Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Expression of the mitotic motor protein CHO1/MKLP1 in postmitotic neurons

The kinesin‐related motor protein CHO1/MKLP1 was initially thought to be expressed only in mitotic cells, where it presumably transports oppositely oriented microtubules relative to one another in the spindle mid‐zone. We have recently shown that CHO1/MKLP1 is also expressed in cultured neuronal cells, where it is enriched in developing dendrites ( Sharp et al. 1997a ) J. Cell Biol., 138, 833–843]. The putative function of CHO1/MKLP1 in these postmitotic cells is to intercalate minus‐end‐distal microtubules among oppositely oriented microtubules within developing dendrites, thereby establishing their non‐uniform microtubule polarity pattern. Here we used in situ hybridization to determine whether CHO1/MKLP1 is expressed in a variety of rodent neurons both in vivo and in vitro. These analyses revealed that CHO1/MKLP1 is expressed within various neuronal populations of the brain including those in the cerebral cortex, hippocampus, olfactory bulb and cerebellum. The messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) levels are high within these neurons well after the completion of their terminal mitotic division and throughout the development of their dendrites. After this, the levels decrease and are relatively low within the adult brain. Parallel analyses on developing hippocampal neurons in culture indicate that the levels of expression increase dramatically just prior to dendritic development, and then decrease somewhat after the dendrites have differentiated. Dorsal root ganglion neurons, which generate axons but not dendrites, express significantly lower levels of mRNA for CHO1/MKLP1 than hippocampal or sympathetic neurons. These results are consistent with the proposed role of CHO1/MKLP1 in establishing the dendritic microtubule array.
Flicker effects in adaptive video streaming to handheld devices

Streaming video over the Internet requires mechanisms that limit the streams' bandwidth consumption within its fair share. TCP streaming guarantees this and provides lossless streaming as a side-effect. Adaptation by packet drop does not occur in the network, and excessive startup latency and stalling must be prevented by adapting the bandwidth consumption of the video itself. However, when the adaptation is performed during an ongoing session, it may influence the perceived quality of the entire video and result in improved or reduced visual quality of experience. We have investigated visual artifacts that are caused by adaptive layer switching -- we call them flicker effects -- and present our results for handheld devices in this paper. We considered three types of flicker, namely noise, blur and motion flicker. The perceptual impact of flicker is explored through subjective assessments. We vary both the intensity of quality changes (amplitude) and the number of quality changes per second (frequency). Users' ability to detect and their acceptance of variations in the amplitudes and frequencies of the quality changes are explored across four content types. Our results indicate that multiple factors influence the acceptance of different quality variations. Amplitude plays the dominant role in delivering satisfactory video quality, while frequency can also be adjusted to relieve the annoyance of flicker artifacts.
Defining logical domains in a web site

Each URL identifies a unique Web page; thus, it is viewed as a natural choice to use for organizing Web query results. Web search results may be grouped by domain and presented to users as clusters for ease of visualization. However, it has a drawback: dealing with large Web sites, such as Geocities, W3C ,a ndwww.cs. umd.edu. Large Web sites tend to yield many matches that leads to a few large, flat structured, and unorganized clusters. As a matter of fact, these sites contain Web sites of other entities, such as projects and people. Many pages in these sites are actually “logical domains” by themselves. For example, Web sites for projects at a university or the XML section at W3C could be viewed as “logical domains”. In this paper, we propose the concept of logical domain with respect to physical domainwhich is identified simply by domain name. We have developed and implemented a set of rules based on link structure, path information, document metadata, and citation to identify logical domain entry pages and their corresponding boundaries. Experiments on real Web data have been conducted to validate the usefulness of this technique.
An Exploratory Study of Cloning in Industrial Software Product Lines

Many companies develop software product lines-collections of similar products-by cloning and adapting artifacts of existing product variants. Transforming such cloned product variants into a "single-copy" software product line representation is considered an important software re-engineering activity, as reflected in numerous tools and methodologies available. However, development practices of companies that use cloning to implement product lines have not been systematically studied. This lack of empirical knowledge threatens the validity and applicability of approaches supporting the transformation, and impedes adoption of advanced solutions for systematic software reuse. It also hinders the attempts to improve the solutions themselves. We address this gap with an empirical study conducted to investigate the cloning culture in six industrial software product lines realized via code cloning. Our study investigates the processes, and the perceived advantages and disadvantages of the approach. We observe that cloning, while widely discouraged in literature, is still perceived as a favorable and natural reuse approach by the majority of practitioners in the studied companies. This is mainly due to its benefits such as simplicity, availability and independence of developers. Based on our observations, we outline issues preventing the adoption of systematic software reuse approaches, and identify future research directions.
Self-Directed Learning Readiness (SDLR) among Foundation Students from High and Low Proficiency Levels to Learn English Language

