Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Antioxidant activities of different wild bitter gourd (Momordica charantia l. var. abbreviata seringe) cultivars

Antioxidant activity assays were conducted using water (H) and methanolic (M) extracts of sixteen cultivars from indigenous wild bitter gourd (Momordica charantia L. var. abbreviata Seringe, MCA) in Taiwan. The scavenging activities against 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and hydroxyl radicals were different among MCA cultivars and the concentrations of 50% scavenging activity (IC50) for the effective cultivar was 181 μg/mL (H) and 246 μg/mL (M) in the former extract and 148 μg/mL (H) and 37 μg/mL (M) in the latter. For inhibitory activities against Cu(superscript 2+)-induced low-density-lipoprotein peroxidation, most MCA cultivars at 4000 μg/mL (especially for M extracts) showed protective activities and were equivalent to 0.8 mM Trolox by thiobarbituric acid reactive substance assays. These useful data may help promote the use and further research of MCA as an antioxidant in the health food industry.
Control of phloem unloading by action potentials in Mimosa

In the sensitive plant, Mimosa pudica, action potentials arise when the leaves are touched and they trigger a sudden decrease in turgor of the pulvinar motor cells, which causes the leaf to close. These potentials may travel through the phloem and they appear to influence pulvinar phloem unloading after stimulation. Mature leaves were exposed to 14CO2 and phloem translocation was observed by autoradiography. In unstimulated pulvini, labeled photoassimilates were restricted to the phloem. However, after stimulation, the 14C-label appeared to be concentrated in the extensor region of the motor cortex. Since stimulation elicits an action potential, it is suggested that it also triggers phloem unloading of sucrose in the pulvini.
Students’ Motivation for Learning in Virtual Learning Environments

The specific characteristics of online education require of the student engagement and autonomy, factors which are related to motivation for learning. This study investigated students’ motivation in virtual learning environments (VLEs). For this, it used the Teaching and Learning Strategy and Motivation to Learn Scale in Virtual Learning Environments (TLSM-VLE). The scale presented 32 items and six dimensions, three of which aimed to measure the variables of autonomous motivation, controlled motivation, and demotivation. The participants were 572 students from the Brazilian state of Parana, enrolled on higher education courses on a continuous education course. The results revealed significant rates for autonomous motivational behavior. It is considered that the results obtained may provide contributions for the educators and psychologists who work with VLEs, leading to further studies of the area providing information referent to the issue investigated in this study.
Factors Associated With Non-compliance with Spectacle Wear in an Adult Nigerian Population

This study aims to determine the degree of compliance of patients with spectacle wear and the factors associated with non-compliance. A total number of one hundred patients were selected and interviewed by the author for correspondence and two assistants. With the aid of semi-structured questionnaires, the information sought after collecting bio-data, included respondents’ duration of spectacle correction and how often they wore their pair of spectacles. Those who wore their pair of spectacles at all times for the intended purpose for which the glass was prescribed such as distance vision, near (reading) vision, or both, were regarded as using it “always”. Those who wore theirs to a lesser degree but for more than 50% of times were regarded as using it “often”. The “occasional” wearers were those who used it for less than 50% of the times. Each respondent was also asked to identify the possible factors associated with non-compliance with spectacle wear. Majority (71%) used their spectacle occasionally while the remaining few (29%) used it often. The reasons cited for not complying with spectacle correction were lack of felt need (58%), spectacle intolerance (28%) and ignorance (14%). Majority of respondents wore their glasses only occasionally. The reasons for not complying fully with spectacle correction were lack of felt need which might have cultural underpinnings, spectacle intolerance, and ignorance of the attendant dangers of not seeing clearly while not wearing their pairs of glasses. Appropriate health education and improvement in optical infrastructures will assist in remedying the poor compliance culture with the wearing of glasses in Nigeria.
POLYSACCHARIDES AND GLYCEROL PRODUCTION BY NON- SACCHAROMYCES WINE YEASTS IN MIXED FERMENTATION

