bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Sample size requirements to detect an intervention by time interaction in longitudinal cluster randomized clinical trials
Authors: Heo Moonseong , Leon Andrew C. 
Published: January 2009

AbstractIn designing a longitudinal cluster randomized clinical trial (cluster‐RCT), the interventions are randomly assigned to clusters such as clinics. Subjects within the same clinic will receive the identical intervention. Each will be assessed repeatedly over the course of the study. A mixed‐effects linear regression model can be applied in a cluster‐RCT with three‐level data to test the hypothesis that the intervention groups differ in the course of outcome over time. Using a test statistic based on maximum likelihood estimates, we derived closed‐form formulae for statistical power to detect the intervention by time interaction and the sample size requirements for each level. Importantly, the sample size does not depend on correlations among second‐level data units and the statistical power function depends on the number of second‐ and third‐level data units through their product. A simulation study confirmed that theoretical power estimates based on the derived formulae are nearly identical to empirical estimates. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
The role of music preferences in early adolescents’ friendship formation and stability
Authors: Selfhout Maarten H.W. , Branje Susan J.T. , ter Bogt Tom F.M. , Meeus Wim H.J. 
Published: January 2009

AbstractThe present study examines the role of similarity in music preferences in the formation and discontinuation of friendships over a 1‐year period. Questionnaire data were gathered from 283 Dutch same‐sex mutual best friends (mean age=12.97) in two waves with a 1‐year interval. Results show consistent evidence for high similarity in specific music dimensions among friends at both waves. Moderate similarity was found in the overall patterning of preferences for music genres at both waves, even after controlling for similarity in social background. Specific music similarity in more non‐mainstream music dimensions and overall music similarity at Wave 1 were related to selecting a new friend at Wave 2. However, similarity in music preferences was not related to the discontinuation of an existing friendship at Wave 2. Thus, results suggest that similarity in music preferences is related to friendship formation, and not to friendship discontinuation.
Extracellular calcium protects against verapamil‐induced metaphase‐II arrest and initiation of apoptosis in aged rat eggs
Authors: Chaube S.K. , Tripathi Anima , Khatun Sabana , Mishra S.K. , Prasad P.V. , Shrivastav T.G. 
Published: January 2009

AbstractNon‐specific L‐type calcium channel blockers, such as verapamil (≥50 μM), induce metaphase‐II (M‐II) arrest and apoptosis in aged rat eggs cultured in Ca2+‐deficient medium. However, the effects of extracellular Ca2+ on verapamil‐induced M‐II arrest and apoptosis have not yet been reported. We have demonstrated that postovulatory aging induced exit from M‐II arrest by extruding a second polar body, a morphological sign of spontaneous egg activation (SEA). Verapamil inhibited SEA and induced egg apoptosis in a dose‐dependent manner in Ca2+‐deficient medium. The initiation of apoptotic features was observed at 50 μM of verapamil. Extracellular Ca2+ (1.80 mM) reduced intracellular H2O2 level, bax protein expression, caspase‐3 activity, DNA fragmentation and protected against 50 μM, but not higher concentrations of ≥100 μM in verapamil‐induced egg apoptosis. These results suggest that extracellular Ca2+ ions have a role during SEA and protect against verapamil‐induced apoptosis in aged rat eggs.
JNK‐binding protein 1 regulates NF‐κB activation through TRAF2 and TAK1
Authors: Yamaguchi Tadayuki , Miyashita Chiaki , Koyano Satoru , Kanda Hiromi , Yoshioka Katsuji , Shiba Tadayoshi , Takamatsu Nobuhiko , Ito Michihiko 
Published: January 2009

