Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Arresten, a Collagen-Derived Angiogenesis Inhibitor, Suppresses Invasion of Squamous Cell Carcinoma

The turnover of extracellular matrix liberates various cryptic molecules with novel biological activity. Among these are the collagen-derived anti-angiogenic fragments, some of which are suggested to affect carcinoma cells also directly. Arresten is an endogenous angiogenesis inhibitor that is derived from the non-collagenous domain of the basement membrane collagen IV α1 chain. As the mere prevention of tumor angiogenesis leads to hypoxia that can result in selection of more aggressive cell types and reduces the efficacy of chemotherapy, we aimed here to elucidate how arresten influences the aggressive human carcinoma cells. Arresten efficiently inhibited migration and invasion of HSC-3 tongue carcinoma cells in culture and in an organotypic model. Subcutaneous Arr-HSC xenografts grew markedly more slowly in nude mice and showed reduced tumor cell proliferation, vessel density and local invasiveness. In the organotypic assay, HSC-3 cells overproducing arresten (Arr-HSC) showed induction of cell death. In monolayer culture the Arr-HSC cells grew in aggregated cobblestone-like clusters and, relative to the control cells, showed increased expression and localization of epithelial marker E-cadherin in cell-cell contacts. Application of electric cell-substrate impedance sensing (ECIS) further supported our observations on altered morphology and motility of the Arr-HSC cells. Administration of a function-blocking α1 integrin antibody abolished the impedance difference between the Arr-HSC and control cells suggesting that the effect of arresten on promotion of HSC-3 cell-cell contacts and cell spreading is at least partly mediated by α1β1 integrin. Collectively, our data suggest novel roles for arresten in the regulation of oral squamous carcinoma cell proliferation, survival, motility and invasion through the modulation of cell differentiation state and integrin signaling.
Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI) sequence conservation and variation patterns in the yellowfin and longtail tunas

Tunas are commercially important fishery worldwide. There are at least 13 species of tuna belonging to three genera, out of which genus Thunnus has maximum eight species. On the basis of their availability, they can be characterised as oceanic such as Thunnus albacares (yellowfin tuna) or coastal such as Thunnus tonggol (longtail tuna). Although these two are different species, morphological differentiation can only be seen in mature individuals, hence misidentification may result in erroneous data set, which ultimately affect conservation strategies. The mitochondrial DNA cytochrome oxidase c subunit 1 (COI) gene is one of the most popular markers for population genetic and phylogeographic studies across the animal kingdom. The present study aims to study the sequence conservation and variation in mitochondrial Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI) between these two species of tuna. COI sequence analysis of yellowfin and longtail revealed the close relationship between them in Thunnus genera. The present study is the first direct comparison of mitochondrial COI sequences of these two tuna species.
QSGD: Randomized Quantization for Communication-Optimal Stochastic Gradient Descent

Parallel implementations of stochastic gradient descent (SGD) have received significant research attention, thanks to excellent scalability properties of this algorithm, and to its efficiency in the context of training deep neural networks. A fundamental barrier for parallelizing large-scale SGD is the fact that the cost of communicating the gradient updates between nodes can be very large. Consequently, lossy compresion heuristics have been proposed, by which nodes only communicate quantized gradients. Although effective in practice, these heuristics do not always provably converge, and it is not clear whether they are optimal. In this paper, we propose Quantized SGD (QSGD), a family of compression schemes which allow the compression of gradient updates at each node, while guaranteeing convergence under standard assumptions. QSGD allows the user to trade off compression and convergence time: it can communicate a sublinear number of bits per iteration in the model dimension, and can achieve asymptotically optimal communication cost. We complement our theoretical results with empirical data, showing that QSGD can significantly reduce communication cost, while being competitive with standard uncompressed techniques on a variety of real tasks.
Forecasting volunteer grid workload using Holt-Winters' method

Resource management can be improved by study and analysis of workloads; which will further help to predict the future workloads. In volunteer grid resources and workload submitted are unpredictable which makes resource management more challenging. In the paper, an attempt has been made to analyze trend and seasonality of volunteer grid workload using Holt-Winters' method. The forecast of workload that can be submitted to volunteer grid has been performed by varying seasonality and observed its impact on forecast values. The results indicated that the workload forecast can be improved by varying the smoothing parameters (α, β and γ) depending on the original dataset available and variant of Holt-Winters' method used.
On the Origin of Large Flexibility of P-glycoprotein in the Inward-facing State*

