Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Serum bone markers in ROD patients across the spectrum of decreases in GFR: Activin A increases before all other markers

Introduction: Renal osteodystrophy (ROD) develops early in chronic kidney disease (CKD) and progresses with loss of kidney function. While intact parathyroid hormone (PTH), 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 (1,25D), and fibroblast growth factor-23 (FGF-23) levels are usually considered the primary abnormalities in ROD development, the role of serum activin A elevations in CKD and its relationships to ROD have not been explored. The aims of this study were to evaluate serum activin A at different CKD stages, and to establish the relationships between activin A, bone biomarkers, and bone histomorphometric parameters. Materials and methods: 104 patients with CKD stages 2 – 5D underwent bone biopsies. We measured in the serum activin A, BSAP, DKK1, FGF-23, α-Klotho, intact PTH, sclerostin, TRAP-5b, and 1,25D. Biochemical results were compared across CKD stages and with 19 age-matched controls with normal kidney function. Results: Median activin A levels were increased in all stages of CKD compared to controls from 544 pg/mL in CKD 2 (431 – 628) to 1,135 pg/mL in CKD 5D (816 – 1,456), compared to 369 pg/mL in controls (316 – 453, p < 0.01). The increase of activin A in CKD 2 (p = 0.016) occurred before changes in the other measured biomarkers. Activin A correlated with intact PTH and FGF-23 (r = 0.65 and 0.61; p < 0.01) and with histomorphometric parameters of bone turnover (BFR/BS, Acf, ObS/BS and OcS/BS; r = 0.47 – 0.52; p < 0.01). These correlations were comparable to those found with intact PTH and FGF-23. Conclusion: Serum activin A levels increase starting at CKD 2 before elevations in intact PTH and FGF-23. Activin A correlates with bone turnover similar to intact PTH and FGF-23. These findings suggest a role for activin A in early development of ROD.
X-ray scanning microscopies of microcalcifications in abdominal aortic and popliteal artery aneurysms

Microcalcifications are important pathological markers. Thus, it is relevant to study the occurring crystalline phases, their formation mechanisms, and the correlations between their structure and pathologic modifications of human tissue. Combining scanning X-ray microdiffraction and small-angle scattering reveals the crystalline phases of microcalcifications, and the abundance and orientation of collocated fibrous tissues (elastin, collagen, myofilament), spatially resolved over aneurysm tissue samples.
Deep Reinforcement Learning with Feedback-based Exploration

Deep Reinforcement Learning has enabled the control of increasingly complex and high-dimensional problems. However, the need of vast amounts of data before reasonable performance is attained prevents its widespread application. We employ binary corrective feedback as a general and intuitive manner to incorporate human intuition and domain knowledge in model-free machine learning. The uncertainty in the policy and the corrective feedback is combined directly in the action space as probabilistic conditional exploration. As a result, the greatest part of the otherwise ignorant learning process can be avoided. We demonstrate the proposed method, Predictive Probabilistic Merging of Policies (PPMP), in combination with DDPG. In experiments on continuous control problems of the OpenAI Gym, we achieve drastic improvements in sample efficiency, final performance, and robustness to erroneous feedback, both for human and synthetic feedback. Additionally, we show solutions beyond the demonstrated knowledge.
Relationship between Macular Vessel Density and Focal Electroretinograms in Early Normal Tension Glaucoma

