Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Double-pass Mach–Zehnder fiber interferometer pH sensor

Abstract. A biocompatible fiber-optic pH sensor based on a unique double-pass Mach–Zehnder interferometer is proposed. pH responsive poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate-co-2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate) hydrogel coating on the fiber swells/deswells in response to local pH, leading to refractive index changes that manifest as shifting of interference dips in the optical spectrum. The pH sensor is tested in spiked phosphate buffer saline and demonstrates high sensitivity of 1.71 nm/pH, pH 0.004 limit of detection with good responsiveness, repeatability, and stability. The proposed sensor has been successfully applied in monitoring the media pH in cell culture experiments to investigate the relationship between pH and cancer cell growth.
Toward a Multidimensional Model of the Self

This article presents a multidimensional model of the self that recognizes cultural variety while providing a comparative framework--giving translatability to difference. In this model, cultures of self can be mapped on an array of continua that represent modes of variation in a multidimensional field. These continua enable us to figure the position of one culture relative to others, while allowing for the possibility that dimensions of self do not co-vary among cultures. Continua also make it possible to plot variance in styles of selfhood within a single culture that could occur between contexts, through historical time, or among subgroups of class, caste, gender, or ethnicity. In the process of delineating this model, I interrogate theories, both venerable and contemporary, concerning experience and embodiment, ranking and gender, morality, emotion and cognition, attachment and need, asking how these elements of self articulate with one another and in what sense their cultural divergence is meaningful.
Level of Acrylamide Precursors Asparagine, Fructose, Glucose, and Sucrose in Potatoes Sold at Retail in Italy and in the United States

The free amino acid asparagine and the reducing sugars glucose and fructose has been reported to serve as precursors for the heat-induced formation of potentially toxic acrylamide in a variety of plant-based food. To contribute to our knowledge about the levels of these precursors, we used ion-exchange chromatography to measure free asparagine and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) to measure free glucose, fructose, and sucrose in 9 potato varieties sold at retail in Italy and in 22 varieties sold in the United States. Asparagine levels (in mmol/kg of fresh wt) ranged from 1.17 for the Agata potatoes to 57.65 Russet potatoes, a 49.3-fold variation from lowest to highest value. The corresponding levels for fructose ranged from 1.73 (Fingerling Ozette) to 33.63 (Red), a 19.4-fold variation from the lowest to the highest value. For glucose, the concentration ranged from 1.11 (Jelli) to 34.73 (Yukon Gold B) potatoes, a 31.3-fold variation from lowest to highest value. The corresponding values for sucrose ranged from 1.16 (Fingerling Ozette) to 40.61 (Marabel) potatoes, a 35-fold variation. The American potato varieties Kennebec, White, and Fingerling Ozette and the Italian potato varieties Agria, Merit, and Marabel had very low levels of both asparagine and reducing sugars. The results may enable consumers, restaurants, and processors to select commercial potatoes with low levels of acrylamide precursors for baking or frying.
Türkçe bilgisayar tutum ölçeğinin yapı geçerliliği

Gunumuzde bilgisayarin her alanda yaygin sekilde kullanilmaya haslanmasi ile birlikte ozellikle egitim ve ogretimde program gelistirme acisindan yeni gelismeler haslamis ve bilgisayarin egitim amaci ile kullanilmasi yeni arastirma problemlerinin dogmasina yolacmistir. Turkiye’de de konu ile ilgili bazi calismalara rastlanmistir (Askar, Orcan, 1987, Ca-likoglu, 1989, Tarticioglu, 1990). Egitim ve ogretim faaliyetleri bilissel, duyussal ve psikomol or davranislar acisindan ele alindiginda, bilgisayar kullaniminin ogrencilerde bilissel alan davranislarinin yaninda, duyussal ve psikomotor davranislarinin da gelistirilmesi geregini kacinilmaz kilmaktadir. Ozellikle bilissel alan davranislari ile duyussal alan davranislari arasindaki istatistiksel olarak anlamli korelasyonlar (Bloom, 1976) yukarida sozu edilen hususun onemini bir kez daha ortaya cikarmaktadir.
DDBDD: Delay-Driven BDD Synthesis for FPGAs

