Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An S/MAR-based infectious episomal genomic DNA expression vector provides long-term regulated functional complementation of LDLR deficiency

Episomal gene expression vectors offer a safe and attractive alternative to integrating vectors. Here we describe the development of a high capacity episomal vector system exploiting human episomal retention sequences to provide efficient vector maintenance and regulated gene expression through the delivery of a genomic DNA locus. The iBAC-S/MAR vector is capable of the infectious delivery and retention of large genomic DNA transgenes by exploiting the high transgene capacity of herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) and the episomal retention properties of the scaffold/matrix attachment region (S/MAR). The iBAC-S/MAR vector was used to deliver and maintain a 135 kb genomic DNA insert carrying the human low density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) genomic DNA locus at high efficiency in CHO ldlr−/− a7 cells. Long-term studies on CHO ldlr−/− a7 clonal cell lines carrying iBAC-S/MAR-LDLR demonstrated low copy episomal stability of the vector for >100 cell generations without selection. Expression studies demonstrated that iBAC-S/MAR-LDLR completely restored LDLR function in CHO ldlr−/− a7 cells to physiological levels and that this expression can be repressed by ∼70% by high sterol levels, recapitulating the same feedback regulation seen at the endogenous LDLR locus. This vector overcomes the major problems of vector integration and unregulated transgene expression.
Dimensioning of the shared transport network for collocated multiradio: LTE and HSDPA

Due to the coexistence of different generations of mobile radio technologies, more and more mobile network operators are keen on deploying multiple radio technologies on a single cell site and carry their traffic over a common transport network. This paper studies such a collocated multiradio system: collocated LTE and HSDPA. Firstly, we investigate the potential gain by using a shared transport network to carry different radio technologies. Furthermore, this paper proposes analytical models to dimension the shared transport network for elastic traffic (TCP-based traffic) from the different radio technologies, by taking traffic characteristics, QoS requirements of each radio technology and the deployed transport QoS function and packet scheduling into considerations. The proposal for modeling the shared transport network is to apply the M/G/R-PS model per QoS class while taking the potential multiplexing gain of bandwidth sharing among the different QoS classes into account. For validating the analytical models, a system simulation model is developed. The analytical results derived from the proposed dimensioning models are validated by comparing with the simulation results for various traffic and network scenarios. Presented results demonstrate that proposed analytical models are well suitable for dimensioning of the shared transport network. With the help of the proposed analytical models, we analyze the potential sharing gain of such a shared transport system under different traffic loads and mix of different radio technologies.
Topology control in heterogeneous mobile ad hoc networks

An ad hoc network is a cooperative engagement of a collection of mobile nodes without the required intervention of any centralized access point or existing infrastructure. Topology control is needed in ad hoc networks to conserve energy and maximize network lifetime while maintaining network connectivity. We propose a topology control protocol based on leader election and density based clustering. We also discuss the alone-soldier-node problem.
Lhx1 functions together with Otx2, Foxa2, and Ldb1 to govern anterior mesendoderm, node, and midline development

Costello et al. demonstrate that Smad4/Eomes-dependent Lhx1 expression in the epiblast marks the entire definitive endoderm lineage, the anterior mesendoderm, and midline progenitors. In proteomic experiments, they characterize a complex comprised of Lhx1, Otx2, and Foxa2 as well as the chromatin-looping protein Ldb1.
Napping for functional representation of policy

Reinforcement learning aims at learning a policy from interactions with the environment to maximize the long-term reward. In practice, we commonly expect that the policy can be a nonlinear mapping from the state features to the candidate actions, and thus has the ability to fit complex decision situations. Functional representation, by which a function is represented as a combination of basis functions, is a powerful tool for learning non-linear functions, and has been used in policy learning (e.g., the non-parametric policy gradient (NPPG) method). Despite the many unique advantages of functional representation, it has a practical defect that a functional represented policy involves a lot of basis functions, and consequently the policy learning algorithm will be costed a lot of time in calculating the many constituting basis functions. This defect will badly hamper the functional representation from being practically applicable in reinforcement learning tasks, as the complex policies are to be continually evaluated. In this work, we proposed the napping mechanism to improve the efficiency of using the functional representation, which periodically simplifies the generated function by a simple approximation model along with the learning process. We integrated the napping mechanism into the NPPG algorithm, and carried out empirical studies. Experiment results showed that the NPPG with napping can not only drastically improve the training and predicting speed from the original NPPG, but also improve the performance significantly.
Reference intervals: the way forward

