Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Risk of Myocardial Infarction and Stroke in Smokers Is Related to Plasma Levels of Inflammation-Sensitive Proteins

Background—The extent to which differences in cardiovascular risk between smokers with similar daily tobacco consumption may be related to plasma levels of inflammation-sensitive proteins (ISP) and whether these proteins are associated with levels of carboxyhemoglobin (COHb%) have not been clarified. Methods and Results—In a population-based cohort of 1489 never smokers, 1685 former smokers, and 2901 current smokers, aged 28 to 61 years, plasma levels of orosomucoid (&agr;1-acid glycoprotein), &agr;1-antitrypsin, haptoglobin, fibrinogen, and ceruloplasmin were measured. COHb% levels were available for 2098 of them. Incidence of myocardial infarction, stroke, and death were monitored over 18.7±4.7 years. The proportion with high ISP levels (ie, ≥2 ISP in the top quartile) increased progressively with daily tobacco consumption (P <0.01) and COHb% (P <0.01). In all smoking categories, the incidence of stroke, cardiac events, and death was related to ISP. In heavy smokers, high ISP levels were associated with adjusted relative risks of 1.57 (1.05 to 2.35) and 1.50 (1.11 to 2.03) for cardiac events and death, respectively. Corresponding figures for moderate and light smokers were 1.59 (1.13 to 2.24) and 1.14 (0.87 to 1.49), respectively, and 1.32 (0.95 to 1.85) and 1.48 (1.10 to 1.98), respectively. Conclusion—ISP levels are related to COHb% in smokers. High levels are associated with an increased cardiovascular risk.
Recognizing Text Genres With Simple Metrics Using Discriminant Analysis

A simple method for categorizing texts into pre-determined text genre categories using the statistical standard technique of discriminant analysis is demonstrated with application to the Brown corpus. Discriminant analysis makes it possible use a large number of parameters that may be specific for a certain corpus or information stream, and combine them into a small number of functions, with the parameters weighted on basis of how useful they are for discriminating text genres. An application to information retrieval is discussed.
Barium titanate nanocomposite capacitor FY09 year end report.

This late start RTBF project started the development of barium titanate (BTO)/glass nanocomposite capacitors for future and emerging energy storage applications. The long term goal of this work is to decrease the size, weight, and cost of ceramic capacitors while increasing their reliability. Ceramic-based nanocomposites have the potential to yield materials with enhanced permittivity, breakdown strength (BDS), and reduced strain, which can increase the energy density of capacitors and increase their shot life. Composites of BTO in glass will limit grain growth during device fabrication (preserving nanoparticle grain size and enhanced properties), resulting in devices with improved density, permittivity, BDS, and shot life. BTO will eliminate the issues associated with Pb toxicity and volatility as well as the variation in energy storage vs. temperature of PZT based devices. During the last six months of FY09 this work focused on developing syntheses for BTO nanoparticles and firing profiles for sintering BTO/glass composite capacitors.
Sixteen Years of Bt Maize in the EU Hotspot: Why Has Resistance Not Evolved?

The majority of Bt maize production in the European Union (EU) is concentrated in northeast Spain, which is Europe’s only hotspot where resistance might evolve, and the main target pest, Sesamia nonagrioides, has been exposed to Cry1Ab maize continuously since 1998. The cropping system in northeast Spain has some similar characteristics to those that probably led to rapid resistance failures in two other target noctuid maize pests. These include repeated cultivation of Bt maize in the same fields, low use of refuges, recurring exposure of larvae to non-high dose concentrations of Cry1Ab toxin during the first years of cultivation, low migratory potential, and production concentrated in an irrigated region with few alternative hosts. Available data reveal no evidence of resistance in S. nonagrioides after 16 years of use. We explore the possible reasons for this resistance management success using evolutionary models to consider factors expected to accelerate resistance, and those expected to delay resistance. Low initial adoption rates and the EU policy decision to replace Event 176 with MON 810 Bt maize were key to delaying resistance evolution. Model results suggest that if refuge compliance continues at the present 90%, Bt maize might be used sustainably in northeast Spain for at least 20 more years before resistance might occur. However, obtaining good estimates of the present R allele frequency and level of local assortative mating are crucial to reduce uncertainty about the future success of resistance management.
Modulatory mechanisms and multiple functions of somatodendritic A-type K+ channel auxiliary subunits

