Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Motility of Actin Filaments on Micro-Contact Printed Myosin Patterns

Protein molecular motors, which convert, directly and efficiently, chemical energy into motion, are excellent candidates for integration in hybrid dynamic nanodevices. To integrate and use the full potential of molecular motors in these devices, their design requires a quantitative and precise prediction of the fundamental mechanical and physicochemical features of cytoskeletal proteins operating in artificial environments. In that regard, the behavior of protein molecular motors constructs in/on nano-confined spaces or nanostructured surfaces that aim to control their motility is of critical interest. Here, we used a standard gliding motility assay to study the actin filaments sliding on a surface comprising heavy mero myosin (HMM) micro- and nano-patterns. To print HMM, we used negative tone, micro contact printing of a blocking protein (bovine serum albumin, BSA) on a nitrocellulose surface, followed by specific adsorption of HMM on BSA-free surfaces. While the large BSA-free patterns allowed for selective confinement of actin filaments motility, the BSA-stamped areas displayed intricate nano-sized HMM patterns, which enabled a deeper analysis of the nano-mechanics of actomyosin motility in confined spaces.
Impact of Drug Transporter Studies on Drug Discovery and Development

Drug transporters are expressed in many tissues such as the intestine, liver, kidney, and brain, and play key roles in drug absorption, distribution, and excretion. The information on the functional characteristics of drug transporters provides important information to allow improvements in drug delivery or drug design by targeting specific transporter proteins. In this article we summarize the significant role played by drug transporters in drug disposition, focusing particularly on their potential use during the drug discovery and development process. The use of transporter function offers the possibility of delivering a drug to the target organ, avoiding distribution to other organs (thereby reducing the chance of toxic side effects), controlling the elimination process, and/or improving oral bioavailability. It is useful to select a lead compound that may or may not interact with transporters, depending on whether such an interaction is desirable. The expression system of transporters is an efficient tool for screening the activity of individual transport processes. The changes in pharmacokinetics due to genetic polymorphisms and drug-drug interactions involving transporters can often have a direct and adverse effect on the therapeutic safety and efficacy of many important drugs. To obtain detailed information about these interindividual differences, the contribution made by transporters to drug absorption, distribution, and excretion needs to be taken into account throughout the drug discovery and development process.
The SignCom system for data-driven animation of interactive virtual signers

In this article we present a multichannel animation system for producing utterances signed in French Sign Language (LSF) by a virtual character. The main challenges of such a system are simultaneously capturing data for the entire body, including the movements of the torso, hands, and face, and developing a data-driven animation engine that takes into account the expressive characteristics of signed languages. Our approach consists of decomposing motion along different channels, representing the body parts that correspond to the linguistic components of signed languages. We show the ability of this animation system to create novel utterances in LSF, and present an evaluation by target users which highlights the importance of the respective body parts in the production of signs. We validate our framework by testing the believability and intelligibility of our virtual signer.
Intercomparison Between VIIRS and CrIS by Taking Into Account the CrIS Subpixel Cloudiness and Viewing Geometry

The Cross‐track Infrared Sounder (CrIS) onboard the Suomi National Polar‐orbiting Partnership (SNPP) has high radiometric accuracy, which can be used to intercompare and understand the radiometric performance of the thermal emissive bands of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) onboard the same platform. Previous studies usually selected uniform scenes to avoid potential uncertainties due to geolocation errors. This study focuses on all scenes (including nonuniform scenes), as well as CrIS subpixel cloudiness, local zenith angle and surface type, and their impacts on VIIRS/CrIS intercomparisons. A geolocation error correction scheme is applied to mitigate the geolocation mismatch between CrIS and VIIRS. Intercomparison results of three days from 19 to 21 September 2016, a quarterly warm up/cool down calibration period, show overall good agreement in terms of radiance biases (less than 0.2 K in terms of brightness temperature) between VIIRS and CrIS, for scene temperatures between 220 and 300 K; however, larger biases are evident outside of this range. The three factors—CrIS subpixel cloudiness, local zenith angle, and surface type—show weak impacts on VIIRS radiance biases. Both clear‐sky and overcast conditions have slightly different radiance biases from other partially cloudy conditions because of more contributions from colder or warmer scenes. The time series show the impact of warm up/cool down and the effectiveness of the correction algorithm for reprocessing VIIRS M15 and M16 data sets. The methods and tools can be applied to monitor and validate other infrared imager/sounder duos onboard the same platform.
Interactive Value Iteration for Markov Decision Processes with Unknown Rewards

