Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Evaluating the Connectivity of a Protected Areas' Network under the Prism of Global Change: The Efficiency of the European Natura 2000 Network for Four Birds of Prey

Climate and land use changes are major threats to biodiversity. To preserve biodiversity, networks of protected areas have been established worldwide, like the Natura 2000 network across the European Union (EU). Currently, this reserve network consists of more than 26000 sites covering more than 17% of EU terrestrial territory. Its efficiency to mitigate the detrimental effects of land use and climate change remains an open research question. Here, we examined the potential current and future geographical ranges of four birds of prey under scenarios of both land use and climate changes. By using graph theory, we examined how the current Natura 2000 network will perform in regard to the conservation of these species. This approach determines the importance of a site in regard to the total network and its connectivity. We found that sites becoming unsuitable due to climate change are not a random sample of the network, but are less connected and contribute less to the overall connectivity than the average site and thus their loss does not disrupt the full network. Hence, the connectivity of the remaining network changed only slightly from present day conditions. Our findings highlight the need to establish species-specific management plans with flexible conservation strategies ensuring protection under potential future range expansions. Aquila pomarina is predicted to disappear from the southern part of its range and to become restricted to northeastern Europe. Gyps fulvus, Aquila chrysaetos, and Neophron percnopterus are predicted to locally lose some suitable sites; hence, some isolated small populations may become extinct. However, their geographical range and metapopulation structure will remain relatively unaffected throughout Europe. These species would benefit more from an improved habitat quality and management of the existing network of protected areas than from increased connectivity or assisted migration.
Questioning Behavior on a Consumer Health Electronic List

Relatively little is known about questioning behavior generally and about questioning in electronic environments specifically. Using a thorough analytical framework, this study characterizes the questioning behavior on a consumer health-related electronic list focused on colon cancer. Data consist of 365 questions included in 1,000 randomly selected messages from Fall 1996. The analysis looks at the dedication of the list to questioning; the pattern of question asking within a message, specifically the density of questions per message and the dedication of the message to questioning; the type of question (using Arthur Graesser's typology of questions); the length of answer anticipated; the subject of the question (based on Debra Roter's typology of content); the combination of type of question and subject; and the manner of establishing context within the list environment. The variables and methodological approach for characterizing questioning behavior draw generally on standard schema from linguistics and psychology. They can be applied with only slight modifications to studies of questioning in other settings and with other types of users, and they establish the basis for comparative studies in questioning behavior.
Compliance with a comprehensive warm-up programme to prevent injuries in youth football

Background Participants' compliance, attitudes and beliefs have the potential to influence the efficacy of an intervention greatly. Objective To characterise team and player compliance with a comprehensive injury prevention warm-up programme for football (The 11+), and to assess attitudes towards injury prevention among coaches and their association with compliance and injury risk. Study Design A prospective cohort study and retrospective survey based on a cluster-randomised controlled trial with teams as the unit of randomisation. Methods Compliance, exposure and injuries were registered prospectively in 65 of 125 football teams (1055 of 1892 female Norwegian players aged 13–17 years and 65 of 125 coaches) throughout one football season (March–October 2007). Standardised telephone interviews were conducted to assess coaches' attitudes towards injury prevention. Results Teams completed the injury prevention programme in 77% (mean 1.3 sessions per week) of all training and match sessions, and players in 79% (mean 0.8 sessions per week) of the sessions they attended. Compared with players with intermediate compliance, players with high compliance with the programme had a 35% lower risk of all injuries (RR 0.65, 95% CI 0.46 to 0.91, p=0.011). Coaches who had previously utilised injury prevention training coached teams with a 46% lower risk of injury (OR 0.54, 95% CI 0.33 to 0.87, p=0.011). Conclusions Compliance with the injury prevention programme was high, and players with high compliance had significantly lower injury risk than players with intermediate compliance. Positive attitudes towards injury prevention correlated with high compliance and lower injury risk.
AccessMiner: using system-centric models for malware protection

Models based on system calls are a popular and common approach to characterize the run-time behavior of programs. For example, system calls are used by intrusion detection systems to detect software exploits. As another example, policies based on system calls are used to sandbox applications or to enforce access control. Given that malware represents a significant security threat for today's computing infrastructure, it is not surprising that system calls were also proposed to distinguish between benign processes and malicious code. Most proposed malware detectors that use system calls follows program-centric analysis approach. That is, they build models based on specific behaviors of individual applications. Unfortunately, it is not clear how well these models generalize, especially when exposed to a diverse set of previously-unseen, real-world applications that operate on realistic inputs. This is particularly problematic as most previous work has used only a small set of programs to measure their technique's false positive rate. Moreover, these programs were run for a short time, often by the authors themselves. In this paper, we study the diversity of system calls by performing a large-scale collection (compared to previous efforts) of system calls on hosts that run applications for regular users on actual inputs. Our analysis of the data demonstrates that simple malware detectors, such as those based on system call sequences, face significant challenges in such environments. To address the limitations of program-centric approaches, we propose an alternative detection model that characterizes the general interactions between benign programs and the operating system (OS). More precisely, our system-centric approach models the way in which benign programs access OS resources (such as files and registry entries). Our experiments demonstrate that this approach captures well the behavior of benign programs and raises very few (even zero) false positives while being able to detect a significant fraction of today's malware.
A comparison between hominy chop and defatted maize germ meal as the main energy source in diets of feedlot steers

