Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Marine Invertebrate Larvae Associated with Symbiodinium: A Mutualism from the Start?

Symbiodinium are dinoflagellate photosynthetic algae that associate with a diverse array of marine invertebrates, and these relationships are comprehensively documented for adult animal hosts. Conversely, comparatively little is known about the associations during larval development of animal hosts, although four different metazoan phyla (Porifera, Cnidaria, Acoelomorpha, and Mollusca) produce larvae associated with Symbiodinium. These phyla represent considerable diversities in larval forms, manner of symbiont acquisition, and requirements on the presence of symbionts for successful metamorphosis. Importantly, the different requirements are conveyed by specific symbiont types that are selected by the host animal larvae. Nevertheless, it remains to be determined whether these associations during larval stages already represent mutualistic interactions, as evident from the relationship of Symbiodinium with their adult animal hosts. For instance, molecular studies suggest that the host larval transcriptome is nearly unaltered after symbiont acquisition. Even so, a symbiosis-specific gene has been identified in Symbiodinium that is expressed in larval host stages, and similar genes are currently being described for host organisms. However, some reports suggest that the metabolic exchange between host larvae and Symbiodinium may not cover the energetic requirements of the host. Here, we review current studies to summarize what is known about the association between metazoan larvae and Symbiodinium. In particular, our aim was to gather in how far the mutualistic relationship present between adult animals hosts and Symbiodinium is already laid out at the time of symbiont acquisition by host larvae. We conclude that the mutualistic relationship between animal hosts and algal symbionts in many cases is not set up during larval development. Furthermore, symbiont identity may influence whether a mutualism can be established during host larval stages.
Production of Antibody against Australia Antigen in Horses

The close association between the Australia( SH) antigen [1-4] and viral hepatitis is well established. Antiserum against the Australia antigen is useful in detecting hepatitis carriers and patients with chronic anicteric hepatitis. The potential practical application of the Au( SH) antigen is evident, especially for systematically testing blood donors for Au antigen. For example, in Berlin we have detected the Au(SH) antigen in 5 of 246 (2 yo) apparently healthy blood donors [5]. The antibodies were found in a small proportion of multitransfused patients and of apparently healthy people (in Berlin we found antibodies in 2 of 235 multitransfused patients and in 3 of 246 apparently healthy blood donors [5]). Soon after the discovery of the antibody in transfused patients by MELARTIN and BLUMBERG [6], a method for producing an antiserum by immunizing rabbits was developed [see also 7,8]. In our experiments, 2 horses were immunized with the whole serum containing Australia antigen (horse No. 1) and with the Aupositive fraction obtained from serum by gel filtration (Sephadex G 200), (horse No. 2). In both animals, antibodies (in horse No. 1 a ‘week’ antibody) were formed within 3 months. The antisera were absorbed with the serum of an individual who did not have Australia antigen; this resulted in an antibody which reacted only with sera of the known Au antigen-positive individuals. The precipitin line formed between the horse antiserum and the Au antigen gave identical reaction to the precipitin lines of both the human and the rabbit antibodies. [The technical details were described by 5, 91. This method of producing antisera is suitable to overcome the lack of Australia antibodies.
A Machine Learning Approach to Riddle Abused Scraps from OSN User Space

Today's Online Social Networks are to communicate with people and share information with them. In this kind of network process user space is a space where scraps or temporal notes of its users can be displayed. But users have very less control on scraps posted on their space. Abused Scraps which are sending and received on the user private space are riddled by allowing OSN users to have a direct control on the scraps posted on their spaces through Filtering Rules and Context Based Filtering Mechanism. A Flexible Rule System, that allows users to customize the filtering criteria to be applied to their space. The Abused Scraps from the user space can be riddled by Machine Learning based soft classifier. The user has a system with a sophisticated approach to decide which scraps should be inserted into a Blacklist.
[DNA synthesis in the testes of infertile men with varicocele--image cytometeric analysis of proliferating cell nuclear antigen].

