Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
No Direct Linkage Between Event‐Based Runoff Generation and Groundwater Recharge on the Maimai Hillslope

Hillslope hydrological investigations in humid regions to date have focused mostly on runoff generation during events. The few papers that have also examined groundwater recharge processes associated with subsurface stormflow production have found strong linkages between episodes of runoff and recharge to the aquifer. But the range of climate, vegetation, and geological conditions examined thus far has been limited. Here we explore how geologic characteristics, timing of subsurface stormflow, and hydroclimatic conditions relate to the timing of bedrock groundwater recharge at the well‐studied Maimai watershed. We hypothesized that recharge would be determined by subsurface stormflow frequency in this system with high rainfall and little seasonality of the hydrologic response. Unexpectedly, isotopic analysis and noble gas measurements indicated that recharge occurred almost exclusively during winter months despite previous work at Maimai showing subsurface stormflow occurs in all seasons and rainfall‐runoff ratios are high year‐round. A sprinkler and dye experiment conducted directly on open bedrock identified groundwater recharge mechanisms and rates, and a simple empirical recharge model suggests almost 90% of recharge occurred from only 55% of annual precipitation. We found no correlation between the timing and magnitude of groundwater recharge and total precipitation, direct runoff or subsurface stormflow. The catchment effectively converted rainfall to runoff during all seasons, but the unfractured low permeability bedrock (2.3 × 10−8 m/s) required long durations of extended catchment wetness for appreciable recharge to occur—a condition satisfied only during winter months with lower evapotranspiration. These findings suggest the need to better understand the geologic controls of recharge in headwaters.
Memetic Algorithms: Parametrization and Balancing Local and Global Search

This is a preprint of a book chapter from the Handbook of Memetic Algorithms, Studies in Computational Intelligence, Vol. 379, ISBN 978-3-642-23246-6, Springer, edited by F. Neri, C. Cotta, and P. Moscato. It is devoted to the parametrization of memetic algorithms and how to find a good balance between global and local search.
Long-term results of various anterior capsulotomies and radial tears on intraocular lens centration.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE To evaluate the long-term effects of various anterior capsulotomies and radial tears on intraocular lens (IOL) centration. MATERIALS AND METHODS Ninety-five eyes of 87 senile cataract patients operated with extracapsular technique were evaluated in IOL tilt and decentration with a new method of measurement. According to the type of anterior capsulotomy and number of radial tears, five groups were constituted as, can opener, envelope, continous curvilinear capsulorrhexis (CCC), CCC with one radial tear (relaxing incision at quadrant 12), and CCC with two relaxing incisions (relaxing incisions at quadrants 6 and 12), respectively. RESULTS Early decentration and tilt in groups CCC and CCC with one radial tear were significantly lower than the other groups (P < 0.05). Late decentration and tilt in the CCC group were significantly lower than the other groups (P < 0.01). Highest values of tilt and decentration were determined in envelope capsulotomy. Additional symmetric relaxing incision at quadrant 6 revealed no effect on the prevention of decentration and tilt compared to one relaxing incision. CONCLUSION CCC with one radial tear is not ideal but sufficient for IOL centration. All other anterior capsulotomy techniques, other than intact CCC, do not guarantee the IOL centration.
Static and Dynamic Variance Compensation for Recognition of Reverberant Speech With Dereverberation Preprocessing

The performance of automatic speech recognition is severely degraded in the presence of noise or reverberation. Much research has been undertaken on noise robustness. In contrast, the problem of the recognition of reverberant speech has received far less attention and remains very challenging. In this paper, we use a dereverberation method to reduce reverberation prior to recognition. Such a preprocessor may remove most reverberation effects. However, it often introduces distortion, causing a dynamic mismatch between speech features and the acoustic model used for recognition. Model adaptation could be used to reduce this mismatch. However, conventional model adaptation techniques assume a static mismatch and may therefore not cope well with a dynamic mismatch arising from dereverberation. This paper proposes a novel adaptation scheme that is capable of managing both static and dynamic mismatches. We introduce a parametric model for variance adaptation that includes static and dynamic components in order to realize an appropriate interconnection between dereverberation and a speech recognizer. The model parameters are optimized using adaptive training implemented with the expectation maximization algorithm. An experiment using the proposed method with reverberant speech for a reverberation time of 0.5 s revealed that it was possible to achieve an 80% reduction in the relative error rate compared with the recognition of dereverberated speech (word error rate of 31%), and the final error rate was 5.4%, which was obtained by combining the proposed variance compensation and MLLR adaptation.
Rapid post‐mortem maturation of diatom silica oxygen isotope values

