Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Resistance in Potato to Pratylenchus penetrans 1

Potato clones from five different breeding populations were evaluated for their relative resistance and susceptibility to Pratylenchus penetrans. Resistance and susceptibility were distinguished by an index of susceptibility (SI) calculated from the numbers ofP . penetrans (including eggs) per g of root of individual clones in relation to that of a susceptible control at 30 or 70 days after inoculation. Evaluations were carried out using 7.5-cm clay pots in a growth chamber at 24 C with 15-hour day length. In the initial evaluation, 70 days after inoculation, the SI of individual clones ranged from 0.01 to 0.75. Clones that supported the least P. penetrans were from a breeding population derived from Solanum tuberosum ssp. andigena that was originally selected for its resistance to the potato cyst nematode, Globodera pallida. In succeeding tests, these clones had a significantly low SI than did susceptible controls or cuhivars that were previously reported to possess resistance to P. penetrans, except cv. Hudson. Resistance to P. penetrans from the Pallida-resistant breeding population was incorporated into potato germplasm better adapted to North American growing conditions.
Compensatory Increases in Nuclear PGC1α Protein Are Primarily Associated With Subsarcolemmal Mitochondrial Adaptations in ZDF Rats

OBJECTIVE We examined in insulin-resistant muscle if, in contrast to long-standing dogma, mitochondrial fatty acid oxidation is increased and whether this is attributed to an increased nuclear content of peroxisome proliferator–activated receptor (PPAR) γ coactivator (PGC) 1α and the adaptations of specific mitochondrial subpopulations. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Skeletal muscles from male control and Zucker diabetic fatty (ZDF) rats were used to determine 1) intramuscular lipid distribution, 2) subsarcolemmal and intermyofibrillar mitochondrial morphology, 3) rates of palmitate oxidation in subsarcolemmal and intermyofibrillar mitochondria, and 4) the subcellular localization of PGC1α. Electotransfection of PGC1α cDNA into lean animals tested the notion that increased nuclear PGC1α preferentially targeted subsarcolemmal mitochondria. RESULTS Transmission electron microscope analysis revealed that in ZDF animals the number (+50%), width (+69%), and density (+57%) of subsarcolemmal mitochondria were increased (P < 0.05). In contrast, intermyofibrillar mitochondria remained largely unchanged. Rates of palmitate oxidation were ∼40% higher (P < 0.05) in ZDF subsarcolemmal and intermyofibrillar mitochondria, potentially as a result of the increased PPAR-targeted proteins, carnitine palmitoyltransferase-I, and fatty acid translocase (FAT)/CD36. PGC1α mRNA and total protein were not altered in ZDF animals; however, a greater (∼70%; P < 0.05) amount of PGC1α was located in nuclei. Overexpression of PGC1α only increased subsarcolemmal mitochondrial oxidation rates. CONCLUSIONS In ZDF animals, intramuscular lipids accumulate in the intermyofibrillar region (increased size and number), and this is primarily associated with increased oxidative capacity in subsarcolemmal mitochondria (number, size, density, and oxidation rates). These changes may result from an increased nuclear content of PGC1α, as under basal conditions, overexpression of PGC1α appears to target subsarcolemmal mitochondria.
A parameter based ANFIS model for crop yield prediction

Crop yield prediction is important as it can support decision makers in agriculture sector. It also assists in identifying the relevance of attributes which significantly affect the crop yield. Wheat is one of the widely grown crops around the world. Its accurate prediction can solve various problems related to wheat farming. This work analyses how yield of a particular crop is determined by few attributes. In this paper, the models of Fuzzy logic (FL), Adaptive Neuro Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) and Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) are used for predicting the yield of wheat by considering biomass, extractable soil water (esw), Radiation and rain as input parameters. The outcome of the prediction models will assist agriculture agencies in providing farmers with valuable information as to which factors contribute to high wheat yield. We compare all these models based on RMSE values. Results show that the ANFIS model performs better than MLR and FL models with a lower RMSE value.
Intellectual Property Rights Policy

