Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Chemical Composition of Kickxia aegyptiaca Essential Oil and Its Potential Antioxidant and Antimicrobial Activities

The exploration of new bioactive compounds from natural resources as alternatives to synthetic chemicals has recently attracted the attention of scientists and researchers. To our knowledge, the essential oil (EO) of Kickxia aegyptiaca has not yet been explored. Thus, the present study was designed to explore the EO chemical profile of K. aegyptiaca for the first time, as well as evaluate its antioxidant and antibacterial activities, particularly the extracts of this plant that have been reported to possess various biological activities. The EO was extracted from the aerial parts via hydrodistillation and then characterized by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The extracted EO was tested for its antioxidant activity via the reduction in the free radicals, 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and 2,2′-azinobis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) (ABTS). In addition, the EO was tested as an antibacterial mediator against eight Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacterial isolates. Forty-three compounds were identified in the EO of K. aegyptiaca, with a predominance of terpenoids (75.46%). Oxygenated compounds were the main class, with oxygenated sesquiterpenes attaining 40.42% of the EO total mass, while the oxygenated monoterpenes comprised 29.82%. The major compounds were cuminic aldehyde (21.99%), caryophyllene oxide (17.34%), hexahydrofarnesyl acetone (11.74%), ar-turmerone (8.51%), aromadendrene oxide (3.74%), and humulene epoxide (2.70%). According to the IC50 data, the K. aegyptiaca EO revealed considerable antioxidant activity, with IC50 values of 30.48 mg L−1 and 35.01 mg L−1 for DPPH and ABTS, respectively. In addition, the EO of K. aegyptiaca showed more substantial antibacterial activity against Gram-positive bacterial isolates compared to Gram-negative. Based on the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC), the EO showed the highest activity against Escherichia coli and Bacillus cereus, with an MIC value of 0.031 mg mL−1. The present study showed, for the first time, that the EO of K. aegyptiaca has more oxygenated compounds with substantial antioxidant and antibacterial activities. This activity could be attributed to the effect of the main compounds, either singular or synergistic. Thus, further studies are recommended to characterize the major compounds, either alone or in combination as antioxidants or antimicrobial agents, and evaluate their biosafety.
The underlying structure of Foreign Language Anxiety in integrated speaking assessment: A mixed methods study

The aim of this mixed methods study is to identify the underlying structure of the construct of Foreign Language Anxiety in integrated listening-to-speak tasks. First, the analysis of the qualitative interviews with six postsecondary ESL learners reveals that anxiety for integrated speaking stems from four different factors: listening, source integration, topic familiarity, and time pressure. These findings informed the next study phase, the development of an initial inventory of 26 items. The questionnaire was checked for content validity and then administered to 190 respondents. Next, based on the quantitative data, Confirmatory Factor Analysis was carried out in order to identify the model that best fits the data. Model comparisons corroborate the qualitative finding that suggests FLA of integrated speaking comprises four correlated latent variables, with all model fit indices falling within an acceptable range. Overall, this study provides evidence for construct validity of FLA in integrated speaking contexts as a multifaceted structure. Findings are discussed in relation to the factors that we identified.
The Drivers of Herbicide Use among Arable Farmers in Canterbury, New Zealand: Toward an Integrated Approach

Abstract Herbicide-resistant weeds are a growing challenge in agricultural systems worldwide, leading to additional management costs and yield losses. Best practice management guidelines have been promoted for decades, yet incidences of resistance continue to increase. In New Zealand, herbicide resistance might be more widespread than commonly assumed. To respond to the emerging challenge, this article draws on qualitative social research with arable farmers and agricultural stakeholders in the Canterbury region to describe drivers underlying herbicide use on three levels: individuals’ psycho-social context, farm system characteristics, and the socioeconomic system. While findings show concerns for maintaining practical and profitable farm operations, we argue that farmers’ herbicide use is influenced by diverse biophysical, technological, and sociocultural factors, with some hindering recommended best practice. These findings demonstrate that integrated systems-based approaches are needed to holistically understand herbicide use as a critical step in collaborative efforts to establish feasible practice guidelines and management strategies.
Wikipedia as Open Educational Practice: Experiential Learning, Critical Information Literacy, and Social Justice

