Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Connexin 33 Impairs Gap Junction Functionality by Accelerating Connexin 43 Gap Junction Plaque Endocytosis

Connexin 33 (Cx33) is a testis‐specific gap junction protein. We previously reported that Cx33 exerts dominant‐negative effect on gap junction intercellular communication by sequestering Cx43 within early endosomes in Sertoli cells. However, the molecular mechanisms that drive this process are unknown. The present study analyzed: (i) the trafficking of Cx33 and Cx43 in wild‐type Sertoli cells transfected with Cx33‐DsRed2 and Cx43‐green fluorescent protein vectors; (ii) the formation of heteromeric Cx33/Cx43 hemi‐channels and their incorporation into gap junction plaques. Fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy‐fluorescence resonance energy transfer and videomicroscopy studies demonstrated that Cx33 and Cx43 associated to form heteromeric oligomers that trafficked along microtubules to the plasma membrane. However, the plaques containing Cx33 were not functional. Immunoprecipitation experiments revealed that zonula occludens‐1 (ZO‐1), a scaffold protein proposed to secure Cx in gap junction plaques at the cell–cell boundary, associated with Cx33 in testis extracts. In cells expressing Cx33, Cx33 and ZO‐1 specifically interacted with P1 phosphorylated and P0 unphosphorylated isoforms of Cx43, and the ZO‐1 membranous signal level was reduced. It is suggested that alteration of Cx43/ZO‐1 association by Cx33 could be one mechanism by which Cx33 exerts its dominant‐negative effect on gap junction plaque.
Structure and function of the plasminogen/plasmin system

Summary Activation of the fibrinolytic system is dependent on the conversion of the plasma zymogen, plasminogen (Pg), to the serine protease plasmin (Pm) by the physiological activators urokinase-type Pg activator (uPA) or tissue-type plasminogen activator (tPA). The primary in vivo function of Pm is to regulate vascular patency by degrading fibrin-containing thrombi. However, the identification of Pg/Pm receptors and the ability of Pm to degrade other matrix proteins have implicated Pm in other functions involving degradation of protein barriers, thereby mediating cell migration, an important event in a number of normal e.g., embryogenesis, wound healing, angiogenesis, and pathological, e.g., tumor growth and dissemination, processes. Prior to the development of Pg-deficient mice, much of the evidence for its role in other biological events was based on indirect studies. With the development and characterization of these mice, and ability to apply challenges utilizing a number of animal models that mimic the human condition, a clearer delineation of Pg/Pm function has evolved and has contributed to an understanding of mechanisms associated with a number of pathophysiological events.
Modeling Hubble Space Telescope Flight Data by Q-Markov Cover Identification

This Paper presents a state space model for the Hubble space telescope under the influence of unknown disturbances in orbit. This model was obtained from flight data by applying the Q-Markov Covariance Equivalent Realization identification algorithm. This state space model guarantees the match of the first Q Markov parameters and covariance parameters of the Hubble system. The flight data were partitioned into high and low frequency components for more efficient Q-Markov Cover modeling, to reduce some computational difficulties of the Q-Markov Cover algorithm. This identification revealed more than 20 lightly-damped modes within the bandwidth of the attitude control system. Comparisons with the analytical (TREETOPS) model are also included.
Culture and Global Change: Social Perceptions of Deforestation in the Lacandona Rain Forest in Mexico

