Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Identification and characterization of a Chlamydia trachomatis early operon encoding four novel inclusion membrane proteins

Chlamydia trachomatis is a bacterial obligate intracellular parasite that replicates within a vacuole, termed an inclusion, that does not fuse with lysosomes. Within 2 h after internalization, the C. trachomatis inclusion ceases to interact with the endocytic pathway and, instead, becomes fusogenic with exocytic vesicles containing exogenously synthesized NBD‐sphingomyelin. Both fusion of exocytic vesicles and long‐term avoidance of lysosomal fusion require early chlamydial gene expression. Modification of the chlamydial inclusion probably occurs through the expression and insertion of chlamydial protein(s) into the inclusion membrane. To identify candidate inclusion membrane proteins, antisera were raised against a total membrane fraction purified from C. trachomatis‐infected HeLa cells. By indirect immunofluorescence, this antisera recognized the inclusion membrane and, by immunoblot analysis, recognized three chlamydial‐specific antigens of approximate molecular weights 15, 18 and 21 kDa. IncG, encoding an 18 kDa and 21 kDa doublet chlamydial antigen, was identified by screening a C. trachomatis, serovar L2, genomic expression library. Three additional genes, incD, incE and incF, were co‐transcribed with incG. Monospecific antisera against each of the four genes of this operon demonstrated that the gene products were localized to the chlamydial inclusion membrane. Immediately downstream from the operon containing incD–G was the C. trachomatis homologue of incA. Like IncD, E, F and G, C. trachomatis IncA is also localized to the inclusion membrane. Reverse transcriptase–polymerase chain reaction (RT–PCR) analysis demonstrated that IncD–G, but not incA, are transcribed within the first 2 h after internalization, making them candidates for chlamydial factors required for the modification of the nascent chlamydial inclusion.
Impaired Cholesterol Metabolism and Enhanced Atherosclerosis in Clock Mutant Mice

Background— Clock is a key transcription factor that positively controls circadian regulation. However, its role in plasma cholesterol homeostasis and atherosclerosis has not been studied. Methods and Results— We show for the first time that dominant-negative Clock mutant protein (Clock&Dgr;19/&Dgr;19) enhances plasma cholesterol and atherosclerosis in 3 different mouse models. Detailed analyses revealed that Clk&Dgr;19/&Dgr;19Apoe−/− mice display hypercholesterolemia resulting from the accumulation of apolipoprotein B48–containing cholesteryl ester–rich lipoproteins. Physiological studies showed that enhanced cholesterol absorption by the intestine contributes to hypercholesterolemia. Molecular studies indicated that the expression of Niemann Pick C1 Like 1, Acyl-CoA:Cholesterol acyltransferase 1, and microsomal triglyceride transfer protein in the intestines of Clk&Dgr;19/&Dgr;19Apoe−/− mice was high and that enterocytes assembled and secreted more chylomicrons. Furthermore, we identified macrophage dysfunction as another potential cause of increased atherosclerosis in Clk&Dgr;19/&Dgr;19Apoe−/− mice. Macrophages from Clk&Dgr;19/&Dgr;19Apoe−/− mice expressed higher levels of scavenger receptors and took up more modified lipoproteins compared with Apoe−/− mice, but they expressed low levels of ATP binding casette protein family A member 1 and were defective in cholesterol efflux. Molecular studies revealed that Clock regulates ATP binding casette protein family A member 1 expression in macrophages by modulating upstream transcription factor 2 expression. Conclusions— Clock&Dgr;19/&Dgr;19 protein enhances atherosclerosis by increasing intestinal cholesterol absorption, augmenting uptake of modified lipoproteins by macrophages, and reducing cholesterol efflux from macrophages. These studies establish that circadian Clock activity is crucial in maintaining low plasma cholesterol levels and in reducing atherogenesis in mice.
RayCursor: A 3D Pointing Facilitation Technique based on Raycasting

