Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Proline Metabolism and Its Implications for Plant-Environment Interaction

Proline has long been known to accumulate in plants experiencing water limitation and this has driven studies of proline as a beneficial solute allowing plants to increase cellular osmolarity during water limitation. Proline metabolism also has roles in redox buffering and energy transfer and is involved in plant pathogen interaction and programmed cell death. Some of these unique roles of proline depend on the properties of proline itself, whereas others depend on the “proline cycle” of coordinated proline synthesis in the chloroplast and cytoplasm with proline catabolism in the mitochondria. The regulatory mechanisms controlling proline metabolism, intercellular and intracellular transport and connections of proline to other metabolic pathways are all important to the in vivo functions of proline metabolism. Connections of proline metabolism to the oxidative pentose phosphate pathway and glutamate-glutamine metabolism are of particular interest. The N-acetyl glutamate pathway can also produce ornithine and, potentially, proline but its role and activity are unclear. Use of model systems such as Arabidopsis thaliana to better understand both these long studied and newly emerging functions of proline can help in the design of next-generation experiments testing whether proline metabolism is a promising metabolic engineering target for improving stress resistance of economically important plants.
Methodological issues in outcome studies of at-risk infants.

OBJECTIVE To identify methodologic problems found in follow-up studies of infants at biologic and environmental risk and provide solutions and recommendations. METHODS This article is a literature review. RESULTS Problems fall into four groupings: (1) conceptualization/design issues, 2) subject population concerns, 3) procedural issues, and 4) measurement/outcome concerns. CONCLUSIONS Main-effect models are not useful; confounding and mediating variables must be identified. In addition, the following are needed: alternative analytic techniques, more precise subject selection and characterization of risk factors, geographically defined samples, broadened scope of outcome measures, and use of epidemiologic techniques.
The transitivity of choices between different response requirements.

This experiment tested the transitivity of hens' choices between response requirements differing in both form and number. In a concurrent second-order schedule procedure, 6 hens chose between two alternatives by making either key-peck or door-push responses. The reinforcement rates on the two alternatives remained constant and equal throughout conditions, but the number of responses (i.e., key pecks or door pushes) required on each alternative was varied by changing the second-order (fixed-ratio) requirements. The preferences obtained from two pairings of response requirements allowed prediction of the preferences expected in a third pairing. No intransitivities were found, implying that the response requirements lie on a common unitary scale of value. For response-based measures, the obtained preferences varied evenly around perfect, multiplicative prediction, and all satisfied strong transitivity, implying an underlying interval scale of value. For time-based measures, only moderate transitivity was satisfied, implying only an ordinal scale of value. Time-based measures were confounded with the differing times taken to complete each response requirement. The existence of such scales indicates that direct comparisons of different response requirements may be possible.
Expectation for metamaterials for antenna applications

Metamaterials are strongly expected to be useful for antenna miniaturization and high functionality. The composite right/left-handed transmission line theory has been proposed to expand to the left handed region. As a result, the degree of freedom of antenna design is enhanced and novel antenna can be achieved. In this paper, the metamaterial technologies are explained as three fields of the application. In addition, the research and development in future are shown in each application.
Sequence requirements in different steps of the pre-mRNA splicing reaction: analysis by the RNA modification-exclusion technique

The stepwise assembly of splicing complexes and the subsequent splicing reaction were analyzed by the RNA modification-exclusion technique, which generates the equivalent of a complete set of point mutations in a single reaction. We found that although the sequences surrounding the 5' splice site, the branch point, and the 3' splice site, including the 3' AG, were required for presplicing complex formation, modified nucleotides at these positions were not completely excluded. The same sequences were required for splicing complex formation; however, modified nucleotides in these sequences were excluded to a much greater extent.
Evaluation of Oral Immunization with Recombinant Avian Influenza Virus HA1 Displayed on the Lactococcus lactis Surface and Combined with the Mucosal Adjuvant Cholera Toxin Subunit B

