Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
DNA Methylation in Oocytes and Liver of Female Mice and Their Offspring: Effects of High-Fat-Diet–Induced Obesity

Background: Maternal obesity has adverse effects on oocyte quality, embryo development, and the health of the offspring. Objectives: To understand the underlying mechanisms responsible for the negative effects of maternal obesity, we investigated the DNA methylation status of several imprinted genes and metabolism-related genes. Methods: Using a high-fat-diet (HFD)-induced mouse model of obesity, we analyzed the DNA methylation of several imprinted genes and metabolism-related genes in oocytes from control and obese dams and in oocytes and liver from their offspring. Analysis was performed using combined bisulfite restriction analysis (COBRA) and bisulfite sequencing. Results: DNA methylation of imprinted genes in oocytes was not altered in either obese dams or their offspring; however, DNA methylation of metabolism-related genes was changed. In oocytes of obese mice, the DNA methylation level of the leptin (Lep) promoter was significantly increased and that of the Ppar-α promoter was reduced. Increased methylation of Lep and decreased methylation of Ppar-α was also observed in the liver of female offspring from dams fed the high-fat diet (OHFD). mRNA expression of Lep and Ppar-α was also significantly altered in the liver of these OHFD. In OHFD oocytes, the DNA methylation level of Ppar-α promoter was increased. Conclusions: Our results indicate that DNA methylation patterns of several metabolism-related genes are changed not only in oocytes of obese mice but also in oocytes and liver of their offspring. These data may contribute to the understanding of adverse effects of maternal obesity on reproduction and health of the offspring. Citation: Ge ZJ, Luo SM, Lin F, Liang QX, Huang L, Wei YC, Hou Y, Han ZM, Schatten H, Sun QY. 2014. DNA methylation in oocytes and liver of female mice and their offspring: effects of high-fat-diet–induced obesity. Environ Health Perspect 122:159–164; http://dx.doi. org/10.1289/ehp.1307047
PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS OF SPEECH CODING TECHNIQUES

2 Abstract: Speech coding has been major issue in the area of digital speech processing. Speech coding is the act of transforming the speech signal in a more compact form, which can be transmitted with few numbers of binary digits. It not possible to access unlimited bandwidth of a channel each time we send a signal across it which leads to code and compress speech signals. Speech compression is required in the areas of long distance communication, high-quality speech storage, and message encryption. For example in digital cellular technology many users need to share the same frequency bandwidth. Utilizing speech compression makes it possible for more users to share the available system. Another example where speech compression is needed in digital voice storage for a fixed amount of available memory compression makes it possible to store longer messages. Speech coding is a lossy type of coding, which means that the output signal does not exactly sound like the input. Linear Predictive coding, Waveform Coding and sub band coding techniques are used to transmit the speech from one place to another. The above mentioned three coding techniques are implemented to check their performance measures like compression ratio and speech audible quality.
Exploiting the Trifocal Tensor in Dynamic Pose Estimation for Visual Control

Image-based approaches for visual control are memoryless, and they depend on the information extracted from the image plane. We propose the use of dynamic pose estimation in the task of driving a mobile robot to a desired location specified by a target image. This approach reduces the dependence of the control on the quality of current visual data and facilitates the planning of complex tasks. The pose estimation exploits the 1-D trifocal tensor (TT) as measurement, which allows us to obtain a semicalibrated estimation scheme that is valid for any visual sensor obeying a central projection model. The contribution of this brief is a novel observability analysis of the estimation problem from the 1-D TT using nonlinear tools, as well as the demonstration of the validity of closed-loop control from the estimated pose by showing a separation principle in our nonlinear framework. The overall position-based scheme drives the robot to a desired pose through smooth velocities without the need of a target model, either scene reconstruction or depth information. The effectiveness of the approach is evaluated via real-world experiments.
Landmark Extraction from Echocardiography Sequence Based on Corner Detection Algorithms Using Product Moment Coefficient Matcher