A great variability in the amount of polysaccharides recovered at the end of fermentations carried out by pure cultures of 89 non-Saccharomyces yeasts was observed. The utilization of fifteen non-Saccharomyces strains in mixed cultures with S. cerevisiae resulted in considerable increases in the final concentration of polysaccharides and showed a strain dependent effect on glycerol production as compared to pure culture of S. cerevisiae. Thus, selected non-Saccharomyces yeasts may positively interact with S. cerevisiae, and represent potential and innovative tools to increase wine complexity. Literature cited Ciani M. , Ferraro L. 1996 Enhanced glycerol content in wines made with immobilized Candida stellata cells. App.l Environ. Microbiol. , 62, 128–132. Ciani M. , Comitini F. , Mannazzu I. , Domizio P. – 2010 Controlled mixed culture fermentation: a new perspective on the use of non-Saccharomyces yeasts in winemaking. FEMS Yeast Res., 10, 123–133. Domizio P., Romani C. , Comitini F. , Gobbi M. , Lencioni L. , Mannazzu I. , Ciani M. 2010 Potential spoilage non-Saccharomyces yeasts in mixed cultures with S. cerevisiae. Ann. Microbiol. , DOI 10.1007/s13213-010-0125-1. Esteve-Zarzoso B. , Manzanares P., Ramon D. , Querol A. 1998 The role of nonSaccharomyces yeasts in industrial winemaking. Internat. Microbiol. , 1, 143–148. Esteve-Zarzoso B. , Belloch C. , Uruburu F. , Querol A. – 1999 Identification of yeasts by RFLP analysis of the 5.8S rRNA gene and the two ribosomal internal transcribed spacers. Int. J. Syst. Bacteriol. , 49, 329–337. Feuillat M. 2003 Yeast macromolecules: origin, composition, and enological interest. Am. J. Enol. Vitic. , 54, 211-213. Romano P., Suzzi G. , Domizio P., Fatichenti F. – 1997 Glycerol and other fermentation products of apiculate wine yeasts. J. Appl. Microbiol. , 82, 615-618. Rosi I. , Vinella M. , Domizio P. 1994 Characterization of β-glucosidase activity in yeasts of oenological origin. J. Appl. Bacteriol. , 77, 519-527.
A Posteriori Error Estimates for Surface Finite Element Methods

OF DISSERTATION A POSTERIORI ERROR ESTIMATES FOR SURFACE FINITE ELEMENT METHODS Problems involving the solution of partial differential equations over surfaces appear in many engineering and scientific applications. Some of those applications include crystal growth, fluid mechanics and computer graphics. Many times analytic solutions to such problems are not available. Numerical algorithms, such as Finite Element Methods, are used in practice to find approximate solutions in those cases. In this work we present L and pointwise a posteriori error estimates for Adaptive Surface Finite Elements solving the Laplace-Beltrami equation −△Γu = f . The two sources of errors for Surface Finite Elements are a Galerkin error, and a geometric error that comes from replacing the original surface by a computational mesh. A posteriori error estimates on flat domains only have a Galerkin component. We use residual type error estimators to measure the Galerkin error. The geometric component of our error estimate becomes zero if we consider flat domains, but otherwise has the same order as the residual one. This is different from the available energy norm based error estimates on surfaces, where the importance of the geometric components diminishes asymptotically as the mesh is refined. We use our results to implement an Adaptive Surface Finite Element Method. An important tool for proving a posteriori error bounds for non smooth functions is the Scott-Zhang interpolant. A refined version of a standard Scott-Zhang interpolation bound is also proved during our analysis. This local version only requires the interpolated function to be in a Sobolev space defined over an element T instead of an element patch containing T . In the last section we extend our elliptic results to get estimates for the surface heat equation ut −△Γu = f using the elliptic reconstruction technique.
Clinical significance of miRNA21 in exhaled breath condensate of non-small-cell lung cancer

