Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Revision of descriptions and calculated properties of road bed soils and asphalt concrete materials upon designing of highway pavements in terms of criteria of residual deformations and fatigue cracking of asphalt concretes

Development of road pavements is a consolidated procedure of designing and calculations of strength, frost resistance and drainage. Strength calculation is a complex procedure involving several criteria, in fact reducing to meeting two requirements: restriction of accumulation of residual deformations in structure and prevention of fatigue cracking in monolith asphalt concrete layers. This article proposes to improve functions of calculated properties of road bed soils and asphalt concretes for calculations according to criteria of both the first and the second groups of ultimate limit states. Such proposals are aimed at harmonization of calculations procedures of road pavements with regulations in the field of soil science and asphalt concrete materials.
On the scalar sector of the covariant graviton two-point function in de Sitter spacetime

We examine the scalar sector of the covariant graviton two-point function in de Sitter spacetime. This sector consists of the pure-trace part and another part described by a scalar field. We show that it does not contribute to two-point functions of gauge-invariant quantities. We also demonstrate that the long-distance growth present in some gauges is absent in this sector for a wide range of gauge parameters.
Effects of intrinsic strain on the structural stability and mechanical properties of phosphorene nanotubes

Using molecular dynamics simulations, we explore the structural stability and mechanical integrity of phosphorene nanotubes (PNTs), where the intrinsic strain in the tubular PNT structure plays an important role. It is proposed that the atomic structure of larger-diameter armchair PNTs (armPNTs) can remain stable at a higher temperature, but the high intrinsic strain in the hoop direction renders zigzag PNTs less favorable. The mechanical properties of PNTs, including Young’s modulus and fracture strength, are sensitive to the diameter, showing a size-dependence. A simple model is proposed to express Young’s modulus as a function of the intrinsic axial strain, which in turn depends on the diameter of the PNTs. In addition, the compressive buckling of armPNTs is length-dependent, and instability modes transitioning from column buckling to shell buckling are observed as the ratio of the diameter/length increases.
Comprehensive Surgical Coaching Enhances Surgical Skill in the Operating Room: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

OBJECTIVES The aim of the study was to determine whether individualized coaching improved surgical technical skill in the operating room to a higher degree than current residency training. BACKGROUND Clinical training in the operating room is a valuable opportunity for surgeons to acquire skill and knowledge; however, it often remains underutilized. Coaching has been successfully used in various industries to enhance performance, but its role in surgery has been insufficiently investigated. METHODS This randomized controlled trial was conducted at one surgical training program. Trainees undergoing a minimally invasive surgery rotation were randomized to either conventional training (CT) or comprehensive surgical coaching (CSC). CT included ward and operating room duties, and regular departmental teaching sessions. CSC comprised performance analysis, debriefing, feedback, and behavior modeling. Primary outcome measures were technical performance as measured on global and procedure-specific rating scales, and surgical safety parameters, measured by error count. Operative performance was assessed by blinded video analysis of the first and last cases recorded by the participants during their rotation. RESULTS Twenty residents were randomized and 18 completed the study. At posttraining the CSC group (n = 9) scored significantly higher on a procedure-specific skill scale compared with the CT group (n = 9) [median, 3.90 (interquartile range, 3.68-4.30) vs 3.60 (2.98-3.70), P = 0.017], and made fewer technical errors [10 (7-13) vs 18 (13-21), P = 0.003]. Significant within-group improvements for all skill metrics were only noted in the CSC group. CONCLUSIONS Comprehensive surgical coaching enhances surgical training and results in skill acquisition superior to conventional training.
Tracer Method to Determine Residence Time in a Permeable Reactive Barrier

