Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Characterization of antagonistic yeasts for biocontrol applications on apples or in soil by quantitative analyses of synthetic yeast communities

Antagonistic yeasts suppress plant pathogenic fungi by various mechanisms, but their biocontrol efficacy also depends on the ability to compete and persist in the environment. The goal of the work presented here was to quantify the composition of synthetic yeast communities in order to determine the competitiveness of different species and identify promising candidates for plant protection. For this purpose, colony counting of distinct species and matrix‐assisted laser desorption ionization time‐of‐flight mass spectrometry (MALDI‐TOF MS; MALDI biotyping) were used to distinguish different yeast species and to quantify the composition of a synthetic community of six yeasts (Aureobasidium pullulans, Candida subhashii, Cyberlindnera sargentensis, Hanseniaspora sp., Metschnikowia pulcherrima and Pichia kluyveri) over time, on apples and in soil, and in different growth media. These studies revealed important characteristics that predispose the different species for particular applications. For example, the competitiveness and antagonistic activity of C. subhashii was strongly increased in the presence of N‐acetylglucosamin as the sole carbon source, M. pulcherrima and A. pullulans were the strongest competitors on apple, and C. sargentensis competed the best in soil microcosms. Based on these laboratory studies, M. pulcherrima and A. pullulans are promising candidates for biocontrol applications against fungal phyllosphere diseases, while C. sargentensis may hold potential for use against soilborne fungal pathogens. These results document the potential of MALDI‐TOF MS for the quantitative analysis of synthetic yeast communities and highlight the value of studying microorganisms with relevant functions in moderately complex, synthetic communities and natural substrates rather than as individual isolates.
Integrating Encyclopedic Knowledge into Neural Network Language Models

Machine translation deals with translation done by computers and has been an ongoing research topic for decades. Recently, phrase-based machine translation was revolutionized by significant improvements of neural models. Recurrent language models, in particular, have been a great success due to their ability to model arbitrary long context. However, one serious drawback of neural models is their high demand for large training data for good performance, which is not always available for less common languages. In this work, we investigate the integration of global semantic information extracted from large independent encyclopedia sources into neural network language models. We integrate semantic word classes extracted from Wikipedia and sentence level topic information into an RNNbased language model. The new resulting models exhibit great potential in alleviating data sparsity problems with the additional knowledge provided. This approach of integrating global information is not restricted to language modeling but can also be easily applied to models that profit from context or further data resources, e.g. neural machine translation.
Granulomatous inflammation and organizing pneumonia: Role of computed tomography-guided lung fine needle aspirations, touch preparations and core biopsies in the evaluation of common non-neoplastic diagnoses

Background: Fine-needle aspirations (FNAs) and core biopsies (CBs), with or without touch preparations (TPs), are performed to characterize pulmonary lesions. Although a positive (P) or suspicious report is sufficient for further management, the significance of unsatisfactory (U), negative (N) and atypical (A) cytological diagnoses remains uncertain. The aims of the study were to correlate U, N and A cytological diagnoses with histological and/or clinical/radiological follow-up and evaluate the utility of FNAs, TPs and CBs. Materials and Methods: We performed a retrospective search and examined 30 consecutive computed tomography-guided transthoracic U, N and A lung FNAs (n = 23) and TPs (n = 7) with surgical pathology (SP) (n = 17) and/or clinical/radiological follow-up (n = 13) and compared them to 10 SP-confirmed P FNAs, which served as controls. Results: The 30 FNAs and TPs were from 29 patients. All 6 U specimens were scantly cellular. Granulomas, the most common specific benign cytological diagnosis, were evident in 8 (of 13) and 7 (of 11) N and A cytology cases, respectively. Histology corroborated the presence of granulomas identified on cytology. Organizing pneumonia was the second leading benign specific diagnosis (5/17), but it was rendered on histology (n = 5) and not FNAs or TPs. Evaluation of the A cases revealed that type II pneumocytes were the source of “atypical”, diagnoses often associated with granulomas or organizing pneumonia and lacked 3-D clusters evident in all P cases. Discussion: U, N and A FNAs and TPs lacked 3-D clusters seen in carcinomas and were negative on follow-up. Granulomas and organizing pneumonia were the most common specific benign diagnoses, but the latter was recognized on histology only. In the absence of a definitive FNA result at the time of on-site assessment, a CB with a TP containing type II pneumocytes increases the likelihood of a specific benign diagnosis.
Economic Growth and Recovery in the United States: 1919-1941

