit events.
High-Level Planning and Control with Incomplete Information Using POMDP's

We develop an approach to planning with incomplete information that is based on three elements: 1. a high-level language for describing the effects of actions on both the world and the agent’s beliefs that we call POMDP theories 2. a semantics that translates such theories into actual POMDPs 3. a real time dynamic programming algorithm that produces controllers from such POMDPs. We show that the resulting approach is not only clean and general but that is practical as well. We have implemented a shell that accepts POMDP theories and produces controllers, and have tested it over a number of problems. In this paper we present the main elements of the approach and report results for the ’omelette problem’ where the resulting controller exhibits a better performance than the handcrafted controller.
Implementation and evaluation of a collaborative clinical pharmacist's medications reconciliation and charting service for admitted medical inpatients in a metropolitan hospital

Medication errors on admission can persist throughout the episode of care and on to discharge leading to inappropriate management that can compromise patients’ care. The aim of the study was to develop, implement and evaluate the role of pharmacist‐led medication reconciliation and charting service for patients admitted to an Acute Assessment and Admission Unit via the Emergency Department in an electronic medication management environment at a metropolitan Australian hospital.
From MMORPG to a Classroom Multiplayer Presential Role Playing Game

The popularity of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) has grown enormously, with communities of players reaching into the millions. Their fantasy narratives present multiple challenges created by the virtual environment and/or other players. The games’ potential for education stems from the fact that players are immersed in a virtual world where they have the opportunity to manipulate and explore, thus motivating the construction of knowledge. The interaction and collaboration between participants allows students to exchange information, test their understanding and reflect on what they have learned. Given the promising results of using MMORPG technologies for educational purposes, this paper translates the multiplayer role playing game (MRPG) aspect, the essential concept behind MMORPGs, into the classroom context. We present the abstraction behind a Classroom Multiplayer Presential Role Playing Game (CMPRPG) and the development of a CMPRPG for teaching ecology. The game has a quest structure in which each result highlights a key teaching objective. It is implemented at a high level, with interaction between reusable game elements defined using triggers. It is observed that the implemented CMPRPG has appropriate usability levels, benefits the learning and application of the concepts of ecology and, in the interactive dimensions, it encourages participation and collaborative narrative structures among participants.