bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Chondroitin sulfate-E mediates estrogen-induced osteoanabolism
Authors: Koike Toshiyasu , Mikami Tadahisa , Shida Miharu , Habuchi Osami , Kitagawa Hiroshi 
Published: March 2015

AbstractOsteoporosis is an age-related disorder of bone remodeling in which bone resorption outstrips bone matrix deposition. Although anticatabolic agents are frequently used as first-line therapies for osteoporosis, alternative anabolic strategies that can enhance anabolic, osteogenic potential are actively sought. Sex steroid hormones, particularly estrogens, are bidirectional regulators for bone homeostasis; therefore, estrogen-mediated events are important potential targets for such anabolic therapies. Here, we show that estrogen-induced, osteoanabolic effects were mediated via enhanced production of chondroitin sulfate-E (CS-E), which could act as an osteogenic stimulant in our cell-based system. Conversely, estrogen deficiency caused reduced expression of CS-E-synthesizing enzymes, including GalNAc4S-6ST and led to decreased CS-E production in cultures of bone marrow cells derived from ovariectomized mice. Moreover, Galnac4s6st-deficient mice had abnormally low bone mass that resulted from impaired osteoblast differentiation. These results indicated that strategies aimed at boosting CS-E biosynthesis are promising alternative therapies for osteoporosis.
The best nanoparticle size distribution for minimum thermal conductivity
Authors: Zhang Hang , Minnich Austin J. 
Published: March 2015

AbstractWhich sizes of nanoparticles embedded in a crystalline solid yield the lowest thermal conductivity? Nanoparticles have long been demonstrated to reduce the thermal conductivity of crystals by scattering phonons, but most previous works assumed the nanoparticles to have a single size. Here, we use optimization methods to show that the best nanoparticle size distribution to scatter the broad thermal phonon spectrum is not a similarly broad distribution but rather several discrete peaks at well-chosen nanoparticle radii. For SiGe, the best size distribution yields a thermal conductivity below that of amorphous silicon. Further, we demonstrate that a simplified distribution yields nearly the same low thermal conductivity and can be readily fabricated. Our work provides important insights into how to manipulate the full spectrum of phonons and will guide the design of more efficient thermoelectric materials.
A monomer-trimer model supports intermittent glucagon fibril growth
Authors: Košmrlj Andrej , Cordsen Pia , Kyrsting Anders , Otzen Daniel E. , Oddershede Lene B. , Jensen Mogens H. 
Published: March 2015

AbstractWe investigate in vitro fibrillation kinetics of the hormone peptide glucagon at various concentrations using confocal microscopy and determine the glucagon fibril persistence length 60μm. At all concentrations we observe that periods of individual fibril growth are interrupted by periods of stasis. The growth probability is large at high and low concentrations and is reduced for intermediate glucagon concentrations. To explain this behavior we propose a simple model, where fibrils come in two forms, one built entirely from glucagon monomers and one entirely from glucagon trimers. The opposite building blocks act as fibril growth blockers and this generic model reproduces experimental behavior well.
Toll-like receptor 5 deficiency exacerbates cardiac injury and inflammation induced by myocardial ischaemia-reperfusion in the mouse
Authors: Parapanov Roumen , Lugrin Jérôme , Rosenblatt-Velin Nathalie , Feihl François , Waeber Bernard , Milano Giuseppina , Vergely Catherine , Li Na , Pacher Pal , Liaudet Lucas 
Published: March 2015

