Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Microtubule Depolymerization in Rat Seminiferous Epithelium Is Associated with Diminished Tyrosination of α-Tubulin1

Abstract In the testis, microtubule-disrupting agents cause breakdown of the Sertoli cell cytoskeleton and sloughing of germ cells with associated Sertoli cell fragments, although the mechanism underlying this event is not understood. In this study, we investigated the effects of carbendazim and colchicine on microtubule polymerization status and posttranslational modifications of tubulin in freshly isolated rat seminiferous tubules. Soluble and polymerized tubulin pools were separated and tubulin was quantified using a competitive ELISA. Carbendazim and colchicine caused extensive microtubule depolymerization, shifting the ratio of soluble to polymerized tubulin from 40%:60% to 78%:22%, and to 84%:16%, respectively. Total tubulin levels remained relatively constant after carbendazim treatment but decreased twofold after colchicine treatment. To determine if modifications to tubulin may be associated with polymerization status, tubulin pools were analyzed by immunoblotting. Acetylated α-tubulin and βIII-tubulin distribution in tubulin pools was not affected by treatment. Tyrosinated α-tubulin (52 kDa) was localized in both tubulin pools and had decreased tyrosination in the microtubule pool after carbendazim treatment. A 47-kDa protein immunoreactive with both tyrosinated α-tubulin and general α-tubulin antibodies was found only in the microtubule pool. The 47-kDa protein (potentially an α-tubulin isoform) lost tyrosination, yet was still present in the microtubule pool based on detection with the general α-tubulin antibody, after carbendazim treatment. Similar effects were seen with colchicine, although loss of total tubulin protein was measured. Thus, decreased tyrosination of the microtubule pool of tubulin appears to be associated with depolymerization of microtubules.
Quantised H ∞ filter design for discrete-time systems

This article is concerned with the quantised H ∞ filtering problem for discrete-time systems. The quantiser considered here is dynamic and composed of a dynamic scaling and a static quantiser. Motivated by practical transmission channels requirements, the static quantiser ranges are fully considered in this article. A quantised H ∞ filter design strategy is proposed, taking quantiser errors into account, where a convex optimisation method is developed to minimise static quantiser ranges with meeting H ∞ performance requirement for quantised augmented systems. A numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed filter design method.
National Survey of Thai Infectious Disease Physicians on Treatment of Carbapenem-Resistant Acinetobacter baumannii Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia: The Role of Infection Control Awareness

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the expected and treatment outcomes of Thai infectious disease physicians (IDPs) regarding carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii (CRAB) ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) METHODS From June 1, 2014, to March 1, 2015, survey data regarding the expected and clinical success rates of CRAB VAP treatment were collected from all Thai IDPs. The expected success rate was defined as the expectation of clinical response after CRAB VAP treatment for the given case scenario. Clinical success rate was defined as the overall reported success rate of CRAB VAP treatment based on the clinical practice of each IDP. The expected and clinical success rates were divided into low (<60%), standard (60%–80%), and high (>80%) categories and were then compared with standard clinical response rates archived in the existing literature. RESULTS Of 183 total Thai IDPs, 111 (60%) were enrolled in this study. The median expected and clinical success rates were 68% and 58%, respectively. Using multivariate analysis, we determined that working in a hospital that implemented the standard intervention combined with an intensified infection control (IC) intervention for CRAB (adjusted odds ratio [aOR], 3.01; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.17–7.73; P=.02) was associated with standard and high expected rates (>60%). Being a board-certified IDP (aOR, 5.76; 95% CI, 2.16–15.37; P<.01) and having higher number of ID consultation cases per month (aOR, 4.84; 95% CI, 1.98–11.80; P<.01) were associated with standard and high clinical success rates (>60%). We identified a significant correlation between expected and clinical success rates (r=0.58; P<.001). CONCLUSIONS Awareness of IC among IDPs can improve physicians’ expected and clinical success rates for CRAB VAP treatment, and treatment experience impacts overall treatment success. Infect. Control Hosp. Epidemiol. 2015;37(1):61–69
Location of the multivalent control site for the ilvEDA operon of Escherichia coli

