Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
On-line empirical mode decomposition biomedical microprocessor for Hilbert Huang transform

On-chip implementation of Hilbert-Huang transform (HHT) has great impact to analyze the non-linear and non-stationary biomedical signals on wearable or implantable sensors for the real-time applications. Empirical mode decomposition (EMD) is the key component for the HHT processor. In tradition, EMD is usually performed after the collection of a large window of signals, and the long latency may not be feasible for the real-time applications. In this work, the architecture of on-line EMD for biomedical signals is proposed. The on-line interpolation method with data reuse as well as component and iteration loop decomposition is applied to obtain low latency and low hardware cost. The first chip of EMD processor is fabricated in UMC 90nm LL process and consumes 57. 3µW.
Phototropins do not alter accumulation of evening-phased circadian transcripts under blue light

ABSTRACT The circadian system induces rhythmic variation in a suite of biochemical and physiological processes that serve to optimise plant growth in diel cycles. To be of greatest utility, these rhythmic behaviors are coordinated with regular environmental changes such as the rising and setting of the sun. Photoreceptors, along with metabolites produced during photosynthesis, act to synchronise the internal timing mechanism with lighting cues. We have recently shown that phototropins help maintain robust rhythms of photosynthetic operating efficiency (ϕPSII or Fq′/Fm′) under blue light, although rhythmic accumulation of morning-phased circadian transcripts in the nucleus was unaffected. Here we report that evening-phased nuclear clock transcripts were also unaffected. We also observe that rhythms of nuclear clock transcript accumulation are maintained in phototropin mutant plants under a fluctuating lighting regime that induced a loss of Fq′/Fm′ rhythms.
Validation of Blood Collection Procedures for the Determination of Circulating Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor (VEGF) in Different Blood Compartments

Aims of the study. Studies on circulating VEGF have reported mixed results, possibly due to a lack of standardization of the pre-analytical phase. The aim of our investigation was to standardize the sampling procedure for the determination of VEGF in different blood fractions. Basic procedures. We evaluated various clotting times for obtaining serum in 30 subjects, as well as different procedures for the preparation of plasma Edinburgh anticoagulant mixture (EDTA, PGE1, theophylline) and CTAD. VEGF was also assayed in lysed whole blood. In vitro platelet activation was monitored by measuring the levels of PF4. VEGF and PF4 were measured using commercially available enzyme-linked immunoassays. Main findings. Clotting time increased the release of VEGF, which reached a plateau between 2 and 4 hours. The percent increase of VEGF at 2 hours ranged from 118% to 4515% (median 327%) compared to samples centrifuged within 10 min from withdrawal. VEGF was not different and PF4 was very low or undetectable in Edinburgh plasma and CTAD plasma, while it was significantly higher in sodium citrate plasma. VEGF in CTAD plasma was not correlated with platelet count or leukocytes. Serum VEGF did not correlate with the leukocyte number, but it correlated significantly with the platelet count. Principal conclusions. The procedures for sample collection described above are highly standardized and easy to perform in a routine setting. We therefore suggest systematic evaluation of VEGF in CTAD plasma, in serum (clotting for 2 hours at room temperature) and in whole blood, until prospective controlled clinical studies will have clarified in which blood compartment(s) VEGF provides clinically relevant information.
Parental stress, family functioning and children’s psychological adjustment in adoptive families: A comparative and longitudinal study

This work focuses on parental stress in adoptive families with regard to certain key components of family functioning (the family cohesion and adaptability and the parental reflective functioning) as well as in its connection with adopted children’s adjustment. The sample included 98 Spanish parents and children: a group of 40 internationally adoptive families and another group of 58 non-adoptive families, who served as a control group. The longitudinal and comparative analysis showed no significant differences between adoptive and non-adoptive families’ stress scores, but a different incidence of higher stress levels (more non-adoptive families scored above the 75% cut-off). Parental stress scores were related to family adaptability, parental reflective functioning and children’s psychological adjustment. The regression model showed that the best parental stress predictor, for adoptive families, was children’s hyperactivity problems, also linked to family adaptability.
Visualization and Measurement of the Cortical Surface

Abstract Much of the human cortical surface is obscured from view by the complex pattern of folds, making the spatial relationship between different surface locations hard to interpret. Methods for viewing large portions of the brain's surface in a single flattened representation are described. The flattened representation preserves several key spatial relationships between regions on the cortical surface. The principles used in the implementations and evaluations of these implementations using artificial test surfaces are provided. Results of applying the methods to structural magnetic resonance measurements of the human brain are also shown. The implementation details are available in the source code, which is freely available on the Internet.
Low-dose cardiac 4D cone-beam CT image reconstruction using two-cycle data

