Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Whisker stable isotope values indicate long-term foraging strategies for female New Zealand sea lions

Determining the foraging strategies for top marine predators is fundamental to understanding their role in the marine ecosystem and essential to gain insight into how species and populations may respond to environmental variability and human impacts. The long-term foraging strategies of individuals can be studied using stable isotope analysis of whiskers, which archive keratinous tissue. Here, stable isotope analysis (δ13C and δ15N) along the length of whiskers from female New Zealand (NZ) sea lions Phocarctos hookeri was used to investigate individuals’ long-term foraging strategies. Previous telemetry studies showed that individual female NZ sea lions have one of 2 distinct foraging strategies that are habitual within and between years. Furthermore, past stable isotope research showed that these 2 distinct foraging strategies, i.e. benthic (foraging on the sea floor) or mesopelagic (foraging at various depths in the water column), can be identified through δ13C and δ15N stable isotope values from blood and whiskers. In the present study, chronological serial stable isotope sampling of female NZ sea lion whiskers confirmed long-term consistency of individual foraging strategies. Thirty-one of 35 individuals showed constant benthic (n = 13) or mesopelagic (n = 18) isotopic values along the length of their whiskers. The remaining 4 individuals showed mesopelagic foraging strategies but with slight oscillations. Serial stable isotope analysis of whiskers is a powerful tool for investigating the ecological niche of top marine predators throughout their adult life. This tool can be used within the Auckland Islands’ NZ sea lion population to determine the proportion of the female population that are exposed to detrimental interactions with fisheries.
Genetic Diversity of Mitochondrial DNA Cytochrome b in Indonesian Native and Local Cattle Populations

Information on the genetic diversity of native and local cattle in Indonesia is vital for the development of breeding and conservation strategies. This study was aimed to assess the genetic diversity and phylogenetic relationship of the Indonesian native (Bali) and local [(Donggala, Madura, Sragen, Galekan, Rambon, dan Peranakan Ongole Grade x Bali (POBA)] cattle populations. Genomic DNA was extracted from blood samples (n= 75). Partial sequences of mtDNA cyt b , 464 bp, were amplified using the polymerase chain reaction technique (forward primer: L14735 and reverse primer: H15149). Thirty-four reference sequences of Bos taurus , Bos indicus , and Bos javanicus were included in the phylogenetic analyses. A total of 55 polymorphic sites and 13 haplotypes were observed in the whole breeds. No variable sites of mtDNA cyt b were observed in Galekan (kept in BCRS) and Rambon cattle. Overall haplotype diversity and nucleotide diversity were 0.515 ± 0.070 and 0.0184 ± 0.0045, respectively. The highest (0.092) and the lowest (0.000) genetic distances were between Bali and Donggala cattle populations and among Galekan (kept in BCRS), Rambon, and POBA cattle populations, respectively. Both mtDNA network and phylogenetic analyses revealed two major maternal lineages (A and B) of the studied population. Most of the sampled individuals (69.33%, present in haplotype H8-H19) were linked to lineage B, which belonged to the same cluster with Bos javanicus . Overall, most of the Indonesian native and local cattle populations had a considerable genetic diversity and shared a common maternal origin with Bos javanicus .
Genetic interrelationship among tepary bean (Phaseolus acutifolius A. Gray) genotypes revealed through SSR markers

Tepary bean (Phaseolus acutifolius A. Gray) is one of the useful plant genetic resources possessing novel genes for abiotic and biotic stress tolerance. It is largely used in the breeding of common bean or related tropical legumes. The objective of this study was to determine the genetic interrelationship present among 20 diverse tepary bean genotypes using 10 selected and polymorphic simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers and to identify genetically unique parental lines for developing breeding populations. The SSR markers amplified a total of 57 putative alleles with a size range of 102 to 304 base pairs. Number of alleles ranged from 2 to 16 with a mean of 5.7 per locus. Number of effective alleles ranged from 1.5 to 11.6 with a mean of 4.32. The mean observed and expected heterozygosity were 0.45 and 0.51, respectively, reflecting moderate level of genetic interrelationship among the tested genotypes. The mean polymorphic information content (PIC) of the SSR loci was 0.50 suggesting that the selected markers had high discriminatory power for genetic diversity analysis of tepary bean. Genetic distances varied from 0.18 to 0.64 with a mean value of 0.42, signifying relatively low levels of genetic diversity among the studied genotypes. Cluster analysis grouped the genotypes into three distinct genetic groups. Unique genotypes such as G40201, G40237, G40158, G40157 and G40158 from Cluster I, G40084 and G40033 from Cluster III were selected. These are distantly related parents and recommended for further breeding or genetic recombination to broaden the genetic basis of tepary bean or related legumes.
The effects of fixational tremor on the retinal image

