Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Exploring the Role of Phytochemicals: Effect of [6]-Gingerol Combined with Colloidal Gold Nanoparticles on Thyroid Carcinoma Cells

Gold nanostructure can be manufactured in many forms, such as spherical by using simple chemical method. X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) pattern of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) was derived from a 400-μL trisodium citrate solution. The diffraction peaks corresponding to the diffraction planes of (111), (200), and (220) were all indexed to the gold with a face-centered cubic structure. The lattice constant calculated from the XRD pattern is 4.078 Å, which matches the conventional cubic gold metal diffraction pattern well (Pattern card number (04-784)). The results of scanning electronic microscope show that the biological nanoparticles of gold have asymmetric shapes and different sizes grouped as a circular particle. It was observed that the fashioning of AuNPs increased with increase in the concentration of [6]-gingerol waste extracts. The viability of FTC-133 cells treated for 48 h with various concentrations of [6]-gingerol extract coated with AuNPs (12.5–400 g/mL) was used to determine the cytotoxicity. A dose-dependent reduction in FTC-133 cell viability caused by [6]-gingerol extract capped with Au NPs was substantial (P < 0.05), reaching 75% cell mortality at 400 g/mL; the IC50 was 90.5%

Hedging Pension Longevity Risk: Practical Capital Markets Solutions

Longevity risk transfer via the capital markets is now a reality. Pension plans and annuity providers can hedge longevity risk with capital markets instruments, reflecting the emergence of a new market that is poised to take off. The key players in this market are hedgers (pension plans and annuity providers), intermediaries (investment banks and broker-dealers) and end investors (ILS funds, hedge funds, endowments, etc.). We argue that the development of liquidity in this market depends on the acceptance of longevity indices and the development of standardized instruments to transfer this risk.Until now, hedgers of longevity risk have almost exclusively approached the subject from the perspective of indemnification (100 percent risk transfer). We propose an alternative approach based on a risk management paradigm that does not require 100 percent risk transfer and is consistent with the way in which other pension-related risks are managed. To this end we present a framework for longevity hedging cantered on standardized indexbased hedges. This framework uses a building-block approach in which standardized hedge building blocks are combined to provide a longevity hedge tailored to the specific demographics, benefit structure and mortality table of any pension plan. The effectiveness of this hedge is maximized by careful calibration of the mix of building blocks and then verified in hedge effectiveness tests.We also discuss customized longevity hedges that will be preferred by some hedgers, who are unconcerned by the lower liquidity and onerous requirements for data disclosure associated with these hedges, and are prepared to pay the additional premium above the cost of a standardized hedge.

Occurrence and Molecular Study of Hypermucoviscous/Hypervirulence Trait in Gut Commensal <i>K. pneumoniae</i> from Healthy Subjects

Hypervirulent Klebsiella pneumoniae (hvKp) is emerging worldwide. Hypermucoviscousity is the characteristic trait that distinguishes it from classic K. pneumoniae (cKp), which enables Kp to cause severe invasive infections. This research aimed to investigate the hypermucoviscous Kp (hmvKp) phenotype among gut commensal Kp isolated from healthy individuals and attempted to characterize the genes encoding virulence factors that may regulate the hypermucoviscosity trait. Using the string test, 50 identified Kp isolates from healthy individuals’ stool samples were examined for hypermucoviscosity and investigated by transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Antimicrobial susceptibility profiles of Kp isolates were determined using the Kirby Bauer disc method. Kp isolates were tested for genes encoding different virulence factors by PCR. Biofilm formation was assayed by the microtiter plate method. All Kp isolates were multidrug-resistant (MDR). Phenotypically, 42% of isolates were hmvKp. PCR-based genotypic testing revealed the hmvKp isolates belonged to capsular serotype K2. All study Kp isolates harbored more than one virulence gene. The genes magA and rmpA were not detected, while the terW gene was present in all isolates. The siderophores encoding genes entB and irp2 were most prevalent in hmvKp isolates (90.5%) and non-hmvKp (96.6%), respectively. hmvKp isolates harbored the genes wabG and uge with rates of 90.5% and 85.7%, respectively. The outcomes of this research highlight the potential health risk of commensal Kp to cause severe invasive diseases, owing to being hmvKp and MDR, and harboring multiple virulence genes. The absence of essential genes related to hypermucoviscosity such as magA and rmpA in hmvKp phenotypes suggests the multifactorial complexity of the hypermucoviscosity or hypervirulence traits. Thus, further studies are warranted to verify the hypermucoviscosity-related virulence factors among pathogenic and commensal Kp in different colonization niches