Never before in history have humans had such power over the environment as we have today, and never before have we been so close to the end of nature. With the destruction of the earth a realistic possibility, global change is the point on which theoretical discussions and practical challenges must converge.The authors of this compelling book argue that before suitable solutions can be found to pressing environmental problems, we need a way to gather information on the human dimensions of global changes. How do small and everyday individual actions add up to the intricate networks of global interactions? What are our rights and responsibilities as humans toward the planet and its natural resources? The Lacandon rain forest in Mexico provides a vivid example of an environmental challenge that will demand the concerted efforts of many different groups, and not only technical solutions, to resolve successfully. Using data taken largely from in-depth interviews with landowners, farm workers, cattle raisers, housewives, professionals, and civil servants, the authors draw a rich portrait of the varied perceptions and positions these groups and individuals hold. At issue are the social, rather than psychological, bases of their perspectives. "Culture and Global Change" offers a model for how the social sciences, and anthropology in particular, can lead the way in developing comprehensive understandings of the interrelationships between groups at the local, regional, and international levels that affect perceptions of the environment and thus the viability of solutions. It is required reading for anthropologists and environmental activists alike.Lourdes Arizpe is Assistant Director-General for Culture, UNESCO. Fernanda Paz and Margarita Velzquez work for the Centro Regional de Investigaciones Multidisciplinarias, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico.
Automated Test Generation for Access Control Policies via Change-Impact Analysis

Access control policies are increasingly written in specification languages such as XACML. To increase confidence in the correctness of specified policies, policy developers can conduct policy testing with some typical test inputs (in the form of requests) and check test outputs (in the form of responses) against expected ones. Unfortunately, manual test generation is tedious and manually generated tests are often not sufficient to exercise various policy behaviors. In this paper we present a novel framework and its supporting tool called Cirg that generates tests based on change- impact analysis. Our experimental results show that Cirg can effectively generate tests to achieve high structural coverage of policies and outperforms random test generation in terms of structural coverage and fault-detection capability.
Immunotherapy with Canarypox Vaccine and Interleukin-2 for HIV-1 Infection: Termination of a Randomized Trial

Objectives: To determine whether immunotherapy of chronic HIV-1 infection can prevent or attenuate viremia upon antiviral discontinuation. Design: This was a Phase II randomized, partially double blinded, 2×2 factorial study of three steps of 12 wk/step. Step I involved four groups: (1) vaccine placebo, (2) vaccine (ALVAC, vCP1452), (3) placebo + interleukin 2 (IL-2), and (4) vaccine + IL-2. Step II involved a 12-wk diagnostic treatment interruption (DTI). Step III involved an extension of the DTI for an additional 12 wk. Setting: The Weill-Cornell General Clinical Research Center. Participants: Chronically infected HIV-1 positive adults with undetectable HIV-1 levels and > 400 CD4+ T cells/μl. Interventions An HIV canarypox vaccine (vCP1452) and vaccine placebo, administered every 4 wk for four doses, and low-dose IL-2 administered daily for 12–24 wk. Outcome measures: Primary endpoints: (1) Proportion of participants with undetectable plasma HIV RNA during trial Step II, (2) mean log10 HIV RNA copies/ml ([HIV]) from weeks 21–25, and (3) proportion of individuals eligible for trial Step III. Results: 44 participants were randomized, but 16 withdrew or were withdrawn before completing Step II. As all participants underwent viral relapse in Step II, the study was terminated after 28 participants completed Step II. Among the four groups, there was no difference in mean [HIV] or the proportion of individuals with < log10 4.48 HIV; no difference between the mean [HIV] of the two groups that received ALVAC (n = 17) versus placebo (n = 11); and no significant difference between the mean [HIV] of the two groups that received IL-2 (n = 11) versus placebo (n = 17). Conclusions: Neither ALVAC (vCP1452) nor low-dose daily IL-2 nor their combination prevented the relapse of viremia upon discontinuation of antiviral therapy.
New rat model induced by anti‐glomerular basement membrane antibody shows severe glomerular adhesion in early stage and quickly progresses to end‐stage renal failure