Myocardial ischaemia-reperfusion (MIR) triggers a sterile inflammatory response important for myocardial healing, but which may also contribute to adverse ventricular remodelling. Such inflammation is initiated by molecular danger signals released by damaged myocardium, which induce innate immune responses by activating toll-like receptors (TLRs). Detrimental roles have been recently reported for TLR2, TLR3 and TLR4. The role of other TLRs is unknown. We therefore evaluated the role of TLR5, expressed at high level in the heart, in the development of myocardial damage and inflammation acutely triggered by MIR. TLR5−/− and wild-type (WT) mice were exposed to MIR (30 min ischaemia, 2 h reperfusion). We measured infarct size, markers of cardiac oxidative stress, myocardial phosphorylation state of mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinases and AKT, expression levels of chemokines and cytokines in the heart and plasma, as well as cardiac function by echography and conductance volumetry. TLR5-deficient mice had normal cardiac morphology and function under physiological conditions. After MIR, the absence of TLR5 promoted an increase in infarct size and myocardial oxidative stress. Lack of TLR5 fostered p38 phosphorylation, reduced AKT phosphorylation and markedly increased the expression of inflammatory cytokines, whereas it precipitated acute LV (left ventricle) dysfunction. Therefore, contrary to the detrimental roles of TLR2, TLR3 and TLR4 in the infarcted heart, TLR5 is important to limit myocardial damage, inflammation and functional compromise after MIR.
Hearing Thresholds, Minimum Response Levels, and Cross-Check Measures in Pediatric Audiology
Authors: Norrix Linda W. 
Published: March 2015

Purpose
Pediatric audiologists must identify hearing loss in a timely manner so that early intervention can be provided. In this article, the methods important for differentiating between a hearing threshold and minimum response level (MRL), important for an accurate diagnosis, are described.

Method
Operant conditioning procedures, used during visual reinforcement audiometry and conditioned play audiometry, are reviewed. Case examples are provided that demonstrate the importance of using evidence-based procedures, evaluating the success of such procedures, and using cross-check measures for interpreting responses as thresholds or MRLs.

Results
Behavioral-hearing thresholds can be obtained when operant conditioning procedures are successful and cross-check measures corroborate the audiometric results. When MRLs are obtained, cross-check measures are critical in determining the likelihood of hearing loss and making follow-up recommendations.

Conclusions
Early diagnosis of hearing loss is important so that intervention can be initiated within critical periods during infant and childhood learning. Accurate diagnosis depends on the audiologist, who must adhere to evidence-based procedures, use cross-check measures, and evaluate the validity of each procedure. Future research and guidelines are needed to examine decision-making processes in pediatric audiology that ensure diagnostic accuracy and timely intervention for infants and children identified with hearing loss.
Triassic–Jurassic climate in continental high-latitude Asia was dominated by obliquity-paced variations (Junggar Basin, Ürümqi, China)
Authors: Sha Jingeng , Olsen Paul E. , Pan Yanhong , Xu Daoyi , Wang Yaqiang , Zhang Xiaolin , Yao Xiaogang , Vajda Vivi 
Published: March 2015

Significance
Geological records of paleoclimate provide the only constraints on Solar System orbital solutions extending beyond the ∼50-Ma limit imposed by chaotic diffusion. Examples of such constraints are coupled high and low latitude, Triassic–Jurassic (∼198–202 Ma) sedimentary cyclicity in coal-bearing outcrops from the ∼60° N-paleolatitude Junggar Basin (Western China), and contemporaneous tropical basins. Analysis reveals climate variability dominated by obliquity-scale cyclicity in the Junggar Basin and precession-scale cyclicity in the tropics. Together, these geological records empirically constrain orbital solutions by providing joint g4 − g3 and s4 − s3 secular frequency estimates of the Earth–Mars orbital resonance. These results demonstrate the opportunity for developing a new class of solutions grounded by geological data extending hundreds of millions of years into the geologic past.
Can We Improve Farm Performance? The Determinants of Farm Technical and Environmental Efficiency
Authors: Guesmi Bouali , Serra Teresa 
Published: March 2015

