Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Model for Vacuum-assisted Soft Soil Consolidation with PVDs

To maintain the ground stability and reduce the post-construction settlement, the soft deposits characterised by high water content, high compressibility and low permeability need to be treated by an appropriate ground improvement method prior to the construction of infrastructure. Application of PVD is a well-practiced ground improvement method for consolidating the soft clays. PVD can be used in conjunction with a fill surcharge, vacuum pressure or a combination of the two. An analytical unit cell model was proposed to capture the large strain geometry and the non-linear soil properties during the large settlement. This model showed an advantage over the traditional model in predicting the soft ground consolidation behaviour. In this paper, this model is used to analyse some case histories. RÉSUMÉ : Pour maintenir la stabilité du sol et réduire l'implantation après la construction, les dépôts doux caractérisés par une teneur en eau élevée, une grande compressibilité et une faible perméabilité doivent être traités par une méthode appropriée d'amélioration du sol avant la construction de l'infrastructure. PVD est une méthode d'amélioration du sol bien pratiquée pour la consolidation des argiles molles. PVD peut être utilisé en conjonction avec une surtaxe de remplissage, la pression de vide ou une combinaison des deux. Un modèle de cellule unitaire analytique a été proposé pour capturer la grande géométrie de la déformation et les propriétés non linéaires du sol pendant la grande colonisation. Ce modèle a montré un avantage par rapport au modèle traditionnel dans la prédiction du comportement de consolidation du sol mou. Dans ce document, ce modèle est utilisé pour analyser certains cas.
Identification and Disambiguation of Lexical Cues of Rhetorical Relations across Different Text Genres

Lexical cues are linguistic expressions that can signal the presence of a rhetorical relation. However, such cues can be ambiguous as they may signal more than one relation or may not always function as a relation indicator. In this study, we first conduct a corpus-based analysis to derive a set of n-grams as potential lexical cues. These cues are then utilized in graph-based probabilistic models to determine the syntactic context in which the cue is signaling the presence of a particular relation. Evaluation results are reported for various cues of the CIRCUMSTANCE relation, confirming the value of syntactic features for the task of cue disambiguation in the context of Rhetorical Structure Theory. Moreover, using a graph to encode syntactic information is shown to be a more generalizable and effective approach compared to the direct usage of syntactic features.
Near-perfect conversion of a propagating plane wave into a surface wave using metasurfaces

In this paper, theoretical and numerical studies of perfect/nearly-perfect conversion of a plane wave into a surface wave are presented. The problem of determining the electromagnetic properties of an inhomogeneous lossless boundary which would fully transform an incident plane wave into a surface wave propagating along the boundary is considered. An approximate field solution which produces a slowly growing surface wave and satisfies the energy conservation law is discussed and numerically demonstrated. The results of the study are of great importance for the future development of such devices as perfect leaky-wave antennas and can potentially lead to many novel applications.
Cortical connections of area 2 and posterior parietal area 5 in macaque monkeys

The overarching goal of the current investigation was to examine the connections of anterior parietal area 2 and the medial portion of posterior parietal area 5 in macaque monkeys; two areas that are part of a network involved reaching and grasping in primates. We injected neuroanatomical tracers into specified locations in each field and directly related labeled cells to histologically identified cortical field boundaries. Labeled cells were counted so that the relative density of projections to areas 2 and 5 from other cortical fields could be determined. Projections to area 2 were restricted and were predominantly from other somatosensory areas of the anterior parietal cortex (areas 1, 3b, and 3a), the second somatosensory area (S2), and from medial and lateral portions of area 5 (5M and 5L respectively). On the other hand, area 5M had very broadly distributed projections from a number of cortical areas including anterior parietal areas, from primary motor cortex (M1), premotor cortex (PM), the supplementary motor area (SMA), cortex on the medial wall, and from posterior parietal areas 5L and 7b. The more restricted pattern of connections of area 2 indicates that it processes somatic inputs locally and provides proprioceptive information to area 5M. 5M, which at least partially overlaps with functionally defined area MIP, receives inputs from somatosensory (predominantly from area 2), posterior parietal and motor cortex, which could provide the substrate for representing multiple coordinate systems necessary for planning ethologically relevant movements, particularly those involving the hand.
A compact, large-range interferometer for precision measurement and inertial sensing

