Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Predictors of the Emergence of Apathy After Bilateral Stimulation of the Subthalamic Nucleus in Patients with Parkinson's Disease

Subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation (STN‐DBS) is a valid therapeutic tool that ameliorates motor symptoms in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). However, apathy is one of the neuropsychiatric complications that may occur after STN‐DBS surgery, and this may adversely influence the quality of life of patients despite significant motor improvement.
Cognitive and Emotional Alterations Are Related to Hippocampal Inflammation in a Mouse Model of Metabolic Syndrome

Converging clinical data suggest that peripheral inflammation is likely involved in the pathogenesis of the neuropsychiatric symptoms associated with metabolic syndrome (MetS). However, the question arises as to whether the increased prevalence of behavioral alterations in MetS is also associated with central inflammation, i.e. cytokine activation, in brain areas particularly involved in controlling behavior. To answer this question, we measured in a mouse model of MetS, namely the diabetic and obese db/db mice, and in their healthy db/+ littermates emotional behaviors and memory performances, as well as plasma levels and brain expression (hippocampus; hypothalamus) of inflammatory cytokines. Our results shows that db/db mice displayed increased anxiety-like behaviors in the open-field and the elevated plus-maze (i.e. reduced percent of time spent in anxiogenic areas of each device), but not depressive-like behaviors as assessed by immobility time in the forced swim and tail suspension tests. Moreover, db/db mice displayed impaired spatial recognition memory (hippocampus-dependent task), but unaltered object recognition memory (hippocampus-independent task). In agreement with the well-established role of the hippocampus in anxiety-like behavior and spatial memory, behavioral alterations of db/db mice were associated with increased inflammatory cytokines (interleukin-1β, tumor necrosis factor-α and interleukin-6) and reduced expression of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) in the hippocampus but not the hypothalamus. These results strongly point to interactions between cytokines and central processes involving the hippocampus as important contributing factor to the behavioral alterations of db/db mice. These findings may prove valuable for introducing novel approaches to treat neuropsychiatric complications associated with MetS.
The Amulet Environment: New Models for Effective User Interface Software Development

The Amulet user interface development environment makes it easier for programmers to create highly interactive, graphical user interface software for Unix, Windows and the Macintosh. Amulet uses new models for objects, constraints, animation, input, output, commands, and undo. The object system is a prototype instance model in which there is no distinction between classes and instances or between methods and data. The constraint system allows any value of any object to be computed by arbitrary code and supports multiple constraint solvers. Animations can be attached to existing objects with a single line of code. Input from the user is handled by "interactor" objects which support reuse of behavior objects. The output model provides a declarative definition of the graphics and supports automatic refresh. Command objects encapsulate all of the information needed about operations, including support for various ways to undo them. A key feature of the Amulet design is that all graphical objects and behaviors of those objects are explicitly represented at run time, so the system can provide a number of high level built-in functions, including automatic display and editing of objects, and external analysis and control of interfaces. Amulet integrates these capabilities in a flexible and effective manner.
A new method of preparing superabsorbent PVF porous foam through the simultaneous acidification of water glass solution–aspect of environmental protection

ABSTRACT: To reduce the wastewater pollution problem, silica particles that have resulted from simultaneous sulfuric acidification ofwater glass solution serve as the pore-forming agent for preparing superabsorbent PVF/SiO 2 foam in this study. This is a departurefrom the traditional porous PVF/starch foam’s manufacture method. The pore structure of PVF/SiO 2 foam is very different from thatof PVF/starch foam. The effect of the concentration of these pore-forming agents on the pore structure, mechanical modulus, andwater adsorption capacity of PVF/starch and PVF/SiO 2 foams are investigated in this study. V C 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym.Sci. 2014, 131, 39894. KEYWORDS: hydrophilic polymers; manufacturing; porous materialsReceived 21 June 2013; accepted 26 August 2013DOI: 10.1002/app.39894INTRODUCTION Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) is a well-studied hydrophilic polymerwith a good reputation in the superabsorbent polymer (SAP)industry. 1 PVA is a nontoxic and biodegradable polymer
Computational Methods for Tracking, Quantitative Assessment, and Visualization of C. elegans Locomotory Behavior