BACKGROUND The analysis of cell kinetics of germ cells have been implicated as important clue to investigate the etiology of infertile patients. We examined the germ cell kinetics of varicocele testis using proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) immunostaing by image cytometry (CAS 2000), which is very accurate and useful method to evaluate the staining intensity. PATIENTS AND METHODS Testicular biopsy specimen obtained from 28 cases of male infertility with left varicocele and 5 normal controls were quantitatively examined concerning PCNA expression. Positive rate of PCNA (PR) was expressed as the percent of nuclear area positively stained with PCNA monoclonal antibody compared with total nuclear area analyzed in more than 20 seminiferous tubules. A hematoxylin and eosin-stained sections, which were fixed in Bouin's solution were used to examine Johnsen's mean score by photomicroscopy. RESULTS PR of right and left testes of varicocele patients were 11.3 +/- 4.8% and 11.3 +/- 4.1%, respectively. PR of normal testes was 21.7 +/- 3.1%. PR of each side were reduced similarly and the difference of PR between right and left testes of varicocele patients were not significant. Bilateral PR was 11.4 +/- 4.1%. Bilateral PR was significant lower than that of normal testes (p < 0.001). Concerning varicocele grade, sperm concentration of seminogram, Johnsen's mean score and the improvement of seminogram, no significant correlations between PR and those were observed. CONCLUSION PR evaluated by image cytometry is very useful biological parameter to assess the germ cell kinetics. In varicocele patients, not only left side but also right side of testes were deteriorated in the cell kinetics and the decrease in DNA synthesis is one of the causes that have deleterious effects on spermatogenesis.
Wearable antennas in the vicinity of human body

A wearable antenna can be defined as an antenna which is designed and meant for part of clothing. In this paper, we address the following issues: (i) textile antenna input-match performance in the vicinity of the human body; (ii) textile antenna radiation characteristics; (iii) power absorbed in the human body; and (iv) peak and averaged SAR over 1 g tissue at the 2.4 GHz ISM band. To our best knowledge, this paper presents the first in-depth results concerning the textile antenna performance in the vicinity of the human body. Numerical results with and without the presence of the human body are discussed in detail.
Social Stress Desensitizes Lymphocytes to Regulation by Endogenous Glucocorticoids: Insights from In Vivo Cell Trafficking Dynamics in Rhesus Macaques

Objective: To determine whether chronic social stress can desensitize leukocytes to normal physiologic regulation by endogenous glucocorticoids. Methods: We analyzed the longitudinal relationship between plasma cortisol levels and peripheral blood lymphocyte counts over 16 monthly assessments in 18 rhesus macaques randomized to recurrent social encounters with a stable set of conspecifics or continually varying social partners (unstable socialization). Results: Animals socialized under stable conditions showed the expected inverse relationship between plasma cortisol concentrations and circulating lymphocyte frequencies. That relationship was significantly attenuated in animals subject to unstable social conditions. Differences in leukocyte redistributional sensitivity to endogenous glucocorticoids emerged within the first week of differential socialization, persisted throughout the 60-week study period, and were correlated with other measures of glucocorticoid desensitization (blunted hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis response to acute stress and redistributional response to dexamethasone challenge). Effects of unstable social conditions on leukocyte sensitivity to cortisol regulation were not related to physical aggression. Conclusion: Chronic social stress can impair normal physiologic regulation of leukocyte function by the HPA axis in ways that may contribute to the increased physical health risks associated with social adversity. GR = glucocorticoid receptor; HPA = hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal; IACUC = Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee; IL = interleukin; SIV = Simian Immunodeficiency Virus.
Zudiet: un sistema que genera patrones alimenticios personalizados y adaptados

