INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES: Multivariable prostate cancer risk calculators (PC-RC) aim to guide the decision to undergo prostate biopsy by predicting the prevalence of clinically significant prostate cancer (csPCa) defined as Gleason score ≥3+4. A new generation of unvalidated PC-RCs incorporate information of multiparametric magnetic resonance imaging (mpMRI) to enhance their predictive performance. The aim of this study is to externally validate 3 novel PC-RCs (Radkte et al. [RC1], Mehralivand et al. [RC2] & van Leeuwen et al. [RC3]) and compare their predictive performance to 2 established mpMRI-naive PC-RCs (PBCG & PCPT2). METHODS: All men without a previous PCa diagnosis who underwent TRUS-mpMRI-fusion guided template prostate biopsy at our institution between 2014 and 2018 were considered for this study. All predictors were retrospectively collected. Probabilities of csPCa were calculated according to the logistic regression models of all PC-RCs. Discrimination, calibration and clinical usefulness were assessed by ROC analyses, calibration plots and decision curve analyses, respectively. RESULTS: After exclusion of 56 (11%) patients due to missing predictors, 468 men were eligible for final analyses, of whom 323 (69%) were biopsy naive and 145 (31%) had at least one prior negative prostate biopsy. MpMRI-TRUS-fusion guided template prostate biopsy detected csPCa in 193 (41%) patients. All mpMRI-RCs clearly outperform the established mpMRI-naive RCs, when it comes to discrimination (RC1: 0.73, RC2: 0.84, RC3: 0.83, PCBG: 0.68, PCPT2: 0.66). Calibration of RC2, PBCG and PCPT2 were considerably worse compared to RC1 and RC3 (predicted proportion of csPCa were 0.43, 0.68, 0.39, 0.29 and 0.12 for RC1, RC2, RC3, PBCG and PCPT2 respectively. RC3 added an incremental benefit over the other PC-RCs in a decision curve analysis across the range of clinically meaningful threshold probabilities to biopsy. CONCLUSIONS: Incorporation of mpMRI as an additional predictor for PC-RCs leads to better predictive performance in comparison to established mpMRI-naive PC-RCs. Among the novel PC-RCs, the model of Van Leeuwen et al. (RC3) outperformed its competitors cumulatively with regards to discrimination, calibration and clinical usefulness within our external validation cohort. Source of Funding: none


A capstone project is a project-based learning course designed to bring aspects of an undergraduate student's experience.  To have an effective capstone project, it is imperative to properly design the curriculum with involvement from the industry.  To improve the performance of the capstone project course, we used the constructive alignment approach to design the curriculum.  In constructive alignment, we mapped the intended learning outcomes, the assessment tasks and the teaching/learning activities interchangeably with each other.  Experiments were conducted with students enrolled in the capstone project courses in our university from February 2016 to May 2017. The result shows that the new design was able to improve the attainment scores for both learning outcomes and program outcomes. This improvement was also in line with marks by industry experts indicating good potential.


Abstract. Dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), gaseous CO2 and alkalinity fluxes from intertidal sediments were investigated during periods of exposure and inundation, using laboratory core incubations, previously published field data and reactive transport model simulations. In the incubations and previous field data, it was found that during periods of alkalinity production (attributed to the accumulation of reduced sulfur species within the sediment), the flux of DIC out of the sediment was greater during inundation than the gaseous CO2 flux during exposure by a factor of up to 1.8. This finding was supported by computational simulations which indicated that large amounts of sulfate reduction and reduced sulfur burial (FeS) induce an alkalinity flux from the sediment during high tide conditions. Model simulations also found that the amount of reactive Fe in the sediment was a major driver of net alkalinity production. Our finding that CO2 fluxes can be significantly lower than total metabolism during exposure has implications for how total metabolism is quantified on tidal flats.


A survey was undertaken to determine the degree of contamination of some stable vegetables and their surrounding soils by parasites in Uyo, Nigeria. Out of the 780 leaves from six vegetables and 50 soil samples screened, 498 (63.9%) of vegetables and 36 (72%) of the soil samples were positive for parasite ova, larvae or cyst respectively. The prevalence of the parasites encountered from the vegetables and soil samples were Ascaris lumbricoides (76.3% vs 100%) Hookworm (63.9% vs 66.7%), Trichuris trichiura (53.8% vs 58.3%). Strongyloides stercoralis (14.1% vs 19.44%), Gardia lamblia (5.6% vs 25.0%), Entamoeba histolytica (2.0%). The results obtained indicate that Leaf Area Index (LAI) is a contributory factor to high prevalence of contamination irrespective of exposed surface area, the vegetables with smaller leaf are index value are more contaminated than vegetables with higher LAI value.
Keywords: Vegetables, Parasites, Soil, Contamination.
(Global Journal of Pure and Applied Sciences: 2002 9(1): 25-30)


Silica nanoparticles were synthesized by a conventional emulsion polymerization by mixing ethanol, ammonium hydroxide, water and tetra ethyl orthosilicate (TEOS). A new reaction apparatus was assembled for a large scale synthesis of silica nanospheres in the laboratory, which was designed for uniform mixing of the reactants. The apparatus was equipped with a disc type agitator with six rectangular propellers. The new apparatus allowed high reproducibility in terms of the mean size and the size distribution of the silica nanoparticles with the relative standard deviation of less than about 6%. Sedimentation field-flow fractionation (SdFFF) was employed for determination of the size distribution of the silica nanoparticles. SdFFF provided size-based separation of the silica nanoparticles, with the retention time increasing with the size. When SdFFF analysis was repeated three times for the same sample, the standard deviation was less than 4%, showing reliability of SdFFF in size measurement. SdFFF seems to provide more accurate size distribution than DLS, particularly for those having broad and multimodal size distributions. Change in the agitation speed resulted in significant change in the mean diameter of the silica nanoparticles. Agitation speed of 400 rpm in 3 L reaction vessel yielded silica particles of about 100 nm in diameter, while at 200 rpm in 1 L vessel yielded those of about 500 nm.


We examined the relation between shift work and occupational nitrous oxide exposure in the second trimester of pregnancy and birth weight and gestational age at delivery among the members of the Swedish Midwives Association. Eighty-four per cent of members who were registered in 1989 responded to a postal questionnaire concerning occupational exposures, including work schedule and the use of nitrous oxide, in relation to each of their pregnancies. We obtained information on births from the Swedish Medical Birth Register. We used models with allowance for dependence between births for the same woman and found that night work was associated with preterm birth (<37 weeks) [odds ratio (OR) = 5.6; 95% confidence limits (CL) = 1.9, 16.4] and to a lesser extent with low birth weight [OR = 1.9 (95% CL = 0.6, 5.8)]. Three-shift work schedule (day, evening, and night rotation) showed a possible association with preterm birth [OR = 2.3 (95% CL = 0.7, 7.3)]. Exposure to nitrous oxide use was associated with reduced birth weight (-77 gm; 95% CL = -129, -24) and an increase in the odds of infants being small for gestational age (< or = 10th percentile of weight for gestational week) (OR = 1.8; 95% CL = 1.1, 2.8).


This paper focuses on the application of total quality management (TOM) in human resources development. It analyzes writings of five leading total quality authors from which four basic principles, or pil'ars, are derived as the basis for the application of total quality within the instructional setting. The pillars are: (1) customer satisfaction; (2) continuous improvement; (3) speaking with facts, i.e., collecting data so that.valid conclusions may be drawn and decisions, including those made by management, may have a basis in these same facts; and (4) respect for people, both learners and instructional staff. Process strategies were developed for actualizing the four pillars in an educational setting. They were applied in two university courses, one an introductory course in human resources development, and the other a course on implementing TQM. A number of strategies, activities, forms ari other documents developed in the pilot efforts have been implemented in courses in other settings. Implications of these pillars for human resources developmen' suggest that, once exposed to this approach, people who may have thought of themselves in preservice training as employees or learners, s'ee themselves as customers with needs and desires to satisfy, and that false expectations can be created if there is no opportunity to change instruction during the course or if the instructor does lot have the ability to make the changes. Finally, skill in managing small instructional groups is essential for ensuring the success of experiential learning. (ND) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. * *******************************************************.,%.*********** A U.S. DEPAII I MbN uttUut,A1 IUN °Ike of Educational RosearCh and improvement EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) 0 This document has been reproduced as received from the person or olgarwiltioh


Over the past two decades, internet users have been the prolific producers of online English translations of
 Chinese classical poetry, resulting in multiple variant translations of the same short originals. This essay gives reasons for the
 popularity of such translations before examining how this corpus can be approached through 'near-simultaneous reading.' A case
 study of ten amateur internet translations of a line from a well-known Tang poem shows how, regardless of the deficiencies or
 limits of any single internet translation, a richer and more accurate understanding of the original can be achieved through
 reading several in succession. Insofar as it refrains from privileging any given translation, near-simultaneous reading allows the
 polysemy of the original to be respected by encounters with multiple versions, and puts the onus of meaning-creation on the
 reader. Reading in this fashion opens new avenues for imagining the multiple meanings of an original text via variants experienced
 in quick succession and assembled uniquely.


The survival rate estimates for the breast cancer censored data have been considered for the 254 patients. The data [11] was treated at the chemotherapy department, Bradford Royal Infirmary for ten years. Here in this paper Inverse Gaussian, Gumbel and Weibull probability distribution (see [13], [14], [15]) models are used to obtain the survival rates of the patients using BFGS (Broyden-Fletcher-Goldfarb-Shanno) variable metric optimization methods. Maximum likelihood method [18] has been used through (BFGS) unconstrained optimization method [3, 6, 7] to find the parameter estimates and variance-covariance matrix for the said distribution models. Finally the survivor rate estimates for the probability models have been compared with the non-parametric Kaplan-Meier [12] method.


Discovery of better biomarkers for diagnosis, prognosis and therapy-response prediction is the most critical task of a scientific quest aimed at developing novel, tailormade therapies for patients with cancer. Consequently, a proteome-wide analysis, in addition to genomic studies, is an absolute requirement for a complete functional understanding of tumor biology. Ultra-sensitive, high-performance Fourier-transform ion-cyclotron resonance (FTICR) mass spectrometry (MS) currently holds an important role in fulfilling the demands of biomarker discovery. In this review, we describe the applicability of FTICR-MS for breast cancer proteomics, particularly for the analysis of complex protein mixtures obtained from a limited number of cells typically available from clinical specimens.


