Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Exercise-Induced Neuroprotection and Recovery of Motor Function in Animal Models of Parkinson's Disease

Parkinson's disease (PD) is manifested by progressive motor, autonomic, and cognitive disturbances. Dopamine (DA) synthesizing neurons in the substantia nigra (SN) degenerate, causing a decline in DA level in the striatum that leads to the characteristic movement disorders. A disease-modifying therapy to arrest PD progression remains unattainable with current pharmacotherapies, most of which cause severe side effects and lose their efficacy with time. For this reason, there is a need to seek new therapies supporting the pharmacological treatment of PD. Motor therapy is recommended for pharmacologically treated PD patients as it alleviates the symptoms. Molecular mechanisms behind the beneficial effects of motor therapy are unknown, nor is it known whether such therapy may be neuroprotective in PD patients. Due to obvious limitations, human studies are unlikely to answer these questions; therefore, the use of animal models of PD seems indispensable. Motor therapy in animal models of PD characterized by the loss of dopaminergic neurons has neuroprotective and neuroregenerative effects, and the completeness of neuronal protection may depend on (i) degree of neuronal loss, (ii) duration and intensity of exercise, and (iii) time elapsed between insult and commencing of training. As the physical activity is neuroprotective for dopaminergic neurons, the question arises what is the mechanism of this protective action. A current hypothesis assumes a central role of neurotrophic factors in the neuroprotection of dopaminergic neurons, even though it is still not clear whether increased DA level in the nigrostriatal axis results from neurogenesis of dopaminergic neurons in the SN, recovery of the phenotype of dopaminergic neurons, increased sprouting of the residual dopaminergic axons in the striatum, or generation of local striatal neurons from inhibitory interneurons. In the present review, we discuss studies describing the influence of physical exercise on the PD-like changes manifested in animal models of the disease and focus our interest on the current state of knowledge on the mechanism of neuroprotection induced by physical activity as a supportive therapy in PD.
A Distance-Based Neurorehabilitation Evaluation Method Using Linear SVM and Resting-State fMRI

During neurorehabilitation, clinical measurements are widely adopted to evaluate behavioral improvements after treatment. However, it is not able to identify or monitor the change of central nervous system (CNS) of each individual patient. Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) has been widely used to investigate brain functions in healthy controls (HCs) and patients with neurological diseases, which could find functional changes following neurorehabilitation. In this paper, a distance-based rehabilitation evaluation method based on rs-fMRI was proposed. Specifically, we posit that in the functional connectivity (FC) space, patients and HCs distribute separately. Linear support vector machines (SVM) were trained on the brain networks to firstly separate patients from HCs. Second, the FC similarity between patients and HCs was measured by the L2 distance of each subject's feature vector to the separating hyperplane. Finally, statistical analysis of the distance revealed rehabilitation program induced improvements in patients and predicted rehabilitation outcomes. An rs-fMRI dataset with 22 HCs and 18 spinal cord injury (SCI) patients was utilized to validate our method. We built whole-brain networks using five atlases to test the robustness of the method and search for features under different node resolutions. The classifier successfully separated patients and HCs. Significant improvements in FC after treatment were found for the patients for all five atlases using the proposed method, which was consistent with clinical measurements. Furthermore, distance obtained from individual patient's longitudinal data showed a similar trend with each one's clinical scores, implying the possibility of individual rehabilitation outcome tracking and prediction. Our method not only provides a novel perspective of applying rs-fMRI to neurorehabilitation monitoring but also proves the potential in individualized rehabilitation prediction.
Antioxidant properties of Zhumeria majdae Rech . f . &

Zhumeria majdae Rech (ZM) has a limited geographic range in southern region of Iran (near Persian Golf). The leaves of this plant are using as a herbal tea, antiseptic and analgesic agent. Ethanol extract of Zhumeria majdae leaves and polar fractions were screened for their reducing power, radical scavenging capacity, inhibition of lipid peroxidation and anti toxicity effect on non-immortalized fibroblasts.The total phenolic compounds of Zhumeria majdae extract and polar fractions were determined, in order to assess their antioxidant activities. Zhumeria majdae extract and polar fractions showed antioxidant potential but ethyl acetate fraction was more active. Also, the phenolic compounds of ethyl acetate fraction was more than crude extract and butanol fraction. Crude extract of Zhumeria majdae (12.5-25 μg/ml) was not toxic on human non-immortalized fibroblasts. This result may confirm the antitoxic effect of Zhumeria majdae
Pathogenesis of a Tissue Loss Disease Affecting Multiple Species of Corals Along the Florida Reef Tract

