Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Block compressed sensing images using Curvelet transform

Due to the optimal sparse representation of objects with edges by the multiscale and directional Curvelet Transform, its application have been increasingly interested over the past years. In this paper, we investigate how the block-based compressed sensing (BCS) can be improved to an efficient recovery algorithm, by employing the iterative Curvelet thresholding (ICT). Also, we consider two accelerated iterative shrinkage thresholding (IST) methods, including the following: 1) Beck and Teboulle's fast iterative shrinkage thresholding algorithm (FISTA); 2) Bioucas-Dias and Figueiredo's two-step iterative shrinkage thresholding (TwIST) algorithm, to increase the execution speed of the proposed methods rather than simple ICT. To compare our experimental results with the results of some other methods, we employ pick signal to noise ratio (PSNR) and structural similarity (SSIM) index as the quality assessor. Numerical results show good performance of the new proposed BCS using accelerated ICT methods, in terms of these two quality assessments.
Saposin-like proteins (SAPLIP) carry out diverse functions on a common backbone structure.

A polypeptide motif characterized by the locations of six cysteines and several hydrophobic residues is found in saposins AD , sulfated glycoprotein-1, acid sphin-gomyelinase (ASM), acyloxyacyl hydrolase (AOAH), sur-factant protein B (SPB), and Entamoeba hktolytku pore-forming peptides (amoebapores) (1-4). The same motif is present, in an altered form, in plant aspartyl proteases (5). Each of the animal proteins binds to, or interacts with, one or more lipids, yet their properties and presumed functions in vivo are otherwise quite varied. In this article we review information about the members of this family and propose, as suggested in part by others (4), that three intradomain disulfide linkages create a common structural framework upon which amino acids in four amphipathic alpha helices can carry out diverse functions. The amino acid sequences of the saposin-like domains are compared in Fig. 1. Suposins are water-soluble cofactors for specific sphin-golipid glycohydrolases (see reviews in references 6 and 7). (The term saposin was recently introduced to simplify a complex nomenclature (summarized in reference 8); saposins B and C are also known as sphingolipid activator proteins (SAPS)-1 and-2, respectively, and many authors prefer this terminology. Saposin is used here to emphasize the amino acid sequence similarity and common precursor of four of the sphingolipid activator proteins. ) Saposins AD (M, = 10,000) are derived by proteolytic cleavage from a 554 amino acid precursor, prosaposin. They are found principally in lysosomes, where they facilitate the catabolism of glyce sphingolipids that have short hydrophilic head groups (9). Deficiencies of prosaposin (10, ll), saposin C (12, 13), and saposin B (14-16) have been associated with lipid storage disorders in humans. Saposins A and C facilitate the action of Bglucosyl-ceramidase and P-galactosylceramidase by binding directly to these enzymes. Although the saposin is required for enzymatic activity in vitro (17,18), full activity of the enzymes also requires the presence of a negatively charged lipid such as phosphatidylserine (17). Studies using monoclonal antibodies to different epitopes on Bglucosylceramidase suggested that saposins A and C bind to separate sites on the enzyme (19), and more recent studies by the same group indicate that saposin C binds the enzyme with higher affinity (20) and has greater cofactor activity (18). The ability of mutations in saposin C to produce a Gaucher-like phenotype in humans (12, 13) also casts doubt on the physiological importance of saposin A in normal glucosylceramide catabolism. In vitro, saposin C can also augment the …
La fréquentation des sites naturels de canyoning : une approche socio-culturelle

A partir d'une etude socio-culturelle (Pociello, 1981 ; Bourdieu, 1979) realisee par questionnaire (N = 237) puis completee de plusieurs entretiens semi directifs, le present article etudie la frequentation des sites naturels de canyoning en France. Reproduisant en partie les oppositions traditionnelles a l'espace des sports (au sens de Pociello, 1995), les resultats mettent en evidence quatre principaux types d'usagers en canyoning : les touristes-clients, les adeptes hedonistes et les puristes passionnes ainsi que les moniteurs responsables des groupes de clients. L'article discute notamment la place du mecanisme de distinction dans l'activite, le rapport au corps des usagers, ou encore, le partage de la frequentation des sites entre une logique de consommation et une logique de pratique.
The neural basis of automatic and controlled semantic cognition : spatiotemporal dynamics revealed by magnetoencephalography and brain stimulation

