Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cannabinoid type-1 receptor signaling in central serotonergic neurons regulates anxiety-like behavior and sociability

The endocannabinoid (eCB) system possesses neuromodulatory functions by influencing the release of various neurotransmitters, including γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and glutamate. A functional interaction between eCBs and the serotonergic system has already been suggested. Previously, we showed that cannabinoid type-1 (CB1) receptor mRNA and protein are localized in serotonergic neurons of the raphe nuclei, implying that the eCB system can modulate serotonergic functions. In order to substantiate the physiological role of the CB1 receptor in serotonergic neurons of the raphe nuclei, we generated serotonergic 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) neuron-specific CB1 receptor-deficient mice, using the Cre/loxP system with a tamoxifen-inducible Cre recombinase under the control of the regulatory sequences of the tryptophan hydroxylase 2 gene (TPH2-CreERT2), thus, restricting the recombination to 5-HT neurons of the central nervous system (CNS). Applying several different behavioral paradigms, we revealed that mice lacking the CB1 receptor in serotonergic neurons are more anxious and less sociable than control littermates. Thus, we were able to show that functional CB1 receptor signaling in central serotonergic neurons modulates distinct behaviors in mice.
A dynamic buffer management scheme based on rate estimation in packet-switched networks

While traffic volume of real-time applications is rapidly increasing, current routers do not guarantee minimum QoS values of fairness and they drop packets in a random fashion. If routers provide a minimum QoS, resulting a less delay, reduced delay-jitter, more fairness, and smooth sending rates, TCP-friendly rate control (TFRC) can be adopted for real-time applications. We propose a dynamic buffer management scheme that meets the requirements described above, and can be applied to TCP flow and to data flow for transfer of real-time applications. The proposed scheme consists of a virtual threshold function, an accurate and stable per-flow rate estimation, and a per-flow exponential drop probability. We discuss how this scheme motivates real-time applications to adopt TCP-friendly rate control.
Modelling versions in collaborative work

The problem of version management for co-operative systems is addressed. The authors first describe a basic version model-a domain model capturing the idea of a version and the relationships between versions, whether electronic or physical, implicitly or explicitly stored. This is a 'modal' model in that it takes into account the context of use of these versions. The model is then extended to model version managers, which are both versioned entities themselves and also include their own models of versions. Finally, the authors show how V-Web, a system for versioning Web pages, fits within the framework of the model.
Hes1 is required for the development of the superior cervical ganglion of sympathetic trunk and the carotid body

Hes1 gene represses the expression of proneural basic helix–loop–helix (bHLH) factor Mash1, which is essential for the differentiation of the sympathetic ganglia and carotid body glomus cells. The sympathetic ganglia, carotid body, and common carotid artery in Wnt1‐Cre/R26R double transgenic mice were intensely labeled by X‐gal staining, i.e., the neural crest origin. The deficiency of Hes1 caused severe hypoplasia of the superior cervical ganglion (SCG). At embryonic day (E) 17.5–E18.5, the volume of the SCG in Hes1 null mutants was reduced to 26.4% of the value in wild‐type mice. In 4 of 30 cases (13.3%), the common carotid artery derived from the third arch artery was absent in the null mutants, and the carotid body was not formed. When the common carotid artery was retained, the organ grew in the wall of the third arch artery and glomus cell precursors were provided from the SCG in the null mutants as well as in wild‐types. However, the volume of carotid body in the null mutants was only 52.5% of the value in wild‐types at E17.5–E18.5. These results suggest that Hes1 plays a critical role in regulating the development of neural crest derivatives in the mouse cervical region. Developmental Dynamics 241:1289–1300, 2012. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
PPCP: Efficient Probabilistic Planning with Clear Preferences in Partially-Known Environments

For most real-world problems the agent operates in only partially-known environments. Probabilistic planners can reason over the missing information and produce plans that take into account the uncertainty about the environment. Unfortunately though, they can rarely scale up to the problems that are of interest in real-world. In this paper, however, we show that for a certain subset of problems we can develop a very efficient probabilistic planner. The proposed planner, called PPCP, is applicable to the problems for which it is clear what values of the missing information would result in the best plan. In other words, there exists a clear preference for the actual values of the missing information. For example, in the problem of robot navigation in partially-known environments it is always preferred to find out that an initially unknown location is traversable rather than not. The planner we propose exploits this property by using a series of deterministic A*-like searches to construct and refine a policy in anytime fashion. On the theoretical side, we show that once converged, the policy is guaranteed to be optimal under certain conditions. On the experimental side, we show the power of PPCP on the problem of robot navigation in partially-known terrains. The planner can scale up to very large environments with thousands of initially unknown locations. We believe that this is several orders of magnitude more unknowns than what the current probabilistic planners developed for the same problem can handle. Also, despite the fact that the problem we experimented on in general does not satisfy the conditions for the solution optimality, PPCP still produces the solutions that are nearly always optimal.
Expanding the reach of health sciences education and empowering others: the OpenCourseWare initiative at Tufts University

