Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
LncRNA H19 diminishes dopaminergic neuron loss by mediating microRNA-301b-3p in Parkinson’s disease via the HPRT1-mediated Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNA) and microRNAs (miRNAs) are a subject of active investigation in neurodegenerative disorders including Parkinson’s disease (PD). We hypothesized a regulatory role of lncRNA H19 with involvement of hypoxanthine phosphoribosyltransferase 1 (HPRT1) in dopaminergic neuron loss in PD model mice obtained by 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) lesions. We predicted the differentially expressed genes and related mechanisms by microarray analysis. We measured the expression of tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) and proneural genes in the substantia nigra of lesioned mice before and after treatment with lentiviral oe-HPRT1, agomir-miR-301b-3p and inhibition of the Wnt/β-catenin pathway. We also evaluated the relationship among lncRNA H19, HPRT1 and miR-301b-3p as well as the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway in these mice. The obtained results predicted and further confirmed a low level of HPRT1 in lesioned mice. We found low expression of lncRNA H19 and showed that its forced overexpression regulated HPRT1 by binding to miR-301b-3p. The overexpression of HPRT1 increased TH expression and inhibited dopaminergic neuron loss via activating the Wnt/β-catenin pathway, as reflected by increased expressions of Nurr-1, Pitx-3, Ngn-2 and NeuroD1. Thus, overexpressed lncRNA H19 protects against dopaminergic neuron loss in this PD model through activating the Wnt/β-catenin pathway via impairing miR-301b-3p-targeted inhibition of HPRT1 expression.
Plant Effects on Parasitoid Foraging: Differences between Two Tritrophic Systems

Plants can affect the effectiveness of carnivorous insects in various ways. An important aspect is that herbivory results in the emission of plant volatiles that are used by carnivores to locate their herbivorous victims. Here we show that such plant volatiles may affect parasitoids differently in two different tritrophic systems. The parasitoidCotesia kariyai(Hymenoptera: Braconidae) is attracted to volatiles from uninfested plants, both host-food plants and non-host-food plants. However, females of this parasitoid clearly prefer host (Pseudaletia separatalarvae)-infested corn plants over uninfested corn plants or artificially damaged plants. This response is quite specific: feeding by early larval instars results in attraction of the parasitoids, while feeding by late larval instars does not. Another parasitoid,Cotesia glomerata,is a specialist ofPieris rapaelarvae in mainland Japan where they feed on crucifers. The wasps preferred uninfestedRorippa indicaplants to non-host-food plants and host-infestedR. indicaplants, or artificially damagedR. indicaplants to uninfestedR. indica.This response was not specific: in a two-choice test the wasps preferred volatiles from artificially damaged plants over those from infested plants. The differences in plant cues available to the two parasitoids are discussed in terms of plant effects on biological control agents.
Framing well-being in a college campus setting

Abstract This investigatory study sought to explore the range and variation of well-being initiatives on a select cross-section of college campuses across the United States and in Canada. This whitepaper seeks to highlight innovative practices that may inspire institutions to consider new ways of promoting well-being for both students and employees. In this whitepaper, we report findings from 10 participating higher education institutions across three major categories: student-serving programs, employee-serving programs, and hybrid programs. The qualitative data collected from key stakeholder interviews and focus groups were analyzed for trends between and across institutions. Importantly, the results of this study are intended to be hypothesis-generating as opposed to hypothesis-testing. In an effort to describe the state of the field with respect to both common and innovative practices the findings have generated additional questions for further research. Several themes emerged from this study: (1) Campuses have not adopted a universally-accepted definition of well-being; (2) While many institutions are using iterations of the wellness wheel and its various dimensions (e.g. physical, emotional, intellectual, social, spiritual, financial) to guide their efforts, there is not a dominant model for structuring or measuring well-being initiatives on campus; (3) There appears to be a systematic shift from use of the term “wellness” to “well-being”; (4) While many institutions are still utilizing traditional health education practices, there appears to be a movement toward more systemic, environmental approaches to well- being, including structural, organizational, and financial strategies, in addition to a range of policy initiatives; (5) There is a range of engagement in well-being initiatives, with significant variance based on institutional philosophy; and (6) Many institutions are designing well-being initiatives that address health disparities—particularly among underrepresented or marginalized populations.
Elucidating biodiversity shifts in ballast water tanks during a cross-latitudinal transfer: complementary insights from molecular analyses.

