Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
BESI: Reliable and Heterogeneous Sensing and Intervention for In-home Health Applications

Advances in sensing, wireless communication, and data analytics have enabled various monitoring systems for smart health applications. However, many challenges remain to deploy such systems in actual homes, such as achieving robustness, unobtrusiveness, fault tolerance, privacy, and minimal user burden. This paper presents how these challenges were overcome in the realization and successful prototype deployment of the Behavioral and Environmental Sensing and Intervention (BESI) system. BESI is designed to sense behavioral activities using wearables and monitor environmental parameters with in-home sensors. With such data, behavioral patterns can then be modeled to determine associations with environmental attributes and, when appropriate, real-time notifications or interventions can be made based on these models. Challenges in building platforms with residential deployment constraints are discussed. BESI is currently deployed for an in-home study on dementia, and the results are presented to illustrate data collection procedures and system performance.
Adversarial Training for Community Question Answer Selection Based on Multi-scale Matching

Community-based question answering (CQA) websites represent an important source of information. As a result, the problem of matching the most valuable answers to their corresponding questions has become an increasingly popular research topic. We frame this task as a binary (relevant/irrelevant) classification problem, and present an adversarial training framework to alleviate label imbalance issue. We employ a generative model to iteratively sample a subset of challenging negative samples to fool our classification model. Both models are alternatively optimized using REINFORCE algorithm. The proposed method is completely different from previous ones, where negative samples in training set are directly used or uniformly down-sampled. Further, we propose using Multi-scale Matching which explicitly inspects the correlation between words and ngrams of different levels of granularity. We evaluate the proposed method on SemEval 2016 and SemEval 2017 datasets and achieves state-of-the-art or similar performance.
Content Specific Feature Learning for Fine-Grained Plant Classification

We present the plant classification system submitted by the QUT RV team to the LifeCLEF 2015 plant task. Our system learns a content specific feature for various plant parts such as branch, leaf, fruit, flower and stem. These features are learned using a deep convolutional neural network. Experiments on the LifeCLEF 2015 plant dataset show that the proposed method achieves good performance with a score of 0.633 on the test set.
Long-term sustained malaria control leads to inbreeding and fragmentation of Plasmodium vivax populations

Plasmodium vivax populations are more resistant to malaria control strategies than Plasmodium falciparum, maintaining high genetic diversity and gene flow even at low transmission. To quantify the impact of declining transmission on P. vivax populations, we investigated population genetic structure over time during intensified control efforts and over a wide range of transmission intensities and spatial scales in the Southwest Pacific. Analysis of 887 P. vivax microsatellite haplotypes (Papua New Guinea, PNG = 443, Solomon Islands = 420, Vanuatu =24) revealed substantial population structure among countries and modestly declining diversity as transmission decreases over space and time. In the Solomon Islands, which has had sustained control efforts for 20 years, significant population structure was observed on different spatial scales down to the sub-village level. Up to 37% of alleles were partitioned between populations and significant multilocus linkage disequilibrium was observed indicating substantial inbreeding. High levels of haplotype relatedness around households and within a range of 300m are consistent with a focal and clustered infections suggesting that restricted local transmission occurs within the range of vector movement and that subsequent focal inbreeding may be a key factor contributing to the observed population structure. We conclude that unique transmission strategies, including relapse allows P. vivax populations to withstand pressure from control efforts for longer than P. falciparum. However sustained control efforts do eventually impact parasite population structure and with further control pressure, populations may eventually fragment into clustered foci that could be targeted for elimination.
Functional MRI in investigating cognitive impairment in multiple sclerosis

