Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Dynamics of a harmonically driven fluid interface in a capillary

We use an harmonic technique to probe the dynamics of a liquid-liquid interface in a capillary. The capillary pressure drop induced by a harmonic displacement of the fluids is recorded as a function of the excitation amplitude and frequency. At low frequency there is an amplitude threshold above which the contact line depins and slides, and this threshold is related to the static hysteresis of the contact angle. When the contact line depins, the damping due to its motion is measured from the component of the capillary pressure in phase with the fluids velocity. At frequencies higher than one hertz we observe a phenomenon of dynamic pinning. The behaviour of the damping suggests that the variation of the contact angle with the three-phase line velocity is frequency-dependent.
“Counselor in Your Pocket”: Youth and Provider Perspectives on a Mobile Motivational Intervention for Marijuana Use

Previous interventions for marijuana use have been administered out of the real-life contexts in which use occurs. In 2010, we interviewed youth aged 15–24 years who use marijuana frequently (n = 8) and providers who treat them (n = 6) on the acceptability and utility of a mobile intervention involving momentary self-monitoring of use-related contexts and responsive motivational messaging following clinic-based brief motivational enhancement therapy. Thematic analysis was used to examine youth and provider perspectives on the mobile intervention. Results suggest that mobile technology is a promising tool for brief interventions to reduce youth marijuana use and warrants further development.
Impact of Use of Language on Audience’s Perception: A Qualitative Analysis of Speeches by Hillary Clinton

Discourse is a fundamental factor to communicate and to identify a language or use of language. Therefore, the language used in political discourse is important for the candidates to persuade the voters. In the light of Hillary Clinton’s political discourses, interviews and debates, the present study aims to identify the impact of her language on audience’s perception. A total of Clinton’s 29 debates and 3 interviews have been extracted from YouTube, which were transcribed in the written text. The findings of the study revealed that pronouns, metaphors, and rhetoric aspects in the speeches fulfil the strategic communicative functions. This allows the study to present a political agenda, identify the important issues, and highlight her political actions. The media portrayal of Clinton’s leadership skills and language used in political speeches had a great impact on the voters. Therefore, more research should be conducted to recognize what voters want from a female candidate as a president.
A novel beamforming to improve secrecy rate in a DAJ based untrusted relay network

Security is a demanding request for wireless networks, with physical layer security the problems in traditional encryption algorithms and key management are vanished. In this paper, a novel beamforming scheme is proposed to improve secrecy rate in an untrusted relay network, where the untrusted relay helps to improve the network coverage area but may act as a potential eavesdroper. A destination-assisted-jamming (DAJ) is used to protect the confidential information against untrusted relays and eavesdroppers. By optimizing beamforming, we align the confidential signal to the equivalent valid signal space and force it to be orthogonal to the cooperative jamming signal space. The correctness and efficiency of the proposed beamforming scheme are validated by numerical simulations.
The Integration of Mind‐Body‐Soul and the Practice of Humanistic Nursing

Nursing has shifted the focus of its praxis toward a commitment to holistic care. This holistic perspective suggests each nurse must bring an authentic self as the essential element of therapeutic participation with another human being. The art of the therapeutic use of self in relationships involves an aesthetic process of ongoing reflected action, whereby an individual strives toward a sense of harmony and balance within oneself and with the world. The artful use of self provides an opportunity for expansion and personal growth and actualizes the potential to expand the good of all.
A Stochastic Programming Approach for Range Query Retrieval Problems

