Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
USMART

Recognising high-level human activities from low-level sensor data is a crucial driver for pervasive systems that wish to provide seamless and distraction-free support for users engaged in normal activities. Research in this area has grown alongside advances in sensing and communications, and experiments have yielded sensor traces coupled with ground truth annotations about the underlying environmental conditions and user actions. Traditional machine learning has had some success in recognising human activities; but the need for large volumes of annotated data and the danger of overfitting to specific conditions represent challenges in connection with the building of models applicable to a wide range of users, activities, and environments. We present USMART, a novel unsupervised technique that combines data- and knowledge-driven techniques. USMART uses a general ontology model to represent domain knowledge that can be reused across different environments and users, and we augment a range of learning techniques with ontological semantics to facilitate the unsupervised discovery of patterns in how each user performs daily activities. We evaluate our approach against four real-world third-party datasets featuring different user populations and sensor configurations, and we find that USMART achieves up to 97.5% accuracy in recognising daily activities.
Dysbiotic Bacterial and Fungal Communities Not Restricted to Clinically Affected Skin Sites in Dandruff

Dandruff is a prevalent chronic inflammatory skin condition of the scalp that has been associated with Malassezia yeasts. However, the microbial role has not been elucidated yet, and the etiology of the disorder remains poorly understood. Using high-throughput 16S rDNA and ITS1 sequencing, we characterized cutaneous bacterial and fungal microbiotas from healthy and dandruff subjects, comparing scalp and forehead (lesional and non-lesional skin sites). Bacterial and fungal communities from dandruff analyzed at genus level differed in comparison with healthy ones, presenting higher diversity and greater intragroup variation. The microbial shift was observed also in non-lesional sites from dandruff subjects, suggesting that dandruff is related to a systemic process that is not restricted to the site exhibiting clinical symptoms. In contrast, Malassezia microbiota analyzed at species level did not differ according to health status. A 2-step OTU assignment using combined databases substantially increased fungal assigned sequences, and revealed the presence of highly prevalent uncharacterized Malassezia organisms (>37% of the reads). Although clinical symptoms of dandruff manifest locally, microbial dysbiosis beyond clinically affected skin sites suggests that subjects undergo systemic alterations, which could be considered for redefining therapeutic approaches.
The Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (MERS-CoV) Does Not Replicate in Syrian Hamsters

In 2012 a novel coronavirus, MERS-CoV, associated with severe respiratory disease emerged in the Arabian Peninsula. To date, 55 human cases have been reported, including 31 fatal cases. Several of the cases were likely a result of human-to-human transmission. The emergence of this novel coronavirus prompts the need for a small animal model to study the pathogenesis of this virus and to test the efficacy of potential intervention strategies. In this study we explored the use of Syrian hamsters as a small animal disease model, using intratracheal inoculation and inoculation via aerosol. Clinical signs of disease, virus replication, histological lesions, cytokine upregulation nor seroconversion were observed in any of the inoculated animals, indicating that MERS-CoV does not replicate in Syrian hamsters.
Caffeine-Induced Suppression of GABAergic Inhibition and Calcium-Independent Metaplasticity

GABAergic inhibition plays a critical role in the regulation of neuron excitability; thus, it is subject to modulations by many factors. Recent evidence suggests the elevation of intracellular calcium ([Ca2+]i) and calcium-dependent signaling molecules underlie the modulations. Caffeine induces a release of calcium from intracellular stores. We tested whether caffeine modulated GABAergic transmission by increasing [Ca2+]i. A brief local puff-application of caffeine to hippocampal CA1 pyramidal cells transiently suppressed GABAergic inhibitory postsynaptic currents (IPSCs) by 73.2 ± 6.98%. Time course of suppression and the subsequent recovery of IPSCs resembled DSI (depolarization-induced suppression of inhibition), mediated by endogenous cannabinoids that require a [Ca2+]i rise. However, unlike DSI, caffeine-induced suppression of IPSCs (CSI) persisted in the absence of a [Ca2+]i rise. Intracellular applications of BAPTA and ryanodine (which blocks caffeine-induced calcium release from intracellular stores) failed to prevent the generation of CSI. Surprisingly, ruthenium red, an inhibitor of multiple calcium permeable/release channels including those of stores, induced metaplasticity by amplifying the magnitude of CSI independently of calcium. This metaplasticity was accompanied with the generation of a large inward current. Although ionic basis of this inward current is undetermined, the present result demonstrates that caffeine has a robust Ca2+-independent inhibitory action on GABAergic inhibition and causes metaplasticity by opening plasma membrane channels.
Serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D and the Risk of Hip and Nonspine Fractures in Older Men