Oxygen isotope values of diatom silica (δ18Odiatom) are increasingly used as paleoclimate proxies; however, the magnitude and timing of post‐mortem alteration of δ18Odiatom values has been unclear. In freshwater diatom silica from a human‐made pond in northern New Mexico, post‐mortem alteration of δ18Odiatom values occurs within one year of sediment burial. Diatom silica collected antemortem has an average δ18Odiatom value of 21.5‰ (VSMOW, σ = 1.3, n = 23), whereas diatom silica from two sediment cores from the same freshwater environment records significantly higher δ18Odiatom values (28.9‰, σ = 0.8, n = 13). The difference in ante‐ and post‐mortem δ18Odiatom values indicate post‐mortem alteration of diatom silica oxygen that results in a >7‰ increase in δ18O values. This study demonstrates that δ18Odiatom values reach mature values within 0.5 years of frustule death. Initial diatom δ18O values that record growing conditions are rapidly overwritten during silica maturation, and the mature diatom δ18O values approach isotopic equilibrium for quartz‐water. The rapid post‐mortem alteration of diatom δ18O values explains much of the disparate data regarding silica‐water fractionation for diatom silica and has a profound effect on the use of diatom silica δ18O values as a paleoclimate proxy in lacustrine and marine environments.
Quantitative Co-Expression of Proteins at the Single Cell Level – Application to a Multimeric FRET Sensor

Background Co-expression of proteins is generally achieved by introducing two (or more) independent plasmids into cells, each driving the expression of a different protein of interest. However, the relative expression levels may vary strongly between individual cells and cannot be controlled. Ideally, co-expression occurs at a defined ratio, which is constant among cells. This feature is of particular importance for quantitative single cell studies, especially those employing bimolecular Förster Resonance Energy Transfer (FRET) sensors. Methodology/Principal Findings Four co-expression strategies based on co-transfection, a dual promotor plasmid, an internal ribosome entry site (IRES) and a viral 2A peptide were selected. Co-expression of two spectrally separable fluorescent proteins in single living cells was quantified. It is demonstrated that the 2A peptide strategy can be used for robust equimolar co-expression, while the IRES sequence allows expression of two proteins at a ratio of approximately 3:1. Combined 2A and IRES elements were used for the construction of a single plasmid that drives expression of three individual proteins, which generates a FRET sensor for measuring heterotrimeric G-protein activation. The plasmid drives co-expression of donor and acceptor tagged subunits, with reduced heterogeneity, and can be used to measure G-protein activation in single living cells. Conclusions/Significance Quantitative co-expression of two or more proteins can be achieved with little cell-to-cell variability. This finding enables reliable co-expression of donor and acceptor tagged proteins for FRET studies, which is of particular importance for the development of novel bimolecular sensors that can be expressed from single plasmid.
Pest Risk Maps for Invasive Alien Species: A Roadmap for Improvement

Pest risk maps are powerful visual communication tools to describe where invasive alien species might arrive, establish, spread, or cause harmful impacts. These maps inform strategic and tactical pest management decisions, such as potential restrictions on international trade or the design of pest surveys and domestic quarantines. Diverse methods are available to create pest risk maps, and can potentially yield different depictions of risk for the same species. Inherent uncertainties about the biology of the invader, future climate conditions, and species interactions further complicate map interpretation. If multiple maps are available, risk managers must choose how to incorporate the various representations of risk into their decisionmaking process, and may make significant errors if they misunderstand what each map portrays. This article describes the need for pest risk maps, compares pest risk mapping methods, and recommends future research to improve such important decision-support tools.
Using Machine Learning, Neural Networks, and Statistics to Predict Corporate Bankruptcy

