Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Prevalence and subtype identification of Blastocystis isolated from humans in Ahvaz, Southwestern Iran

Aim: The aim of the present study was to determine the prevalence and subtype distribution of Blastocystis and its relation with demographic data and symptoms in humans referred to medical centers in Ahvaz 2014-2015. Background: Infections with intestinal parasites are one of the most important threats to human health worldwide, especially in tropical and subtropical areas. Blastocystis sp. is a common parasite of humans with a vast variety of non-human hosts. We aimed to study the prevalence and subtypes of Blastocystis sp. in individuals referred to medical laboratories in Ahvaz city, southwest Iran. Methods: From September 2014 to September 2015, 618 stool samples were collected from 16 medical laboratories in Ahvaz, and examined using direct wet mount, formalin-ether concentration, a modified version of the Ziehl–Neelsen staining technique, and cultivation in xenic HSr + S medium. Subtypes of positive Blastocysts sp. were obtained using the “barcoding” method. The results were analyzed using SPSS software, version 16, with Chi-square and Fisher’s exact test. Results: Totally, 325 (52.6%) of the referred individuals were men and 293 (47.4%) were women. Blastocystis sp. was observed in 146 (23.6%) samples. Co-infections with other intestinal parasites were found in 32 (5.17%) cases. Out of the 146 positive isolates, 20.83%, 20.83% and 58.34% belonged to ST1, ST2, ST3 respectively. Conclusion: Blastocystis sp. was quite common in the study population, with a carrier rate corresponding to nearly one in every four individuals. The subtype distribution identified in the present study was largely identical to that reported from other studies in Iran, with ST3 being the most common.
The Stiff Left Atrium Is to Atrial Fibrillation as the Stiff Left Ventricle Is to Diastolic Heart Failure.

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cardiovascular disorder present in as many as 9% of subjects aged ≥65 years and costing the United States >26 billion dollars a year. It causes significant morbidity and mortality with 750 000 hospitalizations each year and contributing to an estimated 130 000 deaths each year.1 Risk factors for AF such as obesity, diabetes mellitus, coronary artery disease, heart failure, renal disease, heavy alcohol use, sleep apnea, and untreated or uncontrolled hypertension are also the risk factors for both systolic and diastolic heart failure.1 See Article by Khurram et al Therapeutic challenges can be appreciated from a recent trial in patients with paroxysmal AF that found antiarrhythmic therapy to be only 46% effective in preventing recurrence at 6 to 12 months compared with catheter ablation that had a 60% efficacy after the first ablation procedure.2 However, AF recurrences following pulmonary vein isolation procedure are less symptomatic.3 Multiple ablation procedures are also often required. Therefore, guidelines recommend left atrial (LA) ablation for paroxysmal AF after failure of at least 1 antiarrhythmic therapy.4 Atrial fibrosis contributes to AF probably because of disruption of normal electric conduction allowing establishment of the reentry circuit substrate. LA fibrosis can be detected by cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging as delayed gadolinium enhancement.5 Increased LA scar burden also predicts recurrence of AF. However, development of focally placed LA scar after ablation is associated with reduced LA function.6 LA scar burden is likely associated with increased LA stiffness similar to the decreased compliance of a scarred left ventricle (LV) both in ischemic cardiomyopathy as well as in nonischemic cardiomyopathy and in infiltrative/restrictive cardiomyopathy.7 Earlier studies have demonstrated an inverse relationship …
A 0.54 pJ/b 20 Gb/s Ground-Referenced Single-Ended Short-Reach Serial Link in 28 nm CMOS for Advanced Packaging Applications

High-speed signaling over high density interconnect on organic package substrates or silicon interposers offers an attractive solution to the off-chip bandwidth limitation problem faced in modern digital systems. In this paper, we describe a signaling system co-designed with the interconnect to take advantage of the characteristics of this environment to enable a high-speed, low area, and low-power die to die link. Ground-Referenced Signaling (GRS) is a single-ended signaling system that eliminates the major problems traditionally associated with single-ended design by using the ground plane as the reference and signaling above and below ground. This design employs a novel charge pump driver that additionally eliminates the issue of simultaneous switching noise with data independent current consumption. Silicon measurements from a test chip implementing two 16-lane links, with forwarded clocks, in a standard 28 nm process demonstrate 20 Gb/s operation at 0.54 pJ/bit over 4.5 mm organic substrate channels at a nominal 0.9 V power supply voltage. Timing margins at the receiver are >0.3 UI at a BER of 10-12. We estimate BER 10-25 at the eye center.
Quantile regression in partially linear varying coefficient models

