Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modelling of a biologically inspired robotic fish driven by compliant parts

Inspired by biological swimmers such as fish, a robot composed of a rigid head, a compliant body and a rigid caudal fin was built. It has the geometrical properties of a subcarangiform swimmer of the same size. The head houses a servo-motor which actuates the compliant body and the caudal fin. It achieves this by applying a concentrated moment on a point near the compliant body base. In this paper, the dynamics of the compliant body driving the robotic fish is modelled and experimentally validated. Lighthill’s elongated body theory is used to define the hydrodynamic forces on the compliant part and Rayleigh proportional damping is used to model damping. Based on the assumed modes method, an energetic approach is used to write the equations of motion of the compliant body and to compute the relationship between the applied moment and the resulting lateral deflections. Experiments on the compliant body were carried out to validate the model predictions. The results showed that a good match was achieved between the measured and predicted deformations. A discussion of the swimming motions between the real fish and the robot is presented.
TITLE : Development of in vivo Biomarkers for Progressive Tau Pathology after Traumatic Brain Injury

Due to the increasing need for a means to study chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in vivo, there have been numerous efforts to develop an animal model of this progressive tauopathy. However, there is currently no consensus in the field on an injury model which consistently reproduces the neuropathological and behavioral features of CTE. We have implemented a repetitive CHIMERA injury paradigm in human transgenic (hTau) mice. Animals were subjected to daily subconcussive or concussive injuries for twenty days and tested acutely, three months, and 12 months post injury for deficits in social behavior, anxiety, spatial learning and memory, and depressive behavior. Animals were also assessed for chronic tau pathology, astrogliosis, and white matter degeneration. Repetitive concussive injury caused acute deficits in Morris water maze performance, including reduced swimming speed and increased swimming distance during visible and hidden platform phases, that persisted during the chronic time point following injury. We found evidence of white matter disruption in animals injured with subconcussive or concussive injuries, with the most severe disruption occurring in the repetitive concussive injury group. Severity of white matter disruption in the corpus callosum was moderately correlated with swimming speed, while white matter disruption in the fimbria showed weak but significant correlation with worse performance during probe trial. There was no evidence of tau pathology or astrogliosis in sham or injured animals. In summary, we show that repetitive brain injury produces persistent behavioral abnormalities as late as one year post injury that may be related to chronic white matter disruption.
Rôle des conditions géographiques sur l'organisation spatiale des réseaux de défense de la Grande Guerre. Application à la Champagne (région de Reims)

Le role des conditions geographiques et surtout geomorphologiques sur l'organisation spatiale des reseaux de defense de la Premiere Guerre mondiale est analyse a partir du secteur de Reims, sur le front ouest. L'etude est realisee sous SIG a partir de documents cartographiques datant de la Premiere Guerre croises aux banques de donnees actuelles (MNT, geologie, hydrographie). Les reseaux de tranchees presentent une organisation ternaire emboitee en rideaux de defense et sont structures en lignes et boyaux dont la logique repond non seulement a des criteres topographiques multiscalaires (role des fronts de cuesta, des contre-pentes, des talus des voies de communication), militaires (cretes de tir, portees de l'artillerie) et strategiques. Cette approche temoignant de l'importance de la connaissance et de l'exploitation du terrain dans la guerre de position permet aussi de mesurer l'impact environnemental de la Grande Guerre (remuement des terres, pollutions des sols).
A system for machine-written and hand-written character distinction

In applications of character recognition where machine-printed and hand-written characters are involved, it is important to know if the character image, or the whole word, is machine- or hand-written. This is due to the accuracy difference between the algorithms and systems oriented to machine- or handwritten characters. Obviously, this type of knowledge leads to the increase of the overall system quality. In this work a classification system is presented which reads a raster image of a character and outputs two confidence values, one for "machine-written" and one for "hand-written" character classes, respectively. The proposed system features a preprocessing step, which transforms a general uncentered character image into a normalized form, then the feature extraction phase extracts relevant information from the image, and at the end, a standard classifier based on a feedforward neural network creates the final response. At the end, some results on a proprietary image database are reported.
Extraction of synonyms and semantically related words from chat logs