Recent literature strongly suggests that machine learning approaches to classification outperform “classical” statistical methods. We make a comparison between the performance of linear discriminant analysis, classification trees, and neural networks in predicting corporate bankruptcy. Linear discriminant analysis represents the “classical” statistical approach to classification, whereas classification trees and neural networks represent artificial intelligence approaches. A proper statistical design is used to be able to test whether observed differences in predictive performance are statistically significant. The data set consists of a collection of 576 annual reports from Belgian construction companies. We use stratified 10–fold cross–validation on the training set to choose “good” parameter values for the different learning methods. The test set is used to obtain an unbiased estimate of the true prediction error. Using rigorous statistical testing, we cannot conclude that in the case of the data set studied, one learning method clearly outperforms the other methods.
Monitoring Metric First-Order Temporal Properties

Runtime monitoring is a general approach to verifying system properties at runtime by comparing system events against a specification formalizing which event sequences are allowed. We present a runtime monitoring algorithm for a safety fragment of metric first-order temporal logic that overcomes the limitations of prior monitoring algorithms with respect to the expressiveness of their property specification languages. Our approach, based on automatic structures, allows the unrestricted use of negation, universal and existential quantification over infinite domains, and the arbitrary nesting of both past and bounded future operators. Furthermore, we show how to use and optimize our approach for the common case where structures consist of only finite relations, over possibly infinite domains. We also report on case studies from the domain of security and compliance in which we empirically evaluate the presented algorithms. Taken together, our results show that metric first-order temporal logic can serve as an effective specification language for expressing and monitoring a wide variety of practically relevant system properties.
Psychometric Properties of Prodromal Questionnaire-Brief Version among Chinese Help-Seeking Individuals

Prodromal Questionnaire (PQ) and Structured Interview for Prodromal Syndromes (SIPS) have been used as a two-stage process for identifying subjects at clinical high risk (CHR) of psychosis. The Prodromal Questionnaire-Brief version (PQ-B) contains 21 items derived from the PQ. The present study aimed to examine the psychometric properties of PQ-B in a Chinese help-seeking outpatient sample and to explore which items can better predict CHR diagnosis by SIPS and future transition to psychosis. In our preliminary epidemiological study, 1461 patients from a pool of 2101 individuals (15–45 years of age) completed the two-stage process. In the present study, 239 (20%) people were randomly selected among the sample who met the initial PQ-B screening criteria but had no positive diagnosis on SIPS, as well as 72 individuals with negative results on both PQ-B and SIPS, 89 prodromal and 105 psychotic subjects, yielding a total of 505 participants. The internal consistency coefficient for the PQ-B was good, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.897. The concordant validity of PQ-B with SIPS dichotomized diagnosis of prodrome/psychosis versus no psychosis was 0.54. To ensure 80% or a higher sensitivity and a certain specificity, 7 and 24 were respectively set as the cutoff points for the PQ-B total score and distress score for Chinese help-seeking outpatients. A logistic regression model based on six PQ-B items could allow predicting the psychotic diagnosis on SIPS, with an accuracy of 65.8%. Prodromal individuals who scored higher on the 12th item of PQ-B (Do you worry at times that something may be wrong with your mind? ) were less likely to convert to psychosis. PQ-B is a useful instrument for screening CHR subjects, but the cutoff score may be higher than that recommended by the author scores for help-seeking individuals in outpatient clinics. Some specific PQ-B items may have significant predictive power on dichotomized SIPS diagnoses and deserve special attention from researchers in future studies.
Fault-tolerant broadcasts in CAN

Fault-tolerant distributed systems based on field-buses may take advantage from reliable and atomic broadcast. There is a current belief that CAN native mechanisms provide atomic broadcast. In this paper, we dismiss this misconception, explaining how network errors may lead to: inconsistent message delivery; generation of message duplicates. These errors may occur when faults hit the last two bits of the end of frame delimiter. Although rare, its influence cannot be ignored, for highly fault-tolerant systems. Finally, we give a protocol suite that handles the problem effectively.
Equations, Contractions, and Unique Solutions

