Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Adult attachment style and caregiver attitudes after raising a virtual child

Avoidance in adults is related to many negative aspects of caregiving and parenting. This was examined in a simulated parenting experience of 145 students who raised a virtual child from birth to age 19 using the website MyVirtualChild©. Avoidance and anxiety within adult relationships were assessed using the Experiences in Close Relationships–Relationship Structures questionnaire before and after this experience, and caregiver attitudes of positive feelings, perceptions of the child’s security, and willingness to serve as an attachment figure were assessed after the experience. As predicted, avoidance and anxiety were negatively related to caregiver attitudes, with avoidance accounting for these relations. These results support the negative impact of avoidance on caregiver attitudes, even when the child is raised in Cyberspace.
Larval dispersal connects fish populations in a network of marine protected areas

Networks of no-take marine protected areas (MPAs) have been widely advocated for the conservation of marine biodiversity. But for MPA networks to be successful in protecting marine populations, individual MPAs must be self-sustaining or adequately connected to other MPAs via dispersal. For marine species with a dispersive larval stage, populations within MPAs require either the return of settlement-stage larvae to their natal reserve or connectivity among reserves at the spatial scales at which MPA networks are implemented. To date, larvae have not been tracked when dispersing from one MPA to another, and the relative magnitude of local retention and connectivity among MPAs remains unknown. Here we use DNA parentage analysis to provide the first direct estimates of connectivity of a marine fish, the orange clownfish (Amphiprion percula), in a proposed network of marine reserves in Kimbe Bay, Papua New Guinea. Approximately 40% of A. percula larvae settling into anemones in an island MPA at 2 different times were derived from parents resident in the reserve. We also located juveniles spawned by Kimbe Island residents that had dispersed as far as 35 km to other proposed MPAs, the longest distance that marine larvae have been directly tracked. These dispersers accounted for up to 10% of the recruitment in the adjacent MPAs. Our findings suggest that MPA networks can function to sustain resident populations both by local replenishment and through larval dispersal from other reserves. More generally, DNA parentage analysis provides a direct method for measuring larval dispersal for other marine organisms.
Universal correlation for the rise velocity of long gas bubbles in round pipes

We collected all of the published data we could find on the rise velocity of long gas bubbles in stagnant fluids contained in circular tubes. Data from 255 experiments from the literature and seven new experiments at PDVSA Intevep for fluids with viscosities ranging from 1 mPa s up to 3900 mPa s were assembled on spread sheets and processed in log–log plots of the normalized rise velocity, $\hbox{\it Fr} \,{=}\,U/(gD)^{1/2}$ Froude velocity vs. buoyancy Reynolds number, $R\,{=}\,(D^{3}g (\rho_{l}-\rho_{g}) \rho_{l})^{1/2}/\mu $ for fixed ranges of the Eötvös number, $\hbox{\it Eo}\,{=}\,g\rho_{l}D^{2}/\sigma $ where $D$ is the pipe diameter, $\rho_{l}$, $\rho_{g}$ and $\sigma$ are densities and surface tension. The plots give rise to power laws in $Eo$; the composition of these separate power laws emerge as bi-power laws for two separate flow regions for large and small buoyancy Reynolds. For large $R$ ($>200$) we find \[\hbox{\it Fr} = {0.34}/(1+3805/\hbox{\it Eo}^{3.06})^{0.58}. \] For small $R$ ($<10$) we find \[ \hbox{\it Fr} = \frac{9.494\times 10^{-3}}{({1+{6197}/\hbox{\it Eo}^{2.561}})^{0.5793}}R^{1.026}. \] The flat region for high buoyancy Reynolds number and sloped region for low buoyancy Reynolds number is separated by a transition region ($10\,{<}\,R\,{<}\, 200$) which we describe by fitting the data to a logistic dose curve. Repeated application of logistic dose curves leads to a composition of rational fractions of rational fractions of power laws. This leads to the following universal correlation: \[ \hbox{\it Fr} = L[{R;A,B,C,G}] \equiv \frac{A}{({1+({{R}/{B}})^C})^G} \] where \[ A = L[\hbox{\it Eo};a,b,c,d],\quad B = L[\hbox{\it Eo};e,f,g,h],\quad C = L[\hbox{\it Eo};i,j,k,l],\quad G = m/C \] and the parameters ($a, b,\ldots,l$) are \begin{eqnarray*} &&\hspace*{-5pt}a \hspace*{-0.8pt}\,{=}\,\hspace*{-0.8pt} 0.34;\quad b\hspace*{-0.8pt} \,{=}\,\hspace*{-0.8pt} 14.793;\quad c\hspace*{-0.8pt} \,{=}\,\hspace*{-0.6pt}{-}3.06;\quad d\hspace*{-0.6pt} \,{=}\, \hspace*{-0.6pt}0.58;\quad e\hspace*{-0.6pt} \,{=}\,\hspace*{-0.6pt} 31.08;\quad f\hspace*{-0.6pt} \,{=}\, \hspace*{-0.6pt}29.868;\quad g\hspace*{-0.6pt}\,{ =}\,\hspace*{-0.6pt}{ -}1.96;\\ &&\hspace*{-5pt}h = -0.49;\quad i = -1.45;\quad j = 24.867;\quad k = -9.93;\quad l = -0.094;\quad m = -1.0295. \end{eqnarray*} The literature on this subject is reviewed together with a summary of previous methods of prediction. New data and photographs collected at PDVSA-Intevep on the rise of Taylor bubbles is presented.
Homogentisate 1-2-Dioxygenase Downregulation in the Chronic Persistence of Pseudomonas aeruginosa Australian Epidemic Strain-1 in the CF Lung