One of the important issues in range query (RQ) retrieval problems is to determine the key's resolution for multi-attribute records. Conventional models need to be improved because of their potential degeneracy, less-than-desired computability and possible inconsistency with the partial match query (PMQ) models. This paper presents a new RQ model to overcome these drawbacks and introduces a new methodology, stochastic programming (SP), to conduct the optimization process. The model is established by using a monotone-increasing function to characterize range sizes. Three SP approaches - the wait-and-see (WS), here-and-now (HN) and scenario tracking (ST) methods - are integrated into this RQ model. Analytical expressions of the optimal solution are derived. It seems that HN has advantage over WS because the latter usually involves complicated multiple summations or integrals. For the ST method, a nonlinear programming software package is designed. Results of numerical experiments are presented that optimized a 10-dimensional RQ model and tracked both middle-size [100] and large-size (1,000) scenarios.
Optimal Sample Complexity of M-wise Data for Top-K Ranking

We explore the top-K rank aggregation problem in which one aims to recover a consistent ordering that focuses on top-K ranked items based on partially revealed preference information. We examine an M-wise comparison model that builds on the Plackett-Luce (PL) model where for each sample, M items are ranked according to their perceived utilities modeled as noisy observations of their underlying true utilities. As our result, we characterize the minimax optimality on the sample size for top-K ranking. The optimal sample size turns out to be inversely proportional to M. We devise an algorithm that effectively converts M-wise samples into pairwise ones and employs a spectral method using the refined data. In demonstrating its optimality, we develop a novel technique for deriving tight $\ell_\infty$ estimation error bounds, which is key to accurately analyzing the performance of top-K ranking algorithms, but has been challenging. Recent work relied on an additional maximum-likelihood estimation (MLE) stage merged with a spectral method to attain good estimates in $\ell_\infty$ error to achieve the limit for the pairwise model. In contrast, although it is valid in slightly restricted regimes, our result demonstrates a spectral method alone to be sufficient for the general M-wise model. We run numerical experiments using synthetic data and confirm that the optimal sample size decreases at the rate of 1/M. Moreover, running our algorithm on real-world data, we find that its applicability extends to settings that may not fit the PL model.
In Vitro Evolution of Ligands for HCV-Specific Serum Antibodies

Abstract We developed a strategy to improve the properties of ligands selected from phagedisplayed random peptide libraries. A sitedirected mutagenesis protocol that introduces mutations and extends the size of a target sequence has been set up to generate diversity in a single or in a population of clones. The pool of mutants thus created is screened to identify variants with the desired properties. We refer to this strategy as in vitro evolution of ligands. Here we report the application of this in vitro evolution protocol to the identification of improved ligands for HCVspecific serum antibodies. A single clone or population of clones were processed to generate a secondary library. Screening of these libraries with sera from HCVinfected patients identified peptides with an enhanced and broadened ability to detect HCVspecific serum antibodies.
Ju n 20 06 Optical activity in the Drude helix model

An old classical one-particle helix model for optical activity, first proposed by Drude, is reconsidered here. The quantum Drude model is very instructive because the optical activity can be calculated analytically without further approximations apart from the Rosenfeld long wavelength approximation. While it was generally believed that this model, when treated correctly, is optically inactive, we show that it leads to optical activity when the motion of the particle is quantum mechanically treated. We also find that optical activity arises even in the classical regime at non-zero energy, while for zero energy the model is inactive, in accordance with previous results. The model is compared with other one-electron models and it is shown that its predicted optical activity is qualitatively different from those of other one-electron systems. The vanishing of optical activity in the classical zero-energy limit for the Drude model is due to the localization of the particle at the equilibrium position, whereas in the analogous model of a particle moving freely on a helix without a definite equilibrium position, optical activity does not vanish but the spectrum is rescaled. The model under study leads to interesting predictions about the optical properties of e. g. helicene derivatives. PACS numbers: 33.55. Ad, 78.20. Ek, 78.20. Bh ∗Electronic address: dufey@ph.tum. de
Three-phase Optimal Power Flow for Smart Grids by Iterative Nonsmooth Optimization

