Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Intraspecific maternal competition induces summer diapause in insect parasitoids

Organisms often live in unpredictable environments and have to adopt life history strategies that optimize their fitness under these conditions. According to bet‐hedging theory, individuals can reduce variation in fitness outcomes by investing in different strategies at the same time. For arthropods, facultative summer diapause enables survival during dry and hot periods of the year, and can be triggered by a decrease in resource abundance. However, the effect of resource depletion on diapause induction has never been disentangled from the effect of the perception of the presence of competitors. Using two solitary parasitoid species of cereal aphids as a model system, Aphidius avenae (Haliday) and Aphidius rhopalosiphi (De Stefani‐Perez) (Hymenoptera: Braconidae), we tested whether (i) low absolute host density and/or (ii) high levels of parasitoid females’ competition lead to maternal‐induced summer diapause in parasitoid offspring. Under summer‐like climatic conditions, emerging parasitoid females were (i) reared alone and exposed to different host densities (from 5 to 130 aphids), or (ii) reared together with competing females (from 2 to 20 females) and then exposed individually to 50 aphids. For both parasitoid species, low aphid densities did not induce summer diapause. However, the incidence of summer diapause increased up to a maximum of 11% with increasing levels of competition experienced by female parasitoids. More than 60% of the females produced both diapausing and nondiapausing offspring after being kept at the two highest competition densities. Such a “spreading‐the‐risk” strategy has likely evolved to optimize parasitoid fitness by preventing the following generation from exposure to low populations of suitable hosts and high mortality from superparasitism. These results provide the first experimental evidence of direct maternal competition‐induced diapause in insects, and may change the way we apprehend the evolution of arthropod seasonal ecology, by considering intraspecific competition.
Role of PBPD1 in Stimulation of Listeria monocytogenes Biofilm Formation by Subminimal Inhibitory β-Lactam Concentrations

ABSTRACT Disinfectant-tolerant Listeria monocytogenes biofilms can colonize surfaces that come into contact with food, leading to contamination and, potentially, food-borne illnesses. To better understand the process of L. monocytogenes biofilm formation and dispersal, we screened 1,120 off-patent FDA-approved drugs and identified several that modulate Listeria biofilm development. Among the hits were more than 30 β-lactam antibiotics, with effects ranging from inhibiting (≤50%) to stimulating (≥200%) biofilm formation compared to control. Most β-lactams also dispersed a substantial proportion of established biofilms. This phenotype did not necessarily involve killing, as >50% dispersal could be achieved with concentrations as low as 1/20 of the MIC of some cephalosporins. Penicillin-binding protein (PBP) profiling using a fluorescent penicillin analogue showed similar inhibition patterns for most β-lactams, except that biofilm-stimulatory drugs did not bind PBPD1, a low-molecular-weight d,d-carboxypeptidase. Compared to the wild type, a pbpD1 mutant had an attenuated biofilm response to stimulatory β-lactams. The cephalosporin-responsive CesRK two-component regulatory system, whose regulon includes PBPs, was not required for the response. The requirement for PBPD1 activity for β-lactam stimulation of L. monocytogenes biofilms shows that the specific set of PBPs that are inactivated by a particular drug dictates whether a protective biofilm response is provoked.
Microvascular Injury, Thrombosis, Inflammation, and Apoptosis in the Pathogenesis of Heatstroke: A Study in Baboon Model

