Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Detection, tracking and pose estimation of people in challenging real-world scenes

In this thesis, we consider three challenging and longstanding problems in computer vision: people detection, people tracking and articulated pose estimation. Generic solutions to these problems are essential building blocks for understanding images containing people, an exciting and challenging task with numerous applications in automotive safety, robotic navigation, human-computer interaction, and automatic image indexing and retrieval. Indeed, human actions, intentions and emotions can often be inferred from accurate estimates of human body poses and their movement over time. However, untill recently, accurate estimation of body poses has been possible only in controlled laboratory conditions, typically requiring multiple cameras and specialized motion capture equipment. In order to address this shortcoming, we propose algorithms capable of automatically finding people in uncontrolled outdoor environments, tracking them over time and estimating their body configurations. In the process, we also tackle several important technical challenges, including the large appearance variability of humans, the full and partial occlusions that frequently occur in typical street scenes, and ambiguities in 2D to 3D lifting and data association. Humans appear in images wearing a large variety of clothing, in a large number of possible body poses and visible from various viewpoints. Jointly, these factors create very complex appearance patterns that are hard to model and detect well. In order to deal with the large appearance variability, we propose an approach based on the pictorial structures paradigm in which we represent the human body as a flexible configuration of rigid body parts and model the appearance of each body part using local image descriptors and discriminative classifiers. We demonstrate the generality of our approach by successfully applying it to various human detection and pose estimation problems. One of the goals of this work is to demonstrate the advantages of a tight coupling of people detection, pose estimation and tracking. Tracking of people in uncontrolled conditions is difficult not only due to appearance variability, but also to frequent full and partial occlusions, which often happen when multiple people are present in the scene. Presence of multiple people also severely complicates data association between frames of the sequence. In order to address this challenge, we propose a tracking-by-detection framework that combines evidence from single-frame detections over several subsequent frames using a dynamical model of body articulations. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our tracking-by-detection approach by applying it to the problem of monocular 3D pose estimation of people in uncontrolled street environments.
Mitochondrial Leukodystrophy: An Unusual Manifestation of Leigh's Disease

Leigh's disease is an inherited, progressive neurodegenerative disorder of infancy and early childhood. This metabolic disease is biochemically and genetically a heterogeneous disorder with defects involving various enzymes involved in the respiratory chain mechanism. Due to the multitude of enzyme defects known to occur in patients afflicted with Leigh's disease, this condition is known to have a variable clinical, pathological and radiological pattern of presentation. Isolated deficiency of cytochrome oxidase (COX) enzyme is one of the commonest abnormalities seen in patients afflicted by Leigh's disease. A primary white matter pattern of involvement representing a mitochondrial leukodystrophy is rare. Symmetric hyperintensities on T2WI involving the subthalamic nuclei and brainstem have been reported in patients with COX deficiency with SURF 1 mutations and are considered almost a hallmark of Leigh's disease with COX deficiency. We describe three cases of Leigh's disease with a primary white matter involvement diagnosed at our institution on the basis of clinical features, radiological appearance and laboratory findings.
Tubulins in Trichomonas vaginalis: Molecular Characterization of α-Tubulin Genes, Posttranslational Modifications, and Homology Modeling of the Tubulin Dimer

Abstract We have isolated and analysed an α-tubulin-encoding gene (atub1) in an early-diverging eukaryote, Trichomonas vaginalis. The complete atub1 open reading frame included 1,356 bp encoding a polypeptide of 452 amino-acyl residues. A second α-tubulin gene (atub2) was amplified by PCR using primers derived from consensus α-tubulin amino acid sequences. Both T. vaginalis α-tubulin sequences showed high identity to those described in other parabasalids (94.4%–97.3%), and exhibited a high degree of similarity to sequences from Metazoa (such as pig brain) and diplomonads (such as Giardia). Despite large evolutionary distances previously observed between trichomonads and mammals, the three-dimensional model of the T. vaginalis tubulin dimer was very similar to that of pig brain. Possible correlations between α-tubulin sequences and posttranslational modifications (PTMs) were examined. Our observations corroborated previous data obtained in T. vaginalis using specific anti-PTMs antibodies. As described in the related species Tritrichomonas mobilensis, microtubules are likely acetylated, non-tyrosinated, glutamylated, and non-glycylated in T. vaginalis. Evolutionary considerations concerning the time of appearance of these tubulin PTMs are also discussed since trichomonads are potentially one of the earliest diverging eukaryotic lineages.
Identification of a Novel Nephropathogenic Infectious Bronchitis Virus in Israel

