Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Multiple mechanisms for regulation of 3 beta-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase/delta 5----delta 4-isomerase, 17 alpha-hydroxylase/C17-20 lyase cytochrome P450, and cholesterol side-chain cleavage cytochrome P450 messenger ribonucleic acid levels in primary cultures of mouse Leydig cells.

The regulation of mRNA levels for delta 5-3 beta-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase/delta 5----delta 4-isomerase (3 beta HSD), 17 alpha-hydroxylase/C17-20 lyase cytochrome P450 (P450(17 alpha] and cholesterol side-chain cleavage cytochrome P450 (P450scc) was studied in primary cultures of mouse Leydig cells. Treatment of Leydig cells with 8-bromo-cAMP (cAMP) was essential for expression of P450(17 alpha) mRNA, but not for 3 beta HSD. Treatment with cAMP caused a decrease in basal levels of 3 beta HSD mRNA. The addition of aminoglutethimide (AG), an inhibitor of cholesterol metabolism, to the cAMP-treated cultures resulted in increased expression of both 3 beta HSD and P450(17 alpha) mRNA levels. The addition of testosterone or the androgen agonist mibolerone to cAMP- plus AG-treated cultures reduced 3 beta HSD and P450(17 alpha) mRNA to levels comparable to those observed when cells were treated with cAMP only. The glucocorticoid dexamethasone reduced both basal and cAMP- plus AG-induced increases in 3 beta HSD mRNA, but not in P450(17 alpha) mRNA. Estradiol at a concentration of 1 microM had no effect on cAMP- plus AG-induced 3 beta HSD or P450(17 alpha) mRNA levels. The role of protein synthesis in mediating the cAMP induction of 3 beta HSD, P450(17 alpha), and P450scc was investigated. The addition of cycloheximide (10 micrograms/ml) to cAMP-treated cultures for 24 h completely suppressed both constitutive and cAMP-induced 3 beta HSD mRNA levels. Cycloheximide also repressed cAMP-induced levels of P450(17 alpha) to 12% of levels observed in the absence of cycloheximide. In sharp contrast, 24-h treatment with cycloheximide did not suppress cAMP induction of P450scc mRNA, but reduced basal levels by approximately 50%. A time course of induction by cAMP (50 microM) of P450(17 alpha) and P450scc mRNA showed very similar rates of increase in P450(17 alpha) and P450scc mRNA, with the greatest increase occurring between 12 and 24 h of treatment. The results of the study demonstrate that in normal mouse Leydig cells steady state levels of mRNA for 3 beta HSD, P450(17 alpha), and P450scc are differentially regulated. cAMP is required for maximal levels of all three mRNAs. There is high constitutive expression of 3 beta HSD and P450scc mRNA, while expression of P450(17 alpha) mRNA is absolutely dependent on cAMP stimulation. Endogenously produced testosterone negatively regulates the expression of cAMP-induced P450(17 alpha) and 3 beta HSD, while the glucocorticoid dexamethasone negatively regulates 3 beta HSD and P450scc. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)
A Brief Overview of Different LDPC Code

: This paper corresponds to a brief survey of LDPC codes. Many error detection and correction codes have been studied. There are vast classes of such codes; some of them are hamming codes, turbo codes, BCH codes and LDPC codes. But among these codes LDPC codes achieve better performance and lower decoding complexity. LDPC codes were originally discovered by Robert G. Gallager. But after the rediscovery of LDPC codes by Mackay and Neal in 1995 interest on LDPC codes increases because of its bit error performance approaches asymptotically the Shannon limit. An LDPC code is a special class of linear block codes whose parity-check matrix H has low density of ones i.e. sparse. Due to this sparsity in LDPC codes there is low complexity decoding and its implementation is also simple. Also LDPC codes provides large degree of parallelism that can be exploited in the decoder and in LDPC codes information block length are long enough. In addition LDPC codes provides wide range of trade-offs between performance and complexity. A major drawback of LDPC codes is their high encoding complexity.LDPC codes find its application in many areas such as satellite transmission of digital television. LDPC codes also used for 10 GBase-T Ethernet which sends data at 10 gigabits per second over twisted pair cable .
How do urinary incontinence and urgency affect women's sexual life?

