Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Sinusoidal endothelial cells prevent rat stellate cell activation and promote reversion to quiescence

Capillarization precedes hepatic fibrosis. We hypothesize that capillarization of sinusoidal endothelial cells (SEC) is permissive for hepatic stellate cell (HSC) activation and therefore permissive for fibrosis. We examined whether freshly isolated SECs prevent activation of HSCs and promote reversion to quiescence, and whether this effect was lost in capillarization. HSCs were cultured alone or co‐cultured with differentiated or capillarized SECs. Results: Co‐culture with freshly isolated SECs markedly decreased HSC activation after 3 days in culture, but co‐culture with capillarized SEC had no effect. Inhibition of nitric oxide (NO) synthesis abolished SEC suppression of HSC activation. Activated HSCs reverted to quiescence when co‐cultured with SEC plus vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) (that is, with SECs that maintained differentiation), but co‐culture with capillarized SECs did not. Reversion of activated HSCs to quiescence in the presence of SECs plus VEGF was abolished by inhibition of NO synthesis. To establish whether there was indeed reversion, activated and quiescent HSCs were counted before and 3 days after adding freshly isolated SECs plus VEGF to activated HSCs, and proliferation was quantified in quiescent HSCs; the stoichiometry demonstrated reversion. Conclusion: Differentiated SECs prevent HSC activation and promote reversion of activated HSCs to quiescence through VEGF‐stimulated NO production. Capillarized SECs do not promote HSC quiescence, because of loss of VEGF‐stimulated NO production. (HEPATOLOGY 2008.)
Essential oil and plant extract of oregano as agents influencing the virulence factors of Candida albicans.

Candida albicans, a polymorphic yeast, is a physiological component of the human and animal commensal microbiome. It is an etiological factor of candidiasis, which is treated by azole antifungals. Growing resistance to azoles is a reason to look for other alternative treatment options. The pharmacotherapeutic use of plant extracts and essential oils has become increasingly important. In our experiment, C. albicans showed susceptibility to four observed plant extracts and essential oils from peppermint ( Mentha piperita), thyme ( Thymus vulgaris), sage ( Salvia officinalis), and oregano ( Origanum vulgare). Oregano plant extract and essential oil showed the highest antifungal activity, at MIC values of 4.9 mg/mL and 0.4 mg/mL respectively. Therefore, it was subjected to further research on the influence of virulence factors - biofilm formation, extracellular phospholipase production and germ tube formation. Oregano plant extract and essential oil showed an inhibitory effect on the observed C. albicans virulence factors at relatively low concentrations. The extract inhibited the adherence of cells at MIC 12.5 mg/mL and essential oil at MIC 0.25 mg/mL. Degradation of the formed biofilm was detected at MIC 14.1 mg/mL for plant extract and at MIC 0.4 mg/mL for essential oil. Extracellular phospholipase production was most effectively inhibited by the essential oil. In particular, the number of isolates with intensive extracellular phospholipase production decreased significantly. Of the 12 isolates intensively producing extracellular phospholipase, only 1 isolate (4.5%) retained intense production. Essential oil caused up to a 100 % reduction in germ tubes formation and plant extract reduced their formation depending on the concentration as follows: 2.6% (0.8 mg/mL), 21.2 % (6.25 mg/mL), and 64.5 % (12.5 mg/mL) compared to the control.
High temporal resolution in vivo blood oximetry via projection‐based T2 measurement

Measuring venous oxygen saturation (HbO2) in large blood vessels can provide important information about oxygen delivery and its consumption in vital organs. Quantification of blood's T2 value via MR can be utilized to determine HbO2 noninvasively. We propose a fast method for in vivo blood T2 quantification via computing the complex difference of velocity‐encoded projections. As blood flows continuously, its signal can be robustly isolated from the surrounding tissue by computing the complex difference of two central k‐space lines with different velocity encodings. This resultant signal can then be measured as a function of echo time for rapidly quantifying T2 of blood. We applied the method to quantify HbO2 in three cerebral veins at rest and in one of the veins in response to hypercapnia. Average HbO2 measurements in superior sagittal sinus (SSS), straight sinus and internal jugular vein in the group were 63 ± 3%, 68 ± 4% and 65 ± 4%, respectively. Average HbO2 values in SSS during baseline, hypercapnia, and recovery were 63 ± 2%, 79 ± 5%, and 61 ± 3%, respectively. When compared with standard T2 quantification techniques, the proposed method is fast, reliable, and robust against partial volume effects. Magn Reson Med 70:785–790, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Phalangeal Osteotomy for Hallux Valgus