A strain of Escherichia coli K-12 containing a deletion extending from early in the ilvE gene toward the ilvG gene was shown to exhibit a higher expression of the downstream genes, ilvD and ilvA, than did an ilv+ strain. The elevated expression was under apparently normal ilv-specific control, however. The deletion was transferred to the ilv region of lamba h80dilv and shown by restriction endonuclease and heteroduplex analysis to extend through the deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) shown, in the preceding paper (C. S. Subrahmanyam, G. M. McCorkle, and H. E. Umbarget, J. Bacteriol 142:547--555, 1980), to contain the ilvO determinant. The deletion was also transferred to an ilv-lac fusion strain and shown to cause an increase in beta-galactosidase formation while allowing retention of ilv-specific control. Transducing phages excised from these fusion strains with and without the ilvO determinant were compared. The phage carrying the ilvO+ determinant contained ilv DNA extending only into but not through the ilvG gene. It did not exhibit an ilv-specific control of beta-galactosidase formation. The phage carrying the deletion of ilvO but containing ilv DNA extending beyond the ilvG gene exhibited ilv-specific control of beta-galactosidase formation. It was concluded that the multivalently controlled ilv-specific promoter affecting ilv operon expression lies upstream from ilvG and that the ilvO region in the wild-type K-12 strain is a region of polarity preventing ilvG expression and reducing ilvEDA expression.
Molecular diagnosis of Plasmodium ovale by photo-induced electron transfer fluorogenic primers: PET-PCR

Accurate diagnosis of malaria infections continues to be challenging and elusive, especially in the detection of submicroscopic infections. Developing new malaria diagnostic tools that are sensitive enough to detect low-level infections, user friendly, cost effective and capable of performing large scale diagnosis, remains critical. We have designed novel self-quenching photo-induced electron transfer (PET) fluorogenic primers for the detection of P. ovale by real-time PCR. In our study, a total of 173 clinical samples, consisting of different malaria species, were utilized to test this novel PET-PCR primer. The sensitivity and specificity were calculated using nested-PCR as the reference test. The novel primer set demonstrated a sensitivity of 97.5% and a specificity of 99.2% (95% CI 85.2–99.8% and 95.2–99.9% respectively). Furthermore, the limit of detection for P. ovale was found to be 1 parasite/μl. The PET-PCR assay is a new molecular diagnostic tool with comparable performance to other commonly used PCR methods. It is relatively easy to perform, and amiable to large scale malaria surveillance studies and malaria control and elimination programs. Further field validation of this novel primer will be helpful to ascertain the utility for large scale malaria screening programs.
Chronological Changes in Terrestrial Insect Assemblages in the Arid Zone of Australia

ABSTRACT Arid and semiarid environments are characterized by highly unpredictable and ‘pulsed’ availability of essential biological resources. The ‘boom and bust’ response of many vertebrates is commonly invoked for invertebrates and especially insects. This perception of the Australian arid zone is exacerbated by the lack of long-term surveys of insects identified at high levels of taxonomic resolution. From an 18 mo continuous survey of insects in central Australia I determine the phenology of many insect taxa, and clarify which climatic variables most influenced the activity of these taxa. Total abundance and taxon richness were higher in the warmer months and lower in the cooler months. Minimum temperature, rainfall during the survey month, and rainfall during the previous month had significant effects on phenology, demonstrating that there is pronounced and predictable activity of many species in the absence of rain, although rainfall has a marked effect on the activity of some species. Other species were more active or only active in the coolest months. These findings have implications for the most productive time for surveys in the Australian arid zone, the availability of insects as prey or pollinators, and for the potential effects of climate change.
Web robot detection based on pattern-matching technique

In web robot detection it is important is to find features that are common characteristics of diverse robots, in order to differentiate between them and humans. Existing approaches employ fairly simple features (e.g. empty referrer field, interval between successive requests), which often fail to reflect web robots’ behaviour accurately. False alarms may therefore occur unacceptably often. In this paper we propose a fresh approach that expresses the behaviour of interactive users and various web robots in terms of a sequence of request types, called request patterns. Previous proposals have primarily targeted the detection of text crawlers, but our approach works well on many other web robots, such as image crawlers, email collectors and link checkers. In empirical evaluation of more than 1 billion requests collected at www.microsoft. com, our approach achieved 94% accuracy in web robot detection, estimated by F-measure. A decision tree algorithm proposed by Tan and Kumar was also applied to the same data. A comparison shows that the proposed approach is more accurate, and that real-time detection of web robots is feasible.
Evidence that Streptobacillus moniliformis is an intermediate stage between a corynebacterium and its L-form or derived PPLO.

