Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Identification of Lipoprotein MslA as a Neoteric Virulence Factor of Mycoplasma gallisepticum

ABSTRACT Many lipoproteins are expressed on the surfaces of mycoplasmas, and some have been implicated as playing roles in pathogenesis. Family 2 lipoproteins of Mycoplasma pneumoniae have a conserved “mycoplasma lipoprotein X” central domain and a “mycoplasma lipoprotein 10” C-terminal domain and are differentially expressed in response to environmental conditions. Homologues of family 2 lipoproteins are Mycoplasma specific and include the lipoprotein of Mycoplasma gallisepticum, encoded by the MGA0674 gene. Comparative transcriptomic analysis of the M. gallisepticum live attenuated vaccine strain F and the virulent strain Rlow, reported in this study, indicated that MGA0674 is one of several differentially expressed genes. The MGA0674-encoded lipoprotein is a proteolytically processed, immunogenic, TX-114 detergent-phase protein which appears to have antigenic divergence between field strains Rlow and S6. We examined the virulence of an Rlow ΔMGA0674 mutant (P1H9) in vivo and observed reduced recovery and attenuated virulence in the tracheas of experimentally infected chickens. The virulence of two additional Rlow ΔMGA0674 mutants, 2162 and 2204, was assessed in a second in vivo virulence experiment. These mutants exhibited partial to complete attenuation in vivo, but recovery was observed more frequently. Since only Mycoplasma species harbor homologues of MGA0674, the gene product has been renamed “Mycoplasma-specific lipoprotein A” (MslA). Collectively, these data indicate that MslA is an immunogenic lipoprotein exhibiting reduced expression in an attenuated strain and plays a role in M. gallisepticum virulence.
Progress: A Toolkit for Interactive Program Steering

Interactive program steering permits researchers to monitor and guide their applications during runtime. Interactive steering can help make end users more effective in addressing the scientific or engineering questions being solved with these programs, and it may be used to improve the performance of complex parallel and distributed codes. Progress is a toolkit for developing steerable applications. Users instrument their applications with library calls and then steer parallel applications with Progress’ runtime system. Progress provides steerable objects which encapsulate program abstractions for monitoring and steering during program execution. Once created, steering objects are known to and manipulated by Progress' two components: (1) a server executing in the same memory space as the target program and capable of inspecting and manipulating program state, and (2) a potentially remote client providing command and graphical interfaces. Developers instrument their applications with the Progress toolkit library to create and maintain these steering objects. The server maintains information about the steering objects and performs steering actions on the application. This toolkit provides sensors, probes, actuators, function hooks, complex actions, and synchronization points. Progress’ server is built on a Mach-compatible Cthreads library; it is a general toolkit for use with a variety of multithreaded, C programs executing on multiprocessors. Progress has been applied to several large-scale parallel application programs, including a molecular dynamics code and an N bodies simulation. It is currently being used with a complex global atmospheric modeling code.
International Conference on Knowledge-Based and Intelligent Information & Engineering Systems-KES 2014 A personalized recommender system from probabilistic relational model and users ’ preferences

Recommender systems are applications to retrieve useful information from large amount of online data to assist users in discovering interesting items/products in the system. Collaborative filtering, content-based filtering, demographics-based filtering and hybrid approach are main approaches to realize recommendation systems. Most of the existing algorithms use a single approach to deal with recommendation problems. Besides, traditional recommendation approaches mainly deal with single dyadic relationships between users and items whereas data in real world are generally conceptualized in terms of objects and relations between them. Recommender systems based on Probabilistic Relational Model (PRM) 1,2, a framework for learning probabilistic models from relational data, have tried to address this issue. However, existing PRM-based recommendation algorithms do not fit into our context where we are struggling with the contradictory situation of a real-world application that requires building a personalized recommender when no user profile exists. Therefore, we propose a novel approach to build a personalized PRM-based recommendation model with the help of users’ preferences on decision making criteria. Using our approach, content-based, collaborative filtering as well as hybrid models can be achieved from the same PRM. Applying the model on a real-world data from a cold system, we show that our model is actually capable of personalizing recommendations in coldstart situation. c © 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. Peer-review under responsibility of KES International.
Meridians in acupuncture and infrared imaging.