Purpose – In the field of second language education, self-directed learning is really important as it can empower students to attain optimal success in language learning by engaging students to express their ideas confidently, think reflectively and make use of language learning strategies. The main aim of the present study is to investigate students’ self-directed learning readiness (SDLR) in a foundation program in a public university in Malaysia so as to find out how they perceive this approach can improve their learning of the English language at tertiary level. More specifically, the researchers intend to find answers to these research questions: 1) Are foundation students ready to use self-directed learning strategies in English Language learning? (i.e. awareness, motivation and language learning strategies); 2) Is there a significant difference in the three attributes (i.e., awareness, motivation and language learning strategies) of self-directed learning among foundation students? ; and 3) Is there a significant difference between English language proficiency (upper and lower) and the three attributes (i.e., awareness, motivation, language learning strategies) in using self-directed learning strategies? Methodology – A set of survey questionnaires with a 6-point Likert scale were administered to 400 students attending an English proficiency course (i.e., Introduction to Academic English) in the first semester of the Foundation Studies for Agricultural Science program. The data of the questionnaire were analyzed using descriptive statistics, independent samples t-test and paired samples t-test. Findings – Results revealed that the respondents have a rather high degree of readiness to apply self-directed learning strategies in learning English. Motivation has the highest mean scores (M=4.57), followed by language learning strategies (M=4.41) and awareness (M=4.34). Results also showed that there are no difference in terms of SDLR depending on English proficiency levels, namely lower level (MUET Bands 1,2,3) and upper level (MUET Bands 4,5) (p>.05). Significance – The findings are beneficial for students to learn more about their readiness to apply the self-directed learning strategies. In particular, these findings also provide insights for lecturers, program administrators, curriculum developers, and policy makers to plan and implement suitable teaching methods, course outlines, and curricula for the development of the students’ English language abilities.
Long-Term Treatment by Vitamin B1 and Reduction of Serum Proinflammatory Cytokines, Hyperalgesia, and Paw Edema in Adjuvant-Induced Arthritis

Introduction: Immune system is involved in the etiology and pathophysiology of inflammation and vitamins are important sources of substances inducing nonspecific immunomodulatory effects. Given the proinflammatory role of cytokines in the inflammation and pain induction, this study aimed to assess the effects of long-term administration of vitamin B1 on the proinflammatory cytokines, edema, and hyperalgesia during the acute and chronic phases of adjuvant-induced arthritis. Methods: On the first day of study, inflammation was induced by intraplantar injection of complete Freund's adjuvant (CFA) in the hindpaws of rats. Vitamin B1 at doses of 100, 150, and 200 mg/kg was administrated intraperitoneally during 21 days of the study. Antinociceptive and anti-inflammatory effects of vitamin B1 were also compared to indomethacin (5 mg/kg). Inflammatory symptoms such as thermal hyperalgesia and paw edema were measured by radiant heat and plethysmometer, respectively. Serum TNF-α and IL-1β levels were checked by rat standard enzyme-linked immune sorbent assay (ELISA) specific kits. Results: The results indicated that vitamin B1(150 and 200 mg/kg) attenuated the paw edema, thermal hyperalgesia, and serum levels of TNF-α and IL-1β during both phases of CFA-induced inflammation in a dose-dependent manner. Effective dose of vitamin B1(150 mg/kg) reduced inflammatory symptoms and serum levels of TNF-α and IL-1β compare to indomethacin during the chronic phase of inflammation. Conclusion: Anti-inflammatory and antihyperalgesic effects of vitamin B1 during CFA-induced arthritis, more specifically after chronic vitamin B1 administration, suggest its therapeutic property for inflammation.
The tonal phonology of Yoruba clitics

This paper examines the tonal behavior of six types of enclitics in Standard Yoruba, and shows that in all six cases, a constraint applies preventing the last syllable of the host and the adjacent clitic syllable from having the same (High or Low) tone. There are no other host + clitic cases in Yoruba for which such a constraint would be relevant. Potential violations of the constraint are avoided by one of five different methods, depending on the case: failure to link a floating tone, deletion of a tone belonging to the clitic, deletion of a tone belonging to the host, insertion of a toneless vowel, or failure to delete an otherwise optional toneless vowel. This pattern is thus a morphophonemic “conspiracy” in the classical sense. However, Yoruba does not have a more general constraint against same-tone sequences in underlying or derived environments.
Parallelization libraries: Characterizing and reducing overheads

