Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Extraintestinal Salmonellosis in a General Hospital (1991 to 1996): Relationships between Salmonella Genomic Groups and Clinical Presentations

ABSTRACT Episodes of extraintestinal salmonellosis treated at a general hospital (1,522 beds) over a 6-year period (1991 to 1996) were characterized by the analysis of phenotypic and genotypic traits of Salmonella organisms and clinical data from medical reports. Extraintestinal salmonellosis accounted for 8% of all salmonellosis episodes. Fifty-two medical reports, dealing with 6 cases of typhoid fever, 32 cases of bacteremia, and 14 focal infections, were reviewed. All cases of typhoid fever except 1, 7 cases of bacteremia, and 5 focal infections were not related to any underlying disease or predisposing factors, while 25 cases of bacteremia and 9 focal infections were associated with some of these risk factors. All typhoid isolates and 65.4% of the nontyphoid isolates were susceptible to antimicrobials. Fifty-one nontyphoid strains were analyzed and assigned to 21 genomic groups, which were defined by serotype, combined ribotype, and combined randomly amplified polymorphic DNA type (each genomic group could include organisms differing in some phenotypic traits). The relationships between genomic groups and clinical presentations were traced. Organisms causing 22 episodes (17 episodes of bacteremia, 2 of pneumonia, 1 of peritonitis, 1 of pyelonephritis, and 1 of cystitis) belonged to a prevalent Salmonella enterica serotype Enteritidis genomic group, which included organisms assigned to four phage types, five biotypes, and four resistance patterns, causing infections in patients with and without risk factors. Seven other genomic groups, 4 Enteritidis groups (associated with both bacteremia and focal infections), 2 Typhimurium groups (one associated with bacteremia and the other with focal infections) and 1 Brandenburg group (associated with bacteremia) included two or more strains, and the remaining 13 genomic groups consisted of only one strain each.
Temperature-aware thread assignment of many-core processor

This paper presents a temperature aware dynamic thread reassignment scheme for a many-core processor. The proposed scheme uses a hardware based cluster controller to perform thermal management for each cluster of cores. The cluster controller performs dynamic thread reassignment based on the thread transfer matrix with the following methods in descending priority: reducing the hot core temperature to closest to the threshold, transferring the fewest threads, and moving threads to the cores with the fewest active neighbors. The proposed scheme can achieve both good thermal management and high performance for processor cores.
Towards the theoretical foundation of choreography

With the growth of interest on the web services, people pay increasinglyattention to the choreography, that is, to describe collaborations ofparticipants in accomplishing a common business goal from a globalviewpoint. In this paper, based on a simple choreography language and arole-oriented process language, we study some fundamental issues relatedto choreography, especially those related to implementation, includingsemantics, projection and natural projection, dominant role in choices anditerations, etc. We propose the concept of dominant role and somenovel languages structures related to it. The study reveals some cluesabout the language, the semantics, the specification and theimplementation of choreography.
Models for multimedia conference between browsers based on WebRTC

Several models and architectures are proposed to support multiparty communication over IP. Even if some of these solutions support large number of participants using a conference server, solutions that base their media distribution on peers are adapted to support only small conferencing groups. Deploying multimedia communication based on WebRTC API for more than browser-to-browser connection is not inherently supported and creates new challenge in terms of media stream distribution as well as membership and conferencing operation control overhead. Many conference models presented in this paper can support multi-party communication between endpoints over an IP networks. Otherwise, the use of WebRTC technology require direct P2P media negotiation between participants as well as signaling interaction with the Server to manage the conference. This paper introduces two specific conference models adapted to support WebRTC communication between browsers for both small scale and large scale conference. The proposed abstract protocols included in this work implements conference creation and browser joining/leaving and can be mapped using SIP/DSP primitives.
Correlation between exhaled nitric oxide, sputum eosinophils, and methacholine responsiveness in patients with mild asthma.

