Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Tmc1 is necessary for normal functional maturation and survival of inner and outer hair cells in the mouse cochlea

The deafness (dn) and Beethoven (Bth) mutant mice are models for profound congenital deafness (DFNB7/B11) and progressive hearing loss (DFNA36), respectively, caused by recessive and dominant mutations of transmembrane cochlear‐expressed gene 1 (TMC1), which encodes a transmembrane protein of unknown function. In the mouse cochlea Tmc1 is expressed in both outer (OHCs) and inner (IHCs) hair cells from early stages of development. Immature hair cells of mutant mice seem normal in appearance and biophysical properties. From around P8 for OHCs and P12 for IHCs, mutants fail to acquire (dn/dn) or show reduced expression (Bth/Bth and, to a lesser extent Bth/+) of the K+ currents which contribute to their normal functional maturation (the BK‐type current IK,f in IHCs, and the delayed rectifier IK,n in both cell types). Moreover, the exocytotic machinery in mutant IHCs does not develop normally as judged by the persistence of immature features of the Ca2+ current and exocytosis into adulthood. Mutant mice exhibited progressive hair cell damage and loss. The compound action potential (CAP) thresholds of Bth/+ mice were raised and correlated with the degree of hair cell loss. Homozygous mutants (dn/dn and Bth/Bth) never showed CAP responses, even at ages where many hair cells were still present in the apex of the cochlea, suggesting their hair cells never function normally. We propose that Tmc1 is involved in trafficking of molecules to the plasma membrane or serves as an intracellular regulatory signal for differentiation of immature hair cells into fully functional auditory receptors.
Simulating the metal enrichment of the intracluster medium

We present results from Tree + SPH simulations of a galaxy cluster, aimed at studying the metal enrichment of the intracluster medium (ICM). The simulation code includes a fairly advanced treatment of star formation, as well as the release of energy feedback and detailed yields from both Type II and Type la supernovae, also accurately accounting for the lifetimes of different stellar populations. We perform simulations of a cluster with virial mass ≃3.9 x 10 14 M ○. , to investigate the effect of varying the feedback strength and the stellar initial mass function (IMF). Although most of the models are able to produce acceptable amounts of Fe mass, we find that the profiles of the iron abundance are always steeper than observed. The [O/Fe] ratio is found to be subsolar for a Salpeter IMF, with [O/Fe] ≃ -0.2 at R > 0.1 R 200 , whereas increasing to supersolar values in central regions, as a result of recent star formation. Using a top-heavier IMF gives a larger [O/Fe] over the whole cluster, at variance with observations. On the other hand, the adoption of a variable IMF, which becomes top-heavier at z > 2, provides a roughly solar [O/Fe] ratio. Our results indicate that our simulations still lack a feedback mechanism which should quench star formation at low redshift and transport metals away from the star-forming regions.
Age-Dependent Small-Animal Internal Radiation Dosimetry

Rats at various ages were observed to present with different radiosensitivity and bioavailability for radiotracers commonly used in preclinical research. We evaluated the effect of age-induced changes in body weight on radiation dose calculations. A series of rat models at different age periods were constructed based on the realistic four-dimensional digital rat whole-body (ROBY) computational model. Particle transport was simulated using the MCNPX Monte Carlo code. Absorbed fractions (AFs) and specific absorbed fraction (SAFs) of monoenergetic photons/electrons and S values of eight positron-emitting radionuclides were calculated. The SAFs and S values for most source-target pairs were inversely correlated with body weight. Differences between F-18 S values for most source-target pairs were between −1.5% and −2%/10 g difference in bodyweight for different computational models. For specific radiotracers, the radiation dose to organs presents a negative correlation with rat body weight. The SAFs for monoenergetic photons/electrons and S values for common positron-emitting radionuclides can be exploited in the assessment of radiation dose delivered to rats at different ages and weights. The absorbed dose to organs is significantly higher in the low-weight young rat model than in the adult model, which would result in steep secondary effects and might be a noteworthy issue in laboratory animal internal dosimetry.
The Development of Psychological Capacity for Action: The Empowering Effect of a Microfinance Programme on Women in Sri Lanka

