Activity-partner recommendation

LNCS v. 9077 entitled: Advances in Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining: 19th Pacific-Asia Conference, PAKDD 2015 ... Proceedings, Part 1In many activities, such as watching movies or having dinner, people prefer to find partners before participation. Therefore, when recommending activity items (e.g., movie tickets) to users, it makes sense to also recommend suitable activity partners. This way, (i) the users save time for finding activity partners, (ii) the effectiveness of the item recommendation is increased (users may prefer activity items more if they can find suitable activity partners), (iii) recommender systems become more interesting and enkindle users' social enthusiasm. In this paper, we identify the usefulness of suggesting activity partners together with items in recommender systems. In addition, we propose and compare several methods for activity-partner recommendation. Our study includes experiments that test the practical value of activity-partner recommendation and evaluate the effectiveness of all suggested methods as well as some alternative strategies.postprin

Flavonoid intake and the risk of age-related cataract in China’s Heilongjiang Province

Background/Objectives: Epidemiological evidence suggests that diets rich in flavonoids may reduce the risk of developing age-related cataract (ARC). Flavonoids are widely distributed in foods of plant origin and the objective of this study was to evaluate retrospectively the association between the intakes of the five flavonoid subclasses and the risk of ARC.  Subjects/Methods: A population-based case-control study (249 cases and 66 controls) was carried out in Heilongjiang province, which is located in the Northeast of China, and where intakes and availability of fresh vegetables and fruits can be limited. Dietary data gathered by food-frequency questionnaire (FFQ) were used to calculate flavonoid intake. Adjusted odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) were estimated by logistic regression.  Results: No linear associations between risk of developing ARC and intakes of total dietary flavonoids, anthocyanidins, flavon-3-ol, flavanone, total flavones or total flavonols were found, but quercetin and isorhamnetin intake was inversely associated with ARC risk (OR 11.78, 95% CI: 1.62-85.84, P<0.05, and OR 6.99, 95% CI:1.12-43.44, P<0.05, quartile 4 vs quartile 1, respectively).  Conclusion: As quercetin is contained in many plant foods and isorhamnetin is only contained in very few foods, we concluded that higher quercetin intake may be an important dietary factor in the reduction of risk of age-related cataract

Informal Action—Adjudication—Rule Making: Some Recent Developments in Federal Administrative Law

Direct energy consumption of ICT hardware is only “half the story.” In order to get the “whole story,” energy consumption during the entire life cycle has to be taken into account. This chapter is a first step toward a more comprehensive picture, showing the “grey energy” (i.e., the overall energy requirements) as well as the releases (into air, water, and soil) during the entire life cycle of exemplary ICT hardware devices by applying the life cycle assessment method. The examples calculated show that a focus on direct energy consumption alone fails to take account of relevant parts of the total energy consumption of ICT hardware as well as the relevance of the production phase. As a general tendency, the production phase is more and more important the smaller (and the more energy-efficient) the devices are. When in use, a tablet computer is much more energy-efficient than a desktop computer system with its various components, so its production phase has a much greater relative importance. Accordingly, the impacts due to data transfer when using Internet services are also increasingly relevant the smaller the end-user device is, reaching up to more than 90 % of the overall impact when using a tablet computer.QC 20140825</p

Quantum Models for Psychological Measurements: An Unsolved Problem

There has been a strong recent interest in applying quantum theory (QT) outside physics, including in cognitive science. We analyze the applicability of QT to two basic properties in opinion polling. The first property (response replicability) is that, for a large class of questions, a response to a given question is expected to be repeated if the question is posed again, irrespective of whether another question is asked and answered in between. The second property (question order effect) is that the response probabilities frequently depend on the order in which the questions are asked. Whenever these two properties occur together, it poses a problem for QT. The conventional QT with Hermitian operators can handle response replicability, but only in the way incompatible with the question order effect. In the generalization of QT known as theory of positive-operator-valued measures (POVMs), in order to account for response replicability, the POVMs involved must be conventional operators. Although these problems are not unique to QT and also challenge conventional cognitive theories, they stand out as important unresolved problems for the application of QT to cognition. Either some new principles are needed to determine the bounds of applicability of QT to cognition, or quantum formalisms more general than POVMs are needed

Interleukin-1 beta-converting enzyme-like protease cleaves DNA-dependent protein kinase in cytotoxic T cell killing.

Cytotoxic T cells (CTL) represent the major defense mechanism against the spread of virus infection. It is believed that the pore-forming protein, perforin, facilitates the entry of a series of serine proteases (particularly granzyme B) into the target cell which ultimately leads to DNA fragmentation and apoptosis. We demonstrate here that during CTL-mediated cytolysis the catalytic subunit of DNA-dependent protein kinase (DNA-PKcs), an enzyme implicated in the repair of double strand breaks in DNA, is specifically cleaved by an interleukin (IL)-1 beta-converting enzyme (ICE)-like protease. A serine protease inhibitor, 3,4-dichloroisocoumarin (DCl), which is known to block granzyme B activity, inhibited CTL-induced apoptosis and prevented the degradation of DNA-PKcs in cells but failed to prevent the degradation of purified DNA-PKcs by CTL extracts. However, Tyr-Val-Ala-Asp-CH2Cl (YVAD-CMK) and other cysteine protease inhibitors prevented the degradation of purified DNA-PKcs by CTL extracts. Furthermore, incubation of DNA-PKcs with granzyme B did not produce the same cleavage pattern observed in cells undergoing apoptosis and when this substrate was incubated with either CTL extracts or the ICE-like protease, CPP32. Sequence analysis revealed that the cleavage site in DNA-PKcs during CTL killing was the same as that when this substrate was exposed to CPP32. This study demonstrates for the first time that the cleavage of DNA-PKcs in this intact cell system is exclusively due to an ICE-like protease

