Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effect of the enclosure on carriers' body weight loss in the cotton‐top tamarin (Saguinus oedipus)

Infant carrying in cotton‐top tamarins is a costly activity that results in weight loss by the fathers and helpers. However, to date, measures of carrying costs have been obtained in small indoor enclosures. We studied body weight changes in adult and subadult individuals from eight large groups (n>5) for 9 weeks after the birth of infants. Four groups were housed in large indoor/outdoor enclosures (42 m2×3.3 m high), and four were housed in small indoor enclosures (12 m2×2.4 m high). All of the individuals were weighed regularly at least three times a week. Reproductive males lost more weight in the big indoor/outdoor enclosures (mean=6.51%) than in the small indoor ones, as did male adult helpers (mean=5.59%) and female adult helpers (mean=4.4%). Still‐growing subadult individuals also lost weight in the big indoor/outdoor enclosures (mean=3.17%), although the differences did not reach significance (P=0.07). These results support the hypothesis that cotton‐top tamarins living in more natural settings experience higher weight loss than those housed under less‐natural conditions. Am. J. Primatol. 66:279–284, 2005. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
EXPLAINING INFORMAL SECTOR ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN KOSOVO: AN INSTITUTIONALIST PERSPECTIVE

Institutional theory has been widely used to explain entrepreneurship in the informal economy. A first wave of institutionalist theory argued that informal entrepreneurship resulted from formal institutional failures and a second wave that such entrepreneurship results from an asymmetry between the laws and regulations of formal institutions and the unwritten socially shared rules of informal institutions. This paper evaluates the validity of these two waves of institutionalist explanation and a new third wave of institutional theory explaining informal entrepreneurship in terms of a lack of both vertical and horizontal trust. Reporting data from a 2013 survey in Kosovo involving 500 face-to-face interviews with owners of small and medium-sized enterprises, 35.7 percent of sales are estimated to be unreported and a regression analyses reveals this is significantly higher among smaller and older firms, and firms owned by men. No significant association is found between formal institutional failings and the under-reporting of sales, but there is a statistically significant correlation between sales under-reporting and the level of vertical and horizontal trust. Taking account of the limitations of this single country study, the implications for theory and policy are then discussed.
Medium access control protocol for Hybrid Radio-over-Fiber Wireless Sensors Networks

This paper introduces the Dynamic HMARS (D-HMARS) protocol designed for the Hybrid Radio-over-Fiber Wireless Sensors Network (WSN-RoF) architecture, in which multiple clusters of wireless sensor nodes are connected to a base station via an optical link using Radio-over-Fiber (RoF) technology. The D-HMARS protocol was designed to avoid the problem of occurrence of false positive in the Clear Channel Assessment (CCA) mechanism. Simulation results show that the D-HMARS protocol increases the delivery ratio as well as the effective throughput of the network.
Validity and reliability of the Constipation Assessment Scale.

Constipation is a significant problem in patients receiving neurotoxic chemotherapeutic agents, narcotic analgesics, antidepressants, tranquilizers, and muscle relaxants. Increasingly, as acute care moves into the community, nurses will need valid and reliable methods of assessing constipation in individuals with cancer. The purpose of this project was to study the validity and reliability of the Constipation Assessment Scale, a new tool designed to assess the presence and severity of constipation. The sample consisted of two groups: a control group of 32 working adults and a patient group of 32 adults at risk for constipation because of treatment with Vinca alkaloids or morphine. Consenting subjects were asked to complete the eight-item Constipation Assessment Scale (CAS). A significant difference in intensity of symptoms between the two groups (t = 6.32, p less than 0.0001) demonstrates the ability of the CAS to differentiate between subjects with and without constipation and thus provides evidence of construct validity of the scale. Further analysis of scores of the two subgroups in the patient group (subjects receiving morphine vs. Vinca alkaloids) revealed a significant difference (t = 2.54, p less than 0.01) in symptom intensity. This latter finding supports the ability of the CAS to differentiate between moderate and severe symptom intensity. Subjects completed the CAS in approximately 2 min. To study the test-retest reliability of the scale, a group of 16 apparently healthy working adults were asked to fill out the CAS twice with a 1-h delay. The two sets of scores were correlated (r = 0.98). (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Prevalence of enterotoxigenic and Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli in pigs slaughtered in Mato Grosso, Brazil.