A method is presented to evaluate ground water residence time in a zero‐valent iron (ZVI) permeable reactive barrier (PRB) using radon‐222 (222Rn) as a radioactive tracer. Residence time is a useful indicator of PRB hydraulic performance, with application to estimating the volumetric rate of ground water flow through a PRB, identifying flow heterogeneity, and characterizing flow conditions over time as a PRB matures. The tracer method relies on monitoring the decay of naturally occurring aqueous 222Rn as ground water flows through a PRB. Application of the method at a PRB site near Monticello, Utah, shows that after 8 years of operation, residence times in the ZVI range from 80 to 486 h and correlate well with chemical parameters (pH, Ca, SO4, and Fe) that indicate the relative residence time. Residence times in this case study are determined directly from the first‐order decay equation because we show no significant emanation of 222Rn within the PRB and no measurable loss of 222Rn other than by radioactive decay.
Fade depth scaling with channel bandwidth

l ¼fcWb=2 and fh ¼fc þWb=2, and similarly for E. In our investigation we consider a range of values of Wb such that it varies from an arbitrarily small value (a pure sinusoid) to the full-band (7.5 GHz wide) channel. Fade analysis: The bandwidth, Wb, has a strong impact on the local variation of the Eb ,a s is observed fromFig. 1 . I t is apparent that the narrowband channel is far more susceptible to multipath interference and small-scale fading than the UWB channel. This is quantified by considering the standard deviation of this channel for the two bandwidths, which is found to be 4.6 and 0.5 dB for the narrowband and ultra-wideband cases, respectively. Furthermore, the cumulative distribution functions (CDF's) of Eb are estimated for various values of Wb ,a s shown inFig. 2. From the Figure, a 1 Hz channel will, on average, suffer fades deeper than 5 dB for 26% of the realisations, 7% for the 100 MHz channel, 0.07% for the 500 MHz channel, and practically 0% for the 7.5 GHz channel. The progressive convergence
Evaluation of Endod (Phytolacca dodecandra: Phytolaccaceae) as a Larvicide Against Anopheles arabiensis, the Principal Vector of Malaria in Ethiopia

Abstract Malaria control methods rely mostly on adult mosquito control using insecticide-treated nets and indoor residual spraying with insecticides. Plants such as endod (Phytolacca dodecandra) can potentially be used for the control of mosquito larvae as a supplement to adult control methods. Following the discovery of endod, a molluscicide plant, more than 5 decades ago in Ethiopia, subsequent studies have shown that its potency can further be increased by simple procedures such as aging endod berry powder in water. This study was conducted to evaluate the killing effect of fresh and aged endod solution against 4th-stage larvae of Anopheles arabiensis. Laboratory-reared An. arabiensis larvae exposed to different concentrations of endod preparation using distilled or spring water had 50% lethal concentration (LC50) = 49.6 ppm and 90% lethal concentration (LC90) = 234 ppm for fresh and LC50 = 36.4 ppm and LC90 = 115.7 ppm for the aged endod solution in distilled water against the laboratory population. Against field-collected larvae of the same species, aged preparations in habitat water resulted in higher LC50 (472.7 ppm) and LC90 (691 ppm) values, with only a slight improvement over fresh preparations in habitat water (LC50 = 456.2 ppm; LC90 = 896.1 ppm). In general, although aged preparations of endod required lower concentrations than fresh to kill at least 90% of the larvae, these concentrations were much higher (12–70×) than that required for schistosome-transmitting snails.
Integrated Change Impact Analysis Approach for the Software Development Phase

Impact analysis aims to quickly predict the extent of changes which will be required to software project products as a result of a potential change request. The existence of partially developed classes in the software development phase artifacts causes several challenges to the current static analysis and dynamic analysis techniques. Thus, this paper proposes a new approach that integrates between these two techniques to support those challenges. There are two main contributions of this paper: (1) a new change impact analysis approach that is able to support the software development phase; and (2) evaluation results that show the new approach gives higher accuracy of results over the selected current impact analysis approaches.
Interactions among Quorum Sensing Inhibitors