Auxiliary subunits are non-conducting, modulatory components of the multi-protein ion channel complexes that underlie normal neuronal signaling. They interact with the pore-forming α-subunits to modulate surface distribution, ion conductance, and channel gating properties. For the somatodendritic subthreshold A-type potassium (ISA) channel based on Kv4 α-subunits, two types of auxiliary subunits have been extensively studied: Kv channel-interacting proteins (KChIPs) and dipeptidyl peptidase-like proteins (DPLPs). KChIPs are cytoplasmic calcium-binding proteins that interact with intracellular portions of the Kv4 subunits, whereas DPLPs are type II transmembrane proteins that associate with the Kv4 channel core. Both KChIPs and DPLPs genes contain multiple start sites that are used by various neuronal populations to drive the differential expression of functionally distinct N-terminal variants. In turn, these N-terminal variants generate tremendous functional diversity across the nervous system. Here, we focus our review on (1) the molecular mechanism underlying the unique properties of different N-terminal variants, (2) the shaping of native ISA properties by the concerted actions of KChIPs and DPLP variants, and (3) the surprising ways that KChIPs and DPLPs coordinate the activity of multiple channels to fine-tune neuronal excitability. Unlocking the unique contributions of different auxiliary subunit N-terminal variants may provide an important opportunity to develop novel targeted therapeutics to treat numerous neurological disorders.
Combined deletion of p38γ and p38δ reduces skin inflammation and protects from carcinogenesis

The contribution of chronic skin inflammation to the development of squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) is poorly understood. While the mitogen-activated protein kinase p38α regulates inflammatory responses and tumour development, little is known about the role of p38γ and p38δ in these processes. Here we show that combined p38γ and p38δ (p38γ/δ) deletion blocked skin tumour development in a chemically induced carcinogenesis model. p38γ/δ deletion reduced TPA-induced epidermal hyperproliferation and inflammation; it inhibited expression of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines in keratinocytes in vitro and in whole skin in vivo, resulting in decreased neutrophil recruitment to skin. Our data indicate that p38γ/δ in keratinocytes promote carcinogenesis by enabling formation of a proinflammatory microenvironment that fosters epidermal hyperproliferation and tumourigenesis. These findings provide genetic evidence that p38γ and p38δ have essential roles in skin tumour development, and suggest that targeting inflammation through p38γ/δ offers a therapeutic strategy for SCC treatment and prevention.
PIP

In this article, we consider the goal of achieving high throughput in a wireless sensor network. Our work is set in the context of those wireless sensor network applications which collect and transfer bulk data. We present PIP (Packets in Pipe), a MAC primitive for use by the transport module to achieve high throughput. PIP has a unique set of features: (a) it is a multihop connection-oriented primitive, (b) it is TDMA based, (c) it uses multiple radio channels, and (d) it is centrally controlled. This represents a significant shift from prior MAC protocols for bulk data transfer. PIP has several desirable properties: (a) its throughput degrades only slightly with increasing number of hops, (b) it is robust to variable wireless error rates, (c) it performs well even without any flow control, and (d) requires only small queue sizes to operate well. We substantiate these properties with a prototype implementation of PIP on the Tmote-Sky CC2420-based platform. PIP achieves about eleven times better throughput than the state-of-the-art prior work, over a network depth of 24 hops. We also show that PIP can be interagted with duty cycling, and that PIP can support streaming data from/to flash at little overhead.
Variation within and among species in gene expression: raw material for evolution

