Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Evidence for the importance of genetic structuring to the structural and functional specialization of the Plasmodium falciparum var gene family

The var gene family encodes Plasmodium falciparum erythrocyte membrane 1 (PfEMP1) proteins that act as virulence factors responsible for both antigenic variation and cytoadherence of infected erythrocytes. These proteins orchestrate infected erythrocyte sequestration from blood circulation and contribute to adhesion‐based complications of P. falciparum malaria infections. For this study, we analysed the genetic organization and strain structure of var genes and present evidence for three separately evolving groups that have, in part, functionally diverged and differ between subtelomeric and central chromosomal locations. Our analyses suggest that a recombination hierarchy limits reassortment between groups and may explain why some var genes are unusually conserved between parasite strains. This recombination hierarchy, coupled with binding and immune selection, shapes the variant antigen repertoire and has structural, functional and evolutionary consequences for the PfEMP1 protein family that are directly relevant to malaria pathogenesis.
Modeling Performance of Low Level Image Processing Routines on MIMD Computers

This paper describes a generic model for performance estimation of low (i.e. pixel) level image processing routines running on general purpose distributed memory MIMD-style parallel hardware. The model incorporates all main communication and computational tasks typically performed by pixel level operations executing in data parallel fashion. The most important aspect of the model is a new generic communication model applicable to a range of parallel machines. It estimates the cost of sending image data between processes over an interconnection network. The performance model is generic in that it does not give actual definitions for its machine dependent parameters. Benchmarking must provide knowledge of a machine’s specific behavior to obtain an actual model. In this paper an actual version of the model is defined for a local homogeneous cluster of the Distributed ASCI Supercomputer (DAS, see [1]). Execution times predicted by this model are compared with results obtained on the DAS.
Mapping farmland organic matter using HSI image and its effects of land-use types

Spatial distribution of farmland organic is essential for soil fertility adjustment, land-use change and sustainable development of agriculture. It is important to develop a rapid method for mapping farmland organic matter at county scale using remote sensing technology. The HJ-1A HSI image used in the paper has 115 bands, which result in good response to soil organic matter. With the support of in-situ sample data, the correlation between organic matter and characteristic variants of HSI image was analyzed. Then the optimized response wavebands and feature algorithm was selected. Through the application of multiple linear regressions, the model of retrieving farmland organic matter at a county scale was developed. Results indicated that the visible and near infrared bands of HSI image, especially 540-860 nm bands, had good response to farmland organic matter. The model of first order differential logarithm of HSI reflectivity could reach best accuracy, of which the determination coefficients (R) of training and testing samples were both higher than 0.7, while the RMSEs all around 0.2%. The spatial distribution of farmland organic matter was mapped by the model and HSI image. It is concluded that the HJ1A-HSI image has good response and coverage ability for farmland organic matter, which could provide an effective model of mapping organic matter on a county scale. The study also shows that land-use types have certain influence to farmland organic matter.
Introduction of West Nile Virus in the Middle East by Migrating White Storks

West Nile virus (WNV) was isolated in a flock of 1,200 migrating white storks that landed in Eilat, a town in southern Israel, on August 26, 1998. Strong, hot westerly winds had forced the storks to fly under considerable physical stress before reaching the agricultural land surrounding the town. Most of the flock were fledglings, <1 year old, which had hatched in Europe. Thirteen dead or dying storks were collected 2 days after arrival and submitted to the laboratory for examination. Four WNV isolates were obtained from their brains. Out of 11 storks tested six days after arrival, three had WNV-neutralizing antibodies. Comparative analysis of full-length genomic sequences of a stork isolate and a 1999 flamingo isolate from the USA showed 28 nucleotide (nt) (0.25%) and 10 amino acid (0.3%) changes. Sequence analysis of the envelope gene of the stork isolate showed almost complete identity with isolates from Israeli domestic geese in 1998 and 1999 and from a nonmigrating, white-eyed gull in 1999. Since these storks were migrating southwards for the first time and had not flown over Israel, we assume that they had become infected with WNV at some point along their route of migration in Europe.
Genes learn from stress: How infantile trauma programs us for depression

Early-life stress induces persistent memory traces on our genes and programs the life-long risk for depression. Epigenetic marking of the arginine vasopressin (AVP) gene by early-life stress in mice underpins sustained expression and increased hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity, triggering endocrine and behavioral alterations that are frequent features in depression. This epigenetic memory evolves in two steps coordinated by the epigenetic reader and writer MeCP2. While early derepression of AVP is driven by neuronal activity causing Ca2+/calmodulin kinase-dependent phosphorylation and dissociation of MeCP2, subsequent hypomethylation at the AVP enhancer gradually develops to sustain derepression. In a vicious circle MeCP2 occupancy uncouples from the initial stimulus and leads to the hard-coding of early-life experience at the level of DNA methylation. The sequential order of these events demarcates the transition from a preliminary to a persistent, possibly irreversible, epigenetic memory and thus defines a critical time window for the timely therapy of severe trauma.
Seamless handover in industrial WLAN using IEEE 802.11k

