Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Momordica charantia Exosome-Like Nanoparticles Exert Neuroprotective Effects Against Ischemic Brain Injury via Inhibiting Matrix Metalloproteinase 9 and Activating the AKT/GSK3β Signaling Pathway

Plant exosome-like nanoparticles (ELNs) have shown great potential in treating tumor and inflammatory diseases, but the neuroprotective effect of plant ELNs remains unknown. In the present study, we isolated and characterized novel ELNs from Momordica charantia (MC) and investigated their neuroprotective effects against cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury. In the present study, MC-ELNs were isolated by ultracentrifugation and characterized. Male Sprague–Dawley rats were subjected to middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) and MC-ELN injection intravenously. The integrity of the blood–brain barrier (BBB) was examined by Evans blue staining and with the expression of matrix metalloproteinase 9 (MMP-9), claudin-5, and ZO-1. Neuronal apoptosis was evaluated by TUNEL and the expression of apoptotic proteins including Bcl2, Bax, and cleaved caspase 3. The major discoveries include: 1) Dil-labeled MC-ELNs were identified in the infarct area; 2) MC-ELN treatment significantly ameliorated BBB disruption, decreased infarct sizes, and reduced neurological deficit scores; 3) MC-ELN treatment obviously downregulated the expression of MMP-9 and upregulated the expression of ZO-1 and claudin-5. Small RNA-sequencing revealed that MC-ELN-derived miRNA5266 reduced MMP-9 expression. Furthermore, MC-ELN treatment significantly upregulated the AKT/GSK3β signaling pathway and attenuated neuronal apoptosis in HT22 cells. Taken together, these findings indicate that MC-ELNs attenuate ischemia-reperfusion–induced damage to the BBB and inhibit neuronal apoptosis probably via the upregulation of the AKT/GSK3β signaling pathway.
Guideline for the Treatment of Leishmaniasis in the Americas. Second Edition

Leishmaniasis is a neglected infectious disease of great importance in the Region of the Americas because of its prevalence, wide geographical distribution, morbidity and mortality. Several species of Leishmania can cause disease, and the resulting presentations differ in their clinical manifestations, diagnostic signs, severity, and treatment responses. The three main forms of leishmaniasis disease are: cutaneous, mucosal or visceral, of which cutaneous leishmaniasis is the most common. Visceral leishmaniasis (caused by L. infantum) is the most severe form and can cause death in up to 90% of untreated people. In 2013, PAHO, with the support of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, developed recommendations for the treatment of leishmaniasis in the Americas using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) methodology. Since that time, new evidence has accumulated necessitating a revision of these recommendations. This publication, the second edition of the treatment guidelines for the Americas, has been put together with the leadership of PAHO’s Regional Program for Leishmaniasis with the support of the World Health Organization. It presents updated therapeutic recommendations for all three major forms of leishmaniasis disease, detailing the schemes and criteria for indication of treatment in the regional context. There are several notable changes from the first edition. For cutaneous disease, ketoconazole has been removed from the list of treatment options. Evidence for thermotherapy and pentamidine isethionate has been upgraded to “conditional” from “weak” in the previous edition. The number of Leishmania species for which there is strong evidence of the effectiveness of miltefosine has increased from two to four. And the evidence for intralesional antimonials in this disease form is now strong, whereas previously it was considered weak. The evidence for treatments for mucosal leishmaniasis – which is now considered separately to cutaneous disease – has become stronger since the first analysis, with the recommendation for use of pentavalent antimonials with or without oral pentoxifylline now strong. For visceral disease, the evidence has moved in the other direction. Whereas in the first edition, the evidence was considered strong for pentavalent antimonials, amphotericina B deoxycholate, it is now conditional. For miltefosine, there is now strong evidence against its useage. Further changes include the division of recommendations by adult and pediatric populations and the addition of new specific recommendations for immunocompromised patients that were not available in the first edition, including a strong recommendation against the use of pentavalent antimonials.
DPPNet: An Efficient and Robust Deep Learning Network for Land Cover Segmentation From High-Resolution Satellite Images

