Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effect of hypoxia and anoxia on invertebrate behaviour: Ecological perspectives from species to community level

Coastal hypoxia and anoxia have become a global key stressor to marine ecosystems, with almost 500 dead zones recorded worldwide. By triggering cascading effects from the individual organism to the community-and ecosystem level, oxygen depletions threaten marine biodiversity and can alter ecosystem structure and function. By integrating both physiological function and ecological processes, animal behaviour is ideal for assessing the stress state of benthic macrofauna to low dissolved oxygen. The initial response of organisms can serve as an early warning signal, while the successive behavioural reactions of key species indicate hypoxia levels and help assess community degradation. Here we document the behavioural responses of a representative spectrum of benthic macrofauna in the natural setting in the Northern Adriatic Sea (Mediterranean). We experimentally induced small-scale anoxia with a benthic chamber in 24m depth to overcome the difficulties in predicting the onset of hypoxia, which often hinders full documentation in the field. The behavioural reactions were documented with a time-lapse camera. Oxygen depletion elicited significant and repeatable changes in general (visibility, locomotion, body movement and posture, location) and species-specific reactions in virtually all organisms (302 individuals from 32 species and 2 species groups). Most atypical (stress) behaviours were associated with specific oxygen thresholds: arm-tipping in the ophiuroid Ophiothrix quinquemaculata, for example, with the onset of mild hypoxia (< 2mLO(2) L-1), the emergence of polychaetes on the sediment surface with moderate hypoxia (< 1mLO(2) L-1), the emergence of the infaunal sea urchin Schizaster canaliferus on the sediment with severe hypoxia (< 0.5mLO(2) L-1) and heavy body rotations in sea anemones with anoxia. Other species changed their activity patterns, for example the circadian rhythm in the hermit crab Paguristes eremita or the bioherm-associated crab Pisidia longimana. Intra-and interspecific reactions were weakened or changed: decapods ceased defensive and territorial behaviour, and predator-prey interactions and relationships shifted. This nuanced scale of resolution is a useful tool to interpret present benthic community status (behaviour) and past mortalities (community composition, e.g. survival of tolerant species). This information on the sensitivity (onset of stress response), tolerance (mortality, survival), and characteristics (i. e. life habit, functional role) of key species also helps predict potential future changes in benthic structure and ecosystem functioning. This integrated approach can transport complex ecological processes to the public and decision-makers and help define specific monitoring, assessment and conservation plans
Dynamic thermal building analysis with CFD – modelling radiation

In an attempt to reduce the high computational effort required for dynamic thermal simulation of buildings using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) the authors have recently developed an adaptive freeze-flow method (i.e. freezing of flow equations over variable time periods). This article documents the work that has been carried out to predict the surface heat transfer in dynamic thermal building processes using CFD with particular focus on radiation. The Monte Carlo (MC) and discrete transfer (DT) radiation models were investigated and results compared with analytical solutions. The DT model has shown good performance whereas an unrealistic radiation distribution on the surfaces was observed when using the MC model. A further investigation of the DT model for the cooling of a solid wall has shown that the adaptive freeze-flow method is an efficient and accurate means of conducting dynamic thermal CFD simulations which involve radiation. Finally, application of the technique to a more realistic space comprising an uneven distribution of solar gain showed very good results when compared with a zonal dynamic thermal simulation program.
Root rot of pea caused by Aphanomyces euteiches