Defatted maize germ meal (DMG) is arbitrarily rated at a lower economic value than maize meal or hominy chop (HC). Five treatments with 15 steers each were fed different inclusion levels of DMG (0%, 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%), replacing hominy chop during the fattening period. Slaughter data were collected for carcass performance evaluation. DMG has lower fat levels and higher NDF (fibre) levels than HC. A slightly higher feed intake (8.1% for T5 vs. T1) and lower gain (-4.4% for T5 vs. T1) of steers on DMG containing diets resulted in a 9 to 14% poorer feed conversion ratio in comparison to steers on the HC diet. No differences were observed between carcass weights for all treatments and dressing percentage did not differ between T1 (57.4%) and T5 (57.8%). Pricing levels need to be adjusted to reflect the nutritional value of DMG.
Test Performance: the Influence of Cognitive Load on Reading Comprehension

Scores from high stakes tests such as the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) are commonly used as criteria for college admission decisions. So, it is of applied importance to identify factors that contribute to susceptibility to failure on these tests. One potential factor addressed in the current study was whether emotional cognitive load differentially impacts those with low working memory capacity or trait anxiety. Individual differences in subjective arousal were also tested as a mechanism contributing to this effect. In Experiment 1, a reading comprehension task revealed that type of cognitive load affected accuracy. In Experiment 2, state anxiety was induced using methods from previous research. The results revealed that, again, only type of cognitive load affected comprehension accuracy. Together, results suggest that arousal induced via disturbing words negatively influence reading performance regardless of superior working memory capacity. These findings are not based on cognitive load in general, but the semantic value of the words processed, in particular, that led to comprehension difficulty. Results are discussed in terms of theoretical and practical implications. INDEX WORDS: Working memory capacity, Arousal, Trait anxiety, Reading comprehension, Test performance TEST PERFORMANCE: THE INFLUENCE OF COGNITIVE LOAD ON READING COMPREHENSION
DETERMINING ALL GAS PROPERTIES IN GALAXY CLUSTERS FROM THE DARK MATTER DISTRIBUTION ALONE

We demonstrate that all properties of the hot X-ray emitting gas in galaxy clusters are completely determined by the underlying dark matter (DM) structure. Apart from the standard conditions of spherical symmetry and hydrostatic equilibrium for the gas, our proof is based on the Jeans equation for the DM and two simple relations which have recently emerged from numerical simulations: the equality of the gas and DM temperatures, and the almost linear relation between the DM velocity anisotropy profile and its density slope. For DM distributions described by the Navarro–Frenk–White or the Sersic profiles, the resulting gas density profile, the gas-to-total-mass ratio profile, and the entropy profile are all in good agreement with X-ray observations. All these profiles are derived using zero free parameters. Our result allows us to predict the X-ray luminosity profile of a cluster in terms of its DM content alone. As a consequence, a new strategy becomes available to constrain the DM morphology in galaxy clusters from X-ray observations. Our results can also be used as a practical tool for creating initial conditions for realistic cosmological structures to be used in numerical simulations.
Molecular Approaches for the Study of Genetic Diversity in Microflora of Poultry Gastrointestinal Tract

Livestock production currently comprises approximately 40 per cent of the gross value of the world's agricultural produce. At the end of the 20th century, approximately 74 per cent of poultry meat and 68 per cent of eggs were produced in the industrial sector. It is predicted that the consumption, per capita, of poultry products will increase to 17.2 kg by 2020. These needs will require extensive scientific and technological development in many areas.
CHARACTERIZATION OF THE RENIN-ANTIRENIN SYSTEM

Rabbit antibody capable of neutralizing the pressor activity of the enzyme renin, derived from hog kidneys, was characterized with respect to type and capacity to react serologically. Three antirenin antibodies were detected, both a precipitating and nonprecipitating, neutralizing antibody as well as a neutralizing antibody capable of being absorbed by inactivated renin. The precipitating, neutralizing antibody was purified and used successfully in an assay for hog renin by means of a hemagglutination inhibition test. By immunofluorescent methods utilizing the purified antiserum, renin was found to be localized in the macula densa of the distal convoluted tubules and the juxtaglomerular cells of the afferent arteriole in both hog and dog kidneys.
Mycobacterium tuberculosis HspX/EsxS Fusion Protein: Gene Cloning, Protein Expression, and Purification in Escherichia coli.

