julilili42/papers huggingface dataset:
Combined pathological, microbiological and virological evaluation of vitreous aspirates: a retrospective evaluation of 374 vitrectomy specimens with non-neoplastic disorders
2025-10-08

Abstract Background Intraocular infections pose substantial diagnostic challenges due to their varied aetiologies and complex inflammatory responses. The value of combining cytological, microbiological and virological assessments remains underexplored. This extensive retrospective study conducted at a German tertiary care university hospital aims to elucidate the correlation between different inflammatory patterns and detected pathogens in vitreous fluid samples. Methods A retrospective analysis of 374 non-neoplastic vitreous samples from 353 patients was performed, integrating cytological, microbiological and virological data with final clinical diagnoses. Results Cytological analysis showed 284 instances of lymphocytic uveitis and 76 of granulocytic endophthalmitis. Pathogens were identified in 46 out of 181 microbiologically tested samples; notable pathogens included Staphylococcus epidermidis , Staphylococcus aureus , Streptococcus pneumoniae , Tropheryma whipplei , Candida albicans and Toxoplasma gondii . Virological tests on 188 samples detected viral DNA in 42 cases, predominantly varicella zoster virus and Epstein–Barr virus, correlating well with clinical suspicions of retinitis. Interestingly, no pathogens were found in 67% of the lymphocytic uveitis cases, and multiple pathogens were detected simultaneously in seven instances, suggesting potential latent infections or reactivations. A significant pattern emerged correlating increased neutrophil counts with pathogen detection, highlighting a notable association ( p = 0.03) in a subset analysed for both neutrophil levels and pathogen presence. Conclusion This study offers critical insights into the epidemiology of intraocular infections in Germany, underscoring the importance of comprehensive pathological assessments. It emphasizes the diagnostic value of the underlying inflammatory patterns for predicting pathogen presence and identifies notable cases of infections, including rare pathogens like Tropheryma whipplei .
Combinatorial ERK Inhibition Enhances MAPK Pathway Suppression in BRAF-Mutant Melanoma
2025-10-08

Small molecule inhibitors targeting BRAF mutations at V600 and downstream MEK represent a significant advancement in treating BRAF-mutant melanoma. However, resistance mechanisms, often involving reactivation of the MAPK pathway via ERK1/2, limit their efficacy. The ERK1/2 inhibitor ravoxertinib (GDC0994) was tested on melanoma cell lines with and without resistance to BRAFi or BRAFi + MEKi. Short-term assays evaluated cell viability, apoptosis induction, and pathway modulation via Western Blot, while long-term effects were assessed using a colony formation assay. Resistant and parental melanoma cells responded to long-term ERKi treatment with reduced growth, independent of sensitivity to BRAF or MEK inhibitors. Adding ERKi to BRAFi/MEKi significantly enhanced apoptosis and growth inhibition, particularly in resistant lines. Although ravoxertinib alone showed limited antitumor activity, its combination with BRAFi/MEKi yielded substantial benefits, especially in chronic settings. These findings suggest that combinatorial regimens incorporating ERK inhibitors represent a promising therapeutic strategy for BRAF-mutant melanoma.
Developing Computational Thinking Skills through Embodied Dance Activities
2025-10-08