Background: Lung cancer has the highest morbidity and mortality rates among all malignant tumours; as such, tumour markers associated with the development and progression of lung cancer must be investigated. This study aims to investigate the clinical significance of miRNA21 in exhaled breath condensate (EBC) of patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Methods: EBC samples were collected from 30 patients with NSCLC and 30 healthy volunteers by using an EBC collector. The expression levels of EBC and serum miRNA21 were detected. Results: The miRNA21 levels in the serum and EBC in the NSCLC group were higher than those in the healthy groups. The miRNA21 levels in the serum and EBC in stage III NSCLC group were considerably higher than those in stages I and II. In addition, EBC and serum miRNA-21 levels in patients with NSCLC and lymph node metastasis were significantly higher (P < 0.01) than those without lymph node metastasis. Analysis of receiver operating characteristic curve showed that the area under the curve (AUC) for EBC was 0.851, with 76.7% sensitivity and 83.3% specificity. Moreover, the AUC for serum was 0.858, with 86.7% sensitivity and 73.3% specificity. Conclusion: Detection of miRNA21 in EBC, instead in serum, can improve the diagnosis, progression monitoring and prognosis of NSCLC.
LEMNA: Explaining Deep Learning based Security Applications

While deep learning has shown a great potential in various domains, the lack of transparency has limited its application in security or safety-critical areas. Existing research has attempted to develop explanation techniques to provide interpretable explanations for each classification decision. Unfortunately, current methods are optimized for non-security tasks ( e.g., image analysis). Their key assumptions are often violated in security applications, leading to a poor explanation fidelity. In this paper, we propose LEMNA, a high-fidelity explanation method dedicated for security applications. Given an input data sample, LEMNA generates a small set of interpretable features to explain how the input sample is classified. The core idea is to approximate a local area of the complex deep learning decision boundary using a simple interpretable model. The local interpretable model is specially designed to (1) handle feature dependency to better work with security applications ( e.g., binary code analysis); and (2) handle nonlinear local boundaries to boost explanation fidelity. We evaluate our system using two popular deep learning applications in security (a malware classifier, and a function start detector for binary reverse-engineering). Extensive evaluations show that LEMNA's explanation has a much higher fidelity level compared to existing methods. In addition, we demonstrate practical use cases of LEMNA to help machine learning developers to validate model behavior, troubleshoot classification errors, and automatically patch the errors of the target models.
The dynamic relationship between Financial Development and the Energy Demand in North Cyprus: Evidence from ARDL Bounds and Combine Cointegration Tests

This paper investigates the dynamic relationship between financial development, energy demands, economic growth and total trade with the ARDL Bounds and Combined cointegration approaches in North Cyprus for the period of 1977Q1 – 2016Q4. The empirical results provide evidences for the long-run and short-run relationship between the concern variables. All the techniques such as cointegration and innovation accounting method supporting the relationship between variables. Positive innovation in GDP is connected with increase in financial development and energy demands. Energy demands response positively for the shocks from GDP and Financial development, and financial development responses just only GDP and itself.
Correlations between South African Red Grape and Wine Colour and Phenolic Composition: Comparing the Glories, Iland and Bovine Serum Albumin Tannin Precipitation Methods

Phenolic compounds in red grapes might give an indication of phenolic and colour compositions of the resulting wine. This work compared the Glories, Iland and Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) tannin precipitation methods for phenolic characterization of South African Pinotage, Merlot, Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvignon red grape samples (n=31). Significant positive correlations were found for certain phenolic characteristics in the grapes measured by these methods. Levels of phenolic compounds in the grapes and correlating wines were in line with literature. Merlot samples often associated more with higher concentrations of seed tannins, which were also reflected in the wines. Significant correlations were also found with the colour characteristics of the resulting wines and some anthocyanin related measurements in the grapes with the Glories and Iland methods, with the latter correlating slightly better. Significant positive correlations were also found between grape and wine tannins as measured with the BSA method. However, malolactic fermentation changed some of these correlations and this needs to be investigated further. This work might give wine producers as well as wine analyses laboratories valuable information regarding the suitability of these methods to characterize the phenolic composition of South African red grapes and their resulting wines.
The Impact of Chinese Language Lessons in a Virtual World on University Students' Self-Efficacy Beliefs.