In this paper, we target field-programmable gate array (FPGA) performance optimization using a novel binary decision diagram (BDD)-based synthesis paradigm. Most previous works have focused on BDD size reduction during logic synthesis. In this paper, we concentrate on delay reduction and conclude that there is a large optimization margin through BDD synthesis for FPGA performance optimization. Our contributions are threefold: 1) we propose a gain-based clustering and partial collapsing algorithm to prepare the initial design for BDD synthesis for better delay; 2) we use a technique called linear expansion for BDD decomposition, which, in turn, enables a dynamic programming algorithm to efficiently search through the optimization space for the BDD of each node in the clustered circuit; and 3) we consider special decomposition scenarios coupled with linear expansion for further improvement on the quality of results. Experimental results show that we can achieve a 30% performance gain with a 22% area overhead on the average compared to a previous state-of-the-art BDD-based FPGA synthesis tool, namely, BDS-pga. Compared to DAOmap, we can achieve a 33% performance gain with only an 8% area overhead. Compared to the ABC mapper, we can achieve a 20% performance gain with only an 8% area overhead.
A REGULARIZATION FRAMEWORK FORMOBILE SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS

Mobile phone data provides rich dynamic information on human activities in social network analysis. In this paper, we represent data from two different modalities as a graph and functions defined on the vertex set of the graph. We propose a regularization framework for the joint utilization of these two modalities of data, which enables us to model evolution of social network information and efficiently classify relationships among mobile phone users. Simulations based on real world data demonstrate the potential application of our model in dynamic scenarios, and present competitive results to baseline methods for combining multimodal data in the learning and clustering communities.
Políticas e práticas de gestão de pessoas e suas relações com o absenteísmo na área de produção

People are the key resources in organizations seeking greater competitiveness and market value. The objective of this study is to analyze the relations between the policies and practices of personnel management, sense of justice and absenteeism in the production area, in a scenario of constant search for quality of life. The method covered the primary data collection through survey applied to 90 employees in operational and administrative areas of a medium sized company in the city of Sao Paulo and were analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results showed that people management policies applied in the studied organization as jobs and wages, benefits and training had no significant influence on the reduction of absenteeism in the organization. We conclude that the reduction of absenteeism is more influenced by the sense of justice and demonstrates that praise by the upper and enhancement of professional and positive feedback are critical for employees wish to remain in the organization.
Detection of novel genotypes in progeny from a controlled cross between isolates of Uncinula necator belonging to distinct phenetic groups

Sexual recombination and segregation in 18 ascospore progeny of Uncinula necator were analysed by mating type (Mat locus), RFLP and PCR markers. Progeny were analysed from a cross of parental isolates representing the genetically distinct phenetic Groups I (AHd2) and II (BNb2). A total of 27 markers was analysed, consisting of four single loci (Mat locus and three RFLP probes), 16 multi-loci (three multi-copy fingerprinting probes) and seven PCR loci. Novel hybrid genotypes were detected in 28% of the ascospore-derived progeny using the multi-copy RFLP probes, pUnl22-11 and pUnP27, and the PCR primers (CAC)5 and R1, confirming that recombination can occur between isolates representative of the two phenetic groups. This study provides evidence that out-crossing between isolates of U. necator generates novel genotypes and, as such, may have important implications for disease management practices, such as the durability of fungicides and host resistance.
Auditory navigation in hyperspace: design and evaluation of a non-visual hypermedia system for blind users

This paper presents the design and evaluation of a hypermedia system for blind users, making use of a non-visual interface, non-speech sounds, three input devices, and a 37-node hypermedia module. The important components of an effective auditory interface are discussed, together with the design of the auditory interface to hypermedia material. The evaluation is described, which was conducted over several weeks, and used a range of complementary objective and subjective measures to assess usability, performance and user preferences. The findings from evaluations with 9 visually impaired student participants are presented. The results from this research can be applied to the design and evaluation of other non-visual hypermedia systems, such as auditory WWW browsers and digital talking books.
3 Rethinking the Role of Communicative Competence

