Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Shifts in Climate Foster Exceptional Opportunities for Species Radiation: The Case of South African Geraniums

Climate change is often assumed to be a major driver of biodiversity loss. However, it can also set the stage for novel diversification in lineages with the evolutionary ability to colonize new environments. Here we tested if the extraordinary evolutionary success of the genus Pelargonium was related to the ability of its species to capitalize on the climate niche variation produced by the historical changes in southern Africa. We evaluated the relationship between rates of climate niche evolution and diversification rates in the main Pelargonium lineages and disentangled the roles of deep and recent historical events in the modification of species niches. Pelargonium clades exhibiting higher ecological differentiation along summer precipitation (SPP) gradients also experienced higher diversification rates. Faster rates of niche differentiation in spatially structured variables, along with lower levels of niche overlap among closely related species, suggest recent modification in species niches (e.g. dispersal or range shift) and niche lability. We suggest that highly structured SPP gradients established during the aridification process within southern Africa, in concert with niche lability and low niche overlap, contributed to species divergence. These factors are likely to be responsible for the extensive diversification of other lineages in this diversity hot spot.
Documentation of the Tenting Effect

and their examination of various needle sizes' and shapes' effect on the dura mater. Our group has become interested in the pressure dynamics at the dural surface and has observed a phenomenon called the “tenting effect. ” During the performance of a spinal anesthesia, dural tenting before piercing the meninges may precede dural puncture. This effect can be unmasked while performing a needle-through-needle combined spinal epidural (CSE) technique. Clinically, this can be perceived by the suction effect produced by tenting of dura mater– arachnoid with the spinal needle just before piercing it, with the inward motion of saline solution present in the epidural hub. After piercing themeninges, thewater dropwill return to the hub.We describe the tenting effect
Energetics of single active diffusion trajectories

The fundamental insight into Brownian motion by Einstein is that all substances exhibit continual fluctuations due to thermal agitation balancing with the frictional resistance. However, even at thermal equilibrium, biological activity can give rise to non-equilibrium fluctuations that cause “active diffusion” in living cells. Because of the non-stationary and non-equilibrium nature of such fluctuations, mean square displacement analysis, relevant only to a steady-state ensemble, may not be the most suitable choice as it depends on the choice of the ensemble; hence, a new analytical method for describing active diffusion is desired. Here we discuss the stochastic energetics of a thermally fluctuating single active diffusion trajectory driven by non-thermal random forces. Heat dissipation, usually difficult to measure, can be estimated from the active diffusion trajectory; guidelines on the analysis such as criteria for the time resolution and driving force intensity are shown by a statistical test. This leads to the concept of an “instantaneous diffusion coefficient” connected to heat dissipation that may be used to analyse the activity and molecular transport mechanisms of living systems.
Industrial Biotechnology-Made in Germany : The path from policies to sustainable energy , commodity and specialty products

To discover new industrially relevant, thermoactive xylanases a gene library from Thermus brockianus was constructed. Function-based screening revealed a novel xylanaseencoding gene (xyn10) which was successfully expressed in E. coli BL21 (DE3). The resulting protein (38.7 kDa), a member of glycoside hydrolase family 10 was purified to homogeneity and biochemically characterized. Catalytic activity was detected up to 115 °C and highest activity was measured at 95 °C and pH 6.0. The protein was extremely thermostable and showed 80 % remaining activity after incubation at 50-70 °C for 24 h. HPLC analysis showed that Xyn10 hydrolyzes insoluble and soluble substrates, such as oat spelt xylan, xylan from beechand birchwood forming xylobiose and xylose. Specific activity of the enzyme was 1119.5 U/mg for oat spelt xylan and 994.0 U/mg for beechwood xylan, respectively. The xylanase exhibited remarkable stability in the presence of various detergents and chaotropic agents, such as CHAPS, guanidine hydrochloride and urea. This is the first report of the heterologous production, purification and characterization of a xylanase from Thermus sp.
Cost-effectiveness of intense insulin treatment after acute myocardial infarction in patients with diabetes mellitus; results from the DIGAMI study.