Visual understanding of land cover is an important task in information extraction from high-resolution satellite images, an operation which is often involved in remote sensing applications. Multi-class semantic segmentation of high-resolution satellite images turned out to be an important research topic because of its wide range of real-life applications. Although scientific literature reports several deep learning methods that can provide good results in segmenting remotely sensed images, these are generally computationally expensive. There still exists an open challenge towards developing a robust deep learning model capable of improving performances while requiring less computational complexity. In this article, we propose a new model termed DPPNet (Depth-wise Pyramid Pooling Network), which uses the newly designed Depth-wise Pyramid Pooling (DPP) block and a dense block with multi-dilated depth-wise residual connections. This proposed DPPNet model is evaluated and compared with the benchmark semantic segmentation models on the Land-cover and WHDLD high-resolution Space-borne Sensor (HRS) datasets. The proposed model provides DC, IoU, OA, Ka scores of (88.81%, 78.29%), (76.35%, 60.92%), (87.15%, 81.02%), (77.86%, 72.73%) on the Land-cover and WHDLD HRS datasets respectively. Results show that the proposed DPPNet model provides better performances, in both quantitative and qualitative terms, on these standard benchmark datasets than current state-of-art methods.
Sex Disparities in Outcome of Patients with Alcohol-Related Liver Cirrhosis within the Eurotransplant Network—A Competing Risk Analysis

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is one of the most important risk factors for the development of alcohol-related liver cirrhosis (ALC). Importantly, psychiatrists are an integral part of the interdisciplinary care for patients with AUD and ALC. The aim of the current study was to investigate whether sex influences the outcome within this group of patients. For this purpose, data of all registrations for liver transplantations due to ALC within the Eurotransplant region from 2010 to 2019 were analyzed for sex disparities using competing risk models and in-between group comparisons. Relevant sex differences in registration numbers (24.8% female) and investigated outcomes were revealed. Risk ratios for a positive outcome, i.e., transplantation (0.74), and those of adverse outcomes, i.e., removal from waiting list (1.44) and death on waiting list (1.10), indicated a relative disadvantage for female patients with ALC. Further, women listed for liver transplantations were significantly younger than their male counterparts. Notably, sex disparities found in registration and outcome parameters were independent of differences found in the prevalence of AUD and liver transplantations. Further research is necessary to identify the underlying mechanisms and establish strategies to ensure equity and utility in liver transplantations due to ALC.
OsMLP423 Is a Positive Regulator of Tolerance to Drought and Salt Stresses in Rice

Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is one of the main food crops for human survival, and its yield is often restricted by abiotic stresses. Drought and soil salinity are among the most damaging abiotic stresses affecting today’s agriculture. Given the importance of abscisic acid (ABA) in plant growth and abiotic stress responses, it is very important to identify new genes involved in ABA signal transduction. We screened a drought-inducing gene containing about 158 amino acid residues from the transcriptome library of rice exposed to drought treatment, and we found ABA-related cis-acting elements and multiple drought-stress-related cis-acting elements in its promoter sequence. The results of real-time PCR showed that OsMLP423 was strongly induced by drought and salt stresses. The physiological and biochemical phenotype analysis of transgenic plants confirmed that overexpression of OsMLP423 enhanced the tolerance to drought and salt stresses in rice. The expression of OsMLP423-GFP fusion protein indicated that OsMLP423 was located in both the cell membrane system and nucleus. Compared with the wild type, the overexpressed OsMLP423 showed enhanced sensitivity to ABA. Physiological analyses showed that the overexpression of OsMLP423 may regulate the water loss efficiency and ABA-responsive gene expression of rice plants under drought and salt stresses, and it reduces membrane damage and the accumulation of reactive oxygen species. These results indicate that OsMLP423 is a positive regulator of drought and salinity tolerance in rice, governing the tolerance of rice to abiotic stresses through an ABA-dependent pathway. Therefore, this study provides a new insight into the physiological and molecular mechanisms of OsMLP423-mediated ABA signal transduction participating in drought and salt stresses.
Quantum Non-Gravity

