Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Carbon dynamics and CO2 air-sea exchanges in the eutrophied coastal waters of the Southern Bight of the North Sea: a modelling study

Abstract. A description of the carbonate system has been incorporated in the MIRO biogeochemical model to investigate the contribution of diatom and Phaeocystis blooms to the seasonal dynamics of air-sea CO2 exchanges in the Eastern Channel and Southern Bight of the North Sea, with focus on the eutrophied Belgian coastal waters. For this application, the model was implemented in a simplified three-box representation of the hydrodynamics with the open ocean boundary box ‘Western English Channel’ (WCH) and the ‘French Coastal Zone’ (FCZ) and ‘Belgian Coastal Zone’ (BCZ) boxes receiving carbon and nutrients from the rivers Seine and Scheldt, respectively. Results were obtained by running the model for the 1996–1999 period. The simulated partial pressures of CO2 (pCO2) were successfully compared with data recorded over the same period in the central BCZ at station 330 (51°26.05′ N; 002°48.50′ E). Budget calculations based on model simulations of carbon flow rates indicated for BCZ a low annual sink of atmospheric CO2 (−0.17 mol C m-2 y-1). On the opposite, surface water pCO2 in WCH was estimated to be at annual equilibrium with respect to atmospheric CO2. The relative contribution of biological, chemical and physical processes to the modelled seasonal variability of pCO2 in BCZ was further explored by running model scenarios with separate closures of biological activities and/or river inputs of carbon. The suppression of biological processes reversed direction of the CO2 flux in BCZ that became, on an annual scale, a significant source for atmospheric CO2 (+0.53 mol C m-2 y-1). Overall biological activity had a stronger influence on the modelled seasonal cycle of pCO2 than temperature. Especially Phaeocystis colonies which growth in spring were associated with an important sink of atmospheric CO2 that counteracted the temperature-driven increase of pCO2 at this period of the year. However, river inputs of organic and inorganic carbon were shown to increase the surface water pCO2 and hence the emission of CO2 to the atmosphere. Same calculations conducted in WCH, showed that temperature was the main factor controlling the seasonal pCO2 cycle in these open ocean waters. The effect of interannual variations of fresh water discharge (and related nutrient and carbon inputs), temperature and wind speed was further explored by running scenarios with forcing typical of two contrasted years (1996 and 1999). Based on these simulations, the model predicts significant variations in the intensity and direction of the annual air-sea CO2 flux.
Bone marrow transplantation: the battle for hope in the face of fear.

PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES To describe patients' experience of having an autologous bone marrow transplantation (BMT). DESIGN Hermeneutic phenomenologic, descriptive, and interpretive. SETTING Outpatient treatment area of a comprehensive cancer center in the Southwest. SAMPLE 20 adult survivors of autologous BMT, 15 women and 5 men, with a mean age of 46 years. METHODS Content analysis of verbatim transcriptions of open-ended interviews using hermeneutic phenomenology, which combines descriptive and interpretive phenomenology. CONCLUSIONS These patients illustrate that fear, a predominant reality when undergoing autologous BMT, is balanced with hope for survival. The overarching fear, fear of death, often was related to the unknown, including cancer recurrence. The fear of the unknown also came from being unprepared physically and emotionally. Losses were intertwined with these fears and included loss of both control and trust in one's body. Patients discussed fear of leaving the hospital and not having someone "constantly looking at you to make sure that the cancer isn't back. " These fears and losses changed patients' view of life and led to a need for help in bringing closure to the experience. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING PRACTICE Specific nursing actions to help allay fear include providing information about both feelings and procedures, giving opportunities to discuss fears and losses, arranging meetings with others who have had a BMT or suggesting an appropriate support group, and including family in all interventions, as appropriate. Reducing fears with these interventions helped patients maintain hope. By understanding the relationship between hope and fear, nurses caring for people having BMT can use specific strategies to decrease fear, hence increasing hope in patients. Nursing education can emphasize the need to adequately prepare patients. Further research is indicated to explore the effectiveness of interventions to prepare patients for BMT and the interplay between hope and fear.
Heat Shock Protein 101 Plays a Crucial Role in Thermotolerance in Arabidopsis

