Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
MR-based attenuation correction for hybrid PET-MR brain imaging systems using deformable image registration.

PURPOSE Realization of combined positron emission tomography (PET)--magnetic resonance (MR) scanners has the potential to significantly change healthcare and revolutionize clinical practice as it allows, simultaneously, visualization of molecular imaging and anatomical imaging. PET-MR, acquired in one imaging study, will likely become the advanced imaging modality of choice for neurological studies, certain forms of cancer, stroke, and the emerging study of stem cell therapy. A challenge toward the implementation and operation of combined PET-MR scanners is that attenuation corrections maps are not directly available due to space and cost constraints. This article presents a method to obtain accurate patient-specific PET attenuation coefficients maps in head imaging by warping an atlas computed tomography (CT) data set to the patient-specific MR data set using a deformable registration model. METHODS A multimodality optical flow deformable model has been developed that establishes a voxel-to-voxel correspondence between the CT atlas and patient MR images. Once the mapping is established, the atlas is warped with the deformation field obtained by the registration to create a simulated CT image study that matches the patient anatomy, which could be used for attenuation correction. RESULTS To evaluate the accuracy of the deformable-based attenuation correction, 17 clinical brain tumor cases were studied using acquired MR-CT images. A simulated CT was compared to the patient's true CT to assess geometrical accuracy of the deformation module as well as voxel-to-voxel comparison of Hounsfield units (HUs). In all cases, mapping from the atlas CT to the individual MR was achieved with geometrical accuracy as judged using quantitative inspection tools. The mean distance between simulated and true CT external contour and bony anatomy was 1.26 and 2.15 mm, respectively. In terms of HU unit comparison, the mean voxel-to-voxel difference was less than 2 HU for all cases. CONCLUSIONS Attenuation correction for hybrid PET-MR scanners was easily achieved by individualizing an atlas CT to the MR data set using a deformable model without requiring user interaction. The method provided clinical accuracy while eliminating the need for an additional CT scan for PET attenuation correction.
Classification of Twins and Neonatal Morbidity

Prematurity is the most significant determinant of neonatal morbidity among twins, but the relative importance of other factors is unclear. We compared the prognostic value of intrauterine growth retardation, discordancy, and other classifications in 131 consecutive sets of surviving twins. A four-factor model for neonatal morbidity was developed from 161 potential outcome measures. Individual evaluation of each twin for intrauterine growth retardation using singleton growth curves was more effective than discordancy and other classifications in predicting neonatal morbidity. Our findings suggest that evaluation of twin growth should concentrate on individual twin growth rather than discordancy. These results also speak against interpreting growth curves based on twins in the same way as growth curves based on singletons; it is apparent that the frequency of growth retardation with associated neonatal morbidity is increased among twins.
Immune tolerance induction in the treatment of paediatric haemophilia A patients with factor VIII inhibitors

The development of an inhibitor to transfused factor VIII (FVIII) is a serious treatment‐related problem in haemophiliac children. The management of patients with high titre FVIII inhibitors is difficult, and immune tolerance induction (ITI) is the only method available for the eradication of these inhibitors. The results of the ITI regimen used at the Children’s Hospital of Michigan Haemophilia Treatment Center are described and discussed. ITI was attempted in 14 children with severe haemophilia A (13 high responders, one low responder), with daily doses of FVIII alone. FVIII dosage was chosen according to the patient’s historical peak inhibitor titre. ITI included three phases; induction phase, dose reduction phase and maintenance phase. During the first phase, the starting dose was 50 or 100 U kg–1 d–1; during the second phase the FVIII dosage was reduced gradually to 25 U kg–1 every other day according to the inhibitor titre, FVIII recovery and/or half‐life study. In the third (maintenance) phase, the children received either prophylactic therapy or episodic therapy for 12 months. The inhibitor elimination was defined as the time taken to achieve a negative inhibitor assay with no anamnestic response and normal FVIII recovery and/or normal half‐life. Immune tolerance was achieved in 11 of 14 patients (79%) patients within a median time of 6 months; two children are still on therapy, three failed ITI. We observed either failure or prolongation of immune tolerance if the historical peak titre or the maximum titre during ITI was >200 BU. The success rate of our low dose ITI regimen is not different from that reported by other investigators and the inhibitor elimination time is similar to some of the studies reported previously.
Burst Suppression: A More Valid Marker of Postictal Central Inhibition?