An outbreak of stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD), emerged on reefs off the coast of southeast Florida in 2014 and continues to spread throughout Florida’s Reef Tract. SCTLD is causing extensive mortality of multiple coral species and disease signs vary among affected coral species with differences in rates of tissue loss (acute and subacute), lesion morphology (adjacent bleached zone or not) and lesion occurrence (focal and multi-focal). We examined the virulence, transmission dynamics and response to antibiotic treatment of coral species exhibiting different types of tissue loss lesions from two regions in Florida. M. cavernosa with subacute tissue loss lesions in the southeast Florida region near Fort Lauderdale was compared to corals (multiple species) with acute tissue loss lesions in the Middle Keys. Corals from both regions showed progressive tissue loss but the in situ rate of mortality was significantly higher in tagged colonies in the Keys. Aquaria studies showed disease transmission occurred through direct contact and through the water column for corals from both regions. However, transmission success was higher for corals with acute vs. subacute lesions. There was 100% transmission for both test species, M. cavernosa and M. meandrites, touching acute lesions. Among the three species touching subacute lesions, the disease transmitted readily to O. faveolata (100%) followed by M. cavernosa (30%) with no transmission occurring with P. astreoides. Diseased fragments of all species tested responded to antibiotic treatment with a cessation or slowing of the disease lesions suggesting that bacteria are involved in disease progression. Mortality was higher for in situ corals with acute lesions and transmission was higher in M. canvernosa exposed to acute lesions compared to subacute lesions, suggesting that different microbes may be involved with the two lesion types. However, since in situ mortality of M. cavernosa was not measured in the Middle Keys, we cannot completely rule out that a common pathogen is involved but is less virulent within M. cavernosa.
EXTERNAL AUDITORS, CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AND MINIMISATION OF FRAUD: AN ECONOMETRIC TEST OF SELECTED INDIAN COMPANIES

It was the belief of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (“SEBI”) that efforts to improve corporate governance standards in India must continue. Corporate governance is the acceptance by management of the inalienable rights of shareholders as the true owners of the corporation and of their own role as trustees on behalf of the shareholders. The purpose of this study is to investigate the corporate governance role of external audits in a setting where companies traditionally rely more on debt than equity capital. The study has partitioned the Indian audit market into two groups: the first group comprises the top (BIG) Four audit firms with Ernst and young at the top, followed by PriceWaterhouse & Co Deloitte Haskins & Sells, and KPMG, The second group include S.B. Billimoria & Co, S.R. Batliboi & Co, BSR & Co, , Lodha & Co, Lovelock & Lewes, Ambit-RSM ,Chaturvedi and Shah, Rajendra & co. "Six out of the first ten firms making the grade of the study allegiance to one or the other of what the world calls the Big Four," The sole exception is Kolkata-based Lodha & Co. These are classified as the dominant auditors, and the other group consists of all other auditors. 100 companies were selected (Listed either in NSE or BSE or both)* using stratified structured sampling technique. The paper assumed that an Indian company's demand for audit services from one of the two groups of auditors is determined by its set of stakeholders. A positive relationship was found between Indian companies' demand for dominant audit suppliers and the variables that have been used as proxies for the stakeholder interests of creditors, dispersed shareholders, and foreign suppliers. The study also explored a negative association between Indian companies' dominant audit supplier choices and the stakeholder interests of closely held companies. The results suggested that audits play a corporate governance role and econometrically the possibility of fraud can be minimised by getting their accounts audited by big four audit firms.
Quantifying the value of genetically specific organic lines within dairy breeding

