Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Correlations between Endothelial Functions and ROS Detection in Diabetic Microvascular Wall: Early and Late Ascorbic Acid Supplementation

The correlation between endothelial function and reactive oxygen species detecting from diabetic microvascular wall and the antioxidant effect of ascorbic acid (AA) during early and late phases of diabetic induction were determined. Male Spraque-Dawley rats were divided into four groups: control, diabetes rats (DM, using iv.injection of 55 mg/kg BW streptozotocin, (STZ)), and two groups of DM rats treated with AA (1 g/L, (STZ)) starting on day 2 (DM + AAday2) and week 6th (DM + AA6wk). On 12th week after STZ injection, the findings showed that in DM group, Ach (10−5 M)-induced vasodilatation was decreased, while the number of leukocyte adhesion was increased significantly (P < 0.01). Interestingly, these abnormalities induced by DM could be protected or improved in both AA-treated groups, DM + AAday2 and DM + AA6wk. By using dihydrorhodamine 123, our findings also indicated that the existing of ROS productions on diabetic arteriolar and venular walls were different significantly (ROSarteriole = 165.89 ± 24.59 and ROSvenule = 172.26 ± 34.70) (P < 0.05). Moreover by using BH4 inhibitor to induce increase in arteriolar ROS, the results also confirmed that AA could improve endothelial function with closed correlation to its potential to reduce vascular ROS content.
Empowered Participation: How Citizens Use Technology in Local Governance

The partnership between local residents and city officials to inform policy and decision-making about government resources, or participatory governance, has been extensively studied. In addition to numerous ethnographic studies about how citizens engage in-person, there has been increased focus in HCI to understand the impact of technology on citizen participation in local governance. Building upon those studies, this paper provides unique insight from a 3-year longitudinal study on the use of online tools that were organically adapted by citizens to engage in local governance in three diverse Chicago neighborhoods. Though the responsiveness of government officials varied across communities, our results suggest that citizens use technology to heighten the visibility of their concerns, to support mechanisms of government accountability, and to provide various options for resident participation in local governance. We argue that while communities may be effective in their use of ICTs, technology may not increase their political power.
Updates and Knowledge Gaps in Cholesteatoma Research

The existence of acquired cholesteatoma has been recognized for more than three centuries; however, the nature of the disorder has yet to be determined. Without timely detection and intervention, cholesteatomas can become dangerously large and invade intratemporal structures, resulting in numerous intra- and extracranial complications. Due to its aggressive growth, invasive nature, and the potentially fatal consequences of intracranial complications, acquired cholesteatoma remains a cause of morbidity and death for those who lack access to advanced medical care. Currently, no viable nonsurgical therapies are available. Developing an effective management strategy for this disorder will require a comprehensive understanding of past progress and recent advances. This paper presents a brief review of background issues related to acquired middle ear cholesteatoma and deals with practical considerations regarding the history and etymology of the disorder. We also consider issues related to the classification, epidemiology, histopathology, clinical presentation, and complications of acquired cholesteatoma and examine current diagnosis and management strategies in detail.
Mortality in rheumatoid arthritis: the impact of disease activity, treatment with glucocorticoids, TNFα inhibitors and rituximab

