Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Forest Ecology and Management Decision support for integrated landscape evaluation and restoration planning

The historical patterns of Inland Northwest United States forests have been dramatically altered by a little more than two centuries of human settlement and land use. Spatial patterns of forest structural conditions, tree species composition, snags and down wood, and temporal variation in these patterns, have been altered to such an extent that the natural ebb and flow of terrestrial habitats and their linkages has been disrupted. Closely coupled with these changes, fire and other disturbance processes in most dry and many mesic forest types have also shifted, with a bias for increased severity and extent. Here, in the context of planning restoration of some semblance of historical vegetation patkm-disturbance process interactions, we briefly revisit why it is theoretically sound to estimate the range and variation in historical forest spatial patterns. We call these estimates of range and variation, reference conditions or reference variation (RV), and discuss how forestmanagers might use them when evaluating current landscape patterns to identify changes that may have important ecological implications. We term such evaluations, departure analyses, and we describe how departure analysis is implemented in a decision support system @SS) for integrated landscape evaluation and restoration planning. The initial phase of the DSS uses logic-based modeling to evaluate existing pattems of forest vegetation in subwatersheds of one ecoregion against a corresponding envelope of historical reference conditions for the same region, thereby highlighting key departures. The secondary planning phase uses results from the analysis phase in a decision model to prioritize watersheds for possible management actions related to landscape restoration and maintenance. We conclude from our example that there k at least two advantages to a decision-support approach that heats evaluation and planning as distinct but integrated phases: (1) the overall decision process is rendered conceptually simpler and (2) practical considerations of efficacy and feasibility of management actions can be easily accommodated.
The error bounds and tractability of quasi-Monte Carlo algorithms in infinite dimension

Dimensionally unbounded problems are frequently encountered in practice, such as in simulations of stochastic processes, in particle and light transport problems and in the problems of mathematical finance. This paper considers quasi-Monte Carlo integration algorithms for weighted classes of functions of infinitely many variables, in which the dependence of functions on successive variables is increasingly limited. The dependence is modeled by a sequence of weights. The integrands belong to rather general reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces that can be decomposed as the direct sum of a series of their subspaces, each subspace containing functions of only a finite number of variables. The theory of reproducing kernels is used to derive a quadrature error bound, which is the product of two terms: the generalized discrepancy and the generalized variation.Tractability means that the minimal number of function evaluations needed to reduce the initial integration error by a factor s is bounded by Ce-p for some exponent p and some positive constant C. The e-exponent of tractability is defined as the smallest power of e-1 in these bounds. It is shown by using Monte Carlo quadrature that the e-exponent is no greater than 2 for these weighted classes of integrands. Under a somewhat stronger assumption on the weights and for a popular choice of the reproducing kernel it is shown constructively using the Halton sequence that the e-exponent of tractability is 1, which implies that infinite dimensional integration is no harder than one-dimensional integration.
Dependency preserving probabilistic modeling of switching activity using Bayesian networks

We propose a new switching probability model for combinational circuits using a logic-induced-directed-acyclic-graph (LIDBG) and prove that such a graph corresponds to a Bayesian network guaranteed to map all the dependencies inherent in the circuit. This switching activity can be estimated by capturing complex dependencies (spatiotemporal and conditional) among signals efficiently by local message-passing based on the Bayesian networks. Switching activity estimation of ISCAS and MCNC circuits with random input streams yield high accuracy (average mean error=0.002) and low computational time (average time=3.93 seconds).
Sulf1 has ligand-dependent effects on canonical and non-canonical Wnt signalling

ABSTRACT Wnt signalling plays essential roles during embryonic development and is known to be mis-regulated in human disease. There are many molecular mechanisms that ensure tight regulation of Wnt activity. One such regulator is the heparan-sulfate-specific 6-O-endosulfatase Sulf1. Sulf1 acts extracellularly to modify the structure of heparan sulfate chains to affect the bio-availability of Wnt ligands. Sulf1 could, therefore, influence the formation of Wnt signalling complexes to modulate the activation of both canonical and non-canonical pathways. In this study, we use well-established assays in Xenopus to investigate the ability of Sulf1 to modify canonical and non-canonical Wnt signalling. In addition, we model the ability of Sulf1 to influence morphogen gradients using fluorescently tagged Wnt ligands in ectodermal explants. We show that Sulf1 overexpression has ligand-specific effects on Wnt signalling: it affects membrane accumulation and extracellular levels of tagged Wnt8a and Wnt11b ligands differently, and inhibits the activity of canonical Wnt8a but enhances the activity of non-canonical Wnt11b.
Research on product feature extraction for Chinese reviews

