Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Deep Complex Networks

At present, the vast majority of building blocks, techniques, and architectures for deep learning are based on real-valued operations and representations. However, recent work on recurrent neural networks and older fundamental theoretical analysis suggests that complex numbers could have a richer representational capacity and could also facilitate noise-robust memory retrieval mechanisms. Despite their attractive properties and potential for opening up entirely new neural architectures, complex-valued deep neural networks have been marginalized due to the absence of the building blocks required to design such models. In this work, we provide the key atomic components for complex-valued deep neural networks and apply them to convolutional feed-forward networks and convolutional LSTMs. More precisely, we rely on complex convolutions and present algorithms for complex batch-normalization, complex weight initialization strategies for complex-valued neural nets and we use them in experiments with end-to-end training schemes. We demonstrate that such complex-valued models are competitive with their real-valued counterparts. We test deep complex models on several computer vision tasks, on music transcription using the MusicNet dataset and on Speech Spectrum Prediction using the TIMIT dataset. We achieve state-of-the-art performance on these audio-related tasks.
Active learning for node classification in assortative and disassortative networks

In many real-world networks, nodes have class labels or variables that affect the network's topology. If the topology of the network is known but the labels of the nodes are hidden, we would like to select a small subset of nodes such that, if we knew their labels, we could accurately predict the labels of all the other nodes. We develop an active learning algorithm for this problem which uses information-theoretic techniques to choose which nodes to explore. We test our algorithm on networks from three different domains: a social network, a network of English words that appear adjacently in a novel, and a marine food web. Our algorithm makes no initial assumptions about how the groups connect, and performs well even when faced with quite general types of network structure. In particular, we do not assume that nodes of the same class are more likely to be connected to each other - only that they connect to the rest of the network in similar ways.
An in vitro trial to study the effect of inclusion of different levels of coconut oil on sheep rumen methanogenesis and fermentation processes

An in vitro trial was conducted in fermentation vessels under anaerobic conditions using composite feed-1 and composite feed-2 with inclusion of different levels of Coconut Oil (CO) along with buffered rumen liquor of sheep to observe the effects of oil on rumen methanogenesis and fermentation. The Composite Feed-1(CF-1) consisted of 40% of concentrate and Composite Feed-2 (CF-2) had 25 % of concentrate. The different levels of CO used were 0.5,1 and 2 µl/ml. Among the gas production and methane concentration parameters the inclusion of CO showed a significant decrease of 38.67%. A non significant effect on gas production was noted with the inclusion of CO in CF-2. Further, a decrease in total gas production and methane concentration was observed which was highly pronounced in CF-1 as compared to CF-2. The rumen digestibility by inclusion of CO in CF-1 and CF-2 decreased significantly (P < 0.01) from control. The inclusion of CO in CF-2 did not affect Ammonia Nitrogen (NH3 –N) concentration, while in CF-1 the CO inclusion increased the NH3 –N concentration. The inclusion of CO decreased the Total volatile fatty acid (TVFA) concentration significantly (P < 0.01). In both the diets namely CF1 and CF-2 the A:P ratio was unaffected by CO inclusion. The inclusion of CO in CF-1 had a non significant effect in pH. However, the inclusion of CO in CF-1 and CF-2 decreased the protozoa number significantly (P < 0.01). Inclusion of oil tended to decrease Gas production (GP), Metabolizable energy (ME), Short Chain Fatty Acid (SCFA), True Degradability of Dry Matter (TDDM) and Microbial Biomass Production (MBP). The effect was more pronounced when CO level was 1. 0µl/ml or higher. From the above gas production and fermentation parameters noticed in two diets CF-1 and CF-2 with inclusion of different levels of CO, it can be envisaged that increasing the proportion of concentrate in diets and using CO as a feed additive increases the rumen efficiency by reducing the methane concentration and gas production.
A Landscape Study of Computer Science Education in NYC: Early Findings and Implications for Policy and Practice

NYC's Computer Science for All (CS4All) is a 10-year, districtwide initiative aimed at providing high-quality computer science (CS) education to all NYC public school students. It aspires to greatly increase the number of students, teachers, and schools exposed to CS in NYC, and to offer meaningful learning experiences that build on prior exposure and skills at every grade level. These plans include providing high-quality professional development (PD) to some 5,000 teachers, designed to help them learn new programs and pedagogies in CS education, as well as strategies for integrating CS into existing courses. This paper presents findings from an assessment of CS in NYC, conducted in the second year of the CS4All initiative. Using a telephone survey of a representative sample of schools, we describe the current state of CS programming and training in the City. Overall, we found high participation in CS teacher training opportunities (both through and independent of the initiative) and widespread offering of CS courses Specifically, we estimate just over half of schools districtwide (56%) participated in some type of CS training in the 2015-16 school year, and about two thirds of schools (64%) offered students some kind of CS coursework in the 2016-17 school year (through either stand-alone CS courses or the integration of CS into other subjects). The type of programming and training varied by school level (elementary, middle and high). We also explored the extent to which programming and training are reaching schools and students who are historically underrepresented in CS--including women and girls, students of color, low-income students and students with disabilities. We found that schools offering CS courses and activities served fewer Black and Latino students and more White and Asian Students, compared with schools not offering CS. This work is unique, as it is the only districtwide assessment of CS education conducted anywhere in the country to date, thus adding to an under-researched but important and growing field of study
Ten years after the discovery of electronic conduction in liquid crystals

