Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Study of Microstructure Evolution during Semi-Solid Processing of an In-Situ Al Alloy Composite

In the present work, effect of pouring temperature (650°C, 655°C, and 660°C) on semi-solid microstructure evolution of in-situ magnesium silicide (Mg2Si) reinforced aluminum (Al) alloy composite has been studied. The shear force exerted by the cooling slope during gravity driven flow of the melt facilitates the formation of near spherical primary Mg2Si and primary Al grains. Shear driven melt flow along the cooling slope and grain fragmentation have been identified as the responsible mechanisms for refinement of primary Mg2Si and Al grains with improved sphericity. Results show that, while flowing down the cooling slope, morphology of primary Mg2Si and primary Al transformed gradually from coarse dendritic to mixture of near spherical particles, rosettes, and degenerated dendrites. In terms of minimum grain size and maximum sphericity, 650°C has been identified as the ideal pouring temperature for the cooling slope semi-solid processing of present Al alloy composite. Formation of spheroidal grains with homogeneous distribution of reinforcing phase (Mg2Si) improves the isotropic property of the said composite, which is desirable in most of the engineering applications.
Highly Stable Liquid Metal-Based Pressure Sensor Integrated with a Microfluidic Channel

Pressure measurement is considered one of the key parameters in microfluidic systems. It has been widely used in various fields, such as in biology and biomedical fields. The electrical measurement method is the most widely investigated; however, it is unsuitable for microfluidic systems because of a complicated fabrication process and difficult integration. Moreover, it is generally damaged by large deflection. This paper proposes a thin-film-based pressure sensor that is free from these limitations, using a liquid metal called galinstan. The proposed pressure sensor is easily integrated into a microfluidic system using soft lithography because galinstan exists in a liquid phase at room temperature. We investigated the characteristics of the proposed pressure sensor by calibrating for a pressure range from 0 to 230 kPa (R2 > 0.98) using deionized water. Furthermore, the viscosity of various fluid samples was measured for a shear-rate range of 30–1000 s−1. The results of Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids were evaluated using a commercial viscometer and normalized difference was found to be less than 5.1% and 7.0%, respectively. The galinstan-based pressure sensor can be used in various microfluidic systems for long-term monitoring with high linearity, repeatability, and long-term stability.
Gene regulatory networks by transcription factors and microRNAs in breast cancer

MOTIVATION Gene regulatory networks (GRNs) affect numerous cellular processes and every process of life, and abnormalities of GRN lead to breast cancer. Transcription factors (TFs) and microRNAs (miRNAs) are two of the best-studied gene regulatory mechanisms. However, the architecture and feature of GRNs by TFs and miRNAs in breast cancer and its subtypes were unknown. In this study, we investigated the GRNs by TFs and miRNAs with emphasis on breast cancer classifier genes at system level.
Gas Absorption by wavy Falling Liquid Film Formed on Inner Surface of Vertical Tubes

An experimental study on gas absorption into falling liquid film formed on inner surface of vertical tubes has been carried out in order to clarify fundamental characteristics of the gas absorption and enhancement by surface waves,The water supplied into the test tubes is periodically disturbed by flucturating a silicon tube before the test section with a speaker and the wavy films absorb the oxygen filled in the tubes.Imposing the periodic disturbance enhances the gas absorption and the enhancement has a maximum at around 20-30Hz,Where the gas absorption is 20-30% higher,Mass transfer coefficinets obtained with five tubes agree well with those obtained with single tube.Two-dimensional numerical simulations have also been conducted for gas absorption by wavy film and the enhancement mechanism of the gas absorption is discussed.
Network-Based Disease Candidate Gene Prioritization: Towards Global Diffusion in Heterogeneous Association Networks

Disease candidate gene prioritization addresses the association of novel genes with disease susceptibility or progression. Network-based approaches explore the connectivity properties of biological networks to compute an association score between candidate and diseaserelated genes. Although several methods have been proposed to date, a number of concerns arise: (i) most networks used rely exclusively on curated physical interactions, resulting in poor coverage of the Human genome and leading to sparsity issues; (ii) most methods fail to incorporate interaction confidence weights; (iii) in some cases, relevance scores are computed as local measures based on the direct interactions with the disease-related genes, ignoring potentially relevant indirect interactions. In this study, we seek a robust network-based strategy by evaluating the performance of selected prioritization strategies using genes known to be involved in 29 different diseases.
Electrophysiology of the Elasmobranch Stomach

