Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Ageism : we are our own worst enemy Introduction

In 1969, Butler (1969) first coined the term “ageism” to confront “prejudice by one age group toward other age groups” (pp. 243). As with other “isms,” such as racism and sexism, ageism leads to bigotry and discrimination, though it is a very distinct beast in that, for the most part, other “isms” refer to those different from ourselves: distinct, mutually exclusive, and impervious groups. Conversely, age is a fluid social construct in which we are all intimately bound as we move through the lifespan, transitioning in and out of different age-groups. Unlike other “isms,” individuals negotiate shifts from the “in-group” of youth to the “out-group” of old age. Yet we are all immersed, largely unconsciously, in this ubiquitous but too often unrecognized “ism” that needs to be named and challenged. Scientific evidence underscores the seriousness of ageism as a social issue. This was highlighted in a recent paper examining age stereotypes in social media (Levy et al., 2014a). Levy and colleagues found that 98.8% of Facebook group descriptions of older adults reflected negative stereotypes, with 74% of descriptions directly attacking older adults. For example, “. Old People . are a burden on society. I hate everything about them. ” (pp.173). What is of most concern is that these descriptors were not considered in breach of Facebook’s policy on hate speech, which prohibits the singling out of individuals based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, gender, sexual orientation, disease, or disability, but not age. Ageism reflects our infatuation with youth and beauty that buffer our fears of the losses paired with “growing old,” such as the loss of beauty, health, functioning, independence, usefulness, and ultimately, life. Palmore (2015) likens ageism to a “social disease” (pp. 874), that continues to contaminate generations through oversimplified representations of older adults in our culture, media, literature, and social discourse. These representations, or age stereotypes, are predominantly negative and can reduce older people to a homogenous group defined by their weakness, sickness, and senility. Ageism is found in all walks of life, such as healthcare, the work-place, social policy, and everyday interactions, and can directly impact older adult’s health and well-being. A full review is beyond the scope here and has been previously well covered (e.g. Robb et al., 2002; Bugental and Hehman, 2007; Finklestein and Farrell, 2007; Eymard and Douglas, 2012; North and Fiske, 2012; Anderson et al., 2013; North and Fiske, 2013). Instead, I want to focus on the lesser known, indirect effects of ageism. That is, how social and cultural norms reflected in ageism and age stereotypes impact upon our attitudes, expectations, and perceptions of our aging, often in harmful and self-fulfilling ways. In other words, have we become our own worst enemy?
Quantitative Structure-Property Relationship Modeling of Electronic Properties of Graphene Using Atomic Radial Distribution Function Scores

The intrinsic relationships between nanoscale features and electronic properties of nanomaterials remain poorly investigated. In this work, electronic properties of 622 computationally optimized graphene structures were mapped to their structures using partial-least-squares regression and radial distributions function (RDF) scores. Quantitative structure-property relationship (QSPR) models were calibrated with 70% of a virtual data set of 622 passivated and nonpassivated graphenes, and we predicted the properties of the remaining 30% of the structures. The analysis of the optimum QSPR models revealed that the most relevant RDF scores appear at interatomic distances in the range of 2.0 to 10.0 Å for the energy of the Fermi level and the electron affinity, while the electronic band gap and the ionization potential correlate to RDF scores in a wider range from 3.0 to 30.0 Å. The predictions were more accurate for the energy of the Fermi level and the ionization potential, with more than 83% of explained data variance, while the electron affinity exhibits a value of ∼80% and the energy of the band gap a lower 70%. QSPR models have tremendous potential to rapidly identify hypothetical nanomaterials with desired electronic properties that could be experimentally prepared in the near future.
Low back pain and best practice care: A survey of general practice physicians.