AIMS The aim of the present analysis was to estimate the cost-effectiveness of intense insulin treatment after acute myocardial infarction in patients with diabetes mellitus based on the results of the Diabetes Mellitus Insulin Glucose Infusion in Acute Myocardial Infarction (DIGAMI) study. In this study 620 patients with diabetes mellitus and acute myocardial infarction were randomized to intense insulin treatment (insulin group) or to serve as controls given standard antidiabetic therapy. Mortality was significantly reduced in the insulin group. METHODS AND RESULTS The cost-effectiveness ratio was estimated as the incremental cost per life-year and quality-adjusted life-year gained of intense insulin treatment. The incremental costs were estimated as the difference in health care costs and indirect costs (labour production) during the first year of follow-up plus the future costs of increased survival. The life-years gained were based on the 5-year long-term follow-up experience and an assumed annual 20% mortality risk for all patients thereafter. The health care costs were Euro 975 higher in the insulin group during the first year of follow-up, mainly due to a longer period of initial hospitalization related to the institution of multidose insulin. The estimated discounted gain in life-years of the insulin treatment was 0.94 years without and 0.66 with quality of life adjustment, respectively. The cost per life-year gained by intense insulin treatment was Euro 16 900 and the cost per quality-adjusted life-year gained was Euro 24 100. Thus the estimated cost-effectiveness ratios were relatively low. CONCLUSION The results of the DIGAMI study indicate that intense insulin treatment after an acute myocardial infarction in patients with diabetes mellitus has an acceptable level of cost-effectiveness.
Immunohistochemical Evidence from APP-Transgenic Mice for Glutaminyl Cyclase as Drug Target to Diminish pE-Abeta Formation

Oligomeric assemblies of neurotoxic amyloid beta (Abeta) peptides generated by proteolytical processing of the amyloid precursor protein (APP) play a key role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). In recent years, a substantial heterogeneity of Abeta peptides with distinct biophysical and cell biological properties has been demonstrated. Among these, a particularly neurotoxic and disease-specific Abeta variant is N-terminally truncated and modified to pyroglutamate (pE-Abeta). Cell biological and animal experimental studies imply the catalysis of this modification by the enzyme glutaminyl cyclase (QC). However, direct histopathological evidence in transgenic animals from comparative brain region and cell type-specific expression of transgenic hAPP and QC, on the one hand, and on the formation of pE-Abeta aggregates, on the other, is lacking. Here, using single light microscopic, as well as triple immunofluorescent, labeling, we report the deposition of pE-Abeta only in the brain regions of APP-transgenic Tg2576 mice with detectable human APP and endogenous QC expression, such as the hippocampus, piriform cortex, and amygdala. Brain regions showing human APP expression without the concomitant presence of QC (the anterodorsal thalamic nucleus and perifornical nucleus) do not display pE-Abeta plaque formation. However, we also identified brain regions with substantial expression of human APP and QC in the absence of pE-Abeta deposition (the Edinger-Westphal nucleus and locus coeruleus). In these brain regions, the enzymes required to generate N-truncated Abeta peptides as substrates for QC might be lacking. Our observations provide additional evidence for an involvement of QC in AD pathogenesis via QC-catalyzed pE-Abeta formation.
Large-Scale Study of Chord Estimation Algorithms Based on Chroma Representation and HMM

This paper deals with the automatic estimation of chord progression over time of an audio file. From the audio signal, a set of chroma vectors representing the pitch content of the file over time is extracted. From these observations the chord progression is then estimated using hidden Markov models. Several methods are proposed that allow taking into account music theory, perception of key and presence of higher harmonics of pitch notes. The proposed methods are then compared to existing algorithms. A large-scale evaluation on 110 hand-labeled songs from the Beatles allows concluding on improvement over the state of the art.
The Mayo Clinic Study of Aging: Design and Sampling, Participation, Baseline Measures and Sample Characteristics