INTRODUCTION This study aimed to estimate the prevalence of enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC) and Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) strains in pigs slaughtered in abattoirs located in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. METHODOLOGY Intestinal samples from 74 animals were aseptically dissected and lumen content was plated on MacConkey agar. Confluent colonies from each plate were screened for the presence of ETEC and STEC strains by PCR assays. RESULTS It was verified that the prevalence of STEC and ETEC carriers was 1.35% and 9.46% respectively. One (1.35%) of the 74 samples tested was positive for the stx2 gene, and seven (9.46%) for st1, of which two (2.70%) were also positive for lt1. CONCLUSION The results provided represent a benchmark for future research on pathogenic E. coli of porcine origin in Mato Grosso.
Expression of Protein S in the Murine Heart and Cultured Mouse Cardiomyocytes Is Down-regulated by Cytokines

Summary Protein S (PS), a co-factor of activated protein C, is a vitamin K-dependent anticoagulant protein and is known to be produced extrahepatically. In the present study, the concentration of PS mRNA was determined tissue by tissue in the mouse, and it was high in lung, adrenal and heart as well as in liver. We further investigated the effects of lipopolysaccharide (LPS), tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), and interleukin-1 (IL-1) on the PS mRNA expression in murine tissues in vivo. Although LPS and TNF-α significantly decreased the expression level of PS mRNA in all tissues examined (e.g., lung, liver, heart, and kidney) and the PS antigen level in plasma, the suppressive effect of IL-1 on PS gene expression was limited to heart. More specifically, considerable amounts of PS mRNA and antigen were expressed in a cultured mouse cardiomyocyte cell line, and again, treatment with IL-1 decreased the PS expression in these cells. These observations raise a possibility that the expression of cardiac PS may contribute to the regional anticoagulant potential in heart, and suggest that the decreased PS expression by cytokines may result in an increase in the systemic and/or regional prothrombotic potential under inflammatory conditions.
The kinase domains of obscurin interact with intercellular adhesion proteins

Obscurins comprise a family of giant (~870‐ to 600‐kDa) and small (~250‐ to 55‐kDa) proteins that play important roles in myofibrillogenesis, cytoskeletal organization, and cell adhesion and are implicated in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and tumorigenesis. Giant obscurins are composed of tandem structural and signaling motifs, including 2 serine/threonine kinase domains, SK1 and SK2, present at the COOH terminus of giant obscurin‐B. Using biochemical and cellular approaches, we show for the first time that both SK1 and SK2 possess enzymatic activities and undergo autophosphorylation. SK2 can phosphorylate the cytoplasmic domain of N‐cadherin, a major component of adherens junctions, and SK1 can interact with the extracellular domain of the β1‐subunit of the Na+/K+‐ATPase, which also resides in adherens junctions. Immunostaining of nonpermeabilized myofibers and cardiocytes revealed that some obscurin kinase isoforms localize extracellularly. Quantification of the exofacial expression of obscurin kinase proteins indicated that they occupy ~16 and ~5% of the sarcolemmal surface in myofibers and cardiocytes, respectively. Treatment of heart lysates with peptide‐N‐glycosidase F revealed that while giant obscurin‐B localizes intracellularly, possessing dual kinase activity, a small obscurin kinase isoform that contains SK1 localizes extracellularly, where it undergoes N‐glycosylation. Collectively, our studies demonstrate that the obscurin kinase domains are enzymatically active and may be involved in the regulation of cell adhesion. —Hu, L. ‐Y. R. , Kontrogianni‐Konstantopoulos, A. The kinase domains of obscurin interact with intercellular adhesion proteins. FASEB J. 27, 2001–2012 (2013). www.fasebj. org
Mycelium development and architecture, and spore production of Scutellospora reticulata in monoxenic culture with Ri T-DNA transformed carrot roots