AbstractThe mitogen‐activated protein kinase (MAPK) cascades, including c‐Jun N‐terminal kinase (JNK), are composed of a MAPK, MAPK kinase (MAPKK), and MAPKK kinase (MAPKKK). Previously, we reported that JNK‐binding protein 1 (JNKBP1) enhances JNK activation induced by the TGF‐β‐activated kinase1 (TAK1) MAPKKK in transfected cells. We have investigated whether JNKBP1 functions as an adaptor protein for nuclear factor (NF)‐κB activation mediated by TAK1 in COS‐7 cells. Co‐expression experiments showed that JNKBP1 interacted with not only TAK1, but also with its upstream regulators, TNF‐receptor associated factors 2 and 6 (TRAF2 and TRAF6). An endogenous interaction between JNKBP1 and TRAF2 or TAK1 was confirmed by immunoprecipitation analysis. We also found that JNKBP1 could enhance the NF‐κB activation induced by TAK1 and TRAF2, and could promote TRAF2 polyubiquitination. These results suggest a scaffolding role for JNKBP1 in the TRAF2–TAK1–NF‐κB signaling pathway.
Altered expression of inflammatory cytokine receptors in response to LPS challenge through interaction between intestinal epithelial cells and lymphocytes of Peyer's patch
Authors: Chen Jie , Ng Chuen Pei , Tsang Lai Ling , Ho Lok Sze , Xu Peng Hui , Rowlands Dewi Kenneth , Gao Jie Ying , Chung Yiu Wa , Li Ting Yu , Chan Hsiao Chang 
Published: January 2009

AbstractThe intense innate immunological activities occurring at the enteric mucosal surface involve interactions between intestinal epithelial cells and immune cells. Our previous studies have indicated that Peyer's patch lymphocytes may modulate intestinal epithelial barrier and ion transport function in homeostasis and host defense via cell–cell contact as well as cytokine signaling. The present study was undertaken using the established co‐culture system of Caco‐2 epithelial cells with lymphocytes of Peyer's patch to investigate the expression of IL‐8 and IL‐6 cytokines and cytokine receptors in the co‐culture system after challenge with Shigella F2a‐12 lipopolysaccharide (LPS). The human colonic epithelial cell line Caco‐2 was co‐cultured with freshly isolated lymphocytes from the murine Peyer's patch either in the mixed or separated (isolated but permeable compartments) co‐culture configuration, and was challenged with Shigella F2a‐12 LPS for 8 h. The level of mRNA expressions of human interleukin‐8 (hIL‐8), human interleukin‐8 receptor (hIL‐8R), mouse interleukin‐8 receptor (mIL‐8R), mouse interleukin‐6 (mIL‐6), mouse interleukin‐6 receptor (mIL‐6R) and human interleukin‐6 receptor (hIL‐6R) was examined by semi‐quantitative PCR. In both co‐culture groups, hIL‐8 expression of Caco‐2 cells was decreased, and hIL‐8R expression was increased compared to the Caco‐2 alone group. Upon LPS challenge, hIL‐8 expression from the Caco‐2 cells of both co‐culture groups was higher than in the Caco‐2 control group. The increased hIL‐8 expression of Caco‐2 cells in the separated co‐culture group is correlated with a decreased hIL‐8R expression and an increased mIL‐8R expression. In the mixed co‐culture group, the increased expression of hIL‐8 was associated with the upregulated hIL‐8R expression on Caco‐2 cells and downregulated mIL‐8R on murine Peyer's patch lymphocytes (PPL). mIL‐6 expression from mouse PPL was also upregulated by LPS in mixed co‐culture. However, upon the treatment with LPS, hIL‐6R expression of Caco‐2 cells was decreased in the mixed co‐culture, but increased in separated co‐culture. The data suggest that release of hIL‐8 from epithelial cells may act on lymphocytes through a paracrine pathway, but it may also act on the epithelial cells themselves via an autocrine pathway. The data also suggest that the release of mIL‐6 from Peyer's patch lymphocytes affects epithelial cells in a paracrine fashion.
Nutrient‐mediated teratogenesis and fuel‐mediated teratogenesis: Two pathways of intrauterine programming of diabetes
Authors: Yajnik Chittaranjan S. 
Published: January 2009

AbstractThe epidemic of diabetes is spreading quickly to the poor and the deprived. Nutrition during fetal life influences the future risk for diabetes; and both under‐ and overnutrition contribute and coexist in rapid‐transition countries. Nutrient imbalance seems particularly important; for example, low maternal vitamin B12status coupled with high folate predicted higher adiposity and insulin resistance in Indian children, suggesting a role for 1‐C (methyl) group donors in fetal programming. Maternal hyperglycemia worsens the situation. Improving the early‐life environment may be more cost‐effective for preventing diabetes than controlling lifestyle factors alone in later life.
Surgical Management of Blocked Cats: Which Approach and When?
Authors: Williams John 
Published: January 2009

