Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Combined Effects of Block-Based Programming and Physical Computing on Primary Students' Computational Thinking Skills

Basic Digital Education (BDE) is already planned to be integrated with the forthcoming curriculum for Austrian primary schools (6–10 years) as it was already implemented for lower secondary schools (10–14 years) in 2018. BDE includes the most essential and novel developments of Computational Thinking (CT), which are fundamentally responsible for nurturing students' problem-solving skills. Thus, evaluating teaching materials, scaffolding guidelines, and assessments is becoming increasingly important for the successful implementation of CT in Austrian classrooms. This study is a part of a longitudinal multi-cycle educational design research project aiming to explore how to foster CT and to raise the awareness, importance, and confidence of teachers and students in applying CT for everyday uses. Our paper focuses on a sub-study in which teaching units for grade 3 and 4 students (8–10 years) were designed by combining an Open Educational Resource (OER) textbook and Physical Computing with the micro:bit device. The designed learning environment consists of three units and was implemented in two classes over 3 weeks. The two classes were further split into two groups each, to ensure better support during implementation. The class teachers received upfront teacher training and conducted pre- and post-test assessments with the students. The resulting data was then analyzed to gain insights into the effects on CT skills of the young learners. Results showed that combining block-based programming and physical computing devices could become a promising approach to promote computational thinking skills in lower school grades. Furthermore, the observed direction of the designed units supports low-barrier access to increase the desired uses of CT in classrooms.
The Influence of Teacher Discipline on Teaching Effect and Students’ Psychology in Universities and the Normative Suggestions for Discipline Behavior

In today’s educational environment, with the popularization of laws, more and more students pay attention to the maintenance of their own rights. However, due to the misinterpretation of punishment, it is very easy to mistake teacher punishment for “corporal punishment. ” Therefore, it is particularly important to investigate the impact of teacher discipline on students. This paper first collects some knowledge related to the research based on the research results of scholars, and then makes a detailed analysis of this research from two aspects. It, respectively, introduces the influence of teacher discipline on teaching effect and students’ psychology in universities, and the normative suggestions for discipline behavior in this paper. It then uses formulas to explain how the teaching and learning optimization algorithm works. Finally, it analyzes the changes among teachers’ discipline, students’ psychology, and coping style through experiments. The results showed that urban students had the highest probability of being disciplined for being late, at 53%, and the lowest probability of being disciplined for not completing homework, at 34%.
Case Report: Suppurative Labyrinthitis Induced by Chronic Suppurative Otitis Media

A discussion on suppurative labyrinthitis associated with chronic suppurative otitis media (CSOM) may seem to be an outdated issue due to the advent of antibiotics in the last century. In previous literature, limited cases of suppurative labyrinthitis have been reported. This case, therefore, is an excellent and rare opportunity to study its clinical symptoms, diagnoses, and treatments. This report described the case of a 39-year-old female with a history of CSOM for 20 years, and she often presented with otorrhea, vestibular disorder, and hearing impairment. CT of the temporal bone revealed fistulae in both the basal turn of the cochlea and the horizontal semicircular canal. Combined with the otolaryngology examination results, suppurative labyrinthitis was considered. During a three-month follow-up, her symptoms were improved significantly after surgery. In conclusion, suppurative labyrinthitis must not be overlooked and neglected; early diagnosis and treatments are of vital importance.
Genomic Insights Into the Unique Demographic History and Genetic Structure of Five Hmong-Mien-Speaking Miao and Yao Populations in Southwest China