Many pathogenic bacteria use quorum sensing (QS) systems to regulate the expression of virulence genes in a density-dependent manner. In one widespread QS paradigm the enzyme LuxI generates a small diffusible molecule of the acyl-homoserine lactone (AHL) family; high cell densities lead to high AHL levels; AHL binds the transcription factor LuxR, triggering it to activate gene expression at a virulence promoter. The emergence of antibiotic resistance has generated interest in alternative anti-microbial therapies that target QS. Inhibitors of LuxI and LuxR have been developed and tested in vivo, and can act at various levels: inhibiting the synthesis of AHL by LuxI, competitively or non-competitively inhibiting LuxR, or increasing the turnover of LuxI, LuxR, or AHL. Here use an experimentally validated computational model of LuxI/LuxR QS to study the effects of using inhibitors individually and in combination. The model includes the effect of transcriptional feedback, which generates highly non-linear responses as inhibitor levels are increased. For the ubiquitous LuxI-feedback virulence systems, inhibitors of LuxI are more effective than those of LuxR when used individually. Paradoxically, we find that LuxR competitive inhibitors, either individually or in combination with other inhibitors, can sometimes increase virulence by weakly activating LuxR. For both LuxI-feedback and LuxR-feedback systems, a combination of LuxR non-competitive inhibitors and LuxI inhibitors act multiplicatively over a broad parameter range. In our analysis, this final strategy emerges as the only robust therapeutic option.
The significant impact of Ti content on microstructure–toughness relationship in the simulated coarse-grained heated-affected zone of high-strength low-alloy steels

This study aims to investigate the influence of Ti addition on microstructure and toughness in the simulated coarse-grained heated-affected zone (CGHAZ) of high-strength low-alloy steels. The steels with low and high Ti content respectively were subjected to 100 kJ/cm heat input welding thermal cycle. The results indicated that the second-phase particles were mainly oxide covered with MnS and fine (Ti,Nb)N precipitate in low-Ti steel, which were modified to the oxide surrounded by TiN and coarse (Ti,Nb)N precipitate in high-Ti steel. Compared with low-Ti steels, the coarser precipitates induced larger austenite grain in CGHAZ of high-Ti steel. Moreover, the wrapping of TiN decreases the ability of inclusion to promote the nucleation of acicular ferrite, resulting in lower fraction of acicular ferrite in CGHAZ of high-Ti steel. Content of martensite-austenite constituent increased in CGHAZ of high-Ti steel. They were all responsible for the degeneration in toughness in CGHAZ of high-Ti steel.
Yellow Fever Outbreaks in Unvaccinated Populations, Brazil, 2008–2009

Due to the risk of severe vaccine-associated adverse events, yellow fever vaccination in Brazil is only recommended in areas considered at risk for disease. From September 2008 through June 2009, two outbreaks of yellow fever in previously unvaccinated populations resulted in 21 confirmed cases with 9 deaths (case-fatality, 43%) in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul and 28 cases with 11 deaths (39%) in Sao Paulo state. Epizootic deaths of non-human primates were reported before and during the outbreak. Over 5.5 million doses of yellow fever vaccine were administered in the two most affected states. Vaccine-associated adverse events were associated with six deaths due to acute viscerotropic disease (0.8 deaths per million doses administered) and 45 cases of acute neurotropic disease (5.6 per million doses administered). Yellow fever vaccine recommendations were revised to include areas in Brazil previously not considered at risk for yellow fever.
Mixture Optimization on internally Cured High Strength Engineered Cementitious Composite with pre-wetted Sand-like Zeolite

In this paper, mixture optimization on internally cured high strength engineered cementitious composite (HSECC) with pre-wetted sand-like zeolite is conducted based on shrinkage and mechanical performance tests. Experimental study on the effect of the replacing ratio of the cement with the calcined zeolite on matrix compressive and bending strength was carried out first. Based on above test results, four optimized mixtures with the zeolite addition of 144, 194, 244 and 294 kg/m 3 were obtained. Shrinkage and uniaxial tensile tests on the four high strength matrix reinforced with 2% PVA and 1% steel fibers were conducted. Through mixture optimization, strength of cement matrix with the calcined zeolite addition is further improved. The optimized replacing ratio of cement with the zeolite in the matrix is existed to obtain the highest compressive and bending strength. Shrinkage the HSECC with optimized addition of the calcined zeolite is significantly reduced. The highest reduction rate on shrinkage of the composite comparing to the reference achieves 78%. Tensile performance with optimized addition of the calcined zeolite is improved comparing with the reference mixture as well. Four optimized mixtures of HSECC are obtained with cracking and tensile strength, ultimate tensile strain and average crack width at tensile strength achieving of 4.31 - 5.48 MPa and 6.36 - 7.27 MPa, 1.01 - 1.27% and 18 - 24 μ m.
A Study of Mutual Information for GMM-Based Spectral Conversion