Abstract A novel infectious bronchitis variant, designated as IS/885/00, associated with nephritis, was isolated from outbreaks in 23 broiler farms in Israel. The virus was first identified by reverse transcriptase–polymerase chain reaction and showed a distinct restriction fragment length polymorphism pattern from previously described Israeli isolates. Sequence analysis of the S1 gene and the deduced amino acid sequence revealed 97.2% protein similarity to genotype IS/720/99 and 71.6% similarity to the vaccine strain H120, the only strain permitted for use in this country. A database search in GenBank revealed a closely related isolate from Egypt, Egypt/Beni-Seug/01, with 96.6% similarity. Other published nephropathogenic infectious bronchitis virus strains/isolates shared less than 77% similarity with IS/885/00. A vaccine protection test in specific-pathogen-free chicks indicated 91% protection to the trachea and only 25% protection to the kidneys in vaccinated birds challenged with IS/885/00.
COMPARATIVE STUDY OF COSYNCH AND OVSYNCH PROTOCOL ON FERTILITY IN REPEAT BREEDER GIR COW

Present study was done on organized college farm. The objective of the study was to compare the efficacy of Cosynch and Ovsynch estrus synchronization protocols on fertility in repeat breeder Gir cows. A total of 18 repeat breeder cows were randomly divided in to Co synvh, Ovsynch and control group. group (n=6) Gir cows received (Cosynch protocols) wherein, first dose of Busrelin on day zero, irrespective of stage of estrous cycle followed by Cloprostenol on 7 th day and second dose of Busrelin on 9 th day with gir cows being inseminated at the same time with frozenthawed fertile semen. Ovsynch group (n=6) Gir cows received (Ovsynch protocol) wherein, first dose of Busrelin on dy zero, irrespective of stage of stage of estrus followed by Cloprostenolon day 7 th day and second dose of Busrelin on day 9 th with Gir cows being inseminated with frozen thawed fertile semen 20-22 hrs after the second dose of Busrelin without estrus detection. Control group (n=6) Gir cows, without any treatment and were monitored for estrous cycle, followed by heat detection, confirmation of estrus and then timely insemination with fertile semen. All the repeat breeder Gir cows were tested for pregnancy by per rectal palpation on 45 th day after insemination. All the repeat breeder Gir cows from Cosynch and Ovsynch protocol exhibited estrus signs (100%) within 48-72 hours after PGF2 alpha injection. Pregnancy rate recorded for Cosynch, Ovsynch and control group were 50%, 66.66%, 33.33% respectively. In conclusion, this study indicates that, Ovsynch protocol is more efficacious in settling pregnancy than Cosynch protocol in repeat breeder Gir cows (66.66% vs.50%).
Isolation of Outer Membrane of Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 and Its Proteomic Characterization*

In this report, we describe a newly developed method for isolating outer membranes from Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 cells. The purity of the outer membrane fraction was verified by immunoblot analysis using antibodies against membrane-specific marker proteins. We investigated the protein composition of the outer membrane using two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry followed by database identification. Forty-nine proteins were identified corresponding to 29 different gene products. All of the identified proteins have a putative N-terminal signal peptide. About 40% of the proteins identified represent hypothetical proteins with unknown function. Among the proteins identified are a Toc75 homologue, a protein that was initially found in the outer envelope of chloroplasts in pea, as well as TolC, putative porins, and a pilus protein. Other proteins identified include ABC transporters and GumB, which has a suggested function in carbohydrate export. A number of proteases such as HtrA were also found in the outer membrane of Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803.
Studies on the separate isozymes of red cell acid phosphatase phenotypes A and B

Comparisons were made of some of the properties of the isozymes of types A and B red cell acid phosphatase. In each case, the more anodal isozyme had a higher pH optimum and a lower Km for ^‐nitrophenyl phosphate. Thermostability tests indicated that this isozyme was also the least stable in both types. Evidence is also presented which suggests that the two isozymes within one type are interconvertible.
Power‐free values of polynomials on symmetric varieties

Given a symmetric variety Y defined over Q and a non‐zero polynomial with integer coefficients, we use techniques from homogeneous dynamics to establish conditions under which the polynomial can be made r ‐free for a Zariski dense set of integral points on Y . We also establish an asymptotic counting formula for this set. In the special case that Y is a quadric hypersurface, we give explicit bounds on the size of r by combining the argument with a uniform upper bound for the density of integral points on general affine quadrics defined over Q .
The Effect of Using KWL (Know, Want, Learned) Strategy on EFL Students' Reading Comprehension Achievement

There is a fact that most of the Secondary School students are still low in comprehending reading texts. Therefore, the main objective of this study was to see whether the use of KWL (Know, Want, Learned) strategy was effective in improving the students’ reading comprehension achievement in learning English as a Foreign Language. Non-equivalent groups pretest-posttest design was used in this study. The population was the eight th grade students of SMPN 4 Palembang in academic year of 2011/2012 with a total number of 254 students. Out of this population, 40 students were taken as sample. There were two groups, each of which consisted of 20 students. The data were collected by using multiple choice reading comprehension test. The data obtained were analyzed by using t-test formula. The finding showed that KWL strategy was effective in improving the students’ reading comprehension achievement. The effectiveness was indicated by the result of the Stepwise Regression formula that the contribution of KWL strategy on students’ reading comprehension achievement was 70.5%.
Canonical dynamics of the Nosé oscillator: Stability, order, and chaos.