Objective—Severe heatstroke is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality during heat waves. The pathogenesis of tissue injury, organ failure, and death in heatstroke is not well understood. Methods and Result—We investigated the pathways of heatstroke-induced tissue injury and cell death in anesthetized baboons (Papio hamadyras) subjected to environmental heat stress until core temperature attained 42.5°C (moderate heatstroke; n=3) or onset of severe heatstroke (n=4) signaled by a fall in systolic blood pressure to <90 mm Hg and rise in core temperature to 43.1±0.1°C. Three sham-heated animals served as controls. Light and electron microscopy revealed widespread hemorrhage and thrombosis, transmural migration of leukocytes, and microvascular endothelium injury in severe heatstroke. Immunohistology and ultrastructural analysis demonstrated increased staining of endothelial von Willebrand factor (vWF), tissue factor (TF), and endothelial leukocyte-platelet interaction. Extensive apoptosis was noted in spleen, gut, and lung, and in hematopoeitic cells populating these organs. Double-labeling studies colocalized active caspase-3 and TF with apoptotic cells. Findings in sham-heated animals were unremarkable. Conclusion—These data suggested that microvascular injury, thrombosis, inflammation, and apoptosis may play an important role in the pathogenesis of heatstroke injury.
Electronic structure of iron arsenic high temperature superconductors studied by angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES)

The main purpose of the present thesis is to present our ARPES results on the iron arsenic superconductors. As revealed by a series of ARPES measurements on both the AEFe2As2 and the RFeAs(O,F) families (parent compound and carrier-doped systems), the electronic structures of the pnictides are complicated, three dimensional, and closely linked to their superconducting behavior (13; 14; 15; 16; 17; 18; 19). Parent compounds of these materials exhibit the basic hole-electron pocket dual plus an apparent Fermi surface reconstruction caused by long range antiferromagnetism (13; 15). When carriers are introduced, the chemical potential shifts in accordance with the Luttinger theorem and the rigid band shifting picture (13). Importantly, both the appearance and disappearance of the superconducting dome at low and high doping levels have intimate relation with topological changes at the Fermi surfaces, resulting in a specific Fermi topology being favored by superconductivity (15; 16). On the low doping side, superconductivity emerges in the phase diagram once the antiferromagnetic reconstruction disappears below the Fermi level, returning the Fermi surface to its paramagnetic-like appearance. On the high doping side, superconductivity disappears around a doping level at which the central hole pocket vanishes due to increasing electron concentration. Such phenomena aremore » evidence for the governing role the electronic structure plays in their superconducting behavior. « less
An Upper Mass Limit on a Red Supergiant Progenitor for the Type II-Plateau Supernova SN 2006my

We analyze two pre-supernova (SN) and three post-SN high-resolution images of the site of the Type II-Plateau supernova SN 2006my in an effort to either detect the progenitor star or to constrain its properties. Following image registration, we find that an isolated stellar object is not detected at the location of SN 2006my in either of the two pre-SN images. In the first, an I-band image obtained with the Wide-Field and Planetary Camera 2 on board the Hubble Space Telescope, the offset between the SN 2006my location and a detected source (“Source 1”) is too large: ≥0.08′′, which corresponds to a confidence level of non-association of 96% from our most liberal estimates of the transformation and measurement uncertainties. In the second, a similarly obtained V-band image, a source is detected (“Source 2”) that has overlap with the SN 2006my location but is definitively an extended object. Through artificial star tests carried out on the precise location of SN 2006my in the images, we derive a 3 σ upper bound on the luminosity of a red supergiant that could have remained undetected in our pre-SN images of log L/L⊙ = 5.10, which translates to an upper bound on such a star’s initial mass of 15 M⊙ from the STARS stellar evolutionary models. Although considered unlikely, we can not rule out the possibility that part of the light comprising Source 1, which exhibits a slight extension relative to other point sources in the image, or part of the light contributing to the extended Source 2, may be due to the progenitor of SN 2006my. Only additional, high-resolution observations of the site taken after SN 2006my has faded beyond detection can confirm or reject these possibilities.
Monopolistic Signal Provision†

Abstract I study a monopolist who sells a signal to a consumer with a hidden type. The consumer uses this signal to obtain social status, defined as the expectation of the consumer’s type conditional on the signal. The monopolist must decide how accurately different types are revealed. When pooling subsets of types, she reduces social surplus, but extracts greater information rents. I derive the optimal mechanism by examining the covariance between the consumer’s type and his virtual marginal value of social status.
VLAD encoded Deep Convolutional features for unconstrained face verification