Some Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains including Australian Epidemic Strain-1 (AES-1 or AUS-01) cause persistent chronic infection in cystic fibrosis (CF) patients, with greater morbidity and mortality. Factors conferring persistence are largely unknown. Previously we analysed the transcriptomes of AES-1 grown in Luria broth, nematode growth medium for Caenorhabditis elegans assay (both aerobic) and artificial sputum medium (mainly hypoxic). Transcriptional comparisons included chronic AES-1 strains against PAO1 and acute AES-1 (AES-1R) against its chronic isogen (AES-1M), isolated 10.5 years apart from a CF patient and not eradicated in the meantime. Prominent amongst genes downregulated in AES-1M in all comparisons was homogentisate-1-2-dioxygenase (hmgA); an oxygen-dependent gene known to be mutationally deactivated in many chronic infection strains of P. aeruginosa. To investigate if hmgA downregulation and deactivation gave similar virulence persistence profiles, a hmgA mutant made in UCBPP-PA14 utilising RedS-recombinase and AES-1M were assessed in the C. elegans virulence assay, and the C57BL/6 mouse for pulmonary colonisation and TNF-α response. In C. elegans, hmgA deactivation resulted in significantly increased PA14 virulence while hmgA downregulation reduced AES-1M virulence. AES-1M was significantly more persistent in mouse lung and showed a significant increase in TNF-α (p<0.0001), sustained even with no detectable bacteria. PA14ΔhmgA did not show increased TNF-α. This study suggests that hmgA may have a role in P. aeruginosa persistence in chronic infection and the results provide a starting point for clarifying the role of hmgA in chronic AES-1.
Efficient Data-parallel Computing on Small Heterogeneous Clusters

Cluster-based data-parallel frameworks such as MapReduce, Hadoop, and Dryad are increasingly popular for a large class of compute-intensive tasks. Such systems are designed for large-scale clusters, and employ several techniques to decrease the run time of jobs in the presence of failures, slow machines, and other effects. In this paper, we apply Dryad to smaller-scale, “ad-hoc” clusters such as those formed by aggregating the servers and workstations in a small office. We first show that, while Dryad’s greedy scheduling algorithm performs well at scale, it is significantly less optimal in a small (5-10 machine) cluster environment where nodes have widely differing performance characteristics. We further show that in such cases, performance models of dataflow operators can be constructed which predict runtimes of vertex processes with sufficient accuracy to allow a more intelligent planner to achieve significant performance gains for a variety of jobs, and we show how to efficiently construct such models. Our system enhances the DryadLINQ data-parallel language compiler with a planner/optimizer implemented using constraint programming, and can exploit our operator models to significantly enhance the performance of parallel jobs on ad-hoc clusters.
A Routing Protocol Based on Energy and Link Quality for Internet of Things Applications