ABSTRACT The development of safe and efficient avian influenza vaccines for human and animal uses is essential for preventing virulent outbreaks and pandemics worldwide. In this study, we constructed a recombinant (pgsA-HA1 gene fusion) Lactococcus lactis strain that expresses and displays the avian influenza virus HA1 antigens on its surface. The vectors were administered by oral delivery with or without the addition of cholera toxin subunit B (CTB). The resulting immune responses were analyzed, and the mice were eventually challenged with lethal doses of H5N1 viruses. Significant titers of hemagglutinin (HA)-specific serum IgG and fecal IgA were detected in the group that also received CTB. Cellular immunities were also shown in both cell proliferation and gamma interferon (IFN-γ) enzyme-linked immunospot (ELISpot) assays. Most importantly, the mice that received the L. lactis pgsA-HA1 strain combined with CTB were completely protected from lethal challenge of the H5N1 virus. These findings support the further development of L. lactis-based avian influenza virus vaccines for human and animal uses.
More Than a Message: Framing Public Health Advocacy to Change Corporate Practices

Framing battles in public health illustrate the tension in our society between individual freedom and collective responsibility. This article describes how two frames, market justice and social justice, first articulated in a public health context by Dan Beauchamp, influence public dialogue on the health consequences of corporate practices. The authors argue that public health advocates must articulate the social justice values motivating the changes they seek in specific policy battles that will be debated in the context of news coverage. The authors conclude with lessons for health education practitioners who need to frame public health issues in contentious and controversial policy contexts. Specific lessons include the importance of understanding the existing values and beliefs motivating the public health change being sought, the benefits of articulating core messages that correspond to shared values, and the necessity of developing media skills to compete effectively with adversaries in public debate.
Rose Germplasm Analysis with RAPD Markers

The genus Rosa consists of more than 100 species classified into four subgenera, Eurosa, Platyrhodon, Hesperhodos, and Hulthemia, and distributed widely throughout the northern hemisphere. The subgenus Eurosa includes 11 sections. The other subgenera are monotypic. One hundred and nineteen accessions and 213 markers of 36 rose species that include eight sections of the subgenus Eurosa and one species each from the subgenera Hesperhodos and Platyrhodon were used to calculate a similarity matrix, which was clustered with the unweighted pair group method using arithmetic means (UPGMA). The RAPD markers distinguished between all the rose accessions, and species grouped into their respective sections. Therefore, classification of Rosa using RAPD data generally supports traditional classification. The Asian rose sections ( Laevigatae, Banksianae, Bracteatae, Pimpinellifoliae, Chinenses, and Synstylae) were consistently separated from the primarily North American sections (Cassiorhodon and Carolinae). The Cassiorhodon and Carolinae sections were grouped together with the subgenera Hesperhodos and Platyrhodon. Both subgenera separated out at the same level as sections within the subgenus Eurosa, suggesting that they are more appropriately classified as sections within the subgenus Eurosa. Sections Cassiorhodon and Carolinae overlapped, and are probably best grouped as one section as previously suggested.
A RSSI-based technique for inter-distance computation in Multi-Robot Systems

Multi-Robot Systems, i.e., collections of robots which cooperate to achieve a common goal, have become more and more appealing over the years to the robotics community. Research interests come from the several advantages that a multi-robot approach offers over traditional single complex robotic system approaches, such as a larger range of task domains or a higher robustness and flexibility. A primary concern is how to effectively achieve a cooperative behavior in multi-robot systems. Indeed, formation control turned out to be an important technique to achieve this goal. However, the majority of the approaches available in the literature assumes robots to be able to measure inter-distances among them. For this reason, in this paper we focus our attention on providing a reliable technique to compute inter-distances among robots. Experimental results, carried out by exploiting Xbee-Pro radio transceiver, are given to show the effectiveness of the proposed technique.
Towards API-specific automatic program repair

