bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Creation of a National, At‐home Model for Ashkenazi Jewish Carrier Screening
Authors: Grinzaid Karen Arnovitz , Page Patricia Zartman , Denton Jessica Johnson , Ginsberg Jessica 
Published: December 2014

AbstractEthnicity‐based carrier screening for the Ashkenazi Jewish population has been available and encouraged by advocacy and community groups since the early 1970's. Both the American College of Medical Genetics and the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommend carrier screening for this population (Obstetrics and Gynecology, 114(4), 950‐953, 2009; Genetics in Medicine, 10(1), 55‐56, 2008). While many physicians inquire about ethnic background and offer appropriate carrier screening, studies show that a gap remains in implementing recommendations (Genetic testing and molecular biomarkers, 2011). In addition, education and outreach efforts targeting Jewish communities have had limited success in reaching this at‐risk population. Despite efforts by the medical and Jewish communities, many Jews of reproductive age are not aware of screening, and remain at risk for having children with preventable diseases. Reaching this population, preferably pre‐conception, and facilitating access to screening is critically important. To address this need, genetic counselors at Emory University developed JScreen, a national Jewish genetic disease screening program. The program includes a national marketing and PR campaign, online education, at‐home saliva‐based screening, post‐test genetic counseling via telephone or secure video conferencing, and referrals for face‐to‐face genetic counseling as needed. Our goals are to create a successful education and screening program for this population and to develop a model that could potentially be used for other at‐risk populations.
Geographical pattern in the response of the arctic‐alpine Silene suecica (Cariophyllaceae) to the interaction between water availability and photoperiod
Authors: Abeli Thomas , Orsenigo Simone , Guzzon Filippo , Faè Matteo , Balestrazzi Alma , Carlsson‐Granér Ulla , Müller Jonas V. , Mondoni Andrea 
Published: December 2014

AbstractWe hypothesized a geographical pattern of the plant performance (seedling development, biomass production, relative water content and chlorophyll content) as a result of response to the interaction between photoperiod and water availability in populations of the arctic‐alpine Silene suecica from different latitudes, thus experiencing different photoperiods during the growing season. Particularly, we expected a lower drought sensitivity in northern compared to southern populations as a consequence of harsher conditions experienced by the northern populations in terms of water availability. The experiment was carried out under common garden conditions, manipulating the water availability (wet and dry) and the photoperiod (21 and 16 h). We found an interaction between photoperiod and water availability on plant height, leaves, growth, biomass and total chlorophyll. However, the photoperiod neither counteracted nor intensified the effect of drought. Plants exposed to drought compensated for decreasing water availability by reducing their shoot growth. Changes in the chlorophyll content and chlorophyll a/b ratio were observed. Northern populations showed a higher basal growth performance and a greater response to the changed water regime (from wet to dry) than the southern populations. Southern populations showed a reduced ability to respond to drought, but their low basal performance may be advantageous under low water availability, avoiding water loss. In contrast, northern populations showed a stronger plastic response that limited the negative effects of reduced water availability. This study highlights the possibility that the plant response to environmental constraints (specifically water availability) may follow a geographical pattern.
Immediate and Durable Clinical Improvement in the Non-Operated Hand after Contralateral Surgery for Patients with Bilateral Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
Authors: Unno F. , Lucchina S. , Bosson D. , Fusetti C. 
Published: December 2014

Background Little is known about clinical improvement in the non-operated hand after unilateral surgery for patients who present with bilateral carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS). In this prospective study of patients with bilateral CTS, we evaluated the clinical effects on the non-operated hand following unilateral contralateral carpal tunnel surgical release. Material and Methods During a consecutive period of 22 months, 69 patients with bilateral CTS underwent unilateral open carpal tunnel release. Bilateral subjective and objective evaluations were performed pre-operatively, at days 2, 15 and 180 after surgery. Subjective evaluations, analysed with Student t test, included the Boston-Levine symptom severity score and a visual analogue scale including pain, nocturnal symptoms and numbness. A telephone survey was conducted 12 months after surgery. Results The Boston-Levine severity score of the contralateral non-operated hand decreased from 2.70 pre-operatively to 1.70 at 2 days ( p<0.001). The visual analogue pain score decreased at 2 days for 61 patients (88 %), whereas the nocturnal symptoms decreased or disappeared in 63 cases (91 %) and the paresthesia in 52 cases (75 %) ( ps<0.001). These beneficial effects were stable in time with no statistically significant change at 180 days. Overall, 58 patients (84 %) observed a total resolution or a significant improvement in their symptoms at 6 months. At 12 months, 100 % of patients responded to a telephone survey. Fifty one of them (74 %) reported minimal or no symptoms on the non-operated hand. Linear regression (analysis of variance [ANOVA]) showed that gender, age, professional status, duration of preoperative symptoms and severity of electrophysiological disturbances were not predictive of post-operative evolution in the non-operated hand after unilateral surgery for CTS.
Using Noninvasive Prenatal Testing for Aneuploidies in a Developing Country: Lessons Learnt
Authors: Dash Pratima , Puri Ratna D. , Kotecha Udhaya , Bijarnia Sunita , Lall Meena , Verma Ishwar C. 
Published: December 2014

