Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Antiarrhythmic properties of a rapid delayed-rectifier current activator in rabbit models of acquired long QT syndrome.

AIMS Impaired repolarization in cardiac myocytes can lead to long QT syndrome (LQTS), with delayed repolarization and increased susceptibility to Torsades de Pointes (TdP) arrhythmias. Current pharmacological treatment of LQTS is often inadequate. This study sought to evaluate the antiarrhythmic effect of a novel compound (NS1643) that activates the rapid delayed-rectifier K+ current, I(Kr), in two rabbit models of acquired LQTS. METHODS AND RESULTS We used two clinically relevant in vivo rabbit models of TdP in which we infused NS1643 or vehicle: (i) three-week atrioventricular block with ventricular bradypacing; (ii) dofetilide-induced I(Kr) inhibition in methoxamine-sensitized rabbits. In addition, we studied effects on ionic currents in cardiomyocytes with I(Kr) suppressed by bradycardia remodelling or dofetilide exposure. Bradypaced rabbits developed QT interval prolongation, spontaneous ventricular ectopy, and TdP. Infusion of NS1643 completely suppressed arrhythmic activity and shortened the QT interval; vehicle had no effect. NS1643 also suppressed ventricular tachyarrhythmias caused by infusion of dofetilide to methoxamine-sensitized rabbits, and reversed dofetilide-induced QT prolongation. NS1643 increased I(Kr) in cardiomyocytes isolated from normal and bradycardia-remodelled rabbits by approximately 75% and 50%, respectively (P < 0.001 for each). Similarly, NS1643 restored I(Kr) suppressed by 5 nmol/L dofetilide (tail current 0.28 +/- 0.03 pA/pF pre-dofetilide, 0.20 +/- 0.01 pA/pF in the presence of dofetilide, 0.27 +/- 0.02 pA/pF after adding NS1643 to dofetilide-containing solution, P < 0.01). CONCLUSION Pharmacological activation of I(Kr) reverses acquired LQTS and TdP caused by bradycardic remodelling and I(Kr)-blocking drugs. I(Kr)-activating drug therapy could be a potentially interesting treatment approach for LQTS.
Adenylate cyclase toxin-hemolysin relevance for pertussis vaccines

The adenylate cyclase toxin-hemolysin (ACT, AC-Hly or CyaA) is a key virulence factor of Bordetella pertussis. It targets bactericidal activities of phagocytes, such as oxidative burst and complement- or antibody-mediated opsonophagocytic killing of bacteria. Through cAMP signaling, CyaA also skews TLR-triggered maturation of dendritic cells, inhibiting proinflammatory IL-12 and TNF-α secretion and enhancing IL-10 production and Treg expansion, likely hampering induction of adaptive immune responses to Bordetella infections. Non-enzymatic CyaA toxoid is a potent protective antigen and adjuvant that boosts immunogenicity of co-administered B. pertussis antigens and improves potency of acellular pertussis (aP) vaccines in mice. This makes CyaA a prime antigen candidate for inclusion into a next generation of aP vaccines. Moreover, recombinant CyaA toxoids were recently shown to be safe in humans in frame of Phase I clinical evaluation of a CyaA-based immunotherapeutic vaccine that induces Th1-polarized CD8+ cytotoxic T-lymphocyte responses targeting cervical tumors.
Re.: "The health status of nonparticipants in a population-based health study: the Hordaland Health Study".

