Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A commercial gas boiler fitted with the ORC module as perspective solution for households

In this paper the applicability of the commercial gas boiler (De Dietrich DTG X23N) coupled with the laboratory prototype micro ORC setup was experimentally studied. The main objective was to determine the working fluid capability to obtain required temperatures of vapour prior to the turbine, attainable heat rates and efficiencies of the whole system. The boiler thermal power was 25 kW. Tests were carried out with a single stage turbine specifically designed and manufactured for the facility. Investigations show that the boiler was able to provide the saturated/superheated steam of ethanol as a working fluid at proper conditions needed in the ORC system and it can be utilized as a heat source in the domestic micro-CHP. The attained turbine power reached 1.5kW. In authors opinion it is very important conclusion for the research development on the domestic micro ORC.
An Evaluation of the Left-Brain vs. Right-Brain Hypothesis with Resting State Functional Connectivity Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Lateralized brain regions subserve functions such as language and visuospatial processing. It has been conjectured that individuals may be left-brain dominant or right-brain dominant based on personality and cognitive style, but neuroimaging data has not provided clear evidence whether such phenotypic differences in the strength of left-dominant or right-dominant networks exist. We evaluated whether strongly lateralized connections covaried within the same individuals. Data were analyzed from publicly available resting state scans for 1011 individuals between the ages of 7 and 29. For each subject, functional lateralization was measured for each pair of 7266 regions covering the gray matter at 5-mm resolution as a difference in correlation before and after inverting images across the midsagittal plane. The difference in gray matter density between homotopic coordinates was used as a regressor to reduce the effect of structural asymmetries on functional lateralization. Nine left- and 11 right-lateralized hubs were identified as peaks in the degree map from the graph of significantly lateralized connections. The left-lateralized hubs included regions from the default mode network (medial prefrontal cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, and temporoparietal junction) and language regions (e.g., Broca Area and Wernicke Area), whereas the right-lateralized hubs included regions from the attention control network (e.g., lateral intraparietal sulcus, anterior insula, area MT, and frontal eye fields). Left- and right-lateralized hubs formed two separable networks of mutually lateralized regions. Connections involving only left- or only right-lateralized hubs showed positive correlation across subjects, but only for connections sharing a node. Lateralization of brain connections appears to be a local rather than global property of brain networks, and our data are not consistent with a whole-brain phenotype of greater “left-brained” or greater “right-brained” network strength across individuals. Small increases in lateralization with age were seen, but no differences in gender were observed.
The Influence of the Distal Resection Margin Length on Local Recurrence and long- term Survival in Patients with Rectal Cancer after Chemoradiotherapy and Sphincter- Preserving Rectal Resection

Abstract Background Low recurrence rates and long term survival are the main therapeutic goals of rectal cancer surgery. Complete, margin- negative resection confers the greatest chance for a cure. The aim of our study was to determine whether the length of the distal resection margin was associated with local recurrence rate and long- term survival. Patients and methods One hundred and nine patients, who underwent sphincter-preserving resection for locally advanced rectal cancer after preoperative chemoradiotherapy between 2006 and 2010 in two tertiary referral centres were included in the study. Distal resection margin lengths were measured on formalin-fixed, pinned specimens. Characteristics of patients with distal resection margin < 8 mm (Group I, n = 27), 8–20 mm (Group II, n = 31) and > 20 mm (Group III, n = 51) were retrospectively analysed and compared. Median (range) follow-up time in Group I was 89 (51–111), in Group II 83 (57–111) and in Group III 80 (45–116) months (p = 0.326), respectively. Results Univariate survival analysis showed that distal resection margin length was not statistically significantly associated with overall survival or local recurrence rate (p > 0.05). In a multiple Cox regression analysis, after adjusting for pathologic T and N stage (yT, yN), distal resection margin length was still not statistically significantly associated with overall survival. Conclusions Our study shows that close distal resection margins can be accepted as oncologically safe for sphincter-preserving rectal resections after preoperative chemoradiotherapy.
Epigenetic Activation and Silencing of the Gene that Encodes IFN-γ

