Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
From Structure to Function: the Ecology of Host-Associated Microbial Communities

SUMMARY In the past several years, we have witnessed an increased interest in understanding the structure and function of the indigenous microbiota that inhabits the human body. It is hoped that this will yield novel insight into the role of these complex microbial communities in human health and disease. What is less appreciated is that this recent activity owes a great deal to the pioneering efforts of microbial ecologists who have been studying communities in non-host-associated environments. Interactions between environmental microbiologists and human microbiota researchers have already contributed to advances in our understanding of the human microbiome. We review the work that has led to these recent advances and illustrate some of the possible future directions for continued collaboration between these groups of researchers. We discuss how the application of ecological theory to the human-associated microbiota can lead us past descriptions of community structure and toward an understanding of the functions of the human microbiota. Such an approach may lead to a shift in the prevention and treatment of human diseases that involves conservation or restoration of the normal community structure and function of the host-associated microbiota.
Utility of a Commercially Available Multiplex Real-Time PCR Assay To Detect Bacterial and Fungal Pathogens in Febrile Neutropenia

ABSTRACT Infection is the main treatment-related cause of mortality in cancer patients. Rapid and accurate diagnosis to facilitate specific therapy of febrile neutropenia is therefore urgently warranted. Here, we evaluated a commercial PCR-based kit to detect the DNA of 20 different pathogens (SeptiFast) in the setting of febrile neutropenia after chemotherapy. Seven hundred eighty-four serum samples of 119 febrile neutropenic episodes (FNEs) in 70 patients with hematological malignancies were analyzed and compared with clinical, microbiological, and biochemical findings. In the antibiotic-naïve setting, bacteremia was diagnosed in 34 FNEs and 11 of them yielded the same result in the PCR. Seventy-three FNEs were negative in both systems, leading to an overall agreement in 84 of 119 FNEs (71%). During antibiotic therapy, positivity in blood culture occurred only in 3% of cases, but the PCR yielded a positive result in 15% of cases. In six cases the PCR during antibiotic treatment detected a new pathogen repetitively; this was accompanied by a significant rise in procalcitonin levels, suggestive of a true detection of infection. All patients with probable invasive fungal infection (IFI; n = 3) according to the standards of the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer had a positive PCR result for Aspergillus fumigatus; in contrast there was only one positive result for Aspergillus fumigatus in an episode without signs and symptoms of IFI. Our results demonstrate that the SeptiFast kit cannot replace blood cultures in the diagnostic workup of FNEs. However, it might be helpful in situations where blood cultures remain negative (e.g., during antimicrobial therapy or in IFI).
Programming Language for the Development of Distributed Real-Time Applications Dedicated to Embedded Systems

A radioactive diagnostic agent which comprises a protein and a radioactive metallic element combined with intervention of a bifunctional chelating agent of the formula: wherein R1, R2, R3 and R4 are each a hydrogen atom or a C1-C3 alkyl group and is characteristic in having high stability even after administered into a human body.
Violence and Civilization in the Western States-Systems

Andrew Linklater's The Problem of Harm in World Politics (Cambridge, 2011) created a new agenda for the sociology of states-systems. Violence and Civilization in the Western States-Systems builds on the author's attempts to combine the process-sociological investigation of civilizing processes and the English School analysis of international society in a higher synthesis. Adopting Martin Wight's comparative approach to states-systems and drawing on the sociological work of Norbert Elias, Linklater asks how modern Europeans came to believe themselves to be more 'civilized' than their medieval forebears. He investigates novel combinations of violence and civilization through a broad historical scope from classical antiquity, Latin Christendom and Renaissance Italy to the post-Second World War era. This book will interest all students with an interdisciplinary commitment to investigating long-term patterns of change in world politics.
Lebenszufriedenheit in Deutschland: Entwicklung und Einflussfaktoren

