Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Canonical Wnt signals combined with suppressed TGFβ/BMP pathways promote renewal of the native human colonic epithelium

Background A defining characteristic of the human intestinal epithelium is that it is the most rapidly renewing tissue in the body. However, the processes underlying tissue renewal and the mechanisms that govern their coordination have proved difficult to study in the human gut. Objective To investigate the regulation of stem cell-driven tissue renewal by canonical Wnt and TGFβ/bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) pathways in the native human colonic epithelium. Design Intact human colonic crypts were isolated from mucosal tissue samples and placed into 3D culture conditions optimised for steady-state tissue renewal. High affinity mRNA in situ hybridisation and immunohistochemistry were complemented by functional genomic and bioimaging techniques. The effects of signalling pathway modulators on the status of intestinal stem cell biology, crypt cell proliferation, migration, differentiation and shedding were determined. Results Native human colonic crypts exhibited distinct activation profiles for canonical Wnt, TGFβ and BMP pathways. A population of intestinal LGR5/OLFM4-positive stem/progenitor cells were interspersed between goblet-like cells within the crypt-base. Exogenous and crypt cell-autonomous canonical Wnt signals supported homeostatic intestinal stem/progenitor cell proliferation and were antagonised by TGFβ or BMP pathway activation. Reduced Wnt stimulation impeded crypt cell proliferation, but crypt cell migration and shedding from the crypt surface were unaffected and resulted in diminished crypts. Conclusions Steady-state tissue renewal in the native human colonic epithelium is dependent on canonical Wnt signals combined with suppressed TGFβ/BMP pathways. Stem/progenitor cell proliferation is uncoupled from crypt cell migration and shedding, and is required to constantly replenish the crypt cell population.
Low-carbohydrate ketogenic diets, glucose homeostasis, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease

Purpose of reviewObesity-associated nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is highly prevalent, for which weight loss is the generally recommended clinical management. Low-carbohydrate ketogenic diets have been successful in promoting weight loss, but variations in the range of metabolic responses to these diets indicate that the effects of altering macronutrient content are not completely understood. This review focuses on the most recent findings that reveal the relationship between low-carbohydrate diets and NAFLD in rodent models and humans. Recent findingsLow-carbohydrate diets have been shown to promote weight loss, decrease intrahepatic triglyceride content, and improve metabolic parameters of patients with obesity. These ketogenic diets also provoke weight loss in rodents. However, long-term maintenance on a ketogenic diet stimulates the development of NAFLD and systemic glucose intolerance in mice. The relationship between ketogenic diets and systemic insulin resistance in both humans and rodents remains to be elucidated. SummaryBecause low-carbohydrate ketogenic diets are increasingly employed for treatment of obesity, NAFLD, and neurological diseases such as epilepsy, understanding the long-term systemic effects of low-carbohydrate diets is crucial to the development of efficacious and safe dietary interventions.
Statistical analysis of Indian rainfall and rice productivity anomalies over the last decades

Monsoon fluctuations have a reflective influence on rice productivity, which is the main foodgrain in India. The impact of El Niño on spatial variability of summer monsoon rainfall and thereby kharif rice productivity was analysed for the period 1974–2009. It was clear from the analysis that the delayed onset of monsoon along with El Niño has varied influences on rice productivity over different rice growing states as well as over India. Out of eight El Niño years, 6 years received deficit rainfall during monsoon season. But, the quantity of deficit varies from −20.3% in 2002 to −5.5% in 1991. The monthly distribution of monsoon rainfall shows higher frequency of deficit occurred during July and September. Interestingly, all El Niño years, except in 1997, September received deficit in rainfall which indicate the early withdrawal of monsoon. During 8 moderate and strong El Niño years, 5 years the kharif rice productivity falls below the technological trend ranging by between −4.3% in 1986 and −13.8% in 2002 over India. There exists a wide spatial variability of normalized kharif rice productivity anomaly during moderate El Niño event, with a maximum of −21.9% over Gujarat followed by −15.9% at Maharashtra. However, during the strong El Niño event, there is a maximum of −14.2% at Bihar to −6.6% over Maharashtra. The correlation between normalized monthly rainfall anomaly and rice productivity anomaly during the El Niño years indicated that July rainfall contributed 71% of the variations in rice productivity. Analysis of El Niño impact on spatial rice productivity may be useful for formulating farm‐level site specific management planning and policy decisions.
Working-class organisations and popular tourism, 1840–1970

