Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Phasic contractions of isolated human myometrium are associated with Rho-kinase (ROCK)-dependent phosphorylation of myosin phosphatase-targeting subunit (MYPT1)

Force generation in smooth muscle is driven by phosphorylation of myosin light chains (MYL), which is regulated by the equilibrium between the activities of myosin light chain kinase (MYLK) and myosin phosphatase (MYLP). MYLK is activated by Ca2+-calmodulin whereas MYLP is inhibited by phosphorylation of its myosin-binding subunit (MYPT1) by Ca2+-independent mechanisms, leading to generation of increased MYL phosphorylation and force for a given intracellular Ca2+ concentration, a phenomenon known as ‘calcium-sensitization’. The regulation of MYPT1 phosphorylation in human myometrium, which shows increasing phasic contractility at the onset of labour, has yet to be fully investigated. Here, we explore phosphorylation of MYPT1 at Thr696 and Thr853, alongside phosphorylation of MYL, in fresh human myometrial tissue and cultured myometrial cells. We report that pMYPT1 (Thr853) levels are dependent on the activity of Rho-associated kinase (ROCK), determined using the ROCK inhibitor g-H-1152 and siRNA-mediated knockdown of ROCK1/2, and are highly correlated to ppMYL (Thr18/Ser19) levels. Pharmacological inhibition of ROCK was associated with a decrease in oxytocin (OXT)-stimulated contractility of myometrial strips in vitro. Moreover, we have measured pMYPT1 and pMYL levels between and during spontaneous and OXT-stimulated phasic contractions by rapidly freezing contracting muscle, and demonstrate for the first time functional coupling between increases in pMYPT1 (Thr853), ppMYL (Thr18/Ser19) and phasic contractility that is ROCK-dependent. The combined approach of measuring contractility and phosphorylation has demonstrated that the phosphorylation of MYPT1 (Thr853) changes dynamically with each contraction and has elucidated a defined role for ROCK in regulating myometrial contractility through MYLP, providing new insights into uterine physiology which will stimulate further research into treatments for preterm labour.
Academic identities and university faculty responses to new managerialist reforms: experiences from China

Chinese universities are being continually subjected to new managerial practices and technologies that have fundamental consequences on the university faculty's academic life. Within a predominantly communitarian theoretical framework of academic identity, this qualitative case study draws upon interviews with 25 academics in Mainland China to expose the extent to which Chinese academics’ values, beliefs and behaviour are convergent and consistent with those that might be expected within the reform agenda. The systematic data analysis identified six identity-related characterisations of how Chinese university faculty at this case university have reacted to this shifting context, contributing to the global literature on the academic profession in two respects. First, it contributes to the empirically grounded knowledge of the complex manner in which Chinese academics negotiate, challenge or comply with the new managerialist agenda. Second, it explores the prime academic identity that Chinese academics have built up under this new managerial circumstances.
Exploring the Physical, Mental and Social Well-Being of Gay and Bisexual Men who Cruise for Sex on a College Campus

ABSTRACT A mixed methods design was used to collect data from 30 men who were currently, or had a history of, participating in anonymous public sex in college campus venues. Data were analyzed to assess the extent to which participation in these behaviors was associated with both positive and negative outcomes across the areas of physical health, mental health and social well-being. Findings indicated that cruising for sex on a college campus simultaneously presents challenges to, and supports, the health of gay and bisexual men. Recommendations for interfacing with these men by campus and community health providers are given.
A trust management model for service‐oriented distributed networks

The service‐oriented distributed network requires more stable and persistent services, but the services from dishonest or unstable nodes would damage the correctness and availability of services. To efficiently obtain the services from high dependable nodes, many trust management systems have been developed. However, the previous trust models in distributed networks ignore a fact that the entity itself could provide trust information for services also. In this paper, we present a novel trust management model based on the subjective logic trust for service‐oriented distributed networks. The proposed algorithm involves passive trust of entity and combines the direct trust and recommendation trust. We also propose a novel scheme called passive trust feedback to avoid the deceit of malicious nodes and unstable nodes, and to encourage honest nodes. Our proposed model expands the trust range of service resource via passive trust of entity, which generates a flexible access path to the service resources. Simulations show that the proposed trust management model can significantly improve the feasibility of trust management as well as effectively detect malicious entities. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Distributed TLS over multitask networks with adaptive intertask cooperation

