Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Whispers and shouts in the pathogenesis of acute renal ischaemia.

More than half a century of investigations on the pathogenesis of acute renal failure (ARF) have brought about two major concepts, which could be roughly dubbed as vasculocentric and tubulocentric. In the 1950s–1970s the focus of these studies was on the haemodynamic component—vasomotor nephropathy due to the no-reflow, tubuloglomerular feedback and vasoconstriction. In parallel with these studies, but more so in the 1980s–1990s there was a shift of the attention toward the tubular component—necrosis and apoptosis of tubular epithelial cells, tubular obstruction and back-leak. The goal of this review is to unveil the intrinsic coupling between the two components and to develop a unifying view, integrating the contribution of each component to the clinical manifestations of this syndrome. In this vein, the incipient phase of ARF will be putatively linked to the endothelial dysfunction (whispers), whereas the overt oliguric phase of ARF will be largely dependent on the tubular damage (shouts). We shall also attempt to demonstrate that by silencing the phase of 'whispers' it may become possible to prevent the 'shouts' phase. Significant tissue injury is caused by oxidative and nitrosative stress It has been demonstrated that ischaemic and endotoxin-induced renal injury are accompanied by nitrotyrosine formation [1,2]. Apart from inhibiting the activity of several highly susceptible enzymes, i.e. prostacyclin synthase [3], prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase [4] and Mn-SOD [5], detection of nitrotyrosine-modified proteins is indicative of the concomitant oxidative and nitrosative stress resulting in peroxynitrite formation [6]. Noiri et al. [7] have found that peroxynitrite scavenger ebselen reduces (i) nitrotyrosine formation, (ii) DNA damage, (iii) lipid peroxidation and (iv) improves the functional outcome of renal ischaemia, thus lending additional support to the notion that oxidative and nitrosative stress occur in acute renal ischaemia in vivo and are mechanistically involved in the ensuing loss of kidney function. Interestingly, inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOs) per se can be responsible for generation of Reactive Oxygen Intermediates (ROI), especially, when l-arginine becomes depleted in macrophages [8]. While tubular epithelial cells per se could be the source of nitrosative and oxidative species, it is likely that the bulk of these precursors of peroxynitrite originate from the infiltrating polymorphonuclear cells and macrophages (Figure 1). Homing of these inflammatory cells in the renal parenchyma requires pre-activation of endothe-lial cells of the local microvasculature. This alone would predict that endothelial activation and expression of addressins should precede any significant tubular injury by the products of oxidative and …
Pattern-based moving object tracking

Monitoring the locations of a large number of objects that travel in a certain space is a popular problem for its importance in various application scenarios. It brings us a challenge of how to efficiently handle large volumes of location updates required to guarantee the error bound among an object's current, actual location and its current location in the tracking system. Current solutions predict the future locations based on the recent movements of the moving object. However, it is reliable to predict the position in near future only and the prediction accuracy is poor in the long term. This paper is aimed at the above weakness by introducing the movement pattern in Euclidean space based on the historical trajectories of moving objects. Dominant path pattern is proposed and employed in the moving object tracking system, which can estimate where an object will go next and how to get there. Specifically, dominant path pattern is discovered and indexed by a novel access method of efficient query processing. In addition, the pattern mining techniques with consideration of the accuracy and coverage in dominant path patterns discovering are presented. The experiments demonstrate the superiority of the proposed method comparing to existing methods by up to 73% (91%) less overall location updates on practical Taxi(Truck) dataset.
Existential Anxiety, Personality Type, and Therapy Preference in Young Adults

The current study examines the relationship between existential anxiety (EA), personality traits, and therapy preference in a sample of young adults. EA is thought to be universal human experience, yet no published research has been conducted on whether certain personality traits predict higher levels of EA. Males and females (N = 69) aged 18 to 25 years completed several self-report measures, including a measure of EA, five-factor personality traits, and therapy preference (insight- vs. action-oriented). Pearson correlation coefficients and linear regression analyses were conducted to determine the relationship among the constructs of interest. Results indicate a significant positive correlation between Neuroticism as measured by the NEO-Five Factor Inventory and EA. The Neuroticism N4 Self-Consciousness subscale showed the strongest association with EA. There was no relationship between therapy preference and EA. The results suggest that individuals with personality types characterized by elevated levels of shyness, guilt, and inferiority may be more likely to experience elevated EA. Experiencing higher levels of EA does not seem to affect therapy preference. These findings have important implications for clinicians treating young adults who present with internalizing symptoms.
The electromagnetic response in a layered vertical transverse isotropic medium: A new look at an old problem