Heritable variation in regulatory or coding regions is the raw material for evolutionary processes. The advent of microarrays has recently promoted examination of the extent of variation in gene expression within and among taxa and examination of the evolutionary processes affecting variation. This review examines these issues. We find: (i) microarray‐based measures of gene expression are precise given appropriate experimental design; (ii) there is large inter‐individual variation, which is composed of a minor nongenetic component and a large heritable component; (iii) variation among populations and species appears to be affected primarily by neutral drift and stabilizing selection, and to a lesser degree by directional selection; and (iv) neutral evolutionary divergence in gene expression becomes nonlinear with greater divergence times due to functional constraint. Evolutionary analyses of gene expression reviewed here provide unique insights into partitioning of regulatory variation in nature. However, common limitations of these studies include the tendency to assume a linear relationship between expression divergence and species divergence, and failure to test explicit hypotheses that involve the ecological context of evolutionary divergence.
Quick to berate, slow to sleep: interpartner psychological conflict, mental health, and sleep.

OBJECTIVE Relations between interpartner psychological conflict (IPC) and the sleep of men and women were examined, and depression and anxiety symptoms were assessed as intervening variables of these associations. METHOD Participants were 135 cohabiting or married couples. The mean age was 36.50 (SD = 5.93) for women and 39.37 (SD = 7.33) for men. Most women (76%) and men (78%) were European American (EA) and the rest were predominantly African American (AA); there was a wide socioeconomic representation. Men and women reported on IPC used by their partner against them. Sleep was examined objectively with actigraphs, and multiple sleep quantity and quality measures were derived. RESULTS Dyadic path analysis in which both actor and partner effects were assessed was conducted. For women, greater IPC by the partner was related to elevated levels of anxiety, which in turn was associated with shorter sleep duration and worse sleep efficiency; anxiety was an intervening variable. For men, IPC by the partner was related to greater symptoms of anxiety and depression; the latter was an intervening variable linking IPC with sleep quality (lower efficiency, longer latency). Some partner effects were observed and indicate that for both men and women, one's perpetration of IPC is related to increased anxiety in the partner, which in turn is related to longer sleep latency for the actor. CONCLUSION Results build on this scant literature, and using objective well-validated measures of sleep highlight the importance of relationship processes and mental health for the sleep of men and women.
Storing semistructured data with STORED

Systems for managing and querying semistructured-data sources often store data in proprietary object repositories or in a tagged-text format. We describe a technique that can use relational database management systems to store and manage semistructured data. Our technique relies on a mapping between the semistructured data model and the relational data model, expressed in a query language called STORED. When a semistructured data instance is given, a STORED mapping can be generated automatically using data-mining techniques. We are interested in applying STORED to XML data, which is an instance of semistructured data. We show how a document-type-descriptor (DTD), when present, can be exploited to further improve performance.
Making Readability Indices Readable

Although many approaches have been presented to compute and predict readability of documents in different languages, the information provided by readability systems often fail to show in a clear and understandable way how difficult a document is and which aspects contribute to content readability. We address this issue by presenting a system that, for a given document in Italian, provides not only a list of readability indices inspired by Coh-Metrix, but also a graphical representation of the difficulty of the text compared to the three levels of Italian compulsory education, namely elementary, middle and high-school level. We believe that this kind of representation makes readability assessment more intuitive, especially for educators who may not be familiar with readability predictions via supervised classification. In addition, we present the first available system for readability assessment of Italian inspired by Coh-Metrix.
Using Logical Objects to Control Hypertext Appearance

SUMMARY It is accepted wisdom that documents should be represented in terms of their logical structure rather than their appearance. Nevertheless most of the popular document processing systems concentrate on appearance rather than structure, mainly because most users opt for a user interface that is interactive, simple and direct. This paper considers issues related to fonts and other appearance attributes within hypertext documents. It first presents the relevant differences between hypertext systems and document preparation systems whose end product is paper. It then goes on to describe a scheme for representing appearance through logical structure. The scheme aims to meet the extra needs of hypertext systems, and yet still to be simple enough to attract wide usage.
Spectral-component monitoring and control of pulsed laser deposition of YBCO films