This study explores synonym extraction from domain specific chat log collections by means of a tool-kit called JavaSDM. JavaSDM uses random indexing and measures distributional similarities. The focus of this study is to evaluate the effect of different preprocessing operations of training data and different extraction criteria. Four chat log collections containing approximately 1,000,000 tokens were compared: one English and one Swedish from a retail company and one English and one Swedish from a travel company. One gold standard was based on synonym dictionaries and one was a manually extended version of that gold standard. The extended gold standard included antonyms, misspellings and near-related hyponyms/hypernyms/siblings and was about 20 % bigger. On average around two of the extracted synonym candidates per test word were falsely classified as incorrect because they were not included in the dictionarybased gold standard. Precision, recall and f-score were computed. Test words were either nouns, verbs or adjectives. The f-scores were three to five times higher when using the extended gold standard. The best f-scores were achieved when training data had been lemmatized. POS-tagging improved precision but decreased recall and decreased the number of extractions of misspellings as synonyms. A cosine similarity score threshold 0.5 could be used to increase precision and f-score without substantially decreasing recall.
Detection of hot, metal-enriched outflowing gas around z ≈ 2.3 star-forming galaxies in the Keck Baryonic Structure Survey

We use quasar absorption lines to study the physical conditions in the circumgalactic medium of redshift z ≈ 2.3 star-forming galaxies taken from the Keck Baryonic Structure Survey (KBSS). In Turner et al. (2014) we used the pixel optical depth technique to show that absorption by Hi and the metal ions OvI, Nv, CIv, CIII and SiIv is strongly enhanced within │Δv│≾. 170 km s^(-1) and projected distances │d│≾. 180 proper kpc from sightlines to the background quasars. Here we demonstrate that the OvI absorption is also strongly enhanced at fixed HI, CIv, and SiIv optical depths, and that this enhancement extends out to ~ 350 km s^(-1). At fixed HI the increase in the median OvI optical depth near galaxies is 0.3-0.7 dex and is detected at 2-3-σ confidence for all seven HI bins that have log_(10) T_(HI) ≥ -1.5. We use ionisation models to show that the observed strength of OvI as a function of HI is consistent with enriched, photoionised gas for pixels with T_(HI) ≳ 10. However, for pixels with T_(HI) ≾ 1 this would lead to implausibly high metallicities at low densities if the gas were photoionised by the background radiation. This indicates that the galaxies are surrounded by gas that is sufficiently hot to be collisionally ionised (T > 10^5 K) and that a substantial fraction of the hot gas has a metallicity ≳ 10^(-1) of solar. Given the high metallicity and large velocity extent (out to ~ 1.5 x v_(circ)) of this gas, we conclude that we have detected hot, metal enriched outflows arising from star-forming galaxies.
Increases in cortisol are positively associated with gains in encoding and maintenance working memory performance in young men

Abstract Past studies have demonstrated that increases in cortisol secretion are associated with either enhancements or impairments of long-term memory, depending on the subprocess involved. However, working memory is generally studied as a unified system within the cortisol literature. The present study sought to determine if cortisol increases are positively associated with increases in performance in the encoding subprocess of working memory, and whether increases are positively or negatively associated with performance changes in the maintenance subprocess. Thirty-three young men (M = 19.4 years, SD = 0.89) participated in a change-detection task, consisting of a condition requiring encoding only and a condition requiring both encoding and maintenance. To elicit a cortisol response, participants completed the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) between two administrations of the task. Cardiovascular measurements and saliva samples were obtained before the TSST (T1), and mid-way between blocks of the second administration of the change-detection task (T2), to measure autonomic and cortisol responses to the TSST evident during the second change-detection task. Cortisol increases between T1 and T2 were positively correlated with both encoding (r(32) = 0.503, p = 0.003) and maintenance (r(32) = 0.463, p = 0.007) performance. This is a novel finding as previous studies have shown an impairing effect of cortisol on working memory. The positive relation between cortisol and working memory has likely been obscured in previous tasks, which did not examine these specific subprocesses in isolation from each other. The beneficial role of cortisol in the stress response is discussed.
Differentiating G-inflation from string gas cosmology using the effective field theory approach

