Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Why Do Latino Survey Respondents Acquiesce? Respondent and Interviewer Characteristics as Determinants of Cultural Patterns of Acquiescence Among Latino Survey Respondents

Research indicates that Latino survey respondents are more likely to acquiesce than non-Latino European Americans (EAs), thereby decreasing the potential for measurement invariance across cultural groups. To better understand what drives this culturally patterned response style, we examined the influence of respondent and interviewer characteristics on acquiescence. Data were obtained from a telephone survey of 400 Mexican American, Puerto Rican, Cuban American, and non-Latino EA respondents, and a self-administered survey of 21 interviewers. Higher acquiescence was associated with several respondent characteristics: older age, lower education, stronger Latino cultural orientation, Spanish use, Latino ethnicity, and, among Latinos, Cuban American ethnicity. In contrast, acquiescence was not influenced by respondent–interviewer social distance, social deference, or interviewer characteristics (e.g., education, gender, acculturation, interviewer experience). These findings indicate that acquiescence differs across Latino ethnic subgroups and that respondent and language factors are more influential determinants of acquiescence than survey interviewers.
Ultrasonography-Based Thyroidal and Perithyroidal Anatomy and Its Clinical Significance

Ultrasonography (US)-guided procedures such as ethanol ablation, radiofrequency ablation, laser ablation, selective nerve block, and core needle biopsy have been widely applied in the diagnosis and management of thyroid and neck lesions. For a safe and effective US-guided procedure, knowledge of neck anatomy, particularly that of the nerves, vessels, and other critical structures, is essential. However, most previous reports evaluated neck anatomy based on cadavers, computed tomography, or magnetic resonance imaging rather than US. Therefore, the aim of this article was to elucidate US-based thyroidal and perithyroidal anatomy, as well as its clinical significance in the use of prevention techniques for complications during the US-guided procedures. Knowledge of these areas may be helpful for maximizing the efficacy and minimizing the complications of US-guided procedures for the thyroid and other neck lesions.
Draft Genome Sequence of Two Strains of Xanthomonas arboricola Isolated from Prunus persica Which Are Dissimilar to Strains That Cause Bacterial Spot Disease on Prunus spp.

ABSTRACT The draft genome sequences of two strains of Xanthomonas arboricola, isolated from asymptomatic peach trees in Spain, are reported here. These strains are avirulent and do not belong to the same phylogroup as X. arboricola pv. pruni, a causal agent of bacterial spot disease of stone fruits and almonds.
Early-time free-surface flow driven by a deforming boundary

Abstract When a solid boundary deforms rapidly into a quiescent liquid layer, a flow is induced that can lead to jet formation. An asymptotic analytical solution is presented for this flow, driven by a solid boundary deforming with dimensionless vertical velocity $V_{b}(x,t)={\it\epsilon}(1+\cos x)\,f(t)$ , where the amplitude ${\it\epsilon}$ is small relative to the wavelength and the time dependence $f(t)$ approaches 0 for large $t$ . Initially, the flow is directed outwards from the crest of the deformation and slows with the slowing of the boundary motion. A domain-perturbation method is used to reveal that, when the boundary stops moving, nonlinear interactions with the free surface leave a remnant momentum directed back towards the crest, and this momentum can be a precursor to jet formation. This scenario arises in a laser-induced printing technique in which an expanding blister imparts momentum into a liquid film to form a jet. The analysis provides insight into the physics underlying the interaction between the deforming boundary and free surface, in particular, the dependence of the remnant flow on the thickness of the liquid layer and the deformation amplitude and wavelength. Numerical simulations are used to show the range of validity of the analytical results, and the domain-perturbation solution is extended to an axisymmetric domain with a Gaussian boundary deformation to compare with previous numerical simulations of blister-actuated laser-induced forward transfer.
Detecting evolution and adaptation fingerprints in bacterial metabolic backbones

The heterogeneity of reaction fluxes present in a metabolic network within a single flux state can be exploited to construct the so-called backbone as a reduced version of metabolism. The backbone maintains all significant fluxes producing or consuming metabolites while displaying a substantially decreased number of interconnections and, hence, it becomes a useful tool to extract primary metabolic routes. Here, we disclose the metabolic backbone of Escherichia coli using the computationally predicted fluxes which maximize the growth rate in glucose minimal medium, and we compare it with the backbone of Mycoplasma pneumoniae, a much simpler organism. We find that the central core in both backbones is mainly composed of reactions in ancient pathways, still playing at present a key role in energy metabolism. In E. coli, the analysis of the backbone reveals that the synthesis of nucleotides and the metabolism of lipids form smaller cores which rely critically on energy metabolism; but not conversely. At the same time, an analysis of the dependence of this backbone on media composition leads to the identification of pathways sensitive to environmental changes. The metabolic backbone of an organism is thus useful to trace simultaneously both its evolution and adaptation fingerprints.
The changing landscape of membrane protein structural biology through developments in electron microscopy

