Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Assessment of Graft Effects and Function in Cell Replacement Therapy for Parkinson's Disease

This explorative study aimed to apply, develop, and evaluate assessment methods at various levels in cell replacement therapy for Parkinson’s disease (PD). Observed motor effects in five grafted patients support that timed motor tasks and clinical ratings of parkinsonism are able to monitor motor function, but their psychometric properties need further attention. Using positron emission tomography in a unilaterally grafted PD patient, dopamine receptor binding of [11C]-raclopride was found upregulated in the non-grafted, but normal in the grafted putamen. Binding reduction was normal in the grafted putamen, but not in other striatal areas, following amphetamine administration. This supports that graft-derived dopamine release can be measured in vivo in PD. The Clinical Dyskinesia Rating Scale (CDRS) yielded reliable hyperkinesia ratings, whereas dystonia ratings were reliable within but not between raters. In grafted patients the CDRS showed that grafts can increase dyskinesias, without associated motor improvement and unrelated to the degree of dopaminergic reinnervation. Observations support the value of the CDRS, while reliability problems call for improvements. Application of the generic health status questionnaire NHP in grafted patients demonstrated effects beyond motor function, indicating the value of such questionnaires. Psychometric evaluations of the NHP and the PD-specific PDQ-39 showed ambiguities with both, emphasizing the need for further refinements and evaluations, and illustrating the importance of systematic evaluations of outcome measures. Although most methods used here require further attention before they can be considered optimal, this study illustrates the value and importance of multi-level assessments of cell replacement therapies in PD.
Dynamic Cooperation and Competition in a Network of Spiking Neurons

We discuss recurrent networks with local excitatory and surrounding inhibitory connectivity and their implications as model for the dynamics of sensory awareness and oculomotor programming. A spiking version of such a model and its association with simulations of the superior colliculus are reviewed. We also discuss the competition for attention within this model as put forward by Taylor, and present some additional supportive simulations of experiments by Libet and colleagues. Finally we will report on some recent observation in such a model with noisy and spiking neurons without guidance of external input, and show some rst results of autoand cross-correlation calculations within this model.
Unique Transcriptome Signature of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Pulmonary Tuberculosis

ABSTRACT Although tuberculosis remains a substantial global threat, the mechanisms that enable mycobacterial persistence and replication within the human host are ill defined. This study represents the first genome-wide expression analysis of Mycobacterium tuberculosis from clinical lung samples, which has enabled the identification of M. tuberculosis genes actively expressed during pulmonary tuberculosis. To obtain optimal information from our DNA array analyses, we analyzed the differentially expressed genes within the context of computationally inferred protein networks. Protein networks were constructed using functional linkages established by the Rosetta stone, phylogenetic profile, conserved gene neighbor, and operon computational methods. This combined approach revealed that during pulmonary tuberculosis, M. tuberculosis actively transcribes a number of genes involved in active fortification and evasion from host defense systems. These genes may provide targets for novel intervention strategies.
Viruses and Protists Induced-mortality of Prokaryotes around the Antarctic Peninsula during the Austral Summer

During the Austral summer 2009 we studied three areas surrounding the Antarctic Peninsula: the Bellingshausen Sea, the Bransfield Strait and the Weddell Sea. We aimed to investigate, whether viruses or protists were the main agents inducing prokaryotic mortality rates, and the sensitivity to temperature of prokaryotic heterotrophic production and mortality based on the activation energy (Ea) for each process. Seawater samples were taken at seven depths (0.1–100 m) to quantify viruses, prokaryotes and protists abundances, and heterotrophic prokaryotic production (PHP). Viral lytic production, lysogeny, and mortality rates of prokaryotes due to viruses and protists were estimated at surface (0.1–1 m) and at the Deep Fluorescence Maximum (DFM, 12–55 m) at eight representative stations of the three areas. The average viral lytic production ranged from 1.0 ± 0.3 × 107 viruses ml−1 d−1 in the Bellingshausen Sea to1.3 ± 0.7 × 107 viruses ml−1 d−1 in the Bransfield Strait, while lysogeny, when detectable, recorded the lowest value in the Bellingshausen Sea (0.05 ± 0.05 × 107 viruses ml−1 d−1) and the highest in the Weddell Sea (4.3 ± 3.5 × 107 viruses ml−1 d−1). Average mortality rates due to viruses ranged from 9.7 ± 6.1 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 in the Weddell Sea to 14.3 ± 4.0 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 in the Bellingshausen Sea, and were higher than averaged grazing rates in the Weddell Sea (5.9 ± 1.1 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1) and in the Bellingshausen Sea (6.8 ± 0.9 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1). The highest impact on prokaryotes by viruses and main differences between viral and protists activities were observed in surface samples: 17.8 ± 6.8 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 and 6.5 ± 3.9 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 in the Weddell Sea; 22.1 ± 9.6 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 and 11.6 ± 1.4 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 in the Bransfield Strait; and 16.1 ± 5.7 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 and 7.9 ± 2.6 × 104 cells ml−1 d−1 in the Bellingshausen Sea, respectively. Furthermore, the rate of lysed cells and PHP showed higher sensitivity to temperature than grazing rates by protists. We conclude that viruses were more important mortality agents than protists mainly in surface waters and that viral activity has a higher sensitivity to temperature than grazing rates. This suggests a reduction of the carbon transferred through the microbial food-web that could have implications in the biogeochemical cycles in a future warmer ocean scenario.
Uncleaved NS2-3 Is Required for Production of Infectious Bovine Viral Diarrhea Virus