Background: P-glycoprotein relies on largely unknown structural changes for its transport function. Results: EPR spectroscopy and simulations capture large-amplitude structural fluctuations for inward-facing P-glycoprotein. Conclusion: The characterized distinct dynamics of P-glycoprotein suggests mechanistic diversity of ATP-coupled transport in ABC transporters. Significance: Characterizing structural dynamics is a key step toward understanding the mechanism of this multidrug resistance transporter. P-glycoprotein (Pgp) is one of the most biomedically relevant transporters in the ATP binding cassette (ABC) superfamily due to its involvement in developing multidrug resistance in cancer cells. Employing molecular dynamics simulations and double electron-electron resonance spectroscopy, we have investigated the structural dynamics of membrane-bound Pgp in the inward-facing state and found that Pgp adopts an unexpectedly wide range of conformations, highlighted by the degree of separation between the two nucleotide-binding domains (NBDs). The distance between the two NBDs in the equilibrium simulations covers a range of at least 20 Å, including, both, more open and more closed NBD configurations than the crystal structure. The double electron-electron resonance measurements on spin-labeled Pgp mutants also show wide distributions covering both longer and shorter distances than those observed in the crystal structure. Based on structural and sequence analyses, we propose that the transmembrane domains of Pgp might be more flexible than other structurally known ABC exporters. The structural flexibility of Pgp demonstrated here is not only in close agreement with, but also helps rationalize, the reported high NBD fluctuations in several ABC exporters and possibly represents a fundamental difference in the transport mechanism between ABC exporters and ABC importers. In addition, during the simulations we have captured partial entrance of a lipid molecule from the bilayer into the lumen of Pgp, reaching the putative drug binding site. The location of the protruding lipid suggests a putative pathway for direct drug recruitment from the membrane.
Delay-aware fountain codes for video streaming with optimal sampling strategy

The explosive demand for online video from smart mobile devices poses unprecedented challenges to delivering high quality of experience (QoE) over wireless networks. Streaming highdefinition video with low delay is difficult mainly due to the stochastic nature of wireless channels and the fluctuating videos bit rate. To address this, we propose a novel delay-aware fountain coding (DAF) technique that integrates channel coding and video coding. In this paper, we reveal that the fluctuation of video bit rate can also be exploited to further improve fountain codes for wireless video streaming. Specifically, we develop two coding techniques: the time-based sliding window and the optimal window-wise sampling strategy. By adaptively selecting the window length and optimally adjusting the sampling pattern according to the ongoing video bit rate, the proposed schemes deliver significantly higher video quality than existing schemes, with low delay and constant data rate. To validate our design, we implement the protocols of DAF, DAF-L (a low-complexity version) and the existing delay-aware video streaming schemes by streaming H.264/AVC and high efficiency video coding (HEVC) standard videos over an 802.11b network on CORE emulation platform. The results show that the decoding ratio of our scheme is 15% to 100% higher than the state of the art techniques.
An Evaluation of and Pa^ai^^abour Market Policy Passive Labour Market Policy Arbeitsmarktpolitik Labour Market Policy Und Beschsftigung and Employment

This paper reports results of an empirical study on the effectiveness of labour market policy. Sweden and the United States are used to apply a simultaneous equation model with wages and employment being the endogenous variables. In order to explain employment, the amount of unemployment benefits per unemployed (passive labour market policy) and payment for wage subsidies and training per employed and unemployed person (active labour market policy) are used in addition to real wages and output. Wages and output have their expected impact on total employment. It turns out that passive labour market policy has a negative and active labour market measures a positive effect on the number of persons employed. Hinblick auf das Beschaftigungsniveau ausuben.
Optimization of Prime Modules Multiplicative Linear Congruential Generators for Genetic Algorithms

To improve the efficiency of Genetic Algorithms (GAs), huge modulus is usually applied to achieve good figure of merit of Prime Modules Multiplicative Linear Congruential Generator (PMMLCGs). As a result, the intermediate computing results likely integer overflows without special attention and the generating speed needs to be improved. It proposes the optimization methods for direct jump ahead in the random sequence, analyzes the impact of the two main influencing factors, that is, algorithms and the type of implementation, on the efficiency of typical PMMLCGs, both individual and combined. From numerical experiment results, it concludes that modulo decomposition method outperforms functionalities provided by CRT library, that contrary to usual expectations, bitwise shift method ranks last in terms of CPU times consumed, that whether floating-point arithmetic show the superiority over integer arithmetic depends on the complexity of PMMLCGs, and that the type of PMMLCGs coefficients has little negligible effects on PMMLCGs. Research results lay a solid foundation for the implementation of parallel GAs, and help to improve the efficiency of GAs.
Is It Possible to Automatically Identify Who Has Forged My Signature? Approaching to the Identification of a Static Signature Forger