A characteristic signature of String Gas Cosmology is primordial power spectra for scalar and tensor modes which are almost scale-invariant but with a red tilt for scalar modes but a blue tilt for tensor modes. This feature, however, can also be realized in the so-called G-inflation model, in which Horndeski operators are introduced which leads to a blue tensor tilt by softly breaking the Null Energy Condition. In this article we search for potential observational differences between these two cosmologies by performing detailed perturbation analyses based on the Effective Field Theory approach. Our results show that, although both two models produce blue tilted tensor perturbations, they behave differently in three aspects. Firstly, String Gas Cosmology predicts a specific consistency relation between the index of the scalar modes ns and that of tensor ones nt, which is hard to be reproduced by G-inflation. Secondly, String Gas Cosmology typically predicts non-Gaussianities which are highly suppressed on observable scales, while G-inflation gives rise to observationally large non-Gaussianities because the kinetic terms in the action become important during inflation. However, after finely tuning the model parameters of G-inflation it is possible to obtain a blue tensor spectrum and negligible non-Gaussianities with a degeneracy between the two models. This degeneracy can be broken by a third observable, namely the scale dependence of the nonlinearity parameter, which vanishes for G-inflation but has a blue tilt in the case of String Gas Cosmology. Therefore, we conclude that String Gas Cosmology is in principle observationally distinguishable from the single field inflationary cosmology, even allowing for modifications such as G-inflation.
Genomic Organization of the Murine G Protein (3 Subunit Genes and Related Processed Pseudogenes

The functional significance of heterotrimeric guanine nucleotide binding protein (G protein) for the many physiological processes including the molecular mechanisms of drug addiction have been described. In investigating the changes of mRNA expression after acute psychostimulant administration, we previously identified a cDNA encoding a G protein pi subunit (Gpi) that was increased up to four-fold in certain brain regions after administration of psychostimulants. The mouse Gpi gene (the mouse genetic symbol, GNB1) was mapped to chromosome 4, but little was known of its genetic features. To characterize the GNB1 gene further, we have cloned and analyzed the genomic structures of the mouse GNB1 gene and its homologous sequences. The GNB1 gene spans at least 50 kb, and consists of 12 exons and 11 introns. The exon/intron boundaries were determined and found to follow the GT/AG rule. Exons 3-11 encode the Gpi protein, and the exon 2 is an alternative, resulting in putative two splicing variants. Although intron 11 is additional for GNB1 compared with GNB2 and GNB3, the intron positions within the protein coding region of GNB1, GNB2 and GNB3 are identical, suggesting that GNB1 should have diverged from the ancestral gene family earlier than the genes for GNB2 and GNB3. We also found the 5′-truncated processed pseudogenes with 71-89% similarities to GNB1 mRNA sequence, suggesting that the truncated cDNA copies, which have been reverse-transcribed from a processed mRNA for GNB1, might have been integrated into several new locations in the mouse genome.
Possible Involvement of Free Radicals in Neuroleptic‐Induced Movement Disorders Evidence from Treatment of Tardive Dyskinesia with Vitamin E

Defined phenomenologically, tardive dyskinesia (TD) is a sign complex characterized by certain types of abnormal movements that are secondary to prolonged use of neuroleptic drugs. ’-5 In recent years, TD has acquired greater importance to practitioners because of its occurrence in almost epidemic proportion and the evidence that its prevalence may be increasing? 4 TD was originally described as a “dyskinesie facio-bucco-lingui-masticatrice” (BLM or orofacial syndrome). * The concept has evolved to include nonrepetitive choreic and choreoathetoid movements of fingers, hands, and feet. It also includes choreoathetoid movements of the legs and trunk. Tardive dystonia6 and tardive akathisia’ may also be related to the TD complex. Tardive dyskinesia must be differentiated from other neurological disorders such as Huntington’s chorea, Sydenham’s chorea, drug-induced chorea, levodopa-induced dyskinesias, and the idiopathic and symptomatic dystonias. History of chronic use of neuroleptics is necessary before a diagnosis of TD can be made.
Room-temperature continuous-wave quantum cascade lasers grown by MOCVD without lateral regrowth

