Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Human-induced water turbidity alters selection on sexual displays in sticklebacks

Changes in the environment due to human activities are becoming increasingly common. A serious problem in aquatic environments is increased water turbidity due to phytoplankton algal growth. This may affect the breeding system of fishes, especially those with a visually based mating system. Here we show that increased turbidity affects sexual selection in the threespine stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus) through impaired possibility for visually based mate choice. In a laboratory mate preference and mate choice experiment on sticklebacks from the Baltic Sea, which is an area suffering from increased turbidity due to human activities, we found that females spent more time with and visited more often males in clear water than males in turbid water. For males in turbid water to receive the same amount of interest from females as males in clear water, they needed to court significantly more. Thus, turbid water induced selection for higher courtship activity. However, the final spawning decision of the females did not depend on water turbidity, which suggests that nonvisual cues determined the final spawning decision. Because visual cues are important in mate attraction, increased turbidity affects an important evolutionary force, sexual selection, which may have further consequences for the evolution of the sexual displays and preferences. Differences in visual conditions could hence be one factor that has lead to differences among stickleback population in the use of sexual signals.
Influence of environment on residence and selected demographic and clinical parameters of preschool children with IgE-dependent asthma.

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE An important role in the pathogenesis of asthma in children is played by individual parameters and environmental factors, in particular, those related to the place of residence. The aim of this study was to assess the impact of the living environment on the basic demographic and clinical parameters of preschool children with IgE-dependent asthma. MATERIAL AND METHODS 176 children (126 from urban and 52 from rural areas) aged 5.22±0.34 years, with newly-diagnosed IgE-dependent asthma, hospitalised at the Clinic for Lung Diseases and Paediatric Rheumatology of the Prof. Antoni Gębala Children's Hospital of Lublin, were qualified for the study. Medical documentation of the children was analysed, including the implementation of vaccinations. Due to the clinical form of the disease, patients were separated into groups with mild, moderate and severe asthma. RESULTS No statistically significant differentiation was observed between age and current body weight and height of the children. Similarly, gender and the clinical form of asthma were not significantly correlated with the place of residence. Children with asthma, at the time of exacerbation symptoms of the disease, living in a city, significantly more often (p <0.05) were treated with antibiotics in the hospital during hospitalization, while the value of OR (5.08) indicated that the rural environment enforces more frequent use of OGCs during asthma exacerbation therapy. In children from the urban environment, there was a significant correlation between the current body weight and serum calcium concentration, as well as a negative statistically significant correlation between the current body weight and serum selenium concentration. CONCLUSIONS Residence does not determine the clinical course of IgE-dependent asthma in preschool children.
Guidelines for Mitochondrial DNA Typing

Sequence analysis of human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is being used widely to characterize forensic biological specimens, particularly when there is insufficient nuclear DNA in samples for typing. Hair shafts, bones, teeth and other samples that are severely decomposed may be subjected to mtDNA analysis [e.g. 1–5]. Although many of the quality assurance, quality control and interpretational guidelines used for PCR-based nuclear DNA analyses apply to mtDNA analysis, there are some features of mtDNA that warrant specific consideration: (1) mtDNA is maternally inherited, (2) heteroplasmy, and (3) the greater sensitivity of detection of mtDNA typing. It is imperative that guidelines consider the features of mtDNA and that practices do not exceed the state of knowledge on mtDNA. In an effort to refine previously published guidelines [6] and to assist those currently using mtDNA protocols and those considering implementing mtDNA analysis, the DNA Commission of the International Society for Forensic Genetics (ISFG) met on August 16, 1999, in San Francisco, Calif. to develop current guidelines. The following are the recommendations by the DNA Commission on the use of mtDNA analysis. Background
RANGE CONTRACTION IN DECLINING NORTH AMERICAN BIRD POPULATIONS