This thesis investigated the neural basis of different aspects of semantic cognition using magnetoencephalography (MEG) and chronometric transcranial magnetic stimulation (cTMS). The primary aim was to examine the evidence for a potential functional dissociation between ATL and pMTG; (i) in terms of how they support semantic retrieval, and (ii) whether they support different types of semantic knowledge. Chapter 2 investigated the predictions of the Controlled Semantic Cognition framework (CSC - Lambon Ralph et al., 2017). According to this view, ATL and pMTG within the temporal lobe have distinctive roles in semantic cognition: the ATL is argued to correspond to a semantic store and in this way shows processing advantages for patterns of retrieval that are highly coherent with the structure of long-term conceptual knowledge, whereas pMTG is implicated in more controlled aspects of retrieval that might promote the accessibility of weaker associations that are not dominant within the ATL representations. The brain’s oscillatory response to strongly- and weakly-related word pairs was characterised in left anterior temporal lobe (ATL) and left posterior temporal gyrus (pMTG). ATL showed a larger response to strongly-related words, while pMTG responded more strongly to weakly-related words, suggesting these regions contribute to automatic/coherent and controlled semantic retrieval respectively. The chapter also investigated the causal role of ATL and pMTG in automatic and controlled retrieval using cTMS. Results showed disruption for weak associations in pMTG at an early time point, and slightly later disruption for strong associations in ATL. Chapter 3 further contrasted the CSC framework with the dual hub view, which alternatively proposes that (i) ATL and pMTG (plus angular gyrus; AG) represent different types of semantic information – with taxonomic links in ATL (e.g., DOG and RAT) and thematic relationships in pMTG/AG (e.g., DOG and BONE). According to the CSC framework, the functional division between these brain regions is better characterised by automatic/coherent retrieval in ATL/AG and more controlled retrieval in pMTG. Results indicated that ATL, pMTG and AG all responded to both taxonomic and thematic relationships; thus, I did not observe empirical support for the dual hub view. There was greater engagement of ATL for strong associations and pMTG for weaker associations, consistent with the CSC view. These findings together suggest that pMTG may play a role in maintaining a semantic context and detecting situations in which controlled retrieval processes may need to be engaged. In contrast, ATL may support patterns of coherent semantic retrieval between highly-related concepts. Thus, the findings of this thesis help to elucidate the specific roles of these regions in the semantic network.
Ionic Conductivity of an Extruded Nafion 1100 EW Series of Membranes

The proton conductivity of a series of extruded Nafion membranes @of equivalent weight ~EW! of 1100 and nominal dry thickness of 51, 89, 127, and 178 mm# has been studied. Measurements were made in 1 M H2SO4 at 298 K using a four-electrode, dc technique. The membrane area resistance increases with thickness, as expected, from 0.07 to 0.16 V cm2 for Nafion 112 and Nafion 117, respectively. However, in contrast to the published literature, after correcting for the membrane thickness, the conductivity of the membranes decreases with decreasing membrane thickness. For example, values of 0.083 and 0.16 S cm21 were obtained for Nafion 112 and 117 membranes, respectively. In situ current-interrupt measurements in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell confirmed the relatively poor conductivity of the membrane electrode assemblies ~MEAs! based on the thinner membranes. While a high contact resistance to the electrodes may have contributed to the in situ MEA resistance, water balance measurements over the MEA showed that the high resistance was not due to a low water content or to an uneven water distribution in the MEAs. The implications of the findings for the understanding of the membrane properties are discussed.
SMILE and Wavefront-Guided LASIK Out-Compete Other Refractive Surgeries in Ameliorating the Induction of High-Order Aberrations in Anterior Corneal Surface