Die Arbeitslosigkeit in Deutschland ist auf dem niedrigsten Stand seit der Wiedervereinigung. Dies hat auch zur Folge, dass die Lebenszufriedenheit in Deutschland auf einen Hochststand angestiegen ist. Denn erwerbstatige Menschen geben eine signifikant hohere allgemeine Lebenszufriedenheit an als Arbeitslose. Auf Basis der neuesten Befragung des Sozio-oekonomischen Panels zeigt sich, dass rund die Halfte der Deutschen mit ihrem Leben in hohem Mas zufrieden sind. Nur eine kleine Gruppe von weniger als zwei Prozent der Befragten gibt eine niedrige Zufriedenheit an. Das Ausmas der Zufriedenheit bleibt im Lauf des Lebens nicht konstant, sondern verlauft sinusformig. Junge Menschen und Ruhestandler kurz vor und nach Renteneintritt sind besonders zufrieden. Personen im Alter von 50 bis zu 60 Jahren sowie Menschen uber 80 Jahre sind im Durchschnitt am unzufriedensten. Ein Zusammenhang zwischen Hohe des Einkommens und Ausmas der Lebenszufriedenheit besteht nur mittelbar. Wer gesund ist, einen Hochschulabschluss erworben hat oder anderen vertraut, ist auch zufriedener. So weisen zum Beispiel 64 Prozent der Personen, die Vertrauen in andere Menschen haben, eine hohe Lebenszufriedenheit auf. Unter den misstrauischeren Befragten sind es nur 30 Prozent. Auch ehrenamtliches Engagement scheint glucklich zu machen. Zwar engagieren sich nur 10 Prozent der Deutschen regelmasig, ohne hierfur ein Entgelt zu beziehen, dafur sind sie signifikant zufriedener als andere.
Evaluation of the effect of Two-Step Acid Etching on the Surface Treatment and Improved Bioactivity of Nitinol

Introduction: Surface properties, including morphology, submicron and chemical morphology, are important factors affecting the quality and biological responses at the contact location of tissue with the implant material. This could significantly affect the healing process of bones. Materials & Methods: In this laboratory study, morphology and biocompatibility of polished mechanical nitinol (NiTi) shape memory alloys surfaces treated with mixed solution of three acids (HCl-HF-H3PO4) were evaluated. In the next stage, further chemical treatment was conducted in solution of HNO3 and HCl with ratio of 1:1 Vol. at room temperature and the results were assessed. Seventy-five samples were selected for chemical modification of the surface, biological evaluation and surface roughness; furthermore, nine samples were selected as control. Scanning the Electron Microscope (SEM), atomic force microscope (AFM) and inspection of Nitinol surface roughness (NiTi) were carried out to evaluate the surface. In addition, MG-63 cell was cultured on different nitinol surfaces to assess cell adhesion, growth and proliferation. Data analysis was performed using t-test and one-way ANOVA. Results: The obtained results indicated that HNO3 and HCl treatment produced significantly higher roughness compared to (HCl-HF-H3PO4) treatment and untreated surfaces. Moreover, evaluation of cell culture revealed significantly higher amounts of cell adhesion, growth and proliferation in two-stage modified nitinol surfaces, compared to the groups modified with triple acid solution and unmodified surfaces. Conclusion: According to the results, not only chemical surface modification of nitinol changed the surface morphology and created submicron roughness, but it also led to altered chemistry of the surface. This could increase bone-bonding ability in implant and decrease the toxic effects of nickel in the body.
Renal failure due to cholesterol emboli

Abstract Renal failure due to cholesterol embolisation is an uncommonly recognised condition. It is usually associated with severe aortic atherosclerosis and in most cases follows a vascular event, such as angiography, vascular surgery, or aneurysm rupture. We report nine patients, all males, who presented to our unit. Six patients survived the initial event, although two died six and eight weeks later. This report emphasises that, although this condition has a high mortality, long term survival is not a rare event. (Aust NZ J Med 1991; 21: 418–421.)
Data-driven process discovery