The meridians in acupuncture are hypothesized to be made up of polarized molecules. Quantum excitations, quasi-particles and others are assumed to be the media of communication between different parts of the body connected by meridians. Infrared pictures are taken to depict the effect of acupuncture on one acupoint of a meridian to a far away pain area.
Different outcomes after intracytoplasmic sperm injection without oocyte activation in two patients with different types of globozoospermia

Different outcomes after intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) without oocyte activation in two patients with different types of round‐headed spermatozoa (globozoospermia) are reported. After controlled ovarian hyperstimulation and oocyte pick‐up, retrieved oocytes were underwent ICSI without oocyte activation and a 33.33% (4/12) fertilisation rate was obtained in the first case, whereas an abnormal fertilisation was achieved in the second case. The transfer of two grade II embryos in the first couple resulted in clinical pregnancy with a healthy livebirth. It was concluded that the main problem of cases with globozoospermia was a low fertilisation rate or failure fertilisation, and even though ICSI and artificial oocyte activation have been employed to increase this rate, it is not necessarily needed to achieve a pregnancy.
Inhibition of Cyclic AMP Formation by a Selective Metabotropic Glutamate Receptor Agonist

Abstract: It is well documented that the effects of excitatory ammo acid (EAA) agonists on phosphoinositide hydrolysis involve a GTP‐binding protein‐linked or “metabotropic’ receptor mechanism. The mechanisms by which EAAs alter cyclic AMP levels in brain slices, however, are not yet clear. In this study, the selective metabotropic EAA agonist trans‐(±)‐l‐aminocyclopentane‐l,3‐dicarboxylic acid and its isomers were examined for effects on basal and forskolin‐stimulated cyclic AMP formation in slices of the rat hippocampus. Trans‐(±)‐l‐Aminocyclopentane‐l,3‐dicarboxylic acid had little effect on basal cyclic AMP but inhibited forskolin‐stimulated cyclic AMP formation in a biphasic manner. The 1S,3R isomer of 1‐aminocy‐clopentane‐l,3‐dicarboxylic acid produced potent but only partial (~50%) inhibition of forskolin‐stimulated cyclic AMP formation. 1R,3S–l‐Aminocyclopentane‐l,3‐dicarboxylic acid fully inhibited forskolin‐stimulated cyclic AMP but with lower potency than the IS,3R isomer. These results show that in addition to the formation of phosphoinositide‐derived second messengers, the cellular consequences of selectively activating hippocampal metabotropic EAA receptors include an alteration of cellular cyclic AMP levels.
Electrostatic effects on polynucleotide transitions. II. Behavior of titrated systems

The theory developed in the previous paper to discuss changes in electrostatic free energies in polynucleotide order–disorder transitions is extended to cases where one or more of the participating species is titrated to some degree α. It is shown that, for any class of transition, the melting temperature Tm at constant pH is a linear function of the logarithm of the monovalent counterion concentration M, that at high salt the logarithm of the depression of the melting temperature by pH titration is proportional to the pH change, and that the stability of the ordered form as measured by its melting temperature at neutral pH, is a monotonic function of the quantity pHm – pK, where pHm and pK are the pH of melting and the monomer base pK, both measured under similar conditions of temperature and ionic strength. For the transition from double helix to coil, the dependences of Tm and dTm/d log M on pH are determined experimentally and compared with the qualitative predictions of the theory. It is found that dTm/dlog M, a measure of – ΔF̄el (the negative of the electrostatic free energy change in the transition), decreases with increasing pH. In acid solution, where the coil is more extensively prolonated than the helix, the change in electrostatic free energy in the transition is larger than at neutral pH. Conversely, in alkali the electrostatic five energy change is smaller than at neutral pH. Hence (dTm/d log M)acid > (dTm/d log M neutral) > (dTm/d log M)alkali. At Suffeciently high pH, dTm/d log M is observed to become negative, indicating that the electrostatic free energy change is positive in the transition of this region. Date from the literature on the ionic strength dependence of the melting temperature for the acid helices of poly rA, poly rC, and poly dC are also considered from the standpoint of the theory.
Selection of optimal credit card fraud detection models using a coefficient sum approach