Raycasting is the most common target pointing technique in virtual reality environments. However, performance on small and distant targets is impacted by the accuracy of the pointing device and the user's motor skills. Current pointing facilitation techniques are currently only applied in the context of the virtual hand, i.e. for targets within reach. We propose enhancements to Raycasting: filtering the ray, and adding a controllable cursor on the ray to select the nearest target. We describe a series of studies for the design of the visual feedforward, filtering technique, as well as a comparative study between different 3D pointing techniques. Our results show that highlighting the nearest target is one of the most efficient visual feedforward technique. We also show that filtering the ray reduces error rate in a drastic way. Finally we show the benefits of RayCursor compared to Raycasting and another technique from the literature.
DrillBeyond: Enabling Business Analysts to Explore the Web of Open Data

Following the Open Data trend, governments and public agencies have started making their data available on the Web and established platforms such as data.gov or data.un. org. These Open Data platforms provide a huge amount of data for various topics such as demographics, transport, finance or health in various data formats. One typical usage scenario for this kind of data is their integration into a database or data warehouse in order to apply data analytics. However, in today's business intelligence tools there is an evident lack of support for so-called situational or ad-hoc data integration. In this demonstration we will therefore present DrillBeyond, a novel database and information retrieval engine which allows users to query a local database as well as the Web of Open Data in a seamless and integrated way with standard SQL. The audience will be able to pose queries to our DrillBeyond system which will be answered partly from local data in the database and partly from datasets that originate from the Web of Data. We will show how such queries are divided into known and unknown parts and how missing attributes are mapped to open datasets. We will demonstrate the integration of the open datasets back into the DBMS in order to apply its analytical features.
Indoor Positioning UsingWireless Local Area Networks

Determining the context of users and machines is an important topic in current computing research. An essential detail of a physical object's context is its location, which includes both the actual position as well as the semantics of the surroundings. This paper focuses on the specific problem of determining the position of objects and people within buildings. A low-cost approach is based on wireless LANs, which are now widely deployed. The paper presents a sophisticated probabilistic algorithm for indoor positioning using wireless LANs, but also discusses the problems that need to be solved to make indoor geolocation commonplace
Antineoplastic effects in rats of 5-fluorocytosine in combination with cytosine deaminase capsules.

5-Fluorocytosine (5-FC) lacks antineoplastic activity in human subjects because of the absence of cytosine deaminase (CDase) in mammalian cells. Intratumoral conversion of 5-FC into 5-fluorouracil (5-FUra) by locally implanted capsules containing CDase followed by systemic administration of 5-FC can be expected to induce antineoplastic activity at a local site with minimal systemic toxicity. In vitro and in vivo experiments were performed to evaluate this hypothesis. Spectrophotometric analysis confirmed the deamination of 5-FC to 5-FUra by CDase extracted from cultivated Escherichia coli. In vitro studies showed that 5-FC combined with CDase induced significant growth-inhibitory effects on the cultured glioma cells. An active CDase capsule, made of cellulose tubing, was newly designed for local implantation. 5-FC concentrations in the s.c. tumors of the rats given these CDase capsules, followed by 5-FC administration, showed a sufficient amount of delivery of 5-FC to the tumor tissue. 5-FUra appearing in the tumor reached the level of 8.0 micrograms/g at 2 h and stayed at more than 1.0 microgram/g at between 1 and 6 h. Significant reduction of the tumor growth and cytotoxic changes were observed. The passive cutaneous anaphylaxis reaction demonstrated no allergic reaction to the host due to the capsule. These results suggest that this chemotherapeutic method is effective for human brain tumors.
Operating System Process and Thread Migration in Heterogeneous Platforms

Parallel and heterogeneous computing are here to stay. Moreover, diverse computational units are increasingly tighterintegrated in emerging heterogeneous platforms, sharing access to the memory bus. We argue that the traditional way we use heterogeneous platforms is obsolete. We propose new system software that enables programming these platforms as if they were an SMP, via the multi-threaded sharedmemory programming model. Using this model provides better programmability, flexibility, and exploitability. We first provide an overview of the state transformation problem when migrating a thread between different-ISA processors. We then propose, build and evaluate a series of offline and runtime mechanisms that implement our design on top of Popcorn Linux ARM/x86. Results show that the overheads are minimal, thus proving the viability of our architecture.
Calculation of critical flashover voltage of ice-covered insulators using the finite element method

