Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress Regulates the Innate Immunity Critical Transcription Factor IRF3

IFN regulatory factor 3 (IRF3) regulates early type I IFNs and other genes involved in innate immunity. We have previously shown that cells undergoing an endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress response called the unfolded protein response produce synergistically augmented IFN-β when stimulated with pattern recognition receptor agonists such as LPS. Concomitant ER stress and LPS stimulation resulted in greater recruitment of the IRF3 transcription factor to ifnb1 gene regulatory elements. In this study, we used murine cells to demonstrate that both oxygen–glucose deprivation and pharmacologic unfolded protein response inducers trigger phosphorylation and nuclear translocation of IRF3, even in the absence of exogenous LPS. Different ER stressors used distinct mechanisms to activate IRF3: IRF3 phosphorylation due to calcium-mobilizing ER stress (thapsigargin treatment, oxygen–glucose deprivation) critically depended upon stimulator of IFN gene, an ER-resident nucleic acid-responsive molecule. However, calcium mobilization alone by ionomycin was insufficient for IRF3 phosphorylation. In contrast, other forms of ER stress (e.g., tunicamycin treatment) promote IRF3 phosphorylation independently of stimulator of IFN gene and TANK-binding kinase 1. Rather, IRF3 activation by tunicamycin and 2-deoxyglucose was inhibited by 4-(2-aminoethyl)-benzenesulfonyl fluoride hydrochloride, a serine protease inhibitor that blocks activating transcription factor 6 processing. Interfering with ER stress-induced IRF3 activation abrogated IFN-β synergy. Together, these data suggest ER stress primes cells to respond to innate immune stimuli by activating the IRF3 transcription factor. Our results also suggest certain types of ER stress accomplish IRF3 phosphorylation by co-opting existing innate immune pathogen response pathways. These data have implications for diseases involving ER stress and type I IFN.
To Reduce SRAM Sub-Threshold Leakage Using Stack and Zig-Zag techniques

--The growing market of portable electronics devices demands lesser power dissipation for longer battery life and compact system. Considerable attention has been given to the design of low-power and high-performance SRAMs since they are critical components in both high-performance processors and hand-held portable devices. The reduction of the threshold voltage due to voltage scaling leads to increase in sub threshold leakage current and hence static power dissipation. The leakage current consists of reverse-bias diode currents and sub threshold currents. Scaling down of threshold voltage results in exponential increase of the sub threshold leakage current. This paper presents a method based on controlling the leakage currents by using effective stacking of transistors using stack technique and another method based on zig-zag approach. The proposed stack technique forces a stack effect by breaking down an existing transistor into two half size transistors. When the two transistors are turned off together, induces reverse bias between the two transistors results in sub-threshold leakage current reduction. The Zig-Zag technique reduces wake-up overhead caused by sleep transistors by placement of alternating sleep transistors, assuming a particular pre-selected input vector. The simulation results have been carried out using microwind tool on 90 nm technology.
Incorporating weight properties in detection of web spam

This paper focus on incorporating weight properties to enhance Web spam detection algorithms. Our proposed methodology adds this feature into Anti-TrustRank algorithm and call it weighted Anti-TrustRank algorithm to show the effectiveness of the weight properties using a new metric. Experiments are conducted on WEBSPAM-UK2006, a public Web spam dataset and have shown that weighted Anti-TrustRank significantly outperforms Anti-TrustRank algorithm up to 37.85%.
An investigation on TCP large initial window

Transport layer implicates a position where satellite networks form one integrated component of hybrid Internet architecture in today's advance technology. However, the Internet has emerged with an important new class of applications that exhibits significant variations of transmission rate over time. Variable‐rate traffic poses a new challenge for transmission control protocol that provides congestion control, especially for applications that need to share the limited capacity of a bottleneck over a long delay Internet path (e.g. paths that include satellite links). Variable‐rate traffic can be produced by persistent transmission control protocol connections and can be impacted by the initial window at the start or during the restart of a session. Current transport research issues are identified related to larger initial window to highlight the expected performance benefits and derive the implications on the design of geostationary satellite Internet systems as the network evolves toward a next‐generation Internet. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Block relay for physical-layer network coding