Semiparametric models are often considered for analyzing longitudinal data for a good balance between flexibility and parsimony. In this paper, we study a class of marginal partially linear quantile models with possibly varying coefficients. The functional coefficients are estimated by basis function approximations. The estimation procedure is easy to implement, and it requires no specification of the error distributions. The asymptotic properties of the proposed estimators are established for the varying coefficients as well as for the constant coefficients. We develop rank score tests for hypotheses on the coefficients, including the hypotheses on the constancy of a subset of the varying coefficients. Hypothesis testing of this type is theoretically challenging, as the dimensions of the parameter spaces under both the null and the alternative hypotheses are growing with the sample size. We assess the finite sample performance of the proposed method by Monte Carlo simulation studies, and demonstrate its value by the analysis of an AIDS data set, where the modeling of quantiles provides more comprehensive information than the usual least squares approach.
Adaptive Overlays in Peer-to-Peer Netzwerken

In research and business currently we notify three key trends: the explosion of unstructured data; the critical need to formally manage content; and internetworking and collaboration within and between enterprises. Peer-to-Peer information systems address the need to access content wherever it resides, to produce content while maintaining control over it, and to collaborate efficiently by sharing real-time data within a distributed network of stakeholders. Enterprises that are highly dependent on sharing real-time information across geographically spread knowledge workers are likely to benefit immediately from peer-to-peer information systems. This thesis focuses on the issue of determining a relevant peer in a completely decentralized and volatile setting without any static peers, such as necessitated by peer-to-peer information systems in virtual organizations. Example applications, such as the networked semantic desktop and legal music sharing, serve as rationale throughout the thesis. We discuss, which routing strategies exist, when they should be used, and -most importantlyhow can we enhance their recall and lower their communication costs. The full autonomy of peers as well as the full control of their own resources preclude prominent resource location and query routing schemes, such as distributed hash tables. We propose a new resource location and a semantic query routing approach that exploits social metaphors of topical experts and experts’ experts as well as semantic similarity of queries and information sources. The novel design principle of our approach lies in the dynamic adaptation of the network topology, driven by the history of successful or semantically similar queries. This is memorized by using bounded local shortcut indexes storing semantically labelled shortcuts and a dynamic shortcut selection strategy, which forwards queries to a community of peers that are likely to best answer queries. Our results support the development of a completely decentralized peer-to-peer information system significant. Extensive simulations show that the clustering of peers within semantic communities drastically improves the overall performance of our algorithm even in a highly volatile setting, while our index policy locally indices the ’right’ peers, that provide resources to the core interests of a requesting peer. Shortcut overlays are robust; they tolerate interests shifts and high network volatility. These attractive properties, combined with the locality preserving design of the index management and peer selection algorithm, pose shortcut overlay networks as a very promising alternative to state of the art semantic routing approaches.
Dictionary of Contemporary Slang

Containing more than 5000 terms and 15,000 definitions, this book provides a guide to the use of slang today. It deals with drugs, sport and contemporary society, as well as favourite slang topics, such as sex and bodily functions. There are expressions from Britain, Australia, America, the Caribbean and other English-speaking countries. Revised and expanded, the book concentrates on the slang of the last 30 years, illustrating today's cultural and social preoccupations. Tony Thorne is the author of "The Dictionary of Popular Culture" and "Countess Dracula".
Internalization of Escherichia coli by human renal epithelial cells is associated with tyrosine phosphorylation of specific host cell proteins

Human renal epithelial cells are capable of internalizing Escherichia coli regardless of whether the bacteria are isolated from individuals with pyelonephritis or from healthy volunteers. In this study, we investigated the role of host cell tyrosine kinase activity in internalization. We found that internalization of both fecal and pyelonephritis isolates is blocked by tyrosine kinase inhibitors. We found increased intensity of two tyrosine-phosphorylated proteins, with relative mobilities of approximately 123,000 and 110,000, in Western blots of extracts from human renal epithelial cells infected with E. coli. The increased intensity of these tyrosine-phosphorylated proteins was observed only in the Triton X-100-insoluble fraction, suggesting that these proteins could be associated with the cytoskeleton. Increased tyrosine phosphorylation of these proteins upon E. coli infection was observed in both transformed and primary human renal epithelial cells and in cells infected with several different strains of E. coli isolated from the feces of healthy individuals or from the blood or urine of patients with pyelonephritis. The increased tyrosine phosphorylation of these proteins required live bacteria and was blocked by tyrosine kinase inhibition but not by protein synthesis inhibitors or cytochalasin D. These experiments establish a strong link between E. coli internalization and host cell signaling through tyrosine kinases in human kidney cells and provide evidence that specific proteins are involved in these processes.
Dietary breadth and trophic position of introduced European catfish Silurus glanis in the River Tarn (Garonne River basin), southwest France

