Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The effect of occupational lead exposure on lipid peroxidation, protein carbonylation, and plasma viscosity

The aim of the study was to investigate the influence of occupational lead (Pb) exposure on lipid peroxidation, protein carbonylation, and plasma viscosity in workers. The examined group included 283 healthy male employees of manufacturing facilities using zinc and Pb. The mean blood concentrations of Pb and zinc protoporphyrin as well as the mean urine δ-aminolevulinic acid levels were used as markers of exposure for the examined group. Taking into account the obtained mean values of blood lead level, the examined group was divided into three subgroups. When comparing the control group with the subgroups, Pb exposure markers were significantly elevated in all the three subgroups. Concentrations of conjugated dienes (CD), lipid hydroperoxides, malondialdehyde (MDA), and protein carbonyl groups were also significantly increased. Conversely, the levels of total protein and protein sulfhydryls were significantly decreased in the subgroups compared with the controls. The plasma viscosity was significantly elevated in the subgroups. A dose–response between Pb levels and plasma viscosity was not observed. Pb supposedly elevates MDA and CD in a dose-dependent manner. In conclusion, occupational Pb exposure induces oxidative stress that results in lipid and protein damage. Moreover, Pb-induced oxidative stress is likely the primary factor that elevates plasma viscosity, despite decreased protein levels.
Sativex® in multiple sclerosis spasticity: a cost–effectiveness model

Background: Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic, progressive disease that carries a high socioeconomic burden. Spasticity (rigidity and spasms) is common in MS and a key contributor to MS-related disability. Objectives: This study evaluated the cost–effectiveness of Sativex®, a 9-d-tetrahydrocannabinol/cannabidiol-based oromucosal spray that acts as an endocannabinoid system modulator. Sativex was recently approved for the management of resistant MS spasticity as add-on medication. Methods: A Markov model-based analysis was performed over a 5-year horizon from a German and Spanish healthcare payer perspective. The incremental cost of Sativex was low compared with current spasticity treatments, and provided a quality-adjusted life-year gain over the current standard of care. Results: The base-case incremental cost–effectiveness ratio for Sativex was estimated at €11,214/quality-adjusted life-year in Germany, while the drug was the dominant option in Spain, providing savings of €3496/patient over a 5-year period (year of costing: 2010). This was seen because the lower severity of spasticity in patients who had improved led to reduced resource consumption (e.g., physiotherapy and medications). Conclusion: Despite having a relatively high acquisition cost, Sativex was shown to be a cost–effective treatment option for patients with MS-related spasticity.
Antibody Prevalence of West Nile Virus in Birds, Illinois, 2002

Antibodies to West Nile virus were detected in 94 of 1,784 Illinois birds during 2002. Captive and urban birds had higher seropositivity than did birds from natural areas, and northern and central Illinois birds’ seropositivity was greater than that from birds from the southern sites. Adult and hatch-year exposure rates did not differ significantly.
Compact UWB Filter with High Selectivity and a Deep Notched Band

A compact ultra-wideband (UWB) bandpass filter with high selectivity and deep notched band attenuation is presented in this letter. The main structure of this filter is a balun-based coplanar waveguide (CPW)-microstrip CPW transition. This structure has UWB bandpass characteristic (2.85– 11 GHz) and a transmission zero at its lower transition band. To achieve a transmission zero at its upper transition band, some complementary split ring resonators (CSRR) are added in the ground of microstrip. Therefore, this filter, whose skirt factor is 89%, presents high selectivity. Then, a notched band is created by short-ended stubs for 5.5 GHz WLAN. Owing to the stepped impedance characteristic of these stubs, this filter achieves −41 dB deep notch in its S21. Besides, the size of the whole filter is only 0. 38λg ∗ 0. 45λg . The simulated and measured results agree well with each other.
Genomic and non-genomic actions of glucocorticoids in asthma