To tackle the potentially hard task of defining the reward function in a Markov Decision Process, we propose a new approach, based on Value Iteration, which interweaves the elicitation and optimization phases. We assume that rewards whose numeric values are unknown can only be ordered, and that a tutor is present to help comparing sequences of rewards. We first show how the set of possible reward functions for a given preference relation can be represented as a polytope. Then our algorithm, called Interactive Value Iteration, searches for an optimal policy while refining its knowledge about the possible reward functions, by querying a tutor when necessary. We prove that the number of queries needed before finding an optimal policy is upperbounded by a polynomial in the size of the problem, and we present experimental results which demonstrate that our approach is efficient in practice.
Tree-Based Batch Mode Reinforcement Learning

Reinforcement learning aims to determine an optimal control policy from interaction with a system or from observations gathered from a system. In batch mode, it can be achieved by approximating the so-called Q-function based on a set of four-tuples (xt, ut , rt, xt+1) where xt denotes the system state at time t, ut the control action taken, rt the instantaneous reward obtained and xt+1 the successor state of the system, and by determining the control policy from this Q-function. The Q-function approximation may be obtained from the limit of a sequence of (batch mode) supervised learning problems. Within this framework we describe the use of several classical tree-based supervised learning methods (CART, Kd-tree, tree bagging) and two newly proposed ensemble algorithms, namely extremely and totally randomized trees. We study their performances on several examples and find that the ensemble methods based on regression trees perform well in extracting relevant information about the optimal control policy from sets of four-tuples. In particular, the totally randomized trees give good results while ensuring the convergence of the sequence, whereas by relaxing the convergence constraint even better accuracy results are provided by the extremely randomized trees.
Improving computational and memory requirements of simultaneous localization and map building algorithms

Addresses the problem of implementing simultaneous localisation and map building (SLAM) in very large outdoor environments. A method is presented to reduce the computational requirement from /spl sim/O(N/sup 2/) to /spl sim/O(N), N being the states used to represent all the landmarks and vehicle pose. With this implementation the memory requirements are also reduced to /spl sim/O(N). This algorithm presents an efficient solution to the full update required by the compressed extended Kalman filter algorithm. Experimental results are also presented.
Programmed Death-1 Expression on Epstein Barr Virus Specific CD8+ T Cells Varies by Stage of Infection, Epitope Specificity, and T-Cell Receptor Usage

Background Programmed Death-1 (PD-1) is an inhibitory member of the CD28 family of molecules expressed on CD8+ T cells in response to antigenic stimulation. To better understand the role of PD-1 in antiviral immunity we examined the expression of PD-1 on Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) epitope-specific CD8+ T cells during acute infectious mononucleosis (AIM) and convalescence. Methodology/Principal Findings Using flow cytometry, we observed higher frequencies of EBV-specific CD8+ T cells and higher intensity of PD-1 expression on EBV-specific CD8+ T cells during AIM than during convalescence. PD-1 expression during AIM directly correlated with viral load and with the subsequent degree of CD8+ T cell contraction in convalescence. Consistent differences in PD-1 expression were observed between CD8+ T cells with specificity for two different EBV lytic antigen epitopes. Similar differences were observed in the degree to which PD-1 was upregulated on these epitope-specific CD8+ T cells following peptide stimulation in vitro. EBV epitope-specific CD8+ T cell proliferative responses to peptide stimulation were diminished during AIM regardless of PD-1 expression and were unaffected by blocking PD-1 interactions with PD-L1. Significant variability in PD-1 expression was observed on EBV epitope-specific CD8+ T cell subsets defined by V-beta usage. Conclusions/Significance These observations suggest that PD-1 expression is not only dependent on the degree of antigen presentation, but also on undefined characteristics of the responding cell that segregate with epitope specificity and V-beta usage.
Contrasting Responses of Lymphoid Progenitors to Canonical and Noncanonical Wnt Signals1

