Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Identification of genomic regions that interact with a viable allele of the Drosophila protein tyrosine phosphatase corkscrew.

Signaling by receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs) is critical for a multitude of developmental decisions and processes. Among the molecules known to transduce the RTK-generated signal is the nonreceptor protein tyrosine phosphatase Corkscrew (Csw). Previously, Csw has been demonstrated to function throughout the Drosophila life cycle and, among the RTKs tested, Csw is essential in the Torso, Sevenless, EGF, and Breathless/FGF RTK pathways. While the biochemical function of Csw remains to be unambiguously elucidated, current evidence suggests that Csw plays more than one role during transduction of the RTK signal and, further, the molecular mechanism of Csw function differs depending upon the RTK in question. The isolation and characterization of a new, spontaneously arising, viable allele of csw, csw(lf), has allowed us to undertake a genetic approach to identify loci required for Csw function. The rough eye and wing vein gap phenotypes exhibited by adult flies homo- or hemizygous for csw(lf) has provided a sensitized background from which we have screened a collection of second and third chromosome deficiencies to identify 33 intervals that enhance and 21 intervals that suppress these phenotypes. We have identified intervals encoding known positive mediators of RTK signaling, e.g., drk, dos, Egfr, E(Egfr)B56, pnt, Ras1, rolled/MAPK, sina, spen, Src64B, Star, Su(Raf)3C, and vein, as well as known negative mediators of RTK signaling, e.g., aos, ed, net, Src42A, sty, and su(ve). Of particular interest are the 5 lethal enhancing intervals and 14 suppressing intervals for which no candidate genes have been identified.
The Queenmother, Matriarchy, and the Question of Female Political Authority in Precolonial West African Monarchy

Several years ago, anthropologist Ronald Cohen (1977, pp. 14-30) wrote a thought-provoking article the focus of which was the phenomenon of the African queenmother. Female title-holders placed in the highest levels of the political order were a common feature of ancient and later precolonial African political systems. Wherever these political systems have managed to survive colonialism and into the postcolonial era, through being accorded "traditional" status, female title-holders have often survived with them. This broad collection of female titles has been brought together by anthropologists and others, and is considered to be varied expressions of the same institution: the institution of queenmother. Focusing on the institution as it exists today within the traditional political system of the Pabir people of northern Nigeria, but also drawing on examples from elsewhere on the African continent, Cohen attempts to explain why the office of queenmother was so prevalent in precolonial African state systems. He concludes his explanation with a hypothesis on the origins of African queenmothership. The thrust of Cohen's argument is that the office of queenmother was, in general, essentially of a ceremonial character and that it served as a center around which the "opposition" or potential opposition to the king could be safely and nondivisively collected.
Re‐constructing nutritional history of Serengeti wildebeest from stable isotopes in tail hair: seasonal starvation patterns in an obligate grazer

Rationale Nutritional bottlenecks often limit the abundance of animal populations and alter individual behaviours; however, establishing animal condition over extended periods of time using non‐invasive techniques has been a major limitation in population ecology. We test if the sequential measurement of δ15N values in a continually growing tissue, such as hair, can be used as a natural bio‐logger akin to tree rings or ice cores to provide insights into nutritional stress. Methods Nitrogen stable isotope ratios were measured by continuous‐flow isotope‐ratio mass spectrometry (IRMS) from 20 sequential segments along the tail hairs of 15 migratory wildebeest. Generalized Linear Models were used to test for variation between concurrent segments of hair from the same individual, and to compare the δ15N values of starved and non‐starved animals. Correlations between δ15N values in the hair and periods of above‐average energy demand during the annual cycle were tested using Generalized Additive Mixed Models. Results The time series of nitrogen isotope ratios in the tail hair are comparable between strands from the same individual. The most likely explanation for the pattern of 15N enrichment between individuals is determined by life phase, and especially the energetic demands associated with reproduction. The mean δ15N value of starved animals was greater than that of non‐starved animals, suggesting that higher δ15N values correlate with periods of nutritional stress. Conclusions High δ15N values in the tail hair of wildebeest are correlated with periods of negative energy balance, suggesting they may be used as a reliable indicator of the animal's nutritional history. This technique might be applicable to other obligate grazers. Most importantly, the sequential isotopic analysis of hair offers a continuous record of the chronic condition of wildebeest (effectively converting point data into time series) and allows researchers to establish the animal's nutritional diary.
On Maximizing VoIP Capacity and Energy Conservation in Multi-Rate WLANs