BACKGROUND Acute low back pain (LBP) is primarily managed in general practice. We aimed to describe the usual care provided by general practitioners (GPs) and to compare this with recommendations of best practice in international evidence-based guidelines for the management of acute LBP. METHODS Care provided in 3533 patient visits to GPs for a new episode of LBP was mapped to key recommendations in treatment guidelines. The proportion of patient encounters in which care arranged by a GP aligned with these key recommendations was determined for the period 2005 through 2008 and separately for the period before the release of the local guideline in 2004 (2001-2004). RESULTS Although guidelines discourage the use of imaging, over one-quarter of patients were referred for imaging. Guidelines recommend that initial care should focus on advice and simple analgesics, yet only 20.5% and 17.7% of patients received these treatments, respectively. Instead, the analgesics provided were typically nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (37.4%) and opioids (19.6%). This pattern of care was the same in the periods before and after the release of the local guideline. CONCLUSIONS The usual care provided by GPs for LBP does not match the care endorsed in international evidence-based guidelines and may not provide the best outcomes for patients. This situation has not improved over time. The unendorsed care may contribute to the high costs of managing LBP, and some aspects of the care provided carry a higher risk of adverse effects.
Molecular Detection and Ecological Significance of the Cyanobacterial Genera Geitlerinema and Leptolyngbya in Black Band Disease of Corals

ABSTRACT Black band disease (BBD) is a pathogenic, sulfide-rich microbial mat dominated by filamentous cyanobacteria that infect corals worldwide. We isolated cyanobacteria from BBD into culture, confirmed their presence in the BBD community by using denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE), and demonstrated their ecological significance in terms of physiological sulfide tolerance and photosynthesis-versus-irradiance values. Twenty-nine BBD samples were collected from nine host coral species, four of which have not previously been investigated, from reefs of the Florida Keys, the Bahamas, St. Croix, and the Philippines. From these samples, seven cyanobacteria were isolated into culture. Cloning and sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene using universal primers indicated that four isolates were related to the genus Geitlerinema and three to the genus Leptolyngbya. DGGE results, obtained using Cyanobacteria-specific 16S rRNA primers, revealed that the most common BBD cyanobacterial sequence, detected in 26 BBD field samples, was related to that of an Oscillatoria sp. The next most common sequence, 99% similar to that of the Geitlerinema BBD isolate, was present in three samples. One Leptolyngbya- and one Phormidium-related sequence were also found. Laboratory experiments using isolates of BBD Geitlerinema and Leptolyngbya revealed that they could carry out sulfide-resistant oxygenic photosynthesis, a relatively rare characteristic among cyanobacteria, and that they are adapted to the sulfide-rich, low-light BBD environment. The presence of the cyanotoxin microcystin in these cultures and in BBD suggests a role in BBD pathogenicity. Our results confirm the presence of Geitlerinema in the BBD microbial community and its ecological significance, which have been challenged, and provide evidence of a second ecologically significant BBD cyanobacterium, Leptolyngbya.
Delineating and Quantifying Ground Water Discharge Zones Using Streambed Temperatures

Streambed temperature mapping, hydraulic testing using minipiezometers, and geochemical analyses of interstitial water of the streambed were used to delineate the pattern of ground water discharge in a sandy streambed and to develop a flux‐based conceptual model for ground water/surface water interactions. A new and simple empirical method was used to relate fluxes obtained from minipiezometer data to streambed temperatures. The relationship allowed flux to be calculated at locations where only streambed temperature measurements were made. Slug testing and potentiomanometer measurements at 34 piezometers indicated ground water discharge ranged from 0.03 to 446 L/m2/day (and possibly as high as 7060 L/m2/day) along a 60 m long by 11 to 14 m wide reach of river. Complex but similar plan‐view patterns of flux were calculated for both summer and winter using hundreds of streambed temperatures measured on a 1 by 2 m grid. The reach was dominated by ground water discharge and 5% to 7% of the area accounted for ∼20% to 24% of the total discharge. < 12% of the total area consisted of recharge zones or no‐discharge zones. A conceptual model for ground water/surface water interactions consisting of five different behaviors was developed based on the magnitude and direction of flux across the surface of the streambed. The behaviors include short‐circuit discharge (e.g., high‐flow springs), high discharge (e.g., preferential flowpaths), low to moderate discharge, no discharge (e.g., horizontal hyporheic or ground water flow), and recharge. Geological variations at depth played a key role in determining which type of flow behavior occurred in the streambed.
Using matrices in post-processing phase of CFD simulations

