Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The down syndrome biomarker initiative (DSBI) pilot: proof of concept for deep phenotyping of Alzheimer’s disease biomarkers in down syndrome

To gain further knowledge on the preclinical phase of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), we sought to characterize cognitive performance, neuroimaging and plasma-based AD biomarkers in a cohort of non-demented adults with down syndrome (DS). The goal of the down syndrome biomarker Initiative (DSBI) pilot is to test feasibility of this approach for future multicenter studies. We enrolled 12 non-demented participants with DS between the ages of 30–60 years old. Participants underwent extensive cognitive testing, volumetric MRI, amyloid positron emission tomography (PET; 18F-florbetapir), fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) PET (18F-fluorodeoxyglucose) and retinal amyloid imaging. In addition, plasma beta-amyloid (Aβ) species were measured and Apolipoprotein E (ApoE) genotyping was performed. Results from our multimodal analysis suggest greater hippocampal atrophy with amyloid load. Additionally, we identified an inverse relationship between amyloid load and regional glucose metabolism. Cognitive and functional measures did not correlate with amyloid load in DS but did correlate with regional FDG PET measures. Biomarkers of AD can be readily studied in adults with DS as in other preclinical AD populations. Importantly, all subjects in this feasibility study were able to complete all test procedures. The data indicate that a large, multicenter longitudinal study is feasible to better understand the trajectories of AD biomarkers in this enriched population. This trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT02141971.
A multiobjective approach for gene structure prediction

Current advances in DNA sequencing technology have mo- tivated the investigation of reliable gene identication methods, an open area currently present in bioinformatics. Gene recognition can be con- sidered as a search problem, where many evidence sources should be combined in a scoring function that must be maximized to obtain the most likely and right gene structure in a genomic sequence. In this article, we combine a support vector machine classier to reduce the search space together with a multiobjective genetic algorithm as main search engine to deal with a set of prospect structures. We made use of various content statistics that are commonly employed to obtain evidences of coding regions in DNA sequences which will determine the probability of a certain structure to be an actual gene. We use the human sequences located at the chromosomes 3, 19 and 21 as training set, and the chromosome 18 genes to check the performance of our system. Very promising results are obtained.
College football game day stadium incidents: policy and environmental effects on alcohol-related ejections and crime

Alcohol-related crime and misconduct remain an ongoing problem at university-sponsored sporting events in the USA. Prior research has focused on the impact of alcohol on spectator behavior at sporting events, but has not linked policy and environmental factors to behavior inside venues. This study seeks to explore the connection between policy and environmental variables' impact and reported alcohol-related crime and ejection rates within college football stadiums. The analysis tested the effect of alcohol sales policy (sales allowed or prohibited), law enforcement ejection policy, temperature, time of game, whether the home team is ranked, whether the visitor team is ranked, conference game, in-state rivalry, and attendance on college football games in seven stadiums in the USA over the course of three years. Attendance, followed by alcohol sales policy and start time of game, had a direct relationship on and influenced an increase in crime. Law enforcement policy on reporting ejections, followed by temperature, attendance, conference games, and rivalry games, influenced the frequency of alcohol-related ejection reports. Thus, policy variables were significant indicators of alcohol-related law enforcement activity at college football stadiums.
On Classical and Quantum Cryptography

Lectures on classical and quantum cryptography. Contents: Private key cryptosystems. Elements of number theory. Public key cryptography and RSA cryptosystem. Shannon‘s entropy and mutual information. Entropic uncertainty relations. The no cloning theorem. The BB84 quantum cryptographic protocol. Security proofs. Bell‘s theorem. The EPRBE quantum cryptographic protocol.
A probabilistic approach to aircraft conflict detection

Conflict detection and resolution schemes operating at the mid-range and short-range level of the air traffic management process are discussed. Probabilistic models for predicting the aircraft position in the near-term and mid-term future are developed. Based on the mid-term prediction model, the maximum instantaneous probability of conflict is proposed as a criticality measure for two aircraft encounters. Randomized algorithms are introduced to efficiently estimate this measure of criticality and provide quantitative bounds on the level of approximation introduced. For short-term detection, approximate closed-form analytical expressions for the probability of conflict are obtained, using the short-term prediction model. Based on these expressions, an algorithm for decentralized conflict detection and resolution that generalizes potential fields methods for path planning to a probabilistic dynamic environment is proposed. The algorithms are validated using Monte Carlo simulations.
UTSig: A Persian offline signature dataset