Background: The objective of this study was to establish a prospective population-based cohort to investigate the prevalence, incidence and risk factors for mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and dementia. Methods: The Olmsted County, Minn. , population, aged 70–89 years on October 1, 2004, was enumerated using the Rochester Epidemiology Project. Eligible subjects were randomly selected and invited to participate. Participants underwent a comprehensive in-person evaluation including the Clinical Dementia Rating Scale, a neurological evaluation and neuropsychological testing. A consensus diagnosis of normal cognition, MCI or dementia was made by a panel using previously published criteria. A subsample of subjects was studied via telephone interview. Results: Four hundred and two subjects with dementia were identified from a detailed review of their medical records but were not contacted. At baseline, we successfully evaluated 703 women aged 70–79 years, 769 women aged 80–89 years, 730 men aged 70–79 years and 517 men aged 80–89 years (total n = 2,719). Among the participants, 2,050 subjects were evaluated in person and 669 via telephone. Conclusions: Strengths of the study are that the subjects were randomly selected from a defined population, the majority of the subjects were examined in person, and MCI was defined using published criteria. Here, we report the design and sampling, participation, baseline measures and sample characteristics.
Study on Behavioral Personality of a Service Robot to make more Convenient to Customer

In recent years, a lot of companies and laboratories start to announce their various prototype service robots. It does not exist that a killer application of a service robot in a service robot market yet, however it is expected that customers demand a robot having more variety peculiarity when a robot is supplied widely. In order words, in the future, robot users probably want the robot which is fitted for their individual tastes. In the present paper we shall see the robot's variation of behavioral personality from the experiments. These results show that by adjusting the parameters related to robot perception, the robot can be varied in its personality for user. The robot is implemented by "cognitive robotic engine (CRE)" for the dependable integration of human-robot interaction (HRI) components.
Image Segmentation Through an Iterative Algorithm of the Mean Shift

Inside any image analysis system, an aspect of vital importance for pattern recognition and image interpretation that has to be taken into account is segmentation and contour extrac‐ tion. Both problems can be really difficult to face due to the variability in the form of the objects and the variation in the image quality. An example can be found in the case of biomedical images which are frequently affected by noise and sampling, that can cause consid‐ erable difficulties when rigid segmentation methods are applied [Chin-Hsing et al., 1998; Kenong & Levine, 1995; Koss et al., 1999; Rodriguez et al., 2002].
A new approach for identification of heartbeats in multimodal physiological signals

Abstract In this paper, a technique is proposed for detection of heartbeats in multimodal data. Recording of multiple physiological signals from the same subject is common practice nowadays. Multiple physiological signals are generally available but are processed separately without taking into consideration information from other relevant signals. The heartbeats are generally detected from R peaks in electrocardiogram (ECG) signal, however, if ECG is noisy, other signals reflecting the cardiac activity may be used for identifying heartbeats. This paper describes a new method for detection of heartbeats using ECG and arterial blood pressure (ABP) signals. The physiological data are segmented into various fragments and signal quality is determined using the judgment of noise level. If the ECG data fragment is noisy, heartbeats are computed from the ABP fragment. The evaluation was performed on training data set of computing in cardiology challenge 2014. The proposed methodology has resulted in better detection accuracy as compared to the unimodal methods.
CFD Simulations of a hot gas torch for the thermoplastic tape placement process

Tape Placement with thermoplastic matrix materials is a very promising technology, through its ability to produce extreme lightweight parts without a consecutive process. But it needs a very effective heating system. Among others, the hot gas torch is an appropriate system, but lacks in service durability. The authors intend to improve the service durability of such a system and present here the results of the computational fluid dynamics simulations done in order to design a new type of such a hot gas torch. It shows that through a bad temperature distribution pipe type torches are not appropriate for such a system and a helix type has to be designed.
Optical phase characterization of neuron firing with periodic stimulation