We present a compact, fibre-coupled interferometer with high sensitivity and a large working range. We propose to use this interferometer as a readout mechanism for future inertial sensors, removing a major limiting noise source, and in precision positioning systems. The interferometer’s peak sensitivity is 2×10−14 m Hz−1 at 70 Hz and 7×10−11 m Hz−1 at 10 mHz. If deployed on a GS-13 geophone, the resulting inertial sensing output will be limited by the suspension thermal noise of the reference mass from 10 mHz to 2 Hz.
Intermolecular interaction of fosinopril with bovine serum albumin (BSA): The multi‐spectroscopic and computational investigation

The intermolecular interaction of fosinopril, an angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor with bovine serum albumin (BSA), has been investigated in physiological buffer (pH 7.4) by multi‐spectroscopic methods and molecular docking technique. The results obtained from fluorescence and UV absorption spectroscopy revealed that the fluorescence quenching mechanism of BSA induced by fosinopril was mediated by the combined dynamic and static quenching, and the static quenching was dominant in this system. The binding constant, Kb, value was found to lie between 2.69 × 103 and 9.55 × 103 M−1 at experimental temperatures (293, 298, 303, and 308 K), implying the low or intermediate binding affinity between fosinopril and BSA. Competitive binding experiments with site markers (phenylbutazone and diazepam) suggested that fosinopril preferentially bound to the site I in sub‐domain IIA on BSA, as evidenced by molecular docking analysis. The negative sign for enthalpy change (ΔH0) and entropy change (ΔS0) indicated that van der Waals force and hydrogen bonds played important roles in the fosinopril‐BSA interaction, and 8‐anilino‐1‐naphthalenesulfonate binding assay experiments offered evidence of the involvements of hydrophobic interactions. Moreover, spectroscopic results (synchronous fluorescence, 3‐dimensional fluorescence, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy) indicated a slight conformational change in BSA upon fosinopril interaction.
(Short Paper) Burning Zerocoins for Fun and for Profit - A Cryptographic Denial-of-Spending Attack on the Zerocoin Protocol

Zerocoin (Miers et. al, IEEE S&P'13), designed as an extension to Bitcoin and similar cryptocurrencies, was the first anonymous cryptocurrency proposal which supports large anonymity sets. We identify a cryptographic denial-of-spending attack on the original Zerocoin protocol and a second Zerocoin protocol (Groth and Kohlweiss, EUROCRYPT'15), which enables a network attacker to destroy money of honest users. The attack leads to real-world vulnerabilities in multiple cryptocurrencies, which rely on implementations of the original Zerocoin protocol. The existence of the attack does not contradict the formal security analyses of the two Zerocoin protocols but exposes the lack of an important missing property in the security model of Zerocoin. While the security definitions model that the attacker should not be able to create money out of thin air or steal money from honest users, they do not model that the attacker cannot destroy money of honest users. Fortunately, there are simple fixes for the security model and for both protocols.
SimCEC

Traditionally, the evaluation of surgical procedures in virtual reality (VR) simulators has been restricted to their individual technical aspects disregarding the procedures carried out by teams. However, some decision models have been proposed to support the collaborative training evaluation process of surgical teams in collaborative virtual environments. The main objective of this article is to present a collaborative simulator based on VR, named SimCEC, as a potential solution for education, training, and evaluation in basic surgical routines for teams of undergraduate students. The simulator considers both tasks performed individually and those carried in a collaborative manner. The main contribution of this work is to improve the discussion about VR simulators requirements (design and implementation) to provide team training in relevant topics, such as users’ feedback in real time, collaborative training in networks, interdisciplinary integration of curricula, and continuous evaluation.
The Expanding Role for Retinoid Signaling in Heart Development