ABSTRACT Despite increasing characterization of pestivirus-encoded proteins, functions for nonstructural (NS) proteins NS2, NS2-3, NS4B, and NS5A have not yet been reported. Here we investigated the function of bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) uncleaved NS2-3. To test whether NS2-3 has a discrete function, the uncleaved protein was specifically abolished in two ways: first by inserting a ubiquitin monomer between NS2 and NS3, and second by placing an internal ribosome entry site between the two proteins (a bicistronic genome). In both cases, complete processing of NS2-3 prevented infectious virion formation without affecting RNA replication. We tested the hypothesis that uncleaved NS2-3 was involved in morphogenesis by creating a bicistronic genome in which NS2-3 was restored in the second cistron. With this genome, both uncleaved NS2-3 expression and particle production returned. We then investigated the minimal regions of the polyprotein that could rescue an NS2-3 defect by developing a trans-complementation assay. We determined that the expression of NS4A in cis with NS2-3 markedly increased its activity, while p7 could be supplied in trans. Based on these data, we propose a model for NS2-3 action in virion morphogenesis.
Online Case Resolution Systems: Enhancing Access, Fairness, Accuracy, and Efficiency

Online case resolution (OCR) systems have the potential to dramatically increase access to our justice system. Part I introduces the concept of an OCR system, how it might work in practice, and its likely impact on courts and citizens. Part II argues that OCR systems can lower many of the barriers to going to court by reducing the need for face-to-face resolution of disputes; cutting the amount of time needed for hearings; mitigating litigant confusion and fear; allowing asynchronous scheduling that can accommodate work and child-care schedules; and offering a more reliable and easier-to-use means for litigants to voice their views. These advantages should especially benefit those of lower socioeconomic status, who often suffer disproportionality under the status quo. Part III contends that OCR systems need not compromise a judge’s or a prosecutor’s decision-making process but can actually enhance both. OCR systems can provide more, better, and easier-to-use information, and by removing a litigant’s appearance (race, gender, weight, etc.) from a judge’s consideration, can render outcomes less subject to implicit biases.
Integrated long-range thermal bimorph actuators for parallelizable Bio-AFM applications

This paper presents the fabrication of an integrated long-range thermal bimorph actuator that controls the z-position of an AFM cantilever in liquid. Multiplied in an array, such individually actuated probes can parallelize cell force spectroscopy measurements, thereby drastically reducing the time needed per measured cell. This particular approach implicates the need for devices with an individual actuation range of more than 10 μm out of plane. In addition, any crosstalk, i.e. between actuators or between the actuator and the force sensor, must be minimized. To meet these requirements, we designed and fabricated a novel thermal bimorph actuator that was incorporated with force sensing cantilevers. To be nonhazardous to cells, the design was optimized for high thermo-mechanical sensitivity in order to keep the temperatures as low as possible. FEM simulations confirmed that the surrounding liquid constitutes a very large thermal reservoir that absorbs generated heat, leading to a highly localized temperature elevation. Suspended silicon nitride structures with platinum electrodes were micro-fabricated through standard techniques. The finalized actuator was able to displace the cantilever out of plane by about 17 μm in air. An effective passivation layer was created through a parylene deposition, allowing the actuator to function in water.
Probable Cause: A Decision Making Framework.

