Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Using a polyester binder for the interlaminar toughening of glass/epoxy composite laminates

Bisphenol A based polyester is commonly used in the industry as a binder, or tackifier, to produce cost-saving preforms in Liquid Composite Moulding processes such as Vacuum Assisted Resin Transfer Moulding (VARTM). However, it is often reported that the presence of these polyesters has a detrimental effect on the mechanical properties of the resulting composite laminates. This study shows that interlaminar toughness can be increased without negatively affecting other properties by a applying a bisphenol A based polyester binder. Both polyester modified epoxy resin as well as polyester modified glass/epoxy laminates are studied. It is shown that the presence of the polyester has a profound effect on the curing characteristics and glass transition temperature of the epoxy resin. Furthermore, fracture toughness experiments (Single Edge Notch Bending) show that there is an optimum polyester concentration which leads to a toughened epoxy matrix. Composite laminates are produced from binder coated glass fibre plies with VARTM. Double Cantilever Beam fracture experiments show that the polyester binder increases the Mode I interlaminar toughness by 60 %. Three point bending experiments show that the flexural properties were not negatively affected by the presence of the polyester in the interlaminar region between plies.
Movement Patterns for a Critically Endangered Species, the Leatherback Turtle (Dermochelys coriacea), Linked to Foraging Success and Population Status

Foraging success for pelagic vertebrates may be revealed by horizontal and vertical movement patterns. We show markedly different patterns for leatherback turtles in the North Atlantic versus Eastern Pacific, which feed on gelatinous zooplankton that are only occasionally found in high densities. In the Atlantic, travel speed was characterized by two modes, indicative of high foraging success at low speeds (<15 km d−1) and transit at high speeds (20–45 km d−1). Only a single mode was evident in the Pacific, which occurred at speeds of 21 km d−1 indicative of transit. The mean dive depth was more variable in relation to latitude but closer to the mean annual depth of the thermocline and nutricline for North Atlantic than Eastern Pacific turtles. The most parsimonious explanation for these findings is that Eastern Pacific turtles rarely achieve high foraging success. This is the first support for foraging behaviour differences between populations of this critically endangered species and suggests that longer periods searching for prey may be hindering population recovery in the Pacific while aiding population maintenance in the Atlantic.
Echocardiograpic Evaluation of Short-term Outcome of Patent Ductus Arteriosus Closure using Amplatzer Occluder Device

Objective: To compare clinical and echocardiographic data before and after transcatheter closure of patent ductusarteriosus (PDA) with occluder device. Methods: The study population consisted of 30 children with PDA who were subjected to history taking and clinical examination to detect symptoms and signs suggestive of significant shunting. Doppler, two-dimensional echocardiography studies with measurement of mitral inflow velocities in early and late diastole (E and A wave), early and late diastolic mitral annular velocity (E and A) by DTI, Tei index, and standard chamber dimensions. All children were studied before and 3 months after percutaneous closure of PDA that done using the Amplatzer device. Results: Transcatheter closure of PDA produced marked improvement of patients’ symptoms and signs postclosure, significant reduction in heart rate and respiratory rate while there was no significant change in blood pressure or temperature. Also there was significant reduction in LV systolic and diastolic dimensions and volumes, LV ejection fraction, left atrial diameter, E wave, A wave, E wave and A wave while there was significant increase in LV Tei index and no significant change in aortic root diameter, E/A or E/E. Conclusion: Haemodynamic effects of PDA and changes in LV dimensions and function caused by it are reversible after transcatheter closure of PDA.
The influence of adrenergic stimulation on sex differences in left ventricular twist mechanics