In the mid-1990s I had many discussions with colleagues concerning the role of ‘communicative competence’ in language teaching and applied linguistics. These discussions resulted in two publications (Celce-Murcia et al. 1995; Celce-Murcia 1995). Then during the late 1990s I co-authored a text on the role of discourse and context in language teaching (CelceMurcia and Olshtain 2000), which further influenced my thinking about the role of communicative competence in language teaching. In this paper I present a revised and updated model of communicative competence which synthesizes and elaborates on my previous work and which further explores the role that this model of communicative competence could play in language teaching. The term ‘communicative competence’ has been in circulation for about forty years and has been used extensively in justifications and explications of communicative language teaching. Thus before I discuss my revised model in some detail, I would like to summarize briefly the evolution of the term ‘communicative competence’ starting with its original source (Hymes 1967, 1972) through the contributions of Canale and Swain (1980), Canale (1983), and Celce-Murcia et al. (1995). There have been other models proposed to represent constructs similar to ‘communicative competence’ (e.g., the ‘language ability’ in Bachman (1990); Bachman and Palmer (1996); however, these models have been developed with language assessment in mind—rather than language teaching. For most discussions of language pedagogy per se, the model proposed by Canale and Swain (l980), along with the elaborations proposed by Canale (l983), remain the key sources for discussions of communicative competence and related applications in applied linguistics and language pedagogy. in Language Teaching
Positionality at the Center

As a Western feminist supporting and researching gender equality in education in postcolonial contexts, I often wonder: Am I doing more harm than good? The privilege of my social location means that my efforts to support education in postcolonial contexts risk being patronizing, insulting, threatening, imperialist, and recolonizing. Yet neglecting and ignoring postcolonial contexts similarly reflects and reproduces a privileged position. I provide a tentative framework designed to address positionality, power, and privilege while creating an ethical research process for working in a postcolonial context. Beginning with an identification of positionality, the objectives of research, and guiding theoretical frameworks to situate the research in relation to the participants and context, I proceed to establish a methodology designed to minimize the negative effects of power and maximize participants’ empowerment. I position myself as a bricoleur, layering feminist standpoint theory and postcolonial theory, and propose the collaborative data collection and analysis techniques, with particular attention to ethical and cultural sensitivity, using a social constructivist approach to grounded theory. This article highlights the need for Western researchers to reflect upon the power dynamics of their research in postcolonial contexts and develop a strategy for conducting empowering research that prevents the misrepresentation and exploitation of participants. Observations from my doctoral thesis data collection provide examples of how these concepts were operationalized in practice as well as reflections on the disconnect between theorizing and conducting ethical research in postcolonial contexts.
Venue Appropriateness Prediction for Contextual Suggestion

This technical report presents the work of Universit`a della Svizzera italiana (USI) at TREC 2016 Contextual Suggestion track. The goal of the Contextual Suggestion track is to develop systems that could make suggestions for venues that a user will potentially like. Our proposed method attempts to model the users’ behavior and opinion by training a SVM classifier for each user. It then enriches the basic model using additional data sources such as venue categories and taste keywords to model users’ interest. For predicting the contextual appropriateness of a venue to a user’s context, we modeled the problem as a binary classification one. Furthermore, we built two datasets using crowdsourcing that are used to train a SVM classifier to predict the contextual appropriateness of venues. Finally, we show how to incorporate the multimodal scores in our model to produce the final ranking. The experimental results illustrate that our proposed method performed very well in terms of all the evaluation metrics used in TREC.
A Novel Black Box Based Behavioral Model of Power Amplifier for WCDMA Applications