We report on room-temperature continuous-wave (CW) operation of lambda~8.2 mum quantum cascade lasers grown by metal-organic chemical vapor deposition without lateral regrowth. The lasers have been processed as double-channel ridge waveguides with thick electroplated gold. CW output power of 5.3 mW is measured at 300 K with a threshold current density of 2.63 kA/cm2. The measured gain at room temperature is close to the theoretical design, which enables the lasers to overcome the relatively high waveguide loss
Effects of rosuvastatin on subclinical atherosclerosis and arterial stiffness in rheumatoid arthritis: a randomized controlled pilot trial

Objective: To ascertain the effect of rosuvastatin on carotid atherosclerosis and arterial stiffness in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Methods: Fifty RA patients were randomized in a double-blind placebo-controlled trial to receive 10 mg rosuvastatin (n = 24) or placebo (n = 26). Patients were followed prospectively every 3 months for 12 months. Intima–media thickness (IMT), augmentation index (AIx), and subendocardial viability ratio (SEVR) were measured at baseline, 6 and 12 months. Results: Rosuvastatin resulted in statistically significant reductions of total cholesterol (TC), low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), apolipoprotein B (Apo B), and urate levels vs. placebo. However, rosuvastatin had no significant effect on changes in inflammatory markers, including C-reactive protein (CRP) levels [from 2.9 (1.4–11.0) to 3.1 (0.9–13.3) mg/L in the rosuvastatin group compared with from 5.8 (2.6–14.2) to 4.4 (1.2–12.3) mg/L in the placebo group]. Nonetheless, a significant improvement in the Disease Activity Score (DAS) and a reduction in fibrinogen level was observed at 6 and 12 months compared with baseline in the rosuvastatin group. The treatment group exhibited a significant increase in SEVR (from 157 ± 28% to 163 ± 33% in the rosuvastatin group compared with from 143 ± 18% to 143 ± 26% in the placebo group, p = 0.023), but no significant effect was observed in the changes in IMT and AIx. Conclusion: Our data suggest that rosuvastatin has a modest anti-inflammatory effect in RA patients with low disease activity in terms of reduction in DAS and fibrinogen level. Rosuvastastin may also improve subendocardial perfusion and lower the urate level.
Effects of Toluene on Escherichia coli

Jackson, Robert W. (University of California, San Diego, La Jolla), and J. A. DeMoss. Effects of toluene on Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 90:1420–1425. 1965. —When toluene is added at appropriate levels to exponentially growing cultures of Escherichia coli, a time-dependent loss of turbidity is observed which is concurrent with a loss of material to the medium and with unmasking of β-galactosidase. In addition, the galactoside permease system is totally destroyed. Electron micrographs confirm the indications that the cells are not being lysed by toluene, although the cytoplasm collapses to the interior of the cell. Included in the material lost from the cell after toluene treatment is 85% of the total ribonucleic acid (RNA), the principal source of which appears to be the ribosomes. The loss of RNA is temperature-dependent. Protein is also lost to the medium as a function of both temperature and available toluene. Up to 25% of the total protein is found in the medium, the precise amount depending on the level of toluene employed. Zone centrifugation studies of extracts from treated cells indicate that toluene elicits a rapid disaggregation of ribosomes that is terminated, at any stage, by disruption of the cells. The disaggregation is temperature-dependent and does not occur at 4 C. It appears to be distinct from the actual degradation of ribosomal RNA and is accompanied by an accumulation of small particles during the initial phases of treatment at 21 C. Toluene added to crude extracts of normal E. coli cells is unable to cause detectable ribosome destruction.
Genome Analysis Sequence and Comparative Analysis of the Maize NB Mitochondrial Genome 1 [ w ]

