Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Robust Feature Matching for Remote Sensing Image Registration via Locally Linear Transforming

Feature matching, which refers to establishing reliable correspondence between two sets of features (particularly point features), is a critical prerequisite in feature-based registration. In this paper, we propose a flexible and general algorithm, which is called locally linear transforming (LLT), for both rigid and nonrigid feature matching of remote sensing images. We start by creating a set of putative correspondences based on the feature similarity and then focus on removing outliers from the putative set and estimating the transformation as well. We formulate this as a maximum-likelihood estimation of a Bayesian model with hidden/latent variables indicating whether matches in the putative set are outliers or inliers. To ensure the well-posedness of the problem, we develop a local geometrical constraint that can preserve local structures among neighboring feature points, and it is also robust to a large number of outliers. The problem is solved by using the expectation-maximization algorithm (EM), and the closed-form solutions of both rigid and nonrigid transformations are derived in the maximization step. In the nonrigid case, we model the transformation between images in a reproducing kernel Hilbert space (RKHS), and a sparse approximation is applied to the transformation that reduces the method computation complexity to linearithmic. Extensive experiments on real remote sensing images demonstrate accurate results of LLT, which outperforms current state-of-the-art methods, particularly in the case of severe outliers (even up to 80%).
A quantitative analysis of the effect of excision of the AER from the chick limb-bud.

The effect of removal of the apical ectodermal ridge from the early chick limb-bud is re-examined using a new quantitative method of analysis of results. The concept of the proximo-distal sequence of laying down of parts is confirmed and evidence is presented thatthis proceeds as a continuous process, there being a gradual change in the level specified from one cell to another at a more distal level. The results are then interpreted in terms of the ‘progress zone’ model to show that they are both consistent with the model and that they provide an assay for one of its parameters, the rate of change of positional value with time at the tip.
Gaming Across Different Consoles: Exploring the Influence of Control Scheme on Game-Player Enjoyment

Many studies have investigated how different technological features impact the experience of playing video games, yet few have focused on how control schemes may affect the play experience. This research employed a between-subjects design to explore the relationship between the type of console played (Nintendo Wii, Playstation 2) and feelings of flow and enjoyment during the game-play experience. Results indicated that participants reported greater feelings of control and enjoyment with a traditional control scheme (Playstation 2) than with the more technologically advanced control scheme (Nintendo Wii). Further mediation analysis showed that enjoyment was driven by the sense of control that participants experienced and not simply by whether they won the game. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Protein Kinase C-dependent α-Secretase Competes with β-Secretase for Cleavage of Amyloid-β Precursor Protein in the Trans-Golgi Network*

The release of amyloidogenic amyloid-β peptide (Aβ) from amyloid-β precursor protein (APP) requires cleavage by β- and γ-secretases. In contrast, α-secretase cleaves APP within the Aβ sequence and precludes amyloidogenesis. Regulated and unregulated α-secretase activities have been reported, and the fraction of cellular α-secretase activity regulated by protein kinase C (PKC) has been attributed to the ADAM (a disintegrin and metalloprotease) family members TACE and ADAM-10. Although unregulated α-secretase cleavage of APP has been shown to occur at the cell surface, we sought to identify the intracellular site of PKC-regulated α-secretase APP cleavage. To accomplish this, we measured levels of secreted ectodomains and C-terminal fragments of APP generated by α-secretase (sAPPα) (C83) versus β-secretase (sAPPβ) (C99) and secreted Aβ in cultured cells treated with PKC and inhibitors of TACE/ADAM-10. We found that PKC stimulation increased sAPPα but decreased sAPPβ levels by altering the competition between α- versus β-secretase for APP within the same organelle rather than by perturbing APP trafficking. Moreover, data implicating the trans-Golgi network (TGN) as a major site for β-secretase activity prompted us to hypothesize that PKC-regulated α-secretase(s) also reside in this organelle. To test this hypothesis, we performed studies demonstrating proteolytically mature TACE intracellularly, and we also showed that regulated α-secretase APP cleavage occurs in the TGN using an APP mutant construct targeted specifically to the TGN. By detecting regulated α-secretase APP cleavage in the TGN by TACE/ADAM-10, we reveal ADAM activity in a novel location. Finally, the competition between TACE/ADAM-10 and β-secretase for intracellular APP cleavage may represent a novel target for the discovery of new therapeutic agents to treat Alzheimer's disease.
Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration (VMI): An Effective Outcome Measure for Handwriting Interventions for Kindergarten, First-Grade, and Second-Grade Students?

