Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Valproic acid inhibits Aβ production, neuritic plaque formation, and behavioral deficits in Alzheimer's disease mouse models

Neuritic plaques in the brains are one of the pathological hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Amyloid β-protein (Aβ), the central component of neuritic plaques, is derived from β-amyloid precursor protein (APP) after β- and γ-secretase cleavage. The molecular mechanism underlying the pathogenesis of AD is not yet well defined, and there has been no effective treatment for AD. Valproic acid (VPA) is one of the most widely used anticonvulsant and mood-stabilizing agents for treating epilepsy and bipolar disorder. We found that VPA decreased Aβ production by inhibiting GSK-3β–mediated γ-secretase cleavage of APP both in vitro and in vivo. VPA treatment significantly reduced neuritic plaque formation and improved memory deficits in transgenic AD model mice. We also found that early application of VPA was important for alleviating memory deficits of AD model mice. Our study suggests that VPA may be beneficial in the prevention and treatment of AD.
Children Positioning and Identification System using marker recognition

One of the system that is implemented on Future Kindergarten Project (FKP) Laboratorium Sistem Kendali dan Komputer (LSKK) Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB) is Children Positioning and Identification System. Future Kindergarten is made as a solution for the problems in a traditional kindergarten system. The children positioning and identification system is used to identify a child in a classroom and also to find the position of the child in the classroom. The coordinates of each children will be used as the base for further analysis in other modules such as children activity monitoring, and other analysis that will be reported to teacher and parents as a solution to the monitoring system problem in a traditional kindergarten. This paper will discuss the design and implementation process of children positioning and identification system. The system will be designed and implemented such that this system can be integrated and used by other modules in FKP. The implementation will be done using marker recognition library provided by ARToolKit. Detection, tracking, and data sending to server process will be done in high speed so that from obtaining data to showing the data in user interface will be seen as if in real-time. The system designed and implemented is expected to provides each of children's coordinate to be used by other modules in FKP.
Biological Effects of c-Mer Receptor Tyrosine Kinase in Hematopoietic Cells Depend on the Grb2 Binding Site in the Receptor and Activation of NF-κB

ABSTRACT The c-Mer receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK) is most closely related to chicken c-Eyk and belongs to the Axl RTK subfamily. Although not detected in normal lymphocytes, c-Mer is expressed in B- and T-cell leukemia cell lines, suggesting an association with lymphoid malignancies. To gain an understanding of the role of this receptor in lymphoid cells, we expressed in murine interleukin-3 (IL-3)-dependent Ba/F3 pro-B-lymphocyte cells a constitutively active receptor, CDMer, formed from the CD8 extracellular domain and the c-Mer intracellular domain. Cells transfected with a plasmid encoding the CDMer receptor became IL-3 independent. When tyrosine (Y)-to-phenylalanine (F) mutations were introduced into c-Mer, only the Y867 change significantly reduced the IL-3-independent cell proliferation. The Y867 residue in the CDMer receptor mediated the binding of Grb2, which recruited the p85 phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI 3-kinase). Despite the difference in promotion of proliferation, both the CDMer and mutant F867 receptors activated Erk in transfected cells. On the other hand, we found that both transcriptional activation of NF-κB and activation of PI 3-kinase were significantly suppressed with the F867 mutant receptor, suggesting that the activation of antiapoptotic pathways is the major mechanism for the observed phenotypic difference. Consistent with this notion, apoptosis induced by IL-3 withdrawal was strongly prevented by CDMer but not by the F867 mutant receptor.
Optimal Placement of Relay Nodes for Energy Efficiency in Sensor Networks

Energy efficient system design in wireless sensor networks has been previously discussed at different levels of the network protocol stack so as to provide the maximum possible lifetime of a given network. This paper proposes a novel idea to save energy through extra re lay nodes by eliminating geometric deficiencies of the given topology. Given the sensing locations, the problem is to determine the optimal locations of relay nodes together with the optimal energy provided to them so that the network is alive during the desired lifetime with minimum total energy. We first formulate the problem as a nonlinear programming problem. We then propose an approximation algorithm based on restricting the locations where the relay nodes are allowed to a square lattice. This algorithm approximates the original problem with performance ratio of as low as 2 by trading complexity. For the parking lot application we consider, the relay nodes provide a significant decrease in the total energy required to achieve a specific lifetime.
Conserved Alternative Splicing and Expression Patterns of Arthropod N-Cadherin