Building on previous research related to information literacy and learning with Wikipedia, this article interprets Wikipedia editing practices as fulfilling the Association of College and Research Libraries’ (ACRL) Framework for Information Literacy in Higher Education to better understand Wikipedia pedagogy as an Open Educational Practice (OEP) that promotes critical information literacy and social justice. Drawing primarily on data from a large-scale study conducted with students and instructors engaged in Wikipedia-based assignments in the fall of 2016, the authors explore how Wikipedia-based pedagogies directly map on to knowledge practices and dispositions related to authority, information value and process, research, and scholarship as conversation, as presented in the ACRL’s Framework. Description and analysis of these “frames,” and the relevant policies and pedagogical practices engaged in Wikipedia-based assignments, ultimately underscore how viewing Wikipedia as enabling OEPs promotes social justice through improving knowledge equity, understanding and combating systemic biases, and supporting first-generation students’ success.
Investigation of sterilization by a microwave-generated low-temperature atmospheric pressure plasma jet

Abstract An investigation of sterilization by a low-temperature microwave-generated atmospheric pressure plasma jet (MAPPJ) is presented. Escherichia coli (E. coli), Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), and yeast Saccharomyces species (Saccharomyces sp.) at 1.0 × 103 and 1.0 × 104 cfu/mL dilutions are investigated and fungi tested experimentally. The MAPPJ is generated by several watt continuous-wave microwaves and Ar gas, and direct treatment of the bacteria by a programmable planar XY motorized translation stage. After several minutes of plasma treatment, the number of bacterial colonies was sufficiently reduced and found to be nearly zero, and bare ozone and nitrogen dioxide were observed. This investigation shows that plasma sterilization would be a novel application for solid-state microwave power sources.
Building Outline Delineation From VHR Remote Sensing Images Using the Convolutional Recurrent Neural Network Embedded With Line Segment Information

Recently, several recurrent neural network (RNN)-based models have been proposed to delineate the outlines of buildings from very high resolution (VHR) remote sensing images. These models first use convolutional neural networks (CNNs) to recognize the boundary fragments by learning probability maps of both edges and corners and then feed them into RNN to find and link a set of sequent corners into external boundaries of buildings. However, caused by the category imbalance of edges and corners, the local ambiguity of edge detection is very serious, which significantly affects the accuracy of predicted outline corners. To tackle this challenge, this article introduces a convolutional RNN embedded with line segment information (LSI-RNN), a novel network that aims to directly detect line segment instead of edges. To achieve this, LSI-RNN utilizes an additional cotraining branch to generate an attraction field map (AFM) by neural discriminative dimensionality reduction (NDDR) layer. Consequently, the conventional classification problem of edges is converted to a regression problem of line segments, thus solving the aforementioned issues. Experimental results over three remote sensing datasets with different spatial resolutions show that the proposed method consistently outperforms other state-of-the-art methods.
Happiness in Mathematics Education: The Experiences of Preservice Elementary Teachers

In this paper we discuss the happiness of preservice elementary teachers (PSTs). Several times throughout a mathematics content capstone course, PSTs responded to prompts in which they described times from their past schooling experiences or during the course in which they experienced happiness or unhappiness in learning mathematics. Through thematic analysis, we examined their common experiences related to happiness and their mathematics learning. We found that PSTs’ happiness is related to expectations of themselves, their teachers, their peers, and mathematics itself. The study illuminates PST beliefs about mathematics teaching, collaborative group work, and the nature of mathematical understanding.
EGF-Coupled Gold Nanoparticles Increase the Expression of CNPase and the Myelin-Associated Proteins MAG, MOG, and MBP in the Septal Nucleus Demyelinated by Cuprizone

Current pharmacological therapies against demyelinating diseases are not quite satisfactory to promote remyelination. Epidermal growth factor (EGF) can expand the population of oligodendrocyte precursor cells (OPCs) that may help with the remyelination process, but its delivery into the injured tissue is still a biomedical challenge. Gold nanoparticles (GNPs) may be a useful tool for drug delivery into the brain. To evaluate remyelination in the septal nucleus, we administered intracerebral GNPs coupled with EGF (EGF–GNPs). C57BL6/J mice were demyelinated with 0.4% cuprizone (CPZ) and divided into several groups: Sham, Ctrl, GNPs, EGF, and EGF–GNPs. We evaluated the remyelination process at two time-points: 2 weeks and 3 weeks post-injection (WPI) of each treatment. We used the rotarod for evaluating motor coordination. Then, we did a Western blot analysis myelin-associated proteins: CNPase, MAG, MOG, and MBP. EGF–GNPs increase the expression of CNPase, MAG, and MOG at 2 WPI. At 3 WPI, we found that the EGF–GNPs treatment improves motor coordination and increases MAG, MOG, and MBP. EGF–GNPs enhance the expression of myelin-associated proteins and improve the motor coordination in mice. Thus, EGF-associated GNPs may be a promising pharmacological vehicle for delivering long-lasting drugs into the brain.
The Effect of Meclofenoxate on the Transcriptome of Aging Brain of Nothobranchius guentheri Annual Killifish