King’s College London, Department of Physics, Strand, London WC2R 2LS, UK(Dated: 24 February 2010)Observational indications combined with analyses of analogue and emergent gravity in condensedmatter systems support the possibility that there might be two distinct energy scales related toquantum gravity: the scale that sets the onset of quantum gravitational e ects E
MUCOADHESIVE MICROSPHERES: A PROMISING APPROACH FOR ORAL DRUG DELIVERY

Mucoadhesive microspheres are one of the most promising novel techniques for drug delivery. Mucoadhesive systems offer a sustained drug release method, thus enhancing drug absorption in a site-speciﬁc manner. Microspheres have very small sizes and provide efﬁcient carrier capacities. Mucoadhesive systems therefore play a vital role in drug delivery systems. Mucoadhesive microspheres interact with mucous of gastrointestinal tract (GIT) and are considered to be localized or trapped at the adhesive site by retaining a dosage form at the site of action, or systemic delivery by retaining a formulation in intimate contact with the absorption site which may result in prolonged gastric residence time as well as improvement in intimacy of contact with underlying absorptive membrane to achieve better therapeutic performance of drugs. Mucoadhesion is a two-step procedure, and its mechanism can be explained by combining theories of wetting, mechanical interlocking, electronic transfer, adsorption, fracture, and diffusion interpenetration, as deemed suitable. Mucoadhesive microspheres offer added advantages of reliability, safety, speciﬁcity, prolonged action, delayed release, and enhanced activity. These systems can be prepared by solvent evaporation, ionotropic gelation, emulsion solvent diffusion, spray drying, and solvent removal. The resulting microspheres are characterized using a number of parameters using in vivo and in vitro techniques. This review article gives an overview of mucoadhesive microspheres, preparation methods, characterization, applications, and recent developments.
Fusion Proteins CLD and CLDmut Demonstrate Potent and Broad Neutralizing Activity against HIV-1

HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein (Env) interacts with cellular receptors and mediates virus entry into target cells. Blocking Env-receptor interactions represents an effective interventional strategy for developing HIV-1 entry inhibitors. We previously designed a panel of CD4-linker-DC-SIGN (CLD) constructs by fusing the extracellular CD4 and DC-SIGN domains with various linkers. Such CLDs produced by the prokaryotic system efficiently inhibited HIV-1 infection and dissemination in vitro and ex vivo. In this study, following the construction and identification of the most promising candidate with a linker of 8 Gly4Ser repeats (named CLD), we further designed an improved form (named CLDmut) by back mutating Cys to Ser at amino acid 60 of CD4. Both CLD and CLDmut were produced in mammalian (293F) cells for better protein translation and modification. The anti-HIV-1 activity of CLD and CLDmut was assessed against the infection of a range of HIV-1 isolates, including transmitted and founder (T/F) viruses. While both CLD and CLDmut efficiently neutralized the tested HIV-1 isolates, CLDmut demonstrated much higher neutralizing activity than CLD, with an IC50 up to one log lower. The neutralizing activity of CLDmut was close to or more potent than those of the highly effective HIV-1 broadly neutralizing antibodies (bNAbs) reported to date. Findings in this study indicate that mammalian cell-expressed CLDmut may have the potential to be used as prophylaxis or/and therapeutics against HIV-1 infection.
High-Efficiency Design and Control of Zeta Inverter for Single-Phase Grid-Connected Applications

The conventional zeta inverter has been used for single-phase grid-connected applications. However, it has high switching losses to operate at high switching frequency in the continuous conduction mode (CCM). To address this drawback, this paper suggests a high-efficiency zeta inverter using active clamp and synchronous rectification techniques. The proposed inverter utilizes the active clamp circuit for reducing switching losses. The non-complementary switching scheme is adopted for not only clamping the switch voltage stresses, but also alleviating the circulating energy. In addition, the synchronous rectification is implemented for reducing the body diode conduction of power switches. By using the silicon carbide (SiC) metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs), the switching performance of the proposed inverter is improved. Its operation principle and control strategy are presented. A 220-W prototype has been designed and tested to evaluate the performance of the proposed inverter.
FIR, IIR and Wavelet Algorithms for the Rigorous Filtering of GOCE SGG Data to the GOCE MBW

Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) data are strongly affected by noise and long-wavelength errors outside the satellite measurement bandwidth (MBW). One of the main goals in utilizing GOCE data for gravity field modeling is the application of filtering techniques that can remove gross errors and reduce low-frequency errors and high-frequency noise while preserving the original signal. This paper aims to present and analyze three filtering strategies used to de-noise the GOCE Level 2 data from long-wavelength correlated errors and noise. These strategies are Finite Impulse Response (FIR), Infinite Impulse Response (IIR), and Wavelet Multi-resolution Analysis (WL), which have been applied to GOCE residual second order derivatives of the gravity potential. Several experiments were performed for each filtering scheme in order to identify the ideal filtering parameters. The outcomes indicate that all the suggested filtering strategies proved to be effective in removing low-frequency errors while preserving the signals in the GOCE MBW, with FIR filtering providing the overall best results.
Jujuboside A Ameliorates Myocardial Apoptosis and Inflammation in Rats with Coronary Heart Disease by Inhibiting PPAR-α Signaling Pathway

Background Coronary heart disease (CHD) is a chronic disease caused by atherosclerosis (AS), which can cause myocardial ischemia, hypoxia, or necrosis, seriously threatening human health. There is an urgent need for effective treatments and drugs to reduce the various risk factors for coronary heart disease and relieve symptoms of angina pectoris and myocardial infarction in patients. Jujuboside A (JuA) is a triterpenoid saponin extracted from jujube seeds, which has various biological activities such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antiapoptotic, and neuroprotective effects. We study the function of JuA in myocardial injury, dyslipidemia, and inflammation in the CHD rat model, to explore its potential mechanism of improving CHD. Methods A rat model of CHD was established by feeding a high-fat diet. The rats were randomly divided into 5 groups (n = 6): control group, CHD group, JuA 25 mg/kg group, JuA 50 mg/kg group, and JuA 75 mg/kg group. Echocardiography was used to detect the cardiac function parameters of rats in each group, and then, hematoxylin and eosin staining was used to assess the histopathological injury in myocardial tissues. Levels of blood lipids, myocardial injury indexes, and inflammatory factors of rats in each group were measured by biochemical tests and enzyme linked immunosorbent assay, and the levels of Bax, Bcl-2, c-caspase-3, PPAR-α, p65, p-p65, IκBα, and p-IκBα protein expression in myocardial tissues were detected by western blot. Results Compared with the CHD group, JuA therapy significantly improved injury in myocardial tissue and endothelial tissue. It also strengthened cardiac function, while decreasing total cholesterol, triacylglycerol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels in the serum and increasing high-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels. In addition, JuA also restrained cardiomyocytes apoptosis and inhibited the inflammatory reaction by reducing TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-6 expression in myocardial tissues. Furthermore, administration of JuA inhibited the activation of PPAR-α pathway by preventing the phosphorylation of p65 and IκBα in myocardial tissues of CHD rats. Conclusion JuA may improve cardiac function, alleviate myocardial and endothelial injury, and also ameliorate dyslipidemia and inflammatory reaction in rats with CHD, where JuA probably plays a protective role by inhibiting the activation of PPAR-α pathway.
Fiction and Facts about BCG Imparting Trained Immunity against COVID-19

The Bacille Calmette-Guérin or BCG vaccine, the only vaccine available against Mycobacterium tuberculosis can induce a marked Th1 polarization of T-cells, characterized by the antigen-specific secretion of IFN-γ and enhanced antiviral response. A number of studies have supported the concept of protection by non-specific boosting of immunity by BCG and other microbes. BCG is a well-known example of a trained immunity inducer since it imparts ‘non-specific heterologous’ immunity against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus responsible for the recent pandemic. SARS-CoV-2 continues to inflict an unabated surge in morbidity and mortality around the world. There is an urgent need to devise and develop alternate strategies to bolster host immunity against the coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19) and its continuously emerging variants. Several vaccines have been developed recently against COVID-19, but the data on their protective efficacy remains doubtful. Therefore, urgent strategies are required to enhance system immunity to adequately defend against newly emerging infections. The concept of trained immunity may play a cardinal role in protection against COVID-19. The ability of trained immunity-based vaccines is to promote heterologous immune responses beyond their specific antigens, which may notably help in defending against an emergency situation such as COVID-19 when the protective ability of vaccines is suspicious. A growing body of evidence points towards the beneficial non-specific boosting of immune responses by BCG or other microbes, which may protect against COVID-19. Clinical trials are underway to consider the efficacy of BCG vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 on healthcare workers and the elderly population. In this review, we will discuss the role of BCG in eliciting trained immunity and the possible limitations and challenges in controlling COVID-19 and future pandemics.
Non-linear Associations Between Visceral Adiposity Index and Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Diseases: Results From the NHANES (1999–2018)