Objectives To investigate the impact of disease activity, the course of the disease, its treatment over time, comorbidities and traditional risk factors on survival. Methods Data of the German biologics register RABBIT were used. Cox regression was applied to investigate the impact of time-varying covariates (disease activity as measured by the DAS28, functional capacity, treatment with glucocorticoids, biologic or synthetic disease modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs)) on mortality after adjustment for age, sex, comorbid conditions and smoking. Results During 31 378 patient-years of follow-up, 463 of 8908 patients died (standardised mortality ratio: 1.49 (95% CI 1.36 to 1.63)). Patients with persistent, highly active disease (mean DAS28 > 5.1) had a significantly higher mortality risk (adjusted HR (HRadj)=2.43; (95% CI 1.64 to 3.61)) than patients with persistently low disease activity (mean DAS28 < 3.2). Poor function and treatment with glucocorticoids > 5 mg/d was significantly associated with an increased mortality, independent of disease activity. Significantly lower mortality was observed in patients treated with tumour necrosis factor α (TNFα) inhibitors (HRadj=0.64 (95% CI 0.50 to 0.81), rituximab (HRadj=0.57 (95% CI 0.39 to 0.84), or other biologics (HRadj=0.64 (95% CI 0.42 to 0.99), compared to those receiving methotrexate. To account for treatment termination in patients at risk, an HRadj for patients ever exposed to TNFα inhibitors or rituximab was calculated. This resulted in an HRadj of 0.77 (95% CI 0.60 to 0.97). Conclusions Patients with long-standing high disease activity are at substantially increased risk of mortality. Effective control of disease activity decreases mortality. TNFα inhibitors and rituximab seem to be superior to conventional DMARDs in reducing this risk.
Fully asynchronous SPH simulation

We present a novel method for fully asynchronous time integration of particle-based fluids using smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH). With our approach, we allow a dedicated time step for each particle. Therefore, we are able to increase the efficiency of simulations. Previous approaches of locally adaptive time steps have shown promising results in the form of increased time steps, however, they need to synchronize time steps in recurring intervals, which involves either interpolation operations or matching time steps. With our method, time steps are asynchronous through the whole simulation and no global time barriers are needed. In addition, we present an efficient method for parallelization of our novel asynchronous time integration. For both serial and parallel execution, we achieve speedups of up to 7.5 compared to fixed time steps and are able to outperform previous adaptive approaches considerably.
Design of a Location-Based Publish/Subscribe Service Using a Graph-Based Computing Model

We present here the initial results of our investigation of a system architecture for location-based publish/subscribe services utilizing a graph-based model for managing data and computations. This architecture is implemented on a cluster computer using the facilities and the computation model provided by the Beehive framework which supports a transactional model of parallel computing on dynamic graph data structures. We implemented a Museum Visitor Service as an example of a location-based publish/subscribe system to study and evaluate the performance this approach. This service includes features utilizing location-based publish/subscribe functions for supporting coordination and collaboration among members in a social group visiting the museum. We implemented a testbed system for this service and evaluated its performance on a cluster computer. Our work also illustrates that weaker consistency models for transactions can be utilized in such services to achieve higher performance and scalability.
Patient self‐testing and self‐management of oral anticoagulation with vitamin K antagonists: guidance from the British Committee for Standards in Haematology

Ian Jennings, Dianne Kitchen, David Keeling, David Fitzmaurice and Carl Heneghan on behalf of the BCSH Committee UK NEQAS (Blood Coagulation), Sheffield, Oxford University Hospitals, Oxford Haemophilia and Thrombosis Centre, Churchill Hospital, Oxford, The University of Birmingham, Primary Care Clinical Sciences, Edgbaston, Birmingham, and Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, Oxford University, Oxford, UK
Controlled Breeding Techniques for Enhancing Reproductive Performance of Buffaloes

The experiment was carried out in milk shed areas of Panchamrut dairy on 23 postpartum buffaloes, 16 true anoestrus and 7 normal cyclic under  eld condition with to evaluate their response to CIDR and Ovsynch protocol by monitoring estrus induction rate, conception rate and plasma progesterone pro le following time interval post-treatment/AI. CIDR protocol was found to be better in improving conception rate (66.66 vs. 57.14%) in true anoestrus buffaloes. In general, both the protocols improve conception rates and plasma progesterone level in anoestrus buffaloes, though there was no signi cant in uence on plasma protein and cholesterol pro le.
Neural networks for data mining: constrains and open problems

When we talk about using neural networks for data mining we have in mind the original data mining scope and challenge. How did neural networks meet this challenge? Can we run neural networks on a dataset with gigabytes of data and millions of records? Can we provide explanations of discovered patterns? How useful that patterns are? How to distinguish useful, interesting patterns automatically? We aim to summarize here the state-of-the-art of the principles beyond using neural models in data mining.
Magnetotactic Bacteria as Potential Sources of Bioproducts