Process discovery methods automatically infer process models from event logs. Often, event logs contain so-called noise, e.g., infrequent outliers or recording errors, which obscure the main behavior of the process. Existing meth-ods ﬁlter this noise based on the frequency of event labels: infrequent paths and activities are excluded. However, infrequent behavior may reveal important insights into the process. Thus, not all infrequent behavior should be considered as noise. This paper proposes the Data-aware Heuristic Miner (DHM), a process discovery method that uses the data attributes to distinguish infrequent paths from random noise by using classiﬁcation techniques. Data-and control-ﬂow of the process are discovered together. We show that the DHM is, to some degree, robust against random noise and reveals data-driven decisions, which are ﬁltered by other discovery methods. The DHM has been successfully tested on several real-life event logs, two of which we present in this paper.
Recuperación de un ecosistema perturbado en el cerro El Castillo del Bosque Protector Mindo Nambillo

En el cerro El Castillo del Bosque Protector Mindo Nambillo, por donde atraviesa la ruta del Oleoducto de Crudos Pesados (OCP), se realizo la presente investigacion descriptiva. Es una zona de vida Bosque Muy Humedo Montano, tambien considerado como Bosque de Neblina Montano. En la construccion del Oleoducto, en todo su recorrido y en un ancho de 15 m, se provocaron fuertes perturbaciones antropicas. Despues de tres meses de provocada la perturbacion, y de haberse realizado trabajos de recomposicion de la vegetacion en la zona, se hicieron observaciones de la cubierta vegetal para verificar la recuperacion del ecosistema del area, comparando los resultados obtenidos con la descripcion de la linea base presentada por ENTRIX en el 2001. El metodo del Area Minima se utilizo para el conteo y analisis de la cubierta vegetal, en una superficie de 64 m2, donde se encontraron 93 especies de plantas herbaceas y arbustivas, de 29 familias. Ninguna de las especies herbaceas encontradas fueron incluidas en el inventario realizado en la Linea Base de la OCP antes de la perturbacion. Al hacer la comparacion entre las plantas herbaceas que se encontro en el lugar abierto con el interior del bosque tampoco se las encontraron, con lo que se comprueba que en la recuperacion y recomposicion de un ecosistema intervienen especies pioneras herbaceas y arbustivas que migraron a traves de muchos factores o que sus semillas se mantienen en latencia por mucho tiempo y de esa manera un ecosistema se regenera, se recupera y vuelve a su estado de equilibrio, mientras no existan otras perturbaciones.
Biomedical engineering: yesterday, today, and tomorrow

Today, biomedical engineering (BME) in tertiary medical care involves functions such as: medical monitoring (e.g., PET visualization of brain receptors to identify neuronal dysfunction); medical diagnosis (e.g., computer-aided echocardiographic texture analysis to detect myocardial infarcts); radiation therapy (for cancer treatment); organ-support (e.g., peritoneal dialysis); therapeutic function (e.g., encapsulation of insulin-producing pancreatic islet cells for treatment of diabetes). However, is biomedical engineering a relatively new field? Not really, although one may have opened up new vistas of it. In the past, science was not so compartmentalized into material science, engineering science, and life science. Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894), who determined the velocity of pulse-propagation in nerves, was professor of both physiology and physics. On the German 10 DM note is depicted (along with the familiar bell-shaped probability distribution curve) the portrait of Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777-1855). Ranking as one of the greatest mathematicians of all times, he also made important contributions to astronomy, geodesy, and electromagnetism. It is this spirit, to explore and bring to bear physical and engineering sciences as well as psychology to medical and clinical sciences, that constitutes the future of biomedical engineering. A modern and intrinsic concept is that of internal biomedical engineering or organ systems engineering, entailing analyses of organ functional mechanisms and processes. Biomedical engineering development of both macro and micro body processes can eventually lead to more intrinsic and reliable diagnostic methodologies. However, the author first visits a hitherto relatively unexplored phenomenon associated with vital (life) engineering, namely the role of consciousness in health and disease. This approach has in fact been a long-standing tradition in Eastern systems of medicine.
Bacteriological Assessment of the Quality of Raw-mixed Vegetable Salads Prepared and Sold by Street Food Vendors in Korle-Gonno, Accra Metropolis, Ghana