A neuron is the basic unit of the structure and function of the biological nervous system. The detection of neuronal firing is developed rapidly in recent years. However, the cell activity may be affected by most of the technologies. Considering that the concentration of calcium ion in the cell body plays a key role in modulating neuronal firing activity and the solution refractive index is closely related to its concentration, the optical phase information of a neuron is employed in this paper to describe its firing rhythm with a label-free approach. Based on the associated optical parameters, a neuron model with soma and synapses is presented. Due to the phase information of a sample is actually a set of spatial distributed data, the edge detection is performed with a gradient operator to determine the sampling point of phase data for dynamic monitoring. Since the calcium in neurons mainly exist in neuron cytoplasm, Cacl2 solution is used to simulate the liquid environment in neuron cytoplasm, and the relationship between the refractive index of the solution and the change of the ion concentration is measured through experiments. To demonstrate the phase variation during neuron firing, we take periodic change in calcium concentration in the neuron plasma as an example by simulation. According to the above result, the similar periodic variation of refractive index is be obtained by numerical calculation, as well as that of phase value at the sampling point. From the phase distribution, the variation of phase value can be observed clearly. This work could provide the basis for the label-free detection and characterization of neuron firing.
What is Quality of Data and Information in Social Information Systems? Towards a Definition and Ontology

Data and information quality (DIQ) have been defined traditionally in an organizational context and with respect to traditional information systems (IS) as, for example, “fitness for use” of data or “intrinsic” DIQ. Numerous frameworks have been developed that operationalize traditional DIQ accordingly. However, over the last decade, social IS such as social media have emerged that enable social interaction and open collaboration of voluntary prosumers, rather than simply supporting specific tasks as do traditional IS in organizations. After reviewing the current definitions of DIQ, we conclude that these definitions do not capture DIQ in social IS well, nor how it is defined, maintained, and improved through social interaction. Hence, we propose a new definition of DIQ in social IS based on the notion of "matching" between dynamic, voluntary, and heterogeneous supply and demand of data/information. We illustrate our definition with an ontological framework and discuss its implications.
Persistence and cyclical dependence in the monthly euribor rate

This paper analyses two well-known features of interest rates, namely their time dependence and their cyclical structure. Specifically, it focuses on the Euribor rate, using monthly data from January 1994 to May 2011. Two models are considered, one with fractional integration at the long run or zero frequency, and the other replacing the zero frequency with a cyclical one. The results indicate that the latter outperforms the former as well as other standard specifications. Future directions for research (such as nonlinearities, volatility behaviour, and multivariate models) are also discussed.
An evaluation of Safe Dates, an adolescent dating violence prevention program.

OBJECTIVES This study assessed the effects of the Safe Dates program on the primary and secondary prevention of adolescent dating violence. METHODS Fourteen schools were randomly allocated to treatment conditions. Eighty percent (n=1886) of the eighth and ninth graders in a rural county completed baseline questionnaires, and 1700 (90%) completed follow-up questionnaires. RESULTS Treatment and control groups were comparable at baseline. In the full sample at follow-up, less psychological abuse, sexual violence, and violence perpetrated against the current dating partner were reported in treatment than in control schools. In a subsample of adolescents reporting no dating violence at baseline (a primary prevention subsample), there was less initiation of psychological abuse in treatment than in control schools. In a subsample of adolescents reporting dating violence at baseline (a secondary prevention subsample), there was less psychological abuse and sexual violence perpetration reported at follow-up in treatment than in control schools. Most program effects were explained by changes in dating violence norms, gender stereotyping, and awareness of services. CONCLUSIONS The Safe Dates program shows promise for preventing dating violence among adolescents.
Enhancement of DNA Vaccine Potency through Coadministration of CIITA DNA with DNA Vaccines via Gene Gun1

