Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The ROP2 GTPase Controls the Formation of Cortical Fine F-Actin and the Early Phase of Directional Cell Expansion during Arabidopsis Organogenesis Article, publication date, and citation information can be found at www.plantcell.org/cgi/doi/10.1105/tpc.001537.

Polar cell expansion in differentiating tissues is critical for the development and morphogenesis of plant organs and is modulated by hormonal and developmental signals, yet little is known about signaling in this fundamental process in plants. In contrast to tip-growing cells, such as pollen tubes and root hairs, cells in developing tissues are thought to expand by diffuse growth. In this study, we provide evidence that these cells expand in two phases with distinct mechanisms. In the early phase, cell expansion can occur in both longitudinal and radial or lateral directions and is mediated by Rop GTPase signaling, a mechanism known to control tip growth. The expression of a dominant-negative mutant for ROP2 (DN-rop2) inhibited polar cell expansion, whereas the expression of a constitutively active mutant (CA-rop2) caused isotropic expansion in the early phase. In the late phase, expansion occurs only in the longitudinal direction and is not affected by DN-rop2 or CA-rop2 expression. The transition from the early to the late phase coincides with the reorientation of cortical microtubules from random to transverse arrangements. Thus, cell expansion in the late phase is consistent with polar diffuse growth, in which polarity probably is defined by transverse cortical microtubules. We show that the direction of cell expansion in the early phase is associated with the localization of diffuse fine cortical F-actin in leaf epidermal cells. DN-rop2 expression specifically inhibited the formation of this F-actin, but not actin cables, whereas CA-rop2 expression caused delocalized distribution of this fine F-actin throughout the cell cortex. Furthermore, green fluorescent protein–ROP2 was localized preferentially to the cortical region of the cell, where expansion apparently occurs. These observations suggest that ROP2 control of the polar expansion of cells within tissues is analogous to the Rop control of tip growth and of tip-localized F-actin in pollen tubes and root hairs and that the tip growth mechanism also may modulate polar cell expansion in differentiating tissues.
The Importance Of Hydrogeology Assessments For Agricultural Water Demand: A Case Study From Southwest Turkey

The study area is situated in the Lake District of southwest Turkey. The Eğirdir and Burdur lakes are the most important ones in this region due to their size and water potential. The extensive Atabey and Keçiborlu plains that are located between these lakes receive irrigation water both from Eğirdir Lake and from groundwaters. Throughout this region, the demand for irrigation water has increased steadily over recent years. The aim of this work was to investigate the water quality and potential across this region, using hydrogeological, hydrological and hydrogeochemical techniques. The hydrochemical and isotopic characteristics of both the lakes and the groundwater of the study area were determined. Eğirdir lake and the groundwaters of the Atabey and Keçiborlu plains are Ca+2-Mg+2-HCO3type waters, whereas Burdur lake contains Na+-SO4-2(Cl-)HCO3type waters. The 518O, 52H and 3H isotopic contents indicate that both the lake waters and the groundwater in the aquifers between these lakes are young and of meteoric origin. Groundwater is the most important sources for supplying future enhanced demands for irrigation water in this region, from the point of view of water quality and availability.
Compressed Sensing of Multichannel EEG Signals: The Simultaneous Cosparsity and Low-Rank Optimization

Goal: This paper deals with the problems that some EEG signals have no good sparse representation and single-channel processing is not computationally efficient in compressed sensing of multichannel EEG signals. Methods: An optimization model with L0 norm and Schatten-0 norm is proposed to enforce cosparsity and low-rank structures in the reconstructed multichannel EEG signals. Both convex relaxation and global consensus optimization with alternating direction method of multipliers are used to compute the optimization model. Results: The performance of multichannel EEG signal reconstruction is improved in term of both accuracy and computational complexity. Conclusion: The proposed method is a better candidate than previous sparse signal recovery methods for compressed sensing of EEG signals. Significance: The proposed method enables successful compressed sensing of EEG signals even when the signals have no good sparse representation. Using compressed sensing would much reduce the power consumption of wireless EEG system.
Clinical Significance and Prognostic Effect of Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D Concentrations in Critical and Severe Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease

Objective: To examine the association of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] concentrations with critical and severe hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) and assess the clinical significance and prognostic effect of 25(OH)D concentrations in children with HFMD. Methods: This is a prospective observational study. The 138 children with HFMD were divided into common (49 cases), severe (52 cases), and critical (37 cases) HFMD groups. Another 59 healthy children undergoing outpatient medical examinations during the same period were chosen as the control group. Serum 25(OH)D concentrations were measured in all the subjects, and each group was subdivided by serum 25(OH)D concentration into 25(OH)D normal (≥30 ng/mL); insufficiency (20–29.9 ng/mL), and deficiency (<20 ng/mL) groups. The pediatric critical illness score (PCIS) was recorded for the critical and severe HFMD group upon admission to the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU). Children with critical and severe HFMD were also monitored for blood lactate (LAC), serum calcium ions (Ca++), D-dimer (DD), lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), and creatine kinase-MB (CK-MB) levels; the incidences of brainstem encephalitis, neurogenic pulmonary edema, and circulatory failure; and the 14-day mortality rate. Results: Serum 25(OH)D concentrations were generally low in all groups. The critical HFMD group showed a significantly lower serum 25(OH)D mean concentration (20.0 ± 8.4 ng/mL) and a higher proportion of deficiency (18%) compared with the control group (28.1 ± 6.6 ng/mL, 8%), common (29.5 ± 8.1 ng/mL, 10%) and severe (31.9 ± 9.7 ng/mL, 8%) HFMD groups (p < 0.05). In the critical and severe HFMD groups, the 25(OH)D deficiency group had lower PCISs than the 25(OH)D normal and insufficiency groups (p < 0.05); and had higher values than the latter two groups for LAC, LDH, CK-MB and DD; and the incidences of brainstem encephalitis, neurogenic pulmonary edema, circulatory failure, and mortality (p < 0.05). The death group showed significantly lower serum 25(OH)D concentrations and PCISs than the survival group (p < 0.05) and had higher LAC, LDH, CK-MB and DD levels and higher incidences of brainstem encephalitis, neurogenic pulmonary edema, and circulatory failure (p < 0.05). Logistic regression analysis revealed that the serum 25(OH)D concentration was an independent factor that influenced mortality in children with critical and severe HFMD. Conclusions: In this study, we find the serum 25(OH)D concentrations are substantially reduced in children with critical and severe HFMD and are associated with the severity of HFMD. The serum 25(OH)D concentrations may have clinical value for determining the progression of critical HFMD and predicting the risk of death. Further evidence is needed before it can be stated that 25(OH)D concentrations have clinical value in HMFD diagnosis.
Geometric hashing techniques for watermarking

In this paper we introduce the idea of using computer vision techniques for improving and enhancing watermarking capabilities. Specifically, we incorporate geometric hashing techniques into the watermarking methodology. Geometric hashing was developed to detect objects in a visual scene under a class of geometric transformations. The technique is incorporated into watermarking to detect watermarks encoded under transformations. This allows randomization of the watermark code without the need of maintaining the random generator seed. In turn, this randomization increases robustness under attacks such as collusion (determining the watermark from multiple watermarked examples). Depending on the embedding domain, robustness of the watermark under geometric attacks can be achieved.
Computerized Argument Delphi Technique