We determined that the electromagnetic vertical transverse isotropic response in a layered earth can be obtained by solving two equivalent scalar equations, which were for the vertical electric field and for the vertical magnetic field, involving only a scalar global reflection coefficient. Besides the complete derivation of the full electromagnetic response, we also developed the corresponding computer code called EMmod, which models the full electromagnetic fields including internal multiples in the frequency-wavenumber domain and obtains the frequency-space domain solutions through a Hankel transformation by computing the Hankel integral using a 61-point Gauss-Kronrod integration routine. The code is able to model the 3D electromagnetic field in a 1D earth for diffusive methods such as controlled source electromagnetics as well as for wave methods such as ground penetrating radar. The user has complete freedom to place the source and the receivers in any layer. The modeling is illustrated with three examples, which aim to present the different capabilities of EMmod, while assessing its correctness.
Transmit-Diversity for Spatial Modulation (SM): Towards the Design of High-Rate Spatially-Modulated Space-Time Block Codes

Spatial Modulation (SM) is a recently proposed low--complexity modulation scheme for multiple-antenna wireless systems. Recent works have shown that state-of-the-art SM provides a multiplexing gain with respect to single-antenna systems by avoiding inter-channel interference, but it is inherently unable to achieve transmit-diversity. The aim of this paper is to shed light on the design of multiple-antenna wireless systems that exploit the SM concept and can achieve transmit-diversity gains. More specifically, we propose a novel modulation concept, which in a unique fashion combines the high multiplexing gain offered by SM and the transmit-diversity gain provided by Space Time Block Codes (STBCs) technology. This modulation scheme is introduced here for the first time and referred to as "Spatially-Modulated STBCs" (SM-STBC). By using analysis and simulation, we show that SM-STBC achieves multiplexing and diversity gains, as well as still retains a single-stream receiver implementation. By using numerical simulations, we show that the proposed code can provide better performance than state-of-the-art Alamouti and rate-3/4 STBCs.
Performance modeling of cloud apps using message queueing as a service (MaaS)

This paper presents an analytical model to study the performance of cloud applications using message queueing as a service (MaaS). MaaS is a cloud service which allows the development departments to focus on delivering business and computing applications without being concerned with the underlying message queueing infrastructure to be scalable, secure, and reliable. Estimating the service delay (prior to provisioning cloud resources) of this type of cloud apps is an important engineering and resource management problem. Such estimation would help in computing the overall network and service delay that users experience. In a way, cloud providers would allocate the appropriate capacity for the needed cloud resources to meet the Service Level Agreement (SLA) parameters. In this paper, we present an analytical model by using Markov chain to study the performance of cloud apps which use MaaS. Given the expected request arrival rate, the queue size, and the expected service rate of each processing stage of the cloud app, our analytical model can estimate the app performance in terms of key SLA parameters which include response time, throughput, and request loss. In addition, our model yields equations for other key performance measures which include system idleness and utilization, queuing delay, and system and queue occupancies. Our analytical model is verified and validated by using discrete-event simulation and experimental measurements taken from an experiment conducted on AWS (Amazon Web Services) cloud.
Multiplexed Supramolecular Self-assembly for Non-viral Gene Delivery

Keywords: Non-viral gene delivery Self-assembly Spermine Oleic acid Oligoarginine Folic acid a b s t r a c t Recently, there has been success in applying a semi-rational approach to non-viral gene delivery vector development using a combinatorial/parallel synthesis approach to construct libraries of materials with unique molecular structures. In this approach, it is hoped that the random incorporation of various hydrophobic and hydrophilic domains in the library will yield candidates with the appropriate balance of DNA binding strength and endosomolytic properties to yield efficient gene delivery. Herein we describe a library approach to gene delivery vector development that relies on the supramolecular self-assembly of individual components instead of chemical reaction. Each component in the described system is capable of performing a single and well-defined purposedDNA binding (dioleylspermine), membrane permeation (oligoarginine) or targeting (folic acid). A combination of electrostatic attraction and the hydrophobic effect is used to bring the individual groups together to form nanoscale complexes with DNA. Because the components responsible for DNA binding, membrane permeation and targeting are separate, it is possible to alter the balance between hydrophilic and hydrophobic groups by varying the relative amounts in the final formulation. By doing so, we can readily identify cell-specific formulations that have greater transfection efficiency than the individual components and have superior transfection efficiency to lipofectamine 2000 under similar conditions. Gene therapy attempts to treat and ultimately cure some of the world's most challenging diseases by addressing the underlying genetic causes. However, nearly 20 years since the technique was first applied in a human clinical trial, its successes have been few [1]. The greatest single factor responsible for the slow progress is the lack of a safe and efficient method to deliver genetic material to patient cells. While viral vectors have been the dominant vehicles for gene delivery because of their in vivo efficiency, clinical events within the last decade have revealed that their safety is questionable [2e4]. More likely, it seems, future gene delivery will utilize synthetic non-viral vectors. While safer than viruses, these non-viral alternatives currently suffer from poor performance. As such, effort has been made to improve non-viral gene delivery efficiency through rational and semi-rational design of vectors capable of overcoming the various extra-and intracellular barriers that inhibit their performance. A variety of materials are being considered for non-viral gene delivery applications. These include a wide range of polyamines and lipids that are able to electrostatically …
An Improved Optimization Strategy and Its Application to Clustering Analysis