In animal breeding, breeding goals are defined to give relative importance to certain traits, usually based on economic weights (Groen et al., 1997). In Denmark, Finland, and Sweden, the Nordic Total Merit index (NTM), based on common economic weights, is used as the breeding selection tool in dairy production (Kargo et al., 2014). Breeding goals are defined for specific production systems and circumstances. To develop a breeding goal that farmers want to use, it is important to take the objectives of farmers into account. Setting up a breeding goal that does not correspond to the preferences of farmers will make little sense (Nielsen et al., 2014). These preferences can be defined by using farmer choice experiments, for example using conjoint analysis (Tano et al., 2003), a partial profile design (Nielsen and Amer, 2007; Martin-Collado et al., 2015), or pairwise rankings using preference-based tools like 1000Minds (Byrne et al., 2012). Several studies have shown heterogeneity in farmers’ preferences for breeding goal traits (Duguma et al., 2011; Ragkos and Abas, 2015), and this may be linked to different cattle production systems (Sy et al., 1997; Ouma et al., 2007). If farmer preferences are heterogeneous, due to differences in production system, or in farm or farmer characteristics, it might be necessary to create multiple breeding goals within a population (Nielsen and Amer, 2007).
Anorectal melanoma surgical management: A tertiary cancer centre analysis

Background: Primary rectal malignant melanoma is an exceptionally rare neoplasm associated with an extremely poor prognosis despite aggressive treatment. The described management options for localized disease are abdominoperineal resection (APR) and wide local excision (WLE) with or without radiation. Objective: To assess the surgical outcomes of the patients with anorectal melanoma. Design and Setting: Retrospective study. Patients and Methods: This retrospective study describes the experience in surgical management of 18 cases of anorectal melanoma treated surgically at our center, between 2010 and 2015. Main Outcome Measures: To assess the median survival and recurrence rates of anorectal melanoma patients who underwent surgery. Sample size: Eighteen cases. Results: This is a retrospective study of 18 cases of anorectal melanoma. APR was performed in 77.8%, wide excision (WLE) in 16.7%, and posterior exenteration in 5.6%. The median survival of patients undergoing APR was 14.66 months and median survival of patients undergoing WLE was 18 months. No significant difference in median survival was observed in the patients undergoing abdominoperineal resection (APR) or wide local excision (P = 0.168). A significant difference in median survival between the node negative group and node positive group was observed (17 months vs 13.4 months P = 0.019). The median survival of patients with stage I, II, and III cancers were 17.28 months, 16 months, and 13.4 months, respectively. A statistically significant difference in median survival was found between patients with lympho-vascular invasive and noninvasive cancer (13.37 months vs 16.7 months P = 0.029). There was no significant difference in the recurrence rate between APR and WLE groups (86% vs 66% P = 0.893). Conclusion: Anorectal melanoma is an aggressive disease which require timely diagnosis. Nodal status is an important factor that impact median survival. There is no significant difference in survival when WLE compared to APR. Node positivity and lympho-vascular invasion confer poor prognosis. Recurrence rates are identical regardless of the surgical approach. Limitations: It is a retrospective series based on case records. A major drawback of this investigation is the limited detail available for each case. Not all patients who underwent local excision received radiotherapy. Conflict of Interest: None.
AAV Biology, Infectivity and Therapeutic Use from Bench to Clinic