The Wnt family of secreted glycoproteins has been implicated in many aspects of development, but its contribution to blood cell formation is controversial. We overexpressed Wnt3a, Wnt5a, and Dickkopf 1 in stromal cells from osteopetrotic mice and used them in coculture experiments with highly enriched stem and progenitor cells. The objective was to learn whether and how particular stages of B lymphopoiesis are responsive to these Wnt family ligands. We found that canonical Wnt signaling, through Wnt3a, inhibited B and plasmacytoid dendritic cell, but not conventional dendritic cell development. Wnt5a, which can oppose canonical signaling or act through a different pathway, increased B lymphopoiesis. Responsiveness to both Wnt ligands diminished with time in culture and stage of development. That is, only hematopoietic stem cells and very primitive progenitors were affected. Although Wnt3a promoted retention of hematopoietic stem cell markers, cell yields and dye dilution experiments indicated it was not a growth stimulus. Other results suggest that lineage instability results from canonical Wnt signaling. Lymphoid progenitors rapidly down-regulated RAG-1, and some acquired stem cell-staining characteristics as well as myeloid and erythroid potential when exposed to Wnt3a-producing stromal cells. We conclude that at least two Wnt ligands can differentially regulate early events in B lymphopoiesis, affecting entry and progression in distinct differentiation lineages.
Laboratory diagnosis for Giardia lamblia infection: A comparison of microscopy, coprodiagnosis and serology.

OBJECTIVE To evaluate newer techniques such as coproantigen detection and serology in the diagnosis of symptomatic Giardia lamblia infection. DESIGN Blinded comparison of copro-antigen detection (by ELISA), serology (immunoglobulin IgG and IgM anti-G lamblia by ELISA, and IgG, IgM and IgA by immunoblot) and microscopy in clinical samples. Microscopic findings for three preserved stools were considered the gold standard. SETTING Travel medicine clinic. POPULATION STUDIED Adults, post-travel, with gastrointestinal symptomatology. MAIN RESULTS For 152 previously collected stools, copro-antigen detection had a sensitivity of 73 of 74 (98.6%) and a specificity of 78 of 78 (100%). In clinical samples of 62 patients, eight of the 62 patients (13%) were diagnosed with G lamblia infection on microscopy. Copro-antigen diagnosis was accurate in symptomatic patients, with sensitivity of seven of eight (87.5%) and specificity of 52 of 54 (96.8%). Serology was less accurate. IgG response to G lamblia had sensitivity of four of seven and specificity of 24 of 50 (48%), and IgM response had sensitivity of three of six and specificity 27 of 48 (56%). Western blot had a sensitivity of five of seven and a specificity of 38 of 49 (78%). CONCLUSIONS Copro-antigen diagnosis of G lamblia is highly accurate in patients with chronic gastrointestinal complaints, while serology is less accurate and appears to be less useful diagnostically.
Determining movement patterns and habitat use of blue crabs (Callinectes sapidus Rathbun) in a Georgia saltmarsh estuary with the use of ultrasonic telemetry and a geographic information system (GIS)

CRABS (CALLINECTES SAPIDUS RATHBUN) IN A GEORGIA SALTMARSH ESTUARY WITH THE USE OF ULTRASONIC TELEMETRY AND A GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM (GIS) by AMANDA BRIDGETTE WRONA (Under the Direction of James T. Hollibaugh) ABSTRACT Estuarine habitat in Georgia is under increasing threat of degradation, which can negatively impact ecologically and commercially important species that reside there. Blue crabs (Callinectes sapidus) are the second highest valued fishery in Georgia yet little is known about their essential habitat requirements within either subtidal or intertidal areas. Ultrasonic telemetry was used to track 57 crabs, over 4 years, in the Duplin River estuary, near Sapelo Island, GA in order to assess movement patterns and habitat use. Crabs tagged with ultrasonic transmitters ranged in size from 4 to 13.3 cm CW and varied in sex and ontogenetic stage. Crab locations, substrate type, depth, and molting habitat was organized and analyzed within a geographic information system
Student Engagement with, and Participation in, an e-Forum