Sex differences in left ventricular (LV) mechanics occur during acute physiological challenges; however, it is unknown whether sex differences in LV mechanics are fundamentally regulated by differences in adrenergic control. Using two‐dimensional echocardiography and speckle tracking analysis, this study compared LV mechanics in males and females matched for LV length during post‐exercise ischaemia (PEI) and β1‐adrenergic receptor blockade. Our data demonstrate that while basal rotation was increased in males, LV twist was not significantly different between the sexes during PEI. In contrast, during β1‐adrenergic receptor blockade, LV apical rotation, twist and untwisting velocity were reduced in males compared to females. Significant relationships were observed between LV twist and LV internal diameter and sphericity index in females, but not males. These findings suggest that LV twist mechanics may be more sensitive to alterations in adrenergic stimulation in males, but more highly influenced by ventricular structure and geometry in females.
Typical distances in a geometric model for complex networks

We study typical distances in a geometric random graph on the hyperbolic plane. Introduced by Krioukov et al.~\cite{ar:Krioukov} as a model for complex networks, $N$ vertices are drawn randomly within a bounded subset of the hyperbolic plane and any two of them are joined if they are within a threshold hyperbolic distance. With appropriately chosen parameters, the random graph is sparse and exhibits power law degree distribution as well as local clustering. In this paper we show a further property: the distance between two uniformly chosen vertices that belong to the same component is doubly logarithmic in $N$, i.e., the graph is an ~\emph{ultra-small world}. More precisely, we show that the distance rescaled by $\log \log N$ converges in probability to a certain constant that depends on the exponent of the power law. The same constant emerges in an analogous setting with the well-known \emph{Chung-Lu} model for which the degree distribution has a power law tail.
Water as an active constituent in cell biology.

When Szent-Gyorgyi called water the “matrix of life”,1 he was echoing an old sentiment. Paracelsus in the 16th century said that “water was the matrix of the world and of all its creatures. ”2 But Paracelsus’s notion of a matrixsan active substance imbued with fecund, life-giving propertiess was quite different from the picture that, until very recently, molecular biologists have tended to hold of water’s role in the chemistry of life. Although acknowledging that liquid water has some unusual and important physical and chemical propertiessits potency as a solvent, its ability to form hydrogen bonds, its amphoteric naturesbiologists have regarded it essentially as the backdrop on which life’s molecular components are arrayed. It used to be common practice, for example, to perform computer simulations of biomolecules in a vacuum. Partly this was because the computational intensity of simulating a polypeptide chain was challenging even without accounting for solvent molecules too, but it also reflected the prevailing notion that water does little more than temper or moderate the basic physicochemical interactions responsible for molecular biology. What Gerstein and Levitt said 9 years ago remains true today: “When scientists publish models of biological molecules in journals, they usually draw their models in bright colors and place them against a plain, black background”. 3 Curiously, this neglect of water as an active component of the cell went hand in hand with the assumption that life could not exist without it. That was basically an empirical conclusion derived from our experience of life on Earth: environments without liquid water cannot sustain life, and special strategies are needed to cope with situations in which, because of extremes of either heat or cold, the liquid is scarce.4-6 The recent confirmation that there is at least one world rich in organic molecules on which rivers and perhaps shallow seas or bogs are filled with nonaqueous fluidsthe liquid hydrocarbons of Titan7smight now bring some focus, even urgency, to the question of whether water is indeed a * E-mail: p.ball@nature.com. Philip Ball is a science writer and a consultant editor for Nature, where he worked as an editor for physical sciences for more than 10 years. He holds a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Bristol, where he worked on the statistical mechanics of phase transitions in the liquid state. His book H2O: A Biography of Water (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1999) was a survey of the current state of knowledge about the behavior of water in situations ranging from planetary geomorphology to cell biology. He frequently writes about aspects of water science for both the popular and the technical media.
Employment may Protect Fathers in the Setting of Maternal Teenage Pregnancy from Anxiety and Depression: Findings from the Australian