The aim of this study is the computerization of the argument Delphi method. The Delphi method is mainly designed for qualitative prediction within a group of experts, where the experts make predictions and a facilitator controls these predictions until the experts end up with a level of consensus. Argument Delphi, as opposed to the classical Delphi model, is built on the contradictions of the ideas of the experts. Argument Delphi mainly focuses on a discussion topic and asks experts to create new arguments and criticize other arguments from other experts. After a certain level of contradiction, the method yields an amount of contradictory, criticized arguments and builds a decision over these antitheses, as in the Hegelian approach. This is the first time the argument Delphi method has been modeled in a graph of arguments and the problem of qualitative decision has been transferred into a graph problem using Delphi method. This paper is also the first time that argument aggregation and evaluation methods have been proposed. Moreover, the computerized version of argument Delphi is applied to real-world problems using crowd involvement through Facebook. The problem is defined as the prediction of petroleum prices for the end of year and more than 100 contributors from all around the world argued and criticized each other. This paper also discusses the findings of this case study.
Loss of Neurons in the Hippocampus and Cerebral Cortex of AMSH-Deficient Mice

ABSTRACT AMSH, a molecule that associates with STAM1, is involved in the in vitro cell growth signaling mediated by interleukin 2 and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor. To investigate the in vivo functional role of AMSH, we have generated AMSH-deficient mice by gene targeting. The AMSH-deficient mice were morphologically indistinguishable from their littermates at birth, and histopathological examinations revealed normal morphogenesis in all tissues tested. However, all the AMSH-deficient mice exhibited postnatal growth retardation and died between postnatal day 19 (P19) and P23. Examination of brain sections at P6 demonstrated significant loss of neurons and apoptotic cells in the CA1 subfield of the hippocampus. Brain atrophy developed by P16 and was accompanied by complete loss of the CA1 neurons in the hippocampus and marked atrophy of the cerebral cortex. Furthermore, AMSH-deficient hippocampal neuronal cells were unable to survive in vitro, even in the presence of several stimulatory cytokines, while AMSH-deficient cerebellar neurons, thymocytes, and embryonic fibroblasts survived normally. Taken together, these observations indicate that AMSH is an essential molecule for the survival of neuronal cells in early postnatal mice.
A MEASUREMENT OF THE COSMIC MICROWAVE BACKGROUND DAMPING TAIL FROM THE 2500-SQUARE-DEGREE SPT-SZ SURVEY

We present a measurement of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) temperature power spectrum using data from the recently completed South Pole Telescope Sunyaev–Zel'dovich (SPT-SZ) survey. This measurement is made from observations of 2540 deg2 of sky with arcminute resolution at 150 GHz, and improves upon previous measurements using the SPT by tripling the sky area. We report CMB temperature anisotropy power over the multipole range 650 < ℓ < 3000. We fit the SPT bandpowers, combined with the 7 yr Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP7) data, with a six-parameter ΛCDM cosmological model and find that the two datasets are consistent and well fit by the model. Adding SPT measurements significantly improves ΛCDM parameter constraints; in particular, the constraint on θ s tightens by a factor of 2.7. The impact of gravitational lensing is detected at 8. 1σ, the most significant detection to date. This sensitivity of the SPT+WMAP7 data to lensing by large-scale structure at low redshifts allows us to constrain the mean curvature of the observable universe with CMB data alone to be . Using the SPT+WMAP7 data, we measure the spectral index of scalar fluctuations to be ns = 0.9623 ± 0.0097 in the ΛCDM model, a 3. 9σ preference for a scale-dependent spectrum with ns < 1. The SPT measurement of the CMB damping tail helps break the degeneracy that exists between the tensor-to-scalar ratio r and ns in large-scale CMB measurements, leading to an upper limit of r < 0.18 (95% C.L.) in the ΛCDM+r model. Adding low-redshift measurements of the Hubble constant (H 0) and the baryon acoustic oscillation (BAO) feature to the SPT+WMAP7 data leads to further improvements. The combination of SPT+WMAP7+H 0+BAO constrains ns = 0.9538 ± 0.0081 in the ΛCDM model, a 5. 7σ detection of ns < 1, and places an upper limit of r < 0.11 (95% C.L.) in the ΛCDM+r model. These new constraints on ns and r have significant implications for our understanding of inflation, which we discuss in the context of selected single-field inflation models.
Optical fiber communications systems development in the UK