In this study, the evolution of ballast water (BW) assemblages across different trophic levels was characterized over a 21-day cross-latitudinal vessel transit using a combination of molecular methods. Triplicate ballast water (BW) samples were collected every second day and size fractionated (<2.7 µm, 10 µm, >50 µm). Measurements of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), metabarcoding of environmental nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) analyses, complemented by microscopy and flow-cytometry were performed on each sample. Measured ATP concentrations exhibited high variance between replicates, and a strong negative trend in the large (≥50 µm) fraction over the voyage. In concert with microscopy, the metabarcoding data indicated a die-off of larger metazoans during the first week of study, and gradual reductions in dinoflagellates and ochrophytes. The ATP and metabarcoding data signaled persistent or increased cellular activity of heterotrophic bacteria and protists in the BW, which was supported by flow-cytometry. The metabarcoding showed the presence of active bacteria in all size fractions suggesting that the sequential filtration approach does not ensure taxonomical differentiation, which has implications for BW quality assessment. Although our data show that ATP and metabarcoding have potential for indicative ballast water screening for BW compliance monitoring, further research and technological development is needed to improve representativeness of sampling and deliver the unequivocal response criteria required by the international Ballast Water Management Convention.
Distribution of CCR5‐Δ32 and CCR2–64I alleles in an Argentine Amerindian population

: In order to evaluate the frequency distributions of CCR5-Delta 32 and CCR2-64I polymorphisms in an Amerindian population, we tested a total of 42 Chiriguanos individuals that are aboriginal inhabitants of the north west of Argentina. Only one carried the CCR5-Delta 32 allele (0.0238), while 17 out of 35 carried the CCR2-64I mutation, including one homozygous for the mutated allele (0.2571). Although the cohort studied is considered highly endogamic, the HLA genotyping revealed that 8 out of 42 subjects had a gene flow from Caucasian populations. The only heterozygous CCR5+/Delta 32 found and three heterozygous CCR2+/64I belonged to the admix group. In conclusion, the protective deletion CCR5-Delta 32 is practically absent in Chiriguanos whereas the CCR2-64I allele is highly frequent.
The structure of a leafminer–parasitoid community

Summary 1. Quantitative food webs were constructed describing the community of leafmining moths in the genus Phyllonorycter (Gracillariidae) and their parasitoids at a site in southern England. 2. Twelve species of Phyllonorycter were reared from four species of tree. The moths were attacked by 27 species of hymenopterous parasitoids. 3. Four webs were constructed for successive moth generations over 2 years. A summary web was built and a comparison made between webs expressed in terms of number of mines and number of females recruiting to the next generation. 4. All hosts and most parasitoids were recorded in the first year, but new host–parasitoid associations were discovered throughout the sampling period. The diversity of mines and parasitoids was similar across generations. 5. The structure of the parasitoid community was strongly influenced by the host plant. 6. The extent of potential indirect interactions between hosts was assessed by constructing quantitative parasitoid overlap diagrams. The measure of influence used was the importance of one species as a source of parasitoids attacking the other. The greatest potential for apparent competition was between species of host attacking the same species of plant.
INVITED REVIEW SERIES: NEW FRONTIERS IN SLEEP-DISORDERED BREATHING