New facts have recently enhanced interest in the topic of reference intervals. In particular, the International Organization for Standardization standard 15189, requesting that ‘biological reference intervals shall be periodically reviewed’, and the directive of the European Union on in vitro diagnostic medical devices asking manufacturers to provide detailed information on reference intervals, have renewed interest in the subject. This review presents an update on the topic, discussing the theoretical aspects and the most critical issues. The basic approach to the definition of reference intervals proposed in the original International Federation of Clinical Chemistry documents still remain valid. The use of data mining to obtain reference data from existing databases has severe limitations. New statistical approaches to discard outliers and to compute reference limits have been recommended. On the other hand, perspectives opened by the improvement in standardization through the implementation of the concept of traceability suggest new models to define ‘common’ reference intervals that can be transferred and adopted by different clinical laboratories in order to decrease the proliferation of different reference intervals not always justified by differences in population characteristics or in analytical methodology.
Dictionary learning by Normalized Bilateral Projection

Dictionary learning is an unsupervised learning task that finds a set of template vectors that expresses input signals by sparse linear combinations. There are currently several methods for dictionary learning, for example KSVD and MOD. In this paper, a new dictionary learning method, namely K-normalized bilateral projections (K-NBP), is proposed, which uses faster low rank approximation. Experiments showed that the method was fast and when the number of iterations was limited, it outperforms K-SVD. This indicated that the method was particularly suited to large data sets with high dimension, where each iteration takes a long time. K-NBP was applied to an image reconstruction task where images corrupted by noise were recovered using a dictionary learned from other images.
Acute confusional states in the elderly: A radiological evaluation

Computered tomography of the head was carried out on 35 patients who received a hospital diagnosis of delirium according to the DSM‐III, and 25 controls without cognitive disturbance. There were no statistically significant differences in the mean age of the groups or in the cortical atrophy score as measured by the mean width of the four largest sulci in the three uppermost tomographic cuts. Instead, the delirious patients differed from the controls in the frontal horn and cella media indices, in the width of the third ventricle and Sylvian fissure at insula on the left side. There was also a significant excess of low attenuation, brain infarct‐type areas in the delirious patients. The study confirms the marked predisposing role of the structural brain diseases (primary degenerative and multi‐infarct type dementias, Parkinsonism) in the development of acute delirium in elderly patients.
SQL Injection Attack Detection andPrevention Methods: A Critical Review

We have several news regarding data alteration in the communication background. The SQL Injection attack is a popular way of attack in terms of document structure and common threats now a day. There are several ways of attack detection as per our study and also prevention methods had been discussed in several research papers. In this paper our main motivation to discuss and find the better methodology so that in future we can design better attack detection and prevention methods. For better security we also discuss encryption and decryption techniques.
An iterative Bayesian approach for liver analysis: tumors validation study

We present a new method for the simultaneous, nearly automatic segmentation of liver contours, vessels, and tumors from abdominal CTA scans. The method repeatedly applies multi-resolution, multi-class smoothed Bayesian classification followed by morphological adjustment and active contours refinement. It uses multi-class and voxel neighborhood information to compute an accurate intensity distribution function for each class. Only one user-defined voxel seed for the liver and additional seeds according to the number of tumors inside the liver are required for initialization. The algorithm do not require manual adjustment of internal parameters. In this work, a retrospective study on a validated clinical dataset totaling 20 tumors from 9 patients CTAs� was performed. An aggregated competition score of 61 was obtained on the test set of this database. In addition we measured the robustness of our algorithm to different seeds initializations. These results suggest that our method is clinically applicable, accurate, efficient, and robust to seed selection compared to manually generated ground truth segmentation and to other semi-automatic segmentation methods.
Numerical Prediction on the Mechanical Behaviour of Laser Peened Bulk Metallic Glass

Laser peening is an innovative surface treatment technique similar to shot peening, but it can introduce deeper compressive residual stress layers to materials for improving their fatigue life and plasticity. In this paper, a three dimensional finite element model has been developed to numerically simulate the laser peening and subsequent three-point bending of a bulk metallic glass (Zr41.2Ti13.8Cu12.5Ni10Be22.5) beam by using Abaqus software. The constitutive relation used here is based on the free volume theory. Compared the laser peened beam with un-peened beam, the simulated results shown that the improvement in mechanical performance is attributed to the induced compressive residual stress and the free volume increase in the peened area. The yield strain and the yield strength of laser peened BMG are also increased. This research presents how laser peening improves the strength and plasticity of brittle and strainsoftening bulk metallic glasses. Keywords-finite element analysis; laser peening; bulk metallic glass; mechanical performance; free volume
Ontological Evaluation of Reference Models Using the Bunge-Wand-Weber Model

