Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
On the Predictability of Rainfall Anomalies over the Southern Amazonia: A Comparison between NMME and Statistical Models

Prediction of rainfall over the Amazonian rainforest during wet season is fundamen-tal to assess the regional water and energy balance and global carbon-climate feedbacks. Previous observational analysis has identified some large-scale atmospheric dynamic and thermodynamics conditions that can influence the rainfall anomalies during the wet season. Based on these observed persistent conditions that started between June and August (JJA, dry season), we have developed and evaluated several statistical models to predict rainfall conditions during September to November (SON, early wet season) for the Southern Amazonia (5-15 o S, 50-70 o W). Multivariate Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) Analysis is applied to the following four fields during JJA from the ECMWF Reanalysis (ERA-Interim) spanning from year 1979 to 2015: geopotential height at 200 hPa, surface relative humidity, convective inhibition energy (CIN) index and convective available potential energy (CAPE), to filter out noise and highlight the most coherent spatial and temporal variations. The first 10 EOF modes are retained for inputs to the statistical models, accounting for at least 70% of the total variance in the predictor fields. Then the 12-fold cross-validation method is used to estimate the tuning parameters used in the regression algorithms.
HIV_A_304653 513..526

1ICAP Ethiopia HIV Prevention, Care and Treatment Program, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; 2Jimma University, Department of Epidemiology, Jimma, Ethiopia; 3Australian Centre for Precision Health, Adelaide, SA, Australia; 4Department of Biomedical Sciences, Jimma University, Jimma, Ethiopia Background: Unsuppressed viral load in patients on antiretroviral (ARV) therapy occurs when treatment fails to suppress a patient’s viral load, and is associated with decreased survival and increased HIV transmission. Identifying the level of unsuppressed viral load with its associated factors has benefits in controlling transmission and reducing burden. Therefore, this study aimed to assess unsuppressed viral load (>1,000 copies/mL) and associated factors among HIV patients taking first-line antiretroviral treatment at public health facilities in Jimma, Ethiopia. Methods: A facility-based cross-sectional study was conducted on 669 patients on first-line ARV therapy (at least 6 months) in public health facilities in Jimma. Sociodemographic, treatment, clinical, immunological, and viral load data were extracted from medical records, entered into EpiData 3.1, and analyzed with SPSS 20. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed to identify factors independently associated with viral nonsuppression, considering a 95% CI with P<0.05 statistically significant. Results: Among the participants, 258 (38.6%) were aged 25–34 years. Median age was 35 years. Prevalence of unsuppressed viral load was 20.3%. Risk of unsuppressed viral loads was 91% lower among ARV therapy patients who had been taking ARV therapy <2 years (AOR 0.09, 95% CI 0.01–0.83), lower baseline BMI (AOR 4.44, 95% CI 1.56–12.64), lower baseline CD4 (AOR 2.76, 95% CI 1.45–5.29), poor adherence to ARV therapy medication (AOR 3.19, 95% CI 1.29–7.89), and immunological failure (AOR 4.26, 95% CI 2.56–7.09) were the independent predictors of unsuppressed viral load. Conclusion: This study revealed that there is a high level of virological failure among adult HIV patients, and confirms the need to develop close follow-up strategies of targeted interventions for patients in care who are at high risk of unsuppressed viral load.
Bin2Vec: A Better Wafer Bin Map Coloring Scheme for Comprehensible Visualization and Effective Bad Wafer Classification

A wafer bin map (WBM), which is the result of an electrical die-sorting test, provides information on which bins failed what tests, and plays an important role in finding defective wafer patterns in semiconductor manufacturing. Current wafer inspection based on WBM has two problems: good/bad WBM classification is performed by engineers and the bin code coloring scheme does not reflect the relationship between bin codes. To solve these problems, we propose a neural network-based bin coloring method called Bin2Vec to make similar bin codes are represented by similar colors. We also build a convolutional neural network-based WBM classification model to reduce the variations in the decisions made by engineers with different expertise by learning the company-wide historical WBM classification results. Based on a real dataset with a total of 27,701 WBMs, our WBM classification model significantly outperformed benchmarked machine learning models. In addition, the visualization results of the proposed Bin2Vec method makes it easier to discover meaningful WBM patterns compared with the random RGB coloring scheme. We expect the proposed framework to improve both efficiencies by automating the bad wafer classification process and effectiveness by assigning similar bin codes and their corresponding colors on the WBM.
Distributional Effects of Corruption When Enforcement is Biased: Theory and Evidence from Bribery in Schools in Bangladesh