A-J090 Vienna, Austria (Received 11 November 1985) Nose has developed many-body equations of motion designed to reproduce Gibbs's canonical phase-space distribution. These equations of motion have a Hamiltonian basis and are accordingly time reversible and deterministic. They include thermodynamic temperature control through a sin­gle deterministic friction coefficient, which can be thought of as a control variable or as a memory function. We apply Nose's ideas to a single classical one-dimensional harmonic oscillator. This rel­atively simple system exhibits both regular and chaotic dynamical trajectories, depending on the ini­tial conditions. We explore here the nature of these solutions by estimating their fractal dimen­sionality and Lyapunov instability. The Nose oscillator is a borderline case, not sufficiently chaotic for a fully statistical description. We suggest that the behavior of only slightly more complicated systems is considerably simpler and in accord with statistical mechanics.
MYC is downregulated by a mitochondrial checkpoint mechanism

The MYC proto-oncogene serves as a rheostat coupling mitogenic signaling with the activation of genes regulating growth, metabolism and mitochondrial biogenesis. Here we describe a novel link between mitochondria and MYC levels. Perturbation of mitochondrial function using a number of conventional and novel inhibitors resulted in the decreased expression of MYC mRNA. This decrease in MYC mRNA occurred concomitantly with an increase in the levels of tumor-suppressive miRNAs such as members of the let-7 family and miR-34a-5p. Knockdown of let-7 family or miR-34a-5p could partially restore MYC levels following mitochondria damage. We also identified let-7-dependent downregulation of the MYC mRNA chaperone, CRD-BP (coding region determinant-binding protein) as an additional control following mitochondria damage. Our data demonstrates the existence of a homeostasis mechanism whereby mitochondrial function controls MYC expression.
Thioredoxin f 1 and NADPH-Dependent Thioredoxin Reductase C Have Overlapping Functions in Regulating Photosynthetic Metabolism and Plant Growth in Response to Varying Light Conditions 1 [ OPEN ]

Two different thiol redox systems exist in plant chloroplasts, the ferredoxin-thioredoxin (Trx) system, which depends on ferredoxin reduced by the photosynthetic electron transport chain and, thus, on light, and the NADPH-dependent Trx reductase C (NTRC) system, which relies on NADPH and thus may be linked to sugar metabolism in the dark. Previous studies suggested, therefore, that the two different systems may have different functions in plants. We now report that there is a previously unrecognized functional redundancy of Trx f1 and NTRC in regulating photosynthetic metabolism and growth. In Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) mutants, combined, but not single, deficiencies of Trx f1 and NTRC led to severe growth inhibition and perturbed light acclimation, accompanied by strong impairments of Calvin-Benson cycle activity and starch accumulation. Light activation of key enzymes of these pathways, fructose-1,6-bisphosphatase and ADP-glucose pyrophosphorylase, was almost completely abolished. The subsequent increase in NADPH-NADP and ATP-ADP ratios led to increased nitrogen assimilation, NADP-malate dehydrogenase activation, and light vulnerability of photosystem I core proteins. In an additional approach, reporter studies show that Trx f1 and NTRC proteins are both colocalized in the same chloroplast substructure. Results provide genetic evidence that lightand NADPH-dependent thiol redox systems interact at the level of Trx f1 and NTRC to coordinately participate in the regulation of the Calvin-Benson cycle, starch metabolism, and growth in response to varying light conditions.
E-Governance and Public Service Delivery at the Grassroots: A Study of ICT Use in Health and Nutrition Programs in India

E-Governance projects continue to witness sustained policy focus in low- and lower middle-income countries such as India. Not many e-Governance projects are, however, associated with improved performance leading to an enhanced public value, especially in the grassroots delivery units of government organizations engaged in provision of development services to people. Based on a case study of Information and Communication Technology use in public health and nutrition programs in the Indian province of Karnataka, this paper argues for a need to shift the design focus of e-Governance projects. While the grassroots functionaries in such organizations have a critical role in meeting performance goals, e-Governance designs have been largely oblivious to the need of improving their overall work content and environment. Our findings suggest that it is time e-Governance projects in government organizations engaged in public service delivery acknowledge and rectify this incongruity to be more effective in achieving a broad set of governance outcomes and justify huge investments being made on them in relatively resource-constrained regions of the world.
Shielding Effectiveness Measurement of an Electrically Large Enclosure Using One Antenna