In this paper, we study the transmission strategy in a two-way relay channel. In particular, we propose a new class of log M1 (M 2 )-MA (multi-access) block relay protocols where an M1-ary modulation is used in the MA phase, and an M 2 -ary in the broadcast phase. Lower-order (e.g., BPSK) and higher-order (e.g., 16-QAM, 32-PSK) modulations are used respectively for the multi-access phase and the broadcast phase, in contrast to the conventional method of using the same modulation type (of either higher or lower order) throughout. To achieve this, the relay buffers the received symbols from consecutive multi-access phases and performs signal combining in conjunction with the decode-and-forward protocol. We derive the theoretical performance bounds for the Rayleigh fading channels and closed forms for the AWGN channels. Numerical results confirm the advantages of the proposed scheme with an improved throughput in lower signal-to-noise ratio range.
Mechanism of hedgehog signaling during Drosophila eye development

Although Hedgehog (Hh) signaling is essential for morphogenesis of the Drosophila eye, its exact link to the network of tissue-specific genes that regulate retinal determination has remained elusive. In this report, we demonstrate that the retinal determination gene eyes absent (eya) is the crucial link between the Hedgehog signaling pathway and photoreceptor differentiation. Specifically, we show that the mechanism by which Hh signaling controls initiation of photoreceptor differentiation is to alleviate repression of eya and decapentaplegic (dpp) expression by the zinc-finger transcription factor Cubitus interruptus (Cirep). Furthermore, our results suggest that stabilized, full length Ci (Ciact) plays little or no role in Drosophila eye development. Moreover, while the effects of Hh are primarily concentration dependent in other tissues, hh signaling in the eye acts as a binary switch to initiate retinal morphogenesis by inducing expression of the tissue-specific factor Eya.
Hedgehog signaling in the posterior region of the mouse gastrula suggests manifold roles in the fetal‐umbilical connection and posterior morphogenesis

Although many fetal birth defects, particularly those of the body wall and gut, are associated with abnormalities of the umbilical cord, the developmental relationship between these structures is largely obscure. Recently, genetic analysis of mid‐gestation mouse embryos revealed that defects in Hedgehog signaling led to omphalocoele, or failure of the body wall to close at the umbilical ring (Matsumaru et al. [ 2011 ] PLos One 6:e16260). However, systematic spatiotemporal localization of Hedgehog signaling in the allantois, or umbilical precursor tissue, and the surrounding regions has not been documented. Here, a combination of reagents, including the Ptc1:lacZ and Runx1:lacZ reporter mice, immunohistochemistry for Smoothened (Smo), Sonic Hedgehog (Shh), and Indian hedgehog (Ihh), and detailed PECAM‐1/Flk‐1/Runx‐1 analysis, revealed robust Hedgehog signaling in previously undocumented posterior sites over an extended period of time (∼7.0–9.75 dpc). These included the recently described proximal walls of the allantois (Ventral and Dorsal Cuboidal Mesothelia; VCM and DCM, respectively); the ventral embryonic surface continuous with them; hemogenic arterial endothelia; hematopoietic cells; the hindgut; ventral ectodermal ridge (VER); chorionic ectoderm; and the intraplacental yolk sac (IPY), which appeared to be a site of placental hematopoiesis. This map of Hedgehog signaling in the posterior region of the mouse conceptus will provide a valuable foundation upon which to elucidate the origin of many posterior midline abnormalities, especially those of the umbilical cord and associated fetal defects. Developmental Dynamics 240:2175–2193, 2011. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Soil Bacterial Diversity Screening Using Single 16S rRNA Gene V Regions Coupled with Multi-Million Read Generating Sequencing Technologies