It was found in the two-year study reported in this article that a single collaborative language lesson using Second Life can result in a statistically significant increase in student self-efficacy beliefs across a range of specific and general language skills. However, students with different 'real life' prior experience varied in the durability of their language performance beliefs over time. A between-group analysis revealed differences in the pre- and post-tests, which is explained by the specificity of the curriculum - that is, the curriculum within the Second Life environment, and not just the environment itself, has a significant impact on student beliefs. This helps to dispel some critics' concerns about the pedagogical value of these environments. However, a within-group analysis revealed that students with infrequent experience of the 'real life' language context increased in their beliefs, while students with frequent experiences had similar initial responses to the other students, but were more varied in their responses over time. It is proposed that these variations over time are a result of an interaction between the domain specificity of the curriculum and authenticity, or in other words, salience of the enactive mastery experiences in Second Life with that of 'real life'.
Metabolic Response of the Two Marine Unicellular Algae Chlorella salina and Dunaliella bardawil to Toxicity of the Antifouling Agent Irgarol 1051

Toxic pollutants are metabolic poisons that can seriously injure or destroy the photosynthetic organisms upon which the food chain depends. Since microalgae play a key role in marine ecosystems, marine microalgae are proposed as excellent bio-indicators of pollution due to their high sensitivity, which can give warning of the toxic effects of chemicals sooner than any other species. The aim of this work concentrated on the effect of different concentrations of the antifouling biocide (Irgarol 1051) on growth and chlorophylls content (as an essential metabolite) of the two marine unicellular green algae Chlorella salina and Dunaliella bardawil that usually used in fish feeding. The growth of the wall-less Dunaliella bardawil was more sensitive to Irgarol 1051 than the walled cells Chlorella salina, although the concentrations used were greatly different. The product of photosynthesis in the two algal species greatly affected since in the presence of Irgarol 1051, a serious destructive effect was observed. The cell wall appeared to play a significant role in protecting the organism against toxicity of the antifouling agent either by adsorption or degradation. The strength of toxicity depends mainly on the concentration of the antifouling agent, the length of culturing period and the type of organism tested.
Corporate Social Responsibility and Firm Performance : Field Experimental Evidence on the Role of Employee Salary Requirements and Productivity

Whether and how corporate social responsibility (CSR) adds value to the firm remain topics of considerable debate. Much focus has been placed on external stakeholders as channels through which CSR contributes to firm value. This paper focuses on an internal stakeholder the employee as a channel through which CSR adds value to the firm, and demonstrates that this is achieved by two mechanisms: reducing employee salary requirements and increasing employee performance. Using two field experiments implemented in online labor marketplaces where workers were hired, the employer’s CSR was randomly assigned, and workers’ payment requirements and output was subsequently observed, this paper provides causal evidence of these mechanisms. In addition, higher performing workers were willing to give up higher wages to work with a socially responsible firm; this has further implications for the mechanisms through which CSR adds value and for the types of firms that most benefit.
Influence of Agroclimatic Indices on Morphological and Growth Attributes of Maize (Zea mays L.)