Mycelium development and architecture and spore production were studied in Scutellospora reticulata from single-spore isolates grown with Ri T-DNA transformed carrot root-organ culture in monoxenic system. Culture establishment, anastomosis occurrence and auxiliary cell development also were examined. Seventy percent of the pregerminated disinfected spores colonized the transformed carrot roots. After 8 mo, the average spore production was 56 (24–130) per 30 cm3 of medium. Of the spores produced, 75% germinated and produced new generations in monoxenic culture. The mycelium network was formed by thick light-brown hyphae, which exhibit two major architecture patterns related to either root colonization or resource exploitation, and lower-order hyphae, bearing auxiliary cells, branched absorbing structures (BAS), hyphal swellings (HS) and forming anastomoses. BAS were formed abundantly in extramatrical mycelium and frequently had HS resembling vesicles, a feature not previously reported in the Gigasporaceae, to the best of our knowledge. Few anastomosis were observed within the mycelium and most often corresponded to a healing mechanism that form hypha bridges to reconnect broken hyphae or overcoming obstructed areas within a hypha. Numerous auxiliary cells were produced during culture development and their role was inferred.
Dual potency anti-HER2/neu and anti-EGFR anthracycline immunoconjugates in chemotherapeutic-resistant mammary carcinoma combined with cyclosporin A and verapamil P-glycoprotein inhibition

Immunoconjugates of epirubicin were synthesized with monoclonal antibodies against the epidermal growth factor receptors, HER2/neu and EGFR, by creating a sulfhydryl-reactive epirubicin intermediate applying heterobifunctional succinimidyl-4-(N-maleimidomethyl)cyclohexane-1-carboxylate (SMCC), which was introduced at α-monoamide groups of the epirubicin carbohydrate moiety. In parallel, N-succinimidyl-S-acetylthioacetate (SATA) was used to incorporate a sulfhydryl group into immunoglobulin at the terminal amine position of ϵ-lysine amino acid residues. Eprirubicin–SMCC–SATA–IgG immunoconjugates were produced by reacting epirubicin–SMCC and SATA–IgG at appropriate molar ratios. Epirubicin–(anti-HER2/neu) and epirubicin–(anti-EGFR) had greater potency against chemotherapeutic-resistant SKBr-3 mammary carcinoma than did epirubicin at epirubicin-equivalent concentrations. Epirubicin–(anti-HER2/neu) was more potent than epirubicin–(anti-EGFR), and a synergistic level of antineoplastic activity was detected with an epirubicin immunoconjugate 50/50 combination. Competitive P-glycoprotein inhibition with cyclosporin A or verapamil enhanced the potency of the epirubicin immunoconjugate 50/50 combination. Minor levels of antineoplastic activity were detected only with an immunoglobulin 50/50 combination of anti-HER2/neu and anti-EGFR. The investigations represent a potential strategy for enhancing the selective internalization, intracellular deposition, and antineoplastic potency of chemotherapeutics in multidrug-resistant neoplasias.
Septin Form and Function at the Cell Cortex*

Septins are GTP-binding proteins that form filaments and higher-order structures on the cell cortex of eukaryotic cells and associate with actin and microtubule cytoskeletal networks. When assembled, septins coordinate cell division and contribute to cell polarity maintenance and membrane remodeling. These functions manifest themselves via scaffolding of cytosolic proteins and cytoskeletal networks to specific locations on membranes and by forming diffusional barriers that restrict lateral diffusion of proteins embedded in membranes. Notably, many neurodegenerative diseases and cancers have been characterized as having misregulated septins, suggesting that their functions are relevant to diverse diseases. Despite the importance of septins, little is known about what features of the plasma membrane influence septin recruitment and alternatively, how septins influence plasma membrane properties. Septins have been localized to the cell cortex at the base of cilia, the mother-bud neck of yeast, and branch points of filamentous fungi and dendritic spines, in cleavage furrows, and in retracting membrane protrusions in mammalian cells. These sites all possess some degree of curvature and are likely composed of distinct lipid pools. Depending on the context, septins may act alone or in concert with other cytoskeletal elements to influence and sense membrane properties. The degree to which septins react to and/or induce changes in shape and lipid composition are discussed here. As septins are an essential player in basic biology and disease, understanding the interplay between septins and the plasma membrane is critical and may yield new and unexpected functions.
Conservation of residual hearing with cochlear implantation.