The Internet of Things (IoT) is attracting considerable attention from the universities, industries, citizens and governments for applications, such as healthcare,environmental monitoring and smart buildings. IoT enables network connectivity between smart devices at all times, everywhere, and about everything. In this context, Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) play an important role in increasing the ubiquity of networks with smart devices that are low-cost and easy to deploy. However, sensor nodes are restricted in terms of energy, processing and memory. Additionally, low-power radios are very sensitive to noise, interference and multipath distortions. In this context, this article proposes a routing protocol based on Routing by Energy and Link quality (REL) for IoT applications. To increase reliability and energy-efficiency, REL selects routes on the basis of a proposed end-to-end link quality estimator mechanism, residual energy and hop count. Furthermore, REL proposes an event-driven mechanism to provide load balancing and avoid the premature energy depletion of nodes/networks. Performance evaluations were carried out using simulation and testbed experiments to show the impact and benefits of REL in small and large-scale networks. The results show that REL increases the network lifetime and services availability, as well as the quality of service of IoT applications. It also provides an even distribution of scarce network resources and reduces the packet loss rate, compared with the performance of well-known protocols.
Locomotion through Reconfiguration based on Motor Primitives for Roombots Self-Reconfigurable Modular Robots

We present the hardware and reconfiguration experiments for an autonomous self-reconfigurable modular robot called Roombots (RB). RB were designed to form the basis for self-reconfigurable furniture. Each RB module contains three degrees of freedom that have been carefully selected to allow a single module to reach any position on a 2-dimensional grid and to overcome concave corners in a 3-dimensional grid. For the first time we demonstrate locomotion capabilities of single RB modules through reconfiguration with real hardware. The locomotion through reconfiguration is controlled by a planner combining the well-known D* algorithm and composed motor primitives. The novelty of our approach is the use of an online running hierarchical planner closely linked to the real hardware.
Real-Time American Sign Language Recognition Using Desk and Wearable Computer Based Video

We present two real-time hidden Markov model-based systems for recognizing sentence-level continuous American sign language (ASL) using a single camera to track the user's unadorned hands. The first system observes the user from a desk mounted camera and achieves 92 percent word accuracy. The second system mounts the camera in a cap worn by the user and achieves 98 percent accuracy (97 percent with an unrestricted grammar). Both experiments use a 40-word lexicon.
Closed-form expressions of approximate error rates for optimum combining with multiple interferers in a Rayleigh fading channel

This paper presents approximate error rates of M-ary phase shift keying (MPSK) for optimum combining (OC) with multiple cochannel interferers in a flat Rayleigh fading channel. For the first-order approximation, we derive the closed-form expression for ordered mean eigenvalues of the interference-plus-noise covariance matrix, which facilitates performance evaluation for the OC with arbitrary numbers of interferers and antenna elements without Monte Carlo simulation and multiple numerical integrals. We also derive the closed-form expressions for approximate error rates of MPSK for the OC in terms of the average error rate of MPSK for maximal ratio combining (MRC). From the simple evaluation of ordered mean eigenvalues, we show that the first-order approximation gives a simple and accurate way to analyze the performance of the OC.
Early Effects of Reward Anticipation Are Modulated by Dopaminergic Stimulation

The abilities to predict future rewards and assess the value of reward delivery are crucial aspects of adaptive behavior. While the mesolimbic system, including dopaminergic midbrain, ventral striatum and prefrontal cortex have long been associated with reward processing, recent studies also indicate a prominent role of early visual brain regions. However, the precise underlying neural mechanisms still remain unclear. To address this issue, we presented participants with visual cues predicting rewards of high and low magnitudes and probability (2×2 factorial design), while neural activity was scanned using magnetoencephalography. Importantly, one group of participants received 150 mg of the dopamine precursor levodopa prior to the experiment, while another group received a placebo. For the placebo group, neural signals of reward probability (but not magnitude) emerged at ∼100 ms after cue presentation at occipital sensors in the event-related magnetic fields. Importantly, these probability signals were absent in the levodopa group indicating a close link. Moreover, levodopa administration reduced oscillatory power in the high (20–30 Hz) and low (13–20 Hz) beta band during both reward anticipation and delivery. Taken together, our findings indicate that visual brain regions are involved in coding prospective reward probability but not magnitude and that these effects are modulated by dopamine.
Dynamic Causal Modeling of Subcortical Connectivity of Language