OpenCourseWare (OCW) represents an innovative and cost-effective opportunity for institutions to take a more active role in strengthening health sciences education worldwide. OCW content can provide a supplement to curricula available in resource-rich settings, as well as provide much of the basic content critical to teaching and research in resource-limited health education environments. Educational institutions worldwide have the opportunity to explore how OCW and other open tools and materials can supplement efforts to build health education capacity to address global shortages of healthcare workers. Tufts University has worked to leverage open, digital resources to support medical education since 1994 with the creation of the Tufts University Sciences Knowledgebase (TUSK). This experience has yielded vital lessons for institutions interested in OCW, including: effectively motivating faculty participation; managing the inherent complexity of open publishing of health sciences content due to its rapidly evolving nature and reliance on copyrighted materials; generating support through internal and external communication throughout the process; and creating institutional systems that ensure the long-term sustainability of OCW initiatives.
Own-Song Recognition in the Songbird Auditory Pathway: Selectivity and Lateralization

The songbird brain is able to discriminate between the bird's own song and other conspecific songs. Determining where in the brain own- song selectivity emerges is of great importance because experience-dependent mechanisms are necessarily involved and because brain regions sensitive to self-generated vocalizations could mediate auditory feedback that is necessary for song learning and maintenance. Using functional MRI, here we show that this selectivity is present at the midbrain level. Surprisingly, the selectivity was found to be lateralized toward the right side, a finding reminiscent of the potential right lateralization of song production in zebra finches but also of own-face and own-voice recognition in human beings. These results indicate that a midbrain structure can process subtle information about the identity of a subject through experience-dependent mechanisms, challenging the classical perception of subcortical regions as primitive and nonplastic structures. They also open questions about the evolution of the cognitive skills and lateralization in vertebrates.
Hypothalamic Neurotensin Projections Promote Reward by Enhancing Glutamate Transmission in the VTA

The lateral hypothalamus (LH) sends a dense glutamatergic and peptidergic projection to dopamine neurons in the ventral tegmental area (VTA), a cell group known to promote reinforcement and aspects of reward. The role of the LH to VTA projection in reward-seeking behavior can be informed by using optogenetic techniques to dissociate the actions of LH neurons from those of other descending forebrain inputs to the VTA. In the present study, we identify the effect of neurotensin (NT), one of the most abundant peptides in the LH to VTA projection, on excitatory synaptic transmission in the VTA and reward-seeking behavior. Mice displayed robust intracranial self-stimulation of LH to VTA fibers, an operant behavior mediated by NT 1 receptors (Nts1) and NMDA receptors. Whole-cell patch-clamp recordings of VTA dopamine neurons demonstrated that NT (10 nm) potentiated NMDA-mediated EPSCs via Nts1. Results suggest that NT release from the LH into the VTA activates Nts1, thereby potentiating NMDA-mediated EPSCs and promoting reward. The striking behavioral and electrophysiological effects of NT and glutamate highlight the LH to VTA pathway as an important component of reward.
Expression of Concern applied: Modeling fracture toughness of functionally graded steels in crack divider configuration

Fracture toughness of functionally graded steels in crack divider configuration has been modeled. By utilizing plain carbon and austenitic stainless steel slices with various thicknesses and arrangements as electroslag remelting electrodes, functionally graded steels were produced. The fracture toughness of the functionally graded steels was found to depend on the type, volume fraction and position of the phases present. According to the area under the stress-strain curve of each layer in the functionally graded composites, a mathematical model has been presented for fracture toughness prediction using the rule of mixtures. In addition, the fracture toughness of the composites has been simulated by the 3D dynamic finite element method. There is good agreement between experimental results and those acquired from the numerical and mathematical models.
Predictability of dysphagia after laparoscopic Nissen fundoplication