Purpose. To compare the change of anterior corneal higher-order aberrations (HOAs) after laser in situ keratomileusis (LASIK), wavefront-guided LASIK with iris registration (WF-LASIK), femtosecond laser-assisted laser in situ keratomileusis (FS-LASIK), and small incision lenticule extraction (SMILE). Methods. In a prospective study, 82 eyes underwent LASIK, 119 eyes underwent WF-LASIK, 88 eyes underwent FS-LASIK, and 170 eyes underwent SMILE surgery. HOAs were measured with Pentacam device preoperatively and 6 months after surgery. The aberrations were described as Zernike polynomials, and analysis focused on total HOAs, spherical aberration (SA), horizontal coma, and vertical coma over 6 mm diameter central corneal zone. Results. Six months postoperatively, all procedures result in increase of anterior corneal total HOAs and SA. There were no significant differences in the induced HOAs between LASIK and FS-LASIK, while SMILE induced fewer total HOAs and SA compared with LASIK and FS-LASIK. Similarly, WF-LASIK also induced less total HOAs than LASIK and FS-LASIK, but only fewer SA than FS-LASIK (P < 0.05). No significant difference could be detected in the induced total HOAs and SA between SMILE and WF-LASIK, whereas SMILE induced more horizontal coma and vertical coma compared with WF-LASIK (P < 0.05). Conclusion. FS-LASIK and LASIK induced comparable anterior corneal HOAs. Compared to LASIK and FS-LASIK, both SMILE and WF-LASIK showed advantages in inducing less total HOAs. In addition, SMILE also possesses better ability to reduce the induction of SA in comparison with LASIK and FS-LASIK. However, SMILE induced more horizontal coma and vertical coma compared with WF-LASIK, indicating that the centration of SMILE procedure is probably less precise than WF-LASIK.
Stathmin, a gene regulating neural plasticity, affects fear and anxiety processing in humans

The identification of biological mechanisms underlying emotional behavior is crucial for our understanding of the pathogenesis of mental disorders. Besides genes modulating neural transmission and influencing amygdala reactivity and anxiety‐related temperamental traits a different plasticity regulating genes affect interindividual differences in emotional regulation. Recently it has been demonstrated that stathmin, a regulator of microtubule formation which affects long‐term potentiation (LTP), controls learned and innate fear responses in rodents, but its role in human emotion regulation is unknown. We hypothesized that in humans the gene coding for stathmin (STMN1), which is highly expressed in the lateral nucleus of the amygdala and associated thalamic and cortical structures, influences behavioral responses to fear and anxiety stimuli by way of two common single nucleotide polymorphisms (rs182455, SNP1; rs213641, SNP2). These polymorphisms are located within or close to the putative transcriptional control region. We used the acoustic startle paradigm and a standardized laboratory protocol for the induction of fear and psychosocial stress in 106 healthy volunteers to investigate the impact of stathmin gene variation on two fear‐ and anxiety‐controlling effector‐systems of the amygdala. We found that STMN1 genotype interacting with individuals' gender significantly impacts fear and anxiety responses as measured with the startle and cortisol stress response. We therefore conclude that STMN1 genotype has functional relevance for the acquisition and expression of basic fear and anxiety responses also in humans. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
ExtaviJect® 30G device for subcutaneous self-injection of interferon beta-1b for multiple sclerosis: a prospective European study