The aim of the present study was to introduce a new anti‐glomerular basement membrane nephritis model in which plasma creatinine levels dramatically increased only 4 weeks after a single administration of rabbit antirat glomerular basement membrane antibody in Sprague–Dawley rats. According to renal morphology, glomerular lesions characterized by mesangial expansion and adhesion of the glomerular tuft to Bowman's capsule were observed in the early stage at day 7 after disease induction; adhesion was detected in approximately 90% of glomeruli 14 days after antibody injection. After 21 days the rats exhibited pronounced glomerulosclerosis/hyalinosis and severe tubulointerstitial lesions characterized by interstitial fibrosis. Urinary podocytes excreted in nephritis rats were studied and it was found that urinary podocyte loss might be closely related to progression of renal injury. Because this new model simply and reproducibly demonstrates development of end‐stage renal disease, it will be beneficial for elucidating mechanisms by which chronic renal injury irreversibly progresses, as well as for developing therapeutic agents for chronic renal failure.
An Efficient Feature Extraction Method for Iris Recognition Based on Wavelet Transformation

— One of the most reliable biometric is the iris, due to its stability, uniqueness and noninvasive nature. One of the difficult problems in feature based iris recognition is the speed of matching, which is significantly influenced by time required for feature extraction process, size of the template database stored, . etc. In this paper, a new approach of iris image compression and feature extraction based on discrete wavelet transformation(DWT) is applied. The obtained features dimensionality were further reduced by using principle component analysis(PCA), which drastically reduces the size of the iris database images. In the matching stage, a supervised classifier is introduced, namely, k-nearest neighbor(k-NN). The classification attained was 99.5%. This result shows that the proposed technique is robust and effective compared with other recent works.
Technology acquisition channels and industry performance : An industry-level analysis of Chinese large-and medium-size manufacturing enterprises

Through an industry-level analysis of Chinese largeand medium-size manufacturing enterprises over the period of 1996–2001, this article investigates the direct and interactive contributions of four technology acquisition channels to industry performances in terms of innovation performance and productivity. These channels include in-house R&D, foreign technology transfer, domestic technology transfer, and inter-industry R&D spillover. We have found evidence of an important role of inter-industry R&D spillover in shaping and improving industry performance in China, which has been neglected by previous empirical studies concerned with Chinese industrial firms. The empirical results indicate that inter-industry R&D spillover and foreign technology transfer make significant contributions to both labour productivity and the level of total factor productivity in Chinese manufacturing industries. We have also found that in-house R&D and inter-industry R&D spillover share a complementary relationship in shaping innovation performance and total factor productivity in Chinese industry, and that in-house R&D relates to foreign technology transfer as a complement for labour productivity. Finally, on the mixed results among existing literature in the context of developing countries, this article argues that the commonly followed strategy in technology development, combined with government regulations, will play an essential role in determining the relationship between in-house R&D and foreign technology transfer. © 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. over; M
Herschel far-infrared observations of the Carina Nebula complex - I. Introduction and global cloud structure

The Carina Nebula represents one of the most massive galactic star forming regions and displays a high level of massive star feedback. We used SPIRE and PACS onboard of Herschel to map the full spatial extent of the clouds in the Carina Nebula complex at wavelengths between 70 and 500 micrometer. We determine color temperatures and column densities of the clouds in the complex. Our Herschel maps show that the clouds have a very complex and filamentary structure that is dominated by the radiation and wind feedback from the massive stars. In most locations, the column density of the clouds is N_H < 2x10^22 cm^-2; denser cloud structures are restricted to just a few locations. We find a clear large scale temperature gradient from 35-40 K in the central region to <20 K at the periphery and in the densest parts of individual pillars. The total mass of the clouds seen by Herschel in the central (1 deg radius) region is ~656000 M_sun. A simple radiative transfer model for the global spectral energy distribution suggests that the total mass of all the gas (including a warmer component that is not well traced by Herschel) is <=890000 M_sun. Despite the strong feedback from numerous massive stars that is going on since several million years, there are still several 10000 M_sun of cool cloud material present at column-densities sufficient for further star formation. Comparison of our total gas mass estimates to molecular cloud masses derived from CO line mapping suggests that as much as about 75% of all the gas is in atomic rather than molecular form.
Transmission and quantification of verocytotoxin-producing Escherichia coli O157 in dairy cattle and calves