Transcriptional activation and repression of genes that are developmentally regulated or exhibit cell-type specific expression patterns is largely achieved by modifying the chromatin template at a gene locus. Complex formation of stable epigenetic histone marks, loss or gain of DNA methylation, alterations in chromosome conformation, and specific utilization of both proximal and distal transcriptional enhancers and repressors all contribute to this process. In addition, long non-coding RNAs are a new species of regulatory RNAs that either positively or negatively regulate transcription of target gene loci. IFN-γ is a pro-inflammatory cytokine with critical functions in both innate and adaptive arms of the immune system. This review focuses on our current understanding of how the chromatin template is modified at the IFNG locus during developmental processes leading to its transcriptional activation and silencing.
Combination octreotide, midodrine, and albumin may improve survival in patients with Hepatorenal syndrome, but the evidence is weak

A critical appraisal and clinical application of Skagen C, Einstein M, Lucey MR, Said A. Combination treatment with octreotide, midodrine, and albumin improves survival in patients with type 1 and type 2 hepatorenal syndrome. J Clin Gastroenterol. 2009 Aug;43(7):680-5. doi: 10.1097/MCG.0b013e318188947c
Highly Efficient Secondary-Resonant Active Clamp Flyback Converter

Both high switching frequency and high efficiency are critical in reducing power adapter size. The active clamp flyback (ACF) topology allows zero voltage soft switching (ZVS) under all line and load conditions, eliminates leakage inductance and snubber losses, and enables high frequency and high power density power conversion. Traditional ACF ZVS operation relies on the resonance between leakage inductance and a small primary-side clamping capacitor, which leads to increased rms current and high conduction loss. This also causes oscillatory output rectifier current and impedes the implementation of synchronous rectification. This paper proposes a secondary-side resonance scheme to shape the primary current waveform in a way that significantly improves synchronous rectifier operation and reduces primary rms current. The concept is verified with a ${\mathbf{25}}\hbox{--}{\text{W/in}}^{3}$ high-density 45-W adapter prototype using a monolithic gallium nitride power IC. Over 93% full-load efficiency was demonstrated at the worst case 90-V ac input and maximum full-load efficiency was 94.5%.
Combined effect of wood moisture content, drill bit rotational speed and feed rate on drilling resistance measurements in Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst.)

ABSTRACT An IML-RESI PD 400 drilling tool and a standard spade drill bit (IML System GmbH, Wiesloch, Germany) were used to study the combined effect of wood moisture content (MC), drill bit rotational speed and feed rate on drilling resistance (DR) and feeding force (FF). Tests were made with Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) Karst. ) conditioned in a normal climate (20°C/65% RH), at 20°C/95% RH, vacuum-pressure impregnated in water, and oven-dried. Rotational speeds and feed rates had an impact on feed rate per cutting edge for the major cutting edge of the drill bit which was used for correlation with DR and FF for various MC. Impact of MC on DR and FF depended on rotational speeds and feed rates of the drill bit. For feed rates per cutting edge less than 0.09 mm, DR was higher for water saturated (WS) specimens. Negligible differences between DR for various MC were found for feed rates per cutting edge between 0.09 and 0.15 mm. DR was higher at low MC for feed rates per cutting edge which were higher than 0.15 mm. FF extremely increased in conditioned (20°C/95% RH) and WS specimens at feed rates per cutting edge less than 0.1 mm.
Region-Adaptive Deformable Registration of CT/MRI Pelvic Images via Learning-Based Image Synthesis