Adequate correction of hallux valgus may be attempted at various levels of the first ray complex, depending on appropriate determination of the apex of the deformity. Methods of correction may include first metatarsal base osteotomy and first metatarsal head osteotomy as well as uncomplicated first metatarsophalangeal joint soft tissue realignment. In those instances in which the major deformity lies distal to the first metatarsophalangeal joint, however, phalangeal osteotomy is well suited as the procedure of choice. The purpose of this chapter is to outline the role of osteotomy of the proximal phalanx of the hallux, the Akin-type procedure, in the correction of hallux valgus.
Ionic currents of smooth muscle cells isolated from the ctenophore Mnemiopsis

The ionic currents of smooth muscle cells isolated from the ctenophore Mnemiopsis were examined by using conventional two-electrode voltage clamp and whole-cell patch clamping methods. Several separable currents were identified. These include: (1) a transient and (2) a steady-state voltage-activated inward current; both are tetrodotoxin (TTX) and saxitoxin (STX) insensitive, partly reduced by decreasing external Ca2+ or Na+ or by addition of 5 mM Co2+, D-600 or verapamil and are totally blocked with 5 mM Cd2+; (3) an early, transient, cation-dependent, outward K+ current (IKca/Na); (4) a transient, voltage-activated, outward K+ current provisionally identified as IA; (5) a delayed, steady-state, voltage-activated outward K+ current (IK) and (6) a late, transient, outward K+ current which is blocked by Cd2+ and evident only during long voltage pulses. Despite their phylogenic origin, most of these currents are similar to currents identified in many vertebrate smooth and cardiac muscle preparations, and other excitable cells in higher animals.
Unraveling Aspects of Bacillus amyloliquefaciens Mediated Enhanced Production of Rice under Biotic Stress of Rhizoctonia solani

Rhizoctonia solani is a necrotrophic fungi causing sheath blight in rice leading to substantial loss in yield. Excessive and persistent use of preventive chemicals raises human health and environment safety concerns. As an alternative, use of biocontrol agents is highly recommended. In the present study, an abiotic stress tolerant, plant growth promoting rhizobacteria Bacillus amyloliquefaciens (SN13) is demonstrated to act as a biocontrol agent and enhance immune response against R. solani in rice by modulating various physiological, metabolic, and molecular functions. A sustained tolerance by SN13 primed plant over a longer period of time, post R. solani infection may be attributed to several unconventional aspects of the plants’ physiological status. The prolonged stress tolerance observed in presence of SN13 is characterized by (a) involvement of bacterial mycolytic enzymes, (b) sustained maintenance of elicitors to keep the immune system induced involving non-metabolizable sugars such as turanose besides the known elicitors, (c) a delicate balance of ROS and ROS scavengers through production of proline, mannitol, and arabitol and rare sugars like fructopyranose, β-D-glucopyranose and myoinositol and expression of ferric reductases and hypoxia induced proteins, (d) production of metabolites like quinazoline and expression of terpene synthase, and (e) hormonal cross talk. As the novel aspect of biological control this study highlights the role of rare sugars, maintenance of hypoxic conditions, and sucrose and starch metabolism in B. amyloliquefaciens (SN13) mediated sustained biotic stress tolerance in rice.
The LC-VCO PLL frequency synthesizers with constant loop bandwidth