Significant population declines are typically used to diagnose the level of threat faced by endangered species. In contrast, conservation strategies for these species often focus on setting aside parts of their ranges into protected areas, without regard for the distribution of population abundances within those ranges. Since abundances are not uniformly distributed within a species' range, different portions of the range may be of different conservation value. This article examines the relationship between the decrease in abundance of a taxon and the resulting pattern in the contraction of its geographical distribution. Three possible types of decline are considered. High-abundance-biased (HAB) declines occur when the overall decline in abundance occurs predominantly in the portions of the range where abundances are highest. Here, while the total abundance may significantly decline, the range can remain unchanged. Conversely, in low-abundance-biased (LAB) declines, the decline occurs predominantly in are.
Evacuation Planning Optimization Based on a Multi-Objective Artificial Bee Colony Algorithm

Evacuation is an important activity for reducing the number of casualties and amount of damage in disaster management. Evacuation planning is tackled as a spatial optimization problem. The decision-making process for evacuation involves high uncertainty, conflicting objectives, and spatial constraints. This study presents a Multi-Objective Artificial Bee Colony (MOABC) algorithm, modified to provide a better solution to the evacuation problem. The new approach combines random swap and random insertion methods for neighborhood search, the two-point crossover operator, and the Pareto-based method. For evacuation planning, two objective functions were considered to minimize the total traveling distance from an affected area to shelters and to minimize the overload capacity of shelters. The developed model was tested on real data from the city of Kigali, Rwanda. From computational results, the proposed model obtained a minimum fitness value of 5.80 for capacity function and 8.72 × 108 for distance function, within 161 s of execution time. Additionally, in this research we compare the proposed algorithm with Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II and the existing Multi-Objective Artificial Bee Colony algorithm. The experimental results show that the proposed MOABC outperforms the current methods both in terms of computational time and better solutions with minimum fitness values. Therefore, developing MOABC is recommended for applications such as evacuation planning, where a fast-running and efficient model is needed.
Os componentes do sangue afetam a produção de (ERO) pelas células sinoviais de equinos in vitro

Blood-derived products are commonly administered to horses and humans to treat many musculoskeletal diseases, due to their potential antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects. Nevertheless, antioxidant effects have never been shown upon horse synovial fluid cells in vitro. If proved, this could give a new perspective to justify the clinical application of blood-derived products. The aim of the present study was to investigate the antioxidant effects of two blood-derived products - plasma (unconditioned blood product - UBP) and a commercial blood preparation (conditioned blood product - CBP)1 - upon stimulated equine synovial fluid cells. Healthy tarsocrural joints (60) were tapped to obtain synovial fluid cells; these cells were pooled, processed, stimulated with lipopolysaccharide (LPS) or phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA), and evaluated by flow cytometry for the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS). Upon addition of any blood-derived product here used - UBP and CBP - there was a significant decrease in the oxidative burst of synovial fluid cells (P<0.05). There was no difference between UBP and CBP effects. In conclusion, treatment of stimulated equine synovial cells with either UBP or CBP efficiently restored their redox equilibrium.
Millimeter wave radar for the obstacle detection and warning system for helicopters

An obstacle detection and warning system for civil helicopters is now being developed. An infrared camera and a 94 GHz millimeter wave (MMW) radar have been used as its sensor. Experimental MMW radars have been built to examine their propagation properties and obstacle detection performance. A 94 GHz Vivaldi antenna has been fabricated for a compact radar antenna. Measured results demonstrated that the experimental FMCW radar has a satisfactory range and accuracy. It was also shown that the Vivaldi antenna worked well at A 90 to 100 GHz frequency range.
Perspectiva espiritual y calidad de vida relacionada con la salud en el paciente con enfermedad renal

La Universidad de La Sabana informa que el(los) autor(es) ha(n) autorizado a usuarios internos y externos de la institución a consultar el contenido de este documento a través del Catálogo en línea de la Biblioteca y el Repositorio Institucional en la página Web de la Biblioteca, así como en las redes de información del país y del exterior, con las cuales tenga convenio la Universidad de La Sabana.
Effects of single α-to-β residue replacements on recognition of an extended segment in a viral fusion protein.

