Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Variation of soil organic carbon, stable isotopes, and soil quality indicators across an erosion–deposition catena in a historical Spanish olive orchard

Abstract. This study compares the distribution of bulk soil organic carbon (SOC), its fractions (unprotected and physically, chemically, and biochemically protected), available phosphorus (P avail ), organic nitrogen (N org ), and stable isotope ( δ15 N and δ13 C) signatures at four soil depths (0–10, 10–20, 20–30, and 30–40 cm) between a nearby open forest reference area and a historical olive orchard (established in 1856) located in southern Spain. In addition, these soil properties, as well as water stable aggregates ( Wsagg ), were contrasted at eroding and deposition areas within the olive orchard, previously determined using 137 Cs. SOC stock in the olive orchard (about 40 t C ha −1 ) was only 25 % of that in the forested area (about 160 t C ha −1 ) in the upper 40 cm of soil, and the reduction was especially severe in the unprotected organic carbon. The reference and the orchard soils also showed significant differences in the δ13 C and δ15 N signals, likely due to the different vegetation composition and N dynamics in both areas. Soil properties along a catena, from erosion to deposition areas within the old olive orchard, showed large differences. Soil C org , P avail and N org content, and δ15 N at the deposition were significantly higher than those of the erosion area, defining two distinct areas with a different soil quality status. These overall results indicate that the proper understanding of C org content and soil quality in olive orchards requires the consideration of the spatial variability induced by erosion–deposition processes for a convenient appraisal at the farm scale.
DNA and recent human evolution

The study of recent human evolution, or the origin of modern humans, is currently dominated by two theories. The recent African origin hypothesis holds that there was a single origin of modern humans in Africa about 100,000 years ago, after which these humans dispersed throughout the rest of the world, mixing little or not at all with nonmodern populations. The multiregional evolution hypothesis holds that there was no single origin of modern humans but, instead, that the mutations and other traits that led to modern humans were spread in concert throughout the old world by gene flow, leading to genetic continuity among old world populations during the past million years. Although both of these theories are based on observations stemming from the fossil record, much discussion and controversy during the past six years has focused on the application and interpretation of studies of DNA variation, particularly mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). The past year, especially, has brought new data, interpretations, and controversies. Indeed, I initially resisted writing this review, on the grounds that new information would be likely to render it obsolete by the time it was published. However, now that the dust is starting to settle, it seems timely to review various investigations and interpretations and where they are likely to lead. While the focus of this review is the mtDNA story, brief mention is made of studies of nuclear DNA variation (both autosomal and Y‐chromosome DNA) and the implications of the genetic data with regard to the fossil record and our understanding of recent human evolution.
Dopaminergic D4 receptor polymorphism among 24 populations of India: an anthropological insight

Various studies have tried to elucidate the genomics underlying the ethnic diversity of Indian populations. The 48-basepair variable number tandem repeat (VNTR) of the DRD4 gene, besides its clinical importance, has been a subject of interest for understanding human evolutionary history worldwide. In spite of its highly polymorphic nature it has not been much explored by anthro- pologists, especially in the Indian context. In the present study, an attempt was made to infer the allelic variation of the repeat allele among 24 Indian ethnic groups belonging to different ethnic and linguistic groups along with different geographic affiliations. Only the 2R, 3R, 4R, 5R, 6R, and 7R repeat alleles were found in the studied populations, with 4R being the most frequent followed by 2R. All the other repeat alleles (3R, 5R, 6R, and 7R) occurred at very low frequency. Based on the 4R and 5R frequen- cies, the study reveals a common genetic substratum of the Indian population as already proposed by earlier studies. Further, the study also highlights the inflow of genes from the north.
Vocational Student Teachers’ Self-Reported Experiences in Creating ePortfolios