Optimal power flow is important for operation and planning of smart grids. The paper considers the so called unbalanced thee-phase optimal power flow problem (TOPF) for smart grids, which involves multiple quadratic equality and indefinite quadratic inequality constraints to model the bus interconnections, hardware capacity and balance between power demand and supply. The existing Newton search based or interior point algorithms are often trapped by a local optimum while semidefinite programming relaxation (SDR) even fails to locate a feasible point. Following our previously developed nonsmooth optimization approach, computational solution for TOPF is provided. Namely, an iterative procedure for generating a sequence of improved points that converges to an optimal solution, is developed. Simulations for TOPF in unbalanced distributed networks are provided to demonstrate the practicability and efficiency of our approach.
Segmentation of textures using PCA fusion based Gray-Level Co-Occurrence Matrix features

In this paper, segmentation of textures using principle component analysis (PCA) fusion based Gray-Level Co-Occurrence Matrix (GLCM) features in image segmentation is presented. First, four of the most common Haralick's features are calculated. Second, we perform principal component analysis to convert the 4 features extracted data in to four principal components. Then, choose fused coefficient according to PCA-based weighted average rule. Finally, k-means cluster algorithm has been applied for fusion image, the segmentation results has been obtained. The experiments demonstrate that the proposed approach is effective and is able to achieve favorable results in terms of precision.
Development of hindi speech recognition system of agricultural commodities using deep neural network

To create a system for speech recognition customized for services in a particular domain, it is very important to add more and more languages to the ‘supported languages’ database of the system. In this study, we have collected speech data from a sample of the population we were targeting the system for i.e. tasks for agricultural commodities. We performed the acoustic modelling of this data using a combination of Deep Neural Network (DNN) and Hidden Markov model (HMM) in which the HMM state likelihoods are taken from the outputs of the DNN. We have performed a three stage training: RBM pre-training, frame cross-entropy training, and sequence-training optimizing MMI/sMBR. After extensive experimentation, the accuracy of our system comes to about 82%. This study motivates further research for fine-tuning of such systems.
Effects of Acute High-Intensity Exercise With the Elevation Training Mask or Hypoxicator on Pulmonary Function, Metabolism, and Hormones

Abstract Ott, T, Joyce, MC, and Hillman, AR. Effects of acute high-intensity exercise with the elevation training mask or hypoxicator on pulmonary function, metabolism, and hormones. J Strength Cond Res 35(9): 2486–2491, 2021—The elevation training mask (ETM) 2.0 is an increasingly popular hands-free respiratory muscle training modality proposing to mimic altitude; however, the degree to which this occurs has been questioned. The purpose of this study was to investigate the efficacy of this modality in comparison with using a hypoxicator (HYP) during acute aerobic exercise. Eight regularly active subjects (age: 25 ± 8 years; height: 166 ± 12 cm; body mass 64 ± 10 kg; and V̇o2max: 46 ± 6 ml·kg−1·min−1) completed 3 trials, each including resting metabolic rate measurement, pulmonary function tests, and 13 sprint intervals at 90% V̇o2max using either the HYP, ETM, or control. There was no significant difference in metabolism or heart rate between conditions. Fraction of expired air in the first second was greater after exercise (p = 0.02), while oxygen saturation was lower during exercise with the HYP (p < 0.001). Human growth hormone increased with exercise, but no differences were found between conditions; however, a trend was observed for higher growth hormone after exercise in HYP vs. ETM (p = 0.08). Elevation training mask does not seem to change acute pulmonary function, metabolism, heart rate, or oxygen saturation, indicating it likely does not create a hypoxic environment or mimic altitude.
Rigorous modeling and analysis of interoperable medical devices

Medical Devices (MDs) are by definition safety-critical and increasingly also become security-critical when interoperating, i.e., when communicating in some form. Finding errors, inconsistencies, or vulnerabilities in MDs before deployment can significantly decrease costs, and increase quality and reliability. In this paper, we present a rigorous "correct-by-construction" approach for modeling and analyzing interoperating MDs by considering various abstraction levels, i.e., the functional, the safety, and the security level. The approach is illustrated using sample requirements of a hemodialysis device.
A Novel Embedded OTP NVM Using Standard Foundry CMOS Logic Technology