Creating efficient, scalable dynamic parallel runtime systems for chip multiprocessors (CMPs) requires understanding the overheads that manifest at high core counts and small task sizes. In this article, we assess these overheads on Intel's Threading Building Blocks (TBB) and OpenMP. First, we use real hardware and simulations to detail various scheduler and synchronization overheads. We find that these can amount to 47% of TBB benchmark runtime and 80% of OpenMP benchmark runtime. Second, we propose load balancing techniques such as occupancy-based and criticality-guided task stealing, to boost performance. Overall, our study provides valuable insights for creating robust, scalable runtime libraries.
Cramer-Rao Lower Bounds of NDA SNR estimation for BPSK modulated signals over MISO with STBC channels

In this paper, the Cramer-Rao Lower Bounds (CRLB) for the estimation of Non Data Aided (NDA) Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) estimation of Binary Phase Shift keying (BPSK) modulated signals over Multiple Input Single Output (MISO) with Space Time Block Codes (STBC) channels is derived. The Alamouti transmit diversity model is used in this paper. Our assumption is that the received signal is corrupted by additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) with unknown variance, and scaled by fixed unknown complex channel gain. The lower bounds were derived for non-data aided estimation when the transmitted symbols are unknown to the receiver. The NDA bound is then compared to the Data Aided (DA) estimation where the transmitted symbols are known to the receiver. Numerical integration is being used to find the Fisher Information Matrix (FIM) elements in order to calculate the CRLB in the NDA case. It is shown that there is a significant improvement when compared to the Single Input Single Output (SISO) CRLB. In addition, the difference between the NDA and DA CRLBs become smaller at low SNR when diversity is used.
The Mu Opioid Receptor Promotes Opioid and Growth Factor-Induced Proliferation, Migration and Epithelial Mesenchymal Transition (EMT) in Human Lung Cancer

Recent epidemiologic studies implying differences in cancer recurrence based on anesthetic regimens raise the possibility that the mu opioid receptor (MOR) can influence cancer progression. Based on our previous observations that overexpression of MOR in human non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cells increased tumor growth and metastasis, this study examined whether MOR regulates growth factor receptor signaling and epithelial mesenchymal transition (EMT) in human NSCLC cells. We utilized specific siRNA, shRNA, chemical inhibitors and overexpression vectors in human H358 NSCLC cells that were either untreated or treated with various concentrations of DAMGO, morphine, fentanyl, EGF or IGF. Cell function assays, immunoblot and immunoprecipitation assays were then performed. Our results indicate MOR regulates opioid and growth factor-induced EGF receptor signaling (Src, Gab-1, PI3K, Akt and STAT3 activation) which is crucial for consequent human NSCLC cell proliferation and migration. In addition, human NSCLC cells treated with opioids, growth factors or MOR overexpression exhibited an increase in snail, slug and vimentin and decrease ZO-1 and claudin-1 protein levels, results consistent with an EMT phenotype. Further, these effects were reversed with silencing (shRNA) or chemical inhibition of MOR, Src, Gab-1, PI3K, Akt and STAT3 (p<0.05). Our data suggest a possible direct effect of MOR on opioid and growth factor-signaling and consequent proliferation, migration and EMT transition during lung cancer progression. Such an effect provides a plausible explanation for the epidemiologic findings.
Hepatoprotective Effect of Superfine Particles of Herbal Medicine against CCl4-Induced Acute Liver Damage in Rats

This study aimed to examine the hepatoprotective effects of the superfine particles of Radix Tetrastigma (SPRT) against CCl4-induced acute liver damage in rats. Animals were treated with SPRT (0.3, 0.6, and 1.2 g/kg) and showed remarkable hepatoprotection against CCl4-induced hepatotoxicity. CCl4 altered various biochemical parameters in rat liver, including alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), malondialdehyde (MDA), superoxide dismutase (SOD), histopathological changes, and Bax and caspase-3 expressions. SPRT significantly prevented increases in ALT and AST levels, reduced MDA level, decreased Bax and caspase-3 protein expression, enhanced SOD activity, and provided significant amelioration in the histopathological lesions. These findings suggested that SPRT has significant protective effect against acute hepatotoxicity induced by CCl4 in rats.
Red synchrotron jets in Parkes quasars

ABSTRACT We present model ﬁts to spectral energy distributions in the optical and NIR of > 100ﬂat-spectrum radio quasars from the Parkes Half-Jansky Flat-spectrum Sample. Weﬁnd that ∼ 40% of the sources have power-law SEDs, while a similar number showevidence for two primary components: a blue power law and optical synchrotron emis-sion. The blue power law is similar to the dominant component observed in the spectraof optically-selected QSOs. There is strong evidence that the synchrotron componenthas a turnover in the UV-optical rest frame of the spectrum. In the remaining sourcesit is likely that the synchrotron peaks at longer wavelengths. This mixture of twocomponents is supported by optical polarisation measurements in a subgroup of thesources. The sources with power law SEDs show evidence for an excess number of redpower law slopes compared to optically-selected quasars. There are additional spectralcomponents in some of the sources, such as dust and the underlying galaxy, which havenot been considered here.Key words: quasars: general – BL Lacertae objects: general – radiation mechanisms:non-thermal
Hunger in the primary school setting: evidence, impacts and solutions according to school staff in the North East of England, UK