There is increasing evidence that the severity of the clinical manifestations of multiple sclerosis (MS) does not simply result from the extent of tissue destruction, but it rather represents a complex balance between tissue damage, tissue repair, and cortical reorganization. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) provides information about the plasticity of the human brain. Therefore, it has the potential to provide important pieces of information about brain reorganization following MS‐related structural damage. When investigating cognitive systems, fMRI changes have been described in virtually all patients with MS and different clinical phenotypes. These functional changes have been related to the extent of brain damage within and outside T2‐visible lesions as well as to the involvement of specific central nervous system structures. It has also been suggested that a maladaptive recruitment of specific brain regions might be associated with the appearance of clinical symptoms in MS, such as fatigue and cognitive impairment. fMRI studies from clinically (and cognitively) impaired MS patients may be influenced by different task performances between patients and controls. As a consequence, new strategies have been introduced to assess the role, if any, of brain reorganization in severely impaired patients, including the analysis of resting‐state networks. The enhancement of any beneficial effects of this brain adaptive plasticity should be considered as a potential target of therapy for MS.
Solid-Contact Potentiometric Sensors and Multisensors Based on Polyaniline and Thiacalixarene Receptors for the Analysis of Some Beverages and Alcoholic Drinks

Electronic tongue is a sensor array that aims to discriminate and analyze complex media like food and beverages on the base of chemometrics approaches for data mining and pattern recognition. In this review, the concept of electronic tongue comprising of solid-contact potentiometric sensors with polyaniline and thacalix[4]arene derivatives is described. The electrochemical reactions of polyaniline as a background of solid-contact sensors and the characteristics of thiacalixarenes and pillararenes as neutral ionophores are briefly considered. The electronic tongue systems described were successfully applied for assessment of fruit juices, green tea, beer, and alcoholic drinks They were classified in accordance with the origination, brands and styles. Variation of the sensor response resulted from the reactions between Fe(III) ions added and sample components, i.e., antioxidants and complexing agents. The use of principal component analysis and discriminant analysis is shown for multisensor signal treatment and visualization. The discrimination conditions can be optimized by variation of the ionophores, Fe(III) concentration, and sample dilution. The results obtained were compared with other electronic tongue systems reported for the same subjects.
Analysis and Design of an 8.5-Gb/s/Link Multi-Drop Bus Using Energy-Equipartitioned Transmission Line Couplers

An 8.5-Gb/s/link non-contact multi-drop bus is presented. The signal reflections that limit the data rates of conventional multi-drop bus interfaces are dramatically reduced by using transmission line couplers at each signal branching point. As an energy-equipartitioned technique provides the same signal level to every port, wider receiver margin is achieved. The data rate is improved by 1.8 times compared to the most advanced multi-drop bus interface. The theoretical analysis and design techniques of energy-equipartitioned transmission line couplers are discussed in this paper. The design methodologies were verified through simulations performed by using a full-3D EM-simulator and experiments with FR4 test boards. Due to the low-cut characteristics of the couplers, the low-frequency components are cut off so that differentiated pulses arrive at the receiver input point. A receiver detects and recovers the received pulses by integrating them using hysteresis characteristics. The design techniques of the transceiver for the transmission line couplers are also discussed in this paper. The proposed methods were verified by using a test chip fabricated with a 90-nm CMOS process. Experiments with a prototype of an eight-drop multi-drop bus system confirmed at a data rate of 8.5-Gb/s/link. The measured timing margin at the far-end module was 0.49-UI at a BER of 10-12. The power consumption of the transceiver was 75.6-mW at a supply voltage of 1.2-V.
Assessment of the Anti-Hyperglycaemic, Anti-Inflammatory and Antioxidant Activities of the Methanol Extract of Moringa Oleifera in Diabetes-Induced Nephrotoxic Male Wistar Rats

Diabetes mellitus is an endocrine disease of multiple aetiologies in insulin secretion. A deficiency in insulin results in hyperglycemia with metabolic disturbances of biomolecules. Moringa oleifera (MO) is endemic in the tropics with a variety of ethnomedicinal importance. The leaf of this plant has been reported to possess antioxidant and medicinal properties that may be helpful in the treatment and management of diabetes and its associated complications. Diabetes was induced intraperitoneally in rats by a single dose of streptozotocin (55 mg/kg) and treated with methanolic extract of Moringa oleifera (250 mg/kg b.wt) for six weeks. Forty-eight (48) adult male Wistar strain rats were randomly divided into four groups: normal control (NC), Moringa oleifera treated control rats (NC + MO), diabetic rats (DM) and Moringa oleifera treated diabetic rats (DM + MO). Estimation of antioxidant capacity, total polyphenols, flavonoids and flavonols content of Moringa oleifera extract was performed and serum biochemical markers were evaluated. Antioxidants such as catalase (CAT), glutathione peroxidase (GPx), superoxide dismutase (SOD) activities, glutathione (GSH) and inflammatory biomarkers were determined in the kidney. Results showed high antioxidant capacities of MO extract and improved serum biochemical markers, whilst lipid peroxidation (MDA) levels were reduced in non-diabetic and diabetic rats after MO treatment when compared to normal control. Subsequent administration of MO led to an increased concentration of serum albumin, globulin and total protein with a decrease in the level of MDA, and improvements in CAT, SOD, GSH, GPx, (tumour necrosis factor-alpha)TNF-α and (interleukin-6)IL-6. MO contains potent phytochemical constituents that offer protective action against diabetic-induced renal damage, reactive oxygen species (ROS) and inflammation and could therefore play a role in reducing diabetic complications, particularly in developing countries such as in Africa where the majority cannot afford orthodox medicine.
Estradiol modulates behavioral arousal and induces changes in gene expression profiles in brain regions involved in the control of vigilance