ABSTRACT Purpose: To evaluate the relationship between the macular vessel density and photopic negative response (PhNR) amplitude of focal electroretinograms (ERGs) in patients with early-stage normal tension glaucoma (NTG). Materials and Methods: This prospective cross-sectional study included a total of 42 subjects with early-stage NTG. Optical coherence tomography angiography was used to measure macular vessel density, and focal ERGs were elicited by a white light stimulus (30 cd/m2) with background light (1.5 cd/m2). The amplitude of the PhNR was measured from the peak of the b-wave to the PhNR trough. Mean visual field sensitivity was measured by the Humphrey Field Analyzer (HFA) program central 10–2. Spearman’s coefficients were used to evaluate the correlation between the macular vessel density, PhNR amplitude, mean deviation (MD) of the HFA 10–2, retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thickness, and ganglion cell complex (GCC) thickness measured by spectral domain-optical coherence tomography. Results: The mean MD of the HFA 10–2 was −2.0 ± 3.2 dB. The PhNR amplitude significantly correlated with the macular vessel density (r = 0.420, P = 0.006), but not with the MD, GCC thickness, or RNFL thickness. The macular vessel density significantly correlated with the MD (r = 0.364, P = 0.018) and RNFL thickness (r = 0.369, P = 0.016), but not with GCC thickness (r = 0.266, P = 0.089). Conclusions: Macular vessel density significantly correlated with PhNR amplitude in patients with early-stage NTG, suggesting that microvascular alterations are associated with functional changes recorded by focal ERG in very early-stage glaucoma.
Electroplating-Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Electroplating is a process that uses electrical current to reduce dissolved metal cations so that they form a coherent metal coating on an electrode. The term is also used for electrical oxidation of anions onto a solid subtrate, as in the formation silver chloride on silver wire to make silver/silver-chloride electrodes. Electroplating is primarily used to change the surface properties of an object (e.g. abrasion and wear resistance, corrosion protection, lubricity, aesthetic qualities, etc.), but may also be used to build up thickness on undersized parts or to form objects by electroforming.
Morphospace exploration reveals divergent fitness optima between plants and pollinators

The obligate mutualism and exquisite specificity of many plant-pollinator interactions lead to the expectation that flower phenotypes (e.g., corolla tube length) and corresponding pollinator traits (e.g., hawkmoth proboscis length) are congruent as a result of coevolution by natural selection. However, the effect of variation in flower morphology on the fitness of plants and their pollinators has not been quantified systematically. In this study, we employed the theoretical morphospace paradigm using a combination of 3D printing, electronic sensing, and machine vision technologies to determine the influence of two flower morphological features (corolla curvature and nectary diameter) on the fitness of both parties: the artificial flower and its hawkmoth pollinator. Contrary to the expectation that the same flower morphology maximizes the fitness of both plant and pollinator, we found that the two parties have divergent optima for corolla curvature, with non-overlapping fitness peaks in flower morphospace. The divergent fitness optima between plants and pollinators could lead to evolutionary diversification in both groups.
Progerin accelerates atherosclerosis by inducing endoplasmic reticulum stress in vascular smooth muscle cells

Hutchinson–Gilford progeria syndrome (HGPS) is a rare genetic disorder caused by progerin, a mutant lamin A variant. HGPS patients display accelerated aging and die prematurely, typically from atherosclerosis complications. Recently, we demonstrated that progerin‐driven vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) loss accelerates atherosclerosis leading to premature death in apolipoprotein E‐deficient mice. However, the molecular mechanism underlying this process remains unknown. Using a transcriptomic approach, we identify here endoplasmic reticulum stress (ER) and the unfolded protein responses as drivers of VSMC death in two mouse models of HGPS exhibiting ubiquitous and VSMC‐specific progerin expression. This stress pathway was also activated in HGPS patient‐derived cells. Targeting ER stress response with a chemical chaperone delayed medial VSMC loss and inhibited atherosclerosis in both progeria models, and extended lifespan in the VSMC‐specific model. Our results identify a mechanism underlying cardiovascular disease in HGPS that could be targeted in patients. Moreover, these findings may help to understand other vascular diseases associated with VSMC death, and provide insight into aging‐dependent vascular damage related to accumulation of unprocessed toxic forms of lamin A.
Effects of Sleep Restriction on Food-Related Inhibitory Control and Reward in Adolescents.

OBJECTIVE This experimental study evaluated associations between sleep duration, food-related inhibitory control, and food reward in adolescents aged 12-18 with normal weight and overweight/obesity. The potential moderating effect of weight status on the associations between sleep, inhibitory control, and food reward was also examined. METHODS Thirty-two adolescents with normal weight and 32 adolescents with overweight/obesity (ages 12-18) participated in this study. Participants spent 5 hr in bed per night (restricted sleep) or 9 hr in bed per night (habitual sleep) for five nights with experimental periods separated by 3 weeks. Participants completed a food-related inhibitory control task and a questionnaire assessing food reward on the sixth day of each study phase. RESULTS Repeated measures analyses of variance revealed that adolescents performed more poorly on a food-related inhibitory control task and had heightened food reward following sleep restriction. Adolescents with overweight/obesity demonstrated heightened food reward compared with adolescents with normal weight; there was no main effect of weight on food-related inhibitory control. There was a significant interaction between sleep condition and weight status on food reward, with adolescents with normal weight demonstrating heightened food reward following sleep restriction. Adolescents with overweight/obesity showed consistently high food reward with no effect of sleep duration. CONCLUSIONS When sleep restricted, adolescents demonstrated heightened food reward and were less able to inhibit prepotent responses to food images. Adolescents with normal weight who experience acute sleep restriction may perceive foods to be more rewarding relative to normal sleep.
ASYMPTOTIC BEHAVIOUR OF SOLUTIONS OF QUASI-LINEAR PARABOLIC EQUATIONS WITH NON-LINEAR FLUX