Objective To investigate associations between visceral adiposity index (VAI) and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases (CCDs) in the American population from 1999 to 2018. Methods Data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1998–2018) were analyzed in this study. Specifically, VAI scores were calculated using sex-specific equations that incorporate body mass index, waist circumference (WC), high-density lipoprotein (HDL), triglycerides (TG), and cholesterol. Weighted logistic regression analysis was conducted to assess the relationship between VAI tertile and increased risk of CCDs. Restricted cubic splines were used to evaluate the non-linear relationship between VAI and CCDs, such as heart failure, angina, heart attack, stroke, hypertension, and coronary heart disease. Sensitivity analysis was conducted, using VAI quartiles as independent variables. Results A total of 22,622 subjects aged over 20 years were included. In the fully adjusted model after controlling for covariates, the third VAI tertile was more strongly associated with CCDs than the first VAI tertile, with odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (95% CI) values for angina of 2.86, 1.68–4.85; heart attack, 1.75, 1.14–2.69; stroke, 2.01, 1.23–3.26; hypertension, 2.28, 1.86–2.78; and coronary heart disease, 1.78, 1.32–2.41; but there was no significant association with heart failure (p > 0.05). Restricted cubic splines revealed parabolic relationships between VAI score and angina (p for non-linear = 0.03), coronary heart disease (p for non-linear = 0.01), and hypertension (p for non-linear < 0.001). Sensitivity analysis indicated that the fourth VAI quartile was more strongly associated with an increased risk of angina (OR = 2.92, 95% CI, 1.49–5.69), hypertension (OR = 2.37, 95% CI, 1.90–2.97), heart attack (OR = 1.77, 95% CI, 1.09–2.88), and coronary heart disease (OR = 1.89, 95% CI, 1.24–2.86) than the first VAI quartile. VAI had superior predictive power for prevalent CCDs than other independent indicators (p < 0.05). Conclusion Visceral adiposity index score is positively correlated with angina, heart attack, stroke, hypertension, and coronary heart disease, but not heart failure, and the relationships between VAI score and angina, hypertension, and coronary heart disease are non-linear.
An Approach to the Automatic Construction of a Road Accident Scheme Using UAV and Deep Learning Methods

Recreating a road traffic accident scheme is a task of current importance. There are several main problems when drawing up a plan of accident: a long-term collection of all information about an accident, inaccuracies, and errors during manual data fixation. All these disadvantages affect further decision-making during a detailed analysis of an accident. The purpose of this work is to automate the entire process of operational reconstruction of an accident site to ensure high accuracy of measuring the distances of the relative location of objects on the sites. First the operator marks the area of a road accident and the UAV scans and collects data on this area. We constructed a three-dimensional scene of an accident. Then, on the three-dimensional scene, objects of interest are segmented using a deep learning model SWideRNet with Axial Attention. Based on the marked-up data and image Transformation method, a two-dimensional road accident scheme is constructed. The scheme contains the relative location of segmented objects between which the distance is calculated. We used the Intersection over Union (IoU) metric to assess the accuracy of the segmentation of the reconstructed objects. We used the Mean Absolute Error to evaluate the accuracy of automatic distance measurement. The obtained distance error values are small (0.142 ± 0.023 m), with relatively high results for the reconstructed objects’ segmentation (IoU = 0.771 in average). Therefore, it makes it possible to judge the effectiveness of the proposed approach.