In this paper, a new optimization strategy is put forward which locates as many potential unimodal regions as possible in the search space. The potential optima can be further explored by a global optimization method for searching in the identified unimodal regions. The proposed strategy was evaluated by the optimization of test functions. The results obtained by this approach are comparable with those achieved by variable step size generalized simulated annealing (VSGSA) and a genetic algorithm (GA). Finally, we used this strategy in a clustering analysis of a tobacco data set.
Recaption Cost Based LFU Image Cache Algorithm and Application in WAP Browser

This paper presents the idea of recaption cost to characterize WAP sources of images and improve the classic cache removal policy. Then It gets a new policy of image caches, LFU based on recaption cost; using the algorithm in the wap browser, It adopts the strategy of destroying cached images when exiting the browser, in this way, it not only guarantees obtaining newest images when starting browser next time, but also improves the overall performance of the browser.
Design of the Family of Orthogonal and Spectrally Efficient UWB Waveforms

In this paper, a method for the design of nonlinear phase, full-band, ultra-wideband (UWB) pulses that satisfy the Federal Communications Commission's effective isotropic radiation power spectrum mask, or more generally, any other given mask, is introduced. The method uses convex programming in each step of the iterative procedure that updates the phase distribution of the goal function. Thanks to its mathematical structure, this method can be easily modified in order to be applied, in sequential fashion, to several different orthogonal UWB pulse-design problems, addressed later in the paper. The first among them is a problem considered in literature-design of multiple pulses, orthogonal when radiated. When employed for solving this problem, the method proposed here produces a considerably larger number of orthogonal pulses with high energy compared to the methods introduced before. As a novelty, the problem of designing pulses which are orthogonal in reception is considered. Then, a modification of our method is presented that can be used to solve this problem. We also introduce statistical criteria of robustness of pulses' orthogonality in reception, to the variation of the pulses' shape caused by the channel transfer function. After that, a modification of the proposed method is presented that is capable of producing a set of pulses with predefined maximum value of this criteria. Furthermore, it is shown that the method proposed can be used to efficiently design orthogonal pulses using a suboptimal value of the sample rate. All the concepts introduced are illustrated by design examples
Speech production based on the mel-frequency cepstral coefficients

The mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCCs) are frequently used as a speech parameterization in speech recognizers. Practical applications of speech recognition and dialogue systems bring sometimes a requirement to synthesize or reconstruct the speech from the saved or transmitted MFCCs. Presented paper describes an approach to the construction of a MFCC-based speech production system and discusses various possibilities of its excitation.
Towards Integrating Microservices with Adaptable Enterprise Architecture

IT environments that consist of a very large number of rather small structures like microservices, Internet of Things (IoT) components, or mobility systems are emerging to support flexible and agile products and services in the age of digital transformation. Biological metaphors of living and adaptable ecosystems with service-oriented enterprise architectures provide the foundation for self-optimizing, resilient run- time environments and distributed information systems. We are extending Enterprise Architecture (EA) methodologies and models that cover a high degree of heterogeneity and distribution to support the digital transformation and related information systems with micro-granular architectures. Our aim is to support flexibility and agile transformation for both IT and business capabilities within adaptable digital enterprise architectures. The present research paper investigates mechanisms for integrating Microservice Architectures (MSA) by extending original enterprise architecture reference models with elements for more flexible architectural metamodels and EA-mini-descriptions.
The Role of Sleep in the Selective Reconsolidation of Declarative Memories