Estrogens reduce lipocalin‐type prostaglandin D synthase (L‐PGDS) expression in a region‐dependent manner in the mouse preoptic area (POA). This result linked sex hormones with sleep–wake cycle regulation. In turn, the somnogenic effects of prostaglandin D2 have been shown to be mediated via increases in adenosine, and a select group of sleep‐active ventrolateral preoptic nucleus (VLPO) neurons are directly activated by adenosine 2A (A2A) agonists. We hypothesized that increased arousal after estrogen administration is mediated by a reduction of L‐PGDS and lowered A2A receptor expression in the POA. To test this hypothesis, running wheel activity (RWA) of ovariectomized female mice treated with oil or different doses of estradiol benzoate (EB) was studied, followed by quantitative reverse‐transcriptase polymerase chain reaction to determine mRNA expression of genes related to sleep and arousal in brain region extracts from oil‐treated and EB‐treated mice. RWA was increased in estrogen‐treated mice, and these effects followed an inverted‐U dose–response curve. The most effective dose (1.25 μg EB/capsule) increased RWA more than 2.5‐fold, as compared with control animals, and EB doses that were higher or lower were less effective. Increases in RWA were accompanied by decreased L‐PGDS mRNA in the POA and decreased A2A receptor mRNA in the POA and VLPO. Given that EB‐treated animals have higher motor activity and lower levels of L‐PGDS and A2A receptor mRNAs in sleep‐active areas, these correlational findings support the hypothesis that EB may increase behavioral arousal by decreasing the levels of well‐known sleep‐inducing molecules within the preoptic region.
Matched-Pair Analysis Comparing the Outcomes of T Cell/Histiocyte-Rich Large B Cell Lymphoma and Diffuse Large B Cell Lymphoma in Patients Treated with Rituximab-CHOP

Background: T cell/histiocyte-rich large B cell lymphoma (THRLBCL) is a rare morphological variant of diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL), accounting for 1-3% of all DLBCLs. However, its impact on treatment outcome and prognosis is still not clearly defined. Methods: We compared the clinical outcomes between THRLBCL and DLBCL, not otherwise specified (NOS), in patients treated with rituximab plus cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine and prednisone (R-CHOP). Results: Data from 11 patients with THRLBCL were matched to 33 patients with DLBCL-NOS. Patients were matched by five established prognostic factors of the International Prognostic Index, including age, Ann Arbor stage, Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status, serum lactate dehydrogenase level and the number of extranodal involvement. There was no significant difference in the complete response rate to R-CHOP between THRLBCL (91%, 10/11) and DLBCL-NOS (97%, 32/33; p = 0.442). The 3-year event-free survival rate was 81% for both THRLBCL and DLBCL-NOS (p = 0.813). The 3-year overall survival rates were 75 and 81%, respectively (p = 0.719). Conclusions: The treatment outcomes of THRLBCL are similar to those of DLBCL-NOS. The addition of rituximab to CHOP seems to be helpful for the management of THRLBCL, as it is for DLBCL-NOS.
Purification of Antioxidant Peptides by High Resolution Mass Spectrometry from Simulated Gastrointestinal Digestion Hydrolysates of Alaska Pollock (Theragra chalcogramma) Skin Collagen

