Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Setup for investigating gold nanoparticle penetration through reconstructed skin and comparison to published human skin data

Abstract. Owing to the limited source of human skin (HS) and the ethical restrictions of using animals in experiments, in vitro skin equivalents are a possible alternative for conducting particle penetration experiments. The conditions for conducting penetration experiments with model particles, 15-nm gold nanoparticles (AuNP), through nonsealed skin equivalents are described for the first time. These conditions include experimental setup, sterility conditions, effective applied dose determination, skin sectioning, and skin integrity check. Penetration at different exposure times (two and 24 h) and after tissue fixation (fixed versus unfixed skin) are examined to establish a benchmark in comparison to HS in an attempt to get similar results to HS experiments presented earlier. Multiphoton microscopy is used to detect gold luminescence in skin sections. λex=800 nm is used for excitation of AuNP and skin samples, allowing us to determine a relative index for particle penetration. Despite the observed overpredictability of penetration into skin equivalents, they could serve as a first fast screen for testing the behavior of nanoparticles and extrapolate their penetration behavior into HS. Further investigations are required to test a wide range of particles of different physicochemical properties to validate the skin equivalent-human skin particle penetration relationship.
From Example Studying to Problem Solving via Tailored Computer-Based Meta-Cognitive Scaffolding: Hypotheses and Design

We present an intelligent tutoring framework designed to help students acquire problem-solving skills from pedagogical activities involving worked-out example solutions. Because of individual differences in their meta-cognitive skills, there is great variance in how students learn from examples. Our framework takes into account these individual differences and provides tailored support for the application of two key meta-cognitive skills: self-explanation (i.e., generating explanations to oneself to clarify studied material) and min-analogy (i.e., not relying too heavily on examples during problem solving). We describe the framework’s two components. One component explicitly scaffolds self-explanation during example studying with menu-based tools and direct tailored tutorial interventions, including the automatic generation of example solutions at varying degrees of detail. The other component supports both self-explanation and min-analogy during analogical problem solving by relying on subtler scaffolding, including a highly innovative example selection mechanism. We conclude by reporting results from an empirical evaluation of the former component, showing that it facilitates cognitive skill acquisition when students access it at the appropriate learning stage.
A comparative study of MOS VCOs for low voltage high performance operation

Six 10GHz MOS VCOs were designed and fabricated in the IBM 6RF 0.25um CMOS process. Their oscillation frequency, output amplitude and phase noise performance are measured and compared, and the results confirm that replacing shielded-ground inductors with high-resistivity substrate inductors improves phase noise performance. Capacitive source degeneration has also been identified as a performance limiting mechanism in MOS based VCOs rather than performance enhancing as in BJT based VCOs.
A New Omics Data Resource of Pleurocybella porrigens for Gene Discovery

Background Pleurocybella porrigens is a mushroom-forming fungus, which has been consumed as a traditional food in Japan. In 2004, 55 people were poisoned by eating the mushroom and 17 people among them died of acute encephalopathy. Since then, the Japanese government has been alerting Japanese people to take precautions against eating the P . porrigens mushroom. Unfortunately, despite efforts, the molecular mechanism of the encephalopathy remains elusive. The genome and transcriptome sequence data of P . porrigens and the related species, however, are not stored in the public database. To gain the omics data in P . porrigens , we sequenced genome and transcriptome of its fruiting bodies and mycelia by next generation sequencing. Methodology/Principal Findings Short read sequences of genomic DNAs and mRNAs in P . porrigens were generated by Illumina Genome Analyzer. Genome short reads were de novo assembled into scaffolds using Velvet. Comparisons of genome signatures among Agaricales showed that P . porrigens has a unique genome signature. Transcriptome sequences were assembled into contigs (unigenes). Biological functions of unigenes were predicted by Gene Ontology and KEGG pathway analyses. The majority of unigenes would be novel genes without significant counterparts in the public omics databases. Conclusions Functional analyses of unigenes present the existence of numerous novel genes in the basidiomycetes division. The results mean that the omics information such as genome, transcriptome and metabolome in basidiomycetes is short in the current databases. The large-scale omics information on P . porrigens , provided from this research, will give a new data resource for gene discovery in basidiomycetes.
Gaussian Processes for Fast Policy Optimisation of POMDP-based Dialogue Managers

Modelling dialogue as a Partially Observable Markov Decision Process (POMDP) enables a dialogue policy robust to speech understanding errors to be learnt. However, a major challenge in POMDP policy learning is to maintain tractability, so the use of approximation is inevitable. We propose applying Gaussian Processes in Reinforcement learning of optimal POMDP dialogue policies, in order (1) to make the learning process faster and (2) to obtain an estimate of the uncertainty of the approximation. We first demonstrate the idea on a simple voice mail dialogue task and then apply this method to a real-world tourist information dialogue task.
Non-linear registration of scanning probe microscopy images