Objective: There is limited research on fathers in the setting of maternal teenage pregnancy. Most studies report data from regions of social disadvantage and low education. We report on the levels of anxiety, depression and quality of life of fathers in the setting of maternal teenage pregnancy in an area where the unemployment rate is low. Methods: Observational study of 50 fathers in the setting of maternal teenage pregnancy and 100 fathers whose partners were not teenagers (control), living within the same metropolitan healthcare region with high employment rates. Fathers were enrolled within the larger Australian Father's Study and were recruited from antenatal clinics and community settings. Researchers administered the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Satisfaction with Life Scale and demographic questionnaires. Results: Fathers in the setting of maternal teenage pregnancy were significantly younger than control fathers (p<0.05). After adjusting for demographic variables, fathers in the setting of maternal teenage pregnancy did not have levels of anxiety, depression or quality of life that were significantly different to control fathers. Conclusion: Fathers in the setting of maternal teenage pregnancy, when engaged in further education or employment have levels of anxiety, depression and quality of life comparable to control fathers.
3′ end formation of pre-mRNA and phosphorylation of Ser2 on the RNA polymerase II CTD are reciprocally coupled in human cells

Pre-mRNA 3′ end formation is coupled to transcription via the RNA Pol II C-terminal domain (CTD). However, how transcription and pre-mRNA maturation are coordinated in humans is poorly understood. Here, West and colleagues show that Pol II pausing promotes Ser2p by Cdk12, which recruits CPA factor CstF77 and is required for optimal 3′ end processing. This study delineates a reciprocal relationship between early steps in poly(A) site processing and Pol II Ser2p that ensures efficient pre-mRNA 3′ end formation in human cells.
Foraging Parameters Influencing the Detection and Interpretation of Area-Restricted Search Behaviour in Marine Predators: A Case Study with the Masked Booby

Identification of Area-restricted search (ARS) behaviour is used to better understand foraging movements and strategies of marine predators. Track-based descriptive analyses are commonly used to detect ARS behaviour, but they may be biased by factors such as foraging trip duration or non-foraging behaviours (i.e. resting on the water). Using first-passage time analysis we tested if (I) daylight resting at the sea surface positions falsely increase the detection of ARS behaviour and (II) short foraging trips are less likely to include ARS behaviour in Masked Boobies Sula dactylatra. We further analysed whether ARS behaviour may be used as a proxy to identify important feeding areas. Depth-acceleration and GPS-loggers were simultaneously deployed on chick-rearing adults to obtain (1) location data every 4 minutes and (2) detailed foraging activity such as diving rates, time spent sitting on the water surface and in flight. In 82% of 50 foraging trips, birds adopted ARS behaviour. In 19.3% of 57 detected ARS zones, birds spent more than 70% of total ARS duration resting on the water, suggesting that these ARS zones were falsely detected. Based on generalized linear mixed models, the probability of detecting false ARS zones was 80%. False ARS zones mostly occurred during short trips in close proximity to the colony, with low or no diving activity. This demonstrates the need to account for resting on the water surface positions in marine animals when determining ARS behaviour based on foraging locations. Dive rates were positively correlated with trip duration and the probability of ARS behaviour increased with increasing number of dives, suggesting that the adoption of ARS behaviour in Masked Boobies is linked to enhanced foraging activity. We conclude that ARS behaviour may be used as a proxy to identify important feeding areas in this species.
Cutty: Aggregate Sharing for User-Defined Windows

Aggregation queries on data streams are evaluated over evolving and often overlapping logical views called windows. While the aggregation of periodic windows were extensively studied in the past through the use of aggregate sharing techniques such as Panes and Pairs, little to no work has been put in optimizing the aggregation of very common, non-periodic windows. Typical examples of non-periodic windows are punctuations and sessions which can implement complex business logic and are often expressed as user-defined operators on platforms such as Google Dataflow or Apache Storm. The aggregation of such non-periodic or user-defined windows either falls back to expensive, best-effort aggregate sharing methods, or is not optimized at all. In this paper we present a technique to perform efficient aggregate sharing for data stream windows, which are declared as user-defined functions (UDFs) and can contain arbitrary business logic. To this end, we first introduce the concept of User-Defined Windows (UDWs), a simple, UDF-based programming abstraction that allows users to programmatically define custom windows. We then define semantics for UDWs, based on which we design Cutty, a low-cost aggregate sharing technique. Cutty improves and outperforms the state of the art for aggregate sharing on single and multiple queries. Moreover, it enables aggregate sharing for a broad class of non-periodic UDWs. We implemented our techniques on Apache Flink, an open source stream processing system, and performed experiments demonstrating orders of magnitude of reduction in aggregation costs compared to the state of the art.
Photophysiological and Photosynthetic Complex Changes during Iron Starvation in Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 and Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942