Landmark extraction is used as the first step of many vision tasks such as tracking, image registration, localization, image matching and recognition. Furthermore, landmarks are used to reduce the data flow and consequently the computational costs.In this paper we extracted landmarks from echocardiography sequence, our algorithm is based on corner extraction, and then we evaluate our algorithm with applying some test. For this purpose, we evaluated the detectors according to their repeatability, stability and landmark localization under changes in noise.
Control of Rhodopsin's Active Lifetime by Arrestin-1 Expression in Mammalian Rods

In rod photoreceptors, deactivation of the light-activated G-protein-coupled receptor rhodopsin (R*) is initiated by phosphorylation and completed through subsequent binding of visual arrestin (Arr1). The in vivo kinetics of these individual interactions have proven difficult to determine with precision since R* lifetime is much shorter than the lifetimes of downstream G-protein and effector molecules. Here, we have used a transgenic mouse line with accelerated downstream deactivation kinetics to reveal the contribution of Arr1 binding to the overall time course of rhodopsin deactivation. Photoresponses revealed that the lifetime of R* is significantly increased in rods that express half of the normal amount of Arr1, in a manner consistent with a twofold decrease in the rate of Arr1 binding across a wide range of flash strengths. A basic model of photoresponse deactivation consistent with established photoreceptor biochemistry shows that R* phosphorylation and Arr1 binding occur with a time constant of ∼40 ms in wild-type mouse rods, much faster than previous estimates.
A hybrid MEMS-waveguide wavelength selective cross connect

A 16-channel 100-GHz-spacing wavelength selective cross connect is demonstrated using a combination of planar waveguides and MEMS piston-mirrors. Interswitch crosstalk is eliminated and switching speed is an order of magnitude faster than typical thermooptic switches. The power consumption is smaller than one microwatt per switch. An extinction ratio of 20 dB and an insertion loss of 10.6 dB are demonstrated.
Direct radiometric dating of the Devonian-Mississippian time-scale boundary using the Re-Os black shale geochronometer

Many Phanerozoic time-scale boundaries are characterized by oceanic anoxia and mass extinction events with the deposition of black shale. The Re-Os isotope system in black shale can be used to provide depositional ages for these rocks, thus yielding direct radiometric ages for time-scale boundaries. We demonstrate that the Re-Os black shale geochronometer can yield precise ages useful for time-scale research through study of the Devonian-Mississippian boundary within the Exshaw Formation, Canada. The Re-Os date determined places the Devonian-Mississippian boundary at 361.3 ± 2.4 Ma (2σ including λ uncertainty, model 1, mean square of weighted deviates = 1.2), in accord with recent calibration interpolated from U-Pb zircon dates (360.7 ± 0.7 Ma) for the Hasselbachtal section, Germany.
Geochemistry and accumulation of carbon dioxide gases in China

We propose the following identification indicators for CO2 of different origins based on data obtained from analyzing the molecular composition of 1198 gas samples, the CO2 carbon isotope values of 390 samples, and the helium isotope composition of 256 samples collected from wells of 16 oil- and gas-bearing basins and gas seepages in China, and reviewing literature on organic and inorganic CO2 throughout the world. CO2 is of organic origin if CO2 content 13CCO22 is of inorganic origin if ^dgr13CCO2 > -8^pmil or CO2 > 60%; and CO2 is of either organic or inorganic origin or a mixtur of organic and inorganic origins if -10^pmil 13CCO213CCO2 values of organic CO2 mainly range from -10 to -22^pmil. In tectonically stable oil- and gas-bearing basins where deep faults and magmatism are undeveloped, organic CO2 occurs almost exclusively. In tectonically active oil- and gas-bearing basins where active faults and magmatism are present or in areas of modern volcanic activity, the ^dgr13CCO2 values of inorganic CO2 range from -2 to -8^pmil and are distributed along faults. The inorganic CO2 with a ^dgr13CCO2 value of 0 ±3^pmil is of metamorphic origin, and that with ^dgr13CCO2 values of -6 ±2^pmil is mantle derived and of magmatic origin. In China, the ^dgr13CCO2 values of inorganic CO2 gas pools range from -3.41 to -8.44^pmil and the helium ratio (R:Ra) is >1, which indicates that these gases are typically derived from the mantle.
Glycopeptide Analysis, Recent Developments and Applications*