Abstract : Causal inference is an essential cognitive activity that combines judgments of causation with judgments of probable cause. A framework for understanding how judgments of probable cause are made is presented that consists of three major elements: (1) The authors first discuss the concept of a causal background and show how the causal strength of a variable depends on it being a deviation or difference in a background; (2) They discuss various cues-to-causality such as covariation, temporal order, contiguity in time and space, and similarity of cause and effect; and (3) The discounting of an explanation by specific alternatives is discussed as a special case of the sequential updating of beliefs.
The Influence of Career Planning, Race, and Athletic Injury on Life Satisfaction among Recently Retired Collegiate Male Athletes

Collegiate male athletes and nonathletes’ (N = 76) level of life satisfaction was assessed at termination of their collegiate careers, and further analyses indicated the degree of association between athletic injury history and life satisfaction after accounting for demographic and career-planning variables. While no significant Group or Group by Race interaction effects were found, life satisfaction was significantly lower among African American students. Regression analysis, controlling for demographic variables, further indicated that athletes who had sustained a severe athletic injury were no less satisfied with life than noninjured and moderately injured athletes. However, athletes who could state a postcollegiate occupational plan were significantly more satisfied with life than those who were unable to indicate such a goal. Results suggest that the role of athletic participation and athletic injury with respect to life satisfaction may have been overemphasized. The potential role of career planning.
Autonomous Black Hawk in Flight: Obstacle Field Navigation and Landing‐site Selection on the RASCAL JUH‐60A

This paper describes the development and flight test of autonomous obstacle field navigation and safe landing area selection on the U.S. Army Aeroflightdynamics Directorate RASCAL JUH‐60A research helicopter. Using laser detection and ranging (LADAR) as the primary terrain sensor, the autonomous flight system is able to avoid obstacles, including wires, and select safe landing sites. An autonomous integrated landing zone approach profile was developed and validated that integrates cruise flight, low‐level terrain flight, and approach to a safe landing spot determined on the fly. Results are presented for a range of sites and conditions. Approximately 750 km of autonomous flight was performed, 230 km of which was at low altitude in mountainous terrain using the obstacle field navigation system. This is the first time a full‐scale helicopter has been flown fully autonomously a significant distance in low‐level flight over complex terrain, basing its planning solely on sensor data gathered from an onboard sensor. These flights demonstrate tight integration between terrain avoidance, control, and autonomous landing.
Does prosodic-foot disyllabicity hold a default status in Mandarin speech perception?

An acoustic experiment was conducted to investigate the perceptual processing of native Mandarin speakers in syntactic ambiguity resolution. The statistical majority of disyllabic words in modern Chinese [17] and the prosodic theory of Binary Foot Formation in Mandarin [3], [4], [9], [10], [11], [15] point to the stipulation that the disyllabic prosodic feet have a special 'default' status in the prosodic structure of Mandarin. In a situation where neither contextual nor acoustic information is available, given an utterance that can be parsed into disyllabic or tri-syllabic prosodic feet without violating syntactic constituency, native speakers of Mandarin may be biased towards the disyllabic organization. Although experimental results show that Mandarin speakers are more likely to parse the utterance into one of two possible syntactic structures rather than simply recognizing it as ambiguous cf. [7], [8], [13], utterances organized into disyllabic feet are not favoured over ones organized in tri-syllabic feet. A fortiori, there is no indication that the quantitative identity of the prosodic feet is taken into account in the perception and parsing of syntactically ambiguous sentences.
The description of routes : A cognitive approach to the production of spatial discourse

This paper provides a general framework for the analysis of descriptions of routes, in order to account for the way in which spatial cognition is externalized through discourse. Three cognitive operations are assumed to be involved in the generation of this form of spatial discourse: (a) activation of an internal representation of the environment in which navigation will take place; (b) the planning of a route in the subspace of the mental representation currently activated; and (c) the formulation of the procedure that the user should execute to reach the goal. Two major components of the descriptions of routes are considered, those by which speakers refer to landmarks and those which consist of prescribing actions. Descriptions of two routes in a natural environment were collected from 20 undergraduates. A detailed analysis of the protocols was used to establish a classification of items, in which five classes were defined: prescription of actions without referring to any landmark, prescription of actions with reference to a landmark, reference to landmarks without referring to any associated action, description of landmarks, commentaries. Individual protocols were then used to construct more abstract (skeletal) descriptions, reflecting the essentials of the navigational procedure. Skeletal descriptions confirmed that landmarks and their associated actions were key components of route descriptions. Additional analyses indicated that the similarity of individual descriptions to the skeletal description of a route predicted the rated quality of these descriptions. Female subjects provided descriptions containing more landmarks than did males. Lastly, the descriptions provided by high visuo-spatial imagers contained more frequent references to landmarks, which is consistent with the expectation that subjects who are more likely to retrieve visuo-spatial information from their memories should include more references to such information in their verbal productions.
Mapping databases of X-ray powder patterns

by Ron Wehrens and Egon WillighagenWith the advent of high-throughput analysis meth-ods, the number of large databases containing in-formation on chemical compounds has increasedrapidly. They are being used for many different pur-poses. In the pharmaceutical industry, for exam-ple, databases containing hundreds of thousands ofdrug-like compounds are being used to help iden-tify promising new drug candidates. Obviously, theneed for efﬁcient data mining tools is increasing aswell. It is especially difﬁcult to assess how the sep-arate objects in the database relate. Visualisation ofthe contents is of prime importance but not trivial; Roffers a rich environment for this kind of exploratoryanalysis.
Phenotypic divergence in reproductive traits of a moth population experiencing a phenological shift