While sleep has been shown to be involved in memory consolidation and the selective enhancement of newly acquired memories of future relevance (Wilhelm, et al., 2011), limited research has investigated the role of sleep or future relevance in processes of memory reconsolidation. The current research employed a list-method directed forgetting procedure in which participants learned two lists of syllable pairs on Night 1 and received directed forgetting instructions on Night 2. On Night 2, one group (Labile; n = 15) received a memory reactivation treatment consisting of reminders designed to return memories of the learned lists to a labile state. A second group (Stable, n = 16) received similar reminders designed to leave memories of the learned lists in their stable state. No differences in forgetting were found across the two lists or groups. However, a negative correlation between frontal delta (1 – 4 Hz) electroencephalographic (EEG) power during Early Stage 2 non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep and forgetting of to-beremembered material was found exclusively in the Labile group (r = -.61, p < .05). Further, central theta (4 – 8 Hz ) EEG power during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep was found to correlate with directed forgetting exclusively in the Labile group (r = .81, p < .001) and total forgetting in the Stable group (r = .50, p < .05). These observed relationships support the proposed hypothesis suggesting that sleep processes are involved in the reconsolidation of labile memories, and that this reconsolidation may be selective for memories of future relevance. A role for sleep in the beneficial reprocessing of memories through the selective reconsolidation of labile memories in NREM sleep and the weakening of memories in REM sleep is discussed.
The use of in situ volumetric water content at field capacity to improve the prediction of soil water retention properties

Use of in situ volumetric water content at field capacity to improve prediction of soil water retention properties. Most pedotransfer functions (PTFs) developed over the last three decades to generate water retention characteristics use soil texture, bulk density and organic carbon content as predictors. Despite of the high number of PTFs published, most being class- or continuous-PTFs, accuracy of prediction remains limited. In this study, we compared the performance of different class- and continuous-PTFs developed with a regional database. Results showed that use of in situ volumetric water content at field capacity as a predictor led to much better estimation of water retention properties as compared to using predictors derived from the texture, or the organic carbon content and bulk density. This was true regardless of the complexity of the PTFs developed. Results also showed that the best prediction quality was achieved by using the in situ volumetric water content at field capacity after stratification by texture. Comparison of in situ volumetric water content at field capacity, with the water retained at different matric potentials as measured in the laboratory, showed field capacity to approximate 100 hPa whatever the soil texture. Finally, the lack accuracy of PTFs that do not use the in situ volumetric water content at field capacity as predictor did not appear due to the test soils being unrepresentative of the soils used to develop the PTFs, but were instead related to poor correlations between the predictors used and the water retention properties.
Fast method of detecting communities in complex networks

In this paper we introduce a novel method, LCDA, to identify the communities in large complex network based on “local community”. Time complexity of our algorithm is O(n‹k›3 Ln(n) where ‹k› is the mean degree and n is the number of vertices in the network. It is very useful in analyzing very larger complex network. By applying LCDA on Zachary club network we get better structure than classical NG algorithm and higher speed than SA method. Our algorithm exhibits good accurateness by testing much larger complex networks further.
Active process model supported collaboration

We discuss the reuse of process knowledge through conceptualized workflow patterns. Knowledge reuse in the life-cycle of projects has been widely studied, but most known solutions focus on communication issues, isolated from the processes themselves. Due to the huge potential benefits from the immediate reuse of communicated information (e.g. architectural, structural solutions, details, technical specifications, etc.) most of the attention has been given to information retrieval techniques and contextualization of the retrieved information. Actual processes, actors and tools that have led to results of work usually remained unrecorded, since this was considered technically impossible. Indeed, in contrast to intuitive ad-hoc reuse of parts of documents that fit into a given context, ad-hoc reuse of parts of actual processes together with metadescriptors is not so straightforward. In the paper we identify the methods and media in which processes were modeled and executed as the main problem to achieve this goal. Based on analysis of process modeling techniques, we suggest a novel methodological approach and a conceptual solution for a prototype collaboration system supported by active process models. C o n st ru ct io n I n fo rm at ic s D ig it al L ib ra ry h tt p :/ /i tc . s ci x. n et
Planar Translational Cable-Direct-Driven Robots

We present the simulated dynamics and control of a planar, translational cable-directdriven robot (CDDR). The motivation behind this work is to improve the serious cable interference problem with existing CDDRs and to avoid configurations where negative cable tensions are required to exert general forces and moments on the environment and during dynamic motions. Generally for CDDRs the commanded rotations are more demanding than commanded translations in terms of slack cable conditions. Therefore we propose a translational CDDR whose end-effector may be fitted with a traditional serial wrist mechanism to provide rotational freedom (assuming proper design to resist the moments). Only the translational CDDR is considered in this article, including kinematics and statics modeling, statics workspace (wherein all possible Cartesian forces and moments may be exerted with only positive cable tensions), plus a dynamics model and simulated control for planar CDDRs. Here we focus only on planar CDDRs, to clearly demonstrate our dynamics and control work; we will extend this work to spatial CDDRs in the future. Examples are presented to demonstrate simulated control including feedback linearization of the four-cable CDDR (with one degree of actuation redundancy) performing a Cartesian task. An on-line dynamic minimum torque estimation algorithm is introduced to ensure all cable tensions remain positive for all motion; otherwise slack cables can result from CDDR dynamics and control is lost. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.