Metazoan development requires complex mechanisms to generate cells with diverse function. Alternative splicing of pre-mRNA not only expands proteomic diversity but also provides a means to regulate tissue-specific molecular expression. The N-Cadherin gene in Drosophila contains three pairs of mutually-exclusive alternatively-spliced exons (MEs). However, no significant differences among the resulting protein isoforms have been successfully demonstrated in vivo. Furthermore, while the N-Cadherin gene products exhibit a complex spatiotemporal expression pattern within embryos, its underlying mechanisms and significance remain unknown. Here, we present results that suggest a critical role for alternative splicing in producing a crucial and reproducible complexity in the expression pattern of arthropod N-Cadherin. We demonstrate that the arthropod N-Cadherin gene has maintained the three sets of MEs for over 400 million years using in silico and in vivo approaches. Expression of isoforms derived from these MEs receives precise spatiotemporal control critical during development. Both Drosophila and Tribolium use ME-13a and ME-13b in “neural” and “mesodermal” splice variants, respectively. As proteins, either ME-13a- or ME-13b-containing isoform can cell-autonomously rescue the embryonic lethality caused by genetic loss of N-Cadherin. Ectopic muscle expression of either isoform beyond the time it normally ceases leads to paralysis and lethality. Together, our results offer an example of well-conserved alternative splicing increasing cellular diversity in metazoans.
Bap 31 Is an Itinerant Protein that Moves between the Peripheral ER and a Juxtanuclear Compartment Related to ER-associated Degradation

School of Life Sciences, Tokyo University of Pharmacy and Life Sciences, Hachioji, Tokyo 192-0392, Japan; Department of Cell Biology, Nagahama Institute of Bio-Science and Technology, Nagahama, Shiga 526-0829, Japan, Department of Biochemistry, University of Bristol, School of Medical Sciences, University Walk, Bristol BS8 1TD, United Kingdom, and Department of Pharmacology and Neurobiology, University of Basel, Basel CH-4056, Switzerland
Constraints from the muon g−2 on the parameter space of the NMSSM

We generalize the computation of supersymmetric contributions to the muon anomalous magnetic moment (g−2)μ to the NMSSM. In the presence of a light CP-odd Higgs scalar, these can differ considerably from the MSSM. We discuss the amount of these contributions in regions of the parameter space of the general NMSSM compatible with constraints from B physics. In the mSUGRA-like cNMSSM, constraints from (g−2)μ prefer regions in parameter space corresponding to a low SUSY breaking scale.
Defeating Authoritarian State Structures in Semi-Democratic Countries: Lessons from Turkey’s Justice and Development Party

Political success in semi-democratic countries has two aspects: shifting the balance of power in one’s favor and maintaining it. This thesis seeks to examine how the AKP has succeeded in shifting the balance of power in its favor while its predecessor the Welfare Party did not. Focusing on electoral success, existing research primarily lists center-periphery conflict, moderation, class struggle, party organization, and failures of others as the main determinants. Yet the significance of reining in the power of the Kemalist state structure has been mostly disregarded. Therefore, with a comparison of the AKP (2002-2007) and the Welfare Party (19961997) governments, this study tests one assertion using most-similar systems research design that in semi-democratic political settings with strong authoritarian actors, political parties that build broad coalitions via group specific policy promises will be more likely to shift the balance of power in favor of themselves than actors that lack such connections. INDEX WORDS: Justice and Development Party, Joel Migdal, State-in-society, Clientelism, Group specific policy promises, Welfare Party, Authoritarian state structure DEFEATING AUTHORITARIAN STATE STRUCTURES IN SEMI-DEMOCRATIC COUNTRIES: LESSONS FROM TURKEY’S JUSTICE AND DEVELOPMENT PARTY
Synthesis of Zeolite MOF nanoporous composites as bifunctional catalysts