Objective. To investigate the impact of urinary incontinence and urgency on women's sexual life and the prevalence of urinary leakage during sexual activity. A further aim was to explore factors affecting sexual desire and satisfaction with sexual life. Design. A semi‐structured questionnaire study. Setting and Sample. Sexually active women (n=147) aged 18–74years with urinary incontinence and urgency were recruited from four outpatient clinics. Methods. The women completed questionnaires concerning medical history, psychosocial situation, partner relationship and sexual life, and answered the Bristol Female Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms questionnaire. All underwent clinical evaluation. Main Outcome Measures. Prevalence of urinary leakage during sexual activity, factors affecting sexual desire and sexual satisfaction. Results. The vast majority considered sexuality to be important in their lives. One‐third of the women had urinary leakage during sexual activity. Half reported that sexual life was more or less spoiled due to their urinary incontinence or urgency and they were worried about having urinary leakage during intercourse, and almost two‐thirds worried about odor and felt unattractive. The women's dissatisfaction with sexual life was strongly correlated to unsatisfying psychological health, orgasmic disability and worry about urinary leakage during intercourse. Insufficient vaginal lubrication, unsatisfying psychological health and their partners’ ill health were significantly correlated with decreased sexual desire. Conclusions. Urinary incontinence and urgency have a negative impact on women's sexual life. Thus, a dialogue about sexual function in women with urinary symptoms should become an integral component in clinical management.
Metabolism of spermatozoa. The formation and elimination of hydrogen peroxide by spermatozoa and effects on motility and survival.

agreed within ± 12 %. For three preparations of vitamin D3, one in crude wheat flour and two in com oil, the potencies obtained by the phosphatase method differed from the value given by the boneash method by amounts varying from 25 to 40%. The author is indebted to Dr A. M. Wynne for advice and for reading the manuscript, and to Dr D. C. Hill for suggestions regarding the statistical methods. The technical assistance of Miss M. Briggs and Mr S. J. Slinger is gratefully acknowledged.
Practices of Liver Biopsy in France: Results of a Prospective Nationwide Survey

A nationwide prospective study was conducted in France in 89 university and primary referral hospitals' liver units to evaluate practices of liver biopsy and the occurrence of complications. A total of 2,084 biopsies were analyzed, recording the indication, hemostasis parameters, experience of operator, route of biopsy, use of ultrasonography (US), type of hospitalization, side effects, and complications. Pain, anxiety, and discomfort were evaluated by patients by visual analogue scale (VAS). Biopsies were performed by experienced physicians (>150 procedures performed) in 72%, and hepato‐gastroenterologists in 89% of the cases. Hepatitis C was the indication in 54%. Sedation or premedication (atropine) was given in 46%. US‐guidance was used in 56% of the cases. A day‐care procedure was used in 27%. No deaths occurred, but severe complications were observed in 0.57% and increased with the number of passes and decreased with experience of operator, use of atropine, and US‐guidance. Pain was independently related to general anesthesia, experience of the operator, female sex, and hepatitis C. Anxiety was increased in women. Discomfort was increased by venous access and decreased with an experienced operator. Acceptance of additional biopsies was related to a day‐care procedure and independently related to general anesthesia and multiples passes. This study showed that (1) liver biopsy procedures vary greatly in France, (2) hepatitis C is the main indication for liver biopsy at present, (3) US‐guidance should be developed to reduce severe complications, and (4) day‐care procedures increase acceptance of a future biopsy and should also be used more often.
Social network analysis and its application