Subcortical–cortical interactions in the language network were investigated using dynamic causal modeling of magnetoencephalographic data recorded during auditory comprehension. Participants heard sentences that either were correct or contained violations. Sentences containing violations had syntactic or prosodic violations or both. We show that a hidden source, modeling magnetically silent deep nuclei, is required to explain the data best. This is in line with recent brain imaging studies and intracranial recordings suggesting an involvement of subcortical structures in language processing. Here, the processing of syntactic and prosodic violations elicited a global increase in the amplitude of evoked responses, both at the cortical and subcortical levels. As estimated by Bayesian model averaging, this was accompanied by various changes in cortical-cortical and subcortical–cortical connectivity. The most consistent findings in relation to violations were a decrease of reentrant inputs to Heschl's gyrus (HG) and of transcallosal lateral connections. These results suggest that in conditions where one hemisphere detects a violation, possibly via fast thalamocortical (HG) loops, the intercallosal connectivity is reduced to allow independent processing of syntax (left hemisphere) and of prosody (right hemisphere). This study is the first demonstration in cognitive neuroscience that subcortical–cortical loops can be empirically investigated using noninvasive electrophysiological recordings.
A Central Role for Neuronal AMP-Activated Protein Kinase (AMPK) and Mammalian Target of Rapamycin (mTOR) in High-Protein Diet–Induced Weight Loss

OBJECTIVE—A high-protein diet (HPD) is known to promote the reduction of body fat, but the mechanisms underlying this change are unclear. AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) and mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) function as majors regulators of cellular metabolism that respond to changes in energy status, and recent data demonstrated that they also play a critical role in systemic energy balance. Here, we sought to determine whether the response of the AMPK and mTOR pathways could contribute to the molecular effects of an HPD. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS—Western blotting, confocal microscopy, chromatography, light microscopy, and RT-PCR assays were combined to explore the anorexigenic effects of an HPD. RESULTS—An HPD reduced food intake and induced weight loss in both normal rats and ob/ob mice. The intracerebroventricular administration of leucine reduced food intake, and the magnitude of weight loss and reduction of food intake in a leucine-supplemented diet are similar to that achieved by HPD in normal rats and in ob/ob mice, suggesting that leucine is a major component of the effects of an HPD. Leucine and HPD decrease AMPK and increase mTOR activity in the hypothalamus, leading to inhibition of neuropeptide Y and stimulation of pro-opiomelanocortin expression. Consistent with a cross-regulation between AMPK and mTOR to control food intake, our data show that the activation of these enzymes occurs in the same specific neuronal subtypes. CONCLUSIONS—These findings provide support for the hypothesis that AMPK and mTOR interact in the hypothalamus to regulate feeding during HPD in a leucine-dependent manner.
Immunogold localization of xyloglucan and rhamnogalacturonan I in the cell walls of suspension-cultured sycamore cells.

PLANT CELL WALLS SERVE SEVERAL FUNCTIONS: they impart rigidity to the plant, provide a physical and chemical barrier between the cell and its environment, and regulate the size and shape of each cell. Chemical studies have provided information on the biochemical composition of the plant cell walls as well as detailed knowledge of individual cell wall molecules. In contrast, very little is known about the distribution of specific cell wall components around individual cells and throughout tissues. To address this problem, we have produced polyclonal antibodies against two cell wall matrix components; rhamnogalacturonan I (RG-I), a pectic polysaccharide, and xyloglucan (XG), a hemicellulose. By using the antibiodies as specific markers we have been able to localize these polymers on thin sections of suspension-cultured sycamore cells (Acer pseudoplatanus). Our results reveal that each molecule has a unique distribution. XG is localized throughout the entire wall and middle lamella. RG-I is restricted to the middle lamella and is especially evident in the junctions between cells. These observations indicate that plant cell walls may have more distinct chemical (and functional? ) domains than previously envisaged.
Proposed anticipating learning classifier system for cloud intrusion detection (ALCS-CID)

Cloud computing is a modern approach in network environment. According to increased number of network users and online systems, there is a need to help these systems to be away from unauthorized resource access and detect any attempts for privacy contravention. For that purpose, Intrusion Detection System is an effective security mechanism to detect any attempts of attacks for cloud resources and their information. In this paper, Cloud Intrusion Detection System has been proposed in term of reducing or eliminating any attacks. This Model concerns about achieving high detection rate after conducting a set of experiments using benchmarks dataset called KDD'99.
Endemic Mimosa species from Mexico prefer alphaproteobacterial rhizobial symbionts.

