Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Roles of voltage-gated Ca2+ channel subunits in pancreatic β cells

Hallmarks of type 2 diabetes (T2D) include elevated blood glucose and free fatty acids (FFAs) as a result of impaired β cell insulin secretion and decreased β cell mass. The glucose-stimulated insulin secretion (GSIS) in β cells is triggered by depolarization-evoked Ca2+ entry through voltage-gated Ca2+ (CaV) channels. The majority of CaV channels are believed to reside in cholesterol-rich membrane microdomains called membrane rafts. CaV channels consist of the main pore-forming α1 subunit and three auxiliary subunits, β, α2δ, and γ. The roles of the CaV auxiliary subunits and the membrane rafts in pancreatic β cells are not fully understood, but we have recently shown that the TCF7L2 gene, associated with the strongest genetic risk factor of T2D, regulates Cacna2d1 (α2δ1). This thesis aims to elucidate the roles of β1, β2a, and α2δ1 subunits, as well as membrane rafts, in regulating the α1 subunit and, in turn, insulin secretion and β cell survival. Human islets from donors with T2D contained decreased membrane rafts. A similar phenotype was also observed in the diabetic rat model Goto Kakizaki (GK) rat islets. Cholesterol depletion in healthy human islets by cholesterol oxidase (CO) reduced membrane rafts, resembling islets from donors with T2D. Cholesterol depletion resulted in elevated basal insulin release in both human and rat islets. The reason for this appeared to be the declustering of CaV1.2, elevation in basal Ca2+ oscillations, and an increase in single-CaV channel activity as observed in patch-clamp experiments. When suppressing the Tcf7l2 gene, α2δ1 (mRNA and protein) was downregulated and intracellular Ca2+ was reduced as measured by confocal microfluorimetry. The decrease in Cacna2d1 expression resulted in CaV channel internalization in the recycling endosomes. This lowered the whole-cell Ca2+ current and decreased insulin secretion.Human gene expression analysis showed that both Cacnb1 (β1) and Cacnb2a (β2a) genes are abundant in pancreatic islets. When examining the GK rat islets, the expression of both genes was downregulated. Immunoblot experiments showed that high glucose treatment also reduced protein levels of β1 and β2a in INS-1 832/13 cells. Silencing the β1 subunit reduced insulin secretion, which may be due to the observed decrease in whole-cell Ca2+ currents. By contrast, β2a suppression did not affect insulin release. When comparing the palmitoylation state of β2a, cells overexpressing the non-palmitoylated β2a had a decreased membrane expression of both β2a and α1C. However, overexpression of palmitoylated β2a increased intracellular Ca2+, although without affecting secretion. FFA (palmitate) treatment reduced intracellular Ca2+ under stimulatory conditions thus decreasing GSIS. Cells that either lack β1 or express excess palmitoylated β2a have increased risk of apoptosis. These data reveal novel roles of membrane rafts and β1, β2a, and α2δ1 subunits in regulating CaV channel trafficking and activity, thus influencing β cell function and survival. (Less)
CMAR_A_280174 297..306

