Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A low‐cost, scalable technique to study distal coronary arteriole function

Although coronary heart disease is most often tied to obstructions of flow by atherosclerotic plaques in large epicardial arteries, about 10–20% of patients with chest pain considered to be cardiac in nature have normal coronary angiograms (Cannon et al. 1992). In these cases, coronary disease is often linked to contractile dysfunction, for example in relation to metabolic syndrome or obesity (Abel et al. 2008, Pries et al. 2008). Conversely, if the problem is large-artery atherosclerosis, the adverse condition may be partially offset by adaptive responses of the microvessels, such as increased vasodilation (Abel et al. 2008). In both the cases, microvessel function constitutes an important part of the pathology. Despite the essential function of coronary arterioles in the heart, current methodology prevents vessels smaller than 40–50 lm to be studied ex vivo (Goebel et al. 2003). In humans and most animal models, this is two to four times the dimension at the most distal end. According to Poiseuilles law, which defines vascular resistance as the product of vessel length and blood viscosity divided by radius squared four, resistance generated by the regions that have been most studied is 16–256 times less than that by the regions which have thinnest lumen. Taken together with the extensive work specialization of larger coronary vessels (Kuo et al. 1995), it is almost certain that the distal coronary arteriole harbours important vasoregulatory features not yet discovered. In vivo microscopy provides access to a much larger span of the coronary vascular tree than ex vivo techniques, including the distal coronary arteriole (Kuo et al. 1995, Goebel et al. 2003). Although such approaches have so far seen limited use in the literature, we believe imaging techniques such as intravital multi-fluorescence microscopy (Schramm et al. 2007) will provide important information about coronary circulation in the future. Nevertheless, access to the same vascular segments in an ex vivo setting will be essential, as regulation can then be studied and understood isolated from the multitude of neuronal, humoral and local stimuli present in the animal. In addition, the vessels can be exposed to precisely known concentrations of agonists, antagonists or drugs, and the environment can be manipulated to a greater extent than in living tissue. In response to this challenge, we have adapted the agarose preparation, originally developed for renal vessels (Loutzenhiser & Loutzenhiser 2000), to study diameter changes and signalling in coronary vasculature. Small arteries and arterioles are prepared with relatively little effort and modest investments in equipment and training. The preparation provides access to many segments of the coronary microcirculation, including the distalmost coronary arteriole. Its main area of use is to map signalling pathways, compare arteriole-performance and study drug effects.
Overview: apoptotic signaling pathways in the immune system

Correspondence to: Douglas R. Green La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology 10355 Science Center Drive San Diego, CA 92121 USA E-mail: doug@liai.org Cell death is a vital part of life in multicellular organisms, playing roles in development, defense, and homeostasis. In animals, most cell death is via the process of apoptosis, especially when cell death proceeds as part of normal physiology. This volume focuses on apoptosis in the physiology of the immune system. The assorted reviews consider aspects of apoptotic signal transduction, the role of apoptosis in immune development and homeostasis, how apoptosis is involved in some immune effector functions, and how apoptotic cells may affect immune regulation even after death. Each of these reviews is written from the perspectives of laboratories that have contributed extensively to this field, and while they often agree on some points, they disagree on others. Students and newcomers to this exciting area of research are advised to take these as useful starting points in their exploration and evaluations of the various issues that will help them reach their own conclusions with time. Here, I will overview the process of apoptosis, as it applies to vertebrates in particular, in part because only vertebrates have the sort of immune systems we consider here and in part because we know more about the different molecular pathways of vertebrate apoptosis than those of other organisms. My views will certainly differ from those of other researchers in the field, including some of the authors of the reviews in this volume. Where we differ, be assured that I am the one who is always correct. Except, of course, when I am wrong. Apoptosis is technically defined by the morphological features of the dying cell (1), in particular, by the condensation of the chromatin, often accompanied by fragmentation of the nucleus. The plasma membrane is frequently contorted into ‘blebs’, and the cell may break into discrete membrane-bound apoptotic bodies. The apoptotic cell and any apoptotic body are rapidly cleared by phagocytic cells, and the cell death does not trigger an inflammatory response. Although any cell death with these features is by definition apoptosis, we generally Immunological Reviews 2003 Vol. 193: 5–9 Printed in Denmark. All rights reserved
Analysis and Design of Authentication and Encryption Algorithms for Secure Cloud Systems