In the era of increasing connectivity driven by IoT and CPS concepts, wireless networks are gaining importance in industrial applications. One of their obvious benefits is the support of mobile clients. In complex network infrastructures consisting of many access points, roaming becomes an important aspect because many applications rely on realtime communication and therefore need seamless handover between access points. In IEEE 802.11 WLANs, however, the roaming today is mostly reactive, i.e., a connection is kept as long as the quality of the link provides the possibility to transmit data. If the quality decreases too much the connection is lost, and the client must scan the wireless channels and look for a new access point in order to establish a new connection. The scanning procedure typically takes a long time and thus prohibits seamless roaming. This paper investigates a simple, proactive roaming method using the IEEE 802.11k standard to collect information about the wireless environment prior to roaming. Actual handover is then based on an assessment of the signal strength (RSSI). Experimental results show that the proposed method can reduce the handover time by a factor 30.
Component-oriented architecture for SCADA system

Component-oriented techniques have been increasingly used in software engineering. They have been used to solve distributed computing problems. However, in automation world, these techniques have not been implemented to solve distributed control problems. This paper proposes a component-oriented architecture of Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system for applying into distributed control to inherit strong points of component-oriented techniques. Design pattern and OPC (OLE for Process Control) technology are also used to increase open characteristics of the architecture.
Distributed Cooperative Precoding with Power Control for Cellular Systems with Correlated Antennas at the Receiver

We consider the problem of cooperative precoding working alongside an antenna power allocation algorithm in the downlink of a correlated Multiple Input and Multiple Output (MIMO) interference channel. An analytical model for the multicell, multiuser system with receiver-side correlation is analyzed for a realistic system configuration having two antennas each at the basestation and user terminal. Based on the precoder choices of the different terminals and the per-antenna power levels requested, a criterion is proposed for maximizing the received SINR of a severely interference-limited cell-boundary user, while controlling the loss in performance of high-SINR in-cell users in the system. A distributed protocol for cooperation amongst the base stations is also proposed. System performance gains measured in terms of mean and cell-edge spectral efficiency values are provided using numerical simulations. An improvement of about 28% to the mean spectral efficiency and 115% to the cell-edge spectral efficiency is reported over single-cell beamforming. We also demonstrate that terminals with high receive-side correlation form a specific use case of this algorithm. With two antennas at the receiver and 0.9 correlation factor, an improvement of 37% in the mean spectral efficiency is reported. The proposed technique takes into account practical constraints such as limiting to a modest level the information exchanged from the user equipments to the serving base station and amongst the base stations.
Successful bone marrow transplantation for life threatening xanthogranuloma disseminatum in neurofibromatosis type‐1

Abstract: A 2‐yr and 9‐month‐old female patient with neurofibromatosis type‐1 presented with hepatomegaly, anemia, thrombocytopenia, and croupy cough and diagnosed with xanthogranuloma disseminatum (XD). She failed chemotherapy consisting of steroids, 6‐mercaptopurine and methotrexate. A partial response to HLH‐94 therapy that included etoposide and cyclosporine A was initially observed. However, she continued to have significant organ dysfunction without further improvement at 6 months of therapy. She then received matched unrelated donor bone marrow transplantation (BMT) following carmustine, etoposide, cytarabine and melphelan conditioning with complete resolution of symptoms. BMT is an option in therapy‐resistant, life threatening XD cases.
Idletime scheduling with preemption intervals

This paper presents the idletime scheduler; a generic, kernel-level mechanism for using idle resource capacity in the background without slowing down concurrent foreground use. Many operating systems fail to support transparent background use and concurrent foreground performance can decrease by 50% or more. The idletime scheduler minimizes this interference by partially relaxing the work conservation principle during preemption intervals, during which it serves no background requests even if the resource is idle. The length of preemption intervals is a controlling parameter of the scheduler: short intervals aggressively utilize idle capacity; long intervals reduce the impact of background use on foreground performance. Unlike existing approaches to establish prioritized resource use, idletime scheduling requires only localized modifications to a limited number of system schedulers. In experiments, a FreeBSD implementation for idletime network scheduling maintains over 90% of foreground TCP throughput, while allowing concurrent, high-rate UDP background flows to consume up to 80% of remaining link capacity. A FreeBSD disk scheduler implementation maintains 80% of foreground read performance, while enabling concurrent background operations to reach 70% throughput.
The Emphasis on Cognitive‐Behavioural Therapy within Clinical Psychology Training at Australian and New Zealand Universities: A Survey of Program Directors