The importance of retinoid signaling during cardiac development has long been appreciated, but recently has become a rapidly expanding field of research. Experiments performed over 50 years ago showed that too much or too little maternal intake of vitamin A proved detrimental for embryos, resulting in a cadre of predictable cardiac developmental defects. Germline and conditional knockout mice have revealed which molecular players in the vitamin A signaling cascade are potentially responsible for regulating specific developmental events, and many of these molecules have been temporally and spatially characterized. It is evident that intact and controlled retinoid signaling is necessary for each stage of cardiac development to proceed normally, including cardiac lineage determination, heart tube formation, looping, epicardium formation, ventricular maturation, chamber and outflow tract septation, and coronary arteriogenesis. This review summarizes many of the significant milestones in this field and particular attention is given to recently uncovered cross-talk between retinoid signaling and other developmentally significant pathways. It is our hope that this review of the role of retinoid signaling during formation, remodeling, and maturation of the developing heart will serve as a tool for future discoveries.
Interleukin-10-Loaded Nano- and Microparticles for the Local Treatment of the Intestinal Mucosa and the Deep Lung

2 Acronyms . 5 1 General Introduction . 8 1.1 Interleukin-10 . 8 1.1.1 Structure und receptor binding . 8 1.1.1 Biology of IL-10 . 9 1.1.2 Potential as an anti-inflammatory drug . 14 1.1.3 Stability of IL-10 . 16 1.2 Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) . 17 1.2.1 Nanoand microparticles as novel drug delivery systems for the treatment of IBD . 19 1.2.2 IL-10 as a potential drug for the treatment of IBD . 21 1.2.3 Attempts to locally deliver IL-10 to the intestinal mucosa . 24 1.3 The potential of IL-10 for the treatment of lung diseases . 27 1.2 Aims of this work . 28 2. Practical work . 30 2.1 IL-10-loaded PLGA nanoparticles for the treatment of IBD . 30 2.1.1 Preliminary remarks . 30 2.1.2 Introduction . 30 2.1.3 Materials and methods . 34 2.1. 4 Results and discussion . 42 2.1. 5 Conclusion . 57 2.2 Spray-dried IL-10-loaded microparticles encapsulated in Eudragit microspheres . 58 2.2.1 Preliminary remarks . 58 2.2.2 Introduction . 58 2.2.3 Materials and methods . 63 2.2.4 Results and discussion . 70 2.2. 5 Conclusion . 82 2.3 IL-10-loaded spray-dried MP for the treatment of acute inflammation of the lung . 84 2.3. 1 Preliminary remarks . 84 2.3. 2 Introduction . 85 2.3. 3 Materials and methods . 86 2.3. 4 Results and discussion . 93 4 2.3. 5 Conclusion . 99 2.4 IL-10-homologous peptides . 101 2.4. 1 Preliminary remarks . 101 2.4. 2 Introduction . 101 2.4. 3 Materials and methods . 103 2.4. 4 Results and discussion . 106 2.4. 5 Conclusion . 111 3. Summary and outlook . 112 Bibliography . 116 Danksagung . 136 Publication list . 137
Changes in plasma lipoproteins during low-fat, high-carbohydrate diets: effects of energy intake.