Glucocorticoids are the mainstay of asthma therapy. They are primarily used to suppress airway inflammation, which is the central pathological change in asthmatic patients’ airways. This is achieved by many different mechanisms. The classical mechanism is by suppression of the genetic transcription of many inflammatory cytokines that are key in asthma pathophysiology (transrepression). On the other hand, the transcription of certain inhibitory cytokines is activated by glucocorticoids (transactivation), a mechanism that also mediates many of the adverse effects of glucocorticoids. The onset of action through these mechanisms is often delayed (4-24 hours). Other mechanisms mediated through non-genomic pathways are increasingly appreciated. These are delivered in part by binding of glucocorticoids to nonclassical membrane-bound glucocorticoid receptors or by potentiating the α1-adrenergic action on the bronchial arterial smooth muscles, in addition to other mechanisms. These effects are characterized by their rapid onset and short duration of action. Understanding these different mechanisms will help in the development of new and better drugs to treat this common disease and to develop new improved strategies in our approach to its management. Here, the genomic and non-genomic mechanisms of actions of glucocorticoids in asthma are briefly reviewed, with special emphasis on the current updates of the non-genomic mechanisms.
Comparative study of speaker verification techniques based on vector quantization, sphericity models

Three simple speaker verification techniques based on vector quantization, sphericity models and dynamic time warping, respectively, are developed and tested using the same experimental protocol. Two types of feature vectors, the linear prediction derived cepstral coefficients and the melfrequency cepstral coefficients are considered. The efficiency of the combination of the type of acoustic analysis and the verification technique is quantitatively measured through the achieved equal error rate.
Topiramate for Treatment in Patients With Migraine and Epilepsy

Antiepileptic drugs (AED) are often considered first line for monotherapy in treatment of patients with migraines, and also those with comorbid migraine and epilepsy. Topiramate, a newer generation AED, has broad mechanism of action and evidence of benefit in patients with either episodic or chronic migraine along with epilepsy, both generalized and focal.
Routing Protocols for Sensor Networks

A wireless sensor network consists of a number of sensors spreading across a geographical area to perform distributed sensing tasks using wireless medium. In order to facilitate data transfer from a source node to a destination (sink) node, a routing protocol is needed to determine the possible routes. With a limited power supply, sensor nodes are deployed densely and prone to failures. As a result, many traditional ad-hoc routing protocols may not be suitable for large-scale, dense sensor networks. Recently, studies in routing protocols in sensor networks have become a very active and vital area of research. Sensor routing algorithms must be energy efficient, robust to failures, and secure against the compromised and malicious nodes to ensure correct data delivery. In general, the routing protocols can be classified into two categories based on the network structure: flat and cluster-based routing. This paper describes the current routing protocols for sensor networks and examines their characteristics and functionality. The advantages and drawbacks for these routing protocols are provided as well.
Estimating intravoxel fiber architecture using constrained compressed sensing combined with multitensor adaptive smoothing

In diffusion magnetic resonance imaging (dMRI), the accuracy of fiber tracking and analysis depends directly on that of intravoxel fiber architecture reconstruction. Several methods have been proposed that estimate intravoxel fiber architecture using low angular resolution acquisitions owing to their shorter acquisition time and relatively low b‐values. But these methods are highly sensitive to noise. We propose an approach to estimating intravoxel fiber architecture in low angular resolution dMRI. The method consists in using a constrained compressed sensing (CCS) method, also known as crossing fiber angular resolution of intravoxel architecture (CFARI) technique, in combination with multitensor adaptive smoothing in which a diffusion‐weighted (DW) image smoothing scheme is constructed according to the properties of the multitensor field estimated using CFARI. The results on synthetic, physical phantom and real brain DW images show that the proposed method is able to better resolve fiber architectures while correctly preserving image edge information, which provides a new tool for investigating the microstructures of biological tissues and for fiber tractography. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Imaging Syst Technol, 25, 285–296, 2015
Merger and ring galaxy formation rates at z≤ 2