AbstractThe objective of the present study was to analyze the utility of noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) for aneuploidies in a developing country like India. NIPT was offered to 500 pregnant women, after review of data of the ongoing pregnancy. Pre-test counseling included the different methodologies of testing, their benefits, limitations, turnaround time and interpretation of the result and was offered to all. Different vendors were used for the test. The results were explained in a post-test counseling session. The indications of NIPT were positive second (36.6 %) or first (22 %) trimester screen, advanced maternal age with or without positive biochemical screen (24.6 %), ultrasound soft markers (10.8 %), previous history of Down syndrome (4.6 %) and anxious couple (0.1 %). No aneuploidy was detected in 484 samples. In 1 case, no result was available. Fifteen (3 %) cases showed positive results. These included 8 cases of trisomy 21, 3 cases of trisomy 18, 3 cases of monosomy X, and 1 case of triploidy. Confirmatory testing revealed 6 cases (40 %) to be false positive—1 case of trisomy 21, 1 case of trisomy 18, 3 cases of monosomy X, and 1 case of triploidy. Of 484 cases, 230 have delivered healthy neonates, while the rest have yet to deliver. Four cases had to discontinue pregnancy due to complications in later pregnancy but unrelated to the NIPT results. Noninvasive prenatal test qualifies as an ‘advanced’ screening test, and requires invasive diagnostic tests for confirmation of the positive results. The pre- and post-test counseling is essential to appropriately explain the limitations, benefits, and the results to the couple. Recommendations are made for the appropriate deployment of this new technology in developing countries.
Absolute and convective instabilities in counter-current gas–liquid film flows
Authors: Vellingiri Rajagopal , Tseluiko Dmitri , Kalliadasis Serafim 
Published: December 2014

AbstractWe consider a thin liquid film flowing down an inclined plate in the presence of a counter-current turbulent gas. By making appropriate assumptions, Tseluiko & Kalliadasis (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 673, 2011, pp. 19–59) developed low-dimensional non-local models for the liquid problem, namely a long-wave (LW) model and a weighted integral-boundary-layer (WIBL) model, which incorporate the effect of the turbulent gas. By utilising these models, along with the Orr–Sommerfeld problem formulated using the full governing equations for the liquid phase and associated boundary conditions, we explore the linear stability of the gas–liquid system. In addition, we devise a generalised methodology to investigate absolute and convective instabilities in the non-local equations describing the gas–liquid flow. We observe that at low gas flow rates, the system is convectively unstable with the localised disturbances being convected downwards. As the gas flow rate is increased, the instability becomes absolute and localised disturbances spread across the whole domain. As the gas flow rate is further increased, the system again becomes convectively unstable with the localised disturbances propagating upwards. We find that the upper limit of the absolute instability region is close to the ‘flooding’ point associated with the appearance of large-amplitude standing waves, as obtained in Tseluiko & Kalliadasis (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 673, 2011, pp. 19–59), and our analysis can therefore be used to predict the onset of flooding. We also find that an increase in the angle of inclination of the channel requires an increased gas flow rate for the onset of absolute instability. We generally find good agreement between the results obtained using the full equations and the reduced models. Moreover, we find that the WIBL model generally provides better agreement with the results for the full equations than the LW model. Such an analysis is important for an understanding of the ranges of validity of the reduced model equations. In addition, a comparison of our theoretical predictions with the experiments of Zapke & Kröger (Intl J. Multiphase Flow, vol. 26, 2000, pp. 1439–1455) shows a fairly good agreement. We supplement our stability analysis with time-dependent computations of the linearised WIBL model. To provide some insight into the mechanisms of instability, we perform an energy budget analysis.
Bolshevik Disease and Stalinist Terror: On the Historical Casuistry of Artificial Pneumothorax
Authors: Polianski Igor J. 
Published: December 2014

AbstractFrom its initial development by Carlo Forlanini at the end of the nineteenth century until the advent of antibiotics in the 1940s, artificial pneumothorax was one of the most widely used treatments for pulmonary tuberculosis. However, there were strongly held reservations about this therapy because of its risks and side effects. In the Soviet Union under Stalin, such uncertainties became instruments of political denunciation. The leading Soviet pulmonary physician Volf S. Kholtsman (1886–1941) was alleged to have used the so-called ‘aristocratic therapy’ of artificial pneumothorax to kill prominent Bolsheviks. Drawing on documents from Stalin’s personal Secretariat, this historical study of the pneumothorax scandal contributes to the cultural history of tuberculosis, showing how it was instrumentalised for political purposes.
Influence of small ruminant lentivirus infection on cheese yield in goats
Authors: Nowicka Dorota , Czopowicz Michał , Bagnicka Emilia , Rzewuska Magdalena , Strzałkowska Nina , Kaba Jarosław 
Published: December 2014

