Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Regulation of DNA replication fork progression through damaged DNA by the Mec 1 / Rad 53 checkpoint

553 and depth of the electrode 30. Cells from layers 2±3 and 5±6 combined comprised nearly 80% of the total (487 trained, 383 naive and 199 passively stimulated neurons). Orientation tuning curves were normalized to their maximum and ®tted using a polynomial of the 10th order. The squared sum of errors of the ®tting averaged only 0.06. We omitted 7% (trained cells) to 10% (naive cells) of the cells because of a poor ®t (squared sum of errors .0.2). We took the maximum of this ®tted curve as the cell's preferred orientation and the tangent to the curve as the slope at the trained orientation, or at the untrained oblique orientation (NTO). Neurons were divided into 8-degree-wide groups according to the angle between their preferred orientation and trained orientation (or NTO). The numbers of neurons in each preferred orientation group are indicated between brackets in Fig. 3e. The slope changes derived from the ®tted curves were independent of the ®tting method, as similar results were obtained using a different order polynomial (8 or 12) or a spline ®t. Neurometric performance was determined using Bayes's rule 22,23. Performance of an ideal classi®er was measured by computing the probability that one of two orientations was presented, given the responses of a set of neurons. This set was randomly selected either from all cells with preferred orientations within 458 of the trained orientation (naive n = 175; trained n = 230), from all cells with a preferred orientation within 458 of the NTO (naive n = 170; trained n = 224), or from each preferred orientation group independently. Mean proportions of correct response are averages of 30 computations, each made on the basis of a new selection of cells. Each computation was based on 500 trials, taken from a Poisson distribution derived from the mean ®ring rate of the cell. Mean responses to orientations, presented in 18 steps, were taken from the normalized ®tted polynomials and multiplied by the average maximum rate of that group of cells. Standard error of the mean of the per cent that were correct varied between 0.1±1.2%. The values for per cent correct were z-transformed. After linear regression, the 84% threshold corresponds to the standard deviation (z-score of 1). Perceptual learning of spatial localization: speci®city for orientation, position, and context. A. Human perceptual learning in identifying the oblique orientation: retinotopy, orientation speci®city and monocularity. reorganization of the hand …
A capital social dos territ?rios: Repensando o desenvolvimento rural

Rural development can be rethought on the basis of two main intellectual lines. One of them stresses the concept of social capital, defined as a set of resources destined to promote a better use of economic assets by individuals and by entreprises; the other enphasizes the territorial dimension of development and insists that competitivity is a caracteristic of the “milieu” and not only of each firm. The convergence between these two lines of thought can enlarge the reflexion about the countryside: rural areas are not just the physical basis of an economic sector nor are they the residual of what doesn’t belong to cities.
Exploring Individual Differences and Building Complexity in Wayfinding: The Case of the Seattle Central Library

This article focuses on the interactions between individual differences and building characteristics that may occur during multilevel wayfinding. Using the Seattle Central Library as our test case, we defined a series of within-floor and between-floor wayfinding tasks based on different building analyses of this uniquely designed structure. Tracking our 59 participants while they completed assigned tasks on-site, we examined their wayfinding performance across tasks and in relation to a variety of individual differences measures and wayfinding strategies. Both individual differences and spatial configuration, as well as the organization of the physical space, were related to the wayfinding challenges inherent to this library. We also found wayfinding differences based on other, nonspatial features, such as semantic expectations about destinations. Together, these results indicate that researchers and building planners must consider the interactions among building, human, and task characteristics in a more nuanced fashion.
Automated Road Information Extraction From Mobile Laser Scanning Data

