Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Differential Expression Gene Explorer (DrEdGE): A tool for generating interactive online data visualizations for exploration of quantitative transcript abundance datasets

As the scientific community becomes increasingly interested in data sharing, there is a growing need for tools that facilitate the querying of public data. Mining of RNA-seq datasets, for example, has value to many biomedical researchers, yet is often effectively inaccessible to non-genomicist experts, even when the raw data are available. Here we present DrEdGE (dredge.bio.unc.edu), a free Web-based tool that facilitates data sharing between genomicists and their colleagues. The DrEdGE software guides genomicists through easily creating interactive online data visualizations, which colleagues can then explore and query according to their own conditions to discover genes, samples, or patterns of interest. We demonstrate DrEdGE’s features with three example websites we generated from publicly available datasets—human neuronal tissue, mouse embryonic tissue, and a C. elegans embryonic series. DrEdGE increases the utility of large genomics datasets by removing the technical obstacles that prevent interested parties from exploring the data independently.
Classification of Inconsistent Sentiment Words using Syntactic Constructions

An important problem in sentiment analysis are inconsistent words. We define an inconsistent word as a sentiment word whose dictionary polarity is reversed by the sentence context in which it occurs. We present a supervised machine learning approach to the problem of inconsistency classification, the problem of automatically distinguishing inconsistent from consistent sentiment words in context. Our first contribution to inconsistency classification is that we take into account sentence structure and use syntactic constructions as features – in contrast to previous work that has only used word-level features. Our second contribution is a method for learning polarity reversing constructions from sentences annotated with polarity. We show that when we integrate inconsistency classification results into sentence-level polarity classification, performance is significantly increased.
Adapting service interfaces when business processes evolve

Nowadays, there are many popular different notations of business process modeling, such as, e.g. BPMN [1], for a software analysis. Modeling of business processes at the conceptual level allows domain experts to cooperate in the analysis and to design the software. The whole business process model can be later translated to web services and executable BPEL [2] scripts which orchestrate all related parts together. Besides this automatization, it is necessary to define the structure of each data object in the business model. Web services usually communicate by exchanging XML documents [3]. Therefore, a software architect has to define also an XML schema of XML documents by an XML schema language, e.g. XML Schema [4]. In this paper, we present a method which derives and adapts optimal communication XML schemas for a given conceptual schema of a business process, complemented with a conceptual schema of exchanged data. We use a view on a part of a Platform Independent Model of a whole system as conceptual schema of exchanged data. We derive several XML schema documents from given inputs and choose the one which has minimal values for three metrics. The result of these three metrics is a measure of a quality of an XML schema document with respect to conceptual model of exchanged data and business rules applied on this document.
Effects of Wireless Signal Attenuation on Robot Team Performance

This work investigates how wireless signal attenuation affects a team of mobile robots performing exploration. Many coverage tasks, such as search and rescue or exploration, can be performed more effectively when robots communicate with one other. However, in real world environments, maintaining communication can be difficult due to unpredictable wireless signal propagation. In this paper, we investigate the wireless network connectivity in an outdoor area that consist of concrete wall and pillars. Preliminary simulation and physical experimental results are compared to demonstrate the effects of signal attenuation on robot team performance.
Using mesh adaption for the identification of a spatial field of material properties

It is well known that the solution of an inverse problem is ill‐posed and not unique. To avoid difficulties caused by this, when solving such a problem, Tikhonov's regularization terms are usually added to the norm quantifying the discrepancy between the model's predictions and experimental data. This regularization term however is often inadequate to perform the identification of a field of material properties that varies spatially. This is all the more difficult when dealing with the numerical solution of this inverse problem, for the sought field is spatially discretized and this discretization can influence the result of the identification.
An Evaluation Method for Requirements Engineering Approaches in Distributed Software Development Projects

The distribution of software engineering tasks is becoming ever more common. Requirements engineering, as the most critical phase, therefore requires methods and tools to support distributed teams. However, nearly all requirements engineering methods have originally been designed for collocated scenarios. Before applying these methods in distributed settings in practice and for scientific rigor, proper evaluation has to be conducted. Hence, we developed a methodologically sound and cost-effective evaluation method for distributed requirements engineering methods as well as the corresponding tool infrastructure for conducting evaluation projects.
CELLULAR MORPHOLOGY AND IMMUNOLOGIC PROPERTIES OF ESCHERICHIA COLI TREATED WITH ANTIMICROBIAL ANTISENSE PEPTIDE NUCLEIC ACID

