Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Validation and Analysis of COIL, a Gene Associated with Multiple Lambing Traits in Sheep

In a past study, the team used specific-locus amplified fragment sequencing (SLAF sequencing) to detect single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) contributing to the differences in lambing numbers in Xinjiang sheep. This study verified the correlation between the COIL gene and lambing number characters in sheep and explored its possible mechanism of action. In this study, three SNPs in the COIL gene, namely COILSNP1 (rs7321466), COILSNP2 (rs7314134), and COILSNP3 (rs7321563), were explored in terms of their possible mechanism of action. A tissue expression profiling analysis revealed that the COIL gene was significantly more expressed in the uterus and ovaries than in other tissues (p < 0.05), whereas an association analysis revealed that the number of lambs born was significantly different among individuals with different genotypes of this COILSNP1 (p < 0.05). The Cell Counting Kit-8(CCK-8) revealed that the overexpression of the COIL gene significantly increased the proliferation of mouse ovarian fibroblasts and sheep fibroblasts (p < 0.05). The 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) revealed that the overexpression of the COIL gene significantly increased the activity of sheep fibroblasts (p < 0.01) and mouse ovarian fibroblasts (p < 0.05). The overexpression of the COIL gene affected the biogenesis pathway of spliceosomal U snRNPs by validating protein network connections. This activity affects ovulation, embryonic development, and changes in lambing size in sheep.
Radiocarbon Dating of Total Soil Organic Matter and Humin Fraction and Its Comparison with 14C Ages of Fossil Charcoal

During the last decade radiocarbon dating has been used extensively in distinct regions of Brazil to provide information about soil chronology in paleoenvironmental studies. This paper presents 14C data of soil organic matter (SOM), humin fraction, and charcoal in several soil profiles under natural vegetation from different Brazil locations (north, central, and southeast regions). The main objective is to compare the obtained 14C dating of total SOM with humin, the oldest fraction of SOM. In order to validate the humin ages these data are compared with the age of charcoal collected at similar depths. The 14C ages obtained on charcoal were, in most of the cases, in agreement with the humin fraction considering the experimental errors, or 20% older in average. The dates obtained from total SOM showed significantly younger ages than the humin fraction indicating contamination by younger carbon. These results show the humin fraction is considered a reliable material for 14C dating in soils. However, the humin fraction ages could be assumed as the minimum ages for carbon in soils.
Reconstructing time series and their uncertainty from observations with universal noise

A new approach is presented for the reconstruction of time series and other (y,x) functions from observables with any type of stochastic noise. In particular, noise may exist in both dependent and independent variables, i.e., y and x, or t, and may even be correlated between these variables. This situation occurs in many areas of the geosciences when the independent time variable is itself the result of a measurement process, such as in paleo– sea level estimation. Uncertainty in the recovered time series is quantified in probabilistic terms using Bayesian changepoint modeling. The main contribution of the paper is the derivation of a new form of integrated likelihood function which can measure the data fit for a curve to (y,t) observables contaminated by any type of random noise. Closed form expressions are found for the special case of correlated Gaussian data noise and curves built from the sum of piecewise linear polynomials. The technique is illustrated by estimating relative sea level variations, over the last five glacial cycles, from a data set of 1928 δ18O measurements. Comparisons are also made with other techniques including those that assume an error free “independent” variable. Experiments illustrate several benefits of accounting for timing errors. These include allowing rigorous uncertainty information of both time‐dependent signals and their gradients. Derivatives of the integrated likelihood function are also given, which allow implementation of likelihood maximization. The new likelihood function better reflects real errors in data and can improve recovery of the estimated time series.
Sustainable forest management and bioenergy expansion : A multi-scale approach from global to local

