Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Impact of Sybil and Wormhole Attacks in Location Based Geographic Multicast Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks

Problem statement: Wireless sensor networks have been used in many applications, such as home automation, military surveillances and entity tracking systems. The sensor nodes have low computational capabilities and are highly resource constrained. Routing protocols of wireless sensor networks are prone to various routing attacks, such as black hole, rushing, wormhole, Sybil and denial of service attacks. Approach: The objective of this study was to examine the effects of wormhole in conjunction with Sybil attack on a location based-Geographic Multicast Routing (GMR) protocol. Results: The NS-2 based simulation was used in analyzing the wormhole in conjunction with Sybil attack on GMR. Conclusion: It is found that, the Sybil attack degrades the network performance by 24% and the wormhole attack by 20%.
Antenna Selection and Placement Analysis of MIMO Radar Networks for Target Localization

A distributed MIMO radar network consists of a large number of transmitters/receivers to cover a sensing area of interest but under the constraint that the number of antennas is limited. The problem of selecting a subset of antennas at a sampling time to maximize the diversity capability of the MIMO radar in terms of target resolvability is addressed from the information geometric viewpoint in this paper. Fisher information matrix of distributed MIMO radar which takes both radar waveform and SNR into account is derived as a function of individual antenna locations. The Fisher information distance (FID) between the measurement distribution based on all antennas and that based on only the selected set of antennas is calculated and is adopted as the criterion of selecting a subset of antennas. The underlying antenna selection problem is then to select a subset of antennas from all antennas which can result in the “shortest” FID with respect to a given target location. Since an NP hard search process is involved, an exhaustive search method is considered for efficient antenna subset selection. Simulation examples are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm compared with other criteria in different antenna configurations.
Therapeutic factors affecting the cognitive behavioral treatment of bulimia nervosa via telemedicine versus face-to-face delivery.

OBJECTIVE Recently, Mitchell et al. (Behav Res Ther, 46, 581-592, 2008) conducted a randomized controlled trial of an empirically supported treatment for bulimia nervosa (BN) delivered face-to-face (FTF-CBT) or via telemedicine (TV-CBT). Results suggested that the TV-CBT and FTF-CBT were generally equivalent in effectiveness. The objective of the current study was to examine ratings of therapeutic alliance factors in TV-CBT and FTF-CBT. METHOD Data obtained from 116 adults who met criteria for BN or eating disorder-not otherwise specified with binge eating or purging weekly and six doctoral-level psychologists who delivered the therapy were used in the analyses. RESULTS Therapists generally endorsed greater differences between the treatment delivery methods than patients. Patients tended to make significantly higher ratings of therapeutic factors than therapists. DISCUSSION TV-CBT is an acceptable method for the delivery of BN treatment compared to FTF-CBT, and TV-CBT is more easily accepted as a treatment delivery method by patients than therapists.
Analysis of recurrent germline mutations in the MEN1 gene encountered in apparently unrelated families

Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1 (MEN1) is an autosomal dominant disorder that manifests as varying combinations of tumors of endocrine and other tissues (parathyroids, pancreatic islets, duodenal endocrine cells, the anterior pituitary and others). The MEN1 gene is on chromosome 11q13; it was recently identified by positional cloning. We previously reported 32 different germline mutations in 47 of the 50 familial MEN1 probands studied at the NIH. Eight different germline MEN1 mutations were encountered repeatedly in two or more apparently unrelated families. We analyzed the haplotypes of families with recurrent MEN1 mutations with seven polymorphic markers in the 11q13 region surrounding the MEN1 gene (from D11S1883 to D11S4908). Disease haplotypes were inferred from germline DNA and also from tumors with 11q13 loss of heterozygosity. Two different disease haplotype cores were shared by apparently unrelated families for two mutations in exon 2 (five families with 416delC and six families with 512delC). These two repeat mutations were associated with the two founder effects that we reported in a prior haplotype analysis. The disease haplotypes for each of the other six repeat mutations (seen twice each) were discordant, suggesting independent origins of these recurrent mutations. Most of the MEN1 germline mutations including all of those recurring independently occur in regions of CpG/CpNpG, short DNA repeats or single nucleotide repeat motifs. In conclusion, recurring germline mutations account for about half of the mutations in North American MEN1 families. They result from either founder effects or independent occurrence of one mutation more than one time. Hum Mutat 12:75–82, 1998. Published 1998 Wiley‐Liss, Inc. This article is a US Government work and, as such, is in the public domain in the United States of America.
MicrobeDB: a locally maintainable database of microbial genomic sequences

