Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The number of missing teeth in people of the Edo period in Japan in the 17th to 19th centuries.

OBJECTIVE The aims of this study were to examine the number of missing teeth in the people of the Edo period (or number of remaining teeth) and to contribute to the 8020 movement proposed in Japan to help people retain 20 or more of their own teeth until the age of 80. BACKGROUND The study of dentition in ancient skeletal remains of our ancestors from multiple perspectives can yield information that can contribute to the study of physical anthropology and the leading edge of modern dental research. MATERIALS AND METHODS The materials were 82 excavated individuals (52 males and 30 females) from 1603 to 1868 whose maxillas and mandibles were both examinable. The age and sex were estimated by anthropological methods, and the individuals were divided into five groups. The status of missing teeth was compared between groups, and a chi-square test was used to test significant differences between groups. The rates of tooth loss were examined in the maxillas and mandibles. RESULTS In the people of the Edo period, many teeth remained in good condition until early to late middle age. There were more remaining teeth in these individuals than in modern-day individuals. However, the Edo people clearly showed increased tooth loss with age. There were no differences in tooth loss by sex. The tooth type with a high rate of tooth loss was posterior teeth, but incisor loss also occurred with ageing. Mandibular canines were most likely to be remaining. CONCLUSION The Edo people had more remaining teeth than modern-day society. This finding was unexpected. The notion that "people of long past ages lost more teeth more quickly" does not seem to apply to people in the Edo period in Japan.
Nutrient Dynamics of Coastal Phytoplankton: The Role of Episodic Flow Events and Chronic Sewage Discharges

Nutrient enrichment of coastal zones can lead to longer phytoplankton bloom seasons, shifts in phytoplankton community composition and a higher frequency of harmful algal bloom events (HABs). Predicting the effect of nutrient enrichment on any given coastal system is challenging, as the response is mediated by the physical and biological characteristics of the system and the way in which nutrients are delivered to the system. For example, in tropical and sub-tropical regions, the majority of annual nutrient loads are delivered via episodic high-flow events during the wet season. These events stimulate phytoplankton growth and are known to represent an important driver of coastal productivity. However, in populated coastal settings other nutrient inputs from point sources, such as sewage treatment plants (STP), are typically delivered as a relatively constant discharge. While chronic STP nutrient loading may be relatively low compared to flow event inputs, their continuous delivery throughout the year may represent a significant source of nutrients for phytoplankton growth, particularly during the dry seasons. These different sources of nutrients, and the spatial and temporal characteristics of their delivery to receiving waters, likely influence the responses of phytoplankton communities.
Spread Lips + Raised Larynx + Higher F0 = Smiled Speech? - An Articulatory Synthesis Approach

We present an initial study on how to model smiled speech with an articulatory speech synthesizer, led by the research question as to what cues are responsible for the effect of an audible distinction of smiled vs. non-smiled speech. In a perception test, we explore the relative contributions of i) spreading of the lips, ii) raising of the larynx, and iii) raising of the fundamental frequency. 36 test subjects assessed isolated synthetic vowel stimuli of /a:, i:, y:, u:/ on a 5-point “smiley scale”. Results indicate that F0 is the main acoustic factor for perceiving smileyness. The other factors depend on the vowel quality, with best results for the unrounded vowels /i:/ and /a:/.
Improve speaking skills with Duolingo’s mobile game-based language learning

The purpose of this research is to evaluate the effectiveness of Duolingo's game-based methodology in improving speaking proficiency within mobile language learning, while also examining the specific attributes and strategies contributing to its success and exploring implications for language education and learner optimization. Given the growing prevalence of mobile language learning platforms, the research meticulously scrutinizes the specific attributes and strategies employed by Duolingo that contribute to the refinement of oral fluency. This study employs a mixed methods design, integrating phenomenological and experimental approaches through a pre, post and attainment speaking tests with a control group design supported with metaphorical perceptions. The findings underscore the pivotal role of assimilating technological advancements and gamified pedagogical approaches within language education to expedite effective intercultural communication across multifarious linguistic landscapes. Furthermore, the results emphasize the importance of continuously adapting language learning methodologies to leverage emerging technologies and gamification strategies in order to foster effective communication skills in diverse linguistic contexts. The implications for prospective inquiries advocate for longitudinal investigations delving into the enduring implications of mobile game-based language learning on comprehensive linguistic acquisition, necessitating comparative inquiries to ascertain the comparative efficacy of diverse mobile applications in fostering distinct language proficiencies. Additionally, probing the influence of individual learner attributes and predilections in optimizing the utilization of mobile language learning applications could yield valuable insights for tailoring language acquisition paradigms.
Estimation of Room Acoustic Parameters: The ACE Challenge