In these ten years after the discovery of electronic conduction in liquid crystals, a lot of effort has been made to characterize what the electronic conduction is in liquid crystals, understand the unique characteristics of charge carrier transport found, synthesize new materials having high mobility, and explore potential applications as a quality organic semiconductor. Judging from the accumulated data and understandings on properties in liquid crystals as a self-organizing molecular semiconductor, it is no doubt that the liquid crystal is very promising as a new type of quality organic semiconductor for opto-electronic devices, which enjoys both merits in molecularly disordered and ordered materials, i.e., large-area uniformity and high mobility that characterize each material, respectively. In this article, the new results found in this decade on charge carrier transport properties, new materials having a high mobility, theoretical modeling of charge carrier transport, which provides us with the physical basis to understand the unique features of charge carrier transport and with the scope and limitation of liquid crystals as an organic semiconductor, are reviewed briefly, and what the further study needs to be focused on for practical device applications are discussed.
Uptake and Metabolism of N-Acetylglucosamine and Glucosamine by Streptococcus mutans

ABSTRACT Glucosamine and N-acetylglucosamine are among the most abundant sugars on the planet, and their introduction into the oral cavity via the diet and host secretions, and through bacterial biosynthesis, provides oral biofilm bacteria with a source of carbon, nitrogen, and energy. In this study, we demonstrated that the dental caries pathogen Streptococcus mutans possesses an inducible system for the metabolism of N-acetylglucosamine and glucosamine. These amino sugars are transported by the phosphoenolpyruvate:sugar phosphotransferase system (PTS), with the glucose/mannose enzyme II permease encoded by manLMN playing a dominant role. Additionally, a previously uncharacterized gene product encoded downstream of the manLMN operon, ManO, was shown to influence the efficiency of uptake and growth on N-acetylglucosamine and, to a lesser extent, glucosamine. A transcriptional regulator, designated NagR, was able to bind the promoter regions in vitro, and repress the expression in vivo, of the nagA and nagB genes, encoding N-acetylglucosamine-6-phosphate deacetylase and glucosamine-6-phosphate deaminase, respectively. The binding activity of NagR could be inhibited by glucosamine-6-phosphate in vitro. Importantly, in contrast to the case with certain other Firmicutes, the gene for de novo synthesis of glucosamine-6-phosphate in S. mutans, glmS, was also shown to be regulated by NagR, and NagR could bind the glmS promoter region in vitro. Finally, metabolism of these amino sugars by S. mutans resulted in the production of significant quantities of ammonia, which can neutralize cytoplasmic pH and increase acid tolerance, thus contributing to enhanced persistence and pathogenic potential.
Quantitative changes in gene transcription during induction of differentiation in porcine neural progenitor cells

Purpose Differentiation of neural stem/progenitor cells involves changes in the gene expression of these cells. Less clear is the extent to which incremental changes occur and the time course of such changes, particularly in non-rodents. Methods Using porcine genome microarrays, we analyzed changes in the expression of 23,256 genes in porcine neural progenitor cells (pNPCs) subject to two established differentiation protocols. In addition, we performed sequential quantitative assessment of a defined transcription profile consisting of 15 progenitor- and lineage-associated genes following exposure to the same treatment protocols, to examine the temporal dynamics of phenotypic changes following induction of differentiation. Immunocytochemistry was also used to examine the expression of seven of these phenotypically important genes at the protein level. Initial primary isolates were passaged four times in proliferation medium containing 20 ng/ml epidermal growth factor (EGF) and 20 ng/ml basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) before differentiation was induced. Differentiation was induced by medium without EGF or bFGF and containing either 10 ng/ml ciliary neurotrophic factor or 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS). Cultures were fed every two days and harvested on days 0, 1, 3, and 5 for quantitative real-time PCR. Results The microarray results illustrated and contrasted the global shifts in the porcine transcriptome associated with both treatment conditions. PCR confirmed dramatic upregulation of transcripts for myelin basic protein (up to 88 fold), claudin 11 (up to 32 fold), glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP; up to 26 fold), together with notable (>twofold) increases in message for microtubule associated protein 2 (MAP2) and C-X-C chemokine receptor type 4 (CXCR4), Janus kinase 1 (Jak1), signal transducer and activator of transcription 1 (STAT1), and signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3). Transcripts for nestin and Krüppel-like factor 4 (KLF4) decreased sharply (>twofold). The specific dynamics of expression changes varied according to the transcript and treatment condition over the five days examined following induction. The magnitude of neuronal marker induction was greater for the ciliary neurotrophic factor condition while glial fibrillary acidic protein induction was greater for the FBS condition. Conclusions The transient dynamic of CXCR4 expression during induction of differentiation, as well as the upregulation of several major histocompatibility complex (MHC) transcripts, has implications in terms of graft integration and tolerance, respectively. These data confirm and extend in the pig the findings previously reported with murine retinal progenitors and support the use of this large animal model for translational development of regenerative approaches to neurologic diseases.
Deep Subspace Clustering Networks