The association between vitamin D levels and incident fractures in older men is uncertain. To test the hypothesis that low serum 25‐hydroxyvitamin D [(25(OH)D] levels are associated with an increased risk of fracture, we performed a case‐cohort study of 436 men with incident nonspine fractures, including 81 hip fractures, and a random subcohort of 1608 men; average follow‐up time 5.3 years. Serum vitamin D2 and vitamin D3 were measured on baseline sera using mass spectrometry and summed for total vitamin D. Modified Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) of fracture with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Multivariable models included age, clinic, season, race, height, weight, and physical activity. The mean (SD) total 25(OH)D was 24.6 (7.8) ng/mL in nonspine fracture subjects, 21.5 (7.9) ng/mL in hip fracture subjects, and 25.2 (7.8) ng/mL in controls (nonspine fracture subjects versus nonpatients, p = .14; hip fracture subjects versus controls, p < .0001). 25(OH)D levels were unrelated to nonspine fractures. One SD decrease in total 25(OH)D was associated with an increased risk of hip fracture (multivariate HR = 1.60; 95% CI 1.18–2.17). Compared with men in the top quartile of total 25(OH)D (≥28), the HR of hip fracture was 2.36 (95% CI 1.08–5.15) for men in the lowest quartile (<20) (p = .009 for trend). Adjusting for hip bone mineral density attenuated the association by more than 50% (p = .065 for trend). Low serum 25(OH)D concentrations are associated with a higher risk of hip fracture in older men. Measurement of 25(OH)D may be useful in identifying men at high risk of hip fracture. © 2010 American Society for Bone and Mineral Research.
Analogue modelling of deformation in compressive and subduction zones

This thesis presents the results and conclusions from a series of analogue modelling of deformation in compressive and subduction zones (crustal scale and lithospheric scale) : The experiments carried out at the crustal scale show that the symmetry of compressive structures, folds and trust belts with 3 levels of decollement is strongly dependent on the rate of sedimentation. The results were applied to the Subandin Bolivian. The experiments carried out at the lithospheric scale simulate subduction and back-arc extension in a system under compression parallel to the continent - ocean margin (COB). These models show that the density ratio between the continental and oceanic plates is the key factor to explain the back-arc extension: as smaller the difference in density is, less extension occurred. The results were applied to Anatolia. Finally, these models were used to test the reproducibility and limits for analog modeling.
Gum arabic capped‐silver nanoparticles inhibit biofilm formation by multi‐drug resistant strains of Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Clinical isolates (n = 55) of Pseudomonas aeruginosa were screened for the extended spectrum β‐lactamases and metallo‐β‐lactamases activities and biofilm forming capability. The aim of the study was to demonstrate the antibiofilm efficacy of gum arabic capped‐silver nanoparticles (GA‐AgNPs) against the multi‐drug resistant (MDR) biofilm forming P. aeruginosa. The GA‐AgNPs were characterized by UV‐spectroscopy, X‐ray diffraction, and high resolution‐transmission electron microscopy analysis. The isolates were screened for their biofilm forming ability, using the Congo red agar, tube method and tissue culture plate assays. The biofilm forming ability was further validated and its inhibition by GA‐AgNPs was demonstrated by performing the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and confocal laser scanning microscopy. SEM analysis of GA‐AgNPs treated bacteria revealed severely deformed and damaged cells. Double fluorescent staining with propidium iodide and concanavalin A‐fluorescein isothiocyanate concurrently detected the bacterial cells and exopolysaccharides (EPS) matrix. The CLSM results exhibited the GA‐AgNPs concentration dependent inhibition of bacterial growth and EPS matrix of the biofilm colonizers on the surface of plastic catheters. Treatment of catheters with GA‐AgNPs at 50 µg ml−1 has resulted in 95% inhibition of bacterial colonization. This study elucidated the significance of GA‐AgNPs, as the next generation antimicrobials, in protection against the biofilm mediated infections caused by MDR P. aeruginosa. It is suggested that application of GA‐AgNPs, as a surface coating material for dispensing antibacterial attributes to surgical implants and implements, could be a viable approach for controlling MDR pathogens after adequate validations in clinical settings.
A pairwise key predistribution scheme for wireless sensor networks

