Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Spectral analysis of relativistic atoms -- Dirac operators with singular potentials

This is the first part of a series of two papers, which investigate spectral properties of Dirac operators with singular poten- tials. We examine various properties of complex dilated Dirac oper- ators. These operators arise in the investigation of resonances using the method of complex dilations. We generalize the spectral analysis of Weder (50) and y (46) to operators with Coulomb type poten- tials, which are not relatively compact perturbations. Moreover, we define positive and negative spectral projections as well as transforma- tion functions between different spectral subspaces and investigate the non-relativistic limit of these operators. We will apply these results in (30) in the investigation of resonances in a relativistic Pauli-Fierz model, but they might also be of independent interest.
Natural genetic variation in Arabidopsis thaliana defense metabolism genes modulates field fitness

Natural populations persist in complex environments, where biotic stressors, such as pathogen and insect communities, fluctuate temporally and spatially. These shifting biotic pressures generate heterogeneous selective forces that can maintain standing natural variation within a species. To directly test if genes containing causal variation for the Arabidopsis thaliana defensive compounds, glucosinolates (GSL) control field fitness and are therefore subject to natural selection, we conducted a multi-year field trial using lines that vary in only specific causal genes. Interestingly, we found that variation in these naturally polymorphic GSL genes affected fitness in each of our environments but the pattern fluctuated such that highly fit genotypes in one trial displayed lower fitness in another and that no GSL genotype or genotypes consistently out-performed the others. This was true both across locations and within the same location across years. These results indicate that environmental heterogeneity may contribute to the maintenance of GSL variation observed within Arabidopsis thaliana. DOI: http://dx.doi. org/10.7554/eLife.05604. 001
Financial Market Trading System With a Hierarchical Coevolutionary Fuzzy Predictive Model

Financial market prediction and trading presents a challenging task that attracts great interest from researchers and investors because success may result in substantial rewards. This paper describes the application of a hierarchical coevolutionary fuzzy system called HiCEFS for predicting financial time series. A novel financial trading system using HiCEFS as a predictive model and employing a prudent trading strategy based on the price percentage oscillator (PPO) is proposed. In order to construct an accurate predictive model, a form of generic membership function named irregular shaped membership function (ISMF) is employed and a hierarchical coevolutionary genetic algorithm (HCGA) is adopted to automatically derive the ISMFs for each input feature in HiCEFS. With the accurate prediction from HiCEFS and the prudent trading strategy, the proposed system outperforms the simple buy-and-hold strategy, the trading system without prediction and the trading system with other predictive models (EFuNN, DENFIS and RSPOP) on real-world financial data.
Acoustics of clear speech: effect of instruction.

PURPOSE This study investigated how different instructions for eliciting clear speech affected selected acoustic measures of speech. METHOD Twelve speakers were audio-recorded reading 18 different sentences from the Assessment of Intelligibility of Dysarthric Speech ( Yorkston & Beukelman, 1984). Sentences were produced in habitual, clear, hearing impaired, and overenunciate conditions. A variety of acoustic measures were obtained. RESULTS Relative to habitual, the clear, hearing impaired, and overenunciate conditions were associated with different magnitudes of acoustic change for measures of vowel production, speech timing, and vocal intensity. The overenunciate condition tended to yield the greatest magnitude of change in vowel spectral measures and speech timing, followed by the hearing impaired and clear conditions. SPL tended to be the greatest in the hearing impaired condition for half of the speakers studied. CONCLUSIONS Different instructions for eliciting clear speech yielded acoustic adjustments of varying magnitude. Results have implications for direct comparison of studies using different instructions for eliciting clear speech. Results also have implications for optimizing clear speech training programs.
Highly Unidirectional Emission and Ultralow‐Threshold Lasing from On‐Chip Ultrahigh‐Q Microcavities

