Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Human Hand Motion Analysis during Different Eating Activities

The focus of this research is to analyse both human hand motion and force, during eating, with respect to differing food characteristics and cutlery (including a fork and a spoon). A glove consisting of bend and force sensors has been used to capture the motion and contact force exerted by fingers during different eating activities. The Pearson correlation coefficient has been used to show that a significant linear relationship exists between the bending motion of the fingers and the forces exerted during eating. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and independent samples t-tests are performed to establish whether the motion and force exerted by the fingers while eating is influenced by the different food characteristics and cutlery. The middle finger motion showed the least positive correlation with index fingertip and thumb-tip force, irrespective of the food characteristics and cutlery used. The ANOVA and t-test results revealed that bending motion of the index finger and thumb varies with respect to differing food characteristics and the type of cutlery used (fork/spoon), whereas the bending motion of the middle finger remains unaffected. Additionally, the contact forces exerted by the thumb tip and index fingertip remain unaffected with respect to differing food types and cutlery used.
Physiology of static breath holding in elite apneists

What is the topic of this review? This review provides an up‐to‐date assessment of the physiology involved with extreme static dry‐land breath holding in trained apneists. What advances does it highlight? We specifically highlight the recent findings involved with the cardiovascular, cerebrovascular and metabolic function during a maximal breath hold in elite apneists.
Female ornamentation in Malurus fairy-wrens: a hidden evolutionary gem for understanding female perspectives on social and sexual selection

Abstract Phylogeny, ecological environment, social organisation, and mating system are expected to affect degree of female ornamentation, either directly or indirectly, but our understanding of how female ornaments respond to these forces remains incomplete. This article evaluates the evolutionary history and adaptive significance of three putative ornaments—plumage colouration, bill colouration and tail-length—in female fairy-wrens. Despite considerable research on these traits in male fairy-wrens, they have yet to be studied in any detail in females. Phylogeographic analyses in combination with life-history data suggest that female plumage colouration and bill colouration are under active selection, independent of that experienced by males. Social organisation and mating system, as mediated by ecological environment, may shape degree of ornamentation in these traits among females. In contrast, tail-length appears to be driven directly by natural ecological selection imposed by environmental conditions, leading to parallel trait evolution among the sexes within each species. More refined comparative and population-level investigations of adaptive consequences and proximate mechanisms are future research priorities. The study of female fairy-wrens holds great promise to advance our collective understanding of how the ecological environment interacts with sexual selection and social competition to shape ornament evolution in complex social organisms.
HSP27and Atherogenic Index of The Plasma -Heralding Cardiovascular Complications in Indian Diabetic Subjects

Aim: To evaluate the importance of Heat shock protein 27 (HSP27) and Atherogenic Index of the Plasma (AIP) in diabetic subjects, as indicators of cardiovascular disease progression in diabetic subjects. Materials and Methods: 144 subjects were recruited in 4 different groups as follows: Group A1diabetic > 5 years and hypertensive (N = 55), Group A2 – diabetic < 2 years (N = 28), Group B1 – hypertensive (N = 31) and Group B2 – healthy controls (N = 30). Anthropometric measurements were made and blood biochemistry profiles were established using standard protocols. AIP was calculated as Log (Triglycerides / HDL cholesterol),while HSP27 was measured using ELISA. Results: HSP27 varied significantly across the groups (one-way ANOVA, (F (3) = 4.95, p = 0.003). We saw significant increase in HSP27 levels between Groups A1 and B2, Groups A2 and B2, Groups A1 and B1, and Groups A2 and B1 (p= 0.001, 0.025, 0.003 and 0.043 respectively). AIP scores increased across the groups, although not significantly (one-way ANOVA, F (3) = 1.8, p = 0.15). The frequency of high risk AIP scores were more in Groups A1 and A2 as compared to the controls. HSP27 was negatively correlated with the AIP score, (Pearson’s coefficient = -0.173, p = 0.039). Two models of multivariate linear regression revealed that HSP27 and post prandial blood sugar (PPBS) were significant risk factors of AIP; F (5, 138) = 3.069, p = 0.012, R2 = 0.10. (Model 1, t = -2.591, p = 0.011; 95% CI = -0.269 to -0.036 and model 2, t = -2.332, p = 0.021; 95% CI = -0.256 to -0.021). Conclusion: Serum HSP27 and AIP increase in diabetic subjects with or without hypertension. The risk of cardiovascular complications can be monitored using HSP27.
Output‐capacitorless segmented low‐dropout voltage regulator with controlled pass transistors