In this study, the stable collagen hydrolysate was prepared by alcalase hydrolysis and twice simulated gastrointestinal digestion from Alaska pollock skin. The characteristics of hydrolysates and antioxidant activities in vitro, including 2,2′-azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) radical (ABTS•+) scavenging activity, ferric-reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) and hydroxyl radical (OH·) scavenging activity, were determined. After twice simulated gastrointestinal digestion of skin collagen (SGI-2), the degree of hydrolysis (DH) reached 26.17%. The main molecular weight fractions of SGI-2 were 1026.26 and 640.53 Da, accounting for 59.49% and 18.34%, respectively. Amino acid composition analysis showed that SGI-2 had high content of total hydrophobic amino acid (307.98/1000). With the simulated gastrointestinal digestion progressing, the antioxidant activities increased significantly (p < 0.05). SGI-2 was further purified by gel filtration chromatography, ion exchange chromatography and high performance liquid chromatography, and the A1a3c–p fraction with high hydroxyl radical scavenging activity (IC50 = 7.63 μg/mL) was obtained. The molecular weights and amino acid sequences of key peptides of A1a3c–p were analyzed using high resolution mass spectrometry (LC-ESI-LTQ-Orbitrap-MS) combined with de novo software and UniProt of MaxQuant software. Four peptides were identified from A1a3c–p, including YGCC (444.1137 Da) and DSSCSG (554.1642 Da) identified by de novo software and NNAEYYK (900.3978 Da) and PAGNVR (612.3344 Da) identified by UniProt of MaxQuant software. The molecular weights and amino acid sequences of four peptides were in accordance with the features of antioxidant peptides. The results indicated that different peptides were identified by different data analysis software according to spectrometry mass data. Considering the complexity of LC-ESI-LTQ-Orbitrap-MS, it was necessary to use the different methods to identify the key peptides from protein hydrolysates.
Enhanced Ferroelectric and Converse Piezoelectric Properties of Dense Lead-Free Na0.4K0.1Bi0.5TiO3 Ceramics for Actuator Applications

In this work, lead-free Na0.4Bi0. 5 TiO3-K0.1Bi0. 5TiO3 (NKBT) piezoelectric ceramics were prepared by the solid-state reaction method and their structural, ferroelectric and dielectric properties were systematically studied. NKBT sintered at 1150℃ for 4 h exhibited highly dense (96% - 98% of the theoretical density) and uniform grains of size 1.1 μm. The coexistence of tetragonal (P4bm) and rhombohedral (R3c) phases due to the presence of morphotrophic phase boundary for the chosen composition has been confirmed by the Rietveld refinement studies. Enhanced ferroelectric properties such as remnant polarization (Pr) and coercive field (EC) are found to be 37 μC/cm2 and 30 kV/cm, respectively. The optimized synthesis procedure for NKBT ceramics resulted in enhanced strain (%) and converse piezoelectric coefficient (d33*) of 0.3 % and 554 pm/V which is attributed to smaller grain size and switching of non 180o domains. NKBT ceramics with such excellent piezoelectric properties can be considered as a promising candidate for actuator applications.
Improved Bilateral Texture Filtering With Edge-Aware Measurement

Texture filtering depends on high-quality texture measurement to separate structures from textures. However, the existing methods employ axis-aligned box windows for texture measurement, which may cover different texture regions, and so lowering the measurement quality because structure edges are not always parallel to the axes. In addition, the existing texture measurements consider intensity contrast at the pixel level and do not account for the linear characteristics of structure edges in filtering windows; thus, their measurement effectiveness is limited. This results in a dilemma for texture filtering. Large-scale textures are not smoothed using smaller windows, while small structures are removed using larger windows. In this paper, we present edge-aware measures to improve texture measurement. Edge-aware windows are constructed such that each window is inside a texture region to the greatest extent possible, and the linear characteristics of structure edges are accounted for in the texture measurement. Furthermore, we use large box windows for texture filtering and long and narrow edge-aware small windows for texture measurement to filter out large-scale textures while preserving small structures. The experimental results show improved texture filtering with our method compared with existing methods.
Oral Wound Healing Effects of Acai Berry Water Extracts in Rat Oral Mucosa