Partial replacement of α-amino acid residues with β-amino acid residues has been established as a strategy for preserving target-engagement by helix-forming polypeptides while altering other properties. The impact of β-residue incorporation within polypeptides that adopt less regular conformations, however, has received less attention. The HRC domains of fusion glycoproteins from pathogenic paramyxoviruses contain a segment that must adopt an extended conformation in order to co-assemble with the HRN domain in the post-fusion state and drive merger of the viral envelope with a target cell membrane. Here we examine the impact of single α-to-β substitutions within this extended N-terminal segment of an engineered HRC peptide designated VIQKI. Stabilities of hexameric co-assemblies formed with the native HPIV3 HRN have been evaluated, the structures of five co-assemblies have been determined, and antiviral efficacies have been measured. Many sites within the extended segment show functional tolerance of α-to-β substitution. These results offer a basis for future development of paramyxovirus infection inhibitors with novel biological activity profiles, possibly including resistance to proteolysis.
Investigation of DNAmethylation of TWIST Gene in Breast Cancer and Its Relationship to Histopathological Features

BACKGROUND: Promoter hypermethylation and global hypomethylation in the human genome are hallmarks of most cancers. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study is to assess the methylation profile patterns of TWIST gene and to investigate the relationship of methylation with pathological features. METHODS: Romoter CpGisland methylation of TWIST which can be related in breast cancer was performed by methylation-sensitive high resolution melting (MS-HRM) analysis. Formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissue samples of 80 patients with a diagnosis of primary breast cancer from Eskisehir Osmangazi University medical faculty of Oncology Clinic were included. RESULTS: In our study, the promoter hypermethylation frequency of TWIST gene was 25.0%. With these results, when the prognostic factors of the patients were analyzed, tumor stage and age were found to be meaningless with the hypermethylation of TWIST gene, but found to be significant with lymph node positivity, ER positivity, PR negativity, and HER2/NEU negativity. CONCLUSION: Our study is important as being the first study that analyzes association between histopathologic type and TWIST gene promotor methylation status in Turkish population.
Appraisal of Deep-Learning Techniques on Computer-Aided Lung Cancer Diagnosis with Computed Tomography Screening

Aims: Deep-learning methods are becoming versatile in the field of medical image analysis. The hand-operated examination of smaller nodules from computed tomography scans becomes a challenging and time-consuming task due to the limitation of human vision. A standardized computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) framework is required for rapid and accurate lung cancer diagnosis. The National Lung Screening Trial recommends routine screening with low-dose computed tomography among high-risk patients to reduce the risk of dying from lung cancer by early cancer detection. The evolvement of clinically acceptable CAD system for lung cancer diagnosis demands perfect prototypes for segmenting lung region, followed by identifying nodules with reduced false positives. Recently, deep-learning methods are increasingly adopted in medical image diagnosis applications. Subjects and Methods: In this study, a deep-learning-based CAD framework for lung cancer diagnosis with chest computed tomography (CT) images is built using dilated SegNet and convolutional neural networks (CNNs). A dilated SegNet model is employed to segment lung from chest CT images, and a CNN model with batch normalization is developed to identify the true nodules from all possible nodules. The dilated SegNet and CNN models have been trained on the sample cases taken from the LUNA16 dataset. The performance of the segmentation model is measured in terms of Dice coefficient, and the nodule classifier is evaluated with sensitivity. The discriminant ability of the features learned by a CNN classifier is further confirmed with principal component analysis. Results: Experimental results confirm that the dilated SegNet model segments the lung with an average Dice coefficient of 0.89 ± 0.23 and the customized CNN model yields a sensitivity of 94.8 on categorizing cancerous and noncancerous nodules. Conclusions: Thus, the proposed CNN models achieve efficient lung segmentation and two-dimensional nodule patch classification in CAD system for lung cancer diagnosis with CT screening.
Initial Graphics Exchange Specification (IGES), version 2.0