Aphanomyces root rot, caused by the oomycete Aphanomyces euteiches, is the most important and destructive disease of pea. Since the inoculum is persistent in the soil, and no resistant cultivars or means of chemical control are available, the disease is difficult to manage. The occurrence of soil suppressiveness against the disease was previously reported, and the main aim of this study was to understand the mechanism. By analysing chemical data for naturally infested soil samples from a large number of fields, we found that disease suppression was correlated to the Ca content of the soil. This was also true for artificially inoculated soil samples. Suppressiveness was only inconsistently affected by soil sterilisation, and was concluded to be abiotic in nature. Amendments of non-suppressive soils with both neutral and alkaline Ca salts strongly reduced disease severity. In contrast, amendment of suppressive soils with NaHCO3 solutions lowered the content of soluble Ca, increased pH and made the soil less suppressive. It was concluded that high concentrations of Ca in the soil solution was a major factor causing suppressiveness. The effect of Ca in the field was evaluated by adding a neutral Ca salt, CaSO4 in a naturally infested field trial. A clear delay in the onset of disease symptoms was seen at all doses evaluated. A quantitative molecular detection method based on quantitative PCR was developed and compared with the greenhouse biotest traditionally used to detect the pathogen in soil samples. Using the qPCR assay, it was possible to detect and quantify the pathogen at concentrations under 10 oospores g soil-1. The Swedish population of A. euteiches was analysed using co-dominant DNA sequence markers. It was found that the population was dominated by a globally distributed genotype, but that distinctly different genotypes also exist. These results were interpreted as evidence of a predominantly clonal mode of reproduction, but also of occasional sexual recombination.
Does Information Help Recovering Structural Shocks from Past Observations?

This paper asks two questions. First, can we detect empirically whether the shocks recovered from the estimates of a structural VAR are truly structural? Second, can the problem of non-fundamentalness be solved by considering additional information? The answer to the first question is 'yes' and that to the second is 'under some conditions'.
Spinal Anesthesia with Low Doses of Hyperbaric Bupivacaine is Safe and Necessary in Brachytherapy for Carcinoma of the Cervix

Background and objectives: Cervical cancer occupies the third place among women. In advanced cases the treatment of choice is brachytherapy and pain is among the most frequent complaints of treatment. The objective of the study was to compare the incidence of pelvic pain and satisfaction among groups of patients submitted to brachytherapy with and without anesthesia. METHODS: Prospective, longitudinal study at a SUS hospital with 30 patients undergoing brachytherapy between the ages of 18 and 60 divided into three groups: GN (without anesthesia), GR5 (spinal anesthesia with 5 mg of hyperbaric bupivacaine 0.5%) and GR10 (spinal anesthesia with 10 mg of 0.5% hyperbaric bupivacaine). Pain was evaluated immediately after brachytherapy (T1), 30 minutes (T2) and before discharge from the post-anesthetic recovery room (T3), through visual analogue scale and satisfaction with the technique. Effects of both doses administered. RESULTS: In the GN 70%, 50% and 10% felt pain, respectively, in T1, T2 and T3; in GR5 no patient presented pain in the 3 times studied; in GR10, only one patient had pain in T1. Regarding satisfaction, in GN 20% was poor, 60% satisfactory and 20% good; in GR5 100% was good; in GR10, 60% was satisfactory, 40% good. CONCLUSION: Spinal anesthesia with low doses of hyperbaric bupivacaine is safe and necessary in BTCC. In conclusion, after this small study, spinal anesthesia became routine in this procedure and possibly to be implanted in all Brazilian Health System (SUS) units.
Association Between Serum Lipid Profile And Oral Lichen Planus

Background:. Oral lichen planus is an immunologically based, chronic, inflammatory mucocutaneous disorder of undetermined etiology. The overall prevalence of lichen planus in the general population is about 0.1-4%. Materials and method:. The present cross-sectional study was performed in the Department of Oral Pathology, SVS Dental College, Mahaboobnagar, Telangana State. 30 cases of lichen planus were included in the study and 30 healthy subjects were taken as controls. A total of 3 mL of blood sample was taken from each subject and the serum levels of cholesterol, triglycerides, HDL and LDL were determined. The mean outcomes of each group were compared with each other and analyzed two by two tables. Results: The results of statistical analyses showed no significant differences in mean HDL and LDL serum levels between the two groups. Conclusion: Triglyceride can be considered to have a critical role in the incidence of lichen planus and in its manifestations as predisposing factors. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Date of Submission: 25-08-2017 Date of acceptance: 05-10-2017 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Integrated Low Linewidth Brillouin Lasers in Ultra Low Loss Si3N4 Waveguide Platform