Prominent examples are whispering gallery mode (WGM) microcavities, [ 2 , 3 ] which confi ne photons by means of continuous total internal refl ection along a curved and smooth surface. The long photon lifetime (described by high Q factors), strong fi eld confi nement, and in-plane emission characteristics make them promising candidates for novel light sources [ 4–9 ] and biochemical sensors with the ability of detecting few or even single nanoparticles. [ 10 , 11 ] The principal disadvantage of circular WGM microcavities is their intrinsic isotropy of emission due to their rotational symmetry. In addition to the photonic structures consisting of two or more perfectly spherical microcavities, [ 12 ] one of vital solutions is to use deformed microcavities by breaking the rotational symmetry, [ 13–16 ] which can provide not only the directional emission but also the effi cient and robust excitation of WGMs by a free-space optical beam. [ 17–20 ] Deformed microcavities fabricated on a chip are particularly desired for high-density optoelectronic integration, but they suffer from low Q factors in experiments. The Q factors are typically around or even smaller than ten thousand [ 21–27 ] limited by the large scattering losses from the involuntary surface roughness. The high Q factor is of great importance in fundamental studies and on-chip photonic applications. Here, with a pattern transfer technique and a refl ow process ensuring a nearly atomic-scale microcavity surface, we demonstrate experimentally on-chip undoped silica deformed microcavities which support both nearly unidirectional emission and ultrahigh Q factors exceeding 100 million. Consequently, low-threshold, unidirectional microlasing in such a microcavity with Q factor about 3 million is realized by erbium doping and a convenient free-space excitation.
Initial Evaluation on Subsidence of Cemented Collarless Polished Tapered Stem Applied to the Patients with Narrow Femoral Medullar Canal

Purpose: The geometry of the proximal femur is one of the important factors for choosing the suitable stem. We have been applied cemented collarless polished tapered (CPT) stem to the patients with small femur. Radiographic evaluation was performed to access the clinical feature of the stem in early stage of the follow-up. Methods: One hundred total hip arthroplasties with CPT system were performed between October 2004 to February 2006. This study focused on the 53 cases to whom size 1 or smaller sized stem were implanted, and its post-operative period was 41 months (30-46 months). Morphologic classification of preoperative proximal femur, stem alignment, thickness of the cement mantle, cementing technique, subsidence of the stem, improvement in the bone-cement interface, and stress shielding were assessed. Results: The size of the inserted stem was X-SMALL in one case, SMALL in two cases, SIZE 0 in 12 cases, and SIZE 1 in 38 cases. Canal shape of proximal femur was stovepipe type in five cases, normal type in 43 cases, and champagne-flute type in five cases. There was no subsidence in eight cases. 44 stems subsided within 1 mm, one stem subsided 1 to 2 mm, and no stem subsided over 2 mm. In 39 of 45 cases, subsidence was appeared within six months after operation. Marked progressive and excessive subsidence was not seen after the two years of follow-up. Conclusions: Short term radiographic results of THA with CPT stem to small femur were satisfactory with less unfavorable radiographic findings, which imply contribution to longer survivorship of the stem.
Surfen, a small molecule antagonist of heparan sulfate

In a search for small molecule antagonists of heparan sulfate, we examined the activity of bis-2-methyl-4-amino-quinolyl-6-carbamide, also known as surfen. Fluorescence-based titrations indicated that surfen bound to glycosaminoglycans, and the extent of binding increased according to charge density in the order heparin > dermatan sulfate > heparan sulfate > chondroitin sulfate. All charged groups in heparin (N-sulfates, O-sulfates, and carboxyl groups) contributed to binding, consistent with the idea that surfen interacted electrostatically. Surfen neutralized the anticoagulant activity of both unfractionated and low molecular weight heparins and inhibited enzymatic sulfation and degradation reactions in vitro. Addition of surfen to cultured cells blocked FGF2-binding and signaling that depended on cell surface heparan sulfate and prevented both FGF2- and VEGF165-mediated sprouting of endothelial cells in Matrigel. Surfen also blocked heparan sulfate-mediated cell adhesion to the Hep-II domain of fibronectin and prevented infection by HSV-1 that depended on glycoprotein D interaction with heparan sulfate. These findings demonstrate the feasibility of identifying small molecule antagonists of heparan sulfate and raise the possibility of developing pharmacological agents to treat disorders that involve glycosaminoglycan–protein interactions.
Power and Delay-aware Multi-Path Routing Protocol for Ad Hoc Networks

Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANETs) also called mesh networks, consist of a large number of mobile nodes that communicate with each other in the absence of any fixed infrastructure or centralized administration. The principle characteristics of MANET are the dynamic topology and the limited battery power of mobile nodes. The discharge of the battery causes many problems such as the loss of the packets and the re-initialization of route discovery which leads to lot of bandwidth consumption, increase in the delay and decrease in the throughput. In this paper, we propose a new power and delay aware routing protocol for wireless Ad Hoc networks. The goal of our proposed routing protocol is not only to find more stable paths from a source to a destination node in terms of remaining life time of battery, but also to find multi-paths that satisfy Quality of Service (QoS) requirements, given in terms of delay and bandwidth. To evaluate our proposed routing protocol (PDMRP), an extensive simulation study is performed using the NS-2 simulator. We show through simulation that our proposed routing protocol called Power and Delay aware Multi-path Routing Protocol (PDMRP) outperforms the Stable Path Routing Protocol based on Power Awareness (SPR) and the Modified Adhoc On-Demand Distance Vector (MAODV) routing protocols in terms of throughput, end-to-end delay, and loss rate. We modify the AODV protocol in NS-2 simulator so that it supports the energy module. We add the energy class to the relay and destination nodes. Therefore, the life time of each node in this protocol decreases when it sends or receives a packet. This modification is made on the AODV protocol to become similar to the two other routing protocols (The three protocols support the energy module).
Cloning and That Affects Characterization of CER2, an Arabidopsis Gene Cuticular Wax Accumulation

Cuticular waxes are complex mixtures of very long chain fatty acids and their derivatives that cover plant surfaces. Mutants of the ECERFERUMP (cer2) gene of Arabidopsis condition bright green stems and siliques, indicative of the relatively low abundance of the cuticular wax crystals that comprise the wax bloom on wild-type plants. We cloned the CERP gene via chromosome walking. Three lines of evidence establish that the cloned sequence represents the CERP gene: (1) this sequence is capable of complementing the cer2 mutant phenotype in transgenic plants; (2) the corresponding DNA sequence isolated from plants homozygous for the cer2-2 mutant allele contains a sequence polymorphism that generates a premature stop codon; and (3) the deduced CER2 protein sequence exhibits sequence similarity to that of a maize gene (glossy2) that also is involved in cuticular wax accumulation. The CERP gene encodes a nove1 protein with a predicted mass of 47 kD. We studied the expression pattern of the CERP gene by in situ hybridization and analysis of transgenic Arabidopsis plants carrying a CERP-p-glucuronidase gene fusion that includes 1 . O kb immediately upstream of CERP and 0.2 kb of CERP coding sequences. These studies demonstrate that the CERP gene is expressed in an organ- and tissue-specific manner; CERP is expressed at high levels only in the epidermis of young siliques and stems. This finding is consistent with the visible phenotype associated with mutants of the CERP gene. Hence, the 1.2-kb fragment of the CERP gene used to construct the CERP-P-glucuronidase gene fusion includes all of the genetic information required for the epidermis-specific accumulation of CERP mRNA.
Optimal and Adaptive Off-policy Evaluation in Contextual Bandits

We study the off-policy evaluation problem---estimating the value of a target policy using data collected by another policy---under the contextual bandit model. We consider the general (agnostic) setting without access to a consistent model of rewards and establish a minimax lower bound on the mean squared error (MSE). The bound is matched up to constants by the inverse propensity scoring (IPS) and doubly robust (DR) estimators. This highlights the difficulty of the agnostic contextual setting, in contrast with multi-armed bandits and contextual bandits with access to a consistent reward model, where IPS is suboptimal. We then propose the SWITCH estimator, which can use an existing reward model (not necessarily consistent) to achieve a better bias-variance tradeoff than IPS and DR. We prove an upper bound on its MSE and demonstrate its benefits empirically on a diverse collection of data sets, often outperforming prior work by orders of magnitude.
Non-Compliance after a Kidney-Pancreas Transplantation - A Narrative Case-Analysis Involving Different Patient-Physician Relationships and Ethical Frames

