Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Scalable and coherent video resizing with per-frame optimization

The key to high-quality video resizing is preserving the shape and motion of visually salient objects while remaining temporally-coherent. These spatial and temporal requirements are difficult to reconcile, typically leading existing video retargeting methods to sacrifice one of them and causing distortion or waving artifacts. Recent work enforces temporal coherence of content-aware video warping by solving a global optimization problem over the entire video cube. This significantly improves the results but does not scale well with the resolution and length of the input video and quickly becomes intractable. We propose a new method that solves the scalability problem without compromising the resizing quality. Our method factors the problem into spatial and time/motion components: we first resize each frame independently to preserve the shape of salient regions, and then we optimize their motion using a reduced model for each pathline of the optical flow. This factorization decomposes the optimization of the video cube into sets of sub-problems whose size is proportional to a single frame's resolution and which can be solved in parallel. We also show how to incorporate cropping into our optimization, which is useful for scenes with numerous salient objects where warping alone would degenerate to linear scaling. Our results match the quality of state-of-the-art retargeting methods while dramatically reducing the computation time and memory consumption, making content-aware video resizing scalable and practical.
1 Genetic Variability Interacts with Dietary a-Linolenic Acid Intake to Affect Serum Non-HDL – Cholesterol Concentrations in European Adolescents 1 – 3

Two rate-limiting enzymes in PUFA biosynthesis, D5and D6-desaturases, are encoded by the FADS1 and FADS2 genes, respectively. Genetic variants in the FADS1-FADS2 gene cluster are associated with changes in plasma concentrations of PUFA, HDLand LDL-cholesterol, and TG. However, little is known about whether dietary PUFA intake modulates these associations, especially in adolescents. We assessed whether dietary linoleic acid (LA) or a-linolenic acid (ALA) modulate the association between the FADS1 rs174546 polymorphism and concentrations of PUFA, other lipids, and lipoproteins in adolescents. Dietary intakes of LA and ALA, FADS1 rs174546 genotypes, PUFA levels in serum phospholipids, and serum concentrations of TG, cholesterol, and lipoproteins were determined in 573 European adolescents from the HELENA study. The sample was stratified according to the median dietary LA (#9.4 and.9.4 g/d) and ALA (#1.4 and.1.4 g/d) intakes. The associations between FADS1 rs174546 and concentrations of PUFA, TG, cholesterol, and lipoproteins were not affected by dietary LA intake (all P-interaction. 0.05). Similarly, the association between the FADS1 rs174546 polymorphism and serum phospholipid concentrations of ALA or EPA was not modified by dietary ALA intake (all P-interaction . 0.05). In contrast, the rs174546 minor allele was associated with lower total cholesterol concentrations (P = 0.01 under the dominant model) and non-HDL–cholesterol concentrations (P = 0.02 under the dominant model) in the high-ALA–intake group but not in the lowALA–intake group (P-interaction = 0.01). These results suggest that dietary ALA intake modulates the association between FADS1 rs174546 and serum total and non-HDL–cholesterol concentrations at a young age. J. Nutr. 141: 1247–1253, 2011.
An experimental investigation of news credibility: Newspapers & the Internet

Abstract This study used an experiment to examine differences in credibility assigned to news read in paper form and the same news read on a web site. Subsequent to exposure to six identical news stories, randomly assigned newspaper treatment and Internet treatment groups rated the credibility of the stories they read, using standard credibility measures. Generally, news stories appearing on a web site were evaluated as less credible than their identical counterparts on paper.
External Beam Radiation of Tumors Alters Phenotype of Tumor Cells to Render Them Susceptible to Vaccine-Mediated T-Cell Killing

Local radiation is an established therapy for human tumors. Radiation also has been shown to alter the phenotype of target tissue, including gene products that may make tumor cells more susceptible to T-cell-mediated immune attack. We demonstrate a biological synergy between local radiation of tumor and active vaccine therapy. The model used consisted of mice transgenic for human carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) and a murine carcinoma cell line transfected with CEA. The vaccine regimen consisted of a prime and boost strategy using vaccinia and avipox recombinants expressing CEA and three T-cell costimulatory molecules. One dose of 8-Gy radiation to tumor induced up-regulation of the death receptor Fas in situ for up to 11 days. However, neither radiation at this dose nor vaccine therapy was capable of inhibiting growth of 8-day established tumor. When vaccine therapy and local radiation of tumor were used in combination, dramatic and significant cures were achieved. This was mediated by the engagement of the Fas/Fas ligand pathway because Ag-bearing tumor cells expressing dominant-negative Fas were not susceptible to this combination therapy. Following the combination of vaccine and local radiation, tumors demonstrated a massive infiltration of T cells not seen with either modality alone. Mice cured of tumors demonstrated CD4+ and CD8+ T-cell responses specific for CEA but also revealed the induction of high levels of T-cell responses to two other antigens (gp70 and p53) overexpressed in tumor, indicating the presence of a consequential antigen cascade. Thus, these studies demonstrate a new paradigm for the use of local tumor irradiation in combination with active specific vaccine therapy to elicit durable antitumor responses of established tumors.
Tools for mapping ontologies to relational databases: A comparative evaluation