Adeno-associated virus (AAV) has been isolated from numerous vertebrate species since 1966. Besides its wide and promiscuous tropism, AAV infection does not re‐ sult in considerable toxicity or pathogenicity and is capable of achieving adequate and long-term levels of gene transfer, especially following generation of the AAV recombinant variant: rAAV. Due to these properties, rAAV has gained special at‐ tention as a viral vector for gene therapy in the last decade. Currently, there are 130 clinical trials taking place worldwide for several diseases testing the safety and effi‐ cacy profiles of rAAV. During preclinical and clinical studies, several challenges have arisen in terms of reaching the full therapeutic potential of rAAV, such as effi‐ cient delivery of the virus in a targeted and specific manner to a desired tissue. Im‐ portantly, the development of immune responses towards the viral capsids poses an obstacle to rAAV applicability in the clinical setting. Numerous approaches have been developed in order to tailor an optimized therapeutic virus for treating specif‐ ic diseases, including the use of different AAV serotypes or the creation of recombi‐ nant capsid variants with distinctive transduction and immunological profiles. This chapter reviews current information on rAAV clinical trials and the potential for combining rAAV platform with other technologies, such as induced pluripotent cells and gene editing. out domains that are exposed to the surface of the capsid, rather than evenly distributed along the capsid protein sequence [10]. More interesting, Gao et al. compared phylogenies from human and nonhuman primate AAV serotypes. They observed that human AAV4 and AAV5 serotypes were the most divergent, and after they emerged, the rest of the viruses were clustered in groups that included human serotypes (AAV1, AAV6, AAV2, AAV3 and AAV9), exclusive rhesus serotypes (AAV7) or a combination of both (AAV8). Considering that human AAV serotypes share a high similarity in sequences with nonhuman AAV serotypes, they are both well disseminated and are able to cross species barriers. Therefore, there is a possibility that AAV from nonhuman primates could be used for treating human diseases. This is the case of AAVrh10, a serotype isolated from rhesus macaques. This virus was found to be signifi‐ cantly more efficient in transducing neurons from different areas in a healthy dog brain as compared with AAV1 or AAV5, but to a similar extent with AAV9 [11]. More importantly, the rhesus serotype is currently being tested for safety and efficacy in the clinic for the treatment of CNS diseases, such as Battens (NCT01414985 and NCT01161576, clinicaltrials.gov) and MLD (NCT01801709, clinicaltrials.gov). Additionally, a new study is planning to test the safety of this virus for delivering human alpha 1-antitrypsin cDNA to individuals with alpha 1-antitrypsin deficiency (NCT02168686, clinicaltrials.gov); although they are not yet recruiting patients.
Advocacy Activities in Nonprofit Human Service Organizations

The article describes political and advocacy activity in nonprofit human service organizations for children, elderly people, women, and people with disabilities. On the whole, the level of their political activity was found to be moderate, as perceived by the directors of the organizations. The main findings reveal a significant positive correlation between advocacy and political activity in nonprofit organizations and their perceived influence on setting the public agenda. Analysis of the findings indicates that the larger the number of volunteers in the organization, the greater the organization's political influence. In addition, it was found that the more dependent the organizations were on funding from local authorities, the lower the level of advocacy and political activity. The effectiveness of strategies used to attain political influence was also analyzed. The most effective strategy was exerting pressure on decision makers, both on the national and local levels.
Schottky Source/Drain SOI MOSFET with Shallow Doped Extension

Silicon-on-insulator metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect-transistor (SOI MOSFET) whose source and drain are composed of deep Schottky contact and shallow-doped extension is investigated. This new structure aims at reducing the floating body effect of a partially depleted SOI MOSFET while keeping its current drive at the same level as that of the conventional pn junction SOI MOSFET. The shallow doping was performed by implanting Sb to form n-channel devices. Incorporation of the shallow extensions into the Schottky source and drain SOI MOSFET can increase the current drive by about 2 orders of magnitude owing to the reduction of the effective Schottky barrier. It can also decrease the leakage current owing to the reduced field at the drain Schottky contact. The effect of the new source and drain structure on the floating body effect is investigated by fabricating devices with body contact. The body current in MOSFET operation and tests in lateral bipolar operation show that the proposed source/drain structure is effective in reducing the floating body effect and therefore suppressing the early drain breakdown of the SOI MOSFET.
The Molecular Basis for the Antigenic Diversity of Citrus Tristeza Virus: Implications for Virus Detection

