Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Disruption of Choline Methyl Group Donation for Phosphatidylethanolamine Methylation in Hepatocarcinoma Cells*

Despite being widely hypothesized, the actual contribution of choline as a methyl source for phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) methylation has never been demonstrated, mainly due to the inability of conventional methods to distinguish the products from that of the CDP-choline pathway. Using a novel combination of stable-isotope labeling and tandem mass spectrometry, we demonstrated for the first time that choline contributed to phosphatidylcholine (PC) synthesis both as an intact choline moiety via the CDP-choline pathway and as a methyl donor via PE methylation pathway. When hepatocytes were labeled with d 9-choline containing three deuterium atoms on each of the three methyl groups, d 3-PC and d 6-PC were detected, indicating that newly synthesized PC contained one or more individually mobilized methyl groups from d 9-choline. The synthesis ofd 3-PC and d 6-PC was sensitive to the general methylation inhibitor 3-deazaadenosine and were specific products of PE methylation using choline as a one-carbon donor. While the contribution to the CDP-choline pathway remained intact in hepatocarcinoma cells, contribution of choline to PE methylation was completely disrupted. In addition to a previously identified lack of PE methyltransferase, hepatocarcinoma cells were found to lack the abilities to oxidize choline to betaine and to donate the methyl group from betaine to homocysteine, whereas the usage of exogenous methionine as a methyl group donor was normal. The failure to use choline as a methyl source in hepatocarcinoma cells may contribute to methionine dependence, a widely observed aberration of one-carbon metabolism in malignancy.
The body beyond the body: expectation of a sensory event is enough to induce ownership over a fake hand

More than 100 papers have been published on the rubber hand illusion since its discovery 14 years ago. The illusion has been proposed as a demonstration that the body is distinguished from other objects by its participation in specific forms of intermodal perceptual correlation. Here, we radically challenge this view by claiming that perceptual correlation is not necessary to produce the experience of this body as mine. Each of 15 participants was seated with his/her right arm resting upon a table just below another smaller table. Thus, the real hand was hidden from the participant's view and a life-sized rubber model of a right hand was placed on the small table in front of the participant. The participant observed the experimenter's hand while approaching—without touching—the rubber hand. Phenomenology of the illusion was measured by means of skin conductance response and questionnaire. Both measures indicated that participants experienced the illusion that the experimenter's hand was about to touch their hidden hand rather than the rubber hand, as if the latter replaced their own hand. This did not occur when the rubber hand was rotated by 180° or replaced by a piece of wood. This illusion indicates that our brain does not build a sense of self in a merely reactive way, via perceptual correlations; rather it generates predictions on what may or may not belong to itself.
Assessment of Sea Lice Infestations on Wild Fishes of Cobscook Bay

Sea lice are ectoparasitic copepods on fishes and can negatively impact aquaculture operations. Little work on sea lice, specifically Lepeophtheirus salmonis and Caligus elongatus, has occurred in the northwest Atlantic. This project characterized sea lice infestations on wild fishes in Cobscook Bay during 2012. Trawling, seine netting, and fyke netting occurred from March to November. Netting sites were selected to sample the bay’s three regions: Outer, Central, and Inner Bay. Visual examinations of fish were used to identify wild hosts and characterize sea lice life stage abundances, attachment locations, and infection prevalence and intensity. DNA sequencing was used to identify sea lice species. Caligus elongatus was the only identified sea lice species, and was found on 12 fish species. Threespine sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus), blackspotted sticklebacks (Gasterosteus wheatlandi), and winter flounder (Pseudopleuronectes americanus) were prominent hosts with the most infestations (n = 204, n = 32, n = 9). Over 95% of sea lice were in the non-motile chalimus stages, which were predominantly attached to the fish fins. Infection intensity and prevalence on threespine sticklebacks varied significantly between months, reaching maximal values during June. Infection prevalence on threespine and blackspotted sticklebacks differed spatially, with lower levels in Inner Bay than in Central and Outer Bay. Infection prevalence and intensity differed among threespine sticklebacks (12.26%), blackspotted sticklebacks (1.98%), and winter flounder (2.07%), indicating differences in host suitability and importance. These results establish a baseline for sea lice dynamics in Cobscook Bay and inform future sea lice surveys.
Counting Belief Propagation

A major benefit of graphical models is that most knowledge is captured in the model structure. Many models, however, produce inference problems with a lot of symmetries not reflected in the graphical structure and hence not exploitable by efficient inference techniques such as belief propagation (BP). In this paper, we present a new and simple BP algorithm, called counting BP, that exploits such additional symmetries. Starting from a given factor graph, counting BP first constructs a compressed factor graph of clusternodes and clusterfactors, corresponding to sets of nodes and factors that are indistinguishable given the evidence. Then it runs a modified BP algorithm on the compressed graph that is equivalent to running BP on the original factor graph. Our experiments show that counting BP is applicable to a variety of important AI tasks such as (dynamic) relational models and boolean model counting, and that significant efficiency gains are obtainable, often by orders of magnitude.
ISO spectroscopy of circumstellar dust in 14 Herbig Ae/Be systems: Towards an understanding of dust processing