Title of Document: SYNTHESIS OF ZEOLITE@MOF NANOPOROUS COMPOSITES AS BIFUNCTIONAL CATALYSTS Guanghui Zhu, Master of Science, 2014 Directed By: Professor, Dr. Dongxia Liu, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering And Professor, Dr. Kyu Yong Choi, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering As nanoporous materials, zeolite and metal organic framework (MOF) share common characteristics of high surface areas and uniform micropores and differ in thermal/mechanical stability and structural flexibility. The integration of MOF and zeolite into composite particles is expected to produce useful hybrid nanoporous materials where inorganic zeolite and organic MOF components impart the advantages of high thermal, mechanical and structural stability of zeolites and specific functionality and high flexibility of MOFs. This thesis work addresses the synthesis of zeolite@MOF composites and the exploration of their applications as bifunctional catalysts in one-pot cascade reaction. Zeolite@MOF core-shell composites have been synthesized by solvothermal growth of MOFs on the surface of ZSM-5 particles. The acidity from framework Al-O(H)-Si sites in ZSM-5 and basicity from amine groups in MOFs obtained by pre-/post-synthetic modification endow zeolite@MOF composites bifunctionality in two-step cascade catalytic reactions.
Cellular Delivery of Quantum Dot-Bound Hybridization Probe for Detection of Intracellular Pre-MicroRNA Using Chitosan/Poly(γ-Glutamic Acid) Complex as a Carrier

A quantum dot (QD)-bound hybridization probe was designed for detection of intracellular pre-miRNA using chitosan (CS)/poly(γ-glutamic acid) (γ-PGA) complex as a gene vector. The probe was prepared by assembling thiolated RNA to gold nanoparticle (Au NP) via Au-S bond and then binding 3′-end amine of the RNA to the carboxy group capped on quantum dot surface. The QD-RNA-Au NP probe was assembled on the vector by mixing with aqueous γ-PGA solution and then CS solution to construct a gene delivery system for highly effective cellular uptake and delivery. After the probe was released from CS/γ-PGA complex to the cytoplasm by electrostatic repulsion at intracellular pH, it hybridized with pre-miRNA precursor as target. The formed product was then cleaved by RNase III Dicer, leading to the separation of QDs from Au NPs and fluorescence emission of QDs, which could be detected by confocal microscopic imaging to monitor the amount of the intracellular pre-miRNA precursor. The in vitro assays revealed that the QD-RNA-Au NP was a robust, sensitive and selective probe for quantitative detection of target pre-miRNA. Using MDA-MB231 and MCF-7 breast cancer cells as models, the relative amount of pre-miRNA let-7a could be successfully compared. Since the amount of miRNA is related to the progress and prognosis of cancer, this strategy could be expected to hold promising application potential in medical research and clinical diagnostics.
Approval voting and the Poisson-Myerson environment

In this paper, new results are provided in the Poisson-Myerson framework. These results are shown to be helpful in the study of approval voting. Indeed, the Magnitude Equivalence Theorem (MET) substantially reduces the complexity of computing the magnitudes of pivotal events. An example is provided that contrasts with Laslier (2004) results concerning approval voting. In a voting context with three candidates, the winner of the election does not coincide with the profile Condorcet winner in a three candidates contest. A discussion on the stability of the equilibrium is provided.
Solving Multiple Classes of Problems in Parallel with MATLAB*P

MATLAB [7] is one of the most widely used mathematical computing environments in technical computing. It is an interactive environment that provides high performance computational routines and an easy-to-use, C-like scripting language. Mathworks, the company that develops MATLAB, currently does not provide a version of MATLAB that can utilize parallel computing [9]. This has led to academic and commercial efforts outside Mathworks to build a parallel MATLAB, using a variety of approaches. MATLAB*P is a parallel MATLAB that focus on enhancing productivity by providing an easy to use parallel computing tool. Using syntaxes identical to regular MATLAB, it can be used to solve large scale algebraic problems as well as multiple small problems in parallel. This paper describes how the innovative combination of ’*p mode’ and ’MultiMATLAB/MultiOctave mode’ in MATLAB*P can be used to solve a large range of real world problems.
SUGARCANE GROWERS ’ PERCEPTIONS OF A GRADUATED MORTGAGE LOAN REPAYMENT SCHEME TO BUY FARMLAND IN KWAZULU-NATAL