We compare the observed merger rate of galaxies over cosmic time and the frequency of collisional ring galaxies (CRGs), with analytic models and halo merger and collision rates from a large cosmological simulation. In the A cold dark matter (ACDM) model, we find that the cosmic merger fraction does not evolve strongly between 0.2 < z ≤2, implying that the observed decrease in the cosmic star formation rate since z ∼ 1 might not be tied to a disappearing population of major mergers. Haloes hosting massive galaxies undergo on average ∼ 2 mergers from z ≤ 2 up to present day, reflecting the late assembly time for the massive systems and the related down-sizing problem. The cosmic merger rate declines with redshift: at the present time, it is of a factor of 10 lower than at z ∼ 2 in reasonable agreement with the current available data. The rate of CRG formation derived from the interactions between halo progenitors up to z = 2 is found to be a good tracer of the cosmic merger rate. In the ACDM model, the rate of CRGs as well as the merger rate do not scale as (1 + z) m as suggested by previous models. Our predictions of cosmic merger and CRG rates may be applied to forthcoming surveys such as GOODS and zCOSMOS.
Compositional Abstraction for Networks of Control Systems: A Dissipativity Approach

In this paper, we propose a compositional scheme for the construction of abstractions for networks of control systems by using the interconnection matrix and joint dissipativity-type properties of subsystems and their abstractions. In the proposed framework, the abstraction, itself a control system (possibly with a lower dimension), can be used as a substitution of the original system in the controller design process. Moreover, we provide a procedure for constructing abstractions of a class of nonlinear control systems by using the bounds on the slope of system nonlinearities. We illustrate the proposed results on a network of linear control systems by constructing its abstraction in a compositional way without requiring any condition on the number or gains of the subsystems. We use the abstraction as a substitute to synthesize a controller enforcing a certain linear temporal logic specification. This example particularly elucidates the effectiveness of dissipativity-type compositional reasoning for large-scale systems.
Coronary Palmaz-Schatz stent implantation in acute myocardial infarction.

smaller within six months. This has led us to consider using stents to maintain the patency of the fenestration. In an experimental study on mongrel dogs we showed that this was technically feasible. ' Meanwhile stenting of an atrial fenestration has been performed in another centre with a good clinical result (Dr De Giovanni; Birmingham; personal communication). We consider creating a percutaneous fenestration as a temporary treatment in Fontan patients with PLE who have no treatable cause for systemic venous hypertension (conduit stenosis, pulmonary artery stenosis, arrhythmia, ventricular failure) and when conventional medical treatment (diuretics, steroids) is ineffective. It does not appear to offer a long-lasting solution but buys time to improve the patient's general condition before Fontan take-down or heart transplantation is performed. LUC MERTENS MARC GEWILLIG Paediatrc Cardiology, University Hospital Gasthuisberg, Herestraat 49, B 3000 Leuven, Belgium
Holographic Renormalization of Asymptotically Linear Dilaton Gravity

A variational principle is constructed for gravity coupled to an asymptotically linear dilaton and a p-form field strength. This requires the introduction of appropriate surface terms – also known as 'boundary counterterms' – in the action. The variation of the action with respect to the boundary metric yields a boundary stress tensor, which is used to construct conserved charges that generate the asymptotic symmetries of the theory. In most cases a minimal set of assumptions leads to a unique set of counterterms. However, for certain examples we find families of actions that depend on one or more continuous parameters. We show that the conserved charges and the value of the on-shell action are always independent of these parameters.
Correction: Temporal-Difference Reinforcement Learning with Distributed Representations

The initials for author A. David Redish appear incorrectly in the Author Contributions. The correct initials are ADR. The Author Contributions should read: "Conceived and designed the experiments: ZKN DDR. Performed the experiments: ZKN ADR. Analyzed the data: ZKN ADR. Wrote the paper: ZKN ADR. "
Myocardial ischaemia