The domain of Automatic Program Repair (APR) had many research contributions in recent years. So far, most approaches target fixing generic bugs in programs (e.g., off-by-one errors). Nevertheless, recent studies reveal that about 50% of real bugs require API-specific fixes (e.g., adding missing API method calls or correcting method ordering), for which existing APR approaches are not designed. In this paper, we address this problem and introduce the notion of an API-specific program repair mechanism. This mechanism detects erroneous code in a similar way to existing APR approaches. However, to fix such bugs, it uses API-specific information from the erroneous code to search for API usage patterns in other software, with which we could fix the bug. We provide first insights on the applicability of this mechanism and discuss upcoming research challenges.
Contributions of Subsurface Cortical Modulations to Discrimination of Executed and Imagined Grasp Forces through Stereoelectroencephalography

Stereoelectroencephalographic (SEEG) depth electrodes have the potential to record neural activity from deep brain structures not easily reached with other intracranial recording technologies. SEEG electrodes were placed through deep cortical structures including central sulcus and insular cortex. In order to observe changes in frequency band modulation, participants performed force matching trials at three distinct force levels using two different grasp configurations: a power grasp and a lateral pinch. Signals from these deeper structures were found to contain information useful for distinguishing force from rest trials as well as different force levels in some participants. High frequency components along with alpha and beta bands recorded from electrodes located near the primary motor cortex wall of central sulcus and electrodes passing through sensory cortex were found to be the most useful for classification of force versus rest although one participant did have significant modulation in the insular cortex. This study electrophysiologically corroborates with previous imaging studies that show force-related modulation occurs inside of central sulcus and insular cortex. The results of this work suggest that depth electrodes could be useful tools for investigating the functions of deeper brain structures as well as showing that central sulcus and insular cortex may contain neural signals that could be used for control of a grasp force BMI.
Multiple Skip Connections and Dilated Convolutions for Semantic Segmentation

We propose a scale-aware semantic segmentation method specifically for small objects. The contributions of this method are 1) to feed the features of a small region by using multiple skip connections, and 2) to extract context from multiple receptive fields by using multiple dilated convolution blocks. The proposed method has achieved high accuracy in the Cityscapes dataset. In comparison with state-of-the-art methods, it has achieved a comparative performance in category IoU and iIoU metrics.
Excitons in van der Waals heterostructures: The important role of dielectric screening

The existence of strongly bound excitons is one of the hallmarks of the newly discovered atomically thin semi-conductors. While it is understood that the large binding energy is mainly due to the weak dielectric screening in two dimensions (2D), a systematic investigation of the role of screening on 2D excitons is still lacking. Here we provide a critical assessment of a widely used 2D hydrogenic exciton model which assumes a dielectric function of the form {\epsilon}(q) = 1 + 2{\pi}{\alpha}q, and we develop a quasi-2D model with a much broader applicability. Within the quasi-2D picture, electrons and holes are described as in-plane point charges with a finite extension in the perpendicular direction and their interaction is screened by a dielectric function with a non-linear q-dependence which is computed ab-initio. The screened interaction is used in a generalized Mott-Wannier model to calculate exciton binding energies in both isolated and supported 2D materials. For isolated 2D materials, the quasi-2D treatment yields results almost identical to those of the strict 2D model and both are in good agreement with ab-initio many-body calculations. On the other hand, for more complex structures such as supported layers or layers embedded in a van der Waals heterostructure, the size of the exciton in reciprocal space extends well beyond the linear regime of the dielectric function and a quasi-2D description has to replace the 2D one. Our methodology has the merit of providing a seamless connection between the strict 2D limit of isolated monolayer materials and the more bulk-like screening characteristics of supported 2D materials or van der Waals heterostructures.
A safe area search and map building algorithm for a wheeled mobile robot in complex unknown cluttered environments

