Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Comprendre le trafic routier. Méthodes et calculs

Le niveau eleI de la demande de trafic, le nombre important d'acteurs concernes, ainsi que le maillage des reseaux viaires, contribuent a faire du trafic routier un domaine d'etudes complexe. La congestion des reseaux est un phenomene de plus en plus courant, et directement perceptible par le grand public, car elle est subie par de nombreux usagers. C'est pourquoi, depuis une cinquantaine d'annees, des theoriciens du trafic cherchent a mieux comprendre et a quantifier les mecanismes a l'oeuvre. Le present ouvrage tente de faire le point, de maniere accessible, sur le sujet. Il presente en premier lieu les differentes variables qui permettent de caracteriser la progression des Ihicules sur une voie, puis la relation fondamentale qui permet de relier certaines de ces variables. A titre d'illustration, quelques calculs simples, permettant d'estimer le temps de traversee d'un bouchon, sont ensuite fournis. Les notions de debits cumules et de temps de parcours sont ensuite abordees. La problematique des reseaux mailles, ainsi que les calculs d'evolution spatio-temporelle de la congestion terminent l'ouvrage, qui est par ailleurs complete par plusieurs annexes (serie d'exercices avec leurs corriges, glossaire francais -anglais et bibliographie).
Induced polarization of volcanic rocks. 3. Imaging clay cap properties in geothermal fields

Smectite-rich clay caps form permeability seals in geothermal systems. The presence of smec-tite is also responsible for a strong surface (interfacial) electrical conductivity and polarization due to their electrical double layer properties. We developed new complex conductivity models using both differential effective medium (DEM) and volume averaging theories accounting for both conduction and polarization of these high cation exchange capacity (CEC) materials. These models predict that the chargeability is also a non-linear function of the pore water conductivity reaching a constant value at pore water conductivity far above the so-called iso-conductivity point. The iso-conductivity point is characterized by the equality between the conductivity of the rock and the conductivity of the pore water. We apply the DEM conductivity model (which requires only two textural parameters) to smectite-rich volcanic and sedimentary rocks using data sets from the literature. When smectite is present in the volcanic rocks, the CEC of the rock is dominated by the CEC of smectite. The grain conductivity and the normalized chargeability are related to each other by a dimensionless number R = 0.10 (independent of temperature and saturation) and both are controlled by the excess of charge per unit pore volume Q V , which can be determined from the CEC and porosity. Our petro-physical model is also able to predict the permeability of the rock as well from the CEC and the porosity. It is applied to a 3-D data set at Krafla volcano (Iceland). The porosity, the CEC, the percentage of smectite, and the permeability of the clay-cap are imaged by 3-D induced polarization tomography. Electrical conductivity tomography alone does not allow separation of the contribution of the bulk pore space from the interfacial properties related to alteration and therefore should be used with caution.
The epidemiology of adolescent homicide in North Carolina from 1990 to 1995.

BACKGROUND Rates of homicides by adolescents under age 18 years tripled from 1984 to 1994. Most studies report data on urban adolescents and young adults as a single age group (age 15-24 years), but homicide characteristics among adolescents, especially those younger than 15 years, may differ from those of young adults. OBJECTIVE To describe the homicide characteristics among adolescents age 11 to 18 years in North Carolina from 1990 to 1995. METHODS A retrospective, descriptive analysis of adolescent homicides using the medical examiner database. Police interviews provided additional information for cases from 1993 to 1995. RESULTS There were 419 victims from 1990 to 1995 (average annual rate: 9.7 per 100000 adolescents; 9.9 in urban counties, 7.1 in rural). Victims were mostly ages 15 to 18 years (85%), male (79%), and black (76%); 48% lagged behind in school, and, by police report, 40% had a criminal record. Only 23% of the identified perpetrators were strangers. Firearms (59% were handguns) were used in 83% of homicides. Proportionally more younger adolescents (age 11-14 years) were killed by means other than firearms than 15- to 18-year-olds (chi2 = 24.2, P = .007). Drug-related motives (23%) were most common, followed by non-drug-related altercations (20%) and retaliations (17%). CONCLUSIONS Proportionally more North Carolina adolescents than urban young adults (ages 15-24 years) were killed by firearms (83% vs. 75%). Proportionally fewer adolescents were killed by police, strangers, or intimate partners. Interventions should include reducing access to firearms and drugs, and helping adolescents develop nonviolent strategies to resolve disputes. Efforts should be focused on adolescents who lag behind in school and have criminal records.
Impacts of Distributed Generation on the Residential Distribution Network Operation