Along with the fast growth of networks and mobile devices, cloud computing has become one of the most attractive and effective technologies and business solutions nowadays. Increasing numbers of organizations and customers are migrating their businesses and data to the cloud due to the flexibility and cost-efficiency of cloud systems. Preventing unauthorized access of sensitive data in the cloud has been one of the biggest challenges when designing a secure cloud system, and it strongly relies on the chosen authentication and encryption algorithms for providing authenticity and confidentiality, respectively. This thesis investigates various aspects of authentication and encryption algorithms for securing cloud systems, including authenticated encryption modes of operation, block ciphers, password hashing algorithms, and password-less/two-factor authentication mechanisms. Improving Authenticated Encryption Modes. The Galois/Counter Mode (GCM) is an authenticated encryption mode of operation for block ciphers. It has been widely adopted by many network standards and protocols that protect the security of cloud communications, such as TLS v1.2, IEEE 802.1AE and IPsec. Iwata et al. recently found a flaw in GCM’s original proofs for non-96-bit nonce cases, and then presented new security bounds for GCM. The new bounds imply that the success probabilities of adversaries for attacking GCM are much larger than the originally expected ones. We propose a simple change to repair GCM. When applied, it will improve the security bounds by a factor of about 2 while maintaining most of the original proofs. Analyzing Polynomial-Based Message Authentication Codes. We investigate attacks on polynomial-based message authentication code (MAC) schemes including the one adopted in GCM. We demonstrate that constructing successful forgeries of these MAC schemes does not necessarily require hash collisions. This discovery removes certain restrictions in the attacks previously proposed by Procter and Cid. Moreover, utilizing a special design of GCM for processing non-96-bit nonces, we turn these forgery attacks into birthday attacks, which will significantly increase their success probabilities. Therefore, by considering the birthday attacks and the security proof flaw found by Iwata et al., cloud system designers should avoid using GCM with non-96-bit nonces if they do not revise the design of GCM. Analyzing Block Ciphers. We propose a new framework for analyzing symmetric-key ciphers by guessing intermediate states to divide ciphers into small components. This framework is suitable for lightweight ciphers with simple key schedules and block sizes smaller than key lengths. Using this framework, we design new attacks on the block cipher family KATAN. These attacks can recover the master keys of 175-round KATAN32, 130round KATAN48 and 112-round KATAN64 faster than exhaustive search, and thus reach
Selective breeding of mice for antibody responsiveness to flagellar and somatic antigens of Salmonellae

Selective breeding has been performed in mice for their high or low antibody responsiveness to Salmonella antigens (Ag). Two noncross‐reacting Salmonellae (S. typhimurium and S. oranienburg) have been alternately used to immunize successive generations in order to avoid interference of maternally transmitted antibody. Both Salmonellae carry two independent antigens: flagellar (f) and somatic (s). Two two‐way selections were carried out: one for agglutinin response to fAg and the other for agglutinin response to sAg (Selection Ags). The agglutinin response to the other independent Ag was also measured (Associated Ags). The phenotypic character chosen for selection is the maximal agglutinin titer in response to optimal immunization.
Una Propuesta para el Etiquetado Automático de Roles Semánticos

La identificacion de los roles semanticos es una parte crucial en tareas que involucran tratamiento automatico del lenguaje natural como la extraccion y recuperacion de informacion, sistemas de busquedas de respuestas, generacion de resumenes, traduccion automatica, etc. Para el caso del espanol, la investigacion en roles semanticos es escasa. El objetivo del actual trabajo es analizar los sistemas de etiquetado de roles semanticos y proponer un nuevo enfoque del problema para mejorar los resultados basado en una mayor explotacion de los recursos lexicos.
Genetic Predisposition to Natural Rubber Latex Allergy Differs Between Health Care Workers and High-Risk Patients

