julilili42/papers huggingface dataset:
Interferon-stimulated gene 20 kDa protein serum levels and clinical outcome of hepatitis B virus-related liver diseases
2018-06-11

Interferon-stimulated gene 20 kDa protein (ISG20) with 3' to 5' exonuclease activity mainly targeting single-stranded RNA plays an important role in immune responses against various infectious pathogens, including hepatitis viruses. ISG20 levels were measured by ELISA assays in sera of 339 hepatitis B-virus (HBV) infected patients and 71 healthy individuals and were correlated with clinical and laboratory parameters. <i>ISG20</i> mRNA was quantified by qRT-PCR in 30 pairs of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) tumour and adjacent non-tumour liver tissues. ISG20 levels were significantly elevated in HBV patients compared to healthy controls (<i>P</i><0.0001). In the patient group, varying ISG20 levels were associated with different forms of HBV-related liver diseases. ISG20 levels were higher in patients with HCC compared to those without HCC (<i>P</i><0.0001), and increased according to the stages of HCC (<i>P</i><0.0001). ISG20 mRNA expression was up-regulated in tumour tissues compared to the expression in adjacent non-tumour tissues (<i>P</i>=0.017). Importantly, ISG20 levels were strongly correlated with the levels of AST, ALT, total and direct bilirubin among HCC patients (Pearson's r = 0.43, 0.35, 0.34, 0.3; <i>P</i><0.0001, respectively). Although differences between liver cirrhosis (LC) and non-LC patients were not observed, ISG20 levels were elevated according to the progression of cirrhosis in patients with LC plus HCC (<i>P</i>=0.005). In conclusions, ISG20 levels are induced by HBV infection and significantly associated with progression and clinical outcome of HBV-related liver diseases, especially in patients with HCC. ISG20 might be a potential indicator for liver injury and the clinical outcome in HBV-related HCC.
Increasing effort without noticing: A randomized controlled pilot study about the ergogenic placebo effect in endurance athletes and the role of supplement salience
2018-06-11

High salience placebo ergogenic aids can elicit enhanced performance without the athlete noticing (exertion), and deception of athletes seems unnecessary as even believing to have received an inactive placebo supplement maintains the ergogenic placebo response.
Systematic discovery of uncharacterized transcription factors inEscherichia coliK-12 MG1655
2018-06-11

ABSTRACT Transcriptional regulation enables cells to respond to environmental changes. Yet, among the estimated 304 candidate transcription factors (TFs) in Escherichia coli K-12 MG1655, 185 have been experimentally identified and only a few tens of them have been fully characterized by ChIP methods. Understanding the remaining TFs is key to improving our knowledge of the E. coli transcriptional regulatory network (TRN). Here, we developed an integrated workflow for the computational prediction and comprehensive experimental validation of TFs using a suite of genome-wide experiments. We applied this workflow to: 1) identify 16 candidate TFs from over a hundred candidate uncharacterized genes; 2) capture a total of 255 DNA binding peaks for 10 candidate TFs resulting in six high-confidence binding motifs; 3) reconstruct the regulons of these 10 TFs by determining gene expression changes upon deletion of each TF; and 4) determine the regulatory roles of three TFs (YiaJ, YdcI, and YeiE) as regulators of L-ascorbate utilization, proton transfer and acetate metabolism, and iron homeostasis under iron limited condition, respectively. Together, these results demonstrate how this workflow can be used to discover, characterize, and elucidate regulatory functions of uncharacterized TFs in parallel.
Artemether-lumefantrine dosing for malaria treatment in young children and pregnant women: A pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic meta-analysis
2018-06-12

Our findings suggest that revised AL dosing regimens for young children and pregnant women would improve drug exposure but would require longer or more complex schedules. These dosing regimens should be evaluated in prospective clinical studies to determine whether they would improve cure rates, demonstrate adequate safety, and thereby prolong the useful therapeutic life of this valuable antimalarial treatment.
Cost-effectiveness of Endovascular Therapy for Acute Ischemic Stroke: A Systematic Review of the Impact of Patient Age
2018-06-12