Integrated assessment modeling scenarios in which global warming is limited to 2°C above preindustrial level by the end of this century expect bioenergy to contribute between 15-245 Exajoules per year to the global energy portfolio by 2050 excluding traditional bioenergy. Such scenarios often include large-scale deployment of bioenergy combined with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) as a possibility to remove carbon from the atmosphere. Substantial impact on direct and indirect land use change is to be expected. This thesis examines biomass feedstock potentials and assess bioenergy expansion at global, regional and local scales. For the global level it is argued that only the integration of multi-level assessments using top-down and bottom up approaches will help identifying realistic bioenergy potentials at high geographic resolutions. While the demand for bioenergy from Integrated Assessment Models can serve as a target, the combination of biophysical and economic land use models can help breaking this down into realizable and sustainable potentials on the ground. This thesis goes all the way from global bioenergy feedstock assessment under different protection and conservation scenarios to a conservative and environmentally sound assessment of bioenergy potentials on regional levels. The regional analyis concentrates on Korea and Japan. Finally, at the local level, the public opinion of rural town citizens in Japan with respect to sustainable forest management, forest certification and forestbased bioenergy are investigated. The motivation behind this is to examine to which extent success strategies from Austria can be replicated in Japan, which is similar to Austria in terms of forest and geographical situation. At the global level, this thesis finds that 160 million hectares of forest might be lost by 2050 for increased energy production if no sustainability safeguards like REDD policies will be applied. For the local level, the thesis states that there is a large bioenergy potential for Korea and Japan, even though the BECCS potentials seem to be limited under the presented methodologies. For the local level, the thesis concludes that sustainable forest management can also be an entry point for a bioenergy-driven rural revitalization strategy. Forest owners in rural Japanese towns show good knowledge on forest certification. Sustainable forest management based on forest certification ensures that economic and environmental goals can be achieved in unison. Especially, investment in forest infrastructure is among the main elements to ensure competitive harvesting costs in mountainous areas of Japan. It is concluded that different bottomup measures including capacity building and awareness raising need to be developed.
Extremely preterm infants born outside a provincial tertiary perinatal center and transferred postnatally associated with poor outcomes: a real-world observational study

Introduction Extremely preterm infants (EPIs) have high morbidity and mortality, and are recommended to be born in a tertiary perinatal center (inborn). However, many EPIs in central China are born in lower-level hospitals and transferred postnatally, the outcomes of which remain to be investigated. Methods EPIs admitted to the Department of Neonatology, Maternal and Child Health Hospital of Hubei Province from January 2013 to December 2022 were retrospectively recruited and divided into the control (inborn) and transfer groups (born in other hospitals). The neonatal and maternal characteristics, neonatal outcomes, and the treatment of survival EPIs were analyzed. Results A total of 174 and 109 EPIs were recruited in the control and transfer groups, respectively. EPIs in the transfer group have a higher birth weight and a lower proportion of multiple pregnancies than the control group (all P < 0.05). The proportions of antenatal steroids, magnesium sulfate, cesarean delivery, premature rupture of membranes ≥18 h, gestational diabetes, and amniotic fluid abnormalities were lower in the transfer group (all P < 0.05). Survival rates (64.22% vs. 56.32%), proportions of severe periventricular-intraventricular hemorrhage (PIVH) (11.93% vs. 11.49%), severe bronchopulmonary dysplasia (sBPD) (21.05% vs. 20%), and severe retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) (24.77% vs. 20.11%) were similar in the transfer and control groups (all P > 0.05). However, the transfer group had higher proportions of severe birth asphyxia (34.86% vs. 13.22%, P < 0.001), PIVH (42.20% vs. 29.89%, P = 0.034), and extrauterine growth retardation (EUGR) (17.43% vs. 6.32%, P = 0.003). Less surfactant utilization was found in the transfer group among survival EPIs (70.00% vs. 93.88%, P < 0.001). Conclusion EPIs born outside a tertiary perinatal center and transferred postnatally did not have significantly higher mortality and rates of severe complications (severe PIVH, severe ROP, and sBPD), but there may be an increased risk of severe asphyxia, PIVH and EUGR. This may be due to differences in maternal and neonatal characteristics and management. Further follow-up is needed to compare neurodevelopmental outcomes, and it is recommended to transfer the EPIs in utero to reduce the risk of poor physical and neurological development.
Tribute to the Flute: A Literature Review of Playing-Related Problems in Flautists

