Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Oil Shale Ash Addition Effect in Concrete to Freezing-Thawing

Modifying the properties of cement by including mineral-based additives into cement ensures benefits such as preventing environmental hazards of waste additives and pro viding increase in cement amount. Based on these main considerations, as a part of the study in which contribution of ash, obtained as a result of the burning of oil shale rocks in fluidized bed thermal plants, to Portland cement (PC) in 15% ratio is chemically proven, this study is performed in order to understand the direction and severity of the effects that oil shale ash (OSA) might have on the properties of cements. For this purpose, freezing- thawing experiments were performed on cement samples produced with PC 42.5 cement, which has 0, 10, 20, and 30% of OSA additions. It is desired to make a conclusion by finding weight loss factor (AF w ) and relative elasticity module (E) loss related with press and ultrasonic test methods based on given experiments. As a result, it was observed that durability of concretes obtained by addition of oil shale rocks in 15% ratio to PC 42.5 cements against freezing/thawing effects is greater than that of PC 42.5 control sample.
Mapping arealisation of the visual cortex of non-primate species: lessons for development and evolution

The integration of the visual stimulus takes place at the level of the neocortex, organized in anatomically distinct and functionally unique areas. Primates, including humans, are heavily dependent on vision, with approximately 50% of their neocortical surface dedicated to visual processing and possess many more visual areas than any other mammal, making them the model of choice to study visual cortical arealisation. However, in order to identify the mechanisms responsible for patterning the developing neocortex, specifying area identity as well as elucidate events that have enabled the evolution of the complex primate visual cortex, it is essential to gain access to the cortical maps of alternative species. To this end, species including the mouse have driven the identification of cellular markers, which possess an area-specific expression profile, the development of new tools to label connections and technological advance in imaging techniques enabling monitoring of cortical activity in a behaving animal. In this review we present non-primate species that have contributed to elucidating the evolution and development of the visual cortex. We describe the current understanding of the mechanisms supporting the establishment of areal borders during development, mainly gained in the mouse thanks to the availability of genetically modified lines but also the limitations of the mouse model and the need for alternate species.
Optimal Structure Identification With Greedy Search

In this paper we prove the so-called "Meek Conjecture". In particular, we show that if a DAG H is an independence map of another DAG G, then there exists a finite sequence of edge additions and covered edge reversals in G such that (1) after each edge modification H remains an independence map of G and (2) after all modifications G =H. As shown by Meek (1997), this result has an important consequence for Bayesian approaches to learning Bayesian networks from data: in the limit of large sample size, there exists a two-phase greedy search algorithm that---when applied to a particular sparsely-connected search space---provably identifies a perfect map of the generative distribution if that perfect map is a DAG. We provide a new implementation of the search space, using equivalence classes as states, for which all operators used in the greedy search can be scored efficiently using local functions of the nodes in the domain. Finally, using both synthetic and real-world datasets, we demonstrate that the two-phase greedy approach leads to good solutions when learning with finite sample sizes.
Oxidative turnover of soybean root glutamine synthetase. In vitro and in vivo studies

Glutamine synthetase (GS) is the key enzyme in ammonia assimilation and catalyzes the ATP-dependent condensation of NH3 with glutamate to produce glutamine. GS in plants is an octameric enzyme. Recent work from our laboratory suggests that GS activity in plants may be regulated at the level of protein turnover (S.J. Temple, T.J. Knight, P.J. Unkefer, C. Sengupta-Gopalan [1993] Mol Gen Genet 236: 315-325; S.J. Temple, S. Kunjibettu, D. Roche, C. Sengupta-Gopalan [1996] Plant Physiol 112: 1723-1733; S.J. Temple, C. Sengupta-Gopalan [1997] In C.H. Foyer, W.P. Quick, eds, A Molecular Approach to Primary Metabolism in Higher Plants. Taylor & Francis, London, pp 155-177). Oxidative modification of GS has been implicated as the first step in the turnover of GS in bacteria. By incubating soybean (Glycine max) root extract enriched in GS in a metal-catalyzed oxidation system to produce the.OH radical, we have shown that GS is oxidized and that oxidized GS is inactive and more susceptible to degradation than nonoxidized GS. Histidine and cysteine protect GS from metal-catalyzed inactivation, indicating that oxidation modifies the GS active site and that cysteine and histidine residues are the site of modification. Similarly, ATP and particularly ATP/glutamate give the enzyme the greatest protection against oxidative inactivation. The roots of plants fed ammonium nitrate showed a 3-fold increase in the level of GS polypeptides and activity compared with plants not fed ammonium nitrate but without a corresponding increase in the GS transcript level. This would suggest either translational or posttranslational control of GS levels.
Spatio-temporal motion field descriptors for the hierarchical action recognition system