This letter highlights a key problem that arises when frame aggregation, a popular method for boosting VoIP capacity, is used in Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) that employ asynchronous power save mode (PSM). Specifically, it shows how the PSM proposed by the Wi-Fi Alliance renders frame aggregation ineffective. It then proposes a novel opportunistic scheduler that restores the benefits of frame aggregation whilst ensuring stations have minimal energy expenditure.
Association between kinase insert domain-containing receptor polymorphisms (−604T>C, 1192G>A, 1719A>T) and premature ovarian failure in Korean women

Objective The aim of the study was to investigate whether the −604T>C, 1192G>A, and 1719A>T polymorphisms in the kinase insert domain-containing receptor (KDR) gene confer risk for premature ovarian failure (POF) in Korean women. Methods DNA samples from 133 POF patients and 230 controls were genotyped for the three KDR single nucleotide polymorphisms by polymerase chain reaction–restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis. Results The POF patients had significantly increased frequencies of the KDR −604TC and −604TC + CC genotypes (odds ratio [OR], 1.975; 95% CI, 1.219-3.201 and OR, 1.948; 95% CI, 1.221-3.109, respectively) and of the −604TC + CC/1192GG combined genotype (OR, 2.271; 95% CI, 1.359-3.795) and a decreased frequency of the 1192GA genotype (OR, 0.457; 95% CI, 0.231-0.905) compared with the controls. The genotype frequency of the 1719A>T polymorphism was not significantly different between the two groups. The frequencies of the KDR −604C/1192G/1719T, −604C/1192G, and −604C/1719T haplotypes (OR, 3.319; 95% CI, 1.564-7.041; OR, 2.083; 95% CI, 1.351-3.212; and OR, 1.979; 95% CI, 1.073-3.649, respectively) were significantly higher among POF patients than controls, whereas the −604T/1719T haplotype frequency (OR, 0.657; 95% CI, 0.472-0.915) was lower among POF patients. Conclusions Carriers of the KDR −604C variant allele (−604TC and −604TC + CC genotypes; −604TC + CC/1192GG combined genotype; −604C/1192G/1719T haplotype, −604C/1192G haplotype, −604C/1719T haplotype) are consistently more prevalent among POF patients than among controls, suggesting that the KDR −604C allele may increase the risk of POF development in Korean women.
Defining Feasibility and Pilot Studies in Preparation for Randomised Controlled Trials: Development of a Conceptual Framework

We describe a framework for defining pilot and feasibility studies focusing on studies conducted in preparation for a randomised controlled trial. To develop the framework, we undertook a Delphi survey; ran an open meeting at a trial methodology conference; conducted a review of definitions outside the health research context; consulted experts at an international consensus meeting; and reviewed 27 empirical pilot or feasibility studies. We initially adopted mutually exclusive definitions of pilot and feasibility studies. However, some Delphi survey respondents and the majority of open meeting attendees disagreed with the idea of mutually exclusive definitions. Their viewpoint was supported by definitions outside the health research context, the use of the terms ‘pilot’ and ‘feasibility’ in the literature, and participants at the international consensus meeting. In our framework, pilot studies are a subset of feasibility studies, rather than the two being mutually exclusive. A feasibility study asks whether something can be done, should we proceed with it, and if so, how. A pilot study asks the same questions but also has a specific design feature: in a pilot study a future study, or part of a future study, is conducted on a smaller scale. We suggest that to facilitate their identification, these studies should be clearly identified using the terms ‘feasibility’ or ‘pilot’ as appropriate. This should include feasibility studies that are largely qualitative; we found these difficult to identify in electronic searches because researchers rarely used the term ‘feasibility’ in the title or abstract of such studies. Investigators should also report appropriate objectives and methods related to feasibility; and give clear confirmation that their study is in preparation for a future randomised controlled trial designed to assess the effect of an intervention.
Scaffolding Complex Learning: The Mechanisms of Structuring and Problematizing Student Work