HYPOTHESIS The goals of this work were (a) to review the pre- and postsurgical auditory thresholds in a consecutive sample of cochlear implant recipients to determine the fate of residual hearing, and (b) to obtain preliminary indication of the value of a multicenter longitudinal study of residual hearing in implant patients. BACKGROUND Indications for cochlear implantation have been expanded to include severely hearing impaired (SHI) adults and may someday include SHI children. Implantation of individuals with more residual hearing is a concern owing to the possible development of better devices that may make use of residual hearing within the lifetime of implanted children if not that of adults. Preservation of residual hearing would be a desirable outcome of implant surgery; however, conventional thought is that implantation destroys any remaining hearing. This study was undertaken to assess if and how often conservation of hearing occurred after implantation in a sample of multichannel implant recipients. METHODS Records of 50 profoundly hearing impaired consecutively implanted patients were examined for pre- and post-surgical audiometric results. Standard audiometric techniques were used for all testing procedures. Forty patients were considered to have some hearing conserved based on a response obtained at any one of the three speech frequencies prior to implantation. The most recent postimplantation audiometric results were used providing data from users with 1-41 months of use. RESULTS Twenty-one of 40 implanted subjects were found to have responses in at least one of the speech frequencies both pre- and postsurgery, with the majority of those displaying responses at all three frequencies. In this preliminary retrospective study, it did not appear that duration of cochlear implant use, gender, level of preoperative hearing, or length of electrode insertion were related to outcome. There were insufficient data to draw conclusions on individual devices. CONCLUSIONS Conservation of hearing occurred in approximately half of the subjects reviewed. There is no indication of what factors contributed to the preservation of hearing in those with postsurgical residual hearing or if that hearing is usable. The study does suggest that a larger multicenter longitudinal study would be of value of determine what factors may be related to conserved hearing in implanted patients.
Mathematical Modeling of Programmatic Requirements for Yaws Eradication

Yaws is targeted for eradication by 2020. The mainstay of the eradication strategy is mass treatment followed by case finding. Modeling has been used to inform programmatic requirements for other neglected tropical diseases and could provide insights into yaws eradication. We developed a model of yaws transmission varying the coverage and number of rounds of treatment. The estimated number of cases arising from an index case (basic reproduction number [R0]) ranged from 1.08 to 3.32. To have 80% probability of achieving eradication, 8 rounds of treatment with 80% coverage were required at low estimates of R0 (1.45). This requirement increased to 95% at high estimates of R0 (2.47). Extending the treatment interval to 12 months increased requirements at all estimates of R0. At high estimates of R0 with 12 monthly rounds of treatment, no combination of variables achieved eradication. Models should be used to guide the scale-up of yaws eradication.
Predicting HIV Coreceptor Usage on the Basis of Genetic and Clinical Covariates

Background We compared several statistical learning methods for the prediction of HIV coreceptor use from clonal HIV third hypervariable (V3) loop sequences, and evaluated and improved their effectiveness on clinical samples. Methods Support vector machines (SVM), artificial neural networks, position-specific scoring matrices (PSSM) and mixtures of localized rules were estimated and tested using 10x ten-fold cross-validation on a clonal dataset consisting of 1,100 matched clonal genotype-phenotype pairs from 332 patients. Different SVMs were also trained and tested on a clinically derived dataset, representing 920 patient samples from British Columbia, Canada. Methods were evaluated using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves. Results In the clonal analysis, the sensitivity of the 11/25 rule at 92.5% specificity was 59.5%. PSSMs and SVMs increased sensitivity to 71.9% and 76.4%, respectively, at the same specificity (P<<0.05). In clinical samples, the sensitivity of the 11/25 rule and SVM decreased to 25.9% (specificity 93.9%) and 39.8% (specificity 93.5%), respectively. However, the integration of clinical data resulted in a further 2.4-fold increase in sensitivity over the 11/25 rule (63%). Univariate analyses identified 41 V3 mutations significantly associated with coreceptor usage. Conclusion For all methods tested, a substantial sensitivity decrease is observed on clinical data, probably owing to the heterogeneity of the viral population in vivo. In response to these complications, we present an SVM-based approach that integrates sequence information with clinical and host data, resulting in improved performance and sensitivity compared with purely sequence-based approaches.
Relationship of age and gender to the prevalence and correlates of psychological distress in later life