This paper has two main sections and an appendix. The first provides an overview of what lay behind record productivity growth in the US economy between 1929 and 1941. The second considers the role of rigidities and other negative supply conditions in worsening the downturn and slowing recovery. While I argue consistently that the overarching explanation of the Great Depression will and should continue to emphasize a collapse and slow revival of the growth of aggregate demand, I spend relatively little time on what drives this, since the literature deals extensively with this elsewhere. The paper instead concentrates on the aggregate supply side - both the broad array of positive shocks that I argue propelled potential and, eventually, actual output forward, and the negative conditions which, in interaction with aggregate demand, may have increased the size of the output gap and prolonged its persistence. An appendix offers detail discussion and updated calculations of productivity growth rates for the critical period 1929 through 1941.
Rituximab should be used earlier in ITP patients : a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials

To evaluate the efficacy of rituximab to treat immune thrombocytopenia, Medline (Pubmed), Embase and the Cochrane library were mainly searched to provide relevant articles. A meta-analysis of seven randomized controlled clinical trials which included 716 patients analyzed the efficacy of rituximab for treatment of immune thrombocytopenia in order to afford actual response rates. Overall response (OR) rate was achieved in 67.7% (platelets ≥30×109/L, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.60-0.74) for 171 patients, 60.4% (platelets ≥50×109/L, 95% CI: 0.450.73) for 188 patients, respectively; Complete response (CR) rate was 48.1% (platelets ≥100×109/L, 95% CI: 0.370.59) for 251 patients, 31.8% (platelets ≥150×109/L, 95% CI: 0.15-0.55) for 95 patients, respectively. Therefore, rituximab effectively elevated the target platelet count with excellent treatment outcomes in ITP patients.
Probing the Effect of Bioinspired Nanomaterials on Angiogenic Sprouting With a Microengineered Vascular System

High-density lipoproteins (HDL) are known to contribute to vascular homeostasis, but recent HDL-mimetic therapies attempting to capitalize on the vasculoprotective properties associated with HDL have been met with roadblocks in their translational journey to the clinic largely due to the complex role of HDL in vasculature. Among the adaptive processes seen in vasculature, angiogenesis is one process that is both crucial to vascular remodeling and is dependent on HDL to an unknown extent. Here we investigate the effect of HDL mimetic nanoparticles on the angiogenic process of sprouting using a microengineered three-dimensional vascular system. Our study reveals critical effects of HDL mimetic nanoparticles on angiogenesis: 1) exhibiting a bi-phasic effect on angiogenic sprout growth and 2) inhibiting TNF-α stimulated angiogenesis. This method demonstrates the feasibility of leveraging a microengineered physiological model to screen the effects of bioinspired nanoparticles as part of a foundational study for accelerating translational research through biomimetic technologies.
The Development of Compartmentation of cAMP Signaling in Cardiomyocytes: The Role of T-Tubules and Caveolae Microdomains

3′-5′-cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP) is a signaling messenger produced in response to the stimulation of cellular receptors, and has a myriad of functional applications depending on the cell type. In the heart, cAMP is responsible for regulating the contraction rate and force; however, cAMP is also involved in multiple other functions. Compartmentation of cAMP production may explain the specificity of signaling following a stimulus. In particular, transverse tubules (T-tubules) and caveolae have been found to be critical structural components for the spatial confinement of cAMP in cardiomyocytes, as exemplified by beta-adrenergic receptor (β-ARs) signaling. Pathological alterations in cardiomyocyte microdomain architecture led to a disruption in compartmentation of the cAMP signal. In this review, we discuss the difference between atrial and ventricular cardiomyocytes in respect to microdomain organization, and the pathological changes of atrial and ventricular cAMP signaling in response to myocyte dedifferentiation. In addition, we review the role of localized phosphodiesterase (PDE) activity in constraining the cAMP signal. Finally, we discuss microdomain biogenesis and maturation of cAMP signaling with the help of induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes (iPSC-CMs). Understanding these mechanisms may help to overcome the detrimental effects of pathological structural remodeling.
Proposal and implementation of a novel scheme for image and emotion recognition using Hadoop