In this paper we study the large time behaviour of solutions of the quasilinear parabolic equation with nonlinear boundary conditions ut = div a(x,Du) in (0,∞)× Ω − ∂u ∂ηa ∈ β(u) on (0,∞)× ∂Ω u(x, 0) = u0(x) in Ω. We show that the solutions stabilize as t → ∞ by converging to a constant function. For some particular boundary conditions we also obtain a decay rate. Introduction Let Ω be a bounded domain in R with smooth boundary ∂Ω and 1 < p < ∞. Consider a vector valued function a mapping Ω× R into R and satisfying (H1) a is a Carathéodory function ( i.e., the map ξ → a(x, ξ) is continuous for almost all x and the map x → a(x, ξ) is measurable for every ξ ) and there exists λ > 0 such that ⟨a(x, ξ), ξ⟩ ≥ λ∣ξ∣p ( 1 < p < ∞ ) holds for every ξ and a.e. x ∈ Ω, where ⟨, ⟩ means scalar product in R . There is no restriction in assuming that λ = 1. (H2) For every ξ and η ∈ R , ξ ∕= η, and a.e. x ∈ Ω it holds ⟨a(x, ξ)− a(x, η), ξ − η⟩ > 0. 1991 Mathematics Subject Classification. 35K60, 35B40, 47H20.
Plasma osteopontin may predict neuroinflammation and the severity of pediatric traumatic brain injury

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is the leading cause of death in children and adolescents in developed countries, but there are no blood-based biomarkers to support the diagnosis or prognosis of pediatric TBI to-date. Here we report that the plasma levels of osteopontin (OPN), a phosphoprotein chiefly secreted by macrophages and/or activated microglia, may contribute to this goal. In animal models of TBI, while OPN, fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), and matrix metalloproteinase 9 (MMP-9) were all readily induced by controlled cortical impact in the brains of one-month-old mice, only OPN and GFAP ascended in the blood in correlation with high neurological severity scores (NSS). In children with TBI (three to nine years of age, n = 66), the plasma levels of OPN, but not GFAP, correlated with severe TBI (Glasgow Coma Score ≤ 8) and intracranial lesions at emergency department. In addition, the plasma OPN levels in severe pediatric TBI patients continued to ascend for 72 h and correlated with mortality and the days requiring ventilator or intensive care unit support, whereas the plasma GFAP levels lacked these properties. Together, these results suggest that plasma OPN outperforms GFAP and may be a neuroinflammation-based diagnostic and prognostic biomarker in pediatric TBI.
Epidemiological factors influencing in prevalence of cryptosporidium in buffalo calves of Haryana

The present study report the influence of epidemiological factors like age, sex, season, faecal consistency and rearing system on prevalence of Cryptosporidium species in buffalo calves below three month of age from Haryana state. A total of 402 faecal samples from the calves were stained by Modified ZiehlNeelsen staining (MZN) method. Thirty five samples were found positive with prevalence percent of 8.7%. Age wise comparison showed a significantly high prevalence in calves between the age group of 16-30 days. Prevalence of cryptosporidiosis was higher during rainy (12%) season as compared to autumn (9.3%), winter (7.9%) and summer (6.8%) seasons. Depending on the consistency of dung, the highest prevalence was observed in mucus filled bloody samples. Female calves (10.17%) showed slightly higher prevalence rate than male animals(7.6%). In relation to rearing system, significantly (p<0.05) higher prevalence was observed in organized farms (26.7%) as compared to unorganized farms (6.44%). In conclusion, the prevalence of Cryptosporidium in dairy calves should be correlated with the factors like age, sex, season, dung consistency and rearing system of the animal to arrive at a reliable epidemiological data on bovine cryptosporidiosis in Haryana.
Temporomandibular disorders in Class II malocclusion patients after surgical mandibular advancement treatment as compared to non-treated patients.