Glycopeptide-based analysis is used to inform researchers about the glycans on one or more proteins. The method's key attractive feature is its ability to link glycosylation information to exact locations (glycosylation sites) on proteins. Numerous applications for glycopeptide analysis are known, and several examples are described herein. The techniques used to characterize glycopeptides are still emerging, and recently, research focused on facilitating aspects of glycopeptide analysis has advanced significantly in the areas of sample preparation, MS fragmentation, and automation of data analysis. These recent developments, described herein, provide the foundation for the growth of glycopeptide analysis as a blossoming field.
Research on a Community-based Platform for Promoting Health and Physical Fitness in the Elderly Community

This study aims to assess the acceptability of a fitness testing platform (iFit) for installation in an assisted living community with the aim of promoting fitness and slowing the onset of frailty. The iFit platform develops a means of testing Bureau of Health Promotion mandated health assessment items for the elderly (including flexibility tests, grip strength tests, balance tests, and reaction time tests) and integrates wireless remote sensors in a game-like environment to capture and store subject response data, thus providing individuals in elderly care contexts with a greater awareness of their own physical condition. In this study, we specifically evaluated the users’ intention of using the iFit using a technology acceptance model (TAM). A total of 101 elderly subjects (27 males and 74 females) were recruited. A survey was conducted to measure technology acceptance, to verify that the platform could be used as intended to promote fitness among the elderly. Results indicate that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use and usage attitude positively impact behavioral intention to use the platform. The iFit platform can offer user-friendly solutions for a community-based fitness care and monitoring of elderly subjects. In summary, iFit was determined by three key drivers and discussed as follows: risk factors among the frail elderly, mechanism for slowing the advance frailty, and technology acceptance and support for promoting physical fitness.
Bound‐based spectrum allocation for cooperative positioning

This paper discusses the performance of distributed and centralised cooperative positioning system for multiple mobile terminals. A cooperative positioning system uses ranging between base stations and mobile terminals, and in addition exploits the links between the mobile terminals as well. However, the number of links in an all‐to‐all connected setup increases quadratically with the number of nodes. Our goal is to schedule the access for the available resources (used bandwidth) to track the nodes of a dynamic system. Therefore, it is essential to reason if the different links between the mobile terminals are useful. The reasoning assists in allocating resources properly. We investigate distributed algorithms that act based on the Cramér–Rao Lower Bound. We use as benchmark a centralised and much more complex algorithm that requires all link information and we ignore any latency aspects. The results show that our distributed algorithm using limited information performs well. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Leveraging study of robustness and portability of spoken language understanding systems across languages and domains: the PORTMEDIA corpora

The PORTMEDIA project is intended to develop new corpora for the evaluation of spoken language understanding systems. The newly collected data are in the field of human-machine dialogue systems for tourist information in French in line with the MEDIA corpus. Transcriptions and semantic annotations, obtained by low-cost procedures, are provided to allow a thorough evaluation of the systems' capabilities in terms of robustness and portability across languages and domains. A new test set with some adaptation data is prepared for each case: in Italian as an example of a new language, for ticket reservation as an example of a new domain. Finally the work is complemented by the proposition of a new high level semantic annotation scheme well-suited to dialogue data.
NEAR-INFRARED PROPERTIES OF THE X-RAY-EMITTING YOUNG STELLAR OBJECTS IN THE CARINA NEBULA