Annual fish of the genus Nothobranchius are promising models for aging research. Nothobranchius reproduces typical aspects of vertebrate aging, including hallmarks of brain aging. Meclofenoxate (MF) is a well-known compound that can enhance cognitive performance. The drug is prescribed for asthenic conditions, trauma, and vascular diseases of the brain. It is believed that MF is able to delay age-dependent changes in the human brain. However, until now, there has been no study of the MF effect on the brain transcriptome. In the present work, we performed an RNA-Seq study of brain tissues from aged Nothobranchius guentheri, which were almost lifetime administered with MF, as well as young and aged control fish. As expected, in response to MF, we revealed significant overexpression of neuron-specific genes including genes involved in synaptic activity and plasticity, neurotransmitter secretion, and neuron projection. The effect was more pronounced in female fish. In this aspect, MF alleviated age-dependent decreased expression of genes involved in neuronal activity. In both treated and untreated animals, we observed strong aging-associated overexpression of immune and inflammatory response genes. MF treatment did not prevent this effect, and moreover, some of these genes tended to be slightly upregulated under MF treatment. Additionally, we noticed upregulation of some genes associated with aging and cellular senescence, including isoforms of putative vascular cell adhesion molecule 1 (VCAM1), protein O-GlcNAcase (OGA), protein kinase C alpha type (KPCA), prolow-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 1 (LRP1). Noteworthy, MF treatment was also associated with the elevated transcription of transposons, which are highly abundant in the N. guentheri genome. In conclusion, MF compensates for the age-dependent downregulation of neuronal activity genes, but its effect on aging brain transcriptome still cannot be considered unambiguously positive.
Influence of side walls and undulated topography on viscous gravity-driven film flow

While a gravity–driven viscous film flow down an inclined flat plane of infinite extent can be described by an easy analytical solution, flow problems in nature, like glacier movements or the liquid film on the human eye are much more complex. Also to optimize a large number of technical applications, like coating applications or heat exchanger devices, one has to investigate and understand how different influencing factors, like topological features on the substrate or a finite width of the system, influence the flow and its stability isolated from each other. By introducing a wavy structure to the underlying topography, which could be for example a model for roughness, new effects emerge in the flow, which cannot be observed in flows over a flat incline. Eddies can separate from the main flow at the lee side of the undulation for kinematic reasons, or induced by inertial effects. In biological systems these eddies are dead water areas, which are cut off from nutrient supply, in heat exchanger applications their appearance has a strong impact on the convective heat transport within the liquid. Furthermore, the amplitude of free surface of the liquid can be amplified immensely when the liquid is in resonance with the undulation of the underlying topography. In this work we study experimentally as well as numerically the complex interaction of this resonance phenomenon with the appearing of eddy structures in the valleys of the undulation and show, that one can suppress flow separation selectively even at rather high Reynolds numbers when one exploits the resonance phenomenon specifically. Another part of this work deals with the question how the presence of side walls and the contact angle of the liquid there influences the free surface shape of the liquid, the velocity field and the globally transported volume flux. While an additional no–slip condition at the wall causes additional friction and leads thus to a lower volume flux, capillary elevation at the side walls can generate a velocity overshoot in the vicinity of the walls, depending on the film thickness and the wetting properties of the liquid, which counteracts the additional friction coming from the walls. An extensive theoretical parameter study, which is supplemented with experimental data, provides criteria for the first onset of the velocity overshoot and gives answer to the question when the counteracting influences on the global volume flux just cancel each other. An experimental study of the free surface shape of a draining flow shows that this configuration cannot be described by a series of quasi–steady states, even when a dynamic contact angle is taken into consideration, although the flow changes only very slowly in time. Additional time dependent numerical simulations of the draining flow reveal an indentation of the free surface in the vicinity of the side wall, which could promote film rupture in technical thin film applications.
Nodulosphaeria aconiti, a new host record on Artemisia sp. in Uzbekistan

This study reports a novel host and a geographical record of Nodulosphaeria aconiti from Artemisia sp. (Compositaceae) from the Jizzakh Region of Uzbekistan. Phylogenetic analyses of concatenated LSU, SSU, ITS, tef1-α, and rpb2 sequence data revealed that our isolate is closely related to the N. aconiti, which was further proven from morphology. The detailed descriptions and illustrations of N. aconiti with an updated phylogenetic tree for Nodulosphaeria are provided herein.
Deep Neural Network-Based Precoder for Fairness Aware Secure NOMA Scheme