A survey of 88 medium-scale sugarcane farmers (MSFs) using this scheme in 2001 shows that most MSFs would opt to first rent land before purchasing, and recognize that annual returns to land are low relative to land value. Most MSFs view long-term sugarcane supply agreements as a constraint on enterprise diversification, and consider that the quality of mentorship currently received was not satisfactory. Industry players could leverage international donor funding for empowerment projects to improve the quality of mentorship programmes. Client service can be improved by better clarifying the structure of the graduated repayments, sending loan statements on time, and helping clients to interpret loan statements. There is also a new commercial opportunity to act as a coordinator to monitor and improve the MSFs’ financial performance. Using an independent farm valuer would avoid perceptions of bias in the valuations of farms offered for sale in later rounds of the scheme. Options to improve client liquidity in later rounds include requiring larger equity down payments, choosing buyers with substantive off-farm income, and renting before buying. Younger potential clients with less liquidity and less farming experience are likely to choose the latter.
Fingolimod—A Sphingosine-Like Molecule Inhibits Vesicle Mobility and Secretion in Astrocytes

In the brain, astrocytes signal to the neighboring cells by the release of chemical messengers (gliotransmitters) via regulated exocytosis. Recent studies uncovered a potential role of signaling lipids in modulation of exocytosis. Hence, we investigated whether sphingosine and the structural analog fingolimod/FTY720, a recently introduced therapeutic for multiple sclerosis, affect (i) intracellular vesicle mobility and (ii) vesicle cargo discharge from cultured rat astrocytes. Distinct types of vesicles, peptidergic, glutamatergic, and endosomes/lysosomes, were fluorescently prelabeled by cell transfection with plasmids encoding atrial natriuretic peptide tagged with mutant green fluorescent protein and vesicular glutamate transporter tagged with enhanced green fluorescent protein or by LysoTracker staining, respectively. The confocal and total internal reflection fluorescence microscopies were used to monitor vesicle mobility in the cytoplasm and near the basal plasma membrane, respectively. Sphingosine and FTY720, but not the membrane impermeable lipid analogs, dose‐dependently attenuated vesicle mobility in the subcellular regions studied, and significantly inhibited stimulated exocytotic peptide and glutamate release. We conclude that in astrocytes, cell permeable sphingosine‐like lipids affect regulated exocytosis by attenuating vesicle mobility, thereby preventing effective vesicle access/interaction with the plasma membrane docking/release sites. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Multi-Person Motion Tracking via RF Body Reflections

Recently, we have witnessed the emergence of technologies that can localize a user and track her gestures based purely on radio reflections off the person’s body. These technologies work even if the user is behind a wall or obstruction. However, for these technologies to be fully practical, they need to address major challenges such as scaling to multiple people, accurately localizing them and tracking their gestures, and localizing static users as opposed to requiring the user to move to be detectable. This paper presents WiZ, the first multi-person centimeter-scale motion tracking system that pinpoints people’s locations based purely on RF reflections off their bodies. WiZ can also locate static users by sensing minute changes in their RF reflections due to breathing. Further, it can track concurrent gestures made by different individuals, even when they carry no wireless device on them. We implement a prototype of WiZ and show that it can localize up to five users each with a median accuracy of 8-18 cm and 7-11 cm in the x and y dimensions respectively. WiZ can also detect 3D pointing gestures of multiple users with a median orientation error of 8 − 16◦ for each of them. Finally, WiZ can track breathing motion and output the breath count of multiple people with high accuracy.
A web based subjective evaluation platform

