Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Rituximab Infusion Promotes Rapid Complement Depletion and Acute CD20 Loss in Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia1

Complement plays an important role in the immunotherapeutic action of the anti-CD20 mAb rituximab, and therefore we investigated whether complement might be the limiting factor in rituximab therapy. Our in vitro studies indicate that at high cell densities, binding of rituximab to human CD20+ cells leads to loss of complement activity and consumption of component C2. Infusion of rituximab in chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients also depletes complement; sera of treated patients have reduced capacity to C3b opsonize and kill CD20+ cells unless supplemented with normal serum or component C2. Initiation of rituximab infusion in chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients leads to rapid clearance of CD20+ cells. However, substantial numbers of B cells, with significantly reduced levels of CD20, return to the bloodstream immediately after rituximab infusion. In addition, a mAb specific for the Fc region of rituximab does not bind to these recirculating cells, suggesting that the rituximab-opsonized cells were temporarily sequestered by the mononuclear phagocytic system, and then released back into the circulation after the rituximab-CD20 complexes were removed by phagocytic cells. Western blots provide additional evidence for this escape mechanism that appears to occur as a consequence of CD20 loss. Treatment paradigms to prevent this escape, such as use of engineered or alternative anti-CD20 mAbs, may allow for more effective immunotherapy of chronic lymphocytic leukemia.
Modular Organization of Axial Microcircuits in Zebrafish

Spinal Circuit Complexity in Fish Rapid coordination of opposing muscle groups helps zebrafish zip through water. Bagnall and McLean (p. 197) now describe the neuronal circuits that stabilize swimming fish in their three-dimensional environment. By studying the self-righting behavior of larval zebrafish immobilized in agar, the authors identified parallel excitatory and inhibitory circuits driving dorsal and ventral hemisegments that could be activated independently. Larval zebrafish show more refined musculature control than expected. Locomotion requires precise control of spinal networks. In tetrapods and bipeds, dynamic regulation of locomotion is simplified by the modular organization of spinal limb circuits, but it is not known whether their predecessors, fish axial circuits, are similarly organized. Here, we demonstrate that the larval zebrafish spinal cord contains distinct, parallel microcircuits for independent control of dorsal and ventral musculature on each side of the body. During normal swimming, dorsal and ventral microcircuits are equally active, but, during postural correction, fish differentially engage these microcircuits to generate torque for self-righting. These findings reveal greater complexity in the axial spinal networks responsible for swimming than previously recognized and suggest an early template of modular organization for more-complex locomotor circuits in later vertebrates.
Human Computer Interface to Play Virtual Musical Instruments Using Finger Sensor Data Glove

In this paper, an attempting to make a new human computer interface to play musical instruments. Play various musical instruments with the help of a data glove virtually. The data glove that is used, will give us the values of location of hand in the virtual space. Using these values, play musical instruments virtually by calibrating the data glove with the prototyped musical instruments. The main input is the gestures made by human hand which will be further used to select the instrument to be played, play musical instruments and handle various sound related aspects such as volume, tone, pitch, rhythm etc. The output will be getting a system to play various musical instruments in virtual space by using
SOCIAL MEDIA: A TEXT CLASSIFICATION APPROACH

The emergence of social media has brought up plenty of platforms where dissatisfied customers can share their service encounter experiences. Those customers’ feedbacks have been widely recognized as valuable information sources for improving service quality. Due to the sparse distribution of customer complaints and diversity of topics related to non-complaints in social media, manually identifying complaints is timeconsuming and inefficient. In this study, a supervised learning approach including samples enlargement and classifiers construct was proposed. Applying small labeled samples as training samples, reliable complaints samples and non-complaints samples were identified from the unlabeled dataset during the sample enlargement process. Combining the enlarged samples and the labeled samples, SVM and KNN algorithms were employed to construct the classifier. Empirical results show that the proposed approach can efficiently distinguish complaints from non-complaints in social media, especially when the number of labeled samples is very small.
Análisis descriptivo del coltán en Colombia y sus posibles mercados potenciales

