Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Variability of AChE, BChE, and ChAT genes in the late‐onset form of Alzheimer's disease and relationships with response to treatment with Donepezil and Rivastigmine

Several factors are believed to give rise to the late onset sporadic form of Alzheimer's disease (LOAD). We have studied the variation at the genes of three enzymes of the cholinergic system: acetylcholinesterase, butyrylcholinesterase, and choline acetyltransferase. The single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) examined were: AChE rs2571598, BChE rs1355534, BChE rs1803274, and ChAT rs2177369. The sample for the case–control study was 471 LOAD patients aged 60 years or older, and 254 subjects with no neurodegenerative disorders as the control group. A significant difference in the genotype distribution between patients and controls was observed only for ChAT rs2177369, showing that the G/G genotype was to be considered a risk factor with respect to the G/A + A/A genotypes (odds ratio = 1.56; 95% Confidence Interval = 1.10–2.22; P = 0.01). Though indicating a significant association with AD onset, our results are far from definitive since contrast with the ones reported by other authors in a previous case–control study, and call for further investigations. Among patients, 171 took part in an observational study concerning the possible role of the genetic composition on the efficacy of treatment with Donepezil and Rivastigmine. We related the SNPs of the above cited genes with cognitive status measured by MMSE. Carrying an allele or a genotype of these SNPs does not seem to play a relevant role in the response to treatment with the two cholinesterase inhibitors, though some significant results were found associated with the AChE A/A genotype that had the best response when treated with Rivastigmine. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
UAV circumnavigation of an unknown target without location information using noisy range-based measurements

This paper proposes a control algorithm for a UAV to circumnavigate an unknown target at a fixed radius when the location information of the UAV is unavailable. By assuming that the UAV has a constant velocity, the control algorithm makes adjustments to the heading angle of the UAV based on range and range rate measurements from the target, which may be corrupted by additive measurement noise. The control algorithm has the added benefit of being globally smooth and bounded. Exploiting the relationship between range rate and bearing angle, we transform the system dynamics from Cartesian coordinate in terms of location and heading to polar coordinate in terms of range and bearing angle. We then formulate the addition of measurement errors as a stochastic differential equation. A recurrence result is established showing that the UAV will reach a neighborhood of the desired orbit in finite time. Some statistical measures of performance are obtained to support the technical analysis.
Optimizing sorting with genetic algorithms

The growing complexity of modern processors has made the generation of highly efficient code increasingly difficult. Manual code generation is very time consuming, but it is often the only choice since the code generated by today's compiler technology often has much lower performance than the best hand-tuned codes. A promising code generation strategy, implemented by systems like ATLAS, FFTW, and SPIRAL, uses empirical search to find the parameter values of the implementation, such as the tile size and instruction schedules, that deliver near-optimal performance for a particular machine. However, this approach has only proven successful on scientific codes whose performance does not depend on the input data. In this paper we study machine learning techniques to extend empirical search to the generation of sorting routines, whose performance depends on the input characteristics and the architecture of the target machine. We build on a previous study that selects a "pure" sorting algorithm at the outset of the computation as a function of the standard deviation. The approach discussed in this paper uses genetic algorithms and a classifier system to build hierarchically-organized hybrid sorting algorithms capable of adapting to the input data. Our results show that such algorithms generated using the approach presented in this paper are quite effective at taking into account the complex interactions between architectural and input data characteristics and that the resulting code performs significantly better than conventional sorting implementations and the code generated by our earlier study. In particular, the routines generated using our approach perform better than all the commercial libraries that we tried including IBM ESSL, INTEL MKL and the C++ STL The best algorithm we have been able to generate is on the average 26% and 62% faster than the IBM ESSL in an IBM Power 3 and IBM Power 4, respectively.
A fragment based alignment in linear space