Piccoli GB, Soragna G, Rossetti M, Putaggio S, Perrotta L, Bonetto A, Magnano A, Vercellone F (2005) NonCompliance after a Kidney-Pancreas Transplantation – A Narrative CaseAnalysis Involving Different PatientPhysician Relationships and Ethical Frames. Tx Med 17: 107-114 Non-Compliance after a Kidney-Pancreas Transplantation – A Narrative Case-Analysis Involving Different Patient-Physician Relationships and Ethical Frames
The Emotional Coherence of Religion

This paper uses a psychological/computational theory of emotional coherence to explain several aspects of religious belief and practice. After reviewing evidence for the importance of emotion to religious thought and cognition in general, it describes psychological and social mechanisms of emotional cognition. These mechanisms are relevant to explaining the acquisition and maintenance of religious belief, and also shed light on such practices as prayer and other rituals. These psychological explanations are contrasted with ones based on biological evolution.
In vivo mapping of cholinergic terminals in normal aging, Alzheimer's disease, and Parkinson's disease

To map presynaptic cholinergic terminal densities in normal aging (n = 36), Alzheimer's disease (AD) (n = 22), and Parkinson's disease (PD) (n = 15), we performed single‐photon emission computed tomography using [123I]iodoben‐zovesamicol (IBVM), an in vivo marker of the vesicular acetylcholine transporter. We used coregistered positron emission tomography with [18F]fluorodexyglucose for metabolic assessment and coregistered magnetic resonance imaging for atrophy assessment. In controls (age, 22–91 years), cortical IBVM binding declined only 3.7% per decade. In AD, cortical binding correlated inversely with dementia severity. In mild dementia, binding differed according to age of onset, but metabolism did not. With an onset age of less than 65 years, binding was reduced severely throughout the entire cerebral cortex and hippocapus (about 30%), but with an onset age of 65 years or more, binding reductions were restricted to temporal cortex and hippocampus. In PD without dementia, binding was reduced only in parietal and occipital cortex, but demented PD subjects had extensive cortical binding decreases similar to early‐onset AD. We conclude that cholinergic neuron integrity can be monitored in living AD and PD patients, and that it is not so devastated in vivo as suggested by postmortem choline acetylransferase activity (50–80%).
Link-gain based power control mechanism for Wireless Sensor Networks

Recently, the topology control strategies attract more and more the research community as being a crucial issue to be handled for the Wireless sensors networks (WSNs). In this paper, we propose a centralized power control mechanism based on the link gain information to reduce network energy consumption. Our mechanism works through two steps, first we construct a skeleton that ensure network connectivity while reducing considerably the number of links in the network. Second, based on the obtained skeleton, we reduce the power transmission for each node while keeping a connectivity with a node of the skeleton with a link gain greater than a predefined threshold. The simulation results conducted over TOSSIM, show that our proposal can save the network energy up to 10% while achieving better PDR value, which goes near to 12% compared to non-optimized network.
Ranking of persister genes in the same Escherichia coli genetic background demonstrates varying importance of individual persister genes in tolerance to different antibiotics

Despite the identification of many genes and pathways involved in the persistence phenomenon of bacteria, the relative importance of these genes in a single organism remains unclear. Here, using Escherichia coli as a model, we generated mutants of 21 known candidate persister genes and compared the relative importance of these mutants in persistence to various antibiotics (ampicillin, gentamicin, norfloxacin, and trimethoprim) at different times. We found that oxyR, dnaK, sucB, relA, rpoS, clpB, mqsR, and recA were prominent persister genes involved in persistence to multiple antibiotics. These genes map to the following pathways: antioxidative defense pathway (oxyR), global regulators (dnaK, clpB, and rpoS), energy production (sucB), stringent response (relA), toxin–antitoxin (TA) module (mqsR), and SOS response (recA). Among the TA modules, the ranking order was mqsR, lon, relE, tisAB, hipA, and dinJ. Intriguingly, rpoS deletion caused a defect in persistence to gentamicin but increased persistence to ampicillin and norfloxacin. Mutants demonstrated dramatic differences in persistence to different antibiotics at different time points: some mutants (oxyR, dnaK, phoU, lon, recA, mqsR, and tisAB) displayed defect in persistence from early time points, while other mutants (relE, smpB, glpD, umuD, and tnaA) showed defect only at later time points. These results indicate that varying hierarchy and importance of persister genes exist and that persister genes can be divided into those involved in shallow persistence and those involved in deep persistence. Our findings suggest that the persistence phenomenon is a dynamic process with different persister genes playing roles of variable significance at different times. These findings have implications for improved understanding of persistence phenomenon and developing new drugs targeting persisters for more effective cure of persistent infections.
A study of the theories and practices of facilitator educators