The pivotal role of datasets in signature verification systems motivates researchers to collect signature samples. Distinct characteristics of Persian signature demands for richer and culture-dependent offline signature datasets. This paper introduces a new and public Persian offline signature dataset, UTSig, that consists of 8280 images from 115 classes. Each class has 27 genuine signatures, 3 opposite-hand signatures, and 42 skilled forgeries made by 6 forgers. Compared with the other public datasets, UTSig has more samples, more classes, and more forgers. We considered various variables including signing period, writing instrument, signature box size, and number of observable samples for forgers in the data collection procedure. By careful examination of main characteristics of offline signature datasets, we observe that Persian signatures have fewer numbers of branch points and end points. We propose and evaluate four different training and test setups for UTSig. Results of our experiments show that training genuine samples along with opposite-hand samples and random forgeries can improve the performance in terms of equal error rate and minimum cost of log likelihood ratio.
Morphological reinflection with convolutional neural networks

We present a system for morphological reinflection based on an encoder-decoder neural network model with extra convolutional layers. In spite of its simplicity, the method performs reasonably well on all the languages of the SIGMORPHON 2016 shared task, particularly for the most challenging problem of limited-resources reinflection (track 2, task 3). We also find that using only convolution achieves surprisingly good results in this task, surpassing the accuracy of our encoder-decoder model for several languages.
Consequence of the tumor-associated conversion to cyclin D1b

Clinical evidence suggests that cyclin D1b, a variant of cyclin D1, is associated with tumor progression and poor outcome. However, the underlying molecular basis was unknown. Here, novel models were created to generate a genetic switch from cyclin D1 to cyclin D1b. Extensive analyses uncovered overlapping but non‐redundant functions of cyclin D1b compared to cyclin D1 on developmental phenotypes, and illustrated the importance of the transcriptional regulatory functions of cyclin D1b in vivo. Data obtained identify cyclin D1b as an oncogene, wherein cyclin D1b expression under the endogenous promoter induced cellular transformation and further cooperated with known oncogenes to promote tumor growth in vivo. Further molecular interrogation uncovered unexpected links between cyclin D1b and the DNA damage/PARP1 regulatory networks, which could be exploited to suppress cyclin D1b‐driven tumors. Collectively, these data are the first to define the consequence of cyclin D1b expression on normal cellular function, present evidence for cyclin D1b as an oncogene, and provide pre‐clinical evidence of effective methods to thwart growth of cells dependent upon this oncogenic variant.
Different (Painful¡) Strokes for Different Folks: A General Overview of Sexual Sadomasochism (SM) and its Diversity

This article, written primarily for clinicians, draws from a variety of sources and provides a basic overview of sexual sadomasochism (SM). SM represents a wide range of behaviors and practices often associated with sexuality, yet it may also refer to a specific lifestyle or subculture composed of participants who regularly engage in such practices. Although large numbers of individuals are likely to participate in SM practices in various possible forms, many professionals may be unfamiliar with the diversity, terminology, possible motivations, and issues surrounding SM. Given that SM is easily misunderstood, it is important for professionals working in the area of human sexuality to become familiar with alternative expressions of eroticism, creative stimulation, and intimacy. It is suggested that SM potentially may be enriching and beneficial to many who safely participate, or it sometimes may be considered pathological and destructive. Insights are provided herein to raise awareness of issues and to help clinicians negotiate these determinations.
Circadian Rhythm-Dependent Alterations of Gene Expression in Drosophila Brain Lacking Fragile X Mental Retardation Protein

Fragile X syndrome is caused by the loss of the FMR1 gene product, fragile X mental retardation protein (FMRP). The loss of FMRP leads to altered circadian rhythm behaviors in both mouse and Drosophila; however, the molecular mechanism behind this phenomenon remains elusive. Here we performed a series of gene expression analyses, including of both mRNAs and microRNAs (miRNAs), and identified a number of mRNAs and miRNAs (miRNA-1 and miRNA-281) with circadian rhythm-dependent altered expression in dfmr1 mutant flies. Identification of these RNAs lays the foundation for future investigations of the molecular pathway(s) underlying the altered circadian rhythms associated with loss of dFmr1.
Performance comparison of space-time coded MC-CDMA systems

In this paper, the performance of two multi-user MC-CDMA wireless communication systems in frequency selective channel are analyzed and compared. The two MC-CDMA systems use two different space-time block codes with transition matrices of size 2/spl times/2 and 4/spl times/4. Both systems utilize two transmit antennas. Analytical and simulation symbol error rate results are obtained for the two systems for BPSK and QPSK modulations.
Multi atlas-based segmentation with data driven refinement