Abstract Playing musical instruments places unusually high demands on specific parts of the human body. Relative to the instruments they play, musicians may experience instrument-related symptoms, as recorded in flute players. The objective was to provide an overview of the study findings addressing medical problems in flautists to better understand their complaints and pave the way for more personalized healthcare. Several electronic databases (PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library) were systematically searched in July 2022. Furthermore, the references of all included articles were reviewed for additionally relevant sources. The resulting set of studies was summarized in a table, with quality assessment according to the SIGN grading system. From an initial 433 hits, the search yielded 95 studies with a total of 32,600 musicians, including at least 2134 flautists. Among the latter, evidence was found for musculoskeletal, neurological, dermatological, temporomandibular, and hearing complaints, overuse and reflux symptoms, velopharyngeal insufficiency, as well as upper and lower airway impairment. Other specialists may be consulted equally often and should be sensitive to the particular medical problems in flautists. Future studies would ideally contain specific outcome analyses on an international scale and consider flautists as an individual subgroup within a larger number of total participants.
SE-HCL: Schema Enhanced Hybrid Curriculum Learning for Multi-Turn Text-to-SQL

Existing multi-turn Text-to-SQL approaches, mainly use data in a randomized order when training the model, ignoring the rich structural information contained in the dialog and schema. In this paper, we propose to use curriculum learning (CL) to better leverage the curriculum structure of schema, query, and dialog for multi-turn question-query pairs. We design a model-agnostic framework named Schema Enhanced Hybrid Curriculum Learning (SE-HCL) for multi-turn Text-to-SQL to help the models gain a full contextual semantic understanding. Concretely, We measure the difficulty of the data from both a structural and model perspective. In terms of data structure, we mainly consider the turns of the question and the complexity of the schema and SQL query. Accordingly, we designed a data course module to dynamically adjust the difficulty of the data based on the convergence of the model and the schema enhancement method we designed. In terms of the model, we propose a scoring module that will judge the difficulty of a problem based on whether the model could solve the question effectively. Finally, we will consider both aspects and design a hybrid curriculum to determine the flow of model training. Our experiments show that our proposed method improves SQL-generated performance over previous state-of-the-art models on SparC and CoSQL, especially for hard and long-turn questions.
Point-to-area validation of passive microwave satellite precipitation with shipboard disdrometers

The high spatial and temporal variability of precipitation poses a substantial challenge to its global monitoring, particularly over the global oceans. The insufficient coverage of surface-based measurements adds to this problem. These data-sparse areas profit from passive microwave (PMW) satellite sensors, which essentially contribute to the estimation of global long-term precipitation estimates. However, the uncertainty of PMW satellite products demands a validation that requires high-quality surfacebased precipitation reference data over the ocean. The Ocean Rainfall And Ice-phase precipitation measurement Network (OceanRAIN) collects high-resolution point-like precipitation data from long-term equipped RVs for the validation of low-resolution PMW satellite precipitation products. Deployed on research vessels (RVs), these optical disdrometers designed for ocean usage are suitable instruments to accurately record oceanic precipitation. This thesis addresses the emerging point-to-area problem and data-imposed validation constraints on the example of collocated PMW-based Hamburg Ocean Atmosphere Parameters and Fluxes from Satellite data (HOAPS) and OceanRAIN data. The thesis presents three essential aspects for representative satellite validation: the precipitation phase (PP) distinction (rain, snow and mixed-phase), the point-to-area precipitation representation and the instrument/algorithm sensitivity. For the PP distinction, a newly developed algorithm is presented that predicts the PP using the air temperature, relative humidity and the 99th percentile of the particle diameter provided by the particle size distribution (PSD) of the disdrometer. Incorporating the PSD mainly adds to the high accuracy of 91% for a rain–snow distinction. However, including the important mixed-phase precipitation yields 81% in accuracy for the PP separation. The point-to-area problem is addressed by applying two statistical adjustments derived from subtropical radar data to ensure that the along-track data represents the areal precipitation distribution in a PMW satellite pixel. The first statistical adjustment uses the average precipitation event duration to correct underrepresented precipitation rates by sampled short events (1–3 min) and overrepresented precipitation rates of long events (5–20 min). The second adjustment takes the median-normalized precipitation rate to mainly correct cases of strong precipitation overrepresentation on the ship track with respect to the area. Both adjustments reduce the sum of squared errors for the track–area precipitation difference by 86%.
Locus coeruleus features are linked to vagus nerve stimulation response in drug-resistant epilepsy