El presente trabajo hace un analisis descriptivo sobre el mineral Tantalita, mas conocido como “Coltan”, en Colombia, su regulacion y las posibles oportunidades que puede traer para el pais. Para esto, se realiza un estudio global del mineral en el mundo y se analiza el caso del Congo, primer productor de coltan en el mundo. Se pretende presentar posibles mercados potenciales para Colombia y se muestran tambien algunas recomendaciones a lo largo del trabajo para la comercializacion del mineral a nivel internacional.
Regulation of the Germinal Center Reaction by Foxp3+ Follicular Regulatory T Cells

Follicular helper T (TFH) cells participate in humoral responses providing selection signals to germinal center B cells. Recently, expression of CXCR5, PD-1, and the transcription factor Bcl-6 has allowed the identification of TFH cells. We found that a proportion of follicular T cells, with phenotypic characteristics of TFH cells and expressing Foxp3, are recruited during the course of a germinal center (GC) reaction. These Foxp3+ cells derive from natural regulatory T cells. To establish the in vivo physiologic importance of Foxp3+ follicular T cells, we used CXCR5-deficient Foxp3+ cells, which do not have access to the follicular region. Adoptive cell transfers of CXCR5-deficient Foxp3+ cells have shown that Foxp3+ follicular T cells are important regulators of the GC reaction following immunization with a thymus-dependent Ag. Our in vivo data show that Foxp3+ follicular T cells can limit the magnitude of the GC reaction and also the amount of secreted Ag-specific IgM, IgG1, IgG2b, and IgA. Therefore, Foxp3+ follicular regulatory T cells appear to combine characteristics of TFH and regulatory T cells for the control of humoral immune responses.
Identification of a set of calcium-binding proteins in reticuloplasm, the luminal content of the endoplasmic reticulum.

A procedure was developed for the isolation of reticuloplasm, the luminal material of the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). A reticuloplasm-rich extract was prepared from a murine plasmacytoma cell line that contains large amounts of ER, by first extracting the cytoplasmic contents using hypotonic lysis to yield ER-rich 'shells' followed by mechanical lysis to release the ER contents. The extract contains five major proteins with apparent molecular weights of 100, 75, 60, 58 and 55 (X 10(3] Mr by SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The 100, 75 and 58 (X 10(3] Mr species were identified as the known ER proteins endoplasmin, BiP and PD1, respectively. The ER association of the 60 and 55 (X 10(3] Mr proteins was confirmed by confocal fluorescence microscopy with affinity-purified antibodies. Equilibrium dialysis with isolated reticuloplasm gave a calcium-binding capacity of 300 nmoles calcium per mg protein with half-maximal binding at 3 mM-Ca2+. Purified endoplasmin bound 280 nmoles calcium per mg protein at a calcium concentration of 5 mM-Ca2+. A calcium overlay test revealed that, in addition to endoplasmin, reticuloplasm contained at least three other calcium-binding proteins: i.e. BiP, PDI and the 55 X 10(3) Mr protein, respectively, with endoplasmin and the 55 X 10(3) Mr protein (CRP55) accounting for the major proportion of the calcium-binding activity. Treatment of cells with calcium ionophore led to the specific over-expression of the major calcium-binding reticuloplasmins endoplasmin, BiP and CRP55. These studies show that the lumen of the ER contains a family of proteins with the capacity to bind significant amounts of calcium in the millimolar range and thereby to confer upon the ER the ability to perform a calcium storage function analogous to that of the sarcoplasmic reticulum in muscle cells.
Manejo anestésico en terapia endovascular neurológica

