1,721,019 research outputs found
Sketch up: Towards qualitative shape data management
No full textSize functions, a fairly new class of topological transforms, are used to implement SketchUp, a demonstrative classifier of free-hand drawn sketches. Sketches are drawn without a template and in total freedom. Four different such transforms cooperate to allow recognition in a seven item list of tools. 207 drawings have been examined, with 87.9% of success, 8.7% of rejection, 3.4% of errors. The training set is very small: 66 drawings; none of the drawers was common to the training and test sets
Impaired Innate Immunity Mechanisms in the Brain of Alzheimer's Disease.
Full text linkAmong environmental factors likely associated with Alzheimer’s disease (AD), persistent
virus infections, and age-related progressive decline of immune competence might play a pivotal
role. However, AD antimicrobial brain immune responses are poorly investigated. The present
study focused on genes involved in antimicrobial defenses, especially against virus infections, in the
AD brain. In particular, mRNA levels of IRF7, MED23, IL28B, and IFN-α genes were analyzed in
hippocampus and temporal cortex brain samples from AD and non-demented controls. All subjects
were also genotyped for APOE ε, IRF7, MED23, and IL28B gene polymorphisms. Most AD patients
showed decreased mRNA levels of all investigated genes in the hippocampus and temporal cortex.
However, a small group of AD patients showed increased hippocampal mRNA expression of MED23,
IL28B, and IFN-α. mRNA levels of MED23, IL28B, IFN-α from the hippocampus and those of MED23
from the temporal cortex were further decreased in APOE ε4 allele AD carriers. Moreover, rs6598008
polymorphism of IRF7 was significantly associated with decreased hippocampal expression of IRF7,
MED23, IL28B, and IFN-α. These findings suggest that AD brains show impaired innate antimicrobial
gene expression profiles, and individual genetic makeup, such as positivity for the APOE ε4 and IRF7
A alleles, might affect brain immune efficienc
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
NEOPTERIN LEVELS AND IMMUNE ACTIVATION IN THE BLOOD OF CHILDREN WITH DOWN’S SYNDROME
No full textPatients with AD often show altered levels of some immune molecules in their peripheral blood which correlate with cognitive impairment. Downs' syndrome (DS) subjects are at high risk of developing Alzheimer's disease (AD). Here we studied immune molecules, such as interleukin-6 (IL-6), C reactive protein (CRP) and neopterin, in the blood of non demented children with DS to investigate whether altered peripheral immune phenotype could be present in this subjects without dementia, many years before the presentation of clinical signs of cognitive deterioration. Plasma levels of neopterin and IL-6 were measured by commercially available ELISA kits, whereas plasma CRP concentration was evaluated by nephelometric immunoassay technique. We studied a group of 40 patients with DS, 20 healthy controls and 100 patients w ith AD. Plasma levels of IL-6 and CRP were significantly higher in DS than in control children. The increase of IL-6 and CRP from DS children was similar to that found in elderly patients with clinical AD. In the present research we have also studied blood levels of neopterin which were in the normal range either in DS or control. Increased or normal levels of this metabolite have been found in the blood of AD patients. However, increased blood neopterin was likely to be only elevated in patients with advanced clinical stage of AD. Peripheral altered immune phenotype in healthy young subjects with DS might be an early sign of CNS alterations leading many years later to cognitive deterioration and dementia
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