We present a method for combining the Vector of Locally Aggregated Descriptor (VLAD) feature encoding with Deep Convolutional Neural Network (DCNN) features for unconstrained face verification. One of the key features of our method, called the VLAD-encoded DCNN (VLAD-DCNN) features, is that spatial and appearance information are simultaneously processed to learn an improved discriminative representation. Evaluations on the challenging IARPA Janus Benchmark A (IJB-A) face dataset show that the proposed VLAD-DCNN method is able to capture the salient local features and yield promising results for face verification. Furthermore, we show that additional performance gains can be achieved by simply fusing the VLAD-DCNN features that capture the local variations with the traditional DCNN features which characterize more global features.
A Probabilistic Approach to Single Channel Blind Signal Separation

We present a new technique for achieving source separation when given only a single channel recording. The main idea is based on exploiting the inherent time structure of sound sources by learning a priori sets of basis filters in time domain that encode the sources in a statistically efficient manner. We derive a learning algorithm using a maximum likelihood approach given the observed single channel data and sets of basis filters. For each time point we infer the source signals and their contribution factors. This inference is possible due to the prior knowledge of the basis filters and the associated coefficient densities. A flexible model for density estimation allows accurate modeling of the observation and our experimental results exhibit a high level of separation performance for mixtures of two music signals as well as the separation of two voice signals.
Emotion recognition in speech signal using emotion-extracting binary decision trees

The presented paper is concerned with emotion recognition based on speech signal. Two novel elements introduced in the method are an introduction of novel set of emotional speech descriptors and an application of a binary-tree based classifier, where consecutive emotions are extracted at each node, based on an assessment of feature triplets. The method has been verified using two databases of emotional speech on German and Polish, yielding very high recognition rates (72 %) for speaker-independent recognition.
Associations between sleep disturbance and suicidal ideation in adolescents admitted to an inpatient psychiatric unit

Abstract The goals of our study were to: 1) describe the incidence of disturbances in sleep quality, sleep hygiene, sleep-related cognitions and nightmares; and 2) investigate the association between these sleep-related disturbances and suicidal ideation (SI), in adolescents admitted to a psychiatric inpatient unit. Our sample consisted of 50 adolescents between the ages of 12 and 17 years (32 females and 18 males; 41 Caucasian and nine African American). Our cross-sectional design involved the administration of the Adolescent Sleep Wake Scale (ASWS), the Adolescent Sleep Hygiene Scale (ASHS), the Dysfunctional Beliefs and Attitudes about Sleep-Short version for use with children (DBAS-C10), the Disturbing Dreams and Nightmare Scale (DDNSI), and the Suicidal Ideation Questionnaire Jr (SIQ-JR). Analyses were conducted using Pearson correlations, as well as univariate and multivariate regression. Results indicated that our sample experienced sleep disturbances and SI to a greater degree than non-clinical samples. Sleep quality was correlated with nightmares, while sleep quality and nightmares were each correlated with SI. Sleep quality, dysfunctional beliefs, and nightmares each independently predicted SI. Our study was the first to use the four sleep measures with an adolescent psychiatric inpatient sample. It is important to develop sleep-related assessment tools in high-risk populations given the link between sleep disturbances and suicidality. Furthermore, a better understanding of the relationships between SI and sleep quality, sleep-related cognitions, and nightmares is needed to develop potential prevention and treatment options for suicidality in adolescents.
Oral, Direct Factor Xa Inhibitors in Development for the Prevention and Treatment of Thromboembolic Diseases

Anticoagulants are recommended for the prevention and treatment of a wide variety of thromboembolic events. Although existing anticoagulants are effective, their use is limited by parenteral administration or the requirement for frequent monitoring and subsequent dose adjustment. Therefore, there is an urgent need for novel, oral agents with a predictable anticoagulant action. Because of its key position in the coagulation cascade and its limited roles outside of coagulation, Factor Xa has emerged as an attractive target for novel anticoagulants. As a result, the past decade has witnessed an explosion of research into small-molecule, oral, direct Factor Xa inhibitors, and several are now in clinical development. Rivaroxaban, LY517717, YM150, apixaban, PRT054021, and DU-176b, among others, have shown considerable promise; rivaroxaban is currently furthest ahead in its developmental program, having entered phase III in 3 indications. It is hoped that, before long, these anticoagulants will allow us to enter an era of convenient, oral anticoagulation, without the need for regular monitoring or dose adjustment.
Radiologic evaluation of the Llullaillaco mummies.

