Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Esophagogastrectomy: A Safe, Widely Applicable, and Expeditious Form of Palliation for Patients with Carcinoma of the Esophagus and Cardia

Of 262 patients with carcinoma of the esophagus or cardia seen at the Lahey Clinic between January 1970 and January 1983, 209 (79.8%) underwent surgical exploration. This report is confined to the 167 operations performed in the division of the senior author. Half of the tumors involved the esophagogastric junction with nearly equal numbers being located in the lower and upper halves of the thoracic esophagus and a relatively small number involving the cervical esophagus. The majority were adenocarcinomas of which 20 developed in a Barrett esophagus. Three of the squamous cell cancers developed in an achalasic esophagus. Of the resected tumors, 94 were classified as Stage III, 18 as Stage II, and 37 as Stage I. Esophagogastrectomy with esophagogastrostomy is the procedure of choice regardless of the level of the lesion. Of the 167 patients, 149 (89.2%) underwent resection with two deaths within 30 days of operation for a hospital mortality rate of 1.3%. There were 22 major complications (14.9%), which prolonged the hospital stay, and 14 minor complications (9.5%). Satisfactory palliation of dysphagia was achieved in 82.7% of the patients. The overall adjusted survival rate at 5 years was 21.7% ± 7.5% (SEM) with a median survival time of 17.3 months. The 5-year adjusted survival rate according to stage was 43.4% for patients with Stage I lesions, 23.6% for Stage II lesions, and 12.8% for Stage III lesions (p = 0.0004). A multivariate analysis of risk factors involved in survival disclosed that neither age, sex, site of tumor, duration of symptoms, or cell type influenced survival, but stage of the disease had a profound effect. It is concluded that long-term survival of patients with carcinoma of the esophagus or cardia will probably not improve until early diagnosis is possible and that esophagogastrectomy by conventional techniques should be the treatment of choice until other forms of therapy prove superior to it both in terms of palliation and long-term survival.
LETTER TO THE EDITORS: Re: Identifying population differences in lung function: results from the Allied Dunbar national fitness survey

I congratulate Nevill and Holder (1999) for their very clearly presented model of lung function in populations; this is likely to be of great practical use. However, in their example there must have been a high degree of co-linearity between the reference variables. For example, stature may be correlated to body mass, body mass and smoking with body fat, and gender with most of these. Any co-linearity will have a ected the biological relevance of the coe ciant terms. Body mass is the sum of body fat and fat-free mass (FFM), which can be calculated from the other two. Together they reduce the amibiguity which is associated with mass. Expressed as Fat% and FFM/stature, these terms are independant of stature. We found them useful for describing forced expiratory volume and vital capacity (FEV1 and FVC) in shipyard workers studied cross-sectionally (Chinn, Cotes and Reed 1996, and in preparation) whereas body mass index (BMI) was not. The di erence was due to fat and muscle respectively having negative and positive e ects upon the dependent variables; these cancelled out when BMI was used. Nevill and Holder suggested that the lung function assessed cross-sectionally peaked at a mass of 90 kg after adjusting for the other variables. A more meaningful description might have emerged had fat-free mass index been used instead.
Ribosomal S6 kinase signaling and the control of translation.

The highly homologous 40S ribosomal protein S6 kinases (S6K1 and S6K2) play a key role in the regulation of cell growth by controlling the biosynthesis of translational components which make up the protein synthetic apparatus, most notably ribosomal proteins. In the case of S6K1, at least eight phosphorylation sites are believed to mediate kinase activation in a hierarchical fashion. Activation is initiated by phosphatidylinositide-3OH kinase (PI3K)-mediated phosphorylation of key residues in the carboxy-terminus of the kinase, allowing phosphorylation of a critical residue residing in the activation loop of the catalytic domain by phosphoinositide-dependent kinase 1 (PDK1). The kinases responsible for phosphorylating the carboxy-terminal sites have yet to be identified. Additionally, S6 kinases are under the control of the PI3K relative, mammalian Target Of Rapamycin (mTOR), which may serve an additional function as a checkpoint for amino acid availability. In this review we set out to discuss the present state of knowledge regarding upstream signaling components which have been implicated in the control of S6K1 activation and the role of the kinase in controlling cell growth through regulating ribosome biogenesis at the translational level.
A user-satisfaction approach to IS effectiveness measurement