In clinical practice electrocardiography is most often used to evaluate patients with suspected ischaemic heart disease. When interpreted in the light of the clinical history, electrocardiograms can be invaluable in aiding selection of the most appropriate management. Electrocardiography has limitations. A trace can suggest, for example, that a patient’s heart is entirely normal when in fact he or she has severe and widespread coronary artery disease. In addition, less than half of patients presenting to hospital with an acute myocardial infarction will have the typical and diagnostic electrocardiographic changes present on their initial trace, and as many as 20% of patients will have a normal or near normal electrocardiogram. Myocardial ischaemia causes changes in the ST-T wave, but unlike a full thickness myocardial infarction it has no direct effects on the QRS complex (although ischaemia may give rise to bundle branch blocks, which prolongs the QRS complex). When electrocardiographic abnormalities occur in association with chest pain but in the absence of frank infarction, they confer prognostic significance. About 20% of patients with ST segment depression and 15% with T wave inversion will experience severe angina, myocardial infarction, or death within 12 months of their initial presentation, compared with 10% of patients with a normal trace. Changes in the ST segment and T waves are not specific for ischaemia; they also occur in association with several other disease processes, such as left ventricular hypertrophy, hypokalaemia, and digoxin therapy.
A comparative study of robustness of deep learning approaches for VAD

Voice activity detection (VAD) is an important step for real-world automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems. Deep learning approaches, such as DNN, RNN or CNN, have been widely used in model-based VAD. Although they have achieved success in practice, they are developed on different VAD tasks separately. Whilst VAD performance under noisy conditions, especially with unseen noise or very low SNR, are of great interest, there has no robustness comparison of different deep learning approaches so far. In this paper, to learn the robustness property, VAD models based on DNN, LSTM and CNN are thoroughly compared at both frame and segment level under various noisy conditions on Aurora 4, a commonly used speech corpus with rich noises. To improve the robustness of deep learning based VAD models, a new noise-aware training (NAT) approach is also proposed. Experiments show that LSTM-based VAD is most robust but the performance degrades dramatically in the conditions with unseen noise or diverse SNR. By incorporating NAT, significant performance gains can be obtained in these conditions.
On the momentum of population growth

AbstractIf age-specific birth rates drop immediately to the level of bare replacement the ultimate stationary number of a population will be given by (9): $$\left( {{\textstyle{{b\mathop e\limits^ \bullet {}_0} \over {r\mu }}}} \right)\left( {\frac{{R_0 - 1}}{{R_0 }}} \right)$$ multiplied by the present number, where b is the birth rate, r the rate of increase, $$\mathop e\limits^ \bullet _0 $$ the expectation of life, and R0 the Net Reproduction Rate, all before the drop in fertility, and μ the mean age of childbearing afterwards. This expression is derived in the first place for females on the stable assumption; extension to both sexes is provided, and comparison with real populations shows the numerical error to be small where fertility has not yet started to drop. The result (9) tells how the lower limit of the ultimate population depends on parameters of the existing population, and for values typical of underdeveloped countries works out to about 1. 6. If a delay of 15 years occurs before the drop of the birth rate to replacement the population will multiply by over 2. 5 before attaining stationarity. The ultimate population actually reached will be higher insofar as death rates continue to improve. If stability cannot be assumed the ultimate stationary population is provided by the more general expression (7), which is still easier to calculate than a detailed projection.
The Effect of a Hospital-Wide Urine Culture Screening Intervention on the Incidence of Extended-Spectrum β-Lactamase-Producing Escherichia coli and Klebsiella Species

OBJECTIVE Optimal strategies for limiting the transmission of extended-spectrum β-lactamase-producing Escherichia coli and Klebsiella spp (ESBL-EK) in the hospital setting remain unclear. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of a urine culture screening strategy on the incidence of ESBL-EK. DESIGN Prospective quasi-experimental study. SETTING Two intervention hospitals and one control hospital within a university health system from 2005 to 2009. PATIENTS AND INTERVENTION All clinical urine cultures with E. coli or Klebsiella spp were screened for ESBL-EK. Patients determined to be colonized or infected with ESBL-EK were placed in a private room with contact precautions. The primary outcome of interest was nosocomial ESBL-EK incidence in nonurinary clinical cultures (cases occurring more than 48 hours after admission). Changes in monthly ESBL-EK incidence rates were evaluated with mixed-effects Poisson regression models, with adjustment for institution-level characteristics (eg, total admissions). RESULTS The overall incidence of ESBL-EK increased from 1.42/10,000 patient-days to 2.16/10,000 patient-days during the study period. The incidence of community-acquired ESBL-EK increased nearly 3-fold, from 0.33/10,000 patient-days to 0.92/10,000 patient-days (P < .001). On multivariable analysis, the intervention was not significantly associated with a reduction in nosocomial ESBL-EK incidence (incidence rate ratio, 1.38 [95% confidence interval, 0.83-2.31]; P - .21). CONCLUSIONS Universal screening of clinical urine cultures for ESBL-EK did not result in a reduction in nosocomial ESBL-EK incidence rates, most likely because of increases in importation of ESBL-EK cases from the community. Further studies are needed on elucidating optimal infection control interventions to limit spread of ESBL-producing organisms in the hospital setting.
[Serum lipids in school kids and adolescents from Florianópolis, SC, Brazil--Healthy Floripa 2040 study].