Background & Objectives: Antisense peptide nucleic acids (PNA) that target growth essential genes show potent bactericidal properties without cell lysis. We considered the possibility that whether PNA treatment influence the bacteria total nucleic acids content and apply approach to develop a new delivery system to Dendritic cells (DCs). DCs are the most potent antigen presenting cells in the immune systems. Since the uptake of bacteria by DC is a necessary step for generation of effective DNA vaccine, we studied the uptake efficiency of PNA treated bacteria by DCs. Material & Methods: Total nucleic acids of anti- acyl carrier protein (acpP) peptide-PNA treated Escherichia coli Hb101 containing plasmid have been isolated. In addition, peripheral blood monocytes have been purified using mouse anti- cluster of differentiated (CD14) coated magnetic beads and then culture in presence of growth factors. Generated DCs have been assessed for their ability of uptake of flurescein isothiocyanate (FITC) - labeled peptide-PNA treated bacteria and heat inactivated by flow cytometry. Results: The preparation of total nucleic acid from peptide-PNA treated showed five distinct bands which correspond to chromosomal DNA, plasmid DNA, 23S ribosomal RNA (rRNA), 16S rRNA and mixture of small RNA. DCs incubated with FITC- labeled peptide-PNA treated and heat inactivated bacteria showed almost equal fluoresence intensity. Conclusion: Peptide–PNA treatment bacteria are intact and do not appear to alter cell barriers and nucleic acid content. They can be taken up by DCs efficiently. These finding may confirm new application for peptide-PNA in immunology and DNA vaccine.
FEELS: a full-spectrum enhanced emotion learning system for assisting individuals with autism spectrum disorder

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a developmental disorder thatcan lead to a variety of social and communication challenges, andindividuals with ASD are at a higher risk of loneliness and depres-sion as a result of the disconnect and isolation they may feel fromthe rest of society as a result of their ASD. Interventions targetingimproved emotional detection has been clinically shown to be quitepromising; however, there are considerable barriers that make itchallenging to incorporate emotion detection within daily life sce-narios. Motivated by the need to fill this gap, we introduce theconcept of FEELS, a full-spectrum enhanced emotion learning sys-tem which could be useful as a tool to assist individuals with ASD.FEELS facilitates enhanced emotion detection by capturing a livevideo stream of individuals in real-time, then leveraging deep con-volutional neural networks to detect facial landmarks and a customhybrid neural network consisting of a time distributed feed-forwardneural network and a LTSM neural network to determine the emo-tional state of the individuals based on a sequence of facial land-marks over time. The feasibility of such an approach was exploredthrough the construction of a proof-of-concept FEELS system thatcan detect between five different basic emotional states: neutral,sad, happy, surprise, and anger. Future work will include extend-ing the proof-of-concept FEELS system to detect more emotionalstates and evaluate the system in more natural settings.
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation of the Human Frontal Eye Field: Effects on Visual Perception and Attention

When looking at one object, human subjects can shift their attention to another object in their visual field without moving the eyes. Such shifts of attention activate the same brain regions as those involved in the execution of eye movements. Here we investigate the role of one of the main cortical oculomotor area, namely, the frontal eye field (FEF), in shifts of attention. We used transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), a technique known to disrupt transiently eye-movements preparation. We hypothesized that if the FEF is a necessary element in the network involved in shifting attention without moving the eyes, then TMS should also disrupt visuospatial attention. For each volunteer, we positioned the TMS coil over the probabilistic anatomical location of the FEF, and we verified that single pulses delayed eye movements. We then applied TMS during a visuospatial attention task. In this task, a central arrow directed shifts of attention and the subject responded by a keypress to a subsequent visual peripheral target without moving the eyes from the central fixation point. In a few trials, the cue was invalid or uninformative, yielding slower responses than when the cue was valid. We delivered single pulses either 53 msec before or 70 msec after target onset. Contrary to our prediction, the main effect of the stimulation was a decrease in reaction time when it was applied 53 msec before target onset. TMS over the left hemisphere facilitated responses to targets in the right hemifield only and for all cueing conditions, whereas TMS over the right hemisphere had a bilateral effect for valid and neutral but not invalid cueing. Thus, TMS interfered with shift of attention only in the case of right hemisphere stimulation: it increased the cost of invalid cueing. Our results suggest that TMS over the FEF facilitates visual detection, and thereby reduces reaction time. This finding provides new insights into the role of the human FEF in processing visual information. The functional asymmetry observed for both facilitation of visual detection and interference with shifts of attention provides further evidence for the dominance of the right hemisphere for those processes. Our results also underline that the disruptive or facilitative effect of TMS over a given region depends upon the behavioral context.
Release of bisphenol A from polycarbonate and polyethylene terephthalate drinking water bottles under different storage conditions and its associated health risk

