Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Protein Purification: Theoretical and Methodological Considerations

With the rapid advances in recombinant DNA technologies, it became possible to express large amounts of virtually any protein in different host cells, including bacteria, yeast, insect, and mammalian cells. Efficient purification methods are becoming more and more important as the need for protein drugs continues to expand. In this article we cover some basic procedures for the purification of soluble recombinant proteins expressed in Escherichia coli and methods to obtain soluble and active protein from insoluble and inactive inclusion bodies. Finally, methods for the purification of native intrinsic membrane proteins from human lymphoblastoid cell lines, using immobilized monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), are presented. As a first step, the protein of interest has to be released into an aqueous extract. Following extraction, residual debris and intact cells are removed by centrifugation. Nucleic acids are either hydrolyzed or precipitated to reduce the viscosity of the extract. A crude enrichment for the protein of interest is made based on its differential solubility in ammonium sulfate. This is then followed by high-resolution chromatographic methods. The type of chromatographic matrices and the order of their use are evaluated in pilot experiments for column selection. By combining the specificity and discriminatory powers of various chromatographic techniques, it is possible to isolate rapidly a single protein species from a heterogeneous mixture. For the purification of native intrinsic membrane proteins, the use of immunoaffinity methods is emphasized, since specific mAbs may be obtained even against low-copy-number membrane proteins by reducing a multispecific antibody response to a series of monospecific responses by cloning. The use of immobilized, highly specific mAbs is demonstrated in the purification of human leukocyte antigen D-related (HLA-DR) antigens. Rapid advances in complete genome sequences provide us with a continuously expanding number of new potential therapeutic targets. These proteins will have to be purified and characterized. The existence of a functional protein blueprint will be invaluable not only for the diagnosis but possibly also for the treatment of many diseases.
The Influence of Personality Traits on Communication Competence

This pilot study was conducted to identify the relationship between personality traits and communication competence among final year undergraduate students at two public universities in the Klang Valley which were Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). The purpose was to investigate the effects of personality traits on communication competence and to acquire a deeper understanding on one of the main factors of unemployment issue in Malaysia which is communication deficiency among graduates. It was found that four dimensions of personality traits which were extraversion, neuroticism, agreeableness and openness to experience had significant relationships with communication competence. However, conscientiousness trait was not found to be related to students’ communication competence. Extraversion, agreeableness and openness to experience had significant and positive relationships with communication competence while neuroticism was negatively related with communication competence. It was also found that UKM students’ communication competence were significantly influenced by agreeableness trait while for UiTM students, extraversion had the strongest influence towards the communication competence. It is recommended that undergraduate students should be coached to freely express their views freely which may include their discontentment in Malaysia’s classroom settings. This exercise will prosper a healthy two-way communication between a teacher and a student and can further spark verbal exchanges especially among introverted students. Students with low level of openness to experience trait need to have the courage to imagine and explore new things where instructors can assist them in shaping this trait to build up their confidence level as well as to be spontaneous in sharing their experiences in classroom.
Isolation and Characterization of Eight Polymorphic Microsatellite Loci From Zoysia matrella (L.) Merr.

Zoysiagrass is a warm-season perennial turfgrass that provides great utility to golf courses, sports fields, and residential sites. Zoysia species exhibit wide ranges of leaf texture, growth habit, plant height, color, and abiotic and biotic stress tolerance. We report the isolation of 69 microsatellite markers from a GT-enriched genomic library from Zoysia matrella cultivar ‘Diamond’. Eight of 69 novel microsatellite loci were characterized on 20 Z. matrella genotypes and were found to be transferable to four Z. japonica genotypes used in the present study. Allele number per locus ranged from 10 to 19 with a mean of 14. Expected heterozygosity (HE) ranged from 0.70 – 0.92 and observed heterozygosity (HO) ranged from 0.33 – 0.82, indicating that a moderately high genetic diversity (53.7%) exists in these tested zoysiagrass genotypes. The average alleles per individual ranged from 1.58 to 3.08, where six of the eight loci amplified up to four alleles. The higher average allele number per individual is indicative of the allotetraploid genome of zoysiagrasses and its ability to out-cross within and between the species.
Attainment of Program Outcomes under Psychomotor Domain for Civil Engineering Undergraduate Students