This paper reports on research conducted by the authors into how to measure the effectiveness of a personal computer network used by a business school to deliver a range of personal productivity tools to MBA students, as well as academic and administrative staff. The use of user-satisfaction is recognized by many IT researchers as an appropriate surrogate for IT effectiveness. The authors decided to use a user-satisfaction model which is based on the gap between users' beliefs of what is important and their perception of what is delivered by the ISD, to measure the effectiveness of the personal computer network.In brief, the research showed that all was not well with the personal computer network in use. The gaps on the two perceptual performance factors, namely effective benefits and system access, are significant in assessing overall satisfaction with the network. The gap on effective benefits is approximately twice as important as system's access in terms of its impact on overall satisfaction. This research study showed that this gap approach is quite effective. It is inexpensive. It docs not require an enormous amount of expertize, although an acquaintance with factor analysis is necessary. The study need not take a long period of time; the total lapse time for the above research was six weeks, requiring the equivalent of five person-days work.
Financial Problems Of Smes And Problems Encountered To Access Financing

The concern about sustainability of commercial activities of SMEs under aggravating competitive conditions with popularization of chain enterprises has led to a focus on the issue as is the case in many European countries. The difficulties experienced by tradesmen to access and repay loans pose a risk element for the financial sector and social welfare. In this study, we have tried to not only understand and provide solution recommendations for the problems of SMEs in Turkey but also observe their contribution in development by measuring their social welfare. 245 samples have been selected among 1222 tradesman registered to tradesmen chambers in the city centre of Bolu by applying a distribution in percentages by the chamber of registration. A face to face survey has been conducted for the sample selected as a quantitative research method.
Efficiency of homologous intermolecular recombination at different locations on the Bacillus subtilis chromosome

The efficiencies of intermolecular recombination at 12 different locations on the Bacillus subtilis chromosome were determined by transforming competent cells with a nonreplicative plasmid. The efficiencies varied by only about threefold but were significantly different (P less than 0.05 by a chi-square test) for approximately 20% of the locations. The recA gene product is required for recombination, and the addA gene product appears to affect the variation in a site-specific way.
Sustainability Capacity of HIV/AIDS Programmes in Yogyakarta, Indonesia

The Indonesian government established the prevalence target of HIV <0.50% in 2019 to control the spreading of HIV through the National Medium Term Development Plan. To ensure the sustainability of this development plan, a study of the strategic capacity of HIV/AIDS programmes is needed to provide an overview so that the program can be sustained over time. This study aimed to explore the sustainability capacity of HIV/AIDS programmes in Yogyakarta. This was a descriptive study utilizing a qualitative approach. The study involved 42 participants as key informants selected by a purposive sampling technique, and the data were examined using content analysis. By setting priorities of the local government supported by the Provincial Health Office and with the coordination of the Yogyakarta Province AIDS Commission, the programs are able to maintain sustainable HIV and AIDS programmes in Yogyakarta. Funding capacity, evaluation, programme adaptation and communication have not been optimal to ensure the sustainability. Stability of funding is the main obstacle to achieving the sustainability of HIV and AIDS programs. However, with good planning, partnership structure and sufficient organizational capacity, this approach can ensure the HIV and AIDS programmes will continue with the targets set by the Yogyakarta Provincial Health Office. The government in Yogyakarta needs to increase funding capacity, and improve communication to ensure sustainability. The strategy should include adaptation and evaluation of programs through strengthening private sector financing, formulating a communication plan and improving the capacity to respond to change.
Mycoplasma pneumoniae and its role in asthma