Purpose To determine the impact of patient age on the cost-effectiveness of endovascular therapy (EVT) in addition to standard care (SC) in large-vessel-occlusion stroke for patients aged 50 to 100 years in the United States. Materials and Methods A decision-analytic Markov model was used to estimate direct and indirect lifetime costs and quality-adjusted life years (QALYs). Age-dependent input parameters were obtained from the literature. Deterministic and probabilistic sensitivity analysis for age at index stroke were used. The willingness-to-pay (WTP) was set to thresholds of 100 000, and 99 555; societal perspective, 50 000, 150 000 per QALY, respectively. In nonagenarians (90-99 years), acceptability rates at a WTP of 100 000 and $150 000 per QALY. Conclusion Using contemporary willingness-to-pay thresholds in the United States, endovascular therapy in addition to standard care reduces lifetime costs for patients up to 79 years of age and is cost-effective for patients aged 80 to 100 years.
An Adaptive Bayesian Lasso Approach with Spike-and-Slab Priors to Identify Multiple Linear and Nonlinear Effects in Structural Equation Models
2018-06-12

In applied research, such as with motivation theories, typically many variables are theoretically implied predictors of an outcome and several interactions are assumed (e.g., Watt, 2004). However, estimation problems that might arise when several interaction and/or quadratic effects are analyzed simultaneously have not been investigated because simulation studies on interaction effects in the structural equation modeling framework have mainly focused on small models that contain single interaction effects. In this article, we show that traditional approaches can provide estimates with low accuracy when complex models are estimated. We introduce an adaptive Bayesian lasso approach with spike-and-slab priors that overcomes this problem. Using a complex model in a simulation study, we show that the parameter estimates of the proposed approach are more accurate in situations with high multicollinearity or low reliability compared with a standard Bayesian lasso approach and typical frequentist approaches (i.e., unconstrained product indicator approach and latent moderated structures approach).
Prevalence Estimates for Pharmacological Neuroenhancement in Austrian University Students: Its Relation to Health-Related Risk Attitude and the Framing Effect of Caffeine Tablets
2018-06-12

<b>Background:</b> Pharmacological neuroenhancement (PN) is defined as the use of illicit or prescription drugs by healthy individuals for cognitive-enhancing purposes. The present study aimed (i) to investigate whether including caffeine tablets in the definition of PN within a questionnaire increases the PN prevalence estimate (framing effect), (ii) to investigate whether the health-related risk attitude is increased in students who use PN. <b>Materials and methods:</b> Two versions of a paper-and-pencil questionnaire (first version included caffeine tablets in the definition of PN, the second excluded caffeine tablets) were distributed among university students at the University of Graz, Austria. The unrelated question model (UQM) was used to estimate the 12-month PN prevalence and the German version of the 30-item Domain-Specific Risk-Taking (DOSPERT) scale to assess the health-related risk attitude. Moreover, large-sample <i>z</i>-tests (α = 0.05) were performed for comparing the PN prevalence estimates of two groups. <b>Results:</b> Two thousand four hundred and eighty-nine questionnaires were distributed and 2,284 (91.8%) questionnaires were included in analysis. The overall PN prevalence estimate for all students was 11.9%. One-tailed large-sample <i>z</i>-tests revealed that the PN estimate for students with higher health-related risk attitude was significantly higher compared to students with lower health-related risk attitude (15.6 vs. 8.5%; <i>z</i> = 2.65, <i>p</i> = 0.004). Furthermore, when caffeine tablets were included into the example of PN, the prevalence estimate of PN was significantly higher compared to the version without caffeine tablets (14.9 vs. 9.0%; <i>z</i> = 2.20, <i>p</i> = 0.014). <b>Discussion:</b> This study revealed that the PN prevalence estimate increases when caffeine tablets are included in the definition of PN. Therefore, future studies investigating the prevalence of, and predictors for, PN should be performed and interpreted with respect to potential framing effects. This study further revealed that the PN prevalence estimate is increased in students with a higher health-related risk attitude compared to students with a lower one. Therefore, future education and prevention programs addressing PN in the collective of students should not only inform about potential side effects of its use but also address the limited effects on cognition and potential alternatives of PN.
Modularized production of fuels and other value‐added products from distributed, wasted, or stranded feedstocks
2018-06-12