In many models of corruption where enforcement is unbiased and the official maximizes income, the rich are more likely to pay bribes for their children’s education, implying that corruption reduces educational inequality. We develop models of bribery that reflect the fact that, in developing countries, anti-corruption enforcement is not unbiased, and higher income of a household is associated with higher bargaining power and better quality of institutions. In models of biased enforcement, the rich are less likely to pay bribes, making bribery regressive. The OLS estimates of the effects of household income are likely to find spurious progressivity in the incidence of bribery in schools. We exploit temporary rainfall shocks to provide suggestive evidence on the ability to pay effect, while long-term rainfall differences capture the combined ‘poor people’ and ‘poor area’ effects. We find that the poor are more likely to pay bribes, and the amount paid does not depend on household income. The evidence rejects the ability to pay and related models based on unbiased enforcement, and is consistent with the “refusal to pay model” of bargaining power where the rich decline to pay bribes. “Free schooling” is free only for the rich, and corruption makes the playing field skewed against the poor.
Mixed µ analysis for flexible structures. Part 1, Theory

This paper presents new tools for computing upper and lower bounds of µ without frequency gridding. The proposed techniques for computing lower bounds of the peaks of the µ-curve, are divided into two steps. The first one consists of finding the perturbation with minimum Frobenius norm that leads to the limit of stability. Using this result as an initialization, the second algorithm finds the perturbation with minimum sigma-max norm such that the system remains at the limit of stability. The limit of stability is considered both from a state space and from a transfer matrix point of view, which leads to two classes of techniques. The lower bounds are validated by using an upper-bound analysis technique that considers standard scaling over a range of frequencies instead of at an isolated frequency.
Identi¢cation of genes from the obligate intracellular plant pathogen, Plasmodiophorabrassicae

Plasmodiophora brassicae is an intracellular pathogen that infects plants in the Brassicaceae family. Although an important pathogen group, information on the genomic makeup of the plasmodiophorids is almost completely lacking. We performed suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) between RNA from P. brassicae -infected and uninfected Arabidopsis tissue, then screened 232 clones from the resulting SSH library. In addition, we used an oligo-capping procedure to screen 305 full-length cDNA clones from the infected tissue. A total of 76 new P. brassicae gene sequences were identiﬁed, the majority of which were extended to full length at the 5 0 end by the use of RACE ampliﬁcation. Many of the unisequences were predicted to contain signal peptides for ER translocation. Although we located few sequences in total, these markedly increase available data from the plasmodiophorids, and provide new opportunities to examine plasmodiophorid biology. Our study also points towards the best methods for future plasmodiophorid gene discovery.
Type 5 Adenylyl Cyclase Increases Oxidative Stress by Transcriptional Regulation of MnSOD via the SIRT1/FoxO3a Pathway