We examine the time-resolved spectral components emitted at approximately 327 nm and approximately 550 nm in YBCO plumes during pulsed laser deposition of thin films using a KrF excimer laser at (lambda) equals 248 nm. The studied emission signals last for approximately 20 microsecond(s) ec, and show variations when process parameters such as laser power, laser excitation voltage, beam focus, chamber pressure, substrate temperature, pulse repetition rate, and target rotation rate are changed. These signals are also dependent on other factors such as target wear and age of the laser gas mixture. Spectral-component monitoring is a supplementary method of real-time plume evaluation, and allows observation of changes both prior to deposition and during the actual deposition. Adjustments can be made to the process parameters to make the plume conform to criteria necessary for the growth of films with specific qualities. The use of these spectral components as real-time process- control state variables for more reproducible fabrication of high quality thin films will be assessed.
Sparse Coding and Counting for Robust Visual Tracking

In this paper, we propose a novel sparse coding and counting method under Bayesian framework for visual tracking. In contrast to existing methods, the proposed method employs the combination of L0 and L1 norm to regularize the linear coefficients of incrementally updated linear basis. The sparsity constraint enables the tracker to effectively handle difficult challenges, such as occlusion or image corruption. To achieve real-time processing, we propose a fast and efficient numerical algorithm for solving the proposed model. Although it is an NP-hard problem, the proposed accelerated proximal gradient (APG) approach is guaranteed to converge to a solution quickly. Besides, we provide a closed solution of combining L0 and L1 regularized representation to obtain better sparsity. Experimental results on challenging video sequences demonstrate that the proposed method achieves state-of-the-art results both in accuracy and speed.
A Peculiar Spectral State Transition of 4U 1705–44: When an Atoll Looks Like a Z

We report on a clear spectral state transition of the neutron star low-mass X-ray binary 4U 1705-44 observed by the Rossi X-Ray Timing Explorer. In the X-ray color-color diagram (CCD), the source, classified as an atoll, samples the upper parts of a Z, starting from and returning to the left bottom of the Z. We follow the path of 4U 1705-44 on its CCD, model its broadband X-ray/hard X-ray spectrum, and compute the Fourier power density spectrum of its X-ray variability. The energy spectrum can be described as the sum of a dominating Comptonized component, a blackbody, and a 6.4 keV iron line. During most observations, 4U 1705-44 displays strong band-limited noise, with an integrated fractional rms varying from ~10% to ~20%. The spectral transitions of 4U 1705-44 are shown to be primarily associated with changes in the temperature of the Comptonizing electrons. During the soft-to-hard transition, the source luminosity decreased from ~2.1 to ~0.7 × 1037 ergs s-1, whereas the hard-to-soft transition took place at higher luminosities between ~2.5 and ~3.1 × 1037 ergs s-1. In the hard state (top branch of the Z), the source evolves from left to right on the CCD, while its luminosity smoothly increases. Along this branch, the increase in the soft color is related to a smooth increase in the blackbody temperature, while the electron temperature remained remarkably constant (~13 keV). Our observations can be interpreted in the framework of a model made of a truncated accretion disk of varying inner radius and an inner flow merging smoothly with the neutron star boundary layer. The spectral evolution could be driven by changes in the truncation radius of the disk; e.g., the soft-to-hard transition could be caused by the disk moving outward. If this model is correct, then our data show that the disk truncation radius is not set by the instantaneous mass accretion rate, as derived from the source bolometric luminosity. Comparing the power density spectra of 4U 1705-44 and Z sources when they occupy similar branches of the Z, we show that the most significant difference is on the diagonal branch, on which the power density spectra of 4U 1705-44 remain similar to the ones measured on the top branch of the Z (hard state).
Multi-linear formulas for permanent and determinant are of super-polynomial size