Distributed estimation is an important technique for in-network signal processing. In this work, we consider a general case where the unknown parameter vectors (tasks) for different nodes can be different, which is different from the common single-task problem and is known as the multitask problem. Besides, it is assumed that there are some similarities among these tasks. Thus, the performance may be improved by performing the intertask cooperation. To improve robustness against different degrees of difference among the tasks, an adaptive intertask cooperation strategy is proposed. On the other hand, in most of the existing distributed algorithms, it is usually assumed that noise/errors are confined to the output signal. However, in many real environments, the input and output signals may be both corrupted by noise, which is described by the errors-in-variables (EIV) model. In such a case, it has been demonstrated that the total least-squares (TLS) method based on minimizing the squared total error outperforms the classical least-squares method. In this paper, we consider the EIV model with several parameter vectors to be estimated simultaneously, and we derive a distributed TLS algorithm with adaptive intertask cooperation for the in-network cooperative estimation problem. For this algorithm, theoretical performance analysis is provided. Besides, to verify its effectiveness, numerical simulations are given.
Performance Metrics, Sampling Schemes, and Detection Algorithms for Wideband Spectrum Sensing

In this paper, we study the problem of wideband spectrum sensing for cognitive radio networks by partitioning it into four fundamental elements: system modeling, performance metrics, sampling schemes, and detection algorithms. Each element can potentially couple the individual channels so that designs for wideband spectrum sensing should consider the four elements jointly. We propose the p-sparse model for the primary occupancies and study three uniform sampling schemes for wideband spectrum sensing, specifically, partial-band Nyquist sampling, sequential narrowband Nyquist sampling, and integer undersampling. We suggest new performance metrics more appropriate for wideband spectrum sensing, specifically, the probability of insufficient spectrum opportunity and the probability of excessive interference opportunity. We also develop detection algorithms that effectively tradeoff these metrics. Our results indicate that for performance metrics that couple the individual channels, multichannel detection algorithms have a significant advantage over channel-by-channel detection algorithms even for wideband Nyquist sampling. Furthermore, integer undersampling, which corresponds to the simplest sub-Nyquist sampling scheme, along with suitable detection algorithms exhibits appealing detection performance in the regime that better protects the primary system.
Measuring Accessibility of Written Communication for Parents of Students With Disabilities

Effective communication is essential for successful school–family partnerships. Written communication is most common due to the efficiency of written documents, but challenges include assuring the information disseminated to parents is accessible based on readability, clarity, complexity, and structure particularly for parents of students with disabilities and parents with low levels of literacy. The purpose of this review was to understand to what extent written communications intended to inform parents, particularly parents of students with disabilities, were accessible given recommendations regarding appropriate readability levels and document structure. Results from eight studies, published over 30 years, evaluated 461 documents and showed divergent trends in recommended and actual reading levels where written communication became less accessible over time. Recommended readability levels ranged from 5th to below 9th grade, yet actual readability levels were almost 11th grade on average. Implications specific to the readability and accessibility of written communication are discussed.
State-space reduction and equivalence class sampling for a molecular self-assembly model

Direct simulation of a model with a large state space will generate enormous volumes of data, much of which is not relevant to the questions under study. In this paper, we consider a molecular self-assembly model as a typical example of a large state-space model, and present a method for selectively retrieving ‘target information’ from this model. This method partitions the state space into equivalence classes, as identified by an appropriate equivalence relation. The set of equivalence classes H, which serves as a reduced state space, contains none of the superfluous information of the original model. After construction and characterization of a Markov chain with state space H, the target information is efficiently retrieved via Markov chain Monte Carlo sampling. This approach represents a new breed of simulation techniques which are highly optimized for studying molecular self-assembly and, moreover, serves as a valuable guideline for analysis of other large state-space models.
Development and Implementation of a Fault-Tolerant Vehicle-Following Controller for a Four-Wheel-Steering Vehicle