Southern China was the original center of multiple ancestral populations related to modern Hmong-Mien, Tai-Kadai, Austroasiatic, and Austronesian people. More recent genetic surveys have focused on the fine-scale genetic structure and admixture history of southern Chinese populations, but the genetic formation and diversification of Hmong-Mien speakers are far from clear due to the sparse genetic sampling. Here, we reported nearly 700,000 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) data from 130 Guizhou Miao and Yao individuals. We used principal component analysis, ADMIXTURE, f-statistics, qpAdm, phylogenetic tree, fineSTRUCTURE, and ALDER to explore the fine-scale population genetic structure and admixture pattern of Hmong-Mien people. The sharing allele patterns showed that our studied populations had a strong genetic affinity with ancient and modern groups from southern and southeastern East Asia. We identified one unique ancestry component maximized in Yao people, which widely existed in other Hmong-Mien-speaking populations in southern China and Southeast Asia and ancient samples of Guangxi. Guizhou Hmong-Mien speakers harbored the dominant proportions of ancestry related to southern indigenous East Asians and minor proportions of northern ancestry related to Yellow River farmers, suggesting the possibility of genetic admixture between Hmong-Mien people and recent southward Sino-Tibetan-related populations. Furthermore, we found a genetic substructure among geographically different Miao and Yao people in Leishan and Songtao. The Yao and Miao people in Leishan harbored more southern East Asian ancestry, but Miao in Songtao received more northern East Asian genetic influence. We observed high mtDNA but low Y-chromosome diversity in studied Hmong-Mien groups, supporting the role of sex-specific residence in influencing human genetic variation. Our data provide valuable clues for further exploring population dynamics in southern China.
How Coaches Can Improve Their Teams’ Match Performance—The Influence of In-Game Changes of Tactical Formation in Professional Soccer

The tactical formation has been shown to influence the match performance of professional soccer players. This study aimed to examine the effects of in-game changes in tactical formation on match performance and to analyze coach-specific differences. We investigated three consecutive seasons of an elite team in the German Bundesliga which were managed by three different coaches, respectively. For every season, the formation changes that occurred during games were recorded. The match performance was measured on a team level using the variables “goals,” “chances,” and “scoring zone” entries (≙successful attacking sequence) for the own/opposing team. Non-parametric tests were used to compare the 10 min before with the 10 min after the formation change, as well as games with and without formation change. In the 10 min after the formation change, the team achieved more goals/chances/scoring zone entries than in the 10 min before the formation change (mean ES = 0.52). Similarly, the team conceded fewer opposing goals/chances/scoring zone entries in the 10 min after the formation change (mean ES = 0.35). Furthermore, the results indicate that the success of the respective formation change was dependent on the responsible coach. Depending on the season, the extent of the impacts varied (season 1: mean ES = 0.71; season 2: mean ES = 0.26; and season 3: mean ES = 0.22). Over all three seasons, the formation changes had a positive effect on the match performance of the analyzed team, highlighting their importance in professional soccer. Depending on the season, formation changes had varying impacts on the performance, indicating coach-specific differences. Therefore, the quality of the formation changes of the different coaches varied. The provided information can support coaches in understanding the effects of their in-game decisions.
Neighbourhood Influences on Population Health: Time to Unpack the Black Box

EPIUnit—Instituto de Saúde Pública, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal, Laboratório para a Investigação Integrativa e Translacional em Saúde Populacional (ITR), Porto, Portugal, Departamento de Ciências da Saúde Pública e Forenses e Educação Médica, Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal, Public Health and Epidemiology Research Group, School of Medicine, Universidad de Alcalá, Alcalá de Henares, Spain, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia, Department of Epidemiology & Public Health, University College London, London, United Kingdom
Coastal Microbial Communities Disrupted During the 2018 Hurricane Season in Outer Banks, North Carolina

Hurricane frequencies and intensities are expected to increase under warming climate scenarios, increasing potential to disrupt microbial communities from steady-state conditions and alter ecosystem function. This study shows the impact of hurricane season on microbial community dynamics within the barrier island system of Outer Banks, North Carolina. We found that the passage of two sequential energetic hurricanes in 2018 (Florence and Michael) were correlated with shifts in total and active (DNA and RNA) portions of bacterial communities but not in archaeal communities, and within surface waters but not within the sediment. These microbial community shifts were distinct from non-hurricane season conditions, suggesting significant implications for nutrient cycling in nearshore and offshore environments. Hurricane-influenced marine sites in the coastal North Atlantic region had lower microbial community evenness and Shannon diversity, in addition to increased relative abundance of copiotrophic microbes compared to non-hurricane conditions. The abundance of functional genes associated with carbon and nitrogen cycling pathways were also correlated with the storm season, potentially shifting microbial communities at offshore sites from autotroph-dominated to heterotroph-dominated and leading to impacts on local carbon budgets. Understanding the geographic- and system-dependent responses of coastal microbial communities to extreme storm disturbances is critical for predicting impacts to nutrient cycling and ecosystem stability in current and future climate scenarios.
Single Cell Meta-Analysis of Endothelial to Mesenchymal Transition (EndMT) in Glucose Metabolism of the Digestive Diseases