SUMMARY Data from a field study of 14 months duration in a naturally colonized dairy herd and data from an experiment with calves were used to quantify transmission of verocytotoxin-producing Escherichia coli (VTEC O157) in cattle. For the latter, two groups of 10 calves were randomly assigned and put out in one of two pastures. From each group, five animals were experimentally inoculated with 109 c.f. u. O157 VTEC and, considered infectious, put back in their group. Each of the susceptible contact calves became positive within 6 days of being reunited. The estimate of the basic reproduction ratio (R0) in the experiment was 7·3 (95% CI 3·92–11·5), indicating that each infectious calf will infect seven other calves on average during an assumed infectious period of 28 days in a fully susceptible population. The R0 among dairy cows appeared to be about 10 times lower (0·70, 95% CI 0·48–1·04). After the transmission experiment, six contact-infected animals that were shedding continuously during the experiment were housed in a tie stall during winter. After 40 days, all six tested negative for O157 VTEC. In June, after a period of 34 weeks in which the heifers remained negative, they were put out in a clean and isolated pasture to observe whether they started shedding again. On each pasture that was infected with O157 VTEC during the transmission experiment the previous summer, newly purchased susceptible calves were placed. None of the heifers or calves started shedding during 14 weeks, indicating that both the heifers and the previously contaminated pasture did not function as reservoir of O157 VTEC.
IMPROVEMENT WSD DICTIONARY USING ANNOTATED CORPUS AND TESTING IT WITH SIMPLIFIED LESK ALGORITHM

WSD is a task with a long history in computational linguistics. It is open problem in NLP. This research focuses on increasing the accuracy of Lesk algorithm with assistant of annotated corpus using Narodowy Korpus Jezyka Polskiego (NKJP “Polish National Corpus”). The NKJP_WSI (NKJP Word Sense Inventory) is used as senses inventory. A Lesk algorithm is firstly implemented on the whole corpus (training and test) and then getting the results. This is done with assistance of special dictionary that contains all possible senses for each ambiguous word. In this implementation, the similarity equation is applied to information retrieval using tfidf with small modification in order to achieve the requirements. Experimental results show that the accuracy of 82.016% and 84.063% without and with deleting stop words respectively. Moreover, this paper practically solves the challenge of an execution time. Therefore, we proposed special structure for building another dictionary from the corpus in order to reduce time complicity of the training process. The new dictionary contains all the possible words (only these which help us in solving WSD) with their tf-idf from the existing dictionary with assistant of annotated corpus. Furthermore, eexperimental results show that the two tests are identical. The execution time - of the second test dropped down to 20 times compared to first test with same accuracy
Hyperspectral multimodal CARS microscopy in the fingerprint region

A simple scheme for multimodal coherent anti‐Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) microscopy is based on the spectral focusing of ultrafast‐oscillator‐derived pump/probe light and synchronous photonic crystal fiber (PCF) fiber‐generated broadband Stokes light. To date, such schemes allowed rapid hyperspectral imaging throughout the CH/OH high frequency region (2700–4000 cm‐1). Here we extend this approach to the middle (1640–3300 cm‐1) and fingerprint regions (850–1800 cm‐1) of the Raman spectrum. Our simple integrated approach to rapid hyperspectral CARS microscopy in the fingerprint region is demonstrated by applications to label‐free multimodal imaging of cellulose and bulk bone, including use of the phosphate resonance at 960 cm‐1. (© 2014 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)
A Novel Permanent-Magnet Flux Switching Machine With an Outer-Rotor Configuration for In-Wheel Light Traction Applications

This paper proposes a novel permanent-magnet (PM) flux switching (PMFS) machine with an outer-rotor configuration for in-wheel light traction applications. The geometric topology of the outer-rotor PMFS machine is introduced, and the analytical sizing equations are derived to determine the main design parameters of the machine. Two-dimensional finite-element analysis (FEA) models are developed to investigate and optimize the machine performance. Furthermore, the flux-weakening capability of the machine is analyzed and further improved by segmental PMs with iron bridges. The machine performance predictions by 2-D FEA models are validated by experimental tests on the prototype machine. The suitability of the proposed outer-rotor PMFS machine for in-wheel light traction application is demonstrated.
A comparison of modified reconstructability analysis and Ashenhurst‐Curtis decomposition of Boolean functions