We present Infrared Space Observatory (ISO) spectra of fourteen isolated Herbig Ae/Be (HAEBE) stars, to study the characteristics of their circumstellar dust. These spectra show large star-to-star differences, in the emission features of both carbon-rich and oxygen-rich dust grains. The IR spectra were combined with photometric data ranging from the UV through the optical into the sub-mm region. We defined two key groups, based upon the spectral shape of the infrared region. The derived results can be summarized as follows: (1) the continuum of the IR to sub-mm region of all stars can be reconstructed by the sum of a power-law and a cool component, which can be represented by a black body. Possible locations for these components are an optically thick, geometrically thin disc (power-law component) and an optically thin flared region (black body); (2) all stars have a substantial amount of cold dust around them, independent of the amount of mid-IR excess they show; (3) also the near-IR excess is unrelated to the mid-IR excess, indicating different composition/location of the emitting material; (4) remarkably, some sources lack the silicate bands; (5) apart from amorphous silicates, we find evidence for crystalline silicates in several stars, some of which are new detections; (6) PAH bands are present in at least 50% of our sample, and their appearance is slightly different from PAHs in the ISM; (7) PAH bands are, with one exception, not present in sources which only show a power-law continuum in the IR; their presence is unrelated to the presence of the silicate bands; (8) the dust in HAEBE stars shows strong evidence for coagulation; this dust processing is unrelated to any of the central star properties (such as age, spectral type and activity).
A statistical analysis of soft-margin support vector machines for non-separable problems

The statistical properties of support vector machines (SVMs) for non-separable problems are studied. SVMs with hard margins are not always solvable for non-separable problems. Introducing soft margin alleviates this difficulty, but SVMs still fail to successfully solve these problems for heavily overlapped data. From the practical viewpoint, increasing the velocity of a soft margin depending of the number of examples is a way to adapt to increasing data generated from an identity distribution. However, systematic control of soft margin from the theoretical viewpoint is in development. A concept called “lifting up” for overlapped distributions gives a slightly different geometrical structure from the one for linearly separable distributions. In this study, the probability that an SVM can not solve a problem properly is mathematically derived in the one-dimensional case for both a hard-margin and a soft-margin. Some computer simulations confirm the theoretical validity.
Development of Diagnostic Concentrations for Insecticide Resistance Monitoring in Soybean Looper (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) Larvae Using an Artificial Diet Overlay Bioassay

Abstract Diagnostic concentrations for several standard and experimental insecticides were determined for a laboratory reference strain of soybean looper, Pseudoplusia includens (Walker), using an insecticide diet overlay bioassay to evaluate the relative susceptibility of field (P) and F1 generations of four field-collected strains of third-, fourth-, and fifth-instar soybean loopers in 1996 and 1997. Diagnostic concentrations were defined as concentrations that killed 90–95% of the susceptible individuals and were 5 ppm for permethrin, 1,300 ppm for thiodicarb, 60 ppm for chlorfenapyr, 5 ppm for emamectin benzoate, and 60 ppm for spinosad. Field strains exhibited significantly greater percentage survival than the laboratory reference strain in the permethrin bioassays in 1996 and 1997 in both the P and F1 generation bioassays and in the thiodicarb bioassays in 1997. Larvae exposed to diagnostic concentrations of the experimental insecticides chlorfenapyr, emamectin benzoate, and spinosad usually did not exhibit significantly higher percentage survival than the reference strain.
Philosophy of education