The locus coeruleus–norepinephrine system is thought to be involved in the clinical effects of vagus nerve stimulation. This system is known to prevent seizure development and induce long-term plastic changes, particularly with the release of norepinephrine in the hippocampus. However, the requisites to become responder to the therapy and the mechanisms of action are still under investigation. Using MRI, we assessed the structural and functional characteristics of the locus coeruleus and microstructural properties of locus coeruleus-hippocampus white matter tracts in patients with drug-resistant epilepsy responding or not to the therapy. Twenty-three drug-resistant epileptic patients with cervical vagus nerve stimulation were recruited for this pilot study, including 13 responders or partial responders and 10 non-responders. A dedicated structural MRI acquisition allowed in vivo localization of the locus coeruleus and computation of its contrast (an accepted marker of LC integrity). Locus coeruleus activity was estimated using functional MRI during an auditory oddball task. Finally, multi-shell diffusion MRI was used to estimate the structural properties of locus coeruleus-hippocampus tracts. These characteristics were compared between responders/partial responders and non-responders and their association with therapy duration was also explored. In patients with a better response to the therapy, trends toward a lower activity and a higher contrast were found in the left medial and right caudal portions of the locus coeruleus, respectively. An increased locus coeruleus contrast, bilaterally over its medial portions, correlated with duration of the treatment. Finally, a higher integrity of locus coeruleus-hippocampus connections was found in patients with a better response to the treatment. These new insights into the neurobiology of vagus nerve stimulation may provide novel markers of the response to the treatment and may reflect neuroplasticity effects occurring in the brain following the implantation.
Response to David Steigmann’s discussion of our paper

We respond to David Steigmann's discussion of our paper"A general theory for anisotropic Kirchhoff-Love shells with in-plane bending of embedded fibers, Math. Mech. Solids, 28(5):1274-1317"(arXiv:2101.03122). His discussion allows us to clarify two misleading statements in our original paper, and confirm that its formulation is fully consistent with the formulation of Steigmann. We also demonstrate that some of our original statements criticized by Steigmann are not wrong.
DEVELOPMENT VERSUS DISPLACEMENT DILEMMA IN WEST BENGAL: UNRAVELING A GANDHIAN SOLUTION

