Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Laboratory-Based Surveillance and Molecular Epidemiology of Influenza Virus in Taiwan

ABSTRACT A laboratory-based surveillance network of 11 clinical virological laboratories for influenza viruses was established in Taiwan under the coordination of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Taiwan. From October 2000 to March 2004, 3,244 influenza viruses were isolated, including 1,969 influenza A and 1,275 influenza B viruses. The influenza infections usually occurred frequently in winter in the northern hemisphere. However, the influenza seasonality in Taiwan was not clear during the four seasons under investigation. For example, the influenza A viruses peaked during the winters of 2001, 2002, and 2003. However, some isolated peaks were also found in the summer and fall (June to November) of 2001 and 2002. An unusual peak of influenza B also occurred in the summer of 2002 (June to August). Phylogenetic analysis shows that influenza A isolates from the same year were often grouped together. However, influenza B isolates from the year 2002 clustered into different groups, and the data indicate that both B/Victoria/2/87-like and B/Yamagata/16/88-like lineages of influenza B viruses were cocirculating. Sequence comparison of epidemic strains versus vaccine strains shows that many vaccine-like Taiwanese strains were circulating at least 2 years before the vaccine strains were introduced. No clear seasonality of influenza reports in Taiwan occurred in contrast to other more continental regions.
MULTI-ASSET SECURITIES MARKETS

This paper finds in closed form a noisy rational expectations equilibrium for a class of economies with many risky assets and analyzes the properties of such equilibria. Because of the various interactions between the assets, phenomena appear that do not arise in models with a single risky asset. For example, an asset's equilibrium price might be decreasing in its own payoff and/or increasing in its own supply; an asset might be a Giffen good; a higher price for an asset (holding other prices fixed) might be "bad news" for the asset's payoff; and even for assets in fixed supply, uncertainty about other assets' supplies may prevent their prices from being fully revealing. THIS PAPER FINDS in closed form a noisy rational expectations equilibrium for a model of multi-asset securities markets and analyzes its properties. The model has the following features. There is a large number of agents who possess diverse and asymmetric pieces of private information. This information is aggregated and partially revealed by the equilibrium prices, which, together with the private information, create the beliefs held by agents in equilibrium. Agents can vary in their risk attitudes and precision of their private information. The correlation patterns across assets are general; no assumptions are made concerning the variance-covariance structure of payoffs, supplies, or the error terms in each information signal. The multiplicity of risky assets creates phenomena that are impossible in models with a single risky asset. Also, because of the use of price information by agents, equilibrium comparative statics analysis is of a different nature from Walrasian models, where beliefs are independent of equilibrium. When agents in speculative markets have diverse and asymmetric information, equilibrium prices will usually contain information beyond that held originally by each agent. This observation, together with the assumption that agents make statistically correct inferences based on all the information they possess, including current prices, leads to the notion of a rational expectations equilibrium where equilibrium prices affect agents' behavior both by entering their budget constraints and by influencing their beliefs and predictions. A large body of literature on rational expectations models has developed in recent years.2 Much of it has been concerned with fully revealing equilibria, in which informational asymmetries that might originally exist disappear in equilibrium. The notion of a fully revealing rational expectations equilibrium is appealing on the surface, but it has proved problematic both on empirical and on conceptual grounds.3 Most of the difficulties
Dual-switch power gating technique with small energy loss, low area, short crossover time, and fast wake-up time for fine-grain leakage controlled VLSIs

In this paper, we compared various power gating schemes in terms of energy loss, crossover time, and wake-up time using the 45-nm Predictive Technology Model. In this comparison, the Dual-Switch Power Gating (DSPG) shows smaller energy loss, shorter crossover time, faster wake-up time than the other power gating schemes such as the Single-Switch and Charge-Recycled Power Gating schemes. Based on these advantages, the DSPG is suggested in this paper as a viable candidate suitable to a fine-grain leakage control scheme, where logic blocks go in and out very frequently and shortly between the active and sleep modes.
A highly conserved mouse gene with a propensity to form pseudogenes in mammals