This paper presents a fault-tolerant tracking controller for a platoon of two mobile robots. A vehicle model and a unified controller are proposed for both look-ahead and look-behind tracking of a four-wheel-steering vehicle. The controller can handle situations where faults occur at the two steering systems of the vehicle by making use of any operational systems to steer the vehicle. Tracking stability is ensured by the proper selection of design parameters. Experimental results show the control scheme work properly even in the situations when faults are on and off often at different parts of the vehicle
Hu-Tucker Minimum Redundancy Alphabetic Coding Method [Z] (Algorithm 428)

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Impact of frequency compression on music perception

Abstract Objective: To determine the effects of frequency compression on music perception, and the impact of previous music training and hearing status. It was hypothesized that lesser amounts of compression would be preferred, and that this pattern of preference would be more evident in the musically trained groups. Design: A paired-comparison paradigm was used. Subjects listened to pairs of musical passages as processed by a hearing aid with different frequency-compression settings. Subjects indicated their preferred passage and the strength of their preference. Study sample: Fifty-seven subjects divided in four groups, according to hearing status (normal hearing, mild-to-moderate hearing loss), and previous music experience (trained, not trained). Results: Subjects generally preferred the conditions with the lesser amount of compression. Listeners in the group with previous music training showed stronger preference for less compression than those without training, as did listeners with normal hearing when compared to subjects with hearing loss. Conclusions: Although less frequency compression was in general preferred, there was more variability in the comparisons involving the default settings for a 50-dB hearing loss (i.e. start frequency 4000 Hz, compression ratio 2.5:1) and no compression, suggesting that mild amounts of compression may not be detrimental to perceived sound quality.
The Mass Function of Young Star Clusters in the “Antennae” Galaxies

We determine the mass function of young star clusters in the merging galaxies known as the "Antennae" (NGC 4038/9) from deep images taken with the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 on the refurbished Hubble Space Telescope. This is accomplished by means of reddening-free parameters and a comparison with stellar population synthesis tracks to estimate the intrinsic luminosity and age, and hence the mass, of each cluster. We find that the mass function of the young star clusters (with ages ≲160 Myr) is well represented by a power law of the form ψ(M) ∝ M-2 over the range 104 ≲ M ≲ 106 M☉. This result may have important implications for our understanding of the origin of globular clusters during the early phases of galactic evolution.
Resveratrol augments paclitaxel treatment in MDA-MB-231 and paclitaxel-resistant MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells.

BACKGROUND Resveratrol (RES) inhibits cell growth, induces apoptosis and augments chemotherapeutics in multiple cancer types, although its effects on drug-resistant cancer cells are unknown. MATERIALS AND METHODS To study the effects of resveratrol in triple-negative breast cancer cells that are resistant to the common cancer drug, paclitaxel, a novel paclitaxel-resistant cell line was generated from the MDA-MB-231 cell line. RESULTS The resistant MDA-MB-231/PacR cells exhibited a 12-fold increased resistance to paclitaxel. RES treatment reduced cell proliferation and colony formation and increased senescence and apoptosis in both parental and resistant cells. Importantly, RES augmented the effects of paclitaxel in both cell lines. Up-regulation of the MDR1 and CYP2C8 genes were shown to be potential mechanisms of paclitaxel resistance in the resistant cells. CONCLUSION RES, both alone and in combination with paclitaxel, may be useful in the treatment of paclitaxel-sensitive and paclitaxel-resistant triple-negative breast cancer cells.
Use of a codified medication process for documentation of home medications

To determine the quality and completeness of the list of home medications documented by nurses using a codified process, authors conducted a comparative study of home medications using a non-codified and codified process for documentation of required data fields including drug, dose, route of administration, frequency, and schedule. Each documented home medication (DHM) was evaluated based on the ability to convert to an inpatient medication order. The home medication was classified as non-convertible if one or more of the required data fields were missing, inaccurate, or incomplete. The study compared 176 patients with 1618 DHM in the non-codified group to 94 patients with 646 DHM in the codified group. All DHM could be converted to inpatient orders for 70% of the patients in the codified group compared with 42% in the non-codified group. Based on each DHM, the codified process resulted in 92% of the DHM being able to convert to inpatient orders compared with 82% for the non-codified process. Authors conclude that use of a codified process to document home medications has the potential to increase the number of complete drug entries and in the number of patients with a DHM list in which all of the medication entries have all of the dosing information.
Joint audio-visual speech processing for recognition and enhancement