Background: Endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EndMT) is poorly understood in digestive diseases, and the function of metabolism in EndMT is uncertain. Objective: The goal of this study is to elucidate the role of EndMT in digestive diseases and to describe its metabolic state. Method: The GEO database was used to extract single-cell data in order to discover EndMT subpopulations in digestive organs such as premalignant lesions and cancer of the stomach, intestine, and pancreas. Results: By single-cell RNA sequencing in digestive diseases, we generated a single-cell atlas from tissues of patients spanning a cascade of premalignant lesions and cancer. We next established a single-cell network elucidating the cellular and molecular characteristics of endothelial cells (ECs) across many lesions and identified key genes linked with EndMT in premalignant lesions and cancer lesions. The EndMT activation of a wide variety of metabolic signaling pathways was discovered in ECs, and further study of premalignant lesions and cancer tissue indicated that glucose metabolism increased in premalignant lesions and reached a maximum in cancer tissue. Finally, it was shown that INSR and LDHA might be used as prognostic markers for developing premalignant lesions to cancer involving glucose metabolism in digestive diseases. Conclusion: For the first time, we discovered EndMT’s role in digestive diseases and described its metabolism, underscoring its crucial role in glucose metabolism in the disease. We found several targets via gene screening that are beneficial for predicting premalignant lesions that progress to cancer.
Whole-Genome Sequencing Provides Insight Into Antimicrobial Resistance and Molecular Characteristics of Salmonella From Livestock Meat and Diarrhea Patient in Hanzhong, China

Salmonella is a major zoonotic pathogen, which usually contaminates food resulting in salmonellosis in humans. Exploring the characteristics and origins of Salmonella is essential in formulating prevention and control measures for Salmonella infection. We used slide agglutination, antimicrobial susceptibility testing, and whole-genome sequencing to analyze and compare Salmonella’s phenotype, genotyping diversity, and genetic relatedness from livestock meat and diarrhea patients in Hanzhong, China, from 2018 to 2020. Totally 216 Salmonella enterica isolates were screened from frozen whole chicken carcasses (44.3%, 70/158), frozen raw ground pork (36.2%, 59/163), and diarrhea patients (4.4%, 87/1964). Salmonella Typhimurium was the dominant serotype. Notably, compared with other sources, isolates obtained from frozen whole chicken carcasses showed significant resistance to third-generation cephalosporin and fluoroquinolones (p < 0.05). All strains were assigned into 36 sequence types (STs) and two novel STs, and an excellent consistency was observed between ST and serotype. Genomic data revealed that extended-spectrum β-lactamase genes were responsible for third-generation cephalosporin resistance in 52 Salmonella strains, and the most predominant resistance determinant was blaCTX–M. Furthermore, of the 60 ciprofloxacin-resistant isolates, five single-base mutations in quinolone resistance-determining regions were identified in gyrA or parC, and the plasmid-mediated quinolone resistance gene aac(6’)Ib-cr was most often detected. The cgMLST clusters show that five clusters among four serotypes (including S. Typhimurium, S. London, S. Derby, and S. Agona) cover samples from diarrhea patients and livestock meat pathway isolate, indicating a possibility of cross-host transmission. In conclusion, the livestock meat isolates have a higher level of resistance than diarrhea patients’ isolates and could be an essential source of human Salmonella infection.
A Novel and Secure Pseudovirus Reporter System Based Assay for Neutralizing and Enhancing Antibody Assay Against Marburg Virus