It is known that raw-mixed vegetable salads are essential part of people’s diet all around the world. These vegetables salads are consumed raw and often without heat treatment or thorough washing. Raw-mixed vegetable salads therefore can serve as vehicle for the transmission of pathogenic microorganisms associated with human diseases. The aim of this study was to isolate and analyze the common bacterial pathogens associated with raw-mixed vegetable salads prepared and sold by street food vendors in Korle-Gonno, Accra, Metropolis, Ghana. A total of 75 different raw-mixed vegetable salads were sampled from the open places and were subjected to bacteriological analysis using standard Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations (UN) total aerobic plate count method. A total mean colony count of bacteria ranged 0.87-5.6 log10 CFU/g was isolated. Escherichia coli (35%), Staphylococcus aureus (33%), Klebsiella sp. (17%), and Bacillus sp. (15%) were the bacteria isolated from the various raw-mixed vegetables salads investigated. This study has shown that all the raw-mixed vegetable salads sampled from Korle-Gonno, Accra Metropolis, Ghana had a high bacterial contamination and their persistence and proliferation is a reflection of poor hygienic practices by the street food vendors. The use of unsafe or contaminated water to irrigate the vegetables when growing on the farm or garden could also be a contributing factor.
Subcellular Localization of a Small Sporulation Protein in Bacillus subtilis

ABSTRACT SpoVM is an unusually small (26-residue-long) protein that is produced in the mother cell chamber of the sporangium during the process of sporulation in Bacillus subtilis. We investigated the subcellular localization of SpoVM, which is believed to be an amphipathic α-helix, by using a fusion of the sporulation protein to the green fluorescence protein (GFP). We found that SpoVM-GFP is recruited to the polar septum shortly after the sporangium undergoes asymmetric division and that the fusion protein localizes to the mother cell membrane that surrounds the forespore during the subsequent process of engulfment. We identified a patch of three residues near the N terminus of the proposed α-helix that is needed both for proper subcellular localization and for SpoVM function. We also identified a patch of residues on the opposite face of the helix and residues near both ends of the protein that are needed for SpoVM function but not for subcellular localization. Subcellular localization of SpoVM-GFP was found to require an unknown gene(s) under the control of the mother cell transcription factor σE. We propose that the N-terminal patch binds to an unknown anchoring protein that is produced under the control of σE and that other residues important in SpoVM function to recruit an unknown sporulation protein(s) to the mother cell membrane that surrounds the forespore. Our results provide evidence that SpoVM function depends on proper subcellular localization.
A Novel Crossing Minimization Ranking Method

The ranking problem consists of comparing a collection of observations and deciding which one is “better. ” An observation can consist of multiple attributes, multiple data types, and different orders of preference. Due to diverse practical applications, the ranking problem has been receiving attention in the domain of machine learning and statistics, some of those applications being webpage ranking, gene ranking, pesticide risk assessment, credit-risk screening, etc. In this article, we will present and discuss a novel and fast clustering-based algorithmic ranking technique and provide necessary theoretical working. The proposed technique utilizes the interrelationships among the observations to perform ranking and is based on the crossing minimization paradigm from the domain of VLSI chip design. Using laboratory ranking results as a reference, we compare the algorithmic ranking of the proposed technique and two traditional ranking techniques: the Hasse Diagram Technique (HDT) and the Hierarchical Clustering (HC) technique. The results demonstrate that our technique generates better rankings compared to the traditional ranking techniques and closely matches the laboratory results that took days of work.
Hydrogen Cyanide Production Ability by Pseudomonasfluorescence Bacteria and their Inhibition Potential on WeedGermination