One-seventh of the world’s adult population, or approximately one billion people, are estimated to have OSA. Over the past four decades, obesity, the main risk factor for OSA, has risen in striking proportion worldwide. In the past 5 years, the WHO estimates global obesity to affect almost two billion adults. A second major risk factor for OSA is advanced age. As the prevalence of the ageing population and obesity increases, the vulnerability towards having OSA increases. In addition to these traditional OSA risk factors, studies of the global population reveal select contributing features and phenotypes, including extreme phenotypes and symptom clusters that deserve further examination. Untreated OSA is associated with significant comorbidities and mortality. These represent a tremendous threat to the individual and global health. Beyond the personal toll, the economic costs of OSA are far-reaching, affecting the individual, family and society directly and indirectly, in terms of productivity and public safety. A better understanding of the pathophysiology, individual and ethnic similarities and differences is needed to better facilitate management of this chronic disease. In some countries, measures of the OSA disease burden are sparse. As the global burden of OSA and its associated comorbidities are projected to further increase, the infrastructure to diagnose and manage OSA will need to adapt. The use of novel approaches (electronic health records and artificial intelligence) to stratify risk, diagnose and affect treatment are necessary. Together, a unified multi-disciplinary, multi-organizational, global approach will be needed to manage this disease.
Increasing Access to Mental Health Services Through Reduction of Stigma

* Abbreviation: AAP — : American Academy of Pediatrics Despite the mental health needs of children and adolescents, families may have a general reluctance to access care due to a perception of stigma. With >22% of children and youth being diagnosed with behavioral health needs in the United States before they are 18 years old,1 there is a critical need to ensure that these individuals access mental health services before a crisis. Several components can help with this: screening for mental health needs, facilitating referral, and addressing willingness to access care. In this issue of Pediatrics , “A School-Based Intervention for Mental illness Stigma: A Cluster Randomized Trial” by Link et al2 highlights the short- and long-term impacts of a middle school intervention on reducing stigma and social isolation and increasing the potential of … Address correspondence to Shashank V. Joshi, MD, FAAP, DFAACAP, Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Stanford University, 401 Quarry Rd, Stanford, CA 94305-5719. E-mail: svjoshi{at}stanford.edu
Roadmap toward the 10 ps time-of-flight PET challenge

Since the seventies, positron emission tomography (PET) has become an invaluable medical molecular imaging modality with an unprecedented sensitivity at the picomolar level, especially for cancer diagnosis and the monitoring of its response to therapy. More recently, its combination with x-ray computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance (MR) has added high precision anatomic information in fused PET/CT and PET/MR images, thus compensating for the modest intrinsic spatial resolution of PET. Nevertheless, a number of medical challenges call for further improvements in PET sensitivity. These concern in particular new treatment opportunities in the context personalized (also called precision) medicine, such as the need to dynamically track a small number of cells in cancer immunotherapy or stem cells for tissue repair procedures. A better signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in the image would allow detecting smaller size tumours together with a better staging of the patients, thus increasing the chances of putting cancer in complete remission. Moreover, there is an increasing demand for reducing the radioactive doses injected to the patients without impairing image quality. There are three ways to improve PET scanner sensitivity: improving detector efficiency, increasing geometrical acceptance of the imaging device and pushing the timing performance of the detectors. Currently, some pre-localization of the electron-positron annihilation along a line-of-response (LOR) given by the detection of a pair of annihilation photons is provided by the detection of the time difference between the two photons, also known as the time-of-flight (TOF) difference of the photons, whose accuracy is given by the coincidence time resolution (CTR). A CTR of about 10 picoseconds FWHM will ultimately allow to obtain a direct 3D volume representation of the activity distribution of a positron emitting radiopharmaceutical, at the millimetre level, thus introducing a quantum leap in PET imaging and quantification and fostering more frequent use of 11C radiopharmaceuticals. The present roadmap article toward the advent of 10 ps TOF-PET addresses the status and current/future challenges along the development of TOF-PET with the objective to reach this mythic 10 ps frontier that will open the door to real-time volume imaging virtually without tomographic inversion. The medical impact and prospects to achieve this technological revolution from the detection and image reconstruction point-of-views, together with a few perspectives beyond the TOF-PET application are discussed.
Bacteriological Studies of Bovine Semen. I. Numbers of Bacteria and the Relation to Fertility