Reverberation time (T60) and Direct-to-reverberant ratio (DRR) are important parameters which together can characterize sound captured by microphones in nonanechoic rooms. These parameters are important in speech processing applications such as speech recognition and dereverberation. The values of T60 and DRR can be estimated directly from the acoustic impulse response (AIR) of the room. In practice, the AIR is not normally available, in which case these parameters must be estimated blindly from the observed speech in the microphone signal. The acoustic characterization of environments (ACE) challenge aimed to determine the state-of-the-art in blind acoustic parameter estimation and also to stimulate research in this area. A summary of the ACE challenge, and the corpus used in the challenge is presented together with an analysis of the results. Existing algorithms were submitted alongside novel contributions, the comparative results for which are presented in this paper. The challenge showed that T60 estimation is a mature field where analytical approaches dominate whilst DRR estimation is a less mature field where machine learning approaches are currently more successful.
Face Recognition Based on Image Transformation

Face Recognition is a very challenging topic in the field of pattern recognition, since illumination, gestures and expressions of face images are always different. In this paper, feature extraction is carried out on face images respectively through conventional methods of wavelet transform, Fourier transform, DCT, etc. Then these image transform methods are combined to process the face images. Nearest-neighbor classifiers using Euclidean distance and correlation coefficients used as similarity are adopted to recognize transformed face images. By this method, when more than five face images in a face database (ORL database) are selected as training samples, with the rest as testing samples, correct recognition rate can be 97% or higher. When five face images are from Yale face database, the correct recognition rate can be as high as 94.5%.
Subjective Evaluations of Wage Inequality and Preferences for Redistribution

This paper analyzes subjective evaluations of the wage distribution and preferences for redistribution using Swiss data from the International Social Survey Program. Preferences for redistribution are conceptualized and measured as the discrepancy between the perceived and the just level of wage inequality. The results suggest that there is both considerable support for equalisation of wages and at the same time broad acceptance of differences in wages due to different skill levels. Second, financial self–interest, social mobility, social norms about and perceptions of issues of distributive justice do influence individual preferences for redistribution. Additionally, it is argued that differences in the demand for redistribution may largely be explained by different evaluations of what ought to be and to a lesser extent by different perceptions of what actually is. JEL classification: D31, D63, H50
Estimation of signal parameters in frequency domain in presence of harmonic interference: a comparative analysis

In this paper, a novel method for the estimation of the parameters of the spectral components of a signal, also in case of harmonic interference, is characterized and compared to other methods proposed in literature. The comparison criteria include the evaluation of the residual errors and of the uncertainties on the estimated parameters, for different multi-component signals.
An unusual cause of adult onset cerebellar ataxia with hypogonadism

We report an unusual case of sporadic adult onset cerebellar ataxia with hypogonadism. A 40-year-old unmarried man presented with progressive ataxia and dysarthria along with complaints of non-development of secondary sexual characteristics and erectile dysfunction. There were complaints of intermittent diarrhea. Clinical examination revealed a pan-cerebellar syndrome with features of hypoandrogenism. No eye movement abnormalities were evident. There were signs of malabsorption. Investigations confirmed the presence of auto-antibodies found in celiac disease, and a duodenal biopsy confirmed the same. Hypoandrogenism was postulated to be due to hypergonadotropic hypogonadism which has been mentioned in a few patients of celiac disease. However, the pattern seen in our patient was of a hypogonadotropic hypogonadism. This is probably secondary to an autoimmune hypophysitis seen in some patients in the absence of other clinical manifestations. Autoantibody testing should be a diagnostic necessity in any adult with a sporadic cerebellar ataxia.
A Close Look at the Population of Supersoft and Quasi-soft X-Ray Sources Observed in M31 with XMM-Newton

The deepest X-ray images of M31, obtained with XMM-Newton, are examined to derive spectral and statistical properties of the population of the very soft X-ray sources. When classifying supersoft X-ray sources (SSSs) with criteria based on the same hardness ratios defined for recent Chandra observations, one-quarter of the selected SSSs turn out to be supernova remnants (SNRs). Another quarter of the SSSs are spatially coincident with recent classical novae, although they are less than 10% of the nova population observed in the last 25 yr. Only 3 out of the 15 non-SNR SSSs show clear variability, with X-ray flux variation of more than 1 order of magnitude within a few months. Two of these sources display additional, smaller amplitude variability on timescales of several minutes. Their broadband spectra and those of the novae are approximately fitted with a blackbody or white dwarf atmospheric model at near-Eddington luminosity for the distance of M31. Two SSSs appear to reach very large, perhaps super-Eddington luminosities for part of the time and probably eject material in a wind until the luminosity decreases again after a few months. Most quasi-soft sources (QSSs) are repeatedly detected. I discuss the possibility that most QSSs in M31 may be SNRs or foreground neutron stars. Two X-ray sources with both a soft and hard component are in the positions of a recurrent nova and a possible symbiotic nova, but they are probably black hole transients.
Molecular Testing for Fragile X: Analysis of 5062 Tests from 1105 Fragile X Families—Performed in 12 Clinical Laboratories in Spain