To achieve security in wireless sensor networks, it is important to be able to encrypt and authenticate messages sent between sensor nodes. Before doing so, keys for performing encryption and authentication must be agreed upon by the communicating parties. Due to resource constraints, however, achieving key agreement in wireless sensor networks is nontrivial. Many key agreement schemes used in general networks, such as Diffie-Hellman and other public-key based schemes, are not suitable for wireless sensor networks due to the limited computational abilities of the sensor nodes. Predistribution of secret keys for all pairs of nodes is not viable due to the large amount of memory this requires when the network size is large.In this paper, we provide a framework in which to study the security of key predistribution schemes, propose a new key predistribution scheme which substantially improves the resilience of the network compared to previous schemes, and give an in-depth analysis of our scheme in terms of network resilience and associated overhead. Our scheme exhibits a nice threshold property: when the number of compromised nodes is less than the threshold, the probability that communications between any additional nodes are compromised is close to zero. This desirable property lowers the initial payoff of smaller-scale network breaches to an adversary, and makes it necessary for the adversary to attack a large fraction of the network before it can achieve any significant gain.
Towards the Burden of Human Leptospirosis: Duration of Acute Illness and Occurrence of Post-Leptospirosis Symptoms of Patients in The Netherlands

Background Leptospirosis is a global zoonotic disease. Although important for the assessment of the burden of leptospirosis, data on the duration of the illness and the occurrence of post-leptospirosis complaints are not well documented. Hence the main objective of this study was to estimate the occurrence of persistent complaints and duration of hospital stay in laboratory confirmed leptospirosis patients in the Netherlands during 1985 to 2010. Additionally, several risk factors potentially impacting on the occurrence of post-leptospirosis complaints were investigated. Methods/Principal Findings The duration of the acute phase of leptospirosis was 16 days (IQR 12–23); 10 days (IQR 7–16) were spent hospitalized. Eighteen fatal cases were excluded from this analysis. Complaints of leptospirosis patients by passive case investigations (CPC) derived from files on ambulant consultations occurring one month after hospital discharge, revealed persistent complaints in 108 of 236 (45.8%) laboratory confirmed cases. Data on persistent complaints after acute leptospirosis (PCAC), assessed in 225 laboratory confirmed leptospirosis cases collected through questionnaires during 1985-1993, indicated 68 (30.2%) PCAC cases. Frequently reported complaints included (extreme) fatigue, myalgia, malaise, headache, and a weak physical condition. These complaints prolonged in 21.1% of the cases beyond 24 months after onset of disease. There was no association between post-leptospirosis complaints and hospitalization. However, individuals admitted at the intensive care unit (ICU) were twice as likely to have continuing complaints after discharge adjusting for age and dialysis (OR 2.0 95% CI 0.8-4.8). No significant association could be found between prolongation of complaints and infecting serogroup, although subgroup analysis suggest that infection with serogroups Sejroe (OR 4.8, 95%CI 0.9-27.0) and icterohaemorrhagiae (OR 2.0, 95%CI 0.9-4.3 CI) are more likely to result in CPC than infections with serogroup Grippotyphosa. Conclusion/Significance In addition to the acute disease, persistent complaints have an impact on the burden of leptospirosis.
Dynamic regulation of replication independent deposition of histone H3 in fission yeast