Plants are sessile organisms, and their ability to adapt to stress is crucial for survival in natural environments. Many observations suggest a relationship between stress tolerance and heat shock proteins (HSPs) in plants, but the roles of individual HSPs are poorly characterized. We report that transgenic Arabidopsis plants expressing less than usual amounts of HSP101, a result of either antisense inhibition or cosuppression, grew at normal rates but had a severely diminished capacity to acquire heat tolerance after mild conditioning pretreatments. The naturally high tolerance of germinating seeds, which express HSP101 as a result of developmental regulation, was also profoundly decreased. Conversely, plants constitutively expressing HSP101 tolerated sudden shifts to extreme temperatures better than did vector controls. We conclude that HSP101 plays a pivotal role in heat tolerance in Arabidopsis. Given the high evolutionary conservation of this protein and the fact that altering HSP101 expression had no detrimental effects on normal growth or development, one should be able to manipulate the stress tolerance of other plants by altering the expression of this protein.
Role of VEGF Receptors in Normal and Psoriatic Human Keratinocytes: Evidence from Irradiation with Different UV Sources

Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) promotes angiogenesis and plays important roles both in physiological and pathological conditions. VEGF receptors (VEGFRs) are high-affinity receptors for VEGF and are originally considered specific to endothelial cells. We previously reported that VEGFRs were also constitutively expressed in normal human keratinocytes and overexpressed in psoriatic epidermis. In addition, UVB can activate VEGFRs in normal keratinocytes, and the activated VEGFR-2 signaling is involved in the pro-survival mechanism. Here, we show that VEGFRs were also upregulated and activated by UVA in normal human keratinocytes via PKC, and interestingly, both the activated VEGFR-1 and VEGFR-2 protected against UVA-induced cell death. As VEGFRs were over-expressed in psoriatic epidermis, we further investigated whether narrowband UVB (NB-UVB) phototherapy or topical halomethasone monohydrate 0.05% cream could affect their expression. Surprisingly, the over-expressed VEGFRs in psoriatic epidermis were significantly attenuated by both treatments. During NB-UVB therapy, VEGFRs declined first in the basal, and then gradually in the upper psoriatic epidermis. VEGFRs were activated in psoriatic epidermis, their activation was enhanced by NB-UVB, but turned undetectable after whole therapy. This process was quite different from that by halomethasone, in which VEGFRs and phospho-VEGFRs decreased in a gradual, homogeneous manner. Our findings further suggest that UV-induced activation of VEGFRs serves as a pro-survival signal for keratinocytes. In addition, VEGFRs may be involved in the pathological process of psoriasis, and UV phototherapy is effective for psoriasis by directly modulating the expression of VEGFRs.
Dynamic Magneto‐Optical Imaging of Domains in Grain‐Oriented Electrical Steel

Magneto‐optical imaging with magneto‐optical indicator films (MOIF) is a versatile method to characterize magnetic field distributions especially for material development and quality control. Magnetic domains and grains in grain‐oriented electrical steel can be visualized, and quantified without removing the isolation layer. The combination of MOIF with digital high‐speed camera technology enables temporally resolved investigations of the magnetization processes. In contrast to Kerr‐effect measurements MOIF imaging works without sample preparation and even in the presence of industrial insulation coatings. Optical resolution of 25 microns and temporal resolution of 1 ms in single‐shot mode could be demonstrated.
Phased Array Radar Polarimetry for Weather Sensing: A Theoretical Formulation for Bias Corrections