In their interesting article in which they compared the health of participants with that of nonparticipants in a population-based survey in Norway, Knudsen et al. (1) were able to link their eligible population sample with the Norwegian national registry of disability pensions, which includes information about diagnoses. They found that the likelihood of receiving a disability pension was higher among nonparticipants, and this was especially true for persons receiving disability pensions as a result of mental disorders. One of the most important features of their study was that the use of a registry-based outcome provided information on health status several years after inception, and the authors claim that “this was the first study to obtain information about nonparticipation bias using a longitudinal design” (1, p. 1310).
Attention to Faces: A Change-Blindness Study

What strategies does human vision use to attend to faces and their features? How are such strategies altered by 2-D inversion or photographic negation? We report two experiments in which these questions were studied with the flicker task of the change-blindness literature. In experiment 1 we studied detection of configural changes to the eyes or mouth, and found that upright faces receive more efficient attention than inverted faces, and that faces shown with normal contrast receive more efficient attention than faces shown in photographic negative. Moreover, eyes receive greater attention than the mouth. In experiment 2 we studied detection of local changes to the eyes or mouth, and found the same results. It is well known that inversion and negation impair the perception and recognition of faces. The experiments presented here extend previous findings by showing that inversion and negation also impair attention to faces.
Proposing Metrics for Benchmarking Novel EEG Technologies Towards Real-World Measurements

Recent advances in electroencephalographic (EEG) acquisition allow for recordings using wet and dry sensors during whole-body motion. The large variety of commercially available EEG systems contrasts with the lack of established methods for objectively describing their performance during whole-body motion. Therefore, the aim of this study was to introduce methods for benchmarking the suitability of new EEG technologies for that context. Subjects performed an auditory oddball task using three different EEG systems (Biosemi wet—BSM, Cognionics Wet—Cwet, Conionics Dry—Cdry). Nine subjects performed the oddball task while seated and walking on a treadmill. We calculated EEG epoch rejection rate, pre-stimulus noise (PSN), signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and EEG amplitude variance across the P300 event window (CVERP) from a subset of 12 channels common to all systems. We also calculated test-retest reliability and the subject’s level of comfort while using each system. Our results showed that using the traditional 75 μV rejection threshold BSM and Cwet epoch rejection rates are ~25% and ~47% in the seated and walking conditions respectively. However, this threshold rejects ~63% of epochs for Cdry in the seated condition and excludes 100% of epochs for the majority of subjects during walking. BSM showed predominantly no statistical differences between seated and walking condition for all metrics, whereas Cwet showed increases in PSN and CVERP, as well as reduced SNR in the walking condition. Data quality from Cdry in seated conditions were predominantly inferior in comparison to the wet systems. Test-retest reliability was mostly moderate/good for these variables, especially in seated conditions. In addition, subjects felt less discomfort and were motivated for longer recording periods while using wet EEG systems in comparison to the dry system. The proposed method was successful in identifying differences across systems that are mostly caused by motion-related artifacts and usability issues. We conclude that the extraction of the selected metrics from an auditory oddball paradigm may be used as a benchmark method for testing the performance of different EEG systems in mobile conditions. Moreover dry EEG systems may need substantial improvements to meet the quality standards of wet electrodes.
Alleviating stuttering with pharmacological interventions

Stuttering is a speech disorder characterised by frequent prolongations, repetitions or blocks of spoken sounds and/or syllables. Stuttering is very common and is classified by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) as an Axis I disorder. In spite of this, stuttering treatment is sporadically addressed by a practicing physician, especially in the US. Much has recently been learned of the neurophysiological basis of this disorder, which has provided insight into novel treatment strategies, thus helping to guide the practising clinician. Stuttering is likely to be associated, at least in part, to dopamine hyperactivity in the brain. Novel dopamine antagonists such as risperidone and olanzapine, have recently been shown to improve the symptoms of stuttering providing a strong foundation for physicians to more effectively treat this disorder.
Effects of Four Weeks of High-Intensity Interval Training and Creatine Supplementation on Critical Power and Anaerobic Working Capacity in College-Aged Men