A mouse cDNA clone corresponding to an abundantly transcribed poly(A)+ mRNA was found to be represented by 200 copies in mammalian genomes. To understand the origin and nature of this sequence family, we studied two genomic members and two cDNA clones from mouse liver. The DNA sequence of the coding strand of a full-length cDNA clone was shown to have an open reading frame capable of encoding a 25-kilodalton polypeptide that has not been previously described. In vitro transcription-translation experiments verified the presence of an open reading frame encoding a protein of the predicted size. Restriction analysis of genomic DNA and DNA sequence analysis of genomic clones indicated that many of the 200 members of this family represent processed pseudogenes, with one or a small number of active structural genes. The vast majority of the genomic copies are heterogeneous in length, truncated at their 5' ends with respect to the mRNA, and do not appear to have intervening sequences. Two distinct genomic members of this family were sequenced and found to represent incomplete copies of the mRNA. Both are 5' truncated at slightly different points with respect to the mRNA. Both pseudogenes have multiple base changes, insertions, and deletions relative to the mRNA, and one of them encodes the poly(A) tail of the mRNA. The expression of this gene family is highest in rapidly dividing cells such as early mouse embryos and testis, but was seen in all tissues tested. This gene shows extremely high sequence conservation, extending to chicken, amphibian, and nematode genomes. Surprisingly, the gene appears to exist in only one copy in these organisms.
Characteristics of membrane and cytosol forms of the mammary tumor glycoprotein molecule mtgp in human breast carcinoma cell cultures and tumors

The presence, concentration and selected molecular characteristics of the human mammary carcinoma glycoprotein molecule set MTGP, a trace and apparently tumor‐specific molecule, were examined in fifteen cell cultures established from mammary carcinomas, tissue from seven mammary carcinomas and control cultures. Both cytosol and membrane‐associated forms of MTGP were analyzed, and each was phenotyped by reference to isoelectric point and buoyant density. All cells or tissues of mammary carcinoma origin contained membrane MTGP, whereas cytosol MTGP was undetectable in cell cultures from half of the mammary carcinomas. Neither membrane nor cytosol MTGP were detectable in cells other than mammary carcinomas. Cytosol MTGP could be assigned to three groups by reference to presence, isoelectric point and buoyant density. Membrane MTGP also exhibited heterogeneity between different tumors and could be assigned to three groups by isoelectric point and buoyant density. Each form of MTGP was homogeneous for a given single tumor or cell culture and retained its phenotypic features with passage and cloning. Four general types of MTGP are proposed, though there may be additional fine heterogeneity that cannot be further resolved at this time. These data provide an initial characterization of the membrane form of MTGP and an integrated characterization that is consistent with the concept that tumor‐specific antigens may possess both constant regions by reference to antigens recognized by the antisera and variable structure by reference to physicochemical characteristics.
Cooperative inter-beam nulling: A side-channel strategy for managing inter-beam interference

Conjugate beamforming is a practical method of enabling simultaneous downlink to multiple users, but it suffers from inter-beam interference. We propose to utilize side-channels so that users can amplify-and-forward their received signals to other users. The amplified-and-forwarded signals are used with a decorrelating receiver to null interference in a strategy called cooperative inter-beam nulling (CIBN). We derive, simulate, and analyze the achievable rate of CIBN. Our results show that CIBN provides significant rate gains with a sufficient number of base station antennas (>10) and received side-channel SNR (> 5 dB), and that rich scattering environments provide the most rate gains.
DAF-16/FOXO Transcription Factor in Aging and Longevity

Aging is associated with age-related diseases and an increase susceptibility of cancer. Dissecting the molecular mechanisms that underlie aging and longevity would contribute to implications for preventing and treating the age-dependent diseases or cancers. Multiple signaling pathways such as the insulin/IGF-1 signaling pathway, TOR signaling, AMPK pathway, JNK pathway and germline signaling have been found to be involved in aging and longevity. And DAF-16/FOXO, as a key transcription factor, could integrate different signals from these pathways to modulate aging, and longevity via shuttling from cytoplasm to nucleus. Hence, understanding how DAF-16/FOXO functions will be pivotal to illustrate the processes of aging and longevity. Here, we summarized how DAF-16/FOXO receives signals from these pathways to affect aging and longevity. We also briefly discussed the transcriptional regulation and posttranslational modifications of DAF-16/FOXO, its co-factors as well as its potential downstream targets participating in lifespan according to the published data in C. elegans and in mammals, and in most cases, we may focus on the studies in C. elegans which has been considered to be a very good animal model for longevity research.
Numerical Analysis of Multilayer Organic Light-Emitting Diodes