The purpose of this special issue is to collate a selection of representative research articles that were primarily presented at the 2015 International Conference on Cloud Computing and Big Data [1]. This conference brings together researchers and industry practitioners in order to exchange information regarding advancements in the state-of-the-art and practice of cloud computing, big data, and social network, as well as to identify emerging research topics and define the future directions of cloud computing, big data, and social network. Nowadays, various social applications such as blogs, e-mail, instant messaging, social networking (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), wikis, and social bookmarking have been widely popularized by providing digital platforms for social interaction. Today’s online social network or mobile social network pervades all aspects of our daily lives and contains vast amount of data. From this vast amount of data, ability is needed to extract and analyze the social networks of a new era that can be consisted of millions of nodes and connections. Meanwhile, various critical issues such as clustering and evolution mining of social networks, modeling and understanding of social behaviors via computational means, information spread and modeling, social influence analysis, social recommendations, etc., provide significant challenges. This special issue is devoted to analysis of these large-scale social structures and what is more important to identify the areas where social network analysis can be applied and provide the knowledge that is not accessible for other types of analysis.
[Biologic therapy with anti-TNFα in spondyloarthritides and other autoimmune diseases].

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the efficacy of the anti-TNFα (Tumor Necrosis Factor alpha) drugs in a variety of pathologic conditions such as psoriatic arthritis, undifferentiated entheso-arthritides, chronic inflammatory bowel diseases, adult onset Still's disease, Behcet disease. METHODS Review of all published studies evaluating the efficacy of these drugs (mainly infliximab and etanercept, adalimumab to a lesser degree) on the above diseases. RESULTS Results are reported for each pathologic condition. Both drugs showed to be very efficacious in all the above conditions, except Crohn disease where etanercept does not seem adequate. CONCLUSIONS Both drugs work extremely well, even though comparison between infliximab and etanercept efficacy cannot be performed, due to the lack of a direct comparison.
Evidence of a leading role for VEGF in Bartonella henselae‐induced endothelial cell proliferations

Bartonella henselae causes the vasculoproliferative disorders bacillary angiomatosis (BA) and bacillary peliosis (BP). The pathomechanisms of these tumorous proliferations are unknown. Our results suggest a novel bacterial two‐step pathogenicity strategy, in which the pathogen triggers growth factor production for subsequent proliferation of its own host cells. In fact, B. henselae induces host cell production of the angiogenic factor vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), leading to proliferation of endothelial cells. The presence of B. henselae pili was associated with host cell VEGF production, as a Pil− mutant of B. henselae was unable to induce VEGF production. In turn, VEGF‐stimulated endothelial cells promoted the growth of B. henselae. Immunohistochemistry for VEGF in specimens from patients with BA or BP revealed increased VEGF expression in vivo. These findings suggest a novel bacteria‐dependent mechanism of tumour growth.
G Protein-coupled Receptors

Of the many forms of GPCR regulation none has received as much attention as the process of receptor desensitization, i.e. the waning responsiveness of the receptors in the face of persistent stimulation (1, 2). Numerous mechanisms have been discovered, including those that operate at the transcriptional, translational, and protein levels. The latter category in turn includes mechanisms that regulate the rate of degradation of the receptors. Finally, there are mechanisms for the covalent modification of the receptors as well as for the regulation of their association with other proteins and their subcellular localization (1–3). This brief review is concerned with this last group of mechanisms, which appears to be most important with respect to the rapid (seconds– minutes as opposed to hours or days) control of receptor function. Traditionally, receptor desensitization has been viewed as a process antithetical to receptor activation, one which terminates or attenuates receptor signaling. Three families of regulatory molecules have been found to participate in desensitization of heptahelical receptors: second messenger-regulated kinases (e.g. PKA and PKC), GRKs (e.g. bARK, rhodopsin kinase), and the arrestins (visual and non-visual). After briefly reviewing the well established paradigms for regulation of GPCRs by these three families of molecules, I will attempt to demonstrate how newly acquired insights into the function of these receptor regulatory molecules are reshaping understanding of the classical dichotomy between receptor activation and desensitization. The new information suggests that receptor signaling and desensitization are in reality two intimately linked aspects of receptor function and that mechanisms previously viewed as “desensitizing” with respect to one signaling pathway may be “activating” with respect to another.
Design considerations for piezoelectric polymer ultrasound transducers