Non-linear distortions caused by thermal drift and hysteresis of piezo-scanners hinder the alignment of a series of two-dimensional scanning probe microscopy (SPM) images for Nanotomography volume images and for movies. We report on a registration method to correct these distortions. To speed up the registration of a complete stack of hundreds of two-dimensional images, the data were registered in a whole block, and a multi-resolution approach was used. Other specific problems of SPM measurements, such as image artefacts and the handling of image boundaries, were solved by introducing a mask with implicit mapping. With this approach we are able to obtain high-resolution Nanotomography images of modern nanostructured materials over large areas (1 µm) with a resolution of 10 nm. Examples are individual crystalline lamellae in a semicrystalline polymer film as well as a 50 nm wide channel in a nickel-based superalloy.
Stochastic Optimal Control as a Theory of Brain-Machine Interface Operation

The closed-loop operation of brain-machine interfaces (BMI) provides a framework to study the mechanisms behind neural control through a restricted output channel, with emerging clinical applications to stroke, degenerative disease, and trauma. Despite significant empirically driven improvements in closed-loop BMI systems, a fundamental, experimentally validated theory of closed-loop BMI operation is lacking. Here we propose a compact model based on stochastic optimal control to describe the brain in skillfully operating canonical decoding algorithms. The model produces goal-directed BMI movements with sensory feedback and intrinsically noisy neural output signals. Various experimentally validated phenomena emerge naturally from this model, including performance deterioration with bin width, compensation of biased decoders, and shifts in tuning curves between arm control and BMI control. Analysis of the model provides insight into possible mechanisms underlying these behaviors, with testable predictions. Spike binning may erode performance in part from intrinsic control-dependent constraints, regardless of decoding accuracy. In compensating decoder bias, the brain may incur an energetic cost associated with action potential production. Tuning curve shifts, seen after the mastery of a BMI-based skill, may reflect the brain's implementation of a new closed-loop control policy. The direction and magnitude of tuning curve shifts may be altered by decoder structure, ensemble size, and the costs of closed-loop control. Looking forward, the model provides a framework for the design and simulated testing of an emerging class of BMI algorithms that seek to directly exploit the presence of a human in the loop.
Nerve growth factor–endothelial cell interaction leads to angiogenesis in vitro and in vivo

Nerve growth factor (NGF) has important functions during embryonic development and on various tissues and organs under normal and pathological conditions during the extrauterine life. RT‐PCR analysis and immunological methods demonstrate that human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) express the NGF receptors trkANGFR and p75NTR. NGF treatment caused a rapid phosphorylation of trkANGFR in HUVECs, determining a parallel increase of phosphorylated ERK1/2. Accordingly, NGF induced a significant increase in HUVEC proliferation that was abolished by the trkANGFR inhibitor K252a. Also, HUVECs express significant levels of NGF under standard culture conditions that were up‐regulated during serum starvation. Endogenous NGF was responsible for the basal levels of trkANGFR and ERK1/2 phosphorylation observed in untreated HUVEC cultures. Finally, NGF exerted a potent, direct, angiogenic activity in vivo when delivered onto the chorioallantoic membrane of the chicken embryo. The data indicate that NGF may play an important role in blood vessel formation in the nervous system and in several pathological processes, including tumors and inflammatory diseases. Unraveling mechanisms of NGF‐dependent angiogenesis could provide valuable tools for novel therapeutic approaches in antiangiogenic therapy.
Compressive creep of reinforced polymeric piling

Reinforced polymeric piling (RPP) is a sustainable piling product that is gaining attention for use instead of timber piling in coastal and waterfront applications. However, unlike conventional construction materials that have well-documented creep behavior, there is virtually no reliable data on the compressive creep behavior of RPP. RPP is composed of a recycled plastic matrix made of high density polyethylene (HDPE) that is reinforced with steel or fiber reinforced polymer rods (FRP, E-glass, or fiberglass). In this study, an accelerated test method to predict the compressive creep of both recycled HDPE and FRP is employed. The method is based on the equivalence of strain energy density (SED) between conventional constant-stress creep tests and stress-strain tests, conducted at different strain rates. Test results indicate that the tested recycled HDPE exhibited a pronounced viscoelastic or viscoplastic response, at low strains, when loaded in compression. At room temperature, SED predicts that recycled HDPE will creep about 1.1 % in 100 years when loaded at an ultimate stress of 8.3 MPa (1200 psi). FRP exhibits a small viscoelastic tendency. SED predicts that the FRP loaded in compression will creep by less than 0.5 % in 100 years when loaded at an ultimate stress of 88 MPa (12 800 psi). The stress-strain behavior of RPP depends on strain compatibility of both HDPE and FRP. Creep of RPP will depend on the percentage of FRP reinforcement in the cross section. Creep of RPP is estimated to be on the order of 0.2 % to 1.8 % in 100 years under loading and reinforcement ratios employed for this research.
Scheduling of Parallel Migration for Multiple Virtual Machines