Marburg virus (MARV) is one of the principal members of the filovirus family, which can cause fatal hemorrhagic fever in humans. There are currently no prophylactic and therapeutic drugs on the market, and the high pathogenicity and infectivity of MARV make its research highly dependent on biosafety level 4 conditions, severely hindering the development of vaccines and therapies. Therefore, the development of medicines, such as MARV serological diagnosis, vaccines, and therapeutic antibody drugs, urgently needs a safe, convenient, and biosafety level 2 detection method to measure the neutralizing activity of MARV antibodies. To this end, we report a neutralization assay relying on a Rabies virus (RABV) reverse genetic operating system. We constructed infectious clones carrying the eGFP reporter gene and the full length of the original unmodified MARV GP gene. Based on the critical parameters of phylogenetic analysis, recombinant viruses targeting representative strains in the two major MARV lineages were successfully rescued. These pseudoviruses are safe in mice, and their inability to infect cells after being neutralized by antibodies can be visualized under a fluorescence microscope. We tested the system using the neutralizing antibody MR191. MR191 can significantly block the infection of BSR cells with pseudovirus. We compared it with the traditional lentivirus-type pseudovirus system to verify the system’s credibility and obtained the same results as reported in the literature. In general, we have established a safe and visualized method for evaluating the neutralizing activity of MARV antibodies. Compared with traditional methods, it has the advantages of convenient operation, short cycle, and low cost. It is a candidate method that can replace actual viruses for a neutralization assay.
Artificial intelligence and protein engineering : information theoretical approaches to modeling enzymatic catalysis

The importance of dynamics in enzymatic function has been extensively recognized in the literature. Despite this, the vast majority of enzyme engineering approaches are based on the energetic optimization of static molecular structures. Using computational sampling techniques, especially rare-event sampling methods like Transition Path Sampling, we can now generate large datasets of reactive and non-reactive enzyme trajectories. However, due to the high dimensionality of phase space, as well as the highly correlated nature of proteins, using these simulations to understand the drivers of reactivity, or as a starting point for enzyme engineering, is difficult. In this work, we apply information theoretic techniques to both formulate and propose potential solutions to this problem. We also present a novel feature selection algorithm that leverages entropy approximations to find the subset of features X1 . Xd such that H(YIX1.Xd), the entropy of the output variable conditioned on the identified features, is minimized. We validate the advantages of this algorithm through a comparative analysis on synthetic datasets-demonstrating both improved predictive performance, as well as reduced conditional entropy-and finally apply these techniques in the analysis of a large dataset of simulated ketol-acid reductoisomerase trajectories. We find not only that we are are capable of predicting enzyme reactivity with a small number of well-chosen molecular features, but also that the GCMI algorithm constitutes a powerful framework for feature selection, and is well-suited for the analysis of such datasets. Thesis Supervisor: Professor Bruce Tidor Title: Professor of Biological Engineering and Computer Science
Amplification of Cotton Effects of a Single Chromophore through Liposomal Ordering. Stereochemical Assignment of Plakinic Acids (I-J) from Plakortis sp.

Circular dichroism (CD) is a powerful tool for assignment of configuration in natural products,[1] however, its use in acyclic molecules is limited by motional averaging that may reduce or eliminate Cotton effects (CE's). Recently, we reported application of liposomal exciton coupled CD (LECCD) for determination of both relative and absolute configuration of 1, n -acyclic diols ( n >5)[2] which exploited two properties: dual chromophores with very large electronic charge-transition dipole moments and ordering of the long-chain carbon backbones within uniform unilamellar liposomes. This report now describes a sensitive technique – liposomal circular dichroism (LCD) – for assignment of configurations at remote methyl-branched stereocenters in long-chain natural products at sub-µmole levels by exploiting a single chromophore appended to the chain terminus. LCD reveals a general principle: simple Cotton effects arising from perturbation of single chromophores may be amplified by constraining molecules within lipid bilayers. Application of LCD is applied here to an outstanding problem: configurational assignment of the remote stereocenters in methyl-branched in polyketide peroxides (e.g. 1 and 2 ) from marine sponges of the genera Plakortis and Plakinastrella .
A low-cost 4.9 GHz balanced bandpass filter with good common mode isolation