In this work I present a technique of construction and fast evaluation of a family of cubic polynomials for analytic smoothing and graphical rendering of particles trajectories for flows in a generic geometry. The principal result of the work was implementation and test of a method for interpolating 3D points by regular parametric curves and their fast and efficient evaluation for a good resolution of rendering. For the purpose I have used a parallel environment using a multiprocessor cluster architecture. The efficiency of the used method is good, mainly reducing the number of floating-points computations by caching the numerical values of some line-parameter's powers, and reducing the necessity of communication among processes. This work has been developed for the Research and Development Department of my company for planning advanced customized models of industrial burners.
Send Orders of Reprints at Reprints@benthamscience.org Microrna in Aging: from Discovery to Biology

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small non-coding RNA molecules that negatively regulate gene expression of their targets at the post-transcriptional levels. A single miRNA can target up to several hundred mRNAs, thus capable of significantly altering gene expression regulatory networks. In-depth study and characterization of miRNAs has elucidated their critical functions in development, homeostasis, and disease. A link between miRNAs and longevity has been demonstrated in C. elegans, implicating their role in regulation of lifespan and in the aging process. Recent years have witnessed unprecedented technological advances in studies of miRNAs, including ultra-high throughput sequencing technologies that allow comprehensive discovery of miRNAs and their targets. Here we review the latest experimental approaches from the perspective of understanding miRNA gene expression regulatory networks in aging. We provide a methodological work flow that can be employed to discover aging-related miRNAs and their targets, and to functionally validate their roles in aging. Finally, we review the links between miRNAs known to act in the conserved pathways of aging and major aging-related diseases. Taken together, we hope to provide a focused review to facilitate future endeavor of uncovering the functional role of miRNA in aging.
Characteristics of trophic transfer of polychlorinated biphenyls in marine organisms in Incheon North Harbor, Korea

The trophic transfer of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) was characterized for zooplankton (primarily Paracalanus spp. and Acartia spp.), pacific oyster (Crassostrea gigas), shore crab (Hemigrapsus penicillatus), and goby (Acanthogobius hasta) in the aquatic system of Incheon North Harbor, Korea. The congener pattern in the species was clearly divided by the main PCB uptake route. Compared with zooplankton and oyster, the fraction of heavier homologues increased in crab and goby that take PCBs from food. Linear relationships were observed between log (fugacity in lipid/fugacity in seawater) and log Kow for all the species. For zooplankton and oyster, such an observation should not be regarded as a true absence of superhydrophobicity, because establishment of equilibrium with seawater was not evident. For crab and goby, the absence of superhydrophobicity was evidenced by the trophic transfer factor that continuously increased with Kow up to 107.8. These results suggest that superhydrophobicity might be species specific. The trophic transfer factors and the fugacity levels in the lipid phase indicated that bioaccumulation in crab and goby advanced beyond the level in equilibrium with seawater in the harbor basin.
Recent Topics in Speech Recognition Research at NTT Laboratories