Introduction: Bisphenol A (BPA) is a controversial plastics ingredient used mainly in the production of polycarbonate plastics (PC) and epoxy resins that widely used nowadays in food and drink packaging. Even though BPA is not involved in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) manufacturing, recent study had reported the present of BPA in PET water bottle. This study was conducted to investigate effects storage conditions on release of BPA from PC and PET bottled water as well as to assess health risks associated with consumption. Methods: Solid phase extraction (SPE) was used to extract the samples, followed by analysis using ultra high performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detector (UHPLC-FLD). The possibility of developing chronic non-carcinogenic health risk among consumers of bottled water was evaluated using hazard quotient (HQ). Results: Results showed that BPA migrated from PC and PET water bottles at concentrations ranging from 9.13 to 257.67 ng/L and 11.53 ng/L to 269.87 ng/L respectively. Concentrations of BPA were higher in PET bottled water compared to PC bottled water across all storage conditions. Higher storage temperature and longer storage duration increased BPA concentrations in PC and PET bottled water. Concentrations of BPA in bottled water which were kept in a car and were exposed to sunlight were higher than control samples which were stored indoor at room temperature. Conclusion: No significant chronic non-carcinogenic health risks were calculated for daily ingestion of BPA-contaminated bottled water; calculated HQ was less than one.
Can eye of origin serve as a deviant? Visual mismatch negativity from binocular rivalry

The visual mismatch negativity (vMMN) is a negative deflection in an event-related potential (ERP) between 200 and 400 ms after onset of an infrequent stimulus in a sequence of frequent stimuli. Binocular rivalry occurs when one image is presented to one eye and a different image is presented to the other. Although the images in the two eyes are unchanging, perception alternates unpredictably between the two images for as long as one cares to look. Binocular rivalry, therefore, provides a useful test of whether the vMMN is produced by low levels of the visual system at which the images are processed, or by higher levels at which perception is mediated. To investigate whether a vMMN can be evoked during binocular rivalry, we showed 80% standards comprising a vertical grating to one eye and a horizontal grating to the other and 20% deviants, in which the gratings either swapped between the eyes (eye-swap deviants) or changed their orientations by 45° (oblique deviants). Fourteen participants observed the stimuli in 16, 4-min blocks. In eight consecutive blocks, participants recorded their experiences of rivalry by pressing keys—we call this the attend-to-rivalry condition. In the remaining eight consecutive blocks, participants performed a demanding task at fixation (a 2-back task), also by pressing keys—we call this the reduced-attention condition. We found deviance-related negativity from about 140 ms to about 220 ms after onset of a deviant. There were two noticeable troughs that we call an early vMMN (140–160 ms) and a late vMMN (200–220 ms). These were essentially similar for oblique deviants and eye-swap deviants. They were also essentially similar in the attend-to-rivalry conditions and the reduced-attention conditions. We also found a late, deviance-related negativity from about 270 to about 290 ms in the attend-to-rivalry conditions. We conclude that the vMMN can be evoked during the ever-changing perceptual changes of binocular rivalry and that it is sensitive to the eye of origin of binocular-rivalry stimuli. This is consistent with the vMMN's being produced by low levels of the visual system.
Cerebrospinal Fluid Tau Protein Levels and 18F-Fluorodeoxyglucose Positron Emission Tomography in the Differential Diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease

Aims: In this study, we aimed to compare cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) levels of total tau (t-tau), phosphorylated tau (p-tau181) and positron emission tomography with 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG-PET) in the differential diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) under clinical conditions. Method: In a cross-sectional, blinded, single-center study, we examined a sample of 75 unselected memory clinic patients with clinical diagnoses of dementia of Alzheimer type (DAT; n = 24), amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI; n = 16), other dementias (n = 13) and nondemented controls (n = 22). Discriminative accuracy, sensitivity and specificity were calculated and compared using ROC analyses. Results: p-tau181 and FDG-PET were comparable in separating DAT from controls (sensitivity: 67 vs. 79%; specificity: 91% for both) and patients with other dementias (sensitivity: 71 vs. 79%; specificity: 100% for both). The sensitivity of p-tau181 in differentiating MCI patients from controls was significantly (p < 0.05) superior to that of FDG-PET (75 vs. 44%) at a comparably high specificity (82 vs. 91%); t-tau measures were less accurate in all analyses. Conclusions: FDG-PET and CSF p-tau181 levels are able to discriminate DAT in heterogeneous and unselected samples with a high accuracy. CSF p-tau181 might be somewhat superior for a sensitive detection of patients with MCI.
Optimal One Bit Time Reversal For UWB Impulse Radio In Multi-User Wireless Communications

In this paper, with the purpose of further reducing the complexity of the system, while keeping its temporal and spatial focusing performance, we investigate the possibility of using optimal one bit time reversal (TR) system for impulse radio ultra wideband multi-user wireless communications. The results show that, by optimally selecting the number of used taps in the pre-filter the optimal one bit TR system can outperform the full one bit TR system. In some cases, the temporal and spatial focusing performance of the optimal one bit TR system appears to be compatible with that of the original TR system. This is a significant result as the overhead cost is much lower than it is required in the original TR system. Keywords—Time reversal, optimal one bit, UWB, multi-user interference, inter symbol interference
Using determiners as contextual cues in sentence comprehension: A comparison between younger and older adults