Recently, a histone H3 variant in Drosophila and humans, the H3.3 protein, was shown to replace canonical H3 in active chromatin in a replication-independent (RI) manner. In the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe, there exists a single form of H3, which is equivalent to H3.3 and is thought to participate in both replication-independent (RI) and replication-coupled (RC) nucleosome assembly. In this study, we show that RI deposition of H3 at heterochromatic regions is consistently lower than that at a gene-free euchromatic region, and deletion of the conserved heterochromatin-specific proteins Swi6 or Clr4 markedly increases RI deposition at heterochromatic regions such as the silent mating-type loci or centromeres. These results clearly show that RI deposition of H3 occurs preferentially in euchromatic regions. We also observed that RI deposition of H3 could be increased at the thi3+ gene when transcription is induced, indicating transcription further facilitates RI deposition of H3. Taken together, these observations demonstrate that selective deposition of histone H3.3 at transcriptionally active chromatin by the RI assembly pathway is conserved in fission yeast and, thus, our data support an essential role of histone H3 replacement in maintaining active chromatin among diverse eukaryotic organisms ranging from fission yeast to humans.
The Statistical Computation Underlying Contrast Gain Control

In the early visual system, a contrast gain control mechanism sets the gain of responses based on the locally prevalent contrast. The measure of contrast used by this adaptation mechanism is commonly assumed to be the standard deviation of light intensities relative to the mean (root-mean-square contrast). A number of alternatives, however, are possible. For example, the measure of contrast might depend on the absolute deviations relative to the mean, or on the prevalence of the darkest or lightest intensities. We investigated the statistical computation underlying this measure of contrast in the cat's lateral geniculate nucleus, which relays signals from retina to cortex. Borrowing a method from psychophysics, we recorded responses to white noise stimuli whose distribution of intensities was precisely varied. We varied the standard deviation, skewness, and kurtosis of the distribution of intensities while keeping the mean luminance constant. We found that gain strongly depends on the standard deviation of the distribution. At constant standard deviation, moreover, gain is invariant to changes in skewness or kurtosis. These findings held for both ON and OFF cells, indicating that the measure of contrast is independent of the range of stimulus intensities signaled by the cells. These results confirm the long-held assumption that contrast gain control computes root-mean-square contrast. They also show that contrast gain control senses the full distribution of intensities and leaves unvaried the relative responses of the different cell types. The advantages to visual processing of this remarkably specific computation are not entirely known.
Phylogeny and Taxonomic Revision of the Endemic Malagasy Genus Ptychochromis (Teleostei: Cichlidae), with the Description of Five New Species and a Diagnosis for Katria, New Genus

Abstract The Malagasy cichlid genus Ptychochromis is revised and five new species are described, one of which is presumed to be extinct. The three valid nominal species, P. oligacanthus, P. grandidieri, and P. inornatus, are redescribed with diagnoses provided for each. A phylogeny of ptychochromin cichlids, derived from the simultaneous analysis of morphological features and nucleotide characters from a combination of mitochondrial and nuclear genes is presented. Ptychochromis is diagnosed by a suite of derived features of the pharynx, infraorbital series, and palatine morphology. In addition, the sister taxon to Ptychochromis, Ptychochromoides katria, is removed from Ptychochromoides and placed in its own genus, Katria, which is described herein as new. Katria is diagnosed by a unique pigmentation pattern, the absence of paired anterior gas bladder chambers that approach the neurocranium, an elevated vertebral count, and a slender caudal peduncle. An unnamed clade comprising Ptychochromis and Katria is diagnosed by a suite of derived features of the pharynx, sensory canal system, supraneural patterning, and palatine morphology.
Learning Robust Features using Deep Learning for Automatic Seizure Detection

We present and evaluate the capacity of a deep neural network to learn robust features from EEG to automatically detect seizures. This is a challenging problem because seizure manifestations on EEG are extremely variable both inter- and intra-patient. By simultaneously capturing spectral, temporal and spatial information our recurrent convolutional neural network learns a general spatially invariant representation of a seizure. The proposed approach exceeds significantly previous results obtained on cross-patient classifiers both in terms of sensitivity and false positive rate. Furthermore, our model proves to be robust to missing channel and variable electrode montage.
Planar Organization of River Networks: A Hidden Gamma Law Structure