Summary: Analysis of microbial genomes often requires the general organization and comparison of tens to thousands of genomes both from public repositories and unpublished sources. MicrobeDB provides a foundation for such projects by the automation of downloading published, completed bacterial and archaeal genomes from key sources, parsing annotations of all genomes (both public and private) into a local database, and allowing interaction with the database through an easy to use programming interface. MicrobeDB creates a simple to use, easy to maintain, centralized local resource for various large-scale comparative genomic analyses and a back-end for future microbial application design. Availability: MicrobeDB is freely available under the GNU-GPL at: http://github.com/mlangill/microbedb/ Contact: morgan.g. i.langille@gmail.com
Improving Drug Adherence Using Fixed Combinations Caused Beneficial Treatment Outcomes and Decreased Health-Care Costs in Patients with Hypertension

We enrolled 196 patients with hypertension who were already being treated with free-drug combinations of angiotensin-II receptor blocker (ARB) and amlodipine. The free-drug combinations of ARB and amlodipine were replaced with the same dose of the fixed-dose combinations. The average home blood pressure (BP) in all patients receiving fixed-dose combinations was significantly lower than those receiving free-drug combinations (131 ± 10/75 ± 8 vs. 136 ± 11/77 ± 9 mm Hg, P < .01) accompanied with increasing drug adherence. After lowering BP by fixed-dose combinations, the costs for medications decreased by 31% over the 3 months.
EFFECTIVE DELIVERY OF IRON NANOPARTICLES BY AMPHIPHILIC POLYSILOXANE GRAFT COPOLYMERIC VEHICLES FOR GROUNDWATER REMEDIATION

The work upon which this report supported in by federal United of Department of in the ND Graduate Research Fellowship for the graduate North Dakota Water Resources Research Institute. Contents of this report do the views and policies the US Department of Interior, does of trade or commercial their endorsement US ABSTRACT Nanoscale zero-valent iron (NZVI) particles have been surface modified and used for contaminant remediation. NZVI tend to agglomerate due to magnetic and van der Waals forces and form larger particles that settle down in aqeous media. NZVI particles are used for contaminant remediation and the remediation process is known to be surface area mediated. Agglomeration increases particle size and decrease specific surface area which leads to decrease in their reactivity. A novel amphiphilic polysiloxane graft copolymer (APGC) was designed, synthesized and used to coat NZVI to overcome the agglomeration problem. APGC was composed of hydrophobic polysiloxane, hydrophilic polyethylene glycol ( PEG), and carboxylic acid. The APGC was successfully adsorbed onto the NZVI surfaces via the carboxylic acid anchoring groups and PEG grafts provided dispersibility in water. The APGC possessing the highest concentration of carboxylic acid anchoring group provided the highest colloidal stability. It was also found that the colloidal stability of the APGC coated NZVI remained effectively unchanged up to 12 months. The sedimentation characteristics of APGC coated NZVI (CNZVI) under different ionic strength conditions (0-10 mM NaCl and CaCl 2 ) did not change significantly. Degradation studies were conducted with trichloroethylene (TCE) and arsenic [As(V)] as the model contaminants. TCE degradation rates with CNZVI were determined to be higher as compared to bare NZVI. Shelf-life studies indicated no change in TCE degradation behavior by CNZVI over a 6-month period. As(V) removal batch studies with CNZVI were conducted in both aerobic and anaerobic conditions. Increase in arsenic removal efficiency was observed with CNZVI as compared to bare NZVI in both aerobic and anaerobic conditions. Ionic strengths showed minimal (4-8%) inhibiting effect on arsenic removal by CNZVI.
Effect of everolimus on the pharmacokinetics of octreotide long‐acting repeatable in patients with advanced neuroendocrine tumors: An analysis of the randomized phase III RADIANT‐2 trial