This policy provides guidelines for ownership, dist ribution, and commercial development of technology developed by NUST faculty, staff, studen ts, and others involved with NUST programs. Intellectual property rights refer to the principal rights relating to the ownership and dissemination of technology as derived from legisla tion (rules & regulations) granting patents, copyrights, and trademarks etc. The term “technolog y” includes technical innovations, inventions, discoveries, teaching material and comp uter software. This policy also defines NUST’s guidelines for sharing of revenue with facul ty, staff, students and other parties who generate the intellectual property (‘IP’) which is then exploited commercially.
Identifying Metrical and Temporal Structure With an Autocorrelation Phase Matrix

This article introduces a new method for detecting long-timescale structure in music. We describe a way to compute autocorrelation such that the distribution of energy in phase space is preserved in a matrix. The resulting Autocorrelation Phase Matrix (APM) is useful for several tasks involving metrical structure. In this article we describe the details of calculating the APM. We then show how phase-related regularities from music are stored in the APM and present two ways to recover these regularities. The simpler approach uses variance or entropy calculated on the distribution of information in the APM. The more complex approach explicitly searches through the phase and lag space of the APM to predict meter and tempo in parallel. We compare these approaches against standard autocorrelation for the task of tempo prediction on a relatively large database of annotated digital audio files. We demonstrate that better tempo prediction is achieved by exploiting the phase-related information in the APM.We argue that the APM is an effective data structure for tempo prediction and related applications, such as real-time beat induction and music analysis.
Bone Mass and Strength in Older Men With Type 2 Diabetes: The Osteoporotic Fractures in Men Study

The effects of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) on bone volumetric density, bone geometry, and estimates of bone strength are not well established. We used peripheral quantitative computed tomography (pQCT) to compare tibial and radial bone volumetric density (vBMD, mg/cm3), total (ToA, mm2) and cortical (CoA, mm2) bone area and estimates of bone compressive and bending strength in a subset (n = 1171) of men (≥65 years of age) who participated in the multisite Osteoporotic Fractures in Men (MrOS) study. Analysis of covariance–adjusted bone data for clinic site, age, and limb length (model 1) and further adjusted for body weight (model 2) were used to compare data between participants with (n = 190) and without (n = 981) T2DM. At both the distal tibia and radius, patients with T2DM had greater bone vBMD (+2% to +4%, model 1, p < .05) and a smaller bone area (ToA −1% to −4%, model 2, p < .05). The higher vBMD compensated for lower bone area, resulting in no differences in estimated compressive bone strength at the distal trabecular bone regions. At the mostly cortical bone midshaft sites of the radius and tibia, men with T2DM had lower ToA (−1% to −3%, p < .05), resulting in lower bone bending strength at both sites after adjusting for body weight (−2% to −5%, p < .05) despite the lack of difference in cortical vBMD at these sites. These data demonstrate that older men with T2DM have bone strength that is low relative to body weight at the cortical‐rich midshaft of the radius despite no difference in cortical vBMD. © 2010 American Society for Bone and Mineral Research
Approximation Analysis of Influence Spread in Social Networks

In the context of influence propagation in a social graph, we can identify three orthogonal dimensions - the number of seed nodes activated at the beginning (known as budget), the expected number of activated nodes at the end of the propagation (known as expected spread or coverage), and the time taken for the propagation. We can constrain one or two of these and try to optimize the third. In their seminal paper (12), Kempe, Kleinberg and Tardos (KKT) constrained the budget, left time unconstrained, and maximized the coverage. In this paper, we study alternative optimization problems: MINSEED and MINTIME. In MINSEED, a coverage thresholdis given and the task is to find the minimum size seed set such that by activating it, at leastnodes are eventually activated in the expected sense. In MINTIME, a coverage thresholdand a budget threshold k are given, and the task is to find a seed set of size at most k such that by activating it, at leastnodes are activated in the expected sense, in the minimum possible time. It turns out both these problems are NP-hard. Given the hardness of the problems, we naturally turn to the subject of approximation algo- rithms. For MINSEED, we develop a bicriteria approximation by exploiting its relationship to the problem of Real-valued Submodular Set Cover (RSSC). We prove a generic inapproximabil- ity result for RSSC suggesting that improving this approximation factor is likely to be hard. For MINTIME we show that even bicriteria and tricriteria approximations are hard under several conditions. Our proof exploits the relationship between MINTIME and the problem of Robust Asymmetric k-center (RAKC). We show, however, that if we allow the budget for number of seeds k to be boosted by a logarithmic factor and allow the coverage to fall short, then the problem can be solved exactly in PTIME, i.e., we can achieve the required coverage within the time achieved by the optimal solution to MINTIME with budget k and coverage threshold �. Finally, we show the value of the approximation algorithms, by conducting an experimental comparison of their quality against that achieved by various heuristics.
Polynomial Closure and Topology