SUMMARY: Morphological and serological evidence is presented to demonstrate that an organism morphologically identical with Streptobacillus moniliformis is a stage intermediate to the L-form of a strain of Corynebacterium cervicis, that it is serologically closely related to a type culture of S. moniliformis, as well as to strains of Mycoplasma hominis; thus supporting the conclusion that L1, derived from S. moniliformis, and M. hominis have a similar origin, and suggesting that S. moniliformis is an intermediate stage between a Corynebacterium resembling C. cervicis and an L-form.
Heterogeneous Differentiation Patterns of Individual CD8+ T Cells

Dynamic Protection During an immune response, CD8+ T cells are recruited to provide protection. Most cells differentiate into short-lived effectors that help to clear the pathogen, whereas others form long-lived memory cells to protect against reinfection. Gerlach et al. (p. 635, published online 14 March) and Buchholz et al. (p. 630, published online 14 March) used in vivo fate mapping of mouse T cells with a defined specificity during a bacterial infection to show that the dynamics of the single-cell response are not uniform. The response of a particular T cell population is the average of a small number of clones that expand greatly (“large clones”) and many clones that only proliferate at low amounts (“small clones”). The memory pool arises largely from small clones whereas effectors are primarily made up of large clones. The single-cell dynamics as cytotoxic T cells respond to a bacterial infection are analyzed in mice. Upon infection, antigen-specific CD8+ T lymphocyte responses display a highly reproducible pattern of expansion and contraction that is thought to reflect a uniform behavior of individual cells. We tracked the progeny of individual mouse CD8+ T cells by in vivo lineage tracing and demonstrated that, even for T cells bearing identical T cell receptors, both clonal expansion and differentiation patterns are heterogeneous. As a consequence, individual naïve T lymphocytes contributed differentially to short- and long-term protection, as revealed by participation of their progeny during primary versus recall infections. The discordance in fate of individual naïve T cells argues against asymmetric division as a singular driver of CD8+ T cell heterogeneity and demonstrates that reproducibility of CD8+ T cell responses is achieved through population averaging.
Oral cancer in puerto rico

All cancer cases diagnosed in Puerto Rico are analyzed and registered in the Central Cancer Registry. The incidence of oral cancer in Puerto Rico is fourth‐highest in the world. (In 1972 oral cancer accounted for 72% of all cancers in males in Puerto Rico.) A review of the data revealed important contrasts with reported statistics from the continental United States (e.g., 75.6% of the cases in Puerto Rico were initially treated by radiation, compared with 15.3% of the cases in Western New York State).
A two-stage epidemiological study of abnormal eating attitudes and their prospective risk factors in Polish schoolgirls

Synopsis In this longitudinal two-stage screening study of abnormal eating attitudes and behaviours in Polish schoolgirls self-report questionnaires (EAT-26) were completed by 747 schoolgirls aged between 14 and 16 years. On the basis of their EAT-26 scores 167 girls were selected for a clinical interview conducted blind to questionnaire scores. No clinical cases of DSM-III-R anorexia or bulimia nervosa were identified, however, there was a point prevalence of 2·34% for subclinical eating disorder and of 28·6% for dieting. Natural history was investigated, repeating the screening and interviews after 10 months. Both the group mean EAT-26 score and the proportion of subclinical cases remained the same at follow-up however, individual girls showed substantial fluctuations over time. On re-screening 11·5% of the sample had moved EAT category (based on scoring below or above the clinical cut-off point). Follow-up interviews showed that 58% (7) of the original subclinical cases were no longer cases while seven girls were ‘new’ subclinical cases. This second stage of the study also aimed to investigate the risk factors for the development of eating disorders. Several family factors distinguished the dieters from non-dieters at the initial stage. Subjects who began dieting between the initial and follow-up interviews had higher Body Mass Index, felt more overweight and had greater discrepancy between their current and ideal weights than the non-dieters. However, analysis of regression revealed no specific risk factors for development of a subclinical syndrome.
Collaboration in Online Communities: Reconceptualising the Complex Problem of Unauthorised Music File Sharing