LIST OF FIGURES PREFACE ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 1 Philosophy of Education Before the Twentieth Century Socrates and Plato Aristotle Rousseau Pestalozzi, Herbart, and Froebel Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 2 The Philosophical and Educational Thought of John Dewey Dewey's Philosophical Orientation The Meaning and Aims of Education Dewey's Psychology Dewey's Theory of Knowledge Democracy and Education The Place of Subject Matter Dewey Today: An Assessment Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 3 Analytic Philosophy Philosophical Analysis in Education The Analysis of Teaching Current Analyses of Teaching Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 4 Continental Philosophy Existentialism Phenomenology Critical Theory Hermeneutics Postmodernism Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 5 Logic and Critical Thinking Formal Logic Informal Logic McPeck's View of Critical Thinking An Alternative Approach Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 6 Epistemology and Education Justified True Belief Foundationalism Truth Nonfoundational Theories of Knowledge Epistemology and Education Constructivism Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 7 Philosophy of Social Science and Educational Research How Does Science Grow? A Debate in Educational Research Some Examples Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 8 Ethics and Moral Education Pre-Enlightenment Ethics Enlightenment Ethics Utilitarianism Deweyan Ethics Moral Education Cognitive Developmentalism Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 9 Social and Political Philosophy The Current Debate Justice and Equality in Education Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 10 Problems of School Reform Equality Accountability Standards Testing Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 11 Multiculturalism and Cosmopolitanism Multiculturalism Cosmopolitanism The Educator's Dilemma Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature 12 Feminism, Philosophy, and Education Feminist Critiques of Philosophy Epistemology Philosophy of Social Science Ethics Care and Education Summary Questions Introduction to the Literature NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEX
Optimizing online occupancy grid mapping to capture the residual uncertainty

Occupancy grids have been a popular mapping technique in mobile robotics for nearly 30 years. Occupancy grids offer a discrete representation of the world and seek to determine the occupancy probability of each cell. Traditional occupancy grid mapping methods make two assumptions for computational efficiency and it has been shown that the full posterior is computationally intractable for real-world mapping applications without these assumptions. The two assumptions result in tuning parameters that control the information gained from each distance measurement. In this paper, several tuning parameters found in the literature are optimized against the full posterior in 1D. In addition, this paper presents a new parameterization of the update function that outperforms existing methods in terms of capturing residual uncertainty. Capturing the residual uncertainty better estimates the position of obstacles and prevents under- and over-confidence in both the occupied and unoccupied cells. The paper concludes by showing that the new update function better captures the residual uncertainty in each cell when compared to an offline mapping method for realistic 2D simulations.
Relationships between Educators' Organizational Commitment, Job Satisfaction, and Administrators' Gender.

The purpose of this quantitative, causal-comparative study was to examine the differences between teachers’ mean job satisfaction scores based on the administrators’ gender and examine the relationship between the administrators’ gender and teachers’ organizational commitment plans in Tennessee middle schools. Job satisfaction and organizational commitment was measured by the Tennessee Teaching, Empowering, Leading and Learning (TELL) Survey that was administered online and completed by Tennessee teachers voluntarily and anonymously. A stratified random selection of schools based on the administrator’s gender (female, n = 85; male, n = 85) was selected (N = 170) from those achieving the predetermined response criteria of 50% return rate. Schools where the principal had been in position for less than three years were excluded. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to analyze the association between the dependent variable, job satisfaction, based on the independent variable, administrators’ gender. Pearson’s chi-square analysis was used to analyze the relationship between administrators’ gender and teachers’ organizational commitment plans in education. Significance was with the implications for increased gender awareness, teacher commitment and satisfaction, and teacher retention. Descriptors: Job satisfaction, organizational commitment, gender, leadership, teacher retention, and gender stereotypes
Rural school children picturing family life

Rurality is an active agent and central to the lived experiences of children growing up on a farm and attending a farm school. It is a key to their everyday experiences, and influences family life, schooling and their future. Previous studies elsewhere in the world have explored the notion of childhood in rural contexts, but there is a dearth of similar research in South Africa, which has a vast section of the population living in rural areas and therefore a vast number of children attending school in rural areas. A farm school – a public school on private property - provides the context for this study’s exploration of children’s views of family life in a rural area. The data was obtained using drawing as a visual participatory methodology with 16 primary school children, aged between 6 and 10, both boys and girls, providing an insider local perspective on growing up on a farm in a rural environment. How do children picture their lives? What do these pictures tell about rural family life? How does this influence schooling? This paper reports the findings and makes critical recommendations for turning the tide for children in rural education contexts.
Wrong-Doing, Truth-Telling: The Function of Avowal in Justice

Three years before his death, Michel Foucault delivered a series of lectures at the Catholic University of Louvain that until recently remained almost unknown. These lectures - which focus on the role of avowal, or confession, in the determination of truth and justice-provide the missing link between Foucault's early work on madness, delinquency, and sexuality and his later explorations of subjectivity in Greek and Roman antiquity. Ranging broadly from Homer to the twentieth century, Foucault traces the early use of truth-telling in ancient Greece and follows it through to practices of self-examination in monastic times. By the nineteenth century, the avowal of wrong-doing was no longer sufficient to satisfy the call for justice; there remained the question of who the "criminal" was and what formative factors contributed to his wrong-doing. The call for psychiatric expertise marked the birth of the discipline of psychiatry in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as well as its widespread recognition as the foundation of criminology and modern criminal justice. Published here for the first time, the 1981 lectures are accompanied by two contemporaneous interviews with Foucault in which he elaborates on a number of key themes. "Wrong-Doing, Truth-Telling" will take its place as one of the most significant works by Foucault to appear in decades.
Effects of tapering on performance: a meta-analysis.