The study of fixational eye motion (FEM) has implications for the neural and computational underpinnings of vision. One component of FEM is tremor, a high-frequency oscillatory jitter reported to be anywhere from ∼5 to 60 seconds of arc in amplitude. In order to isolate the effects of tremor on the retinal image directly and in the absence of optical blur, high-frequency, high-resolution eye traces were collected in 6 subjects from videos recorded with an Adaptive Optics Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscope. Videos were acquired while subjects engaged in an active fixation task where they fixated on a tumbling E stimulus and reported changes in its orientation. Spectral analysis was conducted on isolated segments of optical drift. The resultant amplitude spectra showed a slight deviation from the traditional 1/f nature of optical drift in the frequency range of 50-100 Hz, which is indicative of tremor; however, the amplitude of this deviation rarely exceeded one second of arc, smaller than any magnitude previously reported.
The Beckmann rearrangement of cyclohexanone oxime to (epsilon)-caprolactam in micromixers and microchannels

A thorough knowledge of material properties is needed for a full and comprehensive understanding of the Beckmann rearrangement in a microreactor. Therefore, this chapter presents the material properties of the ε-caprolactam/oleum mixtures, cyclooctane, cyclooctane with cyclohexanone oxime solutions, molten cyclohexanone oxime and glycerol/water, which are all liquids that are used in this thesis. The density of ε-caprolactam/oleum mixtures shows a linear relationship with temperature and composition. The viscosity shows a major increase with the amount of ε-caprolactam in the ε-caprolactam/oleum mixtures; it decreases with temperature. Viscosity of cyclooctane with cyclohexanone oxime solutions also show a decrease with temperature and only a small influence of composition. The solubility of cyclohexanone oxime in cyclooctane is approximately 11 wt% at room temperature and increases with temperature. The surface tension of the liquids decreases with temperature as well. The composition of the ε-caprolactam/oleum mixtures has a large influence (order of magnitude) on surface tension at low temperatures; at temperatures between 90–120 ◦C the influence is small. The influence of the composition on the surface tension of cyclooctane with cyclohexanone oxime solutions is negligible. The surface tension of glycerol/water mixtures at room temperature is comparable to the surface tension measured for ε-caprolactam/oleum mixtures at 90–120 ◦C (which are temperatures normally used for production of ε-caprolactam). Therefore, glycerol/water mixtures can replace the oleum/ε-caprolactam mixtures in a study of the
Effect of Venture Capital Financing on Investment in Kenya

Purpose: The objective of this paper is to determine the effect of venture capital financing on investment in Kenya. Methodology: To achieve the objective of the study, venture capital was disaggregated into two variables, namely, the number of firms financed and the total amount of financing. Other variables, such as interest rate and GDP per capita were also included in the analysis to act as control variables. The study used 10 years of data spanning from 2009 to 2018. A regression analysis was done in order to analyze the data. Results: The study established that there is a positive correlation between the number of firms financed and the aggregate investment in Kenya. The study observed that the total amount of financing has a positive correlation with aggregate investment. Implications: The study concludes that venture capital financing has a positive effect on aggregate investment levels in Kenya. The study recommends that the Kenyan government should come up with ways of financing small and medium enterprises, which will boost their productive capacities leading to more investment in the country and more generation of income.
Nest food provisioning in the Red-capped Lark Calandrella cinerea does not vary with parental sex differences and time of day

The Red-capped Lark Calandrella cinerea inhabits some of the most highly threatened grassland ecosystems in Kenya. Although previous studies have been undertaken on feeding ecology of this species, a knowledge gap still exists in relation to its nest food provisioning behaviour. We studied the food provisioning behaviour of Red-capped Larks in open grassland habitat at Kedong Ranch in Naivasha, Kenya. Observations were completed on 18 active nests for a total of 163 observation hours between 07:00 and 18:00. Results confirmed that nestling diet comprised insect larvae (including caterpillars), grasshoppers, butterflies/moths, ants and beetles. Food provisioning rates for males and females combined, as well as independently, did not vary with the nestling age. In relation to specific prey items, provisioning rates of insect larvae and butterflies/moths during different hours of the day did not vary. However, there was a significant difference in provisioning rates of grasshoppers for the time periods. The findings provide an understanding of food requirements and feeding behaviour of the Red-capped Lark, and therefore are important for predicting how future changes in the availability of food resources could infl uence feeding, reproductive success, and possibly survival of the species. Keywords: Kedong Ranch, lark, grassland, nestling diet, insects
Stroke controllable style transfer based on dilated convolutions