: Background —For reasons that remain unclear, whether type 5 AC (AC5), one of two major AC isoforms in heart, is protective or deleterious in response to cardiac stress is controversial. To reconcile this controversy we examined the cardiomyopathy induced by chronic isoproterenol (ISO) in AC5 transgenic (Tg) mice and the signaling mechanisms involved. Methods and Results —Chronic ISO increased oxidative stress and induced more severe cardiomyopathy in AC5 Tg, as left ventricular (LV) ejection fraction fell 1.9 fold more than wild type (WT), along with greater LV dilation and increased fibrosis, apoptosis and hypertrophy. Oxidative stress induced by chronic ISO, detected by 8-OhDG was 15% greater, p=0.007, in AC5 Tg hearts, while protein expression of MnSOD was reduced by 38%, indicating that the susceptibility of AC5 Tg to cardiomyopathy may be due to decreased MnSOD expression. Consistent with this, susceptibility of the AC5 Tg to cardiomyopathy was suppressed by overexpression of MnSOD, whereas protection afforded by the AC5 KO was lost in AC5 KO x MnSOD +/- mice. Elevation of MnSOD was eliminated by both sirtuin and MEK inhibitors, suggesting both the SIRT1/FoxO3a and MEK/ERK pathway are involved in MnSOD regulation by AC5. Conclusions —Overexpression of AC5 exacerbates the cardiomyopathy induced by chronic catecholamine stress by altering regulation of SIRT1/FoxO3a, MEK/ERK and MnSOD, resulting in oxidative stress intolerance, thereby shedding light on new approaches for treatment of heart failure. We then investigated the signaling pathway by which AC5 regulated MnSOD expression. In AC5 KD myocytes, we detected a significant increase in MnSOD mRNA, which suggests that AC5 also regulated MnSOD in a transcriptional manner. As noted earlier, the experiments demonstrating the role of MnSOD in mediating the enhanced cardiomyopathy with chronic ISO stress in AC5 Tg led us to investigate the SIRT1/FoxO3a pathway, in view of its protective role against oxidative stress associated with aging in C. elegans , 13, 14 rats 15 and human quiescent cells. 16 In our study, we demonstrate for the first time the importance of AC5, an up-stream gene of the SIRT1/FoxO3a complex regulating MnSOD in cardiomyopathy. We also found activation of SIRT1 and FoxO3a in AC5 KD myocytes, whereas inhibition was detected in AC5 OE myocytes, suggesting that AC5 inhibits SIRT1 and FoxO3a activity, resulting in an impaired anti-oxidant system and induced cell death, suggesting that overexpression of SIRT1 and/or nicotinamide mononucleotide (NMN) or nicotinamide riboside treatment 37 should be able to counteract the adverse effects of increased AC5 in the setting of chronic catecholamine cardiomyopathy. These conclusions are based in part on the acetylation experiments, which have the limitation of using the immunoprecipitation technique. 38 A future direction will be to utilize a specific antibody for acetyl FoxO3a when it is available, which would permit a more definitive conclusion. ssstrtresesss, pplplayayys rrololole.e. 434
The effects of microbial fermentation on antibacterial activity of seaweed ( Kappaphycus alvarezii ) extracts

In the present study, Kappaphycus alvarezii one of the most abundant red algae in Malaysia was fermented with Aspergillus oryzae at 30 o C for six days with 70% initial moisture content. Total phenolic content and antibacterial activity of fermented seaweed extracts was determined and compared to the non-fermented counterparts. It is found that total phenolic content increased as the fermentation progressed. Green variety fermented for four days exhibited the highest phenolic content (10.022 mg GAE/g). Meanwhile, fermented seaweed extracts tested for antibacterial activity showed that antibacterial activity of fermented seaweed against six different bacteria increased as the fermentation day increased. Green and Yellow variety fermented for six days demonstrated the highest antimicrobial activity (7 mm) against MRSA and Salmonella respectively. pH of fermented seaweed extracts increased with the increase of fermentation day and it might be related with the antimicrobial susceptibility which greater at increasing pH value.
Influence of Couple Patterns on Entropy in Multilayer Networks

—Many real-world systems are networks coupled with other networks, and research on these multilayer networks about their structure properties and functions recently produced significant and remarkable findings. There is one type of multilayer network in which an individual has more than one counterpart on other layer network. For instance, important station on an infrastructure network usually has more than one supporter on its counterpart network for optional access or risk diversification. In this paper, we investigate the influence of couple patterns on information entropy and energy of two layer coupled networks with community structures. Couple patterns refer to the allocation of counterpart numbers according to nodes’ degrees and the establishment of interconnections between nodes on different layer networks according to their degree of assortativity. Nodes’ degrees and counterpart numbers are assorted based on the tendency of large degree nodes with more counterparts or the reverse. Additional, a pair of nodes on different layer networks can be interconnected according to their degree of assortativity. Under the scenario of a heterogeneous distribution of counterpart numbers, we have found that the influences of couple patterns on entropy and energy are negative. That is, entropy and energy of the two layer coupled network decrease when counterpart number assortativity and/or degree assortativity positively increase, while increase when the two assortativity are negatively enhanced. Moreover, networks with weak community structures extend these influences compared to networks with obvious community structures.
Syndecan-4/PKCα pathway mediates Prostaglandin E 2 -induced ERK activation in endothelial cells and angiogenesis in vivo*

