Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Evolution of Sex-Biased Gene Expression and Dosage Compensation in the Eye and Brain of Heliconius Butterflies

Differences in behavior and life history traits between females and males are the basis of divergent selective pressures between sexes. It has been suggested that a way for the two sexes to deal with different life history requirements is through sex-biased gene expression. In this study, we performed a comparative sex-biased gene expression analysis of the combined eye and brain transcriptome from five Heliconius species, H. charithonia, H. sara, H. erato, H. melpomene and H. doris, representing five of the main clades from the Heliconius phylogeny. We found that the degree of sexual dimorphism in gene expression is not conserved across Heliconius. Most of the sex-biased genes identified in each species are not sex-biased in any other, suggesting that sexual selection might have driven sexually dimorphic gene expression. Only three genes shared sex-biased expression across multiple species: ultraviolet opsin UVRh1 and orthologs of Drosophila Krüppel-homolog 1 and CG9492. We also observed that in some species female-biased genes have higher evolutionary rates, but in others, male-biased genes show the fastest rates when compared with unbiased genes, suggesting that selective forces driving sex-biased gene evolution in Heliconius act in a sex- and species-specific manner. Furthermore, we found dosage compensation in all the Heliconius tested, providing additional evidence for the conservation of dosage compensation across Lepidoptera. Finally, sex-biased genes are significantly enriched on the Z, a pattern that could be a result of sexually antagonistic selection.
A Framework for Assessing Renewable Integration Limits With Respect to Frequency Performance

The increasing penetration of nonsynchronous renewable energy sources (NS-RES) and demand side-technologies alter the dynamic characteristics, and particularly, the frequency behavior of a power system. Given this, we propose a framework for assessing renewable integration limits concerning power system frequency performance using a time-series scenario based approach. By considering a large number of future scenarios and their sensitivities with respect to different parameters, we can identify maximum nonsynchronous instantaneous penetration limits for a wide range of possible scenarios. Further, we derive a dynamic inertia constraint and incorporate it into the market dispatch model to reduce the detrimental impacts of high NS-RES penetration on the frequency performance. The results using the Australian future grid as a test case show that such an explicit inertia constraint ensures power system frequency stability for all credible contingencies. To improve the frequency performance, we assess and quantify the contribution of a wide range of technologies, including synchronous condensers, synthetic inertia from wind farms and a governor-like response from de-loaded wind farms. The results show that the last option is the most effective one.
Therapeutic angiogenesis following intramuscular gene transfer of vascular endothelialgrowth factor 121 in a dog model of hindlimb ischemia

Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), an endothelial cell-specific mitogen, has been shown to promote therapeutic angiogenesis in animal models of critical limb ischemia. Ischemic skeletal muscle is advantageous for taking up and expressing foreign genes transferred as naked plasmid DNA. Accordingly, we investigated the hypothesis that intramuscular administration of naked plasmid DNA encoding the 121-amino acid isoform of VEGF could augment collateral development and tissue perfusion in a dog hindlimb ischemia model. Unilateral hindlimb ischemia was surgically induced in Beagle dogs. Ten days later, animals received intramuscular injections of pVEGF 121 plasmid directly in the ischemic muscles. Angiogenic effects were evaluated by angiography, calf blood pressure ratio and vasomotor reserve analyses. Thirty days after gene transfer, angiographically recognizable collateral vessels were increased in pVEGF 121 -treated animals compared with controls. Improvement in perfusion to the ischemic limb was documented by a significantly higher calf blood pressure ratio for pVEGF 121 (0.79 ± 0.05) versus controls (0.56 ± 0.14, P 121 -treated animals. Hematological variables showed no significant modification due to the treatment. Our results suggest that intramuscular gene transfer of VEGF 121 may promote therapeutic angiogenesis in critical limb vascular insufficiency.
Syddansk Universitet Endovascular thrombectomy and post-procedural headache

Background: We investigated the prevalence of post-procedural headache in patients who have undergone thrombectomy for ischemic stroke, and correlated history of migraine with risk of peri-procedural complications. A total of 314 patients underwent thrombectomy at the Danish National Hospital from January 2012 to December 2014. Eligible subjects were phone-interviewed using a purpose-developed semi-structured questionnaire according to the International Classification of Headache Disorders 3, beta version criteria. Findings: Among 96 eligible subjects, there was a significant decrease in migraine (p = 0.022) within the first 3 months after EVT compared to 1 year before treatment, which was further evident at interview time (on average 1.6 years after EVT, p = 0.013). A minority of patients experienced headaches for the first time within 3 months of their EVT (migraine 2, TTH 9), which persisted at interview time for subjects with migraine. Out of 12 subjects with peri-procedural complications, 2 had a history of migraine with aura. Conclusion: Thrombectomy leads to a significant decrease in previously known migraine, and new onset of headache in a small subset of patients. A history of migraine does not appear to predispose to peri-procedural complications.
Microbiology, sensory evaluation and shelf life of irradiated chicken breast fillets stored in air or vacuum