The automatic handwritten signature verification is an open problem for the scientific community. The most of the published studies examine a generic document trying to locate where the signature has been written, to segment the signature removing complex backgrounds containing lines and letter and to determining whether the signature was made by the owner. However, there are no studies to determine automatically the author of a fake. This paper presents a first approach to the identification of a static signature forger. The underlying hypothesis is the fact that a forger finds difficult to fight against their own free natural way of writing, leading to the second hypothesis that under several conditions it is possible to isolate these features to determine a fake within a population of known forgers. The experiments shown that gray level based features are a good start point to detect who has written the signatures.
Inertial and magnetic sensing of human movement near ferromagnetic materials

This paper describes a Kalman filter design to estimate orientation of human body segments by fusing gyroscope, accelerometer and magnetometer signals. Ferromagnetic materials near the sensor disturb the local magnetic field and therefore the orientation estimation. The magnetic disturbance can be detected by looking at the total magnetic density and a magnetic disturbance vector can be calculated. Results show the capability of this filter to correct for magnetic disturbances.
Enhancing the Object Constraint Language for more expressive specifications

The Object Constraint Language (OCL) is a precise language which could be used for describing constraints on object-oriented models and other modelling artifacts. The kind of constraints which can be described using OCL include invariants on classes, types and interfaces, preconditions and postconditions of operations and methods. This paper describes some enhancements to OCL that make specifications convey information more effectively. For example, adding redundant invariants, time-based constraints, postconditions, and examples could make the specification clearer to readers, and can be used in showing that the specification says what is intended. Another example of an enhancement is the use of case analysis sugar which splits up a specification into manageable parts. These enhancements have been already integrated in some specification languages such as Larch/C++, a larch style behavioral interface specification language for C++.
Halo: a Technique for Visualizing Off-Screen Locations

As users pan and zoom, display content can disappear into off-screen space, particularly on small-screen devices. The clipping of locations, such as relevant places on a map, can make spatial cognition tasks harder. Halo is a visualization technique that supports spatial cognition by showing users the location of off-screen objects. Halo accomplishes this by surrounding off-screen objects with rings that are just large enough to reach into the border region of the display window. From the portion of the ring that is visible on-screen, users can infer the offscreen location of the object at the center of the ring. We report the results of a user study comparing Halo with an arrow-based visualization technique with respect to four types of map-based route planning tasks. When using the Halo interface, users completed tasks 16-33% faster, while there were no significant differences in error rate for three out of four tasks in our study.
More sensitive assays for better drug resistance prediction?

HIV infection has affected more than 65 million people during 26 years of the epidemic in the world. Since the first drug was used to treat HIV-infected patients, more than 20 drugs have been approved by the US FDA. Use of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), that is, a combination of three or more antiretroviral drugs, has significantly improved patients’ health and prolonged life. In developed countries, AIDS is no longer an incurable disease. Drugs currently used to treat HIV-infected patients target three viral genes: protease, reverse transcriptase and envelope. They can be grouped into four classes: protease inhibitors (PIs), nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs), non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NNRTI) and the fusion inhibitor. Integrase inhibitors and chemokine coreceptor 5 (CCR5) antagonists have demonstrated promising clinical benefit in recent studies. If successful, these drugs will add to the current arsenal to combat HIV infection. Although many drugs are available to treat HIV-infected individuals, some patients still fail to respond to treatment due to maladherence, drug toxicity, suboptimal drug metabolism and drug resistance. While it is difficult to predict the host factors due to the genetic background variations among HIV-infected individuals, mutations that occur in drug-targeted genes and lead to drug resistance can be detected and used as resistance prediction markers [1,2]. Currently, drug resistance testing has become a part of standard practice in the management of antiretroviral chemotherapeutics and is recommended before initiating antiretroviral therapy [1,2]. Careful characterization of drugresistant mutations is also critical for understanding mechanisms of drug resistance. Although it
An Improved Community Detection Algorithm Based on the Edge-Graph of Network under the Spark Environment

This paper designs a community detection algorithm based on edge-graph of network and it can be called PENG, in which the network graph is transformed into edge-graph and the similarity of nodes in edge-graph substitutes for the edge betweenness of GN algorithm. It solves the problems that GN algorithm can not detect the overlapping communities and has high time complexity. The experiment demonstrates that the PENG algorithm, comparing with the traditional community detection algorithms, can effectively detect the structures of overlapping communities when the structures of communities are unidentified and the scale of social network is large.
FACE CLASSIFICATION USING CONJUNCTIONS OF FEATURES