This article presents a low quiescent current output‐capacitorless quasi‐digital complementary metal‐oxide‐semiconductor (CMOS) low‐dropout (LDO) voltage regulator with controlled pass transistors according to load demands. The pass transistor of the LDO is segmented into two smaller sizes based on a proposed segmentation criterion, which considers the maximum output voltage transient variations due to the load transient to different load current steps to find the suitable current boundary for segmentation. This criterion shows that low load conditions will cause more output variations and settling time if the pass transistor is used in its maximum size. Furthermore, this situation is the worst case for stability requirements of the LDO. Therefore, using one smaller transistor for low load currents and another one larger for higher currents, a proper trade‐off between output variations, complexity, and power dissipation is achieved. The proposed LDO regulator has been designed and post‐simulated in HSPICE in a 0.18 µm CMOS process to supply a stable load current between 0 and 100 mA with a 40 pF on‐chip output capacitor, while consuming 4.8 μA quiescent current. The dropout voltage of the LDO is set to 200 mV for 1.8 V input voltage. The results reveal an improvement of approximately 53% and 25% on the output voltage variations and settling time, respectively. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Effect of fiber and mineral filler on asphalt mortar performance

In order to study effect of fiber and mineral filler on the performance of asphalt mortar,dynamic-shear-rheometer and bend-beam-rheometer were used to study the effects of the ratio of filler to bitumen and fiber content on the properties of asphalt mortar.Based on the analysis of asphalt mortar character,it was obtained that the increase of ratio of bitumen and fiber can improve the performance to resist the high temperature deformation,but it will bring the degradation of anti-cracking performance.The test results also indicated that the partial replacement of filler with a certain content of fiber can improve anti-cracking property of asphalt mixture at low temperature while good performance at high temperature is kept.3 tabs,10 figs,6 refs.
Efficiency of piezotome-corticision assisted orthodontics in alleviating mandibular anterior crowding—a randomized clinical trial

Objectives The aim of this clinical trial was to investigate the duration of mandibular-crowding alleviation with piezotome-corticision orthodontics compared with conventional orthodontics. Design Single-centre, two-arm parallel group randomized controlled trial. Setting Orthodontic clinic at the University of Connecticut. Ethical approval The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board (IRB # 12-0147-2). Subjects and methods Forty-one adult subjects from a single centre with more than 5mm of mandibular anterior crowding were randomly allocated using block randomization into experimental and control groups. The experimental group received a corticision procedure with a piezotome on the labial aspect of the mandibular incisors in conjunction to a self-ligation fixed orthodontic appliance. The control group received the self-ligation fixed orthodontic appliance and no corticision. Same archwire sequence (0.014 inch followed by 0.014 × 0.025 inch copper-nickel-titanium) was followed for both groups. Mandibular study casts taken every 4-5 weeks were used to assess changes in the irregularity index by blinded outcome assessors. Outcome measures The time to alignment was calculated in days. Results Twenty-nine subjects (16 experimental and 13 control) completed the study. Overall, no significant difference in the time required to correct mandibular crowding with piezotome-corticision assisted (102.1 ± 34.7 days; 95% CI, 83.6 to 120.6) and conventional orthodontics (112 ± 46.2 days; 95% CI, 84-139.9) was observed. No complications with treatment or unintended consequences were observed on any of the subjects. Limitations A high attrition rate. Conclusions This randomized clinical trial found no evidence that piezotome-corticision assisted orthodontics was more efficient in alleviating mandibular anterior crowding. Registration ClinicalTrials.gov, Identifier: NCT02026258. Funding Division of Orthodontics, University of Connecticut. Conflict of Interest None.
Survival benefit of patients with early-stage ovarian carcinoma treated with paclitaxel chemotherapeutic regimens