Within the information systems field, reference models have been known for many years. A reference model is a conceptual framework and may be used as a blueprint for information systems development. Despite the relevance of reference model quality, little research has been undertaken on their systematical evaluation. In this paper, we propose an approach to evaluate reference models based on the Bunge-Wand-Weber ontology. We demonstrate that this application is possible and useful for model evaluation and several other areas. The main idea of our approach is the ontological normalization of a reference model. An ontological normalization is comparable with the normalization of a database schema but considers the structure of reality and not technical aspects. The ontological normalization of a reference model consists of four steps: (1) Developing a transformation mapping, (2) Identifying ontological modeling deficiencies, (3) Transforming the reference model, and (4) Assessing the results. Although our approach is based on sound theory, we argue that this approach is not inherently superior to other approaches of reference model evaluation.
Iterative Linear Interpolation Based on Fuzzy Gradient Model for Low-Cost VLSI Implementation

In this paper, we propose an iterative linear interpolation (ILI) algorithm, which produces quadratic ILI polynomials to perform the most cost-effective interpolation among state-of-the-art quadratic and cubic methods. Unlike traditional point and area pixel models, the ILI adopts the fuzzy gradient model to estimate gradients of the target point according to its neighbor sample points in different directions. By weighing the gradients using fuzzy membership grades, the ILI estimates the difference between the target point and its neighbor sample points and finally obtains the target point. In 1-D signal reconstructions, using only three multipliers, the ILI obviously outperforms both conventional quadratic Lagrange interpolation and cubic interpolation. To approximate 2-D signals, we use five 1-D ILIs, which costs only eight multipliers to obtain similar peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) performance but better robustness compared with bi-cubic interpolation. Reusing the ILI polynomials of the previous target point, we further reduce the cost of ILI to three multipliers and eight adders. The VLSI implementation using TSMC 0.18-μm technology shows that only 7256 gates are required for running a 200-MHz, 8-bit input/output, 15-bit fix-point data path, and 10-stage pipelined 2-D ILI, which is the quadratic interpolation of lowest cost but with PSNR performance closest to state-of-the-art bi-cubic methods.
CARIN: A Representation Language Combining Horn Rules and Description Logics

We describe CARIN, a novel family of representation languages, which integrate the expressive power of Horn rules and of description logics. We address the key issue in designing such a language, namely, providing a sound and complete inference procedure. We identify existential entailment as a core problem in reasoning in CARIN, and describe an existential entailment algorithm for CARIN languages whose description logic component is ALCNR. This algorithm entails several important results for reasoning in CARIN, most notably: (1) a sound and complete inference procedure for non recursive CARIN-ALCNR, and (2) an algorithm for determining rule subsumption overALCNR.
Five-Step (Pad–Pad Short–Pad Open–Short–Open) De-Embedding Method and Its Verification

We present the method for five-step (pad-pad short-pad open-short-open) on-chip parasitic de-embedding. Its validation is verified by gate electrode resistance and input capacitance of transistors based on 45 -nm CMOS process. Optimized dummy structures to remove the parasitic components due to the pad and routing metal are proposed. Parameters extracted by the proposed method have excellent physical and theoretical trends.
Morphometry of Equine Distal Sesamoid Bone on Clinically Normal Horses

Shape is a fundamental morphological descriptor, one method of its estimation being from digitally processed images. Elliptic Fourier method is an outline-based morphometrics that has some advantages: it does not require either landmarks or previous knowledge about the shape variation of the objects under study; it can visualize the contour of information and reconstruct the original shape; it can be mathematically normalized to size, rotation and starting point of the contour trace; and it can be conducted automatically using computer software. Hence, the variation could be decomposed into several mutually independent quantitative characteristics. In this manner, unacceptable errors based only on human visual judgment of shape, which is frequently deceptive and misled by size factors, can be effectively eliminated. The present study evaluated the shape of equine distal sesamoids (“navicular bone”) in 28 feet belonging to “Cavall Pirinenc Català” by means of Elliptic Fourier methods. No allometric relationship (low coefficient of regression) was demonstrated between area and form of the bone. At the same time, different morphological patterns appeared. Shape differences were centred on the proximal ridge, which moved from a crescentic, oval lucency, slightly oval, to a flat contour, and no concave ridge was detected. So breed does not seem to be very prone to suffer from navicular diseases, as some authors have stated that there is an apparent predisposition according to shape of the proximal articular border. These results provide a baseline to further examine shape quantification in sesamoid morphology.
Continuous anti-stiction coatings using self-assembled monolayers for gold microstructures