Iron is an essential component in many protein complexes involved in photosynthesis, but environmental iron availability is often low as oxidized forms of iron are insoluble in water. To adjust to low environmental iron levels, cyanobacteria undergo numerous changes to balance their iron budget and mitigate the physiological effects of iron depletion. We investigated changes in key protein abundances and photophysiological parameters in the model cyanobacteria Synechococcus PCC 7942 and Synechocystis PCC 6803 over a 120 hour time course of iron deprivation. The iron stress induced protein (IsiA) accumulated to high levels within 48 h of the onset of iron deprivation, reaching a molar ratio of ∼42 IsiA : Photosystem I in Synechococcus PCC 7942 and ∼12 IsiA : Photosystem I in Synechocystis PCC 6803. Concomitantly the iron-rich complexes Cytochrome b6f and Photosystem I declined in abundance, leading to a decrease in the Photosystem I : Photosystem II ratio. Chlorophyll fluorescence analyses showed a drop in electron transport per Photosystem II in Synechococcus, but not in Synechocystis after iron depletion. We found no evidence that the accumulated IsiA contributes to light capture by Photosystem II complexes.
Enhanced Tendon-to-Bone Healing of Chronic Rotator Cuff Tears by Bone Marrow Aspirate Concentrate in a Rabbit Model

Background To evaluate the influence of bone marrow aspirate concentrate (BMAC) on tendon-to-bone healing in a rabbit rotator cuff model and to characterize the composition of growth factors in BMAC. Methods In this in vivo study, 40 rabbits were allocated into five groups: control (C), repair + saline (RS), repair + platelet-rich plasma (PRP; RP), repair + BMAC (RB) and repair + PRP + BMAC (RPB). A tear model was created by supraspinatus tendon transection at the footprint. Six weeks after transection, the torn tendon was repaired along with BMAC or PRP administration. Six weeks after repair, shoulder samples were harvested for biomechanical and histological testing. Ten rabbits were used for processing PRP and BMAC, followed by analysis of blood cell composition and the levels of growth factors in vitro. Results The ultimate load-to-failure was significantly higher in RPB group compared to RS group (p = 0.025). BMAC-treated groups showed higher values of biomechanical properties than RS group. The histology of BMAC-treated samples showed better collagen fiber continuity and orientation than RS group. BMAC contained significantly higher levels of the several growth factors than PRP. Conclusions Locally administered BMAC enhanced tendon-to-bone healing and has potential for clinical applications.
Polyphonic Sound Event Detection with Weak Labeling