Distributed, wasted, or stranded feedstocks, when converted and upgraded into fuels, could replace about 6% of the U.S. demand for liquid fuels, which is about 25% of the net import of petroleum by the United States. We review the current state of modular approaches for conversion of these feedstocks, including the technology and economics associated with processing carbon‐containing waste and stranded, carbon‐containing gas. The wide geographic distribution of the feedstocks will require technology that can be scaled down effectively and that can be manufactured, installed, operated and monitored in ways that gain economies of mass production rather than economies of throughput scaling. This article is categorized under: Energy Research &amp; Innovation &gt; Science and Materials Bioenergy &gt; Systems and Infrastructure Energy Research &amp; Innovation &gt; Systems and Infrastructure
Proteome Response of a Metabolically Flexible Anoxygenic Phototroph to Fe(II) Oxidation
2018-06-12

The cycling of iron between redox states leads to the precipitation and dissolution of minerals, which can in turn impact other major biogeochemical cycles, such as those of carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and sulfur. Anoxygenic phototrophs are one of the few drivers of Fe(II) oxidation in anoxic environments and are thought to contribute significantly to iron cycling in both modern and ancient environments. These organisms thrive at high Fe(II) concentrations, yet the adaptations required to tolerate the stresses associated with this are unclear. Despite the general consensus that high Fe(II) concentrations pose numerous stresses on these organisms, our study of the large-scale proteome response of a model anoxygenic phototroph to Fe(II) oxidation demonstrates that common iron homeostasis strategies are adequate to manage this. The bulk of the proteome response is not driven by adaptations to Fe(II) stress but to adaptations required to utilize an inorganic carbon source. Such a global overview of the adaptation of these organisms to Fe(II) oxidation provides valuable insights into the physiology of these biogeochemically important organisms and suggests that Fe(II) oxidation may not pose as many challenges to anoxygenic phototrophs as previously thought.
Regulation of LRRK2: insights from structural and biochemical analysis
2018-06-12

Abstract Leucine-rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2) is a multi-domain protein and its mutations can lead to Parkinson’s disease. Recent studies on LRRK2 and homologue proteins have advanced our mechanistic understanding of LRRK2 regulation. Here, we summarize the available data on the biochemistry and structure of LRRK2 and postulate three possible layers of regulation, translocation, monomer-dimer equilibrium and intramolecular activation of domains.
Das Maß der Gewalt. Normalität und Exzess von körperlicher Gewalt als historiographisches Problem
2018-06-12

Abstract This paper deals with the question, how an abstract practice like ‘violence’ can be measured. On a methodological level, there are two possibilities: On the one hand, a quantitative approach that tries to determine homicide rates allegedly allowing comparisons over regions and time. On the other hand, there is a qualitative approach that analyses key concepts like ‘cruelty’ in order to define the limits of acceptable violence. However, both approaches have clear shortcomings. This article proposes another perspective: Using the example of France in the later Middle Ages, it scrutinises contemporary ideas of violence as they were expressed in chronicles and treatises. By focussing on decidedly negative descriptions of violent acts, we can pinpoint several characteristics that show which cultural aspects were of special importance for the contemporaries, e. g. the social standing of the people involved, the context of the act itself as well as the physical integrity of the nobles’ bodies.
Investigating Attitudinal Ambivalence via Sequential Priming: Evidence for the Simultaneous and Unintentional Activation of Opposite Evaluations
2018-06-12