Objective Adjuvant chemotherapy was introduced in patients with early-stage ovarian cancer (OC). The benefit of standard chemotherapeutic regimens including taxane has not been established. Methods Patients with early-stage OC from the National Health Insurance Research database of Taiwan who received platinum plus cyclophosphamide (CP) or platinum plus paclitaxel (PT) for 3–6 cycles were recruited, and the disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were determined. Results A total of 1,510 early-stage OC patients, including 841 who received CP regimen and 699 who received PT regimen, were included. The 2 groups had a similar estimated probability of 5-year DFS (PT vs. CP, 79.0% vs. 77.6%; p=0.410) and OS (84.6% vs. 84.3%; p=0.691). Patients >50 years of age who received the CP regimen had a lower 5-year DFS than the patients ≤50 years of age who received the CP (p<0.001) or PT regimens (p=0.001). Additionally, patients >50 years of age who received the CP regimen had a worse 5-year OS compared with the other 3 groups (p=0.019) (p=0.179 for patients >50 years of age in the PT group; p=0.002 for patients ≤50 years of age in the CP group; and p=0.061 for patients ≤50 years of age in the PT group). Patients with the CP or PT regimen for 3–5 cycles had a similar 5-year DFS and OS compared to 6 cycles (p>0.050). Conclusion Chemotherapeutic regimens with taxane could be recommended for early-stage OC patients >50 years of age.
Simultaneous Pure Laparoscopic Resection of Primary Colorectal Cancer and Synchronous Liver Metastases: A Single Institution Experience with Propensity Score Matching Analysis

Abstract Background The aim of the study was to compare the outcome of pure laparoscopic and open simultaneous resection of both the primary colorectal cancer and synchronous colorectal liver metastases (SCLM). Patients and methods From 2000 to 2016 all patients treated by simultaneous resection were assessed for entry in this single center, clinically nonrandomized trial. A propensity score matching was used to compare the laparoscopic group (LAP) to open surgery group (OPEN). Primary endpoints were perioperative and oncologic outcomes. Secondary endpoints were overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS). Results Of the 82 patients identified who underwent simultaneous liver resection for SCLM, 10 patients underwent LAP. All these consecutive patients from LAP were matched to 10 comparable OPEN. LAP reduced the length of hospital stay (P = 0.044) and solid food oral intake was faster (P = 0.006) in this group. No patient undergoing the laparoscopic procedure experienced conversion to the open technique. No difference was observed in operative time, blood loss, transfusion rate, narcotics requirement, clinical risk score, resection margin, R0 resections rate, morbidity, mortality and incisional hernias rate. The two groups did not differ significantly in terms of the 3-year OS rate (90 vs. 75%; P = 0.842) and DFS rate (60 vs. 57%; P = 0.724). Conclusions LAP reduced the length of hospital stay and offers faster solid food oral intake. Comparable oncologic and survival outcomes can be achieved. LAP is beneficial for well selected patients in high volume centers with appropriate expertise.
What is the Best Risk Measure in Practice? A Comparison of Standard Measures