The objective of this study was to determine the oral wound healing effects of acai berry water extracts (ABWE) in rat oral mucosa. To estimate the anti-oxidative effects of ABWE, the contents of phenolic compounds, and DPPH (1,1-diphenyl-2-picryl hydrazyl) and ABTS (2,2’-azinobis-(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid)) abilities were evaluated. Wound healing effects of ABWE were tested following 6-day exposure after induction of wound by applying 50% acetic acid to oral mucosa of Sprague-Dawley rats. Macroscopic and histopathological analyses were performed to determine wound healing effects of ABWE. Sodium fusidate (20 mg/g) was used as positive control. ABWE showed significantly high antioxidant effects in all assays, although its potency was weaker than the positive control. From day 3 after treatment, wound healing effects of ABWE were observed in oral mucosa. These wound healing effects were also consistent with histopathological evaluation results. Taken together, these results indicate that ABWE might have potential as an oral wound healing agent in the future.
Pre-pregnancy BMI, gestational weight gain and body image are associated with dietary under-reporting in pregnant Japanese women

Dietary under-reporting is a common problem when using self-reported dietary assessment tools. However, there are few studies regarding under-reporting during pregnancy. This study aimed to explore the demographic and psychosocial characteristics related to dietary under-reporting in pregnant Japanese women. A cross-sectional study was conducted between 2010 and 2011 at a university hospital in Tokyo, Japan. Nutrient intake was assessed using a self-administered Diet History Questionnaire (DHQ), which had questions about the consumption frequency and portion size of selected food items. The 24-h urinary excretion levels of urea N and K were used as the dietary protein and K intake reference values, respectively. Under-reporting of protein and K was defined as the bottom 25 % of the reporting accuracy (the ratio of reported intake on the DHQ to the estimated intake based on urinary excretion). Under-reporters were defined as participants who under-reported both protein and K intake. Multiple logistic regression analysis was performed to examine the factors associated with under-reporters. Of 271 healthy women at 19–23 weeks of gestation, thirty-five participants (12·9 %) were identified as under-reporters. Under-reporters had a lower pre-pregnancy BMI (adjusted OR (AOR) = 0·81) and lower gestational weight gain (AOR = 0·82); they also reported managing their gestational weight gain with the aim to return to their pre-pregnancy weight soon after childbirth (AOR = 2·99). Healthcare professionals should consider the potential for dietary under-reporting and the possible related factors when assessing the dietary intakes of pregnant Japanese women using self-administered questionnaires.
Mangiferin Facilitates Islet Regeneration and β-Cell Proliferation through Upregulation of Cell Cycle and β-Cell Regeneration Regulators

Mangiferin, a xanthonoid found in plants including mangoes and iris unguicularis, was suggested in previous studies to have anti-hyperglycemic function, though the underlying mechanisms are largely unknown. This study was designed to determine the therapeutic effect of mangiferin by the regeneration of β-cells in mice following 70% partial pancreatectomy (PPx), and to explore the mechanisms of mangiferin-induced β-cell proliferation. For this purpose, adult C57BL/6J mice after 7–14 days post-PPx, or a sham operation were subjected to mangiferin (30 and 90 mg/kg body weight) or control solvent injection. Mangiferin-treated mice exhibited an improved glycemia and glucose tolerance, increased serum insulin levels, enhanced β-cell hyperplasia, elevated β-cell proliferation and reduced β-cell apoptosis. Further dissection at the molecular level showed several key regulators of cell cycle, such as cyclin D1, D2 and cyclin-dependent kinase 4 (Cdk4) were significantly up-regulated in mangiferin-treated mice. In addition, critical genes related to β-cell regeneration, such as pancreatic and duodenal homeobox 1 (PDX-1), neurogenin 3 (Ngn3), glucose transporter 2 (GLUT-2), Forkhead box protein O1 (Foxo-1), and glucokinase (GCK), were found to be promoted by mangiferin at both the mRNA and protein expression level. Thus, mangiferin administration markedly facilitates β-cell proliferation and islet regeneration, likely by regulating essential genes in the cell cycle and the process of islet regeneration. These effects therefore suggest that mangiferin bears a therapeutic potential in preventing and/or treating the diabetes.