This paper precented a phase-locked loop frequency synthesizer with almost constant loop bandwidth. In order to reduce the loop bandwidth variations caused by the LC-VCO gain, a calibration system is introduced, which sets the charge-pump current to be inversely proportional to the square of the divider ratio. The frequency synthesizer with this technique was fabricated in 0. 13μm CMOS process. The measured results show that this method keeps the loop bandwidth almost a constant in frequency range of 2.44G~2.8GHz while consuming less power with better in-band phase noise.
Multicomponent inverse scattering series internal multiple prediction in the t-p domain

Internal multiples constitute unique signal in seismic records, which can negatively impact subsurface imaging and subsequent amplitude analysis, or, potentially, enhance illumination due to their distinct reflection angles and longer ray-paths. Both conventional migration using primaries only, and improved imaging approaches involving internal multiples, benefit from the precise identification and separation of internal multiples from primaries. Elastic versions of the inverse scattering series internal multiple attenuation algorithm extend prediction capacity to include wave-mode conversion and other elastic effects. In spite of having been published in the 1990s, however, little to no numerical analysis of multicomponent versions of the algorithm has been presented, possibly because of the difficulty of finding integral limits which completely suppress artifacts. We present a plane-wave (p) formulation, which admits, possibly uniquely, a sufficiently aggressive limitation on integration limits to create artifact-free P-P and P-S predictions. The process is illustrated with 1.5D synthetic data.
NGCN: Drug‐target interaction prediction by integrating information and feature learning from heterogeneous network

Abstract Drug‐target interaction (DTI) prediction is essential for new drug design and development. Constructing heterogeneous network based on diverse information about drugs, proteins and diseases provides new opportunities for DTI prediction. However, the inherent complexity, high dimensionality and noise of such a network prevent us from taking full advantage of these network characteristics. This article proposes a novel method, NGCN, to predict drug‐target interactions from an integrated heterogeneous network, from which to extract relevant biological properties and association information while maintaining the topology information. It focuses on learning the topology representation of drugs and targets to improve the performance of DTI prediction. Unlike traditional methods, it focuses on learning the low‐dimensional topology representation of drugs and targets via graph‐based convolutional neural network. NGCN achieves substantial performance improvements over other state‐of‐the‐art methods, such as a nearly 1.0% increase in AUPR value. Moreover, we verify the robustness of NGCN through benchmark tests, and the experimental results demonstrate it is an extensible framework capable of combining heterogeneous information for DTI prediction.
Towards a highly efficient diversity census of the prokaryotic biosphere: a group testing approach

Exploring the microbial biosphere has grown exponentially in recent years, although we are far from understanding its entirety. We present the âdiversity censusâ problem of exploring all bacterial species in a large cohort of specimens, and detecting a specimen that contains each species. The naive approach to this problem is to sequence each specimen, thus requiring costly sample preparation steps. We suggest an orders of magnitude more efficient approach for diversity censusing. Specimens are pooled according to a predefined design and standard 16S rRNA sequencing is performed over each pool. For each bacterial species, from the ultra-rare to the most common, the algorithm detects a single specimen that contains the bacterial species. The approach can be applied to large cohorts of monomicrobial cultures or to complex samples containing a mixture of organisms. We model the experimental procedure and show via in silico simulations that the approach enables censusing more than 95% of the species while taking 10 – 70 fold less resources. Simulating experiments using real samples display the utility in censusing large cohorts of samples. Diversity censusing presents a novel problem in the mathematical field of group testing that may also be applied in other biological problems and in other domains.
Morphology of quantified ionospheric range spread-F over a wide range of midlatitudes in the Australian longitudinal sector