BACKGROUND: In health care workers, the natural rubber latex (NRL) allergy phenotype has been shown to be associated with promoter polymorphisms in interleukins 13 and 18 (IL13 and IL18) when compared with nonatopic controls. However, it is not known whether high-risk patient populations, such as those born with neural tube defects or genitourinary abnormalities, demonstrate a heightened propensity toward the same genetic/immunologic risk factors that have been reported for health care workers. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that single-nucleotide polymorphisms in genes encoding IL13 and IL18 occur at an increased frequency in NRL allergic patients with spina bifida (SB) or bladder exstrophy (BE). METHODS: One hundred twenty subjects (40 SB, 40 BE, and 40 control) were screened using a clinical history questionnaire and NRL-specific immunoglobulin E (IgE) antibody measurements in the blood. Genomic DNA was extracted from peripheral blood lymphocytes and analyzed for single-nucleotide polymorphisms in candidate genes of interest. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to identify significant variables with significance defined as P < 0.05. RESULTS: Sensitization (IgE antibody positivity) to NRL allergens was associated with atopic history and number of prior operations and was prevented by the avoidance of NRL beginning at birth. However, unlike health care workers, the NRL allergy phenotype was not significantly associated with promoter polymorphisms in IL13 or IL18 when comparing NRL allergic SB and BE patients with nonsensitized patients and with atopic and nonatopic controls. CONCLUSIONS: In patients born with SB or BE, environmental factors seem to play a greater role in the development of NRL sensitization and overt allergic symptoms than the IL polymorphisms in IL13 and IL18 previously shown to be associated with NRL allergy in health care workers.
Abnormalities in Brain Glucose Utilization and Its Impact on Cellular and Molecular Mechanisms in Sporadic Dementia of Alzheimer Type

Brain glucose utilization and ATP formation were found to be reduced to 54% and 81%, respectively, of control values in incipient sporadic dementia of Alzheimer type, causing reduced availability of the glucose‐derived neurotransmitter acetylcholine. With respect to energy shortage, impacts on energy‐dependent processes such as synaptic transmission, ion homeostasis, protein processing and degradation, extracellular transmission, and extracellular phosphorylation may be expected. Normal processing of the amyloid precursor protein was demonstrated to occur via a muscarinergic acetylcholine M1 and M3 receptor‐mediated signal transduction pathway. Since both the muscarinergic acetylcholine receptors on pyramidal neurons and G proteins were found to be unaltered in DAT, the possibility is discussed that the diminution of glucose utilization and the energy shortage in DAT brain may contribute considerably to abnormal amyloid precursor protein processing and thus to secondary amyloid formation.
Commentary: Income and health: why are curves so appealing?

Martikainen et al. report a linear relationship between household income and subsequent mortality. The linear trend accounts for ‘96% of the variation between income deciles’. Departures from linearity at the top and bottom of the income range are modest and variable—the most consistent being a flattening of the relationship at very high incomes. These results contrast markedly with the most directly comparable study of Backlund et al. which found pronounced curvilinearity, flattening at much lower income levels. The first point to stress about this difference is that it is very unlikely to be due to statistical artefacts or methodological differences between the studies. Both studies have huge sample sizes with very high response rates. Whilst income data are frequently problematic, particularly at the top and bottom of the range, both results are consistent with other findings from their respective countries. In short, we can be confident that they reflect a real difference and one which may be informative about the underlying causal processes at work. The importance of the finding can be illustrated in the context of the income inequality debate. This was sparked by Richard Wilkinson’s assertion that relative income is more important for health than absolute income in developed societies, and has given a new lease of life to research in the area. Although many of the resulting studies have used aggregate data, those based on individual-level data are inherently more informative. One reason is that studies employing only aggregate data are unable to distinguish between the various competing hypotheses. Gravelle has also argued that a relationship between income inequality and health at the aggregate level could simply be an ‘artefact’ of a curvilinear relationship between income and health at the individual level. With such a relationship the effects of income are greater at lower levels. Of two countries with the same average income, that with greater income inequality will have more people at both lower and higher incomes, but the ‘health loss’ at lower incomes will be greater than the ‘health gain’ at higher incomes. So the average health of the more unequal society will be lower. With a more linear relationship the losses and gains would tend to balance each other. Thus the shape of the relationship plays a critical role in the debate. Unfortunately, few studies have addressed it directly. Whilst Wilkinson, himself, is agnostic about the shape of the relationship, others are less so. Wagstaff and van Doorslaer assert that, in addition to four studies explicitly cited, ‘the multitude of other studies . suggest a concave relationship at the individual level between health and income’. In terms of INCOME DIFFERENCES IN MORTALITY 1405
Green Fluorescent Protein-mTalin Causes Defects in Actin Organization and Cell Expansion in Arabidopsis and Inhibits Actin Depolymerizing Factor's Actin Depolymerizing Activity in Vitro1