This paper introduces three recent topics in speech recognition research at NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone) Human Interface Laboratories.The first topic is a new HMM (hidden Markov model) technique that uses VQ-code bigrams to constrain the output probability distribution of the model according to the VQ-codes of previous frames. The output probability distribution changes depending on the previous frames even in the same state, so this method reduces the overlap of feature distributions with different phonemes.The second topic is approaches for adapting a syllable trigram model to a new task in Japanese continuous speech recognition. An approach which uses the most recent input phrases for adaptation is effective in reducing the perplexity and improving phrase recognition rates.The third topic is stochastic language models for sequences of Japanese characters to be used in a Japanese dictation system with unlimited vocabulary. Japanese characters consist of Kanji (Chinese characters) and Kana (Japanese alphabets), and each Kanji has several readings depending on the context. Our dictation system uses character-trigram probabilities as a source model obtained from a text database consisting of both Kanji and Kana, and generates Kanji-and-Kana sequences directly from input speech.
Impact of Phosphodiesterase 4 Inhibition on the Operational Efficacy, Response Maxima, and Kinetics of Indacaterol-Induced Gene Expression Changes in BEAS-2B Airway Epithelial Cells: A Global Transcriptomic Analysis

The effects of phosphodiesterase (PDE) 4 inhibitors on gene expression changes in BEAS-2B human airway epithelial cells are reported and discussed in relation to the mechanism(s) of action of roflumilast in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Microarray-based gene expression profiling failed to identify mRNA transcripts that were differentially regulated by the PDE4 inhibitor 6-[3-(dimethylcarbamoyl)benzenesulphonyl]-4-[(3-methoxyphenyl)amino]-8-methylquinoline-3-carboxamide (GSK 256066) after 1, 2, 6, or 18 hours of exposure. However, real-time polymerase chain reaction analysis revealed that GSK 256066 was a weak stimulus, and the negative microarray results reflected low statistical power due to small sample sizes. Furthermore, GSK 256066, roflumilast, and its biologically active metabolite roflumilast N-oxide generally potentiated gene expression changes produced by the long-acting β2-adrenoceptor agonists (LABAs) salmeterol, indacaterol, and formoterol. Many of these genes encode proteins with antiviral, anti-inflammatory, and antibacterial activities that could contribute to the clinical efficacy of roflumilast in COPD. RNA-sequencing experiments established that the sensitivity of genes to salmeterol varied by ∼7.5-fold. Consequently, the degree to which a PDE4 inhibitor potentiated the effect of a given concentration of LABA was gene-dependent. Operational model fitting of concentration-response curve data from cells subjected to fractional, β2-adrenoceptor inactivation determined that PDE4 inhibition increased the potency and doubled the efficacy of LABAs. Thus, adding roflumilast to standard triple therapy, as COPD guidelines recommend, may have clinical relevance, especially in target tissues where LABAs behave as partial agonists. Collectively, these results suggest that the genomic impact of roflumilast, including its ability to augment LABA-induced gene expression changes, may contribute to its therapeutic activity in COPD.
Bioavailability Assessment of Vitamin A Self-Nanoemulsified Drug Delivery Systems in Rats: A Comparative Study

Objectives: To assess and compare the bioavailability of three different oral dosage forms of vitamin A in rats. The formulations included vitamin A self-nanoemulsified drug delivery (SNEDD) optimized formulation-filled capsule (F1), vitamin A SNEDD optimized formulation compressed tablet (F2) and vitamin A oily solution-filled capsules without any additives (control, F3). Materials and Methods: Bioavailability was assessed after a single oral dose of the three formulations using three groups of rats, each group comprising 6 rats. Blood samples were collected at baseline and over the next 8 h. Plasma was separated and extracted to obtain the drug, which was measured by HPLC. Statistical data analysis was performed using the Student t test and ANOVA with p < 0.05 as the minimal level of significance. Results: From the pharmacokinetic parameters, both F1 and F2 showed improved bioavailability compared to F3. The values of AUC ± SD were 3,080.7 ± 190.2, 2,137.1 ± 130.5 and 1,485.2 ± 80.1 ng·h/ml for F1, F2 and F3, respectively. The Tmax was 1 h in case of F1 and F2 as compared to 1.5 h for F3. The Cmax ± SD was 799.5 ± 48.5, 656.2 ± 64.4 and 425.8 ± 33.1 for F1, F2 and F3, respectively. The increase in AUC, Cmax and Tmax was significant (p < 0.05). The bioavailability calculated from the AUC for F1 and F2 relative to F3 was 207.4 and 143.8%, respectively. The bioavailability increased almost twofold and 1.4 times for F1 and F2, respectively. Conclusions: The study showed that the newly developed vitamin A SNEDD formulations increased the rate and extent of drug absorption compared to the oily drug solution. The present investigation demonstrated that vitamin A SNEDD optimized formulations, either as filled capsules or as compressed tablets, were superior to its oily solution with regard to their biopharmaceutical characteristics.
Local lymph node involvement in pediatric renal cell carcinoma: A report from the Italian TREP project