BACKGROUND: Eosinophils in induced sputum and exhaled nitric oxide (NO) are currently used as non-invasive markers in the assessment of airway inflammation in asthma. As both sputum eosinophils (%) and exhaled NO are raised in asthmatic subjects not receiving inhaled steroids and decreased following corticosteroid therapy, a relationship between them is plausible. METHODS: Exhaled NO was measured by chemiluminescence analyser, sputum induction by 3.5% saline inhalation, and bronchial responsiveness was measured as PC20FEV1 methacholine in 35 stable asthmatic patients using beta 2 agonist alone and the correlation between these non-invasive markers of airway inflammation was studied. RESULTS: There were significant correlations between exhaled NO and PC20 (r = -0.64), exhaled NO and sputum eosinophils (%) (r = 0.48), and also between sputum eosinophils (%) and PC20 (r = -0.40). CONCLUSION: The correlation between exhaled NO and PC20 suggests that exhaled NO or the mechanisms leading to its increase may contribute to airway hyperresponsiveness in asthma. Furthermore, the relationship between sputum eosinophils (%), exhaled NO, and PC20 highlight the potential use of eosinophils (%) in induced sputum and exhaled NO to monitor the severity of asthma.
Stochastic Modeling and Optimization for Robust Power Management in a Partially Observable System

As the hardware and software complexity grows, it is unlikely for the power management hardware/software to have a full observation of the entire system status. In this paper, we propose a new modeling and optimization technique based on partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP) for robust power management, which can achieve near-optimal power savings, even when only partial system information is available. Three scenarios of partial observations that may occur in an embedded system are discussed and their modeling techniques are presented. The experimental results show that, compared with power management policy derived from traditional Markov decision process model that assumes the system is fully observable, the new power management technique gives significantly better performance and energy tradeoff
Dielectrophoresis force and deflection of electroactive poly(p-phenylene vinylene)/polydimethylsiloxane blends

The effects of poly(p-phenylene vinylene) volume fraction and electric field strength on the electromechanical properties and the deflection of poly(p-phenylene vinylene)/polydimethylsiloxane (PPV/PDMS) blend gels were investigated experimentally. The electromechanical properties of the PPV/PDMS blends were measured under oscillatory shear mode at a temperature of 27 °C. On application of an electric field, the storage modulus response, G′, increases between 7 and 50%, depending on the PPV volume fraction, as the electric field strength is varied between 0 and 2 kV mm−1. The stress generated is caused by the induced polarized PPV particles leading to interparticle interactions. With an external electric field applied, the PPV/PDMS films, suspended in silicone oil between copper electrodes, respond with significant and rapid deflections toward the anode, indicating the attractive interaction between the anode and the polarized PPV particles embedded in the PDMS network. As the electric field is removed, the PPV/PDMS films nearly recover their original positions and shapes due to the gravitational force, elasticity, and the reversibility of the polarized PPV particles. Thus, our PPV/PDMS system is a reversible bending system, consistent with the G′ temporal response results. From the deformation data, the dielectrophoresis force, FD, and the degree of deflection vary linearly with the electric field.
Nasal Swab versus Nasopharyngeal Aspirate for Isolation of Respiratory Viruses

ABSTRACT To determine the usefulness of nasal swabs as a simple method for detection of respiratory viruses, we compared nasal swabs and nasopharyngeal aspirates obtained at the same time from the opposite nostrils of 230 children with upper respiratory infection. The sensitivity of nasal swabs was comparable to that of nasopharyngeal aspirates for the detection of all major respiratory viruses except respiratory syncytial virus.
Visual Receptive Field Properties of Neurons in the Mouse Lateral Geniculate Nucleus

The lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) is increasingly regarded as a “smart-gating” operator for processing visual information. Therefore, characterizing the response properties of LGN neurons will enable us to better understand how neurons encode and transfer visual signals. Efforts have been devoted to study its anatomical and functional features, and recent advances have highlighted the existence in rodents of complex features such as direction/orientation selectivity. However, unlike well-researched higher-order mammals such as primates, the full array of response characteristics vis-à-vis its morphological features have remained relatively unexplored in the mouse LGN. To address the issue, we recorded from mouse LGN neurons using multisite-electrode-arrays (MEAs) and analysed their discharge patterns in relation to their location under a series of visual stimulation paradigms. Several response properties paralleled results from earlier studies in the field and these include centre-surround organization, size of receptive field, spontaneous firing rate and linearity of spatial summation. However, our results also revealed “high-pass” and “low-pass” features in the temporal frequency tuning of some cells, and greater average contrast gain than reported by earlier studies. In addition, a small proportion of cells had direction/orientation selectivity. Both “high-pass” and “low-pass” cells, as well as direction and orientation selective cells, were found only in small numbers, supporting the notion that these properties emerge in the cortex. ON- and OFF-cells showed distinct contrast sensitivity and temporal frequency tuning properties, suggesting parallel projections from the retina. Incorporating a novel histological technique, we created a 3-D LGN volume model explicitly capturing the morphological features of mouse LGN and localising individual cells into anterior/middle/posterior LGN. Based on this categorization, we show that the ON/OFF, DS/OS and linear response properties are not regionally restricted. Our study confirms earlier findings of spatial pattern selectivity in the LGN, and builds on it to demonstrate that relatively elaborate features are computed early in the visual pathway.
C O ] 3 M ar 2 00 5 A Non-Messing-Up Phenomenon for Posets

We classify finite posets with a particular sorting property, generalizing a result for rectangular arrays. Each poset is covered by two sets of disjoint saturated chains such that, for any original labeling, after sorting the labels along both sets of chains, the labels of the chains in the first set remain sorted. We also characterize posets with more restrictive sorting properties.
Soft-decision sequential sensing for optimization of interweave Cognitive Radio networks

Under probability-of-interference constraints, proper spectrum sensing is crucial in Cognitive Radios (CRs). However, the capability of a CR to sense the spectrum is limited, especially when multiple users try to access multiple channels. As a consequence, control and resource allocation schemes should optimize not only transmitting resources, but also sensing resources. In this paper, the cost of such sensing resources is incorporated into the optimization, with the aim of dynamically adapting the power (energy) devoted to sense each channel. More precisely, the tradeoff among: throughput, power devoted to sense, power devoted to transmit, and probability of interference is optimized. A soft-decision Bayesian sequential sensing scheme is used to exploit the time-correlation of the primary occupancy. The joint design leverages tools of dynamic programming to solve the sequential sensing problem and relies on reinforcement learning to develop a stochastic solution.
Ubiquitous nonimmunoglobulin p-azobenzenearsonate-binding molecules from lymphoid cells

A ubiquitous nonimmunoglobulin molecule that binds p-azobenzenearsonate (ABA) has been detected in the cytoplasm of several murine cell lines, including T cell hybridomas as well as in normal liver and spleen. Similar to many recently described antigen-specific T cell factors, this ABA-binding protein has a 62,000 mol wt, and, when analyzed by direct binding, the molecule reacts with several different rabbit anti- idiotypic antisera specific to the ABA system. The presence of this antigen-specific, "idiotype positive" molecule in many different cells indicates that it is not an important immunoregulatory molecule.
Laboratory Milling: Rheological Evaluation of Dry and Tempered Wheat

Rheological testing of wheat flours is very effective to evaluate the breadmaking potential of wheat flours. Rheological test were used to compare the wet and dry milling of wheat on two laboratory mills with the wheat milling on industrial mill. The laboratory mills used were Brabender Quadromat Jr. and Chopin CD1, and for rheological test we used Alveograph, Farinograph and Mixolab. The flours obtained by wet milling were much similar to the flour obtained on industrial mill. For most of the parameters studied, we obtained better correlation with industrial milling for wet milling, on both laboratory mills. Higher correlation values for Pearson coefficient indicates that wet milling is more capable do give a representative sample for laboratory tests. Â
The development of a preliminary ultrasonographic scoring system for features of hand osteoarthritis