Contents Introduction 1. No Grand Tours - tourism before 1850 2. Workers and the Great Exhibition - the origins of the package holiday 3. Holidays without pay 4. Collective bargaining for holidays with pay 5. Accommodation for working class visitors 6. Holidays and the state - planning for workers' needs after the Holidays with Pay Act 7. Brits abroad Conclusion Bibliography
Identification and Antioxidant Properties of Phenolic Compounds during Production of Bread from Purple Wheat Grains

Phenolic profiles and antioxidant properties of purple wheat varieties were investigated to document the effects of bread-making. Bread crust and crumb along with samples collected after mixing, 30 min fermenting, 65 min fermenting, and baking were examined. Free phenolic content (105.4 to 113.2 mg FAE/100 g) significantly (p < 0.05) increased during mixing, fermenting, and baking (65% to 68%). Bound phenolics slightly (p > 0.05) decreased after 30 min fermentation (7% to 9%) compared to the dough after mixing, but increased significantly (p < 0.05) during 65 min fermenting and baking (16% to 27%). Their antioxidant activities followed a similar trend as observed for total phenolic content. The bread crust demonstrated increased free (103% to 109%) but decreased bound (2% to 3%) phenolic content, whereas bread crumb exhibited a reversal of these results. Total anthocyanin content (TAC) significantly (p < 0.05) decreased by 21% after mixing; however, it gradually increased to 90% of the original levels after fermenting. Baking significantly (p < 0.05) decreased TAC by 55%, resulting in the lowest value for bread crust (0.8 to 4.4 mg cyn-3-glu equiv./100 g). p-Hydroxybenzoic, vanillic, p-coumaric, and ferulic acids were detected in free-phenolic extracts, while protocatechuic, caffeic syringic, and sinapic were additional acids in bound-phenolic extracts. Cyanidin-3-glucoside was the detectable anthocyanin in purple wheat. Bread-making significantly (p < 0.05) increased the phenolic content and antioxidant activities; however, it compromised the anthocyanin content of purple wheat bread.
IMPACT OF GLUCOSE MANAGEMENT TEAM ON OUTCOMES OF HOSPITALIZARON IN PATIENTS WITH TYPE 2 DIABETES ADMITTED TO THE MEDICAL SERVICE.

OBJECTIVE To improve glycemic control of hospitalized patients with diabetes and hyperglycemia, many medical centers have established dedicated glucose management teams (GMTs). However, the impact of these specialized teams on clinical outcomes has not been evaluated. METHODS We conducted a retrospective study of 440 patients with type 2 diabetes admitted to the medical service for cardiac or infection-related diagnosis. The primary endpoint was a composite outcome of several well-recognized markers of morbidity, consisting of: death during hospitalization, transfer to intensive care unit, initiation of enteral or parenteral nutrition, line infection, new in-hospital infection or infection lasting more than 20 days of hospitalization, deep venous thrombosis or pulmonary embolism, rise in plasma creatinine, and hospital re-admissions. RESULTS Medical housestaff managed the glycemia in 79% of patients (usual care group), while the GMT managed the glycemia in 21% of patients (GMT group). The primary outcome was similar between cohorts (0.95 events per patient versus 0.99 events per patient in the GMT and usual care cohorts, respectively). For subanalysis, the subjects in both groups were stratified into those with average glycemia of <180 mg/dL versus those with glycemia >180 mg/dL. We found a significant beneficial impact of glycemic management by the GMT on the composite outcome in patients with average glycemia >180 mg/dL during their hospital stay. The number of patients who met primary outcome was significantly higher in the usual care group (40 of 83 patients, 48%) than in the GMT-treated cohort (8 of 33 patients, 25.7%) (P<.02). CONCLUSION Our data suggest that GMTs may have an important role in managing difficult-to-control hyperglycemia in the inpatient setting. ABBREVIATIONS BG = blood glucose GMT = glucose management team HbA1c = hemoglobin A1c ICU = intensive care unit POC = point of care T2D = type 2 diabetes.
Dynein-Mediated Cargo Transport in Vivo