A novel embedded one-time programmable (OTP) nonvolatile memory (NVM), using only standard Foundry CMOS logic technology, is described. IP modules with densities from 1Kb to 1Mb were constructed and tested. Reliability data is presented for 1Mb memory modules fabricated in 0.18mu technology
Nox4 supports proper capillary growth in exercise and retina neo‐vascularization

We provide evidence for two distinct functions of the NADPH oxidase Nox4 in angiogenesis using Nox4 knockout mice. First, Nox4 maintains vascular endothelial growth factor expression and prevents an increase in angiopoietin 1 expression, thereby contributing to angiogenesis in exercise. Second, deletion of Nox4, via an enhanced angiopoietin 1 expression, contributes to stabilization of new formed vessels and prevents an exacerbated neo‐angiogenesis in oxygen‐induced retinopathy. By contrast, Nox4 does not influence developmental angiogenesis.
Unsupervised feature selection for interpretable classification in behavioral assessment of children

In this paper, we consider a data set taken from the administration of the Behavior Assessment System for Children test to 157 subjects, and we approach the problem of clustering and classify the subjects in an interpretable fashion. Because the Behavior Assessment System for Children test is originally composed of 149 questions (152 in the particular version used for this experiment), we first propose a feature selection wrapper model composed by a multi‐objective evolutionary algorithm, the iterative clustering method expectation–maximization, and the classifier C4.5 for the unsupervised feature selection towards the classification of the data with two objectives: maximizing the likelihood of the clustering model and maximizing the accuracy of the obtained classifier. We propose a methodology to integrate feature selection for unsupervised classification, model evaluation, decision‐making (to choose the most satisfactory model according to an a posteriori process in a multi‐objective context), and testing. The selected data set that is the result of this process, where each instance is labeled with its class, is then used for supervised learning via both C4.5 and a novel evolutionary computation‐based fuzzy classifier to obtain interpretable rules. We discuss and compare the behavior of two different evolutionary algorithms (ENORA (Evolutionary NOn‐dominated Radial slots based Algorithm) and NSGA‐II (Non‐dominated Sorted Genetic Algorithm)) at different levels: as search strategies for feature selection, as search strategies for fuzzy classification, and in terms of quality of the results. It turns out that ENORA behaves better in terms of quality of the result in the feature selection phase (obtaining a selection that shows higher accuracy under C4.5 after cross‐validation), and again in the fuzzy classification phase, from both points of view: hypervolume evolution and interpretability of results. During the entire process, the solutions are validated by the psychologists who collected the data.
Identification and Functional Characterization of a Novel Bacterial Type Asparagine Synthetase A

Background: Asparagine synthetase A catalyzes the synthesis of asparagine from aspartate in the presence of ammonia as a nitrogen donor. Results: L. donovani ASNA enzyme is of bacterial origin and is both ammonia- and glutamine-dependent. Conclusion: LdASNA is essential for survival of the Leishmania parasite. Significance: The absence of LdASNA homologs from humans validates Leishmania ASNA as a novel drug target. Asparagine is formed by two structurally distinct asparagine synthetases in prokaryotes. One is the ammonia-utilizing asparagine synthetase A (AsnA), and the other is asparagine synthetase B (AsnB) that uses glutamine or ammonia as a nitrogen source. In a previous investigation using sequence-based analysis, we had shown that Leishmania spp. possess asparagine-tRNA synthetase paralog asparagine synthetase A (LdASNA) that is ammonia-dependent. Here, we report the cloning, expression, and kinetic analysis of ASNA from Leishmania donovani. Interestingly, LdASNA was both ammonia- and glutamine-dependent. To study the physiological role of ASNA in Leishmania, gene deletion mutations were attempted via targeted gene replacement. Gene deletion of LdASNA showed a growth delay in mutants. However, chromosomal null mutants of LdASNA could not be obtained as the double transfectant mutants showed aneuploidy. These data suggest that LdASNA is essential for survival of the Leishmania parasite. LdASNA enzyme was recalcitrant toward crystallization so we instead crystallized and solved the atomic structure of its close homolog from Trypanosoma brucei (TbASNA) at 2.2 Å. A very significant conservation in active site residues is observed between TbASNA and Escherichia coli AsnA. It is evident that the absence of an LdASNA homolog from humans and its essentiality for the parasites make LdASNA a novel drug target.
Neoliberal feminism in Africa