A consequence of the recent study of the mechanism of gastric secretion has been the presumption, implicit (1) if not explicit (2), that the distinctive gastric transmucosal potential has a fundamental role in the formation of hydrochloric acid. The following report indicates that the isolated surviving elasmobranch gastric mucosa does secrete acid but, unlike that of other vertebrates, does so without developing a significant epithelial potential difference. The gastric transmembrane potential is neither necessary for hydrogen ion secretion nor is its generation a fundamental feature of the mechanism that leads to the formation of hydrochloric acid.
Automatic Extraction of Distance Information from Stereo Images using Tracking Data - In the Scanning Electron Microscope

This paper describes an approach to depth detection in scanning electron microscope images which aims at the automation of nanohandling procedures. It incorporates simultaneous tracking of an object in a stereo image pair, generated using a self-built magnetic lens for tilting the electron beam. Object depth is concluded from the object displacement. The tracking procedure is based on the active contours method, adjusted by a region based energy function. An automatic contour initialization is presented that makes use of edge detection. All methods described have been implemented and tested extensively in the designated automation environment. The approach is found to provide very accurate depth estimates even at a small level of magnification.
End-Host Multicast Communication Using Switch-Trees Protocols

Switch-trees are peer-to-peer algorithms for building and improving end-host multicast trees. Nodes switch parents to reduce tree cost or lower source-member latency. A node switches parents by disconnecting from its parent and reconnecting to a new parent. If the new parent is well chosen, the performance of the tree is improved overall. We look at the performance of switch-trees using the following metrics: cost, latency, link stress and number of switches. Simulations show switch-tree algorithms can build trees of hundreds of nodes at less than twice the optimal cost. In addition, we describe our implementation of a switch-tree protocol. Experiments show that our protocol builds low-cost trees in practice.
Laban Effort and Shape Analysis of Affective Hand and Arm Movements

The Laban Effort and Shape components provide a systematic tool for a compact and informative description of the dynamic qualities of movements. To enable the application of Laban notation in computational movement analysis, measurable physical correlates of Effort and Shape components need to be identified. Such physical correlates enable quantification of Effort and Shape components, which in turn facilitates computational analysis of affective movements. In this work, two existing approaches to quantification of Laban Effort components (Weight, Time, Space, and Flow) based on measurable movement features (position, velocity, acceleration, and jerk) are adapted for hand and arm movements, and a new approach for quantifying Shape Directional based on the average trajectory curvature is proposed. The results show a high correlation between Laban annotations provided by a certified movement analyst (CMA) and the quantified Effort Weight (81%), Time (77%) and Shape Directional (93%) for an affective hand and arm movement dataset.
β-Catenin Is Essential and Sufficient for Skeletal Myogenesis in P19 Cells*

Wnt1 and Wnt3a are signaling factors known to play a role in the induction of myogenesis in the myotome of the differentiating somite. Both factors may transduce their signal by a conserved pathway that leads to transcriptional regulation by β-catenin/Lef1. β-Catenin and Lef1 are found in the myotome prior to MyoD expression. We have utilized the P19 cell system to study the mechanisms by which Wnt3a may activate MyoD expression and subsequent skeletal muscle development. We have isolated P19 cell lines that stably express either Wnt3a or activated β-catenin and found that aggregation of these cells results in the induction of myogenesis compared with control cells. Pax3, Gli2, Mox1, and Six1 were expressed during Wnt3a and β-catenin-induced differentiation prior to MyoD expression. Furthermore, we have shown that the nuclear function of β-catenin was essential for skeletal myogenesis in P19 cells by overexpression of a dominant negative β-catenin/engrailed chimera. Primitive streak factors were present, but expression of Pax3, Mox1, Gli2, and Six1 was lost in these cells, indicating that nuclear β-catenin is essential for specification of mesodermal precursors to the myogenic lineage. Therefore, Wnt signaling, acting via β-catenin, is necessary and sufficient for skeletal myogenesis in P19 cells.
Urban Object Extraction from Digital Surface Model and Digital Aerial Images

Abstract. The paper describes two different methods for extraction of two types of urban objects from lidar digital surface model (DSM) and digital aerial images. Within the preprocessing digital terrain model (DTM) and orthoimages for three test areas were generated from aerial images using automatic photogrammetric methods. Automatic building extraction was done using DSM and multispectral orthoimages. First, initial building mask was created from the normalized digital surface model (nDSM), then vegetation was eliminated from the building mask using multispectral orthoimages. The final building mask was produced employing several morphological operations and buildings were vectorised using Hough transform. Automatic extraction of other green urban features (trees and natural ground) started from orthoimages using iterative object-based classification. This method required careful selection of segmentation parameters; in addition to basic spectral bands also information from nDSM was included. After the segmentation of images the segments were classified based on their attributes (spatial, spectral, geometrical, texture) using rule set classificator. First iteration focused on visible (i.e. unshaded) urban features, and second iteration on objects in deep shade. Results from both iterations were merged into appropriate classes. Evaluation of the final results (completeness, correctness and quality) was carried out on a per-area level and on a per-object level by ISPRS Commission III, WG III/4.
Effect of lubricant additives in rolling contact fatigue