It is becoming widely accepted that radar polarimetry provides accurate and informative weather measurements, while phased-array technology can shorten data updating time. In this paper, a theory of phased array radar (PAR) polarimetry is developed to establish the relation between electric fields at the antenna of the PAR and the fields in a resolution volume filled with hydrometeors. It is shown that polarimetric measurements with an electronically steered beam can cause measurement biases that are comparable to or even larger than the intrinsic polarimetric characteristics of hydrometeors. However, these biases are correctable if the transmitted electric fields are known. A correction to the measured scattering matrix that removes biases in meteorological variables is derived. The challenges and opportunities for weather sensing with a polarimetric PAR are discussed.
Iterative Thresholded Bi-Histogram Equalization for Medical Image Enhancement

nhancement of human vision to get an insight to information content is of vital importance. The traditional histogram equalization methods have been suffering from amplified contrast with the addition of artifacts and a surprising unnatural visibility of the processed images. In order to overcome these drawbacks, this paper proposes interative, mean, and multi-threshold selection criterion with plateau limits, which consist of histogram segmentation, clipping and transformation modules. The histogram partition consists of multiple thresholding processes that divide the histogram into two parts, whereas the clipping process nicely enhances the contrast by having a check on the rate of enhancement that could be tuned. Histogram equalization to each segmented sub-histogram provides the output image with preserved brightness and enhanced contrast. Results of the present study showed that the proposed method efficiently handles the noise amplification. Further, it also preserves the brightness by retaining natural look of targeted image.
Agarwood Induced Laxative Effects via Acetylcholine Receptors on Loperamide-Induced Constipation in Mice

Agarwood (Aquilaria sinensis, Aquilaria crasna) is well known as an incense in the oriental region such as Thailand, Taiwan, and Cambodia, and is used as a digestive in traditional medicine. We investigated the laxative effects and mechanism of agarwood leaves extracted with ethanol (EEA-1, Aquilaria sinensis; EEA-2, Aquilaria crasna). EEA-1, EEA-2, the main constituents of EEAs (mangiferin, and genkwanin-5-O-primeveroside), and senna increased the frequency and weight of stools in loperamide-induced constipation model mice. EEA-1 and EEA-2 did not induce diarrhea as a side effect, but senna induced severe diarrhea. EEA-1 and senna increased gastro-intestinal (GI) transit in the model mice. EEA-1, but not senna, also increased the intestinal tension of isolated jejunum and ileum in guinea pigs, and the tension increase was blocked by atropine, a muscarinic receptor antagonist, but not by other inhibitors (granicetron, pyrilamine, or bradykinin-antagonist peptide). Furthermore, the increase in frequency and weight of stools induced by EEA-1 were blocked by pre-administration of atropine in the model mice. These findings indicate that EEAs exerted a laxative effect via acetylcholine receptors in the mouse constipation model.
Anomaly Detection in Images With Smooth Background via Smooth-Sparse Decomposition

In various manufacturing applications such as steel, composites, and textile production, anomaly detection in noisy images is of special importance. Although there are several methods for image denoising and anomaly detection, most of these perform denoising and detection sequentially, which affects detection accuracy and efficiency. Additionally, the low computational speed of some of these methods is a limitation for real-time inspection. In this article, we develop a novel methodology for anomaly detection in noisy images with smooth backgrounds. The proposed method, named smooth-sparse decomposition, exploits regularized high-dimensional regression to decompose an image and separate anomalous regions by solving a large-scale optimization problem. To enable the proposed method for real-time implementation, a fast algorithm for solving the optimization model is proposed. Using simulations and a case study, we evaluate the performance of the proposed method and compare it with existing methods. Numerical results demonstrate the superiority of the proposed method in terms of the detection accuracy as well as computation time. This article has supplementary materials that includes all the technical details, proofs, MATLAB codes, and simulated images used in the article.
Space-based and object-centered gaze cuing of attention in right hemisphere-damaged patients