BACKGROUND Severe malocclusions may cause functional and aesthetic problems and symptoms of temporomandibular disorders (TMD). Studies have investigated association between malocclusions and TMDs and shown controversial findings. OBJECTIVE Purpose of this investigation was to examine the prevalence of TMD sub-diagnoses, using Diagnostic Criteria for the TMD (DC/TMD), in patients with Class II malocclusion and retrognathic mandible who had undergone mandibular advancement surgery 4-8 years previously, and to compare their frequencies with non-treated patients with a similar pre-existing condition. METHODS Study cohort comprised 151 patients who had orthognathic treatment due to mandibular retrognathia in 2007-2011. Seventy-seven (51%) participated in the study (Group 1). Group 2 comprised 22 patients who were planned for orthognathic treatment but had not started their treatment. Patients filled in the Finnish version of the DC/TMD Symptom Questionnaire and were examined using to the DC/TMD Axis I. DC/TMD Symptom Questionnaire were inquired by phone from 24 of the 74 patients who did not participate in the study. RESULTS Results showed that Group 2 had more myalgia (13% vs 50%, P < 0.001) and arthralgia (18% vs 65%, P < 0.001) sub-diagnoses than Group 1. A tendency was noted that Group 2 had more pain-related TMD symptoms than Group 1. No differences were found between Groups 1 and 3 in gender and age distribution or frequency TMD symptoms. CONCLUSION Prevalence of especially pain-related TMD diagnoses was higher in Group 2 compared to Group 1, thus indicating a possible beneficial effect of this treatment for TMD.
A POD-DEIM REDUCED ORDER MODEL WITH DEFORMING MESH FOR AEROELASTIC APPLICATIONS

Reduced-order models (ROMs) of nonlinear dynamical systems are essential for broadening the scope of high-fidelity non linear CFD design optimizations or aeroelastic investigations. The wide variety of fluid dynamics ROMs reported in literature shares the aim of reducing the dimensionality of dynamical systems by performing a projection of the governing equations onto a basis that may be often constructed via the Proper Orthogonal Decomposition (POD). Unfortunately, the relevance of POD is still an open question for aeroelastic applications because it is impossible to define a spatial correlation for a domain that is moving and deforming during the simulation. Moreover, when addressing real-life applications, the non-linear compressible Navier-Stokes equations have to be considered, resulting in an additional difficulty. In the present work, we propose a ROM based on the classical Galerkin projection onto a basis contructed via index-based POD. The discrete empirical interpolation method (DEIM) is adopted in order to efficiently deal with the compressible Navier-Stokes equations non-linearities. Numerical tests have been carried out to evaluate the performance of the present ROM. First, we validate the classical POD-DEIM technique for a timedependent and slightly compressible flow around a NACA 0012 airfoil at high incidence. Then, the POD-DEIM ROM is used to reproduce the solution of a high-fidelity model based on the Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) formulation combined with a deforming grid for a flow around an oscillating supercritical airfoil. On the basis of the achieved results, we highlight the limits and the strengths of the proposed technique. Fabrizio Di Donfrancesco, Antoine Placzek and Jean-Camille Chassaing
Elements of a US R&D Plan to Develop Fusion Nuclear Materials