A 200-word or less factual summary of most significant information. If document includes a significant bibliography or literature survey, mention it here) This document contains Version 2.0 of the Initial Graphics Exchange Specification, a defined format for the creation of a file which enables data found in today's commercially available CAD/CAM systems to be exchanged or archived. IGES, Version 1.0, published as NBSIR 80-1978 (R) in January 1980, consisted of entity definitions for geometry, drafting and structural information. Definition entities were provied as a means of expanding the utility of IGES. Version 2.0 of the Specification has been extended in the advanced geometry, electrical, and finite element modeling areas. In addition, the Specification has been reformatted and clarified to enable the user to reference the document more easily. 12.
What Now? Epidemiology in the Wake of a Pandemic

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic and the coming transition to a post-pandemic world where COVID-19 will likely remain as an incident disease present a host of challenges and opportunities in epidemiologic research. The scale and universality of this disruption to life and health provide unique opportunities to study phenomena, and health challenges, in all branches of epidemiology, from the obvious infectious disease and social consequences, to less clear impacts on chronic disease and cancer. If we are to both take advantage of the largest natural experiment of our lifetimes, and provide evidence to inform the numerous public health and clinical decisions being made every day, we must act quickly to ask critical questions and develop new methods to answer them. In doing so we should build on each of our strengths and expertise, and try to provide new insights rather than becoming yet another voice commenting on the same set of questions with limited evidence.
Cassava starch-agar blend as alternative gelling agent for mycological culture media

Cassava starch has been used successfully in plant tissue culture media, and its potential in culturing fungi was evaluated for cost reduction since agar is expensive. Starch was extracted from blended-peeled cassava var. Dokudwoade paste and sun-dried for 48 hours. The cassava starch alone and its blend with different amounts of agar were used to prepare culture media, and medium with 5g agar/250ml was used as the standard. Each amount of agar and/or cassava starch was added separately to 250ml potato broth prepared from scratch and then autoclaved. Media were dispensed into Petri plates and left over night under ambient conditions and observed for media characteristics. Plugs of 5mm diameter of Aspergillus niger and Fusarium oxysporum placed at the centre of each Petri plate were used to assess growth and sporulation. It was observed that media with higher concentration of cassava starch had difficulty in dispensing. Clarity of the media was generally good. The mycelial growth and sporulation of A. niger on all media were reasonably good. However, growth was profuse on the cassava starch-blend media and this was probably due to additional form of carbon in starch. There was no significant difference (P > 0.05) between colony diameters and sporulation. The aerial growth of F. oxysporum was generally characterised by loose fluffy mycelia. Colony diameter and number of spores of F. oxysporium were significantly (P < 0.05) different. The different growth and sporulation characteristics of A. niger and F. oxysporum may be due to their different nutritional requirements. In general, all the media in the study supported growth and sporulation of the test fungi. The use of cassava starch-agar blend in mycological culture media preparation is therefore recommended after more studies to validate the present results.
A quality‐adjusted survival time without symptoms or toxicities analysis of glasdegib plus low‐dose cytarabine versus low‐dose cytarabine as initial therapy for acute myeloid leukemia in patients who are not considered candidates for intensive chemotherapy

In a randomized study, glasdegib (a hedgehog inhibitor) plus low‐dose cytarabine (LDAC) significantly prolonged survival in comparison with LDAC in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). A quality‐adjusted time without symptoms of disease progression or toxicity (Q‐TWiST) approach was used to evaluate comparative quality‐adjusted survival.
Organophosphate Insecticide Chlorfenvinphos Affects Superoxide Dismutase, Catalase and Malondialdehyde in Rat Liver