SUMMARY In this paper, a safe map building and area search algorithm for a mobile robot in a closed unknown environment with obstacles is presented. A range finder sensor is used to detect the environment. The objective is to perform a complete search of the environment and build a complete map of it while avoiding collision with the obstacles. The developed robot navigation algorithm is randomized. It is proved that with probability 1 the robot completes its task in a finite time. Computer simulations and experiments with a real Pioneer-3DX robot confirm the performance of the proposed method.
Genetic Analysis of Ten Gonosomal STR Loci in an Italian Population Using the Elucigene QSTR-XY Amplification Kit

Genotyping of X-chromosomal short tandem repeats (X-STRs) is an emerging tool in forensic genetics because of its inheritance pattern, and a large number of markers has been characterized. Quantitative fluorescence polymerase chain reaction (QF-PCR) analyses of STR markers on the X-chromosome are performed routinely in medical genetics laboratories for the rapid detection of aneuploidy in chromosome X. In this study, 595 Italian participants were genotyped at 10 gonosomal STRs (DXS680, DXS98, DXS6807, DXS1187, XHPRT, DXS742, DXS6809, DXYS267, DXYS218, and DYS448) using a commercially available QF-PCR kit. Here, we report the allele architecture of DXS1187 and DXYS218, which have not previously been characterized for forensic use. The presence and extent of genetic linkage and linkage disequilibrium between all X-STRs were estimated. Allele and haplotype frequencies in the Italian population were assessed and reported together with statistical parameters.
Emotional reactions in women in late pregnancy (24 weeks or longer) following the ultrasound diagnosis of a severe or lethal fetal malformation

We studied the emotional reactions of 41 women in late pregnancy shortly after they had been informed of the diagnosis of ‘severe or lethal fetal malformations’ and 3 months after delivery. In addition, situational variables were explored as determinants of grieving. While grief did not diminish during the study period, psychological instability was less pronounced at 3 months after delivery. More grief reactions were evoked by self‐reported easily versus self‐reported not easily initiated pregnancy, gestational age between 24 and 34 weeks versus beyond 34 weeks, multiparity versus primiparity, and viewing versus not viewing the baby.
Efficiency of analytical and sampling-based uncertainty propagation in intensity-modulated proton therapy

The sensitivity of intensity-modulated proton therapy (IMPT) treatment plans to uncertainties can be quantified and mitigated with robust/min-max and stochastic/probabilistic treatment analysis and optimization techniques. Those methods usually rely on sparse random, importance, or worst-case sampling. Inevitably, this imposes a trade-off between computational speed and accuracy of the uncertainty propagation. Here, we investigate analytical probabilistic modeling (APM) as an alternative for uncertainty propagation and minimization in IMPT that does not rely on scenario sampling. APM propagates probability distributions over range and setup uncertainties via a Gaussian pencil-beam approximation into moments of the probability distributions over the resulting dose in closed form. It supports arbitrary correlation models and allows for efficient incorporation of fractionation effects regarding random and systematic errors. We evaluate the trade-off between run-time and accuracy of APM uncertainty computations on three patient datasets. Results are compared against reference computations facilitating importance and random sampling. Two approximation techniques to accelerate uncertainty propagation and minimization based on probabilistic treatment plan optimization are presented. Runtimes are measured on CPU and GPU platforms, dosimetric accuracy is quantified in comparison to a sampling-based benchmark (5000 random samples). APM accurately propagates range and setup uncertainties into dose uncertainties at competitive run-times (GPU ⩽5 min). The resulting standard deviation (expectation value) of dose show average global γ3%/3 mm pass rates between 94.2% and 99.9% (98.4% and 100.0%). All investigated importance sampling strategies provided less accuracy at higher run-times considering only a single fraction. Considering fractionation, APM uncertainty propagation and treatment plan optimization was proven to be possible at constant time complexity, while run-times of sampling-based computations are linear in the number of fractions. Using sum sampling within APM, uncertainty propagation can only be accelerated at the cost of reduced accuracy in variance calculations. For probabilistic plan optimization, we were able to approximate the necessary pre-computations within seconds, yielding treatment plans of similar quality as gained from exact uncertainty propagation. APM is suited to enhance the trade-off between speed and accuracy in uncertainty propagation and probabilistic treatment plan optimization, especially in the context of fractionation. This brings fully-fledged APM computations within reach of clinical application.
A particle swarm optimization method applied to global optimization of inverse problem

Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) is a global optimal algorithm based on swarm intelligence. PSO is more popular due to its easiness in implementation and fast convergence speed. However, PSO will be trapped into local optima while it is used to solve complex, multimodal inverse problems. To establish a proper balance between the exploration and exploitation searches, this paper introduces a dynamic and adaptive mechanism for the three basic parameters. To preserve the diversity of the swarm, a particular best particle, which takes part in a mutation operation, is introduced in the modified PSO. The numerical results on a case study show that the proposed PSO finds the best results as compared to other ones.
The Effect of Azithromycin on the Pharmacokinetics of Indinavir

This study was performed to examine the effect of the coadministration of azithromycin on the pharmacokinetics of the protease inhibitor indinavir (Crixivan®). In an open‐label, parallel‐design study, 32 healthy male and female volunteers were given indinavir (800 mg tid) for 5 days. One hour prior to the first dose of indinavir on day 5, 18 subjects received 1200 mg azithromycin (Zithromax®), and 14 subjects received matching placebo. Serial samples of plasma were obtained for 8 hours following the morning dose of indinavir on days 4 and 5 and assayed for indinavir by HPLC/UV. Twenty‐seven subjects completed the study. Following coadministration of azithromycin with indinavir, there was no significant change between day 5 and day 4 in AUC (20.7 mg•hr/ml and 23.1 mg•hr/ml; 90% CI on the ratio 81%‐100%) or Cmax (9.88 mg/ml and 10.3 mg/ml; 90% CI 86%‐108%). The day 5 to day 4 difference in indinavir concentrations following coadministration with azithromycin was not significantly different from the day 5 to day 4 difference with placebo (AUC p = 0.68; Cmax p = 0.074). Therefore, azithromycin does not significantly alter the kinetics of indinavir.
Atmospheric Dynamics of Earth‐Like Tidally Locked Aquaplanets

We present simulations of atmospheres of Earth‐like aquaplanets that are tidally locked to their star, that is, planets whose orbital period is equal to the rotation period about their spin axis, so that one side always faces the star and the other side is always dark. Such simulations are of interest in the study of tidally locked terrestrial exoplanets and as illustrations of how planetary rotation and the insolation distribution shape climate. As extreme cases illustrating the effects of slow and rapid rotation, we consider planets with rotation periods equal to one current Earth year and one current Earth day. The dynamics responsible for the surface climate (e.g., winds, temperature, precipitation) and the general circulation of the atmosphere are discussed in light of existing theories of atmospheric circulations. For example, as expected from the increasing importance of Coriolis accelerations relative to inertial accelerations as the rotation rate increases, the winds are approximately isotropic and divergent at leading order in the slowly rotating atmosphere but are predominantly zonal and rotational in the rapidly rotating atmosphere. Free‐atmospheric horizontal temperature variations in the slowly rotating atmosphere are generally weaker than in the rapidly rotating atmosphere. Interestingly, the surface temperature on the night side of the planets does not fall below ∼240 K in either the rapidly or slowly rotating atmosphere; that is, heat transport from the day side to the night side of the planets efficiently reduces temperature contrasts in either case. Rotational waves and eddies shape the distribution of winds, temperature, and precipitation in the rapidly rotating atmosphere; in the slowly rotating atmosphere, these distributions are controlled by simpler divergent circulations. Both the slowly and rapidly rotating atmospheres exhibit equatorial superrotation. Systematic variation of the planetary rotation rate shows that the equatorial superrotation varies non‐monotonically with rotation rate, whereas the surface temperature contrast between the day side and the night side does not vary strongly with changes in rotation rate.