Opinion mining technique aims at automatically obtaining valuable information by retrieving and processing product reviews on the web, product feature extraction is the key step for opinion mining. Currently, the product feature extraction has been studied a lot in the field of English. However, the research of Chinese feature extraction is insufficient. There exist many issues such as small size of datasets, low precision rate, etc. In this paper, we put forward a feature extraction algorithm for Chinese reviews based on Apriori algorithm on the basis of Chinese language characteristics. Experiments with a large number of real network reviews data are carried out and good results are obtained. The experiment results show that this algorithm is effective and has a certain practical value.
An adaptive hash join algorithm on a network of workstations

Due to advances in computer technology, many organizations have a large number of workstation-class machines connected by LAN. Such a network of workstations (NOW) can be used for parallel processing, including database query processing. This paper proposes a new load sharing algorithm for hash join processing on NOWs. This new algorithm combines a chunking method with hash join to manage dynamic changes that occur in NOW environments. The algorithm is compared with two other algorithms: an adaptive nested-loop join and adaptive GRACE hash join. These three algorithms were evaluated on a Pentium-based heterogeneous NOW system with skewed data and various non-query background loads. The results show that the new algorithm is the best among the three in most of the cases and should be used for single join processing on NOWs.
Role of Mutation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa Biofilm Development

The survival of bacteria in nature is greatly enhanced by their ability to grow within surface-associated communities called biofilms. Commonly, biofilms generate proliferations of bacterial cells, called microcolonies, which are highly recalcitrant, 3-dimensional foci of bacterial growth. Microcolony growth is initiated by only a subpopulation of bacteria within biofilms, but processes responsible for this differentiation remain poorly understood. Under conditions of crowding and intense competition between bacteria within biofilms, microevolutionary processes such as mutation selection may be important for growth; however their influence on microcolony-based biofilm growth and architecture have not previously been explored. To study mutation in-situ within biofilms, we transformed Pseudomonas aeruginosa cells with a green fluorescent protein gene containing a +1 frameshift mutation. Transformed P. aeruginosa cells were non-fluorescent until a mutation causing reversion to the wildtype sequence occurs. Fluorescence-inducing mutations were observed in microcolony structures, but not in other biofilm cells, or in planktonic cultures of P. aeruginosa cells. Thus microcolonies may represent important foci for mutation and evolution within biofilms. We calculated that microcolony-specific increases in mutation frequency were at least 100-fold compared with planktonically grown cultures. We also observed that mutator phenotypes can enhance microcolony-based growth of P. aeruginosa cells. For P. aeruginosa strains defective in DNA fidelity and error repair, we found that microcolony initiation and growth was enhanced with increased mutation frequency of the organism. We suggest that microcolony-based growth can involve mutation and subsequent selection of mutants better adapted to grow on surfaces within crowded-cell environments. This model for biofilm growth is analogous to mutation selection that occurs during neoplastic progression and tumor development, and may help to explain why structural and genetic heterogeneity are characteristic features of bacterial biofilm populations.
Some Topics On Braided Hopf Algebras And Galois Extension in Braided Tensor Categories

Braided Hopf algebras have attracted much attention in both mathematics and mathematical physics (see e.g. [2][4][14][16][17][18][20][23]). The classification of finite dimensional Hopf algebras is interesting and important for their applications (see [1] [24]). Braided Hopf algebras play an important role in the classification of finite-dimensional pointed Hopf algebras (e.g. [1][2] [21]). The Hopf Galois (H-Galois) extension has its roots in the work of Chase-Harrison-Rosenberg [8] and Chase-Sweedler [9]. The general definition about H-Galois extension appeared in [15] and the relation between crossed product and H-Galois extension was obtained in [3][10][12] for ordinary Hopf algebras. See books [19][11] for reviews about the main results on this topic. In this paper, we construct new (finite dimensional) Hopf algebras using (finite dimensional) braided Hopf algebras in Yetter-Drinfeld categories by means of bosinization and Drinfeld double. We show that for any braided Hopf algebra B in HYD the bosonization B#H of B and H is also a braided Hopf algebra in HYD. Consequently, we can obtain other Hopf algebras such as (B#H)#H and so on. In [22], the braided Drinfeld double D(B) was constructed for finite dimensional braided Hopf algebra B in HYD with symmetric braiding on B. We give the relation between crossed product and H-Galois extension in braided tensor category C with equivalisers and coequivalisers. That is, we show that if there exist an equivaliser and a coequivaliser for any two morphisms in C (e.g. Yetter-Drinfeld categories), then A = B#σH is a crossed product algebra in C if and only if the extension A/B is Galois, the canonical epic q : A⊗A→ A⊗B A is split and A is isomorphic as left B-modules and right H-comodules to B ⊗H in C. Let k be a field. We use the Sweedler’s sigma notations for coalgebras and comodules: ∆(x) = ∑ x1 ⊗ x2, δ (x) = ∑ x(−1) ⊗ x(0).
Power Vectors: An Application of Fourier Analysis to the Description and Statistical Analysis of Refractive Error