During the past years various fraud detection techniques were proposed and used to reduce fraudulent activities. Selection an optimal fraud detection model becomes keen area of interest for researchers in the field of anomaly detection. Methods and tools for fraud detection model selection which were used in the literature used a limited no of model selection criteria for finding the detection of fraud in various areas. So for the first time we propose a approach based on a Coefficient sum method. This approach is used for ranking of Fraud detection models for finding the optimal model from various fraud detection models. For ranking the FDMs, various model selection criteria, with a set of FDMs are require Real data sets are used for illustration of the Coefficient sum method. The result of this paper gives a ranking method based on the Sum value of each criteria of FDM.
Pre and Post Processing Approaches in Edge Detection for Character Recognition

This paper deals with the recognition of handwritten Malayalam characters. Most of the pattern recognition systems will go through the steps like preprocessing, feature extraction and classification. Here, we have presented edge detection in the preprocessing stage. It is important that the edge detector should give the character edges without fragmentation and displacement of edge pixels. Canny edge detector is used to produce thinned edges of the character. But for high resolution images, it gives spurious branches corresponding to noise and texture of the image. So a technique is applied prior to this process to focus the edge regions using nonlinear an isotropic diffusion via partial differential equations (PDE). Even though this method helped to get accurate edge points, the final result shows some broken edges. These broken parts are then linked using ant colony optimization (ACO) method. This image is further partitioned into different zones for the purpose of feature extraction. Multi layer perceptron (MLP) used these features and classified the characters with a recognition accuracy of 95.16%.
Vasopressin and the Output of the Hypothalamic Biological Clock

The physiological effects of vasopressin as a peripheral hormone were first reported more than 100 years ago. However, it was not until the first immunocytochemical studies were carried out in the early 1970s, using vasopressin antibodies, and the discovery of an extensive distribution of vasopressin‐containing fibres outside the hypothalamus, that a neurotransmitter role for vasopressin could be hypothesised. These studies revealed four additional vasopressin systems next to the classical magnocellular vasopressin system in the paraventricular and supraoptic nuclei: a sexually dimorphic system originating from the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis and the medial amygdala, an autonomic and endocrine system originating from the medial part of the paraventricular nucleus, and the circadian system originating from the hypothalamic suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN). At about the same time as the discovery of the neurotransmitter function of vasopressin, it also became clear that the SCN contain the main component of the mammalian biological clock system (i.e. the endogenous pacemaker). This review will concentrate on the significance of the vasopressin neurones in the SCN for the functional output of the biological clock that is contained within it. The vasopressin‐containing subpopulation is a characteristic feature of the SCN in many species, including humans. The activity of the vasopressin neurones in the SCN shows a pronounced daily variation in its activity that has also been demonstrated in human post‐mortem brains. Animal experiments show an important role for SCN‐derived vasopressin in the control of neuroendocrine day/night rhythms such as that of the hypothalamic‐pituitary‐adrenal and hypothalamic‐pituitary‐gonadal axes. The remarkable correlation between a diminished presence of vasopressin in the SCN and a deterioration of sleep‐wake rhythms during ageing and depression make it likely that, also in humans, the vasopressin neurones contribute considerably to the rhythmic output of the SCN.
Fine structure of receptive-field centers of X and Y cells of the cat

Abstract We investigated the fine structure of receptive field centers of X and Y cells of the retina and lateral geniculate nucleus of the cat using sinusoidal grating stimuli of high spatial frequency. By measuring orientation tuning and spatial-frequency tuning at multiple orientations, the two-dimensional sensitivity distribution was examined. We found that receptive-field centers typically have multiple sensitivity peaks that can be modeled as several spatially offset subunits. A subunit structure was found in both X and Y cells, with an average number of subunits per receptive-field center of approximately 2.9 in X cells and approximately 4.6 in Y cells. In X cells these subunits may correspond to individual cone bipolar inputs. In Y cells, the subunits may reflect the structure of the dendritic tree. The observation of the subunit structure of the receptive-field center, in conjunction with manipulation of the retinal wiring through pharmacological intervention, may provide a new tool for probing the circuitry of the retina.
A Field Lysimeter Study of Heavy Metal Movement Down the Profile of Soils with Multiple Metal Pollution During Chelate-Enhanced Phytoremediation