Registration of pelvic computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is highly desired as it can facilitate effective fusion of two modalities for prostate cancer radiation therapy, i.e., using CT for dose planning and MRI for accurate organ delineation. However, due to the large intermodality appearance gaps and the high shape/appearance variations of pelvic organs, the pelvic CT/MRI registration is highly challenging. In this paper, we propose a region-adaptive deformable registration method for multimodal pelvic image registration. Specifically, to handle the large appearance gaps, we first perform both CT-to-MRI and MRI-to-CT image synthesis by multi-target regression forest. Then, to use the complementary anatomical information in the two modalities for steering the registration, we select key points automatically from both modalities and use them together for guiding correspondence detection in the region-adaptive fashion. That is, we mainly use CT to establish correspondences for bone regions, and use MRI to establish correspondences for soft tissue regions. The number of key points is increased gradually during the registration, to hierarchically guide the symmetric estimation of the deformation fields. Experiments for both intra-subject and inter-subject deformable registration show improved performances compared with the state-of-the-art multimodal registration methods, which demonstrate the potentials of our method to be applied for the routine prostate cancer radiation therapy.
Contain This, Unleashing Docker for HPC

Containers are a lightweight virtualization method for running multiple isolated Linux systems under a common host operating system. Container-based computing is revolutionizing the way applications are developed and deployed. A new ecosystem has emerged around the Docker platform to enable container based computing. However, this revolution has yet to reach the HPC community. In this paper, we provide background on Linux Containers and Docker, and how they can be of value to the scientific and HPC community. We will explain some of the use cases that motivate the need for user defined images and the uses of Docker. We will describe early work in deploying and integrating Docker into an HPC environment, and some of the pitfalls and challenges we encountered. We will discuss some of the security implications of using Docker and how we have addressed those for a shared user system typical of HPC centers. We will also provide performance measurements to illustrate the low overhead of containers. While our early work has been on cluster-based/CS-series systems, we will describe some preliminary assessment of supporting Docker on Cray XC series supercomputers, and a potential partnership with Cray to explore the feasibility and approaches to using Docker on large systems. Keywords-Docker; User Defined Images; containers; HPC systems
Two-step oligoclonal development of male germ cells

During mouse development, primordial germ cells (PGCs) that give rise to the entire germ line are first identified within the proximal epiblast. However, long-term tracing of the fate of the cells has not been done wherein all cells in and around the germ-cell lineage are identified. Also, quantitative estimates of the number of founder PGCs using different models have come up with various numbers. Here, we use tetrachimeric mice to show that the progenitor numbers for the entire germ line in adult testis, and for the initiating embryonic PGCs, are both 4 cells. Although they proliferate to form polyclonal germ-cell populations in fetal and neonatal testes, germ cells that actually contribute to adult spermatogenesis originate from a small number of secondary founder cells that originate in the fetal period. The rest of the “deciduous” germ cells are lost, most likely by apoptosis, before the reproductive period. The second “actual” founder germ cells generally form small numbers of large monoclonal areas in testes by the reproductive period. Our results also demonstrate that there is no contribution of somatic cells to the male germ cell pool during development or in adulthood. These results suggest a model of 2-step oligoclonal development of male germ cells in mice, the second step distinguishing the heritable germ line from cells selected not to participate in forming the next generation.
Regulation of radicals from electrochemical exfoliation of a double-graphite electrode to fabricate high-quality graphene

Manipulation of conditions during the electrochemical exfoliation of graphite is in great demand for the large-scale manufacture of high-quality graphene. Here, we developed a new electrolysis system to manufacture high-quality graphene using double-graphite foil as an electrode. We employed alternating currents to the power system. Graphene with sulfur particles on the surface (GSP) was successfully prepared by adding thiourea into the ammonium sulfate electrolyte. CH4N2S acted as a source of sulfur and regulated the radicals (e.g., HO˙). Thus, exfoliation was controlled. The as-prepared GSP (1% CH4N2S) displayed a relatively high electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding effectiveness (SE) value of 32.46 dB (thickness of 0.208 mm). In the meantime, we study and confirm that the free radicals could also be regulated by lowering the temperature. The as-prepared graphene exhibited an EMI SE value of 21.05 dB (thickness of 0.239 mm), when the temperature of the electrochemical exfoliation was reduced to 20 °C.
Comparison of Dual Energy X-ray Absorptiometry and Bioimpedance in Assessing Body Composition and Nutrition in Peritoneal Dialysis Patients.