Spatio-temporal motion field descriptors for the hierarchical action recognition system have been developed. At the lower level, blurred motion fields representing local features such as speed and direction are estimated from video sequences. At the higher level, feature vectors are calculated by applying a parallel updating scheme to measure the similarity between the input video sequences and so-called template patches, which are selected from learning samples. Instead of traditional patch descriptors that applied computationally expensive methods such as PCA to reduce the size of feature vectors, we extended previous hardware-based ideas of Averaged Principal-Edge Distribution (APED) in face detection by incorporating temporal information. In addition, since the system only employs simple computations such as summation and Boolean operators, it can be implemented on VLSI chips without much effort to achieve real-time performance. We tested our system on a popular action recognition database and promising recognition performance has been reported.
Mobile Robot Localization using Planar Patches and a Stereo Panoramic Model

This paper presents a new type of image-based map for robot navigation formed by panoramic models enriched with depth and 3D planarity information. We take advantage of the scene geometry implicitly contained in the model to localize a mobile robot that is moving in the same environment. The novelty of this model compared to the existing imagebased maps is that the motion of the robot is not restricted to a predefined path or to locations close to the original images. Experimental results demonstrate this. We also present a new technique for extracting planar patches using both intensity and sparse disparity information provided by a trinocular vision system.
Current role of microwave ablation in the treatment of small hepatocellular carcinomas

Percutaneous radiofrequency ablation (RFA) can be as effective as surgical resection in terms of overall survival and recurrence-free survival rates in patients with small hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Effectiveness of RFA is adversely influenced by heat-sink effect. Other ablative therapies could be considered for larger tumors or for tumors located near the vessels. In this regard, recent improvements in microwave energy delivery systems seem to open interesting perspectives to percutaneous ablation, which could become the ablation technique of choice in the near future. Microwave ablation (MWA) has the advantages of possessing a higher thermal efficiency. It has high efficacy in coagulating blood vessels and is a relatively fast procedure. The time required for ablation is short and the shape of necrosis is elliptical with the older systems and spherical with the new one. There is no heat-sink effect and it can be used to ablate tumors adjacent to major vessels. These factors yield a large ablation volume, and result in good local control and fewer complications. This review highlights the most relevant updates on MWA in the treatment of small (<3 cm) HCC. Furthermore, we discuss the possibility of MWA as the first ablative choice, at least in selected cases.
Osteoblastic and cytokine gene expression of implant-adherent cells in humans.

OBJECTIVES Implant surface topography is a key determinant affecting osteoblastic differentiation and cell-cell signaling of implant-adherent cells. MATERIALS AND METHODS To assess the early osteoinductive and cell-cell signaling events in adherent cells, commercially pure titanium implants (2.2 × 5 mm) with nanotopography (HF-treated TiO2 grit-blasted) were compared with micron-scale topography TiO2 grit-blasted (micron-scale, control) implants in vivo. Six implants (n = 3/surface) were placed in 10 systemically healthy subjects and removed by reverse threading at 1, 3, and 7 days. Gene expression profiles of adherent cells were interrogated using low-density RT-PCR arrays. RESULTS Osteoinduction was not observed at day 1 on either surface. At 3 days, elevated levels of BMP6, osteopontin, and osterix (OSX) were observed in RNA of cells adherent to both micron-scale and nanotopography surfaces. Both surfaces supported osteoinductive gene expression at 7 days; however, modest elevations of most mRNAs and significantly higher OSX mRNA levels were measured for cells adhered to nanotopography implants. Further, chemokine and cytokine profiles including CXCL10, CXCL14, IL-9, IL-22, and TOLLIP were upregulated on nanotopographic surfaces as compared with microtopographic surfaces. CONCLUSIONS Implants with superimposed nanoscale topography generate a greater induction of genes linked to osteogenesis and cell-cell signaling during the early phases of osseointegration.
Molecular Cloning and Characterization of a Surface-Localized Adhesion Protein in Mycoplasma bovis Hubei-1 Strain

Mycoplasma bovis (M. bovis) is an important pathogen that causes various bovine diseases, such as mastitis in cows and pneumonia in calves. The surface proteins are generally thought to play a central role in the pathogenesis of this organism. We screened the entire genome of M. bovis Hubei-1 and discovered a gene named vpmaX that encodes the 25 kDa variable surface lipoprotein A (VpmaX). Sequence analysis revealed that VpmaX contains several repetitive units and a typical bacterial lipoprotein signal sequence. The vpmaX gene was cloned and expressed in E. coli to obtain recombinant VpmaX (rVpmaX). Western blot analysis using a rabbit antibody against rVpmaX demonstrated that VpmaX is a membrane protein. Immunostaining visualized via confocal laser scanning microscopy showed that rVpmaX was able to adhere to embryonic bovine lung cells (EBL), and this was also confirmed by a sandwich ELISA. In summary, a surface-localized adhesion protein was identified in M. bovis Hubei-1.
Bacterial Communities Associated with Culex Mosquito Larvae and Two Emergent Aquatic Plants of Bioremediation Importance