This work investigated the effects of different packaging methods (air and vacuum) combined with irradiation (0.0, 2.0 and 3.0 kGy) on the preservation of chicken breast fillets stored at 1oC for up to 18 days by sensorial test, determination of pH and bacterial growth. The findings indicated that the post-irradiation lag phase increased with the dose, leading to an extension in shelf-life. Vacuum-packed samples irradiated at 3.0 kGy exhibited the longest shelf life. Among the analyzed bacteria, coliforms and Listeria spp. were most sensitive to gamma radiation. All the fillets acquired more attractive coloration and better overall impression with irradiation. The combined use of vacuum packaging and irradiation (3.0 kGy) reduced the microbial populations without causing change in pH and yielded a significant shelf-life extension of refrigerated fillets, besides improving its appearance.
Appliance-level Short-Term Load Forecasting using Deep Neural Networks

The recently employed demand-response (DR) model enabled by the transformation of the traditional power grid to the SmartGrid (SG) allows energy providers to have a clearer understanding of the energy utilisation of each individual household within their administrative domain. Nonetheless, the rapid growth of IoT-based domestic appliances within each household in conjunction with the varying and hard-to-predict customer-specific energy requirements is regarded as a challenge with respect to accurately profiling and forecasting the day-to-day or week-to-week appliance-level power consumption demand. Such a forecast is considered essential in order to compose a granular and accurate aggregate-level power consumption forecast for a given household, identify faulty appliances, and assess potential security and resilience issues both from an end-user as well as from an energy provider perspective. Therefore, in this paper we investigate techniques that enable this and propose the applicability of Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) for short-term appliance-level power profiling and forecasting. We demonstrate their superiority over the past heavily used Support Vector Machines (SVMs) in terms of prediction accuracy and computational performance with experiments conducted over real appliance-level dataset gathered in four residential households.
Patterns of Fundus Autofluorescence Lifetimes In Eyes of Individuals With Nonexudative Age-Related Macular Degeneration

Purpose To investigate fundus autofluorescence (FAF) lifetimes in patients with nonexudative AMD. Methods A total of 150 eyes of 110 patients (mean age: 73.2 ± 10.7 years) with nonexudative AMD, as well as a healthy group of 57 eyes in 38 subjects (mean age: 66.5 ± 8.7 years), were included. Investigations were conducted at the University Eye Clinic in Jena, Germany, as well as the Moran Eye Center in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, using the Heidelberg Engineering Spectralis-based fluorescence lifetime imaging ophthalmoscope (FLIO). A 30° retinal field centered at the fovea was investigated. FAF decays were detected in short (498–560 nm) and long (560–720 nm, LSC) spectral channels. The mean fluorescence lifetimes (τm) were calculated. Optical coherence tomography scans and fundus photographs were also recorded. Results In patients with nonexudative AMD, FLIO shows a ring-shaped pattern of prolonged τm in the LSC. This pattern occurs in all patients with AMD (including very early stages) and in one-third of the healthy controls. FAF lifetimes were longer with more advanced stages. The presence of drusen is associated with prolonged τm when compared with the healthy fundus, but drusen identification is difficult with FLIO only. Conclusions FLIO detects a clear pattern of changes within the fundus, which appears to be AMD-associated. These changes are already visible in early AMD stages and not masked by the presence of other coexisting retinal diseases. These findings may be useful for the early diagnosis of AMD and to distinguish AMD from other retinal diseases.
Skin-to-epidural distance in the Southeast Asian paediatric population: multiethnic morphometrics and international comparisons.

INTRODUCTION Paediatric epidurals can present technical challenges due to wide variations in age and weight among children, ranging from neonates to teenagers. This study evaluated the skin-to-epidural distance in the thoracic and lumbar regions to determine the relationship between age, weight and ethnicity and depth to the epidural space in our Singapore paediatric population. METHODS Data from the Acute Pain Service was prospectively collected over 16 years. Details included patient demographics, level of epidural performed and distance from skin to epidural space. Multivariable regression analysis was performed to determine the association of weight, age, ethnicity and gender with the depths to the thoracic and lumbar epidural spaces. A simple linear regression was calculated to predict the depth to both thoracic and lumbar epidural spaces based on body weight. Equations were formulated to describe the relationship between weight and depth of epidural space. RESULTS A total of 616 midline epidurals were studied. Regression analysis was performed for 225 thoracic epidurals and 363 lumbar epidurals. Our study revealed a clear correlation between skin-to-lumbar epidural distance and weight in children. The best correlation was demonstrated between skin-to-lumbar epidural distance and body weight (R2 = 0.729). This relationship was described by the formula: depth (mm) = (0.63 × weight [kg]) + 9.2. CONCLUSION Skin-to-lumbar epidural distance correlated with weight in children. Our results highlighted the clinical significance of differences between Southeast Asian paediatric populations when compared to other populations.
Learning to live with ticks? The role of exposure and risk perceptions in protective behaviour against tick-borne diseases