This study was conducted to demonstrate the feasibility of a new scanning method and image reconstruction for low-dose cardiac CT. We proposed a scanning method that acquires cardiac cone-beam data during two-cycles of cardiac motion. Assuming that the cardiac motion for the two cycles stays stable, we adjust the gantry rotation speed such that the cone-beam data of a given phase are sampled at orthogonal view-angles. In order to keep the dose level lower to the conventional scans, we employed an x-ray tube current modulation in this approach. Prior image constrained compressed sensing (PICCS) algorithm was used for image reconstruction. We performed a numerical study, and evaluated the result images quantitatively. The proposed method improved the accuracy of the image reconstruction for each cardiac phase.
Possible Mechanism of the Vasodepressor Effect of Endokinin A/B in Anesthetized Rats

We investigated the mechanism of the vasodepressor effect of endokinin A/B. An intravenous (IV) bolus of endokinin A/B (0.05-0.3 nmol/kg) dose-dependently decreased mean arterial pressure in thiobutabarbital-anesthetized rats. The magnitude of the response was unaffected by IV pretreatment with NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME, inhibitor of nitric oxide synthase), methylene blue (inhibitor of soluble guanylyl cyclase), indomethacin (cyclooxygenase inhibitor), or tetraethylammonium (TEA, nonspecific K+ channel blocker). L-NAME reduced the half-recovery time of the vasodepressor effect of endokinin A/B relative to responses in rats pretreated with either saline or norepinephrine, which caused a similar pressor effect as did L-NAME. Methylene blue, but not TEA or indomethacin, reduced the recovery time of the vasodepressor effect of endokinin A/B. Therefore, the vasodepressor effect of endokinin A/B is mediated via the nitric oxide/L-arginine pathway and activation of soluble guanylyl cyclase but not by production of prostanoids or opening of TEA-sensitive K+ channels.
Learning styles: Learning that empowers students?

Despite much disagreement, educators and psychologists agree that different students learn differently. Learning differences come under many labels, such as ‘learning styles’, ‘thinking styles’, ‘personality types’ or ‘multiple intelligences’. This paper supports the use of learning style models as a theoretical framework for quality educational development in the Arab Gulf Countries. It will (a) briefly explore various learning styles models, with primary focus on the Dunn & Dunn model and its assessment instruments; (b) review key research conducted internationally, as well as locally at Zayed University; (c) examine the benefits of using multimodal and multisensory instructional packages in various disciplines; (d) consider divergent ideas and thoughts on the value of introducing learning style based education.
An fMRI-Constrained MEG Source Analysis with Procedures for Dividing and Grouping Activation

To analyze neural activity using magnetoencephalography (MEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we developed a method for fixing equivalent current dipoles of MEG in activation areas of fMRI. It includes a procedure for dividing large fMRI activation volumes into subvolumes in each of which a dipole is placed and another procedure for grouping neighboring dipoles whose temporal changes are inseparable based on MEG data. To optimize the procedures' parameters, we carried out simulations and found that (1) any single dipole within 10 mm from a true source can explain MEG data with a correlation of 94% on average for the low signal-to-noise ratio of 3 and (2) a neighboring dipole within a few tens of millimeters from the dipole nearest to the true source tends to be highly incorporated in explaining MEG data. We applied the method to data measured in a language experiment and detected 13 significant sources. The results show that the present method is promising for detecting neural activity originating from a number of separate neural sources.
Machismo in Media Research: A critical Review of Research on Violence and Pornography

Two areas of media research, pornography and violence, are examined with a view to accounting for their discrepant findings, i.e. the effects of pornography are innocuous while those of violence are serious and warrant censorship. Both sets of research are characterized by sexist biases in the way problems are conceptualized and in their research designs. Drawing on a related field, studies of humour, I suggest that reference group theory could eliminate the bias. With respect to current state of knowledge, I treat the contradiction itself as a social fact. The underlying logic of the contradiction, it is suggested, is a machismo orientation defined here as narcissistic pride in sexual virility (pornography) the other side of which is anxiety about male sexual identity (male against male aggression films). Further research on machismo is proposed, similar to F scale research which also looked for unifying dimensions behind apparent contradictions.
The Power of Place

