Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Interleukin 1 receptor–associated kinase 4 (IRAK4) plays a dual role in Myddosome formation and Toll-like receptor signalling

Toll-like receptors (TLRs) form part of the host innate immune system, in which they act as sensors of microbial and endogenous danger signals. Upon TLR activation, the intracellular Toll/Interleukin-1 receptor domains of TLR dimers intiate oligomerization of a multiprotein signalling platform comprising
Gender differences after sirolimus-eluting or bare-metal stent implantation for acute myocardial infarction: clinical and angiographic results of the MISSION! Intervention Study

Aims The effect of gender on the outcome of drug-eluting stents in patients with acute myocardial infarction is unknown. We report the gender-based outcome of the MISSION! Intervention Study comparing sirolimus-eluting stents (SES) and bare-metal stents (BMS) in STEMI patients. 157 Patients were treated with SES and 152 patients with BMS. The primary endpoint was in-segment late loss (LL) at 9 months. Secondary endpoints included clinical events at 30 days and 1 year. The in-segment LL in BMS women versus men and SES women versus men was 0.42±0.54mm versus 0.74±0.56mm (p=0.02) and -0.03±0.39mm versus 0.18±0.44mm (p=0.01). The rate of binary restenosis was 13.0% versus 24.8% (BMS group, p=1.00) and 2.9% versus 4.2% (SES group, p=0.23), respectively. The rate of negative in-segment LL (LL<0mm) was 21.7% versus 5.0% (BMS group, p=0.02) and 57.1% versus 31.6% (SES group, p=0.008), respectively. The rate of death, myocardial infarction, stent thrombosis, target vessel failure and target lesion revascularization was not different between women and men within the BMS and SES groups. 9
Insecticide effects of Ruta graveolens, Copaifera langsdorffii and Chenopodium ambrosioides against pests and natural enemies in commercial tomato plantation - doi: 10.4025/actasciagron.v33i1.5900

The aim of this study was to evaluate the insecticide effect of watery leaf extracts of Ruta graveolens (Rutaceae), alcoholic leaf extracts of Copaifera langsdorffii (Caesalpinaceae) and Chenopodium ambrosioides (Chenopodiaceae) in the concentration of 5% under field conditions. The experiment design was randomized blocks with six replications. The parcels treated with plant extracts showed reduction in the population of pests when compared with the control parcels. The extract elaborated with C. langsdorffii presented greater insecticidal effect under Bemisia tabaci (Hemiptera: Aleyrodidae) and sum of pests. It was verified that after 24 hours of spraying, the parcels treated with the extract of C. ambrosioides presented minor numbers of adults of Tuta absoluta (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae), followed by the parcels treated with extract of R. graveolens . There were smaller numbers of parasitoid eggs of lepidopterans Trichogramma sp. (Hymenoptera: Trichogrammatidae) and sum of natural enemies (predators + parasitoids) in the parcels that had received spraying with extracts from the plants of C. langsdorffii and C. ambrosioides , followed by R. graveolens , compared to the control. There were a smaller number of parasitoids from the family Eulophidae (Hymenoptera) attacking caterpillars of T. absoluta in plants treated with R. graveolens , followed by C. langsdorffii and C. ambrosioides than in the control.
A Virion-Based Combination Vaccine Protects against Influenza and SARS-CoV-2 Disease in Mice