The purpose of this study is to analyse the role of risk perceptions and exposure for protective behaviour against tick bites and the related diseases Lyme borreliosis (LB) and tick-borne encephalitis (TBE), both of which are growing health concerns. We use data from a national survey in Sweden with respondents in geographical areas with substantial differences in both abundance of ticks and incidence of LB and TBE. We find that the share of respondents who frequently use protective clothing (64%), perform tick checks (63%) or avoid tall grass while in areas with ticks (48%) is relatively high. However, the use of protective measures is uneven and a considerably lower share tuck their trousers into their socks (18%), use repellent against ticks (16%) or use a combination of protective measures. Thirty-one per cent of the respondents report one or more tick bites in the last year and 68% report one or more lifetime tick bites, indicating that it is difficult to protect oneself from tick bites. There is a strong positive association between exposure and checking the skin for ticks, but exposure is only weakly associated with other protective measures. Tick bites are perceived as a serious health risk by as many as 43% of the respondents. The perception that a single tick bite is serious is negatively associated with actual exposure to ticks, while the opposite is true for the perception that tick bites constitute a serious lifetime health risk. This indicates a learning effect in relation to risk perceptions and the performance of tick checks, but not in relation to other protective measures. Recommendations include informing people of the risks associated with tick bites, the efficacy of various protective measures and the importance of combining multiple types of protection. Given the high exposure to tick bites, the growing incidence of TBE and LB, and the difficulties in preventing tick bites, other preventive measures should be further discussed, including vaccination programmes.
On spatial attention and its field size on the repulsion effect

We investigated the attentional repulsion effect—stimuli appear displaced further away from attended locations—in three experiments: one with exogenous (involuntary) attention, and two with endogenous (voluntary) attention with different attention-field sizes. It has been proposed that differences in attention-field size can account for qualitative differences in neural responses elicited by attended stimuli. We used psychophysical comparative judgments and manipulated either exogenous attention via peripheral cues or endogenous attention via central cues and a demanding rapid serial visual presentation task. We manipulated the attention field size of endogenous attention by presenting streams of letters at two specific locations or at two of many possible locations during each block. We found a robust attentional repulsion effect in all three experiments: with endogenous and exogenous attention and with both attention-field sizes. These findings advance our understanding of the influence of spatial attention on the perception of visual space and help relate this repulsion effect to possible neurophysiological correlates.
A Longitudinal Study of Road Traffic Noise and Body Mass Index Trajectories from Birth to 8 Years

Background: Being overweight constitutes a health risk, and the proportion of overweight and obese children is increasing. It has been argued that road traffic noise could be linked to adiposity through its influence on sleep and stress. Few studies, to our knowledge, have investigated whether noise and adiposity are associated. Most of them were on adults, and we are not aware of any longitudinal study using repeated measures. Objectives: The present longitudinal study investigated whether road traffic noise exposures in pregnancy (N = 6,963; obs = 22,975) or childhood (N = 6,403; obs = 14,585) were associated with body mass index (BMI) trajectories in children. Methods: We obtained information on BMI and covariates from questionnaires used in the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study, Statistics Norway, and Medical Birth Registry of Norway. We modeled road traffic noise for the most exposed façade of children’s present and historical addresses at 6 time points from pregnancy to age 8. We investigated effects on BMI trajectories using repeated measures and linear mixed models. Results: The results indicated that BMI curves depended on road traffic noise exposure during pregnancy, but not on exposure during childhood. Children in the highest decile of traffic noise exposure had increased BMI, with 0.35 kg/m2 more than children in the lowest decile, from birth to age 8 years. Conclusions: The results indicate that exposure to road traffic noise during pregnancy may be associated with children’s BMI trajectories. Future studies should investigate this further, using anthropometric measures such as waist-hip ratio and skinfold thickness, in addition to BMI.
Affinity Maturation Drives Epitope Spreading and Generation of Proinflammatory Anti–Citrullinated Protein Antibodies in Rheumatoid Arthritis