Cytoplasmic dynein is a microtubule-based motor with diverse cellular roles. Here, we use mutations in the dynein heavy chain gene to impair the motor's function, and employ biophysical measurements to demonstrate that cytoplasmic dynein is responsible for the minus end motion of bidirectionally moving lipid droplets in early Drosophila embryos. This analysis yields an estimate for the force that a single cytoplasmic dynein exerts in vivo (1.1 pN). It also allows us to quantitate dynein-mediated cargo motion in vivo, providing a framework for investigating how dynein's activity is controlled. We identify three distinct travel states whose general features also characterize plus end motion. These states are preserved in different developmental stages. We had previously provided evidence that for each travel direction, single droplets are moved by multiple motors of the same type (Welte et al. 1998). Droplet travel distances (runs) are much shorter than expected for multiple motors based on in vitro estimates of cytoplasmic dynein processivity. Therefore, we propose the existence of a process that ends runs before the motors fall off the microtubules. We find that this process acts with a constant probability per unit distance, and is typically coupled to a switch in travel direction. A process with similar properties governs plus end motion, and its regulation controls the net direction of transport.
Exploring functional similarity in the export of Nitrate‐N from forested catchments: A mechanistic modeling approach

Functional similarity of catchments implies that we are able to identify the combination of processes that creates a similar response of a specific characteristic of a catchment. We applied the concept of functional similarity to the export of NO3−‐N from catchments situated within the Turkey Lakes Watershed, a temperate forest in central Ontario, Canada. Despite the homogeneous nature of the forest, these catchments exhibit substantial variability in the concentrations of NO3−‐N in discharge waters, over both time and space. We hypothesized that functional similarity in the export of NO3−‐N can be expressed as a function of topographic complexity as topography regulates both the formation and flushing of NO3−‐N within the catchment. We tested this hypothesis by exploring whether topographically based similarity indices of the formation and flushing of NO3−‐N capture the observed export of NO3−‐N over a set of topographically diverse catchments. For catchments with no elevated base concentrations of NO3−‐N the similarity indices explained up to 58% of the variance in the export of NO3−‐N. For catchments with elevated base concentrations of NO3−‐N, prediction of the export of NO3−‐N may have been complicated by the fact that hydrology was governed by a two‐component till, with an ablation till overlying a basal till. While the similarity indices captured peak NO3−‐N concentrations exported from shallow flow paths emanating from the ablation till, they did not capture base NO3−‐N concentrations exported from deep flow paths emanating from the basal till, emphasizing the importance of including shallow and deep flow paths in future similarity indices. The strength of the similarity indices is their potential ability to enable us to discriminate catchments that have visually similar surface characteristics but show distinct NO3−‐N export responses and, conversely, to group catchments that have visually dissimilar surface characteristics but are functionally similar. Furthermore, the similarity indices provide a potentially powerful method to scale and generalize NO3−‐N export responses to other regions.
Structure Comparison and Structure Patterns

This article investigates aspects of pairwise and multiple structure comparison, and the problem of automatically discover common patterns in a set of structures. Descriptions and representation of structures and patterns are described, as well as scoring and algorithms for comparison and discovery. A framework and nomenclature is developed for classifying different methods, and many of these are reviewed and placed into this framework.
Evaluation of the SIFT Object Recognition Method in Mobile Robots