This research tested a central assumption of attitudinal ambivalence research: ambivalent attitude objects simultaneously trigger positive and negative evaluations. It further specifies at which stage this activation is likely to produce an evaluative conflict. Experiments 1 to 3 involved two evaluative priming paradigms, in which ambivalent stimuli served either as primes or as targets. The <em>Ambivalent Primes Paradigm</em> tested the degree to which the concurrent and unintentional activation of positivity and negativity influences responding to univalent targets. The <em>Ambivalent Targets Paradigm</em> tested the degree to which ambivalent targets entail an evaluative response conflict irrespective of prime valence. Experiments 1 and 2 revealed slower responses for ambivalent trials compared to congruent trials in both paradigms. Employing a longer stimulus onset asynchrony, Experiment 3 attested to the short-lived nature of the joint activation of opposite evaluations triggered by ambivalent primes. In contrast, the deliberate categorization of ambivalent targets was not affected by this procedural variation. Finally, by relying on a valent/neutral categorization task, Experiments 4 and 5 indicate that conflicts triggered by ambivalent stimuli occur at the response selection rather than the exposure stage. Our findings lend original empirical support to the assumption that positivity and negativity are activated simultaneously and unintentionally in ambivalent attitude objects. Moreover, the present research suggests that ambivalence generates a conflict only if the task at hand requires a univalent categorization. We discuss the extent to which the activation of ambivalent attitudes may be automatic and the implications of our findings for dual-process models of attitudes.
Investigating Attitudinal Ambivalence via Sequential Priming: Evidence for the Simultaneous and Unintentional Activation of Opposite Evaluations
2018-06-12

&lt;p&gt;This research tested a central assumption of attitudinal ambivalence research: ambivalent attitude objects simultaneously trigger positive and negative evaluations. It further specifies at which stage this activation is likely to produce an evaluative conflict. Experiments 1 to 3 involved two evaluative priming paradigms, in which ambivalent stimuli served either as primes or as targets. The &lt;em&gt;Ambivalent Primes Paradigm&lt;/em&gt; tested the degree to which the concurrent and unintentional activation of positivity and negativity influences responding to univalent targets. The &lt;em&gt;Ambivalent Targets Paradigm&lt;/em&gt; tested the degree to which ambivalent targets entail an evaluative response conflict irrespective of prime valence. Experiments 1 and 2 revealed slower responses for ambivalent trials compared to congruent trials in both paradigms. Employing a longer stimulus onset asynchrony, Experiment 3 attested to the short-lived nature of the joint activation of opposite evaluations triggered by ambivalent primes. In contrast, the deliberate categorization of ambivalent targets was not affected by this procedural variation. Finally, by relying on a valent/neutral categorization task, Experiments 4 and 5 indicate that conflicts triggered by ambivalent stimuli occur at the response selection rather than the exposure stage. Our findings lend original empirical support to the assumption that positivity and negativity are activated simultaneously and unintentionally in ambivalent attitude objects. Moreover, the present research suggests that ambivalence generates a conflict only if the task at hand requires a univalent categorization. We discuss the extent to which the activation of ambivalent attitudes may be automatic and the implications of our findings for dual-process models of attitudes.&lt;/p&gt;
Investigating Ambivalence Via Sequential Priming: A Window To Ambivalent Attitude Structure
2018-06-12

This research tested a central assumption of attitudinal ambivalence research: ambivalent attitude objects simultaneously trigger positive and negative evaluations. In the first three experiments, all participants completed two evaluative priming paradigms, in which ambivalent stimuli served either as primes or as targets. Whereas the <em>ambivalent primes paradigm</em> tested the degree to which the concurrent and unintentional activation of positivity and negativity influences responding to univalent targets, the <em>ambivalent targets paradigm</em> tested the degree to which ambivalent targets entail an evaluative response conflict irrespective of prime valence. Experiments 1 and 2 revealed slower responses for ambivalent trials compared to congruent trials in both paradigms. By employing a longer stimulus onset asynchrony, Experiment 3 attested to the short-lived nature of the joint activation of opposite valences triggered by ambivalent primes. As expected, the deliberate categorization of ambivalent targets was not affected by this procedural variation. Experiment 4 relied on a valent/neutral categorization task and suggests that the conflict triggered by ambivalent stimuli occurs at the response expression rather than the exposure stage. Our findings lend original empirical support to the assumption that positivity and negativity are activated simultaneously and unintentionally in ambivalent attitude objects. Moreover, the present research suggests that ambivalence generates a conflict only if the task at hand requires a univalent categorization. We discuss the extent to which the activation of ambivalent attitudes may be automatic and the implications of our findings for dual-process models of attitudes.
Airborne observations of newly formed boundary layer aerosol particles under cloudy conditions
2018-06-13