A dynamic finite element method (FEM) based model for predicting DC and AC critical flashover voltage of ice-covered insulators, implemented on a commercial software, is proposed. The model considers a single arc established on an ice surface modeled as a 2D conductive layer. The arc is modeled by its root which is considered as an equipotential surface in contact with the ice layer, and whose propagation is provided by the validation of Hampton's criterion. The simulation results obtained by the FEM dynamic model are in agreement with those obtained experimentally using a simplified and real short post insulator covered with atmospheric ice.
Correlation of clinical response and response duration with miR-145 induction by lenalidomide in CD34+ cells from patients with del(5q) myelodysplastic syndrome

We examined whether lenalidomide exposure up-regulates miRNAs and mRNAs, previously shown to play a role in the disease phenotype of del(5q) myelodysplastic syndrome, in pre-treatment CD34+ marrow cells. We hypothesized that increased expression would predict for clinical response. Changes in miR-143, miR-145, miR-146a, miR-146b, miR-378, miR-584, SPARC and RPS14 were examined in del(5q) (n=10) and non-del(5q) (n=18) myelodysplastic syndrome patient samples. Significantly increased expression of miR-143 (1.8-fold and 1.5-fold in del(5q) and non-del(5q), respectively), and miR-145 (1.9-fold and 1.6-fold in del(5q) and non-del(5q), respectively) was observed. In the del(5q) myelodysplastic syndrome cohort, transfusion independence correlated with a 1.3-fold or more increase in miR-145 expression and response over 12 months correlated with a 1.5-fold or more increase. Knockdown of miR-143 and miR-145 in cord blood CD34+ cells resulted in increased erythroid progenitor activity. Lenalidomide selectively abrogated progenitor activity in cells depleted of miR-143 and miR-145 supporting a key role for miR-143/145 in the sensitivity to lenalidomide of del(5q) myelodysplastic syndrome patients.
A COMPRESSION METHOD USED IN LANGUAGE MODELING FOR HANDHELD DEVICES

In this paper, a new n-gram language model compression method is proposed for applications in handheld devices, such as mobiles, PDAs, and handheld PCs. Compared with the traditional methods, the use of the proposed method can compress the model to a great extent with good performance preserved. The proposed method includes three aspects. The language model parameters are detailedly analyzed and a criterion based on the probability and the importance of n-grams is used to determine which n-grams should be kept and which be removed. A curving compressing function is proposed to be used to compress the ngram count values in the full language model. And a code table is extracted and used to estimate the probabilities of bi-grams. Our experiments show that by using this compression method the language model can be reduced dramatically to only about 1M bytes while the performance almost does not decrease. This makes the language model usable in handheld devices.
Multiple cytosolic components promote intra-Golgi protein transport. Resolution of a protein acting at a late stage, prior to membrane fusion.

Cytosolic components are required to produce the "primed donor" and to consume the "dilution-resistant" intermediates of the intercompartmental protein transport pathway as elucidated in a cell-free system (Balch, W. E., Glick, B. S., and Rothman, J. E. (1984) Cell 39, 525-536, and Wattenberg, B. W. , Balch, W. E. , and Rothman, J. E. (1986) J. Biol. Chem. 261, 2202-2207). Widely different levels of crude cytosol are required for each of these steps, suggesting that different cytosolic components might mediate each step. Here, we fractionate cytosol and demonstrate that there are multiple transport-active components. Furthermore, we report the development of stage-specific functional assays which reveal that a distinct soluble component is required in the consumption of the dilution-resistant intermediate. This component, of about 25 kilodaltons in its apparent native molecular mass, is derived from calf brain cytosol. While this component mediates the consumption of the dilution-resistant intermediate, it is inactive in the priming stage. This stage-specific component seems likely to be involved in the processing of transport vesicles after the attachment of those vesicles to the target membranes.
A Phase III, Randomized, Multi-Center, Double-Masked, Matched-Pairs, Active-Controlled Trial to Compare the Efficacy and Safety between Neuramis Deep and Restylane in the Correction of Nasolabial Folds