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is characterized by the presence of anti–citrullinated protein antibodies (ACPAs); nevertheless, the origin, specificity, and functional properties of ACPAs remain poorly understood. The aim of this study was to characterize the evolution of ACPAs by sequencing the plasmablast antibody repertoire at serial time points in patients with established RA.
Research on software testing techniques and software automation testing tools

Software Testing is a process, which involves, executing of a software program/application and finding all errors or bugs in that program/application so that the result will be a defect-free software. Quality of any software can only be known through means of testing (software testing). Through the advancement of technology around the world, there increased the number of verification techniques and methods to test the software before it goes to production and off course to market. Automation Testing has made its impact in the testing process. Now-a-days, most of the software testing is done with the automation tools which not only lessens the number of people working around that software but also the errors that can be escaped through the eyes of the tester. Automation testing contains test cases which makes the work easy to capture different scenarios and store them. Therefore, software automation testing process plays a vital role in the software testing success. This study aims in knowing different types of software testing, software testing techniques and tools and to compare manual testing versus automation testing.
Binary Gabor pattern feature extraction technique for hardwood species classification

This paper presents a binary Gabor pattern (BGP) feature extraction technique to acquire significant texture features of microscopic images of hardwood species and later these feature are used to discriminate the hardwood species into 75 different categories. The usefulness of the BGP feature extraction technique has been examined with the help of three classifiers, namely, linear support vector machine (LSVM), radial basis function support vector machine (RBFSVM) and random forest (RF) classification algorithms. Further, the performance of the BGP feature extraction technique for hardwood species classification has been evaluated against several texture feature techniques. The comparison of the results obtained by the feature extraction techniques recommends that BGP feature extraction technique has been better for microscopic images of hardwood species classification than the other feature extraction techniques.
Improving the Quality of Point of Care Diagnostics with Real-Time Machine Learning in Low Literacy LMIC Settings

The scalability of medical technology in low resource settings requires a higher level of usability and clear decision support compared to conventional devices, since users often have very limited training. In particular, it is important to provide users with real time feedback on data quality during the patient information acquisition in a manner that enables the user to take immediate corrective action. In this work, we present an example of such a system, which provides real time feedback on the source of noise and interference on a low cost Doppler device connected to a smart-phone used by traditional birth attendants (TBAs) in rural Guatemala. A total of 195 fetal recordings made from 146 singleton pregnancies in the second and third trimester were recorded over 8 months by 19 TBAs. The resulting 33.7 hours of data were segmented into 0.75 s epochs and independently labeled by three trained researchers into one of five noise or quality categories that dominated the data. A two-step classifier, composed of a logistic regression and a multiclass support vector machine, was then trained to classify the data on epochs from 0.75 s to 3.75 s. After feature selection the highest micro-averaged test F1 score was 96.8% and macro-average F1 test score was 94.5% for 3.75 s segments using 23 features. A reduced real time model with 17 features produced comparable micro-and macro-averaged test F1 scores of 96.0% and 94.5% respectively. The code is portable back to a low-end smartphone to run on such a device in real time (under 400 ms) in order to provide an audiovisual cue for the TBAs via the smartphone. Future work will evaluate the classifier presented here as part of a decision support system for data quality improvement in an ongoing randomized control trial in Guatemala.
Comparison of the Properties of Halloumi Cheese Made from Goat Milk, Cow Milk and Their Mixture

The purpose of this study is to compare the physico-chemical, microbiological and rheological properties of among Halloumi cheese made from 100% goat's milk (T1), 50% cow's milk and 50% goat's milk (T2), 75% cow's milk and 25% goat's milk (T3) and 100% cow's milk (T4), during the storage period at 5oC in brine solution (12% sodium chloride) . The goat cheese (T1) gave the highest value in the moisture content, the total volatile fatty acids (TVFA), the ash, the highest level of Halloumi cheese, and 50% cow's milk (T2) was the lowest. There were also insignificant differences (p < 0.05) in water soluble nitrogen (WSN) and fat / total solid, in the four treatments of cheese. T3 was the highest in fat ratio, non protein nitrogen (NPN), salt, total solid, salt / moisture content. Total number of bacteria for all fresh samples were significantly (P<0.05). The coliform and E. coli bacteria were less than 30 (cfu/g) and were present in the four treatments of cheese. None of them showed Staph. aureus during the months of storage. The molds& yeasts were found in small numbers by 13 to 16 (cfu/g) in the Halloumi cheese (3 months). The rheological characteristics of the Halloumi cheese (T4) were less in consistent and the better taste comparing with the other treatments.