Abstract. This study describes the appearance of ultrafine boundary layer aerosol particles under classical “non-favourable” conditions at the research site of TROPOS (Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research). Airborne measurements of meteorological and aerosol properties of the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) were repeatedly performed with the unmanned aerial system ALADINA (Application of Light-weight Aircraft for Detecting IN-situ Aerosol) during three seasons between October 2013 and July 2015. More than 100 measurement flights were conducted on 23 different days with a total flight duration of 53 h. In 26 % of the cases, maxima of ultrafine particles were observed close to the inversion layer at altitudes between 400 and 600 m and the particles were rapidly mixed vertically and mainly transported downwards during short time intervals of cloud gaps. This study focuses on two measurement days affected by low-level stratocumulus clouds, but different wind directions (NE, SW) and minimal concentrations (&lt; 4.6 μg m−3) of SO2, as a common indicator for precursor gases at ground. Taken from vertical profiles, the onset of clouds led to a non-linearity of humidity that resulted in an increased turbulence at the local-scale and caused fast nucleation (e.g. Bigg, 1997; Wehner et al., 2010), but in relation to rapid dilution of surrounding air, seen in sporadic clusters of ground data, so that ultrafine particles disappeared in the verticality. The typical “banana shape” (Heintzenberg et al., 2007) of new particle formation (NPF) and growth was not seen at ground and thus these days might not have been classified as NPF event days by pure surface studies.
Precise predictions for same-sign W-boson scattering at the LHC
2018-06-13

Vector-boson scattering processes are of great importance for the current run-II and future runs of the Large Hadron Collider. The presence of triple and quartic gauge couplings in the process gives access to the gauge sector of the Standard Model (SM) and possible new-physics contributions there. To test any new-physics hypothesis, sound knowledge of the SM contributions is necessary, with a precision which at least matches the experimental uncertainties of existing and forthcoming measurements. In this article we present a detailed study of the vector-boson scattering process with two positively-charged leptons and missing transverse momentum in the final state. In particular, we first carry out a systematic comparison of the various approximations that are usually performed for this kind of process against the complete calculation, at LO and NLO QCD accuracy. Such a study is performed both in the usual fiducial region used by experimental collaborations and in a more inclusive phase space, where the differences among the various approximations lead to more sizeable effects. Afterwards, we turn to predictions matched to parton showers, at LO and NLO: we show that on the one hand, the inclusion of NLO QCD corrections leads to more stable predictions, but on the other hand the details of the matching and of the parton-shower programs cause differences which are considerably larger than those observed at fixed order, even in the experimental fiducial region. We conclude with recommendations for experimental studies of vector-boson scattering processes.
Single particle dark-field spectroscopy of spherical dimers with down to sub-10 nm gaps fabricated by the annealing of nano-pillars
2018-06-13

Abstract In this paper we present a method for the fabrication of plasmonic spherical dimers and oligomers with narrow gaps and tunable distances. High-aspect-ratio nano-pillars are created by the two-step evaporation of gold on structured substrates. By using electron beam lithography, it is possible to control the close spacing of the pillars. Rapid thermal annealing causes the pillars to adopt a spherical shape. Since by melting the spheres gain in diameter compared to the initial nano-pillars, the distance between two adjacent spheres can be reduced to below 10 nm. Dimers with different distances were fabricated and optically characterized by single particle dark-field spectroscopy. The characteristic red-shift of the longitudinal mode due to stronger coupling for smaller distances could be clearly observed and follows a general scaling behavior.