Background The ExtaviJect® 30G autoinjector was developed to facilitate parenteral self-administration of interferon beta-1b (Extavia®), a first-line disease-modifying therapy in patients with multiple sclerosis. Our aim was to assess patient compliance with treatment when using the autoinjector, patients’ and nurses’ experiences of using the device, its tolerability, and patient satisfaction. Methods This was a 12-week, real-world, prospective, observational, noninterventional study conducted in nine European countries. Questionnaires were used to measure patient compliance and to assess patients’ and nurses’ experiences. All adverse events were recorded by severity, including injection site reactions or pain. Patient satisfaction and health-related quality of life were assessed using the Treatment Satisfaction Questionnaire for Medication-9 (TSQM-9) and EuroQol-5 Dimension (EQ-5D) instruments, respectively. Results Of 582 patients enrolled, 568 (98%) received at least one injection and attended the first follow-up visit at 6 weeks, and 542 (93%) attended the second follow-up visit at 12 weeks. For the whole study, 548 of 568 (97%) patients were compliant with treatment. Among the various questions assessing whether the device was easy and quick to use accurately, without fear of the needle, 56%–98% of patients and 59%–98% of nurses were in agreement. There were nine serious adverse events (four disease-related) reported among the 227 (39%) patients reporting adverse events. Scores increased in the TSQM-9 convenience domain between weeks 6 and 12 (P=0.0009), and in the EQ-5D visual analog scale between baseline and week 12 (P<0.0001), indicating improvement in health-related quality of life. Conclusion ExtaviJect 30G was convenient to use and was associated with high levels of compliance.
Sparse representations of clustered video shots for action recognition

In most action recognition tasks, the target videos are of different temporal length and an action may be repeated several times in one video. As a result, encoding the distribution of video feature points that are far away from each other or are detected from different occurrences of the action into the video representation is inappropriate. It is better that sub video shots containing different occurrences of the action are detected and encoded respectively. In this paper, a novel video representation framework in which video shots are detected efficiently by clustering feature points according to their temporal locations in the video is proposed. Moreover, shot representations are generated based on a variation of the spatial-temporal pyramid matching method using max-pooling and sparse coding of video features. The video can finally be presented by max-pooling shot representations again and be classified using a linear SVM. This framework is evaluated on the KTH and the UCF sports human action datasets and promising performances are obtained compared to state-of-the-art methods.
The Impact of IT Investment on Firm Performance in Korean Insurance Industry

Over the past three decades, the impact of information technology (IT) investments on firm performance has been the subject of active research. Despite increasing importance of research into the productivity of IT in developing countries, almost all findings on IT productivity are based on data collected in developed countries. This study tries to investigate the effects of IT investment on firms' financial performance in the insurance industry of South Korea. Findings show that IT investment has a positive impact on both on cost efficiency and organizational growth in South Korea.
From e-government strategy to services: challenges of inter-organizational IT governance in Egypt

IT governance has been identified as a key enabler also for implementing e-government solutions. However, little is known about what 'best practice' of IT governance could mean when applied to an inter-organizational and highly distributed information infrastructure as typical for the public sector. In this paper the case of Egypt is analyzed based on previous investigations and publications, governmental documents, and data collected from a recent project involvement. The main IT governance challenges have been found as: unclear definition of network membership, extensive voluntarism, vague goal orientation, unprotected data resources, absence of financial governance, and the project status of network. Accordingly, lessons to be learned include that (1) creators of a network hub must clarify goal direction, membership responsibilities, performance assessment for all government agencies involved, (2) participating government agencies need to understand, commit to, practice sharing of accountability beyond hierarchy or ownership, (3) countries with little collaboration culture and network experience are better off to rely on accepted dominating actors for managing inter-organizational collaboration hubs in e-government. Based on essential attributes of the required governance process milestones are suggested for improving inter-organizational IT governance while addressing the detected challenges in Egypt and beyond. In conclusion, more research is needed to discuss any fit of inter-organizational IT governance arrangements to a given e-government context. Building on IT governance research related to enterprises, future e-government research can stay aligned and continue to share the lessons learned.
Proteolysis of formaldehyde-treated albumin in Kupffer cells and its inhibition by suramin.