Sequence alignment is a very important problem in Bioinformatics since it is very useful to discover relationships among biological sequences. In this article we propose a new sequence alignment algorithm that is able to identify sequence similarities in linear space. Our solution is capable of using several parameters specifying in which conditions a given residue can be aligned. This decision is taken based on a perceptron neuron and the best set of parameters is found using simulated annealing. Comparing our algorithm to a well established algorithm, we found that for pairwise alignments, our approach was faster for all instances tested with speedups up to 7.63 and yields better quality results for the majority of the instances.
Motion planning for a crowd of robots

Moving a crowd of robots or avatars from their current configurations to some destination area without causing collisions is a challenging motion-planning problem because the high degrees of freedom involved. Two approaches are often used for this type of problems: decoupled and centralized. The tradeoff of these two approaches is that the decoupled approach is considered faster while the centralized approach has the advantage of being complete. In this paper, we propose an efficient centralized planner that is much faster than the traditional randomized planning approaches. This planner uses a hierarchical sphere tree structure to group robots dynamically. By taking advantage of the problem characteristics on independently moving robots, we are able to design a practical planner with the centralized approach when the number of robots is rather large. We use several simulation examples to demonstrate the efficiency and effectiveness of the planner.
Dynamic Container Deployment: Two-Stage Robust Model, Complexity, and Computational Results

Containers are widely used in the shipping industry mainly because of their capability to facilitate multimodal transportation. How to effectively reposition the nonrevenue empty containers is the key to reduce the cost and improve the service in the liner shipping industry. In this paper, we propose a two-stage robust optimization model that takes into account the laden containers routing as well as the empty container repositioning, and define the robustness for this model with uncertainties in the supply and demand of the empty containers. Based on this definition, we present the robust formulations for the uncertainty sets corresponding to the (l-script) p -norm, where p = 1, 2, and (infinity), and analyze the computational complexities for all of these formulations. The only polynomial-time solvable case corresponds to the (l-script) 1 -norm, which we use to conduct the numerical study. We compare our approach with both the deterministic model and the stochastic model for the same problem in the rolling horizon simulation environment. The computational results establish the potential practical usefulness of the proposed approach.
3D Printing of Flexible Liquid Sensor Based on Swelling Behavior of Hydrogel with Carbon Nanotubes

Flexible sensors with accurate detection of environmental stimuli (e.g., humidity and chemical substances) have drawn increasing research interests in biomedical engineering and environmental science. However, most work is focused on isotropic sensing of liquid occurrence due to the limitation of material development, sensor design, and fabrication capability. 3D printing is used to build multifunctional flexible liquid sensors with multimaterials enabling anisotropic detection of microliquid droplets, and described herein. Electrical conductive composite hydrogels capable of detecting chemical liquid are developed with poly (ethylene diacrylate) (PEGDA) and multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT). Due to the absorption of the liquid droplet and related swelling behavior, the resistance of PEGDA/MWCNT composite hydrogel increases dramatically, while the resistance of pure PEGDA hydrogel decreases significantly. Based on the two composite hydrogels and the related 3D printing method, a mesh‐shaped liquid sensor that can effectively identify the position and volume of liquid leakage in a short time is developed. Furthermore, a three‐layered liquid sensor to enable bidirectional monitor and detection of the liquid leakage in two different sides is demonstrated. The 3D‐printed liquid sensor offers a distinctive perspective on the potential applications in various fields for detection of liquid leakage in accurate position and direction.
On the problem of gradient calibration in diffusion weighted imaging

A calibration method for diffusion‐weighted imaging using an isotropic phantom is proposed. The key point of the method consists in finding optimized balancing times for different orientations of diffusion‐encoding gradients followed by retrospective rescaling of the diffusion‐weighted images. The correction protocol was applied to produce improved fractional anisotropy maps which were analyzed with statistical histograms. The results demonstrate that the described scheme of systematic error reduction is a valid approach for quality control studies of gradient system performance for diffusion‐weighted imaging. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Imaging Syst Technol, 21, 271–279, 2011;
Development of the Zuckerman–Kuhlman–Aluja Personality Questionnaire (ZKA–PQ): A Factor/Facet Version of the Zuckerman–Kuhlman Personality Questionnaire (ZKPQ)