The digital media especially social media is very popular in recent time. Due to which we have more number of videos than before. These videos are generally not tagged and classified. This paper aims for parallel video processing in Hadoop for fast processing and automatic tag emotions. This system recognizes face and tag emotions automatically on hadoop clusters for fast and efficient performance. This will make human work easier in classification of videos and processing on parallel system make it quick.
“ Consumption and Redistributive Politics : The Effect of Credit and China . ”

This article attempts to bring consumption into the study of redistributive politics. Analyzing data from 20 OECD countries over the period 1995–2007, I investigate whether factors that allowed lower and middleincome households to sustain their consumption had any impact on governments’ redistributive efforts. The article focuses on two factors in particular: access to credit and access to cheap imports (notably, imports from China). I argue that by enhancing consumption these mechanisms moderated the effects of income inequality and suppressed public discontent with increasing income inequality, thereby lessening the political urgency of redistribution.
Comparison of R&D Expenditures in Selected Countries

Abstract This paper analyzes the level of innovation expenditures and R&D fund sources in selected countries of the world in the period of 2000 - 2010. The issues presented indicate significant differences between the discussed countries with respect to the factors analyzed. The European countries at the top were apparently Finland, Denmark and Sweden. High R&D expenditures, with a significant share in business enterprise sector, and a large number of patent applications reflected on the strong economic growth in these countries. The level of R&D investments in these countries was sometimes greater than in the USA or Japan. Dynamic growth in both R&D and patent activity has also been observed in South Korea. Special attention has been paid in this paper to the new European Union members - Central Eastern European Countries. Among this group of countries Slovenia definitely had the highest position, where R&D expenditures were the largest and the structure of R&D funds by source reflected a businessdominance type. Estonia, Czech Republic and Hungary were the countries ‘catching up’ - where growth in R&D expenditures has been observed as well as better dynamics of growth and higher patent activity. Romania, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Latvia had relatively disadvantageous situations in respect of R&D development and the innovative activity of business enterprises. Streszczenie Celem artykułu była analiza poziomu i struktury finansowania działalności badawczo-rozwojowej w wybranych krajach oraz skonfrontowanie tych wskaźników z aktywnością patentową i innowacyjnością przedsiębiorstw. Okres badawczy stanowiły lata 2000-2010. Do zobrazowania podobieństw i różnic w nakładach na działalność B+R pomiędzy analizowanymi krajami zastosowano analizę skupień metodą Warda. Poziom finansowania działalności B+R polaryzuje Europę. Kraje Europy Północnej i Europy Zachodniej charakteryzują większe nakłady na B+R i większy udział przedsiębiorców w finansowaniu tych działań. Kraje będące w czołówce to Finlandia, Dania i Szwecja. Korzystne wyniki osiągają też Niemcy i Austriacy. Rumunia, Bułgaria, Litwa, Polska, Słowacja, Łotwa i Węgry to kraje z relatywnie niekorzystną sytuacją w zakresie rozwoju działalności B+R i innowacyjności podmiotów gospodarczych. Spośród krajów wschodniego regionu zdecydowanie wyższe pozycje w tym kontekście zajmuje Słowenia. Realizacja celów polityki UE w wielu krajach jest jeszcze odległa. Dalsze analizy powinny koncentrować się na znalezieniu optymalnego poziomu inwestycji w B + R w różnych sektorach.
Dynamic routing in spectrally spatially flexible optical networks with back-to-back regeneration