One of the most important adverse prognostic factors for adult renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is the retroperitoneal lymph node involvement. The aim of this article is to study the prognostic significance of local lymph node involvement in pediatric RCC and the role of retroperitoneal lymph node dissection (RLND) at diagnosis.
Modulation of Activity in Human Visual Area V1 during Memory Masking

Neurons in the primary visual cortex, V1, are specialized for the processing of elemental features of the visual stimulus, such as orientation and spatial frequency. Recent fMRI evidence suggest that V1 neurons are also recruited in visual perceptual memory; a number of studies using multi-voxel pattern analysis have successfully decoded stimulus-specific information from V1 activity patterns during the delay phase in memory tasks. However, consistent fMRI signal modulations reflecting the memory process have not yet been demonstrated. Here, we report evidence, from three subjects, that the low V1 BOLD activity during retention of low-level visual features is caused by competing interactions between neural populations coding for different values along the spectrum of the dimension remembered. We applied a memory masking paradigm in which the memory representation of a masker stimulus interferes with a delayed spatial frequency discrimination task when its frequency differs from the discriminanda with ±1 octave and found that impaired behavioral performance due to masking is reflected in weaker V1 BOLD signals. This cross-channel inhibition in V1 only occurs with retinotopic overlap between the masker and the sample stimulus of the discrimination task. The results suggest that memory for spatial frequency is a local process in the retinotopically organized visual cortex.
Clinical benefit from nebulized human recombinant DNase in Kartagener's syndrome

Nebulized recombinant human DNase (rhDNase) reduces sputum viscosity, improves pulmonary function, and results in a small reduction in acute respiratory exacerbations requiring intravenous antibiotics in many patients with cystic fibrosis (CF). rhDNase is now recommended for use in CF patients with moderately severe suppurative lung disease. A 14‐year‐old girl with suppurative lung disease [forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) 69% and forced vital capacity (FVC) 81% predicted] secondary to Kartagener's syndrome and severe gastroesophageal reflux had worsening spirometry together with intractable gastrointestinal symptoms over the previous 18 months despite conventional treatment. She was, therefore, started on 2.5 mg rhDNase once daily. Her cough lessened and the volume of sputum decreased within 72 hours of commencement of treatment; this improvement was strongly associated with a dramatic reduction in gastrointestinal symptoms. Spirometry after 4 weeks of treatment demonstrated a 20% improvement in FEV1 and a 13% improvement in FVC. These improvements have been maintained after 4 months of rhDNase therapy. The use of rhDNase should be considered in patients with Kartagener's syndrome and a multicenter trial may be justified. Pediatr Pulmonol. 1995; 20:307–308. © 1995 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Greece faces up to the EU packaging regulation

Since the 1980s, packaging has been increasingly included in the environmental agenda. Worries about packaging waste have led governments to introduce packaging legislation and formulate waste policies. Since 1994, the Regulation 94/62/20.12. 94 on Packaging and Packaging Waste provides a framework for measures to be taken in every country of the European Union to diminish the volume of packaging waste. Reports on a survey of Greek manufacturing aiming at the registration of the recent changes and trends in packaging materials used by consumer goods industries and the investigation of the main problems and prerequisites to meet the new legislative environment.