Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
N-Acetylglucosamine Kinase, HXK1 Is Involved in Morphogenetic Transition and Metabolic Gene Expression in Candida albicans

Candida albicans, a common fungal pathogen which diverged from the baker’s yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has the unique ability to utilise N-acetylglucosamine, an amino sugar and exhibits phenotypic differences. It has acquired intricate regulatory mechanisms at different levels in accordance with its life style. N-acetylglucosamine kinase, a component of the N-acetylglucosamine catabolic cascade is an understudied gene since Saccharomyces cerevisiae lacks it. We report HXK1 to act as both positive and negative regulator of transcription of genes involved in maintaining cellular homeostasis. It is involved in repression of hyphal specific genes in addition to metabolic genes. Its regulation of filamentation and GlcNAc metabolism is independent of the known classical regulators like EFG1, CPH1, RAS1, TPK2 or TUP1. Moreover, Hxk1-GFP is localised to cytoplasm, nucleus and mitochondria in a condition specific manner. By employing two-step affinity purification, we report the interaction of HXK1 with SIR2 under filamentation inducing conditions. Our work highlights a novel regulatory mechanism involved in filamentation repression and attempts to decipher the GlcNAc catabolic regulatory cascade in eukaryotes.
A comprehensive and systematic model of user evaluation of Web search engines: II. An evaluation by undergraduates

This paper presents an application of the model described in Part I to the evaluation of Web search engines by undergraduates. The study observed how 36 undergraduate used four major search engines to find information for their own individual problems and how they evaluated these engines based on actual interaction with the search engines. User evaluation was based on 16 performance measures representing five evaluation criteria: relevance, efficiency, utility, user satisfaction, and connectivity. Non-performance (user-related) measures were also applied. Each participant searched his/ her own topic on all four engines and provided satisfaction ratings for system features and interaction and reasons for satisfaction. Each also made relevance judgements of retrieved items in relation to his/her own information need and participated in post-search interviews to provide reactions to the search results and overall performance. The study found significant differences in precision PR1, relative recall, user satisfaction with output display, time saving, value of search results, and overall performance among the four engines and also significant engine by discipline interactions on all these measures. In addition, the study found significant differences in user satisfaction with response time among four engines, and significant engine by discipline interaction in user satisfaction with search interface. None of the four search engines dominated in every aspect of the multidimensional evaluation. Content analysis of verbal data identified a number of user criteria and users evaluative comments based on these criteria. Results from both quantitative analysis and content analysis provide insight for system design and development, and useful feedback on strengths and weaknesses of search engines for system improvement.
Predicting the survival or failure of click-and-mortar corporations

With the boom in e-business, several corporations have emerged in the late nineties that have primarily conducted their business through the Internet and the Web. They have come to be known as the dotcoms or click-and-mortar corporations. The success of these companies has been short lived and many of these companies have failed rapidly in a short span of 4-5 years. This research is an investigation of the burst of the dotcom bubble from a financial perspective. Data from the financial statements of several survived and failed dotcom companies is used to compute financial ratios, which are analyzed using two data mining techniques - discriminant analysis (DA) and neural networks (NN) to find out whether they can predict the financial fate of companies. Neural networks perform better than discriminant analysis in predicting survival or failure of click-and-mortar corporations. The key financial ratios that play a major role in the process of prediction are identified.
Effects of anthropogenic emissions on aerosol formation from isoprene and monoterpenes in the southeastern United States