We have experimented with using continuous self-assembled monolayer (SAM) coatings on different surfaces, such as gold and silicon nitride, as anti-stiction coatings for radio-frequency microelectromechanical systems (RF MEMS). SAMs are coated on gold and silicon nitride surfaces in order to fabricate stiction-free gold structures after the wet release process. SAM coatings on gold and silicon nitride surfaces change the contact angle of a water droplet from 70.6° to 112.6° and from 36.7° to 115.8°, respectively. From atomic force microscopy, we can see that there is little change in the roughness of the gold and silicon nitride before and after the SAM coating. Using the electroplating technique and the wet release process, we have fabricated 4 μm thick gold cantilevers and bridges on a gold surface with a 6.5 μm gap from the substrate. Cantilevers and bridges are fabricated with different lengths in the range of 100–1000 μm with separations of 100 μm. It is observed that cantilevers and bridges with a length of 1000 μm on a gold substrate are released and standing free. A 1000 μm long gold cantilever has only 16.5 μm tip end deflection after the wet release process and SAM coating, much smaller compared with the 120 μm tip end deflection with the dry release process. Gold cantilevers, 100–500 μm long, on silicon nitride are released free and gold bridges on silicon nitride are released with a length of 1000 μm with continuous SAMs. The SAMs are coated on gold and silicon nitride surface in order. This method enables the gold cantilever and bridge on the gold or silicon nitride surface to be released with low deflection.
Activated platelets inhibit hepatocellular carcinoma cell differentiation and promote tumor progression via platelet-tumor cell binding

Lack of differentiation in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is associated with increased circulating platelet size. We measured platelet activation and plasma adenosine diphosphate (ADP) levels in HCC patients based on differentiation status. Local platelet accumulation and platelet-hepatoma cell binding were measured using immunohistochemistry (IHC) or flow cytometry. Using a xenograft assay in NON/SCID mice, we tested the effects of the anti-platelet drug clopidogrel on platelet activation, platelet infiltration, platelet-tumor cell binding and tumor cell differentiation. HCC patients with poor differentiation status displayed elevated platelet activation and higher ADP levels. Platelets accumulated within poorly differentiated tissues and localized at hepatoma cell membranes. Platelet-tumor cell binding was existed in carcinoma tissues, largely mediated by P-selectin on platelets. NOD/SCID mice with xenograft tumors also exhibited increased platelet activation and platelet-tumor cell binding. Clopidogrel therapy triggered hepatoma cell differentiation by attenuating platelet activation and platelet-tumor cell binding. TCF4 knockdown promoted HepG-2 cell differentiation and inhibited tumor formation, and TCF4 could be the potential downstream target for clopidogrel therapy.
Crowding Out Open Space: The Effects of Federal Land Programs on Private Land Trust Conservation

We examine the effects of U.S. federal land programs on private conservation using county-level panel regressions. Private conservation data measure acres held by The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and by participants in Land Trust Alliance (LTA) censuses. Government data measure federal landholdings (e.g., national parks and forests) and enrollment in the Conservation and Wetland Reserves (CRP and WRP). We find a small crowding-out effect from the CRP on LTA trusts. With TNC, we find crowding in from the CRP and crowding out from federal landholdings. Our theory gives insights as to why these and other effects (e.g., population and income) differ between TNC and the LTA trusts. (JEL H41, Q38)
A three dimensional finite element model of biofilm subjected to fluid flow and its application to predicting detachment potential

Microbial biofouling of wetted surfaces can adversely impact the hydrodynamic performance of pressurized conduits. These impacts are due, in part, to the viscoelastic material properties of biofilm. Of particular interest is the response of biofilm to changing hydrodynamic conditions and its effect on potential for biofilm removal. The goal of this research was two fold; 1) to develop a three dimensional numerical model, incorporating the viscoelastic material description of biofilm, to simulate the response of biofilm to varying hydrodynamic conditions and 2) use this model to identify behavioral characteristics of said biofilm which provide insight into effective removal procedures. Using a viscoelastic Burger fluid material description for biofilm, a numerical fluid-structure interface model was developed. The model was three-dimensional, allowed various sizes and shapes of biofilm to be defined, and was used in a parametric study to investigate biofilm behavior. The effect of the Burger material parameters and flow velocity were investigated. Additionally, the time scale over which microbial processes may influence biofilm material properties was identified and considered along with the results of the parametric study. Simulations revealed a consistent trend: biofilm clusters in flow channels undergo a transition from decreasing rates of deformation to increasing rates due to the interrelated effects of fluid-induced drag and cluster deformation. The results suggested that biofilm clusters which undergo a transition to accelerated deformation, in a time period shorter than that suggested to be influenced by microbial processes, are destined to eventual detachment. Identification of such behavior has significant impacts on biofilm removal methodology.