Objectives There is currently no single accepted definition of computational thinking (CT) but abstraction, algorithmic thinking, problem solving and pattern recognition are often identified as four top skills with decomposition and spatial ability also being considered important. Physical activity has been linked to development of algorithmic thinking, visual processing and pattern recognition, while dance has been associated with ability in problem solving, visual-spatial manipulation, abstraction and pattern recognition. Dance notation has been linked to the development of skills in decomposition. This paper investigates whether taking part in structured dance activities affects performance on CT tests. Participants 50 participants (33 girls, 17 boys) aged between 6 and 9 were recruited from schools in Scotland and out-of-school groups in Germany. Study Methods The methods were influenced by Educational Design theory and adopted a mixed methods approach. It employed an explanatory sequential design with the aim of explaining quantitative results using qualitative methods and comprises three studies. Groups 1 and 2 used a pre-experimental design while Group 3 used a quasi-experimental non-equivalent group design, which arbitrarily split the group in an intervention group and a control group to establish whether there was an observable change in performance on CT tasks after taking part in structured Scottish Country Dance (SCD) activities. Participants undertook the BCTt test [72] as pre- and post-test; motivation was measured using versions of the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI) [44]. Direct observation and teacher interviews provided qualitative information and were used to explore the findings. The intervention consisted of workshops that mapped physical dance and transcription activities to cognitive attributes identified as important for CT. Findings A Related Samples Wilcoxon Signed Rank test found a significant difference between the median marks for pre-test ( M =18.70, SD =4.21) and post-test ( M =20.45, SD =3.137) (n=20, p=0.007) in Group 1. In Group 2, a Paired Samples T Test indicated that the post-test score ( M = 21.50, SD = 1.789) was significantly higher than the pre-test score ( M = 16.69, SD = 3.945), (t(15) = 5.189, p &lt;. 001). However, no differences were found between scores on the pre-test ( M = 20, SD = 2.00) and post-test ( M = 19.67, SD = 2.160), t(5) = 0.237, p =.822 in Group 3A or between the pre-test scores ( M = 13.75, SD = 5.898) and post-test ( M = 15.13, SD = 2.997), t(7) =. 903, p =. 397 in Group 3B. Participants in all studies were observed to engage well with the activities. Conclusions Participants in Groups 1 and 2, who were taught by experienced SCD teachers in a classroom situation and had some prior familiarity with the dance genre, showed a significant improvement in their scores. The addition of related coding activities appears to strengthen this effect. The absence of significant results in Group 3 allows for some hypotheses about which aspects of the dance workshops may be affecting CT.
Universality of gravitational radiation from magnetar magnetospheres
2025-10-08

The intense magnetic fields inferred from magnetars suggest they may be strong gravitational-wave emitters. Although emissions due to hydromagnetic deformations are more promising from a detection standpoint, exterior fields also contribute a strain. However, numerical evidence suggests that the free energy of stable magnetospheric solutions cannot exceed a few tens of percent relative to the potential state, implying that the gravitational-wave luminosity cannot differ significantly between models. This prompts `universality', in the sense that the strain provides a direct probe of the near-surface field without being muddied by magnetospheric currents. Using a suite of three-dimensional, force-free, general-relativistic solutions for dipole and dipole-plus-quadrupole fields, we find that space-based interferometers may enable marginal detections out to kpc distances for slowly-rotating magnetars with fields of G.
Tracing Just-in-Time Compilation for Effects and Handlers
2025-10-09

Effect handlers are a programming language feature that has recently gained popularity. They allow for non-local yet structured control flow and subsume features like generators, exceptions, asynchronicity, etc. However, implementations of effect handlers currently often sacrifice features to enable efficient implementations. Meta-tracing just-in-time (JIT) compilers promise to yield the performance of a compiler by implementing an interpreter. They record execution in a trace, dynamically detect hot loops, and aggressively optimize those using information available at runtime. They excel at optimizing dynamic control flow, which is exactly what effect handlers introduce. We present the first evaluation of tracing JIT compilation specifically for effect handlers. To this end, we developed RPython-based tracing JIT implementations for Eff, Effekt, and Koka by compiling them to a common bytecode format. We evaluate the performance, discuss which classes of effectful programs are optimized well and how our additional optimizations influence performance. We also benchmark against a baseline of state-of-the-art mainstream language implementations.
Differential Hypoxemia During Veno‐Arterial Extracorporeal Organ Support: Its Impact on Mortality and Different Treatment Strategies
2025-10-09