Context: The context of the study is vocational teacher education and the participants are vocational student teachers. They are studying in a blended learning setting as part time students. They represent several disciplines of vocational education and training. The vocational teacher studies take one year and are 60 credits. The study relates to the discussion of vocational education and training (VET) and teachers’ competencies that they are transferring to their VET students by sharing the knowledge of their subject area and working practices. This study is an exploration of one of these working practices: making competence visible in a digital format.Approach: Student teachers’ descriptions of their practices and recommendations of supportive methods for composing an ePortfolio are reviewed and their motivation to compose an ePortfolio is studied as a part of the personal learning environment (PLE) philosophy.Findings: The data revealed some typical practices, such as composing an ePortfolio (the most popular ways of doing this were recording reflections in a learning diary and using digital tools to document artefacts) and making vocational teachers’ competence visible through an ePortfolio (understanding the difference between workspace and showcase portfolios and what kinds of competence to document). The recommendations mentioned by participants were supportive methods of composing an ePortfolio (collaborative learning processes with peers, lecturers’ feedback and assessment and clear instructions) as well as methods of making vocational teachers’ competence visible (e.g. orientation to ePortfolio work using learning objectives and assessment criteria for ePortfolios). Participating student teachers are/were motivated to work with ePortfolios in various ways and expressed an intrinsic motivation to pursue personal growth and become a vocational teacher.Conclusions: The study revealed vocational student teachers’ various perceptions of scaffolding and motivational orientations to make their competence visible through ePortfolios. These can be used to design scaffolding processes to support students’ ePortfolio activities. ePortfolios are used as a study method to promote student teachers’ career development and personal growth and to help them acquire teacher competencies. The study concludes with a review of the learning objectives and the assessment criteria for the ePortfolio process in a vocational teacher education program.
Financial Coping Mechanisms in Patients with Type II Diabetes Mellitus in Rural India

Background: Understanding the financial burden and the pattern of costs involved in managing diabetes can help planners strengthen the basic health care programs. The present study was carried out to assess the cost of diabetes care and the financial coping mechanisms thereof. Methods: The present study was carried out in the rural areas of district Tumkur, Karnataka. A total of 180 participants were included in this study. Data was collected using a pre-tested questionnaire, which was administered as a face-to-face interview during house-to-house visits by the second author. Results: The mean age of the participants was 62.68 ± 8.4 years. The mean total direct cost incurred on managing diabetes was 408.12 ± 23.37 INR/month, while as the total indirect cost was 145.88 ± 11.42 INR/month (P<0.001). The total cost incurred during hospitalization was 201600 INR, which when calculated for individual admissions turned out to be 9600 INR. Majority of the people [126 (70%)] mobilized cash savings to cope-up with this financial burden, which was followed by borrowing money from friends /professional lenders in 52 (30%) individuals. None of our study subjects sold any assets to meet this expenditure and none of our patients had access to any health insurance scheme. Conclusion: The present study points to the ever-increasing cost of diabetes care. The major economic impact of type II DM was due to high cost of the drugs. There is a glaring deficit of social insurance schemes that needs to be addressed.
The stair-step approach in treatment of anovulatory PCOS patients

Clomiphene citrate (CC) is a widely accepted first-line treatment for anovulatory patients with polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS). The current practice is to prescribe CC with gradual dose increments until ovulation is achieved. Typically, progesterone withdrawal bleeding is induced between each dose increment and before the commencement of gonadotropin therapy in CC-resistant patients. It has been recently suggested that dose increments of CC can be administered once failure to induce ovulation at a certain dose has been documented, without induction of progesterone withdrawal bleeding, and this approach has been nicknamed the clomiphene-citrate stair-step (CC-SS) protocol. The same principle has been found feasible before introducing gonadotropin therapy in CC-resistant PCOS patients. Our objective was to review the world literature on the CC-SS protocol and to summarize our own experience with extending the CC-SS approach to initiation of gonadotropin therapy. Studies on CC-SS protocol (n = 4) have found that this approach leads to a significant reduction of the time to ovulation and to an increased ovulation rate. In our own retrospective case series, 18 CC-resistant PCOS patients initiated gonadotropin stimulation without induction of progesterone withdrawal bleeding, using the chronic low-dose regimen. The time to ovulation in the study group was 54.2 ± 6.2 days, while the estimated time to ovulation calculated according to the traditional approach was approximately 110 days. The clinical pregnancy rate was 44% (8/18), and all pregnancies were singletons. One patient miscarried; hence, the live birth rate was 38.9% (7/18). In summary, the CC-SS approach and its extension to the initiation of gonadotropin therapy results in considerable reduction of the time to ovulation, and favorable ovulation rates and reproductive outcome. Large-scale confirmation of these findings by properly designed randomized controlled trials may lead to a change of practice in the treatment of anovulatory infertility in PCOS patients, allowing simplification of treatment and a shorter time to ovulation and pregnancy.
Jack-of-All-trades torn Apart: Skills and Competences of an Enterprise Architect