The Great Nebula in Carina (NGC 3372) is the best target to study in detail the process of violent massive star formation and the resulting feedback effects of cloud dispersal and triggered star formation. While the population of massive stars is rather well studied, the associated low-mass stellar population was largely unknown up to now. The near-infrared study in this paper builds on the results of the Chandra Carina Complex Project, that detected 14,368 X-ray sources in the 1.4 deg2 survey region, an automatic source classification study that classified 10,714 of these X-ray sources as very likely young stars in Carina, and an analysis of the clustering properties of the X-ray-selected Carina members. In order to determine physical properties of the X-ray-selected stars, most of which were previously unstudied, we used HAWK-I at the ESO Very Large Telescope to conduct a very deep near-IR survey with subarcsecond angular resolution, covering an area of about 1280 arcmin2. The HAWK-I images reveal more than 600,000 individual infrared sources, whereby objects as faint as J ≈ 23, H ≈ 22, and Ks ≈ 21 are detected at signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) ⩾3. While less than half of the Chandra X-ray sources have counterparts in the Two Micron All Sky Survey catalog, the ∼5 mag deeper HAWK-I data reveal infrared counterparts to 6636 (=88.8%) of the 7472 Chandra X-ray sources in the HAWK-I field. We analyze near-infrared color–color and color–magnitude diagrams to derive information about the extinctions, infrared excesses (as tracers for circumstellar disks), ages, and masses of the X-ray-selected objects. The near-infrared properties agree well with the results of the automatic X-ray source classification, showing that the remaining contamination in the X-ray-selected sample of Carina members is very low (≲7%). The shape of the K-band luminosity function of the X-ray-selected Carina members agrees well with that derived for the Orion Nebula Cluster, suggesting that, down to the X-ray detection limit around 0.5–1 M☉, the shape of the initial mass function (IMF) in Carina is consistent with that in Orion (and thus the field IMF). The fraction of stars with near-infrared excesses is rather small, ≲10%, but shows considerable variations between individual parts of the complex. The distribution of extinctions for the diskless stars ranges from ∼1.6 mag to ∼6.2 mag (central 80th percentile), clearly showing a considerable range of differential extinction between individual stars in the complex.
Efficacy of Prisms in Neglect Treatment: A Randomized Single Blind Study

Objective: Unilateral Spatial Neglect (USN) commonly occurs after lesions in the right hemisphere. This complex syndrome can be defined as a failure to report, respond, or orient to contralateral stimuli. Patients show several symptoms in everyday life, such as eating only on the right side of the plate, or forgetting to look left before crossing the street. Among the different bottom-up treatments, prisms adaptation has found considerable application, producing a high number of scientific papers, even if these are not always consistent in their conclusions. The aim of this randomized single blind study was to verify the efficacy of prisms in improving neglect syndrome when compared to neutral lenses in a group of stroke in patients with neglect. Methods: All patients were randomized into two groups: Experimental Group (EG) and Control Group (CG). The EG was treated with pointing exercises wearing prismatic lenses producing a deviation of the visual field of 10° to the right, while the CG was treated with pointing exercises wearing neutral lenses that did not produce any deviation of the visual field. Both groups were treated for two weeks. We compared with Analysis of Variance the two groups of stroke patients at two different treatment times, at the enrollment time (T0) and after two weeks (T1). Results: We have compared the EG and CG at T0 and T1 time: both groups show a significant improvement in outcome measure. The analysis between groups highlights that this effect can be related to the time rather than to the group of treatment. Conclusion: According to our results we can conclude that pointing with no visible arm is useful in neglect treatment and that prisms produce some further benefits even if the low number of subjects enrolled is still insufficient to give clear evidence in the use of prisms.
Automatic Construction of a TMF Terminological Database using a Transducer Cascade