We determined whether a widely used assessment of visual-motor skills, the Beery-Buktenica Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration (VMI), is appropriate for use as an outcome measure for handwriting interventions. A two-group pretest-posttest design was used with 207 kindergarten, first-grade, and second-grade students. Two well-established handwriting measures and the VMI were administered pre- and postintervention. The intervention group participated in the Size Matters Handwriting Program for 40 sessions, and the control group received standard instruction. Paired and independent-samples t tests were used to analyze group differences. The intervention group demonstrated significant improvements on the handwriting measures, with change scores having mostly large effect sizes. We found no significant difference in change scores on the VMI, t(202)=1.19, p=. 23. Results of this study suggest that the VMI may not detect changes in handwriting related to occupational therapy intervention.
Increasing Oxidative Stress with Progressive Hyperlipidemia in Human: Relation between Malondialdehyde and Atherogenic Index

The aim of this study was to examine whether malondialdehyde (MDA) formation, a marker of oxidant stress, is altered in different stages of development of hyperlipidemia and whether it correlates with atherogenic index (AI), an important risk factor of atherosclerosis. Commercial kits were used to measure the levels of lipid profile and antioxidant status in the serum of 15 hyperlipidemic patients and 30 age and sex-matched normolipidemic subjects. The normolipidemic subjects were divided into lower and higher lipid groups according to their blood lipid level. The activities of superoxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase decreased in higher lipid group compared with lower lipid group, and were even lower in hyperlipidemic subjects. An increase in the levels of MDA, triglycerides, total cholesterol and LDL-C concentration were observed in higher lipid group, and even significantly increased in hyperlipidemic patients. A significant progressive decline in HDL-C concentration was found during hyperlipidemia evolution. There was a positive correlation between MDA and AI (r = 0.61, p<0.05). These data indicate that oxidative stress is an early event in the evolution of hyperlipidemia, and appropriate support for enhancing antioxidant supply in higher lipid subjects may help prevent the course of the disease.
4-regular Graphs without Cut-vertices Having the Same Path Layer Matrix

The path layer matrix of a graph G contains quantitative information about all possible paths in G. The entry (i ; j ) of this matrix is the number of paths in G having initial vertex i and length j. It is known that there are 4-regular graphs on 44 vertices having the same path layer matrix
Opportunity-to-Learn Standards and the State Role in Education

Standards are the new focus of state and federal policymaking in education. The current policy debate addresses several types of standards, including performance, content, and opportunity to learn (OTL). This article focuses on opportunity-to-learn standards which define a set of conditions that schools, districts, and states must meet in order to ensure students an equal opportunity to meet expectations for their performance. States have been concerned about the issues raised by OTL standards for over a century, but they have not had much success in addressing these issues with state policy. We present some explanations for the historical inability of states to influence the equal provision of education and we offer some principles for designing new state policies that incorporate new knowledge about opportunity to learn. We conclude the article with a discussion of how states might address the underlying problem of reconciling policies more focused on performance with the problems of assuring equitable opportunities to learn.
An experimental comparison of secret-based user authentication technologies

The paper presents a comparative study of software‐based user authentication techniques, contrasting the use of traditional password and personal identifier numbers (PIN) against alternative methods involving question and answer responses and graphical representation. All methods share the common basis of some secret knowledge and rely upon the user’s ability to recall it in order to achieve authentication. An experimental trial is described, along with the results based upon 27 participants. The alternative methods are assessed in terms of practical effectiveness (in this context relating to the participant’s ability to authenticate themselves a significant time after initial use of the methods), as well as the perceived levels of user friendliness and security that they provide. The investigation concludes that while passwords and PIN approaches garner good ratings on the basis of their existing familiarity to the participants, other methods based upon image recall and cognitive questions also achieved sufficiently positive results to suggest them as viable alternatives in certain contexts.
Finite Differencing of Computable Expressions