A range of climatic factors affect the crop growth and development. Temperature is the most important among all environmental factors that influences rate of plant growth. Grain yield of corn differs considerably across the growing areas even when soil fertility and moisture supply are near optimal. Reasons for such variation might be differences in sun shine hours or temperature etc. Temperature influences both timing and duration of the each phenophase. Excess of radiation and high temperatures are often the most limiting factors affecting plant growth and final crop yield. High temperatures can cause considerable preand post-harvest damages, including scorching of leaves and twigs, sunburns on leaves, branches and stems, leaf senescence and abscission, shoot and root growth inhibition, fruit discoloration and damage, and reduced yield. High-temperatureinduced modifications in plants may be direct as on existing physiological processes or indirect in altering the pattern of development. These responses may differ from one International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 7 Number 06 (2018) Journal homepage: http://www.ijcmas. com
The Role of Symmetry in the Recognition of Faces at Novel Orientations

Bilaterally-symmetric objects such as faces are easily recognized from an orientation that is symmetric with respect to the original view. In three experiments we investigate how these effects can be incorporated into extant exemplar-based models of object recognition and identification. Previous explanations based on the creation of novel exemplars in memory to represent the symmetric view are shown to be insufficient, but a model based on selective attention is proposed that can account for the effects of symmetry. This model assumes that mechanisms that recognize symmetry create a separate dimension in memory that makes symmetric orientation views more similar to each other than would otherwise be expected on the basis of their angular difference. Selective attention places more or less weight on this dimension depending on task demands. In a third experiment we investigate the sources of information that may underlie the symmetry mechanisms that create this new dimension, and conclude that the information used to recognize the symmetric orientation view is not limited to image-based information, but appears to include three-dimensional shape information that is revealed by smooth rotation of the head. The results demonstrate the nature of the perceptual mechanisms that recognize symmetric orientation views and describe how these mechanisms alter the representation of the images in memory.
D-trace Precision Matrix Estimation Using Adaptive Lasso Penalties

An accurate estimation of a precision matrix has a crucial role in the current age of high-dimensional data explosion. To deal with this problem, one of the prominent and commonly used techniques is the l1 norm (Lasso) penalization for a given loss function. This approach guarantees the sparsity of the precision matrix estimator for properly selected penalty parameters. However, the l1 norm penalization often fails to control the bias of the obtained estimator because of its overestimation behavior. In this paper, we introduce two adaptive extensions of the recently proposed l1 norm penalized D-trace loss minimization method. The proposed approaches intend to diminish the produced bias in the estimator. Extensive numerical results, using both simulated and real datasets, show the advantage of our proposed estimators.
Unified Statistical Theory of Spectral Graph Analysis

The goal of this paper is to show that there exists a simple, yet universal statistical logic of spectral graph analysis by recasting it into a nonparametric function estimation problem. The prescribed viewpoint appears to be good enough to accommodate most of the existing spectral graph techniques as a consequence of just one single formalism and algorithm.
Anticonvulsant and depressant activities of the seed extracts of Adnanthera parvonina.

In the present study, we have examined the central nervous system activities of the methanol extract of the seed of Adenanthera parvonina (MESAP). The central nervous system activities were evaluated in the picrotoxin (PCT)-, pentylenetetrazole (PTZ)-, strychnine (STC)-induced convulsions and phenobarbitone (PBT)-induced sleep in mice. Diazepam and chlorpromazine were used as reference anticonvulsant and sedative drugs for comparison respectively. Like the reference anticonvulsant and sedative agents used, MESAP (50-200 mg/kg) protected mice against PCTand PTZinduced seizures and prolonged phenobarbitone-induced sleeping time dosedependently. It would appear that seed extract of A. parvonina produces its anticonvulsant activity by enhancing GABAergic neurotransmission or facilitating GABAergic action and/or prevention of cell membrane destabilization in the brain. In general, the average onset of convulsion was delayed, while the average duration of convulsion was markedly reduced. The seed’s extract also depressed the central nervous system (CNS) activity by prolonging the phenobarbitone (PBT)-induced sleeping time in mice. It is, therefore, thought that the anticonvulsant property of the herb may be linked at least in part, to its ability to depress the CNS activity. However, the results of this experimental animal study revealed the anticonvulsant and depressant activities of A. parvonina.