OBJECTIVE:Dysphagia is the most common complication of antireflux surgery. Temporary dysphagia occurs in addition to persistent dysphagia because of technical or physiological problems. Temporary dysphagia may be due to the patient's personal perception or faulty eating habits. The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of the patient's personality as it relates to temporary dysphagia and individual impairment.METHODS:Several studies have used the construct of personality known as “health locus of control” to predict health-related behavior and convalescence after medical or surgical treatments. This study investigates the predictability of the subjective degree of dysphagia and its perceived degree of impairment in relation to the health locus of control after laparoscopic so-called “floppy” Nissen fundoplication in 90 patients. Several questionnaires and single-item questions were given to the patients preoperatively, and 1 wk, 6 wk, and 3 months after surgery. The answers to the questions provided the data for this study.RESULTS:Preoperatively, 92% of the patients had no dysphagia and 8% had a mild subjective degree of dysphagia. Temporary postoperative dysphagia was found in approximately 50% of the patients 1 wk after surgery. The intensity of the dysphagia ranged among mild (18%), moderate (15%), and severe (16%). Three months postoperatively about 80% had no dysphagia and only 2% severe dysphagia. Correlations between the construct of personality and the intensity of postoperative dysphagia and its impairment revealed a significant relationship at all times. Patients with high expectations for their own health-related abilities (internal control) had less dysphagia (r =−0.78 after 1 wk [p < 0.001], r =−0.71 after 6 wk [p < 0.001], and r =−0.64 after 3 months [p < 0.001]), compared with patients who believed that their convalescence depended more on luck, chance, or fate (external control) (r = 0.67 after 1 wk [p < 0.01], r = 0.72 after 6 wk [p < 0.001], and r = 0.63 after 3 months [p < 0.01]). These results are highly significant. The correlation between health locus of control and the degree of a subjective impairment from perceived dysphagia showed similar results (p < 0.01). CONCLUSIONS:The subjective degree of dysphagia and the perceived impairment as a result of laparoscopic antireflux surgery can be predicted according to the personality of the patient. Those patients with low expectations for their own abilities can be identified before surgery, thereby allowing adaptation techniques to be applied that could improve the results and well-being of patients after antireflux surgery.
An empirical comparison of graph-based dimensionality reduction algorithms on facial expression recognition tasks

Facial expression recognition is a topic of interest both in industry and academia. Recent approaches to facial expression recognition are based on mapping expressions to low dimensional manifolds. In this paper we revisit various dimensionality reduction algorithms using a graph-based paradigm. We compare eight dimensionality reduction algorithms on a facial expression recognition task. For this task, experimental results show that although Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) is the simplest and oldest supervised approach, its results are comparable to more flexible recent algorithms. LDA, on the other hand, is much simpler to tune, since it only depends on one parameter.
Low voltage analog circuit design techniques

Analog signal processing is fast and can address real world problems. The applications of battery powered analog and mixed mode electronic devices require designing analog circuits to operate at low voltage levels. In this paper, some of the issues facing analog designers in implementing low voltage circuits are discussed, and possible low voltage design techniques are examined. The authors describe briefly almost all low voltage design techniques suitable for analog circuit structures along with their merits and demerits.
DNA Microarray-Based Identification of Genes Associated with Glycopeptide Resistance in Staphylococcus aureus

ABSTRACT Six pairs of transcription profiles between glycopeptide-intermediate S. aureus (GISA [or vancomycin-intermediate S. aureus; VISA]) and glycopeptide-susceptible S. aureus (vancomycin-susceptible S. aureus [VSSA], including glycopeptide-susceptible isogenic mutants from VISA) strains were compared using a microarray. Ninety-two open reading frames which were or tended to be increased in transcription in VISA in at least five out of six array combination pairs were evaluated for their effects on glycopeptide susceptibility by introducing these genes one by one into VSSA strain N315 to construct an overexpression library. By screening the library, 17 genes including 8 novel genes were identified as associated with glycopeptide resistance since their experimental overexpression reduced vancomycin and/or teicoplanin susceptibility of N315. The raised MICs of vancomycin and teicoplanin were 1.25 to 3.0 and 1.5 to 6.0 mg/liter, respectively, as compared to 1.0 mg/liter of N315. Three of these genes, namely graF, msrA2, and mgrA, also raised the oxacillin MIC from 8.0 mg/liter for N315 to 64 to ∼128 mg/liter when they were overexpressed in N315. Their contribution to vancomycin and beta-lactam resistance was further supported by gene knockout and trans-complementation assay. By using a plasmid-based promoter-green fluorescent protein gene (gfp) transcriptional fusion system, graF promoter-activated cells were purified, and subsequent susceptibility tests and Northern blot analysis demonstrated that the cells with up-regulated activity of graF promoter showed reduced susceptibility to vancomycin, teicoplanin, and oxacillin. In addition, cell morphology studies showed that graF and msrA2 overexpression increased cell wall thickness of N315 by factors of 23.91 and 22.27%, respectively, accompanied by glycopeptide MIC increments of 3- to 6-fold, when they were overexpressed in N315. Moreover, extended experiments and analyses indicate that many of the genes identified above are related to the cell wall biosynthetic pathway, including active nutrient transport systems. We propose that the genes which raise glycopeptide resistance in S. aureus function toward altering the cell wall metabolic pathway.
Learning to Generate Coherent Summary with Discriminative Hidden Semi-Markov Model