This paper presents an analysis of the state of the art solutions for mapping a relational database and an ontology by adding reasoning capabilities and offering the possibility to query the inferred information. We analyzed four approaches: Jena with D2RQ, Jena with R2RML, KAON2 and OWL API. In order to highlight the differences between the four approaches, we used a nutrition diagnostics related ontology for the definition of the concepts and of the rules, and a relational database for the storage of the individuals. As performance evaluation, we focused on the time required to map the relational database to the ontology, and the time required to retrieve the information that is inferred about the diagnostics of a number of people. The obtained results show that the best performance in both cases is given by KAON2.
Cooperative Problem-Based Learning (CPBL): A practical PBL model for engineering courses

Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is an inductive learning approach that uses a realistic problem as the starting point of learning. Unlike in medical education, which is more easily adaptable to PBL, implementing PBL in engineering courses in the traditional semester system set-up is challenging. While PBL is normally implemented in small groups of up to ten students with a dedicated tutor during PBL sessions in medical education, this is not plausible in engineering education because of the high enrollment and large class sizes. In a typical engineering course, implementation of PBL consisting of students in small groups in medium to large classes is more practical. However, this type of implementation is more difficult to monitor, and thus requires good support and guidance in ensuring commitment and accountability of each student towards learning in his/her group. To provide the required support, Cooperative Learning (CL) is identified to have the much needed elements to develop the small student groups to functional learning teams. Combining both CL and PBL results in a Cooperative Problem-Based Learning (CPBL) model that provides a step by step guide for students to go through the PBL cycle in their teams, according to CL principles. Suitable for implementation in medium to large classes (approximately 40–60 students for one floating facilitator), with small groups consisting of 3–5 students, the CPBL model is designed to develop the students in the whole class into a learning community. This paper provides a detailed description of the CPBL model. A sample implementation in a third year Chemical Engineering course, Process Control and Dynamics, is also described.
Investigation of functional gene polymorphisms IL-1beta, IL-6, IL-10 and TNF-alpha in individuals with recurrent aphthous stomatitis.

UNLABELLED Recurrent aphthous stomatitis (RAS) is characterized by recurrent episodes of oral ulceration in an otherwise healthy individual. Some reports in the literature indicate that RAS may have immunological, psychological, genetic and microbiological bases. OBJECTIVE The purpose of the present study was to investigate, using binary logistic regression analyses, a possible association between the functional IL-1beta +3954 (C/T), IL-6 -174 (G/C), IL-10 -1082 (G/A) and TNF-alpha -308 (G/A) genetic polymorphism and RAS in a sample of Brazilian patients, using a multivariate statistical analysis. DESIGN Sixty-four consecutive subjects affected by minor and major forms of RAS and 64 healthy volunteers were genotyped. To investigate the association between the single nucleotide polymorphisms and risk of RAS, binary logistic regression models were fitted. The associations were expressed by odd ratios (ORs) and adjusted for age and gender, with the corresponding 95% CIs. P-values less than 0.05 were considered significant. RESULTS A significant increase in the IL-1beta and TNF-alpha heterozygous genotypes were associated with an increased risk of RAS development (OR 2.40 and 3.07, respectively), in the multivariate model. CONCLUSION Our findings demonstrate that polymorphisms of high IL-1beta and TNF-alpha production were associated with an increased risk of RAS development. Our findings also give additional support to a genetic basis for RAS pathogenesis.
Discourse Theory and Practice: A Reader

much more than a collection of key classic articles and papers in the field of discourse analysis. The aim of the book is to introduce students to the major figures in the field, and to some of their writings which, combined with the interspersed editorial commentaries, should allow students to understand the key epistemological and methodological issues of discourse theory and practice. The Reader is organized into four coherent parts, namely: Foundations and Building Blocks; Social Interaction; Minds, Selves and Sense-Making; and Culture and Social Relations. Key readings include works by Stuart Hall, Jonathan Potter, David Silverman, Erving Goffman, Teun van Dijk, Derek Edwards and Michael Billig. Chapters introduce the student to each individual and their reading, contextualizing each in terms of their contribution to the field, theoretical standpoint and individual method of doing discourse analysis. The many didactic elements of the book make it ideal as an introduction to the study of discourse for all students of psychology, sociology, linguistics or cultural studies.
Dielectric-Barrier Discharge Excitated by Repetitive Nanosecond Pulses in Air at Atmospheric Pressure