An arithmetic formula is multi-linear if the polynomial computed by each of its sub-formulas is multi-linear. We prove that any multi-linear arithmetic formula for the permanent or the determinant of an n x n matrix is of size super-polynomial in n.Previously, super-polynomial lower bounds were not known (for any explicit function) even for the special case of multi-linear formulas of constant depth.
PlaySOM : An Alternative Approach to Track Selection and Playlist Generation in Large Music Collections

Because of the increasing number of music distributors offering an ever growing number of albums and tracks on the Internet, access methods such as retrieval, interactive exploration or similaritybased search demand more sophisticated technologies than metadatabased approaches currently offer including queries for artists, albums, titles or manually assigned genre information. This requirement also holds for private collections with the tracks being more and more often stored uniformly in a library of, e.g., MP3 or OGG files as opposed to just a few tracks stored on separate media such as vinyl records, tapes or compact discs that have to be changed when playing more than one album. The SOM-enhanced JukeBox (SOMeJB) system provides automatic indexing and organization of music repositories based on perceived sound similarity of the single tracks using a map metaphor for visualization with similar songs being placed into similar regions on the map. In this paper we present the PlaySOM , a novel interface allowing to browse a music collection by navigating a map and selecting regions of interest containing similar tracks for playing. This approach offers content-based organization of music as an alternative to conventional playlists, i.e. flat or hierarchical listings of music tracks sorted and filtered by some meta
How are Real Grids Used? The Analysis of Four Grid Traces and Its Implications

The grid computing vision promises to provide the needed platform for a new and more demanding range of applications. For this promise to become true, a number of hurdles, including the design and deployment of adequate resource management and information services, need to be overcome. In this context, understanding the characteristics of real grid workloads is a crucial step for improving the quality of existing grid services, and in guiding the design of new solutions. Towards this goal, in this work we present the characteristics of traces of four real grid environments, namely LCG, Grid3, and TeraGrid, which are among the largest production grids currently deployed, and the DAS, which is a research grid. We focus our analysis on virtual organizations, on users, and on individual jobs characteristics. We further attempt to quantify the evolution and the performance of the grid systems from which our traces originate. Finally, given the scarcity of the information available for analysis purposes, we discuss the requirements of a new format for grid traces, and we propose the establishment of a virtual center for workload-based grid benchmarking data: the grid workloads archive
Algorithmic clustering of music

We present a method for hierarchical music clustering, based on compression of strings that represent the music pieces. The method uses no background knowledge about music whatsoever: it is completely general and can, without change, be used in different areas like linguistic classification, literature, and genomics. Indeed, it can be used to simultaneously cluster objects from completely different domains, like with like. It is based on an ideal theory of the information content in individual objects (Kolmogorov complexity), information distance, and a universal similarity metric. The approximation to the universal similarity metric obtained using standard data compressors is called "normalized compression distance (NCD). " Experiments using our CompLearn software tool show that the method distinguishes between various musical genres and can even cluster pieces by composer.
EEG Windowed Statisticalwavelet Deviation for Estimation of Muscular Artifacts

Electroencephalographic (EEG) recordings are, most of the times, corrupted by spurious artifacts, which should be rejected or cleaned by the practitioner. As human scalp EEG screening is error-prone, automatic artifact detection is an issue of capital importance, to ensure objective and reliable results. In this paper we propose a new approach for discrimination of muscular activity in the human scalp quantitative EEG (QEEG), based on the time-frequency shape analysis. The impact of the muscular activity on the EEG can be evaluated from this methodology. We present an application of this scoring as a preprocessing step for EEG signal analysis, in order to evaluate the amount of muscular activity for two sets of EEG recordings for dementia patients with early stage of Alzheimer's disease and control age-matched subjects.