Practical relevance Feline lower urinary tract disease (FLUTD) accounts for up to 8% of cats presenting to veterinary clinics, with urethral obstruction occurring in 18–58% of those case. Though the requirement for surgery has declined with better understanding and management of the underlying causes of FLUTD, surgery does have an important role in intractable cases.Patient group Male (mostly castrated) mature cats.Clinical challenges The decision to take a cat to surgery has to be based on the severity and frequency of the clinical signs. The decisionmaking process is relatively straightforward where cystic calculi are present; the challenge is deciding when and which urethrostomy to carry out. This article seeks to give guidance for the practitioner grappling with these issues.Global importance FLUTD and urethral obstruction Is a well documented problem throughout Europe, and North and South America.Equipment The basic surgical equipment is readily available; fine-tipped instruments are preferred to allow for atraumatic tissue handling.Evidence base There is an abundance of literature on FLUTD and urethral obstruction and its surgical management, with surgery for this condition first having been reported back in 1967. Recent studies have investigated both the long and short term outcome following surgical management of the blocked cat. Still, there are no hard and fast rules as to when surgery should be carried out, with the guidelines varying in the literature.
Treatment of Feline Herpesvirus-1 Associated Disease in Cats with Famciclovir and Related Drugs
Authors: Malik Richard , Lessels Naomi S , Webb Sarah , Meek Miriam , Graham Paul Gotis , Vitale Carlo , Norris Jacqueline M , Power Helen 
Published: January 2009

Background Feline herpesvirus 1 (FHV-1) is a common cause of ocular and upper respiratory disease in cats and kittens, and a potential cause of eosinophilic dermatitis.Hypothesis The systemic anti-herpes drug, famciclovir (Famvir; Novartis), would be effective in the clinical management of disease attributable to FHV-1, including conjunctivitis, keratitis, corneal sequestra, rhinosinusitis and FHV-1 associated dermatitis.Clinical outcome Oral famciclovir was used to treat signs considered referable to FHV-1 in 10 cats: four had primary ocular disease, two had rhinosinusitis and four had FHV-1 associated dermatitis. Patients treated in Australia (five cats) and Europe (one cat) were given 62.5 mg of famciclovir once or twice daily. Four cats treated in the USA were given 125 mg three times daily. Famciclovir was uniformly well tolerated and, in all cases, had a positive impact on the patient's condition. The apparent improvement in lesions was superior to what had been achieved previously using other therapeutic strategies. One cat with severe destructive rhinosinusitis was significantly improved by a 4-month course of famciclovir in combination with antibacterials. Corneal sequestra detached in two out of three cats treated; cats with ocular signs were qualitatively more comfortable, with reduced clinical signs and an improved appearance of the eyes. Critically, oral famciclovir therapy was considered more convenient than topical ocular therapy. All four cats with FHV-1 associated dermatitis improved substantially, although relapse occurred subsequently in three patients. A further cat with presumptive FHV-1 associated dermatitis responded to topical aciclovir cream before famciclovir could be sourced.Conclusions Famciclovir appears to be a promising systemic drug for treating diseases associated with FHV-1 infection. More rigorous clinical trials are required to optimise the dosing regimen for safe and effective specific anti-herpes treatment in feline clinical medicine.
Regeneration in Rural Catalonia
Authors: Robertson Alexander F. 
Published: January 2009

AbstractThe efforts of rural communities around the world to survive in the face of economic and demographic decline dramatise the bio-cultural processes on which human regeneration routinely depends. This paper explores the very conspicuous symbolic aspects of regeneration in a village in Catalonia, Spain, and traces the long term physical and material processes that underlie them. Scrutiny of two different festivals reveals a passionate concern to renegotiate deeply fractured generational relationships. Having exported its fertility to the towns and cities, the community is now working to incorporate newcomers and devise new livelihoods. Public rituals have done much to sustain these efforts at regeneration, but how they may resist the “sterile growth” of Mieres as a village of mostly empty second homes is a provocative new issue.
Weber’s Theory of Radical Movements: A Reappraisal
Authors: Pettenkofer Andreas 
Published: January 2009