We describe a new class of integrated, ultra-low phase noise Brillouin laser. Leveraging novel laser dynamics in a very-high Q Si3N4 waveguide resonator, record low linewidths and noise in cascaded-order operation, with potential operation across the visible to infrared, can be achieved. Potential applications that span the visible to the infrared are described.
Secure Communication in Erasure Networks with State-feedback

The security and efficiency of communication are two of the main concerns for networks of today and the future. Our understanding of how to efficiently send information over various channels and networks has significantly increased in the past decade (see e.g., [1–3]), whereas our understanding of how to securely send information has not yet reached the same level. In this thesis, we advance the theory of secure communication by deriving capacity results and by developing coding schemes that provide information-theoretic security for erasure networks. We characterize the highest achievable secret-message rate in the presence of an eavesdropping adversary in various settings, where communication takes place over erasure channels with state-feedback. Our results provide such a characterization for a point-to-point erasure channel, for a broadcast erasure channel with multiple receivers, for a network with multiple parallel channels, a V-network and for a triangle network. We introduce several two-phase secure coding schemes that consist of a key generation phase and an encrypted message sending phase. Our schemes leverage several resources for security: channel erasures, feedback, common randomness and the topology of the network. We present coding schemes for all the above mentioned settings as well as for erasure networks with arbitrary topology. In all the cases where we provide exact characterization, a two-phase scheme achieves the secret-message capacity. All our proposed coding schemes use only linear operations and thus can serve as a basis for practical code designs. For networks, we develop a linear programming framework for describing secure coding schemes and for deriving new outer bounds. We use linear programs to describe our schemes and to prove their optimality. We derive new information theoretic outer bounds. In our intuitive interpretation, our proofs find the connection between the rate of the message and the rate of a secret key that is required to secure the message. Our results reveal nontrivial characteristics of secure communication in erasure networks. We find that – in contrast to non-secure communication – the secret message capacity of a cut does not simplify to the sum of the capacities of the channels that form the cut, moreover, the secret message capacity of a network does not simplify to the minimum secret message capacity of its cuts.
Summary of the Geology and Geophysics of the East Pacific Rise in the Vicinity of the Siqueiros Fracture Zone

The results of four expeditions to the Siqueiros area of the East Pacific Rise, including a pre-drilling site survey cruise, have been combined to yield an excellent knowledge of the areal geology and geophysics and some insight into the processes responsible for the production of sea-floor morphology, crustal structure, and chemical variations in basalts. These factors, combined with logistical and climatical considerations, were ultimately responsible for both the selection of the area for crustal drilling and many of the targets and tactics employed on Leg 54.
Modelos de influencia de padres y amigos en el inicio del consumo de tabaco en adolescentes

espanolEl tabaco es la segunda droga mas utilizada por los adolescentes. Objetivo. Analizar la influencia de diferentes agentes de socializacion: padres y companeros, en el uso y en la intencion de uso por los adolescentes. Metodo: Estudio transversal en ambito escolar. N=5,828 jovenes (50.2% chicos, 49.8% chicas) estudiantes de Centros de Educacion Secundaria (media de edad=14.15). Medidas: Consumo auto-informado de cigarrillos, actitudes hacia el tabaco y uso de tabaco por el grupo de influencia. Resultados: El consumo de tabaco por los companeros es la variable que mas incrementa la probabilidad y la intencion de uso. Fumar es mas probable entre los sujetos cuyos amigos fuman (odds ratio 7.16, I.C. 95% 5,5-9,3), que entre aquellos cuyos amigos no son fumadores. Conclusiones: La conducta de los companeros juega un papel predominante en el inicio y mantenimiento del habito tabaquico. Las chicas son mas vulnerables a la influencia social. En consecuencia, la probabilidad de uso o intencion de uso es mayor entre las chicas que entre los chicos ante la presencia de amigo/as que fuman. EnglishTobacco is the second most commonly used drug among adolescents. Aim. The aim is to analyse the influence of different socializing agents: parents and peers, in the use and the intention of use among adolescents. Methods. Cross-sectional study in a school setting in Spain. 5,828 youngsters (50.2% males, 49.8% females) recruited in Secondary Education Centres (mean age 14.15). Main outcome measures: Self-reported tobacco use (ever and current use of cigarettes), attitudes toward tobacco and influence groups tobacco use. Findings. There is a relative importance of parent influence to adolescent smoking onset. Peer tobacco use is the variable that increases the most the probability of use. Smoking is more likely among those subjects whose friends smoke (odds ratio 7.16, 95% confidence interval 5,5 - 9,3), than among those whose friends are non-smokers. Conclusions. Peer behaviour plays a predominant role in the onset and regular use of tobacco. Girls are more vulnerable to social pressure, the use or intention to use increases more sharply among girls in the presence of friends who smoke than among boys.
Limiting spectral distributions of sums of products of non-Hermitian random matrices