This work examines the effect of a microfinance intervention on psychological empowerment among women in the North of Sri Lanka. Psychological empowerment is defined as personal (personal control beliefs) and social (social networks) capacity for action. The intervention included relevant skills training, saving acti-vities, and micro loans to eligible clients. In total, 88 women who had participated in the program for 12-18 months were randomly selected and compared with a matched control group (n = 84). As expected, women in the intervention group showed higher levels of personal control beliefs and reported a larger social network (indicators for personal and social capacity for action, respectively), compared to the control group. Importantly, women who received training showed stronger effects than women who did not, illustrating the importance of training to capacitate women. Implications for theory and practice of microfinance interventions designed to foster societal change toward gender equality are discussed.
The relationship of perceived flexibility, supportive work–life policies, and use of formal flexible arrangements and occasional flexibility to employee engagement and expected retention

This study examines the relationship of perceived workplace flexibility and supportive work–life policies to employee engagement and expectations to remain with the organization (expected retention). It also explores the association of formal and occasional (informal) use of flexibility with these outcomes. Data are from a multi-organization database created by WFD Consulting of studies conducted between 1996 and 2006. Results revealed that perceived flexibility and supportive work–life policies were related to greater employee engagement and longer than expected retention. Employee engagement fully mediated the relationship between perceived flexibility and expected retention and partially mediated the relationship between supportive work–life policies and expected retention. Both formal and occasional use of flexibility were positively associated with perceived flexibility, employee engagement, and expected retention. These analyses provide evidence that workplace flexibility may enhance employee engagement, which may in turn lead to longer job tenure.
'Site under construction' : the role of discourse in the social construction of Local Authority Traveller accommodation

Key traditional foci in Traveller-related academic work have tended to be ’socio-economics’ and ‘culture’/‘ethnicity’. Diverting from these, this thesis takes a sociological Housing Studies starting-point in considering ‘Travelling people’ in the context of ‘housing’ as ‘home’, and ‘residence’ as an aspect of the human ‘way of life’. From the epistemological perspective of ‘weak’ social constructionism (Berger and Luckmann, 1966), and accepting a ‘universalistic’ understanding of ‘ethnicity’ (Malesevic, 2004), I problematize the concept ‘way of life’ in its popular sense of socio-cultural ‘lifestyle’, identifying, and suggesting the term ‘lifeway’ to denote, a dichotomous (nomadic-sedentary) socio-ecological subsense within its English-language construction. Similarly problematised, the construct ‘Traveller’ and its commonly-accepted counterpart ‘settled’ appear as a pair of diversely multi-ethnic human lifeway collectives, differentiated not primarily by degree of mobility, but by contrasting ‘nomadic’ and ‘sedentary’ versions of ‘residence’, ‘dwelling’, ‘home’, etc. Using a reflexive, broadly ‘Foucauldian’ (Carabine, 2001), discourse analysis methodology (Potter, 1996; Wetherell et al. 2001), I consider Traveller/nomadic ’residence’ empirically through a case study (Yin, 2003) of the ‘Local Authority Traveller Site’ as a discursive ‘text’ central to dominant representations of Traveller/nomadic ‘dwelling’/ ‘home’. From Sedentarist and Nomadist socio-discursive accounts of social construction and contestation, I develop bi- and tri-modal understandings of seemingly incomprehensible and/or irreducible intra- and inter-paradigmatic tensions. In this initial attempt at a nomadism-sensitive critique, I argue that academic consideration of Traveller and other socio-ecologically non-hegemonic lifeways, within Housing and beyond, has been limited by a universally ‘Sedentarist’ discursive ‘bottom line’. I propose amelioration of this through reformulation of the concept of lifeway, a discrete, essential dimension of human identity cross-cutting (rather than reducible to) ethnicity, class or gender, from a dichotomy to a continuum of socio-ecological practice; and related expansion of Kemeny’s (1992) concept of ‘residence’. The now considerable theoretical and critical capability of Housing Studies and related fields, combined with the ‘lifeway’ perspectives offered by Romani Studies and related fields, could produce potentially very fruitful and far-reaching ‘integrative’ (Kemeny, 1992; also Acton, 1997) ‘trans-disciplinary’ (Clapham et al., 2012) and ‘theory-making’ (King, 2009) collaboration. This could enable more visible, comprehensible mainstream academic representation of Traveller and other non-hegemonic residence modes, and enhanced mobilities (Urry, 2007) accounts of hegemonic residence, housing, dwelling and home.
IS A CONSUMER PANEL ABLE TO RELIABLY EVALUATE THE TEXTURE OF DAIRY DESSERTS USING UNSTRUCTURED INTENSITY SCALES? EVALUATION OF GLOBAL AND INDIVIDUAL PERFORMANCE