Summary 71 Chapter 3: Methodology 73 (Re)statement of the research problem 73 Research paradigms 74 The interpretive paradigm and this study 76 Focused on meaning making 77 Multiple realities and tentativeness 78 Situated in a context 79 Value bound 80 Co-creation 80 Call to action 81 Comparing and contrasting with other paradigms 82 Positivistic and interpretive paradigms 82 The critical and interpretive paradigms 83 Criticisms of the interpretive paradigm 84
Semantic Traffic-Aware Routing Using the LarKC Platform

The popularity of location-based services and automotive navigation systems calls for a new generation of intelligent solutions to support users in mobility. This article presents a traffic-aware semantic routing service for mobile users based on the Large Knowledge Collider (LarKC) Semantic Web pluggable platform. It proposes a technique for integrating conceptual query answering with statistical learning and operations research algorithms. The presented prototype of a traffic-aware semantic routing service works efficiently with large, heterogeneous information sources and delivers value-added services to mobile users.
A quantitative polymerase chain reaction method for determining copy number within the Prader–Willi/Angelman syndrome critical region

The Prader–Willi/Angelman syndrome critical region (PWACR) on 15q11-q13 is prone to structural rearrangements, including deletions (1), duplications (2) and supernumerary marker chromosomes [SMC(15)s] (3), which can give rise to a variety of phenotypic effects dependent on the origin and nature of the rearrangement (4). A number of methods, such as cytogenetic analysis, fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and methylation-specific or microsatellite polymerase chain reaction (PCR), are currently available for diagnosing these abnormalities (5). To supplement these approaches we have designed a quick and effective method for determining the copy number of the 15q11-q13 region, based upon quantitative PCR coupled to automated gene scanning. Two target sequences are amplified relative to an internal reference (6, 7) and the PCR products are then analyzed directly on an ABI 377 automated sequencer. Comparison of the ratios of reference and target sequence peaks allows the copy number of the 15q11-q13 region to be calculated.
Fatigue and exhaustion in chronic hypobaric hypoxia: influence of exercising muscle mass.

Exhaustive dynamic exercise with large muscle groups in chronic hypobaric hypoxia may be limited by central (nervous) rather than peripheral (metabolic) fatigue. Six males [32 +/- 4 (SD) yr] at sea level (SL) and after 1-mo acclimatization at 5,050 m (HA) performed exhaustive dynamic forearm exercise at a constant absolute load, requiring regional maximum aerobic power at SL, and exhaustive cycle exercise at prevailing maximal O2 uptake (HA approximately equal to 80% SL). Exhaustion time (t(ex)), blood O2 saturation (SaO2), and heart rate (HR) were measured during each exercise bout. Before and after both arm and leg exercise, lactate concentration ([La]), PO2, PCO2, and pH were measured in arterialized blood samples. Integrated electromyogram activity (IEMG) and mean (MPF) and centroid (CPF) power frequencies of the EMG power spectrum during exercise were calculated for forearm flexors and vastus lateralis muscle. t(ex) for forearm exercise at the same absolute load was the same at SL and HA. Similar increases of IEMG (+214% at SL vs. +172% at HA) and decreases of CPF (-13% at SL vs. -16% at HA) and MPF (-22% at SL vs. -21% at HA) were observed. By contrast, at HA, for similar t(ex), leg exercise had to be performed at the same relative (i.e., prevailing maximal O2 uptake) but lower absolute load (approximately equal to 80% of SL). (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)