Citrus tristeza virus (CTV) displays a wide range of seroiogical diversity. Strains have been reported from various countries that do not react with some of the CTV-specific monoclonal antibodies (MAb). We investigated the molecular basis for the emergence of these serotypes of CTV. While CTV-specific MAb MCA13 reacts predominantly with severe strains that cause quick decline and/or stem pitting, 3DF1 is a broad spec trum MAb that reacts with a majority of the CTV strains. To map the antigenic determinants recognized by these MAbs, capsid protein (CP) genes of several serologically and biologically di verse strains from different parts of the world were cloned and sequenced. Sequence comparisons showed that phenylalanine (Phe) at position 124 of the CP was conserved among all the MCA13-reactive strains. This was replaced by a tyrosine (Tyr) in MCA13-nonreactive strains. Sequence comparisons between 3DF1-reactive and nonreactive strains showed that amino acids Aspartic acid (Asp), Lysine, and Phe were conserved at positions 2,13 and 28 in the CPs of all the 3DF1-re active strains, respectively. These were replaced by Glycine, Threonine/Asp, and Tyr in 3DF1-nonreactive strains. The ami-no acid differences in both cases were due to single nucleotide changes in their respective codons. Mutations were intro duced that altered the codons in the cloned CP genes of selected strains and their effect on the reactivity of the two MAbs was evaluated by Western blot analysis. For MCA13, its reactivity dependent on the presence of phenylalanine residue at position 124, for 3DF1, the second amino acid, asp was found to be critical for its reactivity. Our data indicate that point mutations in the CP gene resulting in single amino acid substitutions can result in the loss of a viral epitope. This can drastically alter or eliminate the reactivity of a CTV-specific MAb. This provides the molecular basis for the existence/emergence of new sero types of CTV and indicates the necessity of using a combination of MAbs of differing specificities or a polyclonal antibody for the effective detection of diverse strains of CTV.
Growth performance and carcass composition of African catfish, Clarias gariepinus fed different protein and energy levels

A feeding trial was conducted to evaluate the effects of dietary crude protein and energy levels on the live weight (LW), daily weight gain (DWG), feed conversion rate (FCR), feed efficiency (FE), protein efficiency rate (PER), survival rate (SR), specific growth rate (SGR), thermal growth coefficient (TGC) and carcass composition of catfish (Clarias gariepinus). In this trial a group of 80 catfish were randomly assigned per tank in 3 replicates and fed different levels combination of crude protein and energy, viz: three levels of crude protein (CP) (32; 34; and 36%) with digestible protein (DP) (27; 39; and 41%) and three levels of digestible energy (DE) (11.9; 12.4; and 13.3%) for 8 weeks. At the end of experiment, the results showed that the highest LW, DWG, SGR and TGC were found in fish fed 34% CP: 39% DP: 12.4% DE. The better FCR was reached in fish fed 36% CP: 41%DP: 12.4% DE whereas highest PER was in fish fed 34% CP: 39% DP: 13.3% DE. Meanwhile, fish fed 36%CP: 41% DP: 12.4% DE resulted in significantly higher FE. However, the SR of fish was not affected by any combination of CP: DP: DE. This finding indicated that 34% CP: 39% DP: 12.4% DE was the optimum combination in enhancing the growth of catfish.
Kinetic, equilibrium and thermodynamic studies of Ni(II) ions sorption on sulfuric acid treated Lagenaria vulgaris shell

Chemically modified Lagenaria vulgaris shell (ccLVB) was tested as a new sorbent for the removal of Ni(II) from aqueous solution, in batch conditions. The sorption process was very fast reaching equilibrium in about 20 min. Ni(II) sorption is almost invariant in the pH range from 3 to 6. Sorption kinetics followed pseudo-second order, intraparticle diffusion and Chrastil’s models, which suggest that both surface reaction and diffusion were the rate-limiting steps. Equilibria experimental results are well fitted by Langmuir and Temkin sorption isotherm models, indicating mixed adsorption process. The maximum biosorption capacity of ccLVB for Ni(II) was found to be 84.51 mg g-1. The calculated thermodynamic parameters showed that the biosorption of nickel on ccLVB was feasible, spontaneous and exothermic at 25-45oC. The desorption experiments showed that the ccLVB could be reused for five cycles without significant loss in sorption capacity. Release of Na+ ions from the biosorbent during sorption of Ni(II) reveals that the main sorption mechanism is ion exchange. Presented study suggests that ccLVB can be used effectively for the removal of Ni(II) ions from aqueous solution.