One of the most studied behavioural equivalences is bisimilarity. Its success is much due to the associated bisimulation proof method, which can be further enhanced by means of “bisimulation up-to” techniques such as “up-to context. ” A different proof method is discussed, based on a unique solution of special forms of inequations called contractions and inspired by Milner’s theorem on unique solution of equations. The method is as powerful as the bisimulation proof method and its “up-to context” enhancements. The definition of contraction can be transferred onto other behavioural equivalences, possibly contextual and non-coinductive. This enables a coinductive reasoning style on such equivalences, either by applying the method based on unique solution of contractions or by injecting appropriate contraction preorders into the bisimulation game. The techniques are illustrated in CCS-like languages; an example dealing with higher-order languages is also shown.
Interaction between Oxytocin Genotypes and Early Experience Predicts Quality of Mothering and Postpartum Mood

Individual differences in maternal behavior are affected by both early life experiences and oxytocin, but little is known about genetic variation in oxytocin genes and its effects on mothering. We examined two polymorphisms in the oxytocin peptide gene OXT (rs2740210 and rs4813627) and one polymorphism in the oxytocin receptor gene OXTR (rs237885) in 187 Caucasian mothers at six months postpartum. For OXT, both rs2740210 and rs4813627 significantly associated with maternal vocalizing to the infant. These polymorphisms also interacted with the quality of care mothers experienced in early life, to predict variation in maternal instrumental care and postpartum depression. However, postpartum depression did not mediate the gene-environment effects of the OXT SNPs on instrumental care. In contrast, the OXTR SNP rs237885 did not associate with maternal behavior, but it did associate with pre-natal (but not post-natal) depression score. The findings illustrate the importance of variation in oxytocin genes, both alone and in interaction with early environment, as predictors of individual differences in human mothering. Furthermore, depression does not appear to have a causal role on the variation we report in instrumental care. This suggests that variation in instrumental care varies in association with a gene-early environment effect regardless of current depressive symptomatology. Finally, our findings highlight the importance of examining multiple dimensions of human maternal behavior in studies of genetic associations.
Structure of DNA-Cationic Liposome Complexes: DNA Intercalation in Multilamellar Membranes in Distinct Interhelical Packing Regimes

Cationic liposomes complexed with DNA (CL-DNA) are promising synthetically based nonviral carriers of DNA vectors for gene therapy. The solution structure of CL-DNA complexes was probed on length scales from subnanometer to micrometer by synchrotron x-ray diffraction and optical microscopy. The addition of either linear λ-phage or plasmid DNA to CLs resulted in an unexpected topological transition from liposomes to optically birefringent liquid-crystalline condensed globules. X-ray diffraction of the globules revealed a novel multilamellar structure with alternating lipid bilayer and DNA monolayers. The λ-DNA chains form a one-dimensional lattice with distinct interhelical packing regimes. Remarkably, in the isoelectric point regime, the λ-DNA interaxial spacing expands between 24.5 and 57.1 angstroms upon lipid dilution and is indicative of a long-range electrostatic-induced repulsion that is possibly enhanced by chain undulations.
The ratio of dihomo‐γ‐linolenic acid to deoxycholic acid species is a potential biomarker for the metabolic abnormalities in obesity