Kendall, KL, Smith, AE, Graef, JL, Fukuda, DH, Moon, JR, Beck, TW, Cramer, JT, and Stout, JR. Effects of four weeks of high-intensity interval training and creatine supplementation on critical power and anaerobic working capacity in college-aged men. J Strength Cond Res 23(6): 1663-1669, 2009-The critical power test provides 2 measures, critical power (CP) and anaerobic working capacity (AWC). In theory, the CP measurement represents the maximal power output that can be maintained without fatigue, and AWC is an estimate of work capacity associated with muscle energy reserves. High-intensity interval training (HIIT) has been shown to be an effective training method for improving endurance performance, including &OV0312;O2PEAK. In addition, creatine (Cr) supplementation has been reported to improve AWC without training; however, it has shown no effect on CP. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of 4 weeks of HIIT with Cr supplementation on CP and AWC. Forty-two recreationally active men volunteered to participate in this study. Participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 groups: Cr (n = 16), 10 g Cr + 10 g dextrose; placebo (PL, n = 16), 20 g dextrose; control (CON, n = 10), no treatment. Before and after supplementation, each participant performed a maximal oxygen consumption test (&OV0312;O2PEAK) on a cycle ergometer to establish peak power output (PPO). Participants then completed a CP test involving 3 exercise bouts with the workloads set as a percentage of their PPO to determine CP and AWC. After a 2-week familiarization period of training and supplementing, PPO, CP, and AWC were remeasured before an additional 4 weeks of HIIT and supplementation were completed. Training consisted of 5 sets of 2-minute exercise bouts with 1 minute rest in between performed on the cycle ergometer, with intensities based on PPO. A significant improvement in CP was observed in the Cr group (6.72% ± 2.54%), whereas PL showed no significant change (3.87% ± 2.30%), and CON significantly decreased (6.27% ± 2.38%). Furthermore, no changes in AWC were observed in any of the groups after treatment. The current findings suggest that Cr supplementation may enhance the effects of intense interval endurance training on endurance performance changes.
HYPERCALCEMIA IN MALIGNANT LYMPHOMA AND LEUKEMIA

Hypercalcemia is an uncommon complication of the natural history of malignant lymphoma and leukemia. Despite a high incidence of osseous and marrow involvement, it exists in striking contrast to the relatively high incidence of these complications in multiple myeloma. Of interest is the occurrence of hypercalcemia as a presenting sign of malignant lymphoma. This report is an analysis of the incidence and course of hypercalcemia and its correlation with osseous involvement at the time of initial staging in a large number of untreated patients with advanced lymphoma who were evaluated at a single institution. The patterns of metastatic spread with predilection for bone involvement appear to be more frequent with certain histologic subtypes of the non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas. In addition, a consideration of hypercalcemia in leukemia is included with a review of the literature to date. The importance of the role of tumor-directed therapy on the control of hypercalcemia of leukemia and lymphomas will be considered.
Syntactic and Semantic Differencing for Combinatorial Models of Test Designs

Combinatorial test design (CTD) is an effective test design technique, considered to be a testing best practice. CTD provides automatic test plan generation, but it requires a manual definition of the test space in the form of a combinatorial model. As the system under test evolves, e.g., due to iterative development processes and bug fixing, so does the test space, and thus, in the context of CTD, evolution translates into frequent manual model definition updates. Manually reasoning about the differences between versions of real-world models following such updates is infeasible due to their complexity and size. Moreover, representing the differences is challenging. In this work, we propose a first syntactic and semantic differencing technique for combinatorial models of test designs. We define a concise and canonical representation for differences between two models, and suggest a scalable algorithm for automatically computing and presenting it. We use our differencing technique to analyze the evolution of 42 real-world industrial models, demonstrating its applicability and scalability. Further, a user study with 16 CTD practitioners shows that comprehension of differences between real-world combinatorial model versions is challenging and that our differencing tool significantly improves the performance of less experienced practitioners. The analysis and user study provide evidence for the potential usefulness of our differencing approach. Our work advances the state-of-the-art in CTD with better capabilities for change comprehension and management.
Circulating Levels of Vitamin D and Colon and Rectal Cancer: The Physicians' Health Study and a Meta-analysis of Prospective Studies