We focus on dynamic lightpath provisioning in translucent spectrally spatially flexible optical networks (SS-FONs) operating with multi-core fibers and realizing spectral super-channel transmission, in which flexible signal regeneration achieved with transceivers operating in back-to-back (B2B) configurations and modulation conversion is allowed. For optimized allocation of limited spectrum and transceiver resources, we develop a dynamic lightpath routing algorithm called adaptive routing with back-to-back regeneration (ARBR), which we evaluate in comparison to other reference methods. Using the ARBR algorithm, we study potential performance gains in terms of bandwidth blocking probability (BBP) in such flexible network scenarios. To this end, we analyze three alternative scenarios that differ in the way in which dynamic translucent lightpath connections are provisioned, namely a reference scenario in which the use of regenerators is minimized and the modulation conversion is not allowed, and two other scenarios with intentional B2B regeneration. The results of extensive simulation experiments run on two representative network topologies show that the proposed algorithm outperforms the reference ones in terms of the BBP metric. Moreover, the fully flexible B2B regeneration with modulation conversion can be beneficial in terms of both spectrum and transceiver resource utilization, resulting in lower BBP than other scenarios.
The risk of sub-optimal use of Open Source NLP Software: UKB is inadvertently state-of-the-art in knowledge-based WSD

UKB is an open source collection of programs for performing, among other tasks, Knowledge-Based Word Sense Disambiguation (WSD). Since it was released in 2009 it has been often used out-of-the-box in sub-optimal settings. We show that nine years later it is the state-of-the-art on knowledge-based WSD. This case shows the pitfalls of releasing open source NLP software without optimal default settings and precise instructions for reproducibility.
Immunohistochemical and Electron Microscopic Study of the Inhibitory Effects of Olive Oil Polyphenol on Dexamethasone-Induced Apoptosis

Background: There is accumulating evidence that a polyphenol present in olive oil, oleuropein, has antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-apoptotic effects. This study aimed at determining the anti-apoptotic effect of Oleuropein (Ole) on dexamethasone-induced apoptosis of mouse thymocytes. Method: Mice were randomly divided to four groups as follow: Dexamethasone (Dex)-treated group (20 mg/kg; single dose), Ole-treated group (20 mg/kg per day), Dex plus Ole-treated group, and vehicle group. Sections of thymus were taken 16 hours after dexamethasone injection and studied for histopathological and immunohistochemistry assessment. Result: Further characteristics of degeneration in thymocytes were observed in the Dex group compared with the Dex plus Ole group. Compared with the Dex group (10.94±3.35), positive staining for Bax in thymocytes decreased in Dex plus Ole group (2.64±1.26), but remained higher than the Ole (0.65±0.30) and vehicle (0.67±0.29) groups. Compared with the Dex group (2.94±0.42), positive staining for Bcl-2 in thymocytes increased in Dex plus Ole group (12.24±1.84) yet was lower than the Ole (14.94±1.54) and vehicle (18.93±3.54) groups. Conclusion: Our results suggest that dexamethasone-induced apoptosis is subsided by oleuropein.
To reserve or not to reserve: A study of how individual characteristics and market conditions might explain variation in generic reservation rates among general practitioners