OBJECTIVE To determine the distribution of serum lipids in children and adolescents of Florianopolis, Santa Catarina State, Brazil. To determine the association between undesirable levels for total cholesterol (>170 mg/dL) and others coronary heart disease risks factors. METHODS A questionnaire, physical examination and blood analyses were collected from randomized sample from school kids aged range from 7 to 18 years old. RESULTS 1,053 students participated, aged between 7 and 18 years old. They presented a total cholesterol mean of 162+/-28 mg/dl, triglyceride mean of 93+/-47 mg/dl, HDL-cholesterol mean of 53+/-10 mg/dl, LDL-cholesterol mean of 92+/-24 mg/dl and non-HDL cholesterol mean of 109+/-26 mg/dl. The TC/HDL and LDL/HDL mean rates were, respectively, 3.1+/-0.6 and 1.8+/-0.5. Findings showed that private school children, 10 years old or less, girls and black children had higher lipids values. Overall findings suggest that the best logistic regression model which explained abnormal total cholesterol levels included: obesity, stroke and heart attack familial history, feminine gender, age of 10 years old or less and overweight body image determined on inspection. CONCLUSION In comparison to international literature, our results, showed intermediated total cholesterol, lower LDL-cholesterol and non-HDL-cholesterol and higher HDL-cholesterol. Therefore, primary prevention programs are needed to be carrying out, especially among overweight children and adolescents so to prevent ischemic heart disease as adulthood.
Epitaxial Growth and Characterization of Nonpolar A-Plane AlGaN-Based Multiple Quantum Wells

A serious of non-polar a-plane AlGaN-based multiple quantum wells (MQWs) were successfully grown on the semi-polar r-plane sapphire substrate with metal organic chemical vapor deposition technology. Intense MQWs-related emission peaks at an emission wavelength covered from 277-294 nm were observed based on the photoluminescence measurement. It was found that the employment of the trimethyl-aluminum (TMAl) flow duty-ratio modulation method which was developed based on the two-way pulsed-flows growth technique played a crucial role to control the Al composition of the non-polar a-plane AlGaN epi-layers. The non-polar a-plane AlGaN-based MQWs were deposited with the new developed TMAl flow duty-ratio modulation technique. Evident-3th order X-ray diffraction (XRD) satellite peak was observed from the high resolution-XRD measurement, proving the successful growth of non-polar a-plane AlGaN-based MQWs with abrupt hetero-interfaces.
Development of life-sized high-power humanoid robot JAXON for real-world use

This paper presents the development of life-sized high-power humanoid robot JAXON. Humanoid robots for disaster relief assistance need the same degree of physical performance as humans. We have developed STARO as the high-power humanoid robot with a high degree of physical performance. However this is not enough for practical use of the humanoid robot in a disaster site. We consider the following as additional conditions to operate humanoid robots for disaster relief assistance outside of the lab in outdoor environments. 1) Robots have humanlike body proportion to work in infrastructure matched to human body structure. 2) Robots have energy sources such as batteries and act without tethers. 3) Robots walk with two legs or four limbs and continue to work without fatal damage in unexpected rollover. JAXON satisfied these conditions. We demonstrates the performance of JAXON through the experiment of getting out of a vehicle, stepping over walls, and operating on batteries. Further more, we assesses the performance of the strong armor and the shock absorbing structure through a backward over-turning accident.