The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans provides a unique opportunity to interrogate the neural basis of behavior at single neuron resolution. In C. elegans, neural circuits that control behaviors can be formulated based on its complete neural connection map, and easily assessed by applying advanced genetic tools that allow for modulation in the activity of specific neurons. Importantly, C. elegans exhibits several elaborate behaviors that can be empirically quantified and analyzed, thus providing a means to assess the contribution of specific neural circuits to behavioral output. Particularly, locomotory behavior can be recorded and analyzed with computational and mathematical tools. Here, we describe a robust single worm-tracking system, which is based on the open-source Python programming language, and an analysis system, which implements path-related algorithms. Our tracking system was designed to accommodate worms that explore a large area with frequent turns and reversals at high speeds. As a proof of principle, we used our tracker to record the movements of wild-type animals that were freshly removed from abundant bacterial food, and determined how wild-type animals change locomotory behavior over a long period of time. Consistent with previous findings, we observed that wild-type animals show a transition from area-restricted local search to global search over time. Intriguingly, we found that wild-type animals initially exhibit short, random movements interrupted by infrequent long trajectories. This movement pattern often coincides with local/global search behavior, and visually resembles Lévy flight search, a search behavior conserved across species. Our mathematical analysis showed that while most of the animals exhibited Brownian walks, approximately 20% of the animals exhibited Lévy flights, indicating that C. elegans can use Lévy flights for efficient food search. In summary, our tracker and analysis software will help analyze the neural basis of the alteration and transition of C. elegans locomotory behavior in a food-deprived condition.
mTOR and differential activation of mitochondria orchestrate neutrophil chemotaxis

Neutrophil chemotaxis is regulated by opposing autocrine purinergic signaling mechanisms, which are stimulated by mitochondrial ATP formation that is up-regulated via mTOR and P2Y2 receptors at the front and down-regulated via A2a receptors and cAMP/PKA signaling at the back of cells.
Genome‐wide promoter methylation analysis identifies epigenetic silencing of MAPK13 in primary cutaneous melanoma

The involvement of epigenetic alterations in the pathogenesis of melanoma is increasingly recognized. Here, we performed genome‐wide DNA methylation analysis of primary cutaneous melanoma and benign melanocytic nevus interrogating 14 495 genes using BeadChip technology. This genome‐wide view of promoter methylation in primary cutaneous melanoma revealed an array of recurrent DNA methylation alterations with potential diagnostic applications. Among 106 frequently hypermethylated genes, there were many novel methylation targets and tumor suppressor genes. Highly recurrent methylation of the HOXA9, MAPK13, CDH11, PLEKHG6, PPP1R3C, and CLDN11 genes was established. Promoter methylation of MAPK13, encoding p38δ, was present in 67% of primary and 85% of metastatic melanomas. Restoration of MAPK13 expression in melanoma cells exhibiting epigenetic silencing of this gene reduced proliferation, indicative of tumor suppressive functions. This study demonstrates that DNA methylation alterations are widespread in melanoma and suggests that epigenetic silencing of MAPK13 contributes to melanoma progression.
The economic performance of ownerless firms

This paper explores whether ownership matters in a fundamental sense by comparing the performance of stockholder-owned firms to the much less analyzed ownerless firms, where no stakeholder has residual cash flow rights and control rights are shared by customers, employees, and the community. Controlling for differences in size and risk and only comparing firms within the same industry, we find that stockholder-owned firms do not outperform ownerless firms. This finding is consistent with the notion that owners can be replaced by other governance mechanisms. We find indicative evidence that by disciplining every firm regardless of its stakeholder structure, product market competition plays this role as a substitute for owner monitoring.
The Drosophila insulin-degrading enzyme restricts growth by modulating the PI3K pathway in a cell-autonomous manner

The Drosophila insulin-degrading enzyme (dIDE) is a negative modulator of the PI3K pathway that restrains tissue growth in an autonomous manner. Larvae reared in high sucrose exhibit reduced growth and delayed developmental timing due to insulin resistance; dIDE loss of function exacerbates these phenotypes.
Intersection of nuclear receptors and the proteasome on the epigenetic landscape

Nuclear receptors (NRs) represent a class of transcription factors that associate with both positive and negative chromatin modifying complexes to activate or repress gene transcription. The 26S proteasome plays a major role in NR‐regulated gene transcription by tightly regulating the levels of the receptor and coregulator complexes. Recent evidence suggests a robust nonproteolytic role for specific proteasome subunits in gene transcription mediated via alterations in specific histone modifications. The involvement of nuclear receptors and the proteasome with chromatin modifying complexes or proteins, particularly those that modify DNA and histone proteins, provides an opportunity to review two critical epigenetic mechanisms that control gene expression and heritable biological processes. Both nuclear receptors and the proteasome are targets of environmental factors including some which lead to epigenetic changes that can influence human diseases such as cancer. In this review, we will explore molecular mechanisms by which NR‐mediated gene expression, under the control of the proteasome, can result in altered epigenetic landscapes. Environ. Mol. Mutagen. , 2008. Published 2007 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Expressing vocal effort in con

A new diphone database with a full diphone set for each of three levels of vocal effort is presented. A theoretical motivation is given why this kind of database will be useful for emotional speech synthesis. Two hypotheses are verified in perception experiments: (I) The three diphone sets are perceived as belonging to the same speaker; (II) The vocal effort intended during database recordings is perceived in the synthetic voice. The results clearly confirm both hypotheses.
A Comparison of Global and Partitioned EDF Schedulability Tests for Multiprocessors TR-051101