We present a novel deep neural network architecture for unsupervised subspace clustering. This architecture is built upon deep auto-encoders, which non-linearly map the input data into a latent space. Our key idea is to introduce a novel self-expressive layer between the encoder and the decoder to mimic the "self-expressiveness" property that has proven effective in traditional subspace clustering. Being differentiable, our new self-expressive layer provides a simple but effective way to learn pairwise affinities between all data points through a standard back-propagation procedure. Being nonlinear, our neural-network based method is able to cluster data points having complex (often nonlinear) structures. We further propose pre-training and fine-tuning strategies that let us effectively learn the parameters of our subspace clustering networks. Our experiments show that the proposed method significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art unsupervised subspace clustering methods.
Kinetic Responses of β-Catenin Specify the Sites of Wnt Control

Dissecting Wnt Signaling The Wnt signaling pathway plays a key role in regulating a broad range of functions from development to cancer. But a precise understanding of how Wnt proteins act through their receptors (Frizzled proteins) has been elusive. By paring the system down to its core reactions and performing kinetic analysis in cultured cells, Hernández et al. (p. 1337, published online 8 November) were able to deduce the mechanism of Wnt action without invoking any previous assumptions. Such quantitative analysis of mass balance may offer a way to identify essential control points in other complicated signaling systems, and thus help define targets for therapeutic intervention. Reducing the rate of phosphorylation of β-catenin leads to an increase in the steady-state level of the unmodified form. Despite more than 30 years of work on the Wnt signaling pathway, the basic mechanism of how the extracellular Wnt signal increases the intracellular concentration of β-catenin is still contentious. Circumventing much of the detailed biochemistry, we used basic principles of chemical kinetics coupled with quantitative measurements to define the reactions on β-catenin directly affected by the Wnt signal. We conclude that the core signal transduction mechanism is relatively simple, with only two regulated phosphorylation steps. Their partial inhibition gives rise to the full dynamics of the response and subsequently maintains a steady state in which the concentration of β-catenin is increased.
Aging, Cognitive Decline and Hearing Loss: Effects of Auditory Rehabilitation and Training with Hearing Aids and Cochlear Implants on Cognitive Function and Depression among Older Adults

A growing interest in cognitive effects associated with speech and hearing processes is spreading throughout the scientific community essentially guided by evidence that central and peripheral hearing loss is associated with cognitive decline. For the present research, 125 participants older than 65 years of age (105 with hearing impairment and 20 with normal hearing) were enrolled, divided into 6 groups according to their degree of hearing loss and assessed to determine the effects of the treatment applied. Patients in our research program routinely undergo an extensive audiological and cognitive evaluation protocol providing results from the Digit Span test, Stroop color-word test, Montreal Cognitive Assessment and Geriatric Depression Scale, before and after rehabilitation. Data analysis was performed for a cross-sectional and longitudinal study of the outcomes for the different treatment groups. Each group demonstrated improvement after auditory rehabilitation or training on short- and long-term memory tasks, level of depression and cognitive status scores. Auditory rehabilitation by cochlear implants or hearing aids is effective also among older adults (median age of 74 years) with different degrees of hearing loss, and enables positive improvements in terms of social isolation, depression and cognitive performance.
Termination of experimental galactosemia in rats, and progression of retinal metabolic abnormalities.