In the last decade, consumer panels have been claimed capable of evaluating the intensity of sensory attributes of food products using intensity scales, providing similar results than trained assessors. In this context, the present study deals with the evaluation of the performance of a consumer panel for texture evaluation of milk desserts, based on global and individual performance, and the comparison with a panel of trained assessor panel. Four milk desserts with different texture characteristics were evaluated by 86 consumers and by a trained panel. Both panels evaluated five texture attributes using unstructured intensity scales. Consumers and trained assessors showed very similar discriminative capacity and reproducibility for all the evaluated texture characteristics. However, the consumer panel showed lack of consensus in its evaluations and individual scores for most consumers were not able to significantly discriminate between samples. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS Results from the present work show that although average data for attribute intensity from a consumer panel might be valid and comparable with data from a quantitative descriptive analysis performed by a panel of trained assessors, high variability among consumers exists. Therefore, care must be taken when using intensity scales to study consumers' perception of the sensory characteristics of food products, which suggests that more appropriate methodologies should be developed.
‘We don’t have any limits’: Russian young adult life narratives through a social generations lens

A social generation framework attends to how emergent historical patterns of social organization shape young adult contemporaries, noting shared strategies to constructing subjectivity within a common political, social, and economic milieu. However, the perspective has given scant attention to how young people engage in reflexive life management outside of well-documented Western contexts. Additionally, the framework needs further consideration of how youth lives are shaped by the social relations of globalization. To address these omissions, this article examines how educated, urban Russian young adults engage in reflexive life management. In drawing on a social generations rather than transitions approach, youth meaning-making is analyzed through grounded analysis rather than reliance on previously conceived categories. The study of youth reflexive life management can be reframed as a question: ‘what does making a life mean to educated urban post-adolescents in Russia? ’ We explore how respondents interpret difference and inequality through transnational comparisons, center globality in the biographical project, and encounter citizenship constraints. We focus on three meaning-making projects: idealized globality, assuming nonlinear paths, and vigilant evaluative work.
Teaching evidence-based practice principles to prepare health professions students for an interprofessional learning experience

Objective: The research assessed online learning modules designed to teach health professions students evidence-based practice (EBP) principles in an interprofessional context across two institutions. Methods: Students from nine health professions at two institutions were recruited to participate in this pilot project consisting of two online learning modules designed to prepare students for an in-person case-based interprofessional activity. Librarians and an instructional designer created two EBP modules. Students’ competence in EBP was assessed before and after the modules as well as after the in-person activity. Students evaluated the online learning modules and their impact on the students’ learning after the in-person session. Results: A total of 39 students from 8 health professions programs participated in the project. Average quiz scores for online EBP module 1 and module 2 were 83% and 76%, respectively. Following completion of the learning modules, adapted Fresno test of competence in EBP scores increased (p=0.001), indicating that the modules improved EBP skill competence. Student evaluations of the learning modules were positive. Students indicated that they acquired new information skills that contributed to their ability to develop a patient care plan and that they would use these information skills in their future clinical practice. Conclusions: Online EBP learning modules were effective in developing EBP knowledge and skills for health professions students. Using the same modules ensured that students from different health professions at different stages of their professional programs had consistent knowledge and enabled each student to fully engage in an interprofessional evidence-based activity. Student feedback indicated the modules were valued and beneficial.
Music performance teachers’ conceptions about learning and instruction: a descriptive study of Spanish piano teachers