Background: Prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) induces tumor growth and angiogenesis. Results: PGE2-induced ERK activation in EC and angiogenesis are driven by syndecan-4-dependent PKCα activation. Conclusion: Syndecan-4/PKCα/ERK pathway is important for PGE2 –induced angiogenesis in vitro and in vivo. Significance: Sdc4/PKCα activation is a novel finding in PGE2 signaling and may represent a pharmacological target.
SURAA: A Novel Method and Tool for Loadbalanced and Coalesced SpMV Computations on GPUs

Sparse matrix-vector (SpMV) multiplication is a vital building block for numerous scientific and engineering applications. This paper proposes SURAA (translates to speed in arabic), a novel method for SpMV computations on graphics processing units (GPUs). The novelty lies in the way we group matrix rows into different segments, and adaptively schedule various segments to different types of kernels. The sparse matrix data structure is created by sorting the rows of the matrix on the basis of the nonzero elements per row ( n p r) and forming segments of equal size (containing approximately an equal number of nonzero elements per row) using the Freedman–Diaconis rule. The segments are assembled into three groups based on the mean n p r of the segments. For each group, we use multiple kernels to execute the group segments on different streams. Hence, the number of threads to execute each segment is adaptively chosen. Dynamic Parallelism available in Nvidia GPUs is utilized to execute the group containing segments with the largest mean n p r, providing improved load balancing and coalesced memory access, and hence more efficient SpMV computations on GPUs. Therefore, SURAA minimizes the adverse effects of the n p r variance by uniformly distributing the load using equal sized segments. We implement the SURAA method as a tool and compare its performance with the de facto best commercial (cuSPARSE) and open source (CUSP, MAGMA) tools using widely used benchmarks comprising 26 high n p r v a r i a n c e matrices from 13 diverse domains. SURAA outperforms the other tools by delivering 13.99x speedup on average. We believe that our approach provides a fundamental shift in addressing SpMV related challenges on GPUs including coalesced memory access, thread divergence, and load balancing, and is set to open new avenues for further improving SpMV performance in the future.
Design and Analysis of Microstrip Patch Array Antenna for 24 GHz Radar Sensors Application

: As a new type of microwave antenna, micro-strip antenna enjoys the various advantages over parabolic antenna: little section plane, light weight and low cost. It can be made into the structure corresponds with carries such as communication vehicles and so on. Yet the typical micro-strip antenna element is difficult to adapt the demands of satellite communication system in the different aspects like bandwidth, dual frequency and double polarization etc. This paper proposed microstrip patch array antenna for 24 GHz radar sensors application. CST microwave studio used for designing and simulation of antenna array. Proposed antenna achieves -29.01dB return loss at 24GHz resonant frequency, Bandwidth optimized 697.95 MHz and Gain is 13.36 dB.
Experimental Investigation on the Advantages of Dry Machining over Wet Machining during Turning of AISI 1020 Steel

