Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Draining the Swamp Dodders: Systematics of Cuscuta gronovii s.l. (Subgenus Grammica, Sect. Oxycarpae)

Abstract Cuscuta gronovii species complex (sensu lato, s.l.) is a North American group of species that belong to C. sect. Oxycarpae of subgenus Grammica. Members of C. gronovii s.l. are often associated with riparian or wet habitats, and their delimitation has been problematic historically. DNA sequences from multiple plastid and nuclear ribosomal non-coding regions were used to reconstruct evolutionary relationships among taxa. Molecular phylogeny supported the resurrection of C. saururi, a taxon that has been treated either as C. gronovii var. latiflora or a nomenclatural synonym of C. gronovii var. gronovii. Cuscuta saururi was inferred to be sister to C. cephalanthi, but the relationships among the rest of taxa, although forming a clade with moderate support, remained largely unresolved. Thus, the species limits of C. gronovii s.l. aggregate were also comprehensively investigated through a morphometric study. Plants with 4-merous flowers from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, Canada, which were previously thought to be C. cephalanthi, were described as a new species, C. acadiana. Cuscuta acadiana, although fertile and producing abundant seeds, is unusual in that the majority of its pollen grains intergrade from zonocolpate, syncolpate, or pantocolpate, with variously shaped or twisted ectoapertures. Cuscuta gronovii var. calyptrata, a widely accepted but virtually unknown taxon, was typified and included in all the analyses. Cuscuta umbrosa was treated as a variety of C. gronovii (var. curta), and C. rostrata was maintained as a species. An identification key, detailed descriptions, illustrations, and a summary of geographical distribution, ecology, and conservation status were provided for all the members of C. gronovii s.l. The only taxon of this species complex found to be weedy, especially in cranberries, was C. gronovii var. gronovii.
Effect of Firework Festivities on Bird Richness and Abundance at a Natural Protected Wetland in Central Mexico

Abstract. Firework festivities have been present in the culture and traditions of many human populations around the world, however their effects on bird populations in natural habitats are not well understood. Changes in bird species richness and abundance related to two firework festivities at the lagoon of Zumpango, Mexico, were evaluated in March and April of 2019. Six point counts were established at the edge of the lagoon to record bird species richness and abundance before, during, and after the events. Additionally, noise levels were measured at each point-count. In total, 80 bird species were observed, including 49 aquatic species. The most abundant were Ruddy Duck (Oxyura jamaicensis) and Wilson's Phalarope (Phalaropus tricolor). The values of species richness and abundance significantly decreased the days when the events took place, while noise levels increased. Furthermore, basal noise levels (mean = 54.80 dB) are considered high for this natural protected area. Results show that high impact human festivities have negative consequences for birds, and these activities should be limited or restricted in regional, national, and globally important bird conservation areas such as the lagoon of Zumpango.
Une majoration de la fonction de Hilbert et ses conséquences pour l'interpolation algébrique

A new upper bound for the Hilbert function of a homogeneous, geometrically reduced, ideal is given, depending only on the dimensions and degrees of the components of the associeted variety; this bound, valid in all degrees, allows us to give interpolation results and also to construct a regular sequence of polynomials belonging to the ideal with controlled degrees.
Comprehensive Study of Anti-UVC Activity and Cytotoxicity of Hot-water Soluble Herb Extracts