This research was undertaken for the purpose of isolation and purification of indigenous Pseudomonas spp. and evaluating its ability in hydrogen cyanide synthesis and also evaluating the potential of super-strains on seedling growth inhibition in weeds. According to this, the research was carried out in laboratory tests. 136 strains (obtained from rhizosphere soil of 62 weed species) and 27 strains of Pseudomonas fluorescence were sub-cultured, purified and refreshed. Then these strains were evaluated for the capability in cyanide synthesis by a qualitative method and at last 4 super-strains of cyanogenic Pseudomonas were selected and used in further experiments. The effects of these strains on stem length, root length and stem length/root length rate in rye, wild barley, and wheat were evaluated in three different in vitro tests examining the effects of gas and liquid metabolites produced by the bacteria. The results showed that the abundance and probability of the bacteria isolation was low (about 3.6%). About 37 percent of Pseudomonas isolates were capable of HCN production and this capacity was different among the strains. Gas metabolites reduced more than 90 percent of root and shoot growth in weeds. In this case gas metabolites had greater inhibitory effects rather than other metabolites on plants. However these influences were different in every bacteria treatment. Also wheat had less growth reduction in comparison with weeds which probably mean that the bacteria are plant specific. In conclusion, achievements proved that cyanogenic pseudomonas fluorescence had the potential of biological weed control. However the further studies about their application in natural conditions like greenhouse, and field seem to be necessary.
Comments on "Efficient Multibit Quantization in Continuous-Time Sigma Delta Modulators"

The authors propose three different types of continuous-time modulators to reduce the number of comparators in the main quantizer. Employing an auxiliary quantizer helps to reduce the integrator swing range in front of the main quantizer and to decrease the number of comparators. We wish to remind that the use of the auxiliary quantizer to minimize the number of comparators was published earlier and further implemented in silicon
‘Irresponsible and a Disservice’: The integrity of social psychology turns on the free will dilemma

Over the last few years, a number of works have been published asserting both the putative prosocial benefits of belief in free will and the possible dangers of disclosing doubts about the existence of free will. Although concerns have been raised over the disservice of keeping such doubts from the public, this does not highlight the full danger that is presented by social psychology's newly found interest in the ‘hard problem’ of human free will. Almost all of the work on free will published to date by social psychologists appears methodologically flawed, misrepresents the state of academic knowledge, and risks linking social psychology with the irrational.
Metabolomics in critical care medicine: a new approach to biomarker discovery.

PURPOSE To present an overview and comparison of the main metabolomics techniques (1H NMR, GC-MS, and LC-MS) and their current and potential use in critical care medicine. SOURCE This is a focused review, not a systematic review, using the PubMed database as the predominant source of references to compare metabolomics techniques. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS 1H NMR, GC-MS, and LC-MS are complementary techniques that can be used on a variety of biofluids for metabolomics analysis of patients in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). These techniques have been successfully used for diagnosis and prognosis in the ICU and other clinical settings; for example, in patients with septic shock and community-acquired pneumonia. CONCLUSION Metabolomics is a powerful tool that has strong potential to impact diagnosis and prognosis and to examine responses to treatment in critical care medicine through diagnostic and prognostic biomarker and biopattern identification.
Algorithm Implementation Requirements and Usage Guidance for the Internet Key Exchange Protocol Version 2 (IKEv2)

The IPsec series of protocols makes use of various cryptographic algorithms in order to provide security services. The Internet Key Exchange (IKE) protocol is used to negotiate the IPsec Security Association (IPsec SA) parameters, such as which algorithms should be used. To ensure interoperability between different implementations, it is necessary to specify a set of algorithm implementation requirements and usage guidance to ensure that there is at least one algorithm that all implementations support. This document updates RFC 7296 and obsoletes RFC 4307 in defining the current algorithm implementation requirements and usage guidance for IKEv2, and does minor cleaning up of the IKEv2 IANA registry. This document does not update the algorithms used for packet encryption using IPsec Encapsulating Security Payload (ESP).
Scheduling of maintenance tasks and routing of a joint vessel fleet for multiple offshore wind farms

Maintenance costs related to offshore wind farms are severely limiting their potential for being proﬁtable. This paper proposes a new mathematical model that considers how maintenance tasks should be scheduled and performed by technicians transported using a ﬂeet of dedicated vessels. The model is novel in its combination of modelling several work shifts and including vessels that can stay offshore for several shifts, while handling large maintenance tasks and accurate calculation of downtime costs. Simulation is used to evaluate the performance of the model in its pure form, as well as when solved heuristically using a rolling horizon heuristic. The results indicate that the end-of-horizon effects of the mathematical formulation are handled effectively. Computational experiments also illustrate how the mathematical model coupled with simulation can be used to evaluate strategic decisions regarding the composition of a vessel ﬂeet used to execute maintenance tasks.