Surveys of clinical psychologists' self‐reports of professional practice exist in Australia and New Zealand, but comparatively little data exist on the training available in universities. The present study was designed to gather data on the training and assessment of cognitive–behavioural therapy (CBT). A semi‐structured phone interview was designed for use with clinical psychology training directors, or equivalent, in Australia and New Zealand. Out of a total of 48 universities in the region, 40 clinical directors were successfully contacted: One declined involvement, and 39 agreed to participate, yielding a response rate of 81% (six in New Zealand and 33 in Australia). The data showed that it is common for clinical training programmes in our region to provide clinical trainees with foundational knowledge in CBT (i.e., 29 of the 39 surveyed). However, CBT is mainly incorporated into the auspices of clinical training programmes, there is a wide range of assessment methods to evaluate competence in providing therapy, and relatively few academic units exist that focus exclusively on CBT.
Uncertainties in assessing radiative forcing by mineral dust

The assessment of the climatic effects of an aerosol with a large variability like mineral dust requires some approximations whose validity is investigated in this paper. Calculations of direct radiative forcing by mineral dust (short-wave, long-wave and net) are performed with a single-column radiation model for two standard cases in clear sky condition: a desert case and an oceanic case. Surface forcing result from a large diminution of the short-wave fluxes and of the increase in down-welling long-wave fluxes. Top of the atmosphere (TOA) forcing is negative when short-wave backscattering dominates, for instance above the ocean, and positive when short-wave or long-wave absorption dominates, which occurs above deserts. We study here the sensitivity of these mineral forcings to different treatments of the aerosol complex refractive index and size distribution. We also describe the importance of the dust vertical profile, ground temperature, emissivity and albedo. Among these parameters, the aerosol complex refractive index has been identified as a critical parameter given the paucity and the incertitude associated with it. Furthermore, the imaginary part of the refractive index is inadequate if spectrally averaged. Its natural variability (linked to mineralogical characteristics) lead to variations of up to ± 40% in aerosol forcing calculations. A proper representation of the size distribution when modelling mineral aerosols is required since dust optical properties are very sensitive to the presence of small particles. In addition we demonstrate that LW forcing imply a non-negligible sensitivity to the vertical profiles of temperature and dust, the latter being an important constraint for dust effect calculations. DOI: 10.1034/j.1600-0889.1998. t01-2-00007.x
Genetic ablation of retinal pigment epithelial cells reveals the adaptive response of the epithelium and impact on photoreceptors

The retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) plays a critical role in the maintenance of the outer retina. RPE cell death or dysfunction drives the pathophysiology of many retinal diseases, but the physiological response of the retina to RPE cell loss is poorly understood, mainly because of the absence of suitable experimental models. Here, we generated a transgenic mouse in which an inducible Cre recombinase is expressed exclusively in the RPE under the control of the monocarboxylate transporter 3 gene promoter (RPECreER). This was crossed with a transgenic mouse harboring a diphtheria toxin A (DTA) chain gene rendered transcriptionally silent by a floxed stop sequence. We show that activation of DTA in the double transgenic mouse (RPECreER/DTA) led to 60–80% RPE cell death, with surviving cells maintaining the integrity of the monolayer by increasing their size. Despite the apparent morphological normality of the enlarged RPE cells in the RPECreER/DTA mice, functional analysis revealed significant deficits on electroretinography, and retinal histopathology showed regions of photoreceptor rosetting and degeneration although with retention of a normal vascular network. Our study reveals that whilst the RPE monolayer has a remarkable intrinsic capacity to cope with cellular attrition, specific aspects of RPE multifunctionality essential for photoreceptor survival are compromised. The RPECreER/DTA mouse offers advantages over models that employ chemical or mechanical strategies to kill RPE cells, and should be useful for the development and evaluation of RPE-based therapies, such as stem cell transplantation.
Inertial Sensing-Based Pre-Impact Detection of Falls Involving Near-Fall Scenarios

Although near-falls (or recoverable imbalances) are common episodes for many older adults, they have received a little attention and were not considered in the previous laboratory-based fall assessments. Hence, this paper addresses near-fall scenarios in addition to the typical falls and activities of daily living (ADLs). First, a novel vertical velocity-based pre-impact fall detection method using a wearable inertial sensor is proposed. Second, to investigate the effect of near-fall conditions on the detection performance and feasibility of the vertical velocity as a fall detection parameter, the detection performance of the proposed method (Method 1) is evaluated by comparing it to that of an acceleration-based method (Method 2) for the following two different discrimination cases: falls versus ADLs (i.e., excluding near-falls) and falls versus non-falls (i.e., including near-falls). Our experiment results show that both methods produce similar accuracies for the fall versus ADL detection case; however, Method 1 exhibits a much higher accuracy than Method 2 for the fall versus non-fall detection case. This result demonstrates the superiority of the vertical velocity over the peak acceleration as a fall detection parameter when the near-fall conditions are included in the non-fall category, in addition to its capability of detecting pre-impact falls.
See through ECG technology during cardiopulmonary resuscitation to analyze rhythm and predict defibrillation outcome