Administration of DNA vaccines via gene gun has emerged as an important form of Ag-specific immunotherapy. The MHC CIITA is a master regulator of MHC class II expression and also induces expression of class I molecules. We reasoned that the gene gun administration of CIITA DNA with DNA vaccines employing different strategies to improve MHC I and II processing could enhance DNA vaccine potency. We observed that DC-1 cells transfected with CIITA DNA lead to higher expression of MHC I and II molecules, leading to enhanced Ag presentation through the MHC I/II pathways. Furthermore, our data suggested that coadministration of DNA-encoding calreticulin (CRT) linked to human papillomavirus (HPV) 16 E6 Ag (CRT/E6) with CIITA DNA leads to enhanced E6-specific CD8+ T cell immune responses in vaccinated mice. In addition, coadministration of the combination of CRT/E6 DNA with CIITA DNA and DNA encoding the invariant chain (Ii) linked to the pan HLA-DR-reactive epitope (Ii-PADRE) further enhanced E6-specific CD8+ T cell immune responses in vaccinated mice. Treatment with the combination vaccine was also shown to enhance the antitumor effects and to prolong survival in TC-1 tumor-bearing mice. Vaccination with the combination vaccine also led to enhanced E6-specific CD8+ memory T cells and to long-term protection against TC-1 tumors and prolonged survival in vaccinated mice. Thus, our findings suggest that the combination of CIITA DNA with CRT/E6 and Ii-PADRE DNA vaccines represents a potentially effective means to combat tumors in the clinical setting.
CANDID: Robust Change Dynamics and Deterministic Update Policy for Dynamic Background Subtraction

Background subtraction in video provides the preliminary information essential for many computer vision applications. In this paper, we propose a sequence of approaches named CANDID to solve the change detection problem in challenging video scenarios. The CANDID adaptively initializes the pixel-level distance threshold and update rate. These parameters are updated by computing the change dynamics at a location. Further, the background model is maintained by formulating a deterministic update policy. The performance of the proposed method is evaluated over various challenging scenarios such as dynamic background and extreme weather conditions. The qualitative and quantitative measures of the proposed method outperform the existing state-of-the-art approaches.
Alzheimer's Disease Prediction Based on Machine Learning Methods Applied to Multimodal MR Features

Giovanni Giulietti, Michael Dayan, Laura Serra, Elisa Tuzzi, Barbara Spano', Mara Cercignani, Carlo Caltagirone, and Marco Bozzali Neuroimaging Laboratory, Santa Lucia Foundation, Rome, Italy, Clinical Imaging Sciences Centre, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, University of Sussex, Brighton, United Kingdom, Clinical and Behavioural Neurology, Santa Lucia Foundation, Rome, Italy, Departement of Neuroscience, "Tor Vergata" University, Rome, Italy
Tightly-Coupled GNSS/Vision Using a Sky-Pointing Camera for Vehicle Navigation in Urban Areas

This paper presents a method of fusing the ego-motion of a robot or a land vehicle estimated from an upward-facing camera with Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals for navigation purposes in urban environments. A sky-pointing camera is mounted on the top of a car and synchronized with a GNSS receiver. The advantages of this configuration are two-fold: firstly, for the GNSS signals, the upward-facing camera will be used to classify the acquired images into sky and non-sky (also known as segmentation). A satellite falling into the non-sky areas (e.g., buildings, trees) will be rejected and not considered for the final position solution computation. Secondly, the sky-pointing camera (with a field of view of about 90 degrees) is helpful for urban area ego-motion estimation in the sense that it does not see most of the moving objects (e.g., pedestrians, cars) and thus is able to estimate the ego-motion with fewer outliers than is typical with a forward-facing camera. The GNSS and visual information systems are tightly-coupled in a Kalman filter for the final position solution. Experimental results demonstrate the ability of the system to provide satisfactory navigation solutions and better accuracy than the GNSS-only and the loosely-coupled GNSS/vision, 20 percent and 82 percent (in the worst case) respectively, in a deep urban canyon, even in conditions with fewer than four GNSS satellites.