Objectives: Painful osteoarthritis (OA) of the hand is common and a validated ultrasound (US) scoring system would be valuable for epidemiological and therapeutic outcome studies. US is increasingly used to assess peripheral joints, though most of the US focus in rheumatic diseases has been on rheumatoid arthritis. We aimed to develop a preliminary US hand OA scoring system, initially focusing on relevant pathological features with potentially high reliability. Methods: A group of experts in the fields of OA, US and novel tool development agreed on domains and suggested scaling of the items to be used in US hand OA scoring systems. A multi-observer reliability exercise was then performed to evaluate the draft items. Results: Synovitis (grey scale and Power Doppler) and osteophytes (representing activity and damage domains) were included and evaluated as the initial components of the scoring system. All three features were evaluated for their presence/absence and if present were scored using a 1–3 scale. The reliability exercise demonstrated intra-reader κ values of 0.444–1.0, 0.211–1.0 and 0.087–1.0 for grey scale synovitis, power Doppler and osteophytes respectively. Inter-reader reliability κ values were 0.398, 0.327 and 0.530 grey-scale synovitis, power Doppler and osteophytes respectively. Without extensive standardisation, both intra- and inter-reader reliability were moderately good. Conclusions: The draft scoring system demonstrated substantive to almost perfect percentage exact agreement on the presence/absence of the selected OA features and moderate to substantive percentage exact agreement on semi-quantitative grading. This preliminary process provides a good basis from which to further develop an US outcome tool for hand OA that has the potential to be utilised in multicentre clinical trials.
Activation of NF-κB is required for hypertrophic growth of primary rat neonatal ventricular cardiomyocytes

The transcription factor NF-κB regulates expression of genes that are involved in inflammation, immune response, viral infection, cell survival, and division. However, the role of NF-κB in hypertrophic growth of terminally differentiated cardiomyocytes is unknown. Here we report that NF-κB activation is required for hypertrophic growth of cardiomyocytes. In cultured rat primary neonatal ventricular cardiomyocytes, the nuclear translocation of NF-κB and its transcriptional activity were stimulated by several hypertrophic agonists, including phenylephrine, endothelin-1, and angiotensin II. The activation of NF-κB was inhibited by expression of a “supersuppressor” IκBα mutant that is resistant to stimulation-induced degradation and a dominant negative IκB kinase (IKKβ) mutant that can no longer be activated by phosphorylation. Furthermore, treatment with phenylephrine induced IκBα degradation in an IKK-dependent manner, suggesting that NF-κB is a downstream target of the hypertrophic agonists. Importantly, expression of the supersuppressor IκBα mutant or the dominant negative IKKβ mutant blocked the hypertrophic agonist-induced expression of the embryonic gene atrial natriuretic factor and enlargement of cardiomyocytes. Conversely, overexpression of NF-κB itself induced atrial natriuretic factor expression and cardiomyocyte enlargement. These findings suggest that NF-κB plays a critical role in the hypertrophic growth of cardiomyocytes and may serve as a potential target for the intervention of heart disease.
Thymus reconstitution by c-kit-expressing hematopoietic stem cells purified from adult mouse bone marrow

The introduction of clonal assays and long-term culture systems has resulted in considerable progress in the understanding of the early events that control self-renewal and commitment to differentiation of pluripotent hematopoietic stem cells (PHSC). Relatively little is known about the factors that control the commitment of PHSC to the lymphoid lineages, especially the T cell lineage. In the present study, the expression of the proto-oncogene c-kit was used to isolate and study the capacity of highly purified day 14 colony-forming units-spleen (CFU- S) to reconstitute the thymus of sublethally irradiated Thy-1 congenic recipient mice. We demonstrate here that one c-kit positive (c-kitpos) stem cell upon intrathymic transfer can effectively reconstitute the thymus of a sublethally irradiated recipient. After a lag phase of 15 d, high levels of donor-derived thymocytes (Thy-1.1pos) could be detected until 65 d after transplantation in Thy-1.2pos host mice. Donor-derived cells were only detected in the lobe of the thymus in which cells were previously injected and not in the noninjected lobe. These data suggest that c-kitpos stem cells do not migrate from one lobe to another and that they do not re-seed the thymus after having migrated to the bone marrow. The level and duration of reconstitution was found to be cell dose dependent, suggesting that, over time, endogenous stem cells compete with donor stem cells for available sites in the thymus microenvironment. The data presented in this paper demonstrate that commitment of purified adult bone marrow-derived c- kitpos stem cells to the T cell differentiation pathway can occur in the thymus and does not have to happen in the bone marrow.
Exploiting Network Structure for Proactive Spam Mitigation