This chapter describes the origins of the Society of United Irishmen. This organization was inspired by republicanism. To many observers, creating a republic in Ireland presented an opportunity to create a nation in a unified sense, overcoming through shared commitment to republican ideas of equality the divisions that were responsible for the political corruption and economic backwardness of the country. This was what had happened in France, where a diverse and divided nation was becoming a unified, and singularly powerful, republican patrie. Indeed, the links between the United Irishmen and French republicans were especially strong from 1792, with many prominent figures in the movement spending time in Paris.
The TIL/ML Compiler: Performance and Safety through Types

Systems code requires both high performance and reliability. Usually, these two goals are at odds with each other. For example, to prevent kernel data structures from being over-written or read, either accidentally or maliciously, conventional systems use hardware-enforced protection or software fault isolation (SFI) [18]. Unfortunately, both of these techniques exact a cost at run time: Hardware protection requires expensive context switches and data copying to communicate with the kernel or other processes, whereas SFI requires run-time checks for loads, stores and jumps. Furthermore, these protection mechanisms only guarantee \read/write" safety and are often too weak to guarantee the integrity of a system. For instance, systems code must still verify at run time that a capability (i.e., a le descriptor, port, message queue, etc.) is valid when using SFI or hardware protection. In contrast, systems designed around strong, statically-typed languages such as Modula-3 and Standard ML (SML), provide abstraction mechanisms, including objects, abstract datatypes, polymorphism, and automatic memory management, that enforce read/write safety as well as capabilities at compile-time. For instance, we can de ne an abstract type message queue with appropriate operations using the abstype mechanism of SML. The type system of SML prevents programmers from forging message queue values either accidentally or intentionally. As a result, we need not check at run time whether or not a message queue argument is valid. Thus, in principle, using static type checking should provide superior performance to either hardware protection or SFI, simply because checks are performed at compile or link time instead of run time. Unfortunately, two impediments have kept the \programming language" approach to systems software from becoming a reality. The rst problem is that implementations of languages such as Modula-3 and SML restrict representations of values to support features like polymorphism and garbage collection. In particular, implementations tag values to support garbage collection and run-time type dispatch (e.g., Modula-3's typecase or SML's polymorphic equality), and box objects (i.e., force them into a machine word) to support polymorphism and abstract data types. Systems code requires direct access to underlying hardware or subsystem data structures, and thus cannot a ord to tag or box objects. For instance, it is often necessary to read/write speci c 32-bit (or 64-bit) integer values into device registers, frame bu ers, DMA regions, or page tables. As a result, implementations that tag integers by stealing a bit cannot directly access such devices. Without direct access to the hardware or data structures, the performance bene ts of static type checking become irrelevant.
Classification of Prostate Histopathology Images Based on Multifractal Analysis

SUMMARY Histopathology is a microscopic anatomical study of body tissues and widely used as a cancer diagnosing method. Generally, pathologists examine the structural deviation of cellular and sub-cellular components to diagnose the malignancy of body tissues. These judgments may often subjective to pathologists’ skills and personal experiences. However, computational diagnosis tools may circumvent these limitations and improve the reliability of the diagnosis decisions. This paper proposes a prostate image classiﬁcation method by extracting textural behavior using multifractal analysis. Fractal geometry is used to describe the complexity of self-similar structures as a non-integer exponent called fractal dimen-sion. Natural complex structures (or images) are not self-similar, thus a single exponent (the fractal dimension) may not be adequate to describe the complexity of such structures. Multifractal analysis technique has been introduced to describe the complexity as a spectrum of fractal dimensions. Based on multifractal computation of digital imaging, we obtain two textural feature descriptors; i) local irregularity: α and ii) global regularity: f ( α ). We exploit these multifractal feature descriptors with a texton dictionary based classiﬁcation model to discriminate cancer / non-cancer tissues of histopathology images of H&E stained prostate biopsy specimens. Moreover, we examine other three feature descriptors; Gabor ﬁlter bank, LM ﬁlter bank and Haralick features to benchmark the performance of the proposed method. Experiment results indicated that the performance of the proposed multifractal feature descriptor outperforms the other feature descriptors by achieving over 94% of correct classiﬁcation
Objective and subjective relations in data visualization: examples from molecular biological data collections