ABSTRACT The issue of ‘holiday hunger’ (i.e. food insecurity during school holidays) has received increased attention in recent years, though research in this area is limited. Through qualitative, semi-structured interviews, the current study investigated the views of 12 primary school staff on the existence, impacts and potential solutions to holiday hunger. Thematic analysis revealed holiday hunger forms part of a broader, year-round experience of deprivation and poor nutritional habits. Staff proposed a need for a multi-agency approach to address a range of complex, inter-related needs. Additionally, the findings highlighted a need to address poverty stigma in the development of familial support.
Boundary energy of the general open XXZ chain at roots of unity

We have recently proposed a Bethe Ansatz solution of the open spin-1/2 XXZ quantum spin chain with general integrable boundary terms (containing six free boundary parameters) at roots of unity. We use this solution, together with an appropriate string hypothesis, to compute the boundary energy of the chain in the thermodynamic limit.
Effects of prime word frequency and cumulative root frequency in masked morphological priming

Four visual lexical decision experiments using the masked priming paradigm tested for effects of prime word frequency and cumulative root frequency with primes varying in degree of morphological and orthographic overlap with free root targets in French. Experiments 1 and 3 showed that only high frequency morphologically related primes produce significantly faster response times compared to orthographic control primes. On the other hand, no significant orthographic priming effects were observed in the present study, except in Experiment 2 where the most frequent orthographic primes produced significantly more errors than the other priming conditions. In Experiment 4 similar levels of morphological priming were obtained to free root targets with high and low cumulative root frequencies. These findings are interpreted within the framework of a supralexical representation of morphological information in memory.
THE COGNITIVE PROCESSING OF DERIVED NOUNS WITH AMBIGUOUS SUFFIXES: BEHAVIORAL AND EYEMOVEMENT STUDY

The primary aim of this research has been to investigate whether the suffix ambiguity affects the lexical processing of derived nouns in Serbian. Consequently, in the Experiment 1, the derived nouns were presented isolated to participants in the visual lexical decision task. Bearing in mind that the sentence context was important for the lexical processing, the Experiment 2 was designed as an eye-movement study with the sentences (with derived nouns from the Experiment 1) as stimuli. To the best of our knowledge, the similar experimental study was not performed before in the Serbian language, and therefore this study represents the first attempt to investigate this phenomenon in Serbian. An identical statistical analysis was used to analyze the data collected in both experiments, the Generalized Additive Mixed Models (GAMMs). The final results of all GAMMs analyses suggested that the suffixal ambiguity did not affect the lexical processing of derived nouns in Serbian, regardless of whether they were displayed isolated or in the sentence context. The observed results supported the a-morphous perspective in the morpho-lexical processing, as well as the distributed morphology insights from the theoretical linguistics.
Network maps of technology fields: A comparative analysis of relatedness measures

Network maps of technology fields extracted from patent databases are useful to aid in technology forecasting and road mapping. Constructing such a network requires a measure of the relatedness between pairs of technology fields. Despite the existence of various relatedness measures in the literature, it is unclear how to consistently assess and compare them, and which ones to select for constructing technology network maps. This ambiguity has limited the use of technology network maps for technology forecasting and roadmap analyses. To address this challenge, here we propose a strategy to evaluate alternative relatedness measures and identify the superior ones by comparing the structure properties of resulting technology networks. Using United States patent data, we execute the strategy through a comparative analysis of twelve relatedness measures, which quantify inter-field knowledge input similarity, field-crossing diversification likelihood or frequency of innovation agents, and co-occurrences of technology classes in the same patents. Our comparative analyses suggest two superior relatedness measures, normalized co-reference and inventor diversification likelihood, for constructing technology network maps.
The use, effectiveness, and hazards associated with police use of force: the unique case of weaponless physical force

ABSTRACT Many studies have been conducted on police use of force. However, relatively few have examined the most common type of force used by the police: physical force. In this study, we analyze use of force data collected in the US to: (1) describe and predict the circumstances in which physical force is used, (2) assess the effectiveness of it, and (3) examine the hazards associated with its use. Results show that physical force is most likely to be used in situations marked by lower levels of subject resistance. This explains both its frequent use and its effectiveness at incapacitating resistant subjects. However, physical force is also most likely to result in officer and subject injuries, which is problematic. Our findings highlight the relevance of de-escalation techniques in use of force situations.