OBJECTIVE Peritoneal dialysis (PD) patients are characterized by protein malnutrition and muscle wasting. Reliable, easy, and cheap methods for evaluating nutrition are desirable. Three methods are commonly available: dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), bioimpedance (BI), and subjective global assessment (SGA). The objective of the study was to compare the previously mentioned methods for assessment of body composition and nutritional status in PD patients. DESIGN The study is cross-sectional and consisted of 72 PD patients from a single center PD ambulatorium. METHODS Participants were measured twice by DXA, twice by BI, and once by SGA. Measurements included lean tissue mass (LTM), fat tissue mass (FT) and, for BI, overhydration (OH), intracellular water (ICW), and extracellular water (ECW). LTM and FT were indexed to body area (Lean Tissue Index [LTI] and Fat Tissue Index [FTI], respectively), and ICW for height (ICW/ht). We assessed conventional biochemical and clinical variables, using values for normal individuals as a reference. RESULTS There was good overall agreement between BI and DXA but considerable intra-individual variation (1 standard deviation: FT 5.7 kg; LTM 5.6 kg). Factors affecting the differences were FT, ICW, LTM, and ICW. Obesity (DXA 43%; BI 54%) and muscle wasting (BI 28%; SGA 53%) were common. Agreement between BI and SGA was poor. Thirty-eight percent of patients judged malnourished by SGA also had a low LTI; 23% with normal SGA had low LTI. SGA was closer related to LTI (BI) than LTI (DXA). Plasma albumin was correlated to LTI, FTI, and ICW/ht, and comorbidity to OH, clinical malnutrition, reduced FTI, but not LTI. CONCLUSION Agreement between DXA and BI was high on a population basis but not at an individual level. Obesity and muscle wasting were common in this population. OH might reduce DXA accuracy in PD patients. LTI and ICW may be useful measures to supplement SGA in assessing nutrition.
Autophagy Supports Biomass Production and Nitrogen Use Efficiency at the Vegetative Stage in Rice1[OPEN]

Characterization of a rice mutant defective in autophagy highlights its importance in nitrogen remobilization from senescent leaves, biomass increase, and nitrogen use efficiency in the vegetative plant. Much of the nitrogen in leaves is distributed to chloroplasts, mainly in photosynthetic proteins. During leaf senescence, chloroplastic proteins, including Rubisco, are rapidly degraded, and the released nitrogen is remobilized and reused in newly developing tissues. Autophagy facilitates the degradation of intracellular components for nutrient recycling in all eukaryotes, and recent studies have revealed critical roles for autophagy in Rubisco degradation and nitrogen remobilization into seeds in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). Here, we examined the function of autophagy in vegetative growth and nitrogen usage in a cereal plant, rice (Oryza sativa). An autophagy-disrupted rice mutant, Osatg7-1, showed reduced biomass production and nitrogen use efficiency compared with the wild type. While Osatg7-1 showed early visible leaf senescence, the nitrogen concentration remained high in the senescent leaves. 15N pulse chase analysis revealed suppression of nitrogen remobilization during leaf senescence in Osatg7-1. Accordingly, the reduction of nitrogen available for newly developing tissues in Osatg7-1 likely led its reduced leaf area and tillers. The limited leaf growth in Osatg7-1 decreased the photosynthetic capacity of the plant. Much of the nitrogen remaining in senescent leaves of Osatg7-1 was in soluble proteins, and the Rubisco concentration in senescing leaves of Osatg7-1 was about 2.5 times higher than in the wild type. Transmission electron micrographs showed a cytosolic fraction rich with organelles in senescent leaves of Osatg7-1. Our results suggest that autophagy contributes to efficient nitrogen remobilization at the whole-plant level by facilitating protein degradation for nitrogen recycling in senescent leaves.
Incentive regulation and performance measurement of the Portuguese solid waste management services