In this paper, Black Box approach is presented for behavioral modeling of a non linear power amplifier with memory effects. Large signal parameters of a Motorola LDMOS power amplifier driven by a WCDMA signal were extracted while taking into considerations the power amplifier’s bandwidth. The proposed model was validated based on the simulated data. Some validation results are presented both in the time and frequency domains, using WCDMA signal.
Protein Kinase C, but Not Tyrosine Kinases or Ras, Plays a Critical Role in Angiotensin II-induced Activation of Raf-1 Kinase and Extracellular Signal-regulated Protein Kinases in Cardiac Myocytes*

Angiotensin II (AngII) induces cardiac hypertrophy through activating a variety of protein kinases. In this study, to understand how cardiac hypertrophy develops, we examined AngII-evoked signal transduction pathways leading to the activation of extracellular signal-regulated protein kinases (ERKs), which are reportedly critical for the development of cardiac hypertrophy, in cultured cardiac myocytes isolated from neonatal rats. Inhibition of protein kinase C (PKC) with calphostin C or down-regulation of PKC by pretreatment with a phorbol ester for 24 h abolished AngII-induced activation of Raf-1 and ERKs, and addition of a phorbol ester conversely induced a marked increase in the activities of Raf-1 and ERKs. Pretreatment with two chemically and mechanistically dissimilar tyrosine kinase inhibitors, genistein and tyrphostin, did not attenuate AngII-induced activation of ERKs. In contrast, genistein strongly blocked insulin-induced ERK activation in cardiac myocytes. Although pretreatment with manumycin, a Ras farnesyltransferase inhibitor, or overexpression of a dominant-negative mutant of Ras inhibited insulin-induced ERK activation, neither affected AngII-induced activation of ERKs. Overexpression of a dominant-negative mutant of Raf-1 completely suppressed ERK2 activation by AngII, endothelin-1, and insulin. These results suggest that PKC and Raf-1, but not tyrosine kinases or Ras, are critical for AngII-induced activation of ERKs in cardiac myocytes.
Novel PLL systems which suffer little influence from voltage unbalance and distortion

In this paper, novel methods of making standard sin/cos signals for PWM converters, and novel PLL systems for STATCOM will be proposed. The single-phase utility voltage is transformed to pseudo-three-phase signals, and these three-phase signals are used for the phase detection. Standard sin/cos signals composed by these methods suffer little influence from the voltage unbalance and the distortion of utility voltages. Therefore these methods can be used for the STATCOM to reduce the influence of unbalanced system voltage disturbances such as 2LS.
Estrogen Receptor Hormone Agonists Limit Trauma Hemorrhage Shock-Induced Gut and Lung Injury in Rats

Background Acute lung injury (ALI) and the development of the multiple organ dysfunction syndrome (MODS) is a major cause of death in trauma patients. Earlier studies in trauma hemorrhagic shock (T/HS) have documented that splanchnic ischemia leading to gut inflammation and loss of barrier function is an initial triggering event that leads to gut-induced ARDS and MODS. Since sex hormones have been shown to modulate the response to T/HS and proestrous (PE) females are more resistant to T/HS-induced gut and distant organ injury, the goal of our study was to determine the contribution of estrogen receptor (ER)α and ERβ in modulating the protective response of female rats to T/HS-induced gut and lung injury. Methods/Principal Findings The incidence of gut and lung injury was assessed in PE and ovariectomized (OVX) female rats subjected to T/HS or trauma sham shock (T/SS) as well as OVX rats that were administered estradiol (E2) or agonists for ERα or ERβ immediately prior to resuscitation. Marked gut and lung injury was observed in OVX rats subjected to T/HS as compared to PE rats or E2-treated OVX rats subjected to T/HS. Both ERα and ERβ agonists were equally effective in limiting T/HS-induced morphologic villous injury and bacterial translocation, whereas the ERβ agonist was more effective than the ERα agonist in limiting T/HS-induced lung injury as determined by histology, Evan's blue lung permeability, bronchoalevolar fluid/plasma protein ratio and myeloperoxidase levels. Similarly, treatment with either E2 or the ERβ agonist attenuated the induction of the intestinal iNOS response in OVX rats subjected to T/HS whereas the ERα agonist was only partially protective. Conclusions/Significance Our study demonstrates that estrogen attenuates T/HS-induced gut and lung injury and that its protective effects are mediated by the activation of ERα, ERβ or both receptors.
Cloning and Sequencing of Two Ceriporiopsis subvermispora Bicupin Oxalate Oxidase Allelic Isoforms: Implications for the Reaction Specificity of Oxalate Oxidases and Decarboxylases