In the RADIANT‐2 trial, addition of everolimus to octreotide long‐acting repeatable (LAR) exhibited a clinically meaningful 5.1‐month improvement in progression‐free survival (PFS) in patients with advanced functional neuroendocrine tumors. In this study, we characterized the effects of everolimus co‐administration on octreotide LAR pharmacokinetics and its relationship with efficacy and safety. At least one evaluable blood everolimus and plasma octreotide predose minimum concentration (Cmin) was available for 182 patients and 294 patients, respectively. Concomitant everolimus administration increased octreotide Cmin with a geometric mean ratio (everolimus/placebo) of 1.47 (90% confidence interval [CI] = 1.32–1.64). Risk for progression was consistently reduced when everolimus Cmin was increased twofold, regardless of octreotide exposure (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.74; 95% CI = 0.46–1.18; HR = 0.54; 95% CI = 0.32–0.92 for 6 ng/mL and 4 ng/mL octreotide, respectively). Risk for pulmonary or metabolic events was associated with increased everolimus Cmin. Co‐administration of everolimus plus octreotide LAR increased octreotide Cmin, which did not impact efficacy.
DIAGNOSTIC ACCURACY EVALUATION OF VISUAL ACUITY AND FUNDUS AUTOFLUORESCENCE MACULAR GEOGRAPHIC ATROPHY AREA FOR THE DISCRIMINATION OF STARGARDT GROUPS

Purpose: To evaluate diagnostic accuracy of visual acuity and fundus autofluorescence (FAF) macular geographic atrophy (GA) area for the discrimination of autosomal recessive Stargardt groups. Methods: Subjects aged <50 years old with confirmed molecular diagnoses were classified to Groups 1, 2, or 3 according to a full-field electroretinogram reference standard. Diagnostic accuracy of visual acuity and the FAF macular GA area was assessed with generalized estimating equations, receiver operating characteristic curve area under the curve, and support vector machines. Results: Ten eyes were classified as Group 1 and 7 as Group 2. The mean log minimum angle resolution (Snellen equivalent) was 0.64 (20/87) for group 1 and 0.96 (20/182) for group 2. Mean FAF macular GA area was 0.96 mm2 for Group 1 and 3.23 mm2 for Group 2. The generalized estimating equation analysis showed an 8.3% increase in odds of Group 2 classification with each 0.1-unit increase in log minimum angle resolution and a 24% increase with each 1-mm2 increase in FAF macular GA area. Multivariate generalized estimating equation analysis showed that only the FAF macular GA area was significant. Area under the curve was 0.79 for log minimum angle resolution and 0.89 for FAF macular GA area. The support vector machine classification accuracy was 71% for log minimum angle resolution and 82% for FAF macular GA area. Conclusion: Visual acuity and FAF macular GA area had good independent accuracy for the discrimination of groups 1 and 2, indicating that they may serve as useful diagnostic parameters.
Cell-Type-Specific Activation of PAK2 by Transforming Growth Factor β Independent of Smad2 and Smad3

ABSTRACT Transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) causes growth arrest in epithelial cells and proliferation and morphological transformation in fibroblasts. Despite the ability of TGF-β to induce various cellular phenotypes, few discernible differences in TGF-β signaling between cell types have been reported, with the only well-characterized pathway (the Smad cascade) seemingly under identical control. We determined that TGF-β receptor signaling activates the STE20 homolog PAK2 in mammalian cells. PAK2 activation occurs in fibroblast but not epithelial cell cultures and is independent of Smad2 and/or Smad3. Furthermore, we show that TGF-β-stimulated PAK2 activity is regulated by Rac1 and Cdc42 and dominant negative PAK2 or morpholino antisense oligonucleotides to PAK2 prevent the morphological alteration observed following TGF-β addition. Thus, PAK2 represents a novel Smad-independent pathway that differentiates TGF-β signaling in fibroblast (growth-stimulated) and epithelial cell (growth-inhibited) cultures.
Optimising hydrogen peroxide measurement in exhaled breath condensate