Suppose H is a pseudovariety of groups. This paper studies the pseudovariety of monoids corresponding to the variety of languages generated by the polynomial closure of the variety of H-languages (which is shown to be J*H via a short syntactic argument) and the pseudovariety of ordered monoids corresponding to the polynomial closure of the variety of H-languages. We also explore alternative descriptions of these pseudovarieties under additional hypotheses. Decidability results are given. In addition, we study the positive varieties of pro-V open and closed recognizable sets for a pseudovariety V of monoids. In particular, we obtain a basis of ordered pseudoidentities for such positive varieties. For pseudovarieties of groups H, we relate these positive varieties to the polynomial closure of the H-languages. Again, decidability results are obtained.
Withaferin-A Reduces Type I Collagen Expression In Vitro and Inhibits Development of Myocardial Fibrosis In Vivo

Type I collagen is the most abundant protein in the human body. Its excessive synthesis results in fibrosis of various organs. Fibrosis is a major medical problem without an existing cure. Excessive synthesis of type I collagen in fibrosis is primarily due to stabilization of collagen mRNAs. We recently reported that intermediate filaments composed of vimentin regulate collagen synthesis by stabilizing collagen mRNAs. Vimentin is a primary target of Withaferin-A (WF-A). Therefore, we hypothesized that WF-A may reduce type I collagen production by disrupting vimentin filaments and decreasing the stability of collagen mRNAs. This study is to determine if WF-A exhibits anti-fibrotic properties in vitro and in vivo and to elucidate the molecular mechanisms of its action. In lung, skin and heart fibroblasts WF-A disrupted vimentin filaments at concentrations of 0.5–1.5 µM and reduced 3 fold the half-lives of collagen α1(I) and α2(I) mRNAs and protein expression. In addition, WF-A inhibited TGF-β1 induced phosphorylation of TGF-β1 receptor I, Smad3 phosphorylation and transcription of collagen genes. WF-A also inhibited in vitro activation of primary hepatic stellate cells and decreased their type I collagen expression. In mice, administration of 4 mg/kg WF-A daily for 2 weeks reduced isoproterenol-induced myocardial fibrosis by 50%. Our findings provide strong evidence that Withaferin-A could act as an anti-fibrotic compound against fibroproliferative diseases, including, but not limited to, cardiac interstitial fibrosis.
The Tile Packing Problem

The tile packing problem is a challenging combinatorial puzzle based on tiles with colored edges or colored corners. In its different incarnations, the puzzle gives rise to a number of interesting problems. In this paper, we sketch the background of the tile packing problem and present solutions to the puzzle. We hope that this work will stimulate further interest in this puzzle amongst readers, and that the remaining open problems will eventually be solved.
Direct Pathway from Early/Recycling Endosomes to the Golgi Apparatus Revealed through the Study of Shiga Toxin B-fragment Transport