There has been little research into the conceptions music performance teachers have about learning and instruction, by either psychological or educational researchers. The main aim of this study was to describe the conceptions of 45 Spanish piano teachers from music conservatories, by analysing their differences according to the variable ‘Years of teaching experience’ (YTE). Three groups of 15 teachers were studied as follows: (1) highly experienced teachers (more than 15 YTE); (2) experienced teachers (between five and 15 YTE); and (3) novice teachers (less than five YTE). Data was collected using written open-ended questionnaires, and analysed by means of the lexicometrical method. Three different conceptions were identified between these groups: direct, interpretative and constructive. The findings suggested that the less experienced the teachers were, the more sophisticated, complex and adapted to music education their conceptions about learning and instruction were. Psychological, educative and curricular implications are discussed.
Liberal education in a knowledge society

Liberal education - education which is not training for work - used to be governed by a canon, a recognized body of knowledge which was considered valuable for transmission from one generation to the next. This old idea of liberal education has come under fire because of the growth of scientific knowledge and the changing role of the universities in "knowledge building. " This volume looks at the thinking of educational theorist Carl Bereiter, who has tackled the problem of the liberal education canon in a new way. Bereiter proposes that we view the main task of formal education as "enculturation into World 3". World 3, an idea adapted from Karl Popper (and contrasted with both World 1, the world of physical objects, and World 2, the world of subjective mental states), is much more than the body of accepted ideas. Becoming enculturated into World 3 means learning how to function effectively in creating, interpreting, and improving the objects in World 3 - ideas, theories, problems, and conjectures. The chapters examine both the theory of mind implied by Bereiter's work and the applications of his thought to social and pedagogical issues.
Interactions between Meloidogyne incognita, M. hapla, and Pratylenchus brachyurus in Tobacco.

In a greenhouse pot experiment on the pathogenicity and interactions of Meloidogyne incognita, M. hapla and Pratylenchus brachyurus on four cultivars o f tobacco the cultivars 'Hicks' and 'NC 2326' were susceptible to each nematode and "NC 95' and 'NC 2512' resistant only to M. incognita.Mean heights of susceptible plants were depressed but fresh weight of tops did not differ significantly. Meloidogyne spp. increased fresh weight of susceptible (but not the resistant) roots.Reproduction of M. incognita was decreased in the presence of P. brachyurus in one case. M. hapla reproduction was less with either of the other nematodes in five out of eight cases. In 12 combinations involving P. brachyurus, reproduction of this species was depressed in seven, not affected in four and increased in one.Mechanisms involved in associative interactions were not identified but appeared to be indirect and to involve individual host-nematode responses.
On the Stability of Evaluative Conditioning Effects The Role of Identity Memory, Valence Memory, and Evaluative Consolidation

Evaluative conditioning (EC) refers to valence changes in neutral stimuli (CSs) through repeated pairing with liked or disliked stimuli (USs). The present study examined the stability of EC effects in the course of 1 week. We investigated how this stability depends on memory for US valence and US identity. We also investigated whether CSs evaluations occurring immediately after conditioning (i.e., evaluative consolidation) are necessary for stable EC effects. Participants showed stable EC effects on direct and indirect measures, independent of evaluations immediately after conditioning. EC effects depended on memory for US valence but not for US identity. And although memory decreased significantly over time, EC effects remained stable. These data suggest that evaluative consolidation is not necessary, and that conditioned preferences and attitudes might persist even when people do not remember the concrete source anymore.
DeepStory: Video Story QA by Deep Embedded Memory Networks