La terapia endovascular neurologica (TEV) es el tratamiento minimamente invasivo unico o complementario que se aplica a diversas patologias cerebrales a traves de la navegacion intravascular selectiva. Se realiza con cateteres guiados por fl uoroscopia desde un acceso vascular periferico. Esta practica tambien se le conoce como terapia endovascular neurologica o neurorradiologia intervencionista. La sala de terapia endovascular, es una sala quirurgica moderna que implica un gran espacio por el equipo y monitoreo que se emplea; debe tener suplemento de oxigeno, aire y succion, y contar con lo necesario para proporcionar un procedimiento anestesico seguro fuera del area de quirofano (Figuras 1 y 2). En la actualidad la TEV ha establecido que el manejo de aneurismas intracraneales debe realizarse de primera intencion con este metodo, ya que el nivel de evidencia que ha demostrado sobre el clipaje tradicional es superior. La experiencia adquirida y la efectividad de este tratamiento han sido validadas por numerosos estudios retrospectivos y algunos prospectivos aleatorios tal como el ISAT (The International Subarachnoid Aneurysm Trial)(1,2). Los objetivos anestesicos en procedimientos neuro-intervencionistas son los mismos que en neurocirugia tradicional. La optimizacion de la dinamica intracraneal, la presion arterial, el volumen intravascular y el control de PaCO2 son aun mas importantes en estos casos, que cuando el craneo esta abierto. La tecnica anestesica que se utiliza se ve infl uida por la preferencia tanto del anestesiologo como del neurorradiologo. El desarrollo de este tema se enfoca a describir las tecnicas endovasculares, los problemas particulares que se presentan en cada procedimiento y fi nalmente la seleccion de sedacion y/o anestesia que son las empleadas de rutina en el Instituto Nacional de Neurologia y Neurocirugia (INNN)(3) (Cuadro I). CATETERES, GUIAS Y MATERIAL EMBOLIZANTE
Secondary prevention in acute myocardial infarction

Editor—Mehta and Eagle’s review of secondary prevention in acute myocardial infarction contains some important errors.1 Firstly, in table 3 the relative risks of death cited for references 17, 18, and 20 are in fact percentage reductions in mortality divided by 100. These figures are so out of keeping with the rest of the table that it is surprising they were not spotted earlier. Even as percentage mortality reductions they are inaccurate. In the original paper by Pfeffer et al (ref 17) the 21% reduction observed referred to cardiovascular rather than total mortality, and the 95% confidence interval was 5% to 35% rather than to 25%. Pfeffer et al calculated a 19% reduction in total mortality (95% confidence interval 3% to 32%, P=0.019),2 although a crude calculation gives 17%. Secondly, the data cited from the paper by Ambrosioni et al (ref 20) refer to a combined end point (death or severe congestive heart failure) rather than to total mortality. The mortality statistics are 51/784 (6.5%) in the placebo group and 38/772 (4.9%) in the treatment group, so that the risk reduction is 25% (−11% to 60%; P=0.19)3 and the relative risk 0.75. These are the only two original articles that I have checked. The errors are of fact rather than typography and raise questions about the remainder of the article.
Regulation of the Acetoin Catabolic Pathway Is Controlled by Sigma L in Bacillus subtilis

ABSTRACT Bacillus subtilis grown in media containing amino acids or glucose secretes acetate, pyruvate, and large quantities of acetoin into the growth medium. Acetoin can be reused by the bacteria during stationary phase when other carbon sources have been depleted. TheacoABCL operon encodes the E1α, E1β, E2, and E3 subunits of the acetoin dehydrogenase complex in B. subtilis. Expression of this operon is induced by acetoin and repressed by glucose in the growth medium. The acoR gene is located downstream from the acoABCL operon and encodes a positive regulator which stimulates the transcription of the operon. The product of acoR has similarities to transcriptional activators of sigma 54-dependent promoters. The four genes of the operon are transcribed from a −12, −24 promoter, and transcription is abolished in acoR and sigL mutants. Deletion analysis showed that DNA sequences more than 85 bp upstream from the transcriptional start site are necessary for full induction of the operon. These upstream activating sequences are probably the targets of AcoR. Analysis of an acoR′-′lacZ strain ofB. subtilis showed that the expression of acoRis not induced by acetoin and is repressed by the presence of glucose in the growth medium. Transcription of acoR is also negatively controlled by CcpA, a global regulator of carbon catabolite repression. A specific interaction of CcpA in the upstream region ofacoR was demonstrated by DNase I footprinting experiments, suggesting that repression of transcription of acoR is mediated by the binding of CcpA to the promoter region ofacoR.
Identification of Extract Method Refactoring Opportunities through Analysis of Variable Declarations and Uses