We make a comparative analysis of two different multilayer organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), one of which has an emitting layer (EML), and the other has a carrier transport controlling layer (CTCL) embedded between a hole transport layer (HTL) and an electron transport layer (ETL). The key differences between them lie in the carrier mobilities (relatively low for EML but high for CTCL) and energy levels of the middle layer. An in-depth numerical analysis has been done to provide guidelines for the design of trilayer OLED structures, especially in the context of mobility and energy level offsets. Furthermore, we focus on the transient response and carrier charge and discharge dynamics of those devices. Other than the HTL/CTCL/ETL structure, the transient current balance of the HTL/EML/ETL structure is shown to be much affected by the energy level offsets at the organic/organic interfaces due to the slow carrier dynamics in the EML. It is also demonstrated that the electroluminescence (EL) delay upon turn-on is mainly determined by the electron transport passing through the ETL and further EML, while the fast EL decay upon turn-off is by the rapid discharge of the abrupt accumulation of carriers at the organic/organic interfaces.
Analysis of binding of the family 2a carbohydrate-binding module from Cellulomonas fimi xylanase 10A to cellulose: specificity and identification of functionally important amino acid residues.

The family 2a carbohydrate-binding module (CBM2a) of xylanase 10A from Cellulomonas fimi binds to the crystalline regions of cellulose. It does not share binding sites with the N-terminal family 4 binding module (CBM4-1) from the cellulase 9B from C.fimi, a module that binds strictly to soluble sugars and amorphous cellulose. The binding of CBM2a to crystalline matrices is mediated by several residues on the binding face, including three prominent, solvent-exposed tryptophan residues. Binding to crystalline cellulose was analyzed by making a series of conservative (phenylalanine and tyrosine) and non-conservative substitutions (alanine) of each solvent-exposed tryptophan (W17, W54 and W72). Other residues on the binding face with hydrogen bonding potential were substituted with alanine. Each tryptophan plays a different role in binding; a tryptophan is essential at position 54, a tyrosine or tryptophan at position 17 and any aromatic residue at position 72. Other residues on the binding face, with the exception of N15, are not essential determinants of binding affinity. Given the specificity of CBM2a, the structure of crystalline cellulose and the dynamic nature of the binding of CBM2a, we propose a model for the interaction between the polypeptide and the crystalline surface.
Genetic Heterogeneity of Hypervariable Region 1 of the Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) Genome and Sensitivity of HCV to Alpha Interferon Therapy

ABSTRACT Hepatitis C virus (HCV) populations persist in vivo as a mixture of heterogeneous viruses called quasispecies. The relationship between the genetic heterogeneity of these variants and their responses to antiviral treatment remains to be elucidated. We have studied 26 virus strains to determine the influence of hypervariable region 1 (HVR-1) of the HCV genome on the effectiveness of alpha interferon (IFN-α) therapy. Following PCR amplification, we cloned and sequenced HVR-1. Pretreatment serum samples from 13 individuals with chronic hepatitis C whose virus was subsequently eradicated by treatment were compared with samples from 13 nonresponders matched according to the major factors known to influence the response, i.e., sex, genotype, and pretreatment serum HCV RNA concentration. The degree of virus variation was assessed by analyzing 20 clones per sample and by calculating nucleotide sequence entropy (complexity) and genetic distances (diversity). Types of mutational changes were also determined by calculating nonsynonymous substitutions per nonsynonymous site (Ka ) and synonymous substitutions per synonymous site (Ks ). The paired-comparison analysis of the nucleotide sequence entropy and genetic distance showed no statistical differences between responders and nonresponders. By contrast, nonsynonymous substitutions were more frequent than synonymous substitutions (P ≤ 0.05) in responders, but there was no significant difference in nonresponders. Nonsynonymous substitutions tended to be more frequent than synonymous substitutions in women (P = 0.06) but not in men. Nucleotide entropy and genetic distances were significantly related to serum RNA concentration (P ≤ 0.01). Our findings suggest that after controlling for the major determinants of interferon response, neither complexity nor diversity of the HVR-1 region is associated per se with virus eradication. Because a higher proportion of nonsynonymous substitutions than synonymous substitutions was found only in responders, host anti-HCV-specific immune response rather than viral factors may be playing an important role in the interferon response.
Bacteriocin-mediated inhibition of Clostridium botulinum spores by lactic acid bacteria at refrigeration and abuse temperatures