In addition to plasma physics challenges, demonstration of the scientific feasibility of fusion energy requires development of high-performance materials that can sustain the long-pulse fusion reaction, harvest the fusion power, and regenerate the tritium fuel. Fusion Nuclear Materials encompass the corresponding 3 functional areas: (a) plasma facing materials (PFMs), (b) structural materials, and (c) in-vessel blanket materials.
In the Range of 20 to 35 ms, an Echo-time of 20 ms is Preferred for 3-tesla Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is one of the techniques capable of detecting human brain function noninvasively. Although many fMRI studies have adopted echo-time (TE) of 30 to 40 ms aiming to maximize blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signal change, large distortion and signal dropout occur near air-filled spaces such as frontal sinus in functional imaging because of the magnetic field irregularities. Theoretically, shorter TE could decrease the magnetic distortion and signal dropout near air. However, it has not been determined whether short TE of less than 30 ms may affect the statistical t value of functional image, which is the most important factor to evaluate results of fMRI study. In the present study, we assessed whether shorter TE can be utilized for fMRI study of the human brain. Nineteen healthy volunteers were scanned using fMRI during finger tapping and viewing checker-circle tasks. Signal dropout near the sinus, statistical t value, percent signal change, and modified temporal signal to noise ratio (mtSNR) of functional images were evaluated in the primary motor cortex and primary visual cortex while TE was varied between 20 and 35 ms. Signal dropout was the smallest at a TE of 20 ms, whereas there was no significant effect of TE on the statistical t value both in the primary motor cortex and in the primary visual cortex activity. These findings suggest that 20 ms is the optimal TE value in the range of 20 ms to 35 ms for fMRI.
Assessing Cultural Orientation as a Reflective- Formative Second Order Construct-A Recent PLS-SEM Approach

It is strongly believed that Hofstede’s cultural dimensions do have a significant influence on the behaviours of individuals. The existing studies have mostly examined the five dimensions of Hofstede’s cultural framework including power distance, long term versus short term orientation, masculinity versus femininity, uncertainty avoidance, and individualism versus collectivism. However, there is a dearth of empirical studies investigating indulgence versus restraint as the sixth dimension under the Malaysian context. Thus, to fill this research gap, this study was conducted among Malaysian entrepreneurs to examine the significance of all six dimensions of Hofstede’s cultural framework under the context of Malaysia. The data was collected using snowball and quota sampling techniques from 450 Malaysian entrepreneurs of wholesale and retail SMEs. SPSS version 20 and Smart-PLS software were used for the descriptive and inferential data analysis respectively. Moreover, the construct of cultural orientation was treated as reflective-formative second order construct and the latest approach proposed by Hair et al. (2017) was used to analyse this construct. The findings of this study have provided the empirical evidence regarding the significance of all six Hofstede’s cultural dimensions as the formative indicators of the construct cultural orientations that has been considered as the reflective-formative second order construct in this study. The study limitations, future recommendations, and conclusions are presented at the end.
Deep Learning With Asymmetric Connections and Hebbian Updates

We show that deep networks can be trained using Hebbian updates yielding similar performance to ordinary back-propagation on challenging image datasets. To overcome the unrealistic symmetry in connections between layers, implicit in back-propagation, the feedback weights are separate from the feedforward weights. The feedback weights are also updated with a local rule, the same as the feedforward weights—a weight is updated solely based on the product of activity of the units it connects. With fixed feedback weights as proposed in Lillicrap et al. (2016) performance degrades quickly as the depth of the network increases. If the feedforward and feedback weights are initialized with the same values, as proposed in Zipser and Rumelhart (1990), they remain the same throughout training thus precisely implementing back-propagation. We show that even when the weights are initialized differently and at random, and the algorithm is no longer performing back-propagation, performance is comparable on challenging datasets. We also propose a cost function whose derivative can be represented as a local Hebbian update on the last layer. Convolutional layers are updated with tied weights across space, which is not biologically plausible. We show that similar performance is achieved with untied layers, also known as locally connected layers, corresponding to the connectivity implied by the convolutional layers, but where weights are untied and updated separately. In the linear case we show theoretically that the convergence of the error to zero is accelerated by the update of the feedback weights.
Evaluating the Contextual Integrity of Privacy Regulation: Parents' IoT Toy Privacy Norms Versus COPPA

Increased concern about data privacy has prompted new and updated data protection regulations worldwide. However, there has been no rigorous way to test whether the practices mandated by these regulations actually align with the privacy norms of affected populations. Here, we demonstrate that surveys based on the theory of contextual integrity provide a quantifiable and scalable method for measuring the conformity of specific regulatory provisions to privacy norms. We apply this method to the U.S. Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), surveying 195 parents and providing the first data that COPPA's mandates generally align with parents' privacy expectations for Internet-connected "smart" children's toys. Nevertheless, variations in the acceptability of data collection across specific smart toys, information types, parent ages, and other conditions emphasize the importance of detailed contextual factors to privacy norms, which may not be adequately captured by COPPA.