This empirical paper explores the complex problem space of unauthorised music file sharing, providing insight into collaboration activities in online communities. As many consumers now access their music through unauthorised file sharing, it is interesting to consider what makes such communities so attractive. This paper presents the debates surrounding music piracy/file sharing, using a critical perspective to consider 'another way of doing things'. The arguments in this paper are based on a doctoral study involving 30 interviews, 3 focus groups, and 120 days of participant observation within an underground music file sharing community. Actor- network theory is useful in identifying the controversies in this complex problem space, encouraging a reconceptualisation of file sharers and the information systems they create. These new insights contribute to the literature of information systems development within the context of online communities.
The Modified National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale: its Time has Come

The National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) is a well known, reliable and valid stroke deficit scale. The NIHSS is simple, quick, and has shown significant reliability in diverse groups, settings, and languages. The NIHSS also contains items with poor reliability and redundancy. Recent investigations (include assessing a new training DVD, analyzing web-based or videotape certifications, and testing foreign language versions) have further detailed reliability issues. Items recurrently shown to have poor reliability include Level of Consciousness, Facial Palsy, Limb Ataxia, and Dysarthria. The modified NIHSS (mNIHSS) minimizes redundancy and eliminates poorly reliable items. The mNIHSS shows greater reliability in multiple settings and cohorts, including scores abstracted from records, when used via telemedicine, and when used in clinical trials. In a validation of the mNIHSS against the NIHSS, the number of elements with excellent agreement increased from 54% to 71%, while poor agreement decreased from 12% to 5%. Overall, 45% of NIHSS items had less than excellent reliability vs. only 29% for the mNIHSS. The mNIHSS is not the ideal stroke scale, but it is a significant improvement over the NIHSS. The mNIHSS has shown reliability at bedside, with record abstraction, with telemedicine, and in clinical trials. Since the mNIHSS is more reliable, it may allow for improved practitioner communication, improved medical care, and refinement of trial enrollments. The mNIHSS should now serve as the primary stroke clinical deficit scale for clinical and research aims. When it comes to the mNIHSS, its time has come!
Mutations in the DNA Mismatch Repair Proteins MutS and MutL of Oxazolidinone-Resistant or -Susceptible Enterococcus faecium

ABSTRACT Mutations in mutS and mutL, which encode DNA mismatch repair (MMR) proteins, can confer hypermutator phenotypes and may facilitate the emergence of mutational antibiotic resistance in bacteria. Linezolid-resistant enterococci (LRE) rarely emerge during therapy and contain mutations in 23S rRNA genes. As enterococci with defective MMR could be prone to the development of oxazolidinone resistance mutations, we investigated 13 clinical isolates of Enterococcus faecium, including 2 LRE, for mutations in mutSL. A 4,944-bp fragment spanning mutSL was sequenced from two pairs of linezolid-resistant (MICs, 64 μg/ml) and linezolid-susceptible (MICs, 2 μg/ml) E. faecium isolates (one pair from Austria and one pair from the United Kingdom) identical by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis. The pairs represented distinct strains in which linezolid resistance had emerged during therapy. The MutSL peptides of all four isolates had amino acid substitutions compared with the sequence of E. faecium strain DO (used for genome sequencing). These were Val352Ile (one pair of isolates only) and Met628Leu in MutS and Leu387Pro, Tyr406Phe, Thr415Ser, Phe427Leu, and Phe565Ile in MutL. The significance of these changes remains unknown; these isolates did not show a demonstrable hypermutator phenotype. The same substitutions were found in two of nine geographically diverse linezolid-susceptible enterococcal isolates; the other seven isolates had MutSL sequences identical to that of strain DO. Multilocus sequence typing revealed that all isolates with alternate MutSL peptides belonged to a distinct lineage of a prevalent E. faecium clonal complex, designated CC17. Further studies are needed to investigate the prevalence of these MutSL mutations and their possible roles in the emergence of E. faecium strains resistant to oxazolidinones and other antibiotic classes.
Prophylactic scleral buckle for prevention of retinal detachment following vitrectomy for macular hole