PURPOSE The purpose of this investigation was to assess the effects of alterations in taper components on performance in competitive athletes, through a meta-analysis. METHODS Six databases were searched using relevant terms and strategies. Criteria for study inclusion were that participants must be competitive athletes, a tapering intervention must be employed providing details about the procedures used to decrease the training load, use of actual competition or field-based criterion performance, and inclusion of all necessary data to calculate effect sizes. Datasets reported in more than one published study were only included once in the present analyses. Twenty-seven of 182 potential studies met these criteria and were included in the analysis. The dependent variable was performance, and the independent variables were the decrease in training intensity, volume, and frequency, as well as the pattern of the taper and its duration. Pre-post taper standardized mean differences in performance were calculated and weighted according to the within-group heterogeneity to develop an overall effect. RESULTS The optimal strategy to optimize performance is a tapering intervention of 2-wk duration (overall effect = 0.59 +/- 0.33, P < 0.001), where the training volume is exponentially decreased by 41-60% (overall effect = 0.72 +/- 0.36, P < 0.001), without any modification of either training intensity (overall effect = 0.33 +/- 0.14, P < 0.001) or frequency (overall effect = 0.35 +/- 0.17, P < 0.001). CONCLUSION A 2-wk taper during which training volume is exponentially reduced by 41-60% seems to be the most efficient strategy to maximize performance gains. This meta-analysis provides a framework that can be useful for athletes, coaches, and sport scientists to optimize their tapering strategy.
Whiteness of a Different Color: European Immigrants and the Alchemy of Race

MC 281 is the second in the required sophomore sequence for Social Relations and Policy. In this course, we will explore the interactions and experiences between and among various groups in American history. We will consider how Americans both defended and contested prevailing definitions of fitness for citizenship and inclusion in the political process and American life, and how groups sought to gain access to social and political equality. This course focuses on the history of relationships within and between different groups in the United States, and explores the complexities of those relations. Rarely centered solely on race or ethnicity, such interactions were also affected by gender, sexuality, religion, nation, and class. We will also explore the shifting definitions of race and ethnicity. Students will analyze not only the experiences of the different groups, but also the connections between them to assess the larger dynamics and their implications for public policy.
Influences of nutrition and metabo lism on fertility of dairy cows

During early postpartum, high-producing dairy cows undergo a period of extensive tissue catabolism because of negative nutrient balance. Homeorrhetic controls assure that nutrients are partitioned to favor lactation at the same time that homeostasis secures survival. However, unrestrained metabolic disturbances often lead to diseases which, in turn, dramatically decrease both productive and reproductive performance. Negative nutrient balance has been associated with compromised immune and reproductive functions in dairy cows. Low circulating concentrations of glucose and insulin associated with elevated concentrations of non-esterified fatty acids and ketone bodies postpartum have disruptive and detrimental effects on the oocyte, granulosa and immune cells. Negative nutrient balance is associated with changes in the pattern of ovarian follicle growth which can indirectly affect oocyte quality. Some of this disruption seems to be the result of endocrine and biochemical changes that alter the microenvironment of the growing and maturing oocyte. In addition, cows under negative nutrient balance have extended periods of anovulation. Postpartum anestrus, as well as infertility, is magnified by losses of body condition during the early postpartum period. The underlying mechanism for resumption of ovulatory cycles seems to be associated with metabolic signals and regulatory hormones primarily insulin and insulinlike growth factor (IGF)-1, which link nutritional status with gonadotropin secretion, recoupling of the growth hormone-IGF system, and follicle maturation and ovulation. Feeding diets that promote increases in plasma glucose and insulin may improve the metabolic and endocrine status of cows in early lactation. Furthermore, fertility in postpartum cows is also determined by uterine health. Reductions in circulating concentrations of Ca and antioxidant vitamins around parturition are also linked with impaired immune competence and result in greater risk of uterine diseases that impair reproduction. Specific nutrients and dietary ingredients have been implicated to affect reproduction in cattle. Excess intake of dietary protein has been suggested as detrimental to fertility, although feeding excess of dietary protein can no longer be justified. Addition of moderate amounts of supplemental fat to the diet improves caloric intake, modulates prostaglandin F2 secretion by the uterus, affects ovarian dynamics, enhances luteal function and embryo quality, and has moderate positive effects on fertility. More specifically, some fatty acids might impact fertilization rate and embryo quality in dairy cows. On the contrary, some dietary ingredients, such as gossypol, when ingested in large quantities decrease fertility of dairy cows because of its negative effects on embryo quality and pregnancy maintenance.