This paper presents a survey of literature about road feature extraction, giving a detailed description of a Mobile Laser Scanning (MLS) system (RIEGL VMX-450) for transportation-related applications. This paper describes the development of automated algorithms for extracting road features (road surfaces, road markings, and pavement cracks) from MLS point cloud data. The proposed road surface extraction algorithm detects road curbs from a set of profiles that are sliced along vehicle trajectory data. Based on segmented road surface points, we create Geo-Referenced Feature (GRF) images and develop two algorithms, respectively, for extracting the following: 1) road markings with high retroreflectivity and 2) cracks containing low contrast with their surroundings, low signal-to-noise ratio, and poor continuity. A comprehensive comparison illustrates satisfactory performance of the proposed algorithms and concludes that MLS is a reliable and cost-effective alternative for rapid road inspection.
Structure refinement of the δ1p phase in the Fe–Zn system by single-crystal X-ray diffraction combined with scanning transmission electron microscopy

The structure of the title compound has been refined by single-crystal synchrotron X-ray diffraction combined with spherical-aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy. The structure consists of iron-centred normal and disordered Zn12 icosahedra, zinc-centred Zn12 icosahedra, zinc-centred Zn16 icosioctahedra, and dangling Zn atoms that do not constitute any polyhedra.
Perfusion Flow Enhances Osteogenic Gene Expression and the Infiltration of Osteoblasts and Endothelial Cells into Three-Dimensional Calcium Phosphate Scaffolds

Maintaining cellular viability in vivo and in vitro is a critical issue in three-dimensional bone tissue engineering. While the use of osteoblast/endothelial cell cocultures on three-dimensional constructs has shown promise for increasing in vivo vascularization, in vitro maintenance of cellular viability remains problematic. This study used perfusion flow to increase osteogenic and angiogenic gene expression, decrease hypoxic gene expression, and increase cell and matrix coverage in osteoblast/endothelial cell co-cultures. Mouse osteoblast-like cells (MC3T3-E1) were cultured alone and in co-culture with mouse microvascular endothelial cells (EOMA) on three-dimensional scaffolds for 1, 2, 7, and 14 days with or without perfusion flow. mRNA levels were determined for several osteogenic, angiogenic, and hypoxia-related genes, and histological analysis was performed. Perfusion flow downregulated hypoxia-related genes (HIF-1α, VEGF, and OPN) at early timepoints, upregulated osteogenic genes (ALP and OCN) at 7 days, and downregulated RUNX-2 and VEGF mRNA at 14 days in osteoblast monocultures. Perfusion flow increased cell number, coverage of the scaffold perimeter, and matrix area in the center of scaffolds at 14 days. Additionally, perfusion flow increased the length of endothelial cell aggregations within co-cultures. These suggest perfusion stimulated co-cultures provide a means of increasing osteogenic and angiogenic activity.
Combining visual and verbal information in an impression-formation task.

40 FEMALE STUDENTS RATED MALES USING A PHOTOGRAPH AND 2 PERSONALITY-TRAIT ADJECTIVES IN TERMS OF DESIRABILITY AS A DATE, TO TEST INTEGRATION OF THESE 3 PIECES OF INFORMATION TO FORM THE OVERALL IMPRESSION. RESULTS SUPPORTED THE HYPOTHESIS THAT THE 2 ADJECTIVES WERE SIMPLY AVERAGED TOGETHER, BUT THERE WAS A STRONG INTERACTION BETWEEN ADJECTIVES AND PHOTOGRAPH. THE ADJECTIVES HAD LESS EFFECT IN THE CONTEXT OF LESS DESIRABLE PHOTOGRAPHS, WHICH WORKED AS A DISCOUNTING EFFECT. IT WAS NOTED THAT THE AVERAGING MODEL WOULD BE CONSISTENT WITH THE INTERACTION IF DISCOUNTING PRODUCED LOWER VALUES OF THE WEIGHT PARAMETERS OF THE ADJECTIVES. THE AVERAGING FORMULATION WAS ALSO CONSISTENT WITH THE COMPARISONS BETWEEN RATINGS OF PHOTOGRAPHS ALONE AND PHOTOGRAPHS PLUS ADJECTIVES. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)
High-calcium diet with whey protein attenuates body-weight gain in high-fat-fed C57Bl/6J mice