F OLLOWING the invention of the laser, work commenced during the early 1960s on the use of light waves for telecommunications transmission. Metallic pipe guides and free space propagation were studied but rejected as impractical and, in the mid 1960s, glass fibers were identified as a potential transmission medium. There ensued the now classic paper by C. K. Kao and G. Hockham [l] in the Proceedings of the IEE, describing the monomode optical fiber waveguide. At the time, this appeared to many to be a somewhat absurd proposal because the attenuation of glasses was believed to be far too high for any useful system to emerge. However, shortly after its publication, Kao and co-workers [2] demonstrated that blocks of pure silica were commercially available with attenuations less than 10 dB/km. This was a major step forward because it had earlier been established that to compete with coaxial cable systems, the fiber attenuation should be less than 20 dB/km to allow a repeater spacing of about 2 km or greater. Intensive studies of the attenuation mechanisms in glasses continued during the 1960s, as did studies of fabrication methods for fibers. The major emphasis was on multicomponent glasses made from conventional powder materials and converted into fiber by the double crucible process. Subsequently, this process was developed to the point where attenuation figures of under 5 dB/km could be achieved with good yield on very long continuous runs [3] and it is now being used by a number of manufacturers to make graded index and high Numerical Aperture (NA) fibers. In 1970, the Corning Glass Works announced (at the IEE in London), the achievement of a fiber having an attenuation of 2 0 dB/km. Silica glass had been converted into cored light-guiding fiber and it was only a matter of time before the technology was exploited in the field. The author joined the optical communications group at the British Post Office (now British Telecom) in 1971. It was a time of great excitement and very rapid change as scientists, and engineers in laboratories all over the world started to take the subject seriously. Casual examination of the literature shows a virtual explosion in the numbers of published papers starting at about this time and continuing throughout the 1970s. There were numerous unsolved problems. How to make low attenuation fiber? Would it be strong enough to cable? How to joint it and handle it in a field environment? How to make a long-lived CW semiconductor laser? How to achieve adequate bandwidth in the fiber without using monomode technology? Most of these questions were answered, independently or in collaboration, by laboratories around the world. Thus, by about 1975, a position had been reached whereby all the key components existed to mount a field experiment and in 1977, two were commissioned in the UK.
New method to monitor drugs at dance venues

Editor—Ramsey et al report the analyses of illegally purchased controlled drugs that had been surrendered in a nightclub.1 They argue that monitoring such samples would provide important information to healthcare professionals, which they could use to “formulate better advice on avoiding injury through drug use and to design the most appropriate campaigns against drug use. ” Yet no indication is given of how this would be done, other than by increased use of the TICTAC database, which is edited by Ramsey.2 As this database is presumably already used by people reading this paper, its ability to fulfil this purpose is questionable. No evidence is presented that any evidence based harm reduction strategy uses these data or that an outcome evaluation has been conducted on them. Two major problems arise with ecstasy tablets: the unknown amount of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) present, if at all, and other drugs being sold as 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, such as 4-methylthioamphetamine (4-MTA). Adverse reactions to 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine seem to be both idiosyncratic and rare. Perhaps the information about tablet contents should be made available to people who are deciding whether or not to use the tablets, so that they can avoid ingesting tablets of unknown content. On-site facilities for tablet testing in the Netherlands reduce the drug use of people attending organised dance parties.3 Information on tablets in circulation at the venue is immediately available to both the users and medical support staff. The TICTAC database, on the other hand, would not be able to provide this information without confirmatory analysis. No controlled study has ever been conducted to evaluate whether the availability of information about the contents of ecstasy tablets either increases or decreases the harm associated with their use. What is evident is that restricted access to this information is not preventing adverse reactions and is having no effect on the drug use of young people.
SSDesign: Computational metabolic pathway design based on flux variability using elementary flux modes