Significance Atmospheric secondary organic aerosol has substantial impacts on climate, air quality, and human health. However, the formation mechanisms of secondary organic aerosol remain uncertain, especially on how anthropogenic pollutants (from human activities) control aerosol formation from biogenic volatile organic compounds (emitted by vegetation) and the magnitude of anthropogenic influences. Although possible mechanisms have been proposed based on laboratories studies, a coherent understanding of anthropogenic−biogenic interactions in ambient environments has not emerged. Here, we provide direct observational evidence that secondary organic aerosol formed from biogenic isoprene and monoterpenes is greatly mediated by anthropogenic SO2 and NOx emissions based on integrated ambient measurements and laboratory studies. Secondary organic aerosol (SOA) constitutes a substantial fraction of fine particulate matter and has important impacts on climate and human health. The extent to which human activities alter SOA formation from biogenic emissions in the atmosphere is largely undetermined. Here, we present direct observational evidence on the magnitude of anthropogenic influence on biogenic SOA formation based on comprehensive ambient measurements in the southeastern United States (US). Multiple high-time-resolution mass spectrometry organic aerosol measurements were made during different seasons at various locations, including urban and rural sites in the greater Atlanta area and Centreville in rural Alabama. Our results provide a quantitative understanding of the roles of anthropogenic SO2 and NOx in ambient SOA formation. We show that isoprene-derived SOA is directly mediated by the abundance of sulfate, instead of the particle water content and/or particle acidity as suggested by prior laboratory studies. Anthropogenic NOx is shown to enhance nighttime SOA formation via nitrate radical oxidation of monoterpenes, resulting in the formation of condensable organic nitrates. Together, anthropogenic sulfate and NOx can mediate 43–70% of total measured organic aerosol (29–49% of submicron particulate matter, PM1) in the southeastern US during summer. These measurements imply that future reduction in SO2 and NOx emissions can considerably reduce the SOA burden in the southeastern US. Updating current modeling frameworks with these observational constraints will also lead to more accurate treatment of aerosol formation for regions with substantial anthropogenic−biogenic interactions and consequently improve air quality and climate simulations.
Mapping and characterization of the origin of DNA replication of porcine circovirus

The origin of DNA replication of porcine circovirus (PCV) was mapped to a 111-bp fragment. On top of a hairpin, a nonanucleotide (TAGTATTAC) homologous to nonanucleotides of other viruses was identified. Mutation of this element abolishes replication. PCV may be related to a virus family characterized by single-stranded circular DNA genomes, rolling-circle replication, and homology of their rep proteins.
Building Accurate Semantic Taxonomies from Monolingual MRDs

This paper presents a method that conbines a set of unsupervised algorithms in order to accurately build large taxonomies from any machine-readable dictionary (MRD). Our aim is to profit from conventional MRDs, with no explicit semantic coding. We propose a system that 1) performs fully automatic extraction of taxonomic links from MRD entries and 2) ranks the extracted relations in a way that selective manual refinement is allowed. Tested accuracy can reach around 100% depending on the degree of coverage selected, showing that taxonomy building is not limited to structured dictionaries such as LDOCE.
Low-complexity serial equalization of doubly-selective channels

In this paper, we propose a serial equalizer for doubly-selective channels. We use a Basis Expansion Model (BEM) Finite Impulse Response (FIR) to model the doubly-selective channel and to design the serial equalizer. In contrast to our previous works, we decrease the modeling error of the BEM FIR by fitting the BEM FIR to the true doubly-selective channel over a time-window that is independent of the frequency-resolution of the BEM FIR. We discuss the Serial Linear Equalizer (SLE) as well as the Serial Decision Feedback Equalizer (SDFE).
Adaptive resource allocation in SDMA-based wireless broadband networks with OFDM signaling

The increasing popularity of wireless broadband access in local and wide area networks is the main expression of the need for flexible and ubiquitous wireless connectivity. In order to satisfy user resource requirements in the presence of volatility of the wireless medium, sophisticated multiple access and adaptation techniques are required, which alleviate channel impairments and increase system throughput. The use of multiple antennas at the base station allows intra-cell channel reuse by multiple spatially separable users through space division multiple access (SDMA) and hence enhances cell capacity. However, the employment of antennas in the physical layer raises significant issues in the medium access control (MAC) layer. We investigate the impact of antenna arrays on MAC layer channel allocation in the context of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), which is the predominantly proposed signaling scheme for wireless broadband access. We propose an algorithm to allocate channels to users based on their spatial separability properties, while appropriately adjusting beamforming weights and transmission rates for each user in a channel. The unified consideration of such adaptive techniques yields significant throughput benefits.
On-Body Calibration and Measurements Using a Personal, Distributed Exposimeter for Wireless Fidelity

AbstractThis paper describes the design, calibration, and measurements with a personal, distributed exposimeter (PDE) for the on-body detection of radio frequency (RF) electromagnetic fields due to Wireless Fidelity (WiFi) networks. Numerical simulations show that using a combination of two RF nodes placed on the front and back of the body reduces the 50% prediction interval (PI50) on the incident free-space electric-field strength . Median reductions of 10 dB and 9.1 dB are obtained compared to the PI50 of a single antenna placed on the body using a weighted arithmetic and geometric average, respectively. Therefore, a simple PDE topology based on two nodes, which are deployed on opposite sides of the human torso, is applied for calibration and measurements. The PDE is constructed using flexible, dual-polarized textile antennas and wearable electronics, which communicate wirelessly with a Universal Serial Bus (USB) connected receiver and can be unobtrusively integrated into a garment. The calibration of the PDE in an anechoic chamber proves that the PI50 of the measured is reduced to 3.2 dB. To demonstrate the real-life usability of the wireless device, a subject was equipped with the PDE during a walk in the city of Ghent, Belgium. Using a sample frequency of 2 Hz, an average incident power density of 59 nW m−2 was registered in the WiFi frequency band during this walk.
A 8-bit-grey-level image embedding its 512 color palette