The rapid emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants since the onset of the pandemic has highlighted the need for both periodic vaccination “boosts” and a platform that can be rapidly reformulated to manufacture new vaccines. In this work, we report an approach that can utilize current influenza vaccine manufacturing infrastructure to generate combination vaccines capable of protecting from both influenza virus- and SARS-CoV-2-induced disease. ABSTRACT Vaccines targeting SARS-CoV-2 have been shown to be highly effective; however, the breadth against emerging variants and the longevity of protection remains unclear. Postimmunization boosting has been shown to be beneficial for disease protection, and as new variants continue to emerge, periodic (and perhaps annual) vaccination will likely be recommended. New seasonal influenza virus vaccines currently need to be developed every year due to continual antigenic drift, an undertaking made possible by a robust global vaccine production and distribution infrastructure. To create a seasonal combination vaccine targeting both influenza viruses and SARS-CoV-2 that is also amenable to frequent reformulation, we have developed an influenza A virus (IAV) genetic platform that allows the incorporation of an immunogenic domain of the SARS-CoV-2 spike (S) protein onto IAV particles. Vaccination with this combination vaccine elicited neutralizing antibodies and provided protection from lethal challenge with both pathogens in mice. This approach may allow the leveraging of established influenza vaccine infrastructure to generate a cost-effective and scalable seasonal vaccine solution for both influenza and coronaviruses. IMPORTANCE The rapid emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants since the onset of the pandemic has highlighted the need for both periodic vaccination “boosts” and a platform that can be rapidly reformulated to manufacture new vaccines. In this work, we report an approach that can utilize current influenza vaccine manufacturing infrastructure to generate combination vaccines capable of protecting from both influenza virus- and SARS-CoV-2-induced disease. The production of a combined influenza/SARS-CoV-2 vaccine may represent a practical solution to boost immunity to these important respiratory viruses without the increased cost and administration burden of multiple independent vaccines.
A Single Herpes Simplex Virus 1 Genome Reactivates from Individual Cells

Herpesviruses are highly prevalent and cause significant morbidity in the human and animal populations. Most individuals who are infected with herpes simplex virus (HSV-1), a common human pathogen, will become lifelong carriers of the virus, as HSV-1 establishes latent (quiescent) infections in the host cells. ABSTRACT Latent infection is a characteristic feature of herpesviruses’ life cycle. Herpes simplex virus 1 is a common human pathogen that establishes lifelong latency in peripheral neurons. Symptomatic or asymptomatic periodic reactivations from the latent state allow the virus to replicate and spread among individuals. The latent viral genomes are found as several quiescent episomes inside the infected nuclei; however, it is not clear if and how many latent genomes are able to reactivate together. To address this question, we developed a quiescent infection assay, which provides a quantitative analysis of the number of genomes reactivating per cell, in cultured immortalized fibroblasts. We found that, almost always, only one viral genome reactivates per cell. We showed that different timing of entry to quiescence did not result in a significant change in the probability of reactivating. Reactivation from this quiescent state allowed only limited intergenomic recombination between two viral strains compared to lytic infection. Following coinfection with a mutant that is unable to reactivate, only coreactivation with a reactivation-proficient recombinant can provide the opportunity for the mutant to reactivate. We speculate that each individual quiescent viral genome has a low and stochastic chance to reactivate in each cell, an assumption that can explain the limited number of genomes reactivating per cell. IMPORTANCE Herpesviruses are highly prevalent and cause significant morbidity in the human and animal populations. Most individuals who are infected with herpes simplex virus (HSV-1), a common human pathogen, will become lifelong carriers of the virus, as HSV-1 establishes latent (quiescent) infections in the host cells. Reactivation from the latent state leads to many of the viral symptoms and to the spread of the virus among individuals. While many triggers for reactivation were identified, how many genomes reactivate from an individual cell and how are these genomes selected remain understudied. Here, we identify that, in most cases, only one genome per cell reactivates. Mutated HSV-1 genomes require coinfection with another strain to allow coreactivation. Our findings suggest that the decision to reactivate is determined for each quiescent genome separately and support the notion that reactivation preferences occur at the single-genome level.
Depicting Fecal Microbiota Characteristic in Yak, Cattle, Yak-Cattle Hybrid and Tibetan Sheep in Different Eco-Regions of Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