Objectives A valid marker to predict seizure adequacy in electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is still missing. Postictal suppression has been claimed to correlate with the antidepressive effectiveness of an induced seizure. Postictal suppression index (PSI) is derived from a short time span of electroencephalographic recording at seizure termination, and, alternatively, burst suppression (BS) index is defined as the percentage of suppressed epochs within a predefined time period. Methods In a retrospective study including 9 patients with a total of 104 recorded ECT sessions, we compared the influence of variables that are known to alter seizure adequacy like age, stimulation dose, electrode position, and the number of the consecutive ECT sessions on both indices, PSI versus BS index. Results For PSI, electrode positioning turned out to be a significant independent variable, with bilateral placement revealing higher PSI. Electroconvulsive therapy session number was significant for BS index, with lower burst suppression in higher ECT session number. In contrast to PSI, BS index turned out to be a significant covariate of seizure duration. Postictal suppression index and BS index did not show linear but a significant rank correlation. Conclusions We report first data about postictal BS index in ECT. As a measure of postictal electrical suppression, BS index appears as robust as PSI. Burst suppression index decreases during an individual ECT course, which presumably reflects the anticonvulsive effect of ECT. Less artifact-prone methods of automatic quantification of electrical suppression could improve precise determination of individual seizure adequacy.
Thrombospondin-1 modified bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) promote neurite outgrowth and functional recovery in rats with spinal cord injury

Stem cell therapies are currently gaining momentum in the treatment of spinal cord injury (SCI). However, unsatisfied intrinsic neurite growth capacity constitutes significant obstacles for injured spinal cord repair and ultimately results in neurological dysfunction. The present study assessed the efficacy of thrombospondin-1 (TSP-1), a neurite outgrowth-promoting molecule, modified bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) on promoting neurite outgrowth in vitro and in vivo of Oxygen–Glucose Deprivation (OGD) treated motor neurons and SCI rat models. The present results demonstrated that the treatment of BMSCs+TSP-1 could promote the neurite length, neuronal survival, and functional recovery after SCI. Additionally, TSP-1 could activate transforming growth factor-β1 (TGF-β1) then induced the smad2 phosphorylation, and expedited the expression of GAP-43 to promote neurite outgrowth. The present study for the first time demonstrated that BMSCs+TSP-1 could promote neurite outgrowth and functional recovery after SCI partly through the TGF-β1/p-Samd2 pathway. The study provided a novel encouraging evidence for the potential treatment of BMSCs modification with TSP-1 in patients with SCI.
Identification of inhibitors for single-stranded DNA-binding proteins in eubacteria.

OBJECTIVES The increasing threat of drug-resistant bacteria establishes a continuing need for the development of new strategies to fight infection. We examine the inhibition of the essential single-stranded DNA-binding proteins (SSBs) SSBA and SSBB as a potential antimicrobial therapy due to their importance in DNA replication, activating the SOS response and promoting competence-based mechanisms of resistance by incorporating new DNA. METHODS Purified recombinant SSBs from Gram-positive (Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus anthracis) and Gram-negative (Escherichia coli and Francisella tularensis) bacteria were assessed in a high-throughput screen for inhibition of duplex DNA unwinding by small molecule inhibitors. Secondary electrophoretic mobility shift assays further validated the top hits that were then tested for MICs using in vitro assays. RESULTS We have identified compounds that show cross-reactivity in vitro, as well as inhibition of both F. tularensis and B. anthracis SSBA. Five compounds were moderately toxic to at least two of the four bacterial strains in vivo, including two compounds that were selectively non-toxic to human cells, 9-hydroxyphenylfluoron and purpurogallin. Three of the SSBA inhibitors also inhibited S. aureus SSBB in Gram-positive bacteria. CONCLUSIONS Results from our study support the potential for SSB inhibitors as broad-spectrum antibacterial agents, with dual targeting capabilities against Gram-positive bacteria.
Efficient Energy Transport in 60 Ghz for Wireless Industrial Sensor Networks