Pension systems may have a different impact on the two genders because women are less likely than men to work in formal labor markets and earn lower wages when they do. Recent multi-pillar pension reforms tighten the link between payroll contributions and benefits, leading critics to argue that they will hurt women. In contrast, supporters of these reforms argue that women will be helped by the removal of distortions that favored men and the better targeted redistributions in the new systems. In order to test these conflicting claims and to analyze more generally the gender impact of alternative pension systems, this paper examines the differential impact of the new and old systems in three Latin American countries - Chile, Argentina and Mexico. Based on household survey data, we simulate the wage and employment histories of representative men and women, the pensions that these are likely to generate under the new and old rules, and the relative gains or losses of the two genders due to the reform. We find that women do indeed accumulate private annuities that are only 30-40% those of men in the new systems. However, this effect is mitigated by sharp targeting of the new public pillars toward low earners, many of whom are women, and by restrictions on payouts from the private pillars, particularly joint annuity requirements. As a result of these transfers, total lifetime retirement benefits for women reach 60-80% of those for men and for "full career" married women they equal or exceed benefits of men. Also as a result, women are the biggest gainers from the pension reform. For women who receive these transfers, female/male ratios of lifetime benefits in the new systems exceed those in the old systems in all three countries. Private intra-household transfers from husband to wife in the form of joint annuities play the largest role. Women who work no longer have to give up their own annuity to get this widows' benefit, as they did in some old systems.


I was not less pleased to have the necessity for an operation to be superseded, which I had the day before considered as nearly inevitable. Dr. Butler Lane has sowell set forth the modue operandi of this remedy that I have nothing more to add, than that if you consider this communication to be of any use as an enconragement to others to make such trials, it is quite at your service. I am, Sir, Your obedient Servant, CHARLES MAYO. Winchester, May 26,1847.


Micro Electrical Discharge Machining (Micro-EDM) is a manufacturing process used for drilling of micro-diameter and deep holes whereby electrical discharges emitted by a tool-electrode are used to remove material in a work piece hosed by a dielectric .The process gives the ability to make intricate shapes with great aspect ratio in hard materials not yet feasible with standard drilling process used for instance in turbo-engines. During the process, both the work piece and the tool-electrode get damaged. It is highly difficult and time-consuming to evaluate precisely and in real-time their degree of wear. Moreover, the process is generally managed by a proprietary software which controls both the feed rate of the tool-electrode and the sequence of discharges necessary to remove pieces of material to reach a reference in depth. We demonstrate for the first time that the acoustic emission (AE) technique is able to highlight the different phases in the manufacturing process through the use of an advanced and unsupervised pattern recognition method where each phase is interpreted as an AE source. The task is quite difficult since we are in presence of continuous acoustic emissions on small work pieces. Results concern the drilling of hard material. AE streaming have been collected on multiple AE sensors with different characteristics (for comparison purpose), processed by wavelets for reliable AE hit detection, and then interpreted using a chronologybased consensus clustering with temporal coherence. This is a recent approach used to evidence a chronology of AE sources whereby AE interpretation is focused on the timeline of AE events. The algorithm relies on an unsupervised data fusion process of partitions obtained by many parameterizations (such as subsets of features) with a quantification of both the uncertainty and the robustness of the results obtained. Results show the effectiveness of the approach, in particular in presence of continuous acoustic emissions.


This paper traces the process whereby competition has come to be valued in our economies. Taking a step back in history, we show how it all started not with competition but with cooperation in fact, in the last decades of the 19th century. Comparing Germany and the USA, we then show how national paths diverged after that. While cooperation remained the accepted and dominant rule in Europe, a particular understanding of competition, what we call oligopolistic competition, came to triumph in the United States. After World War II, this particular understanding was diffused to other parts of the world and particularly to Western Europe. When it comes to competition, we thus show that the basic and formal rules of the game that structure Europe today owe a lot, historically, to American models. However, we ponder in the conclusion on the limits to that process of "soft convergence".


: Accidents related to blood transfusion have become rare in neonates, due to the application of very strict rules. The 8 reported cases of post-transfusion hemolysis occurred in prematures less than 32 weeks gestational age. Signs consisted of hemoglobinuria and/or severe jaundice. In some patients exchange-transfusion had to be performed. Immuno-hematologic, bacteriologic and technical investigations did not show the etiology of these accidents. No similar clinical reports were found in the literature. Some authors suggest a mechanical origin.


Narrowband video transmission via ISDN or wireless channels requires high compression factors. Common block-based coders achieve this by taking account of the statistical correlations within the image blocks. Correlations between neighbouring image blocks, however, are neglected. We present an approach using discrete cosine transforms which takes advantage of this additional information hidden in the statistical dependencies between neighbouring blocks in order to improve the image quality of the decoder. The luminance of the current block to be coded is predicted from the surrounding image blocks in order to correct coding errors. By this means the annoying blocking artefacts will be reduced. A smooth and well-balanced image display results. At the same time edges of real objects are undisturbed, thus the sharpness remains.


An analysis assessed the effects of a high school vocational curriculum over time as labor market experience accumulates. Since two additional yerrs of labor market experience had become available for respondents to the National Longitudinal Survey of Labor Market Experience-Youth Cohort (NLS-Youth) and longer trends of effects could be observed, the study replicated the exact specifications of an earlier analysis and added the dimension of expected lifetime earnings. Data were from the NLS-Youth and High School and Beyond databases. Findings indicated that vocational education provided, in the short term, a direct wage advantage for vocational students. The advantage became indirect as time in the labor market accrued and appeared to operate through increased hours of work and fuller employment rather than differential wage rates. An optimum mix between vocational and academic courses in terms of lifetime earnings was characterized by moderate rather tnan heavy concentration in vocational education. An alternative theoretical model of the net societal effects of the vocational curriculum was evaluated. It did not appear to be adequate for evaluating the effects of vocational education because several of its key assumptions did not hold when tested by the available data. The analysis associated with this model testing suggested, however, that the pronounced effects of training-related placement operate not through training, but through assisting the vocational graduate in selecting a better-paying job. (YLB) ********************************i************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ***********************************************************************


A synthesis of a previously unknown indole derivative is presented. The route reported herein allows for the preparation of multihundred gram quantities of material without any chromatographic purification. Conditions are presented for the Pd-catalyzed elaboration of one of the "diversity generating elements" of this important pharmacophore.


On March the 19th 2019 a round table "Franz Brentano: The critic of Immanuel Kant's philosophy", dedicated to the publication of book Franz Brentano. "On the future of philosophy: Selected works" (Moscow: Akademicheskij proekt, 2018) was held at the Institute of Philosophy of the RAS. The round table was hosted by the journal "Voprosy filosofii", Department of Contemporary Western Philosophy at the Institute of Philosophy of the RAS and Center for Phenomenological Philosophy of the Faculty of Philosophy of the RSUH. The discussion was attended by phenomenologists, historians of philosophy, epistemologists. Their focus was on the following topics: the historical-philosophical concept of F. Brentano and his evaluation of I. Kant's doctrine as the reference point of the phase extreme decline in philosophy; the problem of criticizing influential concepts; skepticism and science philosophy; judgment or belief: the problem of synthetic a priori judgments; difference between analytical and synthetic; space, time, categories as themes of critical analysis; ethics: the categorical imperative as psychological fiction. The most controversial topics were the philosophical-methodological problems of the unity of social-humanitarian and natural-science knowledge.


The aim of this study was examined the abdominal obesity prevalence and association with medical-related absenteeism. A cross-sectional study in 185 men from the metal-mechanical industry was conducted. Sociodemografic and antropometrics data of was gathered, waist circumference was measured as an indicator of abdominal obesity. The prevalence of central obesity was 28.7 %. Subjects with higher values of central obesity showed higher frequency, higher duration and higher costs of medical-related absenteeism, however, this relationship was not significant. We conclude that abdominal obesity is highly frequent in this sample; however, since it's a reversible risk, enterprises could get benefits from preventive and promotional programs destiny to control this problem.


Based on Einstein's equation matter and anti-matter annihilate into photonic radiation energy. Photons have unique characteristics since they are massless and they travel at the speed of light in all the inertial reference frames. No other particle shares these unique characteristics. We claim that this unique behavior is due to the fact that photons do not apply gravitational effects on space-time, meaning,although photons will be forced to move in a curved line if space-time is curved they will not curve space time by themselves or apply gravity forces and time dilation on one another. In order to prove our claims we suggest a thought experiment that leads to a paradox. The only way to explain this paradox is to conclude that anti-matter impose anti–gravity and therefore matter and anti-matter together impose zero gravity. Furthermore, this proves that the photonic energy from the annihilation phase has also zero gravity effect on space-time.


Introduction:
 White matter hyperintensity (WMH) is a prominent neuroimaging phenotype commonly detected in patients with stroke as well as genetic disorders like cerebral autosomal dominant arteriopathy with subcortical infarcts and leukencephalopathy (CADASIL). We sought to identify biologically connected pathways between the genetic loci associated with WMH burden in patients with CADASIL.

 Methods:
 We investigated a published polygenetic risk score for WMH burden in 466 CADASIL patients. Sixty-one single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with p-values of p<10
 -4
 comprised the score. We applied GRAIL (Gene Relationships Among Implicated Loci), a statistical text-mining software to assess shared biological pathways among these SNPs. The degree of relatedness to other genes was evaluated by mining PubMed abstracts. Identified related genes were ranked and scored based on inferred functional connections and investigated for association with WMH burden in 804 ischemic stroke patients.

 Results:
 We identified four loci (CADM1, DPP6, GCNT1 and GCNT3) which were significantly more related to other genes in the network than expected by chance (p<0.05, Figure 1). There were 304 SNPs within these loci associated with WMH burden at p<0.05 in a meta-analysis of 804 patients with ischemic stroke. Among the identified keywords were: tyrosine, core, phosphorylation, cathepsin, channels, kinase, cancer, peptidase, suppressor, activated, tumor, fragile, channel, activation, mucin, adhesion, cell and domain.