The development of a new 200-item questionnaire based on the theoretical constructs of the alternative Five-factor model of personality is described. We developed the Zuckerman–Kuhlman–Aluja Personality Questionnaire (ZKA–PQ) from an initial pool of 537 items. Its final version includes 5 factors with 4 facets per factor and 10 items per facet. Internal consistencies were adequate particularly for the factors. The 1 factor confirmatory factor analyses showed satisfactory goodness-of-fit indexes, but not for the 5 factor simple structure. When incorporating the secondary loadings and the correlated error terms, the model fit improved. A multigroup analysis showed gender differences for the factors Sensation Seeking, Neuroticism, Aggressiveness, and Activity for the Spanish-speaking sample but only for Aggressiveness in the English-speaking sample. We assessed the convergent and discriminant validity of the ZKA–PQ by inspecting correlations with shortened versions of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (Costa & McCrae, 1992) and Temperament and Character Inventory–Revised (Cloninger, 1999) in 2 independent and additional samples. This new instrument may be useful for basic and applied research, including normal personality, psychobiology of personality, personality and clinical disorders, and industrial-organizational psychology.
Cellular Basis of Wall Remodeling in Long‐term Pressure Overload‐Induced Right Ventricular Hypertrophy in Rats

To determine the effects of long-term pressure overload on the structural mechanisms implicated in wall remodeling of the right ventricle, a mild pulmonary artery banding was applied to rats approximately 2 months old, and the animals were killed 150 days later. The surgical procedure resulted in a 60% reduction in the cross-sectional area of the constricted vessel and a 52% increase in the weight of the right ventricle. The hypertrophic myocardial response was associated with an elevation in right ventricular systolic pressure (from 33 ± 11 mm Hg to 71 ± 12 mm Hg), right ventricular end-diastolic pressure (from 3 ± 1 mm Hg to 10 ± 3 mm Hg), and central venous pressure (from 2± 0.2 mm Hg to 10 ± 3 mm Hg). The 76% increase in wall thickness after pulmonary artery stenosis was the result of a 24% lateral expansion of cardiac muscle cells and a 44% increase in the number of myocytes across the ventricular wall. The intermyocyte distance was also increased by 22%. These cellular adaptations occurred with no alterations in total myocyte length, average sarcomere length, and volume composition of the myocardium. Ventricular wall area was decreased by 14%, which suggests a small reduction in chamber volume. Myocyte growth was accompanied by proportional expansions of mitochondrial and myofibrillar components, so that the ratio of mitochondria to myofibrils in the cytoplasm remained essentially constant. In conclusion, ventricular remodeling in this model of chronic pressure hypertrophy is characterized by increases in cellular diameter and number that would both tend to decrease the magnitude of systolic and diastolic stresses on a per cell basis and thus improve the myocardial response to a prolonged and sustained mechanical load.
Effect of hypoxia on arterial baroreflex control of heart rate and muscle sympathetic nerve activity in humans.

We tested the hypothesis that acute hypoxia would alter the sensitivity of arterial baroreflex control of both heart rate and sympathetic vasoconstrictor outflow. In 16 healthy, nonsmoking, normotensive subjects (8 women, 8 men, age 20-33 yr), we assessed baroreflex control of heart rate and muscle sympathetic nerve activity by using the modified Oxford technique during both normoxia and hypoxia (12% O(2)). Compared with normoxia, hypoxia reduced arterial O(2) saturation levels from 96.8 +/- 0.3 to 80.7 +/- 1.4% (P < 0.001), increased heart rate from 59.8 +/- 2.4 to 79.4 +/- 2.9 beats/min (P < 0.001), increased mean arterial pressure from 96.7 +/- 2.5 to 105.0 +/- 3.3 mmHg (P = 0.002), and increased sympathetic activity 126 +/- 58% (P < 0.05). The sensitivity for baroreflex control of both heart rate and sympathetic activity was not altered by hypoxia (heart rate: -1.02 +/- 0.09 vs. -1.02 +/- 0.11 beats. min(-1). mmHg(-1); nerve activity: -5.6 +/- 0.9 vs. -6.2 +/- 0.9 integrated activity. beat(-1). mmHg(-1); both P > 0.05). Acute exposure to hypoxia reset baroreflex control of both heart rate and sympathetic activity to higher pressures without changes in baroreflex sensitivity.
Integrated manufacturing system of high-pressure FRP pipes