Hot Streaks in Artistic, Cultural, and Scientific Careers

The hot streak, loosely defined as winning begets more winnings, highlights a specific period during which an individual's performance is substantially higher than her typical performance. While widely debated in sports, gambling, and financial markets over the past several decades, little is known if hot streaks apply to individual careers. Here, building on rich literature on lifecycle of creativity, we collected large-scale career histories of individual artists, movie directors and scientists, tracing the artworks, movies, and scientific publications they produced. We find that, across all three domains, hit works within a career show a high degree of temporal regularity, each career being characterized by bursts of high-impact works occurring in sequence. We demonstrate that these observations can be explained by a simple hot-streak model we developed, allowing us to probe quantitatively the hot streak phenomenon governing individual careers, which we find to be remarkably universal across diverse domains we analyzed: The hot streaks are ubiquitous yet unique across different careers. While the vast majority of individuals have at least one hot streak, hot streaks are most likely to occur only once. The hot streak emerges randomly within an individual's sequence of works, is temporally localized, and is unassociated with any detectable change in productivity. We show that, since works produced during hot streaks garner significantly more impact, the uncovered hot streaks fundamentally drives the collective impact of an individual, ignoring which leads us to systematically over- or under-estimate the future impact of a career. These results not only deepen our quantitative understanding of patterns governing individual ingenuity and success, they may also have implications for decisions and policies involving predicting and nurturing individuals with lasting impact

SIRT3‐dependent deacetylation exacerbates acetaminophen hepatotoxicity

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/102226/1/embr2011121.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/102226/2/embr2011121-sup-0001.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/102226/3/embr2011121.reviewer_comments.pd

Paradoxical roles of antioxidant enzymes:Basic mechanisms and health implications

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) and reactive nitrogen species (RNS) are generated from aerobic metabolism, as a result of accidental electron leakage as well as regulated enzymatic processes. Because ROS/RNS can induce oxidative injury and act in redox signaling, enzymes metabolizing them will inherently promote either health or disease, depending on the physiological context. It is thus misleading to consider conventionally called antioxidant enzymes to be largely, if not exclusively, health protective. Because such a notion is nonetheless common, we herein attempt to rationalize why this simplistic view should be avoided. First we give an updated summary of physiological phenotypes triggered in mouse models of overexpression or knockout of major antioxidant enzymes. Subsequently, we focus on a series of striking cases that demonstrate “paradoxical” outcomes, i.e., increased fitness upon deletion of antioxidant enzymes or disease triggered by their overexpression. We elaborate mechanisms by which these phenotypes are mediated via chemical, biological, and metabolic interactions of the antioxidant enzymes with their substrates, downstream events, and cellular context. Furthermore, we propose that novel treatments of antioxidant enzyme-related human diseases may be enabled by deliberate targeting of dual roles of the pertaining enzymes. We also discuss the potential of “antioxidant” nutrients and phytochemicals, via regulating the expression or function of antioxidant enzymes, in preventing, treating, or aggravating chronic diseases. We conclude that “paradoxical” roles of antioxidant enzymes in physiology, health, and disease derive from sophisticated molecular mechanisms of redox biology and metabolic homeostasis. Simply viewing antioxidant enzymes as always being beneficial is not only conceptually misleading but also clinically hazardous if such notions underpin medical treatment protocols based on modulation of redox pathways

Epigenetic gene regulation by Janus kinase 1 in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma

Janus kinases (JAKs) classically signal by activating STAT transcription factors but can also regulate gene expression by epigenetically phosphorylating histone H3 on tyrosine 41 (H3Y41-P). In diffuse large B-cell lymphomas (DLBCLs), JAK signaling is a feature of the activated B-cell (ABC) subtype and is triggered by autocrine production of IL-6 and IL-10. Whether this signaling involves STAT activation, epigenetic modification of chromatin, or both mechanisms is unknown. Here we use genetic and pharmacological inhibition to show that JAK1 signaling sustains the survival of ABC DLBCL cells. Whereas STAT3 contributed to the survival of ABC DLBCL cell lines, forced STAT3 activity could not protect these cells from death following JAK1 inhibition, suggesting epigenetic JAK1 action. JAK1 regulated the expression of nearly 3,000 genes in ABC DLBCL cells, and the chromatin surrounding many of these genes was modified by H3Y41-P marks that were diminished by JAK1 inhibition. These JAK1 epigenetic target genes encode important regulators of ABC DLBCL proliferation and survival, including IRF4, MYD88, and MYC. A small molecule JAK1 inhibitor cooperated with the BTK inhibitor ibrutinib in reducing IRF4 levels and acted synergistically to kill ABC DLBCL cells, suggesting that this combination should be evaluated in clinical trials.This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the NIH National Cancer Institute, the University of Wisconsin–Madison (UW–Madison) start-up funds, KL2 Scholar Awards UL1TR0000427 and KL2TR000428, the National Cancer Institute Grant 1R01 CA187299 (to L.R.), and the UW–Madison T32 Hematology Training Award T32 HL07899 (to A.C.D.)