Virtualization technology can readily change the placement of an execution environment, such as a virtual machine (VM), in accordance with the current statuses. To effectively manage system resources in the virtualized infrastructure, the elasticity of a virtualized infrastructure has attracted significant attention for determining on which server VM should be deployed. However, there has been little attention to how long it takes to relocate VMs and in what order VMs migrate. It is difficult to determine the migration order of VMs in consideration of the residual resources of the destination server and network topology. In this paper, we propose two methods for scheduling the parallel migration of multiple VMs to reduce the impact on performance degradation due to VM migrations. We first formulate an integer linear programming (ILP) model to determine the VM migration order. To solve the problem in an acceptable time for large infrastructures, we also design a heuristic method based on dependencies between VM migrations and network bandwidth. Simulation results demonstrate that the heuristic-based method obtained the solutions in a few seconds for the settings with small differences with the optimal solutions obtained from the ILP-based method.
Ambulatory Position and Orientation Tracking Fusing Magnetic and Inertial Sensing

This paper presents the design and testing of a portable magnetic system combined with miniature inertial sensors for ambulatory 6 degrees of freedom ( DOF) human motion tracking. The magnetic system consists of three orthogonal coils, the source, fixed to the body and 3-D magnetic sensors, fixed to remote body segments, which measure the fields generated by the source. Based on the measured signals, a processor calculates the relative positions and orientations between source and sensor. Magnetic actuation requires a substantial amount of energy which limits the update rate with a set of batteries. Moreover, the magnetic field can easily be disturbed by ferromagnetic materials or other sources. Inertial sensors can be sampled at high rates, require only little energy and do not suffer from magnetic interferences. However, accelerometers and gyroscopes can only measure changes in position and orientation and suffer from integration drift. By combing measurements from both systems in a complementary Kalman filter structure, an optimal solution for position and orientation estimates is obtained. The magnetic system provides 6 DOF measurements at a relatively low update rate while the inertial sensors track the changes position and orientation in between the magnetic updates. The implemented system is tested against a lab-bound camera tracking system for several functional body movements. The accuracy was about 5 mm for position and 3 degrees for orientation measurements. Errors were higher during movements with high velocities due to relative movement between source and sensor within one cycle of magnetic actuation
Self-employment and labor market transitions at older ages

Self-employment is an important aspect of the labor market activity of older workers and many wage and salary workers choose a period of self-employment before complete labor force withdrawal. Our analysis of the HRS data indicates that the determinants of self-employment transitions among these workers reflect those of younger workers. In particular, there appears to be an important effect of credit market imperfections, but little impact of employer-provided health insurance.In light of the demographic shift toward a relatively elderly population, these results suggest that the degree to which older workers utilize self-employment as a bridge to complete retirement will be more influenced by the distribution of wealth than by the private sector promise of medical insurance. Viewed from a research perspective, these results suggest the need for explicit modeling of joint life-cycle evolution of asset accumulation and the choice of working in the salaried and self-employed sectors.In addition, our results emphasize the importance of viewing "retirement" as a process. In addition to transitions from wage and salary work to self-employment (and vice versa), there are interesting patterns of re-entry to the labor force, and to self-employment in particular, that merit further attention.
Dynamic modeling and sliding-mode control of a Ball robot with inverse mouse-ball drive

This paper presents techniques for dynamic modeling and control of a Ball robot (Ballbot) with inverse mouse-ball drive that is accomplished by simultaneously activating two independent brushless motors. Under this driving scheme, a completely dynamic model of the robot moving in a flat terrain is established constructed based on Lagrangian mechanics. With the model, a sliding-mode control is proposed based on backstepping to accomplish robust balancing and agile path tracking of the robot with exogenous disturbances. Computer simulations are conducted for illustration of the effectiveness of the proposed modeling and control method.
Fabrication of 1×2 Y-branch polymer waveguide coupler by using softlithography technique

Fabrication of 1×2 Y-branch polymer optical fiber (POF) coupler device based on optical polymer epoxy OG142 has been performed using softlithographic process. The device development composed of three part: simulation, fabrication and characterization. Non-sequential ray tracing software has been used to simulate the optical properties of the device. The device design is based on a simple 1×2 Y-branch coupler which enables light signal to be split equally at 3 dB. The simulation results shows that insertion losses are 3.08 dB and 2.93 dB. The experimental results shows insertion losses of 8.2 dB and 9.75 dB with an excess loss of 5.89 dB.
Hemodynamic responses and c-Fos changes associated with hypotensive hemorrhage: standardizing a protocol for severe hemorrhage in conscious rats.