ABSTRACT Objectives Extracorporeal Life Support (ECLS) has evolved into an established treatment for severe cardiogenic shock. As most patients have residual antegrade left ventricular output toward the descending aorta that meets the retrograde blood flow from the arterial ECLS cannula, they may develop differential hypoxemia. The location of the mixing cloud is critical for coronary and brain oxygenation. We analyzed the effects of the development of differential hypoxemia on morbidity and mortality of ECLS patients. Moreover, we analyzed the impact of two different treatment options for this phenomenon, including the administration of beta‐blockers and the provision of a supplementary arterial cannula, on survival. Methods We performed a retrospective review of patient demographics, outcomes, laboratory, and respiratory parameters during and after ECLS support for 76 ECLS patients treated at our institution. Results Overall, 38 ECLS patients developed differential hypoxemia. Treatment of this phenomenon included either the administration of beta‐blockers ( n = 18) or the introduction of a second arterial ECLS cannula ( n = 20). There were no significant differences in median SOFA‐Scores (Sequential Organ Failure Assessment Scores) between groups ( p = 0.072; ECLS vs. ECLS with differential hypoxemia patients). Under all respiratory and laboratory values analyzed, only bilirubin levels were significantly different ( p = 0.020). Development of differential hypoxemia was associated with significantly decreased survival rates (p = 0.05). Moreover, insertion of a second arterial ECLS cannula was a risk factor for mortality (OR: 3.68, 95% CI 1.18–11.47, p = 0.025). Conclusions Development of differential hypoxemia is associated with significantly increased mortality rates among ECLS patients and should therefore be prevented as far as possible. Non‐invasive administration of beta‐blockers seems to be the more effective treatment option for differential hypoxemia, as the introduction of a second arterial ECLS cannula was a risk factor for mortality.
The Simple Essence of Overloading: Making Ad-Hoc Polymorphism More Algebraic with Flow-Based Variational Type-Checking
2025-10-09

Type-directed overload resolution allows programmers to reuse the same name, offloading disambiguation to the type checker. Since many programming languages implement overload resolution by performing backtracking in the type checker, it is commonly believed to be incompatible with Hindley-Milner-style type systems. In this paper, we present an approach to overload resolution that combines insights from variational type checking and algebraic subtyping. We formalize and discuss our flow-based variational framework that captures the essence of overloads by representing them as choices. This cleanly separates constraint collection, constraint solving, and overload resolution. We believe our framework not only gives rise to more modular and efficient implementations of type checkers, but also serves as a simpler mental model and paves the way for improved error messages.
Quantification of High-Resolution Contrast-Enhanced T1-Weighted Vessel Wall MRI for Predicting Disease Progression in Moyamoya Disease
2025-10-09

Objective: In moyamoya disease (MMD), the internal carotid and proximal cerebral arteries narrow, potentially leading to stroke or hemorrhage from fragile collaterals. Disease activity and progression may be detected by contrast-enhanced (CE) high-resolution (HR) vessel wall imaging (CE-VWI) on T1-weighted MRI. However, this imaging approach needs standardization for the evaluation of signal intensity and longitudinal reproducibility. Methods: MMD patients with at least two separate CE-VWI examinations on the same and on different scanners were included. Signal intensity of the vessel wall, pituitary stalk, and temporal lobe white matter were measured and normalized using manually selected regions of interest. Intraindividual longitudinal reproducibility of MRI was analyzed and the clinical course was correlated with vessel wall enhancement data. Results: Eighty-seven patients were analyzed. Primary analysis included 60 patients with two or more CE-VWI measurements (n = 129) with median 14.8 months between examinations (range: 2–36 months) on the same scanner. Intraindividual variation in pituitary stalk enhancement (positive control) and temporal lobe white matter enhancement (negative control) showed median signal variability of 20.5% and 17.5%, respectively. The pituitary-to-temporal lobe signal intensity ratio remained stable over time (p = 0.843) with 9.4% median variability. Correlation analysis revealed a significant positive association between pituitary and temporal lobe signal changes (ρ = 0.717, p &lt; 0.001). A total of 75% of patients showed vessel wall contrast enhancement with fluctuating signal intensity over approximately 15.9 months, likely depicting disease activity. Conclusions: CE-VWI is important for screening disease activity in moyamoya patients. Our findings demonstrate longitudinal intraindividual reproducibility when normalized to pituitary stalk, enabling quantified evaluation of disease progression through longitudinal vessel wall contrast-enhancement changes.
Impacts of fertilization on metal(loid) transfer from soil to wheat in a long-term fertilization experiment – using 87Sr/86Sr isotopes as metal(loid) tracer
2025-10-09