In this paper, we propose a method to embed the high resolution color information of an image in its corresponding grey-level image. The objective of this work is to allow free access to the grey-level image and give high resolution color image access to secret key owners. This method is made of two steps which are the color image decomposition (in a grey-level image and its associated color information) and the color-information hiding. The main contribution of this paper is to consider the decomposition into 512 colors and to apply a reversible embedding of a bitplane plus a color palette. The resultant watermarked grey-level image is then a 8-bit coded image. With this watermarked image and the extraction secret key, a user is able to rebuild a color image composed of 512 colors. Considering the previous work, the two important consequences of this approach are the improvement of the security and a better color image quality.
Insights on the mechanisms of Ca2+ regulation of connexin26 hemichannels revealed by human pathogenic mutations (D50N/Y)

Because of the large size and modest selectivity of the connexin hemichannel aqueous pore, hemichannel opening must be highly regulated to maintain cell viability. At normal resting potentials, this regulation is achieved predominantly by the physiological extracellular Ca2+ concentration, which drastically reduces hemichannel activity. Here, we characterize the Ca2+ regulation of channels formed by wild-type human connexin26 (hCx26) and its human mutations, D50N/Y, that cause aberrant hemichannel opening and result in deafness and skin disorders. We found that in hCx26 wild-type channels, deactivation kinetics are accelerated as a function of Ca2+ concentration, indicating that Ca2+ facilitates transition to, and stabilizes, the closed state of the hemichannels. The D50N/Y mutant hemichannels show lower apparent affinities for Ca2+-induced closing than wild-type channels and have more rapid deactivation kinetics, which are Ca2+ insensitive. These results suggest that D50 plays a role in (a) stabilizing the open state in the absence of Ca2+, and (b) facilitating closing and stabilization of the closed state in the presence of Ca2+. To explore the role of a negatively charged residue at position 50 in regulation by Ca2+, this position was substituted with a cysteine residue, which was then modified with a negatively charged methanethiosulfonate reagent, sodium (2-sulfanoethyl) methanethiosulfonate (MTSES)−. D50C mutant hemichannels display properties similar to those of D50N/Y mutants. Recovery of the negative charge with chemical modification by MTSES− restores the wild-type Ca2+ regulation of the channels. These results confirm the essential role of a negative charge at position 50 for Ca2+ regulation. Additionally, charge-swapping mutagenesis studies suggest involvement of a salt bridge interaction between D50 and K61 in the adjacent connexin subunit in stabilizing the open state in low extracellular Ca2+. Mutant cycle analysis supports a Ca2+-sensitive interaction between these two residues in the open state of the channel. We propose that disruption of this interaction by extracellular Ca2+ destabilizes the open state and facilitates hemichannel closing. Our data provide a mechanistic understanding of how mutations at position 50 that cause human diseases are linked to dysfunction of hemichannel gating by external Ca2+.
A New Additive Homomorphic Encryption based on the co-ACD Problem

We propose an efficient additive homomorphic encryption scheme. In our scheme, an encryption of a message is simply its noisy modular reduction by several different moduli. The security of our scheme relies on the hardness of a new problem, the co-Approximate Common Divisor problem. We analyze its hardness by applying all known attacks and devising dedicated attacks. These analyses are not complete, but give sufficiently plausible evidence for the hardness of this new problem. Our scheme has an advantage in the performance since both of encryption and decryption consist of only several modular multiplications where a modulus is a hard-to-factor integer N or its prime factor, whereas the previous require more expensive modular exponentiations. In fact, our rudimentary implementation demonstrates that our public-key encryption scheme requires about 0.72ms, 4. 00μs and 0. 40μs for encryption, decryption and an addition of ciphertexts, respectively. It also takes about 40μs to compute an encryption of the mean of 1000 integers of 128-bit from their ciphertexts. To the best of our knowledge, our encryption scheme is the most efficient of those that support an additive homomorphic property. As an application of additive homomorphic encryption, we present how to efficiently evaluate a symmetric polynomial by additionally providing ciphertexts of some powers of messages. We also present a threshold version of our encryption scheme for smooth adoption of our scheme to advanced applications such as private set operations.
An Overview on the Isolation and Analysis of Circulating Tumor DNA in Plasma and Serum