The agricultural soils near a copper smelter in southeast China were found to be highly contaminated with Cu, Pb, Zn, and Cd. Metal migration from the soil to groundwater presents an environmental risk that depends on the physicochemical properties of the contaminated soils. Soil solution samples were obtained using lysimeters from a loam soil with multiple metal pollutions over a period of about 1 yr. A field lysimeter study was also conducted to examine the potential use of (S, S′)-ethylenediamine-N, N′-disuccinic acid trisodium salt (EDDSNa3) in chelate-enhanced phytoremedation and to evaluate the leaching of heavy metals. The average heavy metal concentrations in the soil solution (without the addition of EDDS) were high (e.g., 0.15 mg Pb L−1 at a 50-cm depth) compared to the upper limit for protection of groundwater in China, but varied during the sampling period. Cu concentrations were not correlated with pH or dissolved organic carbon (DOC), but Zn and Cd concentrations were related to soil solution pH. EDDS enhanced metal solubility in the soil, but plant metal uptake by Elsholtzia splendens Nakai did not increase accordingly. There may be an increasing risk of groundwater pollution by Cu and the EDDS enhanced phytoremediation technique needs to be carefully applied to minimize this side effect.
1H‐magnetic resonance spectroscopy—determined cerebral lactate and poor neurological outcomes in children with central nervous system disease

By using proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H‐MRS), cerebral lactate has been shown to be elevated in a wide variety of pediatric and adult neurological diseases. In this study we compared 36 newborns, infants, and children with elevated lactate peaks on 1H‐MRS with 61 patients witout an identifiable lactate signal. 1H‐MRS was acquired from the occipital gray and parietal white matter (8 cm3 volume, STEAM sequence with echo time = 20 msec, repetition time = 3.0 seconds) and data were expressed as ratios of different metabolite peak areas (N‐acetylaspartate [NA]/creatine [Cr], NA/choline [Ch], and Ch/Cr) and the presence of a characteristic lactate doublet peak at 1.3 ppm. Outcomes (Pediatric Cerebral Performance Category Scale score; PCPCS) were assigned 6 to 12 months after injury. Patients with lactate peaks were more likely to have suffered a cardiac arrest, were more often hyperglycemic, and had lower Glasgow Coma Scale scores on admission. They were also more likely to have abnormal metabolite ratios when compared with agematched controls or with patients without detectable lactate. Of prognostic importance, patients with increased lactate were more likely to be severely disabled (39% vs 10%), survive in a persistent vegetative state (13% vs 2%), or have died (39% vs 7%). In contrast, patients with similar conditions without increased lactate were more likely to have had a good outcome (23% vs 3%) or recovered to a mild (38% vs 6%) or moderate disability (20% vs 0%). Our data suggest that 1H‐MRS is useful in the prediction of long‐term outcomes in children with neurological disorders. Patients with elevated cerebral lactate are more likely to die acutely or are at greater risk for serious long‐term disability.
Distribution and activation of voltage‐gated potassium channels in cell‐attached and outside‐out patches from large layer 5 cortical pyramidal neurons of the rat

1 Voltage‐gated potassium channels were studied in cell‐attached and outside‐out patches from the soma and primary apical dendrite of large layer 5 pyramidal neurons in acute slices of rat sensorimotor cortex (22–25 °C). 2 Ensemble averages revealed that some patches contained only fast, IA‐like channels, others contained only IK‐like channels that did not inactivate or inactivated slowly, and the remainder contained mixtures of both channel types. IA and IK channels had mean unitary conductances of 8.5 and 20.3 pS, respectively, and had distinctive patterns of gating. 3 Peak activation curves for ensemble‐averaged currents were described by the Boltzmann equation with half‐maximal voltage (V½) and slope factor (k) values of −24.5 mV and 16.9 mV for IA and −7.6 mV and 10.1 mV for IK (patches < 250 μm from the soma) or −22.9 mV and 16.2 mV for IA (patches > 250 μm from the soma). The steady‐state inactivation curve for IA gave V½ and k values of −72.3 mV and −5.9 mV (< 250 μm from the soma) or −83.1 mV and −6.5 mV (> 250 μm from the soma). These values were similar to the corresponding data for IA and IK in nucleated patches from the same cell type. 4 The amount of IA and IK present in patches depended weakly on distance along the primary apical dendrite from the soma. The amplitude of IA increased, on average, by 2.3 pA per 100 μm, while the amplitude of IK decreased by 0.4 pA per 100 μm. 5 I A and IK channels in dendritic cell‐attached patches were activated by the passage of a back‐propagating action potential past the tip of the patch electrode. These results show directly that these potassium channels participate in action potential repolarisation, and thus contribute to the process of synaptic integration in these neurons.
Structure of apolipoprotein A-I in spherical high density lipoproteins of different sizes