Expected Shortfall (ES) has been widely accepted as a risk measure that is conceptually superior to Value-at-Risk (VaR). At the same time, however, it has been criticized for issues relating to backtesting. In particular, ES has been found not to be elicitable which means that backtesting for ES is less straight-forward than, e.g., backtesting for VaR. Expectiles have been suggested as potentially better alternatives to both ES and VaR. In this paper, we revisit commonly accepted desirable properties of risk measures like coherence, comonotonic additivity, robustness and elicitability. We check VaR, ES and Expectiles with regard to whether or not they enjoy these properties, with particular emphasis on Expectiles. We also consider their impact on capital allocation, an important issue in risk management. We find that, despite the caveats that apply to the estimation and backtesting of ES, it can be considered a good risk measure. In particular, there is no sufficient evidence to justify an all-inclusive replacement of ES by Expectiles in applications, especially as we provide an alternative way for backtesting of ES.
Targeting microglia for the treatment of Alzheimer's Disease

While histological changes in microglia have long been recognized as a pathological feature of Alzheimer's disease (AD), recent genetic association studies have also strongly implicated microglia in the etiology of the disease. Coding and noncoding polymorphisms in several genes expressed in microglia—including APOE, TREM2, CD33, GRN, and IL1RAP—alter AD risk, and therefore could be considered as entry points for therapeutic intervention. Furthermore, microglia may have a substantial effect on current amyloid β (Aβ) and tau immunotherapy approaches, since they are the primary cell type in the brain to mediate Fc receptor‐facilitated antibody effector function. In this review, we discuss the considerations in selecting microglial therapeutic targets from the perspective of drug discovery feasibility, and consider the role of microglia in ongoing immunotherapy clinical strategies. GLIA 2016;64:1710–1732
Parsing Based on Parselets: A Unified Deformable Mixture Model for Human Parsing

Human parsing, namely partitioning the human body into semantic regions, has drawn much attention recently for its wide applications in human-centric analysis. Previous works often consider solving the problem of human pose estimation as the prerequisite of human parsing. We argue that these approaches cannot obtain optimal pixel-level parsing due to the inconsistent targets between the different tasks. In this work, we directly address the problem of human parsing by using the novel Parselet representation as the building blocks of our parsing model. Parselets are a group of parsable segments which can generally be obtained by low-level over-segmentation algorithms and bear strong semantic meaning. We then build a deformable mixture parsing model (DMPM) for human parsing to simultaneously handle the deformation and multi-modalities of Parselets. The proposed model has two unique characteristics: (1) the possible numerous modalities of Parselet ensembles are exhibited as the “And-Or” structure of sub-trees; (2) to further solve the practical problem of Parselet occlusion or absence, we directly model the visibility property at some leaf nodes. The DMPM thus directly solves the problem of human parsing by searching for the best graph configuration from a pool of Parselet hypotheses without intermediate tasks. Fast rejection based on hierarchical filtering is employed to ensure the overall efficiency. Comprehensive evaluations on a new large-scale human parsing dataset, which is crawled from the Internet, with high resolution and thoroughly annotated semantic labels at pixel-level, and also a benchmark dataset demonstrate the encouraging performance of the proposed approach.
Management of a Lassa fever outbreak, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, 2016

Due to rapid diagnosis and isolation of imported cases, community outbreaks of viral haemorrhagic fevers (VHF) are considered unlikely in industrialised countries. In March 2016, the first documented locally acquired case of Lassa fever (LF) outside Africa occurred, demonstrating the disease’s potential as a cross-border health threat. We describe the management surrounding this case of LF in Rhineland-Palatinate – the German federal state where secondary transmission occurred. Twelve days after having been exposed to the corpse of a LF case imported from Togo, a symptomatic undertaker tested positive for Lassa virus RNA. Potential contacts were traced, categorised based on exposure risk, and monitored. Overall, we identified 21 contact persons with legal residency in Rhineland-Palatinate: seven related to the index case, 13 to the secondary case, and one related to both. The secondary case received treatment and recovered. Five contacts were quarantined and one was temporarily banned from work. No further transmission occurred. Based on the experience gained during the outbreak and a review of national and international guidelines, we conclude that exposure risk attributable to corpses may currently be underestimated, and we present suggestions that may help to improve the anti-epidemic response to imported VHF cases in industrialised countries.
A large-scale empirical study of forward and backward static slice size and context sensitivity