BACKGROUND Low-fat diets can increase plasma triacylglycerol and reduce HDL cholesterol. Changes in energy intake and body weight can influence the lipoprotein response. OBJECTIVE We sought to prospectively examine the effects of euenergetic and ad libitum dietary fat restriction on plasma lipoproteins in healthy postmenopausal women. DESIGN Participants first received a controlled euenergetic diet in which dietary fat was reduced stepwise from 35% to 25% to 15% over 4 mo. Thereafter, participants followed an ad libitum 15%-fat diet for 8 mo; 54 women completed the intervention. RESULTS During the controlled euenergetic diet, plasma triacylglycerol increased from 1.70 +/- 0.10 to 2.30 +/- 0.16 mmol/L, total cholesterol decreased from 5.87 +/- 0.13 to 5.53 +/- 0. 13 mmol/L, LDL cholesterol decreased from 3.41 +/- 0.10 to 2.87 +/- 0.10 mmol/L, HDL cholesterol decreased from 1.76 +/- 0.08 to 1.50 +/- 0.08 mmol/L, and apolipoprotein (apo) A-I decreased from 5.11 +/- 0.14 to 4.78 +/- 0.14 mmol/L (P < 0.0001 for all changes). Hormone replacement therapy did not affect the relative change in HDL cholesterol. Plasma glucose, insulin, hemoglobin A(1C,) free fatty acid, and apo B concentrations did not change significantly. During the ad libitum 15%-fat diet, participants lost 4.6 +/- 0.4 kg. Plasma triacylglycerol and LDL cholesterol returned to baseline values (1.77 +/- 0.12 and 3.31 +/- 0.08 mmol/L, respectively), whereas HDL cholesterol and apo A-I remained low (1.40 +/- 0.08 and 4.82 +/- 0.18 mmol/L, respectively). HDL cholesterol and apo A-I concentrations stabilized in subjects who were not receiving hormone replacement therapy but continued to decline in women who were receiving hormone therapy. CONCLUSIONS The ad libitum 15%-fat diet resulted in significant weight loss. The euenergetic but not the ad libitum diet caused hypertriacylglycerolemia. HDL cholesterol decreased during both low-fat diets.
Analyzing the sclerocarpy adaptations of the Pitheciidae mandible

Primates are interpreted to be ancestrally adapted to frugivory, although some modern groups show clear adaptations to other diets. Among them, pitheciids stand out for specifically predating seeds. This dietary specialization is known as sclerocarpy and refers to the extraction of seeds from surrounding hard tissues using the anterior dentition followed by the mastication of seeds by the molars. It has been proposed that Callicebus‐Pithecia‐Chiropotes‐Cacajao represent a morphocline of increasingly specialized anatomical traits for sclerocarpic foraging. This study addresses whether there is a sclerocarpic specialization gradient in the mandibular morphology of pitheciids. Finite element analysis (FEA) was used to simulate two biting scenarios and the obtained stress values were compared between different pitheciids. Geometric morphometrics (GM) were used to display the morphological variation of this group. No support was found for the morphocline hypothesis from a biomechanical viewpoint since all pitheciins showed similar stress values and on average Chiropotes rather than Cacajao exhibited the strongest mandible. From a morphological perspective, it was found that there is indeed relative “robusticity” continuum in the pitheciid mandible for some aspects of shape as expected for the morphocline hypothesis, but this gradient could be related to other factors rather than sclerocarpic specialization. The present results are expected to contribute to a better insight regarding the ecomorphological relationship between mandibular morphology and mechanical performance among pitheciids.
Modular linear optical circuits

We propose and demonstrate a modular architecture for reconfigurable on-chip linear-optical circuits. Each module contains 10 independent phase-controlled Mach-Zehnder interferometers; several such modules can be connected to each other to build large reconfigurable interferometers. With this architecture, large interferometers are easier to build and characterize than with traditional, bespoke, monolithic designs. We demonstrate our approach by fabricating three modules in the form of UV-written silica-on-silicon chips. We characterize these chips, connect them to each other, and implement a wide range of linear optical transformations. We envisage that this architecture will enable many future experiments in quantum optics.
Perceived supernatural support heightens battle confidence: a knife combat field study

ABSTRACT Religiosity has been historically linked with propensities for both antisocial aggression and prosocial bravery, and prior research employing indirect measures affirms that envisioning the support of supernatural agents promotes confidence in engaging in violent conflict. Here, we provide the first test of this hypothesis within a realistic combat paradigm (i.e., simulated knife fighting). We primed the presence of supernatural aid and collected measures of trait religiosity as well as political orientation, which typically covaries with religiosity and has been similarly linked with battle confidence in prior research. Consistent with predictions, participants evinced greater confidence in their own performance in an imminent knife battle following a guided visualization exercise analogous to prayer summoning supernatural aid. Moreover, individual differences in trait religiosity comparably predicted battle confidence, an effect that was not accounted for by covarying differences in political orientation, which also predicted battle confidence if analyzed independently of religiosity. Against expectations, we observed limited effects of the visualization manipulation or religiosity, and no effect of political orientation, on coalitional confidence in the groups participants fought alongside. These results, derived from unusually valid methods, are discussed as they extend prior research on the confidence-enhancing effects of perceived supernatural support.
Phospholipase D2 promotes disease progression of renal cell carcinoma through the induction of angiogenin