Algunos de los mayores problemas de salud publica en el mundo son: la inactividad fisica, el sedentarismo, la obesidad, las cuales son generadoras de enfermedades no transmisibles[4]; estas enfermedades son las causantes de seis de cada diez muertes en el mundo[5]. Una de las soluciones a este problema son los gimnasios, pero estos no son satisfactorios debido a su vision generalista. Esta generalizacion, conlleva a que las personas no sean constantes en la practica del ejercicio o en el seguimiento de una dieta, y que estos, despues de algun tiempo se vuelvan monotonos, por lo que los usuarios podrian abandonarlos. Este articulo presenta un generador de dietas llamado ZuDiet, sistema que toma en cuenta las necesidades y caracteristicas del usuario, con el fin de personalizar las dietas tradicionales, agregando valor a los sistemas generadores de dieta convencionales. Dicho generador se enmarca en un proyecto llamado ZuGym, sistema multi-agente adaptativo que toma en cuenta diversos aspectos del perfil del usario tales como gustos, preferencias y patologias, con el objetivo de proveer un servicio personalizado integral de dietas, rutinas de ejercicios y listas de reproduccion de musica, considerando las particularidades de cada uno de los usuarios del sistema.
N-Acetylcysteine reduces respiratory burst but augments neutrophil phagocytosis in intensive care unit patients

ObjectiveThe antioxidant N-acetylcysteine (NAC) has been shown to attenuate septic tissue injury. To evaluate whether NAC affects host defense mechanisms in critically ill patients, thus predisposing to increased risk of infection, the current study focuses on neutrophil phagocytotic and burst activity after treatment with NAC. DesignProspective, randomized, clinical trial. SettingTwelve-bed operative intensive care unit in a university hospital. PatientsThirty patients diagnosed with sepsis/systemic inflammatory response syndrome, or multiple trauma. InterventionsPatients were randomly assigned to receive either NAC (n = 15) for 4 days in increasing dosages (day 1: 6 g; day 2: 12 g; days 3 and 4: 18 g) or a mucolytic basis dosage of NAC (3 × 300 mg/day [control]; n = 15), respectively. Measurements and Main Results Blood samples were taken before NAC high-dose infusion (day 1), after increasing doses of NAC (days 3 and 5) and 4 days after the last high-dose treatment (day 8). Neutrophil oxidative burst activity after stimulation with Escherichia coli and polymorphonuclear phagocytosis were determined in a flow cytometric assay. Baseline values of polymorphonuclear functions were comparable in both groups. NAC high-dose treatment resulted in a significantly improved phagocytosis activity compared with control patients. In contrast to this, polymorphonuclear burst activity was significantly reduced in the NAC high-dose treated group on day 3. ConclusionThese findings suggest that infusion of NAC in high doses affects granulocyte functions in critically ill patients. Antimicrobial host defense requires the effective sequence of cell adhesion, phagocytosis, and bactericidal respiratory burst. The enhanced phagocytotic activity might be a compensatory mechanism in states of impaired respiratory burst to maintain tissue sterility. For certain mechanisms of disease, the effects observed might be favorable (e.g., ischemia/reperfusion, endothelial cell activation), for others (infection) this might be detrimental.
Domestic endotoxin exposure and clinical severity of asthma

Endotoxins are potent pro‐inflammatory substances present in several natural environments and in commercial house dust extracts. To investigate the possible effect of chronic endotoxin exposure on asthma, 28 patients with perennial chronic asthma (20 allergic to house dust mite and eight intrinsic asthmatics) were evaluated during a 4‐month period (lung function, clinical and immunological criteria). At the same time, two house dust samples were collected from each patient's home to determine total house dust weight (mg/m2), endotoxin concentration and house dust mite antigen content (evaluated indirectly by guanine content with HPLC method). The mean (± s. d.) endotoxin concentration, as measured by quantitative Limulus assay was 2.59 (± 3.41) ng/mg house dust, ranging from 0.12 to 20 ng/mg. The mean guanine content was 0.13 (± 0.16) mg/100 mg house dust. There was no correlation between endotoxin and house dust mite concentrations. Patients were compared according to the low or high grade exposure to dust, endotoxins and guanine. Compared with patients with low grade (≤ 5.6 ng/ml) exposure, subjects exposed to high endotoxin concentrations (> 5.6 ng/ml) showed a significant increase in dyspnea (median 2.6 vs 3.3; P<0.05) and treatment (median 14 vs 44.3; P<0.01) scores, oral corticosteroid (median 0.0 vs 13.5 mg/24 hr; P<0.01) and β2‐mimetics (median four vs eight puffs/day; P<0.01) intake, and a significant decrease in FEV1/FVC (median 84.5 vs 67% of predicted value; P<0.01). In contrast, no differences were found between the two groups exposed to low (< 0.07 mg/100 mg house dust) and high (≥ 0.07 mg/100 mg house dust) concentrations of guanine, respectively. We conclude that endotoxins are present in normal domestic environment and could have a deleterious effect on the chronic asthmatic disease.
Cells for bioartificial liver devices: The human hepatoma‐derived cell line C3A produces urea but does not detoxify ammonia