Abstract This paper presents a compact and low-cost balanced bandpass filter (BPF) operating at 4.9 GHz with high selectivity using mixed coupled ‘U’ shaped resonators, parallel coupled feed line, open and centrally loaded short circuited stubs, respectively. The odd–even mode decoupling scheme and the weakly coupled resonator concepts are utilized for the analysis and validation of differential mode (DM) and common mode (CM) equivalent circuits of the proposed BPF. The passband CM response of the balanced BPF is suppressed above 30 dB by employing grounded stubs in the symmetry plane, which converts the CM response to an all stop characteristic. The second harmonics generated by the BPF is also suppressed using open stubs located near the feed lines. The proposed balanced BPF is fabricated on an FR4 substrate (εr = 4.4, h = 1.6 mm, tan δ = 0.02), which provides 10.7% measured 3 dB fractional bandwidth (FBW) and minimum 1.2 dB insertion loss in the passband (4.7–5.2 GHz). A good agreement is found between the simulated and measured results.
A Role for the Mitogen-activated Protein Kinase Kinase Kinase 1 in Epithelial Wound Healing □ D

The mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase (MEK) kinase 1 (MEKK1) mediates activin B signals required for eyelid epithelium morphogenesis during mouse fetal development. The present study investigates the role of MEKK1 in epithelial wound healing, another activin-regulated biological process. In a skin wound model, injury markedly stimu- lates MEKK1 expression and activity, which are in turn required for the expression of genes involved in extracellular matrix (ECM) homeostasis. MEKK1 ablation or down-regulation by interfering RNA signiﬁcantly delays skin wound closure and impairs activation of Jun NH 2 -terminal kinases, induction of plasminogen activator inhibitor (PAI)-1, and restoration of cell–cell junctions of the wounded epidermis. Conversely, expression of wild-type MEKK1 accelerates reepithelialization of full-thickness skin and corneal debridement wounds by mechanisms involving epithelial cell migration, a cell function that is partially abolished by neutralizing antibodies for PAI-1 and metalloproteinase III. Our data suggest that MEKK1 transmits wound signals, leading to the transcriptional activation of genes involved in ECM homeostasis, epithelial cell migration, and wound reepithelialization.
Relationship between noise-induced hearing-loss, persistent tinnitus and GAP-43 expression in the rat cochlear nucleus: Does synaptic plasticity in ventral cochlear nucleus suppress tinnitus?

Aberrant, lesion-induced neuroplastic changes in the auditory pathway are believed to give rise to the phantom sound of tinnitus. Noise-induced cochlear damage can induce extensive fiber growth and synaptogenesis in the cochlear nucleus, but it is currently unclear if these changes are linked to tinnitus. To address this issue, we unilaterally exposed nine rats to narrowband noise centered at 12 kHz at 126 dB SPL for two hours and sacrificed them 10 weeks later for evaluation of synaptic plasticity (GAP-43 expression) in the cochlear nucleus. Noise-exposed rats along with three age-matched controls were screened for tinnitus-like behavior with gap prepulse inhibition of the acoustic startle (GPIAS) before, 1–10 days after and 8–10 weeks after the noise exposure. All nine noise-exposed rats showed similar patterns of severe hair cell loss at high- and mid-frequency regions in the exposed ear. Eight of the 9 showed strong up-regulation of GAP-43 in auditory nerve fibers and pronounced shrinkage of the ventral cochlear nucleus (VCN) on the noise-exposed side, and strong up-regulation of GAP-43 in the medial ventral VCN, but not in the lateral VCN or the dorsal cochlear nucleus. GAP-43 up-regulation in VCN was significantly greater in Noise-No-Tinnitus rats than in Noise-Tinnitus rats. One Noise-No-Tinnitus rat showed no up-regulation of GAP-43 in auditory nerve fibers and only little VCN shrinkage, suggesting that auditory nerve degeneration plays a role in tinnitus generation. Our results suggest that noise-induced tinnitus is suppressed by strong up-regulation of GAP-43 in the medial VCN. GAP-43 up-regulation most likely originates from medial olivocochlear neurons. Their increased excitatory input on inhibitory neurons in VCN may possibly reduce central hyperactivity and tinnitus.