Measuring the performance of solid waste management services usually uncovers very high potential for gains in efficiency and productivity. This circumstance occurs, naturally, due to the fact that these services are outside the market and because they are subjected to various market failures in their organizational framework. The aim of this study was to examine the Portuguese regulatory model and to measure the performance of the Portuguese solid waste management services in order to identify the major reforms carried out and their outcomes. As a first objective, the sunshine regulatory approach adopted in Portugal, in which performance comparison and its public discussion are the main tools, was investigated. The second objective was to compute the efficiency of the Portuguese solid waste management services by means of the non-parametric technique of data envelopment analysis (DEA), evaluating the Portuguese regulatory model and the existing market structure, as well as the influence of the operational environment on efficiency. The benchmarking frontier technique of DEA is particularly useful in the efficiency measurement of public utilities, in which knowledge of the production function is relatively scarce. Several DEA models were used and they all depicted significant inefficiency. The study also proved that efficiency did not depend on ownership (public or private) and that there was no difference in efficiency between the players, irrespective of whether they were regulated or not.
A microbiological study of Papillon-Lefévre syndrome in two patients

Aim—To analyse the microflora of subgingival plaque from patients with Papillon-Lefévre syndrome (PLS), which is a very rare disease characterised by palmar-plantar hyperkeratosis with precocious periodontal destruction. Methods—Bacterial isolates were identified using a combination of commercial identification kits, traditional laboratory tests, and gas liquid chromatography. Some isolates were also subjected to partial 16S rDNA sequencing. Plaque samples were also assayed for the presence of Porphyromonas gingivalis, Prevotella intermedia, and Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans in a quantitative enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) using monoclonal antibodies. Results—The culture results showed that most isolates were capnophilic and facultatively anaerobic species—mainly Capnocytophaga spp and Streptococcus spp. The latter included S constellatus, S oralis, and S sanguis. Other facultative bacteria belonged to the genera gemella, kingella, leuconostoc, and stomatococcus. The aerobic bacteria isolated were species of neisseria and bacillus. Anaerobic species included Prevotella intermedia, P melaninogenica, and P nigrescens, as well as Peptostreptococcus spp. ELISA detected P gingivalis in one patient in all sites sampled, whereas A actinomycetemcomitans was detected in only one site from the other patient. Prevotella intermedia was present in low numbers. Conclusions—Patients with PLS have a very complex subgingival flora including recognised periodontal pathogens. However, no particular periodontopathogen is invariably associated with PLS.
The effect of frequency altered feedback on stuttering duration and type.

PURPOSE The effect of frequency altered feedback (FAF) on stuttering type (i.e., prolongation, repetition, or silent block) and stuttering duration (i.e., average duration of stuttering event and total stuttering time) was examined. METHOD Retrospective analyses of previously collected data from 12 adult persons who stutter who participated in an ABA time-series design while reading orally was undertaken. It was hypothesized that stuttering duration would decrease and there would be a differential reduction in the type of stuttering during FAF, concurrent with previously confirmed reduction of stuttering episodes. A total of 2,971 stuttered syllables were analyzed. RESULTS The total stuttering duration (s/min) was significantly reduced by approximately 50% irrespective of stuttering type (p = .0014). Although significant differences in the average duration(s) of the 3 stuttering types (p = .0064) existed, FAF significantly reduced each type of stuttering by approximately 20% (p = .0055). There was no differential effect on the reduction of proportion of stuttering type during FAF (p = .36). CONCLUSIONS FAF positively affects the speech of persons who stutter by reducing the proportion of stuttered events with a concomitant decrease in duration of residual stuttering and total stuttering time during oral reading.