Mycoplasma pneumoniae (M pneumoniae), primarily recognised as a causative agent of community-acquired pneumonia has recently been linked to asthma. An infection with M pneumoniae may precede the onset of asthma or exacerbate asthma symptoms. Chronic infection with M pneumoniae has been suspected to play a part in some patients with asthma. The role of immunoglobulin E-related hypersensitivity and induction of T helper type 2 immune response leading to inflammatory response in M pneumoniae-infected patients with asthma have also been proposed. Use of macrolides in reducing asthma symptoms only in M pneumoniae-infected patients supports the use of macrolides in patients with asthma having M pneumoniae infection. As macrolides are both antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory drugs, the therapeutic role of their biphasic nature in reducing asthma symptoms needs further attention in clinical research.
The Functions of Affect in Health Communications and in the Construction of Health Preferences

We examine potential roles of 4 functions of affect in health communication and the construction of health preferences. The roles of these 4 functions (affect as information, as a spotlight, as a motivator, and as common currency) are illustrated in the area of cancer screening and treatment decision making. We demonstrate that experienced affect influences information processes, judgments, and decisions. We relate the functions to a self-regulation approach and examine factors that may influence the weight of cognitive versus affective processing of information. Affect’s role in health communication is likely to be nuanced, and it deserves careful empirical study of its effects on patients’ well-being.
Macrophage Migration Inhibitory Factor Promotes Colorectal Cancer

A growing body of evidence implicates macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) in tumorigenesis and metastasis. In this study, we investigated whether MIF expression was associated with clinicopathologic features of colorectal carcinoma (CRC), especially in tumors with hepatic metastasis, and whether neutralization of endogenous MIF using anti-MIF therapeutics would inhibit tumor growth and/or decrease the frequency of colorectal hepatic metastases in a mouse colon carcinoma model. The concentration of serum MIF was positively correlated with an increased risk of hepatic metastasis in human patients with CRC (R = 1.25, 95% confidence internal = 1.02–1.52, P = 0.03). MIF was also dramatically upregulated in human colorectal tissue, with 20–40 times as many MIF-positive cells found in the mucosa of patients with CRC than in normal tissue (P < 0.001 ANOVA). Moreover, in those patients with metastatic colorectal cancer in the liver, MIF-positive cells were similarly increased in the diseased hepatic tissue. This increased MIF expression was restricted to diseased tissue and not found in areas of the liver with normal morphology. In subsequent in vitro experiments, we found that addition of recombinant MIF to colonic cell lines significantly increased their invasive properties and the expression of several genes (for example, matrix metalloproteinase 9 and vascular endothelial growth factor) known to be upregulated in cancerous tissue. Finally, we treated mice that had been given CT26 colon carcinoma cell transplants with anti-MIF therapeutics—either the MIF-specific inhibitor ISO-1 or neutralizing anti-MIF antibodies—and observed a significant reduction in tumor burden relative to vehicle-treated animals. Taken together, these data demonstrate that MIF expression was not only correlated with the presence of colorectal cancer but also may play a direct role in cancer development.
Coeval 40Ar/39Ar Ages of 65.0 Million Years Ago from Chicxulub Crater Melt Rock and Cretaceous-Tertiary Boundary Tektites

40Ar/39Ar dating of drill core samples of a glassy melt rock recovered from beneath a massive impact breccia contained within the 180-kilometer subsurface Chicxulub crater in Yucat�n, Mexico, has yielded well-behaved incremental heating spectra with a mean plateau age of 64.98 � 0.05 million years ago (Ma). The glassy melt rock of andesitic composition was obtained from core 9 (1390 to 1393 meters) in the Chicxulub 1 well. The age of the melt rock is virtually indistinguishable from 40Ar/39Ar ages obtained on tektite glass from Beloc, Haiti, and Arroyo el Mimbral, northeastern Mexico, of 65.01 � 0.08 Ma (mean plateau age for Beloc) and 65.07 � 0.10 Ma (mean total fusion age for both sites). The 40Ar/39Ar ages, in conjunction with geochemical and petrological similarities, strengthen the recent suggestion that the Chicxulub structure is the source for the Haitian and Mexican tektites and is a viable candidate for the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary impact site.
Increased Growth Hormone Binding to Liver Membranes of Obese Zucker Rats