: Transferring a photo to a stylised image with beautiful texture has become one of the most popular topics in computer vision and the application of image processing. Controlling the stroke size of the texture is one of the challenging problems in this task. Recent representative methods for such problem introduce a pyramid model to regulate receptive fields in the network. Meanwhile, dilated convolutions are proved to be a very efficient way to adjust receptive fields without losing resolution. By combining the advantages of both approaches and making special optimisation for VGG19 model for style transfer tasks, the authors propose to exploit dilated convolutions to extract texture information endowing the network with stroke controllable. Several sets of contrast experiments were conducted and results show that their algorithm can generate more attractive stylisation images and control stroke size flexibly. It demonstrates the superiority of applying dilated convolutions as a texture extraction method for maintaining more texture information and controlling stroke size.
Modeling RNA-binding protein specificity in vivo by precisely registering protein-RNA crosslink sites

RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) regulate post-transcriptional gene expression by recognizing short and degenerate sequence elements in their target transcripts. Despite the expanding list of RBPs with in vivo binding sites mapped genomewide using crosslinking and immunoprecipitation (CLIP), defining precise RBP binding specificity remains challenging. We previously demonstrated that the exact protein-RNA crosslink sites can be mapped using CLIP data at single-nucleotide resolution and observed that crosslinking frequently occurs at specific positions in RBP motifs. Here we have developed a computational method, named mCross, to jointly model RBP binding specificity while precisely registering the crosslinking position in motif sites. We applied mCross to 112 RBPs using ENCODE eCLIP data and validated the reliability of the resulting motifs by genome-wide analysis of allelic binding sites also detected by CLIP. We found that the prototypical SR protein SRSF1 recognizes GGA clusters to regulate splicing in a much larger repertoire of transcripts than previously appreciated.
THE RELATIONSHIP OF ENTREPRENEURIAL SOUL AND INTRODUCTION OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY TO UNDERSTANDING OF ACCOUNTING INFORMATION QUALITY

This research was conducted to illustrate the readiness of S1 Accounting students in entrepreneurship and their readiness to compete through familiar information technology that can relate to their understanding of the quality of accounting information that is ultimately needed for decision making and accountability. The results of this study indicate the link between the Entrepreneurial Soul and the introduction of positive and significant information technology to the quality of accounting information. By looking at the correlation coefficient, Entrepreneurial Soul has a higher correlation coefficient on understanding Accounting Information Quality than Introduction to Information Technology on understanding Accounting Information Quality. Therefore, in order to increase understanding of the Quality of Accounting Information, it is necessary to improve the Entrepreneurial Soul and Introduction of Information Technology.
Yield and Yield Attributes of Garden Pea (Pisum sativum var. hortense L.) as Influenced by Nutrient Management Practices under Agroclimatic Conditions of Meghalaya

It is the second most important legume crop of the world (Pawar et al., 2017). The green and dry foliage are used as cattle feed and green pods being highly nutritious are preferred for culinary purpose. This legume contain high percentage of digestible protein (7.2 g), carbohydrates (15.8 g), vitamin A (139 I.U.), vitamin C (9 mg), magnesium (34 mg) and phosphorus (139 mg) per 100 g of edible portion (Gopalan, 2007). Garden pea has long been recognized as a restorer of soil fertility due to their unique ability of symbiotic nitrogen fixation (Rana et al., 1998). This ability has made the crop as one of the most important and useful component of existing cropping system in the present context of soil fertility degradation. Improving the yield of garden pea depends on proper nutrient management and genetic makeup of the variety. Fertilizers play an important role on growth and productivity of garden pea. Nitrogen is essential for synthesis of chlorophyll, enzymes and protein. Phosphorus is essential for root growth, nodulation, energy storage and transfer necessary for metabolic processes. Potassium International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 7 Number 09 (2018) Journal homepage: http://www.ijcmas. com
Evaluating the Effects of Different Doses of Vitamin B2 and Single Dose of Vitamin B12 Against Myelosuppression Induced by Cyclophosphamide in Experimental Rats