ABSTRACT Oxalate oxidase is thought to be involved in the production of hydrogen peroxide for lignin degradation by the dikaryotic white rot fungus Ceriporiopsis subvermispora. This enzyme was purified, and after digestion with trypsin, peptide fragments of the enzyme were sequenced using quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry. Starting with degenerate primers based on the peptide sequences, two genes encoding isoforms of the enzyme were cloned, sequenced, and shown to be allelic. Both genes contained 14 introns. The sequences of the isoforms revealed that they were both bicupins that unexpectedly shared the greatest similarity to microbial bicupin oxalate decarboxylases rather than monocupin plant oxalate oxidases (also known as germins). We have shown that both fungal isoforms, one of which was heterologously expressed in Escherichia coli, are indeed oxalate oxidases that possess ≤0.2% oxalate decarboxylase activity and that the organism is capable of rapidly degrading exogenously supplied oxalate. They are therefore the first bicupin oxalate oxidases to have been described. Heterologous expression of active enzyme was dependent on the addition of manganese salts to the growth medium. Molecular modeling provides new and independent evidence for the identity of the catalytic site and the key amino acid involved in defining the reaction specificities of oxalate oxidases and oxalate decarboxylases.
Framework for secure audio streaming to wireless access network

Advances in the Internet and multimedia technologies have spurred many research efforts in Internet-based multimedia access systems, which integrate wireline and wireless networks. Internet-based multimedia streaming services are in need of a service creation model. In this paper, we presented such a model and framework for delivering real-time traffics to a wireless access network over public Internet protocol (IP) backbone network. We have presented an experimental study of audio streaming when IP tunneling network using generic route encapsulation (GRE) along with Internet protocol security (IPSec) is implemented. The impact on performance, with particular attention to quality of service (QoS) has been evaluated through a series of experiments. A compression scheme based on compressed real-time transport protocol (CRTP) used for delivering real-time traffic securely in wireless access network and preliminary performance results have been presented.
Cultural Capital Does Not Travel Well: Immigrants, Natives and Achievement in Israeli Schools

This study examines the effects of cultural capital on the achievement of Israeli natives and of immigrants from the Former Soviet Union. We hypothesize that teachers are insensitive to cultural distinctions among immigrants. Therefore, they do not reward culturally endowed immigrants to the same extent as native students with similar levels of cultural capital. To test this hypothesis, we use data provided by 4th, 9th, and 11th graders as well as their mothers and estimate linear models to compare the effects of cultural capital on test scores, measuring knowledge, and on grades, indicating teachers' evaluation of students' performance. The results largely support our hypothesis. The effects of cultural capital on test scores do not vary between immigrant and native students. In contrast, these two groups differ markedly in the effects of cultural capital on teachers' evaluations: grades assigned to native students are positively related to cultural capital, whereas this relationship is much weaker or nil among immigrants.
Construction and Analysis of HybridEscherichia coli-Bacillus subtilis dnaK Genes

ABSTRACT The highly conserved DnaK chaperones consist of an N-terminal ATPase domain, a central substrate-binding domain, and a C-terminal domain whose function is not known. Since Bacillus subtilis dnaK was not able to complement an Escherichia coli dnaK null mutant, we performed domain element swap experiments to identify the regions responsible for this finding. It turned out that the B. subtilis DnaK protein needed approximately normal amounts of the cochaperone DnaJ to be functional in E. coli. The ATPase domain and the substrate-binding domain form a species-specific functional unit, while the C-terminal domains, although less conserved, are exchangeable. Deletion of the C-terminal domain in E. coli DnaK affected neither complementation of growth at high temperatures nor propagation of phage λ but abolished degradation of ς32.