An inverse relationship between Ca intake and BMI has been found in several studies. It has been suggested that Ca affects adipocyte metabolism via suppressing 1,25-dihydroxycholecalciferol (1,25(OH)2-D3) and decreases fat absorption. We studied the effect of Ca and milk proteins (whey and casein) on body weight in C57Bl/6J mice. Male mice, age 9 weeks, were divided into three groups (ten mice per group) receiving modified high-fat (60 % of energy) diets. Two groups received a high-Ca diet (1·8 % calcium carbonate (CaCO3)), with casein or whey protein (18 % of energy), and one group received a low-Ca diet (0·4 % CaCO3) with casein for 21 weeks. Food intake was measured daily and body weight twice per week. Body fat content (by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry) of all mice and faecal Ca and fat excretion of seven mice/group were measured twice during the study. Final body weight (44·1 (sem 1·1) g) and body fat content (41·6 (sem 0·6) %) were significantly lower (P < 0·05) in the high-Ca whey group than in the low-Ca casein group (48·1 (sem 0·8) g and 44·9 (sem 0·8) %). Body weight and body fat content of the high-Ca casein group did not differ significantly from the low-Ca casein group even though serum 1,25(OH)2-D3 levels were significantly lower (P < 0·001) in both high-Ca groups than in the low-Ca casein group. Thus changes in serum 1,25(OH)2-D3 do not seem to affect body weight in this animal model. There was a significant difference in fat excretion between the high-Ca whey and low-Ca casein groups (3·9 (sem 0·9) % in the high-Ca whey v. 1·4 (sem 0·2) % in the low-Ca casein group; P < 0·05), which may partly explain the effect on body weight.
Differential distribution of NMDA receptor subunit mRNA in the rat cochlear nucleus

The distribution and expression of mRNAs for different subunits of the N‐methyl‐D‐aspartate receptor (NMDAR) were examined in the cochlear nucleus (CN) of the rat using radioactive in situ hybridization methods. Heavy labeling for NMDAR1 subunit mRNA was observed in all major CN neuronal types with lower labeling for NMDAR2A, 2B, 2C, and 2D mRNA. Silver grain counting was used to compare expression of different NMDAR2 subunits between six of the major CN cell types. Small cells of the small cell cap/shell area had the highest expression of NMDAR2A–C subunit mRNAs of the cell types assessed. These small cells as well as fusiform and corn cells of the dorsal cochlear nucleus had higher NMDAR2C than other NMDAR2 subunits, providing these neuron types with a distinct expression pattern or profile. The other three cell types assessed, spherical bushy cells, granule cells, and octopus cells had relatively equivalent levels of NMDAR2A–C subunit expressions, providing a second distinct profile. NMDAR2D mRNA had low expression in all six cell types assessed. Microsc. Res. Tech. 41:217–223, 1998. © 1998 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Modeling Spectral Envelopes Using Restricted Boltzmann Machines and Deep Belief Networks for Statistical Parametric Speech Synthesis

This paper presents a new spectral modeling method for statistical parametric speech synthesis. In the conventional methods, high-level spectral parameters, such as mel-cepstra or line spectral pairs, are adopted as the features for hidden Markov model (HMM)-based parametric speech synthesis. Our proposed method described in this paper improves the conventional method in two ways. First, distributions of low-level, un-transformed spectral envelopes (extracted by the STRAIGHT vocoder) are used as the parameters for synthesis. Second, instead of using single Gaussian distribution, we adopt the graphical models with multiple hidden variables, including restricted Boltzmann machines (RBM) and deep belief networks (DBN), to represent the distribution of the low-level spectral envelopes at each HMM state. At the synthesis time, the spectral envelopes are predicted from the RBM-HMMs or the DBN-HMMs of the input sentence following the maximum output probability parameter generation criterion with the constraints of the dynamic features. A Gaussian approximation is applied to the marginal distribution of the visible stochastic variables in the RBM or DBN at each HMM state in order to achieve a closed-form solution to the parameter generation problem. Our experimental results show that both RBM-HMM and DBN-HMM are able to generate spectral envelope parameter sequences better than the conventional Gaussian-HMM with superior generalization capabilities and that DBN-HMM and RBM-HMM perform similarly due possibly to the use of Gaussian approximation. As a result, our proposed method can significantly alleviate the over-smoothing effect and improve the naturalness of the conventional HMM-based speech synthesis system using mel-cepstra.
Emotional Intelligence and Work Performance among Executives