Magnetotactic bacteria (MTB) produce intracellular organelles called magnetosomes which are magnetic nanoparticles composed of magnetite (Fe3O4) or greigite (Fe3S4) enveloped by a lipid bilayer. The synthesis of a magnetosome is through a genetically controlled process in which the bacterium has control over the composition, direction of crystal growth, and the size and shape of the mineral crystal. As a result of this control, magnetosomes have narrow and uniform size ranges, relatively specific magnetic and crystalline properties, and an enveloping biological membrane. These features are not observed in magnetic particles produced abiotically and thus magnetosomes are of great interest in biotechnology. Most currently described MTB have been isolated from saline or brackish environments and the availability of their genomes has contributed to a better understanding and culturing of these fastidious microorganisms. Moreover, genome sequences have allowed researchers to study genes related to magnetosome production for the synthesis of magnetic particles for use in future commercial and medical applications. Here, we review the current information on the biology of MTB and apply, for the first time, a genome mining strategy on these microorganisms to search for secondary metabolite synthesis genes. More specifically, we discovered that the genome of the cultured MTB Magnetovibrio blakemorei, among other MTB, contains several metabolic pathways for the synthesis of secondary metabolites and other compounds, thereby raising the possibility of the co-production of new bioactive molecules along with magnetosomes by this species.
EFFECTS OF BIODIVERSITY ON ECOSYSTEM FUNCTIONING: A CONSENSUS OF CURRENT KNOWLEDGE

Humans are altering the composition of biological communities through a variety of activities that increase rates of species invasions and species extinctions, at all scales, from local to global. These changes in components of the Earth's biodiversity cause concern for ethical and aesthetic reasons, but they also have a strong potential to alter ecosystem properties and the goods and services they provide to humanity. Ecological experiments, observations, and theoretical developments show that ecosystem properties depend greatly on biodiversity in terms of the functional characteristics of organisms present in the ecosystem and the distribution and abundance of those organisms over space and time. Species effects act in concert with the effects of climate, resource availability, and disturbance regimes in influencing ecosystem properties. Human activities can modify all of the above factors; here we focus on modification of these biotic controls. The scientific community has come to a broad consensus on many aspects of the re- lationship between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning, including many points relevant to management of ecosystems. Further progress will require integration of knowledge about biotic and abiotic controls on ecosystem properties, how ecological communities are struc- tured, and the forces driving species extinctions and invasions. To strengthen links to policy and management, we also need to integrate our ecological knowledge with understanding of the social and economic constraints of potential management practices. Understanding this complexity, while taking strong steps to minimize current losses of species, is necessary for responsible management of Earth's ecosystems and the diverse biota they contain.
Rotation Invariant Angular Descriptor Via A Bandlimited Gaussian-like Kernel

We present a new smooth, Gaussian-like kernel that allows the kernel density estimate for an angular distribution to be exactly represented by a finite number of its Fourier series coefficients. Distributions of angular quantities, such as gradients, are a central part of several state-of-the-art image processing algorithms, but these distributions are usually described via histograms and therefore lack rotation invariance due to binning artifacts. Replacing histograming with kernel density estimation removes these binning artifacts and can provide a finite-dimensional descriptor of the distribution, provided that the kernel is selected to be bandlimited. In this paper, we present a new band-limited kernel that has the added advantage of being Gaussian-like in the angular domain. We then show that it compares favorably to gradient histograms for patch matching, person detection, and texture segmentation.
Path Loss Simulation of an Infrared Optical Wireless System for Aircrafts