Abstract Membrane proteins are ubiquitous in biology and are key targets for therapeutic development. Despite this, our structural understanding has lagged behind that of their soluble counterparts. This review provides an overview of this important field, focusing in particular on the recent resurgence of electron microscopy (EM) and the increasing role it has to play in the structural studies of membrane proteins, and illustrating this through several case studies. In addition, we examine some of the challenges remaining in structural determination, and what steps are underway to enhance our knowledge of these enigmatic proteins.
LC-MS alignment in theory and practice: a comprehensive algorithmic review

Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry is widely used for comparative replicate sample analysis in proteomics, lipidomics and metabolomics. Before statistical comparison, registration must be established to match corresponding analytes from run to run. Alignment, the most popular correspondence approach, consists of constructing a function that warps the content of runs to most closely match a given reference sample. To date, dozens of correspondence algorithms have been proposed, creating a daunting challenge for practitioners in algorithm selection. Yet, existing reviews have highlighted only a few approaches. In this review, we describe 50 correspondence algorithms to facilitate practical algorithm selection. We elucidate the motivation for correspondence and analyze the limitations of current approaches, which include prohibitive runtimes, numerous user parameters, model limitations and the need for reference samples. We suggest and describe a paradigm shift for overcoming current correspondence limitations by building on known liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry behavior.
High-Throughput Sequencing of Small RNA Transcriptome Reveals Salt Stress Regulated MicroRNAs in Sugarcane

Salt stress is a primary cause of crop losses worldwide, and it has been the subject of intense investigation to unravel the complex mechanisms responsible for salinity tolerance. MicroRNA is implicated in many developmental processes and in responses to various abiotic stresses, playing pivotal roles in plant adaptation. Deep sequencing technology was chosen to determine the small RNA transcriptome of Saccharum sp cultivars grown on saline conditions. We constructed four small RNAs libraries prepared from plants grown on hydroponic culture submitted to 170 mM NaCl and harvested after 1 h, 6 hs and 24 hs. Each library was sequenced individually and together generated more than 50 million short reads. Ninety-eight conserved miRNAs and 33 miRNAs* were identified by bioinformatics. Several of the microRNA showed considerable differences of expression in the four libraries. To confirm the results of the bioinformatics-based analysis, we studied the expression of the 10 most abundant miRNAs and 1 miRNA* in plants treated with 170 mM NaCl and in plants with a severe treatment of 340 mM NaCl. The results showed that 11 selected miRNAs had higher expression in samples treated with severe salt treatment compared to the mild one. We also investigated the regulation of the same miRNAs in shoots of four cultivars grown on soil treated with 170 mM NaCl. Cultivars could be grouped according to miRNAs expression in response to salt stress. Furthermore, the majority of the predicted target genes had an inverse regulation with their correspondent microRNAs. The targets encode a wide range of proteins, including transcription factors, metabolic enzymes and genes involved in hormone signaling, probably assisting the plants to develop tolerance to salinity. Our work provides insights into the regulatory functions of miRNAs, thereby expanding our knowledge on potential salt-stressed regulated genes.
Eggplant resistance to bacterial wilt and to Fusarium wilt: is there a link?

INRA URI 052 maintains a germplasm collection of S. melongena and related species. The accessions of this collection that are described in the literature as resistant to Ralstonia solanacearum, agent responsible ofbacterial wilt, were screened at plantlet stage against Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. melongenae on the basis of the number ofleaves wilted and vessels browning. Results show that the panel of accessions tested display phenotypes ranging from fully resistant to fully susceptible to Fusarium wilt, with ail intermediate resistance levels. Results are discussed on the basis ofthe complexity ofresistance evaluation and of what is known in tomato about a link between resistances to both vascular diseases.
Several Issues of Wearable AR

In this paper, we discuss intuitive methods of interaction with an augmented object and efficient display for users of augmented reality (AR) systems. Furthermore, we propose a way how to integrate AR system for using in the real world. AR systems with robust tracking are often embedded in mobile devices to help users obtain information regarding objects or the environments. However, AR systems on mobile devices such as smartphones are inconvenient to use in real-life due to lack of portability and accessibility. To solve these problems, a wearable AR system has been developed that is convenient and intuitive to use in real-life. Various issues with this system have been discussed in this paper, and practical experiments have been used to compare the various options for each component.
A robust wearable u-healthcare platform in wireless sensor network