PURPOSE To investigate the effect of termination of galactose feeding after a very short duration of experimental galactosemia on the biochemical abnormalities that are postulated to contribute to the development of retinopathy. METHODS Experimentally galactosemic rats (normal rats fed a 30% galactose-rich diet for 2 months) were fed a galactose-free diet for an additional 1 month. At the end of 3 months, retinas were removed to measure oxidative stress, nitric oxides (NOs), activity of PKC, and levels of nitrotyrosine. Data were compared between rats in the control group (fed a normal diet) and those in the experimentally galactosemic group (30% galactose diet for the entire 3 months). RESULTS Interruption of 2 months of galactose feeding by withdrawal of galactose from the diet for 1 additional month had partially beneficial effects on retinal lipid peroxides, but the levels of an endogenous antioxidant, reduced glutathione (GSH), remained subnormal in the retina of galactose-withdrawal rats (P < 0.05 vs. normal and P > 0.05 vs. galactose group). Cessation of the galactose-rich diet had partially beneficial effects on NO levels in the retina, but the levels of nitrotyrosine, an indicator of the formation of peroxynitrite, and activation of PKC were not affected. CONCLUSIONS The results show that retinal dysmetabolism continues to progress after experimental galactosemia is terminated in rats: Particularly, antioxidant levels remain subnormal, and nitrotyrosine levels are elevated for at least 1 month. Identification of metabolic abnormalities associated with the progression of incipient retinopathy after hyperglycemia is normalized may help in the search for the cause of retinopathy.
Unsupervised learning of agglutinated morphology using nested Pitman-Yor process based morpheme induction algorithm

In this paper we describe a method of morphologically segment highly agglutinating and inflectional languages from the Dravidian family. We use the nested Pitman-Yor process to segment long agglutinated words into their basic components, and use a corpus based morpheme induction algorithm to perform morpheme segmentation. We test our method on two languages, Malayalam and Kannada and compare the results with Morfessor-baseline.
Studies on woven century fiber polyester composites

Treated and untreated woven century fiber (CF) composites are investigated for evaluating their flexural, tensile, and impact strengths, Barcol hardness, glass transition temperature, thermal resistance, and water absorption properties. Scanning electron microscopy study revealed a brittle fracture for treated fiber composite, while significant fiber pull-out is observed for the untreated fiber composite. Higher tensile and hardness properties, higher glass transition and thermal decomposition temperatures, and low water absorption properties are obtained for alkaline-treated composites. Enhanced interface bonding due to improved adhesion has helped in the formation of covalent bonds at the fiber–matrix interface, resulting in superior tensile, thermal, and water absorption properties of the treated fiber composite. Flexural and impact properties are higher for untreated fiber composite. This is due to the weak fiber–matrix interface and a differential strain in fiber and matrix. The weak interface has provided an energy absorbing mechanism and enhanced the impact energy absorption capacity. The tensile strength of CF composite is very much comparable with that of sisal fiber composite. The tensile and flexural properties are higher for the woven CF composites than those of short CF composites. But the impact properties are superior for short fiber composites compared to the woven fiber composites. Increased number of interfaces for the short fiber composites has contributed for the cushioning effect and an enhanced energy absorbing mechanism. Water absorption properties have improved for the treated fiber composites due to formation of a strong interface.
Conflict in the intensive care unit: Nursing advocacy and surgical agency

Background: Nurses and surgeons may experience intra-team conflict during decision making about the use of postoperative life-sustaining treatment in the intensive care unit due to their perceptions of professional roles and responsibilities. Nurses have a sense of advocacy—a responsibility to support the patient’s best interest; surgeons have a sense of agency—a responsibility to keep the patient alive. Objectives: The objectives were to (1) describe the discourse surrounding the responsibilities of nurses and surgeons, as “advocates” and “agents,” and (2) apply these findings to determine how differences in role responsibilities could foster conflict during decision making about postoperative life-sustaining treatment in the intensive care unit. Research design: Articles, books, and professional documents were explored to obtain descriptions of nurses’ and surgeons’ responsibilities to their patients. Using discourse analysis, responsibilities were grouped into themes and then compared for potential for conflict. Ethical considerations: No data were collected from human participants and ethical review was not required. The texts were analyzed by a surgeon and a nurse to minimize profession-centric biases. Findings: Four themes in nursing discourse were identified: responsibility to support patient autonomy regarding treatment decisions, responsibility to protect the patient from the physician, responsibility to act as an intermediary between the physician and the patient, and the responsibility to support the well-being of the patient. Three themes in surgery discourse were identified personal responsibility for the patient’s outcome, commitment to patient survival, and the responsibility to prevent harm to the patient from surgery. Discussion: These responsibilities may contribute to conflict because each profession is working toward different goals and each believes they know what is best for the patient. It is not clear from the existing literature that either profession understands each other’s responsibilities. Conclusion: Interventions that improve understanding of each profession’s responsibilities may be helpful to reduce intra-team conflict in the intensive care unit.