Although being a widely introduced and successfully established species, the European catfish Silurus glanis L. (the world’s third largest freshwater fish) remains poorly studied in its introduced areas. Here we studied the trophic ecology of non-native European catfish in a large river system in south-western France using stomach content and stable isotope analyses (SIA). We used fin samples for SIA of catfish and hence tested the validity of using fin tissue as a proxy for muscle in SIA. The mean δ15N and δ13C values analysed from fin tissues did not differ from those analysed from muscle tissue and reflected strong and consistent relationships (r2 = 0.95 for carbon and r2 = 0.98 for nitrogen). The δ15N values varied almost 5‰ among the analysed catfish individuals, while δ13C values varied >5‰. Total length of these catfish ranged from 200 to 2240 mm and was correlated with δ15N and especially with δ13C values. Although catfish length and δ15N values were positively correlated, the mean trophic positions of catfish increased only slightly from smaller individuals to larger ones (4.3 to 4.7). However, larger catfish were considerably 13C-enriched in their δ13C values compared to smaller individuals and had up to 4‰ higher δ13C values than their expected aquatic prey. This might indicate frequent consumption of mammals and/or non-aquatic birds by the larger sized individuals, which were found in the catfish stomachs.
Prevalence of sexual dysfunction among newer antidepressants.

BACKGROUND Sexual dysfunction commonly occurs during antidepressant treatment. However, the reported rates of sexual dysfunction vary across antidepressants and are typically underreported in product literature. The objectives of this study were (1) to estimate the prevalence of sexual dysfunction among patients taking newer antidepressants (bupropion immediate release [IR], bupropion sustained release [SR], citalopram, fluoxetine, mirtazapine, nefazodone, paroxetine, sertraline, venlafaxine, and venlafaxine extended release [XR]) and (2) to compare physician-perceived with patient-reported prevalence rates of antidepressant-associated sexual dysfunction. METHOD This cross-sectional, observational study was conducted in 1101 U.S. primary care clinics. Adult outpatients (4534 women and 1763 men) receiving antidepressant monotherapy were enrolled. The prevalence of sexual dysfunction was measured using the Changes in Sexual Functioning Questionnaire. RESULTS In the overall population, bupropion IR (22%) and SR (25%) and nefazodone (28%) were associated with the lowest risk for sexual dysfunction, whereas selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressants, mirtazapine, and venlafaxine XR were associated with higher rates (36%-43%). In a prospectively defined subpopulation unlikely to have predisposing factors for sexual dysfunction, the prevalence of sexual dysfunction ranged from 7% to 30%, with the odds of having sexual dysfunction 4 to 6 times greater with SSRIs or venlafaxine XR than with bupropion SR. Physicians consistently underestimated the prevalence of antidepressant-associated sexual dysfunction. CONCLUSION Ours is the first study to assess sexual dysfunction across the newer antidepressants using consistent methodology and a validated rating scale. Overall, SSRIs and venlafaxine XR were associated with higher rates of sexual dysfunction than bupropion or nefazodone. Because antidepressant-associated sexual dysfunction is considerably underestimated by physicians, greater recognition and education are imperative when prescribing antidepressant treatment.
Diagnosis of Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation in Patients with Implanted Pacemakers: Relationship to Symptoms and Other Variables

Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is not always accompanied by clear‐cut symptoms and symptoms suggestive of AF may not correspond to a genuine AF episode. The study prospectively evaluated the burden of asymptomatic AF episodes in pacemaker patients (for sick sinus syndrome) with a history of documented paroxysmal AF.
Connecting impairment, disability, and handicap in immune mediated polyneuropathies

Background: In the World Health Organisation (WHO) International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities, and Handicaps (ICIDH), it is suggested that various levels of outcome are associated with one another. However, the ICIDH has been criticised on the grounds that it only represents a general, non-specific relation between its entities. Objective: To examine the significance of the ICIDH in immune mediated polyneuropathies. Methods: Four impairment measures (fatigue severity scale, MRC sum score, “INCAT” sensory sum score, grip strength with the Vigorimeter), five disability scales (nine hole peg test, 10 metres walking test, an overall disability sum score (ODSS), Hughes functional grading scale, Rankin scale), and a handicap scale (Rotterdam nine items handicap scale (RIHS9)) were assessed in 113 clinically stable patients (83 with Guillain–Barré syndrome, 22 with chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy, eight with a gammopathy related polyneuropathy). Regression analyses with backward and forward stepwise strategies were undertaken to determine the correlation between the various levels of outcome (impairment on disability, impairment on handicap, disability leading to handicap, and impairment plus disability on handicap). Results: Impairment measures explained a substantial part of disability (R2 = 0.64) and about half of the variance in handicap (R2 = 0.52). Disability measures showed a stronger association with handicap (R2 = 0.76). Combining impairment and disability scales accounted for 77% of the variance in handicap (RIHS9) scores. Conclusions: In contrast to some suggestions, support for the ICIDH model is found in the current study because significant associations were shown between its various levels in patients with immune mediated polyneuropathies. Further studies are required to examine other possible contributors to deficits in daily life and social functioning in these conditions.
Characterization of a bactericidal lipid developing within staphylococcal abscesses