Fertilizers are widely used to sustain food production but can alter soil chemistry and potentially contribute toxic metal(loid)s to agricultural systems. For the first time, this study examined the occurrence of select metal(loid)s (Zn, Sr, V, As, Cd, Pb, and U) alongside the <sup>87</sup>Sr/<sup>86</sup>Sr isotope ratio in agricultural soil- both total and mobile pools- and wheat grain. Samples were collected from one of four fertilization treatments- mineral (NPK), organic (manure), combined mineral+organic, and unfertilized controls- within the 120-year Static Fertilization Experiment in Bad Lauchstädt, Germany. Fertilization treatments altered soil pH and organic carbon resulting in mineral fertilization lowering pH and increasing cation mobility (Cd, Zn, Sr), whereas organic fertilization increased pH and enhanced the mobility of non-cationic elements (V, As). These effects translated into higher Cd in mineral-fertilized wheat grain and higher As in mineral+organic wheat grain. Fertilization shifted the <sup>87</sup>Sr/<sup>86</sup>Sr ratios in soils and wheat grains toward that of the applied fertilizers, with mineral and mineral+organic wheat grains inheriting the triple super phosphate signature (0.70778) and organic wheat grains matching manure (0.70883). The <sup>87</sup>Sr/<sup>86</sup>Sr ratio in the mobile soil pool was correlated with mobile As, V, and P, demonstrating that the <sup>87</sup>Sr/<sup>86</sup>Sr ratio reflects both fertilizer source and the mobility of select co-occurring metal(loid)s. Overall, this study demonstrates metal(loid) enrichment in soil and wheat from fertilization and establishes <sup>87</sup>Sr/<sup>86</sup>Sr ratio as a robust tracer of fertilizer impacts. These findings underscore the need for targeted fertilization strategies to reduce contaminant accumulation in agroecosystems.
Cortical microstructure is associated with disease severity and clinical progression in genetic frontotemporal dementia: a GENFI study
2025-10-09

Abstract The study of genetic frontotemporal dementia (FTD) allows investigating its earliest presymptomatic stages. Using cross-sectional T1-weighted and diffusion-weighted MRI, we test the hypothesis that cortical microstructural alterations, quantified as cortical mean diffusivity (cMD), are detectable earlier and are more strongly associated with clinical progression than cortical thickness (CTh). The sample comprised n = 710 individuals (47.8 ± 13.5 years, 56.6% female, 14.1 ± 3.3 years of education), including 118 symptomatic carriers and 305 presymptomatic carriers with mutations in C9orf72 , GRN or MAPT genes, and 287 non-carriers, collected from 24 GENFI sites. A subset of n = 453 individuals (289 carriers, 164 non-carriers) were investigated across Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR) = 0, 0.5 and ≥1 stages. Two subsets had longitudinal clinical outcome measures, including n = 403 individuals (239 carriers, 164 non-carriers) with Cambridge Behavioural Inventory-Revised scores during 2.8 ± 1.6 years, and n = 261 individuals (164 carriers, 97 non-carriers) with CDR Sum-of-Boxes scores during 2.0 ± 0.8 years. Regional cMD and CTh were entered into linear mixed-effects models incorporating age, sex and education as covariates; site, and individual nested within site were random intercepts. The results demonstrated that cMD is more sensitive than CTh to track early cortical injury, with elevated cMD first observed at CDR = 0 in C9orf72 carriers, followed by MAPT carriers (from CDR = 0.5 stage), and by GRN carriers (beginning at CDR ≥ 1). At all stages, cortical microstructural injury had stronger effect size and was more widespread than cortical thinning. In all mutation carrier types, cMD was more strongly associated than CTh with subsequent clinical progression. Cortical microstructure is a promising biomarker to identify at-risk individuals before atrophy and clinical progression, with utility in therapeutic trials.
Non-invasive vagus nerve stimulation normalizes food liking and improves liking ratings in depression
2025-10-09