Background/Aim: COVID-19 pandemic caused the rapid dissemination of ultraviolet C (UVC) sterilization apparatuses. Prolonged exposure to UVC, however, may exert harmful effects on the human body. The aim of the present study was to comprehensively investigate the anti-UVC activity of a total of 108 hot-water soluble herb extracts, using human dermal fibroblast and melanoma cell lines, for the future development of skin care products. Materials and Methods: Exposure time to UVC was set to 3 min, and cell viability was determined using the MTT assay. Anti-UVC activity was determined using the selective index (SI), a ratio of 50% cytotoxic concentration for unirradiated cells to 50% effective concentration that restored half of the UVC-induced decrease of viability. Results: Dermal fibroblasts at any population doubling level were more resistant to UVC irradiation than melanoma cells. Both 49 herb extracts recommended by Japan Medical Herb Association (JAMHA) and 59 additional herb extracts showed comparable anti-UVC activity. SI values of selected herbs (Butterbur, Cloves, Curry Tree, Evening Primrose, Rooibos, Stevia, Willow) were several-fold lower than those of vitamin C and vanillin. Their potent anti-UVC activity was maintained for at least 6 h post irradiation, but declined thereafter to the basal level, possibly due to cytotoxic ingredients. Conclusion: UVC sensitivity may be related to the growth potential of target cells. Removal of cytotoxic ingredients of herb extracts may further potentiate and prolong their anti-UVC activity.
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Breast and Cervical Cancer Screening: A Systematic Review

Background/Aim: COVID-19 has dramatically impacted non-pandemic-related care, including preventive medicine. Our objective was to quantify the alterations in the volume of screening tests for breast and cervical cancer during the COVID-19 era compared to pre-pandemic levels. Secondarily, we discussed the causes responsible for this change, presented suggestions for screening optimization and conducted a targeted search of the relevant literature for worsening of future mortality due to screening setback. Materials and Methods: We systematically searched Pubmed, Google Scholar and Epistemonikos for articles in English or Greek, published from March 11th, 2020, until September 14th, 2022, that illustrated quantitative variations of mammograms or Pap/HPV tests. Preprint articles, editorials and speeches were excluded. Quality of included studies was assessed via the JBI critical appraisal checklist for studies reporting prevalence data. The evidence was narratively synthesized. Results: A total of 56 articles were included, being either observational studies or reports from cancer registries. Large reductions were universally identified, peaked during the first wave but partially persisted after easing of the restrictions. Conclusion: Our systematic review provides an updated record of the variations in screening volume and approaches screening neglect from a multidimensional perspective answering why it happened and how we could achieve recovery. A strong awareness campaign is proposed, in conjunction with triaging citizens more likely to benefit from screening. Cervical self-sampling is emphasized in the literature. Various studies displayed a potential increase in cancer mortality in the future based on predictive statistical models.
International Students’ Experience of Remote Teaching and Learning in Portugal

Abstract This article analyzes international students’ assessment of remote teaching and learning (T&L) during the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic in Portugal. While all students have suffered the consequences of campus lockdowns and distance teaching, international students represent a particularly vulnerable group since, even under normal circumstances, they already have to deal with the challenges of new academic and living conditions. In Portugal, most international students come from Portuguese-speaking (designated as Lusophone) countries. Students’ experiences were gathered via an online cross-sectional survey (N = 672), and the quantitative analysis compared Lusophone and non-Lusophone students and undergraduate and postgraduate students. Non-Lusophone students were more negative about remote education than Lusophone ones, being less interested in continuing to study online and giving a more negative assessment of the T&L experience than their counterparts. For them, cultural immersion is probably as important as degree attainment. Postgraduate students reported a lesser increase in study time and rated the pedagogical aspects better than undergraduate students, which suggests, by comparison, a better adaptation to the remote regime. Implementing flexible and hybrid education solutions is critical to maintaining international students’ interest.
Preparing conservatoire students for the music education workforce: institutional and industrial perspectives on instrumental teacher education in England

ABSTRACT A skilled music education workforce is essential to ensure longevity of music-making for future generations of young learners and access to high-quality instrumental music tuition remains crucial for school-aged pupils. Yet, Higher Education providers, including conservatoires, are not held accountable for providing high-quality pedagogical training to ensure that music graduates are best equipped to support musical learning in children and young people. Perspectives on instrumental teacher education obtained through interviews with academics at six English conservatoires were triangulated with questionnaire responses from senior leaders of 66 Music Education Hubs in England. Findings revealed institutional challenges relating to the privileging of principal study activity; inconsistent pedagogical provision across the conservatoire sector, and a mismatch between students’ pedagogical training and employer expectations. Closer collaboration and dialogue between institutions and employers are recommended to ensure that conservatoire graduates are trained appropriately to meet the needs of the modern music education sector.
Prototyping in smart product design: Investigating prototyping tools to support communication in the early stage smart product development