Background: When a patent of an active ingredient expires, generic companies can enter the market and offer equivalent drugs to compete against the brand version. Unless the general practitioner (GP) states otherwise in the prescription, i.e. makes a reservation, the patient will be dispensed the generic version in the pharmacy. The patient can still claim the brand version, but has to pay the additional cost himself. There are a few medically justifiable reasons for the GP to prefer the brand version, and about 7% of the prescriptions in Norway have reservations against generic substitution. However, the large variation in reservation between doctors, suggests that many reservations are based on non-medical considerations. Previous research has shown that factors such as price, age of doctor, patient population, pharmacist mark-ups and maturity of generic markets explain some of the variation. Objectives: This thesis investigates the extents to which market conditions and general practitioners’ characteristics might explain variations in the rates of generic reservation. In addition to the previously studied factors we will introduce some new explanatory variables that, to our knowledge, have not been tested before. Specifically, the effect of competition between GPs in municipalities might provide new insights. Methods: To find links between GP-reservation and the above-mentioned characteristics, data from pharmacy sales and the Norwegian GP-registry were analysed. Both descriptive statistics and alternative models (binary, fixed effects, OLS regression, two-part models) were used to find marginal effects of the variables tested on reservation level. Results: A major contribution of this thesis relates to the gatekeeper function of GPs: our results show that increased competition between GPs results in more generic reservation. Furthermore, older GPs use reservation more often, whilst the effects of sex and speciality are more inconclusive. Increased confidence in generics defined as frequent prescriptions, translates into lower reservation levels. Active ingredients that have recently become subject to generic competition have higher reservation levels. In general, the effects are also stronger in new generic markets as compared to older markets. The results are consistent across the alternative models used.
Rapid enigmatic decline drives the fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra) to the edge of extinction in the Netherlands

In the Netherlands, the fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra) is at the edge of its geographic range and is restricted to three small populations in the extreme south of the country. Despite the species being listed as 'Endangered' on the national Red List, the situation was considered to be stable. However, from 2008 onwards dead individuals were seen on more than one occasion. A sharp decline in numbers has been observed since 2010 (96%; P< 0.01), but we were unable to attribute this to any known cause of amphibian decline, such as chytridiomycosis, ranavirus or habitat degradation. The present work describes this enigmatic decline, and we discuss these results in the context of possible causes.
Flavonoids and Reduction of Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).

BACKGROUND Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and cardiovascular diseases (CV) often coexist. COPD and CVD are complex diseases characterized by a strict interaction between environment and genetic. The mechanisms linking these two diseases are complex, multifactorial and not entirely understood, influencing the therapeutic approach. COPD is characterized by several comorbidities, it is hypothesizable that treatment of cardiovascular co-morbidities may reduce morbidity and mortality. Flavonoids are an important class of plant low molecular weight secondary metabolites (SMs). Convincing data from laboratory, epidemiological, and human clinical studies point to an important effects on CVD risk prevention. OBJECTIVE This review aims to provide up-to-date information on the ability of Flavonoids to reduce the CVD risk. CONCLUSIONS Current studies support the potential of Flavonoids to prevent the risk of CVD. Well-designed clinical studies are suggested to evaluate advantages and limits of Flavonoids for managing CVD comorbidity in COPD.
1 Cell Compatible Encapsulation of Filaments into 3 D Hydrogels

Tissue engineering scaffolds for nerve regeneration, or artificial nerve conduits, are particularly challenging due to the high level of complexity the structure of the nerve presents. The list of requirements for artificial nerve conduits is long and includes the ability to physically guide nerve growth using physical and chemical cues as well as electrical stimulation. Combining these characteristics into a conduit, while maintaining biocompatibility and biodegradability, has not been satisfactorily achieved by currently employed fabrication techniques. Here we present a method combining pultrusion and wet-spinning techniques facilitating incorporation of pre-formed filaments into ionically crosslinkable hydrogels. This new biofabrication technique allows the incorporation of conducting or drug-laden filaments, controlled guidance channels and living cells into hydrogels, creating new improved conduit designs. Disciplines Engineering | Physical Sciences and Mathematics Publication Details Schirmer, K. S. U . , Gorkin III, R. , Beirne, S. , Stewart, E. , Thompson, B. C. , Quigley, A. F. , Kapsa, R. M. I. & Wallace, G. G. (2016). Cell compatible encapsulation of filaments into 3D hydrogels. Biofabrication, 8 (2), 025013-1-025013-13. Authors Katharina Schirmer, Robert A. Gorkin III, Stephen T. Beirne, Elise M. Stewart, Brianna C. Thompson, Anita F. Quigley, Robert M. I Kapsa, and Gordon G. Wallace This journal article is available at Research Online: http://ro.uow. edu.au/aiimpapers/2226