We consider the water path distribution from any point in a basin to the outlet through the river network. Using the Strahler ordering scheme (Strahler, 1957) we separate every hydraulic path length L as the sum L = li i n = ∑ 1 of the lengths of its different components li, where n is the basin’s highest order. We obtain L and li ( i, 1 ≤ i ≤ n) maps and probability distributions through a GIS-based analysis of the geographical and topological organization of river networks. It appears that the li probability distributions follow convex and rapidly decreasing shapes and have a strong scaling property, except for the highest orders. This scaling is consistent with river networks fractality (RodriguezIturbe and Rinaldo, 1997) and its upper limit can be explained by the branched-out topology. Indeed, for a single basin, the highest order component ln necessarily can not have a decreasing probability distribution. This is due to its particular position in the Strahler hierarchical network organization. For similar reasons, probability distributions for ln–1, ln–2, . present a weaker scaling than for l1, l2, . Thus, we consider the truncated hydraulic lengths L′ = li i m n = < ∑ 1 . The probability distributions of L′ are negatively skewed and some of them can be described by a gamma law, whereas basin width functions are generally positively skewed (Rodriguez-Iturbe and Rinaldo, 1997). This shows how a gamma law underlies the river network self-similar organization, even if the shape does not obviously appear in the basin-scale geomorphological functions, due to hierarchical constraints.
Investigation of the levels of oxidative stress parameters in HIV and HIV-TB co-infected patients.

INTRODUCTION Among opportunistic pathogens associated with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), Mycobacterium tuberculosis is distinguished by its relative virulence and potential for person-to-person transmission. Oxidative stress is associated with TB infection with a high level in patients with HIV-TB co-infection. However, the comparative level of oxidative stress in HIV patients on highly active anti-retroviral therapy (HAART) and naïve (untreated) HIV patients is not clear. METHODOLOGY This study is aimed to determine the level of oxidative stress and haematological parameters in HIV patients (naïve), HIV patients undergoing HAART, and HIV-TB co-infected patients. In total, 100 consenting subjects were recruited from the AIDS Prevention Iniative in Nigeria (APIN) Clinic. For controls, normal male healthy volunteers were recruited from the blood donor clinic and females from the APIN clinic staff members, both of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital. Measurements of antioxidant enzyme activity and lipid peroxidation were performed according to standard procedures. Haematological parameters were determined using a fully automated hematology analyzer. RESULTS Red blood cells significantly decreased (P ≤ 0.001) in all patients when compared with control subjects. The lipid peroxidation (MDA) was significantly high (P ≤ 0.05) in naive patients when compared to HIV patients on HAART. The decrease in the levels of GSH in both naive and HIV-TB co-infected patients (P ≤ 0.001) and HIV patients on HAART (P < 0.05) were significant when compared to control patients. CONCLUSION There is lower antioxidant level and higher MDA in naive and HIV-TB co-infected patients as compared to HIV patients on HAART and the seronegative patients.
Cooperative Amplify-and-Forward with Trellis Coded Modulation

In a cooperative communication network, individual users are encouraged not only to transmit their own data, but also relay other user's data. This relaying transmission creates spatial diversity to combat the effect of individual severe fading and path loss. Since cooperative users utilize some degree of their transmission freedom for relaying other user's data, cooperative transmission results in lowering each user's transmission spectral efficiency. Therefore, a coding scheme with high spectral efficiency and optimized performance would be desirable for a cooperative network. This paper proposes the Trellis Coded Modulation (TCM) scheme to be incorporated with the cooperative Amplify-and-Forward (AF) systems. A criterion for designing good TCM codes for AF systems is also derived and two cooperative AF systems achieving 1 bits/sec/Hz and 1.5 bits/sec/Hz for each user are presented. Analyses in this paper show that cooperative TCM schemes can not only achieve high spectral efficiency, but also outperform convolutional codes with a high order modulation scheme.