Microbes are important for mosquito nutrition, growth, reproduction and control. In this study, we examined bacterial communities associated with larval mosquitoes and their habitats. Specifically, we characterized bacterial communities associated with late larval instars of the western encephalitis mosquito ( Culex tarsalis ), the submerged portions of two emergent macrophytes (California bulrush, Schoenoplectus californicus and alkali bulrush, Schoenoplectus maritimus ), and the associated water columns to investigate potential differential use of resources by mosquitoes in different wetland habitats. Using next-generation sequence data from 16S rRNA gene hypervariable regions, the alpha diversity of mosquito gut microbial communities did not differ between pond mesocosms containing distinct monotypic plants. Proteobacteria, dominated by the genus Thorsellia (Enterobacteriaceae), was the most abundant phylum recovered from C . tarsalis larvae. Approximately 49% of bacterial OTUs found in larval mosquitoes were identical to OTUs recovered from the water column and submerged portions of the two bulrushes. Plant and water samples were similar to one another, both being dominated by Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Cyanobacteria , Proteobacteria and Verrucomicrobia phyla. Overall, the bacterial communities within C . tarsalis larvae were conserved and did not change across sampling dates and between two distinct plant habitats. Although Thorsellia spp. dominated mosquito gut communities, overlap of mosquito gut, plant and water-column OTUs likely reveal the effects of larval feeding. Future research will investigate the role of the key indicator groups of bacteria across the different developmental stages of this mosquito species.
Molecular mechanisms of regulation of Toll‐like receptor signaling

TLRs play a critical role in the detection of microbes and endogenous “alarmins” to initiate host defense, yet they can also contribute to the development and progression of inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. To avoid pathogenic inflammation, TLR signaling is subject to multilayer regulatory control mechanisms, including cooperation with coreceptors, post‐translational modifications, cleavage, cellular trafficking, and interactions with negative regulators. Nucleic acid‐sensing TLRs are particularly interesting in this regard, as they can both recognize host‐derived structures and require internalization of their ligand as a result of intracellular sequestration of the nucleic acid‐sensing TLRs. This review summarizes the regulatory mechanisms of TLRs, including regulation of their access to ligands, receptor folding, intracellular trafficking, and post‐translational modifications, as well as how altered control mechanism could contribute to inflammatory and autoimmune disorders.
2010 Rheumatoid arthritis classification criteria: an American College of Rheumatology/European League Against Rheumatism collaborative initiative

Objective The 1987 American College of Rheumatology (ACR; formerly the American Rheumatism Association) classification criteria for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have been criticised for their lack of sensitivity in early disease. This work was undertaken to develop new classification criteria for RA. Methods A joint working group from the ACR and the European League Against Rheumatism developed, in three phases, a new approach to classifying RA. The work focused on identifying, among patients newly presenting with undifferentiated inflammatory synovitis, factors that best discriminated between those who were and those who were not at high risk for persistent and/or erosive disease—this being the appropriate current paradigm underlying the disease construct ‘RA’. Results In the new criteria set, classification as ‘definite RA’ is based on the confirmed presence of synovitis in at least one joint, absence of an alternative diagnosis better explaining the synovitis, and achievement of a total score of 6 or greater (of a possible 10) from the individual scores in four domains: number and site of involved joints (range 0–5), serological abnormality (range 0–3), elevated acute-phase response (range 0–1) and symptom duration (two levels; range 0–1). Conclusion This new classification system redefines the current paradigm of RA by focusing on features at earlier stages of disease that are associated with persistent and/or erosive disease, rather than defining the disease by its late-stage features. This will refocus attention on the important need for earlier diagnosis and institution of effective disease-suppressing therapy to prevent or minimise the occurrence of the undesirable sequelae that currently comprise the paradigm underlying the disease construct ‘RA’.
Talking head detection by likelihood-ratio test

Detecting accurately when a person whose face is visible in an audio-visual medium is the audible speaker is an enabling technology with a number of useful applications. These include fused audio/visual speaker recognition, AV (audio/visual) segmentation and diarization as well as AV synchronization. The likelihood-ratio test formulation and feature signal processing employed here allow the use of high-dimensional feature sets in the audio and visual domain, and the approach appears to have good detection performance for AV segments as short as a few seconds. Computation costs for the resulting algorithm are modest, typically much less than the front-end facedetection system. While the resulting system requires model training, only true condition training (i.e. video where the talking speaker is audible) is required.
Rural landholding mapping and deforestation detection using rapideye® images and NDVI