AbstractThe ongoing wave of radical religious protest confirms the need for an alternative to the rationalist approach that has come to dominate social movement research. At this moment, it seems promising to take another look at Weber’s sociology of religion: it offers a theory which (1) proposes an unfamiliar account of the relation between personal identity and political activism, (2) builds on this to explain the functioning of a specific type of social movements organization, and (3) thereby identifies mechanisms causing a dynamic of protest that cannot be reduced to a “rational” adaptation to an opportunity structure. These concepts can also elucidate the working of movements that are not explicitly religious in character.
Une enquête au début du xe siècle : le questionnaire synodal de Réginon de Prüm
Authors: Grémy Jean-Paul 
Published: January 2009

AbstractIn 906, the Abbot Reginon von Prüm issued a questionnaire concerning the sins perpetrated during the past year within a given parish. Two important improvements can be found in the questionnaire as compared to the already existing handbooks of penance: instead of being used for the private confession of sins, it was designed for a public investigation, and it demonstrates an effort toward some objectivity, by avoiding reproofs or value judgements. For these reasons, it appears as a significant advance in survey questionnaires. A French translation of the questionnaire is provided in the appendix.
The α-glucosidase inhibitor miglitol suppresses postprandial hyperglycaemia and interleukin-1β and tumour necrosis factor-α gene expression in rat peripheral leucocytes induced by intermittent sucrose loading
Authors: Tanaka Yutaro , Mochizuki Kazuki , Fukaya Nanae , Shimada Masaya , Goda Toshinao 
Published: January 2009

Postprandial hyperglycaemia is thought to increase inflammation in leucocytes. In the present study, we examined whether sucrose loading in rats with moderate postprandial hyperglycaemia induces the expression of cytokines in peripheral leucocytes and whether these inductions are suppressed by inhibiting postprandial hyperglycaemia with the α-glucosidase inhibitor miglitol. One group of streptozotocin-treated rats and age-matched saline-treated rats were orally administered sucrose only, and another group of streptozotocin-treated rats was administered sucrose with miglitol, at a single daily dose for 4 d, under 4 h fasting conditions. Blood glucose levels at 0, 0·25, 0·5, 1, 2 and 3 h and cytokine mRNA in peripheral leucocytes at 0 and 3 h after sucrose loading on days 1 and 4 from the start of sucrose loading were determined. Streptozotocin-treated rats showed moderate postprandial hyperglycaemia (>2000 mg/l) at 0·25–1 h after sucrose loading on days 1 and 4. Postprandial hyperglycaemia was not observed in the miglitol-treated rats loaded with sucrose. Gene expression levels of IL-1β and TNF-α were higher in the streptozotocin-treated rats at fasting on day 1 than in saline-treated rats. Fasting IL-1β and TNF-α gene expression on day 1 were not only increased at 3 h on the same day of sucrose loading, but was also increased at the fasting period on day 4. These inductions on day 4 by intermittent sucrose administration were inhibited by miglitol. The present results suggest that miglitol decreases postprandial hyperglycaemia and intermittent sucrose-induced expression of the IL-1β and TNF-α genes in rat peripheral leucocytes.
From European to American History: A Comparative View
Authors: Gerhard Dietrich 
Published: January 2009

To become an historian was already my aim in the last forms of the gymnasium, prior to 1914, though I hardly knew anything about the profession. My father, an attorney, had been thinking of me as of his successor, yet tolerance was one of his outstanding traits. He was willing to wait until the full development of my capacities, the more so since history had always been one of his major interests. My gymnasium — perhaps even more than other Berlin gymnasia — stressed German and especially Prussian history. Even teachers with a wider horizon, such as Wilhelm Pfeifer who had been one of the last amanuenses of Ranke, were obliged to emphasise Prussian history. I remember that one whole semester was given over to the campaigns of Frederick the Great. Pfeifer was a thoughtful and independent teacher, well above the level of his colleagues. I stayed in contact with him until I left Germany in 1935. Later my American students thought that, by way of Pfeifer, Ranke's blessing had been bestowed on me — a kind of successio apostolorum.In the year prior to my graduation from the gymnasium I learnt that recently a book of a new type of history had appeared in the form of Friedrich Meinecke's Weltbuergertum und Nationalstaat. I read it, and it was this book which led to my decision to study history. By showing the influence of cosmopolitan concepts on the emergence of the German national idea Meinecke's book opened up a new historical dimension, the history of ideas — not without objection from other historians that he neglected “real” history.
How I Became a Historian
Authors: Bolkhovitinov N. N. 
Published: January 2009