The novel multi-million read generating sequencing technologies are very promising for resolving the immense soil 16S rRNA gene bacterial diversity. Yet they have a limited maximum sequence length screening ability, restricting studies in screening DNA stretches of single 16S rRNA gene hypervariable (V) regions. The aim of the present study was to assess the effects of properties of four consecutive V regions (V3-6) on commonly applied analytical methodologies in bacterial ecology studies. Using an in silico approach, the performance of each V region was compared with the complete 16S rRNA gene stretch. We assessed related properties of the soil derived bacterial sequence collection of the Ribosomal Database Project (RDP) database and concomitantly performed simulations based on published datasets. Results indicate that overall the most prominent V region for soil bacterial diversity studies was V3, even though it was outperformed in some of the tests. Despite its high performance during most tests, V4 was less conserved along flanking sites, thus reducing its ability for bacterial diversity coverage. V5 performed well in the non-redundant RDP database based analysis. However V5 did not resemble the full-length 16S rRNA gene sequence results as well as V3 and V4 did when the natural sequence frequency and occurrence approximation was considered in the virtual experiment. Although, the highly conserved flanking sequence regions of V6 provide the ability to amplify partial 16S rRNA gene sequences from very diverse owners, it was demonstrated that V6 was the least informative compared to the rest examined V regions. Our results indicate that environment specific database exploration and theoretical assessment of the experimental approach are strongly suggested in 16S rRNA gene based bacterial diversity studies.
Preamble design for carrier frequency offset estimation in two-way relays

A two-way relaying OFDM system based on the two-phase, amplify-and-forward protocol is considered. Preambles are designed for each of the sources with the criterion to minimize the Cramer-Rao bound (CRB) of the carrier frequency offset (CFO) estimate. The resulted CRB shows that it is possible for two-way relaying to incur only marginal loss from one-way relaying in CFO estimation under practical channel conditions. In contrast, the CRB is unbounded if conventional periodic preambles are applied. To facilitate implementation, a specific class of estimators, based on linear filtering followed by conventional CFO estimation, is examined. The necessary and sufficient condition for this class to preserve the CRB is established. Numerical results corroborate with theoretical findings.
Structure‐Function Relationships of the Luteinizing Hormone Receptor

Abstract: Of the 800‐900 genes in the human genome that appear to encode G‐protein‐coupled receptors (GPCRs), two are known to encode receptors that bind the three heterodimeric human gonadotropins, luteinizing hormone (LH), chorionic gonadotropin (CG), and follicle‐stimulating hormone (FSH). LH and CG bind to a common receptor, LHR, and FSH binds to a paralogous receptor. These GPCRs contain a relatively large ectodomain (ECD), responsible for high‐affinity ligand binding, and a transmembrane portion, as in the other GPCRs. The ECD contains nine leucine‐rich repeats capped by N‐terminal and C‐terminal cysteine‐rich regions. The overall goal of this research is to elucidate the molecular mechanisms by which CG and LH bind to and activate LHR and the latter, in turn, activates Gsα. A combination of molecular modeling and site‐directed mutagenesis, coupled with binding and signaling studies in transiently transfected HEK 293 cells expressing wild‐type and mutant forms of LHR, has been used to develop and test models for the LHR ECD, the CG‐LHR ECD complex, and the structural changes in the transmembrane helices and intracellular loops, particularly loop 2, that accompany receptor activation. In addition, a single‐chain CG‐LHR complex was designed in which a fusion protein of the two subunits of human CG was linked to full‐length LHR. This ligand‐receptor complex was shown to be constitutively active in cellular models and in transgenic mice, the latter of which exhibit precocious puberty. From a combination of molecular modeling, site‐directed mutagenesis, genetic/protein engineering, and receptor characterization in cellular and animal models, considerable insight is being developed on the mechanisms of normal and aberrant activation of LHR.
Differential expression of lymphocyte homing receptors by human memory/effector T cells in pulmonary versus cutaneous immune effector sites