This paper illustrates images of dielectric-barrier discharge (DBD) excitated by repetitive unipolar nanosecond pulses in atmospheric air. Different images are obtained for three barrier dielectrics and various gap lengths. Discharge images show that the nanosecond-pulse DBD observed with the eye is a diffuse glowlike mode when air gap is 2 mm; clear filamentary discharge is seen with the eye in the case of air gap of 8 mm. The results show that gap length and dielectrics are the important factors influencing the transition from diffusive to filamentary discharges.
Impact of Carbon Nano-Onions on Hydra vulgaris as a Model Organism for Nanoecotoxicology

The toxicological effects of pristine and chemically modified carbon nano-onions (CNOs) on the development of the freshwater polyp Hydra vulgaris were investigated in order to elucidate the ecotoxicological effects of CNOs. Chemical modifications of the CNOs were accomplished by surface functionalization with benzoic acid, pyridine and pyridinium moieties. thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) and Raman spectroscopy confirmed the covalent surface functionalization of CNOs. Hydra specimens were exposed to the carbon nanomaterials by prolonged incubation within their medium. Uptake was monitored by optical microscopy, and the toxicological effects of the CNOs on Hydra behavior, morphology, as well as the long-term effects on the development and reproductive capability were examined. The obtained data revealed the absence of adverse effects of CNOs (in the range 0.05–0.1 mg/L) in vivo at the whole animal level. Together with previously performed in vitro toxicological analyses, our findings indicate the biosafety of CNOs and the feasibility of employing them as materials for biomedical applications.
Aminoglycosides: Another Perspective

Despite the introduction of several new classes of antimicrobial agents, aminoglycosides are still recognized as first-line therapeutic agents in the management of severe gram-negative sepsis. The major obstacle limiting the use of aminoglycoside antibiotics has been, and continues to be, the possibility of drug-induced ototoxicity and nephrotoxicity. This review critically examines the definitions used to establish the diagnosis of aminoglycoside-induced nephrotoxicity and ototoxicity and the clinical significance of these adverse reactions. The review also focuses on the practical and economic issues surrounding therapeutic drug monitoring practices. We conclude that aminoglycoside antibiotics remain an effective and economical form of therapy for severe infections and that if careful criteria are used in the selection of these agents, the benefits of therapy outweigh the risk of toxicity.
"My Student Was Apprehended by Immigration": A Civics Teacher's Breach of Silence in a Mixed- Citizenship Classroom

In this article, Dafney Blanca Dabach investigates how teachers and their students of different citizenship statuses navigate tensions in formal state-sponsored citizenship education. In traditional US high school civics courses, undocumented immigrant youths' liminal status is often invisible and overlooked as undocumented youth are educated alongside their peers who have full citizenship rights. Disjunctures between idealized rights and structural exclusions become barriers to meaningful civic education. Through this qualitative case study, Dabach examines the possibilities of a teacher's brokering role across different forms of knowledge and experience in a classroom that included undocumented immigrants, naturalized immigrants, and US-born students whose parental origins spanned twelve countries across five continents. She asks: How do civics teachers who are aware of their students' varied citizenship statuses discuss political participation in mixed-status classrooms during nationally focused events.
The Combined Action of Duplicated Boron Transporters Is Required for Maize Growth in Boron-Deficient Conditions

The micronutrient boron is essential in maintaining the structure of plant cell walls and is critical for high yields in crop species. Boron can move into plants by diffusion or by active and facilitated transport mechanisms. We recently showed that mutations in the maize boron efflux transporter ROTTEN EAR (RTE) cause severe developmental defects and sterility. RTE is part of a small gene family containing five additional members (RTE2–RTE6) that show tissue-specific expression. The close paralogous gene RTE2 encodes a protein with 95% amino acid identity with RTE and is similarly expressed in shoot and root cells surrounding the vasculature. Despite sharing a similar function with RTE, mutations in the RTE2 gene do not cause growth defects in the shoot, even in boron-deficient conditions. However, rte2 mutants strongly enhance the rte phenotype in soils with low boron content, producing shorter plants that fail to form all reproductive structures. The joint action of RTE and RTE2 is also required in root development. These defects can be fully complemented by supplying boric acid, suggesting that diffusion or additional transport mechanisms overcome active boron transport deficiencies in the presence of an excess of boron. Overall, these results suggest that RTE2 and RTE function are essential for maize shoot and root growth in boron-deficient conditions.
Real-time tele-operation and tele-walking of humanoid Robot Nao using Kinect Depth Camera

Humanoid robots are not easy to program, it's a challenging task, even if they come with an advanced high level programming interfaces, such as drag-and-drop applications, which are indeed less complex and save a lot of time, it still needs an experienced user to produce a high quality motion, especially for the natural human-like motions which are very hard to reproduce. This paper introduces a new technique to fully imitate the human body motion on a humanoid robot NAO in real time using the Kinect Depth Camera, OpenNI Framework and the Robot Operating System (ROS).
Primary immunodeficiencies suggest redundancy within the human immune system