Abstract Lubricant formulations for manual gear box applications are optimized for gear contacts although rolling element bearings are lubricated with the same fully formulated oil. This may cause fatigue-related damage to these bearings. Several explanations can be considered, but this work focuses on the effect of additives contained in the lubricant. Rolling contact fatigue tests were performed on a twin-disc machine. Artificial dents generated by a Rockwell penetrator were made on the faster surface in order to accelerate the fatigue phenomena. Then, pure rolling and 6.7 per cent slip (slide-to-roll ratio (SRR)) tests were performed with different lubricants (pure base oil, fully formulated oil, and base oil with detergent and anti-foam). Fatigue life results and spalling morphologies are compared. For the sample obtained with the fully formulated oil and 6.7 per cent of SRR, crack analysis was performed. Using focus-ion-beam technique, a spalled sample was milled to reveal a cross-section of a crack. Secondary electron microscopy (SEM) images were taken and energy-dispersive X-ray spectrometry (EDX) analyses along the crack were performed. Additive elements are detected up to the crack tip. Auger electron spectroscopy depth profiling was also performed in the tribofilm generated on the disc surface. The role of additives in rolling contact fatigue is discussed in the light of these results.
Social learning with uninformed agents: Convergence and efficiency

Almost all existing social learning models assume that each agent can perceive her private signal which is used in updating her belief. In this work, we assume that there are some uninformed agents in the network which cannot observe their private signals and update their beliefs just based on the beliefs of their neighbors. We prove that under mild assumptions, even one informed agent is enough to lead all agents in the network eventually learn the true state of the world almost surely. Furthermore, we show through simulation that in a heterogeneous undirected network, it is more efficient to have a few hub agents as the informed agents which can observe their signals, and the convergence speed is almost the same as that when all agents are informed agents.
Clinical application of high-contrast three-dimensional imaging of the retina, choroid, and optic nerve with three-dimensional Fourier domain optical coherence tomography

We present three dimensional (3D) imaging of macular diseases and glaucoma with high speed, Fourier domain optical coherence tomography (FD-OCT). Our FD-OCT system allows video rate cross-sectional imaging with 98 dB sensitivity and 4.3 μm depth-resolution in tissue. This performance results in high contrast sectional images that enhance visualization of fine retinal layers including external limiting membrane and of deep structure such as the choroid and optic nerve. Volume rendering of 3D OCT data set taken for 3.5 seconds provides realistic 3D images of macular, optic disc and their pathologic changes. This manuscript will show the methods for three dimensional FD-OCT including a raster scanning protocol for volume rendering and cancellation of the motion artifact of eye balls, and the application of the high contrast three dimensional OCT imaging to macular diseases and glaucoma in clinical examination.
High Purity Ethyl Acetate Production with a Batch Reactive Distillation Column using Dynamic Optimization Strategy

 Abstract—Ethyl acetate with the minimum purity of 85.0% by mole is inevitably needed as an active solvent used in a wide range of applications across many industries. It is normally produced by the esterification of ethanol and acetic acid. Due to the equilibrium limitation, it has been reported that the ethyl acetate with the maximum purity of 52.0% can be obtained in a batch reactor. To achieve higher purity, further purification unit is added with the use of some energy. Alternatively, to overcome the limitation, a batch reactive distillation column, combining the reaction and separation into a single stage, is proposed. The ethyl acetate is always distilled and withdrawn out the reaction zone and the equilibrium is shifted to the right. The reactant conversion is then improved. Therefore, the objective of this work is to study an approach to produce ethyl acetate with the purity of 90.0% by mole by a batch reactive distillation column. Based on open loop simulations, the distillation with constant reflux ratio cannot achieve the product specification. Thus, dynamic optimization strategy is proposed to handle this problem. The optimization problem is formulated to maximize the weight of distillate product for a given product specification, reboiler heat duty, and batch operating time. For the process safety—preventing the dried column and fractured, minimum reflux ratio must be determined in advance and then an optimal reflux profile is calculated to achieve optimal product yield. Simulation results show that 90.0% purity of distillate product can be produced by the dynamic optimization programming with two or more time intervals. Besides, the higher time intervals results in the higher
New Paradigms in Mantle Cell Lymphoma: Is It Time to Risk-Stratify Treatment Based on the Proliferative Signature?