OBJECTIVE Our purpose was to determine the imaging findings in three 500-year-old frozen mummies of sacrificial Inca children. MATERIALS AND METHODS CT, conventional radiography, and dental radiography of Inca mummies were reviewed. Different techniques, which were adjusted to the anatomic position of the bodies, were used for radiologic analyses. Working sessions were limited to 20 min because of the fragility of these mummies and to prevent thawing of the specimens. RESULTS Internal organs in good condition with a natural shrinkage caused by dehydration were shown on CT scans. Both white and gray matter were clearly observed in the brain and cerebellum. The white matter and the fatty tissue of the bodies were visibly white. This condition was possibly caused by the transformation of the fatty tissue into a waxlike substance and the deposition of calcium salts. The lungs were expanded in all three mummies. The ages of the three children at the time of their deaths were estimated by means of radiographs of the teeth and long bones. Bone mineralization, the muscular volume, and the thickness of the adipose panniculus indicated the good nutritional state of the three Inca children. The spleen was not visualized in any case. CONCLUSION Radiology helped us determine the state of the internal organs, the nutritional conditions, and the physical abnormalities of the naturally mummified children. These mummies can be considered among the best preserved mummies currently known.
Neuronal network properties underlying the generation of gasping

1. The pre‐Bötzinger complex (PreBötC) generates different inspiratory rhythms. Under control normoxic conditions, a mixture of intrinsic and synaptic properties underlies the generation of eupnoea by the PreBötC. Under hypoxia, those network properties change and modify the respiratory rhythm pattern. Hypoxia can be caused by a reduction in oxygen availability in the environment, inadequate oxygen transport, an inability of tissues to use oxygen or several pathological conditions.
Gradual changes in residual stress and microstructure during contact fatigue in ball bearings

AbstractDeep-groove ball bearings have been endurance tested at high stress levels. The purpose of the work was to study the simultaneous generation of residual stresses and occurrence of structural changes owing to cyclic rolling contact fatigue. During the investigation the decomposition of both retained austenite and parent martensite were followed. The residual stresses and the austenite decomposition were measured by an X-ray diffraction technique, using signal averaging. Optical and transmission electron microscopy were used to observe the transformed regions resulting from the martensite decay. Depth profiles of residual stress and of successive structural changes were constructed. The observations are discussed in terms of a qualitative model for residual-stress generation under cyclic rolling contact.
Toward a Task-based Gold Standard for Evaluation of NP Chunks and Technical Terms

We propose a gold standard for evaluating two types of information extraction output -- noun phrase (NP) chunks (Abney 1991; Ramshaw and Marcus 1995) and technical terms (Justeson and Katz 1995; Daille 2000; Jacquemin 2002). The gold standard is built around the notion that since different semantic and syntactic variants of terms are arguably correct, a fully satisfactory assessment of the quality of the output must include task-based evaluation. We conducted an experiment that assessed subjects' choice of index terms in an information access task. Subjects showed significant preference for index terms that are longer, as measured by number of words, and more complex, as measured by number of prepositions. These terms, which were identified by a human indexer, serve as the gold standard. The experimental protocol is a reliable and rigorous method for evaluating the quality of a set of terms. An important advantage of this task-based evaluation is that a set of index terms which is different than the gold standard can 'win' by providing better information access than the gold standard itself does. And although the individual human subject experiments are time consuming, the experimental interface, test materials and data analysis programs are completely re-usable.
Functional Dichotomy between OX40 and 4-1BB in Modulating Effector CD8 T Cell Responses1