The Gaussian mixture model (GMM)-based method has dominated the field of voice conversion (VC) for last decade. However, the converted spectra are excessively smoothed and thus produce muffled converted sound. In this study, we improve the speech quality by enhancing the dependency between the source (natural sound) and converted feature vectors (converted sound). It is believed that enhancing this dependency can make the converted sound closer to the natural sound. To this end, we propose an integrated maximum a posteriori and mutual information (MAPMI) criterion for parameter generation on spectral conversion. Experimental results demonstrate that the quality of converted speech by the proposed MAPMI method outperforms that by the conventional method in terms of formal listening test.
Gene Signature in Sessile Serrated Polyps Identifies Colon Cancer Subtype

Sessile serrated colon adenoma/polyps (SSA/P) are found during routine screening colonoscopy and may account for 20% to 30% of colon cancers. However, differentiating SSA/Ps from hyperplastic polyps (HP) with little risk of cancer is challenging and complementary molecular markers are needed. In addition, the molecular mechanisms of colon cancer development from SSA/Ps are poorly understood. RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) was performed on 21 SSA/Ps, 10 HPs, 10 adenomas, 21 uninvolved colon, and 20 control colon specimens. Differential expression and leave-one-out cross-validation methods were used to define a unique gene signature of SSA/Ps. Our SSA/P gene signature was evaluated in colon cancer RNA-Seq data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) to identify a subtype of colon cancers that may develop from SSA/Ps. A total of 1,422 differentially expressed genes were found in SSA/Ps relative to controls. Serrated polyposis syndrome (n = 12) and sporadic SSA/Ps (n = 9) exhibited almost complete (96%) gene overlap. A 51-gene panel in SSA/P showed similar expression in a subset of TCGA colon cancers with high microsatellite instability. A smaller 7-gene panel showed high sensitivity and specificity in identifying BRAF-mutant, CpG island methylator phenotype high, and MLH1-silenced colon cancers. We describe a unique gene signature in SSA/Ps that identifies a subset of colon cancers likely to develop through the serrated pathway. These gene panels may be utilized for improved differentiation of SSA/Ps from HPs and provide insights into novel molecular pathways altered in colon cancer arising from the serrated pathway. Cancer Prev Res; 9(6); 456–65. ©2016 AACR.
Optimal nutrient exchange and immune responses operate in partner specificity in the cnidarian-dinoflagellate symbiosis

Significance Flexibility in the endosymbiotic Symbiodinium community could provide reef-building corals with the capacity to survive environmental change, but this may be restricted to compatible host-symbiont combinations. Therefore, determining the underlying molecular, cellular, and physiological processes of symbiont compatibility is of critical importance for elucidating the resilience and adaptability of coral reefs. We coupled gene expression data with high-throughput metabolite profiling to compare the effects on the sea anemone Aiptasia when colonized by the thermally tolerant, opportunistic, but comparatively unproductive Symbiodinium trenchii vs. the regular symbiont species, Symbiodinium minutum. This powerful approach revealed strong evidence that optimal nutritional exchange and the response to intracellular oxidative stress are important determinants in the success of novel cnidarian-dinoflagellate symbioses. The relationship between corals and dinoflagellates of the genus Symbiodinium is fundamental to the functioning of coral ecosystems. It has been suggested that reef corals may adapt to climate change by changing their dominant symbiont type to a more thermally tolerant one, although the capacity for such a shift is potentially hindered by the compatibility of different host-symbiont pairings. Here we combined transcriptomic and metabolomic analyses to characterize the molecular, cellular, and physiological processes that underlie this compatibility, with a particular focus on Symbiodinium trenchii, an opportunistic, thermally tolerant symbiont that flourishes in coral tissues after bleaching events. Symbiont-free individuals of the sea anemone Exaiptasia pallida (commonly referred to as Aiptasia), an established model system for the study of the cnidarian-dinoflagellate symbiosis, were colonized with the “normal” (homologous) symbiont Symbiodinium minutum and the heterologous S. trenchii. Analysis of the host gene and metabolite expression profiles revealed that heterologous symbionts induced an expression pattern intermediate between the typical symbiotic state and the aposymbiotic state. Furthermore, integrated pathway analysis revealed that increased catabolism of fixed carbon stores, metabolic signaling, and immune processes occurred in response to the heterologous symbiont type. Our data suggest that both nutritional provisioning and the immune response induced by the foreign “invader” are important factors in determining the capacity of corals to adapt to climate change through the establishment of novel symbioses.
Atrial natriuretic peptide modulation of albumin clearance and contrast agent permeability in mouse skeletal muscle and skin: role in regulation of plasma volume