Bile acid (BA) signaling regulates fatty acid metabolism. BA dysregulation plays an important role in the development of metabolic disease. However, BAs in relation to fatty acids have not been fully investigated in obesity‐related metabolic disorders. A targeted metabolomic measurement of serum BA and free fatty acid profiles was applied to sera of 381 individuals in 2 independent studies. The results showed that the ratio of dihomo‐γ‐linolenic acid (DGLA) to deoxycholic acid (DCA) species (DCAS) was significantly increased in obese individuals with type 2 diabetes (T2DM) from a case–control study and decreased in the remission group of obese subjects with T2DM after metabolic surgery. The changes were closely associated with their metabolic status. These results were consistently confirmed in both serum and liver of mice with diet‐induced obesity, implying that such a metabolic alteration in circulation reflects changes occurring in the liver. In vitro studies of human liver L‐02 cell lines under BA treatment revealed that DCA and its conjugated form, TDCA, significantly inhibited mRNA expression of fatty acid transport protein 5 in the presence of DGLA, which was involved in hepatocyte DGLA uptake. Thus, the DGLA:DCAS ratio may be a promising biomarker for metabolic abnormalities in obesity. —Lei, S. , Huang, F. , Zhao, A. , Chen, T. , Chen, W. , Xie, G. , Zheng, X. , Zhang, Y. , Yu, H. , Zhang, P., Rajani, C. , Bao, Y. , Jia, W. , Jia, W. The ratio of dihomo‐γ‐linolenic acid to deoxycholic acid species is a potential biomarker for the metabolic abnormalities in obesity. FASEB J. 31, 3904–3912 (2017). www.fasebj. org—Lei, Sha, Huang, Fengjie, Zhao, Aihua, Chen, Tianlu, Chen, Wenlian, Xie, Guoxiang, Zheng, Xiaojiao, Zhang, Yunjing, Yu, Haoyong, Zhang, Pin, Rajani, Cynthia, Bao, Yuqian, Jia, Weiping, Jia, Wei The ratio of dihomo‐γ‐linolenic acid to deoxycholic acid species is a potential biomarker for the metabolic abnormalities in obesity. FASEB J. 31, 3904–3912 (2017)
A multi-perspective evaluation of a service robot for seniors: the voice of different stakeholders

Abstract Purpose: The potential of service robots for seniors is given increasing attention as the ageing population in Western countries will continue to grow as well as the demand for home care. In order to capture the experience of living with a robot at home, a multi-perspective evaluation was conducted. Methods: Older adults (n = 10) were invited to execute an actual interaction scenario with the Care-O-bot® robot in a home-like environment and were questioned about their experiences. Additionally, interviews were conducted with the elderly participants, informal carers (n = 7) and professional caregivers (n = 11). Results: Seniors showed to be more keen to accept the robot than their caregivers and relatives. However, the robot in its current form was found to be too limited and participants wished the robot could perform more complex tasks. In order to be acceptable a future robot should execute these complex tasks based on the personal preferences of the user which would require the robot to be flexible and extremely smart, comparable to the care that is delivered by a human carer. Conclusions: Developing the functional features to perform activities is not the only challenge in robot development that deserves the attention of robot developers. The development of social behaviour and skills should be addressed as well. This is possible adopting a person-centred design approach, which relies on validation activities with actual users in realistic environments, similar to those described in this paper. Implications for rehabilitation Attitude of older adults towards service robots Potential of service robotsfor older adults
Analysis of SO2 Pollution Changes of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region over China Based on OMI Observations from 2006 to 2017

Sulfur dioxide (SO2) in the planetary boundary layer (PBL) as a kind of gaseous pollutant has a strong effect regarding atmospheric environment, air quality, and climate change. As one of the most polluted regions in China, air quality in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) region has attracted more attention. This paper aims to study the characteristics of SO2 distribution and variation over BTH. Spatial and temporal variations for a long term (2006–2017) over BTH derived from OMI PBL SO2 products were discussed. The temporal trends confirm that the SO2 loading falls from average 0.88 DU to 0.16 DU in the past 12 years. Two ascending fluctuations in 2007 and 2011 appeared to be closely related to the economic stimulus of each five-year plan (FYP). The spatial analysis indicates an imbalanced spatial distribution pattern, with higher SO2 level in the southern BTH and lower in the northern. This is a result of both natural and human factors. Meanwhile, the SO2 concentration demonstrates a decreasing trend with 14.92%, 28.57%, and 27.43% compared with 2006, during the events of 2008 Olympic Games, 2014 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, and 2015 Military Parade, respectively. The improvement indicates that the direct effect is attributed to a series of long-term and short-term control measures, which have been implemented by the government. The findings of this study are desirable to assist local policy makers in the BTH for drawing up control strategies regarding the mitigation of environmental pollution in the future.