There has been much interest in using software tools to scaffold learners in complex tasks, that is, to provide supports that enable students to deal with more complex content and skill demands than they could otherwise handle. Many different approaches to scaffolding techniques have been presented in a broad range of software tools. I argue that two complementary mechanisms can explain how a diversity of scaffolding approaches in software act to support learners. Software tools can help structure the learning task, guiding learners through key components and supporting their planning and performance. In addition, tools can shape students' performance and understanding of the task in terms of key disciplinary content and strategies and thus problematize this important content. Although making the task more difficult in the short term, by forcing learners to engage with this complexity, such scaffolded tools make this work more productive opportunities for learning. I present arguments for these mechanisms in terms of the obstacles learners face, and I present several brief examples to illustrate their use in design guidelines. Finally, I examine how the mechanisms of structuring and problematizing are sometimes complementary and sometimes in tension in design, discuss design tradeoffs in developing scaffolded investigation tools for learners, and consider the reliance of scaffolding on a classroom system of supports.
IRIS: English-Irish Machine Translation System

We describe IRIS, a statistical machine translation (SMT) system for translating from English into Irish and vice versa. Since Irish is considered an under-resourced language with a limited amount of machine-readable text, building a machine translation system that produces reasonable translations is rather challenging. As translation is a difficult task, current research in SMT focuses on obtaining statistics either from a large amount of parallel, monolingual or other multilingual resources. Nevertheless, we collected available English-Irish data and developed an SMT system aimed at supporting human translators and enabling cross-lingual language technology tasks.
On the Geometry of Matrix Models for N=1*

We investigate the geometry of the matrix model associated with an N=1 super Yang-Mills theory with three adjoint fields, which is a massive deformation of N=4. We study in particular the Riemann surface underlying solutions with arbitrary number of cuts. We show that an interesting geometrical structure emerges where the Riemann surface is related on-shell to the Donagi-Witten spectral curve. We explicitly identify the quantum field theory resolvents in terms of geometrical data on the surface.
Long‐term hearing results following vestibular surgery in meniere's disease

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the long‐term hearing changes following vestibular surgery in patients with Meniere's disease. Study Design: This is a retrospective analysis of patients operated on in a tertiary referral center setting. Methods: Preoperative, postoperative, and 3‐ to 9‐year postoperative audiograms were analyzed in two patient groups. Twenty‐one patients underwent posterior fossa vestibular neurectomy (VN) and five, mastoid endolymphatic sac decompression and shunt (ELS). All frequencies, four‐frequency pure‐tone averages (PTAs), spondee thresholds, and speech recognition scores were compared for operated ear against nonoperated ear of VN subjects. The results were subjected to a covariance analysis. VN and ELS patients whose hearing deteriorated from “serviceable” (PTA ≤70 dB hearing level) and speech recognition ≤30%) to nonserviceable status were compared using nonparametric statistics. Results: Progressive hearing loss beyond the rate of change of the normal contralateral ear was evident in all patients. Serviceable hearing dropped from 81% to 43% of patients an average of 4 years following VN. Conclusions: VN patients have significant hearing deterioration over time in the operated ear. This finding suggests that continued postoperative medical management is necessary for patients undergoing VN. Laryngoscope, 108:1470–1473, 1998
Intimate Partner Sexual Violence: A Multidisciplinary Guide to Improving Services and Support for Survivors of Rape and Abuse