Cyclophosphamide is chemotherapeutic agent that utilized for the treatment of different malignancies; however its’ used associated with numerous adverse effects. Vitamin B2 and vitamin B12 suggested having myeloprotective effect. This work is designed to investigate the myeloprotective effect of both vitamins against cyclophosphamide induced myelosuppression. One hundred adult rats of both sexes were used in this study. The animals were randomly enrolled into ten groups of 10 rats each. Group I: Control group. Group II: Cyclophosphamide-treated. Group III and Group IV Orally-administered vitamin B2 (10, and 40 mg/kg/day), respectively alone for 7 days. Group V: Orally-administered vitamin B12 (0.1 mg/kg/day) alone for 7 days. Group VI and Group VII: Orally-administered vitamin B2 (10, and 40 mg/kg/day), respectively for 7 days and a single IP injection of cyclophosphamide (150 mg/kg) at day 7.Group VIII: Orally-administered vitamin B12 (0.1 mg/kg/day) for 7 days and a single IP injection of cyclophosphamide (150 mg/kg) at day 7. Group IX: Orally-administered a combination of vitamin B2 (10 mg/kg/day) and vitamin B12 (0.1 mg/kg/day) for 7 days and a single IP injection of cyclophosphamide (150 mg/kg) at day 7. Group X: orally-administered a combination of vitamin B2 (40 mg/kg/day) and vitamin B12 (0.1 mg/kg/day) for 7 days and a single IP injection of cyclophosphamide (150 mg/kg) at day 7. On day eight, animals were sacrificed and blood collected for CBCs and femur bone were extracted for bone marrow histological examination. Vitamin B2 and vitamin B12 significantly (P<0.05) increase CBCs; and the combination of vitamins produce -a significant (P<0.05) increase in CBCs compared to corresponding counts in other Groups, and -improve histopathological changes compared to Group II rats. In conclusion both vitamins may have myeloprotective effects against cyclophosphamide-induced myelosuppression.
Mountain Pine Beetle in Colorado: A Story of Changing Forests

The mountain pine beetle (MPB) (Dendroctonus ponderosae) is one of the most prevalent disturbance agents in western conifer forests. It utilizes various species of pines (Pinus spp.) as host trees. Eruptive populations can cause extensive tree mortality. Since the late 1990s, extensive outbreaks have occurred from the southern Rockies to British Columbia. In Colorado, lodgepole pine (P. contorta) forests have been the most affected. Since 1996, about 3.4 million acres of lodgepole and ponderosa pine (P. ponderosa) forests have exhibited MPB-caused tree mortality. A large portion of the larger diameter trees have been killed with significant reductions in basal areas and tree densities. Tree mortality has impacted many forest ecosystem services including fiber production, hydrology, nutrient cycling, wildlife habitat, property values, and recreation. In this article, we examine and summarize some of what we have learned about MPB impacts from observations and research over the past two decades in Colorado.
Castration-resistant prostate cancer: Androgen receptor inactivation induces telomere DNA damage, and damage response inhibition leads to cell death

Telomere stability is important for cell viability, as cells with telomere DNA damage that is not repaired do not survive. We reported previously that androgen receptor (AR) antagonist induces telomere DNA damage in androgen-sensitive LNCaP prostate cancer cells; this triggers a DNA damage response (DDR) at telomeres that includes activation of ATM, and blocking ATM activation prevents telomere DNA repair and leads to cell death. Remarkably, AR antagonist induces telomere DNA damage and triggers ATM activation at telomeres also in 22Rv1 castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) cells that are not growth inhibited by AR antagonist. Treatment with AR antagonist enzalutamide (ENZ) or ATM inhibitor (ATMi) by itself had no effect on growth in vitro or in vivo, but combined treatment with ENZ plus ATMi significantly inhibited cell survival in vitro and tumor growth in vivo. By inducing telomere DNA damage and activating a telomere DDR, an opportunity to inhibit DNA repair and promote cell death was created, even in CRPC cells. 22Rv1 cells express both full-length AR and AR splice variant AR-V7, but full-length AR was found to be the predominant form of AR associated with telomeres and required for telomere stability. Although 22Rv1 growth of untreated 22Rv1 cells appears to be driven by AR-V7, it is, ironically, expression of full-length AR that makes them sensitive to growth inhibition by combined treatment with ENZ plus ATMi. Notably, this combined treatment approach to induce telomere DNA damage and inhibit the DDR was effective in inducing cell death also in other CRPC cell lines (LNCaP/AR and C4-2B). Thus, the use of ENZ in combination with a DDR inhibitor, such as ATMi, may be effective in prolonging disease-free survival of patients with AR-positive metastatic CRPC, even those that co-express AR splice variant.
The role of growth mindset, self-efficacy and intrinsic value in self-regulated learning and English language learning achievements

This study examined the role of growth mindset, self-efficacy, and intrinsic value in self-regulated learning (SRL) and English language learning achievements in Hong Kong primary school students. A sample of 690 4th graders participated in the study. The findings suggest that the level of SRL strategy use (i.e. monitoring, effort regulation, and goal setting and planning) was driven by the students’ motivational beliefs (i.e. growth mindset, self-efficacy, and intrinsic value) in different ways. Monitoring and effort regulation, in turn, were significant contributors to the participants’ English language learning achievements, but goal setting and planning did not predict their English language learning achievements. The finding suggests that growth mindset was a stronger predictor of SRL than self-efficacy and intrinsic value. Implications for fostering adaptive motivational beliefs and SRL are discussed. Future research should consider the influence of the socio-cultural context on the relationships between motivational factors, SRL strategy use, and English language learning achievements.