Allochrony that is reproductive isolation by time may further lead to divergence of reproductive adaptive traits in response to different environmental pressures over time. A unique “summer” population of the pine processionary moth Thaumetopoea pityocampa, reproductively isolated from the typical winter populations by allochronic differentiation, is here analyzed. This allochronically shifted population reproduces in the spring and develops in the summer, whereas “winter” populations reproduce in the late summer and have winter larval development. Both summer and winter populations coexist in the same pine stands, yet they face different climatic pressures as their active stages are present in different seasons. The occurrence of significant differences between the reproductive traits of the summer population and the typical winter populations (either sympatric or allopatric) is thus hypothesized. Female fecundity, egg size, egg covering, and egg parasitism were analyzed showing that the egg load was lower and that egg size was higher in the summer population than in all the studied winter populations. The scales that cover the egg batches of T. pityocampa differed significantly between populations in shape and color, resulting in a looser and darker covering in the summer population. The single specialist egg parasitoid species of this moth was almost missing in the summer population, and the overall parasitism rates were lower than in the winter population. Results suggest the occurrence of phenotypic differentiation between the summer population and the typical T. pityocampa winter populations for the life-history traits studied. This work provides an insight into how ecological divergence may follow the process of allochronic reproductive isolation.
Surgical endodontic retreatment.

Summary. In teeth with periapical lesions and defective root canal seals non-surgical retretment is usually preferred. Sometimes, howeve, such treatment may not be feasible and periapical surgery must be performed. The present study investigated a technique of retrograde root canal treatment as an alternative to the more conventional types of surgical procedure. The material consisted of 35 teeth whose root canals contained posts. In 77 percent of the cases it was possible to instrument and obturate the root canal up to the post. Following treatment the periapical tissues, as evaluated clinically and radiographically, showed evidence of having healed in 71 per cent of cases.
Maestro: A high performance AES encryption/decryption system

High throughput AES encryption/decryption is a necessity for many of modern embedded systems. This article presents a high performance yet cost efficient AES system. Maestro can be used in a wide range of embedded applications with various requirements and limitations. Maestro is about one million times faster than the pure software implementation. The Maestro architecture is composed of two major components; the soft processor aimed at system initialization and control, and the hardware AES engine for high performance AES encryption/decryption. A ten stage implicit pipelined architecture is considered for the AES engine. Two novel techniques are proposed in design of AES engine which enable it to reach a throughput of 12.8 Gbps. First, tightly coupled encryption and round key generation units in encryption unit, and second, ahead of time round key generation in decryption unit. Altera DE2-115 development and educational FPGA board is used as the platform for Maestro. In the proposed architecture the DMA modules act as interfaces between data sources and data sinks by loading the input data into AES engine and taking encrypted and generated test data to target memories.
Optimization of directed information and relations to filtering theory

In this paper we generalize the relation between nonanticipative Rate Distortion Function (RDF) and filtering theory, to processes which are affected by the reproduction process, by utilizing the topology of weak convergence of probability measures. Specifically, this generalization is established via an optimization on the space of conditional distributions of the so-called directed information, subject to a fidelity constraint. Existence of the optimal reproduction distribution of the general nonanticipative RDF is shown, while the closed form expression of the optimal reproduction distribution is obtained for nonstationary processes. The expression of the optimal reproduction conditional distribution is recursively computed, backward in time. Finally, the realization procedure of the general nonanticipative RDF which is equivalent to joint-source channel matching for symbol-by-symbol transmission is described.
Geographic routing protocol for vehicular ad hoc networks in city scenarios: a proposal and analysis

The characteristics of vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs) make the design of routing protocol a great challenge. In this paper, we propose a vehicle density and load aware routing protocol for VANETs called VDLA. VDLA adopts sequential selection of junctions to construct the route. The selection is based on the real‐time vehicle density, the traffic load, and the distance to the destination. The network information is collected by a decentralized mechanism. Through factoring in these metrics, the packets are avoided being sent to roads where network is disconnected, and the network load is balanced to mitigate network congestion. The intermediate junctions are selected before the packet reaches a junction to reduce the unnecessary hops. Our study also investigates the impact of the high mobility of the nodes. An analytical framework is proposed to analyze the mobility. Based on the analysis, the traditional Hello scheme is enhanced to improve the accuracy of the neighbor table. In the simulation, we compare VDLA with greedy perimeter coordinator routing and GpsrJ+, which are geographic routings protocols proposed for VANETs. The results validate the superiority of VDLA in terms of end‐to‐end delay and packet delivery rate. And the superiority holds in different scenarios. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.