The heterogeneous expression of lymphocyte homing receptors (HR) by the (CD45RAlow/ROhigh) memory/effector T cell population in the human is thought to define subsets with tissue‐selective recirculatory potential. To investigate further the localization characteristics of these T cells, we used multiparameter flow cytometry to quantitate T cell subsets defined by expression of the skin‐selective HR called the cutaneous lymphocyte‐associated antigen (CLA), the peripheral lymph node (PLN) HR L‐selectin, the mucosal‐associated HR α4β7‐integrin, and the mucosal‐associated adhesion molecule αeβ7‐integrin in either cutaneous or pulmonary immune effector sites and corresponding peripheral blood. Compared to peripheral blood, skin T cells were highly enriched for the CLA+/L‐selectin+/αeβ7‐integrin− memory/effector subset, whereas lung memory/effector T cells were predominantly CLA−to low L‐selectin−, and almost half were αeβ7‐integrin+. α4β7‐integrin expressing memory/effector T cells were diminished in both skin and lung, suggesting that this HR is not a major participant in determining localization specificity in either of these sites. The characteristic pulmonary T cell HR phenotype did not significantly differ between the normal subjects and those with pulmonary inflammatory disease, and did not correlate with markers of T cell activation. Induction of a rapid up‐regulation of pulmonary inflammation via intrabronchial allergen challenge in asthmatic patients tended to decrease localization specificity, resulting in a more general importation of memory/effector subsets. Taken together, these results suggest that tissue microenvironments play a major role in determining the character of local T cell infiltrates via their ability to import and retain memory/effector subsets selectively or, more generally, depending on the intensity of local inflammatory stimuli.
Reserved Self-training: A Semi-supervised Sentiment Classification Method for Chinese Microblogs

The imbalanced sentiment distribution of microblogs induces bad performance of binary classifiers on the minority class. To address this problem, we present a semisupervised method for sentiment classification of Chinese microblogs. This method is similar to self-training, except that, a set of labeled samples is reserved for a confidence scores computing process through which samples that are less than a predefined confidence score threshold are incorporated into training set for retraining. By doing this, the classifier is able to boost the performance on the minority class samples. Experiments on the NLP&CC2012 Chinese microblog evaluation data set demonstrated that reserved self-training outperforms the best run by 2.06% macro-averaged and 2.30% microaveraged F-measure, respectively.
Join me in Death: Managing Mortality Salience via Mediated Social Encounters

The synopsis of this cumulative dissertation reports the theoretical background, methodology and main results of five studies addressing the role of intergroup versus interpersonal similarities for mediated social encounters under conditions of mortality salience (MS). Drawing upon terror management theory (TMT, Greenberg, Pyszczynski, & Solomon, 1986) individuals were expected to prefer similar over dissimilar others under conditions of MS. In theory, similarity can take place on the intergroup level (i.e. by belonging to the same in-group) as well as on the interpersonal level (e.g., by holding the same attitudes). So far, the relative relevance of intergroup versus interpersonal similarity has not been studied systematically. Particularly in mediated social encounters, intergroup and interpersonal similarity can be independent from each other and might have different effects. The results of five studies in different contexts confirmed intergroup and interpersonal similarities to have different effects in mediated encounters under conditions of MS. In an online dating context, a similarity-attraction effect emerged only among in-group but not out-group members (Study 1), and intergroup but not interpersonal dissimilarity threatened the individuals’ defense against MS (Study 2). In a gaming context, individuals preferred an interpersonally similar in-group (versus out-group) avatar (Study 4) but showed no in-group bias when the avatar was interpersonally dissimilar (Study 3). Further, the valence of the in-group played a role under conditions of interpersonal dissimilarity (Study 3), but not under conditions of interpersonal similarity (Study 4). Finally, Study 5 found an increased interest in media content by in-group but not out-group members under conditions of MS even when the content (extremist propaganda) was negatively valenced and did not match the recipients’ political attitude. The results are discussed regarding their implications.
Picoso - A Parallel Interval Constraint Solver