In this paper, the infrared optical wireless path loss inside an aircraft cabin is estimated. To this end, a Monte Carlo ray-tracing (MCRT) simulation is performed in a geometric computer-aided design (CAD) cabin model. Position, azimuth (AZ), elevation (EL) and field of view (FOV) properties of transmitters and receivers are defined. Key path loss parameters such as the path loss exponent and the standard deviation of the shadowing component are determined for particular line-of-sight (LOS) and non-line-of-sight (NLOS) cases. A LOS path loss exponent of 1.92 and a shadowing standard deviation of 0.81dB are obtained. In NLOS conditions, however, the path loss exponent varies depending on the nature of the particular NLOS case considered. The presented scenarios yield NLOS path loss exponent values of 2.26 and 1.28, and shadowing standard deviation values of 1.27dB and 0.7dB, respectively.
Soft Uncoupling of Markov Chains for Permeable Language Distinction: A New Algorithm

Without prior knowledge, distinguishing different languages may be a hard task, especially when their borders are permeable. We develop an extension of spectral clustering ---a powerful unsupervised classification toolbox ---that is shown to resolve accurately the task of soft language distinction. At the heart of our approach, we replace the usual hard membership assignment of spectral clustering by a soft, probabilistic assignment, which also presents the advantage to bypass a well-known complexity bottleneck of the method. Experiments with a readily available system display the potential of the method, which brings a visually appealing soft distinction of languages that may define altogether a whole corpus.
A performance analysis of view materialization strategies

The conventional way to process commands for relational views is to use query modification to translate the commands into ones on the base relations. An alternative approach has been proposed recently, whereby materialized copies of views are kept, and incrementally updated immediately after each modification of the database. A related scheme exists, in which update of materialized views is deferred until just before data is retrieved from the view. A performance analysis is presented comparing the cost of query modification, immediate view maintenance, and deferred view maintenance. Three different models of the structure of views are given a simple selection and projection of one relation, the natural join of two relations, and an aggregate (e.g. the sum of values in a column) over a selection-projection view. The results show that the choice of the most efficient view maintenance method depends heavily on the structure of the database, the view definition, and the type of query and update activity present.
MINIATURE escherichia coli CELLS DEFICIENT IN DNA.

A newly isolated strain of Escher ichia coli 1K12 regularly produces a large number of unusually small anucleate cells during the logarithmic phase of growth. These small cells do not divide. They may be isolated from the normal, rod-shaped cells by density gradient centrifugation and have properties that may make them useful in a variety of biological studies. In this report we communicate information regarding some of the basic properties of these miiinicells. A preliminary report of this work has been made.1 Materials and Methods. (1) Organism)is and culture methods: E. coli K12 P678 was obtained from Dr. F. Jacob of the Institut Pasteur, Paris, approximately six years ago and has been maintained on nutrient agar slants. The minicell-producing strain, P678-54, was derived from P678 after treatment of a log-phase nutrient-broth culture with triethylenemelamine (0.5 mg/ml). Both organisms are Fstrains that require threonine and leucine. They are unable to utilize lactose, galactose, xylose, maltose, and mannitol as sole carbon sources. For most experiments, these organisms were cultivated in a nutrient broth prepared as described previously.2 In some experiments, appropriately supplemented synthetic medium was used.3 (2) Separation of miiinicells: Cultures of P678-54 were centrifuged for 20 minutes at 10,000 X g. The pellet from 1 liter of culture medium was resuspended in approximately 20 ml of 0.067 11 potassium phosphate buffer, pH 6.8. Both minicells and normal cells were separated on sucrose gradients by centrifugation for 45 minutes at 2000 rpm (1000 X g) in a no. 253 swinging bucket rotor in an International model IPRII centrifuge. A 2.0-ml sample of the cell suspension was layered over a 40-ml linear gradient ranging from 5 to 20 per cent sucrose buffered with 0.067 Jf phosphate at pH 6.8S. The sample zones were withdrawn from the gradient, pelleted by centrifugation at 15,000 X g for 15 minutes, and resuspended in the phosphate buffer. All separations were done at approximately 40C. (3) RNA, DNA, and protein analysis: Samples of 1010 cells or 1011 to 1012 minicells were extracted in 5 ml of cold 10 per cent trichloroacetic acid for 30 minutes. After centrifugation the precipitate was resuspended in 3-5 ml of a per cent TCA and hydrolyzed at 100° for 30 minutes. The supernatant was collected after centrifugation, and the pellet digested in 2 ml of 1 N NaOH for 30 nmin. DNA was determined on the supernatant by Burton's modification of the diphenylamine reaction,4 RNA on a 5-10X dilution of the supernatant by the orcinol reaction,5 and protein on a 10-20X dilution of pellet digest by the Lowry method.6 (4) Respiration and enzyme induction: Oxygen consumption was determined in a Warburg apparatus at 370C;7 f-galactosidase was induced by methyl-fl-D-thiogalactopyranoside (TAILG) and assayed by measuring the rate of hydrolysis of 0-nitrophenol f-D-galactoside at 28S0C.8 Results. (1) Isolation of mutant, general properties, and morphology: The
Directional Sensitivity of Gaze-Collinearity Features in Liveness Detection