Natural science is where the objective and the subjective meet. When we build data collections, we want them to reflect the objective relations inherent in nature, but also classify these collections, adding subjective relations between data objects. Sometimes these two approaches conflict. We present two examples of blending objective and subjective relations in a single data collection, and discuss some possible generalizations. First example deals with the visualization of metabolic networks in three dimensions. We show that the network topology has a substantial subjective component in this case and discuss possible ways to minimize human inference. In the second example we present a collection of metabolic networks as a (subjective) hierarchical structure with (objective) binary relations between objects, and show how the data visualization may be made more logical via the procedure of "hierarchization of relations".
Scenery Character Detection with Environmental Context

For scenery character detection, we introduce environmental context, which is modeled by scene components, such as sky and building. Environmental context is expected to regulate the probability of character existence at a specific region in a scenery image. For example, if a region looks like a part of a building, the region has a higher probability than another region like a part of the sky. In this paper, environmental context is represented by state-of-the-art texture and color features and utilized in two different ways. Through experimental results, it was clearly shown that the environmental context has an effect of improving detection accuracy.
Changes in the fish species composition of all

The fish communities of all Austrian natural lakes (n 1⁄4 43) larger than 50 ha in surface area were assessed and the historical fish communities in c. 1850 were reconstructed. During the last 150 years, the fish communities of Austrian lakes have altered: in 49% of lakes at least one indigenous fish species, usually sensitive or small-bodied taxa, is now missing. Conversely, in all but one of the 43 lakes the number of fish species has increased. In particular, certain fish species of interest to angling and commercial fisheries now occur in more lakes. Generalised linear models were used to identify variables that would explain the loss of fish species using categories of lake use (ranking score). The category human population density around the lakes seemed to be one of the main causes for the loss of fish species.
Microsatellite loci over a thirty-three year period for a malaria parasite (Plasmodium mexicanum): bottleneck in effective population size and effect on allele frequencies

SUMMARY Changes in population allele frequencies may be driven by several forces, including selection and drift, and are revealed only by sampling over many generations. Such studies, however, are rare for protist parasites. Microsatellite allele frequencies for 4 loci were followed in a population of Plasmodium mexicanum, a malaria parasite of lizards in California USA at 1 site from 1978 to 2010. Rapid turnover of the lizards indicates the parasite was studied for a minimum of 33 transmission cycles and possibly twice that number. Sample sizes ranged from 841 to 956 scored parasite clones per locus. DNA was extracted from frozen dried blood and blood removed from stained blood smears from the earliest years, and a verification study demonstrated DNA from the blood smears provided valid genetic data. Parasite prevalence and effective population size (Ne) dropped after 2000, remaining lower for the next decade. For 2 loci, allele frequencies appeared stable for the first 2 decades of the study, but changed more rapidly after the decline in prevalence. Allele frequencies changed more gradually for the other 2 loci. Genetic drift could account for changes in allele frequencies, especially after the drop in prevalence and Ne, but the force of selection could also have driven the observed patterns.
Localized Induction of the ATP-Binding Cassette B19 Auxin Transporter Enhances Adventitious Root Formation in Arabidopsis1[C][W][OA]

Localized synthesis of an auxin transport enhances local IAA accumulation in excised Arabidopsis hypocotyls and drives the formation of adventitious roots. Adventitious roots emerge from aerial plant tissues, and the induction of these roots is essential for clonal propagation of agriculturally important plant species. This process has received extensive study in horticultural species but much less focus in genetically tractable model species. We have explored the role of auxin transport in this process in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) seedlings in which adventitious root initiation was induced by excising roots from low-light-grown hypocotyls. Inhibition of auxin transport from the shoot apex abolishes adventitious root formation under these conditions. Root excision was accompanied by a rapid increase in radioactive indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) transport and its accumulation in the hypocotyl above the point of excision where adventitious roots emerge. Local increases in auxin-responsive gene expression were also observed above the site of excision using three auxin-responsive reporters. These changes in auxin accumulation preceded cell division events, monitored by a cyclin B1 reporter (pCYCB1;1:GUS), and adventitious root initiation. We examined excision-induced adventitious root formation in auxin influx and efflux mutants, including auxin insensitive1, pin-formed1 (pin1), pin2, pin3, and pin7, with the most profound reductions observed in ATP-binding cassette B19 (ABCB19). An ABCB19 overexpression line forms more adventitious roots than the wild type in intact seedlings. Examination of transcriptional and translational fusions between ABCB19 and green fluorescent protein indicates that excision locally induced the accumulation of ABCB19 transcript and protein that is temporally and spatially linked to local IAA accumulation leading to adventitious root formation. These experiments are consistent with localized synthesis of ABCB19 protein after hypocotyl excision leads to enhanced IAA transport and local IAA accumulation driving adventitious root formation.