In order to realise industrialised manufacturing of epoxy FRP pipes, the manufacturing system which can accomplish winding, internal heating curing and extraction processes by only one machine tool was developed. The winding motion control is undertaken by an embedded motion controller. The curing control system composed of embedded industrial computer and PLC was designed to undertake curing, cooling and blowing control. A thermo-chemical model during cure was established, and an analysis based on the finite element technique was developed to simulate the curing process. It is proved that the applying of internal heating curing process can improve the production efficiency and the quality of high pressure FRP pipes.
Differences in Cysteine Protease Activity in Schistosoma mansoni-Resistant and -Susceptible Biomphalaria glabrata and Characterization of the Hepatopancreas Cathepsin B Full-length cDNA

Biomphalaria glabrata snails are known to display a wide range of susceptibility phenotypes to Schistosoma mansoni infection depending on the genetics of both the snail and the invading parasite. Evidence exists for a role of hydrolytic enzymes in the defense of molluscs against invading parasites. To elucidate the role of these enzymes in the outcome of infection in the snail, proteolysis was examined in parasite-resistant and -susceptible snails. Zymographs of extracts from the whole snail or hepatopancreas indicated higher proteolytic activity in resistant, compared with susceptible, snails. Lytic activity coincided with a high-molecular-weight smear (220 to 66 kDa) that was abrogated by the cysteine protease inhibitor trans-epoxysuccinyl-l-leucylamido-(4-guanidino)butane. Quantitative flourimetric assays showed 3.5-fold higher activity in resistant than in susceptible snails. From a hepatopancreas cDNA library, several cysteine protease encoding expressed sequence tags including the full-length cDNA for cathepsin B were identified. Sequence analysis revealed that this cathepsin B belonged to the C1A family of peptidases characterized by the presence of the catalytic cysteine–histidine dyad, the “occluding loop,” signal sequence, and cleavage sites for the prepro and propeptides. Quantitative real-time reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction showed higher up-regulation of cathepsin B transcript in resistant than in the susceptible snail after parasite exposure.
NUS-PT: Exploiting Parallel Texts for Word Sense Disambiguation in the English All-Words Tasks

We participated in the SemEval-2007 coarse-grained English all-words task and fine-grained English all-words task. We used a supervised learning approach with SVM as the learning algorithm. The knowledge sources used include local collocations, parts-of-speech, and surrounding words. We gathered training examples from English-Chinese parallel corpora, SemCor, and DSO corpus. While the fine-grained sense inventory of WordNet was used to train our system employed for the fine-grained English all-words task, our system employed for the coarse-grained English all-words task was trained with the coarse-grained sense inventory released by the task organizers. Our scores (for both recall and precision) are 0.825 and 0.587 for the coarse-grained English all-words task and fine-grained English all-words task respectively. These scores put our systems in the first place for the coarse-grained English all-words task and the second place for the fine-grained English all-words task.
GR-tree: An efficient index structure for GML

As XML grammar language is used to express geographical features, GML has become popular in spatial data storing, publishing, and exchanging. This paper proposes a new index structure, namely GR-Tree, to organize and index GML spatial data. GR-Tree is an extension of R-Tree with augmentation of spatial and non-spatial properties extracted from GML data and added into nodes of tree. The structure of tree and corresponding algorithms for searching, inserting and updating are introduced in this paper. GML query can be optimized via GR-Tree using pruning twice to retrieve less candidate spatial objects. The results of a series of experiments proves that GR-Tree can effectively and efficiently retrieve GML data and has higher query performance than conventional R-Tree in GML query.
Fabrication and Characterization of Novel Environmentally Friendly Thin Film Nanocomposite Membranes for Water Desalination