The bacteriocinogenicity of Lactococcus lactis ATCC 11454, Pediococcus pentosaceus ATCC 43200, P. pentosaceus ATCC 43201, Lactobacillus plantarum BN, L. plantarum LB592, L. plantarum LB75, and Lactobacillus acidophilus N2 against Clostridium botulinum spores at 4, 10, 15, and 35 degrees C was investigated by modified deferred and simultaneous antagonism methods. All the strains, except L. acidophilus N2, produced inhibition zones on lawns of C. botulinum spores at 30 degrees C. L. plantarum BN, L. lactis ATCC 11454, and P. pentosaceus ATCC 43200 and 43201 were bacteriocinogenic at 4, 10, and 15 degrees C. Supplementation of brain heart infusion agar with 0 to 5% NaCl increased the radii of inhibition zones during simultaneous antagonism assays. Detectable bacteriocin activities were extracted from freeze-thawed agar cultures of L. plantarum BN and L. lactis ATCC 11454 which had been grown at 4 and 10 degrees C. These results suggest that low levels of L. plantarum BN or L. lactis ATCC 11454, in the presence of 3 or 4% NaCl, could be formulated into minimally processed refrigerated food products for protection against possible botulism hazards.
[Protective effect of terpenes from fructus corni on the cardiomyopathy in alloxan-induced diabetic mice].

OBJECTIVE To investigate the protective effects of terpenes from fructus corni (TFC) on diabetic cardiomyopathy (DCM). METHODS Diabetes was produced by a single injection of alloxan (220 mg/kg, i.p.) in mice. The fasting blood glucose of mice were tested 15 days later and that greater than 13.9 mmol/L were regarded as the diabetic mice which were divided randomly into the model and TFC groups. TFC dissolved by physiological saline (P.O, 80 mg/kg) was administrated to the TFC group for successive 8 weeks since the 15th day. RESULTS Compared to the control group, the weight index increased significantly. The level of superoxide dismutase (SOD) was markedly decreased and malondialdehyde(MDA), the inflammatory factors (TNF-alpha, IL-6) were obviously increased in myocardium. The histopathological examination suggested that myocardial cells disarranged, swelling and the intercellular space increased in model group. It also showed the infiltration of inflammatory cells and fibroblasts in TFC group. The above change was improved significantly. CONCLUSION TFC ameliorated the alterations of cardiomyopathy in diabetic mice induced by alloxan. the mechanism might be related to decrease blood glucose, antioxidative stress and inflammatory factors.
Effect of fatty acids or calcium soaps on rumen and total nutrient digestibility of dairy rations.