A new method is proposed to measure the shielding effectiveness (SE) of an electrically large enclosure. Traditionally, the SE measurement requires at least two (in an anechoic chamber) or three antennas (in a reverberation chamber). In this paper, only one antenna is needed in the whole measurement procedure. There is no requirement to use a reference antenna. It is interesting to note that if the aperture of the enclosure under test (EUT) can be covered (by using a conductive sheet or aluminum foil), the SE can be measured quickly by comparing the Q factor or the decay time of the covered and uncovered EUT. Measurements have been conducted to evaluate and verify the proposed method. The results are compared with those obtained using the nested reverberation chamber method; limitations of the proposed method are also discussed and identified. It is found that when the EUT is well shielded, the uncertainty of the proposed method could be relatively large. Nevertheless, the proposed method does offer a new simple and efficient approach to measure the SE of an electrically large enclosure.
Stoichiometry and kinetics of poly‐β‐hydroxybutyrate metabolism under denitrifying conditions in activated sludge cultures

The objective of this research was to obtain a more detailed insight in the kinetics and stoichiometry of poly‐β‐hydroxybutyrate (PHB) metabolism in activated sludge cultures. The process of storage and degradation of PHB under denitrifying conditions was studied. Dynamic conditions as occurring in activated sludge processes were simulated in a 2L sequencing batch reactor (SBR) by subjecting a mixed sludge population at a sludge retention time (SRT) of about 6 days to successive periods of external substrate availability (feast period) and no external substrate availability (famine period). Under these conditions intracellular storage and degradation of PHB occurs. It was shown that the process of storage and degradation of PHB is the same under anoxic and aerobic conditions. About 70% of the amount of acetate consumed in the feast period is used for synthesis of PHB, and the remainder is used for growth processes. The anoxic specific acetate uptake rate was 3–4 times lower than aerobically. The PHB metabolism was evaluated on the basis of a metabolic model. In a traditional macroscopic model, 10 parameters would be needed to describe the process. By relating these parameters to metabolic coefficients, only 2 parameters were needed in the description. Degradation of PHB could be described by a power law equation in PHB concentration. The order n in these experiments equaled 0.59, close to a value previously reported for PHB degradation by bio‐P‐cultures. However, PHB degradation by bio‐P‐cultures occurs at a much higher rate. Storage of PHB in the feast period can increase the required COD/N ratio for denitrification by 70% compared to a situation without storage. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Biotechnol Bioeng 68: 496–507, 2000.
Parasomnia Overlap Disorder with Sexual Behaviors during Sleep in a Patient with Obstructive Sleep Apnea.

ABSTRACT Sleep-related abnormal sexual behaviors (sexsomnia) are classified as a subtype of NREM sleep parasomnias. Sexsomnia has been reported as part of parasomnia overlap disorder (POD) in two other patients. We present the case of a 42-year-old male patient with video-polysomnography (vPSG) documented POD. The patient had sleepwalking, sleep-related eating, confusional arousals, sexsomnia, sleeptalking, and REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD). Confusional arousals and RBD were documented during the vPSG. This case had the added complexity of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) playing a role in sleepwalking and sleep related eating, with good response to nasal continuous positive airway pressure (nCPAP). The sexsomnia did not respond to nCPAP but responded substantially to bedtime clonazepam therapy.
Disturbances of mental image processing in post-stroke patients with left and right hemisphere damage.

BACKGROUND The purpose of this article is to point out significant differences in how mental images are processed by post-stroke patients with left and right hemisphere damage. The issues involved are of theoretical importance because of the light shed on the modularity of cerebral functions, especially the imagination, and of clinical importance due to the better understanding of the underlying pathomechanism. MATERIAL AND METHODS The research involved 82 right-handed patients with a lesion in the left hemisphere (Group L), 82 right-handed patients with a lesion in the right hemisphere (Group R), and, as a control group, 82 patients with musculo-skeletal disorders not affecting the central nervous system (Group C), matched by age and sex. Image processing of complex notions was examined by using selected items from the Simple Neurolinguistic Test. RESULTS In the control group, the majority of the patients responded to most of the prompts with polymodal associations of various types. In Group L, responses were dominated by isolated elements of the complex situation, while in Group R the associations were mostly verbal (lexical) and highly restricted in scope. CONCLUSIONS The results indicate that the loss of LH functions interferes with the ability to assemble pieces of polymodal image information into sensible strings, while the loss of RH functions leaves strings to which little information is attached.