The uptake and breakdown of formaldehyde-treated "'Ior '='I-labeled albumin in liver lysosomes have been measured in vivo. Ultracentrifuge studies and gel filtration showed that, in contrast to heat-denatured albumin frequently used in clearance experiments, our formaldehyde-treated protein did not form aggregates. Nevertheless, it was exclusively taken up in the Kupffer cells as demonstrated b autoradiography. The in vitro breakdown of the protein in the Kupffer cells was inhibited by suramin. The results of determinations of the drug in liver fractions were in agreement with a lysosomal localization. Histochemical staining showed a granular accumulation of suramin in Kupffer cells only. Our results indicate that (1) the hypothesis that denatured serum proteins are rapidly taken up by the reticuloendothelial system because they form aggregates is not tenable; (2) the many reports in literature on intralysosomal breakdown of formaldehyde-treated albumin in vitro and its inhibition by suramin apply exclusively to Kupffer cell lysosomes.
Activation of RhoA, but Not Rac1, Mediates Early Stages of S1P-Induced Endothelial Barrier Enhancement

Compromised endothelial barrier function is a hallmark of inflammation. Rho family GTPases are critical in regulating endothelial barrier function, yet their precise roles, particularly in sphingosine‐1‐phosphate (S1P)‐induced endothelial barrier enhancement, remain elusive. We tested the roles of Rac1 and RhoA in this study. Confluent cultures of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) or human dermal microvascular endothelial cells (HDMEC) were used to model the endothelial barrier. Barrier function was assessed by determining the transendothelial electrical resistance (TER) using an electrical cell‐substrate impedance sensor. The results show that pharmacologic inhibition of Rac1 with 50 μM Rac1 Inhibitor II failed to block barrier enhancement elicited by 2 μM S1P. Likewise, expression of a dominant negative form of Rac1, or knockdown of native Rac1 with siRNA, failed to block S1P‐induced elevations in TER. In contrast, blockade of RhoA with the combination of the inhibitors Rhosin and Y16 (6.25 μM respectively) significantly reduced S1P‐induced increases in TER. Assessment of RhoA activation in real time using a fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) biosensor showed that S1P increased RhoA activation primarily at the edges of cells, near junctions. This was complemented by myosin light chain‐2 phosphorylation at cell edges, which could be blocked with Y16 and Rhosin treatment. The results suggest that S1P causes activation of RhoA at the cell periphery, stimulating local phosphorylation of MLC, and resulting in endothelial barrier enhancement. S1P‐induced Rac1 activation, however, does not appear to have a significant role in this process.
Automatically identifying experts in on-line support forums using social interactions and post content

On-line support forums are a common method for businesses to provide product support for customers. The utility of these forums are typically determined by a small number of expert users who provide a large percentage of the high quality answers. The automatic identification of these experts would enable businesses to more effectively manage their support forums, reduce costs, and provide better solutions to customer problems.
Functional constraints on the evolution of long butterfly proboscides: lessons from Neotropical skippers (Lepidoptera: Hesperiidae)

Extremely long proboscides are rare among butterflies outside of the Hesperiidae, yet representatives of several genera of skipper butterflies possess proboscides longer than 50 mm. Although extremely elongated mouthparts can be regarded as advantageous adaptations to gain access to nectar in deep‐tubed flowers, the scarcity of long‐proboscid butterflies is a phenomenon that has not been adequately accounted for. So far, the scarceness was explained by functional costs arising from increased flower handling times caused by decelerated nectar intake rates. However, insects can compensate for the negative influence of a long proboscis through changes in the morphological configuration of the feeding apparatus. Here, we measured nectar intake rates in 34 species representing 21 Hesperiidae genera from a Costa Rican lowland rainforest area to explore the impact of proboscis length, cross‐sectional area of the food canal and body size on intake rate. Long‐proboscid skippers did not suffer from reduced intake rates due to their large body size and enlarged food canals. In addition, video analyses of the flower‐visiting behaviour revealed that suction times increased with proboscis length, suggesting that long‐proboscid skippers drink a larger amount of nectar from deep‐tubed flowers. Despite these advantages, we showed that functional costs of exaggerated mouthparts exist in terms of longer manipulation times per flower. Finally, we discuss the significance of scaling relationships on the foraging efficiency of butterflies and why some skipper taxa, in particular, have evolved extremely long proboscides.