Radio frequency energy transport is a viable technology to power small-sized sensors in wireless industrial sensor networks (WISNs). 60 GHz wireless communication emerges as one of the leading technologies for next generation wireless networks, and it can also be useful to build up WISNs. In this article, we investigate the efficiency of RF energy transport in WISNs with 60 GHz communications. We present a spherical antenna design with supported analytics on directional antennas in 60 GHz wireless communications. We introduce and solve the spherical distribution problem of directional antennas to maximize the energy transport efficiency in WISNs. The extensive simulations given in this article verify that the proposed antenna configuration performs much better than the existing solutions in WISN applications.
Fusion of Different Height Pyroelectric Infrared Sensors for Person Identification

Due to the instability and poor identification ability of a single pyroelectric infrared (PIR) detector for human target identification, this paper presents a PIR detection identification system that can collect thermal infrared features from different parts of human targets through multiple PIR sensors for the human identification. First, fast Fourier transform, short-time Fourier transform, and wavelet packet transform algorithms are adopted to extract thermal infrared features of human targets. Then, the canonical correlation analysis algorithm is used to fuse different algorithm features in the feature layer. Finally, using the support vector machine to classify the human targets. In the decision-making layer, the Dempster/Shafer evidence theory is adopted to optimize the recognition results from different PIR sensors that locate at different height positions. Extensive experimental results demonstrate that the fusion of feature layer data could improve the average recognition rate of the human target with closer distance from the single sensor. In addition, the fusion of decision-making layer could improve the recognition ability of the identification system as well. When the detection distance is 6 m, the correct recognition rate of fusion system is still reached 88.75%. Compared with the system using a single sensor, the recognition rate is increased by an average of 22.67%.
Plant-Based Vaccine: Mice Immunized with Chloroplast-Derived Anthrax Protective Antigen Survive Anthrax Lethal Toxin Challenge

ABSTRACT The currently available human vaccine for anthrax, derived from the culture supernatant of Bacillus anthracis, contains the protective antigen (PA) and traces of the lethal and edema factors, which may contribute to adverse side effects associated with this vaccine. Therefore, an effective expression system that can provide a clean, safe, and efficacious vaccine is required. In an effort to produce anthrax vaccine in large quantities and free of extraneous bacterial contaminants, PA was expressed in transgenic tobacco chloroplasts by inserting the pagA gene into the chloroplast genome. Chloroplast integration of the pagA gene was confirmed by PCR and Southern analysis. Mature leaves grown under continuous illumination contained PA as up to 14.2% of the total soluble protein. Cytotoxicity measurements in macrophage lysis assays showed that chloroplast-derived PA was equal in potency to PA produced in B. anthracis. Subcutaneous immunization of mice with partially purified chloroplast-derived or B. anthracis-derived PA with adjuvant yielded immunoglobulin G titers up to 1:320,000, and both groups of mice survived (100%) challenge with lethal doses of toxin. An average yield of about 150 mg of PA per plant should produce 360 million doses of a purified vaccine free of bacterial toxins edema factor and lethal factor from 1 acre of land. Such high expression levels without using fermenters and the immunoprotection offered by the chloroplast-derived PA should facilitate development of a cleaner and safer anthrax vaccine at a lower production cost. These results demonstrate the immunogenic and immunoprotective properties of plant-derived anthrax vaccine antigen.
Smart control for active power generation, voltage level and harmonic content based on photovoltaic generators

Nowadays, to improve power quality and meet the energy demand, several studies point to the widespread use of Distributed Generation (DG) units equipped with power line conditionning capability. This work proposes a simplified structure and its related control system for Photovoltaic (PV) generation that embodies an Active Power Line Conditioner (APLC), allows harmonic minimization and active power injection to grid. Besides, it allows control of the grid voltage by using a Battery Energy Storage (BES) integrated to the system, which allows controlled bi-directional power flow. Simulation and pseudo-experimental results are presented to demonstrate the correctness of the methodology as well as the feasibility of the proposed distributed generation photovoltaic system and its related feedback control laws.
Homologous recombination is required for the viability of rad27 mutants.