Three-year cohort study was carried out to investigate the influence of small ruminant lentivirus (SRLV) infection on cheese yield in goats. For this purpose records of milk yield, milk composition and cheese yield were collected in a dairy goat herd. Cheese yield was recorded as the amount of fresh cheese obtained from 1 kg milk. All goats were serologically tested for SRLV infection twice a year. The analysis included 247 records in total (71 for seropositive and 176 from seronegative individuals) and was carried out with the use of the four-level hierarchical linear model (α = 0·05). SRLV infection proved to be a statistically significant independent factor reducing cheese yield (P = 0·013) – when other covariates were held constant cheese yield was reduced by 4·6 g per each 1 kg milk in an infected goat compared with an uninfected goat. Other statistically significant covariates positively associated with cheese yield were protein contents, fat contents and the 3rd stage of lactation (P < 0·001 for all).
Immunological consequences of stress-related proteins – cytosolic tryparedoxin peroxidase and chaperonin TCP20 – identified in splenic amastigotes ofLeishmania donovanias Th1 stimulatory, in experimental visceral leishmaniasis
Authors: JAISWAL ANIL KUMAR , KHARE PRASHANT , JOSHI SUMIT , RAWAT KEERTI , YADAV NARENDRA , SUNDAR SHYAM , DUBE ANURADHA 
Published: December 2014

SUMMARYIn earlier studies, proteomic characterization of splenic amastigote fractions from clinical isolates ofLeishmania donovani, exhibiting significant cellular responses in curedLeishmaniasubjects, led to the identification of cytosolic tryparedoxin peroxidase (LdcTryP) and chaperonin-TCP20 (LdTCP20) as Th1-stimulatory proteins. Both the proteins, particularly LdTCP20 for the first time, were successfully cloned, overexpressed, purified and were found to be localized in the cytosol of purified splenic amastigotes. When evaluated against lymphocytes of curedLeishmania-infected hamsters, the purified recombinant proteins (rLdcTryP and rLdTCP20) induced their proliferations as well as nitric oxide production. Similarly, these proteins also generated Th1-type cytokines (IFN-γ/IL-12) from stimulated PBMCs of cured/endemicLeishmaniapatients. Further, vaccination with rLdcTryP elicited noticeable delayed-type hypersensitivity response and offered considerably good prophylactic efficacy (~78% inhibition) againstL. donovanichallenge in hamsters, which was well supported by the increased mRNA expression of Th1 and Th2 cytokines. However, animals vaccinated with rLdTCP20 exhibited comparatively lesser prophylactic efficacy (~55%) with inferior immunological response. The results indicate the potentiality of rLdcTryP protein, between the two, as a suitable anti-leishmanial vaccine. Since, rLdTCP20 is also an important target, for optimization, further attempts towards determination of immunodominant regions for designing fusion peptides may be taken up.
The sorrow of empire: Rituals of legitimation and the performative contradictions of liberalism
Authors: BENTLEY TOM 
Published: December 2014

AbstractUnexpectedly, several prominent European countries have begun to issue official state apologies to their former colonies. What does this proliferation of official colonial sorrow from such countries as Germany, Belgium, Italy, and Britain reveal about the normative tenets of the contemporary international order? This article analyses colonial apologies as crucial symbolic and ritualistic sites where state elites project liberal credentials and affirm liberal normative tenets in the international system. Specifically, the article demonstrates how these apologies for colonial atrocity appear to reinforce liberal conceptions of human rights, the renunciation of violence, cordial relations with formerly colonised states, and commitments to state accountability and transparency. Yet, textual analysis of several state apologies reveals that these performatives simultaneously contradict each of these liberal tenets. It finds that – even in apology – political elites reflect ambivalence about certain human rights violations; persist in glorifying or sanitising the violent colonial past; recycle paternalistic and hierarchical discourses and policies towards the apology's recipients; and offer contradictory notions of the state's historical responsibility. In exposing these performative contradictions of empirical sorrow, the article seeks to expand the discipline's understandings of, and dilemmas within, a key performative and ritualistic legitimation strategy whereby liberalism reproduces itself in the international system.
The political international society: Change in primary and secondary institutions
Authors: SPANDLER KILIAN 
Published: December 2014