Extraction of staphylococcal abscesses by the Folch procedure revealed that all of the staphylocidal activity was present in the lipid fraction. Further separation of the lipids indicated that the bactericidal activity resided in the free fatty acid pool. Lipids similarly extracted from mesenteric or epididymal fat tissue, either before of after activation, did not possess comparable activity. Myristic, palmitic, palmitoleic, linoleic, and oleic acids, as well as lysolecithin, also failed to exhibit the properties of the fatty acid fraction obtained from abscess homogenates. These findings suggest the staphylocidal fatty acid is not a common host lipid.
Optical Performance Monitoring in Digital Coherent Receivers

In this paper, we present a method for combined fiber parameter estimation from digital filter coefficients of a polarization diverse coherent receiver. All deterministic linear optical channel parameters like residual chromatic dispersion (CD), polarization-mode dispersion (PMD), and polarization-dependent loss (PDL) are continuously monitored by analysis of the filter impulse response of the adaptive equalizer. After deriving the according equations from the theoretical linear fiber channel model, we demonstrate robust estimation for a joint combination of all impairments.
Metaphor and the Cultivation of Intimacy

These are good times for the friends of metaphor. They are so salutary that we are in danger of overlooking some very thorny underbrush as we scramble over the high road to figurative glory. Metaphor is a wonderful topic, and its new students are apt to be so enchanted by it that they never learn that the respectable road to its study was blocked until recently. Older students have been quick-perhaps too quick-to suppose that the road has been cleared and that it is the only proper road. Now that the respectability of metaphor seems to be acknowledged all round, the only serious questions thought open concern how metaphor is to be described: in particular (1) how to understand the relation of "poetic" metaphors to metaphors in ordinary speech and prose (about which Karsten Harries' paper has interesting implications), and (2) how to incorporate an account of metaphor into more general theories of language or meaning (a major ambition of Paul Ricoeur's paper). There are other questions, and to indicate them I will note, very schematically, how we came to these good days. There has been a very strong line in Western philosophy, especially in that strain running from British empiricism through Vienna positivism, which has denied to metaphors and their study any philosophical seriousness of the first order. Here it is in Hobbes' Leviathan (pt. 1, chap. 4):
Atmospheric lifetime of fossil-fuel carbon dioxide

CO2 released from combustion of fossil fuels equilibrates among the various carbon reservoirs of the atmosphere, the ocean, and the terrestrial biosphere on timescales of a few centuries. However, a sizeable fraction of the CO2 remains in the atmosphere, awaiting a return to the solid earth by much slower weathering processes and deposition of CaCO3. Common measures of the atmospheric lifetime of CO2, including the e-folding time scale, disregard the long tail. Its neglect in the calculation of global warming potentials leads many to underestimate the longevity of anthropogenic global warming. Here, we review the past literature on the atmospheric lifetime of fossil fuel CO2 and its impact on climate, and we present initial results from a model intercomparison project on this topic. The models agree that 20– 35% of the CO2 remains in the atmosphere after equilibration with the ocean (2–20 centuries). Neutralization by CaCO3 draws the airborne fraction down further on timescales of 3 to 7 kyr.
Barriers to the identification of children with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

BACKGROUND In most countries, the majority of children with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are undiagnosed. In the United Kingdom, a major barrier to accessing specialist services is the limited recognition of disorders by general practitioners. However, it is unclear whether there are also barriers at other stages of the help-seeking process. For children with ADHD, this study aims to examine the correlates of the different stages of help-seeking. METHOD Children with ADHD (n = 232) were identified from the 1999 British Child and Adolescent Mental Health Survey. Rates and correlates of parental recognition of child mental health problems and contact with services for these problems were examined. Children who had used particular types of services were compared with those who had not. RESULTS Most (80%) parents of children with ADHD recognise that their child has a problem although few (35%) construe this in terms of hyperactivity. The impact of the symptoms on key adults, rather than child factors, best predicted parental recognition of problems. Most parents had been in contact with education-based professionals but few had consulted primary care for these problems or had sought help from relevant specialist health services. Parental recognition of problems and perceived burden, rather than child factors, were the main correlates of contact with services. Parental views that their child has hyperactivity were associated with greater severity of symptoms. CONCLUSIONS The main barrier to care for ADHD is the limited presentation of these problems to primary care. The majority of parents discuss their concerns with professionals based in education services. There is a need for parental education about ADHD and for health service input to support education professionals in their contact with concerned parents.