E-mail has become indispensable in today's networked society. However, the huge and ever-growing volume of spam has become a serious threat to this important communication medium. It not only affects e-mail recipients, but also causes a significant overload to mail servers which handle the e-mail transmission. We perform an extensive analysis of IP addresses and IP aggregates given by network-aware clusters in order to investigate properties that can distinguish the bulk of the legitimate mail and spam. Our analysis indicates that the bulk of the legitimate mail comes from long-lived IP addresses. We also find that the bulk of the spam comes from network clusters that are relatively long-lived. Our analysis suggests that network-aware clusters may provide a good aggregation scheme for exploiting the history and structure of IP addresses. We then consider the implications of this analysis for prioritizing legitimate mail. We focus on the situation when mail server is overloaded, and the goal is to maximize the legitimate mail that it accepts. We demonstrate that the history and the structure of the IP addresses can reduce the adverse impact of mail server overload, by increasing the number of legitimate e-mails accepted by a factor of 3.
INTERFACIAL EFFECTS IN SOLID PAINT FILMS RELATED TO SOME FILM PROPERTIES

THE MOST IMPORTANT SOLID-SOLID INTERFACES IN PAINT SYSTEMS WHICH AFFECT FILM PROPERTIES ARE THOSE BETWEEN FILM AND SUBSTRATE, WITHIN THE VEHICLE ITSELF AND BETWEEN VEHICLE AND PIGMENT PARTICLES. THE ACTION OF LIQUID WATER ON THESE INTERFACES IS OF SPECIAL INTEREST. THIS PAPER DISCUSSES INTERFACIAL EFFECTS OF WATER ON BLUSHING, PERMEABILITY AND STRESS-STRAIN BEHAVIOR OF PIGMENTED PAINT FILMS. BLUSHING ONLY OCCURRED ABOVE THE GLASS TRANSITION RANGE. BY PERMEATION STUDIES WITH TRITIATED WATER IT IS SHOWN THAT, CONTRARY TO RESULTS OBTAINED WITH PERMEABILITY CUPS, WATER PERMEATION IN FULLY IMMERSED FILMS IS OFTEN STRONGLY ENHANCED BY PIGMENTATION, AT LEAST UP TO SOME DEGREE OF PIGMENT CONCENTRATION. ELASTIC MODULUS, TENSILE STRENGTH AND ULTIMATE ELONAGTION OF FULLY IMMERSED PAINT FILMS PROVIDE EVIDENCE OF THE INFLUENCE OF WATER ON THE PIGMENT-VEHICLE INTERACTION. /AUTHOR/
Clinical and Molecular Cytogenetic Characterization of a de novo Interstitial 1p31.1p31.3 Deletion in a Boy with Moderate Intellectual Disability and Severe Language Impairment

Interstitial 1p deletions are rare events. Very few cases of 1p31.1p31. 3 deletions characterized by variable phenotypes have been reported. No clear genotype-phenotype correlation has been determined yet. We present a child with a de novo interstitial 1p31.1p31. 3 deletion, identified by array CGH, associated with intellectual disability and severe language impairment. The deleted region contains 20 OMIM genes, but we focused on GADD45A (MIM 126335; growth arrest- and DNA damage-inducible gene), LRRC7 (MIM 614453; leucine-rich repeat-containing protein 7), and NEGR1 (MIM 613173; neuronal growth regulator 1). We discuss whether these genes play a role in determining the phenotype of our patient in order to investigate the possibility of a genotype-phenotype correlation.
Release of two Saccharomyces cerevisiae cytochrome genes, COX6 and CYC1, from glucose repression requires the SNF1 and SSN6 gene products

We show here that SNF1 and SSN6 are required for derepression of the glucose-repressible yeast genes COX6 and CYC1, which encode the mitochondrial proteins cytochrome c oxidase subunit VI and iso-1-cytochrome c, respectively. In an snf1 mutant genetic background, the transcription of both COX6 and CYC1 continued to be repressed after cells were shifted into derepressing media. In an ssn6 mutant genetic background, both COX6 and CYC1 were expressed constitutively at high levels in repressing media. SSN6 acted epistatically to SNF1 in the regulation of both cytochrome genes. These findings are similar to previous findings on the effects of SNF1 and SSN6 on SUC2 expression in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and are consistent with a model proposing that SNF1 exerts its effect through SSN6 on COX6 and CYC1.