One rainy day in the autumn of 1978, when I returned to Moscow from my leave, the Institute's executive secretary for international ties called me to her office and handed me a letter with the invitation for me to write an autobiographical article for the silver jubilee issue of the Journal of American Studies and to tell how I came to be a historian and a specialist on the United States.At first the invitation puzzled me. To be honest, I have never written anything personal and, certainly, nothing autobiographical (except for the formal “autobiography” required in the USSR for official documents). Secondly, my official status and my place in the academic hierarchy could hardly justify my taking up the genre of autobiography. True, addressing their letters to the Institute, foreign correspondents often called me “professor” and even “academician,” but I naturally saw diis just as a polite form of address or as ignorance of our scientific hierarchy. The fact of the matter is that I have never been a professor (there is no such official post at the research institutes in the Soviet Union). As far as the title of “academician” is concerned, the difference between a senior research member of an academic institute and an actual member of the USSr Academy of Sciences (Academician) is the same as between the English “Dear Sir” and the French “Sire.”
The Jacksonian as Leveller
Authors: Ashworth John 
Published: January 2009

Over the past two decades Jacksonian historiography has been enriched by the publication of a large number of scholarly articles and monographs. Legislative voting in the states and in Congress has been analysed, the social composition of the two major parties has been studied, the mechanics of the political system have been scrutinized and political ideas have been reexamined. The present article will be concerned with ideology, the belief system of the Jacksonian Democratic party. It will deal specifically with the Jacksonian conception of equality. Surprisingly, this is a facet of Democratic ideology to which relatively little attention has been paid.In The American Political Tradition, published in 1948, Richard Hofstadter presented what is perhaps the standard view of Jacksonian equality. He cited Andrew Jackson's Bank Veto Message of 1832. Jackson here affirmed thatDistinctions in society will always exist under every just government. Equality of talents, of education, or of wealth cannot be produced by human institutions. In the full enjoyment of the gifts of Heaven and the fruits of superior industry, economy, and virtue, every man is equally entitled to protection by law.Hofstadter concluded that this was “certainly … not the philosophy of a radical leveling movement that proposes to uproot property or to reconstruct society along drastically different lines.”
The Culture of the Provincetown Players
Authors: Goldman Arnold 
Published: January 2009

In the first decades of this century, American movements for social reform included a programme, somewhat belated perhaps, for cultural renewal. Disaffected from their society, lamenting a split between the nation's commercial-industrial genius, so visibly institutionalized, and its creative cultural talent, so individual and so isolated, analysts like Van Wyck Brooks undertook to search for what he entitled “ a usable past.” The phrase implied, however, that much or even most of that past, as commonly understood, wasunusable: a witness to the split, or, in relation to the literary culture itself, a congeries of intellectual and artistic activity passive in the presence of social change, oblivious to its realities, merely acquiescent in relation to the institutions of a developing modern industrial society. Culture in America, Brooks and his allies felt, had no institutions. Without them the seeds of genius would not germinate, for there was no nurturing process, no method of transmission.When “ progressive ” literary intellectuals sifted the past for its neglected, potentially alternative, tradition, they rightly did not think to look back to any earlier American dramatist for inspiration, much less to a “ usable ” dramatic tradition. Yet when the whole Progressive attempt to reformulate the social and cultural basis of American life faltered and foundered in the years of the First World War, a modest theatrical venture undertaken just as the wider movements suffered their first setbacks preserved something of Progressive social vision — focussed it, prompted it, and passed it on as a legacy to later artists and to the intellectual community, and to the public.