ABSTRACT Smart product design (SPD) is more complex than traditional product design (TPD), requiring intense interdisciplinary collaboration. It is well understood that prototypes are an effective means to facilitate communicating design concepts. However, there is limited research concerning prototyping preferences of design disciplines involved in SPD. The research explores the use of prototyping in smart product development. Specifically, it aims to understand the preferences and dimensions of fidelity of different prototyping tools that can support communication in the SPD process for various stakeholders. This paper presents two surveys. The first investigates the use of prototyping tools by different disciplines involved in SPD versus TPD. The second compares elements of key prototyping tools used across disciplines within SPD. Results show that the interactivity and environment dimensions of fidelity of prototyping tools motivate differences in preference between SPD and TPD. Moreover, user depiction and contextual information are key elements of prototyping that support designers in communicating interactive and environmental qualities of SPD concepts.
The circadian clock gene Bmal1 is required to control the timing of retinal neurogenesis and lamination of Müller glia in the mouse retina

A single pool of multipotent retinal progenitor cells give rise to the diverse cell types within the mammalian retina. Such cellular diversity is due to precise control of various cellular processes like cell specification, proliferation, differentiation, and maturation. Circadian clock genes can control the expression of key regulators of cell cycle progression and therefore can synchronize the cell cycle state of a heterogeneous population of cells. Here we show that the protein encoded by the circadian clock gene brain and muscle arnt‐like protein‐1 (Bmal1) is expressed in the embryonic retina and is required to regulate the timing of cell cycle exit. Accordingly, loss of Bmal1 during retinal neurogenesis results in increased S‐phase entry and delayed cell cycle exit. Disruption in cell cycle kinetics affects the timely generation of the appropriate neuronal population thus leading to an overall decrease in the number of retinal ganglion cells, amacrine cells, and an increase in the number of the late‐born type II cone bipolar cells as well as the Müller glia. Additionally, the mislocalized Müller cells are observed in the photoreceptor layer in the Bmal1 conditional mutants. These changes affect the functional integrity of the visual circuitry as we report a significant delay in visual evoked potential implicit time in the retina‐specific Bmal1 null animals. Our results demonstrate that Bmal1 is required to maintain the balance between the neural and glial cells in the embryonic retina by coordinating the timing of cell cycle entry and exit. Thus, Bmal1 plays an essential role during retinal neurogenesis affecting both development and function of the mature retina. —Sawant, O. B. , Jidigam, V. K. , Fuller, R. D. , Zucaro, O. F. , Kpegba, C. , Yu, M. , Peachey, N. S. , Rao, S. The circadian clock gene Bmal1 is required to control the timing of retinal neurogenesis and lamination of Müller glia in the mouse retina. FASEB J. 33, 8745–8758 (2019). www.fasebj. org
Application of Plackett-Burman Experimental Design for Investigating the Effect of Eight Phytohormones on Malt Quality Parameters