Enterprise architecture (EA) is used to improve business-IT alignment. In order to achieve this, the organizations need skilled and competent work-force, namely enterprise architects. However, EA is a management approach without a commonly agreed definition or scope. This makes the education and recruitment of enterprise architects ambiguous and elusive. Even though the enterprise architects often operate in IT department, their job description can significantly differ from other IS professionals. Therefore, EA roles or skills and competences cannot be extrapolated solely from IT/IS discipline or literature, but more domain specific understanding is needed. Yet this is not studied comprehensively. Some frameworks exist where enterprise architects are described as jack-of-all-trades but they provide very little understanding about what type of skills should be emphasized and in what type of EA work. In this Delphi study, we elucidate these shortages by identifying different approaches of EA work and by providing a list of most important skills for an enterprise architect. The skill list shows that the enterprise architect position themselves in the intersection of social and technical communities. This indicates that although different EA domains emphasise different skills, the main defining factor of EA skills is the capability to operate in a sociotechnical playground.
Hybrid order characteristics in car-following behavior

This paper addresses the discovery of an interesting property in car-following processes, which was not reported in the existing literatures. A hybrid order behavior is supported by both experimental data and theoretical simulations. To demonstrate this behavior, the first order and the second order car-following behaviors are defined. Then, by comparing the first and the second order car-following behaviors in the existing analystic models and the real traffic context, this paper finds that a significant amount of the second order car-following processes in real traffic context do not match the existing models and structural mismatches are observed. The popularity and significance of such cases suggest the existence of unmodelled dynamics in the existing methods, that is, the car following behavior should be determined by more factors than the immediate proceeding vehicle. Therefore, the existing car-following models must be improved to accommodate these factors. This forms one of the main values of this paper. This paper then defines the hybrid order car-following behavior and prompts to associate this behavior with the concerned unmodelled dynamics (mismatches between the actual traffic data and the simulation from models). The neural network is employed to model such dynamics. The idea of the proposed hybrid order behavior matches the fact that the car-following behavior is determined by multiple vehicles driving in front of the subject car instead of only the immediate proceeding one. This is valuable because it provides guidance on the improvement of existing car-following models. The neural network model validates that the consideration of multiple vehicles improves the accuracy of car-following modelling.
Observations on Excretion of Vitamin C in Some Vascular Diseases.∗

The urinary excretion of vitamin C by normal individuals has been studied by Harris, Ray, and Ward, and was found to average about 0.03 mg. per cubic centimeter of urine for 24 hours. What rôle, if any, vitamin C plays in the evolution of pathological states associated with vascular damage and hemorrhagic tendencies other than in scurvy is still unknown. Studies were therefore undertaken upon the excretion of vitamin C in the urine in certain pathological conditions. The rate of vitamin C excretion following the intravenous administration of 100 mg. of cevitamic acid (vitamin C) was also studied. Here are presented the results of these studies upon cases of various types of purpura, metrorrhagias, and 2 cases of acute lupus erythematosus, all of which conditions are associated with tendency to hemorrhage and with a greater or lesser degree of vascular damage. In the titration of cevitamic acid 2:6-dichlorophenolindophenol was used as the indicator. In comparing the values for vitamin C excretion in normal urines with those found in the pathological conditions studied, the writer found what appears to be a significant difference between them. In the latter cases the excretion was considerably lower than normal, as much as 80% in some instances. This marked diminution in vitamin C excretion was observed in the cases of purpura and metrorrhagias, as well as in the cases of lupus erythematosus. Following the intravenous administration of cevitamic acid, the excretion in normals rose to about 5 to 6 times the values found before the intravenous injections. This rise occurred in about 2 hours following injection, and came down to the normal level in about 4 to 6 hours. The pathological cases studied showed a striking difference from the normal in their excretion curves, following intravenous administration of cevitamic acid.
The effect of malic acid on performance and some digestive tract traits of Japanese quails

To evaluate the effect of malic acid (MA) on performance and some digestive tract (gut) traits of Japanese quails, 320 quails were divided into 4 treatment groups each with 4 replicates containing 20 birds. While one of groups was fed a mash form basal diet with no additives (0MA), other groups were fed the diets with malic acid at 0.4 (0.4MA), 0.8 (0.8MA) or 1.2 (1.2MA) g/kg from 7 to 42d of age. The weight gains of 0.8MA and 1.2MA birds and the feed consumption of 1.2MA were higher than those of 0MA. Addition of the malic acid to the diets did not affect the feed efficiency. The 0.8MA birds had a higher carcass weight compared to other groups. The 1.2MA birds had a higher gut length compared to the 0MA. The results indicated that feeding diets with malic acid at 0.8 and 1.2g/kg might increase weight gain and feed consumption without affecting feed efficiency and a significant benefit of feeding diet with malic acid at 0.8g/kg compared to the control diet was obtained in terms of carcass weight in the Japanese quails.
Repair of genomic double‐strand breaks in somatic plant cells by one‐sided invasion of homologous sequences