This work proposes an artificial noise (AN)-aided secure multiple-input single-output non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) scheme. In the design of the proposed scheme, we consider fairness that all the users have higher secrecy rates as compared to those given by a competing orthogonal multiple access (OMA) scheme. Despite its importance, the fairness aware design has remained rarely touched since it is mathematically intractable. This work shows that this problem can be efficiently solved by utilizing a deep neural network as the precoder for the information and AN signals even without resorting to some assumptions such as a large antenna array and/or a high signal-to-noise ratio. We will also propose an adaptive mode that switches the access protocol from the OMA scheme to the NOMA scheme only when the fairness is met. Performance of the proposed secure NOMA scheme will be extensively evaluated and compared with existing NOMA and OMA schemes. The comparisons clearly show that the sum secrecy rate can be significantly improved while guaranteeing the fairness, which however cannot be achieved with the existing NOMA scheme.
Comparative transcriptomic analysis of the malaria parasites Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax sensitive and resistant strains

Introduction. Malaria is the sixth leading cause of death worldwide. According to a WHO survey (2019-2020), the total number of malaria deaths is estimated to be 409000. Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax are major malaria parasites, particularly in subtropical areas.Materials and methods. In the present study, we used a transcriptome analysis of raw RNA sequence data to identify and characterize the differentially expressed genes in Plasmodium falciparum chloroquine-sensitive and chloroquine-resistant strains, as well as Plasmodium vivax primaquine sensitive and primaquine resistant strains. The raw RNA sequence data were obtained from the NCBI SRA database using the Accession IDs PRJNA308455, SRR14191963, and SRR332573.Results and discussion. The sequence of raw RNA was quantified, mapped, and annotated. The total number of reads mapped to the reference genome for Plasmodium falciparum was found to be 45474448 and for Plasmodium vivax was 38226870. The Cufflinks-Cuffdiff tool was used to identify differentially expressed genes in Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax sensitive and resistant strains. This differentially expressed gene was further annotated and plotted using the "Limma" package of Bioconductor. The PPI network was constructed in String Database and Cytoscape software. Pathway enrichment analysis of list differentially expressed gene performed using KEGG and GO tool.Conclusion. In sensitive and resistant strains, comparative transcriptome analysis revealed differentially regulated gene expression patterns.
2+1 Einstein–Klein–Gordon Black Holes by Gravitational Decoupling

In this work we study the 2+1-Einstein–Klein–Gordon system in the framework of Gravitational Decoupling. We associate the generic matter decoupling sector with a real scalar field so we can obtain a constraint which allows us to close the system of differential equations. The constraint corresponds to a differential equation involving the decoupling functions and the metric of the seed sector and will be independent of the scalar field itself. We show that when the equation admits analytical solutions, the scalar field and the self-interacting potential can be obtained straightforwardly. We found that, in the cases under consideration, it is possible to express the potential as an explicit function of the scalar field only for certain particular cases corresponding to limiting values of the parameters involved.
Bearing Fault Detection in ASD-Powered Induction Machine Using MODWT and Image Edge Detection

Today the industry depends on various types of three-phase induction machines, requiring operating at variable speeds to perform more complex processes. Therefore, it is vital to monitor their operation conditions to maintain the optimal efficiency of the processes they perform and avoid significant economic losses. The proposed work presents the design and development of a method for bearing damage detection based on Maximal Overlap Discrete Wavelet Transform and image processing for edge detection. Accuracies achieved with three types of damage exceed 90%. The signals for the test are acquired from seven different operating conditions for each type of damage. Supply comes from a power grid source and an adjustable speed drive. The Maximal Overlap Discrete Wavelet Transform is applied with different filtering levels to the three phases of the stator current, the magnitude of the filtered signals is acquired, a periodic two-dimensional array is generated and further smoothed by a Gaussian filter allowing the observation of patterns at the edges. Finally, the obtained images are scanned with a 2-D mask aiming to detect and count patterns associated to the fault detection process. Statistical analysis is performed over characteristic signatures obtained from the current magnitude of the three phases at different classes of damage and several mechanical load conditions.
Globally stable attitude control and quasi-static disturbance estimation in the presence of aerodynamic dissipation

In this paper, we design and verify a novel nonlinear attitude controller for small fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in the presence of dissipation. The attitude controller is designed in the quaternion formalism, which provides the physical insight for the control design by relating it to the geometry of rotations. We also show how the controller can be suitably modified to adaptively estimate quasi-static disturbances and compensate for aerodynamic damping by incorporating suitable refinements to the controller. The performance of the controller is then verified using simulations that demonstrate global stability against arbitrarily large initial attitude errors.