AbstractThe environmental impacts of economic activities have become an important aspect in the evaluation of their overall performance. Consistently, traditional measures of technical efficiency have been extended to assess both the economic and environmental performance of firms. This study aims to use these measures to analyze the performance of a sample of Catalan arable crop farms. Specifically, we apply the methodology recently developed by Coelli et al. (2007) and Murty et al. (2012), and extend it to a consideration of the stochastic conditions under which production takes place as proposed by Chambers and Quiggin (1998 and 2000). Results suggest that efficiency ratings depend on model specification. Also, ignoring the stochastic nature of production yields downward‐biased efficiency scores. Empirical findings suggest that environmental and technical efficiency are strongly interrelated indicating that an efficient use of chemical inputs improves both environmental and technical performance of farms.
Hi-Jack: a novel computational framework for pathway-based inference of host–pathogen interactions
Authors: Kleftogiannis Dimitrios , Wong Limsoon , Archer John A.C. , Kalnis Panos 
Published: March 2015

Abstract
Motivation: Pathogens infect their host and hijack the host machinery to produce more progeny pathogens. Obligate intracellular pathogens, in particular, require resources of the host to replicate. Therefore, infections by these pathogens lead to alterations in the metabolism of the host, shifting in favor of pathogen protein production. Some computational identification of mechanisms of host–pathogen interactions have been proposed, but it seems the problem has yet to be approached from the metabolite-hijacking angle.
Results: We propose a novel computational framework, Hi-Jack, for inferring pathway-based interactions between a host and a pathogen that relies on the idea of metabolite hijacking. Hi-Jack searches metabolic network data from hosts and pathogens, and identifies candidate reactions where hijacking occurs. A novel scoring function ranks candidate hijacked reactions and identifies pathways in the host that interact with pathways in the pathogen, as well as the associated frequent hijacked metabolites. We also describe host–pathogen interaction principles that can be used in the future for subsequent studies. Our case study on Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) revealed pathways in human—e.g. carbohydrate metabolism, lipids metabolism and pathways related to amino acids metabolism—that are likely to be hijacked by the pathogen. In addition, we report interesting potential pathway interconnections between human and Mtb such as linkage of human fatty acid biosynthesis with Mtb biosynthesis of unsaturated fatty acids, or linkage of human pentose phosphate pathway with lipopolysaccharide biosynthesis in Mtb.
Availability and implementation: Datasets and codes are available at http://cloud.kaust.edu.sa/Pages/Hi-Jack.aspx
Contact: Dimitrios.Kleftogiannis@kaust.edu.sa
Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
E. T. A. Hoffmann Revisited: the Nightmare of the Romantic Singer in Berlioz's
Euphonia, ou, La ville musicale
(1844)
Authors: Effertz Julia 
Published: March 2015

Abstract

This article examines Hector Berlioz's musical novella
Euphonia, ou, La ville musicale
(1844) as a rewriting of E. T. A. Hoffmann's musical tales and, via the key figure of the woman singer, as a critical commentary on Romantic musical-literary aesthetics. Through a close reading of
Euphonia
and an analysis of its female protagonist, the singer Mina, the article discusses the undermining of the stereotypical Romantic ideal of the woman singer as a muse to the male hero by means of Berlioz's strong case for female artistic self-expression. Drawing on the ironic treatment of the Romantic singer as a male fantasy in the texts of Hoffmann, Berlioz uses Mina to expose the Romantic ideal of music as a flawed and ultimately unsustainable musical dystopia.
Adult T-Cell Leukemia/Lymphoma in a Caucasian Patient After Sexual Transmission of Human T-Cell Lymphotropic Virus Type 1
Authors: Sibon David , Cassar Olivier , Duga Isabelle , Brouzes Chantal , Ghez David , Pasquier Christophe , Sibon Claire , Desrames Alexandra , Mortreux Franck , Wattel Eric , Bazarbachi Ali , Gessain Antoine , Hermine Olivier 
Published: March 2015

Abstract
Adult T-cell leukemia/lymphoma (ATLL), a T-cell neoplasm caused by human T-cell lymphotropic virus type 1 (HTLV-1), develops in the majority of cases in individuals who were infected with HTLV-1 as young children, by their mother during prolonged breastfeeding. We report the case of a Caucasian French man, whose parents were HTLV-1-seronegative and who developed ATLL after HTLV-1 sexual transmission by a Cameroonian woman. This hypothesis was corroborated by genotyping of the patient's virus, which revealed an HTLV-1B strain, found only in Central Africa, especially in Cameroon. Thus, ATLL may develop after HTLV-1 infection during adulthood, outside breastfeeding.
Label Design Affects Medication Safety in an Operating Room Crisis: A Controlled Simulation Study
Authors: Estock Jamie L. , Murray Andrew W. , Mizah Margaret T. , Mangione Michael P. , Goode Joseph S. , Eibling David E. 
Published: March 2015

Objective
Several factors contribute to medication errors in clinical practice settings, including the design of medication labels. The objective of this study was to quantify the impact of label design on medication safety in a realistic, high-stress clinical situation.