Metabolic pathway modification based on the stoichiometric model has been an effective approach for enhancing microbial bio‐production. The network of optimal pathways for “growth‐associated” and “non‐growth‐associated” production can be designed from the flux variability (solution space). The present study introduces a new computational method (solution space design [SSDesign]) that visually designs the gene knockout solution space. The smallest reaction sets that satisfy the mass balances of intermediates are called elementary flux nodes (EFMs). Because some of the EFMs necessarily occupy the outer boundary nodes of the flux solution space, the proposed SSDesign determines the area over which EFMs should be removed from the solution space of the parent strain, and explores the gene knockouts that will eliminate these undesirable EFMs. To evaluate the performance of SSDesign, the model was applied to growth‐associated and non‐growth‐associated succinate production in Escherichia coli. In the growth‐associated case, the deletion mutants that promoted succinate production at maximum biomass yield were predicted, and a candidate of ΔptsG ΔpykA,F ΔpflA has been experimentally confirmed as a succinate producer. Simply by changing the parameters, the gene knockout combinations yielding high growth yield were successfully predicted by SSDesign. In the non‐growth‐associated case, strong candidates for succinate production were the deletion mutants ΔpntAB ΔsfcA ΔpykA,F and ΔsfcA ΔmaeB ΔpykA,F Δzwf. According to the solution spaces, these strains allow high growth yield and inevitably produce succinate at zero biomass yield, since their metabolic pathways cannot sustain steady‐state without discarding succinate from the cell. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2015;112: 759–768. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Optimal Parameters for Locality-Sensitive Hashing

Locality-sensitive hashing (LSH) is the basis of many algorithms that use a probabilistic approach to find nearest neighbors. We describe an algorithm for optimizing the parameters and use of LSH. Prior work ignores these issues or suggests a search for the best parameters. We start with two histograms: one that characterizes the distributions of distances to a point's nearest neighbors and the second that characterizes the distance between a query and any point in the data set. Given a desired performance level (the chance of finding the true nearest neighbor) and a simple computational cost model, we return the LSH parameters that allow an LSH index to meet the performance goal and have the minimum computational cost. We can also use this analysis to connect LSH to deterministic nearest-neighbor algorithms such as <formula formulatype="inline"><tex Notation="TeX">$k$</tex> </formula>-<formula formulatype="inline"><tex Notation="TeX">$d$</tex></formula> trees and thus start to unify the two approaches.
Establishment of an orthotopic transplantation tumor model in nude mice using a drug-resistant human ovarian cancer cell line with a high expression of c-Kit

The resistance of ovarian cancer to platinum-based chemotherapy is a critical issue in the clinical setting. The present study aimed to establish animal models to replicate this clinical condition, as well as to investigate the resistance mechanisms of ovarian cancer. A cisplatin (DDP)-resistant human ovarian cancer cell line, SKOV3/DDP, was screened, validated and injected subcutaneously into the neck of female nude mice. Following tumor establishment, the tumor was collected and cut into small sections, which were subsequently implanted into the ovaries of other nude mice. The growth of the orthotopic tumors was observed and the tumor-bearing mice were sacrificed and dissected. The orthotopic and metastatic tumor tissues were collected, sectioned, stained with hematoxylin and eosin and analyzed. In the present study, 16 nude mice underwent orthotopic transplantation surgery and a tumor model was successfully established in 14/16 of the mice, with an in situ tumor formation rate of 87.5%. Following euthanasia, a laparotomy demonstrated the tumor formation at the site of transplantation, as well as varying degrees of metastasis to additional organs and tissues. Therefore, the present study successfully established an orthotopic tumor transplantation model in nude mice using a c-Kit-positive DDP-resistant human ovarian cancer cell line. This model may represent a useful tool for investigating the resistance mechanism of ovarian cancer, as well as evaluating the efficacy of therapeutic strategies.