Preset study explains the performance of executives on different levels of emotional intelligence and provides a link between emotional intelligence and effective work performance. 20 Male executives (out of 200) within the age range of 40 to 55yrs. from BHEL (Haridwar) and THDC (Rishikesh) of Uttarakhand State (India) were selected. Emotional intelligence scale constructed by Dhar, Hyde and Pethe (2001) constructed and standardized on the Indian Population and work Performance rating scale constructed by Prof A. P. Singh and Prof D. M. Pestonje (for the Indian population) were used to measure emotional intelligence and work performance of executives. T-tests for independent groups were used to measure the mean difference between groups. The findings of the study revealed that executives having higher emotional intelligence show better quality of work performance as compared to their counterparts.
Data-Driven Rank Tests for Classes of Tail Alternatives

Tail alternatives describe the occurrence of a nonconstant shift in the two-sample problem with a shift function increasing in the tail. The classes of shift functions can be built up using Legendre polynomials. It is important to choose the number of involved polynomials in the right way. Here this choice is based on the data, using a modification of the Schwarz selection rule. Given the data-driven choice of the model, appropriate rank tests are applied. Simulations show that the new data-driven rank tests work very well. Although other tests for detecting shift alternatives, such as Wilcoxon's test, may break down completely for important classes of tail alternatives, the new tests have high and stable power. The new tests also have higher power than data-driven rank tests for the unconstrained two-sample problem. Theoretical support is obtained by proving consistency of the new tests against very large classes of alternatives, including all common tail alternatives. A simple but accurate approximation of the null distribution makes application of the new tests easy.
A comparison of model-based and judgment-based release planning in incremental software projects

Numerous factors are involved when deciding when to implement which features in incremental software development. To facilitate a rational and efficient planning process, release planning models make such factors explicit and compute release plan alternatives according to optimization principles. However, experience suggests that industrial use of such models is limited. To investigate the feasibility of model and tool support, we compared input factors assumed by release planning models with factors considered by expert planners. The former factors were cataloged by systematically surveying release planning models, while the latter were elicited through repertory grid interviews in three software organizations. The findings indicate a substantial overlap between the two approaches. However, a detailed analysis reveals that models focus on only select parts of a possibly larger space of relevant planning factors. Three concrete areas of mismatch were identified: (1) continuously evolving requirements and specifications, (2) continuously changing prioritization criteria, and (3) authority-based decision processes. With these results in mind, models, tools and guidelines can be adjusted to address better real-life development processes.
Research, part of a Special Feature on Exploring Opportunities for Advancing Collaborative Adaptive Management (CAM): Integrating Experience and Practice Navigating a Murky Adaptive Comanagement Governance Network: Agua Fria Watershed, Arizona, USA

Adaptive comanagement endeavors to increase knowledge and responsiveness in the face of uncertainty and complexity. However, when collaboration between agency and nonagency stakeholders is mandated, rigid institutions may hinder participation and ecological outcomes. In this case study we analyzed qualitative data to understand how participants perceive strengths and challenges within an emerging adaptive comanagement in the Agua Fria Watershed in Arizona, USA that utilizes insight and personnel from a long-enduring comanagement project, Las Cienegas. Our work demonstrates that general lessons and approaches from one project may be transferable, but particular institutions, management structures, or projects must be place-specific. As public agencies establish and expand governance networks throughout the western United States, our case study has shed light on how to maintain a shared vision and momentum within an inherently murky and shared decision-making environment.
Diversity of Stomoxys spp. (Diptera: Muscidae) and diurnal variations of activity of Stomoxys indicus and S. Calcitrans in a farm, in Wang Nam Khiao District, Nakhon ratchasima Province, Thailand