Atrial natriuretic peptide (ANP) via its guanylyl cyclase‐A (GC‐A) receptor participates in regulation of arterial blood pressure and vascular volume. Previous studies demonstrated that concerted renal diuretic/natriuretic and endothelial permeability effects of ANP cooperate in intravascular volume regulation. We show that the microvascular endothelial contribution to the hypovolaemic action of ANP can be measured by the magnitude of the ANP‐induced increase in blood‐to‐tissue albumin transport, measured as plasma albumin clearance corrected for intravascular volume change, relative to the corresponding increase in ANP‐induced renal water excretion. We used a two‐tracer method with isotopically labelled albumin to measure clearances in skin and skeletal muscle of: (i) C57BL6 mice; (ii) mice with endothelium‐restricted deletion of GC‐A (floxed GC‐A × tie2‐Cre: endothelial cell (EC) GC‐A knockout (KO)); and (iii) control littermates (floxed GC‐A mice with normal GC‐A expression levels). Comparison of albumin clearances in hypervolaemic EC GC‐A KO mice with normovolaemic littermates demonstrated that skeletal muscle albumin clearance with ANP treatment accounts for at most 30% of whole body clearance required for ANP to regulate plasma volume. Skin microcirculation responded to ANP similarly. Measurements of permeability to a high molecular mass contrast agent (35 kD Gadomer) by dynamic contrast‐enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE‐MRI) enabled repeated measures in individual animals and confirmed small increases in muscle and skin microvascular permeability after ANP. These quantitative methods will enable further evaluation of the contribution of ANP‐dependent microvascular beds (such as gastro‐intestinal tract) to plasma volume regulation.
Current Therapeutic Cannabis Controversies and Clinical Trial Design Issues

This overview covers a wide range of cannabis topics, initially examining issues in dispensaries and self-administration, plus regulatory requirements for production of cannabis-based medicines, particularly the Food and Drug Administration “Botanical Guidance. ” The remainder pertains to various cannabis controversies that certainly require closer examination if the scientific, consumer, and governmental stakeholders are ever to reach consensus on safety issues, specifically: whether botanical cannabis displays herbal synergy of its components, pharmacokinetics of cannabis and dose titration, whether cannabis medicines produce cyclo-oxygenase inhibition, cannabis-drug interactions, and cytochrome P450 issues, whether cannabis randomized clinical trials are properly blinded, combatting the placebo effect in those trials via new approaches, the drug abuse liability (DAL) of cannabis-based medicines and their regulatory scheduling, their effects on cognitive function and psychiatric sequelae, immunological effects, cannabis and driving safety, youth usage, issues related to cannabis smoking and vaporization, cannabis concentrates and vape-pens, and laboratory analysis for contamination with bacteria and heavy metals. Finally, the issue of pesticide usage on cannabis crops is addressed. New and disturbing data on pesticide residues in legal cannabis products in Washington State are presented with the observation of an 84.6% contamination rate including potentially neurotoxic and carcinogenic agents. With ongoing developments in legalization of cannabis in medical and recreational settings, numerous scientific, safety, and public health issues remain.