Finite differencing is a program optimization method that generalizes strength reduction, and provides an efficient implementation for a host of program transformations including "iterator inversion. " Finite differencing is formally specified in terms of more basic transformations shown to preserve program semantics. Estimates of the speedup that the technique yields are given. A full illustrative example of algorithm derivation is presented.
Distinct antimicrobial peptide expression determines host species-specific bacterial associations

Significance Animals form functional unities with communities of microbes. Often, these bacterial communities are highly specific to host species and resemble host phylogeny. But which factors determine community membership? Which host-factors are capable of selecting suitable bacteria by inhibiting colonization by potential foreign colonizers? In this study, we show that animals express a species-specific repertoire of antimicrobial peptides, which supports and maintains a species-specific bacterial community. Loss-of-function experiments showed that antimicrobial peptide composition is a predictor for bacterial colonization. Animals are colonized by coevolved bacterial communities, which contribute to the host’s health. This commensal microbiota is often highly specific to its host-species, inferring strong selective pressures on the associated microbes. Several factors, including diet, mucus composition, and the immune system have been proposed as putative determinants of host-associated bacterial communities. Here we report that species-specific antimicrobial peptides account for different bacterial communities associated with closely related species of the cnidarian Hydra. Gene family extensions for potent antimicrobial peptides, the arminins, were detected in four Hydra species, with each species possessing a unique composition and expression profile of arminins. For functional analysis, we inoculated arminin-deficient and control polyps with bacterial consortia characteristic for different Hydra species and compared their selective preferences by 454 pyrosequencing of the bacterial microbiota. In contrast to control polyps, arminin-deficient polyps displayed decreased potential to select for bacterial communities resembling their native microbiota. This finding indicates that species-specific antimicrobial peptides shape species-specific bacterial associations.
The Political Economy of Natural Resources

The rise in world prices of natural resources, coupled with the resource discoveries induced by high prices, is transforming Africa's opportunities. The economic future of Africa will be determined by whether this opportunity is seized or missed. The history of resource extraction in Africa is not encouraging. This paper reviews and develops the political economy of natural resources as a guide to how Africa might avoid a repetition of that history.
Multiple Hypothesis Testing

INTRODUCTION . 561 ORGANIZING CO CEPTS . 564 Primary Hypotheses, Closure, Hierarchical Sets, and Minimal Hypotheses . 564 Families . 565 Type 1 Error Control . 566 Power . 567 P-Values and Adjusted P-Values . 568 Closed Test Procedures . 569 METHODS BA ED ON ORDERED P-VALUES . 569 Methods Based on the First-Order Bonferroni Inequality . 569 Methods Based on the Simes Equality . 570 Modifications for Logically Related Hypotheses . 571 Methods Controlling the False Discovery Rate . 572 COMPARING NORMALLY DISTRIBUTED M ANS . 573 OTHER ISSUES . 575 Tests vs Confidence I tervals . 575 Directional vs Nondirectional Inference . 576 Robustness . 577 Others . 578 CONCLUSION . 580
HAV Immunity in Iranian Medical Students

Background: Hepatitis A, a fecal-oral transmitted disease, which has been considered endemic in developing countries, seems to change its pattern in developing countries because of their improved socioeconomic status. Objectives: In the present study, we aimed to determine the need of vaccination in 270 students at AJA University of Medical Sciences. Materials and Methods: The serum level of anti-HAV antibody was checked in 270 students of AJA University of medical students, and effect of different factors, including age, gender, pre-university entrance exam region, familial education, familial income, clean water availability, and previous history of jaundice were tested. Results: Of total 270 students, 30 were female. Their age ranged between 18 and 30 years old with the mean age of 20.58 years and just 34% of students had positive level of anti-HAV antibody. Age and sex had no role in positive serum level of anti-HAV antibody. According to analyzed data, lack of clean water availability, pre-university entrance exam region, lower family education, and poor health status estimation increased statistically the risk of HAV infection. Conclusions: Because 66% of students were anti-HAV antibody negative and they will work as health care workers in future, our study suggest vaccinating all students accepted at AJA University of Medical Sciences.
Universal Dependencies for Finnish