This paper describes the parallel interval constraint solver Picoso, which can decide (a subclass of) boolean combinations of linear and non-linear constraints. Picoso follows a master/client model based on message passing, making it suitable for any kind of workstation cluster as well as for multi-processor machines. To run several clients in parallel, an efficient work stealing mechanism has been integrated, dividing the overall search space into disjoint parts. Additionally, to prevent the clients from running into identical conflicts, information about conflicts in form of conflict clauses is exchanged among the clients. Performance measurements, using four clients to solve a number of benchmark problems, show that Picoso yields (almost) linear speedup compared to the sequential interval constraint solver iSAT, on which the clients of Picoso are based.
Attenuation of Mammary Duct Development by Menhaden Oil in BALB/c Mice

Abstract The predominant polyunsaturated fatty acids of the n-6 family found in corn oil (CO) are crucial for normal mammary duct formation when fed to animals. However, as shown here, not all polyunsaturated fatty acids are equally effective in stimulating mammary gland development. The n-3 fatty acids in a 10% menhaden oil (MO) diet fed to mice effectively reduced both the diameter and the length of the growing mammary ducts. Previously, we demonstrated a similar reduction in duct growth by feeding a 10% fat diet high in those saturated fats found in hydrogenated cotton seed oil. The inhibited rate of duct maturation caused by hydrogenated cotton seed oil was reversed when the mice were allowed to mature on a diet containing n-6 fatty acids prior to feeding the saturated fat diet. The addition of 1% CO to a 9% hydrogenated cotton seed oil diet fed to immature mice was also sufficient to restore duct growth. Mice fed menhaden oil diets, on the other hand, continued to show impaired ductal growth well into adulthood. Examination of the ovaries from MO-fed mice as compared with CO-fed mice revealed significantly fewer corpora lutea. When exogenous progesterone was given to MO-fed mice, ductal growth was partially restored, but not to the extent seen in mice fed corn oil diets. Investigation of the fatty acid contents of livers of these mice revealed reduced amounts of arachidonate (20:4) in MO-fed mice when compared with CO-fed animals. The addition of 1% CO to the 9% MO diets did not alter the arachidonate content, indicating a block in the conversion of linoleate (18:2) to 20:4 by the n-3 fatty acids. Hence, dietary n-6 fatty acids are essential xsfor normal mammary ductal development when fed prior to maturation. Although saturated rats are ineffective, n-3 fatty acids can partially substitute for the required n-6 fatty acids in both ductal and ovarian development.
Challenges in visual and inertial information gathering for a sprawling posture robot

We discuss challenges a sprawling posture legged robot faces when moving in a complex environment. These kind of robots can be used for search and rescue applications when proper sensors are used and placed correctly. Finding an adequate position for placing sensors on legged robots with a segmented spine to maximize the information retrieval is not trivial. In this paper, we talk about equipping the salamanderlike robot Pleurobot with necessary sensors to understand its challenges. Our setup gathers visual and inertial information for 3D mapping and localization. To do so, we have come up with three different experimental terrains to analyze the sensing behavior. The results are examples to understanding the behavior of quadrupedal legged robots similar to Pleurobot in search and rescue scenarios.
A comparison between two bio-inspired adaptive models of Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex (VOR) implemented on the iCub robot

In order to develop efficient bio-inspired sensory-motor control for humanoid robots there are different kind of approaches that can be used to simulate a specific human behavior. The purpose of this work is to compare two models of the Vestibulo-Ocular Reflex (VOR) for the image stabilization during head movements. The VOR system has adaptive properties and this behavior resides in the cerebellum. This adaptive system uses the retinal slip as error signal and compensates for the eye dynamics, the control loop latencies and the nonlinearity due to the offset between the rotational axes of the eyeballs and the head. The adaptation mechanism has been represented by the two models in one case as a Feedback Error Learning (FEL) [1] and in the other as a decorrelation model [2]. In this work it has been shown principal results about the implementation on the simulator of the iCub robot.
Three Essays on Economics of Health Behavior in China

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