1Department of Oncology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Pathology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Radiology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, People’s Republic of China; 4GeneplusBeijing Institute, Beijing, People’s Republic of China; 5Department of General Surgery, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, People’s Republic of China Purpose: NF1-deficient GISTs account for about 1% of gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) and are usually considered as a subtype of KIT/PDGFRA wild-type GISTs that have no detectable KIT and PDGFRA mutations. Some KIT/PDGFRA wild-type GISTs actually have cryptic KIT mutations (mKIT). So we investigate whether concurrent mKIT existed in NF1-associated GISTs. Patients and Methods: Three independent cohorts were retrospectively analyzed. KIT/ PDGFRA wild-type GISTs in Xiangya Hospital between May 2017 and Oct 2019 were investigated by next-generation sequencing (NGS) approach targeted 1021 cancer-related genes regions. GISTs cases in Gene+ dataset from May 2017 to May 2020 were collected from the platform of this company. The genotypes of GISTs in MSKCC cohort were downloaded from cBioPortal. Results: A total of 290 cases including 23 KIT/PDGFRA wild-type GISTs in Xiangya Hospital, 136 GISTs in Gene+ database, and 131 GISTs in MSKCC were enrolled. Twenty-six cases have NF1 mutations (mNF1), and 48% (12/26) of NF1-mutated GISTs have concurrent mKIT. Compared with MSKCC (2/10, 20%), a higher ratio of mKIT in NF1-associated GISTs was detected in Xiangya Hospital (3/5, 60%) and Gene+ (7/11, 64%) (p<0.05). No mutation hotspot existed in mNF1. Most of mKIT centered within exon 11 (7/12, 58%) and others including exon 17 (3/12, 25%), exon 9(1/12, 8%), exon 13 (1/12, 8%) and exon 21 (1/12, 8%). No differences in age, gender, and location were detected between NF1-related GISTs with mKIT and those without mKIT. Three GIST cases of type I neurofibromatosis, skin neurofibromas and microGISTs (≤1 cm) were devoid of mKIT, but all the mini-GISTs (1~2 cm) and clinic GIST lesions (>2 cm) in two cases harbored mKIT. Conclusion: mKIT was not unusual in NF1-associated GISTs, especially in Chinese populations. The gain-of-function mKIT possibly facilitated the progression of NF1-deficient lesions to clinic GISTs, however, the underlying mechanism warrants further studies.
K2-Hamiltonian Graphs: I

Motivated by a conjecture of Grunbaum and a problem of Katona, Kostochka, Pach, and Stechkin, both dealing with non-Hamiltonian $n$-vertex graphs and their $(n-2)$-cycles, we investigate $K_2$-Hami.
Plurality in the Measurement of Social Media Use and Mental Health: An Exploratory Study Among Adolescents and Young Adults

On a daily basis, individuals between 12 and 25 years of age engage with their mobile devices for many hours. Social Media Use (SMU) has important implications for the social life of younger individuals in particular. However, measuring SMU and its effects often poses challenges to researchers. In this exploratory study, we focus on some of these challenges, by addressing how plurality in the measurement and age-specific characteristics of SMU can influence its relationship with measures of subjective mental health (MH). We conducted a survey among a nationally representative sample of Dutch adolescents and young adults (N = 3,669). Using these data, we show that measures of SMU show little similarity with each other, and that age-group differences underlie SMU. Similar to the small associations previously shown in social media-effects research, we also find some evidence that greater SMU associates to drops and to increases in MH. Albeit nuanced, associations between SMU and MH were found to be characterized by both linear and quadratic functions. These findings bear implications for the level of association between different measures of SMU and its theorized relationship with other dependent variables of interest in media-effects research.
MATERIAL CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM: LITERATURE SURVEY

— One of the chief challenges faced today is determining the material category of a surface from an image. From the results obtained from several studies on object detection and image classification using Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs), it is possible to study the material classification of everyday objects. The following intensive literature survey enables us to understand the various techniques developed to overcome the challenges.
ASSESSMENT OF SOME TRACE ELEMENT LEVELS AMONG SUDANESE PATIENTS WITH HYPOTHYROIDISM OR HYPERTHYROIDISM

Background: Trace elements are well-known to affect hormones at levels of action, as well as binding to the target tissue, hormone secretion, and activity. Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the serum levels of copper and zinc among hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism Sudanese patients. Material and Methods: One hundred participants were enrolled in this cross-sectional study. Thirty-five hyperthyroidism patients, 35 hypothyroidism patients, and 30 normal healthy individuals were taken as control, with aged-matched 25 to 50 years. The automated analyzer system estimated triiodothyronine (T3), thyroxin (T4) and thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH). Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometers estimated zinc and copper and the data were analyzed by SPSS version 19.0. Results: A significant decrease in serum zinc level among hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism patients were found, when compared with the control group (P-value <0.05). The copper level was significantly increased among hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism patients when compared with the control group (P-value < 0.05). There was an insignificant correlation of copper level with a duration of disease (r= -0.020, P=0.869), with a significant positive correlation of copper with the age of patients (r=0.318, P=0.001). Whereas a significant inversely correlation was observed between zinc level and age of patients and duration of disease (r= -0.227, P= 0.023) and (r= -0.424, P= 0.006) respectively. Conclusion: Study results revealed that patients with hypothyroidism or hyperthyroidism have abnormal levels of copper and zinc.
Modeling the semantics of data sources with graph neural networks