Summary 1. Wide variations were found in the bacterial plate counts of semen from various bulls and in the counts of semen collected at different times from the same animal. The plate count on 202 ejaculates from 36 bulls ranged from less than 100 to more than 3 million organisms per ml. , with an average of 200,000 per ml. 2. No significant differences were observed in the plate counts of first and second ejaculates collected in succession from the same bull. Plate counts for 91 paired ejaculates showed 220,000 bacteria per ml. for first ejaculates and 130,000 per ml. for second ejaculates. 3. There was no apparent relationship between the average plate counts of semen and the general fertility level of bulls. 4. There was no important relationship between the age of bulls and the average plate count of semen.
Genotypic Regulation of Type I Interferon Induction Pathways by Frameshift (F) Proteins of Hepatitis C Virus

Although naturally present in HCV infection patient serum, the virological or immunological functions of the HCV F protein, which is a frameshift product of core coding sequences, remain unclear. Here, we report the effects of the HCV F protein between genotypes and discuss a potential explanation for the differential responses to type I IFN-based therapy among patients infected with different genotypes of HCV. Our study provides one step forward to understanding the host response during HCV infection and new insights for the prediction of the outcome of IFN-based therapy in HCV patients. ABSTRACT Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has evolved mechanisms to evade innate immunity that are leading to chronic infections. The immunological function of the HCV frameshift (F) protein, which is a frameshift product of core coding sequences, has not been well characterized. The HCV F protein is produced during natural HCV infections and is found most commonly in genotype 1 HCV. In this study, we investigated whether the F protein plays a role in type I interferon (IFN) induction pathways. We engineered F expression constructs from core coding sequences of 4 genotypes (1a, 2a, 3a, and 4a) of HCV as well as the sequences which would only be able to produce core proteins. The peptide lengths and amino acids sequences of F proteins are highly variable. We hypothesized that F proteins from different genotypes might control the type I IFN production and response differently. We found that both IFN-beta (IFN-β) promoter activities are significantly higher in genotype 1a F protein (F1a)-expressing cells. Conversely, the IFN-β promoter activities are lower in genotype 2a F (F2a) protein-expressing cells. We also used real-time PCR to confirm IFN-β mRNA expression levels. By generating chimera F proteins, we discovered that the effects of F proteins were determined by the amino acid sequence 40 to 57 of genotype 1a. The regulation of type I IFN induction pathway is related but not limited to the activity of F1a to interact with proteasome subunits and to disturb the proteasome activity. Further molecular mechanisms of how F proteins from different genotypes of HCV control these pathways differently remain to be investigated. IMPORTANCE Although naturally present in HCV infection patient serum, the virological or immunological functions of the HCV F protein, which is a frameshift product of core coding sequences, remain unclear. Here, we report the effects of the HCV F protein between genotypes and discuss a potential explanation for the differential responses to type I IFN-based therapy among patients infected with different genotypes of HCV. Our study provides one step forward to understanding the host response during HCV infection and new insights for the prediction of the outcome of IFN-based therapy in HCV patients.
Coronavirus conspiracy beliefs, mistrust, and compliance with government guidelines in England