A hallmark of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is the presence of intracellular lipid droplets (LD) and it is assumed that phosphatidic acid (PA) produced by phospholipase D (PLD) plays some role in the LD formation. However, little is known about the significance of PLD in ccRCC. In this study, we examined the expression levels of PLD in ccRCC. The classical mammalian isoforms of PLD are PLD1 and PLD2, and the levels of both mRNA were higher at the primary tumor sites than in normal kidney tissues. Similarly, both PLD were significantly abundant in tumor cells as determined by analysis using immunohistochemical staining. Importantly, a higher level of PLD was significantly associated with a higher tumor stage and grade. Because PLD2 knockdown effectively suppressed the cell proliferation and invasion of ccRCC as compared with PLD1 in vitro, we examined the effect of PLD2 in vivo. Notably, shRNA‐mediated knockdown of PLD2 suppressed the growth and invasion of tumors in nude mouse xenograft models. Moreover, the higher expression of PLD2 was significantly associated with poorer prognosis in 67 patients. As for genes relating to the tumor invasion of PLD2, we found that angiogenin (ANG) was positively regulated by PLD2. In fact, the expression levels of ANG were elevated in tumor tissues as compared with normal kidney and the inhibition of ANG activity with a neutralizing antibody significantly suppressed tumor invasion. Overall, we revealed for the first time that PLD2‐produced PA promoted cell invasion through the expression of ANG in ccRCC cells.
Binary Matrix Factorization via Dictionary Learning

Matrix factorization is a key tool in data analysis; its applications include recommender systems, correlation analysis, signal processing, among others. Binary matrices are a particular case, which has received significant attention for over 30 years, especially within the field of data mining. Dictionary learning refers to a family of methods for learning overcomplete basis (also called frames) in order to efficiently encode samples of a given type; this area, now also about 20 years old, was mostly developed within the signal processing field. In this work, we propose two binary matrix factorization methods based on a binary adaptation of the dictionary learning paradigm to binary matrices. The proposed algorithms focus on speed and scalability; they work with binary factors combined with bit-wise operations and a few auxiliary integer ones. Furthermore, the methods are readily applicable to online binary matrix factorization. Another important issue in matrix factorization is the choice of rank for the factors; we address this model selection problem with an efficient method based on the minimum description length principle. Our preliminary results show that the proposed methods are effective at producing interpretable factorizations of various data types of different nature.
An Empirical Assessment of the CIO Role Expectations Instrument Using PLS Path Modelling

The validation of Information Systems research instruments has not been given the attention that it deserves. Based on data obtained from 174 Australian CIOs this study uses component-based structural equation modelling (PLS/SEM) to investigate the psychometric properties and possible modelling of the highly-regarded CIO role expectations instrument developed by Smaltz, Sambamurthy and Agarwal. Results show that the CIO role expectations instrument exhibits solid validity and reliability indices despite some minor weaknesses. The results also demonstrate the possibility to model the constructs of this instrument in different null and hierarchical models, and provide further empirical support for the validity of this instrument to measure the CIO role in different countries and different types of industries beyond the USA healthcare sector in which it was developed. The results provide support for CIO role theory on two central issues: CIOs are fulfilling a configuration of roles not just one specific role; and the CIO roles can be grouped into two major categories: supply (operational) side roles and demand (business) side roles.
Bootstrapping Generators from Noisy Data

A core step in statistical data-to-text generation concerns learning correspondences between structured data representations (e.g., facts in a database) and associated texts. In this paper we aim to bootstrap generators from large scale datasets where the data (e.g., DBPedia facts) and related texts (e.g., Wikipedia abstracts) are loosely aligned. We tackle this challenging task by introducing a special-purpose content selection mechanism. We use multi-instance learning to automatically discover correspondences between data and text pairs and show how these can be used to enhance the content signal while training an encoder-decoder architecture. Experimental results demonstrate that models trained with content-specific objectives improve upon a vanilla encoder-decoder which solely relies on soft attention.