Spherical high density lipoproteins (HDL)† predominate in human plasma. However, little information exists on the structure of the most common HDL protein, apolipoprotein (apo) A-I, in spheres vs. better studied discoidal forms. We produced spherical HDL by incubating reconstituted discoidal HDL with physiological plasma-remodeling enzymes and compared apoA-I structure in discs and spheres of comparable diameter (79–80 and 93–96 Å). Using cross-linking chemistry and mass spectrometry, we determined that the general structural organization of apoA-I was overall similar between discs and spheres, regardless of diameter. This was the case despite the fact that the 93 Å spheres contained three molecules of apoA-I per particle compared with only two in the discs. Thus, apoA-I adopts a consistent general structural framework in HDL particles—irrespective of shape, size and the number of apoA-Is present. Furthermore, a similar cross-linking pattern was demonstrated in HDL particles isolated from human serum. We propose the first experiment-based molecular model of apoA-I in spherical HDL particles. This model provides a new foundation for understanding how apoA-I structure modulates HDL function and metabolism.
Systemic and splanchnic hemodynamic changes in patients with hepatic schistosomiasis.

Although hepatic schistosomiasis is a common cause of portal hypertension, only a few hemodynamic studies, in humans, have been published on this subject. The aim of this study was to determine the systemic and splanchnic hemodynamic changes in hepatic schistosomiasis and to evaluate the influence of liver fibrosis on these changes. A retrospective analysis of a series of 13 patients with hepatic schistosomiasis who had undergone hemodynamic studies was performed. Portal or perisinusoidal fibrosis was present at liver biopsy in 8 patients. The control group included 22 patients with chronic hepatitis and normal hepatic venous pressure gradients. Patients with schistosomiasis exhibited high cardiac index (4.11 +/- 1.15 l.min-1.m-2 vs 2.99 +/- 0.85 l.min-1.m-2; p < 0.05) and low systemic vascular resistance (1039 +/- 316 dyn.s.cm-5 vs 1334 +/- 336 dyn.s.cm-5; p < 0.05). The hepatic venous pressure gradient and hepatic blood flow were normal. Azygos blood flow was markedly increased (0.90 +/- 0.66 l.min-1 vs 0.13 +/- 0.04 l.min-1; p < 0.05). Hemodynamic values were not significantly different between patients with liver fibrosis and those without fibrosis at liver biopsy. In conclusion, patients with hepatic schistosomiasis had a hyperkinetic systemic and splanchnic circulation. In patients with esophageal varices, a normal hepatic venous pressure gradient confirmed presinusoidal portal hypertension. The presence of portal or perisinuoidal fibrosis did not influence hyperdynamic splanchnic state.
An Improved 3D Geometric Tongue Model

This study describes an improved geometric articulatory model based on MRI and CBCT(Cone Beam Computer Tomography) data. The basic idea is to improve the coherence of the vertices of tongue meshes so as to obtain more accurate tongue model. This is conducted in two aspects: i) The representative vertices of tongue surface are depicted in Cartesian coordinate system rather than in a semi-polar gridline coordinate system. ii) tongue surface meshes are modeled with reference to anatomical landmarks. Then, guided PCA is used to extract the control components based on MRI data. The average reconstruction error is less than 1.0 mm. Both qualitative and quantitative evaluation indicates that the proposed method surpasses the conventional semi-polar gridline system based method.