: In this study, the experiment was conducted to investigate the advantage of dry machining over wet machining during turning of AISI 1020 steel using cemented carbide tool on a CNC lathe machine. Surface roughness and cutting temperature were measured by VOGEL surface roughness tester and infrared thermometer respectively. The experiments were conducted based on Taguchi L9 orthogonal array design. Surface roughness, cutting temperature, tool life, and machining cost were analyzed graphically. The average surface roughness and cutting temperature achieved with wet machining was 2.01 µ m and 26.54 0 C, which was 17.41% and 44.86% respectively, lower than dry machining. The high cutting temperature in dry turning result in short tool life, which was 41.15% shorter than wet turning. The machining cost of wet turning was about 56% greater than the cost of dry turning. The cost of coolant in wet turning is 42.88% greater than that of the cutting tools. The highest cost was shared by tool cost, which was 81.33% of the total cost for dry turning, while 70.00% of the total cost was shared by coolant cost for wet turning. Results revealed that dry turning is more economical than wet turning.
Intense physical activity is associated with cognitive performance Intense physical activity is associated with cognitive performance in the elderly in the elderly

Numerous studies have reported positive impacts of physical activity on cognitive function. However, the majority of these studies have utilised physical activity questionnaires or surveys, thus results may have been inﬂuenced by reporting biases. Through the objective measurement of routine levels of physical activity via actigraphy, we report a signiﬁcant association between intensity, but not volume, of physical activity and cognitive functioning. A cohort of 217 participants (aged 60–89 years) wore an actigraphy unit for 7 consecutive days and underwent comprehensive neuropsychological assessment. The cohort was stratiﬁed into tertiles based on physical activity intensity. Compared with individuals in the lowest tertile of physical activity intensity, those in the highest tertile scored 9%, 9%, 6% and 21% higher on the digit span, digit symbol, Rey Complex Figure Test (RCFT) copy and Rey Figure Test 30-min recall test, respectively. Statistically, participants in the highest tertile of physical activity intensity performed signiﬁcantly better on the following cognitive tasks: digit symbol, RCFT copy and verbal ﬂuency test (all P o 0.05). The results indicate that intensity rather than quantity of physical activity may be more important in the association between physical activity and cognitive function.
Recent Progress in Self-Cleaning Materials with Different Suitable Applications

Self-cleaning properties have received significant attention for the importance of their potential. Coatings at Nano-scales offer possibilities of using materials for self-cleaning surfaces. Recent efforts have begun to focus on the kinds of materials including metals, semiconductors and polymers. Such materials can have enormous potential in only a few applications. Moreover, the production of these materials requires high costs with low photo activity. In this regard, TiO2 and its derived materials have shown acceptable and effective suggestions for this application. Moreover, the mechanism of self-cleaning has been explained by the effect of hydrophilic and hydrophobic. Hydrophilic and hydrophobic can have many applications in different areas like water purification, microfluidics and photovoltaic. In this review, the application of self-cleaning in solar cells and environment as well as TiO2 derived materials and their applications in water management have been briefly illustrated. In addition, it has been explained that a huge number of self-cleaning materials, applications and improvement in utilities have been essential. In short, we have conducted a comprehensive review of the new approach and to mention numerous materials with hydrophobic and hydrophilic properties would be promising for most environmental concerns. Bio-inspired surface respond in nature through hydrophobic (Cicada Wing, Butterfly Wing, Lotus Leaf, Rice Leaf) and hydrophilic (Fish Scale, Snail Shell, Shark Skin) properties was divided in 4 and 3 respectively. Anti reflective coatings with self-cleaning properties have drowned considerable attention for both their basic appearances and vast applied usages. Antireflective coatings with self-cleaning properties have been considered because of their fascinating features and vast diversity of empirical uses.
The Acceptance of National Electronic Health Records in Saudi Arabia: Healthcare Consumers' Perspectives

This study aims to investigate factors impacting healthcare consumers’ acceptance of National Electronic Health Records (NEHRs) in Saudi Arabia. The study incorporated perceived security concerns and trust factors into the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model. A questionnaire survey was distributed among Saudi citizens to gain their perceptions, and 794 valid responses were collected. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to analyse the collected data. Both the measurement model and structural model proved a good fit to the research data. All research hypotheses were supported at the significance level of p < 0.001 except the impact of social influence, which was significant at the level of p < 0.005. The proposed model explained 56% of the variance in behavioural intention, implying the presence of additional factors that are not yet identified. A better understanding of these influential factors could prompt policymakers to effectively plan for and enhance the acceptance and use of NEHRs.