Vagus nerve stimulation has shown potential to treat major depressive disorder (MDD) and the vagus nerve plays a prominent role in the regulation of food reward and energy metabolism. However, previous studies using vagus nerve stimulation yielded conflicting results regarding changes in food reward in healthy participants and participants with MDD. We investigated the acute effects of right transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation (taVNS) on ratings of liking and wanting of food and non-food items in 62 participants, including 31 patients with MDD. To test for taVNS-induced changes and evaluate group differences and associations with symptoms, we performed linear mixed-effects analysis with group-wise post hoc comparisons. taVNS increased liking of food cues in patients with MDD (p = 0.020), but not in healthy participants (p = 0.92). Specifically, taVNS induced larger improvements in food liking ratings with increasing scores of anhedonia (p = 0.029). Notably, across all participants, taVNS effects were negatively correlated (p<sub>boot</sub> = 0.002) with the individual hedonic response (i.e., average food liking) suggesting a normalization effect such that lower food liking gets boosted and higher liking attenuated following taVNS. Our results show that taVNS acutely ameliorates hedonic responses to food in MDD suggesting that it could provide a powerful adjuvant to rapidly improve food hedonics. Further investigation is needed to examine taVNS effects on anhedonia beyond food rewards.
Dynamic Wind for Effect Handlers
2025-10-09

Effect handlers offer an attractive way of abstracting over effectful computation. Moreover, languages with effect handlers usually statically track effects, which ensures the user is aware of all side effects different parts of a program might have. Similarly to exception handlers, effect handlers discharge effects by locally defining their behavior. In contrast to exception handlers, they allow for resuming computation, possibly later and possibly multiple times. In this paper we present a design, formalization, and implementation for a variant of dynamic wind that integrates well with lexical effect handlers. It has well-defined semantics in the presence of arbitrary control effects in arbitrary places. Specifically, the behavior of capturing and resuming continuations in the pre- or postlude is well-defined and respects resource bracketing. We demonstrate how these features can be used to express backtracking of external state and finalization of external resources.
Heresy, Empire, and Authority: Muslim–Christian Interactions in Early Modern Ottoman Legal Thought and Critical Edition of Ibn Kemāl’s Treatise on Zindīq
2025-10-09

In early modern Islamic thought, the concept of zindīq (heretic) occupied a critical space at the intersection of theology, law, and state authority, particularly in the context of Muslim–Christian relations. One of the most significant scholarly attempts to define this term came from Ibn Kemāl (d. 940/1534), a leading Ottoman jurist and theologian, whose treatise Risāla fī mā yataʿallaq bi-lafẓ al-zindīq (Treatise on the Definition of the Word Zindīq) sought to clarify the precise meaning and legal implications of zandaqa (heresy). This article provides the first English translation and critical edition of Ibn Kemāl’s treatise, making this important work accessible to a wider scholarly audience. Through a close reading of the text, this study examines how Ibn Kemāl systematically distinguished zindīq from murtadd (apostate), mulḥid (disbeliever), and munāfiq (hypocrite), shaping Ottoman legal discourse on heresy. The present analysis further explores the theological and jurisprudential foundations Ibn Kemāl employed to define and punish heretics, particularly in light of the controversial execution of Mollā Kābid (or Mullā Qābiḍ, tr. Molla Kābız), who had asserted the superiority of Jesus over Muhammad. This case demonstrates the presence of polemical debates in the shaping of confessional boundaries in the ninth/fifteenth-century Ottoman Empire and reflects the broader challenges of Muslim–Christian interactions during this period. Additionally, this study investigates the broader implications of Ibn Kemāl’s classification of zindīq within the context of Muslim–Christian relations, considering how interfaith polemics and religious boundary-making influenced Ottoman legal thought. By contextualizing this treatise within early modern Ottoman legal and theological traditions, this study contributes to the understanding of how heresy was redefined in a multi-religious empire navigating theological, political, and interreligious challenges.