Abstract Barley is the major raw material for the malting and brewing industries. Seed germination is a fundamental process for malting and is affected by physical and chemical factors, especially plant hormones. It is well recognized that the phytohormones gibberellic acid (GA) and abscisic acid (ABA) are the primary hormones that antagonistically regulate barley germination. Other plant hormones, including auxin (IAA), ethylene (ET), brassinosteroid (BR), jasmonic acid (JA), salicylic acid (SA), cytokinins (CTKs), and strigolactone (SLs) also regulate seed germination by mediating the ABA/GA balance. In this study, the effects of eight hormones added during barley germination were investigated. An efficient design of the experimental method was employed to assess the effect of eight factors (α-amylase, β-amylase, limit dextrinase, β-glucanase, wort sugar profile, FAN, and β-glucan content) on epicotyl and root elongation. Almost all studied phytohormones played a significant role on barley epicotyl elongation. GA, ET, BA (benzylaminopurine), and zeatin (ZEA) exerted an increased effect, while ABA, SA, and BR showed a decreased effect for α-amylase, β-amylase, limit dextrinase, and β-glucanase activity. Results showed that in addition to GA and ABA, that SA, ET, BR, BA, ZEA, and JA also had significant effects on malt quality. The balance between these phytohormones is vital to the malting quality of barley. Future applications of these results could improve current recognition about the effects of phytohormones on malting and provide concrete ideas for enhancing malt quality.
Beyond Alternative Text and tables: Comparative Analysis of Visualization Tools and Accessibility Methods

Modern visualization software and programming libraries have made data visualization construction easier for everyone. However, the extent of accessibility design they support for blind and low‐vision people is relatively unknown. It is also unclear how they can improve chart content accessibility beyond conventional alternative text and data tables. To address these issues, we examined the current accessibility features in popular visualization tools, revealing limited support for the standard accessibility methods and scarce support for chart content exploration. Next, we investigate two promising accessibility approaches that provide off‐the‐shelf solutions for chart content accessibility: structured navigation and conversational interaction. We present a comparative evaluation study and discuss what to consider when incorporating them into visualization tools.
Investigating Potential Causes for the Prediction of Spurious Magnetopause Crossings at Geosynchronous Orbit in MHD Simulations

During intense geomagnetic storms, the magnetopause can move in as far as geosynchronous orbit, leaving the satellites in that orbit out in the magnetosheath. Spacecraft operators turn to numerical models to predict the response of the magnetopause to solar wind conditions, but the predictions of the models are not always accurate. This study investigates four storms with a magnetopause crossing by at least one GOES satellite, using four magnetohydrodynamic models at NASA's Community Coordinated Modeling Center to simulate the events, and analyzes the results to investigate the reasons for errors in the predictions. Two main reasons can explain most of the erroneous predictions. First, the solar wind input to the simulations often contains features measured near the L1 point that did not eventually arrive at Earth; incorrect predictions during such periods are due to the solar wind input rather than to the models themselves. Second, while the models do well when the primary driver of magnetopause motion is a variation in the solar wind density, they tend to overpredict or underpredict the integrated Birkeland currents and their effects during times of strong negative interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) Bz, leading to poorer prediction capability. Coupling the MHD codes to a ring current model, when such a coupling is available, generally will improve the predictions but will not always entirely correct them. More work is needed to fully characterize the response of each code under strong southward IMF conditions as it relates to prediction of magnetopause location.
Estimating Paleointensities From Chemical Remanent Magnetizations of Magnetite Using Non‐Heating Methods

Many meteorites experienced aqueous alteration on their parent body. During this process, magnetite usually forms and acquires a chemical remanent magnetization (CRM) if growing in the presence of a magnetic field. The epoch of aqueous alteration on planetesimals encompasses the lifetime of the solar nebula. Therefore, magnetite‐bearing meteorites are potential sources of invaluable data regarding the intensity of the solar nebula magnetic field and its influence on planetary accretion. The major limitation encountered in meteorite paleomagnetic studies is the lack of an empirical law relating a CRM characterized using non‐heating methods and the magnetizing field intensity. This issue is usually bypassed using the empirical law for non‐heating methods calibrated for thermoremanent magnetizations (TRM), resulting in poorly constrained paleointensities. Here, we determine such an empirical law through a series of CRM acquisition experiments. Magnetite is grown in weakly magnetic sedimentary rocks and synthetic samples in a magnetic field while heated at 350°C for 5 hr in an argon atmosphere. All samples exhibit a high‐coercivity magnetization parallel and proportional to the field applied, identified as a CRM carried by magnetite. We determine the CRM empirical law by retrieving the applied field intensity using non‐heating methods. The empirical coefficients differ from the TRM ones by a factor of 2.4–3.2 depending on the method. We use these coefficients to revisit the paleointensities published for the CM chondrite Murchison and the C2 ungrouped Tagish Lake. This empirical law opens the door to the study of numerous magnetite‐bearing meteorites potentially carrying a CRM.
The Ellipse‐Fitting Detection of Winter North Pacific Jet and the Associated Air Temperature Variations in the Northern Hemisphere