Sound event detection (SED) is the task of detecting the type and the onset and offset times of sound events in audio streams. It is useful for purposes such as multimedia retrieval and surveillance. Sound event detection is difficult in several aspects when compared with speech recognition: first, sound events are much more variable than phonemes, notably in terms of duration but also in terms of spectral characteristics; second, sound events often overlap with each other, which does not happen with phonemes. To train a system for sound event detection, it is conventionally necessary to know the type, onset time and offset time of each occurrence of a sound event. We call this type of annotation strong labeling. However, such annotation is not available in amounts large enough to support deep learning. This is due to multiple reasons: first, it is tedious to manually label each sound event with exact timing information; second, the onsets and offsets of long-lasting sound events (e.g. car passing by) and repeating sound events (e.g. footsteps) may not be well-defined. In reality, annotation of sound events often comes without exact timing information. We call such annotation weak labeling. Even though it contains incomplete information compared to strong labeling, weak labeling may come in larger amounts and is well worth exploiting. In this thesis, we propose to train deep learning models for SED using various levels of weak labeling. We start with sequential labeling, i.e. we know the sequences of sound events occurring in the training data, but without the onset and offset times. We show that the sound events can be learned and localized by a recurrent neural network (RNN) with a connectionist temporal classification (CTC) output layer, which is well suited for sequential supervision. Then we relax the supervision to presence/absence labeling, i.e. we only know whether each sound event is present or absent in each training recording. We solve SED with presence/absence labeling in the multiple instance learning (MIL) framework, and propose to analyze the network’s behavior on transient, continuous and intermittent sound events. As we explore the possibility of learning to detect sound events with weak labeling, we are often faced with the problem of data scarcity. To overcome this difficulty, we resort to transfer learning, in which we train neural networks for out-of-domain tasks on large data, and use the trained networks to extract features for SED. We make special effort to ensure the temporal resolution of such transfer learning feature extractors.
Performance of GeneXpert Assay in Detecting Pulmonary Tuberculosis and Rifampicin Resistance in Patients Attending Kitui County Hospital, Kenya

Background: To combat the challenges of TB epidemic in Kenya there has been massive scale up of both treatment and diagnostic facilities.The challenges encountered in these centers is failure to accurately detect Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In this work, we aimed at evaluating the performance of GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay in detection of pulmonary TB and drug resistant testing. Methods: Smear microscopy, niacin test, culture and GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay were used to test for the presence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in 400 patient’s sputum samples. Drug susceptibility testing was done using the culture method and GeneXpert MTB/RIFassay. Results: Out of the 400 samples analysed 37.5% were smear positive of which 60% (p<0.05) were male. For the culture and GeneXpert assays the positive samples were 33% and 32.25% respectively. Smear microscopy had the highest number of false positives (28%) and false negatives (9.6%). For bacilli identification the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive values for smear microscopy were 81.8%, 84.3%, 72% and 90.4% while for GeneXpert they were 97.7%, 100%, 100% and 98.9% respectively. This implies that GeneXpert was a better method. Drug susceptibility testing using the culture method showed that 23 isolate were rifampicin resistant and with GeneXpert they were 26, implying 3 false positives. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value for GeneXpert assay in drug susceptibility testing was 100%, 97%, 89% and 100%. Cost of testing samples with GeneXpert assay was higher than culture but it offers rapid detection in that on average it took between 2 hours against up to 8 weeks for the culture method. Conclusion: GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay offers high potential for rapid diagnosis of TB and drug susceptibility testing in an austere Kenyan environment.
What Do People with Psychosis Think Caused their Psychosis? A Q Methodology Study

Background: A key component of cognitive therapy for psychosis is the development of a meaningful and shared formulation of the onset of the psychosis. Therapists bring an understanding of the development of psychotic symptoms based on theoretical models and try to marry these with the person's own experience and explanations. However, an important question is whether this understanding is compatible with the explanations held by the client. Aims: This study investigated what factors people believed led to the onset of their psychosis. Method: A Q set of potential causes for psychosis was identified from a literature search and interviews with people with differing experiences of psychosis. From this, 58 potential causes of psychosis were identified. Twenty-one people who had experienced a psychotic breakdown then ranked these explanations as possible causes. Results: Using Principle Components Analysis four main factors were identified as perceived causal factors for the onset of psychosis. These factors were described as: a) drug usage; b) traumatic experiences in adulthood; c) personal sensitivity; and d) developmental vulnerabilities. Conclusions: This study revealed that people with psychosis have different explanatory frameworks for the onset of their difficulties. This work is helpful as this effort to understand the person's own understanding of their problems is a first stepping stone towards a collaboratively generated formulation that may be helpful in building a therapeutic alliance, engagement in treatment, and ultimately in improved outcome. It is likely that these different explanatory frameworks could lend themselves to different treatment approaches.