Face detection is an important and interesting problem in computer science. Among the solutions for this problem, machine learning methods have proven to be very effective. However, many good machine learning approaches to this problem require very long training times. In this paper, we propose a machine learning method for classifying faces which requires a very short training time. This method is based on a boosting algorithm in which the weak classifiers are constructed from the conjunctions of different kinds of features. Compared to the best known face classifier, our algorithm can achieve a comparable detection rate with a much shorter training time.
Dynamic planning and weaving of dependability concerns for self-adaptive ubiquitous services

Ubiquitous computing and service-oriented computing enable the development of a new trend of applications that can opportunely interact with services discovered in the surrounding landscape. Although sporadic, this type of interaction requires the deployment of dependable mechanisms to ensure the correct completion of the interactions. However, the integration and the configuration of these mechanisms depends not only on the type of service accessed, but also on the surrounding environment. Such a variability requires an extensive effort of the developers to support the alternative mechanisms. Thus, to reduce this effort, we propose to integrate the Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) principles into the MUSIC planning-based adaptation middleware in order to dynamically plan and weave dependability concerns into the application depending on the execution context. In particular, this paper introduces our continuous support for AOP, which includes i) a uniform model for describing the dependable application configurations and ii) a modular middleware platform for weaving and configuring the dependability concerns when necessary.
Dimerization and Heme Binding Are Conserved in Amphibian and Starfish Homologues of the microRNA Processing Protein DGCR8

Human DiGeorge Critical Region 8 (DGCR8) is an essential microRNA (miRNA) processing factor that is activated via direct interaction with Fe(III) heme. In order for DGCR8 to bind heme, it must dimerize using a dimerization domain embedded within its heme-binding domain (HBD). We previously reported a crystal structure of the dimerization domain from human DGCR8, which demonstrated how dimerization results in the formation of a surface important for association with heme. Here, in an attempt to crystallize the HBD, we search for DGCR8 homologues and show that DGCR8 from Patiria miniata (bat star) also binds heme. The extinction coefficients (ε) of DGCR8-heme complexes are determined; these values are useful for biochemical analyses and allow us to estimate the heme occupancy of DGCR8 proteins. Additionally, we present the crystal structure of the Xenopus laevis dimerization domain. The structure is very similar to that of human DGCR8. Our results indicate that dimerization and heme binding are evolutionarily conserved properties of DGCR8 homologues not only in vertebrates, but also in at least some invertebrates.
Coordinating views for data visualisation and algorithmic profiling

A number of researchers have designed visualisation systems that consist of multiple components, through which data and interaction commands flow. Such multistage (hybrid) models can be used to reduce algorithmic complexity, and to open up intermediate stages of algorithms for inspection and steering. In this paper, we present work on aiding the developer and the user of such algorithms through the application of interactive visualisation techniques. We present a set of tools designed to profile the performance of other visualisation components, and provide further functionality for the exploration of high dimensional data sets. Case studies are provided, illustrating the application of the profiling modules to a number of data sets. Through this work we are exploring ways in which techniques traditionally used to prepare for visualisation runs, and to retrospectively analyse them, can find new uses within the context of a multi-component visualisation system.
Derivation and large-scale expansion of multipotent astroglial neural progenitors from adult human brain

The isolation and expansion of human neural cell types has become increasingly relevant in restorative neurobiology. Although embryonic and fetal tissue are frequently envisaged as providing sufficiently primordial cells for such applications, the developmental plasticity of endogenous adult neural cells remains largely unclear. To examine the developmental potential of adult human brain cells, we applied conditions favoring the growth of neural stem cells to multiple cortical regions, resulting in the identification and selection of a population of adult human neural progenitors (AHNPs). These nestin+ progenitors may be derived from multiple forebrain regions, are maintainable in adherent conditions, co-express multiple glial and immature markers, and are highly expandable, allowing a single progenitor to theoretically form sufficient cells for∼ 4×107 adult brains. AHNPs longitudinally maintain the ability to generate both glial and neuronal cell types in vivo and in vitro, and are amenable to genetic modification and transplantation. These findings suggest an unprecedented degree of inducible plasticity is retained by cells of the adult central nervous system.
Clustering Performance on Evolving Data Streams: Assessing Algorithms and Evaluation Measures within MOA

In today's applications, evolving data streams are ubiquitous. Stream clustering algorithms were introduced to gain useful knowledge from these streams in real-time. The quality of the obtained clusterings, i.e. how good they reflect the data, can be assessed by evaluation measures. A multitude of stream clustering algorithms and evaluation measures for clusterings were introduced in the literature, however, until now there is no general tool for a direct comparison of the different algorithms or the evaluation measures. In our demo, we present a novel experimental framework for both tasks. It offers the means for extensive evaluation and visualization and is an extension of the Massive Online Analysis (MOA) software environment released under the GNU GPL License.