Expression of green fluorescent protein (GFP) linked to an actin binding domain is a commonly used method for live cell imaging of the actin cytoskeleton. One of these chimeric proteins is GFP-mTalin (GFP fused to the actin binding domain of mouse talin). Although it has been demonstrated that GFP-mTalin colocalizes with the actin cytoskeleton, its effect on actin dynamics and cell expansion has not been studied in detail. We created Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) plants harboring alcohol inducible GFP-mTalin constructs to assess the effect of GFP-mTalin expression in vivo. We focused on the growing root hair as this is a model cell for studying cell expansion and root hair tip growth that requires a highly dynamic and polar actin cytoskeleton. We show that alcohol inducible expression of GFP-mTalin in root hairs causes severe defects in actin organization, resulting in either the termination of growth, cell death, and/or changes in cell shape. Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching experiments demonstrate that the interaction of GFP-mTalin and actin filaments is highly dynamic. To assess how GFP-mTalin affects actin dynamics we performed cosedimentation assays of GFP-mTalin with actin on its own or in the presence of the actin modulating protein, actin depolymerizing factor. We show that that GFP-mTalin does not affect actin polymerization but that it does inhibit the actin depolymerizing activity of actin depolymerizing factor. These observations demonstrate that GFP-mTalin can affect cell expansion, actin organization, and the interaction of actin binding proteins with actin.
Beam-steerable integrated lens antenna with waveguide feeding system for 71–76/81–86 GHz point-to-point applications

The paper presents design of an electronically beam-steerable integrated lens antenna for 71-76/81-86 GHz point-to-point applications. The proposed antenna is based on a combination of a waveguide feeding system and a hemielliptical dielectric lens with the diameter of 120 mm. The waveguide feeding system has one WR-12 input port and four electronically switched WR-12 output ports. It is based on SP4T MMIC switch mounted on a PCB with tapered antipodal fin-line waveguide-to-microstrip transitions. The feeding system is connected to an array of four linearly arranged rectangular waveguide feed elements used to effectively illuminate the lens. Measurement results of the fabricated feeding system show that S11 level is below -8 dB in the whole 71-86 GHz frequency band. The average level of S21 in the 71-86 GHz band is about -7 dB with the deviations between four outputs less than ±1 dB and the isolation is greater than 20 dB. The measured gain value of the antenna itself exceeds 38 dBi at the center frequency of the considered frequency band. The half power beamwidth values for all beams are in the range of 1.7-1.9 degrees with the beams overlapping level around -3 dB that provides beam-scanning range over ± 3.4 degrees. High gain values and good beam-steering capabilities allow considering the designed lens antenna as a perspective one for millimeter-wave backhaul applications.
Broadband CPW-Fed Planar Koch Fractal Loop Antenna

A broadband Koch fractal loop antenna configuration with a novel Coplanar Waveguide (CPW) feed is presented. Impedance matching is achieved by a radial stub loaded CPW feed, which acts as a lumped matching circuit. Experimental results show that the antenna has 2:1 VSWR bandwidth of about 19% operating in the frequency range of 1.26 GHz-1.52 GHz and 3:1 VSWR bandwidth of 57% has been measured in the frequency range of 1.21 GHz-1.99 GHz. The antenna exhibits well-defined radiation patterns over the band.
The possible role of squalene and its peroxide of the sebum in the occurrence of sunburn and protection from the damage caused by U.V. irradiation.