Software development is a continuous process that usually starts with analyzing the system requirements and proceeds with design, implementation, testing, and maintenance. Regardless of how good an initial design was achieved, quality of source code tends to decay throughout the development process as software evolves. One of the main contributing factors to this degradation of initial quality can be considered as maintenance operations, for instance to enhance performance or other attributes of the system or to fix newly discovered bugs. For such large software systems, development process also requires reusing existing components which may have been implemented by others. Hence, a comprehensible piece of source code, e.g. one that conveys its message about what it is trying to do easily with understandable and modular implementation, significantly reduces time and effort not only for the implementation phase of the development lifecycle; but also for testing and maintenance phases. In other words, while software decay is inevitable, software comprehension plays a determining role in the total cost and effectiveness of both implementation phase and maintenance phase. Therefore, developers should strive to create software components with modular structure and clearer implementation to reduce the development cost. In this paper, we are interested in finding ways to successfully decompose long methods (those with poor initial implementation and/or decayed overtime) into smaller, more comprehensible and readable ones. This decomposition process is known as extract method refactoring and helps to reduce the overall cost of development. Most of the existing refactoring tools require users to select the code fragments that need to be extracted. We introduce a novel technique for this refactoring. This technique seeks refactoring opportunities based on variable declarations and uses confining fully extractable code regions without any user intervention. We implemented this technique as an analysis and visualization tool to help a user identify candidate code fragments to be extracted as separate methods. With this automation tool, developers do not have to manually inspect a foreign code base to select code fragments for refactoring. Through the visual representations we provide, one can observe all suggested refactoring effectively on large scale software systems and decide whether a particular refactoring should be applied. To show the effectiveness of our techniques, we also provide some case studies conducted using this tool and technique both on our own project’s source code and other open-source projects.
Oscillatory Interaction between Human Motor Cortex and Trunk Muscles during Isometric Contraction

We investigated oscillatory interaction between magnetoencephalographic signals of the human motor cortex and surface electromyogram from the paraspinal (PS) and abdominal (ABD) muscles. The results were compared with data obtained during contraction of the first dorsal interosseus (FDI) and tibialis anterior (TA) muscles. Significant coherence at 15-35 Hz was observed for both PS and ABD muscles in all subjects but the coherence was weak compared with that for FDI and TA. The cortical sources for both the PS and the ABD coherences were located in the motor cortex between the source areas for the FDI and TA coherences, thereby agreeing with the classical trunk area of the motor homunculus previously determined by invasive studies. The sources were strictly contralateral for PS but bilateral for ABD contractions. Our results indicate that during isometric contractions descending motor commands are modulated by cortical oscillations for both limb and trunk muscles, although the modulation is weaker and may be bilateral for trunk muscles.
Change and stability in quantity and frequency of alcohol use among aging males: a 19-year follow-up study.

Summary This report describes prospective data from a 19–year follow-up of a general household sample of San Francisco (California) white males as these men moved towards ‘old age’. Only minor changes were noted in frequency of use while important decreases were discovered in the heavier quantity levels upon follow-up. Men who changed consumption patterns over time were approximately twice as likely to decrease as increase at follow-up. These findings are directly relevant to the interpretation of the consistent cross-sectional finding of decrease in heavy drinking and associated alcohol-related problems among older age strata when these strata are compared to younger cohorts.
Design of Radiation-Pattern-Reconfigurable Antenna With Four Beams