Cattle, yak, and sheep reside as the main ruminants distributed throughout most regions of Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau Area (QTPA) in China. However, there is a lack of large-scale research in the QTPA on their fecal microbiota, which can regulate and reflect host health as an internalized “microbial organ. ” Our study depicted the fecal microbiota community composition and diversity of yak, cattle, yak-cattle hybrids, and Tibetan sheep from 4 eco-regions of the QTPA. ABSTRACT The gut microbiota is closely associated with the health and production performance of livestock. Partial studies on ruminant microbiota are already in progress in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau Area (QTPA) in China, but large-scale and representative profiles for the QTPA are still lacking. Here, 16S rRNA sequencing was used to analyze 340 samples from yak, cattle, yak-cattle hybrids, and Tibetan sheep, which lived in a shared environment from 4 eco-regions of the QTPA during the same season, and aimed to investigate the fecal microbiota community composition, diversity, and potential function. All samples were clustered into 2 enterotypes, which were derived from the genera Ruminococcaceae UCG-005 and Acinetobacter, respectively. Environment, human activity, species, and parasitization all affected the fecal microbiota. By assessing the relationship between the fecal microbiota and the above variables, we identified a scattered pattern of fecal microbiota dissimilarity based more significantly on diet over other factors. Additionally, gastrointestinal nematode infection could reduce the capacity of the bacterial community for biosynthesis of other secondary metabolites, carbohydrate metabolism, and nucleotide metabolism. Ultimately, this study provided a fecal microbiota profile for ruminants living in 4 eco-regions of the QTPA and its potential future applications in developing animal husbandry regimes. IMPORTANCE Cattle, yak, and sheep reside as the main ruminants distributed throughout most regions of Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau Area (QTPA) in China. However, there is a lack of large-scale research in the QTPA on their fecal microbiota, which can regulate and reflect host health as an internalized “microbial organ. ” Our study depicted the fecal microbiota community composition and diversity of yak, cattle, yak-cattle hybrids, and Tibetan sheep from 4 eco-regions of the QTPA. Additionally, our results demonstrated here that the ruminant samples could be clustered into 2 enterotypes and that diet outweighed other factors in shaping fecal microbiota in the QTPA. This study provided a basis for understanding the microbiota characteristic of ruminants and its possible applications for livestock production in the QTPA.
Survival Strategies and Metabolic Interactions between Ruminococcus gauvreauii and Ruminococcoides bili, Isolated from Human Bile

Unique insights into metabolic interaction between two isolates; Ruminococcus gauvreauii IPLA60001 and Ruminococcoides bili IPLA60002, from the human gallbladder, are presented here. The R. bili strain metabolized resistant starches while R. gauvreauii failed to do so but grew well on sugar alcohols. ABSTRACT Little is known about the bacteria that reside in the human gallbladder and the mechanisms that allow them to survive within this harsh environment. Here we describe interactions between two strains from a human bile sample, one Ruminococcus gauvreauii (IPLA60001), belonging to the Lachnospiraceae family, and the other, designated as Ruminococcoides bili (IPLA60002T; DSM 110008) most closely related to Ruminococcus bromii within the family Ruminococcaceae. We provide evidence for bile salt resistance and sporulation for these new strains. Both differed markedly in their carbohydrate metabolism. The R. bili strain mainly metabolized resistant starches to form formate, lactate and acetate. R. gauvreauii mainly metabolized sugar alcohols, including inositol and also utilized formate to generate acetate employing the Wood Ljungdahl pathway. Amino acid and vitamin biosynthesis genomic profiles also differed markedly between the two isolates, likely contributing to their synergistic interactions, as revealed by transcriptomic analysis of cocultures. Transcriptome analysis also revealed that R. gauvreauii IPLA60001 is able to grow using the end-products of starch metabolism formed by the R. bili strain such as formate, and potentially other compounds (such as ethanolamine and inositol) possibly provided by the autolytic behavior of R. bili. IMPORTANCE Unique insights into metabolic interaction between two isolates; Ruminococcus gauvreauii IPLA60001 and Ruminococcoides bili IPLA60002, from the human gallbladder, are presented here. The R. bili strain metabolized resistant starches while R. gauvreauii failed to do so but grew well on sugar alcohols. Transcriptomic analysis of cocultures of these strains, provides new data on the physiology and ecology of two bacteria from human bile, with a particular focus on cross-feeding mechanisms. Both biliary strains displayed marked resistance to bile and possess many efflux transporters, potentially involved in bile export. However, they differ markedly in their amino acid catabolism and vitamin synthesis capabilities, a feature that is therefore likely to contribute to the strong synergistic interactions between these strains. This is therefore the first study that provides evidence for syntrophic metabolic cooperation between bacterial strains isolated from human bile.
The Politics of Knowledge of Medicinal Plants in India: Corporations, Collectors and Cultivators as Constituents