Abstract Background An invisible threat has visibly altered the world. Governments and key institutions have had to implement decisive responses to the danger posed by the coronavirus pandemic. Imposed change will increase the likelihood that alternative explanations take hold. In a proportion of the general population there may be strong scepticism, fear of being misled, and false conspiracy theories. Our objectives were to estimate the prevalence of conspiracy thinking about the pandemic and test associations with reduced adherence to government guidelines. Methods A non-probability online survey with 2501 adults in England, quota sampled to match the population for age, gender, income, and region. Results Approximately 50% of this population showed little evidence of conspiracy thinking, 25% showed a degree of endorsement, 15% showed a consistent pattern of endorsement, and 10% had very high levels of endorsement. Higher levels of coronavirus conspiracy thinking were associated with less adherence to all government guidelines and less willingness to take diagnostic or antibody tests or to be vaccinated. Such ideas were also associated with paranoia, general vaccination conspiracy beliefs, climate change conspiracy belief, a conspiracy mentality, and distrust in institutions and professions. Holding coronavirus conspiracy beliefs was also associated with being more likely to share opinions. Conclusions In England there is appreciable endorsement of conspiracy beliefs about coronavirus. Such ideas do not appear confined to the fringes. The conspiracy beliefs connect to other forms of mistrust and are associated with less compliance with government guidelines and greater unwillingness to take up future tests and treatment.
Positron Emission Tomography Imaging of Long-Term Expression of the 18 kDa Translocator Protein After Sudden Cardiac Arrest in Rats

Supplemental Digital Content is available in the text ABSTRACT Background: Knowledge about the neuroinflammatory state during months after sudden cardiac arrest is scarce. Neuroinflammation is mediated by cells that express the 18 kDa translocator protein (TSPO). We determined the time course of TSPO-expressing cells in a rat model of sudden cardiac arrest using longitudinal in vivo positron emission tomography (PET) imaging with the TSPO-specific tracer [18F]DAA1106 over a period of 6 months. Methods: Five male Sprague Dawley rats were resuscitated from 6 min sudden cardiac arrest due to ventricular fibrillation, three animals served as shams. PET measurements were performed on day 5, 8, 14, 90, and 180 after intervention. Magnetic resonance imaging was performed on day 140. Imaging was preceded by Barnes Maze spatial memory testing on day 3, 13, 90, and 180. Specificity of [18F]DAA1106 binding was confirmed by Iba-1 immunohistochemistry. Results: [18F]DAA1106 accumulated bilaterally in the dorsal hippocampus of all sudden cardiac arrest animals on all measured time points. Immunohistochemistry confirmed Iba-1 expressing cells in the hippocampal CA1 region. The number of Iba-1-immunoreactive objects per mm2 was significantly correlated with [18F]DAA1106 uptake. Additionally, two of the five sudden cardiac arrest rats showed bilateral TSPO-expression in the striatum that persisted until day 180. In Barnes Maze, the relative time spent in the target quadrant negatively correlates with dorsal hippocampal [18F]DAA1106 uptake on day 14 and 180. Conclusions: After sudden cardiac arrest, TSPO remains expressed over the long-term. Sustainable treatment options for neuroinflammation may be considered to improve cognitive functions after sudden cardiac arrest.
Assessment of PARP-1 Distribution in Tissues of Cynomolgus Monkeys

The poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase 1 (PARP-1) enzyme has received much attention in the last decade due to its promising role in cancer therapeutics. Despite the expanding use of PARP inhibitors in cancer therapy, little is known about PARP-1 tissue distribution. Our study provides a detailed survey of PARP-1 tissue and cellular distribution using well-preserved cynomolgus monkey organs and a well-characterized, highly specific monoclonal PARP-1 antibody. Overall, PARP-1 was detected in most organs, but its distribution was restricted to specific cells within each tissue, suggesting that PARP-1 expression is tightly regulated. The strongest expression was in the pituitary, the ovary, the male adrenal gland, and the thymus. One of the key findings of this study was the stronger expression of PARP-1 in proliferating cells rather than mature cells. This observation not only provides clues to the importance of PARP-1 in processes such as DNA replication and transcription in these cell types, but it also provides the basis for further investigation into the effects of its inhibition in the context of malignancy. Overall, this study greatly expands the current knowledge of PARP-1 tissue expression, enabling the identification of tissues where PARP inhibition may be most efficacious.