In this paper we introduce a novel single-document summarization method based on a hidden semi-Markov model. This model can naturally model single-document summarization as the optimization problem of selecting the best sequence from among the sentences in the input doc- ument under the given objective function and knapsack constraint. This advantage makes it possible for sentence selection to take the coherence of the summary into account. In addition our model can also incorporate sentence compression into the summarization process. To demon- strate the effectiveness of our method, we conduct an experimental evaluation with a large-scale corpus consisting of 12,748 pairs of a document and its reference. The results show that our method significantly outperforms the competitive baselines in terms of ROUGE evaluation, and the linguistic quality of summaries is also improved. Our method successfully mimicked the reference summaries, about 20 percent of the summaries generated by our method were com- pletely identical to their references. Moreover, we show that large-scale training samples are quite effective for training a summarizer.
An Efficient and Robust Social Network De-anonymization Attack

Releasing connection data from social networking services can pose a significant threat to user privacy. In our work, we consider structural social network de-anonymization attacks, which are used when a malicious party uses connections in a public or other identified network to re-identify users in an anonymized social network release that he obtained previously. In this paper we design and evaluate a novel social de-anonymization attack. In particular, we argue that the similarity function used to re-identify nodes is a key component of such attacks, and we design a novel measure tailored for social networks. We incorporate this measure in an attack called Bumblebee. We evaluate Bumblebee in depth, and show that it significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art, for example it has higher re-identification rates with high precision, robustness against noise, and also has better error control.
Unifying overloading and λ-abstraction : λ fg

In this short note we present a minimal system to deal with overloaded functions with late binding, in which λ-abstractions are seen as a special case of overloaded functions with just one code. We prove some relevant properties that this system enjoys, and show its connection with the λ&-calculus. We end by showing the practical interest of this system, in particular in modeling object-oriented languages.
Understanding Blight Ticket Compliance in Detroit

Property blight affects more than 20% of properties in Detroit. The City of Detroit issues tickets to owners of these blighted parcels, which incentivize residents to maintain their properties. However, the compliance rate for these tickets is under 10%, which leaves tens of millions of dollars in unpaid fines. In this paper, we seek to understand why compliance is so low and how violations could be better enforced to effectively address the city’s blight epidemic. To this end, we build a predictive model that forecasts ticket compliance, perform in-depth analysis on the groups of residents who own blight-ticketed properties, and investigate how compliance varies between these very different groups.
Strabismus measurements using the alternating and simultaneous prism cover tests: a comparative study.

PURPOSE To determine the most accurate method of strabismus measurement in patients with constant manifest esotropia. METHODS Patients underwent routine cover test assessment with the cover-uncover test and the alternating cover test with any increase in the angle of deviation being noted between the two methods. The simultaneous and alternating prism cover test was then performed to see if a qualitative increase in angle deviation was represented by a quantitative measurement. Patients also were assessed for the presence of binocular vision in free space using Bagolini striated lenses and motor fusion responses to base out prisms. RESULTS There was a significant difference between the alternating and simultaneous prism cover test measurements for all patients (mean difference for near fixation: 4.72 prism diopters [delta]; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.68-7.75 delta; df=51; P<.001). For patients who showed a qualitative change in angle based on observational judgement using the cover tests, the mean difference in angle measured by simultaneous and alternating prism cover test for near fixation was 7.42 delta (95% CI, 5.75-10.30 delta; df=25; P<.001). CONCLUSION To obtain an accurate interpretation of the size of manifest esotropia, the angle of deviation needs to be measured by the simultaneous and alternating prism cover test when an observable difference is noted on the cover test. The presence of a latent component to a manifest deviation should prompt the investigation of binocular reflexes even if the manifest angle is too large to be commensurate with binocular vision.
Crystal Structure of the Termination Module of a Nonribosomal Peptide Synthetase

Nonribosomal peptide synthetases (NRPSs) are modular multidomain enzymes that act as an assembly line to catalyze the biosynthesis of complex natural products. The crystal structure of the 144-kilodalton Bacillus subtilis termination module SrfA-C was solved at 2.6 angstrom resolution. The adenylation and condensation domains of SrfA-C associate closely to form a catalytic platform, with their active sites on the same side of the platform. The peptidyl carrier protein domain is flexibly tethered to this platform and thus can move with its substrate-loaded 4′-phosphopantetheine arm between the active site of the adenylation domain and the donor side of the condensation domain. The SrfA-C crystal structure has implications for the rational redesign of NRPSs as a means of producing novel bioactive peptides.
Next-generation DNA sequencing technologies.

Recently, the requirement for fast, low-cost, and highly reliable methods has triggered the development of next-generation DNA sequencing technologies. In addition to overcoming the restrictions in Sanger sequencing methods, large-scale genetic data have provided the development of different analysis methods. In this paper, widely used next-generation sequencing platforms, the analyses of the data obtained, and the applications of these technologies are discussed.