Methods
Ninety-six anesthesia trainee participants were randomly assigned to either the redesigned or the current label condition. Participants were blinded to the study's focus on medication label design and their assigned label condition. Each participant was the sole anesthesia provider in a simulated operating room scenario involving an unexpected vascular injury. The surgeon asked the participant to administer hetastarch to the simulated patient because of hemodynamic instability. The fluid drawer of the anesthesia cart contained three 500-ml intravenous bags of hetastarch and one 500-ml intravenous bag of lidocaine. We hypothesized that redesigned labels would help participants correctly select hetastarch from the cart. If the participants incorrectly selected lidocaine from the cart, we hypothesized that the redesigned labels would help participants detect the lidocaine before administration.

Results
The percentage of participants who correctly selected hetastarch from the cart was significantly higher for the redesigned labels than the current labels (63% versus 40%; odds ratio, 2.61 [95% confidence interval, 1.1–6.1]; P = 0.03). Of the participants who incorrectly selected lidocaine from the cart, the percentage who detected the lidocaine before administration did not differ by label condition.

Conclusions
The redesigned labels helped participants correctly select hetastarch from the cart, thus preventing some potentially catastrophic medication errors from reaching the simulated patient.
Simulation of the cytoskeletal response of cells on grooved or patterned substrates
Authors: Vigliotti A. , McMeeking R. M. , Deshpande V. S. 
Published: March 2015

We analyse the response of osteoblasts on grooved substrates via a model that accounts for the cooperative feedback between intracellular signalling, focal adhesion development and stress fibre contractility. The grooved substrate is modelled as a pattern of alternating strips on which the cell can adhere and strips on which adhesion is inhibited. The coupled modelling scheme is shown to capture some key experimental observations including (i) the observation that osteoblasts orient themselves randomly on substrates with groove pitches less than about 150 nm but they align themselves with the direction of the grooves on substrates with larger pitches and (ii) actin fibres bridge over the grooves on substrates with groove pitches less than about 150 nm but form a network of fibres aligned with the ridges, with nearly no fibres across the grooves, for substrates with groove pitches greater than about 300 nm. Using the model, we demonstrate that the degree of bridging of the stress fibres across the grooves, and consequently the cell orientation, is governed by the diffusion of signalling proteins activated at the focal adhesion sites on the ridges. For large groove pitches, the signalling proteins are dephosphorylated before they can reach the regions of the cell above the grooves and hence stress fibres cannot form in those parts of the cell. On the other hand, the stress fibre activation signal diffuses to a reasonably spatially homogeneous level on substrates with small groove pitches and hence stable stress fibres develop across the grooves in these cases. The model thus rationalizes the responsiveness of osteoblasts to the topography of substrates based on the complex feedback involving focal adhesion formation on the ridges, the triggering of signalling pathways by these adhesions and the activation of stress fibre networks by these signals.
Dynamics of miRNA-driven feed-forward loop depends upon miRNA action mechanisms
Authors: Duk Maria , Samsonova Maria , Samsonov Alexander 
Published: March 2015