Distributed Generation (DG) is expected to play a key role in the residential, commercial and industrial sectors of the power system. Distributed Generation (DG) provides an alternative to the traditional electricity sources i.e. oil, gas, coal, water etc. and can also be used to enhance the current electrical system. The technologies for DG are based on reciprocating engines, photovoltaic, fuel cells, combustion gas turbines, micro turbines and wind turbines. The DGs are becoming increasingly popular due to their low emission, low noise levels and high efficiency. Some of the main applications of DG are to provide support and reliability to the power system in a grid-connected mode or isolated mode. With the growing use of DG, it is very important to study its impact on residential distribution network operation. In this research, the impacts of installing DG on a residential distribution circuit are explored. The work is focused on analyzing the impact of DG installation on distribution network operation including voltage analysis, electric losses and reliability of the system. First, various DG penetration levels and the impact of distributing the DG across several locations are explored. Secondly, the impacts of installing DG on any one phase on the voltage profiles of the unbalanced three-phase distribution network are investigated. Thirdly, the losses of the system are analyzed. Next, the reliability analysis (SAIDI, CAIDI, ENS, and AENS) of the system is performed by installing DGs as backup generators. Different DG penetration levels, locations and the impacts of installing one large-scale DG on the main distribution line vs. several small-scale randomly distributed DGs are explored. A residential distribution circuit in Blacksburg,
Simulating the evaporation of pinned water microdroplets with implementation of a surface concentration distribution

Numerical and experimental investigations of water microdroplet evaporation on polymer substrates are reported. The study is focused on validating numerical models with experimental data. The experimentally measured evaporation rates are compared to the predictions of a commonly reported model based on a solution of the Laplace equation, providing the local evaporation flux along the droplets liquid-vapor interface. The model consistently overpredicts the evaporation rate, which is presumable due to the models constant saturated vapor concentration along the droplets liquid-vapor interface. In result, a modified version of the model is implemented to account for variations in temperature along the droplets liquid-vapor interface. A vapor concentration distribution is then imposed using this temperature distribution, increasing the accuracy in predicted evaporation rate by ~ 7.7% and ~ 9.9% for heated polymer substrates at Ts = 50°C and 65°C, respectively.
Amyloid fibers are water-filled nanotubes

A study of papers on amyloid fibers suggested to us that cylindrical β-sheets are the only structures consistent with some of the x-ray and electron microscope data. We then found that our own 7-year-old and hitherto enigmatic x-ray diagram of poly-l-glutamine fits a cylindrical sheet of 31 Å diameter made of β-strands with 20 residues per helical turn. Successive turns are linked by hydrogen bonds between both the main chain and side chain amides, and side chains point alternately into and out of the cylinder. Fibers of the exon-1 peptide of huntingtin and of the glutamine- and asparagine-rich region of the yeast prion Sup35 give the same underlying x-ray diagrams, which show that they have the same structure. Electron micrographs show that the 100-Å-thick fibers of the Sup35 peptide are ropes made of three protofibrils a little over 30 Å thick. They have a measured mass of 1,450 Da/Å, compared with 1,426 Da/Å for a calculated mass of three protofibrils each with 20 residues per helical turn wound around each other with a helical pitch of 510 Å. Published x-ray diagrams and electron micrographs show that fibers of synuclein, the protein that forms the aggregates of Parkinson disease, consist of single cylindrical β-sheets. Fibers of Alzheimer Aβ fragments and variants are probably made of either two or three concentric cylindrical β-sheets. Our structure of poly-l-glutamine fibers may explain why, in all but one of the neurodegenerative diseases resulting from extension of glutamine repeats, disease occurs when the number of repeats exceeds 37–40. A single helical turn with 20 residues would be unstable, because there is nothing to hold it in place, but two turns with 40 residues are stabilized by the hydrogen bonds between their amides and can act as nuclei for further helical growth. The Aβ peptide of Alzheimer's disease contains 42 residues, the best number for nucleating further growth. All these structures are very stable; the best hope for therapies lies in preventing their growth.
Clustering and ensembling approaches to support surrogate‐based species management

Surrogate species can provide an efficient mechanism for biodiversity conservation if they encompass the needs or indicate the status of a broader set of species. When species that are the focus of ongoing management efforts act as effective surrogates for other species, these incidental surrogacy benefits lead to additional efficiency. Assessing surrogate relationships often relies on grouping species by distributional patterns or by species traits, but there are few approaches for integrating outputs from multiple methods into summaries of surrogate relationships that can inform decision‐making.
Joint contributions of cortical morphometry and white matter microstructure in healthy brain aging: A partial least squares correlation analysis