The tendency to equate economic growth with industrialization has in the recent past started a violent and bloody movement in the Indian state of West Bengal. The movement that started against forced acquisition of agricultural land for industrialization in Singur gradually spread to other parts of the state of West Bengal including Nandigram. This movement acquired explosive proportions with the intellectuals, civil society and anti-left political parties throwing in their weight behind the displaced peasants who lost their land. Ultimately it became an albatross around the neck of the Left leadership and sunk the political fortunes of the thirty-four year old Left Front government in 2011 state assembly elections. The Singur and Nandigram tragedy are only one among the many agitations that have exploded in various parts of India in recent past. These protest movements have kicked off the development versus displacement debate in India. The killing of protesting peasants in Singur and Nandigram by the trigger happy police not only exposes the political myopia and inhuman indifference of the so-called pro-poor Left Front Government of West Bengal. But it also goes on to show that the political process in India is increasingly getting hijacked by the logic of the market which sees displacement only as an appendix to development. What we need today is to reinvent the principles laid down by Gandhi to usher in a just and equitable economic order. The Gandhian model of economic development is based on the simple yet profound principles of altruism and egalitarianism. This article would focus on the reasons behind the inception of a violent movement in Singur and Nandigram, the fundamental flaws in the development model of the erstwhile Left Front Government of West Bengal, and end by providing a Gandhian solution to the development versus displacement dilemma in the state of West Bengal in India.
Factors Affecting Selection of Nitrogen-Fertilized Grassland Areas by Breeding Wigeon Anas penelope

In a choice between different experimental plots, Wigeon initiated grazing bouts in fertilized vegetation plots in late April and early May, but switched to clipped plots at the end of May. There was a positive correlation between the frequency of plots first visited and time spent grazing in these same plots, as well as between the mean length of grazing bouts in different plots and the time spent grazing in those plots. Wigeon spent more time grazing in fertilized plots during the mid afternoon and evening in the early breeding period (late April and early May) than in the late breeding period (late May and early June). The mean peck rates in different plots did not differ during the early period, but later decreased as a result of increasing vegetation height. There was a positive correlation between the mean nitrogen concentrations in leaf tips and time spent grazing. Furthermore, there was a positive correlation between nitrogen concentration and the mean duration of grazing bouts. The extrinsic and intrinsic factors affecting the birds' selection of particular plots during the breeding season are discussed.
Integration of quality management and industrial metabolism while setting up small and medium agro-industries in Niger, West Africa

Abstract Quality and environmental standards are not basically taken into account in the management culture of small and medium companies in sub-Saharan Africa. It is due to the “end of pipe” approach utilized by these management systems and the extra-charges involved in their implementation. In order to contribute to solving this problem in Niger we surveyed six small and medium agro-industries (SMAI), to study quality management performances and determine the flow of resources, bases of activities in these industries. The results showed different levels of economic performance: environment/site of establishment: 33–83%; requirements relating to the buildings: 14–43%; equipment and workspace: 0–45%; air supply, water and energy: 29–50%; waste disposal and sewage: 0–68%; suitable equipment: 24–85%; measurements of prevention of the cross contamination: 0–100%; pest control: 0–33%. The main resources used by the industrial system in 2013 are: 137 thousand tons of water, 32.4 thousand tons of live weight of animals, 150 tons of plastic caps, 133 tons of carbon dioxide, 122 tons of plastic films. Rejected waste is: 109 thousand tons of water, 1,116 tons of blood of animals, 9.8 thousand tons of contents of the rumen of the animals, 1,348 tons of plastic bottles. These levels of performance are not up to contributing to the competitiveness of these SMAIs. And we propose an approach centered on the implementation of the ISO 9001, the activities of the industrial metabolism study and the sensitization of the promoters of SMAIs on the sustainable development concepts.
The nitrate/(per)chlorate relationship on Mars

Nitrate was recently detected in Gale Crater sediments on Mars at abundances up to ~600 mg/kg, confirming predictions of its presence at abundances consistent with models based on impact‐generated nitrate and other sources of fixed nitrogen. Terrestrial Mars analogs, Mars meteorites, and other solar system materials help establish a context for interpreting in situ nitrate measurements on Mars, particularly in relation to other cooccuring salts. We compare the relative abundance of nitrates to oxychlorine (chlorate and/or perchlorate, hereafter (per)chlorate) salts on Mars and Earth. The nitrate/(per)chlorate ratio on Mars is < 1, significantly lower than on Earth (nitrate/(per)chlorate > 103), suggesting not only the absence of biological activity but also different (per)chlorate formation mechanisms on Mars than on Earth.