Visual speech information present in the speaker’s mouth region has long been viewed as a source for improving the robustness and naturalness of human-computer-interfaces (HCI). Such information can be particularly crucial in realistic HCI environments, where the acoustic channel is corrupted, and as a result, the performance of traditional automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems falls below usability levels. In this paper, we review two general approaches that utilize visual speech to improve ASR in acoustically challenging environments: One directly combines features extracted from the acoustic and visual channels, aiming at superior recognition performance of the resulting audio-visual ASR system. The other seeks to eliminate the noise present in the acoustic features, aiming at their audio-visual based enhancement, and thus resulting in improved speech recognition. We present a number of techniques recently introduced in the literature for bimodal ASR and enhancement, and we study their performance using a suitable audio-visual database. Among the methods considered, our recognition experiments demonstrate that decision based combination of audio and visual features significantly outperforms simpler feature based integration methods for audio-visual ASR. For audio feature enhancement, a non-linear technique is more successful than a regression-based approach. As expected, bimodal ASR and enhancement outperform their audio-only counterparts.
Perceptual data mining: bootstrapping visual intelligence from tracking behavior

One common characteristic of all intelligent life is continuous perceptual input. A decade ago, simply recording and storing a a few minutes of full frame-rate NTSC video required special hardware. Today, an inexpensive personal computer can process video in real-time tracking and recording information about multiple objects for extended periods of time, which fundamentally enables this research. This thesis is about Perceptual Data Mining (PDM), the primary goal of which is to create a real-time, autonomous perception system that can be introduced into a wide variety of environments and, through experience, learn to model the activity in that environment. The PDM framework infers as much as possible about the presence, type, identity, location, appearance, and activity of each active object in an environment from multiple video sources, without explicit supervision. PDM is a bottom-up, data-driven approach that is built on a novel, robust attention mechanism that reliably detects moving objects in a wide variety of environments. A correspondence system tracks objects through time and across multiple sensors producing sets of observations of objects that correspond to the same object in extended environments. Using a co-occurrence modeling technique that exploits the variation exhibited by objects as they move through the environment, the types of objects, the activities that objects perform, and the appearance of specific classes of objects are modeled. Different applications of this technique are demonstrated along with a discussion of the corresponding issues. Given the resulting rich description of the active objects in the environment, it is possible to model temporal patterns. An effective method for modeling periodic cycles of activity is demonstrated in multiple environments. This framework can learn to concisely describe regularities of the activity in an environment as well as determine atypical observations. Though this is accomplished without any supervision, the introduction of a minimal amount of user interaction could be used to produce complex, task-specific perception systems. Thesis Supervisor: W.E. L. Grimson Professor of Computer Science and Engineering
Control of Luteal Relaxin Release by Prostaglandin F2α : Differences in the Sow Cycle and Pregnancy

Abstract The effect of an in vivo prostaglandin F2α (PGF2α ) challenge in pregnant and cyclic sows was compared to determine whether PGF2α -induced release of relaxin (RLX) from the corpus luteum (CL) in late pregnancy is also effective during the cycle. Ovarian venous RLX and progesterone were monitored by radioimmunoassay and RLX localized in the CL by immunohistochemistry. In Day 108 pregnant sows, infusion of PGF2α (100 μ g) into the ovarian artery resulted in an immediate and sustained rise in ovarian venous RLX with an initial decline in progesterone levels by 30 min which then returned to pretreatment levels. In Day 13 or 15 cyclic sows with functional corpora lutea (i.e., elevated progesterone), RLX was undetectable in ovarian venous blood after 100 μg of PGF2α . Administration of PGF2α , via either the jugular vein or intramuscular route was also ineffective in releasing RLX from the CL of the cycle. The intensity of RLX immunostaining of the CL was similar in saline and PGF2α -treated sows. These studies indicate that the control of RLX release from the sow CL differs in the estrous cycle and pregnancy.