For fixed l≥0 and m≥1, let Xn0, Xn1,. , Xnl be independent random n × n matrices with independent entries, let Fn0 := Xn0, Xn1-1,. , Xnl-1, and let Fn1,. , Fnm be independent random matrices of the same form as Fn0 . We show that as n → ∞, the matrices Fn0 and m−l+1/2Fn1 +. + Fnm have the same limiting eigenvalue distribution. To obtain our results, we apply the general framework recently introduced in Götze, Kösters, and Tikhomirov 2015 to sums of products of independent random matrices and their inverses.We establish the universality of the limiting singular value and eigenvalue distributions, and we provide a closer description of the limiting distributions in terms of free probability theory.
Energetics of Swimming and Flying in Formation

Formation movement during swimming and flying has been hypothesized to reduce an individual animal’s energy expenditure. Individuals in a formation distort the flow pattern, creating vorticity in their wake. Vorticity is produced from lifting surfaces and organized as wing tip vortices, from oscillating hydrofoils in the form of a thrust-type vortex street, and by flow separation from rigid bodies arranged as a K k h vortex street. The relative velocity induced by vorticity shed from leading animals can be used to lower the drag and energy expenditure on trailing individuals when ideally positioned in the vortex wake. The wing tip vortices generated by birds reduce induced power as determined by wing tip spacing when flying in V-formation. The optimal configuration to maximize energy savings in fish schools is a diamond shape. Vorticity shed from rigid bodies, such as cars, cyclists, or ducks, produces a region of low relative velocity immediately behind the leader fostering drag reduction and increased energy savings by traveling in a single-file formation.
Aerodynamic Sensitivity Analysis of Rotor Imbalance and Shear Web Disbond Detection Strategies for Offshore Structural Health Prognostics Management of Wind Turbine Blades

Operations and maintenance costs for offshore wind plants are projected to be considerably higher than the current costs for land-based wind plants. One way to reduce these costs would be to implement a structural health and prognostic management (SHPM) system as part of a condition based maintenance paradigm with smart load management. To facilitate the development of such a system a multiscale modeling approach has been developed to identify how the underlying physics of the system are affected by the presence of damage and faults, and how these changes manifest themselves in the operational response of a full turbine. This methodology was used to perform a sensitivity analysis, investigating several inflow conditions in an effort to further evaluate the maturity of rotor imbalance and shear web disbond detection strategies developed in past efforts under variable inflow conditions as would be experienced in actual operation. Based on an aerodynamic sensitivity analysis of the model, the operational measurements used for the pilot study in the detection of pitch error, mass imbalance, and shear web disbond were utilized to confirm the validity of the detection strategies for all three damage/fault cases. Detection strategies were refined for these fault mechanisms and probabilities of detection (POD) were calculated. For all three fault mechanisms, the probability of detecting each fault was 96% or higher for the optimized wind speed ranges of the laminar, 30% horizontal shear, and 60% horizontal shear wind profiles. This aerodynamic sensitivity study contributes to the evaluation of structural health monitoring information with the goal to reduce operations and maintenance costs for an offshore wind farm while increasing turbine availability and overall profit.
Towards a Psychological Analysis of Anomie