Fragile X syndrome is the most common inherited form of intellectual disability. Here we report on a study based on a collaborative registry, involving 12 Spanish centres, of molecular diagnostic tests in 1105 fragile X families comprising 5062 individuals, of whom, 1655 carried a full mutation or were mosaic, three cases had deletions, 1840 had a premutation, and 102 had intermediate alleles. Two patients with the full mutation also had Klinefelter syndrome. We have used this registry to assess the risk of expansion from parents to children. From mothers with premutation, the overall rate of allele expansion to full mutation is 52.5%, and we found that this rate is higher for male than female offspring (63.6% versus 45.6%; P < 0.001). Furthermore, in mothers with intermediate alleles (45–54 repeats), there were 10 cases of expansion to a premutation allele, and for the smallest premutation alleles (55–59 repeats), there was a 6.4% risk of expansion to a full mutation, with 56 repeats being the smallest allele that expanded to a full mutation allele in a single meiosis. Hence, in our series the risk for alleles of <59 repeats is somewhat higher than in other published series. These findings are important for genetic counselling.
An observationally based hypothesis for significant tornadogenesis in mountain environments

Low relief characterizes the topographic environments beneath the great majority the convective storm-type associated with most significant tornadoes, the supercell thunderstorm. In the Rocky Mountains and Appalachians of North America, the European Alps and other mid-latitude regions characterized by complex topography, the potential is large for landforms to disrupt low-level flows beneath supercells and perhaps preclude tornadogenesis in instances that might otherwise yield tornadoes over flatter terrain. Although generally not explicitly stated in studies on tornado climatology, rough terrain is therefore viewed as an inhibitor of tornado occurrence in mountain environments. Research attention and modeling studies on supercells and tornadogenesis accordingly have tended to allocate little attention to supercelllandscape interactions. On rare occasions, however, large, intense (F2-F4) and long-lived tornadoes have been documented to form from supercells propagating over regions characterized by high topographic relief. Two such events in the Northeastern United States are examined in detail in companion presentations at this conference (by Bosart et al. and LaPenta et al.). The present study aims to identify common characteristics of these and other comparable events towards developing a hypothesis explaining the process of significant tornadogenesis within mountain environments.
Hippocampal and Left Subcallosal Anterior Cingulate Atrophy in Psychotic Depression

Background Psychotic depression is arguably the most diagnostically stable subtype of major depressive disorder, and an attractive target of study in a famously heterogeneous mental illness. Previous imaging studies have identified abnormal volumes of the hippocampus, amygdala, and subcallosal region of the anterior cingulate cortex (scACC) in psychotic depression, though studies have not yet examined the role of family history of depression in these relationships. Methods 20 participants with psychotic depression preparing to undergo electroconvulsive therapy and 20 healthy comparison participants (13 women and 7 men in each group) underwent structural brain imaging in a 1.5 T MRI scanner. 15 of the psychotic depression group had a first-degree relative with diagnosed affective disorders, while the healthy control group had no first-degree relatives with affective disorders. Depression severity was assessed with the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale and duration of illness was assessed in all patients. Automated neural nets were used to isolate the hippocampi and amygdalae in each scan, and an established manual method was used to parcellate the anterior cingulate cortex into dorsal, rostral, subcallosal, and subgenual regions. The volumes of these regions were compared between groups. Effects of laterality and family history of affective disorders were examined as well. Results Patients with psychotic depression had significantly smaller left scACC and bilateral hippocampal volumes, while no group differences in other anterior cingulate cortex subregions or amygdala volumes were present. Hippocampal atrophy was found in all patients with psychotic depression, but reduced left scACC volume was found only in the patients with a family history of depression. Conclusions Patients with psychotic depression showed significant reduction in hippocampal volume bilaterally, perhaps due to high cortisol states associated with this illness. Reduced left scACC volume may be a vulnerability factor related to family history of depression.
SPITZER INFRARED SPECTROMETER 16 μm OBSERVATIONS OF THE GOODS FIELDS