Semantic models are fundamental to publish data into Knowledge Graphs (KGs), since they encode the precise meaning of data sources, through concepts and properties deﬁned within reference ontologies. However, building semantic models requires signiﬁcant manual effort and expertise. In this paper, we present a novel approach based on Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) to build semantic models of data sources. GNNs are trained on Linked Data (LD) graphs, which serve as background knowledge to automatically infer the semantic relations connecting the attributes of a data source. At the best of our knowledge, this is the ﬁrst approach that employs GNNs to identify the semantic relations. We tested our approach on 15 target sources from the advertising domain (used in other studies in the literature), and compared its performance against two baselines and a technique largely used in the state of the art. The evaluation showed that our approach outperforms the state of the art in cases of data source with the largest amount of semantic relations deﬁned in the ground truth.
Multi-dimensional mesoscale simulations of detonation initiation in energetic materials with density-based kinetics

In this work we present multi-dimensional mesoscale simulations of detonation initiation in energetic materials. We solve the reactive Euler equations, with the energy equation augmented by a power deposition term. The reaction rate at the mesoscale is modelled using density-based kinetics, while the deposition term is based on simulations of void collapse at the microscale, modelled at the mesoscale as hot spots. We carry out two- and three-dimensional mesoscale simulations of random packs of HMX crystals in a binder, and show that transition between no-detonation and detonation depends on the number density of the hot spots, the packing fraction, and the post-shock pressure of an imposed shock. In particular, we show that, for a fixed post-shock pressure, there exists a critical value of the number density of hot spots, such that when the number density is below this value a detonation wave will not develop. We highlight the importance of morphology to initiation by comparing with a homogeneous counterpart, and we compare relevant length scales by examining their corresponding power spectra. We also examine the effect of packing fraction and show that at low post-shock pressures there is significant variation in the initiation times, but that this variation disappears as the post-shock pressure is increased. Finally, we compare three-dimensional simulations with the experimental data, and show that the model is capable of qualitatively reproducing the trends shown in the data.
Quality of Life with Voice Prosthesis after Total Laryngectomy

Introduction: The loss of voice after total laryngectomy is one of the main impairments in personal and social life. In order to prevent potential psycho-social consequences in the patient and his family, the restoration of phonatory function is the main objective of post-laryngectomy rehabilitation. The aim of this study was to assess quality of life in patients who received prosthetic voice after total laryngectomy. Materials and Methods: Over a one-year period, 51 patients with voice prostheses after total laryngectomy were recruited. 32 patients (62.74%) were administered radiation therapy and 9 patients (17.64%) underwent to surgical reconstruction with flaps. Each patient was administered the VHI-10 and V-RQOL self-assessment questionnaires. Results: The study showed that vocal restoration with voice prosthesis allows patients to recover a significant degree of quality of life after total laryngectomy. The average score on the V-RQOL questionnaire was 75.9 and on the VHI-10 questionnaire was 13.5. It has not been shown a statistically significant correlation between quality of life after tracheoesophageal prosthesis and radiation therapy, chemotherapy or reconstruction flaps. Younger patients showed, on average, a higher score at V-RQOL. These results allow to state that, after prosthetic rehabilitation, at least 75% of patients experienced an increase in quality of life. Moreover, the prosthetic technique (primary vs secondary) does not affect the long-term outcome and radiotherapy, chemotherapy or reconstruction flaps are not absolute contraindications to rehabilitation with voice prosthesis. Conclusion: After total laryngectomy, rehabilitation with tracheoesophageal prosthesis is a satisfactory choice to restore the patient’s ability to communicate verbally.
A Comparative Study of Predictive Models for Nafion-based IPMC Soft Actuators