 Conclusion:
 Biological relationships between the four identified loci suggest putative molecular pathways associated with metabolic, enzymatic, and membrane channel-based activity mediating the effect of WMH burden in CADASIL. The role of biological pathways shared between CADASIL and ischemic stroke related WMH requires further investigation.


Abstract Densification of biochar can reduce transportation and handling costs, as well as significantly decrease loss of biochar during soil application. Although the nutrient-rich biochar tablets may be a potential cost-effective slow-release fertilizer in soil, there is a lack of information on characterization of mixtures of rubber tree twigs and rice residues tablets with embedded NPK fertilizer. Objective of this work was to determine the physical and chemical properties of biochar tablets with and without embedded fertilizer. Biochar tablets were produced by blending of charred rice husk, rice straw, rubber tree twigs, and starch and followed by tableting. Their production with embedded fertilizer was similar to production process of tablets without it, except adding the NPK fertilizer to blending phase prior to tableting. Fourier-transform infrared spectra analysis indicates was utilized for determination of presence of ammonium and phosphorus substances in the biochar tablets with embedded fertilizer (BFs). The NPK fertilizer significantly increased tablet density and total contents of nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, calcium and magnesium. The presence of higher amount of nutrients in BFs suggests that it could release nutrients for plant use.


Mr. LETCHWORTH also showed the following cases: (1) Coat's Disease ; (2) Blue scierotics and fragilitas ossium; (3) Parinaud's conjunctivitis;. (4) Sympathetic uveitis; (5) Stargardt's disease. In describing the last case Mr. Letchworth said: The patient is a girl, aged 14, whose vision was down to A, but it was very difficult. to detect anything abnormal in the fundus. Subsequently there was mottling, and later a development of pigment at the macula. I have known the condition in a. brother and sister, and neither I nor my colleagues were able to find any change at the fovea in the early stages. In all the cases vision was reduced to between ' and 1. The disease is familial.


The effects of glucagon and the glucagon-(1-21)-peptide on the duodenal pressure activity in 12 healthy subjects were studied and compared with those of placebo. A 1-mg bolus injection of either glucagon or glucagon-(1-21)-peptide was given at the end of the first interdigestive migrating complex, followed by intravenous infusion of 2 mg of each drug during the subsequent 2 h. Both glucagon and glucagon-(1-21)-peptide caused significant change (p less than 0.05) in the duodenal pressure activity, as the length of the cycle was significantly increased and the migrating motor complexes were significantly reduced. The frequency of side effects and the degree of discomfort during the recordings were significantly higher (p less than 0.01) in the glucagon period than in both the glucagon-(1-21)-peptide and the placebo periods. No differences in side effects and discomfort between glucagon-(1-21)-peptide and placebo were detected. Glucagon caused a significant increase in both serum glucose and insulin levels (p less than 0.01).


This study investigates the environmental impact of anti-consumption lifestyles and compares it to environmental concern and ethically minded consumption. Environmental impact was measured in a sample of 357 individuals with a carbon footprint calculator capturing all greenhouse gases released by an individual's activities. Three types of anti-consumption lifestyles were considered: frugality, voluntary simplicity, and tightwadism. Results suggest that tightwadism is negatively associated with environmental impact. This negative association is stronger when participants are knowledgeable about the emissions impact of their behaviors. These findings suggest that tightwadism can lead to positive outcomes to achieve sustainability. Surprisingly, frugality and voluntary simplicity, as well as environmental concern, are not significantly associated with environmental impact, whereas ethically minded consumption correlates positively with the latter. This study demonstrates that increasing consumers' environmental and ethical concerns alone might not be an effective way to lead them towards a more sustainable lifestyle. Such findings have important implications for sustainability and public policy makers.


In this paper, we study a multi-step interactive recommendation problem, where the item recommended at current step may affect the quality of future recommendations. To address the problem, we develop a novel and effective approach, named CFRL, which seamlessly integrates the ideas of both collaborative filtering (CF) and reinforcement learning (RL). More specifically, we first model the recommender-user interactive recommendation problem as an agent-environment RL task, which is mathematically described by a Markov decision process (MDP). Further, to achieve collaborative recommendations for the entire user community, we propose a novel CF-based MDP by encoding the states of all users into a shared latent vector space. Finally, we propose an effective Q-network learning method to learn the agent's optimal policy based on the CF-based MDP. The capability of CFRL is demonstrated by comparing its performance against a variety of existing methods on real-world datasets.


Millimeter wave vehicular channels exhibit structure that can be exploited for beam alignment with fewer channel measurements compared to exhaustive beam search. With fixed layouts of roadside buildings and regular vehicular moving trajectory, the dominant path directions of channels will likely be among a subset of beam directions instead of distributing randomly over the whole beamspace. In this paper, we propose a deep learning-based technique to design a structured compressed sensing (CS) matrix that is well suited to the underlying channel distribution for mmWave vehicular beam alignment. The proposed approach leverages both sparsity and the particular spatial structure that appears in vehicular channels. We model the compressive channel acquisition by a two-dimensional (2D) convolutional layer followed by dropout. We design fully-connected layers to optimize channel acquisition and beam alignment. We incorporate the low-resolution phase shifter constraint during neural network training by using projected gradient descent for weight updates. Furthermore, we exploit channel spectral structure to optimize the power allocated for different subcarriers. Simulations indicate that our deep learningbased approach achieves better beam alignment than standard CS techniques which use random phase shift-based design. Numerical experiments also show that one single subcarrier is sufficient to provide necessary information for beam alignment.


The objective of the research was to find out a simple, quick, and inexpensive method for testing salt tolerance of rice genotypes at germination phase. Experiments were conducted at the Laboratory of Seed Science and Technology, Bogor Agricultural University, and in a green house at Experimental Station Muara, Bogor from June 2010 until February 2011. A total of 40 rice genotypes were used in the experiments. The standard method for testing salinity tolerance was applied in the green house where two week old seedling were transplanted to soil medium salinized with 4 000 ppm NaCl for 8 weeks. Dead leaf percentage variable could differentiate 7 tolerant rice genotypes, 19 moderately tolerant, 14 moderately susceptible, and 4 susceptible. Lalan was the most tolerant rice genotype with the lowest dead leaf percentage (30.03%), perfomed followed by B11844-MR-23-4-6, B13133-9-MR-3-KY-2 and B13136-3-MR-1-KY-5. Germinating seed on stensil paper in UKDdp method with 8 000 ppm NaCl for 14 days was the best method for differentiating the tolerant varieties from the susceptible at the laboratory condition. However, The correlation coefficient value between salinity tolerance variable in the laboratory and in the greenhouse is low -0.12608. Keyword : genotype of rice, salinity tolerance, germination phase


Using a new fundamental theory based on bit-strings we derived a finite and discrete version of the solutions of the free one particle Dirac equation as segmented trajectories with steps of length h/mc along the forward and backward light cones executed at velocity {plus_minus}c. Interpreting the statistical fluctuations which cause the bends in these segmented trajectories as emission and absorption of radiation, these solutions are analagous to a fermion propagator in a second quantized theory. This allows us to interpret the mass parameter in the step length as the physical mass of the free particle. The radiation in interaction with it has the usual harmonic oscillator structure of a second quantized theory. We sketch on these free particle masses can be generated gravitationally using the combinatorial hierarchy sequence (3,10,137,2{sup 127}+136), and some of the predictive consequences.


Diatoms are ancestrally photosynthetic microalgae. However, some underwent a major evolutionary transition, losing photosynthesis to become obligate heterotrophs. The molecular and physiological basis for this transition is unclear. Here, we isolate and characterize new strains of non-photosynthetic diatoms from the coastal waters of Singapore. These diatoms occupy diverse ecological niches and display glucose-mediated catabolite repression, a classical feature of bacterial and fungal heterotrophs. Live-cell imaging reveals deposition of secreted extracellular polymeric substance (EPS). Diatoms moving on pre-existing EPS trails (runners) move faster than those laying new trails (blazers). This leads to cell-to-cell coupling where runners can push blazers to make them move faster. Calibrated micropipettes measure substantial single cell pushing forces, which are consistent with high-order myosin motor cooperativity. Collisions that impede forward motion induce reversal, revealing navigation-related force sensing. Together, these data identify aspects of metabolism and motility that are likely to promote and underpin diatom heterotrophy.


Proceedings: AACR 103rd Annual Meeting 2012‐‐ Mar 31‐Apr 4, 2012; Chicago, IL

Centromere-associated protein E (CENP-E) is expressed during mitosis and plays an essential role in establishing and maintaining stable connections between mitotic chromosomes and the microtubules of the spindle. Previous preclinical studies have shown that inhibition of CENP-E function by small interfering RNA, blocking antibodies or small molecule inhibitors arrested cell cycle before metaphase, and could lead to cell death. In a number of cancers, CENP-E is frequently overexpressed in tumor tissues compared with their normal counterparts. In this study, we showed that CENP-E is overexpressed in about 60% of gastric cancer (intestinal and diffuse-type) tissues. In addition, c-Myc up-regulation was observed in more than 50% of the same samples. Overall, about 40% of all gastric tumor samples harbor both CENP-E and c-Myc upregulation. Using a panel of small molecule inhibitors of CENP-E, we evaluated in vitro anti-proliferation effect in a panel of gastric cancer cell lines. Our data suggested that cells with higher levels of c-Myc transcript were more sensitive to CENP-E inhibition. This preliminary study indicated that c-Myc amplification and/or over-expression could be a potential biomarker for selecting gastric cancer patients more likely to respond to CENP-E inhibition.

Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 103rd Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2012 Mar 31-Apr 4; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2012;72(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 4535. doi:1538-7445.AM2012-4535


Over the last decade, a rapid development of embedded systems has enlarged their fields of application. Thus, several experiments have concentrated on the time and cost improvement. Certainly, the size of the cache memory influences the performance of embedded systems such as digital signature programs. The typical approach is to optimize as much as possible the size of the cache memory in designed system on chip to improve time performances of embedded algorithms. In this work, we studied a digital signature program based on elliptic curves which requires improvement of time performance. In the first step, we have carried out an implementation of the algorithm on an open source embedded processor which presents a Harvard architecture cache. In the second step, we have managed the cache configuration of the adopted embedded processor and increased its size to minimize the execution time of the implemented digital signature program. Beyond a certain size of the cache we noticed a performance degradation.