AbstractBackgroundWe perform the theoretical analysis of a gene network sub-system, composed of a feed-forward loop, in which the upstream transcription factor regulates the target gene via two parallel pathways: directly, and via interaction with miRNA.ResultsAs the molecular mechanisms of miRNA action are not clear so far, we elaborate three mathematical models, in which miRNA either represses translation of its target or promotes target mRNA degradation or is not re-used, but degrades along with target mRNA. We examine the feed-forward loop dynamics quantitatively at the whole time interval of cell cycle. We rigorously proof the uniqueness of solutions to the models and obtain the exact solutions in one of them analytically.ConclusionsWe have shown that different mechanisms of miRNA action lead to a variety of types of dynamical behavior of feed-forward loops. In particular, we find that the ability of feed-forward loop to dampen fluctuations introduced by transcription factor is the model and parameter dependent feature. We also discuss how our results could help a biologist to infer the mechanism of miRNA action
A closer look into the materialism construct: the antecedents and consequences of materialism and its three facets
Authors: Segev Sigal , Shoham Aviv , Gavish Yossi 
Published: March 2015

Purpose– This study aims to unbundle the materialism construct into its three facets – centrality, success and happiness – to provide a fine-grained model that delineates the relationship between some of its antecedents (i.e. depression, anxiety, self esteem and affect) and consequences (life satisfaction, innovativeness, time spent shopping and environmentalism).Design/methodology/approach– Using a convenience sample of 568 adult consumers, this study tests a model in which a set of psychological variables serve as antecedents of materialism and its three facets, which in turn affect a set of cognitive, psychological and behavioral consequences.Findings– Results indicate that specific facets have more weight than others, depending on the nature of the needs individuals seek to fulfill through possessions, or their resulting behaviors and cognitions. Results validate the view of materialism as a coping mechanism, but also show that the consequences of materialism can be both positive and negative depending on their underlying facet.Research limitations/implications– This study used a convenience sample, which might affect the generalizability of its findings. The materialism centrality subscale showed a lower than desirable level of reliability. Future research might consider using the longer, 6-item version of this sub-scale.Practical implications– This study helps marketers identify the circumstances under which materialism can lead to negative or positive consequences. Marketers should be careful when designing messages that make unrealistically strong associations between consumption and happiness, positive emotions, self-worth and satisfaction with life.Social implications– The negative social and personal consequences of materialism call for the formulation of policies designed to reduce them, and marketers’ responsibility to consumers’ well-being, especially among potentially vulnerable segments of the population.Originality/value– This study provides an in-depth analysis of the materialism construct, its antecedents and outcomes. It advances our understanding of how materialism works by examining each facet separately and how it is related to the various psychological antecedents and consumer behavior outcomes.
Organizational environments and adaptive response mechanisms in India
Authors: Vohra Veena 
Published: March 2015

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the nature of the organizational environments of Indian business organizations and to identify the adaptive response mechanisms that organizations use to cope with their environments. This paper also examines in detail the causal texture of the organizational environments and attempts to build a conceptual model mapping adaptive responses of organizations to different types of organizational environments.Design/methodology/approach– A constructivist stance was adopted in this exploratory study to capture the perceptions of the organizational leaders through the multiple case study design to capture the features of the organizational environments and their causal texture. The multiple case study design used an embedded mixed-methods approach to collect data. Within-case analysis and cross-case analysis were conducted to draw out prominent themes across cases ordered for particular organizational environment types. The study was conducted by following construct validity, internal reliability and external validity guidelines.Findings– The study highlights and describes in detail the characteristics of the different organizational environment types in India. It is revealed that a majority of Indian organizations exist in turbulent environments. There are differences in the adaptive response mechanisms of organizations in the environment types studied. The study specially focuses on the strategies adopted by Indian organizations to adapt to turbulent environments.Practical implications– This study maps the causal texture of organizational environments in India and maps the organizational adaptive responses to the environment for greater effectiveness. This study offers various strategies to cope with turbulent organizational environments and adds to the research focus on causal texture and adaptive capacities of organizations across different types of environments.Originality/value– This study contributes to an ignored subject area of organizational environments. Managing organizations in uncertain and turbulent environments is complex, and this study provides an understanding about the various types of adaptive mechanism that are used to cope with environmental turbulence. This study also attempts to answer several questions that previous research works have raised about strategies that organizations use when they fail to cope with environmental turbulence.