This paper examines engagement with an online discussion forum, aiming to identify the different levels of participation and to investigate factors that encourage or discourage student participation. The case involved the posing of a short real-life problem via a forum on the university’s virtual learning environment. An in-class survey was conducted to identify students’ participation and attitudes toward the forum. Students understood the benefits of the task, but did not participate due to time pressures and lack of motivation. The reasons for this were found to be inadequate explanation and encouragement to do the task, and insufficient moderator participation. Recommendations for improving forum participation are provided.
IDENTIFICATION OF MAGNETITE IN B-TYPE ASTEROIDS

Spectrally blue (B-type) asteroids are rare, with the second discovered asteroid, Pallas, being the largest and most famous example. We conducted a focused, infrared spectroscopic survey of B-type asteroids to search for water-related features in these objects. Our results show that the negative optical spectral slope of some B-type asteroids is due to the presence of a broad absorption band centered near 1.0 μm. The 1 μm band can be matched in position and shape using magnetite (Fe3O4), which is an important indicator of past aqueous alteration in the parent body. Furthermore, our observations of B-type asteroid (335) Roberta in the 3 μm region reveal an absorption feature centered at 2.9 μm, which is consistent with the absorption due to phyllosilicates (another hydration product) observed in CI chondrites. The new observations suggest that at least some B-type asteroids are likely to have incorporated significant amounts of water ice and to have experienced intensive aqueous alteration.
Genesis, classification and evaluation of cotton growing soils in semi arid tropics of Tamil Nadu.

The study was carried out in the new research station of Tamil Nadu Agricultural University at Cotton Research Station, Veppanthatai of Perambalur district of Tamil Nadu was selected for developing the strong soil resource database for proper appraisal of their productivity potential and their rational use. This study was an embodiment with an objective of characterization, classification and evaluation of some black cotton soils in semi arid tropical region of Tamil Nadu. The black soils of CRS, Veppanthattai were formed at nearly level to plain topography on granitic gneiss parent material mixed with calcareous murram. The soil colour varied from very dark gray to dark grayish brown under dry and moist condition, respectively. The soils were very deep. The textural class of fine earth fraction was clayey and had coarse strong angular blocky structure. The clay content ranged from 52.9 to 64.3 per cent. The silt content in most of the pedons showed an irregular trend with soil depth. The sand content varied from 19.7 to 30.1 per cent. Bulk density increased with increasing depth. The moisture retention at field capacity (33kpa), permanent wilting point (1500kpa) and available water capacity were high. The pH values ranged from moderately alkaline (8.48) to strongly alkaline (9.13). The electrical conductivity of the pedons ranged from 0.14to 0.72 dS m ? 1 indicating that these soils were non-saline in nature. The organic carbonstatus was medium (5.4 to 5.5 g kg ? 1 ) in surface horizons, whereas, in subsurface horizons it was low and ranged from 0.70 to 4.6g kg ? 1 . The CaCO 3 content varied from 7.3 to 15.5 per cent. The cation exchange capacity of soilswas high [44.6 to 48.8 c mol (p + ) kg ? 1 ]. The exchangeable bases were high and in the order of Ca +2 > Mg +2 > Na + > K + on the exchange complex. Based on the morphology, physical, physico-chemical, and chemical properties of the soils, pedons were classified as per USDA soil taxonomy into orders Vertisols . The soils are very deep and ideal for cultivation of cotton, sorghum, soybean, greengram, blackgram, redgram, sunflower, sesamum, maize and pearlmillet.
Optimizing Segmentation Strategies for Simultaneous Speech Translation

In this paper, we propose new algorithms for learning segmentation strategies for simultaneous speech translation. In contrast to previously proposed heuristic methods, our method finds a segmentation that directly maximizes the performance of the machine translation system. We describe two methods based on greedy search and dynamic programming that search for the optimal segmentation strategy. An experimental evaluation finds that our algorithm is able to segment the input two to three times more frequently than conventional methods in terms of number of words, while maintaining the same score of automatic evaluation. 1
Control Complexity in Fallback Voting