This paper explains Brazil's efforts on land use monitoring and control of deforestation through the use of satellite images and geotechnologies. Up until very recently, only Landsat imagery were the basis of monitoring programs, but the government has acquired national coverages of better resolution (5 meter pixel) Rapideye® images. Additionally, it has developed a Rural Environmental Register System, based on open technologies, to receive and manage information from all landholdings in the country. The use of these images in change detection, with a technique of (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index NDVI) difference threshold assisting visual inspection is discussed. It shows an improvement in recognizing smaller (above 1.35 ha) deforestation areas, increasing by 15% the estimated change area on a specific tile and improving overall accuracy by about 13%.
Possibilities to miss predicting timing errors in canary flip-flops

Deep submicron technologies increase parameter variations, which will make microprocessor designs very difficult, since every variation requires a large safety margin for achieving specified timing yield. This means higher supply voltage, which results in large energy consumption. Razor flip-flop (FF) is a clever technique to eliminate the supply voltage margin by exploiting circuit-level timing speculation. It combines dynamic voltage scaling technique with the error detection and recovery mechanism. We are studying an alternative timing-error-predicting FF, named canary FF. This paper discusses a critical issue regarding the canary FF. Detailed gate- and architectural-level co-simulations unveil that canary FF occasionally misses predicting timing errors.
Event Detection using Log-linear Models for Coronary Contrast Agent Injections

In this paper, we discuss a method to detect contrast agent injections during Percutaneous Transluminal Coronary Angioplasty that is performed to treat the coronary arteries disease. During this intervention contrast agent is injected to make the vessels visible under X-rays. We aim to detect the moment the injected contrast agent reaches the coronary vessels. For this purpose, we use an algorithm based on log-linear models that are a generalization of Conditional Random Fields and Maximum Entropy Markov Models. We show that this more generally applicable algorithm performs in this case similar to dedicated methods.
Receipt of HIV prevention interventions is more common in community-based clinics than in primary care or acute care settings for Black men who have sex with men in the District of Columbia

ABSTRACT Characterization of structural barriers that impede the receipt of HIV prevention and care services is critical to addressing the HIV epidemic among Black men who have sex with men (BMSM). This study investigated the utilization of HIV prevention and general care services among a non-clinic-based sample of BMSM who reported at least one structural barrier to engagement in care. Proportions of participants who had received HIV prevention services and general care services in different settings were compared using Fisher’s exact test and correlates of service receipt were assessed using logistic regression. Among 75 BMSM, 60% had accessed a community-based clinic, 21% had accessed a primary care setting, and 36% had accessed an acute care setting in the last 6 months. Greater proportions of participants who had accessed community-based clinics received HIV prevention services during these visits (90%) compared to those who had accessed primary care (53%) and acute care (44%) settings (p = .005). Opportunities for BMSM to receive HIV prevention interventions differed by care setting. Having access to health care did not necessarily facilitate the uptake of HIV prevention interventions. Further investigation of the structurally rooted reasons why BMSM are often unable to access HIV prevention services is warranted.
Immediate vs delayed intervention for acute coronary syndromes: a randomized clinical trial.

CONTEXT International guidelines recommend an early invasive strategy for patients with high-risk acute coronary syndromes without ST-segment elevation, but the optimal timing of intervention is uncertain. OBJECTIVE To determine whether immediate intervention on admission can result in a reduction of myocardial infarction compared with a delayed intervention. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PATIENTS The Angioplasty to Blunt the Rise of Troponin in Acute Coronary Syndromes Randomized for an Immediate or Delayed Intervention (ABOARD) study, a randomized clinical trial that assigned, from August 2006 through September 2008 at 13 centers in France, 352 patients with acute coronary syndromes without ST-segment elevation and a Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction (TIMI) score of 3 or more to receive intervention either immediately or on the next working day (between 8 and 60 hours after enrollment). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES The primary end point was the peak troponin value during hospitalization; the key secondary end point was the composite of death, myocardial infarction, or urgent revascularization at 1-month follow-up. RESULTS Time from randomization to sheath insertion was 70 minutes with immediate intervention vs 21 hours with delayed intervention. The primary end point did not differ between the 2 strategies (median [interquartile range] troponin I value, 2.1 [0.3-7.1] ng/mL vs 1.7 [0.3-7.2] ng/mL in the immediate and delayed intervention groups, respectively; P = .70). The key secondary end point was observed in 13.7% (95% confidence interval, 8.6%-18.8%) of the group assigned to receive immediate intervention and 10.2% (95% confidence interval, 5.7%-14.6%) of the group assigned to receive delayed intervention (P = .31). The other end points, as well as major bleeding, did not differ between the 2 strategies. CONCLUSION In patients with acute coronary syndromes without ST-segment elevation, a strategy of immediate intervention compared with a strategy of intervention deferred to the next working day (mean, 21 hours) did not result in a difference in myocardial infarction as defined by peak troponin level. TRIAL REGISTRATION clinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT00442949.