Psychomotor domain involves physical movement, coordination and applied motor-skill areas, where substantial practices are needed in order to develop these skills overtime. Assessment of psychomotor domain can be carried out in aspects of speed, precision, distance, procedures. The attainment for program outcomes under psychomotor domain can be measured by using direct and explicit assessment. Majority of the lecturers lack the necessary practical experience to relate with fundamentals in order to practice and to give examples resulted in the students not being able to relate theory with practice and apply their knowledge to solve practical problems. This paper identifies the important attributes of students in attaining psychomotor skills in laboratory courses using a program outcome (PO) related to investigation aspects. Majority of the respondents indicated that they have acquired the necessary skills under psychomotor domain related to problem identification, procedure determination, apparatus usage, data collection, results interpretation and proposition of viable solutions. Direct attainment shows that the students passed the PO designed for the laboratory courses. Using relative important index (RII), important factors influencing students’ attainment on psychomotor skills are the condition of equipment in the laboratories, lecturers’ clear instructions before the student conduct experiment and the conducive environment to conduct experiment. A conducive environment with adequate equipment and supported by lecturers to carry out effective investigation give opportunity to the students to acquire and improve their psychomotor skills. This study is important to understand psychomotor elements attained by the students and how assessment is carried out effectively.
Brief Research Report Helicobacter pylori Eradication and Remission of Low-grade Gastric Mucosa-associated Lymphoid Tissue Lymphoma A Long-term Follow-up Study

Helicobacter pylori infection plays a crucial role not only in the pathogenesis but also in the treatment of low-grade gastric mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphoma. The aim of the present study was to evaluate whether H. pylori eradication provides a definite cure in the early stage of this neoplasia by means of a prolonged follow-up. All patients affected by low-grade gastric MALT lymphoma in stage IE that were referred to our department from January 1995 to June 1999 were enrolled in a prospective study. Diagnosis was histologically proved and H. pylori status was evaluated. Staging was performed according to a modified Ann Arbor classification. All patients who proved positive for H. pylori infection were treated with eradicating therapy, and a prolonged clinical and histologic follow-up was carried out. Until June 1999, seven low-grade gastric MALT lymphomas in stage IE were diagnosed (four men and three women; mean age, 56 years). All patients were H. pylori-positive and eradication was obtained in all of them after the first cycle of antibiotic therapy. Complete histologic regression of lymphoma was observed in all cases in a period variable between 3 and 6 months. The mean follow-up period was 42 months (range, 20–54). Only one patient showed a recurrence of lymphoma 22 months after treatment associated with H. pylori reinfection. Our results show the high efficacy of H. pylori eradication in determining a prolonged remission of low-grade gastric MALT lymphomas in stage IE. Thus, this therapeutic approach may avoid or delay the indication for more aggressive therapies, such as surgical resection.
Functional phenotypic plasticity of the endolithic mytilid Leiosolenus curtus (Lischke, 1874) (Bivalvia: Mytilidae)

In Sagami Bay, Japan, Leiosolenus curtus (Lischke, 1874) bores into dead shells of rock barnacles (Tetraclita japonica) in Manazuru, calcareous sand-rock in Oiso, weathered tuff in Miura and agglomerates formed by the tubes of clam worms (Spirobranchus kraussii) in Kanaya. In order to understand the relationships between morphology and environment, the shell morphologies and genetic characteristics of L. curtus, together with the calcium content of the different bored substrata, were analysed. Individuals from Kanaya and Manazuru were characterised by a chalk-like encrustation and a more rounded and inflated shell shape, while those from Oiso and Miura had a striated encrustation. The molecular phylogenetic tree and haplotype network showed that the genetic sequences of the individuals from all investigated localities were very similar, and implied that they belong to the same species. The striated encrustation of the individuals from Oiso and Miura presumably enables them to scrape those residues not dissolved by the mucus secreted by the mantle gland, and thereby to bore into non-calcareous substrata. The more rounded and inflated shell shape of the individuals from Manazuru is thought to be advantageous for boring into thin substrata.
Activation and Role of Memory CD8 T Cells in Heterologous Antiviral Immunity and Immunopathology in the Lung: A Dissertation

Each individual experiences many sequential infections throughout the lifetime. An increasing body of work indicates that prior exposure to unrelated pathogens can greatly alter the disease course during a later infection. This can be a consequence of a phenomenon known as heterologous immunity. Most viruses invade the host through the mucosa of a variety of organs and tissues. Using the intranasal mucosal route of infection, the thesis focused on studying modulation of lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV)-specific memory C08 T cells upon respiratory vaccinia virus (W) infection and the role of these memory C08 T cells in heterologous immunity against Wand altered immunopathology in the lung. The W infection had a profound impact on memory T cells specific for LCMV. The impact included the up-regulation of C069 expression on LCMV-specific C08 memory T cells and the activation of their in vivo IFN-y production and cytotoxic function. Some of these antigen-specific memory T cells selectively expanded in number resulting in modulation of the original LCMV-specific T cell repertoire. In addition, there was a selective organ-dependent redistribution of these LCMV-specific memory T cell populations in secondary lymphoid tissue (the mediastinal lymph node and spleen) and the non-lymphoid peripheral (the lung) organs. The presence of these LCMV-specific mempry T cells correlated with IFN-y-dependent enhanced W clearance , decreased mortality and marked changes in lung immunopathology. Thus, the participation of preexisting memory T cells specific for unrelated agents can alter the dynamics of mucosal immunity. This is associated with an altered disease course in response to a pathogen.
The Moderating Effect of Network Involvement on Satisfaction: The Case of Online Game