ABSTRACT Background: As populations age, psychological distress in late life will become of increasing public health and social importance. This study seeks to bridge the gap in information that exists about psychological distress in late life, by exploring the prevalence of psychological distress among a very large sample of older adults to determine the impact of age and gender, and the modifying effect of these factors on the associations between measures of psychological distress and sociodemographic and comorbid conditions. Methods: We analyzed self-reported data from 236,508 men and women in the New South Wales 45 and Up Study, to determine the impact of age and gender, and the modifying effects of these factors on associations between psychological distress and sociodemographic and comorbid conditions. Results: Higher education, married status, and higher income were associated with lower risk of psychological distress. Although overall prevalence of psychological distress is lower at older ages, this increases after age 80, and is particularly associated with physical disabilities. Some older people (such as those requiring help because of disability and those with multiple comorbid health conditions) are at increased risk of psychological distress. Conclusion: These findings have implications for both healthcare providers and policy-makers in identifying and responding to the needs of older people in our aging society.
Host defenses in experimental scrub typhus: histopathological correlates

Intraperitoneal (i.p.) infection of BALB/c mice with 1,000 50% mouse lethal doses of the Karp strain of Rickettsia tsutsugamushi was inevitably lethal, and associated pathological alterations were confined to the peritoneal cavity. These included: (i) continuous proliferation of rickettsial organisms in peritoneal macrophages until death; (ii) hepatic granulomas appearing 6 days after infection and increasing in size and number until death; (iii) splenomegaly, resulting principally from proliferation of lymphoid tissue, and (iv) terminal peritonitis. Under two circumstances, i.p. infections with R. tsutsugamushi were not lethal: (i) infection with 100 50% mouse infectious doses of the Gilliam strain, which, in fact, resulted in immune protection against otherwise lethal Karp challenge; and (ii) Karp infection of animals immunized with the Gilliam strain. In both cases, the associated pathological abnormalities were, as with primary Karp infection, restricted to the peritoneal cavity. Also similar was the striking splenomegaly due to lymphoid proliferation, which was particularly prominent in immunized animals. In contrast to primary and lethal Karp infection, however, these infections were characterized by: (i) minimal and transient proliferation of rickettsial organisms in peritoneal macrophages; (ii) disappearance of hepatic granulomas; and (iii) absence of peritonitis. It was concluded that the survival of an animal bearing an i.p. infection of scrub typhus depended on its ability to concentrate a sufficiently vigorous immune response in the peritoneal cavity, resulting in the evolution of rickettsiacidal macrophages capable of suppressing the infection.
An Efficient Sensor Deployment Scheme for Large-Scale Wireless Sensor Networks

Sensor deployment to achieve better system performance is one of the critical issues in wireless sensor networks. An effective sensor deployment scheme is proposed for large-area sensor networks, where the event occurrence rate varies over the sensor-deployed region. By utilizing the local event occurrence rate and applying the analytical sensor detection capability expression for the problem formulation, the proposed scheme determines the optimal number of sensors for a typical surveillance sensor network that should be deployed in each local region that minimizes the total number of sensors while satisfying the target probability of the overall detection. The optimality of the proposed scheme is examined, and it is also shown that the sensor deployment by the proposed scheme considerably reduces the total number of sensors in comparison with a conventional sensor deployment.