To increase the trust in using face recognition systems, these need to be capable of differentiating between face images captured from a real person and those captured from photos or similar artifacts presented at the sensor. Methods have been published for face liveness detection by measuring the gaze of a user while the user tracks an object on the screen, which appears at pre-defined, places randomly. In this paper we explore the sensitivity of such a system to different stimulus alignments. The aim is to establish whether there is such sensitivity and if so to explore how this may be exploited for improving the design of the stimulus. The results suggest that collecting feature points along the horizontal direction is more effective than the vertical direction for liveness detection.
Neuroeconomics: Why Economics Needs Brains

Neuroeconomics uses knowledge about brain mechanisms to inform economic theory. It opens up the ‘‘black box’’ of the brain, much as organizational economics opened up the theory of the firm. Neuroscientists use many tools—including brain imaging, behavior of patients with brain damage, animal behavior and recording single neuron activity. The key insight for economics is that the brain is composed of multiple systems which interact. Controlled systems (‘‘executive function’’) interrupt automatic ones. Brain evidence complicates standard assumptions about basic preference, to include homeostasis and other kinds of state-dependence, and shows emotional activation in ambiguous choice and strategic interaction.
Normal cognition and behavior in a Smith‐Lemli‐Opitz syndrome patient who presented with Hirschsprung disease

Smith‐Lemli‐Opitz syndrome (SLOS) is an autosomal recessive disorder of cholesterol biosynthesis. It is caused by mutations in the gene encoding the enzyme 7‐dehydrocholesterol Δ7‐reductase (DHCR7), which catalyzes the final step in cholesterol biosynthesis, usually resulting in cholesterol deficiency. We report a 3.5‐year‐old girl who has cognition in the low average range and normal behavior, but in whom molecular studies identified two missense mutations in DHCR7: V326L and F284L. She was born at term following an uncomplicated pregnancy and delivery, and presented at 12 days of age with poor feeding, abdominal distention, and jaundice. Colonic biopsy was consistent with Hirschsprung disease. On physical examination she had mild ptosis, a long philtrum, mild micrognathia, a short, upturned nose, and subtle 2,3 syndactyly. Her 7‐dehydrocholesterol (7‐DHC) level was markedly elevated at 8.7 mg/dl (normal 0.10 ± 0.05), and her cholesterol level was normal at 61 mg/dl (normal for newborn period 50–80 mg/dl). Karyotype analysis was normal, 46,XX. Breast milk feeding was initiated and continued for 18 months. Cholesterol supplementation was implemented at 100 mg/kg/day at 3 months, which resulted in increased cholesterol levels and reduced dehydrocholesterol levels. Neuropsychological testing has shown functioning in the low average range, between the 14th and 18th centiles when compared to peers. This is markedly higher than most children with SLOS. She has no behavioral problems. MRI and MRS testing of the brain revealed no structural abnormalities. This is in contrast to a recently reported case by Prasad et al. [2002: Am J Med Genet 108:64–68] with a mild phenotype, behavioral problems, and abnormal MRI, who is compound heterozygote for both a null and missense mutation. Our case suggests that patients with severe feeding disorders with or without Hirschprung disease and postnatal onset microcephaly may warrant screening for SLOS. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.