Background We conducted this clinical study to compare the efficacy and safety between Neuramis Deep and Restylane in the correction of nasolabial folds. Methods In this phase III, randomized, multi-center, double-masked, matched-pairs, active-controlled trial (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01585220), we evaluated a total of 67 subjects (n=67). All the subjects underwent Neuramis Deep treatment on one side and Restylane on the contralateral side of the bilateral nasolabial folds at a ratio of 1:1. To compare the efficacy of Neuramis Deep and Restylane, we evaluated the Wrinkle Severity Rating Scale scores and those of the Global Aesthetic Improvement Scale. In addition, we compared the safety of Neuramis Deep and Restylane based on adverse events, physical examination, and clinical laboratory tests. Results Neuramis Deep was not inferior in improving the nasolabial folds as compared with Restylane. In addition, there was no significant difference in the efficacy between Neuramis Deep and Restylane. There were no significant differences in safety parameters between Neuramis Deep and Restylane. Conclusions In conclusion, our results indicate that Neuramis Deep may be a safe, effective material for improving the nasolabial folds. However, further studies are warranted to compare the tolerability of Neuramis Deep and Restylane based on histopathologic findings.
Adaptive stabilization of generalized Hamiltonian systems with dissipation and its applications to power systems

The adaptive stabilization of the generalized Hamiltonian control systems with dissipation, which has a linearly parameterized Hamiltonian function with respect to unknown constants, is considered here. The theoretic result is then applied to power system that cannot be treated by backstepping introduced by Kokotovic et al. Simulations show that the designed adaptive control law is very effective.
Fractal Behavior of the Pancreatic β-Cell Near the Percolation Threshold: Effect of the KATP Channel On the Electrical Response

The molecular system built with true chemical bonds or strong molecular interaction can be described using conceptual mathematical tools. Modeling of the natural generated ionic currents on the human pancreatic β-cell activity had been already studied using complicated analytical models. In our present contribution, we prove the same using our simple electrical model. The ionic currents are associated with different proteins membrane channels (K-Ca, Kv, KATP, Cav-L) and Na/Ca Exchanger (NCX). The proteins are Ohmic conductors and are modeled by conductance randomly distributed. Switches are placed in series with conductances in order to highlight the channel activity. However, the KATP channel activity is stimulated by glucose, and the NCX's conductance change according to the intracellular calcium concentration. The percolation threshold of the system is calculated by the fractal nature of the infinite cluster using the Tarjan's depth-first-search algorithm. It is shown that the behavior of the internal concentration of Ca2+ and the membrane potential are modulated by glucose. The results confirm that the inhibition of KATP channels depolarizes the membrane and increases the influx of [Ca2+]i through NCX and Cav-L channel for high glucose concentrations.
I/O characteristics of MongoDB and trim-based optimization in flash SSDs

NoSQL solutions become emerging for large scaled, high performance, schema-flexible applications. WiredTiger is cost effective, non-locking, no-overwrite storage used as default storage engine in MongoDB. Understanding I/O characteristics of storage engine is important not only for choosing suitable solution with an application but also opening opportunities for researchers optimizing current working system, especially building more flash-awareness NoSQL DBMS. This paper explores background of MongoDB internals then analyze I/O characteristics of WiredTiger storage engine in detail. We also exploit space management mechanism in WiredTiger by using TRIM command.
Model-based estimation of T2 maps with dual-echo steady-state MR imaging

Fast and accurate quantification of spin-spin relaxation parameter T2 is of importance for clinical MRI applications. Classical spin echo (SE) sequences yield straightforward T2 estimates, but require undesirably long scans. By contrast, steady-state sequences such as the Dual-Echo Steady-State (DESS) sequence are considerably faster, but produce signals that depend on more complex functions of both desired and nuisance parameters. Conventional method-of-moments estimators exhibit systematic error because of the approximations used to bypass nuisance parameter estimation. To improve T2 mapping accuracy, we propose a novel, model-based approach to this nonlinear estimation problem. We use a fast scan to estimate nuisance parameters M0* and T1, and then use the exact DESS signal model for regularized T2 estimation from DESS data, with minimal approximations. MR brain simulation results show that the proposed approach substantially improves T2 estimation accuracy and precision, compared to conventional method-of-moments estimators.
Windows Based Data Sets for Evaluation of Robustness of Host Based Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) to Zero-Day and Stealth Attacks