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the formation process of online gamers' satisfaction and the moderating effect of network involvement in this process. For the purpose we collected data from 267 online gamers via a web-based questionnaire survey in China. With the help of researches up to the present, we proposed a research model which consist of four latent variables such as E-service quality, product factor, perceived value and customer satisfaction. Through structural equation model analysis, we found that: first, E-service quality and product factor have positive effect on the customer perceived value, and E-service quality has a greater impact on customer satisfaction; second, E-service quality has a significant effect on perceived value, and it is notable that the effect is bigger for the high-involvement group than low-involvement group; third, perceived value not only direct affect customer satisfaction, but also plays an important intermediary role in the formation of customer satisfaction.
Plant performance: a physiological and genetic analysis using Arabidopsis thaliana natural variation

Plant performance implies complex traits, controlled by a large set of genes and affected by the environment. In this thesis we have tried to take the first steps in unravelling the genes controlling plant performance using naturally occurring accessions (ecotypes) of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana and QTL (quantitative trait locus) analysis. Traits associated with plant performance (mainly the gain, the allocation, and the storage of carbon) have been studied to investigate if there is a relationship between various growth parameters, and between growth and flowering-related traits. We found limited variation for photosynthetic performance (measured as chlorophyll fluorescence) with the exception of the Ely accession. The difference in the growth parameters and the photosynthetic traits observed between Ely and the standard accession Landsberg erecta was probably due to the fact that the D1 protein of Ely encoded by the psbA gene, was mutated, leading to atrazine-resistance. Based on the natural variation that we found within Arabidopsis accessions for different traits that relate to plant growth, carbohydrate content and flowering time , four new recombinant inbred line (RIL) populations (L er x An-1, L er x Kas-2, L er x Kond and L er x Sha) of Arabidopsis were developed and genotyped . QTL analysis for flowering time revealed 12 to 16 different QTLs segregating for flowering time in these four populations. QTL analysis, using the RILs derived from the cross between L er and Sha, revealed five genomic regions where QTLs for g rowth traits (plant areas, dry weight and RGR) are located. QTL analysis, using the RILs derived from the cross between L er and Kond that were grown on hydroponics, also revealed QTLs for the different aspects of plant growth-related traits, sugars and starch contents and flowering-related traits. From the significant correlations and the co-locations of the QTLs for these aspects, we conclude that there is a complex relationship between plant growth-related traits, carbohydrate content and flowering-related traits. This study shows that Arabidopsis natural variation can successfully be used to study the genetic basis of these complex traits.
Alignment Based Siamese Network Model For Face Verification

: Face verification, which is the subset of face recognition task, is one of the popular topics in machine vision. The task of face verification is to accept or reject the two image who claims to be same person. Face recognition, in general, has several problems. One of them is pose variations. With the alignment process, the pose variation problem is expected to be resolved. Convolutional Neural Network (CNN), on the other hand, is good for recognizing pattern and as a feature extractor in images. So, we build a siamese network based on CNN for verification task. The result of this study is the alignment process can increase the accuracy of the system. Accuracy of the system is 51.7% with no alignment and 68.9% when using alignment.
The Disentangled Sub-Processes Involved in Implied Motion Contributing to Food Freshness: The Neural Evidence from ERPs

Implied motion can enhance the consumer’s judgment of food freshness. However, this enhancing effect has only been investigated for a few products. Furthermore, researchers have not conclusively determined whether the effects of the low-level visual sensory processing and high-level conceptual processing on food evaluation differ. In Experiment 1, using different fruits in static water (fruit_IS), fruit with implied moving water (fruit_IM), or only fruits as stimuli, we initially generalized the effect of implied motion on the broader category of fruit, and implied motion improved the perceived freshness of the fruit. In Experiment 2, we recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) and measured the temporal processes involved in the mechanism by which implied motion improved perceived fruit freshness. The behavioral results further supported the findings from Experiment 1. The ERP data revealed a pronounced positive difference between fruit_IM and fruit-only conditions recorded from posterior electrodes at approximately 200-300 ms (P2). This difference reflected the low-level visual implied motion sensory processing involved in the effect of implied motion on improving food freshness. Additionally, an early frontocentral negativity difference of approximately 300-500 ms between fruit_IM and fruit-only conditions was recorded, which reflected the high-level visual conceptual processing involved in the effect of implied motion on improving food freshness. These results strengthen and extend previous behavioral findings indicating that implied motion enhances the consumer’s judgment of food freshness across various food categories, and improves our understanding of the cognitive processes involved in the mechanism by which implied motion influences food judgments.
Investigation Of Optical Characteristics Of Semiconductor Quantum Dots For Multi Junction