Visual monitoring of an object manipulated by a multifingered hand has a problem of occlusion caused by the fingers. In this paper, we propose a new planning method, based on a 3-dimensional CAD model of the environment, for focusing attention in such a monitoring task. We formulate the planning to focus attention as a scheduling problem for the whole task period rather than for a specific time. We introduce a genetic algorithm to cope with combinatorial explosion of the image features considered during time-sequential aspects in the task. The genetic algorithm is a population-based search method which efficiently finds solutions in a large search space by simulating biological evolutionary processes. The algorithm consists of selection, crossover, and mutation procedures applied to a population of chromosomes. To solve the problem of planning a focus of attention by using the genetic algorithm, we employ a coding scheme for a chromosome to produce consistent offspring after the crossover. Experimental results show the usefulness of the proposed method by finding the pseudo-optimal plan within a short computation time.


A nanometric needle sensor mounted in an Atomic Force Microscopy allows systematic picometer-range distance measurements. This force sensing device is used in Piezoresponse Force Microscopy (PFM) as a distance sensor, by employing the cantilever spring constant as the conversion factor opening a pathway to explore the piezoelectric effect at the nanoscale. The force-distance equivalence is achieved if the force sensor does not disturb the system to study, solely. In this manuscript we report a systematic study in which different Lead Zirconate Titanate (PZT) materials, having different d33 values, are measured following the standard theory available for PFM. Both in resonance and out of resonance measurements demonstrate that PFM cannot be considered quantitative. After performing the measurements, we propose a correction of the standard theory employed in PFM by considering the force exerted by the material as a variable. The g33 parameter, inherent to piezoelectricity, governs the amount of force available from the system. A comparison of piezoelectric stiffness for the case of a nanoscale site contact region, similar to the one it is found while performing PFM, is provided. Such stiffness is well below the cantilever stiffness, limiting and diminishing the material movement, as the piezoelectric material does not have enough stroke to induce the intended displacement. A correction factor, named Open Piezopotential Gauge, accounts for these effects, which is used to correct the measurements carried out in PZT materials towards a real quantitative PFM.


RFID facilitates processing of product information, making it a promising technology for anti-counterfeiting. A number of RFID anti-counterfeiting mechanisms have recently been proposed. This paper first compares the strengths and weaknesses of these mechanisms, and evaluates possible impacts of threats to RFID. Subsequently, a track-and-trace anti-counterfeiting system using RFID is proposed. The proposed system is aimed at relatively high-end consumer products, and it helps protect genuine products by maintaining the product pedigree and the supply chain integrity. As such, consumers can safeguard their stake by authenticating a product with RFID readers before making payment. The mechanism is relatively simple and easy to implement.


Species that exploit transient food patches must both effectively utilize such food sources and colonize new patches. The timing and rate of dispersal from existing patches and adaptations that aid dispersal are therefore crucial. Currently, no system exists in which dispersal has been investigated at both the ecological and genetic levels. The extensively studied model nematode Caenorhabditis elegans is potentially such a system. Dispersal between food patches in C. elegans has been found to be related to polymorphism in the npr-1 gene, which regulates the tendency of worms to aggregate on food. Here I show that this non-dauer larval dispersal is affected by various environmental variables and that variation is not fully explained by differences in aggregation behavior. Quantitative trait loci mapping identifies candidate genomic regions, separate to npr-1, which affect variation in dispersal between two isolates. These data suggest that the ecology of C. elegans is more complex than previously thought, but indicate that it is experimentally tractable.


The Genesis of this Special Issue came from the Board of the POMS College on Humanitarian Operations and Crisis Management (HO&CM). It was seen as a necessary initiative to define the field and examine research opportunities. This Special Issue shows that humanitarian operations pose challenges for P/OM researchers and practitioners that differ markedly from those of conventional supply chains associated with profitable enterprises. On the basis of the eight articles in this Special Issue, we have described and demonstrated the unique characteristics of the POM/HO&CM interaction. We have also identified those attributes that tend to overlap with conventional aspects of POM. In addition to wanting to be cost effective, the issue of equity fairness is pervasive in humanitarian operations, and so is the need to always base considerations on �last-mile logistics,� that is, getting aid to those in most need. Research is essential to determine how to train researchers to scout out and map the territory of the real problems. One of the most vexing problems is the lack of robust data in the humanitarian domain which is as richly varied as the types of disasters that can occur.


The focus of the study is examining effects of career management activities in both organizational and individual level. In previous researches, effects of accumulation of career capital and antecedents of career capital were mostly analyzed on individual level. On the other hand; there are some researches about effects of human resource management activities on innovation performance however; effect of organizational career management activities on innovation is limited. This study aims to research the effects of organizational career management programs on employees' career


A comparative study of computational performance of CM-2, iPSC/860 and Cray-YMP computers for calculating matrix coefficients (aerodynamic influence coefficients) using a two-dimensional source panel method (boundary elements) code has been made. Detailed performance results are obtained for CM-2 and iPSC/860 with different numbers of processors / nodes and for Cray-YMP with a single processor. The comparison of the performance indicates that the aerodynamic influence coefficient calculations on CM-2 and iPSC/860 with a large number of processors / nodes near- or outperforme the equivalent Cray-YMP code and achieve a high performance. Since the aerodynamic influence coefficient calcultaions take over 80% of the total computational time on Cray-YMP when the problem is large enough, it is very important to study the computational performance of this part of calculation.


A number of common mobile phase modifiers were characterized by chromatographing monofunctional probe solutes on a cyano-bonded stationary phase under subcritical and supercritical conditions. Solvatochromic analysis techniques were used to characterize the relative selectivity, efficiency, and eluotropic strengths of the various modified mobile phases. Analysis of the combined results suggests that modifier choice may be made in a rational manner to either enhance or mask a particular type of molecular interaction. This control is necessary for challenging applications such as chiral separations. The relative effects of each modifier property change depending on whether the chromatographic system is subcritical or supercritical, thus making knowledge of the phase equilibria associated with the mobile phase essential.


We examine the impact of real estate collateral values on corporate employment. Our empirical strategy exploits regional variation in local real estate price growth, firm-level data on real estate holdings, as well as establishment-level data on employment and the location of firms' operations from the U.S. Census Bureau. Over the period from 1993 until 2006, we show that a typical U.S. publicly-traded firm increases employment expenditures by $0.10 per $1 increase in collateral. We show this additional hiring is funded through debt issues and the effects are stronger for firms likely to be financially constrained. These firms increase employment at establishments outside of their core industry focus and away from the location of real estate holdings, leading to regional spillover effects. We document how shocks to collateral values influence labor allocation within firms and how these effects show up in the aggregate.


This is the first part of a revision of the family Carabodidae by us. The new genus Bovicarabodes comprises three new species from Madagascar, Bovicarabodes deharvengi, Bovicarabodes levyi and Bovicarabodes fortdauphini, which are described and illustrated. Many morphological aspects found in the genus Bovicarabodes, that also exist in several other genera but have not been described before, are introduced and discussed in particular sections such as "Protection mechanisms" and "Medial eye". Other Carabodid genera which also present these features are indicated, studied and compared. The study is based on adult specimens using optical and scanning electron microscopy. The system of leg folding as well as the structure of the medial eyes were studied and compared to type material of many other Carabodid genera. A redescription of Hardybodes mirabilis Balogh, 1970, based on a study of the type material, is included. http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:F7E57D3B-026C-4763-80ED-42E2B0CF8EDF


We study and demonstrate a Bloch-surface-wave-based nano-thin waveguide grating. The waveguide grating is characterized as a Bragg mirror at telecommunication wavelengths. The structure is a dielectric multilayer platform designed to sustain a Bloch surface wave. Such a platform is regarded as a foundation for in-plane integrated optics. The Kretschmann coupling configuration, as the most widely used approach, is utilized to excite the optical surface waves. We use multi-heterodyne scanning near-field optical microscopy to characterize the waveguide gratings in the near-field. The fabricated waveguide grating shows the expected Bragg mirror behavior with a measured reflectivity of approximately 72 % inside the photonic band gap at λ = 1553 nm.


- The objective of this study was to elucidate the optimum protocol timing of thermal manipulation (TM) during embryogenesis, which underline genetic improvement of muscle thermotolerance acquisition. For the present study, 1,440 fertile eggs were divided randomly and equally into control (37.8 °C with 56% relative humidity) and four thermally manipulated groups (TM1, TM2, TM3, and T M4) subjected to 39 °C for 18 h with 65% relative humidity daily during different embryonic periods. Then, at day 35 post-hatch, all groups were subjected to thermal challenge at 43 °C for 6 h to identify the level of thermotolerance acquisition differences between them. Hsp70 mRNA expression was evaluated by using a relative quantitatively RT-qPCR. Single nucleotide polymorphisms sequence of the Hsp70 gene was evaluated by Sanger's sequencing method. Pectoral and thigh muscles samples were subjected to immunohistochemistry to detect Hsp70. Among TM conditions that were investigated, TM1 (39 °C for 18 h during embryonic days (ED) 7–11) induced a significant improvement in thermotolerance parameters (body temperature and T3 levels) during thermal challenge combined with an increase in the levels of Hsp70 mRNA and its protein with a high stability of nucleotide sequences in both pectoral and thigh muscles. The partial DNA sequence of Hsp70 gene in TM1 was reported, and nucleotide sequences were deposited in NCBI GenBank database with the accession numbers (MK852579) and (MK852580). Thigh muscle thermotolerance acquisition was higher than pectoral muscle during thermal challenge at 43 °C for 6 h. Thus, TM during ED7–11 may improve thermotolerance acquisition without adversely affecting performance. the and after during early and middle improves long-term thermotolerance when


Objective To validate the prognostic value of tumor regression grading (TRG) and to explore the associated factors of TRG for advanced gastric cancer (AGC) with neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) plus surgery. Methods Two hundred forty-nine AGC patients treated with NACT followed by gastrectomy at the Mayo Clinic, USA and the Fujian Medical University Union Hospital, China between January 2000 and December 2016 were enrolled in this study. Cox regression was used to identify covariates associated with overall survival (OS) and recurrence-free survival (RFS). Logistic regression was used to reveal factors predicting tumor regression grading. Results For patients with TRG 0-1, the 3- and 5-year OS rates were 85.2% and 74.5%, respectively, when compared to 56.1% and 44.1% in patients with TRG 2 and 28.2% and 23.0% in patients with TRG 3, respectively (p<0.001). TRGs were independent risk factors for OS. Similar findings were observed in RFS. Multivariable analysis revealed that an oxaliplatin-based regimen (p=0.017) was an independent predictor of TRG. The oxaliplatin-based regimen was superior to the nonoxaliplatin-based regimen for OS (38.4 months vs 19.5 months, respectively; p=0.01). Subgroup analyses by histological subtype indicated that the oxaliplatin-based regimen improved the OS in nonsignet ring cell carcinoma compared to the nonoxaliplatin-based regimen (53.7 months vs 19.5 months, respectively; p=0.011). However, similar findings were not observed in RFS. Conclusion TRG was an independent factor of AGC treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy plus surgery. Oxaliplatin-based neoadjuvant chemotherapy regimens improve tumor response and may have an overall survival benefit for patients with nonsignet ring cell carcinoma.