This paper compares the performance of several variations on EDF-based global and partitioned multiprocessor scheduling algorithms, together with their associated feasibility tests, on a variety of pseudo-randomly chosen sets of sporadic tasks. A new hybrid EDF-based scheme is shown to perform better than previously studied priority-based global scheduling schemes, though not as well as EDF-based first-fit partitioned scheduling.
Multiclass Support Vector Machines for Environmental Sounds Recognition with Reassignment Method and Log-Gabor Filters

We present a robust environmental sound classification approach, based on reassignment method and logGabor filters. In this approach the reassigned spectrogram is passed through a bank of 12 log-Gabor filter concatenation applied to three spectrogram patches, and the outputs are averaged and underwent an optimal feature selection procedure based on a mutual information criterion. The proposed method is tested on a database of 10 environmental sound classes. The evaluation system is realized by using the multiclass support vector machines (SVM’s) that gave rise to a recognition rate of the order 90.87%. Keywords—Environmental Sound, Log-Gabor-Filter, Mutual Information, Reassignment Method, SVM Multiclass.
Surface micromachined PDMS microfluidic devices fabricated using a sacrificial photoresist

PDMS is a widely used material for construction of microfluidic devices. The traditional PDMS microfabrication process, although versatile, cannot be used to form microfluidic devices with embedded tall topological features, such as thick-film electrodes and porous reactor beds. This paper presents an elegant surface micromachining process for microfluidic devices that allows complete leak-proof sealing and a conformal contact of the PDMS with tall pre-existing topographical features and demonstrates this approach by embedding 6 µm thick Ag/AgCl (high capacity 1680 µA s) electrodes inside the microchannels. In this process, thin spin-cast films of the PDMS are used as the structural material and a photoresist is used as the sacrificial material. A crucial parameter, namely adhesion of the spun-cast structural layer to the substrate, was characterized for different pre-polymer ratios using a standard tensile test, and a 1:3 (curing agent:base) combination was found to be the best with a maximum adhesion strength of 7.2 MPa. The elastic property of the PDMS allowed extremely fast release times of ∼1 min of the fabricated microchannels. The versatility of this process was demonstrated by the fabrication of a pneumatic microvalve with multi-layered microchannel geometry. The valve closure occurred at 6.37 kPa.
Matrix Product State for Higher-Order Tensor Compression and Classification

This paper introduces matrix product state (MPS) decomposition as a new and systematic method to compress multidimensional data represented by higher order tensors. It solves two major bottlenecks in tensor compression: computation and compression quality. Regardless of tensor order, MPS compresses tensors to matrices of moderate dimension, which can be used for classification. Mainly based on a successive sequence of singular value decompositions, MPS is quite simple to implement and arrives at the global optimal matrix, bypassing local alternating optimization, which is not only computationally expensive but cannot yield the global solution. Benchmark results show that MPS can achieve better classification performance with favorable computation cost compared to other tensor compression methods.
Power Transfer Performance and Cutting Force Effects of Contactless Energy Transfer System for Rotary Ultrasonic Grinding

In rotary ultrasonic grinding (RUG), a rotating transformer can be used to replace the established slip ring technology and provide a contactless power supply to the revolving transducer. Such contactless energy transfer (CET) is safe, and high rotation speeds are possible. Compared with a closely coupled transformer, the transfer efficiency of the rotating transformer is lower. Compensation of the windings is necessary to improve efficiency. In addition, the cutting force in RUG is not constant; this will influence the power transfer performance, which in turn affects the vibration amplitude of the tool. In this paper, by considering the distinct capacitive and mechanical behavior of the transducer and the equivalent series resistances (ESRs) of the compensation elements, mathematical models are developed to identify the transfer efficiency and the output power of the rotating transformer. A general mathematical compensation model is developed for maximum transfer efficiency. The effects of the cutting force on the transfer efficiency, the output power, and the power factor are also researched. The experimental results basically agree with the calculated results. A CET system that can produce high efficiency, a high power factor and adaptive output power that adapts to the variations of cutting force in the RUG is therefore possible.
Comparison of stiffness of soleus and medial gastrocnemius muscles in cats.