Abstract Background: Exhaled breath condensate (EBC) analysis has been proposed as a non-invasive method of assessing airway pathology. A number of substances, including hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), have been measured in EBC, without adequate published details of validation and optimisation. Objectives: To explore factors that affect accurate quantitation of H2O2 in EBC. Materials and Methods: H2O2 was measured in EBC samples using fluorometry with 4-hydroxyphenylacetic acid. A number of factors that might alter quantitation were studied including pH and buffering conditions, reagent storage, and assay temperature. Results: Standard curve slope was significantly altered by pH, leading to a potential difference in H2O2 quantification of up to 42%. These differences were resolved by increasing the buffering capacity of the reaction mix. H2O2 added to EBC remained stable for 1 h when stored on ice. The assay was unaffected by freezing assay reagents. The limit of detection for H2O2 ranged from 3.4 nM to 8.8 nM depending on the buffer used. Conclusions: The reagents required for this assay can be stored for several months allowing valuable consistency in longitudinal studies. The quantitation of H2O2 in EBC is pH-dependent but increasing assay buffering reduces this effect. Sensitive reproducible quantitation of H2O2 in EBC requires rigorous optimisation.
Third Wave Feminism's Unhappy Marriage of Poststructuralism and Intersectionality Theory

This article first traces the history of unhappy marriages of disparate theoretical perspectives in US feminism. In recent decades, US third-wave authors have arranged their own unhappy marriage in that their major publications reflect an attempt to wed poststructuralism with intersectionality theory. Although the standpoint epistemology of intersectionality theory shares some common ground with the epistemology of poststructuralism, their epistemological assumptions conflict on a number of important dimensions. This contested terrain has generated serious debates within the third wave and between secondand thirdwave feminists. The form, content, and political implications of their “unhappy marriage” are the subject of this article.
Speckle reduction process based on digital filtering and wavelet compounding in optical coherence tomography for dermatology

Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) has shown a great potential as a complementary imaging tool in the diagnosis of skin diseases. Speckle noise is the most prominent artifact present in OCT images and could limit the interpretation and detection capabilities. In this work we propose a new speckle reduction process and compare it with various denoising filters with high edge-preserving potential, using several sets of dermatological OCT B-scans. To validate the performance we used a custom-designed spectral domain OCT and two different data set groups. The first group consisted in five datasets of a single B-scan captured N times (with N<20), the second were five 3D volumes of 25 Bscans. As quality metrics we used signal to noise (SNR), contrast to noise (CNR) and equivalent number of looks (ENL) ratios. Our results show that a process based on a combination of a 2D enhanced sigma digital filter and a wavelet compounding method achieves the best results in terms of the improvement of the quality metrics. In the first group of individual B-scans we achieved improvements in SNR, CNR and ENL of 16.87 dB, 2.19 and 328 respectively; for the 3D volume datasets the improvements were 15.65 dB, 3.44 and 1148. Our results suggest that the proposed enhancement process may significantly reduce speckle, increasing SNR, CNR and ENL and reducing the number of extra acquisitions of the same frame.
Evaluación del perfil de nutrientes de bagazo de agave como alternativa de alimento para rumiantes* Nutrient profile evaluation of agave bagasse as alternative feedstuffs for ruminants

El objetivo de este trabajo fue evaluar el perfil in vitro de nutrientes de bagazo de Agave salmiana (AS) y Agave weberi cela (AWC) como alternativa para la nutricion de los rumiantes. El bagazo se recogio en Jalpa, Zacatecas durante el ano 2010. A partir de las muestras recogidas, se evaluo: materia seca (MS), cenizas, fibra cruda (FC), extracto etereo (EE), proteina cruda (PC), carbono organico total (TOC), detergente neutro de fibra (DNF), y azucares reductores totales (ART). Macro y microminerales se determinaron por espectroscopia de absorcion atomica. Ademas, se utilizo una tecnica de produccion de gas in vitro para evaluar la cinetica de fermentacion, y despues de 48 h de incubacion de las muestras se utilizaron para cuantificar la produccion de AGV. La proteina cruda (%) (2.25 vs 2.73), EE (%) (0.274 vs 0.272), CF (%) (22.15 vs 16,58) y cenizas (%) (2.14 vs 1.81) no fueron diferentes estadisticamente (p> 0.05) entre AS y tratamiento AWC. Los valores de DNF (% MS) fueron estadisticamente diferentes (p< 0.05) entre el AS (45.45) y los tratamientos AWC (52.95). No se observaron diferencias en AGV entre bagazo de agave y de frijol. Los valores de calcio (%) promedio de 3.46 y 1.95 para AS y AWC, respectivamente. Se concluye que, el bagazo de agave representa una alternativa viable para la alimentacion de rumiantes, especialmente en la estacion seca. Abstract
Surveillance and Azithromycin Treatment for Newcomers and Travelers Evaluation (ASANTE) Trial: Design and Baseline Characteristics