A large-scale study of 43 C programs totaling just over 1 million lines of code is presented. The study includes the forward and backward static slice on every executable statement. In total 2353598 slices were constructed, with an average slice size being just under 30% of the original program. The results also show that ignoring calling-context led to a 50% increase in average slice size and, in contrast to previous results, a 66-77% increase in computation time (due to the increased size). Though not the principal focus of the study, the results also show an average pace for the slicing engine, on a standard PC, of 3 million lines of code per second thereby providing additional evidence for static slicing's practicability.
CD44 exerts a functional role during EMT induction in cisplatin-resistant head and neck cancer cells

A number of studies report that epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) supports the generation and maintenance of cancer stem cells (CSCs), which show tumor seeding ability and drug resistance; however, the molecular mechanisms underlying induction of EMT-associated tumor malignancy remain unclear. The present study reports that oral cancer cells switch from expressing the CD44 variant form (CD44v) to expressing the standard form (CD44s) during acquisition of cisplatin-resistance, which resulted in EMT induction. CD44s induced an EMT phenotype in cisplatin resistant cells by up-regulating ZEB1, a transcriptional repressor of E-cadherin. More importantly, CD44s up-regulated ZEB1 by suppressing microRNA-200c, which is a non-coding RNA that directly represses the ZEB1 gene. These results demonstrate the importance of the association between platinum resistance and CD44s during EMT induction in oral cancer cells.
Small effective population sizes in a widespread selfing species, Lymnaea truncatula (Gastropoda: Pulmonata)

We present here a spatial and temporal population genetic survey of a common freshwater snail, also a predominantly selfing species, Lymnaea truncatula. The rate of genetic diversity loss was quantified by estimating the effective size (Ne) of the snail populations, using two different methods. A temporal survey allowed estimation of a variance effective size of the populations, and a spatial survey allowed the estimation of an inbreeding effective size, from two‐locus identity disequilibria estimates. Both methods were consistent and provided low Ne values. Drift due to (i) high amounts of selfing and (ii) fluctuations in population sizes because of temporary habitats, and also selection coupled to genome‐wide linkage disequilibria, could explain such reductions in Ne. The loss of genetic diversity appears to be counterbalanced only very partially by low apparent rates of gene flow.
Zebrafish larva as a reliable model for in vivo assessment of membrane remodeling involvement in the hepatotoxicity of chemical agents

The easy‐to‐use in vivo model, zebrafish larva, is being increasingly used to screen chemical‐induced hepatotoxicity, with a good predictivity for various mechanisms of liver injury. However, nothing is known about its applicability in exploring the mechanism called membrane remodeling, depicted as changes in membrane fluidity or lipid raft properties. The aim of this study was, therefore, to substantiate the zebrafish larva as a suitable in vivo model in this context. Ethanol was chosen as a prototype toxicant because it is largely described, both in hepatocyte cultures and in rodents, as capable of inducing a membrane remodeling leading to hepatocyte death and liver injury. The zebrafish larva model was demonstrated to be fully relevant as membrane remodeling was maintained even after a 1‐week exposure without any adaptation as usually reported in rodents and hepatocyte cultures. It was also proven to exhibit a high sensitivity as it discriminated various levels of cytotoxicity depending on the extent of changes in membrane remodeling. In this context, its sensitivity appeared higher than that of WIF‐B9 hepatic cells, which is suited for analyzing this kind of hepatotoxicity. Finally, the protection afforded by a membrane stabilizer, ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA), or by a lipid raft disrupter, pravastatin, definitely validated zebrafish larva as a reliable model to quickly assess membrane remodeling involvement in chemical‐induced hepatotoxicity. In conclusion, this model, compatible with a high throughput screening, might be adapted to seek hepatotoxicants via membrane remodeling, and also drugs targeting membrane features to propose new preventive or therapeutic strategies in chemical‐induced liver diseases. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.