Cortical atrophy and degraded axonal health have been shown to coincide during normal aging; however, few studies have examined these measures together. To lend insight into both the regional specificity and the relative timecourse of structural degradation of these tissue compartments across the lifespan, we analyzed grey matter (GM) morphometry (cortical thickness, surface area, volume) and estimates of white matter (WM) microstructure (fractional anisotropy, mean diffusivity) using traditional univariate and more robust multivariate techniques to examine age associations in 186 healthy adults aged 20-94 years old. Univariate analysis of each tissue type revealed that negative age associations were largest in frontal grey and white matter tissue and weaker in temporal, cingulate, and occipital regions, representative of not only an anterior-to-posterior gradient, but also a medial-to-lateral gradient. Multivariate partial least squares correlation (PLSC) found the greatest covariance between GM and WM was driven by the relationship between WM metrics in the anterior corpus callosum and projections of the genu, anterior cingulum, and fornix; and with GM thickness in parietal and frontal regions. Surface area was far less susceptible to age effects and displayed less covariance with WM metrics, while regional volume covariance patterns largely mirrored those of cortical thickness. Results support a retrogenesis-like model of aging, revealing a coupled relationship between frontal and parietal GM and the underlying WM, which evidence the most protracted development and the most vulnerability during healthy aging.
Fast PCR utilizing buoyant convection in a disposable chip

We report a portable polymerase chain reaction(PCR) device conducting multiple PCR reactions in less than 5 minutes. We designed a novel loop-shaped microchannel in order to circulate PCR reactants fast through it. Temperature differences among three zones in the microchannel continuously generate a buoyant convection along the microchannel. The microchannel is molded in a disposable polymer chip. Our group's first prototype was reported previously, and we present a newly optimized device of the enhanced performance especially in PCR speed and multiplexing. The buoyant flows in the microchannel are newly visualized and compared with results from numerical simulations.
Panic disorder in women: a population-based twin study

Synopsis Previous studies based on probands from clinical samples suggest that panic disorder aggregates strongly in families and may be due to a highly penetrant single major locus. In this study we examine panic disorder as assessed at blind, structured psychiatric interview in 2163 women from a population-based twin registry. DSM-III-R diagnoses were assigned at a narrow and at a broad level both by clinician review and by computer algorithm. The familial aggregation of panic disorder in this sample was only modest. The relatively small number of affected individuals prevented a definitive resolution of competing genetic and non-genetic models of familial transmission. Although there was some inconsistency across diagnostic approaches, most results suggested that the familial aggregation of panic disorder was due largely to genetic factors. Using a multifactorial-threshold model, the best estimates of the heritability of liability ranged from 30 to 40%. From a familial perspective, panic disorder with phobic avoidance appears to represent a more severe form of the syndrome than panic disorder without avoidance. Our results, which suggest that in the general population panic disorder is only a moderately heritable condition, are at variance with results from several previous investigations based on clinically ascertained samples.
Identification, Characterization, and Clinical Development of the New Generation of Breast Cancer Susceptibility Alleles

Abstract : Breast cancer is a common disease in women but the causes are still largely unknown. There is considerable evidence to suggest that genetic factors play an important role in causing breast cancer, but the genes involved in the majority of breast cancers are currently unknown. Our aim is to identify genetic factors that increase the chance of breast cancer occurring. We have collected clinical information and samples from over 1500 breast cancer families. We will compare the frequency of genetic factors in these cases with control women without breast cancer. Within the last year we have used this new strategy to identify three new breast cancer predisposition genes, ATM, BRIP1 and PALB2, that each confer a 2-3 fold risk of breast cancer and account for -3% of excess risk of breast cancer. We have also performed an experiment to evaluate 15,000 coding genetic variants in 864 breast cancer cases and 1498 controls and we are following up these results in additional cases.
Comparative Transcriptome Analysis between the Cytoplasmic Male Sterile Line NJCMS1A and Its Maintainer NJCMS1B in Soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.)

Background The utilization of soybean heterosis is probably one of the potential approaches in future yield breakthrough as was the situation in rice breeding in China. Cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) plays an important role in the production of hybrid seeds. However, the molecular mechanism of CMS in soybean remains unclear. Results The comparative transcriptome analysis between cytoplasmic male sterile line NJCMS1A and its near-isogenic maintainer NJCMS1B in soybean was conducted using Illumina sequencing technology. A total of 88,643 transcripts were produced in Illumina sequencing. Then 56,044 genes were obtained matching soybean reference genome. Three hundred and sixty five differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between NJCMS1A and NJCMS1B were screened by threshold, among which, 339 down-regulated and 26 up-regulated in NJCMS1A compared to in NJCMS1B. Gene Ontology (GO) annotation showed that 242 DEGs were annotated to 19 functional categories. Clusters of Orthologous Groups of proteins (COG) annotation showed that 265 DEGs were classified into 19 categories. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis showed that 46 DEGs were assigned to 33 metabolic pathways. According to functional and metabolic pathway analysis combined with reported literatures, the relations between some key DEGs and the male sterility of NJCMS1A were discussed. qRT-PCR analysis validated that the gene expression pattern in RNA-Seq was reliable. Finally, enzyme activity assay showed that energy supply was decreased in NJCMS1A compared to in NJCMS1B. Conclusions We concluded that the male sterility of NJCMS1A might be related to the disturbed functions and metabolism pathways of some key DEGs, such as DEGs involved in carbohydrate and energy metabolism, transcription factors, regulation of pollen development, elimination of reactive oxygen species (ROS), cellular signal transduction, and programmed cell death (PCD) etc. Future research will focus on cloning and transgenic function validation of possible candidate genes associated with soybean CMS.
Rapid Detection of Virulence-Associated Genes in Avian Pathogenic Escherichia coli by Multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction

Abstract Based on recently published prevalence data of virulence-associated factors in avian pathogenic Escherichia coli (APEC) and their roles in the pathogenesis of colibacillosis, we developed a multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) as a molecular tool supplementing current diagnostic schemes that mainly rely on serological examination of strains isolated from diseased birds. Multiple isolates of E. coli from clinical cases of colibacillosis known to possess different combinations of eight genes were used as sources of template DNA to develop the multiplex PCR protocol, targeting genes for P-fimbriae (papC), aerobactin (iucD), iron-repressible protein (irp2), temperature-sensitive hemagglutinin (tsh), vacuolating autotransporter toxin (vat), enteroaggregative toxin (astA), increased serum survival protein (iss), and colicin V plasmid operon genes (cva/cvi). In order to verify the usefulness of this diagnostic tool, E. coli strains isolated from fecal samples of clinically healthy chickens were also included in this study, as were uropathogenic (UPEC), necrotoxigenic, and diarrhegenic E. coli strains. The application of the multiplex PCR protocol to 14 E. coli strains isolated from septicemic poultry showed that these strains harbored four to eight of the genes mentioned above. In contrast, those isolates that have been shown to be nonpathogenic for 5-wk-old chickens possessed either none or, at most, three of these genes. We found only one enterohemorrhagic (EHEC), one enteropathogenic (EPEC), and two enterotoxic (ETEC) E. coli strains positive for irp2, and another two ETEC strains positive for astA. As expected, UPEC isolates yielded different combinations of the genes iss, papC, iucD, irp2, and a sequence similar to vat. However, neither the colicin V operon genes cva/cvi nor tsh were amplified in UPEC isolates. The multiplex PCR results were compared with those obtained by DNA–DNA-hybridization analyses to validate the specificity of oligonucleotide primers, and the protocol was concluded to be a useful, sensitive, and rapid assay system to detect avian pathogenic E. coli and differentiate them from nonpathogenic strains and those belonging to other pathotypes.
Claudin‐1 involved in neonatal ichthyosis sclerosing cholangitis syndrome regulates hepatic paracellular permeability

Neonatal ichthyosis and sclerosing cholangitis (NISCH) syndrome is a liver disease caused by mutations of CLDN1 encoding Claudin‐1, a tight‐junction (TJ) protein. In this syndrome, it is speculated that cholestasis is caused by Claudin‐1 absence, leading to increased paracellular permeability and liver injuries secondary to paracellular bile regurgitation. We studied the role of claudin‐1 in hepatic paracellular permeability. A NISCH liver and polarized rat cell lines forming TJs, the hepatocellular Can 10 and the cholangiocellular normal rat choloangiocyte (NRC), were used. In contrast to NRC, Can 10 does not express claudin‐1. Can 10 cells were transfected with a plasmid encoding Claudin‐1, and stable Claudin‐1‐expressing clones were isolated. Claudin‐1 expression was silenced by transfection with short interfering RNA in Can 10 clones and with short hairpin RNA in NRC. Claudin‐1 expression was evaluated by quantitative reverse‐transcriptase polymerase chain reaction, immunoblotting, and immunolocalization. Paracellular permeability was assessed by fluorescein isothiocyanate‐dextran passage in both lines and by transepithelial resistance measurements in NRC. In the NISCH liver, Claudin‐1 was not detected in hepatocytes or cholangiocytes. In Claudin‐1 expressing Can 10 clones, Claudin‐1 was localized at the TJ and paracellular permeability was decreased, compared to parental Can 10 cells, this decrease correlating with claudin‐1 levels. Silencing of Claudin‐1 in Can 10 clones increased paracellular permeability to a level similar to that of parental cells. Similarly, we observed an increase of paracellular permeability in NRC cells silenced for claudin‐1 expression. Conclusion: Defect in claudin‐1 expression increases paracellular permeability in polarized hepatic cell lines, supporting the hypothesis that paracellular bile leakage through deficient TJs is involved in liver pathology observed in NISCH syndrome. (Hepatology 2012)