ABSTRACT Purpose: Immigrants and travelers may be sources of re-emergent infection in trachoma-endemic communities close to trachoma elimination. The primary objective of the A Surveillance and Azithromycin Treatment for Newcomers and Travelers Evaluation (ASANTE) trial was to determine whether a newcomer and traveler surveillance and treatment program in addition to annual mass drug administration (MDA) would reduce Chlamydia trachomatis infection when compared to MDA alone. Methods: ASANTE was a randomized controlled trial in 52 communities in Kongwa, Tanzania. In 26 intervention communities, monitors treated everyone in new households, in-coming children and guardians in existing households, and all persons in households who had traveled between annual MDA events. A total of 26 usual practice communities received MDA only. Surveys of 100 1–9-year-olds from each community were conducted at baseline and every 6 months up to 2 years to assess clinical trachoma and C. trachomatis infection. Data on demographics and environmental factors were also collected. Results: Mean prevalences of trachomatous inflammation – follicular (TF) and C. trachomatis were equivalent between the two arms (5.2% and 3.7% in intervention, and 4.9% and 3.6% in usual practice communities, respectively). Of 318 children with TF, 36.5% tested positive for C. trachomatis. TF prevalence was higher among households without a bicycle (p = 0.03) and lower with increasing child’s age (p < 0.001). Infection prevalence was higher among households >30 minutes from water (p = 0.015). TF and infection prevalence decreased with increasing years of education (p = 0.004 and p = 0.002, respectively). Conclusion: The ASANTE trial will inform guidance on the surveillance and treatment of persons traveling or newly arriving to communities hypo-endemic for trachoma.
Multi-Modal Information Extraction in a Question-Answer Framework

Multi-modal information extraction is a challenging task and a topic of ongoing research in the areas of Natural Language Processing and Computer Vision. This paper presents an approach for extracting product specifications for a given attribute query, based on descriptions and images from the MuMIE Dataset provided by Diffbot. Building upon methods from existing literature, we propose an LSTM and CNN-based model for this task. Furthermore, we include a detailed account of the incremental changes that were made to the model throughout the development process. The paper focuses on the textual mode, since the descriptions contain the most relevant information, but also includes preliminary results for the image mode. The final model which relies on a pointer network and domain-aware heuristics achieves a test accuracy of 72.7 %.
Connecting theory and practice in digital humanities information work

The omnipresence and escalating efficiency of digital, networked information systems alongside the resulting deluge of digital corpora, apps, software, and data has coincided with increased concerns in the humanities with new topics and methods of inquiry. In particular, digital humanities (DH), the subfield that has emerged as the site of most of this work, has received growing attention in higher education in recent years. This study seeks to facilitate a better understanding of digital humanities by studying the motivations and practices of digital humanists as information workers in the humanities. To this end, we observe information work through interviews with DH scholars about their work practices and through a survey of DH programs such as graduate degrees, certificates, minors, and training institutes. In this study we focus on how the goals behind methodology (a link between theories and method) surface in everyday DH work practices and in DH curricula in order to investigate if the critiques that have appeared in relation to DH information work are well founded and to suggest alternative narratives about information work in DH that will help advance the impact of the field in the humanities and beyond.
Immunophenotypic Analysis of Platelets

Platelets are the smallest cellular component in the peripheral circulation. Their primary role is maintenance of hemostasis. The evaluation of platelets by flow cytometry has proven beneficial in the investigation of many disease states, including inherited defects, cardiovascular disease, stroke, and many other inflammatory processes. In the absence of an added exogenous platelet agonist, the activation state of in vivo circulating platelets can be measured. Inclusion of an exogenous agonist in the assay enables analysis of the reactivity of circulating platelets in vitro. This unit describes protocols to evaluate platelet surface glycoproteins, platelet activation status, and platelet responsiveness to agonist. Detailed discussion of appropriate sample handling, reagent preparation, flow cytometric set‐up, and data interpretation are provided for three independent assays.