A study of species diversity of Stomoxys spp. and diurnal variations of activity of the most abundant was performed during a one year period at a local dairy cattle farm in Wang Nam Khiao District, Nakhon Ratchasima Province, Thailand. Four species of stomoxyine flies were morphologically identified, including Stomoxys indicus Picard 1908, S. calcitrans (Linnaeus 1758), S. sitiens Rondani 1873 and S. uruma Shinonaga and Kanao 1966. The most common species were S. indicus (50.2%) and S. calcitrans (49.5%). S. sitiens and S. uruma were found in small proportions (< 1%). The number of flies captured was significantly different among the three seasons with the greatest number in the rainy season (mean = 66%; df = 2, P < 0.05). The variations of diurnal activity were observed during different period of times (06:00 to 18:00) during three seasons. Both sexes of S. indicus and males of S. calcitrans showed unimodal activity pattern in cool and summer seasons. But a bimodal activity pattern was recorded in rainy season. For females S. calcitrans, a unimodal peak of activity was observed in cool season and a constant variation of activity all along the day in summer and rainy seasons, with an increase from the morning to the evening. A better understanding of stomoxyine fly behavior, especially the daily flight activity, can assist in prioritization and design of appropriate vector prevention and control strategies.
Validation of the Use of Dried Blood Spot (DBS) Method to Assess Vitamin A Status.

BACKGROUND Vitamin A deficiency is an important dietary deficiency in the world. Thus, the ne¬cessity of screening for deficient populations is obvious. This paper introduces a fast, cheap and relatively reliable method called "dried blood spot" (DBS) method in screening the deficient populations. The validity of this method for retinol measurement was investigated. METHOD The "precision" and "agreement" criteria of the DBS method were assessed. The preci¬sion was calculated and compared with those of plasma using F-test. The agreement was eva¬luated using Bland-Altman plot. RESULTS The imprecision of retinol measurements in dried spots was not significantly different from those of the control (plasma). A good correlation coefficient (r2=0.78) was obtained for dried spots' retinol measurements versus plasma's retinol analysis (P < 0.01). Paired t-test showed no significant difference between the DBS and retinol methods on a group level. Imprecision of DBS measurement was acceptable, compared to that of the plasma method. The difference be¬tween these two methods was not statistically significant on a group level. CONCLUSION Application of DBS standard samples, in which a part of the plasma was replaced with the artificial plasma, was shown to be a reliable calibration mean for retinol measurements in DBS samples. Retinol in dried spots was stable for 90 days. Overall, the DBS method provided a precise measurement of retinol, showing results that were comparable with the measurement of retinol in plasma.
Simulation studies of an All-Spin Artificial Neural Network: Emulating neural and synaptic functionalities through domain wall motion in ferromagnets

Non-Boolean computing based on emerging postCMOS technologies can potentially pave the way for low-power neural computing platforms. However, existing work on such emerging neuromorphic architectures have either focused on solely mimicking the neuron, or the synapse functionality. While memristive devices have been proposed to emulate biological synapses, spintronic devices have proved to be efficient at perform the thresholding operation of the neuron at ultra-low currents. In this work, we propose an All-Spin Artificial Neural Network where a single spintronic device acts as the basic building block of the system. The device offers a direct mapping to synapse and neuron functionalities in the brain while inter-layer network communication is accomplished via CMOS transistors. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of a neural architecture where a single nanoelectronic device is able to mimic both neurons and synapses. The ultra-low voltage operation of low resistance magneto-metallic neurons enables the low-voltage operation of the array of spintronic synapses, thereby leading to ultra-low power neural architectures. Device-level simulations, calibrated to experimental results, was used to drive the circuit and system level simulations of the neural network for a standard pattern recognition problem. Simulation studies indicate energy savings by ∼ 100× in comparison to a corresponding digital/ analog CMOS neuron implementation.