iii Résumé . iv Acknowledgement . vi Table of contents . vii Nomenclature . xiv Contributions. xv Chapter 1Introduction . 1 1.1. Motivation . 2 1.2. Objectives and structure of the thesis . 3 1.3. References . 5 Chapter 2Background and literature review . 7 2.1. Overview of membrane separation processes . 8 2.2. Reverse osmosis . 9 2.2.1. Principles and applications of reverse osmosis . 9 2.2.2. Conventional RO polymeric membrane materials . 11 2.2.3. Fabrication, chemistry and structure of the polyamide layer in TFC membranes . 12 2.2. 4. Major drawbacks of PA-TFC-RO membranes . 14 2.2. 5. Strategies to enhance the performance of the PA-TFC RO membranes . 16 Monomers . 16 Surfactants and additives/co-solvents . 18 Surface modification . 18 Incorporation of nano-scaled material in membranes . 19 2.3. Thin film nanocomposite (TFN) membranes . 21 2.3. 1. Overview of TFN membranes . 21 2.3. 2. Separation properties of TFN membranes: permeability and selectivity . 24 2.3. 3. Antifouling and antibacterial properties of TFN membranes . 26 2.3. 4. Chemical and mechanical properties of TFN membranes . 26 2.3. 5. Challenges of the TFN membrane fabrication . 27
Quality of life outcomes for residents and quality ratings of care homes: is there a relationship?

BACKGROUND quality ratings of care homes are used by decision makers in the absence of direct information about outcomes. However, there is little evidence about the relationship between regulators' ratings of homes and residents' quality of life outcomes. OBJECTIVES to capture social care-related quality of life (SCRQoL) outcomes for residents and investigate the relationship between outcomes and regulator quality ratings of homes. METHODS data were collected for 366 residents of 83 English care homes for older people inspected during 2008. Outcomes were measured using the Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit (ASCOT). Multivariate multilevel modelling was used to investigate the relationship between quality of life outcomes and star ratings of homes, controlling for resident and home characteristics. RESULTS care homes were delivering substantial gains in SCRQoL, but were more successful in delivering 'basic' (e.g. personal cleanliness) than higher-order domains (e.g. social participation). Outcomes were associated with quality ratings of residential homes but not of nursing homes. CONCLUSIONS the approach to providing quality ratings by the regulator in England is currently under review. Future quality indicators need to demonstrate their relationship with quality of life outcomes if they are to be a reliable guide to commissioners and private individuals purchasing care.
Engineering information management tools by example

While there are many established methodologies for information systems development, designing by example has not been formally explored and applied previously. Our work is also motivated by the desire to explore interface-driven development techniques that could complement existing approaches such as model-driven engineering with the goal of reducing the need for modelling and reengineering of existing applications and interfaces, while still supporting the development task. We explore the example-based technique for rapid development of powerful and flexible information management tools based on the example of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, a system that was originally designed to support the workflow of digital photographers in a flexible way. We analyse experiments in which two new systems---one for managing collections of research papers and another for software project management---were developed based on the Lightroom paradigm. We derive a conceptual framework for engineering by example and assess the method by comparing it to traditional model-driven engineering.
On the Potential for Tuning the Longitudinal Plasmon Band of a Distribution of Gold Nanorods Using a Tunable Laser

Gold nanorods hold great potential for bio sensing, imaging and therapy applications. The seed-mediated approach is the most widely used technique for the synthesis of gold nanorods. However, batches of nanorods synthesized using this method have a broadened longitudinal plasmon (LP) peak and uncertainty in the wavelength of the peak. This paper describes a technique to tune the synthesized nanorod distributions by using laser pulses at specific wavelengths that either reduce the width of the population LP peak or control its position. The overlap between the LP peaks of pairs of batches of gold nanorods was successfully reduced by at least 9%. Batches of nanorods with a sharper LP peak and/or a more desirable LP resonance wavelength could eventually be utilized in molecular biosensing and imaging applications requiring the simultaneous detection and differentiation of multiple aspectratio gold nanorods.