Anomie, as defined by sociologists, refers to a state of society characterized by deregulation and erosion of moral values. In the present conceptual analysis, we bring the concept of anomie under a social psychological spotlight. We explore the conditions under which anomie arises and develop a model outlining various responses to anomie. We define anomie as a shared perception of the state of society and propose that two conditions must be met for anomie to emerge. First, a society's social fabric must be perceived to be breaking down (i.e., lack of trust and erosion of moral standards). Second, a society's leadership must be perceived to be breaking down (i.e., lack of legitimacy and effectiveness of leadership). We highlight two key responses of individuals to an anomic situation: a contraction of the personal self and a contraction of the social self. We discuss how a psychology of anomie can inform and advance broader theorizing on group processes.
Height correlations in the Abelian sandpile model

The authors study the distribution of heights in the self-organized critical state of the Abelian sandpile model on a d-dimensional hypercubic lattice. They calculate analytically the concentration of sites having minimum allowed value in the critical state. They also calculate, in the critical state, the probability that the heights, at two sites separated by a distance r, would both have minimum values and show that the lowest-order r-dependent term in it varies as r-2d for large r.
The Effect of Chlorhexidine Mouthwash on Chemoradiotherapy Induced Mucositis in Patients of Head and Neck Cancer

Aim: To assess the effectiveness of chlorhexidine mouthwash in the prevention or amelioration of mucositis among patients undergoing chemoradiotherapy therapy. Patients and Methods: A total of 60 patients (n=30 in each arm) were assigned to receive either Conventional fractionation or Concomitant boost radiotherapy along with concurrent cisplatin. Toxicities were analyzed weekly during the treatment, and one and three month after treatment completion. The radiation therapy oncology group acute radiation morbidity scoring system was used to document the severity.The patients were planned to receive Chlorhexidine mouthwash 5ml, 3 times a day during and after 3 months of completion of the radiation therapy. Results: Acute mucosal toxicity was assessed as per the RTOG Acute Radiation Morbidity Scoring System. Among both the groups, grade I mucosal toxicity was seen in 18 (60%) patients. Grade II mucosal toxicity was seen in 12 (40%) patients in group A and 10 (33.33%) patients in group B. Grade III mucosal toxicity was seen in 2 (6.66%) patients in group B and in none in group A. Conclusion: The severity of mucositis was less intense in both the treatment group. Chlorhexidine mouthwash might provide benefit for the patients receiving chemoradiotherapy.
Complex Probabilistic Inference

Our understanding of probabilistic inference in the brain has progressed rapidly. However, there remains a big gap between the relatively simple probabilistic inference problems facing low-level sensory systems and the intractably complex problems facing high-level cognitive systems. Psychologists have begun exploring cognitively plausible algorithms for approximately solving complex inference problems. We review recent attempts to connect these algorithmic accounts to neural circuit mechanisms, and argue that neural mechanisms for solving low-level sensory inference problems can be extended to tackle complex inference problems.
Prevalence of Listeria monocytogenes in frozen burger patties in Malaysia

A total of 112 burger patties (35 beef burger patties, 39 chicken burger patties and 38 fish burger patties) which are commercially available at retail level were investigated for the presence and number of Listeria monocytogenes. These samples were analyzed using MPN-PCR method and conventional culturing methods. L. monocytogenes was detected in 33.3% of chicken burger patties, 22.9%of beef patties, and 10.5% of fish patty samples. From all contaminated raw burger patties, the estimated count of L. monocytogenes was ranged from 3 to 75 MPN/g. The results suggest that burger act as a potential source of listeriosis if the contaminated burger patty is consumed without adequate cooking. The risk associated with consumption of these samples was found to be high particularly for processed food at retail level in Malaysia. Therefore, food manufacturers play an importantrole in monitoring the manufacturing process and conduct a periodical surveillance on microbiological quality assessment on the processing plants. Besides, there is a need to increase awareness ofconsumers and food handlers to practice proper cooking of the burger patties before the point of consumption, to reduce the risk of listeria infection.