It remains unknown whether increased risk with low levels of vitamin D is present for colon and/or rectal cancer. To investigate the association between circulating vitamin D levels and colon and rectal cancer, we examined the associations between plasma levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] and 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D [1,25(OH)2D] and colon and rectal cancer in the Physicians' Health Study and then conducted a meta-analysis of eight prospective studies of circulating levels of 25(OH)D and colon and rectal cancers, including the Physicians' Health Study. Study-specific ORs and 95% CIs were pooled by using a random-effects model. A total of 1,822 colon and 868 rectal cancers were included in the meta-analysis. We observed a significant inverse association for colorectal cancer (OR = 0.66; 95% CI, 0.54–0.81), comparing top versus bottom quantiles of circulating 25(OH)D levels. The inverse association was stronger for rectal cancer (OR = 0.50 for top versus bottom quantiles; 95% CI, 0.28–0.88) than colon cancer (OR = 0.77; 95% CI, 0.56–1.07; P value for difference between colon and rectal cancer = 0.20). These data suggest an inverse association between circulating 25(OH)D levels and colorectal cancer, with a stronger association for rectal cancer. Cancer Prev Res; 4(5); 735–43. ©2011 AACR.
Health services use and costs in people with intellectual disability: building a context knowledge base for evidence-informed policy

Purpose of review We summarize the research published between 2011 and 2015 in healthcare utilization and costs for persons with intellectual disabilities/intellectual developmental disorders with a particular focus on context studies for evidence-informed policy. Recent findings Persons with intellectual disability show higher unmet needs and lower use of promotion and prevention services and generic health services. Use of generic psychiatric services varies across countries. Persons with intellectual disability and comorbid mental disorders have the highest rates of specialized service use, costs, and unmet needs. International and national cost-of-illness studies show the high impact of intellectual disability in the total direct health costs of mental disorders at least in Europe. On the contrary, the burden-of-illness studies show conflicting results in intellectual disability. Summary Contextual studies of healthcare and costs have improved the knowledge base for evidence-informed planning in intellectual disability in a number of countries. However, only two of these studies have used local atlases of healthcare for improving decision making. The paucity of information on prevalence, comorbidity, and demographic indicators hampers the advance of evidence-informed policy in intellectual disability.
Salmonella Typhimurium outbreak associated with a contaminated food container in a school in Sichuan Province, China

SUMMARY On 13 June 2013, a fever and diarrhoea outbreak occurred in a boarding school in Sichuan Province. We conducted a field investigation and compared food exposure of 81 case students and 104 control students (years 7 and 8) in order to identify the source of infection. There were 401 cases identified (399 students and two cooks). The attack rates were 23–46% in nursery, primary, and secondary schools, but 0% in the high school. Eighty-five percent of case students, consumed cowpea salad compared to 60% of control students at lunch on 12 June (odds ratio 3·1, 95% confidence interval 1·3–7·8). The cowpeas were stored at room temperature for 3 h in a bucket previously used to store raw ingredients. The bucket was cleaned using water without a disinfectant. There were two buckets of cowpea, one for the high-school students and another for the other students. This Salmonella outbreak was likely caused by the cowpea salad due to cross-contamination via a storage bucket.
Universal aspects of small-scale motions in turbulence

Two aspects of small-scale turbulence are currently regarded universal, as they have been reported for a wide variety of turbulent flows. Firstly, the vorticity vector has been found to display a preferential alignment with the eigenvector corresponding to the intermediate eigenvalue of the strain rate tensor; and secondly, the joint probability density function (p.d.f.) of the second and third invariant of the velocity gradient tensor, Q and R, has a characteristic teardrop shape. This paper provides an explanation for these universal aspects in terms of a spatial organization of coherent structures, which is based on an evaluation of the average flow pattern in the local coordinate system defined by the eigenvectors of the strain rate tensor. The approach contrasts with previous investigations, which have relied on assumed model flows. The present average flow patterns have been calculated for existing experimental (particle image velocimetry) or numerical (direct numerical simulation) datasets of a turbulent boundary layer (TBL), a turbulent channel flow and for homogeneous isotropic turbulence. All results show a shear-layer structure consisting of aligned vortical motions, separating two larger-scale regions of relatively uniform flow. Because the directions of maximum and minimum strain in a shear layer are in the plane normal to the vorticity vector, this vector aligns with the remaining strain direction, i.e. the intermediate eigenvector of the strain rate tensor. Further, the QR joint p.d. f. for these average flow patterns reveals a shape reminiscent of the teardrop, as seen in many turbulent flows. The above-mentioned organization of the small-scale motions is not only found in the average patterns, but is also frequently observed in the instantaneous velocity fields of the different turbulent flows. It may, therefore, be considered relevant and universal.
Evaluación preliminar de los efectos de la inundación y la herbivoría sobre plántulas de mangle