The elucidation of crucial biologic pathways of cell survival and proliferation has led to the development of highly effective drugs, some of which have markedly improved mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) therapeutic opportunities in the past 10 years. Moreover, an undeniable clinical heterogeneity in treatment response and disease behavior has become apparent in this neoplasm. Thus, the need for biologic markers stratifying patients with MCL in risk classes deserving different treatment approaches has recently been fervently expressed. Among several newly discovered biomarkers, the dismal predictive value of a high proliferative signature has been broadly recognized in large studies of patients with MCL. Different techniques have been used to assess tumor cell proliferation, including mitotic index, immunostaining with Ki-67 antibody, and gene expression profiling. Ki-67 proliferative index, in particular, has been extensively investigated, and its negative impact on relapse incidence and overall survival has been validated in large prospective clinical trials. However, one important pitfall limiting its widespread use in clinical practice is the reported interobserver variability, due to the previous lack of a standardized approach for quantification among different laboratories. In the present review, we describe some of the major techniques to assess cell proliferation in MCL, focusing in particular on the Ki-67 index and its need for a standardized approach to be used in multicenter clinical trials. The value of MCL biologic prognostic scores (as MIPI-b) is discussed, along with our proposal on how to integrate these scores in the planning of future trials investigating a tailored therapeutic approach for patients with MCL. See all articles in this CCR Focus section, “Paradigm Shifts in Lymphoma. ” Clin Cancer Res; 20(20); 5194–206. ©2014 AACR.
POSBIOTM-NER in the Shared Task of BioNLP/NLPBA2004

Two classifiers -- Support Vector Machine (SVM) and Conditional Random Fields (CRFs) are applied here for the recognition of biomedical named entities. According to their different characteristics, the results of two classifiers are merged to achieve better performance. We propose an automatic corpus expansion method for SVM and CRF to overcome the shortage of the annotated training data. In addition, we incorporate a keyword-based post-processing step to deal with the remaining problems such as assigning an appropriate named entity tag to the word/phrase containing parentheses.
A Hybrid Optimization Algorithm Based on Bat and Cuckoo Search

In order to solve the problems of bat algorithm including low convergence accuracy, slow convergence velocity and easily falling into local optimization, this paper presents an improved bat algorithm based on differential evolution algorithm. The mutation, crossover and selection mechanism of differential evolution algorithm is introduced into bat algorithm, the bat algorithm lack of mutation mechanism has the variation mechanism, so as to enhance the diversity of bat algorithm, the population can avoid falling into local optimum, which enhances the ability of global optimization for bat algorithm. The Simulation results of three standard benchmark functions show that the improved algorithm can greatly improve the convergence precision, convergence speed and robustness, and can effectively discourage the premature convergence.
Prevalence of severe esophagitis in Spain. Results of the PRESS study (Prevalence and Risk factors for Esophagitis in Spain: A cross-sectional study)

Background *N.P. and M.P. contributed equally to this study. The current prevalence of esophagitis in southern Europe is unknown. In addition, the risk factors for reflux esophagitis are not fully understood. Objective The objective of this article is to assess the prevalence and risk factors for esophagitis in Spain. Methods A prospective, observational, cross-sectional, multicenter study (PRESS study) was conducted among 31 gastrointestinal endoscopy units throughout Spain. A total of 1361 patients undergoing upper gastrointestinal endoscopy were enrolled. Sociodemographic, clinical and treatment data were recorded. Results A total of 95% of patients were Caucasian and 52% were male (mean age: 53 ± 17 years). The most frequent symptoms prompting endoscopy were heartburn (40%), regurgitation (26%) and dysphagia (15%). Fifty-four percent of patients undergoing endoscopy were receiving proton pump inhibitor (PPI) treatment. Esophagitis (mainly mild-moderate) was present in 154 (12.4%) patients. The severe form was recorded in only 11 (0.8%) patients. Multivariate analysis results indicated that the likelihood of esophagitis was higher in men (OR = 1.91, 95% CI = 1.31–2.78), in patients with high GERD-Q scores (OR = 1.256, 95% CI = 1.176–1.343), weight increase (OR = 1.014, 95% CI = 1.003–1.025) and high alcohol consumption (OR = 2.49, 95% CI = 1.16–5.36). Conclusion Severe esophagitis is a rare finding in the Spanish population. Male gender, high GERD-Q score, weight increase and high alcohol consumption are main risk factors for its appearance.