Members of the TNFR family are thought to deliver costimulatory signals to T cells and modulate their function and survival. In this study, we compare the role of two closely related TNFR family molecules, OX40 and 4-1BB, in generating effector CD8 T cells to Ag delivered by adenovirus. OX40 and 4-1BB were both induced on responding naive CD8 T cells, but 4-1BB exhibited faster and more sustained kinetics than OX40. OX40-deficient CD8 T cells initially expanded normally; however, their accumulation and survival at late times in the primary response was significantly impaired. In contrast, 4-1BB-deficient CD8 T cells displayed hyperresponsiveness, expanding more than wild-type cells. The 4-1BB-deficient CD8 T cells also showed enhanced maturation attributes, whereas OX40-deficient CD8 T cells had multiple defects in the expression of effector cell surface markers, the synthesis of cytokines, and in cytotoxic activity. These results suggest that, in contrast to current ideas, OX40 and 4-1BB can have a clear functional dichotomy in modulating effector CD8 T cell responses. OX40 can positively regulate effector function and late accumulation/survival, whereas 4-1BB can initially operate in a negative manner to limit primary CD8 responses.
Modulation of periodontitis progression using pH‐responsive nanosphere encapsulating metronidazole or N‐phenacylthialzolium bromide

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE This study aimed to develop pH-responsive polylactide-glycolic acid co-polymer and chitosan (PLGA/chitosan) nanosphere as an inflammation-responsive vehicle and evaluate the potential of the nanosphere encapsulating metronidazole, an antibiotic, and N-phenacylthiazolium bromide (PTB), a host modulator, for treating periodontitis. MATERIAL AND METHODS PLGA/chitosan nanospheres were fabricated using oil-in-water emulsion method. Experimental periodontitis was induced on the rat maxillae, and the sites were randomly allocated to four treatment categories, including periodontitis alone (PR), periodontitis with nanospheres alone, nanospheres encapsulating metronidazole (MT) and nanospheres encapsulating PTB (PB). The ligature was retained until the animals were killed, and the treatment outcome was evaluated by the progression of periodontal bone loss (PPBL), inflammatory cell infiltration and collagen deposition. RESULTS The encapsulated drug was released rapidly from the nanospheres without significant initial burst release at pH 5.5. Compared with group PR, PPBL was significantly reduced in groups MT and PB on day 4 (P<.05). On day 21, PPBL was significantly lower in group PB (P<.05). In groups MT and PB, inflammation was significantly reduced in groups MT and PB relative to groups PR and periodontitis with nanospheres alone (P<.05), and collagen deposition was significantly greater relative to group PR (P<.05). CONCLUSION PLGA/chitosan nanospheres encapsulating metronidazole or PTB showed potential for modulating periodontitis progression.
SrTiO_3 films on platinized (0001) Al_2O_3: Characterization of texture and nonstoichiometry accommodation

Transmission electron microscopy and x-ray diffraction were used to study SrTiO_3 films grown on platinized (0001) Al_2O_3 substrates. The Pt films were epitaxial with an orientation relationship described by (111)_Pt‖(0001)_Al2O3 and [110]_Pt‖[10^¯_10]_Al2O3. SrTiO_3 films with two different Sr to Ti ratios, 1.02 and 1.4, were deposited by radio-frequency magnetron sputtering. In the film with a large amount of Sr excess, the grain sizes were smaller and a high density of planar defects was observed. The films were predominantly (111) textured, but a weaker (110) texture component was also found, independent of stoichiometry. While the (111) texture could be explained with the excellent lattice match with (111) Pt, the (110) textured grains had a large mismatch with the Pt electrode. We propose that the presence of the (110) oriented grains is due to nucleation at Pt surface defects. Planar defects in the films with a large amount of Sr excess served to accommodate the nonstoichiometry. Comparison with homoepitaxial SrTiO_3 films showed that the density of planar defects in the SrTiO_3 films on (111)Pt/Al_2O_3 is insufficient to accommodate all the excess Sr. The influence of the film microstructure on the dielectric properties is also discussed.