Purpose of reviewAutomated external defibrillators require preshock interruptions in cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) to perform rhythm analysis. Artifact filtering technology may provide the opportunity to visualize the underlying ECG trace during CPR. Moreover, a continuous ventricular fibrillation analysis may be performed such to prioritize CPR interventions, that is, chest compression or defibrillation. Recent findingsDifferent ECG filtering techniques and ventricular fibrillation analysis algorithms to predict defibrillation outcome have been developed. Techniques to analyze ECG rhythm during CPR encompass two major solutions: adaptive filters for the suppression of chest compression artifacts and algorithms for a direct analysis of the artifact-contaminated ECG. The above methods achieve overall a high sensitivity of more than 99%, but an unacceptable specificity of less than 93%. Among the different ventricular fibrillation analysis approaches and defibrillation predictors, amplitude spectrum area has appeared as an independent predictor of defibrillation success, with an area under the receiver operating curve of 0.86. SummaryThe feasibility of ventricular fibrillation detection during CPR is a challenging issue that, if solved, would enable CPR to continue during the automated external defibrillator rhythm analysis. Furthermore, it would allow a continuous ventricular fibrillation analysis to optimize the timing of defibrillation and maximize the shock success.
Ground height map generation for a humanoid robot in an unstructured environment

This paper proposes a method to measure an accurate ground height map for a humanoid robot by using a laser scanner in an unstructured environment. To measure accurate dimensions of a surface or an obstacle, a 2D laser scanner is installed on the head of a humanoid robot, called MAHRU-1. By moving the head up and down, 3D depth map around a robot is obtained from the 2D range data. After obtaining the 3D depth map around a robot, a plane segmentation method is applied to the 3D data. At first, all the horizontal and vertical planes in the 3D point map are extracted, and the outliers are removed from the plane. After segmenting the plane from the 3D data, the dimensions and the area of the planes are calculated. The accuracy of the extracted surface is evaluated with experimental results, which show the effectiveness of proposed method to extract the surfaces in the unstructured environment.
Symmetries in the entropy space

This paper investigates when Shannon-type inequalities completely characterize the part of the closure of the entropy region Γ̅<sub>n</sub>* that is symmetric under the action of a specified random variable permutation group. This question is answered exhaustively for every group permuting n = 4 and n = 5 random variables, while multiple examples for arbitrary n ≥ 6 are provided for both tightness and non-tightness of the Shannontype inequalities. For instance, a new result shows that non-Shannon-type inequalities are necessary under the action of the cyclic group C<sub>n</sub>, the dihedral group D<sub>n</sub>, as well as S<sub>1</sub> × C<sub>n-1</sub> and S<sub>1</sub> × D<sub>n-1</sub>, for every n ≥ 6.
Impact of ICT on Education

Information and communication technologies ICT are extremely influencing every discipline under the sun including Education. It is affecting every aspect of education from teaching-learning to assessment and evaluation. It improves the effectiveness of education. It aids literacy movements. It enhances scope of education by facilitating mobile learning and inclusive education. It facilitates research and scholarly communication. Impact of ICT and its potential for the education field is manifold. It positively affects all the stakeholders of the education field. The current papers discuss the same along with the various challenges posed by ICT. The challenges include economical issues, educational and technical factors. Appropriate content, Design and workability of ICT also play a crucial role in adoption of ICT in the education field. The paper delineates in brief the challenges and probable solutions.
Agents or Stewards? Linking Managerial Behavior and Moral Development

The goal of this paper is to connect managerial behavior on the “agent-steward” scale to managerial moral development and motivation. I introduce agent- and steward-like behavior: the former is self-serving while the latter is others-serving. I suggest that managerial moral development and motivation may be two of the factors that may predict the tendency of managers to behave in a self-serving way (like agents) or to serve the interests of the organization (like stewards). Managers at low levels of moral development are more likely to behave like agents, while managers at higher levels of moral development are more likely to behave like stewards. I also argue that managers at the highest level of moral development may serve the interests of people other than the firm’s owners and thereby transfer wealth from the firm’s owners to third parties. Moral motivation is likely to be a factor that moderates the proposed relationships. Finally, I develop propositions that address the role of material incentives in controlling behavior of managers at different levels of moral development.