Developmental changes in hepatic growth hormone binding sites were examined in the genetically obese male fa/fa rats and in the lean littermates. At 16 days, fa/fa pups are normoinsulinemic; the specific binding of 125I-hGH to liver membranes is comparable in the two genotypes. At 4 weeks and later on, plasma membranes and Golgi fractions of male obese Zucker rats have more GH binding sites than lean littermates. The GH pituitary content is comparable in the two genotypes from 2 to 8 weeks and in 14-week-old fa/fa rats it is half that in lean animals. In the two genotypes plasma IGFI dramatically increases during puberty. At 4 weeks, plasma IGFI level is significantly higher in fa/fa rats than in lean littermates. In this model of genetic obesity, an increased GH binding to liver membranes is observed after the third week of life, shortly after the onset of hyperinsulinemia in the fa/fa rat.
Approximation particulaire et méthode de Laplace pour le filtrage bayésien

La these porte sur l'apport de la methode de Laplace pour l'approximation du filtre bayesien dans des modeles de Markov caches generaux, c'est-a-dire dans un cadre sequentiel, avec comme domaine d'application privilegie la poursuite de cibles mobiles. A la base, la methode de Laplace est une methode asymptotique pour le calcul d'integrales, c'est-a-dire dans un cadre statique, valide en theorie des que la fonction a integrer presente un maximum de plus en plus significatif, lequel apporte la contribution essentielle au resultat. En pratique, cette methode donne des resultats souvent tres precis meme en dehors de ce cadre de validite theorique. Les deux contributions principales de la these sont les suivantes. Premierement, nous avons utilise la methode de Laplace en complement du filtrage particulaire : on sait en effet que les methodes de Monte Carlo sequentielles basees sur l'echantillonnage pondere sont mises en difficulte quand la fonction de ponderation (ici la fonction de vraisemblance) est trop localisee, par exemple quand la variance du bruit d'observation est trop faible, or c'est precisement la le domaine ou la methode de Laplace est efficace et justifiee theoriquement, d'ou l'idee naturelle de combiner les deux points de vue. Nous proposons ainsi un algorithme associant la methode de Laplace et le filtrage particulaire, appele le Laplace particle filter. Deuxiemement, nous avons analyse l'approximation du filtre bayesien grâce a la methode de Laplace seulement (c'est-a-dire sans generation d'echantillons aleatoires) : il s'agit ici de controler la propagation de l'erreur d'approximation d'un pas de temps au pas de temps suivant, dans un cadre asymptotique approprie, par exemple quand le bruit d'observation tend vers zero, ou quand le bruit d'etat et le bruit d'observation tendent conjointement (et a la meme vitesse) vers zero, ou plus generalement quand l'information contenue dans le systeme tend vers l'infini, avec une interpretation en terme d'identifiabilite.
A comparative study of earnings quality of firms listed in the NEEQ market and the Growth Enterprise Market

ABSTRACT This paper explores the differences in earnings quality between the National Equities Exchange and Quotations (NEEQ) companies and the Growth Enterprise Market (GEM) companies. The study finds that NEEQ companies and GEM companies have different characteristics in earnings quality. NEEQ companies have a significantly higher level of upward earnings management than GEM companies, while GEM companies have stronger incentives to manage earnings downward through a ‘big bath’ than NEEQ companies, owing to the special treatment and delisting regulations for GEM firms. We also find that the unique institutions of NEEQ have significant impacts on the earnings quality of companies. Innovation-layer companies, companies applying for IPOs, companies with independent directors, companies trading with market makers, companies with private equity (PE) or venture capital (VC) investment have higher earnings quality.
Phenotypical Changes of the Pulmonary Artery Endothelial Cells in Fetal Sheep Model of Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension of the Newborn