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to clone, express, and purify a novel multidomain fusion protein of Micobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) in a prokaryotic system. METHODS An hspX/esxS gene construct was synthesized and ligated into a pGH plasmid, E. coli TOP10 cells were transformed, and the vector was purified. The vector containing the construct and pET-21b (+) plasmid were digested with the same enzymes and the construct was ligated into pET-21b (+). The accuracy of cloning was confirmed by colony PCR and sequencing. E. coli BL21 cells were transformed with the pET-21b (+)/hspX/esxS expression vector and protein expression was evaluated. Finally, the expressed fusion protein was purified on a Ni-IDA column and verified by SDS-PAGE and western blotting. RESULTS The hspX/esxS gene construct was inserted into pET-21b (+) and recombinant protein expression was induced with IPTG in E. coli BL21 cells. Various concentrations of IPTG were tested to determine the optimum concentration for expression induction. The recombinant protein was expressed in insoluble inclusion bodies. Three molar guanidine HCl was used to solubilize the insoluble protein. CONCLUSION An HspX/EsxS Mtb fusion protein was expressed in E. coli and the recombinant protein was purified. After immunological analysis, the HspX/EsxS fusion protein might be an anti-tuberculosis vaccine candidate in future clinical trial studies.
Analyzing Nonstationary Spatial Data Using Piecewise Gaussian Processes

In many problems in geostatistics the response variable of interest is strongly related to the underlying geology of the spatial location. In these situations there is often little correlation in the responses found in different rock strata, so the underlying covariance structure shows sharp changes at the boundaries of the rock types. Conventional stationary and nonstationary spatial methods are inappropriate, because they typically assume that the covariance between points is a smooth function of distance. In this article we propose a generic method for the analysis of spatial data with sharp changes in the underlying covariance structure. Our method works by automatically decomposing the spatial domain into disjoint regions within which the process is assumed to be stationary, but the data are assumed independent across regions. Uncertainty in the number of disjoint regions, their shapes, and the model within regions is dealt with in a fully Bayesian fashion. We illustrate our approach on a previously unpublished dataset relating to soil permeability of the Schneider Buda oil field in Wood County, Texas.
Contention resolution and channel estimation in satellite random access channels

We consider the random access channel (RACH) of a multi-beam satellite system with universal frequency reuse. We benefit from the spatial diversity and the strong directivity of multiple antennas at the satellite to resolve contentions and perform channel estimation. We propose two approaches to detect active satellite terminals (ST) and estimate the channel coefficients of some or all the colliding STs: Grid Reduction (GR) and Successive Channel Cancelation (SCC) algorithm. The performance of the proposed approaches is assessed by numerical results and compared with the conventional satellite RACH system. Both approaches outperform the conventional RACH with Slotted-ALOHA and SCC algorithm shows better performance than GR approach.
Therapy with a Combination of Low Doses of Interleukin 12 and Chloroquine Completely Cures Blood-Stage Malaria, Prevents Severe Anemia, and Induces Immunity to Reinfection

ABSTRACT The immunoregulatory cytokine interleukin 12 (IL-12) induces host resistance against experimental malaria. In this study, we tested the feasibility of using IL-12 in combination with chloroquine (CQ) to rescue susceptible A/J mice from lethal blood-stage Plasmodium chabaudi AS infection. Combined treatment with low doses of CQ and IL-12 resulted in a >15-fold reduction in the parasite load and 100% survival of A/J mice with established infections. Compared to control mice, which succumbed to severe anemia, CQ-plus-IL-12-treated mice had significantly higher early- and late-stage erythroid-cell progenitors in the bone marrow and spleen, resulting in significantly higher hematocrits, erythrocyte counts, and percentages of reticulocytes. Production of parasite-specific gamma interferon (IFN-γ) by splenocytes from these mice was upregulated >20-fold relative to controls in parallel with enhanced IFN-γ mRNA expression. Further, enhanced responsiveness to IL-12 and increased downstream IFN-γ production in CQ-plus-IL-12-treated mice was evident from increased mRNA expression for the β1 and β2 subunits of IL-12 receptor in the splenocytes. Moreover, this combined therapy induced higher levels of anti-malaria antibodies than did CQ alone as well as sterile immunity against reinfection. Because IL-12 can be used at low doses and is effective even in established infections, it may be feasible to use this immunochemotherapeutic approach in human malaria.
The role of named entities in Web People Search