AbstractThis article intends to contribute to the theorising of institutional change. Specifically, it asks how dynamics in the ‘deep structure’ of international society correspond to changes in more specific institutions as embodied by regimes and international organisations. It does so by taking up the distinction of primary and secondary institutions in international society advocated by scholars of the English School. It argues that, while the differentiation offers analytical potential, the School has largely failed to study secondary institutions such as international organisations and regimes as autonomous objects of analysis, seeing them as mere materialisations of primary institutions. Engaging with the concepts of structuration and path dependence will allow scholars working in an English School framework to explore more deeply the relation between the two kinds of institutions, and as a consequence devise more elaborate theories of institutional change. Based on this argument, the article develops a theoretical model that sees primary and secondary institutions entangled in distinctive processes of constitution and institutionalisation. This model helps to establish international organisations and regimes as a crucial part of the English School agenda, and to enlighten the political mechanisms that lead to continuity and change in international institutions more broadly.
Detection ofVibrio choleraeO1 and O139 in environmental waters of rural Bangladesh: a flow-cytometry-based field trial
Authors: RIGHETTO L. , ZAMAN R. U. , MAHMUD Z. H. , BERTUZZO E. , MARI L. , CASAGRANDI R. , GATTO M. , ISLAM S. , RINALDO A. 
Published: December 2014

SUMMARYPresence ofVibrio choleraeserogroups O1 and O139 in the waters of the rural area of Matlab, Bangladesh, was investigated with quantitative measurements performed with a portable flow cytometer. The relevance of this work relates to the testing of a field-adapted measurement protocol that might prove useful for cholera epidemic surveillance and for validation of mathematical models. Water samples were collected from different water bodies that constitute the hydrological system of the region, a well-known endemic area for cholera. Water was retrieved from ponds, river waters, and irrigation canals during an inter-epidemic time period. Each sample was filtered and analysed with a flow cytometer for a fast determination ofV. choleraecells contained in those environments. More specifically, samples were treated with O1- and O139-specific antibodies, which allowed precise flow-cytometry-based concentration measurements. Both serogroups were present in the environmental waters with a consistent dominance ofV. choleraeO1. These results extend earlier studies whereV. choleraeO1 and O139 were mostly detected during times of cholera epidemics using standard culturing techniques. Furthermore, our results confirm that an important fraction of the ponds’ host populations ofV. choleraeare able to self-sustain even when cholera cases are scarce. Those contaminated ponds may constitute a natural reservoir for cholera endemicity in the Matlab region. Correlations ofV. choleraeconcentrations with environmental factors and the spatial distribution ofV. choleraepopulations are also discussed.
Mir-660 is downregulated in lung cancer patients and its replacement inhibits lung tumorigenesis by targeting MDM2-p53 interaction
Authors: Fortunato O , Boeri M , Moro M , Verri C , Mensah M , Conte D , Caleca L , Roz L , Pastorino U , Sozzi G 
Published: December 2014

AbstractLung cancer represents the leading cause of cancer-related death in developed countries. Despite the advances in diagnostic and therapeutic techniques, the 5-year survival rate remains low. The research for novel therapies directed to biological targets has modified the therapeutic approach, but the frequent engagement of resistance mechanisms and the substantial costs, limit the ability to reduce lung cancer mortality. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small noncoding RNAs with known regulatory functions in cancer initiation and progression. In this study we found that mir-660 expression is downregulated in lung tumors compared with adjacent normal tissues and in plasma samples of lung cancer patients with poor prognosis, suggesting a potential functional role of this miRNA in lung tumorigenesis. Transient and stable overexpression of mir-660 using miRNA mimics reduced migration, invasion, and proliferation properties and increased apoptosis in p53 wild-type lung cancer cells (NCI-H460, LT73, and A549). Furthermore, stable overexpression using lentiviral vectors in NCI-H460 and A549 cells inhibited tumor xenograft growth in immunodeficient mice (95 and 50% reduction compared with control, respectively), whereas the effects of mir-660 overexpression were absent in H1299, a lung cancer cell line lacking p53 locus, both in in vitro and in vivo assays. We identified and validated mouse double minute 2 (MDM2) gene, a key regulator of the expression and function of p53, as a new direct target of mir-660. In addition, mir-660 expression reduced both mRNA and protein expression of MDM2 in all cell lines and stabilized p53 protein levels resulting in an upregulation of p21WAF1/CIP1 in p53 wild-type cells. Our finding supports that mir-660 acts as a tumor suppressor miRNA and we suggest the replacement of mir-660 as a new therapeutic approach for p53 wild-type lung cancer treatment.
Ultrasound for “Lung Monitoring” of Ventilated Patients
Authors: Bouhemad Belaïd , Mongodi Silvia , Via Gabriele , Rouquette Isabelle 
Published: December 2014

Abstract
In the intensive care unit, patient lung ultrasound provides accurate information on lung morphology with diagnostic and therapeutic relevance. It enables clinicians easy, rapid, and reliable evaluation of lung aeration and its variations at the bedside.
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