The sterically crowded isoindoline pincer ligand, 6'-MeLH, prepared by condensation of 4-methyl-2-aminopyridine and phthalonitrile, exhibits very different reaction chemistry with Cd2+, Zn2+, and Pd2+. Three different ligand coordination modes are reported, each dependent upon choice of metal ion. This isoindoline binds to Cd2+ as a charge-neutral, zwitterionic, bidentate ligand using imine and pyridine nitrogen atoms to form the eight-coordinate fluxional complex, Cd(6'-MeLH)2(NO3)2. In the presence of Zn2+, however, loss of a pyridine arm occurs through solvolysis and tetrahedrally coordinated complexes are formed with coordination of pyrrole and pyridine nitrogen atoms. Reaction with Pd2+ produces the highly distorted, square planar complex Pd(6'-MeL)Cl in which a deprotonated isoindoline anion coordinates as a tridentate pyridinium NNC pincer ligand.


The effect of the extract of Cyperus esculentus on the changes in sperm count, activity, morphology and testicular histology induces by lead acetate was studied.18 adult male rats were randomly divided into three experimental groups. Group 1 (control) were given clean drinking water and rat chow, group 2 were given intraperitoneally injection 8mg/kg body weight + water + rat chow. Group 3 were given intraperitoneally injection 8mg/kg body weight + water with extract of Cyperus esculentu+ rat cho . The results show a destruction in the testicular histology, decreased sperm count, activity and morphology of Group 2 administered with lead acetate only, which was statistically significant (P<0.05), and there was also a dose-dependent improvement in the parameters studied in the Group 3 given extract of Cyperus esculentus. This shows that the extract of Cyperus esculentus has a regenerative effect on the destroyed testicular histology induced by lead acetate.


The use of drugs was related to medical, psychological, and sociological parameters in an 80-year-old population. Use of drugs on the whole, as well as the use of specific drug categories such as digitalis, diuretics, other cardiovascular drugs, hypnotics, sedatives, analgesics and laxatives were related to an impaired quality of life. However, the use of vitamins and herbal pills was not related to an impaired quality of life. Use of hypnotics was related to neuroticism and to depressed mood. Persons using digitalis, diuretics and other cardiovascular drugs felt more lonely and had a stronger feeling of loneliness. According to a discriminant analysis, five questions could identify 70% of the persons using drugs. These questions were: frequency of visits to the doctor, subjective health, smoking (smokers used fewer drugs), feeling of loneliness, and objective health.


ABSTRACT Objective: To determine the prevalence, outcomes, and predictors of multidrug-resistant nosocomial lower respiratory tract infections (LRTI) in patients in an ICU. Methods: This was an observational cohort study involving patients with nosocomial LRTI (health care-associated pneumonia, hospital-acquired pneumonia, or ventilator-associated pneumonia). Data were prospectively collected between 2015 and 2019. The multidrug-resistant pathogens (MDRPs) identified in the isolates studied included resistant to extended-spectrum cephalosporin-resistant and carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and Pseudomonas aeruginosa, carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae, and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus at microbiological diagnosis. Results: During the study period, 267 patients in the ICU were diagnosed with LRTI, microbiological confirmation of LRTI having been obtained in 237. Of these, 146 (62%) had at least one MDRP isolate. Patients infected with MDRP were found to have poorer outcomes than patients infected with susceptible strains, such as prolonged mechanical ventilation (18.0 days vs. 12.0 days; p < 0.001), prolonged ICU length of stay (23.0 days vs.16.0 days; p < 0.001), and higher mortality (73% vs. 53%; p < 0.001) when compared with patients infected with susceptible strains. Hospital length of stay ≥ 5 days (OR = 3.20; 95% CI: 1.39-7.39; p = 0.005) and prolonged use vasoactive drugs (OR = 3.15; 95% CI: 1.42-7.01; p = 0.004) were independent predictors of LRTI caused by MDRPs (LRTI-MDRP). The presence of LRTI-MDRP was found to be an independent predictor of death (OR = 2.311; 95% CI: 1.091-4.894; p = 0.028). Conclusions: Prolonged use of vasoactive drugs and prolonged hospital length of stay were independent predictors of LRTI-MDRP in this population of critically ill patients with very poor outcomes.


In this article we break asset's betas with common factors into components attributable to news about future cash flows, real interest rates, and excess returns. To achieve this decomposition, we use a vector autoregressive time-series model and an approximate log-linear present value relation. The betas of industry and size portfolios with the market are largely attributed to changing expected returns. Betas with inflation and industrial production reflect opposing cash flow and expected return effects. We also show how asset pricing theory restricts the expected excess return components of betas.


Siberian hamsters (Phodopus sungorus) adapt to seasonal environmental conditions with marked changes in body mass, primarily in the form of adiposity. Winter‐like conditions (e.g. short days) are sufficient to decrease body mass by approximately 30% in part via reductions in food intake. The neuroendocrine mechanisms responsible for these changes are not well understood, and homeostatic orexigenic/anorexigenic systems of the hypothalamus provide little explanation. We investigated the potential role of endocannabinoids, which are known modulators of appetite and metabolism, in mediating seasonal changes in energy balance. Specifically, we housed hamsters in long or short days for 0, 3, or 9 weeks and measured endocannabinoid levels in the hypothalamus, brainstem, liver and retroperitoneal white adipose tissue (RWAT). An additional group of males housed in short days for 25 weeks were also compared with long‐day controls. Following 9 weeks in short days, levels of the endocannabinoid 2‐arachidonoylglycerol (2‐AG) were significantly elevated in RWAT and reduced in brainstem, although they returned to long‐day levels by week 25 in short‐day males that had cycled back to summer‐like energy balance. Endocannabinoid levels in these tissues correlated significantly with adiposity and change in body mass. No photoperiodic changes were observed in the hypothalamus or liver; however, sex differences in 2‐AG levels were found in the liver (males > females). We further tested the effects of CB1 receptor signalling on ingestive behaviour. Five daily injections of CB1 antagonist SR141716 significantly reduced food intake and body mass but not food hoarding. Although the CB1 agonist arachidonyl‐2‐chloroethylamide did not appreciably affect either ingestive behaviour, body mass was significantly elevated following 2 days of injections. Taken altogether, these findings demonstrate that endocannabinoid levels vary with sex and photoperiod in a site‐specific manner, and that altered signalling at CB1 receptors affects energy balance in Siberian hamsters.


Testicular tumors of the adrenogenital syndrome (TTAGS) are a rare disease, with a benign curse. We present the case of a 12-year-old patient with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), precocious puberty and bilateral testicular masses. Hormonal control had been adequate. Incidental finding of bilateral testicular masses, with negative testicular tumoral biomarkers. The patient underwent right testicular sparing surgery, finding an intraparenchymal nodular mass. Pathological study showed a TTAGS, positive for CD99, Melan A, inhibin and synaptophysin markers. Conservative management was decided.


Sound field control to create multiple personal audio spaces (sound zones) in a shared listening environment is an active research topic. Typically, sound zones in the literature have aimed to reproduce monophonic audio programme material. The planarity control optimization approach can reproduce sound zones with high levels of acoustic contrast, while constraining the energy flux distribution in the target zone to impinge from a certain range of azimuths. Such a constraint has been shown to reduce problematic self-cancellation artefacts such as uneven sound pressure levels and complex phase patterns within the target zone. Furthermore, multichannel reproduction systems have the potential to reproduce spatial audio content at arbitrary listening positions (although most exclusively target a 'sweet spot'). By designing the planarity control to constrain the impinging energy rather tightly, a sound field approximating a plane-wave can be reproduced for a listener in an arbitrarily-placed target zone. In this study, the application of planarity control for stereo reproduction in the context of a personal audio system was investigated. Four solutions, to provide virtual left and right channels for two audio programmes, were calculated and superposed to achieve the stereo effect in two separate sound zones. The performance was measured in an acoustically treated studio using a 60 channel circular array, and compared against a least-squares pressure matching solution whereby each channel was reproduced as a plane wave field. Results demonstrate that planarity control achieved 6 dB greater mean contrast than the least-squares case over the range 250-2000 Hz. Based on the principal directions of arrival across frequency, planarity control produced azimuthal RMSE of 4.2/4.5 degrees for the left/right channels respectively (leastsquares 2.8/3.6 degrees). Future work should investigate the perceived spatial quality of the implemented system with respect to a reference stereophonic setup.