Abstract. Ionograms from a standard vertical-incidence ionosonde chain (nine stations), obtained over a wide range of southern latitudes (in geom.lat. range: 23°–52° S), were digitally scanned at 5-min intervals at nighttime (18:00–06:00 LT) for 13 months (January 2004–January 2005). An important parameter of the F-region, so-called range spread-F (Sr), was for the first time quantified in km. Maximum in Sr was recorded at a sounding frequency of 1.8 MHz for each night and for each ionosonde station. A distinct pattern in the magnitude (in km) and in the percentage occurrence of the range spread-F was present in southern winter only (the June solstice). The sub-auroral region (geom. lat. ≥52° S) is characterised by consistently high spread-F (average Sr≈100 km) on 80–100 per cent of the observed nights. There is a sharp equatorward boundary in the spread-F activity in a latitudinal range: 52°–48° S followed by a midlatitude region (44°–48° S) which exhibits a peak in Sr (≈50 km) in winter only, observed on half of the nights. The midlatitude activity reaches its minimum at 42°–43° S, with Sr less than 20 km on one third of the nights. The low midlatitudes (23°–36° S) are characterised by a strong peak in Sr again in winter, centred at about 30° S (average Sr≈70 km) on 80 per cent of the nights. The pattern becomes largely absent during other seasons particularly in southern summer (the December solstice) when spread-F activity shifts to sub-auroral latitudes. The pattern in the occurrence of spread-F appears to have a global character as the enhanced spread-F activity is observed in the Japanese sector in local summer (i.e. the June solstice). It appears that the midlatitude spread-F minimum is only apparent but not real. It delineates the boundary between aurorally generated spread-F (due to travelling ionospheric disturbances, TIDs) and low midlatitude spread-F whose origin is not known.
The Effect of Ink Jet Paper Roughness on Print Gloss

Roughness of a variety of commercial Epson and Kodak ink jet papers was tested by Parker Print Surf (PPS), EMVECO stylus profilometer and Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM). The papers were printed on three Epson ink jet printers. Correlations between paper roughness and paper and print gloss were studied. From all three roughness testing methods used, the best correlation was found for AFM. Pigment based and dye based inks were found to have different effects on print gloss of Epson and Kodak papers. Topography of ink film was also studied by atomic force microscopy.
Meta‐analysis on GLP‐1 mediated modulation of autophagy in islet β‐cells: Prospectus for improved wound healing in type 2 diabetes

Abstract Type 2 diabetes mellitus refers to a significantly challenging health disease due to its high prevalence and risk of other chronic diseases across the world. Notably, GLP‐1 has been recognized to enhance the treatment of T2DM, along with this, GLP‐1 is also involved in autophagy modulation. However, ineffectiveness of few analogue types can limit the efficacy of this treatment. This study particularly aims to elucidate the influence of GLP‐1 receptor analogues on wound infection and patients with type 2 diabetes. To conduct the meta‐analysis, an expansive literature survey was conducted to unveil the studies and research conducted on T2DM patients that revealed whether the adoption of any GLP‐1 analogue in the form of specific interventions impacts the type 2 diabetes mellitus. The literature was searched using multiple search terms, screened and data were extracted to conduct the meta‐analysis and it was conducted using metabin function of R package meta. A total of 800 patients consisting of the both intervention and control groups were employed to carry out the meta‐analysis to analyse and evaluate the impact of GLP‐1 mediated modulation to improve wound healing in the T2DM patients. The results revealed that GLP‐1 mediated modulation considering one type of analogue was an effective intervention to patients suffering from T2DM. The variations in these results depicted insignificant outcomes with the values (risk ratio [RR]: 1.03, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.90–1.18, p > 0.05) and enlightened the fact that adopting different GLP‐1 analogues may significantly improve the efficacy of wound healing in T2DM patients. Hence, interventions of GLP‐1 mediated modulation must be utilized in the clinical practice to reduce the incidence of T2DM patients.
Heterogeneous Cellular Networks With Spatio-Temporal Traffic: Delay Analysis and Scheduling