Abstract:This article explores neoliberal feminism in relation to Africa, with a particular focus on Nigeria. It argues that neoliberal feminism is more likely to be embraced in Nigeria than some of the other kinds of feminism that are circulating there. This is because its high levels of poverty and unemployment have fostered an individualised entrepreneurial mindset that is in some ways more in line with this kind of feminism. The need for income means that all women who can find paid work take it on-often in the informal economy. Thus equality at work and in business has been easier to achieve than equality in the home. It could be argued that a Nigerian version of the neoliberal feminist goal of individual empowerment and a good work-life balance has emerged, though it remains dependent on accepting inequality within the family. This implies the need to be aware that ideas have very different effects in different contexts. The article also reflects on the work of African Women in Media, which seeks to mobilise women in media industries, and to improve the representation and visibility of women in African media.
1-Anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate Binding Parameters in Red Cell Membranes. Does Diabetes Mellitus Affect Cell Membrane Dynamics?

In this study we report the use of 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate as a fluorescence probe to investigate the properties of plasma membranes derived from normal and diabetic red blood cells. The binding of 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate to diabetes-affected erythrocyte membranes, as compared with controls, was measured by means of fluorescence polarization and fluorescence titration techniques. These measurements demonstrated anomalous 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate binding to pathological red cell membranes. The amount of 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate bound to diabetic erythrocyte membranes was greater than that of controls. This fluorometric study indicated that the outer monolayer binding of 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate was markedly augmented in the erythrocyte membranes of diabetic patients. Significant correlations were found between 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate binding parameters and membrane lipid composition. The correlation between these binding parameters and non-enzymatic protein glycation was poor or moderate. Though the fluorescence intensity and emission maximum were quite similar in both groups investigated, binding studies revealed that there were approximately 1.2 times the number of 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate binding sites and a 33% increase in the KD value in diabetic membranes, suggesting significant differences in the environment of the 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate binding sites in these two groups of patients. The results presented in this report indicate that (a) 1-anilino-8-naphthalenesulphonate is a sensitive probe of membrane architecture alterations, and can be used to elucidate the perturbating effects of sterols in membrane systems, and (b) that significant differences in membrane dynamics exist between normal and diabetic red cell membranes. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
A qualitative study of leader behaviors perceived to enable salesperson performance

Abstract This study builds on and extends previous sales leadership research by exploring sales professionals’ perceptions of effective leadership behaviors. Semistructured interviews with both sales leaders and salespeople working in a global enterprise software company were examined through a qualitative analysis. Results indicated that participants believed sales leadership played an important role in influencing sales performance. When asked to describe specific sales leader behaviors that best enable salesperson performance, sales professionals – both sales leaders and salespeople – overwhelmingly referenced coaching, followed by collaborating, championing, and customer engaging. We define and describe these four key sales leader behaviors and identify four potential mediating variables (trust, confidence, optimism, and resilience), from which emerges a conceptual framework of sales leader behaviors perceived to enable salesperson performance. We examine these four key sales leader behaviors and mediators in the broader context of leadership theory, particularly transformational, servant, authentic, and adaptive leadership theories. The key contribution of this study is the identification of a set of leader behaviors that are likely to be especially effective in modern sales organizations given that they originated from the perceptions of sales professionals themselves.