The Windows Operating System (OS) is the most popular desktop OS in the world, as it has the majority market share of both servers and personal computing necessities. However, as its default signature-based security measures are ineffectual for detecting zero-day and stealth attacks, it needs an intelligent Host-based Intrusion Detection System (HIDS). Unfortunately, a comprehensive data set that reflects the modern Windows OS’s normal and attack surfaces is not publicly available. To fill this gap, in this paper two open data sets generated by the cyber security department of the Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA) are introduced, namely: Australian Defence Force Academy Windows Data Set (ADFA-WD); and Australian Defence Force Academy Windows Data Set with a Stealth Attacks Addendum (ADFA-WD: SAA). Statistical analysis results based on these data sets show that, due to the low foot prints of modern attacks and high similarity of normal and attacked data, both these data sets are complex, and highly intelligent Host based Anomaly Detection Systems (HADS) design will be required.
Toward Linking Dyslexia Types and Symptoms to the Available Assistive Technologies

As a result of the widespread, and accelerating, dissemination of digital technologies, there has been a profound effect on how people learn. These effects have been greatly debated over the years. While many educational developers have agree on the effects technologies have brought on educational performance, little attention has been made to the relationship between such technologies effects and individual differences such as individuals who suffer dyslexia. There are readily available Assistive Technologies that offer potential to help students with learning difficulties such as dyslexia. This paper will attempt to tease out these technologies and dyslexia types, hence attempt at providing a solution. The focus should not be on correlating one technology to one disability. Instead of identifying different pedagogical needs such as help with reading and writing. Then, trying to meet those needs by looking at the whole range of ways that available.
The Ascorbic Acid Redox State Controls Guard Cell Signaling and Stomatal Movement

H2O2 serves an important stress signaling function and promotes stomatal closure, whereas ascorbic acid (Asc) is the major antioxidant that scavenges H2O2. Dehydroascorbate reductase (DHAR) catalyzes the reduction of dehydroascorbate (oxidized ascorbate) to Asc and thus contributes to the regulation of the Asc redox state. In this study, we observed that the level of H2O2 and the Asc redox state in guard cells and whole leaves are diurnally regulated such that the former increases during the afternoon, whereas the latter decreases. Plants with an increased guard cell Asc redox state were generated by increasing DHAR expression, and these exhibited a reduction in the level of guard cell H2O2. In addition, a higher percentage of open stomata, an increase in total open stomatal area, increased stomatal conductance, and increased transpiration were observed. Guard cells with an increase in Asc redox state were less responsive to H2O2 or abscisic acid signaling, and the plants exhibited greater water loss under drought conditions, whereas suppressing DHAR expression conferred increased drought tolerance. Our analyses suggest that DHAR serves to maintain a basal level of Asc recycling in guard cells that is insufficient to scavenge the high rate of H2O2 produced in the afternoon, thus resulting in stomatal closure.
The use of transgenic and knock-in mice to study Huntington’s disease

The trinucleotide repeat disorders comprise an ever expanding list of diseases, all of which are caused by an unstable expanded trinucleotide repeat tract. Huntington’s disease (HD) is a member of this family of diseases and more specifically, is a Type II trinucleotide repeat disorder. This means that the mutation in HD is an unstable expanded polyglutamine repeat tract, which is expressed at protein level. There is no cure or beneficial treatment for this fatal neurodegenerative disorder, and patients suffer from progressive motor, cognitive and psychiatric dysfunction. Recent years has seen the development of many genetic models of HD, which allow study of the early phases of disease process, at several different levels of cell function. In addition, these models are being used to investigate the potential of a variety of therapeutic agents for clinical use. Here we review these findings, and their implication for HD pathogenesis.