Much work has been published on the design of ultrasound transducers using piezoelectric ceramics, but a great deal of this work does not apply when using the piezoelectric polymers because of their unique electrical and mechanical properties. The purpose of this paper is to review and present new insight into seven important considerations for the design of active piezoelectric polymer ultrasound transducers: piezoelectric polymer materials selection, transducer construction and packaging requirements, materials characterization and modeling, film thickness and active area design, electroding selection, backing material design, and front protection/matching layer design. Besides reviewing these design considerations, this paper also presents new insight into the design of active piezoelectric polymer ultrasonic transducers. The design and fabrication of an immersible ultrasonic transducer, which has no adhesive layer between the active element and backing layer, is included. The transducer features direct deposition of poly(vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) [P(VDF-TrFE)] copolymer onto an insulated aluminum backing substrate. Pulse-echo tests indicated a minimum insertion loss of 37 dB and -6 dB bandwidth of 9.8 to 22 MHz (71%). The use of polymer wear-protection/quarter-wave matching layers is also discussed. Test results on a P(VDF-TrFE) transducer showed that a Mylar/sup TM/ front layer provided a slight increase in pulse-echo amplitude of 15% (or 1.2 dB) and an increase in -6 dB pulse-echo fractional bandwidth from 86 to 95%. Theoretical derivations are reported for optimizing the active area of the piezoelectric polymer element for maximum power transfer at resonance. These derivations are extended to the special case for a low profile (i.e., thin) shielded transducer. A method for modeling the non-linear loading effects of a commercial pulser-receiver is also included.
Complete Sequence and Genomic Analysis of Rhesus Cytomegalovirus

ABSTRACT The complete DNA sequence of rhesus cytomegalovirus (RhCMV) strain 68-1 was determined with the whole-genome shotgun approach on virion DNA. The RhCMV genome is 221,459 bp in length and possesses a 49% G+C base composition. The genome contains 230 potential open reading frames (ORFs) of 100 or more codons that are arranged colinearly with counterparts of previously sequenced betaherpesviruses such as human cytomegalovirus (HCMV). Of the 230 RhCMV ORFs, 138 (60%) are homologous to known HCMV proteins. The conserved ORFs include the structural, replicative, and transcriptional regulatory proteins, immune evasion elements, G protein-coupled receptors, and immunoglobulin homologues. Interestingly, the RhCMV genome also contains sequences with homology to cyclooxygenase-2, an enzyme associated with inflammatory processes. Closer examination identified a series of candidate exons with the capacity to encode a full-length cyclooxygenase-2 protein. Counterparts of cyclooxygenase-2 have not been found in other sequenced herpesviruses. The availability of the complete RhCMV sequence along with the ability to grow RhCMV in vitro will facilitate the construction of recombinant viral strains for identifying viral determinants of CMV pathogenicity in the experimentally infected rhesus macaque and to the development of CMV as a vaccine vector.
Piriform cortex efferents to the entorhinal cortex in vivo: kindling‐induced potentiation and the enhancement of long‐term potentiation by low‐frequency piriform cortex or medial septal stimulation