Summary Double-strand breaks (DSB) strongly enhance homologous recombination in the genome of somatic plant cells. To characterize the mechanism of homologous DSB repair in detail, Agrobacterium-mediated targeting experiments were performed in tobacco, with repair constructs being homologous to either one or both ends of a transiently induced DSB. The recombination frequencies obtained were at least two orders of magnitude higher than without DSB induction and differed between the two T-DNA by only one-third. Thus, occurrence of homologies at both ends of the break is no prerequisite for recombination. The results demonstrate that most, if not all, reactions are initiated by one-sided invasion of a homologous sequence. This indicates that the classical double-strand break repair (DSBR) model originally proposed for meiotic recombination might be less appropriate for the description of homologous DSB repair in somatic plant cells than an integrative model based on a combination of the synthesis-dependent strand annealing (SDSA) model and of a modified version of the one-sided invasion (OSI) model of recombination. Direct consequences of this finding for the performance of gene targeting experiments, as well as possible implications for the stability of highly repetitive plant genomes, are discussed.
Channel Suspended Sediment and Fisheries: A Synthesis for Quantitative Assessment of Risk and Impact

Abstract Our meta-analysis of 80 published and adequately documented reports on fish responses to suspended sediment in streams and estuaries has yielded six empirical equations that relate biological response to duration of exposure and suspended sediment concentration. These equations answer an important need in fisheries management: quantifying the response of fishes to suspended sediment pollution of streams and estuaries has been difficult historically, and the lack of a reliable metric has hindered assessment for risk and impact for fishes subjected to excess sedimentation. The six equations address various taxonomic groups of lotic, lentic, and estuarine fishes, life stages of species within those groups, and particle sizes of suspended sediments. The equations all have the form z = a + b (log ex) + c(log ey); z is severity of ill effect, x is duration of exposure (h), y is concentration of suspended sediment (mg SS/L), a is the intercept, and b and c are slope coefficients. The severity of ill eff.
Proteomic investigation of glucosinolate systematically changes in Arabidopsis Rosette leaves to exogenous methyl jasmonate

Defense responses of plants are activated not only in the wounded tissues but also in the remote parts of the plants. Two different methyl jasmonate (MeJA) treatments were conducted, i.e., MeJA solution spraying of entire rosettes leaves and pasting leaf surface with lanolin squares containing MeJA. Glucosinolate profiles in leaves were similar using the two methods of MeJA treatment except for indole glucosinolates. The glucosinolate profiles in local and systemic leaves showed that the accumulation of glucosinolates in systemic leaves were delayed comparing with those in local treated leaves. Comparative proteomics were used to investigate the molecular processes underlying the glucosinolate changes in response to local and systemic MeJA induction. A total of 83 unique proteins were detected as differentially expressed between the local and systemic leaves. Functional analysis showed that redirection of metabolism from growth to defense was differentially regulated in local and systemic MeJA induction. The higher contents of indole glucosinolates in systemic leaves might arise from the induction of a long-distance signal produced in local leaves as well as from JA synthesized in systemic leaves.
Subtraction Operational Aggregation Operators of Simplified Neutrosophic Numbers and Their Multi-Attribute Decision Making Approach

: The simplified form of a neutrosophic set (NS) was introduced as the simplified NS (S-NS) containing an interval-valued NS (IV-NS) and a single-valued NS (SV-NS) when its truth, indeterminacy and falsity membership degrees are constrained in the real standard interval [0, 1] for the convenience of actual applications. Then, Ye presented subtraction operations of simplified neutrosophic numbers (S-NNs), containing the subtraction operations of interval-valued neutrosophic numbers (IV-NNs) and single-valued neutrosophic numbers (SV-NNs) in S-NN setting. However, the subtraction operations of S-NSs lack actual applications in current research. Since simplified neutrosophic aggregation operators are one of critical mathematical tools in decision making (DM) applications, they have been not investigated so far. Regarding the subtraction operations of S-NNs (SV-NNs and IV-NNs), this work proposes an IV-NN subtraction operational weighted arithmetic averaging (IV-NNSOWAA) operator and a SV-NN subtraction operational weighted arithmetic averaging (SV-NNSOWAA) operator as a necessary complement to existing aggregation operators of S-NNs to aggregate S-NNs (SV-NNs and IV-NNs). Then, a DM approach is developed by means of the SV-NNSOWAA and IV-NNSOWAA operators. Finally, an illustrative example is presented to indicate the applicability and effectiveness of the developed approach.