Genome Sequencing Center, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri 63108 (S.W.C., P.M., H.S., R.K.W.); University of Utah, Eccles Institute of Genetics, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112 (C.M.-R.F., M.G.); Division of Biological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri 65211 (J.O.A., M.T., S.K., C.T., L.M., K.J.N.); and Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, St. Louis, Missouri 63132 (B.B.)
Dendritic cells in tumor-associated tertiary lymphoid structures license the positive prognostic value of tumor-infiltrating CD 8 + T cells

1 Laboratory Immune Microenvironment and Tumors, INSERM U872, Cordeliers Research Center, Paris, France 2 University Pierre et Marie Curie, UMRS 872, Paris, France 3 University Paris Descartes, UMRS 872, Paris, France 4 Department of Pathology, Hôtel Dieu Hospital, AP-HP, Paris, France 5 Department of Thoracic Surgery, Hôtel Dieu Hospital, AP-HP, Paris, France 6 Department of Pathology, Institut Mutualiste Montsouris, Paris, France 7 Oncology Research, MedImmune LLC, Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA 8 Department of Immunology, European Georges Pompidou Hospital, AP-HP, Paris, France Financial support : This work was supported by the « Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale », the « Fondation ARC pour la recherche sur le cancer »,
Data sources for an environmental quality index: availability, quality, and utility.

OBJECTIVES An environmental quality index (EQI) for all counties in the United States is under development to explore the relationship between environmental insults and human health. The EQI is potentially useful for investigators researching health disparities to account for other concurrent environmental conditions. This article focused on the identification and assessment of data sources used in developing the EQI. Data source strengths, limitations, and utility were addressed. METHODS Five domains were identified that contribute to environmental quality: air, water, land, built, and sociodemographic environments. An inventory of possible data sources was created. Data sources were evaluated for appropriate spatial and temporal coverage and data quality. RESULTS The overall data inventory identified multiple data sources for each domain. From the inventory (187 sources, 617 records), the air, water, land, built environment, and sociodemographic domains retained 2, 9, 7, 4, and 2 data sources for inclusion in the EQI, respectively. However, differences in data quality, geographic coverage, and data availability existed between the domains. CONCLUSIONS The data sources identified for use in the EQI may be useful to researchers, advocates, and communities to explore specific environmental quality questions.
Primary and salvage (hypo)pharyngectomy: Analysis and outcome

Surgery for squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) arising or extending to the hypopharynx is generally reserved for advanced disease or salvage. The prognosis of patients requiring pharyngectomy is poor, and the perioperative morbidity is significant. The aim of the present study is to describe the disease‐related and treatment‐related outcomes of patients undergoing primary and salvage pharyngectomy for cancer of the hypopharynx and larynx over a 10‐year period from a single institution.
Enhancing the Quality of Antibodies to HIV-1 Envelope by GagPol-Specific Th Cells

The importance of Fc-dependent effector functions of Abs induced by vaccination is increasingly recognized. However, vaccination of mice against HIV envelope (Env) induced a skewed Th cell response leading to Env-specific Abs with reduced effector function. To overcome this bias, GagPol-specific Th cells were harnessed to provide intrastructural help for Env-specific B cells after immunization with virus-like particles containing GagPol and Env. This led to a balanced Env-specific humoral immune response with a more inflammatory Fc glycan profile. The increased quality in the Ab response against Env was confirmed by FcγR activation assays. Because the Env-specific Th cell response was also biased in human vaccinees, intrastructural help is an attractive novel approach to increase the efficacy of prophylactic HIV Env-based vaccines and may also be applicable to other particulate vaccines.
Torus palatinus. Report of two cases

Hyperostosis is defined as a benign neoformation of bone tissue, diffused or localized hypertrophy thereof. In the oral cavity can affect the lingual surface of the mandibular bone (torus mandibularis), the hard palate (torus palatinus) or presented as multiple exostosis [1]. The latin word torus means tumor or circular protrusion and is not considered as a pathological condition, but an anatomical variation. The term torus is introduced by Kupfer and Besselhagen in 1879, and is used to designate the exostosis arising on the midline of the palate and the back and inside of the jaw [2].