Younger adults use both semantic and phonological cues to quickly and efficiently localize the referent during sentence comprehension. While some behavioral studies suggest that older adults use contextual information even more strongly than younger adults, ERP studies have shown that this population, as a group, is less apt at using contextual semantic cues to predict upcoming words. The current study extends the investigation of contextual cue processing in auditory sentence comprehension beyond semantic cue processing, by comparing younger and older adults in their ability to use phonological cues in indefinite articles (a/an) to localize the referent in an eye-tracking visual world paradigm. Our results suggest that both age groups use such phonological information for referent localization, but with different timelines: younger adults use the cues to anticipate an upcoming word, whereas older adults show delayed cue processing after the target word has been spoken. Together with findings from semantic context processing, these results support a model of sentence comprehension in which the use of contextual cues continues with aging, but is no longer as efficient as in the young system for anticipatory word retrieval.
Cooperative scheduling, precoding, and optimized power allocation for LTE-advanced CoMP systems

Recent research has shown that coordinated multi-point (CoMP) transmission can provide significant gains in terms of overall throughput of cellular systems. The main purpose of this paper is to enhance the overall cell throughput and to optimize the power consumption in LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) systems using CoMP. In particular, we present scheduling, precoding and power allocation (PA) algorithms based on the signal-to-leakage-plus-noise-ratio (SLNR) for the CoMP downlink. The proposed scheduling and precoding algorithm selects the user equipment (UEs) that can efficiently share the same resource block (RB) without degrading the overall throughput by using the SLNR metric. Additionally, we propose PA algorithms that significantly improve the overall throughput and reduce the power consumption. The PA algorithms are based on solving a set of constrained convex optimization problems using the log-barrier function penalty method based on using the Newton method. We evaluate the proposed PA algorithms by comparing them to equal power allocation (EPA). Performance evaluation results show that the proposed SLNR-based PA algorithms provide considerable performance gains in terms of the overall system throughput and also are shown to have even less power consumption compared to the typical EPA.
Community Detection in Dynamic Social Networks

There are many community detection algorithms for discovering communities in networks, but very few deal with networks that change structure. The SCAN (Structural Clustering Algorithm for Networks) algorithm is one of these algorithms that detect communities in static networks. To make SCAN more effective for the dynamic social networks that are continually changing their structure, we propose the algorithm DSCAN (Dynamic SCAN) which improves SCAN to allow it to update a local structure in less time than it would to run SCAN on the entire network. We also improve SCAN by removing the need for parameter tuning. DSCAN, tested on real world dynamic networks, performs faster and comparably to SCAN from one timestamp to another, relative to the size of the change. We also devised an approach to genetic algorithms for detecting communities in dynamic social networks, which performs well in speed and modularity.
Human action classification based on sequential bag-of-words model

Recently, approaches utilizing spatial-temporal features have achieved great success in human action classification. However, they typically rely on bag-of-words (BoWs) model, and ignore the spatial and temporal structure information of visual words, bringing ambiguities among similar actions. In this paper, we present a novel approach called sequential BoWs for efficient human action classification. It captures temporal sequential structure by segmenting the entire action into sub-actions. Each sub-action has a tiny movement within a narrow range of action. Then the sequential BoWs are created, in which each sub-action is assigned with a certain weight and salience to highlight the distinguishing sections. It is noted that the weight and salience are figured out in advance according to the sub-action's discrimination evaluated by training data. Finally, those sub-actions are used for classification respectively, and voting for united result. Experiments are conducted on UT-interaction dataset and Rochester dataset. The results show its higher robustness and accuracy over most state-of-the-art classification approaches.
Evaluation of the International Child Development Programme (ICDP) as a community-wide parenting programme

Background: Many parenting programmes lack proper evaluation, especially under community-wide implementation. Objective: Examining the effectiveness of the eight-week International Child Development Programme (ICDP), implemented as a general programme. Methodology: Non-clinical caregivers attending ICDP (N = 141) and a non-attending community comparison group (N = 79) completed questionnaires on parenting, psychosocial functioning, and child difficulties before and after ICDP course. Analyses compare changes in scores for both groups over time. Results: The ICDP group showed more positive attitudes towards child management and reported better child management, improved parental strategies and less impact of child difficulties. Caregivers with low initial scores benefited most. The comparison group showed little change with a significant decrease in scores on the caregiver–child activity scale. Discussion: The results suggest that caregivers in the community who do not show clinical signs or have children with behaviour or other disorders, may benefit from participating in parent training based on ICDP.