Intimate Partner Sexual Violence (IPSV) is the most common type of sexual violence and a common component of domestic violence, yet most cases go unreported and service responses are often inadequate. This book brings together advice for all those professionals working with individuals who have experienced IPSV and puts forward recommendations to tackle this prevalent form of sexual violence.
Towards Boosting Video Popularity via Tag Selection

Video content abounds on the Web. Although viewers may reach items via referrals, a large portion of the audience comes from keywordbased search. Consequently, the textual features of multimedia content (e.g., title, description, tags) will directly impact the view count of a particular item, and ultimately the advertisement-generated revenue. This study makes progress on the problem of automating tag selection for online videos with the goal of increasing viewership. It brings two major insights: first, it describes a methodology to construct a ground truth to evaluate methods that aim to improve social content popularity; second, it provides evidence that the tags on existing YouTube videos can be improved by an automated tag recommendation process even for a sample of well curated videos; finally, it suggests a roadmap to explore low-cost techniques either based on crowdsourcing or on tag recommendation algorithms to improve the quality of tags for online video content. Copyright c © by the paper’s authors. Copying permitted only for private and academic purposes. In: S. Papadopoulos, P. Cesar, D. A. Shamma, A. Kelliher, R. Jain (eds.): Proceedings of the SoMuS ICMR 2014 Workshop, Glasgow, Scotland, 01-04-2014, published at http://ceur-ws.org
Miniaturized dual-band filters based on quarter-mode substrate integrated waveguide loaded with double-sided stepped-impedance complementary split-ring resonators

This paper presents two miniaturized dual-band filters based on quarter-mode substrate integrated waveguide (QMSIW) loaded with double-sided stepped-impedance complementary split-ring resonator (DS-SICSRR). The modified SICSRRs, realized by employing the stepped-impedance concept into the conventional CSRR, are with longer electrical lengths and thus exhibit more compact size as compared with its corresponding conventional CSRR counterpart. Subsequently, by loading the SICSRRs with different sizes into the two sides of the QmSIW cavity, two cavity resonators with dual-band response are realized. Since sizes of the SICSRRs on the two sides are tuned independently, the two passbands of the proposed resonator can be controlled flexibly. Based on the proposed QMSIW-DS-SICSRR cavity resonators, two dual-band bandpass filters are implemented, with their measured results in good agreement with the simulated ones. Compared with some related works, the two proposed dual-band filters exhibit size-reduction about 52% and 64%, as well as more controlling flexibility of the two passbands.
The Isoprostanes: Unique Bioactive Products of Lipid Peroxidation

The development of a specific, reliable and noninvasive method for measuring oxidative stress in humans is essential for establishing the role of free radicals in human diseases. Currently, accurate techniques to assess oxidant injury in vivo are extremely limited although a number of approaches are being investigated. Of these, the measurement of specific products of nonenzymatic lipid peroxidation, the F2-isoprostanes (F2-IsoPs), appears to be a more accurate marker of oxidative stress in vivo in humans than other available methods. The purpose of this brief review is to acquaint the reader with the IsoPs from a biochemical perspective and to provide information regarding the utility of quantifying these compounds as indicators of oxidant stress.
Gap2 Promotes the Formation of a Stable Protein Complex Required for Mature Fap1 Biogenesis