I. Tension changes were recorded during stretch of the contracting medial gastrocnemius (MG) and soleus (SOL) muscles in the same hindlimb of cats. 2. The short-range stiffness of both MG and SOL was measured and separated into an active component in muscle fibers and a passive component in the tendon. 3. The active component of the shortrange stiffness was found to be different for the two muscles and the difference could be accounted for in terms of numbers of sarcomeres per muscle fiber. 4. The values of tendon compliance were found to be similar for both muscles despite large differences in the geometrical arrangement of muscle fibers and tendons. 5. With stretches comparable in amplitude to movements during locomotion, total stiffness reached a maximum value not at the peak, as expected, but during the rising phase of a contraction and the tension was largely determined by changes after the region of short-range stiffness had been exceeded. 6. The mechanical properties and geometry of the SOL and MG muscle are discussed with reference to their roles in posture and locomotion.
FRET in Membrane Biophysics: An Overview

Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET), in most applications used as a “spectroscopic ruler,” allows an easy determination of the donor-acceptor intermolecular distance. However, the situation becomes complex in membranes, since around each donor there is an ensemble of acceptors at non-correlated distances. In this review, state-of-the-art methodologies for this situation are presented, usually involving time-resolved data and model fitting. This powerful approach can be used to study the occurrence of phase separation (“rafts” or other type of domains), allowing their detection as well as size evaluation. Formalisms for studying lipid–protein and protein–protein interactions according to specific topologies are also addressed. The advantages and added complexity of a specific type of FRET (energy homotransfer or energy migration) are described, as well as applications of FRET under the microscope.
A novel weave pattern encoding method using neighbor information and its applications

Determination of features of weave patterns is a crucial task in practice, including determination of equivalent weave patterns, determination of weave type, repeat period detection, pattern correction, representation of fabric structures and pattern searching from a collection of weave patterns. Most previous research on the problems is based on binary matrix operations. In this paper, a simple and efficient encoding algorithm and its implementation are presented to reveal the hidden information in the binary matrix of a weave pattern and thus to find a solution to determine features of the weave pattern. By compiling the 32 components with different shapes of yarn cross-sections, it is possible to quickly produce the required weave geometries and weave textures at different levels of detail. A set of frequency matrices of a weave pattern can be considered as the fingerprint where each weave pattern is uniquely endowed with a set of frequency spectra. It therefore enables us to perform a weave pattern search in the database to locate weave geometries and weave textures. Our experiments report a satisfactory result on the problems.
Rateless feedback codes

This paper proposes a concept called rateless feedback coding. We redesign the existing LT and Raptor codes, by introducing new degree distributions for the case when a few feedback opportunities are available. We show that incorporating feedback to LT codes can significantly decrease both the coding overhead and the encoding/decoding complexity. Moreover, we show that, at the price of a slight increase in the coding overhead, linear complexity is achieved with Raptor feedback coding.
Harnessing Grid Resources to Enable the Dynamic Analysis of Large Astronomy Datasets

Grid computing has emerged as an important new field focusing on large-scale resource sharing and high-performance orientation. The astronomy community has an abundance of imaging datasets at its disposal which are essentially the " crown jewels " for the astronomy community. However, these astronomy datasets are generally terabytes in size and contain hundreds of millions of objects separated into millions of files—factors that make many analyses impractical to perform on small computers. The key question we answer in this paper is: " How can we leverage Grid resources to make the analysis of large astronomy datasets a reality for the astronomy community? " Our answer is " AstroPortal, " a gateway to grid resources tailored for the astronomy community. To address this question, we have developed a Web Services-based system, AstroPortal, that uses grid computing to federate large computing and storage resources for dynamic analysis of large datasets. Building on the Globus Toolkit 4, we have built an AstroPortal prototype and implemented a first analysis, " stacking, " that sums multiple regions of the sky, a function that can help both identify variable sources and detect faint objects. We have deployed AstroPortal on the TeraGrid distributed infrastructure and applied the stacking function to the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), DR4, which comprises about 300 million objects dispersed over 1.3 million files, a total of 3 terabytes of compressed data, with promising results. AstroPortal gives the astronomy community a new tool to advance their research and to open new doors to opportunities never before possible on such a large scale. Furthermore, we have identified that data locality in distributed computing applications is important for the efficient use of the underlying resources. We outline a storage hierarchy that could be used to make more efficient use of the available resources, which could potentially offer orders of magnitude speed ups in the analysis of large datasets.
x2Gesture: how machines could learn expressive gesture variations of expert musicians

There is a growing interest in ‘unlocking’ the motor skills of expert musicians. Motivated by this need, the main objective of this paper is to present a new way of modeling expressive gesture variations in musical performance. For this purpose, the 3D gesture recognition engine ‘x2Gesture’ (eXpert eXpressive Gesture) has been developed, inspired by the Gesture Variation Follower, which is initially designed and developed at IRCAM in Paris and then extended at Goldsmiths College in London. x2Gesture supports both learning of musical gestures and live performing, through gesture sonification, as a unified user experience. The deeper understanding of the expressive gestural variations permits to define the confidence bounds of the expert’s gestures, which are used during the decoding phase of the recognition. The first experiments show promising results in terms of recognition accuracy and temporal alignment between template and performed gesture, which leads to a better fluidity and immediacy and thus gesture sonification.