The RAD27/RTH1 gene of Saccharomyces cerevisiae encodes a structural and functional homolog of the 5'-3' exonuclease function of Escherichia coli DNA polymerase I. Four alleles of RAD27 were recovered in a screen for hyper-recombination, a phenotype also displayed by polA mutants of E.coli. All four rad27 mutants showed similar high levels of mitotic recombination, but varied in their growth rate at various temperatures, and sensitivity to the DNA damaging agent methyl methane sulfonate. Dependence of viability of rad27 strains on recombination was determined by crossing a strain containing a null allele of RAD27 to strains containing a mutation in either the RAD1, RAD50, RAD51, RAD52, RAD54, RAD55, RAD57, MRE11, XRS2 or RAD59 gene. In no case were viable spore products recovered that contained both mutations. Elimination of the non-homologous end-joining pathway did not affect the viability of a rad27 strain. This suggests that lesions generated in the absence of RAD27 must be processed by homologous recombination.
Evolutionary diversification of clades of squamate reptiles

We analysed the diversification of squamate reptiles (7488 species) based on a new molecular phylogeny, and compared the results to similar estimates for passerine birds (5712 species). The number of species in each of 36 squamate lineages showed no evidence of phylogenetic conservatism. Compared with a random speciation–extinction process with parameters estimated from the size distribution of clades, the alethinophidian snakes (2600 species) were larger than expected and 13 clades, each having fewer than 20 species, were smaller than expected, indicating rate heterogeneity. From a lineage‐through‐time plot, we estimated that a provisional rate of lineage extinction (0.66 per Myr) was 94% of the rate of lineage splitting (0.70 per Myr). Diversification in squamate lineages was independent of their stem age, but strongly related to the area of the region within which they occur. Tropical vs. temperate latitude exerted a marginally significant influence on species richness. In comparison with passerine birds, squamates share several clade features, including: (1) independence of species richness and age; (2) lack of phylogenetic signal with respect to clade size; (3) general absence of exceptionally large clades; (4) over‐representation of small clades; (5) influence of region size on clade size; and (6) similar rates of speciation and extinction. The evidence for both groups suggests that clade size has achieved long‐term equilibrium, suggesting negative feedback of species richness on the rate of diversification.
Enhanced sensitivity of P‐glycoprotein‐positive multidrug resistant tumor cells to complement‐mediated lysis

The interaction of KB‐V1, a multidrug resistant (MDR) variant of the KB‐3–1 human oral carcinoma, with human complement was investigated. KB‐V1 cells were found to be more sensitive than KB‐3–1 cells to complement‐mediated lysis. Detailed analysis of the capacity of KB cells to activate human complement demonstrated that both C3b deposition and formation of the membrane attack complex (MAC) are higher on KB‐V1 than on KB‐3–1 cells. Furthermore, the MAC formed on KB‐V1 cells, but not on KB‐3–1 cells, was found to be resistant to trypsin treatment, i.e. more stably inserted into the plasma membrane. Immunofluorescence analysis by flow cytometry showed that KB‐V1 cells express less decay‐accelerating factor (DAF, CD55) than KB‐3–1 cells. Two other complement regulatory proteins, membrane cofactor protein (MCP, CD46) and CD59 are expressed to a similar extent on both KB‐V1 and KB‐3–1 cells. Treatment of KB‐V1 cells with neutralizing anti‐P‐glycoprotein (P‐gp) monoclonal antibodies reduced their sensitivity to complement. In addition, KB‐V1 revertants which cease to express P‐gp become more resistant to complement. These results indicate that multiple factors, such as reduced expression of DAF, enhanced deposition of C3b and increased binding and stability of the MAC may contribute to the increased complement sensitivity of KB‐V1 cells. It is suggested that P‐gp is responsible for the complement‐sensitive phenotype of KB‐V1 cells.
Bipolar disorder prevalence: a systematic review and meta-analysis of the literature.