ABSTRACT Serine-rich repeat glycoproteins (SRRPs) are important bacterial adhesins conserved in streptococci and staphylococci. Fap1, a SRRP identified in Streptococcus parasanguinis, is the major constituent of bacterial fimbriae and is required for adhesion and biofilm formation. An 11-gene cluster is required for Fap1 glycosylation and secretion; however, the exact mechanism of Fap1 biogenesis remains a mystery. Two glycosylation-associated proteins within this cluster—Gap1 and Gap3—function together in Fap1 biogenesis. Here we report the role of the third glycosylation-associated protein, Gap2. A gap2 mutant exhibited the same phenotype as the gap1 and gap3 mutants in terms of Fap1 biogenesis, fimbrial assembly, and bacterial adhesion, suggesting that the three proteins interact. Indeed, all three proteins interacted with each other independently and together to form a stable protein complex. Mechanistically, Gap2 protected Gap3 from degradation by ClpP protease, and Gap2 required the presence of Gap1 for expression at the wild-type level. Gap2 augmented the function of Gap1 in stabilizing Gap3; this function was conserved in Gap homologs from Streptococcus agalactiae. Our studies demonstrate that the three Gap proteins work in concert in Fap1 biogenesis and reveal a new function of Gap2. This insight will help us elucidate the molecular mechanism of SRRP biogenesis in this bacterium and in pathogenic species.
Root-endophytes improve the ecophysiological performance and production of an agricultural species under drought condition

Antarctic root-endophytes can improve the physiological tolerance and productivity of lettuce crops by means of several different physiological and molecular mechanisms, and could be a successful strategy to maximize water use efficiency and hence maintain an optimal yield in zones affected by desertification. Thus, application of antarctic root-endophytes to different crops could be a biotechnological tool for food security.
NextCell: Predicting Location Using Social Interplay from Cell Phone Traces

Location prediction based on cellular network traces has recently spurred lots of attention. However, predicting user mobility remains a very challenging task due to the fuzziness of human mobility patterns. Our preliminary study included in this paper shows that there is a strong correlation between the calling patterns and co-cell patterns of users (i.e., co-occurrence in the same cell tower at the same time). Based on this finding, we propose NextCell-a novel algorithm that aims to enhance the location prediction by harnessing the social interplay revealed in cellular call records. Moreover, our proposal removes the assumption held in previous schemes that binds locations of cell towers to concrete physical coordinates, e.g., GPS coordinates. We validate our approach with the MIT Reality Mining dataset that involves 32,579 symbolic cell tower locations and 350,000 hours of continuous activity information. Experimental results show that NextCell achieves higher precision and recall than the state-of-the-art schemes at cell tower level in the forthcoming one to six hours.
Transforming Interior Spaces: Enriching Subjective Experiences Through Design Research

This article explores tacit knowledge of lived experience and how this form of knowledge relates to design research. It investigates how interior designers interpret user lived experiences when creating designed environments. The article argues that user experience is the basis of a form of knowledge that is useful for designers. The theoretical framework proposed in the article examines the nature of user experience and how it can be utilized in the design process. The study of lived experiences is contextualized within aesthetic, subjective, and functional aspects of the interior design process, which requires users to express their meanings and needs. A case study is described to illustrate the various stages of this process.
Vascular Injury Post Stent Implantation: Different Gene Expression Modulation in Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells (HUVECs) Model

To explore whether stent procedure may influence transcriptional response of endothelium, we applied different physical (flow changes) and/or mechanical (stent application) stimuli to human endothelial cells in a laminar flow bioreactor (LFB) system. Gene expression analysis was then evaluated in each experimental condition. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) were submitted to low and physiological (1 and 10 dyne/cm2) shear stress in absence (AS) or presence (PS) of stent positioning in a LFB system for 24 h. Different expressed genes, coming from Affymetrix results, were identified based on one-way ANOVA analysis with p values <0.01 and a fold changed >3 in modulus. Low shear stress was compared with physiological one in AS and PS conditions. Two major groups include 32 probes commonly expressed in both 1AS versus 10AS and 1PS versus 10PS comparison, and 115 probes consisting of 83 in addition to the previous 32, expressed only in 1PS versus 10PS comparison. Genes related to cytoskeleton, extracellular matrix, and cholesterol transport/metabolism are differently regulated in 1PS versus 10PS condition. Inflammatory and apoptotic mediators seems to be, instead, closely modulated by changes in flow (1 versus 10), independently of stent application. Low shear stress together with stent procedure are the experimental conditions that mainly modulate the highest number of genes in our human endothelial model. Those genes belong to pathways specifically involved in the endothelial dysfunction.