The entorhinal cortex receives input from many cortical areas and mediates the flow of information between these sites and the hippocampal formation. Long‐term synaptic plasticity in cortical efferents to the entorhinal cortex may contribute to the transmission of neural activity to the hippocampus, as well as the storage of information, but little is known about plasticity in these pathways. We describe here the use of evoked field potential recordings from chronically implanted electrodes in the rat entorhinal cortex to investigate synaptic plasticity in the large piriform (olfactory) cortex projection to the superficial layers of the entorhinal cortex. Both kindling‐induced potentiation and long‐term potentiation (LTP) were tested. In addition, we attempted to modulate LTP induction by the co‐induction of frequency potentiation and by the co‐activation of the medial septum. Epileptogenic kindling stimulations of the piriform cortex (1‐s, 60‐Hz trains 3 times/day for 5 days) were found to result in a reliable potentiation of field responses evoked by piriform cortex test pulses. Non‐epileptogenic tetanization of the piriform cortex with 400‐Hz 16‐pulse trains reliably resulted in LTP effects. These effects could be augmented by embedding brief LTP induction stimuli within 11‐pulse, 15‐Hz trains that alone produce only frequency potentiation. Co‐activating the medial septum with 10‐Hz trains, just prior to tetanization of the piriform cortex, augmented LTP of piriform cortex inputs to the entorhinal cortex in an input‐specific manner. All potentiation effects were found to last for periods of weeks. These findings demonstrate that both epileptogenic and non‐epileptogenic piriform cortex stimulation induces lasting potentiation of population field responses in the entorhinal cortex of the awake rat. The LTP effects were inducible in a graded manner and were sensitive to the temporal context of stimulation. The finding that low‐frequency activation of the septum can enhance plasticity in the entorhinal cortex adds to a body of data indicating a role for the medial septum in contributing to theta activity and plasticity in both the entorhinal cortex and hippocampal formation. Hippocampus 7:257–270, 1997. © 1997 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Octopus - A Redundant Array of Independent Services (RAIS)

Cloud storage services such as the Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3) are widely accepted and are reaching an ever-expanding range of customers. Especially services providing S3-compatible interfaces enjoy great popularity due to S3’s simplistic, yet powerful approach to store and retrieve data via web protocols. While cloud storage services present a convenient tool, they also might turn into a risk for your data. Apart from planned service outages which may or may not be covered by Service Level Agreements (SLA), there is no guarantee that a service provider might go out of business. One might also imagine that data could be destroyed, lost or altered due to unplanned outages or physical disaster. One possibility to improve availability and also data robustness is to consume services of more than one cloud storage provider simultaneously and to establish a federated, redundant cloud storage system. Octopus cloud storage implements such a federated system realizing the concept of a Redundant Array of Independent Services (RAIS).
Practical Applications for Perceptual Training

Training for the development of perceptual abilities has recently come to the attention of educators. Present perceptual training programs are directed toward two purposes: (a) prevention of a developmental lag in perceptual abilities needed for academic readiness in first grade, and (b) remediation of learning disabilities. The recent programs which appear to be highly reliable are those founded in the psychology of learning. One such program is that for perceptual training developed by Frostig and Horne (1964). The Frostig program was initially introduced in the Tucson Public Schools, District Number One, Arizona, by Laura D. Ganoung, Supervisor of Special Education. For the past three years, techniques for remediating perceptual deficiences have been employed in an exploratory program. Thirty-five children from the special program, with CA's ranging from 6 to 10 years, have participated in this program over the three year period. These children had been diagnosed as having multiple cerebral neurological handicaps and emotional disturbance, but were classified as educable.
High gain and broadband ultra low profile EBG antenna for high power and electronic warfare applications

In this paper, we present a Wide Bandwidth (71%), ultra Low-Profile (<;λ/10) and High-Gain (17 dB) EBG antenna which is used for high power and electronic warfare applications. A prototype of this modelized antenna is manufactured and the measured performances are compared to the simulated ones.
2D localization of specular reflections using ultrasound

Image guidance during cardiac interventions is primarily performed using X-ray fluoroscopy. For some applications, fluoroscopy may be complemented or possibly replaced by ultrasound imaging. However, good visualization of catheters and guide wires can be challenging using ultrasound. In this paper we present a novel method to locate and track a metallic device in real time using two-dimensional ultrasound. The method exploits channel data to identify specular reflections. An approach to characterize the directional echo and differentiate from diffuse backscattering is evaluated. Spatially resolved images are generated with directional properties of the specular objects depicted. The proposed method has been evaluated experimentally using a linear probe. Results of this method showed that the location as well as the angular orientation of a specular reflector can be detected provided its orientation is within a given range.