Preparing and conducting subjective quality assessments is a time consuming and expensive task. Therefore, we present a Web-based evaluation framework which aims on reducing the time needed for planning and designing a subjective quality assessment. The presented framework can be used for both crowdsourced and laboratory experiments. It should ease the task of designing a subjective quality assessment by providing a flexible framework. The framework has proven its applicability and flexibility to design and conduct assessments in the past and is available as open source.
The Interrelationship between Leukotriene B4 and Leukotriene-A4-Hydrolase in Collagen/Adjuvant-Induced Arthritis in Rats

This study aimed to check the involvement of lipid mediator leukotriene (LT) B4 and the activity of LTA4 hydrolase (LTA4H) in the development of arthritis induced in rats by collagen and adjuvant (CIA). High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and enzyme immunoassay (EIA) were used for measurements of LTB4 and LTA4H in plasma, synovial fluid (SF), soluble (SO), and solubilized membrane-bound fraction (MB) from synovial tissue (ST) and peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of CIA-arthritic and CIA-resistant. EIA process is simple, clean, and rapid and offered advantages over HPLC, showing that in SF and MB-PBMCs of CIA-arthritic and CIA-resistant, and in MB-ST of CIA-resistant, LTB4 and LTA4H were altered in parallel and were positively related. In the plasma and SO-ST and SO-PBMCs of CIA-arthritic and CIA-resistant, and in MB-ST of CIA-arthritic, this pattern was not found. The primordial role played by LTA4H in the biosynthesis of LTB4 was confirmed together with the existence of alternative steps that regulate LTB4 without participation of LTA4H. The involvement of compartmentalized and coupled changes of LTB4 and LTA4H in the resistance and development of arthritis in CIA model was demonstrated for the first time.
Bridging MDA and OWL Ontologies

Web Ontology Language (OWL) and Model-Driven Architectures (MDA) are two technologies being developed in parallel, but by different communities. They have common points and issues and can be brought closer together. Many authors have so far stressed this problem and have proposed several solutions. The result of these efforts is the recent OMG's initiative for defining an ontology development platform. However, the problem of transformation between ontology and MDA-based languages has been solved using rather partial and ad hoc solutions, most often by XSLT. In this paper we analyze OWL and MDA-compliant languages as separate technological spaces. In order to achieve a synergy between these technological spaces we define ontology languages in terms of MDA standards, recognize relations between OWL and MDA-based ontology languages, and propose mapping techniques. In order to illustrate the approach, we use an MDA-defined ontology architecture that includes ontology metamodel and ontology UML Profile. Based on this approach, we have implemented a transformation of the ontology UML Profile into OWL representation.
Constrained Multiple-Swarm Particle Swarm Optimization Within a Cultural Framework

Particle swarm optimization (PSO) has been recently adopted to solve constrained optimization problems. In this paper, a cultural-based constrained PSO is proposed to incorporate the information of the objective function and constraint violation into four sections of the belief space, specifically normative knowledge, spatial knowledge, situational knowledge, and temporal knowledge. The archived information facilitates communication among swarms in the population space and assists in selecting the leading particles in three different levels: personal, swarm, and global levels. Comprehensive comparison of the proposed heuristics over a number of benchmark problems with selected state-of-the-art constraint-handling techniques demonstrates that the proposed cultural framework helps the multiple-swarm PSO to perform competitively with respect to selected designs.
Wide-Angle Visual Feature Matching for Outdoor Robot Navigation

We describe an outdoor mobile robot navigation and localisation system based on a new visual feature detector designed for wide-angle image sequences. Wide-angle images exhibit significant radial distortion for which existing scale-space detectors such as SIFT are inappropriate. We argue that the required scale-space images can be correctly obtained through the convolution of the image, mapped to the sphere, with the spherical Gaussian. Several computational approaches to this convolution are investigated in the spatial and frequency domain. In particular a close approximation is developed that has comparable computation time to conventional SIFT but with improved matching performance. We present results from two monocular wide-angle outdoor image sequences obtained using fisheye and equiangular catadioptric image sequences. We evaluate the overall matching performance (recall vs 1-precision) of these methods compared to conventional SIFT. We also demonstrate the use of the technique for variable baseline visual odometry and for place recognition using algorithms inspired by “Video Google”.