OBJECTIVE Bipolar disorder (BD) is common in clinical psychiatric practice, and several studies have estimated its prevalence to range from 0.5 to 5% in community-based samples. However, no systematic review and meta-analysis of the prevalence of BD type 1 and type 2 has been published in the literature. We carried out a systematic review and meta-analysis of the lifetime and 1-year prevalence of BD type 1 and type 2 and assessed whether the prevalence of BD changed according to the diagnostic criteria adopted (DSM-III, DSM-III-R vs. DSM-IV). METHODS We searched MEDLINE, Scopus, Web of Science, PsycINFO, and the reference lists of identified studies. The analyses included 25 population- or community-based studies and 276,221 participants. RESULTS The pooled lifetime prevalence of BD type 1 was 1.06% (95% confidence interval [95%CI] 0.81-1.31) and that of BD type 2 was 1.57% (95%CI 1.15-1.99). The pooled 1-year prevalence was 0.71% (95%CI 0.56-0.86) for BD type 1 and 0.50% (95%CI 0.35-0.64) for BD type 2. Subgroup analysis showed a significantly higher lifetime prevalence of BD type 1 according to the DSM-IV criteria compared to the DSM-III and DSM-IIIR criteria (p < 0.001). CONCLUSION This meta-analysis confirms that estimates of BD type 1 and type 2 prevalence are low in the general population. The increase in prevalence from DSM-III and DSM-III-R to DSM-IV may reflect different factors, such as minor changes in diagnostic operationalization, use of different assessment instruments, or even a genuine increase in the prevalence of BD.
Return Ambiguity, Portfolio Choice, and Asset Pricing

We formulate a tractable continuous-time rational expectations model in which the agent is ambiguity averse and would like to robustify asset return specification. Ambiguity affects the portfolio rule and asset pricing both individually and collectively with risk. Independently existing ambiguity premium helps to explain why investors appear to underinvest in risky assets and do not exploit the asymptotic arbitrage opportunity emerged from trading inertia where return volatility (risk) is nearly zero (Campbell and Cochrane, 1999). Calibration of our Lucas-style model to the annual and quarterly U.S. asset prices and consumption data yields a relative risk aversion coefficient of five, and attributes 23%, 41%, and 36% of the equity premium to risk, ambiguity, and their interactions, respectively.
Multigenerational Employees: Strategies for Effective Management

This article highlights one of the biggest challenges that leaders will be facing in managing an employee age profile which could range from 18 to 80. Traditional Generation, Baby Boomer and Generation X were discussed in this paper. Regarding the behavior, attitude, characteristic, attitude and mentality of the people in the range of age before 1940 to 1980 were taken into consideration. This article also covers the personal behaviors and perspectives of these generations like family commitments, problems and showing the daily routine which includes leisure activities and view of work values.
A pooled RP/SP mode, route and destination choice model to capture the heterogeneity of mode and user type effects

1 This paper presents the ﬁrst representative estimates of the marginal willingness to pay 2 for a reduction in travel time (VTTS) for Austria, being of great importance for transport 3 policy appraisals. The main focus is to investigate mode and user-type eﬀects using a 4 pooled RP/SP modeling approach for mode, route and destination choice data, revealing 5 average VTTS estimates for car (9.90 Euro/h), public transport (3.90 Euro/h), bike (7.30 6 Euro/h) and walk (11.40 Euro/h). 7 The only user characteristic being able to decompose this large diﬀerence in average 8 VTTS between car and public transport into a smaller part, that can be purely attributed 9 to the mode-speciﬁc valuation of in-vehicle travel time, is urban residential location area: 10 When controlling for it, the VTTS diﬀerence becomes 5.5 Euro/h, which, compared to 11 the total average VTTS diﬀerence of about 6 Euro/h, is still relatively high. 12 As our results indicate that in the case of Austria, characteristics of the mode are 13 more important than characteristics of the users, and that the conditions of travel time 14 spent in public transport are perceived as more pleasant than in a car, the investigation 15 of the value of time assigned to travel (VTAT) is a fundamental next research step. 16