Emergence of new types of services has led to various traffic and diverse delay requirements in fifth-generation (5G) wireless networks. Meeting diverse delay requirements is one of the most critical goals for the design of 5G wireless networks. Though the delay of point-to-point communications has been well investigated, the delay of multi-point to multi-point communications has not been thoroughly studied, since it is a complicated function of all links in the network. In this paper, we propose a novel tractable approach to analyze the delay in the heterogeneous cellular networks with spatio-temporal random arrival of traffic. Specifically, we propose the notion of delay outage and evaluate the effect of different scheduling policies on the delay performance. Our numerical analysis reveals that offloading policy based on the cell range expansion greatly reduces the macrocell traffic, while bringing a small amount of growth for the picocell traffic. Our results also show that the delay performance of round-robin scheduling outperforms first-in first-out scheduling for heavy traffic, and it is reversed for light traffic. In summary, this analytical framework provides an understanding and a rule-of-thumb for the practical deployment of 5G systems, where delay requirement is increasingly becoming a key concern.
Fully Associative Ensemble Learning for Hierarchical Multi-Label Classification

In contrast to traditional flat classification problems (e.g., binary or multi-class classification), Hierarchical Multi-label Classification (HMC) takes into account the structural information embedded in the class hierarchy. In this paper, we propose a local hierarchical ensemble framework, Fully Associative Ensemble Learning (FAEL). We model the relationship between each node’s global prediction and the local predictions of all the nodes as a multi-variable regression problem. The simplest version of our model leads to a ridge regression problem. It can be extended using the kernel trick, which explores the complex correlation between global and local prediction. In addition, we introduce a binary constraint model to restrict the optimal weight matrix learning. The proposed models have been applied to image annotation and gene function prediction datasets. The experimental results indicate that our models achieve better performance when compared with other baseline methods.
Nickel-induced Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition by Reactive Oxygen Species Generation and E-cadherin Promoter Hypermethylation*

Background: Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is an important program in tumor metastasis. Results: Nickel chloride (NiCl2) induced EMT in human bronchial epithelial cells, including down-regulation of epithelial-cadherin (E-cadherin) and up-regulation of fibronectin. Conclusion: ROS generation and promoter hypermethylation of E-cadherin are involved in NiCl2-mediated EMT. Significance: The results of this study may shed new light on the role of nickel in carcinogenesis. Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is considered a critical event in the pathogenesis of lung fibrosis and tumor metastasis. During EMT, the expression of differentiation markers switches from cell-cell junction proteins such as E-cadherin to mesenchymal markers such as fibronectin. Although nickel-containing compounds have been shown to be associated with lung carcinogenesis, the role of nickel in the EMT process in bronchial epithelial cells is not clear. The aim of this study was to examine whether nickel contributes to EMT in human bronchial epithelial cells. We also attempted to clarify the mechanisms involved in NiCl2-induced EMT. Our results showed that NiCl2 induced EMT phenotype marker alterations such as up-regulation of fibronectin and down-regulation of E-cadherin. In addition, the potent antioxidant N-acetylcysteine blocked EMT and expression of HIF-1α induced by NiCl2, whereas the DNA methyltransferase inhibitor 5-aza-2′-deoxycytidine restored the down-regulation of E-cadherin induced by NiCl2. Promoter hypermethylation of E-cadherin, determined by quantitative real time methyl-specific PCR and bisulfate sequencing, was also induced by NiCl2. These results shed new light on the contribution of NiCl2 to carcinogenesis. Specifically, NiCl2 induces down-regulation of E-cadherin by reactive oxygen species generation and promoter hypermethylation. This study demonstrates for the first time that nickel induces EMT in bronchial epithelial cells.
A NOVEL PROPOSAL OF GAOFEN-3 SATELLITE CONSTELLATION FOR MULTI-APPLICATIONS

Abstract. Gaofen-3 is the first C-band fully polarimetric SAR satellite in China, which is widely used in various fields such as ocean monitoring, disaster reduction and so on. In this paper, a new satellite constellation is proposed based on the orbit of Gaofen-3 satellite. The constellation includes Gaofen-3 and other two duplicates. It is able to do repeat-pass interferometry, repeat-pass differential interferometry, along-track interferometry and stereo measurement. With these abilities, it can generate the earth DEM without ground control points and have better performance in moving target identification and monitoring. The performance and the system requirements are analysed, which provides a good reference for the design of spaceborne SAR constellation.