El impacto de los niveles de inundacion y de los insectos herbivoros en el tamano de las plantulas de Laguncularia racemosa y Rhizophora mangle fueron evaluados en una hectarea de manglar entre septiembre y octubre del 2000. Los niveles de agua variaron durante la temporada de inundacion de 0-27 cm al inicio y de 10-94 cm al final, con un maximo de 130 cm. Se encontraron diferencias de tamano entre las plantulas vivas y muertas de L. racemosa despues de la inundacion (p < 0.05), sobreviviendo las plantulas mas grandes (56.02 ? 31.47 cm). Sin embargo, en L. racemosa existe una sobreposicion de tamanos entre categorias (vivos vs muertos), asi como al interior de cada categoria, lo que indica que puede haber un efecto del sitio donde se establecen las plantas causado por la microtopografia (zonas bajas vs zonas altas).
An efficient write buffer management scheme considering the parallelism in solid-state drives

: In multi - channel architecture SSDs , as two or more flash memories can operate independently via different channels , I / O operations are actually performed in a cluster unit consisting of several pages . This paper proposes a novel write buffer replacement policy that fully exploits such high parallelism of SSDs and leads to better I / O performance . Our proposed scheme evaluates buffers in a cluster unit by intelligently aggregating the re - reference probability of pages in a cluster . The pages belonging to the least valuable cluster are evicted together when the replacement is needed . This replace - ment policy efficiently takes both the parallel architecture of SSDs and the temporal locality of I / O workloads into consideration , and thus achieves better I / O performance of SSDs . Through the trace - driven simulations , we show that our scheme improves performance up to 25 % in terms of write throughput for common workloads .
Characteristics of Sarcomere Shortening in Single Frog Atrial Cardiac Cells during Lightly Loaded Contractions

We studied sarcomere performance in single isolated intact cardiac cells using techniques that allow direct measurement of sarcomere length and force. This investigation dealt primarily with sarcomere performance during twitch contractions under lightly loaded conditions. In such contractions, there was a significant portion of the contraction in which sarcomere shortening occurred at constant velocity over a significant range of sarcomere lengths. The constant velocity phase of shortening was followed by a phase of shortening in which sarcomere velocity decreased markedly. Both the velocity and extent of sarcomere shortening depended on the stimulus parameters used to excite the cell. With threshold stimulation, sarcomere velocities during the constant velocity phase of shortening ranged from 1 to 5.5 /μm/sec in different cells and significant slowing of sarcomere shortening began at sarcomere lengths of 1.8-2.0 /μm. In contrast, when cells were stimulated with a long duration stimulus (200 msec) of large current strength, sarcomere velocities during the constant velocity phase ranged from 6 to 12 /μm/sec, and significant slowing did not occur until a sarcomere length of about 1.6 lira was reached. The threshold stimulus strength-stimulus duration relationship was determined on the single cell, and it was found to be of the type expected for a cell having an intact excitable membrane capable of generating an action potential when depolarized to a fixed voltage threshold. The data presented in this paper give direct evidence that the lightly loaded cardiac sarcomere has a velocity of shortening which depends on the level of contractile activation but is independent of sarcomere length at sarcomere lengths greater than about 1.6 pm. Circ Res 48: 189-200, 1981