Editor,—Fact or rare coincidence? I read with interest Stewart et al 's report, of bilateral optic disc oedema associated with latanoprost in the September 1999 issue of the BJO . 1 Despite the fact this association looks correct at first sight, the patient has not been rechallenged with the same drug, and therefore coincidence in producing this particular side effect cannot be fully ruled out. I …
The Effectiveness of Equine-Assisted Experiential Therapy: Results of an Open Clinical Trial

This article describes an equine-assisted experiential therapy approach and presents treatment outcomes in 31 participants in an equine-assisted, experiential therapy program. Participants completed psychological measures prior to treatment, immediately following treatment, and 6 months after treatment. Reported reductions in psychological distress and enhancements in psychological well being were significant immediately following treatment and were stable at 6-month follow-up. The article discusses the clinical implications and limitations of the present study and directions for further research.
Effects of Ramp-Time on the Thermal-Fatigue Life of SnAgCu Lead-Free Solder Joints

The effects of temperature-cycling ramp-time on the thermal-fatigue life of lead-free solder joints are investigated in this study. Emphasis is placed on the determination of creep responses and the creep strain energy density per cycle of a PBGA (plastic ball grid array) package’s (SnAgCu) leadfree solder joints on a FR-4 printed circuit board (PCB) subjected to various ramp times (0.5, 1, 5, 10, and 15 minutes) for two different ranges of cycling temperatures, namely, from 0 o C to 100 o C and from -25 o C to 125 o C. For all
GLUT 4 and insulin receptor binding and kinase activity in trained human muscle.

1. Physical training enhances sensitivity and responsiveness of insulin‐mediated glucose uptake in human muscle. This study examines if this effect of physical training is due to increased insulin receptor function or increased total concentration of insulin‐recruitable glucose transporter protein (GLUT 4). 2. Seven healthy young subjects carried out single leg bicycle training for 10 weeks at 70% of one leg maximal oxygen uptake (VO2,max). Subsequently biopsies were taken from the vastus lateralis muscle of both legs. 3. Single leg VO2,max increased for the trained leg (46 +/‐ 3 to 52 +/‐ 2 ml min‐1 kg‐1 (means +/‐ S.E.M., P < 0.05), and cytochrome c oxidase activity was higher in this compared to the untrained leg (2.0 +/‐ 0.1 vs. 1.4 +/‐ 0.1 nmol s‐1 (mg muscle)‐1, P < 0.05). Insulin binding as well as basal‐ and insulin‐stimulated receptor kinase activity did not differ between trained and untrained muscle. The concentration of GLUT 4 protein was higher in the former (14.9 +/‐ 1.9 vs. 11.6 +/‐ 1.0 arbitrary units (micrograms protein)‐1 in crude membranes, P < 0.05). The training‐induced increase in GLUT 4 (26 +/‐ 11%) matched a previously reported increase in maximum insulin‐stimulated leg glucose uptake (25 +/‐ 7%) in the same subjects, and individual values of the two variables correlated (correlation coefficient (r) = 0.84, P < 0.05). 4. In conclusion, in human muscle training induces a local contraction‐dependent increase in GLUT 4 protein, which enhances the effect of insulin on glucose uptake. On the other hand, insulin receptor function in muscle is unlikely to be affected by training.
Hierarchical expectation propagation for Bayesian aggregation of average data

We often wish to use external data to improve the precision of an inference, but concerns arise when the dierent datasets have been collected under dierent conditions so that we do not want to simply pool the information. This is the well-known problem of meta-analysis, for which Bayesian methods have long been used to achieve partial pooling. Here we consider the challenge when the external data are averages rather than raw data. We provide a Bayesian solution by using simulation to approximate the likelihood of the external summary, and by allowing the parameters in the model to vary under the dierent conditions. Inferences are constructed using importance sampling from an approximate distribution determined by an expectation propagation-like algorithm. We demonstrate with the problem that motivated this research, a hierarchical nonlinear model in pharmacometrics, implementing the computation in Stan.