In the mid‐latitudes, the strongly meandering jet stream has contributed to worldwide weather patterns and climate variations. However, the shape variations of the jet and its climatic impacts remain unclear. In this study, we introduced an ellipse‐fitting technique to fit the high‐value wind speeds and identified the location, shape, and strength variations of the winter‐averaged North Pacific jet (NPJ). Particularly, this method has the advantage of objectively detecting the shape variations of the NPJ, including the area and orientation. Focused on the NPJ shape, the area and orientation variations are generally out‐of‐phase, leading to a large‐straight jet and a small‐tilted jet. The shape variation of the NPJ is highly linked to the variations in both mean and extreme temperatures in winter over East Asia and North America. Associated with the small‐tilted NPJ, northern East Asia and northern North America frequently suffer from warm and cold events in winter, respectively, while associated with the large‐straight NPJ, the patterns are almost opposite but with an asymmetric distribution to the small‐tilted NPJ. The distribution of the 300 hPa wind speed anomalies shows a spatial‐asymmetric feature at the exit and entrance of the NPJ. Large positive (negative) anomalies and the poleward (equatorward) shift at the NPJ exit and locations downstream (170°E−140°W) act in combination on the formation and maintenance of the large‐straight (small‐tilted) jet, which may be strongly connected with the sea surface temperature variations and synoptic‐scale transient eddy activities there. Our findings would be helpful in providing potential indicators of temperature variations.
Fusion of MISR Stereo Cloud Heights and Terra‐MODIS Thermal Infrared Radiances to Estimate Two‐Layered Cloud Properties

Our longest, stable record of cloud‐top pressure (CTP) and cloud‐top height (CTH) are derived from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Multi‐Angle Imaging Spectroradiometer (MISR) on Terra. Because of single cloud‐layer assumptions in their standard algorithms, they provide only single CTP/CTH retrievals in multi‐layered situations. In the predominant multi‐layered regime of thin cirrus over low clouds, MODIS significantly overestimates cirrus CTP and emissivity, while MISR accurately retrieves low‐cloud CTH. Utilizing these complementary capabilities, we develop a retrieval algorithm for accurately determining both‐layer CTP and cirrus emissivity for such 2‐layered clouds, by applying the MISR low‐cloud CTH as a boundary condition to a modified MODIS CO2‐slicing retrieval. We evaluate our 2‐layered retrievals against collocated Cloud‐Aerosol Transport System (CATS) lidar observations. Relative to CATS, the mean bias of the upper cloud CTP and emissivity are reduced by ∼90% and ∼75% respectively in the new technique, compared to standard MODIS products. We develop an error model for the 2‐layered retrieval accounting for systematic and random errors. We find up to 87% of all residuals lie within modeled 95% confidence intervals, indicating a near‐closure of error budget. This reduction in error leads to a reduction in modeled atmospheric longwave radiative flux biases ranging between 5 and 40 W m−2, depending on the position and optical properties of the layers. Given this large radiative impact, we recommend that the pixel‐level 2‐layered MODIS + MISR fusion algorithm be applied over the entire MISR swath for the 22‐year Terra record, leading to a first‐of‐its‐kind 2‐layered cloud climatology from Terra's morning orbit.