Generic object recognition in mobile robots is of primary importance in order to enhance the representation of the environment that robots will use for their reasoning processes. Towards this aim, the contribution of this paper is an evaluation of the SIFT Object Recognition method in a challenging dataset, focusing on issues relevant to mobile robotics. The method presented robustness to the typical problems of images acquired in the robotics domain, but its good performance was limited mainly to well-textured objects.
Operations Management Opportunities in Technology Commercialization and Entrepreneurship

The field of Production and Operations Management (POM) is increasingly perceived as a rigorous but narrow field, antiquated and not very relevant to the current challenges and concerns of managers in job‐creating growth companies vital to our economies. I argue that a narrower positioning of POM in the past is responsible for its perceived limited utility to growth firms and global economies. POM at its core is about “doing more with less,” which is very well aligned with the context and needs of resource‐constrained entrepreneurial companies. My discussion is focused on how the research paradigm of POM is and can be relevant to meeting the emerging challenges of growth companies of tomorrow. Specifically, I examine how POM can help meet the needs of these organizations to become scalable and sustainable. The objective is to stimulate thought and discussion and encourage early‐stage POM scholars to seriously consider the contexts of technology commercialization, entrepreneurship, and growth companies as avenues for future research.
FUZZY DATA MINING AND GENETIC ALGORITHMS APPLIED TO INTRUSION DETECTION

We are developing a prototype intelligent intrusion detection system (IIDS) to demonstrate the effectiveness of data mining techniques that utilize fuzzy logic and genetic algorithms. This system combines both anomaly based intrusion detection using fuzzy data mining techniques and misuse detection using traditional rule-based expert system techniques. The anomaly-based components are developed using fuzzy data mining techniques. They look for deviations from stored patterns of normal behavior. Genetic algorithms are used to tune the fuzzy membership functions and to select an appropriate set of features. The misuse detection components look for previously described patterns of behavior that are likely to indicate an intrusion. Both network traffic and system audit data are used as inputs for both components.
Facilitating the Online Search of Experts at NASA using Expert Seeker People-Finder

People-Finder Systems are knowledge repositories that attempt to manage knowledge by holding pointers to experts who possess specific knowledge within an organization. This paper presents insights from the development of Expert Seeker, an organizational People-Finder KMS that will be used to locate experts at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). This paper discusses insights and lessons learned from the development of this system, and the role of technology in automating the maintenance of the expert's profiles. Expert Seeker represents an important first step towards achieving our objective of automatically and intuitively discovering and identifying intellectual capital within the organization. While several systems in place today rely on self-assessment, we look at the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, in particular, data mining and clustering techniques, to uncover and map organizational expertise.
Problem-based learning environments in Moodle: Implementation approches

Problem-based learning (PBL) educators resorted to developing their own environments even with existence of comprehensive Learning Management Systems (LMS). They realized that both commercial and open source systems were designed with traditional lecture-based instruction in mind. The systems lack the features and scenarios required by the inherently collaborative, dynamic, and timely pedagogy. The presence of several PBL flavors and models added more complexity to the development process preventing any single environment from being unanimously recognized by the PBL community. In this paper, we review and discuss the implementation approaches that were used in developing PBL environments in the open-source LMS Moodle. We focus on the instantiation methodologies, scaffolding, customizability, features, and flexibility. We go over a wide range of PBL implementations starting from the basic ones that used whatever features available without adding any new functionality. We then browse two Moodle environments that implemented a particular PBL model. Finally, we discuss a two environment that used scripting in two different forms, one benefitted from a standard like IMS Learning Design (IMS-LD) and the other made use of a specially developed PBL Domain-Specific Modelling Language (DSML).
Early Devonian cephalaspids (Vertebrata: Osteostraci: Cornuata) from the southern MacKenzie Mountains, N.W.T., Canada