Wireless sensor network (WSN) is considered to be one of the most important research fields for ubiquitous healthcare (u-healthcare) applications. Healthcare systems combined with WSNs have only been introduced by several pioneering researchers. However, most researchers collect physiological data from medical nodes located at static locations and transmit them within a limited communication range between a base station and the medical nodes. In these healthcare systems, the network link can be easily broken owing to the movement of the object nodes. To overcome this issue, in this study, the fast link exchange minimum cost forwarding (FLE-MCF) routing protocol is proposed. This protocol allows real-time multi-hop communication in a healthcare system based on WSN. The protocol is designed for a multi-hop sensor network to rapidly restore the network link when it is broken. The performance of the proposed FLE-MCF protocol is compared with that of a modified minimum cost forwarding (MMCF) protocol. The FLE-MCF protocol shows a good packet delivery rate from/to a fast moving object in a WSN. The designed wearable platform utilizes an adaptive linear prediction filter to reduce the motion artifacts in the original electrocardiogram (ECG) signal. Two filter algorithms used for baseline drift removal are evaluated to check whether real-time execution is possible on our wearable platform. The experiment results shows that the ECG signal filtered by adaptive linear prediction filter recovers from the distorted ECG signal efficiently.
Qingchang Wenzhong Decoction Ameliorates Dextran Sulphate Sodium-Induced Ulcerative Colitis in Rats by Downregulating the IP10/CXCR3 Axis-Mediated Inflammatory Response

Qingchang Wenzhong Decoction (QCWZD) is an effective traditional Chinese medicine prescription. Our previous studies have shown that QCWZD has significant efficacy in patients with mild-to-moderate ulcerative colitis (UC) and in colonic mucosa repair in UC rat models. However, the exact underlying mechanism remains unknown. Thus, this study was conducted to determine QCWZD's efficacy and mechanism in dextran sulphate sodium- (DSS-) induced UC rat models, which were established by 7-day administration of 4.5% DSS solution. QCWZD was administered daily for 7 days, after which the rats were euthanized. Disease activity index (DAI), histological score (HS), and myeloperoxidase (MPO) level were determined to evaluate UC severity. Serum interferon gamma-induced protein 10 (IP10) levels were determined using ELISA kits. Western blotting and real-time polymerase chain reaction were, respectively, used to determine colonic protein and gene expression of IP10, chemokine (cys-x-cys motif) receptor (CXCR)3, and nuclear factor- (NF-) κB p65. Intragastric QCWZD administration ameliorated DSS-induced UC, as evidenced by decreased DAI, HS, and MPO levels. Furthermore, QCWZD decreased the protein and gene expression of IP10, CXCR3, and NF-κB p65. Overall, these results suggest that QCWZD ameliorates DSS-induced UC in rats by downregulating the IP10/CXCR3 axis-mediated inflammatory response and may be a novel UC therapy.
Energy of Flat VS Clustering Wireless Sensor Networks: A Comparative Study

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) can be used to collect surrounding data by multi-hop. As sensor networks have the limited and not rechargeable energy resource, energy efficiency is an important design issue for its topology. In this paper, we derive the exact mathematical expression for the flat and clustering schemes, respectively. Then the energy consumption of different schemes are compared. Motivated by the comparison, we propose an energy-efficient multi-tier clustering algorithm EEMC. EEMC terminates in O(log logN) iterations given N nodes, incurs low energy consumption across the network. Simulation results demonstrate that our proposed algorithm is effective in prolonging the large-scale network lifetime and achieving more power reductions.
Spirituality, quality of life, and depression in older people with dementia

ABSTRACT This study aimed to observe dementia’s role in the relationship between spirituality, quality of life, and depression in aging. The sample included 61 participants between 65 and 98 years old, separated into two groups: participants diagnosed with dementia (N = 31) and control participants (N = 30). There was no significant difference in spirituality between demented and control participants; however, different patterns of correlation were observed between spirituality, depression, and quality of life in these groups. Although the level of spirituality did not differ despite dementia, this pathology would appear to play a role in the relationship between spirituality, quality of life, and depression.
A novel, SiPM-array-based, monolithic scintillator detector for PET

Silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) are of great interest to positron emission tomography (PET), as they enable new detector geometries, for e.g., depth-of-interaction (DOI) determination, are MR compatible, and offer faster response and higher gain than other solid-state photosensors such as avalanche photodiodes. Here we present a novel detector design with DOI correction, in which a position-sensitive SiPM array is used to read out a monolithic scintillator. Initial characterization of a prototype detector consisting of a 4 × 4 SiPM array coupled to either the front or back surface of a 13.2 mm × 13.2 mm × 10 mm LYSO:Ce3+ crystal shows that front-side readout results in significantly better performance than conventional back-side readout. Spatial resolutions <1.6 mm full-width-at-half-maximum (FWHM) were measured at the detector centre in response to an ∼0.54 mm FWHM diameter test beam. Hardly any resolution losses were observed at angles of incidence up to 45°, demonstrating excellent DOI correction. About 14% FWHM energy resolution was obtained. The timing resolution, measured in coincidence with a BaF2 detector, equals 960 ps FWHM.
Optimum Relay Position for Differential Amplify-and-Forward Cooperative Communications