The legume genus Mimosa has > 500 species, with two major centres of diversity, Brazil (c. 350 spp.) and Mexico (c. 100 spp.). In Brazil most species are nodulated by Burkholderia. Here we asked whether this is also true of native and endemic Mexican species. We have tested this apparent affinity for betaproteobacteria by examining the symbionts of native and endemic species of Mimosa in Mexico, especially from the central highlands where Mimosa spp. have diversified. Nodules were tested for betaproteobacteria using in situ immunolocalization. Rhizobia isolated from the nodules were genetically characterized and tested for their ability to nodulate Mimosa spp. Immunological analysis of 25 host taxa suggested that most (including all the highland endemics) were not nodulated by betaproteobacteria. Phylogenetic analyses of 16S rRNA, recA, nodA, nodC and nifH genes from 87 strains isolated from 20 taxa confirmed that the endemic Mexican Mimosa species favoured alphaproteobacteria in the genera Rhizobium and Ensifer: this was confirmed by nodulation tests. Host phylogeny, geographic isolation and coevolution with symbionts derived from very different soils have potentially contributed to the striking difference in the choice of symbiotic partners by Mexican and Brazilian Mimosa species.
Glucocorticoid and Estrogen Receptors Are Reduced in Mitochondria of Lung Epithelial Cells in Asthma

Mitochondrial glucocorticoid (mtGR) and estrogen (mtER) receptors participate in the coordination of the cell’s energy requirement and in the mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation enzyme (OXPHOS) biosynthesis, affecting reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation and induction of apoptosis. Although activation of mtGR and mtER is known to trigger anti-inflammatory signals, little information exists on the presence of these receptors in lung tissue and their role in respiratory physiology and disease. Using a mouse model of allergic airway inflammation disease and applying confocal microscopy, subcellular fractionation, and Western blot analysis we showed mitochondrial localization of GRα and ERβ in lung tissue. Allergic airway inflammation caused reduction in mtGRα, mtERβ, and OXPHOS enzyme biosynthesis in lung cells mitochondria and particularly in bronchial epithelial cells mitochondria, which was accompanied by decrease in lung mitochondrial mass and induction of apoptosis. Confirmation and validation of the reduction of the mitochondrial receptors in lung epithelial cells in human asthma was achieved by analyzing autopsies from fatal asthma cases. The presence of the mitochondrial GRα and ERβ in lung tissue cells and especially their reduction in bronchial epithelial cells during allergic airway inflammation suggests a crucial role of these receptors in the regulation of mitochondrial function in asthma, implicating their involvement in the pathophysiology of the disease.
Flexible patient-controlled security for electronic health records

Electronic health records (EHR) are a convenient method to exchange medical information of patients between different healthcare providers. In many countries privacy laws require to protect the confidentiality of these data records and let the patient control the access to them. Existing approaches to protect the privacy of EHRs are either insufficient for these strict laws or they are too restrictive in their usage. For example, smartcard-based encryption systems require the patient to be always present to authorize access to medical records. However, this does not allow a physician to access an EHR of a patient who is unable to show up in person. In this paper, we propose a security architecture for EHR infrastructures that provides more flexibility but retains the security of patient-controlled encryption. In our proposal patients are able to authorize access to their records remotely (e.g. via phone) and time-independent for later processing by the physician. The security of our approach relies on modern cryptographic schemes and their incorporation into an EHR infrastructure. The adoption of our security architecture would allow to fulfill strict privacy laws while relaxing usage restrictions of existing security protections.
Reachability and Minimal Times for State Constrained Nonlinear Problems without Any Controllability Assumption

We consider a target problem for a nonlinear system under state constraints. We give a new continuous level-set approach for characterizing the optimal times and the backward-reachability sets. This approach leads to a characterization via a Hamilton-Jacobi equation, without assuming any controllability assumption. We also treat the case of time-dependent state constraints, as well as a target problem for a two-player game with state constraints. Our method gives a good framework for numerical approximations, and some numerical illustrations are included in the paper.