The central mechanisms underlying the transition from compensation to decompensation during severe hemorrhage (HEM) are poorly understood. Furthermore, a lack of consistency in HEM protocols exists in the current literature. This study assessed the cardiovascular response and Fos-like immunoreactivity (FLI) in specific brain regions following severe HEM at three rates (2, 1, or 0.5 ml.kg(-1). min(-1)) in conscious rats. Heart rate (HR) and arterial pressure were recorded during the withdrawal of 30% of total blood volume (TBV). Data from animals hemorrhaged at the fast (F-HEM, n = 6), intermediate (I-HEM, n = 7), or slow (S-HEM, n = 7) rates were compared with saline (SAL, n = 5) and hypotensive (hydrazaline-induced, HYDRAZ, n = 5) controls. All HEM rates produced similar degrees of hypotension at the time of 30% TBV withdrawal. All HEM rates also produced bradycardia, but the change in HR was only significant in the F-HEM and I-HEM groups. Associated with I-HEM and F-HEM, but not HYDRAZ treatment were significant increases in FLI in the caudal ventrolateral periaqueductal gray (PAG), the central lateral nucleus of the rostral parabrachial nucleus, and locus coeruleus compared with SAL treatment. I-HEM also induced significant increases in FLI in the dorsomedial PAG, A7 region, and the cuneiform nucleus compared with SAL. S-HEM did not induce any significant change in FLI. Our results suggest that HEM at a rate of 1 ml.kg(-1). min(-1) may be most useful for investigating the potential role of the rostral brainstem regions in mediating hemorrhagic decompensation in conscious rats.
Evaluation of Spirulina Supplementation on Intermittent Binge Ethanol - Induced Neurotoxicity in Dentate Gyrus of Rats

Summary. Spirulina is a widely used nutritional supplement which is rich in antioxidants and proteins. Studies have shown that intermittent binge-like ethanol consumption during adolescent period caused neuronal damage in specific parts of the brain, including the dentate gyrus. It has been suggested that antioxidant therapy may provide some level of protection against neurotoxicity of ethanol at cellular level. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the preventive effects of spirulina supplementation on ethanol-induced neurotoxicity in the dentate gyrus of adolescent rats. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were given ethanol (10 g/kg/day, intermittent binge model), or spirulina platensis (1000 mg/kg/day) or both from postnatal day 30 for two weeks duration. The cerebral hemispheres were processed for routine histological staining and immunohistochemistry with anti-GFAP antibody. Ethanol-treated group showed significant deficit in the numbers of granule cells and hilar neurons of the dentate gyrus when compared to the control group. Spirulina supplementation failed to provide protection against ethanol-induced neuronal loss. Spirulina supplementation also failed to alter increased expression of GFAP immunoreactivity induced by ethanol exposure. In conclusion, these findings indicate that spirulina supplementation is not effective in reducing the ethanol-induced neurotoxicity in the dentate gyrus of adolescent rats. Industrial Relevance. Spirulina is one of the widely used nutritional supplements particularly in Asian population. Being a strong antioxidant, spirulina has been shown to have many therapeutic effects in human. However, the question of whether spirulina supplementation is able to mitigate the effect of ethanol neurotoxicity is largely unknown. Therefore, the study was undertaken to investigate the possibility that spirulina supplementation is able to provide some protection against ethanol-induced neurotoxicity in a rat model. Keywords. Spirulina; Antioxidants; Ethanol; Dentate gyrus; GFAP
Event-triggered consensus tracking of multi-agent systems with Lur'e nonlinear dynamics

ABSTRACT In this paper, distributed consensus tracking problem for networked Lur'e systems is investigated based on event-triggered information interactions. An event-triggered control algorithm is designed with the advantages of reducing controller update frequency and sensor energy consumption. By using tools of -procedure and Lyapunov functional method, some sufficient conditions are derived to guarantee that consensus tracking is achieved under a directed communication topology. Meanwhile, it is shown that Zeno behaviour of triggering time sequences is excluded for the proposed event-triggered rule. Finally, some numerical simulations on coupled Chua's circuits are performed to illustrate the effectiveness of the theoretical algorithms.
Reflecting on the design process of the Affective Diary

Affective Diary is a digital diary that makes use of bio-sensors to add some reminiscence of bodily experiences. The design process behind Affective Diary was 'sensitive' to three design qualities extracted from a previous project; providing cues of emotional expressivity building on familiarity, making the design open for personal expressivity and be aware of contradictions between modalities. Through the design process of Affective Diary, with frequent user involvements during the process, these design qualities became further tested, developed and refined. By providing a fairly detailed and reflected description of the design process behind Affective Diary, we aim to provide other designers with inspiration on several levels: both in terms of methods used, but also in why these three design qualities are important and how to realize them. Our aim is also to provide designers with knowledge in the form that makes sense to designers: the practical link between design qualities and final results.