Molecular biology has brought about a new dimension to our understanding and analysis of human cancer. Diagnosis and prognosis of cancer have increasingly benefited from the use of molecular markers and molecular approaches. Although the description of circulating tumor DNA in the blood has a long history, the clinical implications of its presence require a large body of well-controlled and stringently performed large research and clinical tests. This chapter has provided an overview of the essential elements for the preparation and analysis of circulating DNA in the plasma or serum. We hope that the basic approaches and tips summarized here will serve as a foundation for the rigorous and comprehensive molecular analysis of circulating nucleic acids in the years to come.
Do more cardiac rehabilitation visits reduce events compared with fewer visits?

A major goal after a cardiovascular event, whether a myocardial infarction, exacerbation of heart failure, or revascularization procedure, is return to the community and resumption of normal health and functioning. This process has a number of components. They include making sure that there is adequate social support, that patients understand what medications to take, that patients understand what activities to begin and when, that appropriate disease management programs have been engaged, and that patients have appointments or a least a well-explained path to reestablishing care with their family doctor, internist, or cardiologist. Another component is helping patients who have become debilitated to various degrees because of their illnesses regain sufficient strength and well-being to function as well as possible. Cardiovascular rehabilitation is a critical part of this process. Article see p 63 The ability to function well in society is a difficult goal that is hard to measure. Thus, evaluating outcomes of cardiovascular rehabilitation can be challenging. Mortality is often used as a metric for outcome because it is easy to measure, but it might well be argued that, for rehabilitation, reducing mortality and future events does not address what rehabilitation is principally for and that a decrease in events adds to the overall benefit. It is in this complicated environment concerning rehabilitation that we must consider the article by Hammill et al.1 They considered the relationship between the number of rehabilitations sessions and subsequent events in a …
The filter design from data (FD2) problem: parametric‐statistical approach

A large body of literature exists on the filter design problem, assuming that the system to be filtered is known. However, in most practical situations, the system is not known, but a set of measured data is available. In such situations, a two‐step procedure is typically adopted: a model is identified from this data set, and a filter is designed based on the identified model. In this paper, we consider an alternative approach, which uses the available data not for the identification of a model, but for the direct design of the filter. Such a direct design is investigated within a parametric‐statistical framework for both the cases of linear time‐invariant and nonlinear systems. The noise is assumed to be stochastic, and optimality refers to minimizing the estimation error variance. It is shown that the direct design has superior features with respect to the two‐step design, especially in the presence of modeling errors. Another relevant advantage of the direct design over the two‐step procedure is that minimum variance (Kalman) filters for nonlinear systems are, in general, difficult to derive and/or to implement. On the contrary, the direct approach allows for a very efficient filter design. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed direct design, two examples are presented: the first is related to estimation of the Lorentz chaotic attractor; the second, involving real data, is related to estimation of vehicle yaw rate. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Cloud‐Scale Droplet Number Sensitivity to Liquid Water Path in Marine Stratocumulus

Cloud droplet number concentration (Nc) is retrieved from remotely observed marine stratocumulus cloud liquid water path (LWP), cloud optical depth (τc), and cloud thickness, using an optical model that assumes liquid water content (LWC) increases linearly from cloud base. Assuming that LWC is vertically uniform would underestimate τc by 5% and Nc by 14%. Individual retrievals of Nc from 10‐min averages vary by orders of magnitude from long‐term averages. Surface cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) number concentration NCCN is weakly but significantly correlated with Nc (R = 0.3) for the day leading and 6 hr following Nc. Consistent with coalescence and drizzle scavenging cloud droplets, lag correlations show that Nc decreases for 1 hr after the peak area‐average rain rate. Greater observed LWP for lower Nc [d(log Nc)/d(log LWP) = −2.3] is consistent with enhanced entrainment drying of clouds with greater Nc and consistent with removal of Nc by thicker clouds with more coalescence and drizzle. Stronger precipitation in clouds with greater Nc is the opposite sensitivity as expected were LWP to be controlled by the “cloud lifetime” indirect aerosol effect. The strong sensitivity of Nc to LWP suggests that cloud dynamic and thermodynamic forcings drive macrophysical variability that controls Nc in southeastern tropical Pacific stratocumulus clouds. Regressions are relatively insensitive to assumptions about the covariance of errors among the sensors.