Extrahepatic bioartificial liver devices should provide an intact urea cycle to detoxify ammonia. The C3A cell line, a subclone of the hepatoma‐derived HepG2 cell line, is currently used in this context as it produces urea, and this has been assumed to be reflective of ammonia detoxification via a functional urea cycle. However, based on our previous findings of perturbed urea‐cycle function in the non‐urea producing HepG2 cell line, we hypothesized that the urea produced by C3A cells was via a urea cycle‐independent mechanism, namely, due to arginase II activity, and therefore would not detoxify ammonia. Urea was quantified using 15N‐ammonium chloride metabolic labelling with gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. Gene expression was determined by real‐time reverse transcriptase‐PCR, protein expression by western blotting, and functional activities with radiolabelling enzyme assays. Arginase inhibition studies used Nω‐hydroxy‐nor‐L‐arginine. Urea was detected in C3A conditioned medium; however, 15N‐ammonium chloride‐labelling indicated that 15N‐ammonia was not incorporated into 15N‐labelled urea. Further, gene expression of two urea cycle genes, ornithine transcarbamylase and arginase I, were completely absent. In contrast, arginase II mRNA and protein was expressed at high levels in C3A cells and was inhibited by Nω‐hydroxy‐nor‐L‐arginine, which prevented urea production, thereby indicating a urea cycle‐independent pathway. The urea cycle is non‐functional in C3A cells, and their urea production is solely due to the presence of arginase II, which therefore cannot provide ammonia detoxification in a bioartificial liver system. This emphasizes the continued requirement for developing a component capable of a full repertoire of liver function. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2008;99: 644–651. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
What Salamanders Have Taught Us About Evolution

Taxon-based research in evolution permits the development of a multidimensional approach, illustrated here with lessons learned from research on salamanders. The clade is widespread and diverse, yet sufficiently small that one can keep all of the species in mind. This facilitates research from diverse perspectives: systematics and phylogenetics, morphology, development, ecology, neurobiology, behavior, and physiology. Different avenues of research offer unique perspectives on how a relatively old vertebrate clade has diversified. An integrated, hierarchically organized, multidimensional program of research on a taxon illuminates many general principles and processes. Among these are the nature of species and homology, adaptation and adaptive radiations, size and shape in relation to issues in organismal integration, ontogeny and development in relation to phylogeny, the ubiquity of homoplasy, ecological niche conservation, species formation, biodiversity, and conservation. Opportunities for future researc.
Three-dimensional road network by fusion of polarimetric and interferometric SAR data

In this paper a fuzzy classification procedure is applied to polarimetric radar measurements, and street pixels are detected. These data are successively grouped into consistent roads by means of a dynamic programming approach based on the fuzzy membership function values. Further fusion of the 2D road network extracted and 3D TOPSAR measurements provides a powerful way to analyze urban infrastructures.
Scalable video coding extension of H.264/AVC