The automatic development of terminological databases, especially in a standardized format, has a crucial aspect for multiple applications related to technical and scientific knowledge that requires semantic and terminological descriptions covering multiple domains. In this context, we have, in this paper, two challenges: the first is the automatic extraction of terms in order to build a terminological database, and the second challenge is their normalization into a standardized format. To deal with these challenges, we propose an approach based on a cascade of transducers performed using CasSys tool of the Unitex linguistic platform that benefits from both: the success of the rule-based approach for the extraction of terms, and the performance of the TMF standard for the representation of terms. We have tested and evaluated our approach on an Arabic scientific and technical corpus for the Elevator domain and the results are very encouraging.
Modification to the compulsive exchange method for measuring exchange characteristics of soils

The compulsive exchange method for the measurement of cation and anion exchange capacities of soil as described by Gillman and subsequently recommended by the American Society of Agronomy for acid soils has been modified to achieve greater simplicity. Though originally intended for the measurement of highly weathered soils, the method has be extended to saline and non-saline calcareous soils, and also to the measurement of the variation of exchange capacity with pH.
Larviposition in the ovoviviparous blowfly Calliphora dubia

This study examined larviposition in Calliphora dubia Macquart (Diptera: Calliphoridae), an ovoviviparous blowfly of considerable forensic importance in Australia. Females in the field carried 22–83 live larvae, exhibiting a strong linear relationship between female size and the number of live larvae carried. Females took just over 1 min (mean 67.7 ± 7.7 s, n = 54) to larviposit live larvae on or near fresh liver in the laboratory. Females laid larvae at a mean rate of 1.2 ± 0.1 larvae/s, with the fastest rate being 3.4 larvae/s. Most females (70%) laid live larvae only, but 14% laid larvae and eggs at the same time and 16% laid eggs only (none of the eggs laid were viable). Females laying only live larvae laid a mean of 53.7 ± 2.3 larvae, whereas those laying only eggs laid a mean of 48.6 ± 2.8 eggs on each occasion. None of the eggs laid were viable. Most females (86%) laid all their larvae in a single spot, even if they engaged in several bouts of laying live larvae. Nearly one‐third of females did not lay all the live larvae in their ovisacs, but retained half of their complement of developed larvae. Females may be opting to spread their larvae across several carcasses in order to increase their survival and not to overcrowd small, ephemeral carcasses. The fact that a blowfly can lay either eggs or live larvae has enormous implications for the accurate determination of the post‐mortem interval (PMI) as the presence of larvae derived from eggs laid on the body add 6–18 h to the PMI. This paper represents the first report of the ability of female calliphorids to resorb some of their own live larvae.
Hubble Space Telescope STIS Spectroscopy of Long-Period Dwarf Novae in Quiescence

We present the results of a synthetic spectral analysis of HST STIS spectra of five long-period dwarf novae obtained during their quiescence to determine the properties of their white dwarfs, which are little known for systems above the CV period gap. The five systems, TU Men, BD Pav, SS Aur, TT Crt, and V442 Cen, were observed as part of an HST Snapshot project. The spectra are described and fitted with combinations of white dwarf photospheres and accretion disks. We provide evidence that the white dwarfs in all five systems are at least partially exposed. We discuss the evolutionary implications of our model-fitting results and compare these dwarf novae to previously analyzed FUV spectra of other dwarf novae above the period gap. The dispersion in CV WD temperatures above the period gap is substantially greater than one finds below the period gap, where there is a surprisingly narrow dispersion in temperatures around 15,000 K. There appears to be a larger spread of surface temperatures in dwarf novae above the period than is seen below the gap.
Gabor Boost Linear Discriminant Analysis for face recognition

This paper proposes an innovative algorithm named Gabor Boost Linear Discriminant Analysis (GBLDA) for face recognition. In our method, we want to estimate the distribution of high dimensional Gabor wavelet (GW) features in a low dimensional LDA subspace without computing the GW feature of an input image. The computational complexity can be reduced significantly. Hence, GBLDA is suitable for real-time applications. Experimental results show that our proposed method not only possesses the advantages of linear subspace analysis approaches such as low computational complexity, but also has the advantage of a high recognition performance in the Gabor based methods.