Two trials ascertained whether feeding fatty acids as preformed calcium soaps would permit normal digestibility of fiber without reducing availabilities of fatty acids or energy. Six diets contained no added fat (control) or the equivalent of 4.5% added fatty acids as tallow or soy fatty acids, tallow or soy calcium soaps, or tallow combined with the nonnutritive carrier verxite. Six cows were fed each diet in trial 1 to ascertain digestibilities of total nutrients, whereas control, tallow fatty acid, and tallow soap diets were fed to steers with duodenal cannulae in trial 2 to evaluate effects of fat source on rumen fermentation. Digestibility of total fiber in trial 1 was reduced 13% by tallow fatty acids. In trial 2, tallow fatty acids markedly reduced digestibility of dry matter and fiber in the rumen. Diets supplemented with tallow calcium soaps had normal digestibilities of fiber in the rumen and totally, but digestibility of fatty acids was reduced 6% and digestibility of energy reduced 3% compared to feeding tallow fatty acids. Efficiency of synthesis of microbial protein was 39% higher for tallow fatty acids than for control. Feeding tallow verxite also permitted normal digestibility of fiber in trial 1 but caused reduced availabilities of fatty acids and energy. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Aortic root diameter and nasal intermittent positive airway pressure treatment in Marfan's syndrome

We report on a patient with Marfan's syndrome, with coexistent obstructive sleep hypopnea (OSH) and restrictive lung disease, complicated by respiratory insufficiency, who was successfully treated with nasal intermittent positive airway pressure (NIPPV) and oxygen. NIPPV therapy turned out to be effective on arterial gas exchange and well tolerated. Moreover, progressive dilatation of the aortic root was attenuated during NIPPV, but could, however, not be reversed. We hypothetized that (at least partially) a decrease of nocturnal intrathoracic pressures could explain this.
Free radical production during ethanol intoxication, dependence, and withdrawal.

Indices of free radical production and cell damage were examined in male Sprague-Dawley rats chronically exposed to either ethanol (ETOH) or water vapor. In experiment 1, rats experienced either 1 or 11 cycles of ETOH exposure and withdrawal. Brain tissue was harvested 12 hr after ETOH exposure, and 1 hr after being injected with sodium salicylate as a scavenger. Brain tissue was analyzed for the formation of salicylate hydroxylation products as a measure of . OH production during withdrawal. Significant group differences for . OH production were demonstrated for 2,3- and 2,5-dihydroxybenzoic acid in the single cycle ETOH exposed rats compared with their water cohorts. A significant between group difference for 2,5-dihydroxybenzoic acid, only, was demonstrated for the multiple cycles of ETOH exposure. Spontaneous seizures were shown to correlate with increased production of . OH in ETOH exposed rats. In experiment 2, brain tissue was harvested from different groups of rats after removal from the chambers, at 0, 2, 12, 24, 36, and 48 hr after a single exposure cycle. Tissue was analyzed for (1) salicylate hydroxylation (as above), (2) glutamine synthetase activity, (3) whole brain glutamate concentration, and (4) oxidized protein. A multiple regression analysis was conducted on the five dependent variables and found they could be predicted by specific behavioral and neurological ratings. These data suggest that cell damage during withdrawal may have multiple time-dependent components.
Enhanced Anticoagulant Response to Activated Protein C in Patients With IDDM

Anticoagulant response to activated protein C (APC) was studied in 40 healthy subjects and 67 patients with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) using a modified activated thromboplastin time assay. Results are expressed in terms of the APC sensitivity ratio (APC SR). In addition, plasma levels of protein C, total and free protein S (PS), coagulation factors V and VIII, and prothrombin fragment 1+2 (F1+2) were measured. Patients with IDDM and a urinary albumin excretion rate (UAER) <30 mg/24 h showed a median APC SR of 2.5 (interquartile range 2.3–2.9). In patients with a UAER between 30 and 300 mg/24 h, the median APC SR was 2.7 (2.7–2.9). Both values were significantly greater than the median APC SR of 2.1 (2.0–2.5) observed in healthy control subjects (P < 0.001). Also, the percentage of subjects with an APC SR ≤2.0 was markedly smaller in both patient groups. Factor V and VIII levels were not significantly different between IDDM patients and healthy subjects. Grouping of IDDM patients according to the APC SR revealed significantly enhanced levels of total PS (P < 0.05) and factor VIII (P < 0.01) in patients with a poor anticoagulant response to APC (APC SR ≤2.0) compared with those with an APC SR >2.7. The negative correlation of the APC SR in diabetic patients with both coagulation and anticoagulation factors indicates a complex role of this parameter in regulating the coagulation system in IDDM.