The aim of this paper was to study the activity of liver superoxide dismutase and catalase and the concentration of liver malondialdehyde in rats intoxicated with chlorfenvinphos, an organophosphate widely used as an insecticide. The study was carried out on male Wistar rats weighing 180-230 g. The rats were divided into two groups: examined - receiving oil solution of chlorfenvinphos in doses of 0.5 LD50, and 0.1 LD50 and control group receiving oil. The activity of superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and concentration of malondialdehyde (MDA) were determined after 1, 24 and 48 hours of intoxication. We observed an increase in the liver activity of SOD in further period of intoxication with chlorfenvinphos in both doses and a decrease of liver SOD activity in the rats intoxicated with the higher dose. The CAT activity in liver of the treated rats increased at the 1st hour of experiment with a dose of 0.5 LD50 and at the 1st hour and the 24th hour after intoxication with a dose 0.1 LD50. Hepatic concentration of MDA showed a decrease at the 24th hour of intoxication with chlorfenvinphos and an increase at the 48th hour of intoxication with the higher dose and returned to control value for the rats intoxicated with the lower dose. SOD and CAT play a major role in the maintaince of the physiological level of reactive form of oxygen. When reactive oxygen species generation exceeds capability of redox degrading systems, MDA levels increase. The results obtained suggest that reactive oxygen species in liver injury might be caused by chlorfenvinphos.
MV-Sketch: A Fast and Compact Invertible Sketch for Heavy Flow Detection in Network Data Streams

Fast detection of heavy flows (e.g., heavy hitters and heavy changers) in massive network traffic is challenging due to the stringent requirements of fast packet processing and limited resource availability. Invertible sketches are summary data structures that can recover heavy flows with small memory footprints and bounded errors, yet existing invertible sketches incur high memory access overhead that leads to performance degradation. We present MV-Sketch, a fast and compact invertible sketch that supports heavy flow detection with small and static memory allocation. MV-Sketch tracks candidate heavy flows inside the sketch data structure via the idea of majority voting, such that it incurs small memory access overhead in both update and query operations, while achieving high detection accuracy. We present theoretical analysis on the memory usage, performance, and accuracy of MV-Sketch. Trace-driven evaluation shows that MV-Sketch achieves higher accuracy than existing invertible sketches, with up to $3.38 \times$ throughput gain. We also show how to boost the performance of MV-Sketch with SIMD instructions.
Sidr honey abrogates the oxidative stress and downregulates the hyaluronic acid concentration and gene expression of TGF-β1 and COL1a1 in rat model of thioacetamide-induced hepatic fibrosis.

Liver fibrosis is a major health concern, which might progress to cirrhosis. To date, treatment trials rely mainly on the removal of the causative factor. The current study investigated the potential ameliorative role of sidr honey on thioacetamide (TAA)-induced liver fibrosis in rats. Forty-eight Wistar albino rats were equally allocated into four groups: control; sidr honey (5g/kg body weight (BW), orally); TAA (200 mg/kg BW, IP three times weekly/15 weeks); and sidr honey plus TAA at the same dose and administration rout. Rats co-treated with sidr honey plus TAA revealed significant reduction in hepatic malondialdehyde, hyaluronic acid (HA), alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase, alkaline phosphatase, gamma glutamyl transferase, direct bilirubin, and hepatic mRNA expression of transforming growth factor (TGF)-β1 and collagen type I alpha 1 chain (COL1a1) compared to TAA-exposed rats. In addition, the hepatoprotective potential of sidr honey was indicated via improvement of histopathologic picture of hepatocytes and upregulation of total antioxidant capacity, reduced glutathione, catalase, glutathione peroxidase, superoxide dismutase, total protein, and albumin compared to TAA-treated rats. In conclusion, daily administration of sidr honey (5 g/kg BW) is a promising natural antioxidant and fibrosuppressive agent that could ameliorate liver fibrosis via downregulation of fibrosis genes including TGF-β1 and COL1a1 and HA and via enhancement of antioxidant system.