We present Spitzer 16 μm imaging of the Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey (GOODS) fields. We survey 150 arcmin2 in each of the two GOODS fields (North and South), to an average 3σ depth of 40 and 65 μJy, respectively. We detect ∼1300 sources in both fields combined. We validate the photometry using the 3–24 μm spectral energy distribution of stars in the fields compared to Spitzer spectroscopic templates. Comparison with ISOCAM and AKARI observations in the same fields shows reasonable agreement, though the uncertainties are large. We provide a catalog of photometry, with sources cross-correlated with available Spitzer, Chandra, and Hubble Space Telescope data. Galaxy number counts show good agreement with previous results from ISOCAM and AKARI with improved uncertainties. We examine the 16–24 μm flux ratio and find that for most sources it lies within the expected locus for starbursts and infrared luminous galaxies. A color cut of S16/S24>1.4 selects mostly sources which lie at 1.1 < z < 1.6, where the 24 μm passband contains both the redshifted 9.7 μm silicate absorption and the minimum between polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon emission peaks. We measure the integrated galaxy light of 16 μm sources and find a lower limit on the galaxy contribution to the extragalactic background light at this wavelength to be 2.2 ± 0.2 nW m−2 sr−1.
Live-cell superresolution microscopy reveals the organization of RNA polymerase in the bacterial nucleoid

Significance Transcription is one of the most fundamental processes for life. In eukaryotic cells, transcriptional activity is regulated to a large degree by chromosome packaging. In bacteria, despite the absence of a nuclear envelope and many of the DNA-packaging proteins of eukaryotes, the chromosome is still highly condensed into a structured object, the nucleoid. The spatial organization of transcription within the nucleoid and the effect of transcription on DNA organization remain poorly understood. In this work, we characterize how RNA polymerase accesses transcription sites on DNA, and show that active transcription can cause spatial reorganization of the nucleoid, with movement of gene loci out of the bulk of DNA as levels of transcription increase. Despite the fundamental importance of transcription, a comprehensive analysis of RNA polymerase (RNAP) behavior and its role in the nucleoid organization in vivo is lacking. Here, we used superresolution microscopy to study the localization and dynamics of the transcription machinery and DNA in live bacterial cells, at both the single-molecule and the population level. We used photoactivated single-molecule tracking to discriminate between mobile RNAPs and RNAPs specifically bound to DNA, either on promoters or transcribed genes. Mobile RNAPs can explore the whole nucleoid while searching for promoters, and spend 85% of their search time in nonspecific interactions with DNA. On the other hand, the distribution of specifically bound RNAPs shows that low levels of transcription can occur throughout the nucleoid. Further, clustering analysis and 3D structured illumination microscopy (SIM) show that dense clusters of transcribing RNAPs form almost exclusively at the nucleoid periphery. Treatment with rifampicin shows that active transcription is necessary for maintaining this spatial organization. In faster growth conditions, the fraction of transcribing RNAPs increases, as well as their clustering. Under these conditions, we observed dramatic phase separation between the densest clusters of RNAPs and the densest regions of the nucleoid. These findings show that transcription can cause spatial reorganization of the nucleoid, with movement of gene loci out of the bulk of DNA as levels of transcription increase. This work provides a global view of the organization of RNA polymerase and transcription in living cells.
Classification and Retrieval of Digital Pathology Scans: A New Dataset

In this paper, we introduce a new dataset, Kimia Path24, for image classification and retrieval in digital pathology. We use the whole scan images of 24 different tissue textures to generate 1,325 test patches of size 1000x1000 (0.5mm x 0.5mm). Training data can be generated according to preferences of algorithm designer and can range from approximately 27,000 to over 50,000 patches if the preset parameters are adopted. We propose a compound patch-and-scan accuracy measurement that makes achieving high accuracies quite challenging. In addition, we set the benchmarking line by applying LBP, dictionary approach and convolutional neural nets (CNNs) and report their results. The highest accuracy was 41.80% for CNN.
Gregarious desert locusts have substantially larger brains with altered proportions compared with the solitarious phase

The behavioural demands of group living and foraging have been implicated in both evolutionary and plastic changes in brain size. Desert locusts show extreme phenotypic plasticity, allowing brain morphology to be related to very different lifestyles in one species. At low population densities, locusts occur in a solitarious phase that avoids other locusts and is cryptic in appearance and behaviour. Crowding triggers the transformation into the highly active gregarious phase, which aggregates into dense migratory swarms. We found that the brains of gregarious locusts have very different proportions and are also 30 per cent larger overall than in solitarious locusts. To address whether brain proportions change with size through nonlinear scaling (allometry), we conducted the first comprehensive major axis regression analysis of scaling relations in an insect brain. This revealed that phase differences in brain proportions arise from a combination of allometric effects and deviations from the allometric expectation (grade shifts). In consequence, gregarious locusts had a larger midbrain∶optic lobe ratio, a larger central complex and a 50 per cent larger ratio of the olfactory primary calyx to the first olfactory neuropile. Solitarious locusts invest more in low-level sensory processing, having disproportionally larger primary visual and olfactory neuropiles, possibly to gain sensitivity. The larger brains of gregarious locusts prioritize higher integration, which may support the behavioural demands of generalist foraging and living in dense and highly mobile swarms dominated by intense intraspecific competition.