The ambiguity of person names in the Web has become a new area of interest for NLP researchers. This challenging problem has been formulated as the task of clustering Web search results (returned in response to a person name query) according to the individual they mention. In this paper we compare the coverage, reliability and independence of a number of features that are potential information sources for this clustering task, paying special attention to the role of named entities in the texts to be clustered. Although named entities are used in most approaches, our results show that, independently of the Machine Learning or Clustering algorithm used, named entity recognition and classification per se only make a small contribution to solve the problem.
Statistical significance of trends and trend differences in layer-average atmospheric temperature time series

This paper examines trend uncertainties in layer-average free atmosphere temperatures arising from the use of different trend estimation methods. It also considers statistical issues that arise in assessing the significance of individual trends and of trend differences between data sets. Possible causes of these trends are not addressed. We use data from satellite and radiosonde measurements and from two reanalysis projects. To facilitate intercomparison, we compute from reanalyses and radiosonde data temperatures equivalent to those from the satellite-based Microwave Sounding Unit (MSU). We compare linear trends based on minimization of absolute deviations (LA) and minimization of squared deviations (LS). Differences are generally less than 0.05°C/decade over 1959–1996. Over 1979–1993, they exceed 0.10°C/decade for lower tropospheric time series and 0.15°C/decade for the lower stratosphere. Trend fitting by the LA method can degrade the lower-tropospheric trend agreement of 0.03°C/decade (over 1979–1996) previously reported for the MSU and radiosonde data. In assessing trend significance we employ two methods to account for temporal autocorrelation effects. With our preferred method, virtually none of the individual 1979–1993 trends in deep-layer temperatures are significantly different from zero. To examine trend differences between data sets we compute 95% confidence intervals for individual trends and show that these overlap for almost all data sets considered. Confidence intervals for lower-tropospheric trends encompass both zero and the model-projected trends due to anthropogenic effects. We also test the significance of a trend in d(t), the time series of differences between a pair of data sets. Use of d(t) removes variability common to both time series and facilitates identification of small trend differences. This more discerning test reveals that roughly 30% of the data set comparisons have significant differences in lower-tropospheric trends, primarily related to differences in measurement system. Our study gives empirical estimates of statistical uncertainties in recent atmospheric temperature trends. These estimates and the simple significance testing framework used here facilitate the interpretation of previous temperature trend comparisons involving satellite, radiosonde, and reanalysis data sets.
Black holes and elementary string states in N=2 supersymmetric string theories

We compare the logarithm of the degeneracy of BPS saturated elementary string states and the string modified Bekenstein-Hawking entropy of the corresponding black holes in N = 2 supersymmetric heterotic string compactification to four dimensions. As in the case of N = 4 supersymmetric theory, the two results match up to an overall undetermined numerical factor. We also show that this undetermined numerical constant is identical in the N = 2 and N = 4 supersymmetric theories, therby showing that the agreement between the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy and the microscopic entropy for N = 2 theories does not require any new identity, other than the one already required for the N = 4 theory. A similar result holds for type II string compactification as well.
Interactive multi-resolution modeling on arbitrary meshes

During the last years the concept of multi-resolution modeling has gained special attention in many fields of computer graphics and geometric modeling. In this paper we generalize powerful multiresolution techniques to arbitrary triangle meshes without requiring subdivision connectivity. Our major observation is that the hierarchy of nested spaces which is the structural core element of most multi-resolution algorithms can be replaced by the sequence of intermediate meshes emerging from the application of incremental mesh decimation. Performing such schemes with local frame coding of the detail coefficients already provides effective and efficient algorithms to extract multi-resolution information from unstructured meshes. In combination with discrete fairing techniques, i.e., the constrained minimization of discrete energy functionals, we obtain very fast mesh smoothing algorithms which are able to reduce noise from a geometrically specified frequency band in a multiresolution decomposition. Putting mesh hierarchies, local frame coding and multi-level smoothing together allows us to propose a flexible and intuitive paradigm for interactive detail-preserving mesh modification. We show examples generated by our mesh modeling tool implementation to demonstrate its functionality.
In Search of Attention

Turnover, extreme returns, news and advertising expense are indirect proxies of investor attention. In contrast, we propose a direct measure of investor demand for attention -- active attention -- using search frequency in Google (SVI). In a sample of Russell 3000 stocks from 2004 to 2008, we find SVI to be correlated with but different from existing proxies of investor attention. In addition, SVI captures investor attention on a more timely basis. SVI allows us to shed new light on how retail investor attention affects the returns to IPO stocks and price momentum strategies. Using retail order execution in SEC Rule 11Ac1-5 reports, we establish a strong and direct link between SVI changes and trading by less sophisticated individual investors. Increased retail attention as measured by SVI during the IPO contributes to the large first-day return and long-run underperformance of IPO stocks. We also document stronger price momentum among stocks with higher levels of SVI, consistent with the explanation of momentum proposed by Daniel, Hirshleifer and Subrahmanyam (1998).