Shiga toxin and other toxins of this family can escape the endocytic pathway and reach the Golgi apparatus. To synchronize endosome to Golgi transport, Shiga toxin B-fragment was internalized into HeLa cells at low temperatures. Under these conditions, the protein partitioned away from markers destined for the late endocytic pathway and colocalized extensively with cointernalized transferrin. Upon subsequent incubation at 37°C, ultrastructural studies on cryosections failed to detect B-fragment–specific label in multivesicular or multilamellar late endosomes, suggesting that the protein bypassed the late endocytic pathway on its way to the Golgi apparatus. This hypothesis was further supported by the rapid kinetics of B-fragment transport, as determined by quantitative confocal microscopy on living cells and by B-fragment sulfation analysis, and by the observation that actin- depolymerizing and pH-neutralizing drugs that modulate vesicular transport in the late endocytic pathway had no effect on B-fragment accumulation in the Golgi apparatus. B-fragment sorting at the level of early/recycling endosomes seemed to involve vesicular coats, since brefeldin A treatment led to B-fragment accumulation in transferrin receptor–containing membrane tubules, and since B-fragment colocalized with adaptor protein type 1 clathrin coat components on early/recycling endosomes. Thus, we hypothesize that Shiga toxin B-fragment is transported directly from early/recycling endosomes to the Golgi apparatus. This pathway may also be used by cellular proteins, as deduced from our finding that TGN38 colocalized with the B-fragment on its transport from the plasma membrane to the TGN.
Mitochondria Signals Apoptosis-Inducing Factor Release from Species-Mediated Poly ( ADP-ribose ) Polymerase-1 Activation Human Cervical Cancer Cells : Reactive Oxygen Caspase-Independent Cell Death by Arsenic Trioxide in

Although mechanisms of arsenic trioxide (As2O3)-induced cell death have been studied extensively in hematologic cancers, those in solid cancers have yet to be clearly defined. In this study, we showed that the translocation of apoptosis-inducing factor (AIF) from mitochondria to the nucleus is required for As2O3-induced cell death in human cervical cancer cells. We also showed that reactive oxygen species (ROS)-mediated poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase-1 (PARP-1) activation is necessary for AIF release from mitochondria. The treatment of human cervical cancer cells with As2O3 induces dissipation of mitochondrial membrane potential ( m), translocation of AIF from mitochondria to the nucleus, and subsequent cell death. Small interfering RNA targeting of AIF effectively protects cervical cancer cells against As2O3-induced cell death. As2O3 also induces an increase of intracellular ROS level and a marked activation of PARP-1. N-acetyl-L-cystein, a thiol-containing antioxidant, completely blocks As2O3-induced PARP-1 activation, m loss, nuclear translocation of AIF from mitochondria, and the consequent cell death. Furthermore, pretreatment of 1,5-dihydroxyisoquinoline or 3,4-dihydro-5-[4-(1-piperidinyl)butoxy]-1(2H)-isoquinolinone, PARP-1 inhibitors, effectively attenuates the loss of m, AIF release, and cell death. These data support a notion that ROS-mediated PARP-1 activation signals AIF release from mitochondria, resulting in activation of a caspase-independent pathway of cell death in solid tumor cells by As2O3 treatment.
The Effects of Focus of Attention on Visual Skill Performance in a Patient Poulation

i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my great appreciation to Dr. Jared Porter for his patient guidance and valuable insight during the planning and progression of this research. His compliance to meet and discuss several ideas and answer questions has been appreciated very much. I wish to extend my special thanks to Dr. Michael Olson and Dr. Phil Anton for their assistance with the collection of my data. I am particularly grateful for Dr. Julie Partridge for she made my hope to attend graduate school an actuality. I also wish to thank my parents for their support and encouragement throughout my entirety. Finally, I wish to express my enormous gratitude to Mitch Belsley, I feel truly blessed to have you by my side each and every day.
Adaptive Bit Partitioning for Multicell Intercell Interference Nulling With Delayed Limited Feedback

Base station cooperation can exploit knowledge of the users' channel state information (CSI) at the transmitters to manage co-channel interference. Users have to feedback CSI of the desired and interfering channels using finite-bandwidth backhaul links. Existing codebook designs for single-cell limited feedback can be used for multicell cooperation by partitioning the available feedback resources between the multiple channels. In this paper, a new feedback-bit allocation strategy is proposed, as a function of the delays in the communication links and received signal strengths in the downlink. Channel temporal correlation is modeled as a function of delay using the Gauss-Markov model. Closed-form expressions for bit partitions are derived to allocate more bits to quantize the stronger channels with smaller delays and fewer bits to weaker channels with larger delays, assuming random vector quantization. Cellular network simulations are used to show that the algorithm presented in the paper yields higher sum-rates than the equal-bit allocation technique.
PD‐1 expression on the surface of peripheral blood CD4+ T cell and its association with the prognosis of patients with diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma

The aim of the study was to investigate the relationship between PD‐1 expression on the surface of CD4+ T cells and prognosis of patients with diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma (DLBCL). Sixty patients who were newly diagnosed with DLBCL and 39 healthy controls were enrolled. In CD4+ T cells of DLBCL patients, the median MFI of PD‐1 were 541.5 (range: 348.25–758.75), significantly higher than 250 (range: 211–326) in healthy controls (P < 0.001). The ZAP70, PI3K, and NFAT mRNA expression levels of patients were 0.47, 0.47, and 0.62 times, respectively, of those of the healthy controls (P < 0.05). In patients with the percentage of PD‐1 on CD4+ T cells ≥30.25%, their EFS and OS were significantly lower than patients with PD‐1+ CD4+ T cells <30.25% (P < 0.05). The possible explanation is that high PD‐1 expression on CD4+ cells of DLBCL patients may impair T‐cell function and thus contribute to poor prognosis. There was no relationship between PD‐1 surface expression on CD4+ T cells and PD‐1 expression within the biopsy of tumor microenvironments from DLBCL patients.
Macroeconomic Factors and the German Real Estate Market: A Stock-Market-Based Forecasting Experiment

Based on a recursive forecasting approach, this research studies whether macro- economic factors help to forecast excess returns on a real-estate-based German stock market index. Key findings are that macroeconomic factors are often included in the optimal forecasting model, that their relative importance often differs from their importance for forecasting a broad stock-market index, and that their informational content for forecasting excess returns seems to undergo temporal shifts. This research also finds evidence of market timing.
People with Dementia Who Go Missing: A Qualitative Study of Family Caregivers Decision to Report Incidents to the Police

People with Dementia who go Missing: A Qualitative Study of Family Caregivers Decision to Report Incidents to the Police Karen Shalev Green, Charlotte L. Clarke, Francis Pakes & Lucy Holmes ‘Abstract’ Walking and exercising are an important part of living well with dementia. People with dementia may have an inability to recognise familiar places, find a familiar location, or become disoriented and are more likely to become missing. The aim of this article is to identify what factors influence family caregivers of people with dementia reporting them missing to the police’. We used a qualitative approach based on semi-structured interviews of 12 family caregivers of people with dementia in England. We identify four factors that inhibit family caregivers from reporting a missing person incident to the police and three factors that prompt family caregivers to call the police. We discuss implications for improved policy and practices by law enforcement agencies, social services, health services and non-government organisations.
But they all come back: Rethinking prisoner reentry

It is by now a commonplace that the number of people under criminal justice supervision in this country has reached a record high. As a result, the sentencing policies driving that number, and the field of corrections, where the consequences are felt, have acquired an unprecedented salience. It is a salience defined more by issues of magnitude, complexity, and expense than by any consensus about future directions.
RIP-Based Near-Oracle Performance Guarantees for Subspace-Pursuit, CoSaMP, and Iterative Hard-Thresholding

This paper presents an average case denoising performance analysis for the Subspace Pursuit (SP), the CoSaMP and the IHT algorithms. This analysis considers the recovery of a noisy signal, with the assumptions that (i) it is corrupted by an additive random white Gaussian noise; and (ii) it has a K-sparse representation with respect to a known dictionary D. The proposed analysis is based on the RestrictedIsometry-Property (RIP), establishing a near-oracle perf ormance guarantee for each of these algorithms. The results for the three algorithms differ in the bounds’ co nstants and in the cardinality requirement (the upper bound on K for which the claim is true). Similar RIP-based analysis was carried out previously for the Dantzig Selector (DS) and the Basis Pursuit (BP). Past work also considered a mutual-coherence-based analysis of the denoising performance of the DS, BP, the Orthogonal Matching Pursuit (OMP) and the thresholding algorithms. This work differs from the above as it addresses a different set of algorithms. Also, despite the fact that SP, CoSaMP, and IHT are greedy-like methods, the performance guarantees developed in this work resemble those obtained for the relaxation-based methods (DS and BP), suggesting that the performance is independent of the sparse representation entries contrast and magnitude.