Optical characteristics of semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) for multi junction solar cell application have been investigated using effective mass approximation EMA model. Our theoretical calculations show that EMA provides a clear description of experimental results. Thus the observed spectra for the considered QDs indicated a blue shift in the absorbance. Comparing the change in the absorbance of QDs to the solar spectrum, it was found that CdSe and CdS of group II-VI QDs show absorbance in the range of UV to Infrared (IR) while ZnS exhibits wide optical transmittance ranging from vis to deep IR. In the group III-V, when InSb is varied from 1.58nm to 4.78nm wavelengths from 400nm to 2500nm was observed which covered the whole vis to IR. However varying InAs from 2.02nm to 9.53nm wavelengths ranging from 300nm to 2500nm was observed covering significant portion of UV and near IR. It is found also that in the group III-V when GaAs is varied from 1.5nm to 800nm, wavelengths covering the whole UV to visible spectra were observed with a significant portion of IR. The PbS, PbSe and PbTe of group IV-VI exhibited exceptional optical absorbance that could be tuned in broad range of UV to deep IR which makes them excellent materials for photovoltaic application and IR detectors. Thus stacking QDs of appropriate sizes onto one another in orderly manner, multi junction solar cell which enables absorption and utilization of solar energies over a wide range was modeled. Theoretically, the efficiency in these cells could potentially reach above 60%. Among QDs considered it is found that PbSe and PbTe have the smallest sizes for QD solar cell spectrum.
SEED DISPERSAL AND CROP DOMESTICATION: SHATTERING, GERMINATION AND SEASONALITY IN EVOLUTION UNDER CULTIVATION

The transition between wild plant forms and domesticated species can be considered an evolutionary adaptation by plants in response to a human driven ecology. Evidence from archaeobotany and genetics is providing deeper insight into this evolutionary process in terms of its scale, mechanism and parallelism between species. The evidence indicates that the timescale of this evolution was considerably longer than previously supposed, raising questions about the mode of human mediated selection pressure and increasing the importance of the role of pre-domestication cultivation. Different selection pressures were chronologically separated into at least three stages, each important at different points of the evolutionary process affecting different traits. Early selection pressures were ultimately driven by the pre-domestication sowing activities affecting the polygenically controlled germination and seed size traits. Later, in the second stage, release of natural selection pressures of dispersal requirements led to modification of architecture such as awns loss of awns and increase in dispersal unit size. The loss of dispersal requirement combined with positive pressure through harvesting practice led to the typically monogenically controlled non-shattering phenotypes. At the tertiary stage new selection pressures were imposed with changing climate caused by movement of the crops into different latitudes, resulting in typically monogenically controlled aseasonal phenotypes. The genetic evidence shows in most cases that genetically similar mechanisms have been affected in different plant species implying an evolutionary convergence in response to adaptation to human ecology. These adaptations can be considered various types of heterochrony; a mechanism of major importance generally in plant evolution.
Helminth Infection in Freshwater Fishes of Bangladesh (魚病に関する国際セミナ

Edible freshwater fishes common in central, northern and southern parts of Bangladesh were examined to record their helminth infection. A total of 78 taxa of helminths-1 monogenean, 28 digeneans, 8 caryophyllid cestodes, 24 nematodes and 17 acanthocephalans were recovered from 7 different organs of 37 species of freshwater fishes. Two species of trematodes (Ophiocorchis dasus GUPTA and Coitocaecum sp.), eight species of caryophyllids (Lytocestus indicus (MOGHE) WOODLAND, Lytocestus birmanicus LYNSDALE, Lytocestus parvulus FURTADO, Bovienia serialis (BOVIEN) FUHRMANN, Djombangia penetrans BOVIEN, Lucknowia sp. , Capigentoides batrachii GUPTA and Pseudocaryophyllaeus indica GUPTA) and twelve species of acanthocephalans (Neoechineorhynchus topseyi PODDER, Neoechinorhynchus sp., Acanthosentis dattai PODDER, Acanthosentis indicus TRIPATHI, Acanthosentis tilapiae BAYLIS, Pallisentis allahabadii AGRAWAL, Pallisentis sp. 2, Pallisentis sp. 1 Devendrosentis garuai SAHAY et al., Hypoechinorhynchus sp., Heterosentis plotosi YAMAGUTI and Mehrarhynchus secundum TRIPATHI) are reported for the first time from Bangladesh.Parasitic helminth incidence, infection intensity and distribution of the caryophyllid cestodes and acanthocephalans are also reported.