To clarify the role of squalene peroxide in the occurrence of skin damage from sunburn, the optimum condition of squalene peroxidation and the effect of squalene peroxide on cutaneous tissue were examined. Peroxidation of squalene was more easily induced than palmitoleic acid and oleic acid in the unsaturated lipid occurred in sebum. The peroxidation of squalene gradually occurred by U.V. irradation, and it is parallel to increases in the malonyldialdehyde production (production of lipoperoxide). This peroxidation easily carries out in the case of high temperature (40 degrees C than 30 degrees C), and in the case of low pH. Good correspondence was recognized among the spectrum of natural daylight, U.V. absorption spectrum of squalene and erythema curve. Squalene and its peroxide have an important role in the occurrence of sunburn, and/or protection from damage caused by U.V. irradiation.
Fetal frontal cortex transplant (14C) 2‐deoxyglucose uptake and histology

Fetal frontal neocortex from 18-day-old rat embryonic brain was transplanted into cavities in 30-dayold host motor cortex. Sixty days after transplantation, 5 of 15 transplanted rats had surviving fetal transplants. The fetal cortex transplants were physically attached to the host brain, completely filled the original cavity, and had numerous surviving cells including pyramidal neurons. Cell lamination within the fetal transplant was abnormal. The (14C) 2-deoxyglucose uptake of all five of the fetal neocortex transplants was less than adjacent cortex and contralateral host motor-sensory cortex, but more than adjacent corpus callosum white matter. The results indicate that fetal frontal neocortex can be transplanted into damaged rat motor cortex. The metabolic rate of the transplants suggests they could be partially functional.
Celecoxib Induces Apoptosis by Inhibiting 3-Phosphoinositide-dependent Protein Kinase-1 Activity in the Human Colon Cancer HT-29 Cell Line*

Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, which inhibit cyclooxygenase (COX) activity, are powerful antineoplastic agents that exert their antiproliferative and proapoptotic effects on cancer cells by COX-dependent and/or COX-independent pathways. Celecoxib, a COX-2-specific inhibitor, has been shown to reduce the number of adenomatous colorectal polyps in patients with familial adenomatous polyposis. Here, we show that celecoxib induces apoptosis in the colon cancer cell line HT-29 by inhibiting the 3-phosphoinositide-dependent kinase 1 (PDK1) activity. This effect was correlated with inhibition of the phosphorylation of the PDK1 downstream substrate Akt/protein kinase B (PKB) on two regulatory sites, Thr308 and Ser473. However, expression of a constitutive active form of Akt/PKB (myristoylated PKB) has a low protective effect toward celecoxib-induced cell death. In contrast, overexpression of constitutive active mutant of PDK1 (PDK1A280V) was as potent as the pancaspase inhibitor, benzyloxycarbonyl-Val-Ala-Asp-fluoromethylketone, to impair celecoxib-induced apoptosis. By contrast, cells expressing a kinase-defective mutant of PDK1 (PDK1K114G) remained sensitive to celecoxib. Furthermore, in vitro measurement reveals that celecoxib was a potential inhibitor of PDK1 activity with an IC50 = 3.5 μm. These data indicate that inhibition of PDK1 signaling is involved in the proapoptotic effect of celecoxib in HT-29 cells.
Estimation of weighting distribution using fuzzy memberships and wavelet transformation with PSO optimization in satellite image enhancement

Satellite image enhancement suffers from edge localization and distortion of detail. A novel satellite image enhancement is presented which enhance the edge detail as well as a quality of low-resolution satellite images. In the proposed approach, we improve and preserve the edge detail of a significant region using particle swarm optimization and fuzzy logic in the high spectral region. Further, the fusion of detail images is performed to conquer the limitation of intensity distortion and over saturation in the region using an estimation of weights. The magnitude of weights is estimated by fuzzy membership functions to extract optimal spectral information. The measure of enhancement and contrast assessment function criterion are used to examine the performance of proposed method in comparison with other two recent techniques.