This letter presents a novel radiation-pattern-reconfigurable antenna that could operate in four directions without any antenna servo system. This is achieved by changing the wave director and wave reflector via appropriate p-i-n diodes. The reconfigurable antenna is incorporated within the four symmetrical wave detectors or wave reflectors to form the structure. The antenna can cover all directions in the azimuth plane (xy-plane) by controlling the states (ON or OFF) of four p-i-n diodes. The achieved maximum gain of the antenna is 5.08 dB. A good agreement is found between the simulated and the measured results. Further advantages of the introduced antenna design are its easy fabrication process and its low cost.
Characterization of a metalloproteinase: A late stage specific gelatinase activity in the sea urchin embryo

We have partially purified and characterized an 87 kDa gelatinase activity expressed in later stage sea urchin embryos. Cleavage activity was specific for gelatin and no cleavage of sea urchin peristome type I collagen, bovine serum albumin or casein was detected. Magnesium and Zn2+ inhibited the gelatinase and Ca2+ protected against inhibition. Ethylenediamine tetracetic acid, ethylenebisoxyethylenenitriol tetraacetic acid and 1,10‐phenanthroline were inhibitory, suggesting that the gelatinase is a Ca2+‐ and Zn2+‐dependent metalloproteinase. No inhibition was detected with serine or cysteine protease inhibitors and the vertebrate matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) inhibitor, Batimastat, was also ineffective. The vertebrate MMP activator p‐aminophenylmercuric acetate was without effect. These results allow us to identify both similarities and differences between echinoderm and vertebrate gelatinases. J. Cell. Biochem. 66: 337–345, 1997. © 1997 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Current Safety of the Blood Supply in the United States

In common with other developed countries, the United States has placed a great deal of emphasis on blood safety. As a result of careful donor selection and the use of advanced tests, including nucleic acid testing (NAT), the risk of transmission of human immunodeficiency virus and hepatitis C virus has been reduced to about 1 in 1.5 million donations. NAT for hepatitis B virus has not been introduced, but nevertheless the risk is low. Attention recently has been focused on emerging infections. NAT for West Nile virus was implemented within 6 to 8 months of recognition of the need to prevent transfusion transmission of this newly introduced virus. Approximately 1000 potentially infectious donations were identified and removed from the blood supply during the 2003 season. Other emerging infections attracting attention include Chagas’ disease, babesiosis, malaria, and variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
Information geometry of influence diagrams and noncooperative games

What is the "value of information" in non-cooperative games with imperfect information? To answer this question, we propose to quantify information using concepts from Shannon's information theory. We then relate quantitative changes to the information structure of a game to changes in the expected utility of the players. Our approach is based on the Multi-Agent Influence Diagram representation of games. We develop a generalization of the concept of marginal utility in decision scenarios to apply to infinitesimal changes of the channel parameters in noncooperative games. Using that framework we derive general conditions for negative value of information, and show that generically, these conditions hold in all games unless one imposes a priori constraints on the allowed changes to information channels. In other words, in any game in which a player values some aspect of the game's specification beyond the information provided in that game, there will be an infinitesimal change to the parameter vector specifying the game that increases the information but hurts the player. Furthermore, we derive analogous results for N > 1 players, i.e., state general conditions for negative value of information simultaneously for all players. We demonstrate these results numerically on a decision problem as well as a leader-follower game and discuss their general implications.
Use of DNA photoaffinity labeling to study nucleosome remodeling by SWI/SNF.

The ability of large protein assemblies to reorganize chromatin in an ATP-dependent manner is an important process for regulation of gene expression and potentially for DNA replication and recombination. The manner in which these proteins remodel chromatin to make the DNA accessible to DNA binding proteins such as transcription factors is not well understood. Site-directed DNA-protein cross-linking has been used to understand the architecture of the SWI/SNF-nucleosomal complex and the mechanistic details of how the nucleosome is remodeled. A detailed protocol for such a study is presented along with examples of the extent of this approach.