Persistent pulmonary artery hypertension of the newborn is a common lung disorder in neonates affecting one in every 500 live births with high mortality and morbidity rates. Intrauterine ductus arteriosus constriction in fetal sheep is the most commonly used animal model to study this disease entity. In vitro studies using pulmonary artery endothelial cells obtained from this animal model have provided us a lot of important information to understand this disease. Evidence suggests that there is a phenotypical change with pulmonary artery endothelial cells under pulmonary hypertension with increased formation of reactive oxygen species that lead to changes in several signaling pathways. Research using pulmonary artery endothelial cells from this animal model can help us not only to understanding the Pathophysiology of the persistent pulmonary artery hypertension of the newborn but also finding new targets that we can study to treat the disease in human neonates.
A Novel Gene Selection Method Based on Sparse Representation and Max-Relevance and Min-Redundancy.

AIM AND OBJECTIVE Gene selection method as an important data preprocessing work has been followed. The criteria Maximum relevance and minimum redundancy (MRMR) has been commonly used for gene selection, which has a satisfactory performance in evaluating the correlation between two genes. However, for viewing genes in isolation, it ignores the influence of other genes. METHODS In this study, we propose a new method based on sparse representation and MRMR algorithm (SRCMRM), using the sparse representation coefficient to represent the relevance of genes and correlation between genes and categories. The SRCMRMR algorithm contains two steps. Firstly, the genes irrelevant to the classification target are removed by using sparse representation coefficient. Secondly, sparse representation coefficient is used to calculate the correlation between genes and the most representative gene with the highest evaluation. RESULTS To validate the performance of the SRCMRM, our method is compared with various algorithms. The proposed method achieves better classification accuracy for all datasets. CONCLUSION The effectiveness and stability of our method have been proven through various experiments, which means that our method has practical significance.
A hybrid association rule mining approach for characterizing network traffic behaviour

Understanding network traffic behaviour is crucial for managing and securing computer networks. One important technique is to mine frequent patterns or association rules from analysed traffic data. On the one hand, association rule mining usually generates a huge number of patterns and rules, many of them meaningless or user‐unwanted; on the other hand, association rule mining can miss some necessary knowledge if it does not consider the hierarchy relationships in the network traffic data. Aiming to address such issues, this paper proposes a hybrid association rule mining method for characterizing network traffic behaviour. Rather than frequent patterns, the proposed method generates non‐similar closed frequent patterns from network traffic data, which can significantly reduce the number of patterns. This method also proposes to derive new attributes from the original data to discover novel knowledge according to hierarchy relationships in network traffic data and user interests. Experiments performed on real network traffic data show that the proposed method is promising and can be used in real applications. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
KNOWLEDGE DISCOVERY CONDUCTED IN THE AREAS OF MACHINE LEARNING BY HIGH PERFORMANCE COMPUTING USING EVALUATION OF LEARNING ALGORITHMS

The last decade has seen considerable growth in interest in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. In the broadest sense, these fields aim to ‘learn something useful’ about the environment within which the organism operates. How gathered information is processed leads to the development of algorithms, how to process high dimensional data and deal with uncertainty. In the early stages of research in Machine Learning and related areas, similar techniques were discovered in relatively isolated research communities. Whilst not all techniques have a natural description in terms of probability theory, many do, and it is the framework of Graphical Models (a marriage between graph and probability theory) that has enabled the understanding and transference of ideas from statistical physics, statistics, machine learning and information theory. To this extent, it is now reasonable to expect that machine learning researchers are familiar with the basics of statistical modelling techniques. we apply different machine learning (ML) techniques for building objective models, that permit to automatically assess the image quality in agreement with human visual perception. The six ML methods proposed are discriminant analysis, k-nearest neighbors, artificial neural network, non-linear regression, decision tree and fuzzy logic. Both the stability and the robustness of designed models are evaluated by using Monte-Carlo cross-validation approach (MCCV). The simulation results demonstrate that fuzzy logic model provides the best prediction accuracy.