The frequency of innate immune mutations in primary immunodeficiencies suggests redundancy in infection response. Pathogen-driven evolution has shaped the complexity of the human immune system. Our genome contains at least 1854 gene products involved in immune responses. However, the redundancy and robustness of the immune system need further characterization. One way to examine this redundancy is through the study of monogenic primary immunodeficiencies (PIDs) associated with infections. Causal mutations affecting innate immunity genes are, in relative terms, close to seven times less frequent than those affecting adaptive immunity genes in PIDs. Loss-of-function mutations of innate immunity genes encoding pattern-recognition receptors (PRRs) and associated pathways rarely cause susceptibility to infections, which suggests that PRR pathways are partially redundant in the immune responses to infection. This dispensability has also been observed for constitutive products of the immune system, such as secretory immunoglobulin A, and for innate immune cells, such as natural killer and innate lymphoid cell subsets, which are not essential for viability. This Review discusses these findings in the context of their implications for the identification of previously unknown classes of PIDs and assessment of the susceptibility to infection associated with various targeted immunotherapies.
Frame-Based Calculus of Solving Arithmetic Multi-Step Addition and Subtraction Word Problems

Computer-assisted instruction systems have been broadly applied to help students solving math word problems. However, these systems offer little help to students encountering multi-step arithmetic word problems that do not be stored in the predesigned database. MSWPAS is a computer simulation system of people’s arithmetic multi-step addition and subtraction word problems behavior, which composed of MSWPAS-NP and MSWPAS-CP. In MSMPAS-NP, the natural language of word problems are processed and reflected into frames, and in MSMPAS-CP, calculus is performed based on those frames. This paper focuses on MSMPAS-CP. Psychological theoretical foundation and knowledge representation of MSMPAS-CP are presented at first. A method of frame-based calculus for solving multi-step addition and subtraction word problems is proposed, and then the architecture of system and how it works are discussed. Finally, an experiment is carried out, which shows that the method of frame-based calculus can effectively solve multi-step word problems.
NOHIS-Tree: High-Dimensional Index Structure for Similarity Search

In Content-Based Image Retrieval systems it is important to use an efficient indexing technique in order to perform and accelerate the search in huge databases. The used indexing technique should also support the high dimensions of image features. In this paper we present the hierarchical index NOHIS-tree (Non Overlapping Hierarchical Index Structure) when we scale up to very large databases. We also present a study of the influence of clustering on search time. The performance test results show that NOHIS-tree performs better than SR-tree. Tests also show that NOHIS-tree keeps its performances in high dimensional spaces. We include the performance test that try to determine the number of clusters in NOHIS-tree to have the best search time. Keywords—High-dimensional indexing, k-nearest neighbors search.
Whole-brain N-acetylaspartate level and cognitive performance in HIV infection.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE In the brain of HIV-infected patients, proton MR spectroscopic studies are typically used to examine small volumes of tissue with single-voxel methods. Since brain disease is diffuse in patients with HIV, such studies preclude assessment of the true extent of the metabolic burden. To assess this extent, the relationship between global neuronal integrity, reflected by the whole-brain N-acetylaspartate (WBNAA) concentration, was correlated with neuropsychological function and the AIDS dementia complex (ADC) stage score. METHODS WBNAA levels were compared between 15 HIV-infected patients (seven symptomatic, eight asymptomatic) and 13 age- and sex-matched healthy subjects. The patients' WBNAA level was correlated with cognitive performance, as measured with a battery of eight tests (NPZ-8), including the ADC stage score and four total-memory, mood, motor, and processing speed subtests. RESULTS WBNAA levels were significantly different between patients and healthy subjects (mean +/- sigma, 11.82 +/- 1.40 and 12.91 +/- 1.03 mmol/L, respectively; P =.032) after we adjusted for age and sex effects. Intermediate negative correlations were found between the WBNAA level, the processing speed subtest score (r = -0.50, P =.03), and the ADC stage score (r = -0.44, P =.05). CONCLUSION The WBNAA concentration complements brain atrophy data with information about the quality of the remaining neuronal and axonal tissue in patients with HIV infection. In HIV-infected patients, its correlation with processing speed and the ADC score indicates that the latter reflects pathologic deficits, which are extensive throughout the brain.
Dynamical screening of an atom confined within a finite-width fullerene

This is an investigation on the dynamical screening of an atom confined within a fullerene of finite width. The two surfaces of the fullerene lead to the presence of two surface plasmon eigenmodes. It is shown that, in the vicinity of these two frequencies, there is a large enhancement of the confined atom's photoabsorption rate.