Anatomical structure segmentation is the basis for further image analysis processes. Although there are many available segmentation methods there is still the need to improve the accuracy and speed of them to be used in a clinical environment. The VISCERAL project organizes a benchmark to compare approaches for organ segmentation in big data. A fully-automatic segmentation method using the VISCERAL data set is proposed in this paper. It incorporates both the local contrast of the image using an intensity feature as well as atlas probabilistic information to compute the definite labelling of the structure of interest. The usefulness of the new intensity feature is evaluated using contrast-enhanced CT images of the trunk. An overall average increase is computed in the overlap of the segmentations with an improvement of up to 33% for several anatomical structures when compared to only using an atlas based segmentation method. Qualitative results are also shown for MR images supporting the inclusion of this contrast feature in atlas-based segmentation methods for several modalities.
Caffeine does not modulate nutritive blood flow to rat gastric submucosa--a microdialysis study.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Coffee irritates the gastric mucosa disrupting its barrier and increasing the risk of peptic ulcers. However, caffeine's contribution to these effects has not yet been elucidated. In this study we looked at the local effect of caffeine on the microcirculation and nitric oxide production in rats together with systemic marker of oxidative stress malondialdehyde as possible mechanisms whereby caffeine might participate in mucosal barrier impairment. MATERIALS AND METHODS Four groups of rats were anesthetized and administered as a bolus four different intraperitoneal doses of caffeine (0, 1, 10 and 50 mg kg(-1) b.wt. ). The gastric submucosal microcirculation and nitric oxide production were then recorded for 2.5 hours by in situ microdialysis using the flow marker ethanol. At the completion of the experiments, plasma caffeine and malondialdehyde levels as well as morphological mucosal injury were determined. RESULTS There were no major differences in the macro- or microscopic pictures of the mucosa among the groups. Local microcirculatory (ethanol out/in ratio) and nitric oxide monitoring failed to demonstrate statistically significant changes as did measurement of plasma malondialdehyde in response to caffeine injections. CONCLUSIONS Caffeine per se seems unlikely to contribute to the gastric mucosal barrier injury associated with coffee consumption by alterations in nutritive blood flow, nitric oxide production or aggravation of systemic oxidative stress. This information is relevant for better understanding of the mechanisms involved in caffeine-mediated influences on gastric physiology in relation to the irritant effects of coffee.
Evolutionary and social cognitive explanations of sex differences in romantic jealousy

Sex differences in romantic jealousy have been widely reported in the recent psychological literature. According to this literature, men are more likely than women to report being more distressed at sexual than emotional infidelity. There are two explanations for this difference: an evolutionary psychological and a social cognitive explanation. According to the evolutionary psychological account, men and women exhibit differences in jealousy because they faced different reproductive challenges during human evolution. According to the social cognitive account, men and women exhibit these differences because they have been socialised to believe that attachment and sex are weighted differently by each gender. In this study, 268 participants completed a questionnaire designed to compare predictions based on these two theories. The results are generally consistent with the evolutionary account. Men are more distressed by sexual infidelity than by emotional infidelity, and this is not accounted for by beliefs a.
Clinical Evaluation of Antidiabetic Activity of Bael Leaves

Diabetes mellitus is a heterogeneous metabolic disease characterized by altered carbohydrate, lipid and protein metabolism. So many traditional herbs are being used by diabetic patients to control the disease. But very few studies are performed to investigate the efficacy of these herbs clinically. In the present study, an attempt has been made to investigate clinically the antidiabetic activity of Bael leaves (BL) (Aegle marmelos, Corr.) individually and collectively with the standard oral hypoglycemic therapy in non insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) patients. Literature survey reveals its antidiabetic activity in animals but no such studies were performed clinically. BL dried in shadow, were powdered and its decoction was used for the study. The study was performed in four different groups for a period of one month. Clinical protocol was set up for the study. Initial postprandial blood glucose level (PPBGL) was estimated at the time of enrolment in the study and then after one month of the study period. At the end of the study, the initial and final readings were compared. BL 5gm powder individually once daily orally was found to have antidiabetic effect. Antidiabetic effect was more markedly observed when it was combined with the oral hypoglycemic therapy. BL can be combined in high dose with oral hypoglycemic agents to bring the blood glucose to normal levels in patients whose diabetes is not controlled with these agents or in those patients in whom these drugs produce adverse effects on dose increments.
Low cost fault detector guided by permanent faults at the end of FPGAs life cycle

Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs), as any other electronic devices, are designed according to some life expectancy figures. For this reason, its lifetime is finite given due to appearance of faults caused by the natural physical degradation. In this paper, we present a low cost solution for autonomous detection of faults at the end of FPGAs life cycle. Our proposed methodology starts from a pre-analysis of memory elements belonging to modules under verification. Then, with a proper organization, it is created a list of all memory elements, controlled through a Built-In Self-Test (BIST) implementation via the FPGAs Internal Configuration Access Port (ICAP). By means of this list, a virtual scan chain is created, where the vectors (test and result) are written and read using the FPGA reconfiguration capabilities, which means there is no extra hardware to create the physical scan chain. The detection algorithm is implemented in the available system processing unit. The results show that with a minor increase in the program memory of the digital design, it is possible to perform an offline hardware testing of each sub-module in the existing FPGA, with no need of stopping the remaining of the system.
Does Reactance against Cigarette Warning Labels Matter? Warning Label Responses and Downstream Smoking Cessation amongst Adult Smokers in Australia, Canada, Mexico and the United States

Objective Some researchers have raised concerns that pictorial health warning labels (HWLs) on cigarette packages may lead to message rejection and reduced effectiveness of HWL messages. This study aimed to determine how state reactance (i.e., negative affect due to perceived manipulation) in response to both pictorial and text-only HWLs is associated with other types of HWL responses and with subsequent cessation attempts. Methods Survey data were collected every 4 months between September 2013 and 2014 from online panels of adult smokers in Australia, Canada, Mexico, and the US were analyzed. Participants with at least one wave of follow-up were included in the analysis (n = 4,072 smokers; 7,459 observations). Surveys assessed psychological and behavioral responses to HWLs (i.e., attention to HWLs, cognitive elaboration of risks due to HWLs, avoiding HWLs, and forgoing cigarettes because of HWLs) and cessation attempts. Participants then viewed specific HWLs from their countries and were queried about affective state reactance. Logistic and linear Generalized Estimating Equation (GEE) models regressed each of the psychological and behavioral HWL responses on reactance, while controlling for socio-demographic and smoking-related variables. Logistic GEE models also regressed having attempted to quit by the subsequent survey on reactance, each of the psychological and behavioral HWL responses (analyzed separately), adjustment variables. Data from all countries were initially pooled, with interactions between country and reactance assessed; when interactions were statistically significant, country-stratified models were estimated. Results Interactions between country and reactance were found in all models that regressed psychological and behavioral HWL responses on study variables. In the US, stronger reactance was associated with more frequent reading of HWLs and thinking about health risks. Smokers from all four countries with stronger reactance reported greater likelihood of avoiding warnings and forgoing cigarettes due to warnings, although the association appeared stronger in the US. Both stronger HWLs responses and reactance were positively associated with subsequent cessation attempts, with no significant interaction between country and reactance. Conclusions Reactance towards HWLs does not appear to interfere with quitting, which is consistent with its being an indicator of concern, not a systematic effort to avoid HWL message engagement.
A Model for Fresh Produce Shelf-Space Allocation and Inventory Management with Freshness-Condition-Dependent Demand

Asignificant amount of work has investigated inventory control problems associated with fresh produce. Much of this work has considered deteriorating inventory control with many models having been proposed for various situations. However, no researchers have specifically studied fresh produce, which has its own special characteristics. Most research categorizes fresh produce into more general deteriorating categories with random lifetimes and nondecaying utilities. However, this classification is not reasonable or practical because the freshness of an item usually plays an important role in influencing the demand for the produce. In this paper, a single-period inventory and shelf-space allocation model is proposed for fresh produce. These items usually have a very short lifetime. The demand rate is assumed to be deterministic and dependent on both the displayed inventory (the number of facings of items on the shelves) and the items' freshness condition (which decreases over time). Several problem instances of different sizes are provided and solved by a modified generalized reduced gradient algorithm.
A Comprehensive Look at Online Student Support Services for Distance Learners

A survey of online students at the New York Institute of Technology was conducted to determine satisfaction with existing online student services and to find out what types of services would be desirable in the future. Although the online students were generally satisfied with many of the student services they were receiving, there was room for improvement. The institute's students wished to have many of the additional services (e.g., book clubs, a student newspaper, academic clubs, online tutoring, seminars on parenting and time management, and access to an online psychologist) similar to those offered at other schools.