This article seeks to understand one of the most important problems in the contemporary discourse of modern development, that of management, control, collection and trade of medicinal plants in India. The tremendous growth in the market for herbal medicines since the 1990s has prompted large-scale industrial production of these medicines by big pharmaceutical corporations. This relies on medicinal plants mostly derived from the wild, and while their market has grown enormously, it has also led to their over-harvesting, without any concomitant efforts at regeneration. This article offers to analyse the political aspect of the existing market supply chain of medicinal plants in India. This study specifically focuses on problematizing the complex power structures in the market supply chain of medicinal plants, with reference to the knowledge of production that guides the corporations. In order to manufacture herbal products on the basis of large-scale centralized production systems, the corporations privilege their ‘knowledge’ of harvesting, production and distribution over that of the collectors. The collectors are usually part of communities that have built up their knowledge of accessibility and medicinal properties of these medicinal plants over centuries of care, experience and innovation. It is when these two knowledge systems clash, in the larger context of political economy of development and the public policies of the state, that the degradation of nature becomes inevitable.
Empowering Participation Within Structures of Dependency

Participatory Design (PD) seeks political change to support people’s democratic control over processes, solutions, and, in general, matters of concern to them. A particular challenge remains in supporting vulnerable groups to gain power and control when they are dependent on organizations and external structures. We reflect on our five-year engagement with survivors of sex trafficking in Nepal and an anti-trafficking organization that supports the survivors. Arguing that the prevalence of deficit perspective in the setting promotes dependency and robs the survivors’ agency, we sought to bring change by exploring possibilities based on the survivors’ existing assets. Three configurations illuminate how our design decisions and collective exploration operate to empower participation while attending to the substantial power implicitly and explicitly manifest in existing structures. We highlight the challenges we faced, uncovering actions that PD practitioners can take, including an emphasis on collaborative entanglements, attending to contingent factors, and encouraging provisional collectives.
FLAD: a human-centered video content flaw detection system for meeting recordings

Widely adopted digital cameras and smartphones have generated a large number of videos, which have brought a tremendous workload to video editors. Recently, a variety of automatic/semi-automatic video editing methods have been proposed to tackle this issue in some specific areas. However, for the production of meeting recordings, the existing studies highly depend on additional conditions of conference venues, like infrared camera or special microphone, which are not practical. Moreover, current video quality assessment works mainly focus on the quality loss after compression or encoding rather than the human-centered video content flaws. In this paper, we design and implement FLAD, a human-centered video content flaw detection system for meeting recordings, which could build a bridge between subjective sense and objective measures from a human-centered perspective. The experimental results illustrate the proposed algorithms could achieve the state-of-the-art video content flaw detection performance for meeting recordings.
An Investigation of Quantitative Measures of Sleep-Apnea-Induced Nocturnal Cardiac Stress

Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) affects an estimated 18 million individuals in the U.S. adult population. Numerous research findings indicate that OSA has significant adverse effects on the cardiac health. Current method of assessing the severity of OSA using apnea hypopnea index (AHI) which is the average count of apneic events per hour of sleep does not reflect how OSA affects the cardiovascular system health. In this study, we investigate the possibility of analyzing the nocturnal Electrocardiography (ECG) signal to assess the adverse impact of sleep apnea events on the heart. Our approach focuses on determining whether nocturnal cardiac arrhythmia is different depending on whether they occur during apneic events or during periods of normal breathing. We utilized the ECG recordings that are routinely made during full-night (6-8 hr) polysomnography to compute two metrics that are inspired by standard measures of heart rate turbulence (HRT): turbulence onset (TO), and turbulence slope (TS). Eleven volunteers (9M, 2F, 52±8 yrs., BMI 34.07±7.25 kg/m2) who were either previously diagnosed as having obstructive sleep apnea or were suspected of having OSA and referred to our accredited sleep laboratory for diagnosis participated in the study. The volunteers exhibited AHI with 60.80±26.84 range of 18.3 to 105.4. The TS values obtained from averaged tachograms of premature ventricular contractions (PVCs) that occurred during apneic events and normal breathing were 16.11±10.36 ms/RR and 8.77±7.96 ms/RR, respectively and had no significant different means (p>0.08). The corresponding averaged TO were 13.41%±20.87% for PVCs during apneic events and 12.06%±21.02% for PVCs during normal breathing intervals did not significantly different mean either (p>0.8). However, the TO values computed for each PVC during apnea events had a different mean (21.75%±33.00%) compared with TO mean (31.96%±33.24%) for PVCs during normal breathing (p<0.0008). Similar analysis for TS values (72.01±97.84 ms/RR for apneic events and 52.29±73.02 ms/RR for normal breathing) showed that they also have significantly different means (p<0.007). The results of this study suggest that nocturnal PVCs appear to mediate quantifiably different disruptions in the heart sinus depending on whether they occur during normal breathing or during apneic events.
Museum Guidance in Sign Language: the SignGuide project

We present an overview of the SignGuide project. Its main goal is to develop a prototype interactive museum guide system for deaf visitors using mobile devices that will be able to receive visitors’ questions in their native (sign language) with regard to the exhibits and to provide additional content also in sign language using an avatar or video, utilizing techniques from the field of computer vision and machine learning. The paper presents the basic ideas and technologies involved as well as some preliminary results.
Performance Comparison of E-Textile Electrode Properties in a Capacitive Proximity Sensing Setting

New sensing capabilities are rendered possible by using materials with new capabilities. Such materials as e-textiles are especially well suited to be integrated into the sensing technology embedding materials. Thus, e-textiles are predetermined to be used while creating flexible Smart Environment applications. As there are many manufacturing possibilities for the electrode-material integration, the creation of these sensing and interactive surfaces has not been analysed in a structured way, with regards to the capacitive proximity sensing performance. In this paper we contribute a performance evaluation in relation to electrode material, size, filling degree, stitching type, shapes, stretching, and support materials. This structured evaluation and the resulting findings support application developers in choosing the best suited electrode design for their capacitive proximity sensing application.
Interpretation of net promoter score attributes using explainable AI

Net promoter score (NPS) is a market research metric that measures customer’s satisfaction and its analysis is combined with various parameters/drivers. The paper addresses a core problem in customer experience analytics which is related with the deeper understanding of the drivers of indices in NPS and defines the key drivers that are of utmost importance in describing the customer’s experience. To this end, state of the art Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) techniques are applied so as to reveal the role of certain customer experience features and support companies in their decision making process.
Infrastructuring ecological sustainability through multi-scalar speculations

This paper responds to the challenges faced by grassroots sustainability communities in addressing ecological issues, through local action. Now more than ever, designers must fully engage with the messy side of these collaborative practices as we strive to support and sustain socio-political actions to foster more sustainable ecological futures connected to wider landscapes of socio-political change. We report on a community food growing project, as an example of sustainability research within Participatory Design demonstrating the complexity of such engagements when working through relationships across local and global concerns. We focus on infrastructuring place-based actions of the community, connecting these to the broader socio-political and economic landscapes. We contribute a multi-scalar perspective to speculative participatory workshops to connect everyday ecological food practices and imagined futures to socio-political realities across micro, meso, and macro scales. The workshops surfaced how socio-material complexities shape imaginations for sustainability and relational civic agency for situated change.