Gaze cuing of attention is a well established phenomenon consisting of the tendency to shift attention to the location signaled by the averted gaze of other individuals. Evidence suggests that such phenomenon might follow intrinsic object-centered features of the head containing the gaze cue. In the present exploratory study, we aimed to investigate whether such object-centered component is present in neuropsychological patients with a lesion involving the right hemisphere, which is known to play a critical role both in orienting of attention and in face processing. To this purpose, we used a modified gaze-cuing paradigm in which a centrally placed head with averted gaze was presented either in the standard upright position or rotated 90° clockwise or anti-clockwise. Afterward, a to-be-detected target was presented either in the right or in the left hemifield. The results showed that gaze cuing of attention was present only when the target appeared in the left visual hemifield and was not modulated by head orientation. This suggests that gaze cuing of attention in right hemisphere-damaged patients can operate within different frames of reference.
Speculative Growth: Hints from the U.S. Economy

We propose a framework for understanding recurrent historical episodes of vigorous economic expansion accompanied by extreme asset valuations, as exhibited by the U.S. in the 1990s. We interpret this phenomenon as a high-valuation equilibrium with a low effective cost of capital based on optimism about the future availability of funds for investment. The key to the sustainability of such an equilibrium is feedback from increased growth to an increase in the supply of effective funding. We show that such feedback arises naturally when an expansion comes with technological progress in the capital producing sector, when fiscal rules generate sustained fiscal surpluses, when the rest of the world has lower expansion potential, and when financial constraints are relaxed by the expansion itself. Arguably, these ingredients were all simultaneously present in the U.S. during the 1990s. We also show that such expansions can be welfare improving but they can crash. The latter is more likely if bubbles develop along the expansionary path. These (rational) bubbles can emerge even when the interest rate exceeds the rate of growth of the economy.
Evaluation of bone, nutrition, and physical function in Shorinji Kempo athletes

The objectives of this study were to reveal the proportion of Shorinji Kempo athletes who had suffered fractures related to sports activities, and to evaluate bone mass, bone turnover, nutritional status, and physical function in these athletes. A medical examination was carried out for 16 Shorinji Kempo collegiate athletes. Seven athletes (43.8%) had experienced a sports-related traumatic fracture during Shorinji Kempo practice. Four athletes (25.0%) had a lower speed of sound (% young adult mean < 100%), and five athletes (31.3%) had higher levels of urinary cross-linked N-terminal telopeptides of type 1 collagen (a bone turnover marker) than the age-adjusted standard values. All the athletes had a lower daily calcium intake than the adequate intake, 12 (75.0%) had a lower daily vitamin D intake, and 15 (93.8%) had a lower daily vitamin K intake. Significant positive correlations were found between the vertical jump height, and the daily energy, and protein intakes. Results suggest that fractures are a common injury in Shorinji Kempo athletes, and that some Shorinji Kempo athletes need to improve their bone mass, bone metabolism, and nutritional status in order to strengthen bone and improve physical function.
Color Depth Modulation and Resolution in Phase‐Change Material Nanodisplays

The demonstration of non-volatile color-depth modulation in novel phase change nanodisplays allowing for continuous "grayscale" images with ultrahigh resolution and low dimensionality is described. These results hold promise for a new generation of bistable, ultrahigh-resolution, and flexible display technologies, while allowing for other potential applications in nanophotonics and optoelectronics.
The chemoreflex: adult versus child comparison.

PURPOSE Compare the influence of the chemoreflex on heart rate (HR) and blood pressure (BP) responses between children and adults. METHODS Seventy children (35 boys and 35 girls) and 70 adults (35 men and 35 women) performed 30% maximal voluntary contraction static handgrip exercise (SHG) for 3 min, followed by 4 min of muscle ischemia and then 6 min of recovery, while HR and BP were measured. RESULTS During 3 min of SHG, systolic BP (SBP) increased significantly more in men versus boys (23+/-9 vs 18+/-9%) and women versus girls (21+/-10 vs 15+/-7%), respectively. Diastolic BP (DBP) increased similarly during SHG in adults versus children. During SHG, HR increased similarly in males but significantly more in girls versus women (16+/-10 vs 11+/-9%), respectively. During occlusion, HR fell to baseline and remained through recovery in adults and children. Both SBP and DBP decreased similarly during the first minute of occlusion but remained significantly above baseline in adults and children. During the first minute of recovery, BP decreased to baseline in adults. In children, DBP decreased but remained significantly above baseline through recovery. SBP decreased in children during minute 1 of recovery yet remained significantly above baseline for 1-2 min in children. CONCLUSIONS The muscle chemoreflex influence on HR and BP is similar in children and adults as evident in the return of HR to baseline, with a similar concomitant maintenance of BP above baseline during occlusion. When occlusion is released, BP returns to baseline in adults, whereas in children DBP remains significantly above baseline through recovery and SBP for 1-2 min. The differing BP response may be explained by a more active arterial chemoreflex in children.
Ontology-based Workflow Change Management for Flexible eGovernment Service Delivery