The description of sphero-cylinder lenses is approached from the viewpoint of Fourier analysis of the power profile. It is shown that the familiar sine-squared law leads naturally to a Fourier series representation with exactly three Fourier coefficients, representing the natural parameters of a thin lens. The constant term corresponds to the mean spherical equivalent (MSE) power, whereas the amplitude and phase of the harmonic correspond to the power and axis of a Jackson cross-cylinder (JCC) lens, respectively. Expressing the Fourier series in rectangular form leads to the representation of an arbitrary sphero-cylinder lens as the sum of a spherical lens and two cross-cylinders, one at axis 0° and the other at axis 45°. The power of these three component lenses may be interpreted as (x,y,z) coordinates of a vector representation of the power profile. Advantages of this power vector representation of a sphero-cylinder lens for numerical and graphical analysis of optometric data are described for problems involving lens combinations, comparison of different lenses, and the statistical distribution of refractive errors.
Ocular Vascular Endothelial Heterogeneity

Endothelial cells form the lining of the vasculature. Despite the continuity of this layer throughout the body, endothelial cells exhibit remarkable heterogeneity in structure, molecular composition and activity: between sites; and in response to different exposures. One important consequence of endothelial diversity is the localized nature of many vascu- lar disorders. To date a limited number of studies have attempted to define unique phenotypic features of the different in- traocular endothelial subpopulations, which include the endothelial cells of vascular beds in the iris, the choroid and the retina. Differences that distinguish endothelial cells in the circulations of the choroid and the retina, in particular, are be- lieved to be major etiological factors controlling the specific involvement of the two tissues in some of the most common blinding diseases. Age-related macular degeneration involves choroid, and diabetic retinopathy and posterior uveitis are primarily diseases of the retina. Development of effective targeted therapies for these ocular disorders will require a de- tailed understanding of the heterogeneity of ocular endothelia. Our review summarizes the existing literature relating to diversity of the ocular endothelial cells. We highlight structural, metabolic and functional characteristics that distinguish intraoocular endothelial subtypes from each other and from extraocular endothelial cells, and we consider the implications of these differences for the design of novel biological therapeutics for eye diseases.
Recurring Job Optimization for Massively Distributed Query Processing

Companies providing cloud-scale data services have increasing needs to store and analyze massive data sets. For cost and performance reasons, processing is typically done on large clusters of tens of thousands of commodity machines. Developers use high-level scripting languages that simplify understanding various system trade-offs, but introduce new challenges for query optimization. One key optimization challenge is missing accurate data statistics, typically due to massive data volumes and their distributed nature, complex computation logic, and frequent usage of user-defined functions. In this paper we describe a technique to optimize a class of jobs that are recurring over time in a cloud-scale computation environment. By leveraging information gathered during previous executions we are able to obtain accurate statistics for new instances of recurring jobs, resulting in better execution plans. Experiments on a large-scale production system show that our techniques significantly improve cluster utilization.
Structured Learning for Context-aware Spoken Language Understanding of Robotic Commands

Service robots are expected to operate in specific environments, where the presence of humans plays a key role. A major feature of such robotics platforms is thus the ability to react to spoken commands. This requires the understanding of the user utterance with an accuracy able to trigger the robot reaction. Such correct interpretation of linguistic exchanges depends on physical, cognitive and language-dependent aspects related to the environment. In this work, we present the empirical evaluation of an adaptive Spoken Language Understanding chain for robotic commands, that explicitly depends on the operational environment during both the learning and recognition stages. The effectiveness of such a context-sensitive command interpretation is tested against an extension of an already existing corpus of commands, that introduced explicit perceptual knowledge: this enabled deeper measures proving that more accurate disambiguation capabilities can be actually obtained.
Estimation of bacterial use of dissolved organic nitrogen compounds in aquatic ecosystems using Biolog plates