Question-answering (QA) on video contents is a significant challenge for achieving human-level intelligence as it involves both vision and language in real-world settings. Here we demonstrate the possibility of an AI agent performing video story QA by learning from a large amount of cartoon videos. We develop a video-story learning model, i.e. Deep Embedded Memory Networks (DEMN), to reconstruct stories from a joint scene-dialogue video stream using a latent embedding space of observed data. The video stories are stored in a long-term memory component. For a given question, an LSTM-based attention model uses the long-term memory to recall the best question-story-answer triplet by focusing on specific words containing key information. We trained the DEMN on a novel QA dataset of children's cartoon video series, Pororo. The dataset contains 16,066 scene-dialogue pairs of 20.5-hour videos, 27,328 fine-grained sentences for scene description, and 8,913 story-related QA pairs. Our experimental results show that the DEMN outperforms other QA models. This is mainly due to 1) the reconstruction of video stories in a scene-dialogue combined form that utilize the latent embedding and 2) attention. DEMN also achieved state-of-the-art results on the MovieQA benchmark.
Adenylyl Cyclase Functions Downstream of the Gα Protein Gpa1 and Controls Mating and Pathogenicity of Cryptococcus neoformans

ABSTRACT The signaling molecule cyclic AMP (cAMP) is a ubiquitous second messenger that enables cells to detect and respond to extracellular signals. cAMP is generated by the enzyme adenylyl cyclase, which is activated or inhibited by the Gα subunits of heterotrimeric G proteins in response to ligand-activated G-protein-coupled receptors. Here we identified the unique gene (CAC1) encoding adenylyl cyclase in the opportunistic fungal pathogen Cryptococcus neoformans. The CAC1 gene was disrupted by transformation and homologous recombination. In stark contrast to the situation for Saccharomyces cerevisiae, in which adenylyl cyclase is essential, C. neoformans cac1 mutant strains were viable and had no vegetative growth defect. Furthermore, cac1 mutants maintained the yeast-like morphology of wild-type cells, in contrast to the constitutively filamentous phenotype found upon the loss of adenylyl cyclase in another basidiomycete pathogen, Ustilago maydis. Like C. neoformans mutants lacking the Gα protein Gpa1, cac1 mutants were mating defective and failed to produce two inducible virulence factors: capsule and melanin. As a consequence, cac1 mutant strains were avirulent in animal models of cryptococcal meningitis. Reintroduction of the wild-type CAC1 gene or the addition of exogenous cAMP suppressed cac1 mutant phenotypes. Moreover, the overexpression of adenylyl cyclase restored mating and virulence factor production in gpa1 mutant strains. Physiological studies revealed that the Gα protein Gpa1 and adenylyl cyclase controlled cAMP production in response to glucose, and no cAMP was detectable in extracts from cac1 or gpa1 mutant strains. These findings provide direct evidence that Gpa1 and adenylyl cyclase function in a conserved signal transduction pathway controlling cAMP production, hyphal differentiation, and virulence of this human fungal pathogen.
Quantum plug n’ play: modular computation in the quantum regime

Classical computation is modular. It exploits plug n’ play architectures which allow us to use pre-fabricated circuits without knowing their construction. This bestows advantages such as allowing parts of the computational process to be outsourced, and permitting individual circuit components to be exchanged and upgraded. Here, we introduce a formal framework to describe modularity in the quantum regime. We demonstrate a ‘no-go’ theorem, stipulating that it is not always possible to make use of quantum circuits without knowing their construction. This has significant consequences for quantum algorithms, forcing the circuit implementation of certain quantum algorithms to be rebuilt almost entirely from scratch after incremental changes in the problem—such as changing the number being factored in Shor’s algorithm. We develop a workaround capable of restoring modularity, and apply it to design a modular version of Shor’s algorithm that exhibits increased versatility and reduced complexity. In doing so we pave the way to a realistic framework whereby ‘quantum chips’ and remote servers can be invoked (or assembled) to implement various parts of a more complex quantum computation.