Ionic polymer-metal composites are electro-active polymers that, when stimulated by an electric field, convert electrical energy into mechanical energy. The focus of this research is an ionic polymer-metal composite soft actuator that has been realised by Nafion-117 metallised on both sides with platinum. Three models are developed for this study and their predictive ability is compared. The methods used to realise these models are the Multi-layer Perceptron, the curve fitting and a Long-Short Term Memory neural network. The models aim to predict the force with respect to time at different voltages (low to high applied electric fields) and displacements (how much the actuator bends). Their ability to generalise to unseen samples is also evaluated. The Multi-Layer Perceptron produces the best overall results with a root mean squared error of 0.241 mN on data from the unseen sample and computational time for prediction of 1.3 μs.
Effect on Growth of Practical Diet Formulation with Non conventional Animal Protein Sources on Freshwater Catfish (Clarias magur)

The present study designed to evaluate the growth performance and survival of Clarias magur fed with non conventional animal protein sources. Four iso-nitrogenous experimental diets containing 35 per cent of protein level were prepared using ingredients such as Fish meal, Vermi meal, Chicken viscera, rice polish, wheat flour, vitamin and mineral mixture. Fishes fed with fishmeal based diet showed significantly higher final weight 204.93 g and the best specific growth rate 1.78. There was no significant difference for survival rate during the culture period with replacement of the fish meal component of practical diet with vermi meal and chicken viscera meal for magur. The study concluded that non-conventional animal protein like vermi meal and chicken viscera meal is an acceptable ingredient for the replacement of fish meal protein in practical diets of fishes
Assessing Digital Transformation Readiness Using Digital Maturity Indices

: Digital transformation and continuous scientific and technological progress allows for increased efficiency in agriculture, animal husbandry, as well as faster and safer food distribution. Monitoring digital maturity is important. It allows us to understand the current state and outcomes of digital transformation. It also facilitates the creation of future steps towards digital progress. This paper explores the notion of digital maturity of countries and the indices used for it with a focus on agriculture. The paper seeks to identify indices by which countries can view their digital maturity, with the aim of further creating adequate policies. Given the importance of the transformation process, the structure of the index was considered in order to determine connections with the main determinants of digital transformation, especially concerning agriculture
MODE I INTERLAMINAR FRACTURE TOUGHNESS AND FRACTOGRAPHIC OBSERVATION OF MULTIDIRECTIONAL CARBON FIBER/EPOXY COMPOSITES

Mode I interlaminar fracture toughness was evaluated and fracture surfaces were observed to investigate crack propagation behaviors and establish the relationship between fracture toughness and fracture surface morphology in multidirectional carbon fiber/epoxy composites. Double cantilever beam specimens, with artificial cracks made of Teflon film embedded in the middle plane, were prepared. Six crack lengths were considered (25–50 mm). The slopes of the load displacement curves depend on the initial crack length. The mode I interlaminar fracture toughness at crack initiation is approximately constant, regardless of the initial crack length, but fluctuates with crack propagation. The fracture surface morphology indicates that the R-curve is closely related to the crack propagation mechanism. The fracture surface exhibits damage, such as crack migration, fiber bridging, crack branching, double cracking, and ply splits. These results provide insight into interlaminar fracture toughness assessment and the crack propagation behavior of multidirectional carbon fiber/epoxy composites.
Tangled Finite Element Method (TFEM) for Quadrilateral Meshes

In ﬁnite element method (FEM), a mesh is said to be tangled if it contains inverted elements. Tangling can occur, for example, during mesh generation, mesh morphing, shape optimization, and/or large deformation simulation. In standard FEM, tangled meshes can lead to erroneous results; further, untangling may not always be possible. The objective of this paper is to introduce a tangled ﬁnite element method (TFEM) for 2D quadrilateral meshes. In particular, we consider here implicitly tangled meshes where some of the elements are only partially inverted, i.e., are concave; such meshes are harder to untangle than explicitly tangled meshes where the elements are fully inverted. The proposed TFEM framework fundamentally rests on an unambiguous deﬁnition of the ﬁeld in the tangled region. This deﬁnition naturally leads to certain correction terms in the FEM stiﬀness matrix. Once these corrections and an equality condition are included, we demonstrate that accurate solutions can be obtained over even severely tangled meshes. The theoretical properties of the proposed TFEM are established, and the implementation is discussed in detail. Several numerical experiments are carried out to illustrate the robustness of the proposed method.
Combination of zero-valent iron and persulfate radical under ultraviolet irradiation for enhanced phenol degradation