We study the control complexity of fallback voting. Like manipulation and bribery, electoral control describes ways of changing the outcome of an election; unlike manipulation or bribery attempts, control actions---such as adding/deleting/partitioning either candidates or voters---modify the participative structure of an election. Computational complexity can be used to protect elections from control attempts, i.e., proving an election system resistant to some type of control shows that the success of the corresponding control action, though not impossible, is computationally prohibitive. We show that fallback voting, an election system combining approval with majority voting (Brams & Sanver 2009), is resistant to each of the 14 common types of candidate control, and also to three types of voter control. The only election systems previously known to be fully resistant to candidate control are plurality (Bartholdi III et al. 1992, Hemaspaandra et al. 2007) and sincere-strategy preference-based approval voting (SP-AV) (Erdelyi et al. 2009). However, plurality has fewer resistances to voter control than fallback voting, and SP-AV (as modified by Erdelyi et al. (2009)) is arguably less natural a system than fallback voting.
Abstract conceptual feature ratings: the role of emotion, magnitude, and other cognitive domains in the organization of abstract conceptual knowledge

This study harnessed control ratings of the contribution of different types of information (sensation, action, emotion, thought, social interaction, morality, time, space, quantity, and polarity) to 400 individual abstract and concrete verbal concepts. These abstract conceptual feature (ACF) ratings were used to generate a high dimensional semantic space, from which Euclidean distance measurements between individual concepts were extracted as a metric of the semantic relatedness of those words. The validity of these distances as a marker of semantic relatedness was then tested by evaluating whether they could predict the comprehension performance of a patient with global aphasia on two verbal comprehension tasks. It was hypothesized that if the high-dimensional space generated from ACF control ratings approximates the organization of abstract conceptual space, then words separated by small distances should be more semantically related than words separated by greater distances, and should therefore be more difficult to distinguish for the comprehension-impaired patient, SKO. SKO was significantly worse at identifying targets presented within word pairs with low ACF distances. Response accuracy was not predicted by Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) cosines, any of the individual feature ratings, or any of the background variables. It is argued that this novel rating procedure provides a window on the semantic attributes of individual abstract concepts, and that multiple cognitive systems may influence the acquisition and organization of abstract conceptual knowledge. More broadly, it is suggested that cognitive models of abstract conceptual knowledge must account for the representation not only of the relationships between abstract concepts but also of the attributes which constitute those individual concepts.
Cytokine Profiles in Malawian Children Presenting with Uncomplicated Malaria, Severe Malarial Anemia, and Cerebral Malaria

ABSTRACT Proinflammatory cytokines are involved in clearance of Plasmodium falciparum, and very high levels of these cytokines have been implicated in the pathogenesis of severe malaria. In order to determine how cytokines vary with disease severity and syndrome, we enrolled Malawian children presenting with cerebral malaria (CM), severe malarial anemia (SMA), and uncomplicated malaria (UCM) and healthy controls. We analyzed serum cytokine concentrations in acute infection and in convalescence. With the exception of interleukin 5 (IL-5), cytokine concentrations were highest in acute CM, followed by SMA, and were only mildly elevated in UCM. Cytokine concentrations had fallen to control levels when remeasured at 1 month of convalescence in all three clinical malaria groups. Ratios of IL-10 to tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) and of IL-10 to IL-6 followed a similar pattern. Children presenting with acute CM had significantly higher concentrations of TNF-α (P < 0.001), interferon gamma (IFN-γ) (P = 0.0019), IL-2 (P = 0.0004), IL-6 (P < 0.001), IL-8 (P < 0.001), and IL-10 (P < 0.001) in sera than healthy controls. Patients with acute CM had significantly higher concentrations of IL-6 (P < 0.001) and IL-10 (P = 0.0003) than those presenting with acute SMA. Our findings are consistent with the concept that high levels of proinflammatory cytokines, despite high levels of the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10, could contribute to the pathogenesis of CM.