We demonstrated that bacterioplankton utilization of N-containing substrates, in rela- tion to overall substrate utilization, can be assessed by calculating a nitrogen use (NUSE) index from Biolog-ECO microplate readings. The NUSE index was positively correlated with bacterial-specific aminopeptidase activity in coastal plankton samples, and it decreased after ammonia or amino acid addition to seawater cultures; this indicated that the index was sensitive to changes in N concentra- tions in natural samples. The index provides valuable information on dissolved organic nitrogen processing by natural bacterial assemblages, and thereby substantially expands the utility of the Biolog-ECO microplates.
Single-Cell Analysis by LA-ICP-MS.

Robert W. Hutchinson, PhD and James A. Hutchinson, MBBChir, PhD Links [A] http://maxpar.fluidigm. com/productcatalog-metal.php [B] http://pubs.rsc. org/en/content/articlelanding/ 2015/cs/c5cs00055f? iscitedby= True#! divAbstract [C] http://ferrumblogger.com/ [D] http://www.nature. com/multimedia/ webcasts/mass-cytometery.mp4 [E] http://www.uts. edu.au/about/ faculty-science/elemental-bio-imagingcentre/about-us [F] http://www.esi. com/Products/ LaserAblation.aspx Immunologists are only now beginning to appreciate the heterogeneity of immune responses at the level of single cells. Developing novel technologies to measure multiple phenotypic properties of single cells in solid-phase specimens could be a key to a more sophisticated understanding of the diverse behaviors of individual cells. Single-cell transcriptomics, single-cell genomics, and mass cytometry have already revealed unexpected levels of complexity to previously well-studied immune reactions. More recently, laser ablation inductively coupled mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) has emerged as a powerful technique for highly multiplexed imaging of single cells in tissues. Although a very new technology, LA-ICP-MS is now receiving attention as a tool for life science research and clinical diagnostics. The LA-ICP-MS bioimaging found its first applications in oncology, neuroscience, and metabolic research, but now a subgroup of the ONE Study consortium is exploring potential uses in transplantation. This article collates online resources with relevance to the readership of Transplantation introducing the principles and possible applications of LA-ICP-MS imaging of biological specimens. LA-ICP-MS is an analytical technique commonly used in many fields, including material and earth sciences. The approach involves the vaporization of micron-sized regions of a solid sample with focused pulses of high-irradiance laser energy. The vaporized material is annihilated and ionized in an ICP then analyzed by mass spectrometry. By contiguous sampling across a specimen, a data set relating spatial information and elemental composition is generated, which can then be represented by 2-dimensional scatter plots or used to construct element
Internal Kinematics of Spiral Galaxies in Distant Clusters

We introduce our project on galaxy evolution in the environment of rich clusters, aiming at disentangling the importance of specific interaction and galaxy transformation processes from the hierarchical evolution of galaxies in the field. Emphasis is laid on the examination of the internal kinematics of disk galaxies through spatially resolved multiobject spectroscopy with FORS at the Very Large Telescope. First results are presented for the clusters MS 1008.1-1224 (z = 0.30), Cl 0303+1706 (z = 0.42), and Cl 0413-6559 (F1557.19TC; z = 0.51). Out of 30 cluster members with emission lines, 13 galaxies exhibit a rotation curve of the universal form rising in the inner region and passing over into a flat part. The other members have either intrinsically peculiar kinematics (4), too strong geometric distortions (9), or a too low signal-to-noise ratio (4) for a reliable classification of their velocity profiles. The 13 cluster galaxies for which a maximum rotation velocity could be derived are distributed in the Tully-Fisher diagram very similar to field galaxies from the FORS Deep Field that have corresponding redshifts and do not show any significant luminosity evolution with respect to local samples. The same is true for the seven galaxies observed in the cluster fields that turned out not to be members. The mass-to-light ratios of the 13 Tully-Fisher cluster spiral galaxies cover the same range as the distant field population, indicating that their stellar populations were not dramatically changed by possible cluster-specific interaction phenomena. The cluster members with distorted kinematics may be subject to interaction processes, but it is impossible to determine whether or not these processes also lead to changes in the overall luminosity of their stellar populations.