Phenolic compounds, a group of typical hazardous synthetic organic pollutants, are one of the most common contaminants in industrial wastewater. The efficiency of the advanced oxidation process, which is the combination of zero-valent iron (ZVI) and persulfate radical under ultraviolet irradiation was studied for enhanced phenol degradation. Experiments were conducted in a 3 L plexiglass reactor equipped with two UV irradiation sources (254 nm). The effect of variables such as initial pH, ZVI dose, persulfate (PS) dose, phenol concentration, and contact time were investigated. Co-existing effect of cations including Na+, K+, Ca2+, Mg2+, and Al3+ and anions including F–, Cl–, HCO3, NO3, SO4, CO3, and PO4 on degradation efficiency of phenol was investigated using ZVI/PS/UV process. The results showed that the highest phenol removal was obtained at initial pH 5. The optimal dose of ZVI was 0.8 mmol/L and 94.87% ± 3.85% phenol removal was obtained at pH 5 and a reaction time of 30 min. Increasing the PS dose to higher than 0.5 mmol/L did not show any positive effect on phenol removal because of SO4 consumption. Inhibiting and promoting the effect of some co-existing anions on phenol degradation efficiency was observed in the order of HCO3 > Cl– > PO4 > F and CO3 > NO3 > SO4, respectively. However, the co-existence of cations has a significant effect on the phenol degradation efficiency by ZVI/PS/UV process in the order of Al3+ > Ca2+ > Mg2+ > K+ > Na+. The addition of glucose as a quencher in the initial solution showed that the •OH and SO4 radicals were the main radical species in the ZVI/PS/UV process for phenol removal.
Exploring Corporate Social Responsibility Initiatives by Malaysian Hotels: Perspectives from Managers

This paper aims to explore the level of perceptions and awareness among managers in Malaysia with regards to corporate social responsibility (CSR) concepts and management in their hotels. The concept of CSR has grown rapidly in the last few decades and constantly becoming a rising trend within the hospitality sector. In Malaysia, the hospitality sector is not new and its potential in delivering benefits to local communities is still a much-debated subject. In-depth interviews were performed with the managers of ten hotels in Malaysia to obtain an insight into their current perceptions and the reasons behind such perceptions. The study found that there is a chasm between perceptions and realities. Despite all the efforts and the heightened awareness of the hotels about social responsibility, the implementation of CSR initiatives was still minimal due to a lack of knowledge and awareness among the hotel managers. The study underlined the urgent need to provide further illumination on CSR in Malaysia together with the involvement of many other relevant parties that include the role of government, universities, and other institutions such as National Mirror Committee (NMC) and media. Findings from the study shed light on how managers can play their role in CSR, thus providing robust indicators and standards to obtain the actual meaning of CSR.
Evaluation of the relationship between HbA1c level and retina choroidal thickness in patients with gestational diabetes mellitus.

PURPOSE To investigate the effect of hemoglobin A1c level on central macular thickness and central, nasal, and temporal choroidal thickness in patients with gestational diabetes mellitus. METHODS This retrospective study included 41 patients who had been diagnosed with gestational diabetes mellitus and undergone a 75-g oral glucose tolerance test between 24 and 28 weeks of gestation. They were divided into two groups based on their hemoglobin A1c level (group 1: hemoglobin A1c <6.0% and group 2: hemoglobin A1c ≥6.0%). All patients underwent a complete ophthalmologic examination. The central macular thickness and central, nasal, and temporal choroidal thickness were measured using optical coherence tomography. RESULTS Of the 3,016 pregnant women screened, 7.5% (n=228) were diagnosed with gestational diabetes mellitus during the study period and 41 of these patients were included in the study. Group 1 comprised 48 eyes from 24 patients and Group 2 consisted of 34 eyes of 17 patients. The average body mass index values were 30.8 ± 3.3 and 35.1 ± 9.0, respectively (p=0.002). The insulin use rates were 29.2% and 76.5%, respectively (p=0.000). Mean central macular thickness values were 250.8 ± 14.3 µm and 260.9 ± 18.1 µm, respectively, and the difference was significant (p=0.008). CONCLUSIONS Although the body mass index and central macular thickness values were significantly higher in Group 2, there was no difference in the central, nasal, and temporal choroidal thickness between the two groups.