Often, eGovernment services needed by citizens are composite in nature, where component services are offered by distributed and autonomous government agencies. Our approach to deliver the interagency eGovernment composite services for coordination, cooperation and seamless flow and sharing of data is accomplished through an eGovernment portal system based on a workflow management system (WFMS). Versatile eGovernment service delivery can be achieved through customization of the eGovernment services at the design stage, as well as through run-time adaptation of the services by reacting to changes in the government regulations and mandates, citizens' needs, or unexpected results during service execution. In this paper, we present an approach where the workflows adopt to run-time changes. Given a change condition, our system automatically identifies migration rules that specify operations and tasks needed to achieve run-time adaptation and to generate a new workflow. The migration rules are generated from the regulatory rules ontology, which ensure that the new workflow is in some sense consistent with the original workflow.
Redirection of Metabolic Hydrogen by Inhibiting Methanogenesis in the Rumen Simulation Technique (RUSITEC)

A decrease in methanogenesis is expected to improve ruminant performance by allocating rumen metabolic hydrogen ([2H]) to more energy-rendering fermentation pathways for the animal. However, decreases in methane (CH4) emissions of up to 30% are not always linked with greater performance. Therefore, the aim of this study was to understand the fate of [2H] when CH4 production in the rumen is inhibited by known methanogenesis inhibitors (nitrate, NIT; 3-nitrooxypropanol, NOP; anthraquinone, AQ) in comparison with a control treatment (CON) with the Rumen Simulation Technique (RUSITEC). Measurements started after 1 week adaptation. Substrate disappearance was not modified by methanogenesis inhibitors. Nitrate mostly seemed to decrease [2H] availability by acting as an electron acceptor competing with methanogenesis. As a consequence, NIT decreased CH4 production (−75%), dissolved dihydrogen (H2) concentration (−30%) and the percentages of reduced volatile fatty acids (butyrate, isobutyrate, valerate, isovalerate, caproate and heptanoate) except propionate, but increased acetate molar percentage, ethanol concentration and the efficiency of microbial nitrogen synthesis (+14%) without affecting gaseous H2. Nitrooxypropanol decreased methanogenesis (−75%) while increasing both gaseous and dissolved H2 concentrations (+81% and +24%, respectively). Moreover, NOP decreased acetate and isovalerate molar percentages and increased butyrate, valerate, caproate and heptanoate molar percentages as well as n-propanol and ammonium concentrations. Methanogenesis inhibition with AQ (−26%) was associated with higher gaseous H2 production (+70%) but lower dissolved H2 concentration (−76%), evidencing a lack of relationship between the two H2 forms. Anthraquinone increased ammonium concentration, caproate and heptanoate molar percentages but decreased acetate and isobutyrate molar percentages, total microbial nitrogen production and efficiency of microbial protein synthesis (−16%). Overall, NOP and AQ increased the amount of reduced volatile fatty acids, but part of [2H] spared from methanogenesis was lost as gaseous H2. Finally, [2H] recovery was similar among CON, NOP and AQ but was largely lower than 100%. Consequently, further studies are required to discover other so far unidentified [2H] sinks for a better understanding of the metabolic pathways involved in [2H] production and utilization.