This paper derives an optimum relay position of amplify-and-forward (AF) cooperative communications with the differential transmission. As a performance benchmark, we utilize the probability of outage, which is defined as a probability that the instantaneous signal-tonoise power ratio (SNR) becomes lower than a certain threshold. The optimum relay position is found based on the theoretical expression of the outage probability, Computer simulations are also conducted to verify the validity of the theoretical analysis.
Novel Fragile Watermarking Scheme using an Artificial Neural Network for Image Authentication

This paper presents a novel fragile watermarking scheme based on an artificial neural network (ANN). The fragile waterma rk is designed according to the characteristics of the origina l image. If the image is modified, the alteration can be detect ed via the fragile watermark without original image. Based on the type of alteration, we can determine what modifications have been perform ed. An artificial neural network is used to analyze the modification s. The experimental results show that the proposed method can detect tampering, locate where the tampering has occurred, and recognize what kind of alteration has occurred. This method has a high success ratio in recognizing the types of modifications and p rovides sufficient evidence. The experimental results demo nstrate that our method is indeed effective.
Enhanced Metastability Characterization Based on AC Analysis

The common way of characterizing the metastability properties of a circuit is by its metastability resolution constant τ and the aperture window. This approach is based on a model that represents the storage cell as a pair of crosscoupled inverters, each of which is, in turn, modeled by a constant-gain amplifier with a first-order low-pass filter at the output. The former reflects the inverter's signal regeneration capability, while the latter approximates its dynamic behavior. In this simple model there is no natural way of expressing, e.g., the load dependence of tau, therefore each change of the element's load capacitance requires a full recalibration. In this paper we propose decomposing the inverter into its constituent transistors and using their small-signal equivalent circuits for modeling. Metastability characterization is now based on a Spice AC analysis which yields a higher-order dynamic model of the circuit. Once the relevant parameters are known for a given element, the load dependence of tau can be expressed analytically, thus elegantly avoiding recalibration. We compare our approach with the extended nose short simulation (ENSS) method from literature and show that the results deviate by no more than 1-2%.
Phylogenetic analysis of the core histones H2A, H2B, H3, and H4.

Despite the ubiquity of histones in eukaryotes and their important role in determining the structure and function of chromatin, no detailed studies of the evolution of the histones have been reported. We have constructed phylogenetic trees for the core histones H2A, H2B, H3, and H4. Histones which form dimers (H2A/H2B and H3/H4) have very similar trees and appear to have co-evolved, with the exception of the divergent sea urchin testis H2Bs, for which no corresponding divergent H2As have been identified. The trees for H2A and H2B also support the theory that animals and fungi have a common ancestor. H3 and H4 are 10-fold less divergent than H2A and H2B. Three evolutionary histories are observed for histone variants. H2A.F/Z-type variants arose once early in evolution, while H2A.X variants arose separately, during the evolution of multicellular animals. H3.3-type variants have arisen in multiple independent events.
Lung Inflammation, Injury, and Proliferative Response after Repetitive Particulate Hexavalent Chromium Exposure

Background Chronic inflammation is implicated in the development of several human cancers, including lung cancer. Certain particulate hexavalent chromium [Cr(VI)] compounds are well-documented human respiratory carcinogens that release genotoxic soluble chromate and are associated with fibrosis, fibrosarcomas, adenocarcinomas, and squamous cell carcinomas of the lung. Despite this, little is known about the pathologic injury and immune responses after repetitive exposure to particulate chromates. Objectives In this study we investigated the lung injury, inflammation, proliferation, and survival signaling responses after repetitive exposure to particulate chromate. Methods BALB/c mice were repetitively treated with particulate basic zinc chromate or saline using an intranasal exposure regimen. We assessed lungs for Cr(VI)-induced changes by bronchoalveolar lavage, histologic examination, and immunohistochemistry. Results Single exposure to Cr(VI) resulted in inflammation of lung tissue that persists for up to 21 days. Repetitive Cr(VI) exposure induced a neutrophilic inflammatory airway response 24 hr after each treatment. Neutrophils were subsequently replaced by increasing numbers of macrophages by 5 days after treatment. Repetitive Cr(VI) exposure induced chronic peribronchial inflammation with alveolar and interstitial pneumonitis dominated by lymphocytes and macrophages. Moreover, chronic toxic mucosal injury was observed and accompanied by increased airway pro-matrix metalloprotease-9. Injury and inflammation correlated with airways becoming immunoreactive for phosphorylation of the survival signaling protein Akt and the proliferation marker Ki-67. We observed a reactive proliferative response in epithelial cells lining airways of chromate-exposed animals. Conclusions These data illustrate that repetitive exposure to particulate chromate induces chronic injury and an inflammatory microenvironment that may promote Cr(VI) carcinogenesis.