There has been substantial recent interest in annotation schemes that can be applied consistently to many languages. Building on several recent efforts to unify morphological and syntactic annotation, the Universal Dependencies (UD) project seeks to introduce a cross-linguistically applicable part-of-speech tagset, feature inventory, and set of dependency relations as well as a large number of uniformly annotated treebanks. We present Universal Dependencies for Finnish, one of the ten languages in the recent first release of UD project treebank data. We detail the mapping of previously introduced annotation to the UD standard, describing specific challenges and their resolution. We additionally present parsing experiments comparing the performance of a stateof-the-art parser trained on a languagespecific annotation schema to performance on the corresponding UD annotation. The results show improvement compared to the source annotation, indicating that the conversion is accurate and supporting the feasibility of UD as a parsing target. The introduced tools and resources are available under open licenses from http://bionlp.utu. fi/ud-finnish.html.
The multidimensional prognostic index predicts short- and long-term mortality in hospitalized geriatric patients with pneumonia.

BACKGROUND Multidimensional impairment of older patients may influence the clinical outcome of acute or chronic diseases. Our purpose is to evaluate the usefulness of a multidimensional prognostic index (MPI) based on a comprehensive geriatric assessment (CGA) for predicting mortality risk in older patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP). METHODS This prospective study included 134 hospitalized patients aged 65 and older with a diagnosis of CAP. A standardized CGA that included information on clinical, cognitive, functional, and nutritional status as well as comorbidities, medications, and social support network was used to calculate MPI. The pneumonia severity index (PSI) was also calculated. The predictive value of the MPI for all cause mortality over a 1-year follow-up was evaluated and was compared with that of PSI. RESULTS Higher MPI values were significantly associated with higher mortality at 30 days (Grade 1 = 3%, Grade 2 = 12%, Grade 3 = 44%, p < .001), 6 months (Grade 1 = 7%, Grade 2 = 21%, Grade 3 = 50%, p < .001), and 1 year (Grade 1 = 10%, Grade 2 = 33%, Grade 3 = 53%, p < .001). A close agreement was found between the estimated mortality by MPI and the observed mortality. MPI had a significant greater discriminatory power than PSI both at 30 days (area under the receiver operating characteristic [ROC] curve = 0.83 vs 0.71, p = .019) and 6 months (0.79 vs 0.69, p = .035), but not after 1 year of follow-up (0.80 vs 0.75, p = .185). CONCLUSIONS This MPI, calculated from information collected in a standardized CGA, accurately stratifies hospitalized elderly patients with CAP into groups at varying risk of short- and long-term mortality. The predictive accuracy of the MPI was higher than the predictive value of the PSI.
Las cárceles de la miseria

Este libro de Loic Wacquant que resenamos, traducido a trece idiomas, constituye una sintesis de otros varios estudios suyos, publicados en forma de articulos desde hace una decada. Wacquant, investigador universitario en Estados Unidos, nos conduce de lleno a la convergencia generada en las sociedades avanzadas entre un creciente sistema penal y una tendencia generalizada de lo que el nomina “desregulacion del espacio publico”.
Sodium-pump gene-expression, protein abundance and enzyme activity in isolated nephron segments of the aging rat kidney