ABSTRACT A diverse and well-preserved vertebrate fauna occurs in Early Devonian rocks of the Delorme Formation in the southern Mackenzie Mountains, Northwest Territories, Canada. The osteostracans of this fauna include the new cornuate species Waengsjoeaspis nahanniensis and Diademaspis? mackenziensis. Specimens of the latter species had been described in 1976 by Dineley and Loeffler as “Cephalaspis sp. indet. ” The cornuate originally described as “? Cephalaspis gabrielsei” Dineley and Loeffler, 1976 is here assigned to the new genus Superciliaspis and more fully described. Other taxa include a possible example of Parameteoraspis sp. and several other indeterminate cornuates. Only dermal bone has been preserved, but preservation of its external and internal surfaces is excellent. Conspecific osteostracan specimens demonstrate a wide variety of overall proportions, due to differing amounts and directions of compaction. Some preferential orientation of corpses on bedding planes has been seen and several exam.
The effect of procyanidin on expression of STAT1 in type 2 diabetes mellitus SD rats with focal cerebral ischemia.

OBJECTIVES Diabetes with cerebral infarction is a common disease that severely impacts health. This study investigated the effect of procyanidin (PC) on the expression of signal transducers and activators of transcription (STAT1) in type 2 diabetes mellitus SD rats with focal cerebral ischemia. We then explored the protective mechanisms of PC in type 2 diabetes mellitus SD rats with focal cerebral ischemia, to provide theory evidence for its clinical application. METHODS We set up a type 2 diabetes mellitus-MCAO model, evaluated neurological function, and used immunohistochemistry methods to measure the activity of STAT1. RESULTS The brain expression of STAT1 in rats of the sham-operation group was low, but more STAT1 positive cells were found in normal rats with ischemia and in rats with both type 2 diabetes and ischemia when groups were compared with the sham-operation group (p<0.01). Compared with rats that had type 2 diabetes and ischemia, the numbers of STAT1 positive cells after low, medium and high-doses of PC were all decreased (p<0.01), whereby the mid and high-dose groups showed a more substantial decrease (p<0.01) and with no variance between the two groups (p>0.05). CONCLUSIONS These results indicate that PC has a neuroprotective effect on type 2 diabetes mellitus-MCAO; this may be through decreasing the expression of STAT1, which influences the Janus kinase/signal transducer and activator of transcription (JAK/STAT) pathway that may inhibit apoptosis to relieve neurological impairment.
Polarization distance: a framework for modelling object detection by polarization vision systems

The discrimination of polarized light is widespread in the natural world. Its use for specific, large-field tasks, such as navigation and the detection of water bodies, has been well documented. Some species of cephalopod and crustacean have polarization receptors distributed across the whole visual field and are thought to use polarized light cues for object detection. Both object-based polarization vision systems and large field detectors rely, at least initially, on an orthogonal, two-channel receptor organization. This may increase to three-directional analysis at subsequent interneuronal levels. In object-based and some of the large-field tasks, the dominant e-vector detection axes are often aligned (through eye, head and body stabilization mechanisms) horizontally and vertically relative to the outside world. We develop Bernard and Wehner's 1977 model of polarization receptor dynamics to apply it to the detection and discrimination of polarized objects against differently polarized backgrounds. We propose a measure of ‘polarization distance’ (roughly analogous to ‘colour distance’) for estimating the discriminability of objects in polarized light, and conclude that horizontal/vertical arrays are optimally designed for detecting differences in the degree, and not the e-vector axis, of polarized light under natural conditions.
A State-Based Programming Model and System for Wireless Sensor Networks

Sensor networks are one important building block towards the realisation of context-aware applications. Suitable communication protocols and middleware solutions are necessary to facilitate the development of sensor network applications. Additionally, the vast number of nodes in sensor networks necessitates a new programming model for application developers. Commonly used programming abstractions force the programmer to express the global behaviour of a network in terms of local actions taken at individual nodes. We argue that global programming abstractions are needed to express global behaviour of a network. We present RuleCaster, a novel state-based programming framework for sensor network applications. RuleCaster provides a high-level language for application definition, a compiler that splits the high-level specification into individual tasks and assigns them to the nodes, and a service-based middleware that provides the interface for collaborative execution of these tasks