Modified reconstructability analysis (MRA), a novel decomposition technique within the framework of set‐theoretic (crisp possibilistic) reconstructability analysis, is applied to three‐variable NPN‐classified Boolean functions. MRA is superior to conventional reconstructability analysis, i.e. it decomposes more NPN functions. MRA is compared to Ashenhurst‐Curtis (AC) decomposition using two different complexity measures: log‐functionality, a measure suitable for machine learning, and the count of the total number of two‐input gates, a measure suitable for circuit design. MRA is superior to AC using the first of these measures, and is comparable to, but different from AC, using the second.
The Assessment of the Quality of Reporting of Systematic Reviews/Meta-Analyses in Diagnostic Tests Published by Authors in China

Background The quality of reporting in systematic reviews (SRs)/meta-analyses (MAs) of diagnostic tests published by authors in China has not been evaluated. The aims of present study are to evaluate the quality of reporting in diagnostic SRs/MAs using the PRISMA statement and determine the changes in the quality of reporting over time. Methods According to the inclusion and exclusion criteria, we searched five databases including Chinese Biomedical Literature Database, PubMed, EMBASE, the Cochrane Library, and Web of knowledge, to identify SRs/MAs on diagnostic tests. The searches were conducted on July 14, 2012 and the cut off for inclusion of the SRs/MAs was December 31st 2011. The PRISMA statement was used to assess the quality of reporting. Analysis was performed using Excel 2003, RevMan 5. Results A total of 312 studies were included. Fifteen diseases systems were covered. According to the PRISMA checklist, there had been serious reporting flaws in following items: structured summary (item 2, 22.4%), objectives (item 4, 18.9%), protocol and registration (item 5, 2.6%), risk of bias across studies (item 15, 26.3%), funding (item 27, 28.8%). The subgroup analysis showed that there had been some statistically significant improvement in total compliance for 9 PRISMA items after the PRISMA was released, 6 items were statistically improved regarding funded articles, 3 items were statistically improved for CSCD articles, and there was a statistically significant increase in the proportion of reviews reporting on 22 items for SCI articles (P<0.050). Conclusion The numbers of diagnostic SRs/MAs is increasing annually. The quality of reporting has measurably been improved over the previous years. Unfortunately, there are still many deficiencies in the reporting including protocol and registration, search, risk of bias across studies, and funding. Future Chinese reviewers should address issues on these aspects.
GRAFIX: a Tool for Abstract Argumentation

GRAFIX is a graphical tool for handling abstract argumentation graphs. GRAFIX allows the edition and the presentation of argumentation graphs (or sets of graphs), and the execution of some “predefined treatments” (called “server treatments”) on the current graph(s) such as, for instance, computing various acceptability semantics, or computing the strength of arguments. GRAFIX also allows the user to introduce her own treatments (“client treatments”).
Proactive detection of collaboration conflicts

Collaborative development can be hampered when conflicts arise because developers have inconsistent copies of a shared project. We present an approach to help developers identify and resolve conflicts early, before those conflicts become severe and before relevant changes fade away in the developers' memories. This paper presents three results. First, a study of open-source systems establishes that conflicts are frequent, persistent, and appear not only as overlapping textual edits but also as subsequent build and test failures. The study spans nine open-source systems totaling 3.4 million lines of code; our conflict data is derived from 550,000 development versions of the systems. Second, using previously-unexploited information, we precisely diagnose important classes of conflicts using the novel technique of speculative analysis over version control operations. Third, we describe the design of Crystal, a publicly-available tool that uses speculative analysis to make concrete advice unobtrusively available to developers, helping them identify, manage, and prevent conflicts.