Aging is associated with alteration in renal tubular functions, including sodium handling and concentrating ability. Na‐K‐ATPase plays a key role in driving tubular transport, and we hypothesized that decreased concentrating ability of the aging kidney is due in part to downregulation of Na‐K‐ATPase. In this study, we evaluated Na and K balance, aldosterone levels, and Na‐K‐ATPase gene expression, protein abundance, and activity in aging rat kidney. Na‐K‐ATPase activity (assayed microfluorometrically), mRNA (RT‐PCR), and protein abundance (immunoblotting) were quantitated in the following isolated nephron segments: PCT, PST, MTAL, DCT, and CCD from 2, 8, 15, and 24 month‐old‐rats. In the course of aging, creatinine clearance decreased from 0.48 ± 0.02 mL/min/100 g BW to 0.28 ± 0.06 (P < 0.001) and aldosterone decreased from 23.6 ± 0.8 ng/dL to 13.2 ± 0.6 (P < 0.001). Serum Na+ and K+ increased by 4.0% and 22.5%, respectively. Na‐K‐ATPase activity, mRNA, and protein abundance of the α1 subunit displayed similar trends in all assayed segments; increasing in PCT and PST; decreasing in MTAL and DCT; increasing in CCD: in PCT they increased by 40%, 75%, and 250%, respectively; while in PST they increased by 80%, 50%, and 100%, respectively (P < 0.001). In MTAL they declined by 36%, 24%, and 34%, respectively, and in DCT by 38%, 59%, and 60%, respectively (P < 0.001). They were higher in CCD by 110%, 115%, and 246%, respectively (P < 0.001). Rats maintained Na/K balance; however with a steady state elevated serum K+. These results reveal quantitative changes in axial distribution of Na‐K‐ATPase at the level of gene expression, protein abundance, and activity in the nephrons of aging animals and may explain, in part, the pathophysiology of the senescent kidney.
Identification of Volatile Compounds from a Food-Grade Vinegar Attractive to House Flies (Diptera: Muscidae)

ABSTRACT A commercial vinegar product (ChinKiang) was found to be highly attractive to adult house flies, Musca domestica L. Field experiments on a Nebraska dairy demonstrated that traps baited with vinegar and brown sugar captured more house flies than those baited with other house fly attractants. Solid phase microextraction was used in the field to collect volatiles from the vinegar bait. Seven compounds were identified as, acetic acid, furfural, butanoic acid, isovaleric acid, hexanoic acid, 2-phenylethanol, and p-cresol. Electroantennograms showed that the seven vinegar components elicited significant responses from antennae of female and male house flies. Bioassays indicated that the vinegar blend of the seven volatile components were more attractive than any of the individual components. Field evaluations demonstrated that traps baited with the synthetic seven component blend caught as many flies as those baited with vinegar. This is the first detailed report of house fly attractants from vinegar. The vinegar volatile compounds identified in this study will be useful for the development of less objectionable alternatives to the fetid, manure mimicking volatiles currently used in commercial fly bait systems, especially those designed for use in indoor environments.
Conservative Management of Spinal Tuberculosis: Initial Series from Pakistan

Study Design A prospective study on spinal tuberculosis (TB) at a tertiary care hospital in an endemic region. Purpose The aim of the study is to reiterate the importance of conservative management of spinal TB. Overview of Literature Spinal tuberculosis can present with wide spectrum of symptoms, with back pain being the most common symptom. It is the leading cause of non-traumatic paraplegia in developing countries. There is an emerging trend to operate on patients early with spinal TB. Methods Forty-seven (M=14, F=33) patients were enrolled in the study during the four year study period. Initially, all the patients were subjected to computed tomography guided percutaneous needle aspiration (PCNA) followed by antituberculous therapy (ATT) for 12 months. Indications for surgery included patients with moderate to severe symptoms in which PCNA either failed, was impossible to carry out, or produced minimal improvement within 48 hours. Results Presenting complaints included pain (95.7%), weakness (85.1%) and sphincter involvement (12.8%). On the magnetic resonance imaging, a paravertebral abscess was seen in 37 (78.7%), disc and body destruction in 29 (61.7%), and an epidural abscess in 12 (25.9%) patients. Of the 47 patients, 9 (19.1%) required surgery, 4 of whom had failed PCNA attempts and 5 demonstrated indications despite successful PCNA. Conclusions The results of conservative treatment consisting of PCNA and ATT for at least 12 months in compliant patients are excellent. A combined approach using clinical staging, PCNA, and ATT can minimize surgical intervention in most patients. However, ATT remains to be the cornerstone of management of spinal TB.