SVC (scalable video coding) was introduced as an amendment of H.264/AVC by Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) and ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) in 2007. SVC can provide different types of scalability and retain reconstruction quality characteristics similar to single layer H.264/AVC but in trade of higher complexity of the decoder compared to H.264/AVC. This paper presents an overview of improved H.264/AVC standard and describes tools for supporting temporal scalability, spatial and SNR (signal-to-noise ratio) scalability. Temporal scalability is realized by the hierarchical B-frame (bi-predictive picture) structure which shows better results than structures used in prior video coding standards. Spatial scalability uses inter-layer prediction from any other layer and residual prediction which shows better results in coding efficiency. For quality scalability different methods are analyzed and the results are compared. The paper illustrates the results for coding efficiency with concept of using combined types of scalability.
Designing with Image Schemas: Resolving the Tension Between Innovation, Inclusion and Intuitive Use

Until recently, designers who set out to design user interfaces that are intuitive to use, innovative and inclusive of users of different ages did not receive much support to reach all three goals in one solution.Itwasassumedthatproductsthatareintuitivetousecouldnotalsobeinnovativeorinclusive, becausetheywouldhavetorelyonmimickingprevioustechnologiestotapthepriorknowledgeof theirusers.Inthispaper,weproposeimage-schemamethodologyasatooltocircumventthisproblem. Weshowhowimageschemascanbeappliedwithinauser-centreddesignprocessusingContextual Designmethodology.Theevaluationoftheresultinginteractiveprototypeofanaudioentertainment applicationshowsthattherequirementsforinclusivedesign,intuitiveuseandinnovativenesscanall bereachedinthesameproduct.Theseresultsarepromising,andopenupnewdirectionsforfurther research.
Visualizing Dynamic Weighted Digraphs with Partial Links

Graphs are traditionally represented as node-link diagrams, but these typically suffer from visual clutter when they become denser, i.e. more vertices and edges are present in the data set. Partial link drawings have been introduced for node-link diagrams aiming at reducing visual clutter caused by link crossings. Although this concept was shown to perform well for some parameter settings, it has not been used for visually encoding dynamic weighted digraphs. In this paper we investigate the problem of visualizing time-varying graphs as one node-link diagram in a specific layout by exploiting the links as timelines. Partially drawn links are used to show the graph dynamics by splitting each link into as many segments as time steps have to be represented. Conventional 2D layout algorithms can be applied while simultaneously showing the evolution over time. Color-coded links represent the changing weights. We use tapered links to reduce possible overlaps at the link target nodes that would occur when using traditional arrow-based directed links. We experiment with different graph layouts and different numbers of data dimensions, i.e. number of vertices, edges, and time steps. We illustrate the usefulness of the technique in a case study investigating dynamic migration data.
Recombinant human immunodeficiency virus type 1 genomes with tat unconstrained by overlapping reading frames reveal residues in Tat important for replication in tissue culture

Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) Tat is essential for virus replication and is a potent trans activator of viral gene expression. Evidence suggests that Tat also influences virus infectivity and cytopathicity. Extensive structure-function studies of Tat in subgenomic settings with point mutagenesis and transient transfection readouts have been performed. These reporter assays have defined certain amino acid residues as being important for trans activation of reporter plasmids. However, they have not directly addressed functions related to virus replication. Here, we have studied Tat structure-function in the setting of replicating viruses. We characterized mutations that emerged in Tat during HIV-1 infections of T lymphocytes. To ensure that the selection pressure for change was directed toward protein function, we constructed HIV-Is in which the Tat reading frame was freed from constraints exerted by overlapping with the reading frames of vpr, rev, and env. When these recombinant viruses were passaged in T cells, 26 novel nucleotide changes in tat were observed from sequencing of 220 independently isolated clones. Recloning of these changes into a pNL4-3 molecular background allowed for the characterization of residues in Tat important for virus replication. Interestingly, many of the changes that affected replication when they were assayed in transient trans activation of plasmid reporters were found to be relatively neutral. We conclude that the structure-function of Tat in virus replication is incompletely reflected by activity measurements based only on subgenomic transient transfections.