Objective To investigate the association between pre-treatment thrombocytosis and prognosis in patients with ovarian cancer (OC). Methods PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library were searched for articles regarding the prognosis of OC patients with pre-treatment thrombocytosis by the end of March 2018. Pooled estimates for overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) events were calculated as hazard ratios (HRs) either on a fixed or random effect model by Stata 13.0 software. Funnel plot and Egger's test were applied to evaluate publication bias and sensitivity analyses were undertaken to estimate the strength of outcomes. Results Eleven studies that met the inclusion criteria were enrolled, including a total of 4,953 patients. Pooled results showed that pre-treatment thrombocytosis was significantly associated with OS (HR=1.722; 95% confidence interval [CI]=1.437–2.064) and PFS (HR=1.452; 95% CI=1.323–1.593) in the cohort. Significant correlation was found in OS and PFS between pre-treatment thrombocytosis and both epithelial OC (all stages and differentiation degrees of OC) and advanced epithelial OC (III or IV) by subgroup analyses, which were performed according to publication year, country, case numbers, OC category, International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics stage, and cut-off value. However, subgroup analyses indicated no significant correlation between pre-treatment thrombocytosis and OS for patients with high-grade serous (poorly differentiated or undifferentiated) OC (HR=1.220; 95% CI=0.946–1.573; p=0.125). Egger's test demonstrated no obvious publication bias in the articles enrolled in this study (OS: p=0.226; PFS: p=0.071). Conclusion Pre-treatment thrombocytosis might be taken as an independent prognostic indicator for patients with OC.


New type of White-Light Emitting Diode (WOLED) that emits three primary colors of red, green and blue has been demonstrated. WOLED is properly laid out with emitting layers so that all three wavelengths of light can be emitted by using fit energy level, and the organic functional layer named white balanced layer (WBL) is introduced. As for the material used as WBL, the experiment used NPB that has electron blocking effect with its large LUMO value. The color purity of such WOLED can be easily adjusted through the adjustment of the number of electron carriers injected into light emitting layer. Therefore, the experiment organized WOLED by using doping concentration of highest efficiency demonstrated by RGB single color device, and adjusted color purity of white color through the adjustment of WBL thickness adjustment. In the case of WOLED device that possesses the device structure of ITO/m-MTDATA 40 nm/NPB 5 nm/NPB + P-1 (3%) 3 nm/NPB 0.1 nm/Alq3 + C-545T(5%) 0.5 nm/IDE-120 + IDE-105(7%) 35 nm/LiF 1 nm/Al 150 nm in this study, color coordinate was (0.341, 0.424) and light emitting efficiency was 16.5 cd/A at current density 10 mA/cm2, so the WOLED demonstrated highly efficient characteristics of over commercial level.


Blasters are one of the highest exposed work groups to diesel particulate matter (DPM) in underground metal/nonmetal mining. These workers can spend a good portion of their day under a canopy in a basket loading blastholes with explosives. Therefore, one way of potentially reducing their exposures to DPM is to place a canopy air curtain (CAC) on the basket of the ANFO loader. In the original design of the CAC on a roof bolting machine and shuttle car, a fan draws in air through a filter to capture the dust and then supplies clean air beneath the canopy where a miner is working. This paper describes the testing of a CAC that was redesigned to fit an ANFO loader and prevent exposures to DPM as well as respirable dust. Laboratory measurements demonstrated reductions of submicron particles that relate to the percent reductions of DPM. The CAC provided substantial protection of mine workers to DPM (80% reductions), from within 15.24 cm (6 inches) of the edge of the CAC using a 7.62-cm (3-inch) lip. As the mine worker approaches the edges of the CAC, the percent reduction starts to reduce to the 30–50% range. The mine worker achieves the best results when within 15.24 cm (6 inches) from the edge of the CAC. In addition, the CAC should be located such that the breathing zone of the mine worker is 25.4–50.8 cm (10–20 inches) below the CAC.


Turn on events: A molecular probe consisting of a boradiazaindacene unit conjugated with a dicyano-vinyl group has been designed for the selective and sensitive detection of cyanide by strong fluorescence enhancement in aqueous media (see scheme).


Emissions of the trace gas nitrous oxide (N2O) play an important role for the greenhouse effect and stratospheric ozone depletion, but the impacts of climate change on N2O fluxes and the underlying microbial drivers remain unclear. The aim of this study was to determine the effects of sustained climate change on field N2O fluxes and associated microbial enzymatic activities, microbial population abundance and community diversity in an extensively managed, upland grassland. We recorded N2O fluxes, nitrification and denitrification, microbial population size involved in these processes and community structure of nitrite reducers (nirK) in a grassland exposed for 4 years to elevated atmospheric CO2 (+200 ppm), elevated temperature (+3.5 °C) and reduction of summer precipitations (−20%) as part of a long‐term, multifactor climate change experiment. Our results showed that both warming and simultaneous application of warming, summer drought and elevated CO2 had a positive effect on N2O fluxes, nitrification, N2O release by denitrification and the population size of N2O reducers and NH4 oxidizers. In situ N2O fluxes showed a stronger correlation with microbial population size under warmed conditions compared with the control site. Specific lineages of nirK denitrifier communities responded significantly to temperature. In addition, nirK community composition showed significant changes in response to drought. Path analysis explained more than 85% of in situ N2O fluxes variance by soil temperature, denitrification activity and specific denitrifying lineages. Overall, our study underlines that climate‐induced changes in grassland N2O emissions reflect climate‐induced changes in microbial community structure, which in turn modify microbial processes.


Cryptochromes (CRYs) are blue light receptors that mediate plant photoresponses through regulating gene expressions. We recently reported that Arabidopsis CRY2 could form light-elicited liquid condensates to control RNA methylation. However, whether CRY2 condensation is involved in other gene expression–regulatory processes remains unclear. Here, we show that MOS4-associated complex subunits 3A and 3B (MAC3A/3B) are CRY-interacting proteins and assembled into nuclear CRY condensates. mac3a3b double mutants exhibit hypersensitive photoinhibition of hypocotyl elongation, suggesting that MAC3A/3B positively control hypocotyl growth. We demonstrate the noncanonical activity of MAC3A as a DNA binding protein that modulates transcription. Genome-wide mapping of MAC3A-binding sites reveals that blue light enhances the association of MAC3A with its DNA targets, which requires CRYs. Further evidence indicates that MAC3A and ELONGATED HYPOCOTYL 5 (HY5) occupy overlapping genomic regions and compete for the same targets. These results argue that photocondensation of CRYs fine-tunes light-responsive hypocotyl growth by balancing the opposed effects of HY5 and MAC3A.


Recent self-supervised learning methods are able to learn high-quality image representations and are closing the gap with supervised approaches. However, these methods are unable to acquire new knowledge incrementally – they are, in fact, mostly used only as a pre-training phase over IID data. In this work we investigate self-supervised methods in continual learning regimes without any replay mechanism. We show that naive functional regularization, also known as feature distillation, leads to lower plasticity and limits continual learning performance. Instead, we propose Projected Functional Regularization in which a separate temporal projection network ensures that the newly learned feature space preserves information of the previous one, while at the same time allowing for the learning of new features. This prevents forgetting while maintaining the plasticity of the learner. Comparison with other incremental learning approaches applied to self-supervision demonstrates that our method obtains competitive performance in different scenarios and on multiple datasets.


Objective: Aim of this study is to investigate the influence of aortic diameter on hemodynamic environment characteristics in patient with the bicuspid aortic valve (BAV) and dilated ascending aorta (AAo) .Methods: In this study, an MRI of one BAV patient with 4.5 cm AAo was collected and numerical model was constructed. Based on the images,the other three numerical models were constructed with different ascending aortic size with 4.0cm, 5.0cm and 5.5cm respectively while the size and the geometry of other parts were fixed. Then hemodynamics in these four models was simulated numerically and the flow patterns and loading distributions were investigated.Results: Hemodynamics environments in the AAo were simulated with different aortic size. As the aortic diameter increases, we find: 1. the blood flow becomes more disturbing;2.the wall pressure at ascending aortic is higher; 3. the wall shear stress at the ascending aortic decreases; 4.oscillatory shear index of the outer part on the proximal AAo increases;5. all these hemodynamic parameters described above are asymmetrically distributed in dilated AAo and more parts of aorta would be affected as the AAo dilatation progresses.Conclusions: The study revealed that the diameter of ascending aortic can significantly influence the magnitude and distribution of the dynamics. There are altered flow patterns, pressure difference, WSS and OSI distribution features in bicuspid aortic valve patients with vascular dilatation. As the extent of aortic dilatation increases especially exceed 5.5cm,this study support the recent guideline that aortic replacement should be considered .


The method of the sequential completion has been used efficiently to define products of distributions. Some results for products of distributions on R1 have been given by J. Mikusinski, B. Fisher and Cheng Lin Zhi et al. The main aim of this paper is to extend the method to the case for several variables. A number of products such as δ(r) ᴑ δ(s), xr + ᴑ δ(s) and x-r ᴑ δ(s), etc., are considered.


The responsivity and the noise of a detector determine the sensitivity. Thermal energy usually affects both the responsivity and the noise spectral density. In this work, the noise characteristics and responsivity of an antenna-coupled Al-GaN/GaN high-electron-mobility-transistor (HEMT) terahertz detector are evaluated at temperatures elevated from 300 K to 473 K. Noise spectrum measurement and a simultaneous measurement of the source-drain conductance and the terahertz photocurrent allow for detailed analysis of the electrical characteristics, the photoresponse, and the noise behavior. The responsivity is reduced from 59 mA/W to 11 mA/W by increasing the detector temperature from 300 K to 473 K. However, the noise spectral density maintains rather constantly around 1-2 pA/Hz(1/2) at temperatures below 448 K, above which the noise spectrum abruptly shifts from Johnson-noise type into flicker-noise type and the noise density is increased up to one order of magnitude. The noise-equivalent power (NEP) is increased from 22 pW/Hz(1/2) at 300 K to 60 pW/Hz(1/2) at 448 K mainly due to the reduction in mobility. Above 448 K, the NEP is increased up to 1000 pW/Hz(1/2) due to the strongly enhanced noise. The sensitivity can be recovered by cooling the detector back to room temperature.


Abstract Marshallsussmanite (IMA2013-067) is a new pyroxenoid mineral from the Wessels mine, Kalahari Manganese Field, Northern Cape Province, South Africa. Marshallsussmanite has ideal formula NaCaMnSi3O8(OH) and triclinic P$\bar{1}$ symmetry. Marshallsussmanite forms vitreous pink bladed crystals to 2.1 cm. The mineral shows perfect cleavage on both {100} and {001}. The chemical composition from electron microprobe (average of 20 analyses) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer analysis (average of three analyses) is Li2O 0.43, Na2O 8.06, MgO 0.08, CaO 15.33, MnO 21.79, SiO2 51.71; totalling 97.40 wt.%. The empirical formula, normalized to 3 Si and assuming 1 H apfu is Li0.100Na0.906Ca0.953Mg0.007Mn1.071Si3O8(OH). Unit-cell parameters from single crystal X-ray diffraction are a = 7.7854(4), b = 6.9374(4), c = 6.8516(3) Å, α = 90.683(3)°, β = 94.330(3)°, γ = 102.856(3)°, V = 359.59(3) Å3; Z = 2. The crystal structure refinement converged with Robs = 0.0248 and site occupancy refinement gives crystal chemistry [Na0.948Li0.052][Ca0.793Mn0.207] [Mn0.937Ca0.063]Si3O8(OH). Marshallsussmanite is a single chain silicate with a repeat interval of three tetrahedra (i.e. dreier chain). Marshallsussmanite is a member of the pectolite group of pyroxenoids, which also includes barrydawsonite-(Y), cascandite, pectolite, serandite and tanohataite. Parallel silicate chains form layers, intercalated with well-ordered cation layers. Calcium and Mn both exhibit octahedral coordination, while Na has four bonded interactions in a coordination sphere (radius 3 Å) of seven separate O atoms. Procrystal electron density and bond valence modelling results are compared. The mineral has an unusually strong hydrogen bond with O4⋅⋅⋅O3 separation of 2.458(2) Å. Unlike pectolite and serandite, O4 in marshallsussmanite acts as an H-bond donor and O3 is an H-bond acceptor. Cation ordering in pyroxenoids has a substantial impact on the H position and corresponding H-bonding schemata.


This paper presents a direct implementation scheme of the non-local multi-qubit controlled phase gate by using optical fibres and adiabatic passage. The smaller operation number for implementing the multi-qubit controlled phase gate and needlessness for addressing individually save physical resource and lower the difficulties of experiment. Meanwhile, the scheme is immune from some decoherence effects such as the atomic spontaneous emission and fibre loss. In principle, it is scalable.


Cooperative energy spectrum sensing has been proved effective to detect the spectrum holes in Cognitive Radio (CR). However, its performance may suffer from the noise uncertainty, which is portrayed by the SNR wall in some literatures. In this paper we analyze the spectrum sensing performance under noise uncertainty and propose a new approach to obtain the SNR wall. In addition, a suboptimal liner cooperative sensing algorithm with wavelet denoising is proposed to reduce the impact of noise uncertainty. Analysis and numberical results show that cooperative sensing and wavelet denoising can significantly improve the sensing performance under noise uncertainty condition.


Proceedings: AACR 106th Annual Meeting 2015; April 18-22, 2015; Philadelphia, PA

Background:

Uterine papillary serous carcinoma (UPSC) comprises less than 10% of all endometrial cancers but accounts for a disproportionately high number of deaths. Few prospective studies focus solely on this aggressive subtype, making it difficult to determine optimal treatment strategies. The purpose of this study was therefore to identify novel therapeutic targets that could aid in the management of UPSC.

Methods:

Clinical and RNA sequencing data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) was used to identify genes that were differentially expressed between endometrioid endometrial carcinoma (EEC) and UPSC, which also showed a significant association with overall patient survival duration in UPSC patients. Ubiquitin C-terminal hydrolase L1 (UCHL1) upregulation and correlation with survival was validated by immunohistochemical staining of an independent cohort of paraffin samples. UCHL1 was silenced by siRNA transfection and lentiviral shRNA transduction in UPSC cell lines ARK1, ARK2 and HEC50 to evaluate the role of UCHL1 on cell proliferation, migration and cell cycle progression. RPPA data from TCGA was used to identify proteins whose expression correlated with UCHL1 expression. Interaction between UCHL1 and cyclin B1 was determined by co-immunoprecipitation. The effect of UCHL1 silencing on cyclin B1 levels was evaluated by Western blot analysis, and the effect on cell cycle progression was determined by flow cytometry.

Results:

UCHL1 mRNA and protein expression levels were significantly higher in in UPSC compared to EEC. Kaplan-Meier analysis and cox regression of the TCGA data set and an independent cohort of patient samples revealed that UCHL1 expression correlated significantly with poorer overall survival in UPSC, especially in late-stage patients. siRNA-mediated silencing did not affect cell migration, but reduced the proliferation rates of ARK1, ARK2 and HEC50 in vitro. UCHL1 RNA expression was positively correlated with cyclin B1 protein levels in the TCGA data set. Accordingly, UCHL1 silencing reduced cyclin B1 protein but not mRNA expression levels in ARK1, ARK2 and HEC50. Cell cycle analysis of ARK1, ARK2 and HEC50 after UCHL1 silencing showed a reduction in the percentage of cells in the S and G2/M phases, with or without cell synchronization.

Conclusion:

These findings indicate that UCHL1 contributes to the aggressiveness of UPSC by stabilizing cyclin B1 and increasing cell proliferation, suggesting that it may be a therapeutic target for UPSC.

Citation Format: Suet Ying Kwan, Samuel C. Mok, Kwong-Kwok Wong, Rosemarie E. Schmandt, Karen H. Lu. Ubiquitin C-terminal hydrolase L1 (UCHL1) modulates uterine papillary serous cancer progression through interaction with cyclin B1. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 106th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2015 Apr 18-22; Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(15 Suppl):Abstract nr 3559. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2015-3559


The separation of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from the peripheral blood is an important issue that has been highlighted because of their high clinical potential. However, techniques that depend solely on tumor-specific surface molecules or just the larger size of CTCs are limited by tumor heterogeneity. Here, we present a slanted weir microfluidic device that utilizes the size and deformability of CTCs to separate them from the unprocessed whole blood. By testing its ability using a highly invasive breast cancer cell line, our device achieved a 97% separation efficiency, while showing an 8-log depletion of erythrocytes and 5.6-log depletion of leukocytes. We also developed an image analysis tool that was able to characterize the various morphologies and differing deformability of the separating cells. From the results, we believe our system possesses a high potential for liquid biopsy, aiding future cancer research.


This study reviews development of the Russian roundwood exports to main importing countries in Northern Europe. In addition to unit prices and traded volumes, this study also shortly describes the significance of imported Russian roundwood with respect to national roundwood markets in importing countries. According to the trade flows, majority of the roundwood from Russia has been traded to Scandinavia and around the Baltic Sea region. Especially, Finland and Sweden have been the most important roundwood importers from Russia. Although some amounts of roundwood from Russia have also been traded to Central Europe, their role and importance with respect to local forest production and removals have been only marginal. Due to its geographic location and lower logistic costs, Finland has typically paid lower import prices for Russian roundwood than the other importers. If the customs tariffs programme for Russian roundwood exports is coming into full effect in 2011 or later, it is clear that the effects on the national roundwood markets and the production possibilities for the traditional Nordic exporters of forest products such as Finland and Sweden are large. The Baltic States and their sawnwood industry will face a lack of logs. Also, termination of roundwood exports from Russia is likely to cause crucial rechanges in roundwood flows around the Baltic Sea region.


Thiabendazole (TBZ) is widely used in sclerotium blight, downy mildew as well as root rot disease prevention and treatment in plant. The indiscriminate use of TBZ causes the excess pesticide residues in soil, which leads to soil hardening and environmental pollution. Therefore, it is important to accurately monitor whether the TBZ residue in soil exceeds the standard. For this study, density functional theory (DFT) was used to theoretically analyze the molecular structure of TBZ, gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) were used to enhance the detection signal of surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) and the TBZ residue in red soil extracts was quantitatively determined by SERS. As a result, the theoretical Raman peaks of TBZ calculated by DFT were basically consistent with the measured results. Moreover, 784, 1008, 1270, 1328, 1406 and 1576 cm−1 could be determined as the TBZ characteristic peaks in soil and the limits of detection (LOD) could reach 0.1 mg/L. Also, there was a good linear correlation between the intensity of Raman peaks and TBZ concentration in soil (784 cm−1: y = 672.26x + 5748.4, R2 = 0.9948; 1008 cm−1: y = 1155.4x + 8740.2, R2 = 0.9938) and the limit of quantification (LOQ) of these two linear models can reach 1 mg/L. The relative standard deviation (RSD) ranged from 1.36% to 8.02% and the recovery was ranging from 95.90% to 116.65%. In addition, the 300–1700 cm−1 SERS of TBZ were analyzed by the partial least squares (PLS) and backward interval partial least squares (biPLS). Also, the prediction accuracy of TBZ in soil (Rp2 = 0.9769, RMSEP = 0.556 mg/L, RPD = 5.97) was the highest when the original spectra were pretreated by standard normal variation (SNV) and then modeled by PLS. In summary, the TBZ in red soil extracts could be quantitatively determined by SERS based on AuNPs, which was beneficial to provide a new, rapid and accurate scheme for the detection of pesticide residues in soil.


BACKGROUND
Pregabalin (PGB) is a novel antiepileptic drug and is also used as a first-line medication for the treatment of neuropathic pain. However, the mechanisms of its analgesic effects remain largely unknown.

OBJECTIVES
To elucidate the mechanisms underlying the antiallodynic action of PGB in rats with neuropathic pain.

METHODS
In a rat model of neuropathic pain induced by spared nerve injury, mechanical allodynia, as a behavioural sign of neuropathic pain, was assessed by measuring 50% paw withdrawal threshold with von Frey filaments. Activities of dorsal horn wide dynamic range (WDR) neurons were examined by extracellular electrophysiological recording in vivo.

RESULTS
Spinal administration of PGB exerted a significant antiallodynic effect and a prominent inhibitory effect on the hypersensitivity of dorsal horn WDR neurons in rats with spared nerve injury.

CONCLUSION
The antiallodynic action of PGB is likely dependent on the suppression of WDR neuron hyperexcitability in rats with neuropathic pain.


Drugs thought to increase intracellular levels of cAMP were infused intrathecally into the subarachnoid space of the lumbar spinal cord, and the effects on the acoustic startle response in rats were measured. Intrathecal infusions of the cAMP analogs dibutyryl cAMP or 8-bromo cAMP (12.5–100 micrograms) produced marked, dose-dependent increases in startle amplitude compared to the infusion of artificial cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). Local infusions of dibutyryl cAMP at more rostral levels of the spinal cord or brain failed to mimic the excitatory effect seen following lumbar intrathecal infusion. No excitation of startle was seen following intrathecal infusion of cAMP itself, ATP, 5′-AMP, or dibutyryl cGMP. A weak excitation of startle was seen following intrathecal, but not intraventricular, infusion of the water-soluble adenylate cyclase activator forskolin 7-deacetyl-7–O-hemisuccinic acid (forskolin-DHA; 5.0–100 micrograms, in artificial CSF), whereas forskolin itself [0.01–200 micrograms, in dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO)] was without consistent effect. Finally, intrathecal infusion of the selective phosphodiesterase inhibitor Rolipram (12.5–200 micrograms) produced a marked excitation of startle similar in magnitude to the effects produced by cAMP analogs. The excitatory effects of intrathecally infused dibutyryl cAMP, 8-bromo cAMP, forskolin-DHA, or Rolipram support a functional link between spinal cord cAMP and the acoustic startle reflex. Possible sites of cAMP action on startle are discussed.


This study examined the Spanish and English spelling patterns of bilingual adolescents, including the cross-linguistic effects of each language, by applying a fine-grained measure to the differences in spelling in naturalistic writing. Spelling errors were taken from narrative and expository writing samples provided by 20 Spanish–English bilingual adolescents (n = 160). Errors were coded by categories (phonological, orthographic, and morphological) and specific linguistic features affected and then analyzed by language and genre. Descriptive analyses noted similarities and differences among error patterns in both languages as well as language transfer (i.e., borrowings and code-switching). Statistical analyses revealed language differences in proportions of misspellings across linguistic categories. More fine-grained analyses indicated linguistic feature patterns that were shared across languages and unique to each language. Finally, borrowing, while infrequent, was noted more frequently in English compositions. This investigation appears to demonstrate that spelling, when approached as both a cognitive and linguistic activity, is complex since multiple knowledge systems must be coordinated. The use of triple word form theory to analyze misspellings in emerging bilingual writers suggests that discerning patterns of misspellings in each language provides more insight than does transfer alone into the extent that phonology, orthography, and morphology are becoming unified.


During childhood, the thyroid gland is one of the most sensitive organs to the carcinogenetic effects of ionizing radiation that may lead to papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) associated with RET/PTC oncogene rearrangement. Exposure to ionizing radiation induces a transient "oxidative burst" through radiolysis of water, which can cause DNA damage and mediates part of the radiation effects. H(2)O(2) is a potent DNA-damaging agent that induces DNA double-strand breaks, and consequently, chromosomal aberrations. Irradiation by 5 Gy X-ray increased extracellular H(2)O(2). Therefore, we investigated the implication of H(2)O(2) in the generation of RET/PTC1 rearrangement after X-ray exposure. We developed a highly specific and sensitive nested reverse transcription-PCR method. By using the human thyroid cell line HTori-3, previously found to produce RET/PTC1 after gamma-irradiation, we showed that H(2)O(2), generated during a 5 Gy X-ray irradiation, causes DNA double-strand breaks and contributes to RET/PTC1 formation. Pretreatment of cells with catalase, a scavenger of H(2)O(2), significantly decreased RET/PTC1 rearrangement formation. Finally, RET/PTC chromosomal rearrangement was detected in HTori-3.1 cells after exposure of cells to H(2)O(2) (25 micromol/L), at a dose that did not affect the cell viability. This study shows for the first time that H(2)O(2) is able to cause RET/PTC1 rearrangement in thyroid cells and consequently highlights that oxidative stress could be responsible for the occurrence of RET/PTC1 rearrangement found in thyroid lesions even in the absence of radiation exposure.


Background: Depression is a highly prevalent condition and includes clusters of symptoms, namely, depressive cognition, anxiety, and visceral symptoms. Depressive symptoms often respond sub-optimally to pharmacotherapy. Adjunctive transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), a noninvasive brain stimulation modality, may improve depressive symptomatology. Aim: The aim of this study was to study the effect of tDCS as an augmentation strategy in depression and its various symptom domains. Materials and Methods: It is a prospective interventional study. Patients diagnosed with depressive disorder (based on International Classification of Disease- 10 criteria, diagnosed by treating psychiatrist), aged 18-70 years, who showed inadequate improvement on antidepressant selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, were recruited after informed consent. Each participant was administered 20 sessions of tDCS over 2 weeks, each session of 20 min, with anode placement at left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and cathode at right supraorbital region. Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HAM-D) was administered pre- and post-intervention to assess the change in symptoms. Results: Of a total of 35 participants, the mean score on HAM-D prior to and postintervention was 19.97 (standard deviation [SD] = 3.519) and 13.17 (SD = 3.365), respectively. The difference was statistically highly significant (P = 0.000) on paired t-test. All symptom domains of HAM-D, identified using the Cole and Motivala model (Cole et al., 2004), also showed significant reduction from pre-tDCS to post-tDCS scores (P = 0.000). Conclusion: Positive effect of tDCS on depressive symptoms, its tolerability and safety profile, and affordability makes it an effective therapeutic strategy in augmenting antidepressants in patients with depression. However, longer period studies with larger sample size may yield more generalizable results.


Background. Intra-articular infections can rapidly lead to osteoarthritic degradation. The aim of this clinical biomarker analysis was to investigate the influence of inflammation on cartilage destruction and metabolism. Methods. Patients with acute joint infections were enrolled in a prospective clinical trial and the cytokine composition of effusions (n = 76) was analyzed. Characteristics of epidemiology and disease severity were correlated with levels of cytokines with known roles in cartilage turnover and degradation. Results. Higher synovial IL-1β concentrations were associated with clinical parameters indicating a higher disease severity (p < 0.03) excluding the incidence of sepsis. Additionally, intra-articular IL-1β levels correlated with inflammatory serum parameters as leucocyte counts (LC) and C-reactive protein concentrations (p < 0.05) but not with age or comorbidity. Both higher LC and synovial IL-1β levels were associated with increased intra-articular collagen type II cleavage products (C2C) indicating cartilage degradation. Joints with preinfectious lesions had higher C2C levels. Intra-articular inflammation led to increased concentrations of typical cartilage metabolites as bFGF, BMP-2, and BMP-7. Infections with Staphylococcus species induced higher IL-1β expression but less cartilage destruction than other bacteria. Conclusion. Articular infections have bacteria-specific implications on cartilage metabolism. Collagen type II cleavage products reliably mark destruction, which is associated with upregulation of typical cartilage turnover cytokines. This trial is registered with DRKS00003536, MISSinG.


We propose a phenomenological model for shear-induced melting aimed at assisting the design of experimental studies of this phenomenon. For increasing strain rates, the model predicts the changes in liquid fraction and shear stress as a function of interfacial supercooling. We discuss the experimental conditions under which shear-induced melting could be observed in a range of materials.


Existing neural generation approaches create multi-sentence text as a single sequence. In this paper we propose a structured convolutional decoder that is guided by the content structure of target summaries. We compare our model with existing sequential decoders on three data sets representing different domains. Automatic and human evaluation demonstrate that our summaries have better content coverage.


Background/aim Memory is a mechanism for coding, storing, and recalling information. Weak memory and learning disability are common psychological problems in the elderly. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of 4 weeks of frankincense consumption on explicit motor memory and serum BDNF in the elderly. Materials and methods Twenty elderly men (mean age of 60.2 ± 1.7 years) were randomly divided into two groups: experimental (n = 12) and placebo (n = 8). The first blood samples were collected 24 h before the pretest. Then both groups participated in a 4-week exercise program based on the protocol of exercising motor memory. During this period, the experimental group received 500-mg frankincense pills two times a day. The second blood sample collection and acquisition test were conducted following the last session of the exercise program. A retention test and a third blood sampling were performed 2 weeks after the last training session. Mixed analysis of variance (2 × 3) for repeated measures was used to analyze the data. Results Intergroup comparisons showed that frankincense had a significant effect on the acquisition and retention of explicit motor memory. No difference was observed in serum BDNF between the experimental and placebo groups. Conclusion This study revealed that 4 weeks of frankincense consumption facilitates the acquisition and retention of motor memory in older men with moderate mental status.


In the increasing development of the Internet today, Internet frauds happen everywhere and anytime, to identify the suspect is so difficult that detect network bilk case brings difficulty. This project takes the instant chat tool QQ for example and gives a complete solution for the Internet fraud detection. Through the behavior features of suspects, the project can differentiate different people at the high precision, and keyboard popularity rate is very high, which provides hardware environment for the system operation. In the system, this project extracts keystroke feature by monitoring users' keystrokes, and introduces the local authentication and server authentication to identify users. After positioning for the suspects through the IP, the system assist the police to investigate network fraud cases.


: The haplotype harboring the SPINK1 c.101A>G (p.Asn34Ser) variant (also known as rs17107315:T>C) represents the most important heritable risk factor for idiopathic chronic pancreatitis identified to date. The causal variant contained within this risk haplotype has however remained stubbornly elusive. Herein we set out to resolve this enigma by employing a hypothesis-driven approach. Firstly, we searched for variants in strong linkage disequilibrium with rs17107315:T>C using HaploReg v4.1. Secondly, we identified two candidate SNPs by visual inspection of sequences spanning all 25 SNPs found to be in linkage disequilibrium with rs17107315:T>C, guided by prior knowledge of pancreas-specific transcription factors and their cognate binding sites. Thirdly, employing a novel cis -regulatory module-guided approach to further filter the two candidate SNPs yielded a solitary candidate causal variant. Finally, combining data from phylogenetic conservation and chromatin accessibility, co-transfection transactivation experiments and population genetic studies, we suggest that rs142703147:C>A, which disrupts a PTF1L binding site within an evolutionarily conserved HNF1A−PTF1 L